HI EVERYONE. SO THERE AREN'T MANY MARTHA/JACK FICS AND I THOUGHT I'D CONTRIBUTE.
DISCLAIMER: IF YOU RECOGNIZE A CHARACTER, PLACE, OR THING MENTIONED IN THIS FIC, THEN I DON'T OWN IT. FOR THE CHARACTERS YOU DON'T RECOGNIZE, WELL, THEY'RE MINE.
Martha walked along the Roald Dahl Plass smiling as she saw kids running along, laughing. It was a sunny day in Cardiff and Martha was soaking it up, she sat on a bench enjoying the sites of a surprisingly lively Cardiff when she felt someone sit next to her
"Doctor Martha Jones, how are you doing ma'am?" Captain Jack Harkness said as he sat down, her smile grew larger as he threw an arm around her shoulders
"Just fine, and you Captain?" she said leaning in to him
"More than fine now that I have such a beautiful woman in my arms" Martha giggled as Jack leans in to kiss her softly on the lips. They'd been doing this since she left the doctor, Jack had decided Martha needed taking care of after that year she spent walking the earth under the master's reign and he also decided he'd be the one doing it. He'd make random visits to London just talking to her and being a friend and she'd return the favor visiting him in Cardiff and listening to whatever he'd share with her whether it be ranting about his team or a part of the load he carries on his back from that long life of his. Somewhere along the line the two's relationship escalated from friends to sex and with them it was never gonna be just sex, it couldn't be, Martha wouldn't say she was in love, not after the last time she jumped headlong into it with a time traveler, she got her heart broken but it was definitely on the makings of it.
"So what do you want to do today?" Martha asked
"Actually, I can't stay today." Martha made a whine of protest
"Why not?"
"Bank robbery, people are being held hostage by a blowfish, remember them?"
"Yeah, yeah, yeah. Go do your job." She said pouting cutely. Jack smiled adoringly at her before pressing his lips to her temple and running off towards an SUV where she could see four people, two men and two women, looking at her scrutinizing, 'his team' she guessed.
Martha sat for ten more minutes before getting up and walking down to the shops. As Martha walked along she passed three people standing outside a shop, she froze when she heard the word 'TARDIS' she went to a rack of sunglasses to spy on them and was shocked to see one of the men was Jack. But he looked different, like he was slightly younger and his eyes held way less pain than the Jack she just saw. She guessed this was a younger Jack from when he was traveling with the doctor, which meant the other man was the doctor, Martha giggled as she noticed his rather large ears and the woman, the blonde woman with them, she was Rose, Rose Tyler. It was one thing to see a picture of her but to see her in person was wholly different. Martha didn't feel it though, the hatred or jealousy towards her that she thought she would. Maybe because she wasn't in love with the doctor anymore. Okay she wasn't completely over him, she probably never would be but she could honestly say that while she loved him, she wasn't in love with him. And her feelings for him wasn't quite as deep compared to her feelings for Jack. Martha was elated by the thought. She wondered how different this Jack from her Jack, just then younger Jack turned and spotted her and smiled wide and flirtatiously and winked in her direction, she smiled back at him (so not so different). The doctor said something and Jack's grin fell as well did his head, Rose said something to the doctor who rolled his eyes, then beamed at Jack and he returned it grabbing her hand and letting her drag him off. Once again Martha didn't feel jealous and that made her smile as she continued down the shops.
Five minutes later Martha had a shopping bag full of groceries and was minding her own business when she was yanked into an alleyway, she gave a yelp of surprise as the man put a hand over her mouth stifling her scream, she began struggling against him but stopped when she recognized the voice,
"Martha, stop, it's me."
"Jack what is wrong with you? You nearly gave me a heart attack." She said turning and smacking his chest
"Sorry I just—"
"What? Just thought it'd be a good idea to yank me into an alleyway where I thought you were a rapist or murderer or something. You know my mind goes to those things and you know why. What'd you pull me in here for?"
"I missed you." His voiced cracked
"What do you mean? I just saw you not 30 minutes ago." He looked into her eyes and she realized how wrong she was, his eyes were filled with centuries worth more pain and despair than when she last saw him, as he noticed the realization flood her eyes, his own began to water
"You're not supposed to be doing this, you crossed your timeline once today already but twice now Jack, in the same hour…" she said softly letting the statement trail off
"I know, I know I just… I had to see you again."
"How long?"
"382 years" He said with disbelief and sorrow so very present in his voice
"383 years? 382 years? And you're still holding on to me, you let me go right now." She said sternly. He shook his head looking down
"I mean it do not carry me around with you wherever you go, letting me add to your burden." A pained sob ripped from him, she wrapped her arms around him tightly, and he reciprocated using it like a lifeline
"I can't cope, I miss you so much."
"I know."
"I love you." Martha held him tighter and without her bidding them, the words flew from her mouth as well
"I love you too, but you can't hold me like a chip on your shoulder, sweetheart looked at me." He removed his head from her shoulder she wiped tears from his face
"I love you, which is why I want you, no, I need you to move on. If I'm dead, then I'm dead, there's nothing you can do so don't you dare try and change the future, you let it happen. What we had, what we have and what we will have, it's good but all things have got to end, even you'll die one day, and when it happens I'll be right there with you, I promise you, Jack…" she leaned up and pressed her lips to his softly, the kiss was sweet and his longing, grief and passion was palpable the kiss quickly caught on fire his tongue begging her for access which she granted they stood in the alleyway their tongues doing a dangerous, paradoxical tango until it finally cooled off, Martha grabbed his hand and her bag from the floor
"Come on."
"Where are we going?"
"For a walk. Your present self is dealing with some blowfish alien and I reckon your past self's gone back to the TARDIS with Rose and the doctor, so fancy a walk?"
"Of course Martha Jones."
"Centuries and you still remember my name,"
"I promised you I never would forget it, I'm trying my best, and the doctor helps." The way he said it, she wanted to ask but decided asked against it
Later after she's said goodbye to future Jack, which was emotional and tearful on both sides she runs to the Roald Dahl Plass with tears still heavy in her eyes and running down her face. When she gets there she sees Jack there with his team, she doesn't hesitate to run to him and kiss him full and passionately on the lips in front of them,
"Hello to you too." Jack says jokingly but the smile leaves his face when he notices her tears,
"What's wrong? What happened?"
"Nothing, nothing it's just I, um, I love you, okay? I really, really do."
"I love you too." He says beaming before introducing her to the team. Two years later when Tosh and Owen die she decides to tell Jack that sooner or later, sooner being more likely he'll lose her before he wants to. She was right it was before he wanted to lose her but it was in no way a short amount of time they were together. 149 years. Martha had an accident during a trip with the doctor that resulted in her being infected with regenerative energy the doctor managed to help her but as a result she healed almost immediately and didn't grow old but even the regenerative energy couldn't help her when due to her own need to help others, she and their youngest son, Matthew, ended up being reduced to atoms then dust to save a family of four from the same fate. 149 years, 5 kids, 8 grandkids, and 3 great grand they had between them when Martha died. She reaffirmed her promise to Jack before she died; she'd be there for him when he met his end. He didn't just want her there when he died, he wanted her forever. He couldn't cope with losing both his wife and son, he ended up leaving earth with his granddaughter, Cassie (Matthew's daughter), a year later.
Martha Jones was on the 15th New Earth in the 15th New York watching the Face of Boe die, in her head she hears his voice speaking wistfully then she's in a white room and a man's there wearing a light blue shirt with red suspenders and gray trousers. He walks slowly up to her speaking
"Martha Jones, voice of a nightingale, the woman who walked the earth, everyone's savior, my personal angel. You kept your promise, you're here." She doesn't know him, yet she does and that scared her, if her assumption is correct he's the Face of Boe, and he's about to die after saving an entire planet for the past 200 years so she sucks it up
"I'm here."
"Yeah, you are." He kisses her chastely,
"I never stopped loving you but I did move on like you wanted, new husbands and wives and kids and it was good."
"Good." She doesn't know what else to say because he's talking about moving on from her and his husbands, wives and kids over the, according to the doctor, millions of years he's lived. Somehow to him, Martha resembles a wife he's had she guesses, but he said her name, her name specifically, so who exactly is he? And who is she to him?
"I love you." Looking in his eyes she can't help but say it, a dying man's request but it's so much. It's what Martha couldn't seem to attain from any man, it was that look on his face
"I love you too but who are you? I don't even know so how can I love you already? I'd remember meeting you." He smiles softly
"You'll find out soon enough"
He leans in and kisses her one more time before things fade to black. She snaps out of it and realizes that he's dead. The Face of Boe is dead and for some reason that stirs in her core a world of grief, and tears run down her cheeks because whoever he is or was he loved her, he looked at her with adoration and unadulterated love liked she wished the doctor would but never could, then she cried more because the man might not be real but she hoped he was.
The doctor's notices Martha's been slightly more edgy and emotional since old Boe died. She could spend hours just sitting in a corner staring at a wall in deep thought, her smiles are sometimes forced and prodded for by him. He wonders if he made a mistake taking her on as a companion, if she wasn't as strong as he first thought. Then a couple weeks later she meets Captain Jack Harkness and she's all smiles almost every five minutes, he's slightly jealous but he'd never tell.
When time is reversed Jack reveals unwittingly that he's the Face of Boe, as Martha thought, she just has another reason to leave the doctor and she does, she chooses her family but Jack as well. She chooses the looks he gave her in that dream, or hallucination or whatever it was, she chooses a man who won't see her as a replacement or a fill in. A warm body while you yearned for someone else you couldn't have. She choose someone who saw her, the real Martha, not the woman who walked the earth, though Jack appreciated her enough for it, not Doctor Martha, or the perfect daughter Martha. But Martha, who sometimes just liked to lounge on the sofa eating Nachos and drinking a beer watching a Rugby match, and he loved her all the same.
Jack was sitting on a bench in the park staring at the picture on his vortex manipulator. The real picture was lost at least 75 years ago, it was of her and Matthew when he was just born, only a few days old their youngest, her baby, a bonafide mama's boy and never would be found far from her. Jack wished he could say that he was surprised after he managed to think through his grief when the doctor dropped the aftershock of his son's death alongside the earthquake that was the news of her death. But he knew if any of his children were to choose to die by their mother's side it would be Matthew, despite the fact that he had a daughter.
This was not to say that all of their other kids didn't love both him and her dearly. Benjamin, Abigail, Sofia and Nicholas Harkness all loved their parents fiercely, even if they were in constant danger just because of their DNA. But Benjamin, Sofia and Nicholas weren't immortal at all, they grew older albeit slower than regular humans, but they would die. Abigail had inherited Jack's immortality and was the closest of the children to him because of it, Matthew had inherited his mother's gift in ways the others hadn't, they aged slower because of the regenerative energy they'd gotten from her but Matthew just got more than the others he was closest to their mother and even if he had Cassie, he wouldn't let his mother die alone. Wouldn't let his father agonize more than he would because Martha died alone, he knew Jack would grief even more because he lost both his son and wife but he knew he'd care for Cassie regardless. He knew his father would survive, he always did.
Jack took care of Cassie and watched her get married, and have kids and grow old slowly and die as did his other children, except Abby. He was sitting in the park watching his great-great-great-great grand kids, 382 years after his son and wife sacrificed themselves and he still wasn't over it. He missed the love of his life so much, it still hurt every day. He couldn't deal with the fact his son died when it should've been him. Jack should've been there to make that decision with her, to be there with her, should've made that sacrifice not his son, his youngest son with her, his boy, his perfect boy, only 19 years old and his wife, that insane, brilliant, mad, caring, loving woman. He felt someone sit next to him and looked over and saw a man in a bow tie and tweed jacket and floppy hair. He turned away without acknowledging him, he saw a woman with crazy curly, blonde hair in a white jacket and black pants walking towards his granddaughter and grandson,
"Aunt River Song!" They yelled running towards her, he didn't stop them even if part of him kind of wanted to, he held a resentment towards the doctor since that day, he knew what she was gonna do but didn't stop her and however irrational it was, he blamed the doctor, because it easier than blaming himself for yet another thing he could've prevented and was too weak and preoccupied to. Besides he liked River. The doctor chose then to speak
"Hello Jack, lovely day, love days like this, me. Kids playing in the park, parents yelling at them, birds singing. Always did love a good sing song, even birds' singsong maybe that's why the trigger for the dream lord was birds singing, did I ever tell you about that? Crazy time for us, it was when I traveling with Amy and Rory and the dream lord turned out to be—",
"Doctor you're rambling." Jack said, sighing when he finally couldn't take it anymore
"Ah, yes, right. Sorry."
"What are you doing here?"
"Abby wanted me to check up on you."
"I don't need checking up on."
"She knows and I know, it's just she said last she spoke to you, you seemed more disturbed than usual."
"Why isn't she here?"
"Bit of trouble in the Braxiatel Galaxy but she's got it, it's just dealing with the renegotiations of the interplanetary treaty between the Sontarans and the Rutons. You know how they are, she did good work getting them to make peace at all, but it requires constant checking in and negotiations and peace meetings. Boring to me but she can handle it; I know she can good genes in her." Jack smiled softly at the thought of his daughter, and then frowned when he realized why he was upset the last time they talked
"I can't remember her name."
'Who?"
"You know who, her, I promised her before I even knew I was gonna have to, that I would remember her name after she… but I can't remember." The doctor didn't comment as he watched Jack steadfastly try and remember his dead wife's name.
"Her last name was Jones, I know that, but her first name it started with an N or an M or was it a T. No T was her sister. I… N or M. I could get that part, her last name, N or M I always get stuck there." He swiveled his head to the doctor, a tear ran down his face.
"N or M?" he said brokenly,
"M" the doctor mumbled
"M," Jack turned back to watch River playing with the kids, he typed something into his vortex manipulator
"So many M names, you don't realize until you look it up, Mable, Mabry, Macaria, Machiko, Mackenzie, Macy, Madelaine, Madge, Madison, Megan and that's only the first ten, there's hundreds if not thousands, I'll find it though." He said wiping his eyes, and sniffling and rocking back and forth
"Martha." The doctor mumbled
"What?" Jack said freezing
"Martha, her name was Martha, Martha Jones and she was good, Jack."
"She wasn't good, she was brilliant." Jack said harshly, the doctor didn't mind the tone; instead he placed a tentative hand on Jack's shoulder
"Now, I, normally, would never condone this. Crossing your own time line because then you get nostalgic and start to think you can change something or prevent something, well you can't. And if you try River and I will stop you, and then clean up your mess. And you have to be back by the end of the day or we're coming for you." Jack looked at him confused, the doctor just turn his sonic towards the wrist strap and held it there for a few seconds
"All transportation abilities restored. One roundtrip trip that's all, to and back. Go see her, go see Martha. But you heard the rules." Jack smiled hesitantly
"Really?"
"Yeah, you're my friend Jack, even if I could stand to be a better one to you, go see the woman you love one last time then get back here and live your life Jack, don't forget Martha, never do that, but to honor her memory, to honor both she and Matthew's memory, move on." Jack nodded than got up
"Thank you." The doctor nodded
"But what about –"
"Sorted. Already talked to their mom, she says it's fine if River and I watch them while you go visit Martha."
"I owe you."
"No, this is a favor between friends." Jack smiled and walked towards an alley way, the doctor smiled as he saw a blue and purple light emanating briefly. He was glad Martha and Jack had had each other, especially when he treated them less than he should have, that they loved each other and that their love survived through the ages. Now he realized why Martha was so distraught when the Face of Boe, Jack, died. Even then, when he was a giant head in a jar and she didn't know him, he loved her, and she loved him. He looked towards River Song, the dangerous, infuriating, gun-slinging, sexy woman he loved, playing with the children. It was an odd sight, seeing her playing, in a non-threatening way, and with children no less and he knew when she had to go to the library he'd be a wreck and he'd need Jack's help just like Jack needed his but he knew he could count on him to make sure he didn't forget the woman he loved just like he'd make sure Jack didn't forget the woman he loved.
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