Pairing: Captain Jack Harkness x Jenny (The Doctor's Daughter)

Chapter Summary: Jack and Jenny meet and immediately find trouble.

Author's Notes: I've been wanting to write this pairing for ages but just couldn't find the right story for them. After some prodding from followers and friends, I finally focused a little better and found it.

I'm not doing this my usual way, so I can't really say how long this is going to be. Your guess is as good as mine :) My updating schedule will be… not scheduled. My inability to leave a work unfinished means there shouldn't be ridiculous waits, though, and most of the next chapter is already done.

This won't have graphic violence; focusing on how people are hurt makes me physically ill. It will, though, have some violence because it's Jack and Jenny and sort of action-adventure.

Beta: GoingToTheTardis

The air rushed from his lungs as he landed against the pavement.

"That was uncalled for," he muttered, bringing himself to his feet. "You didn't even buy me a drink first," he added, raising his voice even though the intended recipient wouldn't be able to hear.

He dusted off his pants before noticing a few passersby staring at him. He grinned, turning on the charm.

"Never piss off someone who's got an interplanetary teleportation device in the basement," he said, approaching the nearest humanoid, hand extended. "Hi, Captain Jack Harkness." The blue-skinned, green-eyed alien blinked in return. "Wouldn't mind telling me where I am, would you?" The native blinked again. "You don't speak a lick of English, do ya?"

Jack maintained his grin as he looked around for a hint of where he might have been sent by the irate female he'd probably seen the last of.

"I speak English," came a feminine voice from behind him, a distinctly British accent. As Jack turned, the alien he'd been speaking to ran off, along with his friends.

In front of him was a petite blonde with just the right amount of curves. Not that there was really a wrong amount of curves, not as far as the former Time Agent was concerned. She wore a tight t-shirt and tighter pants, a military style belt and boots.

"Hi there," he said, once more extending his hand in greeting. The woman smiled at him, almost a smirk, as she took his warm hand in her cool one. "Captain Jack Harkness. And you are?"

"Jenny," she answered, shaking his hand firmly. "Not really the time to be flirting, though."

"Really?" he asked, keeping his disagreement to himself. Mostly. "Why's that?"

She looked pointedly over his shoulder. "Humans aren't exactly popular here on Xark'nith. Tend to be thrown in cages by the likes of them." She nodded in the direction she looked, and he turned far enough to see a few of the locals rushing toward them, weapons drawn, shouting things in a language he wasn't familiar with. He turned back to Jenny, but before he could speak, she grabbed his hand and grinned.

"Run," she said, and he found himself returning the smile as they broke into a sprint, ducking between nearby buildings, laughing as they rounded a corner of the maze-like city. He felt a thrill at being on an alien planet for the first time in so long, even if the circumstances weren't necessarily what he'd have chosen. Not first, anyway.

"You're seriously fast," he said after a minute of evasion, angry shouts still chasing them through the city. "It doesn't even look like you're trying."

"Love to run," she said, slowing as they came to another intersection in the complex maze of alleyways. "This way." Jenny darted to the left, Jack starting to feel the strain of keeping up as his legs cramped.

"I don't really ever run intentionally," he said between breaths, "but it always happens anyway."

She glanced back at him, ponytail flying, her face lit with her enjoyment. "That's the best kind of running, the kind you weren't planning on."

Her speech was completely unaffected by their exertion, and Jack's mind wandered to other activities that might benefit from mutual stamina. His thoughts were interrupted by some colorful curse words in at least five non-terrestrial languages, plus Spanish.

"You fluent in all those," he asked in one of them while they came to a stop in front of a brick wall, "or just in the curse words?"

"I'm not really fluent in Thalian," she answered, looking around them and then letting go of his hand and backing a few steps away from the wall, "but the others, yes." She looked at him, eyes shining. "Only one way out," she said, facing the wall again and running at it full speed.

Jack found himself gaping as the little blonde ran several steps straight up the wall, grabbed onto the roof of the building, then climbed on top before peering down at him.

"You coming?" She asked, expression triumphant, hands on her hips.

"I'd love to," he said, looking behind him and then turning fully to face the men ran in and then stopped, panting, at the entrance to this particular alleyway, "but I'm a bit rusty on my wall climbing." He held up open hands to show the hostile aliens. "No chance we can resolve this peacefully, is there?" he asked.

Their response was immediate, unanimous, and decidedly unfriendly as they charged into range, and Jack pulled his own gun from its holster.

"It was nice knowing you, Blondie," he called upward, aiming his weapon at a kneecap; he didn't want to aim to kill, especially before he knew whether their weapons were lethal. Finding that out might've been a better thing to use his breath for than a mild flirtation.

Then again, it wasn't like a flirtation was ever really wasted.

He fired as the first attacker came into range, the man going down with a shout. Before Jack could take aim again, the second fired, and a severe spike of pain was followed by an all-too-familiar feeling that answered rather definitively whether the weapon had been lethal.

~O~O~O~

The dark-haired, blue-eyed man in the military jacket went down after he was shot, and Jenny ducked low on the rooftop, having learned quickly that Xark'nithians had difficulty looking upward and rarely did so. She heard Jack's weapon clatter to the ground, and the native who'd shot him spoke to his companions.

"He's dead. Not breathing." Jenny spared a moment to be grateful, not for the first time, that she was good with languages. She'd only been on the planet for a few long weeks, but she'd already managed to pick up most of the dialect. "Did you see where the other one went?"

"Was a bit busy being shot," came a second voice, laced with pain.

"She got away again," said the third. "Come on, let's dispose of this one."

"I need help getting out of here before the cops show," said the second. "Just leave him."

"And end up getting tossed in jail for improper disposal of animal remains? Not likely," answered the first. "You lean on Larxixnix and he'll carry the arms. I'll get the feet. We gotta be quick."

Jenny risked leaning forward far enough to peer at the trio as they gathered up the body. She knew that she should leave, find somewhere safer, maybe finally get the needed part she'd been searching for to get back off this planet and to somewhere a bit friendlier. Instead, she found herself unable to leave Jack behind.

She was simultaneously repelled by and attracted to him. It was as if something was very wrong about him, but it was outweighed by a feeling of right. She'd figured out quickly enough that she could almost feel connections sometimes, possibilities for people or events, and when she'd seen Jack, she'd felt like they had a connection that both brought them together and pushed them apart.

Unsure whether that meant there were opposing possibilities for them or whether something else was going on, as well as unsure what a human was doing so obviously out in public in a dangerous location, she'd approached him. The feeling of connection hadn't ended with his death.

As she watched them carry his body from the alley, their progress slow and limping, she felt herself pulled forward again. She walked along the rooftops, careful not to make noise, until the trio stopped in front of a door. They set down Jack's body in order to unlock it, and Jenny felt her eyes widen.

Jack had moved.

She looked more closely and saw that he was breathing again, or perhaps hadn't stopped breathing in the first place. Their attackers hadn't seemed to notice either the unsteady rise and fall of his chest or the brief twitch of his hand.

Jenny weighed her options for a few seconds. With one man wounded, she could probably free Jack with very little trouble, but he'd just been shot, and the chances of his being able to run to safety were slim, no matter how beautifully he'd run earlier. She could probably throw him over her shoulder, but that would rule out the uneven rooftops, and she'd be quite conspicuous making her way to the abandoned home she'd been staying in.

Waiting until dark would be the safest way to transport him since the city was quiet and unpatrolled after sunset, but Jenny didn't know what they planned to do with his body. If they disposed of him immediately, he might not survive long enough for her rescue. She'd have to try to save him before they took him inside, as they were already moving to do.

She shifted her weight, ready to jump, then froze as a large group came around a corner, chatting about their respective days. The men threw Jack inside and pushed their wounded in behind him, standing guard at the door until the group had passed. They opened the door again as the others moved out of sight, and she heard the wounded man speak.

"You'll never believe this. This guy's still alive."

"Impossible," said the first. "I checked. It's not something I'm ever wrong about. He was dead."

"Well, he isn't now," chimed the third, Larxixix. "Not like he could come back to life."

"Just shut up. Come on. Don't have to hide him if he isn't dead. Let's take him to the Tower."

Jenny settled back on her heels as the door shut behind them.

The Tower, contrary to its name, was actually underground, accessible through the homes of the affluent of the city, and well guarded, even after dark. Jenny had been inside before, but she hadn't been able to explore as well as she liked before she'd had to get out.

The Tower housed the city's undesirables, from species deemed unfit for society to those unable to pay their bills. Those violent were dealt with immediately rather than left to take up space in the city's lockup. Jenny had been trying to find a way to free them, if she could, while trying to repair her ship, but she'd been so far unsuccessful.

She made her way back to her temporary home, glancing wistfully at the ship parked precariously on the roof before she went inside. She retrieved the map of the underground system and lay it out on the table in the main room, studying it once more for any potential weaknesses.

Finally, she found a possible route, a way to reach the cells without being spotted, a narrow ventilation shaft that was marked only lightly. If it was really there, and if it was wide enough, she'd have to climb down several stories, then make her way back up with at least Jack in tow, freeing the rest of the prisoners in the process.

She found herself grinning. She did love a challenge.

She nodded decisively at the map, mentally tracing her route one more time, then rolled it back up and put it away next to a translated version of Earth's Rapunzel.

"Right then," she told herself, "time to climb the Tower and rescue the princess."