Chapter 11


Three days had passed since landing on Foxenbirg and the Doctor felt the restlessness he often got when staying in one place for too long. He'd spent countless hours helping the Empaths set up a suitable camp that would one day become the building blocks to a grand Empire in years to come. Now it was time to step back and let them grow.

On the morning of their planned departure, Mae was the first to seek out the Doctor. She found him sitting on a log by the large camp fire as he gently prodded the dying embers back to life.

"Good morning, Mae!" the Doctor greeted with a warm smile.

"And to you as well," Mae replied as she sat next to him on the log. She watched as he added more dead wood to feed the hungry flames and couldn't help the sad sigh at the thought that he'd be leaving within a couple hours, if not sooner.

"I'm going to miss you, Doctor. Will I see you again?"

The Doctor paused from his work and turned to her, giving her a small smile in return. "Oh, I'm sure we'll meet again someday." He tried to sound reassuring but then again, he wasn't sure if giving her false hope was the best thing to do. After all, how many times had he broken promises to friends and loved ones?

Mae simply smiled back and continued to watch as he finished poking around the fire.

"There we are, good as new." They lapsed back into silence and then shortly afterwards, the Doctor excused himself when Rose had caught his eye in the distance.

For a better part of an hour, Mae sat quietly as she watched the camp come to life. Her people, along with the Doctor and his companions milled about as they ate and struck up conversations about past adventures as well as their foreseeable future. She noted how Don seemed so drawn to Jack, the Empath following the Captain around like a secret admirer. He'd tried to play the part of loyal friend, but it never fooled her for a second – the man was infatuated.

She then turned her attentions to the Doctor and Rose, who were drifting apart from the rest of the crowd to a tree farther back. They were talking and it warmed her to see a real smile light up Rose's face at some funny remark the Doctor had made. Mae averted her eyes when the Time Lord reached out to cup the woman's face and kiss her. Of course, he was still kissing her five minutes later…

Giving them some privacy, Mae focused her attention back to Don. He was fairly young for an Empath, merely in his early forties; Empaths had an extended lifespan of roughly three-hundred years, after all. For as long as she could remember, the man had always been there as a sort-of brother to her and some of the other children on their ship after an illness had taken the life of their parents. Of course, Mae had very little memory of her parents before their passing, but Don was always a constant in her life and she loved him dearly for it.

However, Mae knew it in her heart that Don never truly fit in with the rest of her people. He'd been more of an outcast because of his…preferences. Don loved everyone, and that included aliens, something that her people did not approve of. It was true that the Empaths had travelled in a cramped ship for well over a hundred years and with that travelling came maintenance repairs, restock trips, and other reasons to dock and traverse among the many cultures of the Universe. And Don loved them all… the cultures, the people, the many different worlds. He was never meant to be stranded like this and that's exactly what would happen if she didn't take this next step and free him from his duty to his people.

Oh, but it would be hard to let him go, dear, sweet Don! He was the closest thing to family she had left. At merely six years old, she knew what life lay before her and she wanted that friendship close by her side every step of the way… She was born knowing who and what she was within her Race because it was built into her genetics. So was it her fault for wanting to be just a little bit selfish in this? But no…Mae could never do that to her friend. She loved him enough to give him the freedom that he truly deserved.

"Don." Mae waved her hand to grab his attention away from Jack. The pair were right in the middle of a group of men, everyone laughing and eating away at a hearty breakfast of freshly cooked meat and vegetables from the TARDIS's hefty supplies. After this last meal, they'd be hunting and cooking on their own so everyone made the most of what was given.

Don waved back and separated from the group with a laugh, having caught the end of a joke as he joined Mae on her log.

"And how are you this fine morning, dear Mae?" Don chatted happily enough. He knew that the Time Travellers were set to head out soon, but he tried to keep his smile and mood in check. Mae wasn't fooled in the least bit.

"I'm well, thank you! And you?" she returned, giving him her full attention, and that also included her Empathic sense to read into his soul as he answered.

"Good, good. Going to be an interesting day today, eh? So much to do, but all the time in the world to do it! New planet…new home!" He smiled and while it reached his eyes, it didn't reach his heart. He was very good with his acting, but Mae was skilled with the art of soul searching, a natural born talent that would only improve with time and practice.

"So tell me, Don…what do you think of our rescuers?" Mae cut right to the chase, wanting to hear his opinion of the strange aliens who'd done so much for them.

"Ha, they're a right mess, I think, specially the Doctor and Rose. I can feel the attraction they have for each other rolling off of them in waves, but there's so much fear and pain twisted in between it all that it really makes the head hurt." Don tapped his temple with a finger and a shake of his head.

"Indeed," Mae agreed. "They have a lot of secrets hidden inside…although Rose more so than him. Sometimes when I look at her…I can sense a wolf hidden in the shadows, something dark that shouldn't be there, but it is… I think the Doctor is the only one who can make her better somehow…" She realized she'd been staring at the couple as she spoke and drew her gaze back to Don. They were still kissing…and that was an understatement!

"I can sense a dark shadow, but nothing more. Like I said, hurts too much to dig that deep," Don murmured, ducking his head away from said oblivious lovers.

"And Jack? What do you see?"

Now Don hesitated, cautious about where this conversation might be headed. Mae was merely a child from an outsider's point of view, but Empaths were far more advanced in development when it came to matters of the mind and soul. While this type of conversation would be inappropriate for say, a human child, Mae was far more intelligent. Still, talking about this wasn't an easy subject, even for Don.

"I see…a man," Don observed Jack as he spoke quietly, "a man…who loves everyone around him. A man of courage and strength, that's what he is. I also see sadness in him…but I don't know all the reasons behind it."

Don watched as Jack easily conversed with the men around the camp fire. He was in the middle of telling a story about one of his many adventures in early days. Mae followed his gaze and a soft smile touched her lips.

"Do you like him, Don?" Mae asked abruptly, earning a startled gasp beside her. She simply grinned and tried again. "Do you…fancy Captain Jack?" she tipped her head to the side, tongue in cheek as she studied his face and again read his soul for what it was.

"I know you do…" she added when he spluttered for words, "and he's going to need someone now. You know it. Rose was never his to have and now the Doctor is here. Jack's going to let her go without a fight. He cared about her, but what they had was out of need, not love. You've looked into his heart like I have, you know he's going to be alone again…"

Don swallowed and cleared his throat, not for the first time unsettled by Mae's acute empathetic skills.

"What are you suggesting?" He croaked, glancing between Jack and Mae, and then to the Doctor and Rose before his eyes came back to Mae.

"Go to him… He's lost a partner, but with you…he'll gain so much more. Besides…I think he fancies you too." She elbowed him to emphasize her meaning, her face splitting into a wide grin.

Now Don stood up, a mixture of disbelief, joy, and then sadness on his face. He knelt down in front of her and took her hands in his.

"But what about you? What about the people? We've so few left here, I'm needed here!"

Mae shook her head and pulled her hands free, placing them on either of his cheeks instead with a gentle smile. "He needs you, Don. GO. That's an order, not a request. I'll miss you, but you'll always be with us, with me…in our hearts."

The Doctor's voice rang out, effectively ending their discussion. "Jack, time we headed back, I think!"

Jack extracted himself from the crowd and gave the Doctor a cheery salute. Mae took the opportunity to grab Don's hand and drag him to the Doctor's side.

"Doctor," she spoke in a no-nonsense tone of voice, "Don is going to go with you this time. I won't have it any other way." She then motioned him to kneel down so she could whisper in his ear. "And he fancies Jack," she whispered for the Doctor's ears alone.

The Doctor glanced up at Don with an arched brow and smirked. He'd known that bit of info all along.

"Well, can't argue with the boss, now can we? Welcome aboard, Don!" The Doctor shook Don's hand with a beaming smile and then pointed toward the TARDIS. "Got a lot of work ahead of us. Allons-y!"

The last ten minutes on planet Foxenbirg were bittersweet and the Doctor would commit every second to memory. Mae had been the hardest to let go of. He owed her so much more than he would ever be able to pay back. Many tears and hugs later, the TARDIS doors finally sealed shut and then the dematerialization sequence initiated. With a final wheeze, the precious blue box vanished into the Time Vortex. Mae would never forget the man in the brown pinstripe suit.


Captain Jack Harkness sat on a stool in the medical bay, keeping quietly to himself while the Doctor was busy with Rose. The Time Lord was doing a full-blown medical exam on Rose, using the excuse that he needed to re-check her vitals to make sure everything was back to normal after the living computer incident. Of course, he'd also taken a couple blood and tissue samples for the same reason, though Jack knew better.

Rose begrudgingly sat there, knowing that everything was fine but humouring the Doctor nonetheless. After their departure from Foxenbirg, she was actually expecting the man to pounce on her for scans and tests. He'd managed to tamp down his worry until the TARDIS was safely within the Time Vortex. Then he'd practically chased her to the exam table like some sort of mad scientist. So there she sat, fingering her gold wristband in utter boredom while the Doctor flitted about, doing what he did best – working.

"So…" Rose huffed, quite tired of sitting there doing nothing. "What now?" To her annoyance, neither man bothered to answer her question.

She glanced at Jack, wondering why he was still hanging around when he had other…obligations to attend to. She had to admit that she was happy Don was staying with them. At the same time, she felt a slight sting about his sudden permanence and what it meant. Rose wasn't stupid. Jack would want to head back to Torchwood Seven as soon as possible. The team needed him…and with Don by his side, Jack now had a suitable replacement to take her position. But there was more to it than that and she knew it. Things were most certainly going to get a bit awkward.

Rose tried to push those thoughts aside but then she realized exactly why Jack was sitting in the room with them. He'd been staring at her deep in thought for quite some time, almost as if he was debating something that really needed saying. She suddenly felt a bit sick.

Fixing Jack with a pointed death glare, Rose silently shook her head, warning him to keep his mouth shut. Now, of all times, was not the moment to come clean about past encounters!

The Doctor cleared his throat, peering at the two of them out of the corner of his glasses from the paper he'd just been checking for scan results.

"Do you two need a minute?" He eyed them both from under his rims, clearly feeling the thick tension building between the two. He wasn't blind; he'd seen the silent war brewing as the minutes ticked by.

"I could just, you know, step outside a minute…" the Doctor suggested offhandedly with a casual point of his thumb toward the door. He didn't know what the issue was between them, but clearly it wasn't something they wanted to discuss openly around him.

"Yeah," Rose piped up rather quickly, "can you give us a moment, please?" She levelled a glare at Jack, never once taking her eyes off him and the Doctor proceeded to leave the room. The door shut and Rose counted to ten before launching herself off the exam table.

"Not a word!" she hissed at Jack, stabbing him with a finger to make her point very clear.

"If not now, then when? He has to know, Rose, you know that." Jack countered with equal force, never one to back down from her aggression. He knew Rose better than anyone else, maybe even a little better than the Doctor if he was so bold to point out.

"Not now, Jack, I can't do it right now, it's too soon!" she pleaded, struggling to keep her voice steady.

"What's the point in waiting, Rose? You need him and he needs you too. You've been waiting fifty years to find him again and it's pointless to keep these secrets any longer. Why can't you tell him? Hell, you won't even tell me a damn thing about your past so what does that make me to you after everything we've been through? If you can't tell him something as simple as this, I will!"

Rose grabbed his arm when he went to turn from her and pushed him back against the wall. The air immediately charged with a tension so thick it was almost suffocating. How many times had they been in this exact position in the middle of a fight, only for things to twist into heated passion? She knew he was right…she needed release from the stress and the Doctor was right there waiting for her, but he was still so far out of reach. Jack would never understand that.

"Jack…I can't…it's not simple. I love him, you know that. Don't you understand how much this is going to hurt him? He's a Time Lord and this isn't just an act of sex! It isn't even sex because it goes much, much deeper than that. To love a Time Lord…" Her voice cracked, and she stepped back, covering her face with both hands as a sob caught in her throat.

Jack raked a hand through his hair in agitation, taking in Rose's state of distress with a mixture of guilt and sorrow. He hated to see her like this, but things were not going to be easier for her until she learned to open up. Ok, so she had secrets that the Doctor wasn't suppose to know about – yet – but that didn't mean she couldn't talk to him about it. He'd been at her side for fifty-frigging-years and he was tired of the guessing games. He knew her heart would always belong to the Doctor, but he still cared about her. She had to learn to trust him!

"Rose," Jack sighed heavily, glaring up at the ceiling before reaching out to pull her into his arms in a comforting hug. "…help me understand it. You have your reasons for keeping things from the Doctor, I get that much. But why me? Why can't you talk to me? I'm your friend and you know you can trust me."

"Things are just so complicated…" Rose replied quietly, stifling sobs as best she could.

"Enough with the 'complicated' excuses!" Jack pushed her at arms length from him with a rough shake. "You need him, damn it, Rose! Why can't you go to him?" he barked harshly. No more games.

"Because I can't, alright?" Rose tore away from his arms and yelled, pouring out all her frustration without thinking. "Somewhere in his future and my past, he found a way to the parallel universe and a connection was forged between us. If a Time Lord is fortunate enough to fall in love and act upon those feelings, they form a mind-link with their mate - a permanent bonding! Gallifreyan culture is based off of telepathic touch and that's what we almost have right now!

"When he came to me on that stormy night, a night that was the best and worst night of my life, he only forged a partial bond with me. I don't even know how that's possible, but Susan said he must have had his reasons for it. Maybe my mind wasn't strong enough back then to handle the potency of a full telepathic bond."

Rose floated around the room in a trance-like state as she spoke, hugging herself one minute and then wringing her hands in agitation the next.

"Whatever his reasons were, he came, he loved, he left. I was left with little more than a broken heart and a baby. Imagine how hard it was to face my human-doctor after knowing what I'd done. I betrayed him that night! I never even told him…and in all honesty until I was three months along, I couldn't even believe it had happened. I deluded myself into thinking it was all just a really mucked up dream."

It then dawned on Rose what she'd just blurted out in emotional frustration. Her eyes immediately snapped to Jack in shock that he'd managed to push her over the edge like that, but then a movement from the door's small window to the right caught her wide eyes. The window was clear, but with a spike of fear, she knew exactly who'd been standing there seconds before. The Doctor had chosen the wrong time to come back to the medical bay. Or maybe he'd been standing just beside the door the whole time. Either way, Rose felt suddenly faint. He knew…oh god, he knew.

The world was crashing down on her lungs as Rose stumbled to the door in a panicked frenzy but there was no one on the other side, the hall empty. Stepping back in, she spun around and slumped against the door, feeling sick.

"This is your fault!" she accused Jack with her eyes to the ground, but the rest of her words were interrupted when two distinct ringtones rang out from their pockets. Feeling numb and far from stable, Rose dug into her pocket and pulled her mobile out. She knew who it was without bothering to look at the screen; Torchwood was calling.

Her eyes locked with Jack's. No matter how chaotic the situation, there was one thing they both understood when it came to Torchwood. The team would never call them in unless it was an emergency they couldn't handle without their leader and second-in-command. Therefore, there had to be serious reasons for them to track down Jack and Rose. It made Rose wonder just how on earth their team had managed to trace them within the Time Vortex in the first place, but that wasn't important right then.

Maybe the distraction was a good thing, Rose thought to herself bitterly. In times of stress, it was always instinctual to fall back on training and lock her heart up in the safety of the black box she'd built around it so long ago. Right now, things were spiralling out of her control and she wasn't able to pick up the pieces. Better to become the Agent. As an Agent, she could function enough to survive another day of complete hell.

"We'll discuss this later," Rose growled and then she vanished from the medical bay with a flick of her wrist, her gold band activating as she envisioned her chosen destination for a Vortex Jump.

She flitted into the console room a millisecond later. Thankfully, the Doctor was nowhere in sight. Rose wasn't exactly prepared to face him and only hoped she could avoid him for the time being. However, they needed to get to Torchwood as soon as possible.

Approaching the console, Rose placed her hand on a lever and mentally sought out the ship, asking for her full attention. The TARDIS gave her a gentle hum, acknowledging her touch and patiently waited for a command. With the skill of many years' practice, Rose began to set the coordinates for Torchwood, typing in a specific code and then setting the date to exactly seven days after leaving Earth with Jack. Rose then reinforced the date by thinking about the exact time she wanted the TARDIS to travel to.

The TARDIS hummed appreciatively and gave Rose the go ahead to begin the landing sequence. A couple buttons, knobs, levers, and dials later, and the ship settled to the ground right outside of Torchwood Seven. Rose thanked the ship with a gentle pat to a coral strut before heading outside, not bothering to wait for Jack. The second she stepped into the sunlight, she jumped straight into her waiting bedroom within the building. It was moments like these when she thanked her lucky star for the prized golden band on her arm.


Rose stood in the centre of her small bedroom inside Torchwood Seven. The lights were off with the exception of a modified sun-lamp nestled in the left corner of her room. She had no windows, just four plain white walls and a solid steel door which was currently sealed with three deadbolts from top to bottom. When Jack had the building constructed, he'd opted for an underground safe-house complete with bomb-proof walls and doors. It was built to withstand just about any form of attack.

Unlike previous Torchwood buildings, this one also had a section of living quarters to house the team if any of them ever needed shelter. However, only she and Jack lived within Torchwood itself. Jack was always one to encourage his team members to go out and have a life outside of work whenever possible. Life was too preciously short to waste away within the depressing walls of Torchwood.

With a small sigh, Rose went over to the sun-lamp and gingerly caressed the sapling tree growing under its searing light. The silver leaves of the tree shimmered beautifully as she adjusted the small pot. Testing the soil, she deemed it necessary to feed and water the precious plant and went to her small dorm-fridge to fetch the needed ingredients. This was a task she took seriously because the plant was so important to her. It was a sapling saved from Gallifrey itself, given to her by Susan just before the planet burned. It required special food and care that the Earth could not provide and Rose tended to its every need like an obsessed mother hen guarding her nest.

At a young age of fifty years, the tree stood three feet tall and looked more like a twig with a few small branches of silver leaves. The bark was a very light tan due to its age, but she knew it would fade to gold in another century or two. Now that the TARDIS was back in her life, Rose was suddenly anxious to move the tree to the ship as soon as possible. The vessel would be the perfect home for her tree to thrive inside one of the garden rooms.

After tending to the tree, Rose then went straight to her wardrobe and gathered up a clean Torchwood uniform to dress into. She toed off her trainers and shimmied out of her denim jeans before shedding her simple white t-shirt, dropping the garment with the rest on the tiled floor. She kicked it aside and began re-dressing into tight black jeans followed by a hot pink shirt. She then slipped on her favourite black leather jacket, pulling the zip halfway before loading random pockets with her mobile, spare cash, and other random bits she may need while on the job.

Pausing at her floor-length mirror, Rose examined herself in the mirror. She reached over to flip on the overhead lights and took a moment to run a comb through her hair, deciding to keep it down before digging through a random drawer to find her make-up. She really didn't need it, but a light touch-up was in order.

Finally, Rose turned to glare the last part of her get-up. Chucked in the corner by the door was a pair of knee-high black boots with a good bit of heel. This was it, the final piece of armour to put on before becoming someone else entirely. It took her a second to slip them on, the weight of the world settling heavily on her shoulders once she was done. She was now ready to leave the safety of her room.

Rose took a second to compose her features, carefully locking her heart away to become Rose Marion Tyler, Second Commanding Officer of Torchwood Seven. Her parents would be proud. With that passing thought, she unbolted the door and stepped out into Hell.


End Author's Note: THANK YOU for the reviews :D