Author note: Hey guys! I'm so so so so so sorry that I haven't posted for what seems to me like years, but I've been so busy lately, that I completely sidelined this story until I managed to get back on top of everything. But now I'm back, and I hope this chapter was worth the wait. If not, then I'm very sorry, and I hopethe next few after will make up for it.

So as always, enjoy!

oOo

"So, 19th March 2012, London, England, Earth, the Solar System do ya?" Jack asked as he fiddled with some dials on his control panel, in a very similar fashion to the Doctor at the controls of his beloved TARDIS.

"Erm...almost," Rose replied as she peered over his shoulder curiously. "Only 3 years behind. And we can work on the exact location when we get there."

"Oh, sorry. 2015 then?

"Better," Rose grinned, and the grin was quickly reflected on Jack's face as he typed in the date on a keypad and pounded a huge red button with his fist.

"Hold tight!" he warned as the ship lurched and almost knocked Rose off her feet. She clutched the back of his huge leather captain's chair and leant forwards to watch through the tiny window as the stars melded into white blurs. Then everything when black and there was nothing more to see, so she forced her eyes to find something else to look at.

What they chose wasn't exactly what she'd had in mind, however.

Jack had noticed some loose wiring and had lent over the console to reach them. Rose had turned just at that moment to find his rear end in her line of sight.

"Oh..." she gasped, blushing madly and looking down at her feet. "Um Jack?"

"Ya?" he called from somewhere across the console.

"Do you...erm...need a hand?" she asked tentatively, refusing to look up, and even raising her hand to shield her eyes a little.

"No thanks."

"Ok. I'm...erm...well I'm...I'm gonna try and phone my boyfriend. Ok?"

"Fine by me," Jack called back, obviously not listening, as he scrabbled around, clambering even further across the console in a desperate attempt to reach the wires. His legs waggled in the air, and if Rose hadn't been very embarrased, she would have found it quite comical. As it was she turned away from him and pulled out her phone. She glanced at the screen and saw she couldn't even get the display to work, let alone get a signal.

"Of course...we're in deep space. I can't do this anymore," she muttered, pocketing her phone and turning back to Jack, who thankfully had changed position so that he was now kneeling in a tiny gap behind the console, fiddling with the wires.

"Don't s'pose you have a phone, do you?" she asked uncertainly, and Jack glanced up at her, giving her a quizical look, like he was suddenly hearing her for the first time.

"We're deep out in the middle of the time vortex. It don't matter how powerful your phone is...you won't get a signal out here."

"I used to," she replied without thinking, and he frowned.

"You did? How?"

"The Doctor did something to my phone. Turned it into a superphone. I could use it anywhere - well, except for Krop Tor, but then there was a huge black hole interferring with the signal, so that wasn't surprising really. It broke a few years ago though. I haven't been able to use it since."

"Still got the phone?" Jack asked as he leapt lightly back across the console.

"Erm yeah...actually," Rose nodded a little sheepishly as she pulled the black Samsung from her back pocket and handed it to him. He pulled the back off and carefully removed a black item similar to that of a phone battery.

"Hmmm, never seen one of these before. What is it?"

"I've no idea," Rose shrugged. "He never told me. Just said that with a bit of jiggery-pokery, my phone would work anywhere."

"Then he did tell you," Jack grinned, ejecting a disk tray from part of the console and slotting the black device into it.

"What?" Rose asked, confused. Had she just missed something?

"Jiggery-pokery. I've never seen one before, but I've heard of them."

"That thing's called a jiggery-pokery?" Rose asked, barely stiffling a giggle.

"Not exactly. This is a Jiggery-poke. Jiggery-pokery is the art of making and constructing a jiggery-poke," Jack replied matter-of-factly as he typed something into a keyboard that had appeared, seemingly from nowhere.

"Right," Rose nodded. "That strangely makes sense."

"Course it does," Jack grinned. "I came second in jiggery-pokery."

"The Doctor came first."

"Really? Bet he failed hullaballo."

"Hullaballo? Is that like jiggery-pokery."

"Not really. Hullaballo's the art of making and constructing a hullaba."

"You're kidding...right?" Rose asked, not entirely sure if he was or not.

"Why would I be?" Jack asked, deadly serious as he took the black object back from the computer and put it back inside the phone again. With a click and a beep, the screen lit up and the display came back on.

"No way!" Rose exclaimed as she shoved her new phone back in her pocket and took her old phone back, staring at it in amazement,

"Yes way," Jack replied triumphantly. "Told ya I wasn't kidding."

"This is just...mental," Rose gasped. "You fixed it!"

"Wasn't broken," he replied casually. "Just needed recharging."

"Oh Jack! Thanks so much!" she exclaimed in sheer delight, throwing her arms around his neck and almost knocking him backwards.

"Hey steady on!" he gasped, throwing out a hand to steady himself. "Don't you have a phone call to make?"

"That was just a distraction," Rose admited sheepishly as she let go of him again and blushed slightly.

"Didn't work," Jack replied. "I wasn't paying attention in the first place to be honest."

"Not for you...for me!"

"Why did you need a distraction?" Jack asked, confused. Rose glanced involuntarily at the console, then back at him and he somehow managed to figure it out. "Hey, it could have been worse," he shrugged.

"How?" This time it was Rose's turn to be confused.

"Well...it could have been me lookin' at you."

"Oi!" Rose slapped his shoulder and he yelped in pain, but there was a huge smile on his face never-the-less. However, just as he was about to continue the light hearted banter, his ship gave a violent shudder, the lights dipped for a few seconds and alarms began ringing and shrieking in the confines of the tiny cabin. Rose clamped her hands over her ears because the noise was so deafening.

"What the hell?!" she could just about hear Jack exclaim above the din. He charged back over to the controls and began pressing and pummeling each button in turn, desperation causing beads of sweat to drip down his forehead.

"What's happened?" she asked, rushing to join him.

"Hold that button down," Jack ordered, pointing to a large blue button across the console. Rose lunged forwards and flattened the button, then glanced back at him.

"Hold that button down!" he repeated loudly.

"I'm holding this one down!" she snapped, indicating to him that she was holding it down as far as it would go.

"Well press it harder!" he shot back.

"If I press it any harder, I'm gonna press it through the console!" She was getting annoyed now, and frustrated at the lack of information Jack was giving her.

"Then hold THAT one and THAT one too!" he pointed to two buttons on either side of the controls.

"You're kidding right? I'm not a bloody octopus!"

"Do you want to live?" Jack asked angrily as he dived under the circuit board, searching for a set of wires.

"Men!" she grumbled, extending her arm to hold down one button, whilst trying not to let go of the first one. Then she shifted her feet so that one could take her weight while the other one reached up and planted the heel of her boot on the button.

"What now?" she called from her rather awkward and undignified position.

"Ow I eed do geg do dat buddon der," Jack replied through a mouth full of wires as he reappeared. Then he reached under one of her arms to press a large red button. His left foot kicked a large lever downwards and held it down, whilst with his other hand, he reached round Rose's back and under her other arm to a smaller lever, which he flicked and held up.

A few seconds of mad, violent shaking followed before everything settled back down again, and Rose felt, rather than heard Jack give a huge sigh of relief. His mouth was so close to the back of her neck, she could feel his breath, even through the huge bundle of wires he was holding, and it sent a tingle down her spine.

"Well..." she broke the silence after a moment. "This has definately got to be the weirdest game of Twister I've ever played. How 'bout you?"

"Nah," Jack replied as he spat the wires out onto the floor. "Mine would have to be that time in a club on Duros 9. Seriously, never play Twister with an octopus creature and hope to win. It ain't gonna happen!"

Rose laughed then, and very carefully and gingerly, began to untangle herself from the console, wires and Jack, who was being very unhelpful...almost deliberately getting in her way as he also tried to untangle himself.

"Watch your back," he warned as she tripped on a wire and stumbled backwards, almost into the wall. He shot out a hand to help her, and her skin tingled at his delicate touch. Reminding herself firmly that she didn't need another man in her life right now, she cleared her throat and turned away to look out the window.

"Where are we?" she asked. "Looks like some kind of mountain range, or valley."

"Oh dear. Not good," Jack muttered, and Rose turned to him cautiously.

"Whats not good?" she asked suspiciously, recognizing that tone of voice from another Captain Jack Harkness who she'd spent time with years ago.

"We're erm...a little off course," he replied, trying to sound calm and casual. But it was his eyes that betrayed him.

"How far off course?" Rose asked, glaring at him. She didn't like the sound of this.

"Well, erm...not far. Just Rome...Ancient Rome actually...165 AD to be precise."

There was a sharp crack as Rose's hand connected with a section of the metal wall of the cabin, a loud groan of annoyance and anger, and then her curses began to echo throughout the ship - and probably the whole of Rome too.