PLAGUE

TWENTYFIVE

The Doctor had noted Jack's psychological transfiguration and as he put Rose down he whispered something in her ear; she stood aside, immediately becoming serious.

"Captain."

"Doctor."

The Time Lord waited.

"Where's Wil?"

"Erm," The Doctor looked around nervously. "Do you have an office where we can go talk privately?"

"I think you need to tell me right here and now what has happened."

Jack's posture and demeanor were becoming more forceful and aggressive.

Ianto and Owen eyed each other nervously behind Jack's back, wondering what the hell they were going to do if the man went ballistic on them.

"Can I at least get my clothes, first?"

"No, I don't think so." The Captain folded his arms and widened his stance.

Rose stepped forward. "Jack, what do you think you're doing?"

He scowled. "I want to know now what he did with Wil."

"Jack," The Doctor approached his friend, taking off his glasses in case he got hit in the face. "She didn't want to come back here. She wanted to stay."

"Where?"

"The Brave Woman galaxy."

"Why?"

"Because she has a lot to think about."

"She could've done that here."

"That's just what I told her! I did! I told her she could do her thinking in Cardiff and she said she couldn't. She said that she needed to be alone."

"She could be alone here."

"Right, I told her that too. There was no arguing with her, Jack."

The two men's faces were inches apart.

"You know what she's like, Jack. Once she's made up her mind…"

Jack blinked. The Doctor relaxed a smidgeon.

"Yeah, I know, damn it," the Captain growled. "What the hell's the matter with her?"

There was a long pause.

"Jack, she's a Time Lord."

That took Jack and everyone else in the room by surprise.

"What?!"

"Possibly the most intelligent and powerful Time Lord that has ever lived – and that's including me!"

"But how?"

The Doctor's hands had gone off on their own looking for pockets. When they couldn't find any, he folded his arms in a brief imitation of Jack.

"Do you remember when we found her that last time in the Brave Woman galaxy she told us she had believed for a while that she was a Time Lord? I wasn't sure then, but I suspected that the TARDIS had done something quite extraordinary to her. With her… For her…"

He reached out his hand towards Rose, who came closer and took it in hers.

"I've been with the TARDIS for centuries. In many ways," and here he squeezed Rose's hand comfortingly, "that ship is my oldest and greatest companion. But there are myriad things I don't know about her; she was already unimaginably old when I acquired her. And she keeps secrets – we all do – it's normal sentient behavior. I don't know how the TARDIS engineered it and I may never know, but where I wasn't certain before I am absolutely convinced now. Jack, it's true. Wil is every bit as much a Time Lord as I."

He inhaled deeply and exhaled through pursed lips, softly blowing out his breath.

"But I'm not sure Wil has fully embraced or even totally accepted this 'gift'. If she wishes, she can refuse it. So you see, as she explained, she has a lot to think about."

Jack looked around the room, eyes filling with tears, at all the places he'd seen Wil walking, standing or sitting. The space seemed emptier; felt colder. And so did his heart.

He ended up staring at The Doctor, using the Time Lord's visage to drag himself back to the present.

"What next?" Jack asked him. It was as much a rhetorical as a literal question. The Doctor opted for the latter.

"Well, I wonder if might get my clothes?"

"Yeah, sure, you bet. And then maybe you can tell us how we can get rid of those fucking little robots?"

"Indubitably!"