Grace climbed to her feet, letting Jack help her minimally. She looked at the Angels who were looking back at her with a look that could have passed for obedience, and sighed.

"All right, here's what we are going to do…I want you to find the one who brought you here. Not the one that controls you, the one who is here in this town. Do you understand?"

Jack watched her and she nodded to a confirmation that he couldn't hear and moved towards the door, passing the Angels. Jack followed her. "Is it okay to leave them behind us?"

"Can't watch them, don't worry," she tapped her head weakly. "I've got this."

They began the slow walk down the road in the opposite direction, moving back to the center of town. Grace wobbled but kept walking, Jack steadying her every so often. "You can't die, Grace."

She looked at him, "I'll regenerate, I suppose."

Jack wasn't sure why, but that thought bothered him as much as her actually dying. He had gone through it with the Doctor, and though he was the same man, he wasn't quite the same. He didn't want a different Grace. This was the one he loved. "Grace?" The word came out desperate.

She actually stopped now, and turned to look at him, but lost her balance in the process. His hands shot out catching her as she fell and pulling her gently back upright. "Jack, honey,'s okay. "

"I don't want to lose you, Grace."

He could see her searching for a smile, and she pulled it to the surface, just for him. He knew in that moment she would never be too weak to make someone else feel a little better- And that he would love her no matter the change, because she loved him too-somewhere inside, deeper than she could see at the moment. "I'm not going anywhere." She lifted her arms for a hug and he pulled her burning body to him, leaving her feet dangling. Her breath ghosted across his neck and even that was much too warm. He felt soft lips kiss his check and he let her back down. "Come on silly. We've got work to do."

They walked in silence, side by side, but she was leading. She seemed to be following directions that he couldn't hear. She gave a tiny smile to him and opened her mouth to speak but before the words came her eyes closed and she was falling towards the ground. He caught her, and held her to him, but she was limp in his arms, her head laying back. He lifted a shaky hand to her neck, and felt the double pulse beneath his fingertips. He adjusted his arms so that one was holding her around the back and under her arms, planting his feet so that she lay against him, and raised the other to hold her head up. "Not a good time for regeneration, Grace." His voice dropped to a low, urgent whisper. "And this is defiantly not the time to die. So open those impossibly beautiful eyes. You've got an army to send home."

She wasn't breathing he realized, and he didn't know if her bypass had kicked in or if he should be giving her mouth to mouth but before he could decide she sucked in a breath, deep and long, and opened her eyes. She looked up at him, "Is mouth to mouth just an excuse to kiss me, Jack?"

He didn't fight her as she pulled back away from him, "You caught me. I wasn't about to die with worry, just wanted to kiss you. And how in the world can you read my mind when you aren't even breathing? Hardly seems fair."

She grinned at him, face too pale, and covered in a film of sweat, "I'm good like that. Come on. I know where Dad and Mom are, and I'm getting a headache so I'd really like to release the Angels."

The Doctor heard loud movement behind him, and a couple of men screaming, though the words were unclear. He tried to turn but couldn't and it wasn't until he saw fear in Slin's eyes that he realized that it must be the Angels. But if he lost control of them, anything could happen.

"Slin, why did you lose control?"

"I…I didn't have control. They were being controlled by someone else; the telepathy field was being amplified so it could reach Earth."

"So they lost control."

He shook his head. "Someone else has control." He closed his eyes than reopened them. "Someone who seems to want you guys alive."

Donna turned her head speaking the thought that had just entered his head. "Grace?"

"Your daughter?" Slin shook his head. "No. It took me fifteen years to find someone who could do it, and he only agreed to it because he was dying. Because you can't hold an army of Angels and live."

He heard Donna suck in a breath and he turned to her, wishing now more than ever that he could pull her into a hug. He was tied to a chair and his daughter was dying controlling an army of Angels to save them and the town. And if she died, if something happened and she didn't regenerate, he didn't know how he would continue to live. And he suspected that Donna couldn't either. "He doesn't know her, Donna. She's ours, and she is capable of so so much."

"Well, I'll be going," Slin stood. "She may want you alive but I doubt she cares if I live."

He rose but the Doctor shook his head. "She wouldn't kill you; she is so much more, so much better than that."

"You'll forgive me if I don't take that chance." He moved towards the back door behind him, but it opened as he reached it and Jack stepped in grabbing Slin and pushing him back in with one hand the other behind his back. "Sit down," he growled. "And if she doesn't make it, I don't care how much she may not want to kill you, because I will."

He then turned back to Grace, his face returning to a soft expression, eyes filled with unconditional love. "Come on, sweetheart. Mom and Dad need to see you."

Grace stepped in and he and Donna both let out the breath that had been keeping. Donna began to cry when she saw her daughter. "Grace, honey. Please, just let them go."

She studied them, resting her hands on the table, leaning heavily. "Untie them Jack."

He did, and Donna and the Doctor rushed to her, the Doctor spoke. "Now, sweetheart. Let them go."

"They don't want to go back, Daddy." Tears rolled down her face. "They are so alone, and they don't want to go back."

He felt tears filling his eyes too. His daughter would die if she didn't do this, and her only concern was how alone the Angels felt.

"Grace, please." Donna begged her.

Grace looked at her, "He has to leave the building."

Jack grabbed Slin and pulled him from the building. "Okay."

Grace stood still, not breathing, body stiff with concentration. The Doctor held his arms out to catch her when she fell, he could only hope that it wouldn't be because she was dead. He heard the tinniest whisper and it broke and healed his hearts. It made him wonder how he had help to create something so good. "I'm so sorry. So so very sorry. You're never really alone. And thank you, for going." And she was the girl who would die to comfort a lonely monster.

And then she fell into his arms.