You just keep me hanging on

Donna was sitting in the kitchen enjoying her breakfast and a cup of tea, when Martha stumbled inside looking like she had been roughed up on the way.

"Well don't you look nice this morning" Donna noted.

"Shut up" Martha grumbled and sat down. "I barely slept last night, the TARDIS kept making this insane sound. How did you manage to ignore it?""Ear plugs. My last fiancé snored like a bear."

"Donna, is this yours?" Martha held up a shirt lying discarded on the floor.

"Do I look like I shop in the kiddies section?"

Martha chose not to answer that. "Well, who's it then?"

"Who around here wear shirts that size, hm?" There's a shoe over there as well."

Martha turned and Donna was right. One of the Doctor's sneakers was lying over by the fridge. "What the hell happened last night?"

"Judging by the bra lying outside the library I'd say the Doctor had a visitor" Donna said and sipped her tea. She didn't mean to be intentionally mean to Martha, but the girl really needed to open her eyes and realize that her crush on the Doctor was never going to amount to anything more than that. He was simply too caught up in Rose to ever even look at Martha in any kind of romantic way.

"You're kidding me?"

"Nope. I'm guessing someone's going to be doing the walk of shame soon."

"Jack do you have a moment?"

Jack looked up as Ianto closed the door to his office behind him. "Sure, what's up?"

"I just… I wanted to talk… To you!"

"Alright, well then you came to the right place. What do you want to talk about."

Ianto suddenly got a pained expression on his face. "I well… I wanted to talk about this. Us!"

"You wanted to talk about us?"

"What are we?"

"We are people, Ianto! I'm your boss and you're my employee."

"Is that all?""Is that not enough?"

"So these past weeks…. What was that?""Fun" Jack said with a smile.

"Fun? You think this is fun?"

"You don't?""No! Seeing you and Gwen sending each other looks across the table in meetings and you and Rose holding hands! And now this Doctor, you act like he's your long lost love! Is he?"

"No of course not" Jack said, but it didn't sound as convincing as he had hoped. "He's just… a guy."

"Don't lie to me" Ianto spat. "It's obvious he's more than that. This is just… to much! You want me but you don't want me? And I'm stuck in this limbo-like place, wondering if you're ever going to come around. You just keep me hanging on! Be a man about it, let me go then! If you don't want me let me find someone else!" Before Jack could respond, Ianto had stormed out the office, slamming the door, leaving a stunned Jack behind.

Owen was in an even worse mood than usual, when he and Tosh finally arrived at the hub (an hour earlier than Owen usually showed up). "All I'm saying is; we don't know these people, we shouldn't just trust them.""Jack knows them, and Rose. Isn't that enough for you?" Owen had been complaining ever since they left the hub the day before and Tosh was starting to get really annoyed. She liked Owen (a lot, if she was honest), but she wished he would just shut up for a second

"Ianto" Owen yelled. "Ianto!"

"I'm not a dog" Ianto sneered as he walked into the main room.

"You take orders well enough. Find out what a TARDIS is."

"Owen! He's not your personal assistant. Do it yourself" Tosh said and gave Ianto a sympathetic look.

"I got stuff to do and how long does it take to make coffee" Owen defended himself. "It'll give him something to do."

Ianto sighed. "I'll check it out" he said and walked away.

"See" Owen said to Tosh. "That's a good dog" he yelled at Ianto's retreating form and received a middle-finger salute in return.

"Good morning" Gwen greeted as she entered the hub.

"You look like shit."

"Why thank you Owen, that was just what I needed to hear" Gwen said and slapped the back of his head. "Twat!"

"What happened? Don't tell me Rose snores?""Well I wouldn't know, seeing as Rose opted to stay behind with mystery man. Rhys on the other hand, snores like a rhino and we had another fight.""Again?"

"Again! It's unbearable. He just won't let the whole "new job, new hours" thing go and he keeps accusing me of having a thing for Jack.""Oh" was Tosh's only response. Rhys wasn't exactly the smartest guy in Cardiff, but somehow he had managed to read Gwen's attraction to Jack like an open book.

"Did you find out what a TARDIS is" Own asked, as Ianto entered the main area again.

"Turkey And Relish Diner In Surrey" Ianto said.

"Turkey And Relish Diner In Surrey" Owen repeated.

"Try: Time And Relative Dimension In Space" Rose offered as she entered the hub.

"Yes, that does actually sound better" Ianto said.

"You look worse than me" Gwen noted. "Rough night?""Shut up" Rose mumbled and gingerly sat down.

"Feeling a bit sore, are we?" Gwen couldn't contain her laughter.

"No, just… Tired" Rose said, but her red cheek's gave her away. "My mum's not here, is she?""No, none of your lovely relatives have shown up" Owen said. "So what does it mean, "Time And Relative Dimension In Space"?"

"It's like a time machine, only sort of a spaceship as well.""Seriously" Tosh asked.

"So this Doctor, he's like what? A time traveller" Ianto asked.

"In a way, yeah" Rose said. "Where's Jack?" Ianto promptly left the room at the mention of him.

"What's up with him" Gwen asked.

"Don't know" Tosh said. "Jack is probably in his office."

"Are you alright, though?"

Rose turned to look at Gwen. "Yeah it's but been a really weird day."

"It's seven thirty" Tosh said.

"Weird morning, then!"

"Did you and mystery man get it on all night?"

"No, more like all morning." At the shocked looks on Tosh and Gwen's face, Rose corrected herself. "We fought, again. He's a complete idiot. He keeps berating me for working for Torchwood and acting like he's so above me. He just keep me hanging on, hoping he'll come around and change, but he never does."

"But just so we're clear, he is the guy you were talking about, right? The guy that was older and was a doctor, of sorts" Gwen asked.

Rose sighed and rested her head on her desk. She really didn't function well on three hours of restless sleep. "Yeah" she mumbled form her position. "Sorry I lied."

"Good morning everyone" Jack greeted them. "And Gwen and Rose, don't you two just look…. Special."

"You guys suck" Gwen said.

"Rose, I just had a chat with that lovely mother of yours. They'll be coming around shortly so you might want to get yourself sorted out?"

"Yeah, thanks for the warning" Rose said and left for the bathroom. If she looked anything like she felt right now, her mum was going to question her about it until the end of time.

"What are we going to do about them" Tosh asked. "They're not staying here, are they?" Tosh didn't mean to be rude, but Rose's mother was actually quite horrible.

"Fear not, I have an idea. I'll need to talk to Pete about it, but it's a pretty great idea, if I have to say so myself."

"What is it?"

"Pete used to run Torchwood in his own world and well, we haven't found anyone to take over Torchwood one in London."

"You want them to run Torchwood" Owen asked. "No offence, but they seem like complete imbeciles!"

"Why anyone find you offending is a mystery to me" Jack said to Owen. "Pete is actually quite clever, and Mickey as well…""You call him Mickey the Idiot" Gwen interrupted.

"Yeah, 'cause he is, but that doesn't mean he's not clever" Jack explained. "Just try to play nice when they all get here, thank you."

"They better not have touched any of my stuff" Owen grumbled.

Jack was sitting down on the harbour, just looking at the surrounding sights. The hub was complete chaos right now and it was starting to get to him. He didn't consider himself a control freak, not like the Doctor who definitely had a problem with letting go, but he liked being in control of things, especially the hub and his employees. And right now he felt like he didn't have control of anything and it annoyed him to no end.

"Enjoying the view?"

"I am now" Jack said with a smile as the Doctor sat down next to him. "Did you have fun last night?" He noticed how the Doctor's ears seemed to redden.

"Had a talk with Rose.""Just a talk?"

"Let's leave at that, shall we? I'll be leaving soon, I think.""You're leaving?""Yeah I'm not really one for domestics. Staying in the same place to long, it's not my style."

"So what? We're cramping your style" Jack asked.

"Something like that" the Doctor laughed.

"And Rose?""Rose will be staying.""Does she know that?""I think she does. In the end it was her choice."

"Somehow I find that hard to believe.""You can believe what you want, Jack, it doesn't really matter. Rose is a different person now, maybe I am too. So many things have happened."

"So that's it? You just up and leave with Martha Martha Jones and Donna Noble?"

"What's wrong with Martha and Donna?"

"They're not Rose" Jack said in a deflated tone and got up and left.

Rose was standing outside the hub, wondering if she should perhaps take up smoking or something like that, to calm her nerves, when the Doctor suddenly stood beside her.

"So this is it, yeah?"

"Unless you change your mind" he said, neither of them looking at each other.

"Why don't you change your mind?"

"You know I won't." She just nodded. "I do care about you."

"Yeah? You just don't love me."

"But I care. Isn't that good enough?"

Rose shook her head. "It's not enough. I want you to…. I want you to trust me, I want you to love me, be able to tell me that you love me. I want to know your name, know you, the real you! I want to hold your hand when you feel pain and I want you to trust me enough to share your sorrow…."

"It's not that easy, Rose. I can't change just like that."

"Not even for me?"

"No."

"That's not good enough" Rose said, tears falling down her cheeks. She finally turned to look at the Doctor and opened her mouth, but in the end chose not to say anything and just walked away.

The Doctor was left standing on his own, tears threatening to fall as well. They had fought that morning, again, about the fact that he couldn't fully commit to Rose. She had asked him to stay in Cardiff for a while, begged him to stay, because she couldn't just leave her family and friends after everything that had recently happened. And she felt responsible for taking of anything that might come through the rift, she needed to help with that. It had turned ugly after that. Rose so desperately wanted him to trust her and he wanted to, he really wanted to. It was just…. So hard for him, after so many years on his own and it was so overwhelming to have Rose here again that perhaps he was still a bit shocked. It was too much too soon and now… "It's over now" he whispered to himself.

AN: Thank you so much for the reviews, favourites and alerts for the last chapter. You guys are awesome It definitely brightened my dark mood, so please keep it up! Oh and I should mention this story is in fact going somewhere (the ending is already done) and there is a point to all this.