Byzantine Pyrrichios: Home

Jack reached for the laser and stuffed it in his pocket along with the button torches, then picked up the rocket launcher and settled it casually across his shoulder. He'd learned not to leave anything futuristic lying around, but there was no need to repack the crate – he'd used up all the missiles.

Rose picked up the scabbard from where she'd dropped it, but paused in the act of resheathing the sword, taking a good look at it for the first time. It was exquisite, worked in solid silver, polished to a mirror finish, with a huge red ruby set into one side of the hilt. She glanced up at Jack. "Do you need this back?"

"No. Go ahead and keep it, if you want."

She smiled, a touch of something behind it that he couldn't quite make out. "No, it's not for me. It's a sacred relic. The ksifos ths dikaiosynhs. The Sword of Justice."

Jack laughed, then stopped her again, and motioned towards her wrist. She took a deep breath, finished slipping the sword home, then reached a trembling finger to touch the recall button on the time jumper.

The backlight had turned from white to a soothing violet.

Her wide eyes flew back to Jack's, tears starting, pleading with him to say it, not daring to say it herself. Chuckling at her, he obliged.

"Congratulations, Rose. You did it. You can go home now."

"We did it," she corrected, and gave him the first full smile he'd ever had from this version of his old friend.

They didn't waste time below, but presented the sword to a trembling, awe-struck Emperor Constantine, then Rose pushed the activate button and flashed back to 21st-century London, hand-in-hand with Captain Jack Harkness.

^..^

They stayed that way while they calmly watched Corvantes' goon snatch her former self away from the park, then walked slowly towards the other side, the same direction she'd been strolling before the whole adventure began.

"Well, what now?" Jack finally asked, strangely reluctant to let go and move on, even though he knew Jared and the other flowers were waiting. Plenty of time on this end of history, he told himself again.

Rose stopped and turned towards her companion, giving him a level, measuring look.

"You've never asked me what I am here." She paused, but before he could echo the question back to her, she lifted her chin proudly and went on. "I'm a teacher. Or I'm about to be – I get my certificate next week. And I've already received two job offers."

She turned then and pointed across the park to a large, sprawling white building, which looked vaguely church-like to Jack. "One of them right there, in my old school, the state-run Orthodox neighborhood school. The other one was from a new experimental, private, secular school a few blocks down that way." Her waved a vague hand off to the right, then her face twisted with a rueful, amused grimace. "Up till five minutes ago," waving a hand behind them at the scene of the kidnapping so he knew what she meant, "it was a no-brainer."

"And now?"

She didn't answer, but shot him one last, level look, before the famous Rose supernova smile crept across her face. Without a word, she reached up and kissed his cheek, squeezed his hand a final time, then turned and walked away. To the right.

He stood there a moment, watching her go, then yelled after her, "Hey!" When she looked back, he grinned. "Keep in touch!"

She turned around fully, fists on her hips, mock-belligerent. "Not for an entire chest full of gold!" Then, laughing broadly, she waved her hands between them as if writing runes in the air. "Begone, foul Demon of the Night!"

And with that, she whirled around again, and began walking swiftly into her bright new future.