Captain Jack Harkness (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
captgreatcoat) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
ten_fwd2015-05-12 11:28 pm
captgreatcoat) wrote in ten_fwd2015-05-12 11:28 pm
Entry tags:
The Captain, in the bar
Nobody's seen much of Jack lately. He's been quieter, more subdued, more prone to keeping to himself, shoving his hands in the pockets of his coat and ....
Rose would have called it brooding. Gwen probably would, too.
Rose is gone. Gone back to her time, perhaps. But who knows? She'd just disappeared. He should know better than this, now, to be so attached to people, but Gwen would say that's what keeps people human, and human is something he doesn't always feel. And Rose Tyler was one of the best people he'd known in so many lifetimes' worth of living. She'd taken a con-man and helped show him how to care again, how to live, how to love. She'd had adventures with him across time and space, been his best friend and his best girl though nothing more than friendship had ever officially passed between them, at least not in the confines of 21st century Britain's understanding of relationships.
Rose is gone, and he doesn't know if he's sent her to her death by not warning her.
To anyone who truly knew Jack, the sight of him in his Second World War era coat perched on a barstool with a glass of brandy might seem ... out of place.
He's not breaking his self-imposed not-drinking-unless-he-really-needs-to rule, though. It's synthehol.
He'd probably be better off talking to someone.
Rose would have called it brooding. Gwen probably would, too.
Rose is gone. Gone back to her time, perhaps. But who knows? She'd just disappeared. He should know better than this, now, to be so attached to people, but Gwen would say that's what keeps people human, and human is something he doesn't always feel. And Rose Tyler was one of the best people he'd known in so many lifetimes' worth of living. She'd taken a con-man and helped show him how to care again, how to live, how to love. She'd had adventures with him across time and space, been his best friend and his best girl though nothing more than friendship had ever officially passed between them, at least not in the confines of 21st century Britain's understanding of relationships.
Rose is gone, and he doesn't know if he's sent her to her death by not warning her.
To anyone who truly knew Jack, the sight of him in his Second World War era coat perched on a barstool with a glass of brandy might seem ... out of place.
He's not breaking his self-imposed not-drinking-unless-he-really-needs-to rule, though. It's synthehol.
He'd probably be better off talking to someone.
no subject
Rose, as far as he knew, was living happily in Pete's world with Jackie, Pete, and the Meta-crisis Doctor. She finally had everything that could make her happy. Eleven couldn't think of anyone else who deserved that more than Rose.
"The other me can't find out about that . It might not have happened for him yet."
no subject
He stared, as though studying the Doctor's face would tell him something, confirm or deny what he was being told.
"I know," he said, eventually. "I haven't told him anything."
He'd wanted to. He'd wanted to ask. He'd wanted to rail against him for letting anything happen to Rose. But he didn't need to, now, and all he could do was stare, still grinning.
But that wasn't enough. It was awkward, to hug a man sitting next to him at a bar, but Jack did his best, because Rose was alive. Disappeared, whatever that meant, but alive.
"I was so sure she was dead."
no subject
He knew, just what the meta crisis Doctor said to her at Bad Wolf Bay, and he was glad for it. She needed to hear it, and the part of that man that was him needed to say it. Really, properly, say it. To this day, he still had difficulty with that word.
no subject
She did. More than anyone he knew, Rose Tyler deserved to be happy. And they'd been happy, once, the three of them. It had been belonging, family, things Jack had thought were never going to be his again.
It had hurt, to have that back, to lose it again. But there he was, with a Doctor who could hug him, could set aside that prejudice against what he'd become.
"Thank you, Doctor."
For telling him. But, more, for whatever part he'd played in making her safety the truth, rather than her death.
no subject
Especially after everything she unknowingly did for him. Without Rose, the Doctor was sure he'd have spiraled down some long dark path.
As far as Jack went, maybe this Doctor was a little less sensitive to the 'fixed point' part of him. He was, after all his friend. And Eleven did stop by one or two of those stag parties over the years.
"You're welcome. Just don't tell the other mes."
no subject
"It'll be our secret."
After all, the fact that she'd been on that list of the dead was a secret, too, one he'd hated not sharing with the other Doctor, the one who'd been here with Rose, but ... that was the trouble with time travel. Some things, you couldn't share.
"I can live with thinking I'll never see her again if I just know that."
no subject
He was choosing to forget what happened afterward. For those few moments it was fun and everyone was happy.
"It's what happened. Rose and her family are all happy."
no subject
Not that he'd ever had the pleasure of really meeting Jackie Tyler. But he'd heard enough about her to have an idea how much of London she'd have torn apart if she'd thought Rose had died.
(As much as Jack wanted to.)
"A happy ending for the Tylers, then."
He smiles into his glass, because it reminds him of a night long ago, when the Doctor had shouted that just this once, everybody lived. He hadn't been there to hear it, but in the giddy euphoria afterwards, he'd heard about it.
He can handle a happy ending for Rose.
no subject
"When was the last time you saw me?"
It was best to get a handle on timelines now.