Doctor Who Fic: Universal Realignment (3/8)

[butterfly]

Story Title: Universal Realignment
Author: butterfly
Summary: The Doctor takes Martha and Jack for a trip before the final scenes of "Last of the Time Lords".
Pairing: Doctor/Rose; light amounts of unrequited Doctor/other folks and Jack/everyone.
Rating: At the moment, it's family-friendly. PG or PG-13 (at most).
Warning: AU after Doctor Who 3x13 - "Last of the Time Lords".
Disclaimer: All recognizable characters belong to Doctor Who and the BBC.

Part One is here; Part Two is here.

Universal Realignment

Jack resisted the urge to look back at Rose and Martha, who seemed to be having quite the bonding session.

Rose had a way about her, something in her smile that made a person want to make her happy. The old Doctor had felt it, the new one clearly did, and Jack could still remember the way her old boyfriend had looked at her when they had all met up in Cardiff – like the answer to the universe could be found in her eyes.

 

She was older now – if he had to guess, he’d say she was about three years older than the last time he had seen her, on the Game Station – but all the more beautiful for it. Her hair was shorter than it had been, but not by much, and it seemed to be lighter than he remembered. A different brand or just his memory playing tricks on him? She was wearing less make-up now, only a hint of eyeliner and mascara, and the lightest touch of a warm, pink lipstick. Her clothes were more serious, too – professional, but still attractive.

 

When the Doctor had told him that she had ended up working for the Torchwood on the other side, Jack had tried to picture her in either of the Torchwoods he’d spent time in – the memory of her had fit no more gracefully into the blue glass tower of Torchwood One than it had in his basement in Cardiff. He still couldn’t imagine it. Torchwood hadn’t marked her, not the way that it had marked everyone at Torchwood Three. She was still Rose, from what he could see, though he looked forward to further investigation.

 

Well, if the Doctor would let him near her. He had noticed the Doctor’s hand at Rose’s waist before she had pounced on him for a hug – and even in his joy at holding her in his arms, he had noticed the way the Doctor’s hand clenched into a useless fist as she’d left him behind, even for a moment.

 

Still, Jack didn’t imagine he would be any different if he were in the Doctor’s shoes. The Doctor would never try to cage Rose, but Jack was betting that part of him wished that he could, just to keep her safe.

 

And now, he was letting Rose and Martha have a good chat. If it hadn’t been obvious just that morning that the Doctor had no clue how Martha felt about him, Jack would have called it cruelty, plain and simple. As it was, the Doctor just seemed to be… trying not to be possessive of Rose.

 

After all, the Doctor probably couldn’t imagine any reason why Martha wouldn’t adore Rose. Rose was… well, the one person that the Doctor would want to take home when there was a doomed battle looming. Jack had come to terms with that knowledge years ago, that Rose had merited more consideration than sweet and young Lynda, than Jack himself, than anyone else on the Game Station.

 

Well, he thought he had, at least.

 

Much as he adored Rose – and he did – he couldn’t go as far as the Doctor did in praising her virtues. Rose was a lovely example of some of the best of twenty-first century Earth, no doubt about that, but so was Martha and the Doctor wasn’t giving her any second looks.

 

“Doctor!” Rose’s voice was giddy and sweet, just as he remembered it. He couldn’t stop himself from turning as the Doctor did, seeing Rose skip up ahead of Martha. He was better than the Doctor, though, who stopped dead in the corridor and spun about with a brilliant smile.

 

“Yes, Rose?” the Doctor asked, reaching out with his free hand. Rose took it, easy as breathing.

 

“Not to look a gift horse in the mouth or anything,” she said, and now he noticed that her words were a little crisper than when he’d known her before, more like the Doctor’s – this Doctor’s – way than her previous casual approach to them. Her ‘th’s sounded rather less like ‘f’s now. He was a bit disappointed by that, as he’d been fond of how her tongue wrapped around her accent, but it was still recognizably her. “But travelling between parallel worlds is supposed to be dangerous now. So, how come the Olpanilicks don’t have any problems doing it? Shouldn’t they be tearing a hole in the universe?”

 

“Oh, I have missed you,” the Doctor said in delight, slipping his sonic screwdriver into a pocket and then leaning up against the wall – still holding Rose’s hand. Once again, they were the only two people in the universe, completely unaware of anyone watching them. “You always had the best questions.”

 

“That’s not an answer,” she said archly, taking a step toward the Doctor.

 

“No, I don’t suppose it is,” the Doctor said, tugging at her hand and urging her closer still. It was clear to Jack what he was doing – savoring the moment, making it last as long as he could.

 

“Were they always like this?” Martha asked, right next to him now and very quiet. She didn’t really need to be – right now, the Doctor and Rose wouldn’t notice a bomb landing on them.

 

“From the first time I met them,” Jack recalled, seeing Rose sporting that coy smile of hers. “They’re a sweet couple, but definitely wrapped up in each other.”

 

“I thought, sometimes, that he was looking at me and seeing her, but I was wrong,” Martha’s voice was shaking, just a little, and Jack felt sorry for the kid. She hadn’t known what she was walking into, after all – before today, she hadn’t ever had the chance to see the way the pair of them focused in on each other. “He's never looked at me like that.”

 

“Come on, tell me,” Rose said, her light voice breaking through Martha’s soft words. She was nestled next to the Doctor on the wall now, pressing her side up against his. “You know you want to – you can be all technical and clever about it.”

 

“Well, if you insist,” the Doctor relented, stretching out the words. He pulled Rose’s hand over a bit as if he could get her any closer. Rose grinned in triumph and Jack saw the Doctor’s eyes slid to her mouth, where her tongue had peeked out, just a bit, and he glanced over to see that Martha had noticed that, too.

 

“It’s a matter of natural evolution versus an artificial intrusion,” the Doctor said – he was better at lecturing this time around, Jack noticed. He didn’t go off into as many tangents about the stupidity of the human race as he had before. “The Olpanilicks evolved over the course of thousands of years to snap from one dimension to another.”

 

“Does that mean… no Void?” Rose guessed.

 

“Precisely. They skip the Void entirely. They’re originally from a planet – an entire planet! Rose, oh, I wish you could have seen it – that was dimensionally transcendent. It’s part of their basic structure, written into their DNA, into everything that they are. After the Time War, their planet just… disappeared,” the Doctor said. “I’d assumed that when the dimensions split and there was no safe path between, they’d all died. Clearly, I was wrong about that.”

 

“Not to insult you or anything, but you seem to be wrong quite often, recently,” Rose told him, but there was no bite in her words and it was obvious that the Doctor wasn’t taking any offense, as he continued to grin at her, love-sick and unashamed of it. “Parallel worlds, species that aren’t quite dead yet, planets chained to black holes… the list goes on and on.”

 

“Nothing wrong with being wrong,” the Doctor said, cheerily.

 

Jack grinned, just about ready to jump into the conversation, when he heard an odd scratching noise from further down the hall, beyond the Doctor and Rose.

 

“Doctor,” he warned, but he was too late – Rose had heard, too, and she hauled on the hand the Doctor was holding and then let go, the Doctor falling down behind her in a heap as she stared down the shimmering lizard that had appeared.

 

“Now would be a good time to blow everything up,” Rose said, reaching to grip something in her pocket. The lizard hissed and Rose shifted to the side, standing between it and the Doctor.

 

“It doesn’t want to hurt you!” the Doctor shouted, flailing about at his pockets. “It won’t even know that you’re here, as long as you don’t get in its way.”

 

Another hiss, from behind, and Jack spun around, hauling out a gun to cover Martha, and three Olpanilicks ran right past her, didn’t even seem to register her presence as they converged on Jack, claws scraping loudly against the floor.

 

“There’s more of them over here,” Rose called, and Jack backed up, glancing behind to meet her eyes – they were both doing the same thing, it seemed, protecting the Doctor at all costs. Maybe Torchwood had touched Rose Tyler, after all. There was something of the soldier about her now. “Doctor, they don’t look friendly.”

 

Martha had backed up against the wall, and Jack could see her fingers tight around the edges of the mirror that the Doctor had given her. "Doctor," she said, warningly, "I'd suggest hurrying. I think they're about to-"

 

“They aren’t going to hurt-”

 

One of the lizards leapt toward Jack, claws outstretched – he shot at it and it let out an unearthly screech, falling back to the ground but appearing to be uninjured. There was a series of sharp barking noises from the lizards on Rose’s side, but he didn’t dare take his eyes off the ones facing him.

 

“They don’t seem too happy with us,” Jack said, ruefully, wishing that the Doctor had been right this time.

 

“This doesn’t make any sense,” the Doctor muttered. Jack hoped that he was still working on finding that screwdriver. “They aren’t hostile. They shouldn’t even be able to detect-”

 

He broke off, the sudden silence making Jack glance behind him. The Doctor was pale and guilty and Jack didn’t like the way that looked at all.

 

 “Doctor, what-” Rose looked back and down, her eyebrows drawn in concern at the look on the Doctor’s face. Jack was just about to break the silence when he saw movement behind her, heading toward her face.

 

He stepped around the Doctor, snatching at Rose and spinning down to the ground, covering her with his body and then – oh!

 

Their claws were ripping at him, tearing away clothes and then flesh. Lines of fire were being sliced into his back and it took everything in him to stay where he was, protecting the woman trembling under him and fighting to get free. She was so much more vulnerable than he was and he was not going to let her get hurt.

 

He gasped when he felt the sharp sudden shock of one of the lizards reaching his spinal cord and with everything he had left, he prayed that he could shield Rose until the Doctor could-

  

 

---

 

 

Jack blinked against the brightness, his head aching slightly as he recovered from… well, apparently he was recovering from being clawed to death by lizards that were supposed to have completely ignored him.

 

When he moved his head, he was aware of two things – a whimpering cry that broke into something close to hysterical sobs, and a warm female body holding him half-upright.

 

“Jack?” It was Rose’s voice, of course it was. She hadn’t known after all. He’d died right in front of her and come back – though from looking at the Doctor, he knew this wasn't her first time with the experience. Still, he wished that he could have told her about this before she’d seen it with her own eyes – he hadn’t wanted to cause her pain.

 

“I told you that he’d be fine.”

 

Jack’s vision cleared and he could see the Doctor leaning against the wall, staring down at the scorched remains of his sonic screwdriver on the floor in front of him.

 

“You did it,” Jack whispered, his voice still low and scratchy. “You sent them away.”

 

“Not soon enough,” the Doctor said. “I’m sorry, Jack.”

 

Jack tilted his head upward and saw Rose’s face, luminous over him, still wet from tears. He reached up with a shaking hand to wipe them away and she smiled softly at him, her eyes huge and sad. He wanted to kiss her, as he had back on the Game Station, to reassure her against the cold of night, but he didn’t think he had the coordination to manage it.

 

“I’m so sorry, Jack,” Rose murmured. “I remember now, and I’m so sorry.”

 

“You have nothing to be sorry about,” the Doctor said, his voice sharp. “You didn’t do anything wrong.”

 

The Doctor reached down and grasped Jack’s hand, helping him up with a firm grip. Rose stayed where she was, letting Jack stand above her.

 

“Rose,” Jack said, yanking his hand out of the Doctor’s and turning to look down at Rose, who was so still, so quiet. “Why are you sorry? I'm alive. I'm fine. No regrets.”

 

She stared down at her hands and breathed in a quick, sobbing breath. Jack didn’t dare look at the Doctor, afraid of what he might see there.

 

“Don't… don't lie, Jack. You aren’t happy,” she said, after a moment. “At the time… I didn’t even remember that I’d done it, but – I just wanted to save you.”

 

Jack crouched down, reaching out to take Rose’s hands into his. She peeked up at him through her hair, those big brown eyes of hers meeting his own, and he rocked back on his heels, stunned at the depth of her grief.

 

“Rose… talk to me.”

 

“It was wrong for you to die,” she said, her tone urgent and quiet and just for him. “I knew it the second that I arrived, but it was selfish, so selfish. You couldn’t die, but not… not because time needed you or anything noble like the Doctor would do. You couldn’t die because I was the reason that you were there. Don’t you see, Jack? If it hadn’t been for me, you never would have died to begin with – it was my fault.”

 

“Maybe,” Jack said, squeezing her hands gently. “I don’t regret it, Rose. That wasn't a lie. Dying for you – I’d have done it a thousand times over.” He chuckled, softly. “Maybe I have. It's been worth it."

 

"I hurt you," she said.

 

“You brought him back to life,” the Doctor said, breaking the spell. Jack glanced away from Rose, standing up and pulling her up to her feet at the same time. The Doctor was staring at Rose, all the wonder and terror of the universe on his face. “You looked into the Time Vortex and ended the War.”

 

“I knew what I wanted,” Rose said, her gaze briefly flicking over to the Doctor and then shying away again. "That's what the trick is – you have to be absolutely sure of what you want."

 

“And you saved him,” Jack finished, looking back over at Rose. She parted her lips to speak, and then she met his eyes steadily, her cheeks faintly flushed as she nodded.

 

“I’m sorry,” she said again and, this time, it wasn’t about saving him. However much she cared about him, she loved the Doctor to her bones. Jack didn’t – couldn’t – blame her for that.

 

“Well,” Martha said, clapping her hands together. Jack was probably the only person in the corridor who noticed how intensely uncomfortable she looked. “Maybe it’s time we headed back.”

 

“Yes, that sounds like a brilliant notion,” the Doctor said, far too brightly. “Does anyone remember where we parked?”

 

The Doctor always did know how to break the tension.

 

“As a matter of fact, I happen to have the directions right here,” Jack said, bringing up the correct information on his wristband. “Though I can tell you right now that we start by going back the way we came.”

 

They all headed off, though not exactly together. Rose still seemed lost in her own world and the Doctor was busy staring at her, while Martha spent her time staring at the Doctor.

 

And Jack was left to look after the lot of them and make sure that they didn’t wander off in the wrong direction.

 

It took almost an hour to get back to the TARDIS and Jack didn’t think any of them spoke more than five words during that entire time.

 

“Jack, Martha – you should check out some of the rooms. There's some fascinating stuff in this old ship of mine,” the Doctor said when they finally entered the ship, still not tearing his eyes away from Rose. “I’ll meet you back here in a bit.”

 

Then the Doctor reached out his hand toward Rose, who took it with an almost numb look on her face, and he led her out of the main room, down the hallway that Jack remembered leading to where Rose’s room had been.

 

Martha watched them go, her eyes dark and wide.

 

“You were lying there," she said. "You were dead. And he was more worried about whether or not she’d got scraped up a bit.”

 

“He also knew that I’d get better,” Jack said, not letting Martha see the part of him that wanted to flinch at her words. “He doesn’t have any guarantees when it comes to her.”

 

“You’re wrong about that,” Martha replied. “Rose – maybe she's just human, like me, but I don’t think there’s anything she wouldn’t do for him.”

 

“You seem to have become her advocate,” Jack teased.

 

“Ever since I met him, he’s been so sad and alone.” Martha sounded as if she were feeling her way around the words, trying to decide which ones felt best. “What I wanted, more than anything, was to fix that. I wanted to see him happy. She makes him happy, Jack. What sort of friend would I be if I ignored that?”

 

Not much of one, Jack knew.

 

“So, Martha Jones,” Jack said. “How long did you say you’ve been on the TARDIS?”

 

She paused for a moment, clearly thrown by the change in subject, and then she gathered herself up again.

 

“About four months – I've actually spent more of my time with the Doctor not being on the TARDIS.” She tilted her head at him, and her earrings caught the light, sparkling green and gold. “What’s that got to do with anything?”

 

“Well, I was just wondering if you wanted to swap tours,” Jack said. “You show me the rooms you know and I’ll show you the ones that I knew, back when I was on the crew.”

 

“That sounds like an amazing plan. Top of the line.” She beamed at him, and his breath stopped for just a moment, the way it always did when a beautiful person looked at him the right way. “Did you want to go first?”

 

“I think that I do,” Jack said, holding out his hand toward Martha. She studied him for a moment and then, with a determined and promising look, she placed her hand inside his. “And I know just the place to start.”

 

Martha would, Jack decided, absolutely adore this one little room that he’d discovered during his first week on the TARDIS, when the Doctor and Rose had been too caught up in their discovery of dancing to pay much attention to him.

 

Martha’s hand felt perfect, right here and right now, and Jack grinned at the feeling.

It was moments like this that made life worth living.

---

Part Four

Comments

[rynne.livejournal.com]

I haven't commented on the last two chapters, and I don't have time right now to do the kind of review I'd like to, but I just wanted to let you know that I'm adoring this fic. :D

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I'm so glad that you're enjoying it and if you ever feel like doing a longer review, I'd love to read it.

[wanderlustlover]

This is truly amazing series so far!

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I'm glad you're liking it!

[shinyopals.livejournal.com]

Another lovely chapter.

While I can't say I'm a huge Martha/Jack person, you do do it rather well from inside of his head.

The Doctor/Rose bits were lovely, as ever.

I'm interested to see how/why the Doctor was so wrong about the Olpanilicks!

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

Thank you.

While I can't say I'm a huge Martha/Jack person, you do do it rather well from inside of his head.

Jack is so good at seeing the attractive bits of every person in the universe. I kinda love him for that.

The Doctor/Rose bits were lovely, as ever.

Thank you!

I'm interested to see how/why the Doctor was so wrong about the Olpanilicks!

Hee. All will be explained.

[mirageofmae.livejournal.com]

Yeah! Another chapter! =) It's interesting seeing Rose/Doctor from other characters POV. Lovely, can't wait for more.

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

Thank you! And it's kinda fun to think about how the Doctor and Rose look from other people's perspectives.