Author: Wendy Richards
Email: wendy@thedoctorandme.org
Rated: PG

He skids to a halt. Right in front of him, it's vanishing.

Fading, blurring, becoming transparent... and it's gone. His home. The place that had become his, a place to belong. Gone.

The Doctor's left him?

But why...? It doesn't make sense. Why would he just leave?

Okay, he died. He knows that. Remembers it vividly, and still has the pain in his chest to show for it. But he's alive. Somehow, he is living again. How that's so he has no idea, but the Doctor has to be behind it somehow.

And yet why would the Doctor give him back his life, only to abandon him on this godforsaken satellite, surrounded by dead bodies?

Dead bodies... and vanished Daleks.

Just what happened here?

Pull yourself together, Jack!

He walks, still slow and awkward and in pain, to the main control panel. Looks up and out the window. Where are the Dalek ships? There were hundreds of them out there. They've just disappeared.

Taking all the Daleks with them?

But something about that doesn't make sense. A moment's thought tells him what.

If the Doctor activated the Delta wave, the Daleks would be dead. So, does this mean that the Doctor didn't do it after all? Didn't finish it in time?

But, if he didn't finish it in time, he'd be dead. The Daleks would have killed him.

But the Doctor can't be dead, because he left in the TARDIS.

Yet that doesn't make sense, either. Whether or not the Doctor activated the Delta wave, he should be dead. Because the wave would have killed him, too. Or the Daleks would have killed him.

Something else is puzzling him. Right in front of where he'd been lying slumped, he'd seen that ash. He'd been the last man standing, apart from the Doctor, so it couldn't have been human ash.

Dalek ash? Dalek remains?

So did the Doctor set off the Delta wave after all?

Either way, there's only one conclusion he can draw from the evidence.

He doesn't know how it is that he's alive, when he remembers being killed, when he can still feel the pain in his chest from where the Dalek death-ray struck him. But that's neither here nor there.

Because the inescapable conclusion he has to draw is that the Doctor is dead.

*******

"You all right, Rose?"

"What?" She blinks. Wasn't paying attention again. Mind wandering. "Sorry, Doctor. You were saying something?"

"Just wondering if you're still with me. You looked like we'd left your brain behind on Raxicoricofallipatorious." He leans back from the console, hands deep in his trouser pockets, and studies her.

God. Raxicoricofallipatorious. Almost the last place they went before...

Before he died. Before he became someone else right in front of her.

And before they lost Jack.

She's getting used to the new him. She really is. He's still the Doctor, after all. He's proved that to her in many ways. Okay, he looks and sounds completely different. He even behaves differently - the previous him would never have hugged her mum, much less Mickey. And as for coming to Christmas dinner... He'd have just hung around in the TARDIS on his own, waiting for her. Or, worse, given her an ultimatum like he did before.

He's different, but he's the same man. Well, alien, really. Still the Doctor.

"Sorry." She smiles at him. It's very easy to smile at him. Well, it always was. Still is now. "Was just thinkin'."

"Dangerous, that." And he grins at her, winking at the same time. He's good at winking, now. Makes him look... oh, mischievous and youthful, and very, very sexy.

"So." He sobers now, his expression concerned. "Anything I should worry about? Anything you want to talk about?"

She knows what he's thinking. That it's about him. About the fact that he changed. That he's not the same any more. That she's still having trouble accepting it, and him.

But she's not. She's really not. She meant it when she said she wanted to come with him again, and she meant it even more when she took his hand. They're a team. They're still inseparable. At least, that's how she feels about it, and she hopes he does too. She thinks he probably does. The way he looked at her when he said he'd love her to come, and the sort of anxious expression on his face when he asked whether she was saying she didn't want to come... yeah. He still cares about her, just as much as he did before. She doesn't even have to wonder about that.

No, that's not what she was thinking about.

"Was just wonderin'... Doctor, you never told me what really happened on Satellite Five. I know I went back. But I don't remember getting there - well, only these kind of hazy images. I think I remember walking out of the TARDIS an' seeing you, an' there's music and a strange voice, an' gold. Lots of gold, kind of like dust. What happened to the Daleks?"

He extends his hand to her. She takes it.

"It's complicated, Rose. But this time the Time War's really over."

Complicated? "You're doin' it again, Doctor!"

"Doing what?" he protests.

"Finding excuses not to tell me things. `Complicated'. Like I'm too stupid to understand! An' you know I'm not."

"No." He smiles gently. "I know you're not. You're far more intelligent than a lot of your species I've known. And you're also one of the bravest people I've met."

The compliment warms her, as it always did in the past when he paid her a rare compliment. "Doesn't feel like I'm brave, sometimes. Didn't feel like it when you sent me away an' I couldn't get back to you."

He frowns. "S'pose you're angry with me for that."

"I should be." She glares at him. "Yeah, I am. How could you trick me like that? And sending me away without even saying goodbye, when you knew you were goin' to die? Didn't you know I'd rather die with you than have to go back an' live a borin' life on Earth knowing you're dead?"

His expression is sober, and his brown eyes - still a shock to see brown instead of blue­ - gaze into hers. "Yeah. I knew all that, Rose. But it was also about what I wanted. And I wanted you to live."

Without him? Has he any idea what that would have done to her?

"But you came back, anyway," he continues. "So it didn't do me much good, did it? Blimey, I got a shock when the TARDIS reappeared! Teach me to underestimate you, I s'pose."

She waits, hoping he'll say more.

"Yeah, so you came back. Do you remember opening up the heart of the TARDIS?"

She remembers trying. And she tells him so.

"Right. You know, I should be furious with you for mangling my TARDIS like that." And he grins suddenly. "I'm not, though. Cause it actually worked. You got back to Satellite Five. And, because you had the Time Vortex inside you, you killed the Daleks. Blew them out of existence, just as if they were dust."

She did?

"The Time Vortex?" she stammers. She's heard that before...

"Yeah. That's what's inside the heart of the TARDIS."

"That's what you said before you... before you exploded right in front of me," she says slowly. "That you absorbed the Time Vortex an' no-one's supposed to do that. But... if I'm the one who had it, then...?"

The picture's slowly beginning to dawn. She thinks she understands now why he died.

"You took it from me. Didn't you?" She stares at him, eyes wide.

"Yes. I had to, Rose. It would have killed you." And his eyes reveal pain now at the memory. "I took it from you to save your life. Just as you saved my life by taking it inside you in the first place."

"God... Doctor, it's my fault that you died!"

"Rose..." In an instant, he's beside her, gathering her into his arms. It's the first time he's hugged her in this new body, and it feels different... yet, in another way, it feels exactly the same. Because he still feels like her Doctor. There's still the same sense of warmth and comfort and home and love in his arms. None of that has changed.

"It's not your fault. It was my choice. And, let's face it, dying's not exactly as permanent for me as it'd be for you. So, unless you're really saying you can't stand the new me, it's not a problem. Is it?"

No, that's not a problem. "No, `s still you. I know that. I just... I can't get my head around you dying for me?"

He shrugs. "What better reason?"

And she can't answer that. Because she knows that her own answer would have been exactly the same. Because she would have died for him, too. And the way he's looking at her as he holds her tells her that he knows.

"So," he says, releasing her and stepping back. "That's what happened. But here we all are, safe and sound and alive and ready to begin new adventures. Right? So all's well that ends well, isn't it?"

It's not, though. Because there's something else. Someone else.

"Doctor."

"What? Oh, I don't like that tone," he says, his mouth turning down at the corners. "What have I done now? Or is it something I forgot to do? Did I forget to thank your mum for dinner? It wasn't bad, was it? Shame about the carrots, though. And we never did get around to pudding, did we?"

God. Typical Doctor! She's got serious stuff on her mind, and all he's thinking about - or pretending to think about - is overcooked carrots!

"Jack."

His expression sobers. "Oh."

"What happened to Jack, Doctor?"

And now he looks very sad. He runs a hand through his unruly hair - reminding her that she's itching to do that some time, if there's any chance he'll let her. Though he never used to mind her touching him.

Forget his hair. There's more important stuff to think about. Jack.

"I'm sorry, Rose." His voice is soft, kind, apologetic, the way people are when they're trying to break bad news. "I thought you realised. Jack's dead."

Well, she knew he had to be. He'd said goodbye to them, after all. He'd made it clear he expected to die. And the Doctor hadn't denied it.

But part of her had been wondering, hoping that maybe she'd come back in time to save him, too. Yet when she'd woken up in the TARDIS afterwards he'd been nowhere to be seen.

She bites her lip and just looks at the Doctor. "You... you're sure?"

"I heard him die." She almost doesn't hear him, he speaks so softly. "He was talking to me over the comms system. He told me I had twenty seconds maximum. And then I heard a Dalek say `Exterminate', and he said `I kinda figured that'... and that was it, Rose. I heard him die."

"Oh, god..."

The pain on his face mirrors her own. And this time, tears already pricking at her eyes, she is the one who reaches for him.

*******

So, he is the only one left alive on this barren satellite. Right.

If the TARDIS had still been here, he'd have a means of getting out of here. But it's not. He doesn't quite understand that, but assumes it's something to do with the Doctor being dead. After all, the Doctor did say a couple of times that the TARDIS is telepathic, and he knows, from things Rose said and one or two things the Doctor himself let slip, that the Doctor had telepathic abilities as well. Makes sense that Time Lord and ship would be linked in some way.

So, with the Doctor dead, the TARDIS just... disappears? Probably.

Well. It's not as if he can't come up with a way of getting himself off the satellite. The extrapolator's still here, after all. And there's a lot of tech around the place, tech from many millennia after he was born. Some of it is unfamiliar to him, but he can make a pretty good guess at how to work even that.

Yeah, he can work out a way of getting out of here. But then what? Where to go? What to do?

He's back to being on his own, surviving on nothing but his wits and charm.

Last time he was in that situation, he became a con-man. At the time, he thought it was an okay life. Not perfect, not anything to be proud of, though he never actually hurt anyone.

He can't do that again. Not now. Not now he's known better.

He was with the Doctor and Rose for less than two months. Yet, in that time, he became a different person. They made him a different person. He became the kind of guy who would die for a cause he believes in - who would die for people he loves.

He almost died for them once before - in London, in 1941, when that bomb had to be diverted away from the crash site. He hadn't exactly realised, when he'd done his great big macho hero bit, that he was embarking on a suicide mission. At times, since, he's wondered if he'd still have done the same thing if he had known.

Maybe. Because there was something about that sparky blonde, more naïve than she'd at first appeared, yet not as stupid as he then assumed, and about that dark, enigmatic alien who seemed to be able to see right through to his soul. Something he couldn't understand then, and is only beginning to understand now, had made him want to do anything he could to impress them. To make them see him in a better light.

No. He can't go back to being a conman.

What, then?

He can't go back to the Time Agency. Though that's a moot point, anyway. He's stranded here in the year 200,100. Make his way to Earth - whatever's left of the planet, that is - and get a job, maybe? They'll need experienced people to help with the recovery effort, or at least he thinks so.

And that's it?

The Doctor's dead. There's not much else he can do.

Rose. What happened to Rose?

The Doctor sent her home. So she's back in 2006 or whatever year she came from. And... oh, god, she has no idea. She doesn't know the Doctor's dead.

Though she's not stupid. She'll have figured it out. He took her home, after all. He said goodbye to both her and the Doctor. She knew that he expected to die. She'll know.

Rose stranded in 2006. Him stranded in 200,100. He's not sure who he feels sorriest for. Sure, Rose has her mum and Mickey and her friends, but he got to know her well enough to know that that life isn't what she wants any more. Yeah, she was hurt that Mickey'd found another girl, but she told him afterwards that it was more that Mickey hadn't told her. And she felt bad about the way she'd treated him, knowing that she'd never go back to him, yet never actually telling him it was over.

Rose won't be happy where she is, either.

It would've been some comfort if they could've been together. Oh, sure, it wouldn't be the same without the Doctor. But he loves Rose, too. Yeah, she's young and in some ways she's still naïve. There's far more to her than that, though. Maybe he can't see himself actually settling down with her - but then, he can't see himself doing that with anyone, though if the Doctor had ever suggested it... But they could have stayed together for a while. At least for long enough to get used to it all.

But she's there and he's here, and he's got no way of...

Wait.

Slowly, he looks down at his wristcom.

Her phone number is programmed into it. He could call her. Now. He could call her mobile and speak to her. From almost two hundred thousand years in the future, he could talk to her.

Yeah. He could call her. But is it the right thing to do? Would it just hurt her too much?

He lowers his wrist and sighs. No. He can't do that to her, even if hearing her voice would mean so much to him right now.

No. He has to leave her alone, to get on with her life. And he needs to get on with his.

*******

"There's one thing that still doesn't make sense, Doctor."

He's moved away from her now and is standing by the console again, gazing at the screen. "Yeah?"

"I remember you said something about Jack bein' busy rebuilding the Earth. So if he's doin' that, how can he be dead?"

"I said that?" He looks puzzled and very doubtful.

"You don't remember? It was right after you regenerated. You started to go kind of crazy - you said the regeneration was goin' wrong. An' I said we should go back for Jack, an' you said he was busy."

He shakes his head. "No, don't remember that at all." His expression is apologetic. "Regeneration sickness can do that, Rose. I was delirious. Didn't know what I was saying half the time. I've no idea why I said that about Jack, but he's dead. I'm sorry."

She nods and wraps her arms around herself, trying not to cry.

He was her friend. More than a friend; maybe a brother, but more than that, too. She loved him.

It's so unfair. They survived. The two of them are okay - both alive and well, even if the Doctor did die and changed. Jack died. He went off to his death for them - to try to save the Earth, sure, but also because of them. She still remembers - will never forget, now - the last thing he said to her, just to her.

"Rose. You are worth fighting for."

And he kissed her.

He kissed the Doctor, too. That surprised her at first, though it shouldn't have. After all, she knew that he went for men as well as women. She saw him flirt with enough blokes - including the Doctor - to be reminded on a regular basis. And the Doctor flirted back.

She's never really had an answer to what she's been wondering about the Doctor for a very long time: whether he does things like kissing and sex. Oh, they had that conversation about dancing that wasn't really about dancing, but he'd been vague enough that she couldn't be sure about what he was saying.

Jack kissed him. He kissed Jack. But saying goodbye is different.

Though he didn't kiss her to say goodbye... except that he was tricking her. He wouldn't have wanted her to know what he was doing.

She'd have loved just one kiss from him - from her Doctor, her first Doctor, as he was then. And a kiss on her forehead does not count.

But at least he's alive. Jack isn't.

"I'm glad I got to say goodbye, at least," she says quietly.

"Yeah." He meets her gaze again. "He knew what he was doing, Rose. He did it willingly."

"I know that." She nods. "I... I didn't want to admit it at the time. Even when he kissed me."

The Doctor smiles suddenly, ruefully. "I always knew he'd find a way to do that, you know. Even though I warned him off enough times."

Yeah, he had. Including right here in this console room, the night Jack joined them for the first time. "He kissed you too."

"Yes." And suddenly the Doctor's smile turns faintly bashful.

You kiss him, but you won't kiss me.

"What?" Now he's raising an eyebrow at her.

"Nothing."

"Rose." He sighs and turns to look directly at her. "I know that expression. What have I done now? Or not done? Or forgotten to do?"

"Doesn't matter."

"Rose."

"It doesn't, all right? Look, Jack's dead an' I wish he wasn't an' I can't believe I'm feeling jealous of `im when he's dead!"

"Jealous?" He gazes at her through narrowed eyes. "Why?"

She shrugs. "Told you. `S nothing. `S stupid."

The old him would have let it go. When the new him walks over and takes her by the elbows and turns her to face him, she's surprised. "Maybe you should let me decide that."

There's something about the way he's looking at her, as if he'll understand no matter what it is, that makes her just say it. "Cause you kissed `im an' you never kissed me."

His eyes widen just for an instant. And then he smiles a little. "Strictly speaking, he kissed me."

That's being pedantic. She knows it, and she's damn sure he does, too. Because he didn't push Jack away. She's pretty sure he kissed him back.

"And I did kiss you." He gives her a wicked grin. So different from the evil grins she's used to from his old face. This one isn't darkly sexy, designed to make her shiver. It makes her want to laugh with him. It makes her think about all sorts of wicked things she could do to him - or with him.

"When?" she demands. He's not talking about when he kissed her forehead, surely?

His expression sobers. "You don't remember it. I did it to take the Time Vortex away from you."

Oh. So it wasn't because he wanted to. It was because he had to. She actually feels her face fall.

And then he's smiling again. "Course, there were other ways of doing it, but..." He doesn't finish, but she thinks she knows what he's saying.

Now he's looking intently at her, and she thinks that maybe he's thinking what she is, and she stretches up a little, leaning towards him, and he's bending his head, and she can feel his breath soft against her face...

*******

It wouldn't hurt, would it? Calling her?

It's not as if he needs to tell her anything that will hurt her. He just wants to hear her voice. Any voice, actually. A friendly voice.

The biggest problem is the logistics of time, though. If he does call her, when will he find her? In their timeline, as opposed to the timeline of 200,100 and 2006, now? Or a week ago? A month ago? Before she even met him? Or days, weeks, months from now? When she's settled back into her life on Earth, mourning the Doctor, and maybe him, too, as dead?

Dangerous. One way could lead to her finding out things about her future that she shouldn't, that might change her future. She could die as a result of one simple, selfish phone call. Another way could re-open old grief, when she's on the way to learning to live with it.

Best if he doesn't. Best if he just gets on with finding his way off this satellite, getting back to some sort of civilisation and some sort of a life.

Examine the tech. He already knows what's available in the front control panel. Time to see what the Doctor was working on. What he used to build the Delta wave.

The Doctor.

A lump fills his throat as he moves over to where the two of them were working. Somewhere here the Doctor died.

The floor is covered with little piles of ash. Has to be Dalek remains. Has to be the effect of the Delta wave. Though that still doesn't explain how he is alive.

Little piles of ash. And, just as Rose was reduced, or so they thought, to a little pile of ash mere hours earlier, so has the Doctor been. One of those piles is him.

His legs refuse to hold him up any longer. He collapses to his knees, and finds that his fingers are trailing through ash. The Doctor, earlier; him now. As the Doctor mourned Rose, so he mourns the Doctor.

There's a lump in his throat as he visualises the tall, dark, sometimes saturnine Time Lord as he was the last time he saw him. Standing very close to here, a fixed and not very convincing smile on his face, his eyes holding the knowledge that death was coming for all of them.

The tender, but too-brief, kiss he got in response to his own.

The Doctor, dead. He and Rose, alive. But it's all for nothing if the Doctor's dead.

He was willing to die to save Rose. To save the Doctor. Now, if he could, he might even swap places.

His gaze falls to his wristcom again. And his fingers tap in a sequence on the keypad.

He holds his breath. It rings.

*******

She's holding her breath. His lips are coming closer, closer... Hers part in anticipation...

Her phone rings.

The Doctor jumps back as if stung.

Startled, frustrated, she stares at him. He stares back, expression confused, then he blinks. "You should answer that."

"Oh." She fumbles. Her mobile's in her pocket. She takes it out and automatically looks at the display before hitting answer. And then she stares, and her heart skips a beat.

"It's Jack!"

The Doctor moves like lightning, and is staring at the screen beside her. Her shock is mirrored on his face. "You don't know when he made that call," he says then, quietly. "Could've been weeks ago."

Her hand is shaking. "Yeah, I know." Jack's dead. And she's going to hear his voice again.

She takes a deep breath to calm herself as she thumbs the answer button. This is Jack from their past. He could even be on the Game Station when they first got there, searching for her.

"Hi, Jack." She's proud that her voice doesn't shake one bit. The Doctor is standing right next to her, head bent towards her so he can hear.

"Rose! Great to hear your voice!" He sounds so clear he could be standing right next to her. And there's something in the way he says that, a note in his voice that sounds sad.

The Doctor's gaze is on her. She knows what he's warning her about. Don't say anything that could let Jack know his future. Don't risk changing history. And she knows that's important. She might save Jack's life, but she could end up letting the Daleks win.

"You too," she tells him. And it is. So good. "Where are you?"

He hesitates. After a few moments, he says, "Kinda difficult to say."

"What, you don't know?"

"Hey, sure I know." And that's the Jack she remembers, laughing, sounding so sure of himself.

"Okay, then, where are you?"

"Hey, you tell me where you are."

"I asked you first!"

Oh, the teasing - she remembers it so well. He was always ready with a joke; always knew just how to cheer her up if she was down. He could even, sometimes, tease the Doctor out of his bad moods.

He's quiet again for a moment. "Thing is, Rose, I don't know when you are. We kinda got... separated. And we might be in the same time, or we might not. So I don't want to end up accidentally telling you something that's in your future."

Oh, god, Jack... if only you knew...

"Actually - " Her voice breaks and she has to halt for a moment. "I'm more likely to be in the future from where you are. So `s better if you tell me, okay?"

*******

Why is she so convinced she has to be in the future from his timeline?

But - wait. He can hear the pain in her voice. This has to be Rose after the Doctor took her home. She knows the Doctor's dead. Actually, she thinks he's dead, too. Of course she does. He told her he was going off to die. He said goodbye.

So she's talking to a man she thinks is dead. No wonder she's upset.

Will it hurt her more or less to know that he's alive? That he survived, but he's stuck almost two hundred thousand years in her future so she's unlikely ever to see her again? Well, unless he manages to get a timeship, or talk someone into giving him a ride back to 2006.

Will it hurt her too much to know that he survived but the Doctor didn't?

He's no fool. Sure, Rose loves him, but she loved the Doctor more. Far more. The two of them were more in love with each other than he's ever seen any two people before. The crazy thing was that they never actually did anything about it.

He lets some ash spill through his fingers again. And he makes his decision.

"I'm on the Game Station, Rose. You know what I'm talking about?"

"Yeah. I do."

There's definitely a choke in her voice. This is Rose from after the Doctor took her home.

He swallows. "He took you home, right?"

"Yeah." And now he's convinced he can hear a sob.

"Rose." He's trying to choke back the lump in his own throat. "I... It's all over. The Daleks are gone. The..." He trails off. How does he tell her that the Doctor is dead?

He takes a deep breath. "I don't know how, but I'm alive. I'm the only person left alive on this whole satellite."

*******

She almost drops the phone.

Jack's alive?

But the Doctor heard him die. He said so.

She turns to stare at the Doctor. He's staring at her, his expression disbelieving.

He reaches for the phone, but she shakes her head. Covering the mouthpiece, she murmurs, "You can't, Doctor! He won't recognise your voice."

He can't be alive. It's just a misunderstanding. Has to be.

"Jack. Tell me that again, yeah? What happened?"

There's another pause. And then, haltingly, he says, "Everyone died, Rose. The Daleks came - they killed everyone. Apart from the Doctor, I was the last man standing. Then they killed me. And I don't know how, but about a half-hour ago I woke up. Alive."

He pauses again. She's stunned into silence.

"I know I was dead, Rose. I know it sounds crazy, but I remember dying. And my chest still hurts where the bolt hit me, so I know I'm not imagining it. Anyway, looks like I'm the only one alive here. The Doctor..." She hears him draw in a shuddering breath. "Rose, I'm so sorry. The Doctor's dead, too."

She's about to protest at that, to tell him that the Doctor's alive and well and standing next to her. But the Doctor shakes his head vigorously, waving with his hands as well. She gives him a wide-eyed, questioning stare. But he's already moving away, towards the controls.

He's taking them back to get Jack. And, for the first time since he told her that Jack was dead, she smiles.

*******

"I'm sorry, Rose," he says again. He knows how much this will hurt her. Even if she's already resigned herself to the Doctor's death, to know that he survived and the Doctor didn't has to make it far worse.

She still doesn't speak.

"Anyway," he continues quickly, feeling his heart sink again. This conversation needs to end. Obviously it's too hard for her to talk to him, in the circumstances. "I guess I just wanted to say hi. And make sure that you're okay - that you're safe."

"I'm fine." And now she's smiling. He can hear it in her voice. Putting on a brave face for him? "Jack, what are you going to do?"

"I'll be fine Don't worry about me." For her benefit, he forces a grin to his face. She'll hear it in his voice. "You know me and technology. Few hours, I'll have rigged up something to get myself off this satellite. Make my way to Earth, find somebody who needs my talents... I'll be fine."

"Yeah." She's still smiling. "I know you will."

"You take care, now, Rose." He has to say goodbye. To let her go. And delete her number from his wristcom, just so he'll never be tempted to call her again. Kinder to her that he leave her to get on with her life.

"You too. And, Jack?"

"Yeah?"

The choke's back in her voice suddenly. "I love you. Should've told you before."

"You didn't need to. I know. Love you, too." He swallows. God, he has to end this. Now. Talking to her is too much a reminder of all he's lost. All they've lost, too, with the Doctor dead.

It's getting worse, too. Now, his subconscious is playing tricks on him. He thinks he's hearing the sound of the TARDIS materialising.

Imagination. Definitely his imagination.

"Gotta go, Rose. You take care, you hear?" Goodbye, Rose. Have a great life. See you in hell, maybe, one of these years.

"See ya, Jack." And then he just hears the buzzing of a disconnected call.

Except that he's still hearing the TARDIS's engines. And that's impossible.

*******

The Doctor looks up at her. "Almost there. Just another few seconds."

"Good." She swallows. Although she's happier than she can say to know that Jack's alive, it was so hard to hold it together at the end of that call. He sounded so... lost. Alone.

He was putting a brave face on it. She could tell. But he was depressed. Believed the Doctor dead, of course.

She had to tell him she loves him. It's true, of course. But, apart from that, she wanted to give him some comfort. Even though she knew they'd be with him in a few minutes, she wanted to let him know that he wasn't forgotten. Wasn't unloved.

The Doctor'd glanced up at her when she said it, simply raising an eyebrow. She gave him a questioning stare in return, but he just smiled and nodded. Obviously he did approve.

He's still looking at her now. "You better go out first, Rose. Think you can explain about me?"

Well, she's had to do it before - to her mum and Mickey. She can make Jack understand. "Yeah, no problem."

"C'mere." He's holding out his hand to her again. She takes it. "Never been so glad I jiggery-poked your phone," he says with a grin as he tugs her closer to him.

She flings her arms around him and hugs him tightly. He's alive. They're together. And Jack's alive and they're about to get him back.

He's looking down at her as he returns her hug, his eyes alight, looking as happy as she feels. And suddenly, his lips descend, press hard against hers for an instant, then he raises his head again.

"Go." He gives her a little push, and she realises that the TARDIS has stopped groaning. They're there.

She walks to the door. Her head's spinning. The Doctor's just kissed her, and she didn't even have a chance to react. And Jack's alive. He's alive, and he's just outside the door.

Fantastic.

*******

It's really the TARDIS. He's not imagining it.

It's materialising mere feet away. He drags himself to his feet, staring, disbelieving.

How can it be here? He saw it leave. And the Doctor's dead. Rose is back in London. So how...?

The door is opening. And it's Rose. She's looking around, and then she sees him and a huge grin breaks out across her face.

He stumbles towards her, even as he's asking himself how she can possibly be here. She doesn't know how to fly the TARDIS. Hell, even he doesn't know how, though he can do some of it.

They collide by the main control panel, arms coming around each other, clinging to each other. He buries his face in her soft hair.

"Jack... god, I thought you were dead!" And she's laughing and crying at the same time.

He pulls back just far enough to look at her, and then he dips his head and kisses her. It's not even planned. It's just that she's there and he's alive and they're together and he thought he'd never see her again and he's not alone any more and he loves her and she loves him and even if the Doctor's dead they've still got each other.

She's kissing him back and he can taste the salt of her tears.

Understandable. The Doctor's dead, and she's grieving.

Because he has to know, he breaks the kiss. "How did you get here? The TARDIS...?"

And then, unbelievably, she's smiling. Grinning. "Jack, the Doctor's not dead. He's here. He brought the TARDIS here as soon as we realised you're alive."

The Doctor's...?

Not dead?

Then where is he? Why isn't he out here?

Rose reaches up, catches his face between her palms. "Jack, there's somethin' I need to tell you. About the Doctor."

That sounds... worrying. "What?"

"He's... changed."

"What do you mean, changed?"

She chews her lip for a moment. "You ever heard of regeneration?"

Regeneration? Sounds vaguely familiar, but... He shakes his head. "No. Not that I can remember."

"`S something Time Lords do." She frowns a little. "See, the Doctor did die, but when he dies he gets a new body an' comes back to life. That's why he didn't come out with me - he wanted you to know what to expect first."

He can only stare at her. A new body? "You mean he's a different guy?"

"No!" She almost exclaims it. "He's still the Doctor. He just looks different. Sounds it, too. But it's still him underneath."

The Doctor, alive. Alive, but different. Changed. It's almost too unbelievable to be true.

"Jack."

A different voice. An accent something like Rose's, light, with a touch of humour. He turns in the direction of the speaker.

He's younger-looking, now early thirties in appearance rather than forty-something. Brown hair, and lots of it. Tall and lanky, even thinner than before. And are those brown eyes?

Different clothes, too. Very natty pin-stripes. And a tie?

He's handsome, too. More classically handsome than before, though there was just something about that dark hair, narrow cheekbones and all-knowing expression that was an incredible turn-on.

He feels a stabbing to his chest again, emotional this time, at the knowledge that he'll never again see the enigmatic leather-jacketed man who'd become his friend. More than his friend.

But this is still the Doctor. Rose says so.

He moves away from Rose, begins to walk to the man who's waiting just outside the TARDIS. "Doctor?"

The man smiles, and his eyes are warm. "That's me."

He holds out both hands to Jack - something he could never imagine the Doctor doing before. Previously, he was rarely physically demonstrative or affectionate, reserving most of his touching for Rose. An occasional clap on the back or approving hand to the shoulder; that was about his limit as far as Jack was concerned. He'd been surprised that the Doctor had accepted his farewell kiss.

He takes the Doctor's hands, meeting the gaze of this man who's a stranger and yet one of the two people who mean most to him in the universe. The eyes are different, and yet there's something familiar about the expression they hold, the way that dark gaze seems to see right inside him.

"I'm sorry we left you," the Doctor says. "If I'd known you were alive - "

But he cuts him off with a shake of his head. That's not important. Explanations - the Doctor's regeneration, how he and Rose met up again, exactly what happened to the Daleks, why he is alive - can all wait. What matters is that they're all alive and still together, something he thought was impossible until just a couple of minutes ago.

He drops the Doctor's hands and pulls the Time Lord into a hug, a joyful embrace that reminds him of the one he shared mere hours before with a Doctor who looked different but is the same man.

And then the Doctor draws back, looks at him and, in one swift, breathtaking movement, kisses him.

It doesn't last long and, as the Doctor straightens again, he's grinning. "Thought it was my turn," he says, before turning his head to the side.

Rose is there. In unspoken co-ordination, they open their embrace to include her. And two are three once again.

Something else hasn't changed about the Doctor, Jack sees as he watches the Time Lord smile at Rose, and then bend to kiss her softly. He still loves her as much as before. Only now he understands that he is loved, too.

The Doctor pulls away from their embrace. Standing a couple of feet from them, a proud but fond smile creasing his youthful face, he extends a hand to each of them. "Let's go home."

Accepting the Doctor's hand, Jack returns the smile. He already is home.

END