Title: Worlds Apart
By: _usakeh_
Fandom: Doctor Who
Characters: Jack, Ten
Rating: PG-13
Author's Note: This was written for my lovely girlfriend taffimai, who requested a Jack hurt/comfort story. (That said, this is not your typical hurt/comfort story, to say the least.) Additionally, as ever, I'm infinitely grateful to millari for her excellent suggestions.

“Stop.”

A hand was on his shoulder; the next second somebody was hauling him off the ground. “She’s dead. There’s nothing you can do, Jack,” the man said. His voice sounded terribly familiar, but Jack couldn’t place it. That came as no surprise; ever since he’d seen the first flash of fire, followed by the acrid scent smoke streaming out of the crowded station, he’d ceased to be able to place anything at all. “Leave her,” the man instructed. “You can’t save everyone.” The man paused; then, ever so softly, added, “Even you can’t save everyone.” Even you. Could he know? How? Jack turned, placed both hands on the other man’s shoulder, and stared at him through the thick smoke.

“Doctor. You’re here,” he breathed, staggering slightly. “You’re here,” he repeated dumbly, still struggling to keep his balance.

“Yes.” The manic glee that usually masked the Doctor’s determination was nowhere to be seen. His tone was not light, nor did he attempt to amuse Jack. That was probably for the best. Exhausted as he was, Jack would have taken a swing at the Time Lord had he tried to play this off as a quaint little joke. Maybe in the cosmic scheme of things, an attack blowing apart a full station at rush hour didn’t mean much. What were thousands of lives compared to the birth and death of planets, of galaxies? Compared to the eventual demise of the universe itself? And yet, standing in the center of it, Jack couldn’t help but feel anything but unadulterated horror.

“They’re disgusting,” Jack managed at last. “The people who did this. I’ve seen a lot, Doctor,” he continued, voice cracking slightly, “a hell of a lot, and this still makes me sick.” He looked around at the dying flames, at the bodies thrown back by the blast. “I wish I could get my hands on the bastards. I’d kill them. Not quickly, either. I’d do it slowly as I could, just so that I could listen to them scream.” Jack coughed hard and clutched at his chest. When the fit subsided, he raised his eyes to meet the Doctor’s and asked, “Guess I’m not too different from them after all, am I?”

“Are you quite done yet? Because you know that’s not true.” For a moment, the Doctor looked as though he were about to go on, about to elaborate; instead, he fell silent.

“Yeah?” Had someone given him the chance, Jack would have gone back and prevented himself from lashing out so pointlessly. So stupidly. But once he adopted that tone it seemed that he could only charge on, his stance becoming more aggressive by the second. “You know it, huh? How? Just living longer doesn’t mean you know any fucking more about how the world works, about what’s right and what’s wrong. I’m not going to fall for that bullshit. All I’ve learned after living all these damn years is that many of the things I thought – no, was sure – were true weren’t so true after all.”

Jack took a tentative step forward, clearing a path through the debris scattered across the station floor. “How the fuck can you be so sure of yourself, Doctor? How?”

“What makes you think I’m so sure of myself?” The Doctor walked along beside Jack, white sneakers crunching down upon the broken glass.

“You saying you’re not? That even the great Time Lord himself has his share of doubts?”

“Of course I have my doubts, Jack.” Jack had never heard the Doctor speak so somberly before, at least not for such a long time. Whenever he did let such comments slip, he switched back into a more jovial mode so quickly that anybody not paying close attention would have missed it entirely. But this time the Doctor showed no sign of stopping. His gaze was sharp enough to cut its way through pure diamond.

Jack shook slightly; this time, he knew, it wasn’t simply the exhaustion. He was scared. He’d begged the Doctor to let him in countless times, asked him in every way possible; now that it seemed that he was finally going to open up, Jack felt the sudden urge to run. But he couldn’t. Not with sirens wailing outside. Not with dust still settling on the broken bodies in the shattered station. Not while he might still be able to save them.

“We can’t leave,” Jack said, stopping short. “We can’t leave. I don’t care how insignificant this is when you’re looking at it with the Time Vortex spinning through your mind; I don’t care how damn stupid it is to search around here in the desperate hope that you might save someone. Years ago I might have moved on. But not anymore. That’s what I’ve learned, Doctor. I’m taking the slow path. And you know what that means? That means that we’re staying.”

“No, Jack.” The Doctor placed a hand on Jack’s shoulder. “It means that you’re staying. The TARDIS is waiting for me; I have to leave.”

“Off to be a tourist in still other peoples’ tragedies?” Jack shook himself free of the Doctor’s grasp.

“I came here to try to stop this. Obviously, I didn’t succeed.” The Doctor stared him straight in the eye. “I don’t always know the answers, Jack, and I don’t always succeed. But no matter what–”

“No matter what, you never stay.” Jack was surprised by how steady his voice sounded as he completed the Doctor’s sentence.

“That’s right.” The Doctor’s usual rapid-fire speech pattern was returning. “Absolutely right, Jack. I just jump in and then hop right back out again; it’s up to people like you to clear away the rubble and rebuild. But I know you will do it. You will do it gloriously.” The Doctor looked up at the crumbling ceiling. “You humans are remarkable, you know. Your passion for destruction is exceeded only by your determination to create. It’s quite something.”

“Quite something, huh? I guess we are pretty damn amusing. Most entertaining planet in the galaxy, apparently,” Jack replied at last, gesturing out at the wreckage surrounding them, “at least if you consider this entertainment.”

“That is not what I said, Jack.” A lesser being might have grabbed hold of Jack while saying that. The Doctor didn’t. Instead, he turned to go.

“That’s it, then? That’s all you got to say?”

“Go home, Jack.” The Doctor only turned around halfway, so Jack couldn’t quite make out his expression. “I want you to go home and rest; then, tomorrow morning, you can come back here and continue your work.”

“You came all this way to remind me to get some sleep?” Then he remembered. “No. Shouldn’t have said that. You already said why you came. I’m–”

“No matter! Rest. Rest, so that you can continue to rebuild the Earth, Jack.” The Doctor paused and gave Jack one last, long look. “You know what you need to do.”

Jack’s eyes were stinging; for the briefest moment, he shut them. By the time he opened them again, the Doctor had disappeared back into the smoke.