Title: Bitterblue
By: angstytimelord
Pairing: Tenth Doctor/Jack Harkness
Fandom: Doctor Who/Torchwood
Rating: R
Table: 30_forbidden
Prompt: 1, Bitter
Disclaimer: This is entirely a product of my own imagination, and I make no profit from it. I do not own the Tenth Doctor or Jack Harkness. Please do not sue.

***

The Doctor sat on top of one of the tallest buildings in London, dangling his feet off the side and looking down. Funny that he never got vertigo, he thought idly, contemplating how far it was to the pavement below. That was one thing that never seemed to affect him.

Had he been subject to that in other bodies? He frowned, trying to remember. Not that he could think of; but still, there were times when some of those other bodies were such dim memories that he could hardly remember anything about himself from that time.

Maybe that was a good thing. Maybe, if he was lucky, there would be a day far in the future when he'd almost forgotten what it was like to be in this body, and some of the things that had cut into his hearts wouldn't seem so important or loom so large in his life.

Like .... he closed his eyes, not wanting to think about the images that came into his mind to plague him. Like losing Jack. Like watching the man he loved walk away from him.

No. He wouldn't think about that, he told himself, leaning back and opening his eyes to gaze up into the cloudless sky. Surely he had plenty of other things in his life that he could focus on; he didn't need to think about the less pleasant memories all the time.

There was a part of him that held those memories close to him, didn't want to let them go no matter how much they hurt. But there was another part -- a much more cynical and bitter one -- that used those memories to castigate himself for his own neediness.

Was he really that bitter? The Doctor let out a sound that might have been something of a laugh, or a snort of contempt. Of course he was. And he had every right to be -- even though Jack would say that he was acting like a human.

He'd been here before, hadn't he? He looked around, a slight frown marring his brow. Yes .... the place did look familiar. Funny how he could remember places, the way they'd made him feel, little details about them -- when he could hardly remember some things about himself and who he'd been.

But he'd been here in the not-so-distant past, hadn't he? Yes .... with one of his companions. He frowned again, trying to remember which one. But he couldn't, no matter how much he tried to bring the memory to mind; it wouldn't coalesce into a clear picture in his memory.

Oh,.well. It didn't really matter, did it? All of his companions were gone now, and he was on his own. A fact that he didn't particularly want to remind himself of, but there it was, staring him in the face. He was alone. Again. The way that he always seemed to be.

Maybe it had been Jack who he'd sat here with, Jack who had shared this view with him. Maybe that was why he felt some strange sense of peacefulness here.

He shook his head, the frown returning. No, it couldn't have been Jack. He'd have remembered that -- he'd have associated this place with Jack from the moment he'd stepped out of the Tardis onto the roof of this building. He would have felt something of the immortal's presence.

And that wasn't here. Try as he might, he couldn't conjure Jack up in anything but his mind's eye. And for some odd reason, he kept seeing Jack as he'd looked the day they'd parted, the day that the immortal had left him to return to the life he wanted to lead.

He'd wanted to do nothing so much as fall to his knees and hold out his arms to Jack, beg the other man to change his mind and stay. He would have glad abased himself in any way he'd had to, if he had thought his pleading would make Jack stay.

Of course he wouldn't have stayed. The Doctor's lips twisted into a bitter little smile, giving up the idea of trying to push thoughts of Jack away from him. Why else had he come here, really, if not to brood over the fact that he'd lost the one person he'd thought would be with him forever?

He sighed, looking down at the faraway ground again. There were people down there, walking arm in arm, together. That was how he'd thought he and Jack would look -- but Jack had apparently had other ideas. He'd never looked at their liaison as being something that would last.

Or had he? Had he left because he didn't want the Doctor to hurt him -- so he'd decided to be the one to twist the knife and then walk away?

The Doctor's teeth sank savagely into his lower lip, making him wince and raise a hand to his mouth. His fingers came away smeared with bright blood; the taste of copper was bitter in his mouth, as bitter as his thoughts whenever they ran in circles around this particular memory.

That taste matched the timbre of his thoughts, really. Everything in his life had turned bitter after Jack had left, event hough he went through the motions. But it all seemed empty now; there was no real substance that he could grasp, nothing that he could feel.

Therein lay the problem with him and Jack -- and probably a large part of what had made the immortal back away from him. He'd needed to feel too much. He'd needed Jack more than the other man had needed him -- and he'd made the mistake of letting that need show.

He'd been so sure that he'd have a companion who'd stay with him that he hadn't once thought about the possibility of Jack's leaving him. It had never occurred to him that he was holding on too tightly, or that Jack wasn't the kind of man who believed in forever.

Forever only existed in fairy tales, a voice in the back of his mind whispered, not in the life that he led. Jack might have forever -- it was disconcerting to realize that was always a possibility, given what he was -- but that forever wasn't meant to be spent with a man who needed too much from him.

The Doctor looked down at the pavement again; everyone there seemed to be paired off, like animals going into some sort of glass-and-concrete construction of Noah's Ark. Couples everywhere.

He allowed himself another bitter little smile, the expression chasing across his features and disappearing before anyone could have seen it. It seemed that the rest of the world had someone. He was the only being in this universe whose very destiny hinged on loneliness.

That loneliness had never been easy to combat, but he'd always managed to drive it to the back of his mind, tell himself that it wasn't important. There were always companions, and for a while, their friendship had been enough for him.

But that couldn't satisfy him forever, and somewhere in his consciousness, he'd known it wouldn't. He'd managed to make himself feel that he was happy alone for so long that he'd almost believed it. Until this body, and the night that he and Jack had first discovered each other.

Strange that they'd known each other when he was in his last body, and that there hadn't been more than a small spark of attraction that had barely flared before it had vanished. But now .... when he'd regenerated, it was as though that spark had burst into a flame that couldn't be contained.

He hadn't wanted to contain it; he'd been more than ready for the relationship that had developed between them. And even though there had always seemed to be a part of Jack that had held back and not given himself completely, the Doctor had ignored that fact.

And in the end, he'd lost. Everything that he cared most about had turned his back and walked away, closing a door that the Doctor hadn't realized had even been opened.

Maybe he was bitter. But he certainly had a right to be, didn't he? He'd gambled and lost, when he hadn't known that he should be more careful of the hand he was dealt. And he had no one to blame for that loss but himself.

The Doctor lay back with his back pressed against the concrete of the roof, crossing his arms behind his head and looking up at the blue sky. At any other time, that was a sight that would probably make him smile and think of how much promise a new day could hold.

Or had all of the promise vanished when Jack had left? Maybe that was what he was bitter about, more than anything else. More even than the idea of Jack walking out on him when he'd thought they had forever. The fact that Jack had taken that promise, that hope, away with him.

Or maybe just because he'd figuratively taken the Doctor's hearts -- and he didn't want them back.

He closed his eyes, sighing and pushing the thoughts firmly away. Then, with one quick, graceful movement, he was on his feet again and heading for the Tardis. He'd been here long enough. It was time for him to leave Earth, to do something that would take his mind away from his own problems.

If he was lucky, that would be enough. But, he told himself as he opened the door of the Tardis and entered the ship, luck didn't seem to be on his side lately. It hadn't been for a while now. Not, in fact, since the day that Jack Harkness had become a thing of the past for him.

Yet another reason for him to be bitter, he thought as he leaned over the console of his ship. He'd spend the rest of his life coming to terms with his feelings for Jack. And the sad thing was .... he was much less bitter about that than he should be. He didn't know why, but he couldn't deny it.

Did Jack ever think of him? He couldn't help but wonder. Did the immortal lie in bed at night and let his thoughts wander to the Doctor -- and wonder if it could have been different? Did he ever think about coming back, or regret what he'd done?

He might never know the answer to that. But it was a thought that he couldn't get out of his mind -- not after he'd seen the look on Jack's face when he'd turned around that one last time and raised his hand in a wave of farewell. That hadn't been a look of finality.

He allowed himself a small smile, one that played around his lips for a while rather than just disappearing in the flicker of a moment. This time, the smile wasn't bitter and cynical, despairing for something he thought he might never have back in his life.

This time, his smile held hope.

***