Archive of Our Own

"Rose, look out!" Jack tackles Rose to the ground, knocking them both out of the way of the poison dart. He grins down at her, his hands pinning her shoulders. "Gotcha."

But Rose doesn't smile back or thank him. Her eyes are glued to something just to the left of him. "Oh, Jack..."

He turns his head to see what she's looking at. A short dart, decorated with red and purple feathers, is stuck in his shoulder. "Fuck."

The Doctor catches up with them. "Are you two all—bugger."

The last thing Jack sees before his vision fades is the Time Lord bending down to pick him up. No, don't bother, just run! He tries to form the words, but he's already lost muscle control.

Jack is surrounded by complete darkness and silence. He knows it's not real. It's the poison. Drenian toad toxin is so potent, it's the planet's main export, famed across the galaxy. The economy of an entire sector revolved around it for over three millenia. He learned all about it at the Academy.

It cuts off the senses, locking the victims into their own body with no way to communicate. He remembers learning that it takes hours, sometimes days, for the metabolism to shut down fully. Time the victim has to spend completely cut off, with nothing to do but wait for death.

And that's another thing he learned: there's no cure. Never can be, because the toxin bonds with the victim's nervous system almost instantly, at the molecular level.

The impossibility of an antidote is what will finally get the toxin banned from all legal markets. There were just too many incidents—accidental exposures, people dying slow, lonely deaths because a hovercrane dropped a crate. And nothing to be done about it.

Nothing to be done about him, either. He just hopes Rose and the Doctor made it back to the TARDIS safely. Hopes they didn't bother dragging his as-good-as-dead body along.

He'll never know. He'll just be here, in the dark and the silence, alone with his thoughts till death claims him.

He wonders if he'll know when it happens. Will there be signs, or will everything just... end?

A worrying thought occurs to him: what if death is exactly like this? Endless nothingness, forever? Maybe he's already dead.

And then, there's something. Not sound. Not light. Something like... faint pressure. A pressure on his mind.

Is this what dying feels like?

But no. The pressure becomes stronger. There's a sudden flash of... something.

In an instant, he knows he's no longer alone in his mind. An instant later, he recognizes—

"Doctor!" He flings himself towards the familiar presence and is wrapped up safely and held close. Jack would sob, if he still had a body to do it with.

"Jack, I'm—"

"How's Rose?" He doesn't want to hear explanations or apologies. He only wants to know she's okay.

"Rose is fine. Got us all back to the TARDIS."

Good. Very good. Jack's glad to know this before he dies. "Thank you for coming." The first time Jack was too hurt to communicate, the Doctor had shied away from making telepathic contact without express permission.

There's a smile in the Doctor's voice, but Jack can tell it's forced. "Made it pretty clear last time that I was supposed to." He caresses Jack with a thought. "Not going to look at anything you don't want to show me, all right?"

Jack nods—well, he thinks a nod that he knows the Doctor will pick up on. "How long will this last?" he asks, working hard to hide his fear and project contentment.

"Few hours." Jack can hear—no, feel—the darkness behind the Doctor's words.

"Will you stay with me?"

The Doctor hesitates. "Don't think I can."

Of course. He's lost so many people he loved. I'm an idiot to expect...

"Thing is," the Doctor continues, "My mind's really much... bigger, for lack of a better term, than yours. Puts a strain on you, me being in here. Don't think you could sustain it for hours."

Oh. "All right." He gulps—well, whatever the mental equivalent is. "I understand."

"You could come into mine." The Doctor sounds tense.

"What?"

"Could take you to my mind. We could spend the time there. Would put strain on you, too, being outside yourself for that long, but less than having me in here. An' I could help you maintain a proper form." He sounds almost shy. "Don't worry, I can still give you privacy of mind."

Jack is speechless. The Doctor's offering to take him into his own mind, let him spend these last few hours with him. This is the most intimate thing he's ever been given. It's almost worth dying for.

"Yes," he says warmly. "Thank you."

The Doctor smiles. "All right then." Jack feels himself be wrapped in another consciousness and drawn out and away, into blackness.

It's disorienting at first, but he soon finds his feet—looking down, he realizes they're actual feet. The Doctor's helped him stabilize a full body manifestation. Jack can normally do that himself—well, for a while—but not with his actual body completely numb and cut off from his senses.

"All right, lad?" The Doctor's standing next to him, looking like he always looks, boots to leather jacket.

Jack nods, smiling. Then the thought hits him that this imaginary body is the last one he'll ever feel, ever be able to move. He flinches.

The Doctor frowns. "If this is too hard, we don't have to..."

"No!" He fights down his fears. No use wasting what time he has left fretting. If this is all he gets, he's going to enjoy it to the fullest. He looks around. "Where are we?" They are standing on a field of deep red grass on what appears to be a mountain slope. Far off, Jack can see a snow-capped summit under an orange sky. Silver trees are sparkling in the light of two suns. "It's beautiful."

The Doctor looks pleased. "Wanted you to see it, finally. This is... where I'm from."

"This is Gallifrey?" For a moment, Jack forgets to breathe. Not that he has to, on the mental plane. He looks around again, awed. The Doctor wanted to show him his home And yes, it's probably only because Jack doesn't have much time left, but to be shown this feels like the biggest honor the Doctor could have bestowed on him.

The Doctor holds out his hand. "Want to take a walk?" Jack grasps it, and for what feels like an hour, though it could easily be much less or much more—time perception is different on the mental plane, at least for humans—the Doctor leads him around, shows him where he used to play with his best friend as a child, has him sniff his favorite flowers and points out the best view of the majestic Citadel.

Jack just listens, only occasionally asking a question. He doesn't want to break the spell. The Doctor so rarely talks about his past. It's a shame that once Jack dies, the Doctor will be all alone with these memories once more. But maybe that's what made sharing easier.

They pause to drink from a bubbly little brook, which reflects the light of the suns in myriad colorful sparkles, making it look like a rainbow running through the field. The Doctor smiles at him. "Where do you want to go next?"

"Next?"

"'Course. It's my mind. Can take you anywhere you want to go, long as I've been there. Good memory, me."

In truth, Jack would happily stay here till the last, but he can recognize a dismissal when he hears one. And the Doctor wants to grant him a last wish. He ponders. Then it comes to him. "Ever been to the Boeshane Peninsula?"

The Doctor nods. "Would have been before your time, though. There wasn't a settlement there yet."

He smiles. "That's fine." He mainly wants to show the Doctor the view from the cliff, and maybe take a stroll along the beach up to the Stardust Rocks and show him the little hollow where he lost his virginity. All of that must have been there long before Alpha Capsule set down.

The Doctor takes his hand, and the world around them melts into a swirl of different shades, like water colors in the rain. Jack closes his eyes.

When he opens them, they are standing on a small plateau overlooking the beach, not far from where Jack's parents used to have their restaurant. He smiles and offers the Doctor his hand. His lover takes it with a grin and lets himself be dragged along, first to where the restaurant used to be, then to where their house stood, and then up the cliff to admire the view of the ocean sparkling in the sun.

Jack frowns at the horizon. "It's... off somehow. Not quite right."

The Doctor looks embarrassed. "I'm faking it."

"Huh?"

The Doctor shuffles his feet. "Never been up the cliff. I'm just extrapolating the view from what I've seen from the beach."

Jack laughs. "Well, I appreciate your efforts." He points westwards. "See those rocks over there?"

"Yeah."

"We called them the Stardust Rocks. Have you been there?"

The Doctor shakes his head. "Sorry. Only been on and around the beach."

Jack frowns. "What for, actually?"

"Oh... nothing." The tips of his ears turn pink.

"Doctor?"

There's definite redness in his face now. "Sand crabs. A few regenerations ago, I fancied a nice dinner, and I'd hear so much about the famous Boeshane crabs..."

Jack chuckles. "And you didn't know they're an aphrodisiac."

The Doctor stares at the horizon. Jack looks at him and sees his face turn even darker. The credit drops. He can't help himself, he bursts out laughing. "You did know. That's what you came here for."

The Doctor glares, but there's no heat in it. "Nothing wrong with that. I was a married man then, I'll have you know."

Jack takes the Doctor's face between his hands and kisses him gently. "Nothing wrong with that at all, even if you hadn't been. Love is never wrong." He wants to tell the Doctor to go and find another lover after he dies, to please not pine over him and his other lost loved ones for centuries before he dares to love again. But there's no way to say it that won't make the Doctor retreat into himself, won't make him more likely to shut himself away from the world.

Better to remind him why having a lover is wonderful and worthwhile, even with the inevitable pain of loss. He grins, turning it into a slow leer. "Too bad you don't have details on the rocks. It's where I lost my virginity. Thought we might recreate the experience."

The Doctor laughs. "Incorrigible." His smile turns soft. "That what you want to do? I could take us someplace comfortable. Swanky hotel? Our bedroom?"

"No," Jack decides. If he's only going to have sex one more time, he knows where he wants it. "The console room."

The Doctor blinks. "What?"

"Remember when we had that fight, and afterwards we did it on the jump seat? Well, I always regretted that I didn't have you bend me over the console instead." He licks his lips and puts a hand on the Doctor's zip. "Please?"

The Doctor's pupils dilate. "Your wish is my command."

The colors of the world twirl and fade.

The console room is perfect. If Jack didn't know this was still the mental plane, he'd be convinced he was really here. He whistles. "Wow. Gallifrey and Boeshane were realistic, but this..."

The Doctor grins sheepishly. "The TARDIS is helping. Hope you don't mind."

Jack cocks his head. "How do you mean?"

"Well, she's already in both our minds, so when she saw what I was trying to create, she sort of... took over." He hesitates. "That all right?"

Jack smiles. "Hardly the first time we've had sex in front of her."

The Doctor grins. "Yeah. S'pose it's not that different."

Jack's hands go to his flies—and encounter naked skin. He looks down. He's not wearing a shred of clothing. He raises an eyebrow at the Doctor.

The Doctor chuckles. "Thought it would be faster."

Jack pointedly looks at the Doctor's—entirely present—clothing.

"Oh, er, right." There's a brief shimmer, and then the Doctor's equally naked. Jack sees with a grin that his cock is already half erect.

"How does that work here?"

The Doctor shrugs. "It's all in the mind. This body reacts the way your mind knows your real body would."

If it weren't dying. Jack steps closer to the Doctor and rubs himself against his hip to distract himself from that thought. "Well then." He slowly licks the Doctor's clavicle and feels both their cocks stand to attention. The Doctor's hands cup his ass and squeeze gently.

Jack licks up the Doctor's neck and along his jaw. The grip on his ass becomes harder, more demanding. As they melt into a kiss, the Doctor pulls him so close their cocks are trapped between their stomachs, rubbing against each other with each breath.

The kiss goes on and on—Jack's beginning to appreciate the fact that he doesn't need air here. But the question of how long he's got left is at the back of his mind, and he doesn't want to ask and spoil the mood. So he takes a step back and flashes his best leer. "I don't know about you, but I'm about to come from the frottage. And while that's lovely in itself, I really have my mind set on you taking me over the console this time." Since I won't get another chance.

The Doctor grins sheepishly. "Can do that." He ponders. "Over by the green stabilizers would probably the most comfortable... well, the least uncomfortable, that is. I don't suppose you want a pillow?"

"Nope. I want to feel every last bit of it." Jack walks over to the green stabilizers, deliberately swinging his hips with each step. He knows exactly where the Doctor's eyes are.

He leans over slowly, relishing the edges and knobs biting into his flesh. This is going to be glorious. Too bad it's— He quashes that thought ruthlessly.

The Doctor approaches him from behind. "Ready?"

"Oh yes."

Jack feels two strong hands gliding down his back, massaging gently. They carefully part his cheeks, and he feels a cool finger circle his opening. "What kind of lube do you want me to imagine?" the Doctor asks, sounding a little breathless.

"Brenusian nut oil."

The Doctor chuckles. "Figures."

"Well, it's my favorite!" And my last chance to use it.

A hand covered in a warm, slick substance strokes his crack, and he smells the strong aroma of the nuts. His cock jumps. He moans.

He can hear the Doctor's grin in his voice. "Y'know this stuff was originally a baking ingredient, yeah?"

"Wasted on cake," Jack manages.

A fingertip probes his opening, then slides in gently. The Doctor finds Jack's prostate on the first try. He teases it gently. Too gently.

"More," Jack moans.

The Doctor chuckles softly. "All in good time."

I don't have— He doesn't say it. The Doctor knows what he's doing.

His lover must have felt him tense briefly, because he pulls out and goes back to gentle stroking. "Everything all right?"

"Yeah, this is great." He cranes his head back to grin over his shoulder. "Not used to doing it telepathically, that's all."

The Doctor pats Jack's ass reassuringly. "Don't worry, I'm holding this together so it's just like the physical world. Just do what you always do." He slowly runs a nail along Jack's crack, making him shiver. "I certainly will."

Jack smiles and turns his head back before his neck cramps... if it can cramp, seeing how it's not made of real muscles. He feels more oil slide between his cheeks, and the Doctor gently inserts two fingers into him.

The fingers tease his prostate. Jack tries to push back, but the Doctor puts his free hand in the small of Jack's back—not actually pinning him, but making him still nonetheless. He groans.

The Doctor continues teasing. Jack finds himself curling his toes in an attempt to deal with the tension. When his lover adds a third finger, he groans. "Just fuck me through the goddamn stabilizers, will you?"

The Doctor laughs low in his throat. "Anything you want." The fingers disappear, but before the emptiness can start feeling like a loss, they're replaced by the Doctor's cock. He slides into Jack gently, but faster than he ever has in the physical world, where he’s always so careful not to injure Jack. Bit too late to worry about me, anyway, Jack thinks, but before he can dwell on that thought, he's swept up in the rhythm of the Doctor's thrusts.

Long, slow out, then fast and hard in, time after time. Jack feels the edges of the green stabilizers digging into his hip bones. The Doctor reaches around to where Jack's cock is pressed against the side of the console and starts gently stroking it in counterpoint to his thrusts.

Jack forgets all thoughts. Hell, he forgets how to think. All he can do it feel, sense, enjoy. His balls contract, and he shoots all over his feet and the side of the console, shouting with joy—

And suddenly everything is wrong. He's in pain, there are glaring lights blinding him, the world is shaking.

This must be it then. Death. His final moment. If the pain weren't tearing him apart, he'd laugh at the thought that he managed to die coming.

"Jack? Jack?" There's an insistent slapping sensation on his cheek. "Lad, are you with me?"

He blinks. Darkness-glare-darkness-glare-darkness...

"Bugger. Turn down the lights." A cool hand on his forehead. "Come on, Jack, look at me."

He slowly opens his eyes. No more glare, just warm orange lighting and... the medbay?

"Don't... understand." The Doctor's at his right, worriedly feeling his pulse. "Sorry. My fault. Should have put you back in your own mind sooner. Being slammed back into your own body in the middle of... errr..." He glances over to Jack's left. Following his gaze, Jack sees Rose watching them, her hands deep in the pockets of her hoodie.

"...in the middle of what we were doing," the Doctor continues, "has to be disorienting. But don't worry, you're all sorted now."

"S—sorted?"

"Doctor." Rose steps closer and takes Jack's hand. "You said he'd be right as rain as soon as the antidote kicked in."

Before the Doctor can reply, Jack shakes his head. "There is no antidote."

"What?" Rose looks from him to the Doctor.

The Doctor frowns. "Course there is!" He gestures to an IV drip by Jack's bed.

Jack shakes his head. He's still feeling dizzy and confused, but the old lesson from his Crime and Subterfuge exam comes back like he memorized it only yesterday. "No antidote for Drenian toad toxin. Never can be. Toxin bonds too quickly. Only way to remove it—" He coughs. "—burn out whole nervous system. Dead either way."

Rose looks at the Doctor with wide eyes. "You said—"

"He'll be fine!" He turns to Jack, and his voice is full of the heat he uses to mask rising panic. "Don't care what your third-rate ape scientists taught you. Time Lord, me. Bit more advanced."

Jack blinks. He focuses on the Doctor's face, tries to read his expression through the blurriness. "I'll be fine?"

"Of course you will! Just needed to neutralize the toxin and flush it out of your system, and now there's some minor nerve damage that the neurorestorator—" he gestures to an empty hypospray on the bedside table "—will fix in a few hours." He shakes his head, frustration clear on his face. "What the hell did you think we were waiting for, loitering about in my mind like that?"

Jack gulps and looks away. Rose gasps. Across Jack, she punches the Doctor's arm.

"Oi! What—"

"He thought he was dying!" Her voice is two octaves shriller than Jack's ever heard it. "You enormous git never told him he'd be fine, and he spent all this time waiting to die!" Her eyes are brimming with tears.

The Doctor looks down at Jack, aghast. "Jack..."

He grimaces. "You seemed so..." He casts his mind back to find the right word. "Guilty."

"Cause I let you get hurt! Cause I wasn't fast enough to prevent it! Don't you think I would have told you if you were dying?"

Jack closes his eyes. This is all too much. "Please... need sleep."

"Course you do." The Doctor pulls up his blanket. "We'll leave you alone, so—"

"Oh no, you don't!" Rose again, sounding less shrill and much more commanding. "You're going to take him to his room so he can sleep in his own bed, and then you are going to stay with him!"

"Rose," the Doctor almost wheedles. "Don't you think I'm the last person he wants—"

Jack gathers all his strength to grab the Doctor's hand. His lover looks down at him, startled. Jack squeezes gently. "Listen to the lady, you big oaf."

He's too relieved to even be angry at the Doctor. But oh, he's still going to make him pay for this.

Jack starts by making the Doctor give him a massage. He's asleep for most of it, but every time he wakes up, the Doctor's dutifully rubbing, stroking or kneading part of his body. By the time Jack's mostly rested, all the kinks and knots from the paralysis are gone, and he feels heavy and warm all over.

The Doctor looks better, too. Like the massage has reassured him that he hasn't lost Jack, that they're all right, that their intimacy has, if anything, increased.

Jack smiles with his eyes closed. "Thank you."

He feels the Doctor curl an arm around his waist and snuggles back, making it easier for his lover to wrap himself around him. The Doctor hooks one leg over both of Jack's, kisses the nape of his neck, and gently bites his earlobe. "Mine," he whispers.

Jack smiles, too lazy to open his eyes. "Oh yes. For as long as you want me."

There's a small hitch in the Doctor's breath. Jack half-turns his head and slits one eye.

"What?"

The Doctor shakes his head. "'Nothing"

Now both Jack's eyes are open and focused on the Doctor. "Doesn’t look like nothing."

"'S just... I'll always want you, Jack. I don't let go of those I... and I never forget them, either. And in the end..."

Jack nods. "You lose us. Cause our lifespans are over in the wink of an eye, from your point of view." And of course, today's events have driven that point home to the Doctor in the most painful way possible.

The Doctor closes his eyes and rests his cheek on Jack's shoulder. "Don't know what I'm gonna do without you."

But he'll have to, eventually. Unless something goes really, really wrong, the Doctor will outlive Jack by centuries. Jack brings his left arm up and gently strokes along the Doctor's jawline. "Look at me."

The blue eyes open.

"What you'll do is, you'll love again." He takes care to state it as a fact.

The Doctor opens his mouth, but Jack doesn't let him protest.

"I mean it. You've loved before me. You'll love again."

The Doctor's clearly fighting to keep looking at Jack. "You're... special." He sounds embarrassed by the admission.

"Everyone you loved was special. Each in a different way." He gently touches the Doctor's forehead. "And they're all still in here."

The Doctor swallows and nods.

"I'll be there, too. I'll live on in your memory. That's a hell of a lot closer to immortality than most humans ever get." He grins, making it as flashy and irreverent as he can. "But don't you dare make me a sad memory. You go love again, feel joy again, and look back on our time together with a smile, understood?"

A corner of the Doctor's mouth curls up. "Aye, sir."

Jack laughs, and rolls over fully, dislodging the Doctor but bringing them front-to-front. His hand cups the Doctor's balls as he plunders his mouth with his tongue. He plays his thumb over the head of the Doctor's cock in a way that never fails to get his attention.

"You've got plans for me, Captain?" The Doctor raises an eyebrow.

"Yep." He nibbles the Doctor's pulse-point gently, grinning when he feels his cock jump in response. "Plan to give you as many fantastic memories as you can handle."

"Oh, don't you worry lad—I can handle plenty."