This is my Big Bang fic. Since most people seem to either hate the alt!Doctor, or hate not having a story be about Rose I'm not really expecting this one to be very popular. But it's up, and now I can post to other places. This is a what if story about what the alt!Doctor's life might have been like if Rose had gone with the original!Doctor, like so many other people write. Because I don't think too many people think of him in those stories, and he should get some love too. This is supposed to be the beginning of a series of big life events for him. Hope some of you out there manage to enjoy it as much as I had fun writing it.

There's 3 parts and an epilogue, bringing it to 23 000 words roughly. The original copy if anyone is interested was over 32 000. Yeah, a lot got culled for junk. I'm amazed the fic was actually accepted...

Adventure of a Lifetime

Beginning

Rose Tyler, his Rose Tyler, was kissing him blissfully blank of his worries about himself as a person. A half human. One heart and all. And then it was over, she looked at him for a bit, kissed him again, lightly on the cheek this time, and said the words he was dreading.

"I'm sorry. I made my choice, and I'm sticking to it. I really am sorry."

And with that, she turned to the Doctor (the original one, the 'real' one) and hand in hand they walked off to the TARDIS, and disappeared inside it.

Donna was at the door, and he knew then what would happen to her and wished, right in that instant, that it would happen to him too. She looked a bit surprised and angry at what had just happened to him. Not surprising really. In a way they were the same now. Two impossible things that were trying to live in a universe that didn't want them.

He put on a brave face that he knew she'd be able to see through, and nodded his head to her. She nodded back, stepped fully into the TARDIS and closed the door. A few seconds later the TARDIS began to dematerialise out of this universe and back into its own.

His legs gave out and he ended up sitting in the sand, watching the indent of where the TARDIS had stood lose its shape and form as the wind blew it away. What would he do now? The only person he knew here was Jackie. Jackie! Oh god, he was going to die. He couldn't do this alone.

He felt her hand on his shoulder before he felt her drop down next to him. She threw her jacket over his shoulders; it was only then he noticed he was shaking, and Jackie was silently crying, but smiling all the same.

"She was never happy here. I knew she was doing all she could to leave. I just... with you... I thought she'd stay. I guess neither of us is good enough for her anymore. It's the TARDIS or nothing."

He nodded. He could understand that Rose had never liked it here, but to do what she had done anyway? That wasn't his Rose to begin with. She had changed somewhere along the line, and he didn't know if it was for the better or for the worse.

"Can I stay with you? I don't have anything else... " he said quietly, turning to her and frowning slightly, shook his head. "Just the clothes on my back. That's all I have now."

Jackie flung an arm around him, hugging him from the uncomfortable position. "Don't worry about that just yet. And sure, you can come live with me. Meet Tony. You'll love him. He's so curious about everything."

He tried to smile, but it slipped off his face as soon as it started to form. "So, Norway huh? How do we get back?"

"Zeppelin. This Earth hasn't invented planes. And I don't trust the boats. The trains are good though; they're always on time here. First time I noticed that I was kind of weirded out."

"Scary... "

Jackie let out a sound that he decided was a mix between something being strangled and a laugh. "Everything about this place is scary. Everything's mostly the same, yet so different. You just have to learn and adapt. It takes a bit of getting used to, but you'll get there. I did. Me!"

And he realised that Jackie was right. This woman had hated the way the Doctor had lived his life. Hated him taking her daughter away every available chance he got. Hated more than anything that he had taken Rose so far out of reach of everyone she knew. Family and friends, both were important to Jackie. But Rose had turned her back on all of it to go running around with the Doctor without a care in the world. And then Jackie had found herself stuck here with no-one she knew except Rose and Mickey, and a replica of her dead husband.

What had he done?

"I'm sorry. I..." No, that hadn't been him. It had been the other him. The original him. "He shouldn't have asked her to go with him that second time. He did anyway though, because he was lonely, Jackie. He needed someone with him, and I- he didn't want to let her go afterwards, because he cared too much about her."

She shook her head. "I was miserable without her, but you know what? I would never have met this world's Pete if he hadn't, and I've never been happier. Good can come out of a big mess."

He looked at her, and managed a little smile at that. "You've adapted nicely then, hey? And fallen in love and had another child. That's... that's good Jackie. Think I'll be able to do the same?"

"If you give yourself a chance to, I don't see why not. But get used to everything a bit first. You can think about the important things later. Must be weird, waking up and finding yourself part human."

"Yeah. Weird. That's one word for it. Terrified is what I'm coming closer to right now. I thought Rose was going to stay and help, but she didn't."

They fell silent, sitting on the cold sand on a freezing beach with chilly winds sweeping by them every few seconds. He wondered how many different words for cold he could think up before he ran out of things that felt like he did.

Cold and numb.

When Jackie began shivering next to him, he shook his head and sighed. "I think we should get up now. Start this new life of mine. No better time than the present."

Jackie got up and dusted herself free of sand, but he stayed on the ground. He wasn't sure his legs would work. "Umm, how do you walk again? I seem to have lost the use of my legs."

"Nah, they'll work, you're just in shock. Anyone can see that."

Ah, yes, he should have noticed that himself. Taking a huge breath and trying to act braver than he felt, he grabbed the hand Jackie was holding out, and heaved himself to his feet. When he was standing, he shook off the clinging sand and turned to Jackie. "Where to now?"

"Well, it's getting dark already, but there's a hotel not far from the road. We should make it by nightfall, if we're lucky. And really, I'm amazed I even remember it exists."

He made a sound in the back of his throat, moved a few steps forward, and was glad not to fall back in the sand. He managed to follow Jackie off the beach, and up a slight hill, to the road; on the other side was a small town. He didn't know its name, but it looked better than staying outside. He was beginning to think the cold was only some of what was making him shiver.

The time it had taken to get to the small hotel and book a room (he'd almost had a fit when Jackie suggested separate rooms) seemed to have both crawled and flown by.

It was only slightly warmer inside the room, but there was a heater, which Jackie turned on the first chance she got.

He shrugged himself out of her coat, let it drop to the floor, and flopped into an ungraceful mess on the bed closest to him. He felt drained of energy and his body felt heavy. A yawn broke free of him, and he felt his jaw crack with the force of it.

He was poked in the back by Jackie. "Eat something first. You'll thank me later. You can sleep all you want after. I'll wake you in the morning, so we can start getting home."

He sat up and looked around. "Umm, where's the food then? Are we ordering up here? Does this place have room service?"

"There's a restaurant downstairs. We can let the room heat up a bit while we eat. Come on. Up!"

They had steak and chips with extra tomato sauce and a side order of a small garden salad. He was too tired to enjoy it properly, but felt he would have done if he could have wrapped his still marvellously clever and alien brain around everything that had happened to him today. Well, at least that hadn't changed.

He was beginning to thaw out. Inside and out. Still, he was glad the room was warm when they got back to it. He took off his clothes and climbed under the covers, naked. He only had those clothes; no use staying in them all night while he slept. They'd only get more dirty than they already were. His body was partly human now, he might start to sweat if he got a bit too hot or had a nightmare.

He didn't. He slept like a log through the entire night, only waking when Jackie nudged him awake the next morning. She looked away as he scrambled out of bed and pointed toward the bathroom.

He took his clothes in there, emptied his bladder, and had a shower; feeling better when he was cleaner. He'd scrubbed the day before (his birth day in a way) from his body with careless roughness, and it had flowed away, down the drain.

He needed to learn how to live as a part human without his Rose. Oh god, he'd need money.

"Jackie... how do you get money if you don't have a job?" he asked, noting that his voice sounded a bit higher than normal. Was that the Donna part of him? Or was it just the panic he could feel rising in his chest?

"You don't," her voice answered, immediately, from the other side of the door.

Had she been listening to him having a shower? Was that considered rude on this world? Pervy? Hmm, so many things he'd need to learn and remember.

"You don't need to worry about things like that just yet. Get yourself figured out properly and then you can think about them. Don't worry, me and Pete'll look after you."

Brilliant, he was living off of other people. Though right this minute, he supposed it really couldn't be helped. The band around his chest tightened, and he felt his breath leave his body in a rush. "Jackie, I can't breathe!"

He'd left the door unlocked. He hadn't really ever had the need to lock a door before, so he hadn't given it second thought when he'd done it. Jackie soon figured this out, opened it up, took one look at him, sighed, then came and sat next to him, covering him with a towel.

He only realised he was still naked after he had learnt to breathe properly again. He let out a small chuckle. "Hello. This is the second time in as many days I've come to my senses naked with a woman watching over me." Thankfully he wasn't the least bit sexually attracted to either Donna or Jackie, or he'd have had something to be embarrassed about.

"Donna?"

"Yeah. Poor Donna..."

"Poor? How come?"

"Her body... her brain... it can't handle all the knowledge I have. If it isn't taken away from her, her head will explode. Literally. Boom. Very messy. I don't think my other self will be able to stand to watch that, so he'll take away the memories of their time together. Doesn't he know that she'd rather die than have that taken away? She felt like nothing until she was part us. She wasn't though. She was brilliant already, and she couldn't see it. I miss her. I miss Rose. I miss the TARDIS. I miss my universe. I'll miss not being able to get off this planet. I'm going to miss NOT doing what the Doctor's been doing for the past nine hundred years, like hell."

He had a very strong urge just then to move. Get out of this country, find himself a home somewhere, crawl into a bed and stay there for a hundred or so years. He'd be dead by then. Of old age, if nothing else killed him first. Being dead, he could live with that, it would be just like this was his thirteenth incarnation. It wasn't as if he was supposed to exist anyway.

He knew right then he had a choice. He could leave Jackie, find a way to get money and keep on moving; travelling the world; running away from all he was feeling or he could learn to live with what he had been given, even though it felt like he had nothing. He had always been a bit of a coward in this body. Or was that the Doctor had been? Either way, he wasn't going to quit now. He still had plenty of life left. He might as well choose to live it. Being stuck on one planet didn't mean he couldn't go on the occasional holiday somewhere else in this world. He could even take Jackie and Pete and Tony with him too. A billion things that he could show the child he'd only been told about burst into his mind, and he found himself actually looking forward to meeting little Tony Tyler, and teaching him a few things. He'd start with simple human things. Or maybe he should start big and try to teach him about physics and the sciences, and space and time, of course. Just because he couldn't travel through it didn't mean he couldn't still show people what it was like...

Taking a deep breath, he let it out, stood up, slowly, making sure the towel didn't slip (more to protect Jackie's modesty than his own) and coughed. "Umm, I've got to get dressed now. I understand we have a zeppelin to catch."

Jackie rolled her eyes and walked out, leaving him to get dressed in his suit.

Half an hour later they were in a taxi on the way to the port, where the private zeppelin Pete had sent would be waiting for them. A half hour after that, they were on board, leaving Norway behind them.

He was sick three times on the way back to England. He was sure it was just his body trying to acclimatise itself to the height and movement of the zeppelin, but, just in case it wasn't, he didn't tell Jackie. He didn't want to worry her.

They landed in London at four in the afternoon to find a car waiting for them. And the first thing he did was be thankful he was back on the ground again. He'd have to get used to that zeppelin ride if he was ever going to go on those holidays he'd thought about. Or he'd have to tell people that he got air sick. Him! Air sick! It was enough to get him giggling at the situation.

It was possible he was a tiny bit hysterical. Or else it was the part of him that was Donna that was making him do that. Though, he had giggled a few times in this body... Correction, the Doctor had giggled in this body's form. This terming for the both of them was getting very weird.

He stopped the noise he was making and rubbed his head.

The car ride wasn't as bad as the zeppelin, but it still made him feel a bit queasy. He managed to not vomit though, which he saw as a good thing. It was only a ten minute ride, which could have been the reason why. Or maybe it was his stomach being oversensitive after the zeppelin flight. His entire body was new after all. It could be anything to do with the movement, or the speed, or the sitting down. Hell, it could still be a leftover from the metacrisis. Maybe he was suffering some weird half human form of regeneration sickness. It was possible after all. Maybe it was his grief showing itself in physical form.

The first thing that happened when they arrived inside the huge, great house Jackie and Pete lived in, was that Jackie pulled him into the kitchen, sat him down, and put a bowl of soup in front of him.

"Eat! You've been being sick half the morning. Food'll help." Ah, she'd noticed by herself. There'd been no need for him to try keep a secret of his air sickness then.

Jackie left him alone, staring at the bowl. It had corn floating in it, and bits of meat occasionally showed themselves when he stirred. Taking a deep breath he lifted the spoon and took a mouthful. Oh! Chicken. He almost choked as he started to laugh again. He had been sick and Jackie was feeding him chicken soup. Well, chicken and corn soup.

It was also good, which was odd because it didn't look appetising at all. Well, that just proved it really. Appearances weren't everything; sometimes good things could come from something that looked bad.

The soup helped his uneasy stomach settle down again and another reason for why he had felt ill in the car reared into his head. Hunger pangs. Could they make you feel ill? He had no memories of them doing so for the Time Lord. The Doctor hadn't really felt hunger very strongly unless he hadn't eaten for a few days.

He'd have to get used to eating three meals a day. And sleeping. Sleeping a lot more than he remembered. Yes, that was needed too. And his bladder didn't seem to work the same either. He needed to go again. He had already been once today. He rolled his eyes. "That's wizard, that is," he mumbled to himself. He quickly finished off the soup, got up and went off in search of a toilet.

He found one tucked neatly in between a study and what looked like a play room, if the toys scattered everywhere were anything to go by. He took care of his business, then took a moment to wash his hands. He'd explore later. Right now he was tired again. He had slept the entire night from sundown to sun up and he was tired again! It wasn't even night yet. Either he needed a lot more sleep than most humans, or his body needed to find its own rhythm. Or, again it could be some form of regeneration sickness. He did tend to get a bit tired and sick after he had regenerated, some times worse than others.

There were going to be no more of those, either. This was it for him.

He took a deep breath, stopping himself from going into total panic, stepped back out of the toilet and into the hallway, where he ran into Pete.

"There you are. Jackie sent me looking for you. Having a fit she is. Thinks you've wandered off and left."

He grinned slightly at the thought. "Nah. Got nowhere else to go to anyway. And no money to do it with. Just needed to use the loo. I had to find one first; the only rooms I know how to find in this place are the kitchens and the main entrance."

He didn't mention the study the Doctor had snuck into to use the computer to find out about Cybus Industries. The events that had followed had been so chaotic that is was it was impossible for him to really remember where it was. It could be in this corridor they were standing in now. He had no idea.

"So, my house is your house then. Anything you need?"

"A bed would be nice. I'm still adjusting to everything. And sleeping a lot. Don't worry though, that's something I do after regenerating. Even though, technically, this time, I didn't regenerate. I was only born yesterday. Literally."

Pete smiled at him in a confused kind of way. "One of the rooms near ours is being readied for you. Jackie wants to keep you close, so make sure that you don't wander off or my head will be on the block, if you get my meaning."

He laughed at that and shook his head. "That definitely sounds like Jackie."

"Believe me, it was my other Jackie too. This one is better about certain things though. We have a child now, did she tell you? A boy, Tony. He's got my hair."

Pete sounded extremely pleased with that, patting his balding head with his hands and grinning. "Well, he has the hair I had anyway. Still, getting older, it happens! I might as well take some pride in going bald. I can still brag about what I used to look like through my kids."

He grinned back and nodded. He remembered being a parent. "Yeah, I haven't met him yet, but he must be a smart chap with yours and Jackie's genes."

Pete laughed, shortly, at that. "He's three years old. It's a bit too soon to tell if he's smart or not."

He blinked. "Humans! Intelligence isn't the same as learning. Learning comes from experience, from teachers, from other people. Smart is just... knowing stuff."

Pete thought about it for a while then smiled. "Well, he loves drawing. Don't know if anything he draws is good or not for his age, but it's his favourite pastime when he isn't playing with his toys."

Grinning, the Doctor nodded. "Doesn't really matter right now, anyway. If he has a talent in that area, it'll show up when he's a bit older and learns a few things more about art. Still, might as well encourage it. Everyone needs a hobby. Or a sport. And I think he's still a bit too young for one of those yet."

Before Pete could respond, Jackie was there, glaring at the both of them. "Where the hell did you disappear off to? I was worried sick you'd run off!"

He looked at the floor. "Sorry Jackie. No one was around and I needed to... " He pointed to the door.

She deflated slightly at that and stopped glaring. "Oh. Well, that's alright then."

"He wants to lie down for a bit Jackie. He's tired. Can't blame him, after your zeppelin trip here."

And now she was looking at him all worried. "Do you still feel sick? Or is your head about to explode? Oh god, it's not is it?"

He couldn't help but chuckle at that last. "No, Jackie. It's fine. I'm not Donna. My brain's made to hold the knowledge I have. Although a bigger one would be good. I find myself forgetting things. That comes with getting a bit... old I suppose. Too much information running around in here." He tapped the side of his head.

She frowned at him. "No need for you to be smarter than you already are."

He grinned again. It was getting easier to rearrange his face in that way. "I think I hear a hidden insult in that, Jackie."

"Go to bed, you annoying man," she replied, pointing down the hall to a flight of stairs leading up. "Pete, you can show him where to go."

"Yes, love," Pete replied, kissing her on the cheek, before grabbing his arm and leading him up the stairs and towards a door that was three down on their left.

"Here. There's nothing much in there, sorry about that. You can decorate how you see fit."

And with that, he was left on his own, outside the door that led to his room. His room in a house. A house with windows and doors and carpets and hardwood floors. He opened it up and poked his head inside, before walking in. Inside it was light and airy and, because the curtains were open along with the windows, there was still enough sunlight to see by.

Pete was right, there wasn't a lot in there. On one side of the room, opposite the windows, was a bed that was big enough for two, and off to one side of it was a bedside table, with a lamp. The bed sheets were the same blue as his suit, so he liked them immediately. A wardrobe was built into one of the other walls.

That was it.

He opened the wardrobe and was disappointed to find it empty. It was then he turned around and spotted the door to his own bathroom, inside he found a selection of male toiletries sitting there waiting for him to use.

Well, at least that was something.

Before he could get undressed, have a shower and crawl into the warmth of the bed, he heard a knock at the door. Opening it, he saw a maid holding out a pair of men's pyjamas. "Oh!" he stated, grabbing them with a smile. "Thanks! These'll come in handy. Now I won't have to sleep naked again. I'm not used to that."

The maid's eyes got wide and she opened her mouth to say something, but before she could speak he closed the door. He didn't mean to be rude, but he wanted sleep more than he wanted to spend time chatting.

After a quick shower, he put on the pyjamas. They were a bit big for him around the waist and a bit short in the leg but, for the time being, they'd do him fine. He guessed they must be a pair of Pete's. They were a light green in colour, but that didn't matter. Any colour would do as long as he didn't have to go to bed, forget he had nothing on, again, and surprise anyone else first thing in the morning.

He was asleep almost as soon as his head hit the pillows. He woke up two hours later, to a light tapping on his door, feeling rested. Getting up, he was greeted by Pete. "Dinner's on the table, if you're hungry. Roast dinner, all nice and proper."

He hadn't realised it was still that early. "Thanks, I'll come down when I'm dressed," he replied, rubbing grit out of his eyes. His body ached terribly, he hadn't expected that.

He ended up having his dinner in his room in the end and, by the time he got to eat it, it was cold and not as nice as it looked.

Pete had been right. Tony's hair was the same light shade as his own hair was. What the man had not told him was that Tony had the same eyes, right down to the shape of them, as Rose.

He'd taken one look at the boy and started crying, so Jackie had herded him gently back to his room and stayed with him until it had passed. He had apologised afterwards, when he found she was crying too. She had just lost her daughter. He was being a selfish bastard.

She had told him to stop being so silly, and sent a maid down with orders to bring them up some dinner, then stayed to eat with him. It had made him feel a lot better to know he wasn't alone.

He found that he couldn't get back to sleep when night fell and decided one of the first things he wanted for his room was a bookcase and a few books. Books were a good thing to have when a person couldn't sleep and didn't have anything to do.

He'd ask Pete about it in the morning.

He hung his suit up, even though it should really be washed, because otherwise it made the room look messy. Not that he wasn't used to mess. His other self had used his bedroom on the TARDIS more to tinker around with all the projects he had on the go than to actually sleep.

He suddenly found himself missing everything to with his- the Doctor's old life all over again. The Doctor had Rose, the TARDIS, and couple of regenerations ahead of him. He had one heart and a much shorter lifespan. A few decades left at the most!

He finally fell asleep at two in the morning, dreading waking up later on that day.

* * * * * * * * * *

It took three weeks before he began to feel more comfortable with being himself. He still ached, severely at that, but at least he didn't feel like he didn't have the right to live any longer. In fact the way he felt, now, was similar to the way he remembered the Doctor feeling right after he'd said goodbye to Donna on her shocker of a wedding day.

It was a Monday, and Tony was in his play room. It was also November, and he had found to his horror that he felt the cold. Terribly. His body temperature was, naturally, a little lower than a normal human's while still in the 'normal' range. And his being skinny didn't help very much either.

He wrapped himself in his thick duvet so he could at least try and keep warm as he wandered the house in search of breakfast. It was ten in the morning, so family breakfast was over and done with by now. As long as he cleaned up after himself, he was sure Maureen, the cook, wouldn't mind him invading her domain. He wasn't really that hungry after having another bad night, so a few slices of toast with marmalade and a banana would do him nicely. He could wash it all down with coffee.

He'd found he much preferred drinking coffee rather than tea now. It was a habit he must have inherited from Donna. It felt rather odd.

In the kitchen the percolator was half full. It was one of the ways he could tell that Pete had gone off to work and that Jackie was up. Since her move here, Jackie had also switched from drinking tea to coffee. For her though, as she had admitted to him one morning, it wasn't just a preference, it was more a way of separating her old life from this one.

The same thing couldn't, really, be said of him, he'd woken up that first morning craving coffee like he'd been drinking it his entire life, like Donna had. Brilliant little gift she'd left him with. An odd addiction to coffee.

At least he could function without it, which a lot of humans seemed unable to do. Mainly because once he was up he was up. Still, that didn't stop him from sleeping, a lot, later in the day. He took naps at the same time as Tony did, so he didn't get all cranky. He didn't understand the need though. His brain was that of a Time Lord. He felt things the same way he used to, which was slightly different to humans in some areas. He was still more logical and analytical than the rest of the people around him. Yet his need for the naps was waning, and he thought that soon he'd probably have a normal adult human sleeping pattern.

He made his way to the dining room, carefully carrying his breakfast.

Pete was going to get him a job working with Torchwood until he found something he wanted to do. He had been thinking about it on and off since Pete had raised the subject sometime during last Saturday. He was really beginning to dread the psych evaluation that Pete said was mandatory with working for Torchwood. His first act as a person, after all, had been to commit genocide. He'd never forget that. It was the reason he was stuck here. That and the fact that one universe really wasn't big enough for two of 'him'. What if they decided he was too dangerous to do anything and sectioned him, before he even had the chance to prove that he wasn't as dangerous as he sometimes felt?

Shaking his head, he took a bite of his toast and munched angrily on it. No need to think of that just yet anyway. Pete had said when he felt ready and he didn't think he was, yet. But he was getting better every day, it wouldn't be long now.

The thought of working permanently at Torchwood made him feel sick. Having it as a starter to getting his life together didn't upset him as much, but he knew it was necessary. He planned to enrol in a business course as soon as he had the money so he could learn the skills needed to get a job he wanted to do. After that, he'd earn a bit more and enrol into a university somewhere. There were plenty of things in this universe he could do. He could be a teacher in one of a number of different areas; or a doctor, which seemed more like him, though he didn't think that would be what he chose; or he could do something in one of the more scientific fields.

The Donna part of him didn't care as long as he got paid enough to live.

He had flatly stated that as soon as he started earning some proper money he'd be out of Pete's house (he refused to call it a mansion) faster than Pete could blink. It wasn't that he was ungrateful, because he wasn't. Pete had done so much for him already, including getting him an entire wardrobe of clothes in colours ranging from the blue he favoured, to yellow, to green to black, grey and white. Even pink had been thrown in there. Most of it was everyday wear though, not suits.

Looking through the window at the cold outside, he decided today would be the day he went exploring the inside of the house. But that could wait until after lunch. It was just a few hours. He could do that. He didn't know what to do with himself in the meantime, but he was sure that he'd find something to pass the time.

It was then that he heard the slight noise of footsteps, and turned round to see a pair of bright brown eyes beneath a mop of light red hair peeking at him over the top of the table.

He finished off his toast without looking at the boy, though he could feel Tony didn't once take his eyes off of him. It was a little uncomfortable being stared at like that but still, Tony didn't really know him well enough to speak to. This was the first time the two of them had been in the same room with each other that hadn't ended up with him crying after the first two seconds, then rushing back up to his room.

Well, at least that seemed to have passed. Even if it was just for today.

It must have really confused the poor boy to see a grown-up crying like that. And it had happened quite a few times too. It was a bit hard to avoid him unless he locked himself in his room. Which he had done roughly four times during the past three weeks. He swore that Jackie had parked herself outside his door on those days and listened through it, just to make sure he didn't do anything stupid. He had spent most of them alternating between crying and staring blankly at the wall, but he hadn't had that type of day for a little over a week now. Thankfully.

"Hello!" he said, and Tony smiled at him from the opposite end of the long table.

"Hello," the child parroted back.

They sat in silence for a few seconds, Tony's eyes never leaving his.

"You cry lots," Tony stated as if it was the most normal thing in the world to just blurt out. He probably would have said it to him in front of a crowd of strangers too.

"Yeah. But I'm upset. I bet you cry when you're upset. Why can't I?"

Tony ducked his head down until all he could see were those eyes. "You're a grown-up. Grown-ups don't cry."

He grinned back. "Sure they do. Anyone who tells you differently is lying. And lying is bad. You know that, right?"

A nod of orange blond hair and he let himself relax a bit.

"Why do you cry lots?"

He stared then, as Tony came over to where he was, took a seat next to him and looked up.

He sighed before answering. "I'm grieving."

Tony blinked slowly and frowned as he tried to figure out what that meant. "What's that?"

He frowned. How did you go about trying to explain grief to a child? He'd never had to before... "Umm. It's a bit hard to explain. It's a very deep... hurt. Do you know what death is?"

Some of the grin that was playing around the boy's face dropped as he nodded. "My doggy died. Daddy said it was because she was old. Her name was Rosie."

So, the little dog had survived the Cyberman invasion then. Lived a nice life too if this Jackie had carried on treating it the way the other Jackie had. That was good.

"What you feel when someone or something you love dies or goes away or disappears, that's grief."

He didn't expect it, but Tony got out of the seat he was on, climbed up into his lap and hugged him. "Did your doggy die?"

He hugged back and managed to chuckle at the logic the boy was using. "No. No, my doggy didn't die. I just lost some people who were very important to me.... Your sister Rose and her friend, Mickey. They've gone away and they're not coming back. They can't."

"Not ever?"

"No, not ever."

They hugged each other for a bit, both of them crying, him silently, Tony wildly and loudly. Hadn't Jackie or Pete already told the boy? He had just as much right as anyone else to grieve his losses. Still clutching the whimpering boy to him, he opened his eyes, once he had calmed down himself, and noticed Jackie standing at the entrance to the room, one hand over her mouth, the other hugging her middle. She was crying too.

Wow, he'd started a trend it seemed. And right now, it was a good trend. He bent down to whisper in Tony's ear. "Go to your mum. She needs you now."

The boy didn't need any more cue than that; he was across the room and into her arms in a second.

He left them alone, smiling at Jackie over Tony's head as he walked past them.

He didn't end up going exploring that day. He wanted to give the Tyler's some family time. And he didn't know any better way to stay out of their way for a day than to hide himself away in his room.

Now he'd finally managed to actually say what he was feeling, well, sort of anyway, he felt better. And now Jackie didn't have to hide from her young son that she was hurting and Tony didn't have to start asking hurtful questions (because he would have started asking where Rose and Mickey were sooner or later).

He had a little nap, andwas sitting at his desk, drawing, when he heard a knock on the door.

"Enter," he called out, and Jackie poked her head inside. The rest of her soon followed and she closed the door behind her.

"We didn't know how to tell him," she said, walking over to him. "When my first Pete died, Rose was too young to understand much of anything, but Tony... he gets stuff."

Shifting on his seat, he sighed. "I'm sorry if I interfered. He asked why I've been crying and I answered. Why didn't you explain grief to him when the dog died?"

"We didn't think it was important. It was more than a year ago now, he was only two. He never cried for her. We didn't think he was grieving."

He sighed again. "Children are different. Sometimes they don't cry, and it shows through in other ways."

They drifted off into silence for a while. It was a bit annoying having her watch him as he doodled softly on the lined paper. He put the pencil he was using down. "Was there something you wanted Jackie?"

She nodded and smiled. "Yeah. To thank you. You did a wonderful job, downstairs, with him. You're good with kids."

He grinned. "Yeah, I like children. Had a few of them myself once. Well, the other me- Him- The Doctor."

Jackie nodded. "Well, that was it really. I just wanted to thank you for telling him. You did a better job of it than I would have."

"You didn't want him to know your feelings but you shouldn't hide things like that from him. I think he knew something was going on, even though he never said. At least now he knows what it was."

Nodding again, Jackie patted him on the shoulder and left him to his drawing.

For the first time since he had been left here, he felt like he had accomplished something good. He had a small smile on his face for the rest of the day.

* * * * * * * * * *

He was due to start working for Torchwood the next week but it was breakfast time on Thursday before he finally got up the nerve to talk to Pete and Jackie about his name.

He didn't want to use Tyler as a name, first or last. It would be unfair on Pete and Jackie to try and explain that. From what he'd heard, it had been hard enough explaining away Rose when she had appeared. As far as everyone outside the immediate family was concerned, he was a friend of Rose's who had just lost everything in a rather bad fire, and needed somewhere to stay for a while until he was back on his feet. He liked that as a story because in a way it was true. He had been born into fire.

Chewing slowly on his eggs, he looked up at Jackie and said what was on his mind. "I need a name."

She frowned at him as she ate her bacon, and he choked slightly in embarrassment. "Sorry?"

Pete snickered over at his place at the table, where he was getting his work things ready. A piece of toast was dangling from his mouth. Breakfast with the Tyler's was always fun. It always ended with one of them doing something 'wrong', like speaking with their mouth full. Not that he was perfect. Oh no. He'd definitely inherited some of the Doctor's bad manners himself.

He waited until after his dish had been taken away before trying again. "No, really, I need a name. If I'm going to be working at Torchwood I'm going to need a name before I start.

"I suppose..." said Jackie.

Pete removed the toast from his mouth. "Good luck with that then," he said, getting up from the table. "Tell me when you have a name and I'll get you fixed up with all the papers you need."

He nodded, and smiled. "Yeah, will do. Thanks."

Pete patted him on the shoulder then kissed Jackie goodbye. He felt oddly missed out.

"So, got any ideas?" Jackie asked, as Pete walked out the door, leaving the two of them alone; Tony must have crept off to his play room.

He frowned. "No. I haven't even got the foggiest of where to start. There are so many different names, from so many different cultures, from places and planets everywhere. How am I supposed to pick just one?"

Jackie shrugged. "Dunno. Our parents usually pick ours. Usually within the first few weeks after birth, though some kids are named before they're even born. Name picking is always fun though. Well, when it's a baby. I can't choose a name for you though. It'd be a bit unfair."

Sighing he shook his head. "I'm not asking you to name me, just give me an idea of how to do it. Last time I chose a name I for myself I ended up being called, 'Doctor.' He lived most of his life being called that. Still, it suited me. Him. Oh... whatever!"

The look on Jackie's face made him hide his smile from her. No need for her to know he found her look of concentration funny. "Well," she said, after a few minutes. "Why don't you name yourself after the people who... shaped the man you are now?"

He blinked. "Umm, right now that'd be you and Pete... How would that work?"

She shook her head. "No, I meant the people who were in the TARDIS."

Ah. The Doctor's companions then, specifically the companions from his tenth incarnation. Well, that was a pretty good idea. It could be his way of honouring them. "Two men. Mickey and Jack. I suppose I could also throw in Ianto, but I didn't really know him."

Jackie shook her head. "Mickey's known here."

He grinned. "Heh, well, in that case a first name is no problem. Jack it is. That wasn't hard at all!"

A Jack living with a Jackie. He found it a rather novel idea.

"He's a looker all right. Nothing wrong with naming yourself after him."

Laughing he shook his head. "Yeah, the good Captain would be puffed up like a peacock if he could hear you now. He's good looking and he knows it."

"Last names then. What were they?"

He frowned. "Two Smith's. Mickey and Sarah Jane. Umm, Martha was a Jones. Donna was a Noble. Jack was a Harkness. I don't think I want to use Tyler, it might get confusing. Was there anyone else on board? No I don't think so... "

"So, which one are you going to pick then?"

He grimaced. "Not Smith. That name holds unpleasant memories. So, Jones, Noble or Harkness. I'm taking Jack's first name, so I could leave his last one out... " How was he supposed to choose? Jones or Noble? "Can I have both?" he asked, his voice coming out weaker than he thought it could get. He didn't want to leave out either of the two women, as they had both meant a lot to him.

Jackie smiled sadly at him. "Well, you could grab one as a middle name. Then you can have all three."

It brightened him up to think that. So, three of the Doctor's main travelling companions in this form would get remembered through him then. Naming himself after Rose or any of her family right now would be a bad idea, and it still hurt a bit too much to use, anyway.

"Jack Jones Noble? Or Jack Noble Jones?" After saying them both out loud there was almost no denying which one he preferred. "Ooh, Jack Jones! I like that! Can I have that as a name?"

Jackie snorted out her laughter. "Can if you want, though people might start calling you JJ or something."

Grinning widely, he shrugged. "They can call me whatever they want, I like the alliteration."

And just like that, he had a name. His grin slipped off his face as it became all too clear for him. He had a name! "Jackie... I don't feel too good," he stated, before his eyes rolled up in his head and his head fell onto the table.

He woke up fifteen minutes later on the sofa in the family room with a splitting headache and a roiling stomach. He closed his eyes again and took a few deep breaths, and was glad when the nausea began to subside.

"You okay?" came Jackie's voice from somewhere above him.

He nodded slightly, wincing when it sent pain through his head. "Ow, I think I might have thumped my head pretty hard on the way down."

"It was just a bit of a bump, I don't think anything's seriously wrong with you. What was that all about anyway? The fainting I mean."

He stared at her. "You... don't know how important a name is, do you? A name is who you are. It's one of the most powerful things you have. The Doctor spent most of his life without one, well, hiding it away. There was only one person he could tell his name to. Well, one person at any given time anyway. Time can get a bit mixed up sometimes, you can end up meeting someone who knows your name before you've officially 'met' them a first time. That was a bloody horrid time. She died. She said the Doctor cried when he last said goodbye to her."

Jackie rolled her eyes, not understanding what he'd just said. He huffed. "Fine. For the first time in a very long time, I have a name to use and be called by, and it will stay with me for the rest of my life. I've no title to go with it, at least right now, but I'll be working on that. It was a bit overwhelming."

Jackie nodded, patted him on the shoulder like Pete had done and wandered off to do whatever it was she did in the huge house during the day. He sighed and lay back down properly, rubbing his forehead where he had smacked it on the table.

Well, at least he had a name to give to Pete.

He felt like his new life was now truly beginning.

* * * * * * * * * *

The worst thing to happen to him on his first day working for Torchwood was him getting so nervous he was actually sick. He hoped to never have to vomit again. It hurt and tasted disgusting.

First off, an appointment was made for him to have a psych' evaluation on the following Wednesday. He wasn't looking forward to that but, if it was necessary, he supposed he'd just have to go along with it. Though, if this version of Torchwood shared the values of the other Earth's Torchwood One, then he didn't really want to know what the psychologist would make of him. Would he turn out to be too alien to be classed 'human', or too human to be classed as 'alien'? His mind boggled at the thought. Why couldn't he just be seen as him?

He needed to find out who he was. Not what he was. And that was why he needed to work here for a bit.

Next, he was taken to a lab where two people were busy working, and shown what they were working on. He missed the much more advanced technology he'd had available in the TARDIS almost immediately, and had walked straight out of the lab as soon as his tour of it was over. He took working in a scientific field off his list of the jobs he thought he'd like to do. It wasn't that he didn't like science; he loved it. His problem was that he knew too much. It wouldn't be fair, he had to let these people learn things on their own. He wasn't here to help them along in any way.

After the failed visit to the lab, Pete took him to the archive instead. It was dark down there, and there were hundreds of industrial sized shelves piled full. A million alien artefacts, maybe more, maybe less, were stored in a series of rooms: shelved, stacked, or pushed aside like junk, though a few had been carefully placed, like sacred items, on small pedestal type stands.

His eyes lit up. "Ooh! I like this place. Can I work here? What would I do? Catalogue? It doesn't look like even half of these are named, and the ones that are might not even be named right. Blimey, this place is brilliant!"

Pete smiled widely at him and nodded. "Sure. Have a look around. Anything you need? Just ask. We'll get it for you."

There was a room just before the stacks which would be perfect to set a large desk, good for the larger items that were in there, and there was a window, which didn't open and showed only some form of metalwork on the other side. A window just for the sake of appearances. He let out a happy sound.

"A desk would be great! And a chair too. And a lamp, in case there's small fiddly things and I need light to see them by. And maybe a magnifying glass, that'd be good too. Sometimes you need to see small details to spot the difference between items. Makes are different in some cultures, even when the basic design's the same. That kind of thing. I think that's it. Not too much is it? Oh! And a sketch pad and notebook. I can keep a record for myself then, see what you've got. You can look through them all you want. I just want to see if things in this universe are the same in the other... And why doesn't anyone work down here anyway?"

Pete laughed aloud after he had stopped talking, and thumped him lightly on the back in his 'you're my mate' kind of way. "Well, it's a bit gloomy down here, and most people aren't very happy with being in the dark surrounded by alien gadgets. Makes them think something's going to jump out at them. Jitters I guess you could call it. We can get you want you want by tomorrow if we're lucky."

"Brilliant, lovely. Thanks a lot-"

He had almost called Pete 'Earth Man' then and he grinned at his own line of thoughts. It wasn't too often that Donna would make an appearance that large in his words like that. Still, she was a part of him, and he liked the thought that he still had a bit of her with him wherever he went.

To Donna, calling the Doctor 'Space Man' had been a sign of both frustration and love. She had been like a sister to the Doctor even before the metacrisis had made her a part of him. He hoped everything had turned out for her the way he knew she would have wanted it, but was still afraid that it hadn't.

Well, at least it looked like he would enjoy however long he'd be at Torchwood. Well, if no one bothered him too much. He really didn't think he'd be able to put up with having to deal with too many people at once.

He spent the rest of the morning going through the first box he'd come across on the floor in his new office.

* * * * * * * * * *

Two weeks into his new job and he had one of the shelves completed, catalogued, put into different categories in a 'dangerous' and 'non-dangerous' group setting, and thought he had done a pretty damn good job of it too. Of course, he could have been a lot quicker, he knew what a lot of the items were on sight, which made the job almost comically easy, but he wanted to catalogue and remark on the changes or exact appearance of things in his notebook. He also took his time painstakingly drawing each artefact, to scale.

At least cataloguing gave his inner Doctor something to do. And the Donna part of him seemed content with it as well.

A few more months working here, and he'd probably be set for not only university, but life itself.

And at least he knew he wasn't crazy, though with the way he naturally acted it might give that point of view to people. The psychologist had told him that he wasn't dangerous (He hadn't brought up the subject of genocide though, so that had probably helped a lot!) He had, however, voiced his fears about people calling him bonkers.

All in all the interview had made him feel all crawly inside. Like something in him was trying to get out. He was sure it wasn't anger. He definitely knew how that felt. It may have been extreme discomfort, but trying to talk to her made him want to go somewhere else. He'd decided he didn't want to have a follow up, and though she'd told him that if he ever needed someone to talk to her door was always open, she had lied about that. He'd walked by just the other day and the door was firmly shut.

Stretching, he felt a few of his vertebrae crack and grinned happily. It was lunch time, and he'd told Pete that he was going to eat down here. He'd just discovered a sonic blaster, a squareness gun, like the ones Jack and River had used. If he could pull that apart, and get hold of a few other materials, he might be able to make himself a sonic screwdriver out of it.

He was going to take the lunch break to go over his notes to see if anything he'd already gone by would have any of the parts he needed. He'd had Jackie make him a sandwich so he didn't have to leave his office. It was ham off the bone and made him stop looking at his notes to enjoy the taste of it. It tasted lovely.

His notes were neat, tidy and rather possessively done in his best writing. Each item was noted on a separate page and included the material it was made of, where it came from, the distance from the Earth that planet/moon/star system etc. was and how it worked (if it was still in working order - some things he found, were broken beyond repair). Individual parts, and what they were commonly used for were also written down. He had quite a few notebooks now, and one was solely used as a reference guide so he knew what he was looking for. It was this book he grabbed.

He scoured each page, leaving a slight mark beside any part he'd need and frowned. There were still some parts missing, and it wouldn't run, but he had the rest of the collection to go through yet.

But...

He wanted to be rid of this place. As much as he liked to be here doing this, it was more the Doctor than him. He wasn't that man anymore. While they pretty much enjoyed the same kinds of things, and this being one of them, he wanted something he could truly enjoy and not just 'do'. Right now he was just wasting time so he could save some money together.

He had two choices, either he could stay here until he had all the parts, or he could leave and forget it. It was a tougher choice than he thought it would be, because while he did want out of this place, he wanted something familiar, and a sonic screwdriver was definitely be that.

He let his head fall to the table and he let out a moan of frustration. Some things were going right in his life now (he and Tony got along marvellously, now he could be around him) but some things just seemed like they wanted to explode around him.

Well, soon he should have enough money to start that first little course he had planned.

He decided to go get some college brochures, first thing the next day. He'd like to plan ahead for it.