AN: Sorry about the delay. I just got a full-time job. This chapter is a little long. I promise to get the next one out sooner. I self-beta'd, so please excuse any spelling or grammar errors.

Disclaimer: I own nothing Doctor Who related.

The Doctor took a deep breath and began to talk. He told of the Master returning and his madness, the return of Gallifrey and Rassillon, and how he was once again responsible for their destruction. He talked about regenerating and then crashing into Amelia Pond's garden, of fish fingers and custard, of cracks in the skin of the universe and Prisoner Zero.

The Doctor then told of his adventures with Amy. He became very animated as he related the stories of their exploits: Starship UK, Weeping Angels, Van Gogh. He grew very somber as he began to describe the cracks that seemed to follow him across the universe, how they had swallowed people out of existence, including Amy's Fiancé Rory. His tone grew cold when he mentioned the Pandorica and the alliance his enemies had made to trap him within it, about the universe being swallowed up around them, about flying the Pandorica into an exploding Tardis. The human Doctor, Dr. Jack, just listened as his friend spoke, nodding from time to time, sipping his tea.

After an hour and a half, he had finished. He ran a hand through his hair, physically drained from relating the tale. Dr. Jack just stared at him, a vague, sympathetic look in his gaze.

"So the Tardis is really gone?" Dr. Jack finally said after several minutes. The Doctor nodded sadly. "You couldn't find any-"

"No," the Doctor answered firmly. "I tore through the whole ship. No signs of life. She-" he bit at his bottom lip and gazed down into his now cold tea. "She gave everything she had."

"Why do you think she sent you here?" Dr. Jack asked as he rose from the stool. He moved toward the counter, once again turning on the kettle. The Doctor puffed out his cheeks a bit and shook his head.

"Don't know," The Doctor said. "I suspect if you have a thousand different directions in which you can go, you'd be most likely to pick the one you were most familiar with." Dr. Jack just nodded and returned to his stool.

"Why did you come looking for me?" Dr. Jack said. For the first time in almost an hour, the Doctor met his gaze, defensive at his tone.

"I didn't come looking for you," he countered. "I was looking for Jack Harkness. Ex-time agent Jack Harkness."

"But why did you come if you knew he wasn't working for Torchwood," he said, tapping a finger on the newspaper clipping on the counter. "It says right here Jack Harkness: a university professor, not a Torchwood employee." The Doctor just shrugged.

"I didn't know what this universe's Jack Harkness was like." The Doctor was getting more and more defensive to Dr. Jack's questions. "Maybe there was still an ex-time agent in this universe."

"But even so, Time Agents never did any biuniversal travel. The likelihood of running into a –"

"I didn't really know what the possibilities were."

"But your logic makes no sense!" Dr. Jack drew a hand over his face in frustration. "Unless something has changed severely, the Time Agency never established any cross-dimensional travel; neither were they able to. The Timelords barely had an understanding of it beyond basic side-by-side universes. In the very unlikely chance that the man you were searching for was even similar to the Jack Harkness from your universe and in the even more unlikely chance that he was even familiar with the time agency, what did you hope-"

"I had no hope!" The Doctor cut him off loudly. His anger was clearly visible. He took a deep breath and spoke the next words slowly. "I am alone and forgotten in a foreign dimension. I am lost with a dead ship. I found something vaguely familiar, and ran towards that." He looked up at Dr. Jack, his eyes just about glistening with anger and sadness.

"Had a stranger answered the door, I can't say what my next steps would've been." The Doctor continued. He stared straight ahead, eyes unblinking. "I'm alone here. I've no way back and nothing to go back to.

"I've been frightened of things in the past, terrible things. Monsters and demons and creatures born without mercy… I've felt terror facing things like that before. But… but never the level of fear I feel in this place." Dr. Jack stared at the Doctor's profile; his face was full of sympathy and concern.

"So now you know what that's like." Dr. Jack mumbled to himself quietly.

"What?" the Doctors said, broken from his trance.

"uh, Nothing." Dr. Jack said. He quickly tried to lighten the mood by flashing a cheeky smirk at the Doctor. "So… I see you're still not ginger?" The Doctor laughed lightly and gazed at the fringe falling over his eyes.

"No, Sadly."

"Are you rude this time?" Dr. Jack asked taking a sip of his tea. The Doctor bobbed his head side to side a he considered this.

"aahhh… yeah, still a bit rude. Not as rude, but still rude." He chuckled a bit as he looked up at Dr. Jack. A door suddenly closed loudly in the hallway. Both Doctors heads shot up at the surprise of it.

" 'm Home," a young boys voice called from the hall. Quick, bouncy footsteps preceded the entrance of a young man of maybe 12 or 13 years to the doorway of the kitchen. He was lean and wiry, if still a bit short for his age. His thick blonde hair seemed to go in every direction. He had the same eyes and nose as his sister, but his face was long and narrow instead of round. As he walked into the kitchen he stopped when he saw the two men sitting around the island in the center.

"What's going on?" he looked toward his father. He gestured his head toward the Doctor. "Who's he?" Dr. Jack looked down his glasses at the boy and gave him a stern stare.

"Be polite, Simon. This is friend of mine. He's visiting for a bit. Just came over for a quick chat." Simon looked at the Doctor with the same hesitant glance that his sister had given him earlier. He dropped his bag on the floor walked toward the opposite wall of the kitchen

"I thought you had football practice today?" Dr. Jack asked.

"No. Tomorrow" Simon grabbed an apple from the bowl on the counter and bit into it.

"You play football?" The Doctor asked. "What position are you?" Simon glanced at the Doctor once more and swallowed the bite he had in his mouth.

"Mostly forward." Simon replied. "You play?"

"Yeah." The Doctor replied. Dr. Jack gave him a curious sideways glance.

"You do?" he asked, incredulous. The Doctor smiled at him and nodded.

"I do. I have. Actually, quite good in fact." He replied. Dr. Jack chuckled and shook is head.

"I can't play. I'm rubbish." He admitted.

"He really is." Simon agreed, with a cheeky grin. "I could beat him by the time I was 8."

"Hey," Dr. Jack smirked as he attempted to stop his son's teasing. "You have any homework?" The boy gazed at the ceiling and considered.

"Biology and two reading assignment." He took another bite out of his apple.

"Well, better get started before mum gets home. Nellie's studying in the other room" Dr. Jack said. Simon picked up his bag and took it into the next room. The Doctor turned toward Dr. Jack.

"How many children do you have?" he asked. Dr. Jack raised his brow and glanced at the Doctor.

"Four."

"Four! Blimey." The Doctor gasped. "Do… uh… any of them… um…" He tapped a finger on both sides of his chest.

"No, no. Just one each." Dr. Jack stood next to counter poured hot water over a tea bag. He gestured to the Doctor's cup, offering him another, but the he just shook his head. The Doctor gave him a contemplative look.

"I must know: Why 'Jack Harkness'?" The Doctor inquired.

"Pardon?"

"Why did you choose 'Jack Harkness' as a name?"

"Welllll, I figured I needed a proper name." Dr. Jack replied. The Doctor crinkled his nose.

"Whatever happened to 'John Smith'?" He asked, with some indignation. "I always use that name." Dr. Jack just shrugged his shoulders.

"'John Smith' is boring."

"I happen to like 'John Smith.'"

"But it's not a name you want to keep permanently," Dr. Jack retorted. "And anyway, 'John Smith' isn't a proper name. No one believes you when you say you're name is 'John Smith'. They think it's a cover for something else. Either you're hiding something, or on the run, or involved with something illegal. In your case, it's all three of those, isn't it?" The Doctor chuckled.

"I wanted a name that no one would question," Dr. Jack continued. "One that, when I told people they'd think 'Oh that's his name', not 'Oh that's his alias.'" He set the piping hot cup down on the island.

"So why did you pick Jack Harkness"

"Well, when I was considering names, my first choice was Giacomo… By the way," Dr. Jack interrupted himself. "Did you ever get Casanova's chicken back to him?" The Doctor released a heavy sigh and ran his hand through his hair.

"No, I didn't. And I really should've; I was just in Venice, too." He shook his head.

"Well, Giacomo, That was my first choice, but Rose thought it sounded a little antiquated, since I'm not Italian and this isn't the 18th century. So, she recommended something with a little more… zip, I guess, and shortened it to Jack." He let his teeth clack over the last word and grinned. He held up his thumb and forefinger about three inches apart.

"And Harkness just naturally followed?" The Doctor replied with some sarcasm. Dr. Jack ran a hand over his slicked-back hair.

"Welllll, sort of. I didn't care to use Smith again. Rose didn't want me to take Tyler. She thought it'd be weird. And yeah, Harkness seemed to sound right. The names fit well together," He explained, rattling off the words as he stared into space. He once again turned his focus on the Doctor. "Plus, it's… it's, um, kind of a tribute."

"A tribute? To Captain Jack Harkness?" The Doctor's face was once again filled with disbelief. "A tribute to what? Most species snogged in a single galaxy?" Dr. Jack laughed and shook his head.

"No, no… if, uh, if it hadn't been for Jack," he grinned and held up his right hand, wiggling his fingers. "I wouldn't exist."

"Ah! The hand!" The Doctor took hold of his wrist and began to examine it. "How is the old thing?"

"Oh, it's good. Bit stiff at times. They think I have a spot of carpal tunnel" Dr. Jack rolled his wrist loosely. The Doctor let go of the hand and stared him pensively.

"So you and Rose… You're still together." The Doctor observed. Dr. Jack looked up at him.

"You sound surprised." He retorted.

"Oh, well. 16 years is quite a bit of time."

"Yes, but that's not why you sound surprised." Dr. Jack's voice was cut with a hint of derision. "I think you're surprised that we're together at all. That we're married, that we have children." The Doctor's mouth opened and closed a bit, as if searching for the proper word.

"Well… um…I didn't mean to cause any offense, but… I mean honestly, I know how I am: no domesticity, no settling, always moving, going forward…"

"Adrenaline junkie." Dr. Jack cut in sarcastically.

"… No, no, no. You understand what I mean. I'm just not a…a, uh… home-y type," He fished for the right words. "And I know how Rose is-"

"How is Rose?" Dr. Jack cut him off quickly, the quiet anger building in his voice. The Doctor hesitated for a moment, sensing the tension that had just filled the room. He stared at the man in front of him. An anxious look on his face as he searched for an answer to Dr. Jack question.

"Like me," the Doctor finally sputtered out. Dr. Jack eyes narrowed, but the emotion on his face was still unclear.

"As I recall, Doctor," He began slowly. "You abandoned the two of us here with the intention of us spending our lives together."

"I didn't abandon you-" The Doctor interjected. Dr. Jack held up his hand to cut him off.

"What I'm gathering now is that you believed it would never work," Dr. Jack's brow knit together as his resentment boiled to the surface. "Did you leave here believing that we were set up for failure? A fixed occurrence?" He looked the Doctor straight in the eye, demanding an answer he already knew. The Doctor once again gaped as he sought the right word. Dr. Jack eyes softened as he let out a small sigh.

"There is something that needs to be said," He began. His next words came out in lilting, musical Galifreyan. "And I don't want my children to ever hear this.

"When you abandoned Rose and I here, and you did abandon us," He continued in his native tongue. "I was terrified. I was the first of my kind. There had never been a human-Timelord Metacrisis before. I didn't know what was going to happen to me…. Oh, I knew what was going to happen to Donna and what you were going to have to do," the Doctor looked away with regret, remembering his friend. "I didn't know what was going to happen to me, though. I didn't know if I was capable of being human, if I was going to go mad, if my mind was going to burn, if I… I would hurt Rose. Or if she would hurt me."

"Rose would never…" The Doctor tried to interject.

"Let me talk," Dr. Jack demanded softly. "I was scared. And I didn't know what was going to happen next. And all you could do was call me a monster, a murderer… and leave." He looked into the Doctors eyes and swallowed hard. The Doctor's own face was filled with anxiety and a hint of remorse.

"When you left, I finally understood how Sarah and Rose and Susan and everyone else you had ever left behind had felt. The feeling of desolation that is left in your wake; it's heartbreaking. I'd never considered the pain I'd caused everyone when I ran away, but to feel it first hand…" Dr. Jack shook his head and leaned forward, staring down at the tabletop. "Gallifrey could've burned a thousand times over, and I wouldn't have felt it as deeply as your absence." The Doctor was at a loss for words or actions. The two men sat there for a few minute, the only noise coming from the children in the other room.

"I didn't mean to-" The Doctor broke the silence.

"You never do." Dr. Jack said quietly. "Somehow that makes it worse. There is no malicious intent." Dr. Jack to a sip of his tea. "You feel what your doing is for the best, but those you hurt, those who are closest to you, never get to see that.

"Rose… my God, she cried for three days, wouldn't leave her room. She'd spent years coming back to you and in the end you dump her back here with a 'thanks for playing. Enjoy the home version.' She was in disbelief and I couldn't do anything to fix it. I couldn't think of anything to say," as Dr. Jack spoke, he stared unblinking into the Doctor's eyes. "I didn't know if she'd even take me. I was so afraid of hurting her. Was it the time traveler or me she wanted? Could she stay in one place and be happy with me? I waited in absolute dread that the need to run, that wanderlust that had plagued me my entire life would return and I'd drop away from her, that I'd abandon her once more." He took a deep breath and rubbed the bridge of his nose beneath his glasses. The Doctor sat there motionless, carefully considering all he had been told.

"What happened?" He asked with the quiet sincerity of a child. Dr. Jack sat up, his countenance softened.

"Oh Doctor, you know better than anyone: Time heels all wounds. No heart can stay broken forever," he took another sip of his tea and paused as happier memories filled his head. "We took it very slow. I had my own flat, we dated. We treated it as if the previous four years had been a dream. We… we both had to swallow a lot of pride and be very honest with each other… We built a relationship." He gave the Doctor a half-smile.

"Are you happy?" the Doctor inquired honestly. Dr. Jack nodded.

"Yes," he said without hesitation, grinning. "I mean, it's not always sunshine and butterflies and running through meadows. It's a marriage. It's work, but it's good work, and it's… so very worth it."

"And that need to run?"

"Never came," He gave a barely noticeable shake of his head. "And I worried about that for some time, long after Nellie was born, but… it never happened." Dr. Jack absentmindedly touched the right side of his chest. "It's like a phantom pain. I know it used to be there, and I know what is felt like… sometimes it even feels real. But it has no hold over me, no real effect." For the first time in several minutes, the Doctor gave Dr. Jack a half-hearted grin.

"Doctor, there is something you must realize: You may know who you are, you may have known who Rose was, but you really don't know who I am." Dr. Jack's face showed no anger or resentment, just a need to be understood. "I am no longer just a clone. I'm not even a clone now, look at you! I'm a completely new species. I have a drive deep within me, but it drives me to those I love. Not away from them." He lifted his brow. The Doctor nodded slowly.

"I'm sorry," the Doctor finally said after a minute. "About before, I should've…You're right. I know how it feels." Dr. Jack smiled and shook his head.

"Thank you," He ran a hand over his hair and scratched lightly on the back of his scalp. "Y'know, I think we need something a bit stronger than tea. How about a beer?"