Current mood:	okay
Entry tags:	fic, fic: dw/tw

Fic: The Last Time We Met
Title: The Last Time We Met (Was a Different Time for Each of Us)
Rating: PG
Pairing: Jack/Romana
Word count: 2635
Summary: Six times Jack Harkness met Romanadvoratrelundar and one time he didn't.
Spoilers: Parting of the Ways, End of Days
Notes: Thanks to my lovely beta xwingace, who didn't just correct this but also gave it a proper title and solved the problems of the timeline. This is set in the same universe as We'll always have Paris, but it should make sense without it.
Written for the twdw_ficathon as a gift for iristigerlily (and John Barrowman because it's his birthday today), who wanted the words "Oh... so, you're not dead"; a daffodil and a mention of something to do with neck-ties. Hope you like it! Comments and concrit and not telling JB I wrote this are love.
Fic Masterlist: Here.




Jack doesn't remember their first meeting. He's only five years old and still innocent to most of the cruelties of this universe. He'll learn soon enough. She's beautiful, and the smile directed at him lets him drop his toy gun. Somehow he can't bear to point a weapon at her.

"I'm Jack" he offers, as if to apologize.

Her beautiful blonde hair is flowing down her shoulders when she kneels down to look at him face to face, like an equal. She answers with her own name, but it's long like a song and he has forgotten the beginning before she's even finished. He hides his confusion behind a smile, an ability that'll save him more than once in his life to come.

"We're playing Time Lords and Monsters, want to play? You could... be a Time Lord with me."

He bites his tongue before he spills out that she is the first adult he ever offered that honour. She just smiles sadly, "Time Lords are only fairytales, you know? You play a Time Agent instead."

She shoos him off, watching him while he tries to dodge the other kids, waving his toy gun at them.

She kisses his forehead before she leaves, like a mother he never had, whispering "Thank you."

Jack doesn't know for what. He will forget the nice lady and her name like a story. Not because she wasn't important, but because a child's mind forgets so easily. He will grow up too quickly, forget so much to survive.

But he'll remember a childhood dream. Being a Time Agent.


+++


The second time he meets her he's suspicious.

Jack Harkness, decorated Time Agent on a classified mission in Paris, 1945, knows that these kind of things just don't happen. A beautiful blonde woman doesn’t just appear and ask him for a drink. Even he is not that good.
He can smell another time traveller a mile away, so he tries to scan her for weapons and identification while they're waiting for their drinks. The recordings are scrambled; obviously she's one step ahead of him. Still, he doesn't call for backup. Something about her gives him the strangest kind of déjà-vu.
They talk about things that don't matter, the fastest routes to Marseilles, the wine, what a shame it is the daffodils aren't in flower anymore. She grows tired of small talk quickly, and changes the subject after their third round.

"There's a war going on," she states, staring into nothing as if she could see it happen right now.

He snorts, not just because it is 1945, but because every Time Agent, including him, has been trying to prevent the total breakdown of history for four relative years. He doesn't think they stand a chance against the Daleks in the end, but what else is there to do than try?

"If you had the possibility to destroy your enemy once and for all," she continues, suddenly focussing on him with a force that makes him shudder. "Would you do it?"

She's careful not to create anachronisms in a little French Bar. A professional. For the casual observer they could be talking about a number of things all concerning current events.

"Of course, they're nothing but killers."

"But what if that turns you into a killer of your own kind? What of the innocents you'd endanger?"

"They'd be slaughtered anyway if we lost."

"But do we have the right?"

"Yes." He doesn't even have to think about his answer. He knows what the Daleks can do, was forced to see it happen, the pain and loss still too fresh. He downs the rest of his drink; there are too many faces lurking in that part of his memory. He slams the empty glass onto the shabby table.

"Sacrificing a few to save billions. It always comes down to that, doesn't it?"

She nods resignedly. Then she looks up and almost smiles. "I've always liked the human way of thinking. It's so refreshingly simple."

Before he can ask what she means she kisses him on the cheek, leaving the bar and a very confused Time Agent behind.

Two years later he will wake up in Paris 1979 like he never left, missing the life he led in between. But he'll never forget the strange woman's eyes.


+++


The third time it was luck, Jack convinced himself afterwards.

A girl with a straw hat and a guy with a scarf so long it dangled between his feet, ambushing him atop the Eiffel Tower in 1979, giving him back his freedom in the form of a Chula time ship.

Coincidence. He kissed the girl chastely then, because it was all he could offer as thanks. She seemed almost surprised by this little gesture, touching her lips as if to prove it happened.

It was only later, when his mind finally slowed down and the headaches finally disappeared that he remembered that he had seen the girl's face before. Coincidence perhaps. Wrong place, wrong time. Maybe she liked him. Maybe she was involved in the removal of his memory. Maybe he had met her, kissed or shagged her a dozen times in his two missing years and doesn't even remember. Pity.

The life of a time traveller is complicated, folding in on itself, crossing its own paths, maybe she hadn't met him before, but will meet him. Will have met him. Is going to have... He shakes his head and sets coordinates for the 51st century. Exams on predestination paradoxes had always been his doom at the Academy.

Except for that one incident with the Hyper Vodka and the chicken.


+++


The fourth time he meets a man with a memory of her, who never shares it with him.

Missing two years of his life sharpened his memory on the remaining bits, he concludes. He will never forget Paris, he promises himself while he rigs an empty Chula ambulance to his invisible time ship, waving it as a bait at the first Agents coming his way. Pity it's too crowded with Nazis right about now to do his con there, so London it is instead.
He hums with Edith Piaf blaring out of the speakers, regretting nothing, while he's dodging the ship with the nice panelling following him. Jumps time tracks and makes sure his steps are easy to follow.

He neatly crashes his Chula 'warship' in the middle of the London Blitz and prepares to wait. He adjusts the necktie on his borrowed uniform and then frowns at the sky which is promising rain, cursing not having done this in Pompeii again.

He tries to remember that mysterious girl's face, the angelic features hiding something far older and wiser and he wonders where she is now. He has never met someone quite like her ever before or after. He shakes his head. This is getting ridiculous.
Jack Harkness' thoughts lingering on just one person? If he isn't careful there'll be gossip that he's in love.

He's here for business. And who the heck disguises their time ship as a police box anyway?


+++


The fifth time he'd been waiting for her.

He was clinging to the silly hope that she could find him again, give him a ship like she'd done before. He was back in 1979 after all, even if he had taken the slow path here this time.

He remembers his crash still quite vividly, the responsible Extrapolator lying in a sealed Torchwood safe right now like a dead bird. He curses the piece of circuitry once again for its inability to get him somewhere with decent time travel. Instead of finding himself in the 51st century he'd spat out dirt, checking if his internal organs were still internal, and had looked up to find himself surrounded by military personnel in no mood for jokes. Definitely a case of realizing too late that flying this thing might've been a bad idea.

Now there was nothing else to do but wait for rescue while avoiding anachronisms. And that got him a job as defender of the Earth and to Paris, 1979 again. This was getting ridiculous.

"Oh... so you're not dead." The words, with their oddly surprised tone, make him turn, and there she is, like she's been summoned to the little café he chose to rest in. Truly a professional. He has no idea how she always manages to find him. Even if it did take her over two decades this time.

She looks slightly older, the fine lines around her eyes suggesting that his timeless lady has seen things he wishes on no one. She still seems fragile, but there's an edge to her that reminds him of their conversation about the war.
But the war is over. He died to make sure of that and was left behind for his troubles. Maybe her fate had been similar. He wonders how much time passed for her since their last fateful rendezvous atop the Eiffel Tower.

"Where's your boyfriend with the scarf?" he asks.

Her face darkens for a moment, before the pain is quickly hidden behind a polite smile. "He doesn't exist anymore."

It's not as unimportant as her hand gesture suggests. Messy break-up. Jack had known the guy was an idiot. Probably got strangled by his own scarf. "He left you or you left him?" When she doesn't answer Jack suspects it's the usual mixture of both.

"How about you?" Answering questions with questions. A professional. God, he loves this woman.

"Been here and there..." he pauses, his heart remembering what he lost on Satellite Five. "I died," he adds. Instead of being surprised or outraged the blonde just nips on her tea, as if he just confessed he'd been to the supermarket.

"Strange that we meet here again..." Jack tries again, hoping for a reaction this time.

He doesn't quite get what he wants, though she does shake her head. "Not really. Paris has this rift through space-time. Attracts all kinds of weird time dilations, serendipity, as your people would call it. Also fuels time ships. The Rift, not serendipity." She wrinkles her nose at that thought.

"There's one in Cardiff, too."

She raises an eyebrow, silently asking who would choose Cardiff over Paris. He grins. He knows at least one alien who already did. His guts grow cold, reminding him why he's here.

"Could you give me a ride there? Cardiff, 2006? I got here by surfboard and that turned out to be a one way trip."

He doesn't add who he's so desperately trying to find. Or why. He isn't quite sure himself. She says nothing, offers nothing, just smiles into her teacup, obviously lost in memories herself. But he knows this smile. Has seen it lots of times, because even he is not that good.

"It's not time yet."

It means No.

There's nothing more to say. "Better be going then." He smiles, because he's good at hiding emotions, too.

He leaves her, the last thing he used to believe in, not looking back.


+++


The next time is technically not a next time, but a continuation of the last time.

He walks down the street, lost in thoughts on what to do next. He's been in 1979 before and the year definitely hasn't improved on revisiting. It's got worse actually, because without a decent hangover he actually notices how bad things look.

There is nothing here he can use. Not even the secret government facilities devoted to cataloguing alien artefacts have the equipment he needs yet. Stuck. He shoves his hands deeper into his pockets, heading for his hotel. At least he can get drunk.

A hand on his shoulder yanks him backwards with an unearthly strength, causing him to lose his balance and land on just the person responsible for his fall. He's about to curse, but his voice is lost in the roar of a speeding truck driving past.

Escaping death at a hair's breath. Now this is turning into a bad habit of his. He turns around to see who he's landed on, and of course it's her.

This is the first time he sees her angry, shaking with rage and something else he thinks must be fear. "Don't do that! You could've died, you stupid ape!"

The words ring in his ears and stir something he thought was long dead, but then her lips crash onto his and he forgets the other one whose favourite insult the Ape Approach had been.


+++


Her eyes are deep and hide the darkness beneath with the expertise of someone who's practiced this for a long time.
Still he can see it, almost touch it like he's touching her now, her skin cold against his fingertips, his caresses leaving a trail of heat behind. He continues until he has discovered every inch of her milky skin with his hands. The shadow in the depth of her eyes remains. It tells him she'll never lose control. A professional.

He knows the look focussing on him now, a stare that is reaching past every mask he has, looking right at his soul. Has seen it before in clear blue eyes of an alien in a leather jacket, mourning a lost race.

For the first time he wonders if she is human at all.

He isn't sure who is comforting who that night, trying to forget the things that remain unspoken between them.
He knows his demons well enough, kisses her neck to forget Pain and Abandonment, inhaling her scent to lose sight of Death. She's more than willing to do the same. So much time, so much history that will never be mentioned. The present everything they can embrace.

"You never told me your name," he realizes afterwards, when she rests her head on his chest, listening to his heartbeat as if it is the most peculiar thing in the world.
She pulls herself up onto her elbow, kissing him tenderly. It reminds him of another kiss he stole, such a long time ago. Before dying for someone he believed in. It is a goodbye, perhaps, although the night is still young.

She breaks their kiss, smiling, "I will one day."

Who are you really, and what were you before? What did you do and what did you think? So many questions left unanswered, but he doesn't care. Instead, he closes his eyes with a contentment he hasn't felt in decades.

She's gone when he wakes up, leaving him behind to once again take the slow path.

He wonders if there'll be a next time.


+++


The sixth time is a first time for Jack, the first time something happens to that stupid hand in a jar he has kept ever since he missed the Doctor by mere hours.

It suddenly starts to glow, and the so familiar groaning sound filling the Hub makes his heart sing with joy. Perhaps he's lucky this time.

He doesn't really know what to expect when a familiar blue shape begins to appear, getting more solid with every beat of his heart. Apologies for leaving him behind? Accusations for still being alive or doing such a bad job at saving the world? Stunned silence? Hugs?

He intends to find out.

He's up the railing and in front of the doors before the materialization is even complete, anticipating this moment he's waited for so long. But instead of a leather clad man another familiar face, framed by blonde hair opens the wooden doors. And while he'd hoped it would be Rose, he's not disappointed to see his angel smiling almost manically at him. It's the last person he expected to see again.

"It's time," she simply says, offering her hand.


The strange noise seizes as quickly as it came, leaving an empty Hub behind.