Adventure of a Lifetime: Beginning

The other Doctor, left behind by both the proper Doctor and Rose, has to learn to live a human life as best he can with only the rest of the Tyler clan to help him. The one adventure he thought he would never have is just beginning.

Betas: mad_jaks
Notes: AU end to Journey’s End. Thanks to my beta on this one. I had fun with this one guys. Hope you enjoy.

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Part 1

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, and was 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.

Part 2

It was three days before Christmas when he noticed that his throat was itchy. He kept on clearing his throat, worried he might start coughing and spluttering like Tony and Pete. He really didn't want to get sick. Getting sick was bad, the Doctor rarely ever got sick.

He went to sleep that night hoping that it would go away, and woke up feeling like he'd gone through a sun. He had a fever, his eyes and nose ran constantly, he felt utterly miserable in a way he couldn't ever remember feeling before, and he couldn't stop coughing.

There was a knock on the door and Jackie poked her head in; she took one look at his mussed up hair and sighed. "So you've got it too, then? Just you watch, I'll be next."

He was going to tell her to go bugger off, but ended up having a slight coughing fit instead. Taking advantage of it, Jackie came in and went over to his bathroom. He heard the tap running, and then she was back with a damp washcloth and a glass. She put the cloth on the back of his neck and held it there as she waved the glass of water in front of him.

"Nothing much you can do but sleep it off. Drink lots of fluids too, or you'll end up regretting it. I'll bring you your breakfast up here."

He wasn't hungry but knew Jackie in a mothering mood was a force to be reckoned with. He ate the toast she brought up a short time later, but enjoyed the banana more, even though it hurt to eat that as well.

"Guh, I feel terrible," he stated rather belatedly, as she was about to leave the room with the empty tray.

"You've got a cold, everyone feels terrible when they have a cold," Jackie replied, and left him to his misery. He wished more than ever right now that Rose was there to curl up with, but she wasn't. All he could do was lay on his side and try to concentrate on how to breathe properly with his nose all clogged up.

He spent that and the next day, mostly lying in bed, sleeping or reading. He was afraid he'd end up spending Christmas like that too, so was nicely surprised when he woke up on the twenty-fifth feeling... not 'well' exactly, but better than he had for days. He was still sick, but felt like he was getting better.

Pete and Tony were nearly free of coughing now too, and Jackie seemed happy to not be sick that day.

He had a small stack of presents waiting for him on the breakfast table; one from each of the Tyler's, and he discovered, Maureen, the cook, had baked him some tarts as well. Sick or not, he was going to eat them, before they weren't good anymore. They ended up being his breakfast. Not exactly the most nutritious thing, but it made everyone happy to see him eat something without having to tell him to. Being sick had taken his appetite.

Tony had got him some colouring pencils. He laughed when he opened the small present from the boy, and had hugged him and thanked him. The boy had seen him sketching and obviously thought it would be good if he could add in some colour. Pete got him a new suit, this one a darker shade of blue than his main one. He knew he'd wear it just as often as his other one.

When he opened Jackie's present he had to close his eyes quickly. She had given him a framed photograph, just one. It had been taken the last time the Doctor had shared Christmas with the Tyler's; one of their next door neighbours, Jason, he thought his name was, had taken it for them. Pete wasn't in it and Mickey was, but that didn't matter. He found that he was even missing Mickey. Mickey the Idiot who had turned into Mickey the Hero.

"You didn't have a picture, I thought you might like one."

"Thank you," he replied, going upstairs quickly to put it on his bedside table; the Doctor, Mickey, Rose and Jackie smiled widely back at him. At least now he wouldn't have to worry that he'd forget what she looked like.

Back downstairs with the others, again, he smiled at Jackie. "I Guess I did miss having a photo."

She smiled back at him and nodded. "It's helped me, knowing that I have photos to look through. Not her baby photos of course, they're still in the other universe, but I have a few good new ones from here."

He nodded, glad to feel that he was in a good mood now. "Yeah." His grin widened slightly and he looked down at his lap. He was still wearing his pyjamas. "I got presents!" he stated and laughed. He couldn't remember the last Christmas the Doctor had got presents. All his Christmases lately had been blood and fire and fighting, and death, lots of death. In fact, the closest to a good one he'd probably had was the one the photo had been taken at. He wondered for a few seconds how the Doctor's current Christmas was going, or if it even was Christmas wherever he was. Or if he'd bother with it. Shrugging, and coughing slightly, he decided to forget about him and enjoy this day with his new family.

Still rather full from all the tarts he'd eaten for breakfast, he didn't come down again for lunch, so when dinner time arrived he got a surprise. Not only was there a huge meal, with turkeys and hams, and enough places set to fill the table and extra plates stacked on the side, but he found Pete had invited over quite a number of people for a party.

He ate enough to fill up to almost bursting. Or so it felt. He didn't think he had ever understood that particular saying until just then.

Some of the people there were families, so there was quite a bunch of children in the family room, talking noisily and poking fun at the people on the television. Tony was the youngest child there, but he appeared to be enjoying himself immensely. The poor boy mustn't get a lot of time with other children to play with, he thought, yet, oddly, Tony didn't seem to be spoiled rotten. That must have been Jackie's doing. Being a single mum bringing up her daughter on a council estate probably meant she'd never had any money to spend on things they didn't need. To not buy extra things for Tony, after finding herself rich? Must have needed a will of steel.

He didn't know any of the people there as most were from Pete's 'real life' workplace, Vitex, rather than Torchwood, but he had fun anyway. He even danced with a few people. A woman about the same age as Rose kept on trying to feel his bum when they danced. It was kind of scary to be around someone that touchy.

He went to bed at ten. For him, that was late.

It was only the next day, when he woke up still in a good mood and looked at the photo, that he realised it had been the first day he had spent here that he hadn't spent most of his time either feeling sad or sorry for himself.

He'd had his first good day.

He hoped he would have a lot more like it. It felt good to be happy for once.

Christmas was over and it was now the fifth of January. If he didn't hand in his notice soon, he was going to end up having to go back to Torchwood after the break instead of enrolling at college on the nineteenth. He cornered Pete in his study.

"I need to hand in my notice at Torchwood. I want to do a Business Course at Barking College. Enrolment's in a fortnight."

"Business? That the Donna in you?"

He blinked. He simply hadn't thought of that, "The Donna in me? Do you know... I think it is. Donna definitely knew about that kind of stuff, in spades. She was brilliant."

Barking College. He'd chosen it for two reasons even before he'd even bothered looking to see if it held a course he'd wanted to take. Firstly, for the name. There was something quite 'him' about going to college in a place called Barking; it suited him better than most, he thought. Secondly, for the colour of the front of the main building. It was blue. TARDIS blue. Well, almost anyway.

"I need to rebuild my life, and I don't have any business skills. I've never needed them before, but I'm alone now, and need to get a job. I haven't got the foggiest how to do interviews or even how to go about getting an interview in the first place and thought that this would be a good course to take to get me introduced to it. And it will give me skills that I might need later. I read the course curriculum thingy on the net and it says communication skills. They're important nowadays I hear." He tried a smile. He didn't think he was making a very good impression. He tended to ramble when he was nervous.

The woman who was there for the enrolments nodded her head with a slight frown. "Define rebuilding your life?"

The smile on his face fell. "Umm, two months ago, almost three now, on my birthday in fact... I lost my home. Everything I had, gone. I had nothing but the suit I was wearing. No money, no friends, no clue as to what to do next. I need to start all over again.

And that probably was that. They would reject him for being a broke, friendless, lunatic. Sighing, he got up off the seat he was in and stretched. "I'm staying at the Tyler residence.

The woman, Mrs Green if her nametag was correct, smiled at him and nodded. "Just so that you know, most people who join this course are young; sixteen to nineteen, usually."

He grinned. "That doesn't worry me. I can get on perfectly well with the younger crowd. My... partner... Rose. Well, she's gone now. Never coming back. Went running off with... a doctor, and this chap called Mickey. She was nineteen when I first met her. It'll be good to make some new friends."

And with that, he handed over the form with his details on it, and walked out,

Why did life have to be so hard?

A week later he hung up the phone with a huge grin on his face. "Hah! Jackie, Pete, I got in!"

He hugged both of them for a good five minutes each, then swept Tony up off his feet and ran around the lounge a few times with him hanging off his shoulder, squealing and giggling the entire time. He was too for that matter.

Alright, so, sometimes life wasn't too bad.

Right now he felt like he could fly.

February the second started early for him.

He grabbed the notebook and pens he'd set ready on his desk the night before and stuffed them in his jacket pocket . He was wearing his blue suit. The original one. He was even wearing the same red t-shirt under it. He hadn't really known what else to wear and, since he didn't mind coming off as the eccentric type, he wasn't bothered about wearing a suit to a school. As this one had belonged to the Doctor, the pockets were transdimentional ones. He was sure they'd come in rather handy.

He'd got used to the family having breakfast together but, this morning, Tony was still asleep in bed as he wolfed down a few pieces of toast and a glass of orange juice in the dining room. Jackie was up though, and hugged him good luck. It made him feel a bit like a child himself, but at least she seemed to care about how his day was going to go. He was nervous and jittery, even with her support, but he wanted to go. He needed to do something different with this life, and he had to start somewhere, even if it was a small baby step like this one.

The literacy and numeracy tests he had taken to show his abilities had been easy. He was sure he'd pass the course with flying colours, if he could stay focused. He just hoped the teachers were a bit livelier than the ones he could remember from the Academy back on Gallifrey.

By the time he got to the college, the sun had fully risen and he had five minutes left to find the right room. That didn't bother him too much. If he was a little bit late, well, he couldn't help it.

As it was, he found the room he was looking for with no problems. He spotted someone standing, having a cigarette, right by the main door who, it turned out, was doing the same course. Holly her name was, and she was eighteen. She kept smiling at him.

Most of the class was female. Apart from him, there was only one other male; a boy of sixteen, who looked kind of awkward (He almost laughed out loud when he found out the boy's name was Peter.) and only one other person in the class, besides him (Mrs Green, the teacher he had met last month, didn't count.) who was over the age of nineteen; a woman who looked to be almost his age, called Katie. Well his body's apparent age, anyway. After careful consideration, and help from both Jackie and Pete, he had settled on thirty-eight. He was almost forty. Damn.

Katie had olive skin, shiny, dark hair, even darker eyes, and a body figure close to that of Rose's but with (and he noted it with a slight blush) smaller breasts. And when she spoke it was with an accent that reminded him of Martha's. There was something about her he automatically liked. Automatically liking someone was one of the ways, in his later years, that the Doctor had begun to choose his companions. It was definitely how he'd chosen Rose and Martha.

He smiled at her, and she smiled back. He had been doing a lot of smiling at people the past five minutes. Most had smiled back, too.

Taking a seat off to one side, he turned to the front when Mrs Green (Diane) cleared her throat. "Welcome class, to the Introductory Diploma for Business and Retail Studies."

The course was explained, not in detail but in part, and a sheet was handed out showing the class what would be taught on Monday mornings . It took up the whole lesson, and, apart from a small break, it seemed to go by rather quickly. Diane was both funny but not afraid to point out when someone made a mistake. She was the kind of teacher he liked.

Afternoon class was Computer Studies. Again, it was just an outline of what they'd be doing, the course objectives and a little bit of time left over to muck about on the internet. It was basic stuff, and most of the people in there already seemed to know it as well, but it was part of the programme, and the majority of the class rejoiced at seeing there was something that they'd definitely be able to pass. Their teacher was a man. Justin. All the teachers went by their first names here. That'd take a bit of getting used to. It was a much more relaxed environment for learning than he was used to.

Even though there were still three more different classes to get the information about for the term, he thought that he'd actually enjoy the course. And he was more than likely to make some young friends.

He had to go speak with a tutor before he went home, they went over his info and spent an hour with him to help with a study plan.

He got home just in time for a rather late dinner, tired but happy with his plans and how they were going so far.

He fell asleep as soon as his head hit the pillow, and slept like a log.

"Jack, how are you doing?"

Blinking and turning around, he waved to Katie, the 'older' woman in his class and grinned. "Hi!"

Jackie had taken him shopping to help pick out some clothes he actually liked. He'd been wearing the same two suits to classes and he was sure that everyone was kind of wondering if he had anything else. Not that it was Pete's fault that the clothes he'd bought for him weren't 'him'. The problem was he still wasn't too sure what was 'him' when it came to clothes. He did love his suits though, so blue was definitely in for things he'd like.

"I'd ask what you are doing here, but that'd be a bit stupid."

"Me? Jackie here is taking me shopping. I need more clothes in case you hadn't figured that out yet." He grimaced. "Two suits. It's not good to wear them all the time, or so I hear."

Katie laughed as Jackie rolled her eyes. "Yeah, we noticed you only seemed to wear the same two outfits. We were wondering if you'd have another two for the second week and turn it into some kind of trend."

He shook his head. "Nope. Just the two suits. I was kind of abandoned recently. Left with only the clothes I stood up in... so to speak. I got born and... and..." He was not going to cry on the middle of a busy street.

As if sensing his near meltdown, Jackie quickly pulled him into a hug and begun rubbing his back. "Come on sweetheart, don't be upset." He stood there and just let her wrap him up in her arms. He didn't return the embrace, nor did he say anything. If he opened up his mouth, he was sure he'd start sobbing.

Katie was looking at them in a weird kind of way. "Is he alright?" he heard her asking Jackie. Now he felt invisible too! He sniffed slightly and, without them wanting to, his arms wrapped themselves around Jackie and he clung on tightly.

"He will be. He's a bit... confused and upset." He felt her sigh heavily, and loosened his grip slightly.

"Thank you!" she responded, "I was suffocating."

"Sorry. Jackie... I don't think I can do this. Not right now anyway."

He felt a third hand join hers on his back, and lifted his head from Jackie's shoulder to see Katie grinning at him.

"I could come with you? Shopping. It's better with three."

Jackie smiled at her and patted him on the back. "See? An offer you can't refuse. Between the two of us we'll find you something you like."

He groaned. "Will I get a say at all?"

"Sure! We'll let you pick things out," Katie replied, grabbing onto one of his hands and pulling him forwards, Jackie making sure to keep a grip on his other so he couldn't slip away from her. He was sandwiched between two women bent on making sure he had something to wear. He was either in hell, or very lucky. Possibly it was both at the same time.

He found he was actually good at this whole shopping thing and, to his added horror, he found that he enjoyed it. Spending time with Katie was a new and interesting experience, and he found he really liked her. His spirits rose with each item that he found, liked, and they both seemed to approve of.

The clothes he ended up choosing were mostly in some shade of blue. But he did end up with quite a lot of brown and a few green items as well. He didn't know why he liked green, he just did. Maybe that was a Donna part of him, or maybe it was this new human him that just liked it.

By the end he had another two suits, one brown and one blue. To Jackie's disappointment, he hadn't gone for denim; it was too scratchy on his skin and he found he didn't like it. Jackie had also bought him quite a few new pairs of trousers; three pairs of pyjamas (none of them pinstriped, though he especially liked the dark blue ones with the planets on them); and lots of new underthings to wear. The women had definitely enjoyed helping him out in that department. He'd had the odd thought that perhaps not too many guys would actually liked that.

By the end they were all hungry. And, to show how much he appreciated the good day he'd had, he took the other two to off to buy them tea at a nearby by café. He had a banana flavoured sundae, with a milkshake, also banana. Well, at least it was another thing about him that truly hadn't changed: when given a choice, he'd always go for banana. For some reason, Katie found it hilarious.

As they walked out of the café, still all grins, he clapped his hands together and made his first major slip of the tongue since being in this universe. "So! Come on, back to the TARDIS."

Katie frowned slightly. "What's a TARDIS?"

He slammed a hand over his mouth and made a sound that came out a bit... strangled. He walked off, back toward Jackie's car, and crawled into the back seat to waited for her. She was talking to Katie, he could see her doing it, through the window, and wondered what she was saying to her about it.

He didn't say another word for the rest of the day, worried that he might say something else stupid. In fact, it wasn't until he put on his new planet patterned pyjamas that he began to feel a little bit better.

On the second week, they had to pick out a partner for group work, and he automatically gravitated towards Katie. It was good to have a friend in class now. But he was worried about what Jackie had told her about him when he'd gone to sulk in the car. What he'd said out in the street was still very clear to him, and he needed to know what she thought.

What if she thought it was some kind of nervous breakdown? He wasn't sure one was too far off anyway; he'd been getting a bit snappy towards the Tyler's, lately.

Katie was the only friend he had right now who wasn't living with him, and he felt like he could talk to her. There were things he wanted her to know, but he didn't think she'd believe him.

"Hello," he said as he sat down in the chair next to her.

She smiled at him and nodded. "Hello back. I was afraid you'd quit after what happened Saturday."

Blinking, he frowned. "Why would I quit? It's not like I find this class hard or anything."

"Jackie said that you were... I mean, she kind of said that you were... "

Closing his eyes, and letting his breath out in a frustrated sigh, he let his head hit the table with a bit of a thud. "Said what?" His voice sounded short and bitter to his own ears, he hated to think of what it sounded like to her.

"That you're having a bit of a hard time of it lately."

He snorted out in disbelief. "You were talking for over five minutes. I doubt that's all she said about me."

She shook her head. "No, it's not. But it is all I'll say in the middle of a classroom."

For a second he had forgotten where they were, and it calmed him down a bit to remember. He looked at her and grimaced. "Yeah, thanks. Sorry. I've been snapping at everyone the past two days."

She was still smiling nicely at him. "Nah, that's alright."

He couldn't concentrate on the work they were supposed to be doing in their pairs though, and spent most of the first half of the day watching Katie as she did some of the work set out, occasionally pointing out a few things she missed.

It wasn't the best start to his second week of college, but it was better than having completely lost his rag with her. The horrid thing was he could feel it inside him, rising with every passing second. He didn't know how long he'd be able to keep his temper under wraps.

"Jack? Have you thought about talking to the counsellor? It could do you some good," Katie stated as they sat down in a secluded spot to eat lunch, after the first class was over.

He shook his head. "One of the first things I was made to do soon after I fetched up here was to go to a bloody psychologist. She made my skin crawl. Made me feel like a freak of nature. Which, by the way, I am. Not one other being ever in existence is like me. I'm a complete freak. I hate it. I hate myself. I hate being unable to do anything without help of some kind, even if it's just monetary. I hate not being able to travel. I miss the hell out of everything. I don't know how long I'm going to be able to stand this." Admitting that out loud felt both incredibly good and was infuriatingly saddening, but it was true. He didn't know what Jackie had told her, but he couldn't help himself. He needed someone right then, and here someone was. "I'm a burden. It's all I am to Jackie and Pete and everyone. I can't do anything right, I can't do anything at all. I can't even get a bloody job on my own. It makes me feel so stupid! And stupid is one thing I'm not. Not even close to it. Yet here I am in a bloody stupid school learning things I should probably already know by now. God knows I'm old enough!"

He took a deep shuddering breath and tried ignoring the damp tracks on his cheeks, swiping a hand over his eyes when he found he couldn't any longer. He let out a loud sniff and took a few more deep breaths. "Bloody hell! I can't do this. Really, I can't let my anger out. And it's clawing at me. Or, well, it feels like it anyway."

"Maybe you should get a punching bag then? Beat the crap out of it when you're angry."

He blinked, couldn't help but snort in amusement, and grinned up at her. "Did you just say, 'beat the crap out of something' to me? Heh, I know I've only known you a little over a week, but I didn't know you were so violent."

She grinned back at him and winked. "I'm not."

His heart lurched in his chest before beating a tiny bit faster. He sat up and rubbed at his eyes again before clearing his throat. "Well, I'm a mess. I'm going to go clean my face up a bit before I go to next class."

"Will you be doing something in class this time?"

He nodded. "Yeah, sorry about that. I Guess I just... I need to sort myself out, I know. Maybe it was too soon to start with this, but I just feel like I'm wasting my life if I'm not doing something."

Katie nodded at him, before getting up to make her way to the next class. "I'll save you a seat," she stated, before disappearing around the corner.

He went to the bathroom, and spent a good five minutes trying to wash away the evidence of his outburst. He was late to the next class, but he didn't get into trouble.

He rather thought that Katie had explained to the tutor that he was a bit out of it today.

It was five days later, when he got in the shower and went to soap between his thighs that he found there'd been a few improvements to his 'plumbing'.

He closed his eyes and leaned against the bathroom wall. "Bloody hell!" he exclaimed aloud, "Oh that's just brilliant."

He was in a human body. His system needed to work like a human one. And, while he hadn't had any needs in that department, yet, his body was trying to regulate his hormones into something fit for a human male. Including in the sexual way. Testosterone. He could deal with that. No wonder he'd been so tetchy lately. His hormones were going nuts. His marvellously alien brain had taken a while, but it had finally caught up.

He immediately felt better about all the times he had started getting pissed off for no reason, recently. He was going through an accelerated growth stage similar to puberty.

Standing naked under the streaming water, he laughed out loud. And to think he'd been scared there, for a moment.

He had his first unexpected erection later that night. He laid in bed stock still, afraid to move, wondering if it would just go away by itself like it had arrived. It had, thankfully, ten minutes later.

He wasn't awake when he went through his first orgasm. He woke up all sticky instead.

Sexual frustration, he decided after two more days of his body deciding to act without his consent, was a bitch. Sometimes he couldn't think past what a nice bum Holly had, and what nice breasts most of his female classmates possessed.

He spent most of the third day sitting, hoping he wasn't called to stand for any reason, and blushing if anyone got too close. He felt old and kind of like a pervert for even thinking thoughts like that about people so young. He'd been looking at Peter too, not just the girls. Peter had very nice legs, for a bloke.

Katie, alone, was free from his roaming eyes and it made him think there may be something wrong with him. Did he only like young people sexually? It would explain a lot, really, if that was the case. Still, it didn't stop Katie from being his friend. Knowing what was making him feel so totally out of control recently helped immensely and, for some reason, he confided in her.

"It's not funny! It's very frustrating I'll have you know. I'm not used to it at all, it's entirely new. Not necessarily something I like, but new and rather... intriguing anyway. Next thing, I'll be having sex. Maybe even regularly. Sex, me!"

She grinned at him and he grinned back. "I can think of worse things than regular sex. Regular sex is good, and it feels fantastic. I haven't had that for a while mind, not since Richard anyway. He divorced me for an eighteen year old. I was only twenty-three at the time!"

"Bastard."

"Yeah."

He found he was even comfortable talking about sex around Katie, and he eased up in his chair and sighed. "There's other things I know next to nothing about. How do you ask someone on a date? And what do you do on them? Is it all movies and holding hands?"

She gave him an odd look then, one he couldn't really identify, before she cracked another grin at him. "Got someone in mind?"

He shook his head, and saw disappointment flash in her eyes. Well, it was nice that she was worried for his emotional wellbeing and happiness, it was a sign he had once again chosen the right person to be friends with.

"Just curious right now, for when I am interested. Right now I'm trying to deal with one thing at a time, or I'd probably be overwhelmed."

The disappointment faded from her eyes and she nodded. "Yeah, good idea. I forgot that this is all new to you. Not that I believe half the crackpot things you and Jackie have told me."

He froze a bit at that, remembering he had wanted to talk to her about that last week. "Umm, yeah, about that. What did Jackie say? When I... slipped up?"

Katie shrugged her shoulders a bit and rolled her eyes. "She kept on going on about travelling in a blue box that was bigger on the inside through space and time."

Taking a deep breath, he nodded. "A TARDIS, that stands for Time and Relative Dimension in Space, she's a time machine, spaceship, utterly marvellous and much like me, last of her ki... No, not me. Not mine anymore. Human-Time Lord Biological Metacrisis. I'm now half human... well, mostly human really, just kept the same big old, alien brain."

She was looking at him with a look of pure fascination and, taking heart, he grinned happily and went on, telling her all about the TARDIS and some of how she worked. It was the first time since being abandoned here that he hadn't cried or got angry at the thought of the TARDIS.

It felt good to be able to talk so freely to someone that didn't look like they wanted to lock him up for being completely crazy. Someone not 'psychologically' trying to put him in a category and stick a dozen labels on his head.

The only thing he wanted as a label was his name. Jack. That was him now. Or at least, who he was trying to figure out he was.

Part 3

He found that having a room so close to Jackie and Pete in his current condition was not good. Not good at all.

This was the second time tonight that he'd been woken up by Jackie's loud cries of "OH yes! Pete!" Not to mention the loud grunts and, once, a wail of pleasure..He couldn't remember ever having been woken up by them before. He could only suppose that they were normally a lot quieter about their love making when Tony was in the room next door to them (and not sleeping at his friend's house). Wasn't it an accepted fact that human males had a refractory period? That they weren't able to get erect again immediately after having sex?

Thinking about erections was really not helping when he was sporting one so hard it was painful. He wriggled about, closing his eyes as a grunt of his own escaped him at the friction of his pyjamas against it. Time Lords weren't this sensitive. Weren't really sensitive down there at all. This was different. Nerve endings were alive with sensation and every tiny movement was driving him nuts.

He threw off his duvet, blanket and sheet and lowered his pyjama bottoms.

Tiny muscles were twitching in his thighs, his pelvis and around the base of his penis making it bob slightly. He let out a sound that was half surprise, and half frustration. He felt extremely hot, like when he'd had that cold just before Christmas.

Feeling a bit dirty at his own actions, he slowly lowered his hand and swiped it over the head of his penis. He had to bite his other hand so as not to let out a moan as loud as the people further down the landing. He didn't want them to know what he was doing.

God! That had felt incredibly good.

He sat up, putting the pillows behind his back to support himself, planted his feet, took a deep breath and wrapped his hand around himself.

"Bloody... hell!" he whispered, closing his eyes and trying not to make any more noise. He had a new respect for the Tyler's managing to stay as quiet as they normally did. He was a vocal person by nature; it was going to be difficult for him to stay quiet.

By the time he started actually moving his hand he was panting harshly. He let his head roll back as he pressed his feet deeply into the bed, and his body compensated by bucking up into his hand. He curled his free hand into the sheets beside him and began to thrust. He couldn't help himself.

The hand around his shaft sped up, his panting became more ragged and he began to sweat. His eyes rolled up and his eyelids fluttered closed; his jaws clenched shut. His entire body was tightening up so hard; he wondered if it could kill him. For a few seconds he stopped breathing altogether, the only thing that moved, could move, was his hand.

His mad rhythm faltered for a second and then his body released itself, his head hitting the wall with a bang. A loud cry escaped him as most of his muscles relaxed, while the ones vital to reproduction and... well, this, continued to spasm.

A long, drawn out moan of relieved release ripped its way out of him but his hand kept on, moving slowly, until he felt like he was going to collapse into a pile of mush, and stay that way forever.

It took him a few long minutes to catch his breath, and when he did, he found that he couldn't stop himself giggling. He looked down his body, saw what a mess he'd made and laughed out loud.

The only experiences with sex he could remember having were from a Time Lord's perspective. He'd never once had sex with a human, or as a human before. Heck, he couldn't even remember doing this when the Doctor had been John Smith and had had Martha to watch out for him.

With Time Lords sex was a much quicker thing. They merely controlled the blood flow to the penis to get it erect, inserted into a female, then triggered ejaculation. That was it. Pure and simple.

He'd never had an orgasm before. It felt more than a bit good.

The Doctor had no idea what he was missing out on.

He cleaned off the mess with a corner of the sheet, not caring that the cleaners would probably notice. They'd been cleaning up after him for days now anyway.

For the first time since this whole sex thing had started, he had a good night's sleep. And waking up was just as pleasant.

It wasn't until he was eating breakfast that he realised that he had maybe been a bit louder than he had meant to be. No one said a word, but those sorts of facial expressions were fairly universal. His face flushed red hot and he picked at his eggs, afraid to look back up.

"You know, you don't have to get all embarrassed about last night," Pete said eventually.

"Me? I'm not the person who woke 'other people' up" he muttered, letting himself get as small as he could in his seat as he continued to pick at the food on his plate.

Jackie let out a bit of a cough, looked at him and blushed herself. "Sorry, that was my fault. Pete does this thing... Drives me mad. He only does it when Tony's not home."

"I can't even begin to understand why that might be," he replied, as sarcastically as he could muster.

"Oh, stop being smart. We heard you. It sounded like you were enjoying yourself to me."

He scowled. "Oh yeah, because I bloody love having no control over my body's reactions. Wizard that is."

"You were giggling for half an hour, Doctor."

He slammed his hands down beside his plate, pushed it angrily out of the way and stood up, glaring at Jackie. "Don't call me that! I'm not him. I'm me. I'm just Jack now, alright? Just take the 'i' and the 'e' off your own name. That should be easy enough for you to remember!"

She stared up at him in surprise, and it was only then that he noticed he was breathing hard and his hands were clenched into fists on the table. Had he just shouted that out loud? He hadn't meant to. He'd just wanted them to know.

He turned around and marched off to his room. Today was a Friday, so he had nowhere else to go but around the house and grounds. He wished he had classes or, even better right now, that punching bag.

He used his pillows instead. Screaming helped too he found, the Doctor's home language spilling out of him in a rush. He sulked for a half hour after he had stopped before he felt calm enough to venture out of his room without going into a rage again. He really needed to apologise for going off on one like that to Jackie.

He found her in the family room watching Eastenders. Some things really didn't change at all. He sat down next to her, and waited for the programme to finish.

In the end, he didn't have to wait that long, Jackie sighed loudly, flicked off the television and turned to him. He shifted slightly, and at the same time, they both said, "I'm sorry."

He laughed, nervously, and shook his head. "No, really, I'm sorry. I was embarrassed, and then you called me Doctor. Being called that upsets me Jackie, a lot. I just... I lost it completely. I'm sorry."

Jackie frowned and shook her head in return. "No, don't apologise for getting angry this time. It's our fault. We were teasing you, and we shouldn't have done that. It was juvenile."

Sighing, Jack let his head flop down to rest on the back of the sofa. "It was my first time experiencing that, by the way. Ever. I knew the basics of it, obviously, I've been around a long time, but the feelings and the mess and everything that goes with it? All new. I think I have the right to be embarrassed when all I get is teased for it."

"First time? Oh, god, I'm sorry. We didn't know."

He shook his head. "You didn't have any way of knowing. Things are a lot different with Time Lords. I'm only now getting that, now, because now I'm living it. And I don't mean that only in a sexual way either. Everything is different and new, and I'd appreciate it, I really would, if you tried helping more rather than cracking jokes."

Jackie nodded glumly at him. "Sorry, sweetheart. You just... Well... I look at you and I see him. I can't help it."

His face fell, and he let out a slight whimpering sound that made him feel pathetic. "Jackie... I'm so angry all the time. And I'm afraid, god I'm so afraid, that he was right. That I am some homicidal maniac in the making. Born of blood and anger. He's such a hypocrite! And I hate him for it. Hate him!"

Taking a deep breath, Jackie pulled him to her and began rocking slowly, at the same time running her fingers through his hair. And, in that moment, he wanted, more than anything, his own mother. It took him a few seconds to remember that he didn't have one.

"I hate him too sometimes, for taking Rose away," muttered Jackie, "she was my little girl, and I'll never see her again because of him."

He wrapped his arms around her in reply and buried his head as far as he could between her neck and shoulder.

"She was supposed to choose me. She didn't. It's my fault! I wasn't good enough, because I wasn't him. I told her I loved her, because I felt the same way he did. But she left anyway! She'd made her choice before I was even born. And I'm going to start crying again, now."

"You and me both, yeah?" came Jackie's reply, and it was a relief to him to know that he wasn't completely alone in his misery.

Despite making up with Jackie, he spent the rest of the weekend feeling almost as miserable as when he'd first arrived and, when Monday morning arrived, he found he couldn't even be bothered to get out of bed. Jackie and Pete had obviously had enough of him because, though they had each come by to try and get him to get up, they'd then left him alone for the rest of the day.

It was early evening before there was another knock on his door and, sighing, he dragged himself out of his bed and opened it a peek, so he could see who was there. He thought it would be one of the Tyler's again, so he was kind of surprised to see Katie standing there, looking worried.

"Hey you! I've brought you the work we did in class today. I thought you might like some help with it, since you missed class. You alright?"

He grimaced. "Couldn't get out of bed."

"Why?"

"I couldn't be bothered. Why should I be? My whole life is a lie... I might as well be dead."

He saw alarm in her eyes. "Don't say things like that!"

He rolled his eyes, closed the door on her, went back over to his bed and flopped back down onto it, only to find she'd followed him into the room. Well, that was extremely rude of her. Obviously some people really didn't value other people's privacy. He sighed. "What do you want?"

"I wanted to see what was wrong."

He looked at her then, and shrugged. "What's wrong is I'm not even supposed to be possible, let alone exist. Yet here I am, and all I can do is suffer. Nothing good ever happens to me! Why not? All I want is... I want to be real, I do, but right now I feel like everything is just... here to make me feel more fake."

Katie came and sat next to him, putting her hands on his shoulders and squeezed lightly. "If you weren't real, could I be touching you right now?"

"Believe it or not, it is possible. An illusion can seem very real to the people seeing it. When you've been attacked and almost killed by an idea, then we'll talk about what is real and what's not."

Her grip tightened on him at that, and he squirmed, suddenly feeling very uncomfortable. It was the first time that he'd felt like that around her.

"You are real. I can touch you, and I can feel you. You're alive, breathing and very much here.

He began to shake, and couldn't stop it from happening. "I just want to wake up now, and find these past five months have all been one hell of a bad dream."

"I don't want to be part of a dream. I want to be in your life. I'm your friend, you know this, Jack."

He shook his head. "But my life is a... "

She stopped him from saying any more, by putting a finger to his lips. "You're real. If you're not, then no one is. And then we'd all be fake together."

He blinked at that, and opened his mouth to say something else, before snapping it closed with a loud click.

She grinned down at him. "Yeah, that's better. Think about it, and don't let me catch you talking like that again."

Sighing he shook his head. "I can't stop. I want to stop but... I can't help it. It isn't something I can just turn off. I can't control any of the reactions this stupid body has."

They were silent for a few minutes before Katie took a deep breath and blurted out, "It's true, isn't it? All that stuff about a TARDIS and travelling through time and space. Is that why Jackie told me? Because you couldn't, but you needed someone to know?"

He shrugged. He still had no idea why Jackie had told her. "What does it matter anymore? It wasn't me. It was him. The other me. I'm nothing but a bad duplicate of another person. A part human duplicate, with added 'Donna'. You try being someone else! Two someone elses... "

Katie shrugged, smiled and squeezed his shoulders again "Oh, I don't know. I like you the way you are. You're a bit... under the weather right now, but give it some time and I'm sure you'll begin to feel better again."

He scowled at her and shrugged out of her grip. "Again? Do you think you've ever seen me feeling better than 'this'?"

She stared at him, as if trying to let him figure it out for himself, and sighed when he stared blankly back. "You were all smiles and nervous giddiness our first day of classes; you were quite happy when we were shopping together... There's got to be other times you've been happy."

He glared for a few seconds, before looking at the wall and ignoring her. She tried to get his attention back, but he refused to listen to her anymore. He didn't want to be reminded that he had been happy a few times in this life. Genuinely happy. Right now he felt like happiness was something he'd never feel again.

After a while, Katie sighed and left him to his misery.

He didn't eat the dinner the maid brought up for him soon after. He had no appetite whatsoever.

Right then, he would have been happy starving to death.

He rested his head on the basin of the toilet and tried to catch his breath. Having caught it, he lunged forward, and his body expelled more of the food he had eaten that day.

The nausea had just sprung up on him in the middle of a Communications Lesson, and he'd had to make a dash for the nearest toilets before he threw up all over the floor. He'd now been vomiting for the past five minutes, and he felt like something was going to burst or be lost if he went on like this much longer.

"An anti-emetic would be nice," he sputtered out, after his stomach had stopped its angry spasms, and settled down a bit.

"A what?" Belinda asked, from outside the door. She was his work partner for the day, and had taken it upon herself to follow him into the staff room loo.

"Something to make me stop vomiting. It's quite disgusting you know. Not that I think there's anything left in my stomach mind... Oh, god."

His stomach felt like it was trying to turn inside out and escape through his mouth, as he started heaving while not bringing anything up. Something was seriously not right here. He needed a doctor. Or a nurse.

"Nurse. Please."

"I'm not a nurse," Belinda stated, her voice high and shrill.

"Go get a nurse! I really don't... " Maybe it was something he'd eaten? Or maybe it was his body rebelling against something, maybe he was allergic to something? His stomach settled for a bit again, and he whimpered. "Please... "

The girl nodded and was gone. Thankfully the nurse's office was in the same building as they were. He really didn't think he was going to be able to move very far after she got there. Not that he wanted to move. The bowl of the toilet was cool against his heated forehead, though he was disgusted with wanting to put his head on it in the first place.

Belinda was back a few minutes later, with the nurse in tow.

"You're the fifth one since lunchtime! Did you eat the pasta at lunch?"

He nodded, carefully. He didn't know what her name was but she was a nurse, just having her there made him feel a bit better.

"I think it might be some kind of food poisoning. The front desk has called for an ambulance - the college doesn't want to take any chances. Is there anyone I should contact?"

He groaned, Jackie had recently taken to driving him to college every day so he couldn't skip any more classes. "Oh god, Jackie! Jackie Tyler. She needs to know. She'll be hanging around in the town, somewhere, waiting."

"The Jackie Tyler? As in Pete Tyler, the millionaire's, wife?"

"Know any other Jackie Tyler's?" he asked shortly, holding his stomach and rubbing it to try and ease the pain and sick feeling. It wasn't working. Quickly, he gave Jackie's number to Belinda and sent her out to call it. There was no need to upset her any more than she already was.

His stomach made a gurgling sound and he realised right that he needed the toilet for another reason. And he couldn't move... "Oh god. Get me up, now!"

Thankfully, she managed to get him in the right place at the right time, though he had to be propped up to stop from falling off. He started crying. "What the hell is this?"

He wouldn't regenerate if he got too close to dying; it was like a light switch going on in his brain. He'd just be dead. And in that moment, he wanted desperately to stay alive. "I'm dying, oh god, I'm dying," he choked out, before clutching at the nurse.

It was shortly after he'd said that that Jackie came bursting through the door and hurried over to him. "Oh god, what's wrong?"

"He couldn't stop vomiting," replied the nurse. "He's feeling a bit tired at the moment, and an ambulance is on its way now."

"An ambulance!" shrieked Jackie, grabbing hold of him tightly.

He grunted in pain. "Too tight, Jackie."

She whacked him on his arm, and glared. "Stop worrying me like this."

He sighed, and grimaced. "I can't help it you know... I don't even know what's wrong."

The ambulance arrived a few minutes after Jackie, and soon enough he found himself sitting on a trolley in A&E with a drip stuck in the back of one hand to keep help him get rehydrated. He was going to live, it just didn't feel like it.

He slept for three hours before he woke up; he lunged to one side to vomit... He really hated dry heaving.

It was only then that he noticed he had an audience. Jackie, Belinda and Pete were there. He coughed, and grimaced. "Hello. Bleh."

"You alright now?" Belinda asked, staying away from the bed. He nodded, not really feeling like speaking. Still, he was thankful to the girl. She had helped him a lot through this little bit of mess. His jaw, throat, head and stomach were hurting but the pain wasn't too bad. The Doctor had felt worse, before.

He hadn't known being physically sick like that could be so exhausting. After Pete had gone home to look after Tony and Belinda had left (he hadn't really expected her to stick around after he'd said that he was feeling better) he managed to sleep for the twelve hours until morning.

He woke up still feeling a little nauseous, but not half as bad as he the day before, to find Jackie asleep propped up in a chair beside him.

The nurses took him off the drip after he managed to keep down the water they gave him to drink. He didn't think he would be sick again, but they told him to rest for the day, once he was back home, just in case.

Jackie only had to stop the car once on the way back home, but his bout of nausea soon passed, leaving him with general feeling of malaise, like he'd had with that cold.

He slept most of the day, still rather exhausted from the day before.

When he woke up Jackie brought him a small meal of chicken soup (she loved to feed him the stuff when he was ill, this time it lacked corn) and told him that Katie had called to see if he was alright.

Katie.

He had oddly missed her at the hospital yesterday; he had half expected her to go with him. He had no idea why he had expected that, except that when he felt miserable, she was always near and usually made him feel better.

He'd have to invite her over tomorrow to catch up on what he missed out on for that day's work.

He didn't really need it though. He was finding the course ridiculously easy. He had said, off hand, that he was a genius. And he was. He didn't think the other students believed him, but his tutor and teachers did. They had made him sit through an IQ test. Twice. The second time looking over his shoulder, just to make sure he wasn't cheating.

He was just about to doze off again when his door creaked open and a pair of fast feet came running into his room. Then Tony bounced onto his bed and, more unfortunately, onto him, and elbowed him in the stomach. He was curled into a foetal position for a bad five minutes, trying to not to show how much pain he was in, while trying not to upset Tony, who had started bawling loudly the moment he had landed.

He caught his breath, not sure he wasn't going to start crying himself, and lifted Tony into his arms and rocked him. "Shhh, it's alright, my stomach was a little sore already that's all. You didn't hurt me."

Tony sniffled for a bit, before getting comfortable in his arms and giggling. "Mummy says you were sick."

He raised an eyebrow. "Oh, and that's funny is it?"

Nodding, Tony giggled again, wriggled around until he was sitting in his lap, then picked up a dropped children's story book that Jack hadn't noticed before. "I can read!"

The words weren't as small as he was expecting. He didn't know how advanced human children should be though. He'd been reading by the time he was six months old. And hadn't stopped. He loved reading.

Well, he supposed, technically he was six months old 'now', who he really meant was the Doctor.

Would that always be so confusing? Being two different people at once? With a dash of a third just thrown in for good measure and species definition.

He shook his head and listened as Tony read aloud from the small children's book.

It was a good little story, not in the same league as Earth's Harry Potter books, but it had all the elements that children generally loved. It even had a little mystery in it. Alright, so the main character had lost his dog and went on a search for it.

In the end the dog died. Jack realised that this story was one that Tony read when something was upsetting him. "You alright?"

"Uncle Mickey would read to me. He did voices and everything."

Smiling, he pointed to where his cheap collection of this universe's sci-fi stories was. "How about something a bit bigger, hey? I'll even do voices."

Nodding, and smiling widely, Tony rolled off his lap, and went over to the bookshelf, picking out one of the books at his height and bought it over. Jack was just glad it wasn't one of the adult adult ones.

It had been a long time since the Doctor had read to a child, the last time being to his youngest child, who had got bored of him doing it soon after he had learnt to read for himself. But he took to it like a duck took to water.

Tony was fascinated by the book. There probably weren't too many children's science-fiction stories after all, and Rose obviously hadn't talked about her travels with the Doctor to Tony, possibly thinking they might be too scary. Space, planets, UFOs, the book was opening up a whole new level of awareness to the boy, and Jack was thrilled.

He'd have to tell him about the Doctor's travels. He could make it sound like fiction even, since most people hearing him would think that's exactly what it was. He could talk to the boy about what the Time Lords had been like, what the Academy had been about when the Doctor had gone to school there, and how hard it had been. He could talk of them being gone forever, and of being alone. And, as long as he was careful, he could even talk about the Doctor's past companions without too much fear of getting the boy upset.

When Tony fell asleep in his lap, head lying over his one heart, he smiled down, bookmarked the page they were on and, as carefully as he could, picked Tony up and took him off to bed.

Jackie had been right. Tony soaked information up like a sponge. Better, he took on what he saw before deciding what to think and how he felt about it. He understood things.

And that was marvellous!

He decided then and there that, more than anything, he wanted to be a teacher.

"I know what I want to do now." He stated first thing, right before breakfast.

"Yeah? What'd that be then, sweetheart?" Jackie asked, as she sat down at her place at the table.

"I want to teach. Either young children or adults. The ones that want to learn."

She had stared at him until breakfast was served, and stayed quiet. She was probably thinking he'd change his mind later, but he wouldn't. His mind was set, and he was truly happy to have decided upon a goal. He had something to look forward to in the future.

By Sunday the malaise was gone, and while he was still in a bit of pain, it wasn't that bad, and he was still in a happy mood. Katie was coming over for a few hours, so he could catch up on the work he had missed out on Thursday. Thankfully it was just the one day he needed to catch up on. His head hurt.

He'd been having headaches regularly since his little trip into the hospital three days ago. Well, truly they had started yesterday. Still, at least he wasn't sick anymore. And a little headache wasn't going to stop him, but he had taken some of Jackie's paracetamol anyway, just to be safe.

He was in the family room, drawing idly in a notebook, while he waited for Katie to arrive. He had found he didn't really like television that much, and preferred to draw instead.

He drew a lot nowadays. He didn't often have a lot to do on his weekends and it helped pass the time. Pass the time... There was something wrong about just sitting down and being idle. He couldn't stand it.

Right then, he was drawing Tony, drawing. And Tony was only drawing because he was.

He felt rather important about that. That he could help nurture and care for the boy. Not like a parent, but as a friend and an honorary uncle, like Mickey had been.

Uncle Jack he was. He loved it. He had read Tony another of his books last night, and he knew that it would probably be their little ritual from now on.

"Bloody hell, this place is huge!" Came a familiar voice from behind him and he grinned, turning around to face Katie.

"You get used to it after a while. Still, the TARDIS is bigger. On the inside. The outside, of course, she's a blue police box. God, I miss her."

Katie smiled at him and sat down.

"So, anything interesting happen? I mean on the day I missed?"

Kate shook her head. "Nope. Everyone was asking how you were though. Poor Belinda, she was really worried that she might have made it happen at first."

Frowning, Jack shook his head in reply. "Nah, it was just my immune system playing up on me a bit. I'm still adjusting to this body being human."

She seemed to ignore the human part of his statement and got right on to the work part of the deal. Sort of. "Do you actually need to catch up on anything? Because if not, we could veg out here. You could give me a tour? I must admit, the last time I was here I didn't exactly see much other than your bedroom."

He grinned. "Sure, we can skip it. I don't think it will really matter. I'm sure I'll be able to catch up next lesson."

Katie laughed at that. "Whoever would have thought?"

"Actually," he continued, "I've got a bit of a headache anyway. My brain just isn't used to all these hormone changes, and what with all the information stored inside it." He shrugged. "I've got the better end of the deal though, the other person involved ended up with my mind in a human brain. Her head's probably exploded by now... "

Katie grimaced. "That sounds messy!"

"That's my best friend you're talking about," he snapped at her. He couldn't help it, Donna had been there for him through the whole of the Earth's journey back into its own solar system.

He was pulled into a hug and he let out a sigh. "Sorry. Venting I suppose. Didn't mean to take it out on you. It's just... She really was my best friend for a while, there, and I don't even know if she's dead or alive. She'll either have had her memories of the Doctor and me taken out of her mind, or died. It's hard, because really, I think she would have preferred to die. And so would I, sometimes. Forgetting everything would be the ultimate punishment in the universe. Both of them. Probably all of them. My life isn't half weird and complicated."

She punched him lightly on the shoulder, and he grinned slightly. If Katie could forgive him for being too weird to be 'human', then that was good. She really would have been a really good companion. If he had a TARDIS of his own, he would have asked her to come with him for sure.

"You think too much sometimes, you know that, Jack? Just... relax for a bit. Enjoy a hug."

He chuckled. "Who said I'm not. And you smell nice. Like vanilla."

Without much thought to his actions, he ran his tongue up the length of her neck. She squealed, laughed and punched him on the shoulder again. "What was that for? You shouldn't go around randomly licking people, it's rude!"

He grinned and laid his head on her shoulder. He liked it there; the scent of vanilla was calming and rather comforting. "Sorry. I just wanted to see what it was you had used to smell like that. But I can't tell. And I just remembered whatever it was might not be for human consumption. I've really got to kick the habit of licking random things."

"What's that mean, 'See what I'd used'?"

"As a Time Lord, the Doctor's senses are a lot sharper than a human's. He'd be able to taste whatever perfume you've used was made out of, down to the very last little ingredient. And not be poisoned. I'll really have to stop doing that now. Or I'll probably get sick again, with something far deadlier than a stomach bug or virus."

"You're insane."

He grinned and made a happy noise. "Sometimes." When she said it, it didn't sound too bad. Like when Rose, Martha or Donna had said it to the Doctor; it was normal for his companions to think him mad.

They didn't end up doing the tour of the house. They stayed in the family room most of the day talking about random, everyday things. It was so domestic, he would normally have hated it but, since it was Katie, it was good to do.

By the time Katie left, he was having a nice, comfortable doze on the sofa. In fact, he barely even realised that she had gone.

He woke up for dinner a few hours later, to find a blanket had been thrown over him, still feeling the same calmness.

For the first time since he'd been in this world, he felt like he was truly wanted by someone, and that there might be people, other than Jackie and the rest of the Tyler's, who cared about him.

A month later, when spring had truly begun to show, and the weather had started to warm up, he asked Katie out on a date. And she accepted; rather happily, too.

The tears that he cried that day had nothing whatsoever to do with sadness and everything to do with hope and happiness. He was finding his own feet as a person. An individual. A being separate from the Doctor. He now felt like Jack Noble Jones. And it felt good.

It felt right.

(Epilogue)

Six months after that, when he felt a whispering in the telepathic centres of his mind, he knew who it was and he wasn't afraid to go out there and face whatever it was the Doctor had to talk to him about. He knew he'd feel better afterwards. He wasn't sure how he knew, he just did. This was his chance to get some much needed closure.

He told the Tyler clan that he had to do this by himself. Yet, as he boarded the zeppelin back to Norway, he was both looking forward to it and dreading it at the same time. It was the first time, truly his first time, of doing anything in this world entirely on his own.

Thankfully his stomach didn't decide to rebel against him on the journey, this time.

He booked a room at the same hotel he and Jackie had stayed in before, and settled in for the night, not that he got any sleep. He knew he'd be seeing the Doctor, and maybe Rose, the following morning bright and early.

All he really wanted to know was what had happened to Donna. After he'd learnt that, he could go back home. He didn't care about anything else really. Just that.

He left the hotel and sat on a rock on the windswept beach, glad that he'd brought a jacket with him, now it was autumn. He'd only been waiting a half hour when the image of the Doctor appeared.

They stared at each other for a bit, but time was wasting away. He could feel each second passing, dreading it would be the last. Finally, he got up his courage and asked. "Donna?"

The Doctor looked sad at the mention of her name, took a deep breath and ran his hand through his hair. A habit, Jack realised with a jolt, that he himself had lost, shortly after he'd arrived here.

"I couldn't... I couldn't take our knowledge away from her. She refused to let me, and Rose backed her up. We took her home to her mum and Wilf, and stayed with her to the end. It wasn't messy either, by the way. One minute she was there, and then she was just... gone. Oh, Rose says, 'Hi' by the way. I'm sorry, I can only project one of us at a time."

Jack nodded. "Tell her I say, 'Hi' back."

The image of the Doctor looked away for a moment as he relayed his message.

"She says she's sorry. And so am I. Really, I am. It just... Wouldn't have worked with two of us in the same..."

"I know why you did it. And I am not going to say it's all been sunshine and daisies, living here, because it hasn't. You hurt me, both of you."

The Doctor looked away again, a frown on his face, and said something he couldn't catch. When he turned back to talk to him, he could see the look in the Doctor's eyes was that of someone who was truly unhappy about something. "I'm sorry. And so is Rose. She's crying right now."

He nodded. He'd pretty much guessed that Rose would start crying. He was amazed he hadn't started himself. "But I'm better now, for the most part. It's the reason I'm standing here now. Oh, and I've got a name now, by the way. It's Jack. Jack Noble Jones; a little bit of everyone who's really important. And I have a girlfriend as well."

The Doctor nodded, and smiled slightly. "Good, I'm happy for you. We haven't got much longer and Rose wants to tell you something. So, goodbye 'Jack'."

"Bye Doctor. Take care of Rose. Oh! And thank you. For this moment, that is."

The Doctor smiled, nodded, turned away and disappeared and Rose took his place. She had wiped her face free of tears, though makeup still stained her cheeks under her eyes. She sniffled and smiled.

"Hello, Jack. I just want you to know I'm sorry. I didn't mean to hurt you. I never even really thought of what you'd be like. I don't think I ever saw you as anyone quite... real. And I am so, so sorry."

Smiling, he nodded. "I know you are. Thank you for telling me."

She sniffed again, looking over his shoulder. "Where's mum? I wanted to talk to her too. Just to say a proper goodbye; I didn't last time. I was in too much of a rush and 'in the moment' I guess."

He closed his eyes and shook his head. "I'm sorry Rose, she didn't come. I think she realised this was going to be a... private moment for me. Actually, it was Pete who wanted to come. I managed to convince him I needed to do this on my own. I'm alone, Rose. There's no one else with me."

Sniffing, Rose looked startled for a second. "But... but this is my last chance to say goodbye to her! I'll never have another one. We're using a window into this universe that only opens once every few decades. Or so the Doctor says, anyway. By the time I get to do this again she'll probably be gone or too old to get here."

Jack laughed and shook his head. "You underestimate Jackie. She's tougher than nails, your mum. She'll probably outlive us all. Well, apart from the Doctor."

"It's not funny! That's my mum you're talking about, and she didn't even come to say goodbye to me!"

He knew what her problem was. Rose had acted rashly, made a split second decision, and was now feeling guilty for not saying farewell to her family. He smiled, sadly.

"I'm sorry Rose. It was good to talk to you anyway, even if it was for a little while. I'll tell Jackie you miss her, and that you're doing well, alright?"

She started really crying then, big tears rolling down her cheeks. It reminded him of the image of her that the Doctor carried in his head, from when he'd said his last goodbye to her on this very beach. She nodded slightly, gave him a little smile through her tears, and disappeared. He waited a few minutes for one of them to reappear, but his link to the Doctor was gone and he was truly alone on the beach.

Sucking in a breath, he turned around, walked back to the hotel, went up to his room and collapsed onto the bed.

He thought he'd feel sad or cry himself back to sleep, but in the end he didn't. He felt refreshed, and like a great weight had been lifted off his shoulders. He had got his wish for Donna. He had been so afraid that her memories would have been wiped but they hadn't been, and she had died happy, the way she, obviously, had wanted.

His goodbyes said, he felt like he could finally get on with his life, even if he still didn't know what he was doing half the time.

A smile crept onto his face. It wasn't from excitement or relief, it wasn't even a way to stop himself from breaking down like it had been so many other times before. For the first time, it felt like it fit his face. It was only then that he realised that today was October 11th. His birthday.

The start of his adventure had finally begun. And he wanted to know what was going to happen next.

One thing he knew for sure. He was going to have a fantastic life.