Chapter Text
“Jack, please keep me company!” Rose called from the infirmary where she’d been confined for the past eon. “You’re the only sane one left!”
Her words did not have the desired effect. By mutual agreement the Doctor and Martha either ignored her or didn’t hear her. How could they hear anything over the buzz of their own excited medical babble?
Jack looked slightly pale, more than slightly worried, but the smile was all Jack. It eased her a little. Not because she was afraid what the Dynamic Medical Duo had found, but because it was stressful enough being the only human ever to carry a Gallifreyan child.
Rose was all about exploring the great unknown.
This went a little beyond that.
She wanted this child, they both did. They’d talked about it, planned for it, debated the pros and cons (and terrifying fears) and now that she was pregnant, it felt right. Perfect.
“You’ll be all right, Rose,” Jack whispered and took her hand.
“I know,” she said and leaned against him as Jack eased his body onto the long, wide medical bed. It was comfortable, far more so than she imagined a regular hospital bed felt, wide enough for she and Jack to easily fit, and adjustable with the press of a control.
“I’m just tired of being poked and prodded.”
“And to think, this is only the beginning!” Jack grinned at her, that suave smile that had charmed the universe over. The smile softened, his real smile. “You’ll be fine. You called Martha because she’s the best.”
“I know,” Rose repeated. “And I want her to be my doctor. I want you both here for all of it. Pregnancy, birth, growing up. Everything.”
She looked up at Jack as seriously as she could while in the bed, being monitored by very futuristic-looking machines that beeped and flashed without ever touching her, with her husband and her best friend cheerily arguing about the best way to administer bio-nutrients to her throughout her pregnancy.
However long that took.
“I want you here, Jack,” she added softly. “Both of you. We’re done running.”
He kissed her temple, hand tightening around hers. “We will be.” Jack pulled back and promised, “I will be. Always.”
Rose wanted to ask. She wanted to voice the words she’d practiced. She hadn’t told the Doctor, hadn’t mentioned it to anyone. But she wanted to ask Jack to be there for the Doctor after she was gone. Be there for their children.
Jack smiled again, his true smile not the urbane one he greeted everyone with. “I promise, Rose. I’ll always be here.”
Rose swallowed past the lump in her throat and nodded. “Thank you, Jack.”
“Now, have you chosen any names?”
Jack stretched his legs out beside her and they watched the Dynamic Medical Duo hunch over old texts and computer screens, heads bent together as they delved into medical jargon that made her eyes cross.
God she loved her family.
“No.” Rose sighed. “The Doctor wants to name them all Rose.”
Jack just shrugged. “Nice name.”
She elbowed him and he laughed. Grinning, Rose relaxed slightly and rested her head against Jack’s chest.
It’d only been days since she’d verified her pregnancy. Days where they’d made lazy love in the bath or pool or bed or the hidden hollow on Cheem they’d visited a half dozen times since dropping Martha and Jack back on Earth.
“Are you happy, Rose?” he asked.
“Yes.” She swallowed again, that happy bubble of pure joy threatened to overwhelm her. “Very, very happy.”
“Then that’s all that counts. Though I’m hoping for a blonde haired, blue eyed child, myself.”
Rose pulled back and frowned up at him, confused. “Why?”
But Jack just smiled enigmatically. Rose narrowed her eyes at him, but he grinned and laughed and hugged her closer.
Huffing in exasperation, Rose returned her head to his shoulder. “What have you and Martha been up to since Christmas?”
Jack stiffened and tightened his hold around her. Fear fluttered in her stomach and Rose gripped his hand, squeezing it to let him know she was still there.
“Oh you know, the usual. Spying on our employers, destroying alien tech before it falls into the wrong hands. Meeting an old lover with my brother in tow.”
Rose jerked back. She hadn’t even known he’d had a brother. (Him calling the Doctor brother while Chameleon Arched did not count.) Let alone that he was alive. Let alone that he’d somehow managed to find a way to 21st century Earth.
“Jack…”
Please let Martha have been there. Please. Rose licked her lips and held Jack’s gaze. He looked away, sniffed loudly. Swallowed hard and took a moment.
“Martha got hurt,” he said quietly. “John and Grey were after me. Revenge. I spent…a long time buried in a field outside Cardiff.”
Bile rose in her throat but she swallowed it down. Buried in a field…how many times had he suffocated? John…the name sounded familiar, something Martha said one day on Broad Oak in 1936 about Jack remembering his past as World War I nightmares.
“Did…” she licked her lips and tried again. “What happened?”
“I didn’t know he was even alive.” Jack’s voice broke. “I swear I didn’t. I thought he’d died years ago. Another lifetime. Died in the bombings on Boshane.”
“How’d he find you?” she managed.
Jack only shrugged, shook his head. “Grey wanted revenge and John…anyway, Martha found me.” His voice lowered, cracked. “Saved me.”
Rose wrapped his arm around her and offered whatever comfort she could. She wanted to demand details. Ask why Cardiff—what had they been doing in Wales? What had they found there? If anything. How had his brother survived and how had this John found Jack again?
She wanted to change the subject. She wanted to wrap Jack up tight in her arms so he’d never be hurt again.
“Why didn’t you call us?” she demanded but her voice was hoarse and strained.
Jack shrugged again. “You were trying to get pregnant. I didn’t…”
He trailed off but Rose poked him in the chest. “We’re family, Jack. Remember that? Family! ” Her voice hissed between clenched teeth and she watched Jack’s eyes widen. “You call when you need help.”
“And you?” he asked quietly. Calmly. “Will you call when you and the Doctor need help?”
Rose nodded, decisively. “Yes. We’re done running. Family helps family.” She took a deep breath and whispered, “Even when it’s with other family.”
She swiped her fingers beneath her eyes and wiped the tears away. “I love you, Jack. If you need help, you’re not alone.”
“Sometimes I feel that way,” he admitted and it sounded as if the words were pulled from him. “I look in my future and all I see is a hundred million years of emptiness.”
“God, Jack I’m sorry,” Rose exhaled, breath hitching. Panic and pain and fear and guilt, such heavy guilt it choked her. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t know what I was doing, I didn’t—”
“It’s not your fault,” he promised, kissing the top of her head and tucking her back against his shoulder. His arms were tight around her and offered her a comfort she eagerly accepted.
“It’s not your fault, Rose. You saved me from the Daleks. You saved me from myself.” He took a deep breath and she felt his chest expand beneath her head. “Even afterwards, when I jumped back and landed in the 1860s looking for you and the Doctor, you saved me. Every situation I found myself in I wondered what you’d do, what he’d do, and I tried to live my life like that.”
“Did you meet anyone?” she asked softly, closing her eyes and trying to imagine that level of loneliness.
No wonder the Doctor traveled with companions.
No wonder he never stopped moving. (Running.)
“Did you have friends or lovers?”
“A few,” he admitted. “But I had to keep moving. Didn’t want anyone knowing my secret. And then Torchwood—” she felt him shake his head and his grip tightened around her. “You saw them at Broad Oak. How they were. They were willing to put everyone in danger just so they could take me.”
“Must’ve really pissed them off, you disappearing in 1930,” Rose said, trying not to think about 60+ years of living and loneliness.
Jack snorted and she felt him nod. “I’m not a solitary person by nature, but I didn’t want anyone I cared about getting caught in their pursuit of me.”
“You’re worth it, Jack,” Rose said. She pulled back and looked up at him. “You always have been.” She smiled and added with a sly twist of her lips, “Martha thinks you’re worth it.”
“She met my psychotic, murderous brother and equally psychotic ex-lover all in one day.” Jack took in another breath. “She spent three months helping me track them and their target. Helped me stop them.”
Jack’s arms tightened around her and she heard his heart pound erratically beneath her ear. “She holds me every night in a bed she hates because it’s too soft with the lights blazing bright, because I’m afraid of the dark. I’m afraid to wake up in that grave one more time.”
“Jack.” But Rose didn’t know if she said that aloud or thought it. Her throat closed with fear and pain for her friend. She leaned up, wrapped her arms around him, pressed her lips to his cheek. Held him close. Didn’t know what else to do.
“And still,” he whispered hoarsely, “still she agreed to move in with me.”
Rose let him change the subject. He’d obviously spoken to Martha. That was good. That was all that mattered. That he talk with someone. That Martha was there for him. That he wasn’t (hadn’t been) alone.
She tried a grin, felt it widen. “Are you happy, Jack?”
“Right now, Rose.” He looked from her to the Doctor and Martha still talking in low voices and comparing notes, heads bent toward each other in medical bliss. “I’m very, very happy.”
She pressed her lips to his. “I’m glad. All I want is for you to be happy.”
****
The Doctor crossed his arms over his chest and leveled his best glare at Rose. He didn’t care she smiled up at him with that knowing, loving smile that made his hearts skip. He didn’t care she had submitted to all his and Martha’s tests.
For five hours.
He also didn’t care (mostly didn’t) that she was more than half naked. Her still-flat belly held the barest hint of roundness, of the child growing within her. Standing before him in a very skimpy pair of knickers that rode just beneath her belly and a lacy bra that did more to entice than support, in his considerable opinion, all he wanted to do was take her back to bed.
For the length of her pregnancy. And then some.
What he did care about was Rose in the bathroom that morning, vomiting up every last bit in her stomach as he crouched helplessly behind her only able to hold her hair off her face. She’d been so weak afterwards, he’d had to lift her off the cold tile floor and return her to their bed.
He’d made ginger tea and dry toast, but it’d taken hours for her cheeks to look healthy again. For her eyes to open normally, rather than as if she forced them open just to reassure him. She’d slept and he’d held her, but the sight of her kneeling in front of the toilet still hadn’t diminished.
What had he done to his wife? They’d talked about this: both wanted children, both agreed to alter Rose’s DNA so she could carry their child. But if it meant watching his strong Rose so weak and helpless on the floor of their bathroom, the Doctor could be quite content with this one child.
No matter what he told himself about morning sickness and normality, the frantic fear gripping his movements only knew this was his beloved and she was ill. Sure, she looked fine now, healthy and upright and looking up at him with impossibly deep love in her gaze.
Rose took his hand and squeezed. Their bond hummed brightly and he felt her concern, her love, her understanding. It eased the cold fear around his hearts.
It did not diminish it.
“You are not going,” he said, unmoved. For the fourth time.
“Doctor,” Rose said softly, the edges of exasperation on the word.
She also didn’t dress. It was distracting. And alluring. How was he supposed to think rationally when she stood nearly naked before him?
“They’re our friends and they called for help,” she said and that exasperation magnified.
“They asked for advice on one little, slightly complicated computer question,” he corrected. For the third time. “Which I can easily do without you stepping one foot out of the TARDIS.”
Damn.
He hadn’t meant to say that.
That had been his final argument, the last words to keep her here and then only, only if all else failed and he was truly out of arguments. Which he rarely found himself to be, thank you.
He also didn’t want to lead with that argument because they’d discussed this. Repeatedly. Just last night, in fact. No more running. No more hiding.
But that was before Rose’s debilitating morning sickness. Nine and a half weeks pregnant and he didn’t know how much longer to go. How was he supposed to keep her safe if he couldn’t even keep her healthy?
Frankly, the Doctor didn’t consider it hiding to keep Rose and their unborn child (safe) in the TARDIS and out of potentially harmful ways while he glanced at this computer problem Jack had, fixed it ASAP, returned to the TARDIS and closed the TARDIS doors behind him all the while taking Rose in his arms and possibly making love to her on the jumpseat.
“Forget it,” she snapped. Forget exasperation. She was angry.
“No jumpseat?” the Doctor asked, tugging his ear.
She didn’t look confused, but the emotions coming rather loudly and clearly through their bond told him that even if she didn’t read his mind as a true telepath might, she knew damn well what he was thinking.
“It wasn’t hard to figure out,” she muttered.
Turning for the closet, she grabbed a long-sleeved purple jumper and slipped it over her head, thus ending his lovely view of her breasts. Shame that. Maybe he’d convince her a v-neck was the way to go. Just for his eyes only, of course.
“I thought you agreed—we’re in this together,” Rose said as she turned back, tugging on a pair of loose black trousers and facing him, eyes clear of anger and annoyance. The brandy gaze was now full of concern.
Oh, she was still annoyed. Angry. But if there was one person who knew him best, it was Rose.
“We did,” he admitted slowly. But his mouth was dry and the fear crept up and tightened around his throat. “But…well,” he tried again and tugged his ear.
When he realized the tell-tale sign, he dropped his hand. He shoved his hands into his pockets and balled them into fists. Having a family was terrifying. Why hadn’t anyone ever told him?
A long-ago memory of keeping Susan safe resurfaced. Of taking her away and landing on Earth to keep her out of the Time Lords’ path. Or knowledge. He’d broken her connection with the Matrix to keep her safe. And she’d still been killed by the Time Lords. Not because she was his granddaughter—the descendant of a renegade—because Rassilon was a madman.
The Doctor ran a hand over his face and pinched the bridge of his nose. Damn.
“Having a family is terrifying,” he grumbled, just loud enough for Rose to hear. “I’m terrified for you and the babe.”
Rose closed the distance between them and took his hands. Her grip was warm and reassuring and he relaxed. Slightly.
“What is it, love?” she whispered. “What is it really? We planned for this, talked about it, wanted it—what’s changed your mind?”
The Doctor took a deep breath and admitted, “It’s the first time we’ve been out of the TARDIS when I know there’s a problem.”
“I know,” she agreed, still in that soft voice. “But that doesn’t mean the potential for danger hasn’t existed in other places.”
He nodded, readily agreeing. “I know.” And he did. Wasn’t the point. “But this…UNIT was suspicious enough about this Adipose stuff that they sent Martha and Jack to investigate.”
What he wanted to say was I don’t like it. Stay here. Please I beg you.
What he said was, “I don’t want you caught in any crosshairs, Rose.”
He swallowed and rested his forehead against hers. Their bond flared brighter, as it always did when they physically touched. The reds and golds of her love washed over and through him and eased the knotted ropes of his worry.
It was too soon, far too soon, to feel the baby’s mind, the tendrils of another Time Lord presence. But the Doctor reached for it nonetheless. Good practice and all. He wanted his child to feel his presence, to know the mental touch of Father.
“I told you,” she said calmly but he felt her annoyance. “I won’t take unnecessary chances. I won’t do anything stupid. I won’t endanger the baby.” Her frustration lessened, her lips brushed against his. “I might even stay out of sight. Just to be safer.”
“I don’t know what sort of man I’ll be without you, Rose,” he told her, wrapping his arms around her and refusing to let go.
“I do,” she said calmly, lips brushing against the exposed skin of his neck. “You’re the Doctor. You help where you can and show others how to realize their potential. That’s the kind of man you are. And will be.”
He didn’t think so. In fact, he doubted that very much. But the conviction in Rose’s voice, the faith in him, her inherent trust flowed into him and around him, and he thought—maybe. Maybe he would be. Could be.
“Talking about doing this and actually doing it are a lot harder than I thought,” he admitted ruefully. “Now I know why human men used to force their wives into confinement during pregnancy.”
He released a breath and pulled back just enough to smile at her. “It’s not for the women. It’s so the men know their pregnant wives are safe.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Don’t even think about it.”
The Doctor shook his head. “No.” He swallowed, visions of Rose confined in an elaborately cushioned TARDIS vanished before his mind’s eye. “No, I won’t do that to you. I can’t. Can’t seem to be away from you for that long,” he added with a slight smile.
Pressing his lips to hers, the Doctor pulled back. “Wear comfortable shoes,” he instructed, only half joking.
“I always do since I met you,” Rose said and laughed, that hint of tongue in the corner of her mouth. “Makes for easier escapes.”
“You have your TARDIS key?” he asked and winced at the condescending look she gave him.
“What I don’t have is a sonic; which I think will come in handy.”
The Doctor narrowed his eyes at his wife. Had Martha said something to Rose about that? She’d harassed him (ordered might be more like it) to create sonics for all of them—she, Rose, and Jack. Just in Case.
He’d been working on not panicking. Even an impressive brain such as his couldn’t multitask Not Panicking and anything else. Unless it was Not Panicking in Bed with Rose. That was different.
“Ah. Yes,” he whispered and promised and maybe even agreed. The Doctor released his breath in a rush. He reached into his trousers pocket and extracted the screwdriver he’d just started working on.
“I ah, well,” he said sheepishly and rubbed the back of his neck. “May have started to make you one. It only has a few settings,” he added quickly when she carefully, almost reverently, took it from him.
The awed, stunned look on her face reassured him this was not only the right move, but the smart one. She knew how to use the sonic, of course, and her having one might mean he couldn’t swoop in and save the day, but it also meant she’d be safer.
And that was the only thing that mattered.
“I didn’t think you’d actually make me one,” she admitted softly. “You like being the one with the sonic and saving the day.”
He gathered her close and rested his cheek atop her head. “I’d rather you be safe.”
“Thank you,” she whispered, lips brushing the skin just above his tie. “Thank you, Doctor.”
“Together, yeah?” he said, voice strangled. “Together.”
“Yeah.” Rose kissed him, a hard press of lips to his. “Just remember that. We’re in this together. No matter what.”
As it turned out, together meant Rose not on the roof of the building by the window washer’s trolley (where she’d have been relatively safe though not on the TARDIS which was parked in the alleyway). And the Doctor and Jack in the trolley itself listening in on the window.
Despite what the Doctor wanted (for Martha to stay with Rose not to protect her, never that really! But to…stay with her. On the roof. Where it was safe.) Rose and Martha were in the offices, snooping around.
This pregnancy was going to give him hearts failure.