Title: Comfort Food
By: _usakeh_
Fandom: Doctor Who
Characters: Jack, Ten, the TARDIS
Rating: PG
Author's Note: This was written for taffimai, who kindly provided me with the prompt "comfort food." Thank you, taffimai! I'm also quite grateful to millari for reading this over for me.

Jack knew that there was no way in hell he was going to get to sleep. He found it hard to doze off on the most boring of days; after today’s adventure, the chances that his brain would surrender and let him rest were slim to none. He sighed and wondered whether it would be a good idea to go in search of the Doctor. He’d been careful to give him a lot of time alone over the past few weeks. The Master’s death, after all, had hit the Doctor hard.

“Harder than it should have, given the fact that he was a mass-murdering megalomaniac,” Jack muttered to himself. It was hard, sometimes, to be compassionate. Sure: being the last Time Lord left in the world couldn’t be easy. But seeing the Doctor get all broken up about the Master’s fate was trying at the best of times and nearly impossible to bear at others. Fortunately, in that inimitable way of his, the Doctor managed to hide his pain very well indeed. It very rarely seeped out from behind the Doctor’s manic mask.

When it did, therefore, Jack was sure to give him space. He ceased speaking, went into the other room. He let the Doctor be. He had no idea what the Doctor did in those hours; he went back and forth between wanting desperately to find out how he mourned and deciding that some things were better left a mystery. That said, he couldn’t help but try and imagine what the Doctor did. Maybe he cried. He could see him curled up on the TARDIS floor, tears streaming down his cheeks as they had when he’d held the Master in his arms. Maybe he shouted; maybe he banged his fists against the wall in frustration. Jack attempted to stop conjuring up the images, but his efforts were to no avail. He still came up with every possibility.

Almost every possibility, anyway.


“One trillion, seven hundred million and–”

“Doctor?” Jack interrupted, glancing down at the Doctor in surprise. The Time Lord was lying on the TARDIS floor, his face turned up towards the ceiling.

“Jack!” The Doctor’s voice was bright, perky; still, he made no effort to move from his position on the floor. “What are you doing here?”

“I just came to say hello,” Jack replied. “You’re not exactly in a position to ask, though, are you? You’re the one behaving oddly here.”

“Behaving oddly?” The Doctor echoed, seemingly incredulous. “Whatever do you mean by that?”

“Lying on the floor randomly listing numbers isn’t exactly–”

“Randomly?” The Doctor sat up at last; his eyes were wide with indignation. “These aren’t random numbers. They’re part of a pattern. That’s the whole point, Jack!”

“Oh.” Jack wasn’t exactly sure what to make of that. “Okay then.”

“It’s a game, you see,” the Doctor continued, gesturing at the TARDIS console. “We bounce numbers back and forth at each other. We make patterns. It’s a contest of sorts. Kind of like…volleyball.”

“She…” Jack paused, trying to digest the new information with which the Doctor had provided him. Even after all these years, after all the things he’d seen, the Time Lord still found new ways to fascinate him. He loved it. “Who won the last game?” Jack inquired at last.

“You interrupted us, so…but it hardly mattered. She always wins,” the Doctor muttered. Jack felt a warm glow spread through his mind after the Doctor spoke and smiled. “She loves it when I flatter her,” the Doctor added.

“Yeah?”

“Oh, absolutely. She – ow!” The Doctor rubbed his forehead. “Of course it’s not flattery. Not at all. She’ll have you know that it’s all true, Jack. And it is.”

“Then why play at all?”

“Hmm…guess it’s not as much a game as it is a…oh! Oh!” The Doctor’s eyes were glimmering. “I know the perfect expression. It’s like…comfort food.”

“Comfort food?”

“Precisely.” The Doctor’s eyes widened. “Ooo…good one!” He glanced at Jack. “She just gave me six trillion, eight hundred million and–”

“It’s okay, Doctor. It’s not really my kinda comfort food, if you know what I mean,” Jack said, chuckling.

“It’s not?” The Doctor tilted his head to the side and considered Jack carefully. “No, I suppose it wouldn’t be, would it? So…what is?”

“Well,” Jack began, stepping closer, “I tend to prefer physical pursuits to cerebral ones, if you know what I–”

“No! No, no, no,” the Doctor gasped as Jack reached towards him. “Jack, you can’t–”

“You got me all wrong, Doctor,” Jack interrupted. “For one, if that’s what I want, I tend to ask first.” He paused; then, winking, he added, “Plus, what makes you think I want that skinny little body of yours anyway?”

“The fact that you’ve asked me at least–”

“Do you want to know what my comfort food is or not, Doctor?”

“One second.” The Doctor ran a hand through his hair; for a few seconds, his focus was absolute. “Nine trillion, seven hundred billion, three million, four thousand and two!” That was followed by, “Oh yes! Brilliant!”

“I’m going to take that as a yes.” Once he was sure he had the Doctor’s attention again, Jack sat down beside the Time Lord and pulled him effortlessly into his lap.


“So, what do you think?” Jack inquired after a few minutes had passed in silence. “This beat your numbers game?”

“It’s…it’s not bad.” The Doctor’s thin frame was wrapped in Jack’s arms. Jack had placed one hand across his chest strategically so that he could feel both of the Time Lord’s hearts beating. “We like it quite a bit, in fact. The TARDIS and I like it very much, that is,” the Doctor clarified. “Just in case you were wondering, Jack, she’s not afraid of you anymore.”

“Not afraid anymore, eh?” Jack ran a hand through the Doctor’s unruly hair. “I suppose that’s a start.” Another wave of warmth rushed through Jack in what he could only consider a response. “A good start,” he added. To his surprise, that comment was followed by a yawn. “Wow. I’m getting sleepy.”

“You’re still human after all,” the Doctor murmured. “As far as I can tell, anyway…”

“Doctor?”

“Hm?”

“Mind if I stay here?” Jack asked, pulling the Time Lord in closer still.

“Stay…?” The question hung in the air for just long enough that Jack felt very relieved when the Doctor finally said, “I don’t see why not.”

“You can keep right on doing whatever it is you do with those numbers…unless you don’t find that necessary anymore,” Jack concluded hopefully.

“We think,” the Doctor replied softly, “that this will do just fine.”


Just before sleep took him at last, Jack felt joy surge through every part of his being like light spinning out from a rising sun.