John J. Rambo (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
theydrewfirstblood) wrote2023-06-20 12:33 pm
theydrewfirstblood) wrote2023-06-20 12:33 pm
[PERCHANCE TO DREAM] you can fight, fight without ever winning, but never ever win without a fight
One minute, he's putting up a target outside--cobbling together a modified shooting range so he can teach Jack how to handle a bow...
...and the next, he's in the dark.
John still doesn't know how to do this, but it's happened enough at this point that he understands what can help. He doesn't recognize this nightmare, and it's clearly already in progress, just like his. Just like Vietnam...
God knows how long Jack's been here. God knows what's happening to him.
He concentrates on the war--and when he emerges from the shadows, he's in full black fatigues, bow and rifle in hand.
He keeps to the walls, staying out of sight. In the low light, John finds a door with a control panel and figures out how to get it to slide open.
"There are colonies out there. The human race would survive in some shape or form."
John freezes in the doorway, raising his rifle without stepping into the room before him.
"But you're the only Daleks in existence. The whole universe is in danger if I let you live!"
John doesn't know the voice, but the tone...the way it says that word. Dalek. He's only ever heard one person say that word in just that way...
"D'you see, Jack?"
...wait, what?
"That's the decision I've got to make for every living thing...die as a human or live as a Dalek. What would you do?"
"You sent Rose home. She's safe. Keep working."
John's heart starts trying to beat out of his chest. He very nearly steps into the room...
"But he will exterminate you!"
Now that's a voice John will never forget. Inhuman screaming, buzzing in his ears, seeing the fear it evoked in his soul reflected in the Doctor's eyes...
"Never doubted him. Never will."
John steps back, doors hissing shut in front of him. Jack's voice was just slightly distorted, a hum of digital noise to it--he wasn't in the room.
Neither was the Dalek...but what if it was in the room with Jack?
He had to find Jack. He had to find Jack now, because if he didn't...
...he couldn't let himself think about that. One of those things getting anywhere near Jack...
He'd die before he let that happen.
...and the next, he's in the dark.
John still doesn't know how to do this, but it's happened enough at this point that he understands what can help. He doesn't recognize this nightmare, and it's clearly already in progress, just like his. Just like Vietnam...
God knows how long Jack's been here. God knows what's happening to him.
He concentrates on the war--and when he emerges from the shadows, he's in full black fatigues, bow and rifle in hand.
He keeps to the walls, staying out of sight. In the low light, John finds a door with a control panel and figures out how to get it to slide open.
"There are colonies out there. The human race would survive in some shape or form."
John freezes in the doorway, raising his rifle without stepping into the room before him.
"But you're the only Daleks in existence. The whole universe is in danger if I let you live!"
John doesn't know the voice, but the tone...the way it says that word. Dalek. He's only ever heard one person say that word in just that way...
"D'you see, Jack?"
...wait, what?
"That's the decision I've got to make for every living thing...die as a human or live as a Dalek. What would you do?"
"You sent Rose home. She's safe. Keep working."
John's heart starts trying to beat out of his chest. He very nearly steps into the room...
"But he will exterminate you!"
Now that's a voice John will never forget. Inhuman screaming, buzzing in his ears, seeing the fear it evoked in his soul reflected in the Doctor's eyes...
"Never doubted him. Never will."
John steps back, doors hissing shut in front of him. Jack's voice was just slightly distorted, a hum of digital noise to it--he wasn't in the room.
Neither was the Dalek...but what if it was in the room with Jack?
He had to find Jack. He had to find Jack now, because if he didn't...
...he couldn't let himself think about that. One of those things getting anywhere near Jack...
He'd die before he let that happen.
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One moment he was leaving his study and the next…the next, he was on a lift headed to his death.
Unlike all the other times he's recognized one of his nightmares, he…doesn't accept it, exactly, but he settles into it without a flood of anxiety running through his body. Sure, this is one of the worst days of his life--probably second only to the day Boeshane was attacked--but he knows each second, knows what happens. Some of the days he's relieved change shape in his dreams, usually for the worse. But this one? This one's always stayed the same for over a hundred years, to the point if it weren't so fucking terrifying it might almost be welcome.
Would've been nice if he'd at least got to kiss the Doctor and Rose this time, though. Sometimes he gets lucky and it starts there, and he can taste Rose's lip gloss for a bit after he wakes up.
That's the kind of thought he winds up circling back to as he waits for the inevitable.
They're flying up the ventilation shafts. No, wait a minute. Oh, my God. Why're they doing that? They're going down.
He thought, for the first dozen or so times he reexperienced it, that one day Lynda's terrified voice would have to stop feeling like a fist grabbing his heart. Apparently, today still isn't it. Still, he doesn't react anymore than he did that day. He'll get through it--he'll die, again, but he'll wake up to…
"John?" His voice is barely a whisper when he turns his head at a sound he knows he didn't hear when this really happened to see someone who definitely should not be here.
No. Not this. This day might have been terrifying, but he hadn't watched anyone he actually knew let alone loved falling to the Daleks' hate.
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Makes his way to level 499.
John navigates his way in silence, only making noise when he’s too close for evasion—when Jack can’t run or try to keep him from the fray. He feels a flicker of guilt for the fear in that barely there breath of his name…
John takes up a position beside Jack at the barricade. He glances at Jack’s rifle, then down at his own.
When he lifts it into view, it’s the same type of weapon. The same type of bullets.
They won’t touch him.
With a sneer, John pulls a piece of the barricade free and tosses it behind him, looking away from Jack and settling in to his makeshift gun port.
Dream or no dream, this is my war now. Not his.
They. Won’t. Touch him.
“You heard the Daleks.” John declares quietly, the cold and perfect fury in his voice turning it into little more than a snarl.
“Exterminate.”
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(Feels like he's begging Dad to come with him and Gray-)
Adrenaline carries him to fall into position next to John. "John," his voice drops to a hiss, "There was one survivor of this battle. And it wasn't me." Well. If you got technical, the Doctor hadn't survived either, even if it had been as a consequence of saving Rose from her wonderfully, stupidly human actions. But Jack doesn't think regeneration counts the same way his deaths do. And besides, he's trying to make a point.
"Those things--"
They're bombing whole continents. Europa, Pacifica, the New American Alliance. Australasia's just gone.
Lynda's tinny, panicked voice again. Too fast. Too fucking fast.
He's readying his gun without even noticing what he's doing, too focused on the absolutely pointless task in front of him. Because he knows John wouldn't walk out of this willingly, even if the Dreamscape let him. At least, even if his voice is shaking, his hands are still steady. "Please. I don't want you to see what happens, but I want to see what they'll do to you even less."
Don't make me go through the rest of eternity with that in my head, knowing my own nightmare killed you.
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John wants to say more—to tell Jack what he heard, tell him about the Doctor and Rose and everything she is to him, even now…
How the Doctor gave him absolution. How John saved him from his own hell because of what Jack did for him.
But there isn’t enough time, and John is willing to die to keep these things from hurting Jack, from even sharing his air—so he just shifts to the side, only barely, pressing his shoulder to Jack’s for a moment with his rifle at the ready.
“I’m a soldier, Jack…and you’re the war.”
So shut up and fight.
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No. Without even thinking about it, he shifts into someone colder, angrier--ready to cut down the entire universe for the sake of one person. And if he manages to save anyone else as a consequence, great. If they get caught in the crossfire, too bad but at least it won't be John.
(There are reasons he isn't more afraid of the way Gray talks sometimes, when it's about him or the nice scientist girl.)
"Concentrate your fire on the eyestalks." The cold, sharp words are ostensibly a command to the room, but he knows what happens to everyone else regardless of if they fire a single shot. Doesn't matter. But he has to do everything he still can to protect John from his nightmare.
No amount of ice and steel keeps his heart from jumping into his throat the second those terrible, emotionless monstrosities come into view. But knowing John is at his shoulder also, somehow, makes it easier to look down his sights and see them as nothing but targets.
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But John sees the other shades of this memory in position. He heard Jack’s voice in that other room, talking to these things with perfect faith. Maybe this nightmare had a script, but once upon a time he said those words.
He can’t deny the hero in him, and in that split second John’s love for him is infinite.
He gives himself that one second, then he sights down the line of his rifle as the Daleks roll into the room, horrific as they were on the Doctor’s battleground.
John takes his time to sight the lens of one eyestalk before he starts firing, holding his weapon steady. He’s satisfied by the eventual dull pop of it shattering before moving to the next one. He can’t shatter it, but that horrifying electric screech of a voice wailing about impaired vision is just as good.
…but it’s not enough. It will never be enough, and John sees that pretty quickly.
It’s only a matter of time before they’ll have to fall back.
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Jack grits his teeth, reminding himself they've been dead for well over a century (won't die for thousands of years) and forces his feet to move. He trusts that John knows the moment they have to fall back, keeps his focus on the Daleks. He's sickeningly thankful he knows this day so well now, because it helps him keep shooting without having to think about it. His body remembers every second before it stopped, keeps in motion without any real input from his mind. Which is good, because his mind is only capable of repeating one thing over and over.
Keep John safe.
Of course, even that terrified mantra isn't enough to drown out Lynda's voice coming over the comms one last time.
I've got a problem.
And then that horrible, heartless robotic voice-Human female detected
And that--that monstrosity reducing her to nothing but her species and sex-- of all fucking things, is what sends a few small cracks in the armor Jack's tried to build around his heart. Still, even as he feels himself tearing up, he keeps moving and shooting to try and protect the one person he still can.
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No less beloved, but in charge and more knowledgeable than he is. He knows enough to issue the strategy and John is ready to be his instrument of execution.
As they run, side by side, retreating to the door John was at not long ago, he catches sight of Jack’s too bright eyes…
…and feels something in himself wither when he hears that young woman scream before she dies.
When they reach the door, their rifles run out at nearly the same time. Jack’s empties first, has him reaching for his handgun—
—and John’s last shot ricochets off the body of one of those nightmarish tanks, hitting him in the leg.
“Shit!”
John backpedals, dropping to the ground as pain explodes through his leg. Jack continues firing, so he checks…clipped him, piercing the meat of his thigh. No major blood vessels, no major muscle damage. Strip off his headband, tie it around the wound. Through and through, if Jack helps him up he’ll be fine.
Until Jack’s gun clicks empty, drawing John’s gaze.
The Daleks roll up. They’re both unarmed—and John can’t stand.
“No…”
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(He's not sure if knowing why, now, will make it better or worse.)
But watching John collapse almost makes him freeze. Because this isn't how it happens. No one else is supposed to die here, he's the last one to fall to the Daleks and maybe he hadn't managed to save anyone but that was okay. But if John is among those dead, even in a nightmare--
That thought is what makes Jack move, putting himself between John and the advancing Daleks with his head held high, even angrier than he'd been the first time around.
EXTERMINATE.
And even with his throat tight as he feels himself hoping that John might be in too much pain to watch, Jack glowers at the heartless creature.
"I kind of figured that."
And then he holds out his arms and closes his eyes to brace for the burning, electric pain of the Dalek's laser. It never stops hurting, nearly as much as coming back to life…but it's only for a moment, and then he doesn't feel anything as it all goes mercifully cold and still.
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John forgets, in that instant. Because the way he speaks, the way he stands there, between John and the Daleks with his head held high, arms spread, knowing his fate and still daring them to strike him down…
John forgets Jack can’t die. Jack is brighter than John has ever seen him, blazing with rage and defiance and bravery. It’s a memory of life, but a memory that’s so clear John can only see the man he was in that moment.
Watching Jack fall, John sees the mortal he was, and understands in a way he never did before that Jack’s a hero.
Watching Jack die, John realizes that Jack was an angel long before he ever became immortal.
The Daleks seem to disregard his existence, rolling away and leaving John to bleed, and Jack…
“Jack…Jack!!!”
He remembers, scrambling over to Jack’s prone form, gathering him close. John remembers Jack can’t die, but there is no pulse. No breath. No wound he can treat.
It doesn’t stick, but it does touch me.
John has seen death, courted it, lain with it in battle—but this…
You…not…forget me?
John screws his eyes shut and pulls Jack against his chest, pressing his face to Jack’s neck. His skin is still warm, but there’s no life left in him.
“I won’t leave until the war is over.” He swears softly against Jack’s skin, to Jack and to himself. “I’ll find a way…I swear to God, I’ll find a way.”
Lifting his head, John presses his mouth to Jack’s forehead, shaking as he clings to him…and waits.
And trusts. And prays.
Because he trusts Jack—but he doesn’t trust himself, and the universe doesn’t let John have good things. Not for real.
Not to keep.
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And the next they're all falling to dust and Jack…
Jack's body jerks in John's arms as he's hauled out of the dark (like being hauled over broken glass, still, even in memory), gasping in a great lungful of air, eyes wide and bewildered even though unlike the real day he knows what's happening…
Because he's not alone like he should be. He can see the dust all around him but there's something else. Someone else
He blinks, brow furrowing until he remembers what's really happening. "John. Thank…thank fuck," he wheezes, trying to convince himself his eyes are only burning with the pain of coming back and not the relief at knowing his nightmare hadn't killed the man he loved.
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Then draws back and kisses him, hard and frantic and relieved.
“If you ever tell me you’re not a good man again, I swear on my life I’m gonna break your fucking nose.” He threatens, burying his face in Jack’s neck again. His pulse is racing under the skin, and John can feel it.
He may spend the rest of his life sleeping with his head on Jack’s chest just to his heart beat.
“Or I’ll just tell Rose. Asshole.”
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Rose.
He blinks a few times as his rattled mind puts the pieces together. John had clearly shown up on the Station at some point before Jack saw him, must have overheard him and the Doctor, but…well, he had been in the Dreamscape before Jack arrived, so it wasn't all that surprising if he and Rose had met before. And considering John had said that he knew what the Daleks were…well, the only way that made sense was if he'd run into one of the Doctor's nightmares.
He closes his eyes for a second as a wave of emotions he's never experienced in this nightmare before wash over him.
She brought you back forever - the last act of the Time War was life.
"Rose…she was the one who…brought me back," he says, voice rough with more than the strain of coming back. "Didn't know til pretty recently…Doctor said she…forced her way back, after he sent her to safety. Looked into the heart of the TARDIS. She's the one who wiped out the rest of the Daleks, and…brought me back. Just me." He's not sure how he feels about that, still. From what the Doctor had told him, Rose would have died if she'd kept that energy inside herself much longer. Maybe she would have brought other people back, if she'd been able to. Maybe not.
He reluctantly draws back just a little, not letting go yet but knowing he'll need to because…he knows where this nightmare ends, and it's not with his death.
"She doesn't know," he says, a little distractedly, as he tries to steel himself for what's to come. Even knowing why, he doesn't think it will hurt any less. "And he made me promise not to tell her, so unless you want to explain to him how you found out, you better not tell her, either."
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It's Rose. So she somehow had the power of a god for a minute, and she used it to bring Jack Harkness back from the dead?
Anyone who knew Rose for five minutes wouldn't be surprised. Neither would anyone that had known Jack for half that long.
"I can keep my mouth shut--least if you help me up." John continues, glancing around. "Let's get outta here...or try. Why are we still here in this place? I don't understand..."
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The question John does ask makes him blink rapidly a couple times to keep too much of the pain over what he knows is waiting for him (or, to be more accurate, not waiting) from showing on his face as he gets his arm around John to help him stand, though he knows John will see through his smirk in an instant.
"Because I have to catch my ride." It's not a lie, not really. And for a moment, he feels a small flash of that old anger over being left behind by the Doctor in his chest. What if his vortex manipulator had gotten damaged in the fight and he hadn't even been able to make that one jump? He would've been stuck on this satellite full of death for…
(But it wasn't. You got out. Besides, he was in the middle of regenerating. You know how hard it is coming back in a body you're used to.)
And just like that, Jack forgives the Doctor again--like he always does and always will. Which is a good thing, because that's the moment he hears that beautiful, heartbreaking sound of the TARDIS' revving up to leave him behind. He takes a deep breath and jerks his head in the direction of the noise, knowing it won't matter how long they take to get there.
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It's the chalk plaster smile that John understands--and it makes no sense. Not for the man who was unmade by the horrors of war, not for the man who knew the Daleks that well and feared them so...
John lets Jack help him up. He limps beside him as they move, as they turn the corner...
...as a blue box fades out of existence in front of them with that horrible, wheezing noise that John will never be able to hear without feeling sick and horrified.
Only when the sound dies, and the quiet fills his ears, does he feel something in him that the Doctor coaxed to life again wither and die for good.
"...I'll kill him."
He doesn't realize he's the one that's spoken, because he doesn't recognize the voice as his own. John's never been so--so hungry for a kill.
He thinks, for the first time, that he understands why Jack is so afraid of the thing inside him--because for the first time, John's afraid of his own dark passenger. Well and truly afraid.
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Jack's voice is sharp even as he's blinking his eyes clear--he's never sure if he wants to hold on to that last image of the TARDIS or wipe it away. "He had his reasons." His voice gets softer, a little more distant--and he knows he's still trying to explain it to himself. It makes logical sense, his mind understands entirely why the Doctor left him--but his heart's still not so sure.
"We've talked about it. He was in the middle of dying, sort of, Time Lord thing. Wasn't all his fault, either. He and the TARDIS both felt what happened, what…"
I needed time to accept what Rose did to you.
He lets out a shaky breath. "What Rose did to me isn't supposed to happen. Ever. No one person's supposed to be a fact of the goddamn universe, not even him. And for him, feeling that happen when he was in the middle of regenerating--" he stops before he can speak the terrible truth at the heart of it, that at least for a good time the Doctor had found the idea of him painful.
"...and anyway," he can't quite muster the false cheer the abrupt diversion in his train of thought would usually be carrying. "if I'd gone off with him and Rose, I probably wouldn't have wound up in the right time and place to meet you. I got off the satellite fine, even if I wound up in a different century than I was shooting for. Things worked out."
(Who are you trying to convince here, Jack?)
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The more Jack talks, the more certain John is that he's going to kill the Doctor--the more he wants it.
By the time he finishes talking, John has him by the shoulders, features etched with lethal rage so cold it burns.
"No."
He says it the same way he did the night Jack reached for the champagne in a haze of agony and grief, shakes him slightly before he grips his face between his hands.
"You hear me, Jack Harkness? No. If he knew, and he left you..."
John's thumb brushes over his cheekbone, and the rage grows deeper, more poisonous as his touch grows softer, gentler, more tender.
"If I knew I could sacrifice us, and have you in that box, happy and safe and knowing you were loved? Not being alone--not dying when you didn't have to? If you never met me, and you were free of even one second of the pain you've suffered? I could give up everything and live in that world easy. No version of this where he fucking abandons you--"
Never doubted him. Never will.
He cuts himself off, swallowing around the bile in his throat, rising up at the very idea, fighting the way his chest tightens and his stomach revolts, very nearly forcing him away to be sick.
But he rides it out, and he slides one hand into Jack's hair.
"Jack...you're worth fighting for."
He pulls Jack in to kiss him, and he doesn't stop.
He hopes Jack can taste the blood John can taste on his own tongue--the Doctor's blood.
Because the Doctor is a dead man.