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This is not an EP, I just don't have the energy. However, threads need to happen between Harkness and The Doctor (with a bit of Chase to solve that puzzle), Cuddy, Daniel and Ianto (together or seperate), Ace, and always House. So...top level and we'll thread and that way they'll all be in a tidy bundle for me to NOT DROP!

Jack was there, at the door. Waiting. He wasn't quite what to sure, or how long it had been, but ever since Halloween he had either been smoking pot ot House had been shooting him up with something to keep the dreams under control. He didn't know where to turn, so he played an insane game of ring-around-the-rosies and it had lead him to this door.

Now all he needed was an idea of what to say.

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"Maybe it's both." The Doctor motioned for Jack to sit down. He let Atalanta back in the door. "Do you want to tell me? Saying it aloud might help sort it."

He took a breath and nodded, then sat. He started with what the Doctor was familiar with, the Academy, the breeding, the life Jack had always known. And then he started over as a child on a desert world. The stories were more clear, but hit and miss with specific details.

"But I've been seeing her face," he said, telling the Doctor about the mom he'd been dreaming of for a while now. "I can see he face, I can feel her when she touches me."

After a moment, the Doctor considered this, not quite having the energy to get Atalanta to stop sitting by Jack's feet and looking mournfully up at him. He cleared his throat.

"It wouldn't surprise me if one of them wasn't," he said. "The Earth of the Agency...doesn't quite fit into that, like a round peg into a hole that doesn't quite fit. Every child by then is a wanted child. The other story...well, George Lucas told it better." Pushing back a stray thought about Jay and Padme, he carried on. "But I know this. The future you tells future me, and Martha from a few days after she got here, that you're from some place called the Boeshane Peninsula. That you were the first kid that ever went to the Time Agency from there."

His lips quirked wryly. "Poster boy. They called you the Face of Boe."

He reached out with both hands and caught Atalanta's head, ruffing her ears as he listened. "The Boeshane Peninsula," he repeated. It didn't ring any bels, but then again, he was awake. "I tell you that...someday?"

Atalanta whined gently. The Doctor considered that, and Jack. "Yeah. Not too far ahead of time for me or Martha. Long, long time for you. I don't know what happened. If you figured it out. But it fits, with everything that happens there."

Though how there was a desert and peninsula in the same place, he didn't know.

"Huh," he said quietly, focusing on the dog for another minute, talking sweetly to her...mostly to distract himself.

"Jack Harkness isn't my name."

"Yeah," the Doctor said softly. "I figured that out, a while back. It suits you, though."

That got a weak smile and soft shake of his head. His hands were busily finding the places that made Atalanta lean in hard for more.

"Fucker likes that, too," he said to her, not sure where to go from there. He'd hoped the Doctor would have an answer. A solution.

And at the same time, he knew there wasn't one.

"I heard there were Daleks."

The Doctor was good. Just not good enough to solve problems without solutions.

The expression on his face changed from worry about Jack to something harder. "Oh, there were Daleks."

Chase was distractedly wandering into the room, fidgeting with his tie as he descended the stairs, a couple at once. "Babe, have you seen my..." he mumbled idly before glancing up and actually seeing Jack. "Oh, hey, didn't know we had company," he said, still distracted. He was focusing on getting his tie done up and his gaze was lowered.

Low enough to see Jack's hands.

As much as he might have put himself down, he was a good diagnostician, and this wasn't even that much of a puzzle.

He didn't like the tone in the Doctor's voice and decided then and there that maybe having his mind fucked with in the archery field was probably the lesser of two evils.

And then he heard Rob and looked up. He let go of Atalanta and his eyes darted for the door. "I didn't mean to bother you two. I was just...wondering. I should...go."

"It's not a bother," the Doctor said. He looked up at Chase, eyes signaling that they needed to help Jack, that that was very.important. "Don't go. What were you wondering?"

'What the hell?' he mouthed back at the Doctor, descending the last few steps slower, heading to the door to casually lean against the frame with his hip; effectively blocking out. "Jack...?" he said, slow and concerned. "What are you wondering about?"

A small shrug and even smaller shake of his head, and he didn't even meet Rob's eyes. "I was wondering if you knew more than you've bothered to tell me. I know you've done that before. With other...people."

Companions. Other companions.

"I just don't know what to try to hold on to."

The Doctor rubbed his face, looking sheepish, before looking up at Jack. "Jack," he said after a moment, "the Agency didn't just do a number on you. They did a number on everything about you. I ran a DNA search minutes after we got back to the TARDIS. I don't know anything. I wish I did."

He flicked a gaze of i'll try to explain later to Chase, then said, "I think you should hold onto what's better for you now. Here. What you like. And either way, once you decide, it'll be easier for your head to sort things out, regardless."

Chase took a step forward, very lightly as he took one of Jack's hands into his own, lifting it to eye level so he could take a better look. "Do you want to tell me where these came from?" he asked, lightly.

He pulled his hand away slowly, more crushed by the Doctor's admission than he wanted to even think about.

"I fell down the stairs," he lied.

"You think we're just going to take that?" the Doctor asked. "Like we're that thick?"

He scrubbed a hand through his hair, now really worried.

"Oh, for fuck's sake," Chase reacted a lot more impatiently than the Doctor had, but then, he'd gotten it from both ends. "You and House," he scoffed. "Really. If the stairs are that fucking abusive, maybe you should talk to someone!"

He ran both hands through his hair, holding it back. "Jack. Strip," he ordered.

He knew when he was cornered and when it was useless. Especially in the face of the two of them.

He undid the buttons slowly, trying to keep as covered as he could for as long as he could. But it had to fall eventually and there was no way stairs could have clawed his skin like that. Four parallel gashes repeated up and down, diagonal and across. The worst of it had bandages covering, but from chest to stomach and down his arms looked like he'd been trying to peel himself...or tear something off.

"It's the dreams," he muttered.

"The dreams," the Doctor echoed, looking faintly appalled, though he'd seen weirder and worse. He wasn't surprised. "The dreams make you tear yourself apart?"

"Not just him," Chase said quietly, an aside to the Doctor and it came at a point where he wished they could communicate telepathically.

The quiet comment made Jack hang his head. "It wasn't on purpose. This is really hard on him, too," he said for Rob's benefit. "He's trying. We're both trying..."

The Doctor sighed. "I know, but you might need more help than that," he said, "before you do more damage, unintentional that it might be. Jack, you could bloody rip your own skin off."

Chase was still brushing circles against his forehead with his thumb, eyes shut as he tried to think of what to do and hell if he knew. "Has House prescribed you anything?"

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