(no subject)

[continuum_of_drs]

((Continued from http://community.livejournal.com/prime_education/24097.html?view=957729#t957729 ))

The outside of the vehicle was familiar enough. It never changed, really, except for the breif time it was an armoire, a pipe organ, and a set of doors on Telos....

The inside, however, was probably not what Jack was expecting.

Oh, it was still transdimensional. It was still imbued with a strange life in the very air itself, a sourceless light, a barely audible hum.

But wow.... had it ever gone ... sf. Gone were the organic struts, the gangplank, the metal deck, the wooden doors with the telephone on the inside. Everything surrounded them in white and gold. The console was a slick, eight-sided affair, dominating a more or less empty-looking room. Controls covered it in an orderly pattern not unlike that of a Concorde's panels, and the time rotor had become a salmon-lighted affair within a crystal-and-glass column.

"Well, this brings back memories," Eight muttered. Two spared him an unreadable look before darting through the door into the space beyond.

Comments

[capnhotness.livejournal.com]

Ahh, the police box. Very retro, nice panels, and a little piece of British history. It was quaint and beautiful and Jack always loved the sight of it. Brought back lots of wonderful memories -- and, oh look, his brain shifted gears without a clutch as soon as he stepped through the door.

That clunking sound? It was his mind sputtering to the briefest of stops before he turned it over, gave it a bit of gas, and carried on without faltering too much in his step. "Nice place, Doc -- " He glanced sideways at the Eighth Doctor, who'd apparently known a different TARDIS interior in his day, and grinned a little. " -- mind you, I'm used to something a little more, uh, dark."

[doctorbluebox.livejournal.com]

"So am I," Eight replied. "Though this is what my first seven selves favoured. It's a bit ... bright for my taste, though." He walked over to an incongrouous bentwood hatrack and moved it a little, dusting the startlingly long scarf that hung from it. Granted, his console room looked more like an explosion of the imagination of H.G. Wells. All brass and quartz and levers and dials.

Presently, however, Two returned, with more Doctors in tow. Meet Five and Three. Ever so good at cobbling devices together, this lot.

Two's voice sort of faded into hearing as they approached and walked through the door. "...same time. If we can find the common origin point of all of these time-traces, we can find out where these sentiences have come from and maybe why they're here."

"Robotic infants?" Five asked, an incredulous expression on his face as only Peter Davison could acheive. "Why not seek out living hosts?"

"Perhaps they were directed to them," Three put in.

They stop and regard Jack and Eight.

[capnhotness.livejournal.com]

"Same here," Jack agreed on the brightness factor. "But at least you won't trip over anything in the dark." Not that there seemed to be much to trip over. Besides, he'd had a penchant for tripping over Rose's trainers. And there seemed to be a decided lack of Rose in the general vicinity of the collective TARDIS...es, so it wouldn't seem to be a problem.

Jack was frowning thoughtfully, perhaps meditating on the location and current status of the Doctor's chavtastic companion, when Three and Five arrived. "Hello, Docs. Robotic infants, yes. My class project. I'm inclined to agree that they were put there. One sentience was pretty violent, the one in the doll I had, but these seem docile -- "

He stepped over to the Third and Fifth Doctors, cradling the life-like doll in the crook on an elbow to show them both. "If we can track down where the sentience came from, maybe we'll find who or why."

[doctorbluebox.livejournal.com]

Every Time Lord in the room gathered round the robotic infant and its human and examined it closely.

"Hmmm. We may yet, Captain Harkness, we may yet!" Five observed after a few beats of their nudging and poking. He darted round his other selves and was under the console in a moment. Eight joined him, while Two and Three made their way into the interior again, presumably after more tools and equipment.

He could hear the sounds of sonic screwdrivers and the occasional pop and flash of objecting circuitry. The TARDIS bore all of this with stoic equanimity--after all, the Doctor always repaired whatever spur-of-the-moment changes he made. Well, usually.

"We can--" flashpop! "Ow! Rig a localised timetrace detector beacon on this, er, child, and feed that signal through the main temporal guidance system," Five said from under the console. "That'll give us the originating co-ordinates." He came out from under said structure and looked up at Jack again. "Hopefully."

Two and Three returned, dumping a myriad of odd-looking tools onto the console.

"Temporal detector beacon," Three said, holding up a ... thing.

"Oh, I had one of those at University!" Two grinned, reaching for it. Three snapped it out of his reach. Eight hid a smile.

"All we have to do with this is narrow its focus and attach it to the ... infant." You know, like you do.

Which is what he and Two did (arguing all the while about frequency modulations), while Five and Eight had a slightly more agreeable time at adjusting the temporal guidance system to take its co-ordinates from said thingy and put it through to the viewscreen.

[capnhotness.livejournal.com]

If Jack hadn't acquired a taste for the random eccentricities of the Time Lord, this entire situation might have proven a bit more than he could handle. However, given his previous experience with the Doctor, Jack managed to take this all in stride and only ask, "It's not gonna hurt it, right?" Because Kate wasn't there to ask and he felt morally obligated to pick up the slack her absence left. Also, it was a sentient sort of a life form that, so far, hadn't posed much of threat to anything but Headmaster Snape's sanity.

The Captain grinned at the...thingy, watching the bout between regenerations pertaining to frequency modulations or the like. Over their heads, he shot an amused quip towards the two Doctors who seemed better suited for getting on. "I don't see how you all manage to teach a single class."

Then again, Jack had a hard enough time teaching his not-confusing-science-class without destroying the entire school, so maybe his confusion was just relative. "Okay...should I do anything? Stand on one foot?" he asked, holding the thingy'd up infant, now very carefully. It wasn't that he was uncomfortable being this close to rigged up scientific devices of the Time Lord persuasion, it's just that he kind of was a little bit. Maybe.

[doctorbluebox.livejournal.com]

"Don't worry, it won't be harmed," Two assured him as he and Three carefully taped the small device to the tiny robot's head. "This is simply a scanner. Or will be, if this lace-clad buffoon stops turning up the doppler gain!" And that started him and Three bickering all over again.

Which led Eight right to the answer to Jack's question: "It's because no two of us are ever in the room at the same time during classes." Made sense.

Two and Three managed to get the thing calibrated despite the rather amusing insults tossed back and forth, which sounded more and more like banter the more one listened to it.

"As to standing on one foot... well, if you think it'll help," Five said a little distractedly. "Switching on." And, with the twisting of a few controls, the time rotor started to move. But they weren't going anywhere. Instead, the viewscreen flickered. They were zeroing in on ... something.

[capnhotness.livejournal.com]

Something, indeed. Something that could essentially be described as nothing. It had obviously zeroed in, but after a certain point there was no static or interference, just a perfectly clear signal of...nothing. Absolutely nothing.

The screen was just white. And filled with nothing.

"...is it broken?" Jack asked after a few moments of staring at the blank screen. To him, observing just the screen itself, it seemed like a logical conclusion. No doubt, the Doctors would find from various scans of the dimensional pocket they'd zeroed in on that it was filled with sentience similar to that which the dolls had been infused with. Millions, billions, possibly more, all essentially floating in a void of absolutely nothing, never aging or dying, but without corporeal form.

And dimensional pocket was an excellent way to describe the white void of sentience-housing nothing, for it was connected, somehow, to another dimension -- like a stitch held them both together -- where an Earth existed. An Earth quite unlike the Earth Jack and the Doctors had known in their travels, an Earth with demons and angels and where that silly little comforting religious overtone some humans enjoyed was quite real.

Whether or not the scanner could pick any of this up, however, was likely to do with how much fiddling went on...and how much the TARDIS loved the assortment of Doctors and company currently present.

Jack, still staring at the blank screen, shifted his weight to one foot, just to see if it would improve the reception.

[doctorbluebox.livejournal.com]

"No ... no, the scanner's functioning perfectly. This is simply a pocket dimension ... completely null," Eight said after a moment wherein the lot of them stood and stared except, perhaps, the baby. It might have been holding onto its own feet or something that babies do.

Five twisted a few more dials and inputted a few more commands. The view didn't change at all, except to get a bit darker round the edges. "It's filled with ... primitive sentience," he added.

"What's that it's connected to? Two asked, leaning in and pointing to a readout on a smaller screen on the console.

They all gathered round it until one of them looked at Jack again.

"Earth."

[capnhotness.livejournal.com]

Functioning perfectly. Jack stopped standing on one foot like an idiot and grinned a little.

"Connected...?" he inquired, trailing off as he tried to peer around the Doctors to eye the readout on the smaller screen.

Earth. Captain Harkness blinked, shifted the infant a little, then walked over to gently work his way into the crowd around the screen. "Okay, Earth. Seems like a constant for the Nexus, everyone loves Earth. Big, bluish green planet on a slightly tilted axis circling a lovely little yellow sun -- who wouldn't want to call it home?" Rhetorical question. He eyed the screen, then the scanner display, then the Doctors each in turn.

"Well? Are we going or what?" Did the lot of 'em really need his encouragement? If they were Doctors of anything it was certainly swanning off to parts unknown on very short notice...

[doctorbluebox.livejournal.com]

"Well, we'd best find out what this is all about ourselves," Three said decisively.

There was general assent. Thus, under the console Five went again, reconnecting the temporal guidance system to the dimensional drives and other such terribly ordinary things you need things like sonic allen wrenches and molecular spanners for.

"WHat shall we do with the infant in the meantime, hmm?" Two asked, carefully removing the beacon from its head.

[capnhotness.livejournal.com]

Jack grinned at the general assent amongst the Doctors. Score! Free ride in the TARDIS -- er, not that he was an avid Time Lord fanboy or anything as ridiculous as that.

But he did love traveling with the Doctor!

"Oh, uh -- " Jack stared down at the gurgling infant, who seemed to have taken the proximity to people and scientific to-do to its tiny little plastic and wire heart, as it was looking positively more delighted and generally less creepy by the minute. The eyes were still weird, though... "Something tells me you haven't got a crib lying around a spare room in this ole ship, so...I could take it back to the nursery?"

Don't look now but the damn baby was looking sad and dejected by that option. Clearly the sentience inhabiting the doll was intelligent enough to associate words with situations.

[doctorbluebox.livejournal.com]

Two noticed that, looking at the baby with one eyebrow quirked into his fringe. This one's smart.

"Well, I'm afraid we're rather separate from the nursery, now," he said. We should reach the Earth in question relatively soon, in fact." He made the mistake of straying a hand too near the baby and it now has one of his fingers in a strong robotic grip.

"Fortunately we can still traverse realities," Three mused.

"Never did find out why my later selves can't. They won't tell me," Eight added.

"Or any of us," Two put in, trying to free said finger. How do you tickle the hand of something that has no tactile sense?

"Oh, well, it's probably for a good reason, hmm?" Five put in. Yes. Yes, it is. A very good reason.

And even if there were room for discussion, the console made a soft, musical plong sound.

"Ah. There we are, we've landed," Five said. Reactivating the scanner, they all looked out at a view of ... twentieth-century America.

[molotovmartinis.livejournal.com]

And what a glorious vision it is, too! Smoggy, grungy, congested LA, buildings everywhere, people and cars as the disgruntled cells of fat threatening to turn the city into a heart attack. As is everywhere in this universe, there are plenty of half-angels and half-demons around, influencing people but never directly clashing themselves.

In the distance, the BZR Inc. building gleams sleekly in the pollution-filtered sun. Alternatively, Papa Midnite's is several blocks away. Either is as likely a place as any to find Balthazar, if he isn't kicking it up in the Nexus, or having an interminable business meeting in Hell.

[doctorbluebox.livejournal.com]

The Doctors look at each other.

"I am not staying," they all say in unison.

A beat.

"I don't think you've got a choice," Three points out to Two. The baby hasn't, after all, released his finger yet.

"Oh, no, you are not leaving me here with this!" Two objects, highly affronted.

"I'm not going to stay!" Three replies. He looks at Five. "You stay."

"Oh, no," Five shakes his head. "Nonsense!"

"Not a chance," Eight adds.

"Well, it's all of us or none of us," Two states.

There's a pause.

Cars whoosh by outside the TARDIS, unheeding of its incongrouously retro-English appearance, and even more unheeding of the two men stepping out of it, one in fourties garb and the other in Victorian dress.

"Right. Where to, then?" Eight asks.

[capnhotness.livejournal.com]

Jack was grinning by the time he stepped out of the TARDIS with the Doctor's Eighth regeneration, both looking as conspicuous in their attire as the Time Lord's ship in its outward appearance. "Ahh, Los Angeles...smoggy in ever universe, huh?"

He straightened the collar of his RAF greatcoat and took a moment to adjust the communications link ear-piece in his right ear, ensuring that it was transmitting and receiving across the interdimensional spectrum to and from the Cardiff Bay Hub. What? Torchwood had acquired a lot of technology when Captain Jack discovered the Nexus...

"Well," the Captain answered the Time Lord with a single word cliffhanger, flipping open the wristband he wore to scan the immediate area of the street they found themselves on. Honestly, he had no idea what he was scanning for, but it never hurt. Hell, they could be breathing more than just the pollutants in the LA air. "BZR Inc. Never heard of it. In my experience, starting from a place you know nothing about is the best way to get the most new information as quickly as possible." Really.

[molotovmartinis.livejournal.com]

It's a funny place, this BZR Inc. Posh, in a very obvious way; all shiny and gleaming like everything, including the receptionist, has been smoothed over with furniture polish. And it is old, like a oily-scaled, curled up animal, all sleepy with its power and serene the way an iceberg is.

The receptionist is stabbing a button frantically with one finely manicured finger, the red gleam of panic in his eyes not quite disguised by his glasses. Halfbreeds know each other, halfbreeds know true angels or demons, and halfbreeds know humans.

Halfbreeds do not know Time Lords.

"Call him," says the receptionist into the phone, coldly. For the Doctors, at least, it may be as if his human face simply peels itself away to reveal the rotten, grotesque visage beneath: slime and decay and maggoty with corruption. "It's his own instruction, for anomalies. Call him."

[doctorbluebox.livejournal.com]

Some of the other Doctors might not have seen this or seen it quite as clearly, but Eight has that knack. The minds and the personal timelines of others show brightly for him. It's equal parts bane and blessing, and right now it has him watching this receptionist and a lot of other people in this building very carefully.

He stops by the desk, quietly, and looks into the red-gleaming eyes. He can't do it for long, but he looks into them as long has he can stand to. This earth smelt different to his time-senses. Tasted different. And it's quickly shaping in his mind why. Interdimensional cross-contact on a massive, deeply entrenched scale.

His gaze breaks by only a millimetre. "I think that'd be best, yes."

[capnhotness.livejournal.com]

Jack, for his part in observing their surroundings, had been more interested in the layout of the building, the exits, and formulating an escape plan if the situation should call for it. When they arrived at the desk, he was stopped short by the receptionist and caught himself, well, appreciating the man's well-manicured look in general. And while he wasn't one to judge a book by its cover, so to speak, there was something about the gleam in the man's eyes that made him reconsider the almost knee-jerk reaction.

"I agree," he seconded the Doctor's motion with a grin that might have confused the seriousness of the situation. "Glad we're all on the same page." The Captain leaned slightly against the reception area, feigning casual, as he continued his observation of the building's interior.

"...So," Jack said under his breath to Eight, slightly turned in the Doctor's direction and still grinning, "are we taking bets on who 'he' is?"

[molotovmartinis.livejournal.com]

That the man in glasses only leans back a little in his chair owes much more to the fact he's a receptionist, rather than his demonic nature. But as soon as it's not outright rude, he flees to the back room. The lobby isn't left unattended for more than a few seconds before a pleasant chime announces the arrival of an elevator.

The doors open: oh, it's a Balthazar. Pinstriped suit, horrible tie, immaculate hair, and a faint smile. But for Eight, a repulsive creature all snug and fit in a human skin suit, one he's had centuries to grow comfortable in.

"Gentlemen," he says softly -- so civilized, so sedate -- pressing the hold doors button. "May I invite you upstairs for a drink?"

The smile widens, because he does so delight in the petty discomforts. Yes, come step into this 10x10 box for thirty or so floors with me. Is there muzak? Oh yes, and how.

[doctorbluebox.livejournal.com]

"I'm not sure enough for bets, but I've got some nasty suspicions," Eight mutters to Jack before the lift arrives.

He'll step into the lift with this being. He's the Time Lord who goes where angels, pure or halfbreed, fear to tread. Muzak or no muzak. He hasn't yet met a sanitised synth rendition of The Girl From Ipanema he hasn't lived through. He steps in and utters the words that give monsters nightmares.

"Hello. I'm the Doctor."

[capnhotness.livejournal.com]

...Maybe it was just a contagious sort of feeling, but after meeting the Doctor, Jack had found it very difficult to be afraid of anything. He joked that he wished he'd never met the Doctor, that he was better off as a coward, but it wasn't true. It was nice to have a spine -- especially if you're stepping into a small confined space with a person like Balthazar.

He positioned himself across from the Doctor, grinning serenely at the situation in the elevator and the muzzak. The Doctor. How many times had that introduction gotten a startled, frightened, or awed response from species across the galaxy? It was coming from different lips now, but Jack still smirked in smug appreciation. "And I'm Captain Jack Harkness."

[molotovmartinis.livejournal.com]

He closed his eyes halfway, like a cat, and inclined his head politely.

"I'm pleased to meet such ... esteemed individuals," he said lazily, gaze drifting between the Doctor and Jack, "and I go by Balthazar."

They couldn't have gone more than two floors before the doors slid open again, but the floor-to-ceiling windows boasted a much higher vantage point than what should have been the third level.

"Please ..." Balthazar gestured for them to enter before him. "... enter as guests, with bread and salt between us."

The ritual promise of sanctuary is said mockingly. Sure, it's an ancient agreement, but, well, he is what he is.

[doctorbluebox.livejournal.com]

A flicker passed through the Doctor's mind that this was foreign territory. This kind of dimensional crossover and psionic presence obeyed physical laws that he wasn't familiar with... but that maybe Jack was.

Still, he was what he was as much as Balthazar was what he was. The Doctor adapted.

He stepped out of the lift onto the carpeted floor and looked out the windows for only a beat before turning his eyes back to their host.

"Your hospitality is appreciated, Mister Balthazar, but I can't quite dispel the notion that we were expected."

[capnhotness.livejournal.com]

No, Doc, unfortunately Jack was just the trigger man. He hadn't done much dimensional crossing over, even since discovering the Nexus, and if he had...well, let's just say he wasn't as tuned into his surroundings as the Doctor, so even if he had been in a similar universe (or even the same one), he couldn't have given much information on psionic presence or physical laws.

Jack stepped out of the lift, as well, not exactly marveled by the speed at which it had traveled -- he was from the fifty-first century, lifts were kind of retro -- but nevertheless keenly aware of technology that was advanced beyond the scope of that within the natural setting of their surroundings.

"Not that we don't appreciate expected," the Captain chimed in with a sly smile, "but we're the fly-by-night sort of guys, the sort most people least expect; it's part of our charm." Jack paused for a moment, the underlying message of suspicion made obvious by his tone, then added as an afterthought: "Nice tie, by the way."

[molotovmartinis.livejournal.com]

"Just Balthazar," he said with a calm, knowing smile, crossing the room to the liquor cabinet. The room was pretty sparse by way of decoration, probably because he didn't actually do anything here. "And thank you. I do try."

Pouring scotch without asking (he didn't really care, after all), he took his time in answering the Doctor.

"I spend much of my time in the Nexus. It's inevitable that ... visitors occasionally show up, for one reason or another. For instance, several individuals I met there still owe me payment for services rendered.

"Not any of you, of course." But it could be, his smile says, if you want me to do or undo anything.

[doctorbluebox.livejournal.com]

Nice try, Balthy, but the Doctor's turned down better offers in his junk mail. Join the Krillitane Brotherhood, get 20% off the reality transformation fee!

He looks out the window again, spotting another one of these beings--not human but not exactly nonterrestrial--and a few thoughts occur to him. This earth is rife with dimensional crossings at the point of bodily death. The sentiences in the robot dolls that leaked from the pocket dimension crossed here. The TARDIS landed right outside this building.

There is no such thing as co-incidence, especially when the Nexus is involved.

He looks at Jack. After all, it was Jack who led the both of them into this particular building.

[capnhotness.livejournal.com]

Jack exchanged a quick look with the Doctor; he was well-versed in taking his cue, so to speak. "So, these services you render -- " the Captain began with the tact of a ton of bricks and a tone that suggested he was well aware of it, " -- they wouldn't happen to deal with the transference of sentient consciousness from that nice little pocket dimension you've got out there to, say, otherwise inanimate objects in the Nexus at large, would they?"

Well, someone had to come right out and ask...

[molotovmartinis.livejournal.com]

He raises an eyebrow. "That's not a service anyone has requested from me -- recently, or ever, in fact."

Balthazar delights in telling the truth, see.

[doctorbluebox.livejournal.com]

Oh, perfect. A literalist. He hates literalists, for the record. Either they really are literalists and thereby unspeakably frustrating or they're simply being literalist at that moment and are rather insulting.

"You can't tell me you only ever do what people request. Bored, perhaps? Experimenting?"

[capnhotness.livejournal.com]

"You know, I'm going to start getting insulted in a few minutes." Jack commented to the Doctor, his grin sarcastic and just a little spiteful. "Now, let's think about this carefully before you answer the good Doctor's question, huh? We're both more than just pretty faces, trust me. We traced the origin of the misplaced sentience to this dimension, this Earth, this city. And if the suspicious behavior of that lovely receptionist downstairs means anything, it's that we're definitely in the right building."

Jack paused, just for dramatic effect, and regarded Balthazar again. "So, if you'd kindly drop the bullshit and tell us what we need to know, it'll save us a lot of trouble."

[molotovmartinis.livejournal.com]

He smiles modestly. At the carpet.

"Sometimes, a businessman needs to move ... certain cargo. But lacks the proper storage space to which such cargo may be moved. It may be that one of our numerous operations was ill-informed about the appropriateness of a location. Also, Balam has syphilis."

That last is apparently directed to Jack, re: the receptionist.

[doctorbluebox.livejournal.com]

The Doctor fights down the highly affronted lecture that sprang to mind at the thought of regrding living souls as "cargo" that can end up so callously "misdirected". Fights ... and loses.

"You shift uncounted numbers of sentiences about like they were so many ... apples for the market?" he demands in a tone only an indignant Liverpudlian can achieve. "And expect us to believe it's nothing more than a misfiled business transaction? Those are minds, Balthazar, not boxes of freight, and now they're in vessels, they're not so easily shifted about!"

[capnhotness.livejournal.com]

He might have actually had something to say to that syphilis comment, if he hadn't been so distracted by the use of the word cargo. The Captain opened his mouth to retort -- but Eight beat him to it and Jack stood there gaping for a few seconds while the Doctor lectured on indignantly.

There was just one angle the Doc forgot to rant about and Jack picked it up easily, not missing a beat between the end of the Doctor's justified tirade, "And what the fuck sort of business are you doing that requires moving sentience like that?"

[molotovmartinis.livejournal.com]

"Actually, most of them don't really have minds; they were never alive long enough to cultivate any," Balthazar answers both men, unperturbed. "They're just souls. And probably enjoying a taste of life, however fleeting."

He leans against that wide desk that's probably never seen so much as a scrap of paperwork, and smiles at them genially. "Moving souls is my business, gentlemen. It's what I was born to do."

The faint glow of red to his eyes is meant as punctuation to that last.

"Now, as I was saying, moving them elsewhere is possible, if costly. But I understand this is a matter of principle, so any fee incurred would merely be to cover the expense -- no profit made."

[doctorbluebox.livejournal.com]

This is why the Doctor is a gallivanting do-gooder--business is a cold, foreign, and ultimately incomprehensible concept to him. But all that aside, the practical ramifications still come through to him loud and clear.

"Where would they be moved to?"

[capnhotness.livejournal.com]

Unlike the Doctor, Jack was very experienced in this sort of thing, because the universe as a whole in the fifty-first century still revolved around money. While Eight took the most important of questions, because they were both concerned with where this sentience would end up, Jack took to the negotiations the Doctor probably wouldn't: "How costly is costly, Balthazar?"

But he wouldn't be happy about it. A conman getting conned is never happy about it.

[molotovmartinis.livejournal.com]

Balthazar takes his time answering, examining the view out his windows with a vague air of calculation.

"The most cost-efficient way would be to simply unload them into someone who's got some extra room. A serial killer, a rapist, someone newly in a coma -- longterm catatonic bodies generally can't take the stress, or overcome the body's natural defenses for a fullblown case of possession," he says, all very laconic. "It would be temporary. Of course. The difficulty arises in the fact they almost certainly won't want to leave. We'll need to forcibly extract and bind them to another body or container -- we'll need a psychopomp."

[doctorbluebox.livejournal.com]

At this, the Doctor is floored. This being is talking about the wanton shuffling about of minds as though he were simply slotting data into computers. And that is something he simply cannot stand. It hits him where few other concepts do.

"Only you seem to have already forgotten one fundamental thing!" the Time Lord splutters. "These are conscious minds, however immature that consciousness is! You can't simply tear them out of something they've come round in and become accustomed to, only to jam them into something else, and for how long, until you do the same thing all over again?"

[capnhotness.livejournal.com]

While Jack could and did appreciate the Doctor's fervor in the matter, he was also beginning to worry that the moral ambiguity of the situation was going to strain the Byronesque one a little much. The lecturing, the sputtering -- Jack circled around to the Doctor while he was distracted with laying another morality lesson on Balthazar, his hand finding Eight's shoulder and squeezing in an attempt to reassure and pull him back from the edge.

"All right, I was going to negotiate, but clearly I underestimated the level of evil we're working with here," Jack addressed Balthazar from his newfound position behind the Doctor, steeling his gaze and holding back all the horror and disgust and outrage as much as Eight was throwing it out. "If I say to you that money isn't an issue, can you accept reasonable terms from us on the humane removal and relocation of the sentience?"

Because if that wasn't an option, his itchy trigger finger said, he had six other good ones for the job.

[molotovmartinis.livejournal.com]

"What, then, do you propose to do?" Balthazar inquires of the Doctor, silkily. "I assure you, a professional psychopomp -- Hermes, or perhaps one of the more upstanding shinigami, will ensure smooth transition. As smooth as death gets, anyway. I care not where the souls will be stored, but they will be collected ... sooner or later."

He yawns and adjusts the cuff of his jacket. "I suppose I could be persuaded to much later; long enough for the souls to have passed on in a natural fashion before 'collection'. But to a more pressing matter: money is worthless to me, gentlemen. I require something more ... unique. A something more ... personal."

The red gleam in his eyes is no less greedy for the utter predictability. "A memory, say. Just one from each of you."

[doctorbluebox.livejournal.com]

Eight remains silent for the moment. He doesn't negotiate. He pulls threads out of plans like these, stands back, watches them unravel into glorious messes, and then off into the vortex he goes.

But which would serve the greater good, here?

The greater good. It's a phrase so easily abused, and so easily misunderstood. But it's something he'd lived by for centuries--for the most people to benefit, a few had to suffer. Usually himself. Sometimes those with him. Always the antagonist, or so he wanted to beleive, so he tried to insure. But sometimes it just didn't work out that way, especially in this Nexus of conflicting realities.

So sometimes he couldn't do it his way. Sometimes he couldn't charge in, destroy the plan, and move on. Like now.

He watches Balthazar's red gaze, then, and waits to hear what someone more skilled at negotiating will say.

[capnhotness.livejournal.com]

There were two whole years of his life missing, two years during which he couldn't account for his whereabouts or actions, and he'd not yet succeeded in getting them back. At times it seemed insignificant compared to the moment, but at others he wondered and dreaded what he had done, questioning his morality and always fearing the worst. The way his stomach bottomed out was only a natural, instinctive response to the notion of sacrificing another memory -- but now for completely selfless reasons.

"No," Jack asserted fiercely, stepping up and positioning himself in front of the Doctor in a smooth, solid motion. "You can't have any of his memories. Ever. Take two of mine. Any you want, I don't care. Just not his." That was it, no second thoughts and he didn't so much as flinch. It was pure instinct and he didn't question it.

I wish I'd never met you, Doctor, I was much better off as a coward...

[molotovmartinis.livejournal.com]

"Done." Balthazar says instantly, but he's looking at the Doctor, not Jack. "We'll discuss the details of that later. What's important is, after all, the matter at hand."

With that smile, he could hardly fill his words with less sincerity if he tried. Still, he has a suddenly brisk way of moving that implies at least some sort of action taking place. He picks up the phone on his desk and utters four or five guttural, gratingly alien syllables into it -- hellspeak, people like Constantine called it. Mothertongue, Balthazar would say in his mockingly cultured 'normal' voice.

"Once we've hired the appropriate psychopomp and located suitable vessels, I'm sure you'll wish to oversee the procedure; shall I contact you, Captain? Doctor?"

[doctorbluebox.livejournal.com]

For his part, the Doctor isn't even listening to Balthazar, and is staring at Jack, instead.

"Wh..." It takes a beat for the Time Lord to put the enormity of the concept into words, as he suspects the human stnding in front of him hasn't considered this enormity.

"What did you just do? What if he removes the memory of who you are? Or your ability to remember things at all? The system redundancy of the human brain can overwrite a lot of things, but there are still things it can't recover from! Mine can!"

[capnhotness.livejournal.com]

"It's worth it!" Jack replied with an easy sort of passion he hadn't felt in years. "How do you know? Really? This whole universe is upside-down, with different rules and different physics and different everything -- how can you be sure?" He turned and grasped the Time Lord by the shoulders, fixing him with a hard stare full of an emotion that could only best be described as love. Maybe he hadn't considered the enormity of the decision, but obviously he didn't need to. It was a simple choice that he had made long ago: between himself and the Doctor, Jack knew who he would willingly sacrifice. "I'm not sure and I can't take that risk! You're the Doctor. What if he took something vital, something important, something...beautiful -- and you couldn't recover? I can't let that happen. I won't."

Jack inhaled deeply and let the Doctor go, having said all he could think to say without overstepping some boundaries. He turned back to face Balthazar, all emotion gone from his face and voice. "Yes. I want to know who this psychopomp is and what exactly the arrangements are as you're making them." Caveat emptor, after all. The Captain reached inside his jacket pocket and removed a business card with his contact information on it, offering it to Balthazar blankly.

[molotovmartinis.livejournal.com]

Balthazar reaches out for the card, shakily. Shakily because he's trying very hard not to giggle. It would completely ruin his image (what there is of it to ruin ... further ...?). When he has himself mostly under control, card safely tucked away, he offers Jack one of his own in return.

"I usually ask for a certain amount of choice from the ... donater," he remarks, laughter lurking in his voice. "Not complete freedom of choice, of course, as I hardly want to end up with the memory of the largest rubber band ball you ever constructed. But that would just be cruel now, wouldn't it? Don't trouble yourself, Jack, we'll work out those details in private, hmm?"

They make a funny little triangle, Balthazar looking at the Doctor, the Doctor looking at Jack, and Jack at Balthazar.

[doctorbluebox.livejournal.com]

There is no dissuading this man, is there? No, not in front of the ... half-daemon there is, anyway. The Doctor steps back, watching Balthazar with a gaze that's left alien geniuses shaking in their half-Dalek transport modules and waits.

[capnhotness.livejournal.com]

"Fine," was all he said to Balthazar and he didn't linger long in the funny little triangle they made. Balthazar has his number, so to speak, and the half-demon could be certain that Jack had Balthazar's. Briskly, he moved back to the elevator. God, he needed fresh air and Los Angeles wasn't the ideal place to find that.