You Know I'll Put Us Back Together (Doctor Who fanfic)
Title: You Know I'll Put Us Back Together
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Pre-Martha/Ten, Pre-Donna/Jack if you squint.
Disclaimer: I'm poor, I own nothing, yadayadayada.
AN: This is because I’ve seen Martha-abused fics with Martha needing to be saved, and I’ve seen fics in which Martha’s screwed up because of the way the Doctor treated her, and this bunny popped into my head.
Summary: There are all kinds of abuse. Martha’s merely trading emotional for physical. Friendship for love. Because he says he loves her, and she believes him. Because she loved the Doctor and she had to leave. Pre-JE, post-Doctor's Daughter.
I'm fairly certain I'm going to write a sequel to this if people are interested.
((I didn’t think I was in an especially depressing mood, but after reading this I’m no longer sure.))
./.
./.
./.
“Remember the days of sleepless summer nights
That took us away, a perfect place, a different time
Back when nothing was wrong, now we’re each sold separately
Our summers are gone, gray skies are all I see
These broken days won’t last forever
You know I’ll put us back together”
--“I Owe You a Love Song” -- Shiny Toy Guns
./.
./.
…You Know I’ll Put us Back Together …
./.
“But she’s Martha Jones. She’d never let a man hurt her!”
And Jack just looks at him, silent, stone.
./.
Loyalties to friends and lovers and even Jack can’t keep track anymore.
“Jack? It’s Tish.” Jack looks at the clock, and swears.
“It’s 3am-what’s wrong?” he asks, because unfortunately waking up at 3am now usually means emergencies and not sneaking out of a nameless persons bedroom.
“It’s…” Tish’s voice sounds a bit unsteady, and Jack feels his heart clench a bit. Always a soft spot for the damsel in distress. “It’s Martha. We’re in the hospital. Jack, I think you should be here.”
Jack’s out of the bed and attempting to find the leg-hole in his jeans in the dark before she finishes the last sentence.
“What happened?” he asks, and his voice is steel, because there are a handful of people the world should know not to screw with, and one of those is his girl Martha.
“I can’t…she said…she asked for you, but when I said I’d phone she made me promise…not to tell. Oh Jack,” Tish whimpers, and 365 days rush back, and his jaw tightens.
“What hospital?” he asks, grabbing his keys and his jacket and something that hopefully resembles a shirt. “I’ll leave now.”
./.
There was an entire year that-never-was, and destruction and death were wiped off the chalkboard, leaving only fading white lines to trace the past.
“Mulligans!” the Doctor yelled, and the Universe stepped aside and let him through.
Bend and not break, say the trees, facing the hurricane, the Oncoming Storm. Bend and not break.
./.
Jack breezes past upset orderlies and charms indignant nurses and bypasses even Martha’s family to get to her side.
She’s sporting quite the shiner, and underneath the blankets he can tell that her ribs have been bandaged. Her left wrist is in a cast.
She smiles when she sees him, puffy eye and all.
“Hey,” he says, pulling up a chair.
“Hi Jack,” she says.
“I’d say you look like your hell, but even bruised up you still look gorgeous,” Jack smiles, and Martha starts to laugh, and then stops with a soft whimper and a hand going to her ribs.
“Good to see you, too,” she says. “But you didn’t need to come. I’m fine.”
Jack looks at her, silently contemplating her words. “You always seem to be fine, don’t you?” he asks, eyebrow arched a little, and she frowns.
“What?”
“My tough girl, hmm? What happened to you?”
“What did Tish say?” Martha asks, suddenly the slightest bit defensive, and Jack blinks before leaning in towards her, watching her almost-stiffen with a frown.
“You wanted me to come, but you wouldn’t let her say why, and she sounds at the end of her rope and you’re getting set to stonewall me so let’s forgo the twenty questions, Martha Jones, and you just tell me what happened.”
“Jack…” she says, and the way she says his name, drawn-out with a barely discernible tremble, makes his jaw tighten. “Thank you for coming,” she says, and he catches her hand in his.
“You’ve always just had to say the word,” he says, trying to smile, his rough thumb circling the inside of her palm. And then his hand tightens just a fraction on hers, and he looks straight into her eyes. “Where’s your boy, then?”
“What?” she asks, startled and almost-terrified and half-bolting up.
“Where’s Tom, Martha?” he asks, and her face blanks.
“He’s at work. He stayed for a while, but I told him I was fine and sent him off. He’ll back later, I’m sure.”
Jack resists the urge to throw something, or stand up and pace, or put a fist through the wall. Instead his free hand brushes the hair from her face, and he keeps his face calm and soft.
“You should’ve called me sooner, Martha,” he says, and her face hardens and she tries to pull her hand out of his.
“Jack, I don’t know what you’re-”
“My nightingale,” Jack says, and his voice sounds weary, and Martha reluctantly stutters to a stop. Jack lifts her hand to his mouth and presses a gentle kiss to it. “Did you really think you could lie to me?”
She looks away from him, her bottom lip trembling just the slightest. “Jack,” she starts, and her voice cracks halfway through the word, and she closes her eyes for a moment, gathering herself up. “Jack,” she says, looking back at him. “Jack, you can’t do anything about this. You have to promise me.”
“You aren’t serious,” he says. Not asking, stating, because really.
“Jack, I can handle this myself.”
“I can see how well you’re handling it!” he growls, gesturing to her bruised face and broken wrist. She winces and immediately he regrets his words. “I’m sorry,” he says, “I’m sorry, that was low, I’m an ass, but Martha, I’m not just going to pretend this didn't happen.”
“Jack,” she says, and out of nowhere her voice is firm and steady and has all the fire and strength that he knows she carries inside of her. “I don’t want you involved, and if you can’t handle that then you’ll take your ass out of this room and out of my life.”
“Martha,” he says, completely taken aback, but she glares at him, and for once he backs down. “I won’t do anything without talking to you about it,” he offers, compromising, and she nods slowly. “At least let me call the Doctor,” he says, and she loses about five shades of color.
“Why would you call him?” she asks him, wide-eyed, and he frowns.
“He’s your friend, Martha, he’d want to help you.”
“No,” she says, fingers almost trembling in his, “No, you can’t call him, Jack, promise me you won’t call him.”
“Martha-”
“Jack, please,” she whispers, and he swallows with some difficulty.
“If it means that much to you, then…don’t worry,” he says. There’s an awkward moment of silence. “I’ll go see how Tish is doing,” he says at last, and she nods, and her face softens.
“Thank you for coming,” she says, and he nods, giving her hand a squeeze.
“Couldn’t keep me away from my girl,” he says, and then, with a final look at her, he walks out.
./.
“Doctor. Martha’s been…hurt. She didn’t want me to call you, but-”
“Hang on, she didn’t what?”
“I thought you deserved to know. And given your penchant for…turning up unexpectedly, she wouldn’t be able to prove it was me,” Jack finishes with a bit of his trademark smile.
“What’s wrong, Jack?” the Doctor asks, because there’s something wrong with Jack’s voice, amusement or not, and he’s not about to let it slide.
Jack’s silent for a long moment, and the Doctor waits impatiently and with just the smallest touch of fear, because Jack isn’t one to draw a moment out, he’s not one to withhold information from him and he certainly isn’t one to consider his words before speaking.
“She didn’t want me to call you, Doctor,” he says at last. “And she didn’t want me to know. So I think you should come, but I can’t tell you why. I think you should know, but I can’t tell you myself.”
“Jack…” the Doctor says, pressing for an answer, but there’s only silence. “How bad?” the Doctor asks, his voice low.
“She’ll be all right. If…she’ll heal.”
“Give me the hospital and the time and date,” the Doctor says, sounding almost reluctant to be flying so blind but determined to come and help in whatever way he can.
Martha Jones…what have you gotten yourself into?
“Donna!” he yells, and after a minute or two she pops her head into the control room.
“What’re you yelling at me for? Couldn’t be bothered to come find me like a proper-”
“Jack called,” he cuts in, “Martha’s hurt.”
Her expression immediately changes, and she steps fully into the room, looking worried. “What happened?”
“He wouldn’t say. Bit of a change of course, if you don’t mind,” he says, and she nods.
“Try to actually get the place right this time, hm?” she smirks.
./.
Jack meets them outside the hospital.
“I convinced Tish and everyone to go home, they were just making her more stressed out,” Jack says, before his eyes inevitably slide over to Donna. “Hello, gorgeous,” he smirks. She smiles back appreciatively.
“Jack, is this really the time?” the Doctor sighs, and Jack blinks.
“Right,” he says, a little apologetic smile aimed at Donna.
“So what’s happened to her?” the Doctor asks, and Jack winces. “She’s not too badly hurt. Doctor…you should just go see her.”
“You really won’t tell us anything?” Donna asks, and Jack looks at her with a frown.
“Oh hang on, you’re Donna aren’t you? You’ve met Martha,” he says. “Martha quite likes you,” he adds with a smile, and then a sudden frown. “And you’re quite sharp. Maybe you…”
“Where’s her room?” the Doctor cuts in, and Jack looks between the two of them, even more unsure than before, but with a desperate sort of shrug he takes them there.
“Doctor,” Martha says when they get there, not at all happy, but the Doctor’s a bit too distracted with her injuries to pay much mind to vocal inflections.
“Martha, what’s going on?” he asks, not at all happy either.
“Hey,” Donna smiles at Martha, and Martha manages a smile back.
Jack quite wisely decides to wait outside the door.
./.
Donna notices it first. The way her eyes widen a bit when the Doctor moves too close or too suddenly. The way she avoids speaking about Tom or even saying his name.
It’s not until the Doctor mentions wedding dates, and Martha pales a little, that Donna stands up, furious and reading to kick his arse into next week. “That prick,” she snarls, and the Doctor looks up startled and Donna is ready to go on crusade against him and Martha bolts up, unsteady, terrified.
“Donna,” she says, half-pleading, half-ordering, and Donna shakes her head.
“No,” she says. “He’s not getting away with this,” she says, and still the Doctor is looking between the two of them, confused, and then slowly the pieces fall into place.
“Tom?” he asks the room at large, and both women look at him startled. The Doctor nods sharply. “Right,” he says, and stands up as well, and before the room can devolve even more into chaos, Jack pops his head in.
“Everything all right?” he asks, despite the visual evidence to the contrary.
./.
After much arguing, Donna’s gone to visit her family on the grounds that if she came anywhere near Tom, she would not be able to control her temper and would undoubtedly do something everybody else would regret.
That is, if she didn’t just decide to seek him out with a baseball bat.
Jack is slumped in an uncomfortable hospital chair outside Martha’s room, ready to turn away any and especially certain visitors in order to give Martha and the Doctor some privacy. He is, however, still under strict orders not to kill, maim, or otherwise injure Tom. Jack is attempting to figure out how he can circumvent these instructions without breaking his word to Martha.
Inside, the Doctor has pulled his chair up close next to Martha’s bed, holding her hand in his, and she is looking steadily past him.
“I’m fine,” Martha says.
“He hurts you,” he says.
“He loves me,” she says.
“Martha,” the Doctor says, and his voice is oh-so-gentle, “My brave Martha Jones, why are you letting him to do this?”
“I love him,” she says, and if her bottom lip quivers just a bit, no one comments. She glances down, away from him, and then her shoulders sink a bit, and suddenly she looks so young, so small, so vulnerable. “He loves me,” she says (corrects?).
“Martha,” the Doctor says, and she shakes her head.
“I told Jack I didn’t want you to come,” she says, and her voice is firm, and her shoulders are back and her chin is high and he can see her strength, there in her eyes, in the tilt of her head.
“Martha,” he says, voice soft, she looks away.
“Leave me alone.”
./.
Donna helps them move her back to her house when she’s released the next day, but considering that Martha’s house is really Martha-and-Tom’s house, she’s not allowed to stay all that long. She does give Martha a tight hug and whispered promises that she’s only a phone call away, and reminders that any man that would hurt her isn’t a man worth loving, and that whenever she’s ready they’ll have a total girls night (no, not even Jack will be allowed), and they’ll have ice cream and destroy men’s characters and watch old movies.
Jack and the Doctor hover over her all day, which gets on her nerves, and finally she proclaims (loudly) that she needs some alone time and curls up in front of the telly with the boys upstairs.
Tom has been warned by Tish and Francine and Clive not to enter the house upon pain of death, but she’s warned them (irritably) that it’s not their business. Still, she’s rather expecting him not to show up tonight after work.
Tom enters the room quietly, and Martha sits not-watching the telly, not having noticed him.
“What did you tell them?” Tom asks, voice dark, and Martha looks up, surprised.
“Tom,” she says, standing up as he walks closer.
“What did you tell them?” he repeats, suppressed fury in her voice, and she swallows thickly, knowing Jack and the Doctor are just upstairs, barely a call for help a way, but not willing to abandon Tom to them.
“I didn’t say anything,” she says, her voice placating, her hands slightly in front of her, but her chin still up, her back still straight.
“What did you tell them?” Tom growls, and the Doctor, having come down to investigate the door opening-and-shutting noises, stops in the doorway , looking at the situation.
She faces Tom, no cowering in the corner for her.
Pain, she said, causes people to do terrible things.
He loves me, she said. He doesn’t mean to hurt me.
Maybe he doesn’t. But the Doctor is certainly meaning to hurt him.
“Oy!” he yells, and Tom swivels to meet him, surprised, and Martha’s mouth opens in a silent mew of surprise.
The Doctor straight-up punches Tom in the face. Immediately, he shakes his hand surprised.
“Ow!” he yelps, before noticing that Tom is shaking it off and looking entirely too ready for a confrontation.
“Get out of my house,” Tom growls, and the Doctor narrows his eyes.
“You aren’t going to touch her again after-”
“Tom, Doctor, please-” Martha says, but they both ignore her, practically circling each other. Jack comes half-tumbling down the stairs in his hurry, and seeing the situation-the Doctor and Tom acting like school boys and Martha half-hysterical-he swears roundly.
“Doctor,” he says, voice irritated, “Take Martha upstairs. Tom, get the hell out of the house.”
“Jack, don’t get involved in this,” Tom warns him, and Jack snorts and then grabs Tom by his collar.
“I’m not allowed to beat the crap out of you because I promised our girl Martha over there to play nice, but I swear if you do not leave this house right now…?” he says, tone nice and threatening, before pulling out a gun. Tom swallows and nods, and Jack smiles, letting him loose with a sturdy pat to the shoulder. “Later, Tommy,” he sneers.
Martha and the Doctor are staring at him, and he rolls his eyes. “I keep my promises sometimes, Martha, yes. And Doctor, for the love of all, take her upstairs before she falls down.”
The Doctor tries to take Martha’s arm, but she shoves him instead, and Jack looks between the two of them, worried, and then grabs his jacket and leaves, figuring they need a bit of time to sort things out.
“Martha-” the Doctor says softly, and Martha looks away.
“Tom wouldn’t have-” she starts, but the Doctor cuts her off.
“He won’t hurt you again, after I’m-”
“It’s not your place, Doctor!” Martha spits, suddenly furious. “I know you like to ride in on your white horse and rescue everyone, but I don’t need rescuing, Doctor! I didn’t ask for your help!”
“I don’t care if you asked!” he yells, hands grabbing onto her shoulders, face leaning in close, eyes dark. “He won’t hurt you again!”
“I finally have a life without you and you have to come running in and-”
“I’m trying to keep you safe!” he shouts, giving her a shake, and she pulls away from him.
“That’s a first,” she snarls. He lets go of her in shock, face falling, and she softens with regret. “I’m sorry, I…please,” she says. “Just leave me alone.”
“Martha,” he says, voice so soft it hurts, and she closes her eyes, shakes her head.
“I’m just trying to be happy,” she says. “He needs me,” she says. “He needs me.”
And he almost opens his mouth, almost says “I need you,” but she looks so very tired, and really, it’s not his place to say things like that, is it?
“Jack wants to hurt him.”
“Jack had better not touch him,” Martha says, eyes flashing, and the Doctor shakes his head in irritation.
“How can you protect him after he-”
“Leave,” Martha says, and her eyes are flashing and the Doctor actually takes a step back at the fury in her eyes. “Get out of my house,” she spits, and the Doctor opens his mouth and then shuts it abruptly, taking in the fist at her side, the set of her mouth. Slowly he turns and walks out of the house.
( Part 2 )