If you need to contact me for any reason - questions, criticism, requests, plotting, random love, what have you, feel free to drop a comment here. All comments are screened. Also, feel free to leave critique in the comments on any prompt responses - I don't mind, and in fact, I encourage it if you have any.

If you prefer to contact me by other means, my AIM is allfireburns, and you can contact me by email or gchat with aubrey [at] beyondtherift.com.

daemonprompts: "Go then, there are other worlds than these." - Stephen King, The Gunslinger

"Jack Harkness, don't you dare!"

"Jack Harkness," Azaria whispers, a growl lacing each word, "don't you dare."

( Be afraid of the cold - they'll inherit your blood... )

Muse: Jack Harkness
Word Count: 365

The How's My Driving? Meme

Anything at all, guys. Go for it. Please. ^^

Everything here is what you can assume holds true for my baseline canon Jack. Details may change in AU versions, but...

( We're catching bullets with our heads and hearts and all the darkest parts of us... )

Any questions about my Jack? Ask 'em here, I'll answer. ^^

who_topia: Few men desire liberty; most men wish only for a just master. - Sallust, Roman historian, c. 40 B.C.

The Doctor has sex with Jack sometimes. And Jack doesn't mind, and Jack sure as hell doesn't complain, and of course Jack enjoys it, but it's not the way he'd prefer things.

( Love and other socially acceptable emotions are morphine, cleverly concealing primal urges... )

Muse: Jack Harkness
Word Count: 324
Written for alsotravels.

The DOCTOR WHO MUSE LOVE FRIENDING MEME Come here and meet/share love in the Who-niverse

Because as tiny as it is, I'm kind of in love with who_topia... aaaand love memes. ^^

Current Total: 54
Updated: September 4, 2009

( I'm waking up at the start of the end of the world... )

who_topia: Out of the dark we came, into the dark we go. Like a storm-driven bird at night we fly out of the Nowhere; for a moment our wings are seen in the light of the fire, and, lo! we are gone again into the Nowhere. - H. Rider Haggard - King Solomon's Mines

Jack never meant to like Alice Guppy. He never meant to like any of them, not after they'd shanghaied him, after all their smug superiority and swaggering confidence, those children who thought they knew everything and didn't have a clue. Torchwood weren't his friends, they weren't his family, just a waystation and steady cash until he could find the Doctor and be gone.

But some things couldn't be helped. Over confident amateurs Torchwood might be, but Jack had been around them long enough to know that they were also well-intentioned (most of the time), clever and courageous and loyal by turns. Long enough to care about them. He wished he hadn't. Stay in one place, around one group of people long enough, and...

And he ended up here.

( I really wished I could have saved you... )

I've been nominated for things at arpea_awards! Thank you very much to everyone who nominated Jack - I really, really appreciate it. :)

( A list, for reference's sake... )

Special thanks to Miss smithnjones, who really is fantastic.

justprompts: Unintended - Muse

It occurs to Jack every now and then that he doesn't know how this happened. He loves all of his team, but there's a gap between love and in love, and one day he looked up and found he'd slipped somehow from one to the other.

It occurs to him that he can't afford this anymore - bad enough to watch everyone die around him, to know he'll outlive everything he cares about, but it's a step further, digs the knife a little deeper when he cares about them like this.

There are a hundred things that occur to him, lying in the dark while Ianto sleeps - plenty to think about when you never sleep yourself. Sometimes he pushes himself out of bed, climbs back up to his office and finds some way to keep himself occupied, keep himself from thinking about it. Other times, he stays in the bed, listens to Ianto's breathing, his heartbeat, and finds he stops thinking about those things without even trying.

Muse: Jack Harkness
Word Count: 170

who_topia: If you have to choose, will you more likely pick justice or mercy?

Jack's whole body is humming with adrenaline as he jogs up to the bridge of the Valiant. A couple dozen deaths in a row will do that to you, and Toclafane are - were - nothing if not good at killing. Underneath the adrenaline, there's a dull, distant ache that's only going to get worse, but nothing he can't handle.

The door to the bridge slides open, and Jack has a half-second to register the Master running toward him.

Instinct and a year's hatred surge. Kill him now, with no time for thought or debate. Grab a gun from one of the guards, or just reach up and snap his neck, keep killing him until he stops regenerating, and if the Doctor hates him afterwards...

It's not instinct that stops him. It's not older than that, but deeper, and it's not even a choice. Years as a Time Agent, over a hundred years working for Torchwood, and all of that's nothing compared to the effect the Doctor's presence has on him.

The Doctor wouldn't kill him, so Jack doesn't. He grabs him by the arms, hard enough to bruise, spins him around. "Whoa, big fella! You don't want to miss the party." Nothing slips into his tone, no suppressed violence or rage, and he's both glad for that and somewhat surprised. He gets a pair of cuffs from a guard, secures the Master's hands behind his back. It would be so easy to kill him now, and all of that adrenaline screaming through Jack's veins keeps urging him toward it, because it would be just and right and so well-deserved...

Jack looks to the Doctor. "So. What do we do with this one?"

Muse: Jack Harkness
Word Count: 284

justprompts: What Do I Have to Do? - Stabbing Westward

he is
the favored son of a favored race.

you are
the forgotten son of a nowhere planet.

( What do I have to do to make you happy? )

Muse: Jack Harkness
Word Count: 136

who_topia: "One could not be a successful scientist without realizing that, in contrast to the popular conception supported by newspapers and mothers of scientists, a goodly number of scientists are not only narrow-minded and dull, but also just stupid." - J.D. Watson, "The Double Helix"

"Oh, baby, you're good."

He's saving her from a lifetime of concrete walls and solitude. He's giving her a life, sunlight and books and tech and friends. Working for Torchwood would be better than this. If it kills her in a few years' time, it's still mercy.

She's scared. She's desperate, already broken - being here long enough would do that to anyone. He could say anything, and she'd still come, because it's a way out of here.

He should warn her anyway. Give her a chance...

"It's going to be dangerous. Think you can bear a little danger?"

Muse: Jack Harkness
Word Count: 100

who_topia: I suppose it could get worse. I just don't know how.
AU from the end of "Utopia". Does not apply to anything else with Jack, anywhere. Really.

Jack sighed and tossed aside a scrap of Yana's tech - probably very clever, fantastic... brilliant, as this Doctor would say... but absolutely useless to him now. Across the room, Martha stepped delicately over the body of one of the Futurekind, paused for a moment like she was trying to decide whether she should at least move the body from its careless sprawl, close its eyes.

She didn't, just looked up, over at Jack. "I don't have a clue what I'm looking for. I'm a doctor... not really much good with technology."

"Dammit, Jack, I'm a doctor, not a rocket scientist," Jack muttered under his breath, glanced over at Martha with a faint smile. Martha gave him a flat look in return, and he rolled his eyes a little, still smiling, and shrugged a little. Worth a try, even if he didn't get a laugh out of her.

( It's all wild waste and welter, come singing to the bone, no one can give you shelter from the one thing that you own... )

Muse: Jack Harkness
Word Count: 2996

who_topia: Rooftop picture
Spoilers for "Fragments"

Jack didn't hear her coming. That was strange for him, but he supposed it didn't matter much. If he was just going to come back every time someone killed him, there wasn't a whole lot for him to worry about. He glanced over his shoulder, just long enough to identify her - the Scottish one - and then snorted, turning back to look out over the city. "How did you find me?"

"I saw an odd shadow. I thought I should investigate. You might have been one of our - what was your word? - phantasmahoojits. Don't you have better thing to do than sit on rooftops?" the girl asked as she picked her way toward him across the roof, careful but not overly cautious.

"Not really," he answered, without turning to look at her. Although, on reflection, he wasn't so sure about turning his back on her. She seemed to enjoy shooting him a bit much, and the fact that he'd recover if he died didn't mean he necessarily wanted to die again just now.

( Such a squalid little ending, watching you descending just as far as you can go... )

Muse: Jack Harkness
Word Count: 966