InsaneJournal

Who: Jack Harkness
Where: Cardiff, Wales
When: Wednesday afternoon
What: Reflecting on the past
Status: Complete
Warnings: None



To most people, 24 hours was a decent amount of time. But when you were traveling from the US all the way to Wales, it wasn't nearly enough time. Jack had managed to find him a flight that took just over 15 hours for him to travel from Portland to Cardiff. Annoyingly, that was the fastest one he could find. Most of the flights had multiple stops and layovers, which placed them in the 18+ hour mark. Someone of them would've taken the full 24 hours or longer. He hadn't bothered packing a bag and had purchased a one way ticket. After all, he was going to somehow be back once the Holly-app's timer ran down. But still, it gave him about 9 hours to spend in Cardiff. Jack had expected there to be problems with his passport, but everything had gone surprisingly well. He chalked it up to the various things Holly did for new arrivals.

After arriving, the first thing Jack had done was to get his hands on a phone book. None of the people he knew were even listed. Again, this wasn't really a surprise to him. But he'd had to take a look anyways to confirm it. The city itself was just like he remembered it. All of the buildings were the same, the streets, even the stores and restaurants. After wandering around the city center for a few hours, Jack took the train down to the Bay. As he walked down towards the Plass, the differences became more obvious to him. There was no Jubilee Pizza... it was an indian restaurant. The usual locals who worked around that area were no where to be seen.

Jack stopped dead in his tracks in front of the Millennium Center and stared at the brightly colored carousel. It was identical in every way to the one that had been on the Plass that summer. He swallowed down the lump in his throat at the sight of it, remembering what had happened that first day when the children began acting strangely. The Water Tower was there, but he knew there was no base beneath it. Even though the government had rebuilt the Tower back in his own Cardiff, the Hub was gone for good.

As he stood there taking it all in, the memories of his friends and their adventures washed over him. Jack felt someone tug on his arm and he looked down to see a young boy smiling up at him. "Hey Mister... can you take our picture?"

The kid handed him his iPhone and ran back over to stand in front of the carousel with his mates. Jack smiled and snapped the photo, handed the phone back, and watched as the boys ran off towards the ice-cream parlour. They were about Steven's age... or rather, the age Steven had been when Jack had sacrificed his own grandson to save the Earth.

Jack checked the countdown on the app and frowned. He'd be taken back at roughly 5pm Cardiff time. He wouldn't even be able to be here long enough to see the stars and the way everything lit up in the evening. But there was enough time to grab something to eat, then to make his way up on top of the Millennium Center for one last view of everything from up on high. Jack picked up a bottle of wine from the Tesco and offered up a toast to his friends and to those he'd lost. This time of year was never easy and he refused to let himself forget. He owed it to all of them to always remember. And Jack Harkness never forgot a single one of them... ever.