"People with power sit on a knife's edge, people like him. People like you. Everything you know, everything you could do. Sometimes it'd be so easy to go another way. I've thought the same myself. I think it's easier to be harsh than to be strong. But we try. We really do try."

Jack let his head fall to the side and he looked at the Doctor. Cautiously, he reached out a hand and let it touch against his leg. Just a gesture of companionship.

"Yeah," he laughed, "the Rift. And who's job is it to look after that?" He shook his head and rubbed a hand over his face, it was sore and uncomfortable, and he could feel the bruising under his fingers.

"One day you'll learn that I'm not going to let that happen," he said with a laugh in the back of his throat. "I'm not letting anyone kill you, Doctor, and I don't care where that gets me. You don't like that fact, I know that, but you know what? Suck it up and live with it. We get out of this together, or we don't get out of it at all."