[The Doctor isn't wavering on this one. But he is getting ready to start dodging if he starts swinging.] The only thing you can do now is stop going after superficial satisfaction. [That's all revenge would be. That's all drugs would be.

But he's ready to call in help to escort Jesse to Zero if need be.]

SHUT! UP!

[It's all he has to say, but there's nothing else to say anymore. He doesn't want to hear this. He doesn't want to hear how it's his fault, how he did everything Jane's murderer wanted, how he's going to fuck this up too and it'll be his fault too.

For a horrible, horrible millisecond, he thinks he knows exactly how Mark Hoffman feels. How could he be crazy for wanting them all dead?

But then he just wants it all to be over. He charges forward, probably faster than the Doctor would expect him to be, and the murderous intent is gone from his eyes, but now it's all just desperation, wild, almost insane. He reaches out, trying to grab for the man's collar, somewhere between hitting and not.]

[He brushes a button on his journal but has to yank his hand out of his pocket to reach up and grab Jesse's arm.]

You have to stop this now. [He says bluntly. He's strong- Time Lords are, but he knows he's weak compared to his other selves and a good dose of adrenaline and poor, poor judgement and Jesse can manage to really hurt someone.]

[He's right about that: the adrenaline makes him strong, stronger than he's ever been before with the Doctor. On meth, he's even stronger -- it's what let him beat Richie half to death before he even noticed he was hurt just as bad -- but this is still enough chemistry going through his veins to make his grip like steel, his arm taut like a whipcord under the Doctor's hand.

He doesn't move, but he doesn't let go, either. He's breathing like it hurts to, sweat beading his forehead, feverish. His eyes search the Doctor's, infuriated and helpless at the same time. He's got a thousand more questions to scream into the guy's face, but they all start with why?]

[That's the problem with psychics. Throw an impression at them hard enough, they pick up on it. Even as jumbled and confused as it is. He doesn't let go of his arm though.]

I don't know.

[It's an honest answer. Anything else he did know, her already told him.]

[The line wavers: for that first second, he's absolutely going to hit him, and keep hitting until someone stops him or he can't hit any more. But then, just as quickly, the rage is gone, or at least turned elsewhere, and his arms are just skinny arms again, and he's just a guy standing on the ceiling who doesn't know how to take the view.

He cries more than most guys do, he knows, and it's something he's sometimes embarrassed about, but he can't even muster up the shame this time. He's not Hoffman: he's not going to kill anyone else. And he's not Jesse Pinkman anymore, not really; not the guy who would have bought every gram of crystal meth and heroin he could find and drugged himself to death -- who tried that a year ago. He's not crazy enough to laugh about it, so all he can do is cry, in huge, soul-wrenching sobs, his legs sagging under him.]

[He sees- feels the rage ebb out of him. He is touching him after all, and it's physical as much as psychic. But then he's crying, and the Doctor knows the whole world has crashed in on this young man. He just pulled out the supports.

He just hopes he can help him rebuild it properly.

He pulls Jesse close, giving him a tight hug because he can. If he shoves him off, he'll deal with it then.]

[Again, that shifting, like he's going to push, but doesn't. He needs it more than he could ever say, really, even if all it does is bring back the memory of the only time Mr. White ever hugged him: lost in that meth den, lost in grief and certain that Jane's death was his fault.

He could never remember, before, what he'd said to him then -- the memory is hazy at best, with everything that had been in his system at the time. But now he does remember, clear as day, Walter White's voice saying: "You didn't kill anyone, Jesse." Calm, like. Reassuring. Certain.

You didn't kill anyone.

He shudders, fingers closing tight again on the Doctor's shirt, but not to push him away. He's pretty much just bawling and he can't bring himself to care at all, sobbing beyond speech, and when the words come back all he can think to choke out is:]

I k--killed someone for him.

[He has to ask.] Before now, would you have again? [There's concern in his tone. He doesn't like what's happened to Jesse. He's never liked it, and it's always come through whenever Mr. White was mentioned.]

[It's not even a question he has to think about, and that disgusts him more than it makes him feel anything else right now. He nods, mute, hiding his face childishly against his warden's shoulder.

He wouldn't want to... He never wants to, not really, not even now. But he would have.]

He shouldn't have done any of it. He shouldn't have asked those things of you, and he shouldn't have been so greedy. [Because the blame isn't entirely Jesse's- he just chose to care about the wrong person in the wrong way. A way that cost him.

When he's done crying, he'll offer him something to drink (something non-alcoholic. Something to settle his breathing and calm him again.]

[It takes him a while to cry himself out, and afterwards he looks -- and feels -- a wreck. But he takes the drink with a weary nod of thanks, holding the glass in both hands, staring down at the floor.]

I know you'd be happier if I said I didn't want to kill him for this... but I do.

I would be happier but I wouldn't think it likely. [A little sadly.] It seems like it would make you feel better, but it won't. He should be punished, but you're not the only person he's harmed. She wasn't the only one. What of his family?

[He urges him to sit down until he's fully recovered. Maybe he can collect himself just a bit before he braves the corridors.]

It was...

[It was for his family, it all was, he starts to say... but he's done defending Walter White. He sits down obediently, pliable now, scrubbing at his tearstained face with one of his long sleeves. He's weirdly calm now, distant, or maybe just disconnected. Like maybe it's easier to talk that way.]

A... a lot of people died because of that, actually. Her dad, he worked for an airline, something-- air traffic or something like that. He went back to work, after, and, um. There was a plane crash. And then he tried to kill himself. So a lot of collateral damage, there.

167 people. 168, counting her. I don't... You know, I don't actually know if he lived or not, is that weird? I guess I didn't want to find out. I figured it was all my fault, I didn't want to add to that body count...

I didn't know that, no. [It wasn't in the file. But he wonders how long Jesse's been blaming himself for that more directly, for Jane's loss.]

I don't think you have bad intentions, but sometimes I think you choose the easy way. The easy way to feel better. The easy way to make someone like you. I had a discussion with a lovely Jamaican gentleman that ran my favorite fish and chips place [And he means lovely in temperament, there's no dreamy look to him]. I asked him what if you could go back in time and prevent people from ever using sugar in tea. Or in baking for that matter. And he said that he would have been an African, as his grandfather was taken over as a cane-cutter.

They're such minor choices, Jesse, but you need to start making them for more than the immediate affect. More than making someone like you, more than feeling better.

[He shakes his head numbly, still staring down at his glass.]

It hasn't been easy for a long time.

I don't think it ever will be. [But he thinks it can get better.]

Yeah. You're right about that.

[He sniffs once, rubbing at his face again, although he's dry-eyed now.]

It used to be pretty good, though. I know I'm... not supposed to say that, or whatever, that I liked it, but I did. Even with the cops up my ass, dealing with the neighborhood assholes, trying to stay out the way of the gangs and the asshole tweakers with knives. Even with the drugs. It was, like... free. I was good at it, and I could do what I wanted, and even the assholes... I mean, it was all too low-level for anyone to give much of a fuck, no one that's not totally nuts is going to come after you with a gun over a quarter-gram of crystal.

And I can say, you know, I didn't know, when we started up, Walt and me, how bad it was gonna get. I guess maybe I didn't. But then I did, and I still... [He bites his lip, picking at his jeans.] I still went back to it. After she died. After he... I still went back. I got out twice and I still went back.

What's that say to you?

[He doesn't even have to think about it.] It says to me that you got out, and then you went back to a man that ruined your life and manipulated it so that you would go back. That even the good times were setting you up for something terrible.

Being tricked into thinking it's alright doesn't make it alright.

[A fresh current of anger runs through him, exhausted as he is. He grits it back and knocks down the rest of his drink as if it were a drink before setting the glass aside. By the time he's done, the rage is gone again, and he feels just as empty as before.]

You think... he was just using me? The whole time, I mean?

I think he liked you, I think he favored you. He obviously favored you. But I think he was greedy, unwilling to change but willing to harm others in order not to.

He called me his partner. He called me his family once, sort of. [It hadn't been so explicit as that. They never said that stuff out loud. But he'd said something like it, and Jesse had known what he'd meant.] I mean, we also beat the shit out of each other once, but... he still got me to rehab, all that...

[He trails off, shaking his head, shoulders sagging. He's not sure what he's doing here anymore; just reliving memories that are a thousand times more painful now that he knows the truth, the weight of them pressing him down harder and harder. After a second, he takes out his communicator, typing a message to Claire.]

I'll get out of your hair in a second. I just need to... she's not good with this stuff. Jane stuff.

You're not bothering me. I'm more concerned than annoyed. [He says that genuinely.]

Claire? Why isn't she?

[He shrugs wearily.] Jealousy, I guess. I tried to tell her it's not like much of a competition when one of you is dead, but. [Another shrug.]

Anyways, probably better she stays clear until... until I don't know.

You can stay here as long as you need. I have the TARDIS if you need your privacy and don't wish to return to your cabin quite yet. [He stands up, taking off his hat to toss across the room onto a hatrack.]