Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

NOW

He was humming again.

John paused his reading mid-sentence—which was always weirdly unnerving when speaking High Gallifreyan. The words didn’t just hang in the air; they lingered in the mind like a tangible question, unresolved.

“You want me to keep going?” John asked the slouched figure seated on the floor beside him.

The Doctor didn’t answer. He paused his humming briefly, as if considering the world around him, then resumed with no sign he’d even heard the question.

John sighed. One of these days, then.

He studied his brother more closely, the book still open in his lap, waiting for a reason to continue. The Doctor’s fingers danced gracefully on his thigh, tapping out some indecipherable rhythm—something that looked like it meant something mysterious. Wishful thinking, John knew. Probably nonsense.

“Your pants are red from the grass, Doctor. I’m not sure sitting on the ground was one of your better ideas.”

It was painfully ironic that the Gallifreyan garden in the TARDIS—once a place the Doctor avoided like the plague after the Time War—was now one of the few places where he found peace. That irony wasn’t lost on John. It still hurt. It was still beautiful.

The grass was red, the trees silver-leafed, shimmering in a breeze that wasn’t real. They sat in the meadow, just past the treeline, the forest sprawling before them. The door was nearby, but the TARDIS kept it hidden for now, preserving the illusion: infinite horizon, untouched wilderness. A perfect lie. A perfect kindness.

She was trying. Giving everything she had for her pilot—her thief, as she liked to tease in his mind when he was still the Doctor. John wanted to give her a telepathic hug, to reassure her: she already did the impossible, after all: the Doctor was still here.

But not all of him. The light was dimmer now, flickering in ways John didn’t fully understand. Sometimes it sparked—just for a moment—and he’d catch a glimpse of the man he used to be. Then it was gone. Like trying to hold sunlight in your hands.

If they’d come sooner… maybe the Doctor wouldn’t be sitting here humming to himself in grass-stained trousers, lost to a rhythm only he could hear.

Some days, John told himself this was enough. That being alive counted for something.
Some days, alive was enough.

John flinched slightly when the Doctor moved—sudden and sharp—starting to untie his shoelaces.

“Now, Doctor, we talked about this: shoes are good, shoes are great—let’s keep them on, yeah?”

Pleading with a madman. Brilliant.

He sighed again, leaned over to stop the Doctor from pulling off his left shoe—

“NO!”

The Doctor screamed, flinching hard, scrambling back across the grass. John froze instantly, pulling both hands into the air in a calm, open gesture.

“Okay. Calm down, Doctor. It’s alright—no one’s going to touch you.”

But it was too late. The Doctor kept retreating on his backside, further staining the back of his trousers with crushed red grass, sobbing like a frightened four-year-old.

John stayed very still.

“Brilliant,” he muttered under his breath.

“Looks like you’re having a merry time, brain boys…”

Donna’s voice rang out from behind them, and John turned to see her striding toward them, arms full: teapot, mugs, and biscuits.

Ten minutes ago, she’d left them in peace and sunlight. Now, there were tears.

“Look, Doctor,” John said softly, trying to keep his voice level. “Donna’s here. She brought you some biscuits. Your favourites, yeah?”

He held one out like an offering. Sugar had always worked, even back then. Please, he thought, let today be one of those times.

Donna watched the Doctor freeze—his gaze fixed on John’s hand, eyes wide and flickering with something she wanted to call recognition. She didn’t move. None of them did. It was like watching a tightrope walker wobble over a drop you couldn’t see.

Then, slowly, the Doctor reached out, took the biscuit from John’s hand, and nibbled at the corner like it was the most normal thing in the world. Donna let out a breath she hadn’t realised she was holding.

“Well,” she muttered, “guess that’s a win.”

But the sting in her chest didn’t go away.

It never really did anymore. It just settled in, familiar as her heartbeat. Seeing him like this—watching him nibble a biscuit like a skittish child—was something she thought she’d get used to. She hadn’t.

She crouched down beside them, careful not to startle him. That was the trick—slow movements, soft tone, no sudden noises. She used to shout at him across rooms, throw things at his head when he was being a skinny know-it-all. Now, she offered tea like a peace treaty.

“Good choice,” she said lightly, nodding to the biscuit. “That’s a custard cream, that is. I had to fight Martha for the last packet.”

He looked at her briefly, eyes heavy with something like recognition. But no words came.

She poured the tea anyway.

John shifted slightly beside her but didn’t speak. He was good at the silence. Better than her. Donna always had something to say—even if no one else wanted to hear it—but lately, she found herself biting her tongue more often than not. The things she wanted to say—those didn’t help. Not here.

Like how it wasn’t fair.

How it should’ve been different.

How they’d done everything right—and it still wasn’t enough.

She looked at the Doctor again. His head was tilted now, biscuit forgotten in his hand, gaze turned up toward the trees like he was listening to music only he could hear.

Maybe he was.

Her throat tightened.

She set the teacup down in front of him, careful not to let the porcelain clink against the plate.

“Alright, spaceman,” she murmured. “Let’s try something, yeah?”

She leaned in a little, her voice soft but sure, like she was speaking to a frightened animal—or a friend who’d wandered too far from himself.

“Say ‘biscuit’.”

The Doctor didn’t move.

John turned his head slightly but didn’t interrupt. He never did when she tried this.

Donna waited. Gave him space. Counted to ten in her head.

“Okay, new plan,” she said, smiling like it didn’t ache. “You say anything you want. One word. I’ll even accept something completely mad. ‘Bananas.’ ‘Baldric.’ ‘Trousers.’ Surprise me.”

The Doctor’s eyes flicked to hers—just for a second. It was quick, almost like a muscle spasm, but Donna felt it like a punch.

“Come on, sunshine,” she whispered. “You’ve got this.”

His mouth opened. A breath escaped. No sound.

But then—

“…d’nna.”

Barely audible. Broken. But it was there.

Donna froze.

John lifted his head, stunned.

The Doctor blinked slowly, as if the effort had cost him something.

“…tea?” he added, so quiet it was almost part of the wind.

Donna’s hands trembled. She covered it with a laugh.

“Well,” she said thickly, “I always said you had excellent taste.”

She passed him the cup like it was the most ordinary thing in the world.

A gentle knock tapped against the garden doorframe before it swung inward.

“Everything alright in here?” Martha’s voice was low, careful.

“He said my name,” Donna murmured, like she was still catching up to it. “And asked for tea.”

Martha took in the scene in a single sweep—Donna kneeling, hand still resting on the Doctor’s knee; John frozen beside them; the teacup trembling slightly in Donna’s grip. And the Doctor himself, quietly sipping, like this wasn’t the first time he’d asked for tea in months.

She stepped forward, slow and deliberate. She knelt beside the Doctor, her movements instinctively professional, though her eyes glimmered with something warmer.

“Hey, you,” she said gently. “Fancy surprising us all, yeah?”

The Doctor blinked at her, and for the first time in days, his expression didn’t look vacant—it looked tired. Human tired, Donna might’ve said once.

Martha smiled, gently brushing her thumb along the Doctor’s wrist to feel his temperature and muscle tone. “No rigidity. No tremors right now,” she said, mostly for John’s benefit. “Breathing’s even. No visible disorientation.”

John let out a slow breath, almost soundless. Not relief, exactly—just a fraction less tension in his spine.

The Doctor looked between them now—his gaze slow, like wading through syrup—but there. Present.

“Doctor,” Martha said softly, “can you say something else?”

He opened his mouth. Nothing came.

Then he leaned forward slightly and tapped the side of his teacup with one finger. Not hard. Just enough to make the porcelain clink.

Martha laughed, startled and bright. “Right. Message received.”

Donna finally let out a breath and sat back, brushing her hands down her thighs.

“I need a second,” she said, already standing. “I’ll be back in a minute.”

Martha nodded, and John shot her a glance, but Donna didn’t look at either of them as she walked out—just gave the Doctor one last glance, full of too many things to name.

The corridor felt cooler than the garden, but that was probably just her skin catching up to her heartbeat.
Donna walked until the soft thrum of the TARDIS settled around her. No real destination—just distance. From John, from Martha. From him.

She stopped near a corridor junction lined with those weird round things the TARDIS seems to like and leaned back against the wall, one hand rising instinctively to rub at her chest.

He’d said her name.

She’d waited so long to hear it again that she’d imagined how it might sound—clear and cheeky and full of that ridiculous fondness he used to carry just for her. But the real thing had been... cracked. Barely there. Like it hurt him to form the word. Like it was breaking through too many layers just to reach her.

And still—she’d wanted to sob when he said it.

Instead, she’d smiled. Because that’s what you do when someone you love is finally a little less lost. She slid down the wall to sit on the floor. The hum of the TARDIS buzzed gently beneath her.

“Don’t suppose you’ve got a tissue dispenser in one of these fancy panels,” she muttered.

A faint glow pulsed in the roundel beside her.

“Didn’t think so.”

She stared at the floor, eyes dry but burning.

“You’re really trying, huh?” she whispered. “Giving him a perfect garden, keeping him steady, warm, comfortable.”

The ship didn’t answer, but that was fine. She didn’t need words to know the TARDIS was listening.

“I miss him,” she said.

Just that. Quiet. Honest.

Not the him from before—not entirely. She missed the feeling of being known like that. Of being seen as extraordinary when the rest of the world had her filed under loud and difficult and too much.

And now he looked at her like a stranger some days. Or worse—like a child who didn’t remember why she mattered. She pressed the heel of her hand against her eye.

“Stop it, Donna,” she muttered. “He said your name. That’s something.”

She let her head tip back against the wall, let the silence press in for a moment longer.
And then: a breath. A small, fierce laugh.

“He said my name.”

This time, the smile reached her eyes.

The familiar creak of boots on metal made Donna look up.

Jack stood at the corridor’s far end, his coat slung back and his expression caught halfway between alarm and amusement.

“Well,” he said slowly, “you look like someone who’s either lost a fight or won one and doesn’t know it yet.”

Donna huffed out a sound that might’ve been a laugh. “That obvious, huh?”

Jack stepped closer, eyeing the way she was sitting on the floor like the air had gone out of her.

“What happened?” he asked, crouching down beside her.

“He said my name,” she replied.

Jack blinked.

“The Doctor?” he asked, just to be sure.

She nodded. “And ‘tea.’ Two whole words.”

Jack let out a low whistle. “Damn. I leave the room for ten minutes and you lot get miracles.”

Donna smiled again—crooked and tired. “It didn’t sound like him. Not exactly. But it was him. Underneath all of it.”

Jack didn’t speak for a beat. Just settled beside her, back to the wall, legs stretched out across the corridor.

“Good,” he said finally. “That’s good.”

“Yeah,” Donna said. “It is.”

Silence stretched between them—not heavy, just full.

Then Jack glanced sideways at her, one brow raised.

“You’re crying and smiling at the same time. It’s weirding me out a bit.”

“I’m allowed to be complicated,” she said, without heat.

“True.” He nudged her ankle with the toe of his boot. “You always were.”

They sat there for a moment longer, side by side. At some point over the past few months, they’d stopped being strangers linked by proximity and disaster. Somewhere between emergency med doses, sleepless nights, and quietly shielding the Doctor from the worst of the world—and sometimes from himself—they’d built something solid. A friendship forged in the fire of love and fury: both of them trying to hold the universe at bay for the sake of one impossible man.

They didn’t talk about it. They didn’t need to.

Jack exhaled slowly, tipping his head back against the wall.

“I keep thinking it’ll get easier,” he said. “And then it doesn’t.”

Donna looked over. He wasn’t smiling.

“I see him try,” Jack went on, voice lower now. “Like, properly try. You can tell, right? Behind his eyes—he’s in there, and he’s fighting to get out. And I hate that I can’t help more.”

“You do help,” she said. “He always calms down faster when you’re around.”

Jack shrugged one shoulder. “That doesn’t feel like much.”

“It is,” she said simply.

Jack turned his head to look at her, a glimmer of gratitude in his expression—wary, but real.

“You know,” he said, “if you ever need to scream into a pillow, I keep one in the weapons locker.”

Donna laughed—a sharp, real sound. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

————————-

The garden had gone quiet again, but the stillness felt different now. Not peaceful—expectant.

John stayed on the ground beside the Doctor, who had gone back to nibbling his biscuit in slow, deliberate motions. Martha knelt a short distance away, checking her notes on a small device that flickered softly in the red-tinged light.

“That was him,” John said after a moment, eyes still on the Doctor. “Not just a reflex. Not just a noise. That was him.”

Martha didn’t look up. “Yeah. It probably was.”

There was a strange note in her voice—reluctant awe, like she wasn’t quite ready to believe it aloud. She tapped a few notes into her device, then paused, fingers hovering. “The numbers still don’t make sense,” she muttered. “There’s no human equivalent for this kind of recovery. Not at this stage.”

John tilted his head, watching her carefully.

“But?”

She hesitated. “But he’s not human.”

There was silence, and then she added, more quietly, “Sometimes I forget what that really means. And then he does something like this and I—I start to think maybe—”

She cut herself off, jaw tightening.

John didn’t press. He knew the tone. Hope was a dangerous thing.

Martha cleared her throat. “Anyway. Tea’s a good sign. Motor planning, object recognition, sequencing. It means more of the brain’s talking to itself again.”

John glanced down at the cup in the Doctor’s hands. “He’s still not drinking it properly.”

“Probably because you didn’t add sugar,” Martha said, deadpan.

John raised a brow. “You think he’d take it now?”

“Only one way to find out.”

Martha reached over and dropped in a spoonful from the tin beside her—always on standby. They’d all stopped pretending they weren’t spoiling him. It didn’t matter. He’d earned it.

The Doctor took another sip. This time, he swallowed.

John smiled faintly. “There it is.”

They sat in silence for a bit, watching him.

“He doesn’t flinch as often,” John said finally. “When I touch his hand. Not always.”

“That’s good,” Martha replied. “Could be a sign his sensory pathways are regulating. Early on, he was overloaded—light, noise, even gentle touch might’ve felt threatening. His brain was misfiring panic signals just trying to process input.”

“So fear, basically.”

Martha nodded. “And disorientation. It’s not that he didn’t know you. It’s that he couldn’t hold on to the recognition long enough to feel safe.”

John exhaled. “He’s holding on now.”

Martha watched him for a moment. “You’re really good with him.”

“I should be,” John said quietly. “He taught me.”

————————

The fire in the TARDIS library crackled gently, casting golden light across the mismatched chairs and scattered books. Someone—probably Jack—had lit candles just for the atmosphere, even though the ship didn’t need them.

Donna sat curled into a high-backed armchair with a blanket over her knees and a half-glass of red wine in her hand. Jack lounged across from her on the floor with his back against the couch, nursing something darker and stronger. Martha had taken over the settee, legs folded beneath her, her empty mug resting on the armrest.

John was perched on the windowsill—one leg up, hands clasped around a cup of tea that had long since gone cold.

The quiet between them wasn’t strained. It was earned.

“I’m not saying I’d win,” Donna said, “but I’d give the Sycorax a bloody good slap.”

Jack grinned. “Oh, I know you would. You scare me more than half the aliens I’ve met.”

“She once told a Judoon to ‘shove it.’ In English,” John added.

Martha snorted. “That’s a death wish.”

Donna raised her glass. “And yet, here I am.”

The laughter that followed was light and real. It didn’t erase the ache that hung behind it—but it softened the edges.

For a while, they just sat there, trading stories. Not just old war tales—there was talk of Earth, of food, of terrible dates and awful music. A kind of living, folded quietly around the grief they all carried.

No one mentioned the lives they’d left behind to be here full time, here for the man currently asleep in another room. They didn’t need to. Martha’s wedding band caught the firelight when she reached for her tea, a quiet echo of Mickey, holding the line back at Torchwood. Donna’s phone buzzed once, briefly—Wilf’s nightly check-in. She didn’t answer. She would later. She always did. Sylvia still hadn’t called.

Jack reached across for the wine bottle and refilled her glass without asking. She let him.

And John—John said very little. He just listened. Watched the flicker of the flames and the people who’d become his lifeline.

He still grieved Rose. He always would. That loss had hollowed something in him that would never fill. But this—this strange, brutal, beautiful vigil around a broken version of the man he used to be—this had become something else. A new pain; but also a new purpose when he had thought there was none left.

Eventually, the conversation dipped into silence again.

John glanced toward the doorway—empty now, quiet.

“We got him to speak today,” he said, like it needed saying aloud again. “That’s not nothing.”

“It’s everything,” Donna said.

Jack raised his glass. “To him.”

The others followed.

“To him,” they echoed.

Nobody remarked out loud how reluctant they had become to call him The Doctor when he was not in the room.

They drank—not like a toast, but like a promise.

The fire crackled. Somewhere deep in the corridors of the TARDIS, the hum shifted—low and soft, like breathing.

At some point, someone—probably Donna—said, “Remember the… pee corner incident?”

The room broke into laughter, but not the kind that healed. It was the kind you used when something had cut so deep, the only way to keep standing was to laugh sideways through the scar.

“Oh God,” Martha groaned, burying her face in one hand. “That was, what, the third week?”

“Yeah,” John said. “He’d just started managing a few steps on his own. We thought we were turning a corner.”

Jack chuckled, but it was brittle. “And then he got up in the middle of the night—barely upright, holding on to the walls—and started peeing in the corner of his hospital room like it was the loo.”

“I panicked,” Donna said. “Thought he was collapsing. I ran in ready to catch him—only to find him happily trousers-down like it was the most normal thing in the world.”

“He probably thought he was in the medbay,” Martha said gently. “There’s a panel in the corner that opens into waste disposal. Muscle memory, maybe. Spatial confusion.”

“That’s what we’re going with,” John muttered, “because the alternative is worse.”

They all went quiet for a beat, still smiling—but their eyes didn’t quite match.

“He cried after,” Donna said, almost inaudibly. “I think he knew. Just for a second.”

The laughter didn’t come back, but the silence didn’t feel empty either. 
It felt like love.

Chapter Text

NOW

The morning started gently.

There was music—just low enough to soothe, not overstimulate. Something slow and string-heavy, humming faintly through the TARDIS walls like a memory with a pulse. The lights were warm and diffuse. Donna had picked out his jumper for the day, a soft one with frayed sleeves, and was currently combing his hair with one hand and sipping her tea with the other.

“He’s getting tufty again,” she muttered. “Should I bother asking you to grow scissors, girl?”

The TARDIS didn’t answer, but the overhead light shifted fractionally—just enough to register as fondness, maybe.

The Doctor sat upright, still and mostly silent, eyes studying the pattern of the blanket in his lap. When she gently carded her fingers through his hair, he didn’t flinch. In fact, he leaned ever so slightly into the touch.

That, Donna decided, was nice to see.

John was settled cross-legged nearby, reading aloud in Gallifreyan, as he tended to do a lot since they had discovered that it helped keep the Doctor calm somehow. The words—soft, circular, resonant—filled the air like slow tides. He wasn’t sure the Doctor was always processing the meaning, but it had to be somewhat easier for him to not have layers over layers of translations when his brain was already struggling to keep up. Gallifreyan was the Doctor’s language after all, and sometimes it seemed to land where English didn’t. 

It was somewhat ironic that no companion—baring Susan for obvious reasons—had ever experienced the Doctor language before all this; now it was part of the TARDIS routine like any familiar soundtrack could be.

The TARDIS no longer translated—she couldn’t, not anymore. Whatever part of the Doctor once sustained that connection had fractured too deeply. 

Of course she had always been unable to translate written circular Gallifreyan for complicated programming reason, but she could translate spoken Gallifreyan before all this, if cajoled enough a least. In fact she had done so from time to time when the Doctor had been feeling like speaking his own language. It was a little game between them to see what confusing translations she would come up with for their current passengers. He liked to use antiquated adjectives and poetic declensions just to annoy her. It often came up as nonsense, which was close enough according to her.

Martha sat on the floor near the med trolley, quietly reviewing vitals on her tablet. “I want to do another cognition assessment later,” she said. “He scored way higher last night. That’s… that’s new.”

Donna smiled and leaned in to press a kiss to the top of the Doctor’s head. “He’s just humouring you.”

“I’ll take it.”

The Doctor let out a faint hum. Not quite a word. Not quite nothing.

Jack wasn’t around yet—probably taking a Torchwood call. Rift spike. Field team scrambling. Gwen’s last update had involved rubber gloves, a leaking ceiling, and three lifeforms no one could identify. Mickey was still in Glasgow dealing with the infestation.

Donna’s phone buzzed on the tea tray. She flicked it open.

Granddad
"Your mother broke the hose pipe. Garden flooded again. Said it was the ‘patio’s fault.’ How’s our boy today?”

Her lips twitched. She’d call him later. She always did.

The Doctor shifted slightly as she combed through a stubborn knot, his shoulders relaxing into her palm.

“Alright, now you’re just showing off,” she said softly. “If you start speaking full sentences I might faint.”

He blinked at her, slowly. Then made a low, matching hum.

Donna’s heart clenched.

John looked up. “That was a response. You heard it.”

“I heard it.”

“It’s happening more.”

Martha nodded. “He’s trying.”

Not for the first time lately, it felt like they might actually be gaining ground.

Donna leaned down, touched her knuckles to his temple for a beat. “You want more tea, spaceman?”

The Doctor’s gaze shifted to the cup beside her and, after a pause, gave a slight, deliberate nod.

She reached for it, smiling—

—and then his hand jerked.

Martha’s head snapped up. “Donna—”

The Doctor’s arm twitched again, fingers locking, the cup tipping. His whole body tensed.

“Oh no—no no no—”

His back arched as the seizure took him, the progress of the morning swept away in a moment of shattering, silent violence.

Martha was already moving. “John—under his arms. Donna, back of his head. Now.”

The mug hit the floor and shattered, spilling tea across the carpeted floor.

The Doctor’s spine arched sharply, head snapping back as every muscle in his body went rigid. For a moment he didn’t move—just held there, trembling under the pressure of his own muscles locking.

“Here we go,” Martha said, pushing the trolley forward. “Get ready.”

John slid in beside him. He knew not to restrain him but he could still buffer him from obstacles. 

Donna slipped behind, supporting his head with a folded cloth and her free hand. “It’s okay. We’ve got you. Just ride it out, sweetheart…”

Then the jerking began.

The rigidity broke into rhythmic spasms—his arms flailed, legs jolted. His breathing hitched, shallow and rapid. His hand knocked over what was left of the tea tray. It always felt like it went on forever.

“One minute ten,” Martha said, checking her watch. “Prepping four milligrams.” They were lucky that the few remnant of Time Lords friendly anti-convulsants the Doctor had still kept in his sickbay had been easy enough to synthetize in the UNIT labs. Lucky was not how this felt though. 

John caught the Doctor’s shoulder before it slammed into the chair leg. “He’s going to bruise.”

“Better than choking,” Martha said. Her voice was flat but tight.

Donna winced as the Doctor let out a sharp, involuntary cry—his eyes wide but vacant. His body jolted again, and wetness spread beneath him.

She bit her lip and didn’t say a word.

“Still going. One-forty. Let’s do it.”

Martha plunged the syringe into his thigh and held it there.

“Come on,” John whispered. “Come back to us…”

The spasms slowed. His limbs twitched. Then trembled. Then sagged.

The room held still, suspended between noise and breath.

Then the Doctor made a sound—a wet, broken gasp—and tried to curl inward.

Donna moved with him, wiping his face. “You’re okay. It’s over. Just breathe.”

His gaze flicked downward. He saw the stain.

His expression faltered—barely, but enough. A tremor in his jaw. The smallest recoil.

His fingers curled like he wanted to disappear. Then, with great effort, he turned his face away, pressing it into the blanket.

He didn’t make a sound but his shoulders shook once.

Donna’s throat went tight.

They’d seen him convulse before, too many times. But never with that look in his eyes. There had always been confusion. Or vacancy.

Now, there was something else. Awareness was not always a blessing.

She laid a hand on his back. “It’s okay,” she whispered. “You’re safe.”

No one else spoke.

—————————-

The bathroom was warm, the lights low, and the air thick with the hum of the TARDIS keeping watch.

John knelt by the shower chair, one hand braced on the Doctor’s knee, the other gently smoothing damp curls back from his forehead.

“You’re alright,” he murmured. “Almost done.”

The Doctor didn’t answer—not that John expected him to. His head lolled slightly to the side, eyes half-lidded, his breathing shallow but even. The postictal haze still wrapped around him like static. His muscles trembled occasionally but no longer spasmed. He was strapped to the chair for safety. 

John dipped the flannel into the warm bowl beside him and gently ran it over the Doctor’s thigh. Cleaning him was a ritual by now—efficient, careful, quiet. The incontinence was no longer shocking, just another reminder of how far they'd come and how far they had to go. 

“I really don’t mind,” John said softly, wringing the cloth. “No one does. You're not… you're not less because of it.”

The Doctor blinked once. His gaze slid toward John’s hands.

John offered a small smile as he wiped again. “See? Just two people. Bit of water. No big deal.”

The Doctor made a sound—barely a breath. Not resistance. Not quite agreement. Just something that said I’m still here.

John dried him off gently, braced him against the back of the chair with one arm while he unstrapped him momentarily, then reached for the hem of the soiled jumper.

“Okay,” he said. “Up we go.”

The Doctor let him ease it up over his head, moving slowly, loosely compliant. John reattached the safety belt and then folded the peace of clothing quickly and set it aside, he washed his top half quickly, clinically, and then dried him off carefully. Once done he guided him into clean pyjamas—dark blue cotton, soft and worn, easy on the skin. The Doctor didn’t fight today. He let John dress him, button him up, and press a warm hand to his arm once he was done.

“There,” John said. “Good as new.”

The Doctor didn’t react, but his shoulders dipped slightly—an exhale, maybe.

John knelt again, one hand still resting lightly on the Doctor’s arm. His voice dropped to something rougher.

“It must be awful,” he whispered, not even sure if he was speaking to him or just saying it aloud. “Being in there. Seeing everything. Not being able to say a word properly.”

He looked up at the Doctor’s face—so familiar, so quiet.

“I wouldn’t have blamed you for giving up,” he added. “But I’m glad you haven’t.”

He hesitated, then reached out again, gently brushing the Doctor’s hair back from his temple.

“I know you’re in there,” he murmured. Then, staring into two exhausted brown eyes: “I see you.”

The Doctor didn’t respond but something definitely passed between them.

The door clicked open.

John looked up. Jack stood in the doorway, coat still on, expression unreadable.

He took it in fast: the bowl, the towel, the Doctor sitting limp and strapped but dressed and clean, John crouched at his side.

Jack stepped closer. “I missed it.”

John nodded. “Not a bad one. Could’ve been worse.”

Jack’s eyes lingered on the Doctor, then moved to John. “You okay?”

John offered a shrug. “Getting good at this.”

Jack crouched beside the Doctor and offered a small, quiet smile. “Hey, Doc. Rough day, huh?”

The Doctor didn’t respond. But he didn’t look away either.

After a moment, and following John's slight nod at his silent questioning, Jack unstrapped him, slipped one arm around the Doctor’s back, the other under his knees.

“Let’s get you to bed then.”

He lifted him carefully—like someone carrying a sleeping child. The Doctor gave no protest, head resting against Jack’s shoulder, hands slack in his lap.

John watched them go, then bent to gather the used towels and stained clothes.

The lights in the bathroom adjusted to a brighter setting, the TARDIS humming low and gentle in the silence they left behind - as if to comfort John this time.

————————-

Donna sat in the corridor just outside the bathroom, elbows on her knees, hands wrapped tight around her phone.

The door had closed behind Jack with a soft click. The walls of the TARDIS thrummed gently around her—warm, steady, but not quite comforting. Not today.

Her hands were shaking.

She pressed the call button without thinking. It rang once.

Twice.

“Donna?” came Wilfred’s voice, all warmth and care and surprise. “Everything alright, love?”

Donna’s throat closed. She tried to speak. Nothing came out.

“Donna?”

She covered her mouth with one hand and took a breath. Then another. “Hi, Granddad.”

There was a pause. “You crying?”

“No,” she said. Too fast.

“Right,” he said, gently. “Tell me anyway.”

She blinked hard and looked up at the ceiling. “He just had another fit.”

“Oh, sweetheart…”

“He was doing so well this morning, Gramps” she said, her voice cracking on the last word. “He nodded when I asked him about tea. He hummed along with me. He—he was there, Gramps. He was there. And then he wasn’t.”

Wilf didn’t rush in with comfort. He just waited. He knew Donna was just tired, exhausted actually, and just needed to share the burden before she could put herself together again.

Donna sniffed and rubbed her face with the sleeve of her jumper. “John’s been cleaning him up. He’s probably put him to bed by now. He’s okay. I mean, he’s not, but he’s safe.”

“Of course he is,” Wilf said. “He’s got all of you.”

Donna smiled faintly. “Yeah.”

“Remember, you can’t save someone like him without it costing something, darling. And look how far you’ve brought him.”

There was a beat of silence.

Then Wilf added, “Your mum flooded the patio again.”

Donna barked out a wet laugh. She already knew that but she played along anyway. “She didn’t.”

“Blamed the hosepipe. Said it was cursed.”

“She’s cursed,” Donna muttered.

“She’s trying, in her way.”

“She hasn’t asked about him in weeks.”

“She’s scared.”

“So am I!” Donna snapped. Then bit down on her lip. “So am I,” she repeated, softer.

“I know, love.”

They sat with the quiet for a while, the only sound a faint shift of something mechanical deeper in the TARDIS.

Donna exhaled slowly. “I keep thinking about the other day when he said my name. You remember?”

“‘Course I do,” Wilf said. “You called me before he even finished saying it.”

“Yeah.” It wasn't true but still, she smiled, then blinked hard. “I don’t know why it’s still hitting me like that. Just… I keep going back to it. Like it proves something.”

“It does.”

She didn’t answer, but she clutched the phone tighter.

“I’m proud of you, darling, you’re doing the right thing.” Wilf said.

Donna shut her eyes.

“Call me again later, yeah?”

“I will.”

“Promise?”

“Cross my hearts.”

She ended the call before she could start crying again.

For a little while, she just sat there, fingers curled around her phone. 

————————

The Doctor was asleep.

At least, Jack thought he was. His breathing was slow, his hands still. One curled loosely near his chest, the other tucked beneath the pillow. His face was slack in a way that didn’t look peaceful—just empty. Worn down by exhaustion, not comfort.

Jack sat beside the bed, slightly crouched, coat folded beside him for once.

“You scared Donna,” he said softly. “You scared all of us. Again.”

The Doctor didn’t stir.

Jack exhaled, fingers laced tightly together. “You really don’t make this easy, you know that?”

He glanced at the Doctor's face more closely. No signs of discomfort. The Doctor looked… calm. Or at least not in distress. That counted for something.

“I used to think you were unbreakable,” Jack murmured. “Even when you were bleeding, or regenerating, or doing something so stupid it made my hair grey… I still thought, ‘he’ll bounce.’”

He looked down at the quiet figure in the bed. “You didn’t bounce.”

He rubbed a hand over his face. “And now we’re all circling around you, trying to act like we’ve got it together. Like this is normal. But it’s not. It’s just… pieces. And we’re trying to hold them together.”

He reached over and gently laid a hand on the Doctor’s arm, warm through the blanket.

“I don’t know if you can hear me. But if you can... it’s okay to rest. You don’t have to come all the way back. We’ll meet you wherever you are.”

There was a pause. A shift of air behind him.

Jack looked up.

Martha was standing in the doorway, med kit in hand.

She met his eyes without surprise. “Didn’t mean to interrupt.”

Jack offered a tired half-smile. “You didn’t. He was being rude again and not holding up his side of the conversation.”

She crossed the room and set the kit down. “Did he wake at all?”

“He was awake before, until I put him to bed that is.” Jack said, sitting back to give her room. “Wasn’t talking much but he was there earlier—really there, you know?”

“That’s good,” she murmured, already taking his wrist and watching the pulse in her fingertips. “His body’s in recovery. Postictal but stable.”

She moved with quiet efficiency, checking his breathing, his temperature, laying her palm across his forehead for a moment.

Jack watched her work. “You’ve still got your doctor voice on.”

“It’s how I cope,” she said, not looking up.

“Still?”

“Always.”

She smiled faintly—at him, maybe, or at something private—and turned to check her notes.

“You know,” she added, “he’s bouncing back faster this time.”

Jack blinked. “Really?”

“I wouldn’t say it if I wasn’t sure.” She adjusted the blanket, tucking it in around his shoulder. “He’s not where he was. But something’s shifting. He truly is remarkable Jack."

Jack looked at the Doctor’s face—quiet, calm, unfamiliar in its fragility. Then he wondered, not for the first time:

“Do you think he’s in pain?”

Martha paused. Then: “Not constant pain, sometimes he is, yes, but not all the time. But… I think he knows. That he’s not what he was.”

Jack swallowed.

“I think that hurts more than anything physical,” she finished gently.

He nodded, staring at the Doctor’s hand where it curled beside him.

Martha’s voice softened even further. “But he’s still here, like you said.”

Jack reached out, brushing two fingers gently over the edge of the Doctor’s blanket. “Yeah.”

Then, quieter: “I just wish he didn’t have to fight so hard for it.”

They sat in silence for a few moments. Martha finished her checks, tidied the stethoscope back into the kit with the ease of habits. She didn’t leave.

Jack leaned forward, arms resting on his knees again. “He always did carry the weight of the universe like it was stitched into his coat.”

Martha’s gaze drifted to the Doctor’s face. “Yeah. But I think this time, it's the Universe turn to carry him.”

A soft sound broke the quiet—so small they almost missed it.

The Doctor stirred.

Just a flicker of movement. A breath catching oddly in his throat.

Then, very faintly, he whispered something. Barely audible.

Martha leaned in. “Doctor?”

Another murmur. Not a word. But the rhythm of it—rounder, slower, deeper—felt familiar by now.

“Gallifreyan,” she said softly.

Jack’s breath caught. “Do you think he knows where he is?”

Martha didn’t answer right away.

The Doctor’s lips moved again. Something low and strange—like a lullaby echoing backward. Then silence.

He settled again, his hand twitching once beneath the blanket.

Jack didn’t look away from him. “It’s his language… It never even occurred to me before, you know… English must feel like shouting through glass right now.”

Martha nodded, quiet. “That’s probably why John reads to him so much. It might be the only thing that doesn't feel like such hard work.”

Jack’s voice was soft. “I hope he will come back to us Martha.”

Martha brushed the Doctor’s hair gently off his forehead, not bothering with her clinical voice now. “I think part of him never left.”

They didn’t speak after that.

Jack stayed seated beside the bed, one hand still resting lightly against the Doctor’s.
Martha stayed too, quietly logging vitals, but not really moving to go.

The TARDIS dimmed the lights around them, as if to hold the silence in place a little longer. 

The Doctor didn’t move, and yet somewhere beneath the stillness—beneath the weight of exhaustion and the cotton-soft fog of medication—something flickered.

A sound.

A chime.
No—not a chime. An alarm.

Low and rhythmic, too familiar. The smell of ozone. The sterile heat of machinery at overload.

His body remembered even when his mind didn’t. The pulse of it. The terror of knowing, this is the moment.

His hands were on the lever. His voice—his real voice—was saying something final.

And then it began. He was back there again.

THEN

The booth was glowing.

Red light pulsed, and alarms blared overhead. Wilf banged on the glass, frantic.

“No! No, don’t! You can’t—”

The Doctor turned. His face was pale, bleeding from several cuts, eyes wide, but his voice was steady.

“Wilfred... it’s my honour.”

“Doctor, don’t! DON'T”

But the Doctor was already moving. He pulled the override, and the chamber hissed open. He stepped inside. The door slammed shut behind him.

And the pain started almost at once.

It wasn’t like last time. There was no glow, no golden light crawling through his skin.

Only pressure.

Only fire.

He staggered to one side, his hand braced against the wall. His chest heaved once—then again.

He waited for the energy to come. For the light. For the change.

But nothing happened.

The radiation just kept building. The pain swelling everywhere.

He gasped again, harder this time—his knees giving out. He hit the floor with a grunt, his palms skidding on the metal.

Still no light.

No change.

Just pain, pulsing deeper now—into the marrow of him. Into his skull. Into his mind.

Where is it?
Where’s the regeneration?

He curled forward, clutching his head. One of his hearts stuttered, then kicked hard, like something trying to escape.

He’d regenerated from worse than this. He’d burned and come back. He’d swallowed the Time Vortex and still managed to change.

But this wasn’t the same.

This wasn’t burning.This was turning him inside out at a molecular level.

His fingers trembled against the floor, sweat dripping from his hairline. He pressed his forehead to the metal, forcing the breath in through his nose. Out through his mouth.

“Come on,” he whispered. “Come on, please…”

A flicker.

Somewhere, just for a second—his cells began to stir. The golden charge itched beneath the surface.

And he crushed it. He didn't think about it, just instinct and panic. He locked it down. Bit down so hard his teeth rang.

Not yet.

He couldn’t change yet. Not like this. Not with Wilf still watching.

He’d already told Donna once: he didn’t want to go. And now, with this body already failing, with a new self clawing at the edges of him—he refused.

Just a little longer.

He could hold on. He could recover, stabilise, just steal a bit more time—

—but he was wrong.

Something twisted in his spine. A heat burst behind his eyes and took the colours with it.

The pain didn’t burn out. It just kept going.
The golden light receded.

And he was left there, a broken shadow twitching on the floor.

Outside, Wilf had stopped banging. He was crying. Calling his name. Pleading.

Then he did the only thing he could think of.

He called for help.

————————

NOW

The lights were low.

The Doctor hadn’t stirred since the murmured alien words. His breathing had settled again—deep, uneven, but no longer strained.

Jack sat quietly beside the bed, gaze flicking now and then to the lines of the Doctor’s face. His expression unreadable, but softer than before.

Martha was repacking her med kit, methodical and slow. She didn’t need to hurry. There was nothing else to do right now but wait.

The silence stretched between them, quiet, comfortable.

“He should’ve regenerated,” Jack said eventually, not looking up.

Martha paused. “I know.”

“He had time. He knew the dose. He knew what it would do.”

“He made the choice,” she said. Not angry. Just tired.

Jack leaned back in the chair. “He’s always the one making the impossible choices.”

A beat.

“I still remember what he looked like when we got there.”

Martha set the last vial in place. “Me too.”

“He’d already collapsed,” Jack went on. “Didn’t even try to play it off. Not like him.”

Martha stayed quiet.

“His skin was grey,” Jack said. “I thought he was already dead.”

“He nearly was.” She closed the kit carefully. “The radiation damage was catastrophic. Organs failing. Neural decay had already begun, his brain was damaged from the start. His body was trying to repair itself, but it was… misfiring.”

Jack winced. “Misfiring?”

“Like the regeneration response was caught in a feedback loop. Not enough to trigger full transformation. Just enough to keep him alive. Barely. His energy levels were all over the place”

Jack shook his head. “He chose that.”

“Yes.”

He didn’t speak for a long time. Just watched the faint rise and fall of the Doctor’s chest beneath the blanket.

Then: “Wilfred still blames himself.”

Martha’s voice was gentle. “I know.”

“He shouldn’t. He was locked in. There wasn’t a choice.”

“No,” she agreed. “He's also the reason we found the Doctor at all.”

Jack looked up.

“He was the one who called,” Martha said. I keep thinking about what would have happened if I haven’t given him UNIT’s emergency number after that thing with the Sontarans… Donna asked me to keep an eye on her family after that, and it seemed like an easy thing to do, giving Wilf the code blue number.” She sighed. “UNIT didn’t take him seriously at first. Lucky that you lot were still monitoring our coms and Torchwood did. Gwen escalated the alert within minutes.”

“Of course she did.”

“We got there just in time,” Martha added. “If Wilf hadn’t sent out that signal…”

Jack didn’t finish the thought. He didn’t have to.

They both looked at the sleeping man between them.

Martha smoothed the blanket again, fingers lingering at the Doctor’s sleeve. “He held on. Just long enough.”

“Stubborn bastard,” Jack whispered.

But there was affection in it.

—————————-

It was late afternoon when the Doctor stirred again.

The lights had shifted—cooler now, soft and slanted like the tail end of a long day. Somewhere in the corridor beyond, the sounds of conversation had faded to hush.

John sat beside the bed, book forgotten in his lap. Donna had taken up position at the foot, half-leaning on the bed frame, nursing a cup of tea that had long since gone cold.

They'd been taking shifts. Everyone had. But somehow John and Donna always ended up back here, as if neither of them quite trusted the others to see him the right way. Although, to be fair, Martha still had UNIT responsibilities outside of the Doctor and Jack had to keep Torchwood going. 

The Doctor shifted—just a flicker at first. One hand twitched beneath the blanket, then went still. A few seconds passed before his eyes opened, slow and unfocused.

Donna sat up straight. “John.”

“I see it.”

The Doctor blinked. His gaze drifted across the ceiling, then angled toward them. His lips moved. No sound came out.

“It’s alright,” John said gently, leaning in. “You’re safe.”

The Doctor blinked again. His mouth moved once more, like he was trying to shape something—an apology? A question?

Nothing made it out. His brow furrowed hard.

“It’s okay,” Donna said quickly. “Don’t push, spaceman. You just woke up, we’re not in a rush.”

The Doctor squeezed his eyes shut. Not from fatigue. From fury. His hand tightened into the blanket, and his jaw set hard.

“Easy,” John said. His voice stayed low, calm, even when his own chest had gone tight. “You’re just waking up. You don’t have to fight so hard, we see you trying you know,” he whispered.

A fist flew up and struck John across the cheekbone—sloppy, frantic. The second swing grazed Donna’s shoulder, knocking the tea from her hands. The mug clattered to the floor and shattered. Not the first porcelain casualty, probably not the last. 

Then a knee caught John square in the ribs as the Doctor thrashed against the blankets, trying to sit up, trying to flee—who knew? His eyes were wild. His hands didn’t seem to know what they wanted to do. His body had no map.

John reacted on instinct—grabbed both wrists, pinned them down against the bed.

“Doctor—!” Donna moved quickly. “It’s okay! It’s alright! We’re here!”

The Doctor jerked once more, head thrashing, and a foot came loose from the sheets—catching John again in the chest hard enough to knock the wind out of him.

“Are you done now?” John snapped.

It wasn’t loud. But it was sharp. Harsh with pain. Frustration. Helplessness.

The Doctor froze.

His breath stuttered. His arms trembled. Then, slowly, all the tension bled out of him at once. He slumped into the pillows like something unplugged. His head turned to the side. His eyes stayed open, glassy and distant.

John didn’t let go right away. He just sat there for a moment, catching his breath.

Donna was rubbing her shoulder, but her voice stayed soft. “Well. He’s got one hell of a right hook, I’ll give him that.”

John exhaled through his nose, still holding one wrist loosely. “He’s scared.”

“I know,” she said. “But he’s also dangerous like this, isn’t he?”

He nodded. Just once. Then looked at her properly for the first time.

“You okay?” he asked, quieter now.

Donna nodded. “Yeah. Bit bruised, maybe. You?”

“I’ll live.”

John let out a quiet breath. He was still watching the Doctor—his fingers loose now, twitching faintly where they curled into the blanket.

“I wouldn’t have thought it, back then,” he said softly.

Donna looked over, puzzled. “Back when?”

“When I first saw him,” John elaborated, his gaze haunted. “I didn’t think he’d ever be dangerous again.”

Donna didn’t answer.

—————————-

THEN

The floor of the booth was slick with blood and sweat.

Martha knelt beside him, knees burning against the hard floor, one hand braced behind the Doctor’s neck. His skin was burning hot to the touch, damp with fever. His hearts were hammering—uneven, chaotic. His breathing was shallow, erratic. Cellular readings were fluctuating wildly, almost unreadable.

He wasn’t regenerating.

“Come on,” she whispered, tilting his face toward her and scanning his eyes. “Don’t do this. Not like this.”

She’d never seen him like this. Not even on the worst of days. This wasn’t a man dying. This was a body trying to hold itself together with no blueprint.

Jack crouched just behind her, pale and tight-lipped. “Is this… is this how it’s supposed to go?”

“No,” Martha snapped. “It’s not. He should’ve changed by now. This—this isn’t stalling. This is collapse.”

“He said he was holding it back,” Wilf said, voice shaking. He hovered at the edge of the booth, cap clenched in both hands. “Said he wasn’t ready. That it wasn’t time yet. I’m not even sure he realised he was talking out loud.”

Martha glanced at him, then back to her scanner. “He overrode the instinct. Forced it back. I don’t know how long he’s been doing it, but…” She didn’t finish the sentence.

The TARDIS had brought her here. Gwen had passed on Wilf’s panicked call, and Jack had already reached the scene— how remained a mystery—when she’d arrived. She wasn’t even sure how the TARDIS had gotten the doors open for her—but maybe the old girl had recognised that he needed help. She was the only reason Martha had gotten here in time.

She checked the Doctor’s vitals again. Still no sign of regenerative cascade. His skin was starting to dull—too pale, too waxy. His fingers twitched, then stilled. His eyes were open but unfocused.

“Hold his shoulders,” Martha said sharply to Jack. “He might seize.”

Jack moved instantly, steadying the Doctor’s body while Martha reached for the emergency hypo. It wasn’t originally designed for Time Lords, but she’d modified it—just in case. Always just in case.

She pressed the injector to the side of his neck and triggered the dose.

The Doctor jerked once, a strangled noise escaping his throat. Then he collapsed completely, muscles going slack in Jack’s arms.

Behind them, the booth lights flickered, and the outer door slammed open again—this time with shouts and boots and red berets.

UNIT. Finally.

Martha didn’t look up.

“Clear a path,” she barked. “We need an isolation stretcher, atmospheric shielding, and neuro-stabilizers now. He’s crashing.”

They scrambled.

Jack looked at her, voice tight. “Is he dying?”

Martha swallowed hard, eyes still on the Doctor.

“I don’t know.”

They moved fast once the orders came.

The UNIT medics had barely registered what they were looking at, but they obeyed without question. Within seconds, the stretcher was unfolded—an airtight capsule with its own internal life-support field. The kind they used for alien biohazards, or soldiers too unstable to treat in the field.

Jack helped lift the Doctor in.

He didn’t resist. Didn’t speak. His head lolled to one side, eyes half-lidded and glassy. A single low sound escaped his throat when the stretcher hissed closed around him. It sounded like pain.

Martha checked the seals herself.

The Doctor lay motionless under the transparent shell, cords snaking from his chest and arms. The onboard system was already beeping irregularly—unable to parse the readings. She keyed in overrides and uploaded her personal baseline files from the last time she'd examined him, hoping it would be enough.

Then they were moving.

The transport ship wasn’t far—a converted medical carrier hovering in atmospheric lock just above the area. The trip was quick. Too quick. Not enough time to gather herself.

Not enough time to pretend she wasn’t terrified.

The UNIT hospital was already prepped when they landed. Emergency clearance. No questions. The Doctor’s reputation preceded him.

They wheeled him into a containment wing with reinforced shielding and no windows. Martha kept pace, barking data, rechecking monitors. Still no regenerative cascade. His vitals were degrading too fast now—nervous system spasming intermittently, body temperature wildly unstable, neurological scans unreadable, obvious signs of brain damage. 

She stripped off her gloves. Reached through the side ports.

“Stay with me,” she muttered, brushing sweat-matted hair off his forehead. “Don’t you dare give up now.”

The Doctor twitched. Not a seizure. Not quite. More like his body trying to start something and failing.

A medic to her left flinched. “Is he going to change?”

Martha didn’t answer. Not because she didn’t know. But because she couldn’t say it out loud.

She adjusted the oxygen mix. Stabilized the Time Lord friendly sedative. Calibrated the containment shield.

And for the first time since Wilf’s call came through, she said it—to herself, under her breath.

“He’s not going to regenerate.”

They kept calling him “the Doctor,” but in lower tones now.

As if louder voices might break something.

Martha heard it in the way the techs conferred outside the glass, how the junior medic fumbled her tray when the biosign monitor beeped erratically. They weren’t just treating a patient. They were handling a legend—and watching him unravel in real time.

“Get me another neuro panel,” Martha said, not looking up.

The junior ran to obey.

Inside the chamber, the Doctor had begun twitching again—small, irregular pulses through his hands and jaw. Nothing like seizures. Nothing like anything.

“His nervous system’s short-circuiting,” she muttered. “He’s trying to regenerate in pieces.”

Jack had arrived ten minutes ago and hadn’t said a word. He stood at the viewing panel, arms folded, unmoving. Gwen had tried to pull him away, get him to eat something, rest—he hadn’t budged.

“What happens if he doesn’t do it Martha?” he asked now, voice low.

Martha didn’t look up. “Do what?”

Jack’s eyes stayed on the Doctor’s still form. “If he doesn’t change. Doesn’t regenerate. Just… stays like this.”

Martha opened her mouth.

Then closed it.

She looked at the monitor again. The cellular regeneration signature had dropped below viable threshold. The timeline had passed. The window had closed.

Her hands froze on the control pad.

“He’s not going to finish it,” she said quietly. “He can’t.”

Jack’s jaw flexed. “Then what are we doing?”

“We’re keeping him alive.”

The door slid open behind them, and another tech leaned in—eyes wide, voice reverent. “Dr. Jones, UNIT Geneva just authorised full override. You’ve got any equipment you need. And command wants updates every hour.”

Martha nodded once. “Good. Then tell them the Doctor is critical, non-regenerating, and we’re not giving up.”

The door hissed shut again.

Inside the chamber, the Doctor hast stopped moving. 

Hours passed.

They rotated staff twice, but Martha never left the chamber.

The Doctor’s condition had stabilised—but only just. No more crashing vitals. No cascade. Just a flat, steady plateau of wrongness.

At some point, he blinked.

Just once.

Martha had been adjusting the neural monitors when she saw it. His eyelids fluttered. His eyes opened. Not fully—just enough to register light.

“Doctor?” she said quickly, leaning close. “Can you hear me?”

He turned his head a few degrees. Not toward her. Just away from the bright ceiling lights.

Then he began to hum.

Soft. Disjointed. A rhythm without shape. Like the ghost of a melody—notes looped out of sequence.

It didn’t stop.

“Martha?” Jack’s voice came through the comm. “Is that…?”

“Yes.”

She watched him, heart sinking.

His eyes were open. He was breathing on his own. He was… present.

But the humming didn’t match any known pattern. Not random either. It was persistent. Mechanical, even.

Repetitive.

Martha checked the neural readout again. There was no coherence in the cortical signals. No linguistic activity. No motor control. 

It was just… sound.

“He doesn’t know we’re here,” she said.

There was silence on the comm.

Then Jack again, quieter: “Is this… is this it?”

Martha didn’t answer.

She watched the Doctor hum to himself in the dark, one hand twitching softly against the blanket like he was trying to remember how it worked.

——————————

NOW

The bedroom was quiet again.

Donna had gone to make tea. John remained seated by the bed, legs folded, elbows resting on his knees. The lights were low, the air warm. Outside the impossible windows, the TARDIS kept the stars on dim—just enough to make the room feel anchored in something bigger.

The Doctor was asleep. Not unconscious, not sedated. Just… sleeping. His face was slack, peaceful in a way that always made John ache a little.

He hadn’t spoken again since the episode.

But he hadn’t flinched either.

John stayed quiet, letting the silence stretch. The only sound was the faint hum of the TARDIS around them, gentle and grounding.

Eventually, the Doctor stirred.

Not much. Just a slow inhale, a flicker of his fingers against the blanket. His eyes opened halfway and settled—softly, easily—on John’s face.

John smiled. “Hey.”

The Doctor didn’t answer. But he blinked once, slow and deliberate. His gaze didn’t drift.

John leaned in and gently touched the side of his face—fingertips against his cheekbone, feather-light.

“Lóreneth, shan’ti-nar,” he said softly.

The syllables didn’t belong to any Earth tongue. They belonged to stars and memory. To a home that didn’t exist anymore.

The Doctor’s mouth twitched—barely.

Not a smile. Not quite.

But close.

John stayed where he was.

He didn’t say anything else.

Chapter Text

THEN

Martha was in the observation bay when the Doctor sat up and looked straight at her.

He hadn’t moved in hours. Days, really—not on his own. They’d gotten used to it: the stillness, the blankness, the gentle hum of machines doing what his body no longer could.

But now he was upright. Not fully. Just pushing himself halfway up the bed, eyes wide and locked on the glass.

She froze, her coffee halfway to her lips.

“Doctor?”

No response. Just that fixed gaze, like he could see something past her, through her.

The monitor beeped erratically.

She dropped the coffee and reached for the scanner.

Heart rates elevated. Brain activity spiking. But not random—directed. Focused.

Her mobile buzzed.

She almost didn’t check it. Almost.

It was Wilfred, Donna's grandfather.

She picked up. “Wilf? I can’t—”

“Something’s wrong with Donna!”

Martha’s stomach dropped. “What kind of wrong?”

“She—she said her head was burning up. Then she started shaking. Talking to people who aren’t there. She said Bad Wolf and time’s bleeding—she’s starting to remember!”

Martha’s feet carried her two steps toward the door before she stopped herself.

“No seizures?”

“No. But she’s scared. I’m scared!”

Martha turned sharply, looked back through the glass. The Doctor had collapsed against the pillows again. His hand was twitching—repeating a shape on the blanket over and over.

It was circular.

A word.

“Oh my god,” she whispered.

Wilf’s voice wavered. “Is he doing this to her?”

“Not deliberately,” Martha said. “But if there’s still a link—telepathic, residual—something might’ve triggered it. Maybe proximity. Or timing. Or both.”

“What do I do?”

Martha’s mind was already racing. “Keep her safe. I’m sending help. You’ll hear sirens in five minutes. Jack’s on his way with UNIT support. Tell Donna she’s not alone—and keep her talking, if she’s able.”

“Right,” Wilf said. “Right. Just… tell him not to die, yeah?”

The line went dead.

Martha turned to the comm and hit the emergency override. “This is Dr. Jones. I need a Level 4 extraction unit dispatched to the Noble residence immediately. Code white. And find Jack Harkness—now.”

——————————

The ambulance arrived in under seven minutes.

Donna was unconscious when they brought her in.

Not sedated. Not asleep. Just… overloaded.

Martha met them in the neuro wing, pulling on gloves with the kind of urgency she rarely showed. Jack followed behind the stretcher, white-knuckled and silent. He didn’t speak until they reached the doors of the containment wing. “She was lucid when we reached her,” he said. “Panicked, disoriented—but she knew who I was. Knew what was happening. Then she collapsed again. Pulse spiked. Temp, too.”

“Did she seize?”

“No. But she kept… whispering.”

“Whispering what?”

Jack hesitated. “A name…" he hesitated, "I think it was his.”

There was a pause.

He didn’t say the Doctor. Just his. As if saying more would be crossing some unspoken line.

Martha felt it too—the weight of it. Like something sacred. Or forbidden.

“She’s not going anywhere near him,” she said at last. “Room 3. Opposite side of the floor. Triple-layered dampeners. No visuals. No access. When Wilf and Sylvia arrived moments later, Martha allowed them inside without hesitation. Jack stepped aside, nodded once, and quietly left. He didn’t say where he was going, but they all knew. He went to sit with the Doctor.

He found him the same way he’d left him: curled on his side, one hand twitching at the blanket. Jack sat down heavily in the chair by the bed, rubbing his face with both hands.

“Donna’s here,” he said softly. “Fighting. Like always.”

He waited. No reply. Just the sound of the monitors and the faint rustle of fabric as the Doctor shifted restlessly.

Jack leaned forward, elbows on knees. “She said your name in the ambulance. Or—she tried to. I think I heard it.” He frowned slightly. “But now I can’t remember the sound of it. Like it slipped away the second I looked away”

He let the silence stretch for a while.

He looked down at his hands. “Guess it’s not meant to be remembered.”

“It’s like the universe won’t let us hold on to it,” Jack murmured. “She said it, and then it vanished. Like it was never meant to be spoken aloud.”

He sat back, voice quieter now. “You’re still you. But I miss the sound of who you were. You need to fight this, Doctor… please?"

Martha adjusted the sensors, slipped a headband around Donna’s temple, and tapped the cortical reader.

Then she opened the comm. “Jack? I need you back in here. Now.”

There was a pause. “On my way.”

Language centers: overactive. Temporal lobe: erratic but rhythmic. There was something else—an odd, stubborn consistency beneath all the chaos. A kind of coherence buried in the noise.

Martha leaned closer.

She knew that pattern.

Not exactly. But something close. Something she’d only seen in one other set of readings.

She pulled up the Doctor’s neural baseline from the archives—an old scan from before all this. Before everything broke.

Side by side, it became clearer.

The resonance wasn’t random. It wasn’t fully human.

“Oh god,” she whispered.

Jack moved beside her. “What is it?”

She swallowed. “It’s him. Or something like him. There’s a trace in her brain—it’s not just echoing him. It *matches* him. Almost exactly.”

“You’re saying she’s—what, syncing with him?”

“No. Not syncing. His doesn't look like this anymore these days… This was already there.”

She backed away from the screen, realisation dawning.

“It’s the metacrisis,” she said. “It never fully left. He must’ve taken the rest into himself. Buried it. Shielded her from it. And now…”

She looked toward the other end of the corridor. Toward the Doctor’s sealed room.

“And now he’s too broken to keep it away from her anymore.”

———————————-

Her chest rose sharply as she inhaled.

Her eyes snapped open.

She looked straight at Martha.

And she whispered, “He called me brilliant.”

Martha exhaled—part relief, part disbelief. “Yeah, well. You are.”

But Donna didn’t respond. Her eyes drifted again, her lips parted as if to speak—then closed. Her body slackened.

Across the corridor, the Doctor moaned in his sleep. His heart rate was climbing. A nurse logged a sharp spike in cortical activity.

Martha made a note in both files.

Another monitor began to whine.

——————————

They had Donna in containment for less than five minutes before her vitals plummeted.

“Neural storm!” the technician shouted.

Martha was already moving, snapping orders. “Epinephrine, now. Full field psychic dampeners!”

Lights flickered. The dampeners engaged. That low, teeth-rattling hum filled the air.

Donna spasmed once—arched—and dropped still.

Jack appeared at the glass. “Do you need me in there?”

“Not yet! Get the TARDIS as close as we can safely manage!”

He nodded, already moving. Gwen and Ianto were just behind him, carrying the Torchwood gear.

———————————

Twelve hours later, Donna hovered between silence and chaos. Every near-waking brought flashes of Gallifreyan, broken phrases, facts no human should know.

Day two, something changed. The TARDIS appeared inside Donna’s room—silent, sudden, and unannounced. No engines, no sound. Just there.

No one had moved her. Not even with UNIT machinery.

“She just… arrived,” Gwen said, staring at the blue box through the monitor.

Martha checked the readings. “Her psychic field is flooding the room.”

Whatever link the TARDIS had to her pilot extended to this, too. She’d come unbidden. But not unwelcome.

The monitors calmed again. More than before.

“She’s stabilizing her,” Martha whispered. “Helping her hold on.”

Day three, Gwen and Ianto installed a focused dampening grid around the room, synchronised with the TARDIS’ field.

Day four, Martha administered what she hoped would be the final stabilizer.

Wilf sat at Donna’s side, holding her hand in both of his. Sylvia sat on the other side, brushing Donna’s hair back whenever it fell across her face. Gwen and Ianto were there too, taking shifts to maintain the psychic dampening grid. Wilf had barely left Donna’s bedside in days. He held her hand whenever Jack wasn’t there, whispering stories and humming old songs under his breath. Sylvia came and went in short, stormy bursts—demanding updates, pacing the room, snapping at staff. But she stayed longer now. Spoke softer when no one was listening. Smoothed Donna’s hair like she used to when she was little.

She’d shouted once—called the Doctor a curse, called this place a prison. But she’d come back the next morning with fresh clothes and a crossword puzzle.

“I’m scared,” she admitted, sitting beside Wilf.

“So am I,” he said, without looking away from his granddaughter. “But look at her, Sylvia. She’s fighting.”

Day five, Donna opened her eyes.

Really opened them.

She glanced from Jack to Martha, and finally up at the ceiling.

Then she croaked, “I’m going to kill that spaceman.”

—————————-

They gave her tea before they gave her answers.

Donna sat upright in bed, hair clean and tied back, legs tucked under the blanket. She looked tired—bruised around the eyes, thinner than she remembered—but her gaze was sharp, and her voice had returned to its usual unimpressed rhythm.

“I’m fine,” she said for the sixth time. “If I have to drink one more cup of this tasteless hospital piss, I swear to god I’ll—”

“Make it worse by standing too fast and passing out again?” Martha offered mildly.

Donna scowled. “That was one time.”

“It was two.”

Jack chuckled from his chair in the corner. “She’s definitely back.”

“Brilliant and back,” Wilf agreed from beside her, patting her arm.

Sylvia said nothing, but she hadn’t let go of Donna’s hand in over ten minutes.

Martha finally set the tablet aside. “Vitals are good. Brain scans are stable. The rest… well.”

Donna’s gaze sharpened. “Well?”

“You remember everything?”

Donna nodded slowly. “I remember... all of it. Him. The stars. The fire in my head. The way it felt like I was too big for my skin. And then it went quiet.” She looked at Martha. “You lot did something.”

Martha nodded. “You almost died.”

“I figured.”

“You were lucky,” Martha added, her voice softer now. “It wasn’t just medicine. It was the TARDIS. It was timing. It was everyone pulling together and doing everything exactly right.”

Donna exhaled. “So what now? You lock me in here again?”

“No.” Martha hesitated. “But there’s someone you need to see.”

————————————-

Her steps slowed outside the reinforced door. Jack reached for the lock, then paused.

“You don’t have to—”

“Yes,” Donna said firmly. “I do.”

He opened the door.

The room was dim. Quiet. The kind of quiet that was made, not found.

The Doctor lay curled on his side beneath a blanket, one arm crooked under his head. His face was thinner, his frame smaller. The lines around his mouth had deepened, but his brow was relaxed, almost peaceful.

He didn’t move when she entered.

Donna stood frozen just inside the door.

Martha stepped beside her. “He’s stable,” she said gently. “But he hasn’t been the same since the radiation did a lot of damage to his brain.”

Donna looked at her. “How bad?”

Martha swallowed. “We saved him. But… it wasn’t a regeneration. The damage was already too far gone.”

Donna took another step closer. “What does that mean?”

“It means he’s alive. He’s still him. But parts of him—parts of his mind, his speech, his memory—some of that’s gone. Some of it might come back. Some of it… won’t.”

Donna’s hand trembled at her side. She clenched it into a fist.

“He saved me,” she said.

“Yes,” Martha said. “And we saved you.”

Donna let out a shaky breath. “So now I get to return the favour.”

She stepped forward and knelt beside the bed.

She didn’t speak.

She just reached out and brushed his hair gently back from his forehead.

———————

The others didn’t linger.

Martha gave Donna a squeeze on the shoulder before stepping out. Jack followed, arms folded, gaze unreadable. Wilf stood a little longer at the doorway, eyes fixed on the Doctor with a sadness he didn’t try to hide. Sylvia kept her gaze on Donna, jaw tight, refusing to look toward the bed at all.

Then they were gone.

Donna sat on the edge of the bed and looked at him—really looked. Her spaceman. The most brilliant man she ever knew, the most stupid too. How she long to see his silly smile and his silly coat that flapped dramatically even in still air. The man who once burned with fury and hope in equal measure.

He was here. And not.

She reached out again, gently smoothing his stroking his hair - now flat and greasy when it used to be so magnificently defying gravity. Her fingers hovered over his temple, then curled inward, afraid to press.

“Hey,” she whispered.

For a while, there was no response.

Then he stirred.

His brow furrowed. His eyes twitched beneath their lids. His mouth moved—just slightly.

He didn’t open his eyes. But his body tensed, like he was waking into something unfamiliar and trying not to panic.

“Shhh,” Donna said gently. “It’s alright. It’s just me.”

His lips moved again. One syllable. Then another.

But no sound came out.

Then his eyes opened.

He blinked. Slowly. Once.

Then he looked at her.

And flinched.

It was subtle—but she saw it. A flicker of fear. Not recognition.

“Doctor?” she breathed.

His gaze darted past her, toward the wall. His fingers twitched against the blanket, searching for something that wasn’t there. He mumbled—disjointed, slurred. Something Gallifreyan, maybe. Or nonsense.

Donna’s throat tightened.

She reached for his hand. “It’s me. It’s Donna.”

His hand jerked. He pulled away, trembling.

Donna froze.

Then nodded to herself.

“Okay,” she whispered. “Okay.”

She didn’t cry. Not yet.

She just sat back down, hands folded in her lap, eyes never leaving his face.

In that moment, she didn't stop it, didn't try to distract herself, didn't turn her focus on something else, she let herself see it.

How bad it really was.

————————

NOW

It started over the wrong cup.

John reached for the green one—Donna’s favorite—and she snatched it out of his hand with more force than necessary.

“Don’t,” she said tightly. “Just—don’t.”

John blinked. “It’s a mug, Donna.”

“No. It’s my mug. And it’s the one I use when he’s having a bad day because it fits under the dispenser without splashing. So please, just—leave it.”

Jack looked up from the corner where he was checking vitals on the tablet. “We’re really doing this? Mugs?”

Martha didn’t look up from the console, but her voice was clipped. “We’re exhausted. Everything feels worse when you’re exhausted.”

Donna set the mug down with deliberate care and stepped back. “Fine.”

The silence that followed was thick. The kind of silence that comes not from anger, but from too much caring stretched too thin.

“I didn’t sleep,” John said after a while.

“None of us did,” Martha murmured.

“Last night was different,” Jack added. “He stopped breathing.”

They all went still.

It hadn’t been the first seizure. Not by a long shot. But it was the first time in weeks it had felt like they might actually lose him.

“He looked so still afterward,” Donna said. “Like he wasn’t going to come back at all. And when he finally opened his eyes, he looked at me like I was someone else. I forgot… he used to do that before… I was so glad he stopped.”

“You’re not alone,” John said. “He did the same to me. Then tried to say sorry, but it came out backwards.”

“He always tries,” Martha whispered.

“I know,” Donna said. “That’s what kills me.”

She rubbed her arms, suddenly cold. “He’s trying harder than any of us, and I still got angry because I was tired. And scared. I'm sorry John, it's just a fucking mug, I don't know what came into me.”

John nodded sadly.

Jack leaned back against the wall. “You’re allowed to be scared. You’re allowed to hate this, God knows I fucking hate it myself.”

“But I’m not allowed to hate him,” Donna said. “Not even for a second.”

“You don’t,” Martha said. “You can hate the situation, it has nothing to do with hating him Donna.”

John poured himself a new cup of tea. A different mug this time.

Some time passed, everyone silent but thinking about the same man in quiet devotion.

“I miss the chaos,” John said eventually. “He used to hum when he rewired the TARDIS—completely off-key. It helped him think.”

"Ah. So he knows his singing is awful then, can I use a metacrisis word in court?" Donna asked, the humour not quite back in her tone.

“I miss the shouting,” Jack added. “And the running. God, the running. One time I had to leg it through a burning cargo bay with my arse actually on fire and he just yelled, ‘Keep up!’ Like I was being unreasonable.”

“I miss him being a smart arse,” Donna added. “Looking at me like I’d just dribbled soup on myself every time I asked him to explain something normal.”

They all smiled. Not big, but real.

Then Martha checked the monitor again. “He’s awake.”

They moved, quietly. Together.

They found him sitting up.

Not much—but on his own. No alarms, no call. Just upright, propped against the headboard with the blanket twisted around his legs, eyes blinking slowly in the soft light.

Donna was the first through the door. She stopped short.

“You didn’t call us.”

The Doctor turned his head—slow, careful—and looked at her. At all of them.

Then he smiled.

Not a big smile. Not the daft, manic grin they remembered. But something real and tangible. Something tired. Something proud.

“I woke up,” he said, hoarse but clear.

John froze. Jack actually made a noise—somewhere between a laugh and a breath that caught wrong.

Martha stepped forward, eyes flicking over the monitors. “When?”

The Doctor met her eyes. “Fourteen minutes ago.”

Donna blinked. “You... know how long it’s been?”

He looked faintly offended at the question. Then slowly—purposefully—reached for the pencil on the side table.

They watched in silence as he drew a perfect circle.

His hand trembled, but the lines were steady. He added symbols, arcs, connectors—each movement deliberate. He paused once, glanced up at them, uncertain.

Then kept going.

When he finished, he set the pencil down and looked to them again. Quietly. Like someone waiting for a verdict.

It wasn’t just a drawing. It was Gallifreyan. And not just any word.

They didn’t need it translated. Just the language in which it had been written would have been enough to convey the thought anyway.

Time Lord.

Jack’s hand covered his mouth. John turned away, blinking hard. Martha’s fingers gripped the tablet so tightly the edge creaked.

Donna stepped forward and knelt beside the bed.

“You bloody show-off,” she said, voice thick. “You absolute idiot. You never tire of being an amazing stupid martian, do you?”

The Doctor blinked. Then gave the smallest, shyest nod.

————————————

The TARDIS was quiet again.

Everyone had gone to sleep, or tried to. The halls were dim, humming with her low, steady presence.

Donna found him in the observatory.

She hadn’t meant to. She’d just been walking, thinking. But the door had been ajar, and the lights were on, and there he was—sitting in the big chair facing the stars.

His robe was crooked. His hair stuck up in the back. He looked like someone who’d gotten up in the middle of the night to think and forgotten how to go back to bed.

He didn’t turn when she entered.

“Hey,” she said softly.

His head tipped slightly, acknowledging her.

She sat down beside him. Not too close.

On the screen above them, the stars turned slowly—clusters and nebulae drifting in slow, glimmering spirals. Home, once. A thousand homes.

He didn’t speak.

She didn’t push.

They sat like that for a while. Long enough for Donna to start thinking maybe he’d fallen asleep with his eyes open.

Then he said, very quietly: “doesn’t feel… mine… anymore.”

Donna looked over.

He was still watching the stars.

She wanted to say something. Anything, but nothing would’ve been the right words so instead, she reached out and took his hand.

He didn’t pull away.

And Donna, not for the first time, realised that halfway back might hurt more than completely lost.

——————————

He was walking.

Or dreaming of walking.

Or remembering the dream of walking.

The floor was made of stars. Not the kind you navigated by—but the kind that whispered. Each footstep echoed in a language he almost understood. His own, maybe. Not English. Not Gallifreyan. Just his.

Something brushed his fingertips. Fabric? Fog? Time?

He turned.

There were faces. Blurred. Too close and too far. A woman with red hair and rage in her voice. A man with a gun and grief behind his teeth. A scientist. A soldier. A soldier. A soldier. A—

He turned again.

A hallway. Blue walls. A heartbeat.

The TARDIS.

He reached for it.

His hand passed through the door.

No. That wasn’t right.

Try again.

Reach.

The door was solid now, but the handle was gone.

“Doctor.”

The voice came like a ripple through glass. It wasn’t calling him. It was naming him.

He turned. The voice was behind him. Or inside him.

“Doctor.”

He opened his mouth to answer—

—but there was no voice in his throat. Only light.

He panicked.

Until something warm touched his hand.

Real.

Now.

And the world—the real one—called him back.

Donna sat in the chair beside the bed, gently stroking her thumb over his hand. He’d been asleep for hours. Not deeply. Not restfully. But enough to ease the knot in her chest for a while.

Until now.

His fingers twitched.

Then his brow furrowed. A soft, breathy sound escaped his throat—half a word, half a question, caught behind his teeth.

“Hey,” she whispered. “It’s alright. You’re safe.”

His eyes opened slowly. He blinked at the ceiling. Then at her.

Something flickered across his face. Relief? Confusion? Despair?

She didn’t speak. Just waited.

His mouth moved again, but no words came. He blinked harder, frustrated. His hand clenched in hers. Not to pull away—just clenched.

Like he was gripping the edge of himself.

Then he said it. Just one word.

“Wrong.”

Donna felt it like a cut.

She leaned in, her voice steady even as her heart broke. “I know.”

He looked at her—really looked.

Her thumb brushed lightly over the back of his hand again. “You’re not alone, you know. I’m still here. We all are. You don’t have to do any of this on your own.”

His fingers twitched.

Then, slowly, he moved his hand—just slightly—so his pinky curled around hers. Not a full grasp. But quite deliberate.

Donna blinked hard and let out a soft breath, shaky but sure.

“You’re still a pain in the arse,” she murmured. “But you’re my Martian pain in the arse.”

The faintest, ghost of a smile tugged at the corner of his mouth.

Then he shifted his hand again, fumbling with twitchy, hesitant fingers—two upright, one across the top.

It took her a second.

Then her eyes widened.

“Oh my god,” she breathed. “You cheeky sod.”

He blinked at her, deadpan.

“You’re asking for tea?”

He gave a tiny nod.

Donna laughed, full and stunned and wet with tears. “You brilliant, bloody bastard.”

She kissed his knuckles and stood. “Alright then. Tea it is.”

In that moment tea sounded like hope and Donna used it to pull herself together. Her friend was still here, it was rocky but he was still getting better, slowly, painfully; against all odds. Martha often said that he was amazing, that the way he was recovering was impossible. Sometimes they forgot. After a long day, a hard day, or a cluster of them. 

How could they give up, even momentarily, when he was asking for tea like it was another Tuesday? Her stupid, brilliant Spaceman.