Towards a goal that few can hope to reach

by Sashet

The Doctor tries to come to terms with the aftermath of having been tortured. PWP with Doctor Whump and angst.

A/N: This follows on directly from the events of my story 'Tortured by weariness and pain' and so for it to make sense you should read that first.

This is a massive PWP and features both Doctor Whump and angst and was written in response to a request for a sequel to 'Tortured…'

Dr D gets M&M's (with the blue one's taken out) for doing the Beta thing.

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…Towards a goal that few can hope to reach….

Tortured by weariness and pain, towards a goal that few can hope to reach….

From; The Free Man's Worship by Bertrand Russell

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He didn't have a key but as he lay on the floor he snapped the fingers of his right hand and the door swung open. With quite literally the VERY last of his strength he pulled himself over the threshold, collapsed onto the grating and, as the door swung shut behind him, his last words were;

"Help me."

He felt the comforting thrum of his TARDIS at the back of his mind, below the pain but above the despair as he finally allowed recent events to take their toll on his body and passed out into what he assumed would be a comfortable healing coma.

When he awoke several hours later, the pattern of the TARDIS grating firmly imprinted onto his face and body, he felt nowhere near as well as he had expected to. Although the swelling around his face and eyes had healed and many of the minor cuts and bruises had disappeared, he still ached in far too many places, still felt the pain of what had been done to him far more than he should have done.

Briefly he wondered if the TARDIS had been just an illusion and that the reason he still hurt so much was because he was still hanging in the dungeon, his life slipping from him with every drop of his blood. But he COULD feel her inside his mind and he had to believe that she was real, that this was real. He opened his eyes and raised his head from the floor, the movement made him feel sick as it sent waves of unexpected and unwelcome pain coursing through him again, but what he saw gave him hope. The warm, safe, coral-like structure that could only be his TARDIS filled his vision as he looked around the console room and everything seemed to be as it should be and, despite the fact that something was still very wrong, he managed a small smile.

"Hello old girl, am I glad to see you."

He tried to push himself off the grating, which was now uncomfortably digging into his still sore chest, and was rewarded with a flash of agony that did make him sick, although he had nothing to bring up and all he had left was the sour taste of bile in his mouth and the soreness of overworked muscles in his stomach.

Raising his hand to wipe his mouth the Doctor could immediately see what had caused this latest bout of pain…his left hand, although no longer bleeding, was still filled with the raw gaping wound caused by having had a knife driven through it. The vision of the blade piercing his hand and the sound of flesh tearing flashed in an uninvited memory in the Doctor's mind. The fingers of his hand were swollen and discoloured and angry stripes ran down the veins in his arm as infection from the wound spread into his previously healthy flesh.

"What?" he exclaimed. He knew that his hand should have at least started to heal and if that hadn't healed which of his other injuries lay in wait to catch him unawares with more unsolicited agonies?

"Not enough time?" it was half a question half a hoped for explanation for his still pain wracked state. Maybe he just hadn't had enough time in the healing coma. That had to be the reason…didn't it? He had started to heal, his face was testament to that, but why…why was he awake now when the process was obviously so far from being complete?

"Need the infirmary," he told himself and his ship…she would help him…put the place he needed where he could find it easily. What she couldn't do was help him get there - that was something he had to do himself. "Easy does it," he told himself as he tucked the fingers of his good hand into the metal grating of the floor and pulled.

The loudness of his cry surprised him, more so by the way the cavernous insides of the TARDIS seemed to make it echo back onto his prone form. He hadn't got far at all….less than half of one body length before the pain had brought him up sharply. It was at least as bad as it had been back in the dungeon…his chest…his feet...his leg…his hand…they all still sent fire burning through him as he had tried to move.

This was so wrong…..he knew that….something should have happened whilst he was unconscious…something more than the mending of a few superficial wounds. Something was very, VERY wrong.

"Think," he chided himself when the pain had subsided down to a level that didn't grab at his reason. "Think…why…why…?" the Doctor let his head fall against his arm closing his eyes and letting his mind drift back to the long hours he had spent in the dungeon….hours spent at the hands of a madman hell bent on his destruction...

It was like he was a spectator looking down on himself and he watched with a strange fascination as he allowed his mind to recall what had been done to him. The brutal action of his torturer callously breaking his rib once again took his breath with surprising ease as his side flared with imagined agony in the reality of the TARDIS.

His body twitched where he lay as though the knives and feet and fists that rained down on him in his vision were real. He didn't remember half the blows or half the cuts but he did remember how, above the searing pain, the need to fight this man was his strongest emotion.

He hated his weakness when he screamed as he was burnt time and again until he passed out. Places that he had forgotten about… his thigh and his cheek bore the angry tell-tale marks of the iron. How could he have not remembered them? Too much pain in 'other' places but they were there now, unwanted reminders of a place that would stay with him for a long time.

Why hadn't he healed then? Why hadn't he died then…he was surely wounded, battered, weakened enough from loss of blood to have done so? Why?

"Cmon….think," he told himself. "There has to be a reason…"

"How can you do that, I'm a Time Lord, I'm…"

"Different, unique, the last of your kind?" he waved a hand dismissively. "I've taken all those things and turned them against you, the parts of your brain that stimulate healing are being suppressed by a chemical of my own making which is being continuously pumped into the atmosphere."

"Chemicals in the air!" he said almost triumphantly. "But no… yes... it couldn't be…could it?" His mind whirled through a succession of reasons why that could be the answer - and why it wasn't - until it spun with the effort. A spasm from his chest stopped all his thoughts dead as it demanded his complete attention. The gunshot wound was raw and had started to bleed again and he wasn't sure that deep in the cells of his body he couldn't feel the first stirrings of regeneration.

The Doctor didn't really want to regenerate – he liked his current incarnation quite a lot more than he had done for many lifetimes. He had no intentions of changing it just yet. He had fought to stay alive in the dungeon and he would just have to find a little more strength to stay alive in his TARDIS.

"Still chemicals in my blood?" he asked although there was no one to answer his question. The sound of his weak voice echoing in the TARDIS just told the Doctor how alone he really was. He longed for somebody, anybody to be there...Rose or Martha or Jack. He wondered if his decision to travel alone to save his own heartbreak might be the decision that finally saw his hearts break for good.

Realising that self pity wasn't going to help him the Doctor steeled himself for the pain that was to come, apologised to his ship for the noise he was sure he was going to make and began the slow, laborious and VERY painful act of dragging himself through the console room and towards the infirmary.

Each yard that he covered took longer and longer as his strength bled from him quite literally with every drop of his blood. The time between each painful movement became longer and the respite from them less so as the distinction between the levels of pain he felt blurred until not moving was almost as painful as moving.

The Doctor hadn't even got half way through the console room when his strength finally betrayed him, his pain overwhelmed him and he passed out where he lay, blood, sweat and tears dripping through the grating into the heart of his TARDIS.

His mind, still full of the effects of the drug, tormented him even though he was unconscious. It plagued him with nightmare recollections of what had been done to him in the dungeon so much so that his body twitched and writhed and the much needed healing powers of his Time Lord physiology were rendered all but useless.

FLASHBACK

"You know you can make this stop," a quiet unemotional voice in his ear told him for what seemed like at least the hundredth time. "All you have to do is tell me where the key to your TARDIS is."

"Never," he told the voice through teeth that were clenched in pain and a body that was wracked with what felt like a million tiny points of agony that rose and fell in his consciousness in time with his ragged, laboured breathing.

He hardly registered the next blow that struck him, what was one more broken bone, one more bruise amongst so many? A few more and it wouldn't matter anyway, despite what his captor thought, he was dying and he wouldn't regenerate and in a way the thoughts of death no longer scared him. He welcomed them now as a way to end the pain.

Even Time Lords have their limits, they aren't immortal, and the Doctor knew he was almost at his limit. He coughed weakly, not even having the strength left to cry out in pain, and a trickle of blood spilled from his lips.

"I'm dying," he told his captor, finally accepting his fate was sealed. The drugs in the air would stop him regenerating. "No regeneration," he added managing a small almost triumphant smile despite his pain wracked body.

"You don't die unless I get what I want," the voice was dismembered from the body, seeming to be all around him, as the Doctor floated in and out of the edges of consciousness. "So I'm sorry Doctor but your death will just have to wait a little longer."

He barely felt the pressure of the hypo-gun at his neck or the cool breeze that ruffled his sweat dampened hair as his captor flushed out some of the toxins from both his body and the room.

"Rest now Doctor," the voice said condescendingly. "I'm a patient man and I will have what I want, sooner or later."

A clinically accurate punch to the nerve endings under the Doctor's left clavicle left him unconscious in seconds, so that he never heard his captors' final words …"I hope it is later Doctor."

The Doctor's time sense was off but he still knew that he had been unconscious for several hours and that in that time several of the smaller cuts, burns and broken bones that he had suffered had healed themselves. Although he was still weak and hurting he felt a little stronger than before and his head seemed clearer. He was certain that this slight improvement in his condition wasn't as much for his benefit as for that of his captor. A dead Time Lord wouldn't give him what he wanted whereas a half dead one was another prospect. Now all he had left to wonder was what lay in store for him next.

He didn't have to wait long.

"Feeling better Doctor?" his captor enquired stepping back into the squalid dungeon. The air smelt of sweat and blood and fear and patches of the stone floor were darkened with the drying remains of the Doctor's blood.

The Doctor raised his head, his tiredness was still reflected in his eyes and taut lines of pain creased his face. His body was a contrasting patchwork of colourful bruises and angry red patches, what was left of his suit hung from his slim figure in nothing more than pathetic tatters. Dried blood caked his left hand and arm flaking off in tiny amounts when an unexpected shudder passed through him, the knife protruding from his hand occasionally glinting in the mock candlelight.

"Fantastic!" he quipped back, recalling a favourite phrase of his last incarnation, although it didn't come out as strongly as he had hoped, his throat still raw from his earlier screams.

His nemesis didn't respond with more than just the faintest flicker of a smile, he was glad that the Doctor was once again at least somewhat more of a fitting adversary than the screaming, bleeding, dying wreck of a man he had left in the dungeon a few short hours back. The last of the Time Lords was his to do with as he pleased and what pleased him most, right now, wasn't getting the key to the last TARDIS in the Universe but to see just how much pain his captive could stand.

For him inflicting pain was cathartic, a way to avenge all the wrongs that he perceived had been done to him over his turbulent life. The high he got when he heard a prisoner scream or beg for their life was, for him, almost a sexual experience – not that he would ever allow that to interfere with his goals. He was a specialist in inflicting pain and was well known for his ability to always get what his paymasters required. But with the Doctor it was different – HE wanted the TARDIS for his own ends, nobody was paying him for this job and somehow that made it all the more enjoyable.

He closed the gap between himself and the prone figure of the Doctor, not bothering to try and hide the twinkle of excitement and pleasure in his eyes as he trailed his hand down his captive's exposed torso and was rewarded with a low moan of pain. Carefully he examined the Doctor's body, touching, probing with long assured strokes, feeling out the places that still hurt the most. He made a mental note of every reaction the Doctor made, whether it was a mere grimace or a full blown squeal of pain until he knew everything about his state of health, both physical and mental.

"Time to move on," he stated after the Doctor's final cry of agony when he twisted the blade in his hand, had faded into the silence of the dungeon.

"The answer is still no," the Doctor told him as forcefully as he could manage. Until his captor had reminded him that his body was still a mass of hurt and pain he had been feeling stronger, more capable of facing what was still to come. Now he felt vulnerable and alone again.

"I didn't ask."

"No but you were going to."

"Aren't you curious Doctor?"

"About what, why I'm stuck here in a fake dungeon with a psychopath like you? No…not really."

"You disappoint me Doctor, I'd heard so much about the last of the Time Lords, about how he could stop wars and save millions of lives with just words. About how he used his knowledge of time and space to defeat the greatest warrior races this galaxy has ever known. Look at you helpless, alone, screaming and bleeding just like anybody else. Captured in a simple trap and now only alive because I choose to let you be. I think the Oncoming Storm has all but blown out, don't you Doctor?"

"Is your plan to talk me to death, because I love a good chat, especially over a nice cup of tea? Don't suppose there's any chance of one? No? Right fine…"

The man smiled ruefully, pleased that the Doctor still had fight left in him. It would make the moment that he finally broke him all the sweeter.

"All I want to hear from you Doctor is where the key is…oh and maybe the occasional scream."

"I won't give you either," the Doctor told him painfully as another touch from his captor against the not quite healed bones of his side sent a grimace of agony flushing through him.

"I think you will," the tone was matter of fact as was the action that followed as the man spun the Doctor to face the wall, ignoring his gasps as the action pulled against newly healed skin and bones and served as an unnecessary reminder of all that still hurt. "In fact I'd bet your life on it."

In no more than what felt like a split second the Doctor's world exploded into an unwanted ball of agony. The sound of whooshing air ahead of the crack of leather wasn't enough of a warning to stop the involuntary gasp of pain spilling from the Doctor's lips as the searing pain of a whip bit into his skin.

He hardly had time to draw breath from the first stroke when the next one hit, weakening his knees with its vicious bite. Again and again, without words or warning the whip flew through the air, its accuracy unwavering. Soon the Doctor's back was a mass of angry red welts from his shoulders to his backside.

A blow caught him low, curling over his still broken rib and the Doctor shuddered in the chains that held him. His head tipped back with the pain, sweat dripped into his eyes and he could taste its saltiness mix with the blood in his mouth, where he bit his lip to hold back his mounting need to scream. He could feel the warm trickle of blood down his side.

To the Doctor it seemed like every stroke now broke the skin, he could feel the blood ooze from him as he concentrated on keeping upright and keeping his word. He wouldn't let his torturer hear him scream…not this time….not the next time.

Not until the time when the next blow fell harder than all the others before it, landing in a different direction but directly on top of existing welts and cuts, instantly splitting his fragile skin wide open and then the noise he made wasn't really a scream more a low agonised curse.

As another strike ripped across his shoulders, tearing the flesh the Doctor wondered how many strokes he had endured and how many more there were to come. Another lash buckled his knees and left him swinging from his chains, oblivious to the blood that stained the metal cuffs engrossed as he was in a solitary world of seemingly never ending pain. He couldn't take many more strokes; he'd either pass out or scream. Most likely he would do both.

The tip of the whip bit deep into his side returning his thoughts to the moment as his body scraped against the rough stone wall from the force of the blow. He felt suddenly sick as the shock of another stroke took his breath from him and he let his head hang against his chest as he heaved and retched, gasping for air and still, somehow, fighting down the urge to scream.

Not a word had been spoken and the Doctor had stoically endured each lash until to his utter relief no more blows fell and the dungeon was silent but for the sound of ragged breathing and fought back gasps of agony. He heard the sound of footsteps on the stone floor and felt a fist in his hair as his head was pulled back and twisted to face the man he now considered to be the biggest threat to his life and his sanity that he had ever met.

"Well?" he asked knowing that there was no need to complete the question.

"I told you already…no," the Doctor tried to keep his face impassive so that it didn't betray his hurt and his fear, but he knew that against everything he had hoped and tried for he still sounded both hurt and afraid.

The man didn't look surprised or disappointed at the Doctor's response and he released his hold in his hair with a sudden violent movement that made the Doctor's teeth rattle and all the bones in his neck crack with its force. He spun him back to face him, slamming his raw back against the wall.

The Doctor swayed where he stood, trying to find the strength to push himself upright and take the strain back off his bruised and bleeding wrists, but his legs were like jelly beneath him. Through eyes that were tired with pain he saw that his captor was merely standing impassively to one side, watching his efforts and it took several long moments of internal cursing and fortitude before he managed to stand again.

The man took a single stride away from the Doctor and yet again, with no warning and an unnecessary level of viciousness, unleashed the whip against the Doctor's bruised and sore chest. Now he could see what was to come, the unfurling leather speeding towards him and the red marks that scored his pale flesh, it didn't help the Doctor to be any better prepared for the fire that seemed to follow in its wake. It still hurt…a lot.

One blow then another flew toward the Doctor landing with the same sickening accuracy as they had done on his back. Angry red welts formed and then split, spilling blood down his torso. One high stroke caught the Doctor's chin, splitting it open with ease, the next was low….very low and the sound that spilled from the Doctor's lips was that of a man at the very edge of his endurance.

Then it stopped and the Doctor let his head hang for a brief moment, sweat stained and shaking where he hung, as the pain ebbed and flowed through him. When he looked at his nemesis the man looked as though he had done nothing more strenuous than taken a gentle walk. His face was unflushed and his clothes were still immaculate.

Although he had expected the Doctor to be a formidable adversary the man had expected to have broken him by now. Inwardly he admired the Time Lord's fortitude in the face of everything that he had subjected him to….not that he would ever admit that, but the time for admiration was now gone.

He reached into a pocket and pulled out a plastic bag containing a small amount of fine white powder. He wet one finger and dipped it into the powder. Raising the powder to eye level he made a show of examining it in the half light of the cell before licking it off and grimacing at the taste.

"Not very nice at all," he told the Doctor who was watching him through hooded, wary eyes, his mind wondering what this latest game was all about. "Do you know what it is?"

"No idea," he answered wearily, he hurt too much to be bothered with games.

"Let me show you." He tipped a small amount of the powder into the palm of his hand and held it up for the Doctor to see. As he passed his hand in front of the Doctor's face his advanced olfactory senses perceived an aroma that was peculiar to Earth but deadly to a Time Lord, aspirin, and his eyes widened in horror.

"I see you know what it is now."

"You must know it will kill me?" he asked his captor.

"Yes of course I do," he sounded indignant. "But what I don't know is how much will kill you and what it will do to you first." He bent his lips to his cupped hand as if he was going to blow the powder into the Doctor's face watching with amusement in his eyes at his captive's anxious almost panicked response, then he clenched his fist around the powdered aspirin.

The Doctor blew out a low breath believing that for now the immediate danger had passed. His knew his belief was misplaced when he saw his torturer open his hand and liberally coat the ends of his fingers with the aspirin. Carefully tracing the violent red gashes left by the whip he chose one that was deep and bleeding and dug his fingers into the open wound….

FLASHBACK ENDS

Shaking, gasping in a lungful of air, a strangled cry on his lips the Doctor sat up, suddenly awake. For just a brief moment his disorientation was complete and he believed he was back in his nightmare. The fact he still bled and still hurt did nothing to ease his momentary panic.

"No!" he exclaimed both as an answer to the frequently asked question and as a plea to his torturer, the two events still intertwined in his mind. The silence that greeted his outburst caused him to frantically look at his surroundings. He didn't see what he expected…dreary dank walls and the cold expressionless face of the man who wanted a power he could not hope to control, he saw warmth and light, heard the sound of life…his life... his TARDIS.

Blinking furiously as if he feared that what he saw would vanish before his eyes the Doctor raised a hand to his face and scrubbed at his eyes, pinched the bridge of his nose and was more relieved that he could imagine when nothing changed.

If he had believed in a divine being now would have been the time he thanked it.

Satisfied once more that he was safe he felt a renewed sense of purpose and refused to allow himself to sink back onto the floor. Crab like he shuffled backwards through the console room, cursing silently as the grating tore the fragile skin from the soles of his feet and left his good hand red and sore from the continued effort of pulling his almost useless body. Time passed in an abstract sense amid a kaleidoscope of pain and he still had to stop after every few pulls to rest, but it seemed as if the longer he was in the TARDIS the less things hurt.

That wasn't to say they didn't hurt, they just hurt less.

He was tired through to his sore and broken bones by the time he finally reached the infirmary and allowed himself to fall weakly against the doorframe. The infection in his bloodstream made him shaky and nauseous. One minute he was so hot that his skin was drenched in a thin film of sweat, the next he was shivering so hard he thought he might shake himself to death. More than once he was both at the same time which left him so drained that he barely had the strength to draw another breath.

The sweat stung in his eyes as he shook his head to try and clear the wild thoughts that threatened to overwhelm him and leave him incapable of anything. Thoughts of pain and torture were accompanied by fanciful apparitions that sent him tumbling back to the horrors he had endured. Bloodied knives swam in his vision and the air was filled with the endless demand for him to give up the TARDIS and all her powers. He should have been stronger he told himself as he heard his own screams in the darkness of his mind as his reason slipped away from him and he lapsed once again into unconsciousness.

A gentle steady humming wormed its way into the Doctor's mind as he slumped unconscious in the doorway to the TARDIS infirmary. It was his ships way of helping him heal, an insistent but comforting presence in his mind, settling his troubled thoughts and allowing him to get the rest that his broken mind and body demanded.

A day or more later a much rejuvenated Doctor struggled through the thick layers of darkness in his mind and prised his eyes open. During the time he had been unconscious he had slipped from the support of the doorway and now lay sprawled on the floor, just inside the infirmary. The lighting was low, set that way by his ship, and after dragging in several long deep breaths he slowly pushed himself up. Relieved that the effort didn't make him feel sick or, more importantly, make anything seem to hurt, he checked each part of his body.

It seemed that all he had to show for his time in the dungeon were the last fading bruises from the many beatings he had endured and a few pale scars from the whipping he had received and even they would be gone within another day. His rib was healed although he would still be sore for at least another week. The lasting reminder of his time in the dungeon was his hand where a small scar crossed his life line….a scar that would never fully fade away and would always serve as a reminder of how he had nearly lost his life in that dungeon.

He ran his hand over his face and through his hair both of which felt dirty. Rising carefully to his feet he could still feel the pull of sore, bruised muscles ...there would be no madcap adventures for him for a while longer he thought as he headed for a bathroom.

Stripping off the last remains of his suit the Doctor shuddered inwardly as he tossed the bloodstained garment into a heap and stepped into a hot shower. The warmth of the water eased his still sore body as he scrubbed away the dirt of his captivity. Time and again he washed and rewashed his face and body as if with each cleansing he could make what happened disappear with the dirty soapy water. It was only when he came to wash his hair and the water that ran down his face was still stained a pale red that his resolve broke and his tears fell.

How had he let it happen? Why had he not fought harder or run faster….he was good at running…? Was his torturer still out there waiting for another chance to get his hands on the TARDIS or on him?

"NO!" he shouted slamming his hands into the smooth tiled walls of the shower in frustration as his mind swirled with a million unanswered questions. Viciously turning off the water and stepping from the shower the Doctor hurriedly towelled himself dry a steady litany of curses and protestations filling the air. Angry…at everything… he stalked to the wardrobe room and dressed quickly in a version of his brown suit. Catching a glimpse of himself in the mirror he stopped and turned to look properly.

Reminded of the first time he had seen this latest regeneration in this very same room, many years ago, he stroked his chin, loosened his tie a little and ran his hand through his still damp hair so that it stood up in something more akin to its usual unruly manner. Only his eyes now betrayed the horrors that had befallen him, staring dully back at him, their zest for life quenched by unwanted memories.

"I'm the Doctor," he told himself over-enthusiastically, digging in his pocket to find the reassuring shape of his sonic screwdriver. "And what I want now is a nice cup of tea!"

The Doctor's self enforced bonhomie lasted no longer than the time it took for the last of the scars and bruises to fade completely. He had occupied his time tinkering with parts of the TARDIS that didn't really need it…and she had told him so on more than one occasion…and resting….even at one stage allowing himself to sleep for a few hours. Physically now he was in as good health as he had been before he had stepped onto the surface of that fateful planet, maybe even a little better.

Now he stood in the console room fingers hovering over the controls, ready, or so he thought, to leave the safety of the void and go wherever the Universe needed him. So why was he so hesitant…so unsure…even afraid of what waited for him beyond the doors of the TARDIS?

Reaching for the control lever the Doctor noticed that his hand was shaking.

"Come on…" he chided, swiftly wiping the offending hand down the leg of his suit and reaching again for the lever. "No time for that. Got a Universe to save." He was ready…wasn't he?

You know he's still out there. He'll be looking for you. You got away from him….he'll be looking for you and this time….

The Doctor's hand fell from the lever as his fear started to well up inside him. The shaking in his hand seemed to be spreading and he had to grab the edges of the console to keep his legs from collapsing under him. He could feel the cold sweat of uncertainty at his hairline and his throat suddenly felt tight. He let his head hang as he fought the raging inferno of memories that threatened to engulf him, gripping the console so tightly that his fingers were bone white against its edges.

Who was this man….who knew so much about the Time Lords? How, where, did he get his knowledge from….all the records of the Time Lords were destroyed in the Time War, all that are left are myths and legends, half truths and stories distorted through age and retelling. I am the last of the Time Lords… I killed my people - all of them - right down to the Master…I saw him burn….didn't I? But if …somehow... he did survive surely even he doesn't hate me enough to…..

The Doctor's legs failed him and he slumped to the floor. The only way that his torturer could have known about the power of the TARDIS and the intricate workings of a Time Lord's mind and body was if another Time Lord had told him.

"No," he didn't want to believe that he had been betrayed by a man that he had once called friend and that he had also believed was dead. He hadn't felt the presence of the Master in his mind but his mind was damaged by drugs and his body so full of hurt that he could barely think about anything beyond staying alive for the next second and then the next and then the next. Even the possibility that the Master was still alive didn't sooth the sudden anxiety that filled him.

The Doctor drew his legs up against him, curling into a ball, his head resting on his knees as he sought to accept what he now believed to be true….he had been betrayed…..given up to the hands of a professional psychopath….beaten, tortured, poisoned, all but left for dead ….and behind it all wasn't some despot whose plans for whatever The Doctor had thwarted but the one person who knew the most about him….the one person who had always known the most about him….his friend….his enemy…another Time Lord.

Now he realised that the signs had been there from the start, if only he hadn't been preoccupied with enduring another assault on his body, on not giving in even when his body and mind both begged him to just to end the excruciating agonies that swamped his every waking moment, he might have noticed.

But how would that have helped?

Knowing that another Time Lord was behind this would have done nothing to ease his pain, nothing to stop the fists and feet, nothing to stop the arcing electricity that had almost stopped his hearts where he hung, covered in his own blood.

Would it have given him strength to know that he wasn't alone? Not when the dungeon echoed to his screams because then he knew he was alone, truly alone.

There was nobody to help him, nobody to save him, nobody to hear him cry in the darkness of his despair as his life ebbed from him with every slowing heartbeat and every drop of his blood.

Huddled against the solid security of his TARDIS the Doctor still shook with the fear that what had happened to him could so easily happen again. He had let his lust for excitement and adventure take him to the edge of death and who was to say that he wouldn't again. He hadn't thought anything about his own safety as he bounded onto the planet, rushing off to stop some terror that never was, before allowing his capture with an ease that should embarrass him.

"Stupid," he berated himself. "Just plain stupid, that's what you were." Shaky hands ran through his hair when there was no comforting voice to ease his self doubt, to reassure him, just the nagging voice in his head.

He'll be waiting for you.

Maybe not today or tomorrow but he will be waiting.

The Universe is a big place.

You can't run from him forever Doctor.

"I can…I will…I have to" he told the empty silence of his ship but deep down he knew that if they ever met again then it was a certainty that one of them wouldn't survive their meeting.

Staring at the scar that would forever slash through his palm the Doctor tried to rub it away with the thumb of his other hand, sobbing with the memories it brought back.

FLASHBACK

The Doctor could hardly draw a breath as the arc of electricity jumped from the small device in his captor's hand to his sweat slicked skin causing his body to bend like a bow in his feeble attempt to escape the pain.

Fire seemed to ripple through every cell as the jolts of pure electricity followed each other in endless waves, marking his skin with hot angry burns and leaving him twitching helplessly long after they had ceased.

A sudden burst again his chest and the Doctor felt one of his hearts skip a beat before falling back into an irregular rhythm that drained the small reserves of strength that he had.

The aspirin coursing through his blood was interfering with his genetic structure, he could feel it deep within the core of his triple helix DNA, damaging his cells to the point that, when the toxin finally caused his fatal embolism, they would be unable to regenerate.

He had nothing left to give…nothing. Nothing but his life ….or his TARDIS. But his life would be nothing without his TARDIS.

"You can't make her work," he mumbled feebly through lips that were dry and cracked.

"Don't be so certain of that Doctor."

"Only a Time Lord can…." He couldn't complete his sentence as deep inside him his cells started to burst and bleed. He convulsed where he hung, his body shaking and juddering as badly as it had done under the relentless application of electricity, blood vessels bursting behind his eyes, in his ears and his nose until they spilled free against his skin that was now so pale that it was almost translucent in the fake candlelight.

The Doctor knew that he had reached the point of no return…he could take no more. Every inch of his body hurt worse than he had ever thought possible, his whole body was violated to the point where he would do ANYTHING to make it stop.

Anything.

Even give up his TARDIS.

Finding the strength to raise his head, he no longer cared if his captor saw his tears.

"Save me and I'll give you what you want."

FLASHBACK ENDS

How could he have been so weak? Fortune not fortitude meant that he still had his TARDIS and next time he might not be so lucky. He HAD been willing to give up his ship, just to stop his pain, even knowing what that meant. He would have lived but at what cost? What would his captor have done with his ship, with the infinite power of time and space that fuelled her? He could have gone anywhere and at any time, changed the whole fabric of history and it would have all been the Doctor's fault.

Even though that hadn't happened it was of no comfort to the Doctor as he huddled scared and alone, all but paralysed with fear and self loathing.

He didn't have to try too hard to remember what was done to him and he knew that he NEVER wanted to endure pain like that again. Although now, physically, he was fine, good as new in fact, mentally he was fragile, scarred by his own reactions and tainted with the knowledge of what he had been willing to do.

"I shouldn't have given up; I shouldn't have given you up," he said choking back his tears. "But it hurt…it hurt so much…I'm sorry."

There was nobody to hear him, nobody to ease his fear, nobody to hold him and care for him. He had turned his back on those who loved him, sent them away just to save himself from the heartbreak he felt when they moved on. How he now regretted that selfish action, an action that had ultimately led him to where he was now.

"I was lucky…this time…lucky to escape, lucky not to die. But I should have died, rather than give you up, I should have died. But if…he…the Master… was behind this then what good would my death have been? He knows how to fly a TARDIS, even one as patched up as you are. Dead I wouldn't have been able to save you, alive….maybe alive I had a chance….don't you see I had no choice?"

Broken sobs punctuated the Doctor's words; angrily he clenched his fists into balls and pounded them against his knees and legs. He hardly felt the pain as he banged his head back against the central console in a steady rhythm.

"I'm sorry…I'm so sorry," he chanted over and over again as if the litany of words would ease the emptiness he felt inside. The emptiness that filled the part of him that used to yearn for adventure and the thrill of a different planet beneath his feet. Now all he wanted was to stay where he was. Safe in his TARDIS, safe in the void, away from everybody and everything that could possibly hurt him.

Slowly the Doctor's tears subsided as his resolve grew and his fear became replaced with a misguided sense of anger at the Universe. All he had ever tried to do was help and all it seemed to get him was pain, death and the loss of those close to him. Well no more…he was through with saving people, with helping those in need from now on he would be his own top priority. He would do what HE wanted to do and not what the Universe seemed to think was its right to demand.

Many years ago the Time Lords had taken one of his regenerations as a punishment for breaking their strict laws of non- intervention, banished him to Earth and taken away his TARDIS. It had taken him 8 more regenerations to finally admit that maybe they were right…from now on he would revert to the old ways of the Time Lords…he would watch but do nothing. The Universe would not stop turning because the Doctor didn't come running.

"It's just you and me now," he told his ship as convinced of his new sense of purpose he got up from the floor. "No more rushing around saving people and planets. I can't do it anymore… as long as there is a chance that 'he' is still out there, still waiting for us then I can't…I just can't."

A sudden shrill ringing of a mobile phone made the Doctor jump….that phone hardly ever rang and when it did it usually meant something bad was happening. Instinctively he reached for the phone and then stopped himself – that was the old Doctor, the one who sought out trouble and danger even when he didn't need to. He wasn't that man anymore… he was not going to drop everything and come running just because he could…was he?

The phone stopped and he flipped open the cover, it told him:

1 Missed Call

Martha Jones

The old Doctor would have called her right back he told himself as his finger hovered over the call button – but no – he was damned if he was going to.

"Sorry Martha, this is one you'll just have to sort out for yourself," he told the phone as he shut the cover and popped it back into its holder on the side of the console. It had hardly settled in place before it started ringing again.

What harm would it do to answer it he asked himself? It doesn't mean I have to DO anything and….it isn't like we've spoken in a while …it might be nice just to catch up…and it definitely doesn't mean I'm going to help her out….

"Hello Martha," he said warily before he had another chance to talk himself out of his actions.

"About bloody time too. Where have you been, I've been trying to get you for ages."

"Been…busy," he answered vaguely, not wanting to dwell on what had happened to him or the place in his life that he thought it had left him.

"Doctor…you have to come back," she told him hardly pausing for breath. "It's Donna Doctor, she can remember everything and she's asking to see you."

"Donna?"

"Doctor…I don't know what to do – you have to help her."

"Yes… yes I do."