He was in the darkness, surrounded by his enemies, and haunted by the faces of the dead. All those he had lost; his friends, his family and those whose deaths he had caused. He was running, always endlessly running, yet he could not leave his nightmares behind. The light at the end of the tunnel never got any closer. He was stuck. The blood rushed in his head, panic took hold, fear started to grip his soul. There was no escape now; his luck had finally run out. The creatures around him started to close in. As a metal hand clamped down on his shoulder behind him, he slowly turned and looked into the eyes of his enemies and saw only burning hatred. He sunk to his knees, resigned to his fate, and waited for the shock that would mean the end of his existence…

The Doctor bolted upright in his bed, his sonic screwdriver falling and rolling across the floor as he disturbed where it had been lying on the pillow next to him. He was short of breath, his brow damp with sweat. Every time he fell asleep he had nightmares, and every time they got worse, eating more and more at his soul until one day there would be nothing left, and he became no better than the monsters in his dreams. He threw off his covers onto the floor and swung his legs over the side. He could still feel panic gripping his hearts and his mind was still racing. He took deep breaths, closed his eyes and listened for the low soothing hum of the TARDIS that was always present in the background. Within a few seconds his fear drained away and he opened his eyes again and scanned the floor to find his sonic screwdriver. Even though the room was dark there was a chink of light coming through the gap at the bottom of the door, and so the Doctor could make out the familiar shapes in the room around him. It was sparsely furnished from the bed in which the Doctor occasionally slept in and the desk on which was piled many pieces of broken or scavenged equipment he had dumped on it throughout the many years. Slung over the back the worn and battered chair next to the desk was his trusty jacket. Underneath the chair was the sonic screwdriver, the light from the corridor glinting off the metal. The Doctor walked over to the chair, grabbed his jacket and put it over his shoulders, the fabric slightly rough on his bare torso. He retrieved his screwdriver and put it in his pocket. The Doctor knew he would not get back to sleep for a while and so decided to have a walk through the great expanse of the TARDIS. Opening the door to his room, he stepped out into the dimly lit corridor and headed towards the kitchen. His bare feet padded along the cold metal floor and he found the cooling sensation spreading through his body very refreshing. His mind began to wander as he walked along; he subdued the memory of the nightmare and began to think of the cup of tea he was on his way to make.

Within a minute or so he reached the kitchen, its lights activating as the TARDIS knew he had stepped through the door. The Doctor smiled and felt for the telepathic connection the two of them shared and mentally hugged the heart of the TARDIS in his mind. The background hum changed pitched ever so slightly, as it acknowledged the increased telepathic contact and both of them shared their happiness of their company across the link. The Doctor loved his TARDIS, battered and outdated though it may be, and even if Gallifrey was still orbiting out there in the cold, dark universe, he would never trade it in for a sleeker model. It was special to him, and not just because it was the last one in existence, and he could not imagine a life without it, even if they did have disagreements more often than not. The telepathic connection started to decrease, reverting back to the comforting presence in his mind that had constantly been there for so many centuries, and the Doctor's mind drifted back to the thought of the tea. He flicked the switch on the kettle which he had picked up on earth about 4 years previously and had adapted slightly so it could refill itself. Opening the ornately decorated cupboard he brought out a large Thermos flask and chucked in a teabag from the box that it had been sitting next to. Almost all the cups the Doctor used for tea throughout his reincarnations had been broken or lost when the TARDIS had crashed in Amy's garden in 1996, leaving him only two options on how to drink his tea. Either he could drink it from the Thermos flask or be uncouth and drink it straight from the teapot which had pretty much survived the crash. However, it had a large crack running along the bottom so it was really only useful as decoration until the Doctor got around to fixing it. That would probably not be any time soon as the tube of super-glue had been misplaced and the Doctor did not fancy having to tip the place upside down to find it. He knew he'll probably find it in the jacket of his previous regeneration, along with a lot of other junk. That was the only problem with having pockets that were bigger on the inside; you acquire a lot of unusual but probably worthless stuff. The pockets of his current jacket were already filling up and he could feel it starting to slow him down when he was running, it was getting pretty heavy. He needed to get around to using some of the debris in his room to make a device which cancelled out the weight of pocket junk, but that would have to wait for a time when everyone in the universe got along for a few hours, and that hardly ever happened…

The kettle finished boiling and so the Doctor poured the water into the flask and watched as the water got darker and darker as the taste of the leaves infused throughout the molecules of water. When it reached the perfect strength, which he could tell from the shade alone he dug into his inside pocket on his jacket and brought out the teaspoon that he kept in there. He fished out the teabag from where it had sunk to the bottom of the flask, burning his finger slightly on the water as the spoon was not quite long enough to reach the teabag and fished it out. Then he tapped his right foot four times and the small metal bin which was in an alcove on the other side of the room came towards him on its small motorised wheels. When it reached him it opened automatically and he threw the teabag into it on top of the pile of other waste that was in it and tapped his foot against the side of it. The lid snapped shut and the bin moved back into the alcove. Next time the TARDIS came across a black hole or interstellar recycling plant, the Doctor decided he would empty it but there was no rush, the bin had a system to keep the rubbish in a suspended animation of sorts so it didn't rot. The Doctor patted his pockets and then, feeling what he was looking for, put his hand in the outside left pocket and brought out a small paper packet, ripped it open and poured the powdered milk into the tea before stirring it. He got the lid out of the cupboard, screwed it on tightly and then dried the teaspoon off on his jacket and popped it back in the pocket from which he had got it from. He walked back out of the kitchen, the lights switching off automatically as the door closed. Padding down the corridor, he passed the room in which Amy and Rory were sleeping. He went past the door quietly, and continued on his walk through the many miles of corridors, sipping the tea as he went.