Title: The Greatest of These
Author: Gillian Taylor
Character/Pairing: Rose Tyler, the Doctor
Rating: PG-13 (violence)
Summary: When you seem to have lost everything, how do you move on?
Disclaimer: Don't own them. I just like playing with them...a lot.

A/N: Written as part of the First Sentence Challenge on the LJ community Time and Chips. Kudos to faythbrady for the first sentence. Thanks, as always, to my fabulous betas WMR, NNWest & Aibhinn. This is a what-if story, so it goes very AU after Long Game.

The Greatest of These
by Gillian Taylor

Chapter 1: The Fall

"Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also a prison."
- Henry David Thoreau

The blood on her shaking hands was not her own. She thought she'd seen the worst of humanity in the form of a lying, scheming scrap of skin that had killed so many people. She thought that she'd seen the most terrible things in the universe – Slitheen, Gelth, Daleks, death.

She was wrong.

She kept her hands pressed against the Doctor's wounds, terrified that he was dying. God, there was so much blood.

"Why'd you do this? He was tryin' to help!" she shouted at their captors, though she knew the strength of her words was lessened by the tremor in her voice.

"He's an alien. We don't need his kind of help," the man – a Colonel Shanks – snarled. "Step away from him."

"What? So you can kill him? I'm not leaving him!" She wanted to shift, to put her body between the Doctor and the weapons held by Shanks' men, but she didn't dare. If she moved, if she released the pressure on the wound, he'd lose more blood. She tried to take comfort from the feel of the Doctor's heartsbeats beneath her palms. As long as she could feel his pulse, she could delude herself into believing that he'd survive this, that he'd be fine.

"You don't have a choice."

Suddenly, rough hands were pulling her away from the Doctor. The instant the pressure left his injuries, fresh blood welled to the surface of the wounds, deepening the colour of his maroon jumper.

"Let me go!" She tried to fight back, tried to escape, but the man holding her was too strong. No matter how she kicked, how she tried to hurt him, his grip didn't loosen.

"Do you know what we do with alien sympathisers?" Shanks asked.

"'S that a threat? Not very original, really," she said, mind racing as she desperately tried to determine some way of getting herself out of this particular mess.

"You will become like them. A slave." Shanks aimed a kick at the Doctor's unconscious form.

"No! Leave him alone!" she cried, but she knew that the colonel wasn't listening.

This was all her fault. If she hadn't helped that woman – the blue-skinned one who reminded her of Raffalo – none of this would've happened. How was she to know that this century's humans were prejudiced gits who didn't want anything to do with aliens? How was she to know that anything or anyone alien was a slave and wasn't to be talked to or helped? How was she to know that helping someone who was injured was a punishable offence?

Now the Doctor was paying for her ignorance. No, she corrected herself, not paying. Dying.

Something cold was pressed against the skin of her neck and she stiffened. At Shanks' nod, she felt a sharp prick accompanied by a hissing noise. The world spun around her as the drug began to take effect.

"Wha-?" she slurred the word, barely able to make her tongue and mouth work properly.

The last thing she saw before her eyes slid shut was Shanks' oily smile. The last thing she heard before unconsciousness swept over her was the colonel's cold voice, ordering the Doctor's death.

She heard nothing more.

There was an insistent buzzing noise somewhere near her right ear. Irritated, she swatted at it, trying to shut off the alarm. "It's not time to get up, Mum," she muttered, not quite awake.

That was when the memory returned. The Doctor's body, bloodied. The stain on her hands. The Colonel's cruel smile. "Doctor!" she said as she opened her eyes.

It took her eyes a moment to adjust to the dimness of her surroundings. She was in a small room – cage, she realised, when she spotted the bars lining one wall. The buzzing noise was coming from what looked like a speaker grill inlaid into one of the walls.

A few seconds later, the sound stopped and she could hear other noises around her, as though a number of people were beginning to stir. "Hello?" she tried hesitantly. What the hell had happened?

There was Shanks. And… She'd been drugged! Oh, hell. How was she to find the Doctor now?

"Quiet!" someone called.

"My name's Rose. My friend's been-"

"I said shut it! They'll hear you. If you value your life, keep quiet!" The obvious fear in the person's – woman's?– voice caused her to bite her lower lip, discouraged.

The clamour of thoughts that whirled through her mind practically demanded to be shared. The only way she had to survive, to find the Doctor, was to find out where she was. She needed information. But in this place, simply judging by the fear in that person's voice, information might be the one thing she couldn't have.

"Where am-?" she began, but cut herself off the instant she heard the clang of metal somewhere outside the confines of her cell. Around her, the other noises she'd heard, the indications of life outside this tiny room, ceased, dampening the surroundings with an expectant and fearful hush.

There were sounds now. The clump-clump of booted feet, the jangle of metal, the heavy breaths of someone moving closer. Each sound seemed to grow more ominous, more deadly, as those steps drew closer to her cell. Her fingers curled into a fist as she pressed herself against the solid strength of the wall, staring through the bars.

She told herself that she wasn't scared. She told herself that there was nothing to be worried about, though she knew that was a lie. The Doctor was out there somewhere, maybe dying, and she was stuck in this bloody cell. Despite her brave thoughts, she still had to fight against the urge to draw herself into a more protective posture.

The steps slowed to a stop somewhere close by, but she didn't move to the bars to peer through.

"I know that some of you are new here," a gruff voice said. "So I am going to tell you the rules. You'll hear them once, no more. Recite them to yourselves as needed, but keep in mind that any rule-breaking is a punishable offence. Death is the mildest of these punishments.

"One – you belong to me. Who you were, what your name was, what you did isn't important. You are nothing. You are a slave. You are a prisoner. Who you are, what you are, is a string of numbers stitched onto your tunics. That is your name. You will answer to it."

Rose looked at her clothing, finally recognising that her hoodie and jeans were gone. Instead, she'd been left with a coarse tunic and trousers, both embroidered with a string of numbers. A shiver ran through her as the reality of her situation sunk in.

"Two – no talking unless a guard addresses you. This isn't a place to make friends. You are here to do your job – which is anything I tell you to do."

She needed to get out of here. No question about it, she had to run. The Doctor needed her. And to escape, she needed friends. She'd have to break the rules. That was the only way she could survive.

"Three – you have no opinions. You have no rights. You are mine to do with as I please. The sooner you realise this, the better it will be for you."

Anger burned through her. How she longed to snap, to fight back, to disagree, but pragmatism held her back.

"Four – anything I say is law. Anything the guards say is law. Any breaking of the laws will be punished." The speaker was moving towards her now. When the figure stepped into the faint light outside her cell, she was surprised to discover that her current captor was an alien.

Given humanity's prejudices in this era – Doctor, she thought, despairing of his fate – she had a hard time believing that humans would let an alien be in charge. Unless – and she found this far more likely – this alien's position was as much a prisoner as her own.

The alien – a tall, spindly bloke with spikes instead of hair – turned beady red eyes towards her. Smiling, he asked, "Who violated the rule of no talking?"

Silence greeted the question. She knew that admitting anything would be the height of folly. But, if she didn't speak, how could she learn about where she was or even if the Doctor was alive?

No, she corrected herself. He was alive. Full stop. He had to be. She'd know if he wasn't. She had to know. The world would stop turning or her heart would skip several beats. She had to believe in him. Believe that he was alive. She desperately clung to that hope, praying that it wouldn't be proven wrong.

"Do you have anything to say for yourself, 42398?" the alien asked, moving closer to the bars separating her from him.

She stiffened and glanced down at the numbers on her tunic. "Rose," she said softly, unable to stop her name from escaping her lips.

"Speak up, 42398."

"Rose," she repeated herself, meeting the warden's – at least, that was the closest she could come to a title for him – gaze. "Not 42398."

Gasps echoed around her and she knew that she'd made a mistake.

The alien's lips pressed together and with a sharp gesture another guard came forward and pressed something against the wall just outside her cell. "First violation," the warden declared as the bars slid upwards.

Freedom was an illusion as another guard came into the cell with her and fastened restraints on her wrists. She didn't bother to fight, at least not now. She would bide her time. At some point, someone would slip up and she would be able to escape.

When she was pushed into the hallway, she stumbled and was unable to maintain her balance, instead crashing painfully to the floor. As tears sprung to her eyes the warden stepped forward to touch her chin, tilting it upwards. His gaze seemed to bore into her. "You are now assigned to the infirmary, 42398," the warden said.

Though the position didn't sound too bad, she suspected that that impression was probably incorrect. Then again, it'd probably be relatively easy to escape from there. Who'd expect someone who was ill to run?

"You probably think this isn't a punishment, 42398. You are wrong. Once you go into the infirmary, the only way you can leave that post is by one of two means. Death, or if I decide otherwise. Enjoy your new position." The warden turned his back on her and she was hauled upwards by unkind hands.

"Move," a guard snarled in her ear and shoved her in the appropriate direction, away from the warden and her cell.

Her knees ached with every step, but she was determined to walk without assistance. She knew that she'd receive no help from the guards. Now that she was freed from the cell, she took the time to observe her surroundings.

One side of the corridor was a smooth wall, while the other was lined with cells. She could hear movement inside each cell that she passed, but when she tried to look inside them, she was shoved or poked by her guard, directing her to keep her eyes forward. The row of cells seemed to go on for miles. She could see that the corridor stretched onward into an impossible-seeming distance.

She didn't recall seeing a building this massive when they'd first arrived here. But perhaps, like the TARDIS, this place was bigger on the inside, or it was underground. Wherever here was.

The journey seemed to last for ages, though it was probably only a few minutes, before the guard finally ordered her to stop and keep facing forward. In her peripheral vision, she could see what seemed to be a door. Its colour was vaguely metallic in appearance, but she didn't dare turn her head to try and find out more about it.

Instead, she waited while she heard the rattle of keys and the sound of metal scraping against metal as the door was shifted out of the way.

"Turn around," the guard said.

When she turned, she saw that there was another corridor branching off this one, one that had apparently been hidden behind a door. This time, they only walked a few paces before they reached another door – only this one seemed far more solid than the last. The guard pulled something out of a pouch at his side – something that looked like a rock of some sort – and pressed it into a depression next to the door.

The door slid open with barely a sound, something that seemed astonishing after the apparent lack of advanced technology that she'd seen before. Everything else seemed to be locks and keys, something simple and easy. But this?

She was starting to doubt her chances for escape.

The guard put a rough hand on her shoulder and squeezed painfully, grinning at her discomfort. "You will go inside and do whatever the matron tells you. I'll be back for you later." The guard trailed his hand from her shoulder to her cheek in a parody of a lover's caress, leaving behind no doubt as to what he was planning for her.

She stiffened at the touch, but refused to let the guard see any trace of fear. That'd be the fastest way of making herself a target. She turned and walked away from the guard, still holding her tongue until the instant that the door began to slide shut behind her. "That's what you think," she muttered, putting as much loathing as she could into the words.

Looking around, Rose found herself in a large, airy room that was full of beds of various shapes and sizes. In one corner she could see what seemed to be babies in incubators, while another was walled off with fabric – a surgery, perhaps? It looked like the infirmary saw a bustling business. That didn't surprise her at all.

Given the guards' casual cruelty and the 'rules', she suspected that it was common for a prisoner to see the inside of this room at least once during their stay here. On the bed closest to the door, an old man was covered in boils, all of which seemed to be infected. On another, Rose could see a young girl with pointed ears cradling an injured arm to her chest.

"Oh, my dear child, are you injured?" a kindly voice asked. She faced the speaker, about to voice a denial, when the elderly woman brushed her hand against her arm. "No. There is no injury except for heartache and that isn't something I can heal."

"I…I'm sorry. My name's Ros-" she cut herself off as she glanced around the room, suddenly wary of a guard's presence.

"Oh, do not fear the guards. They do not come here unless it is to extract a patient and even then it is with great reluctance. Any injuries they have are treated in a separate ward. In here, you can tell me your name. I am Alma, Matron of this infirmary." Now that she had the chance to take a closer look, Alma wasn't as old as she'd originally thought. Though her hair was the purest white, Alma's skin wasn't wrinkled. Instead it was pockmarked. Her vivid purple eyes blinked curiously up at her.

"Rose," she said. "The warden told me-"

"You were punished," Alma completed her sentence. "That is what usually happens. None come here unless they are told. Come, I will show you around."

There wasn't much to see, she soon discovered. Besides the main infirmary area, there was a small side room full of bunks for the workers. "We sleep in shifts," Alma explained, gesturing towards the other two workers whom she introduced as Rulan and Exir. "That way someone is always awake for when they bring in the next patient."

"Are you a doctor?" she asked, trying to be unobtrusive as she searched for her friend under the guise of the question.

"No," Alma said, shaking her head. "Not in the human sense of the world. I am Trizellixan."

The name meant nothing to her and something of her confusion must've shown as Alma continued, "I can heal with a touch by taking on the injuries and illnesses of others. I cannot let people continue to suffer."

She knew the implication of that power. Here, amongst all this hurt, she'd probably push herself to the limits just to try to help. "An' what does that do to you?" she asked.

Alma's silence was answer enough.

"I-" she started, but changed tack mid-sentence. "Alma, has anyone new come in here? A tall bloke, large ears, hawk-like nose? He would've been beaten." She closed her eyes for a moment, remembering all the blood. When she opened her eyes again to look at her fingers, she could still see remnants beneath her fingernails.

Alma shook her head. "I am sorry, Rose. No-one came in matching that description. The last person to come inside before you was a man, but he doesn't sound like your friend."

She released a breath that she hadn't known she was holding and closed her eyes against the sting of tears. Surely they would've brought him here if they'd sent him to prison. Either if they knew he was an alien or if they assumed he was like her, an alien sympathiser. "Is this the only infirmary? The only place where they send aliens? Or alien sympathisers?"

"Yes."

With that single word, she felt her hope start to fade. He wasn't here. Oh, god, he wasn't here. Which meant…

She stared somewhere into the distance beyond Alma's shoulder, feeling as though something inside her was dying. "I'm alone," she whispered.

"Rose, do you know basic first aid?" Alma asked, and the sound of the alien's voice jerked Rose out of her reverie.

"Yeah, a bit. But only for humans," 'And Time Lords', she thought about adding, but that didn't matter any more, did it? He was gone.

"That is fine. Please, come with me. You will attend the latest patient. He doesn't need much, just cleaning and general minding, but it is something to do," Alma said, resting a hand on her shoulder. It felt for a moment as if a wave of calm swept over her and she felt almost numb in its wake. "It will get better," Alma told her and then ushered her across the room.

As they walked, she caught a glimpse of Exir's face and was unable to prevent the gasp that escaped her lips in reaction. Half of Exir's face was that of an almost angelic young boy. The other was horribly scarred, almost melted-looking. Alma turned to face her and smiled sadly. "That is our punishment, Rose," she said softly. "This may not seem like a punishment for now, but you will eventually learn. They will come for you at some point."

"Who will?" she asked, unable to tear her gaze away from Exir's ruined face.

"The guards. They take one of us with them every few days. When we come back - well, you can see the results."

She shivered, unable to fathom Alma's calm response. "Don't you fight back? It's not right!"

Alma's lips curled upwards in a faint parody of a smile. "Look around you, Rose. There is much that is not right here. We can only do what we are able, nothing more."

"You can fight back," she tried again.

Alma shook her head and pointed at Rulan. "Rulan tried that once, Rose. You see how the left side of his body seems to droop? That is what happened to him in the aftermath of his rebellion. Do not follow his path. For now, please, there is nothing you or any of us can do." In an abrupt change of subject, the alien pointed at the bed just in front of them. "This is our newcomer and your assignment."

She wasn't happy with the change of subject, but she knew that Alma was uncomfortable with her questions. She would try again later, she decided, when the memory of this conversation had started to fade.

Focusing on the man before her, she did have to admit that her patient – well, technically he was Alma's, though she was assigned to him – was lovely to look at. His face was slack in sleep, but she could tell from the lines around his mouth and his eyes that he was accustomed to much smiling.

It was a nice face, she decided. A kind face. And for some reason that made her miss the Doctor all the more. When she looked up again from her observation of the man, she found that Alma had left her to go attend something else in the infirmary. "Right," she murmured. The only thing for it was for her to try to determine just what had been done with him and what needed to be done.

She touched his face with the back of her hand, reminding herself that even though he looked human he probably wasn't. The skin was warm and slightly clammy to the touch, but she didn't think that was worrying. His pulse, when she let her fingers touch the side of his neck, was steady. There was a flutter of something additional to the steady beat against her fingers. A second heart?

She kept her fingers there for a moment longer, just in case, but there was nothing more. She was imagining it. Of course he only had one heart.

God, she missed the Doctor.

Rose closed her eyes, blocking out the view of her patient and the infirmary. In her mind, she could imagine that this was nothing more than a nightmare. At any moment, the Doctor would knock on her door and tell her that it was time to get up, throwing in some comment about apes sleeping their lives away.

She didn't realise she was crying until she felt a tear splash onto her hand. Opening her eyes again, she decided that the best thing she could do at the moment was to watch and wait for the opportunity to escape to present itself. She needed to know more about this place, about how big it was and the routines that everyone followed.

To do that, she had to talk to Alma and the others. But, for now, she decided to deal with the man. She couldn't keep calling him 'man' or 'sir' or even use the numbers embroidered on his tunic. John seemed like a fitting name for him, she decided.

So John it was.

Her assignments grew until she had ten patients under her care. But she would always come back to John, spending the most time, unless someone was in immediate need of her assistance, with him.

She started cataloguing the little things about John after a while. How she could get a reaction, even though it was the faintest quirk of his lips, out of him when she touched his side. How many freckles there were across his face – 58, though she lost track at least twice and had to start again.

Taking care of him was numbing work. Cleaning him, changing the solution that fed him nutrients, shifting him so he didn't get bedsores. She discovered that it helped to dampen the grief she felt for the loss of the Doctor. Losing herself in caring for someone else was the easiest thing in the world to do, she found.

She wasn't certain when she started talking to him. Maybe it'd started an hour after Alma had first left her alone with him. Maybe it was sooner. But she found herself telling him things that she hadn't told the Doctor. Words that she wished she'd said while she'd had the chance. Words that he'd never hear.

John was a very sympathetic listener, she discovered. Even though he never responded, she always felt better after talking to him.

Alma never berated her for spending so much time with John. In fact, she encouraged it, telling Rose that this was the best way to bring him out of his coma. Hearing gentle voices, knowing that someone cared, sometimes was more than enough to bring someone back from the brink.

There were times when she wondered if that'd be enough for her. Knowing that her Mum was out there somewhere, not knowing if she was alive or dead, didn't really help. She couldn't expect any comforting embraces now. Couldn't expect to see her again.

The reality of her situation was obvious. When she escaped – there was no room for 'if' in this particular equation – she wasn't certain what she could do. She could probably find the TARDIS, but without her key – gone, along with everything else that she'd had on her person – she couldn't get inside. Without the Doctor, she doubted that she could manage to find her way home again.

For better or worse, she was stuck.

Sighing, she ran her hand through her hair, wincing when it caught on a snarl. She tried her best to keep herself groomed, but with the meagre facilities that they had – consisting of a sink and a little harsh soap – there wasn't much she could do. She couldn't keep clean here, not as clean as she was accustomed.

And there were other problems. As the day headed towards night – or what passed for it in this enclosed space – Alma and the others got jumpy, starting at every noise. Something about their movements, about the almost-panic in Exir's face, made her draw closer to John's bed, needing the fragile comfort that he offered.

It was strange, she decided, to allow herself to feel comforted in a place like this. She was far more alone than she'd ever been before. Without the Doctor…

She ruthlessly stopped that train of thought before it could go further. John's expression was peaceful and she could almost allow herself to believe that everything was all right – but how could it be when the Doctor was dead?

That was when she heard the screeching sound of the door sliding upwards. She didn't remember it being that loud when she first came here, but perhaps it was the anticipation that made it stronger. There was a clatter of something being dropped behind her and of scrambling footsteps as the others moved away from the entrance.

Rose didn't move. Perhaps it was fear that held her in place, or maybe it was simply because she was standing next to John, but she stayed as two guards and a balding man in a blue-coloured smock came into view.

They were close now, just on the other side of John's bed. The balding man looked at her scornfully for a moment before moving on, scanning the room with his gaze. The guards – including her friend from earlier, the one who'd all but implied that he would return for her – seemed to be ready for some sort of action.

She remembered Alma's words earlier, describing how the humans would experiment on the people here, how none of them were uninjured from their stay in this prison. Fear caused her palms to sweat and the hairs at the back of her neck to rise. Fear quickened her breathing and sped up her pulse.

When the balding man finished his survey of the room, he pointed his finger. "That one," he said.

He was pointing at her.

To be continued...