Something I forgot to mention in the first chapter: this is set before Day of the Doctor. It's just one of Clara and the Doctor's random adventures.
This chapter is a little longer and much more actiony. I now suppose that I was unconsciously trying to make up for the lack of action in the first chapter. A fair bit of the action is in here, really. Anyway, enjoy.
Winnie was the first of her team in the next morning, having spent only seven hours away from the hospital. When she arrived at her patient's room, she found Mr. Mott talking to two people she hadn't seen before. A tall, thin man in tweed and a shorter woman in jeans and a cardigan.
Winnie went into the room to check up on her patient and find out who the two people were. Before she even asked how Mr. Mott was doing, he introduced the man and woman to her.
"Dr. Roman, this is my friend Dr. Smith and his assistant Clara," said Mr. Mott.
Winnie shook Dr. Smith's hand, and then Clara's.
"If you're here to help," Winnie said, "I'm glad. My team and I are rather stuck."
Dr. Smith opened his mouth to say something, but Clara took a quick look at him and spoke over him.
"Yes, we're here to help. Can you tell us what you know?"
Winnie brought Dr. Smith and Clara to the conference room, and introduced them to Dr. Gray and Dr. Davidson.
"What we know isn't much," Winnie began. "We've run every test we have on Mrs. Temple-Noble, and they all came up empty. Nothing seems to be physically wrong with her, which lead me to believe that her comatose state was brought on by something psychological … Though I have no hard information to back that up."
"Could I examine Donna myself?" Smith asked. Winnie nodded.
"I'll show you back to her room."
Smith (who asked to just be called "the Doctor," but no way was Winnie going to do that) asked to examine Mrs. Temple-Noble alone. Winnie stood outside the door and peaked inside. Smith was holding a cylindrical object with a green light at the end, and pointing it at Mrs. Temple-Noble; it was making a strange noise. Clara stood behind him.
"What d'you think is wrong with her, Doctor?" Clara asked.
"My guess is she managed to remember everything that I wiped from her mind," Smith replied.
"And that's bad?"
"Yes. It means her mind is overloaded with information. Donna Noble … I should have known that she would find a way to remember it all."
Winnie leaned against the outside wall again, processing what she had just heard. Mind wipe, she thought. At least I was correct about why she's in a coma, but "overloaded with information"? Smith, the Doctor, whoever he was, was not who he was supposed to be; Winnie was sure of it.
Winnie called for Smith to join her outside when he had put the cylinder object back in his jacket. She lead him to the staircase and, after making sure that the staircase was empty, cornered him. She shook her head to get away the image of the curly-haired man.
"What kind of doctor are you?" Winnie asked. "You pop up from nowhere, and say things like wiped from her mind and overloaded with information."
"Dr. Roman, listen, I –" Smith stopped and grabbed Winnie's right wrist. She held her old pocketwatch in her hand; Winnie hadn't even realized that she'd taken it out of her pocket. "What –"
Winnie yanked her wrist out of Smith's hand and shoved her pocketwatch into the pocket of her lab coat.
"You have a pocketwatch."
Winnie mentally rolled her eyes. "Yes, I have a bloody pocketwatch. That's not the point, what kind of doctor are you?"
"Is it broken?"
"What?" Winnie huffed and crossed her arms.
"Your pocketwatch, is it broken?" Smith grasped Winnie's shoulders and stared into her eyes. Winnie forcefully removed his hands and took off up the stairs.
"What does it matter?! Never mind, meet us in the conference room in ten minutes and report on your examination of Mrs. Temple-Noble." Winnie stopped before she exited the stairwell. "Get your head together, for god's sake!" She slammed the door on her way out.
Winnie paged Gray and Davidson and headed for the conference room. On her way there, she tried to rid herself of the voices in her head. A deep, man's voice and a lighter, woman's voice.
You have absolutely no sense of responsibility whatsoever! said the woman.
What? said the man
You're capricious, the woman's voice continued, arrogant, self-opinionated, irrational, and you don't even know where we're going!
Exactly! the man replied.
Winnie ducked into a bathroom, carefully placed her glasses in the pocket without her pocketwatch, and splashed cold water on her face. She leaned on the counter with her fingers spread widely and looked at herself in the mirror. She was tired; there were bags under her eyes.
Winnie pushed her glasses back onto her face and stared down at her hands. They were just barely shaking. She clenched them into fists, angry at herself for wearing down, and rushed to the conference room.
Winnie couldn't focus while Smith gave his brief "report" on Mrs. Temple-Noble's condition. She played with her pocketwatch and its broken clasp, and was thankful for the beeping of her pager that metaphorically brought her brain back into her skull.
Winnie, Davidson, and Gray jumped out of their chairs and ran down the halls before Smith had the chance to ask about it, but he and his assistant followed close behind.
Mrs. Temple-Noble convulsed violently, and the bed clanged with her. Her husband tried to hold her down, but it was no use. The doctors took over. Gray actually issued the orders, but everyone managed to work in harmony before the words were out of her mouth.
As Mrs. Temple-Noble calmed, Winnie noticed a gold dust floating from her mouth. It disappeared soon after, but she was sure that Smith also noticed it. He and Clara exchanged a look with each other, then with Mr. Mott.
They know something that I don't, Winnie thought.
Davidson and Gray took Mrs. Temple-Noble for another scan. Mr. Mott went to call Sylvia, and Mr. Temple took their daughter, little Evy, down to the canteen for some chips. Smith and Clara attempted to sneak off, but were noticed by Winnie, who promptly followed them. They hurried through the halls; it was difficult for Winnie to keep up with them at a pace where she would not be noticed. Smith and Clara ducked through a door marked Restricted. When Winnie went through the door, she was faced with a large, old fashioned police box. She circled it, but there was no sign of Smith or Clara. Winnie put her palms onto the police box. She felt a jolt of … something, electricity?, shoot through her body and pulled her hands back.
Time And Relative Dimensions In Space, Winnie heard from nowhere. She shook her head, wiped her hands on her pants, and opened the police box doors to check inside.
She faced a dark, circular room, glowing blue from a cylinder in the center. Smith and Clara were side by side at the console surrounding the cylinder. Smith was pushing buttons and flicking switches, keeping his eyes on a screen the whole time. Clara would point to something on the screen every few seconds.
Clara asked why the Doctor couldn't fix Mrs. Temple-Noble now, but Winnie was distracted by the fact that the room surrounding her shouldn't have been there.
Winnie whimpered. The voices in her head where overlapping, getting louder. Clara looked over at her. She hit the Doctor lightly to get his attention.
"Dr. Roman," he said, walking over to her.
Winnie shook her head. She couldn't make out what the voices were saying, but they were the same ones that had been in her head earlier. She groaned and put her hands over her ears, bending over slightly.
"Winnie," Smith whispered. He put a hand on her shoulder.
Winnie ran out the doors, through the hospital halls, simply away. She only stopped when she realized she was on the roof of the hospital. She took lungfuls of fresh, cool air, and discarded her lab coat. Winnie sat cross-legged on the concrete of the roof. She put her elbows on her knees and her head in her hands.
After a few minutes, Winnie heard the door to the roof open, then shut. Footsteps came towards her. She felt a hand on her shoulder.
"Winnie," said Smith, in a voice which was not quite a whisper. Winnie jumped up.
"No," she said angrily, pointing a finger at him. "This is nonsense. Who are you?"
"My name is the Doctor," Smith replied.
"No!" Winnie shouted. "Bloody hell, tell me your real name!"
"The Doctor. Winnie –"
"I'm so bloody tired of your avoidances and lies," Winnie lowered her voice. She put her lab coat back on. "I have yet to see you use any actual medical training. You're not even a proper doctor, are you? You say things like wiped from her mind and overloaded with information, and it doesn't make any sense!" Winnie let out a short, rough scream. "And what was that bloody light thing that you pointed at my patient? Did it harm her?"
"No, no, of course not," Smith assured her. "It's a scanner, look," he took it from the pocket of his tweed coat and held it out to her. Winnie snatched it from his hand and looked it over.
Bloody nonsense, she thought. It looked like nothing she'd ever seen. Winnie tossed it back to him and walked towards the door which lead back into the hospital.
"I'm going home," she said as she walked. "If the others ask, tell them I've got a migraine and I'll be back early tomorrow." Winnie opened the door and turned to look at Smith. "I don't want to see you again. Take your assistant and leave this hospital." Winnie slammed the door behind her, not realizing that her pocketwatch had fallen out of her lab coat and now laid on the concrete of the roof. Smith picked it up and pocketed it.
When the Doctor was John Smith, he got very upset and confused when Martha told him that he was the Doctor. I decided that I wanted Winnie to get very angry. Plus, as a doctor and a mother, she's quite smart and has every reason to reject what the Doctor is saying, for her sake and for her daughter's.
And if you're wondering why the Doctor is referred to as Smith, it's because that's how Winnie sees him, as Dr. Smith.
Thanks for a reading; I'd love a review. :)