Chapter 7 – Arduous

"Jack?!"

Jack came back to life just in time to find Gwen leaning over him, shaking his shoulder. He blinked, trying to recall what had happened before he had been shot.

"That little bastard!" he exclaimed as he used a combination of Gwen and supply boxes to get onto his feet. "It shot me!" He quickly looked around the room, noticing the missing element almost instantly. "Where's the Doctor?"

"He was gone when I got here…" Gwen answered, pressing a hand to her earpiece. "Tosh, you got his tracker?"

"He's headed towards the main room where the Fraxian directed you to. From what I can make out through his microphone he's at gunpoint, about to be experimented on too."

Jack quickly retrieved his weapon from the floor, putting it in his holster. "Okay, we're gonna go for plan B. Get ready guys, this is gonna get messy."


The Doctor whistled, impressed as he was pushed through the corridors by the obviously nervous Fraxian. "Nice ship! Must've cost a bit! Such perfect décor!"

"Be quiet and keep moving!" the Fraxian demanded, ramming his gun into the Doctor's back. The Doctor fell silent, knowing where the line was drawn. He was utterly expendable.

They finally came to stop at double doors, where the Doctor knew the hold lay in wait on the other side. The Fraxian shoved its gun harder into the Doctor's back, leaning forward and placing its hand on a panel at the side. The double doors slid open smoothly, revealing a small bleak room lined with various electrical equipment. A dozen or so Fraxians buzzed around the room looking busy, a platform in the centre of the room whereupon stood six slanted metal tables, metal bands placed in the right places for hands and feet. The Doctor's eyes flickered across them at the helpless human – it was Donna Noble, currently looking at him with an 'it's-about-time' expression.

"Donna!" the Doctor realised, eyes widening in recognition. However, he didn't get the chance to say much else as suddenly Donna yelled, "Doctor, behind you!" but it proved to be too late as the heavy object came crashing down onto his head and he fell to the floor, out cold. "Oh bloody hell," Donna said, rolling her eyes. "What a plank."

"Excellent," the alien with the black box Donna had since dubbed 'Spotty' due to the large growths over its face. "An adult male!"

"Don't touch him, Spotty!" Donna shouted, but the aliens ignored her as they grabbed the Doctor and dragged him across the grated flooring, depositing him mere inches from where Donna was. The aliens were eyeing the Doctor with glee. She could see where this was going…

The alien raised the device to its mouth. "Test two complete. Mature male of the species susceptible to a forced state of unconsciousness through heavy trauma to the 'skull'. Other tests on this area have shown this is the region where the main 'brain' of this species is kept, reference six point seven point one." The alien moved forward to the Doctor, bending down next to him and examining the area where the fire extinguisher had impacted with his skull. "The area of trauma has begun to darken, and internal red matter – reference five point nine point zero – is expelled from the wound…"

Donna struggled against her bonds. "Get away from him, Spotty!"

The alien looked up at Donna, considering her for a moment. "Adult female shows signs of hostility and protective nature over the male. She remains powerless."

"See if I'm powerless when my boot hits your alien genitals!" Donna shrieked. "Let him go or I'll show you what your own liver looks like!"

The Doctor began to stir from unconsciousness, a frown creasing across his forehead as he groaned softly. The alien stood up and backed away from him.

"Adult male shows signs of consciousness precisely 50 zagnons after trauma to the skull. Surfacing is slow."

The Doctor's eyes flickered open and he raised a hand to his painfully throbbing head, bringing it away again to see the glistening of his own blood on his fingertips.

"Adult male is unaware of the extent of the damage until he examines it himself and finds the internal red matter," the alien spoke into his little black box again, and the Doctor looked up, confused, his eyes scanning around until they settled on Donna.

"I ran in like a loony, didn't I?"

Donna nodded. "It was quite funny when you got hit with the fire extinguisher, though."

"I'm sure it was," the Doctor muttered, hand still on his head.

"Male shows capability of language. The female and male are able to interact together in a pleasant manner."

The Doctor snorted with laughter. Donna glared at him.

"Commence test three," the alien said, nodding to one of its associates. It stepped forward, grabbing the Doctor and hauling him onto both feet. The Doctor struggled, enough to throw them off of him before he received a blow between his shoulders and he fell back down flat onto the floor.

"Adult male shows signs of struggle, discipline seems to be invoking discomfort from trauma to the physical body…"

Donna shrieked in disapproval as the alien issued a harsh, square blow to the Doctor's abdomen. He jolted, eyes flying open and coughing intensely as he curled in on himself in agony, arms wrapped around his midriff.

"As in all the other test subjects, trauma to the midsection introduces difficulty in the respiratory process…" the alien bent down to the Doctor, and looked genuinely surprised. "And in the adult male causes the ejection of their red matter…"

Donna's eyes widened. He was coughing up blood?! The baby…

"Don't you dare hurt him again! He's sick!" Donna screamed, but again found herself being ignored. The aliens grabbed the Doctor again and hauled him onto his feet, and this time he didn't struggle as he continued to cough up blood. They slammed him down onto a metal table and fixed his hands and feet into the metal bands; his body limp with blood running in rivulets down the side of his face from his head wound. Donna once again struggled against her bonds as the Doctor was suddenly bathed in a warm blue light, the aliens furiously tapping at a nearby computer.

"Interesting," the alien surmised. "It looks as though the male of the species carries the offspring… which would explain the protective nature of his mate."

Donna sighed. "I'm not his mate!"

The alien regarded her for a moment, before speaking into the box again. "It seems like the female of the species does not assign herself to one male…"

Donna's eyes widened. "Are you callin' me a slut?"

"… The male remains in a low state of consciousness and continues to eject red matter. The male appears to have a binary vascular system…"

Donna had had just about enough of being ignored. She threw back her head, took in a huge lungful of air… "LET! HIM! GO!" she screamed in the full force of the Noble loudmouth heritage, the aliens suddenly grabbing the sides of their heads and falling to the floor in agony.

"Female displays mammalian response of a high pitched cry that hurts the tympanic membrane!" the alien gasped into his black box, clearly in pain.

"And that's only the beginning if you don't let them go!" came a voice from the doorway, and to Donna Noble it was as though Superman had come to save the day. Captain Jack Harkness stepped through, his gun raised high in the air; his handsome features perfectly lit and defined in the dark, lifeless environment. "I don't appreciate people torturin' my friends, y'know."

"Kill him!" the alien shrieked of its soldiers, and instantly the deafening sound of laser weapons exploded from out of nowhere, aiming towards Jack. He ducked and rolled, Donna's heart racing as she swooned in adoration. Suddenly the room was in chaos as Jack ducked and jumped around the room, leading the trigger-happy aliens away from the doorway.

"Now, Gwen!" Jack shouted over his shoulder and the Welsh woman appeared in the doorway wearing a gas mask, throwing some kind of grenade into the room. Instantly a white jet of gas hissed out of the grenade and Donna's vision being to go blurry, her head heavy on her shoulders…

Jack left the collapsing aliens behind him, fixing his gas mask over his face as he reached the bound Doctor and Donna. Donna was already rendered unconscious by the gas, and the Doctor's eyes slipped shut the moment Jack reached him. Jack reached inside the Doctor's jacket pocket and brought out the sonic screwdriver, buzzing at the Doctor's restraints and catching the unconscious Time Lord in both arms before Gwen appeared next to him. He passed her the sonic.

"Press here!" He demonstrated to her and she nodded, turning to Donna. Jack adjusted the Doctor in his grip and started towards the door, but alien reinforcements were already arriving. He spun back around to Gwen and Donna, but Gwen was cornered, held at gunpoint with her arms in the air.

"Run, Jack!" she implored, her voice loud and clear through his earpiece. For a moment Jack shifted uncomfortably on his feet, indecision gripping him before a laser hit the wall right next to his head. The weight of the precious cargo in his arms made itself clear and he finally turned tail, and ran.

He burst out of the warehouse door and sprinted out into the main road, ordering Ianto to bring the SUV around. He was aware he was probably being pursued so he kept running until the SUV screeched to a halt beside him, the door flying open before he threw himself in and it pulled sharply away.

Owen quickly passed an oxygen mask to Jack who held it to the Doctor's face, still cradling him in both arms. The Doctor remained still as Owen began to examine his head wound.

"What did they do?" Owen asked, wiping at the blood to reveal a spectacular black and purple bruise already forming.

"When we got there they hit him in the stomach, he started coughin' up blood," Jack replied as Owen finished cleaning the wound.

"I need to scan," Owen said instantly, checking the Doctor's pupils for dilation. "The ba… spawn might have been injured." He pulled away, checking the oxygen canister was releasing a sufficient amount of oxygen.

The Doctor was beginning to stir. His eyes flickered open straight up to meet Jack looking down at him, almost leaping out of Jack's arms in shock. It took a moment before Jack realised he still had his gas mask on.

"Are you my mummy?" Jack joked, and the Doctor managed a smile before he suddenly erupted into coughing again, coating the inside of the mask in red. Owen swore and pulled it off again as Jack helped the Doctor to sit up, the Time Lord's arms wrapped resolutely around his abdomen as he groaned in agony, breathing rapidly. Owen drew up his shirt and felt over his swollen stomach, the Doctor hissing in pain and tensing further in Jack's grip.

"It's swelling," Owen muttered, more to himself than the others. "The internal bleeding is making the abdominal muscles swollen and rigid. Trouble is, the spawn doesn't want the muscles to go rigid. It wants to expand."

The Doctor continued to breathe rapidly, back arched in Jack's arms with his eyes closed tightly, before once again coughing up blood all over Jack's shirt. Jack winced at the destruction of his best shirt as Owen reached into his medical bag and picked out a needle, jabbing it expertly into the Doctor's arm and pushing it down. The Doctor's movements gradually began to slow more and more until he finally sagged completely in Jack's grip, still breathing rapidly.

"Putting him out of his misery," Owen explained his actions. Jack nodded in reply, looking down at the Doctor as Owen placed a fresh Oxygen mask over the Time Lord's face. Jack could feel Owen's eyes resting on him as he adjusted the mask, pulling the Doctor further onto his lap. "He won't die tonight," Owen assured him, his face of sincerity. "This is nothing."


A/N: (sadface) Poor Doctor, you'd have thought he'd have learnt by now not to take part in any fic I write :-/