One more chapter to go ... not telling you what happens then but I'm sure you'll hazard a guess...
12. Just The Thing For Healing The Synapses
He materialised inside the TARDIS, scrambling to his wife's bedside, kneeling next to her and grasping her hands.
"River? Are you in there? Can you hear me?" He had never done this before – talked to someone like this. He had only seen it in earth films were the coma victim can hear everything that's said around them.
"I-I went back there. I...tried to kill them – to punish them for what they did to you... I tried. I couldn't do it – I'm not that strong." He looked down at her pale form, which was now not that strong either. He stroked her hair, brushing a curl away from her face and holding her hand.
"I'm only as strong as you make me, and I can't – I can't lose you. I can't go back... Don't make me go back to being alone, because I can't, River. I love you..."
He had wished to stir her like this, but he soon realised that there was some other way, and he was determined to find out what it was. He spoke more seriously now, speaking and trying to direct the words into her mind at the same time.
"Is there anything you can tell me? Anything I can do to help you?"
Her eyelids fluttered, and her hands squeezed his gently, so he leant forward, trying to reach her mind with his. He heard something - a buzzing – no, a whistling – before he was shut out of her mind. He sat back, completely and utterly lost.
...
Then he heard it – the same noise, but coming from somewhere in The TARDIS. His head shot up, and he called out Jack's name, springing from the bed and bolting out of the bedroom door.
He barrelled through the doors, running, practically sprinting to follow the source of the noise, getting closer each second until he fell into The TARDIS kitchen, entering to see Jack fiddling with two mugs and two spoons.
"What are you doing?" he asked, puzzled as to why Jack was here, in the same room that River had regenerated in just hours before.
"I'm just making some tea – I thought you should eat or drink something." Jack replied, confused as to what had suddenly made him appear here, talking urgently as if he was on a mission – which of course he was.
The Doctor's eyes flicked from Jack to the kettle on the kitchen counter, and suddenly everything, EVERYTHING – became clear.
"Tea..."he breathed.
"Doctor, what is it? What's wrong?" Jack asked worryingly.
"Not wrong, right! Don't you see? When she started regenerating, she came here! I can't believe I didn't see it before!" He spun around, grabbing Jack by the arms and shaking him.
"I don't understand? Why did she come here?" Jack didn't know how to treat The Doctor when he was like this, didn't know how to respond to his Eureka moment when he didn't even understand what his epiphany was.
"I tried to reach her – psychically. All I could hear was the sound of a kettle boiling! She was trying to tell me how to help her!" His face was lit up with understanding, and the knowledge that he could maybe revive River.
"How? How can we help her, Doctor?" He still wasn't making any sense – they wouldn't be able to help her at all until The Doctor told him what he had figured out.
"Tea! Tea is the answer!" he yelled triumphantly, waving his arms in the air madly, gesturing to the mugs with tea bags in them. Suddenly, what he had worked out clicked in Jack's mind, and he was suddenly able to comprehend the remedy that The Doctor had concocted.
"Of course! The superheated infusion of free-radicals and tannin!" Just the thing for healing the synapses...
"Come on!" The Doctor shouted, anxious to revive her as quickly as possible.
Jack filled a mug, and they walked as briskly as the overflowing liquid would allow back to where she was resting. They quickly arrived outside the bedroom door, pushing it open with as much speed as the frame could muster.
"If this doesn't work..." Jack started, as The Doctor knelt by River's bedside and raised the mug of tea to her face, and Jack sat down next to him, folding his arms.
"It's got to," The Doctor said simply, holding the mug to her lips and tipping a few drops carefully into her mouth. Jack took the mug back, and they both stood still, awaiting at least some kind of response from her.
"Doctor, I don't think..." Jack was interrupted by a coughing and spluttering from the bed beside him, and River sat straight up, gasping for air as the last breath of time energy left her.
The Doctor let out a strangled cry of happiness, crushing her into his chest and kissing the top of her head repeatedly.
"Doctor..." she struggled to catch her breath.
He pulled away, but instead pressed his lips to hers gently. This seemed to encourage some kind of response from her, at least – but it wasn't really a response really suitable for company.
"Uh, guys? Usually I'd say get a room, but obviously we're already in it, so..."
They broke apart, faces still touching.
"I thought I'd lost you..." he told her gently, trying to tell her in this one sentence how much it would've hurt to lose her forever.
"You'll never lose me – I'm going to stay with you – always." She told him firmly, like it was fact – and The Doctor knew in his hearts that she was right -
"Forever..." he agreed.
I rewatched practically the whole of The Christmas Invasion just to find out what it was about tea that he said.
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I mean really soon. I'm talking like, next chapter soon.
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