"Is the horrible pain coming back?" Jack asked.
"I don't know," the Doctor admitted on a whine. "I hope not."
"It won't be long until dinner arrives," Martha commented. "Then, after that I'll give you the zolpidem and we'll see how much sleep you can get."
"Okay."
"I know I must be sounding like a broken record but you really need to just try to rest and stay relaxed," Martha explained. She got up from her work area and checked the drain coming out of his knee without touching him. There was a lot of fluid still building up suggesting that the swelling had not yet finished coming out within his leg. She checked under the ice packs and looked at the level of swelling along his leg to make sure that the edges of the cast weren't digging in anywhere. It looked to be good still, but the swelling was very evident, still it was being accommodated by the foam in the cast so it wasn't critical yet.
"What do you have available from the TARDIS to work as an anti-inflammatory?" Martha asked the Doctor sure that he must have something.
"Nothing I can use."
"Okay," Martha sighed. "And, you can't take ibuprofen or diclofenac can you?"
"No, I'm allergic to both."
"There must be a Time Lord equivalent?" Jack commented. "It's a standard drug isn't it? How come you don't carry anything on the TARDIS?"
"I had plenty but I've used them over the years and I can't stock up," the Doctor commented. "I just have to make do with generic drugs or what I've got left."
"Is there nothing generic you can take?"
"I have an anti-inflammatory drug but it can't be used at the moment."
"Does it interact with Bladamine or the dijalipam?" Martha wondered why something couldn't be used. Maybe when he had been given the sedation to help him sleep they might be able to change one of the drugs over for a few hours and at least give him a chance of getting the swelling down.
"No."
"Then why can't you take it?"
"The only one I have in stock is given by direct application," the Doctor advised.
"What does that mean?"
"It is held in a slow release pod that is injected into the swollen tissues where the medication is released over a period of time. They are injected using a high pressure interface and you can't do that. I can't take ketamine again, and I don't have the local preceding medications that go with it left. I used them and… it would hurt too much."
"But, is it effective?"
"You can't use it."
"How long does the slow release drug pod last?" Martha asked him.
"31 hours."
"31? That is an odd time frame?"
"There are 31 Earth hours in a Gallifreyan day," the Doctor commented.
"So, what are the preceding medications? How would it normally be administered?"
"An effective analgesic ointment is applied to the area where it is going to be implanted. Then a subcutaneous local anaesthetic is delivered into the tissues where it is going to be implanted. Then once they have taken effect the pod is injected directly into the skin utilising a high pressure system. The pod is slightly pointed and only a few millimetres long so it goes through the skin and into the tissues. It is possible that my skin is already too stretched with swelling that if it was delivered then the skin would split," the Doctor worried. "And, I don't have the ointment or local that works in conjunction with it, so it can't be used."
"I'd not worry about your skin splitting, we can select areas here the swelling is not so extreme," Martha advised. "Maybe we should look at it? If it is going to take the swelling down more quickly then we will be able to get you into surgery more rapidly and that will relieve a lot of the pain you're experiencing," Martha suggested.
"Martha, I've seen the high pressure delivery systems he's talking about. They need to be activated by pressing them down against the skin. It hurts enough when you've not got an injury," Jack commented. "I don't think you'd be able to use it." He sided with the Doctor not wanting to think about how much it would hurt if it was pressed deep against his knee or his shin or his ankle to deliver the capsule of drugs.
"Is it in the same place in the TARDIS for Jack to pick up?" Martha asked the Doctor. "We can look at it. I might be able to access the medication and we could come up with another way to do it? Maybe we could put it into the drip."
"It's not a water soluble medication. It is oil based," the Doctor commented. "It has been specifically developed for the direct delivery. I had other stuff that was just oral, but I've used all of that."
"Could our chemists recreate it?" Martha asked the Doctor.
"I don't know."
"I will go over to the TARDIS and get it." Jack thought if they could look it at the same time as discussing it that Martha would see how it would not be suitable to use on the Doctor.
"Dinner will be here shortly," Martha commented. "Go over and pick it up afterward." Martha had seen some basic needle-less systems so she had an idea what the concerns were. If she had to press it down onto the Doctor's leg with any kind of force to deliver the drugs then it would be agony, but, if she could give it to him without causing him further injury then she thought the benefit might be better than the pain it caused delivering it. The benefit of him having surgery sooner would be far greater than causing pain providing him the medication if there was no other way around it.
When the meals arrived Gerald went and fetched what had been ordered for the East Wing. There were two fish and chips and two chicken and chips along with bread and butter, peas, and sweetcorn fritters as sides. The Doctor wasn't hungry and he still felt a bit sick, but he knew he had to eat something, not only so he could take the night medication, but also because his body was fatigued and needed resource. He was feeling generally achy so he needed to provide nutrition. He knew it wasn't the most nutritious of meals but he had chips, mushy peas, and tomato ketchup. Jack accused him of having enough sauce on his chips for it to qualify as one of his five a day.
Once they had eaten Gerald made teas and Martha got someone to take Jack over to get the drugs from the TARDIS. The Doctor thought it was a waste of time. The drug was not water soluble so it could not be put in the drop and it could not be injected locally, especially not into his smashed leg, without anaesthesia that he could not be given.
When Martha examined the delivery system from Jack she checked the amount of pressure she had to apply to prime the injection system to trigger. It felt like it was going to bruise her even if she wasn't injured, but, if she selected the right point they she would be able to deliver it without causing further injury or upsetting the temporary reduction of his cast leg. If she could get a dose into his knee and one into his ankle then it would be effective along his whole lower leg and foot and give them a chance.
"You're right that it is going to be too painful for you to endure," Martha told the Doctor. She did not mention her intention to give him it anyway, she just put it to the side. "It would be quite a good system if you had the anaesthesia, but I'm surprised that there isn't a more painless method of giving it considering it is designed to be given at the site of injuries. It is a shame we can't give you ketamine with the dijalipam or that would have been ideal."
"There are lots of better systems but I've run out of all of them," the Doctor commented.
While they were finishing their drinks and debating on whether they should send Gerald for ice cream the cowboys came back. Not with a full blooded stallion, but it was a more energetic ride than the last mare. It left the Doctor reeling and feeling deflated, so when it passed Martha gave him three 10mg zolpidem tablets to help him get to sleep. It was getting on for half seven and he was exhausted so she thought it the best option.
"How quickly will they work?" Jack asked Martha, but she looked to the Doctor who was wondering if he would have a chance to fit in a last cup of hot tea.
"About 20 minutes," the Doctor offered. Gerald went to make him a cup of tea, happy to stay on to make sure he was settled, even though his shift had technically finished two hours earlier. At least he'd got his dinner provided. He was staying in the college accommodation rather than the general barracks and it was nicer, but it didn't have a canteen, it was self-catering so he often stayed a bit late with Martha and got his tea there. She didn't mind.
By the time the Doctor was half way through his tea he was starting to drift off. Jack ended up having to rescue the cup before he poured the dregs from the bottom down his front. He was definitely getting sleepy. "Let's lie you down a bit more now," Martha eased the back of the bed down with the bed control. It was slow and gentle enough that the mechanism didn't hurt his leg and he relaxed back. "How is that? Are you comfortable?"
"S'okay…" the Doctor slurred as the drugs were quickly taking him off to sleep.
"Good, you're going to be asleep any minute, so how about you give Jack a goodnight hug?" Martha prompted and glanced to Jack as she discretely picked up the high pressure injection system for the medication. Jack hadn't realised she was going to do it. He wrapped his arms around the Doctor and held him as the dozy Time Lord was falling asleep.
"He's probably going to faint," Martha suggested quietly to Jack. "Then the drugs will keep him under so he will rest. It should work out quite well." She hoped that it would. She got Gerald to come over and to hold the cast as she put the pressure injector to the side of his knee, low down and close to the edge of the cast. It was on the opposite side to the drip. Gerald held the cast still as Martha applied the pressure needed to depress the end of the injection system and activate it.
"It's okay." Jack felt sick as the Doctor screamed in his arms, but he quickly went totally limp as Martha injected the drug and a small fatty globule of medication was fired into his knee. Jack carried on holding the Doctor even though he'd fainted as Martha expected, but the Doctor was so far under that he didn't even flinch when she injected another dose into the front of his smashed ankle.
"That is it done," Martha commented.
"He's out of it." Jack let go of the Doctor making sure that he was in the middle of the bed when he let go of him. He was sound asleep. Martha put the oxygen mask on for him for a while as he slept and she changed the drip over and swapped the ice packs so they were fresh and cold.
"Hopefully he will sleep peacefully for a few hours at least," Martha suggested. "He's knackered more than anything and that affects the way he interprets the pain he is in."
"I think he might be cross with you for giving him those injections," Jack warned Martha as he caressed the Doctor's hair from his clammy face. Even as he was sound asleep with the bruising and swelling on his face he didn't look particularly peaceful. Away from the dark blues and purples his skin was porcelain white making him look ghostly and sick. "He is going to be okay, isn't he?" Jack asked Martha quietly. "I mean seriously? None of the hopefully, probably, should be, ifs? Is he going to be alright? His leg is smashed up isn't it?"
"I've not lied to anyone when I've said I'm optimistic that he will make a good recovery, but I can't promise it. There is room for there to be complications. We will know more once we are able to operate and we can measure how well he comes back together and how he starts to heal. He's got a lot of soft tissue damage that can be considered just as serious as the fractures and also needs surgical intervention. It's not straight forward, but it's not the end of the world either. I don't think it is a life changing injury, but, if things don't go well then it could be."
"That isn't what I wanted to hear," Jack sighed.
"You know as well as I do that I can't give any guarantees Jack." Martha sighed. "Hopefully we have got him to the point where the neurological pain is tolerable even if it is not ideal. At the moment he is too tired and too sore and too worried to be too bothered about things, but when he is more recovered we really need to make sure he doesn't get too bored because then he is going to start to get non-compliant and he could do himself further damage. He will really need to behave, but I am also worried he may end up getting depressed. You know how dark he can get when things don't go his way," Martha confided and the Captain nodded.
"I think there is something he's not told us about what he has been up to as well. The last thing I know he was involved in was the bus that got zapped through a wormhole. I've read the debriefs and I'm not sure there is anything in them that could have been especially upsetting to him. From the sounds of it he probably had fun more than anything, but he didn't stay to submit his own report. Apparently he went into the TARDIS to 'arrest himself'," Martha commented and rolled his eyes.
"We can ask him tomorrow," Jack suggested.
"We will do what we can to make sure he is alright. We're all going to have a part to play, as medics, as his friends, and him as a patient. I hope it will all come together in the end, but getting there is going to be difficult, and I need to figure out how to balance looking after him and the rest of my responsibilities or I'll be getting into trouble too."
Jack and Martha chatted quietly for a while, then Jack put another film on and Martha got on with some more work. Gerald had gone back over to the college accommodation for the night but let Martha know if she needed him to come back to help with anything that he would. It was only ten minutes' walk from the campus so he'd be there early in the morning to help with breakfast. Jack joked that he should bring croissants in with him and he said that he would. Gerald wasn't sure where he fit in with regards the informality surrounding the Doctor and his friends and Doctor Jones. He didn't want to alienate himself and seem offish by being too formal, but he didn't want to get into trouble for being too relaxed either.
He thought he would speak to Doctor Jones because he wanted to spend some time with her helping the Doctor to recover, he was an actual alien patient and not an autopsy candidate. A real live alien and the legendary Doctor at that! A lot of doctors thought that making drinks and doing drug charts and things that might be sorted by nurses in another arena was beneath them, but Gerald agreed with Doctor Jones's philosophy in that it made them better well-rounded medics if they were not afraid to make a cup of tea or get a bed pan out for their patients.
Just after Midnight Martha checked the Doctor. He as still comfortable. She changed the drip bag over without disturbing him. He'd slept for four hours which in normal circumstances was probably getting on to a week of sleep. When Martha had helped him with his injured wrist he'd suggested he'd sleep a bit more than usual while he healed. Because it was not a fatal injury – even if it hurt – he would not be able to get into a healing coma and because it was not rapidly fatal he was not going to regenerate, but he would sleep more. She expected the same would apply now he had injured his leg and that he would need to sleep for several hours each night until he was recovered; something that would do him no harm at all.
As the Doctor remained asleep and appeared to be as comfortable as could be expected Martha elected to go into the adjacent room and get a few hours sleep on the bed in there. She made Jack promise that if the Doctor woke up and was in pain or distress that he would come and wake her up. Jack was content to be left on his own to keep an eye on the Time Lord, there was a full video library and plenty of food. He was quite used to wiling away the hours while his friends, colleagues, and sometime lovers slept.
He put another film on and settled in the armchair by the Doctor's bed to watch it with a family sized bag of crisps and a jug of juice. It was hard to concentrate on the film though, now he was on his own his mind kept on replaying what he had seen of the Doctor in the TARDIS. It was the look of absolute terror and excruciating pain on his friend's face that hit Jack the hardest. How vulnerable he actually was when he was off in the TARDIS. Jack even began to doubt that he should have declined the offer of travelling with him again. The Torchwood team had grown beyond behind his team and his responsibility. They were a team in their own right responsible for their own actions and his presence had done nothing to protect them. It had only hurt them and got them killed because of his obsession with his lost brother.
Jack had no idea how he had got from concern about the Doctor breaking his leg to mulling over Gray, Owen, and Tosh. That was not a good way to start a night alone. He tried to concentrate on the film, pausing and putting it back a couple of chapters to the last bit of he remembered watching. He had seen the film a hundred times, it was Shawshank Redemption and a great film. It was one of Ianto's favourites and he had got him to watch it the first time. It would surely be remembered as a classic one day, but Ianto had tried to use it to teach Jack about patience and planning. It was something he lacked and no film was going to change that, as crazy as it was when he had an eternity to wait, waiting was not his strong point. When he wanted something, he wanted it now.
The Doctor moaned.
It brought Jack out of his mix of movie watching, self-analysis, and self-persecution. The Captain wasn't sure if he was waking up, in pain, or dreaming. He got up from the armchair to stand over him for a moment, studying the Time Lord's expression. His calm loss of tension in sleep had gone and his brow furrowed briefly. His arm moved from lying loosely at his side to being over his abdomen. It looked like he tried to swat at something. Jack thought he was probably starting to dream as the drugs took him out of the deepest slumber.
"Four times…" the Doctor mumbled as his brow furrowed again.
"Shhh, Doc, you're dreaming. Just go back to sleep properly," Jack caressed his head. He knew enough about the Doctor to know his dreams were not going to be kind, especially when he'd been given a drug with a potential side effect of 'vivid dreams'. "Sleep. "Jack soothed him and the Doctor seemed to settle back down again. His facial muscles twitched a couple of times, twisting his expression into one of consternation and once what looked like the pain of his leg infiltrating his slumber, but Jack stroked his head slowly and the Time Lord actually sighed as he headed back into a more peaceful rest again, making the Captain smile.
Jack sat back down on the armchair to watch the rest of the film. When it had finished he went back into the small kitchen within the East Wing. It had been stocked up well for them. He made himself another coffee, he often drank it black but when on Doctor watch overnight he decided to have the comfort of sugared coffee with creamer so it was like a soft liquid candy. In the top of the cupboard was a jar of white sugar with four vanilla pods in it. That would be even better, vanilla sugar in coffee was great.
Jack fetched the jar of vanilla sugar down, but while it had not spoiled it must have got slightly damp at some point because it was all stuck together in a single lump. He banged the jar on the bench. Rapping it down lightly so he could try to loosen it enough to get the spoon in. He did it once and then he did it again, when that didn't work he dared to do it a bit harder. The lump of sugar broke up so he could fetch some shards out to stir into his coffee, but he didn't celebrate his success. He abandoned his coffee making exploits and skidded on the smooth tiled floor back into the Doctor's room. The Time Lord was screaming.
"Doctor?! What is it?" Jack rushed back into the Doctor's room. He couldn't immediately see if he was awake or caught in some kind of night terror, but he was screaming and thrashing out on the bed with enough energy that his leg cast was swinging despite the elevated sling being stabilised with additional wires to prevent accidental movement.
The Doctor shrieked, but he didn't sound like he was in pain. He sounded like he was petrified of something. Jack tried to grab hold f him to steady and calm him down, but he Time Lord managed to land a glancing blow on the side of Jack's cheek. It wasn't hard enough to damage him and it was instinctive and not deliberate. The Doctor's eyes were open, but it was clear from his glassy stare that he was not with them but had been transported somewhere horrific in his mind.
The Doctor flailed enough that the drop was wrenched out of his arm leaving a long streak of blood where the pierced vein objected to having the canola ripped back out of it.
"Martha?" Jack called through to her, but she had already been woken by the screaming and was almost at the door before Jack shouted. The Captain grabbed the oxygen mask and went to put it over the Doctor's nose and mouth to try and help him, but the Time Lord screamed even louder and tried to get away from him actually twisting on the bed.
"What happened?" Martha checked as she tried to observe what was going on.
"I was just making myself a coffee and he went berserk!" Jack wasn't entirely sure what had happened himself. "He was asleep when I left and I was only gone a couple of minutes." Jack fretted. He shouldn't have left him to make the coffee. He tried to hold the Doctor's head still long enough to get the mask on.
"Don't try to force the mask on, it will make him panic even more," Martha advised. "It makes him feel claustrophobic for some reason."
"Sorry," the Captain mumbled and dropped the mask. He had been trying to help not to make things worse. The Doctor turned more on the bed and then screeched at a new level with the mix of fear and pan. His panic making him oblivious but the pain his movement caused in his leg making his panic worse in a cycle that he was unlikely to be able to break himself unless he simply passed out and with the cast on his leg split there was a danger he'd upset the reduction of his injuries.
"Jack, hold the cast on his leg as still as you can to stop it moving," Martha instructed as she went to gather the Doctor into a semi-restraining embrace.
"Be careful, he lashed out when I got too close," Jack warned Martha. Martha could see there was blood starting to discolour the bandage that had been supposed to hold the canola in place. It had spurted beyond the fabric initially but then the bandage had closed over the top and now a red blotch was forming. The Time Lord was snatching for breath between cries. His eyes were open, but unfocused and Martha knew he was not consciously aware of his surroundings.
"Doctor? It's Martha. You're dreaming," she told him firmly as she stood out of the ay of his arms. "Are you listening to me? You're just dreaming. You're safe, but, if you carry on like this you're going to hurt your leg," she warned. "Are you listening to me?" she asked him, but got no response.
"I don't think he can hear us."
"I think he can," Martha argued. "I think he's ignoring us in favour of whatever he is dreaming about," Martha suggested. "Now, I'm not very happy about that at all, Doctor." She gripped his shoulder, pushing her thumb and her fingers into his bony joint enough to cause him some pain to try and draw his attention. "Don't you ignore me, Doctor, focus on me," Martha instructed. "I am real, that is just a dream. It is just a dream, Doctor, and you're safe," Martha spoke calmly and clearly. "Now, calm yourself down, you're dreaming and it is not real. You're safe and you need to lie still, so calm yourself down," Martha repeated the words like a mantra.
As the Doctor began to calm slightly Martha moved closer to the bed and released her grip on his shoulder. Instead she took his hand and caressed his head, leaning over him and holding him in a hug so that he could not accidentally strike her but so she could comfort him. "Calm down, Doctor, it's Martha. You're just dreaming and you're safe. You're safe and you're okay," she assured him quietly. "Come on now, Doctor, are you listening to me? You're safe."
"Martha?" the Doctor bleated quietly. His breath was ragged and his leg was screaming with an agony that had reached a new level and he didn't think he was going to survive it.
"Hello," Martha leant away from him and stroked his clammy head. "You're okay. You were having a bad dream," Martha assured him when he looked a little confused as well as pained. The confusion didn't last long in the face of the pain as his awareness became clearer. He groaned and then he cried out, but it was clear in the tone that the cause was no longer his fears but solely his leg.
"We need to get you straightened out a bit on the bed, so you can relax again," Martha commented. "You moved around a bit while you were dreaming. Take deep breaths through your nose," she told him. She used her hug to straighten him back into the middle of the bed from where he had twisted over slightly. She then had to lift his leg cast so that it was resting back in the middle of the sling and that his toes were pointing up toward the ceiling so the pressure through the cast was correct. The Doctor cried out when she moved his leg even though she only touched the cast and Jack swapped places going to hold him.
"I'm sorry," Martha went and caressed his head once she was happy with the position of his leg in the sling. She then used the bed control to sit him up a bit more so that he didn't look as awkward. "That should help you relax a bit easier." She put the oxygen mask in his hand. His breathing was shaky and he looked anxious and in pain. "Breathe the oxygen and calm down. Let me sort your drip out for you again. You managed to pull it out and bleed on my floor," Martha commented when she saw that there were red droplets in a line across the tiles.
"Sorry."
"Daft git, you don't need to apologise," she assured him. "Let me have your arm a moment." She took his arm into her lap as she pulled the treatment stool over from where she had been working with Gerald earlier. She carefully unravelled the bandage ad cleaned the stop where the canola had been pulled out. She applied a pressure on it as it was still bleeding a little. There was a large collection of blood in the tissues surrounding the vein under the skin so there was going to be a large area of dark bruising form.
"Anyone is going to look at your arm and think I butchered you putting the line in," Martha complained in good humour. "I think we're going to have to give that poor vein a rest and go for the other arm this time." Martha suggested. The Doctor tried to twist slightly so that he could present the other arm to her, but he gasped as the pain shot through his leg.
"Oh no…" he whimpered.
"What? I'll come round the other side," Martha told him. "Don't twist round."
"S'back," the Doctor groaned and then grimaced.
"The nerve pain?" Martha hoped that wasn't the case.
"Rodeo…" the Doctor moaned. The crowd were all filling the stands and were roaring in anticipation as the champion cowboy was mounted onto a large black bull. It was held in the stall behind the gates but it was already bucking and snorting great clouds of condensed rage. Its nostrils were flared and its ears were flat back as it kicked out. If they didn't let it out of the stall it was going to hurt itself or someone else so they and to drop the gate before the countdown was completed. The crowd all roared as the bull leapt into the arena over the falling gate. Spectators were on their feet waving Stetsons in the air as the bull charged, bucking and rearing across the sawdust filled arena. The cowboy clung on, digging his heels in and raising one hand in the air as he gripped the rope wrapped around the bull's thick muscular body.
It bucked and kicked out, then it dropped its head right down and kicked out repeatedly with both back legs. It didn't regain its fee properly and it skidded down in the dirt on its front knees causing the crowd to collectively gasp as it rolled before getting back up to its feet and charging at a rodeo clown in the ring that dodged out the way of the bucking rearing animal. The cowboy had been unseated but had a foot caught in the roping as it was dragged by the kicking bull. Rodeo clowns all rushed in to corner and snare the raging bull, they roped it, dragging it back down to the ground so the cowboy could be freed. The cowboy got to his feet and waved his Stetson in the air to the VIP stand before he was helped out of the arena again as the bull raged in his wake.
"What is he going on about rodeos?" Jack asked Martha when the Doctor passed out.
"I'm not sure," Martha admitted. She took all the gel packs off the length of his leg to see if she could determine why the nerve pain had been so fierce that it had caused him to pass out again when it had been better for him for a short while. "Bloody Hell, Doctor?" She sighed when she looked at his leg. At the front of his shin there was a visible bulge where he'd managed to twist slightly within the cast and muscle contractions had pulled his leg out of line slightly. "I'm going to correct this straight away while he is fainted," Martha warned Jack. "Then I will need to take some more scans to check the position. I know it is painful when it is against the nerves, but if it were to complicate matters with any of the major blood vessels in his leg then it would be worse."
"Okay," Jack nodded.
"Hold him for me?" Martha instructed. Jack embraced the unconscious Time Lord. He did not watch as Martha pressed down on the bulge to locate the end of his shin bone back down into the middle of his leg rather than where it had angled itself upward again. The Doctor gagged and arched against him. Martha got a bit of adhesive plaster tape and she stuck it down over the front of his shin. It would apply a slight pressure to keep it all down or at least to return it into position if any muscle contraction brought it out again. She was surprised there were enough tendons still attached to be able to do it, but there obviously were some somewhere within his leg. The Doctor moaned as she crossed another piece of tape over the top.
"Its okay, Doc, it's just Martha sorting you out," Jack assured him. "Just relax. It won't take long."
"I'm done," Martha commented a moment later. "I'm just going to get that drip back in for you." Martha advised the Doctor. She wheeled the drip stand over to the other side of the bed and positioned it at the head between the bed and the arm chair so it was out of the way. "You'll feel a sharp scratch in your arm," Martha warned as she located a vein in the Doctor's right arm. As she slid the needle in the Doctor flinched, hissing and pulling away indicating just how hyper sensitive the continued pain had made him as he'd taken many needles without any kind of fuss previously. She aped the canola down and bandaged his arm and then connected the drugs back up for him. "There you go, you're all done," she assured him as he groaned softly. "Go back to sleep now."
"Can't…" the Doctor complained miserably.
"How about I go and make tea then?" Jack asked. "I was making coffee when you started to have your nightmare," the Captain advised him. "Do you want a cup of tea before you try to go back to sleep again?"
"Please."
"Martha are you going to go back to bed?" Jack asked. She checked the time. It was half four in the morning, but the Doctor was so pale and he was visibly trembling. He'd experienced an episode of nerve pain which had made him pass out and she'd had to reduce and tape his mid shaft fractures. She didn't think it would be fair for her to go back to bed until he had calmed down a bit more, by which time she would be thinking about getting up anyway.
"No, I'll have a coffee please," she commented and then yawned.
"I'm sorry," the Doctor whispered.
"Why?"
"I'm keeping you up."
"That's no problem," Martha assured him. Jack went out to make the drinks and Martha sat with the Doctor. "So, do you want to tell me what you were dreaming about?" Martha asked him. "And, don't tell me that you can't remember, because I can see in your eyes that you do."
In the kitchen area Jack banged the vanilla sugar to try and loosen it up again. In the Doctor's room they heard the knocking and Martha saw the Doctor jolt and flinch from the sound with enough force that he moved his leg and grimaced.
"I think you need to talk to us about more than your leg about you?" Martha commented as she took his hand. "Don't you? Doctor?"
"Yeah."
"Do you want to wait until Jack is back with the tea, or, do you want me to get him to stay out there a while longer so you can just talk to me?" Martha checked.
"I'll wait for my tea," the Doctor offered hoping that Jack would be a long time and that the cowboy might have been recovered enough to get back on again. There was a fate worse than a broken leg waiting for him. His hearts sunk as he realised this was all just the beginning.