A/N: To the handful of you who have asked: the story's not over yet but I am delighted with how invested some of you are. Rest assured that when I finally finish this thing for good, there will be fanfares and I will make a big, exhausted announcement with cake and flowers and maybe some wine if you're of age or juice if you're not. I would apologize for the time it has taken to update (some of you sounded a little nervous), but I'm putting most of my energy into organizing my future so I'm only the tiniest bit sorry. In the meantime, m'dears, here you go.

Jackie smiled and shook her head, gazing upon the scene before her. The two hospital beds had been pushed side by side—Rose's doing, she knew—and both of Adam Mitchell's victims lay fast asleep, their slack faces clear of the troubles that haunted them. Her daughter lay on her side facing the Doctor, her arm outstretched with fingers just brushing his bare arm, hair splayed around her head. Jackie imagined the hesitant, tender moments that may have occurred before the two fell into sleep. Perhaps Rose had brought him peace. Perhaps he had done so for her.

She backed out of the room, pulling the door shut behind her, and made her way back to the bedroom that Rose had led her to the night before. In some ways she regretted her initial treatment of the Doctor when she had first met him. Namely, the way that she had flirted with his first self at the door of her bedroom, but more importantly the suspicion and the rude words and the long speech she had once given Rose warning her away from this strange man, this paedophile. She had been right to be suspicious, as a mother—and after all, he had turned out to be a time-traveling alien!—and she wasn't about to forget that he had kidnapped her for an entire year and left Jackie to think that her daughter was dead.

Yet seeing them now, even with the Doctor's need to keep some kind of emotional distance from all of them, even Rose; even so, they were right together. They had something she and Pete had never had. And in a way, she envied them the love that neither of them would acknowledge.

"Hold still."

"I am holding still."

"You're fidgeting."

The Doctor quieted and gritted his teeth as Rose peeled the next strip of bandaging from his back. He was leaning forward on the bed, the position creating an uncomfortable stretch in his legs as he bent over them. He could feel skin pulling, the bandage having adhered to the flesh. Despite Rose's care the skin tore as she pulled away the cloth, taking several layers with it. He scrunched up his face and closed his throat against the noises that he wanted to make.

Rose grimaced and added the strip of bandage to the growing pile on the floor. Those that weren't stained a dark brown with dried blood had been yellowed by pus. Some of the lashes had begun to scab, the skin around them stretching and puckering, but the majority were red and puffy where infection had set in.

The last of the bandages were removed, the Doctor's back as bare as it had been when Paul and Alan had ordered the removal of his shirt. The cool air on his naked flesh was a relief after the days of what felt like hot, tight confinement in those strips of cloth. He breathed deeply through his nose, relishing the feel of free skin.

"How's it feel?" said Rose's voice from behind him.

"It's nice," he said. "Good, yeah."

"It's the G-17, right?" She came around into his view, fumbling with a hypospray. He turned his head to look at the medicine in her hand.

"Pop the canister in at the end and twist it," he told her. Rose pushed and twisted and the canister locked into place. "You know the theory," he said, turning back to look at his knees as he waited for her.

"Press the end against the skin and push the button?"

He nodded mutely and felt the bed depress as she knelt on one knee. The light touch of her fingertips on his back made him shiver and with a nervousness that he felt in her silent rigidity behind him, she pressed the hypospray against the flesh and released the medicine into his wounds. Twice. Three times. She singled out the most damaged areas and pumped them with the antibiotics. It hurt, yet he didn't make a sound; the only indication was the tensing of his shoulders. Against the sickly paleness of his skin each freckle stood out like a drop of blood.

The bed shifted again when Rose stood up. The Doctor did not raise his head. Rose was dealing with his silence as well as she could. She understood. It was hard. Some days would be better than others.

"Dermal regenerator?" she asked.

"No." He blinked slowly at the bed covers spread over his legs. "Not until tomorrow. The infection has to be flushed out before the skin can close over it."

"I thought you'd have something that took care of things a little faster. Y'know, like how New New York had those magic drugs."

"It's a Med Bay, not a hospital. Its primary purpose is emergency care."

"So why don't we take you to a hospital somewhere in the future?"

He looked straight ahead and didn't answer.

Rose held back a sigh. "Okay, well what's next?"

"Dermal regenerator."

"But you said—"

"No." He looked at her and held up his hands. "On these."

"Will it—I mean, will it work all the way through?"

He understood the question and looked down at his hands, two bundles of gauze. "On the holes?" He said it bluntly and she bit her lip and nodded. Somehow it hurt to hear the word "holes" in reference to his body.

"Will it?" she repeated.

The dermal regenerator was on a wheeled steel table that Rose had piled medical supplies upon: cloth, cold water, antiseptics, foreign instruments. He looked at it and shook his head once. "It's for superficial injuries. At the most it'll promote regrowth of muscle and tissue. On the correct setting. It has two, see. Look."

Plucking it from the table, Rose studied it in her hands. Just above the handle were two silver buttons, each sporting a symbol unrecognisable to her. The Doctor reached out a hand and pointed to the lower button as best he could.

"That one?" she said.

"That one."

Rose crossed to the other side of the bed where hers was still shoved up against his. She climbed onto her bed and crawled across it to him, where she sat and crossed her legs, depositing the gadget at her side on the hard mattress. "C'mon then. Give me your hand." She held out her own and, meeting her eyes, he placed his hand palm-up in hers. As she gingerly unwrapped the bandaging from around his hand, she couldn't help but think that when all this was over she would like very much to be done with bandages altogether.

Gentle as she was, when the last of the cloth was peeled from his palm he uttered a soft cry and his face paled to an alarming white. His head rolled back and Rose threw out her arms to catch him if need be. A moment later he gasped and his head snapped back upright. His chest rose and fell deeply and Rose saw the whites of his eyes all around his irises.

"You okay?" she inquired, grabbing his shoulders to steady him.

"Started to black out for a second there," he said, taking gulps of air. He leaned against her to catch his breath.

She looked down at his palm. A hole the width of a pea remained where Paul had- She tried not to think about it. Rose turned her face away. It wasn't a pretty sight. At last the Doctor's breathing normalized and he rested his chin on his chest and closed his eyes, tight-lipped. Seconds passed. Finally Rose spoke:

"All right?" She knew it was an absurd question and yet she had to ask. He nodded briefly.

"Setting two," he said without opening his eyes, his voice hoarse as though he had been shouting.

The small silver cylinder lay where she had left it; she curled her hand around it and rested her thumb on the lower button. With gentle fingers Rose took his hand in hers again, almost cradling it, feeling as though any wrong touch would not so much hurt him but instead send him tumbling apart like dandelion seeds blown across an expanse of earth and air. The dermal regenerator buzzed when she held down the button, the end hovering just above the injury. His expression didn't move and she didn't ask if he could feel anything.

The buzzing whirred down to a hum and Rose took it to signify that it had completed its task to the fullest extent. She released the button, waiting for a signal from the Doctor. When he opened his eyes to examine his palm, craning his neck rather than removing his hand from hers, he appeared to be satisfied with the result because he offered her his other hand. She allowed him to draw back the first hand and in its place she took the one still bandaged and carefully set to removing the coverings. This time he remained stiffly upright, fighting back the spike of pain as the final layer was peeled from the flesh. Rose repeated the procedure and he gazed stoically at the opposite wall.

"You're doing really well," Rose assured him as she worked, allowing the low buzz to fill the room. She didn't feel particularly comfortable saying it—he was so old and sad and it sounded cliché, even insincere—but she needed to let him know, somehow, how much she felt for him. The pitch of the dermal regenerator changed and she lifted her thumb and raised the device. A thick white cream was smeared over the holes with steady fingers, causing the Doctor to hiss through his teeth, and then they were done. The holes couldn't be left exposed to the open air and so the Doctor waited as Rose slipped off the bed to fetch new bandages and wrap his hands and his back again. She talked while she wrapped them and he offered short responses. That evening in the cell, telling him stories at his request, came to her mind. She pushed the thought away. She didn't want to reflect on those days.

Reaching across him, she grabbed a small plastic cup of water and a bottle that rattled when she picked it up.

"Painkillers," she said.

"I'm fine."

"Shut up."

He obliged and she shook two pills into her hand before placing them one by one in his open palm and watching him toss them back. She held the water to his mouth and he washed them down.

After a time he raised his head to look at her and asked for the dermal regenerator. Hesitating, she handed it to him and he balanced it in his palm, unable to curl his fingers around it. Rose thought at first that he was going to remove the ugly cuts on his chest but instead he pointed it at the slices along his left arm and struggled to press the top button. He grunted, frowning with effort and fighting to make his fingers do what they simply could not. Rose watched in embarrassed silence as he grew increasingly frustrated, quivering and snarling at his inability to do this one tiny, simple task.

"Come on!" he shouted, letting out a final angry snarl before dropping it against the blankets and thudding back against his pillows. They sat in silence, both of them for different reasons, until at last Rose extended her arm and picked up the device.

"Let me," she said quietly.

He looked as though on the verge of making a retort but closed his mouth and turned his head away. Rose wished she could tell him that she understood, but the truth was that she didn't. She could understand only to a certain degree and then it was him, alone, enduring his new identity as a victim. She took the dermal regenerator and tried to meet his eyes, without success. He had regressed, somehow, overnight. To be honest, she wasn't sure if it was a regression. According to Jack she understood him better than anyone but these were unusual circumstances, after all.

For a long time the dermal regenerator whirred as Rose traced cuts with its tip, an unseen force stitching the skin together. Burns were thinly covered by fresh, pink layers of skin, not yet entirely regrown but a fragile start. Bruises slowly faded and disappeared altogether like magic. And all the while, he looked elsewhere, his downturned lips pressed tightly together.

"My mum used to have to fix me up all the time, back when I was a kid," she said, out of the blue. The regenerator buzzed. "Kept fallin' on the playground an' pushing the other kids around." She smiled at the memory as she worked.

It was a few seconds, but then the Doctor cleared his throat and spoke. "Pushing the other kids around?" He turned his head to look at her, one eyebrow raised.

"Knew that'd get you talking," she said slyly, a mischievous smile playing across her face.

"Bet you were a terror," he muttered.

"Oi!" The dermal regenerator stopped buzzing long enough for Rose to hit him lightly with it.

There was another burn on the underside of his arm and she made him lift it so she could get to it with the regenerator. He held his arm up until weakness overcame it and then he lowered it back to rest on the mattress.

"Bet you were worse," Rose said under her breath, enough time having passed that he almost forgot what she was talking about.

The Doctor let out a long breath. "Ohhhh, I was. I got in loads of trouble, all the time. Couldn't sit still. Always seeking out little adventures. The gossip was, I was a dirty rotten scoundrel who wouldn't add up to much of anything. Always off making trouble." He blinked slowly at the ceiling. "And of course, they weren't wrong. Stole a TARDIS and ran away to see the universe."

Rose laughed. It was the first time she had done so in a long time and it felt heavenly. The Doctor smiled to hear it.

"Got you laughing," he said, sneaking a pleased look at her.

"Got you talking," she retorted happily.

She eyed him, searching for any other areas requiring superficial healing. There was only one: the words scrawled along his chest as though with a red marker, the horror of those words uninhibited by the childish script.

Property of Adam.

She wanted the words gone, she wanted all evidence of them erased forever. They were a reminder of something unspeakable and every reminder kept its memory alive. Perpetuated it. Adam and his thugs had had a very specific intent: to promote submission, fear, humiliation, self-degradation. To remind the Doctor that they had put him in his place. That they, of all people, had made him scream.

It was a minute before Rose realised that she had been staring, motionless, her brain unaware of the distance between her thoughts and real time. Her throat tightened and her fingers gripped the regenerator more tightly. Without further hesitation she turned it to the Doctor's chest and rammed her thumb on the button.

"No." His voice startled her and she released the button again, the buzz halting abruptly. The Doctor's eyes were wide, the expression in them unclear.

"W-what?"

"Don't." He put out a hand to stop her and she drew her arm back, worried. Jack had told her to make sure he let her get rid of the message. What did Jack know that she didn't?

"You're not going to keep it?" she said incredulously, fearing what he would say and what he wouldn't.

"I'm—"

"Tell me you're not."

"I'm not," he told her firmly. Rose waited for him to continue, her worries not abated. "I want to do it myself," he said. "Need to. I need to do it."

"Your fingers…" she reminded him softly. If he couldn't do it before she saw no use in letting him try again on this. Jack said that the best thing they could do for his hands was to insure that he did not use them. The only thing that could come of this was the Doctor hurting himself.

"I don't care about my fingers," he said, his eyes boring into hers.

"Please, just let me get rid of it."

"Rose."

"You can't make me look at it for another day. I can't do it."

"I'm not asking you to," he said, his Adam's apple bobbing. "I'll take care of it. Right now."

"We do it together." She had decided in an instant and before she knew it the words were in the air. She couldn't explain why she was making such a fuss of this, other than her need to protect him from himself. Don't let him use his hands. It was like trying to keep a drowning man from breathing in water. Yet she thought she understood his incentive, the reasoning behind his desire. It was primarily symbolic, she supposed. It was an illusion of control.

A heavy silence overtook him, and then something in his face changed. "Together," he agreed.

She held out the regenerator to him and he folded his fingers around it as far as he could manage, and with Rose pressing the first button, letter by letter, they stitched the skin together. As the skin drew together the seam faded, the words wearing down to next to nothing until all that was left was a series of thin white scars, barely visible in the light of the Med Bay. They both gazed at the skin, even after the task was done and the regenerator had stopped humming, for different reasons and filled with varying emotions but both with that same sense of relief as though something significant had been lifted from their shoulders. Neither of them spoke. No words needed saying. But Rose, her touch soft and feather-light, brushed her fingers along the new skin with eyes filled with wonder. She couldn't attribute it entirely to the healing of his chest, but he looked more him than he had in days.

Her eyes met his and she drew back her hand. "We should…er….I should get you something to cover yourself. Now that you're…you know. With the bandages and healing and all. Since it's…" she gestured vaguely "…better." The Doctor's eyes twinkled and the corner of his lip twitched. He watched as she crawled backwards off the bed and turned away to busy herself at a row of drawers set under the counter.

"I can't even tell what size these are," she muttered with her hands in the drawer, just loudly enough for him to hear. She pushed her hair behind her ear and withdrew a hospital gown, holding it out in front of her. Turning back towards him, she showed him the results of her search, the cloth reaching to her ankles.

"The only ones in your size are pink," she said apologetically.

"Colours are not gender-specific, Rose Tyler," he replied from the bed.

"Then how come you never wear pink?"

He raised his eyes to the ceiling. "Oh, I used to. You should have seen me. Well, some of it was pink. Pink, yellow, polka dots, the lot."

"Tell me you have pictures," she begged.

He wrinkled his nose. "If I did, you would never come even close to seeing them," he said pointedly.

"I'll find them. I will."

"What, you're gonna snoop through my personal things?"

"Not if you don't want me to."

He shifted on the bed and rolled his eyes. "Ohh, blimey," he sighed. "Can't avoid the inevitable, I suppose." Rose grinned and handed him the gown, helping him to get his hands through the short sleeves and tugging it down to his waist, where she stopped and let him take care of the rest. "Tell you what. You get me out of this room and I'll show you."

His companion's brow furrowed. "Don't you think it's too early to be moving?"

Suddenly he switched tactics. "Can you get your mother in here?" he asked, his tone innocent.

"Why?"

"Because I'm dying to be mothered just a little bit more."

Rose flushed and took the hint. "You did almost pass out earlier."

"You were tearing a piece of cloth off of a gaping hole in my hand," he retorted.

"'Scuse me for doin' what I had to!" She threw her hands in the air and turned away, crossing her arms and shifting her weight from foot to foot angrily. Looking at her then, he remembered how young she was; sometimes he forgot.

"I'm not asking to go for a stroll," he said to her back.

"Good, 'cause I'm not taking you on one."

"If I could get up by myself, I wouldn't need your permission."

She pivoted. "That's exactly the problem. You can't. You keep tryin' to do things that'll only make things worse."

"You're really, really missing the point this time," he said, becoming increasingly frustrated.

"Okay, tell me."

He cringed. "Oh, come on, don't make me say it." She gave him a blank and moderately peeved look. "For your information…. For your information, I have things to take care of."

"What kind of 'things'?"

"You know…. Rassilon, this is embarrassing."

"Just say it."

"Bodies have needs," he said loudly.

Rose blinked and closed her mouth with a snap. "Oh," she said, realisation dawning on her.

"Yeah. 'Oh.'" Traces of sarcasm laced the Doctor's voice.

"Oh," she said again, face pink. It hadn't even occurred to her that he might need to…. She cleared her throat.

"There's a bathroom down the hall," she offered.

The Doctor rolled his eyes. "Yes, I know that," he said. "It is my ship."

"Right."

He waited a moment before ploughing forward, as it seemed that Rose was temporarily at a loss for words. "So, you gonna help me into that wheelchair then?" In the corner of the room where he was looking stood an aluminum wheelchair in the design of twenty-first century models; no hover function yet, he mused. Certainly no telepathic motor and steering mechanism to hook up to the patient. He was going to need help with this.

"I can't get you into that by myself."

"I'm not made of glass, you know."

Rose stared at him and raised her eyebrows before lifting her right arm to show him her cast. "I'm not exactly at 100% right now either, remember?"

The Doctor squeezed his eyes shut. "Sorry. I'm sorry." He grimaced. In a moment of deep seriousness, his dark eyes met hers and he asked in a low voice, "You all right?"

She snorted. "I think we've both had better days."

"Are you?"

"Yeah, I'm all right."

She moved towards the door, intending to find Jack or her mother or both to help, but his voice stopped her.

"Can you—leave the door open?"

"Why?"

He shrugged but she knew better. She was afraid, too. Of the noise of the door opening. Of the split second in which she questioned who exactly would be coming through it.

"I can leave it open," she answered.

Ten minutes later Rose returned with Jack in tow, the latter balancing a tray of food in each hand. The Doctor raised his eyebrows.

"What?" Jack said. "You two seem to forget that eating is a thing people do."

"Mum's out shopping for food," Rose explained. "There's not much left in the kitchen so Jack got hold of a car and she's gone to restock."

Jack set down the trays and strode to the bed. "Y'know, Doc, we could just get you a catheter."

"Oh, yes, fit me with a diaper while you're at it," the Doctor scowled. It was clear that he wasn't enjoying his bladder needs being a topic of discussion, much less a big occasion.

Jack winked. "Advice noted," he said. He wheeled the wheelchair to the bedside, pulled the bed covers aside, and reached towards the Doctor. Seeing what he aimed to do, the Doctor withdrew. Rose stood by and watched, unable to help. She crossed to the back of the wheelchair and clutched it one-handed, stabilising it for them. Against the Doctor's protests, Jack slipped his arms under the Doctors shoulders and the backs of his knees.

"Don't you dare," he said. Jack bent at the knees, a tiny smirk gracing his face. "Jack, don't pick me up. Don't you pick me up, Jack. Jack," he said warningly.

Unheeding, Jack scooped him up, the Doctor's complaints momentarily muffled in his army coat, and then deposited him gently in the wheelchair. The Doctor sniffed irritably and looked down at himself. Only the pink hospital gown covered him, other than the bandages and the thick casts encasing both legs to a point above the knee and causing his legs to stick out in front of him stiffly.

"Was that necessary?" the Doctor demanded.

"There's a little bit of the Doctor I remember," Jack said, looking down at him and grinning toothily.

"Did the Doctor you remember want to drop you off in deep space and leave you there?"

"It wouldn't be the first time, would it?" Jack said, the smile disappearing from his face in an instant. Confused, Rose looked on in silence as the Doctor turned his head and neglected to answer.

Rose cleared her throat. "Should we…?"

The moment broken, or at least temporarily irrelevant, Jack took over again and they all pretended, perhaps a little too obviously, that nothing significant had been uttered. Given the nature of Rose's injuries, Jack took the handles and pushed the Doctor to the door, which Rose had left propped open. Wordlessly they wheeled him to the bathroom down the hall on the right, generally used by short-term guests. Rose pushed open the door and the Doctor and Jack entered. The door closed behind them with Rose waiting outside.

No more than thirty seconds passed before Jack emerged alone. "He insists he do it himself," Jack said. He shrugged. "Not that I blame him. As long as he's okay doing it from a wheelchair." Rose shrugged back at him. Jack learned against the wall.

"Sorry I haven't been in there more taking care of things. And maybe I sometimes forget that Time Lords have relatively human needs as well."

"Kind of," Rose said, scuffing her feet against the floor.

Jack peered at her. "Something wrong?"

Rose's feet stilled. "No," she said. "It's fine. I'm fine."

"Very convincing," Jack told her, but he didn't inquire further.

"Truth is, he pissed himself while he was unconscious," Jack said to a stretch of wall. Rose felt her face burn with secondhand shame. "Maybe I shouldn't have, but I cut away his pants and underwear and put clean underwear on him. I couldn't let him lie in his own piss. I'm sure he was unpleasantly surprised when he discovered that." He sighed and slipped his hands into his coat pockets. "This shouldn't have happened."

"Don't," Rose said. It wasn't the first time Jack had begun talking like this and she couldn't stand it. It felt like a painful itch to her each time he tried. Of course it shouldn't have happened. It just hurt when Jack said it.

"Jaaack," the Doctor's voice called through the door.

"I've been summoned. Excuse me." Jack disappeared into the bathroom and returned a little under two minutes later with the Doctor.

"…With a catheter," Jack was saying. "Save you a lot of trouble."

"I'm not—" The Doctor stopped mid-sentence, his head turned towards Jack to argue, the words cut from him as he stared at something, at Jack's coat.

No. It wasn't the coat. It was his hands. Cracked, bruised knuckles were scabbed over and flaked with dried blood. Fighter's hands. Hands tainted by violence.

Recent violence.

The Doctor and Rose eyed his knuckles, Rose fearful of what the Doctor was about to discover. She knew. The Doctor soon would. A voice within her was whispering over and over the same three words: No, no, no, not yet, not yet, no.

The Doctor didn't lift a finger. He didn't move. But his eyes were wide and confused and when he spoke Rose pressed herself against the wall:

"Who were you hitting?"

Jack appeared to be trying to find words to say and as he opened his mouth it clicked into place. The Doctor understood. Realisation dawned on him and the blood drained from his face. "You have him," he said. "You have Adam Mitchell."