DAY THREE: Part IV

"What the bloody hell is going on with that Doctor?" Gwen whispered as Jack pulled on his coat.

"Oh, dear," Jack said, checking his pockets. "I wish I knew, sweetheart."

"Are he and Martha on the skids already?"

"I doubt it."

"Maybe it's Milligan."

"Maybe," Jack said. "But as the illustrious Dr. Milligan pointed out, he's only being a jackass to me and Martha. The rest of you are getting a pass for some reason, even Milligan himself."

"Well all I know is, good God, he's acting bizarre," she said, putting her hands on her hips. "It's like his personality's changed in the last two hours."

"Yeah," Jack chuckled. "I've seen it happen to him before, but usually he has to die in order for that to happen. Hm, maybe he did."

Gwen sighed. He didn't know the Doctor well enough to speculate further. In her experience, men acted that way because they were insecure about something. Usually sex or their job. She doubted it was as simple as that with the Doctor. Men she could deal with. Time Lords were a mystery. She'd leave his care and feeding to the experts.

"So, are you ready to go into the den of the beast?" she asked, dramatically, opening her giant blue eyes as wide as saucers.

"Ready as I'll ever be," he sighed.

"You'll be fine," she told him, patting him on the shoulder. "The Doctor's with you, and Martha and Tom and Rupesh are on the second front, and we're backing them up. What could possibly go wrong?"

"With jury-rigged technology spanning across the globe, in the presence of a highly volatile alien species? Nothing that I can think of."

She smiled and they hugged. "Good luck, Jack."

He waved to Rhys, as he passed, and Ianto was waiting at the top of the stairs. A quick kiss, and Jack was off to the morgue to join the motley crew of travellers. The TARDIS console room contained Tom, Rupesh and Martha, all loaded down with backpacks, and the Doctor, arms crossed and surly, waiting at the controls.

"All is right with the world," Jack announced. "So to speak. Let's do it."

The TARDIS came to a halt a few moments later. "Where are we?" Martha asked.

"Bombay," said the Doctor. "Rupesh, you're on."

Rupesh swallowed hard. He turned to Tom. "Wish me luck."

"Good luck," Tom replied, and they shook hands.

The Doctor, Rupesh and Jack exited the TARDIS, noticing a hospital looming across the street. "Well, here goes nothing," Rupesh sighed.

Upon entering the facility, Rupesh flashed his NHS ID card. "Hello, I'm Dr. Rupesh Patanjali, and these are my associates from the British government. We are working to alleviate the symptoms exhibited by the children – the speaking in unison. I am going to need some specimens and some extra personnel; is there a supervising physician I could speak to?"

"Specimens? As in…"

"Children. Yes, ma'am."

"What will you do?"

"Nothing invasive, you have my word."

The elderly woman, dressed in an old-fashioned nurse's uniform, eyed him. Then she eyed the Doctor and Jack. "May I see your identification again?"

He let her inspect his ID one more time. For good measure, the Doctor stepped forward with the psychic paper.

"All right," she said. "Wait here."

Rupesh exhaled hard and turned to the Doctor. "Erm, I have a question."

"It's the TARDIS' translation circuits," the Doctor told him, anticipating his question. "You thought Hindi was going to come out, and instead you got English."

"I swear I'm speaking in Hindi," he said. "I'm thinking in Hindi. I'm saying words in Hindi, but… that's not what I'm hearing, and it's not how people are responding."

"Yep, and it will happen to Tom in Brazil, and Martha in Japan. That's the way it is – one of the weird things about travelling in the TARDIS. Don't worry, as soon as the TARDIS leaves, it will stop. Just go with it."

A few moments later, the elderly lady returned with one man and one woman, both in suits. "Dr. Patanjali?" asked the woman. "I'm Dr. Hari, I'm the administrator of this facility. May I see your credentials?"

Rupesh showed his ID again.

"And I'm told that you're working with top officials British Ministry of Health?" she asked, eyeing the Doctor and Jack

Rupesh's eyes grew very wide for a moment. Then the Doctor stepped forward and handed her the psychic paper. "Yes, ma'am. Ministry of Health."

"Well, this appears to be in order," she sighed, handing it back to him. "And you say you have a treatment for our children?"

"Well, Dr. Hari, it's a bit unorthodox, but yes, we do," Rupesh told her.

"We'll take any help we can get," she said. "Come on through."

Tom circled round the console slowly, looking up into the Time Rotor. "This is mental," he said to no-one in particular.

"Could you sit down, please?" Martha asked, leaning against a railing, arms crossed. "I don't like you roaming around in here. It's creepy."

He smiled a little. "Why?"

"Because," Martha spat. "It just is. I feel like my worlds are colliding, and not in a good way. You don't belong here. You don't actually belong anywhere near me, and here, this room… this is like…"

He waited for her to finish. She was looking about the console room starry-eyed, and he watched with sadness, and realised that she'd always loved even this ship more than she'd loved him. He'd long ago recognised the ghost of the Doctor in her eyes, but today, there were no ghosts. The Doctor's imprint was so fully upon her soul, there was no hiding it. No reason to anymore.

"It's like what?" he asked.

"It's sacred," she said, knowing that she sounded daft. "It's a sanctuary. When I'm here, then everything is all right. Even when it's not."

"Because the Doctor will fix it?" Tom he asked, one eyebrow raised sardonically.

She returned the sardonic expression and clicked her tongue. "No matter how many hours, days, months, I spent in this old ship, feeling sorry for myself, it's safe, and it's home."

"It's where you've been at your best," he said, showing the first real glimmer of understanding she'd ever seen him demonstrate, at least where her time in the TARDIS was concerned. She'd done some mighty cool things in and around and associated with this room, and they were, indeed, some of her most shining moments. But she was, after all, a doctor, and she'd also had some really amazing moments in the field tending to patients, and in the ED.

So once again, Tom had it slightly wrong. She sighed. "It's home because it's where he is."

Tom swallowed hard. "Well then, I guess everything worked out for the best," he said somewhat bitterly. "With you and me, I mean. You've got what you really want, and I get…" he paused. He almost said the shaft, but realised it would be more accurate to say what I deserve, so he said nothing more.

The look on his face then made bells go off in Martha's head. She recognised something of herself in his gaze, and she seemed to search him.

She knew that expression very well. And it was a revelation to her.

She thought back through the amazing events of the last several years. At some point about four or five years ago, a man met a girl in a basement. He was extraordinary, and she was oh-so ordinary, but pretty, and apparently resourceful and intelligent. And most importantly, she was very, very devoted. They fell in love, and somehow, in the wake of an intergalactic crisis, they got separated and dumped into two separate universes. Their hearts were broken, but they each had to live on. The girl returned to an old love, the man found someone new.

But Martha wasn't around for that bit.

She came in several months later, she was the someone new. And when she met that remarkable, brilliant, handsome man, he quite literally swept her off her feet. He took her places, showed her the universe, brought her into his life, but somehow, kept her constantly at arm's length. Over time, she fell desperately in love with him, but tragically, learned more and more about that "ordinary" girl, a mysterious figure called Rose, who seemed to lurk somewhere in the man's recent past. She could read between the lines, and see that he must have loved her fiercely and vice versa. And the guarded, troubled man was oblivious to Martha's pain, and he lived within himself, feeling he could never love anyone that way again. Many adventures, two three-month stints in close-quarters in history, an apocalypse and a one-year-reverse time lapse later, and Martha walked away from the love of her life, because she could not live in the shadow of Rose. She could not be someone else, let alone someone who lived in a different reality, so it was time to say goodbye. To love so hard and not to feel it returned, it was like jumping without a chute. It was like holding up a stone wall, all alone.

Soon thereafter, Martha met a nice man named Tom. He, like Rose, was basically unremarkable, but clever enough and rather rugged, which she liked. She learned to love him, but never ached for him, never burned when he touched her, never felt she would faint dead away when he smiled. But he was smitten with her, and was eager to know everything about her. Having learned her lesson, she no longer believed in keeping secrets, so she confessed all. She'd loved and lost. She'd seen the stars and comets and the Time Vortex. She'd saved planets, even her own, and at the centre of it all was him. That man, the one whose name Tom grew to hate the sound of, the one whose special powers seemed impossible and whose stake in Martha's life was vexing indeed. Over time, Tom learned more and more about the mysterious "Doctor" who had stolen his beloved's heart, and, as he came to realise, probably still kept it, whether he meant to or not. And there was nothing in time or space that Tom Milligan, citizen of Earth, could do about it. Anger and jealousy oscillated frequently within his mind, and between him and Martha, and the capacity for heartache grew rich in the air, like a thick steam.

But Tom did not have Martha's mettle. He didn't have the strength to walk away from the woman he loved because he couldn't live in the shadow of a Time Lord. He did the weak thing, the easy thing.

Martha knew that it still didn't make it okay… shagging a redhead is no way to deal with the frustration of a distracted lover. But, looked at as a parallel with how she had lived for a year, she could see it now. She'd broken under Rose's weight, and Tom had broken under the Doctor's.

"I'm sorry I made you feel second-best," she said at last. "I know what that's like."

"You did, Martha," he told her.

"All those times when I complained about him and Rose, asked why he couldn't see just me, you must have been screaming at me on the inside."

"I was."

"I'm sorry."

Tom took a deep breath. "Well, for what it's worth, I get it now. The mystique of the Doctor, now that I've met him, I see it."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. I mean, not in a he's a handsome rebel who lives by his own rules, excuse me while I swoon sort of way, but…" Tom seemed to be searching for words. He let out a little grunt of consternation, as though his own feelings, brought on against his will, were making him angry. "He makes me want to be a better man. And not just 'cause he's got you, and I don't."

"That might be the nicest thing I've ever heard you say."

"Thanks. And…" he averted his eyes. "I'm sorry for what I did. I don't think I ever said."

"I know you're sorry, even though you never said."

"And I know it's a cliché, but I really was thinking of you the whole time."

"Just save it, all right? Please?"

"I really was."

"Tom, leave it," she sighed. "It doesn't matter now. You're ruining the moment."

"The moment?"

"Yes! I was just now starting to see what I'd put you through," she said throwing her hands in the air dramatically, like a giant shrug. "I was beginning to see the parallel between you and me and the Doctor, and me and the Doctor and Rose."

"Gee, maybe I ought to give Rose a ring, see if she's available," he muttered.

"Nice, Tom."

"Well, you're being shrill! And you're angry at me for being sorry! What is that about?"

"I'm just bloody angry at you, period!" she yelled. "And I'd just given myself permission to empathise, realise that it takes two to tango. It's the first step toward getting past the humiliation, forgiving you, and being able to be around you without wanting to hit you over the head with a Cricket bat."

"And now that I've apologised, you want to hit me again? You're a bit mental."

"If you force me to revisit those feelings, then it will take longer for the urge to cause bodily harm to go away. Common sense, dear."

"But I need you to forgive me. I love you." He pursed his lips immediately, as though with regret for blurting it out.

"I feel like I need to forgive you too, for my own sanity," she said, rather more emotionally than she would have liked. "But the best way for that to happen is not for you to say you're sorry and make excuses and concessions too little, too late, and say you're thinking about me and you love me…"

"But I do love you."

"Do not say that to me again. It's not appropriate anymore."

"I'm an idiot. I knew it even then," he continued.

"Ugh! This is horrible. Why are you doing this?"

He virtually ignored her. "And I know that there was nothing going on between you and him," he told her. "It was just an excuse."

She plopped down on the navigator's seat and leaned forward with her head in her hands. She exhaled loudly and sat up. "Okay, are we really going to do this? Again?"

He averted his eyes again. "Sorry. It's just… the last time we talked about this, I was a total prat about it. I want a chance to seem civilised again in your eyes."

She felt trumped by that statement, and exhausted by the whole mess. But she wanted to give him that chance. He wasn't an evil human being by a long shot; perhaps, just perhaps, he deserved to have a frank discussion if that's what he wanted.

"Okay. But we have to keep it short or I really will go mental."

"Thank you. I'll keep it short. As I said, I know there was nothing going on between you and the Doctor."

"Okay, yeah. You're right," she said, rubbing her eyes. "Except,well… I never made any secret about my feelings. But you chose to go ahead with the engagement anyway. At least there was never anything… physical. Not while I was in a relationship with you." As she said this, she looked Tom up and down as though to remind him one more time of his own transgression. She knew it was a small thing to do, especially since she had just told herself to give him a chance, but she couldn't help herself.

"But now there is?"

"Yes," she told him. "Now there is."

He gulped. "Since when?"

She crossed her arms over her chest and leaned back in the chair, looking at him with exasperation. He'd seen that look in her eyes before, the look that told him to shut the hell up if he knew what was good for him.

He put up his arms in a gesture of surrender, "Okay, okay. Just curious. Boy, if looks could kill, I'd be dead, Martha. I was going to follow it up by asking if he's better than me in the sack. I guess I'm lucky I didn't go there."

"Blimey, why does everyone want to hear the story of The Doctor After Dark? You're as bad as Jack."

"Truth be told, I don't want to know," he told her. "I can live without the details thank you very much. It's just, erm…" He looked at the floor and bit his thumbnail. He seemed to be stifling a thought.

"It's just what?"

"Nothing," he said, waving the thought away. "It's none of my business."

"You know, you were the one who insisted we have this conversation, so you don't get to do that. You don't get to plant seeds and then say nothing. Out with it."

"Well, it's just… I'm sort of surprised you still want to… you know."

"What?"

"Be with the Doctor," Tom said, almost at a whisper.

"Why wouldn't I?"

"I don't know, it just seems like you'd never have his full attention."

"He's the last survivor of a civilization that helped police the laws of time and space for the universe, Tom. This is stuff I can't even get my mind around, let alone divert his attention in any meaningful way. No-one will ever have his full attention. I've always known that, and I've always known that I'd give anything to be with him anyway."

"Yeah, you're probably right," he said, nodding vigourously. "You've known him a lot longer than I have, you've lived with him, worked with him, lived with the pain, and you've probably thought it through."

"I have," she said, narrowing her eyes, regarding him suspiciously.

"I believe you," he said, conceding. "And after what the two of you have been through, you deserve to be together. If that's what you both want."

"It is."

"I can see that. I mean, you two are trying to be discreet, I don't know if that's for my benefit or not, but… I can see the love in your eyes, and in his. I can see that the past is the past," he said. "And speaking as someone who represents your past, well, I'd say that's a pretty good inside assessment."

"It is," she repeated.

He smiled slightly. "I won't say it doesn't sting, knowing that I'm so far behind you, knowing that you're now so lost in him. And I'm sure Rose would say the same thing if she were here."

Martha frowned. "Maybe." She felt her heart skip a beat, in spite of herself. It wasn't the first time Rose's name had come up in this conversation, but there was something about the turn the discussion had taken that made this occasion jarring.

"Of course she would," he said calmly. "What feeling person wouldn't? You really think it's fun for her, living with the fact that he's done with her, and has decided to be with you instead? That he had the choice, and he chose you?"

"No, I suppose it's not."

"I mean, I remember you said that she was there with you lot, the last time you saw him, when that last big to-do happened with the… you know, those things that look like six-foot pepper shakers with plungers on their bodies…"

"Daleks."

"Yeah. And I don't know what happened between them after that to make him decide she wasn't right for him. Maybe she screwed up like I did," he speculated. Martha got the feeling he was thinking aloud now. "Or maybe she broke up with him. But whatever it was, it was enough to void all that time he spent living with you and thinking of her. He's clearly got over her now, just like you don't have any lingering feelings for me. Poor Rose, I say. Maybe I should give her a ring."

Martha nodded absently.

Because she knew the truth. Nothing had happened to make the Doctor believe that Rose wasn't right for him. Rose hadn't screwed up, she hadn't broken up with him. The Doctor had given her up out of necessity, as a way of handling the unique dilemma of having a twin in this world. He knew that Rose and the twin were right for one another, and the twin was like the Doctor in every way, except for his human aspect.

So it wasn't that the Doctor had been given a choice between Rose and Martha, and he chose Martha. It was that he'd had to close himself off from Rose once and for all…

…and Martha was what remained.

When she looked back at Tom, in spite of fighting them back with every desire in her body, there were tears in her eyes.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

"Oh, Tom," she groaned, sadly. "Things are not always as they seem."

No, they most certainly are not, Tom thought to himself.