Chapter 6: Pain in the neck

Playing entry 18/?.

MILLENNIA: You're okay. Stay with me.

DOCTOR: I told yer I'm fine.

MILLENNIA: You're slurring.

DOCTOR: No am not.

Millennia sighed. By the time they'd reached the familiar side room, the Doctor's condition had considerably worsened. He was now panting and was progressively paling. The amount of blood now caking his hand and clothes was bordering on B movie.

'Okay, sit down,' she ordered. He didn't protest, practically falling onto the floor to lean against the wall. She immediately located some rags and began to tear them up, bunching them into clumps ready to soak up the blood. 'Take your hand off.'

She pulled encouragingly on his fingers to get him to move his hand and expose his bite wound. He was reluctant but eventually relented - it was so bloody she couldn't even see the puncture marks.

'Don't …' he moaned.

'I promise I'll be gentle,' she said as she took one of the rags and commenced dabbing at the blood. He repeatedly winced until the puncture wounds of the fangs revealed themselves, deep and straight into his artery. No sooner had she cleaned it than did more blood churn out, bubbling like a cauldron as the Doctor breathed to indicate it had punctured his respiratory system.

'Right. Hold this,' she instructed, pressing the rag to his neck. For a moment, he did nothing, just staring at her. 'Bluebird,' she prompted.

'Shorry,' he slurred out and raised a slightly uncoordinated hand to press down on the rag. It didn't seem to do much to stem the flow. He needed a dose of one of the vials, and he needed it quickly.

'Where are the vials?' she asked him.

'Err … Jack gottem.'

Millennia's eyes shot open. 'Jack? Jack's got them?'

'Yer.'

'But … oh no,' she moaned and rummaged in his pockets for the communicator with blood coated hands. 'Jack. Leah. Any change?'

'Nothing,' Jack replied.

'It is bad here. Vampire has bit him. He will not clot. We need a vial, or he will bleed out. We do not have a long time,' she stated in English.

'A vampire bit him!?'

'Yes, please, he need help. I cannot stop it bleeding.'

'Shit … We'll think of something. Just do everything you can.'

Millennia switched off the communicator, looking back at the Doctor. The rag pressed to his neck was already soaked. He was sweating a little now, too, his eyes beginning to sink. She took his pulse from his wrist, finding it was higher than usual. He was going into shock already.

'Bluebird, listen to me,' she said, reaching up to press another rag against his neck. 'You need to do absolutely everything I say, okay?'

'Ah can't limbo, I tried,' the Doctor murmured. 'Wash in Hawaii wid … wid … Mel.'

'Look at me,' Millennia implored, keeping her right hand pressed on the one holding his bleeding neck with the other cupping his cheek. 'I said, look at me.'

He eventually did, his eyes defocused but aimed in her direction. 'Mmm?' he asked through pants for air, not even looking like he was listening properly.

'Calm down and take control,' she ordered.

'You carn't chell me whadda do.'

'Theta!' she shouted loudly in his face, making him flinch and look slightly afraid. 'Listen to me right now. Take a breath, and control your blood pressure. Lower your hearts rate and constrict your blood vessels as much as you can.'

'Am shorry,' he whined.

'Don't be sorry, just do what I say,' she ordered. 'Do as I say, and this'll be easier, I promise, bluebird.'

He took a deep breath, which sounded more like a straw sucking up the last of the drink from a glass. Her hand on his cheek dropped to the other side of his bloody neck, feeling for his pulse. Slowly but surely, it began to ease down to a more human-like beat, and a quick check under the rags showed the bleeding had slightly reduced.

'Yes, yes, good, well done,' she encouraged, adding another rag to his neck. 'Keep it like that and talk to me.'

'Bout … wha?' he asked drowsily, his eyes closing briefly.

'Theta!' she shouted again, jerking him back to wakefulness. 'Anything. Tell me … answer me what you didn't earlier. What do you think about the most?'

The Doctor swallowed and shivered slightly. The blood was now caking his entire arm. 'I carn think,' he groaned.

'Is it Leah? Do you think about Leah a lot?' she prompted. 'Theo?'

'Yeah … a lod.'

'What about Rose?'

He laughed suddenly, the air of it continuing to bubble out through his perforated neck. 'Yeah. All der chime.'

'Where did you meet her?'

'H-Henriksh,' he answered, his eyelids fluttering briefly. 'She … she … audshons. I … hadda bomba … ah …'

He suddenly lurched and coughed, bringing up the blood which had managed to get into his respiratory system. It flung out his mouth onto his lap in a cocoon of phlegm.

'Shesh gonnow,' he gasped immediately afterwards before his brow furrowed, and he cleared his bloody throat to try again, crimson dribbling out from the edges of his lips. 'She. Has. Gone,' he forced out with more refinement, his head rolling on the wall.

'She's not gone, we're saving her, and we need you … We all need you.'

'Ish mah fault doe,' he whined, tears now creeping up from his eyes. 'Roesh … nuuurgh,' he moaned in a primal, guttural sound. 'Amchyin.'

'What?'

'Amchyin, ahbromish …'

She was now struggling to understand him. Panicked, she reached for her communicator again.

'Jack! Leah!' she screamed into it.

Playing entry 19/?.

JACK: We know, Millennia, we're trying!

MILLENNIA: He is going bad so fast I can't stop it!

JACK: I said we're trying!

Jack turned to Leah, still standing at the fruit basket that was the console. 'There's gotta be something, Leah, anything.'

Leah's mind raced, jumping from excerpts from the TARDIS manual to what her father had taught her. 'I, um …'

'Leah!' Jack prompted.

She stared at the console, panicking inside. Despite the fact it was all made of fruit, most of the controls seemed to correlate to the size and shape of the fruit they'd become. The vortex loop was a banana, the vector tracker was a peach … maybe, just maybe, she could try and fly it as it currently was if she could remember where everything was ...

'Um, okay, I've got an idea, but it might not work,' she announced.

'Do it. Whatever it is, do it.'

She looked at her honorary uncle, who nodded supportively. She took a breath and commenced the first ever spacetime flight using entirely fruit-based controls.

Playing entry 20/?.

MILLENNIA: Bluebird. Bluebird. Please.

DOCTOR: …

MILLENNIA: Stay with me. Please.

DOCTOR: …

Millennia swallowed, kneeling next to him in his ever-increasing puddle of blood, pressing the last of the rags to his neck. He was now deathly pale, breathing rapidly, and his skin was becoming colder and colder with every minute that ticked by. The grip of his hand on his neck was mostly gone, the only thing now holding it in place being Millennia's own hand. He was still coughing up blood, and now he had a nosebleed, too, as his blood continued to thin inside him.

She rechecked his pulse. It was still slow, and that was quite possibly the only thing keeping him alive at the moment. It was happening so quickly …

'Bluebird. Please speak to me,' she begged.

He said nothing.

She jerked his shoulders urgently. 'Theta!'

He swallowed suddenly and coughed up more blood before he finally spoke, drawling and very nearly indecipherable, 'yeah.'

'Don't go. Please. I need you.'

'Oh. Ah can stay fer one mar drink ah guess bud I carn't pay.'

'I'll pay,' she said, tears welling up in her eyes. 'If you stay here, I'll pay for another drink.'

With his eyes still closed, he half-smiled. 'Mmmkay. Ah'll shtay.'

She nodded, cupping his cheek. 'I remember the Gallifreyan Academy Hot Five. I wasn't in it, but I remember. It was you on the perigosto stick, Koschei on drums, and that strange Patrex kid on pianalaika … what was his name?'

'Err … Ja … Janol,' the Doctor answered.

'Oh, yeah. Do you remember any of your songs?'

He didn't answer, his head stooping a little.

She forced it back up. 'Stay here, you promised me.'

'Am sho tired,' he moaned.

'But you promised.'

'I gotta go academeh chomorrow, if am late again Car'inal Sendoksh'll kill meh.'

'He won't mind, I promise,' she assured him. 'Remember any of your songs?'

'... No …'

'Okay, what about nursery rhymes we used to sing? Remember those? How about the one about cat and the mouse …?'

'Wha …?' he moaned.

'A fat cat saw a stream and took with her a bowl of cream. Asking of a Mouse to dine, "won't you have part of mine?"

'Mouse said yes and licked his fare as Kitty perched back in her chair; tail upright and hair on end, her paws outstretched and spine in scend.

'"Tasty cream!" Mouse shrieked high, "lickety-lick, lickety-lick! … Tasty cream!" Mouse, he cry, "lickety-lick, say I!" ….'

She suddenly stopped when she looked back at him and realised he had ceased breathing. 'Theta!' she shouted, shaking him again.

'Shtop doing tha',' he complained, his breathing resuming.

'Don't do a healing coma yet; you might not wake up again,' she implored.

'Yer sho demanding,' he complained.

'Please listen to me, I did this to you, and I need to fix it,' she said, her voice breaking slightly. 'I'm … I ...' She stopped herself as the tears came, creeping out from under her eyelids. '... This is all my fault.'

He said nothing. He probably hadn't even heard her. Her tears worsened.

She suddenly heard the groan of the TARDIS from somewhere outside the door. Unable to leave the Doctor, she straightened up as much as she could and shouted, 'in here! In here!'

Playing entry 21/?.

MILLENNIA: In here! In here!

JACK: I'm coming!

With the TARDIS door ajar, he looked back at Leah standing by the console, giving her a firm nod. 'Good job, kid, now go prep the infirmary and stay there!'

She ran off. He threw the carved box and the needle gun under his arm, and he rushed out of the TARDIS door into a low-lit corridor. He noticed the trail of dripped blood painting a macabre path into a door where he could hear Millennia shouting from.

He went to the door and pushed it open, running straight into an absolute bloodbath with the Doctor looking half-dead on the floor and Millennia kneeling next to him holding a bunch of bloody rags to his neck.

'Jack!' Millennia gasped, tears running down her cheeks. 'He not stop bleeding!'

Jack pulled out the box, prompting Millennia to pull her hand away so he could catch some of the blood on the lid. It pinged open, and Jack pulled out a vial, attaching it to the needle gun.

'Hold his neck, give!' Millennia ordered, throwing out her hand for the needle gun.

Jack gave it to her without protest, pressing one hand to the rags on the Doctor's neck with the other supporting his limp head as Millennia pushed up his sleeve and tried desperately to find a vein. Precious seconds passed.

'What's the problem!?' Jack asked urgently.

'Veins are collapsed,' Millennia moaned. 'Hold on …'

Finally, she managed to find one in the back of his hand and pulled the trigger on the needle gun, emptying half the vial in.

'How long till it kicks in?' Jack asked anxiously, looking at the Doctor's pallor with slightly blue-tinged lips.

'I don't know,' Millennia answered honestly.

'We need to get him inside the …'

He was interrupted by the sound of something or someone moving around outside the door.

'They have smelt him …' Millennia whispered, panicking. She took over Jack's position holding the Doctor's neck and head as Jack stood up, pulling out his gun and edging to the door. He listened but couldn't hear much.

'I'm gonna have to look,' he muttered.

'Please be careful,' she begged.

He nodded and opened the door a crack. He immediately spotted one down the corridor where the Doctor's blood trail emerged. It looked like something out of his worst nightmares, crouched down and licking the blood from the floor with a long bright red tongue like an insatiable cat licking spilt milk.

Holding his breath, he closed the door again. 'One,' he whispered. 'I'll take care of it. Bring stakes?'

She nodded, quickly handing him hers.

'Nurgh,' the Doctor suddenly said. Panicking, Millennia quickly put her hand over his mouth.

'Bluebird, quiet,' she whispered urgently in their native tongue.

His eyes blinked open, defocused, with his brows lowered in confusion. 'Mmmph,' he hummed below her hand.

'Doc,' Jack whispered, moving to drop to his haunches next to him. 'You gotta stay quiet for us. Can you do that?'

Clearly incredibly confused, the Doctor eventually nodded, and Millennia took her hand away. Jack planted a kiss on the Time Lord's forehead and stood up, gripping the stake firmly in his right hand. He passed Millennia his gun. 'Used one of these before?'

She took it, bewildered. 'No …'

'Don't put your finger on the trigger unless you want to shoot. There'll be a recoil, but it's been modified, so not too much. If I get overwhelmed, get him out of here. A couple of shots in their direction might scare them enough for you to get him back to the Tardis.'

'Okay,' she croaked.

'Good luck,' he said and bolted out the door. Millennia immediately heard the vampire screech as Jack yelled, and a fight began.

'Get up, get up,' Millennia urged the Doctor, wrapping her arms around him.

'Millenn'a?' he asked, swaying as he got to an upright position.

'Shush,' she begged, guiding him to the door. She peaked through just in time to see Jack stab the horrific creature in the chest with the stake, and with a final death shriek, it burned up into blood-red ash and disappeared.

Panting, Jack looked back at them. 'Go!' he ordered as there came the sound of more vampires heading towards them in a chorus of bone-chilling shrieks. She moved quickly, dragging the Doctor through the door and to the left where the TARDIS sat, waiting patiently.

Metres from the time machine's doors, the Doctor suddenly fell over, taking her down with him. Gasping, she quickly jumped to her feet as Jack reached them, still holding his stake. He hauled the Doctor up one-handed by his collar and dragged him to the TARDIS doors.

'Get it open!' he shouted as Millennia caught sight of a few more vampires coming around the corner straight for them. Panicking, she scrambled to hold the gun in both hands, pointed it down the corridor and pulled the trigger with a bang that startled her.

The bullet completely missed anything she may have been aiming for, rebounding off something metal and planting itself out of sight. But it was enough to halt the vampires for a couple of precious seconds, allowing her to scramble in the Doctor's pocket for the key as Jack took position in front of them to protect them as the vampires regrouped.

She dived for the door with the key, thrusting it into the lock and twisting.

It didn't work.

'It is not working!' she shouted, still jiggling the key desperately.

'It needs to be him! It's his key! Isomorphic!' Jack shouted as he took his gun back from her and fired another shot.

'Bluebird, unlock the door!' she shouted at the Doctor, pushing the key into his fingers and holding them tightly so he couldn't drop it.

'Wha …?' he asked, still confused and half on the floor.

'In the lock!' she said, forcing his fingers forward to push the key in. Thankfully, the Doctor had the natural instinct to turn it, and the door opened.

'Get in!' Jack shouted, firing his gun again.

'Bluebird!' she screamed, grabbing under the Time Lord's arm and pulling with everything she had to get him to move into the TARDIS. They staggered in, the Doctor immediately falling onto the ramp with blood dripping into the engines below the grating. 'Wha …?'

'Stay there!' Millennia shouted, running back to the door. The vampires were nearly on them … 'Jack! JACK!'

He backed away from the group of vampires hurriedly, firing his last shot before he finally reached the doors and tripped clumsily over the threshold. As the vampires closed on them, Millennia grabbed the door and slammed it shut, and immediately several thunks of vampire fists and feet met the wooden door, causing it to shake ominously in its frame.

'Oh god,' Jack moaned, panting for air as he turned over and saw the Doctor, somehow, had crawled to the console, holding himself up and pressing a delicious-looking clementine on the controls. The TARDIS activated, and she began to fly. 'Why, why, why does this keep happening!?' Jack gasped.

'Are you okay?' Millennia asked him in English.

There was a sudden loud clang, and they both looked up sharply to find the Doctor had collapsed by the console, coughing.

'Jack … Millennia,' he groaned, twisting his head to look at them. 'Why am I on the floor …?'