As the first light of morning came over the vehicle, Tegan shut off the lights that sent streams of illumination to the surrounding environment. It was still very dim, but she could see the trees just below the belly of the vehicle. The compass on the control panel showed that she indeed had the nose of the vehicle pointed in a northeasterly direction. She could see life waking below them: birds of all colors fluttered in the branches, small animals ran across the open spaces and the wind blew in the trees. But inside the cab, it was silent. Her breathing had evened out, quieted after a small crying jag an hour or so earlier. The Doctor's breathing was unsteady, punctuated with small moans occasionally. He lay in a fitful sleep stretched half sitting, half lying in the chair next to her.

"Hold on, Doc" she whispered. She clucked her tongue again and looked to the energy monitor again. She supposed that it worked the same as a gas gauge in a car. Whether it did work the same or not, the fact that it was showing very low levels of fuel or energy in the car. "This doesn't bode well, I think, Doc. And I've got to set us down somewhere" she quietly said, glancing around. "Somewhere before this thing runs out and I have to crash us. And I need to look at your wound."

She bit her lip and shook her head.

"Power level?"

Tegan glanced sideways at the Doctor. His eyes were open at half-mast. She wanted to launch at him and hug him. He was still alive. But she didn't dare take her hands from wheel. "Doc! You're awake."

"Come on, Tegan. Brave heart," he tried to give her a smile. "What's our power level?"

"If I'm reading this thing right; the level is extremely low. I was thinking to set us down before we had to crash."

"You're starting to think"

"like a pilot. You forget I flew at home," she smiled. "Any suggestions on where to put down?"

"Anywhere," he muttered as the vehicle sputtered on power. "Flat would be advisable."

She nodded and guided the car down as the Doctor slipped back into a daze.

**

When he opened his eyes next, Tegan was unclipping her restraints. He tried to lever off the seat, but she waved him back down with her hand and a grimace. "We're down, Doc. Stay where you are. I want to look at that wound of yours."

He cracked a weak smile. "I take it we didn't crash."

"Brave heart, Doc," she quipped. "I haven't lost a plane yet. Granted I've only flown two, but they're both still in one piece. Now stay put, will you? There has to be a medical kit around here some where"

"No aspirin, please," he grunted.

Tegan sighed and pushed to the back of the small vehicle, digging under seats. "I wonder if it's in the boot. No, wait Cripesdon't they ever mark these things? Yes, here it is." She climbed back over the seats to sit down next to the Doctor. "Lean a little bit to the left, Doc."

"Let me see what's in the case, Tegan," he muttered. "You may not know what you're seeingit is in your future."

She frowned and pulled a syringe out. "This says 'for use with burns'."

He squinted and reached out his right hand. "Must be some sort of numbing agent with an aid to rebuild cells. They should work; mostly on meI do have a slightly different gene sequence than humans. Though I suppose"

Tegan frowned. "It'll work like a scab, Doc. You can undo any damage I do to you in the TARDIS. I'm just worried about infection."

He moaned as he moved and her lips crumpled into a deeper frown. "Doc? How bad is it? You won't regenerate, will you?"

"I don't think so, Tegan. I don't know. I've never been shot like this before," he sighed. "Damage is extensive," he shifted.

"Then hold still, I want to see how extensive this damage is," she insisted. He sat still as she reached over and began to unbutton his shirt. She peeled the blackened and burned material of his shirt back from his body. His whole shoulder was a mass of burned flesh. There was no blood and it looked to be seared shut. She wasn't taking any chances though. "Lay still, Doc. I'm going to spray this on you, that's how it works, right?"

"Right. Quite right, Tegan."

She braced him against the seat, her hand curling over his naked well shoulder. Then, biting her lip, she shook the large syringe sprayer. Then she closed her eyes, muttered something like: 'Brave heart', and sprayed his shoulder. He arched against the seat back, his face twisted in pain. She put down the sprayer and pressed her hand against his ribs, against his uninjured chest and held him down. His breath rattled in his chest, she could feel the force of it against his chest wall. Under her right hand, she could feel his stronger heart pulsing a power beat; under her left his lesser heart fluttered like a bird in a cage. As his breathing became regular, she nodded and eased her hands from his body.

Where she had sprayed the material, his skin was red, but was rapidly being covered by a type of synthetic bandage that looked like fake skin. The Doctor grunted in pain and glanced down at his shoulder, nodding slightly. "Well done," he croaked.

"That's right? It looks horrible."

"It's not for use in beauty contests, I'll grant you. Yes, that's right," he said, his words punctuated by deep breaths. His eyes blinked shut and he puffed a sigh.

Tegan bit her lip and shook her head slowly. His coloring was very pale and his breathing was deep but a little uneven. She sat back, her skirt pulling a little as she rocked back on her haunches. "Go to sleep, Doc."

He muttered and raised an eyebrow. "Playing nurse, Tegan?" His eyes didn't open.

"I'm going to have a look around this vehicle and see what we have. I'm going to shut off the power too. There's nothing you can do and it looks like that stuff has given you some pain relief. Best rest while the pain's low."

He nodded, but by the third nod, he drifted into a deep sleep. Tegan's frown became more pronounced and her eyes filled with tears. She turned and found the release for the door, having it slide open before she viscously turned the key to off. Careful not to jar his arm, she climbed over the seat to the door and out into the early morning air. She made it two stumbling steps before she sat down on the ground, amidst grass, mud and trees, and let the emotion out. And out it did come in gasps, tears and quaking, heaving breaths.

Some time later, she felt the cool of the morning seep through her skirt to wet her skin. Tears cooled on her cheeks dusted with the breezes that brought the heavy, humid smell of jungle to her nose. The sun was warming the place where she sat and she curled her hands into the grass for grounding, just for the feel of it against her palms. Even with everything that was different in this time period and with all the Joiba and thoughts of man ruining people's minds simply to get at their wives, the grass was still the same and would always be the same. Then, with a sigh, she pushed to her feet, leaning back into the vehicle for solidity.

Just a week ago, she had been running through a warehouse to escape all of this. And yet, here she stood, in a jungle, lost, with the man whom she thought she barely understood any more yet put all of her trust in lying severely injured just feet from her. She had to do something.

"Tegan, get ahold of yourself," she whispered. "Do something proactive and instead of reactive, girl."

She turned and began to search the car as the heat of the jungle went from hot to Hades.

**

"Really, Tegan"

It was the next day. She had let him sleep away most of the day, only waking him occasionally to give her input on safety of water and what was edible or not. As night fell, they discussed direction to travel and that they needed to leave the vehicle upon daybreak. She had found a few things that could help: a GPS unit, a few protein bars. And then she had curled up in the pilot's seat and had fallen into a fitful sleep; she woke every hour to check their safety and often quite a few times in between when she heard noises in the surrounding jungle. He had seemed much better when morning came and they had struck out in the direction that the map and the GPS indicated.

"What?" she asked. She was several steps ahead of him, peeling back vines and stepping over (and in some cases in) rotting plant life on the ground. She had been listening for his steps behind her for some time, opting not to glance back at him. It was past midday and the small device the Doctor had explained was a GPS was still showing them tracking in a northerly direction. Although that seemed to be going as it should, the heat and humidity of the jungle made walking a chore and she was covered in sweat, dirt and grime. She pulled harshly on another vine and turned to glance back at him. "Doc, is your arm paining you?"

He shook his head once. "The synthetic you put on me took care of the pain, thank goodness and it is acting as a bandage. There's little threat from infection."

"What's the matter, then?" she asked, wiping sweat from her brow.

The Doctor held out his left hand and wiggled his fingers. "Let me see the GPS, Tegan."

She frowned and leaned against a tree. "We're headed in the right direction, Doc. You can trust me to read this thing properly; you did teach me how to, remember?" she asked testily.

"That's quite not the point, Tegan; you've missed it entirely. You can't do what you're doing and navigate at the same time."

"You weren't able to read it when we left the ship," she replied. "And we did agree that speed was of the essence." She frowned as a trickle of sweat dripped in her eye. With a dirty hand, she wiped at it in agitation. "You did say that that Joiba person would possibly follow us"

"Possibly, not probably, Tegan. There is a very big difference in the two. Though I do agree getting separated from the ship was the best course of action, I didn't agree that you should have to do most of the heavy work"

Tegan took two steps back towards him. She squinted her eyes and saw that a deep maroon was slowly infiltrating his golden hue. Around his arm, the aura was slowly loosing its patina appearance. "It's healing is it?" she changed the subject and nodded towards his arm.

The Doctor frowned. "Don't change the subject, Tegan."

"Hell's Teeth, Doc"

He opened his mouth to respond when a roll of far away thunder sounded over head. Tegan tilted back her head, squinting as a drop of water fell on her brow. "Oh that's just great," she grumbled.

He found humor in the situation and a wide smile graced his features. "It is a rainforest, Miss Tegan."

"Full of rotting plant life, mosquitoes, malaria and Lord knows what kind of animals that can eat us," she complained. "So I would rather not like to stand around and wait to be attacked, infected or killed, if you don't mind," she turned around to begin to tear at the vines again, hissing as one of the rougher ones cut her palm.

The Doctor stepped up, reaching out to catch her wrist in his grip. She turned her palm up to let him see the two criss-crossing wounds on it. "Hmm," he hummed, lifting it close to his face. Then he glanced around at the vines. "They aren't poisonous. It'll just be painful. Have you any more bandages?"

She gave a crumpled smile. "So long as I'm still wearing my skirt, yes." She bent and gently separated another scrap of material from the loosely woven material. She righted and began to wrap the material around her hand. The Doctor watched her while at the same time glancing downwards to see her skirt. She finished tying the bandage and intercepted his amused expression at her clothing. "Doc"

"Well, Tegan," he cleared his throat as a minor blush flushed his features. "Whereas that skirt was alluring when it was long, it is rather not a tax on the imagination the shorter it gets."

"Rabbits, Doc!" she groaned. "It's no shorter than what I wore on the TARDIS."

He nodded but rubbed at the back of his neck as if very self-conscious. "True." He frowned and shook his head, and then the frown dissolving into a smile aimed at disarming her. "Interesting. I wonder what's changed"

Confused, she shook her head and turned. The Doctor sighed and took the GPS out of her hand. "Allow me," he said, authoritatively.

Tired, nearing the end of her patience and physical strength, she allowed him to take the small compass type instrument and move ahead of her in the jungle. "If I must" she sighed. "You must be feeling better; you're back to your usual arrogance"

"And you're approaching normal as well," he replied as he began to walk through the jungle, dodging vines and raindrops. "Grumpy: you're your usual self."

Tegan narrowed her eyes, registered the weird deep yellow and red that flushed his aura and fell into step behind him, cradling her injured palm in her other hand.

**

"Tegan?"

Her name was called and penetrated her fuzzy mind. She could hear the worry in the Doctor's voice. "Hmm?"

A hand closed over her shoulder and she felt both a small shake and an insistent thumb rubbing on her skin. It was then that she realized her eyes were closed and she was leaning against the rough bark of a tree. Her eyes sprung open and she saw the Doctor leaning near her, his hand on her naked shoulder. It was almost dark and she could see that night was approaching again. The last thing she remembered was listening to the Doctor mutter about direction as they encountered a small river and then she had closed her eyes for only a moment. "I must have fallen asleep," she yawned. A blink had her inhaling sharply.

The Doctor's aura was near purple with flushes of gold about his chest region and a bright red about his waist. He caught her upset and frowned. "Tegan? Are you all right?"

Still barely awake, still extremely tired, she blinked again. "You've changed," she nearly cried.

He shook his head in confusion. She saw that the GPS was hanging on a small piece of material about his neck. Her heart pounded and she felt her breath pouring in and out of her lungs as if it were liquid. Her hands hung limply at her sides and she skittered up against the bark of the tree. She could feel that he had changed, not only by the aura, but by the way that his gaze burned bright in his face. Suddenly the nightmare that had rested at the back of her mind that everything had changed, that nothing would be the same again rushed up to meet her. He braced her into the tree, frowning, holding her still as she felt she might bolt.

He had changed. She could feel it. He was the man she had seen in the warehouse, the one that told her he could commit murder, the one that had strode from the TARDIS intent not only on finishing his murderous task but had considered his own death to acceptable in that instance. Murder, suicide, self-sacrifice, changeshe couldn't take it, she shut her eyes hard against the image. "No."

She felt the Doctor shift and then two hands closed over her arms. His hands were ice cold and wet; it was still raining. With her eyes closed, she shook her head. "You've changed," she whispered again.

"Yes, my brain chemistry has changed, I can feel it, Tegan," he responded quietly. "But that's all. I'm still the Doctor"

"No" she whispered again, shaking her head. "No," she repeated louder. "Your aura has changed. You're not the same, Doctor"

"Open your eyes, Tegan; look at me."

"No," she denied again, squeezing her eyes shut. "They've changed me too. Hell's Teeththey've changed me too."

"You're exhausted, Tegan. Listen to yourself. You went from quiet to hysterical in two minutes. You haven't had proper sleep in 36 hours, your little nap notwithstanding," his voice was soothing, quiet, barely above the rushing of the nearby river and the patter of raindrops on the leaves. "I'm still the Doctor, Tegan. I'm just sensing everything differently. I can smell better; I'm noticing things differently; I have a slight headache. I'm still your friend."

She took a deep breath and turned her face away from his voice. "You haven't been the same Doctor since the Dalek's ship."

"Tegan"

"A murderer, Doc" she said mournfully. The tears started to fall as she pushed away from the tree and opened her eyes to stumble away from him and away from his restraining hands.

His agitation sounded in the way he nearly slapped tree trunk. "Teganthe middle of a rainforest is not the place" he started and then his voice dropped again. "I did what I had to do, Tegan. I can't explain it beyond that. I can't. I thought we were beyond this. We need to concentrate on getting through this, Tegan."

"Do you think I want to stay on it? I close my eyes and all I see is you with that look in your eyes telling me you had to commit murder. And then I open my eyes and see that you have changed"

"From Joiba mind altering"

"It doesn't matter!" she yelled and turned to him, opening her eyes wide. The aura dimmed and she saw him, leaning into the tree, his shoulder hard against its rough bark. The sling was lying on the ground near the tree; he had ripped it off when she had tried to bolt. His shirt was nearly transparent from moisture and his hair was plastered to his head. "Can't you see: it doesn't matter."

"Tegan" he whispered. Or at least she thought he whispered her name; she only heard the last syllable, his voice catching on the 'n'.

She lifted her chin. She knew she was tired. She knew she was exhausted; her legs and back and arms all were scarred with scars and wounds and her muscles screamed for relief. Her head throbbed from lack of water and food; they had walked for 8 hours. She wanted to sleep. She wanted to be out of the rain. Above all, she wanted to be rid of this blight to her vision that let her see how he had changed. But she knew that it was exactly that exhaustion that was allowing her to say these things; things that had been at the back of her mind for more than a week.

They stood there, semi-sheltered by the leaves overhead from the falling rain until the twilight began to encroach.

Her skin was clammy, wet and she felt too hot. Her gaze drifted from his face to the surrounding environment to take in the flowing river nearby, and the trees. She quickly looked at him and noticed that he was staring at her openly, his mouth slightly open and his eyessad. Then he cleared his throat and nodded to the river. "It's not too deep, Tegan. We'll have to try and cross it."

"Yes, well" he continued with a sigh, rubbing at the back of his neck.

Tegan frowned and glanced at the river again. "Can't we camp on this side of it," she complained.

"No, Tegan. With the amount of rain that has fallen in the last few hours, I wouldn't be surprised if there is a flash flood somewhere today. There's higher ground on the other side. Do you think you trust me enough to believe that?"

"Don't be testy," she replied. "We'd best get it done. All I want to do is sleep."

At his frown, she turned and walked toward the river. In the twilight and falling rain, it looked like a disturbed black mirror with lines of movement in it. It felt slightly warmer than the rain as she stepped into it. She heard his feet slash into the water next to her. With a sigh, she waded into the water, pushing through it, glad that her skirt had indeed been shortened. The Doctor's longer gait had him walking ahead of her in a moment and she allowed it, following in his wake. She was tired, as she had said. The water got deeper and she felt the level rise past her knees, her thighs and even her pelvis, waist and then rose to her mid torso. The water rose accordingly on the Doctor, but to a lesser level on his body relative to his height.

"This isn't so bad," she huffed. Her feet curled into the stones underfoot. It felt wonderfully sturdy compared to the moving water. "Keep your shoulder dry; why did you take it out of the sling?"

"It's healed," he responded, glancing back at her. "The nanities are doing their work. It itches like the devil, but it's healed. Mostly, that is. Quite as good as new. Watch your footing where you are; it's uneven. We're half way there"

"Wonderfulit's almost-"

She barely had the time to draw a breath as she fell, submerging in the water.

Rushing sound, obliterating everything. Cooler than rain, her hair floating like a lure about her head, her eyes full of muddy, murky water. Scared, wanting to scream, fighting to keep her breath. Moving. She was moving along the bottom. Current dragging her away. Rocks scraping at her bum, twigs against her legs, a large rock in her stomach. She couldn't find which way was up. Murky. Dark. Night swimming.

A large branch came under her waist and it hauled her up and she felt the slap of warm air against her face again. She gasped and shuddered. The branch curled and she was up against something solid that was holding her head above water. Something strong.

"Put your arms around my neck, Tegan," the Doctor said his voice urgent and yet soothing. "Take deep breaths; you're all right." Her gaze cleared and she saw him in the gathering night, his face tight with worry. His skin was visible through his shirt and he was icily cool, but he was holding her like she was his lifeline.

She gulped great mouthfuls of air and wound her arms around his neck. She didn't know she was crying until he waded to the other side, one of his arms around her waist and the other under her thighs, supporting her. He cleared the water, holding her close, until he found a fallen tree. He set her down with infinite tenderness.

His hands brushed her wet hair away from her face, his palms holding her cheeks gently between them. She didn't know if he knelt or sat in front of her. "It's all right," he reassured, his voice teetering between bass and hoarse. "You're all right, Tegan. You took rather a bad spill."

"Doctor?" she whispered, pitifully. Before she could continue, he shifted his weight and she winced. He stood and moved to her side, kneeling by her thigh.

"Which one, Tegan?"

"My left," she sniffled. "What the hell is wrong with me," she muttered, agitated.

"Shock, not fear," he muttered helpfully. He glanced up at her tear stained face. "All those brave hearts must have worked. Show me what hurts, Tegan."

Tegan's hands shook as she showed him the inside of her thigh. It was only a bruise, she could see that, but he made the motions of checking the injury with infinite care. His cool hands gently eased the leg around and prodded carefully. "It doesn't seem to be major, Tegan. Well, major for an injury. It does appear to be rather large for a bruise. I'm quite sure you're all right."

When he looked back into her eyes, she nodded. By her third nod, she was in tears again. It wasn't from pain or fear, but she felt cold, exhausted and entirely weak. It had all been too much, the last week, the last two days, and she felt it crashing in on her. His gaze, his eyes turned gray in concern and he leaned in and brushed his fingers against her wet cheeks, tears mixed with rain, and slowly gathered her in his arms. She put her face sideways on his good shoulder and allowed him to hold her, tight and close.

"I thought you were gone too," he whispered, confessing and his arms tightened.

Maybe it was the shock or the way he soothed her, but she barely felt the rain.