Carefully and quickly Jack heaved the Doctor onto one of the beds in the infirmary, grunting under the weight.
"What did you eat for dinner? Bricks?" he muttered under his breath. After getting the Doctor into what seemed like a suitable position, Jack sat down in a nearby chair, at a loss for what to do. One pulse: half of what the Doctor was supposed to have. What could that mean for him? Biting his lower lip, Jack reached out to check his friend's pulse again. Still only one…and the other was slowing considerably. What the heck was Jack to do? He wasn't some kind of doctor: that was the Doctor! …Hence the name.
"TARDIS," he called out, on a whim, "I'm sure you don't want to lose him as much as I do…" He broke off as the Doctor twitched. One sudden move and that was it. The Doctor's face was twisted with pain. Then Jack recognized what was happening. The Doctor was a Time Lord: Time Lords regenerate. Jack breathed out a sigh of relief. It wasn't over yet.
But then the Doctor's face relaxed and Jack sensed the feeling of self-approval coming from the walls or, he realized, the TARDIS itself. Confused, Jack reached out to check the Doctor's pulse again. To his absolute bewilderment, he felt both. The TARDIS had restored them. But why? Couldn't the Doctor just have regenerated? Jack sat back, frowning. He could ask the TARDIS, but he highly doubted he would get a reply. He would've asked the Doctor, but, for one, the Doctor was unconscious at the moment, and, for another, when he woke up Jack guessed he would rather talk about Rose and the zombies rather than his near-death experience.
Jack sat in his chair, pondering for a few minutes until he heard a slight moan from the Doctor. Immediately he stood and rushed to his friend's side. The Doctor's eyes opened and instantly found Jack's.
"Rose," was all he said, as he propped himself up on the pillow. Jack winced.
"Yeah."
The Doctor frowned. "What happened?"
"Well…I saw your light was blinking on the map, decided that wasn't a good thing, and dutifully ran to the rescue like you told me to. Met up with Rose… Did you see her eyes? Like she was blind or something…anyway. Ran to find you, found you…you only had one pulse though. Opened the closest door which just happened to be the infirmary, threw you in…gently of course…and…well. I think you started to regenerate, but the TARDIS restored your other pulse," Jack explained, almost carelessly. The Doctor's eyes widened.
"One pulse?" he repeated. Jack winced again.
"Yeah."
The Doctor breathed out slowly, looking around, his hand unconsciously rising to his neck. After a moment he frowned, his brow creasing, and looked back to Jack.
"How long've we been in here?"
Jack met his gaze, failing to the relevance. He shrugged.
"Ten minutes at the most. Why?"
The Doctor's frown deepened as he sat up completely.
"Rose probably went to report to her employers," he said. Jack frowned.
"The zombies? They can't get it here. Rose couldn't," he argued. The Doctor looked back to Jack, a slightly amused expression on his face.
"You forget. The zombies don't need to use a door."
As if on cue, a deafening crack echoed in both the men's ears. The Doctor jumped out of the bed and whirled around. The far wall was open to that mysterious black nothingness. Inside it, he saw the horribly mutated corpses of himself, Jack, and Rose, so awfully shredded it made even him want to vomit, and standing in front of the trio of zombies, was Rose. His Rose. Not Jack's. Not Mickey's. Not Jackie's. Most of all, not the zombies, even though they presently had control over her. No. His Rose.
Rose stepped out the wall and started to stride towards him. Immediately his anger dwindled, and the Doctor shrank. Rose had already almost killed him. She could do it again and succeed.
"Rose…" he pleaded hoarsely. What was wrong with his voice? "Rose, the real Rose, I know you're in there somewhere…Rose, listen to me! It's me, the Doctor. You don't want to kill me. That's the zombies, inside of you, in control of you, your soul…Rose…"
She took no notice of his pleadings. Jack watched, itching to help. Finally unable to hold himself back, he ran between the Doctor and Rose, only about a foot away from Rose.
"Rose—" but that was as far as he got. Out of nowhere Rose's arm hit the side of Jack's head with such force that he flew across the room. The Doctor watched as Jack hit the wall hard and fell to the floor, unconscious. He looked back to Rose, now seriously frightened, to see she didn't even seem to have noticed. He backed up and resumed his pleading. He hatedpleading. Oh, how he hated pleading. But how else was he going to get his Rose back? Not that it was working…
His back hit the wall and Rose kept coming. She didn't stop until she there was no physical possible way she could continue. The Doctor, pinned between Rose and the wall, recoiled. Usually he might have savored the closeness, but seeing as she was most definitely going to kill him…
Then an idea popped to his head. His Rose…
Before she could do anything, the Doctor grabbed the back of Rose's head and smashed his lips onto hers. Desperately he kissed her, not quite sure if she was kissing him back or if she just wasn't pulling away because he wasn't letting her. His tongue played with hers for a brief moment before he pulled away, praying it worked.
The Doctor looked into Rose's surprised eyes. They were back to normal…well, kind of. She looked at him, baffled for a moment before whispering,
"Doctor?" and passing out. The Doctor caught her and held her gently. He was never going to do that again, he decided. Too stressful.
A low, animal-like growl reminded him that his work wasn't over yet. He looked up to confront the zombies.
"What do you want?" he said through gritted teeth. The mass of torn flesh that was, in a sort, himself, stepped forward.
"We only wish to go home."
The Doctor gapped. "That's it?" he asked incredulously. "You had to possess Rose's soul and kill Jack and me so you could go home?"
If it were possible, the Doctor zombie might've looked slightly sheepish. "We thought you would kill us."
The Doctor frowned. "Is that possible? Kill the undead…anyway. Doesn't matter." He met his own gaze. "All you had to do was ask. I would've helped."
The zombie looked pleased.
"But on one condition."
The zombie frowned.
"You restore the TARDIS's power," the Doctor said. "It was you who stopped it, am I correct?"
The Doctor zombie winced. "We couldn't get home if it was traveling. We planned to only use the help of Bad Wolf…er, Rose. She couldn't turn off the TARDIS without you questioning her. So we stopped the TARDIS ourselves."
"And sent the shocks through the wire when I was trying to fix it," the Doctor added. The zombie nodded. The Doctor smiled.
"Well then. Now that we've got that sorted out. Let's get to work."
A/N: I love reviewers and live for constructive criticism!
