"You remember how the wolf people had those nanite type things with a name that you wouldn't be able to pronounce that enabled them to create images in their head so they would have something controlling them? But they were controlling themselves, like a mind outside their mind, if you get what I mean," The Doctor babbled on as he and Rose wandered back towards the TARDIS.
Rose was struggling to keep up with what the Doctor was saying. His new self seemed to forget that she was human and needed him to explain things slowly. She frowned as he spouted all this stuff and decided that she'd just have to trust him with whatever he was going to do.
"So I'm guessing somehow these nanite things with a name to hard to pronounce have somehow infected your brain, which would be why I can't find them because they're exactly like normal brain waves only able to function outside the brain thus you can see what looks like a real girl but is really a projected image from your minds eye. They're obviously playing off your emotions, making you more sensitive than usual which was what they'd do to the wolf people but because wolves don't have emotions it just made them revert to normal so they didn't kill each other. So now the only thing we've gotta do is figure out why they infected you and not me and how to get rid of them!" The Doctor grinned at her his arms flung up in the air as if expecting applause.
"What?" Rose asked a blank look on her face, hoping he wouldn't hate her for being a 'stupid ape'. The Doctor's face fell. Rose always used to understand him, even start to add things in that didn't occur to him. Since his regeneration however she seemed to have become more distant, unable to understand most of the things he said.
"You created the girl yourself," he said shrugging, deflated. He opened the TARDIS doors and shut them once Rose had entered after him.
He headed up to the console and flicked a switch. Rose stood, playing with her hands, slightly unnerved by the sudden silence from the Doctor.
"You're not seeing things," the Doctor said, then paused looking up. "Well you are… but they are there… if you see what I mean…"
He caught the still blank look on Rose's face, but she quickly hid it and nodded. He frowned and walked towards her pondering.
"Do you understand what I'm on about?" He asked quietly.
"I'm creating the image of the girl myself," Rose repeated. "So instead of her being in my minds eye she's a projected image which explains why only I can see her."
The Doctor grinned, his hearts sighing with relief that she'd understood. He couldn't bear to think that Rose was turning into a total stranger who neither knew nor cared what he was on about.
"Exactly!" The Doctor said. "Now all we have to do is figure out why it's not affected me and then how to get rid of the nanites with a name too hard to pronounce in your head."
Rose smiled weakly, nodding. Somehow knowing what was altering her mind didn't make her feel any better and to top it all off she wasn't sure whether the hurt and confusion where her own emotions anymore, or that of the nanites.
"Right," the Doctor rubbed his hands together. Rose watched him for a moment until he sighed, his arms falling. "I have no idea how to get rid of them."
"Can't you run a scan or something?" Rose asked. The Doctor shook his head.
"The TARDIS can detect them, but with the telepathic fields in your head as well, the nanites have obviously protected themselves and the TARDIS only detects normal brainwaves," the Doctor said thinking. "It wouldn't be able to tell us how to get rid of them."
"Well… would it be that bad if we just left them?" Rose said looking at the Doctor with some concern. He seemed to be pretty down about the fact that he didn't know how to help her.
"I dunno…" the Doctor mused. "It depends… you'd probably end up seeing things when you were feeling a particularly strong emotion, like earlier when you were upset you saw that girl. But I might be able to give you something to soften the power a bit."
By the time she went to bed that evening (still in Jackie's flat) Rose was absolutely shattered. The Doctor had spent the day cooking up a concoction to control the nanites that had a name to hard to pronounce. In the end she hadn't had the energy to do anything else but crawl into bed. The Doctor was still bursting with energy and was at that very moment down in the TARDIS tinkering away.
She lay awake for a long time, despite her tiredness, lost in thought. She knew that if she spent a while thinking things over and coming to a decision about her feelings then she might be able to sleep better.
Since the Doctor had explained that her emotions were made more sensitive by the nanites, she was starting to worry about whether she really did love him and whether she'd start caring for him less. But maybe now she was conscious of the nanites she'd be able to control them more?
Rose turned over, staring at her bedroom doorway and wondering whether the Doctor would come and watch her, as she knew he sometimes did.
The Doctor meanwhile was pulling wires out of the TARDIS, the Sonic Screwdriver in his mouth. He heard the TARDIS chitter and frowned.
"I know!" He said rather huffily and with much difficulty due to the Sonic Screwdriver. "I'll talk to her tomorrow! There's no point keeping her up all night trying to figure out which were her emotions and the nanites."
The TARDIS made a noise somewhere between a squeak and a purr. The Doctor rolled his eyes taking the Sonic Screwdriver out of his mouth.
"Even if she does love me, that doesn't mean anything round here's gonna change," the Doctor warned. The TARDIS clicked and sounded like she didn't believe a word he said.
"How do you know what I feel?" He asked, but not nastily. "I might only see her as a friend!"
The TARDIS didn't reply as if her point had been proved. The Doctor sighed, putting the wires down and standing up.
"Alright, I know I'm not going to convince you, I can't even convince myself," the Doctor said grabbing his long trench coat off the console and pulling it on. "I'm going… she might still be awake."
As the Doctor opened the TARDIS doors and shut them again behind himself, locking them with the Sonic Screwdriver he didn't notice someone coming up behind him. He paused, thinking he'd heard something but just put it down to being a cat or something. As he turned to walk back up to Jackie Tyler's flat the Doctor didn't get further than two steps away from the Doctor when something whacked him hard over the head.
"What the bloody hell was that for?" The Doctor moaned a huge bump coming up on his head. He received another whack and another, until everything went black.
The next morning Rose awoke feeling slightly fresher than she had been. The Doctor didn't come to breakfast this time but that didn't worry her. He probably couldn't face another domestic. She said goodbye to her mum and said she'd come back for another visit soon.
Sighing as she left the flat she waved over her shoulder to her mum and frowned as she saw her mum was frozen, staring across the Powell Estate. She walked back to her mum waving a hand in front of her face before following her gaze.
Her stomach twisted into a million knots and Rose found she couldn't breath. There lying in the middle of the square was the Doctor, covered in blood and apparently unconscious.
Rose took in the sight for a moment before she suddenly spurred into action running along the balcony and practically throwing herself down the stairs towards him. She had only one thought. To reach the Doctor, make the nightmare go away.
When she reached him he looked worse than when she was looking down on him. There was blood everywhere and as she crouched beside him she couldn't help but think that she might be too late.