Chapter Nine: The Return of the Doctor
Martha tried to ignore the distant guttural commands from downstairs as she handed out the last oxygen tank. She glanced around. The rest of the patients seemed all right, but she'd better get some more oxygen tanks, just in case. She recalled a cupboard in radiology with spare tanks, and hurried over there to get some. But before she could reach the cupboard, she paused near the x-ray room. Not only was the door blasted off its hinges, but someone was shouting inside the room with a tone of utter desperation.
"Take me, take me instead, please!"
She knew that voice. Setting the cart aside, Martha dashed inside the x-ray room and froze at the bizarre sight before her. "Dr. Tyler?"
The watch opened with an explosive swirl of golden mist. It swarmed over Dr. Tyler, knocking over the Slab holding him and making the lights overhead flicker.
Finnegan looked up from her straw, old woman eyes wide. "But—but you're not—Who are you?"
"I'm the Doctor," seethed the man before her as the glow faded. He stood tall, face twisted with an ancient fury, his voice low and dangerous. "I'm a Time Lord. I'm from the planet Gallifrey in the constellation of Kasterborous. I am 902 years old, and I'm the man who's going to stop you and save all thousand-odd people in this hospital. Now get your hands OFF HER."
The Slab holding Rose loosened its grip enough for her to slip to the floor. Gasping weakly, she crawled away from Finnegan.
In the doorway, Martha's eyes nearly bugged out of her head. "Dr. Tyler?"
The Doctor glanced her way and his voice softened, although his eyes still blazed. "Martha Jones. Brilliant."
"What—what just happened?"
"Later," the Doctor said briskly, glaring at Finnegan again. "Do me a favour and get Rose behind that wall, will you?"
And then he whipped out his sonic screwdriver and aimed it at the x-ray machine.
Martha hurried inside to help Rose to her feet. "No, seriously, what's going—what the—are you all right?" She eyed Rose's neck in horror.
"Oh…on the moon, having my blood sucked out through a straw?" Rose rasped with a smile. "Means life's back to normal. Finally."
The Slab that had held the Doctor grabbed him by the ankle. The Doctor paused in his sonicking long enough to deliver a vicious kick to its head.
"Excuse me," Finnegan said, her voice raised, "But what are you doing?"
"Increasing the radiation by five thousand percent," the Doctor said without a trace of pity.
Martha leaned Rose against the wall on the other side of the barricade as the Doctor sonicked something else on the x-ray.
Finnegan tittered nervously. "But why would you do that?"
The Doctor finished his sonicking, stuck the screwdriver back in his lab coat pocket, and aimed the machine at Finnegan. "Because we're going to wait for the Judoon to arrive, and you're going to turn yourself in. You get one chance, and if you blow it, my good friend Martha Jones is going to push the button, and you will burn." He said this last bit with a twisted sort of pleasure.
Martha's eyes widened in panic. "But I don't know which—"
"Then find out!" Rose ordered, her face incredibly pale. She'd taken off her hoodie to press it to her neck.
Finnegan stared at the Doctor. "You'll kill yourself."
The Doctor raised an eyebrow. "Oh, Time Lord, me. Won't even leave a scratch. It's just radiation. We used to play with roentgen bricks in the nursery."
Finnegan gazed back at him warily, lips in a pout. "They'll execute me, you know."
"Not my problem."
Finnegan smiled and took a step forward. "You're not going to use that. You don't want to get your hands dirty."
The Doctor's grip tightened. "Trust me, they're far from clean. You really don't want to know how much blood is on my hands, and you really don't want to know exactly how very, very close I am to adding more. Don't test me. I'm warning you, not another step."
Finnegan bared her teeth and crouched, ready to leap at him with far faster speed than expected out of an elderly body.
"Nonhuman!"
Finnegan froze in her tracks as a rhino's hulking mass appeared in the doorway.
The Doctor pointed his head towards Finnegan. "There you are! I've found your criminal. Plasmavore from the planet—"
But the rhino did not even glance at Finnegan. Instead, it stepped towards the Doctor, inhaling deeply. "Time Lord…"
The Doctor's eyes bulged from his skull as he whipped the x-ray machine to face the rhino. "NOW! Hit it! Hit the button! Hit it now!"
Rose had already dived for the button the moment the rhino had identified his species. Martha's hand, which had been poised over the button, hit it at the same time.
Rose and Martha both watched as the Slabs twitched, as the rhino let out a guttural cry, as Finnegan let out a shrill scream. A bright light flashed, illuminating the skeletons of the rhino, Finnegan, and the Doctor.
After a long, terrifying moment, the Slabs, Finnegan, and the rhino collapsed to the floor.
"Was that…" Rose asked tentatively.
"The Family. Yep," answered the Doctor, looking darkly at the rhino. "They're here. And they could look like anyone." He looked up at Rose and Martha. "You can come out now; I've absorbed all the radiation."
Rose left her stained hoodie behind and rushed over to him; Martha stayed at the controls for a moment, frozen in shock.
The Doctor enveloped Rose in a hug. "Hello."
Rose tried to bite back a smile. "Doctor."
"That's me."
Rose pulled away to look into his eyes. "Is John…I mean…is he…"
"I'm fine. I mean, he's fine. He is me. You had it right. Still me, just…less brain. And a few less organs. It wasn't like dying at all. More like waking up. Everything he was, I am." He thought a moment, face twisting in slight disgust. "Although I have no idea where the love of soaps came from. Must be your mother's influence. Bleh."
Rose's smile didn't last long. Her voice wavered. "How…How much do you remember?"
"All of it, I think…It's a bit blurry though—how do you humans ever cope with that few senses?" He frowned, and his voice diminished uncertainly. "Oh. Rose Tyler. You gave up on me."
She swallowed, suddenly unable to meet his eyes. "I know. I'm sorry, I…"
"Shh, shh, no, it's all right." He tilted her chin up so she looked at him again. "I forgive you. No, no—" He shushed her as she started to protest. "You thought I left you. And I sort of did, and I'm sorry."
"But I could have—"
"Look, Rose, I forgive you. Really." He pulled her closer again. "And we had some good times, didn't we? Gallivanting all over London? Oh!" He groaned. "Except the honeymoon. Apparently that never happened."
Rose's smile returned, and she started to play with his tie. "Shame, that. I've never been to the Empire State Building."
The Doctor looked hopeful for a moment. "When this is all over, do you want to—"
"Definitely."
"Brilliant!" He cleared his throat. "And…Rose, you're right. I'd go mad if we stayed."
Rose smiled sadly. "I know. And it's okay." She hugged him tightly again, burying her face in his chest. "Gosh, I missed you. I mean, you were there, but…"
"Same face, same man, different memories?"
"Yeah. Took me way too long to figure it out, but…yeah."
"Could someone please tell me what was that?" Martha half-shrieked, finally recovering from her shock.
The Doctor released Rose from the hug but kept one arm around her shoulders. "Yes, right, Martha Jones, I can explain, I can completely, completely explain—Oh!" He sniffed and sprung away from Rose. "Ah, sorry, never mind, give us a mo, can't put off expelling this much longer…if you'll excuse me…"
"Expel?" Rose said fearfully as Martha emerged from behind the wall.
The Doctor started bouncing on the balls of his feet. "If I concentrate I can shake the radiation out of my body and into one spot. If I can just… All right, I'm sending it to my left shoe. Here we go, here we go, easy does it..."
His hopping grew more frantic, and Rose stifled her laughter, while Martha just looked more alarmed. "Ow, ow, itches, itches…" At last, he wrenched his oxford off his foot and tossed it into a bin. "There. Done."
Martha gaped. "You're completely mad."
"You're right. I look daft with one shoe." The other oxford followed its pair into the bin. "Barefoot on the moon! Never liked those shoes, anyway. Rose, how could you let me leave the flat wearing such ridiculous shoes?"
"Well, normal humans don't wear trainers with suits to work, do they?" Rose said in exasperation, wrapping her arms around him again.
"Well they should," the Doctor whined as he hugged her tightly. "I could have started a trend. I've always wanted to do that."
"Will someone please explain what the heck is going on?" Martha interrupted. "Who was she?" She pointed at Finnegan's body on the floor. "She was sucking your wife's blood like...like a..."
"Plasmavore," the Doctor explained ominously. "Blood-sucking shapeshifter. That's who the Judoon were looking for."
"Judoons are the rhinos, yeah?" Rose indicated towards the Judoon's body.
"Yep," he popped the p. "Galactic police. Well, police for hire. More like interplanetary thugs."
"But they're still police, right?" asked Martha, "I mean, we can just tell them that the…plasmavore…they're looking for is dead, and they'll return the hospital."
The Doctor let out his breath slowly. "Well…thing is, as soon as they see the Judoon's body, they'll sentence the hospital to death."
"Then why'd you kill it?" Martha demanded.
"It wanted to eat me! Well, not me so much as my life force, and not really the Judoon. The Judoon was already dead the moment one of the Family of Blood possessed it."
"And the Family of Blood want to eat your—whatever—because…"
"Because I'm a Time Lord, and practically immortal barring accidents."
"Right…" Martha took a step back. "You said you didn't believe in aliens."
The Doctor rubbed the back of his neck. "Well, I didn't a few minutes ago. Then I remembered I was one, and that whole theory sort of went to pieces."
Martha took another step back. "Right. I think you've gone mad, Dr. Tyler."
"It's just the Doctor, actually."
Rose laid a sympathetic hand on Martha's shoulder. "You all right? It's a bit much, I know."
Martha considered for a moment, took a deep breath, and nodded. "Yeah, I think so. I mean, these days seems like there's plenty of extraterrestrial stuff going on. I just never thought I'd meet two of them."
"Oh, just me," the Doctor added, "Rose Tyler here's human. From London, even."
Martha took another deep breath. "Right…Never thought I'd meet one of them then. Never thought my boss would be one of them. I mean this is all mad and I'm not sure I quite believe it, but…yeah."
"Good," the Doctor said approvingly.
Rose bit her lip and turned back to the Doctor. "What do we do now? Is the Family in the hospital?"
"Probably, yes. Three more of them. And they'll be tracking me."
"I didn't know they were here," Rose said, obviously distressed, "I'm sorry."
"I'm not," replied the Doctor. "If you hadn't given me that watch, we'd both be dead. You saved my life, Rose Tyler, for probably the millionth time, and don't you forget it."
"Martha helped," Rose said with a small smile.
"That she did!" he turned to Martha. "Thank you from the bottom of my hearts."
"Wait, hearts? As in plural?"
Ignoring her, the Doctor continued, "Right, then! New plan. Step one: You know how really good friends will help you hide the body?"
Between the three of them, they managed to drag the Judoon's body behind the barrier Rose and Martha had hid behind earlier.
"Oh-ho! Yes!" The Doctor removed a wriststrap from the Judoon's body, ushered Rose and Martha out of the room, and sealed the door behind them with the sonic screwdriver. "Might buy us a bit more time before they find the body. Step two, move before the rest of the Family tracks me here." He grabbed Rose's hand. "Allons-y!"
They hurried down the hallway for a few moments before the Doctor paused. "Rose?"
"Yeah?" she murmured, out of breath. Her face was deathly pale.
The Doctor pressed his lips together and tucked a strand of her hair behind her ear. "I'm thick. Stupid brain's not altogether yet. You shouldn't be running or lifting; you just lost a lot of blood." He moved his fingers to her throat. "Neck's not bleeding—that'll be the plasmavore saliva congealing…Your heartbeat's up. Are you dizzy? Light-headed?"
"Not a lot," Rose insisted. "I'm fine."
"Any nausea?" Martha asked, concerned. She turned to the Doctor. "Could she have lost more than fifteen percent blood volume?"
The Doctor glanced worriedly at Rose. "Maybe."
"Not our biggest problem right now," Rose snapped. "Hospital, running out of air, body-snatching aliens out to eat you, remember?"
The Doctor squeezed her hand a little tighter and pressed on towards the stairs, slower this time. "I know. Just no more running for you, all right? I don't want you going into hypovolemic shock."
"Good to see you do have a medical degree after all," Martha muttered.
"Anyway…" the Doctor launched back into a babble. "Right, so, I need to avoid the Judoon because they're still looking for nonhumans, and I need to avoid the Family of Blood, and I need to get everyone in this hospital back to Earth before the Judoon discover one of them is dead or we run out of air….We need the TARDIS."
"His spaceship," Rose explained as Martha opened her mouth to ask.
"But I'll be all right, because now I've got this!" the Doctor waved the Judoon's wriststrap around. "The Family of Blood's vortex manipulator."
"Can we use that to transport everyone out?" Rose asked excitedly as they reached the stairs.
"Looks like the radiation's melted quite a bit of it…I wouldn't trust this thing to transport anyone. But I might be able to cannibalise it, build something to bring the TARDIS over here."
"But you won't be able to transport everyone," Martha pointed out. "Unless your ship's massive. How big's your ship?"
"Oh…what would you say, Rose?" the Doctor asked with a grin as they went down another flight of stairs. "About the size of a police box, maybe?"
"You're kidding," Martha said in disbelief.
"Oi, don't knock the TARDIS," the Doctor objected as they reached the bottom of the stairs on the ground floor. "It's bigger on the…" He froze. Down the hallway, Judoon were issuing commands and scanning panicked humans.
"…Inside. Right." The Doctor turned to Rose and Martha. "I need time to work. Martha, take this." He pressed the watch into her hand.
"What's this?"
"I'm doing a bit of olfactory misdirection—bit like ventriloquism of the nose. The watch smells like me, so the Family of Blood should follow it. Get that watch as far away from the MRI room as possible, because that's where I'll be."
"What do they look like?" Martha asked, trying to hide the fear in her voice.
"Don't know. They could look like anyone. But whoever they are, they'll be very interested in that watch. As soon as they find you, give it to them and run. They shouldn't care about you; you're only human. Can you do it?"
Martha nodded determinedly, tightening her grip on the watch. "Got it."
"Are you sure? No guarantees, you know. You might die."
"And I might not."
The Doctor nodded back, pride in his eyes. "Martha Jones, you are brilliant. Really. Thank you."
Martha smiled, then spun on her heel and took off running, watch in hand.
"I like her," said Rose appreciatively.
The Doctor nodded absent-mindedly, his attention now focused on the Judoon, who were moving closer. He gripped Rose's shoulders. "Rose, I'm so, so sorry. But you need to stay here."
"What, where it's safe?" Rose demanded. "Because we've been over this—How many times do I have to tell you I'm not leaving you?"
The Doctor's eyes flashed between her and the Judoon. "It's not that. Really, it's not. It's just I can't have you running with Martha, and I need someone to hold up the Judoon so they don't find me or the body upstairs." He took her face in his hands, eyes pleading. "So…distract the Judoon for me?"
"All right, fine, but how am I supposed to do that?"
In response, the Doctor crashed his lips onto hers. Rose stumbled back a bit in surprise, but quickly kissed him back. He was snogging her more thoroughly than he had in months, and Rose forgot about the Judoon and the dizziness in her head and the sounds of other patients shouting as they were scanned….
And then the Doctor was gone. Rose opened her eyes just in time to see his bare foot and the tip of his lab coat vanish up the stairs. She licked her lips. That was…odd. Nice, but odd.
"Find the non-human! Execute!"
Rose spun on the spot to see the Judoon advancing, snarling for an execution. She took a deep breath, and stepped into the centre of the hallway, spreading her arms out to block the path. Stop the Judoon. Right. How?
Well, talking worked for the Doctor often enough. "Listen," she said, trying to sound authoritative and not sway on the spot, "There's no non-human here." One of the Judoon flashed a blue light in her face, but she plowed on. "You're looking in the wrong place. You need to put the hospital back—"
The Judoon ignored her. "Human…Wait, non-human trace suspected."
"What?" Rose's eyes widened. "But I'm definitely human— "
The other Judoon aimed their weapons at her as the first Judoon declared, "Non-human element confirmed. Authorise full scan."
Rose tensed as the Judoon pushed her up against the wall. Its wrinkled, fleshy face was centimetres away from her own, and she could feel as well as hear its words. "What are you? What are you?"
"Just have to find out, won't you?" Rose shot back.
The Judoon started scanning her, focusing on her face, and Rose suddenly realised how she was supposed to distract the Judoon. She choked back a laugh.
Only the Doctor could save the world by snogging her silly.
A/N: So...I think you know what to do now. Pretty please?