Chapter 4 – Seedless Grapefruit
Rose woke up feeling like absolute hell.
With a quiet groan she licked her dry lips and turned over, quickly realising she was lying on top of someone in a confined area. She opened her eyes and came face to face with the Doctor, apparently fast asleep beneath her, snoring gently.
It was then she realised that they were lying in a bath tub, covered by the duvet from their bed. Confused, she gently shook the Doctor until he groaned and eased open his eyes, looking up at her tiredly.
"Hello," she whispered, trying not to anger her already massive headache.
"Where are we?" the Doctor asked in a whisper with a furrowed brow.
"Our bathroom, in the tub."
"Okay," he replied, as if this was perfectly normal. "... Why?"
"I can't remember," Rose admitted.
"Okay," he repeated, before staring at her for a moment. "... I think I'm naked."
Rose quickly lifted the duvet, shuffling back to check before her head appeared again. "You've got your boxers on."
"Good," he whispered back, head lulling back as he closed his eyes again.
Then Rose frowned, realising something else as she ducked her head under the covers again. Another pair of feet were sticking out in the opposite direction, and it took some time to realise they didn't belong to either her or the Doctor...
"Oh God," suddenly came a croak of a man's voice and suddenly Jack's head appeared, his hair an absolute mess. "I think I got plastered."
"Jack!" Rose squealed, prompting several groans from the occupants of the bathtub as Jack quickly covered his ears.
"Don't do that," Jack begged.
"Why are you here?"
Jack stopped for a moment, frowning. "I can't remember," he admitted.
"Get the hell out of our bathtub, Jack."
"Nice hosts," Jack commented sarcastically before grunting and getting out from under the duvet to full height. It was at that point Rose realised he was completely naked apart from a pair of sparkling white gloves, and sporting quite an interest in something. Jack and the Doctor groaned again in unison at the next high-pitched squeal of surprise and disgust that came from Rose.
"Woz goin' on?" the Doctor slurred, blinking open his eyes and attempting to sit up. Rose quickly covered his eyes. "Rose? What..."
"You'll thank me later," Rose assured him, staring adamantly at Jack's face before he got the message and clambered out of the bathtub, shortly followed by the rest of him.
He looked at her and grinned. "Oh come on, you love it."
"GET OUT!" Rose squealed again to more groans. When all of Jack had finally left the room she got out of the bathtub and grabbed the Doctor, hauling him up through her aches and pains of getting extremely drunk and sleeping in the bathtub. He moaned and groaned his way to a vertical existence, leaning on her for support.
"I don't feel very well," he admitted.
"It's called a hangover," Rose replied simply, pulling him into their bedroom and sitting him down on the bed, while she went to retrieve some clothes. When she had finished dressing he was sat in the same position, hunched over with his head in his hands, shaking slightly. She grabbed him again and pulled him to his feet once more, where he swayed slightly, blinking erratically.
Rose frowned, taking her husband's arm to try and steady him on his feet. Even without looking at him she could feel through the bond just how bad he felt. To compensate she kissed him in a peck on the lips as she pulled one of his shirts on him, not even bothering to do the buttons up before hugging him tightly. When he didn't react even to that, she simply took his hand and pulled him to the door.
She led him to the kitchen in pursuit of Jack, having to stop him from walking into several walls on the way. They finally reached their intended destination, seeing Jack sitting at the table thankfully relieved and clothed, with Mickey making coffee – evidently as hungover as everyone else. He saw the practically unconscious Doctor and frowned questioningly at Rose, who just grinned and mouthed 'hangover', to which Mickey smiled and continued with the coffee.
"C'mon," Rose encouraged the Doctor, who was looking more and more unwell by the second. "Get some food and coffee down you."
He nodded absently as Rose let go of him to pull back a chair from the table. But just she turned back she felt a strange shudder through the bond and the Doctor suddenly groaned and dived for the sink, where he promptly began to throw up.
Jack and Mickey just stared in slight apprehension as Rose rushed to his side, supporting him with her arms around his chest. He grunted and looked at her with red-rimmed eyes, and his complexion very pale indeed.
"Rose," he croaked. "I don't feel very well."
She rubbed his back comfortingly. "I know," she said gently. "D'you want to go to the Infirmary?"
He nodded silently, just before his eyes rolled back into his skull and he fainted clean away into a puddle of limbs on the floor.
"He doesn't take a hangover well," Jack commented as he placed the unconscious Doctor carefully on the scanner bed as per Rose's instructions.
Rose didn't comment as the scanner lid closed and she commenced the program. The familiar red laser lines began to move up and down the Doctor's body, building his internal systems in an image on the screen in 3D form.
"What's that doin'?" Mickey asked, staring at the scanner with interest.
"Diagnostics," Rose replied, fiddling nervously with her fingers. "He could've been internally injured from those shots or somethin' and we didn't pick it up..."
Jack caught the worry in her tone. "Hey, don't worry. I'm sure whatever it is he'll be fine after a few days' bed rest."
Rose considered this for a moment before spreading a smile and sniggering at the thought. "Just a matter of keeping him there," she said, and moments later the scanner pinged. She looked at the results.
Diagnosis: Venusian Flu
Rose's jaw dropped.
Jack glanced between her shocked face and the Doctor lying on the scanner bed, instantly worried. "What's it say?"
Rose looked up at him with wide eyes, having to swallow to try and moisten her now completely dry throat, before she looked back down at herself and placed a hand to her belly. "I... I'm pregnant."
Jack instantly moved forward to hug her comfortingly as Mickey frowned, stepping forward to look at the scanner's diagnosis. "Him having Venusian flu means you're pregnant?"
"He hasn't got Venusian flu," Jack answered for Rose, deciding to step in as he realised she was beginning to go into shock. "Last time when Rose was pregnant he got very ill because he gets the exacerbated symptoms of pregnancy through their bond, and the scanner says he has Venusian flu because the symptoms are similar, even though he's immune to it."
"Oh," Mickey realised, before he looked at Rose still staring at her belly in absolute horror. "Is this a bad thing, then?"
Rose could only shrug. "Well... no... but... sort of... Well, I dunno, but... I can't be pregnant... I just can't. It's impossible."
"Why's it so impossible?" Jack asked, frowning.
Mickey looked at him. "You don't know?"
"Know what?"
Suddenly the atmosphere was very awkward. Rose pulled a face, realising as she stared at Jack's expression there was no side-stepping this. She took an affirming breath, and began to explain. "Because, well, he keeps sieving condoms and my pills barely work... And after last time he's not ready to have another child yet so we decided..." Rose swallowed, suddenly very conscious of how much of their sex life she was revealing, here. "We decided a few months ago to... umm..." She gestured two fingers in the motion of a pair of scissors snipping together.
It took a Jack a few moments to get it. Then his eyes widened.
"You mean he's..." He pointed at the Doctor with his jaw agape. "He... He had the..."
Rose nodded quickly.
"Martha did it," Mickey said.
"What? When?"
"A couple of months ago." Mickey looked at Jack's expression. "You didn't notice him limping?"
"He told me he pulled a muscle..."
Mickey laughed.
Jack looked a little deflated. "Why didn't he tell me?"
"Well, he probably wouldn't have told me if I didn't walk in on it," Mickey confessed.
"Bet that was awkward," Jack mused.
"It was a bit difficult to miss."
"Is it big?" Jack wondered.
"Excuse me," Rose suddenly interrupted, hand in the air. "Can we stop gossiping about my husband's bits and get him to a bed?"
"Yeah, sorry," Jack said with a massive grin on his face as he moved to the scanner and picked up the Doctor, relocating him to a bed just as he began to stir.
Rose quickly pulled up a chair next to the bed, resting a hand on his hot forehead as he blinked open his eyes. It took a few moments until they came to rest on Rose, who smiled encouragingly at him.
"What happened?" he murmured.
"You fainted," Rose replied gently.
"Did you scan?"
Rose nodded, but dared not to speak for what might come out of her mouth.
"What did it diagnose?" he persisted, still groggy.
Rose swallowed, glancing at Mickey and Jack still standing in the room before she looked back at the Doctor's enquiring eyes. "... Venusian flu," she whispered.
"But we haven't even been to Venus," the Doctor replied tiredly. There was a brief moment of silence. He looked at Rose, who was biting her lip nervously. "What?" he asked.
"Venusian flu," Rose repeated slowly and clearly.
"I know, but..." he began, but then he suddenly froze, staring at the ceiling with his arms paralysed in mid-movement as the penny dropped with a nasty clatter. His deep brown eyes flickered to meet Rose's and he stared at her in absolute horror, completely unblinking... "You mean..." he started with a croak, raising a hand slowly to point at her belly.
Rose nodded.
"You're actually..."
Another nod.
"After my..."
Nod.
"With a baby?" he practically squeaked.
Nod.
He was fully awake now, sitting up straight in the bed as he suddenly felt even sicker than before. "Oh no," he breathed, hands running through his hair as he instinctively did in a situation of high stress.
"What do we do?" Rose asked with a very dry throat.
"I don't know," the Doctor admitted. "Abort it?"
Rose frowned. "Can we do that?"
"It's up to you..."
"No, it's up to you," Rose corrected. "If you're not ready..."
"Oh no," he said again, still grabbing at his hair. "I can't... I can't think about this now."
Rose nodded and kissed him gently. "I understand," she said. "You just get to feelin' a bit better first, yeah? What do you need?"
His hands were still dragging through his hair. Rose quickly took his wrists and held them firmly in each hand before staring straight at him, drawing his attention. "Doctor, what do you need to make you feel better?"
"Umm, the green medicine from the cabinet and lots of fruits," he said quickly.
"Jack, Mickey, can you get him some fruit to eat?" Rose asked the two still hovering in the doorway.
"Sure," Jack said with a nod, before a sly smile crept onto his face. "And this fruit... that'll be seedless, I take it?" he asked, before his rapidly twisting face finally exploded into laughter, Mickey with him as they both swept out the door giggling like immature 12-year-olds.
Rose turned a bright, bright red as the Doctor looked at her, eyes even wider than before. When she couldn't even find the words to say, she resigned and let go of his wrists so he could resume running his hands through his hair.
A/N: Really, for most of this fic, you're just gonna have to nod along and say "oh yes how totally plausible!"...