Chapter 15 – Hope for the Hopeless

Cold, in the summer breeze
Yeah you're shivering
On your bended knee
Still, when your heart is sore
And your heavens pour
Like a willow bending in the storm
You'll make it

Running against the wind
Playing the cards you get
Something is bound to give

There's hope for the hopeless

- A Fine Frenzy, "Hope for the Hopeless"

Rose wakes up screaming. She tries to sit up only to realize something is holding her down. Is she being held captive again? She continues screaming and begins throwing her arms around, trying to do everything and anything she can to break free of whatever is confining her. She won't be a victim any longer.

She feels one of her arms collide with something soft as the other whacks against something hard. It's begins to throb, but she ignores the pain and continues to struggle. Someone grabs her wrists and holds them tightly against her chest. Something wraps around her back. Constricting her. She screams louder.

Then she hears the Doctor's voice. It is only a whisper, but it manages to break through her cries.

"Shhh… It's okay, Rose. It was only a nightmare. You're okay. You're safe. I promise. You need to calm down or you're going to hurt yourself."

She takes a deep breath and starts to relax. That's right. The telepathic connection. I'm on the TARDIS. I'm with the Doctor. I am safe. The restrictive feeling of his arms becomes a comforting embrace. She leans into him and allows the sound of his beating hearts to calm her fully.

"I'm sorry," he whispers. "I should have known that was going to happen." He reaches for her arm and begins messaging where she had whacked it against what she now realizes was the headboard of her bed. She may have a bruise tomorrow, but nothing big. "Going into your mind like that opened it up. The flood of memories is an invitation for terrible, terrible nightmares. I should have warned you."

Rose doesn't respond. She doesn't really mind. She knows it was just a nightmare now. Her mind trying to deal with everything she has been through. Despite the terror from it she still feels, she knows it is over. A piece of her also thinks the fright was worth it just to be in this moment with him. Curled up in bed, in his arms, against his warm chest. It reminds her of the dreams she used to have before everything. When it was just the two of them in the TARDIS travelling anywhere and everywhere and she'd let her mind wander to all the different things that could happen on a dark TARDIS late at night.

She is relieved that she no longer has to hide anything from him, even though she is afraid of what the Doctor thinks of her now and what he is going to do with her next. She wasn't sure how much longer they would have lasted with all those secrets between them. She is glad to be out of that liminal period, between knowing where she stands as the Doctor's companion and whatever will happen next. At least now she won't have to wait much longer to see if he is going to allow her to continue travelling with him or not.

"Do you want to tell me about it?" the Doctor asks her.

She sighs. She knew the moment couldn't last forever. She couldn't spend the rest of her life lying in bed wrapped in his embrace. Well, she could, but not realistically. Besides, after everything he has done for her, taking care of her, doing everything to help her, not leaving her (yet), she owes him this. Complete openness and honesty.

She sits up next to him so that one of his arms remains draped around her waist and his hand rests upon her hip. Her side pressed against his. She plays with his other hand on her lap, weaving her fingers in and out of his. Trying to memorize the feel of every inch of it, just in case she won't get to later. She recalls her dream.

"It was about the Master," she begins, although they both know there is no other topic it could have possibly involved. "It was right after you told me to run back to the TARDIS. Before I got there, I met back up with you. You said we had lost him, and we got in the TARDIS and flew off. We landed on this strange little deserted planet. As soon as we stepped foot out of the TARDIS, she dematerialized. I turned to you for an explanation, only to see that you were no longer you, but him. So I did what you told me to do, and I ran. I ran all day until I found a cave. I sat there and hid until I fell asleep. The next thing I knew I woke up to him sitting on top of me with his hand over my mouth, telling me that he was disappointed and expected more from me after being your companion for so long. He held my wrists over my head and was holding them so tight. I knew what he was about to do. So I tried screaming and kicking him off me. He told me that we were the only life on this planet and told me to scream all I wanted. That he would like it more that way. And… Umm… That's when I woke up."

She lies at the end. The dream continued. Changed.

The arm around her waist tightens. He forces her to stop playing with his fingers by entwining her hand with his. She leans further into him and rests her head against his shoulder. He turns and places his lips on the top of her head.

"Don't worry," he tells her. "I'm right here. I'm me."

Guilt pangs in her abdomen. She's not really sure why she lied to him. Maybe she's embarrassed that the next part of her nightmare scared her so much. Maybe she doesn't want to give him any ideas. She knows both are ridiculous excuses. They need honesty between them if she expects to have any chance at all of staying with him. He already knows everything else. She might as well tell him this too. It's not like it will change his opinion of her any more.

"I lied," she says as she sits up and moves away from him. His hand that had been around her waist drags across her back and the side of her leg as she curls both legs into her chest and wraps her arms around her knees. His hand rests upon her foot as he sits up to lean closer to her. "That wasn't the end of the dream. It shifted into another one. One in the near future, just after the telepathic link. We had just landed back in London and I stepped out of the TARDIS, but you didn't. You just stood in the doorway and told me you were leaving me here. That I am too damaged and am going to be too much of a liability to travel with you anymore. You kept asking me how you are supposed to save planets if you have to be constantly worried about whether or not I am going to have a mental breakdown. And then you took off, leaving me behind, screaming at where you had just been. Begging you not to leave and saying I'd be fine." She gives a small hiccup, trying her hardest not to start crying. "This is why I could never tell you everything. I'm afraid that you're going to want to get rid of me now."

Her voice cracks. For some reason, saying it to him out loud is worse than living through it in her dream. She can feel herself shaking. She doesn't look at the Doctor. A part of her is still afraid that her dream is about to come true. She is reminded of the Doctor in her hallucination. She had vaguely remembered having a vision of him during that time, but it wasn't until the link that she remembered exactly what he had said to her. She must have repressed that memory because it was too much for her to handle. She thinks about what she had to do to get him to stop saying those things in her hallucination and wonders if her actions had aided her forgetfulness. She wonders if she if the same methods can get that memory back out of her head now. She is sitting against a wall, so she starts rocking back and forth, lightly hitting the back of her head against the wall every time she rocks backwards.

The Doctor starts moving. Her first instinct is that he has decided that would be the best idea and is getting ready to head back to London. She goes to increase the speed of her rocking, but instead of heading to the console room, the Doctor turns towards her and places both hands on the sides of her head. Thumbs on her cheekbones, fingers behind her ears and around the back of her neck, steadying her. He leans forward and places a long kiss on her forehead. He then pulls her into him, swinging her legs over his lap. He holds her tight, as her fear of him wanting to get rid of her causes her to continue shaking.

"I will never leave you, Rose Tyler. That much I can promise you. Not unless you beg me too, and even that will take a lot of convincing."

She throws her arms around his neck and holds on tightly, afraid he still might leave her. She hides her face in his neck. She feels like a small child but can't stop herself. The words "I don't have anyone else" quietly slip out from between her lips. And they are true. Everyone else she knows and loves is in a parallel universe. She's not sure what she would do if he decided to leave her somewhere. She guesses she could go find Jack, but he works in a similar field as the Doctor. They are bound to run into each other every now and then and she's not sure she could handle that.

"Hey, hey, hey!" the Doctor says, stroking her hair. "I'm not going anywhere. And I'm not going to let you go anywhere either. Okay?"

She nods. He sounds sincere. "It just felt so real." She's unsure if she's talking about the dream, the hallucination, or both.

"It wasn't. It isn't. I would never say those or do that to you. None of it is true." He whispers in her ear and presses his cheek against her head.

They stay like that for about a minute. One of his hands combing through her hair, the other rubbing her back. Soothing her as she tries to wipe the look on the faces of the dream-Doctor and the hallucination-Doctor, from her mind. She sits up and looks in his eyes, noting that the expression in them is nothing like what either of those Doctors had, and she relaxes. She straightens his tie, which she assumes she had knocked crooked at some point since waking up. She looks at him as he lightly grips her wrists and brings them in front of his face. He is studying her hands, as though confused as to what she is doing, and presses two fingers against her pulse. Then he looks in her eyes. She can't mistake the worried look she sees in his.

"I think I figured out what the Master was referring to. Do you remember the first time he drugged you and told you that thehallucinogens were from Gallifrey?"

"Y… Yes… Is that bad?" She already knows the answer.

"It's certainly not good. Those drugs were meant for Time Lords. We have a different biology than humans. Two hearts. Neurological differences. I'm not sure how they affect humans. As far as I know, it has never been tested before. Deemed too dangerous. I'm not sure what specific drugs he used, but your body might not be able to sufficiently break them down. There may still be traces, or even worse high concentrations, of them still in your bloodstream. There are some tests I can run to get more information and then we can figure out solutions from there."

This is just too much information for her to fully comprehend, but the tone in his voice lets her know just how urgent it is.

She lets the Doctor lead her to the Medical Lab. Did the TARDIS always have a Medical Lab? She's learned to stop really questioning the TARDIS. This place was always bigger than she remembered and she is pretty sure it changes to suit what the Doctor needs.

She sits in a chair while he rummages around through the drawers to find whatever it is he is looking for, one hand constantly resting casually on her shoulder. When he has what he needs, he sits in a chair facing Rose. Their legs resting right up against each other. It is like he is afraid that if he stops touching her, she'd disappear. She certainly isn't going to complain about it. It is still reassuring, especially after just reliving everything again, to know that he is actually there and not a figment of her imagination.

"I need to take a blood sample," he says, holding an empty syringe. Rose has never been afraid of needles, so she holds out her arm and allows the Doctor to do what he needs to. She watches the red liquid fill the vial and wonders what is in there that shouldn't be.

The Doctor pulls the needle out and holds a piece of gauze against the skin where it had been inserted. With his other hand he injects the contents of the syringe into a strange looking machine. He presses a few buttons and it begins to beep and whir. He replaces the gauze with a Band-Aid.

He grabs Rose's hand and looks into her eyes. She knows he can see the fear there. But he just smiles and says, "No matter what the results, we'll figure this out. Together." His grip on her hand tightens. She mimics the motion.

Just then the machine beeps three times, and a printer goes into action. The Doctor gives her hand one last squeeze before he lets go and gets up to go look at the results. This is the first time she can remember that they aren't in direct physical contact since the telepathic link. For some reason, this scares her more than the look on his face as he checks the results. And that scares her a lot.

She stands up and walks behind him. "What is it?" she asks, trying unsuccessfully to hide the shaking in her voice.

"Let's go sit in the den and I'll go over the results with you." He doesn't even look at her as he says this. Just stares at the printed sheets of paper, sets his hand on the small of her back, and leads her into the next room.

They sit on the couch and the Doctor sets the results on the coffee table. He still hasn't looked at her. She glances at the papers, knowing before she does that she won't be able to make sense of any of it.

"Doctor, you're scaring me. Please tell me what is going on. Am I going to be okay?" She's fighting back tears. He wouldn't be acting like this if everything was going to be fine.

He finally looks at her as he grabs her hand in both of his and scoots closer to her. He points at some graphs on the results page.

"There are at least 7 different Gallifreyan drugs still in your system. Five of them are there in high concentrations. Too high. Human bodies don't make the enzymes necessary to break down these drugs with any efficiency. Or really at all for that matter. The good news is that now that I know exactly which drugs they are, I should be able to make an antidote. The bad news is that this combination is extremely deadly. These five drugs are never combined without serious consequences, even in Time Lords. But like I was saying earlier, I don't know exactly how the effects will differ with your human biology."

Rose tries to take in everything he just told her. She is still scared, but there is hope in his voice. They might not exactly know what is happening to her, but they should be able to figure it out and solve each problem as they come across it. So why does he still look so concerned?

"There's more, isn't there?" Rose enquires.

The Doctor wraps his arms around her in a tight embrace. Just this side of what one might consider to be too tight. She wraps her arms around him and rests her chin on his shoulder. But this embrace does not comfort her like they normally do. He is tense in her arms, so she is tense in his. He squeezes her even tighter as he begins to explain.

"At these concentrations, we should still be seeing their effects. You should still be hallucinating almost constantly."

"But I'm not. I haven't seen anything that seems wrong in a while." Even she can hear the doubt in her voice as she remembers the small things here and there that seem off. Particularly around the Doctor. Be it the sound of his voice or the feel of his jacket. But those only lasted a few brief moments. Then everything had gone back to normal. Nothing like this "constant" effects he is talking about.

"Rose," the Doctor starts, not loosening his grip on her. "What do I look like to you?"

What kind of question is that? "I'm not sure what you mean?"

"What do I look like? Describe my physical appearance."

"You look like you have always looked. Well, not always. You look like you did after regenerating on the game station. Suit, tie, converse, and all." The question still confuses her. What is the point of this?

"Oh Rose," he sighs, holding her even tighter, which until this moment she didn't think was possible. "My dear, dear Rose. I am so sorry. I should have noticed sooner. I didn't realize you weren't seeing… While you were being held captive, I regenerated again."

AN: PLEASE DON'T HATE ME!