"TSS."

The Doctor caught a glimpse of Martha standing in front of his bed as soon as he'd opened his eyes.
He growled, unable to verbalize something more friendlily, and shifted his head on the pillow.

"You suffered a toxic shock syndrome. You're lucky you made it."

The Doctor felt the syllables that formed 'luck-y' swirling around in his head for quite some time. Normally he couldn't get his head around things; this time it was the other way round. The word was stuck in his head and the word wouldn't manage to get itself around the Doctor.
Or it was simply the dizziness talking while he wasn't nearly half awake.

It seemed that 'lucky' wasn't quite the word to describe his current state.
In no way.
He'd been degraded, he'd been defiled, he'd been cut open, rearranged, sutured, cut open again, treated with wrong meds, and after not being able to escape dreadful nightmares he was finally awake, only to hear that he was nearly overtaken by death and just escaped with his life.

Really lucky me, thought the Doctor bitterly.
He tried to ignore the stinging pain in his pelvic region and lower abdomen.

"TSS..." repeated the Doctor and tried to sit up as Martha persuaded him to lie back a little while longer, mainly by pressing her hands against his chest.
The Doctor felt his breath being taken out of his lungs and rested on the sheets while running his fingers through his head.

His mind was beginning to work as fast, somersaulting and inaccurately as always.

"But a toxic shock syndrome is caused by...by...by bacterial toxins. Mostly Staphylococcus aureus and Streptococcus pyogenes, I reckon. It spreads fast, which means that infection has taken place around... well, at the earliest as you tucked me into this bed, but I doubt that, the rash wasn't worse than before, there was no decrease in the blood pressure, my body temperature wasn't rising until Jack... we'll leave that part out... where were we, of course, the rest of the symptoms..."

"I know the symptoms of a TSS, Doctor" interrupted Martha and thereby silenced the Doctor "And please try to relax. You need lots of rest."

"No, Miss Jones, all that I need is my Tardis and the fastest way out of this alien prison. I won't stay here where my life lies in the hands of so-called human physicians."
The Doctor's reply was straight forward. But it was his earnestness that scared Martha.
"And it's not my fault that I nearly suffered the fatal consequences of a contamination, that's your problem, Miss Jones, and if you would be so kind as to let me get to my feet..."

The Doctor insisted on sitting up and though he was weakened Martha struggled to keep him from getting into an upright position.
Time Lord's muscles, she hissed barely audible, bigger on the inside too.

"It's got nothing to do with contamination," replied Martha after stepping back from the resisting Time Lord.
She rubbed her strained ankles.
"You infected me," stated the Doctor with razor-sharp accuracy.

"No. It wasn't me. It was Jack."

"Jack?" replied the Doctor as the coldness melted in his stare.
Martha nodded.
"On purpose?" added the Doctor wondering.

Martha sighed.
"As a Time Lord, Staphylococcus aureus and Streptococcus pyogenes wouldn't affect you; or maybe they would, but not under those circumstances. Well, you're the only Time Lord left and you hadn't had been infected by those bacteria, have you? So we won't know until we give it a try..."
Martha shook her head and paused while giving the Doctor a displeased glare, secretly blaming him for her nonsense-talking;
"The point is: Toxic shock syndrome isn't too different from an allergy; you can easily mistake it for one during one of its earlier stages. And we've detected antibodies in your blood. Antibodies against human bacteria..." Martha swallowed, though the following explanation wasn't easily swallowed, and definitely not by the Doctor"...and human protein."

The Doctor's mad rustling gear drive machine in his head, called his mind, was running at full blast as the Doctor tried to digest the reply.
Or, in fact, not digest it.

"So what you want to tell me is that it's my own fault that I had a toxic shock syndrome, or an allergic shock, or a warped offspring of both of them, because I slept with Jack. Isn't it, Martha Jones?!"

The Doctor stared at the floor in embarrassing silence.
Martha didn't even dare to breathe audibly.

"I never said it was your fault," she stated quietly as she didn't want to upset the Doctor more than necessary, "I only wanted to make clear that it had nothing to do with the treatment neither with the meds. But I don't blame you."

The Doctor sighed.
"And it would be a lot easier for me if I could blame you."

Martha's stare sagged; the Doctor couldn't hide his sadness, not from her.
Though he kept on trying.

"Where's Jack?" he asked in a half-hearted attempt to pick up the conversation again.

"I don't know," replied Martha "I think... I sent him away."
"He always gets in the way, doesn't he?" sighed the Doctor.

The uneasy, thick silence weltered through the room.

"Should I call for Jack?"
The Doctor nodded without raising his head; it seemed as if he hadn't moved at all.
Martha wasn't sure if the Doctor had actually given her a nod.
But she felt that he had wanted to.
"Now?" Martha went on.
The Doctor assented motionless.

"Should I tell him about it?"

"I don't know" was the Doctor's tear-choked reply as he lifted his head to face Martha.
But the Doctor remained stony-faced. He cried motionless as hot streams trailed down his red and hollow eyes.

"I think we should both talk to him" concluded Martha "for the better of the two of us."

"Martha?"
Martha was already halfway through the door as the Doctor's harrowing voice stopped her once more.
She paused attentive.
"In case I have failed to do anything right so far... to say anything the right way..." the Doctor's voice trailed off as he was lost in thought again.

"Yes?" said Martha and thereby tried to speed up the conversation.

"Do you have any advice for me? Just in this case, or in general... I don't care. Any form of advice?"

Martha searched her mind for the one thing the Doctor would have needed right now. The one sentence, probably the one word that would assure the Doctor, that would give him hope, that would make him feel less lonely and disgusting and awkward and...

"You'd be better off with using a condom next time."

Martha winced at her own harshness.

"Thank you, Martha."

The Doctor's sad reply was nothing but an unsettled whine.

Martha could have bitten off her tongue as she hurried down the corridor.

That definitely hadn't been what he'd wanted to hear.