With Nancy and Donna each holding one of his arms, the Doctor once again got to his feet. This time his legs held him.
"Ah, that's much better," the Doctor said. He took his arms back from the two women and stood on his own, stabilizing himself against the table when he wobbled slightly. The station shook again, but with the table's help the Doctor kept his feet. "We'd better get moving. We've got a little more than twenty minutes. Come on, the Tardis is back in the residential area."
He sped to the door, tripping a few times along the way. Donna and Nancy caught up with him as he reached the end of the hallway and stopped dead, looking about with a quizzical expression on his face.
"Where on earth are we?" he asked.
"What are you talking about?" Donna asked. "You just led me down this hallway. Look, it's this way," she said, brushing past him. "Don't you remember?"
"I do," the Doctor said, running to catch up while still regarding his surroundings with a furrowed brow. "It's just sort of disorienting, seeing it all this way. You know. With eyes. And not all at once."
Nancy was regarding the Doctor with a frown.
"Was he supposed to be like this when he came out?" Donna asked as they all spun around a corner.
"He was never supposed to be consciously aware of being in the computer," Nancy explained, shaking her head. "Our beta testers all described the experience as being like falling asleep when they were plugged in and then waking up once they were unplugged. They didn't remember anything about being the computer, and they certainly couldn't consciously control the colony's systems. I don't know how he did it."
The hallway rumbled and the lights flickered.
"Well, you didn't exactly have the chance to test it on a Time Lord, did you?" the Doctor replied. "We're wired a bit differently."
Donna snorted. "I'll say."
"Oi!" the Doctor replied.
A door came into view up ahead.
"There," Donna said. "That's the door you brought me into your little safe zone through." The panel beside it was lit up red. "It's still locked!" Donna slowed as she reached it.
"I've got it," the Doctor replied. Then he twisted in a bizarre fashion, one leg turning out to the side and bending while his arm swung out at an awkward angle. A look of surprise and alarm came over his face as he went crashing to the floor.
"Careful!" Nancy shouted, as Donna cried out in surprise. Collecting herself, Donna moved to help him, but he was already picking himself back up.
"Sorry!" he said. "Sorry! I'm fine."
"What on earth was that?" Donna demanded.
"I just tried to open the door like I was still the computer." He brushed himself off as the lights flickered, then pulled out his sonic screwdriver. "Let's try this instead, eh?"
The sonic whirred and the light on the panel changed from red to green.
"Be more careful, will you?" Donna said irritably.
"I was a space station for the past three weeks," he replied sharply. "You'll forgive me if it takes a couple minutes before I get the hang of being a person again."
The door swung open in front of them.
"Shut up and run!" Donna told him.
They ran, Donna leading the way back to the lift, the marquises overhead ominously counting down. Eighteen minutes. They reached the lift.
"Can you call it?" Donna asked the Doctor.
"Never use a lift in an emergency!" the Doctor said, stepping into the shaft and stumbling a bit over the uneven footing. "Don't they teach you that?"
He grabbed the rungs and started up.
"Oh, brilliant," Donna said, stepping up after him. "I just love ladders."
"Well at least you've got a fully functional nervous system," the Doctor grunted. Watching him, Donna saw him reach for the next rung, miss completely, and have to try again before his hand made contact. Then his foot groped about in empty space for a while before finding the next rung.
"Are you sure you can do this?" she asked.
"Yes, of course," the Doctor said. "I'm just not entirely sure where my feet are," he added after a moment.
"Oh, that's comforting. You'd better not fall on me."
"His symptoms do appear to be resolving at an accelerated rate compared to our beta testers," Nancy offered encouragingly.
With the Doctor's difficulty it was several minutes before they reached the level where Donna had entered the shafts before, but the Doctor climbed right past it.
"Doctor!" Donna said. "This is where you let me into the shaft."
"Is it?" he said in surprise.
"Yes. Come on, get the door!"
"Not just yet," he said. "The connection to the residential sector was above that, remember? We've got to keep climbing."
Donna let out a groan.
"How many more levels?"
"Ah…"
"Just two more!" Nancy called from below them.
They clambered past one more set of lift doors before their destination finally came into sight.
"Those are the ones we want," Nancy called.
"Thank you, Nancy," the Doctor said. Then he jerked oddly and dropped about a foot, kicking the wall and nearly kicking Donna in the face. He likely would have fallen from the ladder if one arm hadn't gotten caught over one of the rungs and wedged against the wall, keeping him in place.
"Agh!" he said, wincing and hastily righting himself.
"What was that?" Donna demanded.
"Ah… that was me, trying to open the door again," he said sheepishly.
"Will you stop that? You're gonna get us both killed!"
"I'm trying."
He sonicked the door open and managed to climb his way out of the shaft, then turned around and offered a hand to Donna.
"Thanks," she said, hauling herself up over the ledge without his help. "But I'm not sure that's such a good idea just now."
"Fair point," the Doctor said, dropping his hand.
Donna looked around. The décor here reminded her of that first night in the hospital, but she didn't think she recognized this particular hallway.
"Now which way?" she said.
"Over here," Nancy's voice said. The Doctor's eyes flicked past her and then Nancy marched past them both and down the hall. The marquises overhead gave them about eight minutes. They broke into a run once again. Up ahead, the massive metal doors of the biolock came into view. Donna broke into a grin.
"Not much farther now, Doctor!" Donna called. The marquis gave them just under seven minutes. Plenty of time. They piled into the decontamination chamber, where Nancy gave the sofa and the loose grate an interested glance.
"We can find our own way from here," the Doctor assured Nancy. "If you want to make it to an escape pod, you'd better go now."
"I'd rather make sure you're alright," she said hesitantly.
The Doctor shrugged.
"Well, I suppose we can give you a lift." He twitched and caught himself against the wall. "Oh, for heaven's sake..." He pulled out his sonic and opened the door. "Donna, which way?"
"Follow me!"
They sprinted down the abandoned halls of the residential corridor, the walls vibrating around them as the station continued to shake itself to pieces. The groans of metal sheets tearing themselves away from the outer hull came every few seconds. A strange humming rose about them.
"What is that noise?" Donna panted.
"It's the walls," the Doctor said.
Donna headed for the lift she'd used hours – was it only hours? – ago when she'd found the abandoned Tardis.
"Hold on," she said, braking suddenly. Surprised, the others pulled up short, Nancy succeeding in stopping just down the hall from Donna while the Doctor ended up overbalancing and falling over. "Oh, sorry," Donna said, "but we'd better take the stairs."
"Fine, good, just go!" the Doctor said as he got back to his feet.
They sped back down the hall to the staircase and pelted up it.
"It's just down this hall!"
One of these rooms on the left… there! Donna recognized the lonely storeroom where she'd found the Tardis.
"This one!" Donna said, hitting the door panel. Nothing happened, but the Doctor stopped himself against the wall and sonicked it open. "It's just over this way!" Donna said, leading the way into the room.
"That's far enough."