kore_logs | the Return of the Doctor

Who: the Doctor, Mina, Donna
Where: on the docks
When: Late night of Day 82/early morning of 83
What: The Doctor returns back after his escape attempt, only he's not exactly the same Doctor Kore may remember.
Warning: language, mental instability

When a Time Lord is created, since no actual birth is given, the first sense they acquire, or at least notice, is time followed by sound, then vision. I am a sentient being. The first thought crossed the Doctor's mind, I walk through eternity.

Waves crashed against the shore, and dark eyes blink open. His vision is blurry as he pushes up on his arms, trying to push himself in a sitting position. He's aware of a string of drool, begging the question of how long had he been there with his mouth open, as he raises his hand to wipe it away. And that's when the first impulse of the most intense headache he could recall feeling strikes him. It catches him completely off guard and physically startles him, causing him to lose his balance in the process and slip off the dock into the ocean.

Engulfed by the waves, he struggles, fighting to figure out what's up from down, and shortly afterwards his respiratory bypass kicks in just in time for him to slam into the adjacent dock where he manages to pull himself up, roll over to his side and out of the way from fear of falling off again, and resigns himself for the night. His body felt heavy, mind clouded, everything slowed down as if he had been drugged, which was a very real possibility.

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"It's fine. Tempting as it is to drown him in the sea and be done with it." Obviously she'd never do that do him. Well, at least not for the time being.

"Yeah, yeah, Spaceman, umbrellas." Donna had seen his wardrobe, it left a lot to be desired. "Why don't you try saving your voice, eh?"

"Yes, yes... saving voice." He licked his lips, complying, and doing his best to try and walk again. It was only about every 4 or 5 steps where he was able to take one or two.

"Jim-jams, have any, Mina? 'Not bad for a man in his jim-jams' I said to Rose Tyler once. It was after regenerating... I haven't regenerated, have I, Donna? Am I ginger yet? No this one... I'm still me... two hearts..." He groans in frustration, "I told her I was different. Two hearts! Not a fluke on the x-ray! She didn't listen. DIDN'T LISTEN. Strapped down, drugged. I was different. I was different... I was different."

He inhaled sharply, holding his breath as another headache tore through his skull. Lucky for the other two, they weren't far from Mina's.

"I'm sure we can find something," she said evenly, "and if not, it's good for the circulation to sleep in the buff."

She'd just made that up.

Again, she glanced behind his head, trying to catch Donna's eye. "Do you have any idea?" she asked. The silent second half of the question lingering between them. Do you have any idea what he's talking about? She could understand the bit about two hearts easily enough. And that was the second time he'd mentioned someone named Rose.

As for the rest of it...well...

His fragmented sentences seemed to make a lot more sense to Donna. At least he still had some grasp on his memories - even if his brain was a little bit scrambled. "No, you haven't regenerated, Doctor. Still not ginger. And I bet Rose enjoyed seeing you in your pjs! Was Jack there? I bet he would've liked it too!"

Because joking about Jack was easier to deal with than hearing the Doctor talk about being strapped down and drugged. "We'll fix you up, good as new. Tea, cake and a good sleep. That's what you need."

"Don't." The Doctor warned as he had before on so many occasions while struggling up the steps of Mina's porch as it seemed to be the biggest physical challenge of his life.

"I just want out of these wet clothes. I just..." He was fighting to hold onto the thought, "Oh, I dunno!"

"And we're going to get you out of the wet clothes," she said, kicking the door open and, for once, being thankful that she had no flatmates to contend with right now. Not that she thought Anna, Jones, or Rosa would have given her much grief. But it was easier for keeping secrets.

She led the painfully slow progress in through the front door. "Bathroom at the end of the hall," she told Donna. "I don't know a lot about his physiology, but I reckon we should warm him up a little bit."

"We could always dump him in a warm bath? Or wrap him in tinfoil like they do on the telly." Oh Donna. Never leave her in the wilderness and expect her to keep a team of people alive. It wouldn't end well.

"Or we could turn him into a towel burrito?"

"I don't care." He comments bitterly as he allows them to drag him to the bathroom and once sat on the toilet, he bends over, threading fingers through his hair again.

"I can't... Just tell me what to do." He was struggling to keep onto his the proper train of thought, as this was the longest his thoughts had been clear. "I'll do anything, just tell me."

Well, that almost seemed like progress.

"Take off your trousers," she ordered him, as she leaned over to run the tap on the bathwater. It was a simple enough instruction. And if he somehow mucked it up, it wouldn't be the end of the world.

And that would be good for his track record.

It broke Donna's heart to see the Doctor so helpless. She had never seen him so broken before. "Not like you've got anything we haven't seen before." Well, technically Donna had seen the Metacrisis Doctor naked, but it counted, right? At least she hoped there were no weird surprises.

"We'll have you warmed up in no time." She turned her attention to Mina. "You got a kettle?"

Slowly, he peels his hands from his hair and slowly unbuttons the shirt of Mina's. It takes him nearly as long as it takes for the water to start filling the tub for him to shrug out of the shirt. "Here." He speaks with a defeated tone, avoiding Mina's gaze as he shows an outstretched hand with it.

And that's when he notices the bruising to his arms as she takes the garment.

Slowly, he then fumbles at the buttons of his trousers, taking notice they fit looser than he recalled, and he pauses to touch his abdomen at the bruises there. "I suppose it's a good thing I don't remember."

"Perhaps," Mina said. "Although, I may have a solution for that. Depending on how things go." She wasn't ready to try using Forgetful Mind on him yet. Aside from the obvious fact that he wasn't human and she couldn't guarantee it would work, given his current sanity, she had no desire to go romping through his brain.

And, of course, some things were better off forgotten.

She took her shirt, hanging it on the upper corner of the doorframe. "The kitchen is right down the hall," she told Donna. "I have a kettle and that delightful German chap restored the stove, more or less. It should be in working order. No milk or lemon, I'm afraid. But there is tea and sugar."

Tea. That's what the Doctor needed. Tea. And not just because Donna couldn't bear to see the Doctor in such a state that she needed some air and a few minutes to regain her composure. No, of course not. Well, maybe a little. But he did need tea too. Two birds, one stone.

"I'll be right back then." Hopefully the stove wouldn't explode and kill her. Death by tea making was hardly the way to go.

the Return of the Doctor

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