You Reap What You Sow (32&33 of 45)

[amberfocus]

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Chapter Thirty-two:  Broken Heart

The Doctor awoke cold and alone in his bed, the warmth of his wife missing. His internal time sense told him he had slept for ten hours. He knew he must have needed it if he’d slept for so long but Rose should have woken him up when she got up. She knew how worried he was about Donna.

Or perhaps that was why she had let him sleep. If there’d been no change, well, he wouldn’t worry while he was sleeping. That was the likeliest explanation. Rose probably figured she was well able to worry for the both of them. He decided that he might as well take a quick shower and put on a fresh suit. It would have to be the blue one though, and he knew Rose didn’t like it.

He reached for Rose’s mind and felt a touch of worry but no general feelings of sadness, fear or panic, which meant Donna had to be okay. He hated not having a direct link to Donna. He could read Rose and Dare and even had a faint sense of his unborn daughter but there were no shortcuts to Donna’s mind. Really, that was probably a good thing considering the circular logic of the woman but at times like this it would be useful.

When he finally emerged from the TARDIS he was greeted by a soft kiss from Rose. “There’s been no change,” she told him before he could ask. She handed the baby over to her husband. “He’s been freshly changed and fed and I’m going to go get some sleep now you’re up. There’s more breast milk in the freezer if you need it.”

He nodded mutely as she disappeared into the TARDIS and he went to keep vigil at Donna’s side. Martha came in a few moments later to take a blood sample from Donna’s arm. She eyed the Doctor strangely and he realized that this was the first time she’d actually been in the same room with Dare.

“Did you want to hold him?” the Doctor asked.

She hesitated but slowly walked over to the Doctor’s side. “He’s a beautiful baby,” she said. “This just is really bizarre,” she said. She slipped the blood sample into the pocket of her lab coat and took the baby in her arms. “I mean, this little one is going to grow up and be my husband one day. It’s the oddest feeling in the world.”

“Do you miss the days of living your life in a linear fashion?” the Doctor asked her.

“Sometimes,” she said. “It’s like, in two more years I’m going to meet him and he’s going to be an adult in my time line and I’m going to fall head over heels for him. And I know it because I’m the one who turned all glowy and got possessed by Rose’s wolfiness and I saw the future…but…it’s a major head game, Doctor, because he’s just a baby.”

She shook her head and handed the boy back to his father. “I need to run this sample up to Owen,” she said.

“Martha?” She stopped at the doorway.

“You know that you’re part of my family, don’t you? Not just later, but now?” he asked her.

She turned and gave him a little half smile. “I didn’t,” she said softly. “I do now.” And she walked away from him. He ran a hand through his hair and sighed.

“She’s going to be your wife one day,” he told the little boy who giggled up at him happily. “Martha Jones…Martha Tyler, if she takes your last name. And oh, is she ever a complicated woman. But I know you’ll like her because I’ve met you and her after you’re married. And you were both so happy. I wish I knew that Donna was going to be that happy.”

He frowned. “Odd that. I’ve run into two of my children, a granddaughter, a great granddaughter and her husband, and Jack and Martha, but I’ve never run into a future Donna.”

The Doctor shivered suddenly and his eyes flitted over to rest on Donna’s face. He wheeled his chair closer to the table, shifted Dare into one arm and picked up his friend’s hand. It was reassuringly warm. He didn’t know how long he sat like that but he nearly jumped out of his chair at the hand on his shoulder.

Dare started crying at the sudden movement and the Doctor hurried to soothe him with little bouncing movements. “Sorry,” said Owen. “I needed to tell you that there’s an anomaly in Donna’s blood workup. She’s got a parasite. It’s what is causing the fever. It’s shedding waste products into her bloodstream.”

“What kind of parasite?” the Doctor asked.

“It looks like one that’s been genetically engineered to make a donor organ be acceptable to a new host body. The kidney was most likely purposely infected before it was put into the new host and when it was returned to the original body it couldn’t do what it was engineered to do so it backfired,” Owen explained.

“Shouldn’t it have been removed when I took out her dying kidney?” the Doctor asked.

“The problem is that it moved into her bloodstream before you could do that. It was seeking out an organ that was foreign to the body and it couldn’t find one. It started attacking organs randomly and Donna’s body will start to shut down soon. Her immune system is fighting as best it can but there’s been a gradual increase in her pulse rate over the last six hours. I took an x-ray a little while ago.”

Owen pointed to the x-ray clipped to a light box. The Doctor walked over and flipped the switch to on. The x-ray showed Donna’s ribcage, heart and lungs, and a very thin flexible line wrapped like a vice around Donna’s heart. “It’s settled on her heart.”

The Doctor closed his eyes for five long seconds and then he opened them again and stood up. He handed Dare over to Gwen who was lurking outside the room and then turned to Owen. “What can we do to stop this parasite?” he asked.

Owen looked anywhere but at the Doctor. “Owen, is there a way?”

“Yes,” he said softly. “But you’re not going to like it.”

“How do we do it?”

Owen finally met the Doctor’s gaze. “We’re going to have to kill her.”

The Doctor was silent for a very long time. “Doesn’t that defeat the purpose of healing her? Not to mention that oath thingy you human doctors are all so fond of spouting. First do no harm.”

“It’s the only way to kill it. She has to be dead for two minutes. I can start her heart back up again but it has to stop beating for the full two minutes for this thing to die,” Owen explained. “Then it’ll be shed from her system and she should make a full recovery.”

“What happens if you’re wrong?” the Doctor asked.

“Then we’ll be back where we started,” Owen said.

“What happens if you can’t get her heart started again?” the Doctor asked tightly.

“Then I imagine Donna won’t be the only one dead around here,” he said edging slightly away from the Doctor’s dark look. “Look, I can do this. And Martha agrees with me that it’s the only way to short circuit this thing and kill it dead. I just…Jack said I needed your permission,” Owen said.

The Doctor looked from Owen’s earnest expression back to the pale, unmoving body of his friend. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “Do it,” he said. “Kill Donna.”


Chapter Thirty-three:  Dissension

“You can’t be serious!” Rose said, her eyes flashing fire. The Doctor had woken Rose, knowing that if he proceeded in this without her knowing she might never forgive him. Especially if it didn’t work.

“I’m very serious, Rose,” the Doctor said flatly.

“But…but you’re killing her.”

“To save her life.”

“But you can’t know that, Doctor! You can’t know it,” Rose said desperately, her voice rising. “There’s got to be another way.”

“There isn’t. We’ve looked. It’s impossible,” the Doctor told her, temper beginning to flare.

“Impossible? Don’t talk to me about impossible!” Rose spat. “You said it was impossible for you and me to ever see each other again. That the two universes would go boom if you tried. And here I am walking around big as life in this universe! I don’t have much faith in your definition of impossible, Doctor!”

“The decision’s been made, Rose!” roared the Doctor.

She looked at him, her eyes narrowed, a cold place forming in the pit of her stomach. “You’re not God,” she yelled back. “You don’t have the right!”

“If not me, than whom?” the Doctor said fiercely.

“You’re holding Donna’s life in your hands and you’re just going to take the chance that she’ll survive this. And if she doesn’t? Have you thought at all about what it will do to you if she doesn’t? If you have the blood of one more loved one on your hands?!” Rose asked angrily. “If you have to show up at the Noble’s home with the body of their dead daughter?”

“Of course, I have! Do you think I’d make this decision lightly?”

“Find. Another. Way.” Rose bit the words off one at a time.

“There isn’t one, Rose! There isn’t one! I’ve spent the last five hours looking for one, but we’re all sure. We know there isn’t one. Owen and Martha both agree it’s the only way!”

“Since when do you take advice from Owen?”

“Rose,” the Doctor said warningly.

“Please, Doctor, please. You have to trust me on this. You have to. I know it’ll go wrong. I know it!”

“Rose! Enough!” The Doctor turned the force of the Oncoming Storm on her in those two words.

Rose froze, her expression stricken for a long moment. Then she turned her back on him and walked into the room where Donna lay. She leaned down and hugged the unresponsive body, dropped a kiss on the woman’s forehead, whispered “I love you,” and then turned around and marched back out, retrieved Dare from Gwen and stomped up the stairs to the conference room without another glance in the Doctor’s direction, the door slamming hard behind her.

Silence fell over the assembled members of Torchwood before Jack moved towards the Doctor and put a reassuring hand on his shoulder. “It’s still your call, Doctor,” Jack said. “If you’ve changed your mind--.”

“I haven’t.” He looked at Owen and Martha. “Let’s do this.”



Rose cradled Dare tightly to her body, rocking to and fro in the office chair that wasn’t made for such movements. Silent tears fell down her face. She didn’t know how she knew it but she did. The Doctor was making a terrible mistake. One that would only have one outcome. If the Doctor followed through on his plan, he would be unable to bring Donna back.

It was the first time they had argued since she’d returned to this universe. And they hadn’t had a full out row like this since the time she’d saved her father’s life and brought the Reapers down on them. He’d been a lot more prone to arguing with her back in that incarnation than he was in this one. But nothing had ever been as awful as that argument. This…this was worse.

He hadn’t even been willing to listen to her or reassure her or convince her. He’d shut her down. It was him being right no matter what the cost and her knowing deep within that he was completely wrong. Not knowing it in a human way either. Knowing it bone deep, in an at one with the universe sort of way.

He was going to kill Donna. She couldn’t stop him. She knew that, knew it as clearly as she knew her own name. She cuddled Dare closer and placed a hand over her abdomen, linking into both the unborn child’s mind and her son’s. She sent them both waves of love and delight at the joy they had brought into her life. When she sensed that both little minds were filled with her warmth, she slowly and carefully withdrew, laying Dare down in the little playpen Jack had set up for her. She hoped that what she had done would be enough to shield her children from what was coming next.




Donna’s conscious mind swam just below the surface. She knew if she could just push her head above water she would wake, but somehow she couldn’t take that last step, put forth that last bit of effort. She heard fragments of conversations, and then slowly everything came into a sharp focus as the Doctor and Rose’s argument infringed on her senses.

It bothered her greatly that they were fighting, she’d never heard them fight before, and it took her a moment to put meaning to the words that fired back and forth between them.

Kill me, she thought. The Doctor wants to kill me? To save me? How does that work? Why is Rose so sure it’s wrong? She’s always trusted him. Always. But…it’s Rose. She has to have a reason to not trust him here.

This is Owen’s idea? He’s going to trust Owen’s judgment?! That git couldn’t care less if I lived or died. What the bloody hell is going on? Why can’t I speak?

She pieced together more words, soft murmurs that became questions and answers on the how and the when and the why.

They’re going to do what? Electrocution? Hey, wait a minute. That’s horribly painful. I’ve done that once. I have no intention of going through it again. What is that? It’s cold. Some kind of gel and, oh, no they’re hooking up leads. They’re going to stop my heart. Why, why, why, why, why?

Some kind of parasite, taken up residence, strangling my heart. If the beats stop it’ll kill it. Then they’ll restart my…what? How long? Two minutes? I can’t even hold my breath for two minutes! What about brain damage? I’ll not be breathing!

Doctor, no, you can’t do this. There’s got to be another way! Please, don’t do this. No, no, no, no, no! Aaaaaaaaaagh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Pain washed through Donna and then there was nothing. Nothing at all. In the conference room, Rose Tyler doubled over in pain and Vandarian Tyler began to scream.

Ch. 34&35:  http://amberfocus.livejournal.com/93960.html 

Comments

[kk-animation.livejournal.com]

Holy... *gah* Its two am here and I'm sitting here refreshing your page to see if the next chapters are up... This is driving me nuts, I was holding my breath through all of Donna's thoughts, well most of it, Can't hold my breath that long.

[simplyn2deep.livejournal.com]

I'm like...tearing up right now. that last bit with Donna...reminded me of Hayden Christensen's movie Awake.

I know those deep from the soul feelings. very intense and emotional.

[amberfocus.livejournal.com]

Sorry. It's all very suspenseful, I know.

[amberfocus.livejournal.com]

Yeah, she's scared to death.

[thelastbloom.livejournal.com]

I am extremely confused as to why stopping Donna's heart should be such a huge deal, especially for two awesome doctors living in 2008. While yes, there would be some inheirent risks, I don't think there was actually a need to "kill" Donna as they keep putting it. Is there some reason they can't perform a cardio-pulmonary bypass and hook Donna up to a heart-lung machine for the time her heart needs to be stopped?

[amberfocus.livejournal.com]

It's because of the parasite. It released toxins into her heart that prevented it from being restarted by conventional means, in effect killing the heart muscle the minute it died. I don't think I ended up going into enough detail on that particular element, my beta thought I was getting to sciency so it got cut out, but that is why it happened.