Thicks Man's Blood With Cold - Chapter 2

[lostwolf]

Chapter 1


Chapter 2. Nightmares

‘No!’  Rose woke with a start, tears still wet on her face, hands reaching out, desperately trying to stop the inevitable. She lowered her arms to the bedcovers, before sweeping a hand over her face, scrubbing away the tears.  She’d thought being on the TARDIS would help, but that last dream had been the most horrific so far.

As if in slow motion, she had seen her mother cybertised, seen her cut apart and encased in metal.  And it had been her real mother, not her alternative mother, to whom it had happened; crying out for her daughter with her last free thought.  She had seen Jackie’s life’s blood pooling on the floor and her anguished eyes as the last flicker of recognition and emotion had been snuffed out.  She had seen everything that was human about her mother eradicated and a metal shell take her place.  Rose had been forced to watch her mum die.

Shivering and exhausted, Rose rolled out of bed and made her way to the bathroom; maybe a long hot shower would rid her of the images that still lurked behind her eyelids and sent frightened chills through her body.

‘Open up, Doctor, I know you’re in there.  You’ve got my daughter, and I want her.  I’m not shifting ’til she comes out. You hear me?’

The pounding on the door intensified and, unable to withstand the auditory onslaught any longer, the Doctor released the lever that controlled the doors and then ducked with alacrity behind the console.  If caught, he was down here reconnecting an important wire, a very very important wire.  He most absolutely and categorically was not hiding from Rose’s mother.  She liked him these days, after all, though he secretly suspected that being liked by Jackie Tyler was a more terrifying fate than being disliked by her.  He still remembered the kiss she’d given him at Christmas, under mistletoe no less.  Gave him chills, even now.

‘Doctor?  Rose?’  Jackie sounded far less confident now that the door was open.  She’d never actually set foot inside the TARDIS and he suspected she had no intention of starting now.  

‘Rose? You get out here this minute, madam; you promised me a shopping trip before you go off with him again.  Bev says they’ve got a sale on at Henrick’s.  Never has been the same since his nibs ’ere blew it up, but they’ve got some nice knickers.  I could do with some new ones.  Reckon Howard took a few as a souvenir when I gave ’im the push.  He was a nice ’nuff bloke, but when he started bringing sandwiches to bed, I said ’nuff was ’nuff.  I mean, it’s not nice waking up and finding bits of bacon stuck to ya, is it?  And the crumbs!’

The Doctor risked a glance at Jackie round the side on the console.  She’d parked herself in the doorway, leaning against the doorframe, eyes very firmly focused away from the ship’s interior.  Confident she wouldn’t notice him in he moved, he slipped away, heading off to find Rose before her mother ran out of inane drivel and got violent or, worse, came on board and got friendly and maternal.

Rose lent her elbows against the wall of the shower cubicle, resting her hands flat against its surface and letting her forehead fall between them.  Hot water drummed against her neck, before cascading down her back.  The water soothed her muscles but did nothing to soothe the torment of her mind.  Images of the fires of the Lumic’s incinerators played against her eyelids, the screams of the victims rang in her ears.  The voices where those of strangers but the bodies, the bodies she saw where those of her mother, her father, Mickey, the Doctor.   She clenched her hands into tight little fists, hitting her forehead against the cold ceramic.  Stop it!  Why wouldn’t they leave her alone?

‘Rose?’

Oh God, it was the Doctor!  She flung herself from the shower, frantically scrubbing her face free of tears and, grabbing the first towel to hand, braced herself to face him.

‘Rose?’ He tapped on her door.  Cocking his head to one side, he realised he could hear the shower.  He opened her bedroom door and stuck his head inside. ‘Rose?’  The shower noise stopped and moments later a pink, damp Rose, wrapped in what he was quite sure was the universe’s smallest towel, emerged from the bathroom.

‘Doctor? What is it? Have we gotta leave? I can be ready…’

‘No, no. No, no, no, no,’ He stopped, realising he was saying no rather a lot.  His mouth didn’t seem to be working properly.  Mainly because his brain was too busy analysing the rather tantalising picture of a moist, warm, virtually naked Rose.  Jackie.  Ah.  Now that worked.  Rather like a bucket of ice water, in fact.  ‘Ah, your mum’s here.  Says you’re going shopping?’

‘Oh, right.  I’ll be five minutes.’ She stared at him pointedly.  He tilted his head.  What?  He wondered.  Then he realised.  He was staring. She needed to get dressed.  For that he needed to be elsewhere.  Move. He told himself.  Nothing happened.  ‘Doctor?’

‘Good, right, five minutes you say?  Excellent.  Couldn’t be better.  I’ll just, um, fix things.  While you … um, get dressed and… right.  Anyway, jolly good.’ In a flustered blur of pinstripes he retreated from the room, leaving a slightly bemused but relieved Rose in his wake.  

Rose struggled into some clothes, ignoring the shaking of her limbs, the tremor that seemed to skitter permanently beneath her skin.  She could do this.    Her nightmares weren’t real.  Her mum was alive.  Mickey was alive, forging his own fantastic life, the Doctor was alive.  The smell of hot metal, the thud of boots, the high-pitched scream of delete; these were figments of her overactive imagination.  A day out with her mum.  Normal. Safe. She could do this. She just had to try harder.  She really could do this. She could.

When the Doctor returned to the console room, somewhat hot under the collar and working frantically to banish the image of nearly naked Rose from his head, Jackie was still talking.

‘Then Carol, you know, her who does people’s feet, well, anyway, she says that there’s absolutely no way that that dress cost more than a fiver down the market and that Sharon was just giving herself airs.  And she was right an’ all, ’cause Tina the cleaner was down the market, not the main one, the one that’s by the grocer’s every Friday, she was there picking up some cheap bleach and says there was a stall positively overflowing with knock off dresses just like the one that Sharon was wearing.  Which proves it; that Carol might need to get her moustache seen to but she does know her clothes, I’ll give her that.’

The Doctor wondered if Jackie was actually speaking English.  It sounded like words, but he was fairly certain that they didn’t make any sort of sense.  

‘I was telling Mo ’bout it on the phone last night and she says you can get a really good DIY bleaching kit nowadays.  I thought I might pick one up for Carol, while we were out today. What do ya think, love?’

‘I’m not sure that would be a good idea, mum,’ Rose said, voice full of false cheer as she emerged into the console room at just the right moment.  The Doctor heaved a sigh of relief, the monologue was over.  He sprang up from his awkward crouch under the console, happy to face Jackie now that Rose was there.

‘Well, there you are.  Took you long enough!  I’ve been standing ’ere for bleeding ages.’

‘Sorry, mum.  I’m ready now, though, yeah?’

Jackie huffed, looking Rose up and down. ‘You still look peaky.  You sure the Doctor’s feeding you right?’

‘I’m fine, mum.  Come on.’ She turned to look at the Doctor briefly, her eyes fixed at some point just behind his head, avoiding his eyes, ‘See you later, Doctor, yeah?’

He shifted uncomfortably – she couldn’t possibly know what he’d considered last night, it was his guilty conscience, nothing more, that made him hear doubt in her voice.  He beamed at her, too busy with self-reproach to notice her own avoidance of him, or the dark circles, poorly concealed by make-up, that lurked beneath Rose’s eyes.  With a small sigh Rose surrendered herself to her mother and left the TARDIS behind.

Chapter 3