"Thank you for allowing me to admit you here," Martha told The Doctor, when they were alone.

"You obviously felt more comfortable looking after a sick alien in a clinic, than in your living right?" he chuckled, not at first realising the seriousness in her tone.

"You were very sick, Doctor," Martha reminded him. She put her hand on his and squeezed it.

"I was in a lot of pain," he agreed. "A simple healing coma got me through it though. I knew I'd get myself in one eventually."

"There's more to it, than I think you remember, Doctor." Martha was trying to get a point across to him.

"There is?"

"Do you remember entering a healing coma in my flat?"

"I.. I'm not sure?" He tried to pick through his fogged memories of recent events, with stunted results.

"Shortly after arriving in my flat you collapsed again, because of insufficiency with your respiration. The infection cancelled out your by-pass before anything else and I believe your body wasn't coping with the amounts of helium it had taken in, when it wasn't processing oxygen correctly. Anyway you developed concussion from your fall, which quickly resolved over the couple of hours that you were comatose in my bed. You're lucky I knew what was happening, to anyone else you may have appeared dead, the way your body went into hibernation. You also recovered from a fairly significant gash to your palm."

"I remember that. You stitched me up. That hurt," He looked at where the cut had been. There was no sign of the injury. He stared at his pale palm for some time, as if it held the answer to everything, but began to grow increasingly frustrated, as he realised something else. "I remember getting more sick after that?"

"You did, Doctor. The manner, in which the infection spread, meant that your healing coma did nothing for it. You were heading for full system failure, starting most acutely with your kidneys. I'm afraid that even if I had not got your permission, I would have had no choice but to bring you here." She looked for some reason apologetic, like he was going to yell at her or something.

"I'm sorry, Martha. I left you out of your depth. I usually have emergency protocols set in the TARDIS for this kind of thing."

"We tried the TARDIS, Doctor. The protocol hologram of you said you needed to go into a healing coma. I don't think you were prepared for something that would strike you down as badly as this, were you?"

"I suppose not."

"Do you think it would be a good idea, if I perhaps assisted you in setting new protocols for the future?"

"Maybe," he replied, after a few moments of thoughtful hesitation. Then something else occurred to him. "Hold on a minute. If I've been in two comas and a healing coma can't reach the infection and my biological systems were failing, how did I get better?" The Doctor actually looked at both hands suddenly, turning them over, as if to find some lasting trace of regeneration energy. "Fetch me a mirror!"

"Relax, Doctor," Martha resisted a chuckle at his urgent sense of vanity, despite it being coupled with the fear of losing a life. "You've not regenerated. Though I'm sort of hoping to find out from you how exactly you managed not to at some points?"

"What do you mean, Martha?" There was something he was missing, that she hadn't told her. He felt as if his superior Time Lord brain was not functioning at full capacity. He was not sure if that was something he should be worried about, or whether it was due to residual effect from being in a coma, or just the drugs. If something had happened to his magnificent brain.. well he just didn't know where he'd be without it.

"You suffered double heart attacks," she informed him. "Between shocking you and providing a dose of this," She showed him the vial she'd kept in her pocket, just in case. "I managed to get your hearts going again in time for our labs to figure out what ailed you and how to put a stop to it. By this time you'd suffered a tonic clonic seizure and lost use of your left arm."

"Oh, Martha." He groaned, taking in the information and gazing fixatedly at the medicine's label. "You've done it again, haven't you?"

"Done what?" Martha was unsure what he meant.

"Saved my life?" he relieved her anxiety, by saying.

"I have. And quite frankly I don't want to be in a position where I have to do it again. You need to take better care of yourself."

"I didn't mean to get sick?" The Doctor was astounded that he would even accuse of such a thing.

"I know you didn't, but this had been in your system a while. If you look at where your DNA was first extrapolated via tissue sample, I think you'll find that the scar is finally fading?"

"Yeah. That was a stubborn one."

"You don't usually scar, do you? That was the entry point, where a fungus from Messaline managed to work its way into your blood stream. It must have not taken hold until it entered your respiratory bypass. As your doctor, I should have properly cleaned and dressed it for you, but it all got quite busy after that, didn't it?"

"No, I don't usually scar. I wasn't sure, but I thought.. I thought that maybe I was blocking it somehow, that I was doing it? She's gone Martha and that scar was the only thing I had left of her. And now that's fading too?" An unexpected sob managed to choke him for a moment.

"It's okay, Doctor. You can cry, if you feel you need to. Sometimes crying helps," Martha hugged him. It was the first hug he had received since arriving and getting ill. It had been all medical tests and procedures and taking bits from him and now Doctor Martha Jones was hugging him. He lost his resolve into her shoulder. "You can't just bottle everything in all the time. You'll get scars on the inside, on your soul and they are worse. I've got my scars, from that year. The year that never was. I've talked about though. I had therapy with my family and I'm stronger for it. I think Donna's someone you can talk to, isn't she?

"Yeah," he smiled at the thought of his fiery companion. "Good old, Donna."

"Oi! Who're you calling old?" Donna exclaimed and gave The Doctor a light slap after placing his tray on the table.

"Not you, of course," he laughed, resting back again. He sniffed and attempted to wipe his face with the bed sheet.

"Is everything alright?" Donna checked, though regretting asking it. It was obvious the Time Lord was not alright and he was not likely to answer the question sincerely anyway.

"We were just talking about Jenny," Martha prompted.

"She was brilliant, that girl was," added Donna. "Put him right in his place too. She would have been great aboard the TARDIS. I'm sorry you lost her so soon, Doctor. It wasn't fair. I don't know how you resisted shooting that man. I don't care what you still say, she was your daughter. Two hearts beat in her chest. You say that you're a man that 'never would', but I tell you what, if I was you and that were my daughter, I can't say that I wouldn't have shot that man straight through the brains."

"I'm not sure I could ever go back there, in case I do just that," The Doctor said in a hushed tone. Martha and Donna almost couldn't believe they had heard it. But to them it did seem a natural reaction, if not necessarily for him, but he was still a person as much as they were and they didn't question it.

"It's alright to grieve for her, Doctor. If you don't ever want to visit her grave, we could do something different?"

"We didn't have graves," spoke The Doctor.

"Huh?" Donna wasn't sure what he meant by that.

"On Gallifrey," he elaborated. "Our people were burnt on a pyre. The Time Lord body is a miracle and it was so no trace of their physical form was left. In the war, there was so much fire. So many of my people burnt – are gone. I set my childhood friend a light too recently." The memory of The Master was most fresh in his mind. Whereas, in his recollections of the war, everything was starting to blur together into a great ball of fire, the bodies – even their faces, were lost in the flames.

"That's horrible." Donna responded, though The Doctor shrugged.

"It's the way of life, or should I say death, for a Time Lord. The mind is what usually lives on. In most cases the consciousness of a Time Lord is stored the Matrix. It is possibly for a Time Lord to return after their body is dead and burnt." He felt he had talked enough of his own people for now. Those memories hurt more than ever now and it only served to remind him he was the last one left. Who would burn his body when he was gone too? "I need you both to promise. If something were to happen to me, say if I had died here in UNIT, that Martha hadn't be able to save me that you would make sure my body is burnt and my DNA destroyed."

"Doctor, don't talk like that." It seemed like Martha may have regretted digging this out from him after all.

"No, but I am," he was serious. "Promise me." He didn't often give a direct order to his companions. He trusted both Martha and Donna deeply however and this was something he had to know they could do for him.

"I promise." Donna offered no hesitation.

"Me too, I promise." Martha said also.

"Thank you." The Doctor spoke to his companions sincerely. There was silence for a few moments, before he spoke again. "I think my dinner might be getting cold." He gestured at the tray Donna had left for him on the table.

"Let's get you sitting up properly then," Martha acknowledged. She adjusted the bed head and made sure his pillows were fluffed. She was made sure the drip was still running cleanly, as Donna rolled the table over. Despite the heavy atmosphere of the previous conversation, The Doctor tucked in hungrily to his re-heated hospital meal.

"I'll get you a fresh tea," Donna picked up the one she'd made for him earlier.

"Thanks. I like it hot. In my Eighth regeneration I could drink it stone cold. But I like it hot now. A hot tea should do wonders for my recovery. Never underestimate the healing powers of a hot cup of tea!"

When he had thoroughly scoffed his meal, including both bananas and drunk his tea, which one might practically think had magical properties for the amount he went on about it, The Doctor was ready to sleep again. His companions made sure he was comfortable and the lights were dimmed, before leaving the room so he could continue to receive the rest his body craved.