He'd taken a lot more damage than he let on to his Companions. Hell, he'd taken more damage than he wanted to admit to himself, mostly because he wasn't as resilient as he used to be and he didn't like to think about what that meant.

His plan had been dangerous, even reckless; and their escape extremely narrow (which was how the Doctor preferred it, as it was much more exciting that way.) Their opponents, a band of stone-age humanoids, had turned out to be surprisingly well-equipped with plasma weapons about four thousand years before they should have had such things, thus confirming the Doctor's suspicions that they were smuggling black-market technology through a rogue wormhole in space/time. Closing the wormhole had been the easy part. Disarming and escaping the angry humanoids had not been so easy.

The Doctor, Amy and Rory had been surprised in the weapons cache by an angry war party. There were several blinding flashes, and all three sustained plasma burns before they were able see well enough to mount their resistance. But it was the Doctor, who had pushed his Companions out the cave door and then turned back to the natives, that had received the full blast of a plasma rifle at point-blank range. It would have killed most living beings on the spot, but the Doctor had been able to get off one more round of ion-neutralizing sonic waves before he fell, stunned, to the ground.

Amy, characteristically, had ignored the Doctor's shouted orders to return to the TARDIS and turned back, with Rory trailing behind. With the plasma weapons disabled, they were able to drag the Doctor out of the cave just before the natives descended on him and tore him apart with their bare hands. Rory grabbed the Doctor under his arms and dragged him back to the TARDIS while Amy held off the enemy with a pilfered, more primitive rifle that only shot bullets, but which was effective enough. She had demonstrated that she was not afraid to use it by shattering the kneecap of the first humanoid that came after them. By the time the Doctor and Rory were halfway to the TARDIS the Doctor was on his feet again, and Amy rejoined them, turning every now and them to cover the area with her rife. Those that tried to follow them were sorry, though the Doctor refused to look back to find out how many. Sometimes the level of Amy's enthusiasms disturbed him.

Once back at the TARDIS, the Doctor was walking on his own and even managed a cocky strut up the stairs to the console. He gleefully relived the highlights of their adventure while he pulled levers and pushed buttons and twiddled knobs, guiding the TARDIS through the last part of their escape, until the "vwoorp vwoorp vwoorp" of the Time Rotor was steady and they were well away from what was once again a backwater planet. Then the adrenaline, which had been pumped so efficiently through his body by his two hearts, began to wear off. His legs felt wobbly. He started to feel pain from deep inside, as the internal organs that had been damaged started to protest.

"Amy, Rory, if everyone's alright, I think I'll skip dinner and go have a lie-down. Busy day and all! Bit tired now." At their assurances that they were fine, he forced himself to walk easily-normally-down the steps and into the hall that lead to his seldom-used bedroom. Gratefully, he closed the door on their excited chatter, then leaned against it and closed his eyes.

'Oh, just look at you, daft old man. Having to retire before the sun sets. Of course, there is no sun here in the Time Vortex. No real time either for that matter. So maybe it's alright...'

The pain was worse now. Still, it was nothing a good healing trance couldn't fix. Frankly, he was looking forward to the week or two of enforced quiet time it would require. Another sign he was getting old, perhaps. He was a little concerned about Amy and Rory and what they'd be up to during that time, but probably not as much he should have been.

'Ah, the TARDIS will take care of them," he assured himself. "And she'll wake me if its an emergency. They'll probably be grateful for the alone time. They haven't had much of it since they got married and sailed off with me on their wedding night. Been so busy...'

All pretense at normality gone, the Doctor staggered to his bed and collapsed on it, not even bothering to remove his shoes or his bow tie.

At first the Ponds did enjoy their alone time. So much so, in fact, that they didn't really miss the Doctor until the third day. After all, his habits had always been eccentric, and it wasn't the first time he'd gone missing for days on end. Once he'd gotten engrossed with reading "On the Origin of Species" and had been so busy adding addenda in the margins based on his own experiences that he forgot to leave his comfy armchair for over 24 hours. Another time he'd been in his workshop perfecting a perpetual motion machine and they hadn't seem him almost a week. Finally he'd emerged with the working device in his hands, explained what it was, and proceeded to toss it out into space because the "solution was so boring it wasn't worth telling anyone about."

So on the third day when he didn't appear, and Rory suggested that they check on him, Amy was not that concerned, and thought they should give him some privacy. After all, THEY were enjoying their privacy, weren't they? Amy had followed this up with a suggestive smile and in short order they were enjoying their privacy even more, in the comfort of their own bedroom.

Going into the healing trance was second nature by now, thanks to years of instruction as a youth and centuries of real-life experience. The secret was in the breathing. The Doctor concentrated on each inhale and each exhale until he was aware of nothing else, then began to methodically slow the frequency and the duration of each one. And bit by bit, the Doctor's hyperactive mind let go of everything it usually occupied itself with.

Inhale.

Exhale.

Closing off his connection to the Seventh Dimension (the awareness of all possible events in all possible timelines) was the easiest. Though this awareness was fundamentally what made him what he was, he was used to tuning it out, such as in times of crisis when action, any action, became more important than possibilities. And frankly, it was exhausting keeping it all straight when he was this tired.

Awareness of he Sixth, Fifth and Fourth Dimensions went as one. For a brief moment he lingered in the state his beloved humans occupied, that of Three Dimensions. He felt a bit claustrophobic.

'How do they stand it,' he wondered, not for the first time. But thankfully soon, even this primitive awareness faded.

Inhale.

Exhale.

He reached the dream state, signified by the vivid images that burst into the twilight behind his eyes. At first they were just random bits and pieces that came and went, but soon they became cohesive stories playing out in his mind. He could control these stories if he wanted; he could tell the actors what they should say and what they should do, and even choose the ending. But he didn't bother. He needed to go deeper.

Inhale.

Exhale.

The dream images flickered out, and the Time Lord's awareness moved into a velvety, starless night that was comforting and complete. His consciousness and will went off-line as his body's healing mechanisms took over-soothing, excising, discarding, repairing, growing. Only a spark of himself remained active, a tiny speck floating in a black, tranquil sea, ready to be reignited into full flame when his body was ready, or a dire emergency interrupted the process, but not before.

By the sixth day, Rory was was getting seriously concerned, and Amy had to admit he had a point. Together they set out to find the Doctor's bedroom, but the TARDIS was not being particularly helpful.

"Not again! This is worse than when House was in control" Rory grumbled, as the pair reached another dead end and had to return back the way they came for what seemed the zillionth time.

Amy shuddered at the memory of the dreadful visions House had conjured for her that day. "Oh shut up! It is not. Maybe she's got a good reason for not wanting us to find him."

"We just want to make sure he's O.K. What's wrong with that?"

Amy had no reply as Rory lead the way down yet another corridor. His healer's sixth sense was telling him that something was wrong, and he was not going to be stopped by this willful time machine. They would find the Doctor no matter how long it took.

Five hours later, they did.

The Doctor's body fairly hummed as healing energy sped through his cells-repairing, rejuvenating, reviving. This energy vibrated at at frequency that no living being save a Time Lord could hear, but it's said to produce a beautiful sound that possesses its own healing magic. The Doctor himself couldn't hear it, or anything else. But the tiny spark of awareness that was now He knew that all was proceeding well with the repairs, and so was at peace in the darkness.

Rory looked up from the Doctor's bedside, where he had been poking, prodding and observing the unconscious Time Lord for several minutes. Rory's face was paler than usual.

"Is he... alright?" inquired Amy, disturbed by what she saw on her husband's face.

"I think..." Rory began, then swallowed hard. "I think he's in a coma."

"Oh, good," Amy breathed.

"Good? How's that good? That's not good!"

"Of course it's not," Amy said, pulling herself together. "It's just that for a moment there I thought you were going to say he was dead."

Rory shook his head. "Definitely not dead. But he won't wake up when I call him, and he didn't move when I shook him. Not even when I pricked his hand with this pen. And he won't open his isn't even any eye movement under his lids." Rory frowned. "I mean, I'm no doctor..." he winced at the inadvertent pun... "but he definitely has the same signs as the coma patients I used to care for."

"What do we do?"

Rory sighed. "There's not much we can do outside of a hospital. Make sure his breathing isn't obstructed-it isn't. Make sure he's got good circulation-he does. At least, it seems good. I don't know if it's supposed to be better because of the two hearts thing..." here he trailed off, marveling at what he was saying. He'd certainly never said anything like that back in Leadworth.

"But they're both beating steadily anyway, and his color looks good. Really, since we don't have the equipment to run a bunch of tests I wouldn't know how to read anyway, there's only one more thing I can think of."

"What's that?"

"An I.V. drip. Fluids, you know? So he doesn't get dehydrated. It's routine for any patient that can't drink." Rory ran a hand through his hair, making it stick up in little spikes on one side, and thought hard. "I'd say one with sustenance too but I'm not comfortable preparing that given I don't really know how his body metabolizes food. Remember the time he got really drunk off those orange Ghoshalian grapes that just made us queasy?"

"Do I? He put on his tux and sang show tunes half the night while we tried not to throw up. Then he sulked the rest of the night because he thought we didn't like his singing! Wouldn't believe us when we said it was just the grapes. Mostly."

"Yeah, that. Anyway, I can't risk something like that happening when he's unconscious. Besides, we know he can go a long time without eating. I'm not sure about drinking, though. He drinks a lot of tea, doesn't he? Maybe that's because he needs to!"

As much as Amy loved being in charge, she knew it was better to leave this sort of thing to Rory, so she nodded. "Works for me. But where are we going to get an I.V. thingamabob?"

"Easy! The TARDIS has a medical bay, remember? The Doctor showed it to me the day after I came on board? Part of the tour? Oh wait, right, you left about that point. Said it was boring. Well he's stockpiled all sorts of things over the years he thought his Companions might be able to use. I'm pretty sure I saw what I need in there. Wait here and keep an eye on him. I'll be right back."

'If the TARDIS lets me come right back, that is,' he thought.

The TARDIS seemed to have resigned herself to whatever they were going to do, for Rory found the medical bay right where he left it. Everything was neatly organized too, though it took Rory a minute to realize that things were categorized by they year they had been invented or discovered, not by what they were used for. So the rubbing alcohol he needed to sterilize the needles was nowhere near the actual needles themselves.

'Weird,' he thought. 'Weird, but typical, for him, I guess.'

Once back in the Doctor's room, Rory snapped on some rubber gloves and his training took over. In short order he had assembled the I.V. stand and hung the bag of fluids, while saying a silent prayer to no one in particular that the simple sodium chloride solution that he had prepared would be compatible with Time Lord physiology. Then he tied a tourniquet around the Doctor's forearm, causing the veins in his patient's wrist to pop, swabbed the area with a sterile cloth and inserted the needle. He pulled back the device's syringe a little, which drew some blood into the tubing and assured Rory that the needle was in the proper place. He then snapped off the tourniquet and started the flow.

"There, that should do it," he said, never taking his eyes off the Doctor. "Now we just wait a bit to make sure there are no side effects."

Amy had been standing back, watching him with shining eyes. Now she came up behind Rory and put her arms around him. Together, they watched their sleeping friend for any changes, good or ill.

"O.K..." Rory said, after some time had elapsed. "His breathing and circulation are unchanged. That's good. So there's just one other thing... that I need to do."

"What's that?"

"I... ah... well," he stammered, his professional manner slipping as he looked into the curious eyes of his wife and discussed their best friend. "I will need to... insert a catheter, too."

As Amy's eyes widened, Rory rushed on, "It's necessary because we're introducing... fluids... they have to go... somewhere, and I need to make sure that they're all coming back out and not getting stuck somewhere, so I need to be able to measure... yeah." His voice trailed off and his face flushed crimson. Somehow it had not been this difficult when he had been explaining this very procedure to Old Man Chatham's son a few short months ago!

Amy, thankfully, understood immediately. "Do you have what you need?"

"Yeah. Right here," Rory mumbled.

"Well, get on with it then! What are you waiting for?"

Rory took a deep breath and applied a lubricating gel to the narrow, curved tube he had found. He forced himself to think that this was just routine, that this was just another patient, and was it was always a bit of an awkward job but he had done it before and...

"You might want to look away," he advised his wife, as he reached for the Doctor's trousers. "This can look... really unpleasant."

'And feel even worse! Thank goodness he's out cold,' Rory thought.

Uncharacteristically, Amy looked away.

Something was wrong. The darkness which had enveloped him like a moth in a cocoon at midnight was fading. In its stead wild images painted in lurid, impossible colors danced across his vision. These resolved themselves into creatures, but they were like no creatures he'd ever seen before (and he'd seen quite a few in his 900 years). They changed into something even more horrible as soon as he got a good look at them; right before he could identify them. And then they melted and changed again.

The worst part was not knowing what they were; not being able to name them, and therefore, tame them. Somewhere in the back of his mind his spark of remaining consciousness observed that he was dreaming, but that he had no control over this dream state. That frightened him even more than the creatures. He had to get back under again.

Inhale.

Exhale.

After waiting several more minutes and seeing no reaction from their patient, Rory deemed it safe to leave briefly to get some air and collect some supplies so that they could camp out in the Doctor's room. Amy stayed with the Doctor, with the instructions to call Rory on his mobile phone if there was any change at all with the patient.

Fifteen minutes later, Rory returned, his hair still damp from a quick shower, wearing a fresh shirt and carrying two duffel bags of food and personal items.

"Here we go," he said, sounding more chipper than he had all day. Having found the Doctor and DOING something for him, even if it fell short of what he would have been able to accomplish in hospital, was so much better than sitting around, worrying and not knowing.

Amy took the bags from him and dumped them out in two untidy heaps, checking to make sure he'd brought everything she asked for. Ordinarily this might have irked him but now he merely laughed, joined her on the floor, and helped her set up their makeshift camp.

It wasn't working. Why wasn't it working? It had never failed to work before. It was just a simple mind exercise, after all. Why, he could speak to other creatures with his mind; he could influence the behavior of many with his mind; hell, he could alter the flow of time itself with his mind. So why couldn't he get himself back into the trance state?

Inhale.

Exhale.

In...'BOLLOCKS!'

The dreams kept coming, boiling out of his subconscious like oil from a breached well. Now they contained images of people he knew, people he had loved with every fiber of his being (and still did). But they were people whom he had, with every mental power in his considerable arsenal, tried to forget, because he had damaged every single one of them in some way.

The Doctor wrestled with these unwanted visions, trying to get control of them. Making them stop would be ideal, but he'd settle for directing them to show him the good times he had shared with these people (and there were many! So very many!) and not the inevitable, terrible partings of ways.

Instead, what he got was a gruesome parade of injury, death, and betrayal-his betrayal. In some ways, that was the hardest to bear. Oh, the look in their eyes when they realized he was fallible, that he made mistakes, that he lied, that despite his grand intentions, things didn't always work out for the best. He'd seen that look on so many faces and he'd never got used to it. It hurt.

He tried to cry out but sleep paralysis held him fast. And still the dreams kept coming.

At first it had been fun, like a sleepover, or a camp out indoors. Amy spread blankets on the floor and fluffed the pillows while Rory arranged the snacks and drinks neatly in one corner, and the entertainment in another. He'd brought both their iPods, a portable DVD player, a handful of DVD's grabbed at random, and some magazines he'd seen in the bathroom. He couldn't make out what the words on the cover of the top one said-didn't even recognize any of the letters-but it seemed to depict various types of sleek-looking spacecraft.

'The Doctor's version of a sports car magazine, maybe,' he'd thought and tossed the whole lot in the duffel bag.

But now, Rory was sound asleep, and had been for several hours. Amy knew this because that's when the snoring had started. Ordinarily she would have poked him until he rolled over and stopped, but now she didn't bother. She was supposed to be awake anyway, in case there was any change in the Doctor's condition. There wasn't. The whole time he'd remained as still and silent as ever.

Amy, now slumped in the room's only chair, checked the time on her mobile. It was still almost two hours to go before she was supposed to wake Rory. She sighed. She was in the same bedroom with both her boys, but she felt very alone. Might as well check on the Doctor again.

She pulled the earbuds out of her ears and padded over to the bed in her stocking feet. In the dim light coming from the hallway, the Doctor's face looked younger than it ever had. His forehead, which had a tendency to collapse into deep furrows when he was agitated, was smooth. His lips, which narrowed in a hard line when he was disappointed, were now slightly parted. His eyes, which sometimes sparkled with joy and sometimes went all hollow and black when he was angry, were now closed, sealed with a fringe of long lashes. He looked, well, vulnerable. Amy's breath caught in her throat and she felt like she was going to cry.

'No, stop that!' she admonished herself, swiping at her eyes. 'He's not dying. He's not. Rory's taking care of him and he's just... NOT, O.K.?'

Amy sniffled, then leaned over the bed and gently brushed the Doctor's fringe away from his forehead. Then she leaned in further and pressed her lips against his cheek.

"Come back to us soon, Raggedy Man," she whispered.

"I see London, I see France, I see someone's who's stuck in a trance... and can't get out!"

The voice, mocking and cold, cut through the nightmare dance the Doctor's former friends and allies were performing in his mind's eye, causing their recollected forms to explode into a galaxy of dust. In their place rose another image-a squat, balding man clad in a crimson bow tie and crisp, charcoal jacket.

'Just when I thought it couldn't get any worse,' the Doctor thought with an inward groan. 'Is there no end to this misery?'

The Dream Lord chortled with glee. "Oh dear, you've really got yourself into a pickle this time, haven't you? You know that's what happened to Time Lady Ramillier, right? The one who died so tragically young, at-what was it again-325 years? Poor dear got so addicted to the trance state she forget to come out and eat once in awhile. And then eventually, she couldn't-didn't have the strength. Even a Time Lady-or Lord-has to eat sometime. How long has it been since you have? Do you even know how long you've been under?"

The Doctor fought down his revulsion and his rising panic. This was no time to get emotional. He'd never get control of anything if he got emotional.

"Oh, but I forgot, you would never abuse restorative treatments for your own amusement, would you? Much too moral for that. And yet something's gone wrong, hasn't it?"The Dream Lord prattled on.

'You! Seriously? Of all the nightmares I've ever had... you?' thought the Doctor, stalling for time.

"Yes, me!" the little man giggled. "Miss me? No, of course you didn't. You never call or write. Not even a text message to let me know that you're O.K. But you're not O.K, are you? Bit transfixed at the moment, like a butterfly on a pin, I'd say. And no obvious way out. Perhaps you're under attack. Ooh, what an exciting though. Maybe it's poison!Or maybe there's some sort of spooky ray interfering with your brain waves. Which one of your enemies do you think is doing this to do you? Go on, take a guess. No idea? Typical. You never were very big on the imagination front, were you?"

'If I had to hazard a guess, I'd say this was YOUR doing!'

"My doing? Oh, how you flatter me! I'd love to take credit for it, but I'm afraid I can't. If I could orchestrate something like this I would have done it years ago. So who is doing is it then? Such a mystery, and you do like mysteries, don't you? Let's see...well, perhaps it's not an enemy at all. Perhaps you've finally just gone... mad. Really mad. Not the charming-eccentric-who-is-useful-to-have-around-when-a-downtrodden-species-needs-saving-mad, but the that's where you are now-some Victorian insane asylum. Very creative treatments they had for the insane in those days. I'm sure you'll enjoy them."

'I'm not talking to you anymore, I'm going to WAKE UP now!' The Doctor poured all his concentration into doing just that.

"No so fast, Doctor! Why, I just got here. It would be rude to show me the door so soon! What a terrible host. It's always all about you, isn't it? No wonder no one likes you. They really don't, you know. But you were just reviewing that for yourself, weren't you? Well, it's high time you faced up to certain facts, though really, I hate to say it, but this just might be a case of "too little, too late... "

'No, no, no! I'm NOT listening, I'm NOT falling for this, I'm not, it's just a dream. I'm going to WAKE UP. NOW!'

The Doctor put the entire force of his will into the last command, but most of his will was still offline. The Dream Lord pushed his sweaty, round face right into the Doctor's, and the air around them rang with mocking laughter.

Rory pressed two fingers against the Doctor's jugular vein and counted silently to 30, then doubled the number of heartsbeats he got. He had no idea what a normal rate was for a Time Lord but he could at least determine if there had been any changes. (And why, oh why had they never discussed what was baseline normal for Time Lords? Didn't the Doctor realize, in his line of work, how likely he was to get injured and that someone-that someone being Rory because he was, after all, a nurse-would have to take care of him?)

"Bit selfish, really," Rory murmured, prying open one of the Doctor's eyes to check his pupil.

"What's that?" said Amy from the floor, where she had been trying to nap.

"Oh, sorry! Didn't mean to wake you. I was just... talking to myself. Kind of a bad habit I developed in the coma ward. No one else to talk to and all."

"You didn't. Wake me, that is. I can't sleep." With a sigh, Amy stood up. "How is he?"

"The same. Exactly the same."

"Well, that's... good? Isn't it?"

"I guess. It's not worse, at least... hold on!"

"What?"

"I saw something! His eyelid flickered! Did you see his eyelid flicker?"

"No, but I wasn't looking at..."

"Doctor! Doctor, can you hear me?"

Rory and Amy stared at the mask-like face of their friend.

"Doctor?"

"It's interesting how some asylums thought chaining the patients to their beds and starving them was an appropriate treatment for mental illness. That's humans for you, the humans that you love so much. I wonder if you'd feel the same way after a few years locked up in a cell more appropriate for a mass-murderer than a patient..."

At this latest sally, the Doctor abandoned his plan to remain calm. It wasn't working anyway, and the Dream Lord had gone too far.

'SHUT UP! Don't you ever just SHUT UP?' he shouted in his head.

"Do you?" replied the Dream Lord with infuriating calmness.

But the Doctor ignored the jibe, because something was happening. Behind the nattering Dream Lord the background had changed, just for an instant. He saw white walls and someone hovering over him, a blurry man that he didn't recognize but anything was better than the Dream Lord at this point. He reached out to the man with all his mental might.

"Doctor?" he heard, as if from a great distance.

'Yes!' he thought. Then, 'Help me!'

"Amy! He did it again! Did you see?"

"I saw! Doctor! Wake up! Please wake up!"

She shook his shoulder, none too gently. "Please?"

"Please wake up! Please?"

"They can't help you, you know. Not really. No one can," the Dream Lord declared.

'Oh, bugger off!' the Doctor said. The Dream Lord faded into nothingness, and the Doctor and opened his eyes.

"Oh, bugger off!"

"Wh-what?" asked Rory.

"I said..." the Doctor's eyes widened as he took in his surroundings. "Oh, I wasn't talking to... wait. Where am I?"

He blinked several times and tried to sit up. Rory put a gentle hand on his chest and held him down.

"Might want to wait on that a bit... you've been unconscious for several days."

But the Doctor was staring at his wrist, where the I.V. needle was neatly taped. "A needle? And a... tube? A tube!" He closed his eyes, making a mental inventory. Nothing felt damaged, but... "And there's another one! I'm in a hospital, aren't I?"

Panic flashed across the Doctor's face before Rory could reply. "This is just like before," he shouted. "They lost a needle in one of my hearts and then gassed me to death!"

"Doctor, you're not in a..."

"Don't touch me! Don't get near me! It was horrible and I won't go through that again! I won't!"

Rory held his hands in front of him and took a step back.

"No one's going to hurt you, Doctor. Just stay calm..."

"No, you don't mean to hurt me, but you do! You hurt me with your ignorance and your carelessness and..." abruptly he cut off and looked wildly about, as if seeking escape.

"What's wrong with him?" whispered Amy.

"Confusion... disorientation... fairly common when people come out of coma..." Rory replied clinically, but his face showed the hurt that his voice did not.

"I can't stay here!" the Doctor roared, sitting up so fast the I.V. stand was dragged a couple of feet.

"Doctor, no!" Rory cried. "Amy, help me!" It took both of them to wrestle the Doctor back into a supine position. Amy caught his hand as he tried to rip the I.V. line out and held it tight, while Rory pressed his shoulders to keep him down. The two exchanged a frightened glance as the Doctor raged beneath them.

"No! Stop this! You must stop this! Let... me... GO!" The Doctor gnashed his teeth and writhed in the bed. But they didn't listen, and they kept holding him down.

"Stop! This! Now! I demand that you stop this now!" The Doctor bellowed.

"I can't stand this!" Amy declared. "Rory, what do we do?"

"We... hold on, I guess. Until he comes around. Could take a bit..."

"We don't have a bit!" Without warning, Amy drew back her hand and slapped the Doctor across the face.

He quieted immediately.

Rory gasped. "Amy!"

"What? It worked didn't it?" But when she peered down at the Doctor, she looked more worried than angry. "Doctor?"

He lay still, his eyes wide open and fixed on the ceiling, a red mark developing on his pale cheek. Amy shook him gently. "Doctor? Answer me!"

The Doctor blinked, and then he was back.

"Hullo, Amy!" He lifted his hand, the one not attached to the I.V., and rubbed his cheek. "Why'd you have to go and hit me like that? Something I said? I can't really remember the last few... minutes? Hours? So I apologize if I said anything I shouldn't have... hold on, why am I still in bed when you two are dressed and it's clearly morning out...

"Oh, shut up!" Amy said. She leaned forward and kissed him hard on the lips, closing her eyes against the tears that threatened to form there.

The Doctor tried to squirm away, but Rory was still holding him down, and he didn't get far. Finally, he closed his eyes and accepted the kiss.

"So, in sum, you gave us quite a scare," Rory concluded. He was perched at the foot of the Doctor's bed, detailing their ordeal of the past week.

The Doctor was propped up against the pillows, sipping from a cup of tea. "Yes, I'm remembering bits and pieces now. Some very vivid nightmares that I couldn't control. That's new! How interesting!" he marveled.

"Interesting, he says!" Amy chided from the foot of the bed where she was leaning up against Rory. "Interesting implies fun, or at least, well, interesting. That's not what I'd call it."

"No, I just meant... interesting in a this-never-happened-before-kind-of-way. With the healing trance, I mean. Usually it's quite benign. I get hurt, I black out, I wake up, I'm fine. No fuss, no muss."

"You could have told us that's what you were going to do," said Rory, growing annoyed at the Doctor's light tone and apparent indifference to he'd put them through.

"Ah, it's nothing. Or it's supposed to be nothing."

"It's not nothing! You were in a coma!" Rory said, voice rising.

"Not technically a coma, though of course to you it would have looked like one. Yes, you're right, I should have told you, I guess. I should have known the Nurse would get alarmed..."

"I got alarmed because I'm your friend!" Rory practically shouted.

The Doctor's face softened. "Right. Of course. And thank goodness you-and Amy-were there, eh? I might still be stuck in that hell if I hadn't heard you calling me. Thank you for that."

Rory nodded, feeling suddenly awkward. It always felt strange when the Doctor apologized to him.

"But why the nightmares in the first place? Why did I get stuck?" The Doctor looked around the room, puzzling it out. He spotted the I.V. drip still attached to his arm, as Rory had refused to remove it until he proved that he could drink on his own.

"That's it!"

"What's it?"

"That! That contraption there! It put...saline into me and... what? Why would that be bad? Wait, I know-it partially revived me when I wasn't ready to be revived. That's has to be it. I couldn't get back into the trance with that liquid racing through my veins, but my body didn't want to wake up either because it knew I wasn't fixed yet. So I got... stuck! And then when I DID wake up, which wasn't easy, by the way, I thought I was... an earlier version of me... for just a bit. Perfectly simple explanation, after all."

The Doctor leaned back against his pillows, all smiles now because he had solved it. Rory, however, looked horrified.

"You mean... I... caused... oh no. Oh my God. I'm so sorry, Doctor. I..."

"Ah, shut up," the Doctor said with a grin, holding out his other arm. Rory hesitated. "Come here, you," the Doctor said. Rory edged closer, and the Doctor grabbed him up in a headlock, ruffled his hair, then pulled him down next to him on the bed.

"You were brilliant, Rory Williams" he whispered. "Just brilliant."

Rory flushed with the praise. "But Doctor... you woke up too soon... that can't be good..."

The Doctor smiled and started to reply, but was interrupted when Amy moved up onto the bed to lie on the other side of the Doctor. She wrapped her arms around him as if no had no intention of ever letting go. The Doctor kissed her on the forehead.

"I'll be fine," the 'Doctor assured them, then yawned so hard his whole body shook. "Well, fine after a wee nap, that is. But that's ALL it will be, just a nap. I promise."

The Doctor put an arm around each of them and closed his eyes.

They all fell asleep that way.