forget my name -+- 1/3
10th Doctor x Reader (platonic)
Summary: You might be dying, but there isn’t anything that the Doctor can do to save you other than to keep you safe and hope your fever breaks.
DR WHO TAG LIST: @ask-the-almighty-google (ask to be tagged!)
This will be part of a three-shot, thus why my usual “•||•” are different! :)
Warnings: talk of possible death, sickness/fever, and light angst. Rated T for those elements but would otherwise be rated G.
“Y/N!” the Doctor called you with glee. His eyes glittered like the stars that were waiting outside the window of the TARDIS, springs replacing his feet as he jumped up and down with excitement. He ran about twelve combs through his hair at the thought of showing you your next adventure (nervous preening, a nasty habit). He was fixing his tie, shaking with delight. “I can’t wait to show you the Eighth Great Roman Empire—my goodness, are you alright?”
The sight of you cut him off. Usually, a simple look at his companions never shut him up, never changed the subject (not unless they were wearing something unusually pretty (Rose most often had that effect) or unusually hideous), but the sight of you was so awful that his second heart almost stopped beating.
You looked like you had died five times over.
“Oh, Doctor. Good morning,” you said. “Nothing happ—”
Before you had a chance to finish your answer, he rushed over to you and felt your forehead, neck, hands, and hair. Your face was ashen from slow blood flow. Your skin was cold to the touch and your once-lovely eyes drooped in exhaustion. His lips pursed as he thought of the million tiny things that could be wrong, and the billion big things that couldn’t be right. “Oh, dear… are you feeling unwell?”
“I woke up feeling a little sick,” you told him, trying for a smile but it quickly dropped. With further examination, your lips were chapped more than they should have been; your skin was too warm to the touch; your voice was barely over a whisper. The Doctor’s eyebrows knit together tightly. Where did you… He had to think of the proper word. Where did you catch this?
“A little?” he asked, voice barely a whisper but yet somehow an entire shout. He watched you cringe away. His heart dropped. Was this just a cold? Was it more? It better be just a cold, or he didn’t know what he would do... “Y/N, you do not look even a little sick, you look a lot sick, you look extremely sick.” He turned you about. “Oh, no. When did you start feeling ill?”
“After we left 200,100, I believe,” you said quietly. Your voice crackled and broke with unwellness. The Doctor sat you down and felt your forehead without answering. “Why? Is something wrong with a little cough?”
“Erm,” he mused, “we’ll need to take your temperature…” He knelt in front of you and dug underneath your feet and through the floor. “Y/N, did you wake up feeling like this or did it start yesterday?” He poked his head up to look at you again.
“I think it was after we stepped back into the TARDIS,” you answered honestly. The Doctor sat up, jaw dropped. He stuck a thermometer in your mouth, right under your tongue without a single spoken word. Had you contracted something from the future? What if you got too sick? What if you died? What if it was just a cold?
“Were you feeling ill before we left?”
“No, Doctor.” You sniffed and wiped your eyes with both hands. “I’m sure it’s fine.”
As you began to lean too far forward, the Doctor caught you. “I’m not so sure it is.” His brows were practically one brow now. “You need to sit down. Forget about the Eighth Great Roman Empire. Rest.” He set you onto the grated floor, cupping your face. “You are sick. Understand?”
“Doctor…,” you whined. You tossed your head to the side in embarrassment. You didn’t want the Doctor to see you this way, did you? Funny. He was the Doctor. “Let me go. I want to go with you. I haven’t seen the universe, yet!”
He rolled his eyes and flexed his jaw. How had he been so careless? How hadn’t he known there would be a harmless virus among the humans in the future that would be deadly to you? It was the most obvious thing ever! You had never been exposed to the common cold of 200,100! “You’ve barely seen the future and you’re with fever — look where it’s got you!”
“Doctor!” you snapped. The Doctor stopped, but gave you the stare of death for disposing of his opinion so quickly. Most times, his opinion was taken as fact. He was already anxious enough; for you to ignore nine-hundred years of his expertise was far more deadly than whatever fever you had just contracted. Your hands were wet and clammy against his; your eyes didn’t break away from his; your pulse was audible to him even now — more now than ever before — and he didn’t want to listen to anything else. “I’ll be fine. You can just heal me… can’t you? I mean, you’re a doctor.”
“I can’t just heal you,” he whispered. “Medicine is not definite, and I am not just a medical doctor. Y/N, it is very possible that you don’t have immunity to this cough. I would have to take you back to 200,100 and find someone who does have the immunity and sample their DNA —” The Doctor stopped. “Y/N?”
“Yes, Doctor?” you said quietly. You were still lying in his arms. He stroked your head, your face, the little corner next to your eye. His friend could die. It would be his fault.
Nothing could protect you from a virus.
“What if I found some relative of yours? Gave you the T-cells of this virus?”
“Doctor?” you asked again, now a worried tone in your voice. Perhaps you had figured out how dangerous this sickness could be. “Doctor, am I going to die?”
“Not on my watch,” he swore. “I’ll die before I accept your death.”
You got choked up. The Doctor had never made you cry. If anything, he has made you weep tears of wonder and joy. But he had never scared you just by himself, just by his words. “Doctor,” you cried. “Doctor, I don’t want to die!”
He shushed you gently. “I would never let you die, do you hear me? We’ll just have to hang tight.” He smiled despite his uncertainty. “You’re my friend and I will not have it. Your time hasn’t come yet.”
“Don’t sound so sure,” you said quietly.
The Doctor heaved a heavy sigh and scratched at his sideburns. In his panic, he told you that you would die. In his idiocy, he let that be possible. Now he has to be beyond brilliant to make sure you didn’t end up that way. “Y/N…”
You were quiet for a while. The Doctor held you, running cool hands along your skin. You closed your eyes and let him do what he pleased. Neither of you said anything for almost fifteen minutes. Eventually, you spoke — the tone of your voice sent chills down the Doctor’s back and made each heart skip a beat. “Can I ask you something, Doctor?”
“Of course.”
“If I do die from a fever from 200,100,” you said, “I want you to forget my name.”