ten

"Doctor, these readings are starting to scare me," they heard from the intercom. It was Abi. The Doctor and Nina froze, sharing a look before he spoke up.

"What do you mean?" He asked, obviously worried.

"Korwin's body's changing! His whole biological make-up, it... it's impossible," she said. The whole crew was now listening in. Nina immediately left what she was doing to run to the med-center. She had had a bad feeling about Korwin ever since she first saw him, and leaving Abi with him felt like the greatest mistake of her life.

She ran through the halls and almost got herself lost until she heard Abi's voice once more from the comms.

"This is med-center," she said, her voice filled with fear. "Urgent assistance requested. Urgent assistance!" She almost yelled, her voice rising with each word.

Nina started to sprint her way to the med-center.

"Burn with me! Burn with me!" She heard. Nina froze on the spot. She had heard those words once before, but coming from the Doctor. Yet, it was vaguely the same voice that had said it.

Her instincts kicked in once again when she heard Abi screaming. She started to run once again but was just a few seconds late. When she arrived at the med center, Korwin was already gone.

Nina turned around and spotted the black outline of a human body with one hand in the air on a wall.

6.

Endothermic vaporization, she realized. Nina's hearts dropped when she realized how obvious it was. Korwin was doing this, his body was flaming hot last time she's seen him, it made so much sense. How hadn't she seen it before?

The Doctor and McDonnell burst through the plastic sheeting that acted as a door to the med-center, Scannel with behind them. As soon as the Doctor lays eyes on Nina, he sighed in relief. He ran to her and wrapped his arms around her shoulders, squeezing her tightly, one hand behind her head, pulling it towards his body. Nina could hear how fast his hearts were beating; he had really been worried about her.

"Don't do this to me," he told her. "Ever again." Nina nodded quickly before he let go of her.

"Korwin's gone," they heard McDonnell say, her voice slightly shaken.

"Oh my God...." Scannell trailed off. The three of them turned to look in the same direction and saw that Scannell had spotted, a charred, black shape on a wall, in the shape of a person with one hand in the air. They realize that this charred shape was once Abi. The Doctor walked towards it.

"I'm sorry, I wasn't fast enough," Nina apologized, her voice barely audible. The Doctor wrapped her hand in his, squeezing it tightly.

"This wasn't your fault," he reassured her in her ear.

"Tell me that's not Lerner," Scannell pleaded them, but already knowing the answer. The Doctor approached the wall, letting go of Nina's hand. He ran his hand over the outline of the shape.

"Endothermic vaporization. I've never seen one this ferocious," he whispered. He then looked distant, as if he was realizing something. "Burn with me," he stated.

"Don't," Nina said before she could even realize she had. "Please," she added. The Doctor gave her a worried look, but turned back to the figure, before looking at McDonnell.

"But that's what we heard Korwin say," Scannell said.

"What?!" McDonnell said, offended at their assumption. "D'you think... no way! Scannell, tell him! Korwin is not a killer! He can't vaporize people! He's human!" Nina noticed the scans on the floor and picked them up, looking at them against the light. The Doctor walked behind her and read them too.

"Is this.." Nina trailed off, pointing at some data. "Oh, it is."

"Internal temperature, one hundred degrees!" The Doctor yelled. He took the scans from Nina, holding them higher so that he wouldn't have to bend over to see them.

"Body oxygen replaced by hydrogen," Nina stated, pointing at another graph, standing in her tiptoes.

"Your husband hasn't been infected, he's been overwhelmed!" The Doctor exclaimed. McDonnell snatched the scans from the Doctor's hands.

"The scans are wrong!" She denied. Nina spotted another scan on the ground and grabbed it, looking at it.

"But what is it though? Parasite?" Nina asked the Doctor, ignoring the woman.

"Could be a mutagenic virus," the Doctor pointed out.

"Something that needs a host body," Nina agreed. He nodded.

"But how did it get inside him?!" He wondered.

"Stop talking like he's some kind of experiment!" McDonnell told him, a little bit hysterical. Then Nina realized what was happening. She immediately felt bad for having ignored her. The woman couldn't believe her husband had been the one killing people. She couldn't betray him like that.

"Where's the ship been? Have you made planet-fall recently?" The Doctor asked, not even noticing the blank look on McDonnell's face. "Docked with any other vessels? Any kind of external contact at all?"

"Doctor," Nina whispered. He completely ignored her.

"What is this? An interrogation!?" McDonnell asked him.

"We've got to stop him before he kills again," he said bluntly, not realizing he was speaking of this poor woman's husband. Nina grabbed his arm and pulled him back.

"We're just a cargo ship.." they heard her mumble. Scannell wrapped an arm around the Captain's shoulders.

"Doctor just..." Nina trailed off. "Give her a minute, will you?" She said softly. Only then the Doctor seemed to realize who they were talking about and to whom. He faintly frowned but nodded, understanding.

McDonnell faced away from them for a second but quickly recovered, turning back to face them. "I'm fine," she lied. "I need to warn the crew." As she walked to the intercom, the Doctor turned back to place the scans back against the light. He didn't even realize that he was holding them too high until Nina grabbed his hand and lowered it. He breathed a short laugh, before going back to frowning at the results. "Everybody listen to me!" The Captain called out through the comms. "Something has infected Korwin. We think..." she hesitated. "He killed Abi Lerner. None of you must go anywhere near him, is that clear?"

♧♧♧

"Whatever it is you're still trying to do with those, can you do it faster?" Nina asked the Doctor, swinging her legs. "'Cause we've got about 25 minutes." The Doctor frowned at her time telling. She usually was so precise, and now she wasn't.

"About?" He asked. Nina shrugged.

"My head hurts," she whined, using it as an excuse.

"Is the infection permanent?" McDonnell asked. She had taken a break and was sitting down by some stairs that lead to the door. Scannell was standing by him. Nina was sitting on the edge of the statis chamber, the Doctor standing next to her, still trying to read the scans, which made no sense. "Can you cure him?"

"I dunno," the Doctor said. It wasn't an obvious lie, but it was definitely a lie.

"Don't lie to me, Doctor. Eleven years we've been married. We chose this ship together. He keeps me honest. So I don't want false hope," she said. Although she was pretty much telling the Doctor to say if he was going to live or die, Nina knew that they couldn't give it to her bluntly, and that was exactly what the Doctor was about to do. As the Doctor took a second before taking a decision, Nina took the opportunity to lay it down to her gently.

"We believe that," she started, as softly as one could. "This parasite is too aggressive. To bring him back from whatever sort of trance this is, we would have had to catch it earlier. Even if we were able to undo it -- cure him, if you may, the consequences might have been even worse. He could have come back being someone else completely, no trace of your actual husband. I'm sorry," she finished, as empathetically as she could. "I really am, but he's gone."

McConnell had been listening in carefully the whole time, never breaking eye contact with Nina, until she told her that her husband would not come back. She nodded, taking it in quietly. "Thank you," she whispered. Nina could only grant her a sad smile the Captain looked back down.

Nina suddenly felt a sharp pain through her temples, and dropped her head, holding it with her hands, her elbows on her knees. Her breathing became rather rapid, and the Doctor noticed it. But before he could take any action, a thought popped into his mind.

"Are you... certain nothing happened to provoke this?" He suddenly spoke out loudly, making Nina flinch at the noise. "Nobody's working on anything secret, 'cause it's vital that you tell me," he asked the Captain, his voice a little quieter this time.

"I know every inch of this ship. I know every detail of my crew's lives. There is nothing," she denied, shaking her head. The Doctor obviously didn't believe her, as he kept staring at her harshly.

"Then why is this thing so interested in you?" He asked her, but mostly himself. He didn't know the answer, he didn't know what was going on, and it frustrated him.

"I wish I knew," the Captain told him.

Nina suddenly flinched again as a bigger, stronger wave of pain hit her. She tried not to cry out or grunt, not to catch the Doctor's attention, but Scannell of all people noticed it.

"Are you alright?" He asked her. The Doctor's head immediately snapped towards her. He watched in concern as Nina squirmed in her seat, holding her head even tighter.

He walked to her, placing his hands over hers to take them away from her head. He placed a hand under her chin and pulled her head up, forcing her to face him, to look at him. Nina watched his worried eyes scan her whole face until they fell upon her eyes. Once again, they locked eyes and just stood there. Both of them wanting something to happen, waiting for something to happen, but neither of them actually making a move.

The Doctor ended up by stepping away. Only then they realized that McDonnell and Scannell had walked out of the room, giving them some space. The Doctor stepped away and walked to the other side of the statis chamber.

"Lay down," he ordered her. Nina frowned.

"This really isn't the best time," she warned him. "Cause I'm pretty we've got like about, maybe 23 minutes? But by now I'm only just guessing."

"And that is why you're going to lay down and I'm going to scan you," he said, his voice firm, but not at all cold or mean. Nina put her hands in the air in a fake surrender and gave him a short laugh.

"Alright," she gave in. "Yes, sir." Nina lowered herself to the metal bed, sliding up so that her head was inside of the machine. She couldn't help but to feel self conscious as he stared at her, and read the scans of her body. After a few seconds, he extended his hand for her to take and once she did, he pulled hur up into a sitting position.

"Body temperature of 24°C," he read out loud, a very concerned look on his face. "That's.. that's quite dangerous," he told her.

"It's a fever," she tried to make it sound less important than it actually was.

"It's a giant fever," he corrected. "Your body is eleven degrees warmed than it's usual temperature. Not only that, but we are in a spaceship that's heading for the sun, and the current internal temperature is of 42°C."

"Then let's stop the ship from crashing into the sun," she suggested. The Doctor shot her a sad look. It was almost as if she didn't care what happened to her.

"We will do that," he assured her. "And then I'll take you to the infirmary, and we'll take care of you."

"Doctor! We're stuck in an escape pod off the area seventeen airlock," Martha's panicked voice suddenly came in through the intercom. "One of the crew's trying to jettison us! You've gotta help us!"

"Go," Nina told the Doctor once she saw the fearful look on his face. He nodded and immediately sprinted off the room.