He was running again, not that he hadn't been running most of his life…first from his own people, then from various sticky situations that presented themselves in his timeline like roadblocks on a thruway. This time, though, he was running from something he didn't want to run from.

Clara Oswald.

She was the one thing every nerve in his body cried out for him to run towards. To scoop her petite little frame into his arms and run with her into the TARDIS, flying off into the stars forever. Well, as nearly as he could get to it, considering she probably only had about seventy years of lifetime left. But that was seventy years of time he could be spending with Clara, seventy years of holding her, laughing with her, dazzling her with the wonders of the universe, kissing her, loving her, caressing her….

Bad Doctor. Thoughts like that were what got him into this trouble in the first place.

There were days when he almost…almost…wished he hadn't met Clara Oswald. Hadn't encountered her echoes in the Dalek Asylem and Victorian London. If he'd never met them, he would never have become obsessed with divining the mystery of her, trying to suss out how she could be the same person and yet have lived and died twice.

And yet he knew, now that the mystery of Clara was solved…of how she had jumped into his time stream to save him from the Great Intelligence, subsequently being torn into thousands of little echo Claras, living and dying to save him…that inevitably, he would have run into one of her echoes anyway, and he would still have been pulled into the intrigue of knowing who she was. It was kismet. Fate. Destiny.

So why run?

Especially when he let himself think about just what he was running from. Clara Oswald, with her chocolate colored silky tresses, falling around her shoulders and dancing when she walked. And the way she walked, with a kind of hop and skip, like she was bouncing into every adventure with enthusiasm. And her eyes…how on earth did she make them so large sometimes? Whenever she was feeling an intense emotion they would expand, becoming pools of night spangled with stars…dewy and luminous. And what about her height? Yes, she was short; he'd once twitted her about being too short but he was lying…she was just the right height to tuck under his chin and snuggle between his hearts. Just the right size to pick up and carry away into the TARDIS, off into the universe, just the two of them…

The Doctor swallowed. This was not helping. He looked down to find his hands on the controls of the TARDIS, almost ready to plot in a return journey to Earth; back to London and Cole Hill School…and Clara.

Bad Doctor. Bad, bad Doctor.

He sat down with a plonk on the stairs leading to the upper deck of the TARDIS, trying to focus his mind on exactly why he had decided to run from Clara Oswald. He hoped it would reinforce in his brain just why he should not allow himself to think any longer about her, lest he be tempted to run back to her. It had all started the day they faced the Daleks.

They'd been captured by Dalek puppets and taken to Skaro; while he had faced off with Davros, a Dalek puppet had tricked Clara into inhabiting the empty shell of a Dalek. She had done it willingly at first, faintly remembering how she'd once been a Dalek herself and thinking she could use the shell to infiltrate the Daleks and save the Doctor. However, once inside the shell Clara found herself trapped; worse yet, everything she tried to say was translated to hateful Dalek speech—if she tried to identify herself she found she was actually saying "Exterminate!" in the awful screeching voice of a Dalek. The Dalek puppet had tricked her into it in the hopes of using her to kill the Doctor. And it had almost worked—except that Clara, entombed in the Dalek armor—eventually experienced a full flashback of her echo being converted to a Dalek. It terrified her so much she dissolved into hysterical crying. The resultant sobs coming from this particular Dalek immediately clued the Doctor he was not dealing with a normal one. He quickly opened up the shell and released a sobbing Clara. They eventually escaped, after turning the Dalek stronghold into almost rubble, by causing an uprising among the Dalek mutants living in the sewers below Skaro. Once back on the TARDIS, however, Clara withdrew to her room, only to be found later by the Doctor in a miserable state; engulfed in despair over the thought at how close she came to involuntarily killing the Doctor. He chastised her over it by telling her how close he himself came to destroying her while under the assumption she was a true Dalek. They wound up huddled in each other's arms, trying to assure each other of their forgiveness for how close they came to destroying each other.

And at that moment, the Doctor's hearts had turned to ice. Someday, he realized, if Clara kept traveling with him, he just might become the instrument of her death.

To make up for what had been a harrowing experience, he'd taken them to a peaceful planet, inhabited by a race of gentle aquatic creatures that enjoyed having off-worlders come and explore their colorful seas. He brought Clara back to her home tanned and rested, seemingly recovered from the horrors of their experiences with the Daleks. She'd given him a peck on the cheek, and waved a goodbye with a carefree "see you next Wednesday" on her lips.

He had given her a half-hearted wave from the doorway to the TARDIS…had stepped inside and closed the doors…had dematerialized from London…and rematerialized halfway across the galaxy, with no intention of ever coming back.

She was better off without him, if he was destined to be her death.

He hadn't reckoned, however, on how much he would miss her.

Not miss her.

Crave her.

Every single moment. Every second of every day he was apart from her. Every atom of space. Every instant in time. Every inch of his being.

He wanted her with him to get her take on anything new he saw…to hear her tease him unmercifully about his fez obsession…to see her eyes expand as she took in a new wonder. He wanted to hear her voice, feel her hand in his, and breathe the same air she occupied. He just…simply…wanted her.

It would have driven him mad if he didn't suspect he was already there.

Nothing he could do would drive her out of him. Briefly he took on another companion; Atura was nice enough for an oversized bipedal bear creature with the intelligence of an immature Adipose, but he just wasn't Clara. After a few mild adventures together, they parted amiably on Tetrahedrix Station, where Atura decided to set up shop selling teapots. The Doctor wished him well, and then got back onto the TARDIS and was halfway to Earth before he stopped himself. He felt like banging his head against something for being so weak.

One day he caught a glimpse of someone who looked like Clara from the back, and for a double heart-stopping moment he thought it was one of her echoes. A whole scenario of him saving her from saving him and then taking her on as a companion and heading off into the stars played itself in his head until he actually saw what the supposed echo looked like. He was pretty sure none of Clara's echoes would have four pairs of eyes and a forked tongue, or be male.

However, this incident started up a new frustration for him—the fear he might actually run into another Clara echo and have her sacrifice herself for him. He didn't think his hearts could take it.

Girding his loins, he wandered further out in time and space, trying as much as he could to shake Clara Oswald out of his mind, and lessen his chances of running into one of her echoes. Getting her out of his system wasn't proving successful, as previously noted; and it became apparent when, on another day, while in the library of the TARDIS, he found himself standing in front of a life-size painting of her he had just completed from memory, down to that adorable deep dimple on the left side of her face that he loved so much.

Loved.

He thumped his head on the canvas, touching his hands gently around her face. Yes, that was the problem, wasn't it? He wasn't simply fond of Clara, like you would be of a dear friend or quirky acquaintance. No, he wasn't wasting a mere emotion like that on her. And he didn't just "fancy" Miss Oswald, either. Nor was he merely infatuated with her.

No, drat it all, he was all the way in love with her.

He needed her like he needed air to survive; worse yet, he could actually survive for a time without air. He wasn't sure he was going to be able to survive much longer without Clara Oswald.

And yet he felt he had to try. For her sake.

It was agony.

And so, here he was, a wandering vagabond, drifting aimlessly and Clara-lessly across the universe. He stood up from the stairs to the TARDIS' upper deck and walked down to the controls, intent on perhaps going forward enough in time that he could be assured he would never even accidentally run into her on Earth again. And then the phone rang.

The same phone on the outside of the TARDIS that Clara had called. Outside of Kate Stewart of U.N.I.T., Clara Oswald was the only other person who had that number. Unless you counted a mysterious woman in a shop who'd given it to Clara, just before Clara had called him the first time to help her find the Internet. Someday he intended to find out just who that mystery woman was.

He tromped over to the front door of the TARDIS, flung it open and flipped open the door to the small cubbyhole the telephone sat in on the outside of the TARDIS. For a moment he simply stared at the phone, considering letting it ring itself out until whoever was on the other end simply gave up. Curiosity got the better of him, though, and he snatched it quickly up and jerked it to his ear.

"Doctor?"

He almost dropped the phone. It was Clara. The sound of her voice made his hearts behave in a most irritatingly erratic fashion in his chest. It was almost frightening.

"Yes?" he breathed in response, almost too quietly to hear.

"Where in the universe are you? You've missed more Wednesdays than I care to count."

A very large object seemed to have lodged itself in his throat or chest; he was having trouble breathing and swallowing. He struggled to get his answer out. "Well…er…ehm…I…thought it best…if we stopped…traveling together."

There was silence for a pace on the other end of the line. For a moment the Doctor thought the connection might have been severed, and his hearts constricted alarmingly. Then a very angry Clara bellowed into the phone. "WHAT? Why? What've I done? What's wrong?" There was another pause, and then she continued. "Is this about the oven I destroyed on the TARDIS with that last soufflé? Because if it is, I can—"

"No." His voice was far calmer than he felt, but it gave him the courage to continue. "No, Clara, this is about my being a danger to your health and safety. This is about me staying away so you can have a real life." He swallowed hard, suddenly remembering something Amy had told Rory, long ago, when she'd done something similar in an attempt to not put Rory through any more emotional pain with their relationship. "This is me giving you up…so you can live."

"Well, this is me saying why didn't I get a vote in this decision? Because, Doctor, I thought…we were…there was…something more going on between us…than just being…good friends." Her voice had slowly gotten quieter as she spoke. Her last sentence was almost a whisper. "I guess I was…wrong."

If all the gyrations his hearts had been doing previously hadn't hurt enough, that last phrase stabbed him directly through those organs, causing utter agony. And yet…if she could be made to believe he thought no more of her than that…it would hurt her for a time but ultimately she would heal. She would find it much easier to forget him and move on with her life.

He opened his mouth, fully intending to affirm her statement, and instead found himself blurting out, "No…no, it's not that." He was unable to get past the pain he'd heard in her voice, unable to lie to her and magnify that pain.

"Then tell me what it is. If you're going to leave me, make a case for it. Don't just abandon me like a piece of trash on the side of the road." Her voice was strained, not far from tears.

"Oh Clara…you are worth far, far more than that," he murmured, afraid to say much more.

"Come here and prove it, then," she challenged.

That was the last thing he wanted to do—face the temptation of the full force of Clara—and yet, he knew she would accept nothing less. If closure there was to be, she wanted full closure. He knew in his hearts she did deserve it; he just didn't trust his hearts to be firm to carry it out. Just hearing her voice was weakening his resolve.

"Clara…you are better off forgetting me," he weakly retorted, vainly hoping it would put her off. It didn't.

"I tried that. Maybe if I yelled at you in person it might work. Let's give it a go and see. My place, right now." And with that, she abruptly disconnected the call. If she'd had an old style receiver like he was holding, he suspected she would have banged it down.

Ten minutes later the TARDIS was materializing across the street from Clara Oswald's home.

The Doctor stood at the console, looking at the scanner. He saw Clara emerge from her front door and start walking to the edge of her property. The wind whipped her hair around and lifted the empty sleeves of the sweater she had tossed across her shoulders. The last time he'd seen her, it had been a warm spring day. This looked like late fall, late November or early December. Not quite Christmas, not quite bleak. A few leaves skittered across the street and settled near her on the ground where she stood, waiting for him to emerge. Her expression was taut, as if she was holding her anger in check.

He took a deep breath. This was going to take more control than he was used to exerting in extreme circumstances. He was going to have to try to be as Gallifreyan as he possibly could, and ignore the wild emotions running through him. He took another deep breath to slow down his hearts. Then he stepped out of the doors to the TARDIS.

"Clara! There you are. Well, well, long time no see. You're looking good. How've you been?" He clapped his hands together, the very picture of geniality and friendliness.

Arms crossed over her chest, Clara strode across the street, right up to him. Her jaw tightened. "You have some nerve, Chin Boy," she growled, eyes piercing his.

His hands went up defensively in front of his chest. She had been known to punch when the mood took her, and her blows were not delivered lightly. He'd had the bruises to show it. "How long has it been?" he sheepishly asked, all his previous bluster escaping him at the cold look in her eyes.

"Oh, let's see…about six months, two weeks and…three days. I can't give it down to the minute like you would, but it's been long enough for me to think something dire might've happened to you." She tilted her head slightly. "And then of course I started wondering if you'd died, and I would never know. That of course didn't cheer me up any."

He swallowed hard. "Clara…I have my reasons."

"And you're going to tell them to me," she tartly replied. "But not out here in the street, like a pair of battling divorcees. Let's take this inside the TARDIS. That way you can't run off on me without me going too."

That smarted; she obviously knew him too well. She certainly was not making this easy. Especially since before he could react, she quickly brushed past him, pushed the TARDIS' doors open and marched inside. He swore under his breath. So much for his darting into the TARDIS, shutting the doors and rapidly escaping. She really did know him far too well.

She strode up to the console and turned to face him, arms still crossed tightly over her body. He shut the TARDIS' doors, leaned against them for a moment, releasing a sigh, and then pivoted to face her.

"Now. Why did you abandon me?" Her face was still a tight mask of hurt and pain. And true to form, her beautiful eyes started dilating under the powerful emotions she was feeling.

Slowly walking towards her, he twisted his hands in front of him, looking down at the floor instead of her face. It hurt too much to see the heartache he was causing her. River once said he didn't like to see the damage he did to people; it was all too true. Right now he was agonizing over what he had done and was planning on doing to Clara. He'd made up his mind; it had to be done. But he didn't want to see it played out on her features—especially in those overwhelming eyes.

"There are a lot of reasons, Clara, and they all stem from the fact that you are all too human. I almost killed you on Skaro…how long before I actually am the cause of your death, whether intentionally or unintentionally? I'm not a safe person to be around. I take risks, sometimes mad, insane ones." Here Clara interjected a quiet, "no argument from me on that point." He briefly glared at her and went on, this time looking pointedly at the TARDIS' control panel.

"I have many enemies…even among my own people…and the TARDIS seems compelled to take me to dangerous places so I can apparently save the universe. The least perilous place in the universe is most likely farthest away from me. Is it any wonder I thought it best to take you home, where you can live out a normal life, be happy, fall in love, get married, raise a family? You will be out of harm's way here without me around."

"But you asked me once before if I felt safe running off with you, considering anything could happen," Clara sighed. "I told you then and I repeat it now: that's what I'm counting on—something happening to me. Something amazing, something wonderful, something out of my humdrum, boring everyday existence. I know the risks, Doctor; I was willing to take them then. I still am."

"Well, maybe I'm not willing to let you take those risks." His jaw tightened, and he finally found the courage to look her in the eyes. He gave her a cold glance. "After all…my ship, my rules. I choose who comes aboard, and when they should leave."

He could see the hurt in her eyes, but he could see something else as well. She was weighing his words, looking beyond them, trying to peer into his soul, to divine what really was going on behind his bravado. He hoped and prayed she wasn't successful.

After a moment, she turned her gaze away from him and looked downwards. She bit her lower lip, then glanced back up at him. Her next question took him by surprise. "I may not be afraid, but you obviously are. What are you afraid of, Doctor?"

He turned away from her, clenching and unclenching his hands. "Losing you," he admitted.

"Why? If I'm so fragile, such a liability, why should it bother you so much?" He felt one of her hands lightly touch his arm. Even that barest amount of contact sent a jolt of electricity through his frame. "Why are you so afraid of losing me?"

"Because-! Because…any loss of a companion is painful to me," he blundered.

She pulled her hand back, and he felt the warmth go with her. Her voice sounded sad. "No…there's more to it than that, but you're not willing to—"

He spun around so quickly, she stepped back startled. Before she could react any further, his hands reached out to cup her face, and pull it towards his lowered head. His breathing sped up as he came closer to her. "If you must know," he growled, "this is what I've been trying to avoid." Then he brought his lips down against hers.

Her reaction was to bring her hands up to his wrists and cling to them, as she kissed him back with as much fervor as he was applying to her. The Doctor pressed his lips harder to hers, and slid his hands down from her face to her shoulders. Then, with a soft growl, he pulled her body flush with his, one hand twining up into the hair at the back of her head, the other around her waist, holding her firmly in place against him. Clara sighed into his lips and seemed to melt into his frame. For a moment nothing existed outside of their ardent desire to seemingly fuse together.

He finally released her lips from his, only to capture them again and again with rapid, moist kisses. He moved from her mouth to her jawline, trailing downward towards her neck. Her head lolled backward, giving him more access. He followed the line of her neck back upwards to her lips, where he gave her one more kiss. Then, as her head tilted back down, he leaned his forehead against hers, breathing heavily. He was sure she could feel his hearts pounding away furiously in his chest.

"That…is the main reason I've been running from you, Clara Oswald. I cannot bear to lose you because I…I am—I have—become—so enamored of you. I can't live without you and yet it is too dangerous for me to live with you. I'm trying to save you from me, but it's hard, because all I want…is you," he gasped out. He kissed her temples and then kissed her lips once more, lingering on them. "No matter where I go…what I do…all I can think about is you. It's driving me madder than I already am."

"Then stay right here with me, and keep what little sanity you have left," she murmured in between his kisses. "I've missed you so much since you left me. And if this is how you truly feel…you've replaced the first day I met you as the best day of my life. Today is."

"I don't want to hurt you," he whimpered, kissing the top of her head.

"You already hurt me, by abandoning me without even a goodbye. Nothing could ever hurt me worse than that." She shifted her head to look up into his sad eyes.

"But…you might get seriously hurt, or worse yet, killed," he responded. "I…I can't bear the thought of losing you."

"And I can't bear the thought of being separated from you." She stood on tiptoe to kiss his cheek. "And it sounds like you can't bear being separated from me. So I think that trumps any danger I might face being with you. We are stronger together than apart."

"Clara…do you really care for me as much as I do for you?" He gazed directly into her eyes, willingly losing himself in their depths this time.

"My Doctor…I have been trying vainly to do the little trick of not falling in love with you since I first met you. It stopped being effective long ago," she demurred, her dimple showing to great effect. The Doctor leaned forward and captured her lips in a kiss again; dizzy with the thought that she loved him, too. After the kiss he rested his head against hers, softly touching his lips to her hair, willing the control room to stop spinning, so he could speak. When it finally righted itself, he gave a deep sigh.

"If that's so, there's only one thing I want to ask you, Clara Oswald," he breathed against her temple. "Will you marry me, so we can travel the stars together all the time?"

She lifted her luminous eyes to meet his. Her dimpled expression almost made his hearts stop as she quirked an eyebrow up, smiled and whispered, "yes."

The smile that lit up his eyes almost blinded her in its ferocity.

He was running again, not that he hadn't been running his entire life. And now he wasn't running alone…for along with him ran the best part of him…a petite, brunette feisty woman, all sass and a bit of bossiness. For he had remembered something he once told Amy Pond.

"I'm not running away from things…I'm running to them before they flare and fade forever."

He was so glad he'd decided to give in and run to Clara Oswald at last.