The Eleventh Doctor and Clara play "Hunt the Thimble"
Clara woke with a start, the curtains shrouding her bedroom window blown aside like they were caught in a strong gust of wind. The window was shut tight, just as Clara had left it, but there was a sound that filled the air. An unmistakable, unearthly sound; ancient engines groaning and pulsing, the sheer force of which was sending anything that wasn't nailed down crashing to the ground.
The noise and chaos ground to a halt as the Tardis materialised in the doorway to Clara's bedroom with a thud and Clara couldn't help the gleeful grin that sprung across her face. She threw back the covers and slid out of bed; one step, two steps and she was at the doors. She pushed them open and stepped inside. The Tardis floor felt cold beneath her feet, reminding her she wasn't dressed for adventure. Then he rose up from behind the central console; messy hair more askew than ever due to a pair of frankly ridiculously-sized goggles strapped to his forehead, wonky bowtie and gormless smile. It was him, The Doctor.
"Clara!" He cried enthusiastically, rushing round to where she stood.
"Hello Doctor," Clara smiled "did you miss me?"
The Doctor returned her smile.
"Always. Now, Miss Oswald, where shall we go today? I could take you to the fabled Cheese Planet of Rassilon? Or we could pay a visit the Elder Ood? We could go and meet Prince... I've always wanted to meet Prince! Mind you I'd have to tell him that there's no such thing as purple rain," the Doctor frowned "scientific impossibility, I'm afraid. All of time and space and not once have I ever seen real actual purple rain. Something to do with the colours not mixing properly."
Clara smirked.
"Oh, who told you that? The rain king?"
The Doctor looked slightly offended.
"Yes." Clara raised her eyebrows. "First things first though, Doctor, I'm not exactly dressed for adventuring at the moment and you're blocking the door to my bedroom."
The Doctor looked Clara up and down.
"Yes, they are a bit pink, aren't they?"
"What?"
"Your pyjamas. You can't save the universe dressed like that, you'll clash with all the explosions."
"Going to be seeing a lot of explosions are we?"
"Most likely."
"Well then, you'd better move this big blue box of yours, chin-boy."
The Doctor spun round on the spot, pulled a lever and the Tardis jolted back to life for a single short pulse.
"There we go - I've moved it," the Doctor folded his arms and pulled a face that was unmistakably smug.
"Back in second. Don't go anywhere!" Clara turned and stepped out of the Tardis doors. It was bright and the floor felt rough and hard, not the soft carpet she'd been expecting.
"Doc-tor," she stepped back into the Tardis but there was no sign of the Doctor "you've parked the Tardis outside! Doctor?"
With an exasperated sigh, Clara stepped back outside the Tardis and walked back to her flat as quickly as she could. She returned several minuets later and stepped back into the Tardis where the Doctor was back in the control room, grinning gleefully at a small silver object clasped between two fingers.
"I'm back," Clara said, carefully watching the Doctor studying the item. "what's that?"
"What's what?"
"That! The silver thing you're holding."
"Oh, this!" The Doctor turned to face Clara with a big childish grin of excitement, "it's a thimble!"
"A thimble?"
"Yes, a thimble! I knew I had one around here somewhere! It's been missing for centuries!"
"Doctor," Clara said, affecting her best disapproving teacher-voice, "why do you have a thimble?"
The Doctor skipped down the stairs to Clara.
"I thought we could play Hunt the Thimble!" His enthusiasm was unprecedented in all the time Clara had known him.
"And what's that then?" a look of utter disappointment fell over the Doctor's face as his shoulders fell, "it's a game Clara, honestly, don't human beings know how to have fun?"
"Hey," Clara poked the Doctor, "I'll have you know I am a fun expert. I am the queen of fun. So, how do you play?"
The Doctor's smile returned in an instant.
"Well, it's simple really. One person hides the thimble and all the other people have to find the thimble, and when they do they can't say or do anything except sit and stare at the thimble and then the last person to find the thimble is the next person to hide it! How fun is that?!" the Doctor remarked without a trace of irony.
"Are you sure that's right, Doctor?"
"Of course I am. I am the best at hunt the thimble."
"So you've played it before then, Doctor?"
"Yes! …Actually, come to think of it, that might be why it's missing all the time," he beamed.
"That doesn't really inspire much confidence in your 'skills', Doctor."
"Oi, it's not my fault I out-lived everyone else who was playing," the Doctor frowned momentarily before looking back at Clara. "So do you think you've got the rules stored in your head?" The Doctor asked, jabbing a finger into the side of Clara's head.
"Ow, yes; also don't say 'stored', I'm not an android you know!"
"No…not nearly moody enough," the Doctor remarked.
Clara reached out and snatched the thimble from the Doctor's grasp.
"Right then, I'm going to hide your thimble! Close your eyes, no peeking."
Almost involuntarily the Doctor's hands shot up over his eyes, obscuring his view. He danced excitedly on the spot, like a child that had been granted an extra Christmas. "You'll never be able to hide it from me, Clara, I know this Tardis like I know the back of my hand, which in fairness doesn't mean as much to me as it does to some people, and they are both always going and changing... And, oh forget it."
"Done." Clara said suddenly.
"What?" The Doctor said a bit too loudly, forgetting it was his eyes and not his ears he was covering.
"I've hidden the thimble."
"Already?!"
"Yes, hidden. You'll never find it."
"Ha, Clara Oswald, the impossible girl, you're about to find out how impossible it is to hide a thimble from me!"
"Off you go then," Clara spoke with a note of satisfied smugness in her voice, hands placed firmly and confidently on her hips.
The Doctor rubbed his hands together excitedly.
"Right then you little beauty, where are you hiding? Come to Doctor," the Doctor began, pacing round the central console, peering underneath every now and then. His confident grin was becoming increasingly frowny with each second the thimble eluded him. When he eventually became certain it wasn't in the control room he was positively sulking. "Right, you, Clara Oswald, stay here. No running off! I will find that thimble!"
Clara couldn't help but feel accomplished,
"Told you you wouldn't find it."
"I haven't even started looking yet!" The Doctor called back as he headed down one of the Tardis' corridors and vanished from view.
x x x
It was about an hour from Clara's point of view before the Doctor returned. However the Doctor that returned wasn't quite the same Doctor that had left. Same face, but it looked so old. His hair was long, white, unkempt; his skin worn, stretched and wrinkled. He was hunched over a cane as he stumbled back into the control room.
"Doctor? Doctor what happened?" asked Clara in shock at the transformation that had taken hold of her friend.
The Doctor looked up at Clara as though only just remembering she was there. He threw his cane aside and gripped her shoulders, shaking her somewhat. "Where is it, Clara? Where is my thimble?"
"Doctor, I don't understand what's happened to you? Why do you look so old?"
"Time, Clara. Time doesn't pass in the Tardis like it does everywhere else, and the deeper you go the quicker time passes. I've been everywhere, Clara, every inch of every room, all through the Tardis and I still couldn't find my thimble," the Doctor's lip wobbled as though he were on the verge of tears.
Clara placed a soothing hand to the side of his face.
"Oh Doctor… look in your pocket."
The Doctor reached into his pocket and closed his fingers around the thimble lying within. He pulled it out slowly, holding it up to the light. A smile shone across that old face and a tear ran down his cheek.
"My thimble!" He cried
Feeling joy untold as fire and light burst forth from his body, he was changing; regenerating, leaving in his place a severe, stern looking grey-haired Doctor with the most intimidating eyebrows Clara had seen since looking in the mirror that morning. His eyes were wide in shock as they scanned first Clara and then the Tardis before finally moving back to the thimble still held aloft in triumph.
"What's this?!" he cried in a thick Scottish accent, pointing at the thimble and looking suitable outraged, "is this a thimble? Why have I got a thimble? I hate thimbles!" And with that he cast the thimble across the room in disgust before pointing at Clara advancing on her threateningly. "You! Who are you? Do I know you? Wait, yes; yes I do, you're possible girl, Clara Ostrich or whatever your name is! What do you think you're doing letting me have a thimble? Do you know how dangerous thimbles are?"
Despite the shock of what had just occurred Clara managed to muster the strength to utter a question;
"Are…are thimbles dangerous then?"
"What are you asking me for? I don't know; probably? Thimbles make me cross. I think I'm probably quite dangerous when I'm cross. Do you know why?"
"Why?"
"Because I might pull this face," he said, pulling what could only be described as a 'cross face' which Clara had to admit was pretty terrifying, "now octopus woman, if you don't mind, could you be so kind as to tell me who I am?"