11/Clara, Mentions of 12/Clara
M
Sequel to "Dinner at the End of the Universe"
A/N: This fic is dedicated to everyone who never stopped hoping for a happy ending between Clara and her Doctor- my Christmas gift to all of you who kept on believing in a truly epic love story.
"You're going too fast!"
"You're going too slow!" the Doctor counters merrily, skating backwards along the frozen lake as he pulls Clara forward, holding her up. The village children are laughing and weaving around them, in the careless joy and haste of all children. Clara's eyes are glued to her wobbling feet, but he flashes her a grin, anyway. "A million lives and you never learned to skate?"
Her gaze snaps up as she scowls at him. "Somehow the act of saving you never required learning the double axel." She gives out a yelp as her feet slide far apart, nearly toppling her.
"Nice form, Clara!" giggles one the little girls sipping cocoa on the side of the lake, and Clara sticks her tongue out at the girl as they wobble by, nearly losing her balance again. She glances up and sighs, shrugging, and the Doctor laughs because he knows Clara understands everyone's impulse to smile and joke tonight. They've just defeated an invasion of the Slitheen, the third attack in the month since he and Clara arrived on Trenzalore, and the whole town is celebrating. This time, no one from the town was even injured, let alone killed. He hopes that, one by one, those species circling above like sharks in the water are getting the message, and remembering that there's a very dangerous captain in charge of this particular lifeboat.
Right now, however, he feels anything but dangerous. He nearly wants to leap in the air with joy at knowing that, not only is the town safe, he's kept Clara safe, as well. Not a hair on her beautiful head has been singed, and as he looks down at her, and she smiles helplessly up at him, her feet shaking back and forth, he wants to laugh out loud at his own good fortune.
The Doctor grins and then pulls her close, unable to keep himself from pressing against her for a moment longer. He swivels around and wraps one arm around her waist, holding her up and skating with ease.
Clara sighs with relief, and smiles up at him, and he thinks his hearts will burst out of his chest, because this is officially one new moment among thousands that he is infinitely grateful that this human woman is at his side. His index finger reaches up and touches the end of her pink nose, which matches the rosy cheeks that the cold wind has wrought on her skin. Her dark eyes look bottomless in the moonlight, he thinks, as inviting as the inky space of the universe that has been his mistress for so many centuries.
Space never had the warmth of Clara Oswald.
He squeezes her gloved hand in his, feeling her human heat, as she smiles at him. Her breath comes out in white puffs, and he represses an almost uncontrollable urge to kiss them in the air, because they are each a symbol that Clara is alive and warm, and next to him.
For a traveler who has been quick-sanded on a war-torn planet that is destined to be his grave-sight, he knows it is a bit obscene how happy he is, purely because he is with her.
"Couldn't we do a victory sled next time?" she asks, as he slides along the ice, still keeping her from falling.
"Righty-ho," he says, nodding. "Would you like to try the forest containing the Sontarans that will throw acid on us or the one with the Weeping Angels who will grab the sled from under the snow?"
Clara's mouth quirks, then her head nods perfunctorily. "Victory skate for the win."
The Doctor smiles."Clever clogs." He holds her tighter and presses a kiss to her temple. "Anyway, you don't need to worry," he whispers. "I've got you."
Clara lifts an eyebrow. "Who said I was worried?" she asks, and he loves that, too, how brave she always tries to be, even when he can see straight through her. "And for your information, I've got you," she tells him firmly.
The Doctor sighs and smiles, because what she meant was that she was there to protect him as much as he protected her. But he knows it's true in an entirely different way, as well. Clara Oswald has him by the hearts and soul, even if she doesn't know it yet.
It's something he should probably let her know at some point, he reasons. But right now, he's just too happy to be with her to care.
He skates onward with her, his experienced legs and her wobbly ones, knowing that the sight of them both is probably giving great entertainment to the villagers of Christmas.
Clara smiles, glancing over at the Doctor.
It's hasn't been that long since she'd come to Trenzalore for the last time, when she'd left her life with one Doctor and begun the rest of it with another, with the one who had first run off with her heart. But somehow, this life is the one that already feels normal, despite being nothing like her past, where she'd been divided between a big, blue planet and a small, blue box.
Her reality now is divided only between the two hearts that beat in the alien man she loves.
She watches him, standing at his desk, rifling through a box of spare parts. He tosses them, one after the other, over his shoulder, ignoring the clatter they make, until he finds the right one. And then his face lights up, like a child who's just gotten a favourite present, and his mouth curves into a smile that says how pleased he is with his own ingenuity.
"Ha! You see?" he says triumphantly, tossing his head to shake the hair from his eyes and looking back at her. "I knew we had it somewhere!"
Clara smiles back. It's the little things he does now, she notices, that tell her something has changed. Because the Doctor, for all his companions and long life, has been a solitary creature for as long as she's known him. And considering she has memories of him on Gallifrey, her knowledge stretches back quite a long way. But in all their time together, when the Doctor had ever spoken of his plans, they had always been his plans, his enemies to defeat, his glory when he won. But the moment she'd arrived on Trenzalore, that had changed.
Now, he says "we", as effortlessly as breathing, as if she's become more than his companion, the woman who happens to be stuck on this snow-drifted planet with him. He speaks as though he doesn't exist as a single being anymore, but as part of a whole, part of her.
And every time he does it, something in her heals. That hard, warrior part of her that developed when she was with his older self melts just a bit, and she feels her old self coming alive again, that girl he met who laughed and trusted so easily.
Every time he says "we", so naturally it sounds as if he doesn't even realize it, it's Clara who regenerates.
Clara still thinks of the older Doctor, with his blue eyes and silver hair, who had changed her from a girl who traveled with a madman in a box into a woman who could outwit, out-talk, and charge fearlessly against any alien in the universe. She can't ever speak of that future, and she knows that, too, was one of the skills he taught her.
He'd prepared her so well for her life on Trenzalore, where she now lives in front of a truth field and so must constantly, deftly weave around the truth like the TARDIS weaving through time and space. He'd said so often that he never wanted to change her, but, now that she thinks like him, she knows it was necessary.
Most of all, she wonders if he's alright without her, now that she also knows what she means to him.
She walks over to where he's already begun to use the sonic to solder bits of metal, causing steam to hiss. "Are you building another flying Santa sled for the children?" she asks, and he turns, still smiling.
"No, this isn't for them, it's for…" he stops and his face falls. "Oi! You're not supposed to be seeing this! Get out!" He makes shoo-ing motions with his knobbly hands, and Clara laughs.
"What do you mean 'get out'? I live here."
He frowns, still pushing her away. "Well, you can't right now, I'm working on something special."
She grins. "For me?"
The Doctor is still frowning, but says, "No, for us." Another bit of ice in her heart melts away, as he pushes at her. "So get out before I have Handles vaporize you on the spot for spying." He points to his cyberman head, which makes a feeble noise, trying to sound threatening.
Clara sighs, still smiling. "Ooh, right. Wouldn't want to have Handles stare at me to death." She picks up her basket and coat, heading for the door. She'd promised to meet Mrs. Harper for tea later, anyway. "Need anything?" she asks, hand on the door knob.
"Yes, for you to leave," he says, going back to his desk. His head shoots up just as she opens the door. "Clara!" he calls suddenly.
"Yes?"
His face changes then, his eyes worried. "Don't ever leave."
She smiles and drops the basket, running to him. His arms fly open and she's wrapped in them in seconds, his lips finding hers. She can't tell him that one day, far off in his future, she will have to leave, because it will be he who sends her back. She knows that if he knew that day was coming, he might not be able to bear the weight of it. But she can say the one thing that's so true she knows it in her bones.
"Clever boy," she says, affectionately tapping his nose, "You're stuck with me for the rest of my life."
"Souffle-girl," he tells her, relief in his voice, "I was hoping you'd say that."
It takes another hour for her to leave to meet Mrs. Harper. And when she does, she hastily covers her head with her scarf, hoping she won't have to take it off. She has a most spectacular case of bed-hair.
to be continued...
