The first time Clara slips away, she finds herself packing a suitcase. Only the clothes aren't hers - not exactly. She recognizes them, but she also has never seen them before. Silver pants, a black blouse, a red dress. The suitcase closes.
"Clara? Have you been listening?"
She blinks and looks up at the Doctor. He stands near the TARDIS console, his hand on a switch.
"Um, sorry. What were you saying?" Clara asks.
"Are you alright?"
"Yeah." She smiles. "I'm fine. Just drifted away for a bit."
"Well, as I was saying," he continues cheerfully, "you wanted a beach. I'm taking you to the best one in the universe."
"With white sand?" She follows him as he walks around the console.
"Purple, actually," he corrects, pulling a lever.
"Sounds nice."
Clara relives past lives in her dreams. She had been a nanny (no, a governess), a mechanic, a hacker.
She had died many, many times. She remembers bleeding out from a gunshot wound, shivering from hypothermia, exploding into pieces.
When she wakes, the memories fade away. But each time they hang over her a little longer - like a fog. Each day, clearing her mind becomes more and more difficult. Eventually, she gives up. The fog is a part of her now.
After a run-in with the natives on a jungle planet, Clara and the Doctor are thrown into a cell. The door clangs shut behind them.
"Okay. You were right," the Doctor says. "Blunt doesn't always work."
Clara nods, barely registering the words.
She finds her wrists chained to the ground, raw and red. Her fingers cramp as she pushes a small sliver of metal into the lock, listening to the tumblers.
Footsteps sound against the stone. She freezes, holding her breath. Her muscles burn from their tight grip on the metal. If she is caught, she will be whipped - hard lashes across her back. Her wounds still haven't healed from the previous encounter.
"Clara?" The Doctor waves a hand in front of her face.
"Sorry," she gasps, blinking.
"Are you okay?" he asks, concern etched on his face.
She nods. "Yeah. Fine."
The Doctor sits next to her, looking unconvinced.
"So you can't sonic the lock?" she asks.
He pulls out his sonic screwdriver, aiming it at the door. It buzzes and the Doctor shakes his head.
"It's deadlocked," he replies. "Sonic won't work."
She pulls a bobby pin from her hair, standing. "I can get us out of here."
"You can pick locks?" The Doctor moves to stand beside her.
"Well," Clara says, beginning to work on the lock. "I was a thief once."
The door swings open a few moments later.
"Handy."
Clara sprints down a 1940s New York street beside the Doctor.
"So what's going on?"
"Alien fugitive wants to destroy a fountain in Central Park," the Doctor answers.
"Why?"
"He's trying to get an ancient weapon. Once he has it, he'll obliterate New York. And then, after that, the world. Probably."
"Okay. So how do we stop him?"
At that moment, Clara runs into a solid body. She stumbles, almost falling onto the pavement.
"Whoa there, doll. Take it easy."
Clara looks up. "James?"
While the Doctor was off hunting down a strange signal, she had convinced a drafted soldier to take her dancing. After less than ten minutes, the Doctor had burst in and dragged Clara away to hunt down an alien from another galaxy.
James smiles, adjusting his uniform as Clara regains her balance. "Fancy seeing you again. Thought I lost you after you walked out with…him." He nods toward the Doctor.
"Yeah. Sorry. I can't really talk. There's this thing happening and-"
"Interesting," the Doctor remarks, waving the sonic screwdriver around James's head.
"What?"
"Seems like we've found him."
"Doctor?"
"Did I mention the alien we're looking for is a shape-shifter?"
She raises an eyebrow. "You mean, him?"
James smirks, but not playfully as he had earlier in the evening. It was a menacing glare. Clara shivered. That expression did not belong on his face.
"Looks like the fugitive decided to copy your date," the Doctor continues. "But why?"
"I need her," not-James replies.
"I'm sorry?" Clara asks, stepping backward. The Doctor shifts to stand in front of her.
"I need memories to unlock the safe. Mine are limited. Hers are not."
"You want memories? Fine. Take mine," the Doctor counters. "I'm over a thousand years old. I've got the jackpot."
Not-James smirks again. "You are mistaken, Doctor. She is far older than you."
The Doctor glances back at Clara, a solemn understanding passing over his face.
A cold hand grasps her wrist, grinding her bones together. The world falls out from beneath her.
She stands in a library, the size of a planet. Shadows are fatal.
She stands on a cloud, then she is falling from the sky.
She stands in the desert, the sun beating down on her back. Mouth dry, stomach hollow.
She lies on the grass, blood seeping past her fingers from the deep wound in her stomach.
Clara remembers crash-landing on a foreign, frozen planet. She climbs down a small ladder, using a flashlight to see in the dark tunnel.
Monsters take her. They tear her apart, trap her body in a metal shell.
Her brain forced inside a cage.
"I am human!" she cries, gasping for air.
"Shh. It's okay, Clara," a voice soothes. A hand runs through her hair. "He's gone now. Come back to me."
Her eyes flutter open, blinking under the light.
"We're in the TARDIS," she murmurs.
"We are," The Doctor smiles, but it does not touch his eyes. "The alien latched onto you with a psychic link. He was siphoning your memories, forcing you to relive them. I had to bring you back here to break it."
"Where is he?"
"I don't know. Doesn't matter. Without you, he can't access the weapon."
She nods, closing her eyes. "I'd like to go to my room now."
"Clara," he says softly. Something about his tone makes her open her eyes again. "How much do you remember?"
She knows he means her other lives - the echoes - but she doesn't want to talk about them. It hurts too much. She swallows, avoiding his gaze.
"How long?" he presses.
This was easier to answer. "Since you pulled me out of your time stream," she replies. "It started with dreams, then...the flashbacks."
"You remember everything, Clara. Across your billions of lives. It's a miracle you're still in one piece."
She blinks back tears. It had been so difficult, keeping the pieces in order. Moments of clarity had become rarer and rarer. She'd blink and see another life before her. Blink again, and it would be gone. Everything seemed so solid, so lifelike. She wasn't sure where the present was anymore. Or what was properly real.
But she kept it all buried. She had to help the Doctor. That is her purpose. Nothing else matters.
"You can't kept living like this," the Doctor says.
"How else am I supposed to be living?" she snaps, frustrated. There is no escape. She just wants to rest.
"You can't hold a billion lifetimes in your head. You were never meant for that. No one is," he pauses, looking away briefly. "You have to forget."
"I can't." How could she? She had lived through so much. Someone had to remember all of those people. Someone had to take on the burden.
"I can take the memories. All of them. Lock them away so they won't ever bother you again."
"No," She shakes her head. "I have to remember."
"Why?" he sounds lost.
"Because I have to help you!" she sobs. "I have to save you. I can't do that without them. I need to remember."
"Clara, my Clara," he pulls her into his chest, kissing her forehead. "You already saved me. So, so many times. You do not have to sacrifice yourself for me anymore."
She cries into the Doctor's chest, using him as an anchor. She hopes it's enough to keep her from being washed away.
Awhile later, Clara raises her head.
"Please," The Doctor begs. "Let me save you."
"We're even after this. You don't owe me anything."
He nods and presses their foreheads together.