A/N: Hope you're all well :D I'm so so hyped for tomorrow's episode... Even if I will be unable to watch it live...
Hope you enjoy this chapter!
The Doctor huddled on the large sofa in front of the fireplace, wrapped in a bedspread.
"Here you go." Clara said, and handed her a cup of tea. She was worried how to make it. After all the Doctor became a woman now, and wouldn't like the sweet tea her daft old man used to drink. But all the same, she treated her just as she would treat 12.
"Is it good?"
"Yes, it's brilliant."
Clara sat down on the sofa, just a few centimeters away from the huddled doctor, sipping her own tea.
"I'd like to thank you... for coming to save me." The Doctor knew that Clara probably had been following her, or else she wouldn't have found out she was in danger after regeneration.
"And for grabbing me with pinpoint accuracy." The Doctor grinned.
The companion blushed.
"That's because I've been taught well." Clara said with her sweet voice the Doctor missed so much.
That room was identical to the one she had on the TARDIS or rather, her past self had. It was a small living room, bookshelves, a 3 seater cloth sofa and a stone fireplace. It was a replica of the room where Clara used to spend most of her time snuggling near the Doctor at the time when she was still his companion, sometimes ending up sleeping.
"Seems like you've missed the TARDIS." Said the Doctor
Clara sniffed. "Yeah."
"Even if she used to trouble you sometimes?" The time lady asked. Clara breathed a weak laugh. "Yeah."
After a while, the Doctor was able to ask; "Missed me?" Asked the time lady. "Loads." Replied Clara, trying to hold back a sob.
It wasn't really what she missed... It's not that she didn't miss it... But what Clara missed most of all, which made her library so identical to the former TARDIS were the memories.
How she used to love to cuddle with the Doctor after an adventure. They had so many intimate memories in that library, it would sometimes bring her to tears knowing she was the only person of the two who could remember such beauty.
Well... Not any more...
After a few moments.
Clara sighed
"So..." Her short fingernails drummed on the side of the mug. "Looks like you're the 13th."
"What gave it away?" The Doctor replied. "The clothes." Clara's voice sounded choked.
They were the previous Doctor's clothes, her daft old man's...
Who said, that time when she met him last at the diner, that he couldn't remember her.
Who said he couldn't remember for whom the sacrifice he had made and was going to make was... The 4.5 billion years spent tortured and the Hybrid.
Who said that he'd knew Clara anywhere if he had seen her.
Who said he couldn't remember what she had told him in the Cloisters.
That she loved him and cared for him.
That he had become her pulse every single day.
He gave her a reason to be... Not just the adventures... She could have tons of adventures in her life... She did have so many adventures since the white-haired scotsman pulled her out of Trap Street... But it was never the same without him...
And she told him... She told him...
That she continued living for him.
For them...
"I thought you'd be happy, I mean, to remember you again." Said the Doctor.
"I am, it's just..." Clara thought for a moment. "I thought I'd never talk to you again." The Doctor noticed that Clara had tears shielding her eyes, hazing the companion's view. It broke the Doctor's hearts seeing her so.
"Even if I've changed?"
Is it going to be like last time?
"You're still the Doctor to me, silly girl." Clara gave half a smile as she nudged the time lady with her elbow.
The Doctor smiled in relief.
The time lady opened her throw over and invited Clara for a cuddle. The latter left her empty mug on the small coffee table nearby and leaned against the Doctor's body without a second thought, inhaling the scent... How she missed it.
The clothes were still bathed in 12's fragrance...
All the memories came back to her, and brought tears to her eyes.
The Doctor, on the other hand, remembered every single time they stayed so.
Clara heard the Doctor's heartbeats... Pumping contently,
but at the same time, nervously of how Clara would interact with her... After all, she still might not have fully accepted the change... But she knew... Clara had already accepted her.
Clara's heart was still frozen, but if it could, it would have pumped its way out of her chest with the happiness she was feeling... Reunited with the Doctor after 50 years...
"Umm...Clara?"
"Yeah?"
"Would you like that we would start travelling together again, like the good old days?"
Silence...
"Don't you like travelling with me?"
Clara sat up to look the Doctor in the face. Her eyes had grown... inflated... Just like she remembered them...
"I'd love to, you have no idea how much I'd love to... I've been waiting for this moment for... For so so long... It's just that..." Clara played with her fingernails.
"I still have to go back to Gallifrey... And you know that. You saw me die... And that means that I have to go back. I don't want the Universe to fall... Not because of my egoism.
"You know I can't... You remember what you said... 'One of us has to leave'... I've already spent... years without you... Knowing you never remembered me... And now you want to put the Universe in danger again?"
The Doctor hugged Clara as the latter sobbed.
The Doctor had hugged Clara in such a way so many times... When she was terrified after an adventure... After nightmares of monsters... After the nightmares from her past echoes; those are what terrified her the most. And the Doctor would sit on her bed and hold Clara so close to his chest...
By the new wrinkled face... It was hard for him... He longed to hug her again... But he didn't know how... And besides... He was scared that Clara would try to hide her face.
After Danny died, the consoling hugs increased in frequency. He understood the feeling of feeling the other person so so close near you... But was never able to confess his feelings directly to her...
And when her time had come... The time to face the Raven... There were only 8 minutes left... No... Less... Much less... Clara was always selfless. But at that moment she hugged him, the Doctor knew he was the person that was able to comfort her. He could feel... She was so so scared... And she wanted to tell him so many things but she didn't have enough time... She needed to be comforted in from such a horrible fate... Nonetheless he wasn't able. Not then. But that hug... Was the last proper hug the Doctor gave to Clara Oswald , his Impossible Girl.
Until now.
"I'll tell you what we do..." The Doctor said with her Yorkshire accent.
Clara pulled away... And the Doctor dried the tears off the immortal's face. Her cold hands were so soft against the companion's warm skin. But if Clara were to close her eyes, she would imagine rough, calloused fingertips soothing her.
"One last adventure. One last hurrah."
Clara nodded and the newly regenerated Doctor pulled her former companion again under the throw.
A/N: I hope you enjoyed this chapter! Feedback appreciated as always and enjoy tomorrow's episode!
