Part Three: The Impossible Girl Victorious

All hell broke loose... Actually, it didn't, but I thought that would make for an exciting start to this portion of the account. For what it's worth, a few of the Council were practically tearing their hair out by this point!

'What are you-' Clara started with shock, but her bloodied and tired echo from a future now gone shushed her.

'We haven't got time... Maybe this will explain,' future her stated and went to put her fingers on her temples.

'No! Sorry! What do you think you're doing?' Clara reacted, batting her hands away.

'Ok. This is weird even by your standards...' Aylish noted.

'Please,' the timey-wimey trespasser beseeched.

Clara could see the desperation and the madness in her eyes. A desperation she'd only consciously encountered twice before. With half a mind flitting between volcanoes and cloisters, the Time Lady warily agreed.

Aylish watched, still agape, as this other Clara put her hands on 'her Clara's' temples, both leaning heads together with eyes squeezed shut in concentration.

In an instant of time, Clara saw all that might have been and pulled away with a sharp intake of breath. She then promptly turned, looked up at Aylish for a long moment and then threw her arms around her.

'Ok...' Aylish laughed, nervously. 'It's not like I'm dying or anything like that... right?'

Future Clara just stared at her with pain in her eyes.

'Oh great!' the lass remarked as the penny dropped and she stared into the middle-distance with a poignant sort of glaze.

'You will need this,' future Clara said, placing the vortex manipulator on present Clara's wrist. The Time Lady graciously accepted it with a nod. 'And I think you might find this useful too,' the outlaw traveller continued, offering the sonic screwdriver with a smile. 'This, I believe,' she then added, giving the rucksack to Aylish, 'is yours.'

'My bag!' the lass cheered as she took it and flung the straps over her shoulders.

'Make a good one,' dead-end Clara said, tilting her head by way of a goodbye, and strolled off toward the hangers.

Aylish felt a little sad watching her walk away alone, but she wasn't quite sure why. Surely she'd done her part now and could go her own way?

The lass' wonderings were cruelly answered however when the 'obsolete' Time Lady reached the junction at the far end of the corridor. Looking to her right, she seemed to flinch and lose all nerve before sprinting away to her left. An instant later a small, dragon-like creature with ruby eyes, scythe shaped tail and mouth in its stomach darted passed in pursuit and the horrifying scream that followed had Aylish clasping her hands over her mouth.

'You! She...'

Clara frowned as a passage of Gallifreyan script formed on her wrist with smoky ink. A ward against those... things...

'Listen,' the Time Lady said, soft, but stern, as she took Aylish by the shoulders. 'I know what I need to do, and I need you.' She then turned and gave the door to engineering a hard gaze. 'No matter what we see, or face, or do beyond that door... you have my word that I will get you through and you have my word that it is not the end.' The Time Lady then looked back at her companion with unaltered stare, her words as heavy as lead. 'Do you trust me, Aylish?'

'Yes,' the lass replied with every earnest ounce of truth within her, and without so much as a second's doubt. Mention of 'the end' had the hairs down her back on end, but after what Clara had done in that cold, old tower, and after the sacrifice she'd literally just watched her make, she'd gladly let her lead her through hell if it were the only way out, and she had an inkling that that is what was about to happen.

Clara nodded as she snapped her watch shut. 'Four minuets to save the universe...' She then gave a grin as the adrenaline flooded her system and she grabbed Aylish by the hand.


With no door an obstacle to them, they ran for the next junction and the next door labelled, 'Weapons Banks', 'Med Bay,' 'Engineering.'

Clara, sonic screwdriver held out in anticipation, poured over the ship schematics she'd memorised throughout years of Game Theory and Tactical Intervention classes. It may be of little surprise to you that she felt rather smug in the reassurance that all those witching-hour cramming-sessions were finally paying off, but all those 'shop sessions' were proving invaluable too.

The 'smug' was knocked out of her however as a gauntleted fist shot out from behind the corner.

As she came-to, the world was on its side and Aylish stared back with empty eyes. Her lip stung as a metallic taste filled her mouth and a steady, mechanical growl brought her attention to the shadow looming over her.

She turned, groggily, to Zars, his bloodied chainblade held high for the execution. As he brought it down, she reached for the vortex manipulator...


'Four minuets to save the universe...' Clara said with a big grin and ran with Aylish trailing along behind.

Through the first door and toward the next junction, they halted with a start as another Clara barrelled across their path with a cry. The sound of heavy impact on armour was accompanied by the clatter of falling weapons and our duo rushed to the corner just in time to see the second Time Lady shoving a Sontaran back, further and further, beyond the threshold of the door he'd just emerged from.

With a cheeky glance back at them, the girl with the busted lip then pulled the pin from a grenade on his belt and sealed the door behind her.

The whole ship rocked as the blast roared behind the heavy hatch and warning klaxons wailed to life.

Now all hell broke loose...

A foot forced it's way through the cover of a vent opposite and yet another Clara appeared. 'This way!' she frantically beckoned. 'Hurry!'

Our Clara and Aylish clambered after her just in time, for as she pulled the grill back into place, a squad of Sontarans emerged from the door they were about to use.

Bypassing it entirely and emerging a few feet further down the line, a third Clara stood by the door controls. With a hit of her fist and a wave of her screwdriver, she sealed it just as a straggling troop spotted them and called to the rest of his unit.

Helping Aylish up, our Clara ran on without question. The ship shook and quaked with further blasts on the levels above and below. Alerts of multiple hostile sightings sounded, desperate and confused over the comm system, and a glance out of any porthole would have shown more of those dragon-like creatures circling the vessel like sharks circling a dying whale.

The corridor widened into the landing of a grand stairwell and two sets of trainers squeaked on the glossy floor as the elevators opened to reveal a platoon of murderous guards.

Just as Clara was reaching for her wrist again, the ceiling of each unit caved with a sound akin to a horrific car accident and both went plummeting to a fiery grave, chased by an avalanche of heavy military equipment.

'Stairs it is then...' Clara retorted and they hurried on down into the bowls of pandemonium.

Passed the indescribable chaos of the Med Bay and all that burned within, if the site of her own bodies affected the Time Lady then she certainly didn't show it. There was certainly more madness too once they skirted the wrecks of the elevators and entered the warren of passages that kept the ship alive.

'Can't we do some damage around here?' Aylish asked over the rush of steam as one route was closed to them and a previously inaccessible one opened.

'Too many fail safes and redundancies,' Clara replied as she led her on. 'The only way to end this is with the drive system.

All the while, Darcy huddled further and further beneath her sisters' reading chair as eldritch cracks of light snaked across the Tardis' console and the great machine despaired.

After many a dodge and hair-raising close call, the two girls rested eyes on their goal with merely ninety seconds to spare. One final hurdle remained however as they approached the huge, vault like door: the lock. On each side of the armoured entry were two elevated security stations, each manned by a Sontaran sentry, and each needing to be engaged simultaneously to release the mechanism.

Both guards spotted our heroines at roughly the same time and initiated the appropriate procedure, activating a battery of previously concealed turrets and attempting to contact the bridge.

Aylish gaped at the gatling lasers as they spooled up, like a bunny caught in a truck's headlights. The sudden allure of power whispering her name, Clara again found herself reaching for her new bracelet before time's due.

There was a commotion in each box as a perfect double of the Time Lady appeared behind both guards in the blink of an eye, incapacitated them and deactivated the defenses. They then held the right hands of the twin sentinels against the biometric panels and looked down at the primary Clara to give a respectful 'ok' nod. She returned it while Aylish's head was positively spinning and, turning back to each other with a restful gaze, the wibbly-wobbly doppelgangers unlocked the door.

'This is the true sin of the Sontarans,' the Time Lady said to her companion as she strolled forward and the vault slowly unveiled itself with a near-deafening screech of metal on metal and tortured gears.

Light bled forth from the great beyond, and Aylish let go a terrible gasp as all that the Sontarans had done became apparent.

Dirty and industrial, the coral columns encircling the crystalline time rotor and cybernetic console had been bolted to ceiling and floor with girder and rivet. Nothing about this Tardis was as sleek or free form as she knew to be natural, and everything organic had been forced to match their ends.

The Sontarans had something as brilliant and wonderful as her Time Lady, but there was nothing so kind or symbiotic in the thing. The dark little heart beating at the centre of the dreadnaught–the darkest secret. A battery animal locked away from the stars it so desperately pined for.

'I felt it... her... when we came aboard...' Aylish stated as she stepped onto the decking, so very close to tears.

'I know,' Clara heavily sighed as she started fiddling with the controls. 'I know you tried to tell me and I... This is why our Tardis wouldn't land here, and this is why I couldn't deactivate the weapons.'

'What are you doing?' Aylish shrieked along with the machine as the Time Lady twisted a dial and pushed a gauge as far as it would go.

'The Sontarans have been stupid enough to blindly follow Gallifreyan schematics which means they've installed a Euthanasia Circuit,' Clara replied without any trace of hope or light in her being. 'I have to kill it, Aylish... And... It will hurt, but I have no other choice.'

'She's a afraid,' the lass whimpered as she caressed the living metal. 'So very afraid...'

'I know,' Clara replied. One switch left.

'Can't she deactivate the weapon? Move somewhere else?' Aylish suggested, pleaded–as much to the machine as the Time Lady.

Clara simply shook her head. 'This Tardis only provides security for the other major systems. Surrounding them like a living firewall. As for moving elsewhere, you're probably slaved to the commander aren't you?'

The Tardis chirped in confirmation as the impossible girl lovingly stroked the console.

'She has no choice but to follow his commands,' the once human girl explained for the mostly human girl. 'And right now that means staying put until the weapon fires.'

'There has to be another way!' Aylish replied with the fiery defiance that the Time Lady was looking for.

'There is,' Clara added as she circled the console, the quiet against the storm. 'Not a get out-clause, but a loop-hole...'

'Which is?'

'Taking the shot herself and materialising in front of the laser blast,' the Time Lady coolly explained.

'Would you?' the lass asked sharply, glaring into the wanderer's eyes.

'I have,' Clara confirmed, staring right back. She then turned to the rotor and added, 'This is the least painful way.'

Her thumb hovered by the kill switch as the last few grains of sand ran out.

'Ok,' Aylish muttered to herself as she closed her eyes–hating herself for the tears that escaped. 'Ok...' She opened them again, clear and steeled. 'If that's the way it has to be, we might as well accept it right?' the lass then reasoned as she approached the console.

The machine chirped and purred at her touch. At the end, somebody had shown her kindness.

A sad ghost of a smile touched Aylish's lips and faded just as fast. 'I know you're young,' she continued, feeling Clara's attention fixated on her and a strange association with her words. 'I know there is still so much you want to see and do, but if we don't do this, then nothing ever will have existed. We three are so small compared to all of... that! But the universe is watching us now. It is watching you! So why don't we give it a bit of a show, ay? Put on a brave face and go out swingin'?'

'That much won't be said about your ignominious end,' Commander Nix barked and Aylish span to face him as his pistol flashed.

Moments after she expected a brief-if-agonizing end, she opened one eye, gingerly. The point of light hung in her vision with a distorted sort of quality–which reminded her of old 3D films–and as she took the opportunity to step out of its seemingly unalterable path, she discovered the bolt had somehow froze in mid-air. Now it sparkled like a shard of crystal... static, and no more than few inches from where she'd stood.

where there might have been surprise, there was only grim recollection from her Time Lady, and everything beyond the threshold of the 'console room' bore the same strange look of double-vision.

'What happened?' Aylish enquired as she glided around the bolt, curiously scrutinising it.

'The Tardis has stopped time,' Clara said with an appreciative glance to the console. 'Except for us... apparently...'

'Why?' Aylish asked in a very child-like way.

'So she can make her decision, probably. She might not be able to move until the weapon fires,' the Teacher explained, then nodded to the frozen Sontaran, 'but he must have never mentioned that she couldn't 'fidget' a bit.'

'How long did we have left?'

Clara checked her 'watch'. 'Four seconds...' She then grinned–bright, and sudden, and a little manic–but the clicking of shifting coordinates wiped it away. 'I think she's made her mind up...'

The clacking of figures that would dictate when and where came to a definitive halt, and the terrible silence was punctuated by the unlocking of the dematerialisation lever.

'Why'd you do that?' Clara wondered aloud as she pointed at the switch.

'I think she wants us to make our decision too,' the empath said, a little unsure. 'We aren't getting out of this one. Are we?'

The Time Lady shook her head and noticed the Gallifrayan ward leave her wrist in a wisp of black smoke. 'If not the blast then the Reapers, and I know which I'd prefer. But... it will be as if none of this happened,' she then lied.

Without another word, Aylish reached out and gripped the leaver that would both save and condemn. 'Are you with me then?' the lass enquired, a touch of nobility to her request.

Clara placed her hand over her companion's. 'To the very end,' she said with a heart-warming smile.

Everything beyond the three of them appeared normal again as the Tardis warbled and Nix stared in confusion at his own laser bolt as it struggled turbulently against it's increasingly inverted inertia. Before he could figure out quite what was happening, something in the particles gave and the burst of energy blasted back into its sender, rendering him to a streak of dust.

The second-hand then struck the ill-marked moment, the Tardis hummed excitedly and the undulating drum-boom of the primary cannon rolled throughout the ship. Both girls pushed the lever forward, the machine wheezed as the time rotor rose, and the short-lived trip ended with an almighty roar as the beam blasted through decks and bulkheads.

Struggling to hold on as the deck quaked and girders groaned, Clara turned to Aylish and shook her hand in a 'whatever happens next, it was an honour to be your friend' sort of way.

Aylish wasn't having any of that however and fiercely embraced her, much like she could imagine a sister would. 'See you on the other side!' the lass yelled over the cacophony as the ship came apart at the seams in a rush of fire-lit vacuum and ice.