"All my violence, raining tears upon the sheet,
I'm bewildered,
For we're strangers when we meet."
Strangers When We Meet - David Bowie
The Gallifreyan High Council had been hastily assembled and were talking in muted whispers as they awaited the final guest. It had caused much consternation when it had been suggested the Guest be allowed to attend this pivotal meeting but now everything was resting upon their arrival. The air crackled with expectation. The Lord President's seat remained pointedly empty and the General shook her head as she tried to comprehend the mis-steps and errors that had led them to this moment. Her previous self had spoken to the Doctor in this very room, had quizzed him about the Hybrid as he'd joked about hats and what colour the prophecy was supposed to be. She should have known that he knew even less about the Hybrid than they did. She admitted she too had fallen victim to Rassilon's all encompassing bitterness towards the Doctor and to his surety that the Hybrid would rain destruction on them all, despite the ever-growing evidence that their former leader had completely lost the plot during the Time War, if not sooner.
Glancing around the room at the untested and nervous Council members, the General took the opportunity to escape briefly, slipping out to catch her breath on the balcony. He may have cost her a regeneration (and she idly wondered if she would ever get the opportunity to pay him back for that), but she suddenly found herself wishing the Doctor was there by her side. Looking out over the glittering spires and across to the windswept sandy wastelands beyond the dome of the Citadel, she couldn't help but think that the Doctor, if he were aware of the new prophecy, would come back and do the right thing regardless of the cost to himself. That was simply what he did, once he got the tiresome theatrics out of the way. The General rubbed the chestplate of her armour abstractedly. Theatrics, indeed.
The Time Lords were aware that something must have happened to separate the Doctor and Clara Oswald after their escape, to go some way towards righting the wrong he had committed in the extraction chamber. The Doctor must have seen the error of his ways. Time hadn't quite returned to the way it should be, but neither had it torn asunder, a sure sign a compromise had been reached that satisfied the laws of the Universe, for the time being at least. He had found an alternative. He always did. Or, the General thought with a wry smile, Miss Oswald had put him on the right path. The General had been impressed with what little she had seen of the young Human female in the extraction chamber and in the Cloisters. Fierce, passionate, clever. She could almost see why the Doctor was keen to keep her around. Why he had gone through what he had just for the chance to bring her back, however, was a mystery. The General herself had little time for sentimentality.
Twilight was falling and a dusky purple-pink haze hovered above the horizon. The sudden shade cast across the balcony made the General shiver in what she hoped wasn't a premonition regarding the outcome of the gathering. She briefly shut her eyes, imagining the Doctor as she had seen him before their causes had diverged, wind ruffling his unruly hair, pain and loss etched into his skin. There was a pang of near regret. Four and a half billion years in his own confession dial… for what? Still, it didn't do to dwell. If the new prophecy was to be interpreted correctly - and that, as ever, was a big if: prophecies... they never tell you anything useful, do they? - then the Doctor was now lost to them forever. Which made it doubly a shame that he wasn't there. He would have been able to find himself in a heartbeat. Fighting the urge to chuckle at the ridiculousness of it all, the General allowed herself to enjoy the vista across the Citadel for a moment longer. It was impossible to get tired of this view.
A noise from the Chambers attracted her attention and she wiped any hint of emotion from her face: time to work. The lift doors had swept open as the final member of their party arrived. Stepping back into the room unseen, the General noted all of the Council members had turned as one to stare at the guest with a palpable mixture of awe and fear. The Guest carefully removed their gloves, relishing the attention. The General stepped forward, since it didn't look as though anyone else had the courage to say anything. Typical.
"Welcome home. We know you must have travelled a long way…"
The Guest held up an immaculate bejewelled finger. "Oh, shush." Piercing eyes saw straight through the armour and rigid stance. "General, is that you? You sly old goat. Oh, I much prefer this regeneration. Still not a fan of hair though, I see." Two black, satin, elbow-length gloves were flung with a flourish into the middle of the table. The High Councillors stepped out of the way as the guest barged through, sashaying provocatively over to the Lord President's Chair. Precisely manicured fingers stroked the back of it, waiting for anyone to dare to object. No one did. With the finesse of careful choreography, the Guest sat in the chair and settled her delicately heeled boots on the table, crossing her legs at the ankle.
"Now, now, everybody sit," she ordered, a hint of malice in her tone. She clapped her hands together and the sharp slaps bounced across the Chamber. "Sit, like the good lapdogs you are." The General was bemused but also felt a prickle of alarm as the High Council did as they were told. There was every chance that their list of mistakes had just become a little longer.
"Good," the Mistress drawled, a smirk creeping across her face. "Now, which one of you is going to be brave enough to tell me what is so awful and terrifying that you'd beg little old me for help?"
The Doctor waited, although he didn't particularly expect Ashildr to be forthcoming with an answer to his question. Somewhere in the corner of the cafe, water continued to drip onto something metallic and hollow, beating out a staccato representation of time as it passed. Surprisingly, Ashildr didn't bluster or try to talk her way out of the conversation. She just stared him down, seeming years older than he knew her to be. He frowned.
"It's not like you to be so humble, Ashildr." He purposefully used her original name, hoping to get a rise out of her but, no, nothing. If anything, she briefly looked as though she pitied him, a kind of patronising patience radiated from her, like might be witnessed when a parent tolerates a toddler's tantrum. "I'd have thought you'd be dying to let me know how you managed to get your hands on some Time Lord technology."
"Well," Ashildr murmured, a smile playing on the corner of her lips. "That would be telling, wouldn't it? Now, I'm fairly certain these Judoon would welcome a trip back to their barracks. They've had a long day and I think everyone on the asteroid would feel better if they weren't patrolling for the next little while." The Judoon guard closest to them practically howled his agreement.
"The only reason I can think that you don't want to share your secret doesn't really make any sense to me," the Doctor continued casually, as though he hadn't heard her. "Because I'm fairly certain you don't have access to a time machine. Usually people hide things from me if they're in my future. Is that it? Is Oswald in my future?"
"The Judoon, Doctor. You've got your priorities backwards."
Ashildr tried to step back as the Doctor suddenly darted towards her, but she was too slow. He grabbed her arm, his fingers digging in painfully.
"Don't you dare presume to talk to me about priorities. Don't you dare. Tell me the truth. Who is she? What is she?" His face was thunderous, filled with rage. He felt a satisfied jolt of electricity as he noticed Ashildr's pulse pick up and her thinly veiled gulp of fear. "Is she a trick? A trap? Why do I feel so -" He broke off, his voice suddenly hoarse. He tore himself away from the girl and whirled so his back was towards her. Looking lost, he massaged his temples with the tips of his fingers before dragging his hands over his face. They pulled at the rapidly healing cuts and he welcomed the brief flinch of pain.
"I'm sorry," he muttered. Eventually, he turned to face her, contrite. "I'm sorry, Me. I shouldn't have - you're right, of course, we need to get the Judoon back where they belong. And then I'm getting the impression it might be best if we part company. Am I right?"
Ashildr nodded slowly, trying to mask her slow exhalation as some of the tension seeped out of her body. She suddenly recalled how the Doctor's threat had shaken her on Trap Street, all those years ago. It was almost a relief to know that she could still be surprised but, she resolved, this little outburst was not something that Clara Oswald ever needed to find out about.
The Doctor paused to collect himself. Even to his own ears, his voice sounded weary. When had he last rested? He couldn't remember. "We can use the transporters to send them all directly to the barracks. I don't think anybody would appreciate them walking the halls today." He turned to the Judoon who were still stood at a slightly flagging attention. He felt a flare of empathy for them - this whole mess was hardly their fault. That blame lay directly with whoever had programmed their comrade and turned him into a killer.
"Attention!" He barked, hating the tone he had to adopt but knowing it was the only thing they would understand. "Single file, report to the transporters and then back to barracks. Fall out!" The metallic stomp signified his order had been received and understood. The Doctor stepped out of the way as the Judoom marched past him and over to the transporter pads. He and Ashildr watched as they individually lined up, punched in their access codes and, one by one, began to transport away.
"You did well today, Doctor." Ashildr offered, a verbal olive branch of sorts.
His mind automatically flickered to the young boy he'd seen cradling his injured arm, the sheet-covered body he'd spotted in the South Quadrant earlier, Delores the Plebusian's righteous anger…
"Not well enough," he said, darkly. "And I'm not done yet. Come with me."
He walked to the transporter so briskly Ashildr had to jog to catch up. "Where are we going?"
"We're going to have a quick heart to heart with patient zero," he said as he keyed in the co-ordinates on the transporter. With a flash of light, they were both whisked away from the cafe, leaving behind them a glistening, damp mess of overturned tables and a floor scattered with broken glass.
Clara left Anahson speaking with the young Silurian employee of the Shadow Proclamation and started walking back to the transporter mats, her mind still reeling. Could it be true, what the Doctor's new companion had said? Was it possible that the neural block had caused more damage than they had originally thought? But why would he have even risked the neural block if he'd known what it could do? Unless, a hostile voice sneered from somewhere deep within Clara's mind, it's only making him ill because some idiot reversed the polarity.
She punched in the co-ordinates to the courtroom that Ashildr had given her when she had checked in. Closing her eyes as the transporter lights flashed, Clara instantaneously rematerialised in a lavish, wood panel-lined room. The seal of the Shadow Proclamation presided as a wall hanging above an impressive, throne-like chair. Aside from the shimmering force-fields around the defendant and witness booths, it looked exactly like a High Court she had seen on television dramas back on Earth. Strange how some decor was timeless. Whispering an entirely unnecessary 'thanks' to the transporter - she was always relieved when her constituent parts were rematerialised in their proper places - Clara spotted the Doctor and Ashildr and walked down a small flight of stairs to join them. There was a very tired looking Judoon with them, wearing a luminous prison uniform over his armour. The Judoon sat wearily on a stool, discarded magnetic shackles laying on the floor at his feet. The Doctor was examining what could be loosely described as a laptop, the sonic screwdriver sticking out of an organic-looking port, projecting star charts onto the monitor.
Ashildr sensed Clara's approach and rose from a crouch to greet her. "Hey, how's everything out there?"
"Under control," Clara said, furrowing her brow as she watched the Doctor. He was sat cross-legged on the floor, uncomfortably folded in on himself as he scrolled through the data the sonic was spewing out. "What's that?"
Ashildr made a face. "He's trying to track the original command, find out who the victim was…"
"And discover who wanted them dead." The Doctor muttered, barely looking up. "Yolo here isn't being very forthcoming."
Clara let out a little huff of laughter. "Yolo? You've got to be kidding me." She felt a flash of warmth tinged with sadness as she remembered her students at Coal Hill. Breaking into a smile, she looked up only to find the Time Lord, Viking and Judoon staring at her with confused expressions. "Yolo. You know, like 'you only live once'?"
"What are you talking about?" Ashildr asked, folding her arms across her chest.
The Doctor scrunched up his face. "That's not even accurate…"
"Okay, forget it!" Clara waved her hands at them in amused frustration. "Wrong crowd."
The sonic screwdriver let out a high-pitched squeal and the Doctor turned back to his readings. Clara raised her eyebrows at Ashildr and indicated to the corner with a slight inclination of her head. They moved a good distance away from the Doctor and huddled closely together as Ashildr caught Clara's eye in askance.
"Okay, you're not going to like this," Clara began, wringing her hands together. "We need to stay with them for a bit longer."
"What?"
Clara winced. "I was just talking to Anahson. She thinks there's something wrong with the Doctor. She says he's forgetting things…" she held up a hand to stop her companion from interrupting, "...not just me. Things that he shouldn't be forgetting. And she says it's getting worse."
Ashildr frowned, unconvinced. "He seems...fine. Clara, if this is some excuse -"
"You know me better than that. Or at least I hope you do." They stared at each other for a moment, gazes warring. "And is he? Is he fine?" Clara glanced over her shoulder towards where the Doctor was splayed, briefly resting his head in his hands as though in pain. "Look at him." In the well-lit courtroom, Clara could study him clearly for the first time without interference. She felt something constrict in her throat. He looked thinner, if that was even possible. The skin pulled tightly across the back of his hand was almost translucent, his shoulders were hunched defensively. Even Ashildr had to admit that he was carrying himself a little less confidently than usual, despite his rantings and braggadocio to the contrary.
"He used the wrong setting," Ashildr said, as she watched Clara watch the Doctor.
"What?"
"When he tried to trace the subroutine originally. He told me he used the wrong setting on the sonic. That's why the failsafe was triggered." Ashildr exhaled a long breath. A muscle under her eye twitched as she remembered the Doctor's violent desperation earlier, all vanished now as though it had never happened. He'd always been unpredictable but it wasn't like the Doctor to drop a mystery so quickly. She'd been so grateful for the cessation of his questions that she'd barely realised he hadn't brought up Clara's timelock since. Perhaps there was something to this...
Clara shook her head, feeling a hot panic start to rise from somewhere near the pit of her stomach. "See? We have to stay." Ashildr's expression darkened again and Clara relented a little. "Or not stay. But we have to do something! What if he forgets how to fly the TARDIS again? What if he crosses his own timestream? He's The Doctor. I can't think of anything more dangerous."
"I can." Ashildr said, in a low voice.
Clara couldn't stop her eyes from flickering back over the Doctor's back, reassuring herself that he was there and solid - not hurting for now, at least. "What?"
Ashildr looked at her, direct and to the point. "The Hybrid."
Dumbfounded, Clara opened her mouth to respond but the Doctor chose that moment to shout out triumphantly. "Got it!" He scrambled to his feet, looking around the room as though he hadn't noticed the two women leave his side. "What are you doing over there? Is there a refreshment table? Did I miss out on cake?"
Ashildr stepped forward, clearing her throat. "No, no cake Doctor. You found the origin of the signal?"
The Doctor eagerly scampered over. "Of course I did! Just need to fire up the TARDIS and put in the co-ordinates the sonic has managed to hone in on, do a bit of investigating…" he all but screeched to a halt in front of them. "Where's Anahson?"
Anahson balanced the small data drive in the palm of her hand and curled her fingers around it protectively. Contained within its petabytes of disk space was a relatively small file, filled with several documents that her mother had registered with the High Commissioner all those years ago. Reesha closed down the terminal they had accessed, confident she had erased all traces of their activity. The long, vaulted corridor they were in reminded Anahson of the TARDIS; it seemed to stretch further than the room should physically allow.
"Thanks so much," Anahson stuttered as she turned her swivel stool to face Reesha, whose face was half-illuminated by the blue-white glow from the vidscreen. "I can't tell you how much this -" her words were cut off as Reesha leaned in and kissed her, full on the lips. Anahson barely had time to swallow her surprise and begin to respond before the Silurian pulled away abruptly.
"What was that?" Reesha touched a scaled hand to her lips, puzzled. She'd seen a flash behind her eyes that was half visual hallucination, half sensation. Of a dozen other kisses - some featuring Anahson, some with some of her own past lovers in a starring role, right there in light-speed technicolour. Her eyes widened.
"Sorry," Anahson said, avoiding the other woman's questioning stare. "I wasn't prepared for -"
"Don't worry about it," Reesha said, hurriedly. "I shouldn't have done that."
Anahson's face fell. "Oh. Okay. I understand."
"No, I didn't mean -" Reesha leant forward, a hand reaching towards Anahson's knee.
"Anahson!" She almost jumped six feet in the air at the sound of the Doctor's voice booming her name. She spun around but there was no one behind her. Flushing as she realised her error, she tapped on her earpiece.
"Doctor?"
"I need you back at the TARDIS, we've got a lead and I need you to be Good Cop when we follow it up. And what did I tell you about wandering off on strange planets? Remember that time on Rigel Seven? I had to buy a new pair of boots."
She gave Reesha an apologetic shrug and stood up, secretly pleased for the interruption. However their conversation had been about to continue, she wasn't entirely sure she was ready for it. "Technically, this is an asteroid, not a planet."
"What do you mean, 'technically'? It is an asteroid, there's nothing 'technical' about it, but the principle still applies. Or do I need to specify the same rule with clauses for every potential celestial body we might visit?"
"So, you need me at the TARDIS?" She held out a hand to halt Reesha who looked as though she wanted to say something.
"Because I could do that, you know," the Doctor continued, ignoring her question. "I could actually list every single type: planetoid, planet, dwarf planet, moon… I could do it in alphabetical order! Better still, I could colour coordinate it for you. Print them out onto index cards and laminate them."
"Doctor, I will meet you at the TARDIS in five minutes." With that, she pulled the earpiece out of her ear and shoved it in her pocket. Turning to Reesha, her other hand still firmly grasping the data drive, she smiled kindly.
"It was nice to meet you, Reesha. And thank you. Really." She bit her lip as she felt her embarrassment from earlier dissipate. There was something about knowing she was about to jump into a time machine and fly off to hunt down a murderer that made all her insecurities seem less overwhelming. "You really are a rockstar archivist." With that - and Anahson was pretty pleased her sign off was a good mix of pleasant and sexily enigmatic - she turned to leave.
"Erm, Anahson?" Reesha called after her, rising from her seat to follow. Anahson gave a quick smile to herself before turning around. Can't bear to see me leave? She thought, with a flare of satisfaction. "You can't get out of the archive without my biometric pass." Reesha held up the pass as evidence. Anahson felt her embarrassment quickly, inevitably return.
"Oh, right. Yes. After you." She stood aside to let Reesha lead the way.
The Doctor, Anahson, Clara and Ashildr stood outside the conspicuous blue police box and said their goodbyes. The Aechon had already left for their homeworld on the first transport vessel to depart the asteroid after the lockdown had been lifted. Ashildr had arranged for herself and Clara to return to Aechon to check in on the delegation once they had picked up their own TARDIS from the Shadow Proclamation Parking Facility in the asteroid's hollowed out core. As Clara had already pointed out, they had a little bit of wiggle room in terms of when exactly they had to meet with the Aechon again, as long as they didn't forget in the interim.
Deep in the pocket of Anahson's jeans was a scribbled note in Clara's script with the Diner TARDIS' contact number and a set of emergency spacetime coordinates in case of any significant change in the Doctor's condition. Clara had insisted upon providing them as part of the compromise she and Ashildr had hastily cobbled together whilst the Doctor's attention had been distracted during his reunion with his beloved ship. As they prepared to part company, Clara hugged Anahson close to her and whispered in her ear.
"If anything happens just call me, okay? I don't care how small or insignificant you think it is. Just call. We're going to get to the bottom of this."
The Doctor emerged from inside the TARDIS, tutting impatiently as Ashildr also gave Anahson a hug goodbye. "Come on, come on! The trail's getting cold." He stood amongst them regardless, hovering.
"No it isn't, Doctor," Ashildr fondly scolded. "You've got a time machine."
"I meant to ask, Me. Do you need a lift anywhere? Not in time, mind, in space. Can't be leaving you stranded here by yourself."
Ashildr looked at Clara with bemusement. "I'm not by myself. I'm with Oswald."
"Who?"
Clara stepped into the Doctor's line of vision. Was he just being his usual rude self or was this the memory loss rearing its head again? "Me. I'm Oswald, Doctor." She looked into his eyes and saw absolutely zero recognition, just a mildly panicked expression which he quickly hid with a flourish of his hand as he stepped away to slap the side of the TARDIS like he was a used car salesman.
"Of course you are! Oswald. Oswald, Oswald, Oswald. So, do you need a lift? I don't ask everyone, you know."
Clara felt Ashildr's hand as it grasped her elbow, holding her back from the step forward she hadn't even realised she'd taken. "We've got our own transportation, thanks." Ashildr spoke for them, which was for the best as Clara didn't trust her voice at that exact moment.
"Suit yourselves. Me, it's been a... pleasure as always. Oswald." He nodded to her and Clara felt something inside her tear, painfully. She had to turn away. The Doctor didn't even pause as he waltzed into the TARDIS. "Come on Anahson," he called from inside. The Janus raised her arms in a bewildered shrug.
"What do I do?" she asked Ashildr, a tinge of despair in her voice.
"You've got our number. Just try and keep him under control while we try and find out more. Hopefully, the further away he gets from Clara -" Ashildr risked a glance over to her companion who had moved to the other side of the meeting room table to compose herself, "...the better he will be. We'll be in touch."
A Scottish growl of impatience floated out of the TARDIS. Anahson gathered her wits and, with one last look over towards Clara, stepped into the time machine and quietly closed the door. The familiar sounds of the wheezing engines filled the room, a draft of air lifting Ashildr's messily dried hair.
Clara turned around just in time to see the TARDIS vanish.
"We shouldn't have let them go."
"What was the alternative?" Ashildr argued, gesturing to the place where the TARDIS had just been stood. "Stand around making notes every single time he has a memory lapse? The Doctor's recall isn't the best in the first place," she tried to joke.
"He always remembered," Clara said, "he pretended not to, a lot of the time, but he always remembered and he always cared. That's what makes him the Doctor."
Ashildr didn't always see the Doctor the same way as her companion. To her, he often seemed childish and fool-hardy. After all, he was the one who had run destructively away to the last five minutes of the universe because he hadn't been able to cope with the loss of his friend. But Ashildr sensed this was not the best time to start that particular fight; Clara knew the Doctor the best and Ashildr would continue to trust her implicitly.
"So," Ashildr finally said. "We need to make ourselves useful. Right? That's what you are always telling me. Get information. We don't know anything: we don't know how the neural block is supposed to work, how Time Lords have used them before, whether this is temporary…"
She ushered Clara from the room and they made their way down the long corridor over to the transporter that would take them back to their own TARDIS. The nebula they had been so taken by when they arrived was barely glanced at now. They couldn't have been at the Shadow Proclamation for more than a handful of hours, but it felt like days, and long ones at that. Ashildr was gagging for a cup of tea.
"You're right," Clara admitted, sounding distracted. "We need a plan."
"Love a good plan." Ashildr reached the transporter and pulled up short as she realised that Clara had stopped a few feet away, lost in thought. "Clara?"
"We do love a good plan," Clara echoed, a smile dimpling her cheek as her eyes blazed with the formation of an idea, "but how would you feel about trying out a spectacularly bad one?"
She ran.
She ran as fast as her feet and the shuddering ground would allow her. She ran reluctantly. She ran as she had been ordered.
Crumbling walls filled the air with dust and she briefly coughed as some of it hit the back of her throat. The screeching and screaming showed no signs of abating, and the smell as the sewers oozed up through the fresh cracks in the ground would have made a lesser being gag.
Well, this was tiresome. It had been interesting for a while there but now everything was boring, boring, boring. Apart from her own potentially looming demise, of course, which always came as somewhat of a surprise unless she had specifically planned for it. She never liked to get too attached but, as she tried to turn down another corridor only to be thwarted when the floor fell away into a bubbling brown abyss, it struck her she'd become accustomed to her current form; the ignorant underestimated her whilst her more worthy enemies appreciated its elegant brutality. Plus, she thought idly as she backed away from a caterwauling Dalek, half burned through its golden outer casing, the fluid from its eyestalk dribbling to the floor, the outfits are better.
Another corner rounded and she found that her sense of direction was completely off-kilter. This looked like the very corridor she'd left them in. Evidently, they'd rudely escaped and...yes, there it was!...the opened Dalek casing had been tipped over by the seismic shifts happening beneath the planet's surface but there was no mistaking the empty husk. She closed her eyes and exhaled for a moment, slowing down time somewhere in the centre of her consciousness to try and think her way out of this predicament.
Diddily squat.
With a huff of resignation, she opened her eyes and ruefully twisted the useless bracelet around her wrist. It was a shame none of the Daleks were quite up to shooting her at the moment to give the battery an extra boost. Dying on Skaro, how embarrassing. There was only one thing for it; she was going to have to find some cowering Daleks and make them an offer they couldn't refuse…
...But maybe first there was time for a burger?
She blinked rapidly, ignoring the temptation to rub her eyes in astonishment. An American Diner on Skaro. She sniffed, picking up the scent of a malfunctioning chameleon circuit instantly. It smelled like burned toast. Had he…? She took a couple of tentative steps towards the incongruous eatery, wedged tightly across the corridor ahead of her. She hadn't even heard it arrive. Either he'd become a much better pilot, or -
The door to the diner flung open with the jingle of a cheerful bell. Clara Oswald emerged - different clothes than ten minutes ago - taking in the surroundings with what looked like a satisfied smile. In her hand, she carried a stainless steel tumbler of something cold and delicious, piled high with fresh whipped cream and a cherry stuck on the top. In her other hand, Clara held a bright yellow straw that she shoved into the drink with a flourish before thrusting it in her direction.
"Milkshake, Missy?"
The Mistress knew she hadn't managed to hide her surprise and inwardly cursed the fact that this occasionally not-so-stupid human would have noticed. Recovering quickly, she reached out and took the proffered drink, taking a loud, lip-smacking slurp. The floor shook again but Missy pretended to not notice. The milkshake was good.
"We'll give you a lift but there are conditions," Clara stated calmly, holding the door open. Missy stepped forward only to be temporarily blocked by the cocky human. "Wait. You're going to want to hear what they are. One: you are absolutely not to kill or try to kill or plot to kill anyone while you travel with us." Missy rolled her eyes, picked the cherry out of the mess of whipped cream and popped it into her mouth. "That's non-negotiable. Two: you owe me. I give you free passage from Skaro and you help me, genuinely help me with something. No tricks, no games."
The other end of the hallway collapsed into the sewer with a groan. Missy glanced over her shoulder then scowled at Clara, not wanting to admit that this looked like the lesser of two evils - not her usual modus operandi but making a deal with these Davros-whipped Daleks was hardly favourable either - plus, even she had to admit her curiosity was piqued. How had the puppy got her hands on her own TARDIS?
She was being quite sassy about it too, which was annoying. Missy was confident she would be able to turn the tables soon enough.
"Whatever you say, boss," Missy said, doffing an imaginary cap.
"Don't call me that." The Human held open the door and Missy swept inside, taking in the interior of the diner. It was all a bit much. Garish. No class. She waltzed through to the back, hearing the engines in the console room start up as Clara shut and locked the front door. She pushed her way through the horrible Elvis door and almost forgot herself for a moment. Now this was classy. She paused while she took in the sparse, white interior. Clearly, it wasn't long since this TARDIS had left the workshop. Some alterations had been made, bookcases grown into the walls, comfortable looking seating all the way around the console, mood lighting in the roundels… but there was no hiding the 'fresh from Gallifrey' smell.
"Nice, isn't it?" And this was the biggest surprise of all. Lady Me, stood behind the console looking for all the worlds like she belonged there. Missy smiled inwardly. Oh, she was going to have some fun with this. Time traveller perk. Carefully schooling her features to show no outward recognition, she turned to Clara who was monitoring her reaction closely.
"Who is this? Got a new little playmate did you? I must admit, I'm impressed. It's usually the Doctor who dumps you lot when you get too boring for him. Was it finally the other way around? He is a pathetic old fart these days. Fancy running off with a real Time Lady, did you?"
"Yes, yes," Clara said, crossing her arms over her chest. "Let's get it all out of your system."
"She's pretending not to know me too," Lady Me stated, earning a slow hand clap from Missy as she turned around to address the immortal girl.
"Oh, now you're just spoiling all my fun! We could have played a little game with her, Me, or whatever you're calling yourself nowadays. It would have been just like old times." Missy felt the sudden need to get back on some even footing here, she didn't like feeling off kilter.
"You two have met?" Clara sounded surprised and Missy felt a brief shudder of triumph.
"I'm immortal,"Ashildr replied, her hands out to placate her friend. "Running into Time Lords is an occupational hazard."
Missy strolled around the console, brushing past Ashildr purposefully as she ran her hands over the central column. She circled, predatorily. It had been a long time since she had her own honest to goodness, or whatever her version of that saying was, TARDIS. Too many years spent using cheap time travel, it just wasn't dignified. Like using Ryan Air instead of Emirates to put it in terms that these simpering fleshbags would understand. One of the lights on the console flickered, invitingly. Missy watched it, uncertain of what she had just seen, an eyebrow arching as the pattern repeated itself. Of course, the other two in the room wouldn't have the foggiest what that light meant and Missy absolutely wanted to keep it that way.
"Don't touch any of the controls, Missy," Clara warned, stepping forwards. "We're not going anywhere until you help us."
Missy looked Clara up and down quickly before fixing her with a piercing stare. "You're dead. No heartbeat. You're not breathing. Timelocked! Ooh. Well, that's not fair! That's very upsetting." She pouted, dramatically.
Clara looked bemused. "Er, thanks, I suppose?"
"Upsetting that I wasn't the one who got to kill you."
"Ugh, why did I think this would be a good idea?" Clara said to herself more than anyone else, rolling her eyes.
"Of course, if you're time-locked, it means one thing," Missy continued, moving away from Clara and brushing some imaginary lint from the seat that circled the console. She primly sat, crossing her legs at the knee. "You've been to Gallifrey. To an extraction chamber, to be precise. And, given the one glaring omission from this cosy little reunion, I would hazard to guess that our lover boy has gone and done something very dastardly indeed. Now that is interesting. And for that reason, and that reason alone, you can have my undivided attention for, oh," she pulled out an intricate fob watch, "exactly three minutes."
She snapped the fob watch closed and clasped her hands together, looking every bit the epitome of patience and poise. Clara and Ashildr shared a look and she frowned at their silent communication. Missy pointedly cleared her throat:
"Starting...now."
Anahson stumbled slightly as she ran after the Doctor, down a grassy hill, trying to catch up with his lanky frame as he raced ahead. They had found the author of the Judoon attack easily enough, but he was naturally a little reluctant to be brought to justice. A snivelling hacker with no more motive than petty revenge against the businessman who had stolen his girlfriend, he was astonishingly spritely to say he looked as though he hadn't left the comfort of his apartment for years.
The Doctor was apoplectic. She didn't think she had seen him this angry before. Not since Trap Street, at any rate. He was determined that the hacker pay for his mistake, hence their impromptu chase sequence. She gasped in a lungful of air and tried to enjoy the sensation of being the chaser rather than the chasee for once. The Doctor's anger, however, seemed to Anahson a disproportionate response to the crime: from what they had learned, Govian had written the code to hack the Judoon in a drunken stupor and hadn't even realised that he had been successful until she and the Doctor had followed the encrypted signal right to his front door. Any cover up by treating the Judoon as the perpetrator seemed to have come directly from the Shadow Proclamation itself, which Anahson found far more unsettling. Perhaps they were trying to hide the fact that their armed enforcers had been so easily infiltrated?
The Doctor had gained on Govian, leaping over the babbling stream that ran through the centre of the towering city's award-winning Earth Replica park. If it weren't for all the chasing, Anahson would have been enjoying the juxtaposition of a beautiful 20th Century park slap bang in the middle of the shimmering high rises of this planet's bustling mega-metropolis. Jumping the stream herself, she skidded in the muddy puddle at the other side, flinging an arm out to stop herself from falling.
Govian was flagging, his bulking mass shaking with the effort of his exertions. He tripped over his own feet, crashing face first into a bed of vibrant red flowers. Anahson cringed as she saw the Doctor skid to a halt, kicking up turf under his boots. They were going to have some very unhappy gardeners to contend with if they stayed around long enough. She pulled up short behind him, panting. The Doctor was already ranting to the terrified man who he scrabbled in the compost to try to get away.
"...You'll face the full extent of the law at the Shadow Proclamation," she heard him threaten, his tone deadly serious. "The death penalty. And I'll be there to watch and make sure they do it properly."
What the hell?!
"Doctor!" Anahson interrupted, sharply. "What on earth?"
He barely glanced in her direction, focusing all his fury on the hacker at his feet. "People like you make me sick. Oh, my girlfriend left me, I must kill someone. What right do you have to say who lives and dies? You think you're the only one who ever lost someone? Get up off your arse -"
The Doctor suddenly clutched his head and let out a yelp of pain, stumbling. Anahson rushed to his side and tried to catch his arm as he pitched forward. Something heavy impacted on the side of her face and before she knew what was happening, she was on the ground, reeling. Her vision flared bright white.
The Doctor had hit her. He towered over her, looking horrified. His hand still raised, frozen into a fist. Govian whimpered, filling the stunned silence.
"Anahson -" He crouched down next to her and, instinctively - she couldn't have done a thing to stop herself - she flinched away from him. His eyes widened. "I'm so sorry. I don't know what just happened. I…" He hovered near her as she unsteadily sat up, feeling hot tears streaking down her cheeks, more from the shock of it all than the pain, although her jaw stung.
"Take me back to the TARDIS," she said, amazed her voice came out level. "Now."
The Doctor nodded, flushed. He looked over to Govian, seeming unsure about what to do.
"Leave him," Anahson pleaded. "We can get the Shadow Proclamation to pick him up. But we have to sort this out, right now. You know you're not right. We have to get you some help."
The Doctor looked as though he wanted to argue but thought better of it. Anahson accepted his hand to help her to her feet, feeling something in her leg twinge as she wiped the damp and grass from her jeans. She put some distance between them as she collected herself and could tell from the Doctor's face that this hurt him. Well, tough. She had tried time and time again to bring up his memory loss and his mood swings with him back when they were less frequent but he had always changed the subject and distracted them with another adventure: no more. If the bruise she could feel beginning to blossom on her cheek could give him pause to stop, maybe, just maybe, he would finally let her in.
Govian was rolling in the dirt, trying to get to his feet. The Doctor moved as though to prevent him but Anahson cleared her throat before he could. "Go back to your apartment, Govian. There will be some representatives from the Shadow Proclamation there to visit you soon."
"But I didn't mean to!" The man was crying and, despite her still-racing heart and her aching face, Anahson felt a flash of empathy for him. She could tell he was genuinely shocked without even having to use her abilities.
"I know," she said. "But people died, Govian. Accident or not, you're responsible and you're going to have to face up to that." The hacker sniffed loudly as the Doctor bristled beside her, barely restraining himself. "Go home," she ordered. "Now. If you're not there when the officers call, you know they'll send the Judoon after you and, trust me, that's the last thing you want after what you've done to them."
Govian backed away from them and back up the hill, practically bowing to Anahson as he did so, all the while studiously avoiding the Doctor's glare. Anahson waited until the culprit was a reasonable distance away and turned to the quiet Time Lord, trying to muster up courage and maturity she hadn't thought she would need to possess at such a young age.
"How bad is your headache on a scale of one to ten?" She asked, remembering vaguely that this was something they did on Holby City. Seemed as good a place as any to start.
"One to ten what?" The Doctor asked, raising an eyebrow.
"Don't do that, Doctor," Anahson replied, looking him straight in the eye. "Not anymore. This has gone on long enough, don't you think?"
"Ten." He offered. "Ten, to the power of ten."
Anahson nodded, indicating that they should walk back along the central path of the park themselves, back to where they had parked the TARDIS, close to an elaborate water feature. She wondered how bad the pain had to be in human terms for a Time Lord to rate it so highly. Her next question was preempted by a hesitant pause: "Can you remember? Why we were chasing Govian?"
The Doctor looked down at her, confused, as he walked carefully in line with her. "Of course. He killed the man who stole his girlfriend."
"How?"
"What?"
"How did he do that?"
"...Oh." The Doctor stopped walking.
"You don't know, do you?" Anahson tentatively held out a hand to touch him on the arm and bring his attention back to her. He looked so bewildered.
"Anahson… I think I should take you home." The Doctor was deadly serious, his voice low and accent thick. "I don't think I'm safe for you to be with, right now."
She tugged on his sleeve and pulled him along the path, relieved as she saw the fountains come into sight. "Nonsense," she said, doing her best to put on a bright expression. "It just so happens, you've got some very good friends who are doing everything they can to help you. We just need to give them time." Anahson swallowed down her worry as the Doctor followed mutely behind, so unlike his usual self. Mentally, she crossed her fingers and hoped that Clara and Ashildr would be in touch soon; she wasn't sure how much longer she could stay positive.
Clara found that she had to sit down once she'd finished telling Missy the story of her own, sordid, recent history. She'd left out key points, of course. Missy didn't need to know how long the Doctor had been trapped in his confession dial for the sole purpose of rescuing Clara and the Time Lady certainly didn't need to know anything about what Clara had told the Doctor in the Cloisters. That was between them and, one day, she ardently hoped, he would remember it all. A perfunctory glance to Ashildr told her that she'd covered the basics well enough and, she was pleased to note, had managed it within the time limit. Now all that was left was to see whether Missy would stay true to her word or, and Clara admitted this was the stronger possibility, laugh with glee and do a tap dance around the console room.
"Can we go somewhere nice?" Missy asked, startling them both.
Clara groaned, inwardly. Option B it was. "What?"
"Pardon," Missy corrected. "Manners cost nothing, Miss Oswald."
"Manners like the time you trapped me inside a Dalek, you mean? Or pushed me off a twenty foot drop?" Clara snapped. She was sick and tired of this feeling of being useless. Something was wrong with the Doctor. Something that was very probably her fault and, though she had largely come to terms with the fact that they couldn't be together, she certainly would not tolerate him being in danger or pain out there in the universe without her doing every damn thing in her power to help him, whether he ever knew it or not.
"Ooh, the puppy's got teeth!" The Mistress crowed, delighted. "And here I thought you were wanting my help."
"Not if you're going to turn it against him," Clara responded, her voice raising in volume. "I'll kill you first."
"Clara," Ashildr's warning tone bounced across the walls of the console room but Clara couldn't heed it.
"Look, Missy -"
"Can we go somewhere nice?" Missy repeated, interrupting. Clara threw up her hands and turned her back on the other woman, trying to quash her anger before she did something she might not live to regret. "Can we go somewhere nice," Missy said again, before adding: "to watch the chaos unfold?"
Clara slowly turned to stare at Missy, brown eyes clashing with icy blue. Ashildr stepped towards where Missy was sat. "Chaos?"
"Oh yes, my little Viking friend. Chaos." Missy grinned, loving the attention. "What do you think happens when a Time Lord loses all sense of himself? Especially a do-gooding Time Lord who's spent thousands of years hopping around saving planets and being all..ethical." She spat the last word like it tasted bitter.
"I don't understand," Clara said. "The neural block was supposed to make him forget me, why would any of this happen?"
"Of course you don't understand," Missy scoffed. "What do you really know about your lover boy? You treat him like he's human. Like he's wired the same way as you. Like he's some hobby you can pick up and put down whenever you feel like it." Clara flinched but tried to not let it show. Missy continued, "Time Lord memory isn't the same as human memory. It's interwoven into our timestreams, into our actions in the past, present and future…"
"Hang on," Clara interrupted. "It's interwoven with his timestream?"
Missy folded her arms across her chest and turned to Ashildr with an affronted look at being cut off. Clara barely noticed as she stood and slowly began to pace up and down, speeding up as her mind tried to grasp at a fleeting notion, as though it was dangled in front of her from a just out of reach piece of string.
"Clara?" Ashildr wasn't following but could tell that Missy had finished making her point by the way she sat back and watched Clara; sizing up her skin, potentially, to make a lamp out of later.
"I'm in the Doctor's timestream. All over it. I jumped into it to save him." Clara's eyes were wide as they met Ashildr's. "So if the neural block is removing me from his memory…"
"It's removing you from every regeneration," Ashildr finished, still looking puzzled. "But why would that be chaotic?"
"Actually, yeah," Clara said, scrunching closed one eye and turning back to Missy. "Just because he can't remember my echoes saving him doesn't mean that they didn't do it, right? He never really knew about all of them before anyway."
Missy sighed and took great pleasure in dramatically rolling her eyes back into her head. "Of course not! What on earth was he doing hanging about with you this whole time? He clearly wasn't with you for your brains," Missy finally stood and stretched, languorously. She yawned. "I'm bored now. It was a nice try, but you've both succeeded in boring me almost to death. I'm surprised I haven't started to regenerate."
"Missy…" Clara warned, taking a step forward.
"What happens when a neural block has to block memories from the entirety of a two thousand year timestream?" Missy snarled, getting close enough that Clara that she could feel flecks of contempt land on her face. "Memories aren't static and neither's a neural block. It's a living, breathing process. So: smorgasbord of memories. It gets greedy, that's what happens. It adapts! It shifts and changes until it can't distinguish one memory from the other and then, poof!" She held up her hands in an imitation of a magician making something disappear, a gesture which briefly reminded Clara of the Doctor himself. "Gone is the Doctor you thought you knew. Hello to the Time Lord who only knows that he has the whole of time and space at his disposal and no finicky conscience or memory of his precious companions to hold him back."
Missy pulled a lever on the console before Clara or Ashildr could even begin to stop her. The TARDIS began to whirr and moan as it left the relative safety of the time vortex and headed to whatever destination the Mistress had in mind.
"Whatever you're doing, stop it!" Clara cried, desperately trying to reverse the coordinates that had been set, but it was too late.
"Help me, Missy! Stop it, Missy! Make up your mind, this is exhausting." Missy fanned herself as though she was about to swoon. "Do you want my help or not?" The TARDIS had landed, but the screens were blank and held no clues as to their destination.
"You'll help? This is you helping?" Clara tried to decipher exactly what the hell Missy was playing at. She had known it would be a risk to get the Time Lady on board. Now, however, she was starting to think she had underestimated the situation massively.
"Yes, I'll help," the Mistress said in a sing-song voice. "There's only room for one naughty Time Lord in the universe, after all." She winked at Ashildr and, covering her mouth from Clara's view with her hand loudly whispered, "that's me." She made towards the door to the diner but Clara blocked her exit.
"Why would you help?" she asked, "You. This is exactly what you want. You, and the Doctor at your side, causing havoc. This is why you put the two of us together in the first place, to turn us into the Hybrid. Tell me I'm wrong."
"Oh, get over yourself." Missy scoffed. "You wouldn't be enough to turn him into the Hybrid, you silly little thing. Don't believe every single prophecy you get told about third hand."
"Everything you've told us is a lie, isn't it?" Ashildr accused, standing closely next to Clara. "Clara, we can't trust a word she says, she's just playing us like she always does." It occurred to Clara at that moment that Ashildr seemed more familiar with Missy than she had any right to be. She made a mental note to ask about it later.
She looked to Missy, thinking fast. "She's definitely lying. But, if I've learned anything in the last few years - and we'd better bloody hope that I have - she'll have buried the lie between a truth or two. Won't you?" Clara regarded the Mistress carefully. Did she detect a brief glimmer of admiration? "Like the story about the Doctor, the stolen moon and the President's daughter. Am I right?"
Missy smiled, wickedly. "Let's find out!" She pushed past Clara and Ashildr to skip into the diner, awash with frenetic energy. The Mistress flung the doors open and stepped out into the bright sunshine of the planet beyond.
And Clara and Ashildr had no choice but to follow.
