11.

The Doctor was scanning nearby systems trying to find Missy and the child. They couldn't have hopped far through the space time continuum, just enough to confuse him and muddle the co-ordinates. He reactivated the Cloister bells and the TARDIS interfaces, both spoken and psychic. His ship projected an image of Missy.

'Oops I've run away,' it said.

'Now isn't the time for joking,' the Doctor growled at the hologram, 'She's run away with my daughter.'

'Just getting into her mindset,' the TARDIS flickered and changed into Ohila, 'You were wrong to trust her but that is now by the by. Where do you think she would go?' it asked. 'What would attract her? What has she been toying with of late?'

The Doctor looked up from the console where he was trying to decipher the confused co-ordinates.

'Why would she go back there? The Sisterhood will stop her from doing anything.'

'Only if they see her, only if they are aware of her presence. They could well be distracted by other things.'

'I don't understand,' the Doctor grabbed a screen and searched the results of the scans for information. 'I don't understand in the first place why she would take the baby she saved in the first place and then…. Oh.. wait…the baby she saved,' he waved his hands, 'She used her last regenerations.'

'She is vulnerable,' the TARDIS said, 'She is weakened and increasingly in a lot of pain. She may have gone too far, given too much of herself and now she has no choice but to seek the Sacred Flame.'

Realisation dawned in his wide blue eyes, 'She's gone to top up,' the Doctor said, 'She's gone to replace her energy. A new set of regeneration, just like me. Well… the Sisterhood would never allow that…'

There was a hum and the TARDIS took control of the screen he was viewing and he found himself looking at Karn. He recognised the tent Clara had been in and some of the grates and fires outside on the rocky landscape. The storm had died down. He hunted for sign of the Sisterhood. Their dwelling looked like it had been vacated in a hurry.

'There is a problem,' the TARDIS said.

The Doctor typed in the co-ordinates to Karn as he listened, 'There usually is. What kind of problem?'

'Missy created the forcefield to block telepaths from hearing the child, to protect it.'

'Yes, that was my understanding…'

'That forcefield is no longer…' with that the TARDIS zoomed out on its view of Karn and it was clear that a number of ships from various species were circling the planet. Amongst them the Doctor could count telepaths of all ilks. Touch telepaths, distance telepaths, familial telepaths, the list went on. Some would be mercenaries for unrepresented species, others would be motivated to do the job themselves.

All of them had heard the magnified sound of the Doctor's child through their telepathic scanners. Rumours of Clara's pregnancy had been spreading in the universe even before she went to Karn the first time. Enemies of the Doctor had seen her swollen belly and realised quickly the value of her offspring. She fled but it had been too late. Since then they had been following, tracking in the hope of capturing the baby. Karn had offered a well protected refuge but now it seemed the Sisterhood were scattered, perhaps by Missy herself.

'Our child is down there with her,' the Doctor said, anxiety rising in his voice, 'Why has she taken her?'

'Protection,' Clara's voice came from behind him, 'She's taken her for protection. As a bargaining chip. She's her most valuable asset in all of this, as long as she has her in her arms no-one can touch her while she drinks from the flame. I don't believe this, she had us so fooled… and for so long. I must have been so gullible to let her in.'

'Clara! You shouldn't even be up!' he exclaimed, rushing to where she was leaning at the entrance to the console room. Her skin looked grey and there were dark circles under her eyes from the exhaustion and trauma of the last few days. He quickly reached to hold her upright as she swayed unsteadily on bare feet.

'You didn't honestly expect me to stay in my room did you?' she asked. 'Our baby is missing, presumably taken by an Insane Time Lady. I'm not going to rest.'

'You're still very weak.'

'I'm stronger than I look…' she assured him. 'especially where my child is concerned. Managed the birth, didn't I? In the end?' Her words stung a little but he couldn't tell if she meant them to. The birth she'd managed alone did vouch for her strength, but it also vouched for his weakness. With his help she moved carefully to one of the jump seats and sat down. She could barely disguise the wince and frown that it elicited. 'Karn, lets go…' she said.

'Clara… you're not coming with me,' the Doctor said beginning the dematerialisation sequence. 'You are far too fragile. When we land, I will go, alone, and retrieve our baby.'

She shook her head, 'You saw all those ships, and Missy, if she drinks enough of that stuff… its dangerous, really dangerous. You can't face all that alone.'

The Doctor turned his back to her and yanked the lever to dematerialise. The engines roared and the rotor spun. He braced himself against the console.

'I can and I will,' he said. 'You will stay here, no arguments.'

'But…'

'Clara!' he snapped, 'You were moments from death and you are still weak. I know that one day I will lose you but I'm hoping I can stretch that until you are ninety not twenty nine.'

'Four hundred and ninety,' she corrected softly with a little smile. 'Remember I've been away for a while… and that's why you should let me help. I know what I'm doing, I've been in some alien type jams on my own.'

'No… Clara,' he was suddenly overcome, 'Please don't make me lose you any earlier than I already envision. If you want me to accept that you are human, that you are living and breathing, then at least let me care for you properly, let me keep you safe. If all I have is sixty years… do that for me at least.' He turned away from her and tried to bring himself under control again, his eyes burned. He heard Clara slip off the chair and carefully make her way to where he stood. She wrapped her arms around him from behind.

'I'm sorry,' she said, 'This is a mess. I don't quite know how it got this bad.' He patted her hand and then brought it to his lips to kiss, the whole time watching the screen which showed the surface of Karn. At last he let go of her hand and turned to her.

'Please be careful,' Clara asked of him. He looked down at his hands, withdrew the screwdriver from a pocket.

'I will,' he said, 'You stay put, promise me.'

Clara nodded and he carefully examined her face for mistruths, but Clara could always fool him when she needed to, when it was most critical. He bent and kissed her mouth once, and made his way to the door, snapping his fingers for it to open.

The darkness of Karn lay before him and with it uncanny silence. The world usually hummed with wind, or the rhythm of rainfall. On a clear night he could often hear the Sisters around their fire playing ancient instruments and millennia old songs. Tonight there was nothing, except, he realised when he turned his face to the sky, the dim lights of cloaked warships and the softest pulse of their engines. Oh this was bad. The Sisterhood, Missy and his baby, somewhere in the dark and a dozen enemies waiting to find them.

He'd best make a start. The Doctor glanced back into the TARDIS interior, caught Clara's eye by the console and then snapped his fingers. The doors shut and the darkness grew thicker. He lit his way with the sonic screwdriver and opened his mind hoping to pick up the sound of his daughter. Every other creature in the skies above seemed to be able to hear. He as a touch telepath was at a disadvantage but she was blood and that meant there was a link anyway. If only he could find it. He climbed on and on in silence waiting for flames to come into view.

After what felt like endless time walking they finally did. He hunkered down behind a rock and looked over a make shift campsite below. Fire stilled burn in the cooking grate and in torches around the centre clearing. The style of the camp was definitely that of the Sisterhood but he couldn't spot any members. Considering himself safe he made his way down, checking in tents and doorways.

He was peering inside the largest tent of the camp when the voice came from behind him.

'You're too late,' she said and turning he found Ohila, always Ohila, oldest and wisest, blessed with Time Lord blood, she always survived. 'My Sisterhood have fled, I told them too.'

The Doctor looked horrified, 'Why? The Flame, it's your duty…'

She laughed painfully, 'Our duty to protect the Flame? Yes, it is Doctor and we have for century after century. But never have we faced such a barrage of enemies at once and never has one reached the Flame and drunk from it before now.'

'What?' his hearts sank.

'Your old friend, Missy, is not long come to this planet. She was determined to have her fill.'

'And you didn't stop her?'

'No…' Ohila drew out the word, 'Of course not. Not when she carried a babe in arms.'

'No!'

'We could have killed her, perhaps we ought to have, but she is using your child as a shield, as a bargaining chip, a trade off. No-one knows yet what that child is capable of, or her role in the future, but she is yours, she is unique and we could not bring ourselves to harm an innocent. Innocent now… but I can guarantee that if she spends much more time with Missy her soul will be corrupted by what that creature gives her of herself; her knowledge, her beliefs… her moral code, all being absorbed as each minute passes by your baby's mind, touch telepathy can be a powerful thing.'

'She's already given her, her regenerations…' the Doctor said quietly, his eyes wide. 'She brought her to life, she was still born…'

Ohila's wise face registered shock. 'Then it is worse than we thought. She has toyed with timelines, played God to the child, there will be consequences if this is allowed to continue.'

'I have to find them,' the Doctor darted past Ohila to a worn track behind the largest tent. He knew that this track and many others around the planet led to the sacred flame but he did not know what truly lay ahead of him. Had Missy really filled herself with the Flame? Too much would send her mad if she weren't there already. He had only heard rumours of the other powers it could lend; telekinesis, distance telepathy, they were just the relatively harmless ones, the others could be used in anger and Missy knew all about anger. She might have played god recently, but if she consumed the Flame she would be a demi god in reality.

He scrabbled through the rocks and sparse plants, following the route laid out on the ground. It was his hope to approach Missy quietly, catch her off guard, maybe even be able to retrieve his daughter depending on where he found them and the layout of the place. He opened his mind again and again but still could not hear her, so it was a shock when he slithered down a rock face to come across a clearing brightly lit and surrounding an altar; one of the many for the Flame on the planet as the Sisterhood travelled.

His baby lay in the centre of it under the bright burn of the Scared Flame. The Flame itself was tall and bright held in a small cone of bronze. From that a syphon and a tap from where its hot lifegiving essence could be drained. The Doctor froze, watching as the baby's tiny limbs waved and jerked, seeking contact with the woman who had just laid her down. Missy glanced over at her and let her painted nails walk a path over her rounded little belly.

'Mine,' she said smugly. 'Oh you and I, snooks, we are going to have such fun.'

He couldn't stand it and emerged from the rocks, stepping quickly into the well lit circle around the altar. Missy heard the crunch of gravel and turned to meet him, her face oddly shadowed by the quality of the light, lending her a frightening gauntness.

'Hello,' she said primly, skipping forward. 'You took your time,' she looked around her in exaggerated sweeps of the clearing, 'No Clara?' she asked in her singsong voice, 'Still feeling a bit peely wally?'

'Shut up!' the Doctor commanded her. 'What do you think you are doing?'

'Exactly what it looks like, I've had a wonderful taste of this Flame stuff,' she reached to the altar and produced a tankard. From the top of it wisps of gold could be seen rising. 'You have to know how to get it over, it's a bit… burny…' she added, 'But overall not bad, eight out of ten with the added benefit of extra lives. I feel quite zingy and baby…. Oh well baby she's something else, she's getting all the benefits.'

'What have you done to her?'

Missy frowned, 'Put it this way it gives a new meaning to 'SMA Gold Formula.' This little one is on the real deal.'

'You… she's been given…' he looked at the Flame, undulating softly in the dark of Karn's night, lighting the circle around him. Millions had tried to reach it, taste it, benefit from its life prolonging elements. The Sisterhood had fought them all and now in the face of a woman with a baby they had backed down. His child had been fed from the Flame. Dear Gods what effect had it had on her hybrid genetics? He stepped forward to reach for her…

The Doctor was thrown backwards and landed hard against the rocks, his lower back taking the greatest part of the blow. For a moment the wind was knocked from him and tears sprang to his eyes, the force had been incredible and there had been no warning.

'Oopsie!' Missy said covering her mouth with two fingers in a coquettish gesture. 'Should have warned you… actually no more fun this way. Forcefield, changed it up a bit. Instead of blocking baby's thoughts so others can't read them, now it blocks nasty telepaths from getting to her.' She looked up at the sky, to where the Doctor suspected , hundreds of cloaked and uncloaked ships waited. 'I know they're coming,' Missy said, her jaw set, 'But we can more than handle them now.' She leaned over the baby once more, straightened its playsuit, 'Can't we snookums, you're going to be such a big help to mummy, and then when this is over we can fly away,' she looked up at the Doctor, 'In your TARDIS of course,' she said, 'Where did you park it?'

The distinctive sound of the TARDIS engines appeared on cue, and Missy clapped her hands. 'Oh that's good, how did you do that?' she asked him as he swung around to see it appearing in the middle of the rocks behind him. The door opened and Clara, holding herself up against the frame, appeared in the door.

'Get back inside,' the Doctor ordered.

Clara ignored him, looked past him to where the baby lay on the altar. 'I'm not going anywhere,' she said, holding her side painfully.

'That's a pity,' Missy replied, 'Because it's about to get messy and you're just going to get in the way. We don't want to confuse snookums here….' Missy stepped forward, her smile morphing into the predatory grin of a snake, 'Snookums has a new mummy now, a proper mummy, a Time Lady mummy.'

'Get away from my child!' Clara spat out. 'You are not her mother!'

There was a mechanical sound from above them, followed by dozens of similar groans and whooshes. The three looked up at the sky. Missy's smile grew wider while the Doctor's shock made his eyes grow large. He knew there were stars above somewhere, behind the warships that waited on them.

It only took seconds before the landing parties began appearing, transported from their ships.

'Clara, inside, now!' he pointed to the TARDIS, but she shot a look at him that he had seen before many times. Weak and dizzy still she shoved herself off from the door of the ship and propelled her small body across the boundary between the rocks and the light circle. She stumbled but kept going, making for the altar, utterly possessed with a mothers drive to protect her child. Missy folded herself over in mirth, resting her hand son her knees, cackling.

'Oh very good, not a telepath so in you come through my little forcefield. But I don't know what good you think it will do, on your own in here… with me.' Slowly she straightened up and began gradually closing the gap between her and Clara until they stood on either side of the altar. Clara was leaning on it, gasping, pale and faint. Missy was dancing now and then, glancing up at the host of enemies she felt certain she was about to destroy. She took a sip from her tankard and set it down with a bang.

'Lets get to work,' she said, 'Destroying the universe!' She pulled a weapon from her petticoats.

The Doctor pushed against the forcefield again, tried a setting on the sonic, if he could just bring it down, bring it down and the somehow escape with Clara in the TARDIS, Missy would be left to clear up the mess of the invasion taking place around him. He struggled with a Sylurian and booted another unidentifiable alien hard in the guts.

'Come on,' he growled at the sonic, 'Don't let me down now, disable the blasted thing!'

In the meantime Missy was waving at the sky, encouraging enemies down to join her.

'That's right my lovelies, down you come, come and meet Mummy Missy and her precious little package, Snookums, come and see what we have for you…' her voice slowed and deepened and her eyes burned with the insanity the Doctor had long known was there. He tried another setting. Nothing.

'What did you just call yourself,' Clara asked her. Missy took a break from summoning aliens and looked back at Clara curiously.

'I called myself… Mummy,' she exaggerated the syllables.

'I think you'll find that's my title,' Clara said, her face flushing with anger. Between them her baby wriggled helplessly.

'No, dear, I do am much better job. I mean… she wasn't even alive when I found her.'

Clara's mouth opened but she struggled with the words. 'What?' she stammered.

'I brought her back to life, I gave her my lifeforce. Why else do you think I needed to come here, I had none left, the greedy little thing. Now of course we both have a full tank… but actions like that, raising babies from the dead, they earn you a lot of points on the Who is Mummy Competition.'

Clara pale and shaken would not be swayed. 'She's mine, you might have created a tidal wave in time by bringing her back, but I created her and I will care for her.'

'What makes you think you're up to it?' Missy asked, 'A special baby like this, so unique, so coveted, risen from the dead no less, how can a skinny little human like you care for her properly. Protect her from all this? She was born to be a princess in this universe, a princess to my queen. Powerful, immortal, eternal,' she raved on.

'I'm her mother,' Clara said levelly, 'And I can tell you now she isn't going to be a princess, not to you or anyone else. She's going to be her own person, I'll raise her to be independent, educated, strong.'

Missy burst into laughter, 'Oh Clara, you won't be raising her at all…'

'You can't stop me, in a moment the Doctor's going to get in here and rescue both of us and then we're out of here, away from you, away from this madness.'

'That isn't what I meant,' Missy looked at her pityingly.

'What?'

'I meant you won't be raising her because you won't be alive.'

'You can't threaten me!'

'Oh my dear I don't have to.' Missy laid a hand on Clara's, 'You're human, you're barely going to get this one past primary school.'

Clara knit her brow, confused.

Missy tutted. 'Let me explain for the slow of brain,' she said. 'This one is at least a quarter Time Lord, more now that I've given her her special milk, and being conceived on a TARDIS, it does things to your lifespan…. She'll grow up slow, plenty of extra time to learn… but it does mean that you…' she prodded Clara in the chest, 'You will be dead pretty early on. She wont even remember you… you know what it's like don't you, to have a dead mother?'

Clara stood looking at her dumbfounded for a moment. 'Doctor!' she called. He could hear her over the increasing number of alien thugs he was dealing with at the outskirts of the forcefield but he was rather too tied up to respond. He knew she wanted him to verify what she had been told however and it pained him. Clara, clinging hard to her right to be human, to live a normal life and lifespan, to steer clear of anymore cheats on her timeline, and now she was being told she wouldn't see her child grow up.

She wouldn't be able to protect it. From all of this.

He blasted the forcefield free with his sonic and there was a rush of bodies over him, fighting their way forward, dozen upon dozen heading for the altar. Gods. Missy turned and with her own weapon beat a row of them back but it looked at first glance like she had underestimated. Not to worry, she reached for her living shield.

But Clara had got there before her. Missy was too busy admiring her handiwork as the aliens poured from their ships and she missed her moment to lift the baby into her arms. The thing they had all come for. They pushed Missy aside and she landed hard on the ground, her pristine dress muddied with dust.

'Wait!' she cried but her voice was lost in the din.

The Doctors sonic cut a swathe through the aliens and he made straight for Clara, his arm around her shoulder propelling her away from the altar and towards the TARDIS she had parked so close by. He mentally thanked the Gods that she was such a good driver and then again when the ship flung open its doors. He knew that behind him a war had started, one that might last for centuries, but the priority was not to apply balm to that situation but to save Clara and the baby. Always the priority, no matter how hard he tried, he would always move the stars for her if that's what it took. He hoped she understood.

They stumbled into the TARDIS and the doors slammed shut. Clara collapsed by the console, the baby against her shoulder.

And a tankard of golden liquid by her side.