Chapter 11

The Hummingbird yawned, stretched and brushed her hands off. She was feeling rather proud of herself: she'd managed to fix something – Dimitri's ship. There wasn't even much wrong with it: only a few faulty wires. It was a small ship and Clara suspected that Dimitri must have stolen it, as it was rather beaten-up.

Now she was finished, she had proved her worth to Missy as a time-traveller. Then she could go back to Baker Street with Sherlock and have a nice cup of tea.

But before she could get out of the crumbling room that Dimitri's ship had crashed in, who should appear before her but the Zygon himself: Dimitri.

"Is it fixed?" He demanded to know.

"Certainly is," Clara nodded.

"Good…" the Zygon smirked as if he knew some secret or other that Clara didn't know. In fact, it was because he had a plan – a trick up his sleeve – because he had a contract and he needed to keep his end of the bargain.

Four monsters appeared behind Clara, two taking hold of her arms and two of her wings.

"What are you doing?" She asked, calmly, though inside she wasn't as calm as she came across as, feeling the creatures' grips tightening. When she turned her head around, she saw that the four aliens were all Zoranians: trained soldiers from the planet Zorad who would destroy anyone or anything hat stood in their way.

Fortunately, The Hummingbird knew exactly how to get out of the situation: Zoranian soldiers would only obey anyone who paid them… or anyone who survived them, and Clara had certainly endured them before.

"Once I get rid of you," Dimitri sneered, "I can keep my monsters and go home. How could you be so stupid? My soldiers will destroy you in the blink of an eye, then they will kill your friend, Mr Holmes, and he will no longer be here to foil the plans of James Moriarty," and he sniggered, "Any last words?"

"Yeah, in fact," Clara smiled. She, too, had a plan of her own. She turned to the soldiers restraining her and cleared her throat, "Remember me?"

The aliens shook their heads.

"I'm Clara Oswald and I just so happen to be the one who destroyed your army base when you were all trying to convert the people of Chilima into more soldiers by raining down fumes onto their planet… and you killed my pet dragon, which I do not appreciate in the slightest."

The soldiers' grips loosened as they realised that whom they knew as the Dragon Whisperer was not, in fact, dead as they supposed her to be. They and the other Zoranians back on Zorad had supposed her to have died in the rain of fire, but of course they could never be sure, so they had always been warned of the return of the Dragon Whisperer, come to avenge the death of her dragons.

"They were a lot of last words," Dimitri observed, and was about to order the soldiers to kill before Clara cut him off,

"They weren't my last," she said, sharply, "Release me."

As she ordered, the Zoranians let her go.

Dimitri stood, confused and angry, as his monsters stood back from his victim,

"What is this nonsense?" He questioned.

"Attention!"

The soldiers stood to attention, afraid of what their most feared enemy may well do to them; who knew if she might have dragons hidden away somewhere, ready to jump out and burn them with their fiery breath.

"Now, men," Clara started, "Neither I nor my friend want this Zygon to capture any more innocent monsters, you hear me? Now, what do we do with people we don't like?"

"Destroy, ma'am!" The Zoranians chorused.

"Very good. But don't kill him just yet, alright? Hold him down whilst I speak to him."

"Yes, ma'am!"

And all four of them restrained Dimitri as The Hummingbird called for the Eeuu, who came bounding down the hallway a second later.

"Eeuu," Clara coughed, "Stay alert and if Dimitri tries to escape, catch him," and she strolled up to the Zygon, giving him her eyes of ice (it was a talent, the way she could look at people and make them afraid), "How..? How could you possibly believe you could ever get away with this? You've destroyed the lives of, not monsters, but innocent alien races, and you think you can just waltz out of the consequences? Well, you didn't take Sherlock or me into equation, did you? Don't underestimate the lengths I will go to to make you listen to me. It is your choice to make: go home alone or I order the Eeuu to attack."

Of course, she'd never willingly kill anybody, even Dimitri, but giving false threats is sometimes your only option if you want to get something done.

"I will not leave without my monsters," Dimitri snapped back, angrily, orange spit spraying from his mouth as he did.

"Very well, then. Eeuu, you know what to do with him…"

The Eeuu marched up to Dimitri and raised his scythed hand to plunge into his enemy. He, unlike Clara, would gladly kill the one who forced him to come all the way here on a rickety old ship (that didn't feel safe at all), and then ordered him about.

"No, no, wait!" The Zygon yelled, a split-second before his imminent doom, "Look, I'll leave, just don't kill me!"

The Hummingbird hurriedly commanded the Eeuu to stop, holding up her hand, glad that she didn't have to see the insides of a sucker-covered, orange monster spill out all over the floor and probably onto her shoes.

"Are you being honest with me this time?" Clara asked, sternly.

Dimitri nodded, heartily.

Clara could read his face and see that he was sincere this time. She bit her lip and sighed before lowering her hand.

"Eeuu, let him go," she ordered.

The Eeuu picked up his victim and tossed him towards the ship. Dimitri hurried off, anxious for his life, and disappeared into the ship, that then slowly dematerialised into thin air.

Clara smirked – she had made sure, when she had fixed the ship, to drain most of the fuel so that there would only be enough to make one last trip… Dimitri wouldn't be capturing any monsters any time soon.

Clearing her throat, The Hummingbird turned to her Eeuu and smiled,

"Don't think we'll be seeing much of him anymore…" she mused, "Good work, all of you. Don't worry, I have a friend who can take you all back to where you came from."

But the Eeuu only shook his head.

"You don't want to go home?" Clara asked, surprised, looking up at him, "Very well, then, I suppose. You can stay down here. Just… don't kill anybody, OK? And if you do, I'll be back."

The Eeuu nodded, a strangely creepy but happy smile spreading across its face, literally from ear to ear. Clara was more surprised that the creature had a mouth than she was at learning that it wanted to stay here on Earth.

She smiled back and turned to the Zoranians,

"As for you four, you can follow me."


"Oh, you're back!" Sherlock called when The Hummingbird entered the room. He was currently locked inside one of the cages, looking rather bored, his back to the floor and legs to the wall.

Clara couldn't help but snigger to herself when she saw him. She cracked her back and took the sonic from her pocket before flipping it and unlocking the cage as she walked by.

"What happened then?" Missy asked as the four Zoranians trooped out of the hall and into the room, "Did he just leave as promised?"

"Wasn't quite that simple," Clara sighed, stretching, "I'll tell you about it in a minute, I just have to make a call," and she disappeared behind the huge door to the underground passage leading back up to London Gateway.

"Evening, Doctor!" She smiled, leaning on the wall, "I have to be quick, OK? Just have to as a favour."

"Right..? What's the matter?" The Doctor asked, sounding slightly concerned.

"I've got about maybe… 13 captured aliens, all sitting about in cages. I really need them taking back to their home planets, they're getting really angry… thought I'd ask you, seeing as you have a TARDIS and all. That's if you're not busy, of course?"

"No problem. Just one question: why-"

"Ask questions when you get here, love, I'll see you in a bit. You can track me from my vortex manipulator, right?"

"Yeeessss…"

"Great! See you soon!" Clara chirped, then she hung up.

She slipped her phone back into her pocket just in time as she heard Missy yell 'get off!' from the other room. She smiled and trotted into the room to see the soldiers restraining both Missy and Moriarty.

"I think you know what I'm going to say to you two, don't you?" She coughed, her smile fading into a frown. She looked to the soldiers and then back down to 'M and M', who were, inside, quite worried, but they disguised it rather well.

This was Clara's one chance to destroy both her and Sherlock's enemies – she'd probably never have this opportunity before, and she certainly didn't want to get it wrong, so she cleared her throat and saw Missy close her eyes as she waited the inevitable command for her to be killed.

There was silence.

The two criminals looked back up to The Hummingbird and saw that her frown remained.

"I'll forgive you," she said, "On one condition."

"What?" Moriarty asked, almost surprised.

"…That you help me round up all these monsters," Clara smiled, sheepishly, "Now come on!"