A/N: The following takes place when the twins are about nine.

"Uh… I don't know about this Dad," James said. He watched as his father and sister were furiously cutting at bits of paper, turning them into even smaller bits that they were gluing together in impossible ways. "Shouldn't we let Auntie Idris take care of this? She's usually pretty good at this sort of thing…"

"Nonsense," the Doctor said resolutely. "We are decorating the library for her birthday ourselves—no input from the ship, in order to give her a break."

"…but those chains are hideous…"

"It doesn't matter what it looks like, because we made them!" Alison insisted. She pasted together another couple of links and grinned manically at her handiwork. It was very clear to the young lad that his sister was the one who inherited their father's facial expressions, even if their mother assured him that he had as well.

"If you need me, I'll be in the kitchen," he replied. James was a rather serious boy for his age, which Alison teased him for and his parents worried over. Being serious wasn't necessarily a bad thing, he decided, since it merely meant that he was going to have to be the one to hold things together when it got a bit testy.

Going into the kitchen, James crept up on his toes and grabbed one of the cookbooks that his mother kept handy. He was allowed to cook, as long as he was either in Auntie Idris's kitchen or in Mum's flat with her. The boy flipped through the pages, attempting to find a cake recipe to use, hoping something would catch his eye. He looked, and looked, and looked, and couldn't find anything.

"What do you think I should make?" he asked the ceiling. The TARDIS softly whirred at him, her lights dimming in tandem.

"Really? Where's that?" James wondered. A tiny chime went off and there was a recipe card sticking out of a slot in the wall. He took it, examining the contents.

It was a chocolate cake. Mums everywhere couldn't say no to a chocolate cake, unless they were allergic, and James knew his mum wasn't allergic.

Quickly, the child began gathering the necessary supplies. Bowls and spoons and whisks came out, as well as flour, sugar, cooking chocolate, and all sorts of things he only vaguely remembered using. Auntie Idris helped him with a couple things, since he hadn't memorized the kitchen yet, and soon he was well on his way to baking the best birthday cake anyone in his family had ever tasted.

…and considering his dad was over two thousand years old, that was going to be a fluffing good cake.

Clara was, as she normally was, at work on her birthday. Her coworkers all chipped in and bought birthday cupcakes, as was customary, and it was generally a pleasant day. None of the students made her aggravated for once and she was able to go home on time. She could barely wait to get back to her flat, if she was completely honest with herself, because she knew that although it was a school night, she'd find the TARDIS parked on her sitting room rug and she was going to spend an entire week with her space-family.

No, it did not matter what the space-husband said; she was entitled to use the prefix whether he liked it or not.

Nearly forgetting to lock the door behind her, Clara nearly skipped across her flat. There she was, right where she was every year on November 23rd, and the sight of the TARDIS made her glad. She rubbed a hand over the painted wooden door and chuckled.

"Thanks for taking care of them while I was away," she said. It was a ritual between the two, for Clara to thank the TARDIS every time they met after school now. The space-time ship held the three people who were the most important to her in the entire universe, keeping them alive, safe, and relatively bruise-free, and if she was really honest, she couldn't thank the old girl enough. Letting the hinge give way, the TARDIS opened for the current mistress of the establishment.

"Doctor? Kids? I'm back," Clara called out as she entered the console room. The door closed behind her as she walked through, wondering where it was her troublemaking family had gone off to. She put her bag down by the console itself, checking the controls.

Nothing out of the ordinary…

"What are those goofballs up to this time?" she wondered aloud. The TARDIS obliged and led the way, illuminating the corridor floors that brought the woman to the kitchen. It was a veritable disaster, though in the thick of it all was a very neatly-done cake, and her very splatter-covered son.

"Mum! There you are!" James gasped. He ran up to Clara and hugged her, getting chocolate batter all over the front of her. "I made your cake!"

"I see that," she laughed. "And did Auntie Idris help?"

"Nope! I did it all by myself! Auntie Idris just watched!"

"Oh, how grown-up and responsible you are!" Clara said sweetly, fawning over her son. She kissed him on the forehead and rubbed their noses together—it was a good day indeed. "Now where's Dad and Alison?"

"Probably making a mess in the library… again…" the boy groaned loudly, rolling his eyes for good measure. His mother smirked at that, ruffling his hair.

"Then let's go scold them," she said. The two then walked together to the library, where it indeed was a mess. Snips of paper were everywhere, glitter covered everything, paper chains hung haphazardly across some bookcases, and father and daughter stood in frightful attention, pointing at one another in accusation. They both claimed the other started it, though both father and daughter were sparkly and smeared in various colors and covered in paper bits.

"…and I thought I made a mess," James marveled.

"Well I didn't start it… Da did!" Alison protested.

"You little liar!" the Doctor scoffed. "You act as if I can't be allowed to raise my own children!"

"What's in your hair?" Clara asked, completely ignoring the spat.

"Glitter-paint," Alison volunteered cheerily. She then shrunk back when she noticed her mother's expression was not changing.

"You have glitter-paints, as well as glitter-glue from the looks of it, all over everything, including yourselves," Clara noted. "Now what do you have to say for yourselves?"

"Sorry Auntie Idris," the girl frowned.

"Good—now showers, all three of you, and I don't want to see you again until you're good and clean, do you hear me?" she ordered. Her family slunk out of the library, the children having learned their lesson, while the Doctor copped a feel as he walked by, leaving her skirt a glitter-filled mess on her rear end as a preview of her traditional birthday shag.