Big big thanks to NoPondInTheForest, the best beta one could ever have, and thank you guys as usual for your follows & reviews & favourites! Hope you won't hate me too much by the end of this chapter...
The dazzling brightness of the golden light that enwrapped Melusina and the princes as her spaceship took them out of the Tower and set off for the cosmos caused the time travellers to get blinded once again.
When the glare and the glitter were gone, Jack, Edward, Clara and the Doctors found themselves back inside the familiar and notorious Tower torture chamber, surrounded by the atrocious instruments of torture that had previously made them all feel not only absolutely horrified, but also completely disheartened.
Their minds, however, were in a very different state this time.
Edward de Vere, the genius whose words would be remembered for centuries and centuries to come, if not as his own, as those of a William Shakespeare, had been rendered absolutely speechless by the course of events. None of his masters, he thought, could ever have even dreamed of being close to the kind of knowledge that was now there within his grasp. First it was the creature, followed by the semi-consciousness. After that, it was the new reality and the heaps of gold and jewels. Finally, there were the revelations. The two young boys had turned out to be King Edward V and his brother Richard Duke of York, the renowned princes in the Tower, but the creature herself had made the foundations of both mythology and the green-eyed Doctor's knowledge of aliens shake when she told Edward that she was Melusina, a water goddess whom legend had described as an omen of death. She had, in fact, done nothing but protect life ever since the day she had been born, as she turned out to be an Aurean, a luminescent creature from a species of nurses born out of the gold that's formed inside dying stars. In the words of the brown-eyed Doctor, Melusina was the motherly daughter of a supernova.
Captain Jack Harkness, who could do nothing but stare at the Earl of Oxford, couldn't help but think how the awestruck look on his face might as well stay with him until the end of his life.
Meanwhile, the Eleventh Doctor's brain had not and would not stop asking questions. Clara had – and very intelligently – hinted at something right before Melusina came and carried them both hand in hand to her own magic-like reality. Now that the alien was gone, his companion's words were coming back to him. What if she had been right, he wondered. Could that really have been the reason why Queen Elizabeth had gone through so much trouble? The conviction that some accident in time and space had brought her close to a creature she had wrongly assumed to have been a friend of the Doctor's once, and that she could actually use that creature to hurt him and fulfil her revenge? How had she known that there was something about that creature that would make the Doctor – though maybe not the one she had intended – feel immediately drawn to her anyway? And most importantly, was that all? Because to him, it just didn't make any sense. Just this once, could things really be that simple? Because there was something deep inside him that was trying to convince him they could not.
Clara's features couldn't help but show her disbelief the moment the sounds that had just become barely audible eventually reached her ears. She stood silent for a moment, refusing to believe that they were real. But had to be, didn't they? Otherwise, why would she even hear them?
The Tenth Doctor had been dreading the moment that he knew was soon to come, and when that moment finally came, the frozen hands that had been grabbing his hearts and squeezing them hard seemed to be threatening to crush them into dust.
The bitter reality of the events the younger Time Lord had been anticipating ultimately hit them all in the form of shrieks of pain, cries of despair, and mad laughter, all of them coming from the mouths and the throats of the dozens of men and women who were now occupying the dungeons of the majestic building that had remained nearly empty until that very moment.
"No!" whispered Clara, her gaze darting from the Tenth to the Eleventh Doctor. Shaking her head as her heart sank in her chest, she went on. "No. No. No. No!" she exclaimed. "Why would Melusina put the prisoners back in their dungeons? Why didn't she leave them somewhere else?"
Her Doctor slowly turned to her and held her hands in his.
"Because the thought of not putting them back in their cells didn't even cross her mind, Clara," he said, narrowing his eyes. "Because we never told her we were expecting her to get them out of the Tower in the first place."
"So this is… My fault," said Clara as a tear started to run down her cheek. "I should never have signed that contract, Doctor... Now they're all back in their dungeons just because of me!"
"Clara, listen," said the Eleventh Doctor, grabbing her by the shoulders as he held her gaze. "This is not your fault."
"We should leave this place right now, everyone," said Jack, motioning towards the rest of the party. "The moment everyone else in London realises the Tower's not empty anymore, the Queen's men will want to know why."
"But we can't leave now!" Clara exclaimed.
"I'm afraid we don't really have much choice," said the Tenth Doctor.
"No!" shouted Clara, sauntering towards him. "We can't leave these people, Doctor! What will happen to them if we do?"
"Those people are not our concern, Clara," he answered sluggishly, marking his words. "They never were."
"How can you say that!?" she asked helplessly.
"How can I say that?" said the Doctor, running a hand through his hair. "Look, I don't know the ideas Chinny here has been getting into your head, Clara, but we never… And I can't stress this enough – we don't interfere!"
"We don't walk away!" said Clara defiantly. "That's what you said to me when we first met, Doctor, that we never walk away!"
"I never said that to you, Clara!" he replied, raising his forefinger menacingly before he turned it in the direction of the Eleventh Doctor. "And just in case you haven't noticed, I'm not him!"
"Enough!" screamed a furious Eleventh Doctor. He took a few steps forward and placed himself between the Tenth Doctor and Clara, determined to put an end to their short but heated argument. Looking at his past self, he spoke in a sarcastic tone. "Using regeneration as an excuse to detach your actions from mine, Sandshoes? I may be feeling a bit sensitive these days, but under different circumstances, I would've thought that to be quite beneath you."
"We just can't do what Clara thinks we should do," grunted the other Time Lord, infuriated.
"Oh no! Of course we shouldn't! 'Cause we never interfere! That's what you always say, right?" the Eleventh Doctor went on, his voice full of sarcasm. "The universe is nothing but fixed points and people's destinies have already been sealed, so we walk away! We never help them. We just run away and never look back. Oh, hang on! Maybe sometimes we do! Or have you forgotten Pompeii?"
"This is not Pompeii, Chinny," replied the Tenth Doctor, nonplussed.
"Oh, isn't it? And how? How is this not like Pompeii?" the Eleventh Doctor challenged him. "When many people might be about to die because we have messed up with something lying underneath the surface of their very lives, tell me, Sandshoes, how can this possibly not be like Pompeii?" he asked him so passionately that he accidentally spat out on more than one occasion while he was talking.
His past self had not felt intimidated by his words in the least, and in an equally ugly mood, he held his gaze in defiance, his mouth agape and his breaths short and fast.
"I'm not breaking all the laws of time and space just because you two are reckless," he told him in a faltering voice.
It was the moment when the word 'reckless' reverberated in the torture chamber that Clara decided to rush out of it.
"Clara!" Jack called her out. "Clara! Where do you think you're going? Clara!"
The Doctors turned around just in time to see Clara running away so fast that it seemed to them her life depended upon it.
"Clara! Wait!" cried the Eleventh Doctor, immediately running after her.
Captain Jack Harkness and Edward de Vere would willingly have followed the Time Lord and his companion, had they not been prevented from doing so by the Tenth Doctor walking towards them and spreading his arms in front of them.
"Jack, listen!" he said to the former Time Agent as he put his hand on his shoulder. "What you said before… You were right! We had a chance to leave this place safely, but now that chance is gone. They'll find us soon if we stay, so take Edward away from here while you still can."
"What? And let you three have all the fun without me?" Jack teased. "No way, Doctor! I'm not leaving you here!"
"But you must."
"Maybe I must, but I don't want to."
"Jack, please!" said the Doctor, his voice now sounding desperate. "Even if nobody else does, you please listen to me! Get Edward out of this place. He should never have been a part of this, don't you understand? That was the reason why I brought you here! We never meant to put anyone's life in danger."
Jack stayed silent for a moment. The thought that his immunity to death might have been a decisive factor in granting him passage to Elizabethan England had not crossed his mind until then, but he didn't even need a fraction of a second to understand the sense in such decision.
"Fair enough," he replied. "Now you listen to me, Doctor. I know you, I know that face, and I know what you're thinking, and I've honestly got to tell you that none of this is your fault."
"Isn't it, Jack?" asked the Doctor, gazing down. "Isn't it my fault, really? Mine and mine alone?"
"Of course not!" Jack shouted in earnest. "I know you very well, Doc. I know you way better than that arm-flailing alien that's suddenly landed from the future, and I know how this you tends to take the blame for everything that's ever gone wrong in the universe. But you're not to blame, Doctor! Things… They just happen! And yes, most of the times, you happen to be around 'cause you're trying to make them better, but sometimes you just can't! Sometimes things are beyond all control – even yours! And it doesn't matter how much you might try to restore order, Doctor, 'cause order is not the only thing the universe is made of."
"If restoring order means restoring death," said the Doctor with defeatism, "then there's no difference at all between order and chaos, Jack. Maybe the universe should be done with me… Or maybe… Maybe it's me who should be done with the universe. Maybe the universe would be much better off without me."
"Hello?!" Clara kept shouting. "Remember me from the other night?! It's me, Clara! I've come to get you out of here! Can you hear me?! Hello?! Are you still there?! It's Clara Oswald, your friend! Hello?! Where are you?!"
Clara had spent the last few minutes running like mad along the countless corridors inside the Tower of London. Adrenaline seemed to have taken over her body, her brain, and her senses for a while as she devoted her every effort, no matter how big or small, to which had now become her single quest – finding the young girl who had been locked up in the same dungeon as her two nights before. Soon, however, there was no adrenaline rush that could prevent her from seeing the very real and terrified faces or hear the cries of help of the people that had just been magically sent back to their cells.
"Excuse me, my lady!" she heard someone call out to her. "Have you seen my sister?"
Clara stopped in her tracks and turned to gaze at the young man who had just spoken to her from behind the bars of the small window in the door of the dungeon he had been shut in. Taking a few steps backwards, Clara walked towards the door and felt her knees were failing her the moment she saw there were over twenty other men locked up in the same dungeon as him, all equally filthy and desperate. Clenching her teeth, Clara focused all her attention on the man who had called out to her and studied his features carefully, trying to find some kind of resemblance between him and the girl she'd seen in her own dungeon. Unfortunately for him, she found none.
"Have you seen my sister, please?" the young man asked again. "Is she still in her dungeon?"
But physical resemblances meant nothing, Clara thought. Maybe she had really seen his sister, but maybe she hadn't. And how could she say to that poor man at all?
Clara smiled at him sadly, because even if her heart was breaking inside her, she had just decided to leave him behind. To keep on running. And now, the Eleventh Doctor was getting really close to her.
"Sir, excuse me!" the same young man cried to him. ""Have you seen my sister, sir? Is she still in her dungeon?"
"Clara! Wait!" the Doctor shouted, too busy chasing his friend to pay any attention to the young man who was desperately trying to find out what the whereabouts of his sister were. "I'm with you on this, okay?"
"I've got to find that girl, Doctor!" she said as she kept on running.
"I know! And I know you will! Oi! Listen to me!" The Doctor's long legs were suddenly running at an arm's length of her shorter ones, and finally being able to reach her, he grabbed her by the arm and forced her to turn and face him. "Listen! I'm here with you, Clara, and I'm with you all the way! You don't have to run away from me!"
"It's me that she's running away from, Chinny, not you," said Tenth Doctor, who had been running after them, as he caught them both completely by surprise.
"I know I can't set them all free, Doctor," said Clara, freeing her arm from her Doctor's firm grip and taking a few quick and decisive steps closer towards the younger Time Lord, "but if I can't do that, please let me at least set her free!"
New tears started to run down her face as she said that.
"You don't understand what it means to create a paradox, do you?" the Tenth Doctor cut in, his eyes darting from her to his future self.
"Right now, I couldn't care any less about paradoxes, Doctor," she said in a rebellious tone. "Right now I just care about a young girl who's locked up in one of these dungeons, who's terribly scared, and who only wants to go home, and home is where I'm going to take her even if it's the last thing I ever do!"
"I'm sorry Clara," suddenly said the Eleventh Doctor. Clara's heart skipped a beat when she heard those words, and she immediately turned around with the intention of finding out what might have possibly made the Doctor say them. What she saw then was the Eleventh Doctor standing at the very end of the corridor, right in front of the only dungeon out of all the ones they had found whose door, unlike the doors of all the dungeons they had run past, had been left open wide. Getting closer and looking in, she recognized it soon enough. It was early morning by then, so the room was fairly lighter, and it was absolutely empty except for the bed, which looked exactly the way it did when Clara got up from it two nights before. Only one of its sides was unmade – the one on which she had been sleeping. On the other side, the coverlet looked just a bit untidy. To Clara's mind, everything seemed to suggest that the girl had not slept a wink after she left, or even the night after.
Clara took a few steps inside the room and stopped right in front of the bed, and the Eleventh Doctor walked right behind her.
The Tenth Doctor, however, motioned towards the window, and what he saw upon looking down made his hearts sink even more, if by now that was actually possible.
He wished he were completely wrong, but being a time traveller who had had a soft spot for Planet Earth for nearly a millennia, he knew that, in the days of the Tudors, scaffolds were usually built overnight, and he also knew that whenever there was a crowd gathered in front of one, it was because there would be an execution. Everything seemed to indicate that someone's head was about to be separated from the rest of their body by the stroke of an axe on their neck.
Then, all of a sudden, a nearby bell started to toll.
"The bells of St John are ringing," he said absent-mindedly.
Clara, who had successfully managed to hold back her tears until that moment, suddenly just couldn't stand it any longer and broke down, and the Eleventh Doctor, who had remained right behind her, walked the few steps that separated him from his friend and held her in a tight embrace. Clara didn't say a word. Her mouth had run dry just as much as her eyes had got wet. She just clang to the Doctor's tunic and kept on crying against his chest.
The Tenth Doctor was spared the burden of telling her what his eyes had witnessed by the sudden interruption of Jack, Edward, and Clara herself, who appeared within a flash of white light. He had completely forgotten, but as soon as he saw his three friends suddenly emerging from the recent past, he realised this had to be the moment they had mentioned upon reuniting with them outside "The Mermaid Tavern", when Jack explained how they had eventually managed to get to them after many failed attempts by briefly travelling to the future and asking where he and the other Doctor had been.
That was exactly what happened next.
"Doctors," said Jack, who looked quite surprised to see them, "we need your help! Where were you the morning after you lost Clara at St Paul's?"
The Tenth Doctor stayed silent for a moment. The thought came to his mind that maybe, if there was still a glimmer of sense left inside him, he should just warn them to never go back to the Tower under any circumstances so that none of this would now be happening, but he didn't. He just didn't. He simply gave them the information they had come looking for.
"The Mermaid Tavern," he replied, not being able to meet none of their gazes.
"Irony upon irony," said the Eleventh Doctor sadly from his place right behind him.
At that point, Edward said something to Clara, but the Tenth Doctor didn't even take the trouble to show any interest in what it might have been. A few seconds later, the past versions of their friends were gone, and he kept wishing they had never come in the first place.
"I've failed her, Doctor!" present Clara sobbed against his future self's chest. "I told her I'd come back for her, and now she's gone!"
"We'll keep looking, Clara!" said the Eleventh Doctor, trying his best to comfort her. "Melusina abducted every last person in this building and then put them back here before she left, right? She must be in a different dungeon, that's all. We're going to find her!"
It was at that very moment that a woman's voice was heard inside that room, but whose voice it would turn out to be they hadn't seen coming at all.
"That's a most hopeful deduction, sir, but as your sovereign, it is my duty to inform you that it should just merely be reduced to the category of wishful thinking."
The Doctors and Clara turned around and saw Queen Elizabeth herself and her Secretary of State, Sir Robert Cecil, coming into the dungeon. Behind them, their guards were holding Jack and Edward prisoners by pressing sword blades against their necks.
"Can you not hear that sound?" the Queen went on, smiling brightly. "It is coming from Bell Tower! It is the sound the bell makes minutes before an execution, my dear," she added, her eyes darting to Clara. "And today's execution is a very special one – it is the first after a whole month! Oh, I am sorry that you are not fond of executions, my sweet little girl," she said when Clara and the Eleventh Doctor looked at her enraged. "Your young friend, the one that used to occupy this room, she was not fond of executions either, so I thought, why should I make her witness one when she could be the whole reason for one herself? Am I not merciful?" she asked between giggles. "Most prisoners are never granted such graces! I have to say, though, she did not like the idea very much, but at least she shall never have to see one from that window over there!" She then looked at the window, and widening her eyes in fake surprise, she exclaimed. "Oh, dear god! What is that sight my eyes are seeing? Can that be my dear husband, the Doctor?"
"Elizabeth, stop it!" muttered the Tenth Doctor.
"Oh, it can! What an unexpected surprise! It is my cherished husband indeed! How good it is to see you, my love! It fills me with such joy! After nearly forty years!" She took a few steps towards him and kissed him passionately while the Eleventh Doctor grimaced with disgust. "We should celebrate, my darling, do you not think so?"
Queen Elizabeth then looked at the Eleventh Doctor and Clara before she turned to look at Jack and Edward, as she pretended to be waiting for an answer that never came with a false smile on her face. Her spread smiling lips then twisted to acquire the commanding quality of a tyrannical ruler as her head nodded almost imperceptibly in the direction of Robert Cecil.
"Guards!" shouted Robert Cecil. "Lock up these men and that woman right now!"
"No!" the Queen suddenly screamed at her loyal henchmen. "No, Robert! I have just had a better idea…" Then, turning to the Tenth Doctor, she added. "Guards! You are to escort my dear husband and I to Tower Green, where we shall take the best seats, so that my dear husband shall not miss a single detail of the execution!"
"Elizabeth, I beg you," Edward said to her in spite of the cold blade pressing against his throat, "you cannot do that."
"Of course I can," she replied, turning to him. "I can do what I want! You should know that better than anyone else, Master Shakespeare...," she added, repressing a giggle.
"You don't know what these most remarkable men have just done, Elizabeth," Edward added, refusing to give up trying. "If only you knew, you would not be trying to punish them like this!"
"Shut up, Edward, or I shall see to it that once that insolent girl's head is no longer above her shoulders, you shall be next in line!"
"Leave him alone, Elizabeth!" shouted the Tenth Doctor. "I'm going with you."
"What?" said the Eleventh Doctor, grabbing Prior Him by the arm. "Sandshoes! Have you gone completely insane? You can't do that!"
"Make sure all of you leave this place safe and sound, Chinny. That's all I ask of you," said the Tenth Doctor, taking his future self's hand off his arm.
"But what will happen to you?" the Eleventh Doctor asked him.
"I don't know, and I don't care," the younger Time Lord replied.
"You don't care?" the Eleventh Doctor asked him angrily. "Well, you know what? I do!"
"Nothing will happen to me, Chinny!" the Tenth Doctor shouted at him. "Isn't that always our curse?"
"I'm waiting, my love," interrupted Queen Elizabeth, a devilish smile on her face.
"Please go," the Tenth Doctor nearly whispered. "I'm begging you. Can't you see? None of this would've happened if it wasn't for me... This is all my fault! You and Clara should never have come here, and I'll never forgive myself if something happens to her – or Edward."
"Doctor," said Clara, getting closer to him and taking his hand in hers. "Doctor I'm so sorry!"
"I'm really sorry too, Clara," he said, smiling softly as his eyes locked with hers. "I'm really sorry this me has disappointed you."
"Don't say that!" she exclaimed.
"But it has, hasn't it? Well, don't worry!" he said, a sad smile appearing on his face. "Good news is I'll make up to you for all this in the future. I promise!"
"If you're taking him with you, Your Majesty," suddenly said the Eleventh Doctor, turning to the Queen herself, "then we're all going with him."
"No, sir, you are not," said the Queen. "He is coming with me. The rest of you can go straight to hell for all I care! I only want him."
Queen Elizabeth reached for the Tenth Doctor, who crossed his arms over his chest, refusing to take her hand before his friends' astonished eyes.
"Well, he who laughs last…," Queen Elizabeth said then, taking the hand he had refused to the back of her neck and squeezing it hard. "Well, my dear, it's time to defrock! Provided of course that you are actually wearing real garments underneath that stupid tunic of yours."
It didn't take the Queen long to understand that the Tenth Doctor was determined to disobey each and every single one of her orders. What the Doctor had yet to learn was that a simple snapping of her fingers was all her guards needed to press their swords tighter against Jack's and Edward's necks, so that he would have to give in. And so, the Doctor slowly took off his tunic and threw it to the ground.
"Shall we?" the Queen said then, leading the way with her hand and inviting him to walk at the front. Her guards followed right behind him with their swords aimed at his back, except for the ones that were still retaining Jack and Edward. Before she left the room, Queen Elizabeth walked close to Jack, and pressing her body against his, she kissed him passionately before she spoke. "Such a shame that you came to me at such an inconvenient time, Lord Boeshane. But please, do come back whenever you wish! I shall, until then, be thinking of the most appropriate manner to greet you when you do... What would you prefer, my lord, the scaffold or the stake?"
"None of them would really make much difference, Your Majesty…," said Jack, winking at her as he always did.
But Queen Elizabeth was not listening or looking at him anymore. Her eyes were now locked with Edward's, and if Jack still understood human emotions, then it was plain to see they were looking at each other with deep regret.
"No kiss goodbye for you, Edward," the Queen said, "that time is long gone, I am afraid."
"Exactly as it should be, Your Majesty," replied Edward.
One more snapping of the Queen's fingers made her soldiers free the two men they had been holding captive until then, and right after they did, they left, leaving the Eleventh Doctor, Clara, Jack and Edward alone in the dungeon.
"Oh, thank goodness!" said the Doctor. "I couldn't wait to get rid of this tunic either!" And after saying that, he quickly took it off.
"What has exactly happened here, sir?" asked Edward immediately afterwards. "Why has Queen Elizabeth taken the other Doctor with her?"
"I don't know," Jack told him, "but we can't just let her have her way with him. We must help him!"
"Some woman, huh?" said the Eleventh Doctor. "That's not the Elizabeth I met at all… That's a monster! She's more cruel and tyrannical than ever she was, and this…," he said, flailing his arms about before he suddenly stood still. After a moment during which his brow furrowed and his thoughts were gathered together, he started to nervously pace about the room. "This just doesn't make sense… Does it?" Clara, Jack and Edward silently looked at him as his footsteps led him to the side of the bed that still looked almost intact and watched him sit down. "No matter how casual or accidental her appearance here might have seemed – none of this has happened by chance!" At this point, the Doctor took the small pillow that was lying on his side of the bed and pressed it hard against his chest, hoping that it would help him think more clearly. "If this really is her frightful revenge, then there's still something I'm missing! What is it, Doctor? What? What? What?" After saying those words, the Doctor closed his eyes and lowered his head, feeling the cold white fabric of the case before he buried is head on the pillow.
That was when he noticed its unmistakable scent.
The Doctor quickly opened his eyes and raised his head. He lowered his gaze to take a look at the pillow, and drawing it close to his nose, he started to sniff.
"Doctor, what are you doing?" asked Clara.
But the Doctor never answered. He remained sitting on the bed and sniffing at the pillow for a few more seconds until he suddenly jumped up. Jack, Clara and Edward saw him practically dance around the room as he inspected what little there was to be inspected in it since, except for the bed and the four of them, there was nothing else at all.
But there had to be something!
He knew there had to be something so he didn't stop looking. He turned back to the bed, and grabbing the coverlet hard with both hands, pulled energetically until he stripped the bed off of it. Then he did the same with the white sheets, and as there still was nothing to be found, he removed the cases from the pillows. Once again, he saw nothing, so he moved to the side of the bed where he had just been sitting, and crouching down, he pushed the mattress, with the intention of throwing it to the floor. He never got to do that, though, since he had only pushed it just a little when something that had been lying underneath it suddenly caught his attention. He drew his face close to it and saw threads of wool in many different shades of red, blue, green, brown, orange, purple, and yellow.
And pink.
The Doctor grabbed those threads and pulled, and the unveiling of the object they turned out to be the fringe of made his eyes and mouth gape, even more so when he finally took it entirely out from underneath the mattress. What he found himself holding in his hands was a really long multi-coloured woollen scarf – and one he had seen before. One that, in fact, he had never been able to forget, even if almost five hundred years had passed since the last time he'd laid eyes on it.
The first time he had seen it had been during his leather jacket days. Particularly on the day he and a couple of friends landed the TARDIS in Cardiff to have it refuelled on the rift.
The last time had been around five years later, when the dying body of the Time Lord who had just been forced to leave the room in the company of Queen Elizabeth I and her men had found the courage and the strength to make one last visit to a friend would never forget. A companion he had dearly loved.
On both occasions, that very scarf had been wrapped around Rose Tyler's neck.
And right now, the Doctor really wished he were wrong, but there was only one reason that could satisfactorily explain why he had just found that scarf under the mattress on top of that prison bed. Unless this was all just a big mistake and someone could immediately prove him to be completely wrong, Rose Tyler was about to lose her head on the scaffold.
Holding on firmly to Rose's beautiful scarf and carrying her unmistakable scent still within his nostrils, the Doctor stood up, adjusted his bow tie, and then did that thing he would always do whenever Rose Tyler was involved.
Run.