Disclaimer: I don't own Doctor Who.
Clara dived through the wall—
And hit solid metal. "Owwww," she moaned, standing back. At least she couldn't get bruises. Clara pressed her hands against the wall. It no longer wavered when she touched it. "Doctor!" She shouted. "Doctor! Doctor, are you there?" The Doctor didn't respond. Somehow, the Time Capsule had closed.
The door slid open, and a group of Cybermen marched into the room, guns pointed straight at Clara. "Uhm…hi?" She tried. "Doctor! Me? Me? Can you reach me? Doctor, the thing's closed!" Clara pounded at the metal wall, but it didn't even dent.
"THE TEMPORAL GATE IS CLOSED," one of the Cybermen said. "THE CYBERIUM CANNOT BE TRANSPORTED."
"Right," Clara said. "The Cyberium. The shiny blobby thing. Why's it so important?"
"MISSION HAS FAILED," one of the Cybermen announced. The Cyberium rose from the cracks in its metal plating.
"Good," Clara said, pressing herself against the wall. If her heart was still going, it would be hammering in her chest right now. "Good, your plan failed. Now go…away. And leave these people in peace!"
"CLARA OSWALD IS NO LONGER NECESSARY. CLARA OSWALD WILL BE DELETED!" Bolts of blue energy shot straight towards Clara. She ducked instinctively, covering her head an—
Clara was falling, falling through time and space. Something was swirling around her, tossing her this way and that way. She closed her eyes, tightly as she screamed. Clara knew that she couldn't look, if she looked, she'd be dead, don't look, don't look, Clara, Clara, Clara, "Clara!"
Everything was bright. Light bombarded Clara's eyelids, and she raised an arm to cover them.
"Clara!"
She looked up, blinking, to see the Doctor standing next to her, sonic screwdriver in hand. She lay on soft green grass, but the dirt was purple and the sky seemed to be a royal blue. Clara's vision was fractured, a billion fragments of color and light, stabbing at her eyes. There were Cybermen, surrounding them. Of course there were Cybermen. Something always had to make bad situations worse. The air near Clara shimmered for a moment, and stopped. Looking down at her hand, Clara realized something was wrong, even with her limited sight.
"Clara," the Doctor said urgently. His voice echoed around in her head. "Clara, the Cyberium is inside of you. Can you hear me?"
Her hand was shining, coated in a silver metal. Not coated, Clara thought. It's in me. It's in me, and I can't get it out! She shook her hand, but it only made her feel dizzier.
"The Cyberium will kill you."
"Can't do that," Clara said faintly. Everything was funny, bright and funny and shiny. Her arm was shiny, wasn't that nice? Nothing mattered, not even the silver tendrils flowing through her blood, her skin, her nerves, all the way up to her brain. Clara smiled deliriously. "Can't do that, can it?"
"Clara, the Cyberium is trying to stay in you; once it chooses a host, it doesn't want to leave. You have to push it out."
"Why?" Clara asked, not that it mattered. The Cyberium slipped through her circulatory system, piercing her heart, but that didn't matter, that didn't matter. She didn't need her heart; it wouldn't pump blood through her veins. Clara was a fixed point in time until she returned to Trap Street. She was immortal. So why was she going cold? Clara couldn't go cold; she couldn't shiver or feel the icy metal that was reaching towards her brain.
I can't die, I can't die, I can't die. Her vision swam, the Doctor's face reduced to a strange collection of vague blurry dots—no, 1s and 0s, 0s and 1s, numbers, everything was just numbers. And then he wasn't there, anymore, he was gone, the Doctor had left and she had only just found him!
The sound of Cybermen shooting filled the air as the Cyberium sunk deeper into Clara's mind. An explosion. Clara smelled smoke, but it felt metallic. The Cyberium infiltrated her nose and mouth and ears. And suddenly, she knew that she was going to die, she was going to die (she was going to die). If Clara died here, now, then the universe would fracture, and everyone would be gone. Nonexistent. Annihilated. Destroyed.
Someone was going to save her, he always did. There was a hero out there, saving everybody, but it would be for naught. And Clara couldn't remember his name. Who was he? He was fading away with the rest of the world, as Clara's thoughts turned to binary code and the Cyberium filled her.
"Clara."
Who's Clara? The Cyberium's host wondered idly.
"Clara, you have to fight it. Remember your humanity."
Humans are the sole intelligent species of the planet Sol 3, and are carbon-based life like the majority of organisms in the Milky Way Galaxy.
"Your boyfriend, Clara. He's real, right? I think he's real. He's not imaginary this time, is he?"
Who? Wondered the brain of the girl lying on the sweet-smelling grass under the sapphire blue sky. Boyfriend? Does not…compute. Everything was cold and dark and numbers. The numbers were everywhere. The voice was numbers too, and the Cyberium dissociated it into frequencies and amplitudes. The amplitude of a wave is equal to half the distance between the height of the crest and the height of the trough. A wave's frequency is equal to the number of cycles within the domain of 2 pi.
"Your mother. Ellie Ravenwood."
That was her name, Clara thought. My mother's name, I remember, I remember, I remember—
'E' is the fifth letter in the English alphabet, and is the most frequently utilized letter in the English language, the Cyberium supplied.
"The leaf, that you gave up to save the people of Akhaten. Your mother's leaf. Clara, you have to remember who you are, you're not the Cyberium."
"Incorrect," said the Cyberium.
"Step away from the girl," a loud voice said. "You have to step away, now." Male, estimated age, twenty-two point eight three five nine four three six seven six four one nine two eight. Identity: unknown.
"Can't you see I'm busy?" Asked the face in front of her. Was it a face? No, just numbers, everything was just numbers in the end.
"We know how the Cyberium works, she's gone. If you get too close, you'll die too."
"No. Time Lord. Shut up. Shut up, shut up, shut up, I'm thinking." Male. Time Lord known as the Doctor.
Doctor? Clara thought. Why did that sound familiar? It shouldn't. It was a collection of letters, of frequencies, of sound waves and dots on a page. Who is the Doctor? Clara was cold, so cold. She couldn't see anymore, only know the numbers behind things, the ones and zeroes, the ons and offs.
The Doctor is a Time Lord from the planet of Gallifrey in the constellation of Kasterborous who is a wanted fugitive in over three billion societies. Date of Death: 22 April, 2011. Incorrect. Date of Death: Unknown.
"No," the Doctor said. "You're right. She's gone. Clara's not in there anymore." That hurt, and it shouldn't, because pain was not efficient. The Cyberium did not feel pain. Pain was not in the range of acceptable responses.
Clara. I'm Clara. I'm Clara, Clara Oswald.
Just letters! Numbers! Meaningless drivel!
Ah, there's the English teacher talking! Drivel—never heard a Cyberman use a world like that before! Numbers are boring, when you can have feelings and words and thoughts. I'm Clara Oswald, Souffle Girl, the Impossible Girl. Companion of the Doctor. And yes, that's over, but see, there's the nice thing about time travel! The Doctor never liked endings, and you know what? Neither do I. And if I run hard enough, fast enough, nothing has to end. Not now. And not ever!
"Doctor," Clara said as the Cyberium left her, trickling out through her nose and eyes as she coughed it out of her mouth.
"Clara!" The Doctor said joyfully. She leapt up, running over to hug him. This was the Doctor; this was really him. After centuries without seeing him, after nearly all memory of him had faded from her mind, they were reunited. Yes, he was at the wrong place in her time stream, but that didn't matter anymore. She could think of something, couldn't she? Clara loved problems, because then she could solve them. Every problem had a solution, and she would find one to this. And then she could travel with the Doctor again and everything would be fine, absolutely perfect. "No hugging!" The Doctor protested. Clara had forgotten how the had been in the year or so following his regeneration. "I am against the hugging!" She smiled sadly, wishing that she had never had to leave the Doctor.
But as she held onto him, the Cyberium swirled around him, plunging into his skin. The second Clara noticed, she backed away, horrified. "Doctor! Doctor…did I…?"
"No," he said, shaking. "The Cyberium's been displaced. And it's found the nearest viable host."
"Get away from him!" A man shouted. Clara looked around to see several Cybermen lying deactivated on the ground, and a small group of four people carrying guns standing a few feet back. "He's dangerous now!"
"No," the Doctor said again, spinning around. For an instant, Clara was reminded of another time when the Doctor had been taken over by Cybermen. Yes, that had happened, she remembered, along time ago, when he had looked different. Then, it faded, as he continued speaking. "Not dangerous, for now. Lots of information, lots of new knowledge. Cyberium. It's the databanks of the Cybermen, only alive! You sent it back in time, to hide from the Cybermen, only…you didn't send it back far enough," he explained, gesticulating wildly.
"We didn't have enough power!" Protested one of the female soldiers.
"Ah, but you've got me, now, and I'm a genius." He paused. "Clara, go with them. I'll follow. And you," he said to the soldiers. "Stop waving your guns around, you look silly."
"In case you haven't noticed," said another soldier, hefting his gun, "we're fighting a war."
"He's infected, we should shoot him now, contain the Cyberium."
"No!" Clara said. "You can't. He's your only hope of sending it back."
"This man," one of the soldiers told her, "is suggesting detrimental tactics, and it isn't even a convincing display of humanity."
"He's always like that," Clara said.
"Like an egomaniac?"
Clara nodded.
"That's not fair," the Doctor protested. "I am not the egomaniac. You're the one who said nothing was more important than your egomania."
"Did I?" Clara asked, squinting.
"Alright," one of the soldiers said. "Follow us. Any funny moves, and we'll shoot him. Understand?"
"You can't just go around threatening to shoot people, it's rather—"
"Yep," Clara said brightly, interrupting him. "We understand."
They followed the group of soldiers through the battlefield. On the other side of a large hill, Clara could hear the sound of explosions in the distance, but she tried not to think of it. Eventually, they reached a large stone trap door. Two of them inserted a key into a lock a few feet away, leading Clara and the Doctor down a stone staircase, while the other three took the rear.
"We have to keep it low tech," one of the group explained. He had fairly long orange hair, and looked far too young to be fighting a war. "Else the Cybermen would find us. Can scan for metal, those monsters."
"So, this is like your secret hideout, is it?" Clara asked.
"It's the best we have," he said. "Ko Sharmus, by the way. These are Kiev, Reg, Dawn, and Leona. And you're…"
"Clara Oswald. He's the Doctor," Clara said, pointing at the man next to her with her thumb. He was currently muttering something about the TARDIS. "Come to think of it, Doctor, where is the TARDIS?"
"Good question," said the Doctor. "It's parked on top of the Cyberman spaceship, in a completely different time. Bit difficult to get to it, right now, but we'll manage."
"Do you…have a plan?" Clara asked.
"Yes."
"A plan that doesn't involve thinking of a plan?"
"…no."
Clara rolled her eyes. "Why did they send the Cyberium back in time?" Clara asked.
"It was dangerous, yeah?" Ko Sharmus explained. "All the knowledge of the Cybermen, and its own highly intelligent entity as well. We stole it, the rebellion."
"Rebellion?" The Doctor asked. "This is no…rebellion, it's war!"
"The Cybermen have won," Dawn said. She had short blonde hair that was shaved close to her head. "We're the idiots who keep denying it."
"So, you stole the Cyberium, and sent it back in time so the Cybermen couldn't reach it?" Clara asked.
"Yeah," Ko Sharmus said. "They can only travel back so far—it's rather rudimentary. But we thought it would be—"
"The Artron Energy readings!" The Doctor said suddenly.
"The Cybermen must've travelled back in time to get it," said another rebel, with long dark hair braided into cornrows, although one portion of it had been burnt away. Leona, Clara remembered. "We'll have to send it farther."
"But how do you know it'll be far enough?" Clara asked.
"Their capacities were straining," said Reg, a tall, middle-aged man with a scar across his face. "They barely reached it. If we send it back…a few hundred more years should be good enough."
"Problem is," Ko Sharmus said, "we don't have enough power. And you don't have enough time."
"I'm a Time Lord," the Doctor said. His face was tight, the lines even more visible than usual. "I'll be fine, just get me to your time travel equipment."
"It's sort of been destroyed," Leona said. "Well, not quite. Destroyed, as in, some of it's burnt, some of it's in a million billion pieces, and some of it's fried, but most of it's salvageable…more or less."
"Well, you're not going to get anywhere with that attitude," the Doctor told her.
"We've been working on it," Dawn added, tugging on her short brown hair. "Leona, mostly. Replacement parts are almost finished. But we don't have the power."
"Or the Artron Energy," Leona added, shaking her head. "It's impossible."
"Nothing's impossible," Clara said.
"Its probability is infinitesimal."
"Maybe," Clara conceded. "You see him there? He's the Doctor. And he's very good at turning 'impossible' into—"
"It's impossible," the Doctor said, as they reached a large room. Metal plates, scavenged from Cybermen, were grouped together to form a large chamber. Wires spilled out from in between, like sparkling copper spaghetti. Lights flashed and blinked as gears clicked and whirred, and several pulsating blue circles were scattered across the structure.
"Doctor," Clara said.
"What, do you want me to tell them it isn't?"
"Yes."
"Well it is!" The Doctor said. "You can't expect to build a time machine out of that. You've got no Artron Energy for starters."
"What…is Artron Energy?" Clara asked hesitantly.
"Particles older than time itself—they group around temporal anomalies and complicated space-time events. Highly necessary for time travel," the Doctor explained.
"And we've got zip," Reg said.
"Uhm…" Clara said, thinking. Temporal anomalies. Complicated space-time events. "Have we got any around us?"
"Yes. But no. Not enough," the Doctor said.
Clara?
"What?" Clara asked, annoyed, before realizing precisely what had happened. That was Me's voice. And it was inside her head. Which meant—
I'm about a mile from your location. Is it safe?
"Not temporally, no," Clara said.
"Who're you talking to?" Ko Sharmus asked curiously.
"Good question," the Doctor said, pointing at him. "Clara, who are you talking to?"
"Me," she said truthfully, unable to resist.
"People don't talk to themselves like that."
"I'll explain later," Clara said. She looked over at the Doctor. His face was strained, the wrinkles even more evident. A silver tinge was starting to appear to his skin as the Cyberium worked its way through him. If she asked Me for Artron Energy from their TARDIS, then the Doctor would realize that she was in contact with her. Unless…unless she walked out to get it. In which case she would have to walk through a battlefield of Cybermen. And the Doctor would still want to know how she got incredibly rare particles from the dawn of time.
I could pretend it's him, Clara realized. He's here, in the future, with me, and he can't meet his former self. Perfect!
"Okay," Clara said. "Now's 'later', according to him. Well, you." She saw that he didn't understand. "It's you."
"You're…talking to me?"
"You, from the future." She tapped her head. "In my ear. You. Talking to me. Telling me what to do. I think I can get us some Artron Energy."
"Well, then," the Doctor said. "I'll just go and nip up to my future TARDIS then and—"
"No," Clara interrupted him. "The time streams would intersect and the universe would explode. That's what he said. So, uhm, I need to go get them."
"Excuse me?" Reg asked. "What's a TARDIS?"
"Time and Relative Dimension in Space," explained the Doctor.
"It's bigger on the inside," Clara interpreted.
"Its primary function is manipulating the time vortex and advanced long-range quantum teleportation."
"It's a time machine. And can teleport," Clara said.
"And thus…Artron Energy?" Dawn asked.
"Right!" Clara said cheerfully. "Artron Energy. I'll just go…pop out and get it, shall I?"
"There are Cybermen out there," said the Doctor in disbelief.
"You got a better idea?" Clara asked.
"Y—" the Doctor stumbled, falling into one of the large Cybermen plates. "Cyberium," he muttered. Clara took one look at him, and ran, back through the tunnel and up the steps. With a button, she was able to push the rock aside, pulling herself up back onto the surface of the planet.
I can give you directions, Me told her. There's no more Cybermen in your area right now, so hurry.
Burnt rubber. That was what it smelled like; Clara realized. The metal plates were covered in soot and ash, and a good portion of the room looked like it had been attacked with a flamethrower. Unconnected wires sizzled with energy; their ends chopped off by something sharp enough to shear their threads uniformly.
"Doctor?" Clara called. Nobody. The hideout had been abandoned, and the time machine destroyed. There was hardly enough light left. All the lights on the time machine had been turned off, except for one bulb which flickered sadly in the darkness. "Leona? Reg? Dawn? Ko?" Clara peered around anxiously. "Anybody? Hello?"
A bright blue light shone on the floor, catching her attention. Clara knelt down to take a closer look. Scooping up the Doctor's sonic screwdriver, she stared at it, fascinated. Standing up, Clara called out again. She shone it around the room like a flashlight. "Doctor?" Clara called. "What happened? Did the time machine—" The eerie blue light fell on a dirty footprint on the ground, far too flat and large to be from a human. "Guess that answers that question." The sonic screwdriver buzzed.
The Cybermen must've taken him, Me said.
"Right," Clara responded. "So where would they have brought him?"
Let me see…they have a large ship, just leaving. Possibly teleported him there.
There was a sound, a wheezing, groaning noise, as a TARDIS phased in. The scraps of razor-thin copper wire and calculation-covered paper that littered the floor began to flutter in the air, thrust backwards by the wind of the materializing rock. Me stepped out, raising eyebrows. She whacked the rock, the TARDIS, with the side of her hand, and winced in pain. Turning to Clara, she shrugged. "Chameleon circuit broken again."
"Can we hurry up and find the Doctor?" Clara asked.
"Okay, okay," Me said. "Don't want time to be rewritten, I get it." She stepped inside, seeming the pass straight through the grey stone. Clara followed her, entering the sterile white room inside.
"Setting temporal normative measures," Clara announced, flicking a few switches. "You got spatial coordinates for the ship?"
"Yep!" Me said, typing something into the screen that they had installed recently, then pushing it around so that Clara could see. "Flagship coming right up!" The Time Rotor began to move again, up and down, up and down, as the TARDIS dematerialized and rematerialized inside the spaceship.
Clara poked her head out, seeing an empty metal hallway. This time, though, the walls had glowing blue circles, like the ones on the Cybermen's chests. "Are you going to come with?" She asked Me.
"Better not," Me frowned. "The Doctor seeing me could disrupt the causal nexus."
"Where are they?" Clara asked.
"Behind that door," Me said. "I'll be in contact, but I should go. Don't want them finding the TARDIS."
"Right," Clara smiled. "Walking straight into a room of Cybermen unarmed. Definitely not the most idiotic thing I've done." She shook her head, then stepped towards the door. It opened automatically, revealing a large room full of Cybermen.
In the center were the Doctor and the group of rebels. Dawn was lying on the ground, presumably dead. Her eyes were wide open with shock. Meanwhile, Reg was being held by one of the Cybermen, clawing at the metal arm that was slowly crushing his windpipe. Ko Sharmus and Leona were missing, and the Doctor was conversing with one of the Cybermen.
"YOU WILL RELENQUISH THE CYBERIUM!"
"No!" The Doctor said. "No, no, no, no, no. No. I will not relinquish the Cyberium. I'm a Time Lord, and it's found that I'm a rather good host—won't leave me for the likes of you. Pure metal, with a little bit of organic matter in the center. It needs far more life then a bunch of metal men."
"Uh, Doctor?" Clara said. The Cybermen turned towards her with a massive clanking sound, an army of the perfect soldiers awaiting commands. It reminded Clara of something, once, but she wasn't quite sure what.
"Clara!" The Doctor said. "Has he given you anything that might help?"
"You?" Clara asked. Right. I said I was with future him. "No. Uhm…you do have a plan, right?"
"Of course I don't have a plan. Who do you think I am?"
"YOU ARE CLARA OSWALD. YOU WILL TELL THE DOCTOR TO RELENQUISH THE CYBERIUM," one of the Cybermen ordered.
"Shut up, rusty. I don't take orders from wannabe robots," Clara said.
"THE DOCTOR HAS THE CYBERIUM."
"Yes, I do! And you're not going to get it!"
"INCORRECT."
Clara, Me said. I'm getting some very odd readings here.
"Now is not the time," Clara muttered.
Artron Energy, concentrated in the third deck, section thirty—
"Me?" Clara whispered. "Me? Are you there?" Nothing.
"Uh," Reg said tentatively to the Cyberman holding him, "you seem to want to keep me alive, and you're cutting off my air supply right now…"
"What?" The Doctor said. "Incorrect? What do you mean incorrect—and no, don't start threatening these people here, because it's not going to work."
"INCORRECT," one of the Cybermen repeated.
"Incorrect what? What's 'incorrect'?"
"WE WILL AQUIRE THE CYBERIUM."
"Oh, will you now?" The Doctor asked, pacing. "Clara, I'm done with them! They don't listen? I say 'no you won't', and they just deny it!" He pointed his sonic screwdriver at the door.
"YOUR TERMINATION WILL RELEASE THE CYBERIUM."
"Ah," said the Doctor, "but that's not going to work, is it?" He stumbled, falling against one of the Cybermen, and righted himself. "Cyberium. Taking over." He saw Clara's expression. "It's fine. We've got plenty of time, compared to them."
He's got a plan! Clara thought, triumphantly. The Doctor waved his sonic screwdriver in the air, but nothing noticeable happened.
"YOU WILL BE DELETED," announced one of the Cybermen, and five of the silver soldiers fired their arm cannons before Clara could so much as duck. She winced, but instead of hitting her, the blast of blue energy flew backwards to strike the five Cybermen in the chest. They exploded in bursts of light, disappearing.
The Doctor grinned. "I reversed the polarity," he said, making his sonic screwdriver light up. "Don't—" He held out his hand just as five more Cybermen reversed their arm cannons, and shot towards him. "I re-reversed the polarity." It came out the front end, again shooting the Cybermen in the chest. He raised his bushy eyebrows. "Now," he said. "Let's talk."
"COMMUNICATION REQUEST DENIED," announced one of the remaining Cybermen. There were ten left, lined up and facing the Doctor, Reg, and Clara. The one that had been holding Reg had disintegrated in the second wave of blasts, and he stumbled back, clutching his neck. Clara bent down over Dawn to feel her pulse, and wasn't surprised when there was nothing.
"That," said the Doctor, "was not a request. That was an order. What you're going to do is turn around and run. Because you are not going to get the Cyberium from me! And you can't shoot me!" He lit his sonic up again. "Maybe I reversed the polarity." He shrugged. "Maybe I didn't. There will be no silly shooting."
"Yeah," Reg said, "I don't think they're going to listen to that, Doc."
"Not Doc," the Doctor said. "Never 'Doc'." Clara shook her head, smiling, but the Doctor stumbled again, falling into her. "I'm fine," he muttered.
"CORRECT. THERE WILL BE NO SHOOTING."
"Now you're getting it!" The Doctor said, grinning.
"YOU ARE A LIABILITY. YOU WILL BE DELETED."
"But you can't," the Doctor boasted. "Your guns are useless against me! Always hated them, guns."
"Doctor?" Clara said quietly. "They can still kill us. You know that, right?"
"Nope!" He said. He held his hand up to cover his mouth. "I reversed the polarity of their static electricity generation weaponizing boosters."
"CORRECT," announced the Cybermen, apparently able to hear them. "DELETE. DELETE." But unlike the Cybermen Clara had seen before, on the battlefield in the 21st Century, they didn't march towards her. Instead, they stood stock-still, their heads upturned and their eyes dark and blank. The Doctor held up a finger in the air, and for a moment, everything was silent. Then his eyes widened. "Run!"
Clara, Reg, and the Doctor pushed past the Cybermen just as the door slid open with a wave of the sonic screwdriver. "What?" Reg asked. The Doctor made the metal exit close behind them, and dashed down the steel corridor.
Turning around, he stopped, and beckoned them forwards urgently. "You know how I sent Leona and Ko to find the TARDIS?" Reg nodded urgently as Clara watched him in confusion. "We're going to need it!" He rushed forwards, speeding through the corridor as Clara and Reg chased after him.
Every so often, he stopped to check the air with his sonic before opening an entrance to a new passageway or turning in a new direction. As they reached the fifth fork, Reg stopped, breathing heavily. "I…can't…"
"They're draining the oxygen," the Doctor said grimly.
"Can they do that?" Clara asked.
"I just said that they were doing it, Clara, keep up. Hurry," he said, grabbing ahold of Reg's arm and pulling him forwards. Two doors later, the Doctor turned to Clara. Reg was leaning on him, barely able to drag himself along even with the Doctor's support. "You're fine?"
"Yep," Clara said brightly, steering Reg towards the door that the Doctor had opened. "I thought we were hurrying?"
"You shouldn't be fine," the Doctor said in disbelief. "You're human. Your respiratory systems are so inefficient it's a wonder you can walk. You're not supposed to be fine."
"Was in chorus a lot," Clara said. Great, she thought sarcastically. Now I need to fake being out of breath, or else he'll figure out that I'm…like this. Dead. Sort of dead. Not dead, but not alive either. "My teacher made us sing these long notes as practice. Ms. Avril. Kids used to call her Ms. Evil." Good one, Clara complimented herself. She had always been an excellent liar. Where did that come from? Clara wondered. A memory. It's important, but I don't know…why.
The Doctor seemed to accept it, and ran down the hallway. At the end of the hallway was the TARDIS, in the form of a police public call box from the 1960s, and the trio hurried towards it. Inserting his key into the lock, the Doctor fell forwards, catching himself just in time to avoid faceplanting on the TARDIS floor.
"Oh, oh my dear sweet planet," Reg said, shaking his head in wonder. "It's bigger on the inside!"
And so, it was. The Doctor's TARDIS was even more beautiful than Clara remembered it, with its softly glowing thin white circles set into the dark grey walls and warm orange centerpiece rising up from the center of the console. The console glimmered with brightly-colored lights, contrasting sharply from the buttons' dull grey framing. Two screens stuck out from it, one with a beautiful picture of three planets orbiting around an orange sun and one with several Gallifreyan markings spinning around each other over an orange background. At the sides of the circular room were two panels, full of flashing red and blue status lights. The second level was lit by blue roundels, an orange light emitted from their center. At the top of the Time Rotor, which was above the console, sat three rotating circular objects, each one slightly larger than the one below it, inscribed with the circular language of the Time Lords.
"Finally," the Doctor said. "Someone who says it right. 'It's smaller on the outside,' she said." He pointed at Clara. "Can you believe it?"
"Maybe we should…get in?" Clara said tersely. "Before we suffocate?"
"You should," he said, pointing at the TARDIS. Reg stumbled in, gazing awe-struck at the console.
"What about you?" She asked, confused.
"Cyberium," he explained. "If I let it onto the TARDIS it will take over the machinery. But they have the power, here, to send it back. I just have to get rid of it—"
"The Cybermen are draining all of the oxygen!" Clara protested.
"Respiratory bypass system," said the Doctor.
"That won't last forever!" Clara responded.
"It'll be long enough," he said grimly. "Go. To the TARDIS. Now." Then he turned, the red-lined navy coat of his flapping as he sped down the corridor. Clara ran after him, catching up.
"Doctor," she said, trying to keep up with him as he ran.
"Go back to the TARDIS," he tried to order her, stopping to unlock a door with his sonic screwdriver.
"No."
The Doctor turned around angrily, then stared at her for a moment. He seemed to accept that she wouldn't leave, and turned back to separator, opening it. "I should be able to track the energy source," he explained as he dashed down the next corridor.
"Uhm…third deck in section thirty something," Clara said, trying to remember what Me had told her. I hope she's alright, and it just cut off because of an Artron Energy source again. "You told me. Future me, I mean you, told me to tell present you. Because he knew that I told him."
"Which one?" He asked. "Thirty-what?"
"Er…don't know."
"Third deck," the Doctor said. "That's where we're on. Section twenty-nine which means…" He opened the door with his sonic screwdriver to reveal a long corridor. At the end of it was a clear door, behind which blue energy arched around a metal sphere. "That's our time machine," said the Doctor. He stumbled again, his eyes turning pure silver for an instant before he regained control and sped towards the door with a sudden burst of speed.
Clara ran after him, struggling to keep up. He reached the door well before her, opening it with his sonic screwdriver and sliding through. Then he slammed it behind him. "Doctor!" Clara shouted.
"Go," he said. "Whoever you are, go, and pray I don't find you after this." His voice was muted by the door separated them, but none of the inflection was lost. It was cold and harsh, and it hurt Clara like knives piercing her skin.
"Whoever I am?" Clara asked, confused.
"You," he said loudly, "are not Clara Oswald."
"Yes, I am!" She protested, banging on the door with her fists. It didn't shatter. Glass, she thought. But very, very strong
"I am insulted that you think I would ever fall for that. I know Clara Oswald. You don't talk like her. You don't act like her. And your eyes. Your eyes are all wrong. Clara's eyes are wide, I don't know how she does that thing with the eyes, and yours are all small and hard." He turned away, pointing his sonic screwdriver at the time machine. "Might take a while," he muttered. "If you have hurt Clara when you stole her face, I will find you." He sneered. "Now run."
"Doctor!" Clara shouted, pounding on the door. Is he right? Clara wondered. Am I not Clara Oswald anymore? Clara would remember her mother's souffle recipe, the color of her gran's eyes, the voice of the man she loved whose name she can't remember. Me lost her name so many trillions of years ago; why would she call herself Ashildr when the Viking girl who bore that name was long dead? Clara shook her head. "Doctor! You don't understand!" He ignored her."I am Clara Oswald? Doctor, please!" Surely he was running on his respiratory bypass system by now.
Should I go to the TARDIS? Clara asked herself. The Doctor was still working with the Cybermen's time machine, having torn a portion of the metal sphere off and begun to connect the wires. Sparks flew around him, but he ignored them. "Doctor!" Clara tried again. "Please, you have to believe me, I'm from your future! Doctor, if you stay in there, you're going to die! Please!"
Clara slumped against the wall, defeated, her hand trailing down against the glass door. "You bloody idiot!" The Doctor wasn't anywhere near finished with restoring the time sphere, and she knew that he wouldn't stop even if it was going to kill him. He's going to die, Clara thought, and time's going to be rewritten. Clara on Earth will keep waiting, and waiting, and waiting for him to come. A week will pass, but she'll ignore it, because surely, it's just the Doctor's lousy piloting. And the days will slip by, and he won't come, and Clara Oswald will never see the Doctor again. I'll cease to exist.
Clara rested her head on the cool metal wall. If she could cry, she would, but working tear ducts didn't come with being extracted from one's time stream. Looking back through the window, Clara could see the Doctor lying on the ground. The Time Lord's chest wasn't rising or falling anymore. The Doctor's time had run out.