Chapter Three
"You are not in the right universe…," Kitty explained, "You aren't real. You guys are characters thought up by TV writers." Clara looked as if she would cry. "I'm not real?" She slowly took of her glasses and her words continued to get softer and softer. "I've never been real?"
"No, no, Clara," the Doctor grabbed Clara's shoulders, "You're very real. This is a different universe. The paradox that the TARDIS didn't like is that the TARDIS' existence was being questioned." There is always going to be a parallel universe where the unthinkable is real but I want you to know that you, Clara Oswald, you are real. Even if you aren't real here you are still very real to me." She meaningfully embraced him. He stoked her hair as she sniffled tears into his shoulder.
Kitty awkwardly stood there, half feeling uncomfortable and half wishing the couple in front of her would kiss already. "So," Kitty interrupted, "How are you guys gonna get back home?" They pulled apart and began to think of ways to return to their universe. "Wait! I want to show you something before you go, but you might want to keep your glasses on."
Just across the busy street there was a small little knick knack shop. Usually it hardly ever got any visitors except for the occasional person who believed it was a greeting card shop. After seeing rows upon rows of odds and ends they would walk out with their head hung in despair. But Kitty loved the shop more than anyone else, and she was on a first name basis with the shop owners. A silver bell on the door rang as they trudged into the store. A twenty-something girl stood behind the checkout counter with a smile on her face. "Glad to see you've come back! Did you come to see the Dalek ice cubes trays I called you about?" Clara and the Doctor's faces went blank. "Um, not today. I'm just showing some friends around." Kitty motioned to her friends and the cashier nodded in agreement. Kitty knew about every display in the store. She had made her own little hangout in the far back, which consisted of a tattered bean bag, a fuchsia shag rug, stacks of books, Christmas lights, several half-full bags of chips, and hundreds of papers and pencils littering the floor with no order.
The Doctor jumped back as he nearly stepped on a large pile of drawings that were just thrown on the floor. He carefully bent down and picked up a big stack, but his eyes grew wide and he quickly dropped them, letting them float to the floor in an even bigger mess. "How?"
These were pictures of the Doctor's past. There was a Time War scene, a crudely drawn Seal of Rassilon, a blue sketch of the TARDIS flying through space, and more. The main thing the Doctor noticed was the drawings were all perfect. Not perfect by the artistic skills, but perfect as in each detail was included exactly. And every single picture was signed with Gallifreyan. The Doctor eyed each circle and swoop in the letters. "This is your name, isn't it?"
Kitty nodded silently and looked at her own work. "Okay, I want to show you something else," she whispered, with a bit of nervousness in her voice. She walked toward the middle of the shop, and Clara and the Doctor automatically followed. "This might be kind of hard for you guys. Sorry 'bout that."
Shelves were lined with objects. The Doctor couldn't believe that they were there, so he could only process them as objects, because it was too hard to understand. There were plastic sonic screwdrivers, t-shirts with the TARDIS on them, books about made-up adventures he apparently had but never really happened, and more. Shelf after shelf, row after row, of the impossible. "How about we trade, you'll help me understand something if I help you understand."
"Were you trying to find a ghost that wasn't really a ghost in the 1970's recently? As in, you've gone nowhere else since then, besides here of course.
"Yes, that's right. Now for my question."
Clara blurt out before the Doctor could continue.
"What do we do now?"