A/N: I gotta admit, this story just took a turn I absolutely did not see coming. I hope you'll like where this is heading now :)

"I would try and sleep it all away, but I would find you in my dreams too." – David Jones.

"Hey, you're back!"

The Doctor was welcomed by the sweet sound of her voice the moment he entered the same diner he had been not so long ago. He had no idea how he had managed to find the small restaurant again when he couldn't see a palm ahead of him. The universe seemed to be making it up for taking his eyes away.

"Hello," his voice was harsh, stuck in the back of his throat. He didn't know why he had come back there, he didn't know how he had escaped Nardole's constant hovering. He just trusted his hearts to go to the only place where he knew he would be listened, he wouldn't be taken care of, he would have a friend.

He had no idea what her name was, yet he knew he'd got a friend in her.

"Careful," she warned him, her sound a little closer to him than before, "Or you might slam into the same table you did not so long ago."

The Doctor stopped dead on his track – he had completely forgotten about that incident. He was so focused tried to see her through his sonic glasses he forgot to pay attention to his path. "Right. I forgot."

He heard steps approaching by. "I take you're still blind."

"As a matter of fact, yes," he muffed, his tone lacking the pity it was bound to have. "I borrowed from the universe my eyesight for a few moments, but you know how the universe works, always making us pay for what it gives it. Or was it a dream? I don't know. Reality and fiction tend to equally ridiculous; sometimes it's hard to tell them apart."

He felt her small fingers wrap around his wrists, circling themselves around his pulse. Her hand was cold, even colder than his, like she didn't have a heartbeat to keep her body warm. Why wouldn't she have a heartbeat? "So you're bargaining with the stars, now."

He looked down at her height. Had he still got his eyes, he was sure he would enjoy the view. "You know what they say, bargain is one of the stages of grief."

She chuckled to herself, but he heard her anyway, "You don't seem to me like the kind of person who buys whatever they say."

"Guess I'm not," he shrugged. She seemed to know him so well, even better than himself. "But the real question is, are you?"

For the time it took her to reply, he assumed she was either giving it a great amount of thought or had done some sort of movement with her head, forgotten he couldn't see it. "I'd say it depends on who are they."

"Fair enough," he mumbled under his breath.

She tightened the grip around his fist, "Come on, let's get you a seat."

The Doctor let her guide him towards whatever direction. It was a different table from the one he had last sat, he felt the sunlight coming directly at him, warming him, warming both of them. He pulled his seat on his own, expecting her to do the same.

She didn't. "Can I get you anything? This is still a diner; I've got food."

"Food would be nice," he considered, "But I don't have money with me. I don't think I have money at all."

Surprisingly, she laughed at his remark, "I never said you'd have to pay."

The Doctor fussed with his brows, "Do I really have to explain to you how capitalism works?"

The barista cracked a loud giggle. Why did she find every that dared to escape his lips so amusing? "No, I think you've already did a good job on that last time you were here," she explained, "I'm just saying, I like your company. I'm giving you free food."

He twitched his nose, agreeing, "If you really want to. Just remember, I've got a big appetite. I could give your diner a great amount of prejudice."

She whiffed, "I'll take my chances."

She was absent for a few moments, leaving the Doctor to carefully study the darkness around him. When she returned, she dropped a basket full of pastries in front of him. He was startled by it falling down the table, followed by the sound of her voice, "Well, knock yourself off."

He eyed at her direction intrigued, leaving the snacks untouched, "Won't you joy me? I'd hate to be delighted on my own. Besides, your company pleases me. A lot."

Reluctantly, she took the seat in front of his. Her hand moved to reach a tart at the same time his did, causing them to slam against one another. They both awkwardly leaned back, and the Doctor was the one to cut the ice in the air, "I guess we're more in synch than we'd like to admit."

"Hm, how about that," she hissed, tried to sustain her exterior façade as calm as ever. He had lived for too long not to miss the hint of sorrow in her voice.

Clumsily, he stretched his arm, long enough to reach the opposite edge of the counter, where he wasn't surprised to find her hand just waiting for his. It felt so odd how her grip seemed to be made especially for his. "I feel… I feel like I've known you forever."

Her hand slightly started to shake beneath his, but she couldn't pull it away. Not just yet. "Maybe you have."

He shook his head up and down several times. "I've lived a very long life. Longer than you might think I have."

She gave him a slight squeeze, "Who's to say my life hasn't been just as incredibly long as yours?"

The Doctor's lips turned into a twisted smile. "Maybe we've both been running for a long time only to find each other in the end."

She seemed hesitant at first, but eventually, she came to terms with his sentence, "I'd like to believe that, yeah."

Running his tongue against the back of his teeth, he grabbed a pastry from the basket, throwing it inside his mouth. He made no effort to end the bond between the two of them, neither did she seem to mind. "These tastes really good."

The girl didn't seem to really believe his words, "My mum used to be a great baker. I've still got all of her recipes, but unfortunately I didn't inherit her cooking skills."

He whiffed, "You're greater at this than you might think," his words were true to their meaning.

She leaned closer into the table, wrapping his fingers around her own, "You flatter me."

"Flattering is good," he spoke with his mouth fool, "It does wonders to one's egos."

She hummed in agreeance, "I'd take it that you know it better than anyone else."

The Doctor ran his free hand through his messy hair. "Yeah? What gave me away?"

She teased him by being silent for a short while, "How you're dying to tell me your story just so you can get some compliments from me."

"Oh, come on," he blurted out, "I'm not that obnoxious."

She couldn't tell whether he was joking or a serious as he could be, "Have you met yourself?"

He broke into laughter, "Well, then why don't you let me tell you a story and you'll decide how obnoxious I am."

The Doctor could hear her lips turning into a wide smile, so he smiled as well, "Sounds good to me."

He bounced his head, looking straight at the darkness that she was made of. He was afraid the physical contact was bothering her, but did no effort to end it. "I have this friend, who just happens to be my archenemy as well. I love her, but I absolutely dread her. She once called my companion a pet, and now I've had my revenge by making her my pet for one thousand years."

"That doesn't sound like something you'd do," she hypothesized, softly.

"I didn't have a choice," he said in self-defense. "I took an oath, I sworn to guard the vault where she was trapped for that time. Her becoming a pet was just a consequence of my promises."

She swallowed hard, "Right."

"Moving on. Have you ever had a dream that felt so real you couldn't tell fiction from reality apart?"

"As a matter of fact, yes," she confessed.

"Well, trust me, Santa Claus is not a real person," he assured. "I was trapped in my own fiction, being as sure as heck that it was real life. When you live a life like mind, you've seen so many things you don't doubt the absurd that is happening right in front of you. Stupid me, how could I actually dream the Pope had come to see me?"

She grinned through her teeth, "So you're having dreams with the Church now. Interesting."

If he didn't know better, he would say she knew about his dreams like nobody else. "Yes. More specifically, with a secret ancient scripture, as old as time, lost in translation. And everyone who tried to read it was left dead. Death by themselves. Of course, I was asked to read the text. The Veritas."

"Why you?" she pondered the obvious, but seemed to already know the answer.

"Because, who else?" he gestured with his free hand, "Then again, how can I read something when I'm blind? They didn't know that, of course. Who would trust a blind man to save the world?"

"See that ego I was talking about," she muffed under the breath, not really expecting a comeback.

He carried on, "We were taken to the forbidden library of the Vatican, where the text silently waited for me. I was carrying this gadget, from my people, that would read the words and transport them to my brain. It could be really useful if you're a student and stressed because of finals," he joked. "We were welcomed by a bright light, like someone had broken in, but how could have any one broken in the most secure place in the Vatican?"

"Who were they?"

"I'm getting there," he held a hand up in the air, "The Veritas was locked inside a cage, so no one would be able to be near it. But then again, what is the main purpose of a cage? To be broken in. By priests, especially. He had a gun in his hand, but that's not the issue. The problem was, he had sent a copy of the translated Veritas out to the world."

She sniffed, "Not the brightest idea."

"Not at all," he agreed, "I connected the reading device to my brain, and waited. I was facing with two possibilities, having my eyesight back temporally, or having my brain fried. Luckily, I was granted with the first alternative, even if it was all still blurry. I would be able to read the Veritas. Irrelevant, I should say, as I noticed I wasn't alone anymore, but surrounded by creatures. Not descent and nice creatures, for killing me they desired."

"Did they? Kill you?"

The Doctor chuckled, "You see, you can't die on a dream. If you die there, you die in reality as well, because your body can't tell dream from real apart. As you can see, I'm still here," he grinned, "They took the Veritas away from me, having no idea I had stolen the laptop with its content as I ran away. The moment I thought I had hid away from them, I tried to read the text, but my vision was fading away again."

"I'm sorry," she hummed in a low tone, disregarding he had lost his eyes again only in the land of dreams.

He shrugged, "I managed to escape the place. I have no idea how, but that's the stuff with dreams, isn't it? I was suddenly at the Oval Room, facing the dead president, because he had read the Veritas as well. I told Bill about what it was about, you remember Bill? The scripture narrated about an evil demon who wanted to conquer the world, but in order to do so, it had to learn about the world first. And the only way to do so was by creating a parallel reality, a shadow reality, where everyone thinks they're real, but they're not."

She leaned closer to the table, "Wait, so you're telling me that you weren't dreaming, but stuck in another reality?"

"In general terms, yeah," he nodded, "And the only way to escape that reality was by killing themselves. Killing ourselves. Bill disappeared out of thin air, as that creature, the demon, came to me. They wanted to kill me, they had already killed me too many times. But how do you kill a man made of belief?"

"How?"

"You don't!" he exclaimed, loudly, proudly, "You delete them, like you delete a file from your computer. But you see, the file was once a part of your computer, so you can't truly erase them from existence. What did I do, you might be wondering, and the answer is simple: virtual me emailed real me. Telling myself of all that had happened in that reality, and that I had to stop them from conquering the world."

"Clever," she concluded.

He hummed. "Remember that friend that I had kept inside a vault? Well, yeah. If it comes to it, she'll be my only help to save the world. To save you."

He knew she had blushed with his words. "Well, is it what you're doing next? Waiting for the world to be attacked by demons and save it?"

"Yes. Doing what I always do," he smiled briefly, "Wanna come help save the world with me?"

"Nah," she was quick to say, although there was too much desire hidden beneath her voice, "I think you've got enough help already."

He let out a breath, "I could always use some more."

She gave his hand one last slight squeeze, before letting it go. "Then you know where to find me if you do."

A/N: Any feedback is much appreciated :)