"Maybe it would be best if you didn't come by for a bit – let her heal, then we could reintroduce you to her proper like." There was an anxious twinge to the other man's voice as he stared at the Doctor, hand dropping away from the arm he'd caught him by just before he was going to enter the room, a fresh bouquet of red roses for Clara to replace the ones he'd brought the week before.
"We've been reintroduced, Dave," the Doctor laughed, glancing at the door before looking back to the man who watched his every movement. "We're getting along, you've seen her – she's happy, she's recovering…"
"I think you should go for a bit is all," Dave interrupted.
The Doctor's head gave a small shake and he watched the man going red at the neck, knew there was more to this than just a father's jealousy over his daughter's preference for the stranger who'd stood by her bed when she woke. "What's brought this on?" He responded quietly.
He shifted awkwardly and the Doctor waited, glancing to the door as Dave allowed slowly, "She's remembered her mother's death."
With a nod, the Doctor replied, "This is good, Dave – regaining memories…"
Taking a deep breath, the man continued, "She got some sort of compartment syndrome in her leg; they're going to have to take it off just beneath the knee, set it for this morning…"
"They can't just take her leg," the Doctor barked, free hand coming up into the space in front of him before he shook his head, "No, I can take her somewhere else – somewhere she'll be treated with better technology, more advanced medicine..."
"In what," Dave called, "Your Tardis? And where? Some space planet?"
"Yes, Dave," the Doctor shouted, "Some space planet, in the future, where they can heal her instead of dismembering her!" He pushed past the man as he argued, barging into the room to find the space empty and he turned to growl, "You didn't."
"She agreed," Dave pointed.
"She's distraught!" The Doctor watched as security appeared just beside Dave, giving him a look of reproach before the Doctor took a long breath and reminded, "I am her husband; I make these decisions with her."
"I'm her father – she doesn't even remember you," Dave accused lowly. "She'll be out of surgery soon and you should go."
"Out of surgery – she'll be in recovery," the Doctor nodded, turning and exiting the room as Dave followed, but he raised his Sonic at the elevator, reached it just as it opened and he gave it another buzz so that as he slipped in, the doors closed unceremoniously in Dave Oswald's face.
The machine climbed slowly, just as the rage in his chest did, and by the time he reached the surgical ward, he could feel his cheeks burning with anger as he flashed his psychic paper and was allowed into the restricted area. He settled the roses down and found a surgical gown, dressing himself and pulling a mask over his face to step into the operating room where he closed his eyes against the sight of her leg, what was left of it, being sewn up as she slept.
"Did everything go according to procedure?" He asked weakly, voice muffled by the mask over his mouth as he flashed his psychic papers again and the staff shrank away from him anxiously at the title they saw, and some nodded.
"Everything's gone well," he was told and just as the man began to give him specifics, he raised a hand to shush him, a hand that dropped lightly atop the bandaged head in front of him.
With a sigh, he uttered "Oh, Clara, what have you let them do?"
He turned away and clutched his hand tightly, pushing back out through the doors and tearing the mask off his face before glaring up at Dave coming towards him. "You have no right to be here," the man shouted.
Taking a deep breath to contain his anger, he stared at the other man who came to a stop two feet away to glare at him. "I have every right to be here – and I had every right to be included in this decision."
"To what?" Dave shouted, "Convince her to let you wheel her into your space ship, whisk her off to some dangerous planet where they'd magically fix her?"
Nodding, the Doctor closed his eyes, trying to push his anger aside and understand these were the words of a frustrated father – of a scared father; and he'd been in his position before. When he finally met the other man's gaze, he told him plainly, "Yes, Dave. I would have found a way. It's not magic, some hocus pocus trick I pull out of my hat for a laugh – it's giving her all of the options that are available to her."
"What of her memories, huh?" Dave asked on a huff, "Could you have found a cure for those as well, Doctor? Is there something out there that can bring my Clara back to me – the way that she was?"
"No," he began.
"And what of her daughter, Doctor. No tricks in your bag?" He spat angrily. "You've got a bloody time machine; can't you just go back, take that car out of her path, give her back her life – or better, stop yourself from being in hers?"
The Doctor swung out before he had time to think, clocking the other man square in the jaw as he shouted, "She was my daughter too!" He turned on the spot, hands coming up to his neck on either side as he exhaled a growl, then he dropped a pointed finger at Dave, who was leaning warily against the wall, "That was our daughter she was carrying and I would…" he swallowed his words a moment, watching Dave's tears beginning to drop. "If it were possible, I would turn back time, I would erase it, bend it, break it, but I can't, Dave. You think I haven't tried? I can't," he trailed, turning and swinging his fists down to pound once into the pale blue paint there. "I can't fix her," he cried, turning to Dave, "I can't."
Taking a step towards him, Dave watched the Doctor as he hunched his shoulders and bowed his head and he watched in shock as he dissolved into quiet sobs. The great Doctor Clara had always gone on and on about had been reduced to a simple husband mourning what had happened to his wife and Dave felt all of his defenses drop as he watched him because he knew that pain well. He'd stood in his very place, fifteen years before in a hospital waiting room, and he'd been helpless against the doctor telling him his wife would never recover from her own injuries.
Dave looked to the Doctor and he suddenly saw himself, wondering how he was going to raise his daughter while keeping himself standing, without Ellie, and he slowly approached the other man. He reached up, pressing a palm to the back of his neck to pull him into a hug. One the Doctor latched onto, hands grasping at the material of Dave's sweater as he sobbed into his shoulder. The Doctor understood compartment syndrome, understood Clara had to have been in pain and it angered him that she hadn't said anything sooner. She'd simply sat in that bed and laughed at his jokes and his faces and his stories and she'd pretended like nothing was wrong.
Because she was Clara.
She thought she had to be braver than the men in the room trying to comfort her. She had to be fearless in the face of so much fear so they wouldn't worry because she knew they were worrying about her. Clara felt she had to be limitless – just like always.
"Is this going to affect her travelling with you?" Dave asked softly, and the Doctor knew the question came not from a place of satisfaction, but from a place of sorrow thinking his daughter wouldn't be able to enjoy what he knew she rightfully deserved.
He nodded slowly, slipping back, before sniffling and smiling and then shaking his head and telling him honestly, "There will be limitations for a time, but no. No, Dave, she'll be just as strong and just as capable as anyone else who's flown with me." He grinned then, telling him honestly, "And she's always been so much more."
"She'll have to get a prosthetic – I've been talking to the nurses, they say in about two weeks…"
The Doctor was already nodding, "I'll see to it she's got the best available. And she'll do brilliantly with it, Dave." He laughed, "She'll be running before you know it; living her life as full as it's always been."
Dave smiled, head tilting in a way that was so familiar to the Doctor, and he offered, "Listen to me. I'm her father and all I've offered up are boundaries… restrictions. Thinking she's not capable and here you are," he lifted a hand to gesture at him, "All you know are open spaces." He laughed, "She always said you reminded her of her mum; I can see that now."
With a slow nod, the Doctor sighed and he explained, "You gave her the notion that actions have consequences and even though she's quite a free spirit, that notion guides her, Dave – don't think you haven't played a part in how magnificent Clara truly is."
"Oh," Dave laughed, "I know." Then he looked to the double doors behind them and admitted, "It's not what I wanted; it's what they said had to be done." Dave shook his head as he continued, "I'm frightened this'll all be too much – every person has a line that, when crossed, there's simply a chaos they can't control."
Working his lips against one another, the Doctor nodded knowingly, but he knew that Clara's line wouldn't be the struggle to regain her memories, or working to re-establish her life, or the leg she'd just lost, or the recovery she'd have to go through. It was a single piece of information, a single life that had been taken from her, and when he looked up at Dave, he could see that knowledge in the other man's eye. And the question – when do we tell her? And how?
"She wants to know how you met," Dave told him quietly, shifting awkwardly as he pushed his hands into the pockets of his trousers. "She wants to know more about you."
He nodded slowly, replying, "She'll be here another two weeks, at least; enough time for me to sweep through our place," he trailed before straightening, "There are things that need to be packed away." He thought on the photo albums he'd have to sift through; the items littering every corner of each room that weren't quite explainable. And the small assortment of tiny clothes she'd begun to collect. On a painful exhale, he told Dave, "We'll reintroduce her to her flat first, to how I fit in there… work on the details of time travelling later."
He began walking towards a waiting room at the end of the hall when Dave called out to him, "How do we tell her about the baby?"
The Doctor turned, eyes avoiding Dave's before he nodded and responded, "For now, we don't."