"I know it's not comfortable, Clara – it'll take some getting used to," Martha began slowly, watching the woman in front of her stand awkwardly, shifting as instructed to lock the pin at the end of the sleeve on her leg into the socket of the prosthetic limb set firmly against the ground underneath her.

With a small giggle, Clara reached out for her hands, taking them lightly and smiling up at her a moment before telling her quietly, "Both feet on the ground."

Martha passed a glance at Dave, and then at the Doctor, seeing them both clenching their jaws to keep from crying, their feelings conflicted about the sight before them – on the one hand ecstatic Clara was so enthused to begin walking again, on the other devastated that it had to be this way – and then she asked Clara, "You ready to try and take a few steps?"

She shifted forward immediately with her left leg and Martha gave a wheeze of a laugh before nodding to prompt Clara to try to maneuver her right leg up and then settle the prosthetic to the ground. "Ok," Clara sighed before adding, "Bit different."

"Let's try a few more steps," Martha encouraged, "It might be a bit uncomfortable, a bit strange, but if there's any pain, anything that doesn't feel quite right, you let me know and we can make adjustments." She nodded to the Doctor and Dave, "We'll make as many adjustments as needed."

Dave pointed, "She'll need a new one every so often, yeah?"

Nodding, Martha turned back to tell Clara, "Could be every few months, if you're running enough. But we're working on a better version for you for that."

Face crumpling in amused confusion, Clara laughed at her words before moving forward with her, not releasing her hands as she concentrated on walking. And she sniffled lightly before whispering, "I'm walking."

"Yeah," Martha breathed back quietly, "You're walking, Clara."

"Doctor?" Clara coughed, "Doctor, how do I look?" She took another step and then grinned up at him, blushing when she saw him, hands planted on either side of his neck, wide smile on his lips, eyes red with unshed tears of happiness.

Her gaze shifted towards her father just as the Doctor proclaimed, "You look fantastic, Clara."

But she watched her father push a hand over his eyes, the other crossed over his stomach and she could see the shake of his shoulders, frowning because she knew he was crying and she moved towards him awkwardly with Martha's help. "Dad," she prompted, reaching out and stumbling just as he looked up.

Dave caught Clara by her elbows with a quiet laugh, but he averted his eyes as she searched them, knowing she wanted a reason for his tears and he admitted on a whisper, "It shouldn't be you going through this, Clara – it should be someone else."

"Someone else suffering in my place?" She questioned with a frown.

"No, I don't know, Clara, just…" he shook his head, "It just shouldn't be you."

Martha and the Doctor exchanged a look of apprehension and Martha went to jot down notes on her tablet as Clara took another slow step forward to embrace her father, telling him, "But it is, and it's absolute bullocks, but there's nothing we can do about that now."

Looking up at the Doctor, Dave inhaled deeply and then replied, "Yeah, nothing we can do."

The look in the other man's eyes had been one of accusation – he'd been getting it from Dave since the day he'd found out the Doctor was an alien, had travelled the universe through time with his daughter, and had brought her back one day with a fever threatening to kill her if she wasn't cooled quickly. The Doctor hadn't expected Dave to be at her flat, and there hadn't been time to explain as they emerged from the Tardis. He'd shouted at the man to bring every piece of ice – every pack of frozen peas and every box of ice cream sandwiches – everything and anything Clara had in her freezer to the bathroom as he jumped into the shower and pulled the knob, listening to the moan of discomfort against his chest.

"What's happening? What's wrong with Clara? I'll call an ambulance."

"Dave, just bring me the damned peas!"

It had been faster to get to her place than to get to a bathroom in the Tardis and, in retrospect, he probably should have just dropped them in the arctic, but he hadn't been thinking. Clara had dropped beside him in the jungle with little more than a whimper and he'd thrown the Tardis into the vortex for the safest place he could think of – her flat. He didn't even know when that became his safe place, his comfort zone, his home, but he'd sat in the tub pulling the cardigan off her shoulders with the frigid water splashing down on them when Dave had returned and bent gently beside the tub, pressing the bag to her forehead and wincing when she grimaced.

"Tell me what's going on?" Dave had asked simply.

He'd taken it well, helping him strip Clara down to her bra and knickers as she shivered, all the while giving him that look – one that argued if he'd left her at home, if he'd left her alone, she'd be fine. Except it was so much more complicated than whatever Dave thought. Clara had woven herself into the fabric of his life in a way no one had in a very long time and he'd found himself ignoring the lecture he was getting from the man who paced the bathroom, Clara's soaking wet blouse twisting roughly in his hands.

"I love her," the Doctor had finally shouted, stopping Dave's steps, before calmly breathing, "And if you love her at all you'll shut up and bring me the thermometer she keeps in the bottom left drawer of the vanity there."

She'd been hit with a poison dart from an amphibian she'd tried to get a better look at and he knew that the human immune system would do more to heal her than any medicine, but he also knew he had to keep her cool for that to happen. For the poison to slow its destruction so her body could fight and after the shower, when he quickly discarded Clara of the soaked undergarments before pulling a long shirt over her head as she remained in his lap, he'd done so with Dave standing two feet away, a light gasp of surprise at the level of comfort this stranger had exhibited with his daughter's naked body.

Laying her down in her bed and pulling the sheets to her neck, the Doctor had brushed a hand over her head as Dave uttered quietly, "Not the best way to find out your daughter's shaggin' an alien."

The Doctor had turned then with a simple, "I'm sorry it had to be this way," and since then they'd maintained an amicable relationship for Clara's sake – because it brightened her face to be able to have the both of them in the same room. It eased the burden on her shoulders to be able to honestly tell her father where they'd travelled and what they'd done. It made her happy and he would suffer through the scowls and the occasional witty jab if she could smile during Christmas dinner, if she could look forward to it.

Now he stared at the ceiling with one arm wrapped behind his head, thinking about how he would have to deal with Dave's jealousy over the fact that the man had to head off to work each morning while the Doctor remained behind to help Clara recover. He had to deal with knowing the man was less adept at adjusting to differences in the human body; less so than an alien who had spent his lifetime travelling the stars and seeing every type body the universe could create. He had to deal with the smell of little old ladies because if he disappeared too long, she'd want an answer as to why and Clara wasn't ready for the Tardis.

He glanced up as the door opened and watched Dave enter the room, walking to the edge of the bed to calmly tell him, "She's asleep."

With a nod, he replied, "I know."

"She did well, first day and all – your friend was really good with her."

He smiled and told the ceiling knowingly, "Martha Smith is most definitely a star."

"Dr. Smith, she was a travelling companion of yours. Before Clara, wasn't she."

Turning to look at the calmness in the other man's eyes, the Doctor nodded and admitted, "Yes, we travelled together, a little over a year, though the majority of that we were apart," he sighed, "And then most of it got erased."

Dave chuckled softly and the Doctor could hear the honest amusement in it. "How many girls," he began, head dropping slightly before raising it again to ask boldly, "How many girls had you travelled with? Before Clara."

He sat up abruptly, legs swinging over the side of the bed and he could see the exhaustion in Dave's eyes, knew it was well past midnight and he should be asleep, but he'd gone into Clara's room to watch her – to make sure she settled in alright for the night after a long afternoon of using the prosthetic around the house, and even up the stairs. He imagined her legs would now be sore to go along with the arms that had grown tired of crutches and holding herself up.

All things she'd have to strengthen her body to accommodate.

Narrowing his eyes curiously, the Doctor answered, "I've had many travelling companions; some not entirely companions – it's not an easy number to pinpoint."

"Have you ever loved any of them?" Dave asked pointedly.

"I've loved all of them," the Doctor told him with a nod.

Raising a hand to gesture at him, Dave corrected, "Yeah, but have you ever fallen in love with any of them?"

He lowered his head, knowingly, and then admitted, "Yes."

"And what happened to them?"

The Doctor glanced back up to find Dave waiting, hand hanging limply at his side while the other rested in the pocket of his trousers and he smiled, "They were lost to time, I suppose."

"Lost to time," Dave repeated gruffly. "Will that happen to Clara?" He turned to give the door a quick look before twisting back, "You'll help her heal up and then take her back out to the stars and eventually she'll be lost to time travelling with you?" He shook his head, "What's that mean even, lost to time? Did they die? Did you leave 'em behind as they grew too old for you?"

They were the questions the Doctor knew the other man had been refusing to ask for years and he pushed off the bed to take a step closer to him and he told him honestly, "Some were left behind for their own good; some passed on – but I loved them no less."

"What would you have done if she hadn't been in the accident, Doctor," Dave prompted, "If she'd had that baby girl – would you have taken them both?"

For a moment he watched him, trying to gauge where this conversation was headed, but the other man stared at him blankly and so he nodded, slowly, and told him, "Yes, we would have travelled. As a family."

With a sigh and a scratch of his forehead, Dave shifted on the spot and the Doctor could see the disappointment in his eyes. To him, the Doctor knew, travelling was danger and travelling with a child would have been putting Clara and her child in danger.

"I know you're old, Doctor," Dave told him, "Thousand and a couple hundred, Clara says, and I know she loves you – won't shut up about you and the things you do together when I get her started – but I understand this is a setback." He was nodding to himself as he continued, "Her leg, it'll take time before she's able to really get back to herself and that'll take a toll on your travelling and maybe you could go for a while."

"Go?" He questioned. "You've told me to go before, Dave, and I told you I wouldn't – I told you she'd be able to travel with me; everything, after a time, could go back to how it was before."

He merely sighed and nodded, "I'm sorry. She's just – she's all I've got. I hadn't thought about it in a long while and now, with the accident, it's just suddenly gotten a bit more real, that fact: she's all I've got."

Smiling lightly, the Doctor shook his head and he pointed, "You're forgetting something, Dave."

"What's that?"

Lowering his chin bashfully, he offered, "I know we don't get on as well as either one of us would like, or, for that matter, Clara, but when we were married, I married all of her – being a son in law sort of came with the package."

Dave laughed and tilted his head back, asking lightly, "You're never leaving her, are you?"

"I really don't intend to," he answered honestly.

Gesturing to the door, Dave shot quickly with a sad grin, "Then make yourself useful and take out the bins."