Hello my dear readers! How have I missed you all! I am so so very sorry for the time it took me to update this chapter but there is a very good reason to it: exams! Yup, I had exams at uni and an awful lot of writing assignments to do, including a short story so it took me a lot of time. But now here is Chapter 47, the end of Journey to the Center of the Tardis!

Next episode treated will be the Name of the Doctor, a Meanwhile in the Tardis might find its way between the two stories but I remind you that Time and Space will reach its end before Christmas so we are coming very close to the ending.

Turtle: My dear you are an incredible support! I wish I had the time to talk to you more lately but I'm glad you are still supporting my work! :)

Thank you to Freya Astrid Nova for the proofreading! You are amazing girl, such a great support, you guys really should check her story on my profile: "The Starving Ones".

Do not hesitate to give me feedback, I take criticism very good as long as it's justified and constructive :)

I hope you will like this chapter! You can listen to "A madman in a box" extended version when they reach the heart of the Tardis if you like :)

Enjoy!

Melody - x.

Chapter 47

Between the steam coming out of the pipes and grids, four shapes were trying to find their way to the heart of the machine, only the constant buzzing and light of the sonic screwdriver to guide them in this endless shifting maze.

A few steps ahead of them, a shadow seemed to cross the corridor, making Clara step ahead and stop their progression.

"Shhh…There's something in here." she said frowning, trying to see.

"Those things, they followed us." said Tricky.

Clara turned to glance at the Doctor. He was hiding something from them, Clara knew it, she knew that face.

"Doctor…" she started.

"Trust me." he simply said, looking down at her and squeezing the hand that did not bear the burn.

She only nodded as an answer before becoming startled like the others as a new rattle came from behind them, meaning one of the creatures was chasing them.

"They're on the move again." said Gregor.

"Run, move, move!" shouted the Doctor, making all the others go first.

They ran through the corridors and at one point, Clara turned around… to find she was alone again.

"Doctor...? Ugh, again…"

She looked around her to the different corridors and the direction the Tardis was offering her.

Suddenly she jumped as at the other end of the corridor she saw herself walking.

"I know what I said I was the one who said it." she heard her own voice echo against the walls.

She made a few steps in direction of her reflection, frowning a little.

"Please tell me there's a button you can press to fix this!" she heard herself say behind her, making her jump again. It felt weird to be within and without at the same time, because this was not just a reflection like in a mirror, it was moving and talking on its own. It felt weird to see the person she was…

She backed away slowly and as she stepped to her left in a corridor, still watching her reflection, she started to run. At a corner, she almost bumped into the Doctor, letting out a surprised exclamation.

"Oh thank God! Doctor?"

He was not looking at her and seemed lost in his thoughts. It seemed that he could not even hear her.

"Clara stop! Don't touch it!"

She jumped again, surprised by the voice of the Doctor coming behind her.

"There's a rupture in time somewhere on board the ship." he explained getting carefully closer to her. "A small tear in the fabric of the continuum. It must have happened when the Tardis was pulled in by the salvage vessel. The Tardis is leaking."

"Leaking what?" she asked as the Doctor grabbed her hand and led her through the corridors back to the others.

"The past. You and me." he said. "Everything we've done, everything we've said. Recent history. It's not real, it's a memory."

He suddenly stopped and Clara bumped into him. She leant on the side to see what was ahead of them, what she saw there was one of the creatures.

"What about this one?" she whispered, making the creature turn its head towards them.

"If you give me the option, I'd say this one's real. Run!" he exclaimed, dragging Clara with him as the creature decided to chase them. "She's right onto us!" he added as they stopped for a few seconds.

"Doctor-"

"Clara, don't ask me any more."

He looked around them and picked a corridor to try and escape the creature. After a few steps, he pushed Clara in the corner of the wall and a metal frame, covering her with his body to protect her. She rested her head on his chest, listening to his heartbeats to try and sooth her panicked breath. They could hear the creature searching for them but after a few moments, another memory of Clara and the Doctor walked down another corridor, catching the creature's primitive attention and it ran after them.

Clara felt the breath of the Doctor tickling the top of her head as he sighed, relieved. He leant back to check if it was safe and he led Clara along the corridors again. Thuds were starting to be heard in the walls and pipes, making him look anxiously above them.

"What's that noise?" she asked in a whisper.

"We're right under the primary fuel cells."

"So? So, so what?"

"So… so the fuel's spilled out, so the rods will be exposed." he said. "Means they'll cool…"

"... and start to warp." she said, finishing his sentence.

"Yeah, maybe even…"

"No, no you don't say it, don't you dare say it."

"Maybe even…. break apart…" he said under his breath.

A rod flew out of the wall to pierce the one on the other side, inches away from them, cutting them in their 'finishing-the-other's-sentences' conversation.

"Run?" she said.

"I'm liking how you're thinking."

"Yeah."

They ran, the Doctor trying his best to protect his Clara from the rods successively piercing the walls under the pressure when, only a few steps ahead, they heard a loud scream that sent apprehensive chills down their back. They walked up to the source of the noise to find Gregor trying to pull out a rod that had pierced Tricky's shoulder.

"Cut my arm! I'm an android, I don't feel pain, no pain! N-no pain!" he shouted, his voice and face screaming the contrary of his words.

"Cut the metal!" ordered Clara to Gregor. "Now!" As Gregor was doing as he was told, Clara turned to Tricky: "Tricky, androids don't feel pain, they don't need respirators, no matter how advanced they are. He couldn't cut your arm off, ask yourself why."

"Two bionic eyes and a synthetic voice box." the Doctor said after scanning him with his sonic screwdriver. "But you my friend, are human. Flesh and blood."

Gregor finally managed to cut the metal rod and they pulled it out of Tricky's shoulder. When he finally caught back his breath, he looked up at Gregor.

"Why?" he simply asked.

"It was a joke, it was a stupid joke to relieve the boredom. I'm sorry, Tricky."

"Well it was very funny." said the Doctor, anger growling in his voice. "They lied to you, changed your identity just to provide some in-flight entertainment. Now move, we have to get to the engine room before the creatures come back. Move!"

"Where are we?" asked Tricky, as the Doctor was looking through the window in the door at the room behind it.

"Power source." he only said. "Right, you lot, wait here. I'll check if it's safe, we can only survive a minute or two in there."

"Or?" asked Clara, raising her eyebrows.

"Our cells will liquefy and our skin will start to burn."

"I always feel so good after we've spoken." she said.

"Marvellous. Keep this door shut."

"That will not be problem!"

The Doctor gave a warm smile before entering the room. As they waited, Gregor took out his computer device and started to scan Clara.

"Female human substance." it said. And as it was loading more information from her, Clara stretched out her hand and pressed a button to cancel the scan.

"Don't do that." she said, her voice low enough for Gregor to remember the cold and burning grip of her hands around his throat.

"Ever pointed that to yourself, Gregor?" said Tricky on an accusing tone. "What would it see? What sort of person does this to another human? Make them believe they're made of metal? Eh?! Who am I!" he shouted, his synthesized voice cracking.

"My mouthy kid brother." said Gregor, tearing off of his vest the badge with his name on and giving it to Tricky.

As he explained to Tricky how he lost his sight and voice in an accident and how everything started, Clara looked through the window at the Doctor who was coming back, just when the brothers were starting another fight.

"Stop!" the Doctor interrupted them. "Tricky, listen to me, ask yourself why he couldn't cut you up. He has just one tiny scrap of decency left in him, and you helped him find that, okay?" As Tricky nodded and backed away and the Doctor turned to Gregor: "Now you, don't ever forget this. Now let's go." He opened the door and led them into the power source room. "The Eye of Harmony!" he shouted over the deafening sound the huge orange mass in suspension was creating. "An exploding star in the act of becoming a black hole. Time Lord engineering: you rip the star from its orbit, suspend it in a permanent state of decay." He explained before leading them to the door on the other side of the catwalk.

But as they reached the door, they faced the siamese lava shape and the one that seemed to cover its face with its hand on the other side who were trying to get in by hitting the door repetitively. They turned on their heels to go back where they came from but faced again another lava shape.

"There's no way out! We're trapped!" shouted Gregor.

"Doctor!"

"I can't! Clara I can't tell you!" he said. She could see the pain leaking through the Time Lord countenance and covering his face. "I'm sorry, I tried to protect you. It isn't just the past leaking out through the time rift, it's the future. Listen, I brought you here to keep you safe, but it happened again…" he said, his voice cracking. "You died again…"

At these words, her eyes widened.

"Sensor detects animal DNA." the voice of Gregor's computer spoke up as he was scanning the creatures. "Human core element. Calculating data. Calculating data."

"Turn it off!" she shouted as she ran to Gregor. And before the sensor could provide the result, she took it out of his hands and threw it in the endless emptiness beneath them.

"Hang on!" said the Doctor as he realised something seeing Trick and Gregor next to each other trying to hold the door. "As long as we interrupt the timeline, this can't happen. Don't touch each other, otherwise time will reassert itself!" he said, pulling the brothers and separating them.

The burnt Clara finally managed to open the door and entered, trying to attack Gregor.

As he was about to fight it back, Clara stepped in and her foot whipping the air, she hit the creature, knocking it off. Holding herself on the guard-rail, she kicked it again, making it slip off the catwalk and join Gregor's sensor into its fall.

"Move!" she shouted, turning around to the men, stunned by her audacity. They turned around to see that the the two remaining creatures, the siamese one and the other were fading slowly until they disappeared completely.

"That was brilliant! Ahaah!" exclaimed the Doctor, kissing her forehead joyfully. They managed to get out of the Eye of Harmony room and be safe in the next corridor, just by the door of the engine room. "Ok, guys, wait here, should be safe now. Me and Clara are going to see if we can fix the engine. Don't touch anything!" and the Time Lord and Clara disappeared behind the door.

"The engine room, the heart of the Tardis." the voice of the Doctor echoed.

Clara looked at him and at the rocks at her feet that, a few step further, were disappearing to become a cliff, mist keeping the height secret.

"There's no way across." she said.

"No?" he said, walking up to the edge. "okay, you're right.

"So what do we do? Time for a plan, do you have a plan?"

"Weeell… No. No plan, sorry."

"We're dead" she just stated, crossing her arms. He will have a plan.

"Yes, we are, so just tell me."

"What?"

"Well there's no point now, we're about to die." he said, starting to flap his hands. She could hear the tension in his voice, tension, anxiety and a slight hint of… Anger? "Just tell me who you are."

"You know who I am." she answered, looking confused.

"No, I don't! I look at you every single day and I don't understand a thing about you!" he exclaimed, all his stress starting to leak out. "Why do I keep running into you? Why can I see someone else's eyes in yours? And why, why - no how did you do what you did when we were at the café fighting the walking base stations?!"

"You invited me…" she answered, trembling slightly at the sight of the madness that was starting to burn in his eyes. She had never seen him like this.

"Before that, I met you in the Dalek Asylum: there was a girl in a shipwreck. She died saving my life and she was you. Victorian London: there was a governess who was really a barmaid, and we fought the Great Intelligence together, she died and it was my fault, and she was you!" he continued, getting closer to her, looking into her eyes, turning the Oncoming Storm mode against her as his voice was growling.

"You're scaring me.." she said with a little voice, backing away from him.

"What are you eh? A trick?! A trap?!"

She stepped back, scared by the anger flowing out.

"I don't unders-"

A scream finished her sentence as felt herself go, falling backwards in the depths of the cliff behind her.

At the last second, the Doctor's hands stretched out to grab her and pull her into a tight hug.

"You really don't, do you?" he whispered in her ear.

"I think I'm more scared of you right now than anything else in the Tardis..."

You're just Clara, aren't you? Just my Clara." he said poking her nose before pulling her in for another hug.

"Okay." she panted. "I don't know what the hell this is about but the hug is really nice."

"We're not going to die here." he said, still holding her tight. He then broke the hug, thinking about a plan, making Clara's lips stretch with a knowing smile. "This isn't real, it's a snarl. What does a wounded animal do? It tries to scare anyone else." he explained. "We're close to the engine. The Tardis is snarling at us, trying to frighten us off. We need to jump!"

"You're insane!" she exclaimed.

"We'll cross a portal to the engine."

"How can you be so sure?"

"I can't."

"Well, that's watertight." she sighed, used to his very brilliant but dangerous ideas.

"Hey now, Clara, I have piloted this ship for over nine hundred years. Trust me this one time please." he said. But as he met her face with her eyebrows raised, he chuckled and grabbed her hand. "Okay, okay. As well as all the other times. Ready? Geronimo!"

"No wait!" she exclaimed, as he had started to run towards the cliff.

He turned around and looked at her, confused.

"We don't need to jump, it's the Tardis, she isn't snarling at us to protect herself, she is protecting us!" Clara said. At those words, the cliff decor around them faded and became all white. In front of them and around them were shattered pieces of metal, frozen in the air, still, and a deafening silence pressing against their eardrums.

"How did you…" he started to ask, confused, but seeing the state of the engine, he forgot about how Clara made the Tardis let them in. "The heart of the Tardis, the engine… It's already exploded…" he said, emotion in his voice. "It must have been the collision with the salvage ship. She wrapped her hands around the force, froze it…"

"So, so it's safe?"

"Temporary fix. Eventually this whole place will erupt." he said before being silent for a minute, fiddling his hands, lost. "There's no way I can save her now. She's just always been here for me, and taken care of me, and now it's my turn and I don't know what to do. I think it just…" his words trailed off.

Clara could hear in his voice the tears coming up as he was thinking back to that time, that one time he had really met her. That one time his beloved Tardis could talk. And as he was looking at the metal, her heart broken, torn apart and scattered around them, he could not help but have this memory of Idris dying to return to the Tardis console, still there, but silent. But for him, Clara knew it, it had felt as though she had died. And as now she was dying for real, it was making one more wound in his scarred hearts.

Clara stepped next to him and silently slipped her hand in his, supportive. He squeezed a bit her hand and as he did so, he noticed. Her hand was burning against his palm.

He looked at her palm and saw the burn forming reversed letters and started to chuckle as she gave him a smile.

"Big friendly button, aha oh Clara, Clara, my Clara… You are beautiful!" he said, stroking her cheek. "Beautiful fragile human skin. Like parchment. Thank you!" he added as he kissed her palm and let go of her hand. With a slight and discreet smirk she looked at her palm: the burn was now gone. "The rift in time, all the memories leaking out, I need to find the moment we crashed." he said taking out his sonic screwdriver and flicking it, music starting to echo. "I need to find the music!"

Led by the sonic screwdriver who was playing the echo of the music they heard when crashed, they all walked in the console room. Leaving Tricky and Gregor up while being taken to the source, the sonic led them under the console where they found a rift in the wall, a crack glowing white and the magno-grab on the ground next to it.

"The time rift, recent past, possible future." the Doctor stated.

"So, rewriting today, that's what you're going to do right?"

"I hope so." he said taking the magno-grad and engraving 'Big Friendly Button' on it with his sonic. "I've thrown this through the time rift before, I need to make sure this time. Going to take it in there myself, there might be a certain amount of yelling." he said, looking up to warn Clara.

"It's going to hurt?" she asked.

"Things that end your life often do that."

"I went to the library." she started after a silence. But the Doctor walked up to her and put a finger on her lips to shut her up.

"If I rewrite today, you won't remember, you won't go looking for my name." he said, moving his finger to caress her cheek.

"I don't want to forget, I will not forget one line of travelling with you, not one day." she answered, holding his gaze.

Brown and green.

The time rift shimmered a bit more for a second, making the green of the Doctor's eyes reflect in hers for a second before she closed them to look away.

He kissed her forehead and walked towards the rift. With a last smile, he stepped in it, screaming as the time rift was trying to erase him before being pulled in completely.

"Magnetic hobble-field, we're flying right into it! Clara! Stay by me!" he called, grabbing her hand and pulling her behind him to protect her while the console kept fighting with sparks.

"Please tell me there's a button you can press to fix this!" she said, holding onto him.

"Oh yes, big friendly button!" he shouted over the sound of explosions and music.

"You're lying!"

"Yep!"

"To stop me freaking out?"

"Is it working?" he asked as he was still trying to regain the control of his time machine.

"Not so much!" she said, holding tighter on him, her arms around his waist.

Suddenly a bright light flashed from the wall and a voice they both knew very well came out as the shape of the Doctor was half out of the rift.

"Doctor, Doctor! I'm from your future! We haven't got long to reset time!" he said throwing the magno-grab at himself before vanishing.

Seeing the grenade rolling on the floor, Clara picked it up.

"Clara! No, no!" the Doctor shouted as it was burning her hand. She let it go and he threw himself on the ground to catch it. Reading what was written on the little grenade, he laughed:

"Ahah! Big Friendly Button!"

He smashed his hand on the top of the magno-grab with a smile and a blinding light flashed.

Clara came in the console room, drying her hair with a towel. As she looked up at the time rotor, she smiled. She rested herself on the console next to the Doctor.

"I feel exhausted." she said.

"We had two days crammed into the space of one. Everything is back to normal now, everyone's safe!" he exclaimed, taking her towel and as he walked behind her to reach another panel of the console, whipped her bum with the cloth. As she was raising eyebrows, he said: "Don't mind me, I say stuff."

She smiled and as she started to walk out of the console room to go get a cup of tea in the kitchen, he asked:

"Do you feel safe?"

"Of course." she said with a smile.

"Give me a number, out of ten, ten being woohoo, and one being… aargh!" he said, obviously awkward.

"You're being weird."

"No but I need to know." he said more seriously walking up to her. "I need to know if you feel safe, if you're not afraid."

"Of?"

"The future. Running away with a spaceman in a box, anything could happen to you." he said looking down at her, worried. He had lost her twice already, he did not want to lose her one more time.

"That's what I'm counting on. Push the button." she said with a wink before walking away.

A smiled stretched his lips.

She was Impossible.

He returned to the console and pushed the handbrake lever and the time rotor throttle, making the Tardis start a new journey to another place, another time.

I hope you liked it, let me know what you think! :)