Chapter One

"Isn't it incredible?"

The words were spoken softly, almost inaudibly. The Doctor stood in the threshold of the TARDIS, slightly leaning on the open door with his hands in his pockets. The ship spun very slowly and gracefully, as if it were dancing. Two-thousand years of traveling, but seeing the vast beauty of the universe would never get old to him.

He only wished he could say the same for his human companion.

"Oh, you're not serious, are you?" The Doctor sighed heavily. He shot a sharp glare to the side at Clara.

"Hm? Sorry, what?"

"We're watching two gas clouds practically waltzing with each other in outer space and you're bloody texting?" he asked incredulously.

Clara slyly slid her mobile into her jacket pocket. "Well, we're in a time machine. We can just pop back five minutes and watch it again, can't we?" she teased, smirking. She knew that saying like that would set him off.

"It does not work like that and you know it," the Doctor growled.

"Watching now."

The Doctor crossed his arms with a sigh. Humans...

After a few, short, precious moments of silence...*boo-bleep*

Clara quickly whipped her phone back out.

"Right, that's it," the Doctor snapped. In a flash, he snatched the device from her hands and threw it over his shoulder. It landed with a clang somewhere in the depths of the TARDIS.

"Hey!"

"I hope you have that insured," the Doctor leaned forward and slammed the TARDIS doors shut.

"What the hell was that?"

"Have you really gotten that used to traveling with me? That you think these trips are just a bus tour of Brighton or something?" He spun on his heel, coat fanning out just enough to let some red flare out, and marched towards the console.

"I...no, of course not!" Clara quickly followed him, but made sure to keep her distance and stood on the opposite side of the console.

"Are you bored? Shall I take you back home?"

"Oh, will you stop being so dramatic?" Clara groaned and leaned forward, pressing her forehead against the console, slightly exasperated. "Look, sorry, okay? I just...it's this whole thing with Danny..."

The Doctor raised an eyebrow. "Who?"

Clara lifted her head. A bit of hair fell in front of her eyes. "He's...a friend. I'm attempting to make contact with my own kind back home, you know."

"A friend?"

"Yes," she said quickly, blowing a bit of hair out of her face now.

"A date friend?"

"...Potentially."

The Doctor stared, waiting.

"I don't know. He's...different," Clara continued. "Really...different. Odd, even. But he's nice. And...I don't know. It's all probably nothing. Probably best that you smashed my phone."

"Yeah, sorry about that."

"No, you're not."

"I'm really not."

The Doctor flipped a switch on the console. The switch didn't actually do anything, but it gave him something to concentrate on as the awkward silence enveloped them both. Finally, he cleared his throat. "Ahm...look, if you need to talk-"

"Nope," Clara said as nonchalantly as possible. "Nothing to talk about. Where are we going next?"

Silent relief filled the Timelord. He wouldn't have known what to say even if she had wanted to talk. His running history of relationships was not in good standing. "Well, what would you like to see?"

"Anywhere," she shrugged. "You're the driver."

The Doctor picked up on the subtle look of distance in her big, brown eyes. "Alright then," he quickly typed something in on the computer. "How about...something awesome?"

A small smile tugged at the edge of her lips, which quickly grew into a full sized grin. "Something awesome would be great."

With one hand in his pocket, the Doctor reached up and pulled on the lever with grace. "Something awesome."

"After you," the Doctor gestured Clara to exit the TARDIS first.

She was about to open the door when all of a sudden, an enormous BOOM sounded. She turned to him with wide eyes. "What was that?"

He nodded. "Trust me," he said, his face still solemn.

Slowly, Clara reached out and pulled the squeaky door open and looked up just in time to see something rather spectacular. An explosion of color in the sky. Quite like fireworks, but it was much bigger, brighter, and less controlled than fireworks. "What is that!" she asked, full of curiosity.

The Doctor followed her out and closed the door behind them. He glanced around and congratulated himself on his great parking job. He had landed the TARDIS right on the top of a hill, where a great crowd of people were camped out on blankets, hover chairs, or perched on the roofs of their own small space craft. At the far end of the hill was a vast lake, which appeared to be glowing ever so slightly. Another explosion of light and color erupted in the starry night sky above and people all around clapped and cheered.

"You know how in America, they celebrate their independence with fireworks?"

"Yeah...are these spacey fireworks?" Clara asked excitedly, her eyes not leaving the sky.

"Of sorts. Rather than fireworks, this planet launches meteorites loaded with explosives similar to fireworks at each other. When they collide, it's quite a show."

Sure enough, Clara was watching more closely now, she could see two tails of light as they came together in the sky and exploded.

"That's awesome."

"You can't say that I don't deliver."

Now Clara could see why the lake had a bit of a glow to it. As the remains of the meteorites fell to the planet, they were falling into the lake, still glowing as they slowly sank to the bottom. It was a show above and below. She smiled as they watched for a moment. It had taken a while for her to get used to this new Doctor. The whole thing after Trenzalore had been so sudden and shocking. At times she was still trying to process the fact that her floppy haired Doctor was the same silver haired one that stood before her. She was getting used to him, yes. 'We all change, when you think about it...We are all different people all through our lives and that's okay, that's good you've got to keep moving..so long as you remember all the people that you used to be.'

She would never forget those words for the rest of her life. Of course, she was angry when he regenerated. She had just lost her best friend. And yet, she gained another. How many times had she changed throughout her life? She became an entirely different woman after her mum died. Her friends even said so. But her friends still loved her, despite her change. And she would love the Doctor. It was a new chapter, her and this Timelord.

"So, where are we?" Clara asked, looking up at her friend.

"Vexholi. It's actually quite similar to Earth, really. Oh, hang on a minute..." The Doctor quickly walked back into the TARDIS, returning a few moments later with two folding lawn chairs. "Here we go," he said, plopping them down.

"Lawn chairs. Probably the last thing I ever expected to see you pull from that ship."

"Are you kidding me? Two-thousand years of time and space, I have everything you could ever imagine in there." He folded his long fingers together and he settled comfortably into his seat and resumed watching the sky. "The Vexholians had been in a state of war with the planet that colonized them for several generations. Sort of a similar story of England and America. Basically, Belarous, the other planet, eventually decided that they were not going to win the war. So if they couldn't win the planet, they would destroy it."

"That's a bit dramatic."

"They hurled a giant asteroid here"

"Scratch that. Very dramatic."

"But the Vexholians threw a giant comet at the asteroid to destroy it, which gave both worlds a spectacular light show. Which is why they do this now."

"Aw. So what happened to the other planet then?"

"Oh, they're allies now. Have been for decades now." The Doctor extended a finger and pointed up at the giant moon in the sky. "See the moon there? It's got an interplanetary station on there. Belarous has its own sort of embassy up there with them. That's where they launch the whole light show from."

"Very cool," Clara remarked.

The Doctor leaned back and the two gazed upwardly, enjoying the show for quite some time. At one point, a man with slightly purple skin came around offering snacks. While the Doctor was speaking to him, Clara's eyes wandered over to the huge moon that hung above them, just taking in the fact that it was so big compared to Earth's moon. It seemed to be quite a bit closer to the planet as well. While she was looking though, she saw something strange.

"Um...Doctor?"

The Doctor ignored her as he kept speaking to the man, trying to politely tell him to 'bugger off'. Clara kept her eye on the moon. There was a small, tiny glow coming from it, almost like a flickering candle. But bigger. "Doctor. Look."

"What?" he huffed, turning to her. He saw her eyes fixed on the moon and followed just in time to see a massive explosion coming from the surface. A collective gasp floated through the crowd. "Oh, that's not supposed to happen." He jumped from the lawn chair and began fishing in his pocket for the TARDIS key. Clara followed wordlessly, not even needing to ask where they were going.

/A/N/

Hello hello! I haven't written a fanfic for about 4 years now, so go easy on me. Hope you all enjoy it. Hell, I even opened up a whole new name to put this under because I just wanted to start fresh. I'm so excited for Capaldi's take on the Doctor and there just isn't enough fanfic to get me through in between episodes. So...when you want something *rolls up sleeves* do it yourself. So this is me doing it myself. Already started on Chapter Two...I'll try to get that up as soon as I can. I'll warn you all that I do work an awful lot and the internet at my house is shoddy at best, so I'll get this up as quick as I can. Things may change here and there as episodes roll out, as I'm trying to keep these as true to the characters as possible. And yes, Danny Pink will make a show here in a few chapters time...so stay tuned! Cheers.