Whew, it's been ages since I posted! Sorry about that. Anyway, here's the next chapter, obviously. It's short but sweet. Hopefully. I may have deviated from their characters a little bit, but it was necessary to write this. Hope you enjoy.

The Doctor flicked Clara's king with his finger. It spun around on its base for a few seconds before rolling off the chessboard and clattering to the floor with a loud clang, marking the end of their three-hour-long chess game. "Checkmate."

Clara groaned and buried her head in her hands as the TARDIS's engines began to purr amusedly. "Uggggggghhhh," she whined. "How do you beat me every bloody time?"

"I'm a Time Lord. I'm better at you than everything." He winked.

Clara folded her arms. "Oh, shut up," she snapped crossly.

"You know it's true," he teased her in his rough Scottish brogue.

She pointed a threatening finger at him. "Doctor, you're this close to being smacked."

He caught the look in her eyes and scooted his chair away from her. "Alright, alright," he agreed, raising his hands in surrender. "I'll stop talking."

"You'd better," Clara muttered, her annoyance subsiding a little. She tucked her legs up in front of her and crossed her arms over them.

There was a long pause as the Doctor and Clara stared anywhere but at each other. Both of them were dreading what they knew was about to happen.

Finally, Clara broke the silence. "I guess... I'd better be off," she announced reluctantly.

And there it was. That was the truth of it. Clara's two-week stay in the TARDIS had come to an end, and they both knew that it was time for her to go. They'd spent all day playing chess, trying to put off the moment when they had to bid farewell, but that moment had arrived at last, as they knew it would.

The Doctor couldn't help himself - he let out a long, drawn-out sigh. "I suppose so," he murmured, sadness clouding his gaze.

Clara noticed his pain and stretched out her hand, attempting to offer him some comfort.

But the Doctor didn't want to be comforted. He hastily jumped up, evading her hand, and strode over to the console. "Well, we'd better get you back home, then," he declared briskly, his arms flying over the console as he pulled levers and pressed buttons.

Clara's hand hung in the air. A tear formed in her eye as she slowly lowered it to her side. "Yeah... I guess so," she muttered grudgingly.

The Doctor pretended to not notice her misery, and he kept his back carefully turned so that she didn't notice his. With a shaking finger, he pressed the final button necessary to set the TARDIS in motion. The familiar groan of the TARDIS's engines started up as she set off through time and space, spinning towards 21st century England.

It was done. Clara was really going home. And he was going to be alone again.

The TARDIS landed with a bang. Slowly, reluctantly, Clara stood up and collected her suitcases. The Doctor watched her silently.

Clara opened the door and peered outside. The TARDIS had landed right in the middle of her flat - there was her sofa, her television, her bookcase; all the normal, mundane things that characterized her life when the Doctor wasn't around. A sob welled in her throat.

"I'll come back, you know," the Doctor suddenly reminded her, as much for his benefit as for hers. "I'll come back. This isn't the end of the world."

"Then why does it feel like it is?" Clara brushed a tear from her eye. She turned around and wrapped the Doctor in a fierce hug.

In a rare show of emotion, he hugged her back. The two stayed locked together for minutes on end, reveling in their last few seconds together. "Stay safe," Clara whispered into his shoulder. "And come back soon, d'you hear me? Come back soon."

"Will do," he replied softly. "I'm already planning our next adventure."

Clara offered him a sad smile as she gathered her suitcases and maneuvered them into her living room. "Goodbye, Doctor," she murmured.

"Goodbye, Clara Oswald," he breathed.

Their eyes met for a split second... and then the Doctor abruptly closed the TARDIS door, separating his world from Clara's in a single instant.

The TARDIS's engines hummed to life. Clara watched through a haze of tears as her beloved blue box faded away into nothingness, taking part of her heart with it.

The Doctor paced around his console with his hands clasped behind his back.

Around and around and around. Going nowhere, with no purpose.

This was his life when his companions weren't around. This was the existence that he had to look forward to until he saw Clara again.

The TARDIS's engines throbbed as it whirled through the time vortex, traveling endlessly until someone or something stopped it. Even the familiar hum of his beloved time machine couldn't shake the Doctor out of his misery. Clara was gone, and his heart had stayed behind with her.

For a moment he contemplated traveling to the week after he had left her so that he could take her on another of his adventures. But what was the point? She wasn't staying with him anymore. She would travel with him for an hour - a day - a meaningless blip in the endless years of his life - and then she would be gone again.

And then, even as this thought struck him, the Doctor groaned and smacked his forehead. "Stupid. Stupid, stupid Doctor." He'd known what he had to do all along - he'd just been too cowardly to do it.

The Doctor listed in his head all that he knew about Clara - how carefully she guarded her one hundred and thirteen pairs of shoes, how darkly she pouted when someone woke her up before nine o'clock, how poorly she functioned in the mornings without coffee, how regularly she cheated at games because she couldn't bear to lose.

But for all he knew about her, there was so much more to learn. Why could Clara never make a decent soufflé? Why did she have a ridiculous love of cleaning her house? Why did she still cuddle her favorite stuffed bear, Winston, at night, but made sure not to let anyone know?

Yes, there was a lot to learn about Clara Oswald. And his business was learning - especially learning about things he loved, like Clara.

With newfound energy, the Doctor strode over to the console and input his destination. "I'm coming," he breathed firmly. "Oh, yes. I'm coming."

The TARDIS's engines hummed into life. Clara watched through a haze of tears as her beloved blue box faded away into nothingness, taking part of her heart with it.

The noise of the engines died out as she turned around, wiping her eyes.

And then it came back.

Clara whirled around, her heart soaring as the TARDIS rematerialized. Before she had time to react, the door creaked open and the Doctor stepped out. He was fidgeting restlessly, and could not meet her gaze. "Clara... I've not been honest with myself. Or with you." He paused awkwardly, and then added, "I've realized something over the past two weeks. I..." The Doctor cleared his throat and restarted his sentence - he was little used to expressing sentiment so passionately. "I can't ever be truly happy unless you're around. I travel through the universe, saving people, saving galaxies, and I hate it, because you're not there with me. I'm lonely, Clara. And I'm old, so old." He shuffled awkwardly. "And... I need you. I need you. See to the whims of an old man, Clara. Stay with me. Please." He finally raised his eyes to meet hers. They shone with tears, but they were firm and bright and hopeful and yearning, all at once. "Will you travel with me, Clara?"

In that moment, Clara forgot everything. She forgot about Danny, she forgot about her English class, she forgot about her flat, she forgot about all her doubts about traveling with the Doctor, she forgot about everything that still connected her to Earth. All she could picture was a lifetime with the Doctor in the TARDIS, flying round and round and round the infinite stretch of time and space for ever and ever.

And she knew what her answer would be.

"Yes," Clara breathed. "Oh, yes." She ran to the Doctor and flung her arms around him. He closed his eyes and returned the hug.

"Thank you, my Impossible Girl," he murmured into her French toast colored hair. "Thank you."