CHAPTER 34

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THE CHILDREN ARE THE FUTURE

Oswin came back to the school for time travelers' children with a huge smile on her face the next day. She had gotten to spend an entire adventure with the Doctor disguised as Clara, and she had enjoyed every minute of it. The two of them had saved an entire planet from an invasion by the Macra, who were basically a bunch of giant sentient crabs. She would certainly never look at seafood the same way again.

Molly looked at her oddly as she said, "What are you smiling so much about?"

Oswin never answered. She just wandered through the classroom with a huge grin on her face and seemed to be totally oblivious to Molly's presence there.

"Oswin! Are you there? Hello!" Molly shouted.

Oswin continued to ignore her, and she knew that she was lost in her own inner world. Finally she decided to try one last attempt to get her attention.

"Hey, Clara!" Molly shouted at the top of her lungs.

Oswin jumped as she was completely caught off guard. She turned to look at Molly with an apologetic look on her face as she said, "I'm sorry, Molly. I didn't see you there. Why did you call me Clara for?"

"That seems to be who you want to be now. Ever since you remembered that you're her, you seem to want to abandon Oswin's life and everyone else in it. You almost never come around Marissa anymore, and if it wasn't for the fact that we both work together here I'd never see you myself anymore. Do you even know what Shehzadi is up to these days or Lissa? You haven't had contact with either of them for a while now. Marissa says that she isn't hurt by it, but I think that she is. I know I am," Molly admitted.

"I'm so sorry. I never realized that I was doing any of that. Of course I'm not trying to abandon any of you. I love you and Mari, Molly. I apologize," Oswin said as she embraced Molly.

"You'll have to do more than that. I want you to start spending some more time with us again; and stop spending all of your time either on Skaro, at the school, or sneaking off with the Doctor while pretending to be the other Clara," Molly said.

"You know about that?" Oswin asked in surprise.

"Of course I do. I saw through Clara's impersonation of you pretty quickly when she acted like she barely knew me. She told me the whole story when I pressed her hard enough. If you're going to do something like that, you could at least have let me in on it. I thought that you trusted me to keep all of your secrets," Molly said hurt.

"I do trust you. I'm sorry, sweetie. I didn't realize that I was making you feel this way. I won't anymore I promise," Oswin said.

"You'd better not," Molly said.

"I'm really sorry," Oswin said.

"You should be. You're very important to me, Oswin. I don't want to lose you. I've already lost my family once. Don't make me lose them again," Molly said in tears.

"I won't. I won't. I'm just going through a little identity crisis right now I guess you could say. It doesn't mean anything though. I won't abandon you," Oswin promised as she hugged her.

"Shehzadi's actually become nice now by the way, and she's even considering coming here to teach. Can you imagine her teaching children? I don't think you'd even recognize her now. She's become almost exactly like her mother in terms of personality, and she's gotten a bit of a new look. She's a redhead now. She dyed her hair though. No regenerations or anything like that. Lissa went back to the future by the way once she was satisfied that Shehzadi had changed and wasn't dangerous to her mom anymore. Koschei meanwhile has been so caught up in finding out more about his son with Lucy Saxon that he's making Mari feel a little neglected. She says that she understands, but I think that she's afraid that she's losing him to Lucy. He's spending so much time around her lately. I think that I've got her convinced that everything's okay. At least so far anyway," Molly said.

"I'm sorry. I didn't realize that I was missing out on so much. I've just been so busy lately with the Daleks, John, and the school that I've lost track of everything in Mari's life it seems. I never meant for that to happen," Oswin said apologetically.

Molly smiled at her obvious guilt and said, "I forgive you. Just don't let it happen again, Sis."

"It's a deal," Oswin said with relief on her face.

"Oswin?" Janine said as she came into the classroom.

"What is it, Janine?" Oswin asked.

"Is it really her this time?" Janine asked hesitantly.

"Yes, it's her," Molly said.

"Good. Dorothy!" Janine yelled.

"What's going on?" Oswin asked.

Ace appeared in front of her glowing with the power of the Vortex as she displayed an angry glare on her face. She looked like she would gladly rip Oswin in half if she didn't get the answers that she wanted to hear.

"How could you do that to us? You sent Clara in your place and tried to pass her off as you just so that you could go joyriding with the Professor? You should have told us. I know Clara, Oswin. I knew it was her right away. I practically live with her on the TARDIS. You can't fool me. Don't ever do that again or I'll have to make something precious to you explode. Like your hair for instance," Ace threatened.

"Dorothy, no! You're not going to do that. I'm angry at her too, but I don't want you to do something like that to her. Don't even think about it!" Janine shouted as she wagged her finger in Ace's face.

"You're not the boss of me. I'll do it if I want to," Ace said.

"No, you won't," Janine said firmly.

"What if I do anyway? What are you going to do about it?" Ace challenged.

"If you do anything to Oswin, we're through. I won't be your friend anymore," Janine said.

"I was just kidding. You know that, right?" Ace said as her anger instantly faded and was replaced with concern.

Janine smiled as she said, "I know. I just wanted Oswin to hear you say that. She looks worried."

"I wasn't worried about Ace really attacking me. I know that she's too nice to do anything like that. I was just worried because I'd upset both of you so much. I apologize to both of you," Oswin said.

"Well you're going to have to apologize to me again for that last thing that you said. I'm not nice!" Ace said.

"I'm sorry. You're not nice at all, Ace. You're a bad girl. You're one of the meanest people I know," Oswin said as she tried not to laugh.

Janine of course burst out laughing at this and Ace sighed. "I'm losing my image, and I worked so hard for it too. What's happening to me? When did I go soft?" Ace complained.

Oswin shook her head at her and smiled.

Suddenly an explosion occurred outside, and everyone automatically looked at Ace. "I didn't do it!" Ace protested.

Oswin ran outside to see several Daleks attacking the front of the school. "EXTERMINATE!" cried the chorus of Dalek voices together.

"I've been waiting to try this for a while now," Oswin said as she pulled out her latest weapon in the war against the renegade Daleks.

It was a small handheld device that looked a lot like a cell phone. She opened it up and spoke into it. "Shut down all programs!" Oswin ordered.

All of the Daleks shut down at once and fell hard from the sky onto the ground. They sat there unmoving with their casings frozen up as Oswin said, "It's a good thing for my kids that I recently found another way of hacking into the Dalek Net, isn't it? This time I did it with a modified cell phone. It's such a primitive technology that you didn't even see it coming, did you? You never even thought to protect yourselves against its signal. It's just too bad that it won't work again. Your bosses, wherever they are, have already found a way to block it from affecting the rest of you I'm sure."

"Wicked!" Ace said appreciatively.

They all turned as Oswin heard the sound of clapping yet again. She knew who it was before she even looked.

It was the mysterious woman known only as Victoria again. She had been behind this.

"I see that you still have rotten tastes in friends," Oswin said.

"Yours aren't much better," Victoria said as she eyed Ace, Janine, and Molly with a disapproving look on her face.

"This is low even for you. Attacking kids?!" Oswin said angrily.

"All of you are as nothing to me. Besides, I never came here to attack the children," Victoria said with a sinister smile on her face.

"What did you come here for then? What is it that you want?" Oswin demanded.

"Wait a minute. I know you. I've seen pictures of you in the TARDIS. You're Victoria Waterfield, one of the Professor's old companions," Ace said.

"That is the original owner of this body, yes. It is not, however, who I am," Victoria said.

"I already know who you are. I've known almost from the minute that I first saw you. What I can't figure out is how that you survived. You were supposed to have been destroyed," Oswin said.

"So were you but you had a benefactor who rescued you or at least what was left of you. Well, so did I. You have your Guardian, and I have mine it seems," Victoria said.

"Discord," Oswin said with distaste.

Victoria only laughed but said nothing. Oswin had a feeling that she was missing something. She never liked that feeling. It always turned out bad for her in the end whenever she felt like that.

"Who is she?" Molly asked.

"She's an old enemy of mine back from when I was still Clara Oswald, Molly. In fact, she's not a she at all. More like an it really. One of the Great Old Ones," Oswin said.

"Like Fenric," Ace said as she began to glow with energy.

"I never did like him actually. I was glad to hear that he was dead. Not so much to hear that my counterpart in this new timeline was too though. At least I don't have to worry about their being two of me though unlike you, 'Oswin'," Victoria taunted her.

"Who is he, Oswin? No more secrets, remember?" Molly reminded her.

"Ladies, allow me to introduce you to the Great Intelligence," Oswin said.

"You! I should have known a scumbag like you would escape death somehow. All the really rotten ones always do," Ace said.

"What kind of an ego do you have to have to call yourself the Great Intelligence?" Janine said with a laugh.

"It's called having an inferiority complex, Janine," Oswin joked.

"If I'm so inferior, then why have I already gotten what I came for?" Victoria said with an evil grin on her face.

There was that bad feeling again going through Oswin's body as she said, "What are you talking about?"

"Before you shut all of my little Dalek friends in the area down, some of them made it into the school without being noticed and kidnapped all of your students. They would have gotten your two friends there too if you hadn't protected them," Victoria said.

"No, they wouldn't," Ace said ominously as she glowed even brighter with Vortex energy.

"Oh, they were prepared for you, Ace. They had a way to neutralize your powers," Victoria said.

"Really? What was that?" Ace said skeptically.

"Me," Victoria said with a triumphant smile as she snapped her fingers, and her eyes glowed with energy.

Ace felt her connection to the Vortex become instantly severed, and she was now just an ordinary girl. She was as ordinary as she had ever been anyway. Oswin tried to restore her connection to her, but she didn't have enough knowledge of her Guardian powers in order to do so just yet.

"What's the matter, Clara? You don't have the Guardian user's manual memorized just yet?" Victoria said laughing.

"You're not taking them," Oswin said firmly.

Victoria smiled as several more Daleks teleported into the room and started firing on Oswin and Molly while two of them quickly grabbed Ace and Janine and teleported back out again before Oswin could stop them. "No!" Oswin shouted in fear as the rest of the Daleks teleported back out again so that she had no way to find the children.

No way but one that is.

Oswin grabbed Victoria by the throat as she glowed with the power of the Gold Guardian. "I know enough about my power to suck the life out of you, Great Intelligence. I bet that you couldn't stop me either if I really wanted to kill you, could you? Tell me where my children are now or I'll do it," Oswin threatened.

"No, you won't. The owner of this body is still alive and is a friend of the Doctor's. He was very fond of her as I remember. Would you really kill this innocent woman just to get to me?" Victoria taunted her.

"I want my kids back! What have you done to them?" Oswin demanded.

"Nothing at the moment because I know just how valuable that they are to you. Do you know that I actually tried to grab them before through a mutual acquaintance of ours? I was the one who sent Odd Bob. The Rani stopped him, however, before he could accomplish his task. This time therefore I decided to come in person to make sure that the deed was done. If you want something done right, always do it yourself, Clara. Remember that," Victoria said.

"Where are they?" Oswin said in a cold voice.

"If you kill me, you'll never know. If you cooperative with me though, I'll give them back to you," Victoria said.

"What is it that you want?" Oswin asked.

"You're not actually going to do it, are you?" Molly asked.

"She will. If she's smart," Victoria said.

"What do you want?" Oswin repeated.

"Your powers. Give me the power of the Gold Guardian, and I will return your children to you unharmed. Refuse and I will kill them all. It's as simple as that," Victoria said.

"So you want to become a Guardian and join your friend Discord's side? Is that it?" Oswin asked.

"I will work with the Black Guardian to rewrite time and finally do what I started to do in the first place before you and your echoes stopped me. I will erase the Doctor from history. I will allow you and the children to survive though if you stay out of my way. The Doctor is the only one that I care about now. I will have my revenge on him," Victoria said.

"You can't do it. Without the Doctor, the universe will become a nightmare," Molly said.

"I know. I remember," Oswin said.

"Make your decision now, Clara. Which will it be? Will you choose your Doctor or your children?" Victoria asked.

Oswin realized that what the Intelligence was offering her was the same choice that Molly had already accused her of making. She was being asked to choose between her old life as Clara and her new life as Oswin.

She had absolutely no idea what to do. Now she really did wish that she had a Guardian owner's manual.

Meanwhile back in the future, Davros stared at Cassie with absolute love in his eyes. He finally had been given a chance to be with the woman that he loved at last, and he had taken it. He just hoped that Mira could forgive him if she ever found out what he had done.

He had to do it though. The Valeyard had offered to secretly switch his mind with Anthony's with the help of his ally, Discord, if he would give him complete and unfettered access to the Dalek Net and absolute knowledge of all of its inner workings. Essentially Davros had handed the renegade Daleks over to the Valeyard to use as he pleased.

Once doing something like that would have bothered him. He had devoted his entire life to helping his creations conquer the universe after all. Since he had met Jacqueline though, she had opened his eyes to the monster that he had become.

He knew that as long as he had her in his life that destruction no longer mattered to him. He wanted to become a better man for her in order to be worthy of her. He would do anything to have her become his wife. Even sacrifice the Daleks.

He didn't even feel guilty about handing over control of the Daleks to the Valeyard. He was certain that the Valeyard would inevitably fail and lose his hold on them somehow, and the Daleks would go back to normal so he really wasn't changing things in the universe too much.

"What are you thinking about?" Cassie asked as she kissed him.

"Just you. I'm just thinking about how lucky that I am to have you in my life. You're the most beautiful woman that I've ever known, Jacqueline," Davros said.

"Jacqueline? Since when do you call me that?" Cassie asked in confusion.

"I j-just thought that I'd try it. It is your real name after all. If you don't like it, I'll go back to calling you Cassie. I just like your real name. I think it's as beautiful as you are," Davros quickly stammered in reply.

Cassie smiled as she said, "It doesn't matter to me. It's just the first time that you've ever used it before. You've never called me that once, and I've known you all of my life. The only one who ever calls me that is Davros. You haven't been hanging around him lately, have you?" Cassie asked playfully.

"No," Davros said a little too quickly.

"Alright, that sounds a bit suspicious," Cassie said with a laugh.

"Do you love Davros?" Davros asked with curiosity.

Cassie hesitated and then said, "Yes. I always will. Not as much as I love you though. I need you to know that. I could never love Davros as much as I love you, Anthony."

"Why?" Davros asked.

"I could never trust him. He would gladly hurt my family and all of the people that I care about just to get what he wants. I could never love him as much as you for that very reason. One of the reasons that I love you more is because you're not him. You're the complete opposite of him," Cassie said seriously.

Davros was overcome with guilt. He had proven her right without her even knowing it and had taken the man that she loved from her. How could he ever face himself again if he married her like this? He loved her too much to do this to her.

What could he do though? What was done was done.

Next: Oswin must find a way to save the children of the school. Can she do it without sacrificing her powers? Also what will Davros do now that he realizes how Cassie really feels about him?