AN: This one is kind of fun – the next one won't be.

MYKONOS

Sunlight poured through the wide-open doors of the balcony, a thin curtain swaying in a gentle breeze. The light was so vivid against the clean, white walls it made the whole room glow like the interior of a star, and the Doctor found the weather was so warm she had kicked the blankets away long ago. But it took her that long she was in a bed in a beautiful hotel room, and she appeared to be occupying this bed with a beautiful stranger – a woman who did have the sheets pulled up but who clearly wasn't wearing much, if anything, underneath.

It was by the Doctor's panicking that Clara was woken up from quite a nice dream that she vaguely recalled had something to do with flowers. The smell of shadowy roses dissipating, this wasn't a particularly pleasant way to wake up. The Doctor paced up and down at the side of the bed trying not to trip on the blanket she had tightly wrapped around herself to preserve the modesty she didn't realise she'd lost long ago.

"You're awake – thank god!" she said. Clara had been sleeping on her front and lifted her head a little to squint, bleary-eyed, at the Doctor, who was frantically running a hand through her messy hair and babbling, "Listen, I don't know what's going on here, all I can do is apologise. I don't do this kind of thing a lot – I couldn't even tell you another time I've done it – but I'm sorry."

"What are you sorry for?" asked Clara, a little hoarse since it was the morning. She cleared her throat.

"I'm sure I'm not supposed to be here. For a start, I don't even know who you are. I wouldn't just wake up in bed with somebody if I didn't know who they were – I don't know even know how I got into this bed! Maybe I'm supposed to be in a different room?" The Doctor had forgotten her again, her amnesia floating back to the surface as it always did after she slept.

"You were definitely in this bed when you went to sleep," said Clara, "I was right next to you."

"What? No. Wait…" she stopped her pacing and stared at Clara, who was propped up slightly on her elbows. "Are you trying to tell me we…?"

"We what?" she asked.

"Me and you. The two of us. Did we…?" Clara was waiting to see what euphemism she could come up with, "Did we have… coitus?"

Clara snorted with laughter and dropped back down onto the bed while the Doctor turned the brightest shade of red she'd ever seen. "That's very funny," she said.

"What? It's completely beyond the realm of possibility?" she was a little offended.

"It's funny that you said 'coitus'. But you really think my hair would be in this state if we hadn't spent a few hours last night having crazy sex?" she challenged.

"We did!?" the Doctor was mortified.

"Yeah. And it was a lot of fun. So, y'know, well done, I guess?"

"You… but I don't even know who you are! Why would I have had intimate relations," she fumbled a little over the words, "with someone whose name I don't know?" Clara didn't respond to this, just tried to plump her pillow. "What is your name? I should have asked already, I'm sure."

"I'm Clara."

"Well, I'm the Doctor. It's nice to meet you."

"Again, we've already met, you fucked me last night," said Clara. Her profanity had the desired effect of making the Doctor even more aghast (she didn't like swearing at the best of times). But as always, Clara only found this amusing.

"You… Where am I?" she changed the subject.

"Mykonos," said Clara, "Just a hotel. You've been here for a few days."

"Are you Greek?"

"Unfortunately, I'm English."

"For that, you have my condolences," she mumbled, "Are you here on vacation?"

"I'm attending a destination wedding."

"And when's that? Today?"

"Dunno. Might call it off. I'm the bride, you see, but I was having second thoughts. Then I ran into you at a bar down the street last night, one thing led to another…"

"What!? Seriously!?"

"No," said Clara, laughing again, "I'm just messing with you. We haven't done anything wrong. Not unless you've become a homophobe overnight, that is."

The Doctor stared at her for a few long seconds, getting more confused the more questions Clara answered. "Who are you? We must know each other. I don't drink, let alone drink enough human alcohol to forget somebody I went to bed with." She paused, then added, "Not that I'm not a human."

"Mm, but you're not a human, you're a Time Lord. You're twelve-hundred years old, from the planet Gallifrey in the constellation Kasterborous, as you always say. It's got two suns and red grass."

"How do you know that?" asked the Doctor very seriously.

"We travel together."

"But I don't remember you."

Clara decided she might as well stop being cruel and try to be as honest as she could without spooking the Doctor so much she stormed out of the hotel to look for the ship. Mostly because Clara couldn't be bothered getting up to chase after her.

"You've got an injury," she began, "You forget things."

"I'm the Doctor, I never forget. This is a trick, isn't it? You're trying to keep me trapped in this hotel room, stop me from escaping and finding out the truth."

"What would the truth be?"

"That Earth is being invaded by aliens, or that we're not on Mykonos at all, this is some kind of simulation. You're just a phantom here to entice me."

"And do you find me particularly enticing?" Clara jibed. Again, the Doctor blushed, so she couldn't be that convinced she was stuck inside a computer.

"For a virtual construct, I suppose they've done a good job of making you pretty – whoever's behind this."

"What if I'm not virtual, nobody's behind anything, and this is just my face?" The Doctor didn't answer this, more unwilling to believe she had memory problems than anything else. "If you look into your hearts, you'll know I'm telling the truth."

"How would I know?"

"Because you're compelled to trust me." The Doctor clenched her jaw, annoyed, but had to admit Clara was right. She was torn between what her mind was saying – that she had never seen this woman before in her life – and what her gut was saying – that Clara was the most familiar and knowable person she had ever encountered. "You feel like we've already met before. Because we have. You've just forgotten. I'll explain it properly if you come and sit next to me," she said, finally sitting up a little. The Doctor was frozen to the spot, gawking at her even more blatantly than she had been before. This was because Clara was nude and hadn't covered herself with the sheets and it was evidently more than the Doctor could cope with.

"I'd rather stay over here if it's all the same to you."

"It's not the same to me," said Clara, pulling up the sheets to put her out of her misery, "I'm not talking to you from the other side of the room." Ultimately, the Doctor was too desperate to hear what Clara had to say to decline, and she finally shuffled over and perched herself on the edge of the bed near Clara's feet.

"How did we meet?" she asked.

"You just dropped into my life."

"And we're travelling together now? I'm sure I'm between companions at the moment."

"I'm more of a girlfriend."

"A girl-? That's not true. I don't do girlfriends."

"You do me," said Clara, and once again she flushed. Clara declined to point out that they were married in case it made the Doctor notice she was wearing a ring – when that happened, she usually took it off, which Clara would rather avoid.

"If I had a girlfriend I'm pretty sure I would remember," she said snidely.

"You've got some brain damage."

"No, I don't."

Clara sighed, "You do, since the last time you regenerated. You were underwater, without oxygen, for a long time. You've had these memory problems ever since, usually just when you've woken up."

"And how long do these 'memory problems' generally last?"

"Not too long. It always snaps back. Or it has so far, at least."

"What if I never remember you? What will you do then?"

"I don't know – I guess I'll have to make you fall in love with me again."

"I'm not in love with you."

"You can get back into bed if you like?" she suggested, "We could make a start on it? Do all those things I know you're already thinking of doing?"

"I'm not thinking of anything."

"You're such a bad liar."

"I'm a great liar, I lie all the time – that proves you don't really know me, and this is a trick. You're trying to engineer my complacency, so I don't go out and stop aliens from taking over Mykonos."

"Yeah, because this is definitely where the aliens would start their invasion," said Clara dryly, "They want to come and kill all the parochial Greeks and tourists. If they were going to go anywhere, they'd at least go to Athens – but probably not in this century."

"And what century might this be?"

"The twenty-third."

"Is that when you're from?"

"No, I was born in Blackpool, in 1986. Kidnapped by you in your nasty little box in 2013; I wasn't even thirty."

"And how old would you be now?"

"I'm forty-four. Nanogenes. And no, that wasn't anything to do with you, you just benefit tangentially."

"Uh-huh. You're my forty-four-year-old, eternally young girlfriend from Lancashire?"

"It looks that way."

"Just how do I know you're not actually the Master? How do I know you're not lying about everything, hm?" she still refused to accept that anything Clara was saying was true.

"I'm not the Master," she said, "You can even take my pulse and see for yourself." She held out her left arm for the Doctor to examine. It was the first time the Doctor spotted the spindly, shiny scar snaking its way across the full length of Clara's arm from the epicentre at her wrist.

"What happened to your-?"

The Doctor stopped dead mid-sentence, still fixated on Clara's burn but not taking her up on the offer to check her pulse. She completely zoned out for a long few seconds then closed her eyes tightly like she had brain freeze.

"Doctor?"

She shook her head a little, covered her face with her hands, then threw herself back onto the bed – Clara only just managed to move her legs out of the way in time. Everything was crystal clear: she was on a days-long sojourn to Mykonos with Clara Oswald, her wife of almost twenty years, who was dutifully trying to keep her calm until her memory snapped back of its own accord.

Clara had been through this enough times that she could spot what had happened, "Ironic that my scar brought your memory back since you usually try to forget it's there at all."

"I don't forget, I just don't like thinking about you hurting yourself," she said, sounding a little muffled because she was still covering her own face. Trying to steady her breathing (nothing sent her into a panic more than losing her memory) she waited a while before speaking again. "I'm sorry."

"You don't have anything to be sorry for, sweetheart," said Clara softly.

"I do, because I know it upsets you."

"It upsets you a lot more," said Clara, "I know it's not your fault. Hold my hand," she said, reaching towards the Doctor, who did as bade. "You'll feel alright by lunchtime." The Doctor looked over at her. "What?"

"Why did you tell me you're my girlfriend?"

"Because you hate it so much, it's funny," said Clara, "You can't even conceive of the idea you would ever have a girlfriend. It's marriage or bust with you. Besides, it was clear enough that we've been up to no good. You seemed to be more freaked out by the idea of having a one-night stand."

"I don't have one-night stands, that's why. I couldn't tell you the last person I slept with who I wasn't married to as well. I never even slept with you before we got married. But I suppose there are worse people to have flings with."

"You say that, but I have such a bad habit of never calling people back. And you don't even have a phone to call back."

"Thank god we got stuck with each other after we eloped. Something else I don't remember."

"Well, I don't remember that, either. And going by the witness accounts, that's probably a good thing."

The Doctor went back to staring at the ceiling, still thinking, while Clara toyed with the idea of ordering room service. It was a five-star hotel, after all, which they'd blagged their way into with psychic paper and the sonic screwdriver, of course; the room service was meant to be pretty good. The Doctor squeezed Clara's hand.

"Is it getting worse?" she asked quietly, "I feel like it's getting worse."

"I don't think so."

"You'd tell me if it was, wouldn't you, Clara?" She was getting very serious. "You wouldn't just lie to me to make me stop worrying?"

"If it was getting worse, that would be something we'd have to face together. Not just me keeping you in the dark. And I really don't think it is. When do I ever lie to you?"

"Maybe you're just that good of a liar."

"I'm not, I promise you. And I promise that I'd tell you if it was getting worse. You know you can trust me."

"I do, I just…"

"When we get home in a few days, we can do you another brain scan, okay?" said Clara. She had brain scans on the TARDIS semi-regularly, with Gallifrey's answer to an MRI machine that looked like it had been grown out of coral, just like other Gallifreyan technology. It showed the damage on the Doctor's alien brain and, in the decade since she had regenerated, the damage hadn't changed or progressed at all. But it put the Doctor's mind at ease for a while, at least. "Or we can leave sooner, cut things short?"

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah, if that's what you want, I'm right there."

"But you were looking forward to Greece."

"We can come to Greece literally any time," said Clara, "And I think we've seen everything there is to see on Mykonos. Although, if you want to take the TARDIS back to antiquity I won't say no to visiting Sappho…"

"You wish. You really don't mind going back today?"

"It's absolutely fine. I'm getting a bit sick of all this blue water, anyway. All I ask is that we have some breakfast first, you'll feel better once you've eaten."

"Yeah. Breakfast sounds good. You order for me, I'm all over the place."

"Sure." Clara took out her phone to do just that.

"Oh, and… I love you. Just wanted to make sure you know I've remembered that I love you."

"I love you, too."