𝘗𝘭𝘢𝘺𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘗𝘳𝘦𝘵𝘦𝘯𝘥 | 𝘖𝘴𝘭𝘰𝘤𝘬 3 ✔︎

Chapter XII - Promise

"I hope I wasn't interrupting something." A familiar man with stern eyebrows stood at the TARDIS console, preoccupied with flying the ship. "But, you see, there are some Ice Warriors in peril a couple planets away, and..."

He looks up at Clara and stops, seeing the gun in her hand, pointed toward her head. In the blink of an eye, he rushes over to Clara and knocks the gun to the floor. "Clara Oswald!" he yells angrily, kicking the gun away with a frightening force. "What the bloody hell were you doing?!"

Clara collapses on the floor, wracked with sobs. Tears stream down her cheeks like waterfalls. Her breaths come out ragged. Hiccups and gasps escape through sobs. The Doctor kneels down to her, more gentle this time. "What happened. Clara?" His voice is hoarse but soft, like he's about to cry as well. It almost isn't a question.

~

"So, Missy--who is secretly your boyfriend, Sherlock's, nemesis, Moriarty--kidnapped you and threatened to kill your friends if you didn't kill yourself."

Clara nodded. "Yes. And I would have done it if you hadn't materialized around me. How did you find me, anyway?"

"I used the TARDIS' telepathic interface." the Doctor thought for a moment. "I suppose you'll need to be getting back soon, won't you."

"And Missy expects me to be dead."

"I have an idea of how we might fake your death, but we'd have to work. Right now we're before the moment you shoot. If we can just in time we can lay a decoy to make her think you're dead."

Clara grins at him as their eyes meet. "Clever boy, that just might work."

~

Ash's POV

It had now been a week after Clara's death. Wiggy was at 221B, comforting Sherlock, who really wasn't doing well. I was closing up the Diner when I heard the familiar sound of the TARDIS and saw it's shape materialize.

And out stepped Clara.

Tears sprung to my eyes and I ran to her, encasing her in a huge hug. She was as real as could be. She smelled like her, she felt like her, she looked like her. But she couldn't be real... could she? After all the police--Sherlock, himself--had found the body.

"Hey, Ash," she said.

"Clara." It was all I could get out.

"Listen, Ash, I need your help. I'll explain everything inside the Diner."

I nodded and let her follow me inside.

~

"I need your identity discs," she tells me. We're inside the Diner now, in my Vault, and she's explained everything that's going on. I go down to aisle D and take them out. "Where are you getting the body?" I ask as I hand them to her.

"Battlefields are full of them," she replies, rather sadly. I nod.

Back out by the TARDIS, she tells me, "I'll be back soon, but you can't tell anyone about any of this. Promise?"

"I promise," I tell her. "See you soon."

She steps inside the TARDIS but pauses. "How's Sherlock doing?" Clara asks.

I frown. "Not good," I reply.

The look on her face is so heartbroken it pains me to look at it. But she nods, and I watch as the TARDIS dematerializes and I am left alone outside the Diner.

~

The Doctor's POV

"I've got them," Clara says as she steps back into the TARDIS.

I immediately look up from the console. "Great, are you ready?" I ask.

She nods, but I sense hesitation. "Of course."

How were we going to do this?

Carefully, and with lots of luck. Missy is a timelady, practically my equal, and (apparently) was a criminal mastermind called James Moriarty. Clara and I have our fingers crossed that this will work.

~

WC: 590

12.1.18