clashildr one shots

It's All Fun and Games Until You Have to Commit a Crime

     It never ceased to amaze Clara how a rather large American diner could simply appear out of thin air on some residential street in Britain and nobody noticed. Life would simply continue, although, for all intensive purposes, it had just been flipped around to show that every piece of information humans clung onto was incomplete. People simply continued with their shopping bags and their phone calls and their narrow minded, self-centred belief systems.
     This street was no different. A large playing field crouched next to a block of flats in the suburbs of what looked like it could be London; people milled about, carrying this and that, ignoring each other in the way that Londoners do. A woman on the phone walked right past the two women and the hulking great big building they'd plonked down on the pitch and did not say a word.
     Clara glanced around. "Why are we here, do you think?"
     Ashildr shrugged. They had been aiming for the south coast of England - both thought a beach trip would do them good - but had apparently missed. She turned and locked the door to the diner.  "You know how TARDISes like a bit of trouble," she said. The diner vworped once in response; it almost felt like a chuckle. Ashildr smiled, her hands lingering slightly on the doors affectionately. "Shall we have a bit of a nosey? Chances are, if we're this far off from where we wanted to be, something's gonna happen."
     Clara's stomach dropped. Something's gonna happen. Her own words - ones that she had not spoken and yet had heard - echoed in her head. She tried to conceal the flash of fear that shone in her eyes, but had no idea of whether she was successful.
     Clara felt a strong, small hand take her own, and was immediately snapped from her thoughts. Ashildr pulled her off into the estate, nearly yanking her shoulder out of its socket in the process.
     The estate was the kind of gentile, friendly little place you thought of fondly after you had grown up there. Kids pottered about with bikes and footballs and all the paraphernalia of childhood shining in their eyes like the summer sun glinted off chains and reflective coats. Clara felt memories twinge in the back of her mind of kids she had taught lifetimes ago. She missed teaching, sometimes; missed the rewards of having a strong homestead. She squeezed Ashildr's hand. Where would she be without her only constant?
     As ever, Ashildr seemed more interested in the back roads than the broad daylight - "Come on, Clara; you know that these are the real city." - and was headed in the general direction of an alley. Clara followed knowingly along behind her, secure in experience that they would get to look at the fancy bits in all good time. Perhaps it was just more what Ashildr was used to - the dark, cobbled streets that stank of piss and despair. She had a point, as well - the slums supported the city.
     However, this time, she got more than she bargained for. They both did. In the alley, dimly lit but obviously unkind, was an outline that could never be forgotten. Like a pepper pot, almost; a wide, oval base narrowing to a rounded head and three prongs sticking straight out.
     Upon seeing the Dalek, Clara froze. Her blood ran immediately cold. Ashildr didn't seem to have any reaction at all.
     "Do you know what it is?" Ashildr asked in a whisper. Although safe to assume she had run into one at some point in the billions of years she had lived, the experience had obviously not been viscerally terrifying enough to burn it into her long-term memory.
     "Very bad news."
     Ashildr edged forwards, hand slightly outstretched.
     "Don't touch it!" Clara snapped, pulling her wife back and away.
    "It's fine, it's disactivated," she countered, making towards it again. The Dalek's blue eye did, in fact, stare dead and unseeing, lights off, but Clara still didn't trust it. This thing could wreak havoc, slaughter half the population of Earth, in a heartbeat. 
     Ashildr brushed a finger against the metal.
     The golden Dalekanium begun to glow bright yellow where her skin had touched it. The eyestalk brightened, the lights behind it engaging. The abhorrent creature was coming to life. It twisted its weapons, shuffled back and fore on the spot, and then fixed its single eye on the pair.
     "I... Am... Reborn!" it screamed.
     "Oh, shit."
     Ashildr was staring at her hand. Her face was a picture of everything you don't want to feel.
     Clara grabbed her by that raised hand and legged it. She felt the jolt of Ashildr's resistance behind her, but it was only a moment before both were sprinting full tilt away from the alley and back into the square.
     This was, in a word, a mistake. The Dalek had followed them. There now sat, in this picturesque scene of city life, a psychopath engineered for hatred - armed and willing. Genocide in a heartbeat.
     The sunlight glinted off the metal casing. At first, people laughed, took photos. Until a woman was shot.
     She screamed, arms thrown back, skeleton flashing through her flesh. She collapsed, dead, in a second.
     And then, panic. Every single person in the square screamed and ran. Not one had an idea where they were going and many were murdered as they fled or crushed in the chaos of the herd.
     Clara pulled Ashildr closer towards her. "We need to get it off the street," she said, so quickly she wasn't sure if Ashildr - still rather dazed - had caught her meaning. "I'll act as bait, lure it into the building. Get everyone out. Oh, and Ash?" She leant over and closed the remaining distance between them. She pushed her own lips up against Ashildr's for what felt like a moment but could have been an eternity in the disaster around them. "This isn't your fault. Go."
     Ashildr nodded, mind set, before disappearing off of Clara's immediate mental list of "things to worry about." As one can imagine, that list was pretty occupied at that moment.
     Off the street. Gotta get it off the street.
     Most of the square was empty. All of the residents had fled. Clara stood isolated on the tarmac.
     "Hey!" she yelled.
     The Dalek spun itself around to stare her dead in the eye. Clara could see it twitch its weapons, thinking about shooting. Best not give it the time to, then, eh? She bolted off across the square, pegging it straight past the Dalek and into the block of flats behind it. The Dalek watched her go, and then started after her. It slid itself across the floor like a really malicious snake.
     Clara burst through the doors and tried to lock then shut behind her. Straight ahead - perfect! Stairs! Suck on that, Mr. Slidey.
     Should she be enjoying this?
     Clara hurled herself up the first flight of stairs and then looked back down to see if she was, indeed, out of the woods.
     Through the windows along the stairs, Clara could see the the Dalek staring at the locked door. It turned its round head to fix its mechanical eye on Clara through the window, and, without breaking eye contact, shot the doors clean off. The explosion sent shockwaves through most of the building.
     Maybe she should have seen that coming.
     The Dalek slid its way over the debris and into the building. Its eyestalk was still fixed on Clara, although its body faced away from her. Keeping its head angled the way it was, it turned its body underneath it, and was then face on.
     Clara's hands rested uneasily on the banister. Her last hope was a flight of stairs.
     "Elevate!"
     "Oh, piss off! That's just not fair-"
     A laser shot flew over Clara's head and destroyed half of the wall behind her - she only just managed to duck in time. Priorities reordered, she began sprinting up the stairs again.
     Eventually, she ran out of stairs. The building must have been fifteen stories, and the Dalek was slow, but she still had little time.
     A buzzing from behind her.
     Not enough time as she had hoped, then.
     Keep it talking.
     "Records show you are an associate of the Doctor!"
     "Oh, once upon a time, mate." She turned around to face it.
     "Associates of the Doctor are to be exterminated!"
     The fire alarm started to scream. From the flat behind her, a man in a dressing gown and carpet slippers opened the door. His wide eyes took in Clara and the Dalek quickly before he started to run the other way down the corridor.
     Evacuation. Good idea.
     From the direction that the man - now screaming - had vanished, Ashildr appeared. She ran right up to Clara, took in the Dalek, grabbed Clara's hand and yanked her off down the corridor.
     From behind them as they ran came the whirring of the Dalek along the floor. Neither looked back.
     "I've planted a bomb," Ashildr said.
     "You made a bomb in five minutes?"
     "It's that sort of a day. There's a boiler room at the end of this floor. If we can get it in there, I can set off the bomb and we can kill it."
     The Dalek wasn't long behind them. It never was. Clara glanced behind them to see just how far, and it was not far enough for comfort. She darted into the boiler room behind Ashildr.
     Apart from their sawing breaths, the room was silent. They stood sheltered by the tanks. Slicing through the silence, the Dalek entered the room. Through the gaps in the piping, Clara could see it. It shone with hatred, designed for no other purpose than to kill; Clara edged her way along behind the boilers, trying to keep them between that Dalek and herself. Ashildr was but a step behind her.
     Eventually, she ran out of boiler. The door was tantalisingly close, maybe two paces away, but it was open ground and those two paces would be the most dangerous of their lives. The two of them would have to make their way out of the room, shut the door, and run.
     Clara didn't know if sneaking out as to not arouse suspicion or moving as quickly as possible was the best bet. The deciding factor ended up being that she could not hold her nerve.
     She adjusted her feet and prepared the make the dash.
     "You ready?" she whispered.
     "Right behind you."
     Time slowed. Clara's foot caught on a pipe and she tried to jump out from behind the boiler. From the corner of her eye, she saw the Dalek spin its head around, closely followed by its body. As she fell forwards, she only just had time to get her other foot down, and practically jumped the rest of the way out the door. The Dalek faced them now. It shot directly at them. A moment later, it would have hit Ashildr. A moment sooner, it would have hit Clara. As she ran, Ashildr only just managed to duck the laser beam. Clara watched as it soared over her head and promptly blew a hole in the window opposite. She pulled the cast iron door shut behind her and grabbed a chair from the landing to wedge under the handle.
     "Bollocks to this," Ashildr panted, throwing her back against the wall on the other side of the doorframe. "How about we retire, eh?"
     "This is my retirement. How do you detonate the bomb?"
     "Oh, it's on a timer. We have - ooh, two minutes?"
     Clara looked at her to try and tell if she was joking or not, and was greatly displeased to see that she was not. After barely a second, Ashildr pushed herself off of the wall and started sprinting down the corridor. It was times like this that not strictly having to breathe was a huge advantage. Although her limbs felt as if she was running in a dream - caught in nets, slow, heavy, not taking her anywhere at all - she still managed to stick right behind Ashildr who, over the years, had grown fiercely quick.
     Using the banisters to swing themselves down, they took the stairs close to a flight at a time; their feet crashed on to each landing with almost disorienting bangs that ricocheted up the empty stairwell.
     Bang-bang, bang-bang, bang-bang.
     Their crashes, one after the other, echoed the pounding heartbeat that Clara should have had. She was simply grateful that she had something to drown out her panicked thoughts.
     They barely made it to the doors in time. If they hadn't been blown apart, they wouldn't have had time to get through them. Once in the open, Clara and Ashildr kept running, as fast as they could, yelling at those who gazed up at the building in confusion to get back. Some listened, some stared.
     Clara was knocked off of her feet by the explosion. Shattering glass punctuated the gutteral screams of the people. Flames licked at the building, dancing out of windows; even from two hundred yard away, Clara could feel the heat on her skin.
     Beside her, Ashildr had broken into a relieved laughter. Clara tried very hard not to join her in it, but was eventually overcome.
     "This is probably my best case of arson," Ashildr mused.
     Clara frowned deeply. "Excuse me?"
     In glancing around, Clara's eye had caught a young boy, barely six. He stood alone on the field. His eyes reflected the flames as they stared, dead, at what was once his home. His mouth hung slightly open.
     The flames dipped slightly. Unnoticed above the wails of the people, a helicopter marked UNIT had descended upon the site.
     "Oh, that's about right," Clara muttered to herself. She scrambled to her feet and offered her hand to Ashildr.

-----
  
     Some hours later, Clara and Ashildr still stood in the square. They leant against the diner, facing each other slightly. Many residents searched the rubble for possessions, and, off to the side, were numerous black body bags - mostly casualties of the Dalek, but two had been pulled from the flames. Some loitered around them, some sobbed over them, and everyone else stayed at least ten feet away. Today would be a tragedy never spoken of.
     "UNIT'll want to speak to us," Ashildr said. Her voice was quiet; she still mourned for those she did not know. She still felt responsible.
     "Shall we disappear before they can?"
     Ashildr nodded and pushed open the diner door. She didn't even look at Clara as she made her way through to the console room. She eventually collapsed into one of the chairs that hugged the wall.
     "You kissed me," she finally said.
     "That's not unusual, Ash."
     "You've only ever kissed me like that once before."
     Clara's hands stilled over the console. "You've been kissed by me like that. I haven't kissed you like that. Not yet."
     "Future you. What she said to you, whilst I was out of the room-"
     "Ash."
     "It doesn't take a genius to realise that I am to die."
     "Yes, but she didn't tell me how. Or when. Ash, any moment I spend with you could be the last." She continued to plug a destination into the console. "So forgive me for kissing you like it's the last time before we run into the path of a Dalek." Her voice dropped. She readjusted her footing, kept her eyes down. "You barely made it out of that room."
     Ashildr shook her head, stood from her small chair, and crossed the room to plant a kiss on Clara's temple. "Where are we off to?"
     "Deep space. I think we both need a nap."