The Doctor's words replay through her mind over and over. And for an awful moment, all she can do is relive the moments leading up to her walking out to her death on Trap Street. Everyone has to be brave and face their death in the end. It's not her death that she's afraid of.
It's having to continually have nightmares of the part that comes before, of facing the reality that the Doctor watches her die in a horrifically painful way. She can still recall the exact way it felt to have her soul forcibly removed from her, the sensation of it slipping free of her body in a dark cloud still numbing her lips.
Her hand grips hold of Alina's a little tighter, and she very carefully stares straight ahead.]
I was sent home after our mission in Braccia. Years passed for me there. And at the end of it, before I was pulled back in here, I -
[She almost can't do it. Her head turns, and she looks to Alina with wide eyes. There's a wild desperation there, untamed and seeking safe harbor. Tears build, and she refuses to let them fall.]
I died. The Doctor, he tortured himself for literally billions of years because of it. And then he brought me back, only it was all wrong. I was wrong. I wasn't alive, but a moment frozen in time. Trapped forever between one heartbeat and my last. When I woke up here again, my heart was beating and things felt normal again. But I can't help but think, what if that feeling's wrong? What if I'm still defective, and nothing I do here matters?
[She exhales a shaky breath, finally looking away. She won't hold Alina hostage with that lost look on her face any longer.]
What if I'm not able to be brave enough to ask to change my contract in the end? What if the cost is more than I'm willing to pay? It means that no matter what happens here, the Doctor is always destined to go back and torture himself for billions of years. Because of me. How can I possibly sentence someone I love to that kind of fate?
[She has to make it better. And she will. She'll find a way. But she refuses to make a deal with the orb yet. She's not ready for the high cost that Viveca has warned her about, not when she knows exactly what's the most valuable thing in the entire universe to her. Given the way she and the Doctor part ways back home, there's only one option something like the orb will choose for her price.
She knows, without a question of a doubt, that the orb will ask for her memories of the Doctor in a cruel reversal of their fate. So no matter what, in the end, one of them is destined to have their mind tampered with. It's that fear of losing him all over again that keeps her from acting. It's what keeps her from opening up to the Doctor, knowing very well that no one on this station would survive two forces of nature known as The Oncoming Storm. And she makes no mistake that is exactly who both Doctors would become if they ever found out about her death.
The weight of her life being lost isn't because she's afraid of dying. It isn't because she selfishly wants to still be alive. It's because she wants to protect the Doctor one last time, and she isn't sure she has it in her to pay the price.]
[ guilt swells in her chest, swift and suffocating, rising up to cinch her throat closed. suddenly, drawing breath feels like a monumental task — like a war with her own heavy heart. how long ago had she been cursing her own existence, hoping for an escape from the dread she wakes to each morning, the chains she can't shuck off? how eagerly had she thrown the idea of her sacrifice in aleksander's face as though it were a pointed arrow, in a bloodthirsty attempt to hurt him as he had wounded her? to show him what he had turned her into — this tired, aching thing, looking for a peace she will never find.
and clara had been here all along, rattled by her fear. hoping against all odds for another chance, for another attempt at life, while alina had been mourning her own and all too eager to throw that gift away. her misery feels so stupid and childish, now. so utterly selfish, once faced with clara's fear — faced with the rippling effects of that loss, the damage it had wrought upon her and the doctor. shamefaced, alina's gaze wilts, drooping to their joined hands. it's difficult to look clara in the eye, in the wake of that, but —
her attention snaps up, quick, determination hardening the corners of her eyes. ]
You are not defective. [ immediately, she bristles at the connotations of that word. defective. wrong. so close to what alina believes she is, fearful of what she might become. it stings, to think clara could ever see herself that way. clara — who thinks of the doctor, first. clara, who had no obligation to hold her up, but has stayed to support her in her most uncertain, murky moments. who grows flowers like memories to preserve, who builds gardens for lost women. compassionate, bold clara. ] I didn't know you before, but I know you now. And the Clara Oswald I see in front of me is brave, and stubborn, and strong. Whether your heart is or isn't beating —
[ her fingertips lift, tap-tap-tapping a gentle beat against clara's sternum. softly, her warm palm settles there, fingertips fanning out. ]
— It's one of the biggest hearts I've known. You know what you have to do, Clara, and you will. Even if it hurts. Even if you think you can't possibly bear it. [ because — because people like them have no other choice. because she knows clara won't be able to walk away, if her sacrifice means saving something she loves so dearly. ] I'll be here with you along the way. It's your fate to face, but you don't have to face it alone.
[She's lost count of how many times she's cried on Alina. One more isn't going to harm anything, not with as close as they are at this point. She crumples completely, all of the fear and anxiety she's feeling pouring out of her in tears. She winds up hiccuping in between sobs, and she just sits there with one hand holding Alina's and the other pressed over the hand that's pressed over her heart. There's a steady beating there now, and it races faster and harder as Clara works herself up to becoming nothing but sorrow and tears.
It's hard not to feel like she's feeling sorry for herself, and she couldn't possibly hope to explain that isn't the case. She's finally grieving the inevitable loss of the Doctor, though she hasn't even begun to touch that part of the story yet. How could she, when Alina is trying so hard to make her feel truly alive and that she's capable of making such an impossible choice? ]
I can't do it. [She manages to get out through her sobs.] I can't -
[Her entire body shudders as she tries to force out the admission. Her betrayal, the thing she's done right before coming back to the station.]
I can't risk losing him completely. Not after I had to force him to forget me, everything about me.
[Meaning this time here is all they have left. This is it, after this is over she'll go back to an existence where the Doctor doesn't remember her. He'll know that someone named Clara exists, that they had certain adventures together. But he won't remember her, and all she can do is relive the moment in the diner when she looked at him and realized he didn't know her at all. She had sacrificed her relationship with him then for the good of the universe, and for his own good. But she isn't sure she could do it again, that act of selflessness proving to be a heavy burden for her to try and rationalize now that she's here with not one but two Doctors.]
[ she can see it, the moment clara falls to pieces — the foundation of a woman that had been held together by little more than sheer determination, built on the crumbling bricks her bravery has become. like trying to hold a home together with string and clay alone. for as little love as her life has known, alina moves reflexively, instantly. an arm tangles itself around clara's waist, tugging her in where alina holds her tethered to her chest.
to the lull of her heartbeat, soft and steady. as though even her body senses her attempts to calm clara, beating to the tune of its own lullaby. she can't guard her from the fate that waits for her, no — but she can give clara a hiding place. where her tears are shielded from sight, a weakness she doesn't have to hold at bay, ashamed. it leaves a pooling stan on the front of alina's dress, a flowery pattern that catches clara's tears like they're dewdrops on petals.
but she doesn't flinch, doesn't shift. only buries her nose in the soft silk of clara's hair, palm planted flat against her spine. there's nothing she can say to soothe that fear — hadn't she dreaded, once, that mal had abandoned her in his past? moved past the memory of her so easily? but what clara speaks of is more permanent, more — real, and not the letters aleksander had burned to ash, to scorch away those ties to her old life. to cruelly let her believe in a lie.
she doesn't offer one to clara, either. there's no it will be okay or it won't hurt — it won't be, and it will. clara must know the truth of that. all alina can do is listen, lend her the strength to piece herself back together at the end of it all. (it doesn't feel like enough, but when has she ever done enough?) ]
You leave a mark on the lives you enter, Clara. If he doesn't have his memories left, I have to believe a part of him will always remember how you made him feel. You're unforgettable.
[ but maybe that's fantasy. maybe she's fooling herself, in turn, by wanting to believe this — this station, these strange ties they've all built — won't fully vanish as though they had never existed at all. her eyebrows crease, the quiet confusion obvious in her voice when she murmurs, ]
Why was it so important for him to forget you? Why would you force that on someone?
[ she doesn't have to ask how clara could withstand the pain. some love is larger than selfishness. some bravery outshines others. some destinies can't be outrun. ]
Edited (editing twice bc i'm dumb) 2022-01-06 07:53 (UTC)
[The questions come sooner than she'd like, the exact ones she's not wanting to hear. Hearing them means she has to answer, and she's not ready to face the truth that comes with being cornered into giving a response. Of course, Alina wouldn't press her if she absolutely refused. and she could, she thinks, break down just enough that she isn't pressed.
But there doesn't need to be manipulation here, not between someone that's become so dear to her. Alina has done nothing here but whisper reassurances and love her for who she is, all of her brokenness and faults laid bare out in the open. If she's said this much, she can tell the truth. Just a bit more, it won't hurt anything.]
I had no other choice. He never would have let me go otherwise.
[She's still crying, but she lifts her head and tries to compose herself a little. Wiping at her tears, she ignores the way her lip quivers and tries to keep speaking despite the way it makes her voice tremble.]
The Doctor and I, we -
[Pausing, she swallows the lump that's formed in her throat.]
There's plenty of ways to say you love someone. And even if we never have said it in words, the Doctor and I, our love was so strong that we became dangerous together. So dangerous that losing me meant the Doctor became something I hope you never have to see. He was willing to do anything, to sacrifice the entire universe, if it meant bringing me back. And if we had stayed together, it would have cost the entire universe. As long as we were together, everyone else was at risk. When I realized, I knew I had to make him forget. If he didn't remember, he could move on. The universe would be safe, and he would be able to be happy. I sacrificed the thing I love the most to ensure that.
[Only now she's here, where two Doctors are. Neither of them know the way their story ends, neither of them know that she dies. She doesn't think she needs to tell Alina that. That much should be obvious with the way she's just broken down here. Of course, it also may give some insight into why she's terrified of forgetting him. It's all that will be left in the end. Her memories of him and what they had together. But Alina is right. She'll do what needs to be done in the end, if it means protecting him.]
And I will do whatever's necessary to save him in the end. No matter the cost.
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no subject
The Doctor's words replay through her mind over and over. And for an awful moment, all she can do is relive the moments leading up to her walking out to her death on Trap Street. Everyone has to be brave and face their death in the end. It's not her death that she's afraid of.
It's having to continually have nightmares of the part that comes before, of facing the reality that the Doctor watches her die in a horrifically painful way. She can still recall the exact way it felt to have her soul forcibly removed from her, the sensation of it slipping free of her body in a dark cloud still numbing her lips.
Her hand grips hold of Alina's a little tighter, and she very carefully stares straight ahead.]
I was sent home after our mission in Braccia. Years passed for me there. And at the end of it, before I was pulled back in here, I -
[She almost can't do it. Her head turns, and she looks to Alina with wide eyes. There's a wild desperation there, untamed and seeking safe harbor. Tears build, and she refuses to let them fall.]
I died. The Doctor, he tortured himself for literally billions of years because of it. And then he brought me back, only it was all wrong. I was wrong. I wasn't alive, but a moment frozen in time. Trapped forever between one heartbeat and my last. When I woke up here again, my heart was beating and things felt normal again. But I can't help but think, what if that feeling's wrong? What if I'm still defective, and nothing I do here matters?
[She exhales a shaky breath, finally looking away. She won't hold Alina hostage with that lost look on her face any longer.]
What if I'm not able to be brave enough to ask to change my contract in the end? What if the cost is more than I'm willing to pay? It means that no matter what happens here, the Doctor is always destined to go back and torture himself for billions of years. Because of me. How can I possibly sentence someone I love to that kind of fate?
[She has to make it better. And she will. She'll find a way. But she refuses to make a deal with the orb yet. She's not ready for the high cost that Viveca has warned her about, not when she knows exactly what's the most valuable thing in the entire universe to her. Given the way she and the Doctor part ways back home, there's only one option something like the orb will choose for her price.
She knows, without a question of a doubt, that the orb will ask for her memories of the Doctor in a cruel reversal of their fate. So no matter what, in the end, one of them is destined to have their mind tampered with. It's that fear of losing him all over again that keeps her from acting. It's what keeps her from opening up to the Doctor, knowing very well that no one on this station would survive two forces of nature known as The Oncoming Storm. And she makes no mistake that is exactly who both Doctors would become if they ever found out about her death.
The weight of her life being lost isn't because she's afraid of dying. It isn't because she selfishly wants to still be alive. It's because she wants to protect the Doctor one last time, and she isn't sure she has it in her to pay the price.]
cw: mentions of suicidal ideation
and clara had been here all along, rattled by her fear. hoping against all odds for another chance, for another attempt at life, while alina had been mourning her own and all too eager to throw that gift away. her misery feels so stupid and childish, now. so utterly selfish, once faced with clara's fear — faced with the rippling effects of that loss, the damage it had wrought upon her and the doctor. shamefaced, alina's gaze wilts, drooping to their joined hands. it's difficult to look clara in the eye, in the wake of that, but —
her attention snaps up, quick, determination hardening the corners of her eyes. ]
You are not defective. [ immediately, she bristles at the connotations of that word. defective. wrong. so close to what alina believes she is, fearful of what she might become. it stings, to think clara could ever see herself that way. clara — who thinks of the doctor, first. clara, who had no obligation to hold her up, but has stayed to support her in her most uncertain, murky moments. who grows flowers like memories to preserve, who builds gardens for lost women. compassionate, bold clara. ] I didn't know you before, but I know you now. And the Clara Oswald I see in front of me is brave, and stubborn, and strong. Whether your heart is or isn't beating —
[ her fingertips lift, tap-tap-tapping a gentle beat against clara's sternum. softly, her warm palm settles there, fingertips fanning out. ]
— It's one of the biggest hearts I've known. You know what you have to do, Clara, and you will. Even if it hurts. Even if you think you can't possibly bear it. [ because — because people like them have no other choice. because she knows clara won't be able to walk away, if her sacrifice means saving something she loves so dearly. ] I'll be here with you along the way. It's your fate to face, but you don't have to face it alone.
no subject
It's hard not to feel like she's feeling sorry for herself, and she couldn't possibly hope to explain that isn't the case. She's finally grieving the inevitable loss of the Doctor, though she hasn't even begun to touch that part of the story yet. How could she, when Alina is trying so hard to make her feel truly alive and that she's capable of making such an impossible choice? ]
I can't do it. [She manages to get out through her sobs.] I can't -
[Her entire body shudders as she tries to force out the admission. Her betrayal, the thing she's done right before coming back to the station.]
I can't risk losing him completely. Not after I had to force him to forget me, everything about me.
[Meaning this time here is all they have left. This is it, after this is over she'll go back to an existence where the Doctor doesn't remember her. He'll know that someone named Clara exists, that they had certain adventures together. But he won't remember her, and all she can do is relive the moment in the diner when she looked at him and realized he didn't know her at all. She had sacrificed her relationship with him then for the good of the universe, and for his own good. But she isn't sure she could do it again, that act of selflessness proving to be a heavy burden for her to try and rationalize now that she's here with not one but two Doctors.]
no subject
to the lull of her heartbeat, soft and steady. as though even her body senses her attempts to calm clara, beating to the tune of its own lullaby. she can't guard her from the fate that waits for her, no — but she can give clara a hiding place. where her tears are shielded from sight, a weakness she doesn't have to hold at bay, ashamed. it leaves a pooling stan on the front of alina's dress, a flowery pattern that catches clara's tears like they're dewdrops on petals.
but she doesn't flinch, doesn't shift. only buries her nose in the soft silk of clara's hair, palm planted flat against her spine. there's nothing she can say to soothe that fear — hadn't she dreaded, once, that mal had abandoned her in his past? moved past the memory of her so easily? but what clara speaks of is more permanent, more — real, and not the letters aleksander had burned to ash, to scorch away those ties to her old life. to cruelly let her believe in a lie.
she doesn't offer one to clara, either. there's no it will be okay or it won't hurt — it won't be, and it will. clara must know the truth of that. all alina can do is listen, lend her the strength to piece herself back together at the end of it all. (it doesn't feel like enough, but when has she ever done enough?) ]
You leave a mark on the lives you enter, Clara. If he doesn't have his memories left, I have to believe a part of him will always remember how you made him feel. You're unforgettable.
[ but maybe that's fantasy. maybe she's fooling herself, in turn, by wanting to believe this — this station, these strange ties they've all built — won't fully vanish as though they had never existed at all. her eyebrows crease, the quiet confusion obvious in her voice when she murmurs, ]
Why was it so important for him to forget you? Why would you force that on someone?
[ she doesn't have to ask how clara could withstand the pain. some love is larger than selfishness. some bravery outshines others. some destinies can't be outrun. ]
no subject
But there doesn't need to be manipulation here, not between someone that's become so dear to her. Alina has done nothing here but whisper reassurances and love her for who she is, all of her brokenness and faults laid bare out in the open. If she's said this much, she can tell the truth. Just a bit more, it won't hurt anything.]
I had no other choice. He never would have let me go otherwise.
[She's still crying, but she lifts her head and tries to compose herself a little. Wiping at her tears, she ignores the way her lip quivers and tries to keep speaking despite the way it makes her voice tremble.]
The Doctor and I, we -
[Pausing, she swallows the lump that's formed in her throat.]
There's plenty of ways to say you love someone. And even if we never have said it in words, the Doctor and I, our love was so strong that we became dangerous together. So dangerous that losing me meant the Doctor became something I hope you never have to see. He was willing to do anything, to sacrifice the entire universe, if it meant bringing me back. And if we had stayed together, it would have cost the entire universe. As long as we were together, everyone else was at risk. When I realized, I knew I had to make him forget. If he didn't remember, he could move on. The universe would be safe, and he would be able to be happy. I sacrificed the thing I love the most to ensure that.
[Only now she's here, where two Doctors are. Neither of them know the way their story ends, neither of them know that she dies. She doesn't think she needs to tell Alina that. That much should be obvious with the way she's just broken down here. Of course, it also may give some insight into why she's terrified of forgetting him. It's all that will be left in the end. Her memories of him and what they had together. But Alina is right. She'll do what needs to be done in the end, if it means protecting him.]
And I will do whatever's necessary to save him in the end. No matter the cost.