Fragments

One: The Moments After

"Just one question! Do you happen to know how to fly this thing?"

As this new Doctor spoke these ill-fated words, every single muscle in Clara Oswald's body froze. She stared at him with clueless eyes, unable to speak. His lips had turned up into a manic grin; hers had fallen into a single circle of surprise. A cold chill ran up her spine and through the nerves in her neck.

This couldn't be the Doctor. No, this couldn't be him. Somehow, she must have fallen into a deep sleep back on Earth, back in her cozy apartment, before the Doctor came to take her to Trenzalore. Before her world fell into pieces... This situation- what was happening right now- was impossible. It had to be.

Because if it were real, then it was a nightmare.

The TARDIS was veering out of control. Clara could barely keep a solid grip on the railings, and her feet almost slid out from underneath her. If this man failed to pilot them to safety, they were as good as dead.

Dead. The Doctor, her Doctor... was already this...

Before she could find herself swept away in hidden memories and emotions, her mind flashed back to the present. Barely any time had passed. The man in front of her who was clad in her Doctor's clothes- minus the bow tie, which was piled thoughtlessly on the floor beside him- was already flapping about the console wildly, flipping switches and slapping buttons. By now, the manic grin seen earlier was no more.

"If you're not prepared to give any sort of satisfying answer, I suppose I'll just have to experiment," he growled, and forcefully bent down a lever.

The TARDIS jolted, which nearly sent Clara sailing to the ceiling. Thankfully, she managed to hang on, and emerged from the shock with just a flip flop of her stomach. He pulled the monitor towards himself, and stopped to watch the Gallifreyan symbols flicker across the screen at a dizzying speed. His hands began treading dangerously close to some controls the Doctor had once warned her never to push while he was piloting the TARDIS...

"Stop! You can't use that while in flight!" she shouted over to him.

He frowned, and shoved the monitor around the track to her. "Fine, then. You're so smart, you want to give it a try?"

"No, I- Why can't you just remember?" she cried out suddenly over the sound of the ship's fazing time rotor, and pushed the monitor back.

"Remember what?"

She gaped at him incredulously. Did he know anything? "How to fly the TARDIS?"

The man ran his fingers through his mussed grey hair, slightly curly at the end. His steely blue eyes- startlingly different from her Doctor's green- peered curiously at her. He never stopped fiddling with the TARDIS's controls, but just for a moment, the universe and its danger was gone, and it was solely him and Clara. His gaze was just enough to make her hope that maybe- just maybe- a small part of her Doctor was still in there, as it should be.

"I've never known," he confided in her. "I failed my driving test. Now, I have a second question- who the hell are you? And how'd we get in this crashing time capsule?"

Her single, very human heart shattered, and all hopes were instantly dashed. He didn't remember her. If this man was still her Doctor, he would know who she was. She was Clara Oswald, his Impossible Girl, and she saved his life. Hell, she had saved his life thousands of times over. Tears built up in her eyes, but she couldn't let them fall. She would never let him see her cry.

For her, this was the last straw. If she were in a stable mental state at the time, she might have pestered him for having asked two questions instead of one, but right now she couldn't bear to speak.

"Who are you?" he pressed, staring at her much like he had been just after he was born.

"I'm Clara Oswald," she said. The TARDIS rattled underfoot, which knocked a tear from its perch on the crease of her eyelid. It hit her cheek, and began the long, burning journey down the slope of her face. "I'm the Doctor's friend- your friend. Your traveling companion. You dropped into my world one day and turned it completely around. Every Wednesday, you pick me up and take me on the adventure of a lifetime. We laugh, and joke, and get into quite a lot of scrapes, but it's always worth it. Because you are always there, and I can always rely on you."

Her voice hitched, tears now streaming down her face, glinting like starlight. His expression was still blank, unknowing.

"Please," she whispered. "Please say something, anything, to let me know you remember who I am. Please let me rely on you again."

His mouth opened to reply, but the TARDIS hit another rough spot and veered out of control. Sparks flew from the console. Some landed in Clara's hair. She screeched in surprise, and her hand rapidly snapped up to flick them away. The rings at the top of the time rotor were spinning like crazy every-which-way.

In a desperate attempt to regain dominance, the man kicked the bottom of the console, and reaffirmed a strong grip on two levers. Grunting, he slammed them down in opposite directions. Clara watched as he practically flew towards the monitor to observe the readings. His thick brows furrowed.

"Something's caught our signal. It's pulling us in," he reported.

WHAM

Both Clara and him were thrown to the ground as something in one of the side console panels blew. The cloister bells began ringing. Clara got up slowly, rubbing her head where it had hit the railing, but the Doctor shot up like a rocket. As if he never left it, he was back at the computer screen.

"We're being pulled to somewhere called... Trenzalore?"

Clara was about to respond, but then the TARDIS's engines shut off, and struggling to keep control, they began their reckless descent to the planet's surface.

Well, damn. They just couldn't be rid of the vile place, it seemed. And if her fears were correct, things were about to get really ugly...

I was thinking about Capaldi's entrance, and for some reason it seemed like he didn't recognize Clara. So my mind went crazy, and I wrote this. Hope you all enjoy!