For an Impossible Enigma Chapter 9: The Sun's Flame, a doctor who fanfic

The Rings of Akhaten — Three —

The Sun's Flame

Disclaimer: I do not own Doctor Who, only my ideas.

Rating: T for Travelling Companions

Episode summary: Clara and the Doctor's first date is underway, he's taken her to a whole new star system. The Rings of Akhaten. What they don't realise is the strange traditions around the Festival of Years. Clara grows attached to a young girl, who just so happens to be the Queen of Years and when danger falls upon them can Clara risk everything she loved to save those whom she loves?

"—a tactical boo-boo. More of a semantics mix-up, really," Clara heard the Doctor say. Everywhere hurt.

"What boo-boo?" she asked. Her words came out muffled.

Her name was shouted directly her ear. She groaned when a hand ran over her face. It didn't burn, but she'd expected it to, which confused her. Why should it be burning? "I thought the Old God was Grandfather, but it wasn't," the Doctor continued. "It was just Grandfather's alarm clock."

"Lost… Old God?" she groaned.

"Unfortunately, he's still here." He grabbed her hand and kissed her forehead.

"Just do something," Clara mumbled. She felt Merry grab her other hand and flinched. Merry didn't let go, instead, she began singing.

"Against that? I don't know what to do. Do you know? I don't know. Any ideas?" the Doctor rambled. Clara could see his face go through different emotions — he had no idea how to help. Merry stopped her singing and pulled Clara's head into her lap. Clara noticed it didn't hurt anymore.

"But you promised. You promised!" Merry cried, stroking Clara's hair. It was soothing.

The Doctor hesitated. "I did. I did promise." He stood up, running his hands through his hair. He didn't care about the blood that he would surely have to pick out of it in the morning.

"He'll eat us all," Merry wept above Clara. The ground rumbled beneath them. Clara looked up at Merry and lifted her hand to the girl's golden curls. "He'll spread across the system, consuming the Seven Worlds. And when there's no more to eat, he'll embark on a new odyssey among the stars."

"I say leg it," Clara joked. Her voice scratched against her throat, but she didn't mind. Merry laughed, and it was like music.

"Leg it where, exactly?" the Doctor asked.

"Don't know. Lake District?" Clara suggested, propping herself up slightly.

The Doctor smiled at her and stopped his pacing. "Oh, the Lake District's lovely. Let's definitely go there. We can eat scones. They do great scones in 1927."

Merry moved so Clara could rest against the space moped instead of lying down. She could see the sun that was causing their asteroid to shake. "You're going to fight it, aren't you?"

"Regrettably, yes. I think I may be about to do that," the Doctor told them, sitting next to Clara against the moped.

Clara sighed, reaching over to grab his hand. "It's really big."

"I've seen bigger." He laced their fingers together carefully. Clara was thankful he was sitting on her right, not her left; otherwise, she was sure the pain In her hand would have been considerably greater.

"Really?" Clara asked the Time Lord.

Merry began to sing under her breath. Clara felt the same soothing sensation that she had before when Merry had been stroking her hair.

"Are you joking? It's massive!" he exclaimed, rubbing his thumb over her hand.

"I'm staying with you," Clara told him, lifting her head to face him. She wasn't sure why, but she needed to save him, needed to save him from this.

"No, you're not," he said immediately.

"Yes, I am. I can assist." She didn't want him to face it alone. She was sure he could do it. She was sure he would do it. And she was also sure he needed someone to stay by his side.

"No, you can't," he refused, leaning his head back against the moped so as not to look at her.

"What about that stuff you said," she demanded, grabbing his head with her hands and forcing him to look at her. "We don't walk away."

She hadn't thought about what she was doing until the Doctor had her hand in his, her bad hand. And it wasn't hurting. He stared at her, but she didn't have an explanation. There was still dried blood around her fingers, but the blistering had disappeared.

She was on her knees in front of him. He lifted a hand to her face, brushing her hair away from her eyes. His fingers traced her forehead where she'd bashed it against the wall earlier, then her eyelids, then her cheek. She stared at him, confused as to what he was doing.

"Doctor?" she whispered when he traced her lips with his thumb. He leant forward, his hair flopping in front of his eyes as he closed the distance between them.

Clara froze when his lips met hers, but it was brief, too brief. She wanted nothing more than to kiss him until her oxygen ran out, but the rumbling of the sun interrupted them.

"No, love. We don't walk away," he told her, resting his forehead against hers. "But when we're holding on to something precious, we run. We run and run as fast as we can and we don't stop running until we are out from under the shadow."

The Doctor let go of her head to pull her hands from his face. Clara stared after him as he stood up.

Merry was already standing by the edge of the asteroid. She'd stopped her singing. Clara wondered why she'd been singing until she grabbed hold of the Doctor's extended hand.

The blisters weren't just gone, they were healed. As she was pulled to her feet, there was a definite ache in her body, but there was no burning pain as there had been before.

"Now, off you pop. Take the moped. I'll walk." He straightened his bow-tie and kissed her hand before letting it drop to her side. He lifted her onto the moped, still being careful of her, and then hoisted Merry up behind her. They waited until he'd walked through a stone archway before taking off. Merry clutched tightly to Clara, who was able to drive them to the amphitheatre.

[AMPHITHEATRE]

Clara helped Merry off the moped, and together they stood in the centre of the amphitheatre. Clara could see the sun from their position; it was huge in comparison to the pyramid the Doctor was still on.

"Isn't he frightened?" Merry asked Clara, clutching her hand.

"I think he is. I think he's very frightened." Clara nodded, trying desperately to block out the whispers from behind them. She was sure the guards would be pulling her from Merry any second.

"I want to help," Merry said.

"So do I," Clara told her.

Merry took a deep breath before releasing Clara's hand and standing on her pedestal. Then she was singing, "—Rest now, my warrior — Rest now — "

[OUTSIDE THE PYRAMID]

The Doctor didn't know how he could fight the sun; he wasn't sure he could. He just knew he needed to save Clara, the one girl who had managed to sneak back into his heart after so many years of being alone. She was an enigma, and she was real, and she was a fantasy. She was a story, and yet she lived: the story of two completely normal people who created a completely impossible girl.

He smiled when he heard Merry's voice resonating from the amphitheatre. Clara was safe there, provided he could do something over here.

"Okay, then. That's what I'll do," he told the sun. "I'll tell you a story."

[AMPHITHEATRE]

Clara was sure there wasn't a sound more beautiful to her ears than Merry singing. The crowds around them had begun to sing with Merry, and Clara sang too, hoping that the Doctor could hear their support.

" — Live — Wake up — Wake up — And let the cloak of life cling to your bones — "

Clara stared at the pyramid. She had to do something other than sing. She had to help him. She needed to help him.

[OUTSIDE THE PYRAMID]

"Can you hear them? All these people who've lived in terror of you and your judgement? All these people whose ancestors devoted themselves, sacrificed themselves, to you — can you hear them singing?" the Doctor asked the sun. He closed his eyes when he heard Clara's voice drifting just above the others, trying desperately to sing the right tune when she didn't know it. Clara, his impossible girl.

"— Wake up — Wake up — "

"Oh, you like to think you're a god. But you're not a god. You're just a parasite eaten out with jealousy and envy and longing for the lives of others. You feed on them. On the memory of love and loss and birth and death and joy and sorrow. So…" He trailed off. He thought he knew how he could save them, and he really hoped it would work.

"So, come on, then. Take mine. Take my memories. But I hope you've got a big appetite." Gold wisps spiralled out from the sun towards the Doctor. "Because I have lived" —they hit him, clawing at his chest, leaving burns wherever they touched— "a long life, and I have seen a few things."

" — Wake up — And let the cloak of life cling to your bones — "

Clara could see the gold reaching out to him as she sang. She knew it would be hurting, and, as Akhaten bubbled, she could only sing.

"I walked away from the last Great Time War. I marked the passing of the Time Lords. I saw the birth of the universe and I watched as time ran out, moment by moment, until nothing remained. No time. No space. Just me. I walked in universes where the laws of physics were devised by the mind of a madman. I've watched universes freeze and creations burn. I've seen things you wouldn't believe. I have lost things you will never understand. And I know things. Secrets that must never be told. Knowledge that must never be spoken. Knowledge that will make parasite gods blaze," he ranted.

Just do something.

He would indeed do something, and he hoped Clara would understand why he had to do it. He faced Akhaten, extending his arms, and gold circled him. "So come on, then! Take it! Take it all, baby! Have it! You have it all!"

The parasite drew back the golden wisps, sucking them in like a vacuum. The Doctor collapsed as they left, his body fighting to heal on its own without triggering a regeneration. His fingers blistered, and tears streaked down his face as he thought of Clara having already gone through the same pain.

[AMPHITHEATRE]

" — Wake up — Wake up — "

Merry stopped singing when she saw the gold curls leave the pyramid. Clara stepped forward and grabbed Merry's hand, and the two shared a smile of relief.

Then the rumbling sounded again.

Clara looked up to see that Akhaten had turned dark, the red coiling like a volcano ready to explode instead of a sun ready to shine. It wasn't over yet.

And I will always come and find you. Every single time.

Clara thought of her mother, always sticking by her side. She looked at Merry, who appeared just as worried as Clara felt. She had to do something — she couldn't just sing.

We don't walk away.

And she wouldn't, she couldn't. She had to save him.

Clara didn't think twice as she hopped on the moped behind them. She had to save him. She could see that the sun had returned — the blackness had disappeared, and it was exploding with light.

[OUTSIDE THE PYRAMID]

The Doctor was on his knees when she reached him. She ran over and kissed his head.

"Rest now, my warrior," she whispered, letting him fall back to the floor. She stood up straight, taking in the sun. She had to save him. "Still hungry?" She pulled out her book from under her arm. "Well, I brought something for you."

She opened the book to the first page. "This. The most important leaf in human history."

The Doctor stared at her from his position on the ground. It was the leaf that had started it all. Her leaf. The leaf that was Clara.

"The most important leaf in human history," She said, and laughed sadly, holding it out to the sun. The gold twirls were reaching out for Clara. "It's full of stories, full of history. And full of a future that never got lived. Days that should have been that never were. Passed on to me."

She wouldn't. Not for him. This was her life, and she was willing to give it away to save someone she'd only just met. The gold had reached the leaf, singing the edges of it as it tested the waters, making sure all she said was true.

"This leaf isn't just the past, it's a whole future that never happened. There are billions and millions of unlived days for every day we live. An infinity. All the days that never came. And these are all my mum's." Clara was crying as the wisps licked at her fingers, burning her as they had earlier. She let it happen, let all that pain, not just from the sun, hurt her. Just to see him live.

He had to help her. Slowly the Doctor stood, using the wall for support.

"Well, come on then. Eat up," he shouted, standing net to Clara. She took his hand with her free one. "Are you full? I expect so because there's quite a difference, isn't there, between what was and what should have been. There's an awful lot of one, but there's an infinity of the other. "

The leaf disintegrated into gold dust in Clara's hand, and she dropped to the floor. Her mum was gone — really, truly gone. She'd given away her ring and she'd given away her leaf, all for a mad man in a box — and she'd do it again in a heartbeat if it meant she could save him.

"And infinity's too much, even for your appetite," the Doctor spat out. He fell next to Clara and held her as they watched the sun collapse in on itself.

[AMPHITHEATRE]

The Doctor struggled to drive the moped back with his burns; moving hurt, now that the adrenaline had passed. Clara had to help him off of it once they reached the amphitheatre, which was empty apart from the guards. Clara supposed they had stayed at the pyramid a long while before they'd tried to move again.

"Thank you," Merry told them.

They hadn't noticed her stand beside them. Clara smiled at the girl before pulling her into a bone-crushing hug. The Queen of Years looked at the Doctor over Clara's shoulder. It was then she noticed the blisters scattered along his neck and hands. His head wasn't much better, with burns unlike any she'd ever seen.

Clara pulled back from the hug when she felt Merry stiffen. The girl choked back a cry, running her hands over the blisters on Clara's.

"I'm fine, really, Merry. They don't even hurt anymore," Clara reassured her, brushing the girl's hair behind her ear. Merry stepped back and then touched her forehead like she had done in the pyramid.

"Merry don't," the Doctor called out, obviously knowing more about the customs of her species. Clara didn't know what Merry wanted to do.

"I want to," Merry told them, and her smile lit up her face. She began to sing, her words drifting to Clara's ears. They were old words; words Clara couldn't understand.

"What is it? What's she doing?" Clara asked the Doctor.

"She's the Queen of Years. The royal families on Tiaanamaat were born with varying psychic abilities, passed from generation through to generation. Some, a very long time ago, created songs used to heal," the Doctor explained. Wisps of purple reached from Merry mouth as she sang. "And she knows every song."

The purple tendrils coiled around Clara's hand, and she lifted it to find that they were healing her burns. The blisters receded into her skin, the burns faded until there was no trace of them left. The Doctor's hand slipped from her own, and he fell to the floor.

"Merry, you've healed her now, you can stop," he called out, backing away from the tendrils.

She didn't. They reached him, and he was bathed in the purple glow. It pulsed with both his heartbeats and then it was gone.

Clara rushed over to his side and took his face in her hands. She breathed a sigh of relief when she saw there were no more blisters dotting his neck. He smiled up at her.

"Why did you want her to stop?" she asked.

"When… When a Tiaanamaatan uses their powers, it drains them. Sucks their energy." Clara hadn't noticed before — Merry had seemed fine. "She'd already used her powers on you twice, and I—I was burnt all over, burns even the Tardis might not have been able to heal. Merry might not have recovered from the energy loss."

"But she did, though, right? She's fine now." As Clara said this, she looked over her shoulder at Merry who was watching them with childlike amusement. Clara gestured for Merry to come over. "See, she's fine. We're fine."

Clara wasn't sure why the Doctor was so reluctant to receive help from Merry. She knew the risks, and she knew what she'd been capable of before she did it, so why didn't the Doctor want her to heal him? Was it like a battle scar? Something to show off? Clara knew he loved attention, but to show off this scar just didn't seem like the Doctor at all.

She had scars — scars she wasn't proud of — scars she'd only ever show to one other person in her whole life. Clara thought maybe keeping the scars was his way of punishing himself. Much like her scars. She wanted to kill the person who had damaged him enough that he thought like that, if that was, in fact, why he wanted the scars.

[TARDIS]

They travelled in silence in the Tardis as the Doctor took her back to London. She thought of Merry, whom she'd promised to visit; somehow, that had made the Doctor's face light up with a cheesy grin. It made her stay on the Tardis official — it confirmed that she wanted to stay. And boy, did she want to.

She thought of how much she wanted to wipe off the sad smile the Doctor wore as he watched her walking around the Tardis. She longed to reach across the console and kiss him, as he had done outside the pyramid — except longer, and much more passionately.

She was walking past the monitor when she saw it. The Doctor was on the other side of the room flipping switches like a madman, so he didn't notice when her gaze lingered just a second too long on the monitor. It was a photo of her, a few years younger than she was now when she had had a fringe. She was crying in the photo, and she couldn't work out why.

"Home again, home again, jiggity-jig." He ran round to where Clara was, disrupting her train of thought. She smiled and walked towards the doors, glad to be back. She opened the door hesitantly and stared at the Maitland's.

"It looks different," she told him, closing the door quietly. She'd remembered why she was crying in the picture.

"Nope. Same house, same city, same planet. Hey! Same day, actually. Not bad. Hole in one." He seemed proud of himself.

"You were there," Clara began, turning to face him. "At mum's grave. You were watching." The Doctor turned away from the console. "What were you doing there?"

"I don't know… I was just making sure." He fiddled with a control; it was a nervous habit of his.

"Of what?" She glared at him.

He sighed before pushing himself off of the console and walking over to Clara. "You remind me of someone."

"Who?"

"Someone who died."

Oh. Clara hadn't been expecting that. She backed away from him slightly, thinking. She'd thought she could get away with the whole 'I'm not her, I'm just me' speech, but she couldn't be angry with him when he was remembering someone who died, that was just cruel.

"Well, whoever she was, I'm not her, okay?" Clara said softly. She lifted her hand to touch his cheek. "If you want me to travel with you, that's fine. But as me. I'm not a bargain-basement stand-in for someone else. I'm not going to compete with a ghost."

"No," the Doctor agreed, covering her hand with his own. Then, as if he'd just realised something, his other hand dropped into his pocket. He brought their linked hands in between them and placed something in her palm. "They wanted you to have it."

"Who did?" Clara asked, staring at the ring in her hand in shock.

"Everyone." He smiled down at her. She brought the ring to her lips and kissed it. "All the people you saved. You. No one else. Clara."

Clara grinned at him up at him and slipped the ring onto her finger. She hadn't lost everything. Her mum's ring was still with her, and she had the Doctor. The burns from earlier seemed minuscule when she thought about how many people she'd saved. Clara didn't even care that she'd given the leaf to a monster; she was just happy to have this now.

Before she could talk herself out of it, Clara had reached up and pulled the Doctor's head down to meet hers. His arms flailed in shock, and Clara smiled into the kiss. Her arms tugged him closer, and he finished flailing and put his hands around her waist. She could feel every inch of his body pressed into her, and she sighed when she had to pull back for air.

"What was that for?" he asked her, opening his eyes.

"We didn't really get a proper kiss earlier." Clara grinned, letting go of his hand and stepping back. "Thank you, Doctor." Then she was gone. He watched her step out the Tardis doors and back into her normal life.

He didn't do that — he wasn't the sort of person to kiss his companions. Yet she had kissed him again. Once in Victorian London, and again here. Granted, he'd kissed her on the asteroid, but could he let himself grow attached to her? It had been a while since he'd last had a companion at all, but he was sure it had never worked like this.

She was impossible, but she was his impossible girl — and maybe he'd just have to cross those bridges when he came to them because he couldn't hold back now.

A/N: Thank you to everyone who reviewed and favourited/followed this fic. Special thanks to those who pm-ed me, I love talking to you guys!

I'm so glad the story's turned out the way it did and thank you to my beta kinosternon for being absolutely amazing and fast with editing.

Dark and dangerous, that's the impossible duo, right?

Anyway, see you on the next Friday!

— BB