Clara woke up the next morning feeling much better about the day ahead than she had when she had gone to sleep. She was ready to hit the new day head on, ready to tackle what the hell had happened to the Doctor when he'd regenerated, as well as getting used to the new man he was going to be when they finally found him again. She was both excited and nervous about what would happen after they found him, but one thing at a time.
The bed, thankfully, had been big enough for the two of them but she wouldn't have turned Danni away even if it hadn't been. She was her friend, no one would, right?
She rolled onto her side, smiling softly and sadly at her slumbering friend. She looked so peaceful in her sleep, and she was incredibly reluctant to wake her up and remind her of the day before. So much had happened to Clara, she had been abandoned twice, but she wouldn't wish Danni's predicament on anyone. She'd been so exhausted by losing two husbands in one night she'd not even cried herself to sleep, she'd just gotten changed into the night dress she had been leant – a decisively short one that Clara was sure that Vastra had chosen purposefully – climbed into the right side of the bed and closed her eyes. Clara did very much the same, but she'd taken longer to fall asleep.
As she climbed out of bed the door opened and Jenny peaked her head in. She motioned with a finger to her lips for the other woman to be quiet and Jenny walked in carrying a jug of warm water for the pair.
"Did you sleep well?" she asked Clara quietly and the companion nodded.
"Any news on the Doctor?" she asked in return as Jenny sat the jug down on a small side table next to a basin. She was hoping the Doctor had calmed down over the night and come back to his senses. Unfortunately Jenny's little shake of her head squashed her hopes somewhat.
"Madame is looking into the murders this morning, but she says you two should just relax. If anything comes up, she'll send for you," Jenny explained softly. Clara shot another look at Danni, checking to see if she had woken up. She hadn't, and she wondered if it was best to let her sleep until they had some better news. "She'll be okay."
Clara turned back to Jenny, surprised by the compassion on her face. "Oh, I know," she replied, even though she still wasn't wholly convinced. Eleven wouldn't have left Danni in such a state because of him, and he wouldn't have thought for one moment that she should have been with anyone else but himself at such a difficult time. So, naturally, the feelings Clara was getting when looking over her sleeping form were on the same line.
"There's some of Danni's dresses in the wardrobe," Jenny told her. "Take your time." With a nod of her head and a thank you from Clara, she left the two alone with a small smirk on her face.
Clara took her time choosing something to wear before deciding she really should have a wash. She was just pouring the warm water from the jug Jenny had fetched into the basin when Strax's voice floated in from the courtyard below.
"Come on, Earthling scum! Position it here. Easy now! That's it. Careful." Curious, she walked over the window, opening up to look outside. She smiled at the sight of Strax directing two men who had the TARDIS strapped to the back of the cart, "Don't get it scratched or you and all your bloodline will be obliterated from time and space."
"Very good, sir," one of the men replied like he had heard that from Strax many times before. Clara glanced behind her, checking on Danni to see if she was still asleep.
"Strax!" she called out of the window before checking on her again. Oh, good, she didn't seem to even notice, let alone wake up.
Strax looked up and actually seemed pleased to see her. "Ah, morning, Miss Clara. You're awake at last."
"You got the TARDIS, then?" Clara noted, nodding at the blue box whilst leaning against the window frame.
"Military tactics," Strax explained, one chubby finger pointed upwards. "The Doctor is still missing, but he will always come looking for his box. By bringing it here, he will be lured from the dangers of London to this place of safety, and we will," he clenched his hand into a fist, "melt him with acid."
Clara blinked in surprise. "OK, that last part?"
"And we will not," he once again clenched his hand into a fist, "melt him with acid." He looked up at her apologetically. "Old habits." He waved the newspaper that Clara didn't notice he was holding in his other hand. "The Times. Shall I send it up?"
"Yeah, why not?" Clara replied with a shrug. It wasn't like they had much else to do anyway.
With quite a lot of power behind it, Strax chucked the paper up to the first floor at the unsuspecting Clara, who took it to the forehead with a yell of surprise. She fell to the floor, stunned by the force it had hit her. She sat up again, hand on her head as a bubble of laughter came from the bed behind her. She looked up to see Danni crouching down beside her, picking up the paper and grimacing when she saw the title.
"Ouch, the Times," she commented. "Quite a hefty one, isn't it?"
"Did he have to throw it at me?" Clara grumbled as Danni helped her up.
"Yeah, it caught me out by surprise the first time too. It's always best just to go get it from downstairs if you want to read it."
"Noted," Clara replied, looking her over. She seemed better than when they'd gone to bed, she was smiling and everything, which wasn't what Clara was expecting at all. "How are you feeling?" she asked gently.
"Better," Danni replied. "My husband died, but he's still here." She frowned slightly. "Well, he's in London somewhere, but you know what I mean. He might have just forgotten me a bit, but we've done that before as well. I just need to remind him of why he fell in love with me."
"And how are you going to do that?" Clara asked with a grin.
"Well, I left some clothes here last time I stayed," Danni replied. "I'm hoping I've left my purple dress. He always liked that." She looked over at the wardrobe to see the dress Clara had chosen hanging on the door. "Oh, you'll look lovely in that!" Danni told her happily.
"Not as nice as you in that purple dress," Clara replied without really thinking and Danni shot her a smug look.
"No, that's very true," she agreed. "I look fantastic in that." She opened the doors on the already old wooden wardrobe. "Have you heard anything from Vastra on the murders?"
"Not yet," Clara replied as Danni riffled through the clothes. "Jenny said she'd send for us if anything came up."
"Maybe I should go help her," Danni murmured distractedly. "See if I can spot… where is it?" She had reached the end of the small collection of dresses but none of them were that purple dress that had always pulled his attention. "Oh, I bet it's on the bloody TARDIS!"
"Strax brought it back," Clara told her, "Why don't you go look for it in there?"
"He found the TARDIS?" Danni asked hopefully. She'd not heard much of their conversation, she'd been woken up by talks of not burning the Doctor with acid. Clara nodded and Danni was running out of the room, desperate to head back to her home. They'd barely managed to spend any time in her when she'd finally reappeared and Danni was dying to get back to her.
She smiled at Vastra as she dashed passed in just her night gown. "I won't be long!" she called over her shoulder, heading the courtyard where two men were finally getting the TARDIS upright. She ignored their looks, rushing to the door and giving the blue box a once over. Her paint looked pretty messy, but she knew that the time machine would take care of that when she was good and ready.
"Are you quite alright ma'am?" Strax asked her and she nodded.
"I, er," she glanced at the two men. "I'd just like to go into the box, if you wouldn't mind." He nodded, turning to the two men.
"Thank you for your help, you have been of great service to the Sontaran Empire," Strax said to dismiss them. Neither of them seemed fazed, both heading off with their pay already in their pockets. "There you go, boy, you may enter your blue box." She smiled, too happy to be going home to correct him yet again about her preferred gender, before stepping in. The lights were off, but the familiar console room was wonderful.
"Hello sweetie," she breathed, absolutely elated. She looked around as she slowly walked to the console. Everything seemed to still be intact, although a lot less messy than it had been the day before. The bowl of custard was gone, his clothes from Trenzalore most likely tucked away never to be seen again. She paused with one hand on the cool metal of the controls, looking up at the Gallifreyan above her head. One day she would learn how to read that. She still really only knew how to say 'I love you' and 'no, this isn't a place for fly-fishing'. Maybe, if everything settled down, her Theta would teach her what they said.
She just couldn't stop smiling, even though a large part of her was worried about him; even without a husband, it was nice to be home.
She dragged her fingers across the console top, slowly heading to the stairs to the hallway when she paused, laughing out loud. Hanging there was her purple dress, ready and waiting. She rushed forward and grabbed it, hugging it close. Her blue box always knew what she wanted.
~0~0~0~
Vastra looked up from her easel as the door opened, Danni stepping in, now dressed appropriately for the time period. Jenny was stood in the middle of the room, posing beautifully but she pulled the shawl she had draped over her shoulders closer together at the sound.
"Yowzah," Danni declared at the sight of the young woman. "You're going to turn my head dressed like that, Jenny."
"Ah, Danielle," Vastra greeted, hopefully pulling her attention away from her wife. "You're looking much better, I'm glad to see you still enjoy that dress."
"Oh, it's one of my favourites," she replied, before motioning behind her. "Am I interrupting anything? I can go and come back."
"I certainly do not mind, how about you my love?" she asked Jenny, who shook her head. Whilst she felt slightly under dressed, she wasn't too fussed when it was just the women and not Strax.
Danni smiled but shut the door behind her again, making sure to block the view of anyone who may walk passed unannounced. "Any news on my runaway husband?" she asked, making sure to keep behind the young woman as she went back to posing.
"Not as of yet, I'm afraid," Vastra replied. "I was just thinking upon what the Doctor said. The dinosaur burnt into a crisp, nothing remained, yet he seemed to think it was murder."
"Funny way to murder someone if you ask me," Jenny replied.
"It wasn't exactly well-hidden, was it?" Danni agreed, sitting down in a chair.
"Not every murderer wants to be hidden, my dear," Vastra replied, glancing at her beautiful wife and taking in her lovely form before turning to the, also rather enchanting, Time Lady sat behind her. "Some want to get caught."
"Well burning a dinosaur will certainly get a lot of people's attention," Danni agreed. "But you said last night the Doctor thought there were other related murders? Have a lot of people just spontaneously combusted?" Vastra nodded.
"Is that like love at first sight?" Jenny asked as Vastra looked over at her, holding up a pencil as if trying to understand some perspective before turning back to the page.
"Huh! A little," she agreed with a little laugh. "It is the theory that human beings can, with little or no inducement, simply explode."
Jenny shot her a grin. "You don't need to flirt with me, we're already married."
"It's scientific nonsense, of course," Vastra replied and Jenny frowned.
"Marriage?" she asked and Danni giggled. She'd forgotten how much she liked to watch these two bounce off each other.
"Oh, most definitely," she replied. "So there have been reports of people just exploding?"
"Nine in the last month," Vastra said with a thoughtful look on her face as she looked over the other side of the easel.
"And you think they weren't spontaneous," Jenny surmised.
"I think whoever killed the dinosaur had at least nine previous victims," Vastra confirmed, turning the easel around to reveal not the painting that both Jenny and Danni had been expecting, but a map of London with news articles dotted around it. Pins marked off where the nine victims had been found, red string joining up their respective pieces of information. "All of these perished in the same spectacular fashion."
Danni couldn't help but giggle at the look on Jenny's face, who wasn't best pleased to see what her wife had been working on. "I thought you were painting me!" she snapped.
"I was working," Vastra offered as an excuse as Danni stood up, walking over to the board as they had a little quarrel behind her. It was cute, they loved each other so much but it was always nice to see Jenny put Vastra in her place, but she really did have more important things to focus on. She followed one of the red lines to a newspaper cutting. Nothing out of the ordinary there. They were just average, everyday people.
"Why burn them?" Danni asked, interrupting them. "It's not very efficient, is it? It takes forever, and can you imagine the effort you'd have to use to burn a T-Rex? I mean, drawing attention to yourself is one thing, but that just seems tiresome."
"That is a very good point," Vastra agreed, walking over, thankful that Danni had stopped Jenny's little rant in its tracks. It was a good thing as well, she was so beautiful when she was angry, and they had company. "There must be some advantage to going to such drastic lengths."
Jenny joined the pair, holding the shawl closed, but more out of spite than anything. "Well, tell us, then," she commanded.
"To get rid of evidence?" Danni offered. "Burning up the body hides everything, does it? It may draw your attention, but you've got no hair, no bruises, not marks of any kind to check up on."
"You're thinking concealment?" The lizard woman asked her and Danni nodded.
"Concealment?" Jenny repeated.
"Something they want to hide, or something they don't want other people to notice is missing," Danni explained.
"It's a fanciful theory," Vastra reasoned. "But it fits the facts. By destroying the body so completely, you conceal what is missing from it."
"Missing from the body?" Jenny asked, intrigued but neither woman could answer as the door flung open, Clara rushing in with a newspaper.
"Danni!" she cried, coming to a stop as Jenny turned around, wondering just how many more people we going to see her with her clothes off.
"Clara, what is it?" she asked as the other woman, walking over, concerned.
"Look!" she held the newspaper up in front of her, showing them all a full page of adverts, her fingers jabbing towards the centre of the page. Jenny and Vastra shared a confused look whilst Danni leant in closer, eyes scanning the page in mild confusion as she tried to locate what Clara was showing them.
"Advertisements, yes - so many, it's a distressing modern trend," Vastra offered as Danni gasped, her eyes drawn to a small advert with bold writing 'Impossible Girl – Lunch on the other side?'
"It's him," she murmured, ripping the paper out of Clara's hand so she could look at it more closely. The Doctor had obviously left her that message, it can't have been a coincidence that there was an advert addressing someone with the same nickname they had both given the other woman, in the newspaper the day after he disappeared. You should never ignore a coincidence.
She looked up at Vastra, nodding to confirm what Clara was showing them. She walked over to the doorway, where a grand bell pull hung from the ceiling.
"Ma'am?" Jenny asked and Vastra sent her a wicked grin.
"The game is afoot. We're going to need a lot of tea."
~0~0~0~
Strax was doing a very good job at keeping them well stocked on tea as Vastra, who was deemed the fastest reader, went through the newspaper. Clara, Jenny and Danni went over the map, trying to make sense of the question. Lunch on the other side? Of what?
"There's nothing directly across from the Thames where the dinosaur was," Danni commented. "Nowhere to get lunch at, anyway."
"Maybe it's on the other side of the Thames to where we are now?" Clara suggested thoughtfully and Danni shrugged, trying so hard to keep her focus on the task at hand and not on the question rolling through her mind on repeat.
"Why do you think it was to you?" she asked Clara quietly. "Why not to me? Does he not want me there?"
"Of course he does," Clara promised her firmly, like she didn't even think the opposite could be true. "It's just him being cryptic, you know what he's like."
"No, I don't," she whispered in reply, because none of them did, not with this Doctor. She'd never watched him on TV, she'd never even seen his face before. He was completely new to her. Maybe he did want to be cryptic, but maybe he was trying to get a very firm point across.
Vastra turned another page, finding herself on the gossip section. "There appears to be nothing of significance in the rest of the newspaper, not even in the agony column."
"We can't know it's from the Doctor," Jenny pointed out, walking over to her wife, now fully dressed. She drew the line at the entire house seeing her less than presentable.
"Of course it's from the Doctor. The Impossible Girl, that's what he calls me!" Clara insisted, also walking over. It was right there in front of them and it was hard to argue otherwise.
"But Danni's right, why isn't it addressed to her?" Jenny reasoned in return.
"Because…" Clara trailed off, trying to find a reason behind the Doctor trying to contact her and not his wife. She pointed at Jenny, an idea immediately coming to mind she was rather proud of thinking up on the spot. "Because! Because he wouldn't want to bring attention to her."
"It is quite prominent on the page," Vastra agreed. Danni stepped forward, looking at the paper between the two wives.
"Do you think so?" she asked them hopefully. "If there is something alien going on, they might have heard of me."
"Exactly." Clara cried, although she had no idea if what she had suggested was true or not. "When we work out what he wants, we'll go together. You'll see, he'll be so happy to see you."
Danni tried not to smile, but knowing how much he loved the dress, and how much he'd loved her until he'd regenerated, she couldn't help it. She wanted him to want to see her, and she really wanted to see him. "What does he want, though? Lunch is one thing, but on the other side? Of what, exactly?"
"The other side of London?" Jenny suggested. "A bit vague."
"The other side of regeneration, perhaps, once he's recovered?" Vastra offered, going back to the newspaper, hoping something would stand out to her, maybe something she could have overlooked. It did happen from time to time.
"So what are we supposed to do - guess where we're meeting?" Clara retorted, taking hold of Danni's hand without really thinking about it. She stroked the back of it with her thumb, utterly confused by the puzzle they'd been presented.
"Perhaps that's the point," Vastra offered. "Perhaps you're supposed to prove that you still know him. Think what that must mean for a man who barely knows himself."
"But he doesn't do tricks," Danni replied. "Not like this, not when it's important. He'd want Clara to understand, not to have to spend hours working it out."
Clara agreed there. If he really wanted them to get there for lunch, he wouldn't have made it so cryptic. Maybe they were making it cryptic. "So..." she reached out, pulling the sheet off the outside of the paper where the ad was placed. "Keeping it dead simple..." she held it up to the light, looking through the paper to behind the ad. "'On the other side'…" She turned the paper over and grinned to herself. There, directly behind the ad, was another for 'Mancini's Family Restaurant' that proclaimed to have the finest dinner in London. She looked over her shoulder at Danni, who looked incredibly impressed as she rushed to her side to take a closer look.
"Oh, that's brilliant," she praised.
~0~0~0~
Danni and Clara stood across from the restaurant, both apprehensive at what they might find in there. They were both certain it was the Doctor, but what if it wasn't? What if someone was trying to lure them in under the pretence that it was the Doctor?
"This is definitely it?" Danni asked the other woman, who looked at the newspaper she had brought with her then back up at the building.
"Yeah, this is it," she confirmed but neither of them moved.
"This is ridiculous," Danni declared after a long moment of silence. "It's just a restaurant."
"You're right. Of course you're right," Clara agreed, but it still didn't make either of them want to move any more than they had a second ago.
"What if he doesn't want me there?" Danni asked, turning and looking at Clara, her trepidation shining in her eyes. If the Doctor could see how worried he'd made her, he wouldn't be doing this, Clara was sure of it. His regeneration must have rattled his brain, he couldn't have changed that much, surely?
"He wants you there," Clara told her. "Trust me." And with that certainty in her head, Clara marched forward, determined to get in there and give him a telling off regardless of what actually had happened to him.
Danni watched her, smiling at the way she stormed forward with purpose, practically throwing the door open. She was such a strong-willed woman, sometimes she wished she could be more like-
Oh, she was supposed to be following, wasn't she? She hitched up the bottom of her skirt, rushing across the road and after Clara. In fact, she was so focused on catching up to her friend that she didn't notice the woman she crashed into until it was too late and Danni was already falling to the floor.
"Oh, I'm sorry," she quickly apologised, looking up at the woman. With dark brown hair and carrying an umbrella, she was dressed pretty sternly but the smile she offered her said anything but.
"That's quite alright, my pet," she replied in a deep Scottish accent that had Danni smiling at the thought of her husband waiting in the restaurant. The woman even held her hand out to help her off the floor. "Mind yourself, though. Nothing can be worth rushing that fast for."
"I'm actually meeting my husband," she explained. "Guess I got a bit too excited."
"Ah, well, I can see why you're so excited," she replied. "Hurry along then, don't keep him waiting for too long." Danni nodded, apologising again before dashing into the restaurant.
The woman watched her go, her smile turning into a smirk before she opened her umbrella over her head, popping it open before casually walking away.
~0~0~0~
Danni had been pretty disappointed to find Clara sat at a table on her own, no sign of her husband in sight. They'd been given a circular booth, and they nervously sat in silence waiting for the hopefully quick arrival, Danni worrying one of the napkins on the table.
"Maybe I should go," Danni whispered. "I don't want to upset him by being here, especially if he's only expecting you."
Clara turned slightly on her seat. "What is it with you and avoiding him?" she asked bluntly. "You thought he was going to die, we both did, you think you'd at least be happy about it."
"I am!" Danni replied before looking down at her hands. "Of course I'm happy. He's my husband, I love him, and I'm so glad he didn't die."
"Then what is it?" Clara asked, gently this time.
"What if-" she trailed off. "When he regenerated from Nine to Ten, he hated me. I mean, properly hated me. When he regenerated from Ten to Eleven, he decided that it was time to love me. What if, now he's Twelve, he decides to hate me again?"
It was amazing what could happen in a day. She'd been loved by him for almost six hundred years. Her Theta, who had a town sing for her, who gave her a ring with the last diamond off a planet he'd thought was gone forever. He'd shown her worlds no one else would ever dream of seeing, he gave her a home and a life she couldn't ever thank him for. And yet, now he was a new man, she could only wonder if that had all gone. She had been so certain of him, and now she felt so nervous.
"Then we'll deal with it together," Clara replied, "I made him remember you once, I can do it again." She leant in closer. "Impossible Girl to the rescue once again."
Danni couldn't help but giggle at the smug, exaggerated look Clara sent her way. "Yes, alright, I know," she conceded. "It's too early to make any conclusions. I'm just nervous." She blushed slightly. "What if he likes me, Clara?"
Clara shook her head at the little question, asked like a proper teenager. Sometimes it was very easy to forget just how old the two were, especially with Danni acting like she had a crush on what was actually her husband.
"Danni has a boyfriend," she teased and Danni giggled, flushing even more before smacking her on the arm gently.
"Stop it," she replied and the two fell into a much more comfortable silence, even if Danni did seem to be tearing chunks out her napkin still.
Then her nose wrinkled adorably. "Can you smell that?" she asked. Clara took a quick sniff and pulled the same face. She was right, something stunk.
"Yes," she replied, trying not to breathe through her nose. The pair took a glance around the restaurant but nothing seemed out of the ordinary. It was quiet, but people were eating and no one seemed to notice the stink.
The large seat that Clara and Danni were both sat on dipped as someone joined them and they both turned to see the Doctor sat there in a new outfit. Danni looked him over, really struggling not to breath the smell in as it became incredibly clear that it was coming from him.
She didn't care, though. She was just so happy to see him that the fact that he smelt vaguely like a sewer didn't matter at all to her. She had expecting his old face, though, for just a moment and the guilt made her smile falter in guilt. It didn't matter the face, she was just used to Eleven, that was all. She'd get used to this new one as well, with his aggressive eyebrows and grey hair.
Not the clothes, though. They were going to have to, at the very least, be washed.
The Doctor was shooting her a look, like he couldn't quite understand her. His brows were furrowed, his grey eyes burning into her and she shrank slightly under his imposing gaze. Then he looked up at Clara. "I told you to leave her at the house."
Danni winced and Clara glared, her back straightening. "Believe it or not, she wanted to see you," she snapped in reply, coughing slightly as the smell burnt her throat. "I don't know why, with that smell."
"I know, it's everywhere," he commented, looking around like he genuinely didn't understand that it was coming from him. Danni sat forward slightly, torn between wanting to be closer to her husband and really not wanting to be close to that smell.
"Where did you get the clothes from, sweetie?" she asked him gently and he looked down, clearing his throat.
"Er... I bought them," he offered, something neither of them believed.
"From where?" Danni asked.
"Er, a shop," he offered and Clara shook her head once.
"No," she snapped firmly.
His eyes narrowed slightly in thought as he looked off to one side. "Might have been a tramp."
"With what?" Danni asked at the same time Clara pointed out, "You don't have any money."
"Er..." he trailed off as he struggled to remember for a moment. He'd wiped that moment out of his head, but it came rushing back when he thought about it. "I had a watch!"
"No!" Clara exclaimed, horrified. "That watch was beautiful." Danni agreed with her, although she had been rather glad she'd kept his pocket watch safe. She knew he loved that watch, it had been one of the few gifts she had ever given him in their time together. He was so hard to buy for – he had a TARDIS who could give him anything he wanted, so all he really did desire was time spent with people. She knew he'd have a million and one pocket watches to choose from, but he'd always worn the one she had bought him. He'd told her it was his favourite.
"It was my favourite," he replied, speaking of the watch he'd traded and she was glad she hadn't given him it back when he'd sat down. If he didn't like it, fine, she'd keep it for herself.
Clara seemed to know something was wrong with that, her eyes narrowing. "I thought your pocket watch was your favourite watch?" she challenged. The Clara part of her, the main part, was concerned but annoyed at him for the tricks he was trying to play, leaving cryptic clues and running off in the middle of the night. The Doctor part of her, though, was furious at how he was behaving towards his wife and it was slowly overtaking her own feelings.
"What pocket watch?" he replied and that was it for Danni. She stood up the best she could behind the table.
"I should head back…" she started but Clara turned her glare onto the blonde.
"Sit down," she almost barked and Danni, slightly alarmed, did what she was told. The Doctor chuckled slightly at her being told off, it was nice when it wasn't him coming under fire from Clara but she shot him a look, shaking her head.
"No, no. Don't, don't... Don't, don't smile," she told him firmly. "I will smile first and then you know it's safe to smile."
The Doctor frowned. "Are you cross with me?"
"Yes," she replied firmly. "Yes, I am very cross with you, and you know exactly why!"
"No, actually, I don't," he replied, leaning forward slightly as they argued. Danni leant back, away from the pair as they seemed to forget that she was even there.
"Yes you do," Clara hissed. "You must know how you're behaving! You've been missing all night, but you've not even asked if she's alright!" She was well aware that Danni didn't need the babying that the Doctor would always subject her to, but that's how he behaved. He'd check on her, hug her close, they'd both probably end up snogging and Clara would have to moan about it to get them to stop.
"Who?" he asked, looking confused and Clara just stared back at him.
"Who?" she repeated, "Did you really just…"
"Yes, who?" he demanded, leaning forward. He did, for a moment, think she meant Danielle, but she can't have done. It was obvious that she wasn't going to be okay, her husband had just died. It would take more than one night to get over that. And then she had to get used to his new face, he knew it was going to take a while, especially considering this was the first face he knew she wouldn't have known. When she was ready she'd come to him, but until then he had to give her the space to grieve and move on.
Clara laughed harshly, leaning back and crossing her arms. "I can't believe this." she scoffed. "Regeneration could not have changed you that much!"
"Oh, I see," he replied. "If I hadn't changed my face, would you be cross?"
"If you hadn't changed your face it wouldn't be an issue," she snapped back. "But I would be cross if I wasn't cross!" Even Danni had to look at her, confused.
"Sweetie," she took Clara's hand. "Calm down." Clara nodded, taking a deep breath. "What's wrong?"
"What sort of person would put a cryptic note in…in a newspaper advert?" she stuttered out, motioning to the paper that was on the table in front of her. The Doctor looked down at his hands, looking decidedly uncomfortable.
"Well, I wouldn't like to say," he murmured but Clara nodded, as if motioning for him to continue.
"Oh, go on, do say," she insisted harshly.
"Well, I would say that that person would be an egomaniac, needy, game-player sort of person," he retorted, still not looking up at Clara and Danni shook her head slightly. The Doctor always described himself in many ways. A moron, an old fool. The words 'selfish' and 'childish' came up a lot, and she was always ready to correct him when he became too down on himself, but none of those were actually how he would describe himself.
But he wasn't describing himself, was he? He was describing the sort of person who would put the advert in the newspaper, not himself.
"Thank you," Clara replied to him, sounding very relieved that he, at least, was willing to admit it to himself what he had done.
"You didn't post the advert, did you?" Danni asked him and he looked down at her, looking vaguely confused.
"Of course not, you did," he replied.
"No, we didn't," she told him, looking incredibly serious and he seemed to believe her instantly.
"Oh," he murmured, looking around the room.
"No, no, you placed the ad," Clara insisted and he met her eye, giving her a little shake of his head."Then who… Hang on," Her eyes narrowed in anger again, "'Egomaniac, needy, game-player'?"
"This is a trap, isn't it?" Danni asked her husband.
"You should have stayed at the house," he repeated lowly.
"Oh, you wouldn't have it any other way," she replied in the same low tone and he tried not to smirk in reply, but he failed miserably. He definitely wouldn't. The excitement was nothing without her by his side, and he'd had his fair share of time without her in the past. And the smile she shot him in return, that cheeky one of hers, just proved how right he was about it.
"That was me?" Clara demanded, leaning on the table and still focused on the summation of her character.
"Never mind that," the Doctor dismissed, looking around the room, trying to get any indication of what was going on. He, his companion and his wife were obviously lured here for a purpose.
"Yes, I am minding that!" she snapped in reply.
"Clara!" Danni snapped lowly, also trying her hand at spotting something out of the ordinary, although without having a proper look, she really couldn't see much. "We're in the middle of a trap, we can tell him off for it later, okay?"
Satisfied, Clara gave her a nod, putting her anger on the backburner. "We're in a trap?"
"It's..." The Doctor started, scratching through his new hair, looking for a suitable one for his task. His hair felt courser than his old hair, he hoped that wouldn't bother Danielle. She'd always liked his hair. "It's a vanity trap. You're so busy congratulating yourself on solving the puzzle," he pulled one out, holding it in front of him, "you don't notice that you're sticking your head in a noose."
"What are you doing?" Danni asked him as he stared intently at the small hair he held in his hand.
"I'm trying to measure the air disturbance in the room," he explained shortly before discarding it. "It's too short."
He reached over to Clara, intent on pulling one from her head to use, but Danni got there first. She reached up, pulling one out of her hair with the slight wince that always came with pulling a hair out then held it out to her husband. "Try this." she offered. He didn't thank her, just took it and held it dangling in the air.
"Right, moments when you know you are boring," Clara murmured but Danni shushed her. The Doctor waited a moment longer, then dropped the hair. It barely moved as it fell to the floor, showing him something that he'd suspected since he'd done his first sweep of the room.
He placed his elbow on the table, leaning on his hand to try and look casual as he leant in even closer to the two women. "There is something extremely wrong with everybody else in this room," he murmured out of the corner of his mouth.
"Mmm, basically, don't you always think that?" Clara shot at him in reply.
"Look at them," he commanded and the pair turned to look out at the other patrons, something that he obviously didn't want them to do as he waved them to turn their heads back. "Don't look!"
"You just said to look!" Clara retorted.
"Look without looking!" he commanded. So, surreptitiously, Danni and Clara both looked out at the room, something that was easier for Danni than it was for her friend considering she was sat facing out at the room. At first she didn't see anything wrong, they were all normal, if quiet, people eating their lunch. And then she saw it, the way some of them raised forks with food speared on them up to their lips then down to the plate, whilst some just never even tried to fake it at all.
"They're not eating," she murmured, that same feeling of foreboding that she got when something was going terribly wrong weighing down in her stomach.
"Of course they-" Clara started to correct her, taking another look and noticing the same thing. "OK, no. No, they're not eating."
"Something else they're not doing," the Doctor added, reaching over and plucking another one of Danni's hair out. Her skin tingled, not just because of the quick stab of pain, but because that had been the first time he'd touched her voluntarily since he'd regenerated. He held the hair out and let it drop again. "Breathing," he hissed.
Clara tried her best to look inconspicuous, shuffling the newspaper like she was showing them both something instead of hiding her dread at the predicament they'd found themselves in. "What do we do?"
"Get out of here, I'm guessing," Danni retorted, glancing up at her husband who was still looking critically over the room. "Robots pretending to be people? They're going to have noticed we're not supposed to be here, can we just get up and leave?"
"That depends," the Doctor replied. "Maybe we can, if they've not noticed that we've noticed." He looked her over with an indifferent expression, although his concern for her was rapidly increasing. This was why she should have stayed at the house, out of harm's way. That had been their rule, hadn't it? But now that she was here, and he could see her trying to work a way out, he couldn't say that he wasn't enjoying it. She'd had plenty of time on Trenzalore to hone her skills, but she always looked to him for the answers. He couldn't blame her, he was a genius, but she could never see how clever she was either.
"We could just casually stroll out of here, like we've changed our minds," Clara offered and Danni nodded.
"Of course we can," she agreed. "People do that all the time, sometimes you're just not as hungry as you thought." The Doctor gave them both a nod in agreement, and they all stood up in unison, just as every other person in the restaurant did the same. Danni shared a look with her husband, who seemed just as perturbed by the behaviour. Each of the other patrons were staring straight at them, waiting to see what they did next.
Clara and the Doctor stepped from around the table as Danni made her way to the edge. They each took one step and so did everyone else, closing in on the trio. Another step, and the space between them all was shortened as the people surrounded them.
Danni leant in a bit closer. "Maybe we could take another look at the menu, or something," she offered. The other two nodded and as they all sat down again, so did the people. Each of them picked up a menu, but none of them actually looked at what it was offering them.
"What are they?" Clara whispered, pretending she was trying to make a choice off the menu when really she was just trying to not look at the creepy non-people keeping their eye on the table.
"I don't know," the Doctor admitted, menu in hand. "But don't worry, because that's not the question. The question is what is this restaurant?"
"What is it?" Danni asked, unconsciously sitting closer to him despite the smell of the jacket. He smirked slightly; he still had it, she still looked for him when she was scared.
"I don't know," he admitted and she nodded, staring at the writing in front of her.
"Great, that's… that's great," she murmured. They were approached by a very stiff looking waiter, who stood looking over them with no expression on his face at all. Danni shot him a nervous smile.
"This- this is a lovely restaurant," she told him with an awkward giggle at the end.
"Er... no sausages?" the Doctor asked him, taking another look at the menu. "Do you... And there's no pictures either. Do you have a children's menu?" Instead of answering, the man pulled out a pen-like device from his pocket. He pointed the end at the Doctor, shining him a green light. "Any specials?"
He moved the light up and down the Doctor, obviously scanning him. "Liver," he declared in a robotic voice. Ah, robots, excellent.
"I don't like liver," the Doctor replied but the robot didn't pay him any attention.
"Spleen. Brain stem. Eyes," he rattled off before moving onto Danni, shining up and down her torso slowly.
"Mm. Is there a lot of demand for those?" Clara asked, only glancing up from the menu.
"Ears. Oesophagus. Breast tissue," it declared for her. Danni narrowed her eyes, knowing exactly what he was doing; divvying them up for their spare parts. Maybe they worked for the Cybermen, she'd enjoy beating them again.
"Do you mind?" she snapped. "My husband's right there."
The Doctor, who was very much not pleased at anyone, let alone a robot, talking about his wife's breast tissue, glared up at the machine. "Yes, they're definitely not on the menu," he snapped as the robot scanned Clara as well. The Doctor leant to the side, catching sight of a line that appeared to run right around the robot's face, like a seam. "Excuse me."
With very little effort, he reached up and tore the face straight from the robot, revealing a bare frame underneath made up of thick strips of grey metal, a flame burning behind it. Danni yelped in surprise as the Doctor looked over it in his hands, confirming what he suspected it had been.
"OK. Robot in a mask," Clara murmured.
"It's a face," the Doctor replied, because it was definitely made out of human tissue, and she nodded.
"Yeah, it's very convincing," she agreed. He reached over, placing it on her face like a mask and Danni groaned, batting his hand away.
"Get that off her," she demanded, reaching up and pulling it off Clara, dropping it onto the table with a shudder. "He means it's an actual face."
It took a moment for what Danni had said to register and she yelled, absolutely disgusted as she wiped her face to get rid of any residue. "That's horrible!"
"Yes," rhe robot declared suddenly and they all turned their attention back to the faceless robot.
"Yes, what?" rhe Doctor asked it and it turned its head like it was talking to him.
"Yes, we have a children's menu," it replied before three sets of metal restraints shot out of the seat they were sharing, holding them against the back of it. Once they were in place, three more came out and held their legs in place.
"Get off!" Danni exclaimed in a mild panic. "Let us go!" The chair jolted before it began, rather rapidly, sinking into the floor and down a crude metal shaft.
"You've got admire their efficiency," the Doctor commented as they were taken underground.
"Not the time, sweetie," Danni replied, struggling slightly as she reached out for his hand, but he didn't take it.