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Little birdie called Sweet King Deimar asks I pass word to you that you need take care, be rendered invisible to our Dear Murderous Haiva, and we all moved out of the monastery.

The man is a delight, having stoked his uncle into the murder of the sirens on the word of "no really they're all demons and this is not personal in any regard." So if he lives, we leave.

He believes Haiva would harm me?

Dare I say he knows this would be the case. Emilia's return is: yet he does nothing more than warn?

I don't know how much politics you've tasted in your life, love, but for what's passed over my tongue, I catch a hint of sensible manipulation and a dash of popular public images.

When people stand obsessed, they're dangerous. He is one such man. That, I believe.

Too much politics.

Thank you for the warning. I'll take care. [She won't.]

It's always politics. Headaches and necessities I delightfully am never paid to handle.

Good, because it won't be pleasant if anything were to happen in the monastery. Haven't we had enough?

Yes. More than enough.

Spare the reasons for anyone else to feel there's need for revenge. More than enough of that going around already.

For the record, I should very much hope that no one would take revenge on my behalf, were anything to happen.

I haven't the drive for it myself, but I make no claims for the rest of our mismatched crew.

[ Clara knows that the Doctor was fond of Caitlyn, and Clara is too, so she thinks this news should come from her and not something she discovers on her own. ]

I'm sorry I haven't ever messaged before now just to check in on you, and I'm sorry the first time I'm texting you is to let you know the Doctor's gone. I went home for just a few seconds, and I think he did too, only he...didn't come back.

Thank you for telling me. Are you alright?

[She's just gonna avoid processing her own feelings for the moment and focus on Clara.]

No.

[ She rubs her face before adding the other blow. ]

Caitlyn, I went home too and the Doctor, he's...the Doctor you know he's gone too.

Gone? What do you mean?

The Doctor you knew here is dead, Caitlyn.

[ It wasn't a fresh wound, not until this. She'd lived with it for almost a year, and then she was yanked home and had to go through it all again, the pain of losing him. And then she was brought to this planet again like she never really left, living it again. All she can be now is blunt. ]

I'm sorry. The Doctor exists, but he isn't the same. Not anymore.

[She's memorized the polite script one is meant to mindlessly regurgitate at a funeral, but she's never had anyone she actually knows die before. The script certainly isn't going to be of any use. And without it, she doesn't know what to say. There aren't really any words for how she feels right now.]

I'm so sorry, Clara.

Do you want to talk about it? In person? [Really, she just wants to give Clara a hug.]

[ Clara scrubs at her eyes, wiping away tears before finally sending a message back. ]

Yeah, can you meet me?

[ The next message is how to get to where she's been staying with Red, who's giving her some space to send these messages. ]

[Caitlyn sets off immediately, and it's only a few minutes before she's politely knocking on Clara's door.]

Clara?

[ Opening the door, Clara sees Caitlyn's face and immediately her vision blurs with tears. She reaches blindly out for a hug and grasps the other woman tightly. ]

He thought you were so cool, you know that?

[As soon as the door opens, Caitlyn throws her arms around Clara's shoulders. She's still trying to process the fact that her friend is dead and her other friend is grieving. She feels utterly helpless, unable to do anything to bring the Doctor back or make Clara - or herself - any less devastated by his loss.

She's never felt this helpless before.

She can't even think how to respond. Just digs her fingers into Clara's shoulders a little tighter, clinging to Clara as though for dear life.]

[ Clara holds onto Caitlyn tightly and lets go of the first sob, though she does manage to keep the rest of them at bay, swallowing thickly before pulling back. Wiping at her eyes, she gestures for Caitlyn to come inside to the very humble abode. ]

I was there when he...when...

[ She shakes her head. ]

I didn't realize he left here when I did.

[Caitlyn's grip becomes that much tighter when she hears the sob, but she lets go when Clara does, and steps in.

Clara didn't just lose a friend, she was there when he died. How could anything ever make that alright?

There are tears pricking the corners of her eyes, but she refuses to let them spill over.]

How did it happen?

[ Clara swallows heavily and sits down, inviting Caitlyn to do the same before she swallows thickly. ]

How else? Saving the world. A place called Christmas. He stayed there until he was old protecting them, until he was so old he couldn't fight when the planet was attacked.

[ Wetting her lips, she holds back her tears the best she can. ]

The Doctor's species, they have something called regeneration. Twelve lives to live. The Doctor we knew was the twelfth face but he never told me that. His people can also grant another life cycle, so I begged. I Caitlyn. I made sure they knew how much I—the universe—loved him. [ She corrects herself before she admits to loving him like he was actually hers. ] They listened, but he was still dying, I didn't save him. He had enough strength to finish the fight and then he...changed.

[ She remembers the way he screamed because it hurt, and she can't stop the tears after that, pressing her face into her hands and leaning over with her elbows on her knees. ]

[Caitlyn sits, listening to the story in silence. It makes sense, of course. How else would he die but saving the world? He'd mentioned regeneration to her - a trick up his sleeve, he'd called it, in case of death. She'd thought it meant that he could... not die, somehow. Like magic. Not at all what Clara is describing.

She catches the way Clara corrects herself - she can't help it, noticing things even when she doesn't especially want to - and files it away. Nothing she could even think of addressing right now.

Her arms wrap around Clara again. It's an awkward angle for a hug, but Caitlyn doesn't care. She holds on tight, letting Clara cry for as long as she needs to.

Eventually, she speaks, her voice quiet but intent.] It's how he'd want to die. Defending people. [She's not sure whether that helps.]

[ Clara doesn't care either, but she does nod against the other woman at her words. He knew he was going to die at Christmas, one way or another. When she finally pulls back, she's able to sniffle and compose herself enough to speak. ]

He tried to make me go, he tried to force me away from him. I don't think he wanted me to see—I couldn't let him be alone.

[ And she's glad now that she hadn't, that she got to see that silly, perfect face one more time. ]

Of course you couldn't leave him. [How could anyone leave someone they loved in that person's last moments? She'd have stayed too.

She pulls out her handkerchief and offers it to Clara so that she can dry her eyes.]

Is there anybody else who needs to know? Did he have any family? Other friends at home? [It's so much easier to focus on a task than on her grief. If other people need to be informed, they can talk about how best to do it, what exactly to say.]

[ Normally, Clara would never tell anyone what she knows about the Doctor, what he's shared with her, or at least let slip. She knows so much, but he isn't here anymore, and when he was, he trusted Caitlyn. She's still careful though, not spilling every fact. At least not yet. Using the handkerchief she wipes at her eyes and takes a deep breath, letting it out as she shakes her head. ]

His family is all gone. His planet, his people. I think I've mostly told everyone here who needs to know, but at home, unless you're with him, I don't know if anyone would ever really know exactly when he dies and regenerates.

[ In all the haze of her thoughts, and in telling those who needed to know, she can't remember who she's explained regeneration to and who she hasn't, so the words come with no further explanation. ]

His planet? [She had no idea. She can't even begin to imagine the loss of that, every single person and place one has known... gone. Millions and millions of lives ended. Before coming here, Caitlyn's entire world had been a few square miles of city streets, but there's the whole of Runeterra beyond Piltover, cities and mountains and forests and civilizations... How could something as vast as a planet be gone?

She shakes her head, trying to get her thoughts in order.]

What about funeral rites? Will you need to worry about anything like that? [She's gleaned some information about regeneration, but she's not sure whether it leaves any remains behind.]

His body...there isn't one because he's alive. The whole body changes. One minute he was a big chin and floppy hair, and then I was looking at a man with angry eyebrows and a thick accent. And the first thing he did was run away from me.

[ Well, not the first thing, but she's still hurt about it the things he did (or didn't) do. She backtracks though, letting out a quiet breath. ]

The Doctor's species is called Time Lord. Time Lords get twelve regenerations either at the end of their natural span of life which is thousands of years, or until they get hurt so badly they need a new body. The Doctor you knew was on his last cycle. Because of that he never told me how it worked, how regeneration happened.

[ She feels her throat tighten but she keeps going to get through it. ]

So when I found out he was dying I started begging the Time Lords that were left to give him another cycle and they did. I don't think he wanted them, but they did it.

Edited 2023-10-15 00:26 (UTC)

[Caitlyn's hand finds Clara's, squeezing gently as she hears the other woman's voice thicken. She listens carefully, cataloguing all this new information, slotting into the information she already had, reassessing assumptions she had made, as even in her grief her mind doesn't want to stop trying to understand, to figure out.]

I would have done the same thing. [She speaks softly, but sincerely. She can't imagine letting someone she loves die if there were any way to save them, whatever they wanted.]

[ Clara holds onto Caitlyn like a lifeline while she closes her eyes and tries to forget the way the Doctor sounded when he regenerated, and the way he acted directly after. ]

He called me. [ Opening her eyes, she huffs out a small laugh that sounds more resigned than humours. ] Time, it's...well, he's in control of it, isn't he? When I was with the new him, the regenerated him who ran from me, avoided me, wouldn't let me close, our Doctor called me from his TARDIS, fully aware that he'd already... he asked me not to leave him. To stay, take care of him. Best, rudest phone call I've ever gotten.

[ There, she laughs a little and it's lighter, but that phone call, it hurt as much as it helped. ]

[Caitlyn just sits, lets Clara say everything that she needs to say, holding onto her, and resisting the urge to ask what a phone call is. She has an enough of an idea from context.]

Did you? [She asks the question despite already having an idea of the answer.] Stay?

[ She hadn't wanted to, not at first. She wanted to get far, far away from the man she couldn't recognize. But then she'd been asked to see him, and she had. She really had, even if he wasn't the same.

Taking a deep breath, she lets it out as she nods. ]

Yeah. Yeah, I stayed, how could I not? And it's...a little better. Not a lot. Everything he was is the opposite, and I don't know—I just want him to smile at me again.

[ Her voice cracks and her vision blurs again ]

[The hand in Clara's tightens again. It's starting to properly sink in that she's never going to see the Doctor again. Even if this new person smiles at Clara, it won't be the same smile, and Caitlyn will never get to see it. He's never going to grab her hands and talk very intently at her, or spin in a little circle, or fix his bowtie ever again.

And Caitlyn doesn't really know how to process that. So she has to do something about it instead.

She stands, tugging on Clara's hand a little.]

Come with me.

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Text | un: hide-and-seek | A few days after arriving in Unkharil

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