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Sometimes when Clara went to a new planet she desperately wanted to discover everything about it. She would ask the locals for stories behind landmarks and scour the landscape for clues behind traditions. If that failed, she would find books on the planet and read up on it later when everyone else was asleep.
Occasionally, however, the mystery was best left as just that.
Giggling, she lost her footing for the third time in five minutes, and accepted that this would be one of those times.
The ground bounced beneath her as she landed on the grass. The ripples from the impact sent Jenny flying and soon the two women were crawling steadily towards each other over the grass as it wobbled under them.
“It’s like a waterbed,” gasped Clara when they were finally able to clasp hands. “The whole planet!”
They collapsed next to each other, still chuckling at how much they had struggled to walk.
“Do I want to know what one of those is?” asked Jenny.
“I’ll show you later.”
“Looking forward to it.”
They settled into more comfortable positions, on their backs, fingers tangled together as they watched the translucent clouds meander across the violet sky. Clara saw the awe on Jenny’s face out of the corner of her eye and sighed.
It was hard to get Jenny to sit down and appreciate things sometimes. She always wanted to be moving in any direction she could - whether it was safe or not. The only exception was when they were out in the open and could trace the sky back to the horizon.
Clara figured she would have been the same if she had been born underground. Watching Jenny now, she thought what a tragedy it would have been if she had never managed to see the open air and what a loss it would have been. Not just for Jenny, but for everyone else, who would have missed out on one of the most beautiful smiles there had ever been.
“I love it here,” Jenny whispered, still fascinated by her surroundings.
Clara looked around the field they were in. It was pretty standard in her opinion. It was relatively flat and there was little in the way of vegetation. The only thing remarkable about it was the bouncing ground, but even that wasn’t too much different from the bouncy castles she remembered from the birthday parties of her childhood. Even the sky was fairly normal, with only one sun and no moons.
“We’re in the middle of nowhere.”
“No such thing. Everywhere is somewhere.”
Jenny grinned and Clara was helpless to return it.
They could have been in the middle of a rubbish dump, but if it made Jenny look at her like that, then Clara would have lived there. Soon, Jenny’s gaze drifted from Clara’s face and back up to the darkening sky, her smile fading from cheeky to something softer.
Over her vast experience with time travel, Clara had grown to see moments as places that could only be visited once. She had to make the most of each one because she could never go back. It hit Clara with the force of a freight train, that she didn’t just want to revisit this moment, but that she never wanted to leave it.
The problem was, she knew that she would have to one day leave this planet along with so much more.
It wasn’t until Jenny frowned at her with concern that she realised that she had tightened her grip on the other woman’s hand.
“What?”
“One day I’ve got to go back. Face the Time Lords.”
Jenny blinked, clearly not sure why the subject they never discussed was being brought up. “Die?”
Clara nodded. “I’ve already done it. In the future.”
“Yeah,” laughed Jenny, rolling her eyes. “The future.”
She turned back to the sky and Clara swore that, if her heart had still been beating, it would have stuttered then. The way Jenny was so full of life while she was practically already dead was something they often joked about. Now, though, Clara could only think about what that really meant.
“One day the future will be tomorrow.”
Jenny smirked. “Not with a time machine.”
“Jenny.”
The explanations and justifications she usually prided herself on being able to put together in seconds failed Clara and all she was left with was a barely audible name that had more meaning to her than any other word she knew.
Only when Clara couldn’t bring herself to do anything other than stare at Jenny, desperate for her to read and make sense of the thoughts she couldn’t bear to vocalise, did Jenny’s smile falter.
“You - you can’t be serious.”
Something could happen the next day. Time Ladies weren’t as invincible as Jenny acted as though she was. They could be separated. One of them could be lost. Even with a time machine, they couldn’t predict the future, not in that way.
This moment, this simple, wonderful moment, could end up being the last time Clara was ever truly happy.
It had been a long time since Clara had decided to face the raven. She had decided not long after running away with Lady Me that the only way for her mistake to become a victory was to squeeze every bit of joy and happiness out of the time she had left. Her end would be met with no regrets and her head held high. She refused to go back on her knees, grateful that it was over, sorry that any of it happened at all.
But would she know when to bow out? Or was it inevitable she’d wait too long and her ending would be a blessing in disguise?
She rolled onto her side and cupped Jenny’s cheek. “No. Not anytime soon.”
“Good,” Jenny whispered. She kissed Clara softly as she refused to cry.
It didn’t matter how strong her resolve or convictions were, Clara knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that she could never leave Jenny.
When Jenny pulled away, Clara knew she must have failed to keep her sadness from her eyes.
“We aren’t supposed to lie to each other. You-”
“I’m not. I promise.” Clara reassured her, pulling her closer, needing to feel her hearts, her warmth. To know that she was real and there. “I just want you to know, when it happens-”
“In the future.”
“-in the future,” Clara chuckled as a rogue tear escaped. “I’m going to think about this day. Because it has all been worth it to be here with you right now.”
Clara knew she would never understand all of the mysteries of the universe, no matter how much she travelled, and she was slowly coming to terms with that. It was hard to let go, but she accepted that she would never understand how a planet’s surface could bounce or what she did to deserve to meet Jenny.
However, for the first time in a long time (probably since Danny died, if she was brutally honest with herself), she was just glad to discover these mysteries existed and grateful that she was able to have these once in a lifetime experiences at all.
How many of them she was able to have before she had to return to face the raven, she thought as Jenny kissed her, was entirely up to her and, to her, that ultimate control, was the best victory she could have had.