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"Hello? Exit the box and surrender to the glory of the Sontaran empire!"
The box opened and a grey-haired man looked out of it. "Shush" he said, before closing the door again.
"Doctor?"
The door opened. "I was being chased by a giant dinosaur, but I think I managed to give it the slip." And closed.
Strax turned around to his mistress and her wife. Then the door was opened very slowly and the man came out of the Tardis.
"Sleepy?"
"Sir?"
"Bashful. Sneezy. Dopey? Grumpy." He smiled and ran towards Madame Vastra and Jenny. "Oh! You two! Not Rose … The green one and the not-green one. Or it could be the other way around. I mustn’t pre-judge. Oh you remember …" He pointed to the spaceship. "Uh … also not Rose."
"Who's Rose?", asked Jenny her wife quietly.
"Thingy" he proceded and turned away from the young woman, who looked exhausted. "The not-me one. The … asking-questions one. Have you seen Rose?" he asked Jenny.
"Clara!" the woman shouted.
"Not Clara. Rose!"
"Me. My name's Clara!"
"Might be Clara, might not be. There's a lot to it."
"It is Clara!"
"Well, not really- Oi, Big man, shut it!" he shouted at the T-Rex, who had been roaring. "Oh! You've got a dinosaur too!" He ran around Vastra and Jenny before apologizing, "Big woman, sorry!"
"Doctor! Listen to me! You need to calm down!" Clara tried.
"I'm not flirting, by the way! Do you know Rose?" He was still talking with the dinosaur.
"Who the hell is Rose? … Right doesn't matter. I think something's gone wrong." She turned to the Paternoster Gang, hoping they knew what was going on.
"Wrong? What's gone wrong? Have you regenerated? … I remember you! You're Handles! You used to be a little… little robot head. And now you’ve… really let yourself go." He ran around again and turned to Madame Vastra.
"The frequency!"
"Sorry?"
"Your sonic lanterns! Turn them down! They're giving her a headache!"
"Give her a headache?"
"My lady friend!" The dinosaur roared louder. "Just an expression! Don't get any ideas! I'm already taken … I think." Clara was confused. He wasn't.
Strax was the next to speak up. "How do you know?"
"Oh come one, Clara! You know I speak dinosaur!"
"He's not Clara! I'm Clara!"
He leaned forward and squinted at them. "Well, you're very similar heights. Maybe you should wear … labels." Then he stumbled back. "Why are you ...Why … Why are you going … going dark? Wobbly? Stop that!"
"I don't think we are." If Clara wasn't worried before, she definitely was now.
"Nevermind! Everyone, take five!" he shouted and immediately fell on his face. Unconscious.
Clara ran to him and turned him on his back. "What do we do?"
Jenny looked down at them. "I don't understand. Who is he? Where's the Doctor?"
"Right here. That's him. That's the Doctor."
"Well then, here we go again" Vastra said quietly.
They took a carriage to the Paternoster's residence. Strax was driving, Clara sat with the Doctor's head in her lap on one bench, Vastra and Jenny across her on the other. "Do you know who this Rose person is?" Clara asked, breaking the silence.
"I like to think we know a fair share about the Doctor, but he never mentioned a Rose, did he?" Jenny said.
Madame Vastra looked at Clara. "I imagine she was a companion."
"As far as I know he had loads of them. Couldn't even remember me. Why her?"
Vastra shrugged. "How would we know? He never talks of past companions. Only mentioned the Ponds once or twice and they were the whole reason for him staying here! We couldn't possibly know what made her special."
"You've redecorated."
The Doctor was sitting in a chair, not looking at her. "Yes."
"I don't like it."
"I'm not entirely convinced myself. I think there should be more round things on the wall. I used to have a lot of round things, I wonder where I put them."
He noticed that Clara was fiddling with the console. He had to talk to her properly. Going down the stairs, rounding the console he spoke, "I’m the Doctor. I’ve lived for over two thousand years. And not all of them were good. I’ve made many mistakes, and it’s about time that I did something about that. … Clara, I'm not your boyfriend."
"I never thought you were."
"I think, you did. But I want you to know that I haven't been interested in being anyone's boyfriend for over a thousand years."
He could nearly hear her brain working and thought he probably shouldn't have said that last bit, not when he had talked all day about …
"Rose. You kept talking about her. That's who she was, that's why she's special. You … was she your girlfriend?"
"She … she was more than just my girlfriend."
Clara opened her mouth task how he meant that, but he interrupted her, pushing his hands into his pockets. "So? What do you think?"