When Clara Met Rose(A Whouffle/TenPetals Fanfiction)

Chapter 2

"Stay behind me," the Doctor instructed Clara firmly. He kept the Sonic trained on the waiters at all times, waiters that were made of...plastic? Clara risked a look back over her shoulder at them. 

"Doctor, what are they?" Clara hissed, feet shuffling as she tried to move in a circle along with him. 

"Autons. Living plastic, controlled by the Nestene Consciousness." A deep voice said behind her. Clara froze in place as the younger Doctor lifted his sonic, winking. "Duck." 

She didn't need telling twice. In one fluid- possibly well-practised- movement, she spun, gripped her Doctor by the collar and tugged him down to the floor. He flailed but collapsed on top of her all the same, linking his arms behind his head as he tried to shield as much of her as he could with his lanky body. The other Doctor's sonic let off a high pitched wail. The Autons, no longer seeing the Doctor and Clara as a threat in the light of the new arrivals, jerked their guns up level to the younger Doctor's chest. 

"You want it? Come and get it!" He taunted them. All at once the Autons fired their guns, beams of deadly red fire criss-crossing in the air. Clara winced as several beams came within a fingers breadth of her Doctor's hair, the smell of singed hair strong in her nostrils. She gripped on to fist fulls his coat, so tight that she was surprised that the fabric didn't tear. Her Doctor tucked an arm down between them, wiggling it until he could reach the Sonic that had become lodged between their bodies in the fall. He pulled it out, smiling apologetically at their position, and pointed it behind his shoulder, flicking the metal prongs open and adding their Sonic's low buzz to the Sonic din already reverberating around the room.

The combined power of both Sonics was too much for the Autons. They dropped like puppets with cut strings, falling to the ground with a heavy clunk, limbs disconnecting from their main bodies and rolling on the floor. Clara breathed a sigh of relief and shoved the Doctor off her.

"What was that?" she demanded, giving the nearest Auton a nudge with her boot.

"Autons. And they weren't too happy about us leaving..." The Doctor slid his arms around her. "Are you alright?"

She rubbed his arm. "Fine. You?" She reached up a hand to feel the ends of the burnt hair, several millimetres shorter than the rest.

"Never been better." He pressed a quick kiss to her temple then let her go, moving to inspect the 'bodies'. Clara crossed her arms and glanced around the room, trying to work out where the Autons had sprung from. One moment they had been alone, the Doctor telling her what else was in store for this evening once they had made it off the planet, and the next they had been completely surrounded by plastic aliens that had once been their waiters.

"Doctor," Clara called back over her shoulder, "where are you?"

He swiveled to face her, frowning, "I'm right here."

"No, not you. Other you-younger you."

That caught the Doctor's attention and he spun on his heels in a circle, clapping his hands together. "That, Clara, is a surprisingly good question." 

Clara cupped her hands around her mouth. "Doctor?" she called, feeling very odd shouting the name of the man that was standing by her side. "Doctor!"

There was a loud metallic clang. She looked to her Doctor, who shrugged, and returned to scanning an Auton, seemingly unconcerned by his own disappearance.

"He'll be alright," he said, hefting a shapely leg over his shoulder.

"Any reason why you chose that particular leg?" Clara questioned, amused. 

"It reminded me of yours," he replied smoothly, making her blush, at the same time that a loud bang resonated through the lobby. Clara's ears popped and the Doctor almost dropped the leg as a cloud of smoke filled the entranceway, the Doctor and Rose emerging cautiously from a store cupboard waving their hands in front of their faces and coughing.

"Here we go," the Doctor muttered to Clara, cracking his neck from side to side, "leave this to me."

The younger Doctor saw them and strode towards them, jabbing a finger rudely in their faces. "I don't know who you are or what you're doing here, but you need to get out. Now. Before one of you runs into danger and I have to save you."

Clara stifled a giggle. Unfortunately, he didn't miss it, jamming his hands back in his pockets, leaning forwards on his toes.

"Oh, you think it's funny, do you?" He jutted out his chin. 

"Yes," Clara laughed, earning her an annoyed look from Rose. 

"Clara I thought you said you were going to let me handle it?" Her Doctor whispered in her ear.

"Sorry, I just..." she doubled over with giggles.

The other Doctor looked perplexed. "What's so funny?" He asked Rose, scratching the back of his neck. 

"Beats me," she replied. 

Clara stood on her tip-toes and whispered in the Doctor's ear. By the time she had finished he was laughing along with her, both cracking up whenever they caught the other's eye. 

"What? Seriously, what?" The younger Doctor demanded.

Clara's Doctor sobered up. "Sorry. Clara here-this is Clara by the way-"

She gave him a little wave. He returned it cautiously, hand moving slowly to and fro. 

"-had this wonderful idea-"

"No. You, shut up." The Doctor made a chatterbox motion with his hand. "Chatter, chatter chatter- I forgot how boring humans could be, travelling with you," he told Rose, who smiled up at him and batted her eyelashes slightly. "Right. You two pay attention. I want you out of this restaurant-"

Clara's Doctor, tiring of the other Time Lord's attitude, whipped his Sonic out of his pocket and brandished it at himself across the lobby. The other Doctor's words died in his throat as he took out his own Sonic and held it in the air, flourishing it self-consciously. 

"No. Are you..."

Her Doctor nodded.

"And I'm....?"

"Yep," the Doctor raised his eyebrows, "hello."

The Doctor stared at the Doctor in disbelief. 

Rose stared at the Doctors, then narrowed her eyes and glared at Clara as she worked it out. Clara smiled at her nervously.

Several minutes awkward silence ensued. 

When she could no longer take the tension, so thick in the air she could almost taste it, Clara clapped her hands and cleared her throat. 

"This is going to get confusing."