The Time Lord's Apprentice

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"I'm in the mood for pasta," Peyton announces as she marches into the console room. She grabs the staircase railing to jump up to the flight deck. "Lunch date with Michelangelo?"

"That sounds amazing!" The Doctor agrees. He's lounging in the chair by the controls with his buried in some dusty book, Amy's reading glasses perched upon his nose. He snaps it shut. "I'll put it on the list."

"The list?" Peyton falters, staring at him from across the controls.

"Yes, sorry," he says, jumping to his feet. "Something's just occurred to me. I can't believe I hadn't thought of it before." The Doctor begins flipping switches in preparation for the Tardis to fly.

Peyton folds her arms across her chest. "Let me guess. This is about-"

"Clara obviously can't remember her other selves, so maybe a powerful empath and can sense something in her, tell us anything!"

"Awesome," Peyton deadpans, reaching for the navigation plotters. "Got any particular psychic in mind?"

"We have to pick up Clara first," the Doctor exasperates, batting her away from the controls to set them himself.

Peyton rolls her eyes and storms away from the central console, throwing herself down in the leather chair as passive-aggressively as she can.

In the past two months since the Doctor invited Clara aboard the time machine, Peyton can barely have an adventure anymore without it somehow being related to the 'impossible girl', even when she's not even there!

"What?" The Doctor sighs as the Tardis lands.

"I didn't say anything."

"Aren't you curious to know who she is, what she is?" The Doctor says tiredly, leaning forward onto the console to look across at her.

"Yeah, I guess," she shrugs. "But I have hobbies, other things going on."

"I don't understand why you aren't at least trying to get along with her," the Doctor chides. "What is it about her that gets you so... so... teenager-ish."

"I am not a teenager," Peyton glares.

"By Time Lord reckoning, yes, you are."

"It's not my fault," Peyton says tartly, getting to her feet. "She is just so... so... chatty, and asking questions, and undeservedly confident in situations where she has no clue what is happening. She's got those huge puppy dog eyes that just rip into your soul, and she's so happy-go-lucky. It's unbearable."

The Doctor smiles smugly.

"What?" She sighs shortly. He just continues smiling like that. "What?!"

"That is exactly how I would describe you your first few years travelling with me," he says in a tone that suggests he thinks that this is the funniest thing he's heard. "You don't get along with her, because she reminds you of yourself."

"She is nothing like me," Peyton insists but the treacherous voice in the back of her head insists that he has a point.

"Oh, grow up," the Doctor spins away from her and walks around the console.

"No," Peyton objects sharply, following him. "I have been through so much compared to her tiny life. We are not the same. She hasn't lost anything like I have!"

"She lost her mother," the Doctor stops and faces her again.

"So did River!" Peyton screams in his face.

The creak of the Tardis door opening causes the two Time Lords to freeze, turning their heads to the entryway where Clara pops her head inside, smiling eagerly.