Phi:
"Did he follow you?"
I shook my head, sitting down in the cafe, opposite my twin sister. "No, I wasn't. He's visiting SJ, he think I'm sick in bed."
"Well, you're sick out of bed." Missy sighed. "You need to tell him, hell, I would tell him if it were me. I'm surprised you're even talking to me, Dear Sweet Sister." Oh, I was not rising to that, because she was going to start a scene in the middle of a London cafe.
"I'm not you though, this is the whole reason this is happening." I told her, ordering a mug of coffee, my hair still pulled back in the ribbon from when we were under the water. The ribbon that SJ left when she moved out, though she used to wear it a lot when she was little in her long chestnut curls. Short and red now. "I'm me, and I've been doing my job too long. I'm finally getting some rest."
Missy, Kaylee, stared at me long and hard, her ocean blue eyes boring into my white. I took out the contacts. "Eternal rest is for the weak. You're not weak, you're a fighter, you fight for those children, you fight for me, and you fight for that stupid husband of yours. You haven't even tried, Seraphina."
Oh, she didn't know that, she really didn't understand me any longer. "Koschei, really? You really think that I want to die, again? I have died 3 times. 3! I died when I was 8, I died when my husband did, and then I died again when I forgot what who I was, becoming Sarah. I fought for that year, all year with you, and I said my goodbye to you, because you're the one who even told me what was happening. Now, now I need to say goodbye to my family."
The woman got to her feet, still in the Victorian Nanny clothes, and looked at everyone in the room. "Leave." And like clockwork, which I didn't doubt they were made of, all the people in the cafe stood up and left. "Sera, you may be the Sentinel, but being the Sentinel is what got you killed. You are in no position to ever argue with me, because you will be dead in 6 months. Less if you keep going like you do. Fight."
Fight, fight, fight... No, no more fighting, no more. I couldn't do this any longer, I was tired, so tired. My family found their places, SJ was with Sherlock, living her life how she wanted, her child was the next Sentinel, Khalila Melody Holmes, her brother was working on growing his own TARDIS, though he thought we didn't know, Jenny was with Luke, working on saving the world from itself, and the Doctor, my sweet, sweet, Legacy, my Asa, he had our children to protect, to watch grow and become themselves, along with Clara.
"Sera, stop, please. The faster you think like that, the faster it spreads." Missy told me, grabbing a tissue to catch the blood that then started to trickle from my nose, thick and dark, darker than normal. "There has to be a cure, there has to be, Sister. No one is going to let you die, least of all me. You watched me die, but I won't watch you."
I pulled free, holding the tissue in place myself before grabbing a vial of liquid from my bag, downing it in one. The blood stopped, and the pressure in my body lessened. "Still think I didn't fight? I had two years, and one and a bit was spent making something to lessen the effects. I can fight them until the end, but that's less time to spend with my family. You'd be there too, but you pissed everyone in this family off until they hated you. You should be able to spend time with your nieces and nephew without them wanting to kill you for what you did to them."
That made her laugh. No, seriously, pissing everyone off made her laugh, something that had always pissed me off. She always pissed me off, my big sister Kaylee Dark. "Oh, my Sweet Sister Sera, you think that you're fighting by not telling them? The more people fighting with you, the more the odds will be even. You will stand up and fight this, Priestess!" Then she shoved me. "Fight!" And again. And again and again until I was backed against a table. "Fight back!"
"I can't!" I screamed at her, the gold flooding back to my eyes as I somehow shoved her back. "Nothing even registers me as being sick, Missy! I have tried, according to the TARDIS, I am fine, I'm just getting old. Which I am, so, so old, I am the turn of the universe, and I am the one who watched as she died, and regenerated into a new creation. I have been the Sentinel for longer than anyone else my sister, and the new one has been chosen.
"I was supposed to die a long time ago, to make way for the new one, the new Sentinel of Time who will be born in only two years time, but people kept changing time, changing me. The Chronodyne generators were the last thing that pushed me over the edge, Missy. They shattered my connection, meaning it was hurting me more than healing me. My molecules are disintegrating, and my nerves are eating themselves. Molecular disintegration, you're the one who diagnosed me."
"Yes, and I wish that I didn't let you leave, let you push me away on Skaro-"
"Let me... Push you away?!" I stared at her. "You tried to get me to kill my daughter!"
"Yes, well, she was being annoying." Missy replied simply. "But if you'd have stayed with me, we could have found a cure, and then you could have gone back, Sera."
No, just no. I wasn't doing this. "Goodbye, Missy."
As I moved away from her again, my sister grabbed my hand and I was too weak to be able to pull it free. "I don't care, Sera. You tell them, you tell them because they have a right to know. The Doctor didn't tell you he was going to die, and it killed you. Fairly sure you want to avoid that happening to him or your children." Then she let go of me, but there was something in there now, a larger vial of a dark blue liquid. "It won't stop it, but it will stop the symptoms. The hair loss, the nose bleeds, the weakness, well, maybe not the weakness. The only things that won't leave are the memories fading, and the headaches."
"H, how...? Missy, how did you make this? Why did you make this?"
"You think that you leaving me on Skaro would make a difference?" Missy asked softly. "That me screwing it up again would stop me tying to save my baby sister? No. Not at all, because you need to live. Time can go screw itself, because it's not taking you away from me or those kids. Go home, and tell them."
Then my big sister hugged me tight, and left. "Missy..."
So I headed back to the TARDIS, parked near Coal Hill, and got back into bed, still holding the vial of blue liquid. "What's that, ma?" SJ asked, coming into the room. "Looks like toilet cleaner."
"Oh, um, it's just some flu meds that I made." I smiled, putting it in the bedside cabinet before patting the bed beside me. "How are you, baby? You've been avoiding me, not that I blame you."
Sarah Jane sat down where her da occasionally slept, and I wrapped my arms around our youngest child, and probably the gabbiest, and most opinionated of them, besides possibly Melody. Well, she got arrested, a lot. "I was angry. Aunt Missy tried to kill my boyfriend, and you spent a year drinking Cocktails with her in Italy."
Well, chemical cocktails. "I know, SJ. I'm sorry, but I wanted to make sure that she didn't have another plan, which she did, she just managed to hide it from even me. I'm so sorry, my baby girl, really. What she tried to do, I'm so, so glad we realised."
"Yeah, me too. I was screaming in there, trying to be heard, but it just kept saying the same. I'm not a Dalek, not at all. I'm a memory."
Yeah, yeah, a play on your Time Lord name. "Nice one, baby, you used that name. My name. How old are you now, 20, right?"
That made her giggle slightly. "Yeah, I'm 20. I'll be 21 in about 9 months, ma." Oh, SJ, Cadia...
"I want to tell you my name early." I told her softly, moving her soft brown and red hair away from her eyes as I kissed the scratchy undercut. "It's supposed to be your 21st, but I'm worried with your da's flying we'll miss it."
SJ sat upright, looking right at me for that. "Ma, you don't have to do that, I'm not Time Lord, OK? You don't have to tell me."
"I want to, Sarah Jane." I told her stiffly, looking as my son as he came into the room too. "Cadia, come on, join us on the dark side of being lazy bed bums as your da serves us hot chocolate and jaffa cakes. I've got something to tell you."
"OK, if you're going to tell us that somehow you and da have gotten pregnant and we're going to have a little sibling, I will not share a room."
We all laughed at that, and I smiled at him, fighting back those tears. "No, no, nothing like that, Arcadia. It's fine. It's my name, it's supposed to be a party, and your parent's whisper their given and birth names to their child, or in this case children. With how your father flies this thing, we're going to miss your birthday, so, I want to tell you mine now. While you're both here."
The twins nodded. "Right, OK. As long as we can tell you ours after." Well, I'd love to know them.
"Right, well, you know my given name was Seraphina, which translates to Dragon Princess. It's what your da calls me, because the Writer was too formal. But, what the universe gave me, is Alenna. Infinity, because that was what I was born to see."
And then Arcadia handed SJ a £20 note.
"Right, you win."
"Thank you, Universe."
What?! "Twins, did you have a bet over what my name would be?"
They both looked at me, only Arcadia having the dignity to blue sheepishly. "Well, when you're bored for ages, you start bets. We bet with da over how long it was gonna take you to get ready last week, and he won a tenner. Plus, we also know his name, because it's in the library." Good point.
"Well, sure. And twins..." I took a deep breath. "Yeah, I need to tell you something, you and your da, so stop lurking in the door way, Dove." The stick insect stuck his head around the door. "You're so bad at hiding, you're like a kid giggling in hide and seek."
That made him laugh a little, nudging our kids to move up a bit. "Well, you playing hide and seek..." Shut up, I got lost easily. "So, what do you want to tell us? You're not pregnant or anything are you?"
W...? Why? why did they all think I was pregnant? "Look, you would definitely know, because it would be yours, and have we done anything recently?" His ears turned red after his cheeks went crimson. "Exactly. No, what it is, is-"
And then the sprinklers went on, icy water cascading down over us. "Da!" Cadia shouted as he and my husband left up, SJ and I moving the pillows over our heads. "You were making a cake you idgit!"
"I wasn't wasn't I?" For gods sake... "SJ, Cadia, with me, we're going to need to find the fire extinguishers." Pause. "And maybe the indoor fire engine."
So Asa, Arcadia and Sarah Jane ran out of the room, leaving me, the supposedly poorly one, well, the poorly one, in bed alone. With the sprinklers going.
Oh, I'll tell them tomorrow.