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“Twenty feet of pure diamond. Harder than diamond. But you break through anything, given time.”
He’d never remembered until the end. No chance to make a different choice, to find a way to beat the machine. He supposed it was designed that way, designed so it would break him down, wear him away, until he gave in, until he told them all he knew. There were so many truths he could have given them, he nearly wept when he found out they only wanted to know about the hybrid. One of the easier ones. But he couldn’t tell them, that would give away his bargaining chip. So he stayed, so he fought, so he died. Again and again and again.
He looked at Clara out of the corner of his eye. There had been others, hadn’t there? He wasn’t sure on the right words, but some of his companions were different from others. They were all important, but some were important in a different way. Most recently, it had been River, and … Rose? The memories faded, the feelings changed, softened from regeneration to regeneration, but they were still there. He knew he wanted to save her, wanted to protect her. But his thinking was fuzzy, his head clouded after all that time. He looked at Clara again. He’d wanted to save all of them, but … he thought Clara was one of the important ones.
“What were you bargaining for?”
He stared at her. What answer could he give that would make sense? Something that wasn’t simply the ramblings of an old, mad man. Because … she was one of the special ones. And she was so, so important, but he didn’t know the words. His Ninth regeneration had known how to care, it hadn’t been very good with words, but humans said that actions spoke louder anyway. If that was true, he wondered why Clara hadn’t heard him this time. Perhaps this was one of those things that needed spelling out. His Tenth regeneration had been good at that. Lots of long, rambly, scientific explanations that his companions could never understand. He’d been better with emotions as well, he’d always known what to say, never really shut up. He’d tried that with Clara, but she preferred the simpler explanations, the shockingly insightful words of wisdom that his Eleventh self had conjured up. He’d been great at that, forcing the cumbersome human language to form such beautiful phrases. He appeared to have lost that ability, to pin down in words what his mind was thinking.
“What do you think?”
He spoke automatically, staring at Clara in surprise. Because she’d seen him. It had taken a little while. But he really had thought that she’d seen him. So why was this such a great surprise? He’d thought she’d known. Hadn’t he made it obvious? He cursed this new body; it was unable to work out human emotions. Every little twitch on her face had once meant something to him, but now it was unreadable and he had to rely on what she said and did instead. Perhaps he was the one that couldn’t see her.
He stared at her, lips already forming his answer. Because she ought to know. Because he’d fought for so long and so hard, he just wanted it to be over, and Clara Oswald was a fearsome creature. If he told her she would fight for him, she would shoulder his burden even though it wasn’t hers to share. Because she was one of the important ones. Because she was Clara.
“You.”