Dec. 16th, 2012 12:23 am
City of Waiting Part V
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clocketpatchAt nearly 5000 words, this is by far the longest chapter in this story. Beware the endless exposition. Initially, this entire fic was supposed to be a combination of letters and Brian's reactions to them, but the epistolary style eludes me. Any advice on how to tighten things up would be well taken.
Now, without further ado:
Slow Post
Those who study history have a maxim: To understand the present you must first understand the past. In one present, Brian is washing up mugs and putting away tea things, getting the kitchen in order before reading things he does/ does not want to read. In another present, Amy is mirroring his actions in reverse, leading Ian and Barbara Chesterton to the tables at the front of the shop; locking the door; refreshing the store pot with hot water and bringing out the sugar – No milk until Derek gets back. She debates with herself whether to include little Melody in the conversation.
Amelia Pond, the little girl who spent a long childhood around uninterested adults always hated being shunted away from the important grown-up talk. She hated being treated as if she didn't understand, or being told that her opinions didn't matter – or worse – weren't real.
Little Melody is included and the odd party of four sit around the low purple table. Barbara pours the tea. Ian plugs his nose and does a ridiculous impression of a confused Dalek. Amy shows her sketches of the strange and wondrous people and creatures she met on her journeys. Little Melody is, aside from the occasional giggle, quiet. She watches the proceedings with big shy eyes, nibbling on a biscuit, and understanding more than any child her age should.
In a mutual past, the building blocks of the present are being laid down. Amy speaks. Brian reads. Secrets are revealed:
New York City, 1961
The door was only visible out of the corner of Amy's eye.
She reached into her pocket for the silver key. It felt warm in her palm and this time she wasn't imagining it. The secret door had an oblong-shaped knob. It felt odd in Amy's hand, but the key fit perfectly into its old fashioned key hole even though it was not an old fashioned key.
On the other side of the door Amy found light. It prickled against Amy's skin, but she pushed forward, knowing instinctively what she would find on the other side.
The light only lasted a few, short steps. Past the luminous barrier, was a white room with roundels on the wall and a six-sided console in the centre. For Amy, it was like walking into a stranger's house built on the same plan as your childhood home. It wasn't your home and everything was off and queer and none of the furniture and decorations were right – but the walls and doors were still all in the same place and you could find the toilet without someone having to tell you where to go.
It wasn't the toilet Amy was looking for, but she still knew where to go.
She walked past the console to the hidden archway which led to the rest of the ship. She relaxed her mind and let the destination find her. The emergency lighting was on and, fortunately, the antigravity wasn't out. After a while, Amy was able to stop relying on the ship to lead her – the blood smeared across the floor made a physical trail.
It led to a pale pink room that smelled vaguely of roses. Amy'd found a room like that in the Doctor's TARDIS once. It was a good place to sit when you felt like your head was going to explode from all the madness of the universe. It was the sort of place you'd crawl to in a time of last resort with the hope that the smell of roses and a bit of enforced calm could maybe stop the universe collapsing on your head.
It hadn't helped the room's occupants.
By the back wall, an old woman huddled protectively over a baby. The woman looked ready to collapse. Her hair was white, but thin enough that you could see the pink scalp underneath. Her face was all protruding cheeks and wrinkles. She wore a silvery, full body tracksuit. There were no obvious wounds or tears, but the tracksuit was spotted with blood. In her hand, the woman held what looked like a ray gun. On seeing Amy, she pulled the trigger.
Amy dodged to the side, but there was no bullet, no explosion, no sizzling discharge of compressed gamma energy –
Instead a computerized voice intoned: "Genetic match confirmed."
The old woman wheezed. The baby sobbed. Amy crept forward.
"Are you alright?"
"I'm dying," said the woman. The baby continued crying. The old woman panted and looked at Amy. "Take her. She's yours. Genetic match confirmed."
"I don't understand," said Amy. She didn't. She had some inklings, but they left more questions than answers. It was a TARDIS. It was clearly a TARDIS, but not the Doctor's and he'd said that his was the last, and River had said there would be answers and Rory was still missing –
"I don't have much time," the woman said. The blood spots on her chest were spreading. Her words were punctuated with heavy breathing and distressingly moist, hacking coughs. Despite this, the woman spoke slowly and calmly. There was something about her that struck Amy as almost regal.
"I was searching for a friend," the woman said. "I was unable to locate him directly, but I knew that if I found his enemies he would not be far behind. But he's made new enemies since we were together last and they were more powerful than I gave them credit for. The universe is filled with rumours and darkness – I fear that this time my friend underestimated his enemies as well, that after everything his story has finally ended."
"I did not find my friend, but his enemies had a child with them, a stolen child, who bore the marks of the vortex. I have done what I can to bring her home. Genetic trace confirmed. She's yours."
Amy looked at the baby that the old woman was shielding. The infant's face was screwed up with screaming, bright red and tear-stained. She was wearing a white jumper with little white booties. Amy looked at the key in her hand. She felt the crumpled up note from River resting in her pocket. She did not understand but she understood.
"Melody," Amy said, picking up the baby. The child stopped crying. Amy started. Her eyes blurred. She hadn't thought she'd had any tears left. She'd found her baby. River Song was one thing, but that was all in the future. She was holding her baby again and she'd never thought she would. She'd find Rory and they'd – they'd –
"Thank you," Amy said to the old woman. "Thank you so much."
Then the woman exploded.
*
*
New York City, 1961
The woman exploded.
Amy had seen that golden light before when the Doctor had died (not really died) by a lake in Utah. She had seen it again when Mels was shot in Berlin. Amy knew immediately what it meant.
Amy also knew that her daughter and the Doctor were the only beings in the universe capable of that little glowing-and-then-cheating-death trick. The Doctor had said as much. But then, the Doctor lied. The Doctor was absent. And Amy held River in her arms.
The golden light faded away and the woman wasn't a woman any more.
A dark-haired young man lay sprawled on the floor. The silvery tracksuit he wore had been loose on the old woman. The man had a wiry build, but he was tall and he wasn't half wasted away as the woman had been. The material of the outfit clung to him in a way that was almost indecent. The legs rode up to reveal pale calves dusted with a fine down of dark hair.
Now what? Amy thought. Would the man wake up and solve all her problems? Not likely. Not with her luck. The young man stirred. His eyes opened. They were dark brown to match his hair. He focused on Amy's face and pulled himself up onto his elbows. Amy waited for him to speak. She didn't have the energy to come up with questions or comfort. She could only hope.
"Who are you?" the man asked.
The woman's accent had been BBC English. The man was American, but it was muddled, like a British actor faking a New York accent and almost, but not quite, pulling it off.
"My name is Amy Pond," said Amy. "You found my daughter. You rescued her. Protected her. Brought her back to me. Thank you."
"I don't know what my name is," said the man. "But I think you owe me big time."
*
*
New York City, 1961
"Big time! Big time!" the man repeated manically. Then he curled up on himself. His feet and fingers twitched. He ground his eyes into his fists and then looked up at Amy, his brown gaze red-rimmed and wild. "My head is killing me."
Amy clutched her baby tight against her chest. There was a dangerous gleam in the new man's eyes. Amy remembered the Doctor's erratic behaviour when they'd first met, and Mels in Berlin – well, she was never anything but erratic. She could only hope it would would settle, and sooner rather than later. The woman had seemed competent, brave, strong, tested - and she had returned Melody. Surely all of that was still buried in this new form?
"Are you hungry?" Amy asked. "I could make fish fingers and custard?"
She couldn't. She didn't have the first idea of where to get either ingredient in 1960s New York. Had fish fingers even been invented? Had custard? The man looked at her as if she were mad.
"That sounds profoundly disgusting," he said. His accent was veering back towards English again. Cockney.
"Do you remember anything?" Amy asked.
"Remember? Remember?" The man pulled himself to his feet. The tracksuit ripped under the strain, revealing a silver of pale, hairy chest. "Remember what? I remember the pain of being shot. I remember the pain of paradox burning, burning, burning flesh and wires, but it's happened so many times now. Was that this time or that time, and I don't remember that time so which time?"
"Your friend," Amy tried, cautiously, "was he known as the Doctor?"
The man didn't answer. Instead he started pawing at his face, running his fingers over the newly formed features: small pointed chin, sharp cheeks, long and slightly crooked nose.
"Bloody bastard imprinted on me," the man muttered. "I've got his face. Hold one image too close and now look at me. And I don't even remember him, or me, what an irony there. Damn. I never even met him like this."
Amy stared. Melody made a soft, baby noise.
"Oh, you," said the man, clutching his head with one hand and waving distractedly at Amy and baby Melody with the other. "But you'll be wanting to get diapers and formula and all that. There's a nursery somewhere. There's a kitchen somewhere. There's a library, and a swimming pool, and a flamethrower somewhere. Or it's all gone. Gone. Oh man." The man's accent slipped across the Atlantic again. "There's some powerful psychic interference in this big a city. All shields are down and the brains are fried. Existential crisis to the max man. Is that the right slang? I don't even know the right slang!"
Amy made a decision. "You should sleep. I'm going to find the nursery, if it still exists, and put my daughter to bed. Then I'm going to bed myself. We'll discuss everything else in the morning."
She walked out of the rose-smelling room. As soon as she stepped into the corridor Melody started screaming.
"Wouldn't do that," said the man, quiet and sing song.
"Why not?" asked Amy, edging back into the rose room. As soon as she crossed the threshold, Melody calmed.
"Bad mojo," said the man. "They were using a neuro-chip to facilitate the downloading of information, as a tracker, and to prevent her from wandering. I think this counts as wandering. In this room she'll be fine; ship's put all of the zero energy on priority, attuned it to her. Not a very good solution. It leaves me without a functioning zero room and it leaves her trapped, but times were hard and we made do. Never mind, I'll soon fix that."
The man stretched out his arms. The last thing Amy wanted to do after regaining her daughter was to hand her away, especially to some head case who didn't know his own name and couldn't keep his accent straight. But he – she – had also saved Melody, and was a friend of the Doctor's. Also, though Melody had stopped crying as soon as Amy re-entered the rose room, Amy knew that the man was speaking the truth. Terrible things had been done to turn her little baby into the future River Song, and just because they'd been reunited didn't mean they would get a reprieve from those horrors.
Except.
The future wasn't fixed, the Doctor had taught her that. Time could be rewritten. Maybe the whole tragic loop of her daughter's life could be rewritten in this moment.
Amy handed Melody to the man. He took her tenderly. Then he started screaming.
*
*
London, 2016
Brian sat at the kitchen table, thumbing the first letter. He suppressed the urge to jump ahead. He would do this properly. The earliest envelope was yellowed brown paper with Amelia's familiar messy handwriting scrawling out an address on the front.
The envelope had been opened before and resealed with a bit of tape which had long ago lost its stickiness. The four page letter had been inexpertly typed. Brian had to smile at his impulsive daughter-in-law banging out a reply to him on a machine she didn't fully understand, putting her first draft in the mail, typos, odd-spacing, and all. She hadn't worked out how to capitalize letters or add punctuation until the third page, but had painstakingly pencilled in all of the missing comas and periods. The pencil marks had blurred and smudged with age.
The letter had been unfolded and refolded and the paper was soft along the creases. Someone, Brian assumed Kate's father, had underlined the Doctor's name in red ink and written "code name (?)" in the margin. This first letter, Kate had told Brian, had nearly been lost after her father had dutifully handed it over to his superiors for analysis. It had only been retrieved years later when the Brigadier's rank at UNIT had allowed him access to sealed files.
Brian found himself tearing up as he read. He had a grand-daughter he would never see. Not properly. He'd met Mels, but he hadn't known – then, neither had Amy or his son. His son. Amy didn't know where Rory was. Instead she had this Derek –
"He looks like Jeff's cousin, so that's what I've been calling him. I have to call him something. I can't keep calling him 'the stranger' or 'that alien guy who was a woman before'."
"He keeps switching from hippy, to toddler, to psychotic assassin, and he has a different accent for every time he switches. It has to do with the chip, and how he's keeping Melody safe. And psychic interference from the city. And paradoxes. It's maddening because he never remembers long enough to explain anything properly. I think he's stabilizing. Unfortunately he's stabilizing on hippy, which is by far the most annoying of his personas."
"We're all living in his TARDIS, which is disguised as a bookshop. The kitchen is a disaster zone and the food machine is completely wrecked. We're going to actually have to sell books if we want to eat. Luckily the library is mostly intact and practically never-ending."
Brian reached the end of the letter. Amy assured him that she would keep searching for Rory. She'd repeated that line every other paragraph: "I will find him".
The rest of the letters loomed on the counter. Brian felt cold and shivery. "I will find him." Except, he felt certain that none of the correspondence laid out before him would give any evidence of what had happened to his son. There were no pictures. Rory wasn't mentioned in any of the letters Kate's father had opened.
Brian had given them up to the stars. They would've stayed if he'd asked, Brian was sure of that. Rory got cranky at him, but he listened and so did Amy. They would've stayed. But they had wanted to go, and Brian let them. If he were left behind, alone, that didn't matter so much did it? He was just funny old Brian Williams, watering plants, pottering around the garden with his trowel. He'd given them up to the stars, and now they were both alone.
Brian put all of the letters back into the case and didn't look at then again for several days. He watered plants. He drank tea. He continued logging the cube's lack of movement. He did not call Kate.
*
*
*
*
*
New York City, July 25 1965
Amy was crossing the street back to the shop after posting her letter when she ran into Derek.
"So the prodigal returns," she said, crossly.
He shook his head, panting. That was concerning. It was hot outside even this early in the morning, but Derek rarely seemed to be affected by the elements. A normal human living his lifestyle would've been unfit, but whatever Derek was, he could subsist almost entirely on tuna-and-peanut butter sandwiches, chocolate bars and American-style chips – and still run twelve blocks in the summer heat without breaking a sweat.
"What's wrong."
He opened his mouth to speak, but he shook his head instead.
"Nothing. I thought I'd forgotten something important but it's nothing. I went to the grocery, and then I bumped into Margs and you know how she talks. So we hung out for a bit..."
"A few days you mean," Amy snapped. She didn't mention the fact that he wasn't carrying any groceries. She'd wait to see if he'd explain himself first.
Derek shrugged.
"It didn't seem that long. We just went down to the Gem Spa for egg creams but look what I found. I ran all the way back."
He shoved a newspaper into Amy's face.
Roman Vigilante Haunts Park?
The headline screamed across the front page and suddenly Amy didn't care if Derek was a bit late and lying about milk. She didn't care about Margs. All of the hope that Amy had stuffed as far, deep down into her soul as she could manage over the last four years reared up. She tried carefully to control it; she'd been disappointed before.
But with the Chesterton's showing up. It felt like fate, and Amy couldn't dismiss destiny. Not when her whole life spun on it. She'd landed in New York a bit early, but that must've been just to find Melody and Derek. Now she'd have Rory and it would all be complete.
She was so happy she kissed Derek, right there in the street.
Now, without further ado:
Slow Post
Those who study history have a maxim: To understand the present you must first understand the past. In one present, Brian is washing up mugs and putting away tea things, getting the kitchen in order before reading things he does/ does not want to read. In another present, Amy is mirroring his actions in reverse, leading Ian and Barbara Chesterton to the tables at the front of the shop; locking the door; refreshing the store pot with hot water and bringing out the sugar – No milk until Derek gets back. She debates with herself whether to include little Melody in the conversation.
Amelia Pond, the little girl who spent a long childhood around uninterested adults always hated being shunted away from the important grown-up talk. She hated being treated as if she didn't understand, or being told that her opinions didn't matter – or worse – weren't real.
Little Melody is included and the odd party of four sit around the low purple table. Barbara pours the tea. Ian plugs his nose and does a ridiculous impression of a confused Dalek. Amy shows her sketches of the strange and wondrous people and creatures she met on her journeys. Little Melody is, aside from the occasional giggle, quiet. She watches the proceedings with big shy eyes, nibbling on a biscuit, and understanding more than any child her age should.
In a mutual past, the building blocks of the present are being laid down. Amy speaks. Brian reads. Secrets are revealed:
New York City, 1961
The door was only visible out of the corner of Amy's eye.
She reached into her pocket for the silver key. It felt warm in her palm and this time she wasn't imagining it. The secret door had an oblong-shaped knob. It felt odd in Amy's hand, but the key fit perfectly into its old fashioned key hole even though it was not an old fashioned key.
On the other side of the door Amy found light. It prickled against Amy's skin, but she pushed forward, knowing instinctively what she would find on the other side.
The light only lasted a few, short steps. Past the luminous barrier, was a white room with roundels on the wall and a six-sided console in the centre. For Amy, it was like walking into a stranger's house built on the same plan as your childhood home. It wasn't your home and everything was off and queer and none of the furniture and decorations were right – but the walls and doors were still all in the same place and you could find the toilet without someone having to tell you where to go.
It wasn't the toilet Amy was looking for, but she still knew where to go.
She walked past the console to the hidden archway which led to the rest of the ship. She relaxed her mind and let the destination find her. The emergency lighting was on and, fortunately, the antigravity wasn't out. After a while, Amy was able to stop relying on the ship to lead her – the blood smeared across the floor made a physical trail.
It led to a pale pink room that smelled vaguely of roses. Amy'd found a room like that in the Doctor's TARDIS once. It was a good place to sit when you felt like your head was going to explode from all the madness of the universe. It was the sort of place you'd crawl to in a time of last resort with the hope that the smell of roses and a bit of enforced calm could maybe stop the universe collapsing on your head.
It hadn't helped the room's occupants.
By the back wall, an old woman huddled protectively over a baby. The woman looked ready to collapse. Her hair was white, but thin enough that you could see the pink scalp underneath. Her face was all protruding cheeks and wrinkles. She wore a silvery, full body tracksuit. There were no obvious wounds or tears, but the tracksuit was spotted with blood. In her hand, the woman held what looked like a ray gun. On seeing Amy, she pulled the trigger.
Amy dodged to the side, but there was no bullet, no explosion, no sizzling discharge of compressed gamma energy –
Instead a computerized voice intoned: "Genetic match confirmed."
The old woman wheezed. The baby sobbed. Amy crept forward.
"Are you alright?"
"I'm dying," said the woman. The baby continued crying. The old woman panted and looked at Amy. "Take her. She's yours. Genetic match confirmed."
"I don't understand," said Amy. She didn't. She had some inklings, but they left more questions than answers. It was a TARDIS. It was clearly a TARDIS, but not the Doctor's and he'd said that his was the last, and River had said there would be answers and Rory was still missing –
"I don't have much time," the woman said. The blood spots on her chest were spreading. Her words were punctuated with heavy breathing and distressingly moist, hacking coughs. Despite this, the woman spoke slowly and calmly. There was something about her that struck Amy as almost regal.
"I was searching for a friend," the woman said. "I was unable to locate him directly, but I knew that if I found his enemies he would not be far behind. But he's made new enemies since we were together last and they were more powerful than I gave them credit for. The universe is filled with rumours and darkness – I fear that this time my friend underestimated his enemies as well, that after everything his story has finally ended."
"I did not find my friend, but his enemies had a child with them, a stolen child, who bore the marks of the vortex. I have done what I can to bring her home. Genetic trace confirmed. She's yours."
Amy looked at the baby that the old woman was shielding. The infant's face was screwed up with screaming, bright red and tear-stained. She was wearing a white jumper with little white booties. Amy looked at the key in her hand. She felt the crumpled up note from River resting in her pocket. She did not understand but she understood.
"Melody," Amy said, picking up the baby. The child stopped crying. Amy started. Her eyes blurred. She hadn't thought she'd had any tears left. She'd found her baby. River Song was one thing, but that was all in the future. She was holding her baby again and she'd never thought she would. She'd find Rory and they'd – they'd –
"Thank you," Amy said to the old woman. "Thank you so much."
Then the woman exploded.
*
June 24, 1961
Dear Amelia Williams,
I do not know how you obtained my address. As I believe that your correspondence may be an encoded document, I must advise you to use more secure methods of transit in the future. I also must advise you that I am not of a high enough rank or security clearance to deal with material of this nature. I have no special knowledge of this agent code-named the Doctor. In the future I advise you to send your reports to ranking officers.
If this is not a coded document and you do sincerely believe the story which you have written then my advice is worth little to you. I hope that you find the professional medical help which you require. If you are indeed a British subject stranded in the United States the British Embassy in that country may be able to aid you in gaining this help and assist you in returning home.
Sincerely,
Major A. G. Lethbridge-Stewart *
New York City, 1961
The woman exploded.
Amy had seen that golden light before when the Doctor had died (not really died) by a lake in Utah. She had seen it again when Mels was shot in Berlin. Amy knew immediately what it meant.
Amy also knew that her daughter and the Doctor were the only beings in the universe capable of that little glowing-and-then-cheating-death trick. The Doctor had said as much. But then, the Doctor lied. The Doctor was absent. And Amy held River in her arms.
The golden light faded away and the woman wasn't a woman any more.
A dark-haired young man lay sprawled on the floor. The silvery tracksuit he wore had been loose on the old woman. The man had a wiry build, but he was tall and he wasn't half wasted away as the woman had been. The material of the outfit clung to him in a way that was almost indecent. The legs rode up to reveal pale calves dusted with a fine down of dark hair.
Now what? Amy thought. Would the man wake up and solve all her problems? Not likely. Not with her luck. The young man stirred. His eyes opened. They were dark brown to match his hair. He focused on Amy's face and pulled himself up onto his elbows. Amy waited for him to speak. She didn't have the energy to come up with questions or comfort. She could only hope.
"Who are you?" the man asked.
The woman's accent had been BBC English. The man was American, but it was muddled, like a British actor faking a New York accent and almost, but not quite, pulling it off.
"My name is Amy Pond," said Amy. "You found my daughter. You rescued her. Protected her. Brought her back to me. Thank you."
"I don't know what my name is," said the man. "But I think you owe me big time."
*
August 14, 1961
Dear Amelia Williams,
I must conclude in that case that you are indeed in need of prompt psychiatric treatment. I do not have a daughter. I do not understand how your daughter, whom you refer to as a baby in your letter, could have given you my address. Please desist in this communication.
Sincerely,
Major A. G. Lethbridge-Stewart*
New York City, 1961
"Big time! Big time!" the man repeated manically. Then he curled up on himself. His feet and fingers twitched. He ground his eyes into his fists and then looked up at Amy, his brown gaze red-rimmed and wild. "My head is killing me."
Amy clutched her baby tight against her chest. There was a dangerous gleam in the new man's eyes. Amy remembered the Doctor's erratic behaviour when they'd first met, and Mels in Berlin – well, she was never anything but erratic. She could only hope it would would settle, and sooner rather than later. The woman had seemed competent, brave, strong, tested - and she had returned Melody. Surely all of that was still buried in this new form?
"Are you hungry?" Amy asked. "I could make fish fingers and custard?"
She couldn't. She didn't have the first idea of where to get either ingredient in 1960s New York. Had fish fingers even been invented? Had custard? The man looked at her as if she were mad.
"That sounds profoundly disgusting," he said. His accent was veering back towards English again. Cockney.
"Do you remember anything?" Amy asked.
"Remember? Remember?" The man pulled himself to his feet. The tracksuit ripped under the strain, revealing a silver of pale, hairy chest. "Remember what? I remember the pain of being shot. I remember the pain of paradox burning, burning, burning flesh and wires, but it's happened so many times now. Was that this time or that time, and I don't remember that time so which time?"
"Your friend," Amy tried, cautiously, "was he known as the Doctor?"
The man didn't answer. Instead he started pawing at his face, running his fingers over the newly formed features: small pointed chin, sharp cheeks, long and slightly crooked nose.
"Bloody bastard imprinted on me," the man muttered. "I've got his face. Hold one image too close and now look at me. And I don't even remember him, or me, what an irony there. Damn. I never even met him like this."
Amy stared. Melody made a soft, baby noise.
"Oh, you," said the man, clutching his head with one hand and waving distractedly at Amy and baby Melody with the other. "But you'll be wanting to get diapers and formula and all that. There's a nursery somewhere. There's a kitchen somewhere. There's a library, and a swimming pool, and a flamethrower somewhere. Or it's all gone. Gone. Oh man." The man's accent slipped across the Atlantic again. "There's some powerful psychic interference in this big a city. All shields are down and the brains are fried. Existential crisis to the max man. Is that the right slang? I don't even know the right slang!"
Amy made a decision. "You should sleep. I'm going to find the nursery, if it still exists, and put my daughter to bed. Then I'm going to bed myself. We'll discuss everything else in the morning."
She walked out of the rose-smelling room. As soon as she stepped into the corridor Melody started screaming.
"Wouldn't do that," said the man, quiet and sing song.
"Why not?" asked Amy, edging back into the rose room. As soon as she crossed the threshold, Melody calmed.
"Bad mojo," said the man. "They were using a neuro-chip to facilitate the downloading of information, as a tracker, and to prevent her from wandering. I think this counts as wandering. In this room she'll be fine; ship's put all of the zero energy on priority, attuned it to her. Not a very good solution. It leaves me without a functioning zero room and it leaves her trapped, but times were hard and we made do. Never mind, I'll soon fix that."
The man stretched out his arms. The last thing Amy wanted to do after regaining her daughter was to hand her away, especially to some head case who didn't know his own name and couldn't keep his accent straight. But he – she – had also saved Melody, and was a friend of the Doctor's. Also, though Melody had stopped crying as soon as Amy re-entered the rose room, Amy knew that the man was speaking the truth. Terrible things had been done to turn her little baby into the future River Song, and just because they'd been reunited didn't mean they would get a reprieve from those horrors.
Except.
The future wasn't fixed, the Doctor had taught her that. Time could be rewritten. Maybe the whole tragic loop of her daughter's life could be rewritten in this moment.
Amy handed Melody to the man. He took her tenderly. Then he started screaming.
*
November 31, 1961
Dear Amelia Williams,
The events you listed have all occurred. I do not understand how you came across this information in advance of the rest of the world, but your foresight is not proof of impossibility. It is only a testament to your ability as an information-gatherer and spinner of tales.
While I have my doubts regarding the bulk of your story, I send you condolences on the loss of your husband and best wishes for your friend's recovery and your daughter's health. Since you refuse to desist in sending me letters I appear to have no choice but to hold on to them until they can be delivered to your father-in-law in the future. I hope that he does not live on Mars as I have no desire to travel there.
Sincerely,
Alistair G. Lethbridge-Stewart*
London, 2016
Brian sat at the kitchen table, thumbing the first letter. He suppressed the urge to jump ahead. He would do this properly. The earliest envelope was yellowed brown paper with Amelia's familiar messy handwriting scrawling out an address on the front.
The envelope had been opened before and resealed with a bit of tape which had long ago lost its stickiness. The four page letter had been inexpertly typed. Brian had to smile at his impulsive daughter-in-law banging out a reply to him on a machine she didn't fully understand, putting her first draft in the mail, typos, odd-spacing, and all. She hadn't worked out how to capitalize letters or add punctuation until the third page, but had painstakingly pencilled in all of the missing comas and periods. The pencil marks had blurred and smudged with age.
The letter had been unfolded and refolded and the paper was soft along the creases. Someone, Brian assumed Kate's father, had underlined the Doctor's name in red ink and written "code name (?)" in the margin. This first letter, Kate had told Brian, had nearly been lost after her father had dutifully handed it over to his superiors for analysis. It had only been retrieved years later when the Brigadier's rank at UNIT had allowed him access to sealed files.
Brian found himself tearing up as he read. He had a grand-daughter he would never see. Not properly. He'd met Mels, but he hadn't known – then, neither had Amy or his son. His son. Amy didn't know where Rory was. Instead she had this Derek –
"He looks like Jeff's cousin, so that's what I've been calling him. I have to call him something. I can't keep calling him 'the stranger' or 'that alien guy who was a woman before'."
"He keeps switching from hippy, to toddler, to psychotic assassin, and he has a different accent for every time he switches. It has to do with the chip, and how he's keeping Melody safe. And psychic interference from the city. And paradoxes. It's maddening because he never remembers long enough to explain anything properly. I think he's stabilizing. Unfortunately he's stabilizing on hippy, which is by far the most annoying of his personas."
"We're all living in his TARDIS, which is disguised as a bookshop. The kitchen is a disaster zone and the food machine is completely wrecked. We're going to actually have to sell books if we want to eat. Luckily the library is mostly intact and practically never-ending."
Brian reached the end of the letter. Amy assured him that she would keep searching for Rory. She'd repeated that line every other paragraph: "I will find him".
The rest of the letters loomed on the counter. Brian felt cold and shivery. "I will find him." Except, he felt certain that none of the correspondence laid out before him would give any evidence of what had happened to his son. There were no pictures. Rory wasn't mentioned in any of the letters Kate's father had opened.
Brian had given them up to the stars. They would've stayed if he'd asked, Brian was sure of that. Rory got cranky at him, but he listened and so did Amy. They would've stayed. But they had wanted to go, and Brian let them. If he were left behind, alone, that didn't matter so much did it? He was just funny old Brian Williams, watering plants, pottering around the garden with his trowel. He'd given them up to the stars, and now they were both alone.
Brian put all of the letters back into the case and didn't look at then again for several days. He watered plants. He drank tea. He continued logging the cube's lack of movement. He did not call Kate.
*
April 4, 1962
Dear Brian,
I've finally been able to get the archives on Derek's TARDIS to tell me something about who he was before. It's sketchy, but between one thing and another I'm beginning to get a picture of this stranger I've been living with for nearly a year now. Before, his (her) name was Romanadvoratrelundar (and if all Time Lord names are like that, I think I finally understand why the Doctor preferred to go by a title). She was the High President of the Doctor's world. There was a war. There was a coup. There were Daleks. She was pushed out of power. She aided the Doctor in destroying their world. She escaped into a pocket universe. She came back and searched for the Doctor. She was taken in by his fake death at the hands of the Silence. She rescued Melody. She brought my baby back to me. She died.
I wish I could've let her know that the Doctor survived, but it was too frantic when we first met, and now the person who's been left behind isn't the person who searched for the Doctor and rescued my daughter. That person is a wonderful stranger. I'm not sure if any of her still exists, buried in Derek, or if she's gone, wiped from existence. I'm grateful to her for here sacrifice.
He (Derek) has started calling me his "Evil Alien Empress". I don't think he's joking. He knows that the TARDIS isn't normal. I don't think he realizes that he's not human. He confronts me sometimes, screaming, asking why I did it – why did I kill all of them? Maybe some of the woman still exists, but what's left, Derek is definitely projecting on me.
In other news, I've finished speaking with (and in some cases paying off) groundskeepers' at all of the potential grave yards. Rory hasn't been sighted at any of them yet, but if he does show up I'll be informed immediately.
And our spring book sale went well. Business isn't exactly bustling, but the Rabbit Hole is becoming a fixture in the community. People stop by and chat for hours. Neighbours bring their children over to play with Melody. I'm coping in the past, but I'm still anxious for the future.
Your loving daughter-in-law,
Amelia P. Williams *
December 25, 1963
Dear Brian,
Merry Christmas from the Rabbit Hole!
Melody drew you this picture. The stick figure between Santa and the giant gopher thing is you. Me and Derek are on the right. She's holding hands with her father. She hasn't seen him since she was baby, but she draws him. She was looking at a picture book one day. There was a group of Romans riding motorcycles (who will ever understand children's books?) and she pointed at the Roman in the lead and told me that was her father. She remembers. I don't know how, but she does. Soon, I hope, she'll have more than memories.
I think that blue squiggle in the corner of the picture is the TARDIS. Or it could be just a squiggle. She loves the colour blue. Those crayons usually get used up first. She unwraps them and rolls them sideways over whole sheets of scrap paper.
She says Merry Christmas, Grandpa.
With Love,
Amelia P. Williams, Melody P. Williams, Derek, The Giant Gopher Thing (I think it's actually the rat that got into the store last week. Melody named it Fred and got very upset when it fell into the time rotor. I'm debating getting a cat to prevent further incidents)*
September 1, 1964
Dear Brian,
I hope you enjoy this postcard. I didn't want to go anywhere near the Statue of Library ever again, but Melody has been begging me for months to go see "The Big Green Lady". Of course, she had more fun riding the ferry than climbing the statue.
- Amy and Melody*
July 25, 1965
Dear Brian,
The world is small. Here I am, confined to this little island city, stuck in this one bit of history unable to go any direction but forward. I spend my days setting books on shelves, writing letters, following hunches.
The 22nd was a bad night. The phone book was a dead end. I visited the last R. Williams – the one who never answered – "Dick Willy" ended up being a low-life pimp, and my good luck saw me visiting in the middle of a stake out. I had to call Derek, Derek to convince the officer at the station (who needed to keep his eyes and his hands to himself) that I am not and never have been a prostitute. That went about as well as you can imagine. Derek got Margs to watch Melody while he came for me.
You can guess how I reacted to that on getting back. That woman has been trying to get him to sleep with her for months now – not that Derek would notice. I wonder if being utterly clueless is a genetic trait of the Doctor's people? And she keeps encouraging him to sample everything the sixties have to offer; not that Derek is stupid enough to take her up on that, but who knows what would happen if he did try something? How would it react with his body? What would it do to what's left of his mind? Would it effect Melody through the link?
I'm all for people experimenting. I believe in free love, peace, the woman's movement, all of it. There are good things happening in this city and Margs is part of them, but she needs to stop pushing herself and all of her little pills at my alien hippy wannabe.
In any case, it was a long night. I couldn't sleep. I worked on my draft. Writing these letters is easy. Writing my life is easy. Writing my life into a novel is hard, and Derek of course came over to pick on my mistakes. He needs a slap. I'd give him a slap, but he's in enough pain already blocking the transmissions from the Silence, keeping Melody safe. Four years now. Time goes by, forward, so quickly. I've got more wrinkles when I look in the mirror. I wonder how Rory looks, how the years are treating him. I wish he were here to watch his daughter grow –
The big news for this letter is that we have had a very interesting pair of visitors at the shop. I think I terrified the life out of them. They were acting suspicious, going on about anachronisms. To be fair, I have got a bit sloppy with the books I leave out on the shelves.
The visitors are named Ian and Barbara Chesterton. They are former companions of Guess Who. I knew that there were others, but I didn't realize that he'd blatantly kidnapped some of them. Not that it overly surprises me. I am surprised that he had another couple on board. The soppy old romantic. Obviously, once it'd been established that they weren't agents of the Silence, I invited them for tea.
I was hopeful at first that they would have some way of contacting him. He could land the TARDIS elsewhere and then take a flight or a bus to see us. I can't leave New York – I wrote you about the migraines the paradoxes springs on me – but he could come see us. He could help in the search.
Of course I was disappointed. Obviously. Nothing is ever going to be easy for Amy J. P. Williams. But I'm still fighting on. Ian and Barbara also left the Doctor under less than ideal circumstances and without getting his phone number or forwarding address.
We spent a long time on chronology. They knew the Doctor before I did, which is strange. It always seemed like the Doctor's life started in my garden that Easter when I was seven years old. In a way it did, but there is still so much of him that is hidden. I don't know how much time passed between their travels and my own. Their Doctor sounds much the same: old and bitter, young and ridiculous, manipulative, vulnerable – but he had an old man's body. He knew less about the universe and the universe knew less about him. He had a granddaughter.
Ian and Barbara wanted to know if the Doctor had ever mentioned this Susan, if he'd ever gone back for her, if I knew how her marriage was getting on –
I tried to change the subject as quickly as possible. They're a nice couple. I didn't want to tell them that the only time the Doctor mentioned his family to me it was in past tense. I didn't want to tell them about the things I'd read in Derek's TARDIS archives, about the war, and what happened to the Doctor's people.
This letter is becoming depressing.
It was a good day, overall. Melody enjoyed the stories. I offered them to spend the night in the back. We've got more than enough space in the old ship even if it is a bit gloomy with the emergency lighting running down. But they had to catch a flight so we said our goodbyes and I loaded them both down with all the books they wanted on the house.
And I used the console scanner to take a few pictures of them which I have enclosed. We've exchanged addresses, and I'll be sending them letters along with Alistair. I trust Kate's father, but I want to ensure these letters get to you and the more I send, the more likely that is. Most of all, it's good to have friends to write to who write back. Not just Kate's father, who I'm fairly certain still thinks I'm a mad woman, but people who understand what it means to be stranded in time.
Derek is A.W.O.L. again. He left to buy milk right after the Chesterton's arrived and hasn't been back for two days. Typical. And probably his idea of revenge for having to fetch me from the station earlier. Anyway, I'm posting this and I'll update you on Derek's adventures whenever he shows up.
Your daughter-in-law,
Amelia P. Williams*
New York City, July 25 1965
Amy was crossing the street back to the shop after posting her letter when she ran into Derek.
"So the prodigal returns," she said, crossly.
He shook his head, panting. That was concerning. It was hot outside even this early in the morning, but Derek rarely seemed to be affected by the elements. A normal human living his lifestyle would've been unfit, but whatever Derek was, he could subsist almost entirely on tuna-and-peanut butter sandwiches, chocolate bars and American-style chips – and still run twelve blocks in the summer heat without breaking a sweat.
"What's wrong."
He opened his mouth to speak, but he shook his head instead.
"Nothing. I thought I'd forgotten something important but it's nothing. I went to the grocery, and then I bumped into Margs and you know how she talks. So we hung out for a bit..."
"A few days you mean," Amy snapped. She didn't mention the fact that he wasn't carrying any groceries. She'd wait to see if he'd explain himself first.
Derek shrugged.
"It didn't seem that long. We just went down to the Gem Spa for egg creams but look what I found. I ran all the way back."
He shoved a newspaper into Amy's face.
Roman Vigilante Haunts Park?
The headline screamed across the front page and suddenly Amy didn't care if Derek was a bit late and lying about milk. She didn't care about Margs. All of the hope that Amy had stuffed as far, deep down into her soul as she could manage over the last four years reared up. She tried carefully to control it; she'd been disappointed before.
But with the Chesterton's showing up. It felt like fate, and Amy couldn't dismiss destiny. Not when her whole life spun on it. She'd landed in New York a bit early, but that must've been just to find Melody and Derek. Now she'd have Rory and it would all be complete.
She was so happy she kissed Derek, right there in the street.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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Beta-ish comments:
revealing a silver of pale, hairy chest.
sliver, not silver
I'm grateful to her for here sacrifice.
her not here
Would it effect Melody through the link?
affect not effect
He left to buy milk right after the Chesterton's arrived
No apostrophe!
But with the Chesterton's showing up.
No apostrophe!
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Can't wait to read more...
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