btw, this is set in the current reality where Amy grew up with her parents, not her aunt.
"Come on, Rory!" Amelia cries as she races down Main Street, flanked by her two best friends Melody Zucker and Peyton Barrett.
Together, they dodge past Saturday afternoon shoppers and other excited children in the direction of the most marvellous thing to happen in Leadworth, well, ever.
Peyton can't quite catch what Rory grumbles as he catches up to the three of them. She shoots a gap-toothed grin over her shoulder toward him however as a show of sympathy.
The four kids round the corner and skid to a stop as they lay their eyes on the red and yellow building they had been watching be built from a patch of dirt for what feels like forever.
Around it, a small crowd of children and adults alike have gathered at the base of the stone steps, they too hoping to be among the first inside.
"I thought they'd never finish building this thing," Rory comments, staring up at the brick and plaster.
"One term isn't that long," Peyton reasons.
"But a cinema, in Leadworth!" Melody says excitedly. "We don't have to go all the way to Gloucester anymore."
"What did they say they were showing again?" Amelia asks, looking around at the crowd, causing her vibrant red hair to flick back and forth.
"The Disney one," Rory says matter-of-factly. "Mulan."
"What's that about?" Amelia frowns.
"It's about a girl who goes to fight in a war but she has to pretend to be a boy. And there's a dragon, and swords, and they blow up a mountain!" Peyton babbles excitedly.
"How do you know that?" Melody raises an eyebrow, folding her arms across her chest.
Peyton freezes. She knew, of course, because she had seen the movie before, back when she had lived in the future. "I... I saw the trailer."
The others nod in acceptance and Peyton releases the breath she is holding.
"I think they're opening the doors!" Rory points out, causing the three girls to stand on their toes and crane their necks to look over the crowds.
Throughout the congregation, the clinking sound of children fishing their pennies from their pockets proceeds a great stamping.
• • •
"Bye Melody!" Amelia and Peyton chorus, waving their arms in the air as their friend skips off in the other direction, dragging Rory by the wrist as she goes.
"Bye, Rory!" Peyton adds, earning a scoff from Amy.
The two girls turn and wander back in the direction of the eastern side of town where their parents would be preparing dinner, expecting them home before the street lights had flickered to life.
"I'm going to be just like Mulan when I'm older!" Amelia declares, jumping up onto a short stone wall that lined the path. "I'm going to fight bad guys with a sword and save the world."
"Where are you going to learn to sword fight?" Peyton laughs, climbing up onto the wall behind her, holding her arms out to keep her balance just as Amelia is doing.
"The Doctor will teach me, of course," Amelia says, shooting a bored look over her shoulder at her friend as this was the most obvious thing in the universe.
"Does the Doctor know how to fight with a sword?" Peyton asks.
"He knows everything, P, I told you like a million times," Amelia groans, wobbling a little on a loose stone.
YOU ARE READING
The Time Lord's Apprentice
Fanfiction"But, you're impossible!" "Yeah, and the world is ending, I don't think now is the time." Peyton is an orphan, taken from her mother as an infant by the Unified Intelligence Taskforce. She is raised separately from other children because she is spec...
