Doctor:
Getting dragged back to talk to Churchill, again, when every night he reacted the same way to what I told him. "Leave us." His Silurian Doctor left, and I was left huddling in chains on the floor. "Tick tock goes the clock, as the old song says. But they don't, do they? The clocks never tick. Something has happened to time. That's what you say. What you never stop saying. All of history is happening at once. But what does that mean? What happened? Explain to me in terms that I can understand what happened to time."
That made me smirk a little, and I remembered my wife, the woman who should be my wife, but was probably dead now that everything was here at once, her poor mind couldn't cope. "A teenage girl."
Flashback:
"Imagine you were dying. Imagine you were afraid and a long way from home and in terrible pain. Just when you thought it couldn't get worse, you looked up and saw the face of the devil himself. Hello, Dalek." I smiled, looking at the foul creature as it started to die, and I knew what it was thinking.
"Emergency. Emergency. Weapon system disabled. Emergency."
Then I opened up the top, already frustrated with the weedy and dead voice of the Dalek as I worked. "Hush, now. I need some information from your data core. Everything the Daleks know about the Silence. And I need it before my wife gets out of the shower."
Getting what I needed, I headed to Calisto B, one of Jack's favourite haunts, but at least now he wasn't here right now. He was married to my poor Melody, ad everything that was going to happen... I didn't want to find out he knew how I died. "Gideon Vandaleur. Get him. Now." I told the bar keep, who glared at me.
"Who says he's here?" I just dropped the Daleks eye stalk on the counter, meaning he knew I meant business. In this sector, a Dalek eye was worth big money, and even bigger respect.
A short while later, I was sat at a table reading Knitting for Girls when a cloaked figure sits down with me. "Father Gideon Vandaleur, former envoy of the Silence. My condolences." I smirked, already knowing that it wasn't him.
"Your what?"
Leaning forwards, I lowered my voice a little, so no one else would hear. "Gideon Vandaleur has been dead for six months." Then I sonicked the figure, wearing the same type of eye patch as the woman I was going to make sure died with me, Madam Kovarian who took away our daughter in the first place, and the robot went rigid. "Can I speak to the Captain, please?" I asked the small figure in the eye, who nodded and ran.
"Hello again, the Teselecta time-travelling shape-changing robot powered by miniaturised people. Never get bored of that. Long time since Berlin. Though I honestly preferred you as my wife." I smirked.
I could tell the captain was annoyed at me then. "Doctor, what have you done to our systems?"
"They'll be fine if you behave. Now, this unit can disguise itself as anyone in the universe, so if you're posing as Vandaleur, you're investigating the Silence. Tell me about them." I requested, and they also knew that they would tell me. With Seraphina being high up, I was high up through marriage.
"Tell you what?"
"One thing." I smiled slyly. "Just one. Their weakest link."
Oh, this was an easy weak link. One of the easiest I had ever seen, and they challenged me at chess? That was the only thing I could beat Seraphina at, when she didn't cheat and get a vision. But... She didn't have visions of me any longer. It was too painful to know that she could see my death. And I didn't want her to try and stop it.
A game of chess in progress, and and my oponents Queen is sizzling with voltage. Like I said, this was easy. "The crowd are getting restless. They know the Queen is your only legal move, except you've already moved it twelve times, which means there are now over four million volts running through it. That's why they call it Live Chess. Even with the gauntlet you'll never make it to Bishop Four alive."
"I am a dead man, unless you concede the game." Gantok pleaded, and I knew I already had him hooked. I was going to get this done and find out why I had to die.
I pretended to not like the idea. "But I'm winning."
"Name your price." Oh, he was no fun, I wanted to make him beg.
"Information."
"I work for the Silence." He replied, as though I didn't already know that. "They would kill me."
"They're going to kill me too, very soon. I was just going to lie down and take it, but you know what? Before I go, I'd like to know why I have to die, so I could tell my wife, my beautiful and lost wife why I have to leave her."
"Dorium Maldovar is the only one who can help you."
"Dorium's dead." I reminded him. "The Monks beheaded him at Demon's Run. Not even Seraphina could stop that."
Gantok nodded at me, and I hoped that there was going to be something interesting going on. "I know. Concede the game, Doctor, and I'll take you to him."
What else could I do? So I knocked over my Queen, to get consolation for my Princess.
He took me to Charnel, and we walked past so many skull, some on the floor, some on shelves. "The Seventh Transept, where the Headless Monks keep the leftovers. Watch your step. There are traps everywhere. " Gantok told me, carrying a large torch as we went through the tunnels. Phi would love it, she had a thing about depressing places. Like happy for sad people.
"I hate rats." I told him, remembering the Spider-Rat in the library. That thing was creepy and I did not want to scream like a girl right now.
The Silence soldier smirked at me. "There are no rats in the transept."
"Oh, good."
"The skulls eat them." I flinched a little as the skulls on the shelves turned to look at us newcomers, still with flesh covering our bones. "The headless monks behead you alive, remember."
I saw some nice boxes on pillars in the middle of the room and I got curious. "Why are some of them in boxes?"
"Because some people are rich, and some people are left to rot. And Dorium Maldovar was always very rich."
I opened Dorium's box. The blue head sneezed, and I found it rather comical. "Thank you for bringing me, Gantok."
"My pleasure." He practically purred, and I turned back towards him. "It saves me the trouble of burying you. Nobody beats me at chess." He drew his weapon and moved forward, triggering a trap. He fell down into a pit of ravening skulls.
I rushed to the side of the pit, reaching down for him. "Gantok!" But then he was gone and the skulls turned their attention to me, making me sonic the pit shut, just as Dorium opened his eyes.
"Hello? Is someone there?" I moved in front of him, and his eyes lit up at the sight of me. "Ah, Doctor. Thank God it's you. The Monks, they turned on me."
I nodded my agreement, my stetson falling forwards on my face. "Well, I'm afraid they rather did, a bit."
"Give it to me straight, Doctor. How bad are my injuries?"
Oh, what a question. "Well."
"Ha, ha! Oh, your face."
Present/ All of Time:
Churchill didn't believe a word of what I was saying. "This is absurd. Other worlds, carnivorous skulls, talking heads. I don't know why I'm listening to you."
"Because, in another reality, you and I are friends. You were furious with my wife when she cut her hair off! And you sense that. Just as you sense there is something wrong with time." I told him, and I really hoped that he listened, that he wanted to hear more of the story.
He sighed, and pursed his lips. "You mentioned a girl."
"Yes. I'm getting to her."
"What's she like? Attractive, I assume." That's my daughter he's talking about!
"Hell, with curly hair."
He smiled a little. "Tell me more."
Flashback:
"Oh, it's not so bad, really, as long as they get your box the right way up." Dorium was telling me about how it was down here. "I got a media-chip fitted in my head years ago, and the Wi-Fi down here is excellent, so I keep myself entertained." I wonder how much gossip he got, and if he knew what had happened to his Maldovarium. Over run by Nemonites.
But that wasn't what I was here for. "I need to know about the Silence."
"Oh. A religious order of great power and discretion. The sentinels of history, as they like to call themselves. I'm surprised your High Priestess isn't aware of them."
My Priestess didn't know where I was and it was going to stay that way. "And they want me dead."
"No, not really. They just don't want you to remain alive."
That really helped, Dorium, thank you. "That's okay, then. I was a bit worried for a minute there."
"You're a man with a long and dangerous past, but your future is infinitely more terrifying. The Silence believe it must be averted. Your future is already more dangerous than that of your wife's, even with her Sarani mimicry."
"You know, you could've told me all this the last time we met." Then I paused. "Sarani? The Sarani are myths, the assassins and bounty hunters of old. My wife's genes are mimicking a Calderrian."
Dorium got frustrated with me then. "It was a busy day and I got beheaded. And I've known what she was since the moment you told me she regenerated. My casino had a bet as to what type of assassin race she would become, Sarani, Silurian, Chetari, Lucrian. Sarani won and look how she's ended up. Has the anger fully set in yet, the shakes, the fury. The fear of what she will become?"
"What's so dangerous about my future? More dangerous than what my wife could become?"
"On the Fields of Trenzalore, at the fall of the Eleventh, when no living creature can speak falsely, or fail to answer, a question will be asked." He recited to me, sounding incredibly bored, like I was supposed to have heard of this. "A question that must never, ever be answered."
That sounded familiar. "Silence will fall when the question is asked."
"Silence must fall would be a better translation." He told me, and I wondered what he meant. "The Silence are determined the question will never be answered. That the Doctor will never reach Trenzalore. That his beloved with die in heart break, with nothing left for her."
"I don't understand. What's it got to do with me? And why Seraphina as well?"
"The first question." Dorium replied. "The oldest question in the universe, hidden in plain sight. Would you like to know what it is?"
Would I ask if I didn't? "Yes."
"Are you sure? Very, very sure?" Oh, just tell me already!
"Of course."
"Then I shall tell you. But on your own head be it."
No. Not a chance, not happening. I would never answer that to anyone apart from Melody or Seraphina. "It's not my fault. Put me back." Dorium told me, as I dumped him down inside the TARDIS, knowing that Phina was time locked in the shower. All she would know was that she had a pounding headache after this. "Ow! I've fallen on my nose. Have you got wi-fi here? I'm bored already and my nose is hurting. We all have to die, Doctor, but you more than most. You do see that, don't you? You know what the question is now. You do see that you have to die. For Seraphina to live?"
Present/ All of Time:
"But what was the question? Why did it mean your death?" Churchill asked me, and I could see how desperate he was to know. I had, and now I wish that I didn't.
"Suppose there was a man who knew a secret." I told him as we walked through his palace. "A terrible, dangerous secret that must never be told. How would you erase that secret from the world? Destroy it forever, before it can be spoken."
He considered this for just a moment. "If I had to, I'd destroy the man."
"And silence would fall. All the times I've heard those words, I never realised it was my silence, my death. The Doctor will fall. Why are we here?" I asked him, realising that we'd stopped and now were somewhere else. But why?
He seemed confused "This, this is the Senate Room."
"Why did we leave your office?"
Churchill considered this. "Well, we wanted a stroll, didn't we?"
"I think I've been running." I realised, feeling my hearts beating erratically in my chest. "Why do you have your revolver?"
He looked surprised as to what was in his hand. "Well, you're dangerous company, Soothsayer." He theorised.
I looked at the single tally mark on my arm. "Yes. I think I am."
"Resume your story."
Flashback:
The idiot in the box was still complaining, and he was lucky that Seraphina wasn't here. "Doctor, please, open my hatch. I've got an awful headache. Which to be honest means more than it used to. It's like some terrible weight pressing down on my-" He cut off as I opened his box, and he was upside down. "Oh. I see."
"Why Lake Silencio? Why Utah?" I asked him, walking over to the console again, looking at the image of my wife, still in the shower, still frozen in time. "Why does she have to watch?"
He sighed, as though it should be obvious again. "It's a still point in time." So it was unchangable through time. "Makes it easier to create a fixed point. High Priestess Seraphina is time itself in human form, you should know by now that she is the epitome of all that is fixed. And your death is a fixed point, Doctor. You can't run away from this."
"Been running all my life. Why should I stop? Why should I let my wife, after so many years of me thinking her dead, now lose me just as we're getting back to normal?" I demanded, wanting to know why, why she was going to have to watch me die, and then be alone...
Dorium had gotten even sassier during his time in his little box. "Because now you know what's at stake. Why your life must end."
"Not today."
"What's the point in delaying? How long have you delayed already?" He asked me, and I know he could see the image of Phi on the screen. "You haven't told her, have you? You want to help her get better first?"
I started making a phone call, not looking at him. "We've been knocking about. A bit of a farewell tour for me, a reunion for her. Things to do, people to see. There's always more. I could invent a new colour, save the Dodo, join the Beatles, marry Seraphina again on every single planet!" The person on the other end picked up. "Hello, it's me. Get him. Tell him, we're going out and it's all on me, except for the money and driving." I looked back at the blue head in a box. "I have got a time machine, Dorium. It's all still going on. For me, it never stops. Liz the First is still waiting in a glade to elope with me. I could help Rose Tyler with her homework. I could go on all of Jack's stag parties in one night."
He just looked at me sadly. "Time catches up with us all, Doctor. Your wife and you are no exception."
"Well, it has never laid a glove on me! Hello?"
There was a nurse on the other end of the phone, and I could hear in her voice that there was something wrong. "Doctor, I'm so sorry. We didn't know how to contact you. I'm afraid Brigadier Lethbridge Stewart passed away a few months ago. Doctor?"
"Yes. Yes, I" I didn't know what else I could say. Alistair... Oh, Phina was going to be so upset...
"It was very peaceful. He talked a lot about you and the Writer, if that's any comfort. Always made us pour an extra brandy and a bourbon in case you both came round one of these days. Said how he wished you two would just get together."
"Doctor? What's wrong?" Dorium asked me as I looked at the image on the screen again, the phone falling from near my ear. We never even invited him to the wedding...
"Nothing. Nothing. It's just." I put it down fully and then took the blue envelopes from my pocket, turning the screen back to the home page. "It's time. It's time."
I wrote down the letters, giving as little detail as possible, and then headed back to the bar, where the Teselecta was still frozen waiting for me. "Surely you could deliver the messages yourself?"
I shook my head sadly. "It would involve crossing my own time stream. Best not."
"According to our files, this is the end for you. Your final journey." He sighed, and I could tell he was sorry for me. "We'll deliver your messages. You can depend on us."
I nodded in gratitude. "Thank you."
"Doctor, whatever you and the Priestess think of the Teselecta, we are champions of law and order just as you both have always been. Is there nothing else we can do?" He asked me as I got to my feet and then smiled sadly as I left the bar. It was time to die.
Present/ All of Time:
"Why would you do this?" Churchill asked me, confused as to why I would send invitations to all the people I loved the most. "Of all the things you've told me, this I find hardest to believe. Why would you invite your friends to see your death?"
I gave him a grave smile. "I had to die. I didn't have to die alone." The time we saw them first for 200 years... "Amy and Rory. The last Centurion and the girl who waited. However dark it got, I'd turn around, and there they'd be. "If it's time to go, remember what you're leaving. Remember the best. My friends, my in laws, have always been the best of me."
"And did you tell them this was going to happen?"
"It would help if you didn't keep asking questions." I pointed out to him, see that there were now three tally marks on my arms. "We don't have much time."
"And this girl you spoke of. Did you invite her?"
I nodded to him, smiling at the memory of her shooting off my hat. "Yes, she was there. River Song came twice. And she's not really a girl, she's a woman." I told him. "My daughter."
Flashback
"Well, then. Here we are at last." I smiled at her, seeing my beautiful daughter pull up her visor and look at me, her silver eyes filled with tears.
She shook her head inside the suit, sobbing slightly. "I can't stop it. The suit's in control."
"You're not supposed to." I smiled sadly at her. "This has to happen."
Melody was terrified, and all I wanted to do was hold her, and tell her everything was going to be alright, but I couldn't. Because to her and her mother, nothing ever would be again. "Run. Daddy, run."
"I did run, my girl. Running brought me here."
She sobbed, her eyes closing as she fought against the suit, like she did as a child, not that she ever really had a chance to be one. "I'm trying to fight it, but I can't. It's too strong."
"I know. It's okay. This is where I die, Melody. This is a fixed point. This must happen. This always happens. Don't worry. You won't even remember this. Look over there." I motioned for her to look to the side, where her mother was being held by a future version of herself, as she looked at me, trying desperately to see what this was. But she could never see it.
"That's me." Melody whispered, staring in horror. "How can I be there?"
I smiled sadly at her again, so wanting to help. "That's you from the future, serving time for a murder you probably can't remember." My daughter looked back at me. "My murder."
"Why would you do that? Make me watch? Make mum watch? This could kill her, Doctor!"
No. She was strong, she was oh so strong, this wouldn't kill her. "So that you know this is inevitable. And you are forgiven. Always and completely forgiven. And that no matter what the Silence may have told you, you are my daughter and I love you with all of my hearts."
"Please, Daddy, please, please just run!" Melody begged, as the suit started to raise it's arm, where the weapon was stored.
I shook my head. "I can't."
"Time can be rewritten. I can see all of Time, just like mum can, please!"
"Don't you dare. Goodbye, Melody Donna Pond."
I shut my eyes, the suit zapping him multiple times but I didn't die. "Hello, Sweetie." River smiled at me as I opened my eyes again.
"What have you done?"
She looked down at the suit, as though to make sure. "Well, I think I just drained my weapon systems."
Oh, she didn't. "But this is fixed. This is a fixed point in time."
Then my daughter rolled her eyes at me. "Fixed points can be rewritten."
"No, they can't." I shouted at her. "Of course they can't. Who told you that-" My last thought as everything dissolved into white, was that it was actually most likely to be me. Oh.
Present/ All of Time:
I had Winston Churchill hanging onto my every word. "Well? What happened?"
"Nothing."
"Nothing?"
"Nothing happened." I agreed, looking around the room. Something wasn't right. "And then it kept happening. Or, if you'd prefer, everything happened at once, and it won't ever stop. Time is dying, which means my wife is also out there decaying herself. It's going to be five oh two in the afternoon for all eternity. A needle stuck on a record."
He narrowed his eyes at me. "A record? Good Lord, man, have you never heard of downloads?" Oh, why couldn't I have a camera for that moment?
"Said Winston Churchill."
Churchill sniffed, looking around. "Gunsmoke. That's gunsmoke." Then back at the revolver in his hand. "Oh, I appear to have fired this."
And for some strange reason there was a spear in my arm. "We seem to be defending ourselves."
"I don't understand."
"The creatures that lead the Silence. Remarkable beings. They're memory-proof."
"But what does that mean?"
Now was not the time for an explanation! "You can't remember them. The moment you look away, you forget they were ever there." The tally marks were growing in number, but not by much. "Don't panic. In small numbers, they're not too difficult. Not that I wouldn't give for my wife and her knife right now." Then I saw my other arm was coated in them, and I glanced up to see them on the ceiling in a big cluster as a grenade was rolled in, making me knock Churchill to the ground.
"Go! Go! Go!" Soldiers came in on all sides through the smoke. "Keep the Silence in sight at all times, keep your eye drives active."
"Who the devil are you?" Winston demanded, coughing in the smoke as the sound of high heels could be heard. "Identify yourselves."
"Pond. Amelia Pond." Oh, yes!
"No! She's on our side. It's okay." But then I saw her fully, and she had an eye-patch, just like the woman who stole her niece. "No. No, Amy. Amy, why are you wearing that?" And then everything went black as she shot me.
Amy:
That stunner wasn't supposed to last quite this long. We were already nearly back to base when he finally woke up, staring groggily at the ceiling fan for a while before looking around at the train whistle. "Amy?"
"Those stun guns aren't fun. I'm sorry." I told him, getting to my feet. "I wanted to avoid a long conversation. You need to get up, though. We'll be in Cairo shortly."
And then I got that he thought I was the enemy. What part of I pick my friends well, they have no darkness? When was I ever going to be the enemy, except when we played Wii Sports? "Amy Pond. Amelia Pond from Leadworth, please, listen to me. I know it seems impossible, but you know me. In another version of reality you and I were best friends, you're my sister in law. We, we travelled together. We had adventures. Amelia Pond, you grew up with a time rift in the wall of your bedroom, that you shared with your sister who wasn't really your sister but was a Time Lord prophetess in disguise. You can see what others can't because she opened up your mind. You can remember things that never happened. And if you try, if you really, really try, you'll be able to-" He was gesturing with a model TARDIS. "Oh." Then he looked at the wall, seeing my sketches, of Daleks, Silurians, the Fish Vampire's, Pirates, Weeping Angels, and one of him and my sister, the poor, poor Seraphina. "Oh."
"You look rubbish." I laughed, shaking my head as I hugged him tight, glad that we had finally tracked him down. Sera couldn't.
He looked me up and down in my suit, grinning. "You look wonderful."
"So do you." Not really, he was grotty and well in need of a shave before he met his wife, but hey. "But don't worry, we'll soon fix that." I held up his tweed jacket, that I had drawn so many times trying to remember.
His face lit up further. "Oh, Geronimo." He shaved, thank god, and got dressed, meaning that I could actually get to my desk at long last. "Okay, you can turn round now. How do I look?"
"Cool."
"Really?"
That was never going to be cool. "No."
It didn't really phase him, he just looked around the carriage of the train. "Cool office though. Why do you have an office?! Are you a special agent boss lady? What's that mean? Not sure about the eye patch, though." So many questions at once...
"It's not an eye patch." I scolded, slapping his hand away when he went to touch it. "Time's gone wrong. Some of us noticed. There's a whole team of us working on it, you'll see."
"And you've got an office on a train. That is so cool. Can I have an office? Never had an office before. Or a train. Or a train slash office."
I loved the rambling... "God, I've missed you!" I laughed, throwing my arms around him and hugging him tight.
"Okay." The Doctor laughed. "Hugging and missing now. Where's the Roman? And the Time Lord, where's your sister?"
"Sera's uh, well, you'll see when we get there. You mean Rory, right?" He made a noise of agreement. "My husband Rory, yeah?" I picked up a drawing from my desk, that took me such a long time try and get right. "That's him, isn't it? I've no idea. I can't find him, but I love him very much, don't I?"
"Apparently." He smirked, looking at my drawing.
"I have to keep doing this, writing and drawing things. It's just it's so hard to keep remembering. Sera can't do it at all, it's just a big mess to her as well." I grumbled, looking at the goofy looking guy.
He sighed, shaking his head. "Well, it's not your fault, or Seraphina's. Time's gone wrong. Do you remember why? Does she remember why, that's another good point."
"The lakeside." I told him without hesitation, the moment so horrific in my head, watching either my sister collapsing in pain as everything dissolved, or dying from heartbreak as her husband died by the hand of their daughter.
"Lake Silencio, Utah. I died"
Ah, contradiction. "But then you didn't. See, I remember it twice, different ways." And I wasn't telling him about what happened in the second, and I know that Sera wouldn't either.
"Two different versions of the same event, both happening in the same moment. Time split wide open. Now look at it. All of history happening at once. Which is why we need to make sure your sister is in some form of stasis or something, stop her brain melting," He smiled, though it didn't reach his eyes. No, she wasn't in stasis, she didn't need to be. Her brain found another way to cope.
"But does it matter? I mean, can't we just stay like this? She's alive, she doesn't have a real problem any more, Doctor."
"Time isn't just frozen, it's disintegrating. It will spread and spread and all of reality will simply fall apart." He explained, as the Captain entered the room.
"Ma'am?" I looked at him, and the Doctor pointed at him, grinning. "We're about to arrive. Eye drives need to be activated as soon as we disembark."
That reminded me. "Good point. Thank you, Captain Williams."
"Hello."
He nodded at the Doctor. "Hello, sir. Pleased to meet you."
I should probably introduce them properly. "Captain Williams, best of the best. Couldn't live without him."
He grabbed the drawing from my desk again and held it up, as though comparing him as he left. "No."
"What is wrong?" I demanded, grabbing it back and putting it away.
The Doctor was still laughing at me which I didn't much appreciate. "Amy, you'll find your Rory. You always do. But you have to really look. I'm surprised Phina didn't see him for you, if I'm honest."
"I am looking." I complained. "And Sera tried to help, but she's too busy."
That made him sigh a little, and I saw worry in his eyes. "Oh, my Amelia Pond. You don't always look hard enough, and your sister always over works herself."
"Why are you older?" I asked him suddenly, seeing a lot more lines around his face, mostly due to worry, but also just from general age. "If time isn't really passing, then how can you be ageing?"
Another sigh. "Time is still passing for me. Every explosion has an epicentre. I'm it. I'm what's wrong."
"What's wrong with you?" Because he looked perfectly fine. Breathing, which was good.
"I'm still alive." Oh.
We got back to Area 52 in the pyramids, and headed into the loading area, when the Captain saw the Doctor staring in bemusement the eye drive in his hand. "You have to put it on, sir."
"An eye patch. What for?" He asked, really confused. Oh, just suck it up, I know something that you don't.
"It's not an eye patch."
"It's an eye drive, sir." Captain Williams explained to him as we headed into the area with the holding cells. "It communicates directly with the memory centres of the brain. Acts as external storage."
"Only thing that works on them. Because no living mind can remember these things. Not even Sera knows what they look like."
"The Silence." He looked at all of the individual tanks filled with liquid, all occupied with Silence. "We've captured over a hundred of them now, all held in this pyramid."
He nodded a little, and knocked on the glass a little. "Yeah. I've encountered them before. Always wondered what they looked like."
"Well, put your eye drive on and you'll retain the information, but only for as long as you're wearing it." I told him, secretly hating mine because it looked like I was a crappy stripper pirate. Well, I did used to be a Kiss-o-gram. I think.
"The Silence have human servants. They all wear these." The Doctor pointed out, probably thinking of Kovarian. Oh, I was looking forward to when River killed her.
I nodded in agreement. "They'd have to."
"This way." The Doctor finally put the eye drive on, as the Silence all started seeing him, reacting more than when Sera'd first done some rounds. "They seem to be noticing you."
He sighed, moving away from them a little. "Yeah, they would."
That made me think of a pretty good question. "So why aren't the human race killing the Silence on sight any more?"
"That was another reality. What are the tanks for?" Ah, we were playing 20 questions, I hated this game.
"They can draw electricity from anything. It's how they attack. The fluid insulates them. And I really don't like the way they're looking at you." Yeah, they were staring more and more at him, it was getting just a little bit creepy.
"Me neither."
Captain Williams turned to look at me. "Ma'am, I'm sure it's nothing, but I should really check this out. They haven't been this active in a while." He looked at two soldiers. "You two, upstairs. Check all the tank seals. Then the floors above. Get everyone checking." They obeyed. "You go ahead, Ma'am."
"Thank you, Captain Williams." I grabbed my brother in laws hand, pulling him towards the main door. "Doctor, this way."
"Captain Williams, nice fellow. What's his first name?"
What did he want to know that for? Actually, what was his first name? "Captain. Just through here."
"Just give us a moment. Just need to check something, Ma'am." He mock saluted and then headed to talk to him, while I spoke into my lapel comm.
"We're in. He's on his way."
River spoke back to me. "Tell him to hurry up, mums getting bad again, the nose bleeds are back and her eyes are trying to heal."
Oh, not again... "Put a blind fold on her, I'm bringing him up, over and out, Melody." Then I called over to him. "Come on, Doctor. Time for you to meet some old friends and family."
"Attention all personnel. Attention all personnel. Please check all assigned containment units." Captain Williams told everyone over comms, while everyone else was looking at monitors in the control room. Time had gotten slightly bigger.
"Hi, honey's. I'm home." He called, looking into the main hall to see two people facing away from us, on with long brown hair, and the other with curly blonde. Their small mismatched family.
They both turned around at that, and the Doctor's face fell when he saw her. Her nose was still bleeding slightly, Melody fussing over it, and her eyes... They were cloudy white with a gold swirl through them as they tried to keep healing. That's why she hadn't died yet. Her body had tried to adjust and stop the images from overwhelming her vision. So she just couldn't see any more. "And what sort of time do you call this?"
"The death of time. The end of time. The end of us all once the Sentinal goes. Oh, why couldn't you just die?" Kovarian asked him, glaring from the chair she was tied from. The scratches down her face were still there, though now they were thick scars marring her cheek.
"Did my best, dear. I showed up." He told her, moving right to his wife, cupping her face lightly and stroking her cheek. "You just can't get the psychopaths these days, but tell you what, she is the most loving daughter a man can ask for. Love what you've done with the pyramids. How did you score all this? Seraphina, Melody?"
Sera managed a small smile, reaching out and tracing her fingers down his face, trying to remember what he looked like probably. "Hallucinogenic lipstick. Works wonders on President Kennedy. And Cleopatra was a real pushover."
"I always thought so."
The smile got a little bigger. "She mentioned you."
"What did she say?"
"Put down that knife down."
"Did you? I'm surprised that it even exists here, Princess. Oh, your poor eyes..." He rested his forehead on hers, and I could see him trying so hard not to cry as he looked her staring sightlessly back at him.
"Eventually. God, I missed you, Angel..." And then my sister smiled for the first time in years, kissing him softly, making both River and Kovarian make faces, though their daughters I could understand.
"Oh, they're flirting. Do I have to watch this? Its even worse when your kids in front of you."
"It was such a basic mistake, wasn't it, Madame Kovarian." River herself smiled, turning back to the woman who manipulated her into who she was as Mels. "Take a child, raise her into a perfect psychopath, introduce her to her father, the man you want dead. Problem is, I'm such a daddies girl."
Her father scowled a little. "It's not funny, Melody. Reality is fatally compromised. Tell me you understand that. Look at your mother!"
"Dinner?" They both asked him, and I could see that no matter what, Seraphina was on Melody's side. Like mother like daughter.
The Doctor gave them a bitter smile. "I don't have the time. Nobody has the time, because as long I'm alive, time is dying. Because of you, Melody. Because of you, you probably have the biggest headache on the planet and your mother is blind!"
"Because I refused to kill my dad! I love my parents more than anything!"
"Oh, you love me, do you? Oh, that's sweet of you, loving your old dad. Isn't that sweet. Come here, you." He made to grab her, and I saw where this was going as Sera stumbled back, trying to find something to hold on to, so I grabbed her arm, steadying her.
"Get him!"
River tried to move back. "I'm not a fool, sweetie. I know what happens if we touch. Mum told me the minute we found each other." But then he got a hold of her arm, and the machines started bleeping. "Get off me. Get him off me! Dad, no. Let go! Please Daddy, let go!" Time started moving. 5:03 and counting. "Get him off me! Dad!"
"I'm sorry, my Song. It's the only way." We flashed back to the lake, before the soldiers managed to pull him off.
Sera pulled away to check on her daughter, using her hands to feel where he had gripped her "Cuff him. Sorry, Doctor."
"Oh, why do you two always have handcuffs?" He complained as he was restrained, looking mostly at Sera. Oh, I didn't need to know that, the bedroom rule was there for a reason. "It's the only way. We're the opposite poles of the disruption. If we touch, we short out the differential. Time can begin again."
My niece shook her head sadly. "And I'll be by a lakeside killing you in front of mum."
"And time won't fall apart. The clocks will tick. Reality will continue. There isn't another way."
"I didn't say there was, sweetie." She smiled grimly. "There are so many theories about you and I, you know."
He sighed. "Idle gossip."
"Archaeology."
"Same thing." He was never going to approve of her career choice, was he?
"Am I the the daughter, the little girl who loves you, or the woman who murders you?"
"You're our daughter whatever happens, Melody."
"I don't want to murder you." Then I felt something land on my head, like a drop of rain.
"This is no fun at all."
There was a small smile of Sera's and Rivers faces then. "It isn't, is it?"
"Doctor, sister, what's that?" I asked, as more drops started falling around us.
The gold in my sisters eyes swirled that little bit more as she tried to work it out. "The pyramid above us. How many Silence do we have trapped inside it? I haven't been able to count, have I?"
"None." Kovarian purred from her chair. "They're not trapped. They never have been. They've been waiting for this, Doctor. For you."
And then Captain Williams came back into the room, putting a bar across the door. "They're out! All of them. No one gets in here! Ma'am, my men out there should be able to lock this down. We have them outnumbered."
"And you're wearing eye drives based on mine, I think. Oops." Kovarian smiled, and we all looked at her, well, Sera in the general direction.
"What do you mean?" And then electricity surged through Doctor Kent's eye drive, making her scream in agony, dropping to the ground. "Help her! Help her!" The Doctor shouted and I ran to her side, but I could see it was already too late.
"She's dead."
The Doctor's eye drive tried to zap him too then. "Eye drives off now. Remove them. Seraphina, are you alright?" He asked her, seeing that she was blindly looking around at all the screams of pain surrounding us. "Princess, stay calm, it's fine." I got off his as mine started zapping, but then he got it off too, rushing to Sera's side.
"The Silence would never allow an advantage without taking one themselves. The effects will vary from person to person. Either death or debilitating agony. But they will take you all, one by one." Kovarian told us, but then her own eye drive began to zap her. "What are you doing? No, it's me. Don't be stupid. You need me. Stop it. Stop that!"
"We could stop this right now, you and I." The Doctor told his daughter, trying to comfort his wife while she cried, and I could see she was scared. Hearing screams but not being able to see what was happening, enough to scare even her. "Amy, tell her."
Oh, I was not losing my best friend. "We've been working on something. Just let us show you."
"There's no point. There's nothing you can do. My time is up." He insisted, moving over to me, looking at me hard while River moved to her mother.
"We're doing this for you!"
"Then people are dying for me. I won't thank you for that, Amelia Pond. And neither will your sister when Time starts moving again."
Both the girls he loved shook their heads. "Just let us show you."
"Please." I looked at my Captain. "Captain Williams, how long do we have?"
"Er, a couple of minutes."
"That's enough. We're going to the Receptor Room right at the top of the pyramid. I hope you're ready for a climb." River told her dad, moving over to the last exit in the room.
"I'll wait down here, Ma'am. Buy you as much time as I can." Captain Williams told me, and as I looked at him, I started seeing him in a whole new way. He couldn't be...
"You have to take your eye drive off"
He shook his head, revolver facing the other way. River and the Doctor had already gone, leaving Sera with me, leaning on my side. "Can't do that, Ma'am. Might forget what's coming."
Rory couldn't be serious. "But it could activate any second."
"It has activated, Ma'am." His hand was clenched in pain. "But I'm of no use to you if I can't remember. You have to go now, Ma'am."
I nodded a little, tears filling my eyes as I carefully wrapped my arms around Sera, leading her towards the door. "Yes."
"Now!"
"Yes, thank you, Captain Williams." I took one last look before leaving the room, pausing as I heard the door break. "Sera, you know how you knew the Doctor, how did you know for sure it was always him?"
"Because I just knew. My hearts told me, Ame's." She smiled, blindly stroking my cheek. "Go and get him, but don't leave me, I can't see."
Oh I already knew that, but I grabbed a nearby machine gun and then pulled her back into the room, making the three silence eat lead as Sera grinned. Then I walked over to the Captain, my Rory, pulling off his eye drive and then to his feet. "Come on, you. Up you get. You all right?"
Then I looked over at my sister staring blindly at the woman who took away her baby, her tiny, newborn baby and condemned her to the anger and rage. "Sera, help me."
"You took my baby from me and hurt her, just like you knew I was hurt by my people." She whispered, walking over to her, and taking her knife out of her sheath. "And now she's all grown up and she's fine, but I'll never see my baby again. Another baby lost because of something that I couldn't stop and you brought her up to kill her dad."
"But you'll still save me, though. Because he would, and you'd never do anything to disappoint your precious Doctor. He's the one thing left for you in the Universe, isn't he? Now that your Sarani anger has come in."
"Ma'ams, we have to go, now." Rory told us, but I stayed, watching my sister. I knew what she was going to do, and I approved of it, knowing that she deserved this. She deserved her revenge.
"My Doctor is very precious to me, you're right." Sera agreed, her white and gold eyes blazing. "But do you know what else he is, Madame Kovarian? Not here." She put the eye drive back in place, making her start screaming in pain. "Melody Pond didn't get it all from you, sweetie." And then she leaned back, slashing across her throat, watching as she started drowning in her own blood.
I took her arm, and then Rorys as we left her to die. "So, you and me, we should get a drink some time." He sounded pleased. "And married." Even more fine with that. I found my Rory...
River:
"What's this? Oh, it's as timey-wimey distress beacon. Who built this?" Dad asked, looking at the device that took me ages to build, along with my mothers help. She was blind, not invalid.
"I'm the child of the TARDIS, and the two smartest people in the Universe. I understand the physics." I told him, wishing that he would have just a little more faith in me, that he would believe in my plan. He was my dad...
"But that's all you've got, a distress beacon."
"I've been sending out a message." I tried, making sure that I was close to him, but at the same time far enough away that he couldn't reach out and touch me. "A distress call. Outside the bubble of our time, the universe is still turning, and I've sent a message everywhere. To the future and the past, the beginning and the end of everything, boosted by what little power mum and I have left. The Doctor is dying. Please, please help."
"Melody!" He snapped, making me wince at his tone. "River, this is ridiculous. That would mean nothing to anyone. It's insane. Worse, it's stupid. You embarrass me." My hearts sank at his words as mum came up with Uncle Rory and Auntie Amy, and she hugged my right away.
"We barricaded the door. We've got a few minutes. Just tell him. Just tell him, my Melody. Doctor, you listen to her. She is smarter than us both and she is our little girl!" She snapped at him, and I rested my head on her shoulder, grateful for my mothers rage at that moment.
"Those reports of the sun spots and the solar flares." I explained him, my mother holding me tight. "They're wrong. There aren't any. It's not the sun, it's you. The sky is full of a million, million voices saying yes, of course we'll help. You've touched so many lives, you and mum, saved so many people. Did you think when your time came, you'd really have to do more than just ask? You've decided that the universe is better off without you, but the universe doesn't agree. I don't agree, mummy doesn't agree. You want to leave us behind?"
There was pain in his eyes as he looked at us both. "My Melody and Seraphina, no one can help me. A fixed point has been altered. Time is disintegrating. Once your mother is gone, Melly, it's you that will take her place."
"I can't let you die." I wept, not caring as long as he was safe. As long as my mum and dad lived.
"But I have to die, my Song."
I was getting sick of this, he just wasn't listening. "Shut up! I can't let you die without knowing you are loved by so many, and so much, and by no one more than us. I am your daughter, we're you're family, does that mean nothing?"
"Melody, you and I, we know what this means. We are ground zero of an explosion that will engulf all reality. Billions on billions will suffer and die."
"I'll suffer if I have to kill you. And so will mum, dad."
He sighed, shaking his head at the two of us. "More than every living thing in the universe?"
"Yes."
"River, River, why do you had have to be this? Melody Pond, my daughter. I hope you're proud, my Phi, she takes after you. Amy, uncuff me now. I need to properly meet my daughter for the first time, with my amazing wife whom I love as much as our daughter." Dad...
Mum sobbed a little, coming and standing between us, her eyes slowly healing slightly as I saw a flash of brown in her eyes, looking at him. "I have to say, I have never been prouder of our daughter, Doctor. Of our beautiful Melody, who we never got to raise, not properly."
"Oh my Seraphina." He smiled, kissing her forehead. "I never stopped being proud of her. I knew wherever she was, she would be brilliant. Because I loved her completely."
I shook my head at them, really starting to cry, and I knew that no matter what he was going to make me kill him. He was going to make me kill both of my parents. "Daddy, please. I love you both so much, and I don't want to do this, I can't!"
He shook his head, moving a little closer. "You don't have a choice. But like I said, Melody Donna Pond, you are always our daughter. Donna was our best friend. She gave her life to save all of creation, and we wanted you to be just as brave, to be selfless, and strong, and beautiful. And look at you. You're all of that and more, our Song. You are the most special girl in creation to us."
"I'm not. I won't be if you make me do this, Dad..." I told him, stepping back again. "To everyone I will have killed the best man in the universe, I will leave the Woman of Time dying with grief until one day she could take her own life! I don't want to lose you, you're my parents."
Mum came over and hugged me tight, whispering in my ear. "I'm sorry... I, I think you have to. But my name... the name the Universe gave me, like yours is Nitya, meaning Eternal. My name is Alenna. It means Infinity. No matter what, I will be with you. A heart for us both, my Melody. But I'm not going anywhere yet."
Then she pulled back and dad came towards me instead, not touching me yet. "Now River, I'm about to whisper something in your ear, and you have to remember it very, very carefully, and tell no one what I said, just like what I think your mother told you." He came forward, and whispered something to me, something very different to what mum had said. "I just told you my name." No you didn't. "Now, there you go, River Song. Our Melody Pond. You're our daughter, and you always will be. And wife, child, I have a request." He looked at us both as mum took my hand. "This world is dying and it's my fault, and I can't bear it another day. Please, help me. There isn't another way."
"Then this family meeting is over..." I whispered, moving closer as mum kissed him, thinking this would be the last time she ever could. Please... Please, just let her be safe. "I love you dad."
He smiled wrapping his arms around us both and kissed my hair. "And I love you, my amazing, wonderful daughter... And you are forgiven. Always and completely forgiven."
And then he was gone.
"Tick tock goes the clock, he gave all he could give. Tick tock goes the clock, now prison waits for River." I heard in my head, Time starting again and visions flooding back. Oh, mum...
DW
Oh, my mother... Tigger. Just because she was ginger and little and hyper all the time, it didn't mean she could save us all from Weeping Angels wearing a onesie. "Heard there was a freak meteor shower two miles away, so I got us a bottle." Aunt Amy told me, hearing me teleport in as she stared up into the night sky.
"Thank you, dear." I smiled, still in my uniform, sitting down next to her and taking my glass.
She didn't even look at me. "So where are we?"
"I just climbed out of the Byzantium. You were there. So young. Didn't have a clue who I was. You're funny like that. Sera was wearing that stupid onesie, her hair sticking up all over the place. Where are you?"
"Seraphina and the Doctor are dead." Oh... Oh no...
"How are you doing?"
"How do you think?"
That really didn't help, Ame's. "Well, I don't know unless you tell me."
"I watched my sister killed someone. Madame Kovarian, in cold blood. And I let her, knowing what she was going to do."
Oh, I remember that, its why mums hands were bloodstained. "In an aborted time line, in a world that never was."
"Yeah, but I can remember it, so it happened, so I did it. What does that make me now?" She asked softly, finally looking at me, her eyes still red rimmed. "I need to talk to Sera or the Doctor, but I can't now, can I?"
"If you could talk to him, would it make a difference?"
"But he's dead, so, so I can't. And Sera... Her body burned, Melody, when the Fall of Arcadia went up last week."
I laughed a tiny bit at that, though my mothers death and then the fire... I just wished I could have buried her. "Oh, Aunt Amy, of course dad isn't dead."
"Not for you, I suppose. You're seeing the younger versions of him and my sister running around, having adventures."
That was a good point. "Yeah, I am. But that's not what I mean."
Aunt Amy looked at me hard. "Then what do you mean?"
"Okay. I'm going to tell you what I probably shouldn't. The Doctor's last secret." I sighed, seeing her confused face. "Don't you want to know what he whispered in my ear? I can't tell you what mum did though."
"He whispered his name, like they're supposed to because you're their daughter, Mels."
"Not his name, no. Mum did, but not him."
She was really confused now. "Yes, it was. He said it was."
Simplest way to explain. "Rule One of the Doctor?"
"The Doctor lies. Even more than Sera if he has to."
I smiled. "So do I, all the time. Have to. Spoilers. Pretending I don't know you're my aunt, or Seraphina's my mother, pretending I don't recognise a space suit in Florida. Lying, it's the family trait."
"What did he whisper in your ear?"
"Oh, my daddy. He's always one step ahead of everyone. Always a plan." I laughed, shaking my head.
"River, what did he tell you? River." So I told her, and she hugged me, not all that tight, knowing that one of them was still dead, and then Uncle Rory got home.
"Hey. What?" He asked, coming into the back garden and looking at us.
"He's not dead." She smiled a little. "He's not dead."
His eyes widened. "Are you sure, River? Are you really, properly sure? Sera, what about Sera, please, please tell me she's not dead..."
Oh, my mum. "Uncle Rory... She didn't know. She didn't know he had a plan. Her hearts were still grieving losing me to the Silence. She really did die, but my dad is alive."
"I suppose... I suppose that it means she's not in pain, right?" He asked carefully. "That whatever was happening to her, the Demon side that even the Doctor was a little scared of, it can't get at her any more."
Nodding, I hugged him as Aunt Amy frowned. "Y, you're married to Jack... Oh my God... I'm his Aunt! Jack Harkness is my nephew!"
Oh, now this was going to get interesting. "Uncle Rory dear, I think Auntie Amelia might need another drink."
He was a little shell shocked himself. "Yes. Yes." Oh, wait till I told my husband...
The Doctor:
Trying to anonymously take Dorium back was really starting to annoy me. He wouldn't shut up! "Who's carrying me? I demand to know. I'm a head, I have rights. I want my doors open this time. I demand that my doors are open." Oh well then. I opened them, and then left, still bowed down, trying to keep the facade going. "Is it you? It is, isn't it. It is you, I can sense it. But how did you do it? How could you possibly have escaped?"
Well, I came up with the plan to hide inside the Teselecta, and when I whispered into my daughters ear, I told her to looking into the viewing platform, to show her that I was really going to be alright, and that I was safe.
Removing my cloak, I grinned at the blue basket ball that had become Dorium Maldovar. "The Teselecta. A Doctor in a Doctor suit. Time said I had to be on that beach, so I dressed for the occasion. Barely got singed in that boat."
"So you're going to do this? Let them all think you're dead?" He asked me, and I shrugged.
"It's the only way, then they can all forget me. I got too big, Dorium. Too noisy. Time to step back into the shadows." For a while, and then I was going to pick up my wife, hoping that she was back at her shop, or with Sarah Jane, or just somewhere that I could find her, and tell her that I was alive.
"And Doctor Song, in prison all her days?"
Oh, I didn't want to think about what she did during the night... "Her days, yes. Her nights? Well, that's between her and Captain Jack Harkness, eh? My bloody son in law."
"So many secrets, Doctor. I'll help you keep them, of course."
Not very hard there. "Well, you're not exactly going anywhere, are you?"
He pretended not to be insulted. "But you're a fool nonetheless. It's all still waiting for you. The fields of Trenzalore, the fall of the Eleventh, and the question."
"Goodbye, Dorium." I told him, walking back to the TARDIS.
"The first question. The question that must never be answered, hidden in plain sight. The question you've been running from all your life. Doctor who? Doctor who? Doctor Who." And they were never going to find out.