This is just a one-shot. And I'm not stopping with my other stories, I swear. But with finals all this month, I only have so much time. Time for one chapter, just one. And the change in topic and pace helps me focus.
So, I hope you like…
If I Should Die Before I Wake~
The sky was full of stars. A faint wind fluttered the overgrown grasses and bushes, syrupy and neither cold nor hot. It was somewhere between nine and ten in the evening—a fine, pristine, forgettable sort of evening. The kind that is like the breath of Heaven when it's there but is forgotten in a month's time, because silly humans only remember the very good and the very bad.
Most people living in Leadworth that night would forget it. It carried no weight for them.
But there were three people who would remember it forever, and carry it like a burden all that time.
The wind seemed to stop for a moment, but the grass still stirred. The hushed whisper of the wind changed to a wheezing, grinding, groaning noise—something so unique that should have sounded awful but was like music.
And the TARDIS landed in Brian William's back lawn.
There was silence.
Anyone watching might have thought that nobody had noticed the strange arrival, and that the box was empty.
They would have been wrong.
At the same moment, the back door of the William house and the door of the blue box swung outward. Light spilled from both, streaking across the grass and then colliding with each other, like two hands reaching to grasp each other.
In the house there stood a man. In the TARDIS, a man and a woman.
For a ridiculous moment, Brian felt the world tilt beneath his feet, sure he knew who the couple was. But the next second, he knew without a doubt that he had been wrong. Very wrong.
The three people just stared for a long time.
"Come along, then," Brian said finally, stepping back.
The man looked at the woman, who reached over and squeezed his hand reassuringly, and then she followed him out and across the grass. The light washed over them, illuminating a head of rambunctious honey-colored girls and a red bow-tie.
The Doctor paused on the threshold, teetering on his smooth-soled shoes, and opened his mouth as if to say something.
Brian gave him a stony look, and the other man slumped in defeat and continued walking into the house. Mr. Williams shot the woman a curious, wary glance. She looked directly at him, a strange little smile on her lips. There was something familiar about her blue-green eyes, the way she looked at him.
And then she, too, walked past him. She hovered next to the Doctor, who had his head hung low, his floppy, shiny brown hair drooping towards his face.
Brian huffed out in front of them and motioned for them to sit on the low sofa. He sat himself across from them in an armchair, dragging it closer to the coffee table between them for good measure.
For another long stretch of time, there was silence.
"Doctor," Brian said at last.
"Brian…" he said half-heartedly.
The strange woman whispered something in his ear and the Doctor nodded. "Brian, how long has it been, since…?"
"Since the birthday party?" Brian finished tightly. "Two months. Rory promised me he'd call every Wednesday and Saturday, just to…to catch up." His voice began to crack. "But I knew when he stopped calling six weeks ago…when he never called again…you wouldn't be gone that long on purpose."
The Doctor dropped his head into his hands.
The woman took over, brushing a ringlet away from her face. "Not on purpose, no. He wouldn't. He makes mistakes, sometimes—he dropped me on a desert planet and left me there for a week on accident; took Rose Tyler back home a year too late. Stuff like that."
"But it isn't a mistake this time, is it?" Brian asked. He could feel his face turning red, his eyes stinging. But there was, again, something about the woman's eyes that soothed him. Like…
"No," the Doctor answered, sitting up with obvious effort. Even Brian was taken aback—for a seemingly ageless lord of time, the Doctor looked as if he'd lived through several decades of hell since the last time he had met. Then he had looked melancholy, brooding. Now he looked ancient.
"No, Brian…I'm sorry."
"You lost them," Brian nodded, his voice oddly calm. His eyes were burning now. "You said you wouldn't. 'Not them, never them,' you told me."
"And you believed me," the Doctor said bitterly. "I shouldn't make promises. It's always the ones I promise that I destroy."
The tears began leaking down Brian's round, slowly aging face for real. "What happened to them?"
He didn't wait even a moment before yelling, "I want to know! What happened to Rory and Amy?"
The Doctor flinched violently and mouthed silently, trying to speak around the lump in his throat.
The woman looked torn between sympathy and irritation. She let out a long breath. "He thought he was ready to tell you. I thought it was right that he did. But I—it's too soon."
"Too soon?" Brian snarled through his tears. "I've waited two months, I've suspected for a month, I've known for almost a week now! Two months—two—"
His voice broke, and the woman picked up again. "I'm sorry. I really, truly am. But we've just…just come from there." The Doctor was shaking with silent sobs; Brian was crying, and now she was about to lose control as well.
"It's been…barely a day for us."
"You were there?" Brian asked her.
"Yes, I was there. I was right behind them when they—and then behind Amy when she said—"
The woman broke, just like the other two before her. Her eyes welled up with tears, which sparkled and then spilled over her cheeks. She dashed them away furiously, but they just kept coming, and now she was shaking, and the Doctor had sat up in alarm and wrapped an arm about her, pulling her to him.
She didn't resist the closeness like she might have. Flirting—she was queen. Teasing—they were about equal. But emotional closeness, like this…? That was hard to come by openly with their turbulent circumstances.
"Who are you?" Brian intoned softly.
His voice was gentle, though his hands were still gripping the sides of the armchair as if he was about to tear them off.
She took only moments to compose herself, a kind of strength showing through that made Brian a little sad. The Doctor looked upset and started to say something, but she had already pushed him away and taken a deep breath.
"Now, that's a very long story. It's tied in very closely with Amy and Rory's, though."
"Rory first," he said quickly. "No offense…but my son and daughter-in-law first. But I'd like your name for starts."
Instead of looking insulted, she managed a smile. "I like that. My name's…well, that's a long story, too, but for now you can call me River."
"All right, River," Brian said, pointedly ignoring the Doctor. "Tell me."
River inhaled. "I do some time travel on my own, so I wasn't there for the beginning. But not too long after Rory's party, the Doctor took Amy and Rory to New York, present time. They wanted a day in their world, but somewhere new and fun. They wandered around, saw some sights, and when Amy's feet got tired, they stopped in a park to read."
"A park," the Doctor muttered.
"They just enjoyed themselves…reading and talking…" River's eyes were wistful. "And then Rory went to get coffee. And he never came back."
Brian went from red to white in a second.
"But as the Doctor was reading his book, he suddenly found Rory there—he was a character in the book, and it said he'd been sent back in time to the 1930's. Same city—Manhattan—but evening in the 1930's. And miraculously, I was there too. We got arrested together—" River stifled a sound that was half-sob, half-laugh. "—he was pleased to see me, but upset and confused."
"How did he jump from 2012 to 1930-something?" Brian wondered.
"Have—have you ever heard of the Weeping Angels?" River asked hesitantly.
Brian shook his head; the Doctor intervened. "Scavengers," he said fiercely. "selfish, cruel, malicious crows. They look like angels, Brian, stone angels. Statues!" He gave a bitter laugh. "But they aren't. They are aliens. With the perfect defense. Soon as you look at them, soon as any intelligent being looks at them, they can't move. They freeze. And you can't kill a statue, can you?" he added, mocking his own words.
"Sweetie—" River attempted, but he ignored her.
"They touch you, Brian, when you aren't looking, they come behind you. They're faster than anything. And if they touch you, you get transported back in time. To live out the rest of your days in a different timeline and die before you are born."
Brian looked stricken.
"They feed off of it," River admitted to him. "They live off of 'potential energy.' The life you could have lived."
"And so Rory…?"
River shook her head. "It wasn't over. Even though it is nearly impossible, even though they risked themselves and all of New York city, Amy and the Doctor landed in New York, 1930, just in time to save me from a recovering Angel. She had me by the wrist, draining my life power to get up to strength—"
The Doctor stiffened a little.
"—and then send me back in time. But we were too late to save Rory. Another angel had touched him, sent him not in time, but space. To Winter Quay. We followed him, but we discovered it was the hive. The angels were trying to take over the world, and they had Manhattan."
River and Brian had locked gazes, one full of grief, the other full of fear. Brian was watching her, needing River to go on, but somehow not wanting to know.
"They would send people back in time and put them in a hotel. They would walk in and find a room with their name on it. And inside would be…them. Old. On their deathbed. And then the older version would die, and an angel would touch the younger one, sending them back in time further but to the same place. Sealing their fate."
Brian looked completely lost for a moment, brow furrowed. The tears were beginning to slow as he devoted his attention to understanding what had happened to Rory.
"So—so they would keep getting sent back and back, always there?" He asked. "So the version that died would be them one day, and right before they died, they'd see themselves?"
River looked appreciative. "Yes, sir."
"Don't call me sir," he said absently. "Call me Brian. But, go on please."
River looked at the Doctor, who nodded. "I'll take it from here, dear. Brian, we caught up with Rory just in time to meet the older version of himself. But there was no Amy. When I explained it to them, that his fate was sealed, Amy—well, you know her. She couldn't take that lying down."
There was a small laugh. The three people glanced at each other, not sure who had chuckled, not sure if they had laughed involuntarily. It didn't matter.
"She took Rory by the arm—" The Doctor's voice wavered, "—and they ran for it, right past the Angels, who were trying to turn the lights off so they could c-catch us i-in the dark…but River and I were trapped. Rory and A-Amy were on their own, and so were we, but somehow we ended up on the roof together. The Angels were c-coming, a-and…and…" The Doctor ran a hand across his face, his expression twisting with pain.
"And Rory was standing on the edge of the roof, and Amy was climbing up next to him. They hoped that if R-Rory died twice in the same place on the same night, the paradox would destroy the Angels…"
Brian was staring at the Doctor, horror struck. Sympathy, anger, and anguish were flickering in his blue eyes.
"…I—I asked them what they were doing—And Amy said—she said—"
"'It's called marriage,'" River quoted. "She was quoting something I had said."
"A-and they jumped. Dying twice on the same night in the same place...Rory hoped to cause a paradox and kill the angels. They jumped...Fell." The last word passed through the Doctor's lips like smoke. "I screamed and we ran towards the ledge, but River pulled be back. The paradox was working. Next thing we knew, we were all safe and sound in a cemetery, with the TARDIS. We were going to come home…and I went inside the TARDIS with River."
Here the Doctor stopped, and this time all three of them knew he wouldn't be able to speak anymore.
"I would ask if they were okay, but I know that something else must've happened," Brian commented woodenly.
River's reply was broken. "Yes." She glanced at her husband, who was bowed over again, head in his hands, fingers gripping into his silky hair so tightly that the knuckles were turning white.
"Rory called Amy back. He wanted her to look at something. We heard Amy scream and we ran out, and Rory was gone, and an Angel was facing Amy, just…smiling. The thing Rory had wanted her to see was a gravestone—a headstone with his name on it. He read it, just like we read about Rory in the book, and that made it irreversible. Rory was sent back to another time and died just a year or two ago."
Mr. Williams looked like a phantom. He was not crying, though.
"Amy w-wanted to go b-back and get him in th-the TARDIS, but the timezone was nearly unreachable, and already, it was set in s-stone. And so Amy said her goodbyes, to me, to the Doctor—and she turned her back on the Angel, so that none of us were looking at it, and then…she was gone."
"Gone," the Doctor whispered.
"Her name appeared on the headstone just below Rory's. It read, 'and his loving wife, Amelia Williams.'"
Now Brian was crying. He sank back in his chair, completely devoid of hope. He knew that the Doctor was the doer of wonderful things and the achiever of the impossible, and while at this moment he wanted to hate the Time Lord, he knew that the Doctor would not tell him that saving his son and daughter-in-law was impossible unless it really…really was.
"I'm so sorry," River told him, reaching out and resting a hand on his arm.
Brian blinked up at her, and was again caught by her eyes.
"You said your story was part of theirs," he said a little wistfully. "What is your story?"
River sighed. "Mr. Willi—Brian, do you—do you remember Rory and Amy's friend Mels?"
Brian looked bewildered through his tears. "Y-y-yes. Little spitfire, that one. Haven't seen her since…not to long after R-Rory and Amy's w-wedding…"
"She's me," River said simply. "I am Mels. Or I was."
Brian, to her appreciative respect, only nodded for her to go on, though she could tell he was stunned.
"You see, when I was a very small child—an infant a few weeks old—I was kidnapped and taken far away by the Doctor's enemies. They raised me to be—well, a psychopath. My mission in life was to kill the Doctor. But thanks to him, I escaped. I was alone in New York City, a very long time ago. Only a few years old, barely school-age. And I…regenerated into Mels."
"You're a Time Lord?" Brian asked.
"Almost so. I'll get to that. I was adopted by a nice enough family and befriended Amy and Rory. I was looking for someone, you see, besides the Doctor. And…well. One day, I finally met the Doctor with the Ponds. I hijacked the TARDIS and we went off to kill Hitler—"
Brian could not restrain a disbelieving, gasping chuckle.
"—and I killed the Doctor. Or I nearly did. Long story. Anyways, I regenerated again, because…bloody Hitler shot me. And now I'm me. But not too long before that time—for Amy and Rory—something very wonderful and terrible had happened. Amy got pregnant."
A look of utter grief passed over Brian's face. "She was pregnant when she-?"
"No. We had a few adventures, during which, Amy was abducted and replaced with an avatar her that wasn't pregnant. Rory just thought she had been wrong about the pregnancy, but the Doctor knew better. When he knew for sure what had happened, he destroyed the fake Amy."
Brian was trying to catch up, so River paused to let him think it through before continuing.
"The fake Amy really thought she was Amy—she had a psychic link with her, so while the real Amy was—was being held captive…and…tested on—"
Brian flinched; the Doctor gripped his head even more tightly.
"—the fake was acting, talking, thinking, and being Amy. Rory and the Doctor went after Amy. Practically tore apart the universe for her, and almost started a war to save her. But, they saved her…but not the baby. The baby girl, Melody Williams, or Melody Pond as they called her, was taken back in time and conditioned to be a psychopath. The Woman who Killed the Doctor."
River looked directly into Brian's eyes when she said this, and watched with a terrible sort of terror in her chest as he realized what that meant.
A look of awe dawned in his face. "You," he breathed. "You were the baby. Melody Williams."
"My parents preferred Melody Pond, or the name the people of the Forest gave me, River Song."
"You're Rory's daughter. Amy's baby," he continued. "You're—blimey, you're my granddaughter."
"…Yes." River admitted.
She had told the truth. She was raised to be a crazy, sociopathic, psychotic assassin. She wasn't supposed to want her family, or love her target (much less marry him), or want to get to know Brian Williams. But she did. She had done it all.
And so the fear in her chest grew and grew and grew until she couldn't breathe anymore, and she was sure she was going to collapse—
-and then Brian pulled her into a tight embrace, half-laughing and half-crying onto her shoulder. River hesitated and then hugged him back, reveling in the embrace that was like a father's. Sure, Rory had hugged her. Held her close once or twice, pecked her on the forehead, smiled at her with pride. But the age difference and the terrible rent in her childhood had spoiled things. This was more what she thought a father's embrace would feel like.
Before she knew it, she was crying on his shoulder, too.
There was a quiet thunk, and the two pulled apart. The Doctor had left, snuck out while they were embracing.
Outside, the TARDIS whirred to life and faded away.
River looked stricken, wounded, but Brian reached out a hand and laid it on her arm. "He'll be back. And if he's gone for too long, I really will punch him this time round."
River huddled on the couch, still flooded with affection for Brian, but feeling hurt that the Doctor had left her here alone.
He had said he wanted to travel with her. Apparently not.
Was the running off for real this time? Was he finished with her—was this how their story ended? Maybe one day she'd bump into him again, ages and ages from now, and it would be the version that didn't know her. And she'd probably die of grief…
Brian shoved something in front of her. Something that smelt wonderful and steamed on her face softly.
"Tea," he announced. "Best thing for us both, right now. I suppose. And if you feel up to it, you can tell me more about yourself."
River took a long sip of the hot tea and relaxed instantly, to her own surprise. She gave Brian a feeble smile.
"What am I supposed to ask my granddaughter?" Brian wondered lightly. "I've never done this before, gimme a mo'. Oh! There we go—extremely pretty time-traveller—you got any boys after you that I should be keeping an eye on?"
And to both of their own astonishment, they both went into peels of quiet laughter. River watched the man, with his round belly and rosy cheeks, thinning and graying red hair, and merry blue eyes. He had a big belly laugh.
She clutched her mug and smiled. "Actually, I'm married."
"Married?" he demanded. "To who?"
The smile on her face faltered. "To—the Doctor."
Brian could not hide the flash of fury behind his eyes, but River got the sense that this time he was more mad about the fact that her husband had apparently deserted her than anything else.
"Well, not a bad choice. Look's like a twelve-year-old, though. And that bow tie—"
They started to laugh once more.
Some time later, when Brian had made her a comfortable little bed on the couch and gone up to his room, River thought that that was how her parents would have wanted it. For them to laugh. Amy and Rory had not exactly 'died.' They were unreachable, they were gone from them, but they had lived out a good life.
They would have liked to see Brian and Melody laughing over tea that utterly forgettable Leadworth night.