God From The Machine

When Rory Williams was thirteen, a girl who lived down the road from him was murdered. This was the first terrible crime to take place in Leadworth in living memory, and it cast a dark, cold cloud over the village for a long long time.

Amy had been twelve at the time. Her aunt, eager that Amy shouldn't be exposed to anything that would lead to yet another psychologist, kept her indoors for a few days while it all died down. She even went as far as to pull her out of school. But one night Rory had seen the light on in her window, seen her looking out, and decided he would reach her.

He climbed a tree. He fell off. So he climbed it again and tapped on her bedroom window.

Amy let him in and said, "Someone's been murdered, haven't they? Aunt Sharon turned the TV off, but I turned it back on and saw it."

"Yeah. Yeah, someone died. But they caught the man who did it."

Amy said, "Why didn't the Doctor come and stop it?"

Rory had no answer.

"Why didn't he?" she snapped.

And this vague fragment of conversation came into Rory's head, something his father had muttered once, listening to that girl talking about her imaginary friend, it's like listening to her talk about God sometimes.

That weirded him out.

"I think he would have wanted to. But he can't be everywhere every time something goes wrong, Amy, he's not magic."

"He should have been there," she said. And that was that. Amy Pond's first crisis of faith.

The girl who had been murdered was called Maria Myers and nine years later (after everything about the Doctor had been proven true) Rory saw her sister, who had been just a baby at the time of the killing, standing in the middle of the pathway. Not moving. Just standing there. Her name was Sasha, she was ten, and Rory had only ever exchanged a few words with her.

He wondered what had made her stand like that. Grief? Was it nearly the anniversary of the murder? He moved forward.

"Sasha? Are you okay?"

And just like that she seemed to wake up.

"What? Oh. Hi," she said to Rory, and walked away.

Rory stared after her, and then he went down to the the hospital.

When he got back to his place, still in his scrubs, Amy was there. She had a spare key, and had let herself in, and was watching the television.

"I have a stag party this evening," she said. "Sexy nun, sexy catgirl or sexy nurse?"

"Um."

"There's already a sexy nurse here, so I suppose it'll have to be the catgirl. I need to find my tail."

"It's in the wardrobe," he said. "Thanks for saying I'm sexy," he added, as Amy headed upstairs to the wardrobe.

"S'alright," she called back.

Rory sat down on the sofa, found the remote, and changed channels. He flipped to the news, and then he stared, and then he sat upright, and then he felt a cold feeling of dread.

"Amy," he called, "come and see this."

Amy recognized his freaked-out tone and came running, tail in hand.

They watched, side by side, at what was going on.

"Sasha Myers," Rory said.

"What?"

"That little girl, the one who...you remember, her sister? I saw her today just standing there."

"Oh. I've missed all this," she said, "I've been here all day. Rory, what..."

"We are coming!" said the voice from the television.

"...do you think he..."

Rory knew who he was. In their lives there was only ever one he.

"I don't know, Amy."

"We are coming!"

"He has to come! This is big and scary and it shouldn't happen."

"We are coming!"

"Turn it off," Rory said, and Amy did.

They looked at each other. Silence fell.

"He'll come," Rory found himself saying. "I'm sure he will."

But he didn't.

The next day Rory went to work, but was sent home again almost immediately. He was a nurse, and what they needed was a doctor. The children in the wards looked afraid. And the adults did too.

Amy kept the television on, and Rory tried not to watch it. Eventually he went to his room (which was now shared with Amy) and crawled under the covers, like a little kid. Not long after Amy came and touched his shoulder.

"They're coming tomorrow," she said. "That's what the TV said. What the kids said."

Rory stood up and went to the phone on the landing.

"I'm calling Julia," he said.

"Will she be there?"

Rory called his stepsister's number, and and she picked up almost on the first ring.

"Julia," he said, "it's me, Rory."

"It's happened to Carla and Vanessa," she said. "It. You know." She sounded tired.

"Right," Rory said. "I figured. I called yesterday night, you weren't there."

"We've been in the hospital."

"Oh, right."

Julia gave a sigh. A long sigh. "The hospital was overflowing."

"Yeah."

"The hospital where you work, what's that like?"

"The same."

Another sigh.

Rory realised how little he and Julia talked. She lived half an hour's drive away, and she was a single mum with little time to spare, and although their parents had married they had simply never been close.

"Julia," he said, "keep them safe, ok?"

The next day, all of the children were pointing towards London. And a beam of light had fallen into Earth. And a hush had fallen over Leadworth.

"We should go to London," Amy said.

"No," Rory said. "It's too full of people, everyone's either going there or leaving there. We can't, Amy, please."

Amy scowled. Rory felt, not for the first time, that he was being compared to the Doctor. He was resigned to this by now, and just put his head in his hands and sighed.

"I'm not comparing you to him!" Amy suddenly yelled. "I know you can't do anything!"

She didn't mean it like that, Rory knew, but he couldn't help but go upstairs and slump on the bed, alone. Without even really realising it, he reached out a hand to the bedside table and opened it, and took out a small box.

Inside the box was a ring. He'd bought it several weeks ago, spent ages picking out the best one. One day, when everything was right, when the world was sane again, he'd propose.

Amy hadn't guessed.

But Amy might not care.

In the morning, after a long, long night of silence, they ventured out. There were no children on the streets. In fact, there wasn't anybody.

They made their way to the abandoned playpark and sat on the swings, a pair of kids at the end of the world. Leadworth was even more quiet than usual, and Rory found himself saying, to break the silence:

"What if it was our kid, Amy?"

Amy looked at him. Rory tried to read that look and couldn't.

"What d'ya mean?" she said.

"If it was...if we...had a kid. And it was in danger like all the others. What would we do?"

For several seconds Rory didn't think she would answer, but finally she said,

"I don't want kids."

"Why not?"

"Because people round here would call me an unfit mother, and I probably would be. I'd be crap." And then she suddenly climbed off the swing and said, "We've got to do something, Rory! Bad things are happening, we can't just stand by and let them!"

"What can we do, Amy? Tell me and I'll do it."

But it was clear she had no idea. She looked at the ground and in the voice of a small girl she said, "We can't go to London now, they're not letting anyone in."

"I know."

"Why isn't he here, Rory? We need him."

"I know."

"I need him."

"I...know."

"Stop saying that you know!" she snapped.

From one of the houses...from all of the houses...there came voices. Both of them stopped dead, looked at each other, and listened.

"It's them," Amy said. "It's the children."

"They're saying numbers," Rory whispered.

Because the place was so quiet they could hear them quite clearly: 3, 5, 2, 0, 0, 0.

"What does it mean?" Amy said.

"I don't know. Let's get back, turn on the TV..."

"I don't want to turn on the TV! I don't want to be stuck here! I have to help, we need to help!"

Rory grabbed her by the shoulders and tried to think of something, anything, that would help them in their situation.

"Amy, remember...that one time ages back, when Maria Myers was killed by that nutter? Remember he went on the run, very briefly, and Maria's mum went on TV and said if anyone was thinking of looking for the guy and taking matters into their own hands, don't do it because they don't want more deaths? Remember that?"

"I think so, yeah."

"Well, we have to follow that advice, okay? Suppose the Doctor comes back and you're dead!"

The thought of this seemed to bring Amy to her senses. "Okay," she said. "Okay. Yeah, that's bad."

3, 5, 2, 0, 0, 0, came the chants.

They ran home.

"The govenment has yet to give a reason why the children have stated a number that is equal to ten percent of the child population of each country."

Amy suddenly gave a little roar of rage and turned the television off. Rory didn't know what to do or what to say, and he found himself hugging her. And her hugging back.

"You don't think they're..." he said.

"I think they are," she answered.

It was all so crazy Rory felt like laughing. But he couldn't. Instead, in a voice torn between crying and giggling, he said, "You know, if the Doctor sees this, he's not ever coming back."

Almost instantly he wanted to take the words back, but it was too late. He expected Amy to be angry, maybe even to slap him (something she'd never done before) but she didn't. She just said:

"Yep."

Which was sort of the worst thing of all.

That night, when the sun was slowly rising, someone knocked on the door.

Amy jumped up like a shot, and everything on her face changed. It was glowing with hope. She raced to the door and flung it open-

-but a woman was standing there.

"Mrs Myers," Amy said, her face fallen.

Mrs Myers didn't speak to Amy, but to Rory instead.

"Mr Williams, you're a nurse, aren't you?"

"Yeah," said Rory.

"I need help," she said, and it was clear she had been crying. "Everyone at the hospital is busy, obviously, but I don't know what to do with Sasha. She's scared! I'm scared! And I don't know what to do."

"OK, Mrs Myers. But...I'm not sure I can help."

"You were the only person I could think of coming to," she said, tears on her face. "Do something, please! Inject her, calm her down, I don't know."

"I'll help you," Rory said, knowing he probably would fail to. He stepped forward, and then Amy suddenly pushed her way in front of him and faced Mrs Myers.

"The Doctor will come," she said. "I've seen him. I know him. And I know what he can do."

Mrs Myers just looked at her, "Yes, you keep believing that, dear," she said. "Come on, Mr Williams, please."

So Rory and the woman ran through the village, and Rory eventually managed to say, "I've met the Doctor too."

Mrs Myers looked at him. It was a look Rory had never seen anybody turn on him before and it terrified him.

"There's aliens in London," she whispered, "and monsters have taken our children. I'll believe anything right now but no-one's going to save us."

"Yes they are," Rory said, but his uncertainity showed in his voice.

They approached the Myers' house. Leaning against the wall, Rory noticed, was a bike. It was the bike Maria Myers had been riding when she was murdered, and it had featured in the TV reports. And now here it was, alone and untouched for years, and the night seemed so dark.

They entered the house, and all that could be heard was a young child crying.

"My husband left a year ago," Mrs Myers said. "It's just us now."

Rory didn't answer, but he climbed the stairs, and knocked on the door marked Sasha's Room.

"Sasha?" he called. "I'm a nurse, I've come to help."

When Mrs Myers nodded, Rory opened the door and went in. Sasha was sitting on her bed, and a small TV on the floor was blaring out the news. More children. More fear. More government officals saying that it would be all right and clearly lying.

"Hey, hey," he said to Sasha, "you don't want to be watching that, it'll scare you." He switched it off.

"Turn it on," Sasha said, "Please turn it on!"

Rory uncertainly moved away from the television, knelt next to Sasha and then said, "Don't be afraid."

"I was talking," she said. "I didn't know what was happening. It's like something's got hold of me! I don't know what to do."

Nobody did, Rory thought.

"It'll be all right," he said. But he didn't believe it.

"The people on the TV said that ten percent of children are being..." She couldn't finish.

Rory wished Sasha wasn't such a clever child. "Sasha, nothing's going to happen to you, I swear. Nothing's going to happen to any of us."

Sasha reached forward and turned on the television. Rory didn't want to fight, so he just let her.

"...urge all of you to send children back to their classes straight away," the Prime Minister was saying. "Government representatives will be visiting certain schools to discuss a series of inoculations."

"Oh no," said Mrs Myers. She was standing in the doorway.

"These inoculations are to protect your children. These inoculations are safe. These inoculations will guarantee no repeat of the problems of the past four days."

Even the ten-year-old could tell from his voice that something wasn't right.

"Mummy," said Sasha, "I don't want to go to school."

"You won't, darling."

Mrs Myers called Rory outside.

"You're thinking what I'm thinking."

"The children named ten percent of each country," Rory whispered, so Sasha couldn't hear. "The government will want to...I mean..."

"They're going to give away the children," Mrs Myers said.

Rory's mind fought against it. It was just...utterly inconcieveable. All he could come up with was, "Maybe...I...I don't want to think..."

"Then think," Mrs Myers said. And Rory did. And all the evil humanity was capable of crashed into his head and all he could remember was some man, some perfectly sane man according to the newspapers, who had one day snapped and killed a little girl because she was just there and Rory hadn't stopped it and the Doctor hadn't stopped it and no-one had stopped it.

"Oh God," he found himself saying.

Mrs Myers turned away and said, "Amelia's Raggedy Doctor."

"Amy."

"What?"

"She's Amy now."

"Fine, okay, Amy's Doctor. I think she made him up. I think she's a disturbed girl who lost her parents and invented a imaginary friend."

"Hey-"

"But I've lost one child and I can't lose another one. We can't handle this alone." She paused. "Sasha likes action movies. Superhero movies. Where the person with magic powers ends up saving everyone. We're the everyone now. I always told Sasha...and I told Maria, when she was little...that movies were just modern-day fairytales and they shouldn't be believed. But now we need the person with magic powers. Someone has to save us because we can't do it alone. Please, Rory, you and Amy have to do something. If you can."

Rory didn't know what to say. He waited. The world waited. The TV blared.

"I'll try," he said.

When he got back it was nearly morning and Amy was lying asleep on the sofa, the TV turned off. Rory looked at her. And then he went upstairs and retrieved the ring from the drawer.

He went downstairs and knelt by the sofa, looking straight at Amy, and said,

"Amy. Will you marry me?"

He thought she'd wake up at those words, but she didn't. Rory was glad. He knew why he'd done it when she was asleep.

But a part of him cursed himself for being so cowardly, and he took a deep breath and prepared himself to do what he thought might be the most important thing he ever did.

"Amy! Amy, wake up?"

She opened her eyes. "Uuuuh?"

"Amy! Marry me?"

"What?"

And then her eyes closed again. Rory cursed himself again, prepared to wake her up again, but then she suddenly awoke and said,

"The Doctor."

Rory felt something in his heart crack. "What?"

"Did he come, Rory, did he fix anything?"

"No. He didn't."

Amy pulled herself up. She reached for the remote and turned the television on. Rory sat down next to her, the ring in his pocket, sad and disappointed and angry and trying desperately not to show it.

They watched the news for a bit.

"They're sending the children to school," Amy said.

"How can the parents not know?" Rory whispered.

"Anyone who stays home..." Amy said quietly. "they'll find them, won't they? They'll drag them out and hand them over."

Rory and Amy looked at each other.

And then they both stood up.

And left.

Leadworth had one school. It was a nice place, flowers outside and a big playground at the back. Amy and Rory stopped and looked at it. Through the windows they could see children at their lessons.

"It's not happening here," said Amy. "It's not happening here, this place is too nice, if you want to get rid of ten percent of kids you kill the bad ones, the bad schools..."

"Right," Rory said, and then something hit him.

"Carla and Vanessa," he said.

"What? Julia's kids?" Amy's voice suddenly took on a ring of horror. "You think they..."

"Julia lives in a rough area, she's a single mum..."

"Oh God," Amy said.

"We need a car," said Rory. He cast a glance round, and then realised he was about to steal a car. Something he had never done and had never planned on doing. "Amy?"

Amy glanced around, and tried the door of the nearest one. When it didn't open she picked up a stone from the ground, smashed the window, and opened the door from the inside. "Come on!" she shouted.

When Rory climbed in Amy was hotwiring the car.

"You know how to hotwire a car?"

"Yeah," she said, as if it was the most normal thing in the world.

A few minutes later they were on their way.

They reached the village in twenty minutes, Amy driving like a maniac all the way. They drew to a halt outside the local school, and found their worst horrors realised, because there was a van there and children being loaded into it. Rory looked and couldn't see Carla or Vanessa anywhere, but even that thought was sort of lost in the chaos and the panic.

"People are screaming," Amy said, "We have to help them."

They both stepped out of the car. No-one noticed them. Amy lifted her head to the sky and screamed,

"DOCTOR!"

And nothing happened.

One of the guards detached himself from the crowd and ran towards Amy and Rory. He was holding a gun and screaming, and then he pointed the gun at them and Rory knew what was most likely going to happen. He pushed Amy to the ground, shielding her.

"Amy!" he said. "It's ok, Amy-"

He was about to declare his love for her (it wouldn't have saved them but it would have helped) when suddenly a noise broke the air. The man with the gun stopped, everyone else stopped, and Rory and Amy looked up to see it was the children, all the children, making the sound.

For what seemed like several minutes but probably wasn't, the awful noise went on. Then it stopped, and Rory and Amy looked up. Chaos still reigned, parents were running to their children, and phones and radios were going off.

The soldier who had threatened them had turned away. Nervously, still afraid, Rory and Amy stood up. They watched for a good few minutes, and bit by bit the confusion was sorted out and crying parents started to leave with their crying children. No-one was taken away.

Slowly the world got quieter.

"Is it over?" Amy whispered.

"I don't know," Rory answered. He could see Julia in the distance, clutching her two girls to her. He turned away. He'd call her later.

They helped each other back to the car. Both of them were exhausted, physically and mentally, and as soon as Amy sat down she turned the radio on. They listened for a while.

"It really is over," Rory said, in wonderment.

Amy said what both of them were thinking. "Did the Doctor do it?"

"I don't know." Rory answered. "It was a bit of a...I don't know...a..."

"A deux ex machina?"

"Whatever that is, that's what it was."

Amy was silent.

"Let's go home," she finally said.

They never answered the question of whether the Doctor had done it or not.

Two weeks later they both sat on Amy's bed, in her room, their backs to the crack in the wall. The stolen car had been returned and its vandalism paid for, Julia had gone on holiday to Spain with the kids, the world seemed quiet again but still poised on the brink.

"People say," Rory said, "that something called Torchwood was involved."

"I've never heard of them."

"Me neither."

They sat there in silence. For quite a while.

"People have died," Amy finally said. "Lots of people."

"Yes."

A pause.

"That night after Maria Myers was killed," Amy said. "You came to my window. You told me the Doctor wasn't magic, that was why he wasn't there, why he didn't save her."

"Yeah. I remember that."

Outside there were some children in the playground. Rory could hear Sasha laughing.

"You know," Amy said, "I think I don't believe in magic."

"No?" Rory said, as his world, centered as it was around Amy, rearranged itself just a little bit.

"No."

The crack behind them opened. Not much, but enough.

"All those kids," Rory found himself saying, "What will they grow up believing in?"

Two tendrills of white light drifted from the crack in the wall and wrapped around both heads, digging deep into their brains. And the memory was gone.

Amy blinked.

"What were we talking about?"

"Um...I can't remember. Wait...kids. We were talking about kids."

Amy laughed. "Our kids!"

"No, not our kids."

"Good, cos I don't think that'll ever happen." At Rory's crestfallen look she added, "No, not because of that! Because...I'm not ready, and I dunno if I'll ever be."

"Oh, okay."

They sat there, oblivious to what had happened, but it wasn't quite over and it wasn't quite gone.

Amy said, "I was asleep..."

"Yeah?"

"And you knelt down and you asked me to marry you."

For one split second Rory had no recollection of that, but then in came back to him in a rush. "Yes!" he said, louder than he'd intended. "I asked. But you were asleep."

"And you didn't ask again? You numpty!"

Rory wasn't sure how to react, so he said, "So...you remember that? Even though you were asleep?"

"I was only half asleep. Yeah, I remember it!"

Something seemed to not make sense. But something else did. "Um. Amy."

"Do it properly."

Rory fumbled in his pocket and found the ring.

"Amy, will you marry me?"

"Yeah," she said. "I will."

And even though that was an end to a long and horrible tragedy, one now forgotten by two people who should really have remembered it, that was magical in a way.