A/N: So, this is a...thing. That I am writing. That I'm pretty excited about. We'll see how it goes. This is my current NaNoWriMo project, so I can at least hope to promise regular updates - aiming for Monday and Thursday uploads at the moment. Hope you enjoy!

Disclaimer: Not mine, as ever.

"Dear Santa. Thank for the dolls and the pencils, and the fish. It's…Easter now, so I hope I didn't wake you, but, honest, it is an emergency."

The house is silent. Amelia can hear the tick of her bedroom clock, the drip of the tap in the bathroom down the hall, the faint hum of the fridge downstairs. And, at the edge of what she knows she can really hear – the whisper of something Else.

"There's…a crack in my wall," she says, pressing her palms more firmly together. "Aunt Sharon says it's just an ordinary crack, but – I know it's not, because sometimes, at night, there's – voices."

She pauses. There it is again, an echo of a long-forgotten dream.

You know when grown-ups tell you everything's going to be fine, and you think, they're probably lying to make you feel better?

She frowns, shakes her head; the sound disappears as if she's shaken it out of her ear like a few drops of water. The thought of it doesn't go away, though. "So, please, please send someone to fix it," she whispers. "Or a police-man, or…"

There's a knock at the door.

There's never a knock at the door; not this late, not when it's gone her bedtime, not when Aunt Sharon isn't home. Amelia remains frozen for only a moment, still kneeling by her bed. Then curiosity takes hold.

"Back in a moment."

It's the work of a moment to find her slippers, her cardigan; on a whim, she picks up her torch as well, just in case she has to go outside or the person at the door isn't nice and she has to run away. Whatever her reasons, it doesn't matter. Amelia Pond is a practical sort of person, and a torch just seems like a good thing to have with you in case of…in case of anything, really.

She pads downstairs quickly, pausing only for a moment to take in the obscured outlines of people – two of them – outside her door through the frosted glass. There's a lump of fear sitting in her throat, cold and sharp, but there's excitement too.

Amelia opens the door.

"Hello, I'm the Doctor and this is Rose. Can we come in?"

She just stares at them for a minute, taking them in. The tall man with the funny hair and the blue suit, and the grown-up lady who's a lot shorter than him but smiles just as much. Amelia likes them already – or wants to, anyway, and that's almost the same thing. Still, letting them in is, she knows instinctively Not What You Should Do. It's one of those Things That Are Dangerous they tell you about in school assemblies and on TV. It's a Dangerous Thing.

"Who are you?" she asks instead, holding onto the edge of the front door and curling her fingers more securely around her torch with the other hand.

"I'm the Doctor," the man – the Doctor, he said – says. "And this is Rose." He points, rather unnecessarily Amelia thinks, to the lady beside him.

"Yeah," Amelia says, rolling her eyes a little. "You said that. Why did you knock on my door?"

"Uh—" The Doctor shifts from one foot to the other. "Is your mum or dad there?"

"Haven't got a mum or dad," Amelia says automatically. "Just an Aunt."

She sees something like pity flicker through both their faces, and hates it. Hates that she knows what pity looks like. She's seven.

"I haven't even got an aunt," the Doctor says, grinning widely at Amelia.

"You're lucky," she says, smiling a little in response. Maybe he's okay.

"I know," he nods wisely, and she can't help it – she likes him.

"So this aunt," the grown-up woman says, then, nudging the Doctor until he seems to remember what they were here to do. "Where is she?"

"She's out," Amelia says, shrugging.

"Left you on your own, did she?" The woman – Rose, the Doctor said her name was Rose – asks, frowning.

"Not scared," Amelia scoffs, and it's honestly true. She's used to being on her own.

"Course you're not," Rose nods, but it's perfunctory – she's peering past Amelia, up into the big, empty house. Amelia squares her shoulders, lifts her chin. Defiance bristles through her. Rose, perhaps sensing this, relaxes a little and stoops to look her properly in the eye. "We'd really like to come in, then, if that's okay."

"Are you…" Amelia fumbles for the words; she doesn't know what she is supposed to ask. "Who are you?"

Rose and the Doctor exchange a quick glance, and seem to form some unspoken agreement; then they both get out their wallets, and show Amelia two official-looking cards with small writing and grainy photos. They're even worse than the ones she got done at school; still, at least these are actually printed out and kept safe. Aunt Sharon forgot to send the form back, or even fill it out with an order for prints and frames and key-chains and magnets. Amelia tried not to mind.

"We're from Torchwood," Rose says, tearing Amelia out of her spiral of thoughts; the word sounds like it should be important, and she doesn't miss the way the Doctor winces at it. "We're here to….well, we don't know, but we think we can help."

Oh.

Oh.

"Are you –" Amelia trips over the words in her excitement; hope has rushed through her like wildfire, and thank you, Santa. "Did you come about the crack in my bedroom wall?"

She doesn't miss the way the Doctor reacts to that, either. It's like a switch has been flipped inside him; suddenly he's all alert, crouching down to look her right in the eye, his eyes sparkling with something new, but also…familiar, and Amelia doesn't know why or how that could be.

"That sounds about right," he says, giving her a long, appraising look. "Want to tell us all about it?"

The Doctor wastes no time on niceties; as soon as Amelia opens the door to her bedroom, he strides in past her, clocks the crack in the wall, and presses his ear to it. Amelia stares as he runs his fingers along the ridges in the paint, the places where the wallpaper is curling and fraying, the brickwork underneath showing through and the crack still running through it.

"Feels like a…" he frowns. "Rift, or – something, I'm not—"

Rose takes a sharp breath in. "Rift?" she asks, and Amelia doesn't know why, but the word sounds terrifying when said like that, all high and scared and sort of angry all at once.

The Doctor looks up, quickly shakes his head. "Not like that," he says. "I think. More like… Two parts of space and time that should never have touched, pressed…together."

"So, it's like…like the spaceship," Rose nods, and Amelia thinks she must have misheard her. "The fireplaces. Reinette. Yeah?"

He nods. Shakes his head. Nods again. Then shrugs. "Sort of." He turns to Amelia. "Sometimes, can you hear -?"

"A voice," she nods. "Yeah."

The Doctor stands there for a few seconds longer, obviously straining to hear – then he casts about for a moment before picking up her water glass and emptying it rashly all over the floor; Amelia stares, Rose rolls her eyes, and both of them can only watch as he presses the glass to the wall and listens, hard.

Amelia doesn't need the glass; she's been listening for a while, now.

The Doctor frowns. "Would…have had?"

"The times we had," Amelia nods, reciting from memory. "Would have had, should have had. He says that one a lot."

"He?" Rose asks quickly, carefully.

"I don't know," Amelia admits. "It sounds like a he. But it's just a whisper. It might not be anyone."

"It's…." the Doctor is still standing there, staring at the wall, looking beyond baffled. "But that's…"

"Doctor?" Rose takes a step forward, confident. "What is it, what did you hear?"

"But that's not possible –" he sounds positively outraged. "It can't be!"

"What can't be?"

He points accusingly at the wall. "That," he says, helpfully. "That's impossible."

"Okay…" Rose says slowly, and Amelia thinks she would have started shouting at him for being useless by now, or at least stamped her foot. "So what do we do?"

"We –" the Doctor hesitates. Looks at Amelia, for a moment, obviously curious about her. Then his eyes snap to Rose, and there's something there, something even Amelia can recognise and she's known them for all of ten minutes, and she's seven. Something that makes up his mind for him. "We close it. Force it all the way open, make it snap back on itself."

"Will that work?" Rose asks, and the Doctor just grins, sort of manically.

"In theory? Absolutely."

"Is—" Amelia is surprised to hear how small her voice comes out, and consciously squares her shoulders, because she isn't scared. "Is it safe?"

The Doctor gives her what is clearly supposed to be a reassuring smile. "You know when grown-ups tell you that everything is going to be fine, and you think that they're probably just saying that to make you feel better?"

Amelia stares at him, for a moment completely transfixed. That sounds familiar, and she doesn't know why. Or at least, she doesn't know how it could. That's…something the whisper has said, or something very close to it. And if the Doctor is saying something that the whisper said, then –

"Everything's gonna be fine," Rose says with a lilting smile, reaching out and holding her hand. "Promise."

Amelia looks up at her. "Yeah?"

The Doctor waits just long enough to get a nod from Rose, then jumps into action; he steps back from the wall slightly, and produces from his suit pocket a strange device, unlike anything Amelia's ever seen before. It's silver and shaped sort of like a pen, but when the Doctor presses a button on its side it flashes blue and makes a low sort of…wobbling noise. The Doctor points this device, blue light first, at the wall; for a moment, nothing happens, and he looks utterly ridiculous.

And then the crack opens wide, and Amelia can do nothing but grip Rose's hand so tightly she can feel her own pulse beating back at her through her fingertips.

Stars.

There are stars in her bedroom wall. Darkness, too, black and endless and glowing with green-yellow-blue-milky lights, peppered with the shining pinpricks of starlight… Amelia feels a breeze, like the universe is sighing; the wind on her face comes from a different world.

"Wow," Rose breathes next to her, and Amelia can only nod. The Doctor is still pointing that device at the crack, now burst open wide and spilling the stars across her bedroom wall. His face is set, determined; Amelia thinks he looks worried, almost panicked, which is impossible – how could anyone panic, when there are stars?

Then the crack begins to wobble at the edges – there is a faint hissing sound – it starts closing, the wall returning to paint and wallpaper and brick, the stars shrinking out of sight.

There's an echo of a whisper, carried on the wind from that far-off world – I don't belong here anymore…

"No—" Amelia has barely enough to step forwards and tug at the Doctor's arm slightly. "No –"

The crack is closing. For a moment, it stands out, that first sinister smiling shape, bright white against the pale wallpaper, and Amelia lunges forward to run her fingers over the familiar line. Then its gone, and her wall is…just a wall.

Bye bye, Pond.

"No," she whispers again, too confused to say anything. "No, why did you do that?"

The Doctor just gives her an odd look. "The universe pouring through a crack in your bedroom wall, and I close it up so you can be safe, and you ask, why?"

"There were stars," Amelia says, folding her arms, too upset to meet his eye; she thinks she hears him puff out a long breath of air.

"Okay," Rose says after a short pause, coming over and nudging Amelia lightly before crouching down to wrap her in a gentle hug. "It's okay. You're okay.

"Of course I'm okay—"Amelia wants to stamp her foot in frustration. "There were stars!"

She thinks she sees Rose bite back a smile. "I know, yeah. Pretty special."

"Stars," Amelia says again, blinking back tears. "And you made them go away."

She doesn't talk about the voice; the voice that talked to her, the voice that said goodbye… It's too much.

"The crack wasn't just a…crack," the Doctor says cautiously, fixing her with an appraising stare, as if calculating how much he could tell her. "Take away the wall and the crack would have still been there. It was a crack in the whole universe, opening up to…"

"To?" Amelia demands, still sceptical. She's not sure she likes this Doctor, this mad man who strolled into her bedroom and made the stars go away.

"I'm not sure," he admits then, looking deject. "Another universe, I think."

"Another—" Rose's voice is suddenly higher, louder; Amelia's beginning to recognise something in that specific tone of voice. Grudging hope, maybe, but with a sharp dose of caution and pain in there, too. Rose doesn't want to feel this hope, whatever it means to her. "You think—"

"No," the Doctor snaps, and she shrinks back towards Amelia; then he sighs, rubbing a hand across his chin. "Sorry. I'm not sure, actually. Could have been. Could have been anywhere, it was just a random crack opening up into space somewhere, but… The voice, where did that…"

The Doctor pauses, running his hands over the now-ordinary wall again, frowning. Amelia watches him, breathing quickly; if he finds the voice, he'll make that go away, too. For one long, drawn-out moment, she is frozen, waiting to see what will happen – then the Doctor frowns, pouts, and leans back.

"Doctor?" Rose has regained her composure, Amelia thinks; she sounds all business again, sort of clipped and efficient.

"Nothing," he says quietly, running one hand through his hair and looking defeated. "It's gone, there's…The connection, it just severed, I can't – it's just gone."

Rose slumps in something like relief disguised as disappointment (or maybe it's the other way around), and Amelia does her best to look suitably concerned.

Wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey…Do you know what this is?

Yes, she does. It's her voice, her secret, and it's not gone anywhere. Amelia has to bite the inside of her cheeks to stop from bursting out with this information. There's something about these two that makes her want to keep this a secret from them; something that makes her think they'd only try and take it away from her, like they took away the stars before she could even really see them.

Dimly, Amelia becomes aware of Rose speaking quietly to the Doctor. "…Maybe it's for the best."

He nods, still frowning, tapping the silver device against his chin and pursing his lips. "Maybe," he says – then his eyes go very wide. "No! Yes – ohhhh, no, no, maybe – yes! Yes, that's – no, it can't be, I mean… Yes! No…"

This goes on for some time; Amelia casts a worried look at Rose, who looks equal parts exasperated and curious. Finally, the Doctor stops his pacing, and rounds on them.

"Right, sorry about that… Amelia," he says, pocketing his device and starting towards her as if to give her a hug; he seems t change his mind at the last minute, veering to one side and avoiding her eyes. "We'll have to be off. Things to…you know. Things to do."

Rose raises an eyebrow. "Things?"

"Things," the Doctor emphasises, with what he probably thinks is a subtle nod towards Amelia.

"Right," Rose nods, cautiously glancing at Amelia. "And..?"

"We're off," he repeats emphatically – and then he's already gone, hurtling out of the room like a baby deer, all skinny limbs and whoosh-ing hair. Amelia can do not much more than stare after him, and then turn to Rose with a hundred questions burning her lips.

"Sorry," Rose says quickly, before Amelia can so much as start talking. "I think I better follow him, but we'll come back, okay? Don't worry about the crack, the Doctor said he'd cut the link, you shouldn't have any problems with it anymore."

Rose is already half-way out of the door. Amelia feels, suddenly, helpless. Insignificant. Seven years old. "But—"she starts, and Rose pauses; turns towards her.

"We'll come back," she promises, taking a few quick steps towards Amelia and running a gentle hand over her hair. "Yeah? Check up on you, see how you're doing."

"But the—" Amelia feels foolish, and she knows she's being stubborn. She doesn't care. This could be her last chance. "But the stars."

"Yeah, yeah," Rose smiles and rolls her eyes, not unkindly. "I'll see what I can do. You might just see them again. We can explain more, at least, yeah? Soon. We'll come back, and see how you are. Promise."

"People always say that," Amelia mumbles, face hot.

"Hey," Rose says chidingly. "Are we people?"

Amelia stares up at Rose, and shrugs, defiant. "Yes."

For a moment, Rose is clearly torn. She pauses, dithering, one hand still resting against Amelia's hair; it's obvious she's not sure she should leaving like this. But then—

"Rose!" The Doctor's voice carries up the stairs, his tone impatient, eager. "Rose, we need to go, I have to get this reading stabilised –"

"Better go," Rose says finally, shaking her head. "Sorry. I'll come back for you, yeah? Trust me."

And with that, she takes a step away from Amelia…another… another, and then she's out of the door. Amelia just stands there, feeling her heart hurl itself against her ribcage over and over, as she listens to Rose go down the staircase and out the front door. There's a pause – a fumbled conversation that Amelia strains to hear – and then the door slams shut.

The house echoes with silence.

Amelia stares around her room for a long time, too stunned to do anything else; she's still in her slippers and wearing that old cardigan that's always been far too big on her, and she feels small and stupid and alone. For a while there – really, just a few minutes - she thought someone had arrived to help. Really help, and give her some answers to all these questions she's had all her life without even really knowing how to put them into words, and show her the stars, and…take her away from this. And then they just. Left.

Rose said they'd be back soon. Yeah.

Amelia sits on the edge of her bed, holding the promise carefully against her heart. She doesn't move for a long time.

In the silence of the moment, the quiet hours of the morning where the world is dark and the house is still, Amelia makes her plan. She's going to wait. It might take Rose a while to come back – and Amelia isn't sure the Doctor ever really promised, really – so maybe she's going to have to wait for a long time. But when they come back, and they will, she's going to be ready.

When Aunt Sharon comes in to wake her niece for school the next morning, she finds Amelia fast asleep on top of the covers, fully dressed in her sturdiest jeans, a white jumper, and – inexplicably – a bike helmet. Strewn across the floor are her arts and crafts materials; glitter glue, watercolours, crayons and felt tips, cards and papers in all shapes and colours. In amongst the clutter, there are a few finished drawings and designs and carefully stencilled lists of "Things I'll Need" and "Places I Want To See" and "Questions To Ask."

Finally, underneath a big Child's Encyclopaedia of the Natural World that had until now been gathering dust on the top shelf of the bookcase, Sharon unearths a sheath of finished drawings. Amelia has drawn space; inky black skies dotted with stars, bright blue rocket-ships on their way to the moon with a smiling ginger head poking out of a window, strange and fantastical planets with dinosaurs and talking rhinos, flying whales and lizard-people.

"Amelia," Sharon frowns, shaking the little girl gently by one shoulder. "Amelia, love, what's all this?"

Amelia stirs, and gives her aunt a wide, sleepy smile. "I'm going to find out everything I can," she says simply, as if it were just another thing to tick off her to-do list for the day. "About everything. "

"Everything?"

"Space," Amelia says, pointing to her drawings. "See? And I'm going to see the stars."