As the TARDIS whirled lackadaisically through space, everything was as normal and peaceful as it ever really got aboard the great ship. It tipped this way and that way, swirling on an axis that had no fixed point and generally made its way throughout the universe and all the time zones therein.
Amy Pond sat with her feet up on the console, comfortably watching the miles and years flicker away as the ship simply glided. On the small monitor that her eyes were fixed on, lines of code and graphs twisted and span, here and there, giving her an insight that the eyes simply did not give.
They had been on the ship for some time now and Amy was beginning to understand what the TARDIS was displaying – although she was still multiple lifetimes away from understanding the ship in the way the Doctor did. But that was to be expected.
To Amy, the TARDIS was the most beautiful ship in the universe, that could take them anywhere at any time.
To the Doctor, the TARDIS was his life partner. The most perfect one he could ever have chosen.
"THAT is why I should have taken another!" the Doctor cried, up to the waist in cabling as he attempted to discern why the TARDIS had suddenly decided to spin a third of a degree out of alignment on its Q-Axis which was making landing anywhere interesting. And entirely vague. In fact – it no longer landed anywhere near where it was meant to. Location or time.
The TARDIS bonged loudly, clearly unhappy with what the Doctor was doing as he butchered the stream of cables. They sparked loudly in protest but were no match for the sonic screwdriver.
"How long are we going to keep floating for?" Amy queried, without taking her eyes off the stream of data.
"As long as it takes to recalibrate," the Doctor replied as he disappeared over his head in cables, chasing a single strand "here we have a sun and enough planets to give her the perfect recalibration."
They were in a galaxy packed with hundreds of planets, the largest sun for a million lightyears and a black hole that occasionally swallowed anything that got too close. It was beautiful on screen.
"So what is taking so long?" Amy asked the pile of cables.
"A TARDIS shouldn't need recalibrating – so the cables are buried very deep!" the voice replied from somewhere in the pile.
"Still not done yet?" a voice from the higher platform called. Amy looked around at Rory who was emerging from a doorway high up.
"Nowhere near it," Amy sighed, crossing her arms and staring at the data feed.
Slowly the numbers were petering out, the graphs going flat. To Amy, it seemed to happen like a stream; rushing at first but slowly coming to nothingness. In reality, it happened almost immediately.
"Doctor..." she started but then the lights went out as the TARDIS produced the most horrific sound she had ever heard. A mixture of steel on steel, the sound of wood splintering and from somewhere in the guts of the TARDIS – a deep ringing bell; the Cloister Bell.