Old Faces & New Faces

Chapter One

Clara stood staring at the central console. The Doctor had just come to pick her up to take her on one his amazing adventures to try and persuade her to travel with him full time. The Doctor was currently ensconced underneath the central console, tinkering with some part of his ship and she could hear in his voice that he was getting exasperated that whatever he was doing was not going well.

Suddenly there was a loud beeping sound and a message came up on the screen in front of her. Bending down she looked the gangly man in the face and spoke out to him.

"Doctor, someone seems to have left a message for you. I am just currently trying to work out how a box which can travel through time and space can get text messages.

The Doctor pulled himself out up, and bounced up to his feet. "I'll explain it how it works later, first thing is to find out who wants me."

He pulled the monitor around to him and pressed a few buttons pulling the fully message up on the screen. A beaming smile appeared on his face and he looked at his latest companion.

"You don't mind a quick detour do you, there's someone I want you to meet. "

"I guess this has something to do with your mysterious message. Considering it put a smile on your face I am all game."

The Doctor bounded around the console, pressing buttons and moving levers almost at random according to Clara's eyes.

The humming and noise of the engines picked up, almost like the Doctor has bumped it into overdrive to get them there sooner. And to Clara's astonishment he was standing there now adjusting his bowtie and preening at his hair. At this point Clara couldn't wait to see who could affect the Doctor in that way.

River stood sheltering underneath one of the many trees on this planet waiting on the arrival of the TARDIS and the Doctor, she knew that he would come running as soon as he saw the message from her. Such was the enthrallment of him to her.

The sun was blazing hot, and most people would take advantage to feel the sun on their skin if the spent as much time as River did underground at archeologically digs. But Not River, as well as inheriting her red hair from her Scottish mother she had also inherited her fair skin which burned at the mere touch of a warm sun.

She suddenly felt a rush of wind hit her in the face followed quickly by the sound of the TARDIS materializing. She smiled slightly to herself recognising the sound as been the noise the Doctor loved so much. The sound the TARDIS made when the brakes were left on.

Finally the TARDIS has materialised in front of her and strode confidential forward, reaching for the handle on the TARDIS door. Knowing by instinct that even without having a key to enter her, as the child of the TARDIS she would be allowed access regardless.

Pushing the door open her eyes feasted on the console room. Once more the Doctor has decided that he want to change the console room.

She saw him standing casually against the railing trying to act like he wasn't affected by her arrival. When in fact he was bounding balls of nerves. Sensing that she strode over to him purposively as he called out to her.

"Hello, River" His voice deep and with feeling.

"Hello Sweetie!" She responded as soon as she meet him. Leaning over to kiss him, loving the affect she could have on this man as he deepened the kiss with her. As usual when she started to kiss him he was nervous and always unsure what to do with lips but he quickly got into the swing of it, his tongue probing trying to get access to her mouth. River was about to give him access when she heard a woman's voice ringing across the console room.

"You tried to tell me it wasn't, but I knew it all along. This is nothing but a snog box. Do you make a habit of letting every woman who walks through the TARDIS door kiss you?"

River looked over to where the voice originated and recognised the face of the woman, and knew that with her being on the TARDIS it meant only one thing and she place her left hand onto the Doctor's arm.

"Manhattan has happened?" She questioned lightly, knowing if it had than this was the Doctor who was still getting over the loss of her parents.

The Doctor didn't speak, but River could see it in his eyes as soon as she mentioned it. The haunted look caused by a great loss.

Clara could see the look that was being passed between them and her interest was piqued at the moment. But her interest was more centred on the older woman who had had come in and had planted one on the Doctor.

"Well Doctor, Aren't you going to introduce me to your friend. I presume you do know who she is?" Clara's voice was dripping in sarcasm.

The Doctor quickly became flustered and he felt a red heat creep up his face as he started to blush after realising what Clara has just seen.

"Um, Clara, Um… This is River, Umm she is my umm…"

River stepped in, sensing that this introduction could take a while if the Doctor continued on mumbling as he was at this time.

"As he is trying to say" River said stepping towards Clara. "I'm River, Doctor River Song. And the words that he is trying to get out to describe my connection to him, is that I am his wife"

"His wife?" Clara said her eyebrow arching up.

"Isn't that right sweetie?" River said looking across at him. Knowing that Clara was trying to work out how that could happen by the way they looked now. Considering that her last regeneration had left her in the body of a fortyish old woman. A good looking woman but definitely someone who looked much older that what the Doctor did in this regeneration.

River could see that Clara was still slightly confused.

"Don't let the age gap you see between us get in the way. In reality the Doctor is much older than me."

Looking up onto the Console she could see a book lying on top of it. Spying the authors name on it, she stepped closer to it. Hoping that she had misread the name. But there it was in black and white Amelia Williams, with a cover picture which she could only describe as her first self. The one that Amy had seen in Florida. Picking the book up quickly; she cradled it into her arms. A tear welling in the corner of her eye.

Clara stepped over to her

"I see you are fan as well. I've always loved Amelia William's stories ever since my Mum read them to me when I was little. Especially considering how long ago they were written she does have a knack of predicting technology accurately. Of course the main topic of conversation is always why the lead character is always called Melody. "

River smiled slightly, this was just like her mother. And she knew that character had to be called that so Amy could remind her that she was always in her thoughts even though she never went by that name any more.

River put the book down and turned to look at the Doctor's newest companion.

"I am certain Amy would love that the fact that her novels are still being enjoyed even now. And especially that people are discussing the motives about the name Melody"

Clara was intrigued. The way that River spoke made it sound like she knew much more about this woman than she could of ever had read.

"Amy? You speak about the author of those books like you actually now her personally. But considering what the Doctor has told me about this Box, I guess he took you to meet her once, considering you seem to be fan.

"Actually I know her a lot better than that. And we have meet more than once. We are family to one another."

"Oh my, you are close friends with my favourite author." Clara practically skipped across the TARDIS to the Doctor "You know what you said about where I wanted to go, well can I go meet Amelia Williams considering you and your wife know her so well."

The Doctor just stood there staring at the TARDIS door. Not wanting to respond knowing that he could never fulfil Clara's wish.

"How about it Doctor?"

The Doctor never turned around. He just stared at the door. His voice rang out completely devoid of any emotion as not to bring up those memories.

"Tell her River."

"Clara come over here. There is some things that I need to tell you about Amelia Williams. You took it when I said that we were family that we family that we were very close friends with each other and that I thought of her like family. In actual fact she is my family. Amelia Williams is my family. In fact she is my Mother."

Clara picked up her book and stared at the cover.

"You're making all this up. I've read hundreds of biographies of her life, and they have never mentioned in any of them that she had a daughter but only an adopted son because she was unable to her children herself. I don't think the people who wrote them would miss a big fact like that."

"But of course these biographies also say that she was born in the 1920's. Amy must of let those been written considering how popular she came as an author. But there was most definitely things that she would omitted to them."

"Like it seems that she had a daughter that no-one has heard about, who seems to be able to travel through time as well."

"And a lot more than that. That she was born Amelia Pond but she hated that name growing up and insisted that everyone called her Amy only or she wouldn't talk to them for days. Or that the man she married Rory Williams was one of her best friends growing up, and that they were brought together by their joint best friend." River said that glossing over for a minute that she was the best friend. Considering she still had to broach that fact that was born thousands of years later than she should have been.

"Or the fact that she was born in 1989. The same as her husband."

"That is impossible. Because that would make her about my age. And those books were written years before I was even born. And you say that you are her daughter, but you have to be over twenty years older than her. There is no way she could be father. This just does not make any sense yet." Clara's mind was reeling. Everything that River had just said made her mind reel. That the woman whose' books were read to her as she grew up, that were written in the 1950's were by a Woman who was born only a year before her.

River placed a hand onto Clara's shoulder trying to bring her some reassurance.

"I know that it doesn't make sense, but believe me it is all true. As I said before Amelia is my Mother which you believe is physically impossible as I am physically much older than her. I am sure that the Doctor has told already that his blue box here can travel through time and space. That's exactly what my parents did. They travelled through time with him. My mother became pregnant with me whilst she was on the TARDIS but..." River took a deep breath before continuing "But because of my conception whilst the TARDIS was in flight, my DNA contains Time Lord Traits which give me the ability to live for hundreds of years. Some people through I was unique enough that they could use me, so they kidnapped Amy from the TARDIS and took her to the 51st Century where I was born."

Clara took a deep breath in.

"Ok, that could explain how she managed to write those books in that time. You must have left her there for a while. But it still doesn't explain how you could still be older than her. I presuming after you were born that the Doctor must have found you and your Mother and took you away back to her normal time frame which still doesn't explain how you could be older than her. Which year did you parents travel with him and get Pregnant with you."

"2011" River responded back

"2011, which makes you only about two years in my sense of time."

"The Doctor was able to return my Mother back to then but not me. The people who took me, took me back to the 1960's and I grew up there. Of course there may be something the Doctor may not have mentioned which is that he can regenerate his entire body, physically turning into someone else. And at one point I could. This is the third body I've had. The second one I had grew up with Amy and Rory and became there best friend and got them together so I could be born."

River laughed at bit.

"With this face I meet parents before they even knew who I was, that I was there daughter and best friend. They found out the first part out on the day I was born and taken away. And the second part not so longer."

Clara's jaw dropped slightly.

"Your life sounds impossible."

"Just one of those things that come about from travelling with him" River said gesturing to her husband.

The Doctor turned around and faced both his wife and his newest friend.

"The reason I got River to tell you all that is because I get take you to meet Amy. They lives became part of a paradox, and they created a fixed point in time that I cannot travel to in the past. They lived there lives normally and died without me and River been able to see them again. Rory became a Doctor and Amy a writer. They adopted a child and raised him as Amy was unable to have Children after what they did to her after River was born or as I should say Melody Pond as that is what her parents called her. And that is why the main character is always called that name. So Amy could tell her daughter that she remembered her always."

"You can meet anyone else in history but you cannot meet them. A fixed point in time is something I cannot overcome. River and I can never see them again"

"Sweetie; that may not be true anymore. That's the reason I summoned you."

"River?" The Doctor asked

"I may have found a way to break that paradox and allow us to see them again."