This is my closure for Rory's death in Cold Blood. I was just beginning to think that the possibility of another on-screen romance between Doctor and companion would cease to exist.
There were many things on the Doctor's mind as he pushed Amy back onto the TARDIS. So so many things. The goodbyes of former friends and loves. Knowing the deaths of companions to come. The feeling of forgetting something or someone. The inability to save all. Davros's final victory of him, the man who hated weapons but was a commander at heart. And the shrapnel in his hand. And…
Rory Williams.
The nurse. The fantastic nurse. The extraordinary, oh-so brilliant nurse. The dead nurse –erased from the past, present and future, erased from time and space, erased from everyone's memory but his own.
In truth, the moment Rory took the shot was probably the most horrible moment in his life. Second most horrible, second to Messaline. Because it was like Colonel Cobb all over again: vengeful. It was like looking into Jenny's eyes and hoping for some miracle to happen. Hoping that, after all this time and the good he'd done for others, something good would come to him. But it didn't.
The life was draining from Rory's eyes. The Doctor could feel the excruciating pain that Rory was fighting. When Amy asked if he was going to be alright, the Doctor remained silent. No. This couldn't be happening. Not again. Not again!
But the crack took him. The nurse wouldn't even have a dignified death, because he wouldn't have a death. According to history, Rory Williams never existed. Not anywhere but the Doctor's mind. After the Doctor died, not anywhere at all.
The worst part was that everyone moved on, all easy and chipper. Because they didn't know. There are fixed points in time and space, he'd told Amy and Nasreen.
The Doctor closed his eyes and he could see the young brave man. Twice. He'd died twice now. Once in a dream, once in reality. Then the Doctor took out what he'd fished from the crack. It was blue familiar. It couldn't be… He held it up to the TARDIS. It was. Looking around, he wrapped the piece of the TARDIS up again, pocketing it. Then he entered the ship that would eventually reach its demise.
There he found Amy, back towards him. She was at the console. Her hands were up at her chest. She was looking at something in her palm.
"Amy?" the Doctor called softly. "You wanted a vacation?" When the ginger didn't reply, the Doctor tried again. "Amelia?"
The young woman turned around, a red velvet box in one hand, fingers pinching something else. Something shiny. Something glittering. A ring.
The Doctor looked at the ring and looked up at Amy's tearing face. Slowly, he approached her and took the ring from his companion, slipping it onto her ring finger. Then he pulled her into a hug as Amy sobbed into his tweed jacket.
"He's still alive," he assured her.
"He's gone…" Amy choked out.
"Remember," urged the Doctor. "Remember that I told you to remember him. Because if you do, it makes all the difference. You're human; you're simple, versus me. I've been everywhere: paradoxes, end of the world. If you, a simple space-time event, remember him, he's bound to be out there somewhere, alive."
The pain was unbearable. The red fire shooting up through his spine, overloading his brain. Erasing all need to survive. It was numbing. He wasn't going to be alright and he knew that. Even if he was on that hilltop with Amy ten years into the future, it wasn't going to be alright. If there was one thing that Rory understood, it was that time was a bitch. The Doctor had shown him that with his travels. Maybe there were some things that had to happen, like the Apollo moon missions or second World War. But the tiny details didn't have to stay the same. Wasn't the Doctor tumbling in proof of that enough?
They left him; he could barely feel the absence of people around. He could feel the coldness at his feet –tendrils of light encircling his legs, pulling him in. Then he woke up. Where was he? If his history classes that were buried in his mind served him correctly, then it must have been some ancient times. He was laying on the street, in his 21st century clothes. He stuck out like a sore thumb amidst all the toga-wearing people in the street. Slowly he got up and rubbed the lingering headache away. That was when he realized he was alive. Literally alive. This wasn't some kind of purgatory. He was living!
One of the quirks of time travel, Rory remembered the Doctor telling Amy when she asked why she hadn't contracted some alien flu yet. It was because time travel altered your white blood cells just barely enough and if Rory had just fell through that big crack the Doctor was so scared about, then why wouldn't he have some miraculous recovery?
"Doctor?" someone asked from behind him.
Rory turned around and saw a young man, a few years younger than himself, study him up and down. "Is it you Doctor? Where's the other one? The woman with hair the color of fire?"
Rory opened his mouth to say something but was interrupted by the boy again. "Oh mother and father will be glad to see you! And Evelina!"
"Evelina?" Rory repeated as he was dragged away by the boy and to a Roman house.
"Father, mother, sister!" cried the boy as he dragged Rory into the living room of the house.
"What's the trouble now Quintus?" a girl asked as she and two adults came into view.
"Who's your friend?" the older woman asked.
"Mother, it's the Doctor!" Quintus, Rory guessed that to be his name, was positively excited. By the looks on the other people's faces, they were as well.
"The Doctor?" the man emphasized.
"I think you've gotten me mixed up with someone else…" Rory said, backing away. "I'm a nurse, but I'm not a doctor, yet. Not until I pass exams… if I get to pass exams."
"He looks different," the young girl replied as Rory continued to back away.
"Evelina, a man of power can change his appearance if he so wishes."
"Look, I'm not this Doctor you're talking about," Rory laughed uneasily. "I'm not supposed to be here, so I'll think I'll be going now." As he turned to leave, he caught sight of the household gods altar. The image of the TARDIS was etched into the marble. He turned around to the family and then back at the altar. Then back at the family.
"Wait a minute," Rory started. "The Doctor. With the blue box?"
"You know of him too?" the man inquired.
"I travel with him. Well, traveled."
"Are you lost?" Quintus asked.
"I've been forgotten most likely." The nurse rubbed the back of his head. Wasn't that what scared the Doctor most about the Cracks? They caught with you and if they got you, they'd erase you from time and space.
"That's terrible," the woman commented. "The Doctor would not do that."
"Not by him I don't think. By a lot of others though. It wasn't his choice either." Rory felt a need to defend the Doctor.
"Then what will you do?"
"I don't know."
"Stay with us then,"
"Pardon me?"
"Metalla is right. Stay with us," the man clarified. "We've… been through much to. Sole survivors of what you call a volcano."
"Volcano?" Rory furrowed his brow. "Y-You're from Pompeii? The Doctor was at Pompeii?"
"We feared the same fate might have befallen him," Quintus said. "Evelina found this one day." The boy produced a wooden slab to Rory.
Rory immediately recognized what it was. "TARDIS…" he breathed.
"The Doctor is alright though?" Metalla prompted. "If you know him, he must be alright."
"It's all complicated. Time doesn't work like that I think. Maybe a future him is in a fire." Rory kept turning over the slab of the TARDIS.
"I kept seeing things from it," Evelina admitted to Rory. "Like was whispering to me. It showed me a circle and that a hand would come to steal away the sacred wood through a crack of bright light. Light as bright as the sun."
"That's nice," Rory laughed. He bit his tongue when he realized what it meant. "Quick!" he cried. "Do you have any ink? Anything I can write on this with?"
Startled at the sudden outburst, the man held up a knife. "Is this alright?"
"Yeah great!" Rory exclaimed. He hastily etched a message into the back side of the wood. It was a more laborious task than he'd expected but eventually it was managed.
"I'm Caecilius by the way," the man introduced.
"Nice to meet you. Rory Williams. Now where was it that you found me?" Rory turned to Quintus to ask the question.
"Near the marketplace. Close to the alley."
"Can you take me there again?"
"Why? Are you trying to get back?"
"I'm not going to take my chances. No. I need to give him a message."
The TARDIS piece burned against the inside pocket of the Doctor's jacket. He fished it out and held it by the corner with the cloth. The etching that had not been there burned brightly
Alive. Safe. I love you Amy.