"You're not the first, you know," the Doctor said suddenly.
"What?"
" 'Companion'. You're not the first person I've traveled with."
Amy looked at the Doctor with a furrowed brow, "I know…remember that time I tricked you into telling the TARDIS to show me?" She laughed at the memory, remembering the look on the Doctor's face.
"Right, okay then, where would you like to go next?" The Doctor asked quickly.
Just as Amy was about to ask the Doctor more, Rory came down the stairs with an annoyed look on his face.
"Hey! She got to choose last time, it's my turn!"
"Roranicus!" The Doctor exclaimed, just slightly less enthusiastically than usual.
"Hold on," Amy interrupted, "The Doctor was just saying something about his previous companions."
"We're not the first?" Rory asked in surprise.
"Of course not, you dolt! He's like nine hundred years old. D'you really think he's been alone the whole time?"
"Well, no…I guess…I just thought…I don't know! I never really thought about it!" He stuttered, face reddening.
Amy walked over to him and pulled him over to sit down next to her.
"So, Doctor. These 'friends' of yours, tell us about them. You always want to know so much about us, but you never talk about your past."
"Well, there's no time like the present!" The Doctor replied, obviously trying to avoid the topic.
"No way! Come on Doctor!" pleaded Amy.
"Yeah, you don't have to talk about all of them, how about you start with your first. Or actually, what about your last, right before us?" Rory added, now intrigued.
The Doctor looked away for a moment, and when he looked back, Amy and Rory could swear they saw a different man looking out from the Doctor's eyes. His face contorted with pain for just a moment and then went back to his normal weighted expression.
"Well, there was Wilfred, and Astrid, and Lady Christina I guess, but really it was Dona. Donna Noble…Most important woman in the universe…"
At this point, Amy and Rory could tell that the Doctor was remembering something very sad from his past.
"You don't have to talk about it if you really don't want to." Amy told him, looking concerned.
"No, no…Donna, why, she would have wanted me to tell you. Would have wanted all the credit she deserves."
"Would have wanted?" Rory asked hesitantly, "Is she…"
"Oh no! Not Donna. She was tougher than that! What a woman. Yeah, she was a hell of a woman! Fiery red hair, sort of like you, Amy. Never afraid to speak her mind. She was truly brilliant."
"Were you two… you know…?" Asked Amy suggestively, wiggling her eyebrows.
"Us? Together? No. No way. Ugh ick…I mean, she was lovely, really, but no. No, she was my best friend. And knew me so well. We were supposed to travel together forever. But then, well, she forgot. Had to forget." He ended this particular sentence with that sad gleam in his eyes.
Amy and Rory looked at the Doctor with blank expressions, not comprehending.
"Well, she saved the world. Like I said, most important woman in the universe, only, in the process, she had my knowledge crammed into her tiny human brain."
Amy was about to make some comment about the size of her brain, but something about the Doctor's expression stopped her.
"Go on," she implored, needing to know the rest of the story.
"Well, it was just too much. It's not supposed to happen. Human-Time Lord hybrid. No way it could work. So I made her forget. Had to take away everything we did together, all of the things we'd done," He paused here and took a breath, "Gone. Most important woman in the entire universe, saved every single person and alien alike, and she can't even know about it." The Doctor said this last part bitterly and looked as if he had just tasted something rather disgusting.
Amy had never seen this side of the Doctor before; it was intriguing. She decided she would go for it, and boldly replied, "Wow. Donna sounds amazing! You really do only take the best. So who was before her? Another one that saved the world?"
The Doctor's face brightened a little bit at his next thought, "Martha, good ol' Martha! Jack and Martha and the year that never was."
Rory, who had been uncharacteristically quiet this entire time finally asked, "Martha, who was she? And Jack? Were they married, like us?"
The Doctor laughed, "No way! Not Jack. You know, I'll have to find him one of these days. Amy, you would like him!"
Amy laughed a little, and was about to ask something; Rory however, did not like the last bit, and tried to change the subject, "So…Martha?"
"Oh Martha! She was a friend to me when I wasn't in the best of places. The only problem, all I could ever be to her was a friend, and she wanted more." The Doctor paused, sighing.
"The year that never was?" Rory asked, confused.
"Hm? Oh yes! Well, there was this whole thing with The Master and well, it's all very wibley wobbly. Short story long…no wait other way, long story short- ah that's it! Martha spent a year, traveling the world, spreading our stories. All to save me, and in doing so, saved the world."
"So, where is she now?" Amy asked, knowing that this was the best explanation she would be able to get out of the doctor, " She saved the world, and was fine right? So why'd she leave?"
"Well, I said before, she wanted more than friendship, and I just couldn't do that, not then, so soon after-" The Doctor broke off, with a pained expression, "Anyway, I just couldn't give her what she wanted. So, she left."
"I don't understand," said Rory, "She left, but why don't you still visit her? If you were such good friends, don't you miss her? I understand why you can't see Donna, but don't you think she'd like to see you once in a while?"
The Doctor gave a sad laugh, "oh she wouldn't recognize me now. After Donna, well, I changed. I'll tell you about it some other time." He said, brushing it off.
"Doctor," Amy started, "I don't mean to pry, well actually, I do…but still, you said that you couldn't be more than friends with Martha because it was 'too soon after'… After what?"
The Doctor replied with one word full of emotion, turning away from them and walking over to the console.
"Rose"
After he said it, he picked up a shirt- just a plain t-shirt- that seemed to always b somewhere in the TARDIS. It was one of those things you didn't ask about. It sort-of just "was."
Rubbing the shirt between his fingers, The Doctor took a deep breath, and with a forlorn expression, began, "Until a few years ago, I hadn't been on earth for a quite a while. She was the first person I met here. One of the first things I told her, 'run'. And boy did we run."
He looked down and started fiddling with the controls, "She was…I…I loved her." He said in a strangled tone, as if it physically hurt to speak.
Amy walked over to him, and gave him a hug before asking quietly, "Did she know?"
The Doctor looked up and answered simply, "Yeah. She did."
Rory, still sitting, asked sincerely "Well, did she love you?"
Again, The Doctor replied simply, "Yeah."
At this point, The Doctor looked away from Rory and Amy, who was now sitting next to Rory again. The silence was deafening. Both Amy and Rory were dying to know what happened with Rose, but The Doctor was so obviously in pain and both were afraid to ask.
Finally, Amy plucked up the courage to say, "So Doctor, you both loved each other, what happened?"
At first she thought he hadn't heard her, and was about to try again, when he responded.
"She let go. And I was alone. I was so alone for so long. And then, I found her. Well, actually, she found me." He said this with a sad smile, proud of her feat. "But it couldn't last. Remember when I told you about Donna and the Human-Time Lord hybrid, well I didn't tell the full truth. I said it couldn't work, but a Time Lord- Human was created as well. Looked just like me. Was me." Again he paused and took a deep breath. "He had one heart- basically human, but still me. She couldn't stay. She had a life. I couldn't take that away from her. He was the only solution."
He said this with such a final tone, that even though neither of them had really understood anything he just said, both Amy and Rory knew he was finished for tonight. And for a moment it seemed as though The Doctor was in a different world, a world filled with memories. But then he turned to face them and said, "Nothing like the present! So, Ponds, where are we going?"
And as the Doctor leaped around the console, pushing buttons and puling levers, Amy knew that it wasn't over. They would learn about the mysterious man's past eventually, but for now, it was enough.