Thank you to the three people that reviewed. Your comments made me feel like this story wasn't just a meaningless thing no one could be bothered with floating around in the confines of deep space. And now… a Sherlock quote for your amusement.
Mycroft: This is a matter of national importance! Grow up!
Sherlock: Get off my sheet.
Mycroft: Or what?
Sherlock: Or I'll just walk away!
Mycroft: I'll let you.
And if it all goes crashin' into the sea…
If it's just…you and me,
Tryin' to find the light…
Ships in The Night
The Impossible
"Sherlock!" No one responded to the name. "Oy, Sherlock!" Amy popped out of the TARDIS happily. "Sherlock, I came back! Two months, just like I promised! I kept track this time!" Well…technically it had been two months. On Earth. In the TARDIS, it had been about a week. But she had still kept track. She had made River do the necessary calculations and everything. The Doctor had simply stared blankly, amazed and fiddling with some sort of new gadget thing. "Sherlock!" she shouted, looking around.
The flat was silent, eerily so. Usually John and Sherlock were arguing. Or Sherlock was shooting his gun at the wall.
But things were packed, strewn about the room…
Boxes piled to the ceilings, boxes on counters…
Amy looked around, bewildered, her eyes impossibly wide. "Doctor?" she called back over her shoulder. "Doctor can you come out here for a bit?" The redhead ventured no further. She simply leaned out into the flat, feet glued to the TARDIS floor. "Hello? John? Sherlock?" she yelled. No one answered.
Where were they? Had she messed up the timeline again? This couldn't be right. Was someone else living here? Something was wrong. Very wrong. The room felt cold, distant even. Like no one had inhabited it for years. But surely Sherlock would have told her if he was planning to move….right?
"Doctor?" Amy called again. Where had he gone off to now? Her heels hesitantly clicked on to the floor. The last thing she wanted to do was scare some poor innocent people living here. So she looked around.
Observe, Amy. Close your eyes, breathe, and observe. Don't just see.
Amy closed her eyes, inhaling. And when she opened them, she saw everything differently. Maybe not in the way Sherlock did. But everything still looked…wrong. His skull was still on the mantle, as eerie as ever. His books were still in place on the shelf. Mrs. Hudson had probably dusted them but…They all looked untouched…Amy went over to touch one.
"Sorry!" The Doctor exclaimed, snapping her out of her daze.
"Apologies, just rerouting a circuit breaker, fixing some…wirey…things… and metal. You know how it is!" He babbled joyously, stepping out next to her. He looked around the flat. These ancient green eyes widened. "Ah." Quickly, carefully, the Doctor whipped out his sonic.
Amy looked upstairs, eyes filled with green concern. Something was wrong…very wrong. "Doctor, did we overshoot the timestream again?" She rolled her eyes at the alien.
He moved around the flat, green light pulsing happily along. The skull leered at him. Making a face, the Doctor turned it to the wall.
"Doctor, are you listening?" Amy sifted through the open boxes. Sherlock's experiments. His pipe that he never ever used. His lab equipment…why was everything he deemed useful, things he enjoyed, packed up in various boxes, when sentimental items were still scattered about the flat in plain sight?
Sentiment. A useless thing Amy, something this world does not need. Don't get attached, don't keep anything that isn't useful…
"But why are your sentiments still up, Sherly?" Amy muttered to herself. She started up the stairs.
"Ah." The Doctor spun around, clumsily as a new deer might. He read the screwdriver. Worriedly, he ran a hand through his floppy hair. "A bit not good." He turned, the words "Amy I think we should…" at his lips, but she was already clacking noisily up the stairs. The Doctor straightened his bowtie nervously before flopping down on the couch.
"A bit not good indeed."
Amy was already knocking on John's door when the Doctor found a newspaper. It was buried under all of the acclimated rubbish, old teacups and sorts. He scanned it hurriedly, green eyes jumping from line to line. A member of the royal family was involved in a sex scandal, aliens might invade again this Christmas. The Doctor snorted. Usual rubbish. He simply wanted to know the date.
He bit his lip, looking upstairs.
It had been two months, four days, sixteen hours and forty seven minutes since that day.
The day the press had dubbed 'The Reichenbach Fall'.
"John? John, are you up yet?" Amy rapped on his door demandingly. The disheveled doctor answered. He rubbed his eyes and blinked. He yawned. And when John finally fully looked at her, it was as if he couldn't believe she existed.
He was shocked.
"Amy…?"
And suddenly John threw his arms around her in a crushing embrace. "Amy…oh my God, Amy!" Awkwardly, the redhead patted her friend's back. "It's so good to see you!" Amy simply stood there. She wasn't quite sure what to do.
She settled for pulling back and putting her hands on his shoulders.
"John, are you alright?"
"Hm? Yea, fine. And how are you…um…" John's face fell slightly. More like crumbled. Barely, just barely, John slipped up. His throat tightened. His blue eyes watered a bit. Amy tilted her head at him. He cleared his throat. "How are you feeling?"
What was wrong?
Why was he upset?
"I'm fine." Amy kept her tone low, soothing, calm. It was the tone of voice many a psychiatrist had used on her as a child. "I'm fine John. How are you?" she inquired carefully.
"How's Sherlock?"
Amy saw him stiffen. Saw his eyes glaze over, grow distant, grow bleary. He looked away.
"John?"
She took hold of his face.
"John?"
In a moment, he was back as if nothing had occurred. "Oh, fine, fine." The doctor laughed. It sounded forced, a nervous, high-strung thing that was borderline hysteria. Amy raised an eyebrow. "We're all fine." John reassured her. "Now." He smiled. "Let's go downstairs and I'll make us some tea, shall I?"
He was off and down clattering about in the flat before she could answer.
"Oh, hello John!"
"Good morning Doctor!"
Amy turned and looked to the door on the right. The one with the bullet holes in it. The one with the initials SH carved in it by a sword that still lay lodged firmly in the wood. She traced her fingers over the lettering gently, affectionately…almost questioningly. Her fingers wrapped around the doorknob.
How badly she wanted to throw open the door and scare him half to death!
But Sherlock slept with a gun. And a hunting knife. And in the nude, if Amy could remember their last conversation over Skype correctly. All bullets and bedsheets with this one. Amy laughed softly. She wasn't sure if she wanted to be shot or rendered mentally inept for the rest of her life.
"POND! You're late for tea! Naughty Pond!"
Amy jumped as the Doctor's sweet voice quoted Alice in Wonderland. She smiled and went down the stairs to her schoolgirl crush, following him like she always did.
But this time she'd wait for Sherlock to follow her.
When she got downstairs, it was raining heavily. Pouring, more like. It gave the entire flat a more desolate feeling, a hollowness that made…well, it made everything a tad bit awkward and melancholy. Amy regarded the two men sitting casually across from each other. Almost too casually. They tried too hard to look unsuspicious.
"Alright, what's going on?" Amy asked demandingly.
"Amy, sit down." John asked politely. The Doctor smiled and nodded, patting the space next to him. "Come along, Pond." She did so and accepted the cup offered to her, regarding them both with a wary and questioning gaze. "Will Sherlock be joining us then?" She raised an eyebrow when John choked on his tea and stuttered a "no, he's not."
"Well then where the hell is he? That's rude!"
The Doctor jumped up suddenly.
He knocked over a lamp in his excitement.
"Sorry sorry, bit clumsy!" The Doctor picked it up hurriedly. "Long, long spindly limbs you know how it is! Grasshopper, tweed grasshopper limbs!" He bounded over to John, shaking his hand furiously in both of his. "It has been a pleasure!" Both humans regarded him with curiosity and a mild fear for his sanity. Amy raised her eyebrow again. "Come along Amy, come along!" The Doctor pulled her up alongside him, bouncing towards the TARDIS. "Planets to see, galaxies to save from potential destruction!" He waved absently. "Goodbye, John! Have fun with Sherlock!"
Amy pulled away.
"Doctor?" He blinked childishly at her. Amy put a finger to her lips. "Hush." He blinked and babbled, shocked. "You-I-don't use my own methods against me!" He finally spat out, but by then Amy had already turned to John. "Alright, what's going on? What are you two not telling me here?" John and the Doctor both denied that anything was wrong.
"I've got a sonic screwdriver. And I am not afraid to use it."
"When did you take my screwdriver?"
"Hush."
"John, I want to know." He simply handed her a cup again. "Amy, please sit down." Reluctantly, she did so. The sonic was still tightly gripped in one of her hands. The Doctor regarded his tool turned enemy with wary eyes. He sat down next to her.
Amy raised the cup of tea to her lips.
And gagged. "This tastes horrible!"
John laughed. "Well, it was Sherlock's favorite."
Amy wiped her tongue off disgustedly. "Of course it would be his favorite, if I hated it-" The redhead stopped, looking at John suspiciously. "Wait. What do you mean was? What's happened to him? Where's he gone off to this time?" She stood up aggressively, anger radiating strongly off her and frightening both men.
They both froze and exchanged glances.
"The wrath of Pond." The Doctor whispered to John from behind one hand. Both men stood. "Basically…run." They moved to do so, each taking a single step back, but that was as far as they got. Amy pointed the sonic at them both threateningly.
"Sit. Down." She whispered furiously.
Naturally, the two did so out of fear.
The once friendly buzz now had all the charm of an angry Silurian as Amy pointed the tool at the Doctor. "I live with you, and I can be extremely unpleasant." The Doctor swallowed. Both hearts palpitated rapidly. "Ask John, I don't want to be the one to tell you so if you could please give me back my screwdriver-"
"Wait, you're throwing me under the bus?"
"Oh yea!" The Doctor exclaimed.
"Amy." John looked at her sadly. She was frozen, staring at him with incredulity on her beautiful face. "Amy, just go with him."
"No."
"Amelia, please." The Doctor grabbed her hand in his. Had the current circumstance not been so dreary and horrible she would have blushed. But instead she pulled away.
"When?" she asked softly.
"About three hours after you left, two months ago."
"He can't be dead." Amy said sternly. "He's not allowed to be dead." She cast John a firm, angry glance. "He can't be." Her eyes watered a bit and she wiped at them furiously, looking away from the two men.
"Amy I saw it happen, I watched him-"
"That's impossible, John." Her tone was firm, absolute. She fixed both men with a fiery gaze nearly as vivid as her hair. "Sherlock…is not. Dead." Slightly, Amy's ferocity wavered on the last word. But with her shoulders straight and angry, she clicked back into the TARDIS. The door shut behind her.
The Doctor smoothed down his face nervously with one hand.
"God knows what she'll do if she's alone with Sexy. I can't deal with a hormonal time machine!" He lamented. The gangly man sprung to the door, casting John a glance of pity.
"Last time they ended up at a Ben and Jerry's…oh well long story!" The TARDIS began to dematerialize. "Gotta dash!" He gave John one last smile before leaping inside.
As the TARDIS went back into space, John was left alone.
Three mugs of tea sitting in front of him.
And grief as fresh as the day Sherlock Holmes died pouring down his face.
Amy was stalking furiously around the console when he jumped in, all red hair and red face and ferocity. Her face was eerily similar to her expression after he had gone for twelve years. And four psychiatrists.
The Doctor felt his hearts drop in fear.
But, then again, he supposed that that was just her angry face.
Her terrifying, horrible, angry face.
A face that invoked pure terror in the object of her displeasure.
She pulled levers, she flipped switches.
The sound of her heels echoing aggressively about the room was terrifying.
He jumped when she spoke. "Well? Is he dead?" Amy barked, not looking at him and never ceasing her pacing. The Doctor jumped for words. By this point, he wasn't sure if she was just pushing buttons or if she actually knew what she was doing. "Amy-I-eh-um-well-" the poor alien bit his lip.
"Doctor. Please. Just yes or no?" She finally stopped moving to look at him. And her green eyes were so very sad. He walked past her, righting switches and restoring order. By the time he had ceased his own pacing, Amy was tense with anxiety.
"Amy, you know I can't answer that. It's too personal."
She had anticipated that.
And Amy was not the slightest bit perturbed.
"Alright. I'll just ask the TARDIS then." She flounced over to the large, television-like monitor. He looked after her resilience in amazement. Humans…didn't they know when to give up?
Sherlock was dead.
Couldn't Amy just grieve and accept that?
Evidently not as he watched her arguing with Sexy. Sexy had locked the monitor again. And she needed the master password to open up. "TARDIS, pull up files on Sherlock Holmes." It beeped at her, affronted.
"You can't call her TARDIS Amelia!"
The Doctor walked up to his poor console. He stroked it lovingly. "You should know better." He gave her a slightly reproachful look. "How would you like it if I went around calling you 'Human' all the time?" Amy cocked an eyebrow at him in concern. "You know very well that that's not her name…" He kissed a lever and Amy felt a bit of jealousy as the time machine seemed to sigh contently at the affection.
She waved him away.
"Alright, alright…" Amy took hold of the monitor and held it firm between her desperate hands. "Sexy…"she politely began, ignoring the Doctor's sweet sigh of affirmation. "May I see the files for Sherlock Holmes?"
The screen flashed red.
Password protected. Please state the master password.
"Bowties are cool." Beep.
"Fish fingers and custard." Beep.
"Gallifrey!" Beep.
"Sexy!" The TARDIS seemed to laugh, but the screen stayed red.
"Amy." The Doctor grabbed her face in his hands. "Stop. Please." She had that look on her face again, that look he hadn't seen in years. He knew her. Amy was strong, Amy was defiant. But so very heartbroken when she cried.
A memory flashed through his ancient mind as he held her, her eyes so filled with tears.
The sound of Rose's heartwrenching sobs filled his ears as he closed the door on her, a cry that spanned galaxies as the last link between parallel dimensions closed forever.
"Doctor, please unlock the monitor."
"Doctor, please don't leave me here. Please."
His eyes closed in pain.
Those green eyes that used to be brown.
"Take me back. I want to see him."
The Doctor opened them again. Red hair instead of blonde, fierce, trembling green eyes instead of blue. Amy. Amy. Poor, poor Amy…Hurting Amy, poor Amelia Pond… "Amy, I can't do that." He moved to touch her shoulder, to explain why in all his infinite Doctor wisdom exactly why she couldn't see her best friend on the day that he died. She moved to be alone.
"You're the Doctor." Amy whispered. The sentence was uttered with the reverence of a prayer, with the hope of a wish made by a child. By a little seven year old girl. He bit his lip. Why why why why why did they always believe in him so much? He wasn't Superman, he couldn't do everything, he couldn't fix everything!
But instead of voicing them, the Doctor swallowed his frustrations. They weren't important right now.
"Amy. That's a fixed point in the universe. I can't stop that."
She glared at him.
"So he has to die?"
The Doctor nodded.
"You came back." And that reverence, that awe of him, was replaced by a thinly veiled accusation. He tried not to tell her how much those words had affected him. He felt hurt prick both his hearts, hot and needle sharp.
But instead, he hugged her.
"Amelia." She blinked back tears. "Amy, I am so sorry." He kissed his best friend's forehead. He stroked her hair back soothingly, that ginger hair he was so jealous of. "Believe me, I am. But there are some things even I can't fix." The Doctor felt tears wet his neck.
"I'm not askin' you to save him. I'm just askin' to see him again. Before…" Amy's voice caught on the last sentence. She stood there in his embrace as he pondered her request. She did not sob, she did not wail. Amy Pond would not cry. She would not cry yet. She would cry when she had someone to mourn.
And as far as she was concerned, Sherlock was not dead yet.
"And that's all you want?" The Doctor asked, drawing back to look directly into her eyes. "To say goodbye, and nothing more?" Amy stared right back, eyes slightly red from the sparse tears she had shed.
"Yes."
"Alright, Pond! Let's go!" The Doctor said joyously, stepping back from her embrace. Amy was an emotion kisser. And he was not about to have that again.
But she somehow pinned him against the console and aggressively kissed him on the mouth anyway.
It lasted for a brief second and Amy bounced off with a quick, "Thanks, Doctor."
And then she was gone.
The Doctor's green eyes were wide. With the embarrassed blush of a six year old schoolboy spreading across his face, he turned to the main console.
Sexy seemed to be laughing at him.
"Oh hush." He pointed a warning finger at the time machine, spinning around to properly execute his point. "I promised that it would never happen again and it will not happen again." The Doctor stroked the monitor gently. "Not after…"
"Rose Tyler."
The monitor unlocked with a happy beep.
Sherlock's profile instantly became accessible.
The Doctor smiled. A password that nobody could know. A girl that nobody could possibly remember. His green eyes scanned through the consulting detective's archives.
He shut off the monitor.
He pulled a lever.
He shouted "Geronimo!"
And the Doctor charted a course through time and space to January 15th, 2012.
The day Sherlock Holmes died.
So, what did you all think? Questions, comments, concern, professions of love, anything? Flames will be given to Sherlock, along with your head for his freezer experiment.
I figured sneaking in a little Rose would be nice.
Was I right?