Ah, chapter three. Thank you guys for the amazing reviews. They always make my day and make me smile.

But my favorite review so far would have to be…

GallifreyanReject. Your smiley face made me giggle. Thank you for liking it xD and all of you reading, thanks!

Chapter three! Dun. Dun. Dun.


Sherlock quote of the chapter:

Sherlock: Alone is what I have. Alone protects me.

John: No. Friends protect people.


Ships in the Night

Not An Angel

"I mean it, Pond! One hour that is it!"

"Yeah, yeah." Amy waved an idle hand at the Doctor, leaning impatiently out of the TARDIS door. Galaxies flashed and reflected in her green eyes.

"Just one! One and not a nanosecond over, you hear me?" The Doctor pointed a long, stern finger at her. Amy giggled, despite the serious look present on the old alien's face. It was impossible to take this man seriously. It was like being ordered around by a nine year old boy, the way his face carried on.

Amy only obeyed him when the severity reached and hardened his eyes.

But for now…

She saluted him and gave him a cocky grin. "Sir, yes sir!" she chirped proudly.

He wasn't amused.

"I'm serious Amy!" the Doctor frowned at her. "This timeframe is shaky enough as it is, and you're not allowed to be there when he-"

"Can't be there when he dies." Her eyes hardened. "I know." She frowned and her eyes narrowed slightly at her not-so-imaginary friend. It simply wasn't fair. He was her friend. She had been with him through everything…but she couldn't be there when he died.

Even though they had promised each other to be there.

"Ow, Amy! What the hell?" Sherlock said crossly. Blood welled on his fingertip. He looked at it in annoyance.

"Oh don't be such a baby, Sherly." Amy chastised him. She grabbed his finger and before he could protest, stuck in her mouth. It came out clean.

"You're so ladylike." He rolled his eyes at her. It was hot and muggy. His black hair was plastered to his forehead, blue eyes annoyed and huffy. He crossed his arms, Cupid's bow lips pouting under the hot sun.

"Could ya be any louder?" Amy said reproachfully. She cut her finger without as much as a thought. "Aunt Sharon won't be too happy if she finds us." Her red hair was pulled back in a messy ponytail.

She was ten and he was twelve.

"Now. Repeat after me." She was always so bossy. "I, Amelia Pond." Sherlock smirked. "Say your own name, smarty." Amy narrowed her eyes. The sun made them glow with a fiery green intensity.

They locked pinkies.

"I, Sherlock Holmes."

"Promise to be there for my best friend, Sherlock Bartholomew Holmes." She squeezed his pinky tighter.

"Promise to be there for my best friend, Amelia Jessica Pond." Amy grinned at him evilly. She slugged him on the shoulder.

"To the bitter end." They both synchronized.

"Amelia!"

Amy snapped out of her memories. They'd both been so naïve then. Of course, Sherlock would argue that she was naïve even now. But Sherlock wasn't exactly the most mature man himself.

"It's been two hours since I picked you up from Baker Street." The Doctor said softly, touching her shoulder. She smiled and hugged him. "Doctor, I can't thank you enough for this." His eyes were enough to say that she had.

"Now get out there and be with Sherlock!"

"Wait I'm not with Sherlock!" Amy shouted sourly. The Doctor snickered, shutting the TARDIS door in her face. She whacked the poor box before it dematerialized. Sexy made an angry sound before she completely disappeared.


The Doctor was still chuckling at his own little joke when he heard Sexy. At first, he believed it to simply be her flying sound, but as he listened closer…

The tall, gangly man straightened and paled. "Sexy…" he said cautiously, making his way to console. "Whatchu makin' that sound for…?" The Doctor reached slowly for a lever to land them.

The TARDIS jerked wildly, throwing the room into disarray and knocking the Doctor across it.

"Ow! Hey!" the Doctor yelped, holding his head. It had taken quite a knock against the wall. "Bad Sexy, what the hell do you think you're doing?!" The time machine seemed to swell with fury before throwing him to the floor again.

"Knock it off! Where are you taking us?" He grabbed on to the railing as she thrashed again. A book smacked him in the face.

"You're not gonna tell me, are you?" the Doctor asked, bemoaning the fact that Sexy was a woman. Well, a time machine. Well, a woman time machine type thing that got very angry very easily and was emotionally sensitive…

"I'll have to figure out what you want myself, won't I?"

The machine gave off a more peaceful whirr to affirm his inquiry.

The Doctor sighed and gripped the railing as Sexy raged at him a bit more.

And he braced himself for what would undoubtedly be a very long ride as the TARDIS dragged him through time and space.


"Mrs. Hudson?" Amy knocked on the landlady's door rather demandingly. After a while, she had managed to tame her enflamed cheeks at the Doctor's childishly idiotic statement. She was not with Sherlock. She wanted to be with Sherlock.

As in, be there with him until he died, but that didn't seem to be happening!

Amy felt a brief flash of anger at her imaginary friend. But she quickly smothered it when Mrs. Hudson answered her hammering. The redhead released a sigh of relief she didn't know she had been holding. "Good morning, Mrs. Hudson!" Amy smiled, hugging her. How long had it been?

"Oh Amy! I almost didn't recognize the voice for a moment!" Mrs. Hudson shook a playfully stern finger at her. "Shame, shame dear." Her wrinkled mouth twisted into a worried frown. "It's been too long. You ought to visit more. Sherlock gets awfully lonely." The landlady looked at Amy with slight reproach, as a mother might at a disobedient daughter.

"You are visiting today, yes?" Amy nodded. "Then I suppose I'll get your key." Mrs. Hudson shuffled away and returned mere moments later. Mere moments that left Amy with her fear. That nagging, persistent fear she simply could not shake off. When the old woman finally reappeared again, Amy had to fight to not tell her everything. Like Sherlock, she trusted Mrs. Hudson as her own mother, a confidant.

"Here you go dear." She smiled, kissing Amy's forehead affectionately. Mrs. Hudson sympathized with the redhead's inability to "keep track of anything" and kept the key safe in her own flat. She just didn't know that Amy tended to lose objects in black holes, supernovae, and various other space anomalies. And Amy was not about to be the one who gave Mrs. Hudson a heart attack first.

She and Sherlock had a pool going on that one.

"Thank you." Amy murmured softly. The woman gave her a once over, slightly worried.

"Are you alright, dear? You look a bit…" she gestured to her face. "Peaky. Is something the matter?" Amy swallowed. She couldn't possibly tell her…so she only smiled and laughed.

"No, m'am."

Mrs. Hudson looked unconvinced. But with an odd look that Amy did not quite miss, she let it go. "Alright. I think they're still both fast asleep not quite sure Sherlock never really sleeps anymore…" she tottered off muttering. The door shut behind her. Amy looked up, anxious, and let that slight fear have its' way at her heart again.

Sherlock was going to die today and there wasn't a thing she could do to stop it. Amy, his best friend. She was just supposed to let him die. She had stopped genocides, and yet… the Doctor couldn't allow her to save one man. One man that meant so very much to her, more than anyone, simply because his death kept the universe in balance.

If she saved him, she and the Doctor would have to go through that whole business of righting the universe again. Very tricky, very very weird. Her timeline had been altered so many times and sometimes it was hard to distinguish one life from the other.

So, she couldn't save Sherlock.

But Amy wouldn't just stand there feeling sad and sorry, burdened with this future knowledge. No, dammit, she was going to make the most of this hour left with her friend and make it the best they ever had!

With a toss of her flaming red hair, Amy clicked hurriedly up the stairs. She unlocked the door and was ready to swoop in and drag Sherlock out the door when she heard his voice.

"Hello?" His wonderful baritone voice filled the flat and she smiled. Amy could've jumped for joy. If her legs hadn't suddenly lost all ability to move and her tongue hadn't suddenly died in her mouth and….if these…if these damn tears hadn't sprung to her eyes! He was her best friend. And she was going to lose him. Losing him…would be like losing the Doctor. Ripping her heart out.

"Hello? You're not a burglar, you'd have subdued me by…" Sherlock was standing in front of her, still the same. He was even still in the same house clothes, for Gods sake! However, his blue eyes were wide and showing a hint of concern. If Amy didn't know any better, she'd say that Sherlock was frightened by the sight of her crying. She let a giggle burst from her lips and she swallowed.

"Stupid bloody chair!" She cursed, kicking at the thing and holding her foot in mock pain. "Why the hell do you even keep these things around?" the redhead cursed at him, narrowing her eyes in anger. "You barely even sit as it is, Sherly!" Sherlock stood stock still, simply staring at her.

Was it her overly emotional imagination, or did he look horrified?

He stood there, looking at her with confusion evident, painstakingly so, on his face. He was standing there, hair still mussed, eyes still observing, heart still beating, breathing...Amy launched herself at him fiercely and hugged him. Sherlock started.

"Amy." He stood ever so awkwardly in her embrace, hands to his sides, body tense, rigid. "What are you doing here?" Gently but forcefully, Sherlock removed her from his being, hands on her shoulders. She looked at him ferociously, green eyes ablaze with some sort of anger that made Sherlock curious. It seemed as if the anger itself was only partially directed at him, the rest being projected on to an unknown variable that was probably currently suffering for its' crimes in some dark, remote place. He internally shivered.

"Did the Doctor shag and run?" Sherlock broke the musings with a chuckle and smirk. Amy blushed. "No, we've never-I mean- that's not why I'm here!" she finally stammered out uncomfortably over his laughter.

"The Doctor brought me back." Amy muttered, smiling. "Gave me an hour and then I have to leave again." Her eyes flickered briefly, but it was a mere wisp of emotion before her smile grew larger. Sherlock swallowed. How he hated that smile.

"So, let's go!"

"Where?"

Amy rolled her eyes and tossed her red hair back with a challenging flourish. "Anywhere, stupid!" She smacked him hard on the chest. He narrowed his blue eyes at the word. Sherlock sighed, looking to the door before looking to the woman planted so firmly in front of him, hands on her hips. He took her hands in his and made her sit on the couch.

"I'm staying home today." The man said somewhat gravely. Ordinary people might sound thrilled about the very prospect of a day off, but Sherlock muttered the words like as a curse. Amy raised an eyebrow at him and felt his forehead jokingly. "You feelin' all right, Sherly? Last time I heard, you hated staying at home."

Sherlock sighed and flopped back, propping his feet in her lap aggressively. "Why are you really here, Amelia?" He used her given name as a ploy to coerce the truth from his friend. "I mean, shouldn't you be off and about saving orphans from the future or planning new ways for the Doctor to fall madly in love with you, even when you know that the very idea is quite frankly ridiculous and childish within itself?" He finished, opening an eye to look at her callously.

Amy's eyes hardened to match his and she shoved his feet off with harsh force.

"Why do you always feel the need to bring that up?" She asked coldly. Sherlock could not find a worthy answer, for once. Why did he feel the need to bring up her shortcomings, when obviously she knew of them herself? He normally wasn't so vicious. And for the life of her, Amy could not figure out why he had decided to start now. Of all times for them to fight, today was not that day. "I wanted to stay with you today, not him." Amy said. "I chose you over him, can't you be happy for once? Please?"

As soon as the sound of her words died out, she felt guilty.

Sherlock however, sighed.

"I've upset you."

"Figure that out all by yourself, did ya?" she snapped back. He raised an eyebrow at her, as if to say, 'Really?'

"One hour, yes?" Sherlock coolly responded, standing. Amy could only nod, not trusting her mouth after it had just betrayed her in such a childish manner.

"Alright, let me get dressed and we'll head off."


He flounced down the stairs ten minutes later, hair damp and now fully clothed. Amy looked him up and down. No signs of anything bothering him. No impending doom. However, there was a slight problem. She narrowed her eyes in anger.

"Where's the scarf?"

"I didn't want to wear it today."

"You always wear it."

"I wanted a change."

"Why?" Amy fired out suddenly. Sherlock stopped, looking pensive. "Because I don't feel like running around all day in this ghastly weather and having a scarf flutter about my face, does that answer your question?" he snapped. She flushed. She was supposed to be enjoying this last hour with him, not ruining it and turning everything they said into an argument.

Instead of snapping right back at him, like a normal Amy would do, she bowed her head and muttered a quick, "Sorry." There was a moment of awkward silence, her staring at the floor, trying not to fight with him for once, and him, confused. Sherlock Holmes was never, never confused. But…Amy was acting strange. Stranger than usual and that was extremely…not good. She seemed…damn, what was that emotion again? Think, think…sad. Yes, Amelia seemed sad. Melancholy. Forlorn for some ridiculous reason. John said that you were supposed to listen to people when they got one of these…emotions. It made them feel better.

Sherlock opened his mouth, but nothing came out. He wanted to ask, but wasn't sure how. He shut his mouth, deciding against the whole 'human' aspect, and instead grabbed her gloved hand in his. "Well, c'mon then." The tall man muttered, dragging her impatiently down the stairs as a child might. One might even say that Sherlock Holmes was a child. That, however, was not the case. He was far from childish…he was…different.

Freak.

Damn Amy and her human emotional emotion things! She always had a way of somehow transferring them to him. His blue eyes sparked. He would not be beguiled by her…feeling things. He simply wouldn't tolerate it. Just before opening the front door, he grabbed her shoulders and surprised her, making her look up. Her green eyes were doleful for but a moment before reflecting the female equivalent of himself.

Not as sexy or sociopathic of course, but in a sense.

"What?" Amy asked, planting her feet firmly and putting her hands demandingly on her hips. "What are you lookin' at me like that for?"

"If you don't cheer up and stop having an Amy emotion this minute, I will build some sort of universal cell phone, or…" He glanced down. "Steal the one protruding so very conspicuously from your back pocket and spend the next hour negotiating for the Doctor to come back and remove you from this time period. Are we clear?" Sherlock asked, staring intensely and somewhat crossly at her. The redhead glared back.

The pair stared at each other for minutes.

"Well what are you waiting for?" Amy asked him. "Let's go." Sherlock made an irked sound and grabbed her gloved hand, dragging her out the door.

"Going out for a bit, Mrs. Hudson!"

"Oh, goodbye Sherlock! Bye Amy!"

He hailed a taxi quite easily. Once they got inside, Sherlock crossed one leg over the other and stared out the window impassively, brow furrowed, blue eyes distant. Amy did the same, in a sense. She was a bit on edge as of late. Completely understandable.

How was it going to happen? The Doctor hadn't, no, wouldn't, tell her. It could be anything, anything at all. An automobile accident, he could get shot, drown, blow himself up during one of his experiments…Amy swallowed uneasily.

This bloody idiot was a walking disaster! He didn't even look both ways before dashing across the road, for Godssake!

"Stop." His deep voice delicately ripped from her melancholy reveries. She opened her mouth to explain.

"Here sir?" the cabbie asked incredulously.

Sherlock exited swiftly without another word. Leaving Amy with an expectant cab driver. She sighed and paid him. When she got out of the cab, he was standing still, hands in his pockets. A brief breeze ruffled his hair.

"Do you remember this place?" he asked her.

Amy looked around. An old, but sturdy wooden bench tucked quietly away in a corner of the park. Concealed by a few trees and an ideal spot to simply sit and think. Grass everywhere in a great circle, dew still clinging to its blades from the heavy fog last night. She gave Sherlock a confused look. "What are we doin' here?" she asked. He simply shrugged, looking away, a curious expression on his pale face. He seemed almost…awkward. More shut off than usual, but different.

She wandered over to the old bench she used to sit at. "Why'd you bring me here, Sherly?" Amy asked again. Sherlock gave her a hard look. "It's obvious." He said. Amy looked at the bench. This was where she used to sit and read…or people watch. She'd been people watching the first time she had met Sherlock. No one usually noticed her before, but him…well he did his weird deduction thing and felt someone watching him immediately. And this was how he met her the first time. When he was ten. And already a well trained sociopath, mind you.

"People watching?" He had sauntered up to her, asking arrogantly. "How droll." He hadn't even bothered to sit down. He simply looked her over with those cold, calculating eyes of his. Noticing her notes on the people, he snorted at them and casually leaned against a tree.

"Wrong. Wrong. Wrong." He had said.

Amy had opened her mouth to tell him off in indignation, but he had already started rambling.

"The one over there is a nurse, not a…"he had leaned over her shoulder, "'workaholic trapped in a cubicle, addicted to caffeine.'" He looked to the woman they were staring at. "She works long hours in the hospital and she has that quiet, ridiculous beside manner about her that proves she's got a relative in the hospital. She may even be taking care of said relative, who is her daughter, guessing by the way she is playing with that little stuffed animal keychain."

His blue eyes had been so cold and empty back then.

She had had a horrible mouth for an eight year old.

Amy had promptly stood up and swore at him, to his amusement. Well, it may have been amusing, she had never been quite sure. A corner of his mouth had lifted slightly. She remembered going home and pondering that smile, wondering whether it was cocky and arrogant or simply amused. She realized now that she simply didn't have an answer. It was just his smile.

"Well who are you to act so high and mighty? These people could all be your friends, or you could simply be blowin' smoke out your arse!" She had crossed her arms indignantly. But even back then she saw the wisdom in his eyes. That remarkable ability to see through everyone and everything, an odd yet amazing endowment. She had known that he wasn't lying. She just didn't like the prospect of being wrong at that age. It still irked her.

"I could..." Sherlock had said, that half grin still present. "But how do you know if I didn't?" He had waited for her response until his head suddenly turned.

"Good day, Miss...?"

Amy had frowned. "Sod off."

He had simply shown up the next day, sitting in her spot nonetheless. And that was when she had hit him for the first time. A great big punch to the jaw had sent him sprawling to the ground.

And he had cried. For the first and last time.

"It was the first place I saw you, Amelia. And the last." Sherlock grabbed her and sat her forcibly down on the bench. It creaked ominously under the weight of their older, adult selves. The look on his face was a matter of urgent importance, but whatever the matter was, it didn't seem like he'd tell her. Instead he said, "Amy, I need you to leave. We can't 'hang out'" he quoted with his fingers, "today. Any day but today."

Amy glared at him. He glared just as defiantly back. "I see you four times," she began slowly, "four times out of one. Whole. Year." Her tone was low, but powerful and filled with rage. "Only four and the one time I can convince the Doctor otherwise, you don't want to," she threw his words back at him. "'hang out' today?"

Sherlock nodded.

"Alright what it is going on?!" She asked him. "You've been acting like a psycho all day." Sherlock opened his mouth. "More than usual, now can it and tell me what the hell is going on with you or so help me." The redhead grabbed him by his coat front. "I will end you, Sherlock Holmes."

For an absurd moment, Amy thought that this was how it would end.

She would kill Sherlock and that would be how he died.

But then he removed her hands from his coat forcibly and sighed. "Stop being so theatrical. I just need to…" Sherlock snapped his eyes open and looked at her as if some realization had dawned upon him.

"I'm going somewhere and you can't go." He said coldly. His eyes were blue chips of ice on snow.

"Just try and stop me." She retaliated. "I'm going."

"You can't."

"Why not?"

"Well for one thing, you're looking at me as if I'll be hit by a train at any given moment." Sherlock snapped.

"Do I?" she asked innocently.

"Or as if my body will suddenly stop functioning without reason." He retaliated. The pair stared each other down for a moment, searching for weaknesses skilled in being hidden, looking for signs of a problem that couldn't be found.

Amy finally broke the silence with a defensively, cheeky, "Well, you could." And Sherlock followed the statement with a cold laugh, a mean laugh that froze the very air and killed puppies. "God." He said, laughing at her. His blue eyes were filled with mirth and it was a shocking contrast to that laugh.

"I want to protect you." He finally said. The phrase tumbled awkwardly from his lips, his gift of skillful tongue deserting him with the sentence.

Amy raised an eyebrow. "From what?"

A great, mad, unrestrained anger seemed to well up in the consulting detective in a instant. "I can't tell you that don't you see?!" he said thunderously, beseechingly and yet so furiously at the same time. Sherlock moved his hands to shake her, but threaded them through his own black locks instead. He wanted to say something, but…Amy knew that he wouldn't. If Sherlock didn't want to discuss something, Sherlock wouldn't discuss something. It was quite simple.

"Sherlock you're scarin' me." Amy warned.

He blinked and looked up, sighing as he did so.

"An hour, yes?" Sherlock leaned back against the bench and crossed one leg over the other. "Well then Amelia," he steepled his fingers and smiled at her. "Let's make the most of it, shall we?"


And for the duration of that hour, they talked. It didn't seem like very long at all to them. An hour felt like a minute in Sherlock's constantly roving mind, and in Amy's, it felt as if any second she wouldn't see him anymore, so she might as well cram everything into one giant story.

She talked about the Doctor, the aliens she had befriended…the Doctor some more. Her voice took on a slightly peeved tone when she spoke of a rather enigmatic woman named River Song. It was a curious thing for Amy to be jealous, and Sherlock wanted to hear more, but she skipped right along to other amazing adventures amid the stars. Her green eyes lit up like Christmas whenever her lips said, "Doctor." She talked of their enemies.

The idea of the Weeping Angels intrigued him. Sherlock liked the idea of killers that turned to stone. They were clever, they were crafty, they could bide their time…it was fascinating. The idea of a lonely killer, stalking its prey, turning to stone before it could be harmed was an interesting one. He remarked that he'd very much like to catch and study one.

Amy laughed and said that she didn't want to rescue him from the nineteenth century.

When Sherlock's turn to talk came, he was hesitant. He only remembered the importance of cases, he insisted, nothing of sentiment. And yet as he kept talking, he found that he did. He remembered every ridiculous little conversation he and John had had, every comment exchanged between he and Donovan and Anderson…everything. It was a curious little thing and Sherlock wasn't quite sure if he liked it or not.

He talked of each case with fleeting, tangible detail. Each experiment made his eyes light up with that childish excitement he'd kept hidden all those years. Every little spat with Lestrade made him chuckle quietly. When he talked about Mrs. Hudson, there was affection in his voice, thick and unused to being used. When he spoke of John, Sherlock actually laughed.

It made Amy happy to see him like this. He was her best friend, and while that would never change, she was certainly glad that he had found people to talk to while she perused about the galaxy.

The person of Moriarty both intrigued and alarmed her. Yet Sherlock glossed over the subject when she tried to compel him to share more stories. He simply told her, begrudgingly, that he was an evil man and needed to put down as soon as possible. All signs of his early merriment vanished and Amy found herself sitting next to the old Sherlock. The eight year old sociopath with little to no regard for other humans and under the impression that he was great deal better than they ever could be.

She then brought up Donovan and Anderson to lighten the mood and Sherlock groaned, flopping back like an old gossip. He put his feet in her lap and muttered that they should just get married already. He talked about the numerous different ways he knew they were sleeping together, and how hilarious it was. He broke out into a grin again.

"At one point I arrive for a case, and Sally's wearing his shirt from yesterday!" Sherlock threw his arms in the air. "How stupid can two people be?!" he asked of her, of the universe as if it was a crime that they were ever conceived. "She'll get pregnant." He affirmed to the sky. Amy only laughed.

"What?" he asked, puzzled. He sat up, hair a mess and gave her an annoyed stare.

"Nothin'."

A horn honked and they both looked up.

"That'd be mine." Sherlock said curtly. As Amy flipped her flaming red hair to look, he bristled with unease. He could have kicked himself. That was what happened when he spent time with Amy. She made him more…human. And it was always so much more difficult to recover after she left, always a challenge to sew back on that careful mask of indifference after each visit.

So a small part of him was relieved that it would be the last.

But only a small part.

When Amy turned to look at him, however, Sherlock had composed himself.

"I have to go." He said bluntly, swiftly standing and pulling her with him. Amy narrowed her eyes at his sudden change of mood. His blue eyes kept leaping from point to point, as if looking for some great danger she wasn't yet aware of. She tried to catch his attention.

"Yea whatever Sherly are you sure you're alright?" He turned his head a different direction each time she tried to stare at him. Sherlock still had a hold of her hand, and now he had even pulled her subconsciously behind him, as if shielding her.

Amy hit him on the head sharply.

"OW! What?" Sherlock looked at her reproachfully. "Yes, I'm fine now shut up and listen." The consulting detective took in their close proximity and withdrew a great deal. He still held her hand fast in his own, as if reluctant to let it go. Amy was sure, however, that it must have been for some other reason because his blue eyes were their usual calm, collected selves.

"Take care of yourself, Amelia." He said stiffly. Amy nodded, gently pulling her hand away. "Okay…?" she said. "You too. Now go on." She crossed her arms as if cold and a faint smile came to her face. "Wouldn't wanna miss your cab."

He seemed confused by her sudden withdrawal. But Sherlock only looked to the cab anxiously and muttered a soft, "Yes, I would." Yet the thought seemed quietly directed towards himself. Pensive.

"Sherlock!" Amy said as the driver impatiently leaned on his horn.

"I'm fine." Sherlock repeated again in irritation. "Goodbye Amy." He kissed her cheek swiftly, touching her red hair and dashing off before she could blink. It was a rare gesture of intimacy, something the detective wasn't familiar with and certainly something she didn't expect.

He dashed off to the cab with that mad, impatient stride of his.

She couldn't help but call out to him one last time. "Sherlock!" The consulting detective stopped and waited. Amy smiled. "Be careful, alright?" He nodded cordially before stepping in. She watched the taxi until it was completely out of sight. She watched him go, anxious and worried and praying that for once the Doctor was wrong, that for once he didn't know everything and Sherlock would be fine.

A cab rolled up next to her some five minutes later.

"Cab for a Miss Amelia Pond?" The driver asked, leaning out the window. He smiled at her. He was a reasonably good looking chap, cute grin on his face, bits of stubble here and there…Amy couldn't help but smile back. Yet if there was one thing both the Doctor and Sherlock had told her, it was "Never get in unfamiliar cabs, Amy."

"I didn't order a cab, sorry." Amy said slowly. She took a slight step back. Noticing her hesitation, the driver held his hands up. "Whoa, whoa, it's alright. I was sent by a Mr. uh…" He scrambled for his clipboard. "Sherlock Holmes?" He looked up, smiling. "You know him, sweetheart?"

Amy nodded and felt relief crash over her.

"Well good." His brown eyes sparkled happily. "Then there's nothing to worry about if it's a ca ya know, is there sweetheart?" A slight Irish accent lingered under his words. He smiled at her again, a lovely smile filled to the brim with such charisma that Amy couldn't help but smile back again. She got in the cab and shut the door.

Turning, the cabbie extended his hand. "Pleasure." The two shook hands and he kissed hers smoothly. "You're a cute one." He whispered huskily against her skin. Amy laughed. "You're not so bad yourself there."

He swept his baseball cap from his head to reveal brown hair, short and closely cropped. His eyes were intense, brown, and wonderfully playful. His mouth twitched in a never-ending puppy dog like smile. "It's what I do, Amelia." The cabbie inclined his head in a small bow. His phone beeped and he glanced at it.

"Oh! We're late." His smile turned apologetic. "Sorry." He grimaced. With one last look, he turned and put his hands back on the wheel.

As the car started, Amy looked into his mirror. "Sorry, didn't catch your name?" His eyes twinkled.

That smile crept up on his face again.

"Richard Brook. Glad to have you."

And the two drove off.


So. Had to leave it on a cliffhanger, I'm sorry! It seemed appropriate, given the circumstance. You like? Review. Please I love love love reading them! Until next time…