I'm sorry. I'm really very sorry, but I had to do it. That being said, now you can read on as our little team of companions journeys to ensure Sarah Jane didn't die in vain. Thanks for the reviews, even if you were upset, and on with the chapter!

Dobby's Polka-Dotted Sock

Chapter Seven

"Amy! Amy, are you in there? It's me, Rory!" Amy and Rose visibly relaxed at the familiar voice, and she hurried to get the door back open.

"Careful, Amy," Mels warned, starting to rise from the chair, but the door was already open.

"Thanks, little lady," a tall man with an American accent pushed past her into the room, and she turned an accusing glare on her fiancé.

"Sorry, but we really don't have much time," he explained quietly. "And Mickey and Martha know him, he's—"

"Jack!" Rose cried in delight, allowing the man to lift her in a hug.

"Rose Tyler! Was wondering where you'd got to," the man called Jack said with a grin.

"Ok, so what now?" Mickey asked as he and a woman who could only be Martha Jones shut and relocked the doors, once more quieting the alarm. "We haven't really got much time and—"

"Where are we?" Martha finished for him. It was a fair question, as not even Amy knew, and she'd been standing inside it for a good fifteen minutes now.

"I don't believe it…" Jack said, his head turning this way and that as he removed Roses' arms.

"What is it?" The blonde asked.

"I didn't recognize it from the outside and they never looked like this in the intelligence photos—"

"What photos?" Amy couldn't keep from asking.

"Uh, basically, he's from a terrible future where everyone found out the world was about to end and so they all jumped back into the past," Rory summed up.

"He's a time traveler?" She said in disbelief. Jack grinned.

"Jack Harkness from the fifty-first century. And this," he gestured around the strange room, "is a TARDIS."

TARDIS. That word…she couldn't even begin to describe the feelings it evoked from her. She felt absolutely awed, enthralled, and completely safe all at once. Those doors were just wood, true, but within them she felt at home for the first time since waking up in that cave.

"What is a TARDIS?" Mickey finally broke the silence, looking about the place with curiosity. Jack opened his mouth to reply, but—

"A Time Lord's transport. Abandoned, or the owner would've come in here to see what all the commotion was ages ago," Mels answered as she walked down the steps. Her friend faked a look of surprise and glanced the American's way. "Oh, sorry. Stole your thunder? Bless," she patted his cheek as she passed him, and he stepped back and rubbed at it. "You can get the next one, Captain."

He recovered pretty well all things considered. "Thanks, miss—?"

"Mels," her friend threw a wink over her shoulder at him. "You can call me Mels."

"Alright, Mels, how do you know so much about time travel?" Amy had to agree with his line of questioning. It felt off that Mels was here, and the way she had been saying those things…it was like trying to reconcile two different ideas. Like the outside- the picture –wasn't matching up with the inside.

"I'm a bit clever," her friend smirked, "And I had a great teacher."

Jack raised an eyebrow. "You don't seem the scholarly type."

Mels placed a hand on her hip as she turned ever-so-slightly to face him. "You'd be surprised. Course I got top marks in the practical."

Even Amy had the decency to blush, but Jack's grin only got wider as he stepped forward. "I'll bet you did."

"Careful, Captain," Mels warned though the smirk didn't leave her face.

"Anyway, Jack," Rose finally broke in. "Now that we're all here, what are we going to do?"

"You should be asking Rory," Mels answered first again, "Cause he's the one holding something."

Amy turned sharply to look at him and realized her fiancé was in fact carrying something rolled up. "Hang on, that looks like—"

"It is," he said, unraveling it to reveal The Fairytale Girl's Favorite. "It's the painting you saw in the museum. This woman, uh—"

"Sarah Jane," Mickey supplied, his eyes downcast.

"Right," Rory nodded gratefully at the other man. "She said we'd need it. It had a- a guide or something."

"The Judoon, they just—killed her," Martha said suddenly, and Amy couldn't stop the gasp that escaped. "In the other life…that didn't just happen. We- we at least could try to defend ourselves, but this…" the woman trailed off shaking her head. "Funny thing is, the reason they took me away in the first place, the plasmavore, I remember it happening two different ways. And it wasn't the police or the army that stopped it. I know someone did, but—"

"The voice," Mels said softly. "That voice you're hearing in your head. That's him, that's the one who stopped all this from happening."

"Then why did he leave?" Rose was standing off by herself, leaning against one of the columns and looking very lost. "Where did he go, where is he now?" She swallowed once, and it was quite obvious that tears were about to spill over.

"Rose." Jack placed a hand on her shoulder, but a sob still tore itself from the blonde's throat.

"He's left us, Jack! He's left me! Why- why can't I remember him? I can't even remember his face!"

Amy looked away, feeling uncomfortable with the emotional display, and it was because of this that she saw it. Writing in the painting. "Are those numbers?"

Rory held it up flat against a wall so they could all see.

"Yeah! Numbers and symbols," Mickey agreed.

"Some kind of code, but what?" Martha muttered.

"Coordinates!" Jack announced with glee, already tapping away at his vortex manipulator. Amy felt the stirrings of some kind of memory—not words this time. Instead, she glanced up at the mismatched control panel, almost as if expecting someone to be there pulling levers and throwing switches in a mad dance. Mels snorted.

"You're going to take all of us across the universe with a space hopper?" At his disgruntled look, she held up a hand in defense. "I'm not saying vortex manipulators don't have their advantages, but they're not built for seven people."

"Then how do we get there?" Mickey inquired, and the girl just gave him a look.

"We've already established this is a mode of transport."

"Yes, for Time Lords," Martha laughed in disbelief. "How are we supposed to fly this thing?"

"Can't be much different from stealing a car," Mels shrugged, her eyes sparkling with mischief. Amy and Rory looked at each other in despair. Not this again.

"Well, it looks like the coordinates are entered here…" Jack mused, stepping up to an old-fashioned typewriter set into the console.

"I think this dial controls all the time stuff," Rose offered, having calmed down enough to blink back her tears, and pointed out a strange little dial that looked like part of a children's toy. "And- and this pump thing, I'll bet it boosts the engines or something."

Mickey stepped forward next. "Looks like this button calibrates it."

"And this screen's got to be a way of looking outside so we can see where we're going," Martha suggested, pulling it over toward the Captain and switching it on. "And I think this needs to be kept level."

"I'll get the thermo couplings," Rory said, depositing the painting in the chair and heading underneath the console. But what could she do?

"Don't forget the stabilizers," Mels reminded.

"You mean the blue boringers?" Amy couldn't help but ask with a teasing grin. Her friend rolled her eyes in a sort of fond exasperation, an expression that seemed unnatural to Mels' face. And yet she had felt that the other would understand the joke, at least as much as she did.

Mels shook her head again to clear it and went to stand next to Jack, the two beginning to press buttons and pull switches in a very methodic way. It was quite dull, really.

"But how does it start?" Jack asked aloud in frustration. "I mean, how does it just sort of—go?" If Mels' strange abundant knowledge had run out, she wasn't sure, but the other woman didn't do anything else. The group looked around, searching each other's faces for some kind of clue. Rory came back up and stood by her, looking just as lost as the rest of them.

"Well- there's the zigzag plotter…" she supplied rather lamely. "But I'm pretty sure that's for when it's parked. Oh, I don't know! He'd just pull some lever and it'd make that noise—"

"It's not supposed—" Mels started, but Amy suddenly gasped, a huge smile slowly stealing across her features.

"What? Did you remember something?" Rose asked, poking her head around the center column to see. Amy didn't answer, she just walked up to the console, her hand hovering over a lever.

"Okay, kids…the wibbly lever!" With a flourish she felt that voice in her head just might be proud of, Amy Pond pulled the lever and grinned with delight as the center column pulsed up and down, the whole ship began to shake and rattle, and an achingly familiar vroop vroop filled the air.

"Ohh, who left the brakes on?" Mels complained.

"He loves that noise," Amy couldn't help but defend it. She loved it, too. She nearly didn't catch her friend's soft smile. But she heard her muttered words.

"Yes, he does."

"Somebody hold that down!" Jack ordered, pointing to a switch just out of his reach.

"Got it!" Rory replied, running around the console to do so.

"That button needs pressed!" Mels called.

"On it," she said, happy to have something to do as well.

"Everyone," Jack said, and when they were all looking at him he grinned, "we've just left Earth's atmosphere. Welcome to space."

A collective cheer was raised around the room.

"We're doing it!" Martha and Rose exclaimed, clasping their free hands together and jumping up and down.

"Space! Outer space!" Mickey kept saying in wonder.

Amy and Rory stared at each other across the console, smiles stretched across their faces from ear to ear. They had done this. They'd journeyed all the way from the caves of Lower Leadworth to the citadel of London, and now they were on their way to finding what awaited them in the Pandorica. They'd done it together.

"Look at you all…he'd be so proud." She heard it come from Mels' direction, but it was such a not-Mels thing to say, for an instant, Amy imagined her friend hadn't said it at all…someone else did. But her exuberance at their success kept her from dwelling on it.

After minimal debate, the brakes were taken off upon materialization so as not to attract much attention. Because they had made it, but now things were really getting dangerous.

"We couldn't land in exactly the same place as this box-thing," Jack explained, "There's all kinds of anti-teleportation fields set up around the room. Martha, we're going to need you to draw a map."

"Right," the woman nodded, and she and Mickey went in search of the necessary supplies.

"We should have some kind of plan," Rory suggested, "Maybe a formation to move in, so we stay organized."

"Sure, soldier," Jack grinned at him, and Rory, the Captain, and Mels began discussing tactics. Not having much else to do, Amy walked around the console to where Rose was still positioned. The other girl's euphoria had died down some now that they were here, and she had that sad frown on her face again.

"Hey," Amy said quietly, and Rose looked up at her. "You ok?"

"Yeah, course," the blonde was quick to reassure, "I'm fine."

"You weren't fine earlier," she couldn't help but point out gently. "None of us can remember what he looks like, either. So what's really bothering you?" She waited for the other to speak, and caught some of a rather heated debate between the three strategists of the group.

"You can't take point by yourself, Captain, it's too dangerous!" Mels lectured.

Rory gave their friend an incredulous look. "Since when did you worry about danger?"

She thought their friend might rip her black locks out in frustration, the glare she sent Rory's way was so intense. "It doesn't matter, Rory! Point is, he's thinking of himself as a human shield—but you're not!" The last part was directed at the American.

Jack blinked as a look of realization came to his face. "I- I'm not. I'm not immortal…I can die?"

"Yeah, and that's sort of bad," Rory said uncertainly at the look of wonder on the Captain's face.

The other man shook his head slowly. "Funny thing is, Rory, in the other-life…for a long time I wished I could. Worried about it all the time, when it all was finally going to end. But now," he gave a bitter chuckle, "it'd be really useful to have that back. Figures." Jack sighed and seemed to come out of his reverie. "Well, let's get this all figured out so that things are back to normal around here…well, I say normal."

"That's it, really," Rose suddenly spoke softly.

"What's it?" Amy asked.

"When things go back to normal. Thing is, I knew Mickey, Martha, and Jack—even Sarah Jane's name was familiar. But I didn't know you or Rory or Mels. And you didn't know us."

"I guess…although—"

"What?" The other woman leaned forward in interest, and Amy paused to collect her thoughts and figure out what she was trying to say.

"Well, when I saw you from that alleyway, I didn't know you. I didn't think, 'Oh, there's Rose Tyler.' But, it was like- like I recognized you."

"Recognized me?" Rose repeated.

"Yeah, like I'd seen you before. In a photo or something. What's the matter?" For Rose was shaking her head with a rueful smile on her face.

"That's what I was afraid of. This voice, we're all hearing it—we all know him from the other life. But- I think you knew him last. You and Rory, and Mels."

Amy blinked. "I hadn't thought about it, but yeah, that makes sense."

"So where am I, then?" She had nothing to say that could provide encouragement or comfort, so Amy stayed silent. Martha brought the map over to Jack, and the blonde wiped at her watering eyes a bit as she and Amy went to join the group.

"Ok, so we're not far," Jack said, "So Mels and I will take point, Amy, Martha, and Rose are in the middle, with Rory and Mickey bringing up the rear."

"Isn't that a bit uneven?" Martha pointed out with a raised eyebrow, and Amy crossed hers arms, giving Rory a look that clearly conveyed she was not happy with him.

"Martha, you have medical training, right?" Mels asked, and when the woman nodded, she continued. "Well, that makes you a valuable asset. Amy's the one who's gotten us here, so she needs to be protected, and since we have already two on each side, that leaves Rose with you both in the middle." It was sound reasoning, and so they grudgingly agreed.

"It's really just a short walk down that corridor, a left, and then the fourth door on the right," Martha told them, tracing the path she'd drawn with her finger. "They don't have stationed guards; the Judoon just patrol the halls."

"Let's get started, then," Mickey suggested, and so Amy found herself following Jack, Mels, and Martha to the door. As the Captain inched it open and peered out, she couldn't help turning back to look at Rory's tense face.

"Be careful," she whispered, and he nodded once.

"All clear," Jack murmured under his breath. He and Mels exchanged a glance, nodded, and the two edged out, Martha stepping out after them and Amy close behind. The halls were unremarkable, sterile and brightly lit, but just the sight of that was enough to make the other woman's shoulders tense up. Amy reached out and grabbed Martha's hand, giving it a reassuring squeeze.

The woman turned to smile at her gratefully, mouthing the word, "Thanks."

The group walked on tip-toe, softly as they could down the corridor, the Captain and her childhood friend taking quick glances around the corner and then motioning for the others to go ahead. Amy, Martha, and Rose hurried forward into the next hall, but stopped after ten paces and waited for the two leaders to retake their position.

But a quick look back showed that Jack and Mels had taken up places one on either side of the corridor they'd just left, hiding and guns out.

"What are you doing?" Mickey hissed, but the American just tapped his ear. They all listened.

Heavy footfalls, marching steadily toward them.

"They're going to catch up soon, unless we hold them off for you," the Captain spoke quickly and quietly. "Rory, you take up point, Mickey, stay in the back."

Jack easily gave off the air of a soldier preparing for battle. But— "Mels, you can't!" Amy whispered as loud as she dared, and the other girl just raised an eyebrow as if in challenge. "This isn't just for having a laugh or stealing a car, this is serious!" This just wasn't adding up, it was all very wrong—Mels from Leadworth didn't do this. But hadn't somebody else?

"Oh, I know, Amy. Believe me." And her friend turned her attention back to the other corridor. "But I definitely miss my blaster."

"Let's move," Rory finally ordered, coming to the front and pulling her away. The footsteps of the Judoon were very loud now, and Amy looked back to see Jack and Mels jump out into the open, guns firing.

Rory pulled her into a run, and the others were keeping pace. Her fiancé stopped before the door Martha had indicated and kicked it in, rushing inside. Amy made to follow, but a pained cry made her stop and whip her head back to see—

Mels was falling to the ground, her face contorted in agony, and red, red blood was blossoming through her shirt and jacket. Their eyes locked for just a second, before her childhood friend clenched them shut in pain.

"Mels!" She cried, starting forward, but Mickey's strong arms grabbed her shoulders and half-dragged, half-carried her toward the room. "We have to help her!"

"We can't!" Mickey insisted, and now Rose was pulling on her, too.

"No!" Her friend, her best friend aside from Rory in the whole village of Leadworth, she couldn't just leave her. But now Rory himself grabbed her around the waist and carried her fully inside.

I'm sorry.

"Get off of me!"

I'm sorry.

"Get out of my head! Sarah Jane, Mels—what is the point of you!" She was crying and screaming at who, she didn't really know. But Rose was right—the voice, why wasn't he here to stop this? Why wasn't he helping them? They needed him—Mels needed him right now!—and he wasn't here. The sound of gunshots had stopped and she didn't know if that was because Jack had won or he was dead.

"I think we're going to find out the point," Martha said, and Amy looked at her questioningly before her eyes fell on what was behind the other woman. The Pandorica, beginning to glow. "It's opening."

So, really loaded chapter. I realize that Rory and Amy's knowledge of the thermo couplings and the wibbly lever come from a little short filmed after season five, but that scene could really fit in anywhere as there was no specific time given to the mini-episode. So, I'm sort of taking a liberty there by including it. Also, Amy made a reference to a deleted scene from "Flesh and Stone" where she gets to see pictures of previous companions, Rose among them. Anyway, thanks for reading and let me know what you think in a review!