Rory heard the front door slam shut, and he assumed that the Doctor was now ushering Katniss and Peeta out of their suite. He turned to Amy and River, and he saw that they had arrived at the same conclusion. River switched off her communicator before carefully placing it in her satchel. The three then hurried into Amy's bedroom and fussed with the garment bags to make it seem as if wardrobe fittings had actually occurred.

"That all seemed fairly innocuous, didn't it?" questioned Rory. "They just seemed to talk about the pictures, and the Doctor didn't need to lock us in for that." He watched as identical, steely expressions crossed over the faces of both mother and daughter. As irritated as they were with the Doctor for locking them out of the sitting room, they were even more irritated with themselves for not anticipating his plan. Rory sighed and continued. "I mean, apart from that speechifying bit at the end, but the Doctor likes making speeches, and he didn't even go all Oncoming Storm on them, so it was actually fairly unremarkable for a Doctor speech…."

"You're right, of course," River commented. "And I'm guessing that you haven't even talked to the Doctor since this morning, so it's not as if he would have known whether you had overlooked some vital piece of information or something. Did anything happen today in training?"

"Not really," answered Amy quickly, prompting River to look at her suspiciously. "It wasn't a bad day all in all-Rory even behaved himself." Her eyes darkened. "Mostly," she amended, and Rory assumed that she was remembering their disagreement that was no longer a disagreement. "And the Doctor had been right that Finnick would seek us out, but that seemed to go fine."

Any further discussion was cut off by the Doctor throwing open the bedroom door and looking very suspiciously at the trio.

"Doctor!" Amy exclaimed, albeit somewhat half-heartedly. "I could have been undressing!"

Rory noted that Amy's pretend outrage was blandly dismissed by the Doctor with a wave of his hand. "Don't be silly, Pond. I checked Rory's room first-knocking, mind you, because I haven't forgotten that incident on the dwarf moon of Melinae III. When no one answered, I realized that the three of you must be in Amy's room. And since no one tried to make a fuss by banging at the door when I locked you three out of the common area, I naturally assumed that it was because you had other means of finding out what was going on." The Doctor looked meaningfully at River before continuing. "To be perfectly fair, I would have been fairly disappointed if you lot hadn't been listening in." The Doctor barely waited a beat before continuing. "Since we don't have to go over that conversation, how was training today?"

Amy again spoke first. "We were offered the candies, and we ate them, so we should be in, right?"

"So I was told. I'll expect that we'll know more tomorrow after you're done with your private sessions."

"About that," Amy began, but the Doctor cut her off with a wave of his hand. "Let's discuss that at dinner. Anything else happen today?" With the last question, the Doctor idly began to brush the face of his watch.

The watch, Rory recalled suddenly. He was meant to remind the Doctor about the Gamemakers. Before he could say anything, the Doctor caught Rory staring at the watch. In a remarkably fluid motion, the Doctor let his hand fall away from the watch and stood up to stretch. "Nothing, eh? Not sure if that's good or bad. In any case, if I'm not mistaken, which I'm not, River does need to get the final outfits to the Gamemakers to review in, oh, about an hour. River, you deal with Amy, and I'll take Rory. I have a feeling that this deadline is going to be taken particularly seriously, and I have no interest in dealing with tedious bureaucrats right now. Or ever, come to think of it."

The Doctor swept out of the room, and Rory scrambled after him with the four garment bags. The Doctor had already sat himself in a chair as Rory entered his room and laid out the bags on the bed. He had started to unzip the bags when the Doctor spoke up.

"You didn't think that I was really serious about helping you with your clothes, did you?" asked the Doctor, slightly aghast.

Rory looked confusedly at him. "I did, actually. You know, because of the not drawing unnecessary attention thing." The Doctor rolled his eyes, walked over to the garment bags, gratuitously flashed the sonic at each of them, and then peered at Rory. "Number four will look best with your eyes, so that'll be the first choice by far. Two is, appropriately enough, the second best, so choose that as the back-up. There. Done."

Rory saw no reason not to go along with the Doctor's recommendations, so he zipped up the bags before taking a seat on the floor. Besides, he didn't want to waste any more time because the Doctor needed to know about the gamemakers. "Doctor, I need to tell you about…."

"How are you doing, Rory?" interrupted the Doctor.

"Fine, thanks," replied Rory automatically. "Wait, what? Did you just ask me how I was doing?"

"I did."

"But, but why?"

"Because sometimes you're too focused on taking care of others to take care of yourself. I haven't forgotten the kitchen incident, and I saw how you reacted before the parade. Contrary to what you, Amy, and a rather distressing number of sentient life forms in general believe, I'm not completely oblivious. Are you really fine? Have you had any other episodes that I don't know about?"

"Yes, I'm fine. Truly. I haven't had a memory escape since that first day, not even when I was doing the sword fighting. Everything has been staying put away."

"But then there was this morning…you especially didn't seem fine then."

Rory bristled. "I'm not sure that I know what you're talking about." He turned to the Doctor and was met with a curiously indulgent look. For some reason, Rory was made uncomfortable, and he averted his eyes to stare at the floor.

The Doctor crossed the room and sat down by Rory. "Do you remember that time when Amy asked if I wanted to be forgiven. An astute question on Pond's part. You know my answer, but do you know your own?" And, while Rory still wasn't looking at the Doctor, he felt the question hang in air and knew that the Doctor wanted an answer. Rory, however, wasn't inclined to comply with the Doctor's wishes, and he shifted his gaze only to stare defiantly straight ahead.

An exasperated sigh from the Doctor broke the silence. The Doctor stood up and was nearly out the door when Rory called out to him. The Doctor turned and looked expectantly at the young man who was still sitting on the floor.

"Your watch," Rory said. "Amy and I needed to tell you something about your watch."

Rory was surprised to see that the Doctor seemed slightly crestfallen. "I know about the watch. You're not the first to notice my new habit. Tick-tock goes the clock for the old Doctor, I suppose. It's about ninetieth on my list of things to figure out. Ready for some dinner?"

"I'll be there in a bit."

The Doctor seemed to consider his next words carefully. "Rory, I trust you and Amy. You know what's at stake." With that, the Doctor closed the door softly behind him.

The young man leaned against the bed, closed his eyes, and sighed.

"That's exactly the problem."


Rory' s eyes flew open, and he sat straight up. Then, when he realized he wasn't in his bed, he looked wildly around the room. He relaxed once he saw that he was simply on the floor, and he smiled when he saw Amy sleeping next to him. Rory concluded that he must have fallen asleep right after his conversation with the Doctor, and Amy, who would have been unable to carry him and unwilling to wake him up, must have resettled him with a pillow and blanket on the floor and stayed with him. He reached out to stroke her arm, which elicited absolutely no response from Amy. In that other life, the one that he preferred to forget, Amy had been the lightest of sleepers, always wanting to be alert for even the faintest hint that the Doctor had finally kept his promise. In this timestream, Amy was a remarkably sound sleeper and only the gravest or happiest of circumstances could persuade Rory to risk her wrath at being woken up early. Rory kissed his wife before he got up, stretched, and walked to the common area.

Rory flipped the lightswitch and saw an overturned bowl with a folded sheet of paper next to it on the dining table. Curious, he walked over and saw that dinner had been left out for him. Rory picked up the note and read it quietly to himself. In case my sleeping beauty wakes up before morning. xo Amy. He sat down, picked up a sandwich from a plate, and revisited his conversation with the Doctor.

He knew that both Amy and the Doctor would accuse him of being a hypocrite: whenever Amy felt guilty about anything that had happened in that timeline, Rory was quick to reassure his wife that it had never happened and that they only this timeline counted, this timeline in which she had never wavered and would do things like leave him silly notes.

But Amy never did anything terrible like I did, thought Rory grimly. Not that Amy would have agreed, and she had told him as much on multiple occasions. The first time had been, of course, at their wedding, after a moment when the weight of the 2,000 years had suddenly overwhelmed him. He had slipped outside for a breather, but Amy had almost immediately joined him.

"Trying to avoid another dance with the Doctor? You two looked good out there," she joked as she sat next to him on the bench.

"Something like that," Rory replied weakly. He could feel her intense gaze as he fiddled with the flower in his lapel.

"Rory, don't lie to me," Amy scolded. "Are you thinking about…before?" Rory had nodded in assent, and Amy sighed. "None of it happened. And even if it did, you have to understand how overjoyed I was that you had come back." She leaned over to kiss him lightly on the cheek, but Rory refused to be consoled.

"Amy, I hurt you. I was a monster, I was the the reason why we needed to wait for so long."

Amy rolled her eyes. "I'm not saying it was ideal, I'm just saying that it wasn't you that did that. You can't seriously think that it was."

"How can you say that? How could it be anybody but me? It was me who did that."

"Rory, I'm going to ask you something, and when you answer, I want you to be completely honest with me. Can you promise me that?" Amy reached out to take Rory's hand and waited until Rory nodded before she continued. "If we were in each other's place, and it had been me who had done what you did, would you be angry at me now and unable to forgive me?"

Rory's eyes flew open and his jaw dropped. "Of course not."

"Don't you see what a daft boy you're being?" Her words were tempered by the gentle squeeze of his hand by hers. "All I ask is that you be as kind to yourself as you would have been to me. Stop being unfair: it has to go both ways." Without further ado, she got up, took Rory by both hands, and raised him to his feet. "Let's go inside, Mr. Pond. I think that it's finally our turn to dance."

Rory mulled the incident further as he finished his dinner. Amy was right of course, but knowing that and believing that were two entirely different things in his mind. He sighed and looked at the wall clock: it was now just after 2AM, and he wasn't really tired any more. Maybe, like at their wedding, a bit of outdoor air would help him clear his mind. He remembered the roof from his first day in the Capitol and thought it might be worth a return.


After barely five minutes on the roof, he heard the elevator zoom away. Soon, he heard the elevator again making noise as it returned to the roof. Rory stiffened in the expectation that he might have some very awkward explanations to make for his presence, but he relaxed when the doors opened to reveal Peeta, who was clearly surprised to have company.

"Oh, I'm sorry!" the younger man exclaimed. "I wasn't expecting anyone else to be here."

That much was obvious to Rory. "Just wanted to see if some fresh air might clear my head. I don't mind company if you don't."

"Problems sleeping?" asked Peeta as he walked over to join Rory.

"Opposite, actually. I fell asleep right after we were done with the fittings-sorry about that, by the way. I only just woke up. You?"

"Haven't been to sleep yet. Katniss and I stayed up late talking."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. It was nice, talking about when we were kids and about our families and stuff."

Rory smiled. "That does sound good."

"It was. Really good." And, even in the moonlight, Rory could have sworn that Peeta had started to blush at the mere thought of having spent time with Katniss. Rory vaguely wondered if he had been as soppy about Amy when he was seventeen, and he quickly and honestly concluded that it was likely he had been even worse. He became lost in his own wonderings as to how, exactly, Amy had managed to stay so determinedly oblivious about his feelings when Peeta spoke up again.

"The thing about talking about our families, though," Peeta began slowly, "is that I can't get over how much I hate that they didn't let us say good-bye to anyone."

Rory flinched, and he wished fervently that he had even a fraction of River's ability to dissimulate. "You have two brothers, yeah? I remember the interviews from last year-the three of you look like triplets or something."

Peeta turned to look at Rory, and his mood seemed to be very slightly lightened. "Oh, wow, I'm glad that my brothers aren't around to hear that. They liked to tease me about being the runt of the litter, and I think that they'd be none too pleased that you think that there's any resemblance."

"They sound like pretty typical brothers then."

"They made the days at the bakery pass more quickly, that's for sure. Fun, even, most of the time." More quiet. "I thought that last year was hard, the good-byes. I just wish that I could tell them again how much I'll miss them." A determined look crossed his face. "They will know. Haymitch has my letters. He'll make sure that they receive them."

"I'm sure that they know regardless," said Rory, hoping that it was true.

"Maybe. Not like there's anything I can do about it now," said Peeta, bitterly, and then he sighed. "I'm sorry for complaining. It's not like I'm the only person that this is happening to."

"That doesn't mean that you can't talk about things if they're bothering you," countered Rory. "But, and pardon if this oversteps any boundaries, it doesn't sound like you're trying to win and get back home."

Peeta shrugged. "Same strategy as last year. I don't think that anyone will be surprised."

"No, probably not." Rory considered what he had seen these past few days. "Katniss is probably thinking along the same lines." Did he just say that out loud?

Apparently he had because Peeta's reply was fierce and swift. "She'd better not be. I don't want her to do anything stupid just because of some misplaced guilt or because of some imagined debt."

"And if it was because she cared about you?"

Peeta's answer was barely audible. "That would make it so much much worse."

"Why?" asked Rory, genuinely confused.

"Because I'm the expendable one of the two of us! She's the one that needs to make it back home, not me. It's my fault that she's even here this year-she shouldn't have tried to save me last year."

"That's not being very fair to her. She cares for you a lot."

"You barely know her. How can you possibly have any idea what she thinks?"

Rory's heart fell at the mixture of defiance, anger, and uncertainty in Peeta's voice, and his already considerable anger at having so much useless foreknowledge increased exponentially. But there was also a bit of hope in the boy's voice, and he needed to work off that. Rory tried to keep his voice steady as he answered Peeta's question.

"Like I said earlier, Katniss reminds me a bit of Amy, so I'm going off that. Amy wouldn't spend hours on end talking to someone whom she didn't care about. And if she cares about someone, she'll go to any length to protect that person." Rory paused to let these words sink in before continuing. "Amy's my best friend, and I hate that she has to go through this. The only thing that has been getting me through these past few days is that at least I know that I'll be there to the end for her, and the only thing that gets her through the day is that she can do the same for me. You're right: I don't know Katniss well enough to know how well my analogy works, but you do."

As the silence wore on, Rory started to get irritated with himself for not only meddling, but meddling with a speech. He wondered if Peeta would now think that monologues were the preferred form of communication in District Six.

Finally, Peeta answered. "I don't know if you're right, but I also don't know if you're wrong."

"I don't know either. I don't even know why I said anything in the first place. Come on, we both should head back to our floors. Today's going to be a long day."

As they walked back to the elevator, Peeta spoke up again. "Thanks, Rory."

"For what?" Clearly there was to be no end to Rory's confusion this evening.

"For talking some sense into me and snapping me out of my self-pity. It was like talking to one of my brothers or my friends."

Rory smiled. "I'm really glad to hear that."

When the elevator doors opened at the twelfth floor, they were greeted by the sight of Katniss in her pajamas and a dressing gown and looking very sleepy. Her eyes widened, and maybe even brightened, when she saw Peeta.

"Peeta! I was going to look for you! Where were you?"

"I just went to the roof after you fell asleep."

"Well, don't leave like that again, okay?" Katniss took Peeta's hand and led him away from the elevator.

Various thoughts swirled incoherently in Rory's mind as he took in the familiar sight before him, but he knew he needed to talk to Amy, and that she wouldn't mind being woken up. Probably. Maybe. As the doors closed, however, there was only one thought that he needed to express out loud.

"Good on you, mate."