"Ex Memoria"
28. The Escaped
Chicago, Illinois – in the year 2021
It was hard enough to get anywhere when there was the constant concern of anyone being after them, but it didn't seem nearly as much of an issue when compared to having to deal with a distressed husband worried for his wife.
The Doctor had needed to rein Rory back in several times on their way to the TARDIS, but finally they made it to the blue police box, and the Doctor could have kissed it for how relieved he was to see his ship. Instead, he snapped his fingers and the doors opened in time for him to just about shove Rory inside before he could follow in and shut and lock the doors. When this was done, he'd breathed out with relief, sliding to sit on the ground.
"You just left her?" Rory's shout made him jump.
"Oh, look who's found his voice again," the Doctor forced himself to scramble back on his feet before Rory could try and get past him. "We've been through this, Rory," he stared him in the eyes. "It was necessary, and you would do well to understand this the same as your wife will have understood it."
"Well, I'm sorry if I can't be as trusting as she is that you'll just swoop in like a knight in armor… Doctor," Rory heaved.
"Says the Roman," the Doctor kept the same frown as the other man did. "You're the one who wants to swoop… in…" he tapped his chest for emphasis.
"She's my wife!"
"And you're her husband! Is this going to be the same issue every time, because frankly I don't care for it." Rory looked about to punch him in the face. "Oh, now I know that face, that's," the Doctor's finger hovered about Rory's face for a moment before leading him away from the doors. "We are going to find her again. In the meantime, she can take care of herself, you know she can." This seemed to knock some of the fight out of Rory.
"Of course she can, I… I didn't say she couldn't," he promised.
It was never established exactly how much Rory remembered at this point, from everything that had happened, his death, his coming back, the plastic Roman and all, but looking at him now, the Doctor saw the kind of sadness and worry that could only have come out of holding the woman he loved, dead in his arms, which Rory had done, briefly. He would never stop worrying. He would never stop doing everything in his power not to have to see Amy the way he'd done in that moment.
"Alright," the Doctor clapped his hand on the former centurion's shoulder; they were back on track. "Now, back at the museum…"
"I thought she was following us," Rory shook his head. "I wouldn't have gone if I didn't think that."
"But she wasn't behind us," the Doctor stated the obvious.
"She could still be back there, we…" Rory stopped, wondering if his suggestion to go back would be shot down one more time.
"She's not," the Doctor stated flat out. He could have misled Rory and told him that yes, possibly, Amy was still there, because it was where they needed to go, but he knew better, after the moment they'd just had. He needed to give it straight to Rory, let him decide to go where they needed to be more than where he wanted to be.
"How do you know?" Rory's gaze narrowed. The Doctor looked to the console.
"We were separated, the six of us, but I saw which way they were headed. Tina has the painting, she and Miss Moran Fiorentino will have found shelter, but Amy, and Mike…"
He didn't have to say it. Rory got the pieces in order.
"They've been arrested?" his fury threatened to surge again, and the Doctor held his hands out so he might stop again. "I know, I know, they'll be alright," he sighed, wringing his hands for lack of anything else to keep them busy. "What do we do now?"
"We go back, for Tina, for Gillian, for the painting."
"So we broke out of the museum, left Amy, and Mike, and Tina, and Gillian… so we could break back in? The guards will be on alert, the police…"
"Who said anything about breaking in?" the Doctor frowned to Rory.
"You did, you just…"
"I said no such thing!" the Doctor maintained. At Rory's perplexed face, he gestured around them, to indicate the TARDIS. "We did it the other way before," he explained, getting the ship going. Soon, they were off, leaving their landing space, on their route to the museum. "Time to try it another way."
When they had settled down again, Rory had looked to the Doctor as though to ask where they were. The Doctor turned the screen on, and Rory quickly recognized the place where they had hidden for several hours earlier that day, the one where Gillian Moran Fiorentino had taken cover as her mind unraveled.
"How do we find them?" Rory asked. It had taken them all long enough to reach the exhibit, he could imagine it would take them two or three times as long, now that the guards were on alert. In response, the TARDIS soon rang with a handful of sustained beeps. "What's that?"
"Look," the Doctor pointed to the screen again. The video feed had been replaced with a plan of the museum. They could see three small lights flashing to the rhythm of the beeps. "If Gillian is with Tina, and she has no glasses, then that'll be them," he indicated the lone light. It flitted about, just faintly enough that they could notice, as though Tina and her glasses were in motion.
"Then that's…" Rory's finger pointed to the other two dots, very much stationary in comparison to the first. "That'll be Amy's glasses and…"
"They must have lost them. Rory, I'm sure they're not…" the Doctor tried to reassure him, but even he couldn't help but wonder. "They're not here," he promised Rory and himself both.
TO BE CONTINUED (TOMORROW)
