Sorry sorry sorry about the delay. I don't know why this turned out so tough to write – plot and characterisation difficulties as well as lots and lots of external distractions. Mea culpa.
So this one is basically character-focussed. Slow burners are the best burners and all.
Shout if there's weird typos and the like, it's coming up to 3am here so there'll probably be stuff I miss. Oh, and timelordt, check your twitter.
CHAPTER 29. All Night In The Garden: 22 – 26 March 2011
The console room of the TARDIS was silent. Bereft of its usual sprightly inhabitants, the time machine was currently indulging in some self-maintenance, using the recently-returned power that the Doctor's whatever-he-had-done-overnight had given Her.
However, despite being a twelve-dimensional personality matrix that existed across all of time and space simultaneously and therefore not exactly prone to seeing things "the normal way", She couldn't help but miss them, just like She did every time he left with his latest stray. Of course She understood what they were, what they meant to him, and She quite "liked" some of them, in Her strange time-machine way.
But now, for the first time in years uncounted, it was different. There wasn't just one of them. There was two.
It excited Her, in a way that She hadn't thought was possible except in the wildest possibilities. But Time, ever-mysterious, had chosen this path and She would not question it. And when She looked into the orangey-girl's soul, She saw what she was, she had all the potential that gave Her such hope in the darkness.
But She, more powerful than any Time Lord could ever imagine, also saw into the deepest pockets of the girl's brain, and saw that there was night to match the day.
Just like him. The girl didn't want pity, She knew that. But pity her She did. And She knew the girl would need to be protected. She knew what her mind was on the verge of spiralling out of control. With Her last vestiges of power as energy drained out of her reserves, She had extended her own psychic shield around the girl's mind, inhibiting her psychic abilities down to the level of an ordinary Time Lord. She could have done this months ago to prevent the overload, but some things were just supposed to happen. Now, though, time was very much in flux, and She had more leeway to intervene a bit more. It was hardly a permanent solution, but it would do for now.
But She could not control. Not directly. Her place was to observe – and every now and then land the Doctor somewhere he didn't really intend – not to interfere. Most frightening of all was the simple fact that She, omniscient time machine, didn't know what was going to happen.
No one did.
Amy had already chewed through all the fingernails on one hand and was starting on the other when a firm, calloused hand, gripped her wrist. Stress was written into every pore of her round face, beads of sweat forming on her forehead.
"Easy now," the man who had found them told her gently. "You won't have any nails at that rate."
She held her once-enemy's limp hand in hers. It was icy cold. Felt her pulse. It was rapid and weak... so weak...
The last few minutes had been a blur. Out of nowhere, a shuttle, about twenty metres long, had landed in the clearing. The man, whose name Amy had learnt was Iverson, helped them aboard, laying Kate in a clean, white bed. After finding Amy a new wheelchair – she obstinately refused to lie down – he had summoned several medics who immediately set to work removing the thin repticore spine and tending to Kate's wound. The spine had been laced with an anti-clotting compound which still complicated matters further. She was sickly-pale and on the verge of potentially fatal shock, having already lost far too much blood in the rush to escape.
Amy just watched, biting her fingernails, her own pain irrelevant (and dulling). Once he'd done, she kept watching, her mind a chaotic sea of emotions.
"So what's your name?" Iverson asked, washing his hands in a nearby sink as the medics continued to try and stem the bleeding. He had the astonishing calm that only came with someone who had seen and done this many, many times before.
"Amy Pond."
"And your friend?"
"Kate B-Broad."
"She said you had a few broken ribs. I'll take a look if you want."
Amy shook her head. "Nah. These are a-al-already healing."
He smiled, mistaking her response for an attempt to keep a strong front for her friend. "Broken bones don't fix themselves, Miss Pond."
"Mi-mine do. I'm n-not human," she said bluntly. Might as well get it out of the way now.
"You look human."
"I know. Time Lord, or T-time Lady, rather. We c-came first."
His eyes widened to saucers upon hearing the information. "Really? Never thought I'd see the day."
"You k-know about us?"
"My brother used to be obsessed with Time Lord history." He sighed, a melancholy expulsion of breath laced with old, withering memories. "I never found it too interesting myself. But I thought they all died out."
"Almost. Just m-me and the D-Doctor now. So wi-will Kate be oh-okay?"
"I think so. She's already lost a lot of blood but we've got the very best here and she strikes me as a particularly tough nut. I'd back her in this race."
"What-whatever you c-can do."
Iverson looked at the redhead sympathetically, who had started biting her nails again. "I can get you a drug for the paralysis, if you like. Our medical technology really is first rate."
"Yo-you me-mean a a-cure?"
"Yes. So long as your nervous system is physically intact, it should be able to get you at least some movement back."
"P-please. I'm si-sick of no-not being ab-able to w-walk. And t-this bl-bloody st-stut-tutter."
"I'll get it to you once we're at the hospital."
They fell silent, resuming their vigil over the human girl's life.
Pain. Agony unending, impossible, unbearable.
It's too much. She can't do it. It has to stop. Make it stop, make it stop, make it stop...
And it's over. Gone. Vanished.
The girl opens her eyes, chest heaving, her hands over her temples. A dark-eyed but kind-faced man kneels before her, placing a concerned hand on her shoulder.
"Are you alright? This drug was designed for humans, I don't know what side-effects there will be..."
She opens her mouth. For the first time in months, she speaks freely, fully, with her own voice, free of stutter. A clear, Scottish-accented voice echoes around the small hospital room.
"Yeah, I'm fine, thanks. Don't worry about me."
The Doctor was up and dressed before he was fully aware he was actually awake.
The doubts and misgivings of yesterday had vanished. There was no doubt any more about what had happened. And he was not happy.
Why does she do it? Why did she do it? And why did SHE let her out?
He knew the answer, though, already lay within himself. Completely unknown world, strange temporal and psychic anomalies from the equaliser field, deadly and dangerous aliens that weren't supposed to be there... and he was asking her to stay at home whilst he went out and did whatever?
I mean... really.
It was strange – since when was he so protective? This wasn't the first time he'd tried to keep Amy away from danger... without success. This still-newish version of him seemed to have taken the experiences of his previous life to hand and heart, so he guessed it came from there.
Even so, given that he'd spent the best part of three months consumed by worry and guilt over the consequences of the mistake he'd made, he felt he was allowed – even obligated – to be a little protective.
But clearly, and predictably, she'd objected to this arrangement to the point where she'd taken matters into her own hands, because the latest shared-perspective vision he'd just had sure as hell didn't place her in the TARDIS. The 'daydreams' of yesterday definitely weren't.
He tried to piece together the information he'd gleaned from the several visions he'd had.
Amy and Kate in the forest, running from something – probably repticore. Definitely repticore. Amy can't walk and she's abandoned the wheelchair, so Kate carries her. Kate's injured and goes into shock. Someone rescues them in a shuttle. Amy gets some drugs and regains the ability to talk normally in some hospital – but where? And who is she with? And is Kate safe?
At least she was safe for now, but that didn't stop him feeling more than a little irritated – not least because he couldn't say the same about the human girl, though intuition told him she'd pull through. He hadn't told her to stay at home because he felt like it, he was genuinely, deeply concerned about her welfare. Far more so than his own... and more to the point, more than she cared about hers. Self-preservation instincts didn't seem particularly strong in the Time Lord race nowadays – granted, the sample size of two wasn't great.
But that was enough of that. There'll be time to tell her and the TARDIS off later. Right now, more important questions to be asked – where she is, who she's with, how they found her, why Stanley didn't know – or didn't tell me.
Something was very, very amiss here and it wasn't just his other half gallivanting about on her own. He had to get to the bottom of this as soon as possible.
His unparalleled intellect began to grind into gear as the first vestiges of a plan formed in his mind.
I'm coming for you, Amelia Pond.
Soft, gentle white light. A feather-light bed. A whirring of a heartbeat monitor.
In a hospital. I'm in a hospital.
Kate opened her eyes, her eyelids heavy from wearing-off anaesthetic. A quick appraisal of her surroundings confirmed that her initial guess had been correct, and she was indeed in a cream-white hospital room with a surprisingly low ceiling.
As her vision cleared, she noticed a patch of dark crimson coming into focus in mid-air. She squinted, trying to make out its form. At last, she managed to make out what was on the end of her bed... or, rather, who.
"Amy?" Her voice was still a little weak, but it hadn't lost its crisp verve.
"Evening, sleepyhead. You've been out close to a day. Lazy bugger," Her thick, flaming hair was clasped on one side, framing the gentle lines of her face. She had a wry smirk on her face, and an enigmatic, warm light filled her eyes. A warmth Kate had never, ever seen directed her way before.
"You're not in your wheelchair."
"Yeah, thanks to you, kinda dragging me away from it. No matter now, though, got my voice back and the crutches are great."
"Crutches? What do you mean?"
"They gave me some sort of drug to fix my nervous system. Didn't really work – it's meant for humans, not Time Ladies - so I still can't really work my legs, but at least I can talk normally again. Reckon I should be walking within a week or two as well. And crutches beat wheelchairs by a country mile." She decided not to mention that the drug had triggered no fewer than four brutal psychic migraines back-to-back. It was worth it to be able to talk again, she judged.
"I can imagine," Kate chuckled. "So what happened to me?"
"Those lizard folks that attacked us – repticore – they must have hit you with one of their spine thingies while you were taking them out. I don't know how you didn't notice. Moron." Complete change of heart or not, Amy wouldn't miss an opportunity to fling insults her way. If only because she knew Kate would give as good as she got.
"Says the girl who thought it would be a brilliant idea to play the hero while I ran off. How are your ribs, by the way?"
"They're fine, mostly healed already. And don't apologise," Amy warned, noticing the girl opening her mouth. "If it hadn't been for you diving for that little hole, I'd be done for. Or regenerating, which is just as bad."
"Yeah, well, call us even."
"Then you got me away from those things despite bleeding to death."
"Forget it."
"Now, Kate-"
"Seriously, forget it. It's enough that you didn't just throw me out of the TARDIS straight away. Must've seemed kinda unfair for you, given how you had to wait fourteen years and me about two months."
"I was tempted for sure," Amy laughed. "And the Doctor and I were arguing about it before we ended up here. But I reckon you've earned your stripes now."
"Out of interest, how close was I? To, you know..." Wow, don't think I've ever asked such an awkwardly morbid question in my life.
Amy's face clouded. "Let's not talk about that."
That close, huh? She decided not to push the matter further – on balance, she decided didn't really want to know how close she had come to losing her life."So any news on the Doctor?
"I've asked Iverson, he doesn't know. And I don't know either. I don't like that, not one bit. Something seriously weird is going on around here."
"You reckon it's related? The Doctor getting himself into trouble and the TARDIS going kaput?"
"Maybe. That's not what worries me, though."
"Maybe you are a decent girlfriend after all. Don't beat yourself up about him, though. He'll be fine – he's a Time Lord."
Amy looked away. "It's just a name. We're not gods or anything."
"Don't spread that around, though."
Amy had to laugh at that. "Noted."
"So where are we?"
"Hospital, dunno where. Ask Iverson."
"Iverson?"
"The bloke who picked us up. Nice guy."
"Ah, right."
They sat in silence for a while before Amy finally found the question she'd been waiting to ask for over a day.
"How was Rory, by the way? Back in Leadworth."
"Cut up. Badly. It killed him, losing you. But," she added, noticing the pain that had flickered across Amy's face. "He got better. By the time you came to pick us up, I'd say he'd more or less moved on."
"Yeah, I figured. And you were there the whole time?"
"Yeah."
"You helped him? Whatever he needed, you were there for him?"
"Yes."
Amy gazed at her for a few seconds, her face unreadable, giving away nothing of her thoughts or emotions. "I have to go talk to Iverson about finding the Doctor." She stood, levering herself upright on the metal crutches and turning to leave. "Oh, and Broad?"
"Yeah, Pond?"
"Thanks for saving me."
Jack Harkness liked his sleep.
The empty oblivion of unconsciousness provided a perfect, welcoming escape from the near-bottomless well of memories that darkened his milky-blue eyes.
So he did not appreciate his sleep being interrupted. Certainly not in an abrupt, rude manner. And certainly not by a hyperactive bow-tie wearing alien.
"Harkness! Up, rise, shine! New day, big day, big things to see, big things to do!"
Day? Really? He opened his eyesever so slightly, finding nothing but nighttime darkness – only the slightest hint of light before sunrise crept through the open window.
The Doctor soniced the mattress which promptly heaved upwards, unceremoniously dumping the dazed and disoriented immortal on the floor.
"Whasthematter?" Jack mumbled, feeling half-blind for the non-existent blanket. The Doctor reached down and hauled him upright, brushing the crumples out of his greatcoat as he did so. "Wuzzgoingon?"
"Nothing. Now, I need you to find the superluminal couplings for me. They'll be in the drawing room past the sauna."
"On the TARDIS?" Jack was at least now managing to separate his words, although his voice was still slurred.
"Where else?"
"But," Jack replied groggily, his mind grinding ever-so-slowly into gear. "How am I meant to get back there? We're not in the TARDIS, in case you hadn't remembered."
"Fixed the equaliser while you were asleep. Your manipulator should work fine now. Just need to sonic it and you'll be off." And he did so, grasping Jack's wrist and twirling his screwdriver around the manipulator with a familiar buzz. "Pip pip!"
And just like that, he was gone, vanishing into the Time Vortex in a burst of electricity and smoke.
There was, mercifully, very little lasting damage from the spine. Kate was off the intravenous drip the next day and up and about the day after that. She was still more than a little weak, but like Amy she refused to be cowed by circumstance. They shared the same room – this being a working hospital and hence busy, they were assigned their own ward. Both girls naturally asked if they could have private rooms, but none were available.
Thankfully, Amy turned out to be a good if quite bizarre friend. She was, in her own way, kind (if maintaining a healthy dose of Scottish snark) and generous. Good thing too, because Kate hadn't quite tuned in on all of Amy's idiosyncrasies on her brief sojourn on the TARDIS some months before.
She quickly found out that Amy, like the Doctor, had a borderline obsession with her sonic screwdriver, tinkering with it, twirling it around, using it on random things like the door, the machines, the lights and Kate's hair, amongst others. This tested her patience. Severely.
Even worse was the fact that despite sharing the same room, Kate honestly couldn't remember a single moment when she had seen the Time Lady sleeping or even resting. This wasn't due to lethargy – although she did need a few extra winks to recuperate – this was simply due to the fact that Amy just didn't seem to sleep.
"Don't you ever go to bed?" She groaned as she heard some scraping sound from somewhere else in the room, presumably fabricating yet another completely useless alien gadget. "It's effin' three in the morning!"
Amy glanced sideways sheepishly. "Oh – my bad. Didn't realise you were still awake."
"Kinda hard for me to sleep while you're faffing about all night. Seriously, do you even need sleep?"
"Occasionally. Might skip it tonight."
Kate grimaced into her pillow. "Great. Just keep the noise down, will you?"
An inkling had dropped itself into Kate's mind the next day, however, that Amy's insomnia was actually that, and not all that innocent at all. At times she suspected she saw dark shadows beneath her eyes, although it could easily have been a trick of the dull light. But sometimes she caught her just staring...
And then there was what happened later that afternoon.
"Oi! Amy!" Kate hammered on the door of their room, where Amy had ensconced herself for most of the day. Kate had been busy doing rehab work in the meantime. There was no response from within.
"Come on. Know you're in there. Quit hiding yourself away and doing whatever it is you're doing, Iverson wants to talk to you." Still nothing. "Not speaking, huh? What're you doing in there? You better not have soniced the door again." She tried the handle, finding to her relief – and surprise – that she hadn't soniced it. What's she doing in here?
She sauntered inside and saw a river of red hair sprawled across the table, its owner slumped forward in her chair.
What the hell? She stumbled forward, almost tripping over the flotsam dotting the cramped room in her rush. She reached the Time Lady, whose left cheek was pressed against the desk, eyes firmly shut. "Amy?" Kate shook her shoulders, eliciting a small twitch from her fingers in response. Right. Asleep. Kate wasn't one for paranoia or protectiveness, but recent events had encouraged a certain streak within her that hadn't been evident before.
She must be stupidly tired from getting no sleep for two or three days. Amy's hands were still on the table, her right hand loosely wrapped around her sonic screwdriver and her right clasped around some strange black object that Kate presumed was what she was busy working on. Probably what she was doing last night too, she surmised as she unwrapped Amy's fingers and picked up the object, inspecting it above her eyeline. It looked vaguely similar to her sonic screwdriver – apart from being black, obviously.
Hmm. Weird. Wonder what it does. She turned it over in her hand, squinting, inspecting. As she did so, Amy made a strange mewling noise between closed lips, shifting in her sleep. Her now-empty hand clenched as her arm tensed suddenly, as if trying to grasp the object that Kate had removed from it, then relaxed, sliding off the desk... and brushing against Kate's exposed left knee.
Kate gasped, her fingers flying to her temple. The room and Amy had vanished. Her mind had suddenly found itself somewhere else entirely.
But it was a place she knew very, very well indeed.
It's a silent, peaceful summer night. The little village of Leadworth is sleepy by day, sleepier by dark. Life is tranquil, unchanging, uneventful. Nothing happens here.
Until, that is, a police box literally falls from the sky and lands on a shed in a garden of a too-large house. Steam and smoke, illuminated from beneath by some mysterious golden-yellow light, billows from the open doors, venting into the clear, pristine air.
But no one notices. Everyone is already asleep.
Save for one little girl in a red nightdress. She dashes out of the house, chasing a strange, brown-haired man in raggedy clothes. No one has ever seen the likes of him before in the village. Most people would call the police.
But not Amelia Pond. Nothing fazes her.
That doesn't mean nothing confuses her, though.
"But," she cries, running through a metal arch, "But it's just a box; how can a box have engines?" She emphasises the last word, underscoring just how patently ridiculous the concept it. She may be seven, but she's not stupid – far from it.
"It's not a box, it's a time machine," the man replies matter-of-factly, pausing from his knotting of a lengthy rope.
Amelia is even less impressed, and almost raises an scornful eyebrow. "What? A real one? You've got a real time machine?" Even for a seven year old, she does a fine job of injecting immense scepticism into her voice.
"Not for much longer if I can't get it stabilised!" The man darts this way and that, tossing the rope into the open doors. "Five minute hop into the future should do it!"
It's ridiculous, all patently ridiculous. Amelia knows it is.
And yet...
"Can I come?"
"Not safe in here, not yet. Five minutes. Give me five minutes; I'll be right back."
Amelia's face falls. Something had been born inside, a spark, an unquenchable flame... that he would be different somehow, different to all the others in her life. But the flame is in its infancy, and it flickers now. "People always say that," she replies, with a hint of resignation no seven-year old should be able to muster.
The man turns from where he had clambered onto the box and leaps down, bending over so their faces are level. Their eyelines lock, one piercing, the other enigmatic and ancient. "Am I people? Do I even look like people? Trust me. I'm the Doctor."
And she does.
Two minutes later, she's wrapped in a deep blue cotton jumper and crimson beanie, perched on a suitcase.
Waiting.
Twenty minutes later, she's still waiting.
An hour, she's fallen asleep, waiting.
She spends all night in her garden, waiting for her Raggedy Doctor to return.
She can't possibly know what waiting will one day do to her.
The TARDIS was still darkened, still empty... and waiting.
Right on time, a mini-storm of electricity and smoke signalled the entry of a broad-shouldered man in a steel-blue greatcoat. Jack registered his surroundings as his mind tried to wake itself up. It took him a few seconds to work out that he was indeed back in the TARDIS console room. Looks so friggin' different to how I remember it.
"Right," he muttered to himself. "Drawing room... past the sauna." He stumbled down the stairs, having to steady himself on the railings as he did so. For an ex-military man he really, really wasn't a morning person. At the last step, he tripped, falling on his face with a curse. Okay. This is stupid, and needs fixing ASAP.
Ten minutes later he emerged from the kitchen, coffee in hand. Oddly, the pantry was open and there was a collection of pots on the bench, as if someone – presumably Kate – was planning on cooking something but had gotten distracted as they were getting ready and not bothered to come back. He made a mental note to go and find her and ask, as well as check up on Amy. Although at this time of morning (could he really call this morning?), Kate'd be asleep – god only knew what Amy would be up to, given her sleeping patterns or lack thereof.
He sipped the steaming liquid, feeling it invigorate his body as he headed past the sauna. First door... second door... yeah, here it is. Drawing room. He swung the door open, finding it exactly the same as always – a collection of plush leather couches, ornate furniture, and a currently-dead fireplace.
He frowned – why would a superluminal coupling be here? It'd be the sort of thing that would normally be in the TARDIS workshop – you didn't exactly entertain guests or relax with a metre long steel pole. But the Doctor told him to look, so look he did.
Half an hour later, and he'd certainly looked. He'd taken apart almost the whole room – not difficult, given the sparse furnishings – and found no sign of the coupling. It was a fairly conspicuous object so it hadn't taken him long to be sure that he wouldn't find it, but better safe than sorry.
Why would the Doctor not realise it's here? He headed over to the workshop, the more sensible location to find it... and didn't, after another half-hour and another room half-deconstructed. He looked up, down, and all round but he simply couldn't find it.
This was strange. The Doctor knew about every single itty bitty thing on the TARDIS – he was mind-linked to the ship, of course he would be. How could he not know where it was, if there even was one onboard? Unless...
He raised his wrist, inserting coordinates into his manipulator using the keypad. He pressed the activate button, expecting to rematerialise in the console room.
Nothing happened. The Doctor had configured it to be one-time use only.
His eyes narrowed as realisation gripped him. Wild bloody goose chase. Thanks Doctor. If you wanted me out of the way, could have just asked.
But now that he was here, he might as well check up on Kate and Amy. He sauntered upstairs to the Time Lady's room, finding it empty. No surprise – he hadn't really expected her to be sleeping anyway. There were a few doors he didn't recognise, though...
Ooh. Now that's cool, he thought, standing in a doorway between Amy's bedroom and the TARDIS kitchen. How these two rooms were connected, given they were at least fifty metres' walk away from each other... he decided not to think about it. Another door linked to the library. Oddly, he found no sign of Amy there either – isn't this where she hangs out usually? Where is she? He didn't know why he was getting worried – she could easily be elsewhere in the vast multitude of rooms in the time machine – but he was. He decided to double-check, by making sure Kate was still safely asleep in his bed.
He headed downstairs again, quickly finding his way to Kate's bedroom. He pushed it open, saw the cream-white walls... and his heart almost stopped.
The bed was empty, the sheets creased, the blankets lying unfolded over the edge. It was clear that no one had slept here in days.
Oh no.
The next morning, when her Aunt Sharon returns and finds her, she's perched on the suitcase again.
He said he'd be five minutes, she thinks. That was last evening – he'd taken far longer than just five minutes. She doesn't mind, though. Somehow, for some indescribable reason, she just has this feeling, this sense, that the mad, raggedy man who'd called himself "the Doctor", is coming back.
Somehow, she knows that the man who had dropped out of the sky in a police box, smashed her shed, raided her kitchen for food, eaten the weirdest combination of fish fingers and custard and fixed the scary crack in her wall was coming back for her. "Trust me," he'd said. And she does. He's not like other people.
So she waits.
Back at school, she tells everyone. The girls – and most of the boys – tease her and make cruel songs about her. She admonishes herself for her stupidity and ignores them. She keeps waiting.
At home, she makes dolls, toys, drawings about her Raggedy Doctor that she's still waiting for. She also makes a little blue wooden box, a perfect, small-scale replica of the police box that crashed in her garden that evening. All her memories, all her hopes, all her waiting gets put into that box. She spends many an evening holding it, even talking to it... asking why he doesn't come back. Telling it that she'll keep waiting anyway.
Years pass, and her Aunt Sharon grows frustrated and tired of Amelia – otherwise gifted and razor-sharp – obsessing over her imaginary friend, and calls on the psychiatrists, one after the other. They try, they pry, they bait, they cajole, they press, but they all fail. Still she waits.
Her personality changes, slowly, gradually. She becomes even more aggressive, more cocky, more flirty. She shamelessly leverages her good looks and sharp tongue to her own benefit – but deep within, she is still the same little girl. Waiting.
She's ten, and she's waiting. Twelve, still waiting. Fourteen. Fifteen. It gets harder and harder, but she perseveres.
She keeps waiting.
She has a diary. A black, spiral bound diary. No one knows it exists other than Rory. No one has ever read it apart from her. Within, she writes about anything and everything, the things that she can't say, the things she'll never say. Some about life. Some about Leadworth. Some about her classmates (and those entries are rarely flattering). But mostly about how she's waited. And waited.
She disappears for two weeks. No one knows why. Not many, aside from Rory Williams, her only truly close friend, really care. Then she comes back...
…and is a completely different person. No longer the funny, witty young girl. No longer.
She barges into her room. Hurls her bag against the wall. It thuds against the wall, slides to the floor. Fury to burn a thousand worlds is etched on her face. She spots the little blue wooden box. She's reminded again of all the years she's waited, all the pain she's endured, the imprisonment in that terrible dream of hers... because she waited. She doesn't think. Impulse drives her. She throws the box with all her strength at the wall. It shatters.
She stands there, watching. Pauses. Then marches across to where her bag fell. Forces a hand inside. Pulls out what she wants. She opens the diary. Grabs a pen. Finds the first empty double page. With an unnaturally steady hand, she writes her entry. It's April 2004, and it's the shortest entry she's ever written. Just five words.
'My name is Amy Pond.'
She's stopped waiting.
She was falling. Endlessly falling through a bottomless, nameless pit. She couldn't see anything around her, but the way her body just seemed so weightless told her she was falling.
Then...
She was back in the hospital, back in the room, Amy was still sound asleep on the desk, snoring softly. Kate took no notice, her head spinning like a tumble-dryer and her breathing shallow.
What in god's name happened there?
So think of those last two memory seconds a teaser. Not for the next chapter, though, which will be more plot. You will actually see those memories again, some bits from a slightly different perspective, some from a greatly expanded perspective, some almost precisely the same (I heavily utilised one of my future chapters to finish this...)
Now it's past 3am and I really need to sleep.
