a.n. Edited seventh of August 2012 because I'm an idiot and didn't re-read before posting, only to realise that some sentences were missing half their content and the grammar was just bloody shocking. Sorry guys, I won't be making that mistake ever again!
Four – Glasses are Cool
Amy skidded to a halt just inside the door, and James nearly ran into her in his haste to get inside. He appeared completely gobsmacked as he looked from Lily, who had stopped dead in her tracks, to Amy and back again. Lily, for her part, had gone as white as a sheet.
The Doctor gave Amy a knowing smile and said, "Didn't I tell you to wait on that landing, Pond?"
"We both knew that was never going to happen," Amy rolled her eyes, before letting her gaze settle on Lily, who was still standing frozen in the middle of the hall. "Doctor, why is there another me?"
"Amy Pond, meet Lily Evans," the Doctor said jovially, waving a hand between the two girls. "Lily, meet Amy. You might notice that the two of you share an uncanny resemblance -"
"They're identical!" James burst out suddenly, as though he'd been stuck in suspended animation and had only just regained the ability to function. He seemed to wrench his eyes away from the girls only with great effort. "Whatis going on?!"
The Doctor turned his focus to James, and for the briefest of moments his features contorted into a pained expression – but then, as quickly as Amy could blink, he was back to being perfectly neutral, observing James with nothing more than his usual polite interest. "Hullo, I'm the Doctor," he greeted. "Who are you?"
"James Potter," James said with surprising clarity.
"Nice to meet you, James," the Doctor said. He appeared to be done with the conversation after that, because he spun on his heel and walked back up to the TARDIS without another word.
"Doctor, what's happened?" Amy asked, striding purposefully up to him, pausing only briefly to look Lily up and down as she passed.
"What year is it?" the Doctor called absently over his shoulder as he jumped up to the front door of the TARDIS and clicked his fingers.
The door swung open instantly, and Amy watched Lily and James exchange a surprised glance before realising that the Doctor had been addressing them.
"Oh, uh, it's 1978," James said quickly.
They heard the Doctor clap his hands together as he stepped into the TARDIS. "Ah, wonderful! Marvellous decade, the seventies, lots of fun stuff happening on Earth- more fun stuff happening on Jupiter's largest moon, too, but that's another story -" His voice faded away as he ventured deeper inside the phone box.
"But I wasn't born until nineteen eighty nine," Amy called after him, frowning.
The Doctor poked his head out of the door, and she was amused to see he was wearing a pair of ridiculous 3D glasses. "In your time stream, you weren't born until then," the Doctor informed her, "But in this time stream you were born in -"
"1960," Lily finished his sentence, and he flashed her a smile before disappearing again.
"So, are you two magic then?" James asked, shoving his hands deep into the pockets of his trousers and trying to appear casual as he made his way over to stand with Lily. "Like, a witch and a wizard from another galaxy or something?"
Lily's eyes lit up at that, as though she'd suddenly realised something. "Have you used a time turner to get here?" She pointed at Amy and asked in an awed voice, "Are you me from the future?"
"No, I'm not from your future... Maybe I'm you, or you're me, but I don't know how," Amy said. "And I'm human."
"We're human, too," James pointed out. "You mean you're not magical – you're a muggle."
Amy narrowed her eyes at him impatiently, clearly not a fan of the term. "No, I'm not magical."
"And what about the Doctor, what's he?" Lily questioned, casting a furtive glance at the bright blue phone box.
"A Time Lord," Amy informed them, just as he stepped back out of the TARDIS, still wearing the white cardboard and cellophane glasses. She shook her head, barely containing her laughter. "You look ridiculous!"
"Glasses are cool," the Doctor said, adjusting them on his nose and beaming at James, who fiddled with the frame of his own round, black spectacles. "Ooh, and these glasses are very cool."
"Why, because they've got different coloured lenses?"
"Because they make my cheekbones look marvellous."
Amy closed her eyes and took a deep breath in through her nose. "Seriously, Doctor?" When she saw the smile he was wearing, though, she couldn't help but let out a peel of laughter.
Lily and James shared a glance, looking incredibly worried. "So what's a Time Lord?" James asked, trying and failing to sound nonchalant.
"I'm an alien," the Doctor said. "From your point of view, anyway. I'm a good one, though; I have lots of neat alien tricks."
"You still haven't explained how we got here," Amy said impatiently. "Or why there's another me, with a different name… Who's a witch."
The Time Lord walked down to his companion, holding onto his suspenders. She couldn't quite take him seriously in those glasses, but when he spoke his voice was low and left no room for argument. "Something went wrong. Time's gone all wibbly – but not just time; space, too. There was a jump, across the void, and now we're here -"
"Time's gone wibbly?" James's tone was questioning. "What does that even mean?"
"It means that Amy and I are in the wrong universe," the Doctor answered.
"The wrong universe…" Amy stared up at him. "But, Doctor, do you mean we're -"
"In an alternate reality, yes. With an alternate you, and an alternate -" he stopped himself suddenly, his eyes flickering to James, and seemed to grimace before continuing on normally, "- everything. Everything is different here, your entire life has been altered."
"You mean we're the same person?" Amy asked, gesturing to a bewildered Lily.
"You're different versions of the same person," the Doctor clarified. "There are millions upon millions of universes out there, all with different versions of the same people, but changed by their choices and the choices of those who came before them. In our universe, Amy, you grew up with a crack in the universe in your bedroom wall, and in this universe you're a- a witch. Something equally spectacular, but entirely different circumstances. You see?"
Amy and Lily eyed each other.
"Not really, no," Lily said slowly. "You're asking us to believe that you're an alien from another dimension of time and space, who just happened to crash your space ship into the biggest wizarding school in Britain, right as You-Know-Who is-is…"
She broke off under the penetrating gaze of the Doctor, who had pushed the 3D glasses up onto the top of his head and walked over to her. "I have told you already, Lily Evans, that I am not involved with whoever You-Know-Who is, and if he is as much of a threat as you make him out to be then it is very important that you start trusting me."
Lily looked over to James, who stepped up protectively and jabbed the Doctor in the chest with his finger. "We have a right to be wary, you know. Everyone says a war is coming, excuse us for finding it a bit hard to believe in travel across dimensions."
"How could we have got into alternate universe?" Amy asked, hoisting herself up to sit on top of one of the tables. "Does it have to do with the crack in my wall?"
"Yes and no," the Doctor said, beginning to pace. "We've fallen through a hole in the universe. Something sucked us in here, and now that the TARDIS is cut off from our universe she's lost her power."
Amy frowned. "But you said earlier there was something scrambling the signals, and you said once you figured that out we could go -"
"Yes, well, that was before I realised we were in an alternate universe. The TARDIS feeds off the energy of our universe, it's her life source, and without it she can't function… But there's something else here, something incredibly powerful – your magic," the Time Lord gestured towards Lily and James, who were unmoving, "and that's giving her a different kind of power, but she's not quite sure what to do with it."
"You keep talking about your spaceship as if it's a person," Lily said, her tone questioning. "As if it's a girl."
"That's your ship?" James asked, pointing to the TARDIS. "What is that?"
"Isn't she brilliant!" the Doctor exclaimed, patting the side of the phone box affectionately.
"It's a police phone box," Lily said, walking over with James close on her heels. "Or is that just a disguise?"
The Doctor clapped a hand on her shoulder and said, almost proudly, "You're brilliant, Lily, did you know that?" She just blushed in response, which made James glare at the Doctor, who continued obliviously, "Yes, she's supposed to blend in with the surroundings of wherever we land, but the Chameleon Circuit is broken and she's stuck in this form. I've grown quite fond of it…"
"You're still calling it a she!" James was looking at the Doctor as though he was completely mad.
"She's his one true love," Amy supplied, swanning over and grinning cheekily at the Doctor, who looked unimpressed.
"But how can this be a space ship?" Lily walked up and around the TARDIS, running a hand lightly along the back of the blue box. "It's- small."
"Ah. Well, it looks small…" The Doctor's lips tugged up into a smile as he pushed the door open, revealing the interior of the TARDIS. Lily's face went slack as she peered inside. "Go on," the Time Lord said excitedly, waving her in.
Lily, apparently unable to deny her curiosity, disappeared inside, the Doctor following after her. Amy smirked at James and grabbed his elbow, pulling him towards her.
"Come on," she said, pushing him in front of herself. "Come see what all the fuss is about."
Lily was standing on the staircase, spinning in a slow circle and trying to take in her surroundings, when Amy violently pushed James through the door. For a moment he just stumbled forward clumsily, his mouth opening and closing without any noise coming out – and then he said, "It's bigger on the inside."
The Doctor beamed at him. "Much better reaction than last time!"
Both Amy and James looked at him, confused, but Lily spoke up before they had a chance to question him. "It's like an undetectable extension charm, but-"
"But much more impressive, as it's actually an entirely separate dimension," the Doctor finished, pulling a lever down and pulling the screen towards himself. "Your magic is everywhere, look at this place! It's practically overflowing with it… Hundreds of years and millions of witches and wizards casting spells here, this place is like a magnet for anomalies. If there was a tear in the universe it's no wonder we got pulled here!"
"You said something about a void earlier, Doctor –what's that?" Amy leant back against the railing around the centre console.
"Imagine the universe as a great, big soap bubble with lots of smaller soap bubbles sticking the sides of it."
"Okay." Amy nodded, "So our universe is like the big bubble and we kind of… slipped through into this smaller bubble?"
"Yes! Well… No, it's nothing like that, actually. Ignore the bubble comparison," the Doctor said, rubbing the back of his neck. "Uhm, no, you can think of it like that if it helps."
"Doctor," Amy groaned.
"Okay, hang on, let me think of how to explain – Don't touch that!" The Doctor whacked James's hand away from where it was hovering above a yellow button. James flinched, and Lily looked at him disapprovingly. "Sorry, but you can't just go pressing buttons willy-nilly in here, she's a very delicate thing and needs an expert to fly her-"
Amy let out a snort of laughter, and the Doctor looked slightly offended. "River flies the TARDIS better than you, Doctor."
"River's a show off, and she does not," the Doctor said sulkily, moving around to the other side of the console and turning a dial. "As I was saying, the void is the space between universes. Parallel universes, running in parallel lines, never intersecting, never touching, until there's a shift. Some huge event that's large enough to rip a hole in the universe."
"So it is like the crack in my bedroom?" Amy asked.
"No. Yes. Sort of… This hole, this crack, it's not swallowing the universe, it's not erasing things -" The Time Lord's eyes flitted across to James, who was standing close to Lily, before he turned his gaze back to Amy. "It's displacing them. Swapping things from all different universes and all different times. Like a- like a plug hole! And we were probably pulled here because of your connection with Lily."
"So, hypothetically, could I have just as easily been pulled into your universe, to where Amy was?" Lily asked, wandering around the console and peering down into the corridors stretching away from it.
"Hypothetically, yes, but realistically, your odds were much slimmer. It is possible, because of the magical methods of travel, I'd assume you'd have some of the features that cracks in the universe find appealing, although I'm a much more complicated space-time event and much more attractive." The Doctor pushed his glasses back down onto his nose and stepped up to Amy, grabbing her hand and holding it up in front of his face.
James continued to follow Lily around, but Amy noticed that he was keeping his distance from the centre console, even though he kept sending curious glances in its direction. "Apparition, you mean?"
"What's apparition?" Amy asked, even as she raised an eyebrow at the Doctor, who was fiddling with her fingers and turning her hand around between his own.
"It's kind of like jumping from one place to another, using magic. It's not possible inside Hogwarts, though. This is one of the most fiercely guarded places in the wizarding world, which is why it's even stranger that you got in here," Lily told her, stopping just beside them. "What are you doing?"
"Residue from the void," the Time Lord explained, dropping Amy's hand and shoving the 3D glasses onto her nose. "See?"
He waved his hand in front of her, and Amy could see a green, almost spotty substance floating around him, trailing slightly behind his movements. She looked down at her own hands, and saw the same substance floating all around herself. "This is left over from when the TARDIS slipped from our universe to this one?"
"Exactly! With those glasses on we can see the two universes, overlapping, sort of. Not really, exactly, but that's residue from the void and it shows us what's not meant to be in this universe."
Amy took the glasses off and passed them to Lily, who immediately scanned over her and the Doctor. "So how do we get back?"
"Don't worry, I have a plan for that," the Doctor said cheerily, skipping to the console door.
"What plan?" James asked, taking the glasses off Lily and comparing his own hand to Amy's.
"Haven't got the details worked out yet, I haven't finished talking." The Doctor spun around to grin at the three of them. "Who's in charge around here?"
[-]
Amy watched the Doctor and Lily walking up ahead along the third floor corridor. The Doctor was bouncing slightly as he walked, which Amy knew meant he was excited about what was happening, and the two of them were deep in conversation about the classes Lily was taking and how amazed she had been when she got a letter on her eleventh birthday telling her she was a witch, and what planets were the Doctor's favourites and how he looked quite good for his age of nine-hundred plus.
"Ergh, is she actually flirting with him?" James asked, sounding disgusted.
Amy smirked at him. "Jealous, are you?"
James tried to shrug casually, but instead the gesture came off as slightly injured. "If I've learnt anything about Lily Evans after being at school with her for six years, it's that she's going to do what she wants no matter what I say."
"Good to hear," Amy said, smiling broader now.
"So you two really are alike then," James said, just a hint of flirtation to his words.
Amy observed the slender form of her physical double in front of them, and said thoughtfully, "I don't know. I haven't had much of a chance to get to know her."
James laughed. "If you two are alike, I'm not ashamed to admit I'm a little bit terrified."
"Are you insulting us?" Amy said in mock offence, punching him lightly in the arm.
James ducked away, but both of them were laughing now. "I'm not that stupid! Two of you could kill me."
"Oooh, that's nice to know," Amy joked.
Lily threw them a glance over her shoulder, and James yelled out, "Yes, Evans, we're talking about you!"
"You better be saying nice things to my alternate self!" She called back, and Amy saw the Doctor's shoulders shake as he chuckled.
A few moments passed in relatively comfortable silence, until James asked, "So what's happening with you and the Doctor?"
"What do you mean?" Amy lifted an eyebrow tensely.
"Well, are you two a thing, or -"
"We travel together," Amy told him, trying to inject as much finality into her voice as possible. "I've known him practically my whole life, but I had to wait a long time for him, and he's only known me for a little of his… It's- It's a long story."
"I know all about waiting," James said, and Amy didn't miss how his eyes lingered on Lily, and how the corners of his mouth turned down at the sight of hers breaking into a smile at something the Doctor said.
Amy felt something tug on her heartstrings, and for a moment she felt that crushing sadness threatening to overwhelm her again. "Oh, don't worry about that," she said, knocking her elbow against his. "The Doctor has that effect on women. But he's taken. At least, I think he's taken."
James flashed her a dazzling smile. "Nothing's ever easy in time travel, I suppose."
"Amazing, yes. Easy, definitely not!" Amy paused, and then dared to ask, "So, are you and Lily… a thing?" She tried to make the question a little jokey by mimicking his phrase from before.
Unfortunately, she hadn't noticed that Lily and the Doctor had stopped walking and were within ear shot now. They both turned to face them, and Amy saw a pink tinge to Lily's cheeks. The downfalls of being ginger, she thought.
"Oh, uh, he's a… friend," Lily said, her tone a very forced sort of polite that just made it sound awkward.
"Boyfriend," James corrected, with an immodest shrug of his shoulders and a pointed look at the Doctor.
"Kind of, boyfriend," Lily said quickly, half over the top of him, refusing to meet his eyes.
"Lily," he said warningly, as though she was just being silly and had forgotten something that she should have easily remembered, like her keys.
"Alright," Amy cut in, "no time for a domestic, you two. Is this Dumbledore's office?"
Just as she spoke, an elderly man wearing robes of shining silver, with a white beard hanging to his waist and half-moon spectacles in front of bright blue eyes, appeared from around the corner. "Oh," he said, sounding only slightly surprised, "A welcoming committee."
The man smiled at them all as he walked to the gargoyle they were stopped in front of .
"Professor Dumbledore," the Time Lord said cheerily, stepping forward and extending a hand. "Hello, I'm the Doctor."