"This is magnificent." The Doctor said, turning about in a circle until he made himself dizzy. Pushing his hair from his face, he beamed with child like glee to Rose. "Little cubes!" He turned and darted toward the playground behind them.
"Mum," Melody whispered, tugging on Rose's jacket. She looked down, and followed Melody's gesture to her house.
She spotted Brian at the front door, then Amy and Rory popping their heads out their bedroom window.
"Were you expecting your Granddad?" Rose asked, glancing about and noticing that Brian's car was parked a couple houses over.
"I honestly don't remember." Melody admitted. "Been too long. I'm not even sure if I'm supposed to have my hair longer or shorter."
Rose chuckled, noticing the Ponds having disappeared from the window. "'S why your mum takes pictures of you before you head off."
"Yeah," Melody nodded as the sound of the door opening across the road pulled their attention.
Amy and Rory were chatting with Brian, then seemed to spot them. Checking for traffic, despite what felt like an early hour of the day, the three of them crossed the road. Brian drifted to Melody, giving her a hug while Amy moved into the park.
"Doctor?" She called out to him.
He was up on a jungle gym, examining one of the cubes, surrounded by a bunch of others. He had taken a magnifying glass out of his jacket, trying to get a good look at what he had in his hands.
"It's the invasion of the very small cubes." He commented. "Alien, I think. I need to bring a few back inside the TARDIS to have a look." He hopped down, and Rose cringed as one foot landed on a cube and he stumbled. "Melody, can you help me gather a few?"
"Sure thing," She replied, adding the Gallifrayen word for father-figure. She and he went to work collecting them, and Rose grabbed what was now Melody's abandoned bag and headed toward the Pond house. She headed inside and up the stairs to Melody's room, leaving her bag on the bed. It was hard to tell what came first: her Earth room or her TARDIS room. They were exactly the same, with the same light blue walls and white furniture. Same white and blue bedding with the same collection of nicknacks and toys strewn over available surfaces. At least those weren't all placed exactly the same, making the two a bit more distinct. And the painting on the ceiling that Rose and Amy painstakingly did over a weekend oh so long ago wasn't quite the same as the projected view the TARDIS offered, but it was still lovely.
Rose left the room, down the stairs, taking a moment to look at the photos of the Ponds of the years. Of Melody growing up. Of the five of them together that Brian snapped last summer.
It had surprised both she and the Doctor to discover Brian knew the truth about Melody when Amy's Aunt Sharon did not.
"We trusted Dad to understand more," Rory had explained as Rose had helped him with the barbeque. "Didn't hurt that the Doctor materialized around him. He sort of excepts that we have a unique situation and a unique sort of help with it. He's just glad he gets to know her, to have a granddaughter."
Rose wondered if that's how Jackie would have felt about Jenny, and then Melody. The girls already acted like sisters when Jenny did come by their TARDIS, and she could almost hear her mother going on about how alien it all was but still spoil both girls as rotten as she could.
She refused to get heart heavy as she left the house and headed back to the TARDIS and headed inside.
"What we got?" She asked as she closed the doors and looked at the five of them around the console.
It made her smile, heart swelling at the sight her new, strangely put together family made.
"Well, we can tell you one thing: they're identical. Not a single molecule's difference between them." The Doctor said with a mix of frustration and fascination. "No blemishes, imperfections, individualities."
"How long did it take me to drop off a bag?" Rose asked with a grin.
"Two brilliant minds and the TARDIS, and you expect a dozen cubes to take awhile to look over?" The Doctor challenged with a grin.
"Yet ya still don't know what they are." She teased.
"What if they're bombs?" Brian asked thoughtfully. "Billions of tiny bombs? Or transport capsules, maybe, with a mini robot inside. Or deadly hard drives?"
"Does anyone not remember the Adipose? Their tiny, chubby selves and how harmless they were?" Rose asked.
"They were coming out of people who'd been taking the adipose pills." Rory noted. "Literally coming from their bodies, taking away from them. How is that harmless?"
"They couldn't control that. Infants, they were. Was the crazy nanny or whatever she was that was responsible." Rose countered.
"Might be messages needing decoding." Brian continued. "Or they're all part of a bigger whole, a jigsaw puzzle that needs fitting together."
"Very thorough, Brian. Very, very thorough. Well done. Watch these." The Doctor instructed as he headed toward the doors. "Yell if anything happens," He added before heading out the TARDIS.
Amy looked at Rose. "What exactly is he up to?" She asked.
Rose shrugged, rolled her eyes, moved to follow her husband.
"What are you up to?" She asked him as stood in the park, hands on his hips, and looked around. "You're lost, aren't ya? Not an idea what they are and it's driving you spare, ain't it?" She teased him.
"Completely and totally." He admitted, turning to look at her. His face was screwed up in confusion. "In all my years, not once, ever, have I seen anything like this. All over the Universe, I've been. I've seen Daleks and Demons, Cybermen and crazed overlords. Aliens made of fat, and giant bees, but these! These stump me."
"Was bound to be a first for something." She teased before noticing the insane number of black, unassuming vehicles coming down the street on both sides. Rose's smile fell. "That looks …."
"UNIT," The Doctor said, both mesmerized and surprised. "Shouldn't be too surprised, I suppose, alien invasion and all. Or possible invasion, as it were."
The vehicles stopped, and a mass wave of Soldiers stepped out, quickly surrounding the TARDIS. Parting through them was a middle-aged, posh looking woman with some sort of tech in her hand that made Rose uncomfortable. But if the Doctor said this was UNIT, then there wasn't anything to worry about. At least not yet. She kept back, but she was on edge and ready to jump at the sign of anything bad.
"I do apologize for the early morning greeting," The posh woman said as she parted the crowd. "Spike in artron energy reading at this address, and in light of the last 24 hours we had to check it out. Hello, Kate Stewart, head of Scientific research at UNIT. And with dress sense like that," She held up the tech in her hand, and it made a short noise that made Rose flinch toward her husband. "You must be the Doctor, I hoped it'd be you." She said, just as Rose came around to stand between them.
The woman's smile fell upon seeing her, shock taking over. "Rose Ty … no. No, you died at Canary Wharf."
"Have we met?" Rose asked, now finding her extremely familiar in a way Rose couldn't place.
"Yes. But, no, you wouldn't remember. It was … it was about fifteen years ago, but my god you look the same." She remarked.
"UNIT is still documenting my companions, then? And here I thought I had started being very careful." The Doctor remarked.
"Actually, you've made it easier since you now bring your companions back for a visit here and there. Not to mention the incident at 10 Downing. Memories of our interviews are usually erased …."
"Ha!" The Doctor exclaimed, smiling wide. "I knew it! Memory wipe. There was a moment when we went back to see your mother and I asked what you'd been up to, and you said you couldn't remember."
Rose frowned. "That was over two hundred years ago."
"Yes, well, that always bothered me, and I always had my suspicions. But now I've come to wonder, Kate, since when did science run the military? Because it certainly didn't fifteen years ago, or the soldiers that tried to shoot me in Downing street would've known not to."
"Since me," Kate smiled. "UNIT's been adapting. Well, I dragged them along, kicking and screaming."
"And what do we know about these cubes?" He asked, gesturing around them at the litter scattered about the playground equipment as well as the neighborhood.
"Far less than we need to." Kate said, and as she rambled on with the details, Rose suddenly recalled why Kate was familiar.
"But you are," Kate said, her gaze narrowing on her in confusion. "Rose Marion Tyler, companion of the Doctor in his ninth and tenth incarnations, died at Canary Wharf at age twenty."
"I'm twenty-two, actually." Rose smirked, "And I didn't die, I just never had a reason to stay." She replied, brushing a lock of hair behind her ear and noticing Sarah Jane watching the motion intensely. "And should we really be talking the Doctor's regenerations with just anyone in the room?" Rose asked Kate as she gestured to Jimmy standing a few feet away.
She looked at him coldly. "All soldiers of UNIT are briefed on the Doctor, even those who are soldiers because we're desperate."
The year that never was. That was why she seemed familiar. It had been so long ago in an abandoned time line that Rose forgot. Most everyone that she met along the way had forgotten her unless they happened to be on the Valiant.
"That's impressive. I don't want them to be impressive. I want them vulnerable with a nice Achilles' heel." The Doctor said motioning as if her was caressing a heel.
"We don't know how they got here, what they're made of, or why they're here." Kate said with exasperation.
"And all around the world, people are picking them up and taking them home." The Doctor said nervously.
Melody got their attention by addressing them as Mum and Dad in Gallifreyan, and Rose turned in time with the Doctor to see her stepping out of the TARDIS with her cell phone in hand. "They're all over social media. Instagram, Tumblr, Facebook, YouTube."
"Twitter?" The Doctor asked disgustedly.
"Don't use Twitter." Melody replied with a shrug before handing the phone to Rose.
"Within three hours, the cubes had 1000 separate Twitter accounts." Kate mentioned, and the Doctor's lip curled in disgust. "I've recommended we treat this as a hostile incursion. Gather them all up and lock them in a secure facility, but that would take massive international agreement and cooperation."
"Which won't happen, 'cause every country's UNIT's gonna want to investigate, let alone other agencies." Rose noted as she handed her foster daughter back her phone.
"Exactly," Kate nodded once. "Some places, of course, totting that the cubes are nothing more than an odd fluke until we have evidence to the contrary."
"Hi," Amy said, stepping out the TARDIS in her dressing robe over her nightie. "Just a thought, here. Maybe part of the hostility is that they want to be seen?" She offered the suggestion with a shrug as Rory stepped out and Brian lingered in the doorway of the TARDIS.
Kate looked to Amy, then to Melody, then to Rory, her amusement growing more and more as she glanced at the TARDIS and then to the Doctor. "Thought you didn't do families?" She teased.
The Doctor straightened his bow tie. "Amy's right. They want to be seen, observed, even. So we should do that: observe them. Stay with them, round the clock. Watch the cubes, record absolutely everything about them."
"And how do you plan to do that?" Rose asked. "Live in the TARDIS? Get bored for one second, and you'll be taking us half way across the universe."
"Stay with us," Amy suggested with a shrug before coming to stand behind her daughter and setting her hands on her shoulders. "Got that spare room going unused, sure we could set something up for ya."
There was a pain in Amy's eyes, and Rory scratched at the back of his head, looking away. Rose remembered what Melody had mentioned once, ages ago, about them arguing over the possibility of more kids.
She cleared her throat. "Thanks, but it's alright. Can kip on the couch, and the Doctor doesn't sleep much. 'Sides, probably only be a day or two."
~DWDWDW~
"It's been four days!" The Doctor grumbled as he flopped on the couch next to Melody, cube in his hand. She glared at him after nearly dropping her game controller, but he didn't notice. "Nothing! Not a single change in any cube anywhere in the world."
"You made me lose," Melody told him, addressing him in Gallifrayen.
"Oi, watch it!" Amy said from where she and Rose loaded the dishwasher. "No alien languages if it can't be translated." She then peered up at Rose and mouthed, "was it bad?"
Rose chuckled and shook her head.
"You know, Doctor, you're the one who wanted to observe them." Amy reminded him as they loaded the last plate and shut the dishwasher.
"Yes, well, I thought they'd do something, didn't I? Not just sit there while everyone eats endless cereal and plays video games." He said, looking at his foster daughter as she arched a brow at him. "Seriously, is this what you do all day when you're with your parents? You could observe stars, read up on quantum physics, enter trivia in the local pub."
"I'm a kid." Melody replied.
"You're thirty," The Doctor retorted.
"I look ten." Melody retorted. "And yes, when I'm on Earth I'm more … regular."
"Regular?"
Melody shrugged. "Normal. Try to blend in. So I play video games and eat sweet cereal."
"Are you really surprised by that, Doctor?" Rose asked her husband as she leaned on the counter and looked at him through the entryway to the living room. "She's got Earth friends in an Earth school. Not gonna indulge in the hobbies she has on the TARDIS. And it's history she likes, not physics." Rose corrected.
"Yes, well, I can't sit around all the time like these lot can. Only so much telly one can watch, or cleaning one can do. And they leave, Rose, they leave for their jobs and school." The Doctor rambled hands and arms flying in gestures that had Melody dodging out of the way.
"I don't go anywhere for my job, thanks." Amy retorted. "Journalism doesn't exactly require me to leave the house."
"Well, technically you do go places for your job, but we don't normally think of it as work." Rose reminded her with a wink.
"Well, Vegas was a bit of work." Amy said thoughtfully. "Convincing Rory that Melody probably saw worse than a couple topless women and flyers for … other kinds of women …."
"I have." Melody replied, having returned to her game
"Has she met Jack?" Amy asked quietly.
"No, we see him when she's here with you." Rose replied, waving it off. She didn't dare tell Amy what she already knew of Melody's future and how it involved the former Time Agent.
The Doctor bolted up from the couch and came up to the two women in the kitchen. "I'm bored." He said with a bit of a growl. "I hate being bored, I need to be busy."
"So go tinker on the TARDIS then." Rose replied. "And so help me if you take off …."
"Can't tinker, will leave, I know it. My legs, they're itching to run, Rose. Run fast, run far." He said with a bit of desperation.
"Your legs are staying on this Earth until we learn something about the cubes." She said firmly. "You built me a house once, planned on doing the domestic thing. Sure you could …." She stopped, an idea coming to mind. "Wait here, yeah?" She asked him.
"Why?" He asked suspiciously. "Where you off to that you don't want me coming with you?"
"An idea." Rose replied, getting on her toes to kiss her husband's cheek before heading out the front door. She crossed the road, heading to where the TARDIS remained parked in her usual spot. She was greeted with a happy hum as she snapped her fingers and strode inside. Rose paused to give the door frame a loving rub, then headed inside.
"Alright," She told the TARDIS as she rubbed the console. "Remembered seeing that 'For Sale' sign a little ways back. 'Bout a month back, their time, I think. So let's go to this date." She said as she inputted the date and time of her choosing. She flipped switches and turned knobs before sending herself and the TARDIS on their way.
Panic spiked over her bond, the Doctor clearly having heard the engines and sensed her growing distant.
"It's alright." Rose told him. "Won't be long."
When the TARDIS landed, she stepped outside and walked over to the shop across the way. It only occurred to her as she stepped inside that the TARDIS changed the location on her, and she was in a shop near the Estates, her old home.
"Haven't seen you in here for a decade or so," The man behind the counter said as he gaped at Rose. Jim, she remembered.
"Yeah, just happen to be in the neighborhood." She said off handed, reaching for a print out of the winning lotto numbers. "See ya around, Jim." She said briskly, turning and colliding with someone just stepping in. "God, I'm so sorry."
"Well ain't you a sight." Shareen said, and Rose's heart leaped in her throat as she looked at her friend. Aged, of course, because it had been about fifteen years Earth time since she began traveling with the Doctor. Shareen looked Rose over, shock and disbelief all in one. "Finally come home from all your traveling?"
"No, I'm … I'm just stopping by." Rose stammered, suddenly thankful Rory and Amy were on the other side of town and far from where any of these mishaps could happen. A little boy stepped out from behind Shareen's legs. "This AJ?" Rose asked, smiling at Shareen.
"Yeah," Shareen said, rubbing the little guy's head affectionately. "Glad you finally got to meet him. What about your little girl? Said you had one now, where is she?"
"With her Dad." Rose replied, frantically searching her mind for any memory of the odd correspondence she sent one of her oldest friends. She couldn't remember a name being given, didn't even remember a description. So she took out her phone, went into the pictures, and found a photo of her, Jenny, Melody and the Doctor with a setting that looked like it could have been from Earth.
"Wow," Shareen said as Rose showed her the picture. "I know you said you became a mom ages ago, but she looks older than fifteen."
"She's one of those girls that looks a lot older than she is." Rose said, relieved that she told Shareen about Jenny so long before. "That's River," she said, pointing to Melody. "Sorta adopted her."
"This bloke ain't the same bloke from before, is it?" Shareen asked. "I thought he looked a bit different, skinnier.
"He put on weight." Rose said before tucking the phone back into her pocket. "Listen, I was only popping by for a minute. But it was great seeing you." She said, backing out the door before Shareen could ask anymore questions. She didn't even look back to make sure she wasn't seen going in to the TARDIS.
"What the bloody hell was that about?" Rose asked, and the TARDIS hummed cautiously. "I'm aware what my plan could mean, but we're on the other side of town. 'Sides, she's one of the very, very few who knew me pre-Doctor that don't know the truth about me or my life. It'll be fine." She reassured the Time Ship. She set the coordinates to the day previously, studied the winning numbers on the print out, and then darted out and into the next shop. This one was proper, only a few blocks over from where Amy and Rory lived.
Rose filled out the slip of pre-selected numbers with her carefully memorized choices, paid ten quid for the ticket, then darted out again. She walked toward the Ponds' house, but instead of going there, she stopped to their neighbor two doors down. She slipped the ticket through the mail slot, then headed back to the TARDIS.
"Alright," She said as she entered the time ship. "Time to buy a house."
It was a couple hours before Rose returned to when she left the Doctor. Paper work and furniture buying, sneaking to their house to let the delivery men bringing their furniture and the decorator to do their job, it took about a day for her all said and done. She slept on the TARDIS before returning the TARDIS to their back garden.
She headed down the street, entered the Pond residence, and took note of the time.
Ten minutes for them.
"Oi," The Doctor said, darting for the door before she had it shut. "What do you think you're doing going about in the TARDIS? I can't leave, but you can?"
"Hush up and come with me." Rose said, gesturing with her head to follow. Amy had appeared in the entryway from the kitchen, and with a glance at Melody, the two followed as well.
Rose walked them down to the house that now belonged, on paper, to John and Rose Smith.
"The old Slottman house?" Amy asked confused as they headed up the stairs. "They moved out a couple months back. Won the lottery, put their house up, was sold in two days."
"To us." Rose said, looking at the Doctor who frowned. "We're your neighbors."
Realization dawned on him. "No, Rose. No. You can't mean …."
"Can't stay in their home, you'll drive them spare." She countered.
"Carpets, drapery." The Doctor cringed.
"Right, cause the TARDIS never had carpet ever. And a curtain's not gonna kill ya." She said. "Besides, we don't know how long we'll need to be here for. Somethin' tells me that cubes that fall from the sky aren't gonna suddenly start showing their intent. You need to be busy? Place is full of things you can break apart and put back together. And you'll need to mow 'bout once a week. Oh, and the fence could use a paint."
The Doctor stared at her slack jawed, then stared at the house. "It's so … domestic."
"You were gonna do domestic once." Rose reminded him. "So let's give it another go, Doctor."
He grumbled, then headed inside.
"You're our neighbors?" Amy said as she looked at the house in wonder. "Actually living next to us."
"Until we can find out about those cubes? Yeah?" Rose said, gesturing for she and Melody to follow inside.
They did a small tour of the house, show room ready thanks to the designer. It didn't take long, the layout being identical to the one Amy and Rory had, and then they followed the Doctor out to the back garden. He stood by the TARDIS, looking at her with a scowl, at the flower bed around three of her sides.
"She likes this." He said like he was betrayed. "She's got shade from the trees, and feels you made her parking spot right pretty with the flowers. She's … happy with the domestics."
"It won't kill ya, Doctor." Rose said, kissing him quickly on the lips. "I already let Jenny know where we are, that we don't know how long we'll be here."
"Right, of course you did, because you like making it so we can't leave." He said low, the sound of a patio door opening.
"Well, hi!" An overly cheerful voice called, and Rose looked to the Doctor who cocked an eyebrow. A moment later, a large, round head with a smiling face and big hair popped over the fence.
"Hello, Missus Freeman." Amy said with a wave.
"Oh, Amy!" Missus Freeman said, smiling changing to surprise for only a moment. "How do you know our new neighbors?"
"Hello," The Doctor said, stepping up to the fence and looking up at Freeman with a smile. "I'm John Smith, Doctor John Smith, this is my wife Rose. We're Melody's …."
"God parents." Amy supplied quickly.
"Yes, God parents." The Doctor said, wringing his hands a bit.
"We're her guardians in case something happens to Amy and Rory." Rose supplied through the bond.
"Yes, of course, I knew that. Of course I knew that." He said rather unconvincingly.
"Oh how nice." Freeman said with a too large grin. "Well, welcome to the neighborhood. So nice to see some new faces. I look forward to getting to know you." She said before disappearing behind the fence.
The Doctor looked to Rose. "Domestic," He scowled.
"Get used to it." Rose smirked. "You want to watch the cubes, keep an eye on 'em, best way to do it."
He grumbled, lip still curling while he nodded his reluctant agreement. He headed back inside the house, and Rose looked to Amy.
"So? See ya Sunday for tea?" She asked.
"Looks like." Rose replied with a grin. "Bring Rory by when he gets back from his shift. Sure he'd love to see this."
"The Doctor forced to live like us mere mortals?" Amy smiled mischievously. "Even for a day it would be a riot."
~DWDWDW~
Three months and six days had passed, and nothing happened with the cubes.
Even Rose was getting a bit restless, having not really thought through what she would do while they were stuck on Earth, so she did what she hadn't done in nearly two centuries: she got a job.
"We worked together before, you and I." Rose said to Kate as she and the head of the Science division of UNIT headed to the cube room. "In another reality. One in which Harold Saxon was prime minister. Well, prime minister for more than a couple days."
"Yes," Kate said, grumbling a bit. "I remember it was hell trying to reason with the American government. Took them quite a bit to convince them that Saxon wanted to cause waves before committing suicide himself. Of course, it couldn't be known it was his wife that killed him. Confused too many people. Funny how he never regenerated."
"He chose not to." Rose replied, wondering briefly how this Kate knew the truth about Saxon. "But then he was resurrected by some insane fans."
"Yes," Kate said, "Wish we had had more information on that, but to this day Naismith and his daughter won't talk about it."
Kate and Rose flashed their ID badges and entered the room. "Any changes?" Kate asked.
"No ma'ams." A young girl with dark hair slicked back into a pony tail, and thick rimmed glasses said as she glanced away from the cubes. She wore the standard white lab coat, but Rose couldn't help but note the blue women's suit with a maroon tie over the white blouse. On her feet were red converse. "No change. Nothing to report from your civilian analyst as well."
"Ingrid Osgood, Rose Tyler." Kate introduced. "Expert in alien technology, and the Doctor's long time companion."
"I'm his wife, actually." Rose said a bit more harshly than intended, looking to Kate as if she should have known that. The shock reminded her quickly that she did not, didn't even know of the romantic connection, because all that information was from another time.
Those in the room who were busy running tests before all suddenly stared at them, and Rose glanced around before her eyes fell to Ingrid Osgood.
"The … the … the Doctor's … wife?" She said, hands fumbling in her pockets.
"Yeah, best not flash that one around too much." She said slowly. "Sorta forgot you lot didn't know that bit."
Osgood pulled an inhaler from her pocket and took a deep breath with it.
"Right," Kate said, blinking rapidly and shaking her head. "Dad would've loved to hear that."
"Dad?" Rose questioned.
"An old friend of the Doctor's." Kate said, and it clicked for Rose.
"Wish I had met him." Rose said kindly with a gentle smile. "Alistair, yeah? The Doctor speaks fondly of him when he speaks of his past at all."
Kate smiled sadly, nodded once and cleared her throat. "So, nothing on the cubes, then, Osgood?"
"Not a thing." She replied.
"Alright." Kate said before turning to Rose. "We discovered a bunker in the United States about eight years ago. Supposedly it was meant to be filled with cement, but it ran so far below ground it was only the first few levels that were filled. Our scanners picked up a mass amount of alien tech there, and we only just managed to get into it. Mind having a look?"
"States, you say?" Rose asked. "Wouldn't have been Utah, by chance?"
~DWDWDW~
"Must be weird," Amy commented as she and Rose sat in lawn chairs in the Ponds' back garden, sipping tea as the last whisps of summer lingered into late October. "Being near Melody nearly every day and not being the one looking after her."
Rose watched the girl in question as she kicked a football around her with her Dads, proper acting as defense while foster acted as keeper between two piles of cubes.
"Bit, I guess." Rose admitted. "But then again, 's been weird having a job again. Proper house with the Doctor. Gone through twelve toasters, four toaster ovens, three coffee makers, ten coffee grinders, and one bread maker, but he's been content at least."
Amy chuckled. "The Doctor settled all proper like."
"Never thought I'd see the day." Rose replied with a sad smile. "Know Mum would be thrilled. Though she'd say I was putting on airs and graces being this far away from the Estate. And working for UNIT, even if it's only temporary."
"You didn't tell the Doctor about Osgood, did you?" Amy asked quietly, leaning in so she wouldn't have to let her voice carry one little bit.
"Wouldn't dare," Rose replied seriously. "Him having a fan that dresses like does? You know she copies all of his incarnations? Not just the one I told you about, but each one. Came into work yesterday with a leather jacket and purple jumper. Told her she needed a hair cut to properly pull that one off. She blushed." Rose chuckled. "Then had to use her inhaler."
"Think she's envious of you?" Amy asked.
Rose shook her head. "No. Hero worship is all that is."
Melody cried out in victory, drawing the attention of her Moms. Rose noted the Doctor on his back, arms and legs spread out, while Melody's arms were in the air and a giant grin spread across her face. Rory was laughing proudly, offering his hand for her to give a high five to.
"She looks like Rory's Mum." Amy said. "At least that's what we're saying. She's familiar in a really creepy way we can't put our finger on, but we know she got the curls from her, so that's what we're going with."
Rose swallowed, looking down into her tea and nodding. She bit her tongue, literally, to keep herself from saying anything.
~DWDWDW~
"Does it have to be inside the TARDIS?" Rory asked as they moved out the back door and into the garden where the happy little Time Ship was decked out in lights much to her delight. The house had been too, though Rose shuddered when she looked up at them. The Doctor nearly fell from the ladder multiple times when putting them up, scaring her each time and having her worried he'd fall and regenerate.
"It's not tradition if it's anywhere but." The Doctor countered as they tracked over the newly fallen snow.
"Not our tradition," Amy replied, pulling her hands up in her sleeves to keep the chill at bay.
"No," The Doctor said as he snapped his fingers. "But we have done yours, with the dinner, and the songs, and the endless animated fanfare. Now, Ponds, you do ours."
They all stepped inside.
"Oh come on, Dad." Jenny teased as she and Melody walked in the console room just behind him. "It wasn't that bad. You loved the one with the pink cat and the green thing."
"Supposed to be a bunny." Melody commented.
"Hard to go wrong with a time travel concept, even if it was terribly wrong." He said as he made his way up to the console and pushed a few buttons.
Rose closed the door, being the last one coming inside, and leaned against it.
"Wait, is Santa Claus a Time Lord?" Amy asked.
The Doctor paused in his actions and gaped at Amy. "Santa Claus isn't real, Pond."
"I'm aware, Doctor." She said, glare daggers before gesturing to Melody with her head.
"Mum, you do know I know Santa isn't real?" Melody asked as she plopped on her favorite jumpseat. "Hard not to figure that bit out when you travel through time and space."
"Right." Amy said. "Another facet of your childhood ruined." She crossed her arms and looked away, though it was hard not to see the disappointment.
"Hey," Rory said, coming up beside her and putting a hand on her shoulder. "It's Christmas. So what if Melody doesn't believe."
"Right you are, Rory." The Doctor said, resuming his task at the console. "It is Christmas, we have our families together, and what better way to celebrate," He paused as the first refrains of Rocking around the Christmas tree began to play. "Than by dancing and some crackers, huh?"
He reached into his pockets and pulled out a few, tossing two to Rory and Amy who caught them. They exchanged dubious, amused looked.
"So dancing and Christmas crackers." Amy said as she shifted toward her daughter while Rory pulled the top of his cracker open. "Anything else you three have as a tradition?"
"Egg nog," Jenny answered for her parents. "Rum free, though Uncle Jack has been known to sneak in some hyper vodka when he comes around."
"When can I meet Uncle Jack?" Melody asked curiously.
"Not until you are much, much older." Rose replied firmly, resisting the urge to shutter at what a meeting when Melody was a teenager could mean.
"Umm," Rory said, pulling out set of keys from his cracker. "What's this?"
"Those, Rory, are car keys," The Doctor replied. "And now that you have them in hand, I can remove the perception filter to the car that's been sitting outside your house all day. Your favorite car, now that Melody's older and doesn't need to be so strapped down."
"Car?" Rory asked. "You wrapped up a package of custard creams and put it under the tree, yet you put the keys to a car inside of a Christmas cracker."
"Well, I like our tradition more than yours." The Doctor said with a shrug.
Melody broke hers open, reached in with her fingers, and proceeded to pull out the netting for a proper goal post, proceeded by the thin posts themselves for assembly. "Brilliant!" She exclaimed with eyes alight.
"How did you?" Rory asked as he and Amy stared at the cracker wide eyed.
"Time Lord technology, bigger on the inside. Which reminds me, Amy, best you open yours near the floor. Yours is a bit … breakable."
~DWDWDW~
"Happy Anniversary!" Everyone in the house cheered, glasses clinking in the space above their heads as they toasted the Doctor and Rose.
"What exactly does one get one's spouse for a two hundred and fiftieth anniversary?" Rory asked before he sipped the champagne Jack brought and insisted everyone have a glass of.
"Never made it past twenty myself." Jack said. "Married, that is. Marriage for me always seems to ruin a good thing."
Ianto rolled his eyes but said nothing.
It was the only time they allowed themselves to interact with Jack so far back in their time line, since there was already a version of him not far from London. And, Rose had to admit, it was good to see Ianto again after he'd been gone for so long by her standards.
"Well fiftieth is gold." Sarah Jane said thoughtfully. "Do you just go through the rotation? Start all over again when you hit a hundred?"
"But that poses the question of what you get someone when you've been married for a hundred years." Mickey noted.
"Yeah, think sixty is as far as tradition goes." Martha nodded in agreement.
"What do Time Lords do?" Amy asked, sitting in nearby chair, champagne remaining unsipped as she set it down.
Rose had noticed but said nothing, especially with the quiet way Rory was constantly checking on her.
"Time Lords thought themselves above love and relationships." The Doctor replied with down cast eyes. "We had marriages of politics and complimentary genetics."
"Romantic." Donna snorted, setting her champagne flute down on a table and bumping one of the cubes in a bowl. It tumbled to the ground, but she was oblivious to it.
"Yes, well, was always a bit of rebel." He said, putting on a fake smile.
"So where's your daughter?" Sarah Jane asked Amy and Rory. "Thought she'd be here."
"School night," Rory replied. "My Dad's watching her. Not that she needs it, really, since she's about our age in reality." He paused thoughtfully. "Or is she older than us?"
"No, she's, uh, she's your age." The Doctor said, staring at the drink which remained untouched in his hand.
The room fell quiet, and awkwardness descending upon it while Donna rubbed at her temples a moment. Rose noted, glanced at the Doctor.
He watched her a moment, fiddled with the Donna-tuned perception filter on his wrist. A couple moments later the pain seemed to ease.
"Bloody alcohol in her system affecting her brain chemistry." He cursed.
"You know," Tim said, eyeing a nearby cube suspiciously. "The last time the whole bunch of us were together like this, Dalek's invaded."
"They aren't Dalek tech." Jenny rolled her eyes. "Are they, Dad?" She asked nervously.
"No!" He replied immediately. "No, no of course not." He then looked to Tim, eyes both dark and nervous.
Rose could feel his indecision on how to take this version of their dear friend. While the Jenny that arrived with him had a TARDIS, full grown and usable, the Tim that came with her didn't seem overly friendly with her. There was a scar on his temple, Rose could see, but neither she or the Doctor knew for sure when the relationship between their daughter and former companion started. They would guess it had, what with Tim being nearly thirty now if he hadn't been plucked from his time line so often, but in light of the celebration, Rose made her husband promise to behave regardless.
"Something you're not telling us?" Rose asked Tim.
"Nah," he said, picking up a cube and tossing it once. "Don't see a thing when it comes to these suckers."
"You know what I'd like to know?" Donna asked, her evil grin breaking any tension that might have been in the room and instantly returning the party to its intended feel. "How Rose has managed to stay married to Space Man for over two centuries and not be half mad."
"It's his ass." Jack said instantly. "Stayed perfect over three regenerations."
"Certainly doesn't hurt." Rose quipped.
~DWDWDW~
It was a week after the Doctor and Rose's anniversary party that Amy found herself on the bathroom floor crying. A week ago she was happy, thrilled beyond belief, at the circumstances of her life. She had her daughter with her all the time, knowing full well that if Melody went away for an hour or so months or years wouldn't have passed for her. Her career had picked up considerably despite not having been anywhere outside the city for the last nine months other than a few weekend trips to Scotland or Cardiff. And a week ago, she was just about at the end of her first trimester.
Now she was sitting on the floor of her bathroom hours after discovering her panties were soaked with blood. She'd collapsed and hadn't moved since, even though her skirt was probably ruined and her legs felt sticky.
"Amy!" She heard the Doctor call from down stairs. "Ran out of flour. Was trying to back banana bread, and I may have had a bit of a fumble with it." She could hear him moving around down stairs, his heavy footsteps echoing up to her long before they made their way to the stairs. "Amy? I know you're home. Your car's in the driveway. Amy!"
She caught a glimpse of him catching a glimpse of her through the gap in the mostly closed bathroom door.
His concern made her heart wrench more, and he slowly pushed open the door while holding her eye. It wasn't until he stepped in that he looked down.
"Oh, Amy." He said sympathetically, kneeling down beside her. "Rose was suspicious, but she asked me not to say anything."
"This is the third." She choked out. "After Demon's Run, whatever She did …. But this was the longest I stayed pregnant. Before it was a week, maybe two. Just long enough that Rory and I chalked it up to me being late."
He squeezed her arm. "Would you like me to run some tests?" He asked her, moving his hand to her cheek.
She shook her head. "Scar tissue." She said with a shrug. "Doctors have had a look and my uterus is full of scar tissue. I had to say I was in a car accident when I was pregnant and traveling."
"Scar tissue?" He asked, his voice carrying a light, warm humor and his eyes betraying relief. "Amelia Pond, why didn't you tell us? Scar tissue is an easy fix for me."
"Doesn't bring back what I've just lost." She sniffed.
"No, no it doesn't. It's heartbreaking, and terrible, and I would never wish this sort of pain on anyone, but I want you to know there is hope, Amy."
She looked at him through watery eyes and nodded. "Sorry you had to see this." She said.
"I'm sorry I intruded." He apologized. "I'll leave you to your privacy." He gave her a gentle kiss on the head before getting up and heading out, moving to close the bathroom door behind him.
"Doctor." Amy caught his attention. "I don't have flour, either. It's on the list."
~DWDWDW~
Amy waited a couple more weeks before taking the Doctor up on his offer, waiting to feel physically and (as best she could) emotionally better from the loss of her pregnancy. Telling Rory had been heartbreaking all over again, though in an odd way his concern about the Doctor walking in on her in the bathroom helped to keep her from drowning in the pain too much.
Rose had brought over meals over that time as well, and had Melody over to their home much more than before. If there was ever a time for them to have been so close by all the time, Amy could appreciate it was now.
"I'm surprised you and Rose haven't wandered off yet." Amy confessed as she lay in what reminded her of a tanning bed in the TARDIS medbay.
"Truth be told, Pond, we have left the odd time. Traveled for a couple months here and there, usually on the weekends you lot slip off for a couple days. Then Rose reminds me of the cubes and we come back. But those flash trips, those help more than you know."
"So it's not all domestic bliss, then?" She teased as she felt the warmth of the healing rays penetrate her skin. It was like having a heating pad easing her worst menstrual cramps.
"Well, no, suppose not. But only if you imply domestic as living in the four-walled prison. Had enough of being marooned in my third life, and didn't quite enjoy the time we were forced to stay in 1969. But all that aside, I will never properly admit it to Rose it hasn't been all bad. Though I do wish Missus Freeman would stop asking when we're having children of our own. Bad enough we have to say Jenny is Rose's sister whenever she pops by."
Amy snickered at that, then a thought crossed her mind. "Have you and Rose ever considered this? Healing her so you could?"
"Doesn't work like that," The Doctor replied. "The function has ceased for her all together. Besides, different species. Would have been tricky if she could, may never have happened anyway."
Amy nodded even though he couldn't see her.
"Ah, there we go, all set!" He said, and the heat stopped just before the lid popped open. He smiled down at her smugly. "Next time you feel you need a doctor, you should come to the Doctor," He said, reaching in his pocket and producing a lollipop.
"What am I, twelve?" She snorted as she took it.
"Oi." He said with a frown, making her laugh. "Melody should be coming home from school soon." He noted.
"Right." She said, hopping off the thing and straightening her shirt. She shifted about. "Sure it will work? I … I didn't tell Rory, didn't want to give him hope."
"You're all healed." He assured with a nod.
"Thank you," She said, giving him a quick kiss on the cheek before jogging out the medbay and then the TARDIS. A glance at her watch before exiting the console room told her Melody was likely already home, and she had a pang of guilt for waiting until so late in the day to see the Doctor as it was.
"Rose is a nice girl." Missus Freeman said, startling Amy to a halt. Her big, round head peered over the edge of the fence, the judgement in her eyes almost comical. "To see you and John carrying on the way you two do. I've been watching, you know. The visits to each other's houses after Rose leaves for work, when Rory goes on shift. The way you two seem so close. And now? Leaving his shed? I know he's in there still, saw him go in an hour ago."
Amy gaped at her in shock, then grinned. "Well, did try to shag him the night before my wedding." She said as she approached the fence. She took hold of the top, got on her tip toes, and did her best to get in Missus Freeman's face. "My daughter even calls him Dad. Let's it slip here and there. Wonder what that could mean, huh?" As Freeman's face became more scandalized, Amy glared. "Not sleeping with him, you twat. Keep your nose out our business, would ya?" She then moved away from the fence and headed for the house, she ran through it and out the front door then up to her own home.
When Amy got in, Melody wasn't in her usual spot on the couch. "Mels?" She called up.
"Up here." She replied.
Amy went up stairs, checked in her room, and found Melody sitting on her bed with something in her hand looking utterly confused. "What is is, Sweetheart?" Amy asked, trying to put on a smile but found herself feeling oddly uncomfortable.
"We have to do a project on our lives." Melody said, a tinge of annoyance for the task at hand nearly drowned by confusion. "So I dug out that box you keep all the momentos of my life on Earth in, trying to find something. This was in it." She said, holding up the prayer leaf from her birth.
"A brave woman made that for you. Was said that if I kept it close you would always come home. Like to think it works since you always come back to us." Amy explained with a gentle smile.
"What's the saying mean?" She asked, looking up in confusion.
Amy frowned. "It's your name." She gestured to it.
"No it's not." Melody said, handing the prayer leaf to her.
Amy chuckled nervously. "Well, it's your name in the language of her people, but it's still…." She paused, looking down at the embroidered cloth for the first time in over a decade, and her heart stopped.
She never really bothered to try and read it after the initial glance. She didn't understand why it didn't translate when it wasn't Gallifreyan and the Doctor insisted that the written word of nearly all other languages in the Universe would be. But now as she looked at it, it was clear as day.
And it did not say Melody Pond.
It said River Song.
"Oh," Amy said, eyes lifting to meet the blue eyes of her daughter and suddenly seeing her with the clarity she'd been lacking. "Oh," She said again, smiling as her heart felt lighter, realizing that her worst fears had never been valid.
"What? What is it?" Melody asked.
"It is your name, Melody." She said with tears in her eyes. "You just haven't grown into yet."
Melody shook her head in confusion. Then her eyes went wide. Amy looked to where she was staring, and noted the cube glowing blue. "Oh." She said. "Here we go."
A/N: Told you, really fluff-ish
Thank you to all the readers, favoriters, followers, and reviewers.
Darkelvoriplorellion Tyler, DuShuZhi, CupcakeFlake, BadWolfGirl (We are near the end), Dreamcatcher56, pyro-pixiechik (so was it?), Hlpur, annabethfan15, JuLLiA, debygobel, Tori, and Wazup (Canon? I laugh in the face of canon!)
Thank you all for leaving word. Yes, Melody, little Melody, is different in this fic world but she doesn't regenerate, so ... curls, man.
And I honestly never think of this episode as the "Power of 3", hence the name change other than the obvious reason.I have Tumblr now. MLTrefry. I am a baby deer when it comes to it, and haven't blogged in ages in any shape. way, or form. But you follow me, I follow you, we figure this thing out, right?
4 left.
Until next post.