Disclaimer: While I just bought a TARDIS necklace and a 11 Doctors T-shirt this week, I still do not own Doctor Who.
Author's Note: Well, I'm back from holiday (boo) but that means that more regular updates should resume. :D Thanks everyone for their patience and especially for reviews and etc.
Once Mickey and Rose had disappeared back through the mirror to follow and observe the droid, The Doctor turned back to Amy, who was still bristling, but even he could tell that the anger was a fragile cover for her fear. "Amy, you're going to have to trust me." He said honestly, stepping towards her. "I need to find out what they're looking for. There's only one way I can do that." He raised his hands at the side of her face, reaching for her temples, and gently placing his hands on her cheeks. "It won't hurt a bit."
Amy jolted slightly as he established the link, sliding into her mind, but interestingly, she didn't pull away. Instead, she leaned closer, resting her forehead against his, unintentionally making the connection stronger. "You're in my head." She said, slightly awed.
The Doctor didn't answer right away, as he explored the landscape of Amy's mind. He would have agreed with the androids and said she was incomplete if asked, but he didn't think they were talking about the same thing. There were staircases that led to nowhere, like the landings and connections had been destroyed or had rotted away. There were singular memories that flitted about like moths, without context, unable to connect to anything else. This was a mystery, but the most important thing was on the floor. footprints in golden sand, so many that The Doctor's hearts ached. "Oh, Amy, you've had some cowboys in here."
"Are you going through my memories?" Amy asked, as things replayed across her mind. This was an interesting development, how could she use it?
"If there's anything you don't want me to see, just imagine a door and close it. I won't look." The Doctor reassured her, wanting her to know that she was safe with him, that he was different than these droids, who were scanning her brain without consent or finesse. That he respected her and her privacy. It was enough of an intrusion that he had to be here at all, looking about at boardwalks and scaffolding linking her life together so capriciously, swaying in nonexistent wind without any true support.
Amy's lips quirked in a smirk at that, and she deliberately recalled a few of her more interesting memories. Well, perhaps memories wasn't the right word, but it worked well-enough for this context.
The Doctor suddenly found the opposite of what he had suggested happening. Instead of closing off more private sectors of her mind, she opened her mind fully, without reservation. The connection strengthened again, but he was distracted by the doors that had appeared suddenly in front of him like so many time windows. "Actually there's a door just there. You might want to cl...Oh, actually, several."
Amy would have snorted at how he was missing her point, but she had more important questions, and if he wasn't going to chase her thoughts, well, he could answer some questions at least. "Do you get used to this? Being in someone else's mind?"
"I don't make a habit of it." The Doctor admitted. There had been a time when he was accustomed to connection, even when not purposely establishing a link. Before the Time War there had always been the background noise of the other Time Lords, not like this, where he could see, hear, and feel Amy's mind, but more like a hum of presence, a support network of like minds, even for an old renegade like him.
"Why not?" Amy asked, unable to help her curious mind. "How can you resist it, connecting to someone like this?"
The Doctor could have answered a thousand different ways, he could have mentioned most human's fear of psychic energy, their need for privacy, scientific differences between his brain and other species, or even the despair of connecting to someone who would die and what it was like to be alone in your head when you were not meant to be. If it were not for his connection with the TARDIS he would have gotten far more mad much faster. Instead, he avoided all of these topics entirely. "What age are you?"
"You're not supposed to ask a girl her age." Amy teased. "But I'm twenty-one."
"It's not my question, it's theirs. For some reason, that means you're not old enough." The Doctor explained. "They've been scanning your mind, because they need an exact age." He felt her jolt again, and suddenly, more of those moth-like, unconnected, contextless memories surrounded him. He could barely see for all their fluttering. "Sorry, you might find old memories reawakening. Side effect."
Amy ran from the flashes in her mind. She ran where she always ran to when she was frightened or scared or alone. She ran to her Fireplace Man, who had saved her from the monsters under her bed. It was easier than she expected, and soon she found herself focusing on what she was seeing instead of what he was seeing. "So lonely." She said, feeling as though her heart would break.
"It'll pass." The Doctor reassured her, watching her memories of leaving home, of her parent's death, of an aunt who cared, who did her best, but had to work to put food on the table and needed to escape from the child in order to feel sane, the feeling of being abandoned and alone. "Stay with me, Amy."
If she were honest, Amy had never felt more with someone in her life. Looking into the Doctor's mind, all burning orange sky and bright red grass and deep dark shadows, she found someone just as lonely as she had been, and like anyone in the universe, greedy for connection, like to like, she reached for it, and was swept under a wave. "Oh, Doctor." She said with new knowledge, unable to help it. "Even surrounded by those you love, still alone." For a moment, she could feel anything. "Even after all that pain and misery, it just made you hold yourself tighter in control, it made you kind, even when the well of mercy only has so little left."
The Doctor broke the link in shock, forcing himself out of her mind and pulling her from his. "When did you start calling me Doctor? How did you do that? It's impossible!"
Amy shrugged. "You opened the door, I only stepped through it. You told me to stay with you."
"I didn't mean...that shouldn't have been possible!" The Doctor replied, reaching for his pocket and his sonic screwdriver.
Amy grinned at him, grabbing his hand inches away from his pocket. "Come on, Lungbarrow." She said playfully. "Come dance with me. There's a wedding out there."
"I can't." The Doctor said, trying to wriggle free. Hearing his House's name had made his hearts skip. "They may come after you again."
"Then it'd be best if you stayed to protect me, wouldn't it?" Amy said, all challenge.
"I can't...the time windows..." The Doctor was searching for reasons, trying to cling to his many rules for good behaviour, to keep himself tighter in control.
"Time is not the boss of you, Time Lord." Amy shot back.
The Doctor was off-balance and unsure. He wanted to stay, but he knew he shouldn't. The prudent thing to do, the wise thing to do, was to turn around and go back through the mirror. It had been so long, though, since he since he had not been alone in his mind that he wanted to cling to the afterglow as long as he could. "What did you see?"
Amy tugged at his hand again. "That even the loneliest person in the universe dances at weddings, Thete."
"What did you see?" The Doctor demanded again. She shouldn't be able to see so deeply, not from such a quick link. It was impossible, even for Time Lords.
Amy grinned at that, taking a few steps back. "Dance with me."
Hours later, The Doctor found himself once again studying the woman that a broken ship full of repair droids had punched holes in time to stalk. She was sleeping, curled up on her side, and deep in a REM cycle. He should leave, he knew it. She would only sleep so soundly for a short window of time and Mickey and Rose were bound to have found some sort of trouble. Thoughtfully, he ran his thumb over the tattoo on her shoulder. He hadn't seen it earlier, because she had covered it with some sort of concealer. The scales of the snake under his fingertips were formed by intricate celtic knots, something so utterly the lonely Scottish girl in the village in something so familiar to him. He leaned over and kissed her forehead, smiling to himself as he tied his tie around his head, and then stepped through the fireplace.