Disclaimer: Characters contained within do not belong to me.

Author's Notes: Thank you so much to the people who have taken the time to read and review! I hope you enjoy this chapter, too!! There are some spoilers for "Victory of the Daleks," though, so tread lightly if you're getting your Who-fix from BBC America!

All These Things That I've Done

by Kristen Elizabeth

"There you are!" The Doctor's voice bounced off the watery walls, startling Amy out of her thoughts. "And you've found the pool--clever girl!"

Looking down at the spot where her painted toes dipped below the pool's silent surface, she sighed. "Aren't I just?"

"Not exactly where I left it, though," the Doctor went on, pulling off his own shoes and socks. He plopped down beside her and plunged his feet into the water. "I rather liked it in the library." When she said nothing, he glanced over at her. "Amy Pond, are you hiding from me?"

"What? No!" She drew her knees up and tucked them under her chin. "I was just...thinking."

The Doctor nodded. "Yes. Thinking. My favorite past-time." He paused. "What about?"

Amy sighed again, softer this time. "Don't know. Nothing important." She curled her toes around the lip of the pool. "I just met Winston Churchill."

"Brilliant, isn't he? Except for that rubbish cigar habit."

"And...I met the Daleks."

The Doctor's grin instantly fell. "Yeah. That you did."

"What you said...that I should've already known what they were..." She hesitated. "I don't understand what you meant."

"Still trying to figure it out myself," he confessed. "You're a puzzle, Amy Pond."

Her forehead wrinkled. "Is there something wrong with me?"

"Eh, it might not be you." The Doctor leaned forward, resting his elbows on the rolled-up cuffs of his pants at his knees. "Maybe it's everything else."

"But it could be me?" He lifted his shoulders. "Can't you give me a straight answer for once?" Amy demanded.

The Doctor smiled mysteriously. "There is no such thing. Stick with me long enough and you'll learn that."

Frustrated, she turned away from him. For a long time, there was nothing but the sound of the water as he moved his feet through it.

"We could have died today," Amy finally said, breaking the silence.

"We could die any day," he reminded her. "Today we were just a little closer, is all."

"I never imagined that was even possible. All those years...waiting for you...it never once occurred to me that traveling with you might be dangerous."

The Doctor spoke softly. "Do you want me to take you home?"

"Did Rose ever ask to go home?"

It took him a long time to reply. "She wanted to stay." He kicked the water. "She would have stayed."

Forever.

"Well, so will I." The Doctor glanced at her. "You still owe me a visit to an alien planet." She poked his side with her manicured fingernail. "You're not so easily rid of me, Time Lord."

He grinned. "I've got just the place we can go." He jumped up and offered her his hand. "Are you in?"

She let him help her stand, giving him the sweetest of smiles. "No, that would be you." It only took the slightest push to knock him off his feet. He hit the water with a terrific splash. "The pool, I mean!" she called after him.

When he shot to the surface a second later, he was laughing wildly, his hair plastered to his forehead. "Oh, I like you, Amy Pond!" he declared, wiping water from his face.

Amy gave him a curtsey and a wink before leaving the room.

The Doctor stood in the waist-deep water for a long time after she left...thinking.

There are no extra pieces in the universe. Everyone is here because he or she has a place to fill, and every piece must fit itself into the jigsaw puzzle. -- Deepak Chopra

"Let me get this straight, John. You want my permission to take home a piece of Torchwood equipment that is so valuable we haven't even set a price on it...so you can examine a crack in your wall?"

"Ah..." The man Pete Tyler had first known as the Doctor scratched his fingers through his spiky bangs. "Yeah. Yeah, that's about right." Pete stood up slowly. "If it makes a difference," John rushed on, "the crack is on the nursery wall."

Hands in his pockets, Pete came around to the front of his desk. "Listen, old chap. I get it. Believe me, I do."

"You do?"

"It wasn't so long ago that I was an expectant father, myself. First time parent. Everything's new; everything seems like a potential threat." He clapped a hand onto John's shoulder. "You know I've come to consider Rose my own daughter, so trust me when I say that I'm glad to see you looking after her safety, but..."

John cut him off. "You don't understand. This isn't just a crack. It's something much worse."

"Well, it can't be structural damage. I had a whole bloody team of inspectors go over every inch of that house before you two moved in."

"I don't think there's anything wrong with the wall." John paused to let that sink in. "Have you ever known me to be wrong, Pete?"

Pete folded his arms. "You haven't put a ring on my daughter's hand yet and she's due to have your baby any day. I wouldn't call that right."

"It's...that's...complicated. And beside the point!" John shot to his feet, taking advantage of the extra inches of height he had over Rose's father. "Are you going to let me borrow the magnifier or not?"

Before Pete could reply, there was a knock on the door. It opened a second later and Rose poked her head inside. "Am I interrupting?"

John reached her first. Taking her hands in his, he leaned down for a kiss. "Never. But what are you doing here?" he asked as he not-so-subtly guided her to the chair he'd just vacated. "I thought Jackie had you this afternoon."

"I escaped," Rose said triumphantly. "Thought I'd come here and see if I could do something more useful with my day than researching baby names."

"That's why you're Torchwood's finest, love." Pete kissed her cheek before retreating behind his desk. "But maternity leave means that you shouldn't even be in this building at all."

Standing just behind her, John touched her shoulder. "I'll take you home, Rose."

"You'll do no such thing until one of you tells me why you're both in a strop." After a minute of silence, she craned her neck to see her Doctor, then looked back at her father. "Well, don't all rush at once, boys."

"Minor disagreement," Pete said. "Nothing you should worry over."

"Don't I get to decide that? Or did I surrender my brain when I got pregnant?"

John crouched down next to her chair. "Maybe it can wait for another day."

"Not if it has anything to do with the crack in our nursery wall, it can't!" With a protective hand on her swollen stomach, Rose leveled her father with a look. "Whatever he wants, I'd really like it if you gave it to him."

"Rose, you shouldn't get yourself all worked up about..."

"I can hear voices!" Rose cut her father off. A moment passed. "In the crack...someone's talking." John took her free hand, only to find it cold and clammy. "Now, I may still be learning about your world, but I'm almost positive that hearing voices coming from the walls is mad in any universe."

"What were the voices saying?" John asked. "Could you understand them?"

Rose shook her head. "Not really. It was like...whispers." She threaded her fingers through her Doctor's. "Honestly, I didn't want to know. Sort of still don't."

"Voices?" Pete asked his daughter. "You're certain?"

"I've already started moving the baby's things into another room," she told him.

"Pete." The man blinked and focused on the half-Time Lord. "The magnifier?" John asked again.

His throat closed up, but he nodded. "You'll have it by sundown."

To Be Continued