The Doctor was annoyed. Peeved. Even a little miffed.
Sure, the current situation meant a subject change, which he was all for. He wasn't quite ready to talk to Amy about the night before, and even though he hated himself a little bit for it, he was choosing the cowardly option anyway. He knew that talking about it would be really, really hard, and that the man that she had been with would be brought up, which was a subject he wanted to steer clear of altogether.
So even though the locked door meant a subject change, he was still annoyed. Once the initial reaction of the inoperative TARDIS wore off, it meant that there would be very little distractions, leaving only awkwardness in its wake. Awkwardness that would simply stay there until it was fixed.
How did he know? Because the TARDIS was telling him, the TARDIS was taking a stand, the TARDIS was using her brain.
They weren't getting back in until they had sorted out their problems.
The Doctor kicked the door in annoyance. Having a sentient ship really sucked sometimes.
"Locked out?" Amy asked. "Is there something wrong with it?"
"She's just being a nuisance." The Doctor said, his jaw locked in frustration.
"Is there a reason?" Amy asked, looking worriedly to the Doctor.
"She's..." The Doctor tried to think, not willing to give the real answer. "She's recalibrating. She does it at the most annoying times!"
"Well," Begun Amy. "It's not like we're running from aliens, is it?" She joked, then suddenly turning serious. "Is it? We're not leaving because we're running from aliens."
"Since when do we run from aliens?" He asked.
"When don't we?" She retorted, crossing her arms. Sometimes the Doctor could be completely oblivious to how he acted, like now, for instance. "So what now?"
The Doctor sighed, and turned around, looking back to the hotel. "We go back."
"Great!" Amy cried, trying to include as much enthusiasm as possible into her speech, hiding her frustration. "I can go swimming."
"You didn't go swimming yesterday?" The Doctor asked, as they began walking back to the hotel. "You spent all day in the bar with your friend?"
"No," Amy told him. "I spent the day at the beach; I just didn't get past the sand."
"Of course," The Doctor appreciated, smiling at the thought, and stifling a mental image of Amy enjoying the sand. "Great sand, fantastic sand, completely natural sand. That's why they made this resort; it's practically a spa, an all natural spa."
"Right..." Said Amy, looking up as they approached the hotel, meters away from the doors. "And that lasts, does it?"
"Well, not exactly," The Doctor tells her. "You see, when taken off the planet, the sand stops working, it's just sand. So humans decide to move there, in their billions, until all the room is taken up, all the sand is covered by buildings, and all the buildings are owned by the rich and powerful. Sad day."
"You've seen its future?" Amy asked. "You've been here before?"
"I've seen most things, Amy." He told her sadly as they walked through the doors of the foyer and joined the back of the queue. "When you've been around as long as I have, you've been almost everywhere."
"Really?" Amy asked in surprise. "I mean, I know you're old, like, really old, but isn't the Universe huge? Really, really big, and all that?"
"Nine hundred years is a long time." He told her. "I look at a star and it's just a big ball of burning gas, and I know how it began and I know how it ended. I was probably there both times."
"Wow..." Amy exhaled, standing on her tip toes to peer over the heads of the people in the queue, trying to gauge how long they would have to wait. "Cheery one, you are."
He looked at her and smiled, a real smile, one he hadn't given her in a while. Amy was returning, the real Amy, the Amy who could shake off the bad things that had happened. It wasn't perfect, they wouldn't be for a while, but they'd get there.
"Doctor," Amy begun. "We should talk about last night."
"You know where we should go?" The Doctor interrupted, taking a step forward as the queue shifted. "Barcelona, you'd love it there. They have mountains that sway in the breeze! Can you imagine? Actual mountains that sway."
"Doctor-"
"And the Dogs! You'd love the dogs, they have no noses! It's rude to laugh, of course. They take it very personally."
"Doctor!" She yelled, stopping his rambling. "We need to talk." She said more quietly, aware of people turning to look at her.
"Not right now." He told her, stalling. 'Coward', he told himself. Sometimes he took pride in being a coward; right now he just felt ashamed. Amy looked at him, frustrated, and rolled her eyes. Looking straight ahead she set her jaw and did her best to cross her arm whilst still carrying her case.
"Barcelona, then?" She asked.
"As soon as we get the TARDIS working." He reassured her.
"You're not sending me home, then?" She asked, voicing her fears aloud. Her voice cracked a bit as she spoke, but she swallowed it down.
The Doctor turned to look at her, his brow slightly furrowed. He analysed her, her stance, her too-shiny eyes. Placing a hand on her shoulder he turned her to look at him. "No. I would never..." He trailed off, somehow unable to consider it. Travelling without her, living without her, it seemed so impossible. "You aren't going home until you want to go."
"Well," She said, forcing a smile onto her face. "That's not happening any time soon."
"Next!" They heard the woman on reception call, and after a second they broke eye contact and moved forward to the desk. "How may I help you today?"
"We'd like to check in, please." The Doctor announced happily.
"Unfortunately, sir, we just hired out our last room." A chorus of groans were heard behind them. "It's a busy weekend sir, a conference is-"
"Yes, I know." He interrupted, pinching the bridge of his nose. "Can you check if there are any rooms available in nearby hotels?" He slipped the psychic paper out of his jacket pocket and showed it to the woman. Her demeanour changed immediately.
"Actually, Sir." She said. "We do have one room left. Only one though."
"We'll take it." Amy told her quickly.
"Very well." The woman said brightly as she typed it in, and handing them their keys. "The honeymoon suite, top floor. Would you like me to take your bags?"
"Please." Amy told her, handing them over. She turned to look at the Doctor, only to find him inexplicably vanished. "Did you see where he went?"
The woman looked up in slight confusion. "No, madam."
The bag dematerialised from the counter as Amy stepped away, allowing frustrated prospective customers to take her place. Looking round, she couldn't see the Doctor anywhere.
Right, you lot. I've gotten a couple of reviews saying to make the chapters longer, and now I am holding a poll. Who likes the shorter chapters, meaning mainly consistant publishing (I am a busy girl you know, especially now that lectures have started again), or longer chapters meaning you might not get another chapter as quickly?
I try to end my chapters where it feels natural, occasionally I don't know where to end a chapter and I think it shows, but it doesn't happen too often. If you get a chapter which is 5000 words long, that will have happened. Also, it doesn't help that I tend to be at my most creative at three in the morning, so I write, email to my proofer, then post in the morning after she edits out the sleepyness. I should probably work on that.
This one today is over a thousand words because I shoved two chapters together, as the original ch.22 was about 100 words long... So there you go, my lovelies, one really long chapter.
-Also, I've been watching through Doctor who with my flatmate, who's a Doctor Who Virgin. Yesterday we finally got to the end of series 4- watching Donna's death and David's in the same day. It broke my heart. So this evening we are storming through as much of series 5 as we can, to cheer me up. THE DOCTOR IS STILL ALIVE! Also, now I can get back into 11/Amy mindset, it's been difficult to write while watching 9 and 10, feel like I might've been writing their characters too much into 11's.
So, long or short chapters. Decide, my darlings.