"Ex Memoria"

31. Clearing Out

Chicago, Illinois - in the year 2021

There was no real feeling as though they were restrained in any way, but then the silent lawyer did have that look about him like it might not have been a good idea to try and deceive him. It was going to take some kind of distraction if they meant to get away. Luckily, there was one waiting for them on their way to see Mr. Brown.

When the elevator doors opened, it filled their ears with the kind of chatter which shouldn't have been present at this hour of night. Instead of an empty floor they found the employees milling about, glasses and all, as though some kind of last minute rush had taken over. It looked almost the way they always saw those scenes in movies and television, when a corrupt organization was busted and they were hurrying to pack up before the feds arrived.

There was no way to stop and consider whether or not this would be a bad idea, but Mike decided to go for it, taking hold of Amy's hand and pulling her away from the lawyers, who were busy dealing with the situation presented to them and didn't have an eye on them. Amy didn't argue on the move, instead taking over and pulling Mike in a different direction. She remembered the small room from her previous visit here; they would have a better vantage point.

"What do we do now?" Mike whispered.

"Well…" Amy looked out on the frenzied floor, observing the run around. "The glasses protected them, right? So why do they look so scared?"

"Maybe someone's coming?"

"Oh, someone's coming alright. The Doctor will find us in time, but they have no idea about him, so no… Look, some of them don't have their glasses anymore, but I think the other ones just haven't gotten around to it. I don't think they work anymore. It's like they responded to something specific, to the painting. We took it, so maybe the others destroyed it. They're as much at risk as anyone else, including us. They're not protected, and that terrifies them." She couldn't help but smile, knowing they'd levelled the playing field.

"I just want to make sure Tina's okay," Mike spoke, pacing as much as the small room could allow. He had his back to Amy when he spoke, and he couldn't see the way her face focused, taken with a thought, but he didn't have to. The thought had been tied on to a memory that was strong enough, unprotected as they were, to go on and leave her mind and enter Mike's. When it did, Mike stopped his pacing, suddenly grounded to the floor with revelation. "What…" he breathed, and Amy turned, seeing his face, dazed and a tiny bit smiling, and her hand flew to her mouth.

"Oh, I… I shouldn't have been thinking about that, I…" His eyes were welling up, his smile asserting itself, and now that it was out there, she couldn't very well pretend, so she gave in and smiled, too. "When we were waiting before, in the museum, I took off my glasses for a couple seconds, and she'd done it, too, without realizing, and…" she shrugged. "She didn't want to tell you until after this was all over, so… maybe you can pretend you didn't get her memory from me."

"Right, I can… I can try that," Mike blinked, letting a few happy tears spill.

"Not with that face you won't," Amy dug her hands in her pocket for a fruitless search of a tissue. "So… congratulations then?"

"Yeah," he nodded, wiping at his face. He needed a moment, to settle not only the fact that he was about to be a father, but also the knowledge that it wasn't just Tina who was out there, somewhere he didn't know for sure, but their baby, too. "I think I have an idea," he told Amy.

"About what?" she asked.

"Slowing them down," he nodded out to the frenzied men and women. "Until the others get here."

"Right, okay, how do we do that?"

"Can you show me how you did that thing, when you sent your memories to Rory, on purpose?"

"I think so," she shrugged.

"Right, so you and me, we'll overload them with extreme memories, anything we've got. You saw what it did to all of us, when we had strong enough memories thrown at us. We couldn't help but give in to them. Anything that's strong, for better or for worse."

"That could work," Amy agreed. "Only one thing, we don't know when the Doctor will come." Even as she said it, she knew that if she knew him the way she did, then the answer was clear… He would come right when they needed him the most. "Alright, I'm in. But carefully," she instructed, and Mike nodded.

It was hard to figure out where to start. Once Amy had explained what he needed to do, Mike was in the same place as she was: what were they willing to sacrifice on to these people? In theory they knew they would get it all back in the end, but how could they be sure? They could be giving away something they were meant to cherish.

But then they knew it was their only card to play, so they did what they had to do, and slowly but surely it started to work. Suddenly one bespectacled employee or another would drop what they were doing and begin to laugh, or cry, or just sit with a dopey grin on their face. Amy and Mike were relentless, and their energy crashed like a wave. It was not without consequences.

The more they gave, they also got. The joy and sadness they gave now meant that they received the anxiety from the employees. It was easier at first to push it down and focus on hitting more people, but as the seconds and minutes went by, it was harder to dig out the memories worth passing on when the ones they'd gotten in return were weighing down on top of the heap. If they had to go on much longer, they would be crushed underneath.

TO BE CONTINUED (TODAY)