CHAPTER 24

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CLIODNA NO MORE

Amy's TARDIS landed right in the middle of the Tower of London directly next to the Execution Block where all executions were performed with the executioner's axe. Amy raced outside ahead of River who was just barely being kept inside of the TARDIS by the combined strength of Rory, Brian, Sirona, and Selene.

"Hurry, Amy!" Rory called out as River growled in anger.

"You're all going to pay for this when I get free," River promised.

"I don't remember Mels being this . . . violent," Brian said.

That's because you weren't there to bail her out of trouble ten times a day. Amy's voice said in Brian's mind.

Brian winced as he still wasn't used to having Amy just break into his thoughts like that. He could feel a wave of sympathy go through his mind for a moment and knew that it was Amy silently apologizing.

Sorry. I forget that you're not used to telepathy yet. Amy finally replied.

It's okay. Just go help your friend. I'll catch up eventually. See? I am getting into it. Brian said in his thoughts as he smiled to himself.

On the outside, Amy smiled to herself for a moment and then approached the Queen who she saw waiting for her outside. Was it her or was the Queen smirking?

Amy had a bad feeling that she was being manipulated, and she didn't like it. Not one bit.

"Are you enjoying this?" Amy asked her openly.

"He married me and then never came back. Wouldn't you enjoy getting your revenge for something like that?" Elizabeth asked.

"Yes, I would. I wouldn't kill someone for not wanting me though. I'd just punch them in the jaw, break a few teeth, give them a black eye or two, and move on. This is overkill. Besides which I keep telling you that you have the wrong man. This isn't the Doctor," Amy protested.

"I know. I couldn't think of a better way to get you here though than by using your friends," Elizabeth said with a sinister smile on her face.

"You're the clone," Amy said as she slapped herself in the forehead for being so stupid.

Then she slapped herself again for copying the Doctor.

"Well, it took you long enough, didn't it? I must say you're a little slower than I thought you'd be," the clone said with an evil smile.

That smile was wiped away in an instant though when a huge gun was held against her forehead. Amy looked back to the TARDIS to see that Rory, Brian, Sirona, and Selene were all lying there either stunned or unconscious.

Amy shook her head. She should have known better. In the end, she was usually the only one who could talk River out of doing something stupid. In this case though, she had been wasting her time by trying to talk who she thought was Elizabeth out of doing something stupid instead.

She smiled at herself as she realized that she of all people had become the voice of reason and restraint. When had that happened? It must have been when she became a mom.

"Let's see how fast you are. I'm betting you're not quick enough to avoid being shot at point blank range," River said.

"And you are?" the clone asked.

"River Song. I'm Donald's wife and I'm the very last person in the universe that you ever want to tick off," River said in a threatening tone.

"Stand away from the Queen or die," a guard said behind River as several of them suddenly held their swords at River's throat.

"It appears, my dear, that we are at something of an impasse," the clone said with a chuckle.

"I can still kill you before they kill me," River said.

"What about your mother or your family? Or do you not care about them?" the clone threatened.

Then suddenly the clone realized that Amy was no longer there. Where had she gone?

That answer came seconds later as each of the guards were taken out in rapid succession by a series of lighting fast kicks and punches as Amy pounced on them from out of nowhere. The Queen watched in horror as Amy singlehandedly disarmed and knocked out each and every one of them and then stood before her with anger surging through her eyes.

"You shouldn't have been so worried about me. You should have been more worried about her. She's even deadlier than I am believe it or not," River said proudly.

"I'm not impressed," the clone said bluffing.

"Oh, but I think you are. Furthermore, I think that you're afraid. You should be. You threatened my daughter. You're threatening my friend. Both of those actions are guaranteed to get you on my bad side, and trust me when I say that is not a place where you want to be," Amy said as she grabbed the clone so tightly by the shoulders that she cried out in pain.

Now the clone's eyes filled with terror as she said, "Donald's o-okay. He's in the T-Tower right now."

"Where's the real Queen?" Amy asked in a cold voice.

"S-she's alright as well. I couldn't risk causing a disruption in time by killing her now, could I? P-please don't kill me," the clone begged.

"It was okay for you to try to kill my daughter though, right?" Amy said furiously as she held one of the guard's swords up to the clone's neck.

"Mum," River said in a worried tone.

Amy knocked the clone out with a single touch to her forehead. Then she dropped the sword and smiled gently at River's upset expression.

"What? Do you think that you're the only one who has a dark side?" Amy asked in amusement.

"You're not supposed to have one. I'm the family psychopath not you. You're the one who's supposed to talk me out of crazy things not join me in them," River said with a worried look on her face.

"Sorry. I just don't like being played with and manipulated and almost losing a family member because of it. I already lost you when you were a child and before that I lost Sirona for centuries because of someone playing around with my life, and I won't let it happen again. Do you hear me, Mr. Clever, wherever and whoever you are now? It's not going to happen," Amy said.

Then she saw Rory looking at her with a worried and even fearful expression on her face, and she knew that he had seen the whole thing. Amy felt enormous guilt over what she had done as she said, "I wouldn't have actually done it. That's a line that I've never crossed."

Rory nodded and tried to smile, but she could see that he was still upset. She could also hear him thinking just for an instant through their link that he missed the old Amy. That thought shook her to the core. She could feel him instantly feeling guilty and sorry for thinking it, but it had been there nonetheless.

She couldn't say that she blamed him really. The anger and sorrow that had plagued her later years as Cliodna was catching up to her yet again because of what she had learned recently about Sirona. She had tried to bottle that pain away and had succeeded for a while, but now it had come right back again as soon as she saw River being threatened and taken her by complete surprise.

She had to admit right now that she was really starting to miss being just Amy Pond herself. Humans didn't experience emotions as fiercely and strongly as Time Lords did. Time Lords emotions were just so much more heightened. Maybe she should do something about that.

She could follow up on that thought later though. For now, she had to help rescue Donald, find and defeat Mr. Clever, and then get her family out of there to safety.

No problem, right?

"She said that Donald was in the Tower so let's go get him. Surely he shouldn't be too hard to find," Amy said as she broke the uncomfortable silence and led the way forward.

"Don't worry, Rory. She used to get like this sometimes when I was younger. She's just always had a problem with containing her emotions. She's full of fire and passion. For some Time Lords, it's harder to control ourselves than others especially if we get a naturally angry personality when we regenerate. Surely you've noticed how we tend to get carried away sometimes," Sirona said.

"Yeah, I've seen it in action when I used to travel with the Doctor. He'd fly into a rage sometimes and even scare Amy. Now she's doing it," Rory said worried.

"She'd never act on it, Rory," Sirona said.

"I know that she wouldn't, but it's still upsetting to see. It's like she's a stranger when she does things like that. I know Amy has always been fiery and angry, but that was something else entirely that I just saw," Rory said.

"It's my fault. She's still upset about me. She'll get over it though. It's one reason that I didn't leave her to stay with my other mum. I knew that she still needed me. I can always tell when she was bottling things up whether she's Amy or Cliodna," Sirona admitted.

"We'll help her through it together. I promised to always be by her side no matter what, and I always will be whether she's a Time Lord or not," Rory reassured her.

"I knew that there was a reason that she picked you," Sirona said as she smiled warmly at him.

Amy and River meanwhile had managed to slip into the Tower unnoticed and silently made their way through it without being seen until they came upon Donald's cell. Amy quickly realized that her sonic didn't work on the door though.

This stupid thing never did work on wood! She thought to herself in frustration.

River motioned for her to move aside, and she smiled as River used her gun to disintegrate the door instantly. This, of course, brought every guard in the area running instantly.

"You know that this is a trap, don't you?" Donald said as soon as he came out of the cell.

"Of course it's a trap. That's what makes it fun," River said with a wild grin on her face as she embraced Donald and kissed him in relief.

"This isn't fun. None of it is," Amy said as fought off the guards with her bare hands.

"It depends on your definition of fun. Mine is pretty loose. Let me give you an example," River said as she punched one guard in the face, stunned another with her blaster, and kicked yet another in a sensitive area sending him to his knees in agony.

"Now that was fun," River said happily as she continued to shoot more and more guards.

"Having everyone that I love in danger because of me is not fun. It never was and it never will be," Amy said as she came to a silent decision about her life at last.

"Mr. Clever, I want to make a deal with you. Come out and show yourself to me and let me make you an offer. I'm betting that you'll like it," Amy said.

Somehow Amy wasn't too surprised when Donald suddenly smiled and said in Clever's voice, "Hello, Pond. I have to admit that you're much smarter than I thought and a heckuva lot darker too. You really would make a perfect Cyber Queen. Is that your offer? Please say it is. That would be so cool! Even cooler than bow ties, and I didn't think that anything could be that cool!"

"Get out of my husband!" River screamed as she started throttling Mr. Clever.

"Call her off or all deals are off," Mr. Clever said in a weak voice.

"Melody, stop! It's still Donald that you're strangling you know," Amy said.

That reason and only that reason made River stop, but she still held onto Clever tightly so that he couldn't get away and continued to glare at him. Amy decided to get right to the point. She knew what he really wanted, and she was ready and willing to give it to him. She was going to do it her way though not his.

Amy quickly whispered something in Clever's ear that River couldn't hear, and Clever's face turned from one of surprise to pure joy as he said, "You would do that? Are you sure? I won't have you making a deal with me and then backing out of it. You have to be willing to go all of the way."

"What are you talking about? What deal?" River asked alarmed.

"You didn't tell her? Oh! Let me be the one to do it! Your mum here has just offered to give up fighting my Cybermen forever if I leave her and her family alone. You won't believe how she's going to carry out her end of the promise though. I think that I'll leave that part a surprise. I would love to be there when you find out what it is though. The look on your face is going to be priceless. Alright, Pond. I'll do it. As long as I'm sure that Cliodna will never bother me and mine again, I'll leave you and yours alone. If you go back on your side of the deal though for any reason then I'll come after you with everything that I've got. Got it?" Mr. Clever asked.

"I've got it. Now let's shake on it, and then you can take yourself and your Elizabeth clone and get out of here," Amy said.

"Deal. I don't really care about this particular time zone anymore anyway and that Elizabeth was really starting to get on my nerves. All she does is talk about the Doctor. He left her. So what? She really needs to just over get it already," Mr. Clever said as he rolled his eyes.

The two of them shook hands, and then Donald slumped over into Amy's arms. Mr. Clever was now gone.

"What deal did you make with him? Why would you do that for anyway?" River asked in disbelief.

"I'm tired of my family being hurt because of me. Sirona was hurt because of me, you were hurt because of me, and now Donald has been kidnapped and possessed just to get to me. That's the end of it. No more," Amy said as the two of them held Donald up and finally carried him away from the cell.

"You're starting to sound like the Doctor or at least one of them anyway," River said with a grin.

"What?" Amy asked.

"Never mind. Whatever deal that you just made with Clever is a bad one I'm sure so you can just unmake it right away," River said.

"No. Trust me, Melody. This deal is going to be good for everyone all around. This kind of thing can't happen to anyone that I care about because of me ever again," Amy said firmly.

They soon found the real Elizabeth and freed her from her cell. She quickly resumed command of the guards now that her clone was absent, and she looked at Amy apologetically as she said, "I'm sorry. I thought that I could reason with her and use her to help me. I thought that maybe she could be someone that I could talk to as well. Sometimes it's lonely being the Queen, and who else would know that better than her. I should have realized that she was still under the metal men's influence though and just let you take her away when you offered to. At least now the situation has finally been resolved, and no one was hurt."

"No, not this time. I made sure of that," Amy said in a sad voice.

Elizabeth looked at her questioningly, but Amy didn't elaborate on her answer any further. River meanwhile had a terrible suspicion from what Amy and Clever had both said before that she knew what Amy had planned, and she didn't like it. Amy was making a bad decision based purely on emotion, and she knew that that kind of choice could only lead to more trouble.

River knew that Amy was up to something when she made sure to put as much distance between them as possible all of a sudden. She continued to move at a brisk pace as River struggled to wake Donald up. She had to get after her as soon as possible to prevent her from doing something stupid.

"Donald, wake up. Hurry!" River said impatiently as she started slapping him hard in the face.

"Hey! Watch the face! It's the only one that I'll get with this body, and I don't need you damaging it," Donald said grumpily as he woke up.

"Good. Now I don't have to carry you. Come on. Run! We have to catch up to my mother," River said.

Donald's eyes went wide as he said, "Yeah, we do. We really do. I remember what Clever agreed to now. We have to stop her."

The two of them ran to catch Amy, but it was already too late. Amy had snuck back inside of the TARDIS without letting anyone see her and locked the door. She then quickly made her way to the room with the Chameleon Arch in it.

As she hooked herself up to the machine, she made some adjustments that she hoped would allow her to retain her memories as Cliodna afterwards. She wasn't sure if they would work or not. At least she would still have Amy's memories regardless. She could work with that.

It wasn't until she started the machine that she remembered with horror that Amy didn't know Julia, Selene, or Sirona. In her emotional state, she had completely forgotten that. She tried desperately to stop the machine but she couldn't. It was already too late.

"I'm so sorry," Amy whispered to Julia as the machine started to take her memories away.

Then she began to scream endlessly as the arch rewrote her entire biology and she couldn't stop. Down the hall, Julia who had stayed behind because it wasn't safe outside heard her screams and came running to see what was wrong. Every kind of fear imaginable to her about her mother being hurt or worse flashed through her mind, but she never, ever expected what she found next to have ever occurred.

Amy stumbled out of the arch and fell to her knees in pain. She then looked up to see a little girl that she had never seen before staring at her with worry in her eyes.

"Hey, what's wrong? Are you okay? How did you get in here anyway? I don't remember the Doctor talking about letting any kids come along. It doesn't matter. We'll soon find your mum and get you back to her I promise," Amy said with a warm smile.

"You are my mum. What's wrong with you? Why can't you remember?" Julia asked in a voice filled with fear and pain.

"What are you talking about? Unless? Melody? Are you Melody?" Amy asked in a hopeful tone.

"No, I'm Julia. What's wrong, Mum? Tell me what I can do to make it better," Julia said in tears.

River finally got inside with her Vortex Manipulator to find her little sister in tears, and her mother staring at her blankly.

"Melody, what's going on? Do you know who this little girl is?" Amy asked in confusion.

"What have you done?" River asked in anger.

"What? What are you mad at me for?" Amy asked.

"Where's the watch? There should be a watch. Where is it?" River asked.

"I know that answer to that. There isn't one," Mr. Clever's voice said from everywhere at once.

"You've possessed the TARDIS, haven't you? In fact, you've been in it at least since the time that Elizabeth called us, haven't you? Did you get inside through the cell phone transmissions perhaps?" River guessed.

"You are absolutely correct, Hat Killer! Except for that brief period where I took over your husband, I've been in the TARDIS for this entire little adventure. I've even been subtly influencing Amy's thoughts using the telepathic circuits of the TARDIS the whole time in order to make her come to this conclusion. I wanted her to do this so that I could get rid of my worst enemy and it worked. It worked brilliantly as a matter of fact. Now I've made sure that Cliodna will never, ever return. There isn't a watch. There never is going to be a watch. That arching was permanent! Now she'll be Amy Pond forever. Cliodna is dead!" Mr. Clever said laughing hysterically for a few moments before finally fading away entirely.

"No, it can't be true. I can't have found another mother only to lose her again. I can't," Julia said in tears.

Amy reached out to her and hugged her without thinking about it as she said, "It'll be alright. I don't know what's going on here, sweetie, but I'll make sure that you're taken care of. Even if I have to do it myself."

Julia almost smiled at that but didn't want to get her hopes up unnecessarily. Maybe some part of her did remember after all. Maybe there was still hope that buried somewhere deep down in Amy's mind that the person that she knew as her mother still existed.

River silently swore to herself that she wouldn't let Cliodna be gone forever. Someway somehow she would bring her back. Even if she had to go crawling on her hands and knees to her nemesis in order to do it. She would restore her mother to her true self even if she had to go to Rose Tyler.

Next: Is Cliodna really gone for good? Will Amy still want Julia, Selene, and Sirona in her life now? Can Rose help fix her back and will River be able to bring herself to ask her? Maybe there's another solution entirely. Find out in the next chapter.