CHAPTER 41

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AMY'S CHOICE 2 (THE SEQUEL NO ONE BUT MISSY WANTED)

The older Amy frowned even as she continued to watch the other version of herself talk with her family. She was rapidly becoming angrier and angrier the more that she saw the perfect life that the other her, the one that Rory had picked over her, was now leading. It was the life that she should have had but didn't thanks to the Doctor. Her hatred of both him and her other self continued to grow by the moment as she watched the others laughing and celebrating their victory over the Angels.

"That should have been my life," The older Amy said to herself in a low voice.

"Yes, it should have and with my help it still could," A voice that she didn't recognize suddenly said.

The older Amy turned around to see a woman dressed like an old style nanny suddenly standing there next to her with a very unnerving smile on her face. From the very start, she neither trusted nor liked this woman. Everything about her made her skin crawl.

"I'm Missy," The strange woman said with that creepy smile of hers still plastered all over her face.

"Where did you come from so quickly? You weren't there a minute ago, and I know that I didn't see you walk in," The older Amy said suspiciously.

Then she noticed that the others weren't moving. They were all frozen in time. That's when she knew that her gut instincts about this woman were right.

"Okay what old enemy of the Doctor's are you, and how are you doing that?" The older Amy asked as she got straight to the point with her.

Missy's smile immediately changed to an impressed look as she said, "Very good, Amelia. I can see now why he picked you. Yes, I am an enemy of the Doctor's, but it wasn't always that way. Once I was his best friend just like you. I was closer to him than anyone. We were just like brothers, and I would have done anything for him. I would have even died for him without one moment of hesitation, Amelia."

"What changed between you then?" The older Amy asked.

Missy smiled even wider now knowing that she was slowly reeling her in with her story as she said, "What changed was that, just like you, one day he betrayed me and stabbed me in the back. That was when I saw him for who he truly was, Amelia. He's a hypocrite and nothing more. He's just a lying two-faced phony who does nothing but leave a trail of wrecked and ruined lives in his wake and that's just what he does to his so-called friends."

The older Amy winced and began to immediately look disturbed by that as she said, "The Doctor never betrayed me. He had no choice but to do what he did. If he had taken both of us in the TARDIS, he would have destroyed the universe or something because of the paradox that it would have created."

"And yet here you are," Missy said with a pointed look on her face.

The older Amy's attention was now completely focused on her as she said, "Are you the one behind that?"

Missy nodded as she said, "Yes, I am and by doing so I'm putting the lie to the Doctor's words. If I could save you, then he could have too. We're both Time Lords after all with the exact same knowledge of time, and yet I've saved you when he hasn't. Now you have to ask yourself, Amelia, why is that? Why is it that I saved you and your so-called best friend wouldn't? Notice that I didn't say couldn't. He wouldn't!"

Amelia started to look very upset even as she struggled to remain defiant while she said, "I'm sure that he had a good reason. He would have saved me if he could have. I know he would have. He loves me."

Missy looked at her with a sad look on her face as she said, "I used to think that too once, Amelia. Then one day I found out that I was wrong just like you did. You have to face an unpleasant truth about your so-called best friend whether you like it or not. He left you behind to die. He picked the younger version of you instead because he likes his Earth girls young. That's the plain and simple truth of it, Amelia. You can defend him all you like, but you can't ignore the facts."

The older Amy started to cry now even while Missy had to struggle not to smile. She finally had her now. She was almost hers.

"If I'm so bloody unimportant and useless, then why did you save me for? Why do all of this?" The older Amy said in an emotional voice.

"Now there you go putting words into my mouth, Amelia. I never said that you were unimportant. I happen to think that you're of the utmost importance or else I wouldn't be here right now. You can believe me on that. You're going to be extremely useful to me if you agree to work with me, and that is why I saved your life. I want your help to pay back our common enemy for what he did to us. I will make him suffer for his betrayal, and I'll do it for the both of us. Then once I've succeeded in destroying him as he tried to destroy us, I'll finally give you your life back as it should have been if he had never interfered with it. You'll finally have the life and the family that you would have had if traveling with the Doctor hadn't completely destroyed it," Missy said.

"He didn't destroy my life. He showed me the wonders of the universe and took me on adventures with him. He made me feel like for the first time in my life that I was special," The older Amy protested.

"Yes, he always does that, Amelia. That's how he hooks all of you Earth girls. He always shows you great and wonderful things and makes you feel important like you're the only one who matters to him. Then one day when the going gets tough or he just simply gets bored with you he up and leaves you. He does it to all of them sooner or later, Amelia, and you're no different. Sooner or later they all get left behind, and most of the time he definitely doesn't leave them in better shape than they were when he met them. If they're even still alive that is because just like he did to you he's left so many of his so-called special friends behind to die. You can just ask Adric about that. No wait. You can't," Missy said with a smirk.

"Just . . . stop it. I don't want to hear any more of this," The older Amy said in a voice that was growing more and more furious by the moment.

"Maybe not but you definitely should. Imagine how much better that your life would have been if you had never met him, Amelia. You never would have led a sad and lonely childhood being thought of as completely mad. You never would have lost your daughter and missed out on her entire life," Missy said.

"Stop it!" The older Amy shouted.

Missy continued though with a trace of a smile on her face that she was having trouble concealing as she said, "You never would have become barren and unable to ever become pregnant again either. Not only did he steal your child from you he also stole your one and only chance to ever raise one."

"Shut up!" The older Amy screamed as she punched Missy in the jaw so hard that she nearly dislocated it.

Missy laughed now as she said, "The truth hurts doesn't it? Well, it definitely hurts me anyway."

"Shut up! You don't care about me, Lady. You just want to use me to get your own revenge on him. How do I know that you'll treat me any better than he did? I mean you still haven't even said how you're doing all of this. If you won't even tell me that, you're obviously not going to tell me what it is that you're really up to," The older Amy said.

"That's a good point," Rose Tyler said as she suddenly appeared next to Missy who immediately glared at her.

"Stay out of this," Missy said as she instantly became furious at Rose's intrusion.

She had almost had her!

"Who are you supposed to be? What is it with you people and just popping in out of nowhere like that?" The older Amy said in an irritated voice.

"My name's Rose Tyler and I'm here to keep you from making a huge mistake. Don't listen to this woman or she'll wind up killing you after she's done with you just like she does everyone else who crosses her path," Rose warned.

"Well, it's not like the Doctor treated me any better is it?" The older Amy said in a hurt voice.

"He had no other choice, Amy. He couldn't take both of you in the TARDIS or he would have destroyed the universe since you're both the same person. The only reason that you're here at all is because Missy created a Paradox Machine in order to maintain your existence. You're not supposed to exist at all though and she knows it. Sooner or later once she's done with you she'll just shut her machine off and get rid of you without a second thought because keeping you around for good would be too dangerous. I'm sorry but that's the truth," Rose said.

"Don't listen to her. She's lying," Missy said.

"No, she's not," The older Amelia said.

"How can you be so sure of that? You don't even know her," Missy said still trying to hold onto her last chance to convert her to her cause.

"I don't know you either. I believe her though because I learned a long time ago that the truth is often something that you don't really want to hear. I also learned that the Doctor for all of his faults really does try his best to be a good man. He wouldn't have left me behind unless he had no other choice. All of those things that you said about me are true, but none of those were the Doctor's fault at least not intentionally anyway," The older Amy said.

"How can you possibly be so sure about that?" Missy said in a furious voice.

"Because once long ago he shared fish fingers and custard with a sad lonely little girl who was afraid of a crack in her wall and tried to comfort her about it when no one else would. Those are not the actions of an evil man!" The older Amy said in a defiant voice.

Then she turned to look at Rose and said, "Thank you. You helped me to remember what was really important when I almost forgot about it because of how bitter that I was."

"Very well, Amelia. You had your chance. Now you're truthfully of no more importance to me. Say something nice," Missy said with an evil smile as she pulled a small device out of her pocket.

"That's the remote control to your paradox thingy that's still keeping me here, isn't it? Now that I've decided not to help you, you're going to switch it off and get rid of me," The older Amy said with no trace of emotion on her face as she faced her impending doom.

"That's right. Before I do though, you really should say something nice," Missy said with a wide smile that covered her entire face.

"You're not doing anything to her. She's not being erased. Not like this," Rose said.

"Oh, I beg to differ, Rosie Posie. Amelia asked me how I was stopping time earlier, and I never did answer her. Don't you wonder how? Surely you must be curious," Missy asked with a smug smile on her face.

Rose gave her a look of anger that could have melted the sun as she said, "I already know all about it. I know whose power is doing this for you and what you did to her, and one day I'm going to make you pay for that, mate. One day you're going to get exactly what's coming to you for everything that you've done. I can promise you that."

Missy's constant smirk quickly turned to a look of pure horror as she saw that Rose meant what she was saying. She also saw in that moment a glimpse of the true power of the Bad Wolf reflected in her eyes, and it frightened her to the core.

It also attracted her like a moth to the flame. One day she too would have power like that. She would have the power to make herself into a god and make the entire universe tremble.

Not today though. Today she could still die if Rose decided to destroy her at that moment which it looked like she was just about to do.

Luckily for her though Rose never got a chance to do anything.

"There you are! I caught you right in the act. I knew that you were behind this. The whole thing sounds just like you. Now you've finally gone too far. You've just endangered the entire universe by bringing her back," River said as she suddenly appeared out of nowhere and confronted Rose.

"Melody, I had nothing to do with this. I'm actually trying to fix it if you'll just stay out of my way," Rose said.

"Oh, I see how you're fixing things alright. I've already begun to see the future slowly changing, and I was wondering why. Now I know. It's you. You're altering everything because you just have to save everyone, don't you?" River said.

"It's not her, Melody. If you'll shut up and let her talk for a minute, you'll find out that it was the woman who you just allowed to escape," The older Amy said.

"What?" River asked in confusion.

"That's right, Melody. You just let the person who's really been changing the future escape by distracting me just long enough for her to teleport out of here. It was Missy. You do know who she is, don't you?" Rose asked in an extremely aggravated voice as her eyes briefly glowed with anger.

"Yes, I remember the original timeline perfectly well thank you very much. I didn't see Scary Poppins here though. I only saw you," River said in a worried tone.

"What? She was just here though, Melody. You had to see her," The older Amy said in surprise.

"Blimey! No wonder she's been able to make changes to the future without anyone finding out. She's doing things in secret right under all of our noses. She's using Bella to hide herself from everyone except for who she wants to see her," Rose realized.

"Why could you see her then? She definitely didn't want you to interfere with what she was doing," The older Amy asked.

"Bella's powerful but not that powerful. She can't hide Missy from me. Not yet anyway," Rose said in a worried voice.

"Bella? Who's Bella?" River asked.

"She's someone who I failed, Melody. She's the reason that I do try to save everyone that I can because once I failed to save someone the one time that it mattered to me the most. Someone that I loved like a sister," Rose said in tears.

"Rose, I . . ." River started to say.

"Just zip it. We may have become closer but it's obvious that you still have more than a little bit of resentment against me for coming back from Pete's World and taking the Doctor from you. I'm sorry that things worked out like they did, but you did find happiness with Donald so I don't see why you can't just let it go," Rose said.

"That's not why I was so angry, Rose. I was angry because I can see the future changing, and I'm afraid that my daughters are going to be erased from it somehow. I thought that you were doing it because you've already altered things so much. I jumped to the wrong conclusion because I was scared of losing the happiness that I already have not because of what I lost in the past. I'm sorry," River said.

Rose looked at her in surprise as she said, "What?"

"I must have heard that wrong too. Did you actually apologize, Melody?" Amy said with a smile as she suddenly started moving again and walked towards them.

"Well, I should have known that you wouldn't be affected by Missy's little parlor tricks," River said proudly.

"Why were you pretending to be frozen when you weren't though?" The older Amy said.

Then her eyes widened as she answered her own question by saying, "You wanted to see if I would take Missy's offer or not. You knew that someone had brought me back for a reason, and you pretended to be frozen to see why and if you could trust me or not. That's exactly what I'd do too. How are you not frozen though? Explain."

Amy smiled as she said, "That's the first time that I've ever had to be the one explaining things to myself. Now I can see just how rude and demanding that I can really be."

"Get to the point, Time Lady Me," The older Amy said with a sigh.

Amy smiled liking herself already (how surprising!) as she said, "Well, when you suddenly appeared out of nowhere I became suspicious right away and decided that maybe I should be prepared for anything. Vortex users are usually the only ones who can do things like prevent paradoxes from happening after all so I put Vortex shielding in my clothing so that whatever they did wouldn't affect me. It's lucky for me that I did too apparently. Missy might have decided to kill me too if Rose hadn't come along."

"So you suspected me too?" Rose asked in a hurt tone.

"No, of course not, Rose. I knew that you wouldn't do something like that no matter how badly you felt about the other me being erased. I thought that it might be a new evil Vortex user in town, and it looks like I was right. This Bella person that you were talking about who froze everyone else has powers just like yours, doesn't she? She's a Vortex user too," Amy said.

"Yeah, apparently. I don't exactly know how she got her powers, but I have a pretty good idea who brought her back to life and gave them to her in the first place," Rose said.

"I know. The mysterious Missy," Amy said.

"Yep," Rose said popping the p.

"I'm sorry that I distracted you, Rose. I didn't know that she was here," River apologized again making Amy smile at her in pride.

"Stop it," River said as she saw this.

"Stop what?" Amy asked innocently.

"You know what. I haven't changed that much. I'm still just as tough as I ever was and don't you forget it," River said.

"As if I ever could," Amy said as she hugged her.

"Stop it. Not in front of Rose," River protested.

"I really don't care if your Mum hugs you, Melody. It doesn't make me think any less of you than I already do," Rose joked with her tongue between her teeth.

Then she suddenly turned serious as she said to the older Amy, "Missy's about to switch off her Paradox Machine. I can feel it."

Amy looked at the older Amy with a look of sorrow as she said, "I'm sorry."

"It's okay. I always knew that I didn't have long to be here. Somehow I just felt that. At least I know that one of us got things right anyway and had the family that I was so afraid that we never would. I'm so happy for you. I should never have been so jealous of you for it," The older Amy said in tears.

"It's okay. I'd feel the exact same way in your shoes," Amy admitted as she too started to cry now.

Then even as the older Amy started to fade from existence, Rose got a determined look on her face as she said, "Not today."

"Rose, you can't do this," River protested.

Rose smiled as she said, "Never ever tell me what I can or cannot do, Melody. Yes, a paradox will result if the two Amys remain in the same timeline with two different futures co-existing at once together, but what if she doesn't stay here?"

Both Amy and River smiled as Amy said, "Oh, you clever girl. That's just brilliant."

"What is? What's happening?" The older Amy asked as she kept fading.

"You can't stay in this timeline, Amelia, but you won't be causing a paradox if I create an all new one for you. One where things turned out just a bit different. It's the least that I can do, yeah? Good bye and good luck," Rose said as she began to glow with the full power of the Bad Wolf.

"Wait! What do you mean by things happening differently? Rose!" The older Amy shouted.

Then she suddenly found herself back on Apalapucia once more only this time she was being taken into the TARDIS by Rory instead of being left outside of it. She couldn't see her younger self anywhere inside which completely surprised her.

"Where's the younger me? Didn't you find her?" Amy asked.

"Younger you? What are you talking about? There is no younger you. You look the same age as you did when you came here. Luckily I got you out of there in time before you were trapped for years or worse," Rory said in a relieved voice.

Amy now looked down at her hands and saw that it was true. She was young again. She hadn't spent half of her life here after all. She was still young!

She cheered with joy and gave a very surprised Rory a passionate kiss as her heart filled with happiness. She finally had her life back again just as it should have been.

"Yes, it is lucky, Rory. Very lucky. We could have easily missed out on most or all of Amy's life in a place like this. That's what it's designed for after all," The Doctor said with a relieved smile of his own.

"Raggedy Man," Amy said as she rushed forward to hug him tightly already forgiving him for everything.

As she hugged the Doctor, she whispered, "Thank you, Rose. Thank you so much."

The Doctor stiffened as he said, "What? What did you say?"

"Nothing, Doctor. It was nothing at all," Amy said as she continued to hug him tightly.

She didn't let go for a very long time Rose noted as she watched this from her own timeline. She then smiled as she saw that Doctor getting his Rose back as well as she looked to the future of that reality.

"You just can't help it can you? You really do have to save everyone," River said shaking her head at her.

"If you know about the changes to the future then you know just as well as I do that the days are coming when even I may not be able to guarantee a happy ending anymore, Melody. I've decided to give them out while I still can," Rose said.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Amy asked in a worried voice.

Both Rose and River said at the same time, "Spoilers."

Then they both vanished. Rose left in a shower of golden energy as River left with her Vortex Manipulator. Just as they did so, the others immediately unfroze even as two new visitors arrived who wouldn't leave Amy much time to think about what Rose had just said.

It was Oswin Oswald and a little girl who Amy immediately recognized as a very young Melody. Amy just looked at her in complete shock even as Melody ran to Amy with a huge smile on her face.

"Mother!" Melody shouted with joy as she hugged her.

Amy looked dumbfounded as she said, "Oswin, will you kindly explain exactly what is going on here?"

"Well, it's kind of a long story," Oswin said with a smile as Melody continued to hug Amy tightly while Rory looked at her in complete astonishment.

"Can you just give us the short version then? I'm okay with that," Rory said.

"Dad?" Melody asked as she looked at him now with a smile.

"Yes, I'm your Dad. I think," Rory said in an uncertain voice.

"Of course you are. Melody, go talk to your dad for a while, okay? I promise I'll talk to you some more in a few minutes," Amy said with a smile.

"Okay. Sorry if I've gotten you into trouble, Clara," Melody said with a grimace as she rushed to see Rory who still looked at her in confusion.

"It's alright, Melody. Don't worry about it," Oswin said.

Then she turned to Amy and said with a nervous smile, "I can explain."

"Oswin, did you just undo Melody's entire history?" Amy asked in a voice that was both happy and bothered by that idea at the same time.

"Not really, Red. It's kind of timey wimey as Chin Boy might have said. You see I found Melody while I was on my honeymoon. Well, she found me really. It seems that she had managed to escape from the Silence. I looked into things because I was worried about changing history too, and it seems that there were a few months where Melody was lost by the Silence and they had no idea where she went. They never found out either. So I figured why couldn't some of those few months have been spent with you? I kept meaning to tell you about her, but one thing after another just kept happening to keep me from coming to see you. Now that I can though, I've finally brought her here at last. I've taken good care of her I promise. In fact, I've kind of gotten close to her. It's going to be really hard to have to give her back to the Silence one day in order to preserve her timeline," Oswin admitted.

"Tell me about it. I've already had to do that once myself. I was really hoping that I never would have to again," Amy said as she looked at Melody with regret.

"You won't have to. I'll do it when the time comes," Oswin said.

"You don't have to do that. I'll do it," Amy said.

"Are you really sure that you can find the strength to be able to do that again, Amy?" Oswin asked.

"I don't know," Amy admitted.

"I thought so. That's why I'll do it when the time comes, alright?" Oswin said.

"Are you sure that you're going to be able to do it either?" Amy asked in a knowing tone.

"Not really, no," Oswin admitted.

Amy nodded with a small smile as she said, "Well, let's just take things one day at a time then, okay? We'll worry about that later. Right now I just want to give Melody some good memories for once so I won't be all filled with doom and gloom around her."

"That sounds like a good idea. Well, I guess I'll just say good bye to her then," Oswin said sadly.

"I'll make sure that you get to spend some more time with her before she has to go back, Clara. I promise. I can see from the way that she looks at you that she's gotten pretty attached to you too. Clara, thank you so much for bringing her back!" Amy said as the two women embraced.

Amy silently resolved to herself in that moment that she was going to give Melody the happiest time that she could in those few months. She was going to make sure that even in the horrible times that were still to come for her that she always had something good to look back on.

She wanted to make sure by the time that she was finished that she would never ever doubt just how much that her parents loved her.

Next: Little Melody gets to know Amy's current family while she takes her on a trip to what she hopes will be a fun place. This is Amy's life that we're talking about here though so that fun will always come with a price. Yep, that's right. Amy and company are about to run headlong into trouble. What else is new though? Perhaps a visit by the Amy from my story Living the Dream along with her entire TARDIS crew? That's certainly new isn't it?