A quick apology to anyone who was reading, then there's been this long break between chapters. Life happened, as life sometimes does, and this kinda fell by the wayside. I'm going to post a few chapters over the next couple of days, and hopefully get things back on track. Thanks for coming back to read...
"Why can't we stay in England?" Amy asked.
River sighed. "I can't stay in England Amy. I need to get as far away from London as I can."
"Why?"
"Because I can feel his presence. The Doctor is here, in England. It was strongest when I was in London, but I can still feel it here. And if I can feel him, you bet your bottom dollar that he can feel me too."
"And how is that a bad thing?" Amy asked. "If you can feel him that means we can find him, he can help us."
"That would be the worst possible thing." River said, suddenly realising that she had so much to explain to her mother. "Time is damaged because of what happened at Lake Silencio. I know you were there, I saw you. I was trapped inside that suit. The Silence literally forced me to kill the Doctor. But then I managed to go back and change it. We need to find a way to fix time, but if I know the Doctor he'll try to fix it the easy way, by sacrificing himself."
"What?"
"The Doctor and I are the centres of this disruption. He didn't die, and I didn't kill him. It's like..." River struggled for a metaphor to explain multi-dimensional physics to someone who'd dropped science after their O levels. "Okay, on a hot summer night when you know there's a storm coming, there's a moment before the storm starts when it feels like the whole world is just waiting for that first lightning strike. You can feel the electricity in the air just waiting for somewhere to go."
"Right," Amy was clearly struggling with the concept.
"Lightning happens when a big charge differential bridges the gap between the earth and the heavens. So imagine the Doctor is the sky, I'm the earth, and the time disruption is all that static electricity which is floating in the air making your hair stand on end. The slightest contact between the Doctor and I and... kaboom."
"Lightning," Amy said slowly.
"Lightning indeed," River agreed. "The disturbance in time will be healed, and I'll be back on that beach killing the Doctor. I don't think that's the outcome either of us want."
"Definitely not," Amy considered. "Is there another way? There has to be."
"I think there is, but that's why we need to go."
"Tell me again why it has to be the Pyramids?" Amy asked.
"We're going to need to contain as many of the Silence as possible, and we know they use electricity as a weapon," River explained. "We need somewhere big, not wired for electricity, and no metal at all in the construction. Really dry air would be helpful too, dry air conducts less electricity than humid air. We also need a government that we can persuade to help us. Egypt is functioning as a monarchy, with Cleopatra at the head. I think we can work with that."
"Okay," Amy agreed. "I always wanted to see the pyramids. I just thought I'd go in the TARDIS, or that Rory and I would go together. I never thought you and I would be flying there in a Zeppelin."
The soldier focused on cleaning his gun. It was important to keep his equipment in top condition, you never knew when you might need it.
He wasn't quite sure why he'd become a soldier. At school he'd planned to become a doctor; he'd struggled long and hard but failed to get high enough marks to study medicine, and when offered the chance to join up, somehow the army had called to him. He'd had no close childhood friends, no reason to stay in the village where he'd grown up. In clear contrast to his academic studies, every part of army life came easily to him, as if he were remembering lessons instead of learning them.
"Williams!"
He stood quickly and saluted the officer. "Sir!"
"Report to the Colonel's office, immediately."
"Sir, yes sir!" The soldier returned his gun to the weapons locker, checked that has breastplate was immaculate and his sandals correctly tied, then walked quickly through the barracks and across the yard to the commandants office where he knocked sharply and waited for a response before opening the door. He stepped inside, closed the door behind him and saluted the man behind the desk.
"At ease Private Williams," the Colonel said. "I'd like you to meet Brigadier General Franklin of the US army."
The soldier turned to the unfamiliar man in a US army uniform. He extended his hand. "Pleased to meet you sir." The US uniform was as different from the English as night and day; sharply pressed khakis and brightly coloured badges compared to a traditional Roman military uniform.
"And you Private Williams," Commander Franklin said, shaking the offered hand. "You've been recommended for a secondment to a joint task force between the British and American armies. You will report to the US embassy at 0700 tomorrow for your new assignment."
"Yes sir," the soldier said. The American turned and walked from the room leaving the soldier and the Colonel behind.
"Any questions Williams?" the Colonel asked.
"Do you know what the new assignment involves?"
"It's a special task force, a joint operation. All I know is that you were requested by name, and that it's classified at the highest levels. Make us proud soldier. Now, go pack your bag, you've got a long way to travel."
"Put down that gun!" Cleopatra said with a giggle.
"I will," River smiled while using her free hand to spin the giddy queen around. "But not until you give me what I want."
"Hmm," Cleopatra simpered. "How about I give you what I want and see if you change your mind?"
River laughed: this really wasn't going at all how she'd planned it. It appeared that Cleopatra had decided the game was seduction, and the Egyptian wasn't going to take no for an answer.
It had all started with a friendly chat at a political function which River had talked her way into based on her fake FBI credentials. She'd bonded with the queen while chatting about hair styles, and the difficulty of maintaining a respectable hair-do when the wet-season rains made the air thick with humidity. Cleopatra, who insisted that her new friend call her Cleo, had invited River to join her in having her hair done. River had spent an afternoon having her hair washed, oiled, braided and styled while she sipped champagne with the Egyptian queen and talked about everything from football and politics to tactics, boys and clothes.
River hadn't been intending to manipulate Cleopatra. Her plan involved befriending the woman, and gaining her informed support for the project. Everything she knew about the woman suggested that she would be open to the cooperative venture, and that she was intelligent enough to understand the benefits of fixing reality.
Instead Cleopatra had invited River to walk with her through the palace gardens, and now that they were in a secluded grotto the Egyptian queen seemed quite intent on seduction. River leant back, away from the scarlet painted lips which were approaching hers. She was wearing the hallucinogenic lipstick, a last resort in case Cleo couldn't be brought to see the advantages of cooperating, but really didn't want to use it. So River had pulled out her gun, and Cleo responded as if this were some kind of role play fantasy. Right up until the moment River pressed the barrel against the Egyptian monarch's side and released the safety. Cleopatra froze.
"Put down that gun," Cleo whispered tensely. "You don't really want to do this."
"I really don't," River replied. "I really wanted to talk to you, tell you what's really gone wrong with the world, give you the chance to help out willingly."
"Okay," Cleo tried to smile. "Put down the gun, we can talk."
"That's what I've been trying to do," River explained. "You're the one who had other things on her mind. Not that I'm not flattered, really I am. There was a time, when I was at university, that I would definitely have been pursuing this with you. But things change, and I'm in the middle of trying to save the universe right now, so I'm a little distracted."
She returned the gun to its holster, and Cleo sank down onto a stone bench.
"You're saving the universe?" Cleo asked.
"It's kind of a long story, and it involves traveling through time and space," River sat down on the next bench and looked at the cotton draped queen. "An evil religious order tried to force me to kill someone; an amazing man who never hurt them. I tried to save the Doctor, and now everything has gone wrong."
"The Doctor?" Cleo straightened suddenly. "Does he have a blue box called the TARDIS that can vanish?"
"You've met the Doctor?" River asked eagerly. "I never knew that. Tell me what happened?"
"Later," Cleo promised. "First tell me what you meant about the universe going wrong. Why are you here?"
"Well," River began. "To start with, Egypt is supposed to be the strongest Empire of it's time. Right now all times are happening at once; every country seems to be at the height of its power. I'm trying to save the Doctor, and return time to its proper course. And I need your help."
Cleopatra looked at River, looking into her eyes, gauging her sincerity. "Okay."
"Okay?" River asked quizzically.
Cleo smiled. "Okay. What can I do to help?"
Private Williams took a quick look around the corner then drew back. Finally the target was in sight. Nearly six months of searching had led him to Vatican City, to this corridor outside an office deep in the heart of the Basilica.
A middle aged woman with brown curly hair pulled into a tight bun sat behind a desk with a pile of papers in front of her, quill in hand as she made detailed notes. The woman put the quill down and stopped to rub her forehead, then started writing again.
"Target acquired," Private Williams briefed his unit over the comms. "Team alpha, I want you to guard the rear exit. Bravo, I need you backing me when I go in. The target appears to have limited visibility on her left, on of you cover her from that side. "
"Roger sir," his unit responded.
"On my count then," Williams ordered. "Three, two, one, go…"
"I found Rory," River smiled in anticipation of Amy's response.
"I can't get the eye-stalk right," Amy muttered, looking up from her sketchpad. "Wait, what did you say?"
"Rory, he was in the British Army," River smiled. "They're transferring him to us as part of our team."
"New soldier?" Amy drawled. "Great, we really need another uniformed muscle man. I hope this one's at least cute. There's a distressing lack of eye candy in this place."
River was confused by Amy's lack of reaction. "This one's not exactly eye candy, but I think you'll like him. It's Rory. Well, he's going by Captain Williams now."
"Why am I going to like this Captain Williams?" Amy asked vaguely. "It's not like I'm boyfriend shopping, I'm a married woman. But still, a bit of eye candy wouldn't go astray, don't you think?"
"Of course not," River said vaguely, but her mind was working overtime. Why wasn't Amy reacting to this news? She'd been searching for Rory ever since this endless moment began, and now it was as if she didn't even hear the news. Perhaps she'd respond when she finally met him, until then it was best to let things be.
"Right, new eye candy. So," Amy smiled. "We've been at this for months, finally got the last of the tanks fitted. Captured that Kovarian bitch and nearly got those pesky eye-drive things sorted. I think we need some down time, so... I got us a bottle of Baileys, and some ice-cream."
"Ice cream? What flavour?" River asked, sitting down on the other bed in the room she shared with Amy.
"I got two tubs, chocolate and strawberry," Amy grinned. "I'm hoping your taste in ice-cream flavours hasn't changed in... how long has it been for you?"
"God, ice-cream," River sighed heartily. "There's some wonderful things about the 51st century, but somewhere along the way they've lost the recipe for ice-cream. I haven't had ice-cream for nearly five years."
"Five years," Amy exclaimed. "That's dire! Open the fridge, I hid the ice-cream in the bag marked sprouts. Figured there was no way you'd be poking around in that."
River opened the fridge, rustled around in the freezer compartment, pulled out two small tubs of ice-cream and a glass bottle from the fridge. "I hope you've got spoons," River said. "Otherwise I'm just going to let this melt and drink the ice-cream."
"Of course I'm prepared," Amy chuckled and held up two spoons, then gestured to two glasses sitting on the bedside table. "Really, after all those midnight feasts we had as kids, did you think I'd make you eat with your fingers?"
"I'd forgotten," River admitted, leaning back on her bed and contemplating the ice-cream tubs. "The chocolate better be for me, because there's no way I'm giving it to you."
"Of course it is," Amy tossed the spoon to River who snatched it out of the air then threw the strawberry tub back to the red-head. "You forgot? I mean, it hasn't been five years for me yet, but how could you forget?"
"Oh Amy," River lifted a spoonful of chocolate ice-cream to her mouth and sighed as the flavour exploded in her mouth. "It hasn't been five years since Leadworth." Amy looked up sharply from her ice-cream. "I managed an authorised trip back to Earth in 2020 as part of a student trip five years ago. It was all about the dangers of over-interpreting history based on archaeological finds. But I managed to ditch the students for a few minutes and buy myself some ice-cream. It made me so home-sick."
"How long?" Amy asked sharply. "How long has it been for you?"
"I spent a month in the hospital," River explained. "I was pretty weak after Berlin. That's when I discovered that the TARDIS had set me up with identity papers, bank accounts and everything, all in the name River Song. According to the records I graduated high-school on one of the outlying colonies then moved to New Earth to go to University. I found an apartment, and went to university and studied history. Mostly I just wanted to find out the truth of what the Silence had told me about the Doctor, and if you look carefully he's studded throughout the history books."
"So you went to uni," Amy said impatiently. "I guessed that from the Dr Song thing, but how long has it been?"
"Four years as an undergraduate, I majored in history," River explained. "Then two years of a master's degree, a year working on a dig as a research assistant. Then four years doing my PhD."
"That's eleven years! Eleven years since we were in Leadworth," Amy looked sad. "The Doctor said you'd find us. I never thought it would take so long."
"Nearly fourteen actually," River admitted. "Kovarian took me again on my graduation day, which was eleven and a half years after Leadworth. That's when they put me in the lake. When she dumped me back at the university I ran, avoided capture for just over a year, I spent most of that hiding on an archaeology dig. Then a Time Agent found me, and I stole his vortex manipulator. That's a kind of device time agents use, they strap them to their wrists..."
"I know what a vortex manipulator is," Amy interrupted.
"Really? How?" River asked.
"Uh... spoilers," Amy answered.
"God I hate that word," River said, her frustration evident. "Anyway, it took me another few months to get everything ready to try to save the Doctor. Which brought us here, to this broken moment. I think we've been here for nearly a year, haven't we?"
Amy thought about it. "Yeah, I guess it must be about that. There was the time at my parent's house, then the months in the hospital. And we've been here for months now, building our resources, catching the Silence, analysing time."
River scooped up more ice-cream, eating it before speaking. "I did look for you, you and Rory and the Doctor. That's why I studied history. At first I was just looking for the Doctor, but then I was reading accounts of the Starship UK, and I realised that his un-named companion was you. You never told Mels about that, or anything after the Atraxi invasion. I only knew he was back when I heard the stories about your reception. When did he come back for you?"
"The night before our wedding," Amy smiled, remembering running away from home in her nightie. "The Starship UK was our first stop. That poor star-whale, how did it turn out? That's one thing about travelling with the Doctor. You're there for the highlights, but you never get to know how things turned out. Did the ship make it? All those people? And what about Scotland, insisting on having their own ship. So typical!"
River laughed. "It turned out fine, they made it to safety and the star-whale swam free. Liz Ten is still queen of England in my time, though she's pretty reclusive by then. She called the star-whale a friend of the Empire, even knighted it. First non-humanoid to ever be a knight of the empire. Speaking of knights, did you know that Queen Victoria knighted the Doctor and banished him from the realm, all in one night."
"Really? So he's Sir Doctor?"
"Sir Doctor of Gallifrey, to use his full title," River corrected gently. "It's so typical of him, isn't it? His companion at the time was knighted too, a girl called Rose. That was one of his earlier incarnations: ten I think, though it could have been nine."
"How many incarnations has he had? I knew right from the start that he could change, the night I met him was his first day in the current body, but I can't imagine him with a different face."
"Different faces, different bodies, even differences in personalities," River explained. "I found pictures of some of them, and they are so different. Even the ages, he's been old before, I think this might be about the youngest he's looked. I have all the pictures, but they're in my flat at the university. Maybe one day I'll be able to show you."
"So you pretty much studied him? Researched all about him? Is that what you did for you PhD?" Amy giggled suddenly. "Are you a doctor of the Doctor?"
River laughed outright. "No, I did my thesis on something far funnier than that."
"Oh," Amy raised one eyebrow. "What could possibly be funnier than a thesis on the Doctor?"
"Village life in the late 20th century: a comparison between communities and artefact types from the United Kingdom and South Africa." River recited her thesis title.
"What's so funny about... no, you didn't?" Amy asked.
"I did a dig at the site of Leadworth, deserted for over a thousand years when the Earth was abandoned."
"You studied Leadworth?" Amy was incredulous.
"Apparently I had some very amazing insights into life of that era," River laughed. "That wasn't the original plan of course, I was going to work on an alien culture, maybe the Applans, or perhaps some other culture, but my supervisor insisted that I should play to my strengths. I could hardly admit why I had such insight, and actually sometimes it was much harder, because I had to find sources to confirm things I already knew."
Amy sat up and poured them both drinks before relaxing against the pillows.
"When we found out who you were that was one of the things that surprised me," Amy admitted. "That you were a Dr, and that one day... I mean, as Melody you weren't exactly a bookworm, or a nerd. I can't imagine the girl you were as a teenager even going to Uni, let alone doing what you did."
"So you knew I was a doctor, and an archaeologist?" River asked. "How much do you know about me?"
"The Doctor said it's too dangerous for you to know things in advance," Amy said cautiously.
"I suppose he's right, but I am getting so sick of him and you saying 'spoilers'," River complained.
"If it's any comfort, in your future you'll get your revenge," Amy said supportively. "I think the Doctor hates that word as much as you do, and he's never really gotten to gloat about saying it the way you did."
"I did? Do?" River had a little smile at the thought. "I guess I can cope, so long as it's not all one-sided."
"As if you'd let it be one-sided," Amy grinned. "I think you enjoy it. And, River, even though there's lots of things I can't tell you, I can say that I think you'll be proud of who you become."
"Really?" River smiled at the thought. "So is my mother proud of me?"
"Well, you're hardly what I expected my daughter to turn into," Amy admitted. "Or even what I'd have expected Mels to grow into. How does that work, anyway? I mean, you hated school."
"That wasn't my first time going through school," River said. "Imagine what you would have thought of school if you were going through it for the third time. The only reason I even went was because I wanted to get to know you, otherwise I would have been a regular truant."
"Your third time? River, how old are you?"
"Um, I'd have to work it out," River said thoughtfully. "You've been to America in 1969, right?"
"Space, 1969? Yes, that was over a year ago. I know you were at the orphanage, did you see us there?"
"I saw you at the warehouse, and a few months later at the orphanage," River admitted. "I ran away that time. I think the Silence took you, but I'm a bit vague on the details. I hate the way those things mess with your head. Anyway, I was about nine years old when I ran away from the orphanage. I ran away, ended up in New York. I got sick, couldn't find a way to survive the winter. I regenerated in December in an alley, became Mels, a ten year old toddler."
"You regenerated when you were ten?" Amy asked. "But that means you died? My baby died in an alley when she was still a little girl?"
"I used to look more like you," River said. "I saw you looking at those photos in the orphanage, do you remember that? The Silence grabbed you just after, that's when I ran from them, because I stopped thinking you'd be able to save me."
"You thought I'd save you?" Amy asked.
"I guess it's every orphan's dream, her parents riding up in a shining carriage to rescue her from the horrid orphanange. I knew wasn't really an orphan, but I spent seven years in the orphanage with other children, then two years there with only Dr Renfrew and the Silence after Greystark Hall closed. Of course I dreamt of being saved, the same way you dreamt of the Doctor arriving in his magic blue box and taking you away from Leadworth."
"Oh." Amy thought about this for a while, imagining her daughter as a child, then remembering the question River had asked. "I am you know."
"You are what?" River asked.
"Proud of you," Amy explained. "I could never have imagined the women you'd grow into, but I'm pretty sure my mother would say the same thing about you. And I wouldn't even have my mother without the Doctor and you."
"That's right," River said. "It's like I have two sets of memories from Leadworth, memories of your parents, and other memories where your aunt brought you up. I always assumed that was something the Silence did to me."
"Er," Amy hesitated. "Not the Silence. More like the universe, and the Doctor. It's kind of a long story, and it definitely comes under the spoiler heading."
"Spoilers again?" River rolled her eyes. "So sick of those. You knmow what that calls for, don't you?"
Amy grinned. "Another drink, and lots more ice-cream?"
"Exactly!" River grinned back at her mother and best friend.