A/N: These next two chapters are dedicated to SerahSanguine for their reviews. You got me kicked back into gear. Hopefully the next chapter will also be posted soon, as this is part one of a two-parter. Also, to bwburke94, I did make a mistake and it should be 2009. Thank you.
Amy and Rory's wedding had been wonderful, saving Christmas had been great, and seeing Sarah Jane and Jo again had been grand, but he missed his wife.
The alternate Anna had come back into their lives, asking for help with something called The Magicians.
According to her, there was more than one alternate Anna floating about, and one of them had come and asked for help with something called The Magicians. Another television show, apparently.
It was worse, now that he knew she had been in his life the longest out of anybody he'd known. It might've even been fine if it had only been a few months, but two years had passed and he'd gotten a post card from her, it floating in quite like a howler from Harry Potter (but not quite as loud).
He was actually about to break down and interrupt the Pond's bliss when he got another postcard, one that was Tardis blue. This one was different, however. It was simply date and map coordinates.
He smiled at the thought that he was about to see his wife again.
#####
"Oh, you lot! What're you all doing here?"
He stepped out into the diner to find not just the Ponds, but River as well. River, whom he'd seen fairly recently and averted the destruction of a planet with (that had been a day filled with flirting that he wasn't sure he appreciated but oddly couldn't resist. It was very confusing being around her).
Amy squealed in delight before she threw herself at him, hugging him (and he had a brief flashback to the moment she'd punched him. This was much nicer). "Hello, you! Where's Anna?"
"Dunno. Assumed she'd be here," he said, hugging her back before he pulled apart from her. Rory had stood by, and he nodded to him before he looked at River, saying her name.
"Hello, sweetie," she said.
"Here, I'm here!" Anna said. "Sorry, didn't mean to be late to my own- well."
#####
Things had gotten sorted at The Magicians, though the past month had been filled with magic and mayhem. It had been strange to have a change of scenery, especially after 800 years of living with the Doctor, and she was happy to get back to her husband. About thirty seconds after Anna 1 had shown up, she'd had to pull from her brain the long forgotten episodes. She'd quickly stored all of the television shows of places she wanted to visit in a vault, making them easily accessible with key words and images if they popped up, like faces from episodes. It was how she knew what the blue post card meant, as soon as she received it, though she frowned at the fact that it was '1' as opposed to '2', as she'd thought she would receive.
It was also strange that she got to the diner first, and she worried that she'd missed something. She wouldn't be worried, except the order of episodes had already changed. She knew this because she'd checked the vault out of curiosity and found that they'd done the pirates episode too soon, as well as Please save me from the monsters, with George (and that had been interesting all it's own, with the Tenza energy feeling really good to her). They also hadn't yet run into Craig, and obviously they hadn't done the Pandorica, considering the crack didn't exist here (though maybe both of those things had happened when she was away). Maybe that meant that something was happening that shouldn't have been.
She quickly went to check and see that the Tardis was there, but nobody was inside when she peeked her head in.
She smiled, in the midst of it, realizing she was coming home.
"Hello, beautiful," she said, patting the doors. "Hope you two got into some trouble without me."
She frowned at the pained feeling she was receiving from her, and she sent a shot of reassurance as well as a question, on the off chance she might be able to answer it (she'd brought one Tardis to a place that she could talk and that hadn't ended well, she hadn't tried to recreate that here). She flinched away when the Tardis simply sent her more pain.
"What-?" she started, before she felt the storm approaching the diner.
She exited the bathroom and watched as, at the same time, the Doctor came in.
He didn't see her at first, or he didn't seem to process that it was her. It was more than a 'if looks could kill' type of situation. It looked as if he were hellbent on doing whatever it took to...
But to what?
Hold on, what was he already doing out here? What exactly had...
She barely shook her head.
Changed.
But, it was confirmed when he stopped and looked at her like he couldn't believe...
Like he was relieved she was alive.
"Oh, thank goodness, thank goodness, I knew it was just a trick, you're okay, you're okay, good, good," he said, and he reached her on the first 'you're okay' before he was hugging her, clutching her closely, patting her back before he pulled back.
He raised his eyebrows at the look on her face.
"What?" he asked.
She cleared her throat. "I've just come from The Magicians," she told him. "What, I mean..." She shook her head. "I'm a past Anna."
He raised his eyebrows. "Okay, and?" he asked, just as the door opened behind them. He turned them so that he could showcase her. "She's fine, all. She's good. It was just a trick! Sorry about that River, back on the beach, had to be done. Come on, let's head off on adventure, maybe figure out who was trying to kill my wife," he said.
River already knew. Judging by the look on her face, she knew long before they would head into the diner that a past Anna would be waiting for them.
"No, Doctor," she started, and she froze time.
"Have you frozen time?" he asked, after a moment. "Why the hell have you done that, then?"
She shook her head. "Because I'm a past Anna, Doctor. I'm not- I'm not the one that- I haven't lived what happened on the beach."
He looked at her patiently, smiling slightly, amused, denying the truth which sat with a past version of his wife. "Then how do you already know about it?"
"Because it was supposed to be you, on that beach," she told him. "That's what happened in the show. It was supposed to be-"
"Anna, it's fine," he told her, like he was comforting her, even gently rubbing her arms in a reassuring manner. "It's fine, because you survived, right? Now, we've got a bit of a job about finding out who tried to kill you, and believe me, when I get my hands on them, they will be wishing-"
I saw what happened. I was there. And I'm hoping, for all of our sakes, that it was a trick. Because if Clara Oswald is really dead, then you'd better be very, very careful how you tell me.
The look in his eyes was a trigger. She remembered the line, remembered what had followed. Even if River had had a chance to speak, she wasn't sure that she would've told him the truth. Because whoever told the Doctor that she was dead had better do it very, very carefully.
Maybe she wasn't, though. Maybe this was a trick, maybe...
But, why would she let him think that she was dead if she weren't? Why would she unleash The Oncoming Storm onto the universe if it meant that she didn't have to? If she were alive, and here?
Because maybe somebody had to think her dead. Maybe it was exactly like the situation with the Silence. Maybe it was the Silence. Maybe this was her way of telling herself that the situation was exactly the same.
But, they probably weren't monitoring them now. It might not be safe to let the others know, but telling the Doctor now might be fine. Or, maybe it would rip a hole in the fabric of time.
Let him work through what he was working through. Let him be in denial, if it were true that she were actually dead (though, even after 800 years of life, she was hoping that she'd get thousands more with her husband, who now had hundreds of extra lives, thanks to Rassilon and the torture he'd put him through).
"-that it were me on that beach, instead of you, I promise you that." He started forward, moving her gently out of the way. By the time he'd let her go, he'd stopped, taking the few steps back it took to stand in front of her once more. "Hold on, if it had been me..." he frowned, searching her. "You know about it because... because of the..." he searched her before he stopped, his brows pulled down so much they almost rivaled his future's Angry Eyebrows. "You're a past... But you're fine, no, you're fine, you're standing here, no!" he shouted, before he moved past her to hit the counter. He struck it three times before he turned to her, looking at her. "Tell me there is some possibility that you're still alive. Tell me that you might be alive and out there and about to pop out and say boo or something."
"You were faking your death on the beach, it's entirely possible that I just faked mine," she told him, and he searched her, hope filling him like a literal dying man drinking water. "But I don't think we'll know for certain until I am the future me. How old did I say I was?"
"1200 years old," he said, rubbing at his jaw in the way he did when he was nervous.
She barely laughed at that before she cleared her throat at the look on his face. "No, sorry, just... That's-that's how old you said you were, in the-in the show." She cleared her throat, pushing aside all four of the episodes that had come to light because of triggers. "Four hundred more years. I wouldn't hate that," she told him.
"You'll get much more than four hundred years," he promised her, a look on his face. "Unfreeze time, we've to go."
"Go?" she asked. "Go where?"
"The past," he replied, grabbing her hand and pulling her along, even as she unfroze time. "To follow the trail of a certain astronaut."
#####
"Damn it!" he shouted, dropping the inner workings of the suit before he moved to sonic them, though to do what, she didn't know.
"I still don't understand," Rory said. "Is this-"
"No," River cut him off, though she had to strain to hear her. "It isn't."
"Then why-"
River cut him off with a shake of her head, and Rory mercifully listened. "I don't understand," Amy said, mournfully.
"Whoever, whatever was here is gone, now," the Doctor said, getting up with purpose. "We might be able to trace the signal, or..." he frowned, looking at his readings. "Strange. The suit... it looks like the suit was..."
He stopped, entirely.
"That's not possible."
"What isn't?" River asked, though there was a strange mournfulness about her tone as well, despite the fact that she should know that Anna was alive. Maybe she did, and maybe it was part of the act. Or, maybe she knew she didn't survive, and this was her hint. Her clue. She'd meet her demise in 400 years.
She didn't focus on this.
"That's not possible," he repeated, in a harsher tone. "River, get everybody home. Anna, with me."
"What're we-"
"Now," the Doctor insisted. He was already gathering up the suit in his arms.
"Okay, but they have to come with us," she said, a feeling brushing up against her.
"Fine, hurry."
They were all bundled inside of the Tardis moments later, the Doctor practically running to wherever it was that he was going.
"River, get us to the vortex!"
"On it," she said, but if any of them said anything else, it was lost in the time that she moved down the hallway.
They stopped in a room with a bunch of technical equipment that she recognized as his workshop.
"What're we doing here?"
"Confirming a theory," he told her.
"Which would be?"
"Still needing to be confirmed," he told her.
They sat in a harried silence for the next twenty minutes, only for him to turn to her with a blank look of horror on his face.
"Tell me you are absolutely sure that you survived," he told her.
She searched him before she shook her head. "I'm sorry, I can't."
He shook his head, running his fingers through his hair in a move that was reminiscent of a younger him.
"Talk to me, tell me what you found, just talk it through with me," she quickly added. "What did you find?"
"The suit... it's... it's designed to take your energy until there is nothing left. And I know that you- but it feeds on regeneration energy to power it. The one thing powerful enough to- to drain the-the energy from you, but it's possible that you survived, right?" he asked.
She felt relief fill her. "Yes, it is," she agreed. "I must've just made it look real because..."
She frowned.
River. What River had said, in the library.
"You told me once, standing on a beach, that I should tell you everything the first chance I get. I can fix all of it. You will thank me for it. Standing in the alternate timeline, with Anna by your side, you will thank me a million times over for what I'm about to do."
She looked up at him. "What did you say to River, standing on the beach?"
"What's that got to do with- oh. Oh... no."
"Because I might've had to make it look real-"
"-because of what I said. Telling her to tell me about it... because she thinks that you died, and that has to remain true, to keep the timeline intact."
He looked over at her.
"Damn it."
#####
They dropped River off at her home base before they explained the situation to Amy and Rory.
"River has to think that she's dead," he told them. "Because to her, she is."
"Right. Okay," Rory said. "But you're actually... fine?"
"Of course she is."
River's voice appeared behind them, and Anna turned around... to see older versions of themselves standing there.
"Because it's Anna. When isn't she fine?" River asked, in a bitter voice.
River, the one from the library. The one who had survived The Library.
"Teleport us out of here," River tried to demand, but the Doctor was to future Anna in three strides and then kissing her so passionately that she felt the heat from here. River rolled her eyes but waited, impatiently and upset, for them to pull apart. They did, more than a few moments later, the Doctor whispering something in her ear. She nodded before they pulled apart completely, winking at him.
A moment later, she turned back to the past Anna. "You still need to do 1969, and Canton Everett Delaware the Third. You need to pick up the River that you just dropped off, I've already landed us. Find out everything you can about the Silence." Her eyes flickered over to Amy's, but it was so fast that only she would've been able to catch it. "Make sure things go according to plan."
She felt her heart sink into her stomach at the message she was leaving her. She couldn't stop this, could she? None of it. River would have to be the Silent's Assassin. Worse than that, she'd have to lie to River up to the point of The Library, when she finally got to tell her the truth.
"Will do," she said, thickly.
"Good luck." And then, her and River's future selves were gone.
"Anna, with me."
It wasn't a second later that the Doctor was pulling her away, down the hall.
"What about-"
"It can wait," he told her.
They were standing in a random room the Tardis had populated moments later, entirely blank except for the four walls.
"Is it still possible for you to bring the connection back?"
She felt like she'd been blindsided. She searched him. "Um...? Ye... ah?" she tried. "Why?"
"Great, then do," he said, and he took a step back, closing his eyes, waiting.
She felt something jump in her. It had been over eight hundred years since she'd shared the connection with him. She barely remembered what it felt like. But, as soon as he asked if she could, it wasn't just blindsided she was feeling; it was a yearning hope. She wanted this, more than she'd wanted something in a really long time.
"W... hy?"
Which was why it was so surprising that she asked instead of just did.
He opened his eyes, frowning. "What do you mean, why?"
"I mean, last time we talked about it- I mean, my memory literally can't be going, and you said that we hadn't... earned it? What's changed?"
He searched her, this look on his face. After a moment, he slowly walked up to her, gently taking her face in his hands. "I watched you disintegrate in front of me. Now, I was about ninety eight percent sure that you survived, but I knew that you'd done this for a reason, an important reason. It meant that it had to look like I believed it. Which meant that, for a terrible moment, I had to believe it. That you had died. That I would never see you again. There's over a thousand years of history between us. You nearly re-writing the universe- I'm not discounting that. I'm not saying that what happened wasn't important, because it was. But this? Seeing you disintegrate and having to believe that you didn't survive, even for a moment? It was pure hell." He shook his head. "And I will never feel like that again. So please, Anna," he said. "Put the connection back. Because I think both of us, in our own ways, have earned it."
He tried to take a step back but she reached out and put her hand on his chest. In the next moment, he gasped, pushing their foreheads together before he reached down and kissed her, long and hard.
She opened the connection on her side next and she drew back, gasping as well. It was the feeling of pure love and warmth, of knowing they would be there for you, no matter what.
"I love you," she whispered.
"I love you, too."
They kissed, and then, they were preoccupied, 1969 forgotten for the moment.
But, what some part of Anna never forgot was the feeling when he said that he'd never feel like that again. Because something inside of Anna was telling her that he would.
She knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that the universe was not ready.
