Fic: Impossible
Mar. 1st, 2025 07:15 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
freakishlemonTitle: Impossible
Fandom: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005),Doctor Who & Related Fandoms
Warning: Major Character Death
Rating: Teen and Up Audiences
Characters: Amy Pond, Rory Williams, Eleventh Doctor, brief Vincent Van Gogh
Tags:Amy/Rory, Eleventh Doctor & Rory Williams, series 5 spoilers
Word Count:3,615
Summary: People fall out of the world, sometimes, but they always leave traces…
AO3 Link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/774254
Notes:
Originally posted at my LiveJournal on June 24th, 2010.
Fandom: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005),Doctor Who & Related Fandoms
Warning: Major Character Death
Rating: Teen and Up Audiences
Characters: Amy Pond, Rory Williams, Eleventh Doctor, brief Vincent Van Gogh
Tags:Amy/Rory, Eleventh Doctor & Rory Williams, series 5 spoilers
Word Count:3,615
Summary: People fall out of the world, sometimes, but they always leave traces…
AO3 Link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/774254
Notes:
Originally posted at my LiveJournal on June 24th, 2010.
“Please.
Come on, Amy. Come on. Amy, please. Don’t let anything distract you. Remember Rory. Keep remembering. Rory’s only alive in your memory. You must keep hold of him. Don’t let anything distract you. Rory still lives in your mind.”
“What were you saying?”
&
The Doctor couldn’t believe it. There he was, standing there leaning against the railing by the console as if he hadn’t been shot and killed and erased from history only a few hours ago. Rory Williams. It was impossible. Utterly impossible.
Of course, Rory did end up being utterly impossible because the Doctor learned that Rory wasn’t solid when he went in for a hug. It startled Rory more than it did him- after all, he had a broader experience of sentient forms- but it made them both uncomfortable with their proximity to each other, which was quite close indeed. They resolved never to try that again.
Rory didn’t give off any energy readings, though, which meant he wasn’t a ghost. The Doctor scanned himself with the sonic screwdriver, but there were no obviously abnormal psychic readings there, so he wasn’t some kind of psychic projection cause by any outside influence. No more psychic pollen, then.
It was immediately obvious when Amy popped into the control room to ask for directions to the kitchen that she couldn’t see or hear Rory. The Doctor had the TARDIS scan her, too, just in case, but Rory wasn’t some kind of psychic projection from her either. He was stumped.
“So…” Rory shoved his hands in his pockets. “What do we do now?”
&
“So, if I’m stuck here tagging along on the Adventures of Amy and the Doctor-”
“Oh, stop it. It’s not like that.”
“Does she know that?”
“…”
“Nevermind.”
“No, go on. Finish what you were going to say.”
“If I’m stuck here, do I get a chance to pick where we go?”
“…”
“I mean, I know I won’t be able to properly… experience it or whatever and the places I want to go will probably turn out to be boring anyway-”
“Oh, don’t say that. You’re not boring.”
“I liked living in Upper Leadworth in that dream and you said it was a nightmare.”
“Right.”
“…”
“You were saying?”
“Just that it’d be nice to have a choice once in a while. Since I can’t, you know… do anything else.”
“…”
“…”
“Where to first then?”
&
It turns out that Rory’s choices are just as dangerous as any one else’s. This time there are vampires – proper vampires, not fish from space – and it’s the Doctor who was captured. Rory tried yelling the Doctor’s location at Amy for the twelfth time, but she still couldn’t hear him and he ended up standing around uselessly while the Doctor was chained up in a dungeon.
Rory followed the guards around for a while. The Doctor was convinced that he knew a trick used by Houdini himself and could get out of those manacles in no time. Rory watched him for an hour before he was bored enough to leave. At least this way, he could direct the Doctor out of there if he ever managed to escape.
Rory sighed. The guard had gone off for the night and he had hung up the key not a five minute’s walk from where the Doctor was being kept, which Rory thought would be foolish if this dungeon wasn’t so maze-like.
He punched the wall in frustration at his uselessness and yelled in pain when his hand didn’t go through it.
It took him three hours, but Rory managed to poke the key off the hook and down the hall into the Doctor’s cell. The Doctor still believed he could wriggle his way out of those manacles and said so vehemently as he grasped the key and worked it into the lock.
&
“So, where to next Doctor?” Amy hung on to one of the railings, leaned back, and swung herself back and forth impatiently.
“The golden moons of Purity IX? The landing of the Mayflower? The Boeshane colonies? I know!” The Doctor spun around to fiddle with some switches. “There’s a planet, near the Blue Straits nebula past the constellation of Hyroffia, the sky bird of the Aqerikonian tribes of Meticron, where evolution has created dogs-” He paused dramatically, hands flung up into the arm, which Rory rolled his eyes at. “-With no noses!” Amy snorted.
“Seriously? Dogs with no noses?” she asked, one eyebrow raised doubtfully.
“Isn’t that marvelous? Evolution is a funny thing sometimes.”
“If these dogs don’t have noses,” Amy leaned over the console and the Doctor pointedly looked at Rory over her shoulder so that he wasn’t looking down her shirt. “How do they smell?”
“They smell like dogs, obviously,” Rory said matter-of–factly, grinning at the Doctor’s amusement. The Doctor laughed loudly. He knew it was a terrible joke, but he couldn’t help himself.
“It never stops being funny,” he said to himself as he punched in the coordinates and sent the TARDIS reeling off.
Amy frowned. She never got to hear the punch line.
&
“Are you a beach person or a mountain person, Rory?”
“What?”
“Are you,” the Doctor repeated, slowly. “A beach person or a mountain person?”
“I’m not sure I understand the question.”
“I read a thing once in your time on your planet that said you can learn everything about a person if you know whether they’d rather take a holiday on a beach or in the mountains. Which are you?”
“Mountains.”
“Really? Why?”
“Shouldn’t you be telling me that?” Rory asked with a smile in his voice. “You’re supposed to know everything about me now.”
“I don’t think it works like that.”
“Too bad. You’ve made it a game now. Guess.”
The Doctor didn’t quite know how he had made it a game when Rory was the one making him guess, but he hmmed and stretched his arms out above his head into the grass. They were lying in a field on some distant planet in a time before even primitive lizards had evolved on Earth and stargazing. Amy had dozed off about an hour before, but they were safe for the time being, so they let her sleep on.
“You like the quiet,” the Doctor began. “Up in the mountains, away from the cities and cars and people, it’s quiet. You can take your time, in the mountains. Beaches are noisy and full of people and busy. Even without the people, a beach is busy. The waves crashing in all the time and little sharp skittery things are always running up and down the sand and the rocks. The creatures in the mountains are patient. Owls silently waiting for nightfall and the like.”
The Doctor paused for breath, reaching out a hand to where Rory’s would be if he were made of anything other than what seemed like hope and madness. He mimed nudging that hand with his knuckles and hoped Rory understood the gesture.
“The mountains are a place for thinking. For taking it all in. They’re for cold nights spent in front of fires with warm beverages and good books. They’re a place for star gazing and sun rises and stories as old as the bones of the world. You don’t have to pretend up in the mountains because up there it doesn’t matter who you are. Just that you’re there.”
They let the hushed tones of the wind in the grass and Amy’s sleepy breathing linger.
“Am I close?” The Doctor twisted his head to see Rory’s face.
“Sort of.” The Doctor frowned, puzzled.
“How so?”
“Well, I was just going to say that I don’t much like sand and I always end up sunburned at beaches.”
“Oh.”
“But what you said is true, too.”
&
Amy started to notice something odd about the Doctor.
Not that he wasn’t an odd man already. He was an alien, and a mad one at that, but she was starting to wonder whether the “mad man” part of “mad man with a box” was more like actual madness than the eccentricity she saw as a child.
He had started talking to himself. More than usual. But it wasn’t like when he muttered to himself or talked to the TARDIS or yelled at the sonic screwdriver. It was more like when he talked to her, as if there was another person there.
She knew that it probably wasn’t any of her business, but she began lurking around corners trying to listen in. She didn’t know why, but hearing the Doctor being so open and friendly with no one made her feel like she was missing something.
&
The Himalayas took Rory’s breath away.
The Doctor had landed the TARDIS by Tsongmo Lake in India and Rory marveled at the blueness of the water and the sky. Amy was bored with it after a few minutes, but the Doctor didn’t go back inside with her. He stood next to Rory and witnessed the majesty of the towering peaks around them.
“If there is a heaven,” Rory whispered, unwilling to disturb the scene. “And, you know, if I actually make it there one day… I hope it’s like this.”
&
Rory started losing time. It started with just a few minutes here or there, but he started losing great swathes of the Doctor’s rambling explanations. Thankfully, it was always when the Doctor was focused on distracting Amy, so he didn’t notice.
If it was his time to pass on or whatever, he didn’t mind much. He’s had more time than he should have anyway and he’s been living a pretty amazing afterlife type thing. But he didn’t want to mention anything to the Doctor until he was sure. No need to worry him.
&
Rory was thrilled to be meeting such an influential painter.
He was not thrilled with all the flirting Vincent and Amy got up to. He tagged behind with the Doctor as they walked to the church, glowering at the artist’s back. The Doctor kept glancing over at him, not quite hiding a smirk. Rory may be dead, but that didn’t mean he approved.
“I’m sorry you’re so sad,” Amy said.
“But I’m not,” Vincent replied. “Sometimes these moods torture me for weeks, for months, but I’m good now. If Amy Pond can soldier on, so can Vincent Van Gogh.”
“What?” Rory and the Doctor shared a look.
“I’m not soldiering on. I’m fine.”
“Oh, Amy. I hear the song of your sadness. You’ve lost someone, I think.”
“Can he see me?” Rory asked. The Doctor didn’t answer.
“I’m not sad.”
“Then why are you crying?”
“Hey! Van Gogh!” Rory shouted, running around to the front of the group and walking backwards. “Can you see me?”
Amy wiped a tear from her face, confused.
“It’s alright,” Vincent assured, as he walked through Rory. “I understand.”
“I’m not sure I do.”
“Great. He can see invisible space chickens and hear colors, but he can’t see or hear me.” Rory threw his hands down and sighed. “Typical.”
&
The Doctor was annoyed that Rory was allowed to laugh at his impatience and mock his temporary normal timeline, but he wasn’t able to do much more than glare at him with Amy and Vincent still around.
&
“The way I see it, every life is a pile of good things and bad things.”
The Doctor moved in and hugged Amy close. Rory was glad he did because he couldn’t and she needed it.
“The good things don’t always soften the bad things, but vice versa, the bad things don’t necessarily spoil the good things or make them unimportant.”
The Doctor looked Rory straight in the eye. He didn’t mean just Vincent and his depression. Rory swallowed hard and nodded, awkwardly shifting his nonexistent weight.
So alright, being dead was pretty high on his list of bad things, and being erased from the memory of the only woman he’d ever truly loved was higher still, but the Doctor’s faith in him and his ability to make him feel welcome among all the people who couldn’t see or hear him was pretty high on his list of good things.
Rory resolved to tell him about the increasing frequency of his fading. He deserved to know.
&
“You are the most hilariously nonhuman person on the whole of the planet,” Rory said, laughing, when the Doctor stopped talking to Amy on the earpiece. “You are so far from a normal bloke, it’s amazing this moron let you stay. This? This is gonna be good.”
Rory flopped down onto the Doctor’s bed. The Doctor turned and glared at him for a second before continuing to scurry about the room looking in cupboards and under furniture.
“I mean, come on. ‘I was not expecting this?’” Rory made finger quotes in the air.
“What’s wrong with that?”
“He didn’t mean an actual shout, Doctor. He meant giving him some prior warning before bringing someone around.”
“Well,” the Doctor gestured nonsensically at the air to his left. “It would be unexpected.” Rory snorted.
“Yeah. For you maybe. Not for a normal bloke.” The Doctor pulled one sock out from under the bed.
“You may have a point there,” the Doctor admitted.
“Thank you.”
“Still… not to worry. I’ll blunder through it somehow. I always do.” He tossed the sock over his shoulder, then spun around to survey the room once again. “We shouldn’t be here for long, anyway. As soon as we stabilize the TARDIS, we’re off again.”
“Yep.”
“Now, I need to go off. This room is very ill-equipped for scanner construction. I will be back. Sit tight. Keep out of trouble.” Rory rolled his eyes.
“Don’t forget your keys,” he reminded.
&
The Doctor quickly said farewell to everyone at the match, who all seemed to be heading off for a pizza or something, and strode quickly down the green in the direction of the flat. He glanced around, checking to make sure that no one was around before turning to Rory to discuss a new part to the scanner.
Rory wasn’t there.
“Rory?” No answer. He called again, louder this time. No answer again. “Rory, where are you?”
The Doctor tried to ignore the panic setting into his gut.
“Rory, this isn’t funny.” He waited for a moment. “Well, fine then. If you’re not going to hang around, I’m leaving without you.”
He walked out to edge of the park, but still no Rory. He stopped walking and turned around in a confused circle.
“Seriously though, Rory. Why would you wonder off? No one else can see or hear you!” He fidgeted nervously, tugging at the sleeves of his jacket, and sat down on a bench to wait.
Eventually, the Doctor couldn’t wait any longer. He really did need to get back and work on the scanner so that the TARDIS didn’t end up stuck in flux forever with Amy locked inside.
“Well,” he said, voice cracking to the empty air. “I’m going back. I’ll see you there then?”
He nodded to the empty air and turned to get back to the flat. He couldn’t ignore the cold, heavy feeling in the pit of his stomach.
&
Rory didn’t reappear until after Sophie had left for the night with her new resolve to work in animal rescue. The Doctor watched as he sort of flickered into existence and immediately registered the guilt on Rory’s face when he started moving again. The Doctor threw down a golf club and crossed his arms angrily.
“Oh bollocks.”
“So how long has this been going on then?” The Doctor changed his mind and put his hands on his hips. It was his angry parent pose. It used to send his children running for cover. He hoped it had the same effect on Rory.
“I was going to tell you-“
“How long?”
“A… bit.”
“Don’t make me ask again, Rory.” Rory sighed resignedly, looking anywhere but at the Doctor’s face.
“Since the Himalayas. Just after, actually.” He paused before slowly adding, “And it’s getting worse.”
“And you didn’t think to tell me? Did you think I wouldn’t notice?” The Doctor knew he was shouting, but he bring himself to care. Craig was probably asleep anyway and he slept like a rock. “What were you going to do, Rory? What happens when you can’t come back?”
“I don’t know, Doctor.” Rory scrubbed a hand over his face. “But it’s not like there’s anything we can do.” The Doctor’s face paled.
“I am not letting you die again.”
“I don’t think you have a choice.”
&
Rory disappeared again while the Doctor was talking to Amy about the readings from the cumbersome low tech scanner. He switched it off once he hung up on her and stood silently in the darkened, lonely room. A normal human would be asleep by now, but Time Lords didn’t need as much sleep and he didn’t have anything to do but worry until morning.
The Doctor unwedged a pillow and a blanket from underneath the scanner. He pushed a pile of leftover junk from one corner to another and laid down the blanket. He took the pillow and curled up on the ground hoping against his own biology for this one little snippet of human normality. Sleeping, at least, would make the time pass more quickly. If time passed quickly, Rory would return faster.
But the Doctor left with Amy in the TARDIS without seeing Rory again.
&
“So, are you proposing to someone?”
“I’m sorry?”
“I found this in your pocket.”
“No. No, no. That’s…” The Doctor searched for the right word. “A, uh, memory. A friend of mine. Someone I lost. Do you… mind…” Amy pulled the ring away.
“It’s weird. I feel, I dunno… something.”
“People fall out of the world, sometimes, but they… they always leave traces. Little things we can’t quite account for. Faces in photographs, luggage, half eaten meals. Rings.”
Amy looked down at the ring box in her hands, brow furrowed.
“Nothing is ever forgotten. Not completely. And if something can be remembered, it can come back.”
&
Rory still hadn’t come back.
&
“Amy! Where’s Amy?”
“She’s fine, Doctor, just unconscious.”
“Yes. She’s sedated, that’s all. Half an hour, she’ll be fine. Okay, Romans. Good. I was just wishing for Romans. Good old Romans. How many?”
“Fifty men up top, all volunteers. What about that thing?”
“Fifty? You’re not exactly a legion.”
“Your friend was very persuasive, but it was a tough sell.”
“Yes, I know that, Rory. I’m not exactly one to miss the obvious, but we need everything we can get. Okay! Cyber weapons! This is basically a sentry box. The headless wonder here was a sentry. Probably got himself duffed up by the locals. Never underestimate a Celt.”
“Doctor-”
“Hush, Rory, thinking. Why leave a cyber thing on guard unless it’s a cyber thing in the box, but they wouldn’t lock up one of their own. So, no, not a cyber thing, but what? What? No, I’m missing something obvious, Rory. Something big. Something right slap in front of me. I can feel it.”
“Yeah, I think you probably are.”
“I’ll get it in a minute.”
“…”
“…”
“Hello again.”
“Hello.”
“How’ve you been?”
&
The Doctor believed in miracles. He’d never seen one that he believed to be true before, but he did believe.
But he also believed in madness and grief, and he began to fear that his time with Rory before was a figment of his imagination.
&
The Doctor screamed, alone and trapped within the Pandorica. He struggled against his restraints, but they wouldn’t budge. The TARDIS was exploding right now and he couldn’t do a thing. Useless. Everything was about to be destroyed and he was trapped in a box like a fool.
He kept screaming, praying that the Alliance would realize their mistake and release him. They didn’t. He couldn’t stop the pain in his hearts. His failure burned behind his eyes and he hung his head in shame. Years ago, he had failed to save his own race. Now, he failed to save all the races that ever existed.
He closed his eyes and waited for the end.
“Sometimes, Doctor, I wonder about what you get up to.”
The Doctor’s eyes flew up and his head snapped up.
“How…?”
“What?”
“You’re back.”
“Yeah.”
“I thought you’d gone.”
“I thought I did, too.”
The Doctor laughed, sadly. It really wasn’t very funny at all, but there wasn’t anything else he could do.
“There’s another you, out there,” the Doctor nodded towards the outside. “An Auton - a sort of robot thing - with your memories.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
“Good. Maybe he’ll be some use to you and Amy.”
“That’s a bit unlikely. I’m trapped in a box and everything that ever existed is about to be torn apart.”
“Oh.”
There was an awkward pause.
“You’ll think of something.”
This time the Doctor laughed outright with an unfortunately manic edge to sound.
“Doctor?”
“Yes, Rory?”
“I think…” He stopped, unsure of how to proceed. “I think this is the last time you’ll see me. Even if the universe doesn’t implode.”
The Doctor nodded. He was afraid of that. They always left him in the end.
“So this is goodbye,” the Doctor said, barely louder than a whisper.
“Yes.”
“Goodbye then, Rory Williams. I am glad to have known you. I couldn't have wished for anyone finer.”
“Thanks. You, too. And-” He mustered up the last of his strength to poke the Doctor in the shoulder. “And if this other me turns out to be alright, I mean… not evil or anything… take him along. He’ll need you. And he’ll need Amy.”
“I will.”
“Goodbye Doctor.”
The Doctor blinked and Rory was gone.
&
Silence.
Come on, Amy. Come on. Amy, please. Don’t let anything distract you. Remember Rory. Keep remembering. Rory’s only alive in your memory. You must keep hold of him. Don’t let anything distract you. Rory still lives in your mind.”
“What were you saying?”
&
The Doctor couldn’t believe it. There he was, standing there leaning against the railing by the console as if he hadn’t been shot and killed and erased from history only a few hours ago. Rory Williams. It was impossible. Utterly impossible.
Of course, Rory did end up being utterly impossible because the Doctor learned that Rory wasn’t solid when he went in for a hug. It startled Rory more than it did him- after all, he had a broader experience of sentient forms- but it made them both uncomfortable with their proximity to each other, which was quite close indeed. They resolved never to try that again.
Rory didn’t give off any energy readings, though, which meant he wasn’t a ghost. The Doctor scanned himself with the sonic screwdriver, but there were no obviously abnormal psychic readings there, so he wasn’t some kind of psychic projection cause by any outside influence. No more psychic pollen, then.
It was immediately obvious when Amy popped into the control room to ask for directions to the kitchen that she couldn’t see or hear Rory. The Doctor had the TARDIS scan her, too, just in case, but Rory wasn’t some kind of psychic projection from her either. He was stumped.
“So…” Rory shoved his hands in his pockets. “What do we do now?”
&
“So, if I’m stuck here tagging along on the Adventures of Amy and the Doctor-”
“Oh, stop it. It’s not like that.”
“Does she know that?”
“…”
“Nevermind.”
“No, go on. Finish what you were going to say.”
“If I’m stuck here, do I get a chance to pick where we go?”
“…”
“I mean, I know I won’t be able to properly… experience it or whatever and the places I want to go will probably turn out to be boring anyway-”
“Oh, don’t say that. You’re not boring.”
“I liked living in Upper Leadworth in that dream and you said it was a nightmare.”
“Right.”
“…”
“You were saying?”
“Just that it’d be nice to have a choice once in a while. Since I can’t, you know… do anything else.”
“…”
“…”
“Where to first then?”
&
It turns out that Rory’s choices are just as dangerous as any one else’s. This time there are vampires – proper vampires, not fish from space – and it’s the Doctor who was captured. Rory tried yelling the Doctor’s location at Amy for the twelfth time, but she still couldn’t hear him and he ended up standing around uselessly while the Doctor was chained up in a dungeon.
Rory followed the guards around for a while. The Doctor was convinced that he knew a trick used by Houdini himself and could get out of those manacles in no time. Rory watched him for an hour before he was bored enough to leave. At least this way, he could direct the Doctor out of there if he ever managed to escape.
Rory sighed. The guard had gone off for the night and he had hung up the key not a five minute’s walk from where the Doctor was being kept, which Rory thought would be foolish if this dungeon wasn’t so maze-like.
He punched the wall in frustration at his uselessness and yelled in pain when his hand didn’t go through it.
It took him three hours, but Rory managed to poke the key off the hook and down the hall into the Doctor’s cell. The Doctor still believed he could wriggle his way out of those manacles and said so vehemently as he grasped the key and worked it into the lock.
&
“So, where to next Doctor?” Amy hung on to one of the railings, leaned back, and swung herself back and forth impatiently.
“The golden moons of Purity IX? The landing of the Mayflower? The Boeshane colonies? I know!” The Doctor spun around to fiddle with some switches. “There’s a planet, near the Blue Straits nebula past the constellation of Hyroffia, the sky bird of the Aqerikonian tribes of Meticron, where evolution has created dogs-” He paused dramatically, hands flung up into the arm, which Rory rolled his eyes at. “-With no noses!” Amy snorted.
“Seriously? Dogs with no noses?” she asked, one eyebrow raised doubtfully.
“Isn’t that marvelous? Evolution is a funny thing sometimes.”
“If these dogs don’t have noses,” Amy leaned over the console and the Doctor pointedly looked at Rory over her shoulder so that he wasn’t looking down her shirt. “How do they smell?”
“They smell like dogs, obviously,” Rory said matter-of–factly, grinning at the Doctor’s amusement. The Doctor laughed loudly. He knew it was a terrible joke, but he couldn’t help himself.
“It never stops being funny,” he said to himself as he punched in the coordinates and sent the TARDIS reeling off.
Amy frowned. She never got to hear the punch line.
&
“Are you a beach person or a mountain person, Rory?”
“What?”
“Are you,” the Doctor repeated, slowly. “A beach person or a mountain person?”
“I’m not sure I understand the question.”
“I read a thing once in your time on your planet that said you can learn everything about a person if you know whether they’d rather take a holiday on a beach or in the mountains. Which are you?”
“Mountains.”
“Really? Why?”
“Shouldn’t you be telling me that?” Rory asked with a smile in his voice. “You’re supposed to know everything about me now.”
“I don’t think it works like that.”
“Too bad. You’ve made it a game now. Guess.”
The Doctor didn’t quite know how he had made it a game when Rory was the one making him guess, but he hmmed and stretched his arms out above his head into the grass. They were lying in a field on some distant planet in a time before even primitive lizards had evolved on Earth and stargazing. Amy had dozed off about an hour before, but they were safe for the time being, so they let her sleep on.
“You like the quiet,” the Doctor began. “Up in the mountains, away from the cities and cars and people, it’s quiet. You can take your time, in the mountains. Beaches are noisy and full of people and busy. Even without the people, a beach is busy. The waves crashing in all the time and little sharp skittery things are always running up and down the sand and the rocks. The creatures in the mountains are patient. Owls silently waiting for nightfall and the like.”
The Doctor paused for breath, reaching out a hand to where Rory’s would be if he were made of anything other than what seemed like hope and madness. He mimed nudging that hand with his knuckles and hoped Rory understood the gesture.
“The mountains are a place for thinking. For taking it all in. They’re for cold nights spent in front of fires with warm beverages and good books. They’re a place for star gazing and sun rises and stories as old as the bones of the world. You don’t have to pretend up in the mountains because up there it doesn’t matter who you are. Just that you’re there.”
They let the hushed tones of the wind in the grass and Amy’s sleepy breathing linger.
“Am I close?” The Doctor twisted his head to see Rory’s face.
“Sort of.” The Doctor frowned, puzzled.
“How so?”
“Well, I was just going to say that I don’t much like sand and I always end up sunburned at beaches.”
“Oh.”
“But what you said is true, too.”
&
Amy started to notice something odd about the Doctor.
Not that he wasn’t an odd man already. He was an alien, and a mad one at that, but she was starting to wonder whether the “mad man” part of “mad man with a box” was more like actual madness than the eccentricity she saw as a child.
He had started talking to himself. More than usual. But it wasn’t like when he muttered to himself or talked to the TARDIS or yelled at the sonic screwdriver. It was more like when he talked to her, as if there was another person there.
She knew that it probably wasn’t any of her business, but she began lurking around corners trying to listen in. She didn’t know why, but hearing the Doctor being so open and friendly with no one made her feel like she was missing something.
&
The Himalayas took Rory’s breath away.
The Doctor had landed the TARDIS by Tsongmo Lake in India and Rory marveled at the blueness of the water and the sky. Amy was bored with it after a few minutes, but the Doctor didn’t go back inside with her. He stood next to Rory and witnessed the majesty of the towering peaks around them.
“If there is a heaven,” Rory whispered, unwilling to disturb the scene. “And, you know, if I actually make it there one day… I hope it’s like this.”
&
Rory started losing time. It started with just a few minutes here or there, but he started losing great swathes of the Doctor’s rambling explanations. Thankfully, it was always when the Doctor was focused on distracting Amy, so he didn’t notice.
If it was his time to pass on or whatever, he didn’t mind much. He’s had more time than he should have anyway and he’s been living a pretty amazing afterlife type thing. But he didn’t want to mention anything to the Doctor until he was sure. No need to worry him.
&
Rory was thrilled to be meeting such an influential painter.
He was not thrilled with all the flirting Vincent and Amy got up to. He tagged behind with the Doctor as they walked to the church, glowering at the artist’s back. The Doctor kept glancing over at him, not quite hiding a smirk. Rory may be dead, but that didn’t mean he approved.
“I’m sorry you’re so sad,” Amy said.
“But I’m not,” Vincent replied. “Sometimes these moods torture me for weeks, for months, but I’m good now. If Amy Pond can soldier on, so can Vincent Van Gogh.”
“What?” Rory and the Doctor shared a look.
“I’m not soldiering on. I’m fine.”
“Oh, Amy. I hear the song of your sadness. You’ve lost someone, I think.”
“Can he see me?” Rory asked. The Doctor didn’t answer.
“I’m not sad.”
“Then why are you crying?”
“Hey! Van Gogh!” Rory shouted, running around to the front of the group and walking backwards. “Can you see me?”
Amy wiped a tear from her face, confused.
“It’s alright,” Vincent assured, as he walked through Rory. “I understand.”
“I’m not sure I do.”
“Great. He can see invisible space chickens and hear colors, but he can’t see or hear me.” Rory threw his hands down and sighed. “Typical.”
&
The Doctor was annoyed that Rory was allowed to laugh at his impatience and mock his temporary normal timeline, but he wasn’t able to do much more than glare at him with Amy and Vincent still around.
&
“The way I see it, every life is a pile of good things and bad things.”
The Doctor moved in and hugged Amy close. Rory was glad he did because he couldn’t and she needed it.
“The good things don’t always soften the bad things, but vice versa, the bad things don’t necessarily spoil the good things or make them unimportant.”
The Doctor looked Rory straight in the eye. He didn’t mean just Vincent and his depression. Rory swallowed hard and nodded, awkwardly shifting his nonexistent weight.
So alright, being dead was pretty high on his list of bad things, and being erased from the memory of the only woman he’d ever truly loved was higher still, but the Doctor’s faith in him and his ability to make him feel welcome among all the people who couldn’t see or hear him was pretty high on his list of good things.
Rory resolved to tell him about the increasing frequency of his fading. He deserved to know.
&
“You are the most hilariously nonhuman person on the whole of the planet,” Rory said, laughing, when the Doctor stopped talking to Amy on the earpiece. “You are so far from a normal bloke, it’s amazing this moron let you stay. This? This is gonna be good.”
Rory flopped down onto the Doctor’s bed. The Doctor turned and glared at him for a second before continuing to scurry about the room looking in cupboards and under furniture.
“I mean, come on. ‘I was not expecting this?’” Rory made finger quotes in the air.
“What’s wrong with that?”
“He didn’t mean an actual shout, Doctor. He meant giving him some prior warning before bringing someone around.”
“Well,” the Doctor gestured nonsensically at the air to his left. “It would be unexpected.” Rory snorted.
“Yeah. For you maybe. Not for a normal bloke.” The Doctor pulled one sock out from under the bed.
“You may have a point there,” the Doctor admitted.
“Thank you.”
“Still… not to worry. I’ll blunder through it somehow. I always do.” He tossed the sock over his shoulder, then spun around to survey the room once again. “We shouldn’t be here for long, anyway. As soon as we stabilize the TARDIS, we’re off again.”
“Yep.”
“Now, I need to go off. This room is very ill-equipped for scanner construction. I will be back. Sit tight. Keep out of trouble.” Rory rolled his eyes.
“Don’t forget your keys,” he reminded.
&
The Doctor quickly said farewell to everyone at the match, who all seemed to be heading off for a pizza or something, and strode quickly down the green in the direction of the flat. He glanced around, checking to make sure that no one was around before turning to Rory to discuss a new part to the scanner.
Rory wasn’t there.
“Rory?” No answer. He called again, louder this time. No answer again. “Rory, where are you?”
The Doctor tried to ignore the panic setting into his gut.
“Rory, this isn’t funny.” He waited for a moment. “Well, fine then. If you’re not going to hang around, I’m leaving without you.”
He walked out to edge of the park, but still no Rory. He stopped walking and turned around in a confused circle.
“Seriously though, Rory. Why would you wonder off? No one else can see or hear you!” He fidgeted nervously, tugging at the sleeves of his jacket, and sat down on a bench to wait.
Eventually, the Doctor couldn’t wait any longer. He really did need to get back and work on the scanner so that the TARDIS didn’t end up stuck in flux forever with Amy locked inside.
“Well,” he said, voice cracking to the empty air. “I’m going back. I’ll see you there then?”
He nodded to the empty air and turned to get back to the flat. He couldn’t ignore the cold, heavy feeling in the pit of his stomach.
&
Rory didn’t reappear until after Sophie had left for the night with her new resolve to work in animal rescue. The Doctor watched as he sort of flickered into existence and immediately registered the guilt on Rory’s face when he started moving again. The Doctor threw down a golf club and crossed his arms angrily.
“Oh bollocks.”
“So how long has this been going on then?” The Doctor changed his mind and put his hands on his hips. It was his angry parent pose. It used to send his children running for cover. He hoped it had the same effect on Rory.
“I was going to tell you-“
“How long?”
“A… bit.”
“Don’t make me ask again, Rory.” Rory sighed resignedly, looking anywhere but at the Doctor’s face.
“Since the Himalayas. Just after, actually.” He paused before slowly adding, “And it’s getting worse.”
“And you didn’t think to tell me? Did you think I wouldn’t notice?” The Doctor knew he was shouting, but he bring himself to care. Craig was probably asleep anyway and he slept like a rock. “What were you going to do, Rory? What happens when you can’t come back?”
“I don’t know, Doctor.” Rory scrubbed a hand over his face. “But it’s not like there’s anything we can do.” The Doctor’s face paled.
“I am not letting you die again.”
“I don’t think you have a choice.”
&
Rory disappeared again while the Doctor was talking to Amy about the readings from the cumbersome low tech scanner. He switched it off once he hung up on her and stood silently in the darkened, lonely room. A normal human would be asleep by now, but Time Lords didn’t need as much sleep and he didn’t have anything to do but worry until morning.
The Doctor unwedged a pillow and a blanket from underneath the scanner. He pushed a pile of leftover junk from one corner to another and laid down the blanket. He took the pillow and curled up on the ground hoping against his own biology for this one little snippet of human normality. Sleeping, at least, would make the time pass more quickly. If time passed quickly, Rory would return faster.
But the Doctor left with Amy in the TARDIS without seeing Rory again.
&
“So, are you proposing to someone?”
“I’m sorry?”
“I found this in your pocket.”
“No. No, no. That’s…” The Doctor searched for the right word. “A, uh, memory. A friend of mine. Someone I lost. Do you… mind…” Amy pulled the ring away.
“It’s weird. I feel, I dunno… something.”
“People fall out of the world, sometimes, but they… they always leave traces. Little things we can’t quite account for. Faces in photographs, luggage, half eaten meals. Rings.”
Amy looked down at the ring box in her hands, brow furrowed.
“Nothing is ever forgotten. Not completely. And if something can be remembered, it can come back.”
&
Rory still hadn’t come back.
&
“Amy! Where’s Amy?”
“She’s fine, Doctor, just unconscious.”
“Yes. She’s sedated, that’s all. Half an hour, she’ll be fine. Okay, Romans. Good. I was just wishing for Romans. Good old Romans. How many?”
“Fifty men up top, all volunteers. What about that thing?”
“Fifty? You’re not exactly a legion.”
“Your friend was very persuasive, but it was a tough sell.”
“Yes, I know that, Rory. I’m not exactly one to miss the obvious, but we need everything we can get. Okay! Cyber weapons! This is basically a sentry box. The headless wonder here was a sentry. Probably got himself duffed up by the locals. Never underestimate a Celt.”
“Doctor-”
“Hush, Rory, thinking. Why leave a cyber thing on guard unless it’s a cyber thing in the box, but they wouldn’t lock up one of their own. So, no, not a cyber thing, but what? What? No, I’m missing something obvious, Rory. Something big. Something right slap in front of me. I can feel it.”
“Yeah, I think you probably are.”
“I’ll get it in a minute.”
“…”
“…”
“Hello again.”
“Hello.”
“How’ve you been?”
&
The Doctor believed in miracles. He’d never seen one that he believed to be true before, but he did believe.
But he also believed in madness and grief, and he began to fear that his time with Rory before was a figment of his imagination.
&
The Doctor screamed, alone and trapped within the Pandorica. He struggled against his restraints, but they wouldn’t budge. The TARDIS was exploding right now and he couldn’t do a thing. Useless. Everything was about to be destroyed and he was trapped in a box like a fool.
He kept screaming, praying that the Alliance would realize their mistake and release him. They didn’t. He couldn’t stop the pain in his hearts. His failure burned behind his eyes and he hung his head in shame. Years ago, he had failed to save his own race. Now, he failed to save all the races that ever existed.
He closed his eyes and waited for the end.
“Sometimes, Doctor, I wonder about what you get up to.”
The Doctor’s eyes flew up and his head snapped up.
“How…?”
“What?”
“You’re back.”
“Yeah.”
“I thought you’d gone.”
“I thought I did, too.”
The Doctor laughed, sadly. It really wasn’t very funny at all, but there wasn’t anything else he could do.
“There’s another you, out there,” the Doctor nodded towards the outside. “An Auton - a sort of robot thing - with your memories.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
“Good. Maybe he’ll be some use to you and Amy.”
“That’s a bit unlikely. I’m trapped in a box and everything that ever existed is about to be torn apart.”
“Oh.”
There was an awkward pause.
“You’ll think of something.”
This time the Doctor laughed outright with an unfortunately manic edge to sound.
“Doctor?”
“Yes, Rory?”
“I think…” He stopped, unsure of how to proceed. “I think this is the last time you’ll see me. Even if the universe doesn’t implode.”
The Doctor nodded. He was afraid of that. They always left him in the end.
“So this is goodbye,” the Doctor said, barely louder than a whisper.
“Yes.”
“Goodbye then, Rory Williams. I am glad to have known you. I couldn't have wished for anyone finer.”
“Thanks. You, too. And-” He mustered up the last of his strength to poke the Doctor in the shoulder. “And if this other me turns out to be alright, I mean… not evil or anything… take him along. He’ll need you. And he’ll need Amy.”
“I will.”
“Goodbye Doctor.”
The Doctor blinked and Rory was gone.
&
Silence.
