inside a POLICE CALL BOX (i_keptmyaccent) wrote in we_coexist, @ 2011-02-14 20:27:00 |
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Entry tags: | amy pond, the doctor |
The Eleventh Message [LOG: Amy & the Doctor, TBC in comments]
It wasn’t until her third encounter with the special edition personal ads that Amy finally bothered to read them. She recognized one immediately, assuming he’d written it to find her and possibly even spread them around himself. The Doctor was always doing brilliant things like that. Sure it was silly, and he was probably going to get a lot of messages he hadn’t intended but he’d found a way to communicate with his companion.
It made perfect sense to her. There was another personal ad she hadn’t recognized, though she have. It’d been written for her. But as of yet no one had replied to it.
She wasted no time leaving the following message: “Doctor!? I really hope this is you and this is not some other Space Gandalf. If it isn't you just ignore this. Sorry. But if it is please, please, please call me back. 555-551-5527!”
The rest of the time was spent waiting. And waiting. And staring. An hour felt like several when you had nothing else to pass the time.
The Doctor had already gotten three calls, all of them pranks. He’d seen the personal advertisement, and he’d not been - alright, that was a lie, he’d been mildly amused. It was clever. The telephone calls to his City-given mobile? Less so. He’d taken to letting them collect so that he could delete them at once, which is why it took him so long to get to Amy’s. He’d had quite the backlog.
When he got there? He almost dropped the phone. Had the City actually done him a favor? The Doctor punched in the number that the caller had left and waited.
Amy answered on the first ring: “Doctor?”
“Pond!” There was noise in the background; honking horns and what sounded like shouting. The Doctor raised his voice to talk over the din. “Where have you been? I’ve been looking all over for you.”
“The streets move,” she explained, unsure if the Doctor was aware. “I lost the TARDIS. We were in Colchester and there were the fives and the nines and I was worried that I was in vortex but it’s actually a weird alien city and oh Doctor! It’s so good to hear your voice. I didn’t mean to loose the TARDIS but I had to go out and find out where I was and how did you get here anyway?”
Wow, that was a lot of talking. “Breaths, Pond. Take them, it’s okay.” He gave her a few seconds to get oxygen into her lungs. Meanwhile, he started working through what she’d said. Colchester. Vortex. So she’d been stuck in the TARDIS, and for her none of the events with the Pandorica had happened. No Roman Britain. No River Song. No Rory.
He winced. “I’ve found the TARDIS, so all’s solved. Where are you? Stay still. I’ll come and fetch you.”
“Coffee shop! Moxie Java. It’s currently on Apple and 3rd. I’ll let you know if the streets change.”
“Moxie Java.” The Doctor repeated. He was already on the move - he’d parked the TARDIS just ‘round from a landmark, a huge fountain that was lit up at night. In a few bounds he’d taken the corner and arrived at the blue box’s front door.
Sometimes travel by TARDIS worked. Sometimes he set the coordinates and departed, only to find that the streets had changed by the time he’d arrived. There truly were no shortcuts in the City, but a Time Lord could try.
The vrwooosh of the machine’s materialization announced the Doctor several moments before he stepped into the Moxie Java. He still hadn’t hung up his mobile. “Alright. Eyes open, Pond! Can you see--” Oh. Wait. There was a mop of ginger hair. What were the chances that it was someone else?
Amy spun around on her heel just in time to see that beautiful blue box materialize inside the coffee shop. “Oh Doctor, I could kiss you!”
She didn’t. But just to give the alien a proper scare she did lunge for him and give him a very tight, very long hug.
For an instant, the Doctor was frightened that Amy actually might try to kiss him. Without the looming spectre of Rory, there was no good way to put her off without hurting her feelings and, in spite of occasional callousness, the Doctor did not enjoy hurting feelings. At all.
Hugs were alright, though. When it became clear that the threat was just that, he swung an arm around Amy and hugged her back. He’d been worried. The City was a strange place and no matter how capable the fiery, determined Amy Pond was, he’d half expected that something might happen to her. The Doctor was fond of curious sorts, but the problem with poking your nose in was that it gave things with teeth the opportunity to snap off the intrusive extremities.
“So. Clearly not Colchester. Would you like the good news or the bad news first?”
“There’s good news?” Amy was impressed and let the Doctor go with only a mild hair ruffle just to be difficult. That was Amy for you. He had to be punished for failing to find her earlier. A hair ruffle seemed fitting.
“Hey,” the Doctor grumbled. “Of course there’s good news.” Possibly not news Amy would appreciate, but it was ‘good’ in the Doctor’s book. “I’ve met Sherlock Holmes.” Yes. That was really it. There was more, but the banner, headline bit? Run-ins with famous detectives. “And Jack Harkness is here; you’ll meet him, he’ll probably try to flirt with you.” The Doctor waived a hand, as if to say he does that a lot. “Former travelling companion of mine. Troublemaker. Head on his shoulders, good in a tight spot.”
In other words? The usual - personalities varied, but certain core traits were almost always the same.
“Are you ready for the bad news?”
“Wait. You met Sherlock Holmes? The Sherlock Holmes? The one from the stories? How is that even possible?” Just as the Doctor and Amy had laughed in delight over the possibilities of vampires in Venice, it was fun to share another exciting moment with him just then. “...Are you sure he wasn’t a fish alien?”
But then Amy grinned and it was clear she was teasing him.
“Alright, then. What’s the bad news?”
“Oh no, it’s him. A bit too twenty-first century, but I’m not going to complain.” The Doctor was still a little giddy over it all. Cheery enough that the ‘how is that possible’ question didn’t even phase him. He had an answer, but he didn’t know if he liked it and he wasn’t quite ready to share it with Amy. So? He breezed on by to the bad news.
“We can’t leave. Not yet. There’s a mystery here, Pond. The game is afoot.” Yes. Yes, he did just steal one of Holmes’s iconic lines. No shame.
“So. How long have you been here? The last thing you remember is being trapped in the TARDIS?” The Doctor managed to make the question casual, but his eyes were a little too sharp and were focused squarely on Amy.
“Uh huh,” Amy gave the Doctor a look, as if he’d grown a second head to go with his extra heart. “I’ve been here about a week. Why? Is there something you’re not telling me?”
“What? No.” The Doctor put on an affronted air, which was a complete lie. Of course there were things he wasn’t telling her. “A week. Right, well, I’ve not been here much longer. You’ve gotten the introduction? The City’s a little bit alive, likes to toy with people? I know that you know the streets move.” She’d tried to warn him, after all.
“Wait. If I came where with the TARDIS how did you get here before I did?”
Ah, that was the question, wasn’t it? And the Doctor didn’t like to admit ignorance, so instead he dissembled. “The City. There’s an intelligence of some sort behind the curtain. I’m trying to pull the fabric back so that we can have a look at the wicked witch.” Okay. So maybe he’d gotten his pop culture reference slightly confused. He didn’t seem to notice. “Perhaps we need a dog. A tiny black dog and one of those air horns.”
“I don’t think I trust you with a dog,” she teased. “Alright. So we’ll figure it out. You still haven’t taken me to Rio like you promised.”
And that was that. She wasn’t concerned in the slightest. She may not have trusted the Doctor with a pet but she trusted him with her life. It was the important things that he got right. Amy beamed, “I met a vampire. A real one. He isn’t even an alien or a fish or anything. Oh my god, it was so exciting! Pretty nice bloke, too. Very tall. Tragically handsome.”