The Adventures of the Doctor and Rory the Roman: Four Round Two
1501 AD
Rory inspected his shoulder as best he could. It was amazing that it had taken fourteen hundred years for him to get a serious injury, but he was thankful. He had chips and things and his plastic armor really looked a fright - no way would he be accepted into a legion now - but now he had a huge gash in his shoulder. There wasn’t anything he could do about it and it didn’t…hurt, per say, but it was very odd feeling. Luckily his cape would fit over the hole and no one would be able to tell. Part of his legend was in seeming indestructible so he tried to keep up the image as much as possible.
He patched the hole with bandages - not that he was bleeding - and inspected his surroundings more thoroughly. They were back in Rome - why did he feel like he was home? - as he was avoiding Venice at all costs, and underground, though there was access for the rich and powerful to come and inspect the Pandorica. The Renaissance was getting into full swing and art was considered highly in vogue. The Pandorica was nothing if not intriguing. The current king was quite agog to keep the Pandorica’s location under wraps in case somebody wanted to steal it. Rory couldn’t agree more even if it meant he had to deal with the rich and idle waltzing in to look at the Pandorica whenever they wanted, considering it theirs to laud over.
Granted, having Leonardo Da Vinci and Michelangelo come and look at it had been a bit of a thrill. Rory had never been much into art, but you couldn’t have those two in front of you and not feel just a little bit awed. There were others, so many others, but those two would always go down in Rory’s top ten of historical figures he’d met if only because they were the only ones who didn’t seem to be interested in the Pandorica for its possibility of power or prestige or wealth. They loved it for its structure and form and beauty and meaning, just as Rory himself did.
There was security on hand for the Pandorica at the entrances to the chamber and that was the only way in. Rory had looked very thoroughly and made sure the chamber was structurally sound and that nothing looked out of the ordinary. It was all he could do really. But he liked where they were for the most part and hoped it would be of some duration. He was getting so close. After what he’d been through, five hundred years was nothing.
There were odd sounds sometimes though. He’d learned to never ignore what his ears were telling him, but he had no idea what he was hearing or where it was coming from. It was the oddest ringing, not like a bell or like when his head got banged or something and he saw stars. He just knew somehow that it should be called ringing. He paid close attention to it for a few days but it never changed. There was just a constant ringing. Nobody else seemed to notice it when they came into the chamber so Rory finally came to the conclusion that it was on a frequency only plastic could hear.
Then there was the temperature. Rory was under the impression that it should be rather cold underground at the level they were at. They weren’t very deep at all and the chamber and tunnels leading to it were very drafty. But at night especially he felt ridiculously warm, like he was in a sauna. It was really odd, but it was hard to confirm if he was the only one feeling it because he was generally the only person in the chamber at night. The other guards were stationed outside in the tunnels and probably wouldn’t notice, but he paid attention to their conversations just the same and heard nothing out of the ordinary.
He had decided that he would try and arrange a message to the king to see if they could somehow move the Pandorica. He wasn’t sure if it would happen or not, but he had to try. That was what he did.
That night he was standing guard as usual when he suddenly felt dizzy, which hadn’t happened yet to plastic him. It was very disorienting. There was a sudden gust of wind and he felt his feet pulled out from under him and everything suddenly pressed in against him and when the pressure eased he didn’t know where he was. He most certainly was not with the Pandorica anymore.
The panic that hit him at that point was absolutely terrifying. He’d always been rather prone to it - vampires in Venice, school exams, first day in his legion, asking Amy to marry him - and now he was completely and utterly taken over by sheer, unadulterated panic. At which point, he would have hyperventilated if he could breathe. He was wildly relieved no one was around to see him and laugh at poor Rory Williams, the nervous nurse or some other rubbish name like that, who had failed once again. Who couldn’t do anything right and who’d lost the most important person in his life. It was exactly as if the last fourteen hundred years had never happened. He’d never been plastic, never been multi-lingual, never been a crack shot, never defended and fought against armies and outsmarted emperors. Like he’d never traveled with the Doctor.
And Rory started to feel - in the midst of his fear - that despite the resentment he’d felt against the Doctor, despite the horrible things he’d seen and done, the dangers Amy had been put into, that his life had been changed for the better having known the Doctor. And he’d known that before. The instant Amy had told him about ending the Leadworth dream - so many many years before - he’d been content with their crazy, madcap life. But then he’d gotten killed and erased and turned into a plastic centurion and had been fighting for over a millennia. That sort of thing tended to change one’s perspective and he hadn’t even realized how much resentment had been crowding back into his opinion of his Doctor. Not the many amazing men - all one man - that he’d met since then, just his Doctor.
And the Doctor had helped bring out something that Rory somehow knew he had possessed all along and had shown even when it vexed the Doctor. He had courage and he had faith and he had patience and loyalty and strength and smarts. And he used them in the service of the people he loved, even when they didn’t deserve it or tried to push it away. He’d never been appreciated, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t who he was, a human being - currently plastic - who was very very good.
And Rory calmed down. He closed his eyes and counted to ten and when he opened them again, he still wasn’t where he was currently located, but he could focus and deal with the situation. He was in a white room and there were absolutely no distinguishing features that he could see anywhere. There was just endless white. It was the bleakest thing he’d ever seen. He started to walk.
As he went, he kept his gun hand cocked and ready to go. He was cautious, but he couldn’t hear - even with his ears - anything. There was nothing but the white. He went along this way for at least twenty minutes before he came to anything. It was a door, a simple door. He looked around again for any other signs, but there was just the door. It was white too, but he could make out the handle and slowly reached forward and opened it. When he stepped through it shut behind him with a bang and when he turned back around, it was gone.
There was that pulling sensation again and he squeezed his eyes shut almost on reflex and when he opened them again he was on the Tardis. It was his Tardis, the one he’d first seen, and he almost wanted to sag with relief. There was his Doctor and his Amy, leaning chummily together on the console floor above him. They were laughing animatedly and it was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen. But it wasn’t possible - anything was possible, he knew that - because he knew what was really happening. His Amy wasn’t there and his Doctor was somewhere else and his Tardis was…he couldn’t remember what had happened to the Tardis, just something about an explosion. But this felt like he’d just fallen asleep and the Pandorica and the Alliance and his being a Roman had never happened.
He tried to open his hand gun and it didn’t work. He reached for his sword and it wasn’t there. He was dressed like Rory and he was starving. He tried to hear what they were saying and he couldn’t. It was the weirdest thing that he’d encountered yet. Weirder than the dreams they’d all shared, weirder than the singing Gilleve planet, weirder than meeting multiple Popes, weirder than being plastic. He opened his mouth to call out to the Doctor and Amy and tell them about his fifteen hundred year dream when Amy reached out and kissed the Doctor.
Rory froze and shook his head. This wasn’t real, this wasn’t true, this wasn’t what was happening. He’d rather be plastic. The Doctor didn’t look like he was returning it; in fact, he rather looked like he was trying to get away. That was the Doctor for you, but this was Amy and she was doing…that. They were engaged and now she was doing that. Rory had been waiting for her for so many years - for penance, he reminded himself - at least, he thought he had, and now, there she was, snogging the Doctor in front of him. He was angry and he felt broken and he wanted to do anything but be here. It was like growing up all over again with that painful, exquisite knowledge of loving Amy and knowing he would never be enough for her.
But he was, wasn’t he? She’d chosen him, back in that dream and she’d remembered him even when the universe had erased him from existence. And the Doctor would never let her get away with something like this and even if she wanted to…do that, she’d never do it in front of Rory. She was tactless, but she wasn’t thoughtless. This was absolutely not real; this was not the reality of life. The universe may have changed, but it could not change this much. Rory wouldn’t allow it to.
Laughing a little hysterically at that absurd thought, he ran up the console ramp and grabbed Amy away from a rather relieved looking Doctor and kissed her very properly. It took a second or two, but then she was kissing him back, her lips open and meshing with his perfectly. Her arms entwined around his neck and he brought one hand up to grasp her neck and the other went around her waist, just feeling the bare skin under her shirt and-
“I say, am I interrupting something?”
Rory felt that tugging and pressure and the lovely and far more interesting pressure of Amy’s body and lips was torn away from him. He blinked and standing in front of him in that same white space was the Doctor. The one with the scarf.
“Doctor?” he asked, and looked down and saw his sword.
“You did look rather entranced. I’m sorry to pull you away. But the illusion is never better than the reality.”
The Doctor thumped Rory on the back and Rory felt it, but not the same way he would have when he was human. It felt - almost - good to be plastic again.
“I take it I’m somewhere I’m not supposed to be?” Rory asked ruefully.
“I should say so. You’ve been traveling. I would offer you a jelly baby, but it wouldn’t be a real one, and, anyway, you don’t eat.”
“Why wouldn’t it be real?”
“We’re not here,” the Doctor said, “well, not physically. Our mental selves are here, and one could argue that the mental is the real person. I would, though, perhaps not on Sundays.”
“Where are our mental selves?” Rory asked.
“We’ve, rather, you’ve, gone Regret Traveling.”
“Do I want to know what that is?”
“I don’t see why not. Knowledge is good for you.” The Doctor turned and started to walk away, scarf trailing after him. “Come on, let’s get out. Anyway…it can be mistaken for time traveling, but it’s not. Your body stays where you are. But your mind revisits the past. Not the literal past as I’m sure you saw, but the mental past. All very exhausting, of course.”
Rory hurried to catch up.
“So those were my mental regrets?”
“Yes, astute Rory, but you had to conquer them, which, I have to say, I’m very impressed you did without knowing anything about where you were.”
“I had a good teacher,” Rory said, feeling led to make the compliment.
“The best in the universe!” the Doctor said, smiling broadly. “And this was a gift. Sometimes considered the best and worst gift in the universe. From the Taliki Cr’ofv. They’re empathic and telepathic and dimensionally suited for this kind of thing. Though they’re usually supposed to ask, I might just report this to the Shadow Proclamation. Wait, I forgot, that’s gone now.”
“I’d rather you didn’t anyway,” Rory said, “I-I feel better. I…think it was good.”
“I’m glad to hear it. Nothing like a good regret cleansing.”
“How did you find me?”
“I’m telepathic too, you know,” the Doctor said, sounding impatient. “I came to visit you and then you were in that state.”
“Why do you visit me?” Rory asked, since the subject had come up. “You never visit anyone else. I know.”
“I’d rather not know that,” the Doctor said, looking a bit uneasy. “And you might, well, you might need it more than anyone else. It’s an extraordinary thing you’re doing and you might just need…well, me, and company.”
“You’re blushing, Doctor,” Rory said, smirking, but feeling like blushing himself.
“What nonsense,” the Doctor said, glaring at him.
“How come you remember me?” Rory asked pointedly, giving him an out.
“It wasn’t my fault!” the Doctor declared. “I was at a concert, I’ve always enjoyed Rory Gallagher’s work and you can guess what happened from there.”
“I suppose it’s pointless to ask why you didn’t just erase your memory again once it had been accidentally un-erased?”
“I didn’t think of that,” the Doctor said. “But how could I enjoy the concert?”
“After the concert?”
“Then we wouldn’t be able to hash it over,” the Doctor said. “But still, I’ll tell Romana that a silly Auton could come up with something she couldn’t. That will fix her.”
“Romana, traveling with you, I suppose?”
“Not the other way around, no matter what she says,” the Doctor said. “Just because she got first in flight class.”
“I’m very confused,” Rory said as they came to an exit sign.
An honest to goodness exit sign.
“Romana’s Gallifreyan, we were at school together. She’s a pompous one, stay away from her.”
“Racial trait?” Rory mumbled, but followed the Doctor out, trying to imagine the Doctor in school and failing utterly.
He felt that same wind and dizziness and then found that he was standing in front of the Pandorica with his sword drawn, facing a small blonde woman who was staring at him curiously.
“You’re Rory?” she asked calmly.
“In the plastic,” he said, lowering his sword. “Sorry, was I about to skewer you?”
“Your body memory is very good,” she said. “You wouldn’t let anyone near the box, even with your mind gone. That’s a good sign.”
“I’ll take your word for it,” Rory said, feeling odd talking to another Gallifreyan - Timelady…? - since he knew they were all dead.
“Romana, don’t bluster,” the Doctor said, coming up next to them. “We have to go, there’s a meteor shower in the Gastar nebula! At least, there might be if it isn’t gone.”
“We can’t miss it if it’s there,” Romana said, and spouted off some sort of reason that involved inter-steller travel laws, comet theories and once-in-a-current-regeneration opportunities.
Rory was mind-boggled and he stared openly at her. A female Doctor-like person. How…weird.
“It’s a pity you can’t come with us,” the Doctor said wistfully. “I could tell everyone I traveled with Romana and the Roman.”
“I’m sure you could pick up another Roman somewhere,” Rory said.
“I want the Roman, Rory.”
Rory felt flushed and quickly changed the subject.
“Doctor, can we set it so that only I can trigger your memory?”
“No,” said the Doctor.
“Yes,” said Romana.
The Doctor glared at her.
“Fine, yes. I’ll do it.” He pulled his sonic out of his pocket and held it up to Rory’s face. “Say Rory.”
“Rory,” Rory said, feeling foolish.
“That does that,” the Doctor said and flounced over to where the Tardis was. “I’ve sent a message to the head of the Taliki and they won’t send you back anymore, Rory. Try not to set up a nest in any of their caverns though. I don’t think it will be a problem, they seem to be the only ones left.”
“I’ll bear it in mind,” Rory said.
Romana said something to him in a musical sounding language that he’d never heard before. He stared at her. He could tell it must be Gallifreyan, but he didn’t understand why the Tardis didn’t translate it.
She smiled at him and they disappeared into the box.
Rory put away his sword and patted the Pandorica to make sure it was really there.
“I feel like I’ve just had thirty years’ worth of counseling in ten minutes,” he whispered, trying to clear his head.
Then the day’s first visitor entered the chamber and it was back to business as normal.