fic: lococession 3/5
2013 is a smashing year, not least Christmas Day, which begins with a smash that rattles the windows and sets dogs and car alarms howling over half the neighborhood.
Amy and Rory make it out to the street in less than five minutes, but Mrs. Harrison from across the street is already standing on their porch with her cane raised to start pounding on their door. “Amelia!” she squawks as soon as Amy opens it, “whatever you’ve gotten up to this time, I won’t stand for it!”
“Yeah, sorry ‘bout that,” Amy breathes, looking over Mrs. Harrison’s shoulder at the TARDIS lying on its side in the middle of the road. Its doors are facing upwards, leaking gray curlicues of smoke into the clear predawn sky.
“What is it? Some kind of prank?” Mrs. Harrison demands, as Rory edges his way around his wife and carefully shifts their neighbor aside.
“No! No,” Amy says hurriedly, as other faces begin to appear at windows up and down the street and the TARDIS just lies there, smoking gently but doing nothing else, at the end of a long shallow scrape in the pavement. “It’s… um… art,” she declares, at the same moment that Rory offers “…repairs?”
“Hmph,” Mrs. Harrison grumbles, expressing her complete disbelief in them and her contempt for them as disrespectful hooligans, but she seems to be satisfied and turns around to return to her own house. A few of the other neighbors have come out onto their front steps to look at the strange blue box, but nothing seems to be happening, and the wail of car alarms in the distance dies down, one at a time.
Then the TARDIS doors explode outward and the so does the Doctor, just a whirl of hair and thrashing limbs being borne up by a torrent of golden light.
“No,” Rory mutters, “definitely art.”
The light reaches the height of Amy and Rory’s bedroom window and starts thrashing, whipping back and forth like a pine tree in a high wind, with its trunk vanishing into the TARDIS and the Doctor clinging to its tip, shouting something incomprehensible. Amy starts towards it, not sure what she can do but needing to do something, but before she makes it two steps the column of light gives a particularly vicious twang and throws the Doctor off. He lands hard on the pavement and rolls, then jumps to his feet, impossibly unhurt.
“Doctor!” Amy shouts, as the golden light grows higher, drawing itself up out of the TARDIS until it hangs unsupported in the air. The Doctor is still shouting at it, and it curls downwards towards him, bending like a glittering snake to flick forked lightning at him.
“Safe!” the Doctor roars. The light doesn’t react, just hangs there shimmering, and Amy starts to see that it isn’t light at all but crystals, some kind of flock of crystal shards all hanging together and catching the beginning of the sunrise.
“Safe,” the Doctor repeats, “we’re safe here! Scan around, see where we’ve landed!” He throws out his arms, taking in all of the Leadworth, England, Earth. “Look at that house! Look who lives there!” he shouts, pointing to Amy and Rory. “That’s the Last Centurion, and that - that is Amelia Pond! Nothing can get to you here! Here -- we are -- protected.”
The thing hangs there, sparkling and undulating gently. The coiled menace and winking facets make it look like otherworldly offspring of a viper and a chandelier. Amy wonders how it can even hear the Doctor, let alone understand him.
Then the front segment, that Amy has been thinking of as the head though there's no ears or eyes or mouth that she can see, swings away from the Doctor and towards Amy and Rory. It inspects them thoroughly for a long minute -- there's no expression, just a wall of crystal shards, but Amy knows inspecting when she sees it -- and then ripples all over, once. She can't tell whether it's a shudder of disgust or a nod of approval, and she doesn't have time to think about it because suddenly the creature is heading right for her, looping and slithering through the air like a great glittering eel. Instinctively, she grabs the snow shovel leaning against the railing, though it's a cheap plasticky one from the drugstore and would probably crack if used to break glass.
"Amy! Put that down!" the Doctor snaps. The front of the creature has just about reached the porch, and Amy can sense Rory edging up behind her, braced for trouble; but just before the creature gets close enough to touch, it starts dissolving. The individual crystal shards shoot out in all directions like droplets from a jet of water hitting a wall, with a sound like the breath of a breeze through windchimes.
When the whole creature is dispersed, Amy dares to step down into the street, towards the Doctor, who's staring intently at the front of her house. She turns around to look, and sees the glittering golden crystals lined up in neat rows on her windowsills, dangling from the gutters and the edge of the roof, the perfect alien Christmas lights. Some of them are even moving, inching between the windows like transparent glowworms.
"Look at that! Sanctuary accepted!" says the Doctor. Amy turns back to find him grinning like a loon. "'It curled once about the house, and fell asleep.' That's Eliot’s -- oh, I should go visit him, old T.S. I always knew he had a British heart. But Amy! Hello!" He tumbles forward and sweeps her up into a hug. "Sorry about the mess," he says into her hair. "That's the pre-Dravidian Conglomerate, got caught in a bit of a chase, set the TARDIS for safety and this is where she landed. Rory!" He lets Amy go and darts across to Rory, engulfing him in tweed. "Hello, charmed I'm sure," he says over Rory's shoulder to Mrs. Harrison.
"L-likewise," Mrs. Harrison croaks.
"Hang on, so you've got aliens chasing you here? You're bringing an alien invasion to our house?" Rory asks. "Again?"
"Let 'em come," Amy growls, retrieving the shovel from the sidewalk and brandishing it as best she can. "Let's see how far they get. What is it, Doctor, Cyberthings? Daleks?"
"No!" the Doctor says, releasing Rory. "No, no, got that all sorted, no one's coming, we're fine. Rory! Now listen, it's been -- oh -- seven and three-eighths of a minute, the old respiratory bypass has been pumping away and it's about to fail, bit of turbulence, the TARDIS atmosphere is poisonous to bipeds right now so don't go poking about, but the filter should take care of it. Give it twenty minutes. Normal human resuscitation should do the trick, but don't forget the extra heart. Oh, and, sorry about the police."
There are sirens getting closer. Amy can hear them, now that she's paying attention. "Doctor..." she groans, letting the shovel hit the pavement with a clack.
"Hang on -- resuscitate the TARDIS?" Rory asks, his brow furrowing as he tries to follow the Doctor's babbling brook of consciousness.
"No. Amelia --" he swings around to point an accusing finger at her. "Don't worry. That's an order." He turns back to Rory, fingers twiddling nervously. "Sorry about this," he says, and passes out.
Amy and Rory make it out to the street in less than five minutes, but Mrs. Harrison from across the street is already standing on their porch with her cane raised to start pounding on their door. “Amelia!” she squawks as soon as Amy opens it, “whatever you’ve gotten up to this time, I won’t stand for it!”
“Yeah, sorry ‘bout that,” Amy breathes, looking over Mrs. Harrison’s shoulder at the TARDIS lying on its side in the middle of the road. Its doors are facing upwards, leaking gray curlicues of smoke into the clear predawn sky.
“What is it? Some kind of prank?” Mrs. Harrison demands, as Rory edges his way around his wife and carefully shifts their neighbor aside.
“No! No,” Amy says hurriedly, as other faces begin to appear at windows up and down the street and the TARDIS just lies there, smoking gently but doing nothing else, at the end of a long shallow scrape in the pavement. “It’s… um… art,” she declares, at the same moment that Rory offers “…repairs?”
“Hmph,” Mrs. Harrison grumbles, expressing her complete disbelief in them and her contempt for them as disrespectful hooligans, but she seems to be satisfied and turns around to return to her own house. A few of the other neighbors have come out onto their front steps to look at the strange blue box, but nothing seems to be happening, and the wail of car alarms in the distance dies down, one at a time.
Then the TARDIS doors explode outward and the so does the Doctor, just a whirl of hair and thrashing limbs being borne up by a torrent of golden light.
“No,” Rory mutters, “definitely art.”
The light reaches the height of Amy and Rory’s bedroom window and starts thrashing, whipping back and forth like a pine tree in a high wind, with its trunk vanishing into the TARDIS and the Doctor clinging to its tip, shouting something incomprehensible. Amy starts towards it, not sure what she can do but needing to do something, but before she makes it two steps the column of light gives a particularly vicious twang and throws the Doctor off. He lands hard on the pavement and rolls, then jumps to his feet, impossibly unhurt.
“Doctor!” Amy shouts, as the golden light grows higher, drawing itself up out of the TARDIS until it hangs unsupported in the air. The Doctor is still shouting at it, and it curls downwards towards him, bending like a glittering snake to flick forked lightning at him.
“Safe!” the Doctor roars. The light doesn’t react, just hangs there shimmering, and Amy starts to see that it isn’t light at all but crystals, some kind of flock of crystal shards all hanging together and catching the beginning of the sunrise.
“Safe,” the Doctor repeats, “we’re safe here! Scan around, see where we’ve landed!” He throws out his arms, taking in all of the Leadworth, England, Earth. “Look at that house! Look who lives there!” he shouts, pointing to Amy and Rory. “That’s the Last Centurion, and that - that is Amelia Pond! Nothing can get to you here! Here -- we are -- protected.”
The thing hangs there, sparkling and undulating gently. The coiled menace and winking facets make it look like otherworldly offspring of a viper and a chandelier. Amy wonders how it can even hear the Doctor, let alone understand him.
Then the front segment, that Amy has been thinking of as the head though there's no ears or eyes or mouth that she can see, swings away from the Doctor and towards Amy and Rory. It inspects them thoroughly for a long minute -- there's no expression, just a wall of crystal shards, but Amy knows inspecting when she sees it -- and then ripples all over, once. She can't tell whether it's a shudder of disgust or a nod of approval, and she doesn't have time to think about it because suddenly the creature is heading right for her, looping and slithering through the air like a great glittering eel. Instinctively, she grabs the snow shovel leaning against the railing, though it's a cheap plasticky one from the drugstore and would probably crack if used to break glass.
"Amy! Put that down!" the Doctor snaps. The front of the creature has just about reached the porch, and Amy can sense Rory edging up behind her, braced for trouble; but just before the creature gets close enough to touch, it starts dissolving. The individual crystal shards shoot out in all directions like droplets from a jet of water hitting a wall, with a sound like the breath of a breeze through windchimes.
When the whole creature is dispersed, Amy dares to step down into the street, towards the Doctor, who's staring intently at the front of her house. She turns around to look, and sees the glittering golden crystals lined up in neat rows on her windowsills, dangling from the gutters and the edge of the roof, the perfect alien Christmas lights. Some of them are even moving, inching between the windows like transparent glowworms.
"Look at that! Sanctuary accepted!" says the Doctor. Amy turns back to find him grinning like a loon. "'It curled once about the house, and fell asleep.' That's Eliot’s -- oh, I should go visit him, old T.S. I always knew he had a British heart. But Amy! Hello!" He tumbles forward and sweeps her up into a hug. "Sorry about the mess," he says into her hair. "That's the pre-Dravidian Conglomerate, got caught in a bit of a chase, set the TARDIS for safety and this is where she landed. Rory!" He lets Amy go and darts across to Rory, engulfing him in tweed. "Hello, charmed I'm sure," he says over Rory's shoulder to Mrs. Harrison.
"L-likewise," Mrs. Harrison croaks.
"Hang on, so you've got aliens chasing you here? You're bringing an alien invasion to our house?" Rory asks. "Again?"
"Let 'em come," Amy growls, retrieving the shovel from the sidewalk and brandishing it as best she can. "Let's see how far they get. What is it, Doctor, Cyberthings? Daleks?"
"No!" the Doctor says, releasing Rory. "No, no, got that all sorted, no one's coming, we're fine. Rory! Now listen, it's been -- oh -- seven and three-eighths of a minute, the old respiratory bypass has been pumping away and it's about to fail, bit of turbulence, the TARDIS atmosphere is poisonous to bipeds right now so don't go poking about, but the filter should take care of it. Give it twenty minutes. Normal human resuscitation should do the trick, but don't forget the extra heart. Oh, and, sorry about the police."
There are sirens getting closer. Amy can hear them, now that she's paying attention. "Doctor..." she groans, letting the shovel hit the pavement with a clack.
"Hang on -- resuscitate the TARDIS?" Rory asks, his brow furrowing as he tries to follow the Doctor's babbling brook of consciousness.
"No. Amelia --" he swings around to point an accusing finger at her. "Don't worry. That's an order." He turns back to Rory, fingers twiddling nervously. "Sorry about this," he says, and passes out.