Fic: Anthropomorphic (1/1)
Title: Anthropomorphic
Author: the_tenzo
Character(s): Rory Williams, Eleven (implied Doctor/Rose, Amy/Rory)
Rating: All Ages
Word Count: ~1500
Spoilers: Set prior to The Hungry Earth (5x08)
Summary: Rory Williams knows there is a ghost on the TARDIS.
A/N: Another fic written for the doctor_rose_fix -athon. cainangrey prompted "Rose is a data ghost on the TARDIS. Rory keeps bumping into her." I went in an angsty direction.
There are ghosts on the TARDIS. Rory knows there are.
Amy tells him he's being stupid. She's never seen one, and she's spent so much of her life being disbelieved by others that the only way she can even the score is to not believe anyone else.
"There's no such thing as ghosts," the Doctor says. But Rory has seen vampires who aren't vampires, and humans who are really monsters, and lived a whole life that never existed. He has a feeling that the Doctor is getting off on a technicality with this statement.
Besides, the TARDIS is just creepy, all around. He hears things: the chiming of far-off church-bells, or the trickle of running water, or someone singing under their breath, just behind him, just over his shoulder, until he turns to look and there's nothing.
Except sometimes there's not nothing.
It's not nothing, but it's not really something, either. Rory is left with an impression of a shape that has been seen, in the past, in a memory. A human shape, that flickers and shifts and then evaporates. He does not see it in the present, but the memory is with him nonetheless. He thinks this place may be driving him mad.
As mad as the Doctor.
This is not a consolation.
The corridors never take him to the same location twice. He's sent for biscuits, but where the kitchen was, there is now a large room containing what appears to be a 1/10 scale model of Hogwarts Castle, built out of cotton swabs.
He knows he will get laughed at if he does not return with the requested packets of Jammy Dodgers (the Doctor) and Jaffa Cakes (Amy). Poor Rory, can't even find his way to the kitchen without help. Dear sweet Rory, not quite so cut out for this sort of life, bless.
He realises he is clenching his teeth and tries to relax. He will simply exit this very-much-not-the-kitchen, and try again. Maybe there's a trick to making rooms appear. Maybe you have to really want it... or perhaps you have to pretend you don't. He backs out into the corridor again, and that is when he sees her.
A girl. Well, a woman. An ordinary human woman, by the looks (except for the otherworldly golden glow about her, and how is it that Rory has learnt so quickly to expand his definition of 'ordinary' to include this?). She's young, and blonde, and when she turns to walk back down the corridor and around a corner, he sees that the back of her pink jacket says "Punky Fish."
Punky Fish?
He follows her. He might as well: maybe she knows the way to the kitchen. He supposes he could ask her. He's seen this sort of thing on Star Trek, and maybe she's a hologram, dispatched to show new residents around. The Doctor would say, "There is no such thing as ghosts," but fail to follow that up with, "but there is a very helpful hologram who will take you to biscuits." Too right, he would, and probably on purpose.
"Excuse me," he says, trotting a bit to catch up to her. "Um, hi? Hello?"
She ignores him, or doesn't hear. Is there a special phrase or code word?
"It's just that I can't seem to find my way to the kitchen." He laughs it off a little. Self-deprecating in front of a hologram-a new low.
The woman stops, turns, and scares the life out of him. Her images flickers, like a television with bad reception, and just for a split second she is replaced by a beast. A wolf. Rather, a wolf from a fairy-story, so not really a wolf but more like a monster in wolf's clothing. Anthropomorphic is the word his brain is searching for, as if naming it will make the fact that he's just seen a monster be okay.
But then the young woman is back, in her totally normal contemporary dress and totally abnormal glow about the edges. She opens her mouth, and is clearly speaking, but no sound comes out. The look in her glowing eyes is of great concern, sadness, and fierce determination. Rory reconsiders who it is here that requires help.
"I... I'm sorry, I can't hear you," he says, slowly approaching, like he would an injured animal.
She is still speaking, and there are still no words to be heard. Perhaps if he touches her, maybe that's what she wants. A tiny voice in the back of his mind reminds him that he doesn't know if this woman is friend or foe, and doing what she wants may not be wise.
But he never could resist a cry for help.
She is, as he suspected, not a solid thing. When he gets up close, he can see right through her, to the silvery walls of the corridor behind. His hand shakes slightly as he reaches out, like it did the first time he punctured skin with a needle, or the first time he was permitted to touch the smooth, pink cheek of Amy Pond.
"Has he been kept safe, my Doctor? Protected from the False God?" Rory hears these words in his head, this woman's voice, breaking with emotion, crying out for confirmation. She repeats them again, and once more, and Rory pulls his hand back from her, returning to the silence.
Has the Doctor been kept safe? What sort of question is that? That man is never safe, but he himself the menace, not the other way around. He is the false god that needs protecting from, if anything.
Still, right now everyone seems to be safe, regardless. There's tea, and would be biscuits if Rory could stop being such a knob and just find some. He nods a little. "Yeah, I guess. We're all safe here, I suppose."
The woman tilts her head, considering him. She's the transparent one but he feels as if he is being looked through. She reaches a shimmering hand out, places it on his chest, over his heart.
"I look and I look, but he doesn't come to me any more. Why does he hide?"
He can see the tracks of tears running down her cheeks. The way she speaks of him, Rory can't imagine anyone ever talking to the Doctor like this. It's raw. Intimate. Who is she?
"He's in the, you know... that main room, out there. If you want to find him."
"He hides," she repeats.
"I'm here." Footsteps, and the Doctor's voice. And he's not telling this vision to shut up or go away or anything of the sort. In fact, his tone is tender and indulgent. Rory is dumbstruck.
The woman speaks without sound again but Rory can see her mouth the words, "My Doctor."
"I'm safe," he says, and reaches out to run a single finger along the curve of her arm. "But you mustn't do this. There will be a time, but not now." He takes her hand, though it's just air. "Sleep. Dream."
She fades, dissolves, like fog.
And then they are alone. So very, very awkwardly alone. Rory feels like he just saw the Doctor naked. The Doctor rubs his hands together as if they've just finished a building project together and it's time for a pint.
"Now! About those biscuits, Rory."
Rory doesn't move an inch. "Who... what...?"
"Kitchen's this way, but it does like to move around a lot this time around, I'll grant you." He strides down the corridor a few paces, but turns when he doesn't hear Rory follow. "Come along," he says.
"But Doctor, what was that? She said... she said she wanted you safe, and that you hid from her."
"It's nothing." The Doctor reconsiders for a moment. "No, not nothing. Definitely something. Something from a whole lifetime ago. An echo, I guess you could say. My ship saves more than just hard data, it saves Time. She invited the TARDIS in, and it took something back."
"She was real? I mean, once, on this ship, you knew her, and it saved her."
"I've known a lot of people." The Doctor turns from Rory once again, but does not start walking away. Not before he heaves a heavy sigh (almost human, that sound of regret). "And I knew her."
And he walks off into the darkness, the sound of his boots on the polished floor fading. Rory doesn't care about the biscuits any more. He has a new version of the Doctor to wrestle with. Raggedy doll, invisible friend, absent rival, dangerous alien... tragic lover? That just doesn't seem right. Imagining this mad, infuriating man as someone capable of that sort of folly (Rory knows better than anyone, love is always folly-the best kind of folly) is cognitive dissonance of the highest degree.
That's why the Doctor appears so invested in a happy outcome to the story of Rory Williams and Amy Pond, the girl who waited. Maybe. It's not a mystery solved-not quite yet. But Rory never could resist a cry for help, no matter who was making it.
Author: the_tenzo
Character(s): Rory Williams, Eleven (implied Doctor/Rose, Amy/Rory)
Rating: All Ages
Word Count: ~1500
Spoilers: Set prior to The Hungry Earth (5x08)
Summary: Rory Williams knows there is a ghost on the TARDIS.
A/N: Another fic written for the doctor_rose_fix -athon. cainangrey prompted "Rose is a data ghost on the TARDIS. Rory keeps bumping into her." I went in an angsty direction.
There are ghosts on the TARDIS. Rory knows there are.
Amy tells him he's being stupid. She's never seen one, and she's spent so much of her life being disbelieved by others that the only way she can even the score is to not believe anyone else.
"There's no such thing as ghosts," the Doctor says. But Rory has seen vampires who aren't vampires, and humans who are really monsters, and lived a whole life that never existed. He has a feeling that the Doctor is getting off on a technicality with this statement.
Besides, the TARDIS is just creepy, all around. He hears things: the chiming of far-off church-bells, or the trickle of running water, or someone singing under their breath, just behind him, just over his shoulder, until he turns to look and there's nothing.
Except sometimes there's not nothing.
It's not nothing, but it's not really something, either. Rory is left with an impression of a shape that has been seen, in the past, in a memory. A human shape, that flickers and shifts and then evaporates. He does not see it in the present, but the memory is with him nonetheless. He thinks this place may be driving him mad.
As mad as the Doctor.
This is not a consolation.
The corridors never take him to the same location twice. He's sent for biscuits, but where the kitchen was, there is now a large room containing what appears to be a 1/10 scale model of Hogwarts Castle, built out of cotton swabs.
He knows he will get laughed at if he does not return with the requested packets of Jammy Dodgers (the Doctor) and Jaffa Cakes (Amy). Poor Rory, can't even find his way to the kitchen without help. Dear sweet Rory, not quite so cut out for this sort of life, bless.
He realises he is clenching his teeth and tries to relax. He will simply exit this very-much-not-the-kitchen, and try again. Maybe there's a trick to making rooms appear. Maybe you have to really want it... or perhaps you have to pretend you don't. He backs out into the corridor again, and that is when he sees her.
A girl. Well, a woman. An ordinary human woman, by the looks (except for the otherworldly golden glow about her, and how is it that Rory has learnt so quickly to expand his definition of 'ordinary' to include this?). She's young, and blonde, and when she turns to walk back down the corridor and around a corner, he sees that the back of her pink jacket says "Punky Fish."
Punky Fish?
He follows her. He might as well: maybe she knows the way to the kitchen. He supposes he could ask her. He's seen this sort of thing on Star Trek, and maybe she's a hologram, dispatched to show new residents around. The Doctor would say, "There is no such thing as ghosts," but fail to follow that up with, "but there is a very helpful hologram who will take you to biscuits." Too right, he would, and probably on purpose.
"Excuse me," he says, trotting a bit to catch up to her. "Um, hi? Hello?"
She ignores him, or doesn't hear. Is there a special phrase or code word?
"It's just that I can't seem to find my way to the kitchen." He laughs it off a little. Self-deprecating in front of a hologram-a new low.
The woman stops, turns, and scares the life out of him. Her images flickers, like a television with bad reception, and just for a split second she is replaced by a beast. A wolf. Rather, a wolf from a fairy-story, so not really a wolf but more like a monster in wolf's clothing. Anthropomorphic is the word his brain is searching for, as if naming it will make the fact that he's just seen a monster be okay.
But then the young woman is back, in her totally normal contemporary dress and totally abnormal glow about the edges. She opens her mouth, and is clearly speaking, but no sound comes out. The look in her glowing eyes is of great concern, sadness, and fierce determination. Rory reconsiders who it is here that requires help.
"I... I'm sorry, I can't hear you," he says, slowly approaching, like he would an injured animal.
She is still speaking, and there are still no words to be heard. Perhaps if he touches her, maybe that's what she wants. A tiny voice in the back of his mind reminds him that he doesn't know if this woman is friend or foe, and doing what she wants may not be wise.
But he never could resist a cry for help.
She is, as he suspected, not a solid thing. When he gets up close, he can see right through her, to the silvery walls of the corridor behind. His hand shakes slightly as he reaches out, like it did the first time he punctured skin with a needle, or the first time he was permitted to touch the smooth, pink cheek of Amy Pond.
"Has he been kept safe, my Doctor? Protected from the False God?" Rory hears these words in his head, this woman's voice, breaking with emotion, crying out for confirmation. She repeats them again, and once more, and Rory pulls his hand back from her, returning to the silence.
Has the Doctor been kept safe? What sort of question is that? That man is never safe, but he himself the menace, not the other way around. He is the false god that needs protecting from, if anything.
Still, right now everyone seems to be safe, regardless. There's tea, and would be biscuits if Rory could stop being such a knob and just find some. He nods a little. "Yeah, I guess. We're all safe here, I suppose."
The woman tilts her head, considering him. She's the transparent one but he feels as if he is being looked through. She reaches a shimmering hand out, places it on his chest, over his heart.
"I look and I look, but he doesn't come to me any more. Why does he hide?"
He can see the tracks of tears running down her cheeks. The way she speaks of him, Rory can't imagine anyone ever talking to the Doctor like this. It's raw. Intimate. Who is she?
"He's in the, you know... that main room, out there. If you want to find him."
"He hides," she repeats.
"I'm here." Footsteps, and the Doctor's voice. And he's not telling this vision to shut up or go away or anything of the sort. In fact, his tone is tender and indulgent. Rory is dumbstruck.
The woman speaks without sound again but Rory can see her mouth the words, "My Doctor."
"I'm safe," he says, and reaches out to run a single finger along the curve of her arm. "But you mustn't do this. There will be a time, but not now." He takes her hand, though it's just air. "Sleep. Dream."
She fades, dissolves, like fog.
And then they are alone. So very, very awkwardly alone. Rory feels like he just saw the Doctor naked. The Doctor rubs his hands together as if they've just finished a building project together and it's time for a pint.
"Now! About those biscuits, Rory."
Rory doesn't move an inch. "Who... what...?"
"Kitchen's this way, but it does like to move around a lot this time around, I'll grant you." He strides down the corridor a few paces, but turns when he doesn't hear Rory follow. "Come along," he says.
"But Doctor, what was that? She said... she said she wanted you safe, and that you hid from her."
"It's nothing." The Doctor reconsiders for a moment. "No, not nothing. Definitely something. Something from a whole lifetime ago. An echo, I guess you could say. My ship saves more than just hard data, it saves Time. She invited the TARDIS in, and it took something back."
"She was real? I mean, once, on this ship, you knew her, and it saved her."
"I've known a lot of people." The Doctor turns from Rory once again, but does not start walking away. Not before he heaves a heavy sigh (almost human, that sound of regret). "And I knew her."
And he walks off into the darkness, the sound of his boots on the polished floor fading. Rory doesn't care about the biscuits any more. He has a new version of the Doctor to wrestle with. Raggedy doll, invisible friend, absent rival, dangerous alien... tragic lover? That just doesn't seem right. Imagining this mad, infuriating man as someone capable of that sort of folly (Rory knows better than anyone, love is always folly-the best kind of folly) is cognitive dissonance of the highest degree.
That's why the Doctor appears so invested in a happy outcome to the story of Rory Williams and Amy Pond, the girl who waited. Maybe. It's not a mystery solved-not quite yet. But Rory never could resist a cry for help, no matter who was making it.