Chapter Text
“No, Rory, don't!” was the last thing she said to him. Seconds later, he was dead.
About an hour later, he woke up.
“Amy?” he asked hopefully as he groggily came to. He quickly and automatically checked his body for any obvious injuries but found only minor cuts and bruises. He'd been.. knocked out? He tried to work out how and when but his head hurt and his vision wouldn't focus. “Amy?!” he asked again, louder this time. There was no answer, no Amy. There was, at least, the familiar wheeze and hum of the TARDIS and a gentle warm breeze coming from somewhere near him – the TARDIS was very thoughtful and seemed to want to comfort him. He let himself be comforted and drifted back into sleep.
He awoke to the sounds of unfamiliar voices. Not the expected voices of his family, his Amy, his Doctor, his River. Different voices. Male voices. One clearly Northern, another a jaunty American. Who were they and how did they get in?
Rory sat bolt upright. Fearing danger, he was suddenly alert. “Doctor?!” he called urgently and the voices suddenly stopped.
The time between his call and the arrival of the two men must have been mere seconds but to Rory it was a terrifying stretch of time in which to mounting panic he realised this TARDIS was not the one he called home.
There were battered seats and something he swore must be a tree somehow growing through the ship. The walls were a bronze-y gold leading to a roof that domed over a central column of green-blue light. The floor beneath him was a thick mesh. He knew for sure he was in the TARDIS and that he'd seen this room before but he had no time to remember when before...
The men reached him and the one wearing a battered leather jacket spoke to him.
“You called?” he said, beaming to himself. Without waiting for Rory to reply, he continued, “You called Doctor and here I am.”
“You're not the Doctor...” Rory began to reply, mentally noting that this “Doctor” was the owner of the Northern accent, “Oh shit, wait. Time travel. Gotta sync our diaries.”
The Doctor didn't seem to understand so Rory pulled out a TARDIS blue diary from his pocket. “Right..” he sighed, “Where are we up to?” He glanced at the Doctor. “Big ears, no hair... ah we're VERY early in your timestream no wonder you don't know who I am... Have you met River yet?”
The Doctor looked confused.
“Ah,” said Rory, “You clearly haven't so, erm, let's see...”
“Sorry to interrupt,” said the Doctor who did not appear sorry at all, “But who the hell are you?”
“I'm... a friend,” Rory said carefully, “You meet me in the future. Either that or this is a dream I'm having or perhaps I'm dead again... Oh fuck, I shouldn't have said that.. Spoilers.”
Rory returned to leafing through his diary, trying to get a handle on where and when he was. He finally truly understood River's panic about one day meeting a Doctor who had never seen here before.. and while his thoughts wandered for one brief second to his daughter, the American man lunged forwards and grabbed the diary from his hands.
Before Rory's mind could even register what had happened, the American had tossed the diary to the Doctor and the Doctor had promptly flicked through it. By the time Rory managed to say “Stop, don't!”, the Doctor had read the whole thing.
“Ah.” said the Doctor, “Right.” He passed the book over to the American who also thumbed through it.
“Oh” said the American, “I see”
Rory snatched the diary back and held it to his chest. “You aren't allowed to read that,” he said to no one in particular. Nothing even remotely like this had happened in his dreams of meeting one of the earlier Doctors. This hadn't even happened in any of River's informal “Time Travel and Foreknowledge Etiquette” classes. He was supposed to calmly take control and instruct the Doctor to return time to his correct time.. not let the Doctor gain the upper hand. And yet here he was, not at all in control and possibly in the process of entirely rewriting his own timeline (again!) and being written out of history (again!) because he let the Doctor get hold of foreknowledge...
Rory felt a hand on his shoulder. The Doctor's hand. He looked up into those sad blue eyes.
“Rory,” said the Doctor quietly but purposefully, “I am so sorry, Rory but I have to tell you: you're dead.”