THE RETURN OF THE GIRL WHO WAITED

CHAPTER 1

THE TRUE FATE OF AMY POND

I do not own Doctor Who and I am making no profit off of this.

This is my attempt at doing a Doctor Who story that isn't connected to my War of the Guardians universe. It is set in an alternate universe all of its own where Amy returns just after the events that took place at Trenzalore.

It was right after Trenzalore when the Doctor had finally gotten Clara back out of his timestream and back into the TARDIS that one of the most incredible things that had ever happened in the Doctor's long, long life occurred. For nine hundred years, he had lost one companion after another over and over again. Each time it had been like a fresh wound opening up in his hearts, and once he lost them he almost never saw them again.

Sometimes they did return of course, but even when they did things were never the same as they were before. He had seen Sarah Jane again once more decades after he had left her, but too much time had passed. Sarah Jane had gotten older, and she no longer wanted to travel with him anymore. Rose returned too of course, but he knew that he couldn't give her what he felt that she deserved which was to spend the rest of her life with him. Therefore, he had to give her the Metacrisis Doctor instead so that she at least could have the one adventure that he could never have with her. In all of that time, he had been so alone and had found no one who would or could keep the promise of staying with him forever even though many of them honestly wanted to.

Today was special though. Today was the day that he finally got one of them back, and this time would be different from the other ones. This time the returning companion was there to stay.

The time the universe would finally give him someone back.

The Doctor had just sat a still weakened Clara down in the Captain's Chair in the Console Room of the TARDIS when he heard a sudden gasp of surprise behind him. He turned around in alarm to see who could have possibly gotten into his TARDIS and locked eyes with the last person who he had ever expected to see again.

"Amy?" the Doctor asked in complete disbelief.

"Doctor, is this a dream? Is this real or am I having some kind of near death experience?" Amy asked in what the Doctor knew was a voice filled with barely controlled fear. She had just suddenly appeared in the TARDIS out of nowhere wearing only a hospital gown that barely covered her because it was much too small for her.

"What makes you think that it's a near death experience?" the Doctor asked her out of curiosity.

"Well, I am dying after all," Amy said.

"You are? You look pretty good to me. You certainly look better than I feel," Clara said in a weak voice.

"Who is she?" Amy asked as she started to wonder for the first time whether this could actually be real or not. She had never seen this girl in her life after all so why would she be imagining her in her final moments.

"Amy, this is Clara Oswald. Clara, this is Amy Pond," the Doctor said as he continued to look at Amy like she wasn't really there.

The only thing that convinced him that she wasn't a hallucination was that Clara could see her too. She could still be some kind of trick though or a shared dream of some kind like the time that the Dream Lord had taken his mind over.

"Oh, she's the one who was here before me. I thought she looked familiar," Clara said.

"What are you talking about? I've never seen you before in my life," Amy asked in confusion.

"I've seen a picture of you before in the TARDIS databank. Also, I sort of met you once. Well. one of me did anyway. I called myself Oswin then, and I had been turned into a Dalek," Clara said.

"You were Oswin? Oswin died though. Doctor, explain!" Amy demanded.

"Amy, isn't it more important to you that you understand how you got here? Also I'd like for you to explain why you think that you're dying," the Doctor said as he tried to get her back to the point.

"That's because I am dying. This is all just some hallucination, isn't it? It's just a final trick that my mind's playing on me. I'm back here because I wanted to see you again one last time. That's why I'm imagining this. I'm afraid, Doctor. I'm afraid of dying, and I must have conjured you up one last time to help me make it through it," Amy said as she began to cry.

"Amelia, you're not dying. You're fine," the Doctor said as he finally touched her at last by wrapping his arms around her in comfort.

"No, it's all a dream. I'm really lying in a hospital bed dying. I'm an old woman now, Doctor. You wouldn't even recognize me. I'm not even ginger anymore," Amy insisted.

"You look like you have a pretty thick head of red hair to me," Clara said as she tried to get up.

"No, Clara. Don't try to move. You're still too weak from being lost in my timestream," the Doctor said.

"It sounds like you're still up to your old tricks, Doctor, even if it just in my imagination," Amy said as she laughed for a minute.

The Doctor took out his sonic screwdriver from his coat pocket and scanned Amy with it. His jaw opened in shock at the results that he got back. That couldn't be right, could it?

"Amy, you're not dying. You're perfectly healthy," the Doctor said.

"What are you keeping from me? I know when you're not telling me the whole truth. I've known you all of my life, Raggedy Man, and I know when you're holding things back," Amy accused him.

"You said that your last memories are of being old and lying in a hospital bed?" the Doctor asked.

"Yeah. I still think that I'm there actually. I'm just seeing you because my Raggedy Man always comforts me when I'm afraid," Amy said with a small smile.

"You're not dying, Amelia. You're actually here on the TARDIS. I have no idea how, but you're here," the Doctor said as he started to break down into tears.

"You're admitting that you don't know something and calling me Amelia at the same time. You must really be worried," Amy noted with a small laugh as she tried to lighten the mood.

Then Amy and Clara were both shocked as the Doctor wrapped his arms around her and started to weep uncontrollably. He wasn't just weeping because he had somehow gotten her back though. He was weeping for all of those who he had lost and who would never return.

As Amy put her arms around him in return, she said, "Now, I'm not so sure that this is a dream anymore."

"It's not. Why do you keep insisting that it is?" Clara asked.

"I'm an old woman that's why, and this part of my life has been over with for a long time now. I haven't even thought about being Amy Pond for decades. I became Amelia Williams a long time ago and started writing. I was actually very good at it," Amy said proudly.

"Oh, my God! You're Amelia Williams?! You wrote Summer Falls! That's one of my favorite books. I read it to my kids," Clara said in excitement.

Despite the Doctor crying his eyes out right next to her, Amy couldn't help but smile at that as she said, "Well, it's always nice to meet a fan."

"You can't still be this young though. That book was published in the fifties, wasn't it? You're remarkably well preserved for your age," Clara said in surprise.

Amy smiled at her but made no further reply as she silently comforted the Doctor by gently stroking his back.

"Amy, I missed you so much. I never even got to say good bye to you properly," the Doctor said as he finally recovered the power of speech.

"I know. I'm so sorry about that. I couldn't let Rory be stuck in the past alone though. I had to go with him. I lived a long and happy life too just like I said that I did in my message to you. River gave it to you, didn't she?" Amy asked.

"Yes, she did," the Doctor said as he suddenly became quiet once again.

"What happened to River?" Amy asked as a feeling of dread went through her heart.

"She's dead, Amy. She died saving the lives of over four thousand people including my own. I tried to stop her, but she handcuffed me," the Doctor said sadly.

"She's not completely gone though. I saw her only recently. She was some kind of a ghost, but she seemed to be happy and content. She even helped me save the Doctor," Clara added.

"That sounds like her. She won't even let death stop her from saving him," Amy said as she tried not to cry herself now.

"I'm sorry, Amy," the Doctor said in a sympathetic voice.

"What's going on here, Doctor? I was near death just a few minutes ago, and I thought that I was about to finally go join Rory in whatever lies after this life. Then I suddenly find myself here. Is this my afterlife, Doctor? If it is, it isn't exactly what I expected. Don't get me wrong. I love you and traveling with you was one of the best times of my life, but I don't want to spend the rest of eternity here. I wanted to go on to be with Rory. Why am I here, and why am I young again?" Amy asked.

"This isn't the afterlife, Pond. This is the real TARDIS and the real me. I don't know what's happened, but I have my suspicions," the Doctor said.

Amy nodded and said no more. She knew that that was everything that she was going to get out of him for now. He would only tell her more when he was ready to.

She had finally accepted that this was all real somehow and had decided to make friends with Clara. If she was going to be traveling with her for however long that she was here now, she would have to at least be able to get along with her.

"So you're the one who he replaced me with, huh?" Amy said with a grin as she held out her hand to Clara.

Clara shook her hand and said, "Sorry about that."

"No, it's okay. I wanted him to find someone else. I told him to. He's absolute rubbish when he's alone for too long," Amy said.

"Don't I know it! He was living in the TARDIS all alone on top of a cloud for who knows how long after you left him. He was totally devastated by it and was filled with anger," Clara admitted.

"I'm sorry. I knew that it would hurt you, Doctor. I'm glad that you seem to have recovered though. I'm sure you helped a lot in that, Clara," Amy said.

"I did my best to," Clara said.

"How do you remember that about the cloud? That wasn't you. It was one of your echoes," the Doctor said.

"Yes and I remember being her and meeting you in Victorian times. Weren't you paying attention? I just said earlier that I remembered being Oswin too," Clara said irritably.

"It's just amazing that you remember all of that. Your echoes weren't really you after all. I wouldn't have thought that you remembered any of it. In fact, I was hoping that you didn't," the Doctor said.

"You mean you hoped that I wouldn't remember living and dying over and over again thousands of times. I do though. Don't worry. I'm okay. I don't have any kind of emotional connection to those memories or anything. It's just like it happened to someone else, and I just watched it. I don't have any more of a connection than that," Clara said.

"Are you sure?" the Doctor asked in concern.

"Yeah, I'm fine. Dying isn't that great of an experience by the way. Living is definitely better," Clara said as she directed her last comments toward Amy.

The Doctor looked at Clara with worry as he wondered if she was more affected by her experience than she was letting on. He hoped that she was telling him the truth about it. He made a silent promise to himself to keep an eye on her and make sure that she was really okay.

He moved his attention from Clara to Amy for now because he was more worried about her at that moment. "Amy, could you come to the medical bay with me? I'd like to look you over with the instruments there," the Doctor asked.

"Why? I thought that you said before that I'm healthy. You said that I was alright," Amy said suspiciously.

"Yes and the sonic also showed that you're over eighty years old, Pond. How do you look like you did when you were in your twenties when you're over eighty?" the Doctor asked.

"You already know why, don't you? You're just trying to get me to think about it and figure it out for myself first without you having to tell me, aren't you?" Amy asked perceptively.

"Don't you feel it, Amelia? You're not the same as you were before. Don't you feel any differently at all?" the Doctor asked.

"No, I don't. I feel just like I always did when I was this age. What am I supposed to be looking for? What is it that I'm supposed to be feeling?" Amy asked in puzzlement.

"You're too new. You've only just changed so you don't realize it yet. Your senses probably haven't even started to expand just yet," the Doctor said more to himself than to Amy.

"Okay, now you're scaring me. What's going on, Doctor? Tell me what I've changed into, and please tell me that I'm not a fish vampire or something even worse," Amy said in a nervous voice.

The Doctor smiled as he said, "No, you're not a fish vampire, Amy. You're not human anymore though either."

"What am I then?" Amy asked afraid.

"I often wondered just why you seemed to be unaffected by having given birth to River. I mean having a Time Lord child inside of you should have changed you in some way. Having the blood of a Time Lord going through your body during the pregnancy should have transformed you at least somewhat, but you never showed any signs of it at least not outwardly anyway. I see now though that it was a delayed reaction. The majority of the changes must have waited to occur after your original body died. That does explain, however, why you could no longer have children after River was born. You were no longer compatible with a human even at that point so you couldn't have a child with Rory anymore. It was biologically impossible," the Doctor speculated.

"What? What are you saying, Doctor? What did I turn into?" Amy asked in growing concern.

"Feel where your heart should be, Amelia," the Doctor said.

Amy did so and could feel it beating normally so she said, "It's fine. It's a little fast, but otherwise it's fine."

"Now feel the other side of your chest," the Doctor said.

"No. You don't mean?" Amy asked in shock as she finally understood what he was getting at.

"Just do it," the Doctor said.

Amy's eyes and mouth both flew open wide as she felt another heart beating on the other side of her chest as well. It was true!

"You're a Time Lord, Amelia. That's why you're here. The TARDIS picked up your transformation into a Time Lord as soon as your original body died and brought you here automatically. She was trying to bring the last two Time Lords in existence together," the Doctor said.

"I didn't change though. Melody changed her appearance when she regenerated," Amy said.

"This was more like a change of species than a true regeneration though. It was just your new Time Lord biology asserting itself and rewriting your body after your original body passed on. You can think of this as your first incarnation if you like. Next time when you die though it will be a true regeneration and you will change," the Doctor said.

"Oh, joy! I really look forward to that then. I still can't believe this," Amy said as she continued to feel both hearts beating with her hand.

"Oh, you don't have to worry about that happening for several centuries probably barring accidents or foul play of course," the Doctor replied cheerfully.

"You really know how to make a girl feel good, don't you? Now that's almost as strange as finding out I'm a Time Lord. I'm actually thinking of and calling myself a girl again. I haven't been able to get away with that for a long time now," Amy said with a warm smile.

Clara smiled at her as she said, "You never have to worry about growing old again, Amy. Time Lords don't age unless they want to. I remember being one in one of my other lives. It definitely had its advantages."

The Doctor looked at Clara with worry again even as Amy said with a wry grin, "You're really going to have to explain all about that to me, Doctor. You'll have to catch me up on exactly what trouble you've gotten yourself into while I've been away."

The Doctor never responded though. He was too busy thinking about Clara.

You're worried about her, aren't you? Amy said in his mind.

Both the Doctor and Amy looked at each other in shock about this as Amy said, "Did I just say that in your mind?"

"Yes, you did," the Doctor said as he started to twirl around in joy.

"Say what? What's going on?" Clara asked annoyed at being left out.

"I communicated with him telepathically!" Amy told her in an excited voice.

"Oh, wonderful!" Clara said as she could already foresee herself being left behind now that he had Amy back and she was a Time Lord to boot. What would he possibly need her for now?

"Let me get the medical bay set up and I'll give you a thorough examination, Amy," the Doctor said as he raced out of the Console Room.

"I can hardly wait!" Amy said with a sigh. She really didn't feel like being poked and prodded anymore. She had had enough of that in the hospital at the end of her old life.

Then she noticed the sad look on Clara's face and she said in a gentle voice, "He's not going to replace you with me. We'll all travel together now I'm sure. If I even decide to stay at all that is. I'm still not sure about that yet."

"How do you know that he won't get rid of me now that he has you?" Clara asked.

"I've seen the way that he looks at you. He cares a lot about you, Clara. He's not going to leave you," Amy reassured her.

"Maybe not now, but he will later. You'll go on being young forever, and I'll start to age. Then he'll get tired of me, won't he?" Clara said.

Amy remembered what River had said about not letting him see you age, and she couldn't dispute Clara's words. She knew that he wouldn't want to see her aging. She remembered how upset he had become when he saw her aging.

"It's true, isn't it?" Clara asked in an extremely sad voice.

"He doesn't like to see us getting older. That's true. I won't let him ditch you though, Clara. You have my word on that. You won't go until you want to go," Amy promised her.

"So you're staying then?" Clara asked.

"Yes, I think so. Where else could I go anyway? Amy Pond disappeared and Amelia Williams is dead. The TARDIS is the only home that I have left now. I would like to see my family though especially my son. He must have been going crazy when he couldn't find my body. I wonder what happened afterwards?" Amy said.

"Maybe the Doctor will take you to see him so you can find out," Clara suggested.

"Maybe. I'm sure he'll be much older though. He'll be the version of himself from the present day, and he'll probably faint on seeing me. Then again I did tell him all about the Doctor so he might not think a thing about it," Amy said with a chuckle.

"I thought the Doctor said that you couldn't have any more children. Did you adopt?" Clara asked.

"Yes, I did. His name is Anthony," Amy said as she recalled him with a fond smile.

"I did that in a way. A friend of mine died, and I've been helping to take care of her children. I'm their nanny, but I feel more like their mum," Clara admitted.

"You're always looking after everyone, aren't you? Who looks after you though?" Amy asked.

Clara shrugged as she said, "The Doctor does I guess."

"It seems more like the opposite from what little I can understand about you jumping into his timestream in order to save him. I think that you need someone to look after you too though while you're looking after everyone else. How about I make that my job? If you don't mind that is," Amy said.

"I'm pretty lucky then to have two Time Lords watching out for me," Clara said with a warm smile.

"Please don't call me that. I'm not a Time Lord even if I have turned into one biologically. I'm still just a regular human just like always," Amy said.

"Just a regular girl, eh?" Clara teased her.

"That's absolutely right," Amy said.

"Just a regular girl who travels through time and space with an eleven hundred year old Time Lord from outer space," Clara pointed out.

"Alright, alright! So I'm not and never have been ordinary, but I am still human. I'm human on the inside where it matters and in my heart. I'm not going to let anything change that," Amy said firmly.

Clara looked at for a long moment and studied the resolve on her face before finally saying, "I believe you. You're just stubborn enough to pull it off, aren't you?"

"You wouldn't believe how stubborn I am when I put my mind to something. I waited for twelve years for the Doctor to come back after he left me as a child, and I never really gave up the hope that he would," Amy said.

"Twelve years?!" Clara asked in shock.

"Let me tell you all about. You'll probably want to slap the Doctor when I get through. I know I did. I actually hit him with a cricket bat when he finally came back," Amy said with a huge smile on her face.

"You have to tell me about that!" Clara said eagerly as she waited to hear Amy's story.

She had already forgotten any jealousy that she had ever had towards Amy along with any fears of her replacing her. She was quickly becoming friends with her even as she told her about her life's story.

The Doctor meanwhile was eagerly setting up the equipment in the TARDIS' medical bay as he prepared to study Amy's changes thoroughly. He wanted to see if she was a full Time Lord or not and exactly what she could do. He was also a little worried about Amy's health and whether she went through the changes successfully or not. He was sure that she did, but he wanted to be absolutely certain of that.

For now though, he wasn't worried about any of this. He was just too excited to be worried about anything. He just kept spinning around and laughing in joy as he kept thinking the same thing to himself over and over again.

I'm not alone! I'm not alone!

Next: The Doctor studies Amy and discovers the full extent of what she's become now. Meanwhile Amy wants to go back home and talk to her family to let them know that she's okay. Will that be harder for her than she thinks it will be? Clara, on the other hand, may not be as okay as she's pretending to be.