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The kiss he’d gotten over. When he’d found out about it he was angry, jealous. But he believed what Amy and the Doctor had said – they’d got caught up in something, she’d been possessed by an alien and very nearly died; that the kiss was a shock reaction, a desperate reaching out for life to the nearest person to hand: The Doctor. 

Rory understood. At least, it wasn't something he took personally. As a nurse he’d seen people do the oddest things in shock or having come close to death. And now, over the past few days as he’d watched them – watched Amy – he saw how she was with the Doctor. She wasn’t interested, romantically. Loving, but like a friend. Or like a kid with Father Christmas.

That sort of thing really wasn’t his problem, Rory knew; Amy’s obsession was the problem. And all this uncertainty about her future, about Rory’s place within it, he didn’t want to face. That was why he hadn’t brought it up again. He just held on to the hope that his fears were groundless, paranoid; that one day that would be proved right and Amy would know that TARDIS life would be over and she would need only him. 

Rory watched her walking up the stairs to the console. He felt weak and ridiculous.

'So!' the Doctor said, clapping his hands, coming down from the lab. 'We’re on the way. The butterfly’s gas spore is cooking nicely and soon we’ll have enough. Didn’t want to have to trap him but it was either that or bore the good people of Venice to sleep by bringing Attila the Hun with us.' 

Rory shut the doors and joined Amy and the Doctor at the console. 

'Attila the Hun was boring?' 

'Dull – as – dishwater, Rory! Frankly, his homicidal, shouty crackers-ness is greatly exaggerated. Had to set the sonic to give me a mild electric shock every five minutes just to stay awake.' 

'So when we get there,' Amy said, 'how d’you plan to spread the gas across the city?' 

'Through the roof lantern,' the Doctor replied. He winked. 'Well, it’s more than just a lantern. Went down a storm at Dean Martin’s 1949 New Year’s Eve party – pumped out five tonnes of foam. I didn’t even know it could do that! And suddenly there it was, foam everywhere. Jerry Lewis went crazy when he saw it. He –' 

'OK, OK, getting off topic...' Amy said, eyebrows knotting. She pointed at the console panel the Doctor had opened up and the great knot of components and cabling he’d wired into its circuitry. 'Are you ever going to tell us what’s happening? It’s all been very hush hush.' 

'Yes, quite right, the Doctor meets Martin and Lewis is a story for another time,' the Doctor replied, smiling weakly. 'Well, I’ve kept everything a bit “need to know” because I really wasn’t sure I could make it work. But take a look at this!' 

He turned a dial on the console. There was a loud sizzle of energy, High above, hovering near the entrance, appeared a portal. Its interior shimmered with what seemed like flickering fire and points of starlight.

'A time corridor!' the Doctor announced. 'So, next part of the plan: fold back a portion of Space/Time into this corridor stretching 5,000 years out from this point to when the future TARDIS will be. Then, through a rather nifty cocktail of applied temporal geometry and good old fashioned elbow grease, I hooked the corridor up to the “GO!” circuits to take me along it. By then the spare – let’s call her TARDIS 2 – will have finished growing.' 

'Hang on, hang on, Doctor, 5,000 years, that’s… Massive,' Rory said. 'How are you going to find the TARDIS that far into the future? You don’t even know where she’s going to be then. And how are you going to travel down this... Corridor?' 

The Doctor grinned. 'Well, the TARDIS is going to find the TARDIS. I’ll just be hitching a ride.' 

Rory looked at Amy. 'Does talking to him get any easier?' 

'Not really, no.' 

'Oi! No chatting at the back there! So, plan part three. Emergency Flight Protocol V1.a: If ever a TT capsule is in free fall or badly damaged it activates a program which finds the nearest safe planet or space craft to lock onto. I’ve hacked into this program, adapted it and spliced it with the telepathic circuits, boosting the connection with a power re-route from the main drives. Long story short, it means our TARDIS will home in on the future TARDIS’s mental signal. Another pound of elbow grease later and the whole shebang is now linked to the “GO!” circuits which, as I said, are linked to the time corridor.' 

'OK,' Rory said, 'but how does that help you?' 

'That’s where this comes in!' the Doctor replied, taking from his inside pocket a coil of electrical flex. At one end was a two point plug. The other end was split into two strips. 'The old girl and I have a telepathic connection,' the Doctor said, producing two tabs of glistening plastic and fitting them to each end of the flex. 'She knows just how much I want her to find her future self and she’ll do the rest.' He fixed the plastic tabs of the flex to his temples and slotted the plug deep within the mass of machine parts spiralling out of the console. 'This wires me into the telepathic circuits and with the flick of a switch – bish bash bosh – the TARDIS will drop me off.' 

Amy glanced at Rory. 'This sounds a bit dodgy, Doctor,' she said.

The Doctor shrugged. 'Nah, no more than usual. Well, yes, normally time travel without a capsule or Vortex Manipulator is incredibly dangerous. But with the Entropy Wranglers at full stretch maintaining corridor integrity I think we’ll be OK. And the telepathic link is strong, that’s the thing.' The Doctor patted the console. 'We’ve been together for so long now that if she could talk we’d be finishing each others sentences,' he said sweetly and then turned to one of the monitors. 'OK, so… Time corridor fully connected – tick! Telepathic circuits synced up – tick! Conditional States pathways locked off – tick! Entropy Wranglers on – tick! Helmic Regulator cranked up to –' 

'Look, you’re sure there’s no other way?' Rory said. 

'No. TARDIS 2 is vital. It’s far too risky to have the Saturnynes in here with us.' 

'Well, can’t we just travel 5,000 years into the future in this TARDIS?' 

'That wouldn’t mean she’d aged – just as we don’t when we travel forward in time. For this to work she has to be older. We have to have gone into her future.' 

'Fair enough.' 

'No, no, ten points for effort,' the Doctor said. 'Yes, it has to be this way. I dare say we could get hold of a ship with the right storage capacity, like a space freighter, but we couldn’t materialise around it – the TARDIS is big but she’s not that big. And, as I say, I certainly don’t want the Saturnynes running around here. Dangers aside, think of the fish stink – we’d never get it out. Well, I say that. Only with one of those car fresheners the size of an actual pine tree, of course. And, given that they don’t exist, we’d have to use a real tree which, if I hung it off the console, would just get in the way. And all those pine needles to hoover up! Way too messy.' 

Rory suddenly realised what a lot of this – the wackiness – was about. He was trying to sooth their worries – maybe his own – with jokes. 

'Doctor, once the city’s asleep how are you going to get 10,000 aliens out of the canals?' Amy asked. 

'One problem at a time. So, 5,000 years from now – in about five minutes – I’ll pick up TARDIS 2, bring her back to this point and then it’s off to Venice.' 

'Cool. Good luck,' Rory said. 

The Doctor smiled. 'Won’t need it.' 

'Well, whatever, you just get yourself back here, OK?' Amy said. 

'Yes ma’am,' the Doctor replied, saluting. He adjusted his cuffs and straightened his bow tie. Giving Rory and Amy a thumbs-up, he threw the “GO!” lever and vanished. 

Seven minutes later 

'Perfect!' the Doctor said, grinning, his hands on his hips. 'TARDIS 2. Now we’ve got all the space we’ll need. You know, I impress even myself sometimes which – given there are currently eleven of me – is no mean feat.' 

The Doctor had parked TARDIS 2 by the doors, opposite the time corridor. Rory had to laugh. It was extraordinary. Even by the Doctor’s standards this was out there: Two TARDISes – the second grown from the one they were in, borrowed from an older version of the same man who... Already owned it. Or perhaps in 5,000 years the Doctor would be a new man in a new body. On the point of death, Amy had said, a Time Lord had the ability to do that – regenerate. 

The whole thing was mind bending. As John Lennon had once written, Rory thought, nobody told me there’d be days like these. 

'How long will the gas knock them out for?' Amy said. 

'Long enough. Then it just floats away into the atmosphere. And – job – done!' the Doctor said, whirling about, setting co-ordinates. 'No fuss! No panic! No terrified Venetians going, "OMG! Giant walking fish!” when Rosanna’s ankle biters come trooping out of the canals.'

Three minutes, 22 seconds later – Venice, 1580 

Rory shut the TARDIS behind him. He could see that it hadn’t been long since they’d last been here. This particular square’s shop keepers and market traders were clearing up after Rosanna’s storm. The place was littered – smashed market stalls, roof slates, soggy loaves of bread, candles, iron mongery, ruined fruit and vegetables. 

'How long has it been since we were here last time?' Amy said. 

'One minute after we left,' the Doctor replied happily. 'One minute! That’s precision, sexy time travel.' 

'Thank God you remembered the Saturnynes were stashed in the canals,' Rory said. 

The Doctor’s face suddenly changed. 'Well, yes, but it’s just not good enough... I really should...' He hung his head. 'I can’t believe I forgot in the first place.' 

Rory felt for him. Beneath all the craziness, the jokes, here were the responsibilities of the Doctor’s unique position. The mistakes that could be made, their potential impact upon the lives of millions. Numbers that couldn’t even be counted.

'There was a lot going on,' the Doctor murmured. 'Keeping this place afloat. Well you were both there. I... I...'

'Come on, don’t beat yourself up,' Rory said, gently punching the Doctor’s shoulder. They weren’t that close but he looked so sad Rory had to do something. 'Look, like you say, you had a lot going on... If it wasn’t for you everyone would be dead. And if your plan works there’s no harm done.'

Amy turned to the Doctor. 'Look, Rory’s right...You shouldn’t be so hard on yourself.'

The Doctor looked up, trying to smile. 'Thank you, both. Well, right, I think we –'

'Hey!' Rory said suddenly. 'Wait a minute. What about the gondoliers?'

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