What If?

AMY

I sat out on the pavement, waiting for him to stop messing about in the house. Alternate universes. Well, nothing new there. But how well, alternate this was was a bit hard to handle. I was sat on the side of the road drinking tea from a polystyrene cup with John Watson. A fictional character. Well, supposedly. Police tape had been added to the perimeter of the house now, not just the entrances. This was so unexplainably surreal that I decided to just go with it. He seemed a decent bloke, for a supposedly fictional character. Knew how to make a bloody good cup of tea any way.

"So..." he muttered, "Time travel?"

"Yeah, and space. So we can go any where, at any time." I replied, staring at the pattern of his jumper before looking up at him. Slight frown, he didn't believe me. I stared out into the road, the view of the houses across the street broken up by Sherlock pacing the street impatiently.

"We're from an alternate universe, in this one I might not even exist, in this one I might even have existed in a different time."
Another sip of tea, still frowning. Whether with skepticism or confusion, I couldn't really work out. He faltered before asking, but then said,

"So, in your... universe... Do you know what I am, what happened to me? Or Sherlock?"
I smiled to myself. How do you tell some one that they're fictional?

"In ours, we're pretty sure you're only a fictional character, you may have actually existed but I don't actually know, you and Sherlock are characters in books."

"Oh."
He looked up at Sherlock, as I did, and then asked,

"Any ideas?"
Sherlock didn't stop pacing, just shouted up and down the street. It seemed humorous to me, John seemed used to it.

"Only that these people are actually clinically insane."

I have to admit, I hadn't even read Sherlock Holmes as a kid, but I had the image in my head of an educated victorian gentleman in his late fifties. Sherlock Holmes in this universe, how ever, seemed to be a 30-something grump who badly needed a hair cut. Well, you can't have everything.

~

The Doctor wandered about the house, inspecting every inch, leaving no possibility for the poor souls to get up and start calling for their mothers. This was strictly related to World War 2, how was it getting in here? It was irrational, strange, it shouldn't work. Nancy wasn't alive here. Jamie wasn't alive here. There should be nothing to bring the plague to present day London. He was baffled. But not letting any one else know that of course, he was the intergalactic fountain of knowledge.

He headed upstairs, found the children in their room. He eventually decided to lock the door with sonic, knowing that it would be enough to keep them there for now. He didn't look at them for long, peering around the door. One sitting on the bed, a book now hanging limply in it's hand. The other sat on the floor, surrounded by generic toys, both at peace with the world yet taken by the sinister plague that had altered their faces. As he closed to door he nearly woke them, knocking a small red bicycle to the floor. The metal crashed into the wooden floor, and the boys stirred, but neither woke.

Taking a deep breath, he then headed back down stairs to the kitchen, quickly but quietly. The father, sat at the kitchen table, newspaper limply in hand. Left over chips on a plate, now cold and the grease congealing on the paper. Tea left stone cold in a mug near the left hand. The mug was large, white, lettering on it in various colours. When he took a closer look, it read "BEST DAD IN THE WORLD", and he had to choke back his emotions. It wasn't often that The Doctor lost his composure, but here he found himself willed to tears.

He blinked them back, a deep breath, continuing as he started. Checked the back door, it was locked. He double locked it with the sonic, nearly planting his foot in the bowl of water left for a dog. The dog would have scarpered by now, and he picked it up, leaving the bowl on the kitchen counter. Arthur, it read. He smiled to himself. Good name for a dog. Better name for a horse. He thought he recognised the thin, wiry frame of the man, but cast it out of his mind as he in turn locked the kitchen door.

Now, the mother. Treading quietly up the stairs, he found her in the bedroom, sat at the small dressing table, lying forward over the table as if she were asleep. The glaring mask looked oddly in place on her face, as if he had seen this before. A pair of black rimmed glasses on the wooden surface beneath her hand. A key on a chain next to it, the chain old and slightly discoloured but the key shiny and new. He glanced around the room, no other entrances. The open wardrobe caught his eye, and he wondered if the dog had hidden here. He peered inside, finding no animal, but when he found what hung there he felt the colour drain from his face.

A blue pinstripe suit, next to it a pair of old red converse shoes. A suit and shoes that were his. Or, they had been. Before they were borrowed.

He glanced back at the sleeping mother, a feeling of sickening dread creeping up on him as he imagined her face there, beneath the dark mask. It was her. This time he couldn't save her. He couldn't even talk to her. He couldn't even touch her. All he could do was lock the door as Rose Tyler died again, along with himself, along with their children. Lock the door and walk away.