Chapter Text
7 year old Amelia Pond was writing a letter to Santa Clause and she mentioned the crack in her wall, asking him to send someone... Before she heard a crash outside. Running downstairs she opened one of the drapes on the window to her back garden and saw a blue box fallen on it's side with the remains of her shed underneath part of it.
Amelia quickly grabbed her torch and made her way outside, slowly and carefully. when she made it to the box, the doors flew open and a... grappling hook flew out... Huh?
She heard some creaking noises before she saw a man climb out holding onto the edge of the box. They stared at each other for a moment before the man spoke first.
"Can I have an apple?" He asked and that was weird. "All I can think about, apples." What was with this man? "I love apples. Maybe I'm having a craving... I've never had a craving before maybe I should ask... Nah she wouldn't wanna see me like this.. all weird and not used to myself yet..." He climbed up and sat on the outside edge of the box. "Whoa! Look at that!"
"Are you okay?" Amelia asked, this man seemed confused and the things he was saying were weird and his clothes...
"Just had a fall. All the way down there, right to the library. Hell of a climb back up."
"You're soaking wet." She told him.
"I was in the swimming pool."
"You said you were in the library."
"So was the swimming pool." What?
Never mind, her next question was the more important one. "Are you a policeman?" She asked, only now seeing the words on the box.
"Why?" He asked. "Did you call a policeman?"
Ignoring his question, Amelia asked her own. "Did you come about the crack in my wall?"
"What cra- ack!" He felt to the ground from the side of his box.
"You all right, mister?"
"No, I'm fine, it's okay." He said, she wasn't sure if she should believe him. "This is all perfectly.." He seemed to be in pain but some golden smoke.. Or something, drifted out of his mouth.
"Who are you?"
"I don't know yet. I'm still cooking." He said, before saying something under his breath that she couldn't hear as his hands glowed golden. "Does it scare you?" He asked, either not knowing what he'd said before or trying to distract her.
"No, it just looks weird."
"No, no, no. The crack in your wall. Does it scare you?"
"Yes."
"Well, then," He grinned as he jumped up to his feet. "No time to lose. I'm the Doctor. Do everything I tell you, don't ask stupid questions and don't wander off." He said before promptly walking into a tree and falling backwards.
"Are you all right?"
"Early days. Steerings a bit off."
When they got inside and she gave him an apple before asking him something she should have earlier. "If you're a Doctor then why does your box say "police"?"
He spat out the bite of apple he had in his mouth. "That's disgusting. What is that?"
"An apple."
"Apples are rubbish. I hate apples."
"You said you loved them."
"No, no. I love yohgurt. Yohgurt's my favourite give me Yoghurt." She quickly grabbed him yohgurt. He opened it then drank it straight from the container. "I hate Yoghurt. It's just stuff with bits in."
"You said it was your favourite."
"New mouth. new rules." He said, as if that explained everything. "It's like eating after cleaning your teeth. Everything tastes WRO- AHHHH!" He slapped his hand over his forehead.
"What is it? What's wrong with you?"
"Wrong with me? It's not my fault. Why can't you give me any decent food? You're Scottish. Fry something.
And she did... She made him bacon. Which she was proud of until he tried it, spitting it out and asking if she was "trying to poison me?" He didn't like beans either. Throwing bread and butter out of the door, making the neighbor's cat freak out.
"I've got some carrots.." She offered him, hopefully."
"Carrots? Are you insane?" He asked, not waiting for an answer before continuing. "No wait. hang on. I know what I need." He opened the freezer and looked inside. "I need... I need... I need fish fingers and custard." He took those out in sync pretty much with his speech.
After they.. Well, mostly she, fried up the fish fingers and warmed up the custard enough, they were sitting at the table, him dipping a fish finger into the custard as she watched him eat...
After he finished the last fish finger he drank the custard and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.
"Funny." She told him.
"Am I?" He asked and she nodded. "Good. Funny's good. What's your name?" He seemed to have just remembered he hadn't gotten it.
"Amelia Pond." She answered.
"Ah. That's a brilliant name. "Amelia Pond", like a name in a fairytale." He said, before a question seemed to literally pop into his mind. "Are we in Scotland Amelia?"
"No." She sighed in annoyance. "Had to move to England. It's rubbish."
"So, what about your mum and dad then?" Something strange flashed in his eyes. "Are they upstairs? Thought we'd have woken them by now."
"I don't have a mum and dad. Just an aunt."
"I don't even have an aunt."
"You're lucky." She told him.
"I know." He said. "So your aunt. Where is she?"
"She's out."
"And she left you all alone?"
"I'm not scared."
"Course you're not. You're not scared of anything! Box falls out of the sky, man falls out of box, man eats fish custard," He takes a bite for emphasis, "and look at you, just sitting there. So you know what I think?" He asked
"What?"
"Must be a hell of a scary crack in your wall."
After a moment she led him to her room.
He bent down to look at the crack. "You've got some cowboys in here. Not actual cowboys, though that can happen."
"I used to hate apples," Amelia told the Doctor, "so my mum put faces on them." She was holding one as he turned to her.
He held the apple, examining it. "She sounds good, your mum." He tossed it in the air and caught it. "I'll keep it for later." He said before going back to the crack. Examining the thing. "The wall is solid and the crack doesn't go all the way through it. So here's a thing, where's the draught coming from?" He took out a device with a light on the end and scanned it over the crack. "Wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey." He looked up slightly at her. "You know what the crack is?"
"What?"
"It's a crack." He said quite obviously before dragging a finger across it. "But I'll tell you something funny. If you knocked this wall down, the crack would stay put, because the crack isn't in the wall."
"Where is it, then?"
"Everywhere. In everything. It's a split in the skin of the world. Two parts of space and time that should never have touched. Pressed together, right in the wall of your bedroom. Sometimes can you hear..."
"A voice. Yes."
He took a glass of water and dumped the contents out, using it to listen to the voice himself.
"Prisoner Zero has escaped!" She heard the deep voice from the crack and shivered a bit.
"Prisoner Zero..." The Doctor started softly.
""Prisoner Zero has escaped."" Amelia quoted. "That's what I heard. What does it mean?"
The voice repeated itself and then the Doctor retracted himself from the wall, still holding the glass. "It means, on the other side of this wall, there's a prison, and they've lost a prisoner. And do you know what that means?"
"What?"
"You need a better wall." He said before dropping the glass. "The only way to close the breach is to open it all the way. The forces will invert, and it'll snap itself shut. Or..."
"What?"
"You know when grownups tell you everything's gonna be fine and you think they're lying to make you feel better?"
"Yes."
"Everything is going to be fine."
He then used his device to open the crack, the voice said the thing about the prisoner escaping again twice.
"Hello?" The Doctor called. "Hello!"
A giant eyeball showed up.
"What's that?" Amelia breathed.
Then the crack closed.
"There. You see, told you it would close. Good as new."
"What was that thing?" She asked quietly. "Was that Prisoner Zero?"
"No." The Doctor answered. "I think that was Prisoner Zero's guard." He told her. "Whatever it was, it sent me a message. Psychic paper." He took out a wallet and showed her the paper inside. "Tells us a lovely little message. "Prisoner Zero has escaped." But why tell us?" He asked. "Unless..."
"Unless what?"
"Unless Prisoner Zero escaped through here. But he couldn't have. We'd know." He started running out the bedroom door and down the stairs. "It's difficult. Brand-new me, nothing works yet. But there's something I'm missing... In the corner... of my eye."
After that there were some bells and he promised he'd be back in 5 minutes.