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locker_monsterTitle: The Boy Who Waited (16/49)
Rating: PG
Characters: Rory, with appearances from Barbara
Timeline: set between "The Pandorica Opens" and "The Big Bang"
Summary: London, 1996. Barbara Wright prepares the Pandorica for exhibit at the National Museum. As the work unfolds, she recounts the lengthy history of the stone box and its loyal protector, the Lone Centurion.
Disclaimer: Doctor Who belongs to the BBC. Everything else is me taking liberties with history.
A/N: A huge thank you to my beta
punch_kicker15. This story would still be sitting on my hard drive if it weren't for you.
Pamier Mountains, 1273 A.D.
The Roof of the World.
Rory remembered hearing the other name for these mountain ranges once and he could see how someone had come up with the moniker. They were up so high amongst the peaks that it literally felt like he could reach up and touch the sky.
A muffled curse in Italian made Rory look back. He led the caravan, kicking a path in the knee deep snow for the wagon and their newly purchased ox. Niccolò had slipped on an unseen patch of ice and Marco was helping him to his feet.
“Are you injured?” asked Rory, making his way back to the elder Polo. They had had their fair share of trips and falls while ascending the mountain and he was surprised they hadn’t sprained any ankles or broken any bones yet.
“A bruise, most likely.” Niccolò rubbed his right kneecap before experimentally extending his leg. He didn’t flinch and Rory took that as a good sign.
“It is our hot, Venetian blood,” joked Maffeo. His iron grip on the ox’s yoke had saved him from stumbling too often. “We are not suited for this climate. I envy you, Centurion.”
Rory wasn’t as sure-footed as a mountain goat, but he knew what Maffeo was talking about. While the others were bundled up in numerous layers, he wore just his usual armour. When he exhaled, his breath turned to vapour but his skin hadn’t turned red from the extreme cold. He knew it was cold and he could feel it, but it didn’t bother him. It was strange; it was like he was numb, but at the same time he wasn’t.
“Should we rest?” By “we”, Rory meant the Polos, but he didn’t want to single them out by saying “you”. They were only human and a part of him could actually envy that.
“No, we are too exposed here,” said Niccolò. “Let us find a more protected area to make camp.” Their current position left them exposed to the cutting mountain winds. There was no point in resting if there was a risk of getting frostbite.
Rory made his way to the front of the caravan once more. He missed their horses but they had traded their horses for furs and the ox in the last sizeable village before entering the Pamiers. The ox was stubborn, but it had more stamina than a horse and so it could last longer out in the harsh elements. It wasn’t much help in clearing the snow, though, tied as it was to the wagon, so that left Rory to do the job.
They had at least of month of this ahead of them before they reached the other side of the mountain range. Niccolò was inclined to make the crossing as quickly as possible, but the weather and the terrain were working against them. At the rate they were going, it would probably be two months before they made it out of here.
No one was saying it, but the Pandorica was slowing them down. With the extreme weather, it was even more obvious what a burden the box was to them. Other travellers might have left it behind in a snow bank, regardless of the prestige it would bring them, but Rory had no worries about that here. It wasn’t about the fame or the money for the Polos. They had vowed to bring the Pandorica to China and they would fulfill their promise. They were the best kind of merchant: honest.
Using his sword like an axe, Rory hacked at the ice, chipping it away so the wagon could roll along unimpeded. What he would have given for a snowplough right about now…
The violent winds turned the snowflakes into tiny blades. Rory felt like he was stuck in a blender. His normally tough skin stung from the onslaught and he tried to shield his face the best he could with the scrap of cloth he had scrounged up from their supplies. A nice pair of goggles wouldn’t have gone amiss either, but they didn’t have the components to cobble something together so he resorted to merely squinting to protect his eyes.
It was near whiteout conditions. He barely made out the forms of the Polos in front of him. Maffeo dragged the ox through the knee deep snow while Rory pushed the wagon from behind. They needed to find shelter and they needed to find it fast.
The snowstorm had come out of nowhere it seemed. One minute, the conditions had been clear and then the next the sky turned an angry gray full of voluminous clouds. The pounding snow had begun soon after that. After a week in the mountains they thought they had grown accustomed to the higher altitude and the colder climate, but clearly nature could still dish out more obstacles.
Rory’s foot struck a buried boulder and he let out a grunt, but better him than the wheel of the wagon. A broken axle out here would spell doom for the expedition. They had no other way to carry their supplies en masse and the Pandorica would be stranded.
Niccolò let out a cry, but it was one of relief not pain. Rory poked his head around the wagon, barely making out a cave entrance through the blowing snow. He pushed harder on the wagon, hoping the ox would get the idea and pick up the pace. Maffeo’s solution was to taunt the animal and he threatened to turn the ox into a nice leather coat if it didn’t get moving. Rory himself would have told the ox it would get turned into hamburgers if it didn’t pick up the slack. In the end, it was probably the prospect of some shelter out of the cold that spurred the ox to heave the wagon towards the cave.
Between the two of them they managed to get the wagon to the cave entrance. Then Rory noticed a problem. The cave was too small to accommodate the bulk of the Pandorica.
The ox tugged on its yoke, desperate to get inside. Maffeo slapped the animal on the shoulder. “You have fur,” he scolded the beast. “You can wait.”
“Do we dare to leave the Pandorica outside?” wondered Niccolò, shouting over the snowstorm to be heard.
“It will be fine,” said Rory, making a snap decision. They didn’t have the time to debate this. The Pandorica had been made by aliens after all. It could stand up to the cold and ice. The Polos didn’t have such a luxury.
He ushered the family inside the cave, giving them no chance to argue, and then he unhitched the ox from the wagon. It ran inside without needing any encouragement. Grabbing their bags of supplies, he tossed them into the cavern. There was no way to block the entrance, no convenient large boulder to roll into place, so Rory did the next best thing. He pulled the wagon forwards until the Pandorica struck the edge of the cave entrance. There were still gaps around the box, though, allowing the bitter wind to blow in.
Not wanting to sacrifice any of their blankets, Rory yanked off the Pandorica’s worn covering. “Try to get a fire going,” he said to the Polos. They had gathered at the rear of the cave, moving back as far as possible from the entrance. The ox had already laid down and was as curled up tight as its size would allow.
“What are you doing?” asked Marco. His face was barely visible behind his fur lined hood but his features that had been exposed to the cold were bright red.
“Making a door.” Rory ducked back outside and dug around their supplies until he found a hammer and some of the metal spikes they used to pitch their tent. Back inside the cave, he hammered one corner of the covering into the rock wall. The rock was as tough as steel, but Rory put all of his strength behind each swing and eventually the spike split the stone. He repeated the process on the other three corners. The piece of silk flapped madly as the blizzard battered it mercilessly but at least now they had something to act as a buffer.
“How is the fire coming?”
Niccolò had a flint and some tinder, but his hands shook noticeably and he could barely scrap the flint in a straight line. Maffeo and Marco were shivering so much that their teeth clattered together. Seeing them so helpless, it made Rory feel superior and not in a good way. He wasn’t better than them; he was just… uniquely built. He then took the flint from Niccolò.
“Allow me,” he said courteously. “You should all change into some dry clothes and then rest. You do not want to…” Rory trailed off, realizing he didn’t know the Italian word for hypothermia, but the others seemed to understand what he was getting at. The elder Polo looked grateful for the reprieve and he dug through their bags, pulling out dry clothes, furs, and blankets for everyone. Once he was changed, Niccolò sat down, huddled close to the ox to take advantage of its body heat. He motioned for his son and his brother to join him and the three of them bunched tightly together.
With the higher altitude it was difficult to get a fire going, but after a few tries Rory managed to make a small one. He had no worries about everyone dying from suffocation in such an enclosed space. There was enough fresh air coming from outside that there was no risk of the puny fire using up all of the oxygen. There wasn’t much heat to speak of, but the sight of a flame seemed to boost spirits.
Probably because of sheer exhaustion, the Polos soon fell asleep, piled atop each other like dozing puppies. Rory gathered the blankets around them more tightly, trying to protect them against the cold as best he could. They needed to rest, but he would keep a close eye on them, just in case. A mild case of hypothermia could go unnoticed if one wasn’t looking for the symptoms.
The ox eyed him lazily as he stepped around the slumbering travellers, but it quickly went back to ignoring him when Rory drifted away to the cave entrance. He thought of grabbing more spikes and nailing down the loose edges of the silk covering, but the flapping sound was mildly hypnotic, almost like white noise. If it was helping the Polos to relax, he figured he should leave it alone. Instead, he peeked his head around the material to look at the Pandorica.
The winds lashed at his face, causing him to flinch, but he didn’t pull away. A thin layer of ice had formed on the outside of the Pandorica, but it seemed no worse for wear. Rory reached out and placed his bare hand on the side of the box and the warmth of his skin melted the snow. When he pulled his hand away, a perfect handprint was left behind in the ice crystals.
“Remember the first time it snowed after you came to Leadworth?” Rory didn’t raise his voice. Amy would hear him regardless of the raging storm. “We left handprints all over your window. You made yours into angels.”
He placed his hand on the Pandorica again, angling his palm to the left. When he pulled back this time, the two handprints overlapped, making the splayed fingers look like wings. He drew a circle over top of it, adding the halo. It was crude, but he didn’t care. It made him smile and that was more important.
By now a thin layer of frost covered Rory from head to toe and he stepped back into the cave to thaw out. To his surprise, Marco was awake and trying to coax the fire to glow brighter.
“You should be resting,” insisted Rory, using his best authoritative male nurse voice. He was still worried that Marco hadn’t recovered completely from his illness and a trek through the wintry mountains certainly wasn’t helping his health.
“I could not sleep.” He glanced back at his father and uncle and a small smile touched his lips. The brothers rested against each other, looking perfectly idyllic despite the harsh sleeping conditions.
Rory didn’t see any point in trying to argue. Marco was a grown man and if he didn’t want to sleep, that was his choice. He would just have to keep a closer eye on the young man during the day.
The ice on his skin and armour was starting to melt and he shook himself to dispel the water, almost like a dog would. It was doubtful he would dry out before morning came, but Rory could live with being encrusted with ice. He sat down next to Marco on the cold stone floor, angling his sword so it wasn’t in the way.
“Do you always talk to the Pandorica?” asked Marco.
If Rory had been aware that he had an audience, he wouldn’t have struck up a conversation with Amy. Luckily, he had spoken in English and the howling winds had masked his voice. “Does it seem strange?” countered Rory, hoping to avoid the topic.
“I would talk to my horse in a similar manner but only because I knew it had ears. The Pandorica is merely a stone box. Unless there is something inside that listens.”
Rory didn’t know what to say. Plenty of people had supposed what was inside the Pandorica, but Marco had to be the first to suggest that it had any human qualities. He almost wanted to praise the young man for being so clever. It had been ages and ages since he had talked about Amy with anyone but himself and it hurt not being able to express his feelings for the woman he loved. It was tempting to tell Marco the truth.
He had enough sense not to, though. The ambiguity of the Pandorica was what kept it safe. The unknown made people curious but it also made them cautious. No one would want to open it if they thought an evil might escape. If they knew that only a young woman on the edge of death resided inside, the temptation to smash it open would be far greater.
He felt he needed to say something to Marco, so he decided on a half-truth. “To me, the Pandorica is alive. I have spent so much time with it that it feels like it is listening.”
Marco nodded, as he did whenever he listened to a local talk about their village or their life. The information would be filed away and the most pertinent details would be transcribed later. Rory was left wondering if all of the young man’s observations about the Pandorica were written down in his notes. What a gold mine that would be for a future historian.
“I have always wondered,” began Marco. He shivered as a sudden blast of cold air blew through the cave. The weak fire sputtered but it didn’t go out. “How were you chosen to protect the Pandorica?”
A cave in the Pamier Mountains seemed like an odd place for such an interview, but then it struck Rory that the location was part of the point. He couldn’t avoid Marco, not unless he wanted to stand outside in the middle of a violent snowstorm. The young man wasn’t having troubles sleeping. He had woken up on purpose to talk to Rory. Rory couldn’t help but marvel slightly at Marco’s craftiness.
“Will you write this down later?”
Marco cocked an eyebrow. “I can, if you require.”
“No.” A Roman scholar had written down some of the tale once, but Rory was sure the account was lost. He didn’t want a detailed description committed to paper now, though. “Let this story fade into history and I will tell it to you.”
The prospect of losing such a monumental tale didn’t seem to upset Marco. Perhaps this conversation wasn’t motivated by mere scholarly pursuits. “I accept your terms.”
With Marco’s assurance in place, Rory suddenly didn’t know where to start. Obviously at the beginning, but he would have to omit a few things, like the Doctor’s involvement and who had made the Pandorica. Then there was the matter of putting it into terms that wouldn’t belittle Marco’s intelligence. The young man was too smart to accept the old superstitions.
“My legion discovered the Pandorica in Britannia.” That part was true enough, but there was no need to mention that his legion had been made up of plastic soldiers who only thought they were human. “We had no idea what we had found but we knew we had to protect it from the barbarians.” Rory was stretching the truth a bit here, but before their Auton programming had kicked in, all of the soldiers who had volunteered had been willing to protect the Pandorica from the thousands of aliens whizzing around the night sky.
“What happened to your legion?”
“They were… wiped out.” That was true, in a sense. His fellow Autons had been wiped out from existence. “Only I was left.”
“The Lone Centurion.”
Rory had never heard that moniker before. It was apt. “As the only survivor, I vowed to look after the Pandorica until the time was right and it could be opened.”
“But it does not explain how long lived you are or how you can escape injury. Does prolonged exposure to the Pandorica grant you these gifts?”
“Marco…” Rory sighed. There was no way to escape this conversation. “There are some things I cannot explain.” It was a pathetic response, but the best he had.
Marco frowned, looking like a sullen little boy being sent to bed without dessert. “You have a great deal of patience then. To wait so long for an outcome you cannot foresee.” The young man paused and he stared deeply into the small fire. “When I was young, my relatives would tell me about my father and how he would return one day. I would imagine that day over and over, but there were times where I believed it would not happen.”
The youngest Polo looked up from the fire and over at Rory. “Do you often imagine the day when your long vigil will be over?”
It was odd to see a look of sympathy from him. Without knowing it, they had something in common. “I do think about that day, from time to time.” Early on, it was all Rory could think about. In his head, he used to dream up all sort of scenarios of what would happen when he saw Amy again. They would rush into each other’s arms, they would exchange a passionate kiss, he would break down in tears, and so on. After a while, though, he had stopped thinking about it. He didn’t want his daydreams to become an obsession. He would see Amy again when the time was right and just live the moment as it happened.
“I hope your wait will be at an end soon,” said Marco. He sniffed, his nose red and runny from the cold. “Perhaps I should get some sleep.” He rose to his feet.
“When you met your father for the first time,” asked Rory, “did the moment live up to your expectations?” It may have seemed strange, him asking someone a fraction of his age for advice, but Marco Polo was wise beyond his years.
Marco smiled broadly. “It exceeded them.”
Rating: PG
Characters: Rory, with appearances from Barbara
Timeline: set between "The Pandorica Opens" and "The Big Bang"
Summary: London, 1996. Barbara Wright prepares the Pandorica for exhibit at the National Museum. As the work unfolds, she recounts the lengthy history of the stone box and its loyal protector, the Lone Centurion.
Disclaimer: Doctor Who belongs to the BBC. Everything else is me taking liberties with history.
A/N: A huge thank you to my beta
punch_kicker15. This story would still be sitting on my hard drive if it weren't for you.1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30 | 31 | 32 | 33 | 34 | 35 | 36 | 37 | 38 | 39 | 40 | 41 | 42 | 43 | 44 | 45 | 46 | 47 | 48 | 49
Pamier Mountains, 1273 A.D.
The Roof of the World.
Rory remembered hearing the other name for these mountain ranges once and he could see how someone had come up with the moniker. They were up so high amongst the peaks that it literally felt like he could reach up and touch the sky.
A muffled curse in Italian made Rory look back. He led the caravan, kicking a path in the knee deep snow for the wagon and their newly purchased ox. Niccolò had slipped on an unseen patch of ice and Marco was helping him to his feet.
“Are you injured?” asked Rory, making his way back to the elder Polo. They had had their fair share of trips and falls while ascending the mountain and he was surprised they hadn’t sprained any ankles or broken any bones yet.
“A bruise, most likely.” Niccolò rubbed his right kneecap before experimentally extending his leg. He didn’t flinch and Rory took that as a good sign.
“It is our hot, Venetian blood,” joked Maffeo. His iron grip on the ox’s yoke had saved him from stumbling too often. “We are not suited for this climate. I envy you, Centurion.”
Rory wasn’t as sure-footed as a mountain goat, but he knew what Maffeo was talking about. While the others were bundled up in numerous layers, he wore just his usual armour. When he exhaled, his breath turned to vapour but his skin hadn’t turned red from the extreme cold. He knew it was cold and he could feel it, but it didn’t bother him. It was strange; it was like he was numb, but at the same time he wasn’t.
“Should we rest?” By “we”, Rory meant the Polos, but he didn’t want to single them out by saying “you”. They were only human and a part of him could actually envy that.
“No, we are too exposed here,” said Niccolò. “Let us find a more protected area to make camp.” Their current position left them exposed to the cutting mountain winds. There was no point in resting if there was a risk of getting frostbite.
Rory made his way to the front of the caravan once more. He missed their horses but they had traded their horses for furs and the ox in the last sizeable village before entering the Pamiers. The ox was stubborn, but it had more stamina than a horse and so it could last longer out in the harsh elements. It wasn’t much help in clearing the snow, though, tied as it was to the wagon, so that left Rory to do the job.
They had at least of month of this ahead of them before they reached the other side of the mountain range. Niccolò was inclined to make the crossing as quickly as possible, but the weather and the terrain were working against them. At the rate they were going, it would probably be two months before they made it out of here.
No one was saying it, but the Pandorica was slowing them down. With the extreme weather, it was even more obvious what a burden the box was to them. Other travellers might have left it behind in a snow bank, regardless of the prestige it would bring them, but Rory had no worries about that here. It wasn’t about the fame or the money for the Polos. They had vowed to bring the Pandorica to China and they would fulfill their promise. They were the best kind of merchant: honest.
Using his sword like an axe, Rory hacked at the ice, chipping it away so the wagon could roll along unimpeded. What he would have given for a snowplough right about now…
The violent winds turned the snowflakes into tiny blades. Rory felt like he was stuck in a blender. His normally tough skin stung from the onslaught and he tried to shield his face the best he could with the scrap of cloth he had scrounged up from their supplies. A nice pair of goggles wouldn’t have gone amiss either, but they didn’t have the components to cobble something together so he resorted to merely squinting to protect his eyes.
It was near whiteout conditions. He barely made out the forms of the Polos in front of him. Maffeo dragged the ox through the knee deep snow while Rory pushed the wagon from behind. They needed to find shelter and they needed to find it fast.
The snowstorm had come out of nowhere it seemed. One minute, the conditions had been clear and then the next the sky turned an angry gray full of voluminous clouds. The pounding snow had begun soon after that. After a week in the mountains they thought they had grown accustomed to the higher altitude and the colder climate, but clearly nature could still dish out more obstacles.
Rory’s foot struck a buried boulder and he let out a grunt, but better him than the wheel of the wagon. A broken axle out here would spell doom for the expedition. They had no other way to carry their supplies en masse and the Pandorica would be stranded.
Niccolò let out a cry, but it was one of relief not pain. Rory poked his head around the wagon, barely making out a cave entrance through the blowing snow. He pushed harder on the wagon, hoping the ox would get the idea and pick up the pace. Maffeo’s solution was to taunt the animal and he threatened to turn the ox into a nice leather coat if it didn’t get moving. Rory himself would have told the ox it would get turned into hamburgers if it didn’t pick up the slack. In the end, it was probably the prospect of some shelter out of the cold that spurred the ox to heave the wagon towards the cave.
Between the two of them they managed to get the wagon to the cave entrance. Then Rory noticed a problem. The cave was too small to accommodate the bulk of the Pandorica.
The ox tugged on its yoke, desperate to get inside. Maffeo slapped the animal on the shoulder. “You have fur,” he scolded the beast. “You can wait.”
“Do we dare to leave the Pandorica outside?” wondered Niccolò, shouting over the snowstorm to be heard.
“It will be fine,” said Rory, making a snap decision. They didn’t have the time to debate this. The Pandorica had been made by aliens after all. It could stand up to the cold and ice. The Polos didn’t have such a luxury.
He ushered the family inside the cave, giving them no chance to argue, and then he unhitched the ox from the wagon. It ran inside without needing any encouragement. Grabbing their bags of supplies, he tossed them into the cavern. There was no way to block the entrance, no convenient large boulder to roll into place, so Rory did the next best thing. He pulled the wagon forwards until the Pandorica struck the edge of the cave entrance. There were still gaps around the box, though, allowing the bitter wind to blow in.
Not wanting to sacrifice any of their blankets, Rory yanked off the Pandorica’s worn covering. “Try to get a fire going,” he said to the Polos. They had gathered at the rear of the cave, moving back as far as possible from the entrance. The ox had already laid down and was as curled up tight as its size would allow.
“What are you doing?” asked Marco. His face was barely visible behind his fur lined hood but his features that had been exposed to the cold were bright red.
“Making a door.” Rory ducked back outside and dug around their supplies until he found a hammer and some of the metal spikes they used to pitch their tent. Back inside the cave, he hammered one corner of the covering into the rock wall. The rock was as tough as steel, but Rory put all of his strength behind each swing and eventually the spike split the stone. He repeated the process on the other three corners. The piece of silk flapped madly as the blizzard battered it mercilessly but at least now they had something to act as a buffer.
“How is the fire coming?”
Niccolò had a flint and some tinder, but his hands shook noticeably and he could barely scrap the flint in a straight line. Maffeo and Marco were shivering so much that their teeth clattered together. Seeing them so helpless, it made Rory feel superior and not in a good way. He wasn’t better than them; he was just… uniquely built. He then took the flint from Niccolò.
“Allow me,” he said courteously. “You should all change into some dry clothes and then rest. You do not want to…” Rory trailed off, realizing he didn’t know the Italian word for hypothermia, but the others seemed to understand what he was getting at. The elder Polo looked grateful for the reprieve and he dug through their bags, pulling out dry clothes, furs, and blankets for everyone. Once he was changed, Niccolò sat down, huddled close to the ox to take advantage of its body heat. He motioned for his son and his brother to join him and the three of them bunched tightly together.
With the higher altitude it was difficult to get a fire going, but after a few tries Rory managed to make a small one. He had no worries about everyone dying from suffocation in such an enclosed space. There was enough fresh air coming from outside that there was no risk of the puny fire using up all of the oxygen. There wasn’t much heat to speak of, but the sight of a flame seemed to boost spirits.
Probably because of sheer exhaustion, the Polos soon fell asleep, piled atop each other like dozing puppies. Rory gathered the blankets around them more tightly, trying to protect them against the cold as best he could. They needed to rest, but he would keep a close eye on them, just in case. A mild case of hypothermia could go unnoticed if one wasn’t looking for the symptoms.
The ox eyed him lazily as he stepped around the slumbering travellers, but it quickly went back to ignoring him when Rory drifted away to the cave entrance. He thought of grabbing more spikes and nailing down the loose edges of the silk covering, but the flapping sound was mildly hypnotic, almost like white noise. If it was helping the Polos to relax, he figured he should leave it alone. Instead, he peeked his head around the material to look at the Pandorica.
The winds lashed at his face, causing him to flinch, but he didn’t pull away. A thin layer of ice had formed on the outside of the Pandorica, but it seemed no worse for wear. Rory reached out and placed his bare hand on the side of the box and the warmth of his skin melted the snow. When he pulled his hand away, a perfect handprint was left behind in the ice crystals.
“Remember the first time it snowed after you came to Leadworth?” Rory didn’t raise his voice. Amy would hear him regardless of the raging storm. “We left handprints all over your window. You made yours into angels.”
He placed his hand on the Pandorica again, angling his palm to the left. When he pulled back this time, the two handprints overlapped, making the splayed fingers look like wings. He drew a circle over top of it, adding the halo. It was crude, but he didn’t care. It made him smile and that was more important.
By now a thin layer of frost covered Rory from head to toe and he stepped back into the cave to thaw out. To his surprise, Marco was awake and trying to coax the fire to glow brighter.
“You should be resting,” insisted Rory, using his best authoritative male nurse voice. He was still worried that Marco hadn’t recovered completely from his illness and a trek through the wintry mountains certainly wasn’t helping his health.
“I could not sleep.” He glanced back at his father and uncle and a small smile touched his lips. The brothers rested against each other, looking perfectly idyllic despite the harsh sleeping conditions.
Rory didn’t see any point in trying to argue. Marco was a grown man and if he didn’t want to sleep, that was his choice. He would just have to keep a closer eye on the young man during the day.
The ice on his skin and armour was starting to melt and he shook himself to dispel the water, almost like a dog would. It was doubtful he would dry out before morning came, but Rory could live with being encrusted with ice. He sat down next to Marco on the cold stone floor, angling his sword so it wasn’t in the way.
“Do you always talk to the Pandorica?” asked Marco.
If Rory had been aware that he had an audience, he wouldn’t have struck up a conversation with Amy. Luckily, he had spoken in English and the howling winds had masked his voice. “Does it seem strange?” countered Rory, hoping to avoid the topic.
“I would talk to my horse in a similar manner but only because I knew it had ears. The Pandorica is merely a stone box. Unless there is something inside that listens.”
Rory didn’t know what to say. Plenty of people had supposed what was inside the Pandorica, but Marco had to be the first to suggest that it had any human qualities. He almost wanted to praise the young man for being so clever. It had been ages and ages since he had talked about Amy with anyone but himself and it hurt not being able to express his feelings for the woman he loved. It was tempting to tell Marco the truth.
He had enough sense not to, though. The ambiguity of the Pandorica was what kept it safe. The unknown made people curious but it also made them cautious. No one would want to open it if they thought an evil might escape. If they knew that only a young woman on the edge of death resided inside, the temptation to smash it open would be far greater.
He felt he needed to say something to Marco, so he decided on a half-truth. “To me, the Pandorica is alive. I have spent so much time with it that it feels like it is listening.”
Marco nodded, as he did whenever he listened to a local talk about their village or their life. The information would be filed away and the most pertinent details would be transcribed later. Rory was left wondering if all of the young man’s observations about the Pandorica were written down in his notes. What a gold mine that would be for a future historian.
“I have always wondered,” began Marco. He shivered as a sudden blast of cold air blew through the cave. The weak fire sputtered but it didn’t go out. “How were you chosen to protect the Pandorica?”
A cave in the Pamier Mountains seemed like an odd place for such an interview, but then it struck Rory that the location was part of the point. He couldn’t avoid Marco, not unless he wanted to stand outside in the middle of a violent snowstorm. The young man wasn’t having troubles sleeping. He had woken up on purpose to talk to Rory. Rory couldn’t help but marvel slightly at Marco’s craftiness.
“Will you write this down later?”
Marco cocked an eyebrow. “I can, if you require.”
“No.” A Roman scholar had written down some of the tale once, but Rory was sure the account was lost. He didn’t want a detailed description committed to paper now, though. “Let this story fade into history and I will tell it to you.”
The prospect of losing such a monumental tale didn’t seem to upset Marco. Perhaps this conversation wasn’t motivated by mere scholarly pursuits. “I accept your terms.”
With Marco’s assurance in place, Rory suddenly didn’t know where to start. Obviously at the beginning, but he would have to omit a few things, like the Doctor’s involvement and who had made the Pandorica. Then there was the matter of putting it into terms that wouldn’t belittle Marco’s intelligence. The young man was too smart to accept the old superstitions.
“My legion discovered the Pandorica in Britannia.” That part was true enough, but there was no need to mention that his legion had been made up of plastic soldiers who only thought they were human. “We had no idea what we had found but we knew we had to protect it from the barbarians.” Rory was stretching the truth a bit here, but before their Auton programming had kicked in, all of the soldiers who had volunteered had been willing to protect the Pandorica from the thousands of aliens whizzing around the night sky.
“What happened to your legion?”
“They were… wiped out.” That was true, in a sense. His fellow Autons had been wiped out from existence. “Only I was left.”
“The Lone Centurion.”
Rory had never heard that moniker before. It was apt. “As the only survivor, I vowed to look after the Pandorica until the time was right and it could be opened.”
“But it does not explain how long lived you are or how you can escape injury. Does prolonged exposure to the Pandorica grant you these gifts?”
“Marco…” Rory sighed. There was no way to escape this conversation. “There are some things I cannot explain.” It was a pathetic response, but the best he had.
Marco frowned, looking like a sullen little boy being sent to bed without dessert. “You have a great deal of patience then. To wait so long for an outcome you cannot foresee.” The young man paused and he stared deeply into the small fire. “When I was young, my relatives would tell me about my father and how he would return one day. I would imagine that day over and over, but there were times where I believed it would not happen.”
The youngest Polo looked up from the fire and over at Rory. “Do you often imagine the day when your long vigil will be over?”
It was odd to see a look of sympathy from him. Without knowing it, they had something in common. “I do think about that day, from time to time.” Early on, it was all Rory could think about. In his head, he used to dream up all sort of scenarios of what would happen when he saw Amy again. They would rush into each other’s arms, they would exchange a passionate kiss, he would break down in tears, and so on. After a while, though, he had stopped thinking about it. He didn’t want his daydreams to become an obsession. He would see Amy again when the time was right and just live the moment as it happened.
“I hope your wait will be at an end soon,” said Marco. He sniffed, his nose red and runny from the cold. “Perhaps I should get some sleep.” He rose to his feet.
“When you met your father for the first time,” asked Rory, “did the moment live up to your expectations?” It may have seemed strange, him asking someone a fraction of his age for advice, but Marco Polo was wise beyond his years.
Marco smiled broadly. “It exceeded them.”
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