Here it is. The first chapter of the third and final (mulitchapter) installment to Tyler Family Adventures. Thank you all for your patience. I hope you enjoy.

Thanks so much to my lovely beta LastIncurableRomantic as well as WhoinWhoville, Kelkat9 and so many others for all of their help and encouragement. I don't (and never will) own Doctor Who. This is a labor of love and I make no money off anything.

~oOo~

This is Amy. I'm probably out having an amazing adventure and can't answer my phone right now. Leave a message after the beep and I'll get back to you as soon as I can.

Beep.

"Amy, it's Mum," Rose said, her fingers curling and uncurling nervously. "Just wanted to let you know that Dad and I are here, whenever you're ready. Love you." She rang off and let her mobile fall onto the sofa next to her.

Rose understood that Amy was hurting, grieving, and needed her space, but Rose missed her daughter too. In the six months since they had dropped Melody off with Hannah, Amy had been distant. Well, she'd been distant with Rose and the Doctor. Amy had been in regular contact with Jenny and Sabrina. For the first few months, they had continued with Saturday night dinners at Tony and Trisha's.

However, Amy had confessed to Tony that it was just too hard to be around EJ or Jamie right now. Dinners had ended shortly after that. And since then, the family had felt fragmented.

A hand caressed Rose's shoulder. She didn't even have to turn to know it was the Doctor. A single tear slid down Rose's cheek. What had happened… it was horrific and she didn't know how to ease her own pain, let alone that of her children. It was like her husband's death all over again only this time she didn't have Jack to snap her out of it.

No, Jack was dealing with his own pain and guilt after the incident with the 456. Not to mention helping Melody with her transition. Rose felt utterly helpless.

"Let's go somewhere," she said finally.

He squeezed her shoulder. "Where do you want to go?"

Standing up, she walked around the sofa and let him envelope her in his arms. "I think I'm in the mood to save some people and topple some tyrants."

The Doctor pressed a kiss into her temple. "If that's what you need. I'm sure I can manage to stir up some trouble."

~oOo~

A brisk wind ruffled Rory's hair. The cold never really bothered him; now however he almost seemed to embrace it. Maybe he felt like it tempered his anguish just enough that he didn't do something foolhardy. It's probably why he'd been spending the vast majority of his time on planets that were so cold and isolated they didn't support sentient life. But it was the quiet that he needed to think, to plan the next steps.

He'd been a teenager when he had figured out the River was a Time Lady. She had told him explicitly that she wasn't his sister. At that time they hadn't learned that Jenny was still alive, so Rory had assumed that she was his daughter. None of the explanations he'd come up with as to why River had ended up traveling backwards in their time stream had come anywhere near the horrific nature of the truth.

Suddenly someone pushed him from behind and he whipped around, ready to yell at the offender. Instead of some rude adult, he saw a little girl about twelve with red hair carrying a small silver tube. She was dressed as Lizzie, the character in Amy's books that she had based on herself. Behind the little girl was a young boy, obviously pretending to be Robbie, the character based on Rory himself. Almost everyone, men, women and children, were dressed as characters from the book series.

"Sorry mister," the little girl said sheepishly. "I was so excited that I didn't look where I was going. It's the last Professor Who novel and Dad camped out for a week to get us tickets to the only book reading that Amelia Pond is doing." The little girl bounced on the balls of her feet. "I hope she's as nice in person as she is in those interviews on telly."

Rory smiled. "Amy Pond is the most brilliant, amazing woman I have ever met. That's why I married her." The little girl's eyes widened in shock and he winked.

"Trini, I told you not to wander off." A harried-looking woman came rushing up behind her. "You scarred me half to death."

"Sorry, Mummy," the little girl replied, not sounding the least bit remorseful.

Rory didn't wait around to hear the rest of the conversation between the mother and daughter. That woman had found her lost child. It was a happy ending, one that he wasn't going to get with his daughter. They had found her and she had regenerated in front of them. Died her first death before she was nine.

Briskly he walked towards the back entrance to the performance hall. He wondered if he should have come at all. A day full of happy families, of children laughing, how could Amy stand it? His hands clenched. Neither one of them should be here today. They should be somewhere else, anywhere else. Together.

A door slammed open. "Took you long enough. I swear you really did get Dad's sense of timing. Lords of Time, my arse."

Looking up at the familiar voice, Rory felt some of her anger lessen. "Hello, Brina."

The petite young brunette threw her arms around her big brother and hugged him tightly. "I'm so glad you came. I was a little worried that you wouldn't. How are you? And don't feed me any lines about being alright because there is no way that you because I'm not."

He took in a shaky breath. "I'm… I don't even know how to describe how I feel." He kissed the top of her head. "Guilty mostly. Where's Amy?"

"Inside, having a panic attack." Sabrina pulled out of the hug, tugged on her brother's arm and led him inside. "She's wondering why she even came. But it was part of her contract. Public appearances are required and it's her last book in the series. We only have about an hour until she has to be onstage." Sabrina wasn't telling him anything that he didn't already know. However, he just let her talk. Sabrina prattling on about everything made him feel a little more normal.

Brina led him through a door to a green room, and his hearts stopped when his eyes landed on Amy. His wife was sitting on a plush sofa, her back to them. Her shoulders were slumped, and he could tell that she was forcing herself to take slow, measured breaths.

"Hello, Amy," he murmured, not wanting to startle her. It hadn't worked. Amy jumped up at the sound of his voice. Tripping slightly over her own feet, she stood and turned to him.

"Hello, Rory." Her eyes were red with tears. She he tried to smile but couldn't. Neither one noticed Sabrina sneak out into the hall. "You came. I wasn't sure that you would but I'm glad you did. How long has it been for you?"

"Since I've seen you?" He swallowed hard. "A couple of weeks."

"Liar," she shot back. Her tone wasn't accusatory. It was a fact. Even now, she knew him better than anyone. "How long has it really been?"

He took a couple of tentative steps towards her. "Almost two months. And I have missed you every day. I just needed some time to think, you know." They had been spending more and more time apart lately. In some ways it was easier to get lost in your own pain when you didn't have to worry about someone else's.

"Yeah, I know." She closed the gap between them by a few more steps. "Jenny, she's been taking me back. Taking me to see Melody growing up, before she came to Leadworth. I needed to see that she was all right. We missed so much."

Reaching out, he placed a hand on her arm. "I understand. We missed it, all those first that we thought we'd get when we had our first child. I'm sorry."

"Rory," Amy whimpered. Throwing herself into his arms, she buried her face in his chest. "It hurts. They took her, hurt her, and we can't get her back. And her childhood ripped from her. Raised in foster care instead of by us. Why her? Why our baby?"

"Shhh. I don't know, love." Gently he stroked her back while she cried. More than a few tears slipped down his own cheeks.

Her fingers dug into his back. "It's not fair."

Gently, he guided her back to the sofa and pulled her into his lap. It wasn't fair. Nothing about this was fair. Amy didn't deserve this. Hadn't she been through enough with her parent's death at a young age and being raised by a selfish aunt who hadn't wanted anything to do with her? This wasn't the life he had wanted to give her.

For the longest time neither one of them said anything. They just sat there taking comfort in each other for one of the first time since they had handed Melody over to Hannah: seven months for her, closer to a year for him. It was too much grief to carry alone anymore. What they needed was each other. And a plan. A plan to give their daughter a chance at a future past the Library.

~oOo~

Jenny landed the TARDIS as quietly as possible in Tony and Trisha's guest room. Earlier, she had dropped Amy and Sabrina off at the book reading. It wasn't that she hadn't wanted to stay to support her sister-in-law, but Rory was coming and Jenny didn't want to get in the way of the couple possibly talking for the first time in months. Sabrina knew them better and could help facilitate that. Mostly Jenny was feeling a bit useless and out of place.

Sure, she'd been taking Amy back to visit her daughter growing up, but all she had been doing is piloting the TARDIS. Then after Amy was done, Jenny always brought the ship to her brother. It was an endlessly frustrating cycle with both of them hurting, grieving and pushing the other further away. Jenny could see their timelines pulling apart. If they weren't careful they would snap apart.

Exasperated, she stepped out of the ship and headed down the hall. Hopefully, Tony or Trisha would be around for a cuppa and a chat. She needed to talk to somebody about how she felt and Mum, Dad, Amy and Rory were caught up in their own grief. Even Sabrina, whom Jenny had felt closest to since finding her family was busy being there for Amy and Jenny didn't want to burden her sister further. Not that Jenny blamed Sabrina. Jenny just felt sad and confused and didn't know how to handle things.

"Hello," she called out, walking over the threshold to the kitchen.

"Jenny?" Tony called from the other room. "Is that you?"

Coming into her line of sight, she smiled. "Who else would I be?" Sometimes Earth phrases were confusing.

Tony hugged her. "How have you been?"

A small sigh escaped her and she pulled away from him. "Not great, better than some. You?"

"About the same. I hug EJ and Jamie a little tighter every night now. I just…I can't imagine how Amy and Rory must be feeling." Moving towards the counter, he switched on the kettle.

Jenny nodded curtly and sat down at the table. "Where are Trisha and the kids?"

"Spending the day with Hannah. At least one good thing has come out of this, a closer mother-daughter relationship for those two. I had an early morning meeting so I was supposed to meet them later. You're more important though. Anything in particular on your mind?"

Pausing for a moment, Jenny gathered her thoughts. "I can't help but wonder…Never mind it's not important."

He set down the mugs he'd pulled out of the cabinet. "Whatever it is, I'm sure it's important."

Jenny worried her lip. It was a habit that she'd picked up from Mum. "I can't help but wonder if Dad felt like this when he thought that I had died. Was he distraught? Sad?" She looked down at her hands. This was something she'd been thinking about for months, and now that she had someone to talk to she wasn't sure that she could stop herself from letting it all out.

"He had only known me for a few hours. And I guess I had always thought that it hadn't had time to sink in that he had a daughter, really his daughter. I know that he must have missed me and that he told Mum about me. But I guess, just looking at Amy and Rory and seeing how much losing a daughter, one that they hadn't really had a chance to get to know, affected them… "

She took in a deep breath. "Maybe I thought it would be easy for Dad. I mean I missed him and I looked for Dad everywhere I went, but I didn't miss him the way that Rory and Amy miss Melody." Tony sat down beside her and squeezed her hands. "Does that, does that mean that I'm… I dunno, a horrible person?"

"Jenny, everyone deals with grief in different ways. Dad tends to internalize it everything and act like it doesn't bother him. Mum lets it out and gets snarky when she's mad. Rory gets angry and throws things."

"What about you?" Jenny asked tentatively.

Tony squeezed her hands again. "I take after my birth mum, make tea and tell stories about happier times. Been talking a lot about Mels when she was growing up lately. Telling the kids all about the things that their aunt got up to when she was a kid." The kettle whistled, and he left Jenny's side to finish up.

"Do you think that you could tell me about her? I mean I've heard some of the stories before, but can you tell me again?" Jenny worried her lip again. "And can you tell me about River? The River that you knew growing up?"

"Course I can," he replied, setting a plate of biscuits in front of her. "Mels was, to put it mildly, a handful…"

~oOo~

Jamie giggled as his grandmother, Hannah, pushed him in the toddler swing. Beside them EJ pumped her little legs furiously, trying to get as high as she could, half convinced that she could swing herself over the top of the bar and launch herself into space. EJ entertained anyone who would listen with her tales of daring adventures. Thankfully, Jamie and EJ still had their childhood innocence.

Trisha felt a stab of pain in her chest. In many ways they were exceedingly lucky to still have that. With the lives that their family led, who they were, no one knew how long it would be until they were struck by the cruelty of the Universe.

Trisha and Tony had yet to tell their children what had happened to their cousin Melody. Jamie was still too young to understand. EJ, however, had overheard that Aunt Amy was pregnant when the adults were planning to rescue Amy. To her credit, EJ hadn't brought up the subject again after Tony had told her something had gone wrong and Aunt Amy and Uncle Rory had lost the baby. One day they would have to explain exactly what that meant.

But not today.

Trisha would protect the innocence of her children for as long as she possibly could. Their Granddad may be a Time Lord, their Gran some sort of goddess of time, but she wasn't going to let that or the fact that she herself worked for UNIT hurt her children.

She had always known how precious EJ and Jamie were to her. But now after having seen Melody ripped from her loving parents, knowing that Amy and Rory had had to watch their daughter regenerate twice, it was almost too much.

Several times in the last few months, Trisha had thought about taking the kids and running away, keeping them safely tucked away from anything that could threaten them. With or without Tony. She was scarred and suddenly all those old self-preservation instincts had kicked in. It was the same drive that she had when she'd wanted to take Sabrina away from the Williams family, oh so many years ago.

The only thing that had stopped her was remembering how she had felt when she was kept from her little sister. That and knowing what the loss of EJ, Jamie and herself would do to the rest of the family, not to mention what it would do to the kids. She couldn't hurt them, any of them.

But that didn't mean that she couldn't keep them safe. Or that she wasn't already taking steps to ensure the safety of her family but also of their friends. An enemy of the Doctor and Rose Tyler wouldn't hesitate to use an innocent person as leverage, and Trisha would do anything to stop that. Even if it meant erasing any knowledge of them from existence.

~oOo~

Amy somehow made it through the reading of the first two chapters of her final book without incident. In fact, she could see and feel just how proud Rory was of her for soldering on and putting on a wonderful performance for her fans. When they were done, Rory asked her to join him for dinner. There wasn't going to be any more running from problems, not on her end. Hopefully not on his either.

"We're a right mess, the pair of us," Amy said as they slipped into a secluded booth at the Chinese place near the hotel that she had been staying at. "I'm really sorry that I've been running away. Tends to be par for the course with me, did the same thing the night before our wedding."

"Amy." Reaching over, he took her hand. "We've both been… handling this in our own way. Maybe it helped us to sort out our feeling in the beginning, but I think that now we need to face this thing together."

"Yeah, I know that there is nothing that we can do about what happened to her. Or about the," she swallowed and tucked a strand of stray hair behind her ear with her free hand, "About the Library. Either way we should focus on the time that we do have with her. For all I know, I could have been long gone before she met Dad and Donna that day."

Strictly speaking, Amy knew that River's life continued after that day. River herself had assured Amy but she couldn't tell him, not yet at least. He had to figure it out on his own. Which of course he would, Rory Tyler was brilliant and she missed him. "It won't be easy and I doubt I'll ever be the same as I was before, but I want us to be together again properly."

Rory gave a tight smile. "You're right, there isn't anything that we can do about her life so far but possibly, just maybe we can do something about her future." He threaded their fingers together. "I love you."

She squeezed his hand; everything would be all right, no matter how rocky it might get. "To the ends of the Universe."

"And back again," Rory reassured her.