Secrets are Best Shared

"Who are you River?" Amy asked, natural curiosity bursting through her other concerns. "How can you boss the Doctor around like this, where do you know him from?"

River just laughed. "Sorry Amy, you know the rules, no sneak peaks, no hints. You'll find out though, pretty soon actually. Anyway, come on, we'd better be getting back, you know what the Doctor's like when he gets bored." The two women walked back to the TARDIS much as they'd left, but now the silence was an easy one, the tension lifted and both with their own missions to focus on. As they reached that battered blue box they split, Amy going to Rory and sliding easily into his arms, River talking to the Doctor in low hushed voices. Above them the night sky was clear and bright, the stars above seeming to call to them all as if they'd stayed still to long and were running late. River said her goodbyes then vanished in a flash of light, off to who knew where in time and space. The Doctor, Amy and Rory took one last look around then stepped inside the TARDIS, the doors swinging shut behind them.

12:00, June 26th 3010 "Right, here we are, the Saturn Holo Hotel! The very best resort in the known universe and ever so slightly better as a wedding present than a set of salt and pepper pots." The Doctor threw open the TARDIS doors to reveal a lobby that could only be described as opulent. A marble floor, so brightly polished it was like looking at a mirror, seemed to stretch away in every direction, glass walls soared above them to form a dome at least a hundred foot tall and beyond the glass hung Saturn itself and its famous rings which seemed to sparkle and glow as they reflected the light of the cosmos back at any who cared to watch.

"Now, you're booked in for 24 hours, couldn't manage longer than that even with the psychic paper, this place is usually booked up years in advance as it is. Everything's paid for so whatever you want while you're here just.. oh just go and enjoy yourselves." He gave them both a grin and turned to enter the TARDIS.

"Hey, wait a minute, where are you going?" Amy said, understandably nervous about the TARDIS flying away without her again.

"Don't worry, I'm just going to do a little trip back to Earth, there's some, uh, shopping I need to do."

"Shopping? You?"

"Yes, me. It's rare but it does happen. And the TARDIS knows you now, both of you, she won't have any trouble coming back. Now go have fun."

The TARDIS groaned it's way into the vortex and left the newlyweds standing in the lobby of a hotel a thousand years and 821,000,000 miles away from where they were married just over two weeks ago. They looked at each other and burst out laughing at the absurdity of the situation.

"Okay, come on." Amy said picking up the small bag she'd brought with her. "We'd better make the most of it while we can."

"Yeah" Rory replied "after all, it won't be long before we find there's something horrible stalking the guests. Probably a killer mattress"

"Rory..." Amy tried to sound annoyed but couldn't keep the giggle out of her voice.

"Or room service that eats you."

"Stop it"

"Probably a lift that contains a spirit of ancient evil and muzak that steals your soul"

"Actually I think I've been in that lift"

"Blood thirsty bath tubs."

"I swear I'm going to smack you in a minute"

Somehow Rory managed to keep up a running commentary on various nasty things that could be found in a futuristic space hotel for the full ten minutes it took them to check in and get to their room. Amy was half hysterical by the time they made it to the right door, something about the idea of carnivorous dressing gowns in league with mind controlling complimentary mints had managed to spark her off and she couldn't quite stop laughing.

"Okay, okay" she gasped, holding her side to try and catch her breath. "enough. You win the comedian of the year award!"

"Told you I went into the wrong profession." Rory replied, placing his hand against the door to unlock it. In one quick motion he threw the door open, chucked his bag into the room, swung round, scooped Amy up in his arms and marched over the threshold. Into an empty white room. No, not white exactly, the walls, floor and ceiling were glowing softly as if the whole room was made of light and they seemed to float in the middle of it.

"Okay..." he said, looking around while still holding his wife. "Well that probably explains how the Doctor managed to get the room if they're waiting for the decorators to come."

"It's a Holo Hotel remember?" Amy replied, her lips so close to his ear her breath tickled him. "As in Holographic? You just imagine whatever you want and the room sorta... provides it for you."

"What, anything?"

"ANYthing" Amy damn near purred the word, moving slightly in his grip to snuggle against him. Rory gulped, images of his beautiful bride in very unbridle situations running through his head. He quickly fought them down, determined to be the sort of man Amy deserved, ashamed of himself for thinking such... perverse things.

"Watch this" Amy concentrated and a large black leather couch appeared in the middle of the room. Rory walked towards it, still carrying her, and realised as he got close it really was a LARGE couch, easily big enough for two people to lie on side-by-side if they didn't mind being a bit intimate. All things considered he didn't think that'd be a problem. He laid her down and, pausing only to kick off his shoes, slid alongside her.

"Okay, how did you know how to do that? I've been with you every time the Doctor mentioned this place and I know he didn't explain how it worked."

"Well... to be honest, River told me. This was kinda her idea really."

"I must remember to thank her the next time we see her. Uh, assuming it's a point in her timeline after she's told you of course."

"There... there's something I really want to talk to you about Rory" Amy murmured her hands tracing his shoulders and sliding down his back. He didn't reply but moaned softly at her touch and his eyelids fluttered as he tried to stay focused on her face despite the distraction.

"Didn't you ever wonder why I did it, why I went with the Doctor?"

"Why did you run away on the night before our wedding you mean?" she couldn't bring herself to look at him, only nodded and waited for him to continue.

"Well frankly I didn't get much time to think about it, After all that same night the Doctor turned up at my stag do, told all my friends he'd kissed you and just how good you were, dragged me off to the TARDIS followed by a quick side trip to Venice where you were in such a hurry to show off to him you rushed into the middle of a vampire fish filled fortress and almost got turned into a fish bride for ten thousand fish suitors in the process."

Amy didn't quite know what to say, after all she knew that Rory had a point. Well, several points. Hell, every point in the known universe if she was being honest. She looked away, fighting back tears, determined not to cry in front of him.

"Hey," A hand on her chin eased her gaze back to his, the voice whispering to her tender and full of love. "I didn't say I blamed you for it."

"What? But I was.. I mean, it was a terrible thing to do and..."

"No, it wasn't. Well, okay, under any other circumstances it might have been but come on, it was the Doctor, the man that's been in your dreams for longer than I've known you, the man who saved the world right in front of you and the man who can offer you the whole of time and space. If you hadn't gone with him you'd have regretted it for the rest of your life. Of course you had to."

She reached up and kissed him, hungrily, trying to express physically what she didn't have words for. He returned that passion back, shifting slightly so that he was half lying on top of her and she couldn't resist hooking a leg around him to bring him close. He reached down and started to slide a hand under her blouse but she stopped him, breaking the kiss and gasping for air.

"Wait, wait just a little longer, please. There's something I really need to tell you."

Rory seemed to hover above her, shoulders heaving with the effort of restraining his desire but somehow he managed to comply with her request.

"See, the thing is Rory, you're right...and I won't lie to you, if the Doctor had shown up a day earlier I don't know that I wouldn't do the exact same thing. But there was something else, something that I... that I should have told you right away but didn't and I'm sorry."

"Uh, okay and, thank you, but I've got no idea what you're talking about you know."

"Oh. Right. Well... the thing is... right before the Doctor turned up I found this book in my room..."

Rory didn't say a word but burnt bright scarlet, a blush that started at the root of his hair and flushed over ever inch of visible skin.

"And I promise, really, I didn't realise it wasn't mine and by the time I had I'd already read a bit and I couldn't stop myself and I'm really really sorry and"

"Oh god, Amy... I'm so so sorry, it's just...."

"I didn't know what to think and it just...."

Both talking at once now, voices mixed and overlapping, Rory looking like he wished the world would open up and swallow him, Amy almost babbling as she tried to both reassure him and explain something she seemed unable to quite bring herself to say.

"I'm sorry" both said those words in perfect unison and stopped, starring at each other in confusion.

"You're sorry? Amy, why on Earth are you sorry? I'm the one that... that... well"

"That seemed to spend every waking moment thinking about me? Why would I want you to apologise for that?"

"Because... well... because I was so much better for you in my fantasies then I was in real life. I was such a... a coward."

Now the tears did come to Amy's eyes and she reached up, pulling his head down, nestling him in her shoulder. "No, no you were magnificent for me. Everything I put you through you should have run away years ago. And, in case you forgot, you stood guard over me for two thousand years... just waiting for a chance, a slim slim chance, that you'd see me again even when you could have made it through all that time in the blink of an eye. Not good enough? You set the bar so high I don't think anyone will ever do better in this universe or any other." She stroked his hair and felt the gentle shakes of his body as fears he'd carried for far too many years evaporated under her loving touch and gentle words.

It took her a good five minutes to muster up the courage to say what she knew she had to tell him and, oddly, it was the dampness on her shoulder and neck, the touch of his tears on her skin, that finally convinced her. Secrets, fears, doubts, all of it had to be dealt with here and now. A deep breath:

"Rory... I was the one who wasn't good enough for you."

He pulled away slightly, shocked and opened his mouth to speak. She pressed a finger to his lips, knowing she had to get through this in one go or she never would. "I... I was terrified reading that book, not that I should have in the first place I know, but here was this side of you I never knew existed and that excited me and and.... and I was afraid I'd never be able to live up to it."

Rory lent down and gently kissed her lips then kissed away the tears that were flowing freely from this amazing, wonderful, mad, impossible woman that meant more to him than life itself.

"Amy... the stuff in that book... it only existed BECAUSE of you. Even before the Doctor I'd seen you do so much, seen you been so confident, so sure so... so mesmerising that everyone in the room couldn't tear their eyes away from you. And then all that stuff with Prisoner Zero and the Doctor, good Amy if you could have seen yourself then. And then Venice... did the Doctor ever tell you I shouted at him? Told him that he made people try to impress him?"

Amy shook her head, eyes locked on his.

"Well I did and you know... it was true but the reason I was angry wasn't that you were trying... it's that I was so scared to follow you, to do the same thing. If we ever... you know... actually did any of the sort of thing that was written down.. by me.. I never thought for a moment, not for a single instant, that it'd all be perfect but I also didn't doubt that you'd be anything less than spectacular at whatever we tried."

Rory smiled down at her and it seemed to Amy that he was almost glowing with love and pride in that moment. "My wife, traveler in time and space, written in legend across the universe, who faces down Cybermen and Egyptian Goddesses and weird... fish... people... without so much as blinking, who journeys with the nearest thing to a force of nature given flesh and who's natural instinct is to take the piss out of him... The Amy I wrote is a shadow of who you really are."

She lunged for him at the same instant he melted into her and, words exhausted and their secrets finally both exposed and accepted, they tore into each other. Clothes flew, sometimes intact more often ripped apart to reach the flesh they covered. Foreplay be damned, in this moment they both wanted only one thing. Rory slid inside her roughly, one long motion until he was buried to the hilt, Amy's arms wrapped around his back, her fingers digging into him and scratching so deep she almost drew blood. Frantically they moved together, one entity in both body and soul, until just a few minutes later they both reached their climax together and collapsed naked onto the leather of the couch, panting. All it had done, they both knew, had taken the initial edge off, left them able to think straight again and maybe, just maybe, restore enough self control to fully take advantage of their wonderful surroundings.

"So..." Rory said, a challenge in his voice, "how do you actually use this place anyway?"|

"Just... just think about what you want, what you REALLY want. It'll happen."

"Are you sure about this? I mean, don't you want to know what"

Amy cut him off, placing a finger to his lips. "I trust you. Completely and utterly. Surprise me".

Rory paused, then nodded and she saw something dance in his eyes that set her heart fluttering. A mix of desire and love unlike anything she'd seen before. He kissed her once, tenderly, then stood and looked around, imagining the possibilities. He closed his eyes, and the room rippled around them. The white walls faded away, replaced with stone, their soft warm glow melting into the harsher light of flaming torches. The floor too turned to stone, several thick rugs scattered around the room, each one strategically positioned beneath metal frames designed to bind and hold the human body in particularly open and vulnerable positions. Around the walls glinted racks of vicious looking tools, crops, floggers, paddles and other, stranger devices with harsh metal edges catching the flickering torchlight. In the middle of the room, lit by a single spotlight (the only hint of modern technology to be seen Amy noticed) was a particularly elaborate device, best described as a wooden X frame set inside a metal circle. The X frame was polished to such a finish it seemed to drink in the light, only the red leather straps that adorned it breaking its smooth lines.

Amy had to admit that, despite herself, she was impressed. The level of detail alone was more than she'd expected but the whole place certainly filled her mind with a whirlwind of possibilities. As she finished taking in her new surroundings she realised with a start that his clothes had changed. Instead of the smart suit he'd been wearing he was dressed in simple black trousers and a white shirt, both cut loose and more suited to the Victorian era than the thirty first century. She had to admit they suited him in an odd way, strange as he'd never seemed quite able to find an outfit that he felt comfortable in back in Leadworth. She glanced down and realised she was somewhat out of place in the setting and looked back at him.

"So... aren't you going to dress me?" She asked with a raised eyebrow and a challenge on her lips.

"No"

"No?"

"No. Two reasons: Firstly this is our fantasy, not mine. It's sort of... a symbolic thing that you actually want to do this. And secondly I'm terrible at picking out clothes for you. Remember the pink sweater I got you for Christmas?"

"Ah, yes, you do have a point there. Okay, give me a minute here"

Amy looked around her, seeking inspiration. For a moment she panicked as she drew a blank but only for a moment. She was, after all, in a room where anything could happen with the man she not only loved but had married. A man who'd cared for her so deeply as to watch over her for almost two thousand years. How could she possibly be frightened of this now? She looked over at Rory and raised a hand. Instantly the flames died in the torches, the spotlight dimmed and they were plunged into darkness. A shimmering glow sprung up around her, a wave of golden light racing up her body, removing her clothes as it went and outlining her every curve. Rory stared at Amy, HIS Amy, shining like a goddess, naked yet so bright you couldn't see more than the barest hint of her flesh.

He'd been expecting the light to fade, to flow away as it had come and leave her clothed once more. But Amy Pond was nothing if not creative and without warning she seemed to explode, the light bursting away from her, so bright Rory stumbled in surprise and half fell to his knees shielding his eyes. As he blinked away the afterimages and tried to see straight in the still dark room he could hear a slow, steady clicking sound moving closer. It stopped in front of him and he could just make out a dim shape towering above him. The torches flared back into life and any semblance of rational thought left him.

He'd expected her to go for something revealing, something very, well, traditional for a domina. He'd been right on the traditional side at least, he'd just been expecting 21st century traditional, not 15th. A blood red, crushed velvet skirt flowed down from her hips until it brushed the floor, tight around the hips before sweeping outwards to pool around her feet and giving the impression she could glide across the floor rather than walk. A matching corset circled her body giving her a shape he hadn't realised was possible, her bare shoulders and chest almost ethereal as the dress drank in the light. A cloak was fastened around her throat and ran down to her hips and her hair was teased into the most incredible shape that would have taken her hours to achieve on her own, curling and writhing around itself and pulled back to ensure nothing obscured her face. She moved slightly to one side and he caught a glimpse of tall heels beneath the dress pushing her up to over six foot, slightly more if you measured to the highest hair.

She looked, quite simply, as if she'd walked out of the very best dream Rory had ever had and then some. Beautiful, yes, but the overall effect was a mix of desirable and intimidating leaving no doubt in his mind that here was someone who would only ever consent to so much as look at you if she wanted to. It wouldn't have mattered to him if the world ended that very moment as he couldn't imagine that a better sight could possibly exist within it. He knew in the back of his mind he should be dropping his head, averting his gaze until given permission to look upon her, but he was utterly transfixed. It was thanks to that indiscretion that he caught the flicker of reflected torchlight on her left hand and realised, with a start, that despite the transformation in both appearance and mannerism she still wore his wedding ring on her finger.

"I see you haven't bothered to dress properly boy." Even her voice had changed, the Scottish accent thicker now, her tone colder and more distant. No, no not distant exactly... superior. He shivered at how close it was to what he'd dreamed, what he'd written down in overlong prose what felt like a lifetime ago.