‘Wow.’ said Amy.

‘There, oh ye of little faith.’ smiled the Doctor. He took a deep breath. ‘You can almost smell the sleigh bells jingling.’

They went outside into perfect, virgin snow that was half a metre deep. The sky was a peerless blue, and the sun had a fiercely bright clarity. Around them, the woodland was silent and sculptural with snow.

‘That’s beautiful.’ said Amy, gazing and smiling.

‘Christmas-y, isn’t it?’ the Doctor agreed.

‘Christmas -ish.’ said Amy.

‘It’s great,’ said Rory. ‘I don’t think it’s Leadworth, but it’s great.’

‘Of course it’s Leadworth.’ said Amy. ‘It’s that bit of wood outside Leadworth. You know. That bit of wood?’

‘Really?’ asked Rory. ‘Listen.’

‘To what?’ she asked.

‘Just listen.’

They listened.

‘I don’t hear anything.’ Amy said.

Rory nodded significantly with his eyes narrowed.

‘That doesn’t prove anything.’ said Amy.

‘No traffic? No… birds?’ Rory asked.

‘It’s early.’ said Amy. ‘It’s Christmas Day.’

‘It’s not that early. Look at the sun.’

‘The roads are closed because of the snow.’

‘There’s not that much snow.’

‘It’s Leadworth before there was traffic,’ said Amy.

‘So, not the right Leadworth, then,’ said Rory.

Amy stomped over to the Doctor, kicking up swirls of snow with her wellies.

‘Tell him we’re in the right place!’ she insisted.

The Doctor was examining the TARDIS. The blue police box was perched on the thick snow cover, tilted by the drift so that it stood at a slight angle to the vertical.

‘That explains the lean,’ said the Doctor. ‘We didn’t land on the flat. Never mind. It’s quite rakish. I’d say that was, in fact, lean -esque.’

‘Tell him we’re in the right place,’ she repeated.

The Doctor turned to them.

‘Oh, we’re definitely in the right place!’ he declared.

‘Definitely! This is the right place! We’re slap bang in the middle of Christmas. Christmas is all around us!

Xmas marks the spot! Can’t you feel it? Can’t you sense it? It’s all mince pies and brandy butter, and candied peel and anxious turkeys! It’s tinsel and carols, and baubles and egg nog! It’s—’

‘Is it Christmas, in Leadworth, on Earth, in 2011?’

asked Rory.

The Doctor held up a thoughtful finger, and pursed his lips. He looked from side to side.

‘Let’s find out,’ he decided, and strode off.

‘If it isn’t,’ the Doctor called back to them over his shoulder, ‘and I’m just saying ‘if’, if it isn’t, then the TARDIS has at least transported us to the most Christmas-y Christmas-ness in the whole universe, which is really quite something, and doesn’t deserve any kind of criticism whatsoever!’

‘Making it all up as he goes along,’ Rory said to Amy as they scampered to keep up.

‘Or business as usual, as it’s also known,’ she replied.

They began to ascend a slope through the trees. The glare of sunlight off the untouched snow was so bright they had to squint. It was hard going. Amy slipped and almost fell over. Rory chuckled so much, he did fall over. He slithered a bit too. Amy laughed, and gave him a hand to hoist him up. The Doctor kept straight on up the slope, swinging his lanky arms for balance, cheerfully singing ‘I Saw Three Ships Come Sailing In’.

‘Come on!’ he shouted encouragingly. ‘As a canon!’

‘We can’t even stand up,’ Amy shouted back, ‘let alone manage a three-part harmony!’

‘Come up here! Come on!’ the Doctor cried.

They joined him at the top of the rise. The view spread out below them, bright in the sunlight: woodland and fields, hills, mountains, a glorious snowscape, peaceful and still, entirely serene.

‘That’s pretty stunning,’ said Amy.

‘It is,’ Rory agreed. ‘It really is. It’s not Leadworth, of course.’

‘No,’ said the Doctor.

‘Unless Leadworth looked like this in, I don’t know, the ninth century?’ said Rory.

‘With those mountains?’ asked Amy.

‘So, in fairness, it’s not even Leadworth- ish, is it?’

asked Rory.

‘Yeah, but look at the pretty,’ said the Doctor.

They were forced to agree that the pretty was really very pretty, and they looked at it admiringly for a while.

Ts that a village down there?’ asked Amy.

‘There’s something very strange about those mountains,’ said Rory.

‘Village?’ asked the Doctor.

‘Down there, through the trees,’ replied Amy, pointing. ‘There, you see? I dunno, about a mile away?’

‘I think you’re right,’ said the Doctor.

‘The mountains,’ said Rory, shielding his eyes from the glare. ‘Very odd.’

‘Yes,’ said the Doctor. ‘That’s because they’re not mountains. I don’t think they’re mountains, anyway.

Come on!’

He set off down the slope.

‘Where are you going?’ Amy called after him.

‘What do you mean, you don’t think they’re mountains?’ asked Rory.

‘We’re going to visit that village!’ the Doctor announced. ‘I mean, since we’re here! We might get a lovely Christmas-y welcome! That’d be worth the trip, wouldn’t it?’

Rory and Amy looked at each other and then back at the Doctor.

‘What did you mean?’ Rory repeated. ‘Are you saying they’re mountain- ish?’

‘Come on!’ the Doctor cried, stretching out his arms as he strode down the bank. ‘Fill your lungs! Ahhhh!

Taste that fresh air! Work up an appetite for all that Christmas pud!’

Amy shook her head and set off after the Doctor.

Rory paused for a moment and zipped his cardigan right up to the top.

‘You know what?’ he said. ‘It really is ever so cold.’

‘Come on!’ called Amy.

‘It’s all right for you, duffel coat,’ said Rory. ‘I mean, it is very pretty, it really is. But it’s cold and it’s very…

dead. There’s nothing around. It’s so still and quiet and… bleak.’

The Doctor spun on his heels and pointed at Rory dramatically.

‘Exactly! And a bleak midwinter, cruel frost notwithstanding, is exactly the vicinity in which you’d expect to find a really Christmas-y Christmas! So let’s do that very thing!’

‘Could I go back and get a coat first?’ asked Rory.

‘Please? It’s really cold. And if this is the most Christmas-y Christmas to end all Christmases, I’d like to enjoy it and not be all dead of frostbite.’

‘He is turning blue,’ said Amy.

‘I’ll just be two minutes,’ said Rory. ‘Promise.’

The Doctor smiled.

‘Of course. Well wait right here. Well be enjoying the view. Because it is, as you’ll agree, magnificent.’

He took the TARDIS key out of his pocket and threw it to Rory. Rory caught it neatly and held up both index fingers

‘Two minutes,’ he repeated, and ran off down the rise behind him. Amy and the Doctor turned to stare at the beautiful scenery again. The sun was very bright.

Amy turned her mittened hand into a peak over her eyes.

‘What did you mean about those mountains?’ she asked.

‘Just thinking aloud,’ said the Doctor.

There was a long pause.

‘Will he be all right?’ she asked.

‘He’s only popped back to get a coat.’

‘We should have gone with him,’ she said.

‘I think he can manage a coat.’

Amy glanced at him.

‘We should have stayed together,’ she said. ‘Don’t tut. We don’t know where we are, and we just separated. I’m all right with you, but he’s on his own.

Which one of us is going to get into trouble and need rescuing? Come on, answer me that?’

The Doctor lowered his chin and turned cautiously to meet her look.

‘Are you suggesting,’ he asked, ‘we could be setting ourselves up for some unnecessary shouting and running about later on?

Amy nodded.

‘All right, well go and keep him company,’ said the Doctor. They turned to head back over the slope after Rory.