City of New Beginnings (DW/Stravaganza crossover) Gen Ten/Rose
This is written to a prompt for the "Spring Hopes Eternal" ficathon on the community songs_in_time. My brief was as follows:
Rose wakes up one morning (on parallel Earth) and knows today is the day the Doctor is coming for her. She has been dreaming ever since being trapped there and the dreams have slowly been getting stronger and clearer and he speaks to her. She prepares to leave one life to go back to the other.
Song: “While You See A Chance” by Steve Winwood.
WORDS: 3037
CHARACTERS: Ten/Rose and various observers.
RATING: Gen
SPOILERS: Nothing beyond Doomsday, apart from a pre-S4 mention of Donna.
CREDITS: Thanks to
wendymr and
dark_aegis for beta reading. I also borrowed from the "Stravaganza" universe invented by the young people's writer Mary Hoffman (see Author's Note). Apparently this now has its own section on fanfiction.net, so I suppose this story should be described as a crossover - one I'm surprised nobody has thought of before.
A further inspiration was the Elvis Presley hit, "It's Now or Never", based on the Neopolitan song "O Sole Mio".
So here they were, a city of tourists, of roses and love. There were worse things to be. In their own way, they still had influence. They had the hearts of the people. They had survived, to gaze into each other’s eyes as those two now were doing, to laugh, to love, to eat and drink well, to fill their minds and hearts with beautiful memories. To start again.
Author’s Note:
This is a kind of crossover with the Stravaganza universe created by the young people’s writer Mary Hoffman. She has invented an AU where Italy is known as Talia, Venice is Bellezza and gondoliers are mandoliers. A few people have discovered how to “stravagate”, that is travel between the two worlds, but most need a talisman to do so.
After a few days in Venice, the idea of this being Rose’s universe was irresistible, particularly after a viewing of “Casanova”.
CITY OF NEW BEGINNINGS
Il Politzotto
He was a Bellezzan, born and bred, and he knew every detail of his beat; unlike most modern politzetti, he patrolled on foot. Bellezza was a city of canals and boats, not roads and vehicles. Putting your foot down meant going faster than 5km an hour on the Grand Canal, something only the emergency services were allowed to do, in deference to the foundations of the medieval palaces that lined the banks.
He knew the humbler city that lurked behind that façade. Still relatively safe; the constant presence of huge tourist parties limited the usual bread-and-butter work to breaking up the occasional fight or pickpocket gang, or sorting out a dispute between a wily trader and that rarity, a duped customer who happened to know both the tricks and the language. There was a price to pay for all that car-less beauty; for decades the true Bellezzans had been drifting onto the mainland in search of modern conveniences and a higher standard of living, leaving a breathtaking but artificial wonderland behind them.
Few of Luigi’s comrades on the force were likely to stay more than a year or two and they mocked him affectionately as the last of the old-timers who knew and greeted everyone on his round by name and paused, regular as clockwork, each day in the same old square at the same time, to take his mid-morning coffee in his favourite osteria.
He was, of course, sensitive to every change in the landscape of the little square, no matter how trivial; he didn’t automatically regard the unfamiliar as a threat, but he tended to make a mental note of it and file it away for future reference. He spotted the strange blue box before Maria brought his attention to it as she placed his expresso on the bar; he lit a cigarette and shrugged when she questioned him on its possible identity. He’d seen stranger things, many a time, in Bellezza; probably the local theatre was putting on a stunt, or some fool had miscalculated the date of Carnivale. It could even be a satirical comment on the size of the average local hotel room; it was small enough.
Yes, he agreed with Maria, it seemed to be some kind of police box, of the old-time kind, and it looked foreign, definitely not Talian. - wasn’t that Anglese on the outside? But that was Bellezza in season for you. Strange things came and went and the city shrugged its shoulders and moved on, covering them with graffiti and fly posters within a few days if they were not claimed. Slow death by blending in. No, he didn’t think it had anything to do with terrorists; looked harmless enough, though he agreed there was something about it that felt a bit odd.
Had it been brand new, he might have found it offensive, but it had a flaking dignity that matched this place of crumbling stucco and ancient splintered beams of wood. Half-heartedly, he tried the door, found it unyielding and decided, for the moment at least, to let it be.
Il Ristorantore
You got ahead in this business by watching your customers, working out what made them comfortable and at ease. His papa had taught him that. In this city of cutthroat competition for the best vantage points, the Ripa del Vino was the top of the heap. Here was the place where, centuries ago, merchants had unloaded their barrels of wine and had them ferried away by mandola from the wide quayside to the landing-stages of the houses of the great and the good. Now the cargo was tourists, deposited by vaporetto in wave after wave, washed up thirsty, sore-footed and disorientated, only too happy to linger at one of his tables and watch the world go by over an early evening aperitif. Look after them then and they would return, more lucratively, for dinner - with luck and good management, every night of their stay.
He knew many ristorantore would be indifferent to a single woman, even one as clearly wealthy and attractive as the one who now occupied his corner table with a view of the Rialto Bridge for the third day running. They would push her into the least glamorous spot and laugh behind their hands at her ham-fisted efforts to attract their attention and gesture for the bill. They would not bother greeting her, asking her if she was enjoying Bellezzia, what she had been doing today, agreeing that the Piazza de St Leone was indeed very fine. They would not mention that the Pasta Frutti di Mare she had enjoyed so much yesterday was on the menu again tonight, or bring a mouthwatering selection of gelati and tiramisu to her table when she showed a passing interest in the dessert menu.
But la bella Rosa was not the kind of woman you pushed into a corner, and besides he was not that kind of man. Every so often, someone stood out from the never-ending horde of tourists you processed in this job, and something about the look in his or, more frequently, her eyes, made you want to hear more of their story. There was rarely time to accommodate their struggles with the language, but with Rosa he made the effort.
On the third day something quite remarkable happened. He’d seen tourists gain confidence, sometimes making great developmental leaps seemingly out-of-the-blue. Nevertheless when she began, seemingly overnight, to answer his questions in fluent Talian he was completely taken aback. Was she wily enough to conceal her facility with languages at first, hoping to lure him into some indiscretion? She hadn’t come over to him as that kind of person. Though she was clearly sophisticated and wealthy, there was something guileless about her that didn’t fit with such a calculating move. She seemed as thrilled as a child learning its first steps to discover her new ability to communicate.
It was as he had suspected; she was waiting for a lover. Apparently he had promised her through dreams and cryptic messages that he would be here, in this place, on this very day. The proprietor could not bear to disillusion her, even though he knew that she would be back at her usual table, alone, within a few hours, the candlelight picking out the unshed tears in her eyes.
Sometimes he wished he was younger, and less busy.
As she stood up and pushed back her chair, she asked him the way to Il Ponte de Luppe Cattivo.
His heart briefly stopped. He understood the significance; it was the only bridge in the Old City that lacked a parapet. Some local superstition had prevented generations of builders from tampering with its design after one had slipped and fallen to his death in the canal below. Now it was notorious as a place where star-crossed lovers sought a romantic end to their miseries, though most were fished out quickly enough by well-meaning passers-by.
He gave her deliberately vague directions - a skill perfected by generations of Balezzians - and as soon as she’d turned her back he called over a couple of mandolier friends and offered them free booze that night if they put out the word to keep an eye on her.
La Bella Rosa
She hadn’t really needed to ask the way. Finding Bad Wolf Bridge had been top priority from the moment she’d finished checking into her hotel. It had been a challenge in this maze of streets, some so narrow that you could touch the walls on either side with your arms outstretched. But a very enjoyable one, despite the proximity of the fish market, the slight undertone of sewage that hovered in your nostrils and the need to plaster yourself against a wall at regular intervals while parties of Japanese teenagers surged by.
The man at the restaurant had appeared helpful enough but she suspected he’d told her a cock-and-bull story to deter her from jumping to her death. Clearly he’d taken her under his wing. It was really rather sweet. This wasn’t the first time she’d been alone in a foreign city - far from it - but she generally felt a bit less vulnerable once she’d found a home-from-home where she could be sure of a welcome when she showed up for dinner. And something about La Gallifreia had immediately appealed to her. It couldn’t just be the view; there were dozens of equally idyllic watering-holes along the canal bank. No, she couldn’t quite put her finger on it. It just felt like coming home.
She was surprised she’d told him so much of her story. No doubt he thought she was mad or at the very least drunk on the romance of this amazing place. She’d never made it to Venice with the Doctor, but she imagined that Bellezza was all it was cracked up to be. And there was something very typical of the Doctor, that he’d choose to lead her to such a romantic spot, but choose a little corner of it that was everyday - well, as everyday as anything ever got here - with its pulleys bearing laundry hanging from the towering apartment buildings and its bags of domestic refuse tied to door-handles in plastic sacks. There were even a couple of Sprite cans floating in the water.
Oh yes. Somehow this was so very, very him. And she recognised the place from her dreams, the dreams that had grown in frequency, detail and intensity, throughout the last couple of years, finally driving her to pack a bag, bid her mum farewell and make her way here.
Could anyone else, in this Universe or any other, make her do that?
He hadn’t given her a precise date, but every morning as she woke up her sense of anticipation had grown and when she’d suddenly realised that the babble of voices around her made perfect sense, she’d understood the reason why. Every time she turned a corner, or bobbed out of a passage with a beamed arch low enough to bump her on the head, she’d half-expected to see the TARDIS.
Now she stood, apparently just one of the crowd, on the tiny bridge. Around her the usual street vendors offered her a rose for luck; she just smiled. She didn’t need their talismans. And nor would he. He already had the only rose he’d ever wanted.
Il Mandoliere
You got all sorts in this job. Turned a blind eye to it, most of the time. If what they wanted was, more or less, legal and decent, you went with it. They were on holiday, away from their wives and bosses and the usual inhibitions. If a good-looking guy in a brown pinstripe suit came up to you and said he wanted you to take him through Il Lupo Cattivo Canal, over and over until a certain little lady appeared on the bridge, you went with it. When he asked you to get on the phone to your mates and have them ready with a couple of dozen red roses, and he told you he wanted you to start singing when he winked at you, you went with it.
Oh, he knew what these two were cooking up. He just hoped she wasn’t too well-built, or you’d end up getting wet.
The bloke had money, more than enough of it, and he knew some good stories. His Talian was perfect, too - unusual in an Anglese. Well, he assumed that was what he was - it was hard to pin his accent down.
And he couldn’t help liking him. He hoped she wouldn’t let him down, because this lot was going to cost him a sestina or two. Maybe he even liked him enough to offer him a fair price. On the other hand, the season was short and he’d seen a new TV he liked the look of.
Il Dottore
He’d first heard about the Stravagante phenomenon on a visit to Cambridge in the fifteenth century, from an alchemist who’d been doing experiments far ahead of his time, and he’d immediately been intrigued. A notoriously unstable gateway between universes, partly controlled by a series of talismans! How could he resist? On the other side, by a stroke of luck beyond his wildest dreams, he discovered an alternative Venice where a Duchessa had ruled instead of the Doge, where gondoliers were called mandoliers, and, best of all, where Torchwood was already monitoring a Rift.
He resolved that he was going to do this properly. He’d screwed up his first declaration of love but if their reunion was sufficiently romantic he might get away without having to utter the dreaded word at all. In fact, the process had been absurdly easy, on the technical front at least. His biggest doubt had been whether she’d believe his psychic nudges or dismiss them as the product of an over-active imagination. Also, whether she’d get up the nerve to jump. Whether she’d trust him. After the way Donna had held back in that car chase, he’d had a few moments of doubt. But that was Donna - not that there was anything wrong with Donna - she was a trouper, the first companion for years who’d managed to sort him out and get him back on track towards what he really wanted.
That was Donna. This was Rose.
On their third circuit, he spotted her on the bridge and wondered why he’d ever doubted her. His hearts leapt so hard that he expected to leave ripples in the water. It couldn’t have been more perfect. He was sitting in the bow, on the brocaded love-seat, feigning a nonchalance she’d doubtless see right through. When he was certain she’d recognised him, he winked and, to the mandolier’s consternation, stood up. Luckily, Converse had a good grip.
She was such a tease, and that was one reason he loved her. Her irrepressible sense of fun had survived their separation and she behaved as if they’d only been apart for a day.
“Well, don’t just stand there!” she called, in perfect Talian. “Sing something!”
“You want me to sing?” He gaped and pointed indignantly at the mandolier. “That’s what he’s paid to do! He’s got the voice for it. In the blood, y’know. Native Bellezzian.”
“I’m not jumping if you won’t even sing for me!” she retorted. “Besides, we need him to stop the boat sinking.”
“What? Have you heard my singing? This isn’t one of those Saturday night talent shows, you know!”
But she was adamant. “If you’re not gonna serenade me, you can flipping well get out and come back on the Vespa,” she insisted. “I’ve waited years for this.”
“Le donne!” the mandolier groaned, commenting not on a Chiswick redhead, but on the general unreasonableness of the opposite sex.
“Better get on with it then, I suppose,” the Doctor sighed. The altercation was drawing quite an audience. They might as well get something for their time. He racked his brain for suitable arias but only a cheesy Walls’ Ice Cream commercial came to mind. And Elvis Presley. And Rose on a Vespa, which was enough to make any halfway decent tenor burst into song. So he began:
“It’s now or never, so hold me tight,
Kiss me, my darling, be mine tonight,
Tomorrow may be too late,
It’s now or never, my love won’t wait!”
“Can I stop now?” he pleaded, but his voice was drowned in a chorus of “Bravo!”s from the bridge. She landed in his arms, followed by a shower of red roses, and neither of them could quite believe they were together at last, still standing up, and dry.
“I learned that trick from Casanova,” he couldn’t resist telling her.
Il Restorantore (di nuovo)
It was all round the District of St Leone by nightfall, the story of the blonde woman’s leap of faith and the smiling man in the pinstripe suit who’d caught her in his arms, and the way the watching crowd had clapped, thrown flowers and yelled, “Bravo!”
So he’d been wrong. It wasn’t the first time. The one thing that never surprised him about people was their capacity to surprise him. She wasn’t sitting alone at her usual table, fighting back the tears and pretending she wanted nothing more than the city of lights and reflections before her. She was sitting with her lover, and he’d never seen a couple look happier together, more completed by one another.
And when he’d seen the name of the restaurant, Il Dottore had told him a story of his own - a story too wild to be true, but worthy of the Chianti it had earned him, nonetheless. He’d talked of another great city of colourful towers packed together, narrow streets, grandees in ornate robes and headdresses and a people who’d believed themselves to be impregnable, as the Bellezzians had until the Emperor of Gallia had invaded them from overland, looting their treasures and stealing their proud independence. Their lagoon had not protected them forever. All things change; all must either evolve or die.
So here they were, a city of tourists, of roses and love. There were worse things to be. In their own way, they still had influence. They had the hearts of the people. They had survived, to gaze into each other’s eyes as those two now were doing, to laugh, to love, to eat and drink well, to fill their minds and hearts with beautiful memories. To start again.
Not everyone was that lucky. But for these two, La Bella Rosa e Il Dottore, there was hope. It was a gift to them from Bellezza, the city of new beginnings.
Fino a quando non si riunirà di nuovo, Dottore e Rosa...
Rose wakes up one morning (on parallel Earth) and knows today is the day the Doctor is coming for her. She has been dreaming ever since being trapped there and the dreams have slowly been getting stronger and clearer and he speaks to her. She prepares to leave one life to go back to the other.
Song: “While You See A Chance” by Steve Winwood.
WORDS: 3037
CHARACTERS: Ten/Rose and various observers.
RATING: Gen
SPOILERS: Nothing beyond Doomsday, apart from a pre-S4 mention of Donna.
CREDITS: Thanks to
wendymr and
dark_aegis for beta reading. I also borrowed from the "Stravaganza" universe invented by the young people's writer Mary Hoffman (see Author's Note). Apparently this now has its own section on fanfiction.net, so I suppose this story should be described as a crossover - one I'm surprised nobody has thought of before.
A further inspiration was the Elvis Presley hit, "It's Now or Never", based on the Neopolitan song "O Sole Mio".
So here they were, a city of tourists, of roses and love. There were worse things to be. In their own way, they still had influence. They had the hearts of the people. They had survived, to gaze into each other’s eyes as those two now were doing, to laugh, to love, to eat and drink well, to fill their minds and hearts with beautiful memories. To start again.
Author’s Note:
This is a kind of crossover with the Stravaganza universe created by the young people’s writer Mary Hoffman. She has invented an AU where Italy is known as Talia, Venice is Bellezza and gondoliers are mandoliers. A few people have discovered how to “stravagate”, that is travel between the two worlds, but most need a talisman to do so.
After a few days in Venice, the idea of this being Rose’s universe was irresistible, particularly after a viewing of “Casanova”.
CITY OF NEW BEGINNINGS
Il Politzotto
He was a Bellezzan, born and bred, and he knew every detail of his beat; unlike most modern politzetti, he patrolled on foot. Bellezza was a city of canals and boats, not roads and vehicles. Putting your foot down meant going faster than 5km an hour on the Grand Canal, something only the emergency services were allowed to do, in deference to the foundations of the medieval palaces that lined the banks.
He knew the humbler city that lurked behind that façade. Still relatively safe; the constant presence of huge tourist parties limited the usual bread-and-butter work to breaking up the occasional fight or pickpocket gang, or sorting out a dispute between a wily trader and that rarity, a duped customer who happened to know both the tricks and the language. There was a price to pay for all that car-less beauty; for decades the true Bellezzans had been drifting onto the mainland in search of modern conveniences and a higher standard of living, leaving a breathtaking but artificial wonderland behind them.
Few of Luigi’s comrades on the force were likely to stay more than a year or two and they mocked him affectionately as the last of the old-timers who knew and greeted everyone on his round by name and paused, regular as clockwork, each day in the same old square at the same time, to take his mid-morning coffee in his favourite osteria.
He was, of course, sensitive to every change in the landscape of the little square, no matter how trivial; he didn’t automatically regard the unfamiliar as a threat, but he tended to make a mental note of it and file it away for future reference. He spotted the strange blue box before Maria brought his attention to it as she placed his expresso on the bar; he lit a cigarette and shrugged when she questioned him on its possible identity. He’d seen stranger things, many a time, in Bellezza; probably the local theatre was putting on a stunt, or some fool had miscalculated the date of Carnivale. It could even be a satirical comment on the size of the average local hotel room; it was small enough.
Yes, he agreed with Maria, it seemed to be some kind of police box, of the old-time kind, and it looked foreign, definitely not Talian. - wasn’t that Anglese on the outside? But that was Bellezza in season for you. Strange things came and went and the city shrugged its shoulders and moved on, covering them with graffiti and fly posters within a few days if they were not claimed. Slow death by blending in. No, he didn’t think it had anything to do with terrorists; looked harmless enough, though he agreed there was something about it that felt a bit odd.
Had it been brand new, he might have found it offensive, but it had a flaking dignity that matched this place of crumbling stucco and ancient splintered beams of wood. Half-heartedly, he tried the door, found it unyielding and decided, for the moment at least, to let it be.
Il Ristorantore
You got ahead in this business by watching your customers, working out what made them comfortable and at ease. His papa had taught him that. In this city of cutthroat competition for the best vantage points, the Ripa del Vino was the top of the heap. Here was the place where, centuries ago, merchants had unloaded their barrels of wine and had them ferried away by mandola from the wide quayside to the landing-stages of the houses of the great and the good. Now the cargo was tourists, deposited by vaporetto in wave after wave, washed up thirsty, sore-footed and disorientated, only too happy to linger at one of his tables and watch the world go by over an early evening aperitif. Look after them then and they would return, more lucratively, for dinner - with luck and good management, every night of their stay.
He knew many ristorantore would be indifferent to a single woman, even one as clearly wealthy and attractive as the one who now occupied his corner table with a view of the Rialto Bridge for the third day running. They would push her into the least glamorous spot and laugh behind their hands at her ham-fisted efforts to attract their attention and gesture for the bill. They would not bother greeting her, asking her if she was enjoying Bellezzia, what she had been doing today, agreeing that the Piazza de St Leone was indeed very fine. They would not mention that the Pasta Frutti di Mare she had enjoyed so much yesterday was on the menu again tonight, or bring a mouthwatering selection of gelati and tiramisu to her table when she showed a passing interest in the dessert menu.
But la bella Rosa was not the kind of woman you pushed into a corner, and besides he was not that kind of man. Every so often, someone stood out from the never-ending horde of tourists you processed in this job, and something about the look in his or, more frequently, her eyes, made you want to hear more of their story. There was rarely time to accommodate their struggles with the language, but with Rosa he made the effort.
On the third day something quite remarkable happened. He’d seen tourists gain confidence, sometimes making great developmental leaps seemingly out-of-the-blue. Nevertheless when she began, seemingly overnight, to answer his questions in fluent Talian he was completely taken aback. Was she wily enough to conceal her facility with languages at first, hoping to lure him into some indiscretion? She hadn’t come over to him as that kind of person. Though she was clearly sophisticated and wealthy, there was something guileless about her that didn’t fit with such a calculating move. She seemed as thrilled as a child learning its first steps to discover her new ability to communicate.
It was as he had suspected; she was waiting for a lover. Apparently he had promised her through dreams and cryptic messages that he would be here, in this place, on this very day. The proprietor could not bear to disillusion her, even though he knew that she would be back at her usual table, alone, within a few hours, the candlelight picking out the unshed tears in her eyes.
Sometimes he wished he was younger, and less busy.
As she stood up and pushed back her chair, she asked him the way to Il Ponte de Luppe Cattivo.
His heart briefly stopped. He understood the significance; it was the only bridge in the Old City that lacked a parapet. Some local superstition had prevented generations of builders from tampering with its design after one had slipped and fallen to his death in the canal below. Now it was notorious as a place where star-crossed lovers sought a romantic end to their miseries, though most were fished out quickly enough by well-meaning passers-by.
He gave her deliberately vague directions - a skill perfected by generations of Balezzians - and as soon as she’d turned her back he called over a couple of mandolier friends and offered them free booze that night if they put out the word to keep an eye on her.
La Bella Rosa
She hadn’t really needed to ask the way. Finding Bad Wolf Bridge had been top priority from the moment she’d finished checking into her hotel. It had been a challenge in this maze of streets, some so narrow that you could touch the walls on either side with your arms outstretched. But a very enjoyable one, despite the proximity of the fish market, the slight undertone of sewage that hovered in your nostrils and the need to plaster yourself against a wall at regular intervals while parties of Japanese teenagers surged by.
The man at the restaurant had appeared helpful enough but she suspected he’d told her a cock-and-bull story to deter her from jumping to her death. Clearly he’d taken her under his wing. It was really rather sweet. This wasn’t the first time she’d been alone in a foreign city - far from it - but she generally felt a bit less vulnerable once she’d found a home-from-home where she could be sure of a welcome when she showed up for dinner. And something about La Gallifreia had immediately appealed to her. It couldn’t just be the view; there were dozens of equally idyllic watering-holes along the canal bank. No, she couldn’t quite put her finger on it. It just felt like coming home.
She was surprised she’d told him so much of her story. No doubt he thought she was mad or at the very least drunk on the romance of this amazing place. She’d never made it to Venice with the Doctor, but she imagined that Bellezza was all it was cracked up to be. And there was something very typical of the Doctor, that he’d choose to lead her to such a romantic spot, but choose a little corner of it that was everyday - well, as everyday as anything ever got here - with its pulleys bearing laundry hanging from the towering apartment buildings and its bags of domestic refuse tied to door-handles in plastic sacks. There were even a couple of Sprite cans floating in the water.
Oh yes. Somehow this was so very, very him. And she recognised the place from her dreams, the dreams that had grown in frequency, detail and intensity, throughout the last couple of years, finally driving her to pack a bag, bid her mum farewell and make her way here.
Could anyone else, in this Universe or any other, make her do that?
He hadn’t given her a precise date, but every morning as she woke up her sense of anticipation had grown and when she’d suddenly realised that the babble of voices around her made perfect sense, she’d understood the reason why. Every time she turned a corner, or bobbed out of a passage with a beamed arch low enough to bump her on the head, she’d half-expected to see the TARDIS.
Now she stood, apparently just one of the crowd, on the tiny bridge. Around her the usual street vendors offered her a rose for luck; she just smiled. She didn’t need their talismans. And nor would he. He already had the only rose he’d ever wanted.
Il Mandoliere
You got all sorts in this job. Turned a blind eye to it, most of the time. If what they wanted was, more or less, legal and decent, you went with it. They were on holiday, away from their wives and bosses and the usual inhibitions. If a good-looking guy in a brown pinstripe suit came up to you and said he wanted you to take him through Il Lupo Cattivo Canal, over and over until a certain little lady appeared on the bridge, you went with it. When he asked you to get on the phone to your mates and have them ready with a couple of dozen red roses, and he told you he wanted you to start singing when he winked at you, you went with it.
Oh, he knew what these two were cooking up. He just hoped she wasn’t too well-built, or you’d end up getting wet.
The bloke had money, more than enough of it, and he knew some good stories. His Talian was perfect, too - unusual in an Anglese. Well, he assumed that was what he was - it was hard to pin his accent down.
And he couldn’t help liking him. He hoped she wouldn’t let him down, because this lot was going to cost him a sestina or two. Maybe he even liked him enough to offer him a fair price. On the other hand, the season was short and he’d seen a new TV he liked the look of.
Il Dottore
He’d first heard about the Stravagante phenomenon on a visit to Cambridge in the fifteenth century, from an alchemist who’d been doing experiments far ahead of his time, and he’d immediately been intrigued. A notoriously unstable gateway between universes, partly controlled by a series of talismans! How could he resist? On the other side, by a stroke of luck beyond his wildest dreams, he discovered an alternative Venice where a Duchessa had ruled instead of the Doge, where gondoliers were called mandoliers, and, best of all, where Torchwood was already monitoring a Rift.
He resolved that he was going to do this properly. He’d screwed up his first declaration of love but if their reunion was sufficiently romantic he might get away without having to utter the dreaded word at all. In fact, the process had been absurdly easy, on the technical front at least. His biggest doubt had been whether she’d believe his psychic nudges or dismiss them as the product of an over-active imagination. Also, whether she’d get up the nerve to jump. Whether she’d trust him. After the way Donna had held back in that car chase, he’d had a few moments of doubt. But that was Donna - not that there was anything wrong with Donna - she was a trouper, the first companion for years who’d managed to sort him out and get him back on track towards what he really wanted.
That was Donna. This was Rose.
On their third circuit, he spotted her on the bridge and wondered why he’d ever doubted her. His hearts leapt so hard that he expected to leave ripples in the water. It couldn’t have been more perfect. He was sitting in the bow, on the brocaded love-seat, feigning a nonchalance she’d doubtless see right through. When he was certain she’d recognised him, he winked and, to the mandolier’s consternation, stood up. Luckily, Converse had a good grip.
She was such a tease, and that was one reason he loved her. Her irrepressible sense of fun had survived their separation and she behaved as if they’d only been apart for a day.
“Well, don’t just stand there!” she called, in perfect Talian. “Sing something!”
“You want me to sing?” He gaped and pointed indignantly at the mandolier. “That’s what he’s paid to do! He’s got the voice for it. In the blood, y’know. Native Bellezzian.”
“I’m not jumping if you won’t even sing for me!” she retorted. “Besides, we need him to stop the boat sinking.”
“What? Have you heard my singing? This isn’t one of those Saturday night talent shows, you know!”
But she was adamant. “If you’re not gonna serenade me, you can flipping well get out and come back on the Vespa,” she insisted. “I’ve waited years for this.”
“Le donne!” the mandolier groaned, commenting not on a Chiswick redhead, but on the general unreasonableness of the opposite sex.
“Better get on with it then, I suppose,” the Doctor sighed. The altercation was drawing quite an audience. They might as well get something for their time. He racked his brain for suitable arias but only a cheesy Walls’ Ice Cream commercial came to mind. And Elvis Presley. And Rose on a Vespa, which was enough to make any halfway decent tenor burst into song. So he began:
“It’s now or never, so hold me tight,
Kiss me, my darling, be mine tonight,
Tomorrow may be too late,
It’s now or never, my love won’t wait!”
“Can I stop now?” he pleaded, but his voice was drowned in a chorus of “Bravo!”s from the bridge. She landed in his arms, followed by a shower of red roses, and neither of them could quite believe they were together at last, still standing up, and dry.
“I learned that trick from Casanova,” he couldn’t resist telling her.
Il Restorantore (di nuovo)
It was all round the District of St Leone by nightfall, the story of the blonde woman’s leap of faith and the smiling man in the pinstripe suit who’d caught her in his arms, and the way the watching crowd had clapped, thrown flowers and yelled, “Bravo!”
So he’d been wrong. It wasn’t the first time. The one thing that never surprised him about people was their capacity to surprise him. She wasn’t sitting alone at her usual table, fighting back the tears and pretending she wanted nothing more than the city of lights and reflections before her. She was sitting with her lover, and he’d never seen a couple look happier together, more completed by one another.
And when he’d seen the name of the restaurant, Il Dottore had told him a story of his own - a story too wild to be true, but worthy of the Chianti it had earned him, nonetheless. He’d talked of another great city of colourful towers packed together, narrow streets, grandees in ornate robes and headdresses and a people who’d believed themselves to be impregnable, as the Bellezzians had until the Emperor of Gallia had invaded them from overland, looting their treasures and stealing their proud independence. Their lagoon had not protected them forever. All things change; all must either evolve or die.
So here they were, a city of tourists, of roses and love. There were worse things to be. In their own way, they still had influence. They had the hearts of the people. They had survived, to gaze into each other’s eyes as those two now were doing, to laugh, to love, to eat and drink well, to fill their minds and hearts with beautiful memories. To start again.
Not everyone was that lucky. But for these two, La Bella Rosa e Il Dottore, there was hope. It was a gift to them from Bellezza, the city of new beginnings.
Fino a quando non si riunirà di nuovo, Dottore e Rosa...