FIC: Ginger Goddess, Part 3 (2/?)
Title: Ginger Goddess, Part 3: Drama in Venice and Spacial Multiplicity
Series: none - first part belonged to “There's The Door!”
Rating: M (there be smut inside in more than one spot, or at least some adult thoughts or implications)
Author: tkel_paris
Summary: Unaware of the Doctor's intentions even after months of traveling with him, Donna confronts her own feelings when the Doctor is arrested and in danger of execution. She and Martha need help, and only the man the Doctor was mistaken for can save the day: Giacomo Casanova.
Disclaimer: RTD clearly missed on some of the subtext created by the dynamic of Tate and Tennant.
Dedication: bas_math_girl, for her birthday. Love ya, Online-Mummy! (blows a kiss) Also to tardis_mole and cassikat for extremely helpful beta advice. :D But especially to TM, since I'm sort of writing about an ancestor. (It gets confusing when fiction is mixed into history and the distortions therein.)
Author's Note: This started as a one-shot, but quickly grew into a story and a sequel. And another sequel. :D And there will be one more story after this one. Maybe two. And possibly a DVD extra. ;)
And before we begin, a note about Casanova's life from one of his descendants, my good friend tardis_mole:
Casanova was Venetian by birth, back when Venice was an independent city state. He was the youngest child of an actress, and I mean actress in the true sense - that is a woman who sells her body in order to earn a place on stage. As a small boy he often saw her with a number of men, none of whom were his father. He was an elective mute and was abandoned at young age at a boarding school. It was a young maid who worked there that gave him his first lesson in sexual arousal. It quickly became obvious that he was a polymath, spoke several languages and had a photographic memory.
At the age of fifteen, during his training to be a priest, two sisters visited him. With them he lost his virginity, but he learned a powerful lesson - listen to women. In those days, women had no voice in anything, right down to what they wore, where they went or the marital bed. The age of consent at that time was 12 and girls were a commodity to be sold, shared and bartered. He rescued a few, showed them how a woman should be treated, with kindness and gentleness, and tried to change social attitudes. He was adopted by the Chevalier family, but promptly arrested and imprisoned on false charges by someone who disagreed with the decision. He remains the only successful escapee from that prison tower.
Contrary to popular belief, Casanova was not polygamous, nor did he have sex with children or men. He had several lady friends, some of whom he had sex with, but the relationships did not last long. He had one true love, but she was owned by a rich and powerful man who had blackmailed her and her family and Giacomo had no choice but to let her go. He was married briefly to Bellino, a singer, who then left him. He met her again much later when she beguiled him with a young girl, but didn’t tell him it was his own daughter until afterwards. He spent his later life as a librarian in exile and lived with a common law wife. He was never told that his exile had been revoked and died in Bohemia, which was then also an independent country, and his grave was unmarked.
His few vices in life were chocolate, which was a powder back then to make a thick drink which you half-ate with a spoon, and oysters. He had several children, including one with my greatx6-grandmother, but he was the first to invent a way to lessen the risk of pregnancy. Lemon juice. He hated condoms, because they were made of sheep’s intestines and were so thick that a man could not feel anything during sex to the point of not being able to maintain an erection. He was also the first to make a connection between sex and the transmission of syphilis (or as the Italians still call it, French Pox). Condoms at the time were more like sex toys than a useful device and often made of linen and tied on with ribbon.
At parties, Casanova blew up sheep’s gut condoms, and at the ball held at the meeting between Reinette Passon and King Luis, he blew up several, tied knots in them and called them balloons (Note: this is what the Doctor meant by the French really know how to party in TGitF). He also invented the National Lottery. He had a great many friends, one of whom was Voltaire, although they disagreed on many things. Casanova’s memoirs were written in Venet, the language of Venice and still spoken today. They were translated into Latin, French and Polish, but never into English. He wrote the original Don Juan opera, but Mozart, for whatever reason, changed the dialogue, which hurt him deeply. On seeing the opera, he left without a word and never spoke of it.
Thank you for being so kind as to make sure I gave him fair treatment. I did my best in the original drafts, but your help made the final one the best it could be.
Chapter One
CHAPTER TWO: ENTER A COMPLICATION
Months later in Earth time, he felt like he was eating his own words. They had enjoyed - although Donna would have argued that one if he had voiced it - several adventures, including one on Death's Deal that involved hearing from a future him. It was always an unpleasant thing, running into a future you. Questions would always come up, and they had to remain unanswered because spoilers were a dangerous thing. One wrong spoiler and fixed events could be derailed.
But the way his future self had spoken of Donna - a fondness that spoke without words of so many happy memories - suggested to him that he only had to wait. So he instead focused on finding ways to impress her and please her.
But she was hard to impress. Sights and places impressed her, but being impressed by him personally? He couldn't tell if she even liked him as more than a friend, especially since she never seemed to miss an opportunity to call him a name. He had no idea if they were real insults or affectionate disrespect. He wanted the latter, very badly, because that left room for love. Frankly at this point he was willing to accept sisterly teasing instead. After all, they were not actually siblings and feelings could change.
Hers, not his. His were not going anywhere. He was a Time Lord.
And she pushed his buttons. Literally once he gave in to her demand to learn how to help fly the TARDIS. Of course leave it to Donna to decide she wanted to be able to fly the Old Girl herself. He had never been more nervous than on that first try of hers.
Mind, she caught on rather quickly. It left him even more in awe of her, but he had to settle for her giving him a huge hug and an exclamation that was less than what he wanted: “I bloody love you!”
He knew that when she said that it really meant he had impressed or delighted her. But he didn't mind the little thrill over imagining what it would feel like for her to mean the word “love”.
And just when he thought he had the chance to make progress with her? A plasma coil threat on Earth, at the very hospital her mother worked at, forced them to go undercover. Well, him as a patient. She acted as the concerned friend who was the medical proxy. Still, it was a delay. Donna had been there when the medical students were led into the area, and “John Smith” was one of the patients chosen to check on. The responsibility of checking on him was given to one Martha Jones, a third year student who was just starting to go hands on, which for third year students meant clinical observation with living patients.
A student who claimed she had run into him on her way in. Something he knew he had not done. Well, not yet, obviously.
Donna had tensed when Martha checked his heart, and knew that she was finding something that was baffling her, and she wanted to talk. Instead, she saved her thoughts for herself. Anything she did say would likely bring more attention not less.
But it was more the unusual static electricity that distracted them. However, she glared at the Doctor for starting to talk about Benjamin Franklin. As Mr. Stoker left with a comment that a shrink should visit Mr. Smith, Donna leaned in to hiss into his ear, “What were you thinking? That student was on the verge of realising she really had heard two hearts, and now we'll have to field off a visit from mental! You were not supposed to attract attention!”
The argument was an odd one given that it was carried out in whispers, but that didn't stop them. Nor did his instincts keep under complete regulation. He was luckily saved by the sudden chatter beyond his bed area.
“Are they saying that something's wrong with the rain?” asked Donna, disbelieving and trying to see a window from her angle.
The Doctor's eyes widened. “That's what the coils are for! H2O scoop!”
“What?!”
“Hold on to something, Donna.”
“Why? And what's stable-?”
Even as she asked, the floor shuddered below her. The Doctor grabbed her as she joined in the screaming out of reflex.
The ground stabilized, but not soon enough for Donna's taste. Thankfully she didn't lose her lunch. While the rest of the hospital seemingly went into chaos, the Doctor let her go and hopped off his bed.
“Doctor?”
He drew the curtains to make sure he had privacy. “Those plasma coils were needed for this to happen. Someone just took us right off of Earth,” he quickly explained in a whisper. He opened the nearby drawer where his things were folded nicely, grabbed everything that was his (ignoring the ubiquitous Gideon's bible in the side wooden pocket), tossed them onto the bed and turned his back to Donna before he swiftly disrobed.
Donna stared in open mouthed shock. He wasn't even thinking of modesty! “Doctor!” she squawked, barely audible.
“No time, Donna. I have to be able to investigate this,” he explained as he began to put on his uniform. “And I'll hardly be taken seriously if I'm only wearing a patient's gown. No, no, no, no no, that will never do. I have to be my serious self and be ready for anything. We need to get to answers in a hurry.”
But Donna was paying no attention to his words. In the short moment where he was standing before her wearing nothing but Y-fronts she noticed that while he was skinny, he wasn't scrawny. He had a runner's muscles, a well-shaped bottom, and his skin looked like a human's. Utterly touchable skin sprinkled with dark hairs in the right places. His suit was hiding a multitude of things about him, and she was blinking over the discovery that he wasn't bad-looking at all without at least some of his clothes.
Sod that, her traitorous mind and body thought. He was bloody gorgeous without his clothes! Her hands suddenly itched to know what it would be like to run over that body, and she felt a little weak in the knees from picturing the Doctor turning and looking at her with that gentle look from that rooftop.
If he had any idea what bedroom eyes looked like and knew how to use them, god help her!
The Doctor was dressed within two minutes, putting on nearly full speed. But he glanced back at Donna before he pulled the curtains, and noticed that she was staring rather transfixed. He barely suppressed a grin of delight, knowing that he had crossed an important barrier without even trying. But he had no time to savor the victory. He had a group of people to save, including Donna's mother. “Ready, Donna?”
She blinked, blushing until her skin was almost the same color as her hair. She hadn't even noticed he was fully dressed. “What?!”
Luckily, she was saved by the sobbing and panicked words of one of the student doctors. “Don't! We'll lose all the air!”
“But they're not exactly air tight,” reminded the same student who had checked the Doctor earlier. “If the air was going to get sucked out it would have happened straight away, but it didn't. How come?”
The Doctor pushed the curtain aside, sensing his cue to enter and begin saving the day. With Donna at his side.
Donna was grateful that he focused on the student who acted so calmly given the circumstances. It allowed her a moment to compose herself, and recover her ability to demand answers and to keep the Spaceman in line.
Martha Jones seemed to have a level head about her, and was prepared to act calm for the sake of the patients. He had high hopes for her future, especially as she helped them determine what the Judoon were looking for. And their presence was a definite indication that he'd failed in detecting threats to Earth.
More for Donna to question him pointedly about later.
But their looking for an alien who could hide as a Human by drinking a Human's blood? He hadn't known plasmavores were capable of that. That meant he had to distract them, and he didn't need anyone else distracting him or getting ideas.
He had to find that Mrs. Finnegan, but with the Judoon around and their having seen him and spotted him as not Human he needed a distraction. He had to leave some trace of himself right here to delay the Judoon long enough for him to present himself as bait to the Plasmavore.
And he could only think of one thing. He might get slapped for it, but what else could he do?
“You'll have to distract them, Donna.”
“How-?”
She had no time to finish her question. He cupped her face. “This will save everyone, including your mum.” Then he kissed her, hoping he could get enough access to manage a small genetic transfer.
He really hadn't wanted this to be their first kiss. The universe had to hate him for making it so.
Donna was stunned enough that her lips parted, and a breath sucked in when his cooler tongue slipped into her mouth. The touches were gentle, almost reverent. Like she was the most precious thing in his world and he wanted her to know that.
It was exactly the last thing her mind needed after seeing so much of his naked flesh.
She gasped when he broke it off, leaving her leaning against the wall for support and her eyes closed. Just in case he saw the stunned desire she knew would have been there.
He blushed, both at his own body's reaction and at Martha's shocked expressed. “See you both later,” he whispered before running off to present himself as bait.
He supposed the shock was the only reason he wasn't slapped.
/=/=/=/=/
It was a good idea to have taught Donna about medicine for Gallifreyans, which she had insisted on before they went on their first proper journey, because she had known how to get his heart beating again without breaking his bones. Although she had dragged him straight to the TARDIS for a check-up, which she ran with the Old Girl's guidance. He could only hope that the level of fussing was a sign that her feelings were finally starting to change.
Made him wonder what would happen if he really got hurt. Might be worth it if it woke the feelings in her heard that he wanted to trigger.
Since the TARDIS had to replenish some of his lost blood he had to remove everything from the waist up. “Why make her have to clean more than she has to?” he had asked. “You taught me that.”
Donna had blushed at the sight of his bare chest. “Good to know you were listening for a change.”
While she monitored his readings and gave him medicine as directed, he watched her reactions and discretely paid attention to her pheromones. He hadn't even been thinking when he disrobed before her and yet it had helped his cause immeasurably. Donna might not have thought skinny males were her type, but she was definitely affected by his body. Skinny streak of nothing? Not anymore in her mind, he was certain.
So how could he use this to further his cause? He didn't want her to come to him solely out of lust, but he didn't want her to remain at that stage. Lust didn't last forever, not without being cultivated. He needed to use this to build into love. He was pretty sure she wasn't immune to him; she had shown signs of being swayed by his attentiveness on what was supposed to have been her wedding day.
Maybe he should continue that attentiveness, but in such a way that her newfound lust would keep him on her mind? What if he started wearing less clothing around her? Ooh, there was a swimming pool. Perhaps he should suggest them going there daily. He would wear... what word did Jack use refer to that style of male swimwear? Oh, yes, speedos. That should get Donna's attention.
Not that he wanted her to faint, or jump him like Rose had clearly been inches from trying. Just continue seeing him in a light that would lead to their marriage. He preferred that their first time together to be once they were married, but he would be happy to worship her if she ever begged him to. Which she just might if he kept pushing her buttons by tempting her that often.
Which perhaps meant he should start with something less provocative to either of them. Something on the domestic side, just to prove he could do that. He opened his mouth to suggest going to the gardens for a picnic - where he would wear jeans and a shirt and go barefoot, just to see how she'd react - when she asked a surprising question.
“Do you think Martha deserves an adventure or two?”
He blinked. “You mean as a thank you?”
“That, and what little I understood about her family suggested that she might appreciate a little escape from her life. Might help her deal better with it when we're back.”
He did not want to bring someone else into the mix. “Well, we could go back for her once she's had a few days to unwind.”
“No, she deserves to find us as soon as possible, while all our memories are fresh. Her brother's birthday party is today and it sounds like her parents aren't exactly on good terms. I got the vague impression that Martha has been the designated peacemaker and it's wearing her down. With her medical studies on top, she deserves a little break. And... it'd be fun to have a female friend here. Not that the TARDIS isn't great, but I'd like someone I don't have to translate cryptic thoughts from. Either she takes after you, or you take after her. Anyway, once you've finished taking in that spare blood, we're going to find her after the party I overheard she's to go to tonight, and then we'll offer her a chance to see some amazing things in the universe. You promised me a visit to see some historical figure, and then a trip to somewhere you've been before. How about that?”
The Doctor covered up his disappointment that Donna didn't consider his and the Old Girl's company enough. It seemed odd that his ship wasn't offended at all. Why? But he merely sighed outwardly and nodded. “Okay, it seems fair. But if you were feeling lonely I would have brought you back to Chiswick for a visit sooner.”
“It's not that. It's more than I can't explain to my friends what really happened. And I have very few people I can really call my friends. Alice, Veena, Mooki... but not really anyone else. And I can't even talk with them about this. Martha seems like she needs a friend, and I liked her.” Donna grinned suddenly. “Maybe we'll have fun ganging up on you.”
He groaned, rubbing his face as he foresaw some very uncomfortable moments coming his way. Not to mention a lack of other moments, including the swimming pool.
So it was off to give Martha that encounter she had asked about, and make her feel like she would be treated with respect. And not have to worry about keeping the peace between her family.
Although Martha's first moments aboard didn't suggest anything out of the ordinary. She acted much like many others had before, although she'd stopped still when she asked where was the rest of the crew.
Donna interjected before he could start on one of his explanations. “I'm afraid it's just the two of us for now. Well, three with you here. And I just recently got him to let me learn how to pilot this ship. Doctor, how about Martha gets a few lessons if she wants? She can learn more if she decides she wants to come along for longer than two adventures.”
His eyes looked like portholes.
He barely got that under control by the time they landed in 1598 in London. He enjoyed explaining to them how things had not really changed in the past four hundred plus years. But nothing compared to seeing their reactions when they spied the Globe. Donna had practically dragged them both into the theatre in her eagerness, although Martha needed no coaxing and the Doctor was equally excited.
Donna was a little more skeptical once the play was over. Love's Labour's Lost was an odd play. It seemed to stop at the wrong moment. Even he had to admit she was right. But it was something to see the play performed in the old ways, and Martha started the chorus of “Author!” which Donna seconded, more to hear a possible explanation for the ending.
Meeting Shakespeare himself was not quite the experience the Doctor had expected. Not that Donna didn't remind him that very few things went as he planned or expected. But that Shakespeare would soon become convinced that Donna was his wife, and flirt with Martha? Well, he perhaps should have seen the former coming, but he never imagined learning who the Dark Lady was. Martha would be able to treasure that memory for the rest of her days.
But what did Shakespeare mean when he said that he and Donna had inspired him to complete a play that had been lacking something? What could he have meant by dueling lovers?
Oh, no. He didn't mean Benedick and Beatrice, did he? Oh, he hoped Donna didn't figure that out until after she was already pregnant. It was bad enough to have to share a room with her when Martha was also there. The ladies had tried to send him to the floor, but he refused to leave Donna's side or stop talking. At least until a scream caught their attention and forced their investigation to another path.
Although learning that Queen Elizabeth considered Donna a mortal enemy and wanted her executed and him captured? He could only imagine what he and Donna would get themselves into later in life. Not that there was time to inquire since they had to run back into the TARDIS.
He promptly brought them to the future, as soon as Donna felt they'd had enough rest. However, what possessed the TARDIS to pick the very place he'd first caught sight of Donna escaped him. Until it was clear that there was a distress signal sent by the Face of Boe. And Martha was kidnapped, and Donna yelled at him for forcing her to join him in leaping from car to car. Well, it wasn't his fault that the planet had fallen apart in the thirty years following the release of the Infected, was it?!
Well, once Donna heard the story she did fault him for not sticking around long enough to give them some real advice. And for letting Rose loose, which allowed Cassandra to wreck havoc.
Still, despite what he had thought were good efforts to educate the planet, things had gone to hell. And the things beneath the surface were worse. And his friend had died.
But not before hinting something cryptic. Even by his standards. What did “You are not alone” mean? And why was the Face of Boe smiling when he said it?
To top it all, Martha insisted on hearing about where he was from, to better understand why he acted the way he did. And she asked a question Donna had yet to ask: “What was your planet like?”
So he had to sit down with them both, on the still healing New Earth, and talk of the trees and mountains he had tried sometimes to forget in the midst of his grief. He owed Martha very little except for respect - far more than she seemed to get from most of the world around her, which actually reminded him of Donna and therefore he was inclined to be kinder than she otherwise would have been owed - but Donna was owed a lot and was also more fascinated by his answers. So he promptly took them to a part of the TARDIS gardens that he had been waiting to show Donna, in the hopes of using them as a place to perhaps take their relationship into a romantic level.
He should have figured that the universe would decide he wouldn't get that chance when he wanted. Well, he would just find another path. He knew his future, and he would reach it one day.
Although the looks on their faces had been worth it. He always liked it when a companion got their horizons expanded. And Martha's words had warmed his hearts:
“There are so many terrible things out there. It's good to get to see something beautiful. Even holograms are beautiful. I just wish you could experience the real thing one more time, Doctor.”
Donna had been so overwhelmed by the Gallifreyan gardens with the views of the mountains and twin suns that she could only nod in agreement. The Doctor had to smile and nod thanks to Martha before he turned to watch the play of emotions on Donna's face.
Naturally, however, there were more interruptions to his plans: additional adventures with Martha since Donna invited her to stick around. He could have done without Donna meeting the Daleks, although she had handled herself well. So had Martha. He had to praise their courage in buying him time to disable the Dalek's control over events below.
The only thing that made it better? Martha, although she showed signs that she could easily form a crush on him, seemed to be aware of his feelings for Donna and recognized that she would be just hurting those she was starting to call her friends if she ever acted on it. Which seemed to be helping her grow up. So he supposed he was doing her some good.
But he worried about what the two talked of when they were alone. His ship wasn't giving him any clues to enlighten him about the laughter that rang more than once when he wasn't in the room. At least nothing was as embarrassing or hurtful as when Martha asked Donna the question everyone else seemed to: “Are you a couple?” Donna had denied it, as usual, but he took some comfort from the blush that accompanied it. Didn't mean it didn't sting.
So he decided it was time for another adventure. Somewhere they would both enjoy and which might give him time to impress Donna. The question was where was the least likely place for something to go wrong?
Hmm... would visiting an old friend of his do? Both ladies would enjoy the historical aspects, and his friend would ensure they had the best time possible. Perhaps even help him on his quest. Yes, that would surely work!
Chapter Three: The Dangers of Parting Ways