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newnumber6It's not a Yuletide submission because I didn't want to commit myself, but I did do it as something of a Christmas lark. Normally, I don't write fanfic... not that I have anything against it, but I prefer writing my own stuff. Still, normally I also take a vacation from writing during December. This time an old fanficy idea of mine cropped up while I was on my writing vacation and yet still in the mood to write.
In doing so, I realized the other reason I don't write fanfic... it's hard. In different ways than other kind of writing... making decisions about what perspective to use, how much to assume the audience knows and how much needs to be described, etc. Struggling with the balance between relaying information already known or relying too much on their knowledge is pretty annoying, I much prefer ones where I can decide everything myself. Still, once in a while, it is fun...
So, this story, well, it's more an extended gag, based on a regular conversation![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
locker_monster have about the lack of Canadian content in Doctor Who, especially since one of its co-creators was a Canadian. So, this story contains a lot of references to Canadiana (although some of them might well have been exported). Try to spot them all!
I whipped this up on the quick, with no betas, so it's a little rough, but what the heck, I'll share it...
Title: Banned From Canada
Fandom: Doctor Who
Word Count: Roughly 3800.
Disclaimer: Doctor Who is owned by the people who own Doctor Who. Other references are owned by other people. I'm just playing with them.
Spoilers: Possible slight spoilers for "The Big Bang", and for Canadian TV shows that are no longer with us.
Amy Pond strolled into the TARDIS main control room, her husband Rory on her arm, ready for another trip. She'd gotten tired of floating in the cold dark void of space--or perhaps in the Time Vortex. She didn't really know, or care. What mattered was after their last adventure in Andromeda, they'd stayed inside long enough for her to become restless, and when the Doctor called them out from their room, she knew he'd felt the same. “So, where do we go today?” Amy asked.
The Doctor smiled, seeming as eager to go somewhere as anybody, but not providing any options. He was like that, sometimes... having experienced so much time and space himself, the excitement of others kept things interesting. “Let's let Rory choose one today,” he suggested, then focused his attention on the slightly bewildered looking man.
“Me? I wouldn't know what to choose...”
“Don't think about it too much. In fact, don't even think at all. When I point at you, just say the first thing that comes into your mind, no matter how outrageous or impossible or silly, somewhere in the universe, we'll find it.” His arm hung in the air, pointing up, and then he dropped it to aim squarely at Rory. “And now.”
“Um... Canada?”
The Doctor blinked a few times over the next second, as though he couldn't quite place the name, and then the smile returned. “Excellent. New Canada. Lovely planet. Well, cold. Three habitable planets in the system and they chose to colonize the farthest from the sun.” He furrowed his brow in puzzlement, then clapped his hands together and cheered again. “But, still, Time Lords tolerate the cold even better than Canadians, and overall it's quite lovely. In the summer, the tropics get almost as warm as Cardiff. Of course, summer only comes once every three years, so you may need scarves." The momentarily pensive look that crossed his face melted almost instantly back into the childlike excitement. "Don't worry, I have plenty.”
Rory opened his mouth and hesitated like the words were caught in his throat, and Amy knew he was deciding whether to make an issue of it. Finally, he decided he would. “No, I meant, actual Canada. You know, on Earth. I just thought maybe it would be nice to go somewhere where we're not fighting for our lives.”
“Fair enough,” the Doctor said with a nod. “How about Prince Edward Island, late nineteenth century. We can see the place that inspired the Anne of Green Gables novels, maybe meet the author herself.”
“That's not really what I had in mind,” Rory said.
Without even thinking, Amy said, “Let's not dismiss the idea out of hand.”
Rory's brow raised in mild surprise. “Really?”
Amy shrugged uncomfortably, seeming suddenly embarrassed at showing such obvious interest in what seemed like a thoroughly ordinary trip compared to some of their recent adventures. “It's just that I really loved that book as a kid.”
The Doctor gave a smug little smirk and his eyes twinkled knowingly. “I thought you might.”
Snark replaced embarrassment. “Yes, the little redheaded orphan girl loved the book about a little redheaded orphan girl finding a family. It's not exactly rocket science.” And Amy wasn't exactly an orphan, not any more, but she still had memories from the timeline in which she was. In truth, she liked the book in both timelines. Everyone has their lonely outcast phase.
Rory's head shook in a restrained way, like he was frustrated but trying not to show it, covering it with an resigned smile. “Fine, we can go there if you want.”
The Doctor sprang into motion, bouncing about from different sections of the console, prepping the TARDIS for flight, but Amy raised a hand. “We're doing it again, Doctor, running roughshod over Rory. This was supposed to be Rory's choice, not mine. Where did you want to go?”
Her husband relaxed. He was happy to put Amy's feelings above his own, most, but it felt good to be listened to, validated. Growing bolder, he said, “When I chose Canada, I wasn't thinking about another planet, or a hundred years ago, I was thinking something much closer to modern day...”
Amy quirked a smile and said, “You were, were you? All of time and space, and you choose somewhere we could fly to on holiday. That's so... you.” She kissed him lightly on the cheek, then circled around the console looking at the various doohickeys. “Not that I'm trying to talk you out of it, but... why? I mean, really, Canada?”
“What's wrong with Canada? I've got relatives in Canada...”
“So do I,” Amy said. “The McKays, I think. Second or third cousins. I've never met them, I just remember the boy's name was Meredith and he's a scientist or something.” Very briefly, they considered sending Amy there when her parents died, at least in one of the several realities rolling around in her head. She shrugged, regaining her train of thought. “But everybody's got relatives in Canada, if they look hard enough.”
“I don't,” said the Doctor, looking, just for a moment, impossibly sad as he stared into the TARDIS console.
The only was Rory could think to get his mind off the topic was to keep going with what he wanted to say. “One of those Canadian relatives is my cousin, and we talk now and then. In fact, he was actually in the Vancouver Olympics, as a speed skater. I wanted to see him compete, but at the time, we were in the middle of planning our wedding...”
“You never mentioned him.”
“Yes, well, I'd just gotten you to agree to marry me, and we were watching something about speed skating on the telly, and you made a comment about how they were hot.”
“Oh, please, as though I'd leave you for some... speed skater.”
“I didn't want to take any chances. You'd never said nurses are hot.”
Amy took a step towards her husband, closing the gap between them to kissing distance. “I'm sure I have, but just in case, allow me to correct that oversight. Nurses are very, very hot.” She pressed her lips against those of her slightly befuddled-looking husband, and then turned towards the Doctor. “So, that's settled, we'll do Green Gables another time, right now, let's go to the 2010 Olympics.”
Strangely, the Doctor stood still, his chin jutting out like he was chewing on something particularly tough. “You sure I can't interest you in New Canada? They have a dish there, poutine, that they have refined over the centuries to such perfection that they consider it a basic right of all sentient life to be able to try some. Not to mention they have an incredible entertainment industry... in fact, you know, their chief export, besides poutine, is talent. Actors, musicians, and for some reason, starship captains and engineers, some of the best come from New Canada...”
“No, I don't want to go to New Canada.” Rory interrupted, beginning to suspect something was up. “Is there something wrong with the original Canada?”
“That's a very big question, isn't it?” the Doctor asked. “And I suppose it depends on your perspective.”
“What's wrong, Doctor?” Amy teased. “Do you not know how to get there or something?”
“Of course I do, I've been to Canada dozens of times." He shifted into storyteller mode, as he sometimes did, dropping hints of other adventures that would have seemed like tall tales if it was anyone other than the Doctor. "I rescued a prominent Canadian scientist from Zygons, saved a Toronto school from an invasion by Autons, and even played in a small-town hockey game for the fate of the solar system.”
“But...”
With a little sigh, he admitted it. “I'm not supposed to visit Canada, at least between the mid-twentieth century and the end of the twenty-first.”
Until that moment, Amy didn't think there was anything left about the Doctor that might have surprised her. “You're... banned from Canada?” A surprised laugh burst out halfway through the realization.
The Time Lord spoke quickly, defensively. “No, not banned. I can't be banned. If I want to go somewhere, I go.”
“Except for Canada.”
“How do you even get banned from Canada?” Amy asked. "Their stereotype is politeness."
"I'm not sure it's a just a stereotype. When I first started nursing, one of the first people I had to draw blood from was a lovely woman from Canada. I had to jab her three times, and there I was, leaving bruises on this poor woman's arm, terrified I was going to get fired... and she actually apologized, to me, for having such hard to find veins." Rory still shook his head at wonderment at the memory, then looked to the Doctor, as though suspicious that 'not being liked by Canadians' was evidence that everything they believed about his good intentions was wrong. "What could you possibly do that would make them ban you?"
“I wasn't banned,” the Doctor repeated emphatically. Then, while holding one inner edge of his tweed lapel in each hand, straightening the jacket in an attempt to restore some small amount of dignity, added in a much smaller, almost ashamed, voice, “It's just that I was asked not to return, and I agreed to respect that request.”
“By who? The Canadian government?”
“Please, I never listened to my own government, much less anybody else's.”
“Then who?”
The Doctor stopped, looked up into the light at the top of the console. “Canada has a protector, an alien, much like me." His eyes darted to his companions, one end of his lips curled up into a smile. "Well, not much like me, nobody's quite like me, but he's a bit of a wanderer who adopted Canada and looks out for it. We've... butted heads a few times. Nothing but respect for one another, but he's a little territorial and he asked me not to come back while he was there, and I agreed.” The Doctor brightened a little. “Of course, by 2010, that would have been some time ago. He's probably changed... I know I have... yes, this would be a perfect time to try and make amends. Now let's see if we can track him down.”
A few minutes later, subjectively, the three stepped through the doors of the old British police box, into an alley between two buildings, within sight of the street. The Doctor took several striding steps into that street, took a deep breath, then looked around.
“So where exactly are we?” Amy asked, squinting at the change in the level of brightness compared to the inside of the TARDIS. It was a bright, blue-skied day. A little chilly, but at least the weather was comfortable enough for her while she wore her red sweater.
“Canada, of course.”
“Canada's one of the biggest countries in the world. Could you maybe narrow it down to a city?”
“I'm not sure, I just told the TARDIS to home in on his psychic signature.”
“Then how do you know we're actually in Canada? You said he was a traveler.”
“If there's one thing I know for sure, it's... well, there are many things I know for sure, but of them, the one that's most pertinent right now, is that this is Canada. Just look at it. Look how Canadian everything is!”
Amy and Rory looked around. There were no flags in evidence, nothing that screamed Canada to a tourist. All they could be certain was, it wasn't quite Britain. “Actually, this looks like it could stand in for pretty much any North American city,” Rory said finally.
The Doctor smiled triumphantly. “Exactly.”
“That makes no sense,” Amy said.
“Wait,” Rory said. “I think I've spotted something Canadian.” He pointed. “Tim Hortons. That's a big deal here, isn't it? My cousin visited London a few years back, he went on and on about how he missed it.”
“Yes,” the Doctor said distractedly, scanning the street as he walked. “In fact, on New Canada, there's an entire city named after the franchise, on scenic Timbit Island. Now, my counterpart should be here somewhere. The last time I landed within ten miles of him, he was waiting for me. Said he sensed the TARDIS coming three days before.” Suddenly the Doctor grinned as he checked out a deserted street while they crossed. He stopped in mid-stride, his companions nearly bumping into him. “Oh, there he is.”
There didn't seem to be anybody there on the street at all, just a dog, a German Shepherd but with unusual coloring, with a black and very light brown, nearly white, coat and a reverse mask pattern. It sat staring at them, but it was the only animal or human nearby. “Hello,” the Doctor said, tugging at his bow-tie like he was trying to impress somebody. “You remember me, don't you? New face, I know, but that never fooled you before.”
“Do you think he's talking to the dog,” Amy whispered to Rory, “or some kind of invisible monster?”
“With what we've seen, neither would surprise me.”
The Doctor approached the animal, knelt down in front of it, but at a safe distance. “Now, I know what you're going to say, but I think it's time we mended fences. I've kept my word and stayed away so far.” The dog barked, as though it had some quarrel with that, and the Doctor held up a hand. “No, no, no. I have.” Another bark, and the Doctor's subsequent response sounded even more indignant. “I'm not lying, and I'm not saying you are either.” His voice softened, became conciliatory. “I'm sure you have sensed me more than a few times over the years. But as I've explained to you before, I travel in space and time. You can't blame me for breaking a deal before I've made it, at least from my perspective. I've only landed in Canada once since we last met, and that was strictly a drop-off. One of their citizens somehow managed to launch his car into orbit and crash into a historical research satellite from the future. He's just lucky the Nano-Cybernetic computer was the 3000 model, and wanted human company. Even you,” he said, pointing at the animal for emphasis, “can't begrudge me answering the distress call it sent before returning to its own time.”
“He's definitely talking to the dog,” Amy decided. “Or he's just gone mad.”
“Again, with what we've seen, neither would surprise me.”
The conversation continued, although it seemed pretty one-sided. The dog communicated mainly in head tilts and expressive eyes, ears, and tail. Except for those first two barks, the Doctor was the only one who spoke aloud. “In my defense, usually when you've got large, conspicuous aliens wandering around in a small town and nobody seems to care, it means hypnosis and mind control and invasion. How was I to know those Ice Warriors had been living peacefully in the Northwest Territories for years?" A pause, and he said, "Yes, I know they call it Nunavut now, lovely name, but this was in the Twentieth Century, and for most people on Earth, even in this era, celebrating diversity doesn't include seven-foot tall reptilians from Mars. I thought informing UNIT was only prudent. I was trying to save lives.” The dog just stared. “Fine, if you want me to say it, I'll say it. I made a mistake. One mistake.” He sighed. “Okay, two mistakes. But even you have to admit, after I discovered that the Sasquatch wasn't a robot working for the Great Intelligence, I did all right by him. I even kept that... that beachcomber fellow from trying to hunt him down. And we've had some good times, haven't we? We stopped that black oil monster that came out of the tar sands and started possessing people. Things got a little strained there, but we saved the planet. Together. And remember K-9? If you two could get along, surely we can.”
Finally, Amy couldn't resist any longer, and came to kneel beside the Time Lord. “Doctor?”
“Yes, Amy, this is...” he hesitated, and then said, “well, his kind doesn't really use names of their own.”
“It's...” Amy started, but then corrected herself. She'd learned by now things weren't what they seemed. The Doctor, after all, looked human. “It looks like a dog.”
“It is a dog,” the Doctor said. “A dog bonded symbiotically to a telepathic wandering intelligence. Make no mistake, this dog is smarter than your husband.”
“So it can understand me?”
“Yes. Unfortunately he can only talk to people who are good receptors... the very old, the very young, the mad, and those with a developed telepathic talent. I tick three out of four, so he comes through clear as a bell. But even if you can't hear him, he understands everything you say.” The Doctor addressed the dog directly. “This is Amy Pond. And that...” He looked back to Rory, who raised his hand at the wrist to give a little wave, before the Doctor continued, “is Rory. They're my current traveling companions.” The Doctor smiled ruefully. “He says he won't hold that against you.”
It felt a little weird talking to a dog, but Amy thought the best thing to do would be to treat him like a person... even if that meant flattering him shamelessly. “Hi there. Look, I'm not sure what went on between the two of you, but from what the Doctor's told us, you're a noble spirit, always thinking of others before yourself, even though there's nowhere you quite fit in. He says you want nothing more to protect anyone in trouble, that you've got a strong sense of justice. He says you weren't from here originally, but that even though you're a wanderer by nature, you've adopted this land and work tirelessly to defend it. And I'm happy to meet someone like that, because that sounds like the kind of person the world could use more of. It also sounds a lot like this man, right here.” She pointed at the Doctor. “Oh, sure he makes mistakes, and between you and me, sometimes he's a little insufferable, but I've never known him to let his ego stop him from giving somebody a second chance, or even a third one.”
The dog watched Amy throughout her speech, and finally, he seemed to relax, his head turning away as he licked his nose. “He says he likes you.” The dog looked back to the Doctor for a moment, and the man grinned. “And that he doesn't mind if I travel in Canada.” The cheer evaporated moments later as he continued the relay. “As long as I give him three Canadian character references as good as yours.”
“Character references?” Rory asked, a little disbelieving.
The Doctor shook his head at the question, stood up and started pacing. “No, wait, this will be easy. First, Doctor Suzuki, I'm sure he'd vouch for me, even if he still doubts what I told him about the Ogopogo. There's Detective William Murdoch.” He bit his lip, realizing the problem. “No, we uncovered that Rutan agent back in the 1890s, I suppose that's a little out of the time frame. The kids from Degrassi, they loved me... except I had a different face then and they didn't so much love me... in fact, to them I'm probably just the weird substitute science teacher who created a plastic-liquifying gas that ruined a lot of their stuff.” The pacing stopped, and the Doctor raised a finger. “A-ha, LaCroix. Helping a depressed Haemogoth variant get off the red stuff has to count for something. That means I just need one more... and I have two. I should have thought of them first, my favourite Canadian companions... my only Canadian companions so far, Tom and Annie Edison.” Suddenly, the Doctor frowned. “What do you mean they don't count?” he cried indignantly.
The German Shepherd wagged his tail and let his tongue loll out of his mouth again, and the Doctor's face softened. “Oh, I see. You're playing with me. Yes, I'd forgotten your sense of humour.” The Doctor knelt down once again and spoke softly. “All joking aside, are we okay? I won't stomp all over your territory, I've got a lot of other places to go, but it would be nice to visit Canada now and again.” Finally, the dog rose a single paw and extended it outward. The Doctor shook it as though it were a hand. “Brilliant. Thank you. You won't regret this. I won't take up any more of your time, we'll be on our way. Unless.... you know, there's plenty of room in my TARDIS. If you'd like to come with us for a while... no need to pack, we'll travel light, that's hobo-style.” The German Shepherd sat down in silence, then got up again and turned away. “I understand. I don't want to keep you.”
“I never expected somebody would turn down an offer to travel in the TARDIS,” Amy said, standing up as the Doctor did, watching as the dog walked down the side street all alone.
“He has very important business.”
“Why, what's he doing?”
“He's waiting for a young man to get off school... he's helping him gain the courage to follow his dream.” Upon seeing Amy's puzzled expression, he said, “It's not all saving the universe you know, sometimes the small stories are more important.”
They turned back the way they came. On their way to the TARDIS, Amy couldn't resist asking, “So, this Tom and Annie Edison...”
“Yes?”
“Who's the cooler married couple, me and Rory, or them?”
“Oh, you two, of course.”
She smiled. “You're not just saying that?”
“No question about it.” He grinned at her slyly. “They're not married. Twins. Brilliant kids, in both senses of the word. They used their own knowledge of physics to divert a damaged generation starship that was plunging into a sun, while I was busy fighting off this robotic arm....” He stopped mid-story, and mid-stride, as he observed something that probably should have happened a little more often than it actually did. Somebody was outside the TARDIS, fiddling with the door.
He was a small, white-haired man with glasses, dressed casually with dark slacks and a beige jacket over a blue golf shirt. On his head, he had a green hat. “Can I help you?” the Doctor asked.
The man turned to them, a mix of confusion and anger on his face. “I'm trying to figure out how to use this newfangled police call box, call my friend Davis, tell him this vacation he won for me and Emma sucks. The hotel doesn't even have Magic Fingers.”
“I'm afraid you'll have to use a regular phone for that." The Doctor subtly insinuated himself between the stranger and the blue door.
“Why?” the man asked impatiently. “The sign says Free for use of Public. Well, I'm the public, and Davis is a cop.”
“I'm sorry, but you can't call your friend on this.”
“Just who the hell do you think you are, telling me what I can't do? You young kids think you know it all with your BlackBerries and your Wookiepedias. Well, I know a lot too. I know my taxes paid for this thing.”
“No they didn't!”
“More than yours did!” the man yelled.
Rory stepped in from behind the man, putting a hand on his shoulder and speaking in a gentle voice. “What he means to say is, you can't use this box, it's out of order. We're here to repair it. Right Doctor?” The Doctor smiled and nodded.
The man repositioned his glasses on his face than looked at it. “Figures. The government finally does something right and they screw it up.” He stepped away, enough for the three who belonged in the TARDIS to push open the door and step inside. The man left outside watched, then shouted, “Hey, geniuses, you flubbed the sign, too! It says pull to open!” He shook his head. “Jackasses.”
Inside of the box, where it was far bigger than the outside, the Doctor danced around the TARDIS console, getting things ready for departure, holding off just long enough for the passerby outside to wander off. There didn't need to be any more stories of disappearing objects. “Now if we're going to the Winter Olympics, we'll need toques. I'm sure I have a few in the wardrobe. Rory, be a dear and go fetch them for me.”
“What's a toque?” Amy and Rory asked simultaneously.
“Wooly caps. Or bobble hats, if they've got one of those bobbles on top, but don't take the red and white toque with the bobble, that one's mine.”
Amy pictured him in a hat like that, still wearing his tweed jacket and bow-tie and felt an intense need to talk him out of it. “I thought Time Lords didn't care about the cold. Do you even need to wear a... toque?” The word still felt wrong to her, even when she said it, like she had stopped talking and just started made a random sound.
“I don't need to wear a toque, I want to wear a toque. Toques are cool.”
Fin.
In conclusion, I should totally write for Doctor Who! And the Doctor should totally come to Canada. And I'm tempted to go work on more 'My Own Canon' Runaways issues summaries so I guess the fanfic-ish urge isn't completely wiped out from this.
Edit:locker_monster shooped up a pic of 11 wearing a toque, so naturally I have to include it. :)
In doing so, I realized the other reason I don't write fanfic... it's hard. In different ways than other kind of writing... making decisions about what perspective to use, how much to assume the audience knows and how much needs to be described, etc. Struggling with the balance between relaying information already known or relying too much on their knowledge is pretty annoying, I much prefer ones where I can decide everything myself. Still, once in a while, it is fun...
So, this story, well, it's more an extended gag, based on a regular conversation
locker_monster have about the lack of Canadian content in Doctor Who, especially since one of its co-creators was a Canadian. So, this story contains a lot of references to Canadiana (although some of them might well have been exported). Try to spot them all!I whipped this up on the quick, with no betas, so it's a little rough, but what the heck, I'll share it...
Title: Banned From Canada
Fandom: Doctor Who
Word Count: Roughly 3800.
Disclaimer: Doctor Who is owned by the people who own Doctor Who. Other references are owned by other people. I'm just playing with them.
Spoilers: Possible slight spoilers for "The Big Bang", and for Canadian TV shows that are no longer with us.
Amy Pond strolled into the TARDIS main control room, her husband Rory on her arm, ready for another trip. She'd gotten tired of floating in the cold dark void of space--or perhaps in the Time Vortex. She didn't really know, or care. What mattered was after their last adventure in Andromeda, they'd stayed inside long enough for her to become restless, and when the Doctor called them out from their room, she knew he'd felt the same. “So, where do we go today?” Amy asked.
The Doctor smiled, seeming as eager to go somewhere as anybody, but not providing any options. He was like that, sometimes... having experienced so much time and space himself, the excitement of others kept things interesting. “Let's let Rory choose one today,” he suggested, then focused his attention on the slightly bewildered looking man.
“Me? I wouldn't know what to choose...”
“Don't think about it too much. In fact, don't even think at all. When I point at you, just say the first thing that comes into your mind, no matter how outrageous or impossible or silly, somewhere in the universe, we'll find it.” His arm hung in the air, pointing up, and then he dropped it to aim squarely at Rory. “And now.”
“Um... Canada?”
The Doctor blinked a few times over the next second, as though he couldn't quite place the name, and then the smile returned. “Excellent. New Canada. Lovely planet. Well, cold. Three habitable planets in the system and they chose to colonize the farthest from the sun.” He furrowed his brow in puzzlement, then clapped his hands together and cheered again. “But, still, Time Lords tolerate the cold even better than Canadians, and overall it's quite lovely. In the summer, the tropics get almost as warm as Cardiff. Of course, summer only comes once every three years, so you may need scarves." The momentarily pensive look that crossed his face melted almost instantly back into the childlike excitement. "Don't worry, I have plenty.”
Rory opened his mouth and hesitated like the words were caught in his throat, and Amy knew he was deciding whether to make an issue of it. Finally, he decided he would. “No, I meant, actual Canada. You know, on Earth. I just thought maybe it would be nice to go somewhere where we're not fighting for our lives.”
“Fair enough,” the Doctor said with a nod. “How about Prince Edward Island, late nineteenth century. We can see the place that inspired the Anne of Green Gables novels, maybe meet the author herself.”
“That's not really what I had in mind,” Rory said.
Without even thinking, Amy said, “Let's not dismiss the idea out of hand.”
Rory's brow raised in mild surprise. “Really?”
Amy shrugged uncomfortably, seeming suddenly embarrassed at showing such obvious interest in what seemed like a thoroughly ordinary trip compared to some of their recent adventures. “It's just that I really loved that book as a kid.”
The Doctor gave a smug little smirk and his eyes twinkled knowingly. “I thought you might.”
Snark replaced embarrassment. “Yes, the little redheaded orphan girl loved the book about a little redheaded orphan girl finding a family. It's not exactly rocket science.” And Amy wasn't exactly an orphan, not any more, but she still had memories from the timeline in which she was. In truth, she liked the book in both timelines. Everyone has their lonely outcast phase.
Rory's head shook in a restrained way, like he was frustrated but trying not to show it, covering it with an resigned smile. “Fine, we can go there if you want.”
The Doctor sprang into motion, bouncing about from different sections of the console, prepping the TARDIS for flight, but Amy raised a hand. “We're doing it again, Doctor, running roughshod over Rory. This was supposed to be Rory's choice, not mine. Where did you want to go?”
Her husband relaxed. He was happy to put Amy's feelings above his own, most, but it felt good to be listened to, validated. Growing bolder, he said, “When I chose Canada, I wasn't thinking about another planet, or a hundred years ago, I was thinking something much closer to modern day...”
Amy quirked a smile and said, “You were, were you? All of time and space, and you choose somewhere we could fly to on holiday. That's so... you.” She kissed him lightly on the cheek, then circled around the console looking at the various doohickeys. “Not that I'm trying to talk you out of it, but... why? I mean, really, Canada?”
“What's wrong with Canada? I've got relatives in Canada...”
“So do I,” Amy said. “The McKays, I think. Second or third cousins. I've never met them, I just remember the boy's name was Meredith and he's a scientist or something.” Very briefly, they considered sending Amy there when her parents died, at least in one of the several realities rolling around in her head. She shrugged, regaining her train of thought. “But everybody's got relatives in Canada, if they look hard enough.”
“I don't,” said the Doctor, looking, just for a moment, impossibly sad as he stared into the TARDIS console.
The only was Rory could think to get his mind off the topic was to keep going with what he wanted to say. “One of those Canadian relatives is my cousin, and we talk now and then. In fact, he was actually in the Vancouver Olympics, as a speed skater. I wanted to see him compete, but at the time, we were in the middle of planning our wedding...”
“You never mentioned him.”
“Yes, well, I'd just gotten you to agree to marry me, and we were watching something about speed skating on the telly, and you made a comment about how they were hot.”
“Oh, please, as though I'd leave you for some... speed skater.”
“I didn't want to take any chances. You'd never said nurses are hot.”
Amy took a step towards her husband, closing the gap between them to kissing distance. “I'm sure I have, but just in case, allow me to correct that oversight. Nurses are very, very hot.” She pressed her lips against those of her slightly befuddled-looking husband, and then turned towards the Doctor. “So, that's settled, we'll do Green Gables another time, right now, let's go to the 2010 Olympics.”
Strangely, the Doctor stood still, his chin jutting out like he was chewing on something particularly tough. “You sure I can't interest you in New Canada? They have a dish there, poutine, that they have refined over the centuries to such perfection that they consider it a basic right of all sentient life to be able to try some. Not to mention they have an incredible entertainment industry... in fact, you know, their chief export, besides poutine, is talent. Actors, musicians, and for some reason, starship captains and engineers, some of the best come from New Canada...”
“No, I don't want to go to New Canada.” Rory interrupted, beginning to suspect something was up. “Is there something wrong with the original Canada?”
“That's a very big question, isn't it?” the Doctor asked. “And I suppose it depends on your perspective.”
“What's wrong, Doctor?” Amy teased. “Do you not know how to get there or something?”
“Of course I do, I've been to Canada dozens of times." He shifted into storyteller mode, as he sometimes did, dropping hints of other adventures that would have seemed like tall tales if it was anyone other than the Doctor. "I rescued a prominent Canadian scientist from Zygons, saved a Toronto school from an invasion by Autons, and even played in a small-town hockey game for the fate of the solar system.”
“But...”
With a little sigh, he admitted it. “I'm not supposed to visit Canada, at least between the mid-twentieth century and the end of the twenty-first.”
Until that moment, Amy didn't think there was anything left about the Doctor that might have surprised her. “You're... banned from Canada?” A surprised laugh burst out halfway through the realization.
The Time Lord spoke quickly, defensively. “No, not banned. I can't be banned. If I want to go somewhere, I go.”
“Except for Canada.”
“How do you even get banned from Canada?” Amy asked. "Their stereotype is politeness."
"I'm not sure it's a just a stereotype. When I first started nursing, one of the first people I had to draw blood from was a lovely woman from Canada. I had to jab her three times, and there I was, leaving bruises on this poor woman's arm, terrified I was going to get fired... and she actually apologized, to me, for having such hard to find veins." Rory still shook his head at wonderment at the memory, then looked to the Doctor, as though suspicious that 'not being liked by Canadians' was evidence that everything they believed about his good intentions was wrong. "What could you possibly do that would make them ban you?"
“I wasn't banned,” the Doctor repeated emphatically. Then, while holding one inner edge of his tweed lapel in each hand, straightening the jacket in an attempt to restore some small amount of dignity, added in a much smaller, almost ashamed, voice, “It's just that I was asked not to return, and I agreed to respect that request.”
“By who? The Canadian government?”
“Please, I never listened to my own government, much less anybody else's.”
“Then who?”
The Doctor stopped, looked up into the light at the top of the console. “Canada has a protector, an alien, much like me." His eyes darted to his companions, one end of his lips curled up into a smile. "Well, not much like me, nobody's quite like me, but he's a bit of a wanderer who adopted Canada and looks out for it. We've... butted heads a few times. Nothing but respect for one another, but he's a little territorial and he asked me not to come back while he was there, and I agreed.” The Doctor brightened a little. “Of course, by 2010, that would have been some time ago. He's probably changed... I know I have... yes, this would be a perfect time to try and make amends. Now let's see if we can track him down.”
A few minutes later, subjectively, the three stepped through the doors of the old British police box, into an alley between two buildings, within sight of the street. The Doctor took several striding steps into that street, took a deep breath, then looked around.
“So where exactly are we?” Amy asked, squinting at the change in the level of brightness compared to the inside of the TARDIS. It was a bright, blue-skied day. A little chilly, but at least the weather was comfortable enough for her while she wore her red sweater.
“Canada, of course.”
“Canada's one of the biggest countries in the world. Could you maybe narrow it down to a city?”
“I'm not sure, I just told the TARDIS to home in on his psychic signature.”
“Then how do you know we're actually in Canada? You said he was a traveler.”
“If there's one thing I know for sure, it's... well, there are many things I know for sure, but of them, the one that's most pertinent right now, is that this is Canada. Just look at it. Look how Canadian everything is!”
Amy and Rory looked around. There were no flags in evidence, nothing that screamed Canada to a tourist. All they could be certain was, it wasn't quite Britain. “Actually, this looks like it could stand in for pretty much any North American city,” Rory said finally.
The Doctor smiled triumphantly. “Exactly.”
“That makes no sense,” Amy said.
“Wait,” Rory said. “I think I've spotted something Canadian.” He pointed. “Tim Hortons. That's a big deal here, isn't it? My cousin visited London a few years back, he went on and on about how he missed it.”
“Yes,” the Doctor said distractedly, scanning the street as he walked. “In fact, on New Canada, there's an entire city named after the franchise, on scenic Timbit Island. Now, my counterpart should be here somewhere. The last time I landed within ten miles of him, he was waiting for me. Said he sensed the TARDIS coming three days before.” Suddenly the Doctor grinned as he checked out a deserted street while they crossed. He stopped in mid-stride, his companions nearly bumping into him. “Oh, there he is.”
There didn't seem to be anybody there on the street at all, just a dog, a German Shepherd but with unusual coloring, with a black and very light brown, nearly white, coat and a reverse mask pattern. It sat staring at them, but it was the only animal or human nearby. “Hello,” the Doctor said, tugging at his bow-tie like he was trying to impress somebody. “You remember me, don't you? New face, I know, but that never fooled you before.”
“Do you think he's talking to the dog,” Amy whispered to Rory, “or some kind of invisible monster?”
“With what we've seen, neither would surprise me.”
The Doctor approached the animal, knelt down in front of it, but at a safe distance. “Now, I know what you're going to say, but I think it's time we mended fences. I've kept my word and stayed away so far.” The dog barked, as though it had some quarrel with that, and the Doctor held up a hand. “No, no, no. I have.” Another bark, and the Doctor's subsequent response sounded even more indignant. “I'm not lying, and I'm not saying you are either.” His voice softened, became conciliatory. “I'm sure you have sensed me more than a few times over the years. But as I've explained to you before, I travel in space and time. You can't blame me for breaking a deal before I've made it, at least from my perspective. I've only landed in Canada once since we last met, and that was strictly a drop-off. One of their citizens somehow managed to launch his car into orbit and crash into a historical research satellite from the future. He's just lucky the Nano-Cybernetic computer was the 3000 model, and wanted human company. Even you,” he said, pointing at the animal for emphasis, “can't begrudge me answering the distress call it sent before returning to its own time.”
“He's definitely talking to the dog,” Amy decided. “Or he's just gone mad.”
“Again, with what we've seen, neither would surprise me.”
The conversation continued, although it seemed pretty one-sided. The dog communicated mainly in head tilts and expressive eyes, ears, and tail. Except for those first two barks, the Doctor was the only one who spoke aloud. “In my defense, usually when you've got large, conspicuous aliens wandering around in a small town and nobody seems to care, it means hypnosis and mind control and invasion. How was I to know those Ice Warriors had been living peacefully in the Northwest Territories for years?" A pause, and he said, "Yes, I know they call it Nunavut now, lovely name, but this was in the Twentieth Century, and for most people on Earth, even in this era, celebrating diversity doesn't include seven-foot tall reptilians from Mars. I thought informing UNIT was only prudent. I was trying to save lives.” The dog just stared. “Fine, if you want me to say it, I'll say it. I made a mistake. One mistake.” He sighed. “Okay, two mistakes. But even you have to admit, after I discovered that the Sasquatch wasn't a robot working for the Great Intelligence, I did all right by him. I even kept that... that beachcomber fellow from trying to hunt him down. And we've had some good times, haven't we? We stopped that black oil monster that came out of the tar sands and started possessing people. Things got a little strained there, but we saved the planet. Together. And remember K-9? If you two could get along, surely we can.”
Finally, Amy couldn't resist any longer, and came to kneel beside the Time Lord. “Doctor?”
“Yes, Amy, this is...” he hesitated, and then said, “well, his kind doesn't really use names of their own.”
“It's...” Amy started, but then corrected herself. She'd learned by now things weren't what they seemed. The Doctor, after all, looked human. “It looks like a dog.”
“It is a dog,” the Doctor said. “A dog bonded symbiotically to a telepathic wandering intelligence. Make no mistake, this dog is smarter than your husband.”
“So it can understand me?”
“Yes. Unfortunately he can only talk to people who are good receptors... the very old, the very young, the mad, and those with a developed telepathic talent. I tick three out of four, so he comes through clear as a bell. But even if you can't hear him, he understands everything you say.” The Doctor addressed the dog directly. “This is Amy Pond. And that...” He looked back to Rory, who raised his hand at the wrist to give a little wave, before the Doctor continued, “is Rory. They're my current traveling companions.” The Doctor smiled ruefully. “He says he won't hold that against you.”
It felt a little weird talking to a dog, but Amy thought the best thing to do would be to treat him like a person... even if that meant flattering him shamelessly. “Hi there. Look, I'm not sure what went on between the two of you, but from what the Doctor's told us, you're a noble spirit, always thinking of others before yourself, even though there's nowhere you quite fit in. He says you want nothing more to protect anyone in trouble, that you've got a strong sense of justice. He says you weren't from here originally, but that even though you're a wanderer by nature, you've adopted this land and work tirelessly to defend it. And I'm happy to meet someone like that, because that sounds like the kind of person the world could use more of. It also sounds a lot like this man, right here.” She pointed at the Doctor. “Oh, sure he makes mistakes, and between you and me, sometimes he's a little insufferable, but I've never known him to let his ego stop him from giving somebody a second chance, or even a third one.”
The dog watched Amy throughout her speech, and finally, he seemed to relax, his head turning away as he licked his nose. “He says he likes you.” The dog looked back to the Doctor for a moment, and the man grinned. “And that he doesn't mind if I travel in Canada.” The cheer evaporated moments later as he continued the relay. “As long as I give him three Canadian character references as good as yours.”
“Character references?” Rory asked, a little disbelieving.
The Doctor shook his head at the question, stood up and started pacing. “No, wait, this will be easy. First, Doctor Suzuki, I'm sure he'd vouch for me, even if he still doubts what I told him about the Ogopogo. There's Detective William Murdoch.” He bit his lip, realizing the problem. “No, we uncovered that Rutan agent back in the 1890s, I suppose that's a little out of the time frame. The kids from Degrassi, they loved me... except I had a different face then and they didn't so much love me... in fact, to them I'm probably just the weird substitute science teacher who created a plastic-liquifying gas that ruined a lot of their stuff.” The pacing stopped, and the Doctor raised a finger. “A-ha, LaCroix. Helping a depressed Haemogoth variant get off the red stuff has to count for something. That means I just need one more... and I have two. I should have thought of them first, my favourite Canadian companions... my only Canadian companions so far, Tom and Annie Edison.” Suddenly, the Doctor frowned. “What do you mean they don't count?” he cried indignantly.
The German Shepherd wagged his tail and let his tongue loll out of his mouth again, and the Doctor's face softened. “Oh, I see. You're playing with me. Yes, I'd forgotten your sense of humour.” The Doctor knelt down once again and spoke softly. “All joking aside, are we okay? I won't stomp all over your territory, I've got a lot of other places to go, but it would be nice to visit Canada now and again.” Finally, the dog rose a single paw and extended it outward. The Doctor shook it as though it were a hand. “Brilliant. Thank you. You won't regret this. I won't take up any more of your time, we'll be on our way. Unless.... you know, there's plenty of room in my TARDIS. If you'd like to come with us for a while... no need to pack, we'll travel light, that's hobo-style.” The German Shepherd sat down in silence, then got up again and turned away. “I understand. I don't want to keep you.”
“I never expected somebody would turn down an offer to travel in the TARDIS,” Amy said, standing up as the Doctor did, watching as the dog walked down the side street all alone.
“He has very important business.”
“Why, what's he doing?”
“He's waiting for a young man to get off school... he's helping him gain the courage to follow his dream.” Upon seeing Amy's puzzled expression, he said, “It's not all saving the universe you know, sometimes the small stories are more important.”
They turned back the way they came. On their way to the TARDIS, Amy couldn't resist asking, “So, this Tom and Annie Edison...”
“Yes?”
“Who's the cooler married couple, me and Rory, or them?”
“Oh, you two, of course.”
She smiled. “You're not just saying that?”
“No question about it.” He grinned at her slyly. “They're not married. Twins. Brilliant kids, in both senses of the word. They used their own knowledge of physics to divert a damaged generation starship that was plunging into a sun, while I was busy fighting off this robotic arm....” He stopped mid-story, and mid-stride, as he observed something that probably should have happened a little more often than it actually did. Somebody was outside the TARDIS, fiddling with the door.
He was a small, white-haired man with glasses, dressed casually with dark slacks and a beige jacket over a blue golf shirt. On his head, he had a green hat. “Can I help you?” the Doctor asked.
The man turned to them, a mix of confusion and anger on his face. “I'm trying to figure out how to use this newfangled police call box, call my friend Davis, tell him this vacation he won for me and Emma sucks. The hotel doesn't even have Magic Fingers.”
“I'm afraid you'll have to use a regular phone for that." The Doctor subtly insinuated himself between the stranger and the blue door.
“Why?” the man asked impatiently. “The sign says Free for use of Public. Well, I'm the public, and Davis is a cop.”
“I'm sorry, but you can't call your friend on this.”
“Just who the hell do you think you are, telling me what I can't do? You young kids think you know it all with your BlackBerries and your Wookiepedias. Well, I know a lot too. I know my taxes paid for this thing.”
“No they didn't!”
“More than yours did!” the man yelled.
Rory stepped in from behind the man, putting a hand on his shoulder and speaking in a gentle voice. “What he means to say is, you can't use this box, it's out of order. We're here to repair it. Right Doctor?” The Doctor smiled and nodded.
The man repositioned his glasses on his face than looked at it. “Figures. The government finally does something right and they screw it up.” He stepped away, enough for the three who belonged in the TARDIS to push open the door and step inside. The man left outside watched, then shouted, “Hey, geniuses, you flubbed the sign, too! It says pull to open!” He shook his head. “Jackasses.”
Inside of the box, where it was far bigger than the outside, the Doctor danced around the TARDIS console, getting things ready for departure, holding off just long enough for the passerby outside to wander off. There didn't need to be any more stories of disappearing objects. “Now if we're going to the Winter Olympics, we'll need toques. I'm sure I have a few in the wardrobe. Rory, be a dear and go fetch them for me.”
“What's a toque?” Amy and Rory asked simultaneously.
“Wooly caps. Or bobble hats, if they've got one of those bobbles on top, but don't take the red and white toque with the bobble, that one's mine.”
Amy pictured him in a hat like that, still wearing his tweed jacket and bow-tie and felt an intense need to talk him out of it. “I thought Time Lords didn't care about the cold. Do you even need to wear a... toque?” The word still felt wrong to her, even when she said it, like she had stopped talking and just started made a random sound.
“I don't need to wear a toque, I want to wear a toque. Toques are cool.”
Fin.
In conclusion, I should totally write for Doctor Who! And the Doctor should totally come to Canada. And I'm tempted to go work on more 'My Own Canon' Runaways issues summaries so I guess the fanfic-ish urge isn't completely wiped out from this.
Edit:
locker_monster shooped up a pic of 11 wearing a toque, so naturally I have to include it. :)
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no subject
Date: 2011-12-21 01:42 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-12-21 09:10 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-12-21 01:52 am (UTC)And you worked in a reference to Stargate Atlantis. Hee, Amy's related to McKay. New Canada needs to be a planet on Doctor Who, stat. We so would settle on the coldest planet. :-)
I'm totally convinced that The Littlest Hobo was an alien. I saw one ep where this guy was trying to capture the dog and it managed to briefly hypnotize the guy's assistant.
You also get bonus marks for working in references to Corner Gas, Murdoch Mysteries and Degrassi. I think I might have missed a reference or two. You need to do a master reference list. ;-)
Did the TARDIS land in Vancouver?
"I don't need to wear a toque, I want to wear a toque. Toques are cool."
You've inspired me to make this into an image.
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Date: 2011-12-21 02:30 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-12-21 10:25 am (UTC)There was definitely something not right about the Littlest Hobo. There was even a clip show type episode (though I can't recall if it was actually a clip show or just contained references) where scientists were collecting all the strange dog reports and thought it was a new subspecies of super-dog before they realized it was all one dog. I think that's part of what made me think "He's an alien!" There was also an episode where an old guy seemed to not just talk to him like a person, but understand him (to the point of predicting what he was going to do because 'he told me').
I deliberately was vague on which city the TARDIS actually landed in, so you could imagine it was any city. Although it would be a little odd for them to land in Vancouver and then take off again for the Vancouver Olympics (well, I guess it would be a strictly time trip). I personally thought of it as landing in Toronto during the fall before.
And the master reference list, in order, including really vague and indirect ones:
1. The reference to Andromeda was actually just thrown in as a reference tothe TV show.
2. New Canada of course in reference to Canada's cold-weather-reputation (and I believe they did mention somewhere that Time Lords are more cold-tolerant).
3. PEI/Anne of Green Gables
4. Amy being related to the McKays.
5. Vancouver Olympics!
6. Actors, musicians, and for some reason, starship captains and engineers, some of the best come from New Canada.. Well, we've got a grand tradition of actors and musicians getting exported, and of course, the Captain and Engineer of both Enterprise and Serenity were Canadian actors (not to mention smaller shows... Andromeda had a Canadian engineer).
7. I'll skip the other adventures since they get a more detailed reference later, but the 'hockey game for the fate of the solar system' was just thrown in so I could include a reference to hockey.
8. "Actually, this looks like it could stand in for any North American city" - a reference to our film industry of course, where Toronto or Vancouver fill in for pretty much any city required. Also, the lack of a definable 'Canadian Identity'.
9. Tim Hortons, of course. Although there actually is a Tim Hortons in London now, and apparently several in Ireland, I figured it was plausible enough that Rory's cousin couldn't find one, considering they weren't on every corner.
10. The big one, the one that inspired the whole fic, The Littlest Hobo
11. Prisoners of Gravity. The Nano-Cybernetic computer is his computer assistant NanCy. I just couldn't let Commander Rick stay up there without a rescue.
12. Ice Warriors aren't Canadian, but let's face it, if they were going to settle anywhere, a small town in the Canadian north is prime territory.
13. Sasquatch, not quite purely Canadian, but certainly partly Canadian, and if there was a Sasquatch adventure, the Doctor would at least SUSPECT the Great Intelligence/Yeti connection.
14. The reference to a 'beachcomber' hunting him, well, there's The Beachcombers. Actually, I've never managed to see more than a few seconds of any episodes, so I had to trust that at least one character would go hunting Sasquatch if they heard about one.
continued because apparently the comment's too long.
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Date: 2011-12-21 10:25 am (UTC)16. David Suzuki
17. Ogopogo. Oddly, I had the Zygons/David Suzuki connection from the beginning, but only remembered that the Zygons tried to use the Loch Ness Monster, and therefore they might try the same with Ogopogo, when I was editing.
18. The Murdoch Mysteries
19. Degrassi (And they start episodes with "A Playing In Time Production"... come on! Technically it could have been any version of Degrassi, but I thought of it as the 80s ones.
20. LaCroix from Forever Knight. I like to imagine that after the tragic end of the series LaCroix might seek his own redemption.
21. The Edison Twins, perfect companions to the Doctor. Why, they even saved the ship from...
22. The Starlost... the Generation ship plunging into the sun. And it had a
23. Rogue Canadarm that the Doctor had to fight.
24. Cameo by Oscar Leroy from Corner Gas and his favorite catchphrase.
25. BlackBerry.
26. Toques. The line about Amy finding the word unfamiliar, like she'd just stopped talking words and started making sounds is actually a reference to a Brent Butt comedy bit that I can't find a clip of.
I think that's it. You should see the list of references I couldn't fit in! :)
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Date: 2011-12-21 07:19 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-12-21 09:12 pm (UTC)It's possible I flubbed up and that by the ending of the series they weren't heading towards the sun anymore (one of the episode guides I read implied that the ship might have been taken off course in one episode but never addressed how this might or might not impact the "heading for the sun" subplot that drives the whole series), but I figure, hey, sooner or later, they'll be headed for another sun.
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Date: 2011-12-21 09:15 pm (UTC)Happy you enjoyed the story though!