[ For timeforamy ; Air-Paris ]

[mmkaternater]

[ OOC: Follows this ]

There are approximately 400 billion stars in the Milky Way. A respectable number, for any galaxy. But that's small potatoes when compared to the number of stars found in the entire universe -- something like ten to the power of twenty-four -- which is a very pragmatic, comfortingly mathematical way of saying that space is big.

Really big.

Bigger than your whole town, much bigger than the little flat you have in the city, with the leaky shower head and the upstairs neighbors who like to stomp around wearing wellies filled with bricks. Space is bigger than your township, your borough, bigger than all the places you have ever been, combined and multiplied by themselves until the math makes you dizzy and you have to lie down for a while. Big. Ten to the power of twenty-four. Countless suns, all burning out in the black. Of those, maybe a little more than half have planets. Of those, approximately half have some form of life. Of those, approximately sixteen-million-five-hundred-and-forty-seven-thousand-one-hundred-and-eighty-six have intelligent life, or some variation of it. Comparatively speaking, that is a depressingly small percentage. But, then again, "intelligence" is relative, especially across star systems.

The Doctor is in the TARDIS's control room, hunched over the console, his nose inches away from a chronofribrilator feed that, apparently, requires up close and personal inspection in order for it to function properly. He's muttering to himself, soft space-themed mutter. Once in a while his eyebrows will jump, as if he's just thought of something, but then he will return to his work, subdued. He left Amy in his bed down the corridor, asleep. He does not quite know what to think about that.

He does know that he needs to take her somewhere -- somewhere spectacular -- and he needs to do it right away. What are you doing, old man? You can't honestly expect to carry this off. Not when you're not even being entirely honest with her. Not when she's only just lost her --

He hears bare feet on the catwalk above his head. "Pond!" he announces, "glad you're finally awake. Listen, we're just about to make landfall. Oh, er', well, spacefall, I suppose you could say. Air-Paris: the entire City of Lights, replicated perfectly, floating in the Sunset Constellation of Ursa Minor Minor. Sort of like Starship U.K., but with much more wine and cheese."

Comments

[timeforamy.livejournal.com]

Amy has an urge to show the Doctor just what her definition of 'peckish' entails, what with abruptly throwing her arms about his shoulders and peck repeatedly at his neck 'til he begs for her mercy. But that can wait for later and Amy isn't even certain as to whether Time Lords are ticklish.

She bounds up to the pleasant looking crepe vendor and claps her hands once, excitedly regarding him and the Doctor. "So many choices!" Her eyes are as wide as those of a girl who still believes in fairy tales and happy endings. "I don't know how I'll choose!"

Amy turns to the Doctor. "What do you think?"

[goodwithtime.livejournal.com]

The Doctor puffs his lips, as if to say, Please!, and holds up two fingers for the vendor's benefit. The pleasant-looking French crepe vendor smiles, nods, and then uses his two, long, green tentacle arms to assemble two orders of crepes. The Doctor raises his eyebrows in Amy's direction. 'Grins gamely.

[timeforamy.livejournal.com]

"Oh, so it's a surprise, is it?" Amy fixes him with a bemused raise of her eyebrows in turn, one hand perching to rest on her hip. That's part of the fun, though, when it comes to the Doctor - the art of the surprise.

[goodwithtime.livejournal.com]

Well, actually, the Doctor was referring more to the cart owner's long, tentacle arms (which are now adding dashes of spice and chopping vegetables into a fine dice) which are most certainly out of Amy's regular range of experience. But he smiles -- that big, bright number that wins him over with old church ladies (most of the time) -- and pushes his hands into his pockets.

"I surprise you, don't I? I'm full of surprises. 'Mr. Surprise-A-Lot' they used to call me." Beat. He looks sheepish. Mumbles, "No they didn't. Never called me that. Nevermind. Rubbish."

[timeforamy.livejournal.com]

"That sounds a bit like a name for a Care Bear." Amy teases him with this and her smile, the latter of which is bright. But he does surprise her, and it is something she will never grow tired of.

"You do, though. Surprise me." She pauses and then raises up on the balls of her feet, her lips touching to his cheek. It's a light kiss, but her lips are warm.

Well, can't she surprise, too?

[goodwithtime.livejournal.com]

The Doctor blushes redder than the windmill at the 42nd Century Moulin Rouge and quickly checks with the tentacled crepe vendor (who merely smiles politely, as if he has seen this all before -- 'probably has, as a matter of fact).

"Cheese?"

The Doctor starts. "Sorry -- what?"

"Would you like cheese?" the vendor tries again, barely able to control the smirk that's slowly spreading across his thin, pink cheeks.

"Yes. Kiss. Cheese, sorry --" he glances at Amy "-- cheese?"

[timeforamy.livejournal.com]

"Absolutely," Amy says, "cheese."

She's managed to make him blush and she finds the redness in his face completely endearing. This is new, this kind of flirtation between them, but she is enjoying it a great deal. He's tentative around her, and there's no reason to be - but all of that can change in time.

Amy gives the crepe vendor a bright smile.

[goodwithtime.livejournal.com]

The vendor wraps both crepes in a bit of newspaper and hands them over, holding up a narrow palm when the Doctor reaches for his pockets to pay. "Non," he says firmly, "l'amour." And he looks back and forth between Amy and the Doctor until the Doctor thinks he is going to be dizzy. "Thaaaanks," he says carefully, giving Amy's shoulder a bump when they get back onto the main thoroughfare.

"What was that?"

[timeforamy.livejournal.com]

Amy is admittedly a bit on the confused side herself, but part of her can guess as to the vendor's response. After all, l'amour falls into the realm of slight, brief French that she understood before.

"What was what?" she asks, accepting one of the crepes in her hand. The smell is delicious, she can't help but lean in for a bite before speaking anything more than that.

Nothing on Earth would ever taste this good, that's for sure.

[goodwithtime.livejournal.com]

"Oh, come off it, Pond," the Doctor retorts, eyeing her as he begins to peel the newspaper away from his own crepe, "l'amour --" he makes his eyes all moony "-- that. I've never gotten free crepes before."

[timeforamy.livejournal.com]

Now her eyes glitter and Amy regards him around a mouthful of crepe. She swallows and tucks a strand of hair behind her ear, then turns her eyes back to the Doctor's startled face.

"He thinks we're..." here she makes a tilt of her head "you know. Is that bad?"

[goodwithtime.livejournal.com]

Despite centuries of experience and a prodigious brain between his ears, it takes the Doctor a second or two to apprehend her meaning. "He thinks we're --" he glances over his shoulder "-- really? How do you know? Perhaps he's just one of those fellows who enjoys giving out free crepes."

[timeforamy.livejournal.com]

This could be, but Amy doesn't much think so. She's very convinced that she knows what she saw in the alien's features, even if they aren't features she's ever had the pleasure of seeing before. Still, she is fairly sure she knows what she saw.

"It's something a woman tends to pick up on," she says, "feelings, all that. And I did kiss you. That means something, doesn't it?"

[goodwithtime.livejournal.com]

The Doctor considers her for a moment, his expression thoughtful, green eyes watching her mouth when she presses her lips together to rid them of crepe crumbs.

"Yes," he says quietly. He then takes a gigantic bite of his own crepe, speaking around a mouthful -- "It means you're buying lunch. Come on, Pond!"

He sets out at a brisk walk, munching as he goes.

[timeforamy.livejournal.com]

I'm buying lunch? That's what my kissing him means?

For a moment Amy is completely astonished, surprised that the idea of her kissing him is a prompt for his wanting her to buy lunch. But what happened last night is still fresh in her mind, and she knows it meant something to him, too.

She keeps up with him at a fast walk, her hand tucking into the curve of his elbow.

"Yeah? Getting lunch free of charge might mean more than a kiss, you know." Her smirk is cheeky.

[goodwithtime.livejournal.com]

He shoots her an unfamiliar look -- "more?" -- before her fingers slip round his elbow and pull him back on track. "Oh look --" he pulls her toward a shopfront just off the boulevard, a large plate glass window revealing the interior of a quaint little

"-- piano bar!" the Doctor enthuses, pointing at the neat baby grand that sits in the center of the place. "Looks old, too. Earth old. That piano should be in a museum somewhere, not being made to play New Wave Yu'oal Flesh Punk Classical."

[timeforamy.livejournal.com]

Amy forgets about the idea of kissing - or more than kissing - for a few moments, when the piano comes into her line of sight. She lets out a pleased cry and lets her arm thread more comfortably through the Doctor's.

"That's beautiful!" she cries, "so antique, it's amazing! I only played a bit when I was younger, never anything too serious. Do you play?"

[goodwithtime.livejournal.com]

"A bit," the Doctor admits as she wrings his elbow, "I met Beethoven once. 'Had a bit of trouble with conversation, old Ludwig. He locked me in a cupboard for half an hour until I gave him the melody for his Ninth --"

Then, off Amy's look "-- he wrote most of it. I just, you know, hummed a few bars. Shall we go in?" He stuffs the last of the crepe into his mouth and stuffs the paper into the pocket of his coat, offering her his arm.

[timeforamy.livejournal.com]

"Did you?" Amy gives him an incredulous look, her arm slipping through his again. There is a last bite of crepe in her mouth and she chews while they walk through the large doors together.

Air-Paris is as beautiful inside as it is out, and the piano is something out of some sort of fairy tale. Amy has imagined things like this before, but never seen them.

Her palm lays against the piano's edge while they walk past. "I've never seen one this pretty before. Usually, they're just electric keyboards, you know?"

[goodwithtime.livejournal.com]

"Pianos, oh, pianos are great. I love pianos." He gives the last three notes on the keyboard a playful plinkity-plink.

"Did you know that music is universal? It's true. Search all the planets in all the star systems in the universe and there will always be some alien or other beating on a drum or singing about his homeland. Humans, especially, need music to survive and be happy, I think." He smiles thinly, remembering something. "Time Lords, too."

[timeforamy.livejournal.com]

"What was the music like on your planet?" Amy realizes now that she knows so little about the planet he calls home, and part of her wants to know a great deal more. But he is secretive and she can't blame him for it, not if there are less than pleasant memories involved.

[goodwithtime.livejournal.com]

The Doctor presses a key with the side of his thumb, softly, so that no sound comes out of the instrument. He is looking at the piano now, somewhere past Amy, his face calm and measured by sadness.

"It was very beautiful," he says quietly, touching another key with his index finger. "Sort of...strange...haunting. We had wonderful composers -- like your Mozart and Beethoven -- who created the most incredible melodies. I still hear them, sometimes, in my head, when it is very very quiet inside the TARDIS."

[timeforamy.livejournal.com]

"What do they sound like?"

Amy does not raise her voice so much as a half note's volume. She is too entranced by what he is saying and the story the words are creating. Her heart is beating a bit faster in her chest, but she is completely still. The last thing she wants is to break the sort of trance that he is in.

[goodwithtime.livejournal.com]

The Doctor does not look up, but holds his hands above the keyboard, as if warming them by the heat of potential music. "Sort of like..." he gently presses his fingertips to the keys, playing a strange yet hauntingly interesting single chord. He follows it with another. A third. At first listen, none of the three chords seem to go together. The sound is odd and discordant; a woman sitting in a corner booth even turns her nose up at the noise coming from the piano.

But the Doctor, you see, even though he does not feel the piano is giving him the full range of Gallifrey's musical structure (theirs had at least four more octaves and a couple of other strange adaptations), keeps at it and the "noise" that comes from the instrument begins to sound more and more like real music. It is, as he said, a haunting sound. 'Sort of sits at the bottom of the stomach, like grief tends to do.

[timeforamy.livejournal.com]

It is the last thing she has actually expected him to do, and yet Amy can feel nothing other than completely transfixed. He is playing the sound of a planet of which she has never been to - and likely never will - but it is beautiful, even in its sadness.

There is space to sit two on the piano bench and Amy takes it to her advantage, sinking onto the edge quietly so as not to disturb the music. Her eyes are transfixed to his face, watching with the faintest part of her lips.

It's as if he's speaking through music, something people try so hard to achieve and yet only he has managed to accomplish.