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rabid1stIt's FRAKKING HUGE! And exhausting...and will hurt your brain.
But...okay...let's see now. Someone asked, in comments, if I could illuminate my thinking about Gallifreyan/Time Lord sexuality as it is laid out in Disheveled. Sort of shine a light on the unseen, underwater part of the iceberg.
So...here goes...and understand that while I consider canon when I write (and there will be footnotes to show you how I consider it)...this isn't what I expect canon to present to us or anything...this is only my interpretation for Disheveled. If/When I write another fic I could give the Gallifreyans a whole different history.
But in the Disheveled Universe...it goes down like this:
In the beginning, Gallifrey was a hostile planet. It was so hostile, in fact, that the developing species evolved with all sorts of temporal and spatial sensory adaptations(a). These adaptations were, no doubt, survival mechanisms allowing the fittest of the fit to pass on genetic preferences. On Earth, speed, hearing. thumbs and socialization were important...but on Gallifrey the ability to see around corners, tell the composition of a substance by taste and take merciless advantage of your environment became genetically hardwired. Over time, an intelligent species evolved, one that could utilize the temporal adaptations of other species like the TARDIS cores for even greater survival advantage.
These primitive people would one day give rise to the Time Lords. But first...they had a problem. They were so good at survival in this hostile world they became excessively ruthless. Personal survival meant knowing better than to trust another Gallifreyan. Because if it was to his (or her) advantage to do so another Gallifreyan would take your woman, your TARDIS and your little mechanical dog, too. This bred in some interesting anti-social tendencies(b). Males and females were much more equal in ferocity, for example. The females had no need of protection and were quite literally deadlier than the male. So the species became wary even of each other. They weren't social animals like apes(c)...but were, instead, loners...like polar bears or tigers.
So, they developed telepathy, initially, to create some level of trust. A male encroaching on a female's territory...was in genuine danger of being killed by her...and used for some awful scientific experiment (d). So...he would inject her with a specially adapted poison (the dreaming seed)...one that allowed him to make more direct contact with her mind. Via this link...he would be completely open to her. She would be able to trust him and he would be able to trust her. They could also learn if they were compatible. If they both liked torturing little animals or whatever(e). If they were compatible...then a more serious union would develop (this became True Union...a long term telepathic link). They would essentially join forces to produce and protect children, giving the children a better chance to make it to adulthood.
Yes, civilization had many survival advantages, too, but it demanded they work together. In fact, survival of the species demanded SOME level of cooperation. What to do? What to do? The Gallifreyans again relied on their mental abilities (intelligence & telepathy) to link together into clans(f). And they created a caste society to avoid having the most powerful kill off the less powerful, but still necessary, working class. The most adept Gallifreyans...the most ruthless, most mentally gifted, most temporally aware...became Time Lords. And they focused their energy outward...into conquering time. They could bond with a TARDIS...they could take the simple regenerative abilities of their species and learn to concentrate it to defeat death.
The others, the less gifted Gallifreyans muddled along at more menial levels of society. But unlike in the more ruthless past...they were allowed to coexist with the more adept. Order, caste systems...took care of the competition. The most fit...became Time Lords and could go out in search of more territory...more adaptive technology...a bit of personal space (say...a solar system to themselves). Time Lord Expansion...Empire building, as it were, took on elements of godhood (g). Unlike humans who went to the stars in groups and blended with the alien societies, Time Lords went alone...and set up their own little private kingdoms. They even brought their particular alien worshipers back home and set them against each other in gladiator-like competitions (h) to see who had the best worshipers.
Eventually, Rassilon put a stop to all of that by creating the WRIT(in my universe)...and had it and a lot of other things named after him (in canon). He realized that the Time Lords couldn't keep messing around with the universe, recreating it in their own image every afternoon before tea...because everyone had their own preferences...and eventually time and space would unravel. So Rassilon roped in all his little doggies and said..."Look...we are going to have some rules and a govenment to vote on what needs changing around here."
That is he roped ALMOST everyone in...save a few very individual souls...like the Doctor and the Master and the Rani and Morbius and the War Cheif. All of whom went out into the universe to play god...in their own way. In this, the Doctor is no better than any of his primitive ancestors (he's a renegade Time Lord, just like the ones he fights) because "if you are looking for a higher authority...there isn't one"...and because he's adopted the humans and goes around impressing them with his magnificence and kidnapping their women. But he's mostly a benign pseudo-god...with a sense of humor about himself (I tend to think of him as Cupid with Rose as his Psyche...if you know the myth I mean). Still, I'm not sure Rassilon would approve of him.
Comes the end of the world. The Doctor acting as a Time Lord...with no honorable sense of attachment to anything...but only a sense of what is right for the wellbeing of the universe as a whole...makes the decision that destroys his world, his people. Does he do it alone? I would say...yes. In canon, I would say he acted alone and that haunts him because maybe he WAS playing god. But maybe, I'm wrong and he had the full support of the council. It hardly matters. What matters is...the writ...the rules of Rassilon...went up in smoke. Gallifreyans are mortal beings (in some sense of the word) and they did have families and clans and some attachment to each other. And now that's all gone. A Time Lord finally got what all of them yearned for...sole right to EVERYTHING. And he's lonely.
He was always lonely though...so he can deal with that. But he's not sure he can deal with the lack of meaning in his life and the guilt he feels...and the sense of having no ties at all...no sense of himself in relation to anything or anyone else. So off he goes to Barcelona to end it all, because when he's dead the extinction will be complete. He figures...why draw out the inevitable? And there...he meets Rose(i)...and finds life may have some meaning still for him. When he leaves Barcelona he goes in search of her. Finds her again. But...he has no way of knowing if he's mad or if everything he's ever believed about his people just isn't true. Long ago he rejected the code of non-interference. And he can't really say if that was a good thing or a bad one. He, also, rejected the idea that Time Lords were solitary by inclination. He made friends, and learned to love them. Now, he is poised to reject the idea that Time Lords are solitary by necessity...because when they become attached to something, deeply and wholeheartedly, they warp the universe to have their godlike way (j).
So, to sum up...the Doctor felt the stirrings of love for Rose when he had sex with her as Nine on Barcelona. He sought her out...because he had to know more about her. Because he is naturally curious and because he was needy. She turned out to be everything he needed. And he easily fell in love with her...he became deeply enchanted but also was very aware of the dangers and was holding back. Then, he faced his old enemy the Daleks...and Rose fought by his side...the way a true companion would. And the Doctor felt the instinctive, primitive rush of passion that would make him aroused. He dies...and regenerates in a form to please her. A form that is likely to get him laid...if you will. But he's still not sure exactly how you go about bonding, since that whole processes is frowned upon in his culture in general...but even more so for a Time Lord.
In other words...and ordinary Gallifreyan could marry a human...and just be considered...aberrant...but a Time Lord takes an oath to set all personal attachment aside. And indeed...is trained and even BRED to not even begin to consider that sort of relationship. But the Doctor believes he IS feeling aroused by Rose. And he believes she wants him...so he figures...what the heck...let's give this a try. And it works...he has the first sexual response with her. And then...it works even more...and they have a true union. Well...basic Gallifreyan biology is...after you have your mate...you have a child.
So he asks Rose about joining their lives and bloodlines and she seems okay with it. But it turns out she's NOT. She doesn't want to have children...had no expectation they were anywhere NEAR that point. Largely because before humans are comfortable with starting a family...they need love and security and loyalty and affection and trust and stability and all of the things Gallifreyans have bypassed since time began...by simply doing that True Union thing. The Doctor knows for sure that Rose is the girl for him...but...only because his biology told him so...and his biology...is the one thing his CULTURE has taught him to distrust.(k)
WHEW!
I hope that is clear now...here are the footnotes for my canon basis. Again, not saying this is the only interpretation...just that this is the case I'm using for Disheveled.
a) take the Doctor sensing a “storm coming” in Fear, Her or saying he could see “all that is, all that was, all that ever will be” in Parting of the Ways. Also, licking things to learn their composition.
b) old school...tells us the Time Lords...the most successful members of their society...are isolationists...and can't even trust each other...Rassilon for example sets up an elaborate way to remove anyone who wants immortality from the society...something we were told may well have been self-serving as it also removed Rassilon's strongest competition for sole rulership.
c) the Doctor's interest in humanity is often ridiculed...and he is chided for taking people along with him...and he didn't seem too happy with the idea of passenger's himself at first...see An Unearthly Child.
d) and also e) the line drawn through the Rani...and the Master...and Morbius and the Inquisitor and pretty much any Time Lord we've met other than the Doctor, Romana and those happy at home on Gallifrey.
f) old school...in the Deadly Assassins and Five Doctors and other places...we know that the Time Lords are linked via the matrix and in other ways psychically. And that they have a clan and caste system of some sort.
g) Omega, the Rani, the Master and even the Doctor have set themselves up as minor god figures. Over and over again...with the War Chief and others we run into this tendency and we almost never hear about the great sweep of a Gallifreyan Empire...maybe there was one...but mostly we hear about them meddling individually.
h) the Five Doctors...the death zone.
i) Suicide Blonde...though it will be fundamentally different in particulars in Disheveled.
j) the Doctor has shown over and over that he's rejected Time Lord society. He's run away from it. Sneered at it. And he interferes and is a law unto himself...he says in Resurrection of the Daleks that he left Gallifrey because he grew tired of their lifestyle after Tegan rejects his lifestyle as too unfeeling.
k) which brings us to where we are right now in Disheveled. The Doctor and Rose poised to discover if Gallifreyans are capable of human tenderness and love or if they only mimic it as an adaptive response. Andred, a Gallifreyan guard and Susan...both apparently fall in love...but we don't know if either of them were Time Lords or just Gallifreyan...nor do we have any idea if their relationships worked out or not. Maybe they, too, struggled with sex for the pleasure of it. And making the human feel loved.
Le Pant! Le Gasp! Le Faint!
But...okay...let's see now. Someone asked, in comments, if I could illuminate my thinking about Gallifreyan/Time Lord sexuality as it is laid out in Disheveled. Sort of shine a light on the unseen, underwater part of the iceberg.
So...here goes...and understand that while I consider canon when I write (and there will be footnotes to show you how I consider it)...this isn't what I expect canon to present to us or anything...this is only my interpretation for Disheveled. If/When I write another fic I could give the Gallifreyans a whole different history.
But in the Disheveled Universe...it goes down like this:
In the beginning, Gallifrey was a hostile planet. It was so hostile, in fact, that the developing species evolved with all sorts of temporal and spatial sensory adaptations(a). These adaptations were, no doubt, survival mechanisms allowing the fittest of the fit to pass on genetic preferences. On Earth, speed, hearing. thumbs and socialization were important...but on Gallifrey the ability to see around corners, tell the composition of a substance by taste and take merciless advantage of your environment became genetically hardwired. Over time, an intelligent species evolved, one that could utilize the temporal adaptations of other species like the TARDIS cores for even greater survival advantage.
These primitive people would one day give rise to the Time Lords. But first...they had a problem. They were so good at survival in this hostile world they became excessively ruthless. Personal survival meant knowing better than to trust another Gallifreyan. Because if it was to his (or her) advantage to do so another Gallifreyan would take your woman, your TARDIS and your little mechanical dog, too. This bred in some interesting anti-social tendencies(b). Males and females were much more equal in ferocity, for example. The females had no need of protection and were quite literally deadlier than the male. So the species became wary even of each other. They weren't social animals like apes(c)...but were, instead, loners...like polar bears or tigers.
So, they developed telepathy, initially, to create some level of trust. A male encroaching on a female's territory...was in genuine danger of being killed by her...and used for some awful scientific experiment (d). So...he would inject her with a specially adapted poison (the dreaming seed)...one that allowed him to make more direct contact with her mind. Via this link...he would be completely open to her. She would be able to trust him and he would be able to trust her. They could also learn if they were compatible. If they both liked torturing little animals or whatever(e). If they were compatible...then a more serious union would develop (this became True Union...a long term telepathic link). They would essentially join forces to produce and protect children, giving the children a better chance to make it to adulthood.
Yes, civilization had many survival advantages, too, but it demanded they work together. In fact, survival of the species demanded SOME level of cooperation. What to do? What to do? The Gallifreyans again relied on their mental abilities (intelligence & telepathy) to link together into clans(f). And they created a caste society to avoid having the most powerful kill off the less powerful, but still necessary, working class. The most adept Gallifreyans...the most ruthless, most mentally gifted, most temporally aware...became Time Lords. And they focused their energy outward...into conquering time. They could bond with a TARDIS...they could take the simple regenerative abilities of their species and learn to concentrate it to defeat death.
The others, the less gifted Gallifreyans muddled along at more menial levels of society. But unlike in the more ruthless past...they were allowed to coexist with the more adept. Order, caste systems...took care of the competition. The most fit...became Time Lords and could go out in search of more territory...more adaptive technology...a bit of personal space (say...a solar system to themselves). Time Lord Expansion...Empire building, as it were, took on elements of godhood (g). Unlike humans who went to the stars in groups and blended with the alien societies, Time Lords went alone...and set up their own little private kingdoms. They even brought their particular alien worshipers back home and set them against each other in gladiator-like competitions (h) to see who had the best worshipers.
Eventually, Rassilon put a stop to all of that by creating the WRIT(in my universe)...and had it and a lot of other things named after him (in canon). He realized that the Time Lords couldn't keep messing around with the universe, recreating it in their own image every afternoon before tea...because everyone had their own preferences...and eventually time and space would unravel. So Rassilon roped in all his little doggies and said..."Look...we are going to have some rules and a govenment to vote on what needs changing around here."
That is he roped ALMOST everyone in...save a few very individual souls...like the Doctor and the Master and the Rani and Morbius and the War Cheif. All of whom went out into the universe to play god...in their own way. In this, the Doctor is no better than any of his primitive ancestors (he's a renegade Time Lord, just like the ones he fights) because "if you are looking for a higher authority...there isn't one"...and because he's adopted the humans and goes around impressing them with his magnificence and kidnapping their women. But he's mostly a benign pseudo-god...with a sense of humor about himself (I tend to think of him as Cupid with Rose as his Psyche...if you know the myth I mean). Still, I'm not sure Rassilon would approve of him.
Comes the end of the world. The Doctor acting as a Time Lord...with no honorable sense of attachment to anything...but only a sense of what is right for the wellbeing of the universe as a whole...makes the decision that destroys his world, his people. Does he do it alone? I would say...yes. In canon, I would say he acted alone and that haunts him because maybe he WAS playing god. But maybe, I'm wrong and he had the full support of the council. It hardly matters. What matters is...the writ...the rules of Rassilon...went up in smoke. Gallifreyans are mortal beings (in some sense of the word) and they did have families and clans and some attachment to each other. And now that's all gone. A Time Lord finally got what all of them yearned for...sole right to EVERYTHING. And he's lonely.
He was always lonely though...so he can deal with that. But he's not sure he can deal with the lack of meaning in his life and the guilt he feels...and the sense of having no ties at all...no sense of himself in relation to anything or anyone else. So off he goes to Barcelona to end it all, because when he's dead the extinction will be complete. He figures...why draw out the inevitable? And there...he meets Rose(i)...and finds life may have some meaning still for him. When he leaves Barcelona he goes in search of her. Finds her again. But...he has no way of knowing if he's mad or if everything he's ever believed about his people just isn't true. Long ago he rejected the code of non-interference. And he can't really say if that was a good thing or a bad one. He, also, rejected the idea that Time Lords were solitary by inclination. He made friends, and learned to love them. Now, he is poised to reject the idea that Time Lords are solitary by necessity...because when they become attached to something, deeply and wholeheartedly, they warp the universe to have their godlike way (j).
So, to sum up...the Doctor felt the stirrings of love for Rose when he had sex with her as Nine on Barcelona. He sought her out...because he had to know more about her. Because he is naturally curious and because he was needy. She turned out to be everything he needed. And he easily fell in love with her...he became deeply enchanted but also was very aware of the dangers and was holding back. Then, he faced his old enemy the Daleks...and Rose fought by his side...the way a true companion would. And the Doctor felt the instinctive, primitive rush of passion that would make him aroused. He dies...and regenerates in a form to please her. A form that is likely to get him laid...if you will. But he's still not sure exactly how you go about bonding, since that whole processes is frowned upon in his culture in general...but even more so for a Time Lord.
In other words...and ordinary Gallifreyan could marry a human...and just be considered...aberrant...but a Time Lord takes an oath to set all personal attachment aside. And indeed...is trained and even BRED to not even begin to consider that sort of relationship. But the Doctor believes he IS feeling aroused by Rose. And he believes she wants him...so he figures...what the heck...let's give this a try. And it works...he has the first sexual response with her. And then...it works even more...and they have a true union. Well...basic Gallifreyan biology is...after you have your mate...you have a child.
So he asks Rose about joining their lives and bloodlines and she seems okay with it. But it turns out she's NOT. She doesn't want to have children...had no expectation they were anywhere NEAR that point. Largely because before humans are comfortable with starting a family...they need love and security and loyalty and affection and trust and stability and all of the things Gallifreyans have bypassed since time began...by simply doing that True Union thing. The Doctor knows for sure that Rose is the girl for him...but...only because his biology told him so...and his biology...is the one thing his CULTURE has taught him to distrust.(k)
WHEW!
I hope that is clear now...here are the footnotes for my canon basis. Again, not saying this is the only interpretation...just that this is the case I'm using for Disheveled.
a) take the Doctor sensing a “storm coming” in Fear, Her or saying he could see “all that is, all that was, all that ever will be” in Parting of the Ways. Also, licking things to learn their composition.
b) old school...tells us the Time Lords...the most successful members of their society...are isolationists...and can't even trust each other...Rassilon for example sets up an elaborate way to remove anyone who wants immortality from the society...something we were told may well have been self-serving as it also removed Rassilon's strongest competition for sole rulership.
c) the Doctor's interest in humanity is often ridiculed...and he is chided for taking people along with him...and he didn't seem too happy with the idea of passenger's himself at first...see An Unearthly Child.
d) and also e) the line drawn through the Rani...and the Master...and Morbius and the Inquisitor and pretty much any Time Lord we've met other than the Doctor, Romana and those happy at home on Gallifrey.
f) old school...in the Deadly Assassins and Five Doctors and other places...we know that the Time Lords are linked via the matrix and in other ways psychically. And that they have a clan and caste system of some sort.
g) Omega, the Rani, the Master and even the Doctor have set themselves up as minor god figures. Over and over again...with the War Chief and others we run into this tendency and we almost never hear about the great sweep of a Gallifreyan Empire...maybe there was one...but mostly we hear about them meddling individually.
h) the Five Doctors...the death zone.
i) Suicide Blonde...though it will be fundamentally different in particulars in Disheveled.
j) the Doctor has shown over and over that he's rejected Time Lord society. He's run away from it. Sneered at it. And he interferes and is a law unto himself...he says in Resurrection of the Daleks that he left Gallifrey because he grew tired of their lifestyle after Tegan rejects his lifestyle as too unfeeling.
k) which brings us to where we are right now in Disheveled. The Doctor and Rose poised to discover if Gallifreyans are capable of human tenderness and love or if they only mimic it as an adaptive response. Andred, a Gallifreyan guard and Susan...both apparently fall in love...but we don't know if either of them were Time Lords or just Gallifreyan...nor do we have any idea if their relationships worked out or not. Maybe they, too, struggled with sex for the pleasure of it. And making the human feel loved.
Le Pant! Le Gasp! Le Faint!
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(no subject)
Date: 2007-01-24 04:48 am (UTC)One thing I did want to comment on was this:
The Doctor acting as a Time Lord...with no honorable sense of attachment to anything...but only a sense of what is right for the wellbeing of the universe as a whole...makes the decision that destroys his world, his people. Does he do it alone? I would say...yes. In canon, I would say he acted alone and that haunts him because maybe he WAS playing god.
Yes! I have always felt this is how it was. Simply from his "I made it happen!" reaction to the Dalek. There's a tinge of madness there that says he wasn't in a calm, collected and premeditated place when the genocide happened.
I think these insights into your story are very helpful. And I have to say, I'm really impress with how fleshed out the backstory is.
Okay, off to re-read. :)
I, too, get the feeling he was anything but calm...
Date: 2007-01-24 06:53 am (UTC)I'm glad you found this essay helpful...as I told Platypus...I think I put more effort into this than I did in actually creating the universe...the concept just sort of comes to me...and I check it for flaws (in a sort of minimalist fashion) and off I go writing my story. But since I refer back to it time and again in the story...it does have some deeper reasoning behind it.
Enjoy your rereading...I'm off to write smut, myself.
Rae
Re: I, too, get the feeling he was anything but calm...
Date: 2007-01-24 12:38 pm (UTC)This makes me squee. :)
It's good to know that some of us
Date: 2007-01-24 01:21 pm (UTC)And just because you squeed...I shall tell you that when I woke up this morning I was right in the middle of an unbelievably yummy Christopher Eccleston dream (not a daily...or even monthly occurrence, I assure you, as my dreams tend to be far less entertaining).
Hmmmm! This must mean I need to write more Nine Smut! OR...I don't know...maybe it's a sign I need to find the unisex dressing room where my dream CE hangs out and try on lacy lingerie while I wait for him to pop in and seduce me.
Tomaytoe...Tomahtoe...
:snicker:
Rae
You know...I put more thought into writing this out...
Date: 2007-01-24 06:47 am (UTC)Also, like I said...you don't have to jive with this take on Time Lords..it's Disheveled canon not the real one. I'm sure a real old school nerd...the kind who can name all of the items belonging to Rassilon and tell you how they are used and in what episode they appeared...would find loads of fault in this theory and tons of loopholes for other interpretations, too. I can think of a few myself. But nothing I can easily recall contradicts this theory. So, it works for me.
One thing I've noticed about writers...we are a lazy lot...we get an idea...we do a few fact checks...we're off to the races. Which explains why real fans are always going to cons and asking questions that make the writers go..."OH...really? Huh? I forgot about that...whoops!" And then the fan tears at his/her hair and goes "But IT'S CANON!"
As for how Suicide Blonde fits in...we will touch on it but not explore it in Disheveled. Since it was more boring in Disheveled than in it's own little universe. However, we will deal with the why and how parts of it in Chapter 17. And thrown for a loop does about sum up Rose at this moment.
Rae
(no subject)
Date: 2007-01-24 02:27 pm (UTC)It's wonderful, though! And thank you for the footnotes. I haven't seen old school Who for so long that I am *definitely* rusty. But as soon as I read your references, I went "Oh yeaaahhh...I remember that now!". You've woven together the oftentimes excruciatingly inconsistent DW history into a narrative that makes complete sense. Is it canon? Probably not (but hell, canon isn't canon half the time!) Does that matter? Not to me!
I have thoughts on where the Doctor and Rose are at this moment, but I'll put them into my response to the chapter. ;)
Oooo...looking forward to hearing your thoughts...
Date: 2007-01-25 02:37 pm (UTC)And that is wise...because this last chapter is essential only half the thought process...they've made it only partway around the circle. There's no mistaking TSP was a major turning point for them...but my feeling is that in canon...after TSP, we got a very small sliver of their lives shown to us. I think the AoG montage at the beginning and that whole story about the Doctor and Elton's Mother...tells us many, many things are going on that we aren't seeing...lots of adventures happened...and I think lots of time passed, too. I think that would have been completely obvious to everyone if the PTB's had only left in the hand-holding scene from AoG. That scene tells us loads...though it is the SAME thing that Jackie kissing him like she does tells us.
Basically, that the Doctor is part of Rose...the son-in-law.
Rae
Did I really want to read this?
Date: 2007-01-24 02:53 pm (UTC)I'm always intrigued by a writer's thought process, and being allowed a peek into the backstory for a fic's universe is like... well, sipping on a starbucks. Mmm. Actually, I'm waiting for my coworker to get back with my white chocolate mocha, so I'm a bit preoccupied with Starbucks at the moment.
Anyways, I found myself nodding at a lot of this. I can't claim to be the most knowledgable about old school canon, but the origins of Gallifreyan mating and the subsequent aversion to companionship makes a lot of sense, especially when mirrored with the Doctor's reaction to his and Rose's developing relationship.
I recently re-read all of Disheveled (yes, I'm that crazy), so this was a good companion piece to help flesh out some of the reasons for why the Doctor behaves as he does.
~Kat
who actually has *gasp* more fanart (albeit a bit more simplistic) for you, this time for an earlier chapter... will post it in a Rae-only post this evening. :)
Well...it's gratifying to know...
Date: 2007-01-25 02:42 pm (UTC)And I think really...the only way to remain sane in a universe like that...is to not get too committed to any outcome...person...or place. It's very zen. However, the Doctor is in a very interesting position...being indeed...alone. And that pretty much tosses his culture's philosophy out the TARDIS outer door.
Oh...off to see if I have a picture up. Squee. I love prezzies.
Rae
who privately thinks you spoil me...but I'm not against that. ;->
(no subject)
Date: 2007-01-24 05:56 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-01-24 09:19 pm (UTC)Anyway, on to the essay...
I liked the narrative of Gallifreyan biology. Though I must admit, I'm curious about the female sexual response. Females are often the determinant to how often sex occurs, whether that is through going into heat or other social strictures. That the males were conditioned to only engage in sex for procreation, seems to indicate that the females didn't enjoy sex. And yet, the story of Omega suggests that the males enjoyed sex--i.e. the quest for orgasm. Omega clearly enjoyed it enough to seek partners that also could enjoy it. Though it seems he also had the "only to mate/breed" idea ingrained in his brain, as it took his companion to come up with the jaumalia solution. That suggests birth control wasn't needed in Gallifreyan society. But if the boys play on other planets...
Actually, I think you've implied that Omega wasn't the only Gallifreyan to spread his seed, though he may be the most notorious. Would it be wrong to guess that only or primarily male Gallifreyans dallied with other species? This would seem to be an encouraging thing for the prospects of the Doctor's and Rose's relationship.
So, did Gallifreyan females enjoy sex in your Disheveled canon?
Other bits...
"...and kidnapping their women." Bwahahahaha. I'm sure the Doctor might object to that characterization, no matter what grain of truth might be in there.
Ya know, I start these things off with just a measly little observation and the comment grows and grows and grows. Sheesh!
Excellent question about the females.
Date: 2007-01-25 01:23 am (UTC)Put another way...could we have a female Doctor sometime...because he's not really male at all?
However, for the purposes of Disheveled...I am rejecting that idea and I am giving the Time Lords two sexes and I would say that the female was the stronger of the two sexes as she not only bore children but also didn't have those protective barbs...OR...possibly she has real poison in her barbs and not some kind of drugged cocktail. Leela was a very war-like female and she managed to land a Gallifreyan...and the Doctor gets turned on initial by a Rose that could kick some serious behind.
I think...basically...the males are the more emotional ones, the more sensitive ones in this society. Certainly the Rani, Flavia, the original Romana and the Inquisitor all bear the idea of very powerful females out. And therefore, yes, it is possible that the females are far more pragmatic about sex than the males. Probably overall though...in Time Lord society...sex isn't a big part of the plan...nature tends to take steps to control predator populations and the Gallifreyans are predators.
If pressed...I would say the females respond sexually to new people...and their true companions but not because sex is particularly pleasurable for them. I think it must be more pleasurable for the male...simply because he is actively seeking a female...but honestly...we don't know, yet, that sex IS pleasurable for the Doctor. We know that touch is...and that makes sense...because they have to touch to fire those nematocytes. It would...by necessity have to be pleasurable to inspire them to risk their lives in the approach.
Rae
(no subject)
Date: 2007-01-25 07:20 am (UTC)Damn! That was well thought out. No wonder your work is so believable.
(no subject)
Date: 2007-01-25 05:44 pm (UTC)Thank you, Pooh
Date: 2007-01-26 01:08 am (UTC)Rae
(no subject)
Date: 2007-01-25 10:38 pm (UTC)enough fangirl squeeing , I have work I should be doing. ;)
Really...can there ever be enough fangirl squeeing?
Date: 2007-01-26 01:06 am (UTC)I think not!
Thank you so much for the kind words about Disheveled. I really enjoy writing it and plotting out how all the parts fit together. And that Lesbian Kama Sutra was really important to him...he needed to know what to do with his hands. ;->
Rae
I only just realized ....
Date: 2007-01-27 03:39 pm (UTC)It did occur to me a while back that if he deliberately regenerated in a form he thought would please Rose, you could achieve a kind of cross-series continuity by saying that he picked the great human lover, Casanova, as his model.
Snicker....I would do that np-c...
Date: 2007-01-27 03:50 pm (UTC)Anyway...yes, that is exactly why he was reading that particular book. And it also illustrated the first of many misunderstandings, in a very subtle way, as Rose automatically assumes he has the same interests in reading it that some human male might have. But he was simply, quite innocently, studying the technique of people with a similar handicap to his own.
Rae
(no subject)
Date: 2007-02-08 02:54 am (UTC)Now, the Tardis was in the Time Vortex (or, at any rate, no longer on Earth) when this happened. And the Doctor knows very well that children and pregnant women shouldn't travel through time.
So, why did he take the plunge right then, rather than waiting until he could relocate them to a suitable place for gestation?
In humans, this sort of thing would be explained by sexual urgency. For the Doctor, this is supposedly impossible (although I think he's disregarding his own experience in Chapter 4, personally.) Is there another, less reckless reason why he didn't defer the experiment?
~np~
Well...see...we explain that but...later...
Date: 2007-02-08 03:33 am (UTC)The problem is...Rose's pregnancy speeds up...something the TARDIS realizes...and shares with the Doctor. It was unusal for the radiation to have such a rapid effect on the baby...and there is even a reason why that unusal thing occured but we haven't mentioned it yet.
Here's the relative passage from Chapter 7 about where they were... They’d landed, but not on Earth. Not anywhere close. He stepped to the door, opening it a crack to survey the frigid atmosphere outside. Against all reason, the TARDIS had planet hopped in the same solar system. They'd traveled no more than a decade beyond their last stop. The Doctor considered the history of this region. There was no trouble brewing anywhere nearby. There was nothing nearby but the wildlife refuge he'd hoped to explore. Why were they stalled? As you can see, the Doctor wasn't expecting time travel to have such immediate, tragic results.
Rae
what we might ask is why he never revisits his curiousity on this point...and I would say...because he assumes it is just a fluke response and he's rather traumatized and not thinking clearly.