Hi Everyone! I am so very sorry about the wait, but I've been firmly blocked on this story for the past couple of weeks and it was only this past weekend that I managed to finally force that block to shift. Ow.

I want to thank you all again for your touching kindness after what happened. It's been tough trying to get back into the right mindset to finish this story. I couldn't do it at all last month. I just couldn't. But it's a new month now. And a new season. And it was Easter this Sunday, which is supposed to be a time of sun and smiles after sadness and snow, right? So, what I did is I revised, refreshed, and reposted the whole story in an attempt to shake off this awful, flat feeling. And it sort of worked kind of! I managed to finish the epilogue at last! It didn't turn out quite as I'd hoped, some of the flatness did transfer, I'm afraid, but it's still pretty fluffy, I think. I just hope you like it!

Oh, and I should have referenced this reference last time, but I didn't: "…I once tagged along with a space bus full of tourists that turned up in a Welsh holiday camp in 1959! The Shangri La, it was called. Near Llandrudnod Wells." The Doctor was referring here to "Delta and the Bannermen," an adventure from Season 24 in which the Seventh Doctor and his friend Mel had to help a Chimeron queen named Delta and her young daughter escape a gang of genocidal Bannermen.

And now, without further ado, here is the last and final chapter of Lupercalia! I'd intended it to be a brief epilogue, but it insisted on growing so it is now officially a chapter instead. I hope you enjoy it. And thank you all again for everything! You are the best! THE BEST!

PART VIII: FINIS

Rose was smiling, strolling hand and hand with the Doctor while her eyes roved around the dimly moonlit landscape. They were finally returning to the TARDIS following a rather venturesome detour into the city itself, and Rose was looking forward to curling up under her warm duvet for some much needed sleep. For the moment, though, she was content simply to enjoy the quiet and the company of the long walk back as she allowed her mind to backtrack over the past few hours.

After leaving Lollia and Lucius, Rose had thought it would be fun to stop at an inn for supper, to sample the ancient nightlife and try the local cuisine. The Doctor had seemed uncharactistically wary about her request, but Rose kept looking at him with those eyes, pleading and teasing and knowing all at the same time, until finally he sighed, no longer able to keep up the reluctant front. To be truthful, it had been halfhearted to begin with.

"All right," he'd said, taking her hand with a pointedly reproving squeeze, like he was granting her some huge favor by turning around. "Back to the city we go, then. I think I still have a handful of sesterces tucked away from the last time I was here. Wonder if they still accept coins stamped with Nero's head…"

Rose tilted her head curiously. "Nero?"

"Yeah," the Doctor confirmed, looking oddly uncomfortable all of a sudden. "Just so happens, Nero was emperor back then." He made a face. "Horrible man. Thick as they come."

"So, you met him, then," Rose said with interest. "Was he really as mad as people say?"

"Well…" the Doctor considered. "I wouldn't exactly say mad. At least, not mad in the same sense as his uncle Caligula was mad. But, oh, was he thick. A thick, foppity spoiled fop, as flamboyant as he was cruel. We were lucky to escape with our lives."

Rose frowned slightly at his use of the word 'we,' but knew better than to press him for more. Instead, she settled for a joke, hoping that, if she kept things light, he might just open up on his own.

"That's not so unusual," she smirked. "What'd he do, throw you to the lions?"

The deeply significant look he shot her seemed enough to answer her question, and more. Rose raised her eyebrows.

"What, seriously? He threw you to the lions?"

"Wasn't that bad," the Doctor said with an ambiguous sniff. "I was brilliant, of course. One of my best showings, if I do say so myself. Rose, you've never heard me play the lyre, have you?"

Rose shook her head. "No."

"No." The Doctor grinned his most enigmatic grin, his impish eyes glinting with private laughter. "And neither has anyone else" (1).

Rose had waited for a moment, half-expecting him to be more forthcoming, but unfortunately for her curiosity, that seemed to be the end of it. Affecting a rather smug swagger, the Doctor had strode on ahead with his hands in his trouser pockets and a distinctively puckish expression on his face. Annoyed, and a little confused, Rose had charged after him—only to stop short when she realized she'd been so wrapped up in the Doctor's story, she hadn't noticed they had already reached their destination.

The inn wasn't very big, and it wasn't very brightly lit, but she'd been able to hear the rumble of voices and laughter from the inside, and the succulent scent of roasted lamb made her empty stomach growl. Apparently, the growl had been loud enough for the Doctor to hear, because he'd offered her a wink along with his arm.

"Dame Rose," he'd smiled. "It'd be my pleasure to escort you to supper."

"I thought it would be further," she'd said, taking his arm willingly. "Did you know there was an inn this close?"

"Are you complaining?"

"No, but—"

"Good, I hate complaining. Goes right through my head, complaining. Not that I'm complaining, mind, but—"

"Doctor," Rose shot him an odd look. "Is there some reason we're still standin' here?"

"Ah, yes…" The Doctor looked distinctly edgy. Rose frowned, waiting for him to continue.

"Now Rose, I want you to listen," he said. "I understand you're a tough, independent Twenty-First Century Girl, and that you're more than capable of handling yourself in a crowd of rowdy blokes and, no offense, but if your mother's any indication of how hard a Tyler can slap, it's them in there I should be warning right now and not you, but the point is, Rose, that we're a long way from the twenty-first century and I just—"

Rose was tempted to laugh at the awkward way he was stumbling over his words. "Don't worry, Doctor," she interrupted him. "I'll be careful."

"Yes, but I mean it, Rose," he insisted, clearly anxious. "Women in the ancient world were regarded as the charges of the men in their families—their fathers or…or their husbands. If we go in there, we have to make it very clear to all those drunken holiday makers that you are in my charge. Because frankly, Rose, no matter how quiet we try to be, you are going to get noticed."

"Aw, Doctor," Rose smiled, leaning against his arm. "Is that a compliment?"

The Doctor glanced down at her, his eyes lingering on her dyed hair, then moving to her brightly colored anachronistic clothing, and finally resting on his too-big coat, which she'd draped around her shoulders like a cape, before deciding how to phrase his answer.

"Yes," he said. "Yes it is. So, we're agreed, then?"

"Agreed on what?"

"That for as long as we're in there, we'll let them all believe that we're…you know… Like Lucius thought we were…"

"What? Married?"

"That's the one," the Doctor nodded brusquely, opening the rough wooden door then turning back to hold his arm out once again.

"Coming, wife?"

"Well, when you put it like that," Rose smirked, taking his arm and following him inside the warm, stuffy, crowded room. "You do have enough money to pay for supper, right, husband?"

"You tell me," the Doctor smirked back. "You're the one with the pockets!"

It had turned out, much to Rose's consternation, that the Doctor had been right to worry. Normally, Rose was far from shy when it came to handling herself in a bar or club, but this was different, and it certainly didn't help matters that, despite the Pope's ban, many of the traditional Lupercal practices were still very much alive in the minds of those coarse, hard-drinking men. The Doctor'd had to come to her rescue more than once during their meal—which had actually been surprisingly delicious. Crusty grain bread and roasted lamb sautéed with cumin, red wine, and rosemary. Ultimately, though, despite the meal's quality and the fervent apologies of the overworked innkeeper, the only way to get Rose safely back out the door had been to resort to what the Doctor had termed as 'desperate measures.' In other words—and Rose was still tempted to snicker at the memory—he had distracted the attention of those loud, drunken Romans by putting on a rather unusual and surprisingly impressive performance.

"Rose," he'd said, standing protectively in front of her with his sharp eyes fixed on the leering, rowdy men. "Hand me those spoons."

"You what?"

"The spoons," he repeated, holding out an impatient hand. "The ones that should be in the left pocket of that coat you're wearing."

Rose dug into the coat pocket and thrust the spoons into his waiting hands. "Here," she said. "But what are you plannin' to do with those? Bend 'em with your mind, like in The Matrix?"

The Doctor paused in polishing the utensils on his sleeve, looking startled. "What do you know about the Matrix—oh! You mean that film!" He shook his head with a slight roll of his eyes, his expression dry. "Not hardly," he said. "Now, Rose, prepare to be amazed!"

"By a pair of spoons."

"No." The Doctor shot her a look. "By me playing the spoons."

Rose nearly choked. "What? No way. Seriously? You play the spoons!"

"Why is that always so shocking?" the Doctor asked. "I'll have you know it takes a lot of skill to play the spoons. It's not just any old lump who can do it. Your hand-eye coordination has to be ace—that is," he swallowed slightly, his brief hesitation barely noticiable, "spot on. In fact, my last incarnation was completely useless at it and, as we both know, he was a genius."

"And what about this incarnation?" Rose asked, crossing her arms. "Are you any good?"

The Doctor grinned his broadest grin. "We're about to find out."

The Doctor had then proceeded to step forward, raising his arms for silence. Failing to acquire it, he'd then raised his voice for silence, which'd had only a marginally better effect. The moment he'd started playing, however, the heads began to turn, and soon the whole rowdy crowd was cheering him on—Rose included.

Rose had never seen a person play the spoons before. It may just have been the Doctor's flamboyant style, but it had actually seemed quite a complex, and even athletic, endeavor. He'd rattled the spoons off his knees, his thighs, his elbows, his heels, the back of his neck, assorted chairs and tables, and the heads of various startled customers. He'd rattled them off one finger at a time, then switched hands to do it again. He'd tossed the spoons in the air and caught them behind his back, always in perfect time with his percussion rhythm.

It was only after he'd taken his bows to thunderous applause that the drawback to his plan had become apparent. It seemed his little show had disracted their attention too well, and the boisterous crowd had become more reluctant then ever to let them go. He and Rose were completely blocked from edging out the door—until a man burst in filled with news about the monster that crashed Marius's party and the mysterious couple that had transformed it into a harmless wolf before disappearing themselves.

"Did anyone actually see those two strangers?" the innkeeper had asked, looking rather skeptical.

"Ol' Lucius," the newcomer had nodded, "and his daughter, Lollia. They even had proof—a golden box given to them by the gods themselves."

"Oh, come on," the Doctor had scoffed, "you don't really think those two strangers were gods, do you? Not in this day and age. Far more likely they were just a couple of travelers, wouldn't you say?"

"Well, I wouldn't know," the man had replied, too involved in his second cup of wine to care much. "But I'll tell you this. Marius has announced his son Gaius is to marry young Lollia Valeria at the end of the month. If that's not a sign of divine intervention, I don't know what is!"

"More a sign of Marius's sense of opportunism," the Doctor had muttered to Rose, taking advantage of the crowd's laughter to make a swift escape out the door. The bitter nighttime wind had been a bit of a shock after the stifling warmth of the inn, but Rose, still bundled in the Doctor's coat, was determined not to comment. Instead, she'd asked, "What d'you mean, opportunism?"

"Well," the Doctor had explained, sniffing sharply as he'd buried his hands in his suit's pockets. "Think about it. That party was a shambles when we got there. And I'd wager there were some pretty important guests huddled in with that lot we saw cringing in the torchlight—people ol' Marius would hate to offend. He needed a miracle if his reputation was to be saved—a miracle we were kind enough to provide," he smiled. "Lucius, bein' a businessman, understood that, and he must have used it to convince Marius it was in his best interest to accept his payment and make up their differences. His choice was pretty simple, after all: either latch onto Lucius's tale and gain a lovely gold box and an even lovelier daughter-in-law in the bargain, or else be snubbed as bad luck for the rest of his days."

Rose nodded reflectively. "So, basically, what you're sayin' is that spinnin' our story was his one ticket back into favor. An' if what we saw back at that inn was any example of how fast rumors get around," she grinned, "he'll be the stuff of legend in no time."

The Doctor grinned back. "Never underestimate the power of superstition, Rose," he advised. "It lingers on way beyond conventional rationality: the enduring threads that link the mentality of the present with the faded civilizations of the past."

"Yeah," Rose nodded with a playful smirk. "I was just about to say that."

The Doctor laughed, reaching out to grab her hand. "I'll bet you were."

The conversation had shifted after that, becoming lighter and a little bit silly. They'd kept each other laughing for miles, gradually fading to a comfortable, companionable silence as the night wore on. Now, however, the TARDIS was finally in sight, sticking out against the distant stars like an oddly anachronistic thumb surrounded by the fluffy backs of dozing sheep.

"It's so weird," Rose said, breaking the silence with a slight shake of her head. The Doctor glanced down at her.

"What is?" he asked curiously.

"Well, I was jus' thinkin,'" she said. "It was jus' one act of littering. Jus' one careless act. I mean, I've littered. I'm not sayin' I'm proud of it, but it's like, sometimes you jus' can't be bothered to find a bin, you know? That alien, whoever it was, probably didn't think twice when he tossed that faulty holo-box thing away. But it set off all this stuff, everything that's happened—that monster, Lollia and Gaius finally gettin' together…"

"Yep," the Doctor nodded, his lips slightly pursed. "Causality is strange that way. My people used to have a whole department devoted to clearin' up this kind of mess. They'd put up signs, send out temporal clean-up crews…"

"Sorta like an intergalactic parks service?" Rose observed. The Doctor tilted his head, considering.

"Sorta like," he allowed. "The agents put up signs on all the big tourist spots: the Taj Mahal, the Forbidden City in Beijing, Mount Rushmore… You can still see them, if you have a standard translator."

"'Take only pictures and leave only footprints,'" Rose quipped.

"Not a bad motto," the Doctor smiled. "After all, in a life like ours, it's pretty much impossible to get by without leavin' a few footprints along the way. And hand prints. A few scorch marks..."

Rose smirked. "Good thing, too," she pointed out. "If we followed a completely no-touch policy, that poor wolf would still be sufferin'. Not to mention Lollia and Gaius. An' then there's those people who lost their faces to the Wire, an' all those ill people from that hospital on New Earth…"

"You're right of course," the Doctor nodded. "'S just too bad the Time Lords never saw it that way…"

By this time, they'd reached the TARDIS. The Doctor began patting his suit pockets in search of his key, but then paused as if struck by a sudden thought, turning to look Rose in the eye.

"Rose?"

"Yeah, Doctor?"

"I, um… I just remembered that...well..." He pulled at his nose nervously, then sighed, seeming to deflate somewhat as he ran a hand through his unruly hair. "I think my key is in my coat," he finished lamely.

"Huh? Oh…" Rose dug her hands into the coat's deep pockets once again—only to blanch at a sudden realization.

"Oh no."

The Doctor, still seeming oddly uncomfortable, frowned slightly at her worried tone. "What's wrong?"

Rose gave an awkward little laugh. "Well, you know how we were jus' talkin' about littering and that…"

"Yeeess?" the Doctor drawled.

Rose cleared her throat, then came right out and said it. "I think I left your dog whistle and yo-yo back at Marius's place."

The Doctor raised an eyebrow. "Is that so?"

Rose winced. "Yeah, I remember…I never picked them up after the monster attacked. I'm so sorry," she said.

"No, Rose, it's—" the Doctor tried to interrupt, but Rose didn't seem to hear him.

"But we could go get them in the TARDIS, right?" she asked. "I mean, we can't just leave them there, not after all this. What would happen if someone found them?"

"Rose, I don't think—"

"Or even if they didn't!" she plowed on. "If they stayed there for, like, two thousand years and some archaeologist dug them up! They might start thinkin' the Romans used dog whistles when herdin' sheep or somethin' an' then—"

"Rose!" the Doctor said again, his dark eyes brimming with amused affection as he struggled not to laugh. She looked up at him, anxiously biting her lip, and the Doctor's expression melted into a smile.

"Don't worry so much," he said, pulling the items from his inside jacket pocket and holding them up in front of her. "Here, look. You don't honestly think I'd leave a pair of such obviously out of place objects just lying around the ancient world, do you? I may be impulsive, but I'm not irresponsible. Besides," he added, "they've been with me a long time. I'd hate to lose them now."

Rose frowned. "But when…?"

"Scooped 'em up when I was tending that wolf. See?" He tucked them back into his jacket. "No harm done. Now…"

A look of firm determination crossed his face and he took her gently by the arms. Rose glanced at his hands, then at his face, clearly confused.

"Doctor, what are you—?"

"Just wait," he said, counting down softly to himself. "And three…two…"

Taking in a fortifying breath, the Doctor ducked his head and captured her lips in a light, but tender kiss. He drew back almost immediately, looking slightly bashful, but Rose was all but speechless.

"Wha…?" She blinked. "What was that for?"

The Doctor grinned. "It's midnight!" he explained. "Now exactly twelve seconds past the hour."

"Twelve seconds…?"

"That's right," he said. "Happy Valentine's Day!"

His eyes glittered at the dawning look of realization on her face. "Haven't you ever wondered, Rose," he asked with a rather cheeky smile, "who got the first official Valentine's Day kiss?"

"You mean…" She gave a startled laugh, then rushed to enfold him in a warm embrace, kissing his cheek once, then twice. "Doctor!" she said chidingly over his shoulder. "You could have given me some warnin' you know."

"And spoil the surprise?" the Doctor scoffed, giving her a hearty squeeze before letting her go. "Nah. This way's much more fun. Now, the key, if you please?"

"Right," she said, handing it to him. With a swift, practiced movement, he unlocked the TARDIS door and pushed it open, reaching back to take her by the hand.

"Well, Rose," he said. "Where do you want to go next? We could go back to the original plan: Powell Estate, 2006. Or…" he added quickly, seeing her hesitant look, "in keeping with our present theme of ancient firsts, we could go to Greece—see the first ever Olympics. No, no, on second thought, the first Olympics wasn't all that impressive. Wait, I know! I could take you on a hop to your future; see the games played out in London! Summer, 2012, whaddya say?"

"Summer, eh?" Rose smiled. "I'll take summer over this wind! I'm so cold, I can't even see my breath anymore."

"Summer it is, then!" the Doctor grinned, pulling her after him as they dashed up the ramp to the humming console. "2012, here we come!"

The End

(1) Reference to the Season Two episode "The Romans," featuring the First Doctor, Ian, Barbara, Vicki, and its own tongue-in-cheek reference to The Emperor's New Clothes by Hans Christian Anderson.