Dead of Winter - James Goss [27]
‘Goodbye, Maria,’ I sneered, unable to resist the triumph. ‘I’m afraid that with your usefulness over, it’s time for absorption.’
The creature towered above her… Oh, how to describe it at this moment? Somewhere between smoke and pulsing green meat, as wet and cold as clay yet somehow as vital as lava. It looked incongruous, squeezed into the room between the settee and the fire. It looked wrong and yet magnificent. And it was about to solve the biggest problems in my world.
It paused – seeming to sniff the air. To sense the vastness it was about to sample. I remembered when Kosov first told me about the three strangers – that one of them contained great knowledge, great power. Something that The Sea could really, really use. Kosov was ever so excited. Now I was about to give The Sea what it really, really wanted. It had Mr Pond. It had Mrs Pond. Now I was going to give it Dr Smith.
The creature twitched. It was ready. I savoured the moment, and then gave the command. It began to descend.
Maria stopped snivelling, and stared up at it. She spoke quietly and firmly. I was astonished. ‘Dr Smith…’ she began, sniffing bravely. ‘Dr Smith told me that if ever I was in trouble, and if ever I needed him, really needed him, I was to use his secret name. He said it was incredibly powerful and I could use it to defeat you.’
‘Go on, child,’ I laughed. ‘A name cannot help you.’
‘Yes, yes it can,’ she said, babbling excitedly. ‘Because Dr Smith is the most wonderful man in the whole world. And his secret name is all I need.’
‘Enough!’ I cried. ‘Absorb her!’
Maria, the vile little brat, stared up at the creature, threw open her mouth and screamed like only a child can. She yelled out one word…
‘Rory!’
What Dr Smith Thought
I am the Doctor.
I am in a room. The room is very large and very dark. In the middle of the room is a small box that’s even blacker. With ‘THIS WAY UP’, ‘HANDLE WITH CARE’ and ‘DO NOT OPEN TILL CHRISTMAS’ chalked on it.
It is time to open the box. It is time to begin again.
I open the box.
Oh.
I am not the Doctor after all.
Begin again.
A Letter from Maria
St Christophe
6th December 1783
Dear Mother,
It worked! I called out Dr Smith’s secret name, and he woke up, all startled like he’d sat on a pincushion. He saw the THING that was hovering over me and squealed, pressing himself back against his chair and howling. It wasn’t exactly the bravery I was hoping for, but I could kind of see his point. Whatever it was, it looked dreadful and smelt worse. And it was coming for us.
‘Rory!’ I yelled again. ‘Your name is Rory!’
His head snapped round and he stared at me. ‘What?’ he said. Then he licked his lips. ‘Right. Right. Yeah…’ He blinked. ‘That makes sense.’ He nodded casually and, somehow ignoring the giant monster, turned back to Dr Bloom. ‘Yes, that’s it,’ he said. ‘My name is Rory Williams.’
The Blooms looked at him.
‘I… I’m sorry, but I don’t understand,’ said Dr Bloom. He sounded different. Worried.
‘Neither do I,’ explained the man called Rory. ‘But I’m not the Doctor. You think you’ve won, but you haven’t. You’ve got the wrong man.’ He laughed then, a laugh that turned into a cough.
‘What?’ Dr Bloom cried. It was odd, Mother, it was like everything in the room had changed without anyone moving a muscle.
Dr Smith… well, Mr Rory Williams looked at Dr Bloom and really, really smiled at him. It took quite the hero to be tied to a chair and be winning. And Rory was my hero. You remember that maid who broke things and denied it so impudently? That was the same expression that Rory wore, tied down firmly to the chair, but so triumphant.
‘You’ve got the booby prize,’ he taunted Dr Bloom. ‘The Doctor is still out there somewhere and he’s now got his memory back. You’ve just got me tied to a chair. I’m pretty worthless. Sorry.’ He managed to shrug despite being tied up, clearly a practised manoeuvre. ‘Really. I honestly don’t know why I’ve been pretending to be him, but I am definitely not him. I