Doctor Who_ The Stone Rose - Jacqueline Rayner [47]
The Doctor trailed off. Rose turned to look – he was just standing there with a smile on his face; a smile that she knew well. A smile of discovery.
‘What?’ she said.
‘There seem to have been a lot of miracles round here, don’t there?’
She agreed. ‘Yeah – but that’s what gods do, isn’t it?’
‘I’ve seen a lot of strange things in my time,’ the Doctor said. ‘Things that most people don’t believe exist. Abominable snowmen. Werewolves. Demons. Vampires. But Roman gods with mystical powers? I don’t think so.’
Ursus stepped forward. ‘Watch your mouth!’
‘There you go again!’ replied the Doctor. ‘Always asking me to do things that are at least pretty uncomfortable, if not physically impossible. Look, let me get this straight. The goddess Minerva just appeared to you one day, did she?’
Ursus nodded smugly.
‘After years and years of your worshipping her, making offerings and all that?’
‘Yes.’
‘Doctor, be careful,’ hissed Rose. ‘She’s standing right there.’
‘Not saying very much at the moment, though, is she?’ said the Doctor loudly. ‘Just standing there looking deific, In fact, she only seems to speak when she’s spoken to. Which doesn’t sound a particularly godly way to behave.’ His eyes were shining as bright as the goddess’s. ‘Vanessa!’
The girl hurried forward. ‘Yes?’
‘2375?’
‘Yes,’ she said, puzzled.
‘Sardinia?’
‘Yes.’
‘The Bureau Tygon?’
‘Yes.’
‘Salvatorio Moretti?’
‘Yes.’
‘In that case…’ The Doctor turned to Minerva, who still stood there, beatific and regal. ‘I wish I could see what you really looked like.’
Rose thought she heard a sound, something crashing in her ear. And then Minerva vanished. Just vanished, just like that, as if she’d been switched off. On the floor where she’d been standing was a cardboard box, with ‘SM’ on the side. And out of the top of the box was peering a small, scaly creature, a cross between a baby dragon and a duck‐billed platypus.
It all happened so fast.
Ursus shouted – almost shrieked – ‘What have you done?’ He pulled out his still‐bloody sacrificial knife and ran straight at the Doctor.
Vanessa cried out, ‘That’s the box! From my father’s study!’ and hurried towards it, getting in between the Doctor and the furious sculptor.
The Doctor leapt forward, calling, ‘Vanessa! Stay back!’
He reached them both as Ursus lunged at Vanessa.
The Doctor knocked Ursus’s arm, deflecting the knife away from the girl, just as Ursus pushed her to one side. Vanessa fell to the floor, solid stone.
Rose dived for Ursus, yelling, ‘Noooo!’ She jumped on his back, trying to keep out of the way of his hands, and he overbalanced, falling on to his face. She waited for him to try to throw her off, try to grab her – but he didn’t. And then she saw the crimson puddle spilling out from under him.
He’d landed on his own sacrificial dagger. And he was quite dead.
She slowly, carefully, got up, hoping it had all been a dream, hoping she’d imagined what had happened in the heat of the moment.
But she hadn’t. There was the Doctor, hands outstretched, desperately trying to save Vanessa. His handsome face was determined, his head held high. This was the Doctor at his most Doctorish. And he’d be like it for ever.
Rose choked back a tear as she searched for the phial the Doctor had given her, the miracle cure he’d used to bring her back to life. She found it. It was totally, utterly empty.
She pulled out the stopper anyway, held the glass tube over his unmoving stone head. But there wasn’t a drop of liquid remaining.
She couldn’t stop the tears then. ‘Doctor!’ she cried. ‘Oh, Doctor! Why did we have to come here! It’s all my fault! All my fault you’re here. All that stuff about modelling… I wish you hadn’t listened to me. I wish you’d never come here. I –’
She turned, startled. She’d heard that sound again – something like… thunder? But the sky outside seemed calm and clear.