Doctor Who_ Byzantium! Part 3

Chapter Four.

Naming All the Stars

For even the Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many. but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many.

Mark 10:45

High above Ian and Vicki, and also above the wispy, cotton-wool clouds, the stars of a milky twilight were beginning to settle into their familiar constellations. Rea.s.suring patterns that spoke of being close to home in s.p.a.ce, if not in time.

At least they did to Ian. 'They look different, somehow,'

Vicki noted. 'The stars, I mean.'

'They will have moved to different positions in the next few thousand years,' Ian explained. 'Pegasus will be closer to Andromeda and the Seven Sisters get more spread out, if I remember my astronomy. A break-up in the family, if you like.' Ian chuckled at his witty pun, then realised that Vicki had not understood it and he cursed to himself that he hadn't saved that one for Barbara or the Doctor.

Vicki, in the meantime, seemed mesmerised by the soft-velvet indigo night spreading out before her. 'No, that isn't what I meant,' she continued, without taking her eyes from the star-filled heavens.

'They seem so much clearer. At home, when I used to look at the sky from the building I lived in, well - you could hardly see the stars at all. Except in winter, and even then, they were so faint...'

'Where was this?' Ian asked. It occurred to him that he knew so little about his young companion's past life on an Earth in his own far future.

'New London. Liddell Towers on the South Circular Road.'

Vicki blinked what could have been a tear from her eye, but was probably just moisture from the chill of the oncoming night. every evening, I went up to the roof and looked out into s.p.a.ce. That seemed like the future to me. ' A A future, anyway. An open road to the stars.' future, anyway. An open road to the stars.'

Now Ian understood her question about the sky looking different. 'Ambient light,' he said. 'In towns, even in my time, the street lighting often made seeing anything in the sky difficult. When I was a boy...' He stopped, aware that his tenses were all gone to pot - a habitual problem for the unwary time traveller. 'When I will be will be a boy, I should say,' he noted with a broad grin. 'I used to go on holiday to a cottage in North Wales, out in the country where the nearest neighbour's house was about a mile away. My brother and sister and I used to fish in the river and play cricket in the fields and at night we'd take my father's telescope and try to name all of the stars.' He knelt down beside the teenager and pointed up. 'There, on the meridian. That's Orion, the hunter. a boy, I should say,' he noted with a broad grin. 'I used to go on holiday to a cottage in North Wales, out in the country where the nearest neighbour's house was about a mile away. My brother and sister and I used to fish in the river and play cricket in the fields and at night we'd take my father's telescope and try to name all of the stars.' He knelt down beside the teenager and pointed up. 'There, on the meridian. That's Orion, the hunter.

In Greek mythology, Artemis, the G.o.ddess of the Moon, fell in love with Orion and neglected her duty of lighting the night sky. Her twin brother, Apollo, seeing Orion swimming, challenged his sister to shoot an arrow through a tiny dot in the ocean, which she did without realising that it was her lover that she was killing. When she discovered what she had done, she placed Orion's body in the sky for all eternity. Her grief explains why the Moon looks so sad and cold.'

I see him,' said Vicki excitedly, her eyes transfixed on the patch of sky that Ian was pointing to. 'That's a beautiful story.

Poor Artemis.'

Ian smiled at the girl, warmly. 'The big star at the top left is Betelgeuse. Bottom right is Rigel. In the middle, you see that little s.h.i.+ny thing that looks like a boy scout's badge? That's the Horsehead Nebula, a globular cl.u.s.ter of stars. The three stars in the belt are called Orionis Zeta, Epsilon and Delta.

Now, trace a straight line up from Betelgeuse and you hit Polaris, the pole star. That's in Ursa Minor. Down and a little to the left, you'll find Castor and Pollux, the twins of Gemini.

And those two bright lights just above the horizon, they are Venus and Jupiter. I can never remember which is which. In ancient times, astronomers didn't know the difference between planets and stars. Because the planets roam across the sky in their orbit around the sun, the sky watchers of olden times called them "wandering stars", thinking that they were lost and trying to get home. A bit like us, really.'

Vicki turned, a look of grim determination on her face. 'I want to visit all of them,' she said. 'With you and Barbara and the Doctor. I never ever want to go home.'

From behind, the sound of distant voices made them turn to see Barbara helping the Doctor struggle with considerable difficulty up the steep incline. It was Barbara who was speaking. 'Certainly the Romans were a fierce warrior culture who enslaved nations and ended in an orgy of decadence and decay,' she was saying. 'But their practical achievements, bringing civilisation to large chunks of the world, and their success in maintaining an empire of that size was pretty impressive, wouldn't you say? I mean, the aqueduct alone...'

Out of breath, the Doctor seemed to be both nodding and shaking his head at the same time. 'Enslavement,' he gasped at long last, as he stood with his hands on his knees and his chest heaving. 'It is a truly terrible thing to keep intelligent creatures in fear and bondage, my child. Your appreciation of the Roman face, I mean race, will be lessened, I should say, when you actually see see some of the reality of everyday life.' some of the reality of everyday life.'

He stumbled to a pause, then added, 'Tales of the glories of the Caesars are but one aspect of life in these times. The Romans didn't appreciate or understand either diplomacy or democracy, do you see? Those are Greek words and they had already conquered conquered the Greeks, as you are about to find out. Look over there and you'll see what I mean.' the Greeks, as you are about to find out. Look over there and you'll see what I mean.'

So Barbara and Ian and Vicki looked. And they marvelled at what they saw.

There is a shade of paint, a kind of burnt orange that the colour charts of hardware shops identify as Arabian Sunset.

Barbara Wright once used it on the walls of the scullery of her little flat in Kensal Rise. It helped to give the place more light on the long evenings of an English winter when the television finished at 10:30 and she would read. by candlelight, some of the second-hand history books that she bought from shops on the Charing Cross Road, to save putting another s.h.i.+lling in the electric meter.

She had never quite understood why the colour was called what it was.

Until now.

The sky was a staggering rich shade of Arabian Sunset, stretching all the way to the horizon of the Black Sea; only it wasn't black at all, it was a rich, rolling aquamarine with silver streaks reflecting back the moonlight like a fractured, deep, dark and truthful mirror. Between themselves and the sea lay the city, lights from it twinkling through the twilight. A great sandstone vista in the middle distance, surrounded on three sides by water and on the fourth by rocky hills, it was laid out not in a haphazard and disorganised fas.h.i.+on as most towns are when viewed from a distance, but with perfect symmetry and co-ordination.

It's utterly magnificent,' said Ian. 'When did you say it becomes Constantinople?'

'When the emperor Constantine gets here, fairly obviously!' There was a warmth to the sarcasm in Barbara's voice that Ian found both attractive and exciting.

'History's her strong point,' he explained hurriedly to Vicki.

'If we come across anything requiring an explanation on how the laws of physics have just been broken, or don't apply in this case, then I'm your man. Everything else, just ask the Doctor.'

The Doctor, meanwhile, had wandered a short distance from the group. Across the scrubland and into the city lay a destiny of sorts. The Doctor's acutely honed sense for trouble in the making was telling him (actually, it was screaming at him) that there was some on the way.

A whole wheelbarrow full of trouble.

A soft noise behind him caused the Doctor to spin around quickly, which didn't do his vertigo any favours and he, once again, felt dizzy and disorientated.

Vicki helped to steady him. I'm sorry I startled you,' she said.

'Child,' replied the Doctor, 'I suspect that you will be having a similar effect on me quite frequently in our future travels.'

The girl wasn't entirely sure how to take this enigmatic statement. Before she could decide whether it was a reproach or a compliment, she found the Doctor asking her a question and turned her attention back to him.

'What do you think of it?' he asked, indicating towards the city.

'It's fab,' replied Vicki.

'"Fab",' the Doctor noted with disdain. 'Now there is an example of the way in which computers have ruined the universe's most individualistic language. The youth of the future all speak in tautologies, malapropisms, migraine-inducing syntax, sentences without apparent subjects or verbs and metaphors so mixed they would do credit to a...

a...' he paused, momentarily lost for a decent metaphor himself.

a parliament of rooks?' asked Ian with a cheesy grin.

'I believe this ill.u.s.trates a point, somewhat,' the Doctor added, testily.

There was a sulky streak in Vicki's justification. 'I don't know what it means,' she said. 'Is it a bad word? It's just something I picked up from somewhere.'

It's gear, gear, daddio,' mocked Ian as he moved to the edge of the incline and took a few careful steps down the bank. daddio,' mocked Ian as he moved to the edge of the incline and took a few careful steps down the bank.

'Come on,' he continued, breezily 'It's high time we got this show on the road.'

So they headed off towards the city with the Doctor continuing to warn them that they must be very careful.

'I will say this once and once only, and then I shall refrain from any further comment on the subject,' he noted, as he reached the base of the hill with Barbara and Vicki's help.

'This is a very dangerous time.'

Across a mile of desert sand, Byzantium awaited them.

Chapter Five.

Babylon's Burning

Then came together unto him the Pharisees, and certain of the scribes Mark 7:1

'There are times when I almost feel an admiration for them.

The confession shocked t.i.tus. 'I cannot believe that you, of all people, would express any sympathies for blasphemers!' he said, with not a little outrage.

Hieronymous, the leader of the Byzantium Pharisees, merely nodded wisely and stood to walk around his chamber as he continued to formulate his thoughts. 'Be, then, a.s.sured that I seek the total and final obliteration of the followers of the false prophet. He paused and turned to face his deputies, t.i.tus and Phasaei. 'Say you otherwise, men?'

't.i.tus was merely voicing a legitimate concern...'

A single word from Hieronymous halted Phasaei's bold but useless show of self-defence. 'Silence,' he snapped. And there was.

After a moment, the priest continued, his tone lower and yet in some ways even more menacing than before. He was a truly striking figure, much taller than both of his deputies, and with a handsome, weather-beaten face and a huge, bushy and slightly greying beard that was de rigueur de rigueur amongst those in his position and with his status. 'As a younger man I had cause to study beneath the high priest of Jerusalem at the time that the Galilean impostor was about his most singular ministry. A man of great sagacity and sorrows whose mother named him Caiaphas.' amongst those in his position and with his status. 'As a younger man I had cause to study beneath the high priest of Jerusalem at the time that the Galilean impostor was about his most singular ministry. A man of great sagacity and sorrows whose mother named him Caiaphas.'

'I have heard of this righteous man,' noted t.i.tus. 'His wisdom was oft likened unto that of Solomon the Wise' he continued sycophantically Hieronymous gave t.i.tus a withering look. 'Let us not over-exaggerate. Caiaphas was strange and troubled, but he understood the value of showing those who would follow the teachings of this upstart, who would call himself The Christ, that power is a stronger weapon than blind faith.'

The deputies both nodded, slowly, unsure about exactly what point Hieronymous was trying to make. If any. When the old man became silent while continuing to pace the room, his brow deeply furrowed, t.i.tus and Phasaei exchanged worried glances.

'Wise master,' began Phasaei. 'The Christians...'

Hieronymous turned again, his face dark with anger. 'You would dare to use such a foul name in this holy holy place?' he shouted. place?' he shouted.

'A thousand humble apologies, good master. These followers of the Nazarene. You were of the opinion that you held a degree of admiration towards them?'

'Not so,' replied the priest. 'I admire the dignity with which those misguided souls that I have personally condemned have gone to their deaths. But that is all: Hieronymous stopped pacing and sat with his deputies again. 'Is it not written that a father may have many children? And that some shall be in need of great chastis.e.m.e.nt whilst others walk the path of righteousness without aid? Ten years ago, one of my first acts as Pharisee of Byzantium was to judge upon the case of a girl, no more than a child, named Ruth. A holy name and a spiritual child, seduced by the lure of the Nazarene's sect. They filled her head with notions.

Dangerous notions, about the wonders of the alleged Christ and thereafter she preached to the many. She was filled with the fire of her devotions and her faith. And many came to her cause. Because it is sometimes comforting to witness the pa.s.sion of those who have belief.'

Hieronymous paused, his gla.s.sy eyes filling with undisguised regret. 'We took her from her family to the temple and tried to scourge the false teachings from her, but she was strong-willed and determined. She was tried and shamed, but still refused to denounce the other members of her church. So we took her to the market-place, broken and shaved, and stripped of whatever dignity she had once possessed. And then we stoned her until she was dead. Our sources tell me that her people now regard her as a martyr. It takes incredible courage to die for thy beliefs. Courage that I am not sure that myself, would possess in such circ.u.mstances.'

The deputies were clearly sceptical. 'I have heard similar stories,' noted t.i.tus. 'But that is, largely, all that they are.

Fables put about by desperate criminals to try and make their foolish beliefs acquire validity. They have little basis in reality.' He paused and turned to his colleague for support.

Phasaei seemed indecisive. 'Well,' he began. 'Some might say that...'

'We also have problems much closer to home to deal with,'

t.i.tus said, brutally changing the subject and giving his fellow deputy a pointed look of disgust. 'The crazed actions of Basellas and his band of fanatics. The followers of the Nazarene and their sinful ways are but a minor irritant compared to those black-hearted devils, the Zealots.'

At that moment, in a different part of the city, within a poor stone dwelling, the Zealots were deep into an emergency meeting.

'The systematic ethnic extermination of three of our brothers yesterday now brings the total dead this year to...'

Matthew Basellas, a scarred and embittered veteran of the struggle against the Romans, turned to his comrade and ally, Ephraim. Basellas was rough-shaven and dirty, a clear sign of a life spent constantly dodging arrest and certain death.

And yet he was a powerful figure - the leader of the Zealots, a group of fanatical religious bigots who opposed both the Roman occupation of their lands, and the spread of the Christianity based on the teaching of the false prophet Jesus of Nazareth. 'A lot,' he concluded.