Rose attached the device to the underside of the polyhedron. She looked at the Doctor. He nodded. She thumbed on the button then sprinted back to the boardwalk.
There was a low, subsonic thrum, almost like a sound, but not a sound. People shifted and looked at each other uncomfortably. Something had changed. There was a feeling, like a toothache, all through their bodies. Even Rose felt it. She touched her ears in worry, checking that her earplugs were still in. They were, but the feeling persisted.
Kokopelli appeared on the boulder.
"What the hell?!" someone in the crowd shouted. People exclaimed and shrank back.
The creature was three feet tall, mangy grey-brown, with long ratty ears almost as tall as it was. It sat hunched on the boulder, its all too human eyes startled, then peering out at them malevolently. Its triangular rabbitlike head pulled in, hunching its shoulders defensively against the crowd's gaze.
It was an evil desert hare. Unnatural. The sort of mad spirit the Indians told horror stories about.
Men's boots shuffled on the boardwalks, inching back, women whimpered. Wyatt Earp made a loud exclamation and gripped his gun. Rose grabbed his hand on the hilt and shook her head at him. Rose saw Billie leaning forward intently at his seat on the boardwalk steps, beyond him the adults looked repelled.
"Kokopelli!" the Doctor's voice blasted out like a trumpet call.
Rose's attention flashed to the rabbit as its gaze locked on the Doctor.
"Yes. I know who you are," the Doctor answered its startled look. "It's time to end this."
The rabbit's gaze drifted away from the Doctor, insolently. Then it exploded off the rock. It hopped three great bounds toward the Doctor. Jumped sideways. And disappeared.
And reappeared on the boulder.
Everyone gasped. Babble broke out.
The rabbit looked surprised. It looked down at the faceted magnetite beneath it, then glared up accusingly at the Doctor.
The Doctor grinned. "You're not going anywhere."
The rabbit lifted its flute to its lips.
The Doctor drew his sonic screwdriver.
—
Rose realized the danger almost too late. "Sheriff! Reggie! Cover your ears!" She looked around for something to use but found nothing. "I can't believe I'm doing this." She lifted her skirts and ripped loose a long strip of her petticoats. She tore it in small sections, wadding up the pieces of cloth. She could hear the soft seductive music building behind her.
She turned to find the sheriff reaching for Reggie. The saloon owner seemed only too willing to return the embrace, their eyes hot. Rose jumped up the boardwalk and barged between them, separating them. Wyatt's hands slid up her side instead and closed on her breasts. She slapped him, hard. He staggered back, cheek livid, looking shocked. She shoved the cloth in his hands while his eyes were clear. "It's the rabbit, the flute!" she shouted. "Put these in your ears!" There was a lot of moaning going on around them.
Rose turned to find Reggie wrapped in the arms of one of the miners. She seemed to be enjoying herself. Rose tore her away and shoved more cloths at her, repeating the shouted instructions she'd given Earp.
The miner, deprived of his first playmate, grabbed Rose from behind. With an exasperated roll of her eyes she elbowed him in the gut and stamped on his foot. As he hopped around she turned and pushed him, right over Billie who was kneeling behind his back. The man went sprawling.
Billie stood up and looked around him. "Everybody's gone mad!" he yelled over the noise. Rose looked around. Men had women pushed up against the wooden walls, kissing and pulling up skirts. A few of the women were doing their part for equal opportunity by ripping open vests and shirts. Buttons flew everywhere. Rose felt like putting her hands over Billy's eyes, but the boy was just staring around, appalled. She shoved the last of her cloth to him. "Stuff that in your ears," she ordered.
She turned back to the Doctor, standing in the street, fiddling with his sonic screwdriver. "Do something!" she yelled.
"I am!" he yelled back. She could see his thumb working as he ran through the settings.
She could hear the rabbit's flute, the beautiful sensuous sound. But fortunately it didn't affect her. She could hear the grating, up and down fluctuations of the sonic screwdriver as the Doctor searched for the right frequency.
"There!"
A piercing squeal of feedback flashed through the town, making everyone flinch. The sound of the rabbit's flute cut off.
Rose turned to look, but the rabbit was still playing. It scowled, and played harder, she could see its cheeks puffing out as it blew, but no sound came out. It glared at the Doctor.
The townspeople pulled back from their partners, blushed fiery red, mumbled apologies and curses, and avoided each others eyes as they righted clothes and took self-conscious steps away from one another. Although Rose did notice one young couple, still wrapped up in one another, slip around the corner into the alley.
Voices raised in protest and anger. Their attention turned to the rabbit on the stone. The crowd started to advance, muttering in outrage, there was the sound of wood splintering as someone broke off a club from a section of boardwalk railing.
The rabbit twitched, resettled itself and gave the Doctor a sly look. The sound changed. A low keening started, a soft moaning sound that built into the woman crying/cat screeching sound of a cougar. The crowd stopped, looked at each other, and started to back away. They looked around jerkily, eyes widening, hands trembling, the hairs on their nape standing up as sound piled on sound. Screaming wind, although there was no wind. Shrieking wildcat. Sobbing woman. Sounds that grated, stripped the nerves raw. Low keening sounds of human terror were added to the mix as people drew together in knots, backing away. Staring around wildly to find the direction the danger came from. Dustdevils kicked up in front of them, kicking rocks and sand into their face. A howling wind blew, scouring the street and everyone in it. People screamed, women threw their hands over their faces. Half the people broke and ran.
Billie clung to Rose's waist, hiding his face in her side, trembling. Rose saw the Doctor standing like a pillar in the center of the street, his black duster flying around him as he was enveloped in a stinging whirlwind.
He thumbed the sonic screwdriver and held it out. The blue tip the only color in that beige cyclone. The dust shattered and fell. The sound ceased. All around them, was the sound of panting, terrified humans.
"Enough!" The Doctor stalked out of the dying whirlwind. And the sound changed again.
Kokopelli sat on his pyramid, puffing quick little sharp notes into his flute. But what came out was not sharp or frightening, but spritely. A jigging, happy, circus tune of a song. Even with her earplugs Rose found herself grinning. Billie's arms loosened around her and he looked up. A smile blossomed on his face. He turned to the boulder and started laughing.
The rabbit had hopped down from its perch and was now doing a sprightly little dance in front of the magnetite. His big bunny feet tapping out an Irish reel, hopping in a complex Scottish jig. Even while playing the flute Rose could see its mouth lifted in a smile, dancing around in delight like a children's fairy tale. Everyone laughed.
They roared with laughter, tears coming to their eyes. They doubled over giggling. Some were literally rolling on the ground in mirth. Even Rose burbled out a surprised laugh as Billie reached up and tickled her. He was laughing hard, his eyes sparkling, tears streaming down his cheeks as he giggled. The rags in his ears hung loose down his neck.
Rose's head jerked up. She looked around the town. People were scattered all across the street. Some literally sprawled in the street. People were holding their sides, in stitches, laughing so hard they couldn't breathe. Gasping. Faces red from laughing. Almost blue.
"Doctor!" she yelled in horrified realization. She turned. To find the Doctor laughing.
—
He was grinning that huge innocent grin that made him so beautiful. His grey eyes blazing blue the way they did when he was happy. His cheeks were grinning so hard they must hurt. Tears of mirth streaked down his face. His arms hung limply at his sides, his head tilted back as he laughed with all his heart.
It was horrible.
Rage tore through Rose. She turned to find Wyatt Earp leaning on a post beside her, bent over laughing. His mustache dribbling with snot as he was helpless before the sprightly music.
Rose ripped his gun out of his holster and shot the rabbit.
Or tried to. The gun was heavy and the shot dropped short, kicking up a clot of dirt at the hare's feet. But a stone from the clot struck the rabbit's knee, stinging enough to make it stagger and lose the tune for a moment.
"Kokopelli!" the Doctor roared. The Time Lord surged forward, the sonic screwdriver whirring, the amplified grating sound blanking out the rabbit's resumed song, and adding adrenaline to the worn townsfolk who staggered upright from their exhausted, hilarious sprawls.
The rabbit frantically hopped back onto its boulder and struck up a new song. A new sound full of grating and cacophony and jarring notes that Rose remembered from the gunfight.
"Get him!" Rose instinctively surged forward at that anonymous cry. Toward the rabbit. But the man's voice, behind her, cried again in rage. "She's my wife, you bastard!"
Rose turned in shock to see a shopkeeper attacking a miner. A miner she had earlier seen amorously pressing a woman up against the glass windows of the shop behind him. The shopkeeper's white sleeved arms bunched under their red gartered armbands as he fastened his hands around his enemy's neck. The other man struck out with his fist, clouting the shopkeeper in the side of the head.
Rose turned at hearing other sounds of violence. Men and women who had just seconds ago been too drained to move were now attacking each other. Two women were involved in a full blown rolling catfight in the middle of the street. Billie ran past her, murder on his face as he raised a rock, aiming it at the only other boy in the crowd. Rose grabbed his arm and yanked, making him drop the stone. He turned and kicked her in the shin. She cursed and hopped. He twisted away and ran at the other boy, tackled him, and started punching him.
Everywhere, people were fighting each other. Groups tore at each other in clustered melees. Individuals pounded on each other or chased one another with blood in their eye.
No one was paying attention to the rabbit. The horrible music beat at the air as surely as the people beat at one another. The Doctor was frantically adjusting and readjusting his sonic screwdriver. A man snuck up behind him and slammed a chair down across the Time Lord's back. The chair splintered. The Doctor fell.
"Doctor!" Ignoring the chaos around her, Rose ran.
She saw another man tackle the Doctor's attacker, shoving the bigger man aside and planting a haymaker in his jaw. Rose only partially realized it was Joss the little mine supervisor, before she dropped down beside the Doctor. The blow had knocked the sonic screwdriver out of his hand. But he was already pushing himself up onto his knees, shaking his head. His hat had rolled off. A splinter stuck out of his hair, and a thin line of blood trickled down to his eyebrow. "Rose?"
"Yes. I'm here."
"Where's the screwdriver?"
She turned and scrambled sideways in her skirts and scooped it up. Behind the Doctor she saw Joss, still kneeling astride his victim. The miner had a short candle in his hand. He struck a match off the sole of his boot and lit the candle. The wick caught, fizzing and spitting sparks.
Rose's eyes grew enormous as she realized. The Doctor saw the look and turned.
Joss held up the half stick of dynamite, twisted and threw it at the rabbit. The dynamite arched over their heads.
"NO!" The Doctor scooped up Rose and lunged toward the boulder, tackling the rabbit. The dynamite hit, exploded.
And the world went silver.
—
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