Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The door to the vault opened and closed in quick succession. Eeeeek... bang.

Then a loud, dull thud.

Missy didn’t look up from fiddling with her 3-D printer. Primitive technology, this blob of plastic was. Couldn’t even create a harmless approximation of a Judoon stun gun. She should have waited another decade or two before asking the Doctor for it. But then again, that time with the Monks presented such a perfect opportunity to get herself some new toys. Better a sub-par printer than none at all.

She still hadn’t gotten her pony, mind you.

The sounds repeated several more times. Eeeeek, bang. Eeeeek, bang, thud. Eeeeek bang. Eeeeek, bang, thud.

“So it’s that time of the month for you, eh?” she asked, still not bothering to look up. It was perfectly obvious who was invading her space. The Earth girl was too scared to come here by herself, and the egg man would never make this much noise.

She picked up the new part she had just made by overheating the coffee maker and using its fried inner coil to manipulate the serrated end of a plastic knife into the shape she wanted. Ignoring the Doctor’s shenanigans, she raised the 3-D printer to eye level with one hand and with the other inserted her makeshift part into a tiny opening. It gave a satisfying click. There. Maybe now this thing would know how to print a weapon.

It was only after she finished admiring her handiwork that she noticed the noise had stopped. The Doctor was waiting for her to acknowledge his presence — she could feel the weight of his gaze bearing down just a tad too heavily on the top of her head. Sighing, Missy put the printer down.

“What is it?”

A box filled to the brim with books slid into her field of vision.

“Excellent day for that time of the month!” the Doctor announced, glee in every syllable, as if he’d been waiting all these months to say it. He probably had. “Move out day, end of the term. Sunny and no cloud in the sky, everything in great condition. I was in a bit of a rush so I didn’t sort them properly this time. Rescued them all from the rubbish pile that was becoming a mountain outside one of the residences.”

Missy made a face at the box. “You mean to say you’ve just infested my home with Omega knows how many copies of Introduction to Psychology and Primer to Modern Philosophy?”

“There can’t be that many duplicates.” Missy could practically hear the shrug in the Doctor’s voice. “Firsties tend to be naive enough to want to keep their textbooks, so you should be spared the basic primers. Besides, there might be some surprises in here. You like surprises, don’t you?”

“Oooh, surprises!” She cooed, looking up to fix the Doctor with one of her suggestive looks. She threw in a wink for good measure. “You have no idea what surprises I’ve found in your boxes over the years. Those teenaged humans of yours are quite a bunch of hormonal apes.”

“Missy! These are textbooks!”

“Oh, grow some thicker skin. I was only joking. You’ve stopped bringing me those books ages ago. Everybody knows to go to the Internet for erotic materials nowadays.”

It took precisely three seconds for it all to sink in. Two seconds too long. Slow day for the Doctor.

“What?!?” Those arms were out, flailing like a chicken trying to fly. The Doctor was really quite lovely when he was flustered. “Missy, I never brought you –”

“Oh, honey, are you truly so clueless? You’ve given me loads of them! For years and years and years and years and years and years and –” She took a deep breath, paused, then waved a hand. “Multiply that by however many years you’ve been lecturing and I’ve been stuck in here before the Internet was invented. You get the point.”

The Doctor, for his part, was making an excellent imitation of one of those modern art statues with an expression that no one quite knew what the sculptor intended. On a spectrum ranging from panicked to scandalized, Missy would place his current expression at somewhere in the middle, slightly toward the right.

“Oh, come on. Everyone knows that improper viewing materials come disguised in fake book covers. And I’ve found many, shall we say, extracurricular inserts inside the thickest books you’ve brought me over the years. It’s easy! Even a firstie can do it. But you don’t need to police my reading materials anymore. Like I said. Internet. Speaking of which, this bloody vault is a dead zone. The wifi here is awful.”

She put on her I’m being good face and hoped the Doctor would take the hint and patch in some stronger wifi signals from the next century or so.

Alas, the fish didn’t bite.

“Who needs wifi when you have all these new books?” the Doctor exclaimed, reanimated now that she’d changed the subject. “I bet there are some real treasures among the dross.”

He waited several heartbeats. Then the barest quirking of lips into that fragile smile of his. “Well, aren’t you going to look through them?”

If Missy didn’t know better, she would think that the Doctor was... no, nervous wasn’t the right word. It was as if he really did wonder whether she was going to like the books or not. This was new, this caring about her opinion thing.

Did the real Doctor stay stuck on Mars, replaced by a doppelganger that was more cognizant of feelings?

Missy gave him what she hoped was an oh, all right look and pulled up the box closest to her.

“Now let’s see here, what have we got? Charles Dickens! You’ve got a literary-minded ape in your class, Doctor. Charlie was such an interesting chap, wouldn’t you agree? He saw me letting alien creatures through the rift once and lived to tell the tale, literally. Except he called them ghosts, bless his pea-brained imagination. See, Doctor, I do respect the laws of time. I knew he needed to write A Christmas Carol so I spared him from being eaten by those creatures.”

“That’s not what being good means.”

“Oh, stuff your preaching. Letting someone live and not changing history are precisely how you define your narrow view of goodness.” She waved a hand. “Anyway, what else is in here? Ooh, A Brief History of the Universe. Are you sure you don’t want keep this one for yourself? I’m not the one who needs a refresher on how things really work out there. Unlike you, I don’t deny the reality of death and destruction in cold, harsh space. And what’s this? A picture book! Perfectly uneducational and entirely useful for lining my tea tray. Oh how do I ever thank you, Doctor!” She plastered on a smile. “Giving thanks is what good people do, isn’t it?”

The Doctor rolled his eyes, but the smile threatening to break on his lips was genuine. “You keep the books. They’re yours, all of them. Just remember when you’re tempted to rip one into shreds for idiotic content that I have hundreds of student essays to suffer through. Without the luxury of disintegrating them into atoms.”

“Boo hoo, says the one who inflicts this torture on himself. Just fail them all. I’m sure they deserve it.”

“There are some good ones,” the Doctor pointed out. “Bill’s essays are always excellent, for example, and... well, I suppose hers will be the only good one this time around too. But they aren’t all horrific,” he added, “in fact, most of them put in quite an impressive amount of effort.”

There was fondness in the Doctor’s voice whenever he talked about his humans. Always fondness. Like he was proud of them for evolving from slugs to the point of not failing at stringing two words together. This fondness reeked of patronization. I am the Doctor, here to clap over your pathetic efforts.

“Effort,” she mocked, making sure the Doctor saw her scrunch her nose.

“Well, maybe just a mediocre amount of effort,” the Doctor conceded. “It’s true that a majority of them won’t be fun to read.”

“Like I said, just fail the lot of them. It’ll save you time.”

“That’s a rubbish idea. This is their final assignment. Their course grade is dependent on what they receive on this paper.”

“Then give them all top marks. Earn favor with your stupid apes by praising them for what they don’t deserve. You’ve been doing it the entire term, why stop now?”

Those eyebrows were getting closer to each other. And he started pacing. “And I can’t have Nardole grade them for me. Shouldn’t, anyway, not the final papers. Though I wonder... no, that won’t work either.”

“Doctor, are you listening to me? I’ve already solved your problem for you.”

“I know! I will pick out the readable ones and just skim the rest. I’ll save Bill’s for last. End on a good note, eh?”

“Doctor.”

The Doctor turned on his heels. “What?”

“You’re not listening.”

“Sorry,” he mumbled, raising a hand to scratch at the back of his neck. “You know how it is with me and procrastination. Never leave myself enough time to mark assignments.”

“You have a time machine.”

“Yes, I do. Yes. Well, but I thought I’d give Old Sexy a break, rest up a bit and all, after yes–”

He stopped mid-word.

Missy narrowed her eyes. He said there would be no more trips after Mars...

“No no no no no, it’s not what you think it is!”

Missy didn’t even bother to dignify the lie with her spit. What did the Doctor think she was, one of his stupid apes? His denial did as much good as a human trying to negotiate a peace treaty with the Sontarans. Did he really think he could lie to her and get away with it? She was a gifted telepath.

Not that the present situation called for any degree of giftedness. The Doctor’s mind was practically hurling fuck straight into hers.

“What I mean is, yes. Yes! Yes, the TARDIS does need a break and yes, I do have a time machine. And do you know what I can do with a time machine?”

Missy shot up from where she was sitting and stomped toward the Doctor. “Oh, I don’t know. Maybe try flying away to the edge of the universe right now so I don’t strangle every last bit of your life essence out of you?”

How dare he.

All those promises to stay on Earth for a thousand years, to be each other’s mutual prisoners until his vow was fulfilled, meant nothing to him the moment he found a new pet to orbit around.

The Doctor gulped as he stepped back, eyes panicking and hands raised, with palms open and facing outward. “Missy, let’s be sensible about this.”

“Sensible?” Her hearts were beating so fast that she thought she was once again hearing the thump-thump-thump-thump of the drums. “Tell me one reason why the sensible thing for me to do isn’t to squeeze your neck until you burst into your next regeneration. Because right now, I’m finding it really, really hard to be good to a liar and a promise breaker.”

“No time was lost!” the Doctor exclaimed. “We were back in time for tea. Remember? Time machine!”

“Should I take a little spin in your TARDIS to go blow up a planet and be back in time for your next visit?”

“Missy, calm down! Please!”

“I am calm!” she screamed.

Her voice crashed like waves against the empty walls of the vault, leaving behind nothing but a loud ringing inside her head.

She was so close she could seize the Doctor, grab him by the collar and twist the fabric into a knot until she made his eyes bug out, his body go limp and artron energy start to leak. If she was generous, she may only force him to regenerate once.

So why wasn’t she doing exactly that? Why were her hands balled at her sides, her nails digging into the heels of her palms?

They stood facing each other for minutes, him like a frozen ice sculpture and she like molten lava ready to burn through anything that came her way, her heavy breathing the only sound inside the vault. The Doctor couldn’t meet her eyes; his gaze was directed toward somewhere on her left shoulder. His mind had more holes than Swiss cheese and was shouting panic right into her head. Good. At least he had the decency to feel ashamed. Missy blocked out their mental connection and retreated into herself, wanting nothing to do with the Doctor. She focused on the pain in her palms. It made the sound of the drums fade back into the realm of a distant memory.

Eventually, the Doctor surrendered, sighed, passed a hand over his face.

“Missy,” he began, carefully, as if saying her name the wrong way would unleash his own demise. “I intend to stay with you for a thousand years, and I will.”

“A thousand years on Earth. I don’t care about that stupid vow you made to the executioners. We made our own promise. If I stay in this vault, you stay on this planet.”

It was a mutual promise, the only true lock that kept Missy remaining in the vault. She would have escaped ages ago if the ghost of the Doctor’s voice vowing to keep watch over her on Earth didn’t ring in her ears each time she was tempted to move on, to consign to a future where the Doctor would never be her friend.

The faraway look in the Doctor’s eyes told her that they were both thinking back to the beginning, to her first waking moments inside this prison. She had exhausted herself from slamming her body against the vault, screaming for hours to be let out. There was blood all over her side of the door, smeared handprints from her slapping and pounding. It was a wonder she hadn’t permanently broken any of her body parts that day.

And then the Doctor unlocked the door, stepped to the side and gestured toward freedom.

“Go ahead. Leave. Take your chances out there with the executioners.”

She was going to leave. She really was.

“But if you stay, if you allow me to be your prisoner just as much as you will be mine, we can try to become friends again. Your choice, Missy. I’m not going to fight you any longer.”

And somehow, against every fiber of her being, against all logic and self interest, she stayed.

She should have known that the Doctor was utterly incapable of keeping promises. She speared him with a look that could kill. “You’re a liar, just like all your other selves.”

“But I’m here now, aren’t I? I will give you a full thousand years, I promise. Cross my hearts. You will have me whether you like it or not. Not a single second will be shortchanged.”

Missy could almost believe him.

Almost.

But then he added, “Those interludes with Bill, they don’t count.”

The name burnt her like hot iron to the flesh.

“With Bill,” she mocked, laying on the heavy Scottish accent. “Bill, Bill, Bill. They most certainly do count! The Doctor must spend time with Bill. Because Missy is unimportant, because she’s evil. Oh, but she’s getting better. Missy’s finally showing mediocre effort at being good! It means the Doctor can shirk his responsibilities and send the egg man to do his job for him. And Missy hasn’t set anything on fire in a month! It’s now safe for the Doctor to take his newfound pet on excursions without worrying about coming back to a blown up planet.”

Where was the android when she needed him, when she knew he would side with her on this one?

The air around them felt colder, like the chill that would set upon the fields of Gallifrey after its twin suns set. As if on cue, the fake scenery dimmed a little, projecting “cloudy” in both faux-weather and mood. Missy kept her lips pressed in a thin line, her mind focused on reinforcing her mental shield, on reining in her emotions. Emotions were a weakness. She hated being weak.

But it was already too late. She’d let the truth slip out. It wasn’t so much that the Doctor went on excursions that bothered her. It was about him taking her. Choosing a human over his oldest friend. With Bill, every trip — and she knew there were other ones between Mars and yesterday — was a slap in the face.

“Missy...” The Doctor sounded tired, weary. “There’s no comparison. This isn’t a competition. Nothing about this has to do with Bill. You are improving and I’m proud of you.”

She glared. “According to your brand of goodness.”

“And yours too. You know killing is wrong, you’ve always known. You don’t do it anymore. That’s good.”

“That’s because you’ve locked me in a vault!”

Mutual decision or not, it took one whole month before she was allowed to step outside of the containment field, and another three before she could do so without the Doctor’s supervision. It was beyond humiliating those early days, to have to tend to her bodily functions inside the containment area, treated like a curious lab specimen by someone who claimed to be kind but was entirely oblivious to his casual cruelty. The first time she was allowed inside the bathroom that the Doctor had finally installed for her — the day that marked the start of her fifth month — Missy had slid down onto the tiled floor and cried.

The Doctor gave her a meaningful look. “I can’t let you out, you know that.”

One-thousand-minus-seventy more years. Oh, how she knew.

“And you didn’t kill me just now. See? Progress.”

“Don’t. Push. Your. Luck.” she threatened, because a defanged dog had nothing left but empty barks and pretend dignity. In moments like this, she wondered why she bothered trying to be good at all, why she wanted her friend back when he was so disgustingly vain and arrogant and oblivious.

The Doctor nodded, swallowed, surrendered again. He was looking at her with those blue-grey eyes, wary and hopeful at the same time. She could feel the gears of his head turning, gauging whether Missy had become good enough to merit some sort of loosening of the leash. A reward for Year Seventy, just like those other milestone years when he decided to be oh so gracious and threw her a bone. She bit the inside of her cheeks to push down a scoff. She would never be ‘good enough.’ What did the Doctor want her to do, use his TARDIS to travel back in her timeline to un-kill everyone she was now remembering by name, including one particular regeneration of the Doctor himself?

She gestured toward the kitchen area. “I broke the coffee machine.” If the Doctor was assessing her progress, then she may as well own up to her latest evilness now.

The Doctor glanced at the disemboweled appliance with its heating coil ripped out. He must have known what she was trying to do with it.

“I’ll get you a new one.”

You failed again and must retake the exam, Missy heard.

It always ended like this, these visits, with her outbursts and her sabotaging everything. It didn’t matter if she really did try to be good. The Magnanimous Professor who spoke so highly of his students’ efforts never spared a moment’s thought on how Missy never once broke their promise, how she was going against her very nature to turn good and so of course she would fail. She laughed silently to herself. Why should she be surprised that the Doctor didn’t care? He never did.

She knew how to handle rejection. Strike first, don’t give them the chance to push you away.

“Well? Why are you still here? Those essays aren’t going to grade themselves.” She forced her lips to spread upwards into what she hoped was a smile. “Not unless you allow me to have sharp pointy objects in here so I can build you your very own robot assistant to obliterate your students’ assignments for you.”

The joke had no impact on the iciness in his eyes. “Nice try. That won’t be necessary.”

“Well go on then,” she shooed. “Leave. Mark your essays. Go do important things like spend time with Bill.”

He didn’t move.

“Missy...”

“I’ll be fine,” she snapped. Could the Doctor not take a hint, one that was in the form of a blatant dismissal? “I’ve got books. Boxes of boxes of them. The jailor’s charity for the prisoner to keep Missy from regenerating out of sheer boredom. Or are you as amnesic as your eighth self and don’t remember you’ve just brought me enough books to –”

“Thank you. For saving us back on Mars.”

His voice was sincere and his eyes had softened. Missy told herself she didn’t care.

“Really, if you don’t go mark those essays you’ll get dismissed from your post and won’t be able to guard the vault to ensure I don’t escape.”

“Missy, please just listen...”

“Go. Call your pet after you’re done and perform your song and dance to her. You like to lure them in innocent and young. You’ll have better success with her.”

“Lay off of Bill. We’re discussing us.”

She threw her head back and laughed, a mirthless, bitter bark that grated even on her own ears. The Doctor really did have a talent for cluelessness.

“There’s no ‘us’ to discuss. Sugarcoat it however you want, but I’m your prisoner. You really will be stuck here with me for a thousand years. Because you know what? I don’t do your version of good. Oh, but that means the Doctor will fail! Whatever must he do? I know, he should take on easier projects, ones that he can achieve. Like getting a human to go all starry-eyes on him. Remember Martha? What happened to her? Or let’s go further back. Sarah Jane? How about Jo Grant? He loses them all! But it doesn’t matter, because he can always get new pets. Imagine, a whole world of humans out there waiting for the Doctor to notice them! Must be one hell of an ego boost each time, Doctor, the way you seek out new mayflies like an addict.”

There. She’d stabbed his pride right where it hurt. Maybe now he would leave.

Somewhere in the universe, the Doctor was known as the oncoming storm. That storm was brewing on his face now, and it felt almost familiar, the way the Doctor looked at her with anger and accusation for daring to say anything that was too close to the truth. Missy tilted her chin up, defiant, daring the Doctor to unleash a downpour.

But like the hollow threats of dry thunders not followed by rain, the storm passed and the clouds cleared as suddenly as they had gathered.

“Why do you think so little of yourself?” the Doctor asked softly, using gentleness like a weapon to disarm her.

Oh. He was angry for her, not at her.

Missy slammed up her defenses. “Nonsense! I don’t –”

Determination overtook that face. The Doctor stepped forward, closing the space between them. Before she realized it, her hands were clasped inside his larger ones, and she froze.

Their eyes met, and like a TARDIS drawn into the time vortex, she couldn’t look away even as her defenses crumbled. She was gazing into eternity, a fire too bright for humans to withstand. This was life that only they could comprehend, a dance that only they could lead and follow, with ends and beginnings overlapping and one growing into the other, as enemies and friends, killer and savior, jailor and liberator, always sharing a bond that was too stubborn to be severed and too possessive to allow anyone else to share it for long.

In eternity, she was the constant to the Doctor’s volatility. It may have been Clara yesterday and Bill tomorrow. But until the end of the universe, it would always be the Doctor and the Master.

He wanted them to be friends again. This was real for the Doctor too.

“Missy,” he breathed her name like a benediction. “Please, listen. Thank you. Thank you for not flying away on Mars. Thank you for keeping your promise. Our promise. You always do.”

She looked away, feeling like she was falling with no ground to find purchase. Seventy years and she still didn’t know how to react to compliments.

“You should go,” she murmured, not out of spite this time, but because someone had to make sure Professor Doctor set a good example for his students and did his homework.

“Yeah, good idea.” He squeezed her hands. That hopeful expression was back. “What do you say? Maybe some Chinese later?”

He was choosing her over the mayflies. He planned to come back...

This time, the smile that she was trying to school into a smirk was not pretend.

“If you must, my dear,” she drawled. “Get some extra soy sauce please? And white rice. If you force brown rice on me again, I will make sure your head becomes intimately acquainted with the heaviest book in these boxes.”

He laughed then, a fragile chuckle, but one that reached the eyes. “I have no doubt you will.”

Chapter Text

Later, the Doctor’s offer to make their after-dinner tea turned into a small incident of the electric kettle refusing to obey the law of thermodynamics. After a solid fifteen minutes of muttering at the non-cooperating appliance, he grabbed the two cans of fizzy drinks (free with order of dinner combo) and approached the sitting area. Missy was already settled in her favorite plushed chair, with legs tucked elegantly under her torso, engrossed in her new book.

The Doctor smiled to himself, remembering their relatively peaceful dinner. The difference between their meal and that odd outburst that Missy had earlier about his travels with Bill was night and day. He still didn’t know why she was so upset. He lied, yes. But he always lied. Even the earliest version of the Master knew that. Did he miss something? Or maybe it was a Time Lady thing? He filed the thought away under Things to Ask Bill Later. She always helped him sort things out, his brilliant, wonderful Bill.

But back to the dinner. Right. Aside from one particular grievance that he hoped he would be able to refrain from bringing up in favor of not ruining the mood, it was surprisingly enjoyable. Missy had even laughed at his unfunny jokes. Well, she tried to, anyway. He had a sneaky feeling that she was in fact laughing at him.

Not a single revisit back to their argument. Borrowing Bill’s words when she’d tried to teach him about human social interactions, they were “okay” again.

He cast her an appraising look that went entirely unnoticed. “Of all the books I brought you, I’d never peg you as someone who would pick up this one.”

“Hush! I’m getting to the interesting part, with all the slaughters.” She glanced at the table. “What happened to the tea?”

“Our orders came with these. Thought we should probably drink them instead.”

“If you say so,” Missy said, smirking. “You forgot to turn off the childproof setting on the kettle, didn’t you? How can you forget something that you yourself set up?”

Oh, the childproof setting. The one he had insisted on putting in place and that only he and Nardole could turn off with their biometric signatures.

“I said I wasn’t going to blow up the world with a teakettle. But did you believe me? Nooo. And now your paranoia has deprived me of tea.”

“Free drinks, Missy. It’s hard to keep up with the costs of living nowadays on a professor’s salary.”

“Is this why you steal books and smooch off free chips from that pet of yours?”

“The books were already in the rubbish pile!”

“When one’s rubbish professor assigns too bloody many rubbish books, rubbish piles tend to happen.”

“Couldn’t agree more,” he muttered, as several of his academic colleagues who liked to assign their authored tomes as textbooks came to mind.

“And not a peep from you denying eating free chips with Bill. You’re shameless, Doctor. Requiring her to risk her life and to feed you?”

“So all of a sudden you care about Bill? I recall someone wanted me not to mention her name a few hours ago.” He added, “By the way, it’s friends. Those who travel with me are friends.”

“You don’t like the egg man.”

“That’s not the point,” the Doctor countered. Because, well, she wasn’t exactly wrong. “Can we talk about something else?”

“Of course!” Missy said with far too much glee. He eyed her suspiciously.

“We need to talk about etiquette and proper presentation of one’s outward appearance. For example, you. In case you’re wondering, you are lacking in both. So, so woefully lacking. Abso-lute-ly zero-degree lacking. I don’t know why I bother to keep company with you.”

He was about to ask her what brought this on when she touched a finger to the corner of her mouth. “You’ve got soy sauce over there, dear, and a bit of broccoli stuck between your teeth.” He dabbed a napkin over his mouth and moved to swipe at his teeth. “A bit more to the left... no, your left, you dummyhead! Stop. Yes, there. Now wipe down.”

She flashed a smile of her perfectly white teeth. “All clean. See, I’m a great helper. Am I doing well, Doctor? Good people tell their friends about how uncouth they look, don’t they?”

The Doctor glared. “Good people don’t eat up all the dumplings before others get to try them.”

So much for not bringing up that particular grievance.

Missy gasped with as much sincerity as a Dalek would show goodwill to a Time Lord. “Oh, you actually wanted some dumplings? Last time we had Chinese, I remember a very picky Doctor complaining about how they were completely inedible.”

“That’s because you squirted an ocean of hot sauce over the entire order!”

“I had no choice! You didn’t get me extra soy sauce. How else was I supposed to dress my dumplings?”

“That’s neither here nor there. People don’t dress dumplings. They’re eaten with a dipping sauce, preferably a variety that doesn’t involve setting the tongue on fire. You know full well that I can’t tolerate too much spicy food in this body.”

“Well, whose fault is that? This is why you need to concentrate when you regenerate. Focus on versatile taste buds and good internal plumbing and you’ll be able to enjoy all the delicacies in the universe.” Missy looked pointedly at his head. “Oh, who am I kidding? You haven’t even managed to turn ginger, after all these tries.”

“In case you missed the obvious, we’re usually dying when we regenerate. Not the most convenient time to be thinking about taste buds.” He really shouldn’t be surprised that all incarnations of the Master lacked the ability to grasp fundamentals such as having proper priorities. Really, taste buds? “And what fun would it be if I can’t complain about food I don’t like? I’ve backup. Always carry jelly babies with me and have always liked them for the past ten regenerations or so. In fact, I might even have some now... oh yes! Would you like a jelly baby?”

“Ugh, no! I should have gone back in time to delete the entire lineage leading up to the inventor of jelly babies. Did you know that I once controlled the intergalactic sugar corporation of this quadrant of the universe? Eliminating one’s past, present, and future business rivals is simply sound management practice.” She sighed dramatically. “Too late now. I’ve turned good. Can’t kill off my competitors anymore. See what I have sacrificed, Doctor, how much I’ve changed?”

He scoffed. “Saying something doesn’t make that something true, even if you repeat it a thousand times. And doing this... whatever it is you’re doing with your eyelashes doesn’t work on me.”

Missy pouted.

“This mouth thing isn’t working either.”

Maybe if he told himself that Missy wasn’t having an effect on him, it would become true.

He really did want Missy to turn good, want to see signs of change, anything. Even in the middle of inconsequential banter like this.

“You’re impossible to please,” she said with mock grumpiness, grabbing the nearest object — the big book she was just reading — and sending it flying in perfect projectile toward him. He caught it with ease.

Coming from Missy, it was practically an apology for eating all the dumplings.

“The New Oxford Annotated Bible, Fourth Edition,” he read the title. “Not much of a change from the third edition. No new stories as far as I can tell. Plenty of good stuff though. ‘Love your neighbors.’ Ever heard of that one? I highly recommend you start practicing that on Nardole. ‘Blessed are the merciful.’ Even Davros had a brush with that, and I don’t think you’d want to be one-upped by him. Oh and how about ‘You shall not murder’?”

“Those silly rules are for humans! And you’re reading the wrong bits. Check out the story where a man offers his concubine to a group of sex-starved pudding brains and then chops her into pieces after those men killed her. Way more interesting than all the so-called morals in there.”

He knew that story well. It devolved from personal vengeance into tribal massacre and then led to aggression against neighboring people groups. He’d tried to change it once, but Old Sexy refused to take him there because it was a fixed point in time. “Actions should have consequences,” he said, thinking aloud, then quoted, “Whoever digs a pit will fall into it, and a stone will come back on the one who starts it rolling.”

“Now, that’s just bad planning. Get out of the way if you’re going to roll a stone.”

On this one, he wholeheartedly agreed.

“Why are you reading this anyway?”

“For the alien history,” Missy deadpanned. “Oh, don’t pretend you don’t see it. An alien overlord controlling the human race? Other alien species taking refuge on Earth? And an insufferable Time Lord meddling with history like he always does? There are quite a few episodes with you in them, Doctor. Don’t deny it. If you know where to look, you were entirely conspicuous.” She added in a loud whisper, “Tower of Babel!”

“Oi, the Tower of Babel doesn’t count! Absolutely no meddling with humanity whatsoever there. I didn’t lay a single brick to build that structure. You know I’m lazy when it comes to manual labor. Besides, I landed there by accident.”

“Really?” Missy mocked, arching an eyebrow. It wasn’t fair how she could do it so gracefully. Whenever he tried to do the same, his eyebrows were ready for a full-on attack. “So you accidentally banded all kinds of humans together, silly humans who always thought everybody spoke their language, somehow put it into their minds that doing a joint-construction project was a good idea, and then left them to fend for themselves when you moved on and there was no more TARDIS around for universal translation? Very exploitative, Doctor, I’m impressed. What percentage of a cut did you agree on for the tower’s future revenue?”

“Again, accident!”

Missy hummed.

“And alien overlords? I rather think I’m looking at one right now.”

Missy broke into a grin so wide that even the winner of the national lottery wouldn’t be able to replicate. “Why, thank you, Doctor! So you can be nice if you try.”

“That isn’t meant to be a compliment.”

“Is it? You’ve done your fair share of overlording too, so don’t pretend you’re innocent. Only we both know that I’m much better at it. But to answer your question. The concept of gods exists throughout the universe. It’s surprisingly consistent across history and species.”

“Believing in something doesn’t make that something real.”

“Exactly. So I would say humans have existed without alien overlord intrusion for the vast majority of their pathetic, brief, and insignificant history. But during those forty years of Egypt and the desert, there most certainly was a nonphysical alien life form that staked a claim on the Hebrews. You’d be blind not to see it.”

Well, even when he was blind he had managed to figure out the Monks’ ploy to invade the Earth. He had to concede that the events detailed in Exodus were too unlikely to be the result of some sort of mass hallucination that resulted in a successful revolt against slavery with no outside meddling. Some other being was definitely involved.

“It wasn’t you, was it?” he asked, just to be sure.

Missy looked offended by that. “Non-physical being? Hello? I fought Rassilon because I didn’t want to be without a body and linked forever with those bastards in the purely consciousness realm. Escaped from Gallifrey as soon as they cured me of the drums in my head.”

“Fair enough.” He raised both hands, palm open, to signal he didn’t mean to offend. “I was just making sure.”

Missy seemed appeased by the gesture. “I mean, I’m not saying that creating a religion isn’t a tempting prospect. Subjugating humans through compelling obedience is quite exhilarating, if I may say so.”

“That’s a very glass-completely-empty way of looking at religion. I would categorize the alien-human relationship more as a symbiotic one. Higher being gets worship, humans get favors. That’s not the same as subjugation.”

“Are you amnesic? How’s creating whole nations of mindless followers any different than my creation of the Toclafanes? Yes, I know that was bad, I will never do it again now that I’ve turned good, et cetera, et cetera. But you do see my point?”

“No difference? Missy! Of course there’s difference, loads of difference. You wanted to conquer the Earth! Enslave humans and kill off the ones who stood up against you. You didn’t allow anyone to choose!”

“Free will is overrated. Only makes it harder to exert control.”

“You turned everyone into you!”

Missy made a disgusted face at that. “Ugh. I’ll give you that one. Should’ve waited until this face to play the trick. Look,” she continued, “we’re getting philosophical. That never ends pretty between us. Let’s move on. Next category.”

“Okay. Alien refugees on Earth. Are we talking about zygons here? 'Cause you can’t spot shapeshifters from text.”

“I’m sure there were zygons here and there that I missed, can’t really recall when the very first wave of their kind arrived. But I wasn’t talking about zygons. I was referring to the space ass.”

The Doctor raised his eyebrows “The space ass,” he repeated.

“Yes, that’s how Bill likes to refer to extraterrestrial life forms, doesn’t she? Add space in front of the label and voilà, everything suddenly becomes so much clearer.”

“You still haven’t –”

“Numbers. Chapter twenty-two. Go on, look it up. Use the table of contents if you can’t find where it is. Pay attention to the talking donkey and tell me that wasn’t some alien creature parking its ass on Earth.” She smirked, looking far too pleased of herself. “Oops. I seem to have cooked up a horrible, atrocious pun there.”

The Doctor vaguely remembered reading about a talking donkey several lifetimes ago. The book of Numbers. Who knew humans could write such long lists of genealogy? He flipped through several pages full of names, skimming here and there as he looked for chapter twenty-two.

He stopped abruptly when his eyes caught several words in chapter sixteen.

Missy looked from the open page to his face. “What is it?”

He gave the relevant section a closer read. No, he wasn’t imagining things.

“Doctor? What did you find?”

“You missed a category,” he said. Never mind the talking donkey. That was positively alien. But this. This was an indigenous species committing an act of aggression. “The ground under them was split apart. The earth opened its mouth and swallowed them up.”

He met Missy’s gaze. “The earth opened its mouth and swallowed them up. Ring any bells?”

Those impossibly blue eyes widened. “No.”

He grinned. “Yes.”

When a mystery found its way to not one but two Time Lords, all the promises and rules of the universe could take their collective curmudgeonliness and shove it.

The Doctor snapped the book shut.

“Don’t tell Nardole,” he warned.

Missy beamed.

Chapter Text

If Missy could superimpose human traits onto the TARDIS, she would have sworn that the Doctor’s good ol’ Sexy (really, how kinky was that?) hissed at her the moment she set foot inside the ship.

Missy hissed back. Ungrateful TARDIS. If it wasn’t for her, the Doctor would still be on Mars, stranded in the Victorian era and separated from his beloved box. But no, when the TARDIS needed a favor from her that time, she was welcomed into the main console room with a warm glow and soothing hum.

“Now, now, Old Girl, I’m not going to let her do anything to you,” the Doctor said. He turned to Missy in full professorial sternness. “If you mistreat her in any way –”

“Calm down, I’m not going to lay a finger on her. You do the driving. Although if I may say so, you’re a horrible driver and age has only made you worse.”

That didn’t draw any reaction from him. Strange. He was usually so sensitive about his piloting skills. And just a moment ago the Doctor was practically skipping like a giddy schoolboy toward the TARDIS in anticipation of going on yet another adventure. But now he was all serious. Like, scared serious.

“Give me your hand.”

Missy opened her mouth, a question forming on her tongue. But one glance at the Doctor told her that she was no longer dealing with her almost-friend but her jailor, all eyebrows and storm-on-the-face. She snapped her mouth shut and held out her right hand.

Ah, of course...

The Doctor scanned her hand with his sonic screwdriver and transmitted her biometric signature into the TARDIS’s central processing system. Missy trailed her eyes to the control panel as the Doctor punched a series of buttons and adjusted several knobs. She didn’t have to see the monitor to know that he was restricting her access to the entire ship.

“You should at least allow me into the med bay, you know. It’s just common sense precaution. We won’t go near it unless one of us is horribly wounded and rushed in by the other.”

The Doctor did not acknowledge her request as he continued typing a string of commands on the keyboard. Well, it was worth a try. Being in the TARDIS was no fun if she couldn’t pilot it or roam around. And Missy was hoping she’d be able to have some fun. I’m a prisoner, she reminded herself, trying to employ cold, hard logic to counter the disappointment bubbling up inside her. Prisoners weren’t granted favors. And if this was how the Doctor thought of her, then he probably wouldn’t want her dragging him into the medical bay even if he was ninety percent dead. Friends save each other, jailor and prisoner don’t.

When she regained her sensibility enough to pay attention to her surroundings again, the Doctor was looking at her — may have been looking for a while. “What?” she asked. He made no reply, simply stared some more. It was like back in the vault, with that same expression on his face. Can I trust you?

To be fair, she would be wary of trusting herself too.

“All right,” the Doctor said after a long moment, drawing out the syllables, like he was trying to convince himself he hadn’t just made a horrible mistake. He pushed some new buttons and undid her restrictions to the medical bay.

That was... entirely unexpected, actually. She wouldn’t have been so generous to him if their positions were switched. But for whatever reason, it seemed as if she had just been promoted from prisoner to guest. Was this real? She needed to find out.

“And the toilet.”

Those eyebrows furrowed, and the Doctor hesitated longer on this one before reluctantly punching in a series of keys. “You’ll have access to the guest lavatory,” he said. “Don’t try any of your tricks in there. It doesn’t have sharp objects and isn’t connected to any external power source.”

Still a prisoner, it seemed.

“Okay, okay. I’ll only pee and poo. Satisfied?”

The Doctor replied by further blocking her from accessing whole wings of rooms deep inside the TARDIS.

Watching the Doctor set up safeguard after safeguard against her, Missy felt like an errant student called before the Academy administrator to await punishment. She fought back the burning sensation prickling at her eyes. For all its access to time and space, the TARDIS was but a giant cage. She tried to push away the same wave of humiliation that used to wash over her whenever she had had to fight for basic amenities during her early days in the vault. Then, she’d told herself that she had not yet earned the Doctor’s trust, that he had no reason to believe she wouldn’t repurpose every item in her prison to rig some contraption for escape. But after seven decades, after she piloted the TARDIS to bloody Mars and back without a single deviation to her rescue mission, she thought they had finally established some mutual trust.

Her mind tried to argue that letting her into his TARDIS was already a leap of faith for the Doctor, but her hearts refused to be satisfied with scraps. No. If the Doctor brought her into a TARDIS, then he should accord her with treatment worthy of a Time Lady. She was so much more than the sum of all his pets, stupid humans who would never understand a Time Lord’s telepathic connection with a TARDIS, any TARDIS.

“Missy?”

She blinked herself back into the present. The Doctor had been talking to her.

“Yes, dear?” she said absent-mindedly, familiar syllables rolling off her tongue but without the half-affectionate, half-teasing tone she normally attached to those words.

“Anything else? Do you need access to more rooms?”

Missy almost laughed. Wasn’t this ironic, the Doctor asking her what configuration of a prison he should be setting. She briefly considered demanding unrestricted passage into the heart of the TARDIS, just to see what reaction would be on that face. Oh, that would be quite a sight. Alas, she had no desire to be dragged back into the vault.

She decided to ask for practical things. “The wardrobe room would be nice. I should probably look less Victorian if we’re going this far back in Earth’s history. Maybe the snack room? I don’t need to go into the full kitchen if you’re worried about me and knives, just a place to grab something palatable in case I get tired of lamb stew or whatever it is that the ancient Hebrews ate.” She glanced at the mini library aloft the console room. “I’d like to take a gander up there, if you don’t mind.”

Without comment, the Doctor roamed his hands over an assortment of levers, knobs, and buttons, lowering the security setting of each of the requested areas as she spoke. He was too busy working the console to see the barest hint of confusion flitting across Missy’s face, an emotion that she promptly put under control outwardly, though inwardly she didn’t know what to think.

The jailor was showing signs of being her almost-friend. Which one was he?

“Is that all?” The Doctor turned his head toward her, his face open, questioning.

“That’s all I think I need, yes,” she said, “unless you want to open up the zero room in case I get mortally wounded.”

He granted her full access to the zero room.

All right then. Was this her cue to say thank-you, to play her part as a grateful prisoner?

The Doctor spoke before she could figure out a proper response. “There’s also a music room. Well, there are several, but there’s one with a magnificent grand piano. I bought it the year pianos were invented, it’s quite a thing of beauty. What do you say, Missy, would you like to see it?”

The words escaped before she could hold them back. “Why are you doing this?” This... dangling of favors was not making any sense. If he wanted to take everything away, then he shouldn’t turn around and tempt her with morsels. He was bollocksing up being the bad guy. This was crueler.

The Doctor frowned. “I thought you would like to try out a different piano. I mean, you like the one I got you so much. I thought –”

“Then why only let me into some rooms? I like pianos, yes. But I like welding and sword fighting and inter-dimensional programming too. Will you grant me access to those dangerous areas? Your hands aren’t moving, so I assume the answer is no. How long is my leash, Doctor?”

She knew this TARDIS, had once turned her into a paradox machine. She even managed to figure out the ship’s phone number. If this TARDIS were to lose the Doctor one day, she would have just as much claim over her as the Doctor. She wasn’t a guest and was most certainly not a warden’s responsibility as far as things related to the TARDIS was concerned. Yet her thousand-year collar was tightening up, choking her, reminding her of the sober reality of what she was.

The Doctor was looking at her with a What brought this on? face. Missy sighed, forcing herself to accept said sober reality. This was only going to escalate into another one of their spectacular rows, and she wasn’t going to let that to happen when she was at the brink of going on an adventure. One of them had to be the grownup here, and the Doctor was definitely not the one. He was acting like a child presenting stolen sweets to his guardian and expecting a praise. Well, he was a thief, so maybe it was her fault for expecting more from him than he was capable of being.

She hated, hated being good.

She forced a smile onto her face.

“You know what, the piano room would be lovely. How thoughtful of you, dear. Give me access to that room and I’ll go take a look right now.”

She walked past the main console and started up the stairs that led to the infinite number of rooms inside the TARDIS. Depending on Old Sexy’s mood, she would either find the piano room behind the first door she opened or be taken on an extremely long and not-quite-scenic route. Either way, she suddenly felt the need to put some distance between her and the Doctor.

Her cruel, infuriating, clueless Doctor.

Perhaps there was never a distinction between the jailor and her almost-friend. The Doctor would never consciously choose to be cruel. But in trying to be good to her, he was punishing her every step of the way.

-

They were still on twenty-first century Earth, hours later.

It wasn’t as if they were in a hurry. A few hours against a thousand years was like a wasp trying to measure eternity. Truth be told, the Doctor was rather enjoying a rare moment of peace in the chess room, which had somehow sprung up next to the piano room. He was half-paying attention to a book he wasn’t reading while sitting on the room’s carpeted floor, leaning his back against what the TARDIS had made into a shared wall between the two rooms.

The walls of the TARDIS were usually boundaries that contained a room’s reality to itself. But Sexy had made this particular wall as porous as a paper parasol held up against the rain, giving him the sense that he was in the same room as Missy but also outside of it. He leaned his head against the wall, eyes closed, allowing the music coming from the adjacent room to soothe his mind. Missy was a natural at the piano, and he wondered why he’d never known this about the Master in all her other lives. He was pretty sure that Time Lords retained knowledge and skills across regenerations if they wanted to. If he picked up a flute now, the Doctor felt confident that he could still carry a decent tune as he had so often done so in his second body.

You’ve never asked, a voice that sounded suspiciously like the Master he had known in his third body accused. True enough. He had no argument against that.

Missy was playing her repertoire of Earth music, jolting his memory with familiar tunes that spanned the lifetimes of multiple composers, old friends that he had met from his past adventures. She seemed to have a fondness for Beethoven, though every so often silly songs like that Joplin one would make an appearance.

His thoughts drifted from grumpy Ludwig and silly Charlie to Missy. He wondered what other hidden talents she had that would contribute to making the universe a better place rather than tearing it apart. Brewing a wicked pot of coffee came to mind, as he reminded himself to get her a new coffee machine. He would allow her keep the broken one, he decided, and let her scavenge its spare parts for customizing her other machines. It would be okay because she had promised she wouldn’t burn down the vault, and Missy kept her promises, in this body. But he still wouldn’t allow her to keep any knives because, well, pointy things were different. She was far too interested in pointy things.

A few bars of Mozart drifted into his ears. Pure genius, that one. Precocious, troubled young Wolfie who strutted to his own tunes because none of his contemporaries came anywhere close to understanding what he heard inside his head. Missy too. She danced to her own tune. She was the smartest person he knew.

And he was forcing the smartest person in the universe to survive without knives and on his passable cooking (she had far more colorful words to refer to that). Thank Rassilon for the laziness of humans that encouraged a culture of restaurant takeaways. Otherwise he may have to build her a full kitchen with all its amenities and dangerous tools. Would Missy use knives not to kill but to create? Could she cook? He should ask her someday. It would be a good way to stop her tirade the next time she started listing the top forty-seven reasons why the quality of the food he brought her was so spectacularly sub-par and lacking in every way that even a Judoon would notice.

He chuckled at that, finding that memory funny, now. They discovered an exquisite Indian restaurant that provided free deliveries that same night, so something good came out of it.

After a few more Earth compositions, the music shifted into Gallifreyan tunes that they’d both grown up listening to. A wave of nostalgia in the form of the smell of tall, red grass flooded his senses. Some songs, like the one Missy was playing now, he could still hear sung in his mother’s voice. Other ones reminded him of his days at the Academy, when friends would gather and break out in song, when the lyrics that told of war and lost love were but syllables that happened to sound good with the tune. Then there were the folk songs of the commoners, and the Doctor was surprised that Missy knew one at all. These tunes had a joyous beat to them, and Missy, ever an expert in mechanical precision, kept time to the one she was playing as if she was the town elder leading everybody in dance. The Doctor smiled to himself. Koschei in his early days on Gallifrey never deigned to associate with the common folks.

But his friend did dance among the Highborn Gallifreyans, suffering through the idiocy of socialite galas and military balls with the same determination that got him through the Academy and later assigned to important off-planet missions with the army. As a young man, Koschei had no shortage of ladies willing to dance with him. He had laughed in Theta’s face, that combination of disbelief and scorn that questioned his friend’s intelligence (and kept questioning his intelligence, many galaxies and bodies later), when Theta asked how come he never once brought a partner to those hobnobbing functions. Why tie myself to one mate when I can have them all? Koschei had answered, as if it was the most obvious explanation in the universe. It was only after he had gone off to the library that he realized Koschei had had his eyes fixed on him, penetrating and unblinking, as he gave his answer, lied through his teeth about being able to have anyone he wanted.

Theta had only partnered in a formal dance once. He didn’t remember why he was at the gala, something to do with Act like a Highborn for once and don’t even think to throw your future away or some such, he couldn’t be certain anymore, his mother’s voice fuzzy with the distance of time but always clear in her disappointed tone. So he somehow ended up inside a great hall, sitting alone to the side after a full meal, after food was no longer an excuse for him to find something to do with his hands. And so he watched the crowd dance, watched as Koschei mingled with generals and commanders and won many a Time Lady’s hand. He was just about to leave when Koschei disentangled himself from a particularly tipsy female and started walking toward him.

Koschei, rising in ranks and importance within the army, threw away all the social capital he had gained that evening the moment he extended a hand to his friend. Theta was in his first body then, his eyebrows nowhere near as expressive as the ones on this face, but they’d shot up, his eyes widening, and all he could remember was the growing smirk on Koschei’s lips as he waited for Theta to unfreeze, that smirk that sent his hearts pounding so loudly that he couldn’t distinguish his own heartbeats from the beats of the tune.

He would never forget that tune. Rassilon, High and Mighty. He didn’t remember a single one of these galas when this Tribute to their Great Leader wasn’t played. Koschei had led that night, his steps quick and precise, drawing Theta into orbit around him. There was so much glee in every movement of his body, a bounce that dared anyone who was judging them to try to break them apart. The two of them knew, and everyone else knew, that no one would be able to keep them apart for long. Not then. And not now, the Doctor added, basking in the awareness of having Missy nearby. They were still dancing that same dance, just like Theta watching Koschei move as if he were dancing to a tune of his own, a different version of the music bleating in the background that commanded not respect but ridicule, Koschei’s hurling of a big fuck you to every member of the High Council by dancing with that person to that tune.

Really, the Doctor thought back to the sour faces he glimpsed all around the dance floor that night, he should feel honored.

Missy was playing the same tune now, and the Doctor grinned, hearing the fuck you in every note. How she managed to twist a pompous piece of propaganda into a barbed commentary, he didn’t have a clue, but he fully approved of such an impressive accomplishment.

It was a scary thought, one that the Doctor couldn’t quite contemplate head-on in light of what the Master had become: In every face and every body, Koschei was the one among his kind that he resonated with the most.

Missy played several more Gallifreyan songs before the bright, grandiose notes gave way to something more fluid, more expressive, like the crystalline melodies of clanging ice flowing down a thawing river in early spring. The Doctor closed the book he was not-reading and set it down, turning his full attention to ethereal sounds that were at once channeling the most exquisite light and ushering in the most foreboding dark. Contrasts and paradoxes brought into perfect harmony. Soaring and despairing. Beautiful and harrowing.

These were Missy’s own tunes.

Listening to this music that was entirely reflective of its creator, a tribute to imaginary notes that existed only inside Missy’s head, the Doctor tried and failed to find words to describe the ache that had latched onto his hearts as these notes made him feel, made him see his oldest friend in an entirely different light. Every note reminded him of Missy’s laughs. Every note also brought up images of her tears.

What did she bury inside those hearts of hers, deep emotions that she would never allow to surface except in the music she played?

Missy was the black hole to his eye of the storm. Her very nature was destructive, but there was almost a sense of rightness in her tearing every seam of reality apart. He, on the other hand, always tried to hold things together, to rein in destruction by keeping those closest to him safe. Collateral damage was inevitable, of course, for there were always those who strayed too close into the path of the storm. But those who remained in the center with him, those were the ones he would give his very life to keep whole.

Missy’s laugh rang in his head. Do you? Your version of good is vain, arrogant, sentimental, the voice taunted, and he couldn’t banish her knowing eyes from his mind, those eyes that had seen him with his many companions and, without fail, would see him alone again. How’s Adric doing nowadays? Oh, pardon me, there’s no nowadays because he’s dead. And Jack Harkness? Has he gotten tired of dying yet? What about our dear Brigadier, hmm? You knew that was him, don’t you, that cyberman who shot at me? Why didn’t you save him from being converted? Or save him from dying to begin with?

The clanging ice crystals now felt like stakes that stabbed at his hearts. He had been lying to himself for far too long. He lived from life to life convincing himself that he would protect those under his care, until he’d actually, properly believed it.

A liar falling for his own lies? Oh, how fascinating! the Missy in his mind cooed.

Abruptly, the Doctor stood, as if rising to his feet would shrug off the layers of doubt crusting over him. That was the problem with Missy’s music. It was too her. She was showing him exactly who she was, and like a mirror that reflected both ways, he saw into her destructiveness and discovered the same in himself.

He reached for the closest object he could grasp, and — how did it get here? — his fingers curled around the neck of his guitar, an accident of room-merging that had booted it from the music room and into this one. He placed the strap over his shoulder, feeling comfort in the familiar weight of the instrument bearing down on him, its form solid against his hands.

He let his mind drift as his fingers danced across the frets and he alternated between picking at the strings and strumming up and down, feeling like the instrument had become an extension of his very being. Did Missy feel this way with the piano? He didn’t know. All he could concentrate on was the music coming from the guitar — his music — that was doing an excellent job in drowning out his thoughts, because what was the point of thinking? What use was it to be the Doctor if he couldn’t keep his most fundamental promises? He always lost those whom he had sworn to protect. And then there was one he had forgotten. Her. He only knew the name, and even that was painful to think about. No, he most certainly wasn’t a protector.

No, I don’t keep the ones I love safe. Happy? He snarled at the imaginary Missy. I fail. I always fail. Is this what you want to hear?

He played the song over and over again, grief and anger fueling each other in a tribute once known as Clara but was now simply a verdict rendered I Forget.

-

Missy sat on the piano bench, her hands frozen over the black and ivory keys, listening.

The melody that floated in from the room next door was simple, almost dainty, when it first began. It was a series of single notes, strung together like the first pull of the tide that reminded Missy of a memory, like a whisper in her ear telling her this was how the tune was supposed to go, because those notes had been ordered in this precise way for a reason, and there could be no other shape to this melody but the rising and falling of frequencies that spoke of a time long past.

The Doctor repeated the melody over and over again, playing in single notes the first few times, then gradually building chords around the melody, adding layers and textures that transformed a cry in the dark into an angry roar hurled against the heavens. Missy’s hearts swelled, listening to not just the notes but to the outpouring of her friend’s raw emotions, defiant yet despairing, like a wolf’s howl that would frighten anyone in the vicinity but never actually reached the moon.

After some minutes, Missy decided to answer the howl, dipping her finger on the same key three times to complement another round of the melody, then diverging in counterpoint with her right hand and anchoring the music with a rhythmic base line with her left. She was good at that, seeing things that the Doctor couldn’t see and filling the gaps with her offerings. He never appreciated her overtures, but that didn’t mean he didn’t need them — or need her. How much emptier would this song sound if she hadn’t joined in with notes that only a piano can produce, regardless of how many more layers of complexity the Doctor piled on using his guitar? They needed each other, whether they were willing to admit it or not.

As if by mutual agreement, both of them built the song up over several repeats until they brought it to a final, ringing climax, then let the rest of the tune play out in a softer cadence, removing layers until both guitar and piano were reduced to the single-note melody, ending the piece in perfect unison.

The silence rang loud in the minutes that followed, the slow dissipation of chords and sighs still hanging in the air until they were once again aware of the hum of the TARDIS, signifying the true ending of the song.

Missy turned around on the piano bench. The Doctor, with guitar strapped to his shoulder, was standing behind her in a room that had lengthened with the disappearance of the dividing wall. His eyes were bright with unshed tears, and his body posture screamed of regret. He was grieving, had been grieving, Missy realized, all this time.

“Who was she?” Missy asked. Because it must have been a person, must have been one of his human friends.

She knew it wasn’t River Song, because he could now talk about her at great length. He had processed her death, difficult as it had been during those first years of halting conversations inside the vault. But this one. This one hadn’t even been mentioned.

Missy felt her eyes narrow. By deduction, it could only be one person...

“You still don’t remember, do you?”

The Doctor shook his head.

“I used to call this song Clara. Now, I call it I Forget.” His next words were rushed: “I couldn’t protect her, Missy, couldn’t protect any of them. You are chaos and destruction and you kill people. I am supposed to be the opposite. I save people. Except I never do!”

We’re not so different, you and I.

He was finally admitting it, yet Missy felt none of the smug vindication that she thought she would feel whenever she dreamed about this moment.

The Doctor looked so broken, so lost. So she turned back toward the piano and started playing the counterpoint and bass chords that she had added to I Forget. It sounded different, without the guitar driving the melody. She played through it three times. “What do you hear?” she asked when she finished, her left hand holding down the chord to let the base notes play out on their own.

When the Doctor didn’t answer, Missy did it for him. “Different notes to the same song, parts created to fill in the gaps but do not on their own constitute the melody.” She swung back around. “This is what you’re hearing, Doctor. Everything around Clara that isn’t Clara. It’s a different kind of remembering.”

Remembering around Clara wasn’t good enough for the Doctor, she could tell by the pain in his face, twisting those sharp features into desperation. “I just want to know! Tell me anything that would jot my memory of her. Anything. Why don’t you? You’ve spent time with her, been to Skaro together because I remember being there too, everything except for the big, dark hole that is Clara. And yet you never tell me anything about her.”

Missy tutted. “I gave you Clara. You were so perfect for each other and were on a trajectory toward mutual destruction. But you both cheated a glorious ending. So disappointing.” If she was honest with herself, she was still a bit miffed about that. After all her efforts bringing those two together and they managed to stop short of ripping the universe apart? But seeing her friend’s grief, she suddenly didn’t want to win so much anymore. She continued in a gentler tone, “Believe me, Doctor, your amnesia is what keeps you alive and breathing. It’s for your own good that you don’t remember her. And until you accept that, short, big eyes, and obnoxiously bossy are all you’re going to get out of me.”

“But –”

“Doctor.” She held up a hand. “For your own good. Just believe it. End of discussion. Done. Finite. Do you understand?”

She waited until he reluctantly moved his head in some awkward gesture that resembled a nod. Good enough.

She waited a bit more until he met her gaze. “I know you don’t trust me. But we’re about to go on an adventure. Things will happen, because they always do. So you need to know this: Whatever I will do, whether you agree with me or not, especially if you don’t agree with me, know that it will be for your good, our good.”

She paused for a few seconds. Silence, just as expected. She didn’t think he would endorse her pragmatic approach to goodness, no surprise there. But when things would happen and she must do things that would seem like betrayal to him, he would need to know. He needed to know now.

“We are friends. And we will be back in time for tea. I will make sure of it.”

Chapter Text

Deciding on when to land became a fifteen-minute argument.

Missy had her hands set on her hips, the perfect dictionary illustration of cross. “If we’re aiming for inconspicuous — and don’t try to say we aren’t because you’ve used that word four times — then we can’t also make a grand entrance.”

“We can make an inconspicuous grand entrance!”

“Not on your life. And that’s number five.”

“Oi, are you questioning my abilities?”

“Amping up your guitar on a tank? Remember that one?”

“We’re not bringing my guitar this time.”

Missy scoffed. “I’m almost tempted not to bring you. Didn’t I mention how identifiable you are in those biblical stories? We don’t need any stupid apes to actually write you in by name.”

“They wouldn’t! We’ll be utterly inconspicuous!”

“Six.”

The Doctor started to explain his plan from the beginning for the third time. Missy blocked him out, focusing instead on whether he really was so daft to think that she could be persuaded or was merely too self-absorbed to realize she would never go all gooey-eyed on him like one of his pets. “Tough choice,” she said aloud, and the Doctor stopped mid-sentence, brows furrowed in confusion.

“Oh, don’t mind me,” she said airily, “I’m just making conversation with myself until you’re done word vomiting.”

That hit a nerve. Clearly, the Doctor had surrounded himself with adoring humans for too long. His ego had calcified like an old bone, and Missy was only too happy to shatter it into particles.

She trained her eyes on the outer casing of the time rotor and smirked at the reflection of herself. “What do you think, Missy? Is landing the TARDIS in the middle of a big crowd just in time to pull people out of a giant hole in the ground inconspicuous? Absolutely not! In fact, I can’t think of anything more the opposite. But what about the Doctor? He can’t possibly land anywhere else and give up the perfect opportunity to be the center of attention! Oh, he’ll have their attention, all right. The ancient humans will all hate him. Don’t forget, they wanted to feed their kind to the earth. No, no, no, not everyone, silly, just their leaders. The egotistical leaders had their authority challenged, which means the dissenters must go. Getting them eaten just happened to be convenient. Tsk, Missy. Getting rid of one’s enemies is word-for-word from the evil overlord manual, you should know that. Oh, but I’m good now. I’ll help the Doctor save lives. We’ll tell the ordinary humans all about the underground reptiles declaring war on them. They’ll believe everything. Of course they will! Everybody will see righteous goodness oozing out of the Doctor and instantly trust him. They’ll all believe in scaly bipedal reptiles because the Doctor says so. How could you doubt the Doctor, Missy? Yes, how utterly wrong I am! I must apologize to the Doctor and tell him I’ll go along with his hare-brained scheme. Because that’s what good people do, isn’t it?”

She turned to the Doctor and lifted a hand over her right heart in feigned surprise. “Oh! Goodness, Doctor, you’re listening! Does this mean I’ll have to properly apologize to you?”

“Stop this,” he growled.

“Oooh, the Doctor doesn’t want an apo-o-logy!” she sang.

A second growl entered her ears as she caught sight of the Doctor swinging the TARDIS monitor toward her, all grumpiness on his face. “Go ahead. You make plans for us then, if you think you’re so brilliant. Choose a better entry point in time and place since you’re so worried about being inconspicuous. Oh I know! Why don’t we blend in with the natives and comment on the weather with them? Be all nice and unthreatening. Except there’s a slight problem. A bunch of humans will still fall underground and we’ll save a grand total of no one. We might as well stay here and let the interspecies aggression run amok. Take a nap in the TARDIS and wake up to a world dominated by reptiles. Is this what you want?”

“Did you ever pay attention at the Academy? This isn’t how creating alternate history works.”

“You’re changing the subject.”

“No I’m not.” Missy gripped the handle on the side of the monitor and walked it back toward the Doctor, closing the distance between them. “You want me to decide? Then listen up because I’m only going to say it once.

“We’re not going to show ourselves to any human. You’ll take us a few weeks further back in time than the incident we saw in Numbers. Land the TARDIS underground, zoom in on a nesting area if you can find one. We’ll then shut off whatever it is that caused the Silurians to wake from their hibernation, because by now we’re both a hundred percent sure that Silurians were involved. Then we’ll either stick around or you can use the TARDIS to fast forward us to the day when the people get swallowed up. I’ll blow up a hole in the ground when the time comes to make those hapless dissenters fall through the ground. Kill them or resettle them elsewhere, I don’t care which. Then we go eat some nice lamb stew and come back here without changing a strand of history. Is everything clear?”

If Missy didn’t know better, she would take the waggle of those eyebrows as the Doctor being impressed in spite of himself. She returned the favor with a smirk. “I’ve done my share of preserving history and saving lower life forms too. Just not as conspicuous as you.”

“And if the Silurians are already awake?”

Missy kept the thrill she was feeling from showing on her face. The idiot was mapping out contingencies, which meant he may actually do as he was told.

“We can travel back several months prior to the incident if you want to be extra cautious. If the reptiles are already out of hibernation and gearing up for aggression, then we do what we have both done before. Negotiate, foil their plans, annihilate — that one’s mine, but you’re welcome to borrow it — whatever it takes to keep your precious humans safe.”

When the Doctor made no reply right away, Missy released her hand from the monitor handle and turned around.

“I’ll be at the wardrobe room if you need me, though please knock before entering if you do go there.”

“Missy.”

She didn’t turn around. There was nothing else to discuss. She had already presented her case. It was up to the Doctor to be sensible or reckless, to follow her plan or to give into his ego and barge into human history to play savior.

“Why?” he called after her, and Missy could think of a hundred answers to the hundreds of questions that this single word embodied. Why are you being careful? Why aren’t you trying to control the humans? Why so against meddling all of a sudden? Why care so much about not changing history?

These were all valid. After all, when she was a he and the Doctor was in his third body, the Master did wake a whole subspecies of sea-based Silurians and nudged them toward war with the humans. Even Missy wasn’t sure she wouldn’t awaken any Silurians this time around, deliberate or accidental.

But the real question, the one that wasn’t being asked, was the one that mattered most.

She paused from making her way up the stairs. “Because I want my tea when we come back,” she replied.

Because I want you to trust me.

Somehow, that mattered. Somehow, despite being the most competent being in the universe, she wanted validation from her oldest friend.

Missy walked up the final steps and disappeared into the bowels of the TARDIS.

-

A very frantic Nardole entered the Doctor’s office when first knocking, then banging, on the door produced no response. A quick kick to the wooden barrier did the trick. He’d call janitorial service to have the door repaired later.

“Doctor, you’ve signed up to speak on an inter-term enrichment panel. Did you forget? It starts in fifteen minutes –”

He slid on a pile of essays on the floor and careened into the center of the room, barely missing a very unpleasant meeting between the corner of the desk and his left hip. Nardole squeaked as he tried not to send anything on the desk crashing to their demise. Too much clutter (normal) and an empty chair (not normal). No Doctor.

“Now where has he gone off to?” he wondered. There was the slight possibility that he went to the lecture hall early — as if that would ever happen. Maybe the vault? He had been spending more and more time there lately. At least the TARDIS was parked where she should be, so he could rule that out...

But then he saw the “Out of Order” sign flung halfway across the room on the floor. Which meant the TARDIS door had been opened. Which meant someone had entered the TARDIS...

“Oh no you don’t!” he fumed. Not after Mars, and especially not after yesterday. What did the Doctor think he was, stupid? Well, never mind the answer to that, but he wasn’t so clueless as to miss what that idiot of a Timelord had been up to with Bill in recent weeks.

He stomped an angry path toward the TARDIS and swung the door open.

-

“Oh no no no no no no no what are you – GET OUT OF HERE!”

“Sir, you’re going to be late for the inter-term... wait, are we dematerializing? What are you doing? WHERE ARE WE GOING?”

-

Missy turned on the TARDIS monitor and saw sunlight. She rolled her eyes. Of course he would disregard her perfectly sound advice and attempt to play the conspicuous hero aboveground. He never even made it to the wardrobe room to change. Well — she looked down to give one last glance at her period- and culturally-appropriate attire, albeit an all-black one made with durable, lightweight alien materials for maximum comfort, range of motion, and temperature control — at least one of them wouldn’t attract automatic ire the moment they made contact with the humans.

Pocketing several weapons that she discovered attached to a bunch of outfits and taking along the Judoon stun gun she managed to eek out of the 3-D printer earlier that day, she did one final environmental scan, put her bigger-on-the-inside travel sack into her other pocket, and stepped out of the TARDIS.

Who knew she would actually appreciate that bumbling egg man for once? The Doctor was so afraid of the android discovering her presence that he had forced him out of the TARDIS as soon as they’d landed, without checking for time, location, or atmospheric conditions. Please... the Doctor had begged her via telepathy in desperation. Don’t let him see you. Don’t do anything evil. Don’t make things worse.

He was panicking so much that he failed to do the most sensible thing: pilot the TARDIS back to twenty-first century Bristol and abort the mission until another day. They were in a time machine after all, and she really did prefer to land underground among the Silurians. Confronting one species was much more efficient than entangling in the affairs of both apes and reptiles; given the choices, Missy would choose efficiency over flashy hero-playacting any day.

But no matter. She rather liked this unexpected turn of events.

She let the TARDIS door close behind her and grinned. Freedom. She was free from the vault and free from the Doctor. Ahead of her were choices to make and lower life forms to manipulate. Maybe stop a war from happening eventually, when the time came. But first, some nice lamb stew.

There were people living in tents to her left and a vast expanse of arid land to her right. If she squinted, Missy could make out what seemed like a fortified town very far away, on the other side of the arid expanse. It would take several days’ journey to get there on foot. But she knew she wouldn’t be able to find refuge with the tent people without running into the Doctor. Now that she had taken a hold of freedom, she didn’t fancy having it cut short anytime soon. So Missy walked in the direction of the unknown and hoped that she would eventually happen upon at least some semblance of civilization.

This was going to be so much fun.

-

“You messed up my driving! We’ve landed too early. No ground-opening or people-saving for at least six months!” the Doctor scolded as he pushed Nardole along the dusty path, getting him as far away from the TARDIS as possible. Nardole must not, under any circumstances, find out that he’d taken Missy out for a ride — he didn’t fancy being forced to regenerate just quite yet, or being forced to regenerate at all. “This was supposed to be a quick trip! Pop in, save humans, send reptiles back into hibernation, done. And now you’ve gone and made this long and boring. What are we going to do for six months? Plant seeds and stare at the ground until something sprouts? And you’re useless to have around. Does your arm have a shovel option? Stop shaking your head. That was a rhetorical question. We can’t even dig ourselves underground to investigate. The earth doesn’t crack open on demand, you know.”

Nardole wiggled into a slightly less painful position under the Doctor’s grip. “Then go back to the TARDIS and hop ahead five months and twenty-nine days! Or better yet, hop ahead a few thousands years or so back to Bristol, where you are supposed to be.” He wiggled some more, trying to turn them around. The Doctor gripped his shoulders tighter and marched them forward.

“Can’t.”

“Why not?”

“Because the TARDIS. Timey wimey. We’re already here. She always takes us where we need to go.”

“So why are you blaming me for messing up your timing?”

“Because I can, and it’s easy to blame you for everything.”

“Oi! I don’t appreciate that.”

“Get used to it,” the Doctor said, ignoring Nardole’s noise of protest. His mind was spinning with a thousand thoughts. Should they return to the TARDIS? Yes, they had no reason to risk being seen here, particularly not Nardole, dressed in an aquamarine robe and matching headpiece with Asian floral patterns that screamed loudly of both wrong time and wrong place. In fact, he would kiss every wall of the TARDIS if Sexy would cooperate and lock Nardole inside one of her rooms. Then he could go on to save the world in peace.

But even as he contemplated returning to the TARDIS, his fingers itched to find a way to dig underground, to locate the Silurian hibernation chambers before any of them would wake and declare war on the humans. What he should have done was pilot the TARDIS underground. He was in the process of doing that until Nardole butted in and messed up the setting of the final number in the coordinate. He really did have every intention of following Missy’s game plan –

Missy.

He’d left her alone.

He let out a string of Gallifreyan expletives that he was glad the TARDIS didn’t translate.

Where was she now?

What do you think, Doctor? his inner voice jeered. Gone, of course. Why would she stay?

He had begged her not to show herself to Nardole, as that was the most pressing complication on his mind at the time. He didn’t think to forbid her to leave the TARDIS. Would she have listened? Hmm?

Would a caged bird not fly away the moment she was shown an open door?

And now they were at least ten minutes’ walk away from the TARDIS.

Stupid, stupid Doctor.

“Stop walking!” he shouted, ignoring the minor detail that he was the one shoving Nardole forward. “Change of plans. We need to get back. No, close that mouth, no questions. I forbid you to talk. I’ll explain later.” He released Nardole, trusting that he would follow, and started running toward the TARDIS. Missy? He threw out his mental link when he got close enough, hoping to feel the presence of another Time Lord on the other side of the door. But there was nothing.

He ran and ran and ran. Missy? His mind screamed louder. If he spoke the name aloud, he knew there would be an edge of hysteria tainting those syllables.

Silence.

He pushed open the TARDIS door and ran until he crashed into the console, ignoring Nardole’s huffing and puffing behind him. He grabbed the monitor — the only part of the controls that Missy wasn’t locked out of — brought up what it had last displayed... and his hearts sank.

Date, time, location, outside atmospheric conditions. Textbook landing procedure prior to setting foot outside of a TARDIS. Koschei had always been an excellent student and an expert traveler.

“Doctor?” Nardole wheezed, suddenly sounding too close for his comfort. “Wh - What’s gotten to you? Can... Can you ju - just tell me... what’s going... on?”

The Doctor slumped against the console as the reality of what happened sank in. This was no longer a quick mission to save a few humans. He must now find and recapture — his mind recoiled at the thought, at the stark truth that he was indeed Missy’s executioner and jailor — the other most dangerous Time Lord of the universe.

“Doctor?”

He couldn’t look at Nardole. What was he going to tell him? Missy and I, we were bored, you see, so we decided to go on an outing.

“Doctor, you’re not telling me something, I know that look on your face.”

He owed Nardole a confession that he wasn’t about to give. So he tried to lie as little as possible. “I’m afraid we must live the next six months linearly.” Until I track down a certain someone, he didn’t say, averting eye contact and looking down at the TARDIS console. “I’m sorry, I really am. But there isn’t another way. We need to remain here and I need you to trust me when I say it must be so, no questions.”

He could feel, rather than see, Nardole crossing his arms. The stubborn android wasn’t about to let this go.

“I have full permission to kick your arse,” he said, “and I have a feeling that you deserve exactly that for whatever it is you’re hiding from me.”

“There’s nothing, I swear,” the Doctor said a bit too quickly. He turned to Nardole, daring to meet his eyes to protest his innocence, and knew that the android didn’t believe him one bit.

Sighing, he passed a hand over his face. When all else fails, use diversion. “It’s Silurians. I have good reason to believe that there’s a tribe of Silurians hibernating underground and they are about to wake up prematurely.” He paused to gauge Nardole’s reaction. No scoffing, which was a good sign. “Look, this isn’t all bad. You might enjoy being here. We’ll steer the TARDIS underground and look for their cryogenic chambers. Gather information, like a professor’s field trip. You’ll get to become an expert in everything you ever care to know about the Silurians and I’ll get to save the world by preventing danger from ever happening. That’s good, isn’t it?”

Those crossed arms dropped a fraction of an inch. Good. Dropping of angry appendages was always good. Not to mention no arse had been kicked yet. Nardole still didn’t look convinced, but at least his attention was now led away from what he really must never find out.

“Hmm, I’m still not sure about this, something’s not adding up,” said Nardole. “Can’t we do whatever’s needed to keep the Silurians asleep now and then fly back to Bristol?”

Technically, yes. But technically with Missy missing? Absolutely not.

“I, er, I’m going to need to stick around a bit to monitor the situation. Safety precautions. Very important. Always very important to be responsible and conscientious. A time travel best practice. I thought I should give it a try.” He didn’t even bother to look at Nardole for a reaction with that one. What else should he say? What would make a convincing excuse? History. Ah, yes, use history to your advantage, Doctor. “Do you know that at least one version of historical documents recorded Silurian aggression about six months from now? People get swallowed into the ground, and we can’t let it happen. So we really should stay, to make sure, er, nothing bad happens.”

Nardole was still peering suspiciously at him, though the words were sinking in. “You’re not giving me the whole picture and I don’t like it. Hmpf. But I suppose I can’t argue with history. So what do you need me to do?”

Thank Rassilon and everything that was ever associated with his name! The Doctor moved a step to the right to hide behind the time rotor, keeping Nardole from seeing how relieved he was. He pressed a couple of unimportant buttons and flicked some switches that did nothing, making himself look busy.

“First we need to get some underground readings and check for any signs of conscious subterranean life forms,” he explained, telling the truth. He fully intended to stop the Silurians from harming humans. Just because things got complicated with Missy didn’t mean he was aborting his mission. “Come around to the console, Nardole. We can generate the readings together.”

He would keep the Silurians in hibernation. He would keep the humans alive. He would most definitely keep Nardole busy.

He only wished he knew how to start finding Missy.

Chapter Text

The thing was, not a lot of people knew how familiar Missy was with desert climate and with finding one’s way through a vast canvas of rocks and dust and sand. But the things one learned as a child could never be truly forgotten. As a child, Koschei knew how to find Theta’s barn miles and miles away from the citadel. Koschei knew how to maintain optimal body temperature and not let Gallifrey’s twin suns overwhelm his small form. Koschei knew how life would spring from the most unlikely of physical conditions and knew how to let these signs of life point him to find water.

Koschei knew how to brave arid ground and harsh conditions until he reached his intended destination.

Missy took step after step after step after step. She wasn’t running away from the Doctor as much as she was seeking an embrace from an old friend, the familiar feel of nature at its harshest that reminded her of a time long ago. She wouldn’t see her friend’s smile at the end of this journey, no, not the face from long ago and certainly not the face he was wearing now, with his eyes full of mistrust and with fear too suffocating to let his hope shine through. But she was walking toward freedom, and if the cost to gaining freedom was seeking new life in an utterly dull human civilization, she was only too happy to cough up the payment until she found a way out of here.

She chose not to dwell on whether her desertion would cost a friendship that she had come to value above all else.

“Friend is too generous a word anyway,” she said to herself. Really, no prisoner should think about how their jailor would feel. It wasn’t as if she needed to wonder; she knew what was going through the Doctor’s mind right about now: horror and anger, with a heaping dose of guilt for himself and a crushing load of disappointment concerning her. She wished he didn’t have to ascribe emotions to everything, as if her leaving couldn’t simply be because she could, as if there had to be an elaborate plot and a grand betrayal hidden somewhere behind her actions. Well. At least she’d made things less confusing for them both. The next time they met, hopefully a long time from now and many galaxies away, Missy had no doubt that she would have her best enemy fully back.

Before she could find a way out of this planet, she needed access to the Silurians’ superior technology — she shuddered at the thought of the alternative, of living the next thousands of years linearly in this awful backwater of an era fourteen-plus centuries before Earth’s common era. So finding her way underground must be a priority.

But even if she had to live one year after another in chronological order for the foreseeable future, it was still more tolerable doing it on her own terms than as a prisoner inside a vault. She was free. She was free.

She was free.

“I am free,” she tested the words aloud, hushed and almost whispering, as if the desert wind would betray her and would carry these words straight into the Doctor’s ears. She paused, looked around, and steadied herself with a deep breath. “I am free,” she repeated, a little louder this time, pushing past the lump in her throat and the quiver in her voice. She raised her hands to eye level, sensing imaginary chains falling away (there were no chains when the Doctor was her jailor; those executioners, on the other hand... she tried not to think about it). She pressed two fingers each to her temples. Silence. Wherever the Doctor was now, he was too far away to form a mental link with her. He could scream and shout for her in his mind, but Missy was no longer obliged to hear a single word.

She was completely, properly free.

Funny how a frog that was being slowly boiled alive would have no idea it was dying until it could get out of the pot.

(She really was going native, using Earth analogies. Though she supposed the same cooking method would apply for Sontarans.)

Yet even though she felt release... did this really count as winning her freedom, when she had consented to staying in the vault? It wasn’t a real choice, her mind scolded, bringing up images of the executioners and the promise of permanent death if she had refused the Doctor’s arrangement. But he was my friend, she argued back, a fool’s retort that triggered a flutter of hope flooding over her senses. Curses! She had gone soft, may have even fallen victim to what the humans called Stockholm Syndrome. If the Doctor was a friend, then why did he try so hard to change her, to force his morality onto her? You allowed it to happen, the voice accused, and she conceded that she should be as angry at herself as she was at the Doctor.

It was worrisome, because she wasn’t angry at the Doctor at all.

“What’s wrong with you, Missy?” She flung the words at herself, stomping with her boots for emphasis. “Who cares if the Doctor is panicking right now?”

Her previous selves would never have spared a thought to the Doctor when there were more important things like survival and preservation of self-interest to worry about. Her previous selves didn’t develop empathy.

She marched on, letting her self-anger fuel her every step, ignoring the seizing sensations of her hearts as thoughts of pianos and Chinese food refused to be squashed away. She was breaking their promise and she must decide once and for all whether she was okay with it. Either commit to being good and crawl back to the Doctor like a dog with its tail tucked between its legs or embrace the parts of her that she had been suppressing for far too long.

She slowed her gait until she came to a stop, letting logic and objectivity rein in her emotions. Besides the Doctor, was there any other reason she would bind herself to that thousand-year nonsense?

No, she thought not.

Missy stood facing the direction of the faraway town she was trying to reach — there was no turning back now — and let the desert wind whip against her face, drying the last remaining tears in her eyes. Friend or not, the Doctor had become the reason she was bound on Earth, and she would never fully be the Master under his constraints. She needed to become herself again, and that could only happen away from the Doctor, away from her attempts to deny her very essence just to get him to pay attention to her, to get him to direct a smile her way. If the Doctor was to acknowledge her as his friend, then let him acknowledge her for who she really was.

She walked on, miles upon miles until the sun set and the night chill set in. When she found an abandoned well and managed to drill through the mud and sand that had clogged the waterflow with those handy tools she had swiped from the TARDIS, Missy replenished her supply of liquids, sat down with her back against the well, and closed her eyes.

-

Someone was knocking on the TARDIS door.

Missy? the Doctor almost shouted, before catching himself as he glanced at Nardole typing away on the console’s keyboard, unperturbed by the knocking. He projected a mental query toward the door. No answering connection. He was still the only Time Lord in the vicinity.

So who was outside of the TARDIS?

“Hello?” he called out. No answer. “Give me the monitor,” he said to Nardole, “stop whatever it is you’re typing and do a scan of the outside for me.”

“Fine, go right ahead and disturb me from trying to save the world,” Nardole muttered, then said in a louder voice, “Why don’t you just open the door and see who’s there? I’m pretty sure that’s how doors are supposed to work.”

“You won’t be saving the world if there’s an android-eating alien standing outside.”

“Oh, really funny, Doctor, ha, ha. If it’s a monster, I doubt it would bother to knock.”

“I’ve met plenty of polite monsters during my lifetimes.”

“Well you certainly aren’t one.” Nardole swung the monitor toward the Doctor. “Go ahead, take a look. Human, male, a child. No unusual readings. You could have found that out half a minute ago.”

“Then how would I test our visitor’s level of patience and tenacity?” he quipped, walking toward the entrance. Hmm, an eight-year-old boy. Must have not yet learned enough apathy to pay no attention to a police box standing in the middle of the ancient near east.

“Why, hello there!” he said with a grin he hoped was not scary, flinging the TARDIS door wide open. “I didn’t realize I was expecting any visitor.”

A little boy was staring up at him: dark brown hair and eyes, tan skin, curious demeanor, and by the look of his build, probably didn’t like to take his vitamins everyday.

“Hey, that’s not supposed to do that!” he exclaimed.

“But this is no ordinary police box. Not that you should know what a police box is. Actually, forget I used the words police box, even though I’ve now said them three times. How about we start from the beginning? Hello, I’m the Doctor.”

“It says pull to open! You opened it the wrong way!”

“You can read!” This was interesting. The boy looked like a commoner by all definitions. He didn’t realize general literacy extended this far back into human history.

The boy moved his head up and down with a big smile on his face. “I can! I look at the box and I suddenly know words! ”

Ah, the TARDIS translation had kicked in. This made much more sense. He crouched down to the boy’s eye level. “I can see that you’re a very smart boy, and under any other circumstance, you would be absolutely correct. But I’m afraid this sign here is more of a suggestion. Sometimes when you’re running away from monsters there just isn’t a lot of time to follow instructions. So what do you think of my box? Would you like to come in?”

He didn’t want to be seen interacting with the locals. And as the boy wasn’t showing signs of leaving anytime soon, ushering him inside was the best option.

“Come in? Can I fit?”

“Of course you can! You’re tiny. If my box can fit me and my friend Nardole — you’ll get to meet him too if you come inside — then there’s plenty of room for you.”

“Okay...” the boy said, peering past the Doctor to catch a glimpse inside the TARDIS. Whatever he saw seemed to have convinced him and turned his thinking face into a happy one. “My name is Tzakhi.”

“Tzakhi, that’s a very good name.”

“It’s short for Yitzhak. That’s what my friends like to call me.”

That would be the equivalent of Isaac in Bristol. So he was one of the Hebrew boys that lived in the tented community over to the left. As far as people-saving was concerned, at least he landed in the right place, if only several months too early.

“Right, yes, Tzakhi. Didn’t your family teach you not to speak to strangers?”

“Then you can be my friend. Friends aren’t strangers.”

“I would love to be your friend. Would you like to come inside and meet another friend?”

“Okay.”

“Excellent! Follow me,” the Doctor said as he led the way, showing Tzakhi it was safe to walk inside. He turned around and made a come hither gesture with his hand. Beaming, the boy stepped forward.

The sun was shining into the TARDIS, outlining Tzakhi with a golden halo as he entered. For the briefest second, as the bright light cast Tzakhi’s face in shadow, the Doctor thought he was looking not at a brown-eyed boy but one with clear blue eyes, with a different shade of brown hair and hearts set upon the universe, an eight-year-old who became his friend with a promise to travel the stars.

He stared, hearts racing and air sucked out of his lungs, at the sudden jolt of memory of a different friend from a very different time and place.

He thought he heard someone say his name. He didn’t move.

Ever the helper, Nardole noticed his lack of action and walked cheerfully up to the boy, who was presently looking up and around with his mouth hanging open.

“Hello, my name is Nardole!”

As the image of a blue-eyed boy changed back into the solid form of Tzakhi in reality, the Doctor mustered up a smile and tipped his head toward Nardole, encouraging Tzakhi to follow his new friend to explore the TARDIS.

Nardole was being an excellent host guiding Tzakhi through his initial surprise and growing excitement, showing him the console and the library area up the stairs. The Doctor settled himself against a wall and took in the boy’s “this is so much bigger on the inside!” with detached awareness, still overwhelmed by the unbidden memories that flashed images of a young Koschei before his mind.

He’d just made a new friend, but an old one was lost and wouldn’t be found again until she wanted him to.

He hated admitting, even just to himself, that he may or may not be secretly hoping to start hearing news of mass killings and collapses of tribal nations just to know what Missy was up to. Could he trust her to keep on being good? Because she had changed, was very much on the path of reformation. He was sure of it.

Her words from the piano room came to mind: she was going to do things that he wouldn’t approve. So how many people were going to die until he found her, until he could right his careless mistakes?

“...and here we are back to the Doctor,” Nardole’s voice floated into his hearing, followed by his two friends walking up to him.

He smiled at Tzakhi. “So what do you think?”

Tzakhi was practically glowing with excitement. “Can I bring my family to see your box, please?”

He shook his head. “How about we keep this a secret between us? Nardole and I, we’re not exactly from around here –”

“That’s okay. Mother says we must be kind to aliens and strangers.”

Nardole squeaked. “I didn’t tell him anything, I swear!”

“Foreigners, Nardole. He means foreigners.” The Doctor knelt down. “Very good, we are indeed aliens, Nardole and I. And we need your help. You see, we’ve come here for a secret mission and we need to settle here by ourselves to figure everything out. Tell me, has there been any unusual seismic activities?”

“Sei – samic activities?”

“Anything unusual with the ground?” Nardole supplied helpfully. “Holes suddenly appearing or strange rumblings under your feet? Notice anything of the sort lately?”

“Nope, I don’t think so.”

“Good, good,” the Doctor continued. “How about strange people? Anyone dressed unusually? Not so friendly perhaps, rude and tends to verbally threaten others?”

Nardole shot him a what the heck? look, which he hoped meant “that’s not a good description of a Silurian” rather than “now that you mention it, this reminds me of a certain Time Lady...”

Tzakhi shook his head. “If we have new aliens and strangers, our elders would tell us about them.”

“Ah, but not if they don’t know. Tzakhi, promise me you won’t tell anyone about us. We will keep to ourselves and be mostly inside this box. We need to do a, ah, secret study –” He looked up at Nardole. Think of something. Please.

“Yes, yes. It’s, er, it’s a secret study about... human curiosity! We can’t tell people about the TARDIS, you see, only they can find us. Like you.”

Thank Rassilon, he could kiss Nardole right now. “Yes! A study of curiosity! So many people walked by the TARDIS today but only you came up here and knocked. We know it’s because you’re smart and special. Maybe there are other smart and special people among your tribes. If there are, we’d like to meet them. So we’re staying here a bit longer to find out. But you can’t tell anyone to come up to us. That’s cheating and it will ruin our study. Do you understand?”

Tzakhi looked from the Doctor to Nardole, his face as serious as an eight-year-old in deep thoughts could be, digesting the barrage of nonsense that had been thrown at him. The Doctor held his breath. Please let him understand. He didn’t fancy wiping anyone’s memory today.

He breathed a sigh of relief when Tzakhi’s face brightened. “Oh, so your secret study is a game! I’m first to find you, so I win!”

“Yes, you win!” the Doctor exclaimed. “And what’s so special about this game?”

“It’s only for doing it yourself. Other people have to win on their own. Otherwise it’s cheating.”

Above him, Nardole clapped with enormous enthusiasm. “Bravo, bravo!”

“Can I visit again tomorrow? To find out who else wins?”

How long was a human child’s attention span? “Why don’t you come back in five days? That’s the rule of our study.”

“Five days! That’s so long,” Tzakhi said, pouting. But then he looked around the TARDIS, the desire to be let in again when he returned etched clearly on his face. He looked up at Nardole, who was probably making faces at him to encourage him to stick to the rule.

After some seconds, Tzakhi nodded. “I guess it’s okay.” He fidgeted around a bit, and when the adults in the room were clearly not going to show him any more parts of the TARDIS, he looked straight into the Doctor’s eyes and smiled. “Well, see ya!”

The Doctor brought up his mental to-do list. As soon as the boy was done here, he and Nardole must reinforce the TARDIS with maximum perception filters and activate whatever human-repelling settings that he could program into the central control system.

With any luck, they wouldn’t need to interact with another human again.

He returned the smile.

“See ya.”

-

Missy woke up to something wet prodding at her face. She snapped her eyes open, reached a hand into her pocket that held the stun gun, and found herself facing... a farm animal.

She batted at the animal’s muzzle with her free hand. “Get off me, you beast.”

The mule, or donkey, or whatever it was among Earth’s inventory of four-legged horse-like animals, made a noise that almost sounded derisive. Missy narrowed her eyes. “Are you laughing at me? I have a weapon here modeled after a race of rhinoceros-headed creatures and you wouldn’t want me to test it on you.”

Oh dear, what had the desert sun done to her to cause her to start talking to animals?

She considered the beast before her. Dark brown, two eyes, two ears, muzzle, four legs and a tail. It looked normal enough and probably possessed a normal degree of usefulness. She raised her eyes toward her intended destination. The town was rather far away... She considered her options. It might be to her advantage to not scare it off.

“So why are you here?” she mused aloud, choosing not to dwell on the fact that she was still talking to an animal. “And why wake me up, when this entire rocky terrain is open to your trotting and dust kicking?” Her eyes trailed over to the well. She had rolled away from it while she slept. “Oh! I see. You want water. Well, aren’t you a smart ass.” Pity there was no one around to appreciate her brilliant wit.

No, she was not going to think of the Doctor, not from this day on. The idiot never appreciated a good joke anyway.

“You’re going to have to wait. I’m not going to share any bucket with a beast and risk getting infected by animal saliva and who knows what diseases you carry. Stand over there and let me use the water first.”

The animal neighed — was that the appropriate terminology for noises made by this type of animal? — and stood obediently to the side. Hmm. Curious creature. Definitely worth keeping.

She drew a full bucket of water through the hole that she drilled through the well last night. The water was less muddy than yesterday, which meant this well was connected to an underground current. She made a pleased noise and began rinsing her hands and face. She unpinned her hair and let it flow down past her shoulders as she contemplated her prospects. If she was traveling along an ancient path, she could very well run into other wells along the way. This one happened to have a bucket still tied to it. She shouldn’t count on others having the same. Dumping the face and hand water onto the ground, Missy let down the bucket, this time paying attention to the flow of water as the bucket filled up. It was in the direction of where she was going. Good. She wouldn’t die of thirst then.

Her hair felt filthy after having slept on dust, so she dipped her head into the bucket of new water and did her best with washing given the circumstances. She turned her head as she wetted her hair, still seeing the animal standing nearby. What a thing of curiosity. Either that or it was really, really thirsty.

“All right, come here.” She waved the creature over after she finished washing her hair then drew up another bucket to brush her teeth, thanking herself for the foresight of stuffing her bigger-on-the-inside bag with every hygienic item she could think of. It wouldn’t do for a Time Lady to look improper. She left her hair down to sun-dry and pocketed her numerous hair pins.

“Here,” she said, placing a full bucket of water in front of the animal. “I’m only drawing you two of these. Drink up.”

She took out a hand mirror and applied makeup while the animal slurped away in the background. She couldn’t wait until she could get back to her favorite cosmetic hub in the Nectron III galaxy about a billion years into the future. A girl has needs, and a full stock of insta-spray makeup, hairstyles, and dresses wasn’t too much to ask for. This Earth stuff she was forced to use couldn’t even be mentioned in the same sentence when it came to quality and convenience.

She packed everything away before drawing the promised second bucket of water for the donkey. She stood ready as she observed, one hand on the stun gun. After doing so much for this lower life form, she wasn’t going to let it run away.

She clapped an arm over its neck when it finished. “I don’t know where you came from, but you’re mine now and we’re going that way –” She turned the donkey’s head toward the town. “You’re taking me there. Understood?”

She waited several seconds. “Don’t play games with me. Say yes, or make whatever noise you creatures make. It won’t be a bad arrangement. We’re heading in the direction of the water flow. Even if we don’t run into another well I have the tools to blast open the ground to make one. So what do you say? I get to where I want to go faster and you get to not die of thirst. Mutually beneficial. Agreed?”

She could have sworn the animal glared at her. Missy hummed, one hand idly rubbing over the thick bed of mane up and down several times. When the animal began to relax, she pulled out her stun gun and zapped the creature’s muzzle.

It cursed, letting out some guttural syllables that were distinctly not neighs.

“Oh, don’t be a baby. I used the lowest setting. Right, then. Talk. Use words. I can understand you.” As long as the TARDIS was still in this general region, she would have no difficulty understanding whatever language it spoke. “Or maybe I should go first, let you recover from absolutely no injury whatsoever. Name’s Missy. Not human. Don’t confuse me with those atrocious life forms. And you must be the space ass. Nice to meet you.”

“The space ass?” the creature cried, insulted. “I have a name! Korg. My name is Korg.”

“Well, Korg, the humans will never call you by your name, I’m afraid. You’re quite famous, do you know? I looked you up in the history books. Or story books, depending on how one thinks of the veracity of legends. You’re not native to Earth and therefore the prefix ‘space’ automatically applies to you, according to a human I know from the future. And you’re a donkey, at least that’s what I think you are. Hence, Mr. Space Ass. It is mister, I presume?”

Korg made some donkey-or-horse-sound that curled his lips and bared his teeth. “I don’t know who you are, but I just came from that bumfuck of a town and I refuse to go back there.”

“Oh? Are you so sure? Because in another twenty years or so, you are very much going to be back in that town as some cowardly human’s pet. It will happen. You can’t argue with history.”

Korg growled. “I don’t intend to still be on this backwater planet in twenty years.”

“But history!” Missy sing-songed.

Korg made a series of digging motions with his right front hoof. “Another self-proclaimed prophet. Why do I keep running into them,” he muttered. In a louder voice, he jeered, “Go right ahead into bumfuck. It’s full of your kind. You’ll fit right in.”

“Oh, so you are taking me there! Thank you! You’re so kind.”

“That’s not what I said!” He scuttled backwards when Missy made to approach him “Lay off,” he snapped. “You have no idea what I can do to you.”

“And you have no idea what I can do to you. I should mention that I’m quite skilled at hypnosis, much as I hate the idea of having a sleepwalking donkey as my ride.” She smiled, one of those teeth-baring ones. “Look, we seem to share a mutual disdain for humans. That’s good enough for me. How about you take me to that town and I’ll help conquer it for you? I’ve done loads of conquering among many civilizations across the universe. Six months at most, and you’ll be the most respected royal steed among this corner of backwater Earth. Or.” Missy waited until she held the attention of both his eyes. “I may be able to help you find a solution to the very icky pickle that you’re in, Mr. Shapeshifter-Stuck-in-His-Current-Form.”

“How do you –”

“Trust me. I’ve traveled across the universe. There is no Space Ass race out there.”

Korg was silent as Missy hummed a nonsensical tune to herself, giving the donkey a moment to let the implication of what she may or may not have promised sink in.

She was always an excellent salesperson when it came to pitching the fulfillment of one’s greatest desire in exchange for obedience and servitude. Of course, there was no need to mention her rather spotty record of actually making dreams come true. She expected to be several galaxies away when the moment of this particular reckoning would come.

“Well?” she asked after a couple rounds of a tune that emerged out of her seemingly random combination of notes.

Korg dipped his head in some nod-like fashion and did a lip-trilling thing, flaring his nostrils.

“I take that as a yes. Look, I don’t even have luggage. Everything is in my pockets. Now hold still, I’m hopping on.”

Korg held himself still to be climbed on, and Missy cheered inwardly at this small victory. If only the Person She Was Not Thinking About could see this! Ah well, his loss. Being good was never this much fun. He should have been the pupil and let her teach him how to be opportunistic and manipulative while they were in the vault. That would have been time much better spent. Well, too late now.

“Giddyup!” Missy shouted based on what she remembered of those horse-riding sheriff movies that she had once seen, digging her heels into the donkey’s side.

Korg trotted forward.

Chapter Text

“So why a donkey?” Missy asked, pointedly not caring about the difficulty her conversation partner was having in trying to speak and carry a passenger at the same time.

Korg made a grunt-like sound. “It’s common. Easy to imitate.”

“So are humans. They’re primitive here. Just choose a face from one town and become that person in a different one. No one will notice. Or better yet, assume the identity of someone who died. You’d be surprised how quickly they’ll promote you to god-hood. It’s a favorite tactic of mine. Besides –” She patted Korg’s long neck. “– it lowers your chance of becoming dinner.”

“They don’t eat donkeys here.”

“Really? Pity. I’m feeling rather adventurous with the prospect of exploring the culinary peculiarities of barely civilized humans.”

Korg tensed under her.

Missy laughed. “Oh, you silly thing! Relax. You’re far more useful to me alive than dead. For the moment, at least.”

“Speaking of usefulness,” she continued as if she had been merely chatting about the weather, “why are we walking along an established path? You have hooves. Let’s veer off of the human trails. I’d like to explore the terrain a bit.”

Korg’s ears flattened against his head. If equine animals behaved anything like canines or felines, then Missy supposed this meant she’d just hit a nerve.

“You’re not giving me orders,” Korg growled — barked? whinnied? What was the human term for this very unpleased (and unpleasant) sound? — and for a heartbeat, Missy thought she was going to get flung off his back.

This was entirely unacceptable.

“Now look here, I promised you water and we’re going to find water whether we stay on the footpath or not. Go left.”

She waited a few seconds. Still no change in direction.

Without warning, Missy grabbed a fistful of mane and twisted hard. Ears shot back up, and Korg let out a donkey’s equivalent of a shriek.

She tightened her fist and leaned forward until her mouth was pressed against Korg’s ear: “Let me be very, very clear, you stupid animal. I order, you obey. Don’t make me use my weapons. Not that I need to. I can think of seventy-four ways to kill you with my bare hands, starting with cooking up a nice donkey soup with your entrails, alien biology or not. Now go left.”

There was the slightest of hesitation. Then they started heading left. Good enough. For a first offense, she would let this go.

“And while we’re on the topic of dissecting you for food,” she began, returning to her perfectly pleasant conversational tone, “I must keep you in peak condition so when the time comes, my donkey steak won’t be too fatty. That mound over there, looks no more than half an hour away. I’m sensing something unusual. Let’s go have a look-see.”

The mound didn’t look particularly tall or rocky and appeared to blend right into its surroundings. It couldn’t have been more than three stories tall if she went by human architectural standards of those boring modern-day office buildings. Yet something was off. Missy couldn’t decide whether the top of the mound was pointy or flat even though she was staring directly at it and hadn’t blinked. It was as if she kept forgetting what she saw even when she wasn’t looking away.

Missy was about to remark on the strangeness of the mound when jerky movements almost threw her off balance. This time, the sudden hesitation in Korg’s steps wasn’t due to misplaced willfulness.

“You’ve been up there before,” she stated rather than asked.

Korg had come to a stop. Those ears were now flicking back and forth. “Once. The humans don’t know. To them, the land is flat.”

“Fascinating.” A few seconds went by. “Well? Get me up there. I haven’t got all day.”

Korg’s tail was flicking so hard that Missy could hear the agitation impacting his hind legs.

Even a human with half a brain could piece the clues together: Whatever Korg saw when he climbed the mound that one time, it had traumatized him.

“I assure you we’ll be perfectly safe. Unless a previous me is up there mucking about. Even then, I’m brilliant enough to fend off myself.”

What was that figure of speech that humans used about stubborn asses not moving forward? Bucking against something, maybe an asteroid? Whatever the correct phrase, that would be Korg. He had lowered the front of his body while sticking his behind up in the air, almost launching her forward if she hadn’t tightened her thighs and dug her heels into the donkey’s sides.

“Fling me to the ground and you’re dead,” she warned.

Korg let out a rather panicked neigh. “I... no, I wasn’t trying to...” He raised himself back to balance on very shaky legs. From the way he took two steps back without being aware of it, Missy could tell that he was terrified — of the mysterious mound, yes, but there was quite a healthy dose of terror reserved for her too. She was inordinately pleased by this progression of events. Seventy years and not a soul around to fear her. She forgot that it felt this good.

Missy suddenly felt protective of her newly acquired subject. “Take me up there. I won’t let anything happen to you. Promise,” she coaxed with uncharacteristic gentleness and meant it. No one was allowed to harm her alien donkey.

With great reluctance, Korg began walking them toward the mound. He hesitated a bit when they arrived. “Are you sure about this?” he asked. It was the fear of the anxious instead of the challenge of the insubordinate, so Missy replied with a simple “yes” and did not berate him. After another moment of visibly gathering his resolve, Korg took the first step up the mound.

Without a saddle, Missy placed one hand at the juncture where the donkey’s neck met its back to steady herself. With her other hand, she rubbed soothing circles into Korg’s body.

She could tell immediately that this mound was unusual. It was brimming with energy, the air around them charged like electricity. The perception filter that was in place could not by itself account for such an altered state. No, there was a peculiar warmth in the air, comforting to her like being in the middle of the time vortex.

Were her senses off? She hadn’t been outside of the vault for decades, and a quantum fold chamber was the cruelest environment to place a Time Lady in, suppressing all signs of time passing so she couldn’t tell night from day in the world around her.

Whatever this energy was, it had awakened something deep within her to just be.

When they got to the top of this hidden hill, they were greeted with a large flat surface like a field. This was definitely not what Missy thought she would see when she was trying to decide what sat at the top of the hill. This field was larger and rectangular, decorated with a full carpet of vibrant, green grass that didn’t belong anywhere in this arid climate. It was as if they had been plucked out of the desert and thrust into a temperate biome.

“Curious,” Missy mused, eager to look around.

She hopped off of Korg and shooed him to the far edge of the field. What a peculiar environment shrouded in peculiar technology, she thought to herself. Time to investigate. She jumped in place a couple of times. Gravity was normal as far as she could tell. She walked a small circle on the surface, stomping her boots hard enough to indent the grass. The blades bent as expected and did not give out any chemicals or fumes when pressed, so nothing amiss there.

But there was something distinctly not-Earth about this place. At the least, Missy concluded based on her observation of the desert climate back down the hill, this place was nothing like its surroundings outside of the perception filter. Had they teleported? She looked up. Unlikely, as the sun above them was still in the same position.

The only explanation seemed to be that this reality had been transported to them, a humid grassland taken from another place, teleported through a portal even as Missy and Korg hadn’t moved from their present location. Maybe they had entered the equivalent of one of those gaudy snow globes and were now locked away inside a tropical reality within the desert, like fake winters trapped inside those plastic round things.

Except...

Missy’s skin itched with something more primal. It was dismissible back when she was at the foot of the hill, but the sensation was growing with each second she spent in this reality. More than anything, this sensation was telling her not to rely on logic to interpret her observations.

She knew in her hearts that she hadn’t just entered into an out-of-phase regional lock. She could feel it in her bones: this was a time lock, and the energy she was sensing all around her, the vortex-like comfort that made her want to simply be, was time energy.

They had been sent back — no, this plain had been sent forward — millions of years from when the Earth was still young, when its climate was humid and its vegetations luscious. This was a specific time preserved by a specific species that flourished under these specific conditions.

If she traveled back in time, if she went back to the height of the reptiles’ existence on Earth before the meteorite struck, Missy knew exactly what, or who, she would see.

Like Time Lord art, she had stepped into a slice of Silurian history, frozen in time.

And the time lock was so powerful that it had preserved this mound through the extinction of dinosaurs and the subsequent rise of mammals, through eras of massive changes to the planet’s climate until this day.

Missy bent down, plucked a blade of grass and inhaled.

It was ancient.

She turned to Korg. Mystery solved.

“The good news is that barring fatal assaults to your body such as if I kill you, you are going to live as a donkey forever. The bad news is, you are going to live as a donkey forever.”

She smiled. It was one of those “you win” smiles, because this level of stupidity deserved full mockery. She wasn’t surprised when Korg didn’t smile back — what did a donkey’s smile look like, anyway? — though it didn’t stop her from frowning all of a sudden, feigning disappointment for having her well wishes rejected.

“It’s your own fault. You decided to be brilliant and change into a four-legged animal to make your climb up here easier. Well congratulations, you trotted right into a time lock. You’ve been frozen. Literally. I should cut you into pieces and sell you as popsicles.”

Korg was too busy taking this all in to rise to the bait. Was it just her, or did blood seem to have drained off of that long face, leaving it slightly grey on the spectrum of donkey palettes and more leathery to the eye?

“Yes, frozen. The lizard people locked this place in time for their own purposes. You happened to be collateral damage.”

“Who?” Korg blurted out, then decided it wasn’t what he wanted to ask. “Why... How?” A pause, then: “Can you fix me?”

“That’s quite a lot of questions from a mind as dull as yours. Let’s see here: Silurians, an indigenous species of bipedal reptiles. Because survival. By using superior technology. Maybe.”

“Maybe? Just maybe?”

Of course he would only care about finding a cure for himself.

“Better than a no and worse than a yes, somewhere in between. Take it or leave it. It’s all you’re getting.”

Korg huffed. “Then why do I bother with you? I’m leaving.”

Missy waited until Korg crossed back over to the edge of the mound where they came from before calling out to him: “Don’t you wonder why I’m not affected by the time lock?”

Korg froze.

Oh, she was going to enjoy toying with him very, very much.

“Go on. I don’t want to hold up your exit. Do continue going down this hill. And since I don’t suppose we’ll meet again, have a nice life... as a donkey.”

She turned around and started examining the ground again, this time focusing on getting a feel of the time energy that permeated this place. Who knew the Silurians were advanced enough to preserve whole slices of their reality? This must have been one of their many experiments trying to stay alive ahead of the anticipated global destruction. Preserving themselves via time-locked barriers failed, obviously, so the lot of them went into subterranean hibernation instead.

Which meant there should be Silurians directly underground.

A smile spread across Missy’s face. If she could get to the Silurian chambers from here... Dominating primitive civilizations was always one of her favorite pastimes, but her real aim was to get off-planet. If she could tunnel her way into where the Silurians kept their technology and gather all the parts she needed to build a basic teleportation device, then there was no need to go into that town.

“Move out of the way. I’m trying to find the best spot to drill,” she said to Korg, who had returned by her side as she knew he would. “Go chew on dinosaur grass or something.” She was the only one who could sense time energy here, and she would need to find the spot where the energy was at its strongest to blast into the underground.

She decided the most logical way to go about scouring this field was through systematic exploration. Missy walked the perimeter of the flat surface, tuning her mind to the energy level of every inch of grass to detect any unusual fluctuations in the air. She carefully paced the entire rectangular boundary. Nothing noteworthy. There was just enough time energy around the edges to make the shield covering the mound hold up over the years, without anything in excess to spare to power a direct connection to the Silurians below. She then examined the center. Also nothing.

The top of the mound was easily the size of a rugby field (what was it with her using human analogies lately?), inconveniently large for pinpointing the exact spot to get to the Silurian chambers. She raised her head to the sky. The sun was still in peak position, perhaps just past noon. Tedious drudgery aside, she had a good chance of locating the spot today, though what she wouldn’t give to have her sonic umbrella back, or the Doctor’s screwdriver — heck, she’d even take those sunglasses of his that most certainly did not make him ‘look cool’ — it would make scanning this place so much easier.

But beggars couldn’t be choosers, she supposed, pointedly not thinking about resorting to yet another human phrase. She would walk the rest of this field and hoped to be at least a galaxy away by this time tomorrow.

Missy took out her hair tie and pins. If she was going to be under the blazing sun for the next several hours, then she should get her hair out of the way before strands of sweat-soaked locks stick to the back of her neck. She chose to twirl her hair into a tight bun instead of the half-frazzled state she had allowed her hair to fall into during her vault days. She was in full control of her destiny now. Time to take care of all of herself. Missy dipped a hand into her sack and took out a hat she had taken a liking to in the wardrobe room, one that matched her current outfit. There. Properly shielded from the sun and ready to get to work.

She started slowly at first, taking meticulous steps as she walked the length of the field, keeping her path straight so when she turned around on the far side, she could move one body width closer to the center and knew she’d be treading on uninspected territory. She walked ten lengths like this, making her way toward the center, alert and controlled in her analysis of the energy around her.

This much she knew: it wasn’t Time Lord energy that the Silurians had stolen. The consistency of the particles in the air was too diluted. This particular variation of time energy was a dull yellow compared to the brilliant gold of its unadulterated counterpart on Gallifrey and in the time vortex. The version of time energy she knew could burn stars and obliterate entire civilizations. This was just residual dregs that the Silurians harnessed from Earth’s beginning, when Sol 3 didn’t warrant a passing glance in the minds of any invading species.

This was a dripping pipe compared to the waterfall of the time vortex, but Missy had been locked away for so long that even these tiny drops felt like a feast to her. She itched, craved. Time energy had been absent from her life since she first entered the vault, the quantum-fold chamber blocking everything that was life-giving to a Time Lord. Like someone forced into sobriety against her will (the promise to remain with the Doctor was given freely; to be deprived of the essence of time was not), she was now being presented with a rotten grape and she was powerless to keep herself from sucking greedily at its fermented sourness.

The hunger that had laid dormant in her was rearing its head in full force, awakening some base instinct in her to want, to immerse every part of her in the warmth of the time energy around her. This sense of want quickened her pace and destroyed her logic, drawing her back to places she had already walked to let more time energy spark against her skin, back and forth, back and forth, until she exhausted an area of the warmth of time.

She walked the surface hungrily. She leaned down, passing her hand through grass and holding onto the occasional rock. The more she plunged headfirst into time energy, the more the base of her spine tingled, spreading a sensation like liquid light into her limbs.

More, more, more. More because it was not nearly enough. More because she wanted, needed, to feel alive...

And then a rush of time energy slammed into her. Or rather, she slammed into it, her meandering steps taking her right into a spike in energy so strong that she thought she had run into the time vortex itself.

Missy threw her head back and gave a contented sigh, letting her eyes flutter close. This was what froze the donkey. His poison was her drug. The very same force that broke the shapeshifter was freeing her to become a proper Time Lord again.

She stood inside the energy spike for — minutes? hours? — feeling alive, feeling the crusty weight of the past seventy years peeling off of her. She shouldn’t have berated the Doctor for going away on trips. He felt the soul-crushing drain of linear time too. It was easier for him because he could pop into the TARDIS at any time, like he used to do in his third body when he was exiled on Earth. But because the Doctor could sit inside his TARDIS didn’t mean staying on Earth wasn’t hard for him. Why was she angry at him again, about the yesterday that was two days ago? Hmm, lies, the Doctor lying, Theta lying, always lying. He would never change that about himself just as she would never properly turn good.

She really should be concerned about becoming so empathetic, but she was so relaxed enveloped in time energy, both body and mind, that having sentimental emotions didn’t matter at the moment. She allowed herself to dwell on the Doctor for another moment before mentally pulling away.

“We dig here,” Missy said to no one in particular when she opened her eyes at last, noting that the sun had almost completed its journey toward the horizon. She inhaled deeply for a final whiff of that golden warmth before refocusing on the present, prepared to work. She took out her blaster and readied herself to start drilling.

How tall was this mound, twenty, thirty feet? She should do a test run to rumble a blast strong enough to send vibration down into the earth’s surface, just to be sure. No holes yet, in case the Silurians had already awaken. It wouldn’t do to give them an easy path out from the underground.

Settings adjusted, Missy pressed the blaster against the spot of the energy spike and pressed the trigger.

She had fired many weapons throughout her many lives. She also possessed an excellent mind for all things mathematical, mechanical, and multidimensional.

None of which prepared her for the energy kickback that sent her flying across the surface of the mound.

“Missy!” She heard through the ringing of her ears, then felt a nudge against her shoulder as the motion guided her into a sitting position. There was a rock against her back so she leaned onto it. Funny how selfishness manifested more or less in the same way across different species. With her as his only hope for a cure, Korg was suddenly concerned for her well being.

“I’m fine, I’m fine. Stop fussing over me!” she complained. “It’s that patch of grass I just blasted that you should be concerned about. The underground reinforcement against invaders is too strong. I’m going to have to find another place to drill, preferably not sitting on an elevation.”

“But you did it. You made an opening!”

Oh, by Rassilon’s... she broke open the Earth’s surface, after all.

“Any scary lizards climbing out?” she asked, not feeling a bit of the sarcasm she poured over her words.

Korg was oblivious. “No. Nothing. You made a small hole. It can fit your head, I think, but definitely not mine.”

Which wouldn’t prevent any Silurian worth half a Mondasian pence to use their superior tools to make the opening wider at the push of a button. But this wasn’t the time to scare the donkey.

“We’ll wait a bit and see. Go munch off some grass. It’s probably the last edible thing we’ll come across for the next few days. If no reptile people appear after you feed, then we should be safe.”

“The next few days? You’re still set on going into that town? What are you planning anyway? One moment you want to travel, and the next moment you want to drill your way down into giant lizards.”

Missy glared. “What part of conquering humans don’t you understand?”

“The part that prefers to stay alive! Since I met you you’ve threatened to kill me every few minutes, and any time now, there may or may not be deadly lizard people appearing from underground to destroy us.”

Missy waved him off. “Relax. They won’t go after donkeys. It’s me who may be in danger. Do you see me acting like a coward?” She took out some food and water from her sack. “I’m eating. Do whatever you want. But don’t complain to me about hunger later on if you pass on your last meal.”

She kept a close watch on the opening as she munched. While she couldn't be sure that she didn’t wake any Silurian — though with each passing second that seemed less likely, thank Omega — she was fairly certain that her blast had disturbed some sort of Silurian infrastructure, triggering its automatic defense to repel the energy of her blast back up to the surface. The thought that the Silurians had developed technology advanced enough for her use was thrilling, but any excitement she felt was dampened by the realization that she was going to have to work out how to take down the Silurian security system with the limited tools she had on hand. Without having a TARDIS to bypass defense barriers and materialize directly underground, she would have to play a much longer game than a quick in-and-out heist to steal parts and technology.

Ah well. Minor adjustments to her plan. As long as she didn’t run into the Doctor, she would travel the stars yet.

When Korg reappeared with pieces of grass stuck to his muzzle, Missy stood and flashed him a smile. “Ready, partner? Onwards to the town! We have humans to dominate and lizard technology to steal. Oh, and perhaps a shapeshifter to cure.”

Korg made no protest as Missy climbed onto him.

-

When evening set in and the moon’s light was too dim to unveil the secrets of the land, a small form stumbled its way down to the foot of the mound. Once down, it looked around, as if the dark did nothing to disadvantage its vision. This creature didn’t seem to be familiar with its surroundings, having made neither head nor tail of the vast expanse of arid land it had found itself treading. But when it turned toward the direction of the community of tent dwellers now more than a day’s journey away, it caught sight of a vertical column of fire that touched both heaven and earth and lit up the patch of the sky overlooking the tent people. Perhaps it was attracted by the fire or simply driven by curiosity, the form, currently shrouded in darkness, made its way toward the shining sky and into brighter terrain.

-

The Doctor stood atop a small hill nearest to where his TARDIS was parked, overlooking the eastern edge of the camp grounds of the Hebrews. Or Israelites, as they would eventually come to be known. He took in the view of tents that seemed to stretch endlessly into the dark of the night. According to future records, there were hundreds of thousands of them here, travelers on a forty-year journey to their Promise Land. As far as navigation was concerned, they were on the path to the most convoluted itinerary imaginable, like trying to draw a straight line between two points on a crumbled piece of paper, meandering and time consuming, creating whole generations of children who wouldn’t know what living in a permanent location was like until well into adulthood. Timey wimey indeed.

Humans, always so resilient, so sure of their destination even if every step they took led them further into the unknown. He thought of Orson Pink, the first time traveler from Earth who dived headfirst into the end of the universe. And Colonel Godsacre from Victorian England, the first man on Mars whose journey would never truly be forgotten. Both of them achieved the impossible. Both of them, he was sure, would take the same risks again if given the opportunity for a do-over.

He knew what was ahead for the Israelites and for the other humans already settled in the Promised Land. War. Devastation. Staking of territorial claims. Petty land-grabbing that resulted in senseless bloodshed that not even a Time Lord could prevent. He may be looking at a civilization of humans now, but one day, if the TARDIS would allow him to return to this era, he may well meet the same people again but see in them monsters instead.

He squeezed his eyes shut, clearing his mind of morbid thoughts. That would all be in the future. Right now — the Doctor opened his eyes with kindness in his hearts and looked over the expanse of tents of a people marching to the tune of hope — right now there was life that flourished under peace. And if he made his moves carefully, their peace wouldn’t be cut short prematurely by the unexpected waking of the Silurians.

He turned his eyes toward the massive, vertical torch of fire that shot up from these humans’ place of worship to what seemed like the edge of the sky. He wondered what Bill would think of the sight if she were here. The words “pillar of fire” on the page of a book just couldn’t do the actual phenomenon justice. It reminded the Doctor of the eruption of an upside-down volcano that he’d seen once, the orange-red flames connecting the mouth of the volcano from above to the ground below. Bridging the lowly to the heavenly, the locals had said. This sentiment was quite prevalent across the galaxies. For humans, the yearning for this connection would one day propel them to explore every corner of the universe.

The Doctor smiled. No matter where he went, he always ran into humans. Just like he would without fail run into...

Tried as he may, he couldn’t stop his thoughts from turning toward Missy. Missy had referred to the Israelites’ god as a nonphysical alien life form that had staked a claim on these people. This was true enough as a definition, but it was too clinical, too impersonal. Maybe he’d gone senile and sentimental, but looking at the fire, he could almost believe that this nonphysical alien life form cared for this particular group of humans.

He wondered what Missy would think if she could see this pillar of fire. Had she made her way into the camps? Was she looking at it too?

Would he see her again?

His hearts ached. Subsided was the terror of a jailor losing his captive — he frowned, knowing this was how Missy thought of him sometimes, maybe even most of the time. What was left now was this terrible sense of hope that all was not lost, that maybe she was still on his side even if this was no longer true in terms of physical proximity.

Maybe they would return to the vault after this to finish their leftover Chinese food.

He stared into the fire, hoping to cross paths with Missy again. Hoping, but not praying. Never praying. Time Lords had no gods to pray to. (To swear to, on the other hand... Rassilon and Omega and The Other deserved to be codified in invectives for the mere existence of the very pompous race they created.)

“I’m not human and don’t always stay on this planet. But I walk this earth and I breathe its air, so this is home for me,” he said to the fire, to the being behind the fire that was fueling it. “We’ve probably met before, in a different place and a different time. But since I’m here... hello. I’m the Doctor.”

There was no answer and he didn’t expect one. He lifted his eyes to the sky, to the stars that whispered of other worlds and civilizations filled with equally beautiful and not-quite-explicable things. Just like Earth.

He would continue to travel the stars until his dying day. But for now, he was content to take the linear option of living in a planet that was as close to home as it could be.

Chapter Text

“Repeat what we went over so I know you’ve got it.”

Nardole threw his arms up in the air. The gesture might have looked a lot more threatening if he wasn’t wearing a silky robe-like outfit in the color of one of River’s dark-wine dresses. Come to think of it, River did repurpose quite a few of her outfits when she got tired of wearing them. The Doctor grimaced. This looked all wrong on Nardole, with or without matching head gear.

Said fashion horror was currently protesting loudly against being patronized, something about “I came up with the plan too” and “I was upgraded with enhanced memory when you pieced me back together, you should know that.” The Doctor crossed his arms and glared. This always worked, sooner or later. He’d give it ten seconds this time, considering the partially blocked line of vision due to the time rotor and the fact that, well, Nardole did come up with half the plan. But that didn’t mean he should be entrusted with its execution unless he demonstrated some base level of trustworthiness. Any time now. Three, two, one...

“Oh, all right, you prickly penguin. It’s like I’m minding a five-year-old,” Nardole muttered as he typed a string of commands into the keyboard and brought up a map of approximately one hundred-mile radius all around the TARDIS. “Right then,” he said in a bored tone, “this is us, the TARDIS, and here’s the region we’ve landed in. This is all the basic geographical conditions I’ve mapped out, with elevations and temperature readings. And here’s the underground, or what we think is the extent of the Silurian hibernation chambers based on sonic pulses we’ve sent down from the TARDIS. And here –” He tapped a few keys. “– are energy readings we’ve gathered in the past three days, laid over the geographical terrains. Big spike in energy on this hill fifteen miles away, right here, forty hours ago. And here, straight down, is a corresponding disturbance underground that your sonic pulse detected. No sign of conscious life forms attached to either readings.”

“Yes, yes, I know all of this. No need to be redundant. Next part, chop chop.”

Nardole pinned him with a look so poisonous that, even in his maroon nightgown, he looked menacing. “Well, pardon me, sir, I seem to recall it was you who asked me to be redundant.”

“The plan, Nardole. I asked you to repeat the plan, not all the background clutter.”

“Our plan,” Nardole shot back.

They glared at each other for several moments, and there went a potential good start to their investigation, straight into the rubbish bin. They really wouldn’t last the week, would they, without River clearing her throat just about now to de-escalate the situation or Bill crashing into his office and accidentally diffusing the tension, or even Missy reveling with so much glee that they would let go of whatever it was they were disagreeing over in favor of joining forces to wipe the smugness off her face.

Patience, the Doctor reminded himself. None of his stabilizing forces was with him now.

Not that he should count Missy as a stabilizing force.

Not that he should be thinking about Missy at the moment, when even the most casual slip-up would send Nardole soundly kicking his arse.

“Fine, our plan,” the Doctor said, deciding to be the bigger man. “And thank you for your very informative background clutter. Now go on,” he added, “please.”

Nardole brightened immediately, pacified. He brought up another layer of reading onto the monitor. “One of our scans detected the presence of a perception filter where the energy spike is the strongest, so Option A is to find a possible door or entryway that the perception filter may be hiding. We’re not going with Option A because it’s a terrible idea –”

“No it’s not!”

“– because the Doctor –” Nardole said, all dagger-in-eyes, “– is never careful with his sonicking and the moment he thinks he’s gotten past the door some security alarm is going to go off and we’ll be dead.”

“Pessimist,” the Doctor muttered.

“So this leaves us with Option B. We will have the TARDIS send a few more sonic pulses into the underground to fully map out the area. We’re going to find a big enough patch of empty space that’s safe, then steer the TARDIS straight into the Silurian chambers.”

“At which point we may also trigger the security alarm,” the Doctor pointed out. “Your plan takes longer and is no better than mine.”

Nardole made one of his high-pitched sounds that came from the back of his throat. “Excuse me, Doctor, but I beg to differ! You, breaking a lock, a hundred percent chance of blaring alarm. The TARDIS going underground, bypassing all security layers, almost guaranteed success.”

“Just because you don’t know how to use a sonic device doesn’t mean –”

“I know about yesterday,” Nardole said, crossing his arms in front of his chest. “The one from four days ago.”

Yesterday as in him-and-Bill yesterday, before-they-got-here yesterday? How...

“You set off the enemy spaceship’s alarm because your sonic sunglasses were on the wrong setting.”

“Oi! It was very hard trying to adjust settings while running for your life!” He paused, thought about how Nardole knew all this. “I’m going to have a word with Bill.”

“Lay off of her, she needed future medicine from me and I pried it out of her. It was either that or limp around the school grounds for the next few weeks.”

The Doctor made a face at the thought of an injured Bill. Yesterday — the one from four days ago — really didn’t go well. Fair enough. Maybe picking the lock of Silurian doors wasn’t a good idea.

But why was he so against going underground? It was sensible, at least as sensible as trying to deactivate the Silurian security system from the outside.

Because this was Missy’s suggestion.

And if Missy knew to suggest it, she would know to find her way underground, with or without a TARDIS.

He must not, under any circumstance, allow Nardole to go near the vicinity of where Missy might possibly be.

“Gather more readings,” he commanded. “Search farther outward. I’m not convinced the spot you found is the only place we should focus on. For all we know, that energy spike might be a normal thing, like the pillar of fire that appears over the camp every night. Strange to us, not worth noticing to the locals. Give me more. More research. More facts. More certainty. You know what? I think you need to go talk to some locals.”

Option C: send Nardole out of the TARDIS on some errand, then steer the TARDIS into the Silurian chambers underground. After all, time machine — he’d be back before Nardole said hello to the first person he met.

Nardole’s eyes narrowed in suspicion. “I thought we were staying away from the humans.”

“Desperate times, desperate measures.”

Nardole swung the monitor toward the Doctor. “I’d hardly call three days of mapping while taking enough breaks for three scrumptious meals a day ‘desperate times.’ No aliens breathing down our neck as far as I can tell. Just look at how many readings we generated!”

“And all of them important,” he cut in, before Nardole went into full fishwife mode. “Look, if you don’t want to help me with saving the world, fine. Then go into the human market and bring back some decent groceries. We’ve had nine meals of spaceship food, as Bill would call it. Time to go local and try some real stuff.”

He was always careful not to insult Nardole’s full-service catering selections because offending him almost always meant energy bars for the next few days. But if it would get Nardole out, he was willing to sacrifice his stomach. Desperate times indeed.

Nardole’s face had turned into the picture perfect model of a tea kettle, growing redder with each passing second until he couldn’t get any more insulted. “Fine! I’ll go get acquainted with some locals,” he declared, words dripping with disdain for being demoted to kitchen duty after his cooking was panned. The Doctor sighed to himself. This one may be a whole week of energy bars.

Though he could always hope for delayed punishment. “I mean, I won’t object to some local delicacies if you bring back any –”

Bang. Bangbangbang. Bangbang.

“Wha –” they said in unison, exchanged a look, and turned their attention to the TARDIS door.

Bangbangbangbangbang.

Impossible. No earthling, human or Silurian, should notice the TARDIS.

“Perception filter?” the Doctor asked.

“Fully up and reinforced. I checked.”

“Human-repelling shields?”

“Upgraded and with added layers.”

“TARDIS fuel level?”

“Still nearly full.”

Bangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbang.

“Check the monitor.”

“It’s running all our mapping programs.”

“Then exit out of them.”

“That might take a few minutes, sir.”

“If it’s a Silurian out there, then I think taking a few minutes of precaution so we don’t die is well worth the effort.”

“The shields should repel Silurians too. I set them up against all life forms native to Earth.”

“Well it’s not working!”

“Then maybe someone installed the wrong shields.”

“That’s impossible, it doesn’t work like that. And stop talking. Force quit the programs and do a scan of the outside.”

“I am! It isn’t my fault that your TARDIS system can’t multitask.”

“Don’t insult the TARDIS –”

BANGBANGBANGBANGBANG.

“Er, if you don’t mind me saying sir, we might not have a few minutes.”

BANGBANGBANG! BANG! BANG! BANGBANGBANGBANGBANG!

“Open the door! Please! Open, open, open!”

It was a child’s voice.

“Tzakhi,” they both said together.

“But the human-repelling shield –”

The Doctor dashed to the door. “Never mind that, he’s special, remember? Come, we need to get him in here before he attracts any of the ordinary humans’ attention.”

He grabbed the handle and swung the door open before he could coordinate his facial muscles enough to put on a sort-of smile. It didn’t matter. His face immediately twisted into something that was the very opposite of a smile when he saw what was on the other side of the door.

Three eyes, brown, scaly skin. Unconscious (thank goodness).

Tzakhi had dragged a Silurian to the TARDIS.

-

“Why didn’t the time lock freeze you?” Korg asked, finally, after the question had been swirling in his mind so loudly that Missy was tempted to knock him unconscious just so her own mind could have a moment’s reprieve.

“Not human. I already told you.”

“Neither am I.”

“Not human and superior to any other life form in the universe. There. Is that clear?”

“No,” Korg huffed, but focused his attention back on wading through the off-path terrain. It was obvious that he didn’t expect Missy to explain further. She wasn’t going to, of course. But what they had was time, and she quite liked the sound of her voice this time around.

“On the top of that mound. What did you feel?” she asked.

“Cold. Like a force was leeching heat from me.”

“Proof of your inferiority. I felt rather warm and invigorated.” She could still feel the final traces of time energy tingling down her spine. “That’s because I’m made for time energy.”

“Was that what it was? Time energy?”

“Your senses are as dull as the humans.”

“Don’t compare me with humans,” Korg snapped. “You have no idea what I can do to them if I’m in my original form.”

Missy rolled her eyes. Pity there were no sight receptacles on the back of Korg’s head to see it. “No, I have no idea,” she said, laying on the sarcasm, “because how many ways can you kill a human in your current form? Oh, I don’t know... maybe zero?”

“And you can? For all your threats about killing me, you don’t seem any different than a human.”

Missy laughed. “Oh, honey, you have no idea.” She grabbed a handful of mane and twisted hard, her voice dropping to a dangerous tone: “Compare me with humans again and I’ll very generously showcase my life-taking skills on you.”

“Ow!”

“Oh, grow up.” She released her fist.

Korg shook his head back and forth as if trying to fluff the pain away, all the while not missing a beat in his steps. Whatever he was, he sure could do more than one thing at a time, even in his donkey form. His mind was whirring again, Missy could tell, and she waited for whatever half-decent bits of thought to form and then get scrambled through that mouth of his into stupid speech. Korg was of a species with slightly above-ordinary mental capacity — the light probing she had done on the surface of his mind had told her as much. This would explain why he needed to change his form just to climb a hill, if he didn’t have the physical prowess to match his mind.

“So you aren’t affected by time energy and you kill humans. That still tells me nothing about what you are.”

“Nope,” she said airily.

“You’re not from Earth.”

“Ooh, getting warmer! Do continue. I quite like this game.”

“We’re not playing a game, Missy. If I’m throwing in my lot with someone from another planet, I’d like to know something about her.”

“Ding, ding, ding! Another planet, cor - rrrecto!” she sang, rolling her ‘r’ with relish. “Oh, dear, it’s getting hotter by the second!”

Korg was getting annoyed. “There are billions of planets out there. Do you expect me to name one at random and guess your home planet?”

“Yup.” She popped the p. Oh, this was so exciting.

Korg made that exasperated whinnying sound that she liked. “You’re being impossible! If you don’t want us to make conversation, just say so.”

Well, if he was going to play that game... she smirked and kept silent.

Several minutes went by. Then: “Clom?”

“Nope.”

They traveled another quarter of a mile or so.

“Mondas?”

“Don’t be daft.”

She managed to sing the entirety of American Pie at the top of her lungs, relishing the building tension of Korg’s neck muscles, increasing with the start of each new verse as she turned up the dramatics. If only the Doctor was here, he would forever regret bringing the dial-radio into the vault that week in 1972 when the song made it across the pond and became a top-of-the-chart hit in the UK.

She was contemplating singing This is the Song that Never Ends when Korg spoke again: “Amanopia?”

“What am I, blue? Do you have eyes?”

“At least humanoids live there! I’m not going to guess something like Vortis unless you’re secretly insectoid.”

“Hmm, fair enough.”

Missy recited the alphabets of twenty-three species whose languages were phonetic. She was deciding between the Zocci or the Voord alphabets for her twenty-fourth recitation when Korg started saying the alphabet of the common language on Xenon.

Ah, of course.

“You’re a Whifferdill.”

This would explain why he understood what she was doing, when she was pretty sure the TARDIS didn’t usually care to translate alphabet letters. Whifferdills had highly elastic minds to adapt to all kinds of languages to match their physical shapeshifting. A natural polyglot, even if his body was frozen.

“Was,” Korg said bitterly. “If I were infected with mono-morphia, at least there’s a cure. But frozen with time energy? You said it. I’ll be in this form forever!”

“We don’t know that,” Missy pointed out.

“Well I know! I feel it. Stuck. Every part of me forced to exist unnaturally. Can you change that? Can anyone? Because the last time I checked, the only race who can manipulate time are the Time Lords, and legend has it that there aren’t any of them left!”

Missy didn’t answer. There was no advantage in letting Korg know what she was. Korg was wrong anyway. She didn’t have a cure for him, not by virtue of being a Time Lady.

But Korg was of a fairly intelligent race.

“When you said you were made for time energy,” he began after another round of loud thinking, “you - you don’t happen to be from Gallifrey, do you?”

“What are you talking about?” Missy retorted, though her tone was soft, void of anger. “There’s no more Gallifrey, check your legends. No Gallifrey means no Time Lords.”

“But Gallifrey did exist once, right? You could be ancient, for all I know. Not that you look it, I mean. Whatever your age, Missy, you are a very attractive humanoid.”

“Oh, don’t be a smart ass,” Missy scoffed, almost fondly.

Korg was smart. She would leave it to him to take this line of query to its logical conclusion.

They spent the next hour in silence, Missy memorizing the rocks and trees along the way (these desert trees reminded her a bit of Gallifrey, the way they seemed to bring out the harshness of the sun like the ones back home). Korg was musing over their conversation.

Going off the human paths easily saved them days. At this rate, they would reach the town in a day’s time. The trade off, of course, was forsaking established trails and therefore access to wells along the way. They may be traveling the shortest distance between two points, but it certainly wasn’t the easiest. Korg’s breathing was getting heavy and Missy knew she needed to find water for him soon. After all, that was part of their bargain. Her supply of water was not nearly enough to quench a parched donkey.

She looked around and mapped out the positions of nearby plants. Most of what she saw were shrubs with pointy leaves, thornbushes that didn’t need a lot of water to survive. But to her right were a cluster of three desert thorn trees — acacias, if she wasn’t mistaken — and this type of trees had long roots. Assuming that each tree’s root system had similar depth and spread, she should be able to deduct the general availability of underground water based on their proximity to one another.

“Head toward those trees. I think I can dig you some water there.”

Korg didn’t need to be told twice. He closed the gap in a couple of minutes, stopping at the tree that was closest to where they were coming from. “Acacia,” he said, confirming Missy’s guess. “I’ve seen plenty of lone ones. Three of them is unusual.”

“Which is why I think there’s a good water source down under.” She hopped off of Korg and took out her blaster. Remembering yesterday, she adjusted the setting to something less far-reaching as the one she used on top of the mound. “Step back, I’m blasting us a hole.”

Missy chose a spot in between two of the trees and pressed the trigger, making a hole wide enough for a donkey to comfortably dip his head in and deep enough down for her to not be able to see the bottom. She waited several seconds, expecting water to either gush out due to a sudden change in underground pressure or to gradually seep out onto the surface. When neither happened, she found herself once again wishing to be in possession of a sonic device.

“Well, this is strange.” She reached a hand to pick up a small rock and tossed it into the hole she made. Instead of the thwup of hitting water, the rock sent back a solid clink. Twenty-five feet. No water, but metal.

She turned to Korg. “You don’t happen to have any glow-in-the-dark superpowers, do you? Eyes turn into torches or some such? I can use some light shining into the hole.”

“I wish,” Korg grumbled. “Though my hearing is superior to that of the humans. That rock throw, it did something to the trees. I heard all three of them rustling.”

“Like someone’s shaking their roots?” Missy asked.

“Like someone’s shaking their roots.”

Nature was never one to connect things so cleanly. Without a doubt, they had stumbled across a system of manually constructed, underground water infrastructure. Not human.

“How thirsty are you? Never mind, no need to say anything. You look horrid so the answer must be ‘dying.’ I’m afraid we’re going to have to wait.”

“Wait?”

“Yes. Go sit under the tree. If what I’m thinking is correct, then the metallic sound we heard meant I blasted into a reservoir and it is empty. Trees need water every day or so. This means a refill is going to happen eventually. Now go and find some entertainment for yourself.”

Missy didn’t bother with what Korg decided to do. She peered over the opening of the hole, trying to map out more than the five feet or so that the sunlight made it possible for her to see. The edges around the hole were ragged because she had blasted into the ground without caring for aesthetic. But if she could see far enough down, she knew the walls of the hole would turn smooth, and rocks would become metal. She threw several more rocks down the hole, aiming to hit the edges each time. About fifteen feet down it was still rock hitting rock. But her last stone produced another clink at around twenty feet, signaling that she had reached the upper limit of the reservoir.

She wasn’t surprised when, one hour three minutes and forty-six seconds later, she heard the sound of water. It began slowly at first, but the initial minutes of drip and trickle soon gave way to a spraying sound and then gushes. Gushes of water slapping against the metal confines of the reservoir, gushes of water rising higher and higher until it surpassed metal walls and began wetting the jagged stone edges. Missy wondered whether the flow of water was controlled by pressure-detecting sensors or by a timer. If by sensors, then she may have disabled this automated system’s ability to stop when she blasted through the top of the metal reservoir.

But no, the tree roots needed access to the water so the reservoir would not have been a sealed entity. Timer, then? She watched as the water level continued to rise. A few more minutes, and the water would be high enough for Korg to dip his head into the hole to drink.

When the water was but a few inches from the ground, Missy realized this tightly-controlled automated water system didn’t only supply the three trees with water; there must be an extensive water delivery system set up to ensure the hydration of hundreds if not thousands of underground desert dwellers.

It appeared that she had uncovered yet another piece of Silurian technology.

She waved at Korg. “Come over, the water’s about to spill over the top. Plenty for you to drink, lap, slurp, gulp, or all of the above.”

“Another lizard people thing?” Korg asked after taking a long draught, then lowered his head again to drink some more.

“Seems like it. Automatic plumbing, drawn from wherever the source is located and delivered to the edges of their colony. Far too sophisticated a feat for human apes.”

After Korg had finished, Missy waited for fresh water to come to the surface. She then helped herself to the water — it was refreshing and sweet — and refilled her containers. She watched as the water overflowed and spread out onto dry, dusty ground, creating an expanding circle of darkened dust that looked out of place in this climate. What an odd sight in the heart of a desert. Curious birds of prey descended from the sky to peck at the water. Small critters that she saw here and there in passing darted from their hiding places to sniff and slurp. Missy dipped her hands into the hole and washed off as much grime as she could from her face, neck, and arms.

At precisely half an hour after the first drop of water, the gushing stopped. Pre-programmed and timed. Absolutely no chance of humans having a hand in any of this.

But this didn’t mean the humans wouldn’t appreciate this luxury. Missy listened intently as the water receded down the hole, presumably being delivered through whatever pipes the Silurians had constructed to reach other parts of their colony. She thought she heard at least one strand of water flowing in the direction of the town she was trying to get to.

That town was just under a day’s journey away now, close enough for Missy to rig something between here and there to hijack this abundance of water source into her destination. The Silurians were hibernating and had no need for water. Taking away these trees’ life source would be a pity, but a Time Lady’s comfort was well worth the lives of three trees.

Missy grinned to herself. Indoor plumbing, here she came.

-

The Doctor was pointing at the unconscious body.

“That’s – Tzakhi, what have you done? That’s – that’s a –”

“I know she’s an alien. We take care of aliens and strangers, remember?”

“But that’s a Silurian!” the Doctor exclaimed. “Wait a minute. What did you say? She? How do you know it’s a she?” He placed an arm over Tzakhi’s shoulder. “Never mind that right now. Come inside. I’ll carry the Silurian in after you.”

“It’s a she because she told me,” Tzakhi said as he was being ushered inside the TARDIS. “Her name is Kaeta. She didn’t mention Si - Sirulians.”

“Silurians,” the Doctor corrected. He scooped Kaeta up and brought her inside the TARDIS. Like Tzakhi, this Silurian was a child. No wonder the two children felt drawn to each other. “You’ve talked with her then? Before she fell unconscious?” If only the TARDIS translation circuit extended to all of time and space. How many conflicts would be avoided if species could simply understand each other?

“Yup. Her favorite color is green. Oh, hi Nardole!” Tzakhi waved when he saw the other occupant inside the TARDIS.

“Tzakhi, you kept your promise for four days! I thought the Doctor told you to come back after five.”

“But my friend is sick and she needs a doctor,” Tzakhi said, as if it were the most logical thing in the world. It was, for a child who didn’t realize no real doctor in the entire universe would deign to call this particular Doctor a colleague among their trade.

“Silurian child, girl, name’s Kaeta,” the Doctor said to Nardole, relaying the pertinent information. “Running a fever, her skin’s scorching. Quick, activate a scan for her body. Then go into the med bay to prepare the basics while I wait for the analysis.”

“Human bacteria, I reckon,” said Nardole as he typed and turned knobs to start a scan. “Probably caught something from –”

“We don’t know that,” the Doctor warned, moving one of his eyebrows in Tzakhi’s direction, then mouthed drop it at Nardole. He didn’t want the boy to feel bad for making his friend sick. “You know what? Scan both of them. Better safe than sorry.”

“As you wish,” Nardole said, more to the screen than to the Doctor, as he adjusted the setting and then pushed a final button to get the scan going. He then turned to Tzakhi. “You want to know a secret?” he said in a mock whisper. “I’m the better doctor around here. I need to go make some preparations. You stay here with your friend and be good, okay?”

Tzakhi nodded. “Okay.”

Nardole twisted his mouth into a smug victory smirk as he walked past the Doctor. But the expression soon turned serious as he walked up the stairs, mirroring what the Doctor was feeling inside.

There was no point in denying reality. A Silurian had woken up from hibernation. If it happened to one, then there may be many more yet to come.

-

Nardole prepared two beds and two sets of medical equipments, just in case. He knew he was right and knew that the Doctor knew it too. The interaction of two species unfamiliar with one another always carried biological risks, especially for two races that had been kept isolated from each other for so long. The Silurian girl was sick from contracting human germs. Who knew what dinosaur germs were making their way into Tzakhi’s system right now, minutes away from knocking him unconscious as well?

He hummed as he worked, finding the familiarity of his actions comforting. For all their intelligence, Time Lords were daft when it came to retaining information they didn’t want to remember. How many times had he tended to Missy while the Doctor stood sheepishly by? That food poisoning episode was the worst. Even he hadn’t quite forgiven the Doctor for dropping chunks of raw chicken into a soup without heating it up just because he thought chicken pieces that came herb-crusted on the outside were already cooked. Missy had spent hours cursing the Doctor in tens of languages in between her violent bouts of vomiting. So yes, suffice to say that he was much more of a healer and caregiver between the two of them.

And right on cue, the food poisoner in question rushed into the med bay with his face white as a ghost. He dumped Kaeta unceremoniously onto a bed. “Bacteria on skin. Harmless to humans. Deadly for Silurians. It’s gotten into her insides as well. Use the antibacterial pills from fifty-first century, the blue ones somewhere in some drawer. That should clear all the infections. Then get her immunized for everything else. There should be a universal vaccine also somewhere in some drawer.”

“Right, thanks for the specifics,” Nardole muttered as he dispensed a blue pill he’d already found from ‘some drawer’ and took out the medicine transmogrifier that one of the Doctor’s past companions named Rory had left behind (with detailed notes on how to use it, bless him). A zap to the pill and it was transformed into a patch that could be placed onto skin and absorbed into the body when a patient couldn’t swallow. Nardole slapped the patch onto Kaeta’s arm.

In another drawer, this one labeled Martha, Nardole took out the universal vaccine and applied it on the girl’s other arm. As he touched her, he noticed her skin was already receding in temperature. Good. She should return to her cold-blooded self at anytime now, if Silurians were cold blooded. He wasn’t sure, actually.

He turned to the Doctor, who was hovering in a very unhelpful way on the other side of the bed. “Should be fine now, thanks to your friends Martha and Rory.”

A shadow passed over the Doctor’s face and Nardole suddenly remembered, made the connection between Rory and how he was related to River. He was about to apologize when the Doctor nodded sharply. “Thank you, Nardole.”

“Glad things turned out alright,” he said, trying to lighten the mood. He looked around. “Say, er, where is Tzakhi?”

The Doctor whipped around. No Tzakhi in the med bay. “He’s wandered off. I told him to follow me.”

Funny how they had both spent the same amount of time with Tzakhi but it was him who knew the boy so much better. “He didn’t wander off, Doctor.” He waited until the Doctor turned back around, confusion creasing the lines on his face. Nardole sighed. Time Lord intelligence truly was overrated. “He’s exposed to bacteria too. Silurian ones.”

Those eyebrows raised very, very high. “Oh.”

“Yes, oh. Go find him and carry him here. Thank me later for setting up two beds and prepping two doses of everything.”

As far as everyday victories went, this one was sweet.

Chapter Text

The Doctor looked at the tiny forms of two sleeping children, the very definition of peace.

“Friends, huh?” Nardole said next to him.

“To children, everyone is a friend.” If only things were so simple with grown-ups. “Humans and Silurians. One can only hope that this is the future.”

Here they were, four people with four different identities. Human, Silurian, Android, Time Lord. But to Tzakhi, the only title that mattered was ‘friend.’

“You have Vastra in the future,” Nardole pointed out. “The famous Paternoster Gang, friends of the Doctor. River told me all about them.”

“Vastra only likes some humans.”

“So do you.”

The Doctor was about to protest, but then thought about the sea of faces he looked into at each lecture, every mind dull except for Bill’s. “Touché,” he murmured.

What a funny word, friend. So particular yet so fluid. Friends meant infinite possibilities, a commitment to generate shared experiences together. Friendship had no map or instructions manual, and so it resulted in things like human boy and Silurian girl. Friendship, like time, was constantly in flux. It could change the future.

And perhaps, if two friends tried really hard and remained committed to each other, they could become better people, bring out the best that was buried deep inside them. The Doctor tried to push away that persistent, stupid hope that refused to be extinguished. Four days and no news yet of towns obliterated and people annihilated. Did it work, all these years of trying to turn his enemy back into a friend?

“This one doesn’t look like Madame Vastra,” Nardole said, breaking the silence between them. “Not like the photos I’ve seen from clippings that River kept for her research.”

“Different tribes. Vastra’s tribe originated from Europe, specifically in the London region. This girl here, her tribe is closer related to the Sea Devils.”

“In the middle of a desert?”

“Travel back sixty or seventy million years and we might find ourselves thigh-deep in a swampland.” The Doctor thought back to a different Earth, before the meteorite struck, when dinosaurs still roamed the planet. Even with longer life spans, Silurians were still mayflies whose only way to cheat death was to freeze themselves in time. “The Silurians have been hibernating for a long time.”

They fell into another stretch of silence, interrupted only by the occasional beeps and buzzes that indicated both patients in the med bay were in good condition.

The Doctor recalled the minor detail that Tzakhi had shared, two children’s instant connection over discovering each other’s favorite color. What he wouldn’t give to take a hold of this budding friendship and let it bloom into lasting peace between two species indigenous to Earth! He thought back to the last time he attempted to broker peace among a group of humans and Silurians, thousands of years into the future from where he now stood. What he managed to accomplish that time was to delay further mammal-reptile interaction for a thousand years. Delaying was not solving. This time, though. This time, he would settle for nothing less than solving.

But first there was work to do.

“So what’s next?” Nardole asked.

The Doctor thought about which version of the truth to tell his companion. He needed to go underground — there must be a reason why Kaeta woke from hibernation. If it was related to the energy spike that the TARDIS picked up from a few days ago, then it may be related to Missy. He must find the source of irregularity and deactivate it.

And he must do so alone.

“I need you to take Tzakhi home.”

“But sir –”

“He likes you better. No questions, no time to waste. I will take Kaeta back to her hibernation chamber and put an end to whatever it is that woke her up. Preserve history so we don’t return to a Bristol ruled by Silurians.”

The Doctor glanced sideways at Nardole. His face was all scrunched up, with eyes glinting with suspicion. He wasn’t liking this one bit.

This was the advantage of having Nardole as an assistant and not a friend, the Doctor thought, not letting that little pang of guilt take hold of his hearts. He gave orders, and Nardole must obey. He would deal with a very cross imaginary River later.

“And for Rassilon’s sake, go into the wardrobe and find something more suitable to this time period.”

“Oi!” Nardole protested, but started walking toward the door anyway.

He, on the other hand, would be fine going into the Silurians’ den in his professor’s outfit. The only pair of eyes that he may run into had already spent the last seven decades berating his utterly unacceptable and disastrously disgraceful pompous piece of a shite outfit that he dared call fashion. He decided to bring his shades along, just to be extra spiteful.

The ghost of a smile crept onto his face as the stupid hope returned and flared in his hearts. A traitorous, idiotic sentiment.

Idiot Doctor.

He held onto this hope as tightly as he could, wishing against all things logical that he would see Missy again.

-

The Doctor didn’t bother taking off the hand brake as he landed the TARDIS underground. If the Silurians were awake and hostile, then simply silencing the landing noise wouldn’t make materializing any less conspicuous. He waited for a moment. There was no immediate banging on the door. Good.

He gave the monitor that was currently projecting the med bay one last glance. Kaeta was still in her medically-induced sleep. The Doctor nodded at the screen as if making a solemn promise. If he did this right, if he could find the cryogenic pod that she broke out of and put her back into it, then both she and her people wouldn’t wake again for a long time.

He stepped outside into a cool, cavernous chamber carved out of solid rock. Two corridors were attached one to each end of the roughly rectangular-shaped room, connectors that led into darkness, linking a sprawling underground civilization together. This room, on the other hand, was lit. The Doctor looked up, found the sources of light and smiled. Brilliant Silurians. They had drilled holes from Earth’s surface and angled mirrors along the walls of the holes, capturing the light of the sun and bouncing it from surface to surface all the way down to this space below.

He was in a non-residential section, so to speak, standing in the middle of a room full of machines — Silurian technology. This explained the energy spike in Nardole’s readings. Command centers from all across the universe were rooms filled with concentrated knowledge and ambition, too full of themselves to be contained into neat little underground chambers. The energy pulsing in this place must have projected its way up onto the earth’s surface, catching one equally knowledgeable and ambitious Time Lady’s attention.

So where had Missy gone off to?

He touched a hand to the machine closest to him, the one he gathered to be the mainframe computer, a giant clunk of metal decorated with monitors and panels full of buttons and knobs. The metal warmed under his hand before the rumbling of a vibration gave him not nearly enough of a warning when the jolt of pain hit, a zap of electricity that sent him jumping backwards and would have done much more damage if he were a simple ape with one heart.

The machine had scanned him, concluded that he was not Silurian, and promptly rejected him.

“Isomorphic control,” he mused to himself, cradling his shocked hand in his undamaged one. “Very good, very good.”

Good because this meant the other Time Lord roaming about this place hadn’t yet figured out how to alter the security mechanism of Silurian technology. Good because Missy was far too determined to give up on a puzzle and therefore she must still be around in this time and place.

He, on the other hand, had a sleeping Silurian aboard the TARDIS.

The Doctor ran back into his time machine and headed straight for the storage room that helpfully showed up as the first door on the left among the TARDIS corridors. “Good girl!” he exclaimed, and wasted no time rummaging through a box labeled ‘biometric technology.’ Naturally, what he was looking for was at the very bottom of the box, which was quite a bit deeper on the inside than it appeared. “Aha!” He raised an arm in victory after many minutes of digging, holding up a device that would allow him to scan and store the biometric data of any carbon-based life form as he pulled himself out of the box and rolled onto the TARDIS floor. With this reader, all he needed was a quick nip on Kaeta’s arm and he would have the key he needed to unlock the Silurian machines.

Of course, the device being long unused and dusty, it took the Doctor a good fifteen minutes to polish the nuclear power chip, jolt it, and restart the power, by which point he had forgotten about the TARDIS rearranging the corridors to make it easier for him to find the storage room and so bumbled through several wrong turns before finding the medical bay again.

All good — he reassured himself as he stepped out of the TARDIS having obtained what he needed — Time Lord, time machine, be back in time for supper.

He approached the biggest machine, the one with the most buttons and screens, with his device in hand. Normally he would inject the Silurian biodata into his mate’s hand. But he was companion-less at the moment and so laying the device onto the machine’s surface would have to do. He quashed the mocking voice inside his head taunting him in full female Scottish brogue about how reckless he was, never caring about the consequences of offering his pets as experiments when he very well knew the danger of mixing biometric matter of one species with another, because why else would he not inject it into himself?

“Because,” he retorted, out of reasons and not needing one anyway, as he waited for the machine to accept traces of Silurian DNA offered up by an inanimate device. For a full minute he waited and doubted that this would work, started pondering whether he needed to carry Kaeta out to place her hand on the machine. He was about to snatch the device back when the familiar sound of mechanical whirring started, followed by lights blinking and monitors coming to life, an ancient machine awakening from slumber.

“Welcome to the future, you beauty,” he greeted, giving a button an experimental push. No zapping rejection, the isomorphic shield was for security only. “Now let’s see here. Are you the central computer, or does that honor belong to one of your fellow machines in here?” He waited until the symbols on the screen rearranged themselves into English letters — his Silurian had gone rusty and he was glad Sexy was gracious enough to provide translation into the language that had become practically native to him after using it nonstop for seventy years — and his eyes grew wide at what he found himself reading.

Post-apocalypse Protocol

1. Activate scan to check all areas for apes. Engage bio-beam for positive readings. Any ape-kind detected will be automatically eliminated.
2. Conduct aboveground assessment of atmospheric conditions. If outside environment is suitable for habitation, commence colony-wide de-hibernation. DO NOT DE-HIBERNATE ENTIRE COLONY UNDER ANY OTHER ATMOSPHERIC CONDITIONS. If outside conditions are no longer suitable for habitation, de-hibernate only sections 2437-1 and 2437-2 until the underground is further developed for prolonged habitation.

“Computer, show me sections 2437-1 and 2437-2,” the Doctor commanded. A monitor to the right of the one displaying the protocol lit up with a map indicating the two sections. They were labeled Engineers - Underground Exploration and Engineers - Cosmos Exploration.

“So either build yourselves an underground civilization or find a way out of the planet,” he mused. “Survive the apocalypse at all costs. Brilliant.”

Brilliant except for the utter lack of failsafe backups. Had the Silurian leaders thought about the possibility of someone other than one among their ranks to first wake, such as a little girl like Kaeta? What would she know about activating scans and de-hibernating the others of her kind?

Life was fragile. Survival was never guaranteed, not when the Silurians went into hibernation and not when they would wake. This colony had put all their hopes upon their elders and fellow engineers. It was equal parts foolish and inspirational.

3. Prior to de-hibernation, ensure the continued workings of the automated water delivery system. The system was designed to cycle in a closed loop should the apocalypse evaporate Earth’s atmosphere. Closed loop supply is sufficient to sustain the ruling council and sections 2437-1 and 2437-2 for one year.

“Show me the automated water delivery system.”

The monitor to the left of the one displaying the protocol flickered a weaving pattern of pipes and reservoirs onto the screen. Even knowing that the Silurians had mastered the use of metal technology long before the humans, the Doctor couldn’t help feeling amazed at the elaborate workmanship of the Silurians in preparing for their apocalypse.

His eyes were drawn to a rogue set of pipes straying off into the top right corner of the screen.

“Computer, show me the water delivery system from one year ago.”

All but that one set of stray pipes flashed on the monitor, indicating that the system was indeed a closed loop, or had been, until recently. The outward branching set of pipes was new, connected to a reservoir that was indicated by a red signal on the screen. He knew red, the designated color of dangerous buttons and malfunctions throughout the universe. This red dot over the upper-right reservoir was the computer’s warning that some sort of breach of structural integrity had occurred. It didn’t take a genius to know who had fiddled with the water system.

“Not very good at covering your tracks,” he chided, a smile spreading across his face in spite of himself. “Computer, follow the path of water pipes taken out of the closed loop system.” Take me to Missy.

As expected, the screen traced the rerouted pipes into where he knew a human town currently existed aboveground, his memory still fresh with what he’d seen of Nardole’s maps. The Doctor thought back to his own observations. He vaguely remembered catching a glimpse of this town when he was standing on top of the hill overlooking the tent community. It was very far from where the Israelites were parked at the moment.

His brows knitted together of their own accord. Reaching the town would require several days’ journey on foot, and undertaking a water infrastructure project would take weeks. How had Missy managed a scheme so elaborate in such a short period of time?

“Computer, shut down.”

He would come back to decode the mystery of Kaeta’s waking later. It was clear from what he saw here that an entire colony of Silurians had not awakened, and that the technology safeguarding their hibernation was still very much in place. He would keep Kaeta inside the TARDIS longer, where she was safe. Handling Silurians could wait. Locating Missy was his priority.

Shoving the bio-reader device into his pocket, the Doctor turned around toward his TARDIS –

And came face-to-face with a farm animal.

The... donkey? — he thought that was what it was, anyway — was standing right in front of the TARDIS, blocking his way. It may have been here for a while, the Doctor couldn’t be sure, what with his over-imaginative mind thinking that the creature was eyeing him with suspicion. What was an animal meant to live aboveground doing here? It must have found its way down via some hole in the ground.

“Hello there. I’m the Doctor! I used to be able to speak Horse, but I suppose you’re a donkey, so that’s neither here nor there. I’m sure you can understand me because the TARDIS translates. That’s the blue box behind you. Which reminds me, can you kindly move to the side so I can get inside my box and be on my merry way?”

The donkey flattened its ears and was making some digging motion with one of its front hooves. It showed absolutely no sign of moving out of the way.

“Ah, pretending to be a charging bull, are you? Here, make me your target. I even have red fabric lining the inside of my coat, see? Don’t you just love that? Come on, be a dear and run over this way.” He paused, then added, “Please?”

The Doctor could have sworn that the donkey rolled its eyes. Had the TARDIS become even more advanced in its translation circuitry, now providing interpretations in the form of body language? One thing was clear. The donkey understood what he was saying and was more intelligent than he had assumed.

An intelligent donkey possessing human-like sentient capacity...

Oh. Oh!

He gave the animal a look that was all raised eyebrows and grinning teeth. “You! You’re the space ass!”

The huff that came out was not one of amusement. “Oh dear god, another crazy. What did I ever do to deserve this?” the donkey muttered, which delighted the Doctor even more because finally, finally, here was confirmation that Missy was out and about.

In a louder voice, it — or should it be he, now that the donkey had proven to be an intelligent alien life form? — practically spewed fire at the Doctor, “Why do you lot keep insulting me with that? My name is Korg!”

The Doctor grimaced, imagining the fun Missy must have taken at the creature’s expense. He dipped his head apologetically, making sure he was looking at and not down on Korg. “Ah, forgive me, that was our shorthand for you because, well, you see, you’re quite famous –”

“Spare me, she already used the same excuse.”

Come to think of it, he really disliked being always one step behind Missy.

He passed a hand through his hair, scratched a bit at the back of his neck, his mind quickly decided on a different approach. “Mr. Korg, intelligent life form not from Earth, my sincerest apologies.” He stepped closer, extending a hand in front of Korg’s muzzle as a tentative peace offering. “It is an honor to meet you.”

Korg did another one of his donkey eye rolls, but this time the Doctor sensed more exasperation than anger. Good enough for him.

“So, Korg, taking a stroll in the underground? How far do these tunnels go? Any chance I can fast track into the closest town?”

Korg eyed him suspiciously. “Are you planning to conquer humans too? The closest town is taken.”

“Oh, come on,” the Doctor said using his joking tone. He spread his arms and moved them up and down, gesturing at himself. “Look at me! Don’t you want me as your overlord? I may be a few days behind that other crazy that you’ve met, but I promise you, I’m the better supreme ruler. I make better omelets. I put bacon in mine.”

Korg gave a huff of disbelief. Small steps, the Doctor reminded himself. Going from strangers to demanding undying underling devotion was too drastic a step. That was more Missy’s style, not his.

“I was joshing with you. I’ve no intention to be an overlord. Megalomaniac, not me. Idiot trying to help, me.” He looked at Korg. Poor thing was skinny even by donkey standards. “I’m serious about the bacon in the omelet. Give it a try. It will transform your outlook on eggs entirely. You’re alien, not a real donkey. Can’t just survive on grass and grains.

“But I’m getting off track. The crazy lady you mentioned? Now that’s a classic megalomaniac. Allow her to conquer a town and there won’t be a town left after a few days. Whole planets have been depopulated because of her. Or him. She used to be a he, if you can imagine it. Anyway, my point is, you don’t want her if you want to live. Get me to the town as quickly as possible and not a single life will be lost.”

The way that Korg was looking at him, the Doctor had to reach up a hand to make sure he didn’t suddenly grow another head. Why didn’t the donkey seem to believe a word he’d said? Granted, a creature of this time may not know what bacon was, so maybe he should have skipped that part. But the part about Missy — why wasn’t Korg nodding in agreement with him?

Just so he would have something to do with his hands, the Doctor took out his sonic sunglasses and put them on. As expected, the shades registered the presence of an alien life form. Young, male, native to the planet Xenon, presently afflicted by some unknown, constricting condition that inhibited the manifestation of his natural appearance. A shapeshifter.

“Ah, you’re a Whifferdill!” the Doctor exclaimed. “It’s been years since I’ve met one of your species! I have a friend once, Frobisher. Likes to be a penguin whenever he could. Not as useful as a donkey, I suppose. Nice chap, knew him in my sixth and seventh bodies. Wonder what he’s up to nowadays, timey wimey spacetime history and all.” He took off his glasses, frowned. “But you. You’re stuck in donkey form. It’s not just my glasses telling me this. I can smell it. There’s something peculiar about your biological composition. It’s as if you and I share artron energy. Not natural for you at all.”

He drummed his fingers along the straight edge of his sunglasses, trying to think his way through solving the mystery when he realized Korg was glaring at him with such intensity that, if he could stay standing on his hind legs, he would have accompanied the expression with the crossing of his front limbs.

“What?”

“Time Lords,” Korg spat, in a tone that eerily reminded the Doctor of a very fed-up Nardole. “Do you all love listening to your own voice so much? Because the reason I volunteered to guard the control room is so I don’t have to put up with your kind’s incessant babbling. Because by god is she annoying. Because after five months of being threatened with disembowelment every other minute, I’ve come to treasure my three hours of silence every day. But you! You have to barge in here acting exactly like her and –”

The Doctor’s mind reeled. “Hang on!” He held up a hand. “Stop. Sorry. Mouth, close. Continue your diatribe later. I promise I’ll be all ears. But did you say five months?”

“Yes!” Korg fumed. “Ever since that day I found her by that stupid well, it’s all donkey soup this and donkey popsicle that. Are you going to kill me too?”

Five months! Voices rang in the Doctor’s head, from River to Missy to Tegan and Sarah Jane and Nardole and almost everyone who had traveled in the TARDIS with him, jeering voices that mocked him for his deplorable piloting skills.

He’d planned on steering the TARDIS from the Israelite camps into the underground to check on the energy spike, gather what information he could and return in time for Nardole’s dinner.

Five months. Plenty of time for Missy to conquer a town and reroute the Silurians’ water infrastructure into that town.

Five months of Missy on the loose. What damage had she done, how should he even begin to ask? He settled for “No, I’m not going to kill you.” Surely that was more reassuring than anything Missy had said?

Korg was looking him up and down, and the Doctor did his best to keep still, willed his body not to react to being judged like a school boy caught in the act of cheating. The donkey didn’t care for Time Lords, that much was apparent. And why would he, if his first encounter with one was Missy? But Korg was standing before him, alive, after five months of constantly being with her. He’d even volunteered to keep watch over Silurian technology. Which meant Korg had earned Missy’s trust.

And Missy had somehow won Korg’s allegiance.

No death or destruction of whole people groups. Did it work? Had the past seventy years mattered?

The silence was growing into something very uncomfortable, like moldy food wafting stronger and stronger in the air with each day he refused to clear out leftover takeaways from his rubbish bin. He decided to stop spinning the question inside his head and just spit it out.

“How is Missy?”

Korg snorted. “If you care so much about her, then why show up now? She conquered the town all by herself, you know.”

“I don’t approve of her ways,” he countered, “the scheming and the bloodshed. And particularly not what she did, changing history like this.”

“Then why show up only now?” Korg repeated, accusing with both voice and eyes.

“I –” He glanced at the TARDIS, asking the same question of his very uncooperative time machine. Old Sexy managed to taunt him by her mere presence. “Accident,” he said. “Miscalculation. Time’s in flux and I steered into the wrong gap.”

“Excuses.”

He had no defense for that.

“And get your facts straight. That was no bloodshed,” Korg continued. “She became the savior of the town. Showed up and gave everyone indoor plumbing. Got promoted to high priestess after she correctly interpreted some astronomical events. Then took over as queen when the king mysteriously disappeared.”

The Doctor raised an eyebrow.

“She deposed a maniac.”

“Excuses.”

Korg didn’t back down. “The entire town prefers her.”

“Careful, now. You don’t know when she’s going to strike.” Being a benevolent ruler was nothing like her. Missy must have ulterior motives.

Korg opened his mouth to argue, but was interrupted by the sounds of dripping water that soon turned into a generous flow. Water delivery time.

“My shift is over,” Korg said. He turned and disappeared into a tunnel before the Doctor could ask more questions.

He remained in the control room, pondering over what just happened. Something wasn’t making sense. “Think, Doctor, think,” he chided, replaying the past ten minutes in his mind. Talking donkey, Whifferdill, historical fact, normal. Silurian technology, accessible, logical, also normal.

Time. The five month delay was his bollocking. Absolutely normal even if he wouldn’t admit it to anyone else. But not the hint of time energy he detected on Korg, in a very impure and diluted form but definitely there, a mystery. Yet even that was a run-of-the-mill, normal mystery. “No no no no no, that’s not it. There’s something else. Something obvious I’m missing...”

An image flashed across his mind. The map. The underground water pipes and the human town that was at least a day’s journey from here.

Korg’s presence here should have been an impossibility. He was spending three hours a day guarding the Silurian command center. Three hours simply didn’t fit into a full day’s journey. Couldn’t, unless the Whifferdill was a teleporter.

He knew what Missy wanted now that their promise was broken. Out and away. Very, very far away.

Could Whifferdills teleport? Was this why Missy kept Korg close?

He was about to enter the TARDIS — no time to waste — to do some research and, more importantly, to get back to a Nardole that he needed to profusely apologize to, when Korg reappeared from the shadows. Gone and back again.

“Korg! I was just –”

“Sorry, Doctor. Missy’s orders.”

The donkey charged and headbutted into his side, no harm done except for a prickling sensation on the back of his hand, a painful pinch piercing through skin. Within a single gasp of breath, whatever had hit him started having an effect. The Doctor stumbled. It was no longer easy to walk the final steps toward the TARDIS. He felt lightheaded. Was it poison? No, he wasn’t in pain and his innards weren’t rebelling yet. But he was woozy and his vision was blurring. He tripped over his foot, a liability he thought he was no longer prone to after growing out of his previous body, and fell onto... something warm and soft. His head was pushed up against a bed of fur and it tickled his nose. That something soft started moving with him on it, away from the TARDIS and into the shadows.

His body-mover stomped on a glowing pad and he felt the familiar tug of dislocation, of dimensional travel. Teleportation. Ah. The Whifferdill wasn’t a teleport. The glowy patch inside the tunnel was.

Reconstituted Silurian technology, the Doctor thought as he began to lose consciousness. Missy had figured out short-distance teleportation. Missy had had five months to work on it. Missy would soon manage something much farther in range.

His last thought before everything turned black was Missy.

Chapter Text

Missy looked up at the night sky. Ancient stars that appeared younger than their true age twinkled at her. Stars from millions and billions of Earth’s light years away. Illusions. In reality, most of these stars were on the cusp of their final bursts of glory, dying stars holding onto their last breaths, counting down toward the inevitable destruction that would soon take their planets and the civilizations clinging onto those little balls of rock with them. And there were some that were already gone, no longer in existence even as the humans composed poems and songs praising their supposed permanence. If Missy could take the TARDIS to those stars’ coordinates, go on a trip of space travel without moving backward in time, she knew she would find in deep space not stars but the dark nothingness of black holes and stardust swirling around them.

After all these years, she still found the death of stars beautiful. Why wouldn’t she? It was the proper order of things. It was natural. What was unnatural was trying to stop the universe from devolving into chaos, trying to play God to continue the lives of people whose times were up. It should have been obvious: No star, no planet; no planet, no life. What was unnatural was seeing humans — Earthlings — spread out into all corners of the universe given a few eons’ time, their impossible existence reeking of the interference of a meddlesome Time Lord. The Doctor knew nothing of the beauty of destruction. Ironic, wasn’t it, when he’d been responsible for so much death and destruction himself.

And that, above all else, was what made the Doctor beautiful. He’d always been beautiful, of course, from that young, innocent first face of his bearing a given name that he no longer acknowledged to all the other bodies he commanded as he moved in each of them with awkward grace. But it was those now-ancient hands soaked to the bones with blood that were so compelling, blessed with long fingers this time around to disguise the truly dangerous weapons that they were. How many of his pets would let him touch them if they knew the full extent of the lives he’d extinguished? None. Not even that wife of his who was raised to become a weapon herself. His human associates may be able to think up excuses for him, explain away his actions with weak justifications, but none of them would truly grasp the full weight of destruction associated with every strand of time stream that he had aborted, created, destroyed, or otherwise altered.

The Doctor was like an exploding star. Young-looking (sometimes more so than others) and harmless when viewed from billions of light years away, when the outward skin of a jovial idiot was all that his small-minded Earthlings could perceive. But get close enough to him and one would be confronted with the ancient core of the Time Lord, and it was to this real Doctor that Missy’s hearts whispered friend.

She itched to go out into the galaxies, and she would. She was close to completing her teleportation device. Out there, she would see exploding stars again.

But she would be alone.

In a few days’ time, the game of cat and mouse would begin again, two Time Lords playing in the sandbox of a universe not nearly large enough to keep them apart for long. She would be the one running this time. Would he take on her role and try to get her attention? Would he chase her across all of time and space to capture her, take her back to the vault?

Perhaps, Missy pondered as her eyes trailed after a shooting star, wondered whether it was chasing after something or being chased, perhaps after she had traveled alone for too long, he would simply need to ask, and she would willingly go with him back to twenty-first century Earth.

Whether nearby or from afar, the Doctor would always remain a part of her life. This was what they were, the constant push and pull. The Master and the Doctor, enemies and friends, from now until the end of the universe. This was natural.

The sound of hooves trotting from behind brought Missy back to the present. Korg approached her cautiously, but not in terror like those humans associated with the previous king whom she had inexplicably decided to spare.

“There’s food for you from the banquet. The others have all left.”

“I’m not hungry.”

“You’ve been saying this for two days.”

“Not human. I don’t gorge on food every few hours like those lower life forms.”

Korg didn’t argue further. Good donkey. He really did know her temperament by now.

“I’ll go check on the Doctor then.”

There was nothing to check, not since Korg first transported him here. But Missy let him take his leave and stopped herself from following after him. The Doctor would wake soon enough. She cast one more glance at the sky. The shooting star was gone. She may as well return to the Silurian command room and try to rig more of their technology. Take advantage of the TARDIS while it was parked there.

Silly Doctor, so mistrusting and locking her out of almost the entire TARDIS. If only he knew that she would never leave him without first saying goodbye. She needed to formally resume their intergalactic chase, after all, and this sort of things was best initiated face-to-face. Besides, did he not realize that those seventy years counted for something and deserved at least an acknowledgement of a season coming to an end?

No matter. They would say their goodbyes soon enough. Her teleporter was almost complete. With her limited access to the TARDIS, she may even be able to upgrade it into a more powerful model. Give it a few more days and it would be done.

Then (after saying goodbye, of course) she would leave.

-

The first words he heard when he regained consciousness were, “Hello, sleepy face.”

It was in Gallifreyan. The TARDIS didn’t translate Gallifreyan.

The Doctor strained his eyes to try to see more than the ceiling of an enclosed area, strained against the shackles that pulled his arms above his head and extended his legs out and far apart, strained against his dry throat to make a sound.

He wasn’t given the chance to answer.

“Three days,” Missy’s voice rang from somewhere beyond him, melodic in the syllables of their native tongue, like a tune that was innocent on the surface but could at any moment go terribly wrong. “I spent three whole days trying to decide whether I should kill you right away or save you for later. Guess what? I’m going to kill you later. Aren’t you proud of my self-control, Doctor?”

A hand, soft and warm, cupped his right cheek. He violently jerked his head away.

“Tsk, tsk, ever so ungrateful. Is this how you treat a friend?”

“You’re not my friend,” he spat.

Her response came after a delay that was a split second too long. The Doctor couldn’t help but hope that his words had stung. In his present condition, words were the only weapon he had left.

“Then you shall honor me as Queen,” Missy said icily. She tugged at one of the metal constraints binding his wrists. It didn’t hurt, but the gesture sent him a sobering reminder of who was in charge. “I can have you stripped naked and beaten and thrown into prison, you know. Break every bone of this lovely body of yours and then set you on fire. I can sap life out of you little by little until artron energy oozes out from your every pore.”

The Doctor ignored Missy’s goading and focused instead on his surroundings. He was in a room of some sort, probably hers, which would make the flat surface he was lying on her bed. The clinks of his shackles confirmed that they were metal, standard human metal, breakable if he could blast it with the right sonic frequency or exert enough force on a weak point. Neither of which, of course, he was physically able to do in his current predicament. Maybe if he rolled his weight toward the edge of the bed and get it to flip over...

“Oh stop it, I know exactly what you’re thinking. It’s not going to work.”

“How do you know what I’m thinking about? For all you know, I can be –”

Gentle fingers touched the top of his head and ran through his hair. They trailed down the side of his head, ghosting over the shell of his ear with just a whisper of touch, then danced a trail down to and along the base of his neck. He shivered at the barely there contact. The motion repeated itself twice, each time growing in familiarity, tickling and pressing and caressing as if she’d done it thousands of times before. As the fingers moved, they sparked tingly sensations that went straight down his spine and drained all strength from his limbs. “Try flipping the bed now,” Missy whispered against his ear, and the brush of her stray hair against that sensitive spot at the juncture of his jaw and neck lit up his nerves, drew a gasp into his lungs. He felt the twitch of her lips pressed over his ear, a smile... no, a smirk, the knowing taunt of the Mistress over his defeat.

Missy abruptly pulled away. The moment shattered.

“I should just leave you to the locals. They’re rather inventive when it comes to torturing prisoners.”

He tugged at his shackles, rattling them. “You’ve poisoned their minds.”

“I enlightened them by showing them a convenience of the future! Even you don’t like getting stuck in some uncivilized era without indoor plumbing.”

If only it was just about indoor plumbing. There was a larger plan at work, he was certain of it. The Doctor knew this tone, cocksure and ruthless and much more befitting of the Master’s previous bodies than this face, this face which he had come to know alongside a slightly softer, saner voice. It was unsettling, how unlike herself Missy sounded and yet at the same time no different from who she had always been.

“Whatever you’re plotting, Missy, don’t.”

“And how are you going to stop me, all tied up like this?”

“Untie me then.”

“Not going to.”

“Missy, this isn’t a game!”

“Is it?” Soft humming followed by the clicking of her heels. The Doctor noted the sound. Stone floors. Missy was Queen. This must be her palace, or whatever resembled a palace given the architectural limitations of the time. “Tell you what, an arm for an arm, literally. I free one of your appendages, I cut it off of a human. Can be the same person or different victims. Your choice.”

Cutting off appendages. Missy had weapons. Think, Doctor, think. The Master was a connoisseur of efficiency. She could stomach mess and carnage but didn’t necessarily prefer it. Vaporize someone, leave no body behind, done. No cleanup required. Quick and efficient, always the preferred way to kill. Preferable for vaporizing body parts as well. This meant she had a laser device. A blaster.

“Oooooh, I like the way your mind goes crazy with thoughts!” came a squeal that pierced right into his ears. “You’re getting warmer, but don’t go all smug on me. It’s not like it’s cold in here to begin with. The sun outside is positively sweltering.”

Seconds later, Missy’s voice drifted in from farther away. “I suppose I should thank you for delivering the TARDIS right into my territory. I was hoping you’d do it sooner, but you’re never one to be punctual. You forgot to lock me out of my room in the TARDIS, by the way. The one I claimed for myself during that year that never was. I’m surprised you’ve kept it. You have no idea what I have stored in there.”

Missy took out something that cast a shadow over him, blocking the natural light coming in from the sole opening in the wall that could barely be called a window. The Doctor studied the shape of the shadow. It was –

“My sonic umbrella, for example. So good of you to bring me a present. I would thank you if I didn’t have to go through all the trouble to retrieve it across spacetime dimensions. But it’s all good. Now I can do intellectually stimulating things like torture you. The donkey is useless when it comes to providing entertainment. You’d think he’d’ve learned a few song and dance over the years but no, not a single rhythm gene in him. Speaking of which, how do you like my very own space ass? Was he nice to you? Should I give him a little chat about not being mean to grumpy Time Lords?”

Missy closed the umbrella and poked his stomach with the pointy end. “Do you know what else I can do now? I get to play around with all the Silurian computers! You made it so easy, Doctor, personally gifting me with a Silurian to get through the isomorphic security.”

“Kaeta...”

“Is that what she’s called, the Silurian girl you kidnapped? Oh calm your eyebrows, I kept her sleeping. I have no use of her being awake.” Missy lowered her voice, whispered as if plotting a conspiracy, “How about it, Doctor, do you want to know what I found digging through the Silurian computers?”

“No.”

“Spoilsport.” He could hear the pout in Missy’s voice. They both knew he was lying. “Well, guess what? I’m not going to tell you.”

Missy feigned being offended and didn’t say anything else. The Doctor took the opportunity to replay all the information he’d heard. Missy went inside the TARDIS. The settings against her accessing most of the ship were obviously still in place, or she’d be millions of galaxies away by now. But Missy could go into the medical bay and there she discovered Kaeta. She had spent the last three days rummaging through the Silurian central control system –

Remembering the protocol he’d seen displayed on the monitor as soon as the main computer booted, the Doctor gasped.

“Oh, for shame, your mind is like a sieve. No, I didn’t de-hibernate the Silurians. No point in doing that.”

Yet, the Doctor completed the sentence silently. This meant Missy hadn’t finished extracting Silurian data and technology.

“Correct. And use your voice, please? It’s tiring to sift through all your pathetic and unimportant thoughts to get to your slightly less pathetic and unimportant ones.”

He fixed his eyes at the ceiling of the rare, solidly built structure of this time — the labors of hundreds of hapless humans forced to construct a dwelling fit for a queen. He spoke into the room. No use turning his head when Missy didn’t want to be seen. “Are you going to teleport away? To another planet?”

“Another planet is no fun. I’ll need to assemble something more advanced and tweak the power so I can reach a nearby galaxy.”

“And unleash an entire colony of de-hibernated Silurians on humans the moment you’re ready to leave.”

“We’ll see about that,” Missy deflected, which the Doctor understood as another way of saying yes.

If he needed to stay on Earth to sort out the mess of Silurian aggression against humans, then he wouldn’t have time to run after her.

This was her plan from the beginning, the Doctor realized. She had intended to run away since day one of setting foot in this era.

“What about our promise?”

Maybe it was the way the question sat uncomfortably between his ears, pushing out all the little noises that had been buzzing in the background. Everything around him suddenly went quiet, including Missy. Even time itself seemed to have stopped.

“What about it?” came the whispered words long moments later, a trembling voice so soft that he thought he may have imagined it.

Missy didn’t dismiss his question, didn’t scoff at his sentimentalism or laugh at his naivety. It could only mean one thing...

Was it real? – he wondered, asked in his mind. The air between them went quieter still. He knew Missy had heard.

He wanted to know, wanted to make sense of the past few days for him and the last five months for her. Or perhaps it went much further back, back to that horrible planet of self-appointed executioners who knew nothing of second chances and sought only to exact vengeance.

I’ll be good, I promise. I’ll turn, I’ll turn good. Please, teach me. Teach me how to be good.

He tried. Missy had too, in her own way. Yet it still led to this, the two of them inside this room, once again on opposing sides.

But that wasn’t the promise they were talking about, was it?

The real promise — theirs — was simply to be friends again, even if it took a thousand years. Nothing more and nothing less.

So was it real, their promise?

“Doctor, brace yourself.”

It took him several seconds to realize he’d heard the words not with his ears, but in his mind.

Come in.

Missy had only lowered a fraction of her mental defenses, controlled and intentional in what she was allowing him to glimpse, but he was given access to venture into her mind. He took a tentative dip in, feeling bright colors red orange yellow purple. It was nothing like what he expected, all these fire and molten rocks, boiling rage that was in complete contrast to the icy primness she projected to the outside world. This world of tumultuous fire was held back only by Missy’s iron force of will, her mental constraint keeping the anger and bitterness and even the undercurrent of madness that was always there at bay.

Away from the storm raging in her mind, the Doctor was allowed to wander in deeper, into a stillness devoid of the practiced bravado that was so much a part of the Master that it was never truly pretend. The Doctor waded in, careful not to disturb this stillness that he never knew the Master possessed. As he walked on, he lowered his own mental shield, reciprocating Missy’s rare act of generosity with his own offering of trust.

Suddenly he was stepping on squishy soil, dark patches of Missy’s mind that were fertile instead of barren, nurturing instead of destructive. He continued to walk in suspended darkness until he came across a tender shoot sprouting out of the soil, a bright shade of light green, living, defying all expectations. He knelt in front of the fragile shoot, feeling sad and no he was not going to hope because why hope for a goodness that may be here today and gone tomorrow? But this was real, what he was seeing before him... was it? He reached out a hand, tried to touch, and was thrown back by a force so strong that he was propelled back into complete darkness. Permission denied.

It was calm in this deep recess of Missy’s mind, sandwiched between the rage above and the insanity rumbling below, an insanity that was her essence, her core. He wanted to find the sprouting shoot again, this one thing that was undeniably good within Missy.

Would it grow? Did it stand a chance?

Show me, Missy. Show me what I must do to turn you good.

Red orange yellow purple flashed around him in response. Anger. The Doctor looked about, startled. What did he do wrong?

Let me help, please! There’s goodness in you. I saw it, it’s there. I know goodness. I know what you need. Just let me –

No, he heard all around him, a vibration that entered his mind’s ears and shocked through his whole body. There was no further explanation. Just no.

As he was pushed outward and upward back toward the volatile surface of Missy’s mind, the Doctor knew Missy had rejected his offers, rebuffed every one of his pleas. Wait, he shouted, knowing that it was futile but couldn’t stop himself from hoping. He could show her goodness, fix her, especially now that he knew the goodness inside her had sprouted. The fragile shoot, so new and full of promise whether or not the seed had always been buried inside each of the Master, could be cultivated into a beautiful tree. He could do it. He wanted to help. If only Missy wasn’t keeping her goodness out of his reach...

The last thing he saw in Missy’s mind were her clear blue eyes, the familiar sight of unshed tears, as he felt an answering burn in his own eyes. He squeezed his eyes shut to make the burning go away. When he opened them again, he was back inside Missy’s room.

He was looking at Missy now, at her real, physical eyes and red-painted lips that had moved into his field of vision — the face of an almost-friend. He couldn’t reach out to touch her, could do nothing but watch helplessly as their not-friendship was slipping through his fingers.

“You know what I realized over the past five months, Doctor?” Missy asked in a hushed voice after they stared at each other for what felt like an eternity, time enough for stars to die and reborn out among the galaxies.

He shook his head. No, he didn’t know. No, he didn’t want to know.

“I’m never, ever going to be good. Not in the way that you want me to be. But I am doing well and have only killed that bastard of a king. So let me be good as Missy. Let go of your rigid morality and see me.”

See me. He’d said these words to someone before, he thought, but couldn’t quite remember when and to whom. Yet he remembered the feeling, the mixture of longing and desperation that accompanied the plea. Of watching helplessly as the other person moved away from him like a passing ship in the night.

Their promise had fizzled down to this. No more Missy being good, just good enough.

“I do, just let me help,” he insisted, because he refused to settle for good enough when he’d just seen real, proper goodness inside Missy, that green shoot that had so much potential to grow.

Those piercing eyes hardened. The flashes of anger made Missy look... complete. He couldn’t tear his gaze away. The unleashing of her storm was making her come alive.

“You have no idea what you’re saying,” Missy snarled, her lips curling and oh they moved so beautifully. “We’re done with our promise because we’ve both broken it. You first,” she spat, challenged, pausing for a denial that they both knew he had no right to voice the moment he offered Bill all of time and space. “And yet here you are, still judging me by your morals, still finding fault because Missy isn’t up to your standards. I can see it in your eyes.”

She could read him plainly because he wasn’t trying to hide. What she had done was inexcusable.

“You changed history,” he accused.

“What? By giving those apes indoor plumbing? By using Silurian technology that’s already here? Makes no difference in the grand scheme of things. This town’s going to be destroyed in two decades, with or without toilets inside their houses and regardless of who’s king.”

“Missy –”

“Stop.”

“Did our promise mean nothing, not even before?”

“I say stop.”

“You’ve changed. Don’t deny it. The old you would have destroyed this town and save the indoor plumbing all to yourself.”

“Stop!”

He didn’t know whether he closed his mouth because of Missy’s insistence or at the sight of tears spilling over those watery eyes and rolling down her cheeks.

He blinked, confused at all the emotions he was witnessing and feeling suddenly out of his depth. He stayed his eyes on Missy as she turned away and swiped a hand over her face, until she went out of his line of vision. She may be physically retreating, but there was still a lingering connection between their minds and he could sense her growing frustration with him. He didn’t understand. He didn’t know why she was crying.

It took seven minutes and thirty-nine seconds before Missy sufficiently collected her composure to speak.

“I promised you a thousand years so we could be friends again. I thought it could work. But I’m an idiot. We will never understand each other.”

He opened his mouth to protest but she shushed him. The sound of boot clicks followed, and then she was in his view again, reaching out her arms and freeing him of all his shackles with mechanical precision. Wordlessly. No threats of severing human limbs or mockery of his incompetence.

He sat up, rubbing at his wrists. This should feel like freedom, being released. Instead, the Doctor felt like a kite being cut loose, set adrift and no longer wanted.

Aside from the boots, Missy had changed into local clothing — a part of his mind registered — noticing the many layers she still wore to hide this regeneration’s slight built, finely woven linen with beautiful embroidery. She kept the dark purple color scheme, a luxury of the royalty and the rich. A dress fit for a queen indeed.

Missy was staring at a spot on the floor and didn’t notice his eyes on her. “I’m trying to be good and I will keep going, because what started as my commitment to you when you saved me from the executioners has become a challenge for myself. But I’m done trying to become your good. You will only make me your friend again if I conform to all your standards. That’s not who I am.”

He pulled at her hand, tried to get her to sit. “Missy...”

She yanked away and took a step back. Their eyes connected then, and he was pinned by such cold resentment that for a moment, Missy was unrecognizable. “Stop it. Whatever you’re going to say, stop! You filter everything through your own morality. Even your praises. Especially your praises. So you think I have changed? Well I know I’ve changed. I chose to. Don’t you dare use me to prove the success of your Missy Reformation Project. I want you as my friend and I’ve always accepted everything about you. But do you? Because every day in that bloody vault of yours I knew I would never be your friend until I could meet your impossible standards. Well, guess what? That’s not how friendship works!”

The Doctor opened his mouth to protest... what? Nothing was making sense. Missy was bending reality to her logic and he couldn’t follow. He replayed what he thought he’d heard: Missy was being good. Missy wasn’t being good. Missy was forced to be good. Missy promised to be good. Missy rejected being good. Missy chose in her own terms to be good. These were contradictory statements, any combination of them. Why was it then that she seemed to hold all of them as true?

He heard a clicking sound. A blaster was pointed his way.

“I don’t understand.”

“No, you don’t.”

Too late, he heard. They were done pretending to be friends.

He waited for the blast that he knew wouldn’t come.

“Honor me as queen,” she repeated her command from earlier. “Or I will shoot at maximum setting.”

The Doctor had refused to play the Master’s games many times before, always preferring to let his nemesis destroy himself with his own ego or to stoke his rage until his anger led to a slip-up. But this time, he was dealing with a Master who felt betrayed, and though he didn’t fully understand, was truly very confused as to why Missy was angry, he knew enough to know that he had somehow played a role in it.

Closing his mouth — rebuttals would only provoke her further — he slipped off the edge of the bed, fell onto one knee, and brought a fist over his left heart. “Your majesty, Mistress the Queen,” he murmured, holding Missy’s gaze.

Missy tore off their mental connection, an instinct born out of self-preservation. But she couldn’t hide the sudden flare of heat in her eyes.

See me. He saw her now, familiar as Koschei in any body. It didn’t matter whether she was good or evil. He didn’t want to lose her.

“Please,” he pleaded, not for his life.

He remembered the graveyard. Their positions were reversed then. He remembered what she had wanted. He now wanted the same.

He would try again. Again and again and again until he got it right, until he had his friend back. If she would let him.

“Please.”

Her eyes grew darker with more emotions, and he dared to hope. She could deny it all she wanted, but this... whatever it was, it mattered to her too. Would she try again?

She lowered the weapon.

When Missy spoke again, she spoke as Queen: “I will show you my kingdom, backwater and despicable as it is. You will see me as these tiny humans’ competent and beloved overlord.”

He nodded. Any start was a good start.

She closed the distance between them when he didn’t quite succeed at standing up, his legs wobbly from three days of disuse. She reached out her hands to hold him up by his arms, steadying him. He looked down.

“Mistress, I –”

Apologies meant nothing if he didn’t know what he was apologizing for, didn’t understand how and why he broke what he did.

She shook her head. Don’t. It wasn’t absolution. Only a delay.

“I will give you today, Doctor. Today, I’ll play your game. Today, I am your good.”

Chapter Text

“You’ve met the space ass,” Missy said with a wave toward Korg, ignoring his indignant huff. “He’s going to be your minder. I sit on him, he drags your chain. Capisci?” She turned to her ride. “That’s Italian for ‘do you understand,’ a language that doesn’t exist yet.”

“Crystal,” the Doctor said the same moment that Korg did his lip-blowing thing.

She threw the looped end of the metal chain over Korg’s head. Turning to the Doctor, Missy ordered, “Give it a tug.” He raised his arms and bent his elbows, pulling his bound wrists toward his chest. The chain tightened.

“Ow, are you trying to restrain him or choke me?” Korg complained.

“Both,” she trilled. “This is going to be so much fun!”

Her companions — yes, this was how the Doctor referred to his pets — fixed her a look that questioned her sanity. She smiled sweetly in response.

“Allons-y!” she shouted once she was settled on Korg, digging her heels into his sides to signal for him to start moving. That was what the Doctor liked to say when he was in that young, skinny body of his, if she remembered correctly. When they were both manic and bouncy. Missy pointedly ignored this older-face version of him. She most definitely did not care to see the look he was probably sending her way for dragging up that period of their shared history.

“Our first destination is the town well, the one that existed before I got here. I enhanced it into an ever-flowing tap on demand,” Missy said as Korg walked onto an established path that led to the town square. The humans were starting to notice them and trying hard not to openly gape at the peculiar sight of yet another pale-skinned stranger among their midst. Missy remembered their reaction to her when she first arrived. It was as if they had no capacity in those pea-sized brains of theirs to grasp the existence of a humanoid with fair complexion. Well, surprise, here was another one of her kind, in more ways than one.

“Based on my not-entirely scientific observation, water-borne diseases decreased significantly after I connected the tap to the underground water purification system,” she continued, speaking louder and addressing the Doctor in English. She wanted the TARDIS to translate her achievement tour to the townsfolk. This was her victory lap and it wouldn’t do to only have a Gallifreyan as her audience.

She steered Korg toward a humble structure of stones that stood at waist-height for an average-sized adult human of this time. Several locals were already at the well to take advantage of the less intense heat of the morning sun to draw their water for the day. Missy motioned for them to finish before directing Korg to get closer.

“Make way for the prisoner to gawk,” she commanded to a crowd of about thirty that was now gathered around the ancient well. She gestured for the Doctor to go near and look. At this early time of the day, the sunlight would be bouncing off the metal sidings she had installed along the inner walls of the well, and the Doctor should be able to make out the self-timing aqua pump she’d put in at the very bottom. That was the part she was most excited to showcase. The Master was always the better engineer and she knew the Doctor knew it.

She de-looped the chain from Korg and threw it toward a burly looking human. The human’s rather asymmetric face split into a ferocious grin. He tugged hard at the chain, forcing the Doctor to stumble forward. As the Doctor passed Missy, he sent her an I’ll make you pay look that was all vertical eyebrows. She smirked.

The human had enough brain cells in the void between his ears to drag the Doctor toward one side of the well so she could see his face while he looked down. The Doctor was still in his grumpy mode when he placed his bound hands onto the ledge. But the longer he looked, the more his eyes widened and his face gave way to an impressed expression in spite of himself.

“Rhodian interdimensional engineering with Gallifreyan timekeeping technology,” he said in their native tongue, mindful of spoilers. “So simple, and yet it works beautifully.”

A rush of pride flooded her hearts, and Missy beamed. The Doctor answered with a smile that was barely visible going by the slight upward quirk of his lips but oh, how that spark of mutual interest and understanding danced in his eyes.

“What do you see, prisoner?” a different human male shouted from the crowd, prompting a chorus of taunts and jeers directed the Doctor’s way. The Doctor was unperturbed. He lifted his head and scanned the crowd, his face now shining with that patronizing brand of love he always had for these primitive apes.

“I see that you’re very lucky to have the Mistress as your Queen.”

The crowd cheered, and Missy couldn’t decide whether there was any sincerity to the Doctor’s words. The donkey must have detected a generous helping of brown nosing, judging by the choking noises he was making. If Korg was free to speak in front of humans, Missy was certain his word choices would be quite colorful.

“Now, now, flattery won’t get the chains off you,” she spoke, mainly addressing the crowd, which cheered again. The burly human approached and bowed, giving her back the chain.

“Thank you, you not entirely useless pudding brain.” The man looked as if he was about to weep. He would probably tell his children and grandchildren about this most exciting day of his sorry life in the decades to come. Now, that was a good deed she’d just bestowed on someone entirely undeserving of her goodwill. Pity the Doctor was a pudding brain himself when it came to noticing her being good.

Missy settled the looped end of the chain back over Korg. “Step back, prisoner. We must move on.” She dug her heels into Korg. “Giddyup!”

“You are enjoying this far too much,” the Doctor said when the crowd was out of hearing range and the three of them were heading toward their next stop, a pastureland that was flourishing thanks to improved irrigation and alien enhancement of soil composition that produced top-quality grass even in the desert climate.

His tone was amused, unlike the snort-like sound that Korg was making. He was probably rolling his eyes right now.

“My dear Doctor, you aren’t sophisticated enough to understand the thrill of finely executed domination.”

The Doctor chuckled. “I suppose not.”

She directed Korg off the main footpath and toward an unusually green stretch of grass that laid about half a mile ahead. “We’re approaching the outer boundary of this town,” she informed the Doctor. “It was full of sheep and goats that looked like they were plucked straight from a famine when I first arrived. Now, they’re all so heavy that you can hardly lift them up anymore.”

The Doctor made that face that he usually reserved for coming across a surprisingly not horrible student essay. “I take it that you’ve discovered data on Silurian agriculture as well.”

Missy hummed, pleased with impressing the Doctor twice within the past hour. “Let’s just say that tweaks in soil composition, irrigation, and the genetic composition and therefore the nutritional value of grass were involved. Not bad for an evil overlord, wouldn’t you say?”

The Doctor responded with a genuine smile.

When they arrived the pastureland, the old couple that was in charge of tending to this enhanced plot of their ancestral property welcomed their queen profusely, calling in their adult children from the fields to prepare food and drink for her. Missy unhooked Korg and let him loose to go feed himself, knowing how much he preferred the fortified grass. She coiled the long chain and draped it over her shoulder, pulling the Doctor close as they were all but ushered into the couple’s home and offered to recline in the most spacious part of the modest hut that could barely be called a house. “It’s a few hours’ wait, but we’re going to eat the best lamb stew in the universe,” she said as she looped an arm through his bound ones.

He waggled his eyebrows at her. “We? I thought I’m a prisoner.”

“You are. But I’m good today, remember?”

“You are always most excellent and good, my Queen.” The old woman appeared from the back of the hut, carrying a tray with dried fruits and tea. She brought two portions of everything.

Missy shot the Doctor a triumphant look as she sat down on the floor mat, pulling him down with her. She leaned her head against his shoulder once the woman excused herself to go prepare what she knew was going to be a scrumptious feast. For a moment, she was back outside the mausoleum again, pressed close to a horrified Doctor looking on as cybermen were being reborn. Then she was back inside the vault, sharing space on the couch with her keeper, reading inane literature and eating passable food interspersed with mindless banters.

It was only days for him and he’d been unconscious for most of that time. But it had been five months for her and she... missed this. Having him near. Her friend, even if it was only for a day.

“Can you manage?” she asked, tugging at the chain.

“I’m fine.”

Neither of them moved to grab the food.

“How long are they going to leave us alone?” the Doctor asked.

“Quite a while, I suppose. She’s prepping the ingredients for the meal and he’s slaughtering the lamb with his children’s help. We can get out of their space later, tour the pasture and meet some of the animals that they breed. You’d like that, wouldn’t you, trying to show off your fluency in Sheep and Goat, or was that Horse that you used to speak?” Missy sneered, “What a waste of a complex Time Lord brain, stooping to the level of speaking to animals.”

“You speak to Korg,” he pointed out.

“That’s completely different! He belongs to a fairly intelligent race.”

“Coming from you, that’s a high compliment. By the way, did you ever –” There were rattling noises coming from the kitchen area, and the Doctor stilled.

“Relax, the humans will be minding their business for quite a while. And besides, I don’t care what they think about us. They’re primitives with no concept of the complexity of Time Lord relationships.”

She unlooped their arms and ran a hand through his hair — she liked what he had this time around — and he stiffened next to her, though he didn’t pull away.

“I don’t even understand the complexity of what’s between us.”

Missy sighed inwardly. No, he didn’t. He would always stop her from doing whatever it was that he didn’t approve, not realizing that they still existed in this universe precisely because they were opposites who balanced each other out. But there would be no argument as long as the sun was still out. They were friends today. Because today she had committed to be his good.

She pulled herself upright and reached for the tea. “Come, let’s try this before it gets cold. I guarantee you’ll never think of tea the same way again...”

“Stay here, both of you. Don’t wander off without Mummy.”

Her two travel mates glared.

“How do you put up with her?” Missy heard Korg bleat and the Doctor’s answering shrug as she walked ahead without them, approaching a tree that looked like another acacia but had been genetically modified using microbial nutrients she had found in the Silurian lab where she found the base ingredients for enhancing the old couple’s pastureland grass.

She’d tried modifying five or six trees, but only this one survived. Some trees didn’t take well to the foreign biological materials she’d grafted into the gene code; others couldn’t adapt to the sped-up growth cycle she’d forced on the trees using Gallifreyan time modification. Weak trees, all of them. A girl couldn’t wait forever for fruit if she was readying to leave the planet at any time.

She climbed the sole successful tree, feeling the shimmer of the perception filter she had erected around it to keep the locals from noticing the strange-looking fruits. She plucked three of the ripest ones, palm-sized bulbs of silver that reminded her of the leaf color of Gallifreyan trees. The fruit’s blue flesh was unique to this tree though. The insides of those Gallifreyan fruits were red like her home world’s grass.

She stopped by a water pump to rinse the fruits — another one of her infrastructure improvements — and looped back to her two idiots from a different direction. They hadn’t noticed her approaching, too focused on their heated discussion. Missy grinned. She walked a few steps off the footpath, found the perfect spot where the air carried the conversation right into her ears, perched herself onto a rock and listened.

“Like I said, she’s not really going to eat you. She doesn’t like the meat of ride animals. Too tough. Trust me. I’ve known her for two thousand years.”

“So I should be happy that she’s going to kill me some other way?”

“No one’s going to kill you. You’re in the history books, alive for at least two more decades.”

The Doctor paused to let Korg digest the spoiler. Bless his hearts, he was always so patient with inferior life forms. Missy would have threatened Korg with imminent slaughter if he had dared raise this subject with her. Which was why she supposed their conversations tended to stick to the weather or the progress of the town’s well digging initiative. Impersonal topics. She realized she didn’t even know whether Korg still had family on Xenon.

Missy returned her focus to the conversation. It had drifted away from Korg’s self-perceived doom and back, predictably, to her.

“– gives orders to everybody like she owns this planet.”

“She’s prone to the theatrical, that’s all.” The Doctor waved a hand. “And it isn’t limited to her current body. You should have seen all the grandstanding she did when she used to sport a perfectly coifed mustache and beard –”

Perfectly coifed? Well, this was new. She had no idea he’d noticed. Missy filed this under both ‘compliments’ and ‘blackmail materials’ in her mind.

“– chase each other around the universe. We knew we’d always see each other again. No one else has the right to kill us permanently.”

“Permanently! Did she – he –”

“Korg, focus on the positive! I get to travel the stars knowing that there’s always another one of my kind roaming around! Can you say the same about another space ass out among the galaxies?”

“Well I do have a couple of relatives still on Xenon,” Korg said.

“Really? That’s great! Are they penguins?”

“They like to take dog forms.”

Relatives on Xenon. Another thing to file away for future use.

“Good, good. When Missy and I are done here, we can take you to your family.”

Korg did his donkey huff. Smart one, even if he was frozen. If Missy had taught him anything, it was to never ever trust a Time Lord, especially not when one was making a promise.

Smart and stubborn, apparently.

“But Doctor, did she? K-Kill you? Temporarily, I mean?”

“It’s complicated,” the Doctor hedged, and Missy rolled her eyes. If Korg wanted to know so badly... yes. Yes, she dropped him from a great height and caused him to regenerate. And the Doctor in turn had left her past regenerations to die on many occasions. Always preferred to keep his hands clean from dealing the final blow, the coward. That she — or he, back then — managed to cheat death didn’t excuse the Doctor’s tacit involvement. On the killing of each other, they were even. No feeling of guilt there whatsoever.

“Look, you can run away if you’re really so afraid of her. Why haven’t you?”

Missy propped her elbows on her knees and rested her chin on her hands. She’d often wondered the same. Was the donkey so naive to believe that she was working on a cure for him?

“She’s my only hope for a cure.”

Smart, stubborn, had relatives on Xenon, and a terrible liar.

The Doctor snorted. “You don’t really believe that.”

“You’re a Time Lord too. Can you cure me?”

“No.” The Doctor looked away. “Er, maybe. Well, not really. Not yet.”

Korg’s ears drooped.

“I’m sorry.”

“No, don’t be. You have nothing to do with it. It was my own fault.” Korg dug his front hoof into the ground. Missy knew this tick of his by now, the physical sign of his agitation. “You don’t think I want to leave? I do! But she’s the most interesting person I’ve met in a long time. And, well, she’s not that bad. I mean, not good, but she’s done good things for this town. She’s smart. She knows about other planets out there. I... god, why am I defending her?”

“You’re not,” the Doctor said softly, more to himself than to Korg. “Missy’s... multifaceted. She can be the universe’s most destructive force and yet the next moment she might become your greatest ally. She’s the cleverest person I have ever known. And yet if you’ve been part of some of her schemes, they were... let’s just say they were needlessly convoluted.

“You see, we Time Lords, we’re never just one person. We’re everyone we’ve been and yet brand new. Missy will always be the boy I knew at the Academy, my best childhood friend. But she’s nothing like that now. I’m nothing like the boy I used to be. But we still orbit around each other because we’re the last two left. We will never be who we are without the other.

“She’ll still try to kill me, I’d be a fool not to be on alert for that. But she will expect me to come back, just like I will always keep an eye out for her among the stars if I ever lose her. We... we just are.”

The Doctor’s voice had gone hushed, as if he was no longer speaking to Korg. Missy rose from her rock and stepped forward, straining her ears to catch each faint syllable that the gentle wind was carrying to her.

Outside of the mausoleum, she had wanted the Doctor’s attention. In the vault, she had craved his approval. And now, even after she had rejected his good, she remained powerless against him. She still wanted to know what he thought about her, still sought his validation.

Curse Rassilon to the lowest level of the Time Lord matrix! She didn’t realize she had fallen so far into the web of their mutual entanglement.

“I think I’m losing her, Korg. And I don’t know why. It’s like pumping up a bucket of water from that well over there and then spilling it onto the ground. No amount of digging up wet soil would get the water back, not in the same form.

“And yet I can’t stop hoping. I can’t stop telling myself that if I wait long enough, if I let the water play through its life cycle, if I simply do nothing, then the water’s going to get absorbed into the sky and come back as rain. And then I’ll have my full bucket of water back without having done a single thing to make it happen.

“Because you know what? Everything else I’ve tried isn’t working. Missy’s a different person from a few decades ago. Trust me, you wouldn’t still be alive if you met an earlier version of her. But she says she’s doing things on her own terms, and I don’t know what part I can play anymore. Maybe all I can do is wait. Do nothing until the time comes again for us to stand together, to exist again as pure drops of water like the best friends we used to be.”

The Doctor sighed, turned his head, and looked right at her.

“Is this the right answer? I hope so. Because it’s all I’ve got.”

A tremor ran through her body. She felt as if she was struck by lightning. The clouds had gathered and the thunder had roared. But when was the rain going to fall, to make them friends again, standing on the same side and made of the same substance?

She didn’t know.

The sun was sinking into the Jordan River. Missy and the Doctor sat shoulder-to-shoulder along the bank, his chain gone along with the charade meant for the humans, their backs to the town that was fast becoming a mass of shadows in the distance. Korg had dropped them off here earlier and had smartly taken leave for the rest of the evening. He had probably maxed out his quota of Being with Time Lords for the rest of the week.

“The Jordan River,” the Doctor mused. “Cross it and the Israelites would reach their Promised Land.”

“Technically, I’m already in the Promised Land,” Missy pointed out. “Those tent people have no concept of finders keepers, like ninety-nine percent of the civilizations across the universe. So what do you suggest, Doctor? Think I should stay around to watch all the slaughters?”

“That’s not funny.”

“But it’s true. It will happen. Korg’s going to be here, the lucky bastard. Look, I have a stake in this game now, my kingdom is going to be threatened in about twenty years.”

“You don’t sound concerned.”

Instead of answering, Missy rested her head on the Doctor’s shoulder. She had no intention of staying here this long.

“Twenty years,” the Doctor said, understanding the promise that could be implied there. “Does this mean you’re not going to unleash the Silurians on the humans?”

“I don’t know yet,” she answered honestly. “I suppose it depends. Will you hunt me down and force me back into the vault?”

“It was never forced,” the Doctor answered too quickly, his words too rushed. Denials like this one were truth tellers, she knew, and knew that the Doctor knew. He was never truly comfortable with jailing her. Rescuing her from death, yes. Convincing himself that he was providing her with a home for her body and mind to heal, oh dear Rassilon did he succeed in believing that one. But even the most elaborate prison was still a prison, and the Doctor was the one who commanded the lock, not the physical one that they both knew she could break free from at any moment, but the one disguised as a promise.

“Missy.”

“Hmm?”

“It’s probably the wrong thing to say, because I’m still not understanding what you want.” His mind was spinning, spinning, spinning. “But you chose to stay, didn’t you? We both did. And it was you who asked me to teach you how to be good. So what was I supposed to do? I tried my best, even if what I think you’re telling me now is that I’ve been doing it all wrong.”

Poor Doctor. He was trying so hard.

“Just say what you really want to say.”

A pause, an end to the rambling of words and in his mind. Missy’s head rose and fell in tandem with the Doctor’s shoulder as he took a deep breath.

“I’m proud of you. You’ve managed this town well and didn’t give into your urge for destruction. You’ve truly changed.”

She supposed she had.

“It is the wrong thing to say,” she said as gently as she could, because she was still being measured according to his standards, still seen as a reformation project. Yet she was all too aware that he was trying. “But thank you.”

“I don’t mean to offend.”

Her idiot Doctor. “I know.”

They stared as the sun sank deeper into the river.

“You’re a wonderful engineer, always have been,” the Doctor said suddenly, as if the beauty of the sunset reminded him of the cold, logical tasks of connecting circuits and welding machine parts. As if the sight before him could be linked to Missy somehow. “You design and build excellent systems, repaired so many TARDISes. And from what I’ve seen today, you’ve single-handedly established a flourishing and very much anachronistic human kingdom.”

After the lamb stew and the fruits, they had visited most of the main connector points of the underground water system that Missy had rerouted. The Doctor was impressed by the way she tapped into — she relished the victory of drawing an eye roll from him with the pun — the Jordan River, incorporating this massive water source into the Silurian delivery system so the supply would never deplete and the water would always reach its end users purified. She hadn’t known that the Silurians’ design was a closed loop when she first fiddled with infrastructure development. By adding a water source that didn’t exist millions of years ago, she had inadvertently closed the loop again and made it better.

“You have a question in there somewhere. Spit it out.”

The Doctor shifted and she raised her head, allowing him to study her face. From this angle, she could see his silver hair almost glowing in the orange sky. The fading light cast his face into a shadow, but even obscured she could make out the pain on his face.

She held his gaze calmly. Waited.

A hand reached out, touched her face. It was meant to deflect the force of the truth.

“You break everything. Everywhere you go, you leave a path of destruction behind you. And you know I can’t just sit on my hands and do nothing, to wait until the universe is no longer at risk. Missy... why?”

Why not? she wanted to ask. Everything fell apart in the end. And since everything had an ending, everything would eventually break.

But today hadn’t ended yet. She cast a glance at the reddened sun. Today she was still his good.

“I don’t go out of my way to keep things from breaking,” she explained. “When history plays itself out with my town, I’m going to let it happen. I see no point in trying to prolong the lives of these humans when they’ll be gone in another breath.”

The Doctor opened his mouth. She shook her head, silencing him.

“I blew up planets and destroyed civilizations, yes. I’ve stopped. That’s all I can promise for now. As for the past, why I did what I did...” She lifted a hand to cover his, relished the warmth on her cheek. “My madness accounts for some of it. It isn’t an excuse, just an observation. And the rest... you know why. You’ve done it too.”

We are not so different.

The power of holding every life form on a planet at her mercy. The thrill of immortality in face of other people’s deaths. The validation of her superiority. The glee of seeing the enemy’s beliefs crumble (her) and the self-righteousness of exposing the wrong of the enemy (him).

In short, the cravings of every Time Lord. She was simply more honest about them.

She knew the Doctor knew all this, had felt no differently when the rush of Time Lord exceptionalism coursed through his veins. He may get his fix from saving people and she from destroying them, but if their core motivation was the same, then could either of them claim the moral high ground over the other?

Today was not the day to argue. The Ancient Near Eastern humans began their days at sundown. The sun was still visible above the horizon.

“I enjoyed today, enjoyed us,” the Doctor said, tightening his grip on her chin, pulling her closer. There was hunger in his eyes, and she wondered if he was seeing her as she was seeing him, through the filter of the setting sun, hiding her faults and projecting a halo of imaginary goodness around her.

“Me too,” she whispered. It was the truth.

But she turned her face away when he leaned in closer.

“No, Doctor. We can’t. I’m sorry.”

He stilled, loosening his hold on her face.

“Right,” he mumbled and backed away.

Missy kept his hand in hers, squeezing it gently as she lowered it onto his knee, willing him to feel the reassurance the gesture was meant to convey. He was confused, perhaps disappointed, and her hearts ached at not being able to explain herself in a way that he would understand. She wasn’t unfeeling. If anything, the Master had always felt a fuller depth of emotions than the Doctor in any of their bodies. And because she experienced her emotions so deeply, she knew she must protect his.

As long as the Doctor was drawn to her based on his standards, what he thought he was feeling wasn’t truly real.

Soon it would be time to wake the Silurians. If she decided to do it. And... well, she was going to do it, wasn’t she? Holes didn’t form out of the ground for no reason.

When she decided to de-hibernate the Silurians, then. When that time came, she knew the Doctor would no longer want to kiss her.

The realization was bitter, and Missy felt her eyes sting with unshed tears: for this — for them — to work, it would always be up to her to change. Her version of good, bringing life-giving water to a town and getting rid of its dictator, was good enough for the Doctor today because they would never stay around to see her refusing to save her subjects from invaders in the future. Because by then, there may not even be any living human left.

She lifted their joined hands and brought them up to her lips, pressing a soft kiss onto his knuckles, not caring about the mixed signals she was sending. She kept eye contact with him while doing so, willing him to believe that she didn’t do this to deceive. Not this.

“À la prochaine,” Missy murmured, choosing to use a different language to distract the Doctor. See you later. She didn’t know when, but soon. It was a promise.

She squeezed his hand one final time.

I’m sorry.

She couldn’t meet his eyes when she knocked him out with her stun gun, choosing instead to focus on his hand, at the spot where her lipstick was smeared over his knuckles. She heard him gasping her name before unconsciousness overtook him.

The sun finally dipped below the horizon. Tomorrow had begun.

Everything around her faded into black.

Chapter Text

Nardole was sipping his tea inside what he had come to think of as his tent among the natives, his very own living area that went from a temporary place to put him up for a few days to his proper home business storefront. Truth be told, life wasn’t half bad as a scribe. He was becoming rather well known for earning his keep by writing contracts and transactional receipts for the locals.

Wherever the Doctor had traipsed off to, he must still be in the region. Otherwise all the scrolls and tablets he had written for the Israelite elites would revert back to his home language and he’d be labeled a fraud in no time. He shuddered. This meant he would have to try his hands in goat-raising, the horror. If they would even let him stay, that is.

Come to think of it, what would his alien-language tablets look like to future generations of humans? Maybe he should convince the Doctor to ask a past version of River to take care of the accidental anachronism after they were done here.

Nardole twisted his mouth in disgust. He was going soft, taking the Doctor’s sudden disappearance in stride as if he condoned it, as if he condoned this whole trip to begin with. Five months. No TARDIS. No note to say he’d be back soon. No news of him from neighboring towns. It was as if he didn’t want to be found doing whatever it was that he was doing. He wondered what else the Doctor was hiding.

Not for the first, or probably the hundredth, time, he congratulated himself for having the foresight to take his fully loaded travel sack along when he was preparing for what he thought would be a quick drop-off of Tzakhi with his family. The humans in this era were nice but woefully lacking in every kind of conveniences he had come to expect as part and parcel of standard-issue quality living. Tables and chairs, for example, and tea from fifty-second century Space China. Pens and papers, tech gadgets of all kinds, spare clothing, cleaning items... and let’s not forget Mr. Pookie, his favorite stuffed toy from about the age of four. Mr. Pookie was off limits to everyone, including Tzakhi.

And right on cue...

Nardole gulped down the last of his tea when the flap of his tent flew open. Tzakhi burst through the entrance, his hair wild and his eyes even wilder. The boy ran a few more steps before coming to a stop, shaky legs barely supporting his small body as he doubled over with his hands on his knees, huffing dry breaths and unable to speak.

“Hello to you too, Tzakhi. Something tells me you’re not here to fight over my tea.”

Tzakhi tried to answer and something went down the wrong pipe. He started coughing and wheezing. Tears collected around his eyes and rolled down his face.

“I was only joking! I’m happy to share my tea anytime. No need to choke yourself over it.” He walked over and clapped Tzakhi on his back a couple of times, then rubbed circles until the last of the coughs made it out of his system. “There, there, calm down. Good.” He tried again: “Now. What’s got you all frantic?”

Tzakhi darted his eyes toward the outside, his eyes growing wide. “He’s back, Nardole! Your friend, the Doctor is back!”

The name sent three emotions rushing up from the pit of his belly up to his head: relief took control first, followed by a burst of joy that vanquished whatever doubt he’d had about the Doctor abandoning him. But then the pettiness kicked in.

“So now he decides to show up?” he grumbled, wanting so much to frown and be angry if only this blasted smile spreading across his face wasn’t getting in the way. If the Doctor was here now, he’d punch him in the arm just like Bill so often did to the both of them. But then, like Bill, he would probably pull that prickly penguin into a hug.

All this warring of emotions took but a blink or two as Nardole quickly stepped outside. Sunny day, no clouds. Occasional sounds of birds circling the desert sky. Quiet.

He popped his head back inside the tent. “Say, I didn’t hear the TARDIS, did you? How come you know he’s returned when I’m the one with superior hearing?”

“No, he didn’t come with his box. The Doctor just showed up. He’s sleeping right outside of the camp.”

The Doctor alone and unconscious...

“We should go. Did anyone notice him?”

“Yes, he’s surrounded by people –”

Nardole didn’t wait for Tzakhi to finish as he exited his tent and started running. So much for not making contact with humans. Who was breaking his own rule now?

He knew how to get to the outer edges of the tent community quickly. Before his presence became broadly accepted as normal and not worth raising an eyebrow over, he had spent many a day outside of the camp, preferring a peaceful secret rendez-vous with Tzakhi to being the focus of sideway glances and hushed whispers. Tzakhi and he were alike in this way: both of them were waiting for their friend to return, knowing that no language in the universe could contain the proper words for them to explain just who and and how important what their friends were to them.

Nardole turned his head around for a quick glance. Tzakhi was keeping pace behind him despite his earlier exhaustion. He didn’t mention Kaeta. Did this mean she wasn’t with the Doctor?

Typical. Take someone along and then leave them behind. Wait until the Doctor started inventing new excuses for this latest round of losing somebody. Maybe he really would go ahead and tune the Doctor out this time by turning off his auditory circuitry in his head.

“Clear out, clear out!” Nardole shouted to the crowd of about twenty that had gathered when he arrived the outside of the camp. There was no mistaking that this was the crowd that Tzakhi was talking about. An unconscious stranger was the only unusual — and by extension, exciting — thing that had happened around here in the past week or ten, so of course these gawkers all came out of hiding to check out the buzz, drawn like flies to hover over a pile of dung, all of them.

Drawn to that impulsive, idiotic dung of a Time Lord who had no business being exposed to so many humans.

Nardole pushed himself through layers of bystanders to get to the front. “No need to panic. Whatever is wrong with him, I can fix it... I think.”

Sprawled on the ground, the Doctor looked pale and his clothes a bit ruffled, but otherwise he didn’t appear injured, at least not outwardly. Nardole approached and knelt down, reached out a hand to touch the spot just below his jaw as his mind focused into caretaker mode. Skin slightly clammy and cool to the touch, double heartbeats faint but steady. Normal for a Time Lord, if a bit less than prime condition, so nothing wrong there. He checked the Doctor’s head for any cracks and bumps. None. The only curiosity was the hair, which didn’t seem to have lengthened during the last five months. It was strange but probably nothing to worry about. He then checked one of the Doctor’s hands. There was something red smeared across a couple of knuckles. Nardole brought the hand closer for a quick sniff, catching a whiff of artificial smell that absolutely did not belong to this time period. He narrowed his eyes. If he didn’t know better, he would have believed the marking to be that of a woman’s kiss. But that was impossible. The human women of this time painted their lips but not with something that was so obviously synthetic. Was this what caused the Doctor to faint, a hallucinogenic lipstick like River’s? Blimey. He must have slept through his Sol 3 history lessons. He had no idea Silurians wore lipsticks to begin with, let alone used their technology to manufacture them chemically.

“Well, what’s wrong with him?” a man — one of Tzakhi’s relatives, an uncle’s cousin if he wasn’t mistaken — asked. “Is he dangerous?”

Now that was a question with many possible answers. Nardole flipped open the Doctor’s eyelids. No response. He was entirely unconscious, though he knew better than to equate that with ‘safe to be around.’ He jabbed the Doctor’s side with a finger, right below the ribs where ticklish humans would react by instinctively curling in and away. No muscle response.

He looked up at the hovering man. “In this state, he can’t even squash a bug if it bites him in the face.”

“You know him?”

Nardole suddenly noticed that everyone around him had gone quiet, all eyes and ears trained on him to catch what he had to say.

He stalled for some seconds. Usually this was when the Doctor would butt in with his gibberish nonsense and distract everyone into forgetting what they were asking about in the first place. Nardole, on the other hand, was never quick on his feet. “Well,” he began, tried not to squeak, “know is a loaded word, don’t you think? I mean, I know enough to know that he’s not going to die on us, but that doesn’t mean I know what’s really wrong with him.”

“He’s light-skinned like you.”

Murmurs in the background. Nardole didn’t know whether the statement was meant to be an observation or an accusation.

“It doesn’t work like that. Do you think every blue person in the universe knows one another?” He paused. Bad example. Too much spoilers and knowledge of things humans shouldn’t yet know. “What I mean is... look, there are thousands upon thousands of you living in these tents. You’re all tan-skinned compared to me. Do you know everyone here? Even the ones living on the far end of the other side of the camp?”

“Hmm, I suppose you have a point,” the uncle’s cousin conceded.

“What do we do with him?” a different voice asked. “We’re from different tribes here. Which tribe’s leader should we consult?”

“Depends on how much meddling you want from the top,” the uncle’s cousin muttered. Only Nardole was close enough to hear him. He’d gained a good understanding of the underlying dynamics between the leaders among the tribes over the past few months. Tzakhi himself belonged to the same tribe as the two main leaders of the Israelites, a priestly cast of some sort. If this uncle’s cousin was part of that tribe, then going to his leaders would quite literally escalate this incident to the top bosses.

Not to mention the tension he knew was brewing within the priestly tribe. Even he as an outsider was beginning to sense unrest rumbling under the surface with each passing day. Tzakhi was too young to understand, but Nardole had seen enough of the universe to know that power struggles never ended well. Really, shouldn’t the humans band together in the event that outside threats like Silurians crept up on them unannounced? Images of what he’d seen on the telly flashed across his mind: twenty-first century broadcasts of humans divided over the vote to exit the European Union and more humans divided over electing an imbecile of a life form who promised to build a wall as president of the United States. He sighed. Never mind.

“If it’s all right with you, I can take him and do my best to nurse him back to full health,” Nardole offered, speaking loudly enough to prevent the crowd from starting a debate about tribal responsibilities. The uncle’s cousin was right. No interference was best. History wouldn’t stand a chance if the higher-ups ended up getting involved with the most careless Time Lord in all of time and space.

“He’s all yours,” yet another voice said, and others quickly echoed in agreement.

“Yeah, thought so,” Nardole said to himself, shifting the Doctor’s body to an easier position for him to scoop him up. For all these people’s rules that encouraged caring for aliens and strangers, the tent people were quite adamant about remaining ceremonially clean, which meant not touching suspicious, pale-skinned strangers. Not that anyone could blame them. If Nardole didn’t have a history with the Doctor, or rather, if he hadn’t promised River to look after him, he wouldn’t want to touch this mess of a grimy body either.

“You owe me a full week of uninterrupted streaming of Game of Thrones,” he said as he picked up the Doctor bridal-style. “It’s a visual story about lots of power-hungry people scheming against other power-hungry people,” he explained to Tzakhi, the only one still sticking around. “Well, then, let’s get back to my tent and see what’s wrong with the Doctor, shall we?”

“Okay,” Tzakhi said, following Nardole, his tone unusually subdued.

There was nothing to say to him, not really. Nardole didn’t know which would be worse: to find out that Kaeta had met some unpleasant fate or that she had rejoined her kind who would soon declare war against the humans. Either way, both he and Tzakhi were kept in the dark. The Doctor had better wake up soon and give a bloody good explanation about every single day of the past five months.

-

When the humans, android, and Time Lord had finally gone, a donkey descended from a small hill and lowered his head so that the bundle of cloth he was carrying around his neck fell to the ground, opening up to reveal a glowing patch of alien technology. The donkey found a spot by the foot of a hill that was hidden by thorn bushes, picked up the glowing patch by his teeth, and hid it in a way that no one but experienced eyes trained to detect teleportation devices would notice. The donkey’s motions were precise but slow, belying his exhaustion from many hours of transporting an unconscious body from a day’s journey away to the tent community. He activated the glowing patch, satisfied that, from now on, he would no longer need to make the same journey again on foot.

Picking up the now-empty cloth bundle with his teeth, the donkey stomped on the newly installed piece of technology and disappeared.

-

Missy had been spending more and more time inside the Silurian command center ever since she laid claim to the Doctor’s TARDIS and started rummaging the rooms she had access to for the final component she needed to turn her run-of-the-mill teleporter into one powerful enough to send her into a different galaxy, hopefully getting her to one with a sufficiently advanced civilization that could offer her the technology for time travel. She was anxious to hop forward at least a couple of millennia.

It would be so easy if she could get inside the heart of the TARDIS and harness the energy source of the Eye of Harmony to create the ultimate teleporter, may even be able to rig a vortex manipulator out of the primitive hardware she had scraped together. But she couldn’t get inside even a full-service lavatory, let alone the very heart of the TARDIS. Korg was useless as her surrogate, what with him having no hands and his alien body’s general bad reaction to time energy.

Her eyes went wide as an idea occurred to her. There was another non-human that she could expose alien phenomena to...

Closing and locking the TARDIS door so Korg wouldn’t bumble in by accident, Missy crossed the console room and proceeded to walk straight into the medical bay.

-

“Hello there, I’m Missy. You must be Kaeta. I’m delighted to finally meet you.”

Kaeta forced her blurry eyes to remain open, reached a hand to rub her two lower ones. The lady with very blue eyes and very red lips seemed to know who she was and wanted to be friends. She even spoke her language. But how could she? She was one of the apes, and apes were enemies.

Not him, she remembered. Not the boy who called himself Tzakhi who was most definitely her friend. Where was Tzakhi now? She tried to sit, to struggle out of soft fabric wrapped around her, to –

“Now, now, don’t overexert yourself. You’ve only just recovered from an illness, from what I gathered based on these printouts of your scan and the antibacterial patch on your arm. Besides –” The lady smiled. She looked pretty but Kaeta could feel her own body chill in response to something about her. She didn’t know exactly what. “Do you want to know a secret?” the lady asked, her voice lowered into a whisper. “You don’t need to hurry. We’re in a time machine.”

A time machine? Father said apes were inferior and would never possess advanced technology. Had they always had a time machine? Was this how they survived the apocalypse without going into hibernation?

“Do you want to see more of this time machine?”

Want to? There was nothing she wanted more! Kaeta nodded as a smile spread across her face.

“Good! Well, come on then. Get on your feet, up! No time to waste to see the sight of your life.” The lady called Missy was stern, but she held out a hand so Kaeta could wiggle out of the covers and stand up.

“How did you find me?” she asked. The last thing she remembered, she was talking with Tzakhi and started feeling dizzy. The sun was too hot. She felt her scales burning up.

The lady smiled. “Oh, I have my ways. But I think the real question is what happened with you. Why weren’t you properly sealed in your cryo tank and why did you wake up early?”

“I – I woke up early?” What about the ruling elders? What about her family? She thought she was late, opening her eyes and thinking that the others had left her behind...

“That may have been partially my fault,” the lady said to herself, looking thoughtful. She then turned to Kaeta. “You weren’t in a cryo tank, were you? You were in the command center when mass hibernation was activated, and you were preserved in time because your leaders had imposed some sort of time suspension over that room.”

“I –” She didn’t know what the lady was talking about. All she knew was she wanted to know what the leaders were doing, what the adults were trying to keep from her and so she snuck into the elders’ room, the one full of machines. She was going to follow the tunnels back into her family unit, she really was. She only wanted to wait a bit longer just to make sure the room was truly empty and she wouldn’t be seen. Then the next thing she knew, she woke up and there was a hole leading to the aboveground, where Tzakhi lived.

“Where’s Tzakhi?”

“Who?”

“Tzakhi, my friend. He’s an ape like you.”

The lady shoved her face right into hers. Her blue eyes had gone dangerous. “Don’t you ever compare me to humans or I’ll turn you into one.” She was angry, and Kaeta was scared but she couldn’t step back because the lady was still gripping her arm. She was forced to look straight at the lady. Was she, was she going to –

“Are we very, very clear?”

Kaeta gulped, dipped her head. “Y-Yes.”

“Good.” The lady broke into a smile. How could she be happy again so quickly? She was strange. And terrifying. Kaeta felt again the chill over her skin when the lady looked her up and down, making a tutting voice. “Bit skinny. But you’ll do.”

The lady tugged her arm and started walking — no, skipping — toward the door. “Follow closely, dear. Wouldn’t want you to get lost and get eaten by the corridors.”

Kaeta stumbled after her. What had she gotten herself into? She shouldn’t have wandered off on her own. Shouldn’t have snuck up on the elders. If she had stayed with her home unit, she’d still be hibernating and not be in a hungry time machine.

But then she wouldn’t have met Tzakhi, and — dare she say? — the elders were wrong. Apes weren’t hostile creatures. Tzakhi was nice and he told her about his family, how they loved him and how they took care of each other. Just like her own family. And he liked blue because it was the color of the sky! How could they be evil when even this strange lady who was a bit scary didn’t hurt her, but said she brought her here and made her feel better?

The lady was singing some tune that Kaeta didn’t recognize. She let go of their joined arms to twirl around, the bottom part of her clothing flaring out and her footwear clicking. This was a very inefficient outfit, one that the elders wouldn’t allow, but she didn’t seem bothered by it. She moved so prettily, Kaeta could almost believe that she really wasn’t an ape. This lady who called herself Missy, what was she?

The dancing and skipping took them down corridor after corridor — long, narrow paths that looked like the tunnels underground but these were so much more complicated, intersecting with one another in straight lines and (how was it possible?) in circles — until they arrived at a door. Or at least that was what she thought it was. It felt much more than a door. Like a... barrier. A thick and heavy shield for protecting them from what was inside. Kaeta glanced at the lady. Why did she bring them here?

“The Eye of Harmony,” she breathed reverently, looking through a window on the door and into the other side. “A copy of the real Eye, but no less powerful.” Then the lady suddenly whipped around, planted her hands on her hips and looked very cross. She lifted her head and started shouting into the air. “So you think you can thwart me from finding my way here, you stupid old cow? Don’t you ever dare forget that I know you. I know every one of your diversion and tricks and I broke them all when my previous regeneration made you into a paradox machine. Your resistance is nothing.”

The time machine seemed to vibrate around them. Kaeta didn’t think machines had emotions, but she felt as if the time machine was getting angry at them. Was what the lady said true? Was the time machine going to eat them?

The lady stopped being angry all of a sudden and smiled at her. “This is it, dearie. You want to know how time travel works? Harness the power of an exploding star and voilà, all of time and space at your disposal.”

The lady looked through the window of the door with longing in her eyes, sighed. “But I can’t go in there. Only you can.”

“M-Me?”

The lady said this was an exploding star. Why would she want to go inside?

“Yes. You wanted to see the time machine, didn’t you?”

“But –”

“Go in!” A hand grabbed the back of her neck, gathered the fabric of her collar, choking her. Kaeta tried to scream, to kick the lady away. But it only made her lose her footing as she was shoved right in front of the door.

The lady used her other hand to slap something onto her wrist.

“I wouldn’t touch that if I were you. One mistake and you might find yourself spliced into a million itty bitty pieces across forty-two different dimensions.”

She was having trouble breathing, couldn’t gasp in enough air. Was she going to die? She shouldn’t have wandered off. Should have listened to her parents. Tears rolled down all three of her eyes. I’m sorry, Mother, so sorry. I’m going to die.

“Open. The. Door.”

Kaeta was crying now, sobs choked into coughs and her hands flailing. I don’t want to die. Don’t want to die –

The hand behind her neck tightened and she couldn’t breathe anymore. Don’twanttodiedon’twanttodie pleasepleaseplease don’twanttodie –

“Open! The! Door!”

Pain and dizziness. Panic. Need air. No air. Oh god she was dying. The lady was going to kill her right here. Couldn’t breathe. Need. Need...

She drew on all her strength and brought a hand to the scanning pad of the door. A dot of light came on. Green. Access granted.

Kaeta was thrown into the room with the exploding star. She stumbled in, coughing and wheezing, gulping in air, finally able to breathe. It took her a moment to compose herself, to blink away the tears. The more she returned to herself, the more her scaly skin prickled with the sense that she had entered a realm not meant for Silurians. Kaeta straightened her body and walked further down the footpath she was on.

Then she looked up.

She was surrounded by a brilliant, orange light. Burning fire was all around her. She didn’t feel hot, wasn’t blinded by the light. It didn’t make sense. She shouldn’t be here. Shouldn’t still be alive. This was an exploding star, brilliant and dangerous and — she stared straight into this Eye of Harmony — a ball of angry flames and it was nothing like what she’d seen before. Nothing so destructive yet so full of possibilities.

Nothing so beautiful.

Kaeta stared, all three eyes wide and mouth open, a sense of wonder washing over her. This was nothing like the technology that the elders liked to boast about. This was the key to time travel. Even though she didn’t understand how, she knew it was the explosion of this star that made it possible.

The device that the lady had put on her wrist beeped, signaling the completion of something. This she could understand. This technology was closer to what the leaders of her colony used. It was empty of fuel before and now it was full.

Kaeta continued to stare. She wanted to burn the sight into her memory so she could always remember this moment, remember seeing into the heart of the universe. She was feeling hotter, now, but she didn’t want to leave. Going back outside would mean returning to normal. She didn’t like normal before the hibernation and she didn’t like normal now. Being normal would mean never seeing the technology of the elders that was kept away from most Silurians. Being normal would mean never meeting Tzakhi.

It was becoming unbearably hot in the room. She was feeling every one of the star’s rays. The lady was right. The time machine was hungry. Any moment now, the star was going to devour her...

The same hand returned to the back of her neck and dragged her body out of the room and back into the corridor.

“Much as I would enjoy the sight of the Eye of Harmony consuming your wee little life, I did promise a certain someone that I would keep my body count to a minimum.”

The lady was staring at the star herself, staring through the open door with flames dancing in her eyes. She looked as if she was remembering something from the past. Kaeta wondered if she too had gotten too close to the Eye of Harmony or had stayed in the room too long like she did. But the energy from the star didn’t seem to be harming her. The lady took a deep breath, her eyes falling close. She looked relaxed.

After a minute or so, the lady reopened her eyes and turned toward her. “All right, poppet. Hand it over.”

Kaeta didn’t need to ask what. She unstrapped the device around her wrist and deposited it onto the lady’s open palm.

“Thank you. Now close the door.”

She touched the scanning pad again, and the door slid close.

The lady looked her up and down like she did before. “Congratulations. You’re a time traveler now.”

Was she?

“I – I feel tired.”

Those blue eyes roamed all over her some more, then paused, considered.

“Right. Of course you are. Come along then. Follow me. I’ll take you back to the med bay.”

Kaeta made no protest as she followed.

Chapter Text

The Doctor let his eyes slowly drift open. First thing that registered was light. It was daytime. Different from what he last remembered, when it was night. That felt like ages ago.

He waited for his vision to become less blurry. From what he could gather, he was still surrounded by primitive decorations. Still very far away from the twenty-first century. He let his eyes fall shut again, suddenly feeling the weight of reality settling on him like a dull blanket, forcing him to accept the solidifying of time into fact and history with each passing second. So it was real, everything that happened in the past week or so from his perspective. He was TARDIS-less and not any closer to preventing the Silurians from waking up, or rather, not any closer to preventing Missy from de-hibernating the reptiles.

Missy.

Now that was a reality that he didn’t want to deal with.

He had wanted to kiss her. A proper kiss. Not the pretend-robot kiss they had shared in the mausoleum. Not even the thank-you kiss he had given her later that day, for helping him realize that he was an idiot. Well, who was the idiot now? You let her parade you around her town on a leash and show you some civil engineering projects, and that was all it took to short-circuit your brain and let your hearts take over?

The uncomfortable truth was, there was something in his hearts that would take over reason whenever Missy was involved. He’d done exactly that on the planet of the executioners, sparing her life based on a friendship that was no longer what it used to be. And the past seventy years, every moment when he’d told himself that Missy was getting better... he was a fool. Did he really think that Missy wouldn’t wake up the Silurians and try to control them as she once did with the Sea Devils many regenerations ago? Things went wrong that time, as they always did, and he ended up saving the Master from being destroyed by his own plotting.

The thing was, saving the Master had always been instinctive. He’d never questioned it. He just did. One life in exchange of billions lost and billions more to be annihilated. Easy choice. Jump in, don’t think. Save the Master.

But this time he’d gone one step too far.

He would never kill any incarnation of the Master permanently, that much he knew would always be true. But to kiss her, Doctor? He forced a swallow down his parched throat. ‘We are the only ones left’ was an excuse so pathetic that a mole hill would do a better job at holding up against a tsunami than these empty words.

If a kiss meant acceptance of who Missy was, then he had betrayed his very self with that one aborted folly.

There was good in her, he told himself. The green shoot he saw inside Missy’s mind was undeniably real, and it was only a matter of time before it would grow into a giant tree. He was a Time Lord, a controller of time who could defy linearity at a whim. All of reality was one. He had accepted, was now accepting, will accept that spark of goodness as if it was already fully grown. Work in progress or not, Missy was fully accepted.

Oh? Even if she decides to wake the Silurians?

No! He would never!

But you did, Doctor. You would have kissed her if she hadn’t stopped you.

He would.

He was a fool for holding onto hope, for not resisting harder. Missy’s tears were tempting him into believing the possibility of her redemption. And he was drawn to her — to the idea of her, this made-up future of what she could become — seeing the tree in his mind’s eye when there was only a frail, new shoot of today.

But it was real, this beginning of goodness. It had to be. Must be.

Otherwise, he would have accepted evil, and he’d have forfeited all rights to have the moral high ground.

He tore his mind away from all lingering thoughts of the almost-kiss, of feeling the softness of Missy’s cheek in his hand. Yes, he’d wanted to kiss her in the moment. But he couldn’t possibly want it any longer.

His inner voice jeered. Truth and lies and excuses coexisting all at once in past, present, future. Contradictions. These were what they were.

Who he was.

Slowly, the Doctor opened his eyes again.

He wasn’t being immediately fussed over, which meant no other being with a decent level of mental acuity was present to detect his sudden wakefulness, which meant not even Korg was in the room. Was he in a room? He stared at the patch of ceiling that his eyes could see and found himself looking at some heavy, fabric-like material. The color was dark brown — textured, if his still-blurry vision wasn’t mistaken. Just beneath the ceiling was an energy field of some sort set to capture sunlight during the day, judging by the wavering edges of the field that signaled it was drawing upon an energy source, recharging. Invisible except to those who knew what an energy field was.

The Doctor felt the spinning and swirling and racing of thoughts in his head as he tried to make sense of what his eyes were telling him. Sunlight. This meant he was no longer underground. Fabric, not stones, so he was no longer in Missy’s palace. But even the old couple who cooked him lamb stew didn’t live inside flaps of fabric. Flappy materials were flimsy, weak and temporary. Rubbish for security. But excellent for travels, though. Which meant...

He was inside a Hebrew tent made with goat-hair fabric. Specifically, he was inside one with a reconfigured ceiling to display magnified images of the cosmos at night.

This was Nardole’s tent. Someone had transported him back to where the TARDIS had first landed and Nardole had found him. Over the past five months, Nardole had settled among the Israelites and acquired his own place among the community.

The realization hit him like a metal hand punched right into his stomach, forcing all air out of his lungs. History was solidifying ahead of him and he was utterly powerless to chase after it.

No no no no no no no no...

Missy was going to do it.

Regardless of what she had said, Missy was going to de-hibernate the Silurians. He knew it not because he doubted her I don’t know at the bank of the Jordan River — he believed her even now that she hadn’t made up her mind yet, not when she spoke those words. But she did decide shortly after.

He knew because he was sent back here, and here was where both of them knew the earth would open up and swallow the Israelites in a few days’ time, because it said so in historical records. His being sent back here was the clearest challenge from Missy for him to try to stop her, to either change history or give up and grab a front-row seat when the day came to watch his beloved humans die.

What should he do to stop this — what could he do?

“I know you’re awake,” came the biting voice from somewhere to his right. Grumpy and not amused. “Complete lack of acknowledgement and gratitude. Why am I even surprised? Oh, guess what? I’m not.”

The Doctor groaned and forced his limbs to move. All he managed was coaxing little movements from his arms and legs, enough for him to realize he was lying on a mat that was also made with woven animal hair. “How long have I been out?” he asked, gave up trying to move.

“As in since scooping up your sorry arse from outside the camp and taking you in? A few hours. Can’t speak to all the other hours you’ve been away in the past five months.”

He recoiled at the thought of needing to explain his disappearance. He hadn’t decided yet which version of the truth to tell. “Thank you, Nardole.”

It was only right that his attempt at a peace offering went unacknowledged.

“You lost the girl, didn’t you? Tzakhi was very disappointed when his friend didn’t return with you.”

Now that was an entirely unnecessary twist of the knife.

“I’ll explain later. Promise.”

Nardole sniffed, having been thoroughly rendered immune to his empty promises over the decades. At least the boy who cried wolf in that story knew that having wolves show up was a possibility. Whereas for him... the Doctor lies. Everybody knew that.

“Well, can you sit up or not?”

“I er...” He tried rolling onto his side, but his arm was in the way. “No.”

“Utterly useless.”

Robotic arms reached out and pulled him up by the torso. Once upright, the Doctor shifted to a sitting position, suddenly finding it possible to sit on the ground cross-legged.

“Thank you.”

“All the thank-yous in the world aren’t going to get you back on the good list.”

“Understood,” he whispered, then added, slightly louder: “I mean it, Nardole. Thank you. For everything.”

“You’re still regaining strength. Save your breaths.”

The Doctor allowed himself the barest of smiles. This was as much of an acknowledgement that Nardole was concerned as he was going to get for now.

His eccentric associate hadn’t assimilated completely into Hebrew culture, the Doctor noted, taking in the site of an android in a lime green outfit that looked more like a bathrobe than something that one would wear among outside company. His tent was cozy, not large but not too small either, period-appropriate aside from the altered ceiling. To one of the sides was a work station of some sort, with a fold-out table and two folding chairs that Nardole must have taken out of his bigger-on-the-inside travel sack. Said travel sack was hanging off a side flap of the tent somehow. If Nardole could install an energy field across the top of his tent, then getting a bag to stick to a flab of fabric was entirely possible.

His eyes drifted to the assortment of tea on top of the table, treasures that a non-human who didn’t technically need food shouldn’t be hoarding and brewing multiple pots of it everyday as if his life depended on it. The Doctor became aware of an aftertaste of something both floral and bitter at the back of this throat. Nardole had hydrated him with tea while he was unconscious. The thought warmed his hearts. So the android did care.

He watched as Nardole pulled out a second mat from one of his piles of stuff, unrolled it, and set it directly across from him. He then went back to the table to fuss about with a burner that had no right to be in this era as he prepared kettle and tea, brewed another pot of that floral and bitter stuff and set it on the second mat when he was finished. Only one cup. The Doctor suppressed a smile. Given what he had gone through, Nardole had every right to be petty.

Nardole sat down on his mat, picked up the teacup, and took a long sip.

“Nice tent.”

Nardole drained his cup without sparing him a glance.

The Doctor rubbed a hand over his face and pinched the bridge of his nose with two fingers. This one was going to be tricky to explain.

When he looked across the tent again, the teacup had been set down.

“The last five months, Doctor. What happened. All of it. No lies.”

Seconds stretched into minutes. Nardole returned to tea-drinking until he finished the entire pot. At some point, the energy shield above them beeped, indicating that it was fully charged. All required sun beams captured. Which meant midday had passed and it was now late afternoon.

The Doctor kept his eyes trained on the teapot that now sat empty in front of Nardole. It was easier to make his confessions to an item that couldn’t pass judgment on him. Omega knew he had already went through the events of the past few days and declared himself at fault for everything.

He inhaled deeply, then breathed out. Well, here it goes.

“I made a mistake with the TARDIS,” he began. If he started at the beginning, maybe he would know what to say when he got to the present. “I landed in the Silurian underground chambers four days ago, from my perspective. But I had in fact jumped forward five months by accident.”

He glanced at Nardole. The android had his arms crossed in front of his chest, his expression stony. They both knew this wasn’t even close to the heart of what needed to be said.

“I used Kaeta to access the Silurians’ central command system. It worked. I was able to scan the entire underground colony. There are thousands of cryogenic pods organized in sections. The leaders, soldiers and engineers by their ranks and the rest by family units. It extends from beneath the tent community here all the way past the other side of the desert, into the settlements by the Jordan River.” Where Missy currently reigns, he didn’t say. “Kaeta is an anomaly. There is no mass de-hibernation.”

“Yet.”

“We don’t know that.”

“But you’ve said it. History books. Holes in the ground. Silurians’ doing.”

“Time can be rewritten,” the Doctor said automatically, words he’d used on countless companions but none as hard to convince as Nardole.

Nervous seconds ticked by as he waited for Nardole to digest what he had heard. Time could indeed be rewritten, and was being rewritten now as Missy’s presence in this era all but changed if to when in terms of mass Silurian de-hibernation.

“That still doesn’t explain Kaeta waking up.” Those arms were still crossed, screaming How? and accusing the Doctor of hiding vital information pertinent to the survival of the humans.

He was guilty as charged. But knowing his sins didn’t mean he was going to reveal the secret he was clutching close to his hearts.

The Doctor shook his head and said simply: “No, it doesn’t.”

Nardole countered that with a sound of displeasure but otherwise said nothing. The Doctor knew this tactic. Nardole was trying to wait him out. He knew this look too, the way Nardole’s jaw seemed to have emerged from that round face of his and was now set against him in determination. And that glint in his eyes, fierce because he had nothing to hide, disapproving and baleful, landing heavily on the Doctor’s conscience because yes, everything Nardole was accusing him of was true and as stupid as it was, the Doctor was still choosing to hide and would continue to hide the truth from him.

“Look, Nardole, there really isn’t time for this –”

“A Silurian woke up.”

“That’s because, ah, you see, there is this hill that the Silurians keep hidden with a perception filter, the very spot where your readings found an energy spike. The hill is directly above the Silurians. Energy spikes up, Kaeta’s zapped awake. Simple as that. Trust me, she’s an isolated case –”

“You still aren’t telling me everything.”

“Am I? Well, if I’m going to tell you, then it’s no longer something I’m not telling you, would it? Don’t you think it’s better to leave something for the ‘not telling you’ category? The stockpile’s wearing thin, if I may say so –”

“Cut it with this bullshit!”

Reflex caused the Doctor to flicker his eyes upward, startled, and lock gaze with Nardole. Who knew the android had it in him to call him out, properly, on things other than being late for lectures?

Nardole looked less amused than a cat being pulled by its tail. “People are going to die and you’re telling jokes? Earth as we know it is going to get invaded and all you care about are secrets! I don’t believe it!” He spat, “What did River ever see in you?”

Now that crossed the line...

“Take that back.”

“Why? Because it’s true? Because for all her gushing about your virtue you’re nothing but a liar with a superiority complex who thinks everyone is stupider than you? Even if you question my brain I still have eyes. I know evasive when I see it and I know this look of yours that says you’re trying to spin up some story to dig yourself out of a hole.

“Don’t you dare try to cut me off, close your mouth for once! You tricked me into taking Tzakhi home then disappeared for five months. Makes no difference if you time traveled by mistake. The issue is you tricked me!

“And don’t deny that everything doesn’t have to do with you. We showed up here and within days a Silurian wakes up. A rebellion is brewing in these tents and according to your calendar, any day now the dissenters are going to get eaten up by the ground, by the Silurians. Are you suggesting there’s no connection between what’s going to happen and our presence here? Or, excuse me, your presence here? Because I know I didn’t cause any trouble.”

Nardole’s face was bright red, something that the Doctor didn’t think was possible to this extent after reconnecting his head with android parts. Nardole had worked himself into a frenzy of huffing and puffing. He waited some seconds until he was sure no more word would come.

“Are you quite done now?” he began, keeping his voice low. It was the only way to check his own rising anger. “Because no one, no one, cares more about the fate of humans than I do. Why did you think I went into the Silurian command center? For a field day in the sun? I’m not a space tourist. I’m not even in space! No! I went because I needed to know why a Silurian girl came out of hibernation and crawled her way out of the ground. I needed to know whether some process had started so I could stop it.

“And you! A right help you’ve been. You’ve gone native. Five months and what have you got to show? Oooh, a tent with altered ceiling! That will stop the humans from being attacked. If you’re going to be stranded among humans then at least make yourself useful. In all this time, have you never thought to borrow somebody’s horse to check out that spot with the energy spike? Or a sheep? Because even riding on a sheep would have gotten you there weeks ago. And no, you! Stop moving! I’m talking to you, don’t turn your back on me –”

Nardole took down his travel sack and plunged his arm inside to take out something heavy. He then flung the sack aside and stormed up to the Doctor and slammed a stack of papers so hard down on the mat that the thud sent dust flying all around them. The Doctor looked from the papers to Nardole.

“Detailed readings and notes from my visit to that invisible mound four months ago. Oh, and since you’re never going to ask, it was by mule.”

The Doctor glanced at the top sheet. It was the first page of a full analysis of a grassy, pre-meteorite Earth environment. Everything from the temperature reading to the energy reading of an unusual atmospheric composition was exactly as what Korg had described to him. He glanced at the transdimensional sack that was now on the ground. Nardole must have made use of his fifty-second century all-in-one CASP machine (the only computer-analyzer-scanner-printer you will ever need, that annoying tagline from the advertisements rang in his ears) that he’d stuffed in there.

Nardole’s voice, irritated and unamused, bore down on him from above his head. “There is a hole on the top of this hill, big enough for Kaeta to climb through. It isn’t a natural phenomenon.” A pause, an invitation for the Doctor to tell the truth. He let the opportunity pass. “Now my question is, if this hole isn’t natural, then who made it?”

The Doctor focused his gaze on a spot next to the stack of papers, remaining stubbornly silent.

“Not humans, because they can’t see this hill. And not Silurians because only one woke up and Kaeta was unarmed.” A thick finger came into his field of vision, poking at the bottom of the page. The Doctor read the words there. Blast analysis. Involvement of advanced technology confirmed. “I know it’s not me. So this leaves only one other person who happens to have alien technology at his disposal.”

Nardole was accusing him of disturbing the Silurians. He couldn’t fault him for the logic, but as usual, the android took what was before his eyes and proceeded to arrive at the wrong conclusion.

“What? Nothing to say? Well, good. Then maybe you shouldn’t be all on your high horse about caring for humans and protecting them when you’re the one putting them in danger –”

He shot up then, fueled by a strength that he didn’t realize he had regained, propped up by a fury that had come upon him so suddenly that, even with his eyes open, he was seeing stars.

“You have no idea what you’re talking about!”

“Oh really?” Nardole sneered. “Then how do you explain the hole? You didn’t get to the other pages. It says later in the report that the blast was recent. It’s you all right, by process of elimination.”

The Doctor threw up his hands. “Why is it always process, process, process with you? Focus! Yes, there’s a hole on that hill that may or may not have been made by me. Did you see anything climbing out of it when you were there? No? Then stop obsessing over it. Think. How else are Silurians going to invade, if they are going to invade? Certainly not showing themselves miles and miles away! That hole is useless. Too far. Strategically rubbish. If you’re going to surprise humans, wouldn’t you do it somewhere with a whole lot of them conveniently gathered in one place, catch them unawares, capture their leaders if at all possible? Oh, I don’t now, how about right in the middle of this community here?”

“You think I don’t know that?” Nardole shouted. “Why do you think I came back here? I’ll have you know that I’m not some damsel in distress waiting for the Doctor to come rescue me. I came back for Tzakhi and his people. To keep an eye out for them and to protect them!”

“You’re being a defeatist,” the Doctor countered. “You’re assuming that the Silurians will de-hibernate and attack. Our goal should be to change history, to make sure they don’t wake up at all.”

“Then do it!” Nardole was practically roaring now, all caution cast to the wind. He may as well be saying I care for these humans more than you to him, and perhaps he was right, perhaps the duty of care that evolved out of five months of interacting with humans ran deeper than the Doctor’s own philosophical sense of obligation to protect them.

He raised a hand to rub at his temple, forcing logic back into his mind. The real issue was that the Silurians were going to wake up. Unless he could stop a very volatile and amoral Time Lady from unleashing Silurians as part of her escape plan. And he needed Nardole’s help with that. To stand by his side regardless of how things were going to go with Missy. To keep the humans alive, to contain the damage.

He took a deep breath. “I’ve gotten carried away, I’m sorry.” He forced his lips upward, hoping he was successful in sending an expression that resembled apologetic. Nardole’s mouth fell open. “Nardole, I need to tell you something.”

He breathed in. Then out. Breathed in again.

And found he couldn’t look Nardole in the eye.

“Doctor...” the voice was wary. He’d caught on to the seriousness that had settled around them.

“Nardole, I’m sorry. Thing is, well. There’s a ninety-nine percent chance that the Silurians are going to wake up. Ninety-nine point five, even.”

“Oh?” He could practically hear Nardole’s scrunched nose and narrowed eyes. “And why is that?”

“Or it might not mean anything at all!” he retracted, looked Nardole in the eyes again with every intention to deceive. It was always easier for him to run away, wasn’t it? “I mean, point five percent chance is a lot, wouldn’t you say? It’s certainly more hopeful than a lot of other situations! Odds are pretty good, I’d say. Perhaps. Maybe.”

Nardole gave him The Look, the one that greeted him on the executioner’s planet, the one that made him know without a doubt that he’d missed the mark.

You’re changing the subject, Sweetie, the River in his head admonished. Right as always. And gentle, nudging him to do the courageous thing, for the sake of the humans.

“I mean, well, ah...” Right, Doctor, let’s try again, shall we?

He rushed to get the words out: “You see, it wasn’t me who blasted that hole on the mound.” He paused. The silence was downright suffocating. Last chance to turn back.

He looked away. No. He refused to be a coward.

“Missy did.”

“You – wait, did you say –”

He sighed, bracing himself. “It’s Missy. She’s here.”

“WHAT?”

Nardole was up against his face in an instant. The Doctor tried to lean back from flaring nostrils and seething mouth, only to have his collar grabbed by an unyielding hand.

“Look, I’m sorry –”

“YOU BROUGHT MISSY HERE?!?”

“I didn’t –” I didn’t know. I didn’t think. I didn’t respect promises. “I didn’t tell you because I have reasons. Yes, reasons! I said I’d explain. I’m explaining now. I just need you to calm down and lis –”

Crack!

His eyes shut instinctively and his vision was filled with flashing white dots. He heard the sound first, a loud slap of flesh against flesh, then the pain followed. Within seconds, the left side of his face was stinging and throbbing. He’d forgotten how strong Nardole could be, those arms and hands that weren’t human.

It took several seconds before he could open his eyes. Nardole was still fuming, with not a single emotion besides anger to be found on that face. His right hand was still raised, perfectly poised to backhand him at any moment.

He looked from the hand back to Nardole, then dropped his gaze, surrendering. “Go ahead. I deserve it.”

The hand moved, but instead of inflicting more pain it joined the other hand at his collar as both pushed down, forcing the Doctor onto the ground as he stared up into a face more terrifying than a yeti’s just inches above him.

“If even one person — anyone — dies, it’s all on you.”

Every syllable drummed judgment into his ears, slapped him harder than any physical hand could. At least one person had already died at Missy’s hands. And she would soon place countless humans at the mercy of aggressive Silurians. This, all of this, was entirely his doing.

They stared at each other for minutes, Nardole glaring and the Doctor too pinned to dart his gaze elsewhere. His breaths were fogging up the bottom edges of Nardole’s glasses, quick inhales and exhales that matched his racing hearts but not fast enough to chase his runaway thoughts. He hadn’t planned on letting Missy loose, hadn’t planned on missing five months. Heck, he hadn’t planned on any of this.

He needed to get back to Missy, to do whatever damage control he could. Now that Nardole knew, there was no need for secrets. He would go back to the Silurian control room — there must be a means to teleport from here if he was brought back from Missy’s town before the effect of the stun gun wore off — and retrieve his TARDIS. He would reason with Missy, beg if he had to, give her whatever she wanted to get her to agree to leave the Silurians hibernating.

Another few minutes, and a hint of the old Nardole was returning to that face. The Doctor decided to take a chance. “I know where Missy is. I can find her. Stop her schemes. Prevent mass destruction to the human race. Let go of me... please.”

There was the barest of a nod, then the hands released him. Those same hands returned to help him stand. “I’m going with you.”

After this, he had no right to shut Nardole out. And yet... “Are you sure? I’m probably going to walk right into one of her traps.”

“Then you’ll need my help all the more.”

The Doctor turned around then, facing his assistant. No. Friend. Nardole was a friend that he didn’t deserve. “Very well. Let me tell you what I found in the underground –”

He stopped when he landed his eyes toward the entrance of the tent, saw a human standing there. They weren’t alone.

“I heard you fighting,” Tzakhi said, talking more to Nardole than to the Doctor. He was subdued, wary, as if saying the wrong words would unleash anger upon him. “You were loud. I heard you outside.”

Right, tents. Flaps of hair and fabric, useless for blocking out sound. He looked at Nardole, raised an eyebrow. Your friend, your responsibility. Nardole glared.

Tzakhi took a step toward Nardole, then stopped. His lower lip quivered for several seconds. “Are – Are you leaving, Nardole?”

Humans. What was this trick that they had, this innate skill to inflate their eyes and make them look all watery?

“I, er, Tzakhi... no! Of course I’m not leaving! I was just, er, sending the Doctor away. He needs to go see an old friend.”

“But you’re going too! I heard you.” Tzakhi looked at Nardole with pleading eyes. “Can I go also?”

“No,” Time Lord and android both said together.

“Why not? You always said I should get out of here if I can, and now I can!”

The Doctor mouthed What’s going on? at Nardole. “Rebellion,” Nardole hissed out of the side of his mouth, “power struggle among Tzakhi’s tribe.”

Ah yes, the brewing rebellion of Numbers 16. It had been five and a half months since the TARDIS brought them here, which meant the dissenters were going to challenge their leaders any time now. So it appeared that Tzakhi was part of the rebellion by association of blood.

The Doctor walked up to the boy, leaving enough distance to not frighten him. He lowered his body so they were the same height. “Tzakhi, listen to me. If your older relatives decide to do anything stupid, don’t follow them. Just run here and hide inside this tent, yeah? I’ll reinforce it with an external shield so no fire from heaven or alien bacteria will get to you.

“But where we’re going, it’s dangerous. You see, I seem to have lost my box and I need to go get it back. It’s not a mission for boys. You stay here.”

“I can’t! Nardole, it’s happening! Uncle Korah says if Moses and Aaron don’t want to ne - negotate –”

“Negotiate.”

“Negotiate. Uncle Korah says if there’s no negotiate, then he’s going to round up the opposition.”

The Doctor glanced up at Nardole. “Time?”

Nardole shrugged. “Days. If negotiation fails, then no more than two or three.”

Time was running out. The Doctor unbent his knees, straightened back to full height. “I need to go to Missy now. You stay here with Tzakhi, no listen –” He took out his sonic glasses, stuffed them into Nardole’s hand. “I need you to find out locations. This cousin Korah’s tent. Other dissenters’ tents. Do a geo-scan of the ground of each area with the sonic. Map out any stress points and determine the weakest spots. That’s where the Silurians will target their invasion. Contain those areas. Set up energy shields around them like what you did here on the ceiling, but make them stronger, enough to withstand Silurian attacks.

“I’ll do everything I can on my end to keep Missy from de-hibernating the Silurians. If I fail, if I don’t come back when the rebellion breaks out, then the ground is going to open up in three places. Your energy shields should be able to prevent the Silurians from breaking through and harming the humans. Then get to safety, you and Tzakhi. Come here and wait for the TARDIS. She will come for you both, whether it’s me piloting or Missy.”

Nardole gasped. “You’re letting her pilot the TARDIS?”

“Only if emergency protocol is triggered. She doesn’t know that yet.”

Nardole made a high-pitched sound, protested. “I rather think she wants me dead!”

“Leave persuading Missy to me. I’ll start with stopping the de-hibernation.”

Nardole didn’t look convinced. “If you say so.”

The Doctor turned to the boy. “No time to waste. Tzakhi, go. Nardole isn’t leaving, be happy. Pay attention to what the adults are saying and tell Nardole everything that sounds important.” He turned to Nardole. “Thank you for always protecting the humans, for everything,” he said in a low voice, meaning every word. “I’m sorry, I really am. I got us into this mess and I’m going to fix it. I –”

“I’m not done kicking your arse,” Nardole interjected.

The Doctor raised a hand to his face. Still warm to the touch, doubtless swollen. The mark of his idiocy. “No, of course not.”

“I will fulfill my promise to River.”

He opened his mouth, was about to argue –

“So make sure you come back, you insufferable, pompous, reckless idiot.”

Oh. He clicked his mouth shut, gratefulness washing over him. He gave Nardole a solemn nod. Thank you.

Taking the sonic screwdriver that he kept in the inner pocket of his coat as an alternative to his glasses, the Doctor pushed open the flap of Nardole’s tent and made his way outside of the tent community and toward Missy.

-

“So, Kaeta,” Missy said as they were sitting inside the TARDIS snack room, the Time Lady nibbling on an energy bar — just because the Doctor despised them didn’t mean she wouldn’t eat them if he would bring her some; besides, she rather thought delivery pizzas tasted more like cardboard than these bars — while the Silurian girl was making excellent progress toward devouring an entire package of microwavable frozen chips (Missy heated them up using the room’s toaster oven, the slightly more civilized way, thank you very much).

Kaeta spared one eye for her while keeping the other two firmly on the food she was annihilating. “Hmmpf?”

“Oh, nothing important, I was just thinking. Now that you’ve rested and are feeling better, oh, I don’t know, maybe you’d want to reunite with your family?”

The girl’s third eye literally lit up. “You know where they are?”

“Of course I do, you silly girl. You know it too. No one has moved from that underground cave of your people’s. It’s been millions of years. Don’t you think it’s time for you lot to wake up?”

Now that her teleportation device was fully charged — and enhanced into a vortex manipulator thanks to the Eye of Harmony — it was time to put her escape plan into motion.

Kaeta looked as if she had been given the Christmas present of her wildest imagination. Missy smiled. “See, I’m not as scary as you thought. I’m good to you, am I not?”

Kaeta moved her head up and down vigorously. The poor girl. She missed her family so much. She reminded Missy of the daughter she had a long time ago, so trusting and innocent, the natural qualities of children. Innocent in a way that drew fondness out of her instead of contempt.

She would give Kaeta her family back. It was easy enough. That her kind-hearted favor came with side benefits for herself was an entirely acceptable consequence of choice.

“Well, eat up. I doubt your family knows how to turn potatoes into chips, let alone process them into these fat-filled horrors that offer no nutritional value whatsoever. Everybody’s favorite way to slowly kill oneself.”

“It tastes good,” the skinny stick of a Silurian said, shoving in another mouthful of deep-fried atrocity.

Missy smiled, rubbed a hand on Kaeta’s head as if petting a bald puppy. “Of course it does. Put you in a ship with full access to all of time and space, and you choose chips.” She glanced at the monitor that was mounted to one of the walls, displaying the main console room. Korg was walking circles around the control panels. He must be bored out of his mind.

“When you finish, I’m going to introduce you to a friend. You’re going to love him...”

Missy closed the TARDIS door behind her, leaving Korg to babysit Kaeta doing whatever it was that donkeys liked to do to entertain Silurian children. She took out the medical patch she found on Kaeta’s arm and used it to get through the security of the command center consoles. Excitement rose from the pit of her stomach as the main computer whirred to life. Soon. Soon she would be traveling through the stars again, and nothing in all of space and time would be able to stop her.

She followed the protocols all the way down to the last item on the numbered list, marking the cryogenic pods of the elders and engineers for priority awakening and making sure the altered water system was functional and wouldn’t get in the way of mass defrosting. Only one step remained: proceed with full-scale de-hibernation. This computer didn’t have a big red button for her to press, but all she needed to do was type in the final command and the entire colony’s cryogenic pods would begin thawing their occupants at various specified rates. All of them, whether Silurian leaders or commoners, would open their eyes to an entirely new era on Earth within the next day.

As she finished inputting the string of commands, a zapping sound from behind her signaled that the preprogrammed containment field had been activated. Right on time. Missy smiled. She did always love to perform before an audience.

She turned around. “Found the teleportation pad that Korg dropped off for you, didn’t you, my dear Doctor? Don’t get too close to the edge of the containment field. I’m not responsible for any loss of life or limbs.” She looked the Doctor up and down. He was standing with his arms to the side, with that beautiful look of menacing threat on his face. Pity that he was tinted in blue. She couldn’t get the low-level force field she put together using the technology on hand to emit a transparent energy wall.

They were once again separated by a containment field. Except this time, it was the Doctor who was the trapped animal, on display for her to see. Her eyes flicked to his swollen cheek.

“Did the egg man do that to you? I’m impressed. I didn’t think he had it in him.”

Her gaze drifted to his eyes. They were hard, all traces of tenderness that was there that night by the bank of the Jordan River gone. This was right, she told herself, this was how the Doctor really thought of her. At least he had always seen her as a worthy opponent. That was enough.

“What? Nothing to say? Then let’s cut to the chase. Humans or Silurians. Which are more important to you?”

Confusion flitted across the Doctor’s face for a fraction of a second at the unexpected question. Yet he remained silent.

“What about free will versus forced domination? We’ve discussed this one before, so don’t play stupid.”

His response was so soft, she would have missed it if she wasn’t already paying attention: “Missy.”

Missy, don’t do it. Missy, please. Missy, you’ve changed.

She shook her head. “It’s too late, Doctor.” She raised her left arm, revealing the now-complete vortex manipulator on her wrist.

Piecing everything together, the Doctor broke his silence, pleaded, “Then go. Leave like you said you would. You’re right, there’s no more promise between us because I broke it. I won’t hold it against you, won’t go hunting after you across the universe, I promise. You don’t have to wake up the Silurians. Don’t do it. Please.”

She stared coldly at the Doctor, putting on indifference like trying on an Earth coat he once got her. But the days of gift giving were over. She wouldn’t let his lies trick her. Not anymore. “So you’re choosing humans over Silurians?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“But you are.”

The Doctor answered yes with his silence.

“What about free will? Can you suppress the Silurians’ future indefinitely, depriving them of self-determination as living, breathing creatures?”

“They are intent on killing the apes.”

Missy laughed. “That’s your reason?” she scoffed. “These Silurians have been sleeping for millions of years, they don’t know a thing about the homo sapiens that have since evolved from the monkeys. Who gave you the right to decide that they don’t deserve to wake up and try to co-exist with a species they’ve never met?”

Even through the blue filter, Missy could see the Doctor’s face darkening, the Oncoming Storm emerging from the everyday traveling idiot. “We’re Time Lords. We have to make difficult decisions for the good of the universe. Sorry, but risking the lives of humans for the theoretical possibility of peaceful co-existence is not good enough.”

“Kaeta keeps telling me about her friend Tzakhi.”

The Doctor started, edged so close against the containment field that if there was no barrier between them, he would have lunged at her. He seethed, accusation etched on every line of his face. “You woke her!”

“Well I needed someone to charge my makeshift vortex manipulator with the energy of the Eye of Harmony. It’s your fault for locking me out of ninety-nine percent of the TARDIS.”

“Why you –”

“She’s alive, if that’s what you’re concerned about. And look,” she cut in before the Doctor could say anything that she knew he would regret later, “I’ve got what I wanted. You’re right, I can teleport away right now and leave the Silurians as they are. You’ve got enough explaining to do to the egg man to give me plenty of time for a head start. I really don’t have to do any of this.”

The reality of what Missy was about to do drained all anger out of him. “Then why?” the Doctor asked, desperate. He was always so beautiful when he begged, especially with this face of his. It was so expressive, so unable to hide anything, forever baring his hearts and his love of humans for the world to see.

Missy answered in a level voice, “Because you are choosing humans over Silurians.”

“And so you’re going to do the opposite? Just to spite me? Missy, whatever you have against me, take it out on me. Please. Not the humans. They’re defenseless!”

No, not to spite you, Missy’s mind screamed. He wouldn’t hear, not with the wall that she’d put up, reinforcing her mental shield three, four times over. What was the use? He would never understand. It was easier to plaster glee all over her face.

“Yes, they are rather defenseless!” she chirped. “That’s why I tend to choose winners. For example, the biologically and technologically superior Silurians.”

“But they’ll die! All of them, even the people in your town, your subjects!”

“So now you want me to act as their Queen?” The acknowledgement was validating, even if the circumstances leading up to it didn’t give the Doctor any other choice. Missy stood even straighter, tilting her head back a fraction in a perfect royal pose. “So what if it’s my will that they should all die?”

“Missy, please! You don’t have to do this. There’s good in you. I’ve seen it. Choose good. Please!”

“Is there?” she asked thoughtfully, as if posing the question to herself. “Well then I suppose I should return to evilness, if doing good is so idiotic. Look,” she snapped, “you have no understanding of what I’m about to do. You didn’t spend five months here living the slow way, getting to know everything there is to know about this place and about these humans. You don’t know a thing about the futility of pushing things off. You think you’re solving the problem by letting the Silurians sleep longer? What good is kicking the bucket down the road going to do?”

The Doctor opened his mouth to spew more nonsense, whiny noises that she had no patience for at this very moment. Ignoring the babbling and further protests, Missy turned her attention back toward the computer. The fool of a Doctor. This was never about spiting him. It was about keeping promises. The promise to reunite Kaeta with her family. The promise to herself, to find out once and for all what it meant to be good on her own terms, far away from the Doctor. And the promise to...

She shook her head. No, that promise had already been broken. There would be no more tea with the Doctor, no more of them sharing meals and reading together. It didn’t matter, she told herself. It never did.

Missy took a deep breath. Focus. Block out the Doctor’s Missy! and No! and focus on the matter at hand. The Doctor was more than capable of managing the aftermaths of what would happen. The universe could say anything about the two of them but never that they underestimated each other. It was extremely unlikely that she would one day return to Earth to find a planet overrun by reptiles.

She checked the string of inputs that she had already typed in, confirming that everything was correct. Then, reveling in the tingle of anticipation traveling down her spine, Missy activated the commands, sending the signal to all cryogenic chambers to begin the process of defrosting.

Chapter Text

The weather forecast for today was sunny, dry, and hot. Same as yesterday. Same as all the days before yesterday. Anyone with eyes could see that. But as Nardole took off his regular glasses and replaced them with the Doctor’s shades, the sonic device decided to be helpful by beaming a string of meteorological numbers and symbols right into his visual cortexes. This was like those university canteen workers telling him that the fish fingers were greasy and the burgers overcooked, scooping him a heaping dose of No New Information alongside a plop of mushy beans.

At least they were perfect when it came to shielding his eyes from the afternoon sun. Why hadn’t he thought of getting his own pair of sunglasses before? Nardole added ‘shades’ to his mental list of things to get upon returning to Bristol. Any regular pair would do. He rather enjoyed the sun-blocking property of the glasses more than the fancy tech readings that were obstructing his vision. So this was why the Doctor was always so aloof whenever he had his glasses on. The bloody egotist couldn’t see past those pixilated letters and couldn’t for the life of him refrain from making assumptions about everyone based on those fancy readings and statistics.

Egotist was too kind a word, really. Nardole didn’t let himself dwell on other, more appropriate epithets because there were people milling about and he didn’t want to scandalize anyone by accidentally muttering his very creative profanities within their hearing range. He was angry at the Doctor. Fuming. How could he? Taking Missy out of the vault and bringing her on a trip? It wasn’t as if he could use boredom as an excuse, what with his many adventures with Bill. Ridiculous. And irresponsible. And utterly, completely infuriating that it was still up to the Doctor to devise a plan to save them all from a reptile invasion.

Nardole walked on, letting the motion of stomping foot in front of foot cool his head. Justified or not, he mustn’t let his anger cloud his purpose. The humans’ lives were at stake and he wasn’t going to let anyone die if he could help it. He was doing this for Tzakhi and his people, he told himself, not for the sodding egotist’s declaration that no one cared about humans more than he did. Well if that was true, then what was Tzakhi’s favorite flavor of tea or his sister’s favorite song?

Foot in front of foot. Calm down, Nardie.

He knew he was walking weird and he didn’t care. He was used to the strange glances directed his way by now, bless these primitive humans who didn’t yet know about androids and sonic devices disguised as eyewear. Although judging by the looks that were checking him out up and down, these people may be more curious about his lime green comfort robe than his stomping around in dark specs. Nardole reminded himself that he was wading further into the tent community than he had done so in a long time, not since he first arrived and was taken to the top leaders for some sort of interrogation. Most people this deep into the settlement had never seen him.

Moses, Aaron, and the tribe leaders. Nice blokes, all of them, if a bit stodgy. All he got out of that interrogation was that he would never be able to eat bacon until he returned to the twenty-first century. Something about agreeing to abide by their rules and he’d be permitted to live among them as an alien. That was it. He had no desire to see any of them again.

He was hoping to avoid them now, following Tzakhi surreptitiously at a distance as the boy weaved in and out of clusters of tents, leading him to where the rebellion leaders lived. He had activated the mapping feature of the glasses so he could return by himself later. He couldn’t be seen with Tzakhi too often. That poor boy had taken too much of a liking to him. He knew the adults didn’t approve, but who was he to turn an eight-year-old away whenever he showed up wanting a warm cup of Zyzxian tea and storytime about space travel as they sat looking up at the magnified cosmos inside his tent?

Ahead of him, Tzakhi glanced back and made a gesture at a large tent. This one. Nardole nodded. He waited until Tzakhi found a couple of boys his age to play with before getting closer. Focusing on the ground before this tent, he reached a hand to activate the ‘analyze’ function of the lenses. Green letters and numbers flashed before his eyes as the glasses pulsed sonic waves toward the ground, generating readings and capturing the plot’s geological fingerprint.

After a couple of minutes, the glasses beeped, signaling completion of data collection and analysis. He turned his head and looked down a path demarcated by two rows of tents on either side, spotted Tzakhi on the far end, and proceeded to pretend he was continuing on with his afternoon stroll.

He repeated the same data-gathering method with two other tents that Tzakhi marked out for him. These were farther away, being the homes of rebellion leaders from another tribe who lived in a different section of the tent community. Many of the Israelites who had never seen him before weren’t shy in their gawking. Humans, so similar to other life forms he encountered throughout the universe. Everyone always stared at him wherever he went. He could never pinpoint on the exact reason. It must be his handsome face.

He was glad to have gotten to know Tzakhi’s people even though his appearance in this community could have been avoided altogether. And while he was still mad at the Doctor, he could understand the Time Lord’s restlessness and desire to jump at every chance to travel through time and space. Truth be told, Nardole missed traveling too.

He looked up at the sun and found himself staring at a magnified version of the star’s surface, stunning in its pale-green details of flares and fireballs after the glasses filtered out all the harmful rays for the humanoid eye. This was the same sun he’d taken for granted day after day for the past seventy years. The sight was so unexpectedly mesmerizing that Nardole gasped and forgot to release his breath until his lungs ached.

He let out a long sigh disguised as an exhale, expelling the tight ball of frustration and resentment that had rolled into a tangled mess inside him. Let it go, an inner voice that sounded like his yoga instructor said, or was it the blond girl from that movie with the talking snowman? Eh, it didn’t matter, the practical wisdom was the same. Ten more seconds of being angry at the Doctor and then drop it.

He counted to ten, inhaled, then exhaled again, all the while still tilting his head toward the sun.

And with that, he forgave the Doctor.

“Thank you,” Nardole said to Tzakhi when they were back in their section of tents, his mission completed and sonic sunglasses tucked away as they headed home under the pre-evening sky. In this part of the community, people were used to seeing them walking side-by-side.

“What will the Doctor do with these readings?” Tzakhi asked.

“I don’t know. But he’s going to come up with something brilliant. He always does.”

They walked past several tents in silence. Then a look of determination took up Tzakhi’s face as he turned toward Nardole. “Why were you and the Doctor fighting?”

“Well...” It was an absolutely fair question to ask, after what Tzakhi had heard and seen. If only he knew how to put the Doctor had less sense than a lemming jumping off a cliff with its face stuck in its arse into age-appropriate language. He looked at that guileless face, so innocent in his ability to still see the world as black and white. “You see, Tzakhi, sometimes, er, sometimes when adults don’t agree on things, it may look like we hate each other even though we don’t.”

“You hit him. I saw his face. It was all puffy.”

“And I feel very sorry about it.” Well, sorry that Tzakhi saw it. The Doctor deserved many more blows, forgiven or not. But for the boy’s sake, he added, “Violence is never acceptable, Tzakhi. Hitting the Doctor did nothing to resolve the situation we were arguing about.”

“But you were angry.”

“Yes, I was,” he admitted. “Look, Tzakhi, we’re all working together now, aren’t we? That’s the thing about the Doctor. No matter what personal disagreements he has with his friends, when there’s danger to prevent and people to protect, he will always do the right thing.”

“What about Kaeta? Is she bad?”

“Kaeta is your friend. So she’s my and the Doctor’s friend too.”

“But the Doctor says the Silurians will invade us. That’s bad.”

“We don’t know that.” Goodness, when had he turned into the Doctor? Speaking half-truths and giving false assurances were the Doctor’s job, not his. “He’s gone to Kaeta’s home for this exact reason, to talk her people down from wanting to fight humans. The Doctor has helped many species reach peace before. I’m sure he’ll do it again.” If Missy doesn’t sabotage everything.

They stopped in front of Tzakhi’s home, which was closer to the inner part of the tent community than his edge-of-the-camp real estate. “Tomorrow’s a big day,” Nardole said. “Your leaders are going to try to negotiate with each other, and the Doctor will do the same thing with the Silurians. We’re going to need both groups to work something out. But for now, all we can do is wait.”

Tzakhi smiled at him. “Okay. See ya,” he said, then joined his family members who were beckoning him to help out with this and that after he had gone off for most of the afternoon. Nardole looked up. The sky was beginning to turn pink. It was time for him to go home.

Back in his tent, Nardole combined the readings generated by the sunglasses into a single message and hit send, an email sent by the Doctor’s sunglasses to the Doctor’s screwdriver. Later tonight, after the humans had gone to sleep, he would go back and set up the strongest shields he could muster around each of the three rebellion leaders’ tents. Androids didn’t need much sleep and he was glad to have a task to focus on to help him pass the hours.

Wherever the Doctor was, his screwdriver should receive a copy of the geological analysis soon. Would the message be intercepted by Missy? He wasn’t sure, suddenly feeling helpless at the realization that, in a way, it had always been the Doctor who was enabling Missy to get into all sorts of trouble.

“Time Lords,” he muttered, not trusting either one of them very much, or any much at all. “You better not destroy this planet. Both of you.”

Because he bloody well knew that they could.

-

Novice evildoers were often prone to the false belief that the mere act of setting things into motion would bring about catastrophe at such unprecedented speed that the earth would immediately begin shaking and the sky melting into a heavenly downpour.

Reality was far more subdued. After all, thawing bodies took time. For hours and hours, Missy waited by the computers while the Doctor glared from inside the containment shield, two Time Lords waiting out their anticipation of what was to come in the slow tick-tocking of linear time. They were periodically interrupted by banging noises coming from inside the TARDIS. Most of the time the noises were followed by Korg’s exasperated shouting and Kaeta’s giggles. Poor Babysitter Korg, Missy mused, feeling not the slightest bit guilty at all. She pretended to not look at the Doctor whenever a peal of laughter pierced through the doors of the TARDIS. She liked him grumpy, but she liked it even more when his eyebrows would ease up just a little, bringing out a less severe version of him that she had come to know inside the vault.

All too soon, the laughter subsided and he was back to full-on glaring mode.

“It was always going to happen this way, and you know it,” Missy said, trying to make conversation for what felt like the hundredth time.

The Doctor held onto his silence, the accusation in those blue-grey eyes his only word and the gears turning in his head the only noise.

“If you aren’t going to talk, then stop thinking so loudly.” Really, this version of the Doctor knew nothing of manners.

“People are going to die.”

“People are always going to die. Have you not yet realized that what we read in Numbers were in fact our future actions?”

“That’s what you would like to think. But you’re wrong. History says a hole opened up from the ground. It doesn’t say that the Silurians did it. Even you know that’s true.”

Missy scoffed. “And I suggested an alternative, didn’t I? Back in Bristol. How to avoid humans and Silurians altogether. You didn’t follow my plan.”

“So you decided to rewrite history because I got distracted by Nardole and didn’t land us in here right away? If it’s an apology you want, then I’m sorry. I wanted to follow your plan. I did. It’s just, well, things happened. Like they always do. And so what? We roll with it. We improvise. Like we always do. Just because things went wrong doesn’t mean we have to throw out our entire plan.”

The Doctor was working up a flush that was noticeable even through the blue tint of the barrier. Bless his hearts, always so full of righteous superiority that made him blind to the bloody obvious. Must she start using monosyllabic words? This wasn’t about holes in the ground but something far bigger. For someone who professed to be the protector of humans, he really had no clue.

Missy walked up to the barrier until her nose was but a hair’s breadth from the energy field. “Doctor,” she said, and waited until she had his full attention. “The moment you chose the humans, I had to choose the Silurians. It’s as simple as that. I don’t have any grand plans. I don’t care whether this is right or wrong. I’m not doing this to win.”

She knew it was the truth as soon as the words left her lips. Maybe the Doctor knew it too, if the softening of his eyes was any indication. But he still didn’t understand. He was still angry and trying to break free of the containment field. His hand was in his pocket, gripping and spinning and pressing the buttons of his sonic screwdriver to find the right frequency to deactivate the energy shield. Yet another example of missing the point. The containment field was set to the Doctor’s biometric signature. He would never be able to escape out. The trick was to escape in. Give it a few more hours and maybe he would figure it out.

“I have my reasons,” Missy said as she stepped away.

They entered another long stretch of silence. De-hibernation was still in progress, like it bloody had been for the past bloody half a day. Missy alternated between pacing, checking the monitor of the main computer for progress, and smirking at the Doctor. She supposed she could join him inside the containment field, annoy him with her proximity and get him to be at least a little bit interactive. But he had his sonic screwdriver and it was too dangerous, too risky that something would go wrong when she was so close to victory. It was better to practice self-restraint than to throw away her freedom.

Pity. She really did want to go near him. The reality was starting to sink in: in less than a day’s time, they would be galaxies apart, and seventy years of being in each other’s presence was truly and properly coming to an end. What should one say at this kind of parting? Words suddenly felt inadequate. They had said all that was needed to be said and yet not nearly enough.

Well, if she wasn’t going to join him in there...

“You know, I did make the containment field wide enough for you to sit down if you’d like.”

“Thank you, but I am fine.”

“Whatever suits you, my dear.”

It wasn’t the waiting that was frustrating. It was the Doctor, so near physically and yet so very closed off mentally. He was back to being the Doctor who had just found out the true identity of the enigmatic lady called Missy outside of the mausoleum, careless and cruel in dismissing every one of her overtures. The way he was refusing to engage, it was as if the past seventy years — heck, or even Skaro — had never happen.

Missy made another round of her pacing-looking at monitor-glancing at the Doctor. The stubborn idiot hadn’t changed position, including his hand inside his pocket. He was so set on finding the right frequency to disintegrate the energy shield that he had failed to consider any other alternative.

She walked up to the containment field.

“All right, Professor Doctor. Exam time. True or false? If I trap you here for a thousand years, you will try to break free for the entire thousand years.”

The eyebrows were coming together despite their owner’s best effort to try not to engage. Missy put on her best imitating-the-Doctor-as-professor face and tsked.

“You don’t get points for questions you skip, you do know? Or have you been marking exams improperly all these years?”

She smiled upon receiving a full-on glare. Finally, a reaction from him.

“I’m not going to play your game anymore.”

“But this isn’t a game!” she exclaimed, going all Scottish. “It’s an exam. A test. Like all those check-ins you’ve done on me to assess my progress.”

“People are –”

“Going to die, yes, yes. I do have a memory better than those mayflies’. And no, I don’t care that they are going to die. Now quick: what’s seventy divided by a thousand?”

“Seven hundredths,” the Doctor said automatically.

“Correct! See? My exam is easy.” Missy winked.

“Stop it!”

“Then don’t try so hard to answer so quickly. Question three: How far east must I travel from where we’re standing to get to the North Pole? Earth’s version, not the planet.”

The Doctor made a face that contained at least five emotions: irritation, impatience, displeasure, general grumpiness, and a tiny bit of confusion. Who knew that face could deploy so many frown lines all at once? Missy felt her own face spread in delight. She should have done this ages ago, turning the table on him.

The Doctor didn’t bother trying not to answer with this one. “You don’t travel east to get to the North Pole,” he said.

“Exactly!” Missy brought her hands up and clapped, then twirled around and around before settling in front of the containment field once more.

For all that he was professing not to play her game, the Doctor was clearly waiting for the next question. When Missy did nothing but smile at him for a full minute, curiosity won over self-control.

“Exactly what? I’m going to keep trying to break out of here, yes, and I assume you were referring to your seventy years which was seven percent of our promise. Just because you put in effort during those years isn’t going to –” He abruptly stopped.

Yes, he was finally getting somewhere...

“Seventy years or a thousand, it makes no difference if you aren’t going to turn good, if we’re never going to reach North Pole,” the Doctor stated. His expression darkened. “You lied. All this time.”

“I didn’t lie. We didn’t lie. We’ve merely been going around in circles instead of heading north.” She held up a hand the same time the Doctor opened his mouth. “Let me finish, Doctor. I changed, yes. But in what way? Living linearly and depriving me of opportunities to do evil didn’t turn me good.”

“But you were remembering. All those names and faces, they were coming back to you.”

“So now I’m an evil person who has developed a conscience. Woo-bloody-hoo. Congratulations to me. Horrible combination, I should add. I really ought to blame you for it.”

Because none of her past selves would be trying this hard to engage with the Doctor, to spoon feed him how to get out of his little prison that she had set.

Because every single one of her past selves would have been galaxies away by now.

Well at least the Doctor was also not giving up, sucking in another lungful of air in order to spew out more nonsense. Fool. That made two of them.

“What about being good on your own terms? You said it. You said you were going to –”

“You know full well that my version of good is never going to match yours, so it doesn’t matter.” She trained her eyes on the Doctor, daring him to disagree. His lips thinned into a line. He couldn’t. “So this brings us back to exactly where we were a minute ago. Doctor stupid and Missy bad. See? We are going in circles.”

“But –”

“Doctor,” she cut in. She was tired of circles. “Look, I didn’t say our time together in the vault didn’t matter. I already pointed out that I grew a conscience. And since I’ve only killed one person so far, this means I must have learned restraint. Count your blessings. That’s two wins for you already. Don’t be greedy.”

The eyebrows suddenly jumped to attention, going all vertical. “Greedy? Oh, so demanding from you exactly what you asked me to do is greedy? Wanting to see signs of improvement is greedy? Getting you to admit that you have changed, because I see it Missy, I know you have. That’s now greedy?

“You were signed over to me. All those paperwork absolving responsibilities for this and indemnifying all parties of that. Those executioners treated you like property. And you know what? I could have too. I could have let you rot inside the vault for a thousand years, shut you in and jump forward a millennium in my TARDIS and be done with it. But I didn’t. Because I know you can change and I was willing to try. You did too. We promised each other. And it worked. Don’t deny it, Missy. You’re different.

“Why is it so hard for you to admit that you’ve been good? So you killed a person. That’s bad, very very bad. But we’ll work on it. We’ll do it right now. Object lesson. Waking up the Silurians. Don’t. Let me out and we’ll figure something out. Choose the right thing.”

Whatever it was the Doctor wanted to hear in response, she didn’t have it. So she simply shook her head.

They were always like this, going around and around and around and around in circles. How many times had they had this conversation? She’d lost count. She knew the script by now: I saved you, you promised, we did the vault, you changed.

But this time, a new thought popped into her head. As she stood looking at the blue energy shields, their roles reversed, Missy wondered if her understanding wasn’t also in reverse all this time.

Maybe it wasn’t her that the Doctor was trying to convince. Maybe he was trying to convince himself.

Maybe he was having second thoughts. Maybe he’d had many second thoughts over the past hours and days and weeks and months and years and decades.

She tilted her chin up.

“Do you regret saving me from execution?” she asked, her voice soft but defiant. The question rang loudly despite the whirring machineries in the background, the words too blunt to be swept away into some dark corner. “Do you, Doctor?”

The Doctor peered at her through the blue barrier, his face unreadable. Missy forced herself to look him in the eye. She told herself she didn’t care what his answer may be. It didn’t matter anyway. The Doctor lies. Whether yes or no, there was a fifty-percent chance that what he really meant was the opposite.

If their positions had been reversed, would she have saved him? The Doctor was no innocent himself. He would have tried talking his way out of it, orate hours upon hours on morality and doing what must be done. And those executioners wouldn’t buy a word of his excuses. At least she’d owned up to her crimes. Planets that no longer existed were hard to cover up, after all.

The Doctor was a bloody idiot. Her idiot. Of course she would save him. There was never any hesitation in that. Her hesitation was on the afterwards. On how after every single time she tried to help, he still saw her as morally inferior.

She wasn’t sure who looked away first, but Missy was hearing her own boots clicking on the ground and soon she was checking the monitor again, looking at the same information and at the same progress bar that was not filling up fast enough.

“What does the monitor say?” the Doctor’s voice floated into her ears.

“Just over an hour left,” she answered.

“You can still stop this.”

“And summon thousands of zombie Silurians to life in their half-frozen bodies? We’re better off waiting until full de-hibernation when their brains become activated. You do want to try reasoning with them, I assume?”

There were banging noises from the TARDIS, and a distinct Ow! from the donkey. Both Time Lords listened on as Kaeta squeaked first in horror, then burst into laughter followed by pleas to be allowed to do whatever it was that she made Korg do again.

“Korg thinks very highly of you, you know,” the Doctor said.

Well, considering his alternatives in that human town, she wouldn’t expect anything less.

Another minute or so, and the TARDIS fell back into silence.

“Missy.”

His voice was soft, almost tender, and her hearts raced and filled her internal hearing with thumps that reminded her of the drums. He was going to answer, but he was preparing her first. A thousand hostile words would burn less than this inexplicable gentleness.

“You know what? Never mind.” She shouldn’t have asked. Didn’t want to know the truth anymore. “Forget about it.”

“Come here.”

Funny, it was the Doctor who was inside a cage but she felt like she was the one who was trapped. She took a step back. “I said forget it! I don’t want to know the answer any more.”

“Missy, come here.” A pause. “Please.”

She shook her head. “Say what you have to say. You don’t need to soften the blow. I can handle it.”

“Then at least look at me.”

Face me. If this was a challenge, then she must admit that, for once in the Master’s many lives, she was losing her courage.

She was still staring at the ground when the whisper of a thought touched the surface of her mind, the telepathic knock of someone requesting permission to enter. The last time they did this, the last time Missy granted the Doctor entry into her mind, she was still willing to be his good. Was she done trying, now?

Yes. No. Maybe. She was tired of fighting, tired of keeping her guard up against the only other person who was remotely like her in the entire universe. Her enemy. Her friend.

She turned toward the Doctor and lowered her mental shield just enough for him to enter in, to wander about in the lobby of her mind but to proceed no further. The Doctor settled in on the edge of her consciousness, lowered his own mental defense even more. A beckoning. He wasn’t trying to probe into her mind. He was showing her his.

She was looking at herself kneeling on the execution platform, seeing through the Doctor’s eyes. She saw right through her own bravado and wondered if this was her observation or the Doctor’s. She was scared, pleading with the Doctor that she would turn good. But there was another emotion screaming in her mind: pain. Pain welling up in the Doctor’s chest as he contemplated the real possibility of going through with the execution. He placed a hand on the lever, felt the texture of the instrument of death against his palm. This was done entirely by touch; the Doctor never took his eyes off of her. She was begging now, no longer for her life but for the Doctor to understand that she was his friend. The pain in her — the Doctor’s — chest spread, constricting his hearts and his throat. It makes no difference, he managed to force out of his mouth, and she knew now that it was a lie. He pulled the lever and she fell, zapped but not killed. Relief. This wasn’t her emotion. Must be the Doctor’s. The barest hint of uncertainty as to what would be next. Pain. More pain. For having to come to this. But there was no regret. Not a hint of it then, and not now even as Missy was digging for it, sifting through all these bursts of emotions to find what surely must be buried in there somewhere...

Missy gasped as she exited the Doctor’s mind, her hands propped against the computer behind her and her body shaking. Her eyes were glued to the Doctor’s, her cheeks wet and her vision blurry from all the tears. The Doctor’s eyes, too, were red-rimmed — she could tell despite the blue force field. He had dragged up one of his most painful memories for her sake, bared his soul to answer her question.

He didn’t regret saving her.

“Koschei –” He used this name of hers so sparingly, like a prized treasure to be admired. How could he admire her still, after she failed all of his tests? “You hurt me and break my hearts and hurt the people I love. Make no mistake: I disapprove of what you’re doing and I will fight you. But I do not and will never regret saving you.”

Her eyes wouldn’t stop leaking and so she didn’t bother trying to wipe away her tears, letting them form paths down her cheeks and drip onto the floor. No matter how many times they saved each other, they were always standing on opposing sides. She had thought that maybe this time it’d be different. Maybe he did too. Fools, both of them.

“Please, let me out of here. You can’t deal with the Silurians alone. It backfired last time, remember? Release me. I can help.”

She had to collect herself for a moment to find her voice. “If I let you out, you’ll make for the TARDIS and ruin everything.”

“And I’ll help you.”

“No, Doctor, not this time. I have Kaeta as a leverage. She likes me and thinks I saved her. I’ll take my chances.”

The frown returned to his face. “You’re making a mistake.”

“Am I? Then I’ll die here and you’ll be free from your promise.”

“Don’t you dare say that –” The Doctor thrust his face up against the barrier. “I didn’t save you just to watch you die!”

Missy turned away. She couldn’t trust her eyes to stop being so oversensitive. Stealing herself into one of the tunnels, she leaned against the stone surface and threw her head back, squeezing her eyes shut to empty her tears. Soon. Soon the Silurians would walk this very tunnel and enter their central command center. Soon she would have to draw on all her wit and savvy to manipulate their leaders.

She could leave now, activate her vortex manipulator and leave the Doctor to handle the mess by himself. She should do exactly that. Yet she still had promises to keep, and it wouldn’t be right to disregard promises.

Had she turned good, after all?

Victory had never felt so hollow, completely void of that rush of thrill that she loved so much, that tingle that would travel up her spine and urge her on to start planning for the next planetary domination. But this victory had no hope, no witness, no reward. She was staying because of the Doctor but the Doctor would never understand. Missy slid down into a sitting position, knees propped up and her head buried into the lap of her period-appropriate garment. No, she had not turned good. For in another day’s time, the blood of many innocent lives would be added onto her account, and no amount of the Doctor’s foolish optimism would save her from herself.

She allowed herself to cry, muted sobs that drenched the fabric of her many layers. She only had forty minutes to break down and she used up the entire time. When she finally composed herself, she felt like a child’s failed attempt at solving a jigsaw puzzle, a Missy-shaped reconstruction made up of shattered pieces that had been put back together all wrong. But there was no time to sort things out. The progress meter on the monitor was almost full.

Missy glanced at the Doctor when she emerged from the tunnel. They were both failing terribly at hiding. She hated the concern she saw on his face and he must hate being caught at the tail end of hiding his sonic screwdriver into his pocket. Idiot. Hours upon hours of trying and he still couldn’t figure out how to escape?

“De-hibernation will be done in three minutes,” she told him. “Go north, quit trying to go east. Figure it out.”

Missy didn’t wait for an answer. She walked straight toward the TARDIS — it was time to fit all the pieces together. She gave a couple of warning knocks, then went inside to quite an unexpected sight. Kaeta had her arms and legs wrapped around the underside of Korg, her head thrown back and body dangling inches from the ground in a very ape-like way. She giggled when she caught sight of Missy, then began swinging her body sideways until she gained enough momentum to swing herself into a sitting position onto Korg’s back. “Look, Missy!” she shouted with the enthusiasm of an over-energized child, and Missy had to hold herself back from sneering at Korg, who looked downright miserable.

Well, at least the absurdity before her eyes helped tear her mind away from the Doctor enough for her to want to laugh.

“Come off the donkey, my dear. It’s time for me to show you something.”

“Now?”

“Yes. You can come back and play with Mr. Korg later.”

“But –”

“Now, Kaeta.”

She had forgotten how difficult it was to reason with children, especially when zapping them into silence wasn’t an option. Kaeta wrapped her arms around Korg’s neck and only held on tighter when Missy approached. “One more loop, please!” she begged, “I think Korg likes me!”

It was a full five loops around the main console later that Kaeta was willing to loosen her hold.

When Missy finally coaxed the girl onto the floor and took her hand, she realized that her own palm had become sweaty. Calm down, Missy, she scolded herself as she paused to take a deep breath before exiting the TARDIS. It was too late to check on whether the Doctor finally broke free of the containment field. No time to spend on frivolities. Ready or not, history was about to happen now.

“Hello there!” Missy greeted a sea of Silurian elders as she pulled open the TARDIS door and stepped into the half-circle of bodies that had formed around the box. She tugged Kaeta’s arm so she would become visible to the crowd, eliciting a collective gasp.

“Yes, I’ve brought you all a present. Kaeta’s been lovely and I have enjoyed her companionship so, so much.” She plastered a smile on her face as her eyes scanned the command center. About twenty Silurian leaders had gathered here, all old and male and still groggy from hibernation. She may have the upper hand yet.

Her smile broadened when she saw that the teleportation pad was now empty of the Doctor. He was never going to be able to break out of the containment field that she’d tweaked just for him, but he had figured out how to teleport himself back to the tent people. Exactly as she’d hoped.

All the dice had been cast.

She dipped her body in an elegant curtsy.

“Now, my dear reptilian gentlemen, let us negotiate.”

-

“Doctor!” Nardole exclaimed when the Time Lord barged into his tent, the same time that the Doctor blurted out: “Quick, date and time! Tell me!”

“Er, it’s the next day in the early morning, sir. You were gone from yesterday late afternoon and through the night.” The Doctor looked like he was in information gathering mode, so he added, “I’ve set up energy shields around the areas of the three opposition leaders’ tents. Your sonic’s readings confirmed my suspicion. Those areas happened to be the weakest spots geologically.”

“And the rebellion?”

“The top bosses are negotiating with the opposition leaders today as far as I know. Hey, aren’t you supposed to be negotiating with the Silurians? What happened? Why are you back so early?”

“I’m going back. But I first need to confuse the isomorphic setting on the energy barrier.”

“The what? What are you talking about?”

“Hand, Nardole. I need your hand. And while you’re at it, I also need your mouth shut.”

“Now that’s not nice –”

“Hand!”

Nardole extended his right hand, palm up. The Doctor scanned it with his sonic screwdriver and then pressed some buttons on the tool. It gave a beep a few seconds later.

“You said the energy fields are up?”

Nardole nodded. “Yup, at all three areas.”

“Good. This means I can have my sunglasses back.” He added, almost as an afterthought, “Thank you.”

“Yeah, yeah, it’s much better not to say anything you don’t really mean. Here you go. Sunglasses. As good as new. I sent you the data. Full map and analysis. Did you get it?”

It was impossible to read the Doctor’s emotions when he was hiding behind his shades. “Let’s just say I was a bit tied up over the past half a day.”

A bit tied up. This could only mean...

“You saw Missy.”

The non-answer was confirmation enough.

“I’m coming too.”

“No, Nardole, listen to me. Stay here. History has been set in motion and it’s not going to stop until it runs its course. The Silurians are waking and the opposition leaders’ negotiation is going to fail. We’re talking about hundreds of thousands of Israelites and who knows how many thousands of Silurians. It’s going to be a full-on war if both sides don’t learn to understand each other. None of the Israelite leaders or Silurian elders will even want to understand. There’s only one person who can stop this, and you must keep him safe.”

It wasn’t hard to guess who. “Tzakhi?”

“Yes, Tzakhi. Keep him away from the holes and don’t let him out of your sight. The human race’s future depends on him.” The Doctor checked his screwdriver, seemed satisfied with what he was looking for, and pocketed it into his jacket. “I need to go.”

Nardole nodded. Goodbye and good luck. The sun was about to rise and soon the humans would be heading out of their tents to gather that curious food that appeared on the ground every morning without fail. He was frankly getting kind of sick of this manna stuff, but he supposed it was better to collect his food than to stay in his tent and fret about what was to come.

He would find Tzakhi after breakfast and keep him safe.

Because he really didn’t fancy returning to an alternate future with no human and all Silurians.

Chapter Text

The Doctor materialized back into the Silurian command room in a crouching position. The twenty or so Silurians leaders to his right all had their backs to him, their attention directed toward the TARDIS — and by extension, toward Missy. He knew Missy was there even though he couldn’t see her through the wall of reptilian backs. How many times had he been in the same position as the Silurians, uncovering the mastermind behind whatever scheme he was trying to put an end to, only to find himself face-to-face with his best enemy?

And right on cue, Missy’s voice sounded from beyond the wall of Silurians. “Exactly. If I hadn’t met this wonderful and sweet young lady here and used my spaceship to find out where you are, you lot would still be hibernating, sleeping through eons of a perfectly habitable Earth.”

Her spaceship? The Doctor huffed as quietly as he could. He’d quite like to see her try and fail to fly the TARDIS. In any case, Missy was in no immediate danger, enthralling her crowd with her exaggerated heroics. He looked down, pressed a button on the rim of his glasses, and started scanning. As expected, the readings confirmed what he had worked out earlier, that Missy had designed the containment shield to block out any life form that registered with his biometric signature.

He took out his screwdriver and, as quietly as he could, projected Nardole’s biodata toward the energy shield. Just then, the Silurians all started laughing at something Missy was saying, providing the perfect cover for the sizzling sound as the containment field dissipated and he was now free to set foot inside the room.

There were two tunnels connecting the command center to other parts of the Silurian underground, one to his right where he would have to go through the Silurians and Missy, and an unobstructed path to his left. The Doctor remained crouching, paused long enough to hear Missy began spinning her tale of conquering the human town aboveground (Missy lying about more bloodshed than she had actually committed; his past selves would never have believed that), and started inching his way toward the left.

When he reached the tunnel and shrouded himself in the shadows, the Doctor turned to check on Missy one final time. She was now regaling the Silurian leaders with examples of her benevolence, going into detail after detail of how she perfected their underground water delivery system with the added connection to the Jordan River. The murmurs that spread through the group were positive in tone, admiring even. It was the Silurians that he should probably be worried about. Missy would be more than fine.

The Doctor turned his focus toward the darkness that led to some other parts of the Silurian colony and activated a scan. Strings of letters scrolled past his sunglasses, performing spatial analyses and matching the data with what he and Nardole had gathered through their mapping from five months ago.

A water reservoir, a concentrated area of advanced technology — likely an armory of some sort — and more tunnels that branched off into chambers. Life forms detected: 4,701. The Doctor let out several Gallifreyan choice words. Thousands of Silurians, and this was only one of two wings! Even if half of the population was children like Kaeta — he was being unrealistic — there would still be thousands of newly awakened Silurians of warrior age eager to return to living aboveground.

He stepped into the unknown, feeling strangely at ease with having only his glasses to rely on to give him readings in the dark. It was as if he was blind all over again, only this time, there was no enemy to destroy, only a different species he hoped he could persuade to coexist peaceably with the humans. A minute or so of careful exploration led him to a fork in the road. He tapped on his glasses to bring up the map overlay. Reservoir to the left and armory to the right. He walked right.

Like the central command room, the armory was a rectangular space carved out of rocks and connected by two tunnels on the two ends of the space, with ceiling holes that brought in sunlight from the surface through angled mirrors. As the path he was walking on merged into the room, the Doctor noticed something glowing on the ground. Another one of Missy’s teleportation pads. Of course she had been here, this treasure trove of Silurian technology and weaponry. Probably quite often too, if she had set up teleportation between here and her town. The Doctor took out his sonic screwdriver and scanned the pad, just to check on some basic information, then frowned. This teleportation pad wasn’t connected to Missy’s town. It led away from the town and hinted at a connection to somewhere further south, about a day’s travel from the command room.

The Israelites’ camp. How...

The teleportation pad suddenly went dim for several seconds, then returned to its unnatural neon green glow after a succession of three quick beeps sounded from inside it. If the Doctor didn’t know better, he may have mistaken the sounds for confirmation of –

“Oh no, oh no no no no no you don’t!”

He had just activated the teleportation pad by feeding it information from his sonic screwdriver, from the geological data and analyses that Nardole had sent him. And the moment he did so, the pad had teleported its counterpart into the coordinates directly below one of the rebel leaders’ tents, to one of the weakest points of Earth’s crust in this region.

“And here is one of my subjects that I have spared from death,” Missy’s voice floated in from behind him. The timing was absolutely precise. It could only mean that she’d known all along exactly what he was going to do. The Doctor pressed his mouth into a line. Missy had no doubt been itching to revel in this moment of victory.

The worst thing was, he wasn’t all that surprised. Furious at Missy, yes, and maybe slightly more so at himself. But any surprise he felt when the teleportation pad initially activated was long gone. For who was the Doctor if not the idiot who always fell, over and over and over again, for every one of the Master’s traps?

“I had to be careful with this one. He’s very willful and not at all obedient. But he can be useful from time to time, so I allow him to walk about without chains out of the goodness of my heart.”

He whipped around. Missy was sitting on Korg with Kaeta settled in front of her. She was flanked by the twenty or so Silurian leaders. Several of them held lantern-looking lighting contraptions in their hands. In the dim light, Missy was the picture perfect Queen of the Underworld depicted among countless legends across the galaxies. Maybe she was the inspiration for all of those mythologies.

Missy’s face was pure glee. “Prisoner, aren’t you going to bow before your Queen?”

“You’re not my queen,” he spat.

“Oh! Such insolence! Did you hear that? I’m afraid this is what you’ll have to deal with, my dear gentlemen, when you encounter the humans. The apes are stubborn and do not submit easily to authority, even to a superior race like yours. You can certainly opt for peaceful coexistence. After all, you and I both see the value of diversity and I won’t dissuade you from trying. But as you can see, even a lowly prisoner can prove to be more trouble than he’s worth. And if the humans band together in revolt, are you willing to bear the cost of possible casualty among your ranks?”

The Silurian elders looked one at another, murmured among themselves, then turned their attention back to the Doctor. He could feel the weight of their collective appraisal: was the disobedience of someone they presumed to be human representative of all the apes, and were these arrogant apes worthy of coexistence?

The death of hundreds of thousands of humans was too high a price to pay for his righteous anger.

The Doctor dropped down on one knee and held a fist over one of his hearts, though not before hurling Missy a murderous glare. Missy’s smile only grew wider.

“I suppose there’s yet hope for the apes,” she pretended to change her mind. “Well, gentlemen, there is no need to decide immediately. My prisoner John Smith here has set up a travel pad that will take you directly to the most strategic point of breaking out onto the Earth’s surface — that’s the glowing device on the ground there. You will need to blast your way to the surface when you get to the strategic point, since the apes don’t know you are underground and it’s up to you to make first contact.”

The Doctor shot up and stood in the way between the Silurians and the teleporter. “No!”

Missy narrowed her eyes. “Prisoner, step down,” she warned in a tone that threatened dire consequences for disobedience, and the Doctor almost laughed. What were they, new acquaintances? He wouldn’t be here if he cared one whit about consequences.

But what he did care about was gaining enough goodwill from the Silurians. For that, he shouldn’t paint himself as the insolent subordinate.

He turned his body so he could make eye contact with both Missy and the Silurians. The look he shot just for Missy promised dire consequences for her as well, but his posture, arms hanging by his sides and his upper body slightly bent forward, projected perfect deference. He settled his gaze upon somewhere between the chins and shoulders of the first row of Silurian leaders, playacting the servant who knew better than to make direct eye contact with his superiors. He schooled his tone into one of earnest leave-taking. “Listen to me, please. There’s a third way.”

For all that Missy complained about him thinking too loudly, the Doctor could practically hear her thoughts spinning at this moment, curiosity mixed with a dash of confusion. But she didn’t forbid him to talk, which was as good as a go ahead as far as he was concerned.

He rushed his words out before Missy might change her mind: “Listen, all of you came from a time long past, when the Earth was beautiful and lush with all kinds of greeneries. Trust me when I say that the land aboveground is no longer the beautiful prehistoric swampland that you were used to. It is now dry and arid, all rocks and sand and a scorching sun, with barely any natural sources of water. You don’t have to rely on me for this information. Kaeta here has seen it. The world aboveground is barren and dry, isn’t it, Kaeta?”

All eyes turned toward the little girl, who froze when she became the center of attention. Missy raised a hand to Kaeta’s upper arm and squeezed it gently. She then whispered something into her ear. If the Doctor didn’t know better, he would have thought it a genuine gesture to comfort a child.

Missy lifted her head and addressed the Silurians, “Tell them, my dear, is the land above very dry, with a very hot sun, and not at all pleasant?”

Kaeta nodded, followed by a whispered, “Yes.”

The Doctor raised his voice, “I can give you what you knew. Please, let me help you. Let me find you an uninhabited planet with the exact climate that you were used to. Rally all the thousands of your kind and I’ll use the TARDIS to take you to your new home, a brand new planet with no apes that you can call your own.”

“Oh please,” came a mockery dripping with sarcasm. “You couldn’t even steer the TARDIS from fifteen miles away without messing up the time!”

“So maybe my flying needs a little recalibration every once in a while. It’s never anything big,” the Doctor reassured the Silurian elders. He glared at Missy. “That was an exception, by the way.”

“Sure it was, dear. And in an alternate reality of opposites, I’d be a rich woman if I have a credit for every time you pilot the TARDIS flawlessly.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means exactly what it means. I spent the past seventy years literally penniless. You connect the dots.”

“You didn’t need money! And might that not have to do with the minor detail that the TARDIS was parked on Earth for seventy years?”

Missy coughed. “Mars.”

“Not my fault,” he pointed out. “You didn’t know what caused her to have a sudden bout of constipation on that bloody planet either. Your exact words.”

Missy was sneering at him with that look that told him to stop digging himself deeper into the ground, and it was then that the Doctor realized the Silurians had stopped whispering among themselves.

The eldest looking Silurian, judging by the bent of his back and for having the most wrinkles on his face, cleared his throat as delicately as possible under present circumstances.

“While I have no doubt that you two are well acquainted with each other,” he began, sending the Doctor a pointed look, “this is perhaps not the place for your domestic disputes.”

“Disputes?” Missy objected the same time the Doctor shrieked a horrified: “Domestic?”

The Silurian leader continued, “The madam here saved one of our daughters, so we are willing to work with her while we adjust our colony to life post-hibernation. Our condition is clear: we will no longer remain underground now that we know Earth’s surface is habitable. While your proposition appears reasonable, Mr. John Smith, the madam here is your Queen. We will not consider your offer until we know you have both her permission and the ability to operate her space ship.”

“Of course I do,” the Doctor protested. “It’s my –”

“The TARDIS, it’s how we got here,” Missy interrupted. “I’m the superb pilot of the ship, of course. But the prisoner here is alright. He did help steer.”

The Doctor raised an eyebrow at Missy, questioning. Why are you helping? Missy’s expression was unreadable.

The Silurian leader had that wise-man gaze that seemed to be able to pierce through all the outer layers and into the soul. As he looked from Missy to the Doctor, he came to a decision.

“We will return to the command room to monitor the waking of the rest of our colony,” he said. “After we acclimate everyone, the elders will reconvene to consider our best option moving forward. Madam, we are grateful for all that you have done. You returned life back to us. We owe it to you to ensure that we all flourish.” Raising a hand to give a signal, the Silurian leader led the way back to the computer room. Missy hopped off of Korg and gave him instructions to reunite Kaeta with her family.

Both Time Lords watched as the Silurian elders walked back toward the command center. At some point during the group’s retreat, the Doctor realized that Missy had drawn near.

And so they were alone again, the Doctor and Missy, facing each other in the dark save for the glow of the teleporter and the light from one of the portable lanterns that an elder had handed to Missy.

In the dim light, Missy looked softer, less maniacal. It made her compelling, just like how she appeared by the bank of the Jordan River, when the setting sun gently covered her sharp edges. Here, the Doctor could almost believe Missy’s goal wasn’t to annihilate all humans and Silurians.

Missy’s lips moved upward to form not a smirk, but the hint of a genuine smile.

“Come, Doctor. There’s another teleportation pad on the far side of the armory, at the mouth of the other tunnel. That one leads to my town.” She extended her free arm and linked it with his before he could protest. “We have another day until the Silurians come to a decision and the human rebels finish negotiating with their leaders. Since you aren’t going to get to dump any lizards onto empty planets yet, let’s go home and work out our unfinished businesses from there.”

Home. Was that what that town was to Missy now, after five months?

He let Missy lead him forward.

-

“What about Lucifer IV? Safer than the original and not yet populated as far as I know.”

“Too gaseous. I went there with River once. She had to abort her dig to save both our lungs.”

Missy munched loudly on a fig as they sat on a carpet inside her room, a finely woven tapestry of intricate designs made from animal hair and colored with expensive dark red and purple dyes. The bowl of figs they were sharing had moved from equidistance between them to right next to her within the past hour. She glanced at the window to mark the position of the sun. It was approaching noon. Time to get one of those useless palace aides to bring them lunch.

All of their suggestions of an empty planet were rubbish so far. The Doctor was too particular in his travels as he almost exclusively visited inhabited planets — preferably ones issuing distress signals — to have an extensive knowledge of planets with no life form. Missy, on the other hand, had thus far avoided suggesting planets she had previously depopulated as a result of her numerous conquers and overlording. She was enjoying this rare moment of them working together too much to ruin the mood.

The Doctor was nice to be around again, his face relaxed and eyebrows deactivated from angry mode, now that he was actively working toward preventing a human-Silurian confrontation. Now that they were working on the same side, toward the same goal. It was what he always wanted, right? To have Missy by him, sharing their combined intellects and perhaps their hearts, planning their next destination in their grand promise to go see the stars together.

The thing was, she wanted it too.

“What about planetoids?” the Doctor suggested. “I came across one in Galaxy 93360-H once, a nice ball of rock. The atmosphere’s a bit thin, but nothing time can’t solve if we fast forward a couple billion years and let the Silurians out after the little ball learns how to rain and grow vegetation.”

“Planetoids are less stable, dear. Give that one a maybe. We’ll return to it if we don’t come up with something better.”

“Good idea.” The Doctor paused, his head spinning loudly again, and turned toward her. “Missy, why are you helping with this?”

“You mean why aren’t I dead set upon destruction?”

“That’s a very negative way to put it, but yes. Why? I thought you are choosing Silurians over humans.”

“Which is exactly what I’m doing, helping Silurians.”

“You know what I mean.” The Doctor searched her face, frowned when he didn’t find whatever he was looking for. “Really. Why?”

She huffed her exasperation toward the ceiling. How dense was he? Hmm, maybe she shouldn’t answer that. Putting on a neutral expression, she turned to the Doctor. “Because your proposal is sensible,” she said, pointing out the bloody obvious.

The Doctor smiled, one of those I’m-proud-of-you-for-doing-good smiles. But somewhere beneath that unbearable patronizing smugness was genuine surprise, and that was enough to keep Missy from resurrecting the same argument about their differing views on goodness. This time that they had right now, this sitting in her palace and making conversation time, was an unexpected gift. This was truly their last day they were going to have in this era and she was determined to make it a pleasant one. Let the horrors to come be confined to tomorrow. Historical records did not lie. The ground was still going to open up and swallow people.

“I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop,” the Doctor said, his smile fading. “For some mass destruction of Silurians when they’re trapped in a room with no escape. Or for some secret plan to conquer humans that you’ve already set into motion.”

“Are you giving me ideas? Keep talking if you are. You might spout some decent ones yet.”

“Missy,” he chided. “I’m serious.”

She laid a hand on the carpet and idly plucked at the strands of goat hair that made up this tapestry. It was a finely woven piece of floor decoration, a gift, even if presenting tributes to one’s ruler was a standard strategy for one to keep oneself alive. She plucked and plucked some more, until a pile of dislodged hair was beginning to form. She felt the weight of the Doctor’s gaze bearing down on that spot. The pile was nowhere big enough to be visible unless someone knew where to look. If each hair she pulled out signified a life uprooted from existence, then did it matter if one more or one fewer insignificant life form was going to die an anonymous death when so many other hair was still attached to the tapestry, enough humans and Silurians left to be fruitful and multiply and grow their respective species into civilizations that would continue to clash with other civilizations over petty land-grabbing? It mattered to the Doctor, of course. He always abhorred the death of individuals. Well, humans were going to die tomorrow. The other shoe was well on its way of dropping.

She flashed him a smile. “Think of some larger planets, will you, love? We’re going to transport as many Silurians who are willing to be relocated.”

Because some Silurians would choose aggression over relocation. Because the Doctor was trying too hard to ignore the obvious. Because history did not lie.

Missy blew at the pile of goat hair. The strands flew temporarily into the air, tangoed a too-short dance against gravity, before scattering and disappearing onto the carpet.

-

Missy excused herself after they had drawn up a shortlist of suitable uninhabited planets for the Silurians. They could select the final winner later. For now, since she was here and she took her responsibilities very seriously, she needed the Doctor to stay out of her way.

“Be a good prisoner,” she teased as she blew him a kiss, walking out of her room to play the responsible adult and dispatch some of her queenly duties. The Doctor would find ways to entertain himself. She would bet this entire palace that he wouldn’t last five minutes confined in here. This should give her plenty of time to set her affairs in order.

Granting a bunch of empty titles to those power-hungry leftover aides from the previous king was the best way to clean house after she was gone. It would be like the automatic flush function she had put in for the public toilets, swooshing away each piece of shit when they would inevitably fall on top of one another trying to become the next king. The real responsibilities of managing the town, she would turn over to the current High Priestess. She was more competent than the entire lot of palace monkeys combined, the best hope for keeping her town functioning for the next twenty years.

She would do a final round of inspection of the water delivery infrastructure to make sure the pipes and the built-in purification system would continue to work under automated timers with routine robot-programmed maintenance for the foreseeable future. Pity that a system designed to last forever wouldn’t make it to the next century. History would one day crush and bury all the anachronistic technology and condemn her improvements into anonymity. Destruction would be the fate of all five months of her work because none was ever meant to work its way into early human consciousness, as it should be.

There was no need to worry about Korg. He was in the history books. He would find a way to survive.

As for herself, she would change back to her black outfit made from alien materials, ditch this time period’s inconspicuous in favor of the inconspicuous of the millions of worlds out there waiting for her exploration. After a quick shower, of course. Who knew when she was going to next encounter the kind of high-quality, purified water like what she had made? Missy ran a mental list of things to pack: weapons, her sonic umbrella, food and drink rations, and personal items, in this order of importance.

As she prepared the pertinent palace records that she had been keeping so the High Priestess would have everything she needed to govern this town after her, all the while dreaming up preposterous royal titles to bestow on those palace imbeciles, Missy couldn’t help but notice that she was forming a cleanup crew to take care of any ripples in time that her presence in this tiny blip of history may have caused. Even if every single one of her subject was going to die at the hands of Silurians in the next few days — she would do everything she could to prevent creating this particular alternate history — she would still ensure that time would heal itself of all memories of her. And some day, Korg would be the only alien that the humans would mention in their history.

Cleaning up. This was more than the Doctor would ever do, so no, she wasn’t becoming like him. But she was doing good and wasn’t feeling as nauseated at the realization as she thought she would be. In fact, looking at her neatly assembled scrolls that she may or may not have transmogrified from their original digital formatting, she was almost... proud. Of herself and the progress she had attained on her own terms over the past five months. Maybe this meant she had gone soft. Surprisingly, she didn’t mind it so much.

-

“I received five reports from the townsfolk that the prisoner has escaped,” Missy said to her freshly painted nails as she heard the Doctor stomped his way back into the palace like a graceless elephant. “You really are hopeless at being inconspicuous.”

“I’m back now, aren’t I?”

She blew across her nails. Two more minutes. Then she could finish them off with clear varnish. She thanked herself for the foresight of setting up this small square table and some chairs off to the side of the main palace floor. She would hate to have to paint her nails while sitting on the uneven ground.

She could practically hear the Doctor’s confusion. “You, something’s different. Is it your clothes? You’ve gone all black. But that’s not it... your hair! Did you do something to it?”

“I washed it. Some of us care about cleanliness, you know.” Her hair was still damp after she toweled off with this era’s subpar excuse of a drying cloth and so she let it hang loose while she painted her nails.

A silver fruit came into her view. “I brought you one of these. Seeing that you’re in no condition to use your hands, we’ll eat them later.”

“I kept asking you to get me those insta-spray-on stuff from that cosmetic planet. You never listened.”

“Believe it or not, I did try to stay put in Bristol.”

“Sure you did, Mr. Mars.” She glanced up. He was still hovering over her, holding a silver fruit in each hand. “There is an empty chair right next to you. You do see it? Or have you gone blind again?”

The Doctor sat. When she lifted her eyes from inspecting her nails to his face, he was already wearing that fragile smile, the corners of his lips raised in uncertainty. “We keep having more time.”

Missy hummed. “Nothing is truly urgent. Silurians need time to thaw, humans need time to negotiate, and my nail polish needs time to dry.”

He pointed to the vortex manipulator around her wrist. “But not for long.”

Missy went still. Did this mean he wouldn’t stop her?

“Where will you go, Missy?” the Doctor asked softly.

She thought for a moment. “Out. Away.” She shrugged. “I don’t know. I was planning an escape, not space tourism.”

“Come back with me.”

She shook her head.

“We can try again.”

She fixed him a Look. “The definition of insanity is trying the same thing over and over while expecting different results. I should know. I’m insane.” Maybe that was why she kept trying to get the Doctor’s attention again and again, believing each time that it would be different, that it would work. Well, she’d tried one too many times and now knew that spending more time with him didn’t translate into a higher chance of having her friend back.

“Missy –”

“No.”

“– tell me what I did wrong and I’ll do it differently this time.”

That beautiful face was so earnest and open. She would miss seeing this face.

“You did everything right as the Doctor. But I’m the Mistress, so it didn’t work for me.”

“But –”

“Hush, my dear. Let’s not argue, not on our last day.”

The Doctor watched as Missy coated each of her nails with a clear layer of varnish. It was almost like being back in the vault, on a lazy Sunday afternoon when the Doctor would sit and stare at whatever she was doing rather than muster up an ounce of motivation to start marking his students’ essays. During those days, Missy would sometimes ask about his day. Since she was Queen here and he the prisoner, maybe they could play this game in reverse.

“While you were out playing fugitive, I was being productive and held court for a full two hours.”

This caught the Doctor’s interest. “Oh? And what nuggets of wisdom did you bestow on the aggrieved?”

“Why are you saying this as if you question my unmatched wisdom? Here’s a riddle for you: Pudding Brain A claims that Pudding Brain B has moved the stone that marks his property line. Pudding Brain B claims that the stone has always been at that position. What would you do?”

The Doctor thought over the scenario. Then his eyes lit up as if literal light bulbs had been installed inside them. “I know! Impose a special assessment on all properties. The larger the lot, the higher tax the landowner pays. The stone will be back in its original position in no time.”

“Ooh, you’ve gone twenty-first century bureaucratic, Doctor! I’m impressed. But that’s too tedious for me. I simply hypnotized Pudding Brain B and forced him to tell the truth.”

“Missy! But that’s –”

“What? Wrong? Not moral? He only moved the stone about ten feet. I slapped a fine on him and let him go.”

She smirked as she waited to see which of the warring emotions on the Doctor’s face would win out, Mr. Cross ready to condemn her or Mr. Patronizing ready to praise her for not killing an unimportant life form.

“If it helps, there were no spoilers,” she supplied. “The other bloke was also hypnotized. Neither of them will ever remember what happened and what caused the stone to return to its place.”

The Doctor continued to look disapproving but settled for no comment.

“Riddle number two. You’ll appreciate this one. Two women, one baby. Which one is the mother?”

“Isn’t this case five hundred years too early?”

“Mothers across the millennia fight over babies, my dear.”

The Doctor shot her a Whatever you say look and she reveled in this rare moment of triumph. “So what did you do?” he asked after some seconds. “Hypnotism again?”

“Playing the same trick twice is boring!” She pouted. The idiot cared nothing for variety. She checked her nails. All dry. “Besides, I had full access to your pockets when you were unconscious and tied up at my mercy. Remember this?” She fished out a device from her pocket, a piece of technology she had swiped from the Doctor.

“The biometric reader!”

“Don’t worry, I’ve only used it for non-evil purposes. Quick scan of both women and the baby and ding ding ding! Mystery solved. I would’ve offered to make a clone baby for the not-mother, but that’s evil, isn’t it?”

The Doctor held out a hand. “Give it back.”

“Prisoners in this time aren’t allowed to own complex scientific devices.”

“Give. It. Back.”

“Or else what?” Missy taunted, but placed the device into the Doctor’s hand. “Here, I’m done using it. No need for me to carry around dead weight. All right, final case: Couple A and Couple B are neighbors. Husband A stole Family B’s sheep. Husband B got angry and stole Family A’s goat. Wife A got furious and so she had the stolen sheep slaughtered and served it for dinner. She then sent the carcass to Family B and demanded to have the goat back. Wife B also got furious, took the carcass, stormed next door, and stuffed everything down Family A’s toilet — don’t ask me how, I didn’t make them bigger on the inside. The toilet clogged, naturally. Now even more furious, Family A offed the goat, ate the meat, went next door, and clogged Family B’s toilet with goat remains. Meanwhile, both Family A and Family B went to Family C to use the facilities, and I don’t know the details but a huge fight ensued among all three families and toilet C ended up clogged as well. So they all decided to do their business at the public toilet –”

“Am I supposed to care about any of this?” the Doctor groaned. “Go get them a couple of Daleks and sink their plungers into whichever toilet needs unclogging.”

“Careful there, Doctor. If you humiliate the Daleks, Davros might not want to be your arch enemy anymore.”

He rolled his eyes. Share your toys, the gesture said. Missy supposed she could be generous and let Davros have the arch enemy title temporarily while she clung onto both the titles of friend and not-friend for now.

“Frankly, I would just take away all their toilets,” the Doctor muttered, still mulling over the case despite claiming he didn’t care.

Missy squealed. “You and I finally agree on something! I did exactly that! I revoked Families A and B’s indoor plumbing privileges and put Family C on probation. See, we really aren’t so different.”

The Doctor spluttered. “Don’t you dare compare us to... toilets.” His voice cracked at the last syllable, and a gasp of air later, those shoulders started shaking and he broke down in laughter. “Oh, Missy,” he said in between wheezes, his face growing redder and redder. “If this... this... doesn’t put you off... of overlording... I don’t know... what will... how dull... absolutely... dull...”

Seeing him like this was infectious, and Missy too laughed. It started out as giggles at first, but when the Doctor failed to rein in his hysterics after seeing her lose it, he started making high-pitched noises, which sent her bursting into something much louder that got in the way of her breathing, making her lungs burn and her sides hurt. Oh dear Omega, she hadn’t laughed so hard in years.

When she thought they’d both calmed down, the Doctor had to choose that moment to shake his head and snort, “Daleks.” Their eyes connected, and that was all it took to set them both howling again.

After finally, finally, catching her breath, Missy drew her chair closer to the Doctor’s and leaned into his side. “Now do you see why I decided to scrub myself clean and paint my nails? After two hours of those exciting cases? You’d be bored to tears too.”

Wherever she was going to go next, Missy decided she would take a long break from overlording primitive civilizations.

But for now, she would wait until the Doctor’s breathing calmed down and his face returned to its normal color. She would wait until he put his arm around her, like he did in the vault usually after an average of three minutes and seventeen seconds of hesitation. She would then wait until he grew too self-conscious and pulled away, usually after no more than twelve minutes, at which point she may or may not decide to make him feel even more uncomfortable by running her hand through his hair.

Then, they would eat those silver fruits together.

Chapter Text

“The prisoner has been upgraded to my personal assistant,” Missy informed the Silurian elders when they reconvened at midnight, all de-hibernation complete and judging by the united front that the Silurians were presenting, their stodgy deliberations were also over and done with. As far as stopping a war was concerned, the Doctor was optimistic that this may actually work. At least none of the elders came back into the central command room holding blasters and sharp metal sticks. So far so good.

“I have ordered John Smith to transport your colony to Planet D0073D0-J, or Dodo for short, in the Hepmonna VII galaxy. The planet’s environment matches Earth’s condition before you lot went into hibernation, with similar vegetation and basic non-intelligent life forms that can serve as food for your people while you build up a more sustained nutritional ecology. Approximately half of the planet is comprised of water, with tidal patterns controlled by three orbiting moons. The mineral composition of the uppermost crust is a bit heavy on Cadmium and the planet’s core is primarily lead, so you’ll have to adjust to longer days with slower planet rotation and squishier ores when you start mining for metals again.”

Missy spoke in an authoritative tone and with her back straight. Standing two steps behind her, the Doctor noted that every part of her exuded Queen. Was this what she was like when she conquered worlds and ruled planets? This was Koschei commanding the Gallifreyan army and the Master superimposing his will on weaker life forms. But Missy was providing such clear and sensible directives that the Doctor couldn’t quite muster the indignation to disapprove of what he knew were lives lost and planets destroyed along the way in order for her to evolve into a consummate ruler. In fact, what he was feeling was quite akin to fondness, and that was simply not the correct sentiment to have toward a megalomaniac.

“Now, I know everyone is eager to resume life as you once knew it on Earth. But that is simply not possible. It will be up to you, the rulers, to guide your colony. John Smith and I will provide you with several maps of the planet including its atmospheric patterns and geothermal conditions. Over the months, I have gained a comprehensive understanding of you lot’s technological know-how so these maps will be targeted to your knowledge level to ensure maximum effectiveness. Consider your options carefully. Choose relocation and you will be provided with everything you need to succeed. Choose war and you will be left on your own to die.”

Missy had made a captive audience of the Silurians. None of them seemed to show any outward consternation at her implication that they didn’t have the capability to survive on Earth. The Doctor looked intently at the top leader’s face for clues as to whether he would accept or reject the offer. When their eyes connected, the Doctor could only detect calmness. He felt as if his hearts had skipped a beat. The time to convince the Silurians was over. A decision had already been made.

Missy walked up to the TARDIS and pushed open the door. Her black outfit presented a sharp contrast to the blue exterior and the warm light coming out from the inside. She spun around, perched her arms on the edges of the doorway and faced the elders. “All of time and space contained in this box and she’s ready to transport you to new life on Dodo. So what do you say?”

The room became silent as all eyes deferred to the leader to give voice to their decision. Even the whirring of the computers seemed to have become muffled. The Doctor held his breath, hearing the thumps of his double heartbeats increasing in speed, not slowing down even after his respiratory bypass kicked in. The world around him faded away as his focus was reduced to the Silurian leader. The next words coming out of his mouth would determine the fate of the humans.

The leader dipped his head, an acknowledgement of one person in authority to another. “Your offer is very generous, madam.” There was a pause, and the Doctor looked along with the leader toward Missy. She had tightened her grasp on the door frames. Missy, too, understood the gravity of the moment. The Silurian leader resumed, “Our colony will need to begin life anew, whether on Earth or on a new planet. But it appears that Earth is no longer our home.”

The thump-thump-thump-thumps were growing louder and louder inside his ears. Could this mean...

“We accept your proposal.”

The Doctor let out his breath.

-

Nardole knew he wasn’t one to excel in the art of blending in, but what he had was superior hearing. Couple that with proficiency in handling most of the universe’s technology, and even his purple-wearing self — he thought he had made a good outfit choice until he drew many fascinated stares and realized the color purple was quite rare in this era — wouldn’t be caught red-handed for spying on the negotiations between the Israelite leaders and the growing number of rebels.

He settled on a sizeable rock that prevented any tent from being built near it, pretending to be out absorbing sunlight as he sat cross-legged on the rock facing the community’s worship structure that was about a couple of stone throws away if he used his dominant robotic arm — the giant portable temple they called the tabernacle. Aliens weren’t allowed near it but he was far away enough to not attract any pinched lips and crossed arms. He activated the long-range vision setting on his glasses. All set. He didn’t need to get that close as far as eavesdropping was concerned. The topmost weakness about desert living: tents, giant or not, were flaps of fabric encircling open space, not the best setup for secret conversations.

He knew the faces of the three men approaching one of the Israelite leaders’ tents that stood next to the worship structure. These were the three rebellion leaders whose tents he had scanned the day before: Tzakhi’s uncle Korah leading the way and two blokes from a different tribe named Dathan and Abiram walking further behind, flanking a large group of rebels. Nardole did a quick survey of the mass of bodies that extended around several tents. The opposition had rallied at least 250 supporters to their cause.

Just for the record, Nardole noted to himself, Moses and Aaron looked nothing like any of those grand paintings of European artists or in those illustrated children’s books that he liked to read. Of course, they were everything that he wasn’t — then again, that was true of everyone in the entire tent community when compared to him — hair on their heads and beard on their chins, tanned skin, not too tall, looked nothing like Father Christmas or the muscular bloke in that Ten Commandments movie. That one time when Nardole was brought before them, they had seemed larger than life. Now, the two patriarchs looked weary, as if they didn’t want to deal with a power struggle over priestly authorities that they themselves had simply been saddled with as part of their worship duties.

“We’ve been sitting in this desert for years!” one of the rebels, Korah, the one who was Tzakhi’s uncle, shouted so loudly that Nardole didn’t need to strain his ears to hear. “If this is all meant to be, then fine, we’ll continue to stick together. But sticking together means living as a community. You two have no right to concentrate power only for yourselves. If we stick together then we’re going to have to be equal. Don’t act as if you’re above the rest of us. If Aaron can go into the sanctuary, then we should too.”

Moses fell prostrate onto the ground toward the worship structure, lamenting and supplicating his God in a mumble of keening, rushed words. Nardole turned his attention to Korah, standing above his elderly leader with righteous anger flushed on his face, and he was suddenly transported back to his many adventures with the Doctor before they settled in Bristol, those years of encountering the universe’s power-mongers in the past, present, and future, earnest souls who were committed enough to their country or planet or a cause to rise up. Some of them toppled tyrants while some deposed good leaders. A few became legends who reigned over their era’s Golden Ages while others morphed into worse monsters than those they had overthrown. One thing was certain: there was never any guarantee of stability after a revolution. The Doctor wasn’t here to talk them out of confrontation and Nardole was not about to insert himself into the dispute. Hopefully these humans would only argue and save their collective energy for the Silurians attack to come.

He let his eyes trail over the hundreds of humans standing behind their rebel leader. Did they know what they were fighting for? A quicker trip to their Promised Land or simply better food variety? Nardole never bothered investigating the column of fire that appeared over the worship structure each night because the humans thought it so unremarkable. But maybe full access to that being behind the fire was enough of a motivation to rouse these men to want to wrest that access away from the hands of Moses and Aaron. Or perhaps each person had their own reasons for joining the opposition, for hadn’t he heard the Doctor say it often enough that in all his lives he had never met someone who wasn’t special, who when given the opportunity wouldn’t rise to the occasion and shine like the stars in the heaven, each one of them unique?

When Moses got back on his feet, what he relayed were instructions. Nardole cocked his head to one side to better position his ear, pretending to move his head to chase the sunlight that was shrinking away from him. He managed to catch about eight out of every ten words, good enough to piece together that the rebels were given instructions: get their ceremonial gears in order and find out tomorrow who the Israelites’ God would choose to grant full worship access.

Nardole thought this sounded like a proposal. A challenge.

He looked from Moses to Korah. Even from a distance, he could sense the thrill of the rebel leader for a chance to be proven right.

“We accept your proposal.”

-

It was like déjà vu — the Doctor observed as he watched thousands of Silurians file into the TARDIS, the process bottlenecked near the entrance with each reptile’s incredulous reaction to how spacious the ship was past the double doors, so much bigger on the inside! — as if no time had passed from all those years ago (for Earth) and many bodies before this one (for him) when he rigged old Noah’s ark with a bit of Time Lord technology to fit in all those animals. He supposed the TARDIS could function as an ark as long as saving people didn’t destroy the threads that weaved time into interconnected strands of history. Then again, it wasn’t as if he couldn’t change history. It was perfectly doable provided that he avoided those unwieldy fixed points in time. This wasn’t one of them, and he was suddenly feeling defiant against that stupid record in Numbers. The laws of time didn’t say humans must be swallowed up. In fact, he would very much like to flip off the universe right now and do everything he could to make sure there would be no hole in the ground come tomorrow morning.

He walked up to Missy, who was standing next to one of the computers.

“You were right,” he said with his gaze fixed on the line of Silurians. He didn’t need to turn his head to feel the surprise that those three simple words elicited. “About free will. If I kept them asleep, I would have deprived them of self-determination.”

He felt a gentle squeeze on his forearm, Missy’s acknowledgement and willing foregoing of an otherwise deserved I told you so.

“Would you say the same thing if the leaders turned down your offer?”

A family unit was struggling to enter the TARDIS, two parents with five children in tow. None of them looked like warriors. In fact, he hadn’t yet seen a Silurian from this colony that conformed to his deeply held image of vengeful lizards.

“It would still be the truth,” he said, avoiding the question. Would he have seen the value of self-determination in the face of a rejection? He feared they both knew what the answer would be.

“I have my reasons for de-hibernating them. But believe me, Doctor, I did it for our own good.”

She’d said that while they were still at St. Luke’s and inside the TARDIS, in the piano room. He really did want to believe her.

“You couldn’t have predicted the elders’ answer.”

Missy tensed. He didn’t have to see it; the sudden stillness was palpable.

The silence that stretched was too long to be companionable, the truth Missy was hiding too obvious: she had other reasons.

“No,” Missy said at length. He saw her straightening her body out of the corners of his eyes, then heard the familiar boot clicks as she signaled the end of their exchange and walked toward the other side of the room.

It was during the final check inside the TARDIS before they set off for D0073D0-J — the Doctor refused to call the planet Dodo — when Missy looked around and addressed the chief Silurian leader who had remained with them inside the console room.

“Where’s Kaeta?”

“Your steed has returned her to her family unit,” the leader said.

“Yes, but I don’t recall seeing her enter the TARDIS. Did you, John Smith?”

Now that Missy mentioned it...

“I can do a scan and locate her whereabouts. We have her biometric data still up on the screen.” He brought up the analysis that the TARDIS performed on her five months ago and pressed several buttons to overlay the data with the ship’s security circuit. The monitor displayed a new schematic full of dots, denoting thousands of life forms on board. As the security circuit inspected each Silurian’s biological signature, dots began to disappear. The scan was completed within a matter of minutes. No dot.

“She’s not here,” the Doctor and Missy said in unison.

“Euldvar, are you certain that everyone in your colony is accounted for?” Missy asked.

The Silurian leader mumbled something. Or perhaps it was the Doctor’s own ears that muffled the answer into slowed-down syllables as if the words had been filtered through a thick, cottony barrier. What did Missy just call him?

For a good minute, all the Doctor could think about was the Silurian leader — his name was Euldvar? He swore he’d heard it before, but couldn’t recall where, when, and what significance it held...

Missy’s sharp voice pulled him back into the present.

“John Smith! Prisoner! I said come with me outside.”

Euldvar was already walking ahead. The Doctor hurried after him. Focus on the present, he chided himself. He would figure out who this Silurian leader was later.

He heard a gasp before Euldvar stepped to the side after exiting the TARDIS to let him see what was outside. Ah, but of course, the Doctor thought with no surprise at all as he took in what was before him.

The command center was filled with young Silurians, males and females of fighting age and presently dressed very much for war. More of them spilled over into the two tunnels to each side of the room. The Doctor put on his sonic sunglasses and did a hasty scan. There were at least a hundred of them.

A particularly tall Silurian stepped forward and bowed before Euldvar. “All glory to you, our leader.” The voice was high-pitched. This was a female warrior.

Euldvar’s face was stony. “Gan.”

As Silurian leader and rebel faced each other, the Doctor did another scan for a specific biometric signature. This time, the scan yielded one result. Further back, inside the tunnel to his left, floating in the air so she must be riding on Korg, was Kaeta.

He only half-paid attention to the exchange that ensued. Everything was obvious enough: there was a faction — there was always a faction, no matter the planet and era and species and governing structure, why were organized life forms so self-destructive, Time Lords included? — who refused to leave Earth. This faction believed themselves to be strong enough to attack the human apes and reclaim the overworld from them. This faction was young, strong, willing to take their chances and, as far as the Doctor was concerned, was neither right nor wrong in desiring to remain on their home planet and forge a new life on Earth.

But the weapons they were holding, that was wrong. He made eye contact with Missy, the only Time Lord empowered to intervene while they were still trying to maintain their façade, and gestured for her to do something. But the eyes that met his were impassive, and she appeared not at all like she was going to take sides among a domestic dispute.

Fine. If Missy chose not to meddle, then he would.

He stepped forward. “Euldvar – if I may –”

“Hush!” Missy hissed at him. He sent her a glare.

“Please, Euldvar, and Gan, is it? Please listen,” he tried again, this time taking two more steps until he was standing in between them. He bowed at the Silurian leader. “Pardon me, sir, I know I’m a horrible prisoner and am speaking entirely out of turn, but seeing how I was the one who suggested the relocation, perhaps I can explain it to this warrior leader here.”

He spun around to face Gan and found that he needed to tilt his head upward slightly in order to meet her bottom two eyes. “Gan!” he greeted. “Pleasure to meet you. I’m the – well, you may call me John Smith, that’s how I’m known here, yes.”

He scanned the crowd behind Gan. “I see that you’ve enlisted quite an army for yourself here. Do you know what’s great about armies? They are made up of soldiers who are sons and daughters and brothers and sisters and fathers and mothers, people who are committed to protecting their loved ones. Now as I’m sure you know, her majesty the Mistress here has offered to give your colony a brand new home, a planet of perfect conditions that everyone will love. She and I have both run many tests. The planet is safe and in almost every way ideal for Silurians.

“You may be thinking: Why does a perfect planet need protectors? And you know what? You’re correct. Planet D0073D0-J is absolutely idyllic and Silurians will have no natural predators there. You won’t need warriors or soldiers or an army. But the thousands of people in your colony, they need protectors. Think about the people you’re leaving behind. Your parents and siblings and children and aunts and uncles and great-cousins’ third nephew two generations removed. They all need you. So please, please choose life and new possibilities and come with us.”

He was entreating Gan, entreating the young Silurians standing behind Gan, appealing to their better nature. These rebels were intent on war and he would not have it, not if he could do anything to stop them.

“Or let me put it another way,” the Doctor pushed on. “You’re being asked to travel across space and time, to be pioneers. It’s going to require more courage than picking up sharp metal sticks and waving them around. Your people inside the space ship, they’ve already chosen to be brave. They started out with less courage than you warriors have. And you know what I know is going to happen? Two, three weeks in, they’re going to run into challenges with conquering new wetlands and building new cities. They’re going to wish the colony’s best warriors will be there with them. But her majesty the Queen here, she’s only offering a one-way trip. So it’s either now or you’ll never get to use your bravery to usher in a new age of Silurians.” He looked past Gan and into the crowd behind her, young faces that were less defiant and more uncertain than their leader’s. “Come on, think for yourselves. What do you say?”

Behind Gan, numerous Silurians looked one at another, hearts and minds conflicted over the ties of their loved ones and the pull toward their sense of duty over the tiny, insignificant square miles of desert dust in the world above.

“Well?” the Doctor stepped back and extended an arm, gesturing toward the TARDIS. “Same offer, whether you decided yesterday or are deciding right now. In fact, your change of heart will be highly regarded and welcomed. I know I’ll be thrilled.”

Minutes of silence were followed by the clanging of weapons hitting the floor. From the command center and from within the tunnels, about thirty Silurians moved forward and approached the TARDIS.

“You’re leaving behind the only home we know!” Gan bellowed, cowing a handful of Silurians into indecision before they mustered up enough resolve to follow the others into the TARDIS. She then turned her attention to the Doctor, towering over him in full disdain. “Euldvar has gone soft, letting an ape babble on with such nonsense. You know nothing of honor and survival. Do you even have a single weapon on you? Do not pretend to fight for peace if you have never known war.”

The Doctor opened his mouth to argue, to tell Gan about wars and conflicts that her tiny lizard brain would never be able to understand, wars that spanned galaxies and the destruction of entire sectors, all for nothing but the clashing of egos between two of the most dangerous species in the entire universe, the Time War that would put her infantile boasting to shame and –

With lightning speed, Gan unsheathed her sword and placed it across Euldvar’s throat.

“Gan!”

The rebel leader snarled, “No more deserter, or he dies.”

“Put that down – please, we can talk. Talking is good. Talking is always the real solution.”

A flex of muscles, and the sword dug into scaly flesh, threatening to draw blood.

“You talk too much.”

“No no no no no no no, please, Gan. He’s your elder. The very person you warriors try to protect. Look,” the Doctor said, raising both arms, palms open, “look, I’m unarmed. Let him go. Believe me, violence is not the answer. It never is. Please listen!”

The Doctor looked over at Euldvar, his peaceful demeanor gone and yet he could detect no panic. He looked at Gan. Maybe if he could get her to direct the sword at him... but goading her further was too risky. He looked at Missy. Help, please.

Missy called out. “Gan, will you and your warriors accept our offer?”

Gan’s face split into a grin. It was ferocious and ugly. “No.”

“Then take down your sword. We yield to your terms.”

“Mis –”

“Prisoner, step down! And stay silent.”

A rush of fury flooded his senses. What was Missy playing at? He bloody well was not going to stay silent –

“Kaeta. Where is she?” Missy asked, cut in before the Doctor could interject.

“The little girl? She chose to stay.”

“Rubbish!”

“Doctor, stop!” Missy shouted in Gallifreyan, and he was slapped so hard in his mind that he stumbled backwards. To the Silurians, she was a goddess whose thundering voice had just sent her subject fumbling. Gan considered her for a long moment, came to a decision, and withdrew her sword.

“The girl claims she is waiting for a friend. Your steed has agreed to look after her.”

Missy nodded and turned to Euldvar. “You will stay?”

“It appears that I don’t have a choice.”

“And Gan, you will accept the full responsibility of your self-determination?”

“Of course,” Gan said smoothly, full of confidence with a nauseating amount of naivety. But that wasn’t what irked the Doctor the most. It was Missy’s knowing usage of self-determination, hurling their earlier conversation back into his face. Would he allow the Silurians self-determination even if they chose against his will? Conceding to his own point but finding it no less infuriating, he supposed he must.

“Then the colony is all boarded. John Smith, take those who have agreed to be relocated to their new planet. I will stay behind to assist the warriors.”

“And leave you alone?” the Doctor protested.

“Your concern –” Missy curled her upper lip, mocking the true nature of his worry of letting her loose without him. “– is unwarranted. My conquest of humans was done without aid. I do not need yours now.” I’ve been on my own for five months, I will handle the rebels. “Oh, and do return quickly after your repopulation project.” Don’t fuck up the driving this time, dear.

The Doctor balled his fists at his sides as he made his way toward the TARDIS. Focus, Doctor, focus. The ninety percent of Silurians ready for relocation was priority. Settle them first. Then come back.

But he wouldn’t be the Doctor if he gave up so easily, not when he could try one last time.

Pausing right before he crossed the threshold, the Doctor turned around. “Last chance. The offer’s still open.”

Gan threw her head back and laughed. “No,” she said. There was victory in her eyes, the knowing look of a lion mocking a gnat. When she returned to her full height looming over Euldvar, there was nothing but derision directed the Doctor’s way. “No, we will not come with you.”

-

“Have Dathan and Abiram come forward.”

Nardole focused on catching every word that was exchanged between the Israelite elites — regardless of sides, all the people gathered near the worship structure were leaders and well-known figures among the tent community, prominent enough to be given the option to rebel — as he leaned his back against the large rock. He’d been sitting on the ground for some time, after the sun had moved westward and away from his sunbathing perch. He recognized the key players’ voices by now.

No shuffling of feet followed Moses’s command, nothing that resembled sounds of sandals hitting the ground. Hmm. Was his hearing receding? Korah was so proud to confront his leaders. Why would the other two rebellion leaders not want to be up in the face of the very person they were opposing?

He got up onto his feet and arranged his body into one of those basic yoga poses that allowed him to pretend he was exercising while getting a clear view to observe the negotiation. From this position he could see Dathan and Abiram still flanking the group of two hundred fifty, not coming forward. One of them had his hands planted on his hips, the very definition of angry, so it was unlikely that they were afraid or intimidated by the old man. Nardole brought his palms together above his head. There. He could hold this pose for several minutes without drawing any attention, he hoped.

The two rebel leaders connected gazes and nodded to each other before answering Moses. “No,” one of them said while the other finished: “We won’t come forward.”

They were friends, Nardole realized, good friends who would stand together until the end. He’d seen enough of this kind of silent communication on Darillium to know that no matter what was going to be said, there would be no backing down for these two.

“– you promised you’ll lead us to a place of milk and honey.”

“Well, I rather think the Egypt we left behind was that land of milk and honey.”

“We’ve been stuck here in the desert.”

“Where’s the milk and honey now?”

“Do you really think people don’t have eyes to see?”

“Or not notice that we haven’t made progress camping in this endless desert?”

“Why are you even surprised that we don’t like you bossing us around?”

“At least fulfill your promises. Where are our vineyards? Our beautiful fields?”

“Not answering? Yeah, thought not. Because you don’t have a single clue where we’re going, do you?”

“So let the two of us point out the obvious: you failed to deliver and keep failing to deliver. Don’t make empty promises of the future.”

“You want us to come forward? No, we’re not going to walk up to our oh-so-wonderful leader. In fact, let us make it really clear: wherever you think you’re taking us, we’re not coming.”

“Because we’re not so sure that there is a Promised Land.”

“And even if there is, no. We will not come with you.”

-

When the sun was moving its way down toward the horizon, Tzakhi bounded into Nardole’s tent. “It worked! Uncle Korah spoke with Moses and he wants Uncle Korah to gather our family in front of the assembly tomorrow!”

Nardole looked up from sipping his tea. Tzakhi always burst in when he was taking tea. He was glad for it this time, to be able to use the teacup as a shield to hide his frown. The negotiation that he observed from earlier today didn’t go well at all. But Tzakhi wouldn’t understand. “I’m not so sure that’s good news. Isn’t it better if your uncle and his conspirators decide to step down instead?”

“But Uncle Korah says our family is going to be given top honor!”

What was it with rebellion leaders across all of time and space, believing themselves to be invincible? “I’d be very careful if I were you. Tell you what. Why don’t we have a stay-in day tomorrow right here? I can tell you more stories about Professor River Song the space archaeologist and you’ll get to choose what tea you want to drink. Deal?”

“But my whole family is going to join the assembly tomorrow. I need to go too.”

“It’s not safe, Tzakhi.” Your Uncle Korah is going to die.

The features on that boyish face turned eight-year-old-grumpy. “You keep saying that. It’s not true.”

“Tzakhi –”

“Tomorrow is special. I’m not going to miss it.”

He promised the Doctor to keep the boy safe.

“Fine, then I suppose I’ll go too. Can’t think of a better way to spend my morning than witnessing the collapse of the opposition,” Nardole muttered. He turned to Tzakhi, made certain that the boy was paying attention. “Stay close to me, yeah? I might be really scared tomorrow, seeing that big bearded Moses again. How about keeping me company and make sure I don’t make a fool of myself?”

When Tzakhi told him You’ll be fine instead of his usual okay, Nardole knew that tomorrow was going to be a trying day.

“See ya!” Tzakhi chirped, excitement infused in both his words and steps.

He allowed himself one anxious whine when he was alone again.

He’d done everything he could do here.

The ball was now in the Doctor’s court.

Chapter Text

The Doctor leaned against the TARDIS door, his hands in his trousers pockets, and allowed himself a rare moment of respite. A late afternoon storm had just passed on Planet D0073D0-J and the atmosphere was filled with the pleasant scent of the soil after the rain. Petrichor. Funny how scent memories weren’t something that could truly go away. Every intake of his breath reminded him of both the past and the future, of old friends lost in his past during a time that was still thousands of years in the future from this moment of relative present. Amy and Rory would forever be dear to his hearts. And River too. His brilliant, bespoken, beloved River. He realized it now, had finally put the pieces together some years into Darillium, that the River he spent twenty-four years with came freshly from Manhattan. She’d barely had time to grieve the loss of her parents before she was thrust into a final night with him. He was prone to miss these things, emotional details that should be no different than factual observations such as the color of grass or the distance between two trees, but he was oblivious when it came to noticing feelings. He supposed it was a true testament of his companions’ patience and love that each one of them had put up with him for so long.

He briefly wondered how long Bill would stay with him. He frowned, squashing the thought like spitting out a particularly mushy pear. Thinking about endings was never pleasant. He hated endings.

And then there were Nardole and Missy. He could admit it now, after having this time away — this time that he didn’t think he would have to evaluate and examine himself, with no excuse of needing to run from monsters or save the world because, well, he had a time machine — that both of them were as much his companions as the others. Far be it for the android to show his softer side or for Missy to admit to caring, sometimes, not much at all but still a little bit every once in a while. Yet these two currently not-quite-friends most certainly brought good into his life, coaxed out the best in him: Nardole by being his conscience and Missy his anti-conscience.

He’d had a lot of time to think, these past months that he stayed on D0073D0-J to help the Silurians rebuild some semblance of a life they had known. Between setting the mining drill on autopilot and waiting for enough ores to be extracted, the Doctor had asked himself many times just what went wrong between him and Missy.

He still didn’t know, to be honest. But he believed he had come closer to the truth.

Bill was appalled when she found out the true nature of Missy’s imprisonment. No amount of I would have had to kill her permanently or she doesn’t get bored, trust me was enough to deflate those horrified eyes back to their normal size. It was easy to dismiss Bill at first, using Time Lord logic to justify that no human could truly understand the resilience of his kind, especially a survivor like Missy. But Bill was always much better at the emotional stuff than he was. If she was so disturbed at his and Missy’s arrangement, then maybe it wasn’t what normal people would think up. Maybe Missy did get lonely and needed interaction with the outside world in order to change — and change on her own terms, Missy’s voice inside his head pointed out, as she was wont to do so often these days.

Maybe he could reintegrate Missy back into society, offer to take her on some test runs just to make sure it wasn’t all an act, then slowly incorporate her into his adventures with Bill and Nardole.

Maybe, he thought, even if it wasn’t yet time for them to become friends again, it could be time for Missy to be treated as the equal that he never stopped thinking her to be.

In the distance, a group of Silurians cheered and clapped, celebrating the grand opening of the water purification plant that they had constructed. The Doctor smiled to himself, happy for these brave pioneers who were beginning life anew in a foreign galaxy. Life forms in all of existence were so insistent on ceremonies, as if the cutting of a ribbon would increase the operational success of the plant. He thought back to the endless rituals performed with pomp and arrogance in high-collared robes. Time Lords were the guiltiest of them all.

A Silurian elder approached him. “Will you be joining us at the banquet, Doctor?”

He was the Doctor to them now. He’d earned this title among them.

“That is very gracious of you, Srret, but I’m afraid I must be on my way. Duty calls.”

“But the people! They would all like to say goodbye to you.”

He trailed his gaze toward the water plant, then followed the curve of a footpath down to a school and a hospital. New life on a new planet that he had helped to build. These Silurians would never set foot on Earth again.

He placed a hand on Srret’s shoulder, gave it a squeeze in thanks. “Thank you. I suppose one final meal wouldn’t hurt.”

Time machine. What was a few more hours if it would bring joy and stoke hope for these people to face the challenges of an unknown future to come?

-

Missy looked disapprovingly at both lizard and donkey. “Staying behind was not an option,” she scolded. “And not a peep from you again about wanting to see the human boy. That was also not on the menu.”

“But ma'am, your box, it’s a time machine! You can take me to my parents after I see Tzakhi.”

“Who says I’m going to make a special trip just for you?”

“But –”

“Silence, you stupid girl! And you too.” She fixed Korg her sternest glare. She was almost impressed that the donkey held his own for a full three seconds before lowering his head. “Get out of here, both of you. Go directly to my palace and don’t let a single human see you.”

Missy turned and walked down the tunnel that led to the armory, trusting that the two delinquents would do as they were told. Her hands were balled so tightly into fists that she could probably manage a good dent on some primitive Earth metal. But pain was good. Pain focused her mind on stomping one boot in front of the other and not to give into the itch that was burning like fire at the tip of her fingers, that long forgotten but oh so familiar urge to wrap her hand around the blaster and just kill, kill, kill.

She had gotten rid of people who crossed her for lesser crimes than this, had hardly given thought to any of her executions back when the Master roamed the universe in conquest. What was happening to this regeneration, with all these thoughts about restraint and consequences?

She refused to call this being good. There were strategic reasons for sparing their lives — Korg’s survival was written in the history books, and it simply wouldn’t do to kill a Silurian when she needed to work with the warriors of their kind. But it was one thing to give reasons to her non-action and quite another to suppress her rage. Missy swung her right leg and kicked the tunnel with the full measure of her fury. As soon as her boot connected with stone, something like a light switch flipped on inside her and her world was suddenly aglow with nothing but the screams of her raw nerves. For a few blessed seconds, she luxuriated in the way her synapses took a hold of the pain and hurled it straight into her hearts. Her entire body thrummed in response, and she reveled in the thrill that she had almost forgotten. Her toes were burning and throbbing like the fire behind her eyelids. Her mind blazed.

It was during times like this that she really missed her former self. Harold Saxon would sniff out that thrill like a hound scenting a path after blood. He would never be so prudent about listening to reason and reining in his anger. Heck, even her newly regenerated current self would have demanded the donkey and the girl to say something nice and be done with it.

After the last of the tingles subsided, Missy hobbled her way to the forked path. She could hear the seventy or so of the remaining Silurians up ahead to the right, amateur warriors boasting about using this and that weapon to impale the apes. She scoffed. She didn’t doubt the lizards’ intent of gut-skewering, but their bravado was child’s play. Wait until they actually saw disemboweled human innards. Then let’s see if any of them weren’t so preoccupied with turning up the content of their own stomachs to still be able to boast.

She took out her sonic umbrella from her travel sack as she made her way silently down the path to the right. When she reached the threshold of the armory, she pointed the umbrella at the glowing teleportation pad and replicated a copy of the data that she had tricked the Doctor into uploading onto the device. She smiled as the reading registered three force fields each set up around a weak spot on the Earth’s surface. The egg man had some use after all.

Only hostile Silurians remained, exactly as it should be. Certain that all the pieces of her plan had fallen into place, Missy straightened herself, plastered on a faux-bright smile, and entered the armory.

-

“Doctor!” Korg exclaimed as the TARDIS materialized between him and the teleportation pad he was heading toward that would take him and Kaeta back to Missy’s palace. The Doctor who was just popping out of the ship looked grimier and had longer hair compared to just minutes ago. Korg reminded himself that this was a Time Lord operating a time machine. Who could tell how many months or years had passed? One thing was fairly certain. Judging by the lack of reptiles meandering around the interior of the ship, this must mean that the Silurians had successfully settled on Dodo.

“How long have I been gone?” the Doctor asked.

“Long enough for me to calm Kaeta down after Missy screamed at her and made her cry,” he huffed, swinging his neck around to catch a glimpse of the sleeping girl to make sure she was still lying securely on his back.

“You’re both still alive. Consider it a blessing.” The Doctor pinned him with a glare, clearly not pleased at them either. “Where’s Missy?”

“With the Silurian warriors. They should be in the armory.”

“I doubt they’re still there.” The Doctor stuck a finger into his mouth then held it up in the air. “Morning. Two hours after sunrise. A Thursday, I believe, though days of the week are pesky little things. Probably less than an hour before everything is going to happen.”

He rushed back inside the TARDIS. Things were quiet for a few seconds, then the Doctor poked out his head, his eyebrows somehow conveying both confusion and impatience. “Well? Come on!”

“What do you mean –”

“TARDIS. Inside. Now. Safest place you can be when things are about to blow up to shit.”

“But Missy –”

“I’ll deal with her. Get inside. We have no time to waste.”

As Korg stepped inside the TARDIS with great reluctance, he wondered if the two Time Lords ever traveled with anyone other than each other. He felt sorry for whoever that person was, for being stuck in the crossfire whenever the two of them disagreed on something, which he was beginning to gather to be quite often. He walked toward a chair and shrugged Kaeta onto it, then braced himself for his first actual ride in a time machine.

-

The early morning sun painted the sky with beautiful colors of joy and optimism, subtle tints of pink and pastel purple not yet overpowered by the scorching heat that was to come. Nardole wondered if all humans saw the sky the same way he did, with so many layers of color and mood indicators. But even the most starry-eyed romantic in him knew that today would turn out to be nothing like the deceptively peaceful sky. Any minute now, Tzakhi would burst into his tent announcing that it was time for them to go to the center of the community for a general assembly. Specifically, Tzakhi and his family would stand near Korah’s tent to await a verdict of some sort from their god. Nardole could only hope that the shields he’d set up around the three tents were strong enough to keep the Silurians from breaking out. As for the humans who would be standing inside the barriers, well, those he wouldn’t be able to help. He felt a sickness in his stomach. No matter what he did to minimize damage, humans would still get swallowed by the ground today.

Where was the Doctor when he needed him? He hadn’t heard a peep from the Time Lord after he barged in a day ago, shoving his face in here for less than a minute to take some readings from him and snatch back his sonic sunglasses. Nardole had been checking his mobile phone throughout the night, hoping that the Doctor would remember this particular method of communication that was ubiquitous in Bristol. Apparently technology was just as easily forgotten as people once they were out of sight. Nardole supposed he could call the TARDIS, but even he had to admit that the Doctor may have rigged his calls to always be routed straight to voicemail. Voicemail was the equivalent of a black hole when it came to a certain Time Lord.

And so he supposed he must keep waiting for the Doctor to turn up to miraculously save the day. He would do his part in the meantime, keeping Tzakhi as far away from his uncle’s tent as possible. Hopefully his status as an outsider would get him assigned to a spot very far away from where the ground would open up, and if he had to lock Tzakhi into a bear hug to keep him by his side he would absolutely do it, consequences be damned.

The flap of his tent flew open. “Nardole! Come on, we’re going to be late!”

He shoved his mobile back into his sack. “Just give me a moment, Tzakhi. Let me put on a hat. Big day today, wouldn’t want to be disrespectful to your elders.”

“Pink’s not really a good color on you,” Tzakhi said, the cheeky whelp.

“This color is called salmon,” he corrected, though it wasn’t like they were near a body of water for him to catch one for show and tell. “And I’ve worn this outfit many times since I got here. No one has said anything bad about it. I reckon it’s your fashion taste that needs changing.” He put on his matching hat, angling it just right so that the tassels on both sides were dangling right in front of his ears. “Right, all done. Remember what I said yesterday? I’m going to be very nervous, so stay near me in case I need to hold your hand.”

Tzakhi rolled his eyes. “You’re not scared. Just find me when you get there.”

“Wait, you’re not walking with me?”

“This is a family assembly! I have to be with my family’s tribe and clan. It’s okay though. You can find us there and stand with us. They’re used to seeing you with me even though you’re an alien.”

Well, this complicated things. This meant he would need to get to the very front of the assembly in order to keep an eye on Tzakhi.

“Are you sure –”

A woman’s voice called out Tzakhi’s name from several tents away.

“I have to go. See ya!” Tzakhi disappeared into the other side of the tent flap. “Coming, Imma!” he shouted, excitement in every syllable and Nardole had no problem imagining the extra bounce in his steps today, a little boy so excited to be at the front of the assembly in anticipation of witnessing tribal honor being bestowed upon his family. Times like these were when Nardole had to remind himself that Tzakhi was a human boy who very much belonged to this era of human history, wearing his people’s culture and tradition like a second layer of skin. Keep Tzakhi safe, he repeated the phrase over and over, the voice inside his head sounding more and more like the Doctor’s. He could see the truth clearly now: keeping Tzakhi safe was indeed within his ability; keeping him from shock and sadness, however, was simply impossible.

-

Missy waited by the teleporter outside of the armory until the last of the Silurian warriors had stepped through into the place of the planned explosion. Based on the data she collected with her umbrella, all seventy of them had just materialized into a spacious chamber of cryogenic pods that happened to be located right underneath one of the tent humans’ dwelling places. The other two weak spots on Earth’s surface weren’t too far away, which meant she could divide the group into three and assign each group to blast their way aboveground to swallow up — or down, in this case — some unlucky apes into the Silurians’ underground sprawl. Everything up until this point would be perfectly in line with what was recorded in history. Beyond that, it was really up to how competent the egg was at setting up those shields.

Missy glanced around the armory one last time. All clear. She readied herself as she stepped on the teleportation pad to join the Silurian warriors, putting on a smile as she dematerialized and then reappeared –

“Hello, there, John Smith. Welcome back from Dodo! I see that you are quite... tied up at the moment.” Her smile turned into a smirk as smugness washed over her at the sight of having bested her counterpart at the game of surprise. She was never going to get tired of seeing him bound and chained, was she? Did he think she wouldn’t warn the Silurians ahead of time and provide them with metal chains along with thorough instructions on how to surround, capture, and tie up the prisoner John Smith the moment they materialized on the other side of the teleportation pad?

Of course she knew the Doctor was back. She knew it the moment she switched from speaking Silurian to English some minutes ago and the lizards had no difficulty understanding her. And where else would the Doctor steer his TARDIS but right into where the action was going to be?

She decided to ignore him for the moment. “General Gan, we have landed in the strategic location that I briefed you and your warriors about. There are three spots that my readings have indicated are ideal for invasion. Please, kindly divide your fighters into three groups.”

Gan, who by now was thoroughly impressed with her competence, nodded and proceeded to carry out her order. Missy was pleased that the Doctor was here to witness her ascension among the Silurians.

After a long moment of observing the Silurians getting into formation, Missy walked up to her true target. “So good for you to show up, my dear Doctor, opening up the TARDIS door to give us light in this chamber. Tell me, is everything settled on Dodo?”

The question was genuine. The Doctor must have sensed it, for his expression softened from greatly disapproving to neutral.

“I stayed with them for several months. They’ve built homes and factories and schools. The engineers replicated the water delivery system. Srret has taken over as the new leader. He’s very capable and charismatic. The Silurians are in good hands.” The Doctor looked around, furrowed his brows. “Where is Euldvar?”

Ah, she didn’t expect him to notice so quickly. She turned her attention to Gan, who was dividing up the warriors into three groups. “Three holes in the ground, three human rebel leaders and their families get eaten. Not a single deviation from history. Admit it. Things are working out exactly as they should be.”

The Doctor’s eyes had turned icy, she could feel it.

“What have you done with Euldvar?”

Gan was now distributing detonation devices to the appointed leader of each group. They had already been programmed to explode upon impact with hard surfaces, along with a teensy tweak Missy had added that would interdimensionally transport all debris from the explosion into the closest black hole, the perfect method to dispose of unwanted waste.

“The Silurians will capture the humans who fall through the holes. If your egg man did his job, then no one else will get hurt.”

“I asked about Euldvar, not the invasion.”

Missy squeezed her eyes shut for some seconds, hearing the thump-thump-thump-thump of her hearts as the sounds of the Silurians strategizing faded into the background. Euldvar had been against using violence. He had argued passionately for negotiating with the humans up until his dying breath. He was starting to sway the hearts and minds of the younger Silurian warriors, those who had never been in battle. If they had turned, then any hold she managed to gain over Gan would have been lost. There was no other way. She needed to maintain her authority among the Silurians.

She opened her eyes with determination. There was no other way.

She turned to her erstwhile executioner. “Doctor, when you first heard Euldvar’s name, you wondered where you have come across it before. I saw it on your face, you were so preoccupied with trying to figure out why you knew the name.” She paused, waiting to see if the Doctor had finally caught on. His eyes were darting about, taking in the Silurians preparing to initiate invasion while his mind was working working working to sift through past memories for anything remotely associated with the name Euldvar. His hands, too, were busy behind his body, trying to wiggle their way into freeing at least one wrist from the chains. Missy glanced at Gan. She hadn’t yet dispatched two of the groups into the other locations. They still had plenty of time to take care of business from the past.

“When Rafando found me, I was hiding out in some corner of the far future.” At this, the Doctor’s eyes suddenly sparked into focus. He was catching on. “Those men charged me with a long list of crimes but they were too incompetent to hone in on my relative timeline. I protested against a few charges, one in particular was the death of a certain Silurian leader. I objected to being sentenced to death for something I had not yet done, or would ever get to do in an aborted timeline since they had captured me.” She paused, letting it all sink in. “You demanded to see my charges before executing me, didn’t you? That was when you first saw the name.”

Those eyes now projected pure horror. “You...”

“I’ve already been executed for the crime, I figured I may as well commit it.”

“Euldvar! You - You killed him!”

“I took care of the sole dissenter on behalf of Gan. She needed to rally her group’s morale and I needed to establish authority among them. It was quick and painless. Really, Doctor, try to understand –” She reached out an arm. The Doctor backed away before any contact was made.

“Stay away from me!” he hissed.

“As you wish,” Missy said airily as she let her arm drop to the side and turned back to observe the Silurians. One group had just been given the coordinates to walk deeper into a tunnel leading away from the chamber. Invasion should happen in ten minutes or so.

It was easier to focus on the military actions before her. They were simple. Gan gave orders, her subordinates followed. The Silurians’ operation had none of the push and pull that seemed to plague every interaction she had with the Doctor, even cut-and-dry ones that were perfectly obvious to her, because regardless of why and how and what worse things would have resulted if she hadn’t done what she did, Missy had violated the Doctor’s moral code and thus Missy was once again evil and bad.

She heard a long intake of breath. Typical. The world as the humans knew it was minutes away from being invaded and the Doctor was preparing for one of his monologues. At least it was consistent across almost all of his regenerations. Missy pretended not to listen.

“I stayed at D0073D0-J for almost two years. The Silurians needed my help to rebuild their lives. I was happy to help. We started with the basics: shelters and homes, greenhouses, basic vehicles, a town center for gathering and exchanging goods. Everybody cooperated. Thousands of Silurians contributed their resources and skills to build a new world. We then moved onto bigger things. Ore mines and smelting plants and setting up pipes for water delivery. Then someone suggested schools and we built two. Others saw the need for a hospital and a group of Silurians made it happen. Businesses were founded and flourished. The farms weren’t like the ones they were used to on Earth but the Silurians adapted, figured out how to cultivate crops with different soil compositions and practically invented five or six new plant species.

“Things didn’t happen overnight. There were setbacks and failed attempts. Children and the elderly got sick and died. People hoarded and stole from one another. Srret had to appoint the elders to hold court and convene a senate to establish a new code of law. But none of the bad things negated how amazing the Silurians were, how brave of them to commit themselves to a future full of uncertainties.

“Almost two years, Missy. Twenty-two months! I’ve had a lot of time to think, about what you did. You didn’t just de-hibernate the Silurians. You gave them back their lives. I was the one who was afraid of the risk. I couldn’t let go of my prejudice against the Silurians from different times and places to give this group a chance. But you did. You saw their need for self-determination and gave them a chance. And you know what? Up until the moment I came back and landed my TARDIS in this room, I really believed it, believed you. I thought you’ve changed.”

He let out a laugh. It was nothing like the chuckle that she had come to know even when her eyes were closed and she was pretending to be asleep on the couch in the vault. This one was bitter and full of cynicism, betraying the disillusionment of a very tired Doctor.

“I’m a fool. I was too blind to see that you never cared. You de-hibernated the Silurians for no other reason than to cause chaos. And here I was building up my hopes on that planet, thinking that when I return we can try something different. Do you know what I thought about? I thought maybe I could convince you to come with me. Then I can bring you into the TARDIS on a more regular basis, let you do a few test runs and if that goes well, then we can travel to every star in the universe together. I thought it would be good to let you out, to be around more than just Nardole and me. To give you that self-determination you’ve fought so hard for on behalf of the Silurians.”

He laughed again. This time, the cynicism was replaced by an edge of hysteria. “Oh Doctor, Doctor. You’re such a fool. Well, guess what? You win, Missy. Isn’t this what you’ve always wanted? You. Win. You’ve blindsided me well and good. Congratulations.”

Missy tried her best to ignore the Doctor, to not let his words have an impact on her. Yet a lump was undeniably forming in her throat. Was this what it felt like to have everything one wished for? She had her freedom, conquered her human town, took command over the Silurians, succeeded in every way to make history happen the way it should, and any moment now, she could activate her vortex manipulator and get very far away from this time and place. Every single one of these accomplishments was hard earned. She won. She should be thrilled, proud of herself, exhilarated.

Winning felt miserable.

A second team of Silurians was sent into the tunnel. She glanced at the Doctor. He wasn’t doing anything to stop them.

“Nardole’s force fields will hold,” he explained, answered the unspoken question.

“You have so much faith in the egg man.”

“I trust him fully.”

His words — or rather, what he did not say — hurled like arrows into her hearts. He didn’t trust her, would probably never trust her again. It shouldn’t matter. It didn’t matter. Missy was her own judge and validator and no other being in the universe could hold that power over her. But who was she fooling? Lies. Her hearts were maintained by the Doctor. She’d said this many years ago, long before she agreed to turn good.

She was losing. Even as she was winning and winning she had lost. She had committed one too many act that the Doctor disapproved, and now he wouldn’t even fight her to stop the Silurians. Nardole would stop the lizards from attacking the humans. And would Nardole then deal with Gan afterwards? Would Nardole think of a way to prevent the Silurians from ever attacking humans again? Would Nardole try to get the two sides to agree to negotiate while the Doctor proudly looked on?

Well, what did she care?

“Turn around. I’ll get you out of those chains.”

“You have your umbrella. Use it.” Don’t touch me.

Missy pointed her umbrella at the lock and freed the Doctor.

The Doctor walked up to Gan. One last attempt to stop a war, the idiot. Gan stopped him before he could utter a syllable.

“The answer is no.” She unsheathed her weapon, pointed it at the Doctor. “Now back off or I will use this on you as practice before I do the same with the rest of the apes.”

Missy knew how ruthless Gan was and how stubborn the Doctor could be. She didn’t need a war to break out before the proper one began. “John Smith, back off!” she commanded, hated how weak she sounded even to her own ears. When the Doctor didn’t move after many seconds, she added telepathically, pleaded: please.

The Doctor looked up at Gan. “I want to believe that you are an honorable Silurian, that you are open to other ideas of coexisting with the humans. But who knows? I very well may be wrong. Rassilon knows I’ve been wrong about many things lately. Just know that the offer to relocate is still open,” he said, searched Gan’s face for the ‘no’ that he knew he would find before shaking his head and resigned himself to backing down.

From within the tunnels, two groups of Silurians signaled that they were in position. Missy met Gan’s gaze. They were ready. She nodded.

Gan bellowed, a howl that started like the rumbling of rocks then grew into piercing thunders. Answering cries sounded from beyond the tunnels. Seconds later, all of the group leaders hurled their detonating devices against the ceiling, and the Earth exploded.

-

Tzakhi was standing at the front of the assembly, excitement etched on his face. Nardole kept checking the barriers around Korah’s tent with the enhanced vision setting on his glasses. The boy was outside the boundary of the force field. Good. This was the best he could do. The three rebel leaders and their families were standing right in front of their tents and therefore inside the force fields. Unless he could figure out a way to drag all of them out and away, these poor humans were going to fall through to the underground very soon.

The Doctor had better do his part and catch the rebels from below the Earth’s surface.

Moses was giving a command now, telling everyone to back away from the rebels’ tents. A sensible directive, Nardole nodded, as he approached Tzakhi from behind and stood ready to pull him back. Tzakhi was not part of Korah’s nuclear family; he should be safe.

Moses was now predicting that the ground would open up and Nardole wondered how he knew this. He decided he wanted nothing to do with the being guarding over the Israelites and how this being’s knowledge extended to the shenanigans of the Silurians beneath Earth’s surface. He would accept the ground opening up as fact because this was what the Doctor knew from the future. That the Silurians would emerge was a bit too much for him to think about now. How many Silurians were they talking about? He realized the Doctor never did say. Would the humans soon be invaded by tens, hundreds, or maybe even thousands of giant lizards?

As an android, Nardole had enhanced senses in every way. Which was why before Moses was finished with his speech, he could already feel the crumbling of the ground near him, heard three distinct booms of detonation, and by the time he smelled burnt rocks and caught the first crack of the ground breaking open, he had his arms wrapped tightly around Tzakhi and was pulling him back from a giant hole that opened up right where his uncle’s tent used to be. Within the blink of an eye, everything within the force field was gone.

Screams. He could identify individual screams both near and far. But not Tzakhi. Tzakhi was too stunned to make any sound, his eyes bulging in horror and his mouth hanging open. He was so young. Had he seen death before? Nardole held him tighter and was relieved when tiny arms wrapped over his. “It’s okay,” he whispered in Tzakhi’s ear. “Remember the Doctor? He’s going to take care of the people who fell. Trust me. Trust him, he’s the Doctor.”

It took Nardole a few seconds to realize that the screams he heard in his ears had changed; the pitches had gone higher and the sounds were now tinged with more horror. He followed the path of Tzakhi’s still-wide eyes to the hole and took in the sight before him. Silurians, tens of them, had climbed onto the surface and wielding weapons — unsuccessfully, thank heavens — against the force field.

“K-Kaeta...” Nardole heard. It was all Tzakhi could utter. He was seeing invaders who looked like Kaeta and realized that his friend belonged to a species that was hostile to humans. Nardole knew this feeling well, the moment when the bitter truth knocked one’s stomach all the way down to the sole of one’s foot. Nothing he said would take away that sinking feeling, but it didn’t mean he wasn’t going to try. “Not all Silurians are bad. We’ve discussed this before. Kaeta’s a good Silurian. She’s still your friend.”

“B-But these are her family...”

“We don’t know that. They may not be her relatives at all.” He tugged Tzakhi up to his feet. “Come on, let’s go. Follow your people and run back to your tent. Just be careful not to fall over and get stepped on, yeah? There’s no need to worry. No one else is going to get eaten by the ground. I know because I set up the force fields. Look, the Silurians aren’t able to break out of the containment. See?”

As soon as he said this, more screams erupted from the other side of the humans’ worship structure, where the rest of the rebels were standing. Nardole turned his head and looked, and all he could see was fire, fire everywhere. He cursed himself for being so careless. He should have blocked fire from coming through the barriers. He hadn’t planned on the Silurians using anything other than metal as their weapons –

“Nardole!”

Someone was calling his name from under the ground. That voice. If he wasn’t mistaken...

“Nardole, listen, it’s me, the Doctor. I’m using a frequency that only you can hear. If my signal is reaching you, then do this for me. I’ve used the TARDIS to, ah, coat the three holes with temporal energy. Just think of it as sending up rain through the rocks. Wait. Bad example. It’s nothing remotely like that. It’s basically the Time Lord’s version of creating dimensional distortion. You know what? Never mind. You don’t have to understand any of this. I need you to get to each of the holes then change the setting on your glasses to close range vision. Yes, it’s the setting you never use and yes, I may have fiddled with it but I’ll explain later. Once you get to a location, press down on that setting for seven seconds while looking directly into the hole. It’s going to cause the force shield to cave in on itself and send the Silurians back underground. The temporal distortion will take care of the rest and close up the ground. Do this for all three locations. Hurry. Oh and thank you, Nardole. You are brilliant, I don’t say this enough. I will see you soon – oh, no no no you don’t, come back here, you –”

The signal cut off, leaving Nardole to wonder just who else the Doctor was with besides possibly Missy. That sounded more like a yell targeted at a child. Could it be...

“Focus, Nardie, focus on the important things!” he scolded himself. Looking down at a very puzzled Tzakhi, he explained, “The Doctor just sent me a message that no one but me can hear. He gave me the solution to taking care of the Silurians. See? Didn’t I tell you that the Doctor will come through for you humans? I need to do something for the Doctor. Don’t follow me, you understand? Good.”

He ran to the farthest hole first, Dathan’s tent where there was the most fire damage. Close range vision setting, press down, hold for seven seconds, look into the hole. At precisely seven seconds, a bright light broke through the barrier and created another wall that wrapped around the Silurians, only this one also sucked them back into their world and repaired the ground after it.

One hole closed, two more to go.

Nardole ran to Abiram’s tent next and repeated the actions. The humans around him were still running around in panic and shouting that they would be eaten up next, that is to say, no one was paying attention to him. Close range vision setting, press down, hold for seven seconds, look into the hole. Another group of Silurians sent back underground and hole closed up.

He ran back to Korah’s tent and was about to repeat the same procedure when he noticed that the Silurians there had gone back down, probably realizing from what happened at the other two locations that they weren’t going to win today’s battle. Having a clear view into the underground, he could see a little girl riding on a donkey. The girl was staring up at him and Nardole knew instantly that Tzakhi must not be allowed to see her –

“Kaeta!” Tzakhi’s voice screamed from behind him as the boy ran up to the hole at the precise moment she looked up and shouted, “Tzakhi!”

Too late.

“No!” Nardole yelled just as he heard the Doctor screaming the same from underground. Tzakhi was gone in a blur, launching himself straight toward Kaeta.

Nardole’s glasses beeped. Close range vision setting was still on; he had been staring at the hole as Tzakhi made his way down. The ground was about to close up and everyone he cared about was down there.

Without giving it another thought, Nardole ran inside the barrier and jumped down the hole a split second before the temporal energy sealed up the Earth above him.

Chapter Text

“Tzakhi! Tzakhi, are you alright?”

Tzakhi tumbled onto the ground and rubbed his eyes. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine,” he said automatically, not sensing any pain. It was strange, jumping into a hole where the air underneath him was squishy and soft. He didn’t fall. He just sort of... floated down. Maybe this was a special power of Kaeta’s people.

Tzakhi heard his name again and tried to blink into being able to see in the dark. Someone, a different voice, was whimpering not too far away from him. It sounded like his little sister even though he knew it was Nardole. Wasn’t he supposed to be over a hundred years old? Nardole was weird. Grownups weren’t supposed to cry.

“Over here!”

Tzakhi lifted his head. He could see clearly now even though everything was less colorful in here than outside. But he knew a donkey when he saw one, and sitting on top of the donkey was –

Scrambling to his feet, he ran into what looked like a tunnel and directly at a familiar face at the end of it.

“Kaeta! I knew you’d be here!”

“Tzakhi!” Kaeta smiled brightly. She looked just as he remembered, except this time she was glowing in health and no longer sick. He was about to ask how she was feeling when she patted the donkey’s neck. “Mr. Korg, let me down! I want to talk to Tzakhi.”

The donkey lowered the front part of its body and tilted its behind upward. “This is as low as I can get. You can jump down from here,” it grunted, and Tzakhi’s eyes went wide. Donkeys could talk?

Kaeta wrapped her arms around the donkey’s neck as soon as she got down. “Thank you, Mr. Korg!” The donkey gave another grunt. This one sounded like he was embarrassed.

They were the same height again, same arms and legs and head, same everything except she was scaly and had an extra eye. But things were different. Last time, he looked at someone who was clearly an alien and ended up finding so many similarities between the two of them. This time, all he could think of was that third eye and how it meant she belonged to a people that wanted to invade his people.

“Tzakhi? What’s wrong?”

He dropped his head. If he looked only at Kaeta’s feet, then she was no different than any other person. The shoes were different than the sandals he was wearing, but they were feet, the familiar shape of ankles and legs used for walking. Going by that alone, he would never guess that the person on top was scaly and mud-brown and had three eyes.

He reminded himself that Kaeta wasn’t like those big lizard people that he saw earlier, angry ones waving their swords around and shooting fireballs. Kaeta was his friend.

“Did I do something wrong?”

Tzakhi shook his head.

“So why are you...”

“Your people. You hate us,” he mumbled to the ground.

Those feet shuffled. “Oh.”

From the other side of the tunnel, Tzakhi could hear a lot of shouting. A voice — it sounded like the Doctor’s — was yelling something about dropping weapons. Those lizard people had big swords. He didn’t remember seeing Uncle Korah or any of his relatives carrying anything. How were they supposed to fight the Silurians if they didn’t have anything to fight with?

He didn’t feel brave enough to follow the sounds and go see what was happening. But he couldn’t just stand here. Maybe he could get help from Moses and Aaron.

“Do you know how to get me back outside?”

Kaeta shook her head. “There’s a hole at the elders’ command room. That one didn’t close up but it’s far away.”

There were screams now and some of them sounded like his cousins’. Then a lot of people started talking at the same time and everyone was trying to shout over one another. He could hear Nardole because his pitch had gone high. He only sounded like this whenever he was afraid.

“Can you stop this?” he pleaded, but all Kaeta did was bite down on her lower lip. There was another squeak. He felt bad because Nardole wasn’t part of his family and he wouldn’t fall underground if it wasn’t for him. It was him who dragged Nardole to the assembly. The Doctor was yelling again, saying something about a misunderstanding. It didn’t sound like anyone was listening to him.

It was Kaeta’s turn to stare at the ground, and as she did so, she looked like she had gotten farther away even though she hadn’t moved. It was like there was a wall separating them now, like they really were on two different sides.

The donkey went up to Kaeta and bumped his head gently against her shoulder. “I’m supposed to take you to safety. Get on.”

“But –”

“Come on, I’ll take Tzakhi too. You can both get on.”

And leave his relatives behind?

He couldn’t, not when Imma and Abba had taught him to always do the right thing, and leaving his relatives while they were in danger was wrong. But what could he do when even the grownups were in trouble? He was no match for the Silurians. The moment he stepped into that other side where the noises were coming from, a Silurian was going to attack him.

He smiled at Kaeta when she and the donkey approached him, hoping that it was a smile and not something opposite. He really liked Kaeta. And he was glad that this talking donkey was going to take her to safety. He gave the noisy area beyond the tunnel a nervous glance. He had no idea what he was going to do, but he supposed this was goodbye.

“Tzakhi, come on!”

“I can’t. My uncle is over there.”

“And so is General Gan! She’s the strongest of our warriors. You can’t just walk in there. She’ll kill you!”

“So what am I going to do?” he shouted and immediately regretted it. It wasn’t Kaeta he was yelling at. What she said was true. What good would it be to get himself killed? He didn’t know. His mind felt like it was being buried by a sandstorm and he could no longer think, just react. He wasn’t angry. He was just scared. “Sorry, I...”

Sticking with family was the right thing to do. But he wasn’t brave enough to do it. He looked up at Kaeta. “You go. I’ll stay here.”

Kaeta’s top eye was glowing. He didn’t know what it meant. The last time he saw that, she got sick and almost started to cry. Maybe this eye gave off signals when a Silurian was having bad feelings. If this was correct, then he was making Kaeta feel horrible and being a bad friend.

But Kaeta didn’t cry. Instead, she had her thinking face on until her eye stopped glowing and she looked a lot calmer. Shuffling backward on the donkey, she patted the space in front of her.

“Get on, Tzakhi. We’ll go in together.”

“What?!” That came from the donkey, who said exactly what Tzakhi was thinking.

Kaeta jutted her chin forward and sounded very sure. “Mr. Korg, we can’t leave Tzakhi all by himself. He wants to go to his family, so we’ll go with him.”

“But you’ll die, both of you!” the donkey — Mr. Korg was his name, he supposed — exclaimed. Mr. Korg was right. This General Gan, she didn’t sound nice at all. What if she not only killed humans, but her own kind too?

Tzakhi looked around. On the other side of this space was another tunnel. He had no idea where that one led, but any tunnel was better than this one. Too bad he couldn’t go with them.

“Maybe it’s better if Mr. Korg takes you to safety.”

For a long time, Kaeta didn’t say anything and Tzakhi wondered if he succeeded in convincing her. He remembered the stories that he loved growing up, stories about how the hero would leave on journeys not knowing what was ahead. Was this what he was supposed to do, to walk into the tunnel and leave what was safe and certain behind? But he wasn’t a hero, he was a boy. And his legs were very much not moving forward.

“Tzakhi.” Kaeta’s voice pulled him out of his childhood stories. “Your favorite color is blue.”

It had nothing to do with what they were talking about, but... she remembered!

“And yours is green.”

She nodded. “And you brought me to Missy when I got sick.”

Missy? Who was Missy? Maybe Kaeta was confused about the Doctor’s name. She was delirious when he dragged her to the TARDIS after all. It didn’t matter. “I’m glad you’re all better.”

“I am.” They stared at each other, and Tzakhi thought back to the first time they met, when neither of them knew what to think about the strange-looking person in front of them. Judging by Kaeta’s look, she was remembering that time too.

The noises on the other side were getting fiercer.

“Are we still friends, Tzakhi?”

He answered immediately, “Of course we are. Friends forever.”

“Friends forever.” Kaeta patted the spot a second time. “So we stay together. Come on.”

Tentatively, Tzakhi placed a palm flat on the donkey’s back and lifted his other arm. Kaeta grasped him by the wrist, and with her pulling and his pushing, he climbed on.

“This is a horrible idea,” Mr. Korg sulked as he took them on the slowest ride Tzakhi had ever had in all the times he had been on a four-legged animal. With so much hesitation that came with each step, he was surprised they weren’t going backwards.

“It’s the only idea we have,” Tzakhi pointed out. “So did you ever find your family?” he asked, trying to lighten the mood.

“I did!” Kaeta said. Even though he couldn’t see her face, he could hear the smile that was there. “Missy asked her helper to take them to a different planet. I’m going to join them later.”

“Who is Missy?”

“She’s a very pretty lady. She’s sometimes mean and scary but I like her. She’s a queen and a goddess. She’s not an ape — she gets angry if you call her one. I actually think it’s easy to tell that she’s different. Her skin is much paler than you and your people. Oh! And she has a ship that looks like a blue box.”

“The TARDIS? But that’s the Doctor’s!”

“Who’s the Doctor?”

“He’s, er –” How should he describe the Doctor? He was weird just like Nardole and was cross and funny in a different way than Nardole. Should he say the Doctor was an ape, just to give a visual? But Tzakhi was pretty sure being an alien meant the Doctor wasn’t what a Silurian would consider an ape... “He’s old.”

“Missy has an assistant called John Smith. He’s old too.”

“Maybe the Doctor is John Smith?”

He felt Kaeta move her shoulders. “Maybe.”

“Does he have white hair?”

“For you apes, all the old ones have white hair.”

“That’s not true! Nardole is over a hundred years old and he doesn’t have white hair.”

“Who’s Nardole?”

“You two, hush!” Mr. Korg cut in. They were almost there.

Something wasn’t right. They were so close to where all the fighting was happening, but as they got closer, the noises didn’t get any louder. Instead, it was so quiet that the fighting may be all done.

No! Tzakhi felt cold all of a sudden. “Do you think –”

“Don’t. Guessing will only make things worse in your head. We’ll find out what’s going on when we get there.” Mr. Korg sounded like a grownup all of a sudden, a brave one. And so Tzakhi rubbed his mane and said okay.

Sound came back when they reached the end of the tunnel. His guess was right, there was no more fighting, only voices. Tzakhi thought back to what his elders told him about war and battles. When one side became the winners — it was obvious who won here — sometimes they would capture the losers and use them as trade-backs for things they wanted from the losers. What was that word that Nardole taught him? Negotiate. Yes, maybe they were doing negotiate right now.

Mr. Korg stopped right before they were going to move out of the shadows and all three of them started listening. The Doctor was talking. Tzakhi could hear him pleading about getting along between species but he was cut off by a loud and horrible laugh. That other voice then said it was impossible to coexist with apes, so whoever was talking must be a Silurian. The Doctor kept going and starting talking about being friends with an android. The Silurian voice didn’t sound convinced, saying they all still looked like apes. The Doctor then said the android used to have two heads and had to share it with a robot, and even though Tzakhi knew that Nardole was an android, he was having a hard time picturing Nardole with two heads living inside something called a robot.

“Whom should I kill first?” the Silurian asked, completely ignoring the Doctor and what he was saying, and it was then that he finally heard Uncle Korah’s voice. Tzakhi gasped when Uncle Korah spat and said that God would avenge them all. He shouldn’t have said that. He had no idea how dangerous Silurians were! But the Silurian only laughed. “Tell you what, I’ll be nice and leave your god with some apes to subjugate. You lot here, if any you convince we Silurians to get along with you, then I promise we will never invade you apes again.” This was followed by a lot of voices laughing. Clearly, all the Silurians thought it was a very funny joke.

“What’s so funny?” the Doctor decided to talk again. “You just made a promise, and a promise is a serious thing! It’s like a baby. You make one, you keep it.”

“John Smith, watch your language!” scolded a different female voice. Tzakhi turned around to whisper in Kaeta’s ear: See, John Smith is the Doctor! Kaeta nodded and whispered in his: That’s Missy.

“What? It’s true,” the Doctor continued. “General Gan, I challenge you to make a promise about your promise. If I can prove that I, an ape, am friends with a Silurian, you will stop invading the humans.”

The Silurian — so that was General Gan — scoffed. “You have no proof.”

“Just let me into the blue box. I’ll return, I promise! I’ll bring you my Silurian friend.”

“No.”

General Gan must have given a signal. All of a sudden, there were sounds of metal clanging. The Silurians were taking out their weapons!

“What do we do?” Tzakhi hissed, terrified. He needed to do something, but Mr. Korg wasn’t moving and Kaeta was hugging him from behind so he couldn’t jump off. “They’re going to kill my family!”

“I don’t know!” Kaeta sounded equally as panicked. But she hugged him tighter, wouldn’t let him move at all.

Tzakhi flailed his legs and kicked his heels into Mr. Korg. The donkey made pained voices and he felt bad, but he needed him to move. To do what, he didn’t know, but they didn’t come here just to hide and listen to his relatives die.

“Let go of me!” he said to Kaeta, which only made her hold on more. He wiggled and kicked, thinking only about Uncle Korah and the rest of his family, and by the time he realized that things had gone completely quiet around him, it was too late.

A torch of light blasted into the tunnel and shone right on the three of them.

All eyes were on Tzakhi. The sudden attention was too much and his legs stopped kicking. His mouth was still open in the middle of a shout, but no more sound came out.

General Gan pointed at him. “Why is he not captured?” She tilted her head at the Silurian closest to them. That Silurian bowed and pulled out a sword.

“Stop what you’re doing right now, you stupid donkey!” Missy shouted as Mr. Korg was trying to turn around. Kaeta was right. Missy was scary when she was angry. “Step forward. I order you.”

Breathing quicker, Mr. Korg walked them into the space. It was a big room with stone walls all around, lit by strange lights that weren’t fire. This room was connected to many tunnels. At the center of this space was everyone who had fallen through the holes. Uncle Korah and his aunt and cousins were there. Dathan and Abiram’s families were there. Everyone was tied up, even the Doctor and Nardole, who were being kept separate from his people, off to the side.

Tzakhi’s attention snapped back to the Silurian that was coming toward them. “No, stop!” Kaeta pleaded from behind him. “General Gan, this is the friend I was talking about. Tzakhi, he’s my friend!”

The General spat. “Then you have poor choice in friends. You, take that ape. Quickly.”

Kaeta squeezed her arms around him. “Please! Tzakhi isn’t dangerous! He loves his parents and has a little sister and he likes the blue sky with the sun! He likes to sing songs that his elders taught him and he plays this game with bouncing rocks and jumping that he showed me. He’s a good ape!”

The Silurian with the sword was about to grab his arm when the scary lady shouted, “Halt!” The Silurian became uncertain all of a sudden and switched to pointing his sword at Tzakhi instead.

“Kaeta,” Missy said. “This is your friend, you said?”

“Yes, ma'am,” she answered, her voice quivering.

“Say it louder.”

The arms around him hugged tighter. Kaeta’s breathing was quick and Tzakhi could hear every gasp of panic through the pounding of his own heartbeats. But she found enough of her voice to say it loudly: “Tzakhi is my friend.”

“Remember, you promised!” the Doctor interrupted, and even though Missy shushed him harshly, General Gan didn’t say anything to disagree. She started looking very, very angry.

Missy didn’t seem bothered by it at all. “There you have it, Gan, two wee little friends. You’re not taking Kaeta. She’s mine. And since she and the boy are inseparable, I’m claiming him too.”

The Silurian General’s nostrils flared. She made a hissing noise.

“You’re advocating for the apes.”

“I’m advocating for my spoil,” Missy argued. “None of the other humans is going anywhere. You might as well keep them alive and slow roast them later. Up to you. I’m only taking what’s mine.”

The Silurian leader thought for a moment, then her top eye glowed in a way that told Tzakhi she was irritated. “And what will you give me in return for the boy?”

Missy answered without hesitation, “John Smith and this bald one. They’re all yours.”

The glow subsided.

“Agreed.”

Before Tzakhi realized what was happening, the sword pointing at him disappeared.

The General snarled, “Warriors, take the apes to the large cavern next to the water reservoir. Keep them alive for now. You, donkey, take back your charges on behalf of the Queen. If I see either of these whelps again, they will not be spared.”

His aunt and uncle glanced back at him and gave him a smile, mouthed ‘thank you,’ and that was all Tzakhi saw of them before they disappeared behind a crowd of Silurians.

Tzakhi sank backwards into Kaeta. He did it. He stopped the Silurians from ever invading his people again. But he was not a hero, because the General may still kill everyone here. He wanted to get off Mr. Korg and do something, but his body had gone all weak and he couldn’t squeeze a sound past his throat.

Kaeta slumped forward into him, her arms sagging down like she also got weak. They leaned into each other and didn’t have the energy to say anything while Mr. Korg took them away.

And then he fell asleep.

-

Missy stood, impassive and away from the action as she took in the sight of Silurian warriors reinforcing the binds around the Doctor and the egg man, adding more ropes and metal chains than it was necessary to fully restrain the traitors. The Doctor’s sonic screwdriver and sunglasses, those she had confiscated.

Missy was busy examining her nails when the Silurians seized the Doctor and Nardole the moment the warriors returned to the underground. A girl had priorities after all, and it would be unseemly to leave that dot of something on her otherwise pristine pinky nail just to pay attention to the Doctor’s plea that it was all a misunderstanding.

There was nothing to misunderstand. He and the egg man stopped an invasion. Humans lived. Silurians lost. And so naturally, the traitors must be punished.

The distractions were gone now, Korg taking the children away and all the Silurian warriors except for Gan force-marching the humans into a tunnel. Truth be told, Missy would have sent the egg man off with the humans, but he was loyal to a fault and she supposed there was nothing she could do to pry him off the Doctor’s side.

Gan shoved the Doctor and Nardole roughly down onto their knees. Missy smirked as a rush of thrill tingled throughout her body. This was the best kind of domination, the kind where she could get other people to do it for her. Gan was angry enough at her people’s failure to invade the humans to play judge and executioner. All it took was a well planted slip-of-tongue on her part, a casual Oh, I didn’t realize John Smith actually plotted with that bald one to set up containment shields, and the Silurians, freshly pushed back down underground, wasted no time in surrounding the two culprits. Missy supposed it was a good thing that no lizard life was lost, or else she’d be staring at some missing limbs by now.

“Don’t think you will get out of this alive,” Gan said, her voice soft and calm, the deadliest kind of fury. She circled her captives like a lion deciding on which part of its prey to tear apart. “You will die for nothing. We will conquer the apes.”

The Doctor fixed the General with that beautiful glare of his. “You said you’ll never invade humans again. You promised!”

Gan ripped her weapon from her waist and struck the side of the Doctor’s face with her sheath. “Do not insult my honor, John Smith! There will be no invasion. We will return their hostages to them in exchange for their unconditional surrender.”

“I’m not so sure the Israelites will take this group back.”

The Doctor got a sneer in return. “All the apes are small minded and predictable.”

Missy was half-hopeful that the Doctor would lose control of his tongue and let slip that these humans were rebels and that it was unlikely for their leaders to want them back. That would make things so much more exciting and may even stoke up the Silurians’ war appetite again. But the idiot managed to retain half his brain and said no more. How disappointing.

Gan tutted. “What happened, lost your tongue? I didn’t think it was possible for you to be silent.” She pulled her sword out of its sheath, and Nardole squeaked. Gan turned an ugly grin on him. “Your crime is choosing the wrong side, hairless one,” she said, raising her sword. “Misplaced loyalty wins you death.”

As Gan was about to swing her sword down, the Doctor pleaded, “No please, kill me! Let him go. He was just obeying my orders.”

“And spare him for what? I have no use of traitors.”

“Gan, listen to me...” The Doctor shuffled on his knees, turned toward his oldest enemy. “Missy. Missy! Save Nardole. He has nothing against you.”

“Nothing?” Missy sneered. She crossed her arms in front of her, signaling her answer, her rejection. It wouldn’t be strategic to get involved, not when she still needed to ally with Gan and the Silurians for a bit longer. It was bad enough that she intervened for Kaeta and her friend. She couldn’t risk saving the Doctor too. Besides, he was the one who got himself into this mess.

Gan was looking at her now, trying to detect if there was any hint of her cooperating with the enemy. Missy met her gaze calmly. “I like John Smith. He is useful.” Gan tightened her grip on the sword. The barely noticeable shifting of her weight indicated that she could pivot at any moment to attack Missy instead. Missy pretended not to notice and kept her eyes on all three of Gan’s. “I also liked Euldvar.” She added, as if to remind Gan of the obvious, “I didn’t hesitate when we needed to get rid of him.”

They stood like this for some moments, Queen and Warrior Leader considering each other, frozen as if taken out of time. Missy heard clinking metals in the background, the Doctor trying to break loose from his chains, struggling against an impossible task. Gan must have heard it too, but her face remained stony, betraying no sign of what she was going to do.

As they continued to stay like this, a sudden rush of noises echoed down the tunnel connected to the cavern where everyone else had gone. She noted the sounds but did not react to them.

After another minute, Gan lowered the sword to her side. “What do you propose?”

Missy turned to the Doctor. He was accusing her with near-vertical eyebrows but didn’t say a word, still hoping she would help get the egg man spared. Well, time would tell whether his wish would be granted. She needed to target him first.

She extended her right arm toward Gan. “I’d like to have the honor.”

A pause, and then the sword was placed into her hand. “Thank you,” Missy nodded and gave the sword an experimental swing. The swish it made was crisp, cutting air with minimal resistance. It was a well forged weapon, if only limited by the inferior quality of Earth metal. Light, aerodynamic, and sharp. Perfect for slicing a Time Lord.

It was a pity that her last conversation with the Doctor had ended on such a sour note, she mused before pushing the thought away. What was there to pity? They were enemies.

Missy took several steps forward and pointed the sword at the Doctor. “Throat or heart? Your choice.”

The Doctor knelt straighter. “You will let Nardole go?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“He’s here by accident. I never intended to bring him along. You know that.”

“He’s here now.”

“But –”

She extended her arm, tipping the point of the sword into the hollow spot of the Doctor’s throat.

“It was always going to be me in the end,” she said lightly, as if discussing her day’s schedule with the Doctor when she was in the vault: I’m going to read five books by the time you come back here with dinner.

The Doctor swallowed, bobbing his Adam’s apple dangerously close to the sword. Missy scoffed at this mockery of fear. Now the egg man, he was terrified out of his mind. It wasn’t difficult to achieve, of course, given the microscopic size of whatever he had between his ears. Where did the Doctor find this egg?

“Are you going to do it?” The Doctor had switched to Gallifreyan. “You have a plan. Tell me this is a ruse.”

“I don’t do native languages,” she said loudly. “Really, John Smith, can’t you follow any rules, or do I have to send you back to that sorry little planet where I first found you? I may still do that. Intergalactic postage is exorbitantly expensive, but I can select the slowest shipping method for delivering a dead body.”

The Doctor continued in their home language, “Missy, stop it! This is for show, it must be. Give me one hint that you’re bluffing.”

The thing she loved most about his Gallifreyan: after seventy years of speaking it in the vault, he still hadn’t decided on what to use for ‘Missy.’ Usually he’d say her name in English, but sometimes... there was a nostalgic kind of beauty in hearing her childhood name roll off his tongue. She was glad that Gan wasn’t privy to this moment. She wouldn’t know how to explain the reason behind her blinking away the memory of an Academy boy’s cheery greeting.

She liked this face. It was so easy to read with his hearts laid out as plain as day, especially when those hearts were breaking.

“If you aren’t bluffing, if this is really the end, then please keep Nardole safe. He’s done so much for me, he deserves someone to look out for him after I’m gone.”

What did he mean, gone? At worst he was going to regenerate. They lived forever. Permanent death was for other people.

There were more noises coming from the far end of the tunnel. Missy wanted to glance back at Gan, to see what she was making of those noises. But she couldn’t risk being seen as uncertain and weak-minded. She tightened her grip on the sword’s handle. It was time to move forward.

She drew back the sword a little. “Say you last words. In Silurian.” By which she meant, pick any language other than Gallifreyan that the TARDIS would translate into Silurian for Gan, which she knew the Doctor understood perfectly well. “If you tell me a good sob story, I won’t make it too painful. Are you going to beg for a quick death, John Smith?” She tilted her head to try to catch any further sound coming from the cavern. There was nothing. And Gan was oddly quiet behind her too. She pondered this for a moment. “You have two minutes.”

The Doctor’s eyes flickered from the sword to somewhere behind Missy — at Gan, judging by the angle — then looked back at her. His eyes widened. “Two minutes! That’s a lot of time. You’re very generous.”

Missy smiled. “I’m always generous.”

“Two whole minutes!” he exclaimed. Everything about him suddenly brightened. “I’ve got a good story. I had a sword fight with a very stubborn bloke once, an enemy. He was utterly evil. He even had an evil moustache. Fortunately for me, he was terrible with a sword. I defeated him in under two minutes. He gave me a good exercise though. In fact, I got quite hungry and had to eat a sandwich –”

“Are you sure that’s how the story goes? Terrible with a sword? That bloke was quite skilled, I’ll have you know. And an evil moustache? I seem to recall someone remarking on his perfectly coifed moustache not three days ago.”

“A moustache can be perfectly coifed and evil! And you’re taking up my time.”

“One minute.”

“Er, sir,” Nardole cut in, “is it a good idea to be telling a story right now?”

“Hush, Nardole, now you’re taking up my time.”

“No extras, there goes ten seconds,” Missy said sweetly.

“I don’t need two minutes anyway. I’d say a minute and forty seconds would do.”

“Oh? Well then you have thirty more seconds.”

“Ah, good, good. Where did I leave off? So this bloke and I, we fought some more after I ate my sandwich –”

“His sandwich.”

“Minor details. I ate. Then, thanks to my excellent footwork, I captured his sword and defeated him soundly.”

“You didn’t capture his sword with your foot, dear. You kicked him. Strictly speaking, that was against the rules.”

“There weren’t any rules.”

“Of course there were. You just always ignore them. Oh and ten seconds.”

“Er, sir, a plan? Any second now?”

“Hearts!”

Nardole blinked.

“Hearts,” the Doctor repeated, looking at Missy. “You asked, I’m answering. Go ahead Missy. Swing that baby hard and slice through both my hearts.”

There was labored breathing behind her, and Missy dipped herself into a curtsy. “As you wish, my dear.” She straightened herself and leveled her sword. “Don’t you dare move, John Smith.”

With all her might, she swung the sword straight down the Doctor’s chest to Nardole’s shriek and a loud thud behind her.

For the next few seconds, clanging metal hitting against the ground was the only sound in the room. Thank Rassilon that the egg man had been shocked into silence. Missy stepped toward the Doctor as he freed himself from his restraints. She threw the sword forcefully against the ground and let loose her indignation. “One more peep from you about my lack of skills and I swear I’ll slice you properly open.”

“Oi, I didn’t say this regeneration is horrible with a sword,” came the cheeky reply. “If you recall, I did win our sword fight. Don’t deny it.”

“Hmm, you probably cheated.” Missy replayed the last few moments in her head. “And it was one minute and forty-seven seconds, dear. You underestimated.”

“You overestimated.”

“I accommodated a known handicap. You couldn’t have limited your words to two minutes even if all your regenerations depended on it.” She turned to Nardole and sighed dramatically. “Oh for heaven’s sake, unfreeze yourself, Humpty Dumpty. Turn around so I can sonic you.”

The Doctor held out his hand. “Speaking of which.”

Missy rolled her eyes but took out the sonic screwdriver and sunglasses and returned them to their owner. She grasped her umbrella and pointed it at Nardole. A quick blast at the right frequency and his restraints also fell to the ground.

She turned to the Doctor. There was relief in his eyes, tremendous relief, and somewhere mixed in there was a thank-you or two. She let the moment linger for longer than she should. She didn’t think he would ever look at her like this again.

“So when did you figure it out?”

“When you gave me two minutes. Gan started swaying behind you.”

“Did she? I was surprised she held out that long.”

“She’s a warrior.”

“Makes no difference in the eyes of human bacteria.” She grimaced. “Not that bacteria have eyes. That would be horrid. And I did consider killing you for real. It would have been one of my finest achievements.”

“I have no doubt you did.”

All three of them approached Gan. She had fallen to the ground, unconscious and her entire body burning. Missy knelt down and pressed a hand to Gan’s forehead. Her body’s reaction against unknown human microorganisms was spreading fast. This bacteria-induced illness would not go away on its own, Missy knew, having read the medical records on the TARDIS from when the Doctor healed Kaeta and the human boy.

She felt the Doctor drew near from behind. “This was your plan all along,” he said. It wasn’t a question. “You de-hibernated the Silurians with the purpose of exposing them to human bacteria. You meant to kill all of them.”

With that, they were back on opposing sides. The Doctor would never condone the premeditated killing of life, whether human or Silurian. Ignoring the accusation, Missy stood, spotted and fetched Gan’s sword, then gently laid it beside its owner. Gan was an honorable warrior. She deserved to be accorded with the symbol of her valor.

“You chose humans. I had to choose Silurians, and I chose to destroy them.” The dice had been cast during their first encounter in the command room. That felt like a lifetime ago.

She heard the sound of the Doctor sucking in a lungful of air and she raised a hand, stopping the lecture that she didn’t want to hear. “We saved as many Silurians as we could. You saved as many of them as you could. The Silurians on Dodo will never experience war. That was why I agreed to your plan. Believe me, Doctor, none of this was meant to be senseless killing. I did it to save humans, to keep them alive because you care for them so much.”

Gan’s top eye was only half-closed, a sign of her refusal to succumb to darkness even when she fell. Missy reached a hand to draw it shut. She was a fighter till the end.

She stood up. “Let’s go to that cavern by the reservoir. I’m sure you heard the noises coming from there. Everyone should have dropped like lumber by now.”

The Doctor was looking at Gan, deep in thought.

“Doctor?”

He took out his sonic screwdriver and scanned her. “She can still be cured.”

“Of course she can. You’re a bit slow, my dear. The egg man is already ahead of you on this one.”

At the mention of his assistant, the Doctor looked around. “Nardole, where has he gone?”

“Inside the TARDIS, preparing medicine to save everybody.” Missy met his gaze. “It’s your call. But last I checked, you’re still choosing the humans. Do you really trust Gan and her warriors to keep a promise that you forced on them?”

The Doctor didn’t answer, found a spot on the ground to look at. They both knew that if even one Silurian warrior was healed, humans would eventually be conquered.

“I’m going to check on the others,” Missy announced as she walked toward the tunnel. The Doctor was foolish enough to want to work a miracle where everybody would live. But he may also love humans just enough to become hard-hearted in this case, to let the illness run its course and wipe out any memory of this colony of Silurians forever.

She had done her part. Now let the Doctor decide.

-

Blood. There was blood everywhere in the cavern where the Silurians had taken all the humans. And silence. An eerie silence that was not at all peaceful. Taking in the carnage, Missy felt a sickness in her stomach that none of her previous regenerations had felt before. She never realized that the silence of the dead could be so loud. It was as if all the slain souls collectively screamed the despair of their final moments through their blood, gripping onto the stillness of the air, making the atmosphere heavy and oppressive as a final refusal to be obliterated from this world.

Missy lifted her eyes to the lone figure standing among the fallen bodies, a human holding a Silurian sword. His eyes were wild, as was his hair and beard, frayed and stained with blood that dripped down onto his clothing.

“Well, this was unexpected.” Missy smirked. Who knew humans were capable of such violence? She knew, of course. But the Doctor would never bring himself to admit that his favorite species was a bunch of destroyers at the core. “Let me guess: the giant lizards started killing you apes and you fought back.” She glanced at the bodies around her, at the utter lack of defensive wounds on many of the Silurians. “Except in this case, fighting back meant poking the lizards after they have gone unconscious. Bravo! I’m impressed.”

“These abominations started it,” the human spat. “They grabbed our old and our young. They grabbed our wives.”

“They were grabbing all of you the last I checked.”

“No! They grabbed to kill!”

It wasn’t hard to guess the order of events: humans and Silurians both fell sick, and so out of fear, the Silurians killed as many as they could — the weaker humans who also succumbed to sickness — before losing consciousness.

Funny how the turn of events was determined solely by one fact: the bacterial disease worked faster on Silurians. She would know, she’d read the TARDIS records. It was Kaeta who fainted before Tzakhi.

And so the Silurians lost nature’s war, leaving themselves utterly vulnerable to the strongest humans who simply usurped their weapons and killed them all.

“You violated your god’s command. Thou shall not kill, if I recall correctly.”

“God has already rejected us,” the man said in a voice so terrible that it pulled Missy from examining a cluster of fallen Silurians to giving him full attention. Ah, right, these were the Numbers 16 humans, rebels and opposers of their god’s chosen darling Moses. Their tiny brains were too stuck in their beliefs to interpret recent events as anything other than divine punishment. As far as they were concerned, they had been booted underground, flung into their worst nightmare of approaching their god for vindication only to be found guilty and condemned.

Missy had to muster up all her self-control to not flash the man a smile and offer her congratulations.

“So go find yourself a new god. There are plenty of them around. You can even give me a try if you want.” She winked, but it drew no reaction from the man. Right, she forgot. Humans were made of this bizarre mixture of loyalty and treachery. She would laugh at the notion of a traitor still defending the god who disowned him if the living proof wasn’t standing right in front of her. Was this why the Doctor liked having humans as pets so much? Kick them a thousand times and they would still come bounding back begging for affection. “Look, I know your stories. Your god took you out of Egypt and you’re on your way to the Promised Land. That’s future invasion against my kingdom, by the way, absolutely rude of you lot. Serves you right that you’ve been stuck in an endless desert. But you didn’t want to submit to your god’s meandering and pointless navigation. You wanted the shortest distance between two dots and an upgraded menu thrown into the bargain. Wasn’t that why you rebelled? Well good for you. It worked. You’re now god-free. Go find yourself another navigator. Look up to the stars, for heaven’s sake, pun very much intended. It took me and that slowpoke of a donkey only five days to get to your Promised Land. Much quicker and less fuss about sacrificing barbequed meat to a hungry god.”

The more Missy talked, the redder the man’s face became. His eyes were practically bulging out of their sockets. “You dare blaspheme against the Lord my God!”

“Former god. He rejected you,” Missy pointed out.

“HE’S STILL MY GOD!”

The declaration bounced off the cavern’s walls at all angles and it sounded more like a wolf’s howl sent up to the moon than human words. If the sound reached the Doctor’s ears, what would he think? He would praise his beloved humans for their boundless faith and optimism. Missy had no delusion of his sort, thank you very much. But she was willing to acknowledge a living being’s conviction at face value.

“Fair enough. Cling to your god and conveniently forget about your premeditated murders of perfectly sentient lizards. Why should I care?”

“These were barbarians, freaks of nature who sullied the name of the God of heaven!”

“You killed them. Your god didn’t.”

These very words snatched open the curtains that was hiding the man in denial and thrust him to the blinding light of reality. A snap of his head as if waking from a dream, the clang of metal hitting the ground, and then the man started mumbling, staring wide-eyed at his hands. “I... no, I... I’m a murderer...”

“It was in self-defense?” Missy supplied, pretending to be helpful.

“They were helpless...”

“I’d say so.”

It never failed to be entertaining, playing humans like an instrument to the point of inciting utter disgust directed at themselves. They were like diamonds, put them under enough pressure and they would sparkle, shine like exploding stars, their susceptible minds spinning to kill, maim, deceive, and otherwise enact all kinds of chaos at the barest suggestion on her part. Then came her favorite part: the ending, the explosion. The mortal’s need to self-destruct when the mind became overwhelmed with horror and guilt. She rarely needed to lift a finger to contribute to the humans’ self-inflicted clean-up job.

Beads of sweat were pooling on the man’s face and Missy knew that he would lose to fever and death very soon. The others had already fallen, human murderers who looked as dead as the Silurians they had killed. Something in her itched to give this human a taste of his own medicine — no pun intended this time, because even the big-hearted Doctor would hesitate to heal monsters — and she reached into her pocket and wrapped her fingers around her blaster.

She didn’t know why she was still playing the Doctor’s game, the one that required her to calm down before doing anything drastic.

But before she could count to ten, the man swayed, mumbled a string of apologies to his god, and fell onto the ground.

“Well, there goes trying to save everybody,” Missy muttered as she kicked a Silurian, rolling her over to hide the sword wound on her back. She never intended for them to live, so having the humans do the cleanup was fine by her. But what should she do with the fainted humans? They were the bad guys according the Doctor’s morality code but must also be saved at all costs if she used the Doctor’s Christmas list instead.

Missy walked up to a human child not much older than Tzakhi. He was one of the unlucky ones that the Silurians killed. This one, she knew the Doctor would have healed, because the Doctor always saved children. So his tiny life was senselessly lost due to the Silurians’ fear. She walked around the cavern and counted the number of human children. Six in total and another two or three that looked like they were older teenagers.

With all the children gone, it would be the most fair to simply kill everybody.

She considered what this would mean. She killed her town’s previous king and the Doctor disapproved. She killed Euldvar and the Doctor disapproved. She let known her plan to kill the Silurians all along and the Doctor disapproved.

What was one more act of destruction when everything inevitably led to the same reaction?

She walked up to a human with a sword still in his hand and pulled out her blaster.

“Missy, no!”

A mass of brown rushed toward her. Seconds later, a wet muzzle butted at her arm to try to get her to lower her blaster.

Oh, for Rassilon’s sake...

“Stay away, you meddlesome donkey!”

First it was letting Kaeta stay behind when the Silurians were being taken to Dodo. Then he stepped out of the TARDIS after expressively being told to stay in there which caused Tzakhi and the egg man to jump down. Then, he had the nerve to take the children right into the lion’s den and would have gotten them killed if she hadn’t intervened. And now this? The donkey was really testing her limits.

Korg was undeterred. “Please! These people are Tzakhi’s family.”

“Then he’d be better off without his scum relatives.” She paused. “The children. Where are they?”

“At your palace.”

“Go back there and fetch them. Take them to the Doctor. He’ll figure out where to resettle them after this is all over.”

She turned her attention back toward the same human.

“You... you can’t just kill all of them...”

Who did Korg think he was talking to? “I can and I will.”

“But they’re unconscious!”

She glared. “I haven’t noticed. Get out of my way.”

Korg answered by swinging his head from side to side, the donkey’s equivalent of a refusal.

Missy turned back to her target. “Fine. Stay if you want. I don’t mind having an audience. It’s more fun this way.”

“No!”

The shot fired into the ceiling, and Missy stumbled onto the ground, having had her side rammed by the full weight of a donkey. She sprang up a split second later, letting out a scream that the rocky walls of the chamber made louder and more terrifying. “What’s wrong with you?” she snarled. “These are murderers. They’re every bit as deserving of death as the Silurians.”

“But y-you’re not a m-murderer,” Korg stuttered, his eyes wide with fear and his entire body trembling, and it was then that Missy realized her blaster was trained at the spot right between the donkey’s eyes, the setting set to maximum kill.

Korg was sinking lower, his legs going weak. “Please,” he begged. “Let them die of sickness if that’s what you want. Just. Don’t kill. Please.”

Missy felt a sudden urge to laugh. The Doctor was right. Korg had developed some strange kind of high regard for her. All based on lies.

Of course they’re lies. You’re the Mistress. The Master. No one defines you. Not the donkey. Not even the Doctor.

The voice inside her head sounded suspiciously like that of her previous incarnation’s. It grew louder as it fueled determination inside her, telling her to get on with what she knew was the right thing, what the Doctor would never have the guts to do.

“Final warning. Back down or I’m not responsible for anything I might do.”

Korg stood his ground.

No one would get in the way and no one would stop her. Her former voice grew louder in her head, turning into drums and morphing into maniacal laughter. The sound was familiar, like a scratchy blanket that she kept wrapped around her because it was what she knew. She missed this, missed being ruthless and decisive and guided by nothing but a tune of her own.

Missy lowered the blaster and smiled sweetly at Korg.

“Tell you what? If you think I’m so good, why don’t you say something nice about me?”

Chapter Text

“This isn’t a good idea,” Nardole said, putting the Doctor’s worried face into words as they leaned over a bed in the med bay currently occupied by a recovering Gan, kept in stasis and all vital signs stabilizing.

“No. But we can’t just let her die.”

“Do I need to remind you that she’d have no problem letting us die if it’s the other way around?”

“Which would be cruel,” the Doctor pointed out. “And cowardly. We must be different. I would face her and risk a thousand deaths before I’m going to allow sickness to overtake her.”

“So what are we going to do afterwards? Release her to the wild?” Nardole was frankly getting tired of him singing this tune, all this Time Lord talk about mercy and kindness when there were people closest to him to save.

“I’ll figure something out. That’s later. We’ve got loads of time until later.”

“He has no plan, I knew it,” Nardole muttered to himself before saying in a louder voice, “Come up with something good, yeah? We can’t keep using the TARDIS as an emergency room.”

As if by mutual agreement, they allowed themselves a long stretch of silence as the beeps and buzzes of medical machines kept track of the passing time. Nardole wondered if he could convince the Doctor to strap Gan to the bed. Better safe and harsh than nice and, well, dead. It was unlikely to happen, of course, and so he was left hoping that Gan would remain unconscious for a long time.

After some minutes, the Doctor put on his sunglasses and pressed a button on the rim. His jaw tightened in a way that indicated to Nardole that something wasn’t right. But just as he was about to open his mouth to ask, the Doctor removed his specs and took out the sonic screwdriver to scan their patient.

“Hmm,” came the only reaction from the Doctor as he pocketed his device.

They stood in silence some more. Nardole didn’t feel restless, not precisely. They were in a time machine after all, and any moment lost could be turned back if they went about it carefully. But he did feel rather useless for standing here when there was so much more he could be doing. Sneaking a glance at the Doctor and gathering that he wasn’t about to stop pretending to be a statue anytime soon, Nardole made his way to the supply cabinet and pulled open several drawers.

“What are you doing?”

“Preparing more doses,” he answered. “We have a lot more patients outside.”

Nardole was fussing around with a particularly unorganized drawer that had everything he needed stuck at the very back corner when he became unnerved by the silence in the room. It was very unusual for someone who loved to talk and give orders to be so strangely subdued.

“You do want me to tend to the others, right?” he asked. “Sir?”

The Doctor’s eyes turned shifty. Nardole knew this look. It was the same expression when he wouldn’t tell him where he’d sneaked off to with Bill or when he refused to divulge any detail after sending Nardole down to the vault to clean up a floor full of shattered kitchenware amid overturned furniture.

“Doctor?”

He was about to give up on receiving an answer when the Doctor cleared his throat. “I appreciate your assistance, Nardole.”

He motioned for the Doctor to get to the point. He wasn’t like Bill or any of the Doctor’s human friends. He could take the full blow of reality and he braced himself for it.

The Doctor continued, “You can stop what you are doing. The bacteria are more aggressive than I thought.”

“Oh?” Nardole squinted at the Doctor. What did he mean? They had plenty of time. Gan could have easily hung on for another couple of hours before her illness became incurable. And even if Gan was unusually hearty, well, time machine, right?

The Doctor he knew would never give up so easily. “No worries. I’ll change my method. Treat the fever first, then move onto the vaccination. It’s more efficient in any case, probably what I should already be doing if we are to treat a hundred people at the same time –”

“Nardole. We’re losing them, already have. I just did a scan. There are barely ten life forms left underground.”

Out of over a hundred? He didn’t have a good feeling about this.

“So everybody’s dying, regardless of whether some started out healthier than the others?”

The only response he got was silence. The Doctor shifted his weight from one foot to the other.

“Sir?”

“Well, almost everybody’s dying. Everybody except for Missy.”

So now the truth came out.

Nardole glared right at the Doctor until it became so unbearable for him that he had no choice but to turn and face him. The stubborn idiot had acquired that mouth-in-a-line look that he’d wear whenever he didn’t want to talk about something. Fine. He had no qualms giving the Doctor an earful.

“So let me get this straight. A moment ago there were over a hundred living, breathing life forms out there, and now there are only ten, if we’re being generous.”

Silence.

“Missy’s a known murderer.”

That drew a reaction. The Doctor’s mouth was pressed so thin now that he no longer looked like he had lips.

“You aren’t saying anything, so this means you agree. And you’re defending her, you know, by doing this –” He waved an arm. “– this not saying anything, thing.”

“I’m not saying anything because we don’t know what happened.”

“Oh!” Nardole let out a screech, incredulous. “Listen to you! We don’t know what happened. Let me give you the basics, yeah? Missy has been set loose. Missy enjoys killing. Missy has been deprived of the chance to kill for decades. Go ahead, add it up, even you can do the math.”

“It’s not that simple, Nardole. Listen to me –”

“Is Missy supposed to be here? Wait, let me rephrase: Is any of us supposed to be here? You let this happen, Doctor. All the deaths. It’s all on you.”

He was still fuming when a thought suddenly occurred to him. “Tzakhi! Oh my god – what happened to Tzakhi!” he shrieked, horrified.

“We don’t know what happened,” the Doctor repeated, louder and his voice sharper this time. “I have the sonic readings, the facts. And the facts are telling me that the cavern only has twelve life forms left. I also have questions. Why didn’t Missy kill everybody, and why hasn’t she run away? If she did the killing, she would have fled by now. So maybe it’s not Missy at all. And how aggressive is the illness? We only know that both humans and Silurians are susceptible, nothing more. And like you said, what happened to Tzakhi and Kaeta? They’ve been vaccinated and are immune, so where are they? Not dead, this I can assure you. Missy likes Kaeta. I’ve never seen her become so fond of someone so quickly. She won’t kill her. Trust me on that.”

The Doctor put on his sunglasses and pressed a couple of buttons. “Kaeta’s not here,” he said after reading through whatever it was the lenses were displaying. “No match of her biometric signature anywhere. Wherever she’s gone, Tzakhi is probably there too. My guess is Missy has ordered the space donkey to take them back to her palace.”

Missy’s palace? The Doctor had left out quite a lot of details about Missy and what he knew of her shenanigans here. Nardole shot him a disapproving look. “Your guess? I don’t trust guesses where our friend is concerned.”

The Doctor took off his glasses and wiped a hand over his face. He looked weary all of a sudden. “I don’t disagree, Nardole, but that’s the best I’ve got. Look, I need to go to the cavern and check on Missy. Gan, she’s in a coma?”

Nardole didn’t like where this was going, but he nodded.

The Doctor fiddled with some settings on his glasses. “Stay here. Monitor Gan. I’ve just patched my signal into the med bay so my calls will come directly in here if I need you.”

He didn’t bother to protest. It was becoming a pattern, this keep-Nardole-out-of-action tactic whenever the Doctor was about to go make contact with Missy. He didn’t know who he was more angry with, Missy for breaking all of the rules or the Doctor for being an irresponsible prick. Since he didn’t trust his voice, he waved a hand at the Doctor to signal his acknowledgement.

The Doctor had the sense to look sheepish. “Thank you, Nardole. I promise no more trouble after I sort out the remaining issues and, ah, take care of Missy.”

Promises, promises. If he had a credit for every promise that the Doctor broke...

He fixed the Doctor with his I’m-not-at-all-pleased-with-you face. “Don’t get killed,” he threatened, because those three words really did sum up everything about this absurd situation of lizards and ancient humans and one insane Time Lady.

-

The Doctor walked toward the cavern that used to house hibernating Silurians in their cryogenic pods. The difference that this place had seen over the past few days wasn’t lost on him. One week ago, the large chamber held hundreds of lives ready to be reborn, endless possibilities. Now — he walked the final length of the tunnel leading him to the dreaded destination — he knew that nothing but death awaited him.

Just to be extra certain, he ran another scan. The results came back the same. Out of a room of what should be over a hundred viable life forms, there were now only twelve dots, including one non-terrestrial being, biological determination: Time Lord.

The Doctor tried to dismiss the uneasy feeling that was rising from the pit of his stomach but could come up with no alternate scenario that didn’t point to the mass destruction of lives. He could pretend to Nardole but not to himself. The illness was not any less aggressive in Gan than it should be in any of the other Silurians or humans. None of them should have died this quickly. There was only one sensible, logical reason. He paused at the final threshold. One, two, three more steps, then he would reach said reason.

“Missy?”

His voice bounced off the cavern’s stone walls.

“Missy, I know you’re in here.” The Doctor stepped into the large space, passing from the shadow of the tunnel into a slightly less dim surrounding, and stopped.

He smelled it first: the stench of death, a sickeningly sweet scent mixed with wafts of burnt flesh. His eyes soon followed: blood, so much blood everywhere, visible even in this barely lit space, splattered on both humans and Silurians and staining every sword.

He looked deeper into the cavern and there she was: in the middle of all the carnage sat Missy, half-kneeling with her hands and knees on the ground and her legs tugged underneath her torso, her face pointed toward his left. Strands of her hair had fallen out of her elaborate bun. She was staring straight ahead, her eyes strangely intense in an unfocused way as if she was lost in her own world.

In this semi-darkness, the skin on her face and neck seemed to glow with an unnatural whiteness. It made her look other-worldly. She appeared as lifeless as the fallen bodies all around her.

“Missy? It’s me, the Doctor. Can you hear me?”

Hearts racing with a spike of adrenalin, he walked a path through the sea of bodies toward her. The rush of nervous energy was mixed with not a small degree of relief. From what he could see, Missy had nothing to do with most of the deaths. The majority of the dead — every Silurian if he wasn’t mistaken — had sustained at least one physical injury and it wasn’t difficult to imagine the two species annihilating each other, mutually hostile from the beginning.

The rest, however... he knew the smell of bodies burnt by a blaster and the space was filled with it. His breaths became shallower and faster. Missy, what have you done?

He was about to reach Missy when his feet stumbled over something bulky. He looked down and saw an unmoving lump of dark brown. Four legs, long neck, tail and mane. Very much unresponsive. The recognition sent a jolt of horror through his entire body as if he were struck by lightning.

He thought Korg had gone into Missy’s town because Tzakhi and Kaeta weren’t in the cavern...

The Doctor knelt and placed a hand on Korg’s side. Sensing nothing, he moved his hand up to the neck, feeling hair and fur attached to a body that was still warm to the touch but cooler than it should be. He then felt his way around Korg’s jaw. Still nothing. How should someone go about checking for pulses on a donkey?

“Korg?” he tried, shaking him lightly. It was then that he realized Korg’s eyes were open — dark, vacant, and lifeless.

Korg had had enough time in his final moment to register his impending doom and to become horrified.

The Doctor snapped his head toward Missy, seeing not his almost-friend but someone he no longer recognized. He shot up, shaking with rage. If Korg wasn’t in the way of the shortest path to Missy, he would march up to the murderer and –

Stop, Doctor, stop stop stop! Violence was not the answer. It never was.

He clenched his hands so tightly that even the bones hurt. He used the pain to direct his focus — breathe in, breathe out. He breathed and breathed some more until the desire to unleash his fury on Missy was forced into his fists to be balled up and thrown away.

Taking careful steps, he walked around Korg’s body without looking down, knowing that one glance of the body would send what restraint he had salvaged flying out through the tunnel. His observed Missy as he approached her. She continued to stare blankly at nothing, her form so still that he couldn’t tell if she was breathing. Her palms were planted flat on the ground and the blaster was nowhere to be seen.

When he got close enough, the Doctor crouched down, grasped her left forearm, and with his other hand he rolled up her sleeve to expose the vortex manipulator.

“You don’t deserve to have this.” He unstrapped the device and put it around his own wrist. He was met with no resistance; Missy remained catatonic.

It was a full minute later when he realized he was gripping Missy’s arm so tightly that it was sure to leave a terrible bruise, but she showed no sign of feeling any pain. He willed his hand to release her, but his hearts were far less charitable. Missy was too calm, unmoved and unmoving. She had morphed into a monster before his eyes and he’d faced down enough monsters in his life to know how to defeat them, how to shatter them like glass with his words, always his weapon of choice.

“That king from your town that you murdered, Euldvar, and now Korg. Do you realize what you did?”

No answer.

“What did he do to warrant death? All these months, Korg had been nothing but loyal. He cared for you!”

The Doctor thought he saw the lines around Missy’s eyes tighten — the only sign of life from her that he could detect. He ignored the moisture that was beginning to collect there.

“I am no longer your friend,” he informed her, simply and plainly because it was true. “You will return to the vault, and when you do, you will remain there as a prisoner. I will be your jailor and caretaker, nothing more. Do you understand?”

Those clear blue eyes were glistening. The Doctor let her be, pretended not to notice. He’d seen enough of Missy’s tears, all those drops of treachery that were used to deceive. He couldn’t be sure at first, was even hopeful that she was starting to feel remorse. But no longer. He wouldn’t be fooled anymore.

“Get up. We’re going back to the TARDIS.”

Missy shook her head. The movement caused her tears to spill over and roll down her cheek. With that, a dam was suddenly broken and soon there were more tears, the shaking of shoulders, and finally, the sobbing.

The Doctor refused to be manipulated. “Stop it. Stop it now!”

Missy didn’t seem to hear. Her arms had gone weak and she collapsed, curling herself into a fetal position to hug her knees and bury her face into those knees. Despite the position she was displaying, there were no theatrics. If anything, Missy appeared to be trying very hard to stifle her sobs, her breathing ragged as if it hurt her very soul to weep. This was nothing like the screaming and wailing that she had subjected the Doctor to during her early vault days. This was Missy trying, and failing miserably, not to break down.

The sight of a crumbling Missy was like pouring cold water over the Doctor’s head, dousing every last bit of his anger. He squeezed his eyes shut but couldn’t block the sounds from his ears. These silent gasps and sniffles, he knew them well — they were his deepest secrets that only his Old Girl knew, those dark nights right after the Time War when he spent days and weeks falling apart deep inside the bowels of the TARDIS, shutting himself from the universe because he couldn’t face the thought of going on with all of Gallifrey’s screams trapped inside his head.

One minute turned into five and into ten and twenty. Missy cried and cried and cried.

Forcing his eyes open to take in the shaking form in front of him, the Doctor knew he could choose one of two paths: be cruel and demand vengeance, or be kind and help Missy salvage what she could.

Korg wouldn’t have wanted revenge, bless that hero-worshipping donkey for never leaving Missy despite knowing how dangerous she was.

He placed a tentative hand on her back.

“Missy...”

Her body convulsed, shrank away. And then a heartrending wail escaped her.

The wail resonated with something deep inside his hearts. This brokenness, amplified by planets-full of blood on her hands, once stained his hands too. This version of the Master was him fresh after the Time War, a wanderer in the universe rejecting the very love and kindness that he needed. In the end, love and kindness saved him, and it was precisely why he must extend the same offer to Missy, to affirm by his presence the possibility to rebuild what had been destroyed, no matter how stark the reality.

He sat down next to Missy.

She was right, it was terrible to be an evil person who had developed a conscience. He supposed he could liken the process to trying to grow a beard — he should know, having abandoned any and all effort to grow one a very long time ago — stuck between two poles of presentable but couldn’t turn back without wiping away all progress once the journey had begun. If he couldn’t help Missy struggle through the unpresentable phase, then what would become of her?

He spoke with as much gentleness as he could muster: “What you have done, it’s going to be painful for a long time.”

Missy freed her head from her knees to shake it.

“I killed all the humans... holding swords,” she hiccupped through labored breathing. “He wouldn’t let me finish... the unarmed ones... stepped in... and I killed, I killed –” She choked on a lump in her throat, coughed, and broke down in sobs again.

She couldn’t say Korg’s name.

The Doctor looked away, granting Missy as much privacy as he could under present circumstances. Everything suddenly made sense.

Missy wasn’t a clockwork squirrel that he could take apart and then put back together. No, she wasn’t something to be fixed by having his view of goodness superimposed on her, and he was wrong for insisting upon doing so. But she was wrong too. Letting her try to become good on her own would never work because, well, the scene before them was the clearest evidence of what would happen when Missy did as she pleased. She was chaos at the core, and if it was the wrong thing to do to force his version of good onto her, then it was equally wrong for him to stand aside and withhold guidance to help her develop a goodness of her own.

He needed to be her jailor, the Doctor realized as he forced down the unsavory thought along with the bitter taste that was rising up at the back of his throat. The challenge was to convince Missy to be a willing prisoner, because that was what she had to be in order for him to guide her through the process of becoming good.

There was every reason to believe that they would get it wrong over and over again for the entire thousand years. But at least for now, he knew what was needed to start over.

They must be equal in every way.

Slowly and carefully, the Doctor placed a hand on each of Missy’s shoulders and uncurled her body, keeping his touch gentle to let her know she could take as long as she needed to exhaust all of her sobs. He waited patiently, sat facing her until she trusted both him and herself enough to make eye contact.

He knew this face wasn’t good at emotions, so he tried to move the corners of his mouth upward and hoped that what came out would at least be a not-frown. He gave both her shoulders a reassuring squeeze.

“Missy, listen to me. What you’re feeling, this remorse that’s breaking your hearts, there’s nothing you or I can do to make it go away.” He knew this because those memories of everything that went wrong with the Time War was still there, even after he reset the timeline and created new memories of having saved Gallifrey in the end. “You have a choice. You can take the pieces and put your hearts back together in a new and right way. It will be slow and painful, but I promise I’ll be here to help you through each and every step.

“Or, you can try to squash away the pain and pretend it’s not there, build a wall around your hearts until nothing can pry them open again. Missy, please don’t choose this path. It may feel like the easier and faster way to deal with your pain, but you will only become more bitter and unfeeling, and one day you will get so lost that nothing in the universe will be able to make you feel again.”

It pained him to present both choices to her, to open up the possibility of losing Missy forever to the second option. But to not let her choose would bring them back to his failed attempt to make her good. True friendship was full of risks, he realized, just like every step of their millennia-old tango always beset by traps and even death. But if they were to entertain the possibility of becoming friends again, then whatever Missy decided, he must accept it. He would accept her.

“Let me show you something.”

Releasing her shoulders, the Doctor reached for Missy’s right hand, paused at first brush of his fingers over hers to search her eyes until he was granted permission to join their hands. “This hand.” He lifted it to the space between their faces. “This hand killed Korg. That was wrong.”

Panic flashed across those eyes and Missy attempted to pull away, but the Doctor tightened his grip. “Stay with me. Trust me. Please.” He waited until Missy became less tense before tugging her hand closer to himself. “You will need to change, to learn to be good. And yes, it will be painful.” Another pause until something in Missy’s gaze signaled that she had heard, whether she agreed with him or not. He continued, “But you are not a broken machine to be fixed. You never were. You have both good and evil inside you. If you would let me, I promise I’ll do what I can to help you bring out the good that’s there. Your good, not mine.”

He pressed a kiss to the hand. Missy’s fingers were cool under his lips and he could both taste and smell the residual scent from the laser blaster. Instead of letting disgust overtake him, he inhaled and let his lips linger, accepting this part of Missy that was nothing short of the Master’s core essence.

When he pulled away, Missy’s eyes, normally so blue, were now dark. He couldn’t guess her thoughts and so he loosened his hold, allowing her to pull back her hand if she chose. She didn’t.

Instead, she leaned in, closing the space between them until he could feel her breath on his lips. His mind flashed back to that evening by the Jordan River, to the one other time when they were this close to each other. Missy had turned away then; now, all it would take was for either of them to tip their head and there would be contact.

“Will you turn away this time?” he murmured, even though he already knew the answer. Missy let him kiss the hand that killed Korg, so yes, she would let him kiss her if he chose. The question was on him instead: was he willing to fully accept her as she was, change or no change?

He wasn’t sure who closed the distance, only that when their lips met, the sensation was as familiar as a thousand years and many bodies ago yet as new as if they had never done this before. Missy’s lips tasted like tears, and the observation wasn’t lost on him — they were engaged in this intimate act of trust and acceptance amid a sea of death and carnage. The thought urged him on to explore the contour of those lips, to see and know her as she was. Missy deepened the kiss in return, the willing offer of her vulnerability, and he wondered if hope had a taste.

He lifted a hand to touch her face, thumbed away the wetness there and pushed back a strand of hair behind her ear as he parted his mouth, savoring the tingly feeling on his lips as each swipe of Missy’s tongue lit up his nerves. She managed to keep the kiss on this side of propriety, limiting to gentle caresses with the occasional nibble. He mimicked her, following in a dance of new sensations as he kissed away all the saltiness that was there.

Regret could never undo crimes. Tears were useless for making amends. But though he couldn’t absolve Missy of what she had done, he could offer her respite, grant her the grace to stand and perhaps to one day face her past.

He just didn’t expect the reckoning to come so soon.

He felt it first: the air around them plunged into a chill, causing the hairs on the back of his neck to rise. Next came the voice, colder than the air: “I should have known that John Smith is your consort. Traitor!”

And finally, he saw with his eyes — the tallest of the Silurians standing behind Missy, a sword pointed against her back.

Gan hissed, “And you, John Smith. One word from you and I will push the sword through her body.”

“It wasn’t Missy! She didn’t kill your –”

Inches away from him, Missy’s eyes widened in surprise as her upper torso jerked forward. Gan had struck with enough force to send her doubling over, but the sword didn’t break through. “Metebelis silk,” was all Missy could choke out, and the Doctor thanked the spiders of that insectoid planet for having just saved her life. But even the most durable spider-silk outfit wouldn’t withstand too many of Gan’s assaults. He looked from Missy to Gan and considered his options. There was only one: get away from the sword.

He wrapped his arms around Missy and pulled them backward, leveraging the momentum to roll away from Gan. The bodies they had to roll over kept them from getting too far but also obstructed Gan from having a direct path to chase after them. They sat up when they hit against a pile of bodies.

Missy grabbed a Silurian sword and shoved it into his hand. “Run! Get back to the TARDIS. Was there blood on Gan’s sword?”

Why did she ask? Was Missy hurt? He rewound his mental images to when he saw the tip of the sword against her back. “No, no blood.”

“Then Nardole’s fine, probably just tied up.” She gave him a shove. “Go!”

He got to his feet and then pulled Missy up. Gan was advancing. He looked around. They weren’t near another Silurian or one of their swords. “You first!”

“No, I need to deal with Gan... bugger, she’s coming.” She raised her voice: “Let John Smith go. He saved you. He healed you from your illness.”

“Then he should have let me die!” The last word was spoken as if Gan was right next to them, and before the Doctor could react, a gleam of sword sliced through the air and whacked Missy directly in the back, sending her stumbling to the ground.

“Missy!” The Doctor swung the sword in his hand, cutting through air. Gan laughed, the sound moving farther away with each second. She was too quick and her movements too unpredictable. He scanned the cavern but couldn’t spot her. How could he defend against someone who moved like the wind and struck like a vulture?

He ran to where Missy had fallen.

“I’m fine,” she said, struggling to stand.

“Not for much longer, that last blow severed quite a few threads of silk. Your outfit won’t hold up.”

“It’ll hold up enough if you would listen and run!” Missy snapped, and the Doctor saw right through her anger into the panic underneath. Before he could interject, she switched to Gallifreyan and pushed on, “Neither of us is a match for Gan. I need my blaster. It’s somewhere among the bodies. Gan won’t follow you because she wants to kill me. Your running will buy me time.”

This one, the Doctor saw out of the corner of his eyes. He raised his sword just in time to block a blow swinging down toward Missy’s head. The clash of weapons sent a jolt that rumbled all the way to the handle of his sword. He lost grip and the sword flew to the side.

He was helpless to prevent what came next: Gan backhanded with her sword and it struck Missy’s back, on the left side of her waist. Broken spider silk gave way to pale flesh. One more direct hit and Missy would be cut open.

“You may be a god, but I will prevail,” Gan mocked, her voice and laughter traveling around and around them like a phantom that had split into multiple manifestations.

“She didn’t kill your warriors!” he shouted into thin air, and if Gan heard, she must not have cared about the details of what brought about her fighters’ demise.

The Doctor looked down, picked up two swords but there was no sight of the blaster. He ran toward where Missy had crumbled. He tried to wrap her hand around a sword, but she was in too much pain to hold it. Beads of sweat had formed on her forehead and were rolling down her face. Even without breaking skin, Gan’s blows had caused substantial damage.

“Missy. Missy!” he shouted, forcing focus back into her eyes. He didn’t know how much time they had before Gan would attack again, so he wasted none and started speaking while he worked on his arm. “I let you go, and I forgive you for everything that needs forgiving. I’ll wait for you if you will come back to me. Your choice.”

The Doctor gave the strap of the vortex manipulator one last tug and freed it from his wrist. He put it on Missy as quickly as he could. “First trip local. Travel the stars later. Good luck.”

He activated the device and Missy dematerialized not a moment too soon. As soon as she was gone, a sword thrust up against his throat. He wasn’t cut through only because the blow was meant to slice open Missy’s skull.

For the first time since the initial attack, he could see Gan’s face. She was furious but her hand held steady, not advancing the sword.

The Doctor looked up at her top eye. “General, grant me my last words, please.”

The eye glowed, indicating strong emotions. He hoped it was a merciful one.

A swoosh against his skin, and the sword returned to its sheath.

The Doctor raised his arms, palms open, and slowly stood up. “Please, whatever you have against the Mistress, lay it on me.” He looked around. Death was always indiscriminate, whether toward human or Silurian. “Your warriors, I’m so sorry. They deserve to be honored. But consider what you see. Weapons drawn and blood everywhere. Surely you can guess what happened? Missy wouldn’t use a sword when she has a blaster. It truly wasn’t her.

“If you want revenge anyway, I won’t stop you. I can’t. You and your sword are too strong. But if you invade the humans again, then I will do everything that is within my power to fight you. I’ll turn into a ghost and haunt you if I must. Do you understand?”

Gan stared at him for some seconds. Then she curled her upper lip. “You talk too much.”

“Then let me talk too much some more before you silence me forever. You. General Gan. Sole surviving Silurian warrior. You’re amazing, do you know? Your life has spanned millions of years from the beginning of Earth until now. You’ve seen and done things that the humans have no idea are possible. They don’t even have the brain capacity to imagine it. Tall, walking lizards. Those humans who live in tents directly overhead, they’re going to convince themselves that today never happened. Your actions won’t ever make it into their history books. Do you know what this means? It means that your slate is sparkling clean! More than that: you didn’t personally kill any human, you never did. You’ve no blood on your hands and you owe no debt to anyone here.

“You know where I’m going with this. My offer’s still open. New life on planet D0073D0-J. Everyone you know is now there. For you I will make a special trip. And then you can kill me. What do you say?”

Gan looked at him as if he was an idiot, but she made no move to kill him. In fact, she wrapped a hand around the sheath that was tied around her waist, tugged it loose, and threw it to the ground.

“There will be no killing, John Smith. You saved my life. I refuse to tarnish my honor by being ungrateful.”

The Doctor let his hands drop and breathed out through his nose as Gan’s words sank in, relief washing over him. “That’s good. Very good.” He then straightened his body and put on his solemn face. Gan was formidable but she was honorable. He nodded, paying the respect due to a General. “Thank you.”

“But I won’t go with you. You’re wrong. I have blood on my hands.”

Euldvar.

“The Mistress killed Euldvar.”

“And I approved of it.”

“So make amends and protect your people on their new planet! They’ll need you.”

Gan made no reply, and the Doctor had the feeling that she very much disagreed with him. Instead, she eyed her fallen warriors, lingering on each body as she silently bid them goodbye. He followed her gaze. No matter how many battle scenes he had seen, death had never ceased to be senseless.

“These friends of mine, they gave their lives to stay behind with me. I cannot leave them and go to your new planet alone.”

As delicately as he could, the Doctor suggested, “You don’t have to go alone.”

Gan turned to him, confused at first, then realization hardened her demeanor. “You will not bring along the apes!”

“Why not? There are only eleven of them left, women and men whose only crime was falling ill. They can’t return back to the surface, trust me on this. Besides, these aren’t the ones who slaughtered your warriors. Missy already executed those.”

Three eyes closed in on him, like phantom rocks pinning down his chest. “You speak the truth?”

The Doctor answered with his face before opening his mouth. “Every word.”

“The Queen, she avenged my warriors,” Gan said to herself, looking away, her tone infused with wonder and a hint of disbelief. He shouldn’t be glad over the humans’ deaths, but the Doctor couldn’t stop the slight twitch of his lips that mirrored the lifting of grief and defeat as he observed Gan. It wasn’t the killing that was important to her; it was that her warriors mattered enough to be granted retributive justice.

He gave Gan time for the revelation to take root, pulling out his sunglasses to locate the humans that were still alive among the lifeless bodies. All of them had been taken further into the back of the cavern, indicating that these were the earliest humans to faint. The Doctor removed his glasses so he could see them properly. Eight women and three men. Humanity’s survivors.

He would steer his TARDIS onto them and take them directly into the med bay. After finding and freeing Nardole, of course, plus maybe a few rounds of apologies. None of what he needed to do would be too time-consuming, but it would give Gan the solitude she needed to think and mourn.

He walked toward the tunnel that would lead him back to the TARDIS, pausing when he reached Gan. “I need to tend to the survivors. After that, I’m going to take a swing by D0073D0-J, hopefully with you on board.”

Contempt colored those brown features. “You’re forcing us to coexist with apes.”

“I admit it’s going to take some getting used to, but you’ve seen it work. Kaeta and Tzakhi, two species, absolutely different yet the best of friends.”

“They’re children,” Gan spat.

“Yes, and they represent all the possibilities of the future. Remember, they risked their lives for each other. They’re not so different from you warriors.”

Gan fell into a thoughtful kind of silence, one that indicated she was pondering the warrior analogy and was starting to map out what living with humans would require. To the Doctor, she was no less a general in this mode, a master tactician considering options and potential realities before coming to a decision. This was not the proper time to interrupt. He only hoped that she would make the right choice.

Gan spoke after a long moment, “When – if – the humans arrive the planet, they’re going to need an advocate, someone to argue in favor of their integration into Silurian society.”

The Doctor forced himself to swallow back the logical question. He didn’t like waiting at all, and Gan, who was so quick with her sword, was far too slow for his liking in her deliberation. But it wasn’t lost on him that she called the survivors humans and not apes, and that alone was enough for the Doctor to allow for all the time in the world to let Gan consider just who might be fitting to be the humans’ advocate.

The voice that broke the silence was soft but broached no argument: “I am too roughened by blood and hatred for the task.”

“But –”

“Hush!”

She entered into another stretch of silence, and in mere seconds the Doctor thought up dozens of scenarios of what could come next, from outright rejection to a full embrace of the enemy. He looped the possibilities over and over in his head, and still Gan gave no hint as to what she was thinking.

When he had exhausted the last drop of his patience, the Doctor looked up and quirked an eyebrow. So...?

“The children, then,” she eventually concluded. This, too, was said with authority, her decision final. “They can be the humans’ advocates. From them, I’ve seen the impossible. My responsibility will be to guide them, to ensure they will be seen and heard. This, I must oblige.”

A thousand emotions exploded inside the Doctor. He opened his mouth to shout his excitement or yell in relief, he didn’t care which –

“Go tend to the sick, John Smith,” the General commanded. There was a hint of amusement in her tone. “You do talk too much.”

“Yes, ma'am,” the Doctor said, bowing his acknowledgment on both counts, as he grinned and made his way toward the TARDIS.

-

Silurians were buried according to Silurian rituals and humans according to human ones. Ceremonies completed, this left one more burial for a loyal, spirited, and kindhearted Xenonite.

The Doctor was unsurprised when he found Missy’s blaster underneath Korg. The weapon had made an indent in the Whifferdill’s belly. The shape looked all wrong on him, the mark of a broken timeline that should have never happened.

Here lay Missy’s final victim, he started thinking, then stopped himself mid-thought. No. Wrong word. Korg was many things but victim was not one of them. The Doctor searched his mind for the scant details that he gleaned from Missy. She killed the humans who murdered the Silurians first, she’d said, which meant Korg had more than enough time to flee if he wanted.

Clarity flashed across his mind. It was a choice.

“Oh Korg... why were you so brave?”

In his own misguided way, Korg had chosen to save lives over his own safety, chosen to stay.

“Korg, Whifferdill from Xenon, Stopper of Missy,” the Doctor said, bestowing Korg the honor that was due him. Because he did stop Missy. With his death, Korg had snapped her out of her murderous trance and rekindled from the ashes the possibility of her redemption. That possibility was now his to see through to the end, if Missy would allow it.

“You did it, Korg. Thank you.”

He placed a hand over the indented flesh, felt the swirling of artron energy that was locked inside that body. The energy warmed his fingers, dissipating at last like sour wine burning a hole through wineskin through decades of erosion.

The Doctor pocketed the laser blaster so he could focus on his final task. Korg needed to be moved. No being with artron energy flowing inside him should be left on Earth.

He called for Nardole.

Chapter Text

Missy sat huddled on top of a hill overlooking the tent community. She didn’t trust herself to travel in space or time, not yet. She hugged her knees into herself, pretending to still be holding the Doctor’s hand and feeling his touch on her face.

The world around her was in chaos, but it wasn’t fun anymore.

Everything happened as it should. The Silurian warriors that attempted to conquer humans were no more. The humans were taken by surprise, but like how they treated the Daleks that would invade London on Christmas day in the far future, these Israelites would soon forget about having seen any creature out of the ordinary and relegate the ground swallowing people as a legend.

The Silurians’ act of aggression led to the exchange of bacteria on both sides. Nardole’s shields weren’t disease-proof and all it took was one human falling ill to begin infecting the entire community.

Missy took in the sight of the tent people dying followed by the sounds of mourning. Body after body fell unconscious onto the ground and all she could see in her mind’s eye were lifeless Silurian bodies in the cavern, one gone after another as she killed one and one more and another and another one more until finally... him. (How long would it take until she could say or even think his name again?) Her memory was fuzzy as to what exactly was said, or why she thought it so necessary to take this last life. She simply did (and could), and it was only after she pressed the trigger and he fell to the ground that something crumbled inside her. Like one of those twentieth-century construction wrecking balls, that last thud of a body destroyed the wall around her hearts and forced her new conscience to face what she had done. The Doctor had gone on and on about not hardening her hearts. For her, she would quite like to have that wall back.

Missy looked down at the Israelites and wondered how long it would take for them to all die. It didn’t happen this way in the version of history she read, but that version also had... him alive and talking to humans twenty years from now. Strangely, nothing around her indicated that she had unraveled the timeline. Maybe she didn’t change history. Maybe those biblical stories were fairytales all along.

As she was staring down at human civilization expecting its doom, she noticed an elderly man, the head priest by the look of him, holding some incense and running toward that giant worship structure at the center of the community. She glanced at the pillar of cloud that signified the presence of these humans’ god and waited to see if this god would answer the people’s prayers. Was this god kind? Did this being care enough to respond?

Gan had called her a god. She didn’t care enough for her loyal subject to let him live.

Missy watched in fascination as the series of events unfolded. There was no other way to describe it. After the priest man offered up his incense, the extraterrestrial being roused into action and absorbed the spread of the disease. She trailed her eyes toward one particular family wailing over a dead male and took note of how none of the relatives contracted the illness despite excessive handling of the dead. It was as if the spread of bacteria was being restrained. Something was happening; a mysterious force was at work. Back in the vault, Missy had called this force a nonphysical alien life form and the Doctor had called it an alien-human symbiotic relationship. Whatever this it was, lives were being saved right before her eyes.

It didn’t make sense. The plague could have been — should have been — much worse for the humans. But people stopped dying and the spread of the disease halted, a luxury not accorded to the Silurians warriors.

“You’re like him,” she whispered to the pillar. “You’re fire and storm and danger, alien and unpredictable. But you also protect and save. You’re just like him.”

The Doctor saves. But he was out of Missy’s life now, no more trying to save her or teaching her how to be good. She felt suddenly overwhelmed by the sight before her, of the incongruity of a people honoring their god who both prevented death yet also permitted many to die. Exactly like the Doctor.

The Doctor said there would be pain for a long time. That the pain would never truly go away.

He said he would wait for her.

He might have to wait for a very long time.

-

Missy traveled the stars.

She started with the Prion star system, which contained the first star that Theta pointed out to Koschei when they observed the night sky in the cool of Gallifrey’s summer. It was a dinky little blip in the universe with only a handful of inhabitable planets. But as Missy sat atop a cliff on one of those planets overlooking blue, llama-like creatures grazing on purple grass, she thought maybe she could one day invite the Doctor here for a picnic.

She visited Katuria and stayed there far longer than intended. When a revolution broke out to overthrow the tyrant in power, she aided the rebels by teaching them how to make weapons out of grass. When the tyrant was overthrown and exiled, Missy took charge of body counts and was rather disappointed that the number was so low. But the lack of wholesale massacre gave the rebels legitimacy and cemented what she knew would be a future era of peace, so she supposed there were other ways to rule the universe besides obliterating a third of it.

She went back to some of the planets her previous selves had destroyed. Some had been re-colonized while others remained desolate. She didn’t feel any particular urge to mourn. In fact, she felt nothing, as empty as that icy planet she destroyed that had since broken into five pieces and orbiting around a star in awkward synchrony. There was beauty in the sight of torsos and limbs preserved in ice like some stuck-on bas relief, and there absolutely was beauty in the silence, so completely silent this time around now that she was no longer subjected to the drums. But as Missy stood on the precipice of a ridge of the largest piece of former-planet looking down into a valley of her trophies, humanoid life forms preserved by the cold, destroyed too quickly to have had time to finish their screams, she felt none of the satisfaction that her past self was so certain that he would always enjoy.

She finally planned a trip to that cosmetics planet that sold spray-on everything. She started a business there, selling bigger-on-the-inside shopping bags and contracting her line of products to the planet’s biggest retailers. By the time she sold her business and turned her profit into universal credits plus an all-out shopping spree, Missy was the proud owner of every designer spray-on dress, shoes, hairstyle, lipstick, nail polish, handbag plus accessories, and those ‘face and eye things’ that the Doctor had had no clue how to buy for her when she was on Earth. As Missy was about to leave the planet, she was gripped by a sudden bout of nostalgia and decided to manually put on her Victorian-style outfit with matching makeup and hairstyle. She got compliments on her distinguished style all the way from her closed shop to the sparse alleyway where she planned to dematerialize. She smiled and thanked each of her well wishers. Who knew that her last act on this planet would be to start a retro fashion fad from tens of thousands of years ago? One thing was for sure: it was the right decision to have kept some of her old clothes.

She became a space tourist, going on space cruise after space cruise. She considered it the irrefutable proof of her reformation when the ship docked on the New New New Disney planet and she managed not to strangle anyone during the extended, hour-long It’s a Small World ride.

She picked up a pet some decades into her travels to ease her boredom, a young little blue humanoid who had more ambition than every member of Gallifrey’s High Council combined. They infiltrated the largest galactic corporations of the Isop Galaxy and blackmailed those members of the Board of Directors with corrupt interplanetary dealings into resigning and handing over majority control of the corporation to them. They enjoyed many years of living in unimaginable riches, but when this pet was losing herself to the lure of absolute power, Missy took the only certain action that would ensure her downfall: she made her pet the sole proprietor of the entire corporation. The last Missy saw of her, it was three years later when the blue thing was fleeing from creditors who threatened to unleash a Quantum Shade after her. Missy didn’t mention that there was already a chronolock on the back of her neck. She teleported away when the tattoo counted down to one. Everyone deserved their last minute of privacy.

She never traveled with a pet again.

She didn’t save people or answer distress calls. It wasn’t what she did. But since she knew the Doctor was grounded on Earth and they wouldn’t cross paths as they progressed in their respective timelines, sometimes — and only sometimes — Missy would push a lower life form out of the way of gunfire meant for her or sell her services to help avert an apocalypse or two. She never stayed long enough to accept thanks. She was too busy running away from the implication that she may have continued to change even without the Doctor.

She destroyed a star just to see if she still could. She could. And basked in the glee as she soaked in that single moment of boom! — blazing whiteness blinding the entire solar system, light propelling more light as it swallowed up all fifteen planets until the appetite of the universe was temporarily satiated and everything returned to blackness. The universe would grow hungry again, and Missy would then hear whispers in her mind luring her toward more destruction. She would do her best to make it spectacular. Endings were still beautiful, she concluded as she flew away in her escape pod, the parting gift of the planet evacuation crew that would wake up from hypnosis without a clue as to why they and the inhabitants of the sole populated planet were arriving at the nearest galaxy as alien refugees.

She stopped by Miasimia Goria to find out what she already knew, that she was the only remaining Time Lord traveling among the stars. The planet had been left in ruins after the native life forms that required sleep were deprived of the ability to do so and started destroying one another. By the time Missy arrived to see the rebirth of primitive life that would one day evolve and diversify into others, the culprit of destruction, the other renegade Time Lady the Rani, had long since disappeared.

She found life on Dodo, hiding among forest trees to observe the resettled Silurians flourishing on their new planet. She was glad to see Kaeta with her friend among the crowd and surprised to see the remnants of the Hebrews blending in as fully accepted citizens. She saw Gan when she felt something poking at her back and she turned around to the voice of the General banishing her from the planet, threatening to pull out her sword if she resisted. Missy didn’t argue. The Silurians didn’t need a god; they already had the most capable and honorable protector. As she dematerialized, she thought she saw Gan nod in acknowledgement of those words, and she knew that if she ever dared return and was executed for it, her death would not be for the repayment of past treacheries which were no longer held against her.

She hopped from planet to planet to planet. Somehow, she always ended up alone. She preferred it this way, had even planned out how to distance herself when an acquaintance or business partner became too close. Sometimes, Missy would look up at the stars from a strange land and would wonder if another pair of eyes from lifetimes away was gazing at the same ones. The universe was a lonely place without the Doctor.

-

The TARDIS trip back to Bristol wasn’t any less bumpy than usual, but the Old Girl seemed to have caught onto her thief’s mood and dimmed the light in the console room, making everything more quiet, more subdued.

“I’m sorry,” the Doctor said, again. He’d lost count of how many times.

Nardole continued to ignore him.

What could one say after running out of excuses? He’d already relayed the facts: they would return to Bristol, resume their daily lives, and (he did draw a reaction from Nardole with this one; the android had created a new expression roughly the equivalent of I-will-point-my-finger-and-laugh-at-you-forever, or thereabouts) wait for Missy’s return.

He’d also voiced his opinions, which came out as a one-sided rambling of every reason he could think of for why Missy would come back to him. He stopped with reason number fourteen, afraid that if he went on, he would change his mind and start to agree with Nardole.

The truth was, he wasn’t sure if he would ever see Missy again.

And so they spent the last minutes of their ride in silence, letting the TARDIS take the scenic route of staying in the time vortex longer than normal before she decided that her two passengers were fit to pass as stable, functional human beings once they set foot on St. Luke’s campus. They arrived at the exact same time as when they had left, and not wanting to be the recipient of Nardole’s glares and silent scolding any longer, the Doctor dashed to the lecture hall for his inter-term enrichment panel that was supposed to be on the topic of wildlife preservation but which he ended up monologuing for a solid half an hour on the perils of creating accidental timelines due to irresponsible (and hypothetical, of course) time travel. Nardole must have streamed the panel discussion from the TARDIS, for he seemed to have taken his monologue as his confession and accepted it as the apology that he half-intended it to be. He wasn’t forgiven, of course. No tea showed up for him that afternoon and he wasn’t offered any dinner when Nardole invaded his office with a scrumptious Indian meal and ate every last bit of it by himself.

That evening, the Doctor walked down to the vault and let the door stay open as he entered inside. Unfinished Chinese takeaway greeted him and his stomach turned at the smell, at the memory of what started it all. It was his fault. He shouldn’t have let Missy out. But his faults ran much deeper, didn’t they? He’d been doing everything wrong in his attempt to reform Missy. She played his game because she wanted her friend back, but when he demanded a version of Missy that would never exist, it was foolish for anyone, let alone the smartest person he’d ever known, to keep trying.

He sat on one of the armchairs and stared at half-empty food cartons through the night and into the morning. When afternoon came around again and there was no sign of Missy, he knew she was never coming back. She had a vortex manipulator. She was always precise in time travel. There was no reason for her not to return to the point where they left off, unless she wanted to punish him and make him wait.

He did say he would wait for her.

“Tell Bill I’ll be right up,” he said when he sensed Nardole behind him. He stood, took the food cartons, and walked over to the rubbish bin. He took the time to take out what was there and replaced it with a new bag. After he had done everything he could to put it off, the Doctor walked up to the door and readied himself to face Nardole.

“I’m –”

“Shove it. I heard you the first time.”

“Right.”

Nardole held out a hand. “Give that to me. You’re going to be late and you don’t want Bill wandering down here. She’ll rip a new one in you. Besides,” he added, “you have no idea where to take this, do you?”

He was going to find out.

He shook his head.

Nardole took the bag of trash from him, dragged him out into the real world, then closed and locked the vault door. “You’re not going to tell Bill.”

Of course he wasn’t. But he thought Nardole would have insisted on some level of transparency.

He raised a brow, questioning.

“You’re going to stay put on Earth — no traveling — and I’m going to monitor intergalactic patterns for any destruction of planets and star systems in the past, present, and future that we don’t already know about. As long as the TARDIS doesn’t turn up anything Missy-related, I’ll play along with your self-delusion. You will continue to lecture and I will resume my social life among the humans.”

Nardole, he was willing to remain here, to wait for Missy with him.

He opened his mouth.

“You’re late. Run along.”

The Doctor nodded, then started up the stairs.

“You’re welcome,” he heard as he neared the top, simple syllables not meat for his ears but which carried a significance beyond what he deserved. Those words spoke of unconditional acceptance and friendship extended by someone who knew the depth of his idiocy. Those words showed that, over time, what was broken between him and Nardole would one day be mended.

For he first time since returning to Bristol, he smiled.

-

Missy directed her full attention to each of her steps, careful not to flatten a stray cricket or a napping caterpillar, lest she accidentally kill an aristocrat and incur the wrath of the ruling class. She may be many things, but let no one accuse her for never learning from past experiences. She didn’t mind the pecking chickens or the penguins zipping here and there — those creatures would survive if she knocked them over — but anything tiny and squishable really shouldn’t be allowed on the streets, especially not one so crowded as this narrow horror, a winding snake barely two meters wide leading to the busiest marketplace of this quadrant of the galaxy. She shouldered her way through a small group of blue humanoids, non-natives like her that were acting too suspiciously to be casual tourists. As she passed the group, Missy caught the eye of the sole male and threw him an appraising look. The male immediately looked away and dug a hand into his pocket, the reflex of a novice smuggler who didn’t even bother to hide his contraband in a less stupid and obvious spot.

Missy smirked, allowing herself to enjoy the discomfort she had caused for a few seconds before focusing back on the street. The natives who chose to remain in their natural form were no easier to avoid since they were short and rather shapeless except for appendages that roughly equated to those of a human’s but without everything that would normally go on a face. She couldn’t quite shout at these pale yellow blobs to pay attention when no eye or ear could be seen to do the paying of attention, now, could she?

She made it to the market without committing accidental murder and found the stall that sold parts for vortex machineries, the sole reason for her presence on this planet. “Six thousand credits!” she protested to the insectoid who kept the shop. “I can buy it for half the price on the outpost of Planet 54783-B even after I factor in ten thousand years’ worth of inflation.”

The mantis-looking thing smiled at her, if the widening of its mouth could be considered that. “You are most certainly correct, ma'am. Time travel technology is much cheaper in the future. But we are in the past. There isn’t yet a Time Agency to fund the research and development of time technology and to contract out mass manufacturing of vortex manipulators.”

“So why are you here?” Missy asked, from one time traveler to another.

“I landed here in need of replacement parts and found none. I had to develop my own vortex parts and when I did, I thought I’d stay around a bit to give a hand to other stranded time travelers.”

“Well I’m not stranded, so either cut your price or no deal.”

“Five thousand credits.”

Missy crossed her arms. “Do you think I’m gullible? You used primitive metal to build these parts. That alone should depreciate the base value of your products. Truth be told, I was thinking more around three thousand credits.”

The mantis hissed. “Four thousand five. I’m not going any lower.”

Missy raised her left arm and considered the state of her vortex manipulator. It was made from Earth technology and wouldn’t last more than five or six trips. She supposed she could travel into fifty-first century and buy a brand new one from the Time Agency. That should cost her no more than five thousand credits for the whole thing. But seeing how she was already here...

“Four thousand. Give me the part and I’ll transfer the credits into your account right away.”

The mantis didn’t say anything for many seconds, but eventually made some clicking noises in its jaw and slid the vortex part over to Missy with its pincer-like forearm.

She grabbed the part with one hand and beamed the credits into the shop account with the other. “Thank you! Nice doing business with you.” She smiled and made her way out of the market.

After about an hour of wandering the bazaar, Missy found a small eating establishment in the quieter part of town and settled there, reinforcing her vortex manipulator in full view of the server and the one other patron in the restaurant. She really didn’t know why she chose, of all the galaxies and planets in existence, to stop by Xenon during this time of relative history. That mantis creature was right. Aside from the stray time traveler, the civilizations in this sector of the universe didn’t do much inter-galactic travel, let alone hop around in time. She could have gone anywhere in all of time and space to buy replacement parts. But somehow she ended up here, at the planet of the Whifferdills.

She didn’t plan it, didn’t know any more than the vague knowledge that there were maybe one or two of his kind that knew who he was, on the off chance that they may be interested in news about a long-lost relative. She’d never even asked, who and what names and where on the planet and whether they were on good terms and what was the real reason that he ended up on Earth.

Well, too late now.

The vortex part clicked into place and gave a beep. Repaired and stabilized, good for at least another hundred trips.

She stuffed the sentimental nonsense back into somewhere deep inside her hearts, where she shut away all the other memories that still caused her pain. Despite her best efforts, the walls she tried to rebuild around her hearts had all refused to solidify, leaving her with flares of past regrets and sorrows that would visit her like an unwanted relative several times each year. How long would it take until the pain would go away?

Missy pushed her chair out and stood up. She got what she came here for. It was time to go.

She dug out a few coins from her pocket and placed it on the table. “Keep the change,” she shouted at the door that led to the kitchen area, toward where the server had disappeared to escape from this dull late-afternoon slump.

She was almost to the door when it opened and a Whifferdill appeared, stopped moving, and gave off so much emotion that Missy could tell he was disturbed even without facial features.

Bizarre creatures, these Whifferdills were. Missy wouldn’t have given this one a second glance if he wasn’t blocking the entrance.

“Kindly move out of my way, please.”

The Whifferdill took a step forward, panicked, then took a step back.

“I suggest choosing one direction. Doing both isn’t going to help.”

The Whifferdill tried again, repeating the same exact motions.

Missy let out her frustration in something that sounded like a growl, and every part of the Whifferdill went still. “Oh, come on, what’s wrong with you? Don’t tell me I have to pick you up and move you. You have two options. Step forward, in. Step backward, out. Believe it or not, that’s all there is to a door.”

When he didn’t move, she placed her hand on the Whifferdill’s shoulder and was about to haul the creature in when he shrank away so violently that he tipped over backwards and fell onto the ground.

“Oh, Rassilon’s bloody –” The sight of uncontrollable trembling clicked everything in place and pulled the wind from her lungs. This Whifferdill was scared out of his mind. Terrified.

Missy stared. Only one Whifferdill in the entire universe would have such a reaction upon seeing her.

But it was impossible.

“I’m not holding any weapon,” she attempted, giving information to see if she would receive any in return.

The trembling didn’t subside.

Missy crouched down and extended her hands palms-up so they were in plain sight. “I’m not holding any weapon,” she repeated, slower this time, focused on his head where a face would be if he were a different species, and held her own body still.

She mentally brushed the surface of the Whifferdill’s mind. The touch was light; he wouldn’t notice her presence. She didn’t need to go to deep. His mind was hurling horror in all directions and every one of his thoughts screamed the word Missy.

Missy withdrew her mental probe. She had all the confirmation she needed.

“Korg,” she forced through a throat that went suddenly dry. It was the first time she spoke this name since she left planet Earth all those years ago.

Slowly, as if playing her action through the slow-motion function of a human film, she extended a hand toward Korg, stopping just shy of contact so he would be the one to decide what was going to happen next. “No weapon. Let me help you get up.” She hesitated. “Please.”

Korg directed his head toward the hand, looked at it without eyes. He must have known that this was the hand that killed him. Even the Doctor had pointed it out. Was Korg seeing a blaster in his mind? Was he replaying his final moment before death? Because Missy was certain she did kill him, regardless of whether he was presently alive and in front of her.

It occurred to her that she should back away. But it was her turn not to be able to move.

“Please,” she repeated. She didn’t know what else to say.

Korg was giving out the impression that he had closed his eyes, or the equivalent of it, while his chest rose and fell with quick breaths. Missy found her breathing matching his, her hearts pounding against her ribcage.

People she killed didn’t come back to life, not unless he was the Doctor. Her mind reeled at this new experience, of being thrust up against a misdeed from the past. How long had this one been festering? Tear open a century-old scab and it was still bleeding underneath.

She felt she was being looked at again.

“Missy.”

She went completely still.

“I-I’m fine, just surprised...” Korg rocked forward, but he didn’t quite make it. “Er, help me up, please?”

She never thought she was capable of such relief as the moment when Korg grasped onto her proffered hand.

“So how does eating and drinking work?” Missy asked, back inside the restaurant and sitting across from Korg over a cuppa, her second one within the past hour.

Normal human features appeared on his head. “Like this.” He wrapped a stubby yellow appendage around his mug and took a sip with his newly conjured mouth. This face was handsome, though nothing that fit what Missy thought a Korg ought to look like.

“Fascinating.”

They fell into a tolerable silence as they finished their respective hot beverages. Missy stole glances at Korg. He looked like a run-of-the-mill Whifferdill, average in every way. Nothing about him explained why they were sitting here having tea, pretending to be amiable acquaintances hundreds of galaxies away from where they had last interacted, when one of them died at the hand of the other.

Korg caught her staring and smiled. “You have questions.”

Her body kicked into self-defense mode and she smirked. “Maybe.”

He barked a laugh. “Oh, Missy. I’ve missed you.”

“Really? Then you must be living a pathetic and solitary life.”

“I have... quirks.” His expression turned serious. “Episodes, you just saw one.” He added quickly: “They don’t last long. Usually I’m good at avoiding things that I know would set me off. But everyone has times when they cannot control themselves, right?”

Korg was almost teasing, the operating word being almost. He was deeply traumatized by what she had done to him and would always be.

The server brought them new tea. Korg thanked him with a smile that didn’t reach the eye, and that was enough to tell Missy everything.

They knew him here, the afternoon server and the kitchen staff, and he was by no means a welcomed guest. This restaurant was dead. No normal, healthy Xenonite would choose to visit a rundown establishment during the slowest hours of the day. Not unless he wasn’t permitted entry at any other time.

“Missy?”

Missy blinked back into the present. How did one go about making amends? She was great at breaking things but rubbish at fixing anything that needed more than recalibrating levers and installing new circuitries.

Living beings, for example. Korg’s life was ruined. She had wrought in him a debilitating condition that would forever brand him an outcast. To be fair, she didn’t know what kind of life he had led prior to his stint on Earth. But certainly nothing remotely comparable to what she had raked him through in that Silurian cavern.

Overwhelmed by a sudden bout of nerves, Missy snapped, “If you’re waiting for an apology, you’re not going to get one from me.”

Well, that attempt went wrong straight out of the gate.

Korg gaped at her for some seconds, then tipped back his head and laughed. “No! No apologies. We’re talking. I’m not dead. You can’t apologize for what you didn’t do.”

Missy reached for her cup, emptied it in a gulp, then waved to the server for another refill. It was easier not to have to make eye contact. “Let me rephrase. I... regret what happened and I’m glad things turned out differently. It was the Doctor, I assume?”

“That’s how it ends, yes. But it started with the kids.”

At this, Missy looked up. “The kids?”

Korg nodded. “Kaeta. She was inconsolable. Refused to leave my body. Tzakhi too, wouldn’t let the Doctor bury me. So he had to come up with lies, spin a tale about still being able to save me until he talked himself into an idea.”

“That’s the Doctor.” How long had it been? Decades, maybe centuries? The universe was never as entertaining without that blundering, blustering idiot always a hop across spacetime away to bother.

“He told the children he would work with the time energy locked inside of me. That if he could release it in a controlled setting, maybe it can bring me back to life. So he –”

“Took you to the zero room,” Missy cut in. It was an ingenious idea, using the very substance that had cursed Korg’s body to regenerate him. But things shouldn’t be this simple. The diluted time energy in Korg wouldn’t have been enough to force a regeneration, let alone bring a dead non-Time Lord back to life. “What did you feel?” she asked. “When did your consciousness come back?”

“For a long time, nothing. The Doctor told me I was in the zero room for weeks. He channeled the time energy in me to jumpstart something, reverse the polarity of something else, I really don’t understand. Something about energy dissipation rate over time and regenerating tissues. All I know is, if you hadn’t, er, done what you did, the energy inside me wouldn’t have an outlet and I would still be frozen. So I suppose I owe you a thank you.”

“Now, don’t get me too big-headed.”

She turned over Korg’s words, supplied the scientific details and overlaid everything with the Doctor’s voice. The result was a strangely coherent monologue inside her head explaining the process of inducing regenerative properties inside a host body and reconfigurating residual artron energy over time into particles that could be manipulated to mimic the host’s natural biological cellular structure. But this process was like pin-pricking a hole in a bucket the size of an ocean. The initial jolt that brought Korg back to life was quick. But the un-stucking part, dissipating all that artron energy that froze him, would take years.

“According to my mental math, you stayed as a donkey for at least twenty more years.”

“Twenty-six. It was three more decades of linear living in that town for me but not for the Doctor. He took the children to Dodo to resettle them, said he stayed there with the other humans to help them integrate. He and his assistant returned to Earth, well, thirty years later. The Doctor claimed it was an accident.”

“Typical,” Missy sneered. “I stand by my words. I’m the much better driver.” She thought back to what she read in the Book of Numbers. “So you did see the destruction of my town. How was it?”

“Chaotic, horrific, spectacular. You would have loved it.”

Missy sighed as she basked in a sudden rush of nostalgia. “It would have been more spectacular if I were in it,” she said. “And you? You found a new human?”

“Balaam? Yeah, that was quite an experience.” He made a face. “Look, when I said I missed you, I meant it.”

She was oddly touched by this declaration of preference.

“So what is it, then? The Doctor brings you back here then goes traipsing off across the universe, leaving you behind like he does with his human pets. Is this what you want?” She eyed Korg, saw the weight of the universe that once lorded over this used-to-be immortal. “I’ve only collected minimal information. But judging by what I saw in the past hour, you’re not okay.”

Korg shrugged “I manage. Besides, I have family.”

“Ah yes, your relatives.”

Korg drained his third cup of tea and placed several bills on the table. “I think it would be better if I show you. I’ve often wondered whether the day will come. Can you spare the time?”

Missy pointed to her vortex manipulator. “A better version of that clunky blue box. Takes me anywhere I want to go in space and time with precise accuracy. So yes, I’ve got all day.” She stood, extended an arm toward the door. “Lead the way.”

Once outside the restaurant, Korg morphed into the familiar form of a donkey.

“Hop on.”

Missy balked at the offer. It was one thing to travel with a strange lady that one found in the desert. But to travel with one’s murderer –

Korg rolled his eyes, just like he did on the first day they met. “Get on. Riding on me is efficient. We both like efficient.”

She patted Korg’s neck in a silent thank-you. She was terrible at making amends, but he was gracious enough to let her try, even at the risk of bringing on his episodes. The thought locked her into inaction, broke open something in her hearts that let those blasted emotions leak all over the place.

A donkey muzzle nudged against her face. It was wet and slimy. It was familiar.

Missy laughed, glad for the donkey slime to disguise her tears.

She hopped on.

Chapter Text

It would have been better, Missy mused as she settled into the familiar motions of traveling by donkey, to not have developed a conscience. Her past selves would have laughed at the good fortune of Korg, spewed some threats about future life-takings, and demanded entertainment or something equally frivolous from him. It would have been exactly like meeting the Doctor again after he changed from Long Scarf to Celery Stick: pick up where they left off as arch enemies, no time spared for dwelling on past actions.

But now she was thinking as loudly as Korg, her mind taking her back to the Silurian tunnels and the moment she pulled the trigger. She’d killed so many people in all her lives, had in fact killed a good number of humans that day before turning her blaster on Korg. So why was this particular murder so different?

Missy looked around. Their surrounding was becoming increasingly rural and sparse. Korg must live at the outskirt of outskirts. At this rate, they would be traveling for quite some distance yet. Which meant plenty of thinking time for her. Let’s start with some special killings, shall we? Lives she took from among those who were more than acquaintances. People who meant something to her. Well, there was Korg, obviously, her current enigma. Then there was Euldvar. No, he didn’t matter enough. They had to be kills she actually cared about, people like Lucy if only she had properly died at the hands of her previous self. Missy sifted through her memories. That blue pet that she took on? No, leaving her to die by Quantum Shade wasn’t the same as active murder. Seb? He was an AI program, he didn’t count.

A self-satisfied smile spread across her face when she remembered Dr. Chang. Yes, perfect. Dr. Chang, so loyal and respectful, and she genuinely did like working with him. He even died like Korg, horrified when he realized she was really going to do it. They were alike in so many ways.

So how did Dr. Chang die, what was it that he said? Please don’t kill me. Well, there was that. But that wasn’t the nice thing he said. She had made him say something nice.

I truly believe that you’ll never be able to find it in your heart to murder me.

Yes, that was the one. So eloquent and pleading and perfect.

The donkey, on the other hand. What did he say?

No and no and no. He’d said no over and over again up until his dying breath.

By any category, Dr. Chang was better than Korg. So why was it that she barely shed a tear for one and became consumed by the other?

“Tell you what? If you think I’m so good, why don’t you say something nice about me?”

“Missy, no!”

She aimed and shot the nearest human in one swift motion.

“Nooo!”

“He had a sword –”She pointed with her blaster. She didn’t know why she bothered trying to explain. “– he killed Silurians.”

She walked up to the next armed human. Hooves trotted behind her. She aimed and shot before Korg could catch up.

“No! Why...”

“Are you going to say something nice or not? You’re really getting on my nerves.”

She found another human. Then another. And another. All armed.

“No, stop, please, stop!”

All dead now.

She kept her motions erratic so Korg couldn’t figure out where she would turn next. The donkey didn’t have her keen sense of detecting the living among piles of the dead. She acquired this skill a long time ago on Gallifrey’s battlefields during the Time War.

Locate target, kill, retreat. Repeat ad nauseum. It worked well then and it hadn’t failed her yet.

Korg was a wreck by now, his “No!” and “Please...” mere whimpers. And still he trailed her every step. He was like a fly that kept buzzing in and out of her field of vision. A nuisance she would sooner blast off if only he would say something nice.

Missy walked among the fallen bodies to make sure she didn’t miss anyone. Satisfied that she had killed them all, she grinned. The cavern was smelling delightfully like burnt flesh.

They must have spotted the alcove hidden in the far end of the cavern at the same time. There were more humans there, the early fallen ones, unarmed. Missy gripped her blaster. A pity that they would have to become collateral damage. There was no Plan B. They were all going to die.

Before she could take a step forward, Korg blocked her way.

“Missy, please, isn’t this enough?”

“Move.”

“You don’t have to do this. Please!”

Fury brewed like molten lava inside her, ready to burn a path straight through Korg and toward the surviving humans. Missy smiled at her one remaining obstacle. “You still haven’t said something nice. So stubborn. Well I guess I’ll have to break my tradition just for you.”

She hadn’t yet raised her blaster when it all sank in for Korg; at the precise moment of realization, his body seized up and his eyes went impossibly wide.

“Missy, no, please...”

Those eyes were so terrified. It wasn’t a good look on him, some corner of Missy’s mind observed. The donkey had always been a scaredy cat, but something about this was different. The grin faded away from her face. For some reason, her hand holding the blaster started trembling.

And then it was over. A pull of trigger and a final “No!” and everything fell — the donkey, the blaster from out of her hand, and Missy herself. All she could see was black, the black horror of Korg’s eyes, and her inside crumbling into blackness.

Those eyes...

Missy could remember now, the mental image of Korg’s final moment bursting from monochrome into sudden, bright colors. It was those eyes, those farm animal beads of black that said so much more than every one of his “No’s.” Korg’s begging was nothing like the sniveling of Dr. Chang.

“Missy!” Korg yelped rather loudly, jarring her from the bright colors of her mind back to the blue trees and brown paths of the present.

“What?”

“You’re twisting my mane, like, pulling hard.”

She let go immediately. “Still no tolerance for pain, I see.”

“I don’t go out of my way to test it out.”

“Hmm. Fair enough.”

Missy observed the swaying of donkey neck as Korg moved forward, completely unconcerned that the passenger he carried could take out her blaster at any moment and kill him for a second time. The difference was so clear to her, now. Dr. Chang knew he was going to die and begged for his life. But Korg, he knew he was going to die and dare she believe that he didn’t care? Because she saw it in those eyes. Korg was determined to block her way to the humans no matter what. The begging he did though, it was for her life.

In fact, Korg had said the nicest thing he possibly could about her with that look.

Missy, you’re going to kill me, but you’re not a murderer. I will die at your hands, but you won’t kill anymore. I’m pushing you, because then you’ll stop.

He’d died horrified because hope was a terrible thing to be ripped from someone’s heart. She should know. She’d been the cause of extinguishing hope from a certain someone’s dual hearts in almost all of his bodies. And still the Doctor hopes.

She was wrong. Korg wasn’t like Dr. Chang. Korg fully grasped her capacity for evil yet chose to see nothing but the good in her. Just like the Doctor.

Missy placed a palm over where she had pulled Korg’s hair in silent apology, feeling the initial tensing then relaxing of the muscles there. The Doctor’s words rang in her ears. She damaged everything that she remotely cared for.

“So where have you traveled to since Earth?” Korg broke the silence, and Missy almost laughed. He must be bored out of his mind to be making conversations. “There are so many planets out there in the universe. I wish I can see more of them, just like you do.”

“There’s no traveling with anyone,” Missy corrected Korg’s use of the plural in the common Xenonite language. “I traveled all across the universe in the past, oh, hundreds of years or so, I lost count. I’ve been here and there.”

“But the –”

“The Doctor is out of the picture. You do realize we weren’t travel mates? He was my jailor and I was his prisoner. I’m surprised he never let that slip during his hours of word vomiting.”

“Oh, I learned that from Nardole decades ago,” Korg said so conversationally that he didn’t seem to understand that prisoners were dangerous. Then again, he possessed neither the awareness nor plain common sense to stay away from one’s murderer. “But the Doctor. He says you’re his friend.”

“Did he now?”

“Yes, well, to be together all these years, you must be. And besides, I mean, you’re here. So technically, um. You’re... free?”

Missy didn’t bother responding. Let him retain his delusions. This one was harmless enough.

They traveled the rest of the way in silence until Korg stopped at the edge of a small town. Missy understood it as her signal to hop off, letting the donkey turn back into a Whifferdill. Like a good host, he extended her the courtesy of keeping his facial features.

“My house is just around the corner, first one to the right,” he said as they entered the town. Several of Korg’s neighbors waved at him when he passed by their houses and he greeted them back. So it seemed like he wasn’t a total outcast after all. “I should warn you –”

“MISSY!”

A mass of limbs launched directly at her and wrapped around her body. The squeal alone was enough of an assault; the physical restraint against her person, that was presumptuous beyond reason. Missy felt her hearts beating fast against the body that now clung to hers. A head nestled into the space at the crook of her neck. Missy glanced sideways to see who her attacker was, and the first thing she saw was a scaly head with a third eye.

“What are you doing here?” She managed to wiggle her arms free and grip Kaeta by her shoulders to peel her off. She looked her up and down. The erstwhile little girl had grown taller, replaced by a young lady who was now up to her chin and would one day stretch out even longer. That smile, though, Missy could recognize her anywhere.

“Summer holidays,” a deeper voice answered in Silurian beyond them, and it was then that Missy noticed a gangly youngster had drawn near, a brown-haired, olive-skinned youth that could no longer be called a boy.

“Well, well, someone has gone native among the giant lizards. You’ve grown too, I see.”

Tzakhi nodded while Kaeta laughed. “His voice cracks sometimes.”

“Hey!” Tzakhi protested.

“What? It’s true.”

The children — not children anymore — broke into laughter as they continued to tease each other like siblings who had grown up together. Missy supposed that was true of them. It must have been at least six or seven years, almost double their lifetimes since they first met.

“Everyone, inside!” Korg poked his head out of his house, every square inch of him exuding parental authority. Missy turned to him and smirked, which brought a shade of red onto his yellow head. She didn’t need for that face to have features to know what Korg was feeling. Home with his two charges, he was happy.

Once inside, they settled down to even more tea. The kids claimed their spots on the couch while Missy sat on a high-back chair at the dining table, positioning herself in no uncertain terms that she was not here to interact with children. She got two cheeky grins in response.

“They visit every year,” Korg explained after bringing out two full plates of sandwiches for the young ones, then sat down on the chair opposite Missy. “The Doctor gave Srret a device just like the one you have and showed him how to use it for the first trip. They’ve come here all by themselves for a few years now. It’s a kindness for me too.” Korg nodded at the two heads bowed in concentration over their respective plates of sandwiches. “He knew I could use the company. My relatives, well. I’ve been on Earth for so long and I never aged there...”

That was the burden of all immortals who cared for mayflies. Missy refused to fall into this trap, but she couldn’t deny that she was glad for this unexpected reunion.

“Nice house,” she said, more to keep the conversation going than anything. Korg’s living space was modest, furnished with only what was necessary, which apparently included a wall full of pictures of the two youngsters, just like a proud parent. Missy felt proud too as she marveled at this turn of events that she never expected. Everyone was still alive.

Her eyes landed on a photo taken among forest greenery. “You’ve been to Dodo, I see.”

“Only twice. I accompanied these two on their return trips when they were younger.”

Missy turned to Kaeta and a smile tugged at her lips. The Doctor was wrong: she didn’t break everything she touched. This little girl who started out as disposable but who had become so much more — Kaeta was the sole life form she came across during that adventure on Earth that she didn’t leave damaged, crushed, or dead. Scared into silence, yes; that was part and parcel for everyone who dared interact with her. But to have grown fond of Kaeta and have her come out intact on the other side, this was something she didn’t believe was possible.

It shouldn’t be possible, actually.

“Kaeta,” she said, careful not to speak too loudly for the girl to think she was calling her. “She’s so happy to see me. She doesn’t know, does she? About what I did to you.”

“They were so young then. We told them it was an accident.”

We. The Doctor and Korg. Nardole had probably played along too.

“They must have figured it out at some point. They’re no longer children.”

“Not if it’s the truth.”

Missy side-eyed the Whifferdill. Did he come back to life missing his entire brain?

“It is the truth,” Korg repeated, sounding so insistent that Missy wondered if he had to convince himself of this in order to keep carrying on day after day.

Those yellow hands that were wrapped around his mug suddenly gripped tighter, and Missy realized she had verbalized her thoughts. Tension strung through Korg’s entire body, so much so that Missy was afraid she had triggered another one of his episodes. But Korg eventually calmed down and sent Missy a small smile.

“It doesn’t matter. We’re both here now, alive.”

It would always matter. But now wasn’t the time to argue. So Missy turned back to her tea — her sixth cup of the day — and let the steam curl around her face. She pondered the absurdity of hope. It worked out like a fairytale for Korg: the hero went through great trials and was rewarded with life and love at the end of his journey. But life was more often a nightmare than a fairytale.

“You’ll never truly be safe around me,” she said into her mug, felt the need to point out. “Despite what the Doctor may have told you, I haven’t changed that much. He’s as deluded as you are. I’ve killed him before too. He just keeps coming back.”

In the background, Kaeta and Tzakhi went into the kitchen and both came out with a cold beverage in hand. Missy flashed them a perfect smile as they passed by. They smiled back, too distracted to notice Korg staring at his mug with facial features that had turned serious.

It was a good two minutes before Korg’s mind quieted down from the noisy whirring. “Before, whenever I thought about living forever, to really think about it, I... it was horrible,” he confessed. Missy disagreed. Living forever had always been her goal in life. But then again, she wasn’t frozen as a donkey.

Korg snapped his head up. “You know what? I thought I was going to be relieved when I finally died, but I was terrified. I wasn’t brave at all. I wanted to die and I didn’t want to die. It was... it didn’t make sense. It was confusing.

“But it wasn’t you I was afraid of. Well, I am, still. I mean, we’re all a bit scared of you. It was that I wasn’t more afraid of you. I really was only scared of the dying part, if that makes sense. You’re you, Missy. If I choose to spend time with you, then I take full responsibility of the risks.”

He wasn’t making sense, and Missy was more convinced than ever that the Doctor didn’t properly piece him back together when he brought him back to life.

“Stay for dinner?”

She all but told him she was dangerous and a dinner invitation was his response? How... why?

“Perhaps I should –”

“I’ll order out if you don’t trust my cooking, although I haven’t managed to poison the kids yet so that must mean something.” Korg chuckled. “They’re bottomless. They’ll be hungry again as soon as dinner is ready.”

Missy took another sip, buying herself the time she needed to regain her voice. “Pity, I rather like the metallic taste of arsenic if you were planning on poisoning me.”

There was no bite to her tone; she didn’t even manage a hint of sarcasm to hide how hollow her words sounded. The truth was, she did understand what was happening. She came to Xenon seeking an impossibility that turned out to be real. And she was feeling it. Hope. This blasted sentiment that was melting away every wobbling brick of the wall she tried rebuilding around her hearts.

She knew the longer she stayed, the more out of depth she was going to feel. If she valued self-preservation, she would leave now, extract herself from the company that she didn’t exactly belong in. She had no part in this odd family that the Doctor had stitched together.

But hope kept her sitting and held her captive in this house. Hope was becoming real, and she... wanted it.

She was accepted for simply being who she was: a crazy, scary, destructive Time Lady who played Earth like a sandbox and left it in ruins. And still Korg wanted her to stay.

Korg was looking at her again with his real eyes, the ones that were hidden behind conjured facial features and so much more earnest. Missy sighed, sweeping away the last of her defenses.

“I suppose a regular, non-life-threatening meal will have to do,” she said, and Korg’s entire demeanor brightened. “But on one condition: I need to use your kitchen after you’re done cooking your meal.”

“Of course, whatever you need!” He raised his voice. “Don’t eat too much, you two. Save your appetite. Missy’s staying for dinner.”

The beaming glow on Kaeta’s face and third eye was so breathtaking that Missy would never forget it for the rest of this life. Here was a life she befriended, beautiful and given every opportunity to develop into her full potential. Next to this young lady was the other half of an enduring friendship that became the symbol of peace between two hostile species. And well within an arm’s reach of her was her living and breathing murder victim who, inexplicably, did not hold anything against her.

An odd family indeed.

She knew what she needed to do next, after this.

It was time to go back.

-

Summer came and went, and the academic year was well underway at St. Luke’s University. Preparing for the new term had taken most of the Doctor’s time, though his calendar was filled not so much with lesson plans as with the need to satisfy his inner compulsion to attend every faculty meeting and budget planning session that the department was having. He had a suspicion that the department head had started to conveniently forget sending him meeting notices, but a quick hack into the university’s intranet gave Professor Doctor all the information he needed to poke his nose into every administrative meeting held across the university.

Being busy was good. Being busy meant not having time to sit in his office and think, which further meant not giving into the temptation of walking down those stairs and into the vault. He hadn’t done it much lately. Those nights when he would sit outside the empty box just staring into nothing had become less and less frequent. As days turned into weeks and into months, the Doctor was forced to admit that Missy would never return. Why would she? Nardole had tracked several catastrophes that had popped up across the universe’s past, present, and future, every one of them broadcasting Missy’s handiwork as if she meant to wink at him with each of her chaos-inducing masterpieces. He would go after her if he knew where and when she would pop up next. But the only place with the slightest possibility of a Missy appearance was here, and so the Doctor clung onto impossible hope and convinced himself to stay day after day, even as the hope was beginning to look no different than his colleagues remaining at St. Luke’s for the sheer lack of ability to obtain better teaching posts elsewhere.

Tonight, not even an enjoyable tutoring session with Bill was enough to distract him. After Bill left and Nardole excused himself to go attend some party, he grabbed a book on his desk and started flipping through the pages. But the words weren’t sinking in, and he soon found himself facing the vault, his mind blank as he couldn’t recall the last few minutes of how he ended up here.

He did something he hadn’t done in a long time: he disarmed the security and pulled open the door.

Everything looked the same as the last time he was here, and the last time and the time before that, the quantum-fold chamber being immune to what was happening outside. It was strange how stasis worked, neither speeding up nor slowing down time. Everything simply was. This was had gotten slower lately though, judging by those snail-paced hours when he was last here, an entire night spent in vigil as he stared and stared at the those fake windows until the fake stars disappeared and the fake sun rose. The last time he did this, a fortnight ago, he hadn’t slept all night. He wondered if tonight would be the same.

He approached the piano and started playing the same tune that he played on the guitar, that time with Missy. Each note tugged at the strands of his neural block, trying to unravel what had been suppressed. Maybe he would remember properly one day, but today was not the day. Today, tonight, he was simply here because he happened to be here, just was, no reason and without hope, without witness, without reward.

He pushed back the piano bench and stood up abruptly, turning on his heels to exit the vault. What was he doing here? This place had been empty for three months and would always remain empty. He needed to get out of here. He had duties to perform come morning. He needed to rest.

The fake windows had gone dark and he stumbled into one of the armchairs. The next thing he knew, he was sitting in it.

Ah, well. What did it matter if he took one night off from what Nardole called real life?

The Doctor lay back on the armchair, shifted from a very uncomfortable position into a less uncomfortable one, and drifted into a dreamless sleep.

He was awakened in the morning by a very cross Nardole.

“You can’t keep sleeping in here,” came the scolding from outside the vault, all protocols of secrecy forgotten.

“It was an accident,” he lied.

“Yes, and I have a full head of hair. Really, at least put in a little bit of effort when you make stuff up,” Nardole huffed. “I’m going back up. Your lecture is in fifteen minutes. Don’t say I didn’t remind you.”

And with that, the feeling that another person was in his personal space went the way of heavy footsteps trudging up the stairs. The Doctor groaned and pulled himself up. Fifteen minutes. This meant he had a good fourteen minutes to waste. That, or he could spend some of it making himself presentable. With as much determination as he could muster, he hauled his protesting body toward the vault’s bathroom. Once inside, he braced himself to look at the mirror. The face staring back at him was surprisingly not bad — hair not sticking out in too many directions and clothing not terribly crumbled. He borrowed some of Missy’s mouthwash, rinsed, and then used the toilet. All of that took a total of three minutes and twenty-five seconds. Plenty of time to spare.

He had just made his way back into the outside world when he felt it: the presence of another being who was very much not Nardole. He inwardly swore. Careless Doctor. He wasn’t planning on resorting to memory-wiping tactics so soon. Maybe he could persuade whichever human it was that the vault was just part of the university’s architecture. His mind racing, the Doctor readied an explanation on his tongue as he turned around –

And stared.

It was... but it couldn’t, was he –

“What’s the matter, cat got your tongue?”

Missy.

Missy was leaning casually against the vault’s open door with a teasing smile playing on both her lips and eyes. She looked like she had never left for a single day, not since they were last here eating Chinese food together.

The Doctor glanced down, spotting the vortex manipulator around her wrist.

Ancient Israel did happen. She came back...

A thousand thoughts swirled inside his head but he couldn’t give voice to any of them, none of the how’s and why’s and what happened’s felt like the right thing to say. Missy was here. But was she here to stay or to say goodbye?

Her eyes were still strikingly blue. But they were older, so much older.

“How long?” he whispered, afraid that anything louder would travel right through Missy and reveal her to be a phantom.

She shrugged. “Decades or centuries, I didn’t really count. Time is very relative when you’re hopping around from era to era.”

“Did you see the stars?”

Did you get bored of the universe? Is this why you came back?

Missy arched her eyebrows in response to his thoughts. Are you saying you’re more interesting than the universe? she silently teased, and the Doctor allowed the corners of his lips to spread up and out. “Some,” she answered his verbal question aloud, and he missed this, missed carrying on two conversations at once and perhaps having a third one at their subconscious level. “I wanted to see all the stars in the universe in one go, thought I would keep going forever.” Those older eyes found his. “But it wasn’t fun without a friend.”

She held his gaze, looked at him expectantly. It was his turn to speak. The proper thing to say would be to offer to go see every star with her, to fulfill their very first promise to each other. He could bring her into the TARDIS now, leave everything behind and fly away. It was all he ever wanted.

But if he did that, it would mean condoning the destruction of stars and planets and casual termination of lives. It would cancel everything he’d tried to teach her over the past seventy years.

The hint of a smile faded away from her lips. He had hesitated too long.

“I see,” she said dully. “We’re still not friends.”

“Of course we’re friends.”

After all they had been through? Why wouldn’t they –

The stench of burnt flesh, the sight of dead bodies. Euldvar, brave and wise and benevolent and gone. The lifeless eyes of Korg. Scent and visual memories crowded his mind unbidden, and Missy was in all of them, Missy everywhere. Missy always linked with death.

“Oh, right,” she said, imprinting on his senses and reading his mind. “That was where we left off. We’re enemies.”

“Missy, don’t. That’s not true and you know it.” He just – he didn’t know why those memories chose this moment to surface, except that they were the most recent ones of her. He reminded himself that they were traveling on different timelines, that months for him were centuries ago for her.

The Doctor brought a hand to his face, trying to wipe away those treacherous memories, his mind spinning to find the right words to explain. “I –”

“We are no longer friends. The minute I walk back into this vault, I will revert to a prisoner. You will be my jailor and caretaker, nothing more.”

Those were his words to her at the cavern, spoken in anger. After hundreds of years, she still remembered. Missy not only heard every word through her catatonic haze, but had been deeply affected by them.

“I didn’t mean –”

“Oh yes you did, you meant every word. You said them to hurt me.”

He wished he hadn’t, now.

Missy shook her head. “I’m the foolish one. I had hoped... well, that’s the problem. I hoped.”

“Missy...” He took a step forward, stopped when she glared up at him like a hissing cat.

This was going all wrong. It wasn’t how their reunion was supposed to play out, not in the hundreds of scenarios he had imagined over the past three months. The Doctor chanced another step, moving slowly this time, and said the first thing that came to mind: “Please stay.”

Missy sneered. “And be your prisoner forever? Even you must know how ridiculous this sounds.”

He chose not to answer. Answering would drive a wedge into the rift that was beginning to form between them and split it into a chasm. He held onto hope instead. Because Missy hadn’t said no. He knew Missy. If she was serious about a rejection, he would be staring at thin air right now in the wake of her dematerialization.

Missy had her chin tilted forward, the very posture of defiance. “I see more,” she accused, because she was right, his mind was a sieve. “More things you don’t approve of.”

“The stars. You destroyed them.”

“I destroyed one. And I evacuated all intelligent life forms before doing so.”

“You created a refugee crisis across several star systems.”

Those eyes narrowed in accusation. “You tracked me?”

He knew it was a bad idea.

“Well, technically, Nardole did. He needed a new hobby so I let him.”

He wasn’t surprised that Nardole’s name could still draw unadulterated disdain out of Missy. “And what did Nardole conclude? That I’m an evil destroyer of civilizations and should be locked away for all eternity? Boring. In other news: space is cold, water is wet, and honey is sweet, even the alien-bee ones.” She sing-songed the last few words, putting her insanity on full display, bringing her teeth together to make buzzing noises.

“Stop it.” He knew too well that Missy was doing this as self-defense, to protect herself from getting hurt. He closed the rest of the distance between them. She looked up at him, a manic grin on her face, but her mind was like a sieve too and it was showing him all the things underneath, red orange screams pain yellow alone explosion laughter tears purple red red red.

But in the midst of the chaos, there it was — a tree. This tree wasn’t big yet and had gnarly, twisted branches; its leaves were more brown than green. But it was there. The sapling from all those years ago had survived.

Missy abruptly stopped all of her theatrics. The Doctor had seen too much and she flung up the walls around her mind. Outwardly, she was composed again if holding herself a bit too stiffly, and could pass as a perfectly normal human being.

“There’s nothing in there I don’t already know,” the Doctor murmured, but did the courteous thing and stepped away from her mind. He allowed himself a small smile, because anything bigger could scare Missy away, and he didn’t want to lose her anymore. “You saw the stars and aside from that one exception, you didn’t destroy them. That’s very good. You’ve proven that the universe is generally safe with you in it.”

Missy tensed at the compliment. The Doctor pushed his thoughts to the surface of his mind, daring her to inspect them and verify that he was sincere.

“Please stay.” He resisted the urge to look down at her vortex manipulator to see if it was being activated. He kept his eyes on hers instead. “Don’t you feel it? Ever since the Silurians, we’ve been heading toward something new, something so much bigger than before.

“And I don’t know, Missy. I have no idea what this ‘bigger’ is. All I know is you’ve changed. I have too. Maybe we can figure out this new thing together. If you stay, then you can help me. Help me help you. Lead me to the point where our new selves can trust each other, make it work for both of us.” He added, “Please.”

The distant chiming of the university clock tower told him that he was now late for his lecture. Missy was looking uncertain, but at least she was still here. It was as good as he was going to get; he was out of time.

“I need to go to my lecture. The vault’s all yours, as your home if you want to make use of it. Leave the door unlocked if you’d like. We can work out a new arrangement later. Agreed?”

He took her hand, lifting it and wrapping both of his around one of hers. After a few seconds of hesitation, Missy’s other hand joined in and covered his knuckles. He leaned down and kissed it, quick but gentle.

“It’s so, so good to see you.” Their gazes held. Yes, her response resonated in his mind. Please stay, he didn’t say, because he knew Missy had already heard.

-

When the Doctor returned from his lecture, Missy was in the bathroom. He chose not to dwell on his initial terror at finding the vault empty. The relief that soon followed wasn’t any less embarrassing, especially not with this grin that suddenly took over his face. It was just as well that Missy wasn’t here to see such indignity. What she couldn’t see, she wouldn’t be able to mock and taunt and make fun of later.

She stayed.

He walked over to the armchairs and spotted the Oxford Bible on the coffee table, its cover scrawled over by Missy’s very creative use of a ball-point pen as a scalpel on the hardback. It now read: The New Oxford Annotated Bible: Fourth Missy’s Edition. The Doctor chuckled as he opened it from the beginning. Scribbled on the margin of the page detailing the story of Noah’s Ark was a picture of the TARDIS with her door open and pairs of animals filing in. “That wasn’t exactly how it happened,” he mumbled, but conceded that his presence was quite conspicuous to a trained Time Lady’s eye. He flipped over to the next page and found a doodle of himself with a scowly expression lording over humans by the Tower of Babel. “Wrong face,” he tutted. That one was all Bowtie’s doing.

He flipped forward and the book opened to a section where its spine was creased. The Book of Numbers. Ah, of course Missy would revisit that section to annotate her trophies. To his surprise, there was only minimal doodling of Tzakhi and his relatives, although how she was able to find out that Nardole was eavesdropping on the Israelite leaders’ conversation, he didn’t know. That sketch of a humanoid with a literal egg as his head though, it left no doubt as to who that was supposed to be.

It was Numbers 22 that was so scribbled over that calling it a rewrite was an understatement. The entire margin was filled with illustrations of a donkey in all sorts of absurd poses. Korg was nowhere near this acrobatic, although the doodles really did resemble him. The text was unsalvageable, every reference to the speaking donkey written over with ‘Korg’ and the human he was associated with smeared with such hostile epithets that the Doctor was certain even the most banned book in the universe couldn’t compare. She ended with a victorious and laughing Korg in Numbers 31, standing on his hind legs and gloating over piles of human bodies.

“You figured out Korg’s alive,” he said when Missy padded out of the bathroom. She was dressed in her indoors clothing and her hair was down, the vortex manipulator around her wrist the only indication that she had recently been outside of the vault. She perched on the edge of the armchair opposite him, her posture unusually tense for someone who had just had a bath.

“I found him on Xenon.”

“That’s good! Saves me loads of explaining.”

“He saw me and had a panic attack.”

The Doctor wasn’t sure what Missy was trying to get at. “You did kill him,” he pointed out, not unkindly. “But the last time I saw him, he asked after you. So all things considered, I’d say his opinion of you is positive neutral.”

Missy watched as he closed the book and placed it on the coffee table. “Well, I’m still here.”

“We’re still here,” he said to the book. It was easier to focus on something other than the one person occupying his mind.

Missy also looked away. “So now what?”

“I don’t know,” the Doctor said carefully, aware that the wrong word would send them back to past failures. “Would you still like me to show you how to be good? You’re getting there, might as well go all the way and then decide later whether to commit to it. Up to you. In fact, I won’t hold you if you no longer want to be here.”

This. This was the ‘bigger’ that he was talking about, the new frontier that was opening up into the unknown. He was going beyond the familiar grounds of wrangling goodness out of someone labeled evil by the rest of the universe. Where they were treading into had no road sign or instruction manual.

Missy turned her head to the window projection on the far side of the room and curled her lips at its unrealistic depiction. The prospect of being confined once again must be nauseating, especially after having traveled the stars.

“I stayed with Korg for two days. After that, I didn’t want to travel anymore, so I came back.”

“That’s... good.”

“It’s not good or bad,” she snapped at him. “You still don’t get it, do you? I don’t need a professor to show me how to be good. While I was out roaming the universe, I continued to change. Believe me, it was terrifying. And disgusting.”

She did it. She turned good on her own terms whether or not he agreed with her goodness. So then what did he have left to offer? Why did she return?

Missy looked at him as if he were a pudding brain, then sighed dramatically. She reached behind her armchair and brought around her travel sack. With a thud, she dropped it next to the coffee table. “As I said a long time ago, one of us has to remember these sorts of things.” She waited for him to understand, which he didn’t, so she made that exasperated face that seemed to question her own intelligence for willingly associating with an idiot. She dug into the sack and pulled out a perfectly decorated cake.

“Happy birthday.”

“It’s not –” He paused, did some calculations aligning Earth’s current time with the Gallifreyan calendar. “Oh.” Accepting the cake from her hands gingerly, because it was bad form not to receive a gift when it looked absolutely innocuous from every angle, the Doctor attempted a smile. “Thank you.”

“Stop looking at it like it’s going to explode. If I want cake smeared on your face, I’d do it with my own hands.”

He set the cake down and gave the writing on it a closer look. Thin, red frosting spelled out a birthday greeting especially for him in Gallifreyan, complete with that circular symbol he hadn’t seen in a long time, Koschei’s shorthand for his given name.

“Shall we eat it?”

“You’re the one permitted to handle knives here, my dear.”

He stood up. “Yes, let’s eat. I’ll fetch plates and utensils.”

The cake was surprisingly good, moist and dense exactly as he liked it, infused with a flavor that the Doctor was quite certain wasn’t available on Earth. He tried not to dwell on the likely conclusion that Missy made the cake herself, because baking cakes for each other was something that friends did and, well, they were close but not quite there yet, weren’t they?

He pointed to Missy’s sack. “What else is in there? You’re far too efficient to waste a large bag on just a cake.”

“Oh, some of my loots from over the years.” She took out a large metal cylinder full of warning labels in an alien language. “Turns out I’m the one who started the Moltavian Industrial Revolution. This one’s my latest attempt at enriching the planet’s extracted crude oil. Use it on your TARDIS or bathe the egg man in it, I don’t care which as long as I don’t have to lug this thing around anymore.”

She got Nardole a gift? The Doctor tried his hardest not to let the smile on his face get any bigger. He shoved what was left of his slice of cake into his mouth.

Missy didn’t pay him any attention. She reached back into her sack and took out so many small bottles and compact items that they lined up across the entire length of the coffee table. Those spray-on things. Ah, so she did manage to visit that cosmetics planet. “For Bill,” was all Missy said. The Doctor looked up from his plate and sent her a questioning Mmm? through a stuffed mouth.

Missy shrugged. “She’ll like these, trust me on this. I can’t explain why. I just know. It’s as if I’ve seen her decorate her face before.”

The Doctor picked up a handful of items. All were in their original packaging and sealed. He decided to trust Missy.

“Why are you doing this?” he asked, because Missy’s behavior was so unexpected. None of this... gift-giving, caring, selfless thing matched his last memory of her, when her hand smelled of burnt flesh and her head still topped Gan’s Most Wanted list.

Missy met his gaze calmly. “I want my friend back.”

“You can’t just bribe your way into a friendship. You know that?”

“Can’t I?” She didn’t take her eyes off of him. “Then maybe I should try harder.” Missy shifted in her seat and pulled at her left sleeve. “I wasn’t going to just give you a cake, you know.”

She tugged at the vortex manipulator until the strap came loose, then placed it next to the cake.

Her freedom. Surrendered willingly as a gift.

“I want my friend back.”

He’d never seen her so determined, so willing to throw all self-interest away, choosing what was uncertain over what was beneficial, profitable, and easy. He glanced from the vortex manipulator to the steel behind her eyes, and his breath caught.

Yes, both his hearts screamed, but his mind clung to rationality. “What if we do this wrong again?” he whispered, afraid to speak too loudly lest the worry became reality.

She didn’t seem to hear him.

“You may want this today, but in two, three days, in a month, things will default back to old routine and we’re going to hurt each other again.”

“I want my friend back.”

“Missy –”

“I. Want. My. Friend. Back.”

Her face, that determination, was all the explanation he needed. It wasn’t about doing things perfectly; they never would. It was certainly not about not hurting each other — they had been doing that across time and space in all of their regenerations. As the Doctor considered Missy’s words, so direct and plainly spoken, he could only conclude that she was willing to commit to possible failure because it was never about doing things right. Because friendship could never be bought and traded and rewarded like prizes at an arcade.

Whether turning Missy good would end in utter disaster, it was entirely irrelevant to their becoming friends again. Time together. That was their real promise to each other. Missy came back for him — the one thing she couldn’t have from traveling the universe — and he would be here for her for as long as she needed.

The Doctor exhaled, unlocking his hopes and fears from a very far down part of his hearts. Of course he wanted his friend back.

“Welcome home, Missy.”

-

The new term at St. Luke’s brought on a new routine. Missy was glad of the subtle changes from term to term. The slight variations of the Doctor’s schedule gave her a sense of the passing of seasons. He had been talking more and more about space in his lectures lately, if the mutterings of the egg man was anything to go by. It had been almost half a year since he returned from ancient Israel. Frankly, she was surprised he hadn’t stolen off to some planet in all this time.

Today, the Doctor stormed into the vault fuming about being right and ranting about how Bill knew nothing of real Roman history. Missy smiled through the entirety of his ramblings and started to mentally calculate how many hours it would take until he would grab Bill by the hand and drag her toward the TARDIS and into Roman times. Maybe she should suggest taking Nardole along so she could have some peace and quiet. With any luck, the Doctor’s horrific piloting would grant her many hours or maybe even days of uninterrupted solitude.

He was on his fifth round of making the same complaint when she leaned back into the armchair and waved a hand casually. “Just take her along. Show her a desolate Scotland with no Romans and then come back for chips. Really, how hard can it be?”

That shut the Doctor up. He turned to her with that Who are you and what have you done with Missy look that she loved so much.

“Don’t pretend you aren’t planning to do exactly that.”

“Why would I think that?” the Doctor asked a tad bit too innocently. Oh, he’d probably been thinking about it for hours.

“Wrong question. The real question is: Why are you telling me all this?”

“Because I’m right!”

“Sure you are. I’m not questioning your superiority.” Missy grinned, her eyes widening with delight. She sat up and leaned forward like a cat spotting the perfect prey. “Is this really happening? Is the Doctor feeling insecure for having his absolute rightness challenged? Ooh, I’ll side with the pet on this one, just so I can see you all flustered when you’re proven wrong.”

“This isn’t a casino for taking bets!” He glared at her. “And I’m right.”

“Prove it, then.”

The Doctor paid her proper attention at that. Oh good. So she wasn’t just a wall for him to bounce off his smug voice. “Missy? Did you – you’re allowing me to go on a trip?”

“I’m the prisoner here, not you. Besides, it’s your life to risk. Mark my words, something is bound to happen.”

The idiot didn’t hear a word of her warning. “I’ll take Bill right into the heart of history and show her that not a single Roman solider of the Ninth Legion survived. Yes, that’s exactly what I’ll do. I’ll even take Nardole along as a witness.” He added, as an afterthought, “What about you?”

“Me? What about me?”

“I can’t let you out, of course, not with Nardole being super strict about locking you in since you returned –”

“That ungrateful bastard,” she hissed.

“– but I thought, well, you’re not a prisoner in the same sense anymore, not like before. I was thinking — and this is just a thought, mind you, I haven’t given it much marinating but then you know me, always the need to think out loud — I thought if you’d like to catch some fresh air... wait, there won’t be fresh air to catch, you’ll still need to be confined, but you know what I was thinking –”

“No, I don’t. Spit it out.”

The Doctor stopped, laughed when he realized how ridiculous he was being, and brought a hand to the back of his neck. Missy rolled her eyes. Whether he was Theta or the Doctor in any of his faces he would never cease to be absolutely annoying in that clueless, adorable-if-she-was-willing-to-admit-it way.

She waited until he was ready to form complete, coherent sentences.

“The TARDIS, she can use some sprucing up. I thought if you’re interested, maybe you can help me do some maintenance work. It’ll give you a change of environment.”

“Free labor for something you’re too lazy to do, dear? This arrangement has a name in some parts of the universe and it’s not a pretty one.”

“Only if you want,” the Doctor hurried to add, concern etched on every line of his face, so open and always so easy to crush like a bug if she was still evil and wanted to hurt him.

“I don’t suppose I will have full access to the TARDIS?” she asked. Better to know the confines of her new prison now than to have a rude awakening later.

“Unrestricted access to the engines and all mechanical areas, plus the rooms you had access to before. We can expand on that later. Make this one a trial run.”

Missy looked around the four walls of the quantum-fold chamber. It was bigger on the inside and mostly comfortable. But a change of scenery would be very nice.

“I want access to the scanner and monitor. You can’t take me to a new place and deprive me of the entertainment of watching you get into trouble.”

“Deal,” the Doctor said confidently and so quickly, as if he was certain they would find nothing in second century Scotland. What was that saying about not learning from history? He was going to be in for a big surprise.

“And the egg?”

Resignation flashed through the Doctor’s face at the mention of the family member that one couldn’t get rid of. But the need to deal with Nardole didn’t mean an obligation to involve him on everything.

The Doctor took her hand and whispered as if plotting a conspiracy, “Don’t tell Nardole.”

And with those same words that sent them on their previous adventure, they grinned at each other and set off for a new one.

Fin