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Chapter Text

The Doctor wavers on the street, standing at some precise halfway point between the TARDIS and Martha's mum's house. It's funny, the way a blue police box doesn't look odd standing there in the middle of the road. It looks solid, like it can stand through anything, just the way Martha always thought the brick house behind her could stand through anything. She didn't go near it, during the year that wasn't. She couldn't have, but even if she could have risked getting back into England, she doesn't think she would have come here. She doesn't think any of the pictures seared into her mind will ever go away; she looks at the Doctor and the Doctor looks at her and he smiles a little, crookedly.

"I can't," he says.

"Mum really wants to thank you properly," Martha says.

"Really I can't, he shouldn't be left alone."

"You don't trust him alone, you mean," Martha says.

The Doctor thinks about this for a moment. "Yep."

"Well, I don't either," Martha says. "Listen, you're sure you've got him sorted?"

"Unbreakable chains," the Doctor says. "At least until he calms down a bit."

Martha thinks of the last time she saw the Master: pale, blank-eyed, jaw set. He hadn't said a word to any of them. UNIT came to take them all down; Martha sat next to Lucy Saxon in the carrier. The poor woman was as pale and blank-eyed as the Master had been, and Martha wanted to say something to her, but I'm sorry didn't really seem like the right thing, and her mind had been filled with other things: the year that never was. Britain without a Prime Minister and America without a President. What on earth they would say to poor Leo. What she could possibly say to the Doctor now.

The whole flight, she kept thinking about Vicky and Sean. Of all mad things, Vicky and Sean and the student housing and the wasted years of Vicky's life and her own voice telling Vicky, get out, and even as she rehearsed it in her head she knew there was no point. It was never about competing with Rose Tyler-- Rose Tyler, who always knew what to say, who was blonde, who had looked into the Heart of the TARDIS-- in the first place, because she's seen now the horrible grief in the Doctor's face when he looks at the Master, and Martha Jones thinks she might understand, if only a little, what it really is she can't hope to replace.

When the UNIT carrier landed, Martha hugged her mother and father and sister very tightly and promised to be back quick as you like, and for the first time in her life no one asked her where she was going or why she was going or when she would be back. The look her family gave her was the look Martha has become used to seeing everywhere she walked in the world, and even the memory of that look frightens her a little. It's just one more reason she can't leave them.

She and the Doctor dropped Jack off in Cardiff; he said words about his team that he might have really meant, but Martha knows: that's only half the story. If Jack had his way, he'd wring the Master's neck over and over and over until the Master is out of regenerations. Martha doesn't know what she might do, but the look on Jack's face when he said goodbye warms her. It's all right to get out: Jack has people who need looking after, and so does she.

"All right," Martha says to the Doctor, with a smile, nodding. A few autumn leaves skitter past them down the road.

"And you?" the Doctor asks softly.

"I can't," Martha says. "Not knowing all the things he's done. Not when there are people here who need me. I just-- can't."

"All right," the Doctor says, but he's smiling. "Martha. Thank you."

He's wearing the same suit he was when he met her. Different shoes, though. He'd chucked the red ones into a bin cos one was full of radiation, and Martha had fallen a little bit in love. He hugs her; Martha squeezes her eyes shut and runs her hands over the smooth cut of the suit jacket down his back, and imprints it firmly into her memory: how tightly he holds her, the smell of cloth and metal and a faint whiff of tea, the way when he pulls back to grin at her again he holds onto her arms for a moment and the corners of his eyes crinkle up a little.

"You never know," she says. "I might save the world again while you're off among the stars."

"You might," he says, and he sounds like he means it.

"Although," she says, pulling her mobile out of her pocket, "that reminds me--" and tosses it to him; he catches it deftly. "Just in case the universe needs saving, and you're up for a bit of fun... I'm going to call you. Check in. You'd better pick up."

"I will," he says, and the smile turns into an outright grin.

"--Doctor," Martha says. "I'm glad you're not alone anymore." She stands on tiptoe and kisses him on the cheek, and gives him a grin over her shoulder, and doesn't tell him she loves him. He knows.

Back inside, she finds Tish and Dad trying to explain the events of the last year to Leo, with minimal success, while Mum hovers and tries to foist tea on all of them. Martha makes a note to buy herself a new phone-- and, come to that, maybe to buy herself a new flat; it's remarkable how little she cares that nearly everything she owned is gone. Travelling with the Doctor-- the year that wasn't-- it's all given her a lot of perspective.

She picks her mum's cell phone up from the kitchen table; the Archangel logo glows on the screen. First thing tomorrow, Martha tells herself. I'm calling Jack and making sure Torchwood gets well rid of those satellites. And I'll need to start looking for a new flat. I should call Julia. I should call Vicky. I wonder what old Morgenstern's up to. I--

She smiles a bit and dials the nearest hospital information to see if she can find Thomas Milligan.

"So," the Master says.

"So," the Doctor echoes, checking the readings on the console. It's safe enough to have the Master in the control room now; it's keyed to his biodata and won't respond to the Master without some serious tampering.

"First planet we get to," the Master says, "I'm leaving. You can't watch me every moment, and you won't keep me locked up."

"Then we won't go to a planet," the Doctor murmurs; one of the screens tells him they're approaching the year one billion. Good millennium.

"You can't keep me here forever," the Master whispers.

"No," the Doctor agrees, "but I can for a very long time." He glances over at the Master, who glares back, elegantly disdainful, right hand manacled to one of the TARDIS's pillars, left hand tapping out an absent rhythm against his thigh. The Doctor watches his tapping fingers for a long moment, but doesn't offer to help the Master rid himself of the drumbeat, not today: that is compassion.

He sets them into stable orbit around a red dwarf near M87. He launders his spare suits and the Master's spare suits and forgets to tell the TARDIS to separate whites and colours, so all the Master's beautiful crisp white shirts come out pale grey or pale blue. The Master, if he notices, makes no comment. After they've gotten a quarter of the way around the red dwarf and the Master has made no trouble at all (and hardly spoken, save a few quiet inquiries as to their position in time and relative to the star) he unlocks the cuff on the Master's wrist, presses a cup of tea into his freed hand, and leaves him be: that is an empty gesture of trust.

After this, he keeps catching the Master tampering with the TARDIS in any way he can. On one memorable occasion (roughly halfway around the red dwarf), the Doctor is awoken by the techno thump of a horribly familiar song, and for a moment of blind panic thinks he's back on the Valiant. Here come the drums screams through the TARDIS, and the Doctor pulls on his tatty blue bathrobe and stumbles down the helix staircase to the control room to shut it off. The Master is conspicuously absent from the proceedings; when he turns up a few hours later with rumpled hair and the TARDIS provides them with beans and toast, the Doctor makes no mention of it: that is punishment enough.

"I can't tell what you're thinking," the Master says conversationally later that day. He's discovered a game cupboard on the level directly above the control room; to the best of the Doctor's knowledge, the game cupboard contains a Snakes and Ladders game from the 1950s, a chess set from the thirteenth century, a Judoon poker deck, a board game from the 2200s entitled So You Think You Know The Great Classics? Harry Potter Trivia Game! and the thing the Master has brought out, a sort of glittery half-transparent Rubik's Cube from the forty-second century. In the hands of a human it might take hours to figure out its intricacies, but the Master solves it and scrambles it over and over with each absent twirl of his fingers, click-click-click-click, click-click-click-click.

"Can't you?" the Doctor asks absently. He's trying to coax the TARDIS to play music that isn't from 1990 to 2015, but with minimal success. "Right now I'm thinking that if I can't get my Chopin files back soon, our next stop is Paris, 1840."

"Must we?" the Master murmurs. "France is dull, Doctor."

"Mm," the Doctor says. He's gotten the TARDIS' music records to go back to 1970, but there her database stubbornly freezes, so with a sense of resignation he lets her play David Bowie; at least it chases the other song from his head. He turns, the Master's words catching up with him. "What do you mean, you can't tell what I'm thinking?"

"I've been trying," the Master says, tapping his own temple with a forefinger in explanation. He goes back to fiddling with the Rubik's Cube from 4129. "But your head's just filled with static. White noise. I wonder how long it's been like that."

Wonder if he'll ever know, David Bowie sings musingly in the background. The Doctor touches the screen gently and the music cuts off. "I don't know," he murmurs. "A long time."

The Master laughs shortly, but doesn't say anything else until some hours later when the Doctor catches the Master upstairs in his wardrobe room, wearing a wide-brimmed hat and a long striped scarf and mugging ridiculously into the mirror. "Hey!" he protests when the Doctor snatches the hat from his head.

"Not funny," the Doctor says.

"I think it's wonderfully funny," the Master returns, unwinding the scarf and throwing it over a nearby dummy. "In fact, I think everything about this whole situation is absolutely hilarious."

There's a note in the Master's voice like the edge of hysteria, and the Doctor goes tense. "Why do you say that?"

The Master stares blankly at his own reflection in the mirror. "How long will we be orbiting this star, Doctor?" he asks very quietly.

The Doctor watches the Master's reflection for a long moment: dark eyes, round face, clean-shaven, neat hair. His tie is dark grey paisley and worn with the absolute exacting straightness of the completely mad. The Doctor listens to his own heartsbeat and feels through the great distance between himself and the universe a faint thrill of terror. The Master's idea of cruelty is giving him the hope he might someday be let in.

"Where would you like to go?" he asks.

The Master turns from the mirror in surprise, and gives the Doctor an appraising look. "New Earth," he says, and smiles. "Don't look so shocked, Doctor." (The Doctor isn't aware he'd been looking anything of the sort.) "It's all useless white noise but you still think. I've been given to believe you take all your rebounds to New New York?" A grin. "No, sorry. New New New New New--"

"Shut up," the Doctor says.

That is compassion too: watching the brief flare of triumph in the Master's eyes. Hope is funny like that.

"New Earth," he says. "No weapons on you. Any tricks at all and you'll be locked up for as long as you need to be."

"I've got it, I've got it," the Master says, sneering faintly.

The Doctor goes downstairs to set a course.

The TARDIS is parked down a side alley in between glittering skyscrapers. The Master walks with a spring in his step and the Doctor walks with his shoulder brushing the Master's, knowing how dangerous this is and knowing that he can't possibly do otherwise.

"Ooh," the Master says, turning to the Doctor just outside a twenty-storey shopping complex. He gives the Doctor a little pout. "Can we pretty please go inside?" And, eyes suddenly wide, positively glowing with false sincerity, "I'd really, really like some nice new shirts. Your washing machine doesn't work very well, does it."

The Doctor clenches his teeth. "In, then," he says, and he doesn't need to, but he takes the Master's arm and steers him. Any excuse to touch the only other Time Lord in existence. Why the Master doesn't shake him off, though, the Doctor can't imagine. Maybe he feels the same way; sometimes he catches the Master looking at him with peculiar hunger.

An interactive map in the mall's ground-floor atrium directs them to the twelfth floor: Apparel for Human and Humanoid Males. The Doctor privately suspects that high fashion in the year five billion twenty-eight does not necessarily include well-tailored dress shirts suitable for twenty-first century Earth politicians. Funny of the Master to want to come here, of all places. The Doctor supposes that just now the Master wants to stay as far away from old Earth and the twenty-first century as possible. They get into the shining crystal lift, and the Doctor thinks, In just a year this all goes away. In a year-- But he becomes distracted by the amused, considering way the Master is eyeing the family of cats who have just gotten into the lift with them. "Behave yourself," the Doctor mutters, and the Master gives him a grin that lights his whole face and is in absolutely no way reassuring.

Nevertheless, behave himself the Master does, at least to the letter of the law. He wreaks absolutely no havoc upon the family of cats-- who exit on the eighth floor, Communications and Technology-- and neither does he do anything to the human woman and her humanoid tree companion who get in at floor six and stay on after the Doctor and the Master leave. In the shop itself, he never strays from the Doctor's line of sight, although he does elect to put on a falsetto and take the Doctor down the lingerie aisle, insisting earnestly that he must have treated all his other traveling companions by buying them pretty clothes. The Doctor doesn't bother disguising his annoyance. "Just find the shirts you want," he snaps.

The Master laughs. "New New New New New New New New New New New New New New New York," he says. "Am I just the latest rebound, Doctor?" he says.

"You asked to come here," the Doctor says evenly.

"I did, didn't I," the Master says, feigning surprise. "Funny thing for me to do."

"Shirts," the Doctor says, pulling one out at random. It's brilliantly orange and reads I ♥ New New New New New New New New New New New New New New New York in large white letters. A look of absolute disgust crosses the Master's face, but the Doctor's charmed, and replaces it with a sense of mild regret.

Ten minutes later, after several pointed quips regarding the Doctor's taste in clothing and a brief incident with a tutu, the Master has acquired dress shirts, although he seems as partial to pale green and pale pink as he is to white. "Wash these separately," he tells the Doctor as they head for the checkout queue.

"Do your own washing!" the Doctor returns, somewhat nettled.

The Master stares at him for a long moment and, inexplicably, giggles. The Doctor stares back at him, and in an instant is overwhelmed with the sudden horrifying absurdity of the whole situation: he is standing in tenuous balance with the only other Time Lord in existence, and here they are, in a checkout queue in a shopping centre in New New York holding dress shirts and arguing over the washing. There's a terrible moment in which he almost screams, and then he's laughing too, grinning like mad, and he feels, for an even briefer, confused moment, honestly breathlessly happy.

The friendly arachnid at the checkout gives them a pointy, good-natured, puzzled sort of grin and rings them up. The Doctor's about to take out his psychic paper when, to his astonishment, the Master pulls out a credit card apparently quite capable of paying a slightly absurd amount. "Here you are, Mr. Saxon," the arachnid says cheerfully, handing back the Master's card with one forearm, punching out his receipt with a second, and pushing the bag of clothing into the Doctor's astounded arms with a third. "Free with the purchase."

"But-- what--" the Doctor sputters. "Where did you get that?"

"Thank you," the Master says to the arachnid, and "Really, Doctor, there's a lot of time between the year 2007 and the end of the world. You don't think I went straight into politics, do you?"

"You stopped by New Earth?" the Doctor demands, and swallows hard, shoving the bag of clothing at the Master. "Is that why you wanted to stop here again? To finish a-- a project?"

"Oh, calm down," the Master says in annoyance, heading for the lift. The Doctor follows, still furious, and when the Master glances up at his face he sighs. "All right. I thought if you didn't show for the election, and I got bored, I might turn the paradox machine back into a normal TARDIS and go somewhere else." He shrugs. "I like this planet. I like cats."

The Doctor stares through the transparent doors of the lift, watching lavishly decorated department after lavishly decorated department flash by, and says nothing. Of course the Master wanted him there for the destruction of Earth. That's the real reason he can trust the Master-- inasmuch as he can trust the Master at all-- to be walking on this planet free, instead of in chains. Whatever he thinks to do, he'll want to do with an audience, and the Doctor is the best audience he could ever hope to have. Although it's funny he hasn't tried anything yet besides wave lacy purple underthings with pom-poms attached in the Doctor's face. In fact, all the Master's doing even now is rummaging through the clothing bag-- and he's--

"What are you doing?" the Doctor asks in honest puzzlement; the Master has emerged triumphant from the bag and is holding nothing at all-- nothing except--

A moment of sheer horror before the Master deftly slaps the patch to the side of the Doctor's neck, and then...

"What was that?" the Doctor asks, but he doesn't feel panicked about it, or even curious. Just... content. Bone-deep content, and all right, and better than all right, so much better that a smile breaks across his face and he nearly wants to laugh. The Master has been watching all of this with great interest, and smiles too when the Doctor does.

"Best I could do," he murmurs. "It's very popular right now. They're giving out free samples. Anyway, there's no Confuse on the market and you need a prescription for Sleep."

The Doctor hardly hears him. He hears the words, but they're unimportant. Whatever he's feeling, it's incredible; it's as though he's made of harmless light, his fingertips tingling nearly with anticipation. He's smiling so hard it hurts and that's wonderful. Nothing is wrong and nothing will ever be wrong again. He knows he's still fully cognizant, and he knows quite well that the Master has just slapped some sort of synthesized mood to his jugular, and he knows that he's feeling the way he's feeling because of said synthesized mood, but-- He takes a shuddering gasp and pulls the patch off and stares at it. It trembles transparently on his hand, a little square of plastic with a crescent moon, and next to it, in neat block letters, BLISS.

He remembers Novice Hame's words about the ravage following Bliss echoing in the empty senate chamber, and it's the first time the memory doesn't hurt. He looks up. "Tell me something," he whispers, and the look on the Master's face, expectant and hungry, doesn't alarm him at all. "Tell me something terrible," and the light behind the Master's eyes flares and it's all absolutely wonderful.

"You will always be alone," the Master says quietly. "Even if we both live for another thousand years, you will always be completely alone, and it's no one's fault but your own."

It's just words. "Something else," the Doctor whispers. "Please. Come on. More."

A grin spreads across the Master's face, comprehension like a wildfire. "That's sick," he says, soft and delighted. "It's good, isn't it? Not caring. Imagine if you could do it forever."

"I can't," the Doctor says. "It will wear off in a few minutes." But this doesn't bother him either; the future, in which he will not feel like this, is not connected with this moment. "--Where are we?"

This last is prompted by the opening of the lift doors; outside is a low concrete ceiling and a wide passage leading off to an intersection some twenty feet away.

"Lower level," the Master says. "Laboratories. Come on."

The Doctor follows him down the corridor, still needing nothing more out of the world than what is happening right now, still grinning until his face aches a little. "You could have given me something else," he comments. "Forget. Or-- oh, Grief. Do they sell Grief? For funerals and things?"

"Doctor," the Master says, laughing, "if I'd given you something like that, it wouldn't have made any difference at all."

Somehow this filters through.

The grin doesn't waver, but there's something reflexive in the way the Doctor says, as though completely unaware of the previous conversation, "So what are you doing down here?"

The Master does him one better and ignores the question entirely; he appears to have been counting doors, and now pushes open one at the end of the corridor. Inside, the Doctor sees, is a laboratory, hundreds of feet long, full of humans and humanoids in lab coats and goggles, working diligently away. The emblem of the synthesized moods' crescent moon is stamped into the concrete walls, and on the front end of each table is a small digital sign, each reading a different state: Sleep, Awake, Calm, Happy, Forget, Remember. Aids to the alleviation of exhaustion or grief or insomnia or nerves or failing mind. It's brilliantly clever and the Doctor knows intellectually that it's cheating, that it's wrong, that it will all come to a terrible tragic ending, but he doesn't care.

He laughs with elation and follows the Master down to the last table, marked Bliss, where the Master is talking with an official-looking woman in a lab coat. He knows in an instant he's missed something crucial, and he knows he shouldn't have left the Master alone for even one second, but he doesn't care and doesn't care and feeling this way forever would be the greatest possible blessing.

"Hmm," the official-looking woman in the lab coat says, giving him a once-over. "How do you feel, young man?"

"What? Me?" The Doctor gives her a grin. "I feel wonderful. Brilliant. Just great."

"I see," the woman says, and turns to the Master. "Thank you for your advice, Mr. Saxon, but I think I can see the results with my own eyes. We're continuing this line."

The Master smiles. "As you say," he murmurs, and turns. "All right, Doctor, I'm finished here."

"What did you do?" the Doctor asks as they exit the laboratory and set off back down the musty corridor. It's only to make conversation. It really doesn't matter what the Master did. If the Master said he'd poisoned every last mood patch, the Doctor might even laugh.

But all the Master says is, "We just talked."

They're quiet in the elevator; the Doctor finds himself wondering what the Master said to the woman in charge, and then wondering why he's bothering to wonder when it doesn't matter, and then thinking, But yes it does! Annoyance blossoms in his chest, followed by anger and the terrible weight of grief and a sudden blank horror. Through it, the Doctor keeps grinning in the perfect imitation of manufactured bliss, and when they exit into the atrium, he says with the perfect imitation of cheer, "Back to the TARDIS now, eh?"

The Master looks at him sideways and pauses by a fountain, the water of which changes colours every few seconds, insidiously, glowing from the neon lights behind. "Spare me, Doctor," he says, with a faint smile. "That bit of screaming in your head was the first break from the static I've had."

"Then," the Doctor says, in a low voice that shakes a very little, grin vanishing, "what did you say to that woman?"

"That Bliss will have to be produced on an absolutely massive scale to meet consumer demand," the Master says, staring past the Doctor's shoulder at a fixed point of nothing. "That they could become incredibly wealthy or lose everything, and that it probably isn't worth the risk. She hadn't thought of becoming incredibly wealthy before, you know."

The Doctor drags in a hissing breath between his teeth. "You mean you're the one responsible for the plague?"

The Master gives him a withering look. "I don't create viruses. I only used what was already there." He smiles. "In their minds."

"You had no right," the Doctor says, soft and furious.

"But Doctor," the Master says, shaking his head as though displeased with a slow pupil, "you'd already seen the aftermath. This always happened. That's the beauty of time travel, isn't it? You get to witness the ends of things before their beginnings. Jack, for instance."

"That doesn't give you the right!"

"Oh, but I think it does. Or did you forget that you had the right to prompt Queen Victoria to create Torchwood? And the right to take down Harriet Jones at the very beginning of her Golden Age, because she used the agency you had such a hand in creating? Say what you like, Doctor. Everything you touch changes; you just don't have the guts to take the responsibility."

The Doctor doesn't hit him, because there are far more subtle and effective ways of dealing with the Master and he would never, ever hit anyone, but it's still a near thing.

"But we can still stop it," he says, a little frantic now, "We can put in fail-safes, we can--"

A hand on his chest, gentle. "Doctor. We can't. You know what happens." He tsks softly. "Oh, those pesky paradoxes."

He looks into the Master's face and sees, with a thrill of fear, that the Master understands him. He's never going to get used to this.

"Take me back to your prison," the Master says. "I've had my fun. Tie me up and punish me just like you promised you would."

The Doctor clenches his teeth, takes the Master's elbow in a grip like a gentle vice, and starts walking.

Ten minutes see them back on the TARDIS; the Doctor manacles the Master back against the pillar in the control room, but it's an empty gesture without substance. A check in the clothing bag turns up no further mood patches, for which the Doctor is silently grateful. He goes upstairs and hangs the Master's purchases neatly next to his own suits with slightly trembling hands. He goes back down and sits silently next to the Master. The Master watches him and he stares at the floor and can feel the Master's gaze like a laser, and can't find the words. He aches, so many feelings crowding into his mind that they all register only as a horrible dragging pain.

"Why?" he asks finally. "That's not your style at all-- killing off the population." He looks up at the Master and sees the absolute horrible understanding in the Master's face and says savagely, "That gives you nothing to rule over! What were you trying to accomplish?"

The Master smiles and reaches out, touching the Doctor's jaw very gently. The Doctor barely avoids flinching. "Doctor," the Master breathes, "don't you see? If you will not let me conquer worlds, the only thing I have to best is you."

He surges to his feet, shaking. The Master stares up at him calmly, the barest hint of a triumphant smile at the corner of his mouth.

"Did you think keeping me was going to be easy, Doctor?" he asks softly. "Safe? Nice? Did you think having me with you would mend your poor, lonely, damaged hearts? It won't. Keeping me will be misery. It will be difficult, and trying, and it will always, Doctor, be difficult and trying."

"I know," the Doctor whispers. "I don't care."

"Liar," the Master says easily. "Round one to me."

"It's not a game!"

The Master laughs. "It's always a game."

The Doctor turns and goes to the console and stares unseeingly at all the buttons and levers and screens and knobs, and he wants to cry. He wants to crumple to his knees and howl with tears and he wants the Master to hold him and tell him it's all right--

And while he's at it he'd like Gallifrey back and everyone he's ever known to be safe and happy, he thinks savagely, and pulls the handbrake without setting a course. It doesn't matter where they go; he doesn't care.

Chapter Text

The first time Jack Harkness sees Martha Jones again, it's about a year after they bid each other farewell.

The first thing Jack says to Martha is, "Most folks get in here by delivering the pizza."

The first thing Martha says to Jack is, "Delivering the pizza. Really."

"Yeah," Jack says.

"Into your secret government hideout," Martha says.

She's wearing a jean jacket and black slacks and a low-cut grey top and heels, and Jack thinks she looks more beautiful than ever. "Yeah," he says. "Come on, meet the team."

"How the hell did she get in?" Owen wants to know, from down in the surgery theatre where he's dissecting their latest find. "She doesn't have a pizza."

"That's Owen," Jack says. "Martha Jones, Owen Harper. You're both doctors."

"Really," Martha says, and gives Owen an up-and-down once-over and turns back to Jack. She doesn't seem bothered by the alien Owen's dissecting; Jack figures he should probably just be grateful she makes no comment, because, although the creature proved to be pretty dangerous before they killed it, now that it's dead it looks remarkably like the thing from Alien Autopsy. "Right," Martha says, "who else, then?"

Jack sees the face Owen makes behind Martha's back, angry astonishment at her absolute dismissal of him, and Jack isn't too worried; Martha is perfectly capable of taking care of herself. All the same, he makes a quick mental note to watch Owen carefully while Martha's around.

It's not the first such mental note he's had to make, either. All of his team are rattled, and understandably. From their perspective, in the space of a week they'd nearly seen the end of the world, thought they'd lost Jack for good, had Jack awaken only to vanish on them, been called off to the Himalayas, and returned in great confusion to find Jack awaiting them with enthusiasm. He can tell none of them quite know what to make of him now. In all the time they've known him, he's been silent and efficient and as closed-off as he can possibly be, and it's always been for a good reason: he's responsible for them. Or he'd been telling himself that, but he's had time to think, and he's come to realize, it hasn't been about responsibility, it's been about fear. If you live forever, you don't want to get attached to anyone. That was the real reasoning, but seeing the Doctor again-- and having a year in chains to think things through-- well, that can really give a guy perspective.

He can't help wondering about the year that never was. If any of them survived. He's really damn glad they don't remember it.

"This is Tosh," he says, going across the catwalk to the computer bank. Martha follows him, her heels making small clanging noises on the grating. "Toshiko Sato. Tosh, Martha Jones."

Tosh looks up from her computer at Martha and gives her a quick smile. "Hello."

"Hi," Martha says. "So you're the one I go to for computer things?"

"Yes," Tosh says, looking a bit surprised. "Me or Ianto." She glances at Jack. "Um, Jack--?"

"Actually," Jack says, grinning, "I have no idea why Martha's here. Martha, why are you here?"

"For computer things," Martha says, rather dryly. "But no rush, I'd like to meet the rest of the team."

"Ianto and Gwen went to get takeout," Tosh offers, with another quick smile. "If you like we can do the computer things you need now and you can stay with us for dinner."

"Yeah," Martha says, grinning. "Yeah, I'd like that." She goes to the bank of screens and leans over Tosh's shoulder. "Right, there's some organizations I need you to look up. I tried it on my own, but--" She glances over at Jack and makes a helpless hand gesture. Jack grins lopsidedly. "Nothing. At least nothing useful. I thought using the secret government agency computers might up my chances a bit."

"Right," Tosh says, keying in the search engine. "What sort of organizations?"

"Prydonian Labs," Martha says. "Used to be Lazarus, so that's not what I'm looking for. John Kaster Foundation. But there's no one named John Kaster in connection with the foundation, at least no one real. There's pictures of him, funny-looking bloke, but when I searched elsewhere for the same bloke-- nothing." She pulls a piece of paper from her jacket pocket and sets it on the desk next to Tosh. "Here's a few others, but they might be unrelated." Tosh turns her chair to look at Martha properly, and Martha gives her a little smile. "I have some theories, but I figured two places aren't enough to get accurate data. So that's what the others are for."

"All right," Tosh says, looking a little taken aback, and starts a search. "Prydonian Labs-- used to be Lazarus Labs, you got that--" Her fingers fly over the keyboard, and new windows pop up. "As an ultimate failure, Richard Lazarus' research into genetic coding to increase lifespan indefinitely was abandoned... Prydonian Labs hopes to create a new and better future... More thorough background research and controlled experiments before a project of Lazarus' magnitude can again be attempted... Although the funding from Saxon was pulled, financial backers in connection--"

"Stop," Martha says. Jack realizes he's gone very tense, leaning forward over Tosh's left shoulder as intently as Martha is over her right. "Who are the financial backers?"

"Just a moment," Tosh says, frowning in concentration; a few more windows and a password-hack later and she's pulled up a list.

"There," Martha says, tapping the screen. "Lucy Saxon."

"The politician's wife?" Tosh glances at their grim faces, confused. "Well, that's not surprising, is it? Mr. Saxon dies and he leaves all the political money in his wife's hands-- of course she'd carry on some of his work--"

"Can you cross-reference?" Martha asks. "I dunno, pull up all the organizations I gave you and see if Lucy Saxon is funding any of the others?"

"Sure," Tosh says.

"I don't understand, though," Jack murmurs, watching Tosh work. "She looked awful by the end. And she said his name with the rest of us."

"I know," Martha says, frowning. "But you've got to wonder why she married Saxon in the first place, don't you? Maybe he didn't need Archangel to get to her. The Do--" Jack gives her a warning look and she stops abruptly, startled, then says, more carefully, "He said Saxon's always been a bit hypnotic. Maybe he did something to her."

"Do you want me to look at the Archangel network too?" Tosh asks, and turns. "I'm sorry, Martha, that's the only other thing Mrs. Saxon's name is mentioned in connection with."

Martha frowns. "You sure?"

"Just Prydonian Labs and the defunct Archangel network," Tosh says, and glances at Jack. Jack gave his team an accurate enough explanation for Archangel-- psychic network in the satellites, attempted brainwashing of Earth's population, alien influences-- before they blew all fifteen satellites from the sky, but he never explained the nature of the alien influences or what the attempted brainwashing was supposed to accomplish. Of course his team thought at the time that Jack had given them all the information he knew, but Tosh isn't stupid, and she's caught on that there's more to this than Jack first told them. All the same, all she says is, "I can cross-reference the names of all the other people who are giving Prydonian Labs backing, and see if there are any matches."

"Yeah," Martha says, sighing. "That would be great."

"What's this about, anyway?" Jack asks quietly, watching Tosh's computer whirr its way through a search.

"My sister," Martha says. "Tish. She usually has secretarial jobs and that-- she likes 'em, too-- and sometimes she does PR, organizes events. Thing is, though, last year she had two jobs in four days." Jack glances over at Martha, and she gives him a wry smile. "Take a guess which four days."

"Hah." Jack considers her for a moment; she looks back at him steadily. He hadn't known she wasn't still off traveling the universe until he got the phone call this morning. I texted the Doctor, Martha had said. He gave me the number. Silly of me not to have asked for it earlier. Jack isn't surprised Martha's not still with the Doctor-- not with the Master to consider-- but he was surprised she can still contact the Doctor. Although, in retrospect, this is the girl who saved the world. Jack supposes the least the Doctor can do is let her send the occasional text message.

"So," he says, "where did she work?"

"Head of PR for Lazarus Labs," Martha says grimly, "and at 10 Downing Street, although when they hired her they were vague. Apparently Saxon told her she was just supposed to-- stand there and look pretty. That's what Tish told me."

Jack sees the look on Martha's face and knows that she wants the Master dead just as much as he does. All he says, though, is, "So what's the work been since?"

"She got a few jobs," Martha says. "All the ones on my list. But she hasn't been able to keep one of them. It's weird, it-- This one place, she was working in the human resources department, and when she went to get her stuff at the end of the day, her purse had been looked through and all her phone contacts had been scrambled. Another place, there was a bomb planted in her department. The Kaster Foundation kept tapping all her phone calls, even though she was just doing secretarial stuff. And the best bit is, a lot of places would call her in for interviews, and they'd ask her funny questions. Stuff that had nothing to do with PR, with reception, nothing. And then they wouldn't hire her, obviously. Tish is getting pretty freaked out, so I tried doing research, but all these places look completely normal." She shrugs. "I thought trying you lot would be the next thing to do."

"What about you?" Jack asks. "Has anyone been doing this to you? The rest of your family?"

"All got stable jobs," Martha says, shrugging. "Not a weird thing in sight." For the first time in minutes, she smiles again. "And I got snatched up by a hospital in central London the moment I passed my exams."

Jack laughs. "That's fantastic!"

"Got it!" Tosh puts in.

They crowd back around the monitor.

"The one person funding every single one of these organizations," Tosh says, highlighting the name, "is a Ms. Rosamund Ingram. Ever heard of her?"

Both Martha and Jack shake their heads blankly.

"Owen!" Jack calls. "Have you ever heard of someone named Rosamund Ingram?"

Owen emerges from the operating theatre, pulling off latex gloves. "No," he says. "Who is she, a little old lady with radioactive cats?"

"Maybe a really rich old lady," Jack says. "Tosh, run a general search, will you?"

Tosh nods; the sound of her typing is overrun by the sound of the round door of the main entrance grinding open. Gwen and Ianto come in, both of then laden with bags full of takeout cartons. Jack makes the introductions: Gwen Cooper, Martha Jones. Martha Jones, Ianto also Jones. Gwen gives Martha a cheerful grin and Ianto gives her a slightly cautious one, and five minutes sees them sitting at the table in the room off the kitchen, eating wontons. Owen and Gwen engage in a brief battle over the sweet-and-sour sauce, in which Gwen triumphs, so Owen turns to Martha.

"How'd you get in, anyway?" he asks.

"Through the roof," Martha says. The team stares at her. Jack is amused to note that she looks as though she's quite enjoying their astonishment. "Your paving-stone elevator works both ways, you know," she says when the silence has stretched sufficiently. "Thought it was pretty funny, there being patches of Cardiff I just didn't want to notice." She grins at Jack. "How'd you make that perception filter, anyway?"

"Um," Jack says, sudden visions of unforeseen consequences of Martha's visit crowding into his head. "It got put there. I didn't do it."

Martha's eyebrows go up, but all she says is, "So Jack told me you lot were in the Himalayas last year. How was it? I've never been."

Yeah, one of the few places in the universe you've never been, Jack thinks with a rush of affection.

"Cold," Owen says.

"But beautiful," Tosh adds. "We got a tip-off about problems in Tibet."

Martha frowns. "I don't understand, though. I thought Torchwood's jurisdiction was only Britain."

"Technically," Owen says, "but it was fallout from our Rift. Cardiff. And no one there knew how to handle it."

"Except that there turned out to be nothing," Gwen puts in. "Pass the rice, Ianto? Thanks. Just this funny old temple and a lot of clues that led nowhere."

"Clues?" Martha asks.

"Like a quest or something," Owen says in disgust. "These funny Tibetan scriptures Tosh ran through our decoders, but they just read a load of rubbish."

"'Follow the infinite road'," Tosh supplies. "There was a lot of information about mandalas and sacred rings and sacred knowledge, but we never found our alien."

"So you just came right back here," Martha says, and smiles a little, sadly. "Must have been a nice little vacation."

No one seems to quite know what to make of this, and Jack's throat inexplicably closes up a little. He doesn't have anything to say either.

"I made pie," Ianto says quietly into the silence. "It's probably quite chilled by now. If you want me to--"

"No, no, I'll get it," Jack interrupts, standing. "In the fridge?"

Ianto nods.

Jack leaves the room, door swinging shut behind him. The pie, which he finds on the top shelf, looks wonderful. Bless Ianto, he thinks, and goes back to the door, then pauses. It's still dead silent in the other room.

Okay, here it comes, Jack thinks, and sure enough, only a few seconds later, Gwen's voice: "How do you know him?"

"Jack?" Martha says, in some surprise. "I-- was hitching a ride with a friend. My friend and Jack's. Jack hadn't seen the friend in a while, so he decided to come too."

Owen snorts. "You're as bad as he is. Stop being cagey. Let's have it."

"But Jack hasn't told you," Martha says, quieter (Jack has to lean back against the wall and listen very hard). "It's not my story to tell. Jack's my friend; that's all."

"Good," Owen says. "It's nice to know that sometimes Jack has people he's just friends with."

"You mean the flirting?" Martha says coolly. "That's him being friendly."

Right, Jack thinks, and comes back in with the pie. "Who's being friendly?"

Martha sucks her cheeks in a little and looks at Owen with a raised eyebrow, then says, "Owen. He's really great company."

"We were asking about you," Owen says, looking up at Jack, face hard. "And about how you never tell us a single bloody thing. Where'd you go off to that week? You'd only just come back and you vanish, and we had to go to the damn Himalayas without you and apparently in your week you were off with Miss Jones here and some friend--"

"Owen," Jack says quietly, and Owen shuts up.

Ianto silently cuts the pie and hands everyone a piece. For a moment no one moves. Then Martha taps her fork gently against the side of her paper plate and says, staring down at her hands, "Why have you never told them, Jack?"

"Torchwood catalogues and classifies aliens," Jack says. "If they have sufficiently advanced technology, the official policy is to take the alien or aliens in for questioning and to confiscate all of their technology for Torchwood to study."

Martha stares at him. "But you wouldn't--"

"Hold on, your friend's an alien now?" Owen demands.

"Yes," Jack says heavily, and breathes out. Give me strength. "We're talking about the Doctor."

He sees Tosh look at him, shock flashing across her face. "Hold on," she says, "but I've met him-- I was doing some forensic work, on that thing that crashed into Big Ben-- it's on my résumé, you know that, Jack, but it's what got me hired, and I met him!"

"Great," Owen says, stabbing viciously at his pie. "Is that why Gwen got hired too, Jack? God knows she's not good for anything else."

Martha stands up, her chair squealing back against the concrete floor. "You can leave this table now, Mr. Harper."

Owen tilts his chin up a little and considers her. "No, thanks," he says. "I think I'll stay."

"Now," Martha says, in a voice like steel.

A long moment: Owen fiddles with his fork, and Jack holds his breath far past the point of asphyxiation. "Sorry, Gwen," Owen mutters.

She won't look at him. "Who's the Doctor, Jack?" she asks.

Martha sinks slowly back into her chair. Jack remembers that unless he wants to collapse and wake up with a pounding headache, he should probably breathe. "An alien," he says. "The-- one of the last of his kind. Humanoid. He can travel in time."

"I think sometimes he saves the world," Tosh puts in.

"--He did," Ianto says unexpectedly, and blushes a little when everyone turns to look at him. "At Canary Wharf. He-- tried to get everyone out."

The look on Martha's face, some peculiar mix of surprise and sadness and understanding, tells Jack that she hadn't known this particular bit of information before. She doesn't say anything, though, so after a pause Jack says, "Yeah, that's what he does. And we've run into each other a couple of times. Last time, Martha was with him too. That's how we know each other."

Martha looks around the table and offers a smile. "I'm not an alien, though," she says. "Completely human, I swear."

Another silence.

"Want to see what the database has come up with?" Tosh asks her.

"Yeah, I'd love it," Martha says, standing again, and follows Tosh out of the room. Jack looks around at Ianto and Gwen and Owen, and says, "Owen, you're on cleanup duty tonight. C'mon, guys, let's go see what Tosh has found."

The others are out, and Jack's nearly in the doorway, when Owen grabs his arm and spins him around and glares at him and says, quiet and fierce, "Jack, that wasn't out of order and you know it. You just hired Gwen because you like her--"

"Stop right there," Jack says, shaking loose from Owen's grip. "Not today, Owen. Clean up the damn food." A sort of stubborn hurt flashes across Owen's face, and Jack wonders how many goddamn times Owen will need to be forgiven. Just as long as he never shoots Jack with real intent again, he decides. He can forgive a lot of Owen's crap. "Just clean up the food," he says again, more gently.

Owen's shoulders don't relax, but he nods a little and gets to it.

Jack emerges to find Toshiko looking frustrated and Martha looking triumphant and both Gwen and Ianto looking mostly puzzled. "But it should turn up something," Tosh is saying. "Even if it's a fake name, there should be things like account history. There's nothing outside these organizations. Rosamund Ingram doesn't exist."

"It could be code," Martha says. "Or someone being sloppy and not bothering to create a backstory for this name. But I think it's a message."

"What sort of message?" Gwen asks.

"I dunno," Martha says, eyebrows going up a little as she contemplates the screen. "But someone this careless obviously wants to be found."

"By the really suspicious people like you," Jack says, slinging an arm over her shoulder. She grins up at him. "Got what you wanted?"

"I think so," Martha says. "I should probably drive back to London tonight."

"You sure about that? It'll take hours. What's the rush?" Jack asks, but he follows Martha over to the paving block.

"I have a date tomorrow," Martha says, grinning as she steps onto it, Jack stepping on after. She grins at Tosh and Ianto and Gwen. "Thanks for dinner, by the way. Nice meeting all of you."

"A date, huh?" Jack says as they rise. "Who's the lucky... guy, right?"

"Tom Milligan," Martha says, smiling into the middle distance. "The Master killed him right in front of me." She glances over at him. "I called him first thing to make sure he was still alive, and-- well, the hospital that hired me? He's a pediatrician there."

Jack laughs. "How 'bout that." The paving slab reaches ground level, and he offers her his arm; they step off it together into the growing twilight. She smiles up at him, and Jack reminds himself that she's apparently dating Tom Milligan and probably wouldn't like it if he kissed her, so he asks, "How'd you get hold of the Doctor, anyway? To get my number, I mean."

Martha's smile turns into an outright grin. "I had his number. I can call him anywhere in the universe."

Jack briefly considers feeling horribly jealous, and then decides not to; if he's going to live forever, he's definitely going to run into the Doctor again sometime. "So how is he?" he asks.

"I don't know," Martha admits. "I thought I'd give him a bit of time, you know-- So I just texted him asking for your number, and that's all I got back-- just the number. I hope he's all right."

"He's always all right," Jack says bracingly.

The smile Martha gives him for this pronouncement is uncomfortably knowing. "And so are we," she says.

Jack laughs. "That's the spirit."

"Listen," Martha says, "if any aliens turn up, give me a call. I can come give you my professional opinion."

"You sure you don't want to work for us?" Jack asks.

"Nah," Martha says. "I like being a doctor."

"World always needs more doctors," Jack agrees.

"Then I'll see you, Jack," Martha says, and reaches out, taking his hands and giving them an affectionate squeeze. Her palms are warm and dry and Jack knows he'll miss her like crazy and probably call her next week asking her to forget about Tom Milligan and come on a date with him, if only to hear her laugh at him for suggesting it.

He watches her walk off towards the car park and goes back inside, grinning.

Chapter Text

This world is a cold and desolate place.

A red giant star hangs sullenly in the sky, bathing everything in bloody orange light. The sky is deep indigo and a chill wind whistles through the orange-tinged grey heather. This place is where the TARDIS has landed them at random: the console read Kigkrywui, year roughly 27,004,000, give or take a few centuries. The whole place appears long since abandoned. From the Doctor's lack of reaction when he saw the TARDIS' readout, from the way he's striding curiously through the heather, he's never heard of this planet before, nor been to it.

The Master has.

Sometime around the year 100,000, long before the Time War, long before his first set of regenerations ran their course, and only shortly after he had started calling himself the Master in his own head, he had happened to come to this place. The light had been yellower then, but the planet much colder, everything covered in a light powdery snow. There had been no grey heather then. The Kigkry warmed and fueled their small stone cities with hot springs below the planet's surface, and although their technology was primitive at best, they were not surprised at the Master's appearance, and moreover only dipped their ears in polite Kigkry smiles when the Master offered them certain technological advancements. They had seen the devastation those technologies could bring, they explained to the Master, and when he asked them how they knew, their ears went up and they clicked a little with nervousness and finally one of them said, Show him the Sacred Room.

What the Master saw there he will never forget.

He crunches along calmly after the Doctor. His feet aren't yet used to the funny shoes the Doctor has lent him, but their dirty off-white cloth is far more suitable to this terrain than his polished black dress shoes, so he makes no complaint. In the distance he can see the low hive-like bumps of a ruined Kigkry city, and isn't surprised: the Kigkry Sacred Room, as he understands it, is as eternal as can be expected, and will preserve its physical home. A mutable fact.

"Out of curiosity," he says, coming up next to the Doctor, "do you have any idea where you're going?"

"Exploring," the Doctor says, squinting up at the stone hives. "There's no one alive here but us, but the TARDIS did pick up some funny energy readings." He turns and gives the Master a grin. "Could be interesting."

Unbelievable, the Master thinks. The Doctor's been alone so long he's nearly forgotten how to keep his thoughts contained, and the resultant fallout is incredible. It's composed entirely of white noise and occasional flashes of sheer misery, but sometimes something else, too: a strong flare of something not quite lust and not quite hope, that the Master finds impossible to catalogue. In any case, it's quite remarkable, the way he's nearly able to beat the Doctor down, but can't quite manage it. If the Doctor would just stop forgiving, could just give up for one moment--

"What sort of energy readings?" he asks.

"Funny fluctuations in spacetime," the Doctor says, starting to walk a little faster. Evidently funny fluctuations in spacetime put a bit of a spring into his step. "Quantum stuff."

"Doctor," the Master says, and catches briefly at his coat sleeve so that the Doctor turns to look at him, startled. The Master gives him an utterly disdainful look. "I'm not one of your humans. I can feel the 'funny fluctuations in spacetime'."

The Doctor actually stops walking, and goes very still. "Oh," he says, and swallows. "Right."

"What sort of quantum 'stuff'?"

The Doctor drags in a breath and says, quite rapidly, "Something here is playing with the n-space possibilities. The TARDIS calculated it at something approaching an infinite number of permutations, but contained, except that the possibility matrices are horribly degraded, and if there's a lot more decay some of the permutations will escape into this reality."

The Master sucks in a breath. Evidently a few hundred thousand years makes quite a difference in the safety of the Kigkry Sacred Room-- although 'safety' was a relative term to begin with. Perhaps one of the possibilities destroyed the Kigkry themselves; unsurprising, but a pity nonetheless. They may have been completely useless in the grand scheme of the universe, but they were intelligent custodians. And abominably furry.

"They called it their Sacred Room," he says, and is nearly as shocked to hear himself say it as the Doctor is. He's learning, though, because the shock on the Doctor's face morphs at once into suspicion.

"You've been here before," the Doctor says.

"A long time ago," the Master says softly, and resumes walking.

"So what does their... sacred quantum room do?"

Draws you in and pulls you apart. Shows you what might have been and is and what might be. Tempts you terribly. Changes things.

Changes things, the Master thinks, and feels his pulses race.

"It offers possibilities," he says quietly, nearly under the crunching their shoes make on the brittle ground. "If it leaked-- Everyone would be offered possibilities. It would probably take all of thirty seconds for the universe to collapse."

The Doctor thinks about this for a moment; then a grin lights his face. "Time to save the universe, then," he says.

The Master groans. Save yourself, save the bloody world, he thinks, but that might not be necessary. If he's offered the right possibility... He follows the Doctor wordlessly on up the hill and at length they reach the tunnel that leads down into the city. Cold radiates out from the dark doorway. The Doctor, unsurprisingly, produces a small torch from the pocket of his trenchcoat and shines it down into the gloom: smooth stone descends into blackness. They set off down into the heart of the city, walking carefully-- the stone is worn-down and slippery, and a false step might send them into an undignified slide. The Master hopes, with vague petty vindictiveness, that the Doctor will lose his footing. He could do with a laugh.

They walk along the dark echoing tunnel (which flattens out eventually, but gets no warmer; the hot springs, evidently, have vanished, which might also account for the absence of the Kigkry) and some twenty minutes in, both stop abruptly. It's like a buzzing in the fingertips and a light in the mind and voices whispering on the edge of hearing, and for a horrible moment the drums in the Master's head go absolutely deafening. They stand for a moment in front of the blank stretch of stone wall.

"How does it work?" the Doctor asks in a whisper. He could figure it out in an instant, but he's still asking. The Master nearly doesn't catch the surge of hatred in time; his nails dig hard into the palms of his hands and he barely manages to not slam the Doctor right through the wall.

"You walk through," he says. "Just walk right through."

"No," the Doctor says, turning to look at him intently, the torch lighting his face from below and making his eyes glitter strangely. "How does it work? How many people can it calibrate? If we both go in, does the whole thing go boom? What happens when a possibility is chosen? Why--"

The Master holds up a hand, and the Doctor stops talking abruptly. The Master's eyes drift shut briefly with the thrill of being obeyed, but he says, quite calmly, "The Sacred Room, to my understanding, was used as a method of observation. The Kigkry told me that the first of their kind to use it-- to find it, it wasn't made-- chose to use it carefully. Fortunate he did, wasn't it?" The Master stares at the blank stretch of stone and frowns. "They told me... They were only allowed inside their quantum room in pairs. Both to see: one to choose, and the other to mediate. To say no if they found the choice dangerous."

"Clever," the Doctor murmurs, his eyebrows going up. "But they're all gone now."

"And with no one to choose stability it's breaking down," the Master says. "At a guess. Or it just has a flawed energy field and we're all about to die." He grins.

"And when a possibility is chosen?" the Doctor asks, ignoring this last.

"It becomes so, as I understand it," the Master says. "A lot of Kigkry discoveries were made in that room. Central heating. This really delicious bright blue food-- pity they're gone, I would have liked to have some more."

"So we'll have to make it stable," the Doctor says. "Refuse all the choices until we find the right one."

The Master's lip curls a little. "So who chooses, and who mediates?"

The Doctor glances at him. "I'll choose," he says, as though this is perfectly obvious. "And you don't want the universe to end, so when I find some way of making this thing stable you'll allow the choice to be made."

"You'd trust me with that."

The Doctor fixes him with a steady look, chin tilted up a little, deadly serious. "I have to," he says.

Together they walk through the wall, which presses back at them like stone and then like rubber and then like soft clay before yielding. For a moment they're standing in a dusty dark cavern; then the Doctor's torch goes out. Darkness. The drums beat under the Master's pulses and he can hear the Doctor breathing next to him, calm and even. Slowly, as though a very great distance away, a point of light flickers and glitters to life. After a moment it's followed by another, and then another, and more and more glowing into existence, like faraway stars, except that the points of light are entirely at random, even underneath them, without a point of reference for the floor. The Master can feel his feet standing solidly on nothing, and he's a Time Lord; it isn't disorienting, but neither is it comfortable. More and more pinprick lights appear, exponentially multiplying, until there is more light than darkness. For a moment the Master catches a glimpse of the Doctor's face: his mouth is a little open, in something like a smile, pure wonder in his eyes, and the Master nearly has time to think it beautiful before the blinding white light eclipses his sight entirely, and--

They're standing on a suburban Earth street of the twenty-first century; the TARDIS is to the Master's right, a brick house to his left. The Doctor's wearing his blue suit, and he's staring in some astonishment at Martha Jones.

"Come in for tea," Martha says.

"What?" the Doctor says.

"Tea," Martha says. "Mum really wants to thank you properly."

"But we-- had this conversation," the Doctor says, with some difficulty. The Master smiles a little. He remembers the utter confusion. He remembers not quite knowing where he was, having a peculiar sense of déjà vu, glancing around as though certain someone was watching him-- yes, the Doctor does it now, his gaze sweeping unseeingly over the Master. The Master remembers, too, what he chose, and he remembers the quivery-eared horror with which the Kigkry shunted him out of the room and off of their planet as politely and quickly as possible.

"First time I've had this conversation," Martha says, grinning. "What, can Time Lords get déjà vu?"

"No," the Doctor says. "I-- I don't have time to come in for tea."

"All right," Martha says, shrugging, and the scene dissolves into whiteness.

Interesting, the Master thinks. Another thing the Kigkry told him: since there are infinite possibilities, the room sorts through probabilities first. It rummages through your head and finds what you want and puts those possibilities ahead of lesser ones. Interesting.

Fade in: the TARDIS, going haywire around them. The whole place is pervaded with the sense of a recent regeneration, like cinnamon and copper under the Master's fingernails and inside his eyes. A blonde girl is clutching at the console. "But what about Jack?" she asks.

Confusion passes briefly across the Doctor's face, but he's still going as haywire as the TARDIS and shakes it off in a moment. "He needs to stay behind and rebuild the Earth!"

Dissolve.

Try harder, the Master tells the room in annoyance, but when the next scene fades in Rose Tyler is still there, standing in front of the TARDIS, staring up into the sky. It's nighttime, and a fine rain of ash is sifting down from above. The Master grins to himself. Oh, that Christmas had been perfect. When he turns his attention from the sky, the Doctor is staring at Rose, with a look of confusion and pain.

To his astonishment, this reality starts solidifying around them.

"No," the Master snarls. "Whatever he's choosing here, I'm not allowing it."

The Doctor sighs and reaches out and takes Rose Tyler's hand, and the scene fades into whiteness. Then--

Everything is blood red and searing hot and, to the Master's absolute astonishment, they're standing in the Panopticon. He is, at least; the Doctor is on his hands and knees on the floor, shaking madly. There's an uncertainty to his form; he has the same hands and hair and face as he did when stepping into the quantum room, but the posture is different, the clothing entirely wrong. At the edge of hearing: screams, explosions. And... the Master turns to see what the Doctor is staring so fixedly at, and sees the Eye of Harmony.

"You didn't," he breathes.

But of course, it's quite brilliant: by the time the Master himself had fled, Skaro had been blasted to charred dust and the Dalek Emperor had taken on a full offensive directed towards Gallifrey itself. The Time Lords had been, impossibly, losing. That was when the Master had gone; stolen a chameleon arch, stolen a TARDIS, and fled to the end of the universe, to a time where neither Daleks nor Time Lords would ever think to look. He refused to be used again. And meanwhile the Doctor had been here, below the citadel, knowing: a universe with the Time Lords dead is far better than a universe controlled by Daleks.

He kneels next to the Doctor in fascination, the stones almost red-hot under his knees. The Doctor's teeth are clenched and his eyes are over-bright and he looks as though he's in almost unbearable agony, and this time the Master does have time to appreciate the beauty, because the moment stretches onwards and onwards; not solidifying yet, because the Doctor hasn't decided.

The Master realizes, with a faint thrill of surprise, that if the Doctor chooses to let the war play out another way, he will not stop it.

But the Doctor reaches a trembling hand into his pocket and pulls out something absurdly simple: a hand grenade made for skirmishes early on in the war. When thrown, the grenade would distort the time field for a ten foot radius, freezing the victim to a fixed point in time. It would also, the Master thinks, be entirely suitable for completely destabilizing the nucleus of a black hole and effectively burning up an entire planet and every single Dalek fleet surrounding it. The Doctor stares at the hand grenade for a long, terrible moment. Then he pulls out the pin and lobs it at the Eye of Harmony.

Whiteness.

They're standing on the wind-torn side of a gravelly cliff above an expansive plain full of missiles, and the Doctor is coming towards him, slowly, as though he's a cornered dog. "Weapon after weapon after weapon," the Doctor says.

It takes the Master a moment to realize that he's holding something out at arm's length, and that this is what the Doctor must be talking about.

"All you do," the Doctor says, "is talk and talk and talk."

"What?" the Master says.

"But after all these years," the Doctor says, "and all these disasters, I've always had the greatest secret of them all. I know you."

It's not supposed to work like this, the Master realizes. The observer is never a part of the scenario, never.

"Explode those ships," the Doctor says, staring out over the world and back at the Master, "you kill yourself. That's the one thing you could never do." He holds out a hand, slow and careful, so damn sanctimonious and right, and says, softly, "Give that to me."

"No," the Master says. "This isn't real. This is a trick."

Confusion flickers across the Doctor's face.

"I know how it goes," the Master says, laughing a little. "All right? I know. You thought you were going to die and you still had the guts to blow up Gallifrey."

The Doctor stumbles backwards as though the Master has slapped him.

"But I couldn't even blow up this stupid little planet," the Master says. The drums pound in his head and the wind roars across the cliff top and he nearly has to shout to hear himself. "I gave in and I ran. And back on Gallifrey I ran. And you-- you always run too. You ran when you saw the vortex, and you ran to the vortex. How stupid can you be? And you just-- keep-- running--"

The Doctor has gone very pale. "Stop talking," he says. "We need to find a way to stop this thing. Can't you feel it? It's breaking all its parameters."

"But you didn't run from Gallifrey!" the Master shouts at him. "And you didn't run from me! Why didn't you run?"

"I couldn't!" the Doctor screams back, shaking. "Someone had to end it-- you're my responsibility--"

The Master grabs the lapels of the Doctor's coat furiously, his doomsday device dropping into the gravel, forgotten. "Am I the Time War?" he snarls. "Am I Romana? Am I your friend? Am I something you can fix, am I something you can save--?"

"Yes," the Doctor says, furious, fierce.

"Forgiving me won't solve anything!" the Master yells, shaking him. "Loving me won't make everything better! After the Time War-- when you were all that was left-- Jack loved you! Rose loved you! Martha loved you! Did it change a thing?"

The Doctor swallows. "No," he whispers.

The Master slowly lets go of his coat.

They're not on the cliff anymore, but in the white nothingness; it flickers, like a bad film projection, nearly unreal. They're both breathing too hard and the Master wants to break something, the Doctor's nose or fingers or neck, but he can't. All of the room's possibilities have been useless. Not one of them has tempted the Doctor sufficiently. Not one of them, even the last, can rid him of the Doctor, not really. The whiteness is fading into grey and the walls of the cave are appearing back around them.

"This," the Doctor whispers, echoing a little. "I choose this. Just an empty cave on a dead world. No more possibilities here."

The Master can feel it solidifying. "Yes," he says.

The room deposits them, gently, back into the dark corridor, and goes, with absolute awful finality, silent.

The Doctor switches on his torch. They walk wordlessly back up along the tunnel to the surface. A chill, blood red sunset greets them, and they set off back down the heathery slope towards the TARDIS. The crunch of brittle plant life underfoot nearly drowns out the drumming, and the Master hates everything in the whole universe with a terrible vicious ache.

"Why didn't it kill you?" he asks.

The Doctor glances over at him, eyes wide with remembered pain. The light here is almost exactly as it was before the Eye of Harmony. "I ran," he says, soft and simple. "It didn't destabilize right away. It-- froze. And I ran. I ran to the TARDIS and I hit the first coordinates I could find and I spent a week getting drunk in a bar on Betelgeuse because I couldn't hear anyone anymore. And then I went back to look, and it had burned. There was nothing left. No one."

They walk on in silence.

When they reach the TARDIS, the Doctor pauses for a moment and runs a hand up her wooden side before going in. The control room hums soothingly. The Doctor won't even look at the Master; the Master watches him go up one level, but doesn't hear him go up any more. He pauses over the TARDIS' controls, his hands itching to try them and knowing it's quite useless.

He goes upstairs and finds the Doctor sitting on a couch the Master's rather fond of. He's leaning back and staring blankly at nothing, and without probing at all the Master knows the Doctor is slowly taking all the choices and memories and shoving them down and down until he can pretend none of them matter.

The Master sits down next to him on the couch and digs for a moment between the cushions; he finds a few shortbread crumbs and a penny from 1896 before his hand closes over the white bag. He turns to the Doctor, knowing it's hardly worth it, knowing the look on the Doctor's face will make him want to gouge his eyes out with a blunt spoon, and knowing, too, that despite all the things he's said, the Doctor will still cling to false hope, and that is today's victory.

The white bag crackles when he pulls it out; a bit squished, but it will do.

"Jelly baby?"

Chapter Text

"The Scissor Sisters," the Master says.

The Doctor stares at him in astonishment over the console. The Master is grinning down at him over the banister of the helix staircase, the ring on his hand making a little ting noise against the metal every time his fingers come down absently tapping out the drumbeat.

"The Beatles," the Doctor says. "That's classic."

"The Bee Gees," the Master says, looking altogether evil.

"Queen?" the Doctor suggests, grasping at straws.

The Master considers this. "All right," he concedes, and comes down to look at the console readings over the Doctor's shoulder. "So what's the latest quest of goodness and light?" Apparently spotting the coordinate readings, he groans. "Earth? At least go somewhere interesting."

"Earth's interesting!" the Doctor says, a little affronted. "Pick a year."

"Oh, so I get to pick the vacation spots now?" The Master makes a show of thinking very hard. "Six billion."

The Doctor sighs. "The Earth's gone by then."

The Master laughs. "Exactly!"

So he's not in such a cooperative mood after all. The Doctor turns away and punches in a random navigational algorithm for Earth: the TARDIS will factor out all the year/location matches for major wars, plagues, and disasters. The Doctor feels too tired today to save the universe; he's already doing that, second by second, every moment the Master is here with him.

The past few days have been strange and intense in a way the Doctor really doesn't care to examine. They can't be in the same room for more than a few minutes without the crackling tension reaching an unbearable pitch. The Master has spent quite a lot of time watching whatever visual entertainment broadcast stations the TARDIS can pick up; she also supplies him with jelly babies, and the Doctor often finds himself wandering through the room where the Master's watching telly and filching a few sweets from the bag, then wandering back out. It gives him an opportunity to brush his hand against the Master's and call it an accident.

He doesn't think about what the Master said in the quantum room. He was angry. They both are, and afraid. It doesn't matter what the Master says: he's the Doctor's responsibility, and they understand each other, and if the Doctor is making up excuses, then the Master is too. They can't bear to part, and the Master knows it-- it's in the way he doesn't smack the Doctor's hand away too hard when he steals jelly babies, and in the way he looks at the Doctor when they're pretending the Doctor's not looking, and in the way he says the Doctor's name.

"Here we are!" the Doctor says, as the TARDIS lands with a bump. He squints at the readings. "Oooh. 1145! France!"

"Hooray," the Master deadpans.

"Come on," the Doctor says, looking up with a grin. "Let's go sightseeing! It might be fun."

"1145," the Master says. "In our best suits."

The Doctor glances down at himself. "It's not really my best suit, this one--"

"Tunics," the Master says, sharp and precise. "Swords. Robes. Boots. Flashy sightseeing has its place, and this is not it."

"All right," the Doctor says, deflating a little; it is a good idea. They go up to the wardrobe room.

Ten minutes see them wandering through the small, rather muddy city of Paris, dressed in scholarly robes (long enough to hide the Doctor's trainers; he really likes the red ones). They come upon a thriving market near (and somewhat inside) a church. The Doctor buys a loaf of hot bread near the church door and some spiced wine near the baptismal font. The Master toasts him somewhat ironically; he's almost certainly not wishing the Doctor good health.

"''Scuse me," the Doctor says cheerfully to the wine vendor, "but do you happen to know if the King is in residence?"

The vendor snorts. "Sure he is. Out at his hunting lodge in the forest of Vincennes."

"How long is that on foot?" the Doctor asks.

The vendor shrugs. "Four, five miles. You'll get there today if you've got urgent business, anyway."

"Great," the Doctor says happily. They leave the church; he turns to the Master. "Fancy a look? I love a good medieval castle."

"What I can't figure out," the Master says, "is whether your mind really does shut down and your mouth runs on automatic prattle mode, or if you genuinely enjoy this."

The Doctor looks at him properly, going serious. "If you want us to go back and sit around on the TARDIS, we can, you know."

The Master winces. "Medieval castles. Right. Hooray."

So they go. The walk is pleasant; it's early enough in the autumn for the trees above them to still be vividly green, but late enough that the day is fairly cool. The Master hums something to himself; a moment's listening and the Doctor can tell the song's in a quick measure, one-two-three-four. He opens his mouth.

"Not today," the Master says, not looking at him. "Don't try to help today. We're sightseeing."

No more is said until they reach the castle of Vincennes, which really is, as the vendor said, not much more than a hunting lodge. Still, it's large and well-fortified and the Doctor hasn't gone hawking in a very long time. It might be fun.

They're stopped by a guard at the door, so the Doctor digs in his robe pocket and comes up with the slightly psychic paper. He expects it will say something like let the nice men in for a bit of feasting and hunting or even let that man in for some feasting and hunting but please put the other one in the dungeon for safekeeping. What he's definitely not expecting is for the guard to snap to attention, call at once for a second guard, and say, when this guard appears, "They're to be taken at once to Queen Eleanor." Moments later they're being hurried off along the corridor.

Any idea what this is about? the Master murmurs dryly inside his head. The Doctor flinches. It's no real violation of space; telepathic communication between Time Lords is as intimate as a murmuring very close to one's ear, but no more than that-- it gives the Master no particular access to his thoughts. All the same--

All the same it catches terribly in his chest and makes his hearts beat too fast and for a moment he's nearly overwhelmed by the shock of this nearly-forgotten contact, and the Master can hear that, judging by the smirk that flickers across his face. Even so, after a moment the Doctor's able to reply, calmly enough, I only thought the paper was going to let us in, not give us a private audience.

Oh, how lucky we are, the Master returns dryly.

They've crossed an open courtyard and come to a heavy wooden door; the guard knocks, and after a moment a woman's voice calls, "Enter."

The guard opens the door and bows low. "Your Majesty," he says. "The learned envoys you sent for."

"Finally," the Queen says dryly, and comes to the doorway to take the psychic paper from the guard's offering hand. She is richly dressed; her hair is red, and she has a proud face-- she is not pretty, but something in her bearing makes her stunningly beautiful all the same. She reads the paper; for a moment a puzzled frown flashes across her face, but she looks up at the Master and the Doctor and smiles charmingly. "Come in, gentlemen."

They enter; she shuts the door behind them and goes back to her chair by the window. She sinks down into it. There are no other chairs in the room; the Doctor and the Master are left standing. "I'm afraid you've caught me working on a tapestry," she says. "Louis is forever urging me to work on tapestries. He insisted on it all through my pregnancy, and he insists on it now. He doesn't believe it's quite safe for me to take up my hunting and hawking yet, and when I read excessively he becomes uncomfortable." She tilts her head a little and smiles another dazzling smile. "But your paper said you were here to listen to my concerns about Louis, not the woes accompanying the birth of darling Marie. Your names, gentlemen?"

Feeling rather delighted, the Doctor says, "I'm the Doctor. And this is--"

"A magister from Saxony," the Master says, with an insincere charming smile.

"Saxony?" Queen Eleanor's eyebrows rise a little. "You sound quite French, Magister."

"An unfortunate side-effect of my education only, your Majesty," the Master says, still smiling.

"I sympathize, Magister." She turns her attention to him. "And you, Doctor? What is your field of study?"

"Oh, a little of everything," the Doctor says; he's grinning too, he notices, and it occurs to him that perhaps the Master's smile isn't as insincere as all that. There's always something wonderful about being in the presence of a human who's really alive. "You know, philosophy, astronomy, medicine..."

"How learned," Eleanor says, sounding honestly impressed. "Then perhaps you will be able to succeed where I have not-- a few great men talking to another." She considers the half-finished tapestry hanging on the arm of her chair, frowning. "My husband is... troubled, gentlemen," she says. "Many men who have his ear whisper that I will be his downfall, and he has withdrawn from me. It is perhaps my own fault that I cannot regain his confidence-- I have, I am told, a regrettably short supply of piety and austerity, and Louis seems to have these virtues in such abundance he doesn't quite know what to do with them." She sighs. "I doubt you will believe me, but I don't want you to speak with him because I have some political machination in mind. I sincerely want what is best for my husband and for France, and if I do not know my husband's mind, I cannot do my job as a queen. Will you do this for me?"

The Doctor and the Master glance at each other. "Of course," the Doctor says. He knows Eleanor's marriage is already troubled, and he knows it only gets worse in the following year while they're on crusade; it isn't his job to save her marriage, especially since the history following her divorce is quite important to this planet. There's nothing wrong with saying hello to Louis VII, though, or giving Queen Eleanor some peace of mind.

She stands. "I shall arrange for you to have an audience with my husband tomorrow," she says, "as he is out hunting today and it is doubtful he'll be back before nightfall. I should also recommend you eat in your room: there is no need to announce your arrival to our whole court."

The Doctor bows and the Master inclines his head a little, and they're ushered out of the Queen's chambers and then taken by a guard to a suite further inside the lodge. There's a window looking out onto the forest, a fireplace, a table, two chairs, and a bed. The Doctor eyes the bed with a distinct sense of déjà vu.

The Master laughs. "Shall we take turns sleeping?" he asks.

The Doctor doesn't deign to answer.

It's already twilight: a dinner of bread and pork and oranges and wine is delivered by a man in Aquitaine livery. They eat in silence; halfway through the pork, the Master says, "Eleanor really is something, isn't she," and the Doctor says, "Yes," but after that there is nothing more to say. The Doctor is aware of every breath the Master takes, every small shift of movement, and it terrifies him. Of course it was going to be like that at the beginning. The only other Time Lord in existence-- of course he was going to be hyperaware. But it should have gone away by now. He should at least be used to the Master's physical presence. But it hasn't; he isn't.

They don't much need sleep this night, but they both go to the bed anyway, and lie down as far apart as they can. The Doctor finds himself breathing exactly as the Master does, and he wants to scream. He doesn't. He forces the awareness down and down, viciously, and some horrible time later he sleeps.

When he awakens it's pitch black in the room and the Master has gone.

He stumbles out of bed and gropes his way to the door of the room. In the corridor there is intermittent, fitful light provided by flaming torches set into the walls at odd intervals. The Doctor can feel the Master, still somewhere in the lodge, so he sets off, following the tug somewhere in his chest.

He hasn't gone ten feet when he runs into the Master heading the other way. The Master's hair is in disarray and he looks quite pleased with himself; a startled look briefly crosses his face when he nearly runs head-on into the Doctor, but it soon replaces itself with a smug grin. "Hello, Doctor," he says. "Fancy meeting you here."

"Where were you?" the Doctor demands.

"Walking," the Master says.

The Doctor grabs the front of his robes and shoves him back against the wall. "Where were you?"

The Master laughs, but he's breathing rather too hard, and his eyes glitter in the light of the torch set in a bracket by his head. "I wasn't tired," he says. "I went for a walk. Get the hell off me."

The Doctor gets the hell off him.

The Master straightens his robes. "Back to bed, then," he says coldly.

Neither of them sleep any more that night, although they both lie rigidly in the little bed for hours. It's probably a miracle neither of them turns and punches the other from sheer tamped-down panic.

In the morning, they're given breakfast-- bread and wine again-- and taken to the king's private chambers, where they are announced as a doctor and magister of Saxony, sent by her Majesty the Queen. To be sure, however, the Doctor offers King Louis VII the slightly psychic paper; where before the king had looked irritable and troubled, when he reads the irritation melts away and leaves the troubled look all the more pronounced.

"Please," he says. "Sit down, gentlemen."

They do so; their chairs have no arms or backs, but at least the king's room has enough seats for an audience.

"Are either of you familiar with the matter of visions?" Louis asks, tapping the arm of his chair absently with a hand. "Your paper tells me so, Doctor."

The Doctor grins a little. "Then I must be."

Louis smiles back, rather awkwardly. "Yes." He stares down at his knees. "I have been needing to say this for some time, but my barons would think me mad and no one in the Church wants to listen to anything I say these days."

"Then," the Doctor says, "please." His grin goes a little crooked. "Unburden yourself."

Louis laughs a little and takes a deep breath. "Shortly after my daughter's birth," he says, "I had a vision. In my mind's eye, I saw a great-- cataclysm. Like a-- a tunnel, or a fantastic whirlpool, but made of every colour in which God has ever painted-- blues and reds like the most vivid of flowers. And then-- you must forgive me, gentlemen; the things I saw are far beyond my comprehension, and I must relate the inconceivable to the tangible world, feeble as the attempt may be."

"It's all right," the Doctor says softly. "We understand."

The king looks up at their faces and sees, the Doctor supposes, startlement, but no disbelief. "Strangely, Doctor, I really think you might." Louis sighs and runs a hand over his face. "I-- trust you gentlemen have heard of the catastrophe at Vitry?"

The Doctor has, and nods, but the Master says, impatiently, "No, sorry, just came in recently from Saxony, you know. What about the vortex-- er, that whirlpool of yours?"

"But surely--" Louis says anxiously.

"Last year his Majesty's army assaulted the town of Vitry," the Doctor says, placing a hand on the Master's arm and squeezing a little, warningly. "The town was burnt. Hundreds of people had gone to the church for refuge, but--"

"We didn't realize in time," Louis says, pleadingly, going a little pale. His voice has taken on the air of a man who has repeated a story dozens of times in the vain hope someone will eventually believe him. "And I keep dreaming-- of the flames--" The Master makes a small impatient noise and the Doctor tightens his grip on the Master's arm accordingly. King Louis, however, straightens a little and clears his throat and says, quite steadily, "I've been under pressure from Abbot Bernard for some time to atone for that terrible sin." He smiles a little, sadly. "He's angry with Eleanor, you know, and Eleanor tells me I shouldn't listen to him. My God, it's like a lion's den."

"The whirlpool from your vision?" the Master asks.

"Yes, of course. My apologies." Louis runs a hand over his face again. It shakes a little. "When the image of the fantastic whirlpool faded, I found myself-- suspended in the heavens, it seemed. All around me were lines of light, like a spider's web. And it came to me that if I could comprehend the place in which I found myself, I would be gifted with knowledge as great as God's." Louis swallows, oblivious to the way both his guests have gone very tense and still. "Even in my vision, of course, I was horrified at this great blasphemy. And this, gentlemen, was the point at which I believe I triumphed over temptation, and God gifted me with a greater purpose."

The Doctor finds his voice. "What purpose, your Majesty?"

"I imagine that is why Eleanor sent you," Louis murmurs. "She seeks to understand me. But at Christmas I intend to announce it officially in any case, so there is little harm in telling you: I intend to go on a great crusade to capture the Holy Land. I dream of it too." He leans back in his chair and regards them. "You see, gentlemen, I awoke from my vision with a conviction; with a calling. I understand that, to atone for my past sins, I must go to war again."

The fingers of his right hand drum against the arm of his chair. Tap-tap-tap-tap. Tap-tap-tap-tap. Tap-tap-tap-tap.

"What's that?" the Master asks sharply, fixing his gaze on Louis' hand.

The king abruptly stops his tapping. "Just-- just a noise in the back of my head," he says. "Like a reassuring little call to the crusade. It's no matter."

"No," the Master says, in a strange, tight voice. "That ring you're wearing."

"What, this?" Louis asks, holding up his hand and considering the signet ring on it with some confusion. The Doctor recognizes it too, with a jolt of shock: it's identical to the one the Master wears. "It was a gift," the king says, "from the Count of Champagne upon our return to peace. Beautiful design, isn't it."

The Master stands abruptly. "The Doctor here will be better at discussing visions than I am," he says, still in that terrible tight voice. "I must go." He strides from the room.

The Doctor itches to go after him, but he turns to the king and says, quiet and fast, "He's not used to royalty-- he doesn't-- I'm sorry. I think you're right about your vision." He gets to his feet. "I'm so sorry, your Majesty, I really can't stay."

He bolts.

It's not difficult to find the Master, not with the waves of a peculiar fury coming off him to follow. A few minutes' searching and he comes to the source: Queen Eleanor's room. A modicum of caution makes him open the door quietly, and inside--

Eleanor of Aquitaine and the Master are kissing with something approaching equal fury, as though they're trying to crawl inside each other's skins. The Doctor clutches hard at the doorframe; he can feel it, the hands and mouths and sheer anger, can feel it so vividly his knees go weak. But some of the anger is his-- the Master isn't allowed to do this--

The Master senses it and pulls away to look at the doorway. Eleanor does too, and merely gives the Doctor a look, but the Master's shoulders go very tense. "You've gotten what you wanted, my lady," he says. "You won't see me again."

"I know," Eleanor says. "What shall I give you as payment?"

"Nothing," the Doctor says, breathing hard. "We're leaving. Now."

"As the Doctor says," the Master murmurs, and kisses the Queen's hand. She smiles at him, rather suggestively, but says no more, merely closes the door behind them when they leave.

"What did you say to her?" the Doctor demands.

"Only that Louis is going on crusade," the Master says. "After all, it's what she wanted to hear."

"You were kissing her," the Doctor says furiously.

"Yes," the Master says. "Jealous?"

"Of you? Don't be stupid."

"Of her," the Master says.

The Doctor clenches his teeth very hard and keeps walking. They're nearly a mile from Vincennes when the Doctor speaks again. "Louis," he says. "Louis heard the drumming."

"He saw the vortex," the Master says shortly. "And he heard the drumming. He'll go to war. So I'm not a special snowflake."

"It didn't make him want to take over the universe," the Doctor says. "It can be controlled. It doesn't have to be obeyed."

"He didn't have it for nine hundred years," the Master snarls.

"Then let--"

"No."

"And he saw the Matrix," the Doctor says, his voice shaking a little. "How is that possible?"

"I don't know," the Master says, and it sounds almost like a lie, but it isn't.

"That ring he had. It was like yours."

"Yes," the Master says, and breathes out shudderingly. "I was found with it in my pocket in the Silver Devastation. Fancy that."

"And nothing else," the Doctor murmurs.

"Just that and the watch," the Master says, and his voice shakes with barely suppressed fury at the universe.

A long, horrible silence.

"Beethoven," the Doctor says, very softly.

"...McFly," the Master says, with the beginnings of a very small grin.

"Can we at least agree the Spice Girls were rubbish?"

He can see the Master giving him a sideways look.

"Yeah, all right," the Master says.

Chapter Text

It's a slow night at the Hub. Gwen and Tosh are out investigating a minor disturbance in the bay that's probably nothing but a confused whale, Ianto's doing paperwork, and Owen's slouched in his chair, spinning around idly and eating a bag of crisps. Eventually Owen and then Ianto clear out; Gwen calls to make her report, rather tiredly, telling Jack that the thing in the bay looks like it might be a baby kraken and they're bringing it in. Jack laughs and suggests they turn it into sushi if it causes too much trouble, then flips off his headset and goes to make himself a cup of coffee.

He sits down at his desk and stares at his mobile for a long moment. Then he picks it up and calls Martha Jones.

"Jack!" she says happily when she picks it up. There's no noise in the background tonight; sometimes when Jack calls he can hear something that sounds like a family dinner, but today he guesses she's at her own apartment.

"Hey," he says. "Listen, do you have crazy Friday night hospital work tomorrow or are you free?"

"Depends," Martha says; he can nearly hear her grin. "What do you want, mister?"

"Well, if you've dropped that Milligan guy yet, I was wondering if you wanted to come on a date."

Martha laughs. "Didn't you know? I've sworn off immortal blokes. And yes, I'm still dating Tom."

"How's that working out for you?" Jack asks, grinning.

"I'll come on a date," Martha says. "But it's gonna be a strictly no-shagging date, got that?"

"Yes ma'am," Jack says, and so he finds himself meeting Martha in front of the Hub the following afternoon. He's got a slowly fading tentacle-welt on his left arm and, even though he took a quick shower before going up to meet Martha, he feels fishy and vaguely annoyed.

"You look great," Martha says by way of greeting, mouth twisted into a wry grin. She looks great, anyway: boots, skirt, hair down. Jack briefly regrets agreeing to a no-shag date, but he's a gentleman.

"So do you," he says. "Sorry-- Gwen and Tosh managed to catch a baby kraken out in the bay yesterday."

"Can I see it?" Martha asks, looking impressed.

"After our date," Jack says, offering Martha his arm. "How was the drive?"

"Long," Martha says. "Next time you want a date, you're coming to London."

"Be happy to," Jack says cheerfully. Maybe the next date will be a little more hands-on.

This date is pretty great too, though: they wander along the waterfront for a bit, then find a pub Jack likes and have a cheerful informal dinner together. Martha has some really funny secondhand stories about Tom Milligan and the crazy things that happen in pediatrics; she has even funnier, and sometimes touching, stories about working in the general hospital. ("I can't tell you the number of times I've had people say I should be a psychologist too," Martha says, looking half pleased, half exasperated.) In return Jack recounts for her a few of Torchwood's latest finds; the kraken, a lot of funny junk that scans as extraterrestrial so they're keeping it in storage, Owen's slightly hilarious encounter with an alien whose secondary systems meant it squirted him with neon teal fluid when they'd thought it was quite dead and he'd tried to dissect it. They both laugh in exactly the right places and bounce off each other wonderfully and Jack honestly can't remember the last time he felt so damn happy.

"I'm going to say this every time," he says, as they leave the pub and walk back down the waterfront. "But seriously. You should consider working for Torchwood."

"I know," Martha says. "But-- there's just so many brilliant things I can do with my life. And-- Jack, I know your team are wonderful, but I've seen the world. I've seen so many people capable of really amazing things, and I want to find them again. I'd love to do stuff with you and with Torchwood whenever you need me to, but I've got a job, and a life, and--"

"And you repeat that every day," Jack says quietly. "So if he ever turns up again, you can say no."

Martha stares out over the water. "That too," she says.

"Have you called him?" Jack asks.

"A few times," Martha says, and looks back over at Jack. "He seemed fine. I mean, a bit on the manic 'everything is fine!' side of fine, but-- all right. Says he met Eleanor of Aquitaine a bit before I called."

Jack laughs. "How 'bout that."

"Queen Elizabeth chased us out of the Globe and back into the TARDIS once," Martha says, grinning. "Anyway, you've got a squid thing to show me."

"So I do," Jack agrees. They go down into the Hub.

It's empty, which is a bit weird: it's only about six in the evening. Usually his team is still in, well into the night. He shrugs; maybe they went out for curry or something. Martha follows him to his office, where the baby kraken is sitting, burbling to itself, in a tank in the corner. "Bit adorable, isn't it?" Martha says, going over and peering down at it, but Jack freezes in the doorway. Martha looks back up. "What is it?"

"My vortex manipulator," Jack says. "I keep it on the desk. I just-- I always keep it on the desk. It's not there."

"So maybe it fell off or something," Martha says, frowning. "Anyway, what's the problem? The Doctor made sure it didn't work."

"Yeah, but who knows, maybe a sonic screwdriver fell through the Rift and one of them worked out how to use it."

Martha props her hands on her hips. "How likely is that?"

"I don't know," Jack says, and presses his headset. "Tosh? Come in, Tosh. Toshiko?"

Nothing.

"Owen?" Jack tries. "Ianto! Gwen! Anyone there, guys?" He drops his hand and turns to Martha. "They knew I'd be back soon. They wouldn't all just take off without leaving their headsets on."

"So the conclusion you've reached is that they've fixed your vortex manipulator and gone off somewhere with it," Martha says.

Jack weighs the options for a moment. "Yeah, pretty much."

"Right then," Martha says, and digs into her handbag, coming up with her mobile. "Just a sec, then."

"Wait a second," Jack protests, "you can't go calling the Doctor for this!"

Martha pauses in the process of opening the phone and looks up at him. "We can wait a bit, if you like," she says. "Maybe they got lucky and just got jumped to-- to Swansea this year or something, and they're just out of range, and they'll be calling in a minute. Or they could be on the Rift a thousand years ago. Have any other way to time travel?"

"Got the message," Jack says, holding up his hands. "Go ahead."

"...Sorry," Martha says, and proceeds with her call. "Hi! --No, actually, I know, I'm not just checking in. ...Yeah. Um. Jack and I were out having dinner and he thinks his team got his vortex manipulator to work again. --I know! I know that, but Jack thinks they must have." She rolls her eyes and tosses the phone to Jack.

He catches it. Heart suddenly thumping very hard, he raises the phone to his ear. "Hello, Doctor."

"What do you mean, your team repaired your vortex manipulator?" the Doctor asks without preamble. "That's impossible. Only Time Lord technology could have got it back into working order."

Jack's eyebrows go up a little. "So maybe some Time Lord technology got through the Rift," he says. "Look, Doctor, all I know is they're gone, and so is my vortex manipulator."

"Give the phone back to Martha," the Doctor says.

Jack sighs and tosses it back over.

"Yeah?" Martha says. "Well. Yeah. It's our best guess anyway, isn't it? ...Doctor!" She laughs. "No it isn't, thank you. Just a quick stopover, honestly. We'll find them in five seconds and you can be on your merry way. --Um." She turns to Jack. "What time is it?"

"Six fifteen," Jack says.

"Six fifteen," Martha says. "Yeah, we'll meet you up top. Thanks." She snaps her mobile shut and turns to Jack. "And back we go."

"Great," Jack says, a bit flatly.

They take the paving stone to the surface.

"Time for a mutual agreement," Jack says abruptly, as they step off the paving stone. Martha gives him a questioning look. "I won't kill him if you won't."

"I won't," Martha says, but she wraps her arms around herself and stares into the distance. "The Doctor hasn't talked about him," she says after a moment. "But it's the Doctor. I can't imagine him leaving anyone just-- caged for ages. Not if he cares about them."

Jack opens his mouth to reply, but he's interrupted by a familiar noise, and despite his concern for his team, despite the knot of furious trepidation in his belly at the idea of meeting the Master again, that sound and the sight of the blue police box fading into view makes him grin widely. A glance at Martha tells him she's doing the same. They walk over to the TARDIS together.

A moment and the Doctor pokes his head out. He sees them and breaks into a grin. "There you are! In, come on."

"How exactly," Martha asks, as Jack closes the door behind them (and they both relax a little in the familiar hum of the control room), "are we supposed to find Jack's team? I mean, they could be anywhere, right?"

"Oh, sure," the Doctor says, looking unconcerned, "but it shouldn't be difficult to trace, sloppy time-travelling like that." He frowns in concentration and pulls his glasses out of his pocket, settling them carefully into his face. A few moments' fiddling with things on the console, and, "Aha!" he says, and presses a button. The central column starts to move; he grins up at Jack and Martha. "Only jumped back about ten years. Should be easy to find them."

"Great," Jack says, leaning back against what seems like it's probably a safe bit of the console. "So how're you doing, Doctor?"

"Fine, fine," the Doctor says absently, frowning back down at the readings.

"And your passenger?" Jack asks pointedly.

The Doctor glances back up. "Fine," he says again. "He's fine, he's-- watching Teletubbies or something, I don't know." He reads the look on Jack's face correctly, because he says, "Isomorphic controls on the TARDIS. He can't do anything."

They land with a bump.

"Right!" the Doctor says. "End of the last millennium! --Oh no, hang on." He darts back to a screen on the console and hits a couple of buttons. "That can't be right. It can't, it--" He looks up. "Jack, don't they know not to press something twice if it takes them somewhere unexpected the first time?"

"Maybe they thought they could get back that way," Martha suggests, shrugging.

"Oh, yes, good, that's true." The Doctor grins at Martha. "Well, in their haste to get back home, they jumped off to-- 2217 China! Imagine that. Off we go!"

What follows is a somewhat dizzying series of leaps. Each time they land, the Doctor says, "Nope!" and keeps going, following what Jack figures is probably some sort of time-travel footprint. Further and further into the future they go, going by jumps of decades or centuries; around 3200, they leave Earth and start in on a whirlwind tour of the galaxy. The longer this goes on, the more anxious Jack feels and the more cheerful the Doctor becomes.

"Someone fixed your vortex manipulator brilliantly," he says.

"And when I find out who it is, I'm giving them a good punch," Jack returns grimly.

"I'd like to talk to them first," Martha says, coming up to the console and peering uncomprehendingly over the Doctor's shoulder at a readout. "Ask how they did it." She looks sideways at the Doctor. "And nice to see you again too."

The Doctor looks confused for a moment. "Of course it is!" he says. "I mean, obviously it is, but we've got Jack's team to rescue, and--"

Martha smiles in a long-suffering sort of way and gives him a hug. After a moment the Doctor's face breaks into a grin and he hugs her back enthusiastically. It makes Jack feel weirdly like an intruder, and it also makes him feel even angrier with the Master for being here and getting in the way of the Doctor and Martha continuing on around the universe together. He knows it's irrational and that it was the only thing to be done with the Master and that, in a way he can almost understand, the Doctor sort of needs the Master around. He knows Martha has a life to get back to and wouldn't have stayed for long anyway. He knows they're both trying their damn best to move on from the Doctor. But it's still weirdly unfair.

"Oh, here we are!" the Doctor says, one arm still around Martha, peering down at the console. They land with a bump. "--Yes, they haven't moved yet. And we're..." The Doctor's eyebrows go up. "We're at the Rirhath B Galactic Crossings. Lovely place. Big, though. Quite the spaceport." He removes his glasses and folds them into a pocket in his suit. "Let's go see what it's like out there." He lets to of Martha and springs to the door, Jack following.

The door opens onto a breathtakingly expansive spaceport. The white floor stretches out into the distance in every direction, and Jack has to crane his head back quite a bit to get a good look at the ceiling, which is so far away that various patches of weather are getting in the way of his view of it. Holographic signs hovering some twenty feet from the floor are indicating the arrival and departure times of spacecraft; one of the holographic signs is being rained on, and keeps flickering sullenly. Jack can see a few food kiosks in the distance; closer to are a number of faintly glowing squares into which people (mostly very alien, non-humanoid people) are appearing and disappearing, closely monitored by what looks like a giant purple centipede.

"Ah. Well," the Doctor says quietly.

Another giant purple centipede is flowing in their direction; in a moment it's right in front of the TARDIS, and rears up a little so that its eyestalks can examine the Doctor and Jack closely.

"Your spacecraft had not been cleared for landing," it says, its mandibles clicking. "This is the seventeenth time, Doctor."

"I know," the Doctor says. "I'm sorry, truly, but you know I'm always in a bit of a hurry. --And speaking of unauthorized landings, have four humans teleported in here recently? Friends of mine."

"They had a vortex manipulator," Jack puts in.

"Yes," the centipede says, legs further down its body making a rustling noise like a sigh. "The vortex manipulator has been returned to the Time Agency, and your friends are in custody. This is going to be a lot of paperwork, Doctor."

"It always is," the Doctor says. "All right."

"Come with me, then, both of you," the centipede says.

"What about--" Jack starts.

"We have enough paperwork already," the Doctor says firmly, taking Jack's elbow, and shuts the door of the TARDIS firmly behind them.

Jack sighs and follows him.

Here we go again, Martha thinks, and sits down on the edge of the console, swinging one leg idly. The whole of time and space and I get a hug and then he runs off to rescue Jack's team while I sit here in the illegally parked spaceship and wait for them to fill out five thousand forms.

Good thing I'm well over him, then.

She grins to herself.

"I don't think it's a very good idea to sit there," someone says behind her.

Martha springs to her feet and whirls around. The Master's standing on the other side of the console, looking rather bored and mildly amused. He isn't wearing a suit jacket, but he is wearing a tie.

"You see," he says, "if I sat on the console, nothing would happen. He's made very sure of that. But if you touched something by accident... Who knows."

Martha says nothing. As long as she keeps the console between herself and the Master, he can't hurt her. But he wants to; it's absolutely plain in the way he looks at her. He's also plainly enjoying the caution and the fury he can see in her face.

"Oh, don't be like that," the Master says, pulling a pout. "I'm a better man now. The Doctor's sweet do-gooder ways are having a nice positive effect on me. Any day now I'm going to start rescuing puppies from trees. Sorry. Kittens. Kittens from trees and puppies from sacks in the river. Don't believe me? No?"

I tricked you, Martha thinks, looking at him steadily. I tricked you and I made you see the fob watch and I wish I'd left you at the end of the universe to die in peace.

"Oh dear," the Master says. "And now you're pitying me. It would have been so much better for everyone if you'd just left the professor be. Is that it?"

"Yes," Martha says.

"Then allow me to disillusion you," the Master says coldly. "Your precious Doctor told you to go around the world and tell everyone to love him as you do. And you did what you said. Because you love him. How does he repay you? He replaces you with me."

"He had to," Martha says, quite steadily.

"No no no," the Master says, raising a finger to his lips for a moment. "No. If it was out of mercy-- if he didn't want to kill me-- if he didn't want to be responsible for killing the Time Lords again--"

Shock flares in Martha, but she doesn't move.

"But he didn't tell you that part, did he?" the Master asks, mouth curving into a horrible smile. "I'm guessing he told you the Time War was a terrible battle that resulted in mutual destruction. He just... forgot to mention he did it. Burned Gallifrey and killed them all."

"No," Martha says, very softly.

"The point is not that you believe me, Martha Jones," the Master murmurs. "The point is that you know. You know that the Doctor could have got rid of me any way he liked-- stranded me in some backwater time on some backwater planet, frozen me in time, thrown me into a sun-- and he didn't. He didn't because I am a Time Lord, and because I am a Time Lord he loves me." The Master's lip curls. "Just as much as you love him. Let's make you a Time Lord, Miss Jones, and let me be human again, and all our problems would be solved."

Martha has no reply to this. Her throat has closed up and she's not quite sure whether it's from pity or horror.

"Well now," the Master says, smiling again. "I'm glad we had that little talk."

He saunters out of the room.

Shaking a little, from unspent adrenaline, Martha goes down the walkway and sits with her back against the TARDIS doors, ready to spring up in case the Master comes back in. He doesn't. She stares unseeingly at the console and thinks very hard and decides, although it's difficult, that she won't ask the Doctor. Maybe she won't ask him because it's cowardly; maybe she doesn't want to see his eyes slide away from her and his face close off and know that the Master was telling the truth. (Which truth? That he'd burned his own planet? That he loves the Master? Maybe both. Maybe it doesn't matter.) But even if it is the truth, the Master must have twisted it. He's done it before: he's done it to Martha's mother. He should know better than to try the same trick on the Jones women twice.

Some interminable time later, when the Master hasn't turned up again at all and Martha has actually started to relax a bit, the TARDIS door is flung open unceremoniously and she falls out onto a white floor and finds herself staring up at a gathering thunderstorm in the ceiling.

Luckily in the ensuing flurry, in which three pairs of trainers, a pair of heels, a pair of polished dress shoes, and a pair of combat boots all do their best to avoid stepping on Martha's face, the centipede who was escorting Torchwood back to the TARDIS completely fails to see Martha, and they manage to get away without filling out any more paperwork.

"Thanks," Jack says, shaking the Doctor's hand, and begins ushering his team back towards the Hub so the Doctor and Martha can have a moment to say goodbye. She catches up with Jack as they pass the fountain; she has a frowning, worried sort of look on her face, but when she sees him glancing at her she smiles. Jack knows the smile a bit too well: it's the Patented Torchwood Nothing Is Wrong smile, and it doesn't reassure him at all.

They all get into the Hub, and collapse on various office chairs and couches. Jack stays standing.

"What the hell was that?" he demands.

His team won't look at him.

"Someone gave me a sort of funny screwdriver," Gwen says at length. "Me and Tosh, when we were out with the kraken. Said it was good at fixing broken things and getting things unlocked."

"So we came back," Tosh says, "and-- and we decided we'd have a go on that broken watch you have. The-- the thing that turned out to be a teleportation device."

"Vortex manipulator," Jack says, crossing his arms. "So when you'd fixed it, why did you decide to press it?"

"To see if it worked," Owen says, as though this should be obvious.

"More than once," Jack says flatly.

"Er. That would be me," Ianto says. "I thought-- perhaps it took you to some fixed point and back again."

"And then we panicked a little," Tosh says, looking embarrassed.

"I'll say you did," Jack says. "All right. Now that's out of the way, who was this someone, Gwen? And I'll be wanting that funny screwdriver."

Gwen bites her lip, fishes in her pocket, and pulls out a sonic screwdriver. She tosses it to Jack, who pockets it. "Well?"

"Er," Gwen says, and glances at Tosh. "A-- a woman."

"Yes, definitely a woman," Tosh says, nodding.

"And?" Jack prompts.

"With-- long hair. I think. A white woman." Tosh frowns. "I'm sorry, Jack, she just-- wasn't remarkable."

"Can hardly remember her at all, really," Gwen says.

"Perception filter," Martha puts in grimly. "Just wonderful." She looks at Jack. "How did I manage to go twenty-three years without any excitement?"

Jack allows himself a grin. "No idea." He shoves his hands in his pockets. "Well. No lasting harm done, and I've got myself a sonic screwdriver. Congratulations, team, you've met the Doctor and traveled the universe. Now go on home."

They dissipate, and he sinks down onto the couch next to Martha. "Are the doctors you work with like this?"

Martha laughs. "Not usually. Sometimes the patients are, though."

"Mm."

Companionable silence. Then: "Jack!" Gwen calls, in some alarm.

Jack sits up straight. "What?"

Gwen's face, pale with shock, appears above the catwalk. "Jack," she says. "All the stuff we picked up this last week. The alien trinkets and that."

"What about them?" Jack asks, with a sense of foreboding.

Gwen bites her lip. "They're all gone."

Chapter Text

On Saturday, Martha gets a call from Tom. "New Thai place opened just down the road," he says. "Want to go check it out?"

"Tuesday," Martha says. "I'm out early Tuesday, and you wouldn't believe all the stuff I have to do this weekend."

On Sunday, Martha gets a call from Jack. "All that alien junk was definitely stolen," he tells her. "And we dusted for prints but there was nothing. What I don't get is how they did it so quickly. The Doctor dropped us off right after he left."

"Unless your team went all button-happy while we were at dinner," Martha says. "That would've given the thief nearly an hour."

On Monday, Martha gets a call from Tish. "And this time it's a hospital," Tish says. "A hospital that wants me to do secretarial work. I looked it up like you said, and nearly everything's run by computer. This is getting ridiculous."

"A hospital, though," Martha says. "Well, I'm a doctor. Let's have the address. I'm going to check it out."

She meets Tom at the new Thai restaurant after work on Tuesday. "So," Tom says. "You have that look about you today. You're up to something."

Martha grins at him over her water. "I'm making an inspection," she says. "At a hospital."

"But you're not a hospital inspector," Tom says, looking a bit confused.

"I am now," Martha says, still grinning. "Authorized and all. By Torchwood."

Tom's eyebrows go up slightly, but all he says is, "Well, better you than me. You take the inspections and the paperwork and I'll take the screaming kids, thanks."

Martha laughs; they order their food.

In quite a lot of ways, Martha's grateful Tom doesn't ask too many questions, because she doesn't want to lie to him. He's intelligent and funny and a really fantastic kisser and he loves to talk medical stuff and his family is lovely and her family like him well enough and Martha knows far too well that in the right circumstances Tom would be willing to give his life for her, and all of that is wonderful, but sometimes Martha thinks it might be a bad thing she has that list in her head. With the Doctor, it had been this mixed-up confused bundle of impressions and some steady glowing conviction in her chest, a certainty she loved him. With Tom she feels fond and happy and definitely attracted, and it really is nice to date a bloke without lots of personal baggage for a change, but sometimes Martha wonders if she did it too fast. That maybe if she'd waited she wouldn't be comparing them and finding Tom coming up a bit wanting.

But there it is, that smile Tom's giving her from across the table, like he thinks she's the most important thing in the universe, and Martha knows it doesn't matter that Tom doesn't remember the few days they were revolutionaries together and doesn't know about the really peculiar bits of her life. It's good right now to have someone normal who loves her, so she props her elbows on the table and grins at him and asks him about his day.

The following morning she goes to the hospital that's been trying to hire Tish. Jack's debriefed her: the hospital checks out just fine, but Ms. Ingram is on the list of donors. ("Apparently she funded the construction of the entire psychiatric ward. It was built just this past year," Jack tells Martha as she eats breakfast, phone perched uncomfortably between her shoulder and ear. "You might want to check that out.") He's also assured her there will be a few people expecting her, but that he won't notify them until as late as possible, so no one will really have time to properly hide anything.

The hospital, on a first look, is an unremarkable off-white eight-storey building. The handles of the front doors form a brass circle, split down the middle with each half-circle a handle; Martha only notices them at all because the design on the handles is a rather attractive Celtic knot, although not one she's ever seen before. The lobby is clean and light, and when Martha goes up to the receptionist's desk and introduces herself and flashes the Torchwood badge Jack gave her when she left Saturday morning, the receptionist is cheerful and helpful. "Yeah, we've got you penciled in for an inspection tour, Dr. Jones," he says. "Miss Ridley will be down in just a moment to take you around."

"Thanks," Martha says, and entertains herself while she waits by reading the hospital's mission statement, which is framed and hanging near the receptionist's desk. It's like every other hospital statement of intent she's ever read, and completely unsuspicious. She sighs.

"Dr. Jones?"

Martha turns. Miss Ridley has short blonde hair and a smart suit, and she looks weirdly familiar, but Martha can't place her at all. She smiles. Miss Ridley doesn't, just says, "Let's get on with the inspection, then." She turns on her heel and marches off down the corridor. Martha follows, feeling a little indignant.

Whatever else she is, though, Miss Ridley is very efficient. She gives a precise explanation and history of each ward, ushering Martha through, just slowly enough that Martha can get a good look at things and see they're quite normal. At the end of nearly an hour Martha's seen a quite a lot and found nothing suspicious; all the same, this trip isn't a waste, as seeing another hospital is interesting even if it is perfectly normal.

"That's all, then," Miss Ridley says. "Any questions?"

"Yeah," Martha says, frowning a little. "I heard there's been a new psychiatric ward put in. We haven't gone by there."

Miss Ridley's face becomes slightly less friendly, which is quite a feat. "I'm afraid that's off-limits. Authorized personnel only."

"But I am authorized personnel," Martha says politely. "I'm authorized by Torchwood. Let's go there, yeah?"

"Follow me," Miss Ridley says, through what sounds like clenched teeth, and sets off.

The psychiatric ward is on the eighth floor, right at the top of the hospital. "It used to be storage space and a few offices up here," Miss Ridley explains in the lift. "But in the past year or so we have experienced a great enough influx of patients in need of psychiatric care."

Martha frowns. "So why not take 'em off to other hospitals?" she asks. "Specialty ones and the like? Why build a psychiatric ward here? You'd need new equipment, new staffing--"

"The ward was built and staffed through a series of donations," Miss Ridley says shortly. "Extremely generous ones, enough to accommodate people in the area." She stares straight ahead at the elevator doors. "I must ask you, Dr. Jones, to behave as you would in any other ward and not converse with the patients; it might upset them. Direct all your questions to the staff."

Odd thing to say, Martha thinks. Of course I'd talk to the doctors. I wouldn't want to upset any of the patients. "Of course," she says aloud.

The doors of the lift slide open, and they go out into the corridor, Miss Ridley's heels clicking off in a businesslike way. Martha pauses to read the plaque affixed to the wall by the lift: any number of wards have them, but this plaque in particular catches her interest, because it reads This ward funded by the generous donations of Rosamund Anne Natalie Ingram. Martha's eyebrows go up a little, and she hurries to catch up with Miss Ridley.

"Plaque there says a Ms. Ingram is responsible for those donations," she comments. "Who is she, then?"

Miss Ridley laughs without humour. "You'd have to take that up with the board of directors, Dr. Jones," she says. "I've never met Ms. Ingram myself." She directs Martha into one of the rooms of the ward; somewhat to Martha's surprise, it's full of teenagers, watching telly or drawing with crayons, watched by two doctors with clipboards. "This is the adolescent recreational room," Miss Ridley explains quietly, standing in the doorway. "Most of the patients in this ward are adults, but I thought you might want to see these rather than just hearing about them."

"Yeah," Martha says. "Thanks."

She turns to follow Miss Ridley back into the corridor when something grabs her ankle. She stops and looks down. A boy of about fourteen stares up at her with huge eyes. He's clutching an orange crayon with one hand and Martha's ankle with the other. "You," he says. "You're Martha Jones."

"Yes," Martha says, feeling a spike of shock.

"You saved the world," the boy says. "You told a story and we all thought and thought. And it worked. The blood's gone. This time."

Martha's heart is pounding too hard. "Yeah," she says, very gently. "It worked. Can I have my foot back?"

"Oh!" the boy says, and snatches his hand back as though burned.

Martha makes to crouch down next to where he's sitting, but Miss Ridley takes this opportunity to latch onto Martha's arm, drag her out into the corridor, and shut the door with a snap. "It was good of you to agree with him," she says. "It's best to always agree, but I think we'd better be going now."

"But hang on, I want to talk to him!" Martha says, a little angrily. "He was saying really important stuff!"

"He was raving, Dr. Jones," Miss Ridley says, and there's a hardness in her face that tells Martha causing a row isn't the way to get back into the psychiatric ward, so she shrugs and lets Miss Ridley escort her into the lift and then out into the lobby. "Thank you for coming to visit, Dr. Jones," Miss Ridley says, and gives Martha a cold smile, and shakes her hand, and shows her out the door.

Martha calls Jack the second she gets to her flat.

"And he remembered," she says excitedly, once she's explained to Jack in brief the events of the day. "Jack, he recognised me, and he remembered the year that never was! Do you think-- do you think maybe all the people in there remember somehow, and they keep on raving about the Toclafane and that? So they're locked up cos everyone thinks they're mad?"

"Could be," Jack says. "And let me guess, then you got kicked out."

"Shockingly, yeah," Martha says. "Listen, Jack, I've got to go back there. This Ingram woman is the only reason the ward exists, and at least one person in there remembers the year that wasn't, and those things have to be connected somehow."

"And you can't exactly pull a degree in psychology or psychiatry or whatever out of your ass, right?" Jack sighs. "Look, Torchwood authority covers a lot, but you have a job that isn't Torchwood and that makes things difficult. And, y'know, harder to fake."

"I can always do it legally," Martha says dryly.

"Torchwood's legal!"

"Outside the government and beyond the police?" Martha makes a rather undignified noise of disbelief. "You know what I can do? I can talk to my supervisor about having visited that ward and noticing a few instances of possible malpractice. He can write a few notes and make a few calls and by the end of the week, I'll be back in, and I won't have anyone hovering over my shoulder making sure I don't talk to the delicate patients. I'll have an official-looking clipboard and a weekend's worth of paid leave and I won't have to use the word Torchwood once."

A crackling silence on the other end.

Then Jack says, rather mournfully, "Are you sure you don't want to work for me?"

Martha laughs and says, "Well, thanks for listening, anyway," and hangs up on him.

The next morning Martha goes to her supervisor. He questions her extensively, and when he's satisfied she's not just trying to cause trouble or get the weekend off, he writes a few notes and makes a few calls and on Friday evening Martha's walking into the Rosamund Ingram Psychiatric Ward, holding an official-looking clipboard and feeling rather pleased with herself.

She starts with the adolescent rec room, but the boy who recognized her isn't there and none of the other teenagers seem to take any more notice of her than of the other doctors in the room. After a minute of searching, Martha sits down next to a girl with short brown hair who looks to be in about her late teens and is frowning at a Rubik's cube, although she glances up when Martha sits down.

"Hi," Martha says gently.

"It won't work," the girl says, holding up the cube for Martha's inspection. "It's only three dimensions and I can't even see." She bites her lip. "There was a time I could see, only I can't remember anymore."

"I'm sorry," Martha says. "I could never figure those things out anyway." The girl's accent catches up with her. "Hey, where are you from?"

This question seems to puzzle the girl horribly for a moment, before she says, a bit uncertainly, "Manchester. I've been living in Manchester."

So what are you doing in London? Martha thinks, but all she says is, "What's your name, then?"

"Annie," the girl replies at once. This question seems like an easier one to answer, and she looks quite relieved for it. She goes back to staring at the Rubik's cube.

"Well, Annie," Martha says after a long moment, and stands, "I hope you figure that puzzle of yours out."

She goes down the corridor to the office of the psychiatric ward's supervisor, and is completely unsurprised when she discovers the door partially open and Miss Ridley's voice issuing from inside, saying coldly, "I don't care if she has enough authorized documents to run this whole hospital! We need her out now."

A sigh; a man's voice says, "I know, Jenna. We're working on it. But they're all raving anyway; what's she going to find out?"

"She has contacts," Miss Ridley says darkly. "Torchwood, for a start."

"...That changes things a bit," the man says. "All right. I can't have her out today but I can have her out tomorrow. Now go away and do your political meddling elsewhere."

Martha takes this as her cue to get out of the corridor quick as she can, so she goes into one of the adult rooms to find a doctor who might not be in on whatever-this-is and will be willing to answer her questions. A man in a bed near the door is humming to himself as she passes, and the tune sounds almost familiar, but she can't quite place it. She finds a doctor near the end of the row. "Excuse me?"

The doctor turns and gives her a smile. "Dr... Jones, right? How can I help you?"

"I was wondering," Martha says. "What's wrong with most of the people here? How were they admitted?"

"Most of the younger ones are disturbed and from bad situations," the doctor says. "The older ones generally suffer from delusions-- from schizophrenia--" She shrugs. "Any of a typical number of mental ailments. Usually they're brought in by family or neighbors."

"Any... shared delusions?" Martha asks.

"A few," the doctor says, "but that's quite common."

"All right," Martha says. "Thanks, then."

She peers carefully at each patient in the room, but many of them are sleeping, or staring into space, or won't meet her eyes. Maybe the boy was a fluke; maybe Miss Ridley's just really paranoid. Maybe the hospital simply doesn't like Torchwood. Maybe the people here are mad but harmless and there's nothing that needs to be done.

But she's nearly at the door when the man who was humming to himself says, rather hoarsely, "Wait." She stops and turns to him, and he breaks into a grin. "Martha Jones," he says. "I was in London, you know. On the very last day. You sat on the stairs and you told us, and-- and he came down from his ship and took you. And we thought it was the end but we said what you wanted us to say, and then it all went back." His expression darkens suddenly. "But I remember. Why do I remember?"

"I don't know," Martha whispers. She notes distantly that she's clutching her clipboard so hard it's leaving imprints on her palms. "The Doctor told me only the people on the Valiant would remember."

The man snorts. "Git. He's been wrong before."

"Wait," Martha says, coming over to the foot of the bed, "you know him?"

Confusion flickers across the man's face. "Know who?"

"The Doctor!"

"Which doctor?"

Martha's heart sinks. "Never mind," she says. "Sorry."

But she goes home that night convinced she's on to something. She only has a day to find out what's going on, but a day should be more than enough.

That night, for the first time in months, Martha Jones dreams of the end of the world. Everything around her is burning: the sky orange with fire, the trees covered in ash, the streets red with blood-- that's how she always remembers it, that's how she once wrote it down. Her dream isn't quite a nightmare, because it is unreal. She walks among the shining ash-silver trees and feels unbearably homesick. The pavement under her shoes is cracked and broken, and in the distance there is something that looks at first like a manhole cover before it resolves itself into a half-shattered stone with that peculiar Celtic design on it, and Martha wakes up crying a little and completely bewildered.

She goes back to the hospital the next morning, but when the lift reaches the psychiatric ward, Miss Ridley's standing there waiting for her with a cold, self-satisfied look on her face.

"I'm afraid, Dr. Jones," she says, "that upon reviewing your documents we find you are not adequately qualified to be here. I'm going to have to ask you to go home."

Martha steps out of the lift. "What are you hiding?" she asks.

"Hiding?" Miss Ridley says delicately.

"Yes, hiding," Martha snaps. "Keeping from me. You, the ward supervisor, Ms. Bloody Ingram, any of you! Why do you have people from all the way up in Manchester down here? Why do some of them know me?"

"They are delusional, some of them have been transferred either by relatives or by their original hospitals, and I am keeping nothing from you, Dr. Jones," Miss Ridley says with perfect equilibrium, and shunts Martha back into the elevator.

Martha grits her teeth, but she has no choice but to go.

She spends the afternoon and evening with Tom; they play a few video games, wander around the nearest park, talk about medicine, try to remember as many opening lines of books as they can, get a large box of pizza, and spend the evening in watching The Weakest Link. Bit by bit Martha relaxes, and since she suddenly has nothing to do tomorrow, she decides to spend the night with Tom.

"Complain," Tom suggests, after she's been quiet for a bit too long, and wraps an arm around her waist, kissing her shoulder. "You're being paid for it."

"No," Martha says. "I'm not going to get anything out of it this way. I don't even know why I went. Just a funny hunch, and a friend told me to go with it. I-- I'll go back to it in a bit when they're not expecting me."

"All right," Tom says. "Just-- promise in the meantime you won't do that thing you do sometimes. Where you get all intense. It's wonderful and all, but sometimes I can't keep up. I like it better when you're just quoting Harry Potter and I can't remember the next line."

"What," Martha murmurs, "you want me to intimidate you with the geeky trivial things?"

"Exactly."

She laughs and turns to kiss him. "All right. Deal."

But that night she dreams again of silvery trees and orange sky and screams and the world burning.

And the night after that.

And the night after that.

Chapter Text

The Master wonders idly when the Doctor will start asking questions. He has his own, of course, set up in a neat line like dominoes, one question leading inevitably to the next, but it must be the Doctor to ask the first question. He won't, of course; the Master knows this. He's been with the Doctor long enough now to understand something he didn't when the Doctor first suggested keeping him: this bind he's in is a peculiarly symbiotic one. He makes the Doctor's life hell and in return the Doctor endlessly forgives him, and it creates a sort of hungry feedback loop; each of them trying to break the other in the way they know best.

But today seems like a good day to win.

Today they're on a planet the TARDIS has identified as Asterion, Earth year 3218: the sun is a brilliant blue-white, the sky glowing like a gem. Three misshapen little moons are circling each other near the horizon, and the Doctor and the Master are walking along a muddy track, the dirt below them a peculiar slate colour. On either side of the track are vast tangled fields of some vividly maroon plant, and despite himself the Master is enjoying the view. The plants are probably poisonous, the bright star beating down light probably gives off enough radiation to be quite harmful to humans, and his shoes are getting dirty. The Doctor is striding along cheerfully, heading towards a cluster of life-signs that were the only ones the TARDIS managed to pick up.

"Humans!" the Doctor says happily. "Here! I didn't think they'd gotten all the way out to Canum Venaticorum this early, but here they are! Very edge of their world!"

"Doctor," the Master says, "why..." He considers how best to phrase it. "This strange cheerleading obsession with a lot of mildly intelligent apes?"

"Because that's just it!" the Doctor returns, grinning at him. The Master still feels strange whenever the Doctor grins at him; he's used to the Doctor's old bodies, to a certain chivalric politeness, to defiance, even to the occasional bit of mania, but this is something else again. This fresh-faced freckled floppy-haired man swings between happily frivolous and deadly serious as easily as breathing, and if the Master does too, that's the Doctor's fault. It's all the Doctor's fault; his fault he's spouting some stupid admiration for humans again, explaining earnestly, "They're a lot of apes that fell out of trees and started banging things together and they ended up out among the stars! That's amazing, you do have to admit that's amazing."

"Thrilling," the Master deadpans.

Whatever the Doctor has to say about humans, the city they come to after a few more minutes' walking is less than impressive. It looks as though the humans have tried using the slate-coloured dirt as a sort of concrete, but sags a little, suspiciously, like wet clay. Their city is of reasonable size despite this, and a few well-fed children are playing a complicated version of hopscotch off the main boulevard, which the Doctor and the Master wander down with varying degrees of curiosity. It doesn't take long, of course, for a few adults to spot them and go running for blasters-- so they're not as stupid as all that. The Master had suspected they might be when he saw their utter lack of defenses around the city.

A man comes out into the street ahead of the others and points a blaster at them; they've stopped walking by then. The Master watches disinterestedly, but the Doctor puts his hands up and says, "It's all right. We're just passing through."

"How?" the man demands roughly. "We're not on any of the maps."

"Oh, well, I'm an explorer," the Doctor says.

This does nothing to reassure the man. "We've got nothing to trade," he says. "Piss off. Go back to your fancy spaceship."

"But what about those crops?" the Doctor asks, gesturing vaguely back the way they came. "You could do something with them! Dyes-- spices-- fuel--"

"They're poisonous," the man says shortly. (The Master smirks.) "So what's the deal, you're philanthropist explorers or something?"

"Something like that, yeah," the Doctor says, running a hand through his hair. It stands crazily on end. "We've got no weapons, honestly. We just want to look around."

The man sighs and holsters his blaster. "Fine," he says. "But once you've had a look you'll clear out, understood?"

"Oh, absolutely," the Doctor says, his eyes wide.

So they spend the day looking around, and the Doctor spends the day talking to people. Besides the pathetic clay buildings and the blasters, the people have a few large barns full of genetically modified chickens and cows, and a huge greenhouse where perhaps a quarter of the crops survive (the slate-like earth, when properly ground and baked, makes excellent heat-retaining glass, but as one woman explains exasperatedly to the Doctor, they can't very well live in glass houses-- hence the strange concrete-esque living structures). The only life native to this planet is the poisonous maroon plant, which, if nothing else, converts carbon dioxide into oxygen very efficiently, and the solar power the furiously burning sun provides is more than enough to fuel their various electronics. Really all these people need is a lot of good rock and metal and some decent trade relations, but-- and here seems to be the crux of the problem-- the humans who originally funded the colonizing of this planet didn't like the slow rate at which progress was being made, words were exchanged, and the colonists of Asterion are now on their own.

Somehow this gets explained to them over a communal dinner, which makes the Master feel uncomfortably twitchy. The food's all right, though, as human food goes, and a few attractive women (and a count of one attractive man) have been glancing his way, so the evening isn't a total waste. Or, perhaps, he thinks, watching the first man who had talked to them cradling his blaster and staring sullenly at his plate, not a waste at all.

"Sounds as though you've fallen on hard times," the Master says, in his best voice of sincere sympathy, sliding into a chair next to the man.

"Yeah," the man says, not looking up.

"My... compatriot," the Master says, "seems to think that if you attempted to open trade relations again, with nearby colonies, you might get out of your bind."

The man snorts.

"But you don't agree," the Master murmurs. "Who's in charge here?"

"That would be me," the man says shortly.

"Yes, I thought so." The Master smiles a little. "And what is your name?"

"Greg Howard," the man says. "Look, why all the questions? Who are you, anyway?"

And he makes the mistake of looking up.

"I am the Master," the Master says softly, locking eyes with him. "And I have a suggestion for you, Greg Howard. It is not diplomatic. It is not nice. But it will get you what you want."

Howard's cheeks go a little flushed. "Yeah?"

"The ship I came on," the Master says, "has certain... technologies. I can't give you metal or stone or more of whatever else you need, but I can give you the tools to get it." He smiles. "I assume the ship you arrived in is still in working order?"

"Yeah," Howard says again.

"You have a ship," the Master says delicately, "and I have nuclear firepower. Think about it." He stands and makes his way over to the Doctor, who seems to be in the midst of telling an absolutely hilarious story, judging from the uproarious laughter coming from his audience. The Master sits down.

"And then," the Doctor says, "and then, there was this big explosion right next to where all the paintings were all hidden-- only one of them survived, and it was one of the ones that had THIS IS A FAKE on it in big letters. Oh, I wonder if the people at the museum ever looked. Would've been a shock, wouldn't it, when they figured out there was no real one to replace it?" He looks up and grins. "Oh, hello, Master. I was just telling these people about Paris."

And there's that spike of pleasure the Master feels whenever the Doctor says his name, but here-- here, offhand, in a room full of people, in the middle of a stupid story of a city long gone-- it's somehow spoiled, somehow cheapened. The Master wants him to say it and mean it.

"Muddy backwater city," he says dismissively. "Are you bored yet?"

The Doctor smiles lopsidedly and gets up. "We can go," he says.

They head for the door.

Three, the Master thinks, two, one...

"Wait!" Howard calls, running over to them. The Doctor turns in astonishment. The Master turns, hiding a smirk. "Please," Howard says. "Can-- can you help us? With-- technology. Anything."

The Doctor breaks into a grin. "Of course!" he says. "We'll do whatever we can."

So they stay the night in one of the dampish buildings, and the following morning they walk back to the TARDIS amid a blazing silver sunrise. The Doctor collects wires and bolts and trots off to the TARDIS' own greenhouse to get a few packages of seeds, and while he's gone the Master kneels down in the control room and lifts a panel and coaxes a handful of charged particles into a small jar, which in turn goes into his coat pocket. He stuffs the other pocket full of wire, which should nicely alleviate suspicion, and together he and the Doctor set off back to the little city.

The Doctor spends all morning in the greenhouses, planting the seeds he's brought and chatting cheerfully with the farmers. The Master stays in one of the cool damp houses; he dislikes getting his hands dirty. Around noon, Howard joins him near a window.

"It's here," the Master says, pulling the jar from his pocket. "That power you'll need." Howard peers at the jar, his face awed and glowing a little from reflected light. "Of course," the Master says, pocketing it, "if you simply release it, it will destroy your entire city. You'll need my help."

"Of course," Howard says, willingly enough.

The Master looks at him.

Howard swallows. "Master," he says.

"Tell me, Howard," the Master says, "how many people would protest if you had my compatriot locked up? He... won't see our way of doing things, you understand. He'll advocate diplomacy at all costs."

"We-ell," Howard says. "I know some of the farmers would protest."

"How if he resisted arrest?" the Master asks. "How if he threatened them?"

"Then there would be no problem at all," Howard says.

"Good," the Master murmurs. "I promise no one will be killed. He doesn't like to hurt people. See it done."

Howard goes.

The Master grins to himself.

The rest of the afternoon is very busy: there's a brief commotion in the greenhouse, after which Howard reports that the Doctor is locked up in a storage room. The Master touches Howard's head in brief amused thanks. Someone runs in with the Doctor's confiscated weapon, and the Master pockets the sonic screwdriver with a smirk, then calls a meeting of engineers and explains what's needed: their excellent glass is quite good enough to make missile shells, at least for the Master's purposes. "Maps," he says. "We'll need maps of this part of the galaxy; we'll need to see what planets near us have suitable metal and ore." Suitable metal means suitable missiles, suitable ships. Maybe even suitable robots, if it comes to that. Maybe some day soon he'll be capable of putting the Doctor in more effective chains than those of old age. That would be nice.

Purple twilight falls. The Master shoos his humans off to their lopsided homes, and goes into the greenhouse, humming to himself. He picks an apple, considers it, polishes it on his coat sleeve, and slides it into his pocket before picking a second and strolling out of the greenhouse, eating pensively. He walks down the grey-blue boulevard in the gathering dark, watching stars spark into sight overhead, and when he reaches the shed where the people of Asterion have locked the Doctor, he feels an amusing antiquated urge to knock.

He doesn't.

The Doctor is sitting back against a wall, wrists shackled over his head, legs sprawled out casually in front of him, although when the Master enters he pulls one up to his chest to make room, and tilts his head a little. "Little overboard, isn't it," he says.

"Your own fault for pulling your sonic on them," the Master says, sitting down next to him. "Apple?"

"Mm. Not terribly easy to spoon-feed."

"No," the Master agrees, and holds it up to the Doctor's lips. A moment's consideration and the Doctor bites into it, then leans his head back against the wall, chewing.

"Nor terribly subtle," he adds.

The Master shrugs. "You shouldn't have left me alone."

Even the Doctor's thoughts are quiet. "No," he murmurs. "Perhaps I shouldn't've." He turns his head; the Master smirks and holds up the apple so the Doctor can have another bite.

"Aren't you going to ask what I'm doing?" he inquires after a moment. "My terrible plans, now you're safely locked away?"

"Oh, but I already know," the Doctor says, glancing at him sideways in the gloom. "Even with me safely locked away, the TARDIS won't respond to you, so you'll need another ship. These people have one." He sighs and adjusts the way he's sitting. "Of course that's not all; if they'll follow you far enough to let you take their ship, they'll follow you far enough you can start invading other planets properly. It never stops, does it? You just try to take over the universe, again and again."

Dropping the apple he's brought for the Doctor onto the ground is petulant and childish, but the Master does it anyway. "And you'll always try to save it," he says, kicking the apple away and drawing one leg up to his chest, just as the Doctor's sitting.

"Yes," the Doctor says. "It needs saving even when you're not trying to destroy it."

The Master's hands ball into fists; still loose, though. "Meaning...?"

"When things are saved," the Doctor says, staring up at the ceiling, "You see them carrying on and surviving and being wonderful. But to destroy things-- to destroy things you need an audience." He looks over at the Master. "You need someone who knows what you're doing, or there's no point."

"Are you saying I need you?" the Master sneers.

The Doctor regards him steadily. "Yes."

The Master gets swiftly to his feet. "Then, Doctor," he spits, "you can stay here to rot."

"And let me die?" The Doctor looks up at him. "You won't. Killing me doesn't mean you've won."

He kicks the Doctor, hard.

The Doctor's head hits the wall with a dull thump; his legs twitch and his hands go into fists and he spends a moment struggling to breathe. But when he looks back at the Master his face is still calm, so the Master kicks him again, harder, and kneels down, burying a hand in the Doctor's hair and yanking. The fleeting look of pain in the Doctor's face abates his fury a little.

"I am winning," he whispers.

"Are you?" the Doctor rasps, opening his eyes and peering at the Master. He's wincing a little.

"You've had me locked up," the Master snarls. "Now it's my turn."

The Doctor merely looks at him impassively.

"I had Earth," the Master says. "For a year I had Earth."

"You did," the Doctor agrees.

"What do you call winning?" the Master demands. "When I've burned every world across all of time and we're standing on some dark abyss and there's no one left to save? Is that when I'll win?"

"No," the Doctor says.

The Master's pulses pick up a little.

"Me," he breathes. "If I vanished. If you couldn't sense me anywhere. If you were alone again."

A look of pain crosses the Doctor's face. "That's not winning," he says quietly. "That's running away."

The Master's free hand seizes the Doctor's collar. "So you're telling me you will never allow me to win."

Something peculiar flickers in the Doctor's eyes. "No," he whispers. "I'm not saying that."

They're inches apart and both trembling a little and the Master wants to kill him. Wants to kill him in some stupid graceless messy way-- with a knife, perhaps-- stab the Doctor in one heart and then the other and press his palms to the Doctor's chest like he's trying to stem the blood when really he'll just be feeling it well under his hands, and then he'll feel the sparks of regeneration and the Doctor's glowing new body will form at his fingertips. That would be winning, and close to, one hand buried in the Doctor's hair, the Doctor can see this imagining and shudders a little, not quite from horror.

"Let me go," he whispers. "Please, let me go and I--"

"Will smother me in compassion," the Master says contemptuously. "Act like a savior. Keep the little people safe and work all the while to make me like you. Do forgive me for rejecting this plan."

"Let me go and I won't have to escape," the Doctor says steadily. "And this will be yours, start to finish."

"Obey you, and it will be mine, start to finish?" The Master laughs, his hands tightening a little. "If you think you know me, why are you bothering to say any of that?"

The Doctor's eyes glitter. "Compassion," he says.

The Master stills. Asterion is of course the perfect place to rule; its people are too lost and too stupid to do other than let him. And from Asterion it's a very short while to other worlds; there are mercenaries and weapons that can be bought, entire civilizations to be brought to their knees before him. The universe is vast and the drums demand its vastness. But Asterion is a petty challenge. Finding weapons and mercenaries is boring work and takes time he doesn't care to waste. And this small space-- the Doctor pressed to the wall and the Master kneeling with his hands in the Doctor's hair-- this space is vast too; the dark stretches around them and the Doctor breathes in time with the drumbeats. It's impossible he can't know.

"Ask nicely," the Master murmurs.

The Doctor just looks at him, for a long, terrible moment. Then, "Master," he says, like a breath. "Please."

Silence again. The Master isn't entirely sure he can move. Maybe this really is what winning feels like. The static in the Doctor's mind is full of urgent little crackles; he's horribly afraid. The Master holds onto that fear and lets the silence stretch and somehow he's leaned in to rest his forehead against the Doctor's.

"Contingency plan?" he asks in nearly a whisper, and can feel the Doctor's shuddering little exhale like it's inside his own skin. "If I say no?"

"I wouldn't have let you off on your own like that without one," the Doctor replies; his voice is just a little too shaky to be properly amused. "They'll let me out tomorrow. Howard might not be so bright, but a lot of the others are."

"And now that you've told me?" the Master inquires. His hand in the Doctor's hair shifts a little and the Doctor shivers again.

"You still don't know which ones," he says.

"No," the Master agrees, and starts to pull away, and to his absolute delight the Doctor makes a very quiet, swallowed-down sound of protest, although when he looks at the Doctor, the Doctor's face is absolutely impassive.

Perfect.

He disentangles himself from the Doctor and stands, pulling the sonic from his pocket. A moment's work and the Doctor's arms fall. He winces and massages his wrists and gets unsteadily to his feet. "Thank you," he says, and looks up from his hands, frowning a little. "Why?"

"It's very simple," the Master says, and kisses him.

The Doctor stands absolutely frozen for a second, then stumbles back against the wall and seizes the Master's hair in his hands and kisses him back as though he's been starved for it. Of course he has, the Master thinks, perhaps a little dizzily; he's been living a saintly hands-off life because everyone is too fleeting, too fragile, too human. His nails dig into the Master's scalp and he's trembling, and accordingly the Master shifts against him to support both their weight and cups the Doctor's face gently in his hands and slows the kiss, and the soft sound the Doctor makes is far more than worth it. If this is twisting painfully at his insides, making him want to sob and crawl inside the Doctor's skin, then it must be even worse for the Doctor, and that makes it far more than worth it too.

He pulls away very gently; the Doctor stays pressed against the wall for a moment, his mouth a little open and his eyes very wide.

"Back to the TARDIS, then," the Master says, as though absolutely nothing has happened at all, and watches the Doctor take his cue: watches his shoulders straighten, watches the precise moment when the Doctor's face shifts out of open and vulnerable.

"And onwards," the Doctor agrees, and holds out a hand; the Master sighs and tosses him his sonic. They go to the door of the store room. The Doctor glances back up the street. "They'll be all right," he says. "I couldn't give them the metal, but they'll have a decent supply of wood soon." He sets off down the street.

The Master drops his jar of charged particles in the mud as they go. In the morning, someone will find it.

This round to him.

Chapter Text

In all his nine hundred years, the Doctor can't recall having ever felt quite like this.

He's certainly felt something close before. Romana, for instance: he remembers wanting to sit very close to her and lean their heads together and grin, because being in her presence made him happy like almost nothing else in the universe. Or, more recently, the sensory memories from this body making the recollection closer, Reinette: the moment the fireplace started to swing around and he'd looked up into her face and had a sudden brilliant flash of insight. But this-- this isn't either of those things. This is what he felt around Romana painfully honed, because there is no background hum of other Time Lords out there in the universe to dull his awareness. This is like being hit with that flash of insight every time the Master enters a room or tilts his head a certain way. The Doctor finds that his skin is tingling nearly constantly; he keeps getting distracted and bumping into things and he has the horrible feeling that if he tried to talk he would stammer, but he hasn't said enough to prove this theory one way or another.

It's as though some door has been unlocked in his mind, and he's too afraid to close it again for fear of what he might see on the other side.

They spend a day in the depths of space near a supernova, but the Master acts totally disinterested and without someone else's enthusiastic awe to feed off, the Doctor feels peculiarly lost. The TARDIS feels too small to properly contain them both, so the Doctor sets a course for 1973; they go to a David Bowie concert and get completely sloshed and somehow still manage to avoid touching each other at all. They sit out on a dark street staring up at the gently spinning stars; the Master starts to say something and stops and the Doctor can't decide whether he's being kind or cruel.

Back on the TARDIS, the Master retreats to some far-off room and the Doctor sets a course at random through the vortex, hoping absently that they might pick up some distress signal; he feels an overwhelming need to be useful, to help people. To save something and make it right, because he's beginning to see that saving the Master and making him right is going to be difficult in ways he hadn't even thought to consider.

What he gets isn't a distress signal. Instead, the TARDIS gives a sort of shuddering hum and locks onto coordinates the Doctor doesn't recognize, although they're identified as being for the planet Xi Cephei, which-- the Doctor squints at the readings as the TARDIS begins the process of materialization-- is a planet covered entirely in water, its life readings in billions. And there the TARDIS sits, apparently somewhere underwater, humming to herself in a self-satisfied way, so the Doctor pulls up a screen display.

The scene that meets his eyes isn't one of murky water, darting fish, or anything he generally thinks of as oceanic, but rather a shimmering blue-green corridor, and the corridor is slowly filling up with people. The Doctor leans forward to examine them more closely: they look, more or less, like large octopi, their skin a velvety purple-brown and their eyes amber and intelligent. They're very cautiously touching the outside of the TARDIS.

This seems worth a look.

He goes down and opens the TARDIS door very slowly, so as not to alarm them; they scuttle back, and stare up at him. "Hello!" he says.

The TARDIS' ability to translate what he says into their language shocks them visibly; velvety skin ripples and a few of their tentacles twitch. Finally one inches forward a little and says, in a soft, strangely beautiful voice, "What are you?"

"I'm a traveller," the Doctor says. "I'm called the Doctor."

"And I am called Xeph," the spokesoctopus says. "We are the Cephei." It shuffles forward a little, hesitates, and when the Doctor does nothing to discourage it, it touches the side of the TARDIS again, very carefully. "She is living," it says, not like a question.

"Yeah," the Doctor says, and steps out of the TARDIS. The shimmering blue-green floor yields a little under his weight, like a waterbed. "Sorry, I-- I don't actually know how I got here."

"That is easy," Xeph says, its eyes calm. "Your living ship was drawn to our living ship, Doctor. Our living ship would not have let yours in if it was not for some purpose." Other Cephei behind Xeph ripple a little, probably in agreement. "And now you must come with us. There is something you must see."

"Well, I've got-- I've got someone I travel with," the Doctor says, a little awkwardly. "He probably won't like coming out and discovering I'm gone."

"Not particularly," the Master agrees, opening the TARDIS door and peering out. The Cephei shuffle again, with curiosity rather than nervousness this time; the Master glances around at the shimmering blue-green walls and at the Cephei. "Where are we going?"

"I don't know," the Doctor says, bouncing a little on the balls of his feet. "Let's find out."

The Cephei lead them off down the corridor; the Master, not quite used to the waterbed quality of the floor, walks a little awkwardly, but the Doctor doesn't dare offer his arm. At least this place does something to soften the tension between them. The Cephei's tentacles make soft sucking noises as they amble along, and the ship around them sways gently as though in a current. At length the corridor opens up onto a sort of amphitheatre: a huge domed space, as much scooped out below them as rising above their heads. On the floor of the amphitheatre are banks of organic consoles, glittering with coral; a few have holographic displays shining over them. Above-- the Doctor tilts back his head a little to get a quick look-- the dome is semitransparent, and outside is the sea.

The Doctor notes immediately that it seems completely empty.

He looks back around; all the Cephei that have accompanied them thus far are now pouring down into the amphitheatre, using their appendages to reach the ground with ease and grace. Xeph stays behind, staring anxiously up at the Doctor. "Will it be easy for you to reach our navigational space?" it enquires.

"Easy enough," the Doctor says, and he sits down at the edge of the corridor where it opens onto the amphitheatre, grins up at Xeph and the Master, and slides down into the Cephei control room. Various Cephei who have not yet seen him scatter in alarm, and then scatter further as the Master slides down after him and stands up, brushing off his suit. When he sees the Doctor staring at him, he merely raises his eyebrows.

Xeph comes down into the control room with rather more dignity; when the other Cephei see it, they relax a good deal. "Do not fear," Xeph says, still in that odd beautiful voice, with an edge of cheer now. "This creature is a traveller called the Doctor. With him is--"

"The Master," the Doctor says, before the Master can.

"The Master," Xeph agrees, tentacles curling a little-- a gesture of thanks, the Doctor supposes. "They came here," it adds, "in their own living ship."

A sort of shiver ripples through the assembled Cephei.

"Please," Xeph says, "follow me," and wends its way over to one of the consoles. It surges up, wrapped halfway around the console, and begins pressing various buttons with two of its appendages. After a moment, a holographic image flickers to life over the console: a readout, the Doctor sees, of this ship. He pulls his glasses from his pocket in order to take a closer look. They must be, he sees, in a large chamber at the front of the ship. The corridor in which the TARDIS landed runs the ship's length, and smaller corridors branch out to living quarters on its sides at intervals. There is also a lower level, connected by the sole means of the central chamber: this lower level must be workshops. Also low on the front of the ship is something that looks nearly like a mouth. A glance shows that a constant rush of seawater is coming in through this opening and running down a canal in the ship's underbelly. A clever way of catching food, the Doctor sees. In all, the ship gives the impression of being a sort of superfunctional mechanical whale.

"Very clever," he murmurs. "When did your people design them?"

Xeph slides back down onto the floor. "We didn't," it says. "They grow-- they grew, once, long ago."

"And now?" the Doctor asks quietly, folding his glasses away again.

"This is an old world, Doctor," Xeph says. "An old world orbiting an old and cruel star. Our lifetimes are long, but even we do not remember when food was plentiful. Now all that is left are small creatures who feed on radiation. These creatures poison us, not sustain us. This--" it gestures to the diagram of the ship with a tentacle, "is one of the last great motherships. There are no more than a dozen now." It turns pleading amber eyes up to the Doctor. "Please. You must help us."

"A moment," the Master says, laying a hand on the Doctor's shoulder. (A feeling like electricity shoots up the Doctor's spine.) "Why him? Why us? Why do you think we can help you?"

"Because you are from elsewhere," Xeph says calmly. "Because you are travellers and you have seen many things beyond this world and outside our comprehension. This gives you ideas that we do not have the experience to imagine. And," it raises itself up a little to emphasize the importance of its final point, "we have long been told the arrival of a new sort of living ship will signal a great change for the Cephei. You, Doctor and Master, are a tiding of change. It is our fortune you are travellers and do not bring destruction."

The Master's hand on the Doctor's shoulder tightens, nearly imperceptibly.

"We'll help," the Doctor promises. "We'll help in whatever way we can."

Another shivering spreads through the surrounding Cephei.

"Thank you," Xeph says quietly. "Would you like a look around?"

"That might be a good idea, yeah," the Doctor says, and turns to head for the corridor. The Master follows him, but, oddly, none of the Cephei do. The Doctor pauses. "Is anyone coming with me?"

"No," Xeph says. "You should be free to make your assessments and speak your minds."

So, feeling somewhat surprised, the Doctor heads out into the lower corridor, the Master following. Once they're alone, the Master drawls, "So this really is how it works. You try to find as many dying planets as possible and save everyone. How's that working out for your conscience?"

The Doctor turns on him. "Don't touch them," he says, low and furious. "I'm going to save them, and you'll do nothing to stop me."

The Master actually laughs in his face. "Is that a challenge?"

"No," the Doctor says softly, his chin going up a little. "It's a fact."

"Oh dear," the Master murmurs, still grinning, but says nothing more.

It's difficult to concentrate with the Master walking beside him. He's conscious of stupid small things: the way the Master walks, the way the Master breathes, every inch of space between them. He's probably missing crucial details about the ship because his completely insane body is feeling something close to withdrawal. But he grits his teeth and tries to observe anyway, and what he discovers horrifies him.

He takes a sample of the water rushing through the ship, and a very gentle sample of the ship's material off a wall, and walks the length and breadth of the ship, looking. Then he goes up to the TARDIS and runs both the water and the ship fibres through tests. The water results come up horribly radioactive, dangerous enough that the Doctor nearly leaps out of his seat and goes to tell them to shut off the canals as fast as they can, but first he checks the results for the ship, too. It is made of a living tissue surprisingly like that of the TARDIS in cell structure; it seems to be withstanding the radiation admirably, and isn't ill in the least. That's one good thing, anyway. He takes his portable biological scanner and runs back towards the control room ("I'll just stay with the TARDIS, shall I!" the Master shouts after him) and takes a cell sample from the willing Xeph. Xeph comes up with minimal radiation damage too, so the Doctor orders the canal shut immediately, explaining the extent of the poisoning in the water.

"Our sustenance, Doctor," Xeph says, after giving the orders to some nearby Cephei to close the canal and to relay this message to the other ships. "We have very little left. A few rotations' worth at best. Afterwards we will slowly starve, and our mothership with us-- it cannot survive if we are gone."

"I'll think of something," the Doctor promises. "It hasn't come yet, but there's always a solution."

"No there bloody well is not," the Master says, when the Doctor repeats it to him later that day, back in the TARDIS, scanning the ship over with her sensors. "If the whole planet's a big poisonous mess of radioactive plankton or some rubbish, there's not a lot that can be done. The only thing I came up with is piling them all in here and evacuating them, and no one would take them."

The Doctor stares at him.

"Oh, don't think you're the only one who can come up with stupid heroic plans," the Master snaps, and stalks out of the console room.

But when the Doctor suggests this plan, Xeph is adamant. "No," it says, polite but firm. "Our ships cannot live without us, and we cannot live without our ships." It looks at him closely, amber eyes knowing. "Can you live without your ship, Doctor?"

"...No," the Doctor concedes.

"Keep trying," Xeph says, and presses a tentacle gently against the Doctor's trainer for a moment in silent faith.

"Everything I come up with is worse than the last thing I come up with!" the Doctor tells the Master, shutting the TARDIS door behind him. "Get them out? Can't leave the ships. Bring them food? Food can't live here. Clean up the water? Don't have the power. Do something about the sun? Don't have the power!"

"I'm sorry lack of power bothers you," the Master says mildly, putting his feet up on the console.

"And get your shoes off her!" the Doctor snaps.

The Master sits up a little straighter. "Excuse me?" he says, very quietly.

"Off," the Doctor snarls.

The Master leans back and digs his heels a little into the console, watching the Doctor impassively. And the Doctor doesn't even think about it, just strides across the room and seizes the Master's collar and yanks him up out of his chair and onto his feet, and the Master laughs at him. Laughs and very gently disentangles the Doctor's suddenly limp hands from his collar and then holds them, delicately, the Doctor's wrists in his palms like birds.

"Let go," the Doctor says, his mouth very dry.

"You will not order me around, Doctor," the Master says, ignoring him entirely. He runs a thumb over one of the Doctor's wrist bones and the Doctor twitches a little to stop himself from shivering. "You will not because you want to be kind. You want to think that you are my friend. You want to think that you are nice and that you are always a step ahead of the game and that you are merciful." The Doctor starts to pull away and the Master tightens his grip, ever so slightly; the Doctor stills. "And you don't want to listen to me because I'm willing to tell you-- no, I savor telling you-- all those dark things in your head that no one else has the guts to see."

"Let go," the Doctor says again, in a whisper. "Please, just-- let go."

"You are not kind," the Master says, and strangely he says it without malicious glee, but with something quiet and cold in his face. "You come from a calculating and indifferent people, Doctor, without room for kindness. You don't have a solution for everything. Your solutions are to trust your humans or to trust the whims of the universe. And this--" the Master's hands on his wrists tighten almost painfully, and his face twists-- "is not mercy, Doctor."

The Doctor wrenches his hands away and stumbles back against the console. "It's the only thing I could do!"

"No, Doctor," the Master snaps. "That is not all. You could have killed me over and over until I ran out of regenerations. You could have imprisoned me in some remote place where I could hate you in peace. You chose to bring me with you out of guilt and loneliness, and that does not make you good or kind or right."

"Can we save it?" the Doctor snaps. "Can we please save this conversation for when I'm not trying to save these people?"

"And you always run away," the Master says relentlessly. "How shall we save them, Doctor? They will not leave. There is nothing to stay for. There is nothing you can do."

The Doctor can think of nothing to say. Silence stretches and thickens around them, and after a moment the look on the Master's face shifts subtly from mocking to something unreadable.

"There is nothing you can do," he repeats, but very softly, and suddenly the Doctor can read the expression on his face, vividly: understanding. The Master understands that saving the Cephei is not about finding the solution to a challenge, or about the Cephei themselves, nor even because it is right. It's about Gallifrey. It's about never letting anything die on his watch again. And in the face of that understanding the Doctor can feel some inner walls silently crumbling, and knows that the Master can see it, but the look on the Master's face does not shift to triumph.

Feeling nearly as though he's dreaming, the Doctor takes a step forward and then another and then he's got his face pressed to the Master's shoulder, shaking like mad, and the Master's arms wrap 'round him, hands rubbing small smoothing circles on his back.

"I forgive you," the Master whispers.

How long they stay thus infolded, the Doctor doesn't know, but neither of them want to let go. Eventually, the Doctor is the one to break away, and then they can't quite look at each other, and he says, awkwardly, "I should-- go tell them. They'll need to evacuate or they'll die."

"...I'll come with you," the Master says. When the Doctor looks up at him involuntarily in astonishment, the Master's eyebrows just go up a little, so the Doctor smiles hesitantly and goes out and down the corridor, the Master following.

When they reach the mothership's control room, however, the Cephei are all milling about and talking and waving their tentacles excitedly. The Doctor and the Master slide down into the amphitheatre and Xeph rushes over, its skin rippling with excitement. "Thank you!" it says happily. "Oh, thank you!"

"What?" the Doctor says, utterly bewildered.

"Your ship and the mothership," Xeph explains, shivering all over with happiness, "have been communicating. Exchanging information. It just began to come up on the mothership's displays-- she's learned how to fly, and she's transferring the information to the other ships even now."

The Doctor starts to grin in proud astonishment. "So you'll be able to leave your planet and take your ships."

"Yes!" Xeph says, and is so overcome with happiness that it wraps its tentacles around the Doctor's legs in a shivery enthusiastic hug, and the Master has to catch his elbow to keep him from falling over.

They receive the same treatment from a number of deliriously happy Cephei while making their way back out of the control room, but after assuring Xeph that their survival is all the thanks the Doctor needs, they finally manage to get away and walk back up the corridor towards the TARDIS. The waterbed quality of the floor, far from being a little unbalancing, actually makes the Doctor bounce a bit as he walks, and he can't stop grinning. When he glances at the Master, though, the Master's face is impassive. When they reach the TARDIS, the Doctor pauses to give her a brief, loving pat of thanks before they go into the control room and he shuts the door.

"So," he says, looking straight at the Master. The terrible crackling tension is still there, but its edge is somehow less dangerous. The Doctor's still scared, but now it's the right kind of fear. "Where now?"

The Master frowns a little and opens his mouth, but at that precise moment the Doctor's mobile rings. That means Martha, so he says, "Sorry, hang on a moment," and answers it. "Martha?"

"Are you busy right now?" Martha's voice asks without preamble. The Doctor's not an expert, but she doesn't sound happy.

"No," he says, eyebrows going up a little. "Just saved a planet, thanks for asking, but we're between sightseeing spots. What's going on?"

"I-- need to talk to you," Martha says. "Let's-- let's go out for lunch or something. Soon as we can." A pause. "Please, Doctor?"

"Tomorrow," the Doctor says. "How's your tomorrow looking?"

"Wonderful," Martha says, sounding relieved almost to tears. "Tuesday the eighth?"

"I'll be there," the Doctor says; there's a brief discussion of food and a street address is given.

"Thanks," Martha whispers, and hangs up.

"Wherever it is you wanted to go," the Doctor tells the Master, going to the console, "it will have to wait. I think Martha Jones needs a doctor."

He sets a course.

Chapter Text

When Martha gets to the coffee shop, the Doctor's already there, his trenchcoat draped over the back of his seat. He spots her in the doorway and waves with such happy enthusiasm that Martha finds herself grinning back as she wends her way over to the table.

"Martha Jones," he says, beaming at her as though he's quite proud of her for just being here. "How are you?"

"You're very chipper, Doctor," she says, sitting down across from him. "What's the occasion? Saved a particularly nice planet, have you?"

"Saved a particularly nice species," the Doctor says. "Well, two, actually. The Cephei-- these sort of purple octopi-- and their ships. The TARDIS taught them to fly."

Feeling it's probably prudent not to ask whether it was the ships or the octopi that learned to fly, Martha accepts the coffee the Doctor slides across the table to her. "How is the TARDIS, then?" she asks.

"Good, good, quite good," the Doctor says, and then, to Martha's absolute astonishment, "and the Master too. I've got him locked up for a bit-- I didn't think you'd much like it if I brought him along." He catches the look on Martha's face and his own softens a little, out of the manic cheer into a gentle seriousness. "And I'm all right too," he says, and Martha understands that somehow the Master's actually been a help. She'd rather thought the pure evil would more or less cancel out the potential helpfulness of a shared cultural background, but apparently she's wrong.

"I'm glad," she says, and thinks she probably means it.

"I am too," the Doctor says, and looks at her. Really looks at her, exactly the way Tom sometimes does, like she's the most important thing in the world, and Martha's heart turns over, because a year ago she would have given anything for the Doctor to look at her like that. But she knows he's able to look at her like that now because the Master-- the Master-- has done something for the Doctor that Martha Jones can't.

"Don't," she says. "Listen, I'm dating this bloke called Tom Milligan."

"Oh." The Doctor looks confused. "Is that what you wanted to talk to me about?"

"No," Martha says, rolling her eyes in fond exasperation.

"...What, then?" the Doctor prompts after a moment.

"Oh. Um." Martha stares down into her mug. "I-- keep having nightmares," she says a little awkwardly. "Variations on the same dream every night for a month now, which is getting a bit ridiculous." She looks up at him; he's listening closely, with a faint frown, not as though he doesn't think this worth his time but simply as though he's concentrating, and it heartens her. "They're-- dreams about the year that never was, or that's what I thought at first. I mean, I guess that's not too strange. I know my family sometimes still dreams about. But they didn't-- they didn't see all the blood and the burning." Martha swallows.

"I'm sorry," the Doctor says softly. "That's not something anyone should have to see."

Martha gives him a grateful look but waves this away. "But I hadn't been dreaming about it, Doctor. Not for months, not until I stopped by the Ingram psychiatric ward." She realizes she's not presenting this in any sort of clear order, so she takes a deep breath and says, "I don't always-- dream I'm me, is the funny bit. I started that way-- you know, I'd just dream I was myself, running through a burning city. But then-- sometimes I'm really little, and Mum is telling me to hurry up or we'll be left behind. Or I'm trying to make sure Leo and Tish are with me. And we're trying to get somewhere, quickly, before-- before we get killed, I suppose." She looks up at him and spreads her hands. "And I wouldn't've bothered you, but I've gotten to the point where I can't sleep well and it's interfering with my life."

"May I see?" the Doctor asks.

It takes her a moment to figure out what he means, and when she does, she surprises herself by actually hesitating a little. Then, "Yeah, all right," she says, and leans forward a bit, closing her eyes. The Doctor props his elbows on the table and touches his fingertips gently to her temples.

It's very weird, more than anything else; she can feel the Doctor kind of sorting politely through her thoughts as thought they're private files stored up in synaptic links, and when he reaches the relevant memories he pulls them out to examine carefully: the burning orange sky, the silvery trees, the bodies sprawled out on the street.

"I don't know, Martha," he murmurs, still probing gently through her thoughts, "it looks like it's just trauma. I can fix it if you like, but--"

He stops very suddenly, having gone far enough back to reach the recollection of the first dream, and the funny Celtic knot she'd seen on a stone. The Doctor's shock doesn't actually hurt, but she feels it, and, "Martha," he says, tightly, "is there anywhere else you might have seen that symbol? Anywhere at all?"

"Sure," Martha says in faint surprise, and blinks her eyes open to look at him. He's staring straight at her with an alarming intensity she'd only really seen him have around the Master. She swallows a little and thinks of the design on the handles of the hospital doors.

The Doctor drops his hand; Martha feels a brief flare of loss, but ignores it. "So... probably a good thing I came to you with this, then?" she asks.

"That Celtic knot of yours is the Seal of Rassilon," the Doctor says, and when Martha stares at him blankly he adds, impatient, "Rassilon, one of the founders of Time Lord society. You shouldn't be dreaming it and it definitely shouldn't be etched into the doors of London hospitals!"

"One London hospital," Martha says.

"Any!" the Doctor says, and rakes a hand through his hair. It stands madly on end. "And you say you started having these dreams after visiting a psychiatric ward?"

"At the hospital with the Seal of Whatsit," Martha says, nodding.

"Rassilon."

"Rassilon," Martha repeats dutifully. "It's all a bit complicated."

"You have my complete attention," the Doctor says, quite seriously.

So Martha takes a deep breath and explains. She tells the Doctor about Tish's suspect job offers, about Rosamund Ingram, about Miss Ridley, and about the ward. She tells the Doctor all about the conversations she had with the patients, and how a few of them had remembered the year that never was. "How is that possible, anyway?" she asks when she has brought up this last point. "I mean, I suppose if they'd been right under the Valiant, but it was over Norway or something, not London!"

The Doctor has been quiet and still all through this recitation, but at these words he stirs a little. "No," he says. "Even if they've been right under it-- only temporally sensitive beings can clock an erased paradox properly. Humans can't do it."

"So maybe they weren't human," Martha says. "I mean, they looked it, but that doesn't mean much."

"No," the Doctor murmurs. "No, it doesn't." He grins suddenly. "Want to go over and see?"

Martha finds herself grinning back. The Doctor leaps to his feet, shrugs on his trenchcoat, goes over, and offers him her arm. "Miss Jones?"

Technically it's 'doctor', Doctor, Martha thinks, but she gets to her feet and takes his arm. "Thanks, Mr. Smith."

They take the Underground; Martha pays for both tickets and doesn't mind the price at all because the faintly bewildered look on the Doctor's face during the whole ordeal more than makes up for it. Back on the street, the Doctor remains fairly bouncy and cheerful, but he keeps darting little sideways glances at Martha, and Martha is weirdly reminded of the way she used to look at him. Not with quiet soulful looks or any rubbish like that, but warily. As though she's the alien.

She supposes she is, after a fashion. The human doctor who saved the world. She smiles lopsidedly at him and feels overwhelmingly happy that he still turns up in her life now and again.

She leads the Doctor to the front doors of the hospital; he studies the door handle Seal of Whatsit, but lays a hand on her shoulder when she actually reaches for it. "Not the front door," he says, catching her hand, and takes off around the side of the building. Martha comes readily enough, grinning. She recalls suddenly one of her first memories of Jack: he's beaming like mad, laughing as he runs down a slope, and he says, "Oh, I've missed this," more a laugh than words. That's Martha Jones now: running hand in hand with the Doctor, realizing all over again why she was really mad enough to consider travelling around with this man.

"If we're going to break in," she says a little breathlessly as they skid to a halt by a side door, "remember I'm a medical professional and this will look really bad, yeah?"

"Oh, yeah, sure, got it," the Doctor says, unlocking the door with his sonic screwdriver. He grins at her. "Don't worry, I've got this slightly psychic paper. Anyone asks, it'll say we should be here. Besides, we're doctors."

"Yes," Martha says patiently, following him inside, "but I've been here. If anyone recognizes me, they'll know I don't work here."

"So we're visiting," the Doctor says, and locates a sign that says STAIRS. "Come on, this way!"

Martha doesn't bother suggesting they take the lift. It's more conspicuous, and she suspects the Doctor not-so-secretly enjoys leaping up staircases. Still, eight floors later, she's a bit out of breath and her legs ache. The Doctor's unabated enthusiasm makes her hover for a moment between amused and annoyed, but amused seems the way to go, so at the top of the last set of stairs, she gives him a slightly breathless grin. He goes to the door onto the ward, opens it a little, peers out, and goes very still. A moment; he shuts it again slowly and turns to Martha, his grin gone.

"Lucy Saxon," he says. "What's Lucy Saxon doing these days?"

Martha stares at him. "I told you, the only thing she's done in public in all this time is given money to the place that used to be Lazarus Labs. They call it something funny now-- er, Prydonian Labs?"

Shock spasms across the Doctor's face again. "Prydonian Labs?"

"Yeah," Martha says, watching his face carefully. "That means something too?"

"Yes," the Doctor says shortly. "We should go. We should go now."

"What, back down all those stairs?" Martha says, laughing a little.

"Yes," the Doctor says. "Listen, in that ward right now is a blonde woman-- short hair--"

"Miss Ridley?" Martha says, not feeling terribly surprised. "Yeah."

"Martha," the Doctor says, very quietly, "she was holding your parents hostage on the Master's orders. She ordered the military to shoot at your car."

And Martha very suddenly remembers why Miss Ridley looks so familiar.

"Right," she says, a little breathlessly, although it's horror this time rather than exertion, "right, we can go now."

They run.

"Want to explain a bit?" Martha asks, when they're safely back on the street. "Fancy explaining how this stuff adds up?"

"I've got a theory," the Doctor says, staring back up at the eighth floor of the hospital. "Actually, I have a few."

"And one of them has to do with Lucy Saxon?" Martha says. "You saw her, Doctor. She said your name too."

"I know," the Doctor murmurs. "That's the bit that doesn't add up. Actually. One of the bits that doesn't add up, there are a few of those." He glances over at Martha. "And someone's been trying to get at Tish but not at you? Not at the rest of your family?"

"No," Martha says. "But none of the rest of us are looking for jobs, and it would look a bit suspicious if someone came poking around our houses, wouldn't it? Although I haven't had any funny patients trying to do me in, either."

"What do your parents do?" the Doctor asks. "Your brother?"

"Dad and Leo are in retail," Martha says. "Mum's a lawyer. Why?"

"I don't know," the Doctor murmurs. "Thought it might be good to know, just in case."

"In case of what?"

"I don't know that either," the Doctor admits, and looks over at her. "I know a lot less than I should about this, whatever this is, but I think the Master might have an idea. Coming with me?"

"Oh yes," Martha says grimly.

"Right," the Doctor says, turning, "then--"

A Rubik's cube hits him very hard in the back of the head and shatters.

"Ow!" The Doctor claps a hand to the back of his head and stares down in astonishment at the shattered Rubik's cube, then turns around and stares up at the hospital. "Given trajectory," he says, "eighth floor."

"Are you all right?" Martha asks, more concerned about concussion than trajectory.

"Yeah." The Doctor gives her a brief crooked grin. "Thick skull."

Martha doesn't quite have the heart to laugh.

"If it's from the psychiatric ward," she says slowly, "it belonged to that girl I told you about. Annie. She said she used to be able to figure it out. Maybe she got frustrated with it."

"Funny thing to say, isn't it," the Doctor murmurs. "Good throwing arm, too."

"What?"

"That was deliberately aimed," the Doctor says.

"But why would a teenage girl throw something at you?" Martha asks, bewildered.

"I don't know," the Doctor says, "but if your Miss Ridley saw me, maybe she was hoping to give me that concussion you're so worried about. Still. Good aim."

"Yeah, but then why didn't she try to hurt me?" Martha wants to know, not because she doesn't believe the Doctor but because very little of this is making any sense at all.

"Because you didn't recognize her," the Doctor says softly, and bends down to pick up the shattered pieces of Rubik's cube. He slips them into the pocket of his trenchcoat. "I did."

"Then we'd better be talking to the Master," Martha says. "Now."

They get back on the Underground; the Doctor keeps rubbing the back of his head absently, but when Martha takes a few surreptitious glances at his face, there's nothing to indicate he does have a concussion, so she lets it go. Beginnings of sentences start running through her head. Doctor, the Master said-- Doctor, when you were back on your planet-- Doctor, at the end of the Time War-- Doctor, could you tell me--

But she says nothing. There's a lot she doesn't know about the Doctor but she's always known that, and she trusts him.

They're getting off the train at their station when the Doctor stumbles and grabs Martha's arm so hard she nearly screams. For a moment she thinks perhaps he's tripped on the space between the train and the platform, but when he straightens, he's so drained of colour a spike of alarm goes through Martha. "What, Doctor?" she asks, pulling him away from the train doors and towards the wall of the tunnel. "What's wrong?"

He stares at her wildly without seeing her and she's reminded, a little irrationally, of the way he looked when they were on the spaceship that was about to crash into a sun. That scares her too, but she steels herself and asks again, quite calmly, "What's wrong, Doctor?"

"He's gone," the Doctor whispers.

"Who?" Martha asks, with a distinct sinking feeling.

"The Master," the Doctor says. "He's gone."

"What, he took the TARDIS and--?"

"No," the Doctor says, a little impatiently, a flicker of something less intense and more like normal annoyance crossing his face. "No, even if he'd gone back to the end of the universe I'd sense him. He's gone."

"...Dead?" Martha hazards.

"Can't be," the Doctor mutters, "that doesn't make sense," and takes off for the stairs. Martha resigns herself to more running and takes off after him.

The TARDIS isn't far from the station, for which Martha is grateful. She nearly smacks into the Doctor, though, because he skids to so abrupt a halt right in front of it, and glancing around his side she sees immediately what's brought him up short: the TARDIS' door is slightly ajar.

"Did you lock it?" Martha asks.

"Yes," the Doctor says, but it's nearly a wail of anguish, and Martha feels terrible.

"All right then," she says. "Let's go in and see what's happened."

They go in.

Everything is absolutely completely intact and as it should be, as far as Martha can tell, except that the Master is lying on his back on the floor of the control room, and definitely not locked up somewhere like the Doctor said he was. But also not gone, because he's definitely breathing, if asleep.

All the same, the Doctor's face is tight with worry; he kneels by the Master, checks his pulse, and goes even paler. "Martha," he snaps, "is there anything here? A watch? Some-- some useless trinket?" But before Martha can answer he's sprung to his feet again and is tearing around the room in some frantic futile search.

Martha kneels down by the Master and checks his pulse too. It feels normal, but the Doctor must have noticed something, so she presses a hand down over his heart. All in working order. Then she slides her hand over to the other side of his chest, and--

Nothing.

"Doctor," she whispers, and stands. "Doctor?"

He turns to her, his eyes wide. "What?"

"He doesn't-- he-- why?" Maybe the Doctor's panic is catching. She takes a steadying breath. "Doctor, I think he's human."

"Yes," the Doctor says shortly. "But he wouldn't have pulled something like this twice, and there'd be no point, not unless he took the TARDIS somewhere else and hid first-- but he wouldn't hide from me, so someone else must have done it. And-- and taken the thing that has his Time Lord essence in it."

"You mean a fob watch?" Martha says, trying to carry on speaking calmly in the face of the Doctor's short sharp breaths and shaking hands.

"Anything!" the Doctor says. "It doesn't-- it's a convenient form, that's all. Lots of the older chameleon arches came with them, but some of the newer ones--"

Martha nearly wants to say that perhaps it's a good thing they don't know where or what is keeping the Master's Time Lordly essence. That perhaps this is the only kind solution to the problem of a universe with the Master in it. But she doesn't.

"So we could be looking for anything," she says.

The Doctor rakes a hand through his hair. "Yes. Essentially yes."

Chapter Text

Lately Harry Saxon finds himself saying a lot of things he never thought he'd have to say at any point in his life. Sometimes the things he finds himself saying are fairly normal: "I found your sonic screwdriver. It was behind the settee," for example, or "Torchwood just called and your friend Jack really doesn't seem to like me very much."

But then again, sometimes Harry Saxon finds himself saying things like "...Excuse me. You seem to have a severed hand. In your-- police box. That's bigger on the inside than the outside. Are you sure you're quite sane?"

That last is more or less the summation of Harry's life at the moment.

And the worst bit is that the man who calls himself the Doctor is completely unfazed by all of this. "Ah, thanks, Harry," he'll say, or "Jack will warm up to you eventually," or, in this last case, "Yeah, that's my hand. Don't worry about it."

Harry damn well worries about it.

Because ever since he woke up in a strange bronze room a week ago, everything about Harry's life has been worrying. He remembers running for Prime Minister for a lark, and he remembers not being at all surprised at losing, and he remembers being a bit let down anyway and getting completely sloshed, but none of that accounts for a persistent, week-long hallucination. Neither does he think he has the necessary imagination for such a vivid hallucination; when he awoke to find a strange man wearing a suit and a worried expression sitting next to him, the man told him without preamble that he wasn't who he thought he was and promptly took Harry to see the Orion Nebula to prove it. Harry's almost entirely certain he wouldn't be able to imagine something like that.

So now he's the houseguest of this man, the Doctor, who is apparently a two-hearted alien and travels in time and space. This much Harry's willing to get his head around; he was briefly involved with politics, after all, and he knows about Torchwood and UNIT, even if he never had any personal involvement. The problem is, the Doctor seems firmly convinced that Harry is exactly the same sort of alien he is, and has only some very dubious-sounding scientific babble to back up this claim.

All the same, there's alarmingly little to disprove him. Harry, being a methodical man by nature, has been going back through his own memories and finding alarming gaps. He only vaguely remembers his parents, and though he certainly remembers being at boarding school, the lessons he can dredge up are about elementary particle physics, not elementary grammar. More importantly, he knows quite well he was (is? he doesn't know) married to a woman named Lucy, but there are days' worth of gaps in his recollection of her, and for some indefinable reason he doesn't at all care to go looking for her and beg her to assure him that the Doctor's just a madman and he's perfectly all right. Sometimes he catches sight of his reflection in the mirror and it takes him a moment to recognize the face looking back at him.

And so Harry finds himself staying, mad as it is. Finds himself waking up in a little cottage on the outskirts of Kilkenny, the smell of the Doctor's attempts at cooking wafting under his door and prompting him to throw on his dressing gown in alarm. Finds himself hurrying into the kitchen and snapping, "No no no, Doctor, don't massacre the eggs!" and taking the skillet from the Doctor's unresisting hands.

When breakfast has been rescued, they sit down together and the Doctor looks at Harry seriously over the top of his tea. "How did you sleep?"

"Fine," Harry says, and downs his own tea in two scalding gulps. He's not really a morning person.

"Any dreams?" the Doctor asks. The Doctor asks this quite often. Apparently he has a theory that Harry's dreams could give them insight into who or what has... made Harry human, although Harry feels distinctly uncomfortable with the whole concept. And he has had a few peculiar dreams: he's dreamed of dueling with a sword, which he's certainly never done in his life, and he's dreamed of Lucy wearing a red dress that looks absolutely fantastic on her but is hardly her style, and on one horrible occasion he's dreamed of being a sort of living corpse, but he rather suspects that these aren't the sorts of dreams the Doctor is interested in.

"No," he says, digging into his eggs and tapping nervously on the table with his free hand. "Sorry."

The Doctor glances at his hand; he stops tapping.

"That rhythm," the Doctor says gently. "Do you hear it in your head?"

"Er. Yes." Harry shrugs uncomfortably. "It's just there, that's all. Nothing important."

"But it is," the Doctor says. "It's incredibly important. If I could have a look--"

"Inside my head?" Harry asks, and gives a bark of laughter. "No thank you, Doctor." And he winces a little. "Sorry, I'm not trying to be rude, I just-- It's quite strange enough you're an alien without you having to act like it."

A spasm of pain flickers across the Doctor's face, and Harry files it away. He's not quite sure why he's trying to keep track of the things he can say to hurt the Doctor; maybe it's his own helpless rebellion against the strangeness in which he finds himself caught. Or maybe-- and this is the more likely hypothesis-- he wants to understand what sort of relationship the Doctor has with this other man who is what Harry apparently used to be and will be again. He has a few guesses already.

The Doctor recovers quickly enough, though, and shrugs. "If it ever gets bad," is all he says, "let me know."

"Of course," Harry says, and gets on with breakfast.

"Any luck?" Jack asks.

"Nothing," Martha says in exasperation. "But that's not surprising, is it? He tells me we could be looking for anything at all, and it's not as though I have special Time Lord-sensing abilities!"

"You must have something, though," Jack says. "I mean, he didn't even bother asking Torchwood. And we're the ones who are supposed to be getting alien tech. You've got to be at your hospital every day."

"I think the Doctor sometimes forgets I'm not the same sort of doctor," Martha says dryly. "It's all right, I've got evenings and that. Tom thinks I'm just working overtime."

A pause. Then Jack says, a bit delicately, "Did you point out to the Doctor that maybe we're better off this way? I mean. Yana was a nice guy. Maybe Harry's a nice guy too. And since it doesn't look like he's trying to take over the world, maybe we should just-- let him be."

"No," Martha says, staring out her window at the quiet street. "The Doctor would be gutted, Jack. He doesn't want to be alone."

"He's not," Jack says in exasperation. "He's got us--"

"Jack," Martha says, "he burned his own planet."

Startled silence on the line.

"He must have had a reason," Martha says, "but it's not the sort of thing you bring up in normal conversation, is it? I think maybe he's guilty. You can tell him to leave the Master human, but I'm going to find that fob watch or whatever it is."

"Martha," Jack says awkwardly, "look, I love the guy too, but I think maybe you're going a bit too far."

"No," Martha says, frowning a little, "the thing is, it's more than that. The Doctor thinks-- and I think too-- that whoever made the Master human is mixed up in all the stuff with Ms. Ingram and that. It's a bit suspicious we'd just pieced together enough to ask the Master about it and suddenly he doesn't remember any of it."

"So how do you know the Master's not behind all of it?" Jack asks darkly.

"I don't know," Martha says. "Maybe he is. But we can't know that until we've got him back, can we."

Jack sighs. "Well, we'll keep looking. But I'm only doing this cos I trust you, got that?"

"Not the Doctor?" Martha asks.

"Nope," Jack says. "You, Martha Jones."

The line goes dead.

"Huh." Martha stares at the phone for a moment, sees the time reading on its display, swears, and runs off to the café down the street where she'd promised to meet Leo for lunch. He's on his break between shifts and is already waiting with a couple of sandwiches when she arrives.

"Martha," he says, grinning at her as she sits down. "What's up?"

"Oh, lots," she says. "Doctor-related stuff." He waggles his eyebrows at her and she makes a rude gesture, at which Leo only grins wider. "Hey, you haven't got any watches in recently, have you?"

Leo shrugs. "A few? Stopwatches, mostly."

"Fob watches at all?"

"Nah, Martha, I'm not in antique retail," Leo says, rolling his eyes. "Why, is the Doctor popping off to the nineteenth century and doesn't have the right accessories yet?"

"He's in Ireland," Martha says with dignity. Leo has a decent grasp on the idea of the Doctor, anyway, but also a tendency to vacillate between teasing and confused whenever anyone brings him up. In Leo's eyes, Martha is still his slightly-geeky problem-solving medical older sister, and the rest of the family's sudden switch in attitude to absolute trust and respect baffles him. Martha does absolutely nothing to abate Leo's slightly bemused teasing; it might have bothered her once, but the utter normalcy of the whole thing is heartening. "And I need to find something for him that might or might not be a fob watch."

"Sounds like I'm well out of it, then," Leo says firmly. "But if you want to come by and look, we've just got a whole load of junk in. Donated by someone called, er. Engle? Ingle?"

Martha sets her sandwich back on its plate very carefully. "Ingram?"

Leo beams at her. "That's the one."

Harry is washing the dishes.

The Doctor is watching him with a singularly peculiar expression, as though he's almost entirely convinced he's dreaming and even so is unsure whether it would be more appropriate to laugh or cry.

"You could always stop staring and help me," Harry says eventually.

"Nah, you look like you're doing okay," the Doctor says, and after a moment's consideration perches on the countertop and swings his feet. Harry hasn't yet been able to figure out why the Doctor always wears any of a number of ridiculously tight pinstripe suits. (The only reason he's thought up so far is they look good on him, but it strikes him as a bit silly that the Doctor's one concession to something approaching practicality is his shoes.) The Doctor's police box has offered up any number of similar suits-- thankfully slightly less form-fitting-- in Harry's size, although there's a suspicious amount of black. When Harry asks the Doctor if he might just go into town and get a horrible touristy t-shirt or two, the Doctor says they don't have any money, and looks incredibly cagey when Harry demands how they're paying for this cottage then. The end result, in any case, is that while the Doctor swings his feet and watches, Harry does the dishes in a dress shirt with the sleeves pushed up to his elbows, feeling slightly ridiculous.

"So tell me about your planet, then," he says. "...Our planet."

"I don't need to, though," the Doctor says. "Once we find your Time Lord stuff you'll remember it all anyway."

Harry sets a pan on the draining board with a clatter and glares at the Doctor. "I only have your word that I'm a week-old human. I only have your word we should be hiding in a cottage in Ireland instead of out actively looking for whatever it is that will make me some sort of alien again and get you off my back. Humour me."

"Well, our planet, it's--" The Doctor flounders a little. "It's called Gallifrey. We-- we grew up in the Citadel of the Time Lords--"

"Tell me about them, then," Harry interrupts. He's not quite sure why, but the strange quiet pain on the Doctor's face is making him uncomfortable, not least because he has a peculiar, instinctual feeling that any pain should be his doing, directly, and that horrifies him. "Or me," he adds abruptly. "What sort of man am I? What's my name? Are all Time Lords the Something?"

"No," the Doctor says, grasping at this. "No, but we can choose titles, and I'm--"

"The Doctor," Harry says, smiling lopsidedly and attacking the cutlery. "Do you make people better?"

"Sometimes," the Doctor says.

"So I've got a title too?" Harry prompts.

"Yes," the Doctor says, and doesn't elaborate.

"Well?"

"Well what?"

Harry points a sudsy fork at him. "Stop acting like you have the attention span of a goldfish on speed. My name."

"You called yourself the Master," the Doctor says mildly.

Harry snorts. "Hello, I'm a Time Lord called the Master! Bit stuck up, am I?"

To his astonishment, the Doctor grins a little. "The name you had at the Academy was worse."

"Oh, did I change it after graduating?" Harry says, brightening. "Was it my degree, then? Hah, I'm a master and you're only a doctor."

"Do the dishes," the Doctor says calmly.

"So Time Lords," Harry says, going back to scrubbing. "Two hearts. Retro time machines. Ability to accidentally turn human. Flash suits. What else?"

The Doctor considers this, obviously trying to think up something both interesting and safe. "Ability to regenerate," he says finally. "If a Time Lord's body becomes old or receives a fatal injury, we can regenerate every cell in our bodies. New face, new personality, everything."

Harry's considers this, not entirely sure it makes any more sense than the rest of what he's been told so far. Then again, the retro time machine seems to work, so maybe it follows that the rest does too. "So what did you look like before?" he asks.

"Oh." The Doctor scrunches his face up for a moment. "Not too much hair. Big ears. Leather jacket."

The mental image this brings up makes Harry snort a little. He covers it by rinsing out a glass.

"And before that," the Doctor says, "sort of long hair. Curled a bit. Someone once told me I looked a bit like Thomas Jefferson. Only not ginger."

Harry just stares at him.

"And before that-- oh, that was one of the older ones. I only did that a few times. Looked distinguished, though. Maybe it was to make up for the time before that. I really liked colourful clothes that time. And the time before that, I was blond. Quite young-looking, too. That was a good one. And the time before that--"

"Hold on," Harry interrupts, "can you do this forever? Are you immortal?"

"Well." The Doctor makes a little hand gesture that indicates bending the rules a bit. "Technically you're only allowed twelve regenerations. Thirteen bodies. But sometimes allowances are made."

"So which one are you on?" Harry asks, draining the water from the sink and searching absently for a dishtowel.

"The tenth," the Doctor says, as though this doesn't particularly concern him.

"...And me?" Harry asks.

"Your second," the Doctor says promptly. "Well. This go-round. I think if you add them all up it must be at least your seventeenth."

Harry does a quick calculation in his head, knows very well that thirteen plus two does not equal seventeen, and has a sudden horrible flash of memory to that dream of being a sort of living corpse. He swallows hard and suddenly this all feels a lot more real and more serious. For a moment he thinks he might be sick.

The Doctor hands him a dishtowel with such quiet understanding in his face that Harry wants to hit him.

He doesn't.

He spends the evening watching Teletubbies, because the sheer silly mindlessness of it all is comforting. He sleeps soundly that night, and awakens to discover that, whatever the Doctor's culinary faults, he cannot actually butcher toast.

"Dream anything?" the Doctor asks, like clockwork.

Harry thinks about this for a moment, and decides that today is a good day to answer truthfully. "Yes," he says, and looks up. "I dreamt you were handcuffed to a wall and then I kissed you. I don't know about you, Freud, but I think maybe it means something."

He feels a little sick again when he sees the absolute stillness that comes over the Doctor's face.

"Oh God," Harry says, "you're in love with this Master bloke."

"Harry, when I ask you about your dreams, I mean the ones that might give some indication about how you ended up human," the Doctor snaps.

"And repressing it," Harry says, leaning his chair back on two legs. "God, you must be absolutely gutted to see me like this."

"Harry--" the Doctor says.

"I think I might fancy you too," Harry says, his chair legs coming back to the floor with a thump. "Thought I should mention. If it's all funny and unrequited. With you and him."

"Harry," the Doctor says again, tightly, "you won't want to have had this conversation once you're back to being the Master. Trust me on this."

"I'll sign us up for marriage counseling or something, then," Harry says, nearly meaning it, and goes back to his eggs.

"Found anything?" Leo asks.

"Good question," Martha sighs. "Thing is, I'm not sure what I'm looking for. I mean, the Doctor says it could be anything." Leo holds up a rubber duck for her perusal. "Anything that can be opened," Martha adds.

"Doesn't narrow it down that much, does it," Leo says. "Look, Martha, why are you looking for something if you don't even know what it is? And why are you looking instead of the Doctor?"

Because now that the Master's human, the Doctor's acting like he thinks the Master might die at any moment. But Martha doesn't try to explain this; she definitely hasn't told the rest of her family she's helping the Doctor recover the Master. She just shrugs. "He's got other stuff he needs to do," she says. "And once I find this thing, we'll start getting answers."

"Um. Cosmetics case?"

"Maybe," Martha says, and looks it over. It seems perfectly ordinary.

And then she sees, in a corner, the same sort of funny astronomical etchings that were on the Doctor's and Yana's fob watches. Her heart picks up. "Leo!"

"Just a moment, Martha, I'm helping a customer!" he returns, and goes back to speaking with a pretty girl who is apparently trying to sell him something. Martha sighs and comes over.

The girl is holding a music box and explaining, "I don't even really know why I have it. I don't think it works, but it looks nice, doesn't it? Think I could get something for it?"

Martha suddenly notices that the girl looks vaguely familiar. "Excuse me, what's your name?" she asks.

The girl looks over at Martha in surprise. "Lidia Tran," she says. "And you're Martha Jones."

Heart suddenly pounding too hard, Martha sets the cosmetics case on the counter and says, quite calmly, "Can I see that music box of yours, then?" Lidia slides it across the counter, and there the funny astronomical designs are, etched on the cover. Martha swallows very hard. "Have you-- ever tried opening this, Lidia?" she asks.

"I don't know," Lidia says, frowning a little.

Leo's glancing between them in a baffled sort of way.

"Do me a favor, yeah?" Martha says, quite calmly. "Try-- try opening it."

So Lidia does.

It's the first time Martha's actually seen it-- golden light floating out and suffusing itself into Lidia's face-- but what's happening is unmistakable.

This has just become very complicated.

Chapter Text

Harry and the Doctor have just sat down to lunch when it happens: a sort of tingling flare behind the Doctor's eyes, not quite so intense as the one he felt when the Master had opened his fob watch, but still absolutely unmistakable. He stands up so quickly his chair tips over and crashes to the floor. Harry stares at him in such honest innocent astonishment that even through the shock, the Doctor's hearts turn over.

He can't very well leave Harry alone here, which means-- "In the TARDIS," the Doctor says. "Quick."

"But what about lunch?" Harry protests, following him to the door.

"Lunch can wait," the Doctor says shortly.

Being in the TARDIS with Harry Saxon is disconcerting nearly to the point of pain. He shuts the door neatly behind them, stands with his hands lightly holding the edge of the console, and watches with intrigued incomprehension as the Doctor sets coordinates for London, two minutes ago. He's soft-spoken and polite and for all that there is still a sort of hardness in his face; it isn't madness, just determination.

"What's so bloody urgent?" he asks now.

"Another Time Lord," the Doctor says, pulling the handbrake. The TARDIS lurches into the vortex. "Not-- not one I know."

"But--" Harry says, but they're already landing, and the Doctor's running for the door, so Harry sighs in a long-suffering sort of way and follows.

The Doctor's less surprised than he might be to find that they're in front of a shop that reads JONES & SON: HARDWARE AND RETAIL, BOUGHT AND SOLD. That's clever. That's damn clever. He runs in to find Martha and Leo staring at a girl of about eighteen who's holding an open music box and looking astonished. She closes it slowly, lays it on the counter, turns to the Doctor, and says, quite calmly, "Hello."

"Hi," the Doctor says, feeling distinctly as though he's just been punched in the stomach.

"Do I know you?" the girl asks hopefully.

"Er. I'm the Doctor."

The expression on the girl's face changes subtly from hopeful to wary. "Oh," she says. "Er. That's wonderful. I'm Qworenn."

"Sorry," the Doctor says. "I-- I mean. That's a lovely name! I don't. Know you."

She shrugs in an awkward, one-shouldered way. "You wouldn't have. I was still at the Academy." She looks around with a frown. "But-- where is everyone?"

The Doctor finds he can't quite speak; he feels Harry standing beside him, staring at the girl with great interest, and is visited with the sudden desperate wish for the Master to be standing next to him. The Master would know exactly what to say; probably he would say This idiot burned them all, but at least that would be something.

Martha comes to his rescue. "There isn't anyone," she says. Qworenn looks around at her in faint astonishment, as though surprised the human can communicate, but Martha goes on, completely unfazed, "Your planet's gone. It's just you and the Doctor." She takes a deep breath. "Right now. Doctor--" and she tosses him what appears to be a cosmetics case. He catches it, faintly bewildered, takes a closer look, and stares at her in astonishment. "We were looking for Harry's," she says, "but Lidia-- er, Qworenn came in here with that music box, and I..." She looks faintly embarrassed. "Well, I wanted to be sure I wasn't going mad, so I asked her to open it."

"It's all right," the Doctor says. "Qworenn? Do you have any idea what's going on?"

"Yes," Qworenn says, frowning a little. "This is Earth?" At the collective nod, she looks slightly less worried. "And the year?"

"Two-thousand nine," Martha offers, and Qworenn looks abruptly worried again.

"We were supposed to come to the thirty-first century," she says, a little nervously.

The Doctor's heartsrate picks up. "We?"

"The evacuees," Qworenn says, looking distinctly uncomfortable now. "But-- I don't think it went quite right. I mean, some of the Dalek ships had already gotten through the transduction barrier, and--"

"Start from the beginning," the Doctor hears himself saying, absolutely quiet and calm. Martha elbows Leo; Leo hurries to pull up some chairs, offering the first to Qworenn, which seems to calm her somewhat, and when the Doctor stays standing, Harry takes his arm and pulls him gently into his seat.

"I-- was only at the Academy, I told you," Qworenn says, a little nervously. "I didn't really know too much. But-- when the Dalek emperor launched the first fleet at Gallifrey itself, that's when the orders to start evacuation came."

"Who gave the orders?" the Doctor asks, swallowing. "Romana?"

"I-- don't know," Qworenn says, looking a bit surprised. "It wasn't that organized, I mean-- they just shoved a lot of chameleon arches at us, stuck us in a few Type 70 TARDISes, and told us the courses were already set, just pull the handbrake and put on your chameleon arches."

"Who are they?" the Doctor demands. "Who gave you the arches? Was it on Romana's orders?"

"Just-- just some of the professors," Qworenn says, looking alarmed. "I don't think it was official. I mean, the President had been preparing some of the void ships, but of course the Daleks went for those first--"

"I know that," the Doctor snaps. "I saw that. That's why-- that's why I thought--"

He becomes suddenly aware that Harry's gripping his right arm, Martha his left shoulder; both of them are watching Qworenn steadily, but he knows they're both really paying absolute attention to him, and that's somehow steadying.

"Sorry," he says. "Go on."

"We tried to stick to the plan," Qworenn says. "I mean, the one the President laid out. We were to evacuate to thirty-first century Earth and lay low." She swallows. "The professors were talking about-- about trying to evacuate the Matrix, too, I mean, take its main access out of the Citadel and put it in-- keys of some sort. Only one of the explosions had scattered the keys, and they weren't sure what to do, so they decided they just had to get the students out." She takes a deep breath. "And when we got into our evacuation TARDIS, I put on my chameleon arch, so I don't know why we're here. This century, I mean. The TARDIS was supposed to stick us all in a scenario together, but..." She gestures helplessly. "Twenty-first century co-op, working at a launderette? The manager was a grumpy old man. Human as they come."

Why didn't she tell me?

I would have run.

The Doctor takes a deep breath. "Romana. Tell me. Is she alive?"

"I don't know, Doctor," Qworenn says, and she obviously understands the look that crosses the Doctor's face, because she adds, "I'm sorry."

He waves it away. "And you have no idea where anyone else is? Any of the other evacuees?"

"No," Qworenn says apologetically. "I mean, logically some of them would be in London. This year. Since I am."

"The Silver Devastation," Harry says unexpectedly.

Everyone turns to stare at him. He looks as surprised as any of them, but he says, looking steadily at the Doctor, "Is that allowed? If it just came into my head? Or do I have to have dreamt it?"

"No," the Doctor says. "Go on."

A brief wry smile flickers across Harry's face. "It. Just seems important. That's where I found my--" And blank shock comes across his face. "Where's my ring gone?"

"What, the one with the Lazarus Labs logo on it?" Martha says. When everyone turns to stare at her, she shrugs. "Well, it did. Those two sort of lines of bubbles? Lazarus Labs. Prydonian kept the logo, so I've been seeing it too much. I don't know, I thought maybe it was a little thank-you gift cos you and your wife had donated money."

The Doctor turns back to Harry in sudden excitement. "You're Harry Saxon," he says. "Do you remember Lucy?"

He's not too surprised to see Harry's shoulders shift uncomfortably, nor to hear Harry say, "Just-- just funny bits and pieces. But I... do remember Lazarus Labs. I think-- I think we designed the logo. Lucy and I. Lucy was just so happy I had some power and influence, she wanted to use some of the influence for frivolous things. So my ring came before the Labs." He makes an impatient gesture. "But it's gone. I can't think where. I had it on election day, I know that."

"You had it with you when you took off with the Doctor last year, too," Martha says, rather dryly. "Doctor?"

"He definitely had it in medieval France," the Doctor says, "because King Louis VII had one too."

"...Am I the only one here who's really confused?" Leo asks into the pause.

"No," Qworenn says.

"No," the Doctor says, grinning suddenly and leaping to his feet. "We're going to the Silver Devastation." There's a general outcry of whats and whys. He waves them off. "Martha," he says, "when I said the Master was gone, you thought I meant he'd taken the TARDIS and left."

"Hold on!" Qworenn says. "The what? Who?"

The Doctor chooses to ignore this; when Martha nods, he goes on, "But someone who knows how to operate a chameleon arch would know how to work the TARDIS." He finds that he's grinning and can't stop. "But the Master couldn't have done it, because I programmed the TARDIS to not respond to any of his flight commands. But I didn't do it for anyone else, because no human can work the TARDIS properly and if there are no other Time Lords there's nothing to worry about, but if there are other Time Lords-- even Time Lords in human form retain some knowledge, especially around Time Lord technology--" He turns to Harry. "If the manual circuits fail--?"

"Telepathic backup," Harry says, "although technically the manual is backup."

"See?" the Doctor says, beaming around at the others' startled faces.

"He's the Master?" Qworenn demands.

"What's going on?" Leo asks.

"Yeah, but even if some human Time Lord decided to get back at the Master by sticking his Time Lord bits on some other planet or in some other time," Martha says, "why d'you think it's the Silver Devastation?"

"Irony," the Doctor says simply. "It's where Yana was found. But if that's not good enough, we can just go look at the TARDIS travel log. Automatically records previous coordinates." He grins around at them. "Come on!"

They all run back out to the TARDIS; Qworenn's snort of faint derision for the old model, and Leo's quiet breathed wow, are far less important than the way Harry and Martha go with him straight to the console and watch as he pulls up the TARDIS' last trip before Ireland: not Xi Cephei after all, but the Silver Devastation, 5523. "Hah!" he says, grinning triumphantly at Martha and then Harry, who both grin back at him. He turns. "Qworenn! Shut the door, will you?"

She does, looking mutinous.

"Right!" the Doctor says, pulling the handbrake, and off they go.

The Silver Devastation, Martha discovers, is more or less exactly what it sounds like. It spreads around them in all directions as far as the eye can see, endless acres of cold, silvery sand. A shivery wind causes the sand to slide smoothly across itself and bite at their ankles. Even the star above them is a brilliant white, the sky grey. Leo's mouth seems stuck a little way open, and Qworenn, after a few seconds of hesitation in which it's quite obvious she wants to stay with the ship, sighs in a long-suffering way and takes his arm, setting off after the enthusiastic Doctor.

Which leaves Martha walking with Harry.

"All right," Harry says after a moment, "what's this Master bloke like?"

Martha glances sideways at him. Harry Saxon, like John Smith, carries himself a little differently than his Time Lord self did. His movements are looser, easier, more genuinely friendly. He gives her a look of guarded honest curiosity.

"Not nice," Martha says.

"I guessed," Harry says, "given that girl's reaction and the way the Doctor won't tell me a damn thing. ...How not nice?"

Martha considers. They're here to get the Master back, and she very much doubts he'll mind that she told his terrible deeds to his human self. More importantly, though, the Master and what he has done are terrifying, and Harry, strange though it is to think this, seems like he's a decent bloke. Sane, anyway. Not evil. And Martha remembers quite well John Smith's horror at hearing about the Doctor-- about the Doctor, who is far greater than the Master will ever be. She remembers seriously wondering if John Smith would choose to open the fob watch. And if she heard that she was really anything like the Master, she'd flat-out refuse to change back. This wouldn't be a bad thing. This would be a very, very good thing. And it's not as though the Doctor's alone, if he'll only think about it for a moment: there's Qworenn, trudging away ahead of them, and there's that cosmetics case Martha found, and if Qworenn's to be believed, there must be hundreds of Time Lords hidden in London alone. Maybe if Harry refuses to change back, the Doctor will see sense.

"You took over the world," she says. "For a year you took over the world. You went to the end of the human race and you brought them back to the twenty-first century and you used the Doctor's TARDIS to build a paradox machine so those future humans could kill their ancestors, and then you made the world burn."

Harry stares at her.

"Sorry," Martha adds.

"I-- I suppose the paradox collapsed," Harry says weakly.

"Yeah," Martha says.

They walk along in silence, their feet slipping a little in the sand. Martha glances behind them; the TARDIS is sitting forlornly in the distance. The Doctor seems to know where he's going, though.

"Why are you talking to me?" Harry asks.

Martha looks over at him in surprise. "What?"

"You. Talking. To me. If I did that to the world."

"I don't know," Martha admits, staring at Leo's back some ways in front of them. "Maybe because you're actually acting horrified this time."

They lapse into silence again. The Doctor has picked up the pace a little; accordingly, so does everyone else, slipping and sliding a bit more in the sand.

"Him," Harry says. "What about him? I don't mean, why does he talk to me; I mean, why does he want the Master back?"

"Before?" Martha shrugs. "I'd've said because he didn't want to be alone. Now... I have no idea."

"Oh, I do," Harry says. "He's damn well in love with him."

Martha rather unceremoniously falls over.

"Are you okay?" Harry asks anxiously.

"Yeah," Martha says, getting to her feet and starting onwards. "I mean no! He's what?"

"The Doctor," Harry says. "In love with the Master. I thought it was sort of obvious."

"I wouldn't have noticed," Martha says. "Since I wasn't really travelling with both of them." All the same, she's starting to have a horrible sinking feeling. She hadn't really considered why the Doctor was so determined to keep the Master around, aside from the obvious. A desperate and perhaps slightly unhealthy desire to not be alone had really seemed like a good enough reason to her. Or at least a reasonably sane one.

They fall silent again, but don't have a lot of time for reflection, because the Doctor's given a gleeful shout of triumph. Martha sees him bend down, pick something up from the sand, and come running over to them. It's a fob watch. He grins and hands it to Harry. "Here we are. Go on, open it."

Harry stares at it for a long moment and then hands it back to the Doctor. "No," he says. "Thanks, but no."

The Doctor gives him a look of utter astonishment. "What?"

"I don't want it," Harry says, enunciating very clearly. "I don't want to be a-- a mass-murdering megalomaniac. Thanks."

"Who told you that?" the Doctor asks, going very still.

"Me," Martha says. The Doctor turns to her with a look of shocked betrayal that twists into utter fury, but she stands her ground. "You're not alone again, Doctor. There are hundreds of Time Lords. In London. Let the Master go."

"Yeah, I think I'm all for that plan," Leo puts in.

"But he has information we need!" the Doctor says with a note of panic in his voice.

"You think he might," Martha returns.

"Doctor," Qworenn puts in, "this is the Master we're talking about. They only resurrected him for the Time War. The Time War is over. Let him be over too."

The Doctor looks around at them all quickly in turn, and Martha is shocked to see something like real fear in his face. "No," he says. "I-- We need him. Don't you see, this isn't going to be as easy as just telling a bunch of young people to open their trinkets! Martha, you've already found at least one more component of a chameleon arch in your brother's shop. Not everyone has theirs. And Qworenn-- you've told me, you weren't with anyone else, even though you left with them. Something's gone wrong. And we still don't know where the Master's ring fits into this, or Ingram and her hospital. The Master will know. Please."

"No," Harry says steadily.

"Please," the Doctor says again, holding out the fob watch.

"If he won't, just throw it away," Qworenn snaps, and reaches out. The Doctor jerks his hand back.

What happens next happens so quickly Martha nearly misses it: both the Doctor and Qworenn seize the fob watch at the same time, it opens, and something flies out and hits Qworenn in the neck. She falls over backwards with a look of astonishment and promptly explodes, in a spectacular golden way. Then she sits back up, with a different face, her hair short and spiky and her clothes not fitting properly, and she laughs in a slightly drunken way. "Never done that before."

Martha, Leo, and Harry stare at her.

"What the hell just happened?" Leo asks after a long shocked pause.

"Regeneration, I think," Harry says a bit blankly.

"Mmhm." Qworenn stands up a little unsteadily and dusts herself off, grinning. "That was a rush."

"That was a trap," the Doctor says, staring down at the open fob watch in his hand. "Some sort of-- dart. Instantly lethal."

"Wonderful," Harry says. "Everyone wants me dead."

"Looks like," the Doctor murmurs.

"So you'll forgive me for not wanting to try opening anything suspect ever again," Harry says tightly, and fishes a little velvet box, the sort in which rings and trinkets are kept, out of his jacket pocket. He tosses it nervously from hand to hand.

"I think we should get back to the TARDIS," the Doctor agrees.

"Makes sense, though, doesn't it," Martha says, as they turn to head back. "I mean, someone clever enough to turn the Master human would probably be clever enough to know the TARDIS logs destinations, and leave a trap."

"That means half the stuff that looks like chameleon arch components back in London might be rigged," Qworenn puts in. She seems slightly less punchy now. "This is gonna make things complicated."

"Yes," the Doctor murmurs, frowning.

They all walk in silence. Leo's sticking close to Martha now, probably because he's beginning to suspect she's the only other sane one among them. After all, of the other three of their number, one has just completely changed appearance, one wants to bring back a sociopathic mass murderer, and one is still nervously tossing a jewelry case around.

"So that's it, then?" Martha asks as they reach the TARDIS. "No more mad searches for the Master's fob watch or whatever it is?"

"That's--" The Doctor cuts himself off and stares at Harry. "Harry, what is that?"

Harry stops tossing the jewelry case back and forth and blinks at it. "This? I don't know. I just found it in my pocket, that's all."

"...What's in it?" the Doctor asks.

Both Martha and Qworenn realize a fraction of a second before Harry responds. "No, don't--!" they say as one, but too late: Harry's opening it, and gold light is streaming out.

Chapter Text

He closes the jewelry case slowly, smiles down at it, and pockets it. He looks around at them all: Leo, confused, Qworenn, nervous, Martha, resigned, and the Doctor, with such naked relief in his face that the Master wants to laugh.

He quickly reviews his time as Harry Saxon and wants to laugh rather more.

"If we might move this little tête-à-tête inside the TARDIS," he says. "I believe you wanted some answers, Doctor." The relief on the Doctor's face turns to confusion, and the Master doesn't bother holding back laughter this time. He goes into the TARDIS, bouncing a little, and hears the others following him warily. He sits down in the Doctor's chair, spins a full circle, and beams around at everyone, wondering idly how long it will take Martha to slap the Doctor for being so stupid as to bring him back. He estimates probably three minutes. "Now!" he says. "First I think I'll get this out of the way: no, I'm not behind this." He pulls a pout. "Oh, don't look like that, Qworenn. Sometimes even mass-murdering megalomaniacs take the day off. Watch a bit of telly." He leans forward; she takes an involuntary step back. He smirks a little and directs his next words to the Doctor. "It's always the women, you know."

The Doctor just raises his eyebrows. Good: that means he's back on form and taking his cues like a good boy. We won't talk about Harry Saxon because there's nothing to talk about.

"Lucy," the Master says.

He'd first met Lucy about two months after arriving on Earth. She was pretty, and so obviously vapid that he knew immediately something was up. Insatiably curious, he'd gotten her father out of a spot of financial trouble and taken her for a spin in the TARDIS. She had come brilliantly alive in there: mouth a bit open, face alight, and the Master had thought her beautiful, and known then he wanted her, and so wanted to break her. He'd taken her on a little trip to Utopia.

"Of course the irony of the whole thing," the Master says, spinning idly in the chair, hands clasped together, grinning at his audience's absolute rapt attention, "is the etymology of utopia. Miss Jones?"

"Er," Martha says, blinking. "Paradise? A perfect place."

The Master shakes his head. "Doctor?"

"Greek," the Doctor murmurs. "No place. A place that doesn't exist."

"Exactly!" the Master says happily. "Clever, isn't it? Utopia. Bye-bye, kids, have fun in your rocket ships searching for nowhere! But I had the coordinates, and I thought, why not? Let's see what happened to my children from Malcassario. Let's give Lucy some perspective."

Utopia had been a cold and barren world in the middle of the dying universe. No one had questioned their presence; they were freezing and starving and angry and desperate, and didn't ask questions. Lucy had turned to the Master, her face vivid in its very blankness, and she'd said, calmly, Harry, let's save them. Let's make them better.

How? he'd asked, tolerantly amused.

She'd shown him.

"Hold on," Martha says. "Lucy did that? Lucy made the Toclafane? She's the one who made those horrible-- those mad pickled future humans?"

The Master beams at her. "Bit of a shocker, isn't it?"

"How?" the Doctor puts in. "I never saw the inside of those spheres, but they couldn't possibly have been physically powered. You're telling me Lucy engineered perfect weaponized spheres capable of flight, motor control, life support systems--" The Master nods, still beaming, and the Doctor turns. "Martha. Leo. Would either of you even begin to know where to start?"

"No," Martha says.

"I have no idea what you're talking about," says Leo.

"Qworenn?" the Doctor asks.

"Maybe if you gave me a year and a research team," Qworenn says dubiously. "What do bedtime stories have to do with apparently lethal spheres?"

"Nothing," the Doctor says. "How long did it take Lucy?"

The Master shrugs. "About a month before they took over production. She came up with the basic concept in about three seconds flat, though." He leans the chair back a bit. "Come on, Doctor, you don't think genetic manipulation and a paradox machine was my first idea? It just made Lucy so very happy."

"All very fascinating," the Doctor says, "but you still haven't told us what exactly Lucy's behind that's relevant here."

The Master stares down pensively at his laced fingers, then back up at the Doctor. "Then tell me, Doctor, what you have pieced together, so I might fill in the blanks. You were so very sadly remiss about telling Harry anything actually useful."

"Lazarus Labs," the Doctor says.

The Master shrugs. "Another whim."

"After Lazarus' death," the Doctor says, "she apparently continued funding, but the lab's name was changed. Now it's Prydonian Labs."

"Is it?" the Master says in delight. "Oh, now I'm almost certain. That's clever of her too. What else?"

"That woman who had my family hostage," Martha says, stepping up next to the Doctor. "Miss Ridley. She works in the Ingram Psychiatric Ward, where-- where..." She turns. "Doctor."

"Oh no," the Doctor says. "Oh no no no, we were there and we didn't-- She couldn't figure out a Rubik's cube-- they remember--" He turns to Qworenn, suddenly beaming. "We've found the evacuees!"

"In a psychiatric ward?" says Qworenn.

"--More to the point," the Master says, getting to his feet, "one apparently funded by Lucy. Oh dear."

"I didn't say that," Martha says. "I said someone who used to work for you was working there. Lucy's not funding it at all. It's funded by a woman who doesn't exist. Rosamund Something Something Ingram."

The Master goes still, holding up a hand. "What are the Something Somethings, Miss Jones?"

"I can't remember," Martha says, looking a little affronted.

"Hold on," the Doctor says. "Plaque near the elevator?" Martha nods. He makes a face, thinks about it, and says, "'This ward funded by the generous donations of Rosamund Anne Natalie Ingram.'"

A pause.

"Oh," the Master says, scrunching up his face. "Now I feel dirty."

The Doctor reaches for the controls. "We have to get back now," he says. "Before she-- does something to them."

"Just a moment," the Master says, catching the Doctor's arm before he can actually set coordinates. He revels in the Doctor's sharp, quiet little intake of breath, and doesn't let go until the Doctor steps back a little from the console. "We have a time machine," he says. "Don't you think it might be fun to figure out what's going on before we charge in, banners flying?"

"Yeah," Martha says unexpectedly. "Who are we dealing with here?"

"The Rani," the Doctor says. "She's a renegade scientist."

"Time Lord?" Martha asks.

"Not at the moment," the Master says. "That's the impressive bit. She's absolutely human at the moment, which is nice, because it means my taste can be excused. Anyway..." He squints over the TARDIS controls. "Chameleon arches aren't a hundred percent. They do a better job on the body than the mind--"

"And it wouldn't surprise me if the Rani had tinkered with hers," the Doctor puts in. "Programmed in memory commands so she'd start remembering when she came in contact with Time Lord technology."

"Bingo," the Master says, and beams up at the Doctor, who grins back. "But I know too much," he says, "so she turned me human and rigged that fob watch to kill me. Bit of a bad job, really."

"Oh, is that what happened?" the Doctor says.

"More or less," the Master says. "Oh, come on, it was Lucy, of course I was going to give her a kiss hello, especially after she was nice enough to break into the TARDIS and unlock that handcuff I was in." Of course the fact that Lucy accomplished these tasks with a sonic screwdriver might have been a tip-off, but the Master was so used to the Doctor's at that point, he hadn't thought much of it; he'd been more preoccupied by Lucy, looking magnificent with her hair down and her eyes wide, saying, Oh Harry, thank God I've found you. "And then she stuck that chameleon arch on my head and switched it on before I could do anything."

"So why didn't she get rid of that jewelry case?" Leo asks unexpectedly.

"Too busy gloating, I imagine," the Master says, and ignores the knowing smirk the Doctor flashes him. He's above the Doctor's petty taunts.

...No he isn't.

He kicks the Doctor absently in the shin.

"Ow!" the Doctor says. "All right, what's she going to do with all the evacuated human Time Lords in that ward of hers?"

"Kill them?" Martha suggests. "Leo just got a big supply of junk and trinkets and that from her; maybe it's rigged chameleon arch stuff."

"No," the Doctor murmurs, "there wouldn't be any point in killing them."

"You wouldn't have to stick with poison," the Master points out. "You could have other sorts of drugs. So a Time Lord opens their nice little trinket, gets hit with some drug the Rani designed, bam, and back comes all their Time Lord biodata and grafts with whatever's just been put in their system."

The Doctor frowns, raking a hand through his hair and causing it to stand on end. "That doesn't seem very efficient though, does it? As Qworenn pointed out--" He gives her a nod and she nods faintly in return, looking very young-- "the evacuation went wrong. The evacuees are scattered-- we can only hope they're all in London-- Martha, how many people were in that ward?"

"Fifty? A hundred?" Martha shrugs. "Can't be all the evacuees."

"Exactly," the Doctor says. "And giving all those trinkets to Leo? That's suspect too. She wants me in this somehow."

"Not to mention she seems to have taken my ring," the Master puts in. "She might have saved herself some trouble and taken Louis', if they're meant for the... same thing." He turns on Qworenn, who shrinks back a little, wavers, and then raises her chin to look at him properly. "You said something was scattered."

"Keys to the Matrix," Qworenn says.

"Scattered how? Through time?"

"I-- I think so," Qworenn says.

"Keys," the Master says, turning back to the Doctor, whose face has lit with comprehension. "I never noticed a damn thing-- I never thought to activate it, but one must have gotten into the TARDIS I used to get away."

"And the Rani needs it to find out where all the Time Lords are," the Doctor breathes. "But she's never used the Matrix before. She probably has no idea how to get in."

"...Do you?" Martha asks. They both turn to her; she's wearing a faint frown and probably hasn't been able to follow most of this, but she's asking all the same.

"Yes," the Doctor says. "Which would explain why she wants my attention."

"Hold on," Leo says. "Keys to the Matrix? Is there gonna be a bit with a red pill and a blue pill soon?"

"What?" the Doctor says blankly. "The Matrix-- has stuff. Memory stuff. Biological imprints, memories of dead Time Lords-- you know. Information!" He turns to the controls. "Anyway, it's extradimensional, so it survived the Time War."

"Take the blue pill," the Master stage-whispers to Leo.

"So where are we going, Doctor?" Martha says, actually managing to insinuate herself in between the Doctor and the Master. Very brave of her. Clever, too, the Master thinks, smirking a little, and resists the urge to accidentally-on-purpose touch her inappropriately only because he knows he'd be feeling the retaliatory slap for days.

"Back to Earth," the Doctor says. "You, Leo, and Qworenn are going to go through your shop and sort out all the chameleon arch parts, so we'll know what she's rigged. The Master and I--" he glances briefly over at the Master-- "are going to find the Rani and have a good talk with her."

The Doctor drops them off behind Leo's shop a moment after they left; Martha turns back to see the TARDIS dematerialize behind them, and feels a twinge of unease, but lets it go.

(Just before they landed, she worked up the courage to actually pull the Master aside. He'd come willingly enough, looking amused, but Martha really can't shake the horrible feeling that he's just smilingly waiting for an opportunity to kill her as violently as possible.

"Why are you helping us?" she'd demanded.

"My stint as Harry made me see the error in my ways," the Master replied, eyes very wide. She'd just looked at him. He'd sighed and said, matter-of-factly, "To get back at the Rani, Martha Jones."

But that's not quite it either, Martha feels.)

Leo hurries inside the shop, pulling out his mobile. "Dad? Hi. Listen, I need to go through some stock-- Oh, that's all right, bring Tish with you. Could you just take over for an hour or two? No, now. Dad, just bring your lunch with you. Okay. Thanks." He grins over at Martha. "Hey, here's the Jones family saving the human race."

"The Time Lord race," Martha corrects him, going to the counter to make sure the cosmetics case is still there. It is. "Which makes this new and exciting."

"I don't feel very comfortable about this," Qworenn says, hovering nervously by Martha's elbow. "This is a Time Lord affair, not a human one. Should we be dragging more humans into this?"

"Sorry," Martha says; Qworenn might be one of only three Time Lords in the universe, but she's still acting like a worried teenager, and Martha doesn't have time for it right now. "I guess you aren't temporally-sensitive enough to remember the year that wasn't, but I'm Martha Jones and I'm quite capable of saving the world."

Qworenn stares at her.

Martha's mobile rings.

"Excuse me," she says, and picks up. "Yeah?"

"Hey, Martha," Jack's voice says. "I thought I should get a status update."

"Oh," Martha says, suddenly rather unsure whether to laugh or cry. "Well, the Master's back, but it turns out a lot of Time Lords evacuated from Gallifrey and are hiding as humans in London now, only some of them got misplaced and a lot of the rest of them are locked up in a hospital ward by an evil scientist who is apparently Lucy Saxon, who is also a Time Lord, so me and Leo and Qworenn-- she's a Time Lord too-- we're going through Leo's shop, cos Lucy Saxon shipped a lot of rigged chameleon arch parts over and we need to sort through them so nothing bad happens to the Time Lords when they start opening their stuff."

"...Oh," Jack says.

"Listen, if you break every speed limit law in the country, do you think you could be here in an hour or two with your alien-tech-sensing gadgets?"

"Sure," Jack says. "The team's tired of sitting on their hands anyway. I'll let Owen drive."

"Don't die," Martha says. "...Thanks, Jack."

"Anytime," he says.

"Right!" Martha turns to Leo and Qworenn, putting her mobile away. "Let's get to work, then."

Qworenn holds her ground. "Why are we doing something because the Doctor and the Master tell us to? They might be wrong. It's the Doctor and the Master."

"We're doing it," Martha says quietly, "because I trust the Doctor." Qworenn opens her mouth. "Yes, even with the Master there," Martha says swiftly. "You don't want to help us save the Time Lords, you can leave this shop now."

Qworenn looks away. "I'll help," she says.

Leo hangs up a CLOSED sign. A few minutes later, Clive and Tish arrive, somewhat bemused and clutching sandwich halves. Given a brief rundown of the situation, they're more than happy to help; Tish finds a pop channel on the radio, and they spend a fairly enjoyable hour-and-a-quarter going through all of the inventory sent in by Ms. Ingram. Then the Torchwood van squeals to a halt outside and Jack's team piles out and into the shop, setting off another round of introductions, which culminate in Owen attempting to chat up Tish right in front of Clive and Martha stepping on his foot with her heel. Then the alien tech scanners come out and they get down to business.

And they're left alone in the TARDIS, the Doctor and the Master.

Silence.

Then, "You-- you--"

The Master obviously can't think of the words to express what he's feeling. The Doctor can guess. Shame might be a top contender. He just stands still and waits.

"Stop looking at me like that!" the Master snarls. "Just-- stop, stop being all sanctimonious, good for you, doing the right and chivalric bloody thing--"

"It wasn't you," the Doctor says. "Not really. I couldn't have--"

"Yes you could," the Master says, seizing the front of his shirt. "You could have taken as much advantage as you wanted and you didn't."

"--Oh," the Doctor says, suddenly understanding. "Oh, you wish I had."

Because then the Master wouldn't have to take the responsibility. There would be someone to blame. There would be an excuse. There would be a memory without the consequences.

"So why didn't you?" the Master asks quite pleasantly. "Was it because I was human? Is it that you so miss having any contact-- any contact at all-- with another Time Lord? Have you missed this?"

It's not really unexpected, but the Doctor has no defenses up and the feel of the Master suddenly in his mind, setting nerve endings alight from the inside, is nearly too intense to bear. He makes a soft choked noise and sways in; the Master's no longer gripping his shirt, but has his arms wrapped around the Doctor, hands pressed against his back, supporting him. The Doctor feels a sudden wave of shocked anger-- this is definitely taking advantage-- but the Master's expecting this and takes it all and feeds it back into the Doctor's head; the Doctor's fingertips ache a little with the intensity of it, and he definitely whimpers this time.

"But wait," the Master murmurs. "Surely, Doctor-- there are other Time Lords now-- it cannot be because you feel alone."

"Let go of me," the Doctor mumbles, hanging onto the Master's shirt, which doesn't really help his case.

"You told me once," the Master whispers, leaning in and pressing his forehead against the Doctor's, perhaps as a sensory aid to this recollection, "that I need you. That I need an audience or there's really no point."

The Doctor's eyes drift shut. It feels, illogically, as though there's suddenly not quite enough air in the console room, and all the remaining air far too warm. "It's true," he says quietly. "You do."

"But you need me, too," the Master goes on, very softly, pulling the Doctor closer against him. "You need someone who thinks as quickly as you do. You need someone to challenge you. You don't need a vapid human cheerleader. You need someone to make you feel past that static in your head. You need someone to see all that you've done and forgive you for it."

"Isn't that yourself you're describing?" the Doctor murmurs.

The Master stays quite still, but strikes out with his mind. This time the Doctor's expecting it, and absorbs the blow; the Master's momentarily off-balance, and in that moment he nudges his way into the Master's mind. It thuds around him, every single thought torn apart by the drumbeat before it can reach coherence, and the Master makes a small noise like a sob and clutches at the Doctor's back.

"Stop it," he says hoarsely.

Static or drums, drums or static. The Doctor cups the Master's face in his hands and kisses him; one of them bites the other's lip and they taste blood and the other one kisses back very gently in retaliation, but the Doctor's already lost track of who's doing what, whose fingers winding in whose hair, who pulls away first to tug off coats and undo buttons. The Doctor's fingers stutter for a moment across the Master's cheek, the flutter of his fingertips and the flutter of the Master's eyelashes both as exact as the drumbeat, and the Doctor thinks all the same it might just be the hammering of their hearts.

"I don't need you," he says.

"Harry thought you needed therapy," the Master returns, grabbing his tie and pulling him towards the staircase.

"The Rani--" the Doctor protests.

"Time machine," the Master says.

They stumble their way down a level, managing to discard their shirts and the Master's belt and tie on the way, but he hangs onto the Doctor's tie so determinedly that the Doctor thinks it's not worth the effort of wresting it from him. "I don't," he says, as the Master tugs him towards a room he distinctly remembers as having a bed in. "Really. Because."

"If you're about to tell me you haven't gotten laid since you burned Gallifrey--" the Master says.

"There was this one time in France," the Doctor confesses.

"Well, that's a relief," the Master says, tugging the Doctor into the bedroom and using him to bodily close the door, pinning him against it. "Although it's usually in France, isn't it?"

That means Romana.

"I don't want to talk about it," the Doctor says, surprising himself; he was nearly ready to start going on about inventing banana daiquiris.

Surprise flares briefly in the Master's face, too; then he grins. "I hate banana daiquiris," he says, and seizes the moment of sudden slightly pained gratefulness in the Doctor's head, holding it like a warm idea between them. "You need me," he whispers.

"Symbiosis," the Doctor says, avoiding his eyes and ducking his head to work on undoing the Master's trousers. The Master catches the Doctor's wrists in his hands; the Doctor looks back up at him. "Yes," he says. "But you're scared too."

The Master's hands tighten painfully for a moment. Then he lets go, steps back, face blank, leaving the Doctor standing against the door. The Doctor thinks for a moment he might actually tell the Doctor to get out of the way. Instead he raises his eyebrows a little and says, "More comfortable in a bed."

They manage to remember to take their trousers off before getting onto the bed, for which the Doctor is faintly proud. And then he has trouble thinking of anything at all, because the Master has crawled on top of him and is kissing him fiercely. The Doctor arches up against him and clutches at the duvet and begins to lose track of which limbs and dragging little breaths belong to whom. He's forgotten how good this is; knowing, precisely, what pulls them undone, fingernails dragged up the Master's spine and soft kisses to the corners of the Doctor's eyes, a particular way the Master twists his hand and the Doctor nearly biting through his lip again. The drums fade and they kiss away blood and somewhere the world is burning and the Doctor never wants to end this.

They lie in each other's arms, trembling.

The Doctor slowly pieces together which hands and arms and legs and face belong to him. He aches and he has bruises down his arms and his lip is slightly bloodied and, madly, he's still wearing his tie, and the Master is giving him such a dazed satiated grin, his hair standing crazily on end, that the Doctor doesn't care at all.

"They used us, you know," he mumbles. "Figured, maybe if one of us ran away, the other might not."

"Mmhm," the Master says. "That mean I win?"

"No," the Doctor says. "Means I was stupid, though."

"Here's to bravery," the Master says, patting the top of the Doctor's head lazily.

"...The Rani?" the Doctor asks after a minute.

The Master groans. "And to perseverance," he says, but he sits up and tosses the Doctor his trousers.

They go upstairs together to set a course.

Chapter Text

JONES & SON: HARDWARE AND RETAIL, BOUGHT AND SOLD is in a state of total organized chaos.

Clive and Qworenn are hovering over Clive's laptop with the inventory list; Clive announces each item and Qworenn checks it off on the computer. Jack's only known her for about twenty minutes, but he can already tell she feels much more comfortable with all these humans around when she's doing something useful. (She does keep shooting him uncomfortable looks, though. Yeah, yeah, Jack Harkness the human fact. At least she's attractive, so he doesn't really mind the staring.) Tish, Gwen, Tosh, and Ianto are in charge of sorting through all the items that Owen, Martha, and Jack pull from the shelves under Leo's direction. It's actually sort of fun: here they all are, the seven people in the world that Jack really trusts and knows, and Martha's brother, and a Time Lord. Once in a while someone's mobile rings; the first time, it's Leo's wife, and he tells her he's just stuck in shop but casserole would be great, thanks honey. The second time it's Francine; she demands a full explanation from Martha and a few minutes later turns up in a sharp suit and sets about helping them take things from the shelves.

"Let me get this straight," she says to Martha, passing an opaque thermos to Jack. "The Doctor figured all of this out on information from the Master?"

"Yeah," Jack says. He's been sort of wondering the same thing.

"That's right," Martha says. "I don't know, none of it seems dodgy until-- well. It's not like I knew them well, but I got the impression that the Master and his wife were on the same side for a while there. I'm thinking maybe she's still under his control and doing all of this on his orders." She shrugs. "As long as we don't open any of this, though, we should be fine. And the Doctor can take care of himself."

"Can he?" Francine asks quietly. "Last time he needed you."

"Yes," Martha says, "and this time he's got me too."

Her mobile rings.

"Hang on," she says, and answers. "Hello. --Tom!" She backs away from the commotion, but everyone goes momentarily quiet anyway. Martha makes a 'keep going!' hand gesture at them, but Jack's damn well not going to keep going until he hears this conversation, and the Joneses seem to think so too, although Jack's team looks a bit puzzled.

"Yeah," Martha says. "Yeah, I'm at Leo's shop-- No! I mean. We're just doing inventory stuff, there's no need-- I'm fine. Yeah. I've been sleeping okay. No, I have. No, you don't. No--" she laughs-- "no it isn't, don't be silly. ...No. Honest. --No, wait, Tom! Look, all right, you can come over but this is all going to sound absolutely mad. Yeah. All right. See you."

She puts her phone away.

"Hey, does that mean we get to meet the boyfriend?" Jack asks cheerfully into the silence.

"Yeah," Martha says, and lets out a breath. "He was-- in London at the end. He'll be all right. He'll believe me."

"Yeah, you've got a whole load of mad people to back you up," Owen says.

"Yes she does," Jack says. "Okay, back to work, then."

At this point they've more or less entirely cleared the shelves, so Jack, Owen, Martha, and Leo go over to help the others sort through the stuff they've found. Martha is frowning to herself; Jack thinks it must be about Tom Milligan until she says abruptly, "Qworenn, this-- Matrix. The Doctor said it was all-- information about Time Lords and that. Is there other... information in it too?"

"Oh yes," Qworenn says, pausing in the inventory checklist, placing one fingertip against the screen to keep her place. "It's also a repository for the knowledge of all the Time Lords who have died. It's a pretty comprehensive survey of the entire breadth and history of the universe, really-- and some parallel ones as well, I think."

"And did the Master know enough that he'd be able to-- to access the Matrix with that ring he had?" Martha asks.

"I think so," Qworenn says. "Why?"

Martha considers this. "All right, forgive the cliché-- knowledge is power, right? He was wearing that ring for a year." She glances around at her family and Jack. "Do you know if he ever used it?"

"I wasn't usually graced by his presence," Jack drawls, but Tish, Francine, and Clive all shake their heads.

"Then," said Martha, "I think he might actually be telling the truth."

There's a moment of silence; puzzled, surprised, indignant. Tosh is looking very uncomfortable about the whole thing and Francine looks as though she'd like to give both the Doctor and the Master a very thorough talking-to and probably a few slaps.

It's in this moment that Tom Milligan chooses to walk in the door.

"Wow," he says. "Uh. Jones family get-together with some friends? I can come back another time, Martha."

"No, that's all right," Martha says. "Come on in."

Jack sizes the guy up. He's sort of scruffy, which is surprising, and is still wearing his doctor's clothes, complete with stethoscope, which is just funny, and has an aura of friendliness about him, which probably helps when it comes to working with kids. He comes in and shuts the door behind him, and after the round of Torchwood introductions are made, he says, "Okay, what's this all about?"

So Martha explains.

Jack shoos everyone back to work, but he keeps an ear open, just in case Martha needs someone to back her up. He hears her talk about the Doctor, and about the Time Lords. He hears her talk about the Master and the year that never was. "That's the first time I met you," Martha says. "We did an operation taking down one of the Toclafane together, and then you took me into London. It was the first time I'd been in England for a year. I only-- I only knew you for about two days, but you were really helpful. And--" Jack can hear the smile in her voice and glances over to see Martha giving Tom a look that makes him hope like hell Tom's not about to call her crazy-- "When I told you I'd been in space, you said-- you said, was there anything else you should know. And I said yeah. I've met Shakespeare. And you just-- I don't know, the world was so mad. You believed me."

"...Martha," Tom says, "look, I'd like to, but--"

"Proof," Martha says. Jack starts to open his mouth and step in, but Martha calls, "Qworenn, can you come over her for a moment?"

"Sure," Qworenn says, looking rather puzzled, but she comes over.

"Time Lords," Martha says, "have two hearts. Qworenn's a Time Lord. Check."

So Tom Milligan puts on his stethoscope and presses it to first one side of Qworenn's chest and then the other, while she stands there, looking more amused than anything else. "Wow," Tom Milligan says, and "Right then," Tom Milligan says, and "So what can I do to help?" Tom Milligan says, and that's when Jack gives in and decides maybe the guy's good enough for Martha after all.

"You can help us sort through this stuff," Jack says. "We've still got a long way to go."

***

The Doctor parks the TARDIS in front of the townhouse the Master had lived in for eighteen months with Lucy. That's really sloppy of her, really; she might have thought to change residences, but then, she always did like luxury. Lucy. The Rani too, the Master thinks, recalling the interior of her TARDIS. Lucy the Rani. He rolls it around in his mind, and it doesn't quite fit, one syllable too many for the drumbeat. He bounces impatiently as the Doctor takes a moment to conscientiously lock the TARDIS behind them. Actually, none of his thoughts are fitting quite right, like there's flashes of completely sane of laughter at the edge of sight, or the steam rising from a teacup just at the edge of hearing. Or is it the other way around? He's still got the Doctor under his skin and he's feeling far too smug still to start feeling disgusted or panic just yet.

He rings the doorbell with enthusiasm.

It's a long moment before Lucy answers. Her hair is up and she's wearing her best nylons, and she gives him a look of perfect vapid surprise, her mouth a little o. "Harry!" she says.

He hits her.

She stumbles back, her face still blank, and the Doctor runs up. "Master!" he snaps, and even though it's only annoyed the Master feels a little thrill anyway. "What are you doing?"

"Doctor!" Lucy says breathlessly, clutching the doorframe.

"Rani," the Doctor says mildly. "Might we come in? I'd like to have a chat."

Lucy's eyes dart to the Master for a moment; then she shrugs and holds the door wider. Now that the Master's looking for it, he notices something else about her too: faint and metallic, like a distant sun. "So you're back," he says. "Dear."

She smiles. "Yes, Harry."

"Inside?" the Doctor reminds them impatiently.

"Jealous?" the Master murmurs, following him in.

"Not a chance," the Doctor hisses back.

They sit down in the breakfast nook where the Master ate every day for months. Lucy-- the Rani, oh, if he thinks that he'll probably start hitting her again, Lucy-- pours tea for the three of them, pointedly in front of them, and sips her own to demonstrate its safety. "Please," she says. "Chat away."

"What do you think you're doing?" the Doctor asks without preamble.

Lucy studies him for a long moment, and then studies the Master for a long moment as well, lingering on the Doctor's skewed collar, the Masters hastily done-up tie, how disordered their hair is. "Serving you tea," she says.

"The Time Lords," the Doctor says, "in that psychiatric ward. What are you planning to do with them?"

"It's the safest place for them," the Rani says. "After Harry's little paradox stunt, quite a few of them were starting to attract attention. I thought it best to keep them together. After all, imagine if here and there panicked Academy students started turning up! The ideas they might get."

"But not all of them remember that year," the Doctor says. "You must have found them other ways."

"Oh, they come in groups," the Rani says, sipping her tea, pinky up. Her nails are painted a pearly cream today. She hasn't lost Lucy's silly vanity. "I'd just ask them to turn out their pockets."

"And then take away their Time Lord essence," the Doctor says tightly, "put something in it, and sell it to the Jones family, is that it?"

"Ah, Doctor," the Master puts in, "generally it's bad practice to let the enemy know how much you know."

"Oh, but I know," the Rani says. "Since you didn't die, Harry, I assumed the two of you would have gotten over your little differences long enough to work it out."

"So then why aren't you being a smart little girl and killing us?" the Master asks, leaning forward.

"Because I'm doing nothing wrong," the Rani says, her eyes going vapidly wide. She turns to the Doctor. "The drug I've inserted in their watches and trinkets won't mutate them horribly, you know. I've made very careful calculations. Last time, we weren't smart enough, or quick enough, or brave enough. Only you were, Doctor, and that was merely adrenaline and desperation. All the same, that hand of yours is very helpful-- I took a few samples, but there's nothing in your genetic code that makes you exemplary."

"Last time," the Doctor says flatly.

"The new Time Lord race will not be a species that could possibly lose a time war," the Rani explains. "More tea?" It's an empty question; neither the Doctor or the Master have actually touched theirs. "When those children open their trinkets and become Time Lords again, it will be at thirty percent increased brainpower-- quicker reflexes, more synapse connectivity, increased calculated aggression."

"But there are no Daleks left to fight!" the Doctor snaps. "They don't need those things. And-- thirty percent increased brainpower? They'll go mad!"

"I don't know, that's not so bad," the Master puts in just to be unhelpful, tapping out the drumbeat absently against the table. The Rani shoots him a dirty look and the Doctor ignores him entirely, which means at least one of them is learning.

"And even if your drug does work, and no one goes mad from it," the Doctor presses on, "a lot of young Time Lords can't live on twenty-first century Earth! Romana was going to evacuate them to the thirty-first century, but I imagine even that would have been temporary, since they would have still had their TARDISes--" He turns to the Master. "Did Qworenn say where they'd left their TARDIS?"

"I imagine it looks like one of those red phone boxes that are all over this city," the Master says dryly. "That would be in keeping. And no, she didn't."

"Are you just trying to take my TARDIS?" the Doctor demands of the Rani.

"Please, Doctor," she says. "That old clunker?"

The Master snorts softly.

"She's wonderful," the Doctor says indignantly. "And she won't work for you anymore either. She's completely on isomorphic now."

"I don't want your TARDIS, Doctor," the Rani says, setting her teacup down daintily. "I want your support. I can't even begin to imagine how difficult it will be to make the new Time Lord race with you opposing me."

"All right," the Doctor says, leaning forward, face hard. "Try me."

The Rani smiles graciously. "The use of your TARDIS would, of course, be a great help. And if we don't find any of the others, it might be a little difficult to grow new ones. All the same--" She shrugs. "Are you sure you don't want a bit of tea, Harry?"

"Please," he says, giving her a false smile, "continue digging that pretty grave."

She shrugs again and turns back to the Doctor. "I confess I did take your TARDIS on a short tour after I'd made Harry human. I wanted to see if you'd discovered any habitable planets. I must confess some disappointment-- so many were uninhabitable! The radiation levels on a few of them-- well, I went back to one and it only got worse, just water and bacteria everywhere, but when I went back to the other it got better after a few millennia. That's the wonderful thing about radiation that's nuclear rather than solar." She gives the Master a slightly mad smile. "Wouldn't you agree, Harry?"

The Master experiences, not for the first time in Lucy's company, a sudden horrible sinking feeling.

"And it's such a... New Gallifrey sort of place," the Rani goes on thoughtfully. "Only the one star, but there are two moons. The sky is silver and it's absolutely covered with red vegetation."

"...What's it called?" the Doctor asks.

"Asterion," the Rani says brightly.

"Asterion had a nuclear war?" the Doctor demands.

"Oh yes," the Rani says. "Well, naturally, I wanted to know how it had started. It's always good to know the beginnings of things. And would you imagine--"

"No!" the Master cuts in. "Stop it. Stop talking."

"Shush, Harry," the Rani says. She's clearly enjoying herself immensely. "You see, Doctor, someone had just happened to carelessly drop a jar of charged nuclear particles on the ground outside the human settlement on Asterion in the year 3218. Can you imagine!"

The Doctor turns to the Master very slowly. "What did you do?" he asks, very quietly and steadily.

"Oh, as though I was just going to untie you and go," the Master says with all the contempt he can muster. "Keeping me will be misery. It will be difficult, and trying, and it will always, Doctor, be difficult and trying. Or don't you remember?"

"But what did you gain?" the Doctor demands. He looks as though the Master has killed someone he actually cares about.

"A tiny, momentary bit of power," the Master says matter-of-factly. "Listen to the nice Rani, Doctor."

The Doctor keeps staring at him for a long moment, as though trying to read his mind. It's a useless exercise; he'll only hear the drumming. At length he wrenches his gaze from the Master's and looks back at the Rani. "Asterion," he says. "New Gallifrey. What year?"

"Roughly 800,000," the Rani says. "I checked-- the radiation levels are down by then." She leans forward. "Just think, Doctor-- a new Citadel of the Time Lords! A new empire!"

The Master starts laughing, quietly. Both the Rani and the Doctor turn to stare at him. "Oh, come on," he says, still chuckling. "A Time Lord empire? Founded by the three of us? There goes that policy of neutrality!" They keep staring. He finds he cannot actually stop laughing. "No, wait, I've got it! I can make more black hole converters, you know. I can be Rassilon. Lucy, my dear, you get to be Omega, that would be fitting. Oh, Doctor, that leaves you as the Other. Yes, that sounds about right. I can rule for a thousand years of terror and the new Eye of Harmony will have all sorts of gadgets to keep it in check and they'll all be named after me! The Sash of the Master and the Key of the Master and the Seal of the Master. While we're at it we might as well have a bloody Trouser Press of the Master. Does that sound nice? Does that sound fun? Yes, come on, let's build a new Time Lord empire!"

The Doctor reaches out very gently and presses a hand to the Master's arm, pain in his face. The Master's laughter subsides, mostly from angry shock; all this and the Doctor is still forgiving him. He wrenches his arm away.

"Well," the Rani says, looking disconcerted.

The Doctor stands. "The Master's right," he says, and ignores the twin looks of astonishment that are thrown at him. "Whatever this is, we-- we're all guilty exiles of the old society." He takes a shuddering breath. "Up, both of you, and in the TARDIS. Now."

And the Rani follows the Doctor outside too, for the same reason the Master does: where else, really, can they go?

The Doctor's shunting them back out of the TARDIS almost as soon as they're in it; he's only made a spatial leap, the Master sees at once, not a temporal one, because they're now parked outside the Jones' retail shop. The Rani shoots the sign above the window display a look of trepidation, but goes inside anyway. Perhaps she really thinks she can't win without the Doctor's help. The Master can't decide if this makes her a defeatist or a realist.

The scene inside the shop is, more than anything, crowded. The whole checkout counter is littered with hundreds of hinged knickknacks-- jewelry boxes, music boxes, cosmetics cases, glasses cases, little handbags, and of course watches. It's quite impressive, in fact. And oh, it does warm the Master's hearts to see the looks of hatred and fear crossing the faces of the Jones family and Jack when they look at him. He smiles and gives them a little wave.

"Right," the Doctor says, grabbing the Rani's elbow and pulling her up to the counter. (The half of the crowd that has never seen Lucy become visibly confused.) The Doctor takes one of the knickknacks-- a fob watch, perhaps for nostalgia's sake-- and presses it into the Rani's hand. "Open it," he says.

"But--" says the Rani.

"Open it," the Doctor repeats, very quietly.

The Rani opens it.

She opens it away from her, and a dart thuds into the floor.

"I thought so," the Doctor says. He takes the fob watch from her unresisting hands, gazes down for a moment at the swirling gold in its depths, and shuts it, setting it on the counter slightly apart from the rest of the knickknacks. Then he picks up a second, gives it to the Rani, and says, patiently, "Open it."

And so it goes.

The Master wonders idly why the Rani doesn't open one of the knickknacks right in the Doctor's face, purely out of spite; then again, perhaps even he wouldn't, not with the looks ranging from curious to venomous trained on her by their human audience. All except Martha Jones, he sees: she's watching him steadily, rather than the proceedings. He raises his eyebrows at her. She raises them back.

Well, what the hell, he's bored.

He waggles his eyebrows. Her eyes narrow. He rolls his. Hers narrow further. He winks at him. Her eyebrows shoot back up. He grins. She looks skeptical. He considers this for a moment, and winks again.

Miracle of miracles, Martha Jones cracks a smile.

Then she tilts her head at the Doctor, looks back at the Master, and give him a look that plainly says, Well? He shrugs, makes the universal gesture for He's quite mad, and nods. Martha winces a little, shrugs too, and goes back to watching the Rani, which definitely concludes possibly the most surreal exchange of the Master's life. He's left with the distinct sense he's just gotten a strange skewed sort of blessing from Martha Jones, and decides that it's best to just blame this on stupid babbling human Harry. That's the only explanation.

She must really want the Doctor to be happy. Oh, he is winning today.

The extraction of the Rani's drug from the chameleon arch components winds to a close, and the Doctor looks around. "Leo, Mr. Jones, where do you keep-- baskets? Things to carry things in?"

"Round the back," Leo says, running for the back room. After a moment Tish and Ianto follow him.

"Right," the Doctor says when they've returned with baskets and bags, taking a firm hold of the Rani's elbow again, "all that stuff into those bags, and into the TARDIS-- we're going to the hospital."

So off they all go again, four Time Lords and eleven humans piling into the TARDIS console room for another short spatial leap across London. The Master hasn't enjoyed himself this much since-- well, since a few hours ago in a bedroom in the TARDIS, but that's hardly the point.

Evidently not wanting to cause too much of a commotion, the Doctor takes them into the hospital through a side entrance ("Nice Seal of Rassilon on the front doors, by the way," he says cheerfully to the Rani as he unlocks the side door) and all fifteen of them walk up the eight sets of stairs en masse, although the Master finds himself in the front with the Doctor and the Rani. No one, even Qworenn, seems to want to get too close to any of them.

When they reach the eighth floor, the Doctor pulls out his slightly psychic paper and flashes it at the bewildered doctors and nurses who rush to see what all the commotion's about. That gets them through, but only barely. Eventually the Doctor finds the man in charge. "I'll need all your patients in one room," the Doctor tells him. "The biggest room you've got, all sitting in a circle. And quickly."

The man hesitates and turns to the Rani. "Ms. Ingram?"

The Rani sighs and makes a defeatedly bored gesture. "Do as he says."

Ten minutes and they're in the largest room in the ward. Quite a few of the patients are shooting Martha awed looks, as is the slightly scruffy man who looks very vaguely familiar and seems to have attached himself to Martha's arm. This all strikes the Master as rather annoying, so he lounges in the doorway and waits for something interesting to happen.

For a while nothing interesting seems forthcoming. Lacking any other means of giving the right Time Lord essence to each human sitting there, the Doctor asks them to pass each of the trinkets around in the circle, opening each one before handing it to the person next to them. For a while there are nothing but small noises of surprise as the humans see the funny glowing stuff inside each opened item, and then half way around the circle a boy opens a music box and the gold suffuses his face. He closes it in astonishment, all the other patients staring at him, and his face breaks into a grin.

"We're okay!" he says.

"Yeah," the Doctor whispers. "You are that." It appears he has tears in his eyes.

The Master looks away.

At length every trinket has been opened and a hundred young Time Lords are sitting there quietly, apparently trying to absorb everything that's happened. Then a girl with short brown hair turns to the Doctor and says, quietly, "Thank you."

"Of course," the Doctor whispers.

"But where are the others?" the girl asks.

"I don't know," the Doctor says.

"And you won't!" the Rani says, standing unexpectedly. "I have this knowledge, but you've all scorned my help."

And the Master is overcome with a sudden sweeping sense of having been here before. At the time the figures might have been anyone: a man in a suit, a woman with blonde hair, all those scared upturned faces. "If I can't have it," the woman is saying (has said) with cruel petulance, holding up-- it doesn't matter what she's holding up; the Master had understood then that if he took it, he would become the most powerful man in the universe, and that he sees now it's his ring and the key to the Matrix makes no difference. Just as he did in that room on Kigkrywui, he snatches it from the Rani's hand; in that room, he'd felt power starting to solidify around him, and then everything had flickered and he'd found himself in a cave with the Kigkry nervously shunting him out. Now, here, the ring in his hand is not a quantum possibility but a fact.

"Master," the Doctor says, very softly, and the clenched-teeth quiet terror in his voice-- should make the Master laugh, turn, blow him a kiss and slip on the ring with the thought of opening and of knowing.

He doesn't.

He holds it tightly and watches it glitter and thinks, absurdly, of King Louis VII tapping out a drumbeat on the arm of his chair and saying, And it came to me that if I could comprehend the place in which I found myself, I would be gifted with knowledge as great as God's. And this, gentlemen, was the point at which I believe I triumphed over temptation. He thinks of the Doctor saying, as though he really believes it, It can be controlled. It doesn't have to be obeyed. He thinks of the Cephei wrapping his legs in shivery joyful hugs and gazing up with amber-eyed admiration. He thinks of the look on the Doctor's face, watching him wash the dishes. He thinks of the Doctor staring at him across his lab on Malcassario and telling him he's brilliant. He thinks of the swordfight he remembered even as Harry. He thinks of a thousand stupid things they've done together and he sees the pleading fear in the Doctor's face, and the rage in the Rani's, and the hard determination in Martha's that tells him he will have another thing coming if he pulls that taking-over-the-world stunt again.

He holds onto the ring very hard for a moment, so that it digs painfully into his palm, and then he hands it to the Doctor.

The Doctor looks back at him as though he's not at all surprised that the Master would give it to him, and for the first time in nearly forever, the Master doesn't feel resentment for his compassion.

"It shouldn't be me using this," he says, looking around at the assembled Time Lords. "Have any of you ever accessed the Matrix?"

Nearly every head shakes, but a man near the back raises his hand. "I have, Doctor," he says. "Only-- only for a bit of thesis research, but I think I might be able to use it. A little."

"Right," the Doctor says, and tosses it to him.

"...Wait," a timid voice says.

Everyone, the Master included, turns to stare at the woman who spoke; one of the Torchwood humans, the Japanese one. She looks slightly alarmed at the sudden attention, but says, "I-- I think I might have something that can help." She clutches nervously at her computer bag. "It's in one of my files. Um. 'Follow the infinite road'. An alien inscription we found in Tibet. It-- it talked about sacred rings and sacred knowledge."

"Oh, that's brilliant, Tosh!" Martha says. "Doctor, do you think?"

"It's worth a try, anyway," the Doctor says.

"And here's the next problem," the Master puts in; the Rani's trying to edge past him. He grabs her arm. "What do we do with little Lucy?"

"I'll take her," Qworenn says unexpectedly. "I don't know about her motivations, but she knows her stuff. If Gallifrey's gone and we need to start out on a new planet, we can use her for simple things. She'll provide the science and I can provide the scruples."

"Brilliant," the Doctor says happily, and actually goes so far as to give Qworenn a hug.

The Master hands the Rani over willingly enough and says, "And I do so hate to keep raining on this parade, but where will they live? Stranded on Asterion?" He looks around. "Does anyone remember where your TARDIS is parked?"

Silence.

"Oh dear," the Master says, and rather means it. All these Time Lords are not allowed on his-- on the Doctor's-- on the TARDIS. That's all his freedom gone, all chance to change the universe, and when he glances at the Doctor he sees the Doctor has thought of the same thing.

And then there's a noise in the corridor almost but not quite exactly like that of a TARDIS materializing. Everyone immediately leaps to their feet and piles out into the corridor, where a puzzling sight meets their eyes: a large, purple-brown, amber-eyed octopus is climbing out of a slightly larger conch shell and looking around at them all. "Hello, Doctor and Master!" it says cheerfully.

No one in the crowd screams, which says something about present company.

The Cephei trundles over to them. The Doctor beams down at it. "How did you get here?" he asks in delight.

"Your ship taught our ships interesting and valuable things," the Cephei says. "Many of our ships are extradimensional now, and capable of temporalspatial travel." It pats the Doctor's trainer fondly with a tentacle. "But don't worry, we do not interfere. We merely observe."

The Master can nearly feel the Doctor's hearts constrict.

"Xeph," the Doctor says, "a lot of these people here are temporally sensitive refugees of my own species. They've lost their living ships. Your planet-- the one you're on now-- what's it like?"

"New Cephei?" Xeph's tentacles wave in a complicated way that's probably a shrug. "The oceans are deep and vast, but there is land too, with oxygen and flying creatures and vegetation. Most of our new living ships are grown there."

"Could you--" the Doctor says, and cannot go on.

"Could you take them?" the Master asks. "Could your planet support another species?"

"If it is yours?" Xeph says. "Yes, of course. Will there be more refugees?"

The Doctor glances back at the man who took the Matrix key, and then at the Cephei again. "Yes," he says. "Quite a lot."

"Well," Xeph says, its skin rippling with amusement, "New Cephei has quite a lot of land."

***

"Thanks for the tea, Mrs. Jones," the Doctor says, getting to his feet and folding his napkin neatly.

"Come by any time you like," Martha's mum says, but she says it in such a way that implies that, like this time, the Master will never be invited. Martha can't really blame her.

She follows the Doctor outside. The Doctor hears her and turns on the street, standing at some precise halfway point between the TARDIS and Martha's mum's house. It's funny, the way a blue police box doesn't look odd standing there in the middle of the road. It looks solid, like it can stand through anything; like she's starting to realize the Doctor can too. It doesn't matter that she didn't make him better all on her own: she's a doctor. It's just her job to do enough to help people help themselves, and she's done that. She looks at the Doctor and the Doctor looks at her and he smiles a little, crookedly.

"Still have that phone?" Martha asks.

"Of course," the Doctor says. "Never go anywhere without it."

"You think they'll be all right?" Martha says.

The Doctor's smile grows a little. "Torchwood? Your family?"

"The Time Lords," Martha says.

"Yes," the Doctor says. "And Torchwood, and your family."

"You are not alone," Martha says, grinning a little.

"No," the Doctor says, "no," and he looks at her, really looks at her, and says, seriously, "I've got you."

Martha steps up to him and shoves his chest lightly. "Told you."

"Mm." The Doctor leans down a little and hugs her tightly; Martha grins against the fabric of his suit and breathes in the smell of cloth and metal and a faint whiff of tea. He pulls back to grin at her again, holding onto her arms for a moment, the corners of his eyes crinkling up a little.

"So you and the Master," Martha says, "you're just-- travelling on."

"So we are," the Doctor says.

"And that's all right?"

The Doctor contemplates this for a moment. "It will be difficult, and trying," he says, nearly as though it's a recitation, "and it will always be difficult and trying. But that's what makes it fun."

"You're completely mad," Martha says, laughing, and lets him go.

She watches the TARDIS fade from view, and then she goes back inside to her family.