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The day she was born, the drums were so quiet. Instead, his mind was filled with all the things he was going to show his darling daughter, whose eyes were much alike his own back in his first life. Nidriannhura (Nidria for short) was a beautiful name and in The Master’s opinion, fitting for a beautiful child. She would be the only child the Master would have ever, not that he minded that much. Her Mother, Jodred, didn’t want many children anyway.
When Nidria was small and her father was away, she would often be heard questioning where he was. Before he was known permanently as the Master, an infamous child of Gallifrey, it was thought of as cute. She would go outside every day after her studies and play, when she was done, she’d go back inside the Estate, her clothes covered with red grass and simply ask, “Where’s Father?” The other adults would laugh, especially Jodred, because it was adorable. When he was there, he’d answer himself and Nidria would smile and hug her father, which was something not every child did, and kiss his knees, his cheeks, his beard and face. There was no denying that Nidria loved her father and he her.
(He was restless when she was taken to see the Schism, because of the Drums. Jodred didn’t understand-no one did. He held his daughter that night and hoped that she wouldn’t become a victim as he did.)
She came back from the ceremony a little shaken up, but not worse off. Nidria smiled, her blue eyes shining as they looked up at her father as she confessed, “I imagined you and Mother were there with me and I wasn’t afraid anymore, just a bit cold.” As she spoke, her arms hugged herself and her Father felt the cold too, an effect of their mental connection.
So the Master reached down and picked the eight year old up. “Well, in that case, I’ll give you my warmth and you won’t need to be cold.” Nidira smiled and snuggled herself into her father.
It was on her ninth birthday that the Doctor, someone Nidira looked to as an uncle, gave her the dark star alloy brooch.
Years later saw Nidira excelling at the Academy, the Master was known then as The Master and did not go to her graduation ceremony. Instead, she was met with the smile of her mother and even—strangely enough—the Doctor. His absence was noted to her, but she quietly understood. In private, outside on that red grass while the rest of her friends and family were inside celebrating the way they do, Nidria simply asked the only person who would be truthful to her: “Is Father alive?”
The Doctor seemed uncomfortable with this question, his hand went immediately to pick at his celery stick sitting on the color of his jacket. He fiddled with it before sighing, “He is…but he’s not as you knew him.”
Nidria feared this to be true but shrugged, “I still love him.”
The Doctor nodded, “As do I.”
As it would turn out, the next time the Master would see his daughter, he would be a she and refer to herself as the Mistress. Nidria realized who the figure was right away and as if she was a child, ran up and hugged her tightly. Just like she always did.
(The Doctor wouldn’t know this, but it wasn’t as if there was no more fighting after all his selves saved Gallifrey; there was leftovers and the Mistress had to fight in that.)
“I missed you,” Nidria thought, allowing herself a mental connection with the parent she loved so much.
(Jodred had died many battles ago.)
In a rare show of affection, the Mistress had wrapped her arms around her child and the drums, like they always were with Nidria, were distant.
(The Mistress’s biggest regret was always the same; leaving behind Nidria.)
Later, the pair joined each other on battlefield, with Nidria following Missy’s orders and the pair of them kicking Dalek ass. In Missy’s terms, of course. Granted, Nidria would have liked it far better if they could have some quiet, but now Gallifrey was winning and she had her Mother back and she felt invincible. Later, she told Missy this who laughed loudly and gave her daughter that toothy smile and held Nidria closer, “Of course you are, you’re with me!”
“Well, if that’s all it takes, I’m happy.”
Nidria smiled widely as well, and even though she had a different face, one with dark skin with freckles and reddish brown hair that framed her head in a bound of cloud-like curls, her eyes still remained the same color her entire life span. There was a lack of innocence that was long lost to the War, but to Missy---they would always belong to the little girl who would smile at her, as if she were a hero. Perhaps, in Nidria’s eyes, no matter how much death and desolation the Mistress brings forth to the Universe, she would still be a hero. Someone to love, someone to admire, someone to hug and someone to miss. It may be blind naiveté, but wasn’t all love?
Perhaps, that was why, on a battlefield, Missy’s last time on Gallifrey, she finally let it all go.
The pair were at it again, but this time was different. You see, the Daleks couldn’t kill them straight away anymore, no, it took prodding. It left a bloody mess in both uses of the word bloody. That was when Missy stumbled onto Nidria, in a pool of her own blood. The Dalek that did this was also perishing and Missy, later, would smile at that because of course her daughter wouldn’t go down without a fight. In that moment, though, Missy knelt down and held her daughter onto her lap.
“I’m sorry,” Nidria managed to bite out, her eyes struggled to focus on her mother, “I—“
“Shhh,” Missy interrupted, and the Time Lady wondered why she bothered. She should have felt no allegiance to Gallifrey and should have taken Nidria by the hand and flew away in some TARDIS. Ah, but Missy wanted to prove the president wrong. And now, she was paying. “Don’t be sorry dear.”
“I’m cold,” and finally, tears left Nidria’s eyes. She’s always felt cold every time she died and she’s hated it. Without knowing it, she pushed this feeling onto the Mistress, the feeling of coldness, “s-s-so cold.”
“I’ll make you warm, Nidria, dear,” Missy promised, and she did her best, she did. She held her daughter closer, not caring for the blood and tried to remember all the warm moment in her life and pushed those onto her daughter. Missy felt her daughter’s relief at the warmth and soon, she felt nothing. In her arms, lay her daughter, her only child (not that she minded) and the last person in the universe who would ever love her more than she loves herself.
It was a cold day when Missy left Gallifrey, a dark star alloy brooch in one hand and a TARDIS key in the other. She was cold and needed a nice distraction to forget these events. The Doctor, of course, the original owner of the brooch in her hand, would be a good choice. She needed to heal because---the pain of burying your own child is not one to name---but more than that, she needed a friend. She was going to get her friend back and she knew just how.
She couldn’t bring back Nidria. Others, well….