Chapter Text
She wakes to the sound of a storm outside, the wind rattling the branches of a tree against her window. In the still quiet darkness of her bedroom she rubs the sleep from her eyes and sighs. Another nightmare, another restless night. Rose Tyler has many restless nights with her job, and the nightmares always come with it. Tonight, though was about him—as it is most nights. He’s been gone for so long now, he almost feels like a memory, like the dream of a life that never happened. She both dreads and hopes for the day he might come back; he did things she couldn’t bring herself to forgive him for but she understands why he did it. She glances at the clock on the table beside her bed and rolls out of bed, pulling on her robe. He’ll be wanting his tea soon, and since she was going down to make tea for herself she might as well bring him some.
When she’d found him, he was stark raving mad. Now he sat in the corner of his cell, glaring at her through the reinforced plexiglass walls. His cell consisted of three levels of security, the innermost being iron bars encasing the cage from roof top to the floor beneath his feet. The second layer was reinforced bullet proof plexi-glass walls with holes drilled into it to allow breathable air through. The third was a state of the art alarm system that went off the second he so much as thought about trying to escape. It had cost Rose four good Torchwood employees (whom are currently on sick-leave while they recuperate from their injuries) two Torchwood issued vehicles, one sonic screwdriver, the battered remains of a blue police public call box, and astronomical amount of damage done to the Torchwood building. Even after all of this, what won the fight in the end between her and the Master was a piece of rotting timber that he failed to notice her swinging towards his head.
Rose thought that it was surely the end when she went to face him. She was out-numbered, out-witted, and completely out of her league. She was going up against a Time Lord, a crazy one even. Not that Rose hadn’t done that once before, but that’s another story. She didn’t have anyone but herself and her employees to take him on, and the only bit of knowledge she had was what she knew of his species in general. She hadn’t wanted to kill him though; she wanted to preserve him as much as she could in case she ever ran across the Doctor. It was only because of the Doctor’s double and the TARDIS he grew years before the Master ever set foot in her universe, that she had the knowledge to figure out who the Master was. The TARDIS data-bank had a little information on him, just enough to give Rose an idea of who she was dealing with.
Everything in that data-bank warned her to run away and avoid him at all costs. Yet she couldn’t just abandon the planet though and leave an insane megalomaniacal Time Lord to run loose and terrorize the citizens of planet Earth, now could she? As she paced the cement floors outside of his cell he deemed her unworthy of his gaze and opted to stare at the floor instead. He was sulking she mused, had been sulking for months now. At first he was capable of escape quiet easily, as Rose learned one morning when she found sitting at her kitchen table helping himself to a pot of tea while her Mother cowered in the corner of the room next the refrigerator, watching him with a mixture of contempt and fear. The plexiglass was a new touch, and now after discovering that even if he made it through the plexiglass an alarm would set off, made him sulk even more about it.
Sometimes she thinks he sets the alarm off on purpose.
He had decided that if he couldn’t rule the universe he’d opt to annoy her instead. He did everything he could to irritate her, everything from setting off the alarms to screaming at the top of his lungs until she came down to the basement to shut him up. It was odd too; her Mother complained often that she didn’t like having to wash her knickers in front of him. Whenever she’d go down there to do the laundry she’d demand he’d turn away and he’d just stare at her and she’d get angry and later on have a row with Rose as to why he had to be in the basement at all.
It was really quite simple honestly; it was because she didn’t trust anyone at Torchwood with him. She wanted to keep him where she could see him. He was as slippery as they come, and he had proven himself more than capable of out-witting her. She was quite proud of herself though, she’d kept up with him as best she could and even he had to admit that she wasn’t an average ape. Hitting him with an old plank of wood though was technically cheating, but he’d been cheating all the way up until he blew a hole in the side of the Torchwood building (which was where her office was unfortunately.) He’d deliberately antagonized her that day, blowing up her office (which he knew she wasn’t currently occupying, but it was done to get her attention not kill her) and then showing up at her house later that evening and demanding she hand over the TARDIS.
Long story short, he wanted the TARDIS and he bloody well got it. While he stood in the garden mooning over the TARDIS she stood behind him and grabbed an old piece of timber, cracking it across the side of his face hard enough to knock him out. When he woke up he was handcuffed and chained to the bars of a cell that Pete had Torchwood employees quickly pull together while Rose kept the Master busy. It was a fairly simple design quickly welded together to keep him contained until they could manage better means of confinement. Every time he escaped after she felt was a means of him mocking her intelligence, as if saying ‘Ha, I’ve escaped again!’
“Still not talking to me are you?” Rose says as she opens a floor level panel on the side of the cage, sliding a tray of tea and oatmeal through it. He liked his tea black with two sugars, didn’t care for oatmeal but suffered it only because her Mother refused him anything else. Rose noted the black cuff on his ankle as he shifted his weight to reach for the tray. They’d fitted him with that recently, another safety precaution. Rose refused at first and then when Tosh brought it over she agreed only if they’d let her put it on him. Tosh made it especially for him; it was a modified version of a Taser gun that would light him up like a Christmas tree if he so much as set a toe beyond the perimeter set for it. They’d opted to do this when he refused to stop setting off the alarm at two in the morning just to wake up the whole household.
He was furious with her over that, scowled menacingly at Tosh and Owen if they tried to help Rose. In the end after much arguing and a few compromises he proffered his ankle and she snapped it in place. Thus was how he ended up with sugar in his tea in the morning, and Rose got a little more sleep on weekends.
Sometimes being his jailor really sucked.
“Tell me how it happened,” he says quietly without looking at her. His obsession with the Valeyard, with the man who haunted her nightmares was endless. The Master seemed honestly disturbed by the idea of the Valeyard being in this universe with him. “Tell me exactly what he did.”
“I’ve told you already,” Rose scowls at him through the glass, “I’ve told you--..”
“Eighteen,” he cuts her off sharply.
“What?” Rose frowns at him.
“Eighteen,” he begins smoothly as he sips his tea, “you’ve told me eighteen times already.”
“And after eighteen times you still don’t get it, do you?” Rose grounds out, fending off the ache of hurt in her heart whenever she thought of the Doctor who wasn’t. “He wasn’t who I thought he was…he grew a TARDIS and ran off with it and then crashed it in my Mum’s garden.”
“I think there’s more to it than that,” he says knowingly, glancing at her, “I think your lying to me.”
“It’s none of your business,” Rose scowls at him.
“The Valeyard running loose in this universe is everybody’s business Rose Tyler,” he points out, “even I have limits…he’s…” The Master shakes his head as if recalling something from long ago, “different.”
“TARDIS is trashed anyways,” Rose mutters quietly as she turns to leave, “I dunno why you bothered to try and steal it at all.”
“Because I can fix it,” he says as he stands, stepping towards the glass to watch her.
“It’s dead,” she points out, “Or dying…she’s too badly damaged. I haven’t the foggiest clue what he did while he was gone but she’s in pieces.”
“The difference between the Valeyard and I Rose Tyler,” he says as she starts up the stairs, determined to end their conversation. “Is that I want to rule this universe…. he wants to destroy it.”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” Rose says as she shuts the door to the basement and carries on with her chores.
She started having Pete bring him his meals. She didn’t want to look at him anymore, let alone talk to him. He was driving her crazy on purpose, determined to terrorize her because she’d trapped him. She managed to keep away from him for a solid week before she woke up to the sound of her shower running at one in the morning. She rolls out of bed blurry eyed and half awake, stumbling into her bathroom. She gets one look at his bare leg carefully perched outside of the tub, her eyes drifting down from his strong thigh to the black ankle bracelet before she sputters indignantly, “what the hell are you doing!?”
“Well you can’t expect me to sit in my own filth now can you?” He replies smoothly, “even Time Lords need a shower once in a while.”
“It’s one in the morning!” Rose strains not to shout but still says it just a tad bit too loudly.
“And I don’t need to sleep that often,” He retorts easily, “you humans, you sleep so much. It’s absolutely absurd how often your species has to sleep.”
“Get out of there right now!” Rose growls angrily.
“I would,” he says as he casually hangs his head around the shower curtain to look at her, “but I haven’t any clothes to wear.”
“What? Where are the clothes you were wearing?” Rose sighs heavily.
“I burned them,” he says so easily it was as if he was discussing the weather.
“You what?” Rose gapped at him as he disappeared behind the shower curtain. The sweet smell of cherry blossoms filled the room and she heard him chuckle. “You’re going to have to find me something a bit less feminine to wash with.”
“Why did you burn your clothes!?” Rose demanded angrily, tempted to yank back the stupid shower curtain that prevented her from scolding him properly. However it would mean he’d be stark naked right in front of her and that was something she wasn’t keen on just at the moment. She’d never even seen a naked Time Lord before (save for a half-human one,) there’s no telling what he might actually look like.
“So you’d get me new ones,” he explained simply, “a bit slow on the uptake early in the morning aren’t you?”
Rose furrowed her brow in thought, staring at the shower curtain in a mixture of anger and confusion. Then finally she turned and ran downstairs, catching sight of the living room fireplace as she descended. There in the hearth burned his clothes, and for a single moment she thought about being vindictive and locking him up in the basement butt naked.
Then she remembered the orange jumpsuit Torchwood had given her for him to wear.
When she presented him the obscenely bright orange jumpsuit with an elegant flourish the appalled look on his face was priceless. He sneered crudely and when she saw the glimmer of mischief in his eyes she added, “Don’t worry, if you burn this one there’s plenty more where it came from.”
The sneer drops right off his face and turns into a horrible scowl that eventually turns into a glare. When he’d emerged from the bathroom Rose tried desperately hard not to howl with laughter at the sight of the Time Lord parading through her bedroom and then kitchen looking like a giant orange popsicle.
“You realize this means war don’t you?” he says casually as he fixes himself a cup of tea. He’s turned his back to her and she cannot see the expression on his face, there was no telling if he was being serious or not.
“You wanted new clothes so I provided them for you,” Rose sniffs indignantly. “It’s not my fault you opted to burn your clothes. All you needed to do is let me know that they needed washing. How was I supposed to know they were dirty? The Doctor never really changed clothes much…I figured you lot don’t get dirty as easily as we humans do.”
“I’ve been wearing that sweatshirt and those jeans for ages now,” he says sourly, “I’d hoped you see reason and at least grant me a decent set of clothes.”
“Where did you come from anyways?” Rose asks as he turns to face her, leaning against the kitchen counter to regard her with a carefully guarded expression.
“I came from the stars,” he says dramatically; tilting his chin up to make himself appear nobler. “From a galaxy a long way away from here.”
“Please,” Rose snorts into her tea, suppressing a smile.
“No really,” he says as the smile drops from his face. “I did.”
“Where then?” Rose asks as she watches him watching her, his fingers drumming lightly on the kitchen counter and the muscle on the right side of his jaw ticking ever so slightly as he contemplates an answer.
“Gallifrey,” he tells her as he stares into his tea cup. “I came from Gallifrey.”
“I thought all that was under a time lock?” Rose responds with mild surprise, “how did you get out?”
“I’m clever,” He chuckles lightly. “Did nobody tell you?”
“Gallifrey was destroyed in the Time War,” Rose says quietly, “and the Doctor’s running about in the other universe thinking all of you are dead—does he know your alive?”
“Yes,” he says quietly, “in fact, I ended up in this universe because I saved him.”
“You saved him?” Rose quirks a brow.
“Yes,” he replies peevishly, obviously irritated by her skepticism, “I saved him. I sent Rassilion and all his idiot council members back into the Time War---and got pulled in with them.”
“I take it you don’t like this Rassilion bloke?” Rose asks curiously.
“Not really,” He sighs. “You see…Rassilion was a bit on an ass to me while I was there…repaired my body but left me to be the court jester while he and his esteemed colleagues prattled on about how to save Gallifrey.”
“So you’d still leave them all to rot?” Rose asks with a frown, “you’ve found a way out—you could have at least saved some of them. Not all of them are bad apples like Rassilion.”
“Yes,” he says as he sips his tea, “Pretty much. I barely had enough time to save myself before the planet was destroyed let alone worry about anyone else.”
“Wow,” Rose says as she sets her cup down. “I thought you were just a bit twisted but you really are an asshole, aren’t you?”
He narrows his eyes as her and tilts his head to one side, his chin dipping down as he levels his gaze upon her. There is something malicious glimmering in his eyes now as he speaks lowly, his voice dropping an octave as he replies, “Did you ever wonder how I knew your name?” His voice is deep and smooth and far too confident as he casually begins, though Rose can tell this is anything but casual. “How I knew your every move? It’s because I know everything about you Rose Tyler…. I know everything that he knew because I was in his mind and saw it all.”
“You’re lying.” Rose snaps, her eyes glittering like diamonds.
“Rose Marion Tyler…Badwolf.” he begins with a cruel smirk curving his lips. “You were nineteen when he met you. He brought you back a year late and your Mum went ballistic over the course of that year as any parent in their right mind would. You travelled the galaxy with him; you saw the end of the earth. He regenerated and like the stupid little ape you are, you turned your back on him when he needed you most. You cowered in a corner rather than accept he gave his life to save you because you tried to give your life for his. He couldn’t possibly accept that of course not; you were his precious pet so he burned through a regeneration to pull the time vortex out of your head. It took a bit but you finally warmed up to him and soon you were running across the universe with him again. You then went to New New York…you met…Cassandra, wasn’t it?” He ponders this for a moment and then continues, “She then redefined the meaning of awkward as she paraded around in both your body and his. He lost you…. he lost you when the Daleks and the Cybermen tried to take over the planet. Your father Pete saved you at the last minute and that’s how you ended up here.”
Rose gapped at him and he continued before she could comment, “You like your tea with milk and sugar and just a dab of honey, you love chips,” he emphasized her love for them with a mocking roll of his eyes and a girly trill to his voice. “You can’t stand it when people muck about in your head; your favorite color is pink. You have this thing when you’re thinking about something you sort of bite your lower lip. When you’re anxious or angry you tend to draw your hands up into your sleeves and stretch them out as if you’re trying to relieve the tension in your shoulders but it’s actually a subconscious attempt at looking stronger than you are. You try to appear less frustrated than you really are--…”
“OK,” Rose grounds out, “I get it.”
“You bite your nails when you’re nervous and your pheromones smell like orange blossoms in the spring,” he snickers at the last bit. “He really did like to observe you.”
“Shut up,” Rose says quietly though her voice is as cold and hard as ice. It threatened to bring tears to her eyes, the extent to which the Doctor had observed her. She had no idea that he’d known so much about her, that he’d learned so much by just watching her.
He falls silent and watches her watching him before he finishes his own tea and sets the cup in the sink. “Well,” he rubs his hands together gingerly and starts for the basement. “Suppose I should get to bed.”
He hums lightly as she listens to him descend the stairs, the iron bars of his cell creaking as he shuts it behind him with a soft click. She thinks that being his jailor has just reached an entirely new level of horrible.
The following week is tiresome. He is belligerent and uncooperative with Pete to the point that she has to go down there herself and deal with him. He seems pleased until he realizes that all he was getting for breakfast was cold tea and a stale biscuit.
“Where’s my sugar?” he demands quietly as she turns to leave.
“You get nothing,” Rose begins without looking at him, “you get absolutely nothing until you stop being such an ass. You get food, you get to bath but only when it’s necessary and if you so much as utter a syllable about my pheromones or any other bodily functions of mine, you’ll never see another cup of tea again.”
“Oh come now,” he smirks at her. “Be reasonable…you thought I was lying to you….I said I knew everything about you and I do. How do you think I managed to out-maneuver you at every turn?”
“You are completely incorrigible!” Rose huffs and storms back up the stairs.
When she enters the kitchen Jackie spares her a glance while washing dishes. “He being an ass again?”
“Yes,” Rose scowls deeply. “Why can’t he just….just….be decent?”
“He’s a bit mad darling,” Jackie says sympathetically, “you can’t expect him to be decent. He and the Doctor never got on well back in the other universe and you were the Doctor’s companion once.”
“He knows everything about me,” Rose scowls. “And I only know what the damn data-bank tells me about him.”
“How does he know all that then?” Jackie asks as she pulls a tray of biscuits from the oven and sets them on top of the oven. Tony toddles in shortly after, dragging a stuffed bear behind him. She lifts him up into his high chair and proceeds to feed him.
“He read the Doctor’s mind at some point or other,” Rose gestures casually with one hand. “I don’t even know how he got that information I just know he has it.”
“Nosy bugger isn’t he?” Jackie frowns as Tony overturns the little bowl of cereal she places in front of him.
“I don’t know what else to do with him,” Rose sighs. “He won’t stay in the cell; he roams the house freely and wakes me in the middle of the night when he’s bored. He mocks me and annoys me intentionally….I can’t take him to the Torchwood detainment facility, I don’t trust them with him.”
“You wouldn’t dare risk anyone hurting him and yet you can’t stand the sight of him,” Jackie chuckles lightly. “Mixed signals that.”
“No,” Rose says quickly, “I just want to keep him alive is all…. he’s sort of the last of his kind….and maybe if the Doctor finds his way here I can hand him over to him.”
“Rose,” Jackie sighs softly, a look of concern in her eyes as she cups her daughter’s cheek gently. “Sweetheart…you know he’s never coming back. He’s gone Rose…you managed to have a good five years with that other version of him here…and then he went mad and made off with the TARDIS and crashed it in my garden later. You and him had a good run…he gave my daughter the best damn five years of her life and I’m grateful every day for that…but I’m sorry sweetheart you can’t just sit there and hold out hope that you’ll run across the Doctor or that other one will come back, you’ve got to live your life…you have to move on.”
“I know,” Rose says as she ducks her head, turning her gaze out the kitchen window.
“No,” Jackie sighs. “I don’t think you do….when your Father died….back in the other universe….I thought he was the love of my life and I just couldn’t let go of him.”
“Mum,” Rose groans as Jackie continues.
“No really,” Jackie says gently, “I thought he was the love of my life….and I was devastated. I refused to move on and even when I tried…. I didn’t want commitment. I had boyfriends sure…you remember some of them I think,” Jackie smiles faintly. “None of them ever compared to your Father. He was an ass and he drove me crazy…he was irresponsible and we argued all the time but I loved him more than anything.”
“Mum,” Rose frowns. “Where are you going with this?”
“What I’m saying sweetheart,” Jackie begins, “is that even though you lost him…The Doctor…there will be other loves. You can have more than one soul mate darling, it’s entirely possible. I found Pete….and I’m grateful for him every day. So basically, what I’m saying is, if I could find another version of your Father in a different universe than you can find another soul mate too.”
“I’m going to work,” Rose says quietly and cannot meet her gaze.
“Alright,” Jackie says and steps away, watching her daughter forlornly as she grabs her coat and leaves.
Work is tedious and troublesome. Rose is swamped with paperwork and unclassified items with no names. She spends most of her time trying to work out what half of the items are and what they do. When Tosh notices the worn look on her face she takes pity on her and offers to finish up the paperwork. Rose is grateful and takes a dinner break, sitting by the peer in Cardiff. She is lonely and tired, the stars above her head glittering like diamonds in the sky. As the cold breeze whips at her hair she feels that ache of loneliness even deeper than before. The chips she’d been eating have gone cold and she’s finished her tea. There was no point in sitting out here alone by the sea anymore and yet she couldn’t make herself get up and walk back to the Torchwood building. Instead she walks along the metal railing that lines the wharf and watches the stars above her.
She misses travelling the universe, she misses seeing new planets and meeting different species. Down here on earth it was more like protecting the Earth from invasions, and she never got to have much of a conversation with any of them. When the other version of the Doctor came to live with her here things had been great. He helped her with her work at Torchwood, but at that time the TARDIS was still being grown and they were left stranded on Earth. He struggled with fitting in, becoming a human. He struggled with having to sleep every night, with going to work every day and being incredibly and plainly domestic. There was something clearly off about him, but Rose didn’t want to see it. There was a funny glint in his eye she ignored, or the way he spoke sometimes that set her on edge. So, Rose tried something else, tried to cheer him up by renting an apartment for them. They lived together in Cardiff near the Torchwood building. Every morning they’d walk to work together hand in hand and stop off at a little restaurant by the wharf every Friday evening to have dinner.
They’d built a life together, they’d managed it. The only dark time Rose could remember in their past was the day she realized she could never give him children. They’d discovered that after several attempts, and a doctor’s visit through Torchwood medical confirmed what they’d feared. It was another hard blow, another loss. They got through it eventually, had intended on adopting when the proverbial shit hit the fan. It’d been another mission, another hard day. Yet this day was unlike the others, it was her life or the lives of many and he chose her.
He chose her.
She hadn’t known it at the time, she hadn’t understood what he’d done. He’d done it without a second thought and it broke Rose when she found out what he did. The Doctor wouldn’t have killed all those people to save her, Rose wouldn’t have wanted that. She still has nightmares about it, about knowing that he’d killed twenty people just so Rose could live. He’d argued with her endlessly about it too, told her he’d rather her live and watch the whole bloody planet burn. He’d admitted to everything she tried to ignore, admitted to his boredom and his disgust with the way humans live. He didn’t want that life for himself, he wanted to be what he was and Rose could understand that. The whole mess was tearing her apart, she loved him blindly, endlessly, but what he did…what he did….
He left that night.
She hadn’t seen him in weeks until he crashed the TARDIS in her backyard and she found him half dead inside. When she ran inside to get help, he’d disappeared. He was just gone and she found nothing but the TARDIS and his sonic screwdriver. She searched for him, for ages it seemed. She never found him, she tried to call his phone but found it in a garbage can near the wharf.
He was gone.
Her world shattered into pieces, colliding like molecules inside a dying star that went supernova. Rose hated to dwell on the past, had learned from the Doctor not to do that. She couldn’t help but to reminisce upon her lost love though, upon the pain she’d felt and the grief she went through upon his loss. It was clear he was never coming back, that he was done trying to live a human life with her. She understood that, accepted it.
When she finally grew tired of walking the empty wharf she headed back to the Torchwood building, passing the dozing security guard at the door with a half-smile curving her lips. She smacks the desk he sits at casually as she goes, the security guard waking with a start as he watches Rose wide eyed and startled as she passes through the metal detector and heads up to her office. When she catches sight of frantic employees running two and fro through the corridors of the level on which she worked, she knew something was up.
“I was gone for an hour,” Rose says with a groan, gesturing towards the mess of an office and the fire currently being put out on a nearby desk.
“Yes,” Tosh grimaces as she watches the blaze being put out. “I’m sorry…. they wanted to look at that hair dryer…or whatever it was…. turned out it was more like a plasma weapon.”
“I told you,” Rose sighs as she pinches the bridge of her nose. “Please don’t let them touch the unclassified items. If I deem them safe then they can meddle with them, but if I haven’t looked at them yet don’t let anyone touch them.”
“I know I’m sorry,” Tosh says honestly, twisting her fingers nervously together in front of her. “We’re all so bored up here you know? It’s been quiet lately as you know and I just thought maybe we could help.”
“It’s alright,” Rose shakes her head and rubs her eyes wearily. “I’m bored too…it’s been way to quiet lately and that’s making me a little nervous.”
“It’s making us all nervous really,” Tosh agrees as she watches her co-workers place the plasma gun carefully back in its sealed container.
“Anything on the radar?” Rose asks as they start towards the monitors across the room.
“Nothing,” Tosh shakes her head. “The skies have been clear.”
“That’s crazy,” Rose frowns. “There is always something going on.”
“Maybe they’ve finally given up and are leaving us alone?” Tosh says hopefully.
“Doubt it,” Rose chuckles lightly. “It’s almost like there…. hesitant…. or scared of something.”
“Maybe it’s the Master,” Tosh suggests with raised eyebrows. “Maybe they’re frightened of him.”
“He’s a Time Lord,” Rose shrugs. “They might be stupid enough to relate the Doctor to the Master and assume the Master would defend the earth just the same.”
“Well if that’s the case let’s let them believe that and have a good weekend,” Tosh laughs.
“I’m game,” Rose laughs too, running a hand through her blond hair. “I’m heading home alright?”
“Alright” Tosh says with a wave. “Have a good night!”
When she gets home she sees the light of the living room TV shining through the hallway door. Upon closer inspection she finds the Master watching cartoons and can’t help but smile a little. He was batshit crazy but he was also kind of amusing. Here was this lunatic Time Lord capable of universal destruction and he was watching cartoons at midnight.
“Rough night?” he says as she starts up the stairs.
She doesn’t answer him, heads upstairs instead to shower. When she’s clean and in her pajama’s she finds him still watching TV, flipping channels until he finds one he likes. She drops down next to him on the sofa and snatches the bowl of popcorn from his hands. “That’s mine you know,” Rose scowls at him. “My favorite actually…you been digging in my cabinet?”
For a brief moment he looks like a scandalized cat and then while he responds he goes into the kitchen and retrieves a second bowl for her. “I know it’s your favorite,” he smiles knowingly. She rolls her eyes and looks away while he divides the popcorn separately and hands her a bowl. She would have to lock up her cabinet now too. “You know,” he says casually, “if you were to let me help…things might actually pick up at work.”
“Absolutely not,” Rose shakes her head. “I wouldn’t trust you with a teaspoon let alone allow you near any of the unclassified items at work.”
“It’s been quiet lately hasn’t it?” He continues as if he hadn’t heard her, “don’t you think that’s odd?”
“Yes,” Rose says carefully as she watches the TV screen. “What do you know about it?”
“Nothing,” he shrugs. “I just noticed how oddly silent it was around your planet when I arrived.”
When she doesn’t say anything, he adds, “we could check the surrounding galaxy with the TARDIS scanner.”
“No,” Rose says a little too quickly, “and besides….the TARDIS is dead.”
“You’re lying,” he says quietly with ice in his tone, “don’t lie to me….I can hear her….she’s still alive.”
“The last of the power was spent using the data-bank….I was saving her last bit of power for an emergency and you were it. She’s completely dark inside….not a trace of life in her,” Rose sighs. “I’m not lying to you.”
“She’s alive,” he argues quietly, “you just can’t hear her but I can….she’s just…sleeping is all.”
“So she’s on standby?” Rose frowns as she turns to look at him.
“No,” The Master says as he turns his head to meet her gaze. “Not like that…. she doesn’t have the power to even start her engines. That idiot damaged her pretty badly in the crash. She’s preserving what she has left of her power.”
“I’m not letting you inside the TARDIS,” Rose tells him firmly.
“Well you can’t very well get her running by yourself,” he replies evenly, “and let’s face it, now that you know she’s not dead you won’t be able to stop yourself from running out into the garden to try and find a way to power her up.”
“I’m not going to---…” Rose shakes her head but he cuts her off.
“Yes you are,” he smiles at her knowingly. “You will because you’re just as bored as I am and you want off this planet as much or nearly as much as I do.”
“You’re right…I do want to travel again. You might actually be telling the truth and we could get the hell off this planet…or you’ll steal the TARDIS right out from under me and go off to terrorize the universe,” Rose frowns at him. “I’m responsible for you whether I like it or not. I can’t trust you near that TARDIS no matter how badly I want off this planet.”
“Suit yourself,” he says with a shrug. “You’ll come around eventually.”
He was right unfortunately, though Rose refused to admit it. As the days went on things began to get strange on planet Earth. Not the typical Torchwood strange, but properly strange.
“The bees are disappearing,” Tosh frowns at Rose over her lunch. They sat at a seaside café, it was beautiful day, the birds were singing, the air smelt of summer and the sea shimmered like gold under the sun. Yet here was Toshiko Sato, talking about bee’s disappearing. Rose stared down at her lemon chicken salad and tried to will away the uneasy feeling settling in the pit of her stomach.
“How do you know?” Rose questions as she takes a bite of chicken.
“It’s in the newspaper,” Tosh says as she shows Rose the newspaper she’d been reading. “How odd right?”
“Global warming….” Rose shrugs. “Things like that have been happening what with pollution and all.”
“True,” Tosh agrees, “but it’s like…they’re leaving in swarms.”
“Swarms?” Rose says skeptically, “you been reading the tabloids again?”
“No,” Tosh smiles at her sheepishly. “I’m just saying…it’s made it to the newspaper.”
“Well,” Rose says as she takes a sip of her ice tea and set the glass back down on the table. “If bees were aliens than I’d be worried.”
“I think they are,” Tosh frowns at her. “Or at least some species are.”
“Wait,” Rose blinks at her. “Really?”
“Yeah,” Tosh nods. “I don’t know which ones though.”
“Hmm,” Rose says thoughtfully as she takes another bite of salad. She stirs the fork among the greens in her salad, spinning them about like the hands of a clock face turning in rotation. Her mind has been wandering lately; perhaps the Master has kept her so distracted she hasn’t noticed the signs? Maybe something serious is happening and she just wasn’t paying attention? It was her job to protect this planet, and her preoccupation with holding the universe’s most dangerous alien captive in her basement was starting to take its toll on her work.
“We should probably check it out,” Rose says thoughtfully with her gaze fixed on a distant point out at sea as her mind wanders away to distant shores, of years long past and a man she once knew. He’d have noticed this already; he’d have seen the signs. She was failing him; she was becoming just another disappointment. When the Master came to her universe she knew she was the only one who had even a chance at stopping him. Only because she travelled with the Doctor, but who was she kidding? She knew she stood a snowballs chance in hell at winning.
She managed it though.
She’d resorted to an old-fashioned ape technique which she still feels guilty about. She’d clocked him right alongside the head with a piece of wood, knocked him unconscious rather than face him in some heroic stand off like the Doctor would have.
Granted rendering the Master unconscious probably wouldn’t have crossed his mind.
That very evening she’d been battered and bruised, her hair smelt like smoke and there were flowering bruises all along her right cheek. The blast from the explosion in her office hadn’t been extraordinary, it was just enough to wreck her office and blow out the windows. It was also just enough to shake the building and send her tumbling backwards over a table just as she reached the department floor where her office was located. She’d limped all the way back down to the ground floor afterwards, scrambled into a torchwood vehicle with Tosh and Owen and raced after the Master like they were in some kind of action film.
It was absolutely mad.
Maybe if she could manage all that than she could manage this? Maybe she was over thinking things, and truly there wasn’t anything to be worried about at all. Then again the Master had mentioned how silent the galaxy was, how odd he found it.
“You think so?” Tosh perks up almost hopefully.
“Yeah,” Rose nods. “Just in case.”
“I’ll call Owen and let him know were going to check it out,” Tosh tells her just a little too cheerfully and pulls out her mobile.
They pull up at a meadow on the edge of town. This was the place where the newspaper had done its report, displaying a lovely picturesque image of a quaint little meadow full of flowers like something out of a gardening magazine. The picture did it justice, Rose thought as she gazed upon the acre wide patch of colors. As they strolled down the narrow dirt bike trail that winds through the meadow Rose noted the apparent lack of bee population. She found a few though, wandering from flower to flower and as absurd as she felt doing it, she spoke to them.
“Where you lot off to then?” Rose said with her hands on her hips, gazing down at the bees near her knees.
“I doubt they speak our language,” Tosh suppresses a chuckle.
The Doctor would have known how to speak to them, Rose inwardly sighs at the thought. He would have known exactly what to do and here she was, talking to honey bees out in the middle of a meadow in broad daylight.
“Maybe we’ve got the wrong species?” Rose says as she glances back at Tosh. “You got that translator device with you?”
“I don’t think it would be able to speak to bees,” Tosh says as she ponders it, “maybe if we just observe them? Maybe see what they’re up too?”
“Like taking another lunch break in the middle of a park on a nice day,” Rose grins at her. “I’m up for it.”
They walked on a little while further, climbing to the top of a nearby hill that overlooked the valley they’d just driven through to get there. Sitting atop some rocks they watched the meadow with mild interest, eventually boredom began to set in.
“I always knew I was never meant to be a naturalist,” Tosh says idly as she watches the meadow. “I wanted to build rockets and play with gravity canons since I was twelve.”
“I was just worried about making the gymnastic team,” Rose laughs. “I won the bronze in school.”
“Somehow I don’t think we’re going to learn anything this way,” Tosh sighs.
“Agreed,” Rose nods. “We should head back you think?”
“Yeah,” Tosh says as she turns her gaze towards the sky. They both watch as swarms of birds sweep past overhead, headed north.
“When do you suppose birds migrate?” Rose asks as they watch the birds grow smaller and smaller in the distance.
“Not until the fall at least,” Tosh responds, her expression unreadable.
“The animals are fleeing,” Rose begins quietly, “the bees are disappearing…. something’s coming.”
“Oh I hate it when you say that,” Tosh groans.
“Why?” Rose frowns at her.
“Because you’re always right,” Tosh sighs as the two of them start back towards the car.
When she gets home he’s sitting patiently in the basement cell while her Mother makes dinner. He’s taken to keeping to his cell when her Mum and Tony are home. Only because Jackie refuses him dinner if he comes anywhere near them while their home. He’s reading the newspaper when she comes down to the basement with his dinner, watches as he casually folds it and sets it aside to look at her.
“Had an interesting day?” He asks almost smugly as she slides the tray into his cell.
“Not really,” Rose sighs. “Chasing bees…. paperwork.”
“You noticed,” he grins at her. “Good.”
“Noticed what?” Rose says as she quirks an eyebrow.
“The bees disappearing…it’s in the papers.” He tells her as he nods towards the neatly folded newspaper beside him. He stands to retrieve his meal, idly tossing away the buttered biscuit with a mild look of disgust, sniffs the soup her Mother made and rolls his eyes. “Your Mother,” he sighs. “She certainly loves pepper.”
“I would’ve eaten the biscuit had I known you meant to toss it,” Rose scowls at him. “You’re wasting food.”
“It was stale anyways,” he casually waves it off.
“Picky,” Rose snorts rudely.
“Observant,” he counters easily, raising his eyebrows as he meets her gaze.
“What do you know about the bees disappearing?” Rose asks to change the subject.
“Nothing much,” he says as he takes a bite of soup. “Only what I read in the papers. We’d know more if you’d let me power up the TARDIS scanner.”
“I can scan the surrounding area around the planet from the Torchwood facility,” Rose counters quickly.
“Yes but not the surrounding galaxy,” He says wearily, setting the bowl of soup aside. “Rose this is bigger than what you think.”
“The bees are disappearing…the animals are legging it….” Rose sighs. “Could just be global warming.”
“Or it could be an invasion your scanners aren’t picking up,” he snaps irritably, frustration working its way into his voice, “you’re worse than he is.”
“You claim you haven’t a clue what’s going on and yet you act like you’ve got an idea….so if you know something spit it the hell out!” Rose blurts out angrily.
“Let’s look at the facts, shall we?” he sighs as his patience wears thin. He proceeds to explain to her as if she were a small child the list of factors that she has both described to him and the things he observed on his own. “Take these factors and group them together, isn’t it bizarre? The animals are frightened…. the bees are leaving off planet…. the galaxy is silent. Doesn’t that say something to you? Doesn’t that make you the least bit uneasy? It’s certainly got my attention,” he says with his expression a mask of both irritation and stubborn determination. “When things like this happen…it means it’s time to leave.”
“Why?” Rose says as she steps closer to the cell, meeting his gaze.
“Because when things like this happen…it usually means something higher up on the food chain is coming. Have you ever seen fish at feeding time Rose? When the little fish are mucking about eating the tiny bits off the seafloor, they scatter the moment something bigger comes along. They can sense it, and when they know something bigger than them, something that threatens them is coming, they run away.”
Rose debates this for a few moments, watches him finish his soup and then smugly watches her, waiting for her to give in. Finally, she lets out a sigh, running a hand through her hair. “That jumpsuit is hideous on you.”
He blinks at her response, and then gives into her attempt to change the subject. She won’t listen just yet but she will eventually, “black was always my color.”
“Clearly,” she says dryly and turns to leave.
“Rose,” he says casually as he lifts the neatly folded newspaper up and spreads it out before him so he can look it over. “Haven’t you ever wondered why I’m still here?”
“What?” She asks, pausing to turn and look at him.
He sighs, looks up at her haphazardly tosses the paper aside. She watches him as he pops the door open, twisting a red wire in the side panel so that the alarm doesn’t go off. He then smiles at her smugly, and tilts his head to one side. “I can escape easily. I’ve been here for months and never once have I harmed so much as a hair on anyone’s head. I’ve had countless opportunities to strangle you in your sleep. Do you honestly think that this stupid little ape contraption is beyond my comprehension? That I don’t have the means to remove it at any time? Please…. spare me,” he sneers coldly. “I could have left the day I woke up in that stupid little cell. I didn’t because I’m right where I want to be.”
Rose regards him thoughtfully, and fully turns to face him in the dim light of the setting sun filtering through the narrow basement windows. “You never actually wanted to take over the planet, did you?”
“At last!” he says with a dramatic flair, hands gesturing wildly in the air above him. “You’re listening!”
“I have been listening!” Rose began firmly but he cut her off, placing his right index finger over her lips so that he might continue talking.
“Sssshhh,” he says coolly, a mocking smile curving his lips. “I’m talking,” He waits to see that she’s listening before removing his finger from her lips. “You think you know everything…do you recall what the very first words I ever said to you were?”
“Unhand me ape?” Rose says with raised eyebrows.
He grimaces and pinches the bridge of his nose, motioning with his hand to skip ahead. “After that.”
Rose thinks on this while he waits patiently and wrinkles her nose at the memory. “Just listen.”
“Yes,” he smirks at her. “That’s all I wanted. I wanted you to hear me out. You hadn’t the foggiest clue what I’d been through when you found me. You’re so much like him you know. So just....so righteous…. you come along and decide I’m the enemy without a second thought.”
“You were stark raving mad,” Rose snaps, “you were ranting about drums! You were screaming at me in a different language, not to mention you tried to kill one of my employees with his own gun!”
“Well excuse me if I was a bit out of my head at the moment, I’d just fallen through the bloody Time War!” He fumes loudly, “then somehow I managed to escape with my life into an alternate universe inside the remnants of a Dalek escape pod that’d I’d wedged shut with a bit of pipe and some chewing gum!”
“You blew a hole in the side of my office!” she shouts back angrily.
“Old habits die hard!” he shouts back, “I was just trying to get your attention!”
“You came from the Time War?” Rose says quietly after a long while, the stunned expression on her face as she registers what he’d said was dissolving what anger she’d been feeling before.
“If you’d been listening,” he tells her pointedly, “or had given me a chance to explain I would have told you as much.”
“The TARDIS data-banks…” Rose began but trailed off at the glare he shot her.
“Are old,” he replied, “old and outdated…. they didn’t tell you everything…they didn’t tell you what happened in the end.”
“What happened in the end?” she echoes quietly, wondering just what she’d missed.
“In the end he saved me,” he admits quietly, “he stopped the drums in my head.”
“Drums….?” Rose quirks an eyebrow. “What like actual drums?”
“No,” he scowls at her. “They were sort of…telepathic…. I’ve been hearing them in my head since I was a child…the infinite schism.”
“What’s that?” Rose asks curiously.
“A tear in the fabric of time,” he explains easily, “when Gallifreyan children are accepted into the academy they must first look into the schism…. bit like a coming of age ceremony.”
“I see,” Rose nods even though it sounds wildly dangerous and not something she’d ever want her own children anywhere near.
“All I wanted,” he tells her pointedly, “all I bloody well wanted was the TARDIS. I wanted to get it running and get off this rock. I didn’t want your planet, I didn’t want the universe….I wanted to simply leave… wander the universe, maybe even make myself as great a hero as your precious Doctor was,” he finishes with each word dripping in sarcasm, a smirk curving his lips as he gazes at her.
“You know everything in that data-bank would tell me you’re making up this whole story just so I’ll let you in the TARDIS,” Rose sighs, crossing her arms over her chest.
“Look,” he says as he levels his gaze upon her. “Just let me help with your little bee problem. If you won’t let me leave this damn planet then at least give me something to do,” he says firmly, “or…. I’m sure I can find a way to entertain myself?” He lets the threat hang in the air and all Rose can imagine is him finding creative ways to wake her up in the early hours of morning or terrorize the maids by tinkering with the vacuum and making it do something awful.
“Well you’ve made it perfectly clear I can’t keep you here even if I wanted to,” Rose growls up at him, “I suppose I haven’t much of a choice, do I?”
“Nope,” he says as he pops the P delightfully and grins at her.
“Fine,” she snaps irritably, “but you will do as I say.”
“Yes ma’am,” he says as he mockingly salutes her.
“You sleep down here; you stay down here…. My family doesn’t want you in this house, your only here because I don’t trust Torchwood not to dissect you.”
“Excellent,” he says as he bends over to yank the black ankle bracelet off. “I can take this off then.”
“How long has that been broken!?” Rose nearly shouts as he stands up straight to grin at her.
“I got it off weeks ago,” he shrugs. “I just rigged it to look like it was still operational.”
Rose stares at him blankly for a moment, internally debating whether she wanted to scream in frustration or walk away. In the end, she walked away, and settled on the living room couch to watch TV until she fell asleep. She awakens to the sound of angry words harshly whispered in a language she hasn’t heard in years. When she finds, him he’s standing in the garden before the TARDIS. Her TARDIS key in his hand and the door to the TARDIS still firmly shut.
“Isomorphic controls,” Rose supplies easily as he stares at the key and then at her. “He wanted to make sure that I’m the only one that key will work for, and that I’ll be the only one who has access to the TARDIS…. just as a safety precaution.”
“Oh he would,” The Master rolls his eyes. “Bit of irony for you right there.”
“What do you mean?” Rose frowns at him.
“Long story…. a story from a life long ago that really does feel like ages…. ages and ages. I’m so bored down here on your silly little planet Rose Tyler,” He sighs and extends the key out towards her, dangling the chain on his left index finger. She takes it back and tucks it away in the pocket of her pajama bottoms before regarding him quietly for a long while. He looks tired and worn, frustration wrinkles his brow and makes him fidget in a way that makes him look restless.
“He planned all this, didn’t he?” The Master says as he looks at her. “He set all this up…he planned on giving you the TARDIS.”
“He probably knew it would be safe here,” Rose shrugs. “Nobody’s going to come looking for a TARDIS in an alternate universe, especially in this one. There aren’t any other Time Lords here, or at least there weren’t until you showed up.”
“Figures,” he groans as he rubs his face. “I finally get some resemblance of my sanity back and I get stuck on Earth. I get stuck on Earth with a run-down TARDIS, a half-human half something former companion, an entire armada of idiot Torchwood lackeys, and your Mother’s cooking.”
“Hey,” Rose scolds lightly, “leave my Mother’s cooking out of this.”
“Your Mothers cooking has room for improvement,” he shakes his head lightly. “Honestly…you should hide the pepper.”
“What do you mean half something former companion?” Rose frowns at him. “I’m entirely human thank you very much.”
“Don’t be stupid,” he says as if she’s being incredibly daft, “you couldn’t possibly be entirely human after becoming Bad Wolf.”
“Well I haven’t exactly been manipulating temporal matter lately so I think we’re safe,” Rose says dryly.
“Have you even tried?” he asks, quirking an eyebrow at her.
“No,” Rose says skeptically, “I seriously doubt I can manipulate time. Believe me if I could I would have stopped you from blowing a hole in the side of my office.”
He regards her for a moment, wrinkling his nose in what could possibly be misconstrued as disgust before turning away from her. “It’s all too coincidental,” he frowns as he gazes up at the TARDIS. “He’d never have left her here if he knew she was dying. When a TARDIS dies all the firewalls drop and she gets bigger on the outside as well.”
“So you think he brought her specifically to me for a reason?” Rose says, stepping beside him to gaze upon the TARDIS also. “You think he’s got plans again?”
“Oh yes Rose Tyler,” he nods as he glances towards her. “The Valeyard’s been planning.”