The silo became frenzied when it was announced over the speakers that the rocket was going to fly; the refugees were going to Utopia. People were crying tears of joy as they packed the rolls of blankets and clothes they had held on for. Couples embraced, children were excitedly telling stories, and grandparents carried grandchildren too young to walk or understand the joy everyone was experiencing.

The lab, which had once been a quiet and somber place, was now full of life as Yana, Dezi, Jack, and the Doctor tried to make the rocket prepared in the shortest time they could. The guards had been pulled from the silo gates to help with the preparations, but that also made them relatively defenseless, and though the gates were closed, gates could be opened.

Martha and Chantho had offered to grab any extra supplies needed and had been sent out a couple of minutes ago. Dezi had planned on joining them, figuring she would be of no help to her brother, but Yana had insisted she stay here, pointing out that they needed someone to work on the computers. Her task really did not exist, or could easily have been done by Jack, but nevertheless she relented and stayed on a stool, keeping an eye on levels and occasionally making sure nothing got too hot by ordering the Doctor and Yana to move on from it.

The two men were now standing on opposite sides of a clear circuit board in the center of the lab – the very same circuit board Dezi had grabbed gluten extract for just earlier that day. She heard a noise from the Doctor, sounding like a scoff. Frowning, she looked over to see him sniffing the cord in his hands before he asked, "Is this..?"

"Yes, gluten extract. Binds the neutralino map together," Yana explained with a nod.

Dezi watched as the Doctor stared at Yana, the cord still held loosely in his hand. He looked down at it and shook his head, "But that's food. You've built this system out of food and string and staples. Professor Yana, you're a genius."

Yana scoffed to himself, an action that Dezi knew was coming the minute the Doctor had started to praise him. Her brother knew he was a genius, she could see it in is eyes every time he had to slow down to explain something to her – a frustration that he understood it so why didn't she? That look had been unbearable as he had gotten older and had talked to others, had seen that no one else thought the same way as him. Now, as an old man, the look never showed up and any praise to him was met with scoffs – not a smile like he used to or even a nod.

"Says the man who made it work," Yana pointed out.

The Doctor quickly shook his head, "Ooh…it's easy coming in at the end but…you're stellar. This is…this is magnificent. I don't often say that 'cause…well, 'cause of me."

"Well, even my title is an affectation. There hasn't been such a thing as a university for over a thousand years. Dezi and I spent our lives going from one refugee ship to another," Yana said somberly, a frown on his face reflecting in the clear glass to where Dezi was sitting.

"He taught himself everything," Dezi called over to the men, "He would read all these books and soon people started noticing him. We were sent here before most because they knew he was a genius and wanted him to work on the rocket."

The Doctor nodded slowly while Yana remained frowning, "See? If you had been born in a different time, you'd be revered," when Yana made of noise of clear protest, the Doctor pushed, "I mean it. Throughout the galaxies."

"Oh, those damned galaxies. They had to go and collapse," Yana said with a shake of his head. He sighed heavily, looking down from the circuit. "Some admiration would have been nice. Just a little. Just once."

Dezi frowned, eyeing her brother from her seat. Surely her brother hadn't forgotten the praise that had been lauded over him; the praise that had landed them in the silo months before others. She could see the Doctor frowning as well, his brow furrowing as he too saw the falsehood in what her brother had said. But then the Doctor looked at the circuit and he nodded slowly, knowingly, "You can't activate it from onboard. It's gotta be from here. You're staying behind," he said in a low voice, "No praise as a child for your brains can match praise for a sacrifice."

Yana didn't reply for a long moment, making the silence stretch between him and the Doctor until it was so thick that Dezi felt like she was choking, "With Dezi and Chantho," he informed in a soft voice, "They won't leave without me. Simply refuses."

She felt the Doctor's eyes on her and she did not shy away from them. She held their gaze proudly as he tilted his head while he studied her, "Yana and I are old," she reminded the far younger man softly, "This new world will have no place for us. We told Chantho she should go but she claimed she did not want to knowing we were dying without her."

The Doctor stared at the siblings, an odd look on his face, "You would both give your lives so they could fly."

"It's time we've slept," Dezi said, the double meaning on her final word clear for all in the room.

A peaceful silence fell over the lab as the two men worked, Dezi kept an eye on levels, and Jack was working on some monitors. It came as quite a shock, making Dezi literally jump in her seat, when the tannoy went off and Lt. Atillo's voice, rushed but cheerful, came out of it, "Professor, tell the Doctor we've found his blue box."

"Ah!" the Doctor cried out at the news.

Dezi frowned as she remembered the green square on the monitor before the Doctor arrived; surely, they had to be connected. Not for the first time did Dezi wonder just how much the Doctor was telling him about himself. All they knew was that he was a Time Lord and a hermit with friends, though the hermit part might have been something he had said defensively when pushed by Dezi.

"Doctor," Jack called over, his voice not rising to a yell but still commanding.

The Doctor hurried over to Jack side and, after some trepidation as she remembered the sickening feeling she got around Jack, Dezi followed him. She looked over the Doctor's shoulder on the very opposite side of Jack to see a blue box with the words 'police call box' engraved on it. The image made Dezi take a step back and place a hand on her stomach as she felt it convulse. She swallowed hard at the bile coming up her throat, just managing to keep it down. Whatever that box was, something about it made Dezi want to destroy it – a violent reaction that she tried to tell herself was not rational. But a voice, a female's voice cold and hard hissed back that it was rational and if she just remembered then she would know why.

The Doctor, Yana, and Jack were oblivious to the discomfort Dezi was feeling. The Doctor clapped Yana on the shoulder with a wide beam on his face and cheerfully informed him, "Professor, it's a wild stab in the dark, but I may just have found the three of you a way out."

As the Doctor and Jack went off to work on something, Dezi looked over at her brother to see him with a distant expression on his face. He placed a hand on the screen, as if he wanted to reach out and touch the blue box. He turned to Dezi and for a moment, he had those wild eyes that scared her. But then there was a clang of outside and whatever had possessed Yana passed. Dezi, however, still felt ill, and this illness was only amplified when she saw the blue box just inside the lab. She couldn't help but feel it was mocking her, laughing at her for how she was reacting to it. After all, it was just a stupidly painted box.

Sucking in a deep breath, she watched as calmly as possible as the Doctor grabbed a chord and plugged it into an outlet, winking at the siblings, "Extra power. Little bit of a cheat, but who's counting?" He turned to Jack and commanded, "Help Dezi with the retro-feeds."

Jack nodded and walked over, giving Dezi a wide smile with bright white teeth practically sparkling at her. Despite Dezi's discomfort, she couldn't help but grudging admit to herself that Jack was useful. She didn't have to explain anything to him twice and he worked in a thankful silence, only occasionally speaking to himself as he figured something out.

The two worked, Dezi hardly noticing when Martha and Chantho returned or when Yana sat down heavily in a chair. While she did glance at her brother in concern, she could see Chantho already heading over to him. She glanced over to Jack, seeing him instruct Martha in a stern manner, ordering her to do the same job she had just done, but quicker. She could see that Martha was taken aback by Jack's harsh tone and had actually shied away from the man when she had responded with a,"Yes, sir."

Going back to her work, Dezi allowed her eyes to flick up to Yana, voyeuristically watching as the Doctor and her brother spoke in a low tone. She could tell Yana was talking about his headaches and the drumming like noises he heard during them. She had always figured that it was just Yana's heartbeat he was hearing but she had never pushed the issue because Yana always got so agitated at the topic and would usually snap at her viciously.

This time, though, it was different. Dezi was surprised to see Yana slowly get to his feet and offer the Doctor a tired smile, just as she was surprised to see the Doctor's brow furrow in clear concern. Biting her lip, she thought about walking over to the Doctor and asking what her brother had said, but Dezi controlled herself and continued working.

Besides monitoring levels, they needed to set up a feed to contact Lt. Atillo so they could keep an eye on the radiation chamber for the rocket. Anyone who went into the room without protective gear would die instantly, and that protective gear would be useless if the levels rose too high. In the lab, they would have to monitor the radiation levels, keeping whoever was in the chamber safe and not vaporized.

Yana was sitting at the computer, waiting for Lt. Atillo to come through, "Professor, are you getting me?" Lt. Atillo's asked, his face slowly appearing on the screen. While it wasn't the clearest or best connection, feedback lines would break through and cut the man's face in half, it would work. It had to work.

"I'm here! We're ready!" Yana shouted back, "Now all you need to do is connect the couplings. Then we can launch," he started to explain to Lt. Atillo, but then the picture cut out completely and Yana cursed and hit the screen, "God sakes! This equipment! Needs rebooting all the time!"

Dezi glanced at the levels, allowing herself a small smile when she saw that they hadn't shifted. Stable was good, stable meant the levels weren't going to suddenly sky rocket. She looked back to see Martha now sitting at the computer, diligently waiting for it to come back on.

"Are you still there?"

"Ah, present and correct. Send your man inside. We'll keep the levels down from here," Yana said from over Martha's shoulder.

There was a pause and then Lt. Atillo's voice came in a softer, stressed filled whisper, "He's inside. And good luck to him."

Dezi turned to Jack, pointing at a dial, "Make sure that stays below the red," she ordered. Jack nodded dutifully.

"Where is that room?" The Doctor asked, pausing in his work to see what was going on.

"It's underneath the rocket. Fix the couplings and the footprint can work. But the entire chamber is flooded with stet radiation," Yana explained, his eyes never leaving the screen.

"Stet? Never heard of it."

"You wouldn't want to. But it's safe enough. We can hold the radiation back from here."

Anxiously, the lab waited in baited breath as the person in the chamber worked on the couplings. When an alarm began to sound, Dezi placed a hand on her beating heart, looking over at the levels, "That's 0.2; keep it level," she reminded him, looking at the scanner. 0.2 wasn't close to the red, but anywhere besides 0.01 was too close for comfort. Stet radiation was tricky and could easily jump levels. It was equally as likely for the levels to go to 0.4 or 100 next.

The lights flickered ominously before shutting off, red lights turning on automatically. Alarms started to blast through the lab. Exchanging horrified looks, Dezi and Jack started to work on the levels frantically, trying to bring them down. But every time Dezi risked a glance at the levels, she could see the arrow pointing closer and closer to the red.

"Radiation's rising," she warned Yana in a tight voice.

"We've lost control!" Jack corrected.

Yana turned to the monitor and warned Lt. Atillo desperately, "The chamber's going to flood."

The Doctor turned to Jack, pointing his finger at him as he shouted his command, "Jack! Override the vents!"

Dezi continued work frantically as Jack tried to override the vents, hoping that sucking the radiation out would give the person in the chamber just a bit more time. But it was no use and Jack growled in frustration, hitting the console with his hand.

Looking over at him, Dezi paused as he saw him look at two live cables on the ground, sparking intensely, "You're not…" she said slowly, her eyes widening as Jack walked over to the cables and held them up so they were chest level.

"We can jump start the override!" He told the Doctor.

Even as the Doctor yelled out in protest, "Don't! It's going to flare!" Jack pressed the cables together. Just as the Doctor had warned, the cables flared and the current flowed through Jack. All the other occupants of the lab could do was watch as Jack cried out before falling to the ground, dead.

Martha ran over to Jack's body, the first to react to the sudden death, "I've got him," she told the others, her voice rushed but still calm.

Chantho started to edge over to the cables which were still close to Jack and Martha, "Chan—don't touch the cables—tho," she warned as she nudged the cables aside.

Dezi stepped out from behind the levels, placing a hand on Yana's shoulder when she met up with him. Seeing any death was hard, but as she and Yana got older, death touched them in a different way. It was almost a reminder of what was coming for them, "Oh, I'm so sorry," Yana said in a soft voice, turning to the Doctor with a grim frown as Martha started CPR.

The Doctor had not moved from his spot and was just staring at Jack's body, an odd, thoughtful expression on his face as he watched the corps, "The chamber's flooded with radiation, yes?"

"The engines cannot start without the couplings," Dezi reminded him with a frown, "This was all for nothing."

"Oh I don't know," the Doctor replied. He finally moved towards Jack, but it was only to pull Martha away from him, "Martha, leave him."

"You've gotta let me try," Martha protested, fighting against the Doctor's grip.

The Doctor just turned Martha to him, looking her in the face with a stern expression on his face, "Come on. Come on. Just listen to me. Now leave him alone," he ordered. When Martha nodded, though it was clear she did not agree with the Doctor, he turned to Yana with a half-smile on his face, "It strikes me, Professor, you've got a room a man can't enter without dying. Is that correct?"

Yana stared at the Doctor, his face dropping at the reminder of the situation they were in. Dezi felt herself bristled at the man's question, but before she could snap at the man, Yana answered, "Yes."

"Well…" the Doctor started, his voice trailing off as Jack jerked upright, gasping for air desperately. While everyone jumped, the Doctor just calmly removed his glasses and gave Yana a smile, "I've got just the man."

"Was someone kissing me?" Jack asked, his hand going to his mouth with a frown.


It took no effort to get Jack to agreed to go to a chamber full of stet radiation, even when Dezi informed him of all the nasty side effects stet had given to the few who had survived an encounter with it. Yana ended up being the one that needed convincing. He had paced back and forth while trying to work it out before the Doctor gently cut into his ramblings to say, "He's impossible."

Yana had ended up needing to sit down, rubbing his head as he watched Jack and the Doctor run from the lab.

Dezi, looking down at the levels, shook her head at her own actions. There would be no gain to see that the chamber was completely filled with stet radiation, and clearly he would survive it. So she walked over to Martha and stood next to her, waiting as Martha tried to contact the Doctor, "We lost picture when that thing flared up. Doctor, are you there?" Martha asked after checking her watch to make sure she had given the Doctor and Jack enough time to run to the chamber.

"Receiving, yeah. He's inside." The Doctor reported, his tone causal and blithe.

"And still alive?"

"Oh, yes."

From his chair, Yana looked over at the screen with wide eyes, "But he should evaporate. What sort of a man is he?" He asked Martha.

Martha frowned and turned in the chair to look at Yana properly, "I've only just met him. The Doctor sort of travels through time and space and picks people up. God, I make us sound like stray dogs. Maybe we are."

"Time travel?" Dezi scoffed, her arms crossing.

When Martha nodded, Yana let out a slow 'puff' of air, "He travels in time?" He breathed.

Martha shrugged, "Don't ask me to explain it. That's a TARDIS. The sports car of time travel, he says."

Dezi slowly looked over at the blue box, the TARDIS. The name, like the few times she had heard it before in her head, sounded familiar. She winced, feeling an almost echo of the word shifting from Martha's voice to the same cold female as before, 'That's a TARDIS…'That's a TARDIS…'

"Martha," Dezi asked, making the woman look at her, "Does time traveling have symptoms or side effects?"

Martha paused, mulling the question over, "Headaches, confusion, and nausea, though the last bit might be because the Doctor's a bad driver."

Dezi frowned; she thought about asking whether or not voices went along with the headaches, but she thought better of it. Martha seemed smart enough to know that hearing voices was not normal anywhere, including at the silo. So she kept her mouth shut, listening instead to the conversation the Doctor was having with Jack.

"That's why I left you behind. It's not easy even just…just looking at you Jack, 'cause you're wrong," the Doctor was explaining, his voice almost hoarse with a remembered pain.

"Thanks."

"You are, I can't help it. I'm a Time Lord. It's instinct. It's in my guts. You're a fixed point in time a space. You're a fact. That's never meant to happen. Even the TARDIS reacted against you—tried to shake you off. Flew all the way to the end of the universe just to get rid of you."

"So what you're saying is that you're, uh, prejudiced?"

"I never thought of it like that."

"Yeah."

Dezi frowned as the conversation continued. Some of the words, like TARDIS, seemed to echo in her mind, 'Time Lord…fixed point,' she winced and rubbed at her forehead, feeling a pit settle in her stomach as the two men continued.

"Last thing I remember back when I was mortal…I was facing three Daleks. Death by extermination. And then I came back to life. What happened?"

The word 'Dalek…' echoed in Dezi's head so loudly that they drowned out what the Doctor and Jack were saying to each other.

"No one's ever mean to have that power. If a Time Lord did that, he'd become a god, a vengeful god. But she was human," the Doctor was saying when Dezi was finally able to hear him.

She wanted to ask who they were talking about, but a glance at Martha's face – which was in a firm frown – made her hold her tongue. Whoever the Doctor and Jack were talking about, Martha clearly did not like her, "Do you think she could change me back?"

"I took the power out of her. She's gone, Jack. She's not just living on a parallel world, she's trapped there. The walls have closed."

"I'm sorry."

"Yep."

All the words now were starting to mull together, making it hard to think, let alone listen to what the Doctor was saying. As if it might help she took a step back from the monitor, and then another, but that just put her closer to the TARDIS. Just look at the box made her wince from a sudden stab of pain. Starting to become concerned, she looked over at Yana to see if he had noticed. But he seemed to be just as distant as Dezi was not a few moments earlier. He was staring at the TARDIS his hand raised as if he wanted to touch it. When Yana turned around, his hand falling limply to his side, Dezi frowned as she saw tears running down his face.

As if some sort of signal had gone off, Martha also turned around, taking in the two siblings, "What's wrong?" She asked, though the source of her concern was unclear.

"Chan—Professor, what is it—tho?" Chantho asked, looking at Yana.

Yana shook his head slowly, "Time travel. They say there was time travel back in the old days. I never believed. But what would I know? I'm just a stupid old man. Never could keep time. Always late, always lost. Even this thing never worked," he explained bitterly, pulling out a familiar fob watch and looking down at it.

The fob watch, broken since Dezi and Yana could remember, was a part of a pair – Dezi had the other one. Both had circles raised on the once silver surface, but the circles were in different patterns. When they were young, both had pretended the broken watches meant something different – that they were different. But as time went on, they had never paid attention to the watches, allowing them to collect dust in their jacket pocket.

"Time and time and time again. Always running out on me," Yana said with a shake of his head, glancing briefly at the watch.

Martha got up from the chair and walked over to Yana, an odd expression on her face as she stared down at the watch, "Can I have a look at that?" She asked in a slow voice.

Yana frowned slightly, "Oh, it's only an old relic," he said with a chuckle. "Like me."

"I don't think mine is that old," Dezi protested lightly. Without even thinking about it, she pulled the watch from her own pocket, looking at briefly, "I am younger."

Martha stared at the two, her eyes widening as she took in not one, but two fob watches. Two very, very familiar fob watches, "Where did you get them?"

"Hm?" Yana hummed, not really paying attention in favor of staring at the fob watch. It had been such a long time since he had truly looked at it…he had forgotten how the circles used to reflect the light, how they had become a source of amusement for two bored children.

"We were found with it," Dezi answered, not even noticing how light and airy her voice had become as she too was looking at her fob watch with newfound curiosity.

"What do you mean?"

"Yana and I were orphans in a storm," Dezi recited, "He and I were naked – he was a child and I was just a baby in his arms. We were found off the coast of the Silver Devastation. Abandoned with only the watches."

"Have you opened it?"

"Why would we? It's broken," Yana reminded Martha slowly, moving his gaze from his watch to look at Martha with growing concern.

"How do you know it's broken if you never opened it?" Martha challenged.

Yana blinked, looking over at Dezi with a frown, "I don't know," he answered, looking back down at the fob watch.

"Does it matter?" Dezi asked Martha, looking up from her fob watch.

"No. It's…nothing. It's…Listen, everything's fine up here. I'm gonna see if the Doctor needs me," her rushed sentence done, Martha hurried from the room, leaving Yana and Dezi to look at the fob watches in their hands and Chantho to watch them carefully.


The Doctor was surprised when he heard a clatter of feet from someone, and even more surprised when that clattered turned out to be Martha. He didn't really pay much attention to her, instead focusing on sending the rocket off as quickly as possible.

Martha, however, not excepting this, moved in front of his work so he had to look at her, "Doctor, it's the professor and Dezi. They've got these watches. They've got fobwatches. They're the same as yours. Same writing on it. Same…everything," she explained quickly, her hand flapping a bit as she spoke.

"Don't be ridiculous," the Doctor said with a frown. It was impossible to be the same fobwatch as his – each one was created specifically for the Time Lord; they always had the name of the Time Lord, or Lady, on it. They could not have his.

"I asked them. They said they've had it all their lives," Martha pressed.

"So they've got the same watches," Jack said from somewhere behind the Doctor, also working to make the rocket fly.

"Yeah, but it's not a watch. It's this chameleon thing," Martha tried to explain to Jack.

Knowing that her explanation made no sense to him, and he actually knew what she was talking about, the Doctor chimed into the conversation, "No, no, no. It's this…This thing, this device, it rewrites biology, changes a Time Lord into a human."

"And it's the same watch," Martha repeated empathetically.

The Doctor shook his head and set his mouth into a hard line, "It can't be," he protested with a firm note in his voice.

His attention was taken by an alarm blaring. Recognizing it, the Doctor quickly headed over to the levers needed to fix it and worked on it. His mind was whirling with what Martha was implying. He had already noted how similar the professor was to…an old friend. An old enemy, really. They had spent much longer as foes trying to kill each other then childhood friends. That old enemy had had a sister too, though the Doctor had never really been around the sister. A few hundred years younger than them, she was still at the Academy. He had hoped it was a coincident, but if Martha was telling the truth...

"That means he could be a Time Lord. You might not be the last one," Jack said, voicing what the Doctor already was thinking.

Instead of answering him, the Doctor barked, "Jack, keep it level!"

"But that's brilliant, isn't it?" Martha asked, staring at the Doctor with her wide eyes and a smile on her face.

The Doctor stared at the console, unable to look at Martha and see how hopeful she was about the entire thing. He didn't hold it against her – he was prone to making the past better than it was – but it still made him frustrated to see her happy about this possibility. As hypocritical as it was, he still replied with, "Yes, it is. Course it is." And then he paused, thinking back on the conversation he had with Yana about the drums in his head, "Depends which one. Brilliant, fantastic, yeah. But they died, the Time Lords. All of them, they died."

"Not if they were human," Jack pointed out.

Swallowing hard, the Doctor turned to Martha, a horrible thought hitting him. To get so much information from the siblings she had to have pressed them to a point where they were actively thinking on the watch and if they were actively thinking…"What did they say, Martha?" When Martha didn't reply he repeated himself at a yell, "What did they say?"

Martha inhaled sharply at the sudden burst from the Doctor, "They looked at the watches like they could hardly see it. Like that perception filter thing," she remembered, closing her eyes as she spoke.

"What about now? Can they see it now?"


Dezi stared down at the watch, aware that her brother was doing the same with his. She could hear voices, so many voices swirling around in her head, 'The TARDIS. The time vortex. Time travel. Time Lord.'

She couldn't tell the source of where the voices came from, nor could she tell who had said in the first place. All she could tell was that they were all shifting to a hard female's voice, 'The voices all the damn time. Never-ending, never stopping. Open me. Open the light and summon me and remember who you are. Remember him.'

She wasn't aware of Chantho edging towards them, her bug-like face filled with concern, "Chan – Dezi and Yana, won't you please take some rest – tho?"


"If they escaped the Time War then it's the perfect place to hide. The end of the universe," Jack theorized.

The Doctor continued to work on the rocket. They were so close to getting it launched, he just needed to do two more things.

"Think of what the Face of Boe said. His dying words. He said…" as Martha reminded him of something he had not forgotten, the Doctor set off the rocket.

And then he felt it, a consciousness he not only recognized but knew personally. How could he forget the feeling when they had first spoken mentally? And then he felt another consciousness and he felt his mouth dry as he recognized that one as well. Everyone would…the mad woman was known across Gallifrey even when she was at the Academy. He'd met her once and it had scared him far more than her brother's drums ever did.

As Martha repeated what the Face of Boe had said, the Doctor raced over to the computer and typed it 'Y.'

"You."

'A.'

"Are."

'N."

"Not."

'A.'

"Alone."

When the Doctor was done, 'YANA' blinked on the computer screen, and the Doctor felt like his stomach had been turned to ice as he stared out at the familiar word. How could he have been so blind? The Face of Boe had tried to warn him with his dying breath and he had thrown that sacrifice away by not noticing. Dezi even had the same name...always Dezi, never anything else because she had left with her brother on her graduation day instead of taking a title. He had never seen her again, even when he was fighting her brother and he had shoved her out of his mind, but that was no excuse. He should have remembered.


In the lab, Chantho said in a soft, squeaky voice, "Chan—Professor Yana and Dezi—tho?"

For the first time, Dezi noticed how annoying the little insect was. She scoffed at herself for thinking Chantho was her friend. Chantho was nothing but a pest. She turned slowly, aware her brother was doing the same. By the way Chantho's face dropped, Dezi knew their eyes must have changed, that their faces must have hardened.


Worried that he had done something to the rocket, the Doctor grabbed the phone connected to it and yelled into it, "Lieutenant, have you achieved velocity? Have you done it? Lieutenant! Have you done it?"

"Affirmative. We'll see you in Utopia."

Not wasting time to correct the man, the Doctor hung up the phone and then sprinted for the lab, Martha and Jack hot on his heels. He knew, though, with every beat of his hearts that they knew he was coming and they would stop him.


Dezi's brother casually threw a lever to lock the main door, "That won't stop him for long," Dezi muttered. The Doctor was a determined man when things were taken from him or harmed and now they had his TARDIS. No Time Lord would ever part with their TARDIS, especially if they've bonded with it, which the Doctor surely was. He was one of those Time Lords who thought the TARDIS' were alive and not just helpful tools.

"Chan—but you've locked them in—tho," Chantho squeaked in protest.

Dezi's brother gave Chantho what he thought might be a friendly smile – something that 'Yana' would have given her, perhaps, "Not to worry, my dear. As one door closes, another must open."

He nodded to Dezi and she gleefully flipped the switch, knowing that the main gate had just been powered down and the Futurekind would be scurrying into the silo.

"Chan—you must stop—tho!"

This time neither sibling bothered to placate the distressed Chantho, instead choosing to work in the lab quickly in effectively. While they had the Doctor squirming now, Dezi was right when she had warned that the door would not hold him back for long. If they wanted to fulfill the plans they had created as soon as they had awoken, they had to be quick.

"Chan—but you've lowered the defences! The Futurekind will get in—tho!" Chantho protested from somewhere behind them. When neither answered her, she spoke again but in a more mournful tone, "Chan—Professor and Dezi, I'm so sorry but I must stop you two. You're both destroying all our work—tho."

The words, the implications in them really, made the siblings turn to see Chantho holding a safety gun. It was only stocked with one bullet and it was made specifically to kill the shooter if the Futurekind ever got in. Dezi smirked, knowing that Chantho would go for her brother first. She looked to him, delighting to see a matching smirk on his face as he held out one of the live cables that had killed dashing Jack, "Oh…now I can say I was provoked," he said in a low voice. Chantho stared at the wire, her hand shaking heavily as she struggled to fire her gun, "Did you never think, in all those years standing beside us, to ask about those watches? Never? Did you never think, not ever, that you could set us free?"

"Chan—I'm sorry—tho. Chan—I'm so sorry," Chantho whimpered.

Her brother just rolled his eyes, "And you with your 'chan' and your 'tho' driving me insane," he snapped savagely.

"Chan—Professor, please—" Chantho begged, her eyes widening as Dezi's brother advanced on her slowly, menacingly.

"That is not my name! The Professor…was an invention; just like how Dezi was an invention. So perfect a disguise that we forgot who we are."

"Chan—who are you—tho?" Chantho asked, her eyes skirting between the siblings.

"I am the Master," the Master said, "And she is Dezi." He thrusted the cable forward and Dezi watched as Chantho died.

The insect laid on the floor was no longer distraction from their work. Dezi started to work on making sure they had everything. She looked over to see the Master pick up the Doctor's hand and stare at it; he placed his hands on the glass around it, watching as the fingers trembled.

"Professor!" the Doctor had finally arrived to the lab door and was pounding on the glass, "Dezi, Professor, let me in! Let me in! Jack, get the door open!"

Ignoring him easily, the Master walked over the navigation chart, the one leading to 'Utopia,' and stared down at it with a scoff.

"Professor! Dezi! Professor, Dezi, where are you two?! Professor! Dezi! Professor, Dezi, are you two there?! Please, I need to explain! Whatever you two do, don't open those watches!"

"Utopia," Dezi sneered, walking up behind her brother. Her brother shook his head, crumbling up the navigation chart in favor of picking up the circuit board to hand to Dezi.

"It's heavy," he warned tauntingly. In response, she stuck her tongue out at him.

"Professor! Dezi!"

As Dezi set the circuit board in the TARDIS next to the Doctor's hand, the Master started to pull the cables from the machine.

"Open the door, please! I'm begging you both, Professor! Dezi! Please! Listen to me!"

Dezi clucked her tongue, "I'm weary of him," she announced. She turned to go and snap at him, to taunt him into silence…but all she felt was a burning pain as Chantho shot her with the forgotten gun.

"How dare you!" The Master roared, turning at the noise and taking in the sight of his little sister bleeding and Chantho holding the gun that had harmed her. He grabbed the second live cable and thrusted it at Chantho, succeeding in killing her. Turning to his sister, he swore in a forgotten language.

"I need to regenerate," Dezi murmured haltingly.

The Master nodded slowly. Carefully, he lifted her into the TARDIS, moving her out of sight from the door even as the Doctor finally succeeded with his quest to get into the lab. He moved to the front, just outside the TARDIS and smirked as the Doctor ran frantically into the room and took it in. When the Doctor spotted him, the Master thrilled at how his eyes darken and his face hardened. He took a step, but the Master backed into the TARDIS and locked it. He strolled to the console, flipping as switch that prevented the Doctor from being able to open the TARDIS with his own key. Hearing a whirling noise, he flipped another switch that made it impossible for the Doctor to use his screwdriver as well.

"Deadlocked," he pronounced.

Clearly the Doctor had been around humans far too long, because his next step to get in was brute force. He pounded on the TARDIS doors, "Let me in! Let me in! I'm begging you! Everything's changed! It's only the three of us! We're the only ones left!"

As if Dezi hadn't already told him that. The Master scoffed, making sure the Doctor heard him. He turned to his sister, smiling grimly as a golden glow appeared around her. He made no move to keep away from the incoming regeneration, even though he knew the rules. Any Time Lord or Lady close to a regenerating Time Lord or Lady would regenerate as well. The rule had made it so easy for the Daleks to win in the Time War; all they need was to trigger one regeneration and then everyone around would regenerate as well, creating a mass slaughter.

"Just let me in," the Doctor cried out frantically.

The Master did not reply, choosing to allow his last moments as an old man to focus on what form he wanted next. As the golden light started around him, matching the one around his sister, the Master couldn't help but chuckle, "If the Doctor can be young and strong, then so can we."

Despite how much he didn't want to, the Master screamed out along with his sister. The golden light filled the TARDIS as if it too wanted to make sure the Doctor knew exactly what was happening and exactly what he couldn't stop.

When the regeneration process was done, the Master woke up on the grown next to the Doctor's hand. He looked up to see Dezi staring down at him, looking as if she was in her mid- to late thirties with blonde hair and dark blue eyes. She was short too, only about 5'1.

"We're both blonde, Kosch," Dezi reported with a small smile that her brother gave back.

She helped him to his feet and they looked outside at the door, hearing the frantic yells from the Doctor and his band of humans.

"Young?" The Master asked, and Dezi nodded.

"Ha, ha! Ha, ha, ha!" As if he wanted to prove it to himself, he ran around the console, making sure to not hit Dezi as she turned on the speaker so their voices would be projected to the Doctor and his friends, "Doctor – " Dezi started in what sounded like a low and menacing voice, but then she giggled, "I don't think I can pull that off."

Laughing at her, the Master took his turn to speak to the Doctor, "Hello," he greeted in a high-pitched voice, "Hello," he repeated in a much lower voice, "Hello," he said normally, "Anyway, why don't we stop and have a nice little chat while I tell you all my plans and you can work out a way to stop me? I don't think!"

"I'm asking you really properly! Just stop! Just think!" The Doctor yelled.

"If you want us to, use our names," Dezi demanded.

"Master, Dezi. I'm sorry."

"Tough!" The Master nodded to Dezi who started the controls for the TARDIS.

The Doctor did something with his screwdriver outside that made the console spark. Dezi jerked back from it, hissing at the burn, "You hurt my sister!" The Master snapped. He took over for the controls, getting the TARDIS back to taking off, "End of the universe. Have fun. Bye bye!"

"Doctor, stop them!" Martha yelled.

But it was too late. Dezi knew the Doctor would be standing there, a horrified expression on his face as he stared at the TARDIS taking off with Dezi and the Master inside.


In case anyone is wondering, I picture Dezi to look a bit like Elizabeth Banks only with a slightly lighter hair color. Her theme song for this regeneration is Rebel Rebel by David Bowie.

As for this chapter, I hope it makes sense that the Doctor would write off Dezi having the same name. I mean the Master practically told him about the drums and the Doctor just brushed him off. I feel like the Doctor gets so hung up on being the hero and saving everyone he doesn't notice important detail until it's too late.

I also hope it makes sense that the Doctor didn't really know Dezi. There was an age difference and then the Master headed off with her before the Doctor did. Even if they spoke a few times, who would remember their best friend's younger sibling? He only knew her by reputation.

And now...review time:

NicoleR85: Thank you!

skye-speedy: While I can't answer your questions, I will promise that the Master knows quite a bit about his little sister and she hides nothing from him.

time-twilight: That question will be answered soon. I hope you enjoyed the chapter.

PrincessMagic: Thanks!

I'll see everyone next week!