CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

Deadly Threat

Rose gasped as the darkness engulfed her suddenly, as if someone had just turned off the lights. The fear came instantly. She wasn't in the hallway. She wasn't anywhere identifiable, in fact. The darkness around her never receded as a light - like a spotlight - glowed around her. She could see two feet in any direction, but no further. Whether there were walls or not, she wasn't quite sure. The only thing she knew for sure was that the Master was there.

She felt him before she saw him, stepping out of the shadows and closer to the dim circle of light that separated him from her. But he stayed on the edge of it, circling around to get nearer to her rather than walking through it. She stepped back instinctively, keeping pace with him.

"You've run out of places to hide."

He sounded different. Younger. And the body he wore now - what little she could see of it - had broken the pattern of his previous incarnations. No dark hair, no goatee. But somehow, he still had those same eyes. Those same dangerous, piercing eyes.

"Please." Rose turned in circles, following him, keeping him in her sights and keeping as much distance as she could. "Just leave me alone."

"Well, at least you know how to ask nicely."

He didn't stop circling. Heart pounding against her ribs, she kept pace with him.

"Did he tell you what you would find in here? Your precious Doctor..." He was taunting her, his voice cutting. "Did he ever tell you about his darkness and his secrets? The centuries of lies - pretending everything he did was safe and good and right?"

"He never pretended that." She gulped, trying to keep calm and find a way out. "I know his past isn't perfect. I know he's done and seen things that no one should have to in any life."

"Oh, there's that sympathy again." He smiled wickedly, still circling as if he didn't want to step into the light. "You humans. So much blind love and trust."

"You're right. I do love him. And I do trust him. But I also know him. I know him well enough to know what he's capable of. It's not blind."

"You know him," the Master mocked, smirking at her. "Oh, that's so human! He must eat that up, doesn't he?"

She swallowed the lump in her throat as the Master stopped walking, eyes fixed on her, and lowered his head a fraction. He was eyeing her like prey. It made her heart beat even faster.

"Please. Just let me go."

He paused a moment as if to consider, then smiled as he stepped forward. As he crossed into the light, he breached the one barrier she had left, and she gasped in horror.

"No," he said simply.

"But I don't understand!" She took a step back for every step he took closer, well aware that she was walking into the darkness. "You said yourself, you're not real!"

"Reality itself is a construct. A fiction." He smiled wickedly. "Reality is what you make it."

"But I'm no threat to you, you must know that! Just let me go!"

"Sorry, can't do that."

"Why not?"

He stalked slowly, eyes on fire as he licked his lips. "Maybe I have a need to inflict pain and suffering on lesser species. Or may I want to see the Doctor suffer endlessly for all the times he's insufferably stood in my way throughout the years. Or maybe, just maybe..." He smiled wider. "I just like killing. Just for the pure fun of it. Even if I have to do it with my bare hands."

"Doctor!"

*X*X*X*

"Doctor!"

"What? What is it?"

River was clinging to his arm as he leaned down, studying her. Her eyes were wide with fear as she stared back at him. "Rose. It's Rose. It has to be."

"What? What's wrong?"

"She's..." River swallowed hard, her eyes darting to the unconscious figure on the floor of the Tardis, then back to the Doctor, then to the nearest exit. "She's terrified."

"Terrified of what?"

"I don't know!" Her eyes went back to Rose's body on the floor, and she gasped. "Doctor, look at her."

He spun a bit awkwardly and studied her silently for a few seconds before coming in closer. She was hyperventilating, her face and neck covered in sweat. As he dropped to his knees beside her, he felt her neck for her pulse. It was racing. She was still and silent, but she was frantic.

"I'm pulling her out," River announced.

"No," he answered firmly.

"What do you mean, no! She's terrified!"

He stood and spun to her. "Because if you pull her out you might not be able to send her back in! If she's terrified, she's not dead, and if she's not dead, she can still keep working because in case you haven't noticed, River, he's not reacting in the slightest."

River stared as the Doctor pointed in the direction of his younger self, lying unmoving on the floor. Casting another look down at Rose, the Doctor thought fast, and out loud.

"I can send you in her place but you don't know him. You have no chance of talking sense to him when and if you find him and that's a big if because she hasn't done it yet and she'd know his pathways better than you do. In any case, if you did find him, chances are pretty good he'd simply throw you out. Which means if you pull her out of there and she's in any way damaged, she will have no time to recover before he's dead. I'm dead. Time gets rewritten, here and now."

"What do we do?" River demanded impatiently.

He stared down at Rose for a moment, then at the other body lying still on the floor. There was only one thing they could do.

"No," River said suddenly as the thought occurred to her at the same time. "No, Doctor, you can't do that!"

She stepped between him and the Doctor lying on the floor, blocking his path as he advanced.

"You shouldn't even be in the same time space as him! You can't interact with him and you certainly can't go into -"

"Get out of the way," he interrupted, staring hard at her.

"What makes you think he'd even let you in!"

"If anyone can break down his defenses, I should think it would be me."

"But you can't! It could kill him - you - both!"

"The only risk is if I encounter his consciousness."

"And can you guarantee that you won't?"

"No."

"Then don't do this," she said firmly. "Send me."

"I can't."

"Why the hell not?"

"Because Rose is channeling through you! To put you in, we'd have to pull her out."

"Do it, then. We can put her back in afterwards."

"If her mind can take the stress - if yours can!"

"Well her mind is certainly under stress as it is!"

Anger and frustration mounting, the Doctor took a step forward, crouching in on River's personal space. "And what makes you think you'd be any better equipped than she is to handle the Master?"

River blinked, confused. "The Master?"

"You've never met him, you know nothing about him other than what I've told you."

"But how can she be -"

"Shut up!" he ordered. "We haven't got time."

Swallowing hard, River remained silent. The Doctor lowered his voice as he set his mind on the task at hand. "I know him," he whispered. "He's a creation of my own mind, and I alone know how to stop him. Not you, not Rose."

"If he's merely a creation of your own mind, why is he threatening her in the first place?"

"He's threatening her because I know him. Because he's the Master. And because it's what he would do."

She didn't speak. She was searching him for some reassurance, or some stroke of genius that would find another, less dangerous way of helping Rose. But nothing came. And finally, he nodded slowly.

"River. Trust me." He set his hands on her shoulders. "Please."

Still hesitant, she finally nodded and stepped out of the way. As the Doctor knelt beside the body of his former self, he cast a long look at the hyperventilating woman lying across from him.

"Run, Rose," he whispered, as if she might somehow hear him. "I'm coming."