The Master screamed at him just as angrily as he had six hundred years ago, demanding that he open the doors to the ship, that they go back. Wilf hurried off to get a sedative and Jack stood aside with his hand in his pocket, ready to pull out a gun any second.

He had intended to talk to the Master and try to bring him down. If he could risk touching him, he might have tried to slip inside his mind and calm him down that way. But it was hard to look into that face. Even though its shape had changed and its eyes were a different colour, it looked exactly the same.

"He's slipping. I don't know what to do. Please."

He remembered reading those words on his psychic paper and not needing to even think twice about who it might be from. It had been eighty years since he had married and the Master had left to follow his own path. They had seen each other very rarely since and each time the Master seemed more different—more feral. He was paranoid and angry and had been growing quite the temper. He had also heard some terrifying rumours about people going missing or hearing a voice in their heads that told them to do unspeakable things.

The drums had finally taken hold of him.

Qhoya had always been a loving woman and she put up with the Master far longer than anyone else would have. She was convinced that she could save her brother if she only had enough time. Finally, the day came when she called out to the Doctor, begging for help. How could he ignore it?

Some good old-fashioned travelling would be sure to help, just like the old days. The Master needed work and adventure to keep his mind from falling victim to itself, and that strategy had worked perfectly until they went their separate ways. Maybe it would work again?

"Master, you need to listen to me," he said slowly, putting his hands on the Master's face and looking into his eyes with urgency. "That was all so long ago. We are past all this now."

"What are you talking about? She's still out there!"

"No, she's not. She's not, I promise," he answered quickly. "We lived this already. Things are so different now."

Jack be damned, this was too important to worry about privacy now. He kept his hands firmly on the Master's face and pulled him into a kiss, trying desperately to pull his scattered mind back to the present. If he could just transfer a little narin he might be able to shift the Master's thoughts around and bring him down.

But the Master pulled away quickly and slapped him hard across the face. "What the hell do you think you're doing? We are not leaving her!"

Qhoya had left Gallifrey with them, hoping that they could work together to bring the Master back to himself. For a while they travelled peacefully, enjoying each other's company except for the occasional slip on the Master's part. It was so easy to make him angry and so difficult to calm him down. When he got upset he could be so cruel and, worse, he was beginning to get physically aggressive.

When they came across a city that was experiencing a virus outbreak, it seemed that the drive to achieve a particular goal helped the Master focus. They didn't fight for almost the entire mission and the Master had proved more help than hindrance for the first time in days. It looked hopeful that maybe he could be saved after all.

"Qhoya is dead," he said as calmly as he could. "I'm sorry. I am so sorry but I couldn't save her."

"I can still hear her! She's still alive!"

"What's he saying?" Jack sounded nervous, his hand slowly withdrawing his gun. "Doctor, what's happening?"

They found the source of the virus and managed to quarantine the infected with the kind of speed that he could only achieve when working in tandem with his old friend. They worked feverishly on a cure, but nothing was working and the patients were dying so fast that it wouldn't help anyone soon anyway. They had done all they could. All that was left was to help the infected until they passed and destroy the original specimen harbouring the virus.

At some point Qhoya had slipped away without them noticing. She had decided to deal with the virus source on her own and went to the quarantined lab. They didn't realize that anything was happening until the communicators in their safety suits came alive with the sound of her coughing.

"I'm sorry," he repeated, stepping forward and trying to touch him again.

But the Master cried out with rage and swung a fist at him, just like he had back then. The fist luckily missed his face and hit him with a heavy thump in the chest instead, though it prompted Jack to finally pull his gun out and point it at the Master.

"Look at my face," he urged. "My face is different. So is yours. And the TARDIS, see how she's changed? This is a different time."

He remembered hearing the Master's voice in his ear, calling out over the communicator in fear. He wanted to know where she was and why she had gone there. Why was she coughing? What were her symptoms? The patients were dying all around them and nothing they could do would save them, and now the Master could hear Qhoya coughing somewhere.

She had torn her suit. A stupid mistake, she explained with laboured breath. She had been setting up the computer to initiate its purge sequence for the lab and she accidentally activated one of the laser scalpels, burning the tiniest of holes into her glove.

"Tell your dog he better put that weapon away unless he intends to use it," the Master hissed venomously. "Before I break his neck."

"Jack, put the gun away," he ordered, being sure to speak clearly in English now. "Threatening him won't make this better. He already feels that you're a natural threat and a gun in the hands of an immortal man is not going to improve his mood."

"He hit you," Jack answered simply. "Twice."

"Wilfred will be back soon and it won't matter. Put the gun away."

They could hear her dying over the communicators and they all knew that it was too late. Qhoya said goodbye to her brother with kind and loving words, asking him to fight for the goodness left in him. Even as she spoke, the Master was running for the lab, acting off of pure instinct without a single thought to the consequence.

They couldn't save her. It was simply too late. Trying to get in that lab could release the virus once again and he simply couldn't risk that, besides the lab likely would purge before they even got near it. Maybe if he was faced with the same situation today he could save her, but back then he was young and inexperienced.

In their very first bodies, the Master may have been tall but he was very thin and not very strong, so it had been easy to hold him back. He dragged him back to the TARDIS, hoping to keep him inside until he could calm down and accept the situation. But as they listened to Qhoya's coughing growing louder and more frequent, the Master begged to go back for her.

"I'm not putting it away until you get him under control," Jack said stubbornly. "There are still people on this ship that can die, and a lot more outside. I'm not letting this maniac hurt anyone without a fight."

"He won't put the gun down," the Doctor told the Master quickly in his native tongue. "Because he's afraid of you. He's only afraid. If we can just calm down and talk about this, he'll put it away."

Before the Master could answer Wilfred hurried back into the room, clumsily hiding the syringe behind his back. The old man approached the Master with very little caution, beginning to assure him that everything was alright. Wilfred didn't get within fifteen feet before the Master snarled a threat in Gallifreyan.

"Wilfred, step back," the Doctor said calmly.

"He won't hurt me," Wilf answered in almost disbelief.

"He will. He's not himself right now, trust me."

They could hear her ragged breathing, her painful coughing, until the lab finished its countdown. They heard the whoosh of flames and a brief second of her screaming before the sound cut out, and then the Master lost his last ounce of control.

He launched himself at the Doctor, just as he did now. He called him a selfish bastard and a murderer and a coward while he delivered blow after blow in his blind fury.

In their past days, the two had grappled and fought until the Master finally pinned the Doctor down with his hands around his throat. He realized then that the Master was beyond coming back and that he would die if he didn't fight. A tough struggle and a few good kicks managed to knock the Master off, but he didn't know what to do next. When the Master flew at him again, all he could think to do was pick up one of the hard helmets from their suits that had been dropped on the floor and hit him in the head with it as hard as he could. The visor shattered and the Master fell, but when he saw the Master trying to get back up with that same rage in his eyes, he acted purely out of instinct.

He picked up a shard of the shattered visor and drove it straight into the Master's belly.

"Doctor!"

A gunshot went off somewhere but he was only vaguely aware of it. There were fists striking him, rattling his thoughts into a blurred mess and making it difficult to stand. He couldn't look away from the anger and the pain in those eyes, couldn't stop thinking about how he had caused them to look like that. Another gunshot ripped through the air and suddenly the Master was falling, just like he had before.

He remembered listening to the Master gasp for air and looking into those bright blue eyes, dying for the very first time. He remembered the sting in his fingers from where the shard had cut him while gripping it, and the warm sensation of the Master's blood pouring out of him. He pulled the shard out, crying out and screaming at the Master that he was sorry. He didn't mean to. He hadn't wanted to hurt him. He was so very sorry.

Now, as Wilfred injected the sedative, those now brown eyes looked up at him with a look of sudden clarity. "Did I hurt anyone?"

"No, everyone's fine, Harry," Wilfred answered quickly. "You'll be fine too. Just rest now."

The Master looked up at him fearfully, his eyes clouding over as the sedative took effect. Jack had made the first shot a warning, and the second a takedown. The bullet had ripped straight through the leg, knocking him down without causing irreparable damage.

"It's going to be okay," the Doctor confirmed. "I've got you. It's just a scratch. You'll be fine."

"It wasn't your fault," the Master's words slurred together slightly as he spoke. "I know that. I'm sorry. I'm sorry for this."

"It's okay. Just go to sleep, alright? You have a rest and everything will be better in the morning. Listen to me, Master, everything is just fine."

"Doctor," The Master's eyes were beginning to slide shut, but he managed to get out one last whisper. "My name is Harry."

That day had been their very last adventure together. The uncertainty about their relationship had finally been put to an end when those blue eyes looked up at him and quivering lips choked out some of the hardest words he'd ever heard.

"I will hurt you for this, Doctor. For everything. I will make you suffer."

He remembered kissing the Master's forehead, touching those black curls one last time before they were gone. There was no going back now, he knew. His friend was gone forever.

While the Master gasped and groaned in pain on the floor, he had run over the console to take off. He didn't know what else to do, so he simply took the Master home. The TARDIS landed at the edge of the red fields, outside the great stone building where his family lived, and flung open the doors.

As he and Jack worked together to lift the Master off the floor and get him to the medical room, he remembered Jinnar helping him doing the same thing so many years ago. Jinnar was the youngest in the family, his eyes full of fear and uncertainty as he stared at the gaping wound and listened to the terrible sounds escaping the Master's mouth. The boy was nearly in tears by the time they laid him down.

On that day, so very long ago, the Doctor carried his friend inside the home of his parents and left him there. The moment that Master's skin began to glow, he ran. He couldn't watch brand new eyes open full of hatred and he couldn't bear facing a mother who had just lost a child.

"What the hell were you thinking?" he growled at Jack as they lifted the Master onto his operation table. "You could have killed him!"

"He could've killed you!" Jack shouted back. "I told you he's dangerous! The guy has a flashback about his daughter and all of a sudden he's a threat to everyone around him. What if he got Wilfred?"

"Don't you use me to make him sound bad," Wilfred answered sternly. "I knew the risks when I signed up. The boy is ill—"

"He's not a boy, Wilfred," Jack sounded exasperated. "He's a man who has committed crimes most of us can only imagine with full knowledge and intent. You both might think he's some helpless patient but I haven't forgotten what he's capable of."

"Don't talk about things you don't understand, Jack."

"I'm the only one here who does understand. You've both deluded yourselves into thinking that everything he's done is in the past and we can all be friends and play house together. You're making a huge mistake with this guy—"

"That's enough!" he roared, earning a moment of stunned silence. "In case you've forgotten, there's a man here with a bullet in his leg. Unless you intend to help me remove it, you can get out."

Jack stood and glared at him a moment before speaking again. "I am not apologizing for saving your life."

"Get out!"

As his old companion swept from the room like a storm, a part of him did feel bad for Jack. It was unfair to be angry with him when all he was doing was what he thought was necessary. Whatever actions he had taken, he was still only trying to help. A bullet in the leg was certainly nothing to get worried about when it came to a Time Lord, and with some rest and an accelerator the Master would be back on his feet in a day or two. Jack could have easily shot him in the chest or in the head, but he had been careful not to do anything too harmful. Still, the Doctor couldn't help feeling angry over it.

Once he had the Master patched up and settled in his bed he would go to Jack and apologize. In the meantime he had work to do.

"You should teach me how to do stitches," Wilf said quietly as he slid a pillow under the Master's head and went to find a blanket. "With you two always finding ways to hurt yourselves, it might be a good idea to have an extra person who can put you back together."

He agreed and the two stayed silent for a moment as they gathered the supplies they were going to need. He thought about the night before and how wonderful it had been. He had let the thrill of it all get to his head and didn't stop to think about how badly things could still go if the Master wasn't cared for properly.

Wilfred was entirely right about overexerting him, and he didn't even know what they'd been up to in the night. Their activities were physically tiring as it was, but they both fully embraced the narin and let their minds meld together—something that felt amazing at the time, but were also quite exhausting on a mental and emotional level. It was a level of intimacy that their people usually saved for special occasions and days when not much else was expected of them, but it had been so long since he had been with someone who was even capable of that connection that he just dove into it. He had had a few other partners since being widowed, but nothing quite compared to the purity of fusing your soul with another person as well as your body.

He felt a bit guilty about it now. He should have known that the Master wasn't ready for it, or at least not without being able to get sufficient rest afterwards. He had pushed out the doctor part of his mind the moment he decided he wanted to invite the Master to his bed, and embraced every particle of narin he tasted without any thought to the consequence.

He was shocked out of his train of thought when something cold and wet touched his face. He instinctively jerked away and looked down to see Wilfred smiling at him with a cloth in his hand.

"You're bleeding."

"Am I?" he touched his fingers to his brow, where Wilfred had placed the cloth, and they came away red. "So I am."

"He's got a good arm on him, you've got to give him that," Wilf said, reapplying the cloth and looking at him with kind eyes. "I know it's been rather awful, Doctor, but everything's alright. It's been two steps forward and one step back all along, so don't let it worry you. This is just one bad day out of many good ones."

"Thank you, Wilfred," he muttered, taking the cloth for himself.

"And Jack was only doing what he thought was best."

"I know."

He pulled a seat over to the table so that he could set to work and dig out the bullet, but Wilfred was still watching him intently. "You could talk to me, you know," Wilf said kindly. "Harry talks to me about all sorts of things—the weather, things he'd like to do, things that are bothering him. He even tells me about where you come from sometimes, and some of the things that happened there. You could always talk to me too."

Wilfred wanted to know what happened. He wanted to know why the Master had finally become so infuriated that it officially ended their friendship, but he was too shy to ask. He was used to talking to the Master, who seemed comfortable with most conversations—even the ones that involved his greatest sins.

"Did I ever tell you about the time I met Shakespeare?"