Chapter Thirty-Six

Rose checked the time on her phone and her mouth tightened with displeasure. A missed call from an unknown number was dismissed with a swipe of her thumb, the message from Zoe catching her attention, settled as it was in their private chat where they discussed presents for Jackie's birthday and stupid things that had culminated in a heated debate over whether they would prefer to own a horse the size of a cat or a cat the size of a mouth. The middle finger emoji that streamed across her screen was the last remnants of normality between the two sisters before the revelation of Zoe's relationship with the Doctor. Leaving her on read had done nothing to abate the persistence that Rose found annoying and oppressive, and her thumb hovered over the message alert, weighing up the pros and cons of looking at it. With reluctance making her chest ache, she tapped the message with the awareness that, if she didn't, she would spend the rest of the day thinking about it.

Can we talk?

And then, minutes later, a single word had appeared under the request.

Please.

Rose examined the plaintive word and closed her eyes, the memory of the Doctor and Zoe tangled together pressing in on her. Anger licked at her chest, and she clicked out of messages and turned her phone onto silent so it wouldn't bother her. Picking up her jacket, she put it on and paused in front of the mirror where she sucked her stomach in and frowned at her reflection; normally, she was happy with how she looked, aware that she was never going to be tall and slender like the models she had once idolised in Shareen's glossy magazines, but she was happy with how she looked. Compared to Zoe though – her taller, slimmer, and far more beautiful sister now that she had shed the puppy fat of youth – she felt short and dumpy.

Feeling ridiculous, she turned sharply from the mirror and left the room, nearly tripping over Leia who was scooting towards the front door with her favourite stuffed toy hanging from her mouth.

"Where d'you think you're goin'?" Placing her hands under Leia's sticky armpits, Rose lifted her up onto her waist and carried her through to the living room where Sabrina was standing in a towel, her wet hair dripping over her shoulders, checking her messages on an old Nokia. "Your kid's makin' a break for it."

Sabrina's mouth lifted up. "Don't know where she thinks she's going to go, she's got no money."

"Don't think she cares too much, reckon she just wants an adventure," Rose said, reaching for the pack of wet wipes on the table. "Also, she's got jam in her armpits."

Sabrina sighed, eyes fluttering shut with exasperation. "I swear to god, this child..."

Laughing, Rose cleaned the jam from Leia's arms and then her hands before she stepped over K9 to put her into the playpen that was filled with stuffed toys and wooden bricks. Her eyes caught on the engravings on the side of the bricks, reaching in to turn it over to examine, swallowing when she recognised the swirling writing of the Doctor's native language, unsurprised that he had given Leia a present. Setting the brick back down and smoothing her hand over Leia's head in farewell, she turned and scratched K9 behind his ears, waking it up from sleep mode.

"Hey, buddy," Rose said. "Keep an eye on Leia, would you? Make sure she doesn't escape, okay?"

K9's ears twitched. "O-kay."

Her nose scrunched at the sound of his voice. Distinctive at the best of times, it had taken on a rough, broken hue that made it sound as if he was congested, microwave parts still clogging up his systems, and she ran her hand down the length of his back.

"Voice circuits still givin' you some problems, huh?" K9 shifted a little, moving against her hand, seeking more attention. "Poor thing. Can't be nice."

"Master's programme is in process of updating my systems," he said, brokenly. "In three hours and fifty-eight minutes, I will be restored to full functionality."

"I'm sure you will." She petted his flank and gave his ears a tweak. "You're a good dog."

His tail twitched in a wag. "Affirmative."

Straightening up, Rose paused when she caught sight of Sabrina watching her with a small frown on her face. There had been a small discussion over what to tell the extended family regarding the fact that she and Zoe travelled but had no pictures to show for it – the pictures they did have raised more questions than they answered. The Doctor had suggested telling them the truth, Jack bobbing his head in agreement next to him, but Mickey, Rose, Zoe, and Jackie had hesitated. In the end, Jackie had decided to keep things as they were, concluding that it didn't matter as they rarely saw their grandmother, aunt, uncle, and cousins. Following her lead, they continued with the story that the Doctor was John Smith, Jack's American cousin and a different John Smith from the Northerner who had gone back home at Christmas never to be seen again.

It was a fairly flimsy story, one that Rose expected it to fall apart at some point in the near future, though she wondered if they might as well simply tell Sabrina. Out of all the Essex-based family, Sabrina Powell was easily the nicest and most open minded of them all, accidentally fumbling her way to basic human decency while the rest of her family slipped deeper into snobbery and disdain for others. Rose's senior by four years, she had made it through her three-year university course studying geography before falling pregnant at her graduation party where her birth control failed her.

"John's an inventor, right?" Sabrina asked, eyes on K9 who was peering into her daughter's playpen, interested in the small human as he had never seen one before. "One of those genius types?"

"Yeah," Rose said, adjusting her jacket awkwardly as her cousin inched closer to the truth with each clue that was laid at her doorstep. "He builds all sorts of stuff, an' K9's one of the few things he's built that doesn't actually blow up when you touch it."

Her frown deepened. "Are you sure it's safe around Leia?"

"Couldn't be safer," she promised before turning her back to look for her bag that she was certain she had left in the living room. "I'm headin' off. Tell Mum that I've gone to meet Sarah Jane – she'll know who that is – an' that I'll be back later."

"Okay," Sabrina replied, hand tightening on her towel as Leia slapped a hand to K9's nose and laughed. Rose's words took a moment to penetrate her concerned haze and, when they did, she turned in mild alarm. "Wait, you're not staying? Zoe said she'd look after Leia and I assumed you'd be there."

"Don't worry about it," Rose told her, finding her bag behind the sofa and giving the strap a yank to pull it free, nose wrinkling as she brushed the cobwebs from it, a sign that Jackie needed to vacuum more thoroughly. "The Doc – John'll be with her. They're attached at the bleedin' hip right now, an' he's great with kids. You might have trouble gettin' Leia back from him at the end of the day though. Don't worry about it."

"Last time Zoe babysat, she ended up reading The Shining to her," she complained. "Leia had nightmares."

"Leia's two," Rose replied. "How much is she really gettin' right now?"

Sabrina sighed, annoyed. "You're no help right now."

"Not tryin' to be," she said with a grin. "An' just tell Zoe no inappropriate books, but, seriously, you don't have to worry about it. Like I said, John's great with kids. Now, shut up, I need to go."

"Yeah, yeah," Sabrina grumbled, waving her off, attention drifting back to K9 and Leia. "Have a good day, you useless sod."

"You too!"

Despite the lift having been fixed for some months, Rose automatically bypassed it and made her way down the stairwell as she popped two paracetamol tablets from a blister pack in order to ease the headache that hadn't disappeared despite two cups of tea and a plate of toast. What she wanted was Zoe's cooked breakfast, a staple after a heavy night out, followed by the Doctor handing over the hangover cure with an amused expression on his face that was only funny when she wasn't hungover and in pain. Swallowing the tablets dry, she pushed open the doors to the outside and held it open for Maurice to pass, watching him in surprise as he missed the opportunity to comment something foul and sexual to her.

"Oi, Maurice, what's wrong with you?" Rose asked, making him pause on the staircase. "Bad trip or somethin'?"

"What?"

"You didn't hit on me just then," she pointed out. "Not that I mind, to be honest, could easily do without that first thing in the mornin', but it's out of character an' all. You okay?"

"Yeah, I'm fine," Maurice said, eyes darting towards the door. "Just tell that mate of yours to mind his own, all right?"

"Which mate?"

"The tall one," he said, unhelpfully. "Bloody attacked me last night when I was havin' a nice chat with Zoe. Fuckin' psycho is what he is."

"The Doctor?" Surprise whipped through Rose, not sure if she had ever seen the Doctor become physically violent with someone. "What did he do?"

"Shoved me against a wall an' threatened me," Maurice complained. "All I was doin' was talkin' to Zoe. We were mindin' our own business when he came along an' got violent. I could press charges."

"You're a drug dealer," Rose said, pointedly. "You press charges an' you'll probably end up in jail instead. Aren't you on probation anyway?"

"Only until the end of the month," he said. "Just tell him to watch his back."

She rolled her eyes. "You pick a fight with him an' you'll regret it. He might look like the wind'll knock him over but he's somethin' else when his back's against the wall. If I were you, I'd leave well enough alone."

Maurice muttered something under his breath that Rose chose to ignore, leaving him behind as she exited the building. Whatever had happened the night before between the Doctor and Maurice, she was certain it had been something to do with Zoe. Ever since they were kids and had entered puberty – Rose earlier than Zoe – Maurice had been dropping sexualised comments in their presence, directing them to their faces when they turned sixteen. No matter how many threats Jackie had levelled at him, he hadn't stopped, and she found it interesting that one altercation with the Doctor was enough to draw a line under years of interactions that had left her questioning whether she was the one to blame for his attention.

She would have thanked him had she not been avoiding him.

Passing swiftly in front of the TARDIS, ignoring the brush of disapproval in the back of her mind from the ship itself, she made her way off the estate. Vague plans of messaging Sarah Jane and asking to meet her for a chat about everything fell apart when a horn honked, a jump running through her, and she turned.

"Are you kiddin' me?" Rose muttered, surprised and annoyed when she recognised Drew behind the wheel of his UNIT-issued jeep, waving at her. "Don't be a stalker, please don't be a stalker."

"Rose, hey, hold on a second!"

He drew the car onto the estate and parked it, rummaging with something in the front cabin as she considered making a run for it and pretending she hadn't seen him, though she suspected it was too late for that. He clambered out of the car with two takeaway cups in his hands, kicking the door shut behind him.

"Morning," Drew said brightly when he reached her, holding a steaming cup towards her. "Coffee? I don't actually know if you drink coffee but I know Zoe mainlines it so I thought maybe you liked it too. If you don't, I also have tea. Everyone likes tea." He offered her the other cup. "I have sugar and milk in the car as well."

Rose stared at the cups and then at him. "What are doin' here?"

"Picking you up," he said, brightness not dimming in the face of her less-than-enthusiastic response to his presence, reminding her – somewhat unkindly – of a Labrador puppy. "Colonel Mace suggested you might like to have a tour of UNIT before you make a decision about whether or not you want to work for us. He did try to call – well, his assistant called but you didn't answer – and I offered to come and get you since I know where you live and everything. I told him you had TARDIS stuff to do today but on the off chance that's already finished, you could come and see UNIT? Properly, I mean. The colonel doesn't get excited about, well, anything, to be honest, but the thought of you coming to work for us is bringing out the red carpet treatment normally reserved for VIPs."

Used to listening to people who released streams of consciousness from their mouths, she was easily able to parse Drew's meaning. Ignoring the warmth that bloomed in her chest that came from the fact that Colonel Mace considered her VIP, she frowned.

"Why would he ask me to tour UNIT?" Rose asked. "Alistair only passed on the offer yesterday."

"Yeah, the Brig called earlier and said the colonel should offer you a tour," Drew said with a small shrug. "I guess he thinks you're close to agreeing and wants to sweeten the deal."

"Alistair suggested it?"

Understanding slotted into place and sent a sigh rolling out of her. News travelled fast but gossip travelled faster, and it was clear that Alistair had been informed about what she and Jackie had walked in on the night before and was taking it upon himself to remind her that she had options. Reminded that there was no privacy on or off the TARDIS, everyone but the man himself aware of her feelings for the Doctor, annoyance rose up in her chest and she took the tea from Drew with a rough hand.

"Why are people so bloody interferin'?"

"Is that a rhetorical question or do you want an answer?" Drew asked, bringing the coffee to his mouth and taking a sip, eye twitching in distaste.

"Rhetorical, I think."

"Are you okay?" He asked, eyes sweeping over her face with the faintest hint of concern peeking through his cheerfulness. "You seem...off."

The demand to know exactly how he knew she was off when he didn't know her well enough to know she liked one sugar in her morning tea rested on the tip of her tongue. Anger at Zoe, annoyance at Drew turning up without warning, and embarrassment that her feelings were spread across London made cruelty step within reach. Unleashing it on Drew would be satisfying for however long it took her to put her emotions into words, but she knew that she would feel guilty immediately afterwards. He was a nice person and snapping at him made her think of kicking a puppy: unnecessary, cruel, and not who she was.

Aside from an eagerness to spend time with her, he had done nothing to earn her vitriol and she forced the cruelty back from her lips, pushing it down and down and down until she was certain it wouldn't hurt him.

Opening her mouth to dismiss his concerns, the sound of the Doctor's laughter reached her and her stomach twisted. Looking back over her shoulder, she watched as the Doctor bounced on his feet outside the TARDIS, hands tucked into his pockets, waiting for Zoe who had dashed back inside to grab her coat. Grabbing Drew by the front of his jacket, she hauled him out of sight, ignoring the spluttering he made when she half strangled him in her haste to make herself unseen. One hand on his chest to keep him behind her, she peered around the corner and watched with a sour feeling growing inside of her as the Doctor helped Zoe into her coat, gently removing her hair from beneath the collar before taking her hand.

"Why are we hiding?"

She jumped, Drew's breath warm against the side of her face. "What?"

"You pulled me over here," he told her, moving to look around the corner but she pushed him back. "We're hiding from something. What is it? Is it dangerous? Do I need to call it in?"

"You don't need to call everythin' in," Rose said, eyes rolling. "Sometimes you can deal with it yourself, y'know?"

"That goes against UNIT policy," Drew said. "It's in the employee handbook."

"Of course there's a handbook," she muttered, shaking her head before gesturing for him to remain where he was, inching around the corner. The Doctor and Zoe walked into Bucknall House, unaware that Rose was watching them. As soon as they were out of sight, she relaxed, leaning back and resting her head against the wall, eyes closed. "Sorry 'bout that, I'm just...I don't want to see Zoe or the Doctor right now."

"Oh." Drew shifted at her side. "They're not giving you problems about last night, are they?"

Her eyes snapped open, a glare levelled at him. "What d'you know about last night?"

"I was there," he said, uncertainly, thrown by her sudden shift in mood. "Were they making fun? My brother's like that. Sometimes I want to strangle him."

"Yeah, somethin' like that" Rose said, deflating, and she searched for a change in topic that she hoped made her seem less volatile. "How long does a tour at UNIT take then?"

"Depends on the person, but you're a VIP," Drew replied. "A VVIP. Yours will probably take a few hours. Definitely into the afternoon. He'll want to show you everything, even stuff that most UNIT officers can't see. Classified doesn't really work when you're the expert on alien tech."

The idea of being an expert at anything made her laugh.

"Is there food at UNIT?" She asked when she was done. "I'm starvin'. I haven't eaten anythin' yet an' it's all I can think about."

"There's food," he reassured her, hesitating before seizing the opportunity before him. "I could also take you to breakfast if you'd like? Colonel Mace doesn't know what time we'll be getting in. He told me to wait for as long as you needed to get ready if you were coming so having breakfast somewhere wouldn't be a huge problem., as long as you promise not to tell him. That's – that's if you want to come, I mean."

Since Rose's plan for the day had been to find something to eat before texting Sarah Jane to see if she was free to talk, the idea of breakfast – even with a man she had hoped would be a one-night stand – was tempting.

Touring UNIT was also something she had wanted to do since arriving there on the Monday gone, unable to do so at the time as she was whisked into the field before she had a chance to poke around in the nooks and crannies; and, it would be a lie for her to claim that she wasn't interested in UNIT's offer of employment. Last night it had felt like distant opportunity, something for her to think about further down the road when she was ready to leave the TARDIS, but in the aftermath of learning about the Doctor and Zoe, she looked at the offer in a different light.

Stripped of naïve dreams and foolish hopes, she was forced to reckon with the fact that she needed something after the TARDIS if she didn't want to become bitter with her best years behind her.

Zoe's insistence on getting her A-Levels made sense to her now.

"Go on then," Rose said, certain she was going to feel less pathetic at UNIT then weeping on Sarah Jane's sofa even though the smile that bloomed across Drew's face caused spasms of discomfort in the pit of her stomach. "Somewhere not here though."

Drew nodded, pushing away from the wall after pausing for permission to move, a quick nod letting him straighten up.

"I know this great breakfast place near the Tower of London," he said. "Well, it's technically brunch but brunch is like breakfast just at a different time really."

"Breakfast fan, are you?"

"Yeah," he said, smile spreading across his face as she began to thaw, warmth seeping into her voice and softening the stiff line of her body. "Waffles, pancakes, any baked goods from the continent, a fry up, obviously, cereal if I'm feelin lazy –"

Rose laughed. "All right, all right, I get it. You're a dork."

"A dork who happens to know the best breakfast place in all of London," Drew told her, eyes sparkling as he lifted his coffee to his mouth again, forgetting he didn't enjoy it in the face of her laughter. "Shall we?"

"I guess so," Rose said, resigning herself with amusement to more time spent in Drew's company, irritated with herself for finding him charming despite her best efforts. "What are you doin' workin' on Saturday anyway? Don't you get time off?"

"Sundays and Mondays," he replied, opening the passenger door for her. "But flexibility's key when working at UNIT. You'll find that out."

"I haven't said yes yet."

"What's not to like about working for us?" He asked, leaning against the open door. "Good salary, good benefits...me."

"Get in the car," she said, pulling the seatbelt across her torso. "I'm hungry."

"Yes, ma'am."

Drew laughed when she scowled at him through the car window and shut the door, thrilled with how his morning was turning out.


As the early afternoon sun spread through the windows of the meeting room within UNIT's London-based headquarters, the rapid, incessant clicking of a ballpoint pen was slowly driving Colonel Mace mad. It had started seven minutes earlier when the presentation was showing the optimum positions of the fifteen satellites that were being considered to be put into orbit of the Earth through an unprecedented international agreement drawing governments and organisations all over the world into the defence of the planet. Deliberately ignoring the sound, he kept his attention focused straight ahead to the annoyance of the man with the pen.

The Master clicked the pen faster, his face the picture of perfect attention even as his mind wandered far and wide; the meeting had bored him two minutes in and annoying the people around him was the closest he was able to get to entertainment without risking the future of the Archangel Network. Lucy had suggested that morning that perhaps they should take another trip in the TARDIS, his irritability growing with every minute spent on Earth among the natives, but the thought of travelling to the end of the universe again filled him with a sense of boredom that threatened to overwhelm him.

The fact that the TARDIS controls were locked in place was a sense of ever-present frustration and anger that grew with each failure at opening the controls up. He suspected the TARDIS was working against him but the controls were melted and fused to each other, delicate switches irreplaceable without visiting Gallifrey and parking the TARDIS in a repair shop. As returning home was something he wasn't willing to do – particularly with a stolen TARDIS and a missing Doctor – he had to make do with the bits and bobs he was able to find in the TARDIS and around London.

For that, Torchwood had been helpful in turning a blind eye when he slipped alien technology into his pockets on his near-weekly visits there – since the humans were stupid enough to begin aiming a particle gun at the weak points in the wall between one universe and another, he wanted to keep a close eye on them so he knew when to leave Earth on the inevitable day they made a mess of it. His trip to UNIT that day was twofold: deliver a presentation on the Archangel Network that was ostensibly to protect the human race against another Sycorax incident while leaving the way clear for him to sow his special brand of chaos, and to have a discreet rummage in their R&D department for something that would replace the burnt out circuits in the fifth-adjacent control panel.

Had the Doctor been taking better care of the TARDIS, the Master wouldn't have had to go to such lengths to repair the damage inflicted on it at the end of the universe.

As it stood, he wasn't sure whatever the UNIT vaults held in way of alien technology was worth the boredom of sitting through a three-hour meeting to discuss the finer details of the Archangel plan. Were he a normal politician, he would have sent an aid to run through it for him, the few people that he kept on staff capable enough to answer questions without drooling their stupidity over themselves, though only barely; it was his boredom that was the problem.

It had been five months since he arrived on Earth, skin thrumming with regeneration energy, laughter in his mouth and remembering who he was, and delight burning through him at having a TARDIS – the Doctor's TARDIS – around him. Those first few days where he tried to make sense of his life as Professor Yana – dull and uninspired – and the powerful, aching gap where Gallifrey and the Time Lords were supposed to lie in his mind blended together to form a mess of memories and emotions, clawing his way into some semblance of normality before he explored the TARDIS and took in the changes since he had last been inside. Clear from the first that the Doctor was travelling with humans again, which meant that the war was over, the Master had poked around the various rooms and stood in the Doctor's bedroom and frowned at the sight of female clothes that spoke of a presence other than the Doctor.

With the TARDIS computer down and uncooperative, he had to piece together information from other sources and watched from a distance as the TARDIS appeared on a council estate in Peckham twice a week without the Doctor anywhere to be seen, only Zoe Tyler emerging alone and returning to the TARDIS alone. As he began to piece a life together – fake documents, a bestselling memoir, a beautiful new wife – he kept an eye on the Powell Estate and was rewarded for his patience when the Doctor appeared two months after he had arrived on Earth only to immediately regenerate after getting a broadsword through the chest – idiot – and then head back to the stars.

His questions about the Doctor answered, life fell into a routine that bored him. Not even Lucy with her delightful desire to inflict pain and witness suffering was enough to pull him out of it. At times he thought he should just give up and go knock on the Doctor's door – exhausted from the war and desperate for answers about Gallifrey's absence in his mind – but he knew if he did approach the Doctor with the hand of friendship extended, it would be rebuffed as it had been so many times before.

No.

He knew the only way to get the Doctor's attention and keep it was to set fire to the things he loved, and burning Earth to a cinder seemed like a good way to go about doing it. Perhaps if Earth was gone and the insipid humans that lived on it were nothing more than ash, the Doctor might finally return home.

"Mr Saxon." The Master lifted his eyes from the presentation and looked to Colonel Mace, thumb hovering over the thrust device, a brief spark of thrill rolling through him. "Would you like to have a tour of the facilities while you're here? I don't believe you've had the opportunity yet, have you?"

"You know, I'd be delighted," he said, tucking his pen away with a final click. "I've heard such wonderful things about UNIT that I wouldn't mind having a poke around."

With more restraint than the Master thought he possessed, Colonel Mace nodded to an officer lining the wall and issued an order to show him around the facilities. Smiling widely at those who had to remain in the meeting, he strolled from the room with a small bounce in his step, his decision to enjoy the smaller things in life – one of Lucy's silly human customs had been to come up with New Year's resolutions – going well so far. Holding his hands behind his back, he moved through the hallways of UNIT and examined the man next to him. Harriet Jones was the type of person to ask the names of those she came across, taking a personal pride in knowing each and every person who worked for her from her personal assistant down to the cleaners. It seemed exhausting to him but also a good way at getting information, and so he turned to the man.

"Who are you then?" He asked.

"Lieutenant French, sir."

"Do you have a first name with that rank, lieutenant?"

An easy smile stole across his face. "Drew, sir."

"Did you have a late night, Drew?" The Master asked, reaching out to pluck at the man's collar, pulling it down to reveal light bruises across his neck. Colour rushed through his cheeks and Drew pulled his collar back up, making him laugh. Humans were strangely disparate in their attitudes towards sex – some flaunted it, others concealed it – it was baffling. "Now, now, no need to be embarrassed. I hope it was good."

Drew coughed, flustered. "I – it was, sir."

"Good man," he said, clapping him on the shoulder as he had seen human males do in what he assumed was a bonding ritual. "Don't suppose we can have a look around R&D, can we? All that alien technology has really captured my imagination."

"Of course, sir," Drew replied, not meeting his eyes even though a small smile was playing at his lips. "Right this way."

For a species who had only recently crawled out of the primordial soup they were cultivated in, UNIT was almost an impressive organisation that was built deep into the earth below the Tower of London, creating layers upon layers of secrecy in their heart of Britain; not like the Americans who slapped everything alien into the Nevada desert and pretended like nothing alien was there. He appreciated the British approach to hiding things beneath the day-to-day life of its citizens, the secrecy nearly reminding him of home. Sliding his hands into his pockets, he followed Drew through the building and down the long journey where the doors opened up onto a wide laboratory filled with scientists and engineers who were like children playing with toys the Master had long since set aside.

Lip curling disdainfully, he failed to see the Doctor's fascination with them.

"Here we go, sir," Drew said, scanning his card in front of the reader to let them pass through the security protocols. "This is our Research and Development department. Shall I get Dr Taylor for you?"

"Who's Dr Taylor?"

"The man in charge around here," he said, hesitating briefly before leaning in, voice lowered in confidence. "If I were you, I'd probably just look around myself. Dr Taylor's a little...eccentric."

The Master made a sound in his throat. "Funny, I know an eccentric doctor too."

"Is there anything in particular you'd like to see, sir?" Drew asked.

"Not really," he said, eyes taking note of what was in the room and might be useful for what he needed. It was a shame he couldn't take everything with him but his pockets weren't deep enough and the TARDIS was refusing to do even short hops in the same time zone without screaming blue murder in his mind. "Tell me about what you do with the technology. As I understand, it's different to the Americans."

And Torchwood, he thought, preferring Yvonne Hartman's approach to keeping the technology for themselves.

"It is," Drew said. "Where the Americans, the Chinese, the Russians, and others keep the technology for themselves, we work at repurposing it into tech that's suitable for human use. One of the things that came out of this lab was DNA profiling that's used around the world now to help solve crimes. It was all thanks to a species reader the Zygons left behind in the 70s, I think it was. It took a few years but one of our geneticists was able to make sense of it in the end."

"Fascinating," the Master lied, ambling over towards a table with what looked to be a piece of an Aeolian communication dish. Fingering it, he distracted Drew with another question before slipping it into his pocket. "Didn't fancy the R&D lifestyle, eh?"

"I prefer a bit more action myself, sir," he said with a grin, and the Master marvelled at how easy it was to get humans to trust him. "I'm hoping to get an assignment overseas once my current one ends. London's great and all and, thanks to the Doctor, the centre of a lot of alien activity, but I'd like to work in one of the field offices we have."

"A man with ambition," the Master nodded. "I like to see that. Perhaps I can put in a good word for you in the future." And send you to the Arctic circle, he thought, sliding a Zask transmitter into his pocket, eyeing a scientist close to him with a neck that was slender, the urge to wrap his hands around it and hear it snap making his jaw ache. "Was UNIT able to recover anything from the Slitheen incident of last year?"

"The ship, sir," Drew replied. "That's not here though. It was transported out of the city to our larger storage facilities."

Annoyance passed through him. "Shame, I wouldn't have minded seeing a proper alien spaceship. It's terribly exciting, isn't it? Aliens and the like."

Drew nodded. "Yes, sir, it is. I couldn't believe it when I was briefed about UNIT. It felt like a practical joke, to be honest. I'd come up through the Army, trained at Sandringham, and I thought it was a prank my squad mates were pulling on me until I came here myself."

"I bet," the Master said, uninterested and growing bored once more as he turned an Abzorbalovian teleport button over in his hand, twisting it between his fingers, wondering if he should use it to send his mother-in-law somewhere that wasn't near him, tiring of her incessant chatter. From the corner of his eye, he glimpsed someone he had only seen from a distance and in pictures, and his whole body turned, body lighting up with opportunity. "Is that Rose Tyler?"

Recognisable from the times he had seen her on the estate with Zoe prior to the Doctor's return from wherever he had been, she was prettier than he expected. Not as tall as her sister, and her blonde hair clearly came from a bottle, twisted onto the top of her head in a messy bun, the type that Lucy favoured when she was on her knees for him; she seemed softer than Zoe did, less brittle around the edges, and she looked up from what she was examining, her eyes brushing over him to settle on Drew, a strange expression of reluctance and acceptance settling on her face.

He chuckled.

"Well, I'll be damned," the Master said, looking at Drew with fresh appreciation. "Rose Tyler was your partner last night?"

The colour stained Drew's skin in patches, a smile struggling over his mouth. "How did you guess that?"

"I'm a very clever man," he said, seizing the chance that fate had given him. "Introduce me."

The brief contact he had made with Zoe Tyler two weeks earlier at her dinner with the prime minister had been enough to let him know how carefully he should tread with her, her intelligence razor sharp and her attention to detail unusual for a human; her sister was an unknown entity that might provide him with the insight he needed in the Doctor's current movements while the TARDIS computer remained stubbornly and firmly out of action. Eager to spend more time with her – a feeling the Master doubted was mutual given the way she stiffened imperceptibly at his approach –, Drew led him across the open laboratory, his pockets growing heavier as he went, until he was in front of the Doctor's travelling companion.

"Hey," Drew said, hand twitching towards her only to pull it back, remembering where he was. "How's your tour going?"

"Fine, thanks," she said, eyes flickering to the Master who smiled brightly at her. "Thought you'd been pulled into a meetin' or somethin'."

The Master wondered if the Doctor enjoyed the London accent that came out of Rose's mouth or if it made him want to rip his ears off.

"My fault he's not there," the Master said, pulling her attention to him. "I do believe I was annoying Colonel Mace a little bit."

Her mouth curved in a smile. "Annoyin', are you?"

"Only sometimes." He held out his hand. "Harold Saxon, Leader of the Opposition." The name registered with her and her hand gripped his in a surprisingly firm handshake. "I know who you are, of course. You're the Doctor's companion."

"We prefer friends these days," Rose said. "Companions is a bit outdated."

"I'm sure it is," he said, faintly amused. "Since you're not male and American, nor are you Zoe Tyler whom I've already met, you must be her sister."

The muscle beneath Rose's eye twitched, his words hitting a sore spot that he filed away for use at a later date. "Rose. My name's Rose."

"Of course," he replied. "You should call me Harry. Only my mother calls me Harold, and I don't know why I keep introducing myself like it. Do you think it sounds more ministerial?"

"Harold?"

"Yeah."

"I don't really know," Rose said, looking to Drew, silently questioning if the Master was entirely sane. "S'pose it's what you prefer, isn't it? Not that I'm helpin' you, by the way. I know about you. Zoe gets into a right state when you give Harriet problems at PMQs."

He laughed, delighted by the information. "Does she now? Would it help you to know that I'm simply doing my job in providing a robust opposition to Her Majesty's government?"

"Don't pay much attention to politics really," she admitted. "But you're not gettin' my vote or whatever. Harriet's a mate so I'm votin' for her party when there's an election."

The Master held his hands up in an offering of peace, mildly entertained by her. "Not to worry, plenty of people will vote for me when the time comes. If I were a betting man, I'd say that I'm going win the next election with a landslide."

"You're confident," Rose noted. "An' a little bit smug."

"Fault of the job, I'm afraid," he said. "Politicians aren't exactly known for their modesty."

"Or their honesty."

The Master grinned. "Or that."

"I don't mean to be rude," Rose said in a tone of voice that implied she was about to be rude. "But what're you doin' here? I thought UNIT was classified. Actually, I thought everythin' alien was classified."

"It was until the Sycorax invaded," Drew explained, standing a little too close to her than was considered appropriate, and the Master caught Rose's eye, a smile shadowed on his mouth, inviting her to trust him, and he was rewarded by the sight of her attempting to hide a smile. Pathetic, he thought, pleased with himself. "With the knowledge of aliens now public knowledge, UNIT's opened up its archive and services to all members of parliament, not only those in key Cabinet positions."

"Mighty generous of them, I think," the Master said. "It's been a whirlwind few weeks since I received my security clearance. It's not at all what I expected when I was elected to office."

Rose frowned. "Weeks?"

"Since the invasion," he clarified.

"Right, yeah, sorry," she apologised, pink dusting her cheeks and making her look beautiful for a human. "Er – how much d'you know about the Doctor?"

"Oh, this and that," the Master said with a vague gesture of his hand. "Enough to know that things don't always happen at the same pace for you as it does for the rest of us. I guess it's been longer for you."

"Yeah, a bit." Her hand fluttered against the side of her head, smoothing stray hairs back, her eyes watching him with more interest than she was showing her surroundings, suggesting to him that science and technology was not something she was overly interested in. "Time travel, y'know?"

"Not really," he lied, pleasantly. "How are you finding UNIT?"

"It's a hell of place, an' they do good work," Rose admitted. "The attention's a bit much. I'm not used to people askin' me to come an' work for them, so the VIP treatment's kind of overwhelmin'."

Seeds of concern and panic planted themselves in his chest. Most of the Doctor's companions had to be forced out of the TARDIS and yet Rose was entertaining a job offer from UNIT, which he couldn't allow to happen. If she took the job while he was attempting to get the Archangel Network up and running, his plans would come to nothing. He expected little to nothing from the people at UNIT, scientists and engineers and statisticians who worked theoretically rather than practically, but someone who had travelled with the Doctor would be able to recognise the low level telepathic field he was threading through the satellites, the design based off the TARDIS systems. She would recognise the Gallifreyan symbols running through the circuitry and call the Doctor in, ending everything far too soon.

World domination was no fun if there was no time to dominate it.

Drew leaned in, head dipping an inch, voice pitched low and intimate. "Do you think you can see yourself working here?"

"Maybe," she said, stepping away from him to pick a laser spoon up off the table and examine it, her fingers automatically finding the safety and flicking it on without thinking about it. "I'm still not sure now's the right time thou –" she stopped talking abruptly, snatching up an artefact identity card from the table and flashing it to Drew. "Van Statten? What the hell's UNIT doin' workin' with van Statten?"

"I don't know who that is," Drew said.

"Henry van Statten," the Master informed him. "An American billionaire who has his fingers in most pies."

"Fuckin' idiot is what he is," Rose muttered, tossing the card down in a small fit of irritation. "Might be worth comin' to work here just to stop UNIT doin' stupid shit like workin' with van-bloody-Statten." Sighing heavily, she rolled her neck and winced at the sharp pain that rolled through her from a pulled muscle. "I think I'm done. Drew, any chance you could get someone to show me out of this place? It's like a bloody maze with hundreds of locked doors."

"There's no need for that, Lieutenant French," the Master said before Drew offered to do something gallant such as driving her home himself. "My business has also come to an end, and I happen to know the way out. I'd be happy to help you through the locked doors, Ms Tyler."

She eyed him. "'S just Rose."

"I'll have to sign you both out," Drew said. "Security protocols. And do you need to contact your staff, sir?"

"My people know what to do without me." The Master dismissed the question with a wave, offering Rose his arm with a smile. "Shall we?"

At the security station, the Master watched in amusement as Drew attempted to prolong the time spent with Rose by making her sign multiple forms and stretching the conversation until it was so thin awkwardness shimmered in the air between them. Only when Rose's irritation became too obvious to ignore did Drew open the door to the outside with a swipe of his card and enacted what – to the Master's eye – looked to be the most awkward hug in all of human history. Rose patted Drew on the back and twisted herself out of his arms, cheeks burning with embarrassment, she avoided looking at him as they stepped into the fresh air and let the chill of February wash over them, his car pulling around to collect him.

"No need to be embarrassed," the Master said after letting the silence stretch until she was beginning to squirm. "We've all slept with people we regretted the next day."

Her eyes flashed, shocked.

"What makes you think –? Did he tell you that we –?"

He chuckled and pulled on his butter-soft leather gloves. "Anyone with eyes can see that he's pining for you, and the marks on his neck suggest that you were a little amorous last night."

"It was a mistake," she said through gritted teeth, skin blotching with colour. "I was drunk an' needed a distraction. He's a nice enough bloke, just not –" another heavy sigh left her. "Not what I need right now, y'know?"

"Trouble in the TORDIS?"

"TARDIS," Rose corrected.

His brow wrinkled in faux confusion. "Are you sure? Doesn't it stand for Time or Relative Dimension in Space."

"Time and," she said, emphasising the conjunction. "It's Time and Relative Dimension in Space."

"Fascinating," the Master mused. "So, the Doctor's ship is capable of travelling through time and space at the same time in one journey? It doesn't have to make multiple stops along the way." Rose shrugged, never having cared much to learn about how the TARDIS worked, content simply to know it did. "Gosh, what technological wonders those Time Kings have."

"Lords," she corrected again. "He's a Time Lord, an' don't get too impressed. He's an idiot about 80% of the time. Sometimes I think his lot chose the name to make themselves sound better than they are." Anger burnt through the Master like a wildfire, the urge to smack the words from her mouth making his fingers ache, her sigh cutting him off. "Sorry. Jesus, I'm sorry. I shouldn't be – it's been a bit of a weird twenty-four hours an' my sister's pissed me off an' I'm complainin' to you when I don't even know you."

Swallowing back his anger, he smiled. "That's okay. Sometimes talking to someone you don't know if helpful."

"Should probably see a therapist for that instead of the Leader of the Opposition," Rose said with a small grin. "Pretty sure it's not in your job description."

"Well, you may not be a constituent but you are a British citizen so an argument could be made for it," the Master said, glancing at the car and then back at her, an idea forming in his mind, the opportunity to extract information from her too valuable to let go to waste. "I don't know about you but dealing with UNIT always leaves me in need of a unwinding. Care to get a drink with me?"

She stared at him. "It's the middle of the afternoon."

"It's also a Saturday," he told her. "I believe that makes it a little more civilised."

Reaching up to adjust the collar of her jacket, Rose's eyes flicked over him. "Are you askin' me out on a date?"

His gaze turned interested. "Would you like me to?"

"Not really," she confessed, the blow to his ego only a small one. "Like I said, it's been a weird twenty-four hours, and I've already made the mistake of shaggin' one person I shouldn't, I don't need to add Harriet's political enemy to the list."

Eyes sparkling with amusement, he let his smile grow across his face, hours spent practising in the mirror and receiving Lucy's feedback to know exactly how to make himself look more handsome than he was.

"In that case," he said. "No date, merely a drink between two potential friends."

Rose hesitated before checking her phone quickly. Whatever she saw on it made his interest pique and her face purse as though she had sucked on something sour. Tapping at the screen, she dropped it back into her bag and plastered a fake, bracing smile on her face.

"Sure," she said. "Sounds like a great idea."

When he was first getting to known London, he had stumbled into a number of drinking establishments that made his nose wrinkle and his disdain for humans to grow. It was only after meeting Lucy and letting her show him around – you showed me the stars, let me show you London – that he had come across a handful of decent bars that were worth him gracing them. He took Rose to a bar in the West End that made excellent cocktails, one of the very few saving graces of the human race, even if the bar itself occasionally filled with tourists after The Lion King let out. Fortunately, it was the middle of the afternoon and the show was in the middle of its Saturday matinee, which meant there was plenty of space for them to sit in a corner and talk.

He had found that humans were startlingly susceptible to alcohol, and he discreetly plied Rose with cocktails to get her to loosen up, talking about unimportant topics that veered clear of the Doctor, Zoe, and UNIT. Boring though it was, he watched her slowly become intoxicated until she was at what he deemed the perfect level, whereupon he ordered a cheese pizza from the waiter – not able to stomach the consumption of animal flesh the way the humans did, no matter how native he was trying to pretend he was. Watching her devour a slice, he nudged her gently with questions about the Doctor, slipping them in as small afterthoughts, greedily hoarding the answers she gave him.

When she was on her fifth drink, she leant her cheek on her hand and stabbed the colourful umbrella into her drink, ice clinking as he turned over and over in his mind that the Daleks weren't gone.

He had assumed that the Doctor's presence on Earth meant the war was over and the Time Lords had won – a victory that could only have been assured by the total destruction of the Daleks – but the ambling story Rose had told him of the Game Station chilled the blood in his veins.

"You ever been in love with someone who didn't love you back, Harry?" Rose asked, words slurred around the edges.

He looked at her sharply, annoyed at being pulled from his thoughts, before he remembered himself and lifted his eyebrows. the warm buzz of being shy of drunk making her want to confide in her new friend. "Oh, dear, this sounds serious. Should I get more drinks in?"

She laughed and kicked him lightly beneath the table, an assault that he allowed stand since she was proving talkative. "No, but also yes because I'm nearly finished."

"Affairs of the heart are best accompanied by alcohol," he informed her, gesturing for another round of drinks. "At least that's been my experience."

"If I drink anymore, my liver's goin' to stop workin'."

"Grow a new one."

She snorted into her drink. "That's funny. You're funny."

"Thank you," the Master said. "Go on then, tell me your problems."

Her eyes rolled towards him. "You really want to know?"

"More than you can possibly imagine," he said, wishing Lucy was there to help keep the frustration at bay. "Who's broken your heart?"

"My sister."

He blinked, rapidly re-evaluating what he knew of humans and their mating rituals, almost certain he would have noticed something like that before, even as disgust clawed its way through him.

"That's...huh." It wasn't often he found himself lost for words, and he wondered if the Doctor knew about this quirk of humankind. "I have to admit I didn't expect your sister to be responsible but I'm not judging. Love, I've been told, comes in all shapes and forms."

Rose squinted at him before she gagged. "Ew, gross, no. Jesus, what the hell's wrong with you?"

"You just said –"

Balling up a damp napkin, she threw it at him. "Don't go repeatin' it, it's bad enough it's been in my brain once, I don't need a re-run."

"My apologies," the Master said, relieved to cross incest of the list of human oddities. "I misunderstood. How did your sister break your heart?"

The disgusted expression lingered on her face before she sucked the bright pink liquid of her cocktail up through a swirly straw. "I found out last night she's been lyin' to me for months. She's been havin' it off with the Doctor behind my back since Christmas. Walked in on them havin' sex yesterday."

Blood rushed through his ears and deafened him, his hearts beating loudly in his chest, as Rose dragged the world out from under his feet.

It was commonly acknowledged that the death of the Doctor's wife in the TARDIS matrices explosion had knocked whatever common sense and good behaviour he possessed out of him, casting him off into the universe without anything anchoring him to Gallifrey, his children almost relieved to see the back of him, grief so overwhelming it infected everything it came across. The Master had given him space to breathe after Levokania's death, space to figure out what he wanted, but he had always believed that the Doctor would return to Gallifrey and the two of them could work together and shape Gallifrey into the planet they wanted as they had dreamt of as children before arranged marriages and being good Time Lords got in the way.

The Doctor's flight from Gallifrey with Arkytior had dented those plans but the Master had held onto the hope that he would come back. When he never did, he allowed the sound of the drums in his head – the constant cacophony of noise – to take over, giving into the darker, crueller impulses the Doctor had tempered in him through friendship.

The one thing that had comforted him through the long period of waiting and the sharp edge of disappointment that came with the realisation the Doctor was never coming home, not properly, was that the Doctor would never replace him with a human. Their friendship was complex and ageless, moments scattered throughout time and space, and the thought of the Doctor finding refuge and companionship with Zoe Tyler made his blood burn. The more he aligned himself with humans, the more he developed intimate relationships with them, the further away he drifted from the man the Master had known on Gallifrey. It was enraging, and the struggle to keep his face neutral, not to give himself away to Rose as he tried to calm the rapid thundering of his hearts was painful; the drums in his head roared a beat that told him to kill, kill, kill, kill Zoe Tyler for getting in the way.

Instead of rising from the table to seek Zoe out, he reached for his drink and sipped it.

"Oh?"

"An' it's not just because they're shaggin' each other," Rose continued, having not noticed the battle that raged inside her drinking partner. "It's that they didn't tell me. It's that Zoe didn't tell me. We used to tell each other everythin' an' it used to be the two of us against the world. Now..." another sharp jab at the ice in her drink. "Now it feels like it's her an' the Doctor an' I don't know where I fit in with that. I don't know if they want me to fit in."

The Master considered the decorative umbrellas and thought of thirteen separate ways he could utilise it to kill Zoe Tyler.

"Hence your interest in UNIT," he said.

She squinted at him. "Yeah."

"Get out before they toss you out, clever," the Master nodded, finding himself oddly sympathetic towards Rose even as he focused on the need to keep her on the TARDIS. "Of course, that's assuming they want you out. My understanding is that the Doctor likes a bit of a crowd to show off for. I imagine having you there will puff up his ego and your absence only deflate it."

"Huh?"

"Do you really want to leave?" He asked. "Or do you think that's what you should do?"

"What's the alternative?" Rose replied, finishing her drink and pulling the fresh one towards her, tucking the yellow umbrella behind her ear. "I stay on the TARDIS an' mope? I don't want to see them all lovey-dovey with each other."

"No, I quite agree," the Master said, thinking of how he had shaken hands with Zoe at the restaurant when he could have wrapped a hand around her throat and choked the life from her. "Of course, if you leave then you are implying imply that they've won."

She blinked. "Won?"

"I find the best way to not care about someone or something is to act like I don't care," he said, leaning back in his seat. "Eventually it comes true."

"What?" Her brow creased. "I go back to the TARDIS an' pretend everything's fine?"

"If that's what you want," the Master said, not caring what she did as long as it was off the planet and out of the 21st century. "Or you could make the Doctor jealous by having sex with people in front of him."

Rose laughed, startled. "What?"

"Men are simple at the end of the day, my dear," he said, catching the affectation too late; Lucy had told him it marked him out as being older than he was, a small slip in his cover. "Did he even know you were an option?"

"No, I – I don't know." Her face twisted in thought. "I mean, it's not like he's blind. An' he's definitely flirted with me before. I know I wasn't imaginin' that. I just – I don't know when that stopped though."

"There you go then," the Master said, reaching beneath the table to hook her back around his toes, pulling it towards him out of her sight. "Go off on your travels and flirt with people in front of him. Let him know what he's missing."

Rose considered his suggestion before shaking her head, her nose scrunched. "No, I can't do that. Not to Zoe."

"The sister who's been lying to you?"

"I'm pissed at her but that doesn't mean I want to hurt her," Rose replied, staring at the table as the Master reached down into her bag and removed her phone. Taking his, he pressed them together, face-to-face, and squeezed the side, a small green light scanning the contents of Rose's phone and taking a copy. "Not much anyway, an', honestly, it's not like the Doctor'd look twice at me when he's got Zoe. You've met her. You've seen how gorgeous she is."

Only for a human, he thought, derisively.

"To compare you and her would be to compare the sun and the moon," the Master said. "Both are beautiful though in different ways."

Rose's mouth slipped open, and she stared at him in surprise, his compliment piercing the drunken haze that consumed her. Smiling, he rested their phones on his thigh and took another sip of his drink.

"Have you ever looked at someone an' just not known who they are anymore?" She asked once she regained herself. "Because I saw Zoe last night an' I didn't see my sister. All I saw was this woman who had taken her place an' I hadn't realised it. D'you know what I mean?"

He tapped the edge of his fingernail against the table. "I have some idea."

I don't know who she is anymore," Rose said, his presence no longer necessary as she worked through her issues out loud. Glancing at her and making sure her eyes weren't on him, he flipped the phones face up and checked that he had everything from her folders, dropping it back into her bag. "I don't think I've known for a while. The sister I knew...the sister I knew died in France. I don't know this woman who came back. We haven't...there hasn't been time to get to know her. Not really. Not with everythin' that's happened. I guess we've just tried to pretend everythin' was normal but it's not. She's my little sister who's now ten years older than me. Nothin' about that's normal."

The Master looked up, attention sharpening on her. "France? What happened in France?"

"She got trapped in the 17th century – no, 18th, I think." Her eyes drifted to the rest of the bar. "Six years she spent there. She was only a kid when she got stuck, barely seventeen, an' I knew the girl she was at the beginning. I remember sayin' goodbye to my sister an' then this other person with my sister's face was telling me that it was seven years later an' she'd lost a wife an' had this whole life without me."

"She's married?"

"Widowed." Rose clumsily took her drink again, missing the expression on the Master's face as he received more information about Zoe Tyler in the space of one afternoon that he had in three months of careful research. "Her wife died. Cholera, I think. I don't know, she doesn't really talk about it."

"That's a shame," he murmured.

"Yeah." She stabbed at the ice in her drink. "An' here I was thinkin' she wasn't ready to date because she was still gettin' over Reinette." Reinette he repeated in his mind, Reinette, Reinette, Reinette. "S'pose she followed the Jack method though. Get over someone by gettin' under someone else."

"There are worse methods," the Master considered, lightly. "Perhaps their relationship is a passing fancy. Two lonely souls coming together."

She looked up. "You make it sound like poetry."

"Is life not poetry?"

Her eyes rolled. "Never liked it much."

"You haven't been reading the right poems."

"Oh?"

"Tell me not, in mournful numbers, life is but an empty dream," the Master recited easily from memory, choosing one that he hoped would be enough to encourage her to stay off Earth until he was ready. "For the soul is dead that slumbers, and things are not what they seem."

She rubbed her forehead. "Sounds depression'."

"It is a little, I suppose," he agreed. "It's something of a clarion call to do great things, however small they may be, and that even though it's not always fun or easy, you must do it anyway. The body dies but the soul lives on, that sort of thing."

Rose swallowed, mouth sugary sweet and aching from the cocktails. "How's the rest of it go?"

The Master leaned his head back against the wall behind him and closed his eyes, imagining Gallifrey as he preferred to remember it: beautiful and safe. Slowly, he began to recite the poem for her, letting the words fall from his lips, the anger inside his chest dying down to low embers, the drums in his head quietening for a brief moment. As he spoke the last stanza, he almost felt at peace.

Rose sighed slowly. "You've got a nice voice."

His eyes opened.

"You've had too much to drink," he replied. "It wasn't my intention to get you drunk."

"Think I got myself drunk," Rose admitted, sighing again as she reached into her bag that the Master had pushed back beneath her seat and pulled out her phone where there were multiple missed calls from Zoe, several messages from Jack, Mickey, the Doctor, her mother, and even one from Sarah Jane. "God, can't even bugger off for an afternoon without people panickin'. Bunch of bloody worrywarts."

Thoroughly tired of her company and eager to be on the TARDIS where he could peel back the layers of a life being lived and take in the surroundings with his new understanding, seeing if there was anything he missed on his first run through, he leaned over the table and placed his hand over hers. She froze in surprise, eyes wide as she stared at him, mascara beginning to smudge beneath her eyes, her lips stained pink.

"Would you like some advice, Rose?"

"May as well," she said, tongue darting out to wet her lips. "'S not like you can make more of a mess than I've already made of things."

"UNIT can wait," the Master said. "It sounds to me like there are more things for you travelling the universe than there are for you here right now, unless you want an eager UNIT puppy trailing after you."

She laughed. "Drew's not that bad."

"Just eager," he said, waggling his eyebrows to draw a grin from her. "Go, be angry at your sister where she can see you. Take it from me, letting these issues fester will change your relationship irrevocably. And, if you change your mind about taking the higher road, you can always remind the Doctor what he's missing by flirting up a storm in front of him."

Her head tilted to the side. "I really don't want to leave the TARDIS."

"Then don't."

"But I'm embarrassed," she said, voice curving into a whine that made his jaw ache even as he smiled.

"Embarrassment, I'm pleased to say, isn't fatal." He slipped his fingers into her palm and lifted her hand from the table, thumb running over her knuckles. "Once you face them head on, everything will be easier to deal with. The waiting is much worse."

"You're very wise."

"I'm older than I look," he said. "Now, come on, you need to go back to the TARDIS and I need to get home and back to work. Unfortunately, the life of a politician isn't the nine-to-five I'd like. Come on, on your feet. There we go."

Tucking her arm into his and helping her put her bag on over her torso, he threw down enough money on the table to cover three times as many drinks as they had and guided her out of the bar that had filled up with and emptied of Lion King audience members in the time they had been there. Outside, night had fallen, the streets illuminated with the orange light that the British government appeared to think was acceptable to light the way for its citizens after dark, and nodded at his driver to open the door to the car that waited outside for him.

"Here," the Master said. "Use my car to take you home."

"No, I couldn't," Rose protested, swaying into him. "What about you?"

"A little bit of fresh air never hurt anyone," Harry said, helping her into the backseat and watching her fumble with the seatbelt before he tired of it and took over, clicking the metal into place. "Don't forget: illegitimi non carborundum, Rose."

She frowned. "I don't speak nonsense."

"It's Latin," he told her. "Dog Latin, to be precise. It means, don't let the bastards grind you down."

Her head rested against the head rest, her face slack with alcohol and her smile verging on charming. "Thanks, Harry. You're pretty decent for a Tory."

The Master grinned. "I try to be. Good luck with everything."

Shutting the door, he stepped back from the edge of the pavement and raised his hand in farewell, watching as the car pulled away and joined London's evening traffic, certain there was another hour or two ahead of her before she got home. As the car moved away, the smile leeched from his face and he pressed his fingers to the bridge of his nose, squeezing, to ease the pressure there.

"God, that was exhausting," he complained to no one. "Humans. I don't know how the Doctor stands them."


"Ah, shit, Doc, I thought you were waitin' with Zoe."

Screwing the lid of the Thermos shut, the Doctor turned and grinned widely as he took Mickey in. Evidently, putting on a shirt and trousers was too much trouble when Jack was waiting for him in bed, and his friend shifted beneath his eyes before scowling at him.

"Fuck off," Mickey said, embarrassed.

The Doctor laughed and tucked the Thermos under his arm, picking up Zoe's soft cardigan that she liked to wear when pottering around the TARDIS. "Don't mind me. I'm just getting some supplies. It looks like we've got a long wait in front of us, and I'm pretty sure Zoe's not planning on moving an inch until she claps eyes on Rose."

"Good luck with that," Mickey said, pressing his back against the wall as the Doctor walked by him. "Not a word about this to the girls, yeah?"

"Your secret's safe with me," he replied before pausing. "Make sure you go easy on Jack though. His knees still aren't up to a lot of strain right now. You may want to take charge of the whole thing."

Mickey's swearing followed him out of the kitchen, giving him a good laugh until he reached the front door. Certain that Zoe would take any show of good humour the wrong way at the moment, he reorganised his face before opening the door and stepping outside.

A sigh caught in his throat at the sight of Zoe sitting in the same place he had left her after she had stubbornly plopped herself down onto the bench, folded her arms over her chest and declared that she was going to wait for Rose to arrive even if it took all night. Not even Jackie had been inclined to wait, citing the cold and the Doctor's presence as a reason to retreat back into the flat, telling them she would either see them in the morning or the next time they visited, her abrupt departure leaving the Doctor feeling awkward and uncomfortable, wishing Sarah Jane had stayed for a little longer after picking up K9. As it was, Jack and Mickey had lasted ten minutes longer than Jackie before making the flimsiest of excuses to go into the TARDIS that Zoe had allowed them the dignity of maintaining despite the fact she met his eyes and raised her eyebrows, the hint of a smile playing on her lips.

Leaving the TARDIS, he pulled the door firmly shut behind him and crossed the distance to join her at the bench. She looked up at his arrival, tiredness settled around her eyes, and she murmured appreciatively when he draped her cardigan around her.

"Thanks."

"It's only going to get colder," he warned her, waiting until she had shoved her arms into the cardigan before sitting down and wrapping an arm around her, pulling her back against his chest. "And I'm a fan of you unfrozen."

"It is cold," she agreed, colour inching back into her cheeks, eyes falling to the Thermos hopefully. "Coffee?"

"As if I'd bring anything else out to you," he said, pouring her a cup and placing in her hands. "Although, we've got some mulled wine left over from Christmas that I didn't know about. I thought we'd drunk our way through the Christmas stuff."

"There's also some fruit cake leftover," Zoe said, nose buried in her coffee. "In the cupboard over the fridge."

"I know what I'm having for breakfast tomorrow."

She laughed lightly, shoulders wriggling as she made herself comfortable. "You don't have to wait here with me. I'm sure you've got a list of things that need doing. Didn't you say earlier that you wanted to review my telomerase data?"

"I do, at some point, I definitely want to do that," the Doctor said, not enjoying the reminder of the work he was starting to suspect was more than he had first imagined. "But there's nowhere else I'd rather be right now."

Zoe huffed and glanced up at him. "Romantic."

Leaning in, he kissed her cheek, breath warming her cool skin. "Honest."

He shifted his weight so that she could settle against his side, her eyes focused on the mouth of the estate, and he wished that he had the ability to draw her into the TARDIS and not worry about whether or not Rose was going to turn up but he didn't. For as long as he had known them, the Tyler sisters were close and loving, even if it had drifted in recent years – or months, depending on who was counting – and he found himself missing the days when he would come across them, their hair on the top of their heads, face masks on, giggling over one thing or another. He couldn't remember the last time he had seen them do that but he knew it had to have been before France.

The fact that Rose wasn't there and hadn't responded to anyone's messages worried him. He thought that perhaps she had been abducted – Jack's recent experience far too fresh in his mind to think anything else – but once Zoe had sent out a text blast to her Earth-based friends, Drew French had let her know that Rose was at UNIT having a tour, and the Doctor relaxed for all of ten seconds before Jack wondered whether she was going to accept the job they had offered her.

Having not realised Rose staying was an option, the Doctor worried that she was going to leave the TARDIS; while he didn't know how to make sense of the complex emotions running through him at the thought of it, he knew he didn't want her to leave.

Not just for Zoe's sake but for his too.

Rose was his friend, his first friend from after the war, and the woman who pulled him out of the darkness and forced him to start living again. If she left because of him and Zoe, he wouldn't forgive himself.

"Where do you want to go when we leave?" The Doctor asked to distract himself from his guilt. "Got anymore places to tick off your list?"

"I'm not seventeen anymore," she reminded him.

"Doesn't mean you can't have a list," he said.

"There's nowhere in particular I want to go," Zoe said, absently resting her hand on his inner thigh, lifting her coffee to her mouth. "Maybe Mickey's got some place in mind. He's still relatively new to everything."

"And, rather like you, keeps having a rough go of it," the Doctor mused, considering that at least Rose and Jack had a good introductory period to the TARDIS unlike Zoe and Mickey. "But I'm pretty sure he'd be happy to stay in the TARDIS with Jack for the next few weeks."

A grin split across her face. "You can hardly blame them. As I recall, when we started sleeping together, you didn't want to let me out of our room for a good few weeks."

"I still don't," he murmured, tucking his nose beneath her ear and kissing her there, delighting in the fine shiver of pleasure that ran through her, her fingers giving his thigh a warning squeeze. "Do you remember that day in Jamaica when we snuck away to the waterfall?"

Zoe turned into him, The memory of him in the clear blue water, the moon full and silvery overhead, reaching out for her filled her mind's eye, and she swallowed. "It's pretty hard to forget."

"We could go back there, just the two of us," the Doctor suggested, trailing suggestive fingers down the length of her arm. "Make a small holiday of it."

A small, pleased sound rumbled through her chest. "Tempting."

He rubbed his nose along her jaw, and she turned her head, her mouth within easy reach, and he lifted his hand to brush her hair back from her face, murmuring when she closed the distance and kissed him. Hand falling to cup her cheek, the Doctor enjoyed the few quiet moments of bliss that came from kissing Zoe, his mind silent and the world settled around him, before she pulled back a solitary inch.

"You're distracting me," she accused, a soft murmur rolling across his mouth. "I don't appreciate it."

"You kissed me," the Doctor said, kissing her again with a smile. "It's hardly my fault you can't keep your lips off me."

The brown of her eyes turned dark and liquid, flecks of gold spooling through them as they turned fond, her fingers lifting to scratch the underside of his jaw. "You are pretty kissable, but even these lips aren't enough to get me to leave right now."

Cold air rushed between them when she pulled back to settle at his side, eyes moving back to the mouth of the estate, and he was left disoriented by the abrupt change in mood.

"Zo –"

"I've waited a year for my sister to come home before, a few hours is nothing."

"She probably just lost track of time," the Doctor said even though, out of all of his friends, Rose was the most time conscientious, which he suspected probably had something to do with the fact he had brought her home late once. "UNIT can be fun when it wants to be."

"D'you think they really have offered her a job?" Zoe asked.

"Probably," he said, honestly. "She's perfect for them. Look at how well she handled everything this week."

Her right knee bounced. "Good, that's good for her. D'you think she'll take it?"

"That I've got no idea," the Doctor said, arms going around her again, keeping her warm as best as his cooler body temperature could. "Do you not want her to take it?"

"I want her to talk to me," she said, petulant and annoyed. "I want her to stop being a little cow and acknowledge that things are different instead of ignoring me like we're kids and I knocked over her make-up case."

"It's only been a day," he said, gently. "And you've both been busy."

The scoff that left her throat was devastating. "If I'd walked in on her shagging you, I'd have made the time."

"It's not me your angry with, love." Rubbing her arm to soothe her temper, he pressed a kiss to the back of her head. "And it's not really Rose you're mad at either. We can not talk about it all we want but you and I both know you're angry at yourself for not telling her sooner."

"I know," Zoe said, wincing when she heard the sharp tone. Breathing deeply, she sighed and turned her face into his neck. "I keep thinking about the look on her face when she opened the door. She looked betrayed."

Not knowing what to say to make the situation better, the Doctor held her tighter against him and murmured his love into her hair.

"I'm sorry," she said into his neck. "She's just..."

"Your sister?"

"I was going to say a pain in the ass."

The Doctor snorted and kissed the top of her head before the sound of a car turning into the estate had them looking up. Sleek and black – the likes of which weren't typically seen on the estate – it slid to a smooth stop near them, and the driver got out dressed in a well-tailored black suit, a gun holstered at his hip. Stepping to the rear of the car, he opened the back door and Rose half-fell, half-stumbled out of the car.

"She's drunk," Zoe said, flatly. "She's fucking drunk."

"Rose?" The Doctor called out, releasing Zoe and getting to his feet as he watched her grip the car door tightly and pat the driver with a heavy hand. "You okay?"

Rose heaved herself upright and took a step forward. Between lifting her foot from the ground and placing it back down in a step, she found something to trip over – the Doctor suspected air was the main culprit – and the driver swiftly caught her before she face planted the ground. Her hands gripped his shoulders tightly as he set her back on her feet.

"Thanks, Frank."

"Ma'am," the driver – Frank – said with a polite nod. "You take care now."

The Doctor watched her give a small salute to the driver who climbed back into the car and pulled away from them, silence stretching before –

"You're drunk."

"Oh no," the Doctor muttered.

Rose turned and stared at her sister who had risen to her feet and was glaring accusatory across the length of concrete between them, the Doctor realising he was physically in the middle of them only when it was too late to move.

"Says the girl who drinks a whole bottle of wine by herself on a bloody Tuesday," Rose replied, tightening her bun with a violent jerk. "Save the judgement for someone who doesn't know you, ZoZo."

"Maybe we should all go inside," the Doctor suggested, not enjoying the childhood nickname that he hadn't heard in a while, certain it wasn't meant affectionately. "I'll put the kettle on."

Zoe ignored him, arms folded across her chest, a frown darkening her features. "I thought you were at UNIT today but you've been out drinking instead?"

"I was at UNIT then I went drinkin', not that it's any of your business." Rose rummaged through her bag, dropping a half-eaten pack of Starburst to the ground and scattering some loose change along with it. She pulled out her TARDIS key that was attached to a keychain purchased on Thanatos before the rain storms that had forced them inside for a week and brandished it at Zoe. "I can drink when I want."

Zoe's expression flattened. "With Drew?"

"What d'you know about Drew?"

"Deano said you went home with him last night," she said, and the Doctor worried that the aggressive approach she was taking was the wrong one. "What were you thinking? Drew's a nice guy, he's not someone you have a one-night stand with."

"You're judgin' me for sleepin' with Drew?" Rose demanded, weight resting heavily on her back foot. "You don't get to judge me for sleepin' with anyone considerin'."

"Considering? Considering what?" The Doctor discovered he wasn't as invisible as he hoped when Rose gestured obscenely at him. Zoe's arms dropped from her chest and she took three long steps forward, stopping before she got too close, irritation splayed across her face. "Can we finally talk about this now then? "You've been avoiding me all day –"

"I've been busy," Rose snapped. "UNIT's offered me a job."

"So we've heard," she said, shortly. "Are you taking it?"

"Why?" Rose demanded, striding past the Doctor who quickly side stepped out of her way. "Want to shag your boyfriend in peace?"

"Oh my god, why d'you have to be such a bitch about it?" Zoe snapped as Rose jammed her key into the lock and opened the TARDIS; his ship giving a mournful sigh in the back of his mind, not enjoying conflict within her walls anymore than the Doctor did. "It's not the end of the bloody world that I'm with the Doctor. You don't have to go out and get plastered because of it."

"I didn't get drunk because of it, you egotistical cow," Rose shot back. "I got drunk because someone bought me drinks."

"Someone other than Drew? Get you."

"Fuck you, Zoe," Rose said, fury burning through her as she stormed into the TARDIS, Zoe on her heel. "You're not the only person who can have a sex life on this bloody ship. Get off your fuckin' high horse?"

"I don't have a high horse, you –"

The Doctor breathed out slowly, his breath misting before him, and he looked into the warmth of the TARDIS where Rose and Zoe's angry voices echoed back at him, and he found himself contemplating spending the night in Mickey's flat as he suspected it was more welcoming than his home at the moment.

"Right," he said, bracing himself. "This is going to be fun."