"A salaried employee now, is it?" he continued. "Perhaps we should change your name to something more appropriate. The Servant. The Lackey."
The Master wafted the jibe aside with a languid movement of his hand.
"Purely a temporary arrangement, I assure you. Even a renegade timelord has bills to pay. And you'll be gratified to know that my long association with you greatly increases my marketability. Feigle's offer for a little advice on coping with your potential interference was remarkably generous."
"Feigle, yes." The Doctor's eyes sharpened intently. "I trailed them here after they snatched Jasmine on Hagulon Beta, and I assumed it would be some old enemy. But I've never seen the man before in my life. Just what is he after?"
"All will become clear in due course. Assuming you live that long."
"Perhaps it'll become clear sooner than you think. What was it you said earlier? You plan on stopping everything I try 'until the time comes'? Now that was an interesting choice of phrase. Careless too, getting chatty about your future plans when you know I'm keyed into the system."
"Ah, too true," the Master agreed, shaking his head mournfully. "I must be getting old. Unless of course it should emerge that letting you have a few hints about the first plan was all part of the second plan."
The hard-eyed smile crawled across his pale face, and the Doctor frowned, but answered with a superior sniff:
"First plan, second plan... Overcomplicated as usual. That was always your weakness."
"And yours was your predictability. For instance, I know your own plan is going to be something very dramatic and large scale, and that you're very close to putting it into action."
"Oh, you're hoping to throw out some guesses and get me to own up to the truth? You've played that card too often."
"Not at all. Your young friend has been here for a while, more than long enough for you to come up with something. The attempt in Feigle's office today depended on his capricious decision to have her brought into his presence and was therefore a spur of the moment affair, not the main plan. The fact that you've made yourself known to me here tells me that you're past the stage of hiding patiently behind the scenes gathering information, therefore the attempt will be soon. And likewise, that you're under the impression it doesn't matter if I know you're tapping the communication system tells me you're not relying on that ability for the success of your idea, therefore it's something unsubtle." The Master leaned back with a satisfied look. "You see, Doctor, too many years have passed, too many encounters. We have few surprises to offer one another."
The Doctor had listened closely, but without so much as a flicker of a response to indicate whether the Master's hypothesis was correct. Afterwards, he let the silence stand for a moment, unhappily contemplating his old enemy with an appraising eye.
"I think there are one or two surprises left," he said quietly. "First, I had to get used to the idea that there was no evil thing you wouldn't do in the pursuit of power. For a while, I imagined there might be something left inside, a line you wouldn't cross, but eventually you made me give you up. Then I watched you slip deeper and deeper into insanity, obsessed with your plans to cheat death and with your vendetta against me. Do you have any conception of how I felt, seeing you sink lower and lower every time we met? But even then I honestly believed you retained a kind of honour, or at least a kind of self respect. I never thought I'd see you playing second fiddle to a spiteful, sadistic little weasel like Feigle."
The Master's eyes dropped to the floor, and his shoulders moved, once, in the bare bones of an internal shudder of laughter. He smiled easily and looked back up at the Doctor.
"Weasel he may be, but he's a weasel with a large number of armed men at his command and that makes him a weasel to be treated with some respect."
"Did you see him earlier?" Agitated, the Doctor leaned forward towards the screen. "Did you see him all twisted up with pleasure at the thought of what he was going to have done to Jasmine? He wants to sit and watch the film tomorrow evening. Is his side really the side you want to be on? Doesn't it make you feel sick inside? Doesn't it make your fingers itch and your toes curl and your teeth grate? Don't you recoil?"
The Master listened to this placidly.
"Not really. I like Jasmine, she's very personable, but I'm afraid my brief social interaction with her has given you a false sense of optimism. Frankly, the weasel can do what he likes to her as long as it doesn't interfere with my own schedule."
The Doctor drew back, frustrated, but took in a breath and persevered:
"I sometimes wonder if this callousness is something you have to work at. Very easy to let your concentration slip and allow some feelings through. You didn't have to give her a fruit juice."
"That's where you're wrong. The fruit juice is all part of the plan, just like everything else." The Master leaned forward a little, his black eyes intensifying. "You're quite convinced, aren't you, that your way of life is superior to any other? Should I be like you, and drift around the universe, and gain nothing and build nothing and leave nothing behind? When you're gone, there'll be nothing to prove you ever existed. Is that your rebellion against the Time Lords? Do those decadent, enfeebled ponderers shudder at the mention of your name? I shall live forever. In body, or failing that in legend. The universe will be marked forever by my presence, and that, old friend, is what makes a life worth the living."
There was a sudden energy, an alertness about him, and a flash of white teeth showed through his steady, placid exterior in anticipation of the Doctor's reaction, but the Doctor looked away with a mild air of distaste.
"You should try being good, you know," he said distantly. "Just for a year, say. You might like it, and you never know till you try."
The Master relaxed back in his seat and smiled broadly.
"Perhaps I shall. In the millennia ahead I shall no doubt be in frequent need of novel experiences. For now, though, I shall look forward to finding out what plan you've cooked up to retrieve your young friend. I trust it will be entertainingly melodramatic."
His finger stabbed a button on the desk, and the screen went dark. Left alone, the Master sat peacefully for a long time, his face contemplative and still, stroking his fingers steadily through his beard.
Meanwhile, in the Tardis, the Doctor stared intently down at the blank monitor, as if expecting it to give up some secret. His palms slammed down hard onto the console top.
"Just wait, you hairy faced old fraud. I'll give you melodrama."