oOo

The Doctor pounded angrily on the door to the Master's TARDIS, furious with himself, as much for not realizing Ace had no intention of doing as he told her as for the fact that he'd allowed himself to be bodily thrown out the door. In his defense, the Master rarely resorted to fisticuffs; the unexpectedly physical attack had disconcerted him while he was distracted by his spasm of fear for Ace and her baby. The blow the Master had landed had been hard enough to do damage; thank the Universe and everything in it that Kyris appeared to be in a position to help her.

A sudden shudder, a grinding, wheezing noise more subtle than the one given off by his own TARDIS, and the Doctor stepped hastily back. The Master was dematerializing, and the Doctor raced grimly for his own machine, meters away but feeling farther as the noise dissipated into nothingness. When he glanced back over his shoulder, the Master's TARDIS was gone.

A few seconds later, so was he.

oOo

"Where is the disk?"

The Master's voice, harsh, unpleasant, grated on Kyris' ears, but it was to Ace he spoke. "Well?"

The threat this time was, indeed, a knife; either temporal grace didn't apply to non-projectile weapons or it was another bluff. Based on what his mother's disk had already shown him, Kyris was inclined to believe the former over the latter possibility. "Smashed to bits," Ace growled in reply, perpetuating the bluff Kyris had started. Confirming the false as true. She turned her attention back to Kyris. "Well?" There was tension in her voice and the way she held herself, but not the panic he'd seen only moments before.

Kyris risked a smile as he pulled his hands away from her abdomen. "You're fine," he said softly. "You're both fine."

Ace, who had begun to smile back at him, frowned fiercely at that slip of the tongue, even as she pulled herself to her feet. The Master, of course, caught every nuance. "Both? Pregnant, eh? Yours, I presume?" This last was directed at Kyris, but he didn't bother waiting for answers. "Very good. Always nice to have an extra hostage along, and the Doctor's grandchild and son are about the best hostages one could ask for." He gestured with the knife. "Up on your feet, boy, and believe that at the first sign of resistance I will not hesitate to use this. On either of you." His eyes and voice were ice.

Kyris slowly did as he was told, exchanging warning glances with Ace. Don't try anything. Not when there was so much more to lose than he'd realized...

But Ace merely stood there, glaring, hands stuffed into her jacket pockets, unmoving. She appeared to take the threat seriously, which relieved Kyris' mind. The time to do something would come, but it would be better if the Master were distracted. Hopefully by the Doctor's return.

The Master produced a pair of binders, from where Kyris hadn't the faintest clue, but he caught them when the renegade tossed them to him. "Put these on. No, not on yourself, on her." The Master's smile was thin and humorless. "She's already proven herself to be a menace, no matter what her condition." Once the binders were, reluctantly, snapped around her wrists, his body relaxed, but only a little. "So. A baby, eh? Boy or girl?"

Kyris, who already suspected the answer, nevertheless felt a surge of elation as Ace admitted, "Girl. I've already picked out a name." She glanced sideways at Kyris, who was bolstered by her calm acceptance of the current situation. "Patience, in case you're interested."

"Not really, no." The Master's voice was dismissive. "Walk ahead of me, please, one behind the other, that's it." He followed them out of the console room. Kyris risked a glance back to see if he could tell where the Master had sent them, then hurried to keep up with Ace's confident stride. Off to imprisonment again, no doubt, but this time Kyris knew he had to find a way out for them both. For all of us, he corrected himself silently. Fatherhood was upon him, ready or not, and motherhood for Ace, not at all what they'd expected, but here it was and could not be ignored.

He wasn't fooled by Ace's choice of names; there was only one name this baby would ever have.

Susan.

And it was up to him to save her.