When Leto woke, she found herself in a soft warm bed. She kept very still, though she longed to stretch her aching limbs. There was someone else in the room, no, two people, and they were talking together, quietly so she could only hear the murmur of voices.
She sat up and looked around. A bright, clean room.
"Ah, you're awake. Good." One of the men who had been talking, a military man. "I'm Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart. This is the Doctor." He indicated the man next to him.
"You're like him," she said. "Like the Master."
The Doctor frowned, sat by the bed. "We're of the same species, my dear."
"It's frightening to look at you; it's as though you don't exist."
He reached out and clasped one of her hands between two of his. "Flesh and blood, just like you. You're not human then?"
Leto shook her head. "I…I was brought here."
"Why? What is the Master doing on Earth?" asked the Brigadier.
"I don't know; I'm sorry." She touched her head. "It's so noisy here, my head. Your people are so very noisy."
"We'll go soon," said the Doctor. "Just a few questions."
She nodded, smiled. "Alright."
"The Master, do you remember what happened? What he was doing?"
She knew how to answer that; Keller often made sure that victims of his hypnosis did not remember what they did under his control. "No." She frowned, shook her head as though confused. "I can't remember." She looked up at the Doctor. "I can't…why can't I remember?"
"It's all right. Don't worry about it; it's only to be expected. Can you tell me your homeworld? I may be able to return you there."
"It doesn't matter. It's dead now. Destroyed, all of it."
He looked at her, into her eyes, and the compassion she saw in his almost convinced her to tell him the truth. "I'm sorry. We'll let you rest now."
"Thank you."
She lay back down on the bed curled beneath the blankets and tried to sleep.
- - -
"Doctor, I expected you'd come for a gloat, sooner or later." The Master stood in his cell, watching the Doctor through the bars. He had spent most of his time pacing, but now he stood perfectly still, hands clasped behind his back.
"That's more your style," said the Doctor. "No, I came to ask what you were doing at that house."
"Do you really expect me to tell you?"
"Not really, but I expect Leto will recover her memory in time. We'll find out, and whatever you were doing, it's over now."
"Ah, so you've taken her into your tender care, have you?"
The Doctor's jaw tightened; he was angry. "You took her from her planet, forced her to obey you. Did you destroy her world too?"
"I saved her, Doctor," he said mildly. "If it were not for me, she would be dead."
"You used her."
The Master shrugged. "That too."
"You'll never learn, will you?" said the Doctor, turning to leave.
"How is the charming Captain Yates?" asked the Master.
The Doctor stopped, gave him a hard look. "Recovering. Though he hasn't regained consciousness."
"Ah, well, a miscalculation on my part. I see you are unharmed. How did you escape from my little trap?"
He gave a tight smile. "I'll let that be something for you to think about while you're in here."
- - -
Later that evening the Doctor returned to the medical wing to visit Leto. Jo followed him in, closing the door softly behind her. They found her awake and sitting up in bed, reading. The colour had returned to her face, though there was still plenty of cuts and bruises visible on her arms.
"How are you feeling?" asked the Doctor, sitting by the bed. Jo brought a chair over and sat next to him.
"Much better, thank you. May I ask what happened?"
"We found you lying on the road, unconscious. Seems the Master pushed you from the car."
"The Master?"
"Don't worry, my dear, we've caught him. He's in a cell downstairs. What I was wondering is what we're going to do about you."
"What do you mean?" asked Leto, drawing back from him.
"No, no, it's nothing for you to worry about. But if you've no home to return to, and you're trapped on Earth, well, we'll have to make sure that you have a place here. I don't think the Brigadier would have any objection to you staying at UNIT, at least in the short term. You'd be safe here, and it would give you time to adjust to Earth culture."
"That's very kind of you, Doctor, and I don't mean to be ungrateful, but is it necessary to stay on this world?" She glanced at Jo, gave her an apologetic look. "You do not mean to be, but you humans are a very noisy people. It's…it can be difficult to concentrate." She looked back to the Doctor. "You are a Time Lord; don't you have a TARDIS?"
"I do, my dear, but it, like me, is currently trapped on Earth. I had hoped I might be granted a sort of special dispensation to return you to your world. They've done it before." He sounded wistful, and Jo noticed it too.
"Can we get you anything?" she asked. "I know the food in here isn't very good."
"Oh no," Leto told her. "The food is fascinating, but, ah, would it be possible to have another book?"
"Yes, of course." Jo smiled.
"Thank you."
When they left, Leto caught the first few sentences of their conversation as the door was pulled close.
"Noisy?" asked Jo, confused, not annoyed.
"There are very few humans with any real psychic abilities, Jo, but Leto comes from a planet where empathic abilities are considered normal. They'll have some mental defences to keep their thoughts protected."
"So it's like we're shouting all the time?"
"Yes, something like that."
Leto fell back against her pillow, closing her eyes. These were kind people, and they gave their trust so freely, accepting her at her word. They did not frighten her, and when the Doctor said she would be safe here, she believed him.
It would be so easy, too easy to stay. She gave a ruthful smile; it might be safe, but how dull it would be to be trapped on this primitive world.
When she woke, it was still daytime. She found her clothes and shoes in the bedside cabinet and dressed quickly. She was careful as she moved about, testing her muscles to see how extensive the damage was. There were dull aches through her body, but it was nothing that wouldn't be sorted after a few days of rest, though she did not expect such a luxury.
Leto turned the door handle, and found it unlocked. Outside, there was a soldier. She smiled, surprised to find that they were not quite so lacking in caution as she had assumed.
"I'm sorry to bother you," she said, "but I've been cooped up in bed for hours. I wondered if it would be possible to go for a walk?"
"I'm afraid not, Miss. But the Doctor did say to take you down to the lab if you got restless. This way."
The Doctor greeted her with a friendly smile when she entered his laboratory, and Jo politely asked if she'd like a cup of tea. While she went to fill up the kettle, Leto sat down by the workbench, taking a closer look at what the Doctor was doing. She recognised the equipment, the set-up, it was almost exactly what the Master had worked with in the cellar.
Sitting right in front of the Doctor was the artefact itself.
"What is that?" she asked.
"That's what I'm trying to find out," he told her. "I don't suppose you can remember anything about it."
Leto shook her head. "I'm sorry; I've tried." It wasn't entirely untruthful.
"Here's your tea," said Jo, passing her a mug, then another to the Doctor. Leto accepted it gratefully, sipping at the milky liquid as the Doctor worked.
"What's going to happen to him?" asked Leto.
"Prison, I should think."
"They don't execute criminals?"
"Not in this country, no. Not any more."
Leto took another gulp of her tea. "Why does he want to kill you?" she asked.
The Doctor didn't reply immediately. She watched him carefully, trying to guess what he was thinking. "We were friends, a very long time ago. Back then we seemed to want the same thing, but we disagreed about the means."
She didn't ask anything more, it was obvious it was not a topic he wished to discuss.
Instead she talked about the books she had read, and he seemed to appreciate her interest in Earth's literature. Jo, too, had suggestions about what to read, though it seemed that the Doctor didn't have the faintest interest in the sort of books she liked. "But reading's supposed to be fun," she protested. "Sometimes it's nice to kick back with something light from the bestseller list. It can't all be deep themes and streams of impenetrable prose."
And if they believed that she would betray them, they made no sign of it. They were cautious, not mistrustful, but she needed more freedom if she were to help the Master to escape.
As it turned out, she didn't have to.
"Good evening, Doctor." The Master stood in the doorway to the lab, quite unharmed and armed with a revolver. "Your UNIT friends really do have a lot to learn about security."