"Too late, grandfather, there's nothing left now."
- The Doctor and Susan
"They've done what!"
Winifred was as angry as Ancelyn could ever recall. Her temper had not ever been particularly long and the past few months had shortened it considerably, but even now he saw, with some pride, that she did not let it better her.
She took a deep breath. "Can we go after them?"
"Not if we wish to remain undetected by our enemy," he told her.
She chewed her bottom lip, glanced at Harry. "Did you know anything about this?"
"Certainly not." Flustered, but not guilty, still Winifred was not so quick to accept his word.
"You and the Captain seemed to be getting along rather well."
Harry sighed, a little huff. "Brigadier, if I had helped him I would tell you. But I didn't."
She nodded, sat down at her desk. "Alright." A glance at Ancelyn. "With those three gone is there any chance we can repair the stealth units?"
"The professor is not optimistic."
Another nod, more deliberate. "Then to hell with this. I'm not sitting around in this rat-hole while we've got people fighting in London. Get everyone ready to move out. If we're going down, we're going down fighting."
The roads really were in remarkably good repair, all things considered. And it was a very nice day, sunny and bright and blue. No traffic either, obviously, which, actually, would have been terribly useful for helping to distract one from the fact that however skilled the driver was there was no way to prevent the, possibly genetic, fear that occurred when travelling at this sort of speed in a vehicle so primitive.
"Could we slow down?" Livia thought desperately for an excuse. "This medical equipment is very delicate."
"And will be of absolutely no use if we do not catch up with the Doctor," said the Master, not missing a beat, but taking the time to glance in the mirror, catching Livia's eyes.
She sat back in the seat, one hand clinging to the seatbelt, and resisted the temptation to close her eyes and hide from the rushing scenery.
"You got any idea where the Doctor's heading?" asked Jack.
"Oh, that's easy, Captain. He's heading to the heart of the problem, to Cybercontrol."
"And how do you know that?" Livia said.
"The Doctor is very predictable." He smiled, a private joke. "Besides we tend to think alike."
"But it won't be on Earth. In orbit, or the moon if they were feeling particularly vulnerable," she said. "So somehow he's found a spaceship?"
Jack glanced back at her. "The Brigadier told us where they'd landed when we were in London. Pretty detailed layout of the base too."
"Oh, great," said Livia. "So we're heading smack into the middle of an army?"
"Not quite," the Master told her. "The humans seem to have finally taken the initiative. I imagine the Cybermen will be quite distracted, allowing the Doctor, and ourselves, to slip past."
"And that's where he thinks Rose is? Cybercontrol?" she said.
"It would seem so."
Livia leaned forward. "You know, don't you? You know who took her."
"No." He relented a little. "Though I do have some rather nasty suspicions."
She sat back, closed her eyes. Tired.
Somewhere, between waking and sleeping, she remembered a voice. Her name, and…
"What was that?" Livia looked around, alert, suddenly afraid, and drawing a curious look from Jack.
"You were sleeping. Dreaming. Nothing's changed."
"I don't dream," she muttered. "I…sorry…forget it." She stared determinedly out the window, careful to keep her thoughts from her expression. I remember, she thought, I remember that voice and my name and…someone was there. Someone took Rose and they knew me.
Thunder. No, an engine. Rumbling with the tell-tale metallic ring of a primitive engine. Livia searched the skies. "Look!"
"That's got to be a good sign," said Jack as the planes flew overhead. "Didn't realise they had any left." He looked down at the scanner. "Wait, wait, the Doctor…he's stopped."
"Stopped breathing or stopped moving?" asked the Master.
"Guess."
"Captain."
"He's stationary, a good thirty miles away. Still not at the Cybermen's base though."
"Then either the Cybermen have stopped him, in which case there is little we can do, or the humans have. And I'm quite sure he'll be able to talk his way out of that. Either way, it makes no difference, we must reach that ship."
He hadn't even noticed them until the warning shot, but then their van had been under the cover of a stealth shield. His own vehicle, however, had been visible for some time. It seemed that the saboteur had had a chance to damage the unit installed in the car after all. Though they had not quite finished the job.
"Get out of the car!"
A sergeant, all nerves and pasty white skin. The Doctor wasn't confident of his ability to shoot straight, or refrain from shooting someone who obviously wasn't a threat. He didn't have the heart to argue, and followed the sergeant's instructions wordlessly. Waiting whilst the private reported in.
"Sir!" He ran up, almost smiling. "Greyhound has confirmed his identity. We're to bring him in."
"Right." The sergeant nodded.
The Doctor turned, very slowly and keeping his hands up. "That means you can stop pointing the gun at me now."
"Oh, right. Sorry."
The Doctor grinned. As good a mask as any. "Well done. Now let's get this over with."
Despite his age, Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart couldn't bring himself to sit back in the London HQ with the Prime Minster. If there was going to be a fight for his world, then he wanted to be out there, right in the middle of it, with his soldiers.
The mobile UNIT HQ gave him an overview of their entire operation and indicated a lull in the storm. Of course, that was about to be broken: his guest had arrived.
The doors banged open. The Doctor. Hands buried in the pockets of his jacket. Face dark. The anger was rather unjustified, the Brigadier felt, given that the Doctor's path would have taken him straight into a Cyberman patrol.
"Doctor…" he began.
"Whatever it is, no. You seem to be doing just fine by yourselves, and I have to find Rose. So if you could just give me a car with a working stealth unit, that would be great."
"You were heading straight into the heart of Cyberman controlled territory."
"I know. I'm trying to get to Cybercontrol."
"May I ask why?"
"Rose. Someone's taken her. Because they want to get to me. And I was so busy keeping out of the way and hoping you lot could take care of yourselves that I refused to see what was going on."
"Which is?"
The Doctor stepped forward, his eyes fixed intently on the Brigadier. "I haven't time for this. I haven't time to save the world. That's up to you, Brigadier. I have to save her. Let me go."
And the Brigadier smiled at his oldest friend and offered his hand. It wasn't as though he had ever been able to change the Doctor's mind once it was set. "Good luck, Doctor," he said, as the Doctor accepted his hand. "I'll see you soon."
It was obscenely quiet. Still. Dull metal structures and all the silence in-between.
"And what happens when we get out of the car?" asked Livia.
"I imagine that the Cybermen will respond," the Master told her.
"Oh good." She checked the medical equipment again. Well-packed and secure, but it wasn't light and she knew she couldn't carry both it and a gun.
"The Doctor should be here in five," said Jack.
"Then we'll let him choose the ship," the Master said. "And we'll wait."
The Doctor pulled the UNIT vehicle to a stop at the edge of the Cyberman base. There was more than one spaceship here, but the one he had chosen lay some distance from the heart of the base and appeared in good repair. All ready for launch.
One last look about and he ran. Silence. Except for his footsteps on metal. Familiar technology, familiar layout. Penetrating the ship was easy.
But they knew, they must have known, and when he noticed that the storage hold held nothing but hibernating Cybermen he felt the beat of his hearts increase. He risked the transport tube, took it all the way to the bridge.
Empty. Powered down. But he could soon fix that. So spartan, dull metal and the quiet blink of pale lights. There were two exits other than the transport tube, and no way to secure either quickly.
First things first, he decided and turned to the launch controls.
They knew, of course they knew. He'd have to override.
The sound of metal. The soft spin of the door. There was no-where to hide.
"Oh, hello," said the Doctor.
The Cyberman said nothing. Raised its arm, the blaster levelled at the Doctor's chest.
An arc of golden light shot forward, striking the Cyberman in its chest unit. It fell forward, an electronic scream signalling its death.
Jack, glitter gun in hand, ran onto the bridge. "Just in time," he said, flashing a grin. "You weren't going to leave without me, were you?"
The Doctor didn't smile back. He shook his head a little. "I had to go. Jack, she's…"
"Hey, relax." Jack stepped forward, reaching out, not quite embracing the Doctor, but his hands were on his shoulders and the Doctor didn't object. "I get it, okay? But I'm here now, and we can go rescue her together, alright?"
"Thanks," said the Doctor, a quiet murmur. A noise by the door, and Jack looked distinctly uncomfortable. "Who's that?"
"Ah, I had some help getting here," he said, as Livia and the Master arrived on the bridge.
"Well, Rose is going to need to finish her treatment," said Livia, but all the Doctor's attention was on the second arrival.
"You," he said simply, taking two shorts steps forward, but suddenly Jack was in his way. "Move," ordered the Doctor, not taking his eyes from the Master.
"No, Doctor. Now I know there's some history with you two, but we would never have got here without his help."
"Hardly surprising. He's probably behind this whole thing."
The Master stepped round Jack, facing the Doctor, utterly nonplussed. "How soon we forget," he said. "I thought we had come to an understanding, Doctor. And yet here you are, falling back into old patterns without the slightest provocation from me."
"Rose-"
"I'm here to help you, Doctor. I did so before and I will do so now."
"I thought you were dead."
A single raised eyebrow, and the barest hint of a smile. "A mistake you've often made."
"What are you doing here?" A disbelief, and the Master knew the question that he was asking.
"My TARDIS was destroyed, and no survivor of your burning could risk travelling in time. No-one except you. And I knew that you'd eventually come back to Earth, so here I am."
"You were waiting for me?
"For six years. I believe I missed you once or twice but now, here we are."
"Here we are," repeated the Doctor, folding his arms. "But someone knows more than what they're saying."
"Doctor, I-"
"Not you," he said. "You." He looked at Livia.
"I…Doctor, I'm here to help Rose. I promise you," she protested.
"Yeah, and what else?"
She looked down, unable to meet his gaze. "I didn't know before. I would have said something." She glanced up, saw him waiting. Took a breath. "I heard a voice. Before she was taken. In the room outside the surgery someone was calling my name. I don't know who. I don't remember."
The Doctor looked at the Master, but he merely shrugged, said, "Nothing to do with me, I assure you."
"Alright. we've wasted enough time." He turned back to the launch controls. "Jack, get over here." And over his shoulder, to the Master, "Get those doors sealed, there could be more sentries."
"We dealt with quite a few of them," he said, but followed the Doctor's suggestion.
The ship shook. Livia stumbled, but did not let any of the medical equipment fall. The Doctor seemed not to notice. "Ready?"
"That was weapons fire," said Jack. "I don't think we can complete an orbit launch with-"
"Doesn't matter," snapped the Doctor, shoving Jack aside, adjusting the controls himself.
The ship came alive, the engines humming through the metal. And without a word of warning from the Doctor the sky went rushing past.
The crash wasn't as bad as what it could have been. Apart from a few bruises, nobody was hurt. As Livia checked that nothing in the med-pack had been damaged, the Doctor said, "Storage holds been jettisoned. No more problems with the Cybermen."
"That's a little optimistic, don't you think?" muttered Livia, standing up. "What was that for?"
"We couldn't complete an orbit launch," said the Doctor. "But we could make a terrestrial one."
"No more Cybermen knocking on the door then?" said Jack.
"And how much damage have you done to this thing?" Livia asked.
"Ah." The Doctor paused, took a look over the launch controls. "Well, more than enough experience between us to get it all sorted out in an hour or two." He grinned, fished his sonic screwdriver from his coat. "Let's get to work."
Livia didn't realise the Master was there until she noticed the shadow standing over her. Soldering wires was hardly the most skilled work required to make the ship space worthy, but it did require a steady hand. After listening carefully to the Doctor's instructions, she worked on her own whilst the others dealt with the more complex repair problems they faced.
"What do you want?" she asked, not bothering to look up.
"To talk."
"I'm busy, and you should be too."
"Are you really that concerned about finding that human?"
"Yes."
"Because she's your patient." It wasn't a question.
Livia stood up, turned to face him. "And what's wrong with that?"
"You do seem to take your oaths to a dead society very seriously."
She frowned, irritated at being asked to defend her actions. "I believed in them then; I believe in them now. What does it matter to you?"
The Master didn't answer her question, said instead, "Have you considered what will happen once this is over?"
"I go home," she said simply.
"Home?" he echoed.
"Yes, I had a perfectly acceptable life on this planet before the Cybermen came…and before I got my memories back."
"And that's enough, knowing what you do now?"
She spoke crisply. "I believe we've already had this discussion."
"A jest, nothing more" He smiled, not unpleasantly but it was hardly reassuring. "You don't want to stay on Earth."
She was quiet, considered returning to work, ignoring him until he went away. "No, I don't," she admitted. "Not now."
"And?"
"And the Doctor has his TARDIS. That's a way off of this world to somewhere a little more civilised. Somewhere where I can do some good without having to work with such primitive medicine or risk upsetting the technological evolution of this planet."
"You'd risk it then? Travel with him, in one of our ships?"
"I don't see any other choice." She smiled, understanding. "But then, that's why you're here, isn't it?"
"Very perceptive."
"Well?"
"How much do you know about Captain Harkness?"
Livia shrugged. "He travels with the Doctor; he's from the future."
"He was a Time Agent," the Master told her.
She frowned. "The lesser races have always meddled with time travel, if they want to give themselves pretentious titles…"
"Like Lord?"
"No other race ever mastered time travel."
"Or the same finesse with arrogance. How gratifying to see you have not cast off all your heritage."
Her grip on the soldering laser tightened. "If you had a point, I suggest you make it."
He smiled easily. She was angry, but hardy disposed to violence. He knew that she was no threat. "Captain Harkness was a Time Agent with access to reliable temporal technology. Ships with the ability to travel through time and space without the Rassilon imprimatur or an equivalent genetic marker in the operator."
"Ah, and so with access to one of these ships-"
"The freedom of time and space. Not as efficient or accurate as Gallifreyan technology, but quite sufficient for its purpose."
"You have one of these ships then?"
The Master shook his head. "Not yet, but I intend to get one. There have been several temporal incursions on this planet over the past six years. There will be more."
"Fine, but what does this have to do with me? You don't need my help to steal a ship."
"No," the Master conceded. "But there is another matter." He paused, seemed almost uncomfortable. "You're aware of my physiology?"
"You mean your body-snatching?" Her voice was tinted with disgust. "Yes."
"You think I find it appealing? I do what I have to do to survive. But I do want to be free of it."
"Ah." Livia nodded, silent a moment in thought. "Well, it would be possible to create a Gallifreyan body on this world. Given time."
"How much time?"
"However long it takes to develop the tools required for the technique. This is not an advanced society," she said. "But there are problems. I cannot recreate Rassilon's legacy, I cannot give the body the ability to regenerate, or give it the symbiotic nuclei. One body, one life and in one time." She smiled ruthfully. "Else I might have considered it an option."
"Well, one must begin somewhere. And this alternative is quite acceptable."
"I didn't say I would help you."
"You want off this world; I would not be unwilling to have a useful passenger once I have acquired a time-ship."
"No," she said shortly. "I'm well aware of how very dead your allies tend to end up. If I agree to this, then I want my own ship and I want it before I complete any treatment."
"Acquiring a second ship should be a great deal easier than acquiring a first." The Master gave a slight bow. "I agree to you proposition."
"There's one other thing," she said. "Creating a body is a simple matter with the right tools, but transferring consciousness is a little more…problematic."
"Let me worry about that, my dear."
"In that case, I want to know how you intend to achieve it," said Livia.
"The same as last time, through the power of the Source, the organising principle of the Traken Union."
"Traken," murmured Livia. "The planet still exists then?"
"It depends when you mean," and Livia was chilled by his tone. "It survived the Time War, but was destroyed in 1984, Earth time, of course."
"So the first thing is to acquire a time-ship." She paused, not wishing to think that far ahead. Not yet. "But Rose comes first."
"Oh, naturally," said the Master. "We wouldn't want to disappoint the Doctor now, would we?"
"Ready?" The Doctor was grinning, seeming to take delight at the prospect of the danger that faced them all. He stood over the main bridge controls, captain of the cybership.
"I don't know if you've noticed," said Livia. "But there aren't any restraints."
"Cybermen don't need them," the Doctor told her. "Must use some sort of magnetism to secure themselves if they're piloting."
"Well, that's absolutely super for them, but what are we going to do?" she asked.
The Doctor's grin seemed to widen. "Hold on tight."
Jack was a little more reassuring. "We're just going for a close orbit, the g-forces shouldn't be that bad."
"Oh. Good."
"Hey, at least you don't have to be standing up when we take-off," said Jack.
"Small comfort," she replied.
"Are you sure you don't want me to assist?" asked the Master.
The Doctor snorted. "Yeah, right. Who am I going to trust my life to, you or Jack? Ignition on."
"Engines hot," said Jack. "Reaction's steady. You sure about those calculations?"
"Well, if I'm wrong, we'll soon find out. Launch in five…four…three…"
Livia closed her eyes, pretended she was anywhere else at all.
Oh, dear reader, but what of Rose? Through all this, we have seen neither hide nor tail of our so-called heroine, and, perhaps, we should discover where Fate has placed her on this great board where we draw our tale.
Rose, dear Rose, is sleeping. Is she well? I know not. Medicine is certainly not my forte, and I must trust to the diagnosis of my players. Soon, however, Rose will wake and perhaps she will give some comment of her own on the state of her health. Perhaps she will tell us what aches and pains and maladies she feels she is suffering from. But, for now, we must be content with the simple fact that she is indeed alive.
Ah, and here is the event that signals the end of her rest. Not woken by the kiss of some prince or of any other who might take on the role of her rescuer, she wakes instead to the soft shriek of metal against metal.