Author's Notes:
Hi all! Thanks to all the lovely reviewers since last time - JessieDear13, EmmaMarie, MayFairy, SophieQueenOfTheWorld, MountainLord-92, SawManiac211, Celestial Valkyrie, Ahsilaa, Dragoneisha, sailormajinmoon, TheWickedHart, Geraldine, Aietradaea, Imorgen, Push To Shove, EDZEL2, Misplaced Levity and Freya.
To Geraldine: Sorry this has taken a while to post, but it wasn't the easiest chapter to write. Thanks very much for continuing to review :)
To Guest: The Type-40 TARDIS wasn't necessarily meant to be the Doctor's eventual TARDIS, it was just meant to show his interest in that particular model, even this early in his time-line. However, if you wish to believe it was "Sexy", please go right ahead ;) I'm very glad you are enjoying the plots as much as I enjoy writing them, that's terrific! XXX
To Freya: Thanks so much for the review, you are just in time for the next chapter!
- Chapter Thirty Two -
"Regrets collect like old friends,
Here to relive your darkest moments.
I can see no way, I can see no way,
And all of the ghouls come out to play.
And every demon wants his pound of flesh,
But I like to keep some things to myself.
I like to keep my issues drawn,
It's always darkest before the dawn..."
- Florence and the Machine, "Shake it Out"
As weak as she was, Tejana didn't hesitate. Sitting up abruptly, her hand flashed out of the concealing folds of Koschei's tunic and a fierce click resounded throughout the room.
"If I were you, my Lord," she said in a cold voice. "I wouldn't move a muscle. This is a laser screwdriver." She nudged the slender device firmly under Lord Oakdown's chin, the triple-section tip pressed deeply into his flesh. "Your son made it for me in the future. As with everything he does, it's technologically perfect, extremely powerful and utterly lethal. And I'm more than willing to use it, right here, right now."
It seemed that today was destined to be a day of firsts, she reflected grimly, and not good ones either. Using the psychic link as an offensive weapon and now her laser screwdriver as well. It had always been strangely comforting to know the deadly capabilities of the Master's gift, but up until now she had always obstinately refused to even consider utilising them, preferring to pretend that the device was just a tool, like the Doctor's sonic screwdriver. At this particular moment, however, she was beyond desperate. And if she had to end up using the laser technology to kill someone, her despicable father-in-law seemed like a very good place to start.
Then, as the two Chancellery Guard took a hurried step forward, their stasars raised, she added, "Oh, and I'd also be instructing your friends Tweedledum and Tweedledummer to back off. Very, very slowly."
Lord Oakdown gave her a twisted smile, taking care not to move his head as he did so, all too conscious of the threatening weapon burrowing into the soft skin of his neck. "Don't be foolish, child. Resisting arrest will only make things worse for you."
"Arrest? Is that what I'm resisting?" Tejana retorted sarcastically. "Now that's funny...the way you were touching me, I thought perhaps you had something else in mind. Your reputation with women precedes you, my Lord. I know all about your...proclivities. And I can assure you that if you ever lay another finger on me, I will slice it off and jam it somewhere very uncomfortable, probably sideways! Now tell them to get out and close the door behind them!"
"It won't do you any good," Lord Oakdown growled. "There are already more Guard on the way, summoned through the psychic link. You can't escape, no matter what you do. You're trapped. Put down the weapon, and I promise things will go much easier for you."
Tejana gave a harsh, brittle laugh. "How stupid do you think I am?" she demanded. "I'm a Time Lady, a descendant of the Great Houses of Gallifrey...I know the penalty for breaking the Fourth Law of Time. Immediate execution, without trial. So maybe I should go ahead and melt your brain inside your skull, just for the fun of it. After all, I have nothing to lose!"
Rage and frustration flashed through his eyes. She recognised the nasty look and she smiled inwardly. He had underestimated her. He had seen her lying on the floor, a small, fragile-looking woman, alone and apparently vulnerable, and in his arrogance, he had assumed she would be easy pickings, like so many of the other females he dealt with on Gallifrey. It was a mistake she guessed he wouldn't be making again.
"Very well," he bit out. "I fail to see how you think it will advance your cause, but I will accommodate your wishes...for now." He raised his voice to a commanding bark. "Guards! Wait outside for the reinforcements."
The guards hesitated, indecision written across their faces. Tejana watched them warily, her grip on the laser screwdriver as steady as a rock, her aim unwavering. Their duty was to protect Lord Oakdown. They were probably already going to be in enough hot water with the Castellan for not anticipating the very real danger she represented, and allowing the great Lord close enough to her to be effectively taken hostage. However, if they disobeyed his orders and he was injured or killed as a result, their lives wouldn't be worth a grain of salt. Reluctantly, making the only decision they could under the circumstances, they backed carefully and slowly away, until they were outside in the corridor. Then the door closed behind them and Tejana and Lord Oakdown were left alone.
"Wise choice," she approved. "I saw your son disintegrate a man with his laser screwdriver once, you know, someone who had crossed him. It liquefied his flesh and turned his bones into cinders from the inside out. Not a pretty sight."
"Who are you?" Lord Oakdown demanded. "You claim to be a descendant of the Great Houses, but the Matrix holds no record of your bio-data, past, present or future."
She sighed. In her depleted condition, her arm was already growing tired from holding the screwdriver against his neck, but she knew she couldn't falter or allow him to call her bluff. Her only chance was to buy enough time for Theta and Koschei to get back here with their stolen TARDIS. And the only way to do that was to keep Lord Oakdown talking as long as she possibly could.
"That's because I got here by falling through a crack in time. I was supposed to be born here on Gallifrey, two hundred years from now. But the Time-fire has wiped me from the history of the Universe, including the predestination records of the Matrix."
"A crack in time?" he sneered in open contempt. "Here on Gallifrey? A likely story."
"It's true. Back in my time-line, there's been some sort of temporal explosion at a weak point in the space-time continuum, causing a series of hair-line fractures in the Time Vortex. They've slowly been spreading, backwards through time and space. By now, I think they've consumed nearly the entire Universe. Gallifrey has been hanging on by a thread, but the transduction barrier is beginning to fail. One by one, people here will begin to disappear too, erased from time as if they had never been. It's already started to happen. You're a senior Time Lord, you've travelled in the Vortex before. You must be able to sense it."
Lord Oakdown froze, as if her words had suddenly struck a chord with him. His gaze flickered around the grey, ghost-like room, and a small shudder ran though his body. "This study..."
"Used to belong to a man named Borusa, one of the greatest politicians Gallifrey ever produced. You once knew him very well indeed. The Time-fire has taken him, and in the process, has changed the entire history of this planet. That's why this study has been taken over by entropy dust, because in real time, it never actually existed. It's nothing more now than a footprint of the Neverwere."
His dark eyes narrowed, his brow furrowed in thought, but his handsome face gave nothing away. Tejana wished she had some idea whether he remembered Borusa or not. Surely, if he did, he would understand the danger Gallifrey was in. Unexpectedly, a small, faint hope emerged deep inside her. She had never in her wildest moments considered turning to the Master's father for help. But for all his multitude of faults, he was still a senior Time Lord...if she could just make him understand, perhaps it wasn't impossible after all.
"You said you know my son, in the future," he said in a hard voice. "How well do you know him, exactly?"
Tejana bit her lip, trying to decide exactly how much she should tell him. Breaking the Fourth Law of Time was the last thing she had ever intended to do. Revealing future events went against everything she had ever been taught, everything she had ever believed in. Even caught as she was in the maelstrom of this unholy mess, she had been so careful from the beginning never to reveal the full truth about herself to anybody on Gallifrey. But things had come to such a perilous pass that she knew she could no longer worry about protecting the causal nexus. If there was even the slightest chance that she could convince him to help her, she had to take it. Slipping her finger inside the high neckline of her gown, she tugged free the golden necklace the Master had recently given her. The stylised oak tree shone like fire against her breast. Lord Oakdown visibly recoiled in shock at the sight, drawing his breath in sharply.
"I'm his wife," she said simply.
Doing his best to regain his usual cool self-possession, Lord Oakdown forced a sneer to his face. "Easy enough to say!" he said in a voice like ice. "You're a proven renegade and traitor, nothing but a liar trying every deception you can think of to save your own skin. That necklace means nothing – you could have stolen it from anywhere, at any time! Why should I believe you?"
"Because of this." And fixing him with a steady gaze, Tejana softly said one word – the one beautiful, melodic word that proved beyond any shadow of a doubt that she was entitled to wear the symbol of Oakdown, around her neck or anywhere else she desired. The Master's true name, given to him at his birth by this man and his wife, a closely-held secret that only Koschei's chosen life-mate would ever be permitted to share.
The last of Lord Oakdown's composure fell away, his face as white as chalk as acceptance finally sank in. "Oh, Rassilon," he whispered, looking as if she had slapped him. "It's true. But I would never allow my son to ally himself to someone of inferior bloodline, never!"
An uncontrollable ripple of jealous anger surged through Tejana's hearts as she remembered that Lord Oakdown's idea of a suitable consort for his son was the Lady Ushas – aristocratic, beautiful, voluptuous, blindingly intelligent and so very well connected. She could only imagine what he would say if he discovered that Koschei's chosen wife was born of the House of Lungbarrow, let alone that she was the daughter of Theta Sigma, a boy he had not even considered worthy to be friends with the Heir of Oakdown.
Her lips tightened into a thin line, and she slipped the Master's golden necklace back beneath her dress, her eyes flashing with pride. Perhaps the House of Lungbarrow had never possessed the wealth or political influence of the other Great Houses, but when it came to lineage, few could claim a bloodline more pure. It was said that her family could trace their antecedents all the way back to the mysterious Other himself.
"My bloodline is one of the oldest on Gallifrey," she replied haughtily. " I have no intention of telling you which House I belong to, since it's hardly relevant to this discussion, but as it happens, it's older by far than yours. And believe me, Lord Oakdown, I'm not exactly thrilled about being related to you either! The fact remains, whether you like it or not, eight hundred years from now, far into the future, I'm Koschei's wife...and I'm pregnant with his son."
"His son?" he echoed, his voice trembling as his eyes dropped to her still-flat stomach. "You're carrying my...grandson?"
She nodded, pushing home her advantage. Everything she had ever heard about the Master's father had indicated that his family name was the thing that mattered to him most. Surely then his grandson's life would have some value to him. "The last Heir of Oakdown."
"My grandson," he repeated, as if testing how well the word rolled off his tongue. His expression had inexplicably softened and, for the first time, Tejana thought she could see real emotion there. "Does my son...the Koschei from this timeline...know about this? Is that why he was helping you?"
"No, I've told him nothing. He subconsciously feels the connection between us, but that's all. He knows nothing of what happens in the future." She pinned him with her gaze. "Please, Lord Oakdown. I need your help. Not for my sake, but for the sake of your son and your grandson. I need to get to the Medusa Cascade. There will be a rift in time manifesting there very soon. I can use it to get back to my own time-stream, and maybe I can help to prevent the erasure of the Universe."
He hesitated briefly, his eyes acute and keenly assessing as they met hers. "You said your son would be the last Heir of Oakdown," he said slowly. "What did you mean by that? Why will he be the last of our line? What happens to me in the future? Do I live to see my grandson?"
Suddenly, Tejana felt very weary, the terrible weight of her knowledge pressing down on her like a heavy fist. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see the entropy dust stirring and shifting, eternally moving, never still, and it made her shudder.
"No," she said flatly, not pulling any punches. "You die, approximately six centuries from now, in the Last Great Time War, with all the other Time Lords. Gallifrey burns and is completely destroyed. Of our entire race, there are only three survivors – Koschei, myself, and one other male. That's why my son will be the last pure-blood Time Lord ever born. There will be no others."
"A war? A war that we lose?" Lord Oakdown snapped incredulously. "Against who?"
"Creatures named the Daleks. Cyborgs without mercy or emotion, things that live only to hate. Our people haven't encountered them yet, in your time-line, but they are already out there, breeding on their home world, Skaro. And the devastation they will cause, the pain and the death and the loss, is beyond any calculation." Tejana's face twisted with bitterness at her dark memories, the wolf that forever waited outside her door. "Gallifrey doesn't lose the War, my Lord. But neither do we win. Our planet is destroyed, but so is the Dalek Empire. There are no winners and no losers. Just death and destruction."
She wasn't sure what she expected from Lord Oakdown in response to her stark revelations, but his calm, unnaturally-poised silence unnerved her. His face was still unreadable, his expression thoughtful as his gaze rested on her stomach. There was obviously a lot going on inside his head, but she had no idea what it was.
"Death and destruction," he murmured, an odd light of triumph in his eyes. "And yet the House of Oakdown lives on, beyond it all." He gestured towards Tejana's stomach, careful not to make any sudden movements. "My grandson. I will never live to see him born, but he will carry my name forth into the Universe. Please...I know it's asking a lot...but may I touch? This will be my only chance, the only thing I will ever know of him."
Tejana hesitated, unsure what to do. She didn't want his hands anywhere near her, but the yearning in his voice pulled at her hearts. Her own father hadn't wanted anything to do with her precious baby. Did she have the right to deny her son the only contact with his other grandfather he would ever experience? She knew what the Master would say...but her life-mate had never learned the value of forgiveness.
"All right," she conceded eventually. "But just don't forget who's holding the laser screwdriver."
He gave her a thin smile. "Oh, believe me, my dear, I haven't forgotten. Thank you for this concession. You have no idea what it means to me."
Slowly, he put his hand out and laid it on her stomach. She felt the repellent warmth of it spreading across her skin beneath the thin layer of her clothes and she tensed, almost flinching away. But then she forced herself to remain still, reluctantly accepting his touch. He closed his eyes and she felt him probing the psychic link with his mind. Koschei's protective barriers held strong, keeping him out of Tejana's head. But she felt him brush her child's developing consciousness, gently touching the steadily growing miracle that was his grandson.
His smile widened in recognition. It should have been a beautiful, poignant moment – a grandfather welcoming the advent of his grandson. But Tejana couldn't help feeling there was something predatory about that smile. Something cunning. Something...unpleasant.
"I feel him," he said, his hand moving softly against her belly in an intimate, stroking caress. "I can sense his essence. So this is Koschei's son. Hmmmm...a good, strong boy. Such a pity...he will never have the chance to be born."
With that, in a flash of unbelievable speed, his hand shot up to her wrist and twisted it in a violent wrench. Tejana's attention had been so concentrated on his interaction with her baby that she was taken completely by surprise. She screamed in agony as she felt the small bones in her wrist snap. The laser screwdriver fell to the floor with a clunk and Lord Oakdown snatched it up victoriously.
"I'll take that, if you don't mind," he taunted, slipping the weapon inside his voluminous robes. "As you said earlier, if my oh-so-clever son made it, I'm sure it's a very useful little toy. You should never have dropped your guard, you foolish, sentimental girl. I sensed your physical weakness as soon as I laid hands on you. You're channelling all your energy towards the child."
"What are you doing?" she gasped weakly, tears of pain streaming down her face. "I explained to you what happens..."
"And I'm very grateful," he smirked. "After all, that was what I came here to learn. Why do you think I took the trouble to apprehend you personally, only bringing two intellectually-challenged and easily-disposed-of guards with me? I couldn't take the chance that the Castellan would find you first. He's such a stickler for the rules, he would have had you executed immediately, without allowing you to speak, as laid down by the Laws of Gallifrey. But I wanted to force you to talk, to find out what happens in my own personal future. Forbidden knowledge, to be sure, yet so very, very useful. I have to admit, however, I didn't expect you to make it quite so easy for me. Nevertheless, now that you have so obligingly told me, I can work to change it all. My son survives this Great Time War, but I do not? I don't think so, my dear. That is entirely unacceptable. If anything, it should be the other way around."
Tejana felt almost light-headed with pain, stabs of agony lancing through her shattered wrist and up her arm. Oh stars, how could she ever have made such a stupid mistake? How could she have allowed him to lull her into believing he would care anything for his grandson? Of course, there had never been any chance he was going to help her. He was an Oakdown. His own survival was always going to be paramount, even above the interests of his family. She should never, ever have told him about his forthcoming death in the Time War. "The...other way around?"
He laughed. "Oh yes. You didn't really think I would truly be swayed by all your inane, emotional drivel about being his wife, did you? Come now, why should I care for my son's future, or the future of the brat he seeded so successfully in his whore's belly? If I'm going to be dead anyway, why would any of you matter to me? I have no intention of allowing you to return to your own time to help avert the erasure of the Universe. As it happens, I'm quite happy with the way things presently are. With every other planet apart from Gallifrey gone, this so-called Time War will never eventuate and I will continue to enjoy my life without the threat of my imminent death hanging over me. And I do so enjoy my life, you have no idea. There are so many diversions I've yet to sample, so many fleshly delights and tempting vices available to a man in my position, it would be such a shame to have it all cut short before I reach my prime."
"Didn't you hear me say that the transduction barrier is failing?" Tejana demanded. "Gallifrey is running out of time! In a few hours, there will be nothing left at all. The entire planet will have been erased from time, including you and your sick, filthy life!"
"Nonsense!" he responded in a patronising tone. "It's all quite straightforward, really. All the Time Lords need to do is to ensure that the transduction barrier is sufficiently strengthened to resist these cracks in time – a no doubt simple matter for a race as temporally advanced as ours. And once you've been executed as a traitor, no-one will ever suspect the truth of what happened to the other planets. Gallifrey will stand proudly alone in the Universe, in all her might and majesty, as is only right and proper."
"You're mad! Utterly mad! You can't just play with time like that! There's a reason why it's forbidden! What about the rest of the Universe? Thousands of galaxies, millions of planets, billions of lives! Including your own unborn grandson!"
"What about them? The other worlds will be no loss to us. Compared to the Time Lords, they were nothing but primitives." He leaned closer to her, smiling cruelly. "And as for the child...well, while we're both being so deliciously honest with each other, you may as well know that Koschei was never any more to me than a means to an end. I needed to have a true-born son, to maintain my prestige among the Great Houses, but beyond that, he has always been supremely unimportant to me...as is his progeny." Reaching out a hand, he softly cupped her face, stroking his thumb sensually along her cheekbone. "Ah there, there - don't look so shocked, little girl. You would never have made a good Oakdown anyway. You are clearly far too unversed in the harsh realities of life."
Tejana pulled her face sharply away, an incredulous sickness rising in her throat. His disdain for the other inferior races of the Universe was a sentiment that would be shared by many of his Time Lord colleagues, and did not surprise her. But there was something else in his voice, something in his touch, some kind of strange, bitter, underlying resentment as he spoke of Koschei that suddenly made her realise the shameful truth about her life-mate's father; the truth that she now saw had already been subtly undermining and corrupting the Master's life before the drums had ever begun.
"Oh gods, you're jealous of him, aren't you? You've always been jealous of him, your own son!"
Lord Oakdown stiffened in anger at her words, the mocking smile falling away from his lips, and she knew even before he spoke that she had hit a very large nerve indeed. "Silence! You know nothing, you traitorous little bitch!"
She glared up at him like a feral animal, hatred and contempt shining in her eyes as she cradled her broken wrist to her chest. "Oh, but I do! Because I'm right, aren't I? You had to have a true-born son, to keep your position among the Great Houses, to be able to flaunt your heir in their faces. But as he grew, you saw that he was going to be more than you ever were, more than you ever could be!"
"Ridiculous!"
"No, it's not! I can see it all now. The great Lord Oakdown, whose pride and arrogance could never allow his son to eclipse him!" she spat, horrified at her sudden insight into the sterile, loveless life the Master had been forced to lead from the very beginning. No wonder her life-mate had never wanted to speak of his father, even to her. No wonder his hatred for this one single man had been virulent enough to create The Moment, the most devastating weapon the Universe had ever known. "That's why you pushed him so hard, always riding him to be the best, to be the brightest. That's why nothing he ever did was good enough for you, why you always wanted more and more and more from him. He thought it was because you were concerned for the glory of House Oakdown, but it wasn't that at all! It was because you secretly wanted him to fail! You wanted to prove to yourself and everyone else that he would never surpass you – you wanted the satisfaction of seeing him crash and burn. But he didn't, did he? The harder you pushed him, the better he became, the more he shone, and the more you hated him for it! You jealous, twisted old fool! What have you done? What have you done?"
Pulling back his hand, he slapped her as hard as he could, snapping her head forcefully back against the wall. Bright, painful lights seared through her brain, temporarily blinding her, and blood ran steadily from the corner of her mouth down her chin. Dimly, at the same time, she heard the sound of marching feet outside the closed door of the study.
Lord Oakdown got to his feet, breathing heavily in a mixture of anger and what she realised to her disgust was renewed desire. Clearly, hurting her had aroused him all over again, the sick bastard.
"The reinforcements from the Chancellery Guard just arrived," he hissed. "It seems our chat is over. Such a pity. You're so fragile...such a tiny, breakable little thing. It would have been a great pleasure to demonstrate to my son's little slut-wife how it feels to be taken by a real man. I would have enjoyed listening to you scream. No matter. I'm sure I will enjoy watching your execution even more."
Tejana gave a gurgle of low, rough, defiant laughter. "You'd better. Because killing me will probably be one of the last things you ever do. You think you know your son, but you don't. You only know the tiniest part of what he is destined to become. Back where I come from, he's one of the most ruthless and dangerous men in the entire Universe. You want to talk about the harsh realities of life? Let me fill you in on some of them. I didn't come through that crack alone, Lord Oakdown. He's here on Gallifrey – your son, from the future. You can't see him and you can't hear him, but believe me, he's here. He was the one who injured Anzor. He was the one who would have destroyed you and the rest of the High Council at the Ball, if I hadn't intervened. And if you're fool enough to be responsible for the slaughter of his wife and his unborn child, he will come for you, and he will show you no mercy."
He glared down at her and she saw something move behind the coldness of his eyes. Was it...fear? Had he already sensed the Master at some stage during the past few days, invisibly stalking him down the long corridors of the Citadel, a chill spectre standing too close behind him, watching him as he talked and ate and slept? With all her hearts, Tejana hoped so, taking a savage comfort in the thought, as the pain he had inflicted on her crept steadily through her body. He deserved to be afraid before he died. He deserved every second of the revenge the Master would take on him, even if she wouldn't be alive to see it.
Taking a step backwards, he spread his arms challengingly. "Let him come!" he derided. "If he's here, if he truly cares for you as much as you seem to think, let him come now! Let him try to save you! I'm waiting!"
There was a short, charged silence, in which nothing happened. Lord Oakdown sneered at Tejana in triumph, underscored with what she sensed was hidden relief. He had seen the devastation the ghost-Master had wreaked in the Ballroom and she guessed he hadn't been entirely sure what would come in response to his challenge. However, to her dismay and his elation, nothing stirred whatsoever. Anguish and despair lanced through her. Where was the Master? What had happened to him after he had helped her destroy the Daleks in the Adytum? He had to be here somewhere. She refused to believe that he had destroyed himself, or that he was gone forever. The Master always came back, she told herself desperately, always!
"Oh dear," Lord Oakdown said in mock disappointment, amused at her misery. "It seems he is asleep. Or perhaps he doesn't watch over you as closely as you would like to believe. Or perhaps he's nothing but a fantasy inside your pretty, deluded little head. Either way, it appears my invisible son is not coming. Resign yourself to the inevitable, my dear. You are going to die like the renegade you are and nothing is going to save you."
Turning to the entrance, he rapped out, "Guards!"
At once, the door burst open, and a dozen of the Chancellery Guard flooded into the room.
"Seize her!" Oakdown ordered coldly. "Seize the traitor and escort her to the Panopticon for immediate execution."
Obediently, the original two guards, the ones she had labelled Tweedledum and Tweedledummer, marched forward and grabbed her roughly by the arms, hoisting her to her feet and dragging her towards the door.
Back on Earth, the Doctor smiled up at the Chaos-Master lounging on King Henry's throne, his face written with contempt. "Oh, I'm clever, you're right about that much. Shame I can't say the same about you. With every minute that goes by, you're proving yourself to be nothing but an inferior copy of the real Master. He might be a psychopathic megalomaniac, but at least he would have had enough brains to realise that if the Universe dies, so does he!"
The Chaos-Master leaned forward on the throne, his brown eyes burning with anger, his voice dripping with malice. "Don't take me for a fool, Doctor. You and I both know that until the energy drain from your daughter is complete, my existence in the physical world can't become permanent. He cheated me of that, when he stole her away through that crack. I'm dying, inch by inch, even as we speak. But at least this way, I get to take the entire Universe with me! Even better, I get to watch you suffer while I do it!"
The Doctor stretched his arms wide in a challenging gesture. "Well, here I am. This is what you wanted, isn't it? The two of us, face to face. Game over!"
"Oh no, you don't! The game's not over until I say it is!" The Chaos-Master leaned back again, a taunting smirk on his face, evidently enjoying the moment. Idly, he poked the waxwork dummy of Anne Boleyn in the eye, and watched with glee as she tumbled violently off the platform and crashed to the ground. Her head broke off from the impact and rolled across the smooth marble floor to rest at the Doctor's feet. The Chaos-Master's grin widened. "So, did you like my mummies? Good, weren't they? Not quite as much fun as the Daleks, but nearly. Tell me, what did you say to them? Are you my mummy?" He broke into wild, cackling, maniacal laughter. "Oh, go on, Doctor, where's your sense of humour? Even you have to admit, that's a good one! Are you my mummy? Ha, ha, ha! I stole that line from your daughter's memories – the first time she met her precious Captain Jack, in actual fact! So very touching!" Then he put his hand up to his cheek in mock consternation. "Oh dear, but I forgot, you still can't remember anything about poor little Ana, can you? You've always been a pretty lousy excuse for a Dad, really, even from the beginning. And now it looks you're going to die not even remembering what she looked like!"
The Doctor sighed loudly. "Blah, blah, blah. Get on with it, would you? Only, I'm on a bit of a tight schedule here."
"Don't attempt to provoke me, Doctor!" Rage flickered in the Chaos-Master's eyes. "Surely even you must realise how helpless you are. I control the Pandorica. I control this museum. I control you! You have no TARDIS, no technology, no weapons. I can kill you as slowly and as painfully as I please, and there's not a thing you can do to stop me!"
"I wouldn't count on it, sunshine!" Rory snarled, stepping forward, his hand flipping down to reveal his laser weapon. "He's not quite as defenceless as you might think!"
The Chaos-Master threw his head back and crowed loudly in delight. "Ah, and there he is, the Doctor's little plastic man. I was wondering how long it would be before you entered the fray. I've been looking forward to this part!"
Reaching beneath his black hoodie, he produced a small device, remarkably similar in appearance to a television remote control.
"What is that?" the Doctor demanded. "What are you doing?"
"Oh, this? Just a little something I cooked up while you were all off playing with those Daleks. I just happened to find a really nice little microwave oven down in the staff room. A little bit of tinkering, a little bit of augmentation, and...hey presto, a frequency modulator!" Extending his arm, the Chaos-Master pointed his invention directly at Rory. "Because, of course, we all know what concentrated radio frequency power does to plastic, don't we?"
With that, he pressed the activating button on the device.
"NO!" the Doctor shouted, whirling around to Rory, already knowing he was going to be too late. "DON'T!"
At first, nothing seemed to happen. But then Rory tried to stride forward, only to find that all his joints had seized up, and he could only move in a series of tiny, spasmodic jerks. His mouth worked silently, his face twisted in agony, unable to utter a sound.
"Doctor? What's happening to him?" Amy screamed, running to her boyfriend's side.
The Chaos-Master giggled insanely. "Keep watching! We haven't got to the good bit yet!"
"Stop this!" the Doctor yelled. "This is between you and me. Leave him alone! Stop it now!"
"Not a chance!"
Bubbles were beginning to break out on Rory's skin, each one rising like a loathsome white dome and then exploding with a small pop. Steam rose from his body and the room reeked with the acrid smell of burning plastic.
"Rory!" Amy shrieked. "Oh god, no, RORY!"
Gradually, he turned his head towards her. His features were melting and running like candle wax, sliding horribly away from his face. His fingers had already disintegrated, liquid flesh dripping from his hands to the floor in viscid, hissing blobs. Even as they watched, his body collapsed in on itself, his clothes falling emptily into a puddle of molten plastic.
Amy fell to her knees beside all that was left of her fiancé and howled like a wounded animal, her overwhelming grief echoing around the shadowy room like a death knell. Shocked and sickened, the Doctor turned slowly back towards the Chaos-Master, every movement stiff and wooden, like an old man. He had warned Rory against radio-waves, back when the young centurion had begun his long, two thousand year watch over the Pandorica. But neither of them could ever have anticipated this.
"You see?" the Chaos-Master mocked. "Complete control!" Tossing the frequency modulator carelessly aside, he rose to his feet, every line of his stolen body as lithe as a jungle cat.
"And now we dance, Doctor. Now we dance!"
Another Author's Note:
Yeah, yeah, okay, so I killed Rory. But hey...everyone else has had a go at it, so I thought I would join the club, LOL. Hope you all enjoyed!
Ciao until next time XXX