30. Or is it?

The Master braced himself against his prison – he hated to say the words "wooden cage" because, really, what sort of Time Lord capable of firing bolts of lightning couldn't break out of a wooden cage? It was the epitome of stupidity. And yet here he was, helplessly floating along in the air, trapped by a primitive construct that even the Doctor could break out of. Though maybe not… It was made of wood, after all.

The Master eyed the man who had abducted him. He was the Tenth Doctor in every sense of the word: tall, gangly, skinny, hair mussed and flying all over the place (was that styled or was he simply so bad at stealth that he was constantly running?). But something was off. For one thing, he was acting all weird. Well… weirder. And what was with the sudden strange habit of licking the corner of his mouth?

Not to mention all these ravings about absolute power, resurrection and genocide were starting to sound very unlike the Doctor indeed. Well, all except the genocide bit. The Doctor had been known to talk about that, having done it twice – how could you not mention it? – but this guy was practically revelling in the idea of it. And even the Master had to admit that it was odd for anyone who wasn't a Time Lord capable of mass destruction and spurred on by a crazy drumbeat that somehow managed to survive his death.

This just wasn't how it seemed. But it would also be an astronomical coincidence if the man just happened to look like the Doctor, wouldn't it? He pondered that for a moment. Maybe he could find a version of himself here? But then again, they were likely to be some goody-two-shoes or a drooling idiot working in a human supermarket. He wasn't sure which was worse. And heaven forbid it be both.

"So," he said, interrupting the Doctor-but-not-the-Doctor's monologue about blood purity, "who are you, exactly?"

"Barty Crouch Junior," the Definitely-not-the-Doctor replied.

"Well that explains the licking. The Doctor never really was one for licking himself."

As if on cue, Crouch licked his mouth, his face a picture of impatient confusion. "What?"

"The subconscious licking," the Master corrected. "As habits go that could be much worse. Imagine a psychopath with the subconscious urge to tap dance…"

Crouch apparently didn't deem that last comment as worthy of a response, and kept walking, muttering to the pale body cradled in his arms that soon, everything would be alright, the world would be theirs, and the Muggles would die for laughing at wizards who got drunk in public and shoved sticks into people's faces.

Ok, so maybe that wasn't the reason that the Muggles would be punished, but quite frankly the Master didn't care about the real reason – it was probably pedestrian anyway, purges like this always were. One group didn't like the way another acted, so made up a pretence and killed them, usually under the name of "purity". That was the way things worked, and quite frankly he'd seen enough of it to know the drill like the back of his hand.

And his hands changed with every regeneration, so that just made it all the more impressive that he knew his hands (and the situation) so well.

Crouch flicked his wand – causing the Master's little Box of Luxury to jolt uncontrollably for a good few moments – and the surrounding area shimmered. A dilapidated building came into view, and the Master couldn't help but wonder if Crouch had chosen it for the Scare Factor he so obviously thought it had. The man was probably playing a horror film soundtrack in his head right now, just to add to the atmosphere.

The door creaked as it opened, and Crouch stepped inside, careful not to knock the dead man's head against the door. The Master was left floating around aimlessly outside, feeling very much like a canary. Crouch returned minutes later, and floated the Master inside, slamming the door shut behind them with an impressively loud bang.

"Ooo," the Master mocked. "Nice try. Would have been scarier if it wasn't already so cliché. Is it too much to ask to be inventively kidnapped?"

Crouch growled at him, which soon sent the Master off on a thought-tangent of what would happen if the Doctor regenerated into a dog. How much easier would it be to just fob off his oldest foe with a simple bone? He wouldn't have to bother with trying to kill him, then, and could take a much more relaxed approach to world domination. Sadly, he would never find out, because it went against all the laws of biology.

"Is this interesting enough for you?" Crouch snarled, thumping the Master's cage down in the middle of a dirty room.

A quick glance around revealed all that he needed to know. High, dirty windows – underground cellar, clearly rarely used, given the layer of dust on the floor. A stone table in the middle – altar, sacrifices. And with that dead man (the evil wizard the Doctor had mentioned earlier, most likely) perched on top of it, it was hard to miss what was going to happen. But as if it wasn't obvious enough already, Crouch had gone to the trouble of plopping candles around the room (couldn't wizards conjure light?) in a vague shape that was clearly supposed to mean something deadly and magical. Oh, and there was a cauldron in the corner. Never forget the cauldron in the corner – that was always a fatal mistake of his.

Or it would have been, if he was a character in a fairy tale. As it was, the cauldron only earned a glance of curiosity and mild trepidation. His main worry was how he was going to get away from the psychopath staring at him with a truly disturbing expression that normally preceded something homicidal and painful.

"So let me just get this straight," the Master said in as calm a voice as he could muster. "Your plan is to use my life force to bring back old Snake Face here?"

"The Dark Lord," Crouch spat, deeply offended by his master's new moniker.

"Whatever his name is," the Master said indifferently, "he's still dead. You'll need a huge amount of energy to bring him back."

Crouch shrugged. "The Dark Lord saw the possibility in It's mind." He gestured around him. "He'll be back soon."

"Well good luck with that. Because first, you have to let me out of this cage. And if you think I'm just going to let you suck me dry so you can become an amateur Necromancer, you obviously don't know me very well."

Crouch's responding smile was expected but chilling nonetheless. "In your world," he replied, "that could have been considered a valid threat." He pointed his wand at the door to the room, causing it to bang shut, lock itself, and then disappear from existence. "But here, it was just a good joke."

The Master's cage opened noiselessly.

oOo

Dumbledore was also staring at the empty patch of grass in disbelief. The clearing was uncomfortably silent – nearly everyone had returned to Headquarters, the Ministry or Azkaban, respectively, to clear up the consequences of war with Voldemort. Those remaining simply stared in shock.

Surprisingly, it was Ron who broke the silence first. "But… how can he be gone?"

Snape's lips were pursed into a thin line. "I was the only one guarding the body," he explained. "Surprisingly, your own life being threatened by a group of wizards is enough to distract you. The body must have disappeared then."

Ron opened his mouth to argue, rapidly become red in the face in indignation that he was one of the ones to blame for the loss of Voldemort's body, but Dumbledore silenced him with a raised hand.

"It doesn't matter how or why it is gone, only that it is gone."

"And that the Master is gone," the Doctor added.

Dumbledore nodded gravely. "Yes, that is rather perturbing."

"To put it mildly," Snape muttered.

"Why?" Harry asked. "Why would they take him?"

"Because he's also a Time Lord," River explained. "And worse than that – he's a Time Lord with an unstable life source. His soul is ripped open – it'll be much easier to get enough energy from him to resurrect Voldemort than it was from the Doctor."

Ron, Harry and Hermione went pale.

"So how do we find them?" Hermione asked. "If a group of Death Eaters have taken them, they could be anywhere!"

"And anywhen," the Doctor added unhelpfully. "They had a Time Turner."

"The Time Turner is still here," Dumbledore countered, gesturing vaguely towards it, eyes still focussed on the empty grass.

"Oh well that narrows it down," Ron muttered.

"I know the locations of numerous Death Eater safe-houses, headquarters and prisons," Snape offered. "But there is no guaranteeing that they will be there, especially now they know that I am a spy."

"Maybe there are clues?" Harry suggested.

Snape stared at him in disbelief. "This isn't a detective novel, Potter."

"I know that," Harry replied tersely, "but maybe there's a way of seeing where they went – if we use a Time Turner, we could go forward to see."

"And find out the Dark Lord has already returned?" Snape asked. "If we are not here in the present day there is no way of stopping it."

"And if you see it, it'll become fixed," the Doctor added.

"I agree with Harry," Dumbledore said suddenly.

Snape turned to glare at him. "You can't be serious!"

"It is possible," Dumbledore explained, ignoring Snape's anger, "that there are in fact clues, but we may not need to go into the future to find them. All we have to do is ask the Master."

Everyone stared at Dumbledore in varying degrees of incomprehension.

River, however, was nodding. "That could work. Doctor, how far apart can Time Lords be and still be able to communicate mentally?"

The Doctor ran that idea over in his head. "It would all depend on his mind being open and focussed."

"But could it work?"

"Yes," the Doctor agreed. "It could."