Out Of His Madness

"It's a child." A harsh voice croaked from the group of stunned – and mostly confused – collaborators.

"Not just any child. She is the perfect assassin, designed for our very specific purpose."

"I do not understand." Another voice, mechanical and tinny, said hesitantly. "There are no more Time Lords. They were all destroyed in the Last Great Time War."

"As I said, she is Time Lord 2.0. I have genetically modified her . . ."

"Which suggests that you were in possession of Time Lord DNA, which is impossible."

Normally, such interruptions would have angered him, but not now. They allowed him to look even more brilliant than he truly was; and if they had just accepted it all as pure fact, well, where would have been the fun in that?

"I acquired all the necessary Time Lord components from one source."

"But he is the last of them." The other voice continued. "Are you saying that this child is the child of the Doctor?"

At the sound of the name, furious shouts and insults were hurled around. He controlled himself, despite the fact that he worked so hard not to mention that name, for this very reason.

"He is not the last Time Lord. There was one other, trapped in the safety beyond the Time Lock. I have the necessary resources it took to track him down and use him." At this, another set of lights blinked on, spot-lighting a figure chained to the wall in a crucifix position. He was humanoid, with wild and unkempt hair and beard. His clothes were ragged tatters, and his, although closed, rolled wildly under his lids.

"Where did you find him?" An awe-struck voice whispered.

"Time and space are as nothing to me. I can have anything and everything I want brought here in a matter of seconds." The Voice spoke as if this level of power was completely normal.

"So, the child is a Time Lord, but the daughter of a psychopath." The mocking voice from earlier spoke again. Someone gestured at the hanging man. The Voice was unworried.

"I agree that it is regrettable that the Master is so mentally unstable. However, I have done everything in my considerable power to ensure that the child has no such faults. And of course, she is not entirely Time Lord."

A volley of shouts rang out.

"A hybrid?"

"Such tampering was banned by the Shadow Proclamation."

"How did you manage such a thing?"

"It's an abomination!"

He let the shock and fresh anger wash over him. He hadn't expected quite this much resentment from them, but then it could have been quite a shock. It was, of course, highly unethical to experiment with DNA in such a way. So much so, that the Shadow Proclamation had indeed created an entirely new Convention on the subject. But he had never been one for following the rules. He suddenly realised that they were waiting for him to explain himself.

"The child's genetic make-up is only 49% Time Lord." He knew he would have to tread carefully here. Metaphorically, of course. "The other 49% was donated by one of our number."

"What? Who?" He paused, worried about the reception of the truth.

"The child is 49% Dalek." The gruff, catching, metallic voice of one such monstrosity cut through the silence. "The Doctor is our greatest enemy. We care nothing for the Galactic Law, so made the necessary sacrifices to have him exterminated."

"Even if it means conflicting your perfect Dalek genes?" Someone jibed from further down the table.

"It is a small price to pay for the Doctor to be exterminated. He destroyed the Emperor Dalek and the Cult of Skaro. Even the Supreme Dalek and Davros himself could not escape him. It is our right to be his down-fall."

"That and it was the only DNA that worked." The Voice spoke quietly, and was only heard by those nearest to it. "However much they might dispute it, it would seem that Time Lords and Daleks are not that dissimilar."

Before things could descend into chaos, someone else broke through the general racket.

"That leaves 2% unaccounted for. What else have you hidden away in her?" The Voice was pleased to be back on safer ground.

"What I consider to be the most ingenious part. That tiny 2% is the most important part of her. In all the previous embryos, the cells literally tore themselves apart. It would seem that even at a cellular level, Time Lords and Daleks will fight to the death. So, we had to find something, a sort of catalyst if you like, that would prevent this cellular massacre. And by a happy, and somewhat ironic, chance I found the perfect answer. What she was lacking, was just a little scrap of humanity. So I gave her some. A tiny 2% of human DNA, binding the warring cells together. And not just any human. I presume many of you will recall a certain Rose Tyler, the female human who travelled with the Doctor."

"But she is trapped in a parallel Universe. Are you trying to tell us that you can cross even those boundaries?"

"I must say, I considered it for a while. But then I realised that the Time Radiation she must have picked up would render her DNA useless, so I simply stepped back through time, to when she was a child, before she met the Doctor, before she was corrupted, and took just enough to be useful."

"That's genius."

"I like to think so."

"So, is she ready?"

The girl's eyes opened abruptly, as if on cue. One was a golden yellow, like a mid-summer sun, the other was the colour of a wine bottle's green glass. She blinked a couple of times, and then sat up. The dress she was wearing was shapeless, thin and off-white, revealing pale arms and legs that looked far too delicate and fragile to belong to a purpose-built killer.

"She doesn't look like much." There were more muttered agreements, and it was true – sat there, shivering slightly, with her fingers playing nervously with the fabric of the dress, the girl looked unimpressive, and not in the least bit dangerous.

"We don't want her to look dangerous, that would only hinder our plans. We need the Doctor to feel sorry for her, for him to feel compelled to save her. This was never going to be a quick task, it will take time. By why shouldn't we make him suffer, as we have suffered for all this time?"

"And what about afterwards? When the Doctor is dead, what will we do with her then?"

"I'm undecided at the moment. Maybe we decommission her. Or maybe," the Voice took on that sharp edge again. "Or maybe, we release her upon the Universe, and let the devil take the hindmost."