And here's the next chapter! I just wish I didn't have to move or I would have a lot more done. Ah well, mea culpa. Enjoy.
The Master was utterly shocked. He had expected the Doctor but this was an entirely different Time Lord.
"You seem surprised," she said with a grin and dropped the teleporter into her pocket. She was wearing a long lab coat that seemed to have more pockets than was normal and her clothing was dark grey in color. Her eyes were losing the glowing light of the Vortex but he could see the powerful mind of a Time Lord in them. She seemed familiar.
"Who are you?" he asked and looked quickly at the Doctor. "How did you get here?"
"I used a teleporter of course," she replied and gave him a look that said that he should have known that straight off. The look gave him the last clue.
"You?" he said incredulously. "Rani? But I thought you were dead."
"And I thought you were dead," the Rani pointed out and looked over at the Doctor. "Having fun?" she asked with a smile, taking in his tied-up condition. The Doctor gave her a look. The Master took in the Doctor's face and narrowed his eyes.
"You knew she was alive," he said accusingly. "You knew she had survived the Time War."
"Actually, I only found this out yesterday," the Doctor said and shrugged as best he could. "She was in hiding and doing it very well. I was not aware that she was capable of creating a personal teleporter so quickly though." He shrugged again. "I didn't tell you because I'm not daft enough to do that."
"Good thing," the Rani said and then looked closely at the Master. "Are you alright?" she asked in concern. The Master stiffened and glared at her.
"I'm fine," he said bluntly, in the same manner he'd used when he'd fallen out of a tree and broken a rib and almost his neck. The Rani looked closer and saw the subtle signs of deterioration.
Wilfred Motts was rapidly realizing that he was the only human in the room. Dr Anne was acting like she always had but when he looked at the other two; he realized why he had almost mistaken her for the Doctor. Their body language was the same or close to it. He also noticed that though she seemed to be watching only the Master, she stood where she could see the door as well. On the face of it, their conversation was perfectly polite and calm, but to someone who'd served in wars, the tension was obvious. It was a standoff, the two Time Lords staring at each other and both trying to tell what the other would do.
"Is Donna alright?" he asked and Dr Anne nodded absently.
"We'd planned to surprise you with it for Christmas," she said and the Master's eyes narrowed at the comment. "Circumstances forbade that though."
"You couldn't have," the Master said abruptly. "Even with a Time Lord mind, the process of altering her brain would take years!" Dr Anne looked fairly smug.
"I didn't need to," she said and Wilfred noticed that the two of them were relaxing. Clearly, this debate was something between friends. "All I had to do was put her through the Trial." She grinned even more smugly. "That was easy enough to implement with the right equipment." Both the Doctor and the Master stared at her with expressions of shock.
"You couldn't have built the equipment," the Master said at the same moment the Doctor said: "The Trial couldn't have been that easy for her!"
"As for the equipment, I got some from Torchwood and UNIT, without them knowing," Dr Anne said and then turned to the Doctor. "She had your memories. It isn't that hard to do it again."
"That's brilliant," the Master said and closed his eyes in thought. "Potentially deadly, but even if it was, she could regenerate afterwards, I think." He began to pace. "Theoretically, she would be healed of all wounds by the energy."
"And if she took in the energy, she could actually use it to heal herself even if it wasn't automatic," the Doctor put in. "That is brilliant even for a Time Lord." Then he frowned suddenly. "But we should have noticed that," he objected. The Rani nodded and pulled out a small device.
"Observe," she said and held it out to the Master. He took it and then choked. After a moment, he began to laugh delightedly.
"You built a masking screen!" he said through the laugh. "But that hasn't been used since before we were born." Then he shook his head ruefully. "The only reason they stopped that was because they knew it could be detected easily if looked for. But if no one looks, no one sees." He grinned and handed it back. Wilfred stared at the two of them in disbelief. Somehow, even the Doctor seemed to be forgetting that they were in the middle of attacking each other. It was remarkable how at ease they suddenly were.
"Can I see?" the Doctor and Wilfred looked on in disbelief as Dr Anne walked over and held it in front of him and the Master didn't try to stop her. The Doctor leaned forwards and stared at it with interest. "Oh that is lovely," he said at last. "You've improved on the design, I see." His shoulder moved as if he was trying to hold it and he glanced down in irritation.
"Even so, the complexity would require some very intricate work," the Master said thoughtfully. "In other words, you were working for at least a month, maybe longer." He turned to Dr Anne. "How long have you known about her, anyway?"
"About a month," Dr Anne said promptly. "I've been working on it since I figured out why she had blocked memories of stuff like the Racnoss and the Daleks." Her eyes revealed a sudden burst of anger at the last word and the other two Time Lords had the same brief expression.
"Then you were already ready to heal her when you talked to me," the Doctor said and shook his head. "Do you really have to be so secretive?" Dr Anne shrugged and grinned ruefully. The Master seemed to be thinking hard about something.
"So you helped the Doctor find me?" he asked but it was more of a statement. Dr Anne nodded and the tension mounted again. "That explains the shields too," he added and Dr Anne smiled smugly again.
"Didn't have it as easy as you thought, did you?" she said with a dry tone. "I also upgraded their firewalls and their missile defenses," she added as an afterthought. The Master laughed.
"Not good enough firewalls," he said and pointed towards the computer. "I've already hacked through that. If it weren't for the fact that they have their main computers completely isolated, I would have dealt with them easily." He smiled as she blinked in surprise. "I haven't lost my touch it seems."
"Touché," Dr Anne said grudgingly. "Well played. But I very much doubt you've even found where I was located."
"Not yet," the Master said with a grin. Then his hand lashed out and lightning shot out at Dr Anne. Fast as he was, she was faster. Before it hit, she was dodging and her hand shot out. The Master was thrown back by an unknown force – or possibly Force, Wilfred realized – and she pulled a device from her pocket and pointed it at Wilfred. It buzzed and he found himself suddenly free of restraints, even as two guards burst through the door. Dr Anne looked at them quickly and then grinned.
"A bit too tall," she said with a laugh. "Get them out." Then she turned to the Master even as he unleashed another bolt of lightning at her. She caught it in her hand and smiled back at him. "Is that all you've got?" she said in a mocking voice. The Master snarled at her and leapt forwards. Dr Anne was not prepared for this and his first punch sent her reeling before she could block it. His second punch was blocked and her riposte shoved him back a pace. The two guards removed their helmets and Wilfred recognized them as the two cactus-like aliens who had told the Doctor about the device.
They hurried forward as the Rani slammed a fist into the Master's solar plexus. Apparently, Time Lords were close enough to humans in that respect and the Master gasped for breath. She took that time to look over at the bound Doctor.
"Get him out of here!" she shouted and then hissed in pain as the Master lashed out. She countered but was blocked and saw out of the corner of her eye that the Vinvocci pair had resorted to dragging the restrained Doctor out the door. She grinned and the Master glanced over at them. Her sucker punch landed heavily in his gut and he paled and doubled over. She started forwards to help but stopped herself. The Master straightened and gave her a look of irritation.
"You do realize that there are cameras in here?" he asked irritably. "The Doctor is not getting away this time." The Rani shrugged and reached into her pocket.
"That's his problem," she said and pulled a small cube from her pocket. The Master looked at the Rubik's Cube and gave her an inquiring look. "I've been monitoring the telepathic communications in or around the Earth and I've found some odd ones centered on you. Care to explain?" The Master blinked at her. This was very much unexpected.
"I have no idea..," his voice trailed off and he felt the drums pounding louder, loud enough that the Doctor had been able to hear them. The Rani cocked her head to one side at his sudden silence. "They're louder," he whispered and shuddered. "Someone is calling to me, through the drums." He clutched at his head as the drumming screamed through him. He saw the Rani step forwards and then stop.
"So that's it," she said and frowned. "I wonder what's coming. The Ood said that something was returning, not just you. What did they mean?" Then her head shot around to see the door open and several Masters enter.
"He escaped through a teleporter," one said and then saw the Rani. She had already pulled her spatial dislocater and before the clone could aim for her, she was pressing the button. A corona of temporal energy surrounded her and she was sucked into the Vortex. The Master ran forwards and tried to trace the energy, but felt his life ebbing suddenly as he touched the Vortex. He snarled and turned towards the other Masters.
"Scan the orbit," he said and waved them away. "Ensure that we are all prepared tonight." They left and he turned back to the Eternity Gate. The technology was primitive and unwieldy, but Gallifrey was no longer accessible. For a moment, his memories returned, brought to the surface by his old friends but he shoved it away. The drums were calling and he would finally know their origin.
Donna looked up as the Rani stepped out of the Vortex.
"Took you long enough," she said and beckoned her over. "I've hacked their defense network, got it all set up before you left. The weapons will only go where we wish them." Her fingers flew over the keyboard at an impressive rate. "I'm working on the rest of it, but there are some very impressive overrides in these things. Several of them are completely isolated." The Rani nodded and slumped onto a chair.
"He's learned several new tricks," she said wearily. "We can get through by hacking the carrier signal for whatever is tormenting him, but I think we may have a bigger problem."
"Well, cheer up spacegirl," Donna said and grinned. She typed in another rapid line and the lab was filled the humming sound of a TARDIS materializing. "The Time Lords could mess around with a TARDIS and so can I," she said triumphantly.
"That's brilliant," the Rani said with a smile. "But if someone could reach into a Time Lord's mind, they are a formidable adversary indeed."
"How long has he had the drums in him?" Donna asked and then shook her head. "It's rather odd still to have all these memories," she muttered and closed her eyes. When she opened them, she looked thoughtful. "The Untempered Schism should be impossible to use without the help of a Time Lord," she said slowly. Her mind was, as she had told the Doctor, both human and Time Lord, giving her an added insight. "Occam's Razor," she said and looked at the Rani.
"What exactly do you mean?" the Rani asked, a sinking feeling coming over her. Donna gave her a look that told her she was being dense.
"If only a Time Lord could do that, then it is a Time Lord, or more than one." Donna's mind raced over the possibilities. The Meddling Monk had been in the Time War and anyway, the Master had fought him also. Then the pieces came together. "Oh no," she said and her eyes filled with horror. "Oh no, they couldn't have done that." She turned to the computer and brought up the screen with the mental link, then shook her head and stood up.
"What is it, Donna?" the Rani asked with a note of impatience. She was ignored as Donna strode towards the TARDIS and shoved it open.
"Come on Rani," she said over her shoulder. "We need the computers in here to be sure." The Rani glared at her and stood up, her muscles protesting the movement.
"Sure of what?" she demanded. "What is the matter?" Donna tapped on the screen and shook her head.
"The Untempered Schism is one of the most important parts of the Citadel of Time," she said. "You'd need the permission of the entire Council and there would be guards around at all times. Unless you were already able to access it, and only the Lord President would be able to do that."
"That's impossible," said the Rani flatly. "The Council was rather archaic and moribund by tradition; they would not do something like that."
"The Council before the Time War," Donna said bleakly. "You weren't there to see it, but they changed." The Doctor's memories coruscated through her and she shuddered. "They went mad."
"But how is that possible?" the Rani asked in horror. "The time lock should have sealed them away." Then she shook her head. "They sent it back in time, making the Master. They created him." The horror was gone, replaced by pure unadulterated rage. Her hands clenched into fists. "They twisted my friend into the madman he is today," she said in a cold voice that heralded destruction. Donna nodded.
"And they plan worse, I'd say." She placed a hand on the TARDIS's control panel and shuddered at the memory. "We have to act, but I can't sever the link without time." She bent over the console. "I think I may have an idea," she said finally. The Rani looked at her expectantly, but Donna shook her head. "I need you to keep him thinking we are still there," she said. "If this works, I'll be back in a few hours." She briskly pushed the Rani out into the lab and shut the TARDIS doors.
"She seems a great deal like the Doctor," the Rani said irritably. Sylvia Noble chuckled from where she sat on a bench.
"Actually, Donna has always been like that," she said and smiled. "Stubborn as a mule and very much a take-charge person. It drove me crazy."
"I wonder what she's planning," the Rani said and then turned to the computer. The Master was still dangerous and she had work to do.
Donna Noble pulled the levers, having an odd sense of déjà vu, remembering the Doctor doing so in both her own memories and his. She felt the TARDIS talking to her, showing her the correct levers for what she'd planned. If this worked, she'd have to ask the Doctor to teach her how to properly connect to the TARDIS, she mused. Her Time Lord and human mind ran through the probability patterns again and came up with the same answer: maybe. It was not exactly comforting. She pulled the last lever and the TARDIS went soaring through the Vortex, aimed towards the Master. Donna grinned as the TARDIS spun through space and time.
"Allons-y!" she said and laughed. This was more fun than she'd remembered.
Enjoy this installment and please review.