THE END OF THE WORLD - PART ONE
chapter ii
"Backwards or forwards?" the Master asks, after she wakes up. She gives him a confused look. Humans. "In time, you idiot."
"Forwards." she replies, shooting him a glare. "A lot forward. One hundred years."
He snorts. "You call that 'a lot forward'?"
"Ten thousand, then!"
"The new Roman empire is boring." he says, "Try something a little more interesting, will you?"
"You decide!"
"Five point five slash apple slash twenty-six."
"That's not even a year!"
Ever since Rose Tyler went to bed the night before, he contemplated where to bring her first. The TARDIS tried giving suggestions in the form of pamphlets being left on his bed, the console, inside the refrigerator, everywhere. Perhaps a small, friendly planet with nothing to worry about, she had said. Like Midnight so she can try relaxing in Leisure Palace?
He got the perfect idea when he stopped thinking. The drums, of course, filled his thoughts and he thought of Gallifrey, his planet that is now gone. His TARDIS realized what he was up to and on his way to the library from the kitchen a lower drawer opened and he tripped over it, falling.
He found it soon enough in a history book detailing the planet called Earth. It is going to end in the year five point five slash apple slash twenty-six. His companion is going to watch her planet burn, and he's going to find out if Rose Tyler is as strong as she seems.
Rose Tyler, he thinks presently, even he has to admit that name just rolls off the tongue.
"Yes, it is."
"Years are numbers," she protests in a way that is almost adorable, "You mentioned something about an apple in there!"
"Let's see," he says, tapping his fingers against his chin in the familiar beat of four thoughtfully. "Tiny human brain versus nine hundred years of Time Lord knowledge."
"You're nine hundred years old?" she exclaims.
He admits it silently to himself; he doesn't know how old he is. How would he? Time travelling makes his life non-linear, and time doesn't really pass by in the TARDIS. Like Romana had told him, after the first couple of centuries, it's hard to keep track. Last he checked he was nine hundred, and that shall be his age forever.
"If I wanted someone to just repeat everything I say I would've gotten a parrot, Rose Tyler." he tells her as he starts setting the coordinates on the TARDIS.
"Don't make me regret agreeing to come with you!"
"You're right," he drawls, "I'm sorry. How can I ever make it up to you? Breakfast in bed? Do you want a poem or song of apology? Or is all that and graciously letting you travel time and space not enough for you for the great Dame Rose Tyler?"
"Just stop it with the attitude, yeah?" she asks, "I was hoping we could become friends or something close to it."
"Like companions?" he shrugs, and thinks about it for a few seconds. It wouldn't be too bad, he supposes, and it's not like he has any plans of making Rose Tyler his enemy. "I hereby deem you my companion."
She smiles at that, and he feels slightly triumphant. "Good." she says, "It's a start." The Master doesn't know what it's a start towards to, and he runs through all the possibilities of this relationship crashing and burning, but he finds himself smiling back. "So, this 'year', what's supposed to happen here?"
"Look for yourself." he says, gesturing to the door of the TARDIS.
"You didn't bring me to some carnivorous skittles-that-eat-humans planet, did you?"
He holds his hand to his heart in mock offense. "I'm appalled that you think I would do that to an companion." he replies. Carnivorous skittles that eat humans, he wonders, really?
"Where are we?" she asks, grabbing his hand so he can lead the way. The feeling is unusual and he's not used to having a hand to hold, and he doesn't know if it's a good unusual or a bad unusual, so he doesn't shake it off. He brings her down a flight of stairs, and a large shutter in the wall opens, revealing a window, the sun and earth as its view. Platform One, he notes.
"Five billion years into your future." he tells her, he looks at his watch and counts the seconds until he looks up in perfect timing with the sun flaring red. "There's a party being held here, I'm sure an announcement will happen–"
"Shuttles five and six now docking. Guests are reminded that Platform One forbids the use of weapons, teleportation and religion. The main event is scheduled for fifteen thirty-nine. Drinks will be served afterwards in the Manchester Suite."
"–Any minute now." he finishes with a smile after the computer's notice.
"What is this main event?"
"I thought you'd appreciate the surprise," he says, not exactly lying.
She sticks her tongue out at him in a very childish manner. "By guests," she starts slowly, "Do they mean people?"
"Of course they mean people." he says, "Incredibly planet-ist of you to assume that humans are the only people there is."
"What I meant was aliens. By guests, do you mean aliens?"
"Yeah." he says, guiding her through the hallway. "Rich aliens from all across the galaxy have come to witness this wonderful, wonderful event."
She stops to look out another window, a different view of the sight she saw when they first entered. The heat of the sun makes the earth look almost orange, up against a backdrop of midnight blue and stars. "It's beautiful."
If only she knew what she was looking at… The Master thinks this to himself, grinning. Rose Tyler, finding beauty in complete and utter destruction. Perhaps they are alike in more ways than one. His train of thought is interrupted when a male Crespallion, blue skin and everything approaches them. "Who the hell are you?"
He's not even listening that much to his words, the look on Rose Tyler's face is much too amusing. "Sorry, what?"
"How did you get in? This is a maximum hospitality zone. The guests have disembarked. They're on their way any second now." the voice sounds affronted, and the Master is running through a million ways on how they could continue unharmed by the security on this ship, until he remembers the item in his coat pocket: psychic paper.
He pulls it out. "I was invited," he says, as if it were obvious. "This is my invitation: the Master and companion. I'm the Master and this is my companion, Rose Tyler. Is this how you treat your guests?"
The face of the Crespallion turns a darker shade of blue, as if blushing. "No, no, of course not! I apologize, sir. If you're on board, we better start. Once again, really, I'm sorry–"
Rose Tyler cuts him off, laying a hand on his shoulder reassuringly. "Really, it's fine." she says, "Now go about, we don't want to be keeping you from your job." As if it were even possible, the Crespallion's face turns an even darker shade of blue, blushing even harder, and the Master scowls, grabbing Rose's hand and forcing her to turn away. "What was that paper of yours? It was blank."
"It's magic," he says, sarcastically. "The paper's psychic, shows people whatever I want them to see, etcetera, etcetera. Nothing much."
"He's blue."
"That didn't stop you from flirting with him."
"I was not!" she protests, "That was being nice. You should try it sometime."
The same Crespallion stands by a door and begins to speak in a loud voice. "We have in attendance the Master and Rose Tyler. Thank you. Staff, please go to your positions." The steward clears his throat. "And now, might I introduce the next honored guest? Representing the Forest of Cheem, we have trees, namely, Jabe, Lute and Coffa." Ah, the Forest of Cheem. He's only ever been there once, but the people are still fascinating. Everybody with skin like bark, much like the female tree of Cheem standing next to her two larger male escorts. "There will be an exchange of gifts representing peace. If you could keep the room circulating, thank you."
Rose's expression is the most amusing thing he has ever seen in his entire life, and that includes Theta's third year History assignment back in the Academy. "Next, from the solicitors Jolco and Jolco, we have the Moxx of Balhoon." The Moxx of Balhoon has a giant head and a small body, blue again.
The steward continues. "And next, from Financial Family Seven, we have the Adherents of the Repeated Meme." Figures, robots actually, in black cloak-like clothing, with golden chains around their necks step out of the door and into the room.
"The inventors of Hypo-slip Travel Systems, the brothers Hop Pyleen. Thank you." These reptile-like creatures in fur make their way through the room. "Cal Spark Plug. Mister and Mrs. Pakoo: the Ambassadors from the City State of Binding Light." The Master turns to look at the new guests but is interrupted by a new voice.
The trees from the Forest of Cheem approach him. "The gift of peace. I bring you a cutting of my Grandfather." Jabe, he presumes, gives him a tiny branch in a pot, and he hands it over to Rose Tyler. He smiles politely as the trees look at him expectantly.
"Master," Rose Tyler says, nudging him. "Our gift of peace."
"Oh, yes." he says. His mind runs through things that trees could possibly want and finally he settle for a rather pitiful idea, one, he loathes to say it, that even Rickey the Idiot could've come up with. "I give you air from my lungs." He breathes out in her direction and the tree giggles slightly.
"How intimate."
"There's more where that came from." he winks.
"I bet there is." Rose Tyler rolls her eyes at the exchange as the trees leave. "Jealous?"
"You didn't need to flirt with a tree."
"You didn't need to flirt with a Crespallion and you did it anyway." he smirks, "'Sides, that's not flirting. It's being nice. I recall a certain someone telling me to try it sometime."
"From the Silver Devastation, the sponsor of the main event, please welcome the Face of Boe." Several Crespallions push a large glass case, which barely make it through the door. Inside is a giant head with straggly hair and squinted eyes. The Master has heard of him before, but never imagined he would look like this.
The Moxx of Balhoon approaches them. "My felicitations on this historical happenstance. I give you the gift of bodily salivas."
He can't help but let out a very, very long laugh when the alien spits on his Rose Tyler. She looks absolutely disgusted, closing her eyes but trying to remain composed. "Thank you," she says.
The Adherents of the Repeated Meme approach and he grins, still amused by his companion's state. "A gift of peace in all good faith." It holds out a medium-sized silver ball and he nods.
"In return, we gift you with air from my lungs." He breathes on the group of aliens and they go away, to the next group of aliens in the room.
"I can't believe they fell for that." Rose Tyler snorts, "Air from your lungs? Do you honestly think you're that important?"
"I am that important."
The steward clears his throat and the room goes silent. "And last but not least, our very special guest. Ladies and gentlemen, and trees and multi-forms, consider the Earth below. In memory of Earth, we call forth the last Human. The Lady Cassandra O'Brien Dot Delta Seventeen."
The Master decides he needs to take Rose to more places like this if it means watching the expression on her face. Lady Cassandra O'Brien is just a face on stretched skin, being rolled around in a frame by two assistants.
"Oh, don't stare." Cassandra says, "I know, I know it's shocking, isn't it? I've had my chin completely taken away and look at the difference. Look how thin I am. Thin and dainty. I don't look a day over two thousand." He needs to take a picture of Rose Tyler's face. Suddenly, Cassandra's voice starts crackling. "Moisturize me! Moisturize me!"
One of her assistants uses a pump spray on the skin and Cassandra regains her smile. "There, all better now. Truly, I am the last Human. My father was a Texan, my mother was from the Arctic Desert. They were born on the Earth and were the last to be buried in its soil. I have come to honor them and say goodbye to them and to the dying earth."
She seems to catch that last part. The Master continues to put on a façade of innocence as Rose Tyler looks at him expectantly with her eyes wide as she mouths the words, 'dying earth?'
"Oh, no tears, no tears. I'm sorry." Cassandra continues, "But behold, I bring gifts. From Earth itself, the last remaining ostrich egg." She presents the gift to the Moxx of Balhoon who accepts it hesitantly. "Legend says it had a wingspan of fifty feet and blew fire from its nostrils. Or was that my third husband? Oh, no. Oh, don't laugh. I'll get laughter lines. And here, another rarity. According to the archives, it is called an iPod."
The 'iPod' is wheeled in and Rose looks at it in incredulity. "That's a jukebox." she whispers.
"Well, they don't know that." he replies.
She leaves his side and walks behind Cassandra, disbelieving that she could just be some rectangular flap of skin. The aforementioned flap of skin begins to talk once more. "It stores classical music from humanity's greatest composers. Play on!" He shakes his head. Tainted Love could hardly be considered a classic.
"Refreshments will now be served. Earth Death in sixty minutes."
That gets Rose Tyler running right back to him. She grabs his arm abruptly. "Earth Death?" she exclaims.
"Did I forget to mention that?" She storms off in an unknown direction. "You're going to get lost, you know!"
She turns around and walks back to him. "I don't care!" she hisses at him, "I just need to get away from you. You're mad. Who brings someone to the end of their planet on their first adventure together?"
"I promise, our next date will be much better."
She groans in frustration and chooses the path of an unknown corridor and leaves him. He rolls his eyes (She'll be back.) and turns around, only to see a flash of white light coming from the camera of that tree girl. Jabe, was it? "Thank you." the tree says, and he smiles fake-politely and goes off to find someone else to talk to.
Contrary to what he thought, Rose Tyler does not come back for a while. She hasn't been in the room for exactly thirty-four minutes. He finds her in one of the viewing rooms, in his opinion a better one than the main function room, after watching the assistants wheel the TARDIS away.
"Earth Death in twenty-five minutes." the computer announces.
She's playing with the gifts of peace. The ball has been set on the floor next to her, she's sitting on the ground, and she's picked up the cutting of Jabe's grandfather. "Hello. My name's Rose. That's a sort of plant. We might be related."
"And you say I'm the mad one?" he interrupts, walking into the room. "You, Rose Tyler, are talking to a twig."
"How does talking to a twig beat making someone witness the end of their own planet?" she asks, pointedly. "Y'know if you just told in me in the beginning that we were going to see the end of the world, I would've been fine with it."
"Oh, but where's the fun in that?"
She gives up, he can tell, because she knows that she's fighting a losing battle. "Where are you from?" she asks, "What planet?"
"I come from all over the place."
"What's your home planet, then? Who are you?"
He thinks of Gallifrey and he thinks of the Dalek Emperor taking over the Cruciform and he winces. The sound of drums gets louder. "I'm the Master." he says, "That's all you really need to know. All that really counts is that I'm here, and I'm me and that you're here too. Alright?" The last part comes out a bit snappier, and he almost regrets it, but the drums are almost deafening.
"What planet are you from? At least tell me that."
He raises an eyebrow at her. "Can't remember." he deadpans, "What does it matter where I'm from?"
She sighs frustratedly. "Because you're taking me to all these planets and I don't even know if they're safe or not, and I'm just supposed to trust you. How can I do that if I don't even know what planet you're from?" He doesn't reply and she relents. "I'll tell you something about me, if you tell me something about you?"
"I'll save that offer for another day." he tells her, "What were you thinking about a while ago?"
"It's just that, how come all of them speak English?" she asks, "They're alien aren't they? Why do they speak English?"
He laughs. Silly humans. "The TARDIS has a built in translator." he explains, "It gets inside your head and everybody around you speaks in the language you're most comfortable with, with help from the telepathic field."
"Your machine gets inside my head. It gets inside and it changes my mind, and you didn't even ask?" Her tone is accusatory.
"Well," he starts, "Essentially, yes. It's good, though, if you think about it! Would you rather they were all speaking in whatever language they have in Crespallion or Balhoon?"
"Right." she says, "Shareen always said never to argue with the designated driver. I tried looking at my phone a while ago, no signal." She laughs weakly. "Can't exactly call for a taxi."
He freezes.
She thought about leaving. He thinks he should be glad about the whole thing. If she wants to leave, the TARDIS will respect that and she can go back to her boring earth life with Mickey the Idiot and forget about him, not that anyone can. More like, he can forget about her. He can continue traveling time and space alone, just him and his TARDIS, and nobody else to stop him. There wouldn't be anymore annoying Rose Tyler to encourage him to do the right thing.
No more Rose Tyler. Somehow, the thought scares him, and he admits it silently to himself. He came to Earth planning to die in the battle against the autons. He wasn't going to regenerate, and this girl, this stupid human girl, saved him.
Rassilon, the TARDIS was right. He does need her.
Her voice snaps him out of his thoughts. "Any way you s'pose I could call my mum or something?"
"Not possible." he answers, immediately. Talking to her mum could just make her homesick and she'd want to leave, but if his attitude towards her is what's pushing her in that direction at the moment, then perhaps it wouldn't hurt to do one nice thing for her. He grabs her phone. "Unless..." He takes her phone apart, and starts poking around with the end of his Tissue Compression Eliminator. It takes him a few minutes and he nearly chucks the phone out the window. (Theta's screwdriver thing would be better for this.) Eventually, he gives Rose Tyler her phone back. "Just dial your mum's number. It'll work."
She presses the numbers on her phone quickly and excitedly and presses the primitive human device against her ear. "Mum?" she asks, and he can hear her mother answer on the other line. And she didn't want to believe him about superior Time Lord physiology.
"Oh, what is it? What's wrong? What have I done now? Oh, this red top's falling to bits. There must be something, you never phone in the middle of the day." Rose Tyler laughs, and he can swear that he sees a bit a tears in her eyes. "What?"
"Nothing." Rose says immediately, "You all right, though?"
"Why wouldn't I be?"
"What day is it, Mum?"
"Wednesday, all day. You got a hangover?" She looks at him, not believing her mother's words. "Oh, I tell you what. Put a quid in that Lottery syndicate. I'll pay you back later."
"I'm just calling to say I might be late from home."
"Is there something wrong?"
"No, I'm fine." she says, "Top of the world."
He decides not to make some cheesy joke about the phone bill. "So, you're done with all the sentimental shit with your mum." he says, "I was thinking it'd be best if we go back to the–"
"My mum's dead." Rose states.
"Don't be silly." he tells her, "You just talked to her."
"I mean, she's dead now. That was five billion years ago. So, she's dead now. Five billion years later, my mum's dead."
"Of course she's dead now!" he exclaims, "Even Time Lords don't live that long! What could possibly make you think that any of you would stay alive this long? Bundle of laughs you are. I'm starting to reconsider you as a companion." She smiles just a bit as the floor begins to shake for a few seconds. He frowns. "That's not supposed to happen."
The two of them make their way back to the observatory deck. "That wasn't a gravity pocket. I know gravity pockets and they don't feel like that. What do you think, Jabe? Listened to the engines. They've pitched up about thirty Hertz. That dodgy or what?"
"It's the sound of metal." Jabe replies, "It doesn't make any sense to me."
He shrugs and Rose hits him not-so-playfully, giving him a look. She doesn't need any words to say save the world or else, her eyes covered it. He sighs. "Where's the engine room?" he asks, resigned.
"I don't know, but the maintenance duct is just behind our guest suite, I could show you and your wife." Rose Tyler laughs. She actually laughs. He glares at her, because being his wife would be a wonderful, wonderful thing because he's a wonderful, wonderful person.
In fact... "Sounds wonderful. Thank you, we appreciate it." he says, slipping his arm around Rose's waist. That shuts her up. "My lovely wife and I would be glad to join you."
"Actually, sweetheart," the pet name is said through gritted teeth and a fake smile, he feels somewhat accomplished at this. "I think I'm going to go and talk to Lady Cassandra, yeah?"
"Anything you want." he tells her, his voice dripping with sweetness. "Just don't cause any trouble."
"Nothing that you wouldn't do." She winks at him and walks away.
Jabe smiles at him. "You two are very–" she struggles to find a word, presumably "–cute."
"Of course we are." he says, "Now, about that maintenance duct?" She leads him to the area, and it's fairly dark with pipes everywhere. "Who's in charge of Platform One? Is there a Captain or what?"
"There's just the Steward and the staff. All the rest is controlled by the metal mind."
"The computer, not the metal mind." he corrects her, slightly annoyed by her need to make it sound more complicated. "Who controls that?"
"The Corporation. They move Platform One from one artistic event to another."
The Master rolls his eyes. "There's nobody from the Corporation on board. I'm going to need a better answer than that." Realization dawns on his face and he cuts off Jabe's almost-answer. "Automatic, then?" He looks around at the different pipes and wiring. "Alpha class, which means this ship's unsinkable." He grimaces, thinking of the Titanic. "They once said that about a ship on Earth. It did sink. Since it's automatic though, would that mean there's nobody to help if you lot die?"
The tree does not look very pleased with his last statement. "I'm afraid not."
He laughs, he actually does. "Wonderful."
AN: Hello, everyone! I'm really happy about the reviews, follows and favorites on this story. They made my day so, thank you for them! I'm sorry this chapter's a little shorter than the last one, but the next one's going to be the other half of this episode from Rose's POV plus an original scene at the end. Love you all! ~Bell