ALIENS OF LONDON
chapter v
The TARDIS is in a less jerky flight now, thank Rassilon for that, and he's pressing the different buttons and setting the date. He drums his fingers on the console as he waits for them to land. "Where are we going now?"
"The Powell Estate, 2005." he replies, just as the TARDIS lands, "Go home, Rose Tyler."
The Master doesn't want to let her go, honestly. He wants to be selfish and keep her with him and never bring her back. But today is just another example of how his emotions are going to get the better of him. Today is just another example of why he should travel alone.
"What?"
This actually cannot be happening.
She hears the Master's voice a few moments later, after a rather uncomfortable silence. "Yes, it can."
Rose didn't realize she had spoken that out loud, but she doesn't really care at this point. "You're just taking me home." she deadpans, her face, impassive. "You're taking me home to the Powell Estate when you could be taking me to some far off alien planet on the other end of the universe." She laughs, genuinely yet unsurely at the same time. "This is a joke, right? Or just a quick visit to Mum–?"
"A permanent visit to your mother." he amends, waving his hand dismissively and Rose feels like her heart just got caught in her throat. She tries approaching him, grabbing his hand, and she notices that his eyes are dark and cold and serious, with just the tiniest bit of something else mixed in there too. He shakes off her touch and she flinches as he turns around, hiding his face. "Don't you see? We had our fun, and now I don't want you anymore. I set the time to twelve hours after you originally left. Just say you were at a sleepover or something."
The words sting badly, and for a few seconds she remembers Jimmy Stone and she shuts her eyes at the thought, trying to wish the memories away. If he doesn't want her anymore, who is she to hang around? Rose Tyler is strong, and she is not going to get hurt from a man who treats her like dirt, again. She shrugs in what she hopes is a nonchalant manner. "Okay then."
He turns back to face her very abruptly after that. "What?"
"I said it's fine." she says, "You don't want me to hang around, I don't want to either anyway." She thanks her lucky stars for how convincing she is. "I mean, I miss home so much–" Not exactly a lie. "–and sometimes being at home is better than always traveling to places where mad aliens may want to kill me. And normally I wouldn't mind, but the person who's supposed to be saving me isn't doing a great job." She's already walking, having reached the door of the TARDIS and she doesn't want to face him, but she just hopes that he's hurt about this too.
"Exactly why I want you gone, Rose Tyler." he replies, being very cool about the whole thing and she curses him for it. "You always need saving, why on earth would I want someone who'll just act as dead weight, when I could have anyone in the whole, wide–"
She shuts the door before he can finish the sentence.
When Rose arrives at her house, she's trying to wipe away the few tears that have fallen with her jacket sleeve. The Master's being a right git, but still. She had the entire universe to see and now she's back at the Powell Estate. She doesn't succeed that much, because there are still smudges of mascara around her eyes, so one look at her and Jackie would know that she was crying.
She uses her key to open the door and walks inside, and is greeted by the sight of a bunch of papers scattered on the table and on the floor surrounding it. POLICE APPEAL FOR ASSISTANCE. CAN YOU HELP? it says, ROSE TYLER HAS BEEN MISSING FROM HER HOME ON THE POWELL ESTATE SINCE 6TH MAR–
She's panicking already when she hears glass shatter. Her mum is standing by the doorway to the kitchen before running towards her and enveloping her in a tight hug. "You're here! You're really here! It's you!"
"It's me." she says, her voice cracking just a bit because her heart is still in her throat.
Her mum notices the smudges of make-up on her face, and her rather messy hair (running away from the Gelth with Charles Dickens must've messed it up somehow) and immediately goes on full protective mother mode. "Where were you, Rose?" she asks, still not letting go of her daughter. "The hours I've sat here, days and weeks and months, all on my own. I thought you were dead!"
"I'm not, Mum, I'm not." she says, giving her mum's hand a reassuring squeeze. "I'm here. I'm alive."
"Where were you?" Jackie repeats.
She runs through the possible answers in her head. A night at Shareen's was hardly an acceptable answer now. "Traveling." she says instead, hoping that she's lucky enough for it to work.
The older Tyler raises an eyebrow. "Your passport still in your drawer!" she exclaims, "Please don't lie to me, Rose."
"You wouldn't believe me if I told you." she tells her, "Just trust me on this one, okay? I'm so sorry. I never thought that it would take this long, but there are just so many things to see."
"So many things to see, that you didn't have enough time for more than just one phone call? One phone call. Just to know that you were alive. Did you even think about me at all?"
Rose winces, feeling guiltier than she's ever been in her entire life. She sits down on the couch and her mum sits down next to her. She leans her head atop Jackie's shoulder and talks in a quiet voice. "Of course I did." she says, immediately. "All the time, Mum. I'm sorry, I really, really am."
"Do you know, what terrifies me is that you still can't say. What happened to you, Rose? What can be so bad that you can't tell me, sweetheart? Where were you?" Jackie asks, "You've been crying. Did somebody hurt you? I swear to God, I'll give them a good old Tyler slap the moment I see them if you just tell me–"
"It doesn't matter." Rose replies, "The point is, I'm here with you now. Isn't that enough?"
"I love you," her mum says instead, "And one day, when you're ready, you'll promise to tell me, won't you?"
"'Course I will." she says, and this is a promise that she'll keep. One day, Jackie Tyler will know about the blue box that's bigger on the inside and the madman who lived in it, and all the things that he and his companion saw, Rose swears it. She'll know about Cardiff and Gelth, and how their last phone call took place five billion years into the future during the end of the planet. "Now's just not the time."
The TARDIS won't budge. It's funny, considering that the blue box let him bring Rose Tyler to her destination in the first place. Really, if she didn't want the kitten to leave that badly she could've set their course to somewhere like Gadrahadradon, but the TARDIS is staying put. When he exits the police telephone box, he notices the words BAD WOLF spray painted across it and is amused, sort of. Of course someone had to vandalize the second most amazing being in all of the universe. The first, being him of course.
The Master would have to fix that Chameleon Arch sometime soon. He never understood what Theta found so appealing about its appearance. He'd have a lot of free time now, of course, without any annoying human to annoy him all the time. He'd finally have some semblance of quiet; there's no chance of true peace until that incessant drumming goes away. He hates to admit it, but Rose Tyler's voice made the drums sound just a little bit softer. They'd still be there of course, but they'd become something far off in the distance that you could easily ignore.
The realization hits him like a ton of bricks.
He got attached to a human.
Rassilon, help him.
He's ready to walk to the Powell Estate and get back what's his but he doesn't. He's not going to say sorry, he'll never apologize. She'll come running back soon enough, though, he's one hundred percent sure of it. And Rose Tyler shouldn't come back to the TARDIS anyway. There's no way that she's ever going to die (or come close to dying) because of him ever again. He's not going to waste a regeneration dying for a silly ape either, which is all the more reason why he shouldn't get attached, but he acknowledges silently to himself that he already has.
Emotions got the better of him (are getting the better of him) and he hates himself for it.
After drumming his fingers on the exterior of the TARDIS a few times, he comes to a decision. No, he's not going to go and get Rose Tyler. Yes, he'll keep her if she decides to come back.
Before he could waste anymore thoughts on a stupid human girl, a horn sounds and a shadow appears. He looks up and sees a spaceship just as Big Ben chimes once. He can't see anything else because of the buildings blocking the view, but after a while he starts to see black smoke float in the sky.
He rolls his eyes and realizes that maybe this is the reason why the TARDIS is staying put, refusing to go anywhere but London. He steps inside the time machine again and sets the coordinates to the street in front of the clock tower, where soldiers have already began to gather. "Get back!" they say, "Get back!"
He cranes his neck for a better view, and he gets one. Does he recognize the ship? No. Does he know why it crashed? No. He grins a bit to himself. He's always loved a good mystery, and now it seems that he's gotten one.
Another man gets out of the car near him and sighs. "Just my luck." he says in a Northern accent, presumably because of all the soldiers blocking the way. "Best watch it on the TV instead."
"Wonderful!" he exclaims suddenly, startling the man in the leather jacket. He doesn't mind at all and instead runs back to the TARDIS, and goes inside, straight to the living room where he's bound to find an Earth channel on the telly. Instead, he finds the telly gone from its usual place. "I need an earth television!" he shouts, looking up to the ceiling, knowing that he could just think it, but he doesn't care. "Now!"
The TARDIS responds with a shaky movement that causes him to fall down on his bum. He stands up and rushes to the console room, and he finds the location set to the Powell Estate. "No!" he shouts, "No, no, no, no, no, no, no. I am not apologizing to some girl who's of an inferior race than I am! She'll come back to me, I don't need to–"
The box lands with a start. The floor slants and he finds himself falling again, sliding to the door. He can feel the TARDIS giggling in his mind and he scowls because he just knows what she's trying to tell him. You'll find a telly in her house! He fixes his messed up hair and is ready to walk back to the console room until the TARDIS shakes again.
The Master realizes he's in a losing battle and he steps out the door.
He finds her house soon enough and he reluctantly knocks on the door. He plasters on a fake smile, for the sake of whoever's going to answer the door. The smile immediately fades when it's the pink and yellow kitten, because he knows there's no need to pretend with her.
"Rosie?" he hears her mother call, walking towards the door from what he assumes is the kitchen. "Who is it?"
Both of them aren't minding her and it's him who speaks first before getting cut off. "Rose Tyler–"
"Don't." her voice is steely and determined, and just loud enough for her mother to hear, "I'm definitely not going back with you."
Rose Tyler is pushed aside and a stinging slap is delivered to his face by an older blonde. He immediately clutches his cheek with his hand and double overs in pain. When he looks up he sees his companion looking vaguely amused. To her right, is the woman who slapped him with a glare that could kill a million Dalek fleets. "I'd like to see you stitch that, mate."
The Master is fishing for something in his pocket, muttering a string of curses in Gallifreyan. Rose realizes he's looking for his Eliminator as she closes the door and her eyes widen. "Don't you dare." she says and she sees him roll her eyes. He stands up straight again and acts as if nothing happened.
"Rose Tyler," he says, "As I was about to say before I was ever so rudely interrupted," he shoots a glare towards Jackie, "Could you please on the tel–"
Another slap resounds throughout the living room. "Who the hell are you?" Jackie exclaims, "You can't just waltz in here and ask for a favor when you're the reason why my daughter's been gone for a year! Twelve months I've been looking for her! What? Did you find her on the internet or something? Because I'm telling you, your stupid charm and smiles aren't going to fool me! Now, who are you and what did you do with my daughter?"
The Master blinks a couple of times as he rubs the side of his face. "Use your indoor voice." is all he replies, "And, please, don't be stupid. Your daughter's been gone for twelve hours, not twelve months. I understand humans are quite primitive, but I at least thought that you had a good sense of time–"
"Answer the question or you're getting another Prentice slap very soon."
Rose hears him muttering something about stupid humans under his breath, and her eyes narrow further at him. "Rose and I were traveling."
"Travelin'." her mum deadpans, "I'm going to tell you what I told my daughter. There's no possible way she could've been travelin' while her passport is still in her drawer. Rose is my daughter. It's okay when she lies." Rose winces. "But you're just this random stranger who blundered into her life and next thing I know, she's vanished off the face of the Earth! Who. Are. You?"
"I'm the Master." the aforementioned alien replies.
"You're mad if you think I'm going to call you that." Jackie says, "Where'd you take my Rose?" Her mum repeats, then adds, after a silence. "And what did you do to make her cry?"
That last sentence is enough to make Rose Tyler want to crawl under a rock and die of embarrassment. She's silently hoping that the Master'll say sorry or something like that; realize what a jerk he was being, but he doesn't. Instead, a tiny smirk starts to form on his face and she scowls at it. The bastard faces her with the smug look on his face. "I knew you couldn't live without me." Hit! Rose punches him before Jackie can. "Oi! Don't ruin the face."
Rose shakes her fist. Why hadn't anyone told her that punching someone would actually hurt? "Get away from my home or I'll call the cops."
Jackie watches the exchange with a confused expression. "Was he your boyfriend or something, Rose?" she asks, "Please tell me you haven't picked up another Jimmy Stone."
"Who's Jimmy Stone?"
Rose ignores him. "I thought he was different," she begins, telling the absolute truth in a rather quiet voice. She shoots him a glance before turning back to her mum. "But it turns out they're exactly the same." There's a silence after this before Rose continues talking. "Leave. You're right. We had our fun and now I don't want you anymore."
She's ready to shut the door in her face before she hears him continue talking. "I'm an alien and Rose and I time-travel in that blue box in the street–" she opens the door tentatively again, and the smug look has been wiped off of his face and he looks dead serious. "–and we've seen the end of the world and Charles Dickens and that's pretty much it right now, so if Rose Tyler would like to stop being so bloody difficult I need to go inside this home and turn on the television because an alien spaceship has just crashed into Big fucking Ben."
Rose raises an eyebrow. A ship just crashed into Big Ben? she wonders. Jackie is not so easily convinced. Of course she isn't. This is her mum she's talking about. "You're mad." she says, "A madman, a, a, a lunatic kidnapped my Rose. I'm calling the cops."
"Be quiet for just one second!" he shouts, "Now, go inside, turn on the TV. Put it on the news channel. I'll just be here, watching you realize that I'm right. Just like I always am."
Jackie slams the door in his face and she has to crack a smile at that. She turns on the telly out of pure curiosity and sees the headline on the news. "Big Ben destroyed as a UFO crash lands in Central London. Police reinforcements are drafted in from across the country to control widespread panic, looting and civil disturbance. A state of national emergency has been declared. Tom Hitchinson is at the scene."
"The police are urging the public not to panic. There's a help line number on screen right now if you're worried about friends or family." Hitchinson says on News 24.
"See!" she hears the Master's muffled voice from the other side of the door, "I told you! Are you coming or not?"
"Shut up!" she shouts back. "And get it through your thick skull that I'm staying here!" She turns to her mum. "Sorry about that."
"It's fine." Jackie hugs her, "Nice punch."
She laughs, smiling as she pulls away. "Thanks."
Rose turns her attention back to the telly and sits down. "The army are sending divers into the wreck of the spaceship. No one knows what they're going to find." She can hear her mum in the background mentioning something about getting a bunch of people together to celebrate her coming back home and she replies with a 'yeah, sure, whatever', not really paying any attention.
She shifts back into her old life, and realizes that maybe she could do this. She's seen her share of the world and now she's going to live a normal life like everyone else with her mum, Mickey, Shareen and all the rest of her friends.
She smiles just a little at the thought, but she can't get the image of a blue box spinning through the stars out of her head.
After thirty minutes or so, people start to gather in her living room. Ru's the only one she really recognizes. "You've broken your mother's heart," she says after grabbing a cuppa and sitting next to her. "I cradled her like a child."
She's being completely serious and Rose laughs despite of it. "You have any idea where Mickey is?"
Ru raises an eyebrow. "You mean Jackie hasn't called Mickey yet?"
"Not that I know of."
"Jackie, come here!" Ru calls, "You owe someone an apology."
Jackie, interrupted from her conversation with someone else (Beatrice and Connor Allen, she thinks, those are the names of her mum's friends over there) raises an eyebrow. "Who?"
"Mickey, of course!"
Her mum ignores the statement and instead hushes him and points at the telly. "A body of some sort has been found inside the wreckage of the spacecraft." Hitchinson says, "Brought to the nearest shore. Unconfirmed reports say that the body is of extra-terrestrial origin. An extraordinary event unfolding here live here in Central London. The body is being transferred to a secure unit mortuary, the whereabouts is yet unknown. The roads in Central London are being..."
Rose doesn't mind the rest. She's trying to get her thoughts off of all things alien, after all.
The TARDIS materializes in the Albion Hospital, parking itself in a store room. The TARDIS is still rather angry with him, but he's decided not to care, it's one of the many things that he's good at anyway. Rose can't possibly not want to travel with him. He's wonderful.
(He knows he said a lot of the things earlier just to hurt her, but really, he expected some kind of begging. Rose Tyler, dropping to her knees and asking to stay. She didn't even mind him when he came back, and that's just rude.)
The first person he spots is Big Ears and Leather. "Hey!" the Master calls, "You, over there!" The man continues walking, not minding him and he runs over to him, stopping him in his tracks. "You. You were there at Big Ben, and you were just some random civilian. Now you're here, in a place that's supposed to be closed off to the public. Who are you?"
Big Ears shuffles through his notes that he's holding. "Now's not the time to bother me." he says in a thick Northern accent, "And I believe I should be asking you that question. I know everyone who's supposed to be here, and you're not one of them."
He fishes his psychic paper out of his pocket. "Harold Saxon, I'm the doctor who was called to examine the alien."
His conversation partner looks bored. "That's psychic paper." he says, "And even if I didn't know it what it was, I'm the doctor. Doctor John Smith. Now, as much as I'd like to ask how you've got psychic paper in your possession, I need to go and do my job."
"That can't actually be your name."
"It's common for a reason." he replies, walking in his intended direction. "If you'll excuse me."
They both freeze when they start hearing a thumping coming from the walls. Thump, thump, thump. "You have any idea what that is?"
John shakes his head. "It's coming from Body Cold Chamber 5."
The Master starts running in the opposite direction John does. He's certain the thumping is coming from this door and he uses the Eliminator to shrink it. By the time the minuscule door lands on the floor, he realizes that the thumping is in a beat of four. He scowls. He wasn't following the thumping; he was following the drumming. They're so, so, loud. Onetwothreefour, onetwothreefour...
And he's just barreled into a room of Red Berets. After a second or two of looking at each other, they all finally lift their weapons. He waves with a tiny smirk and he's already getting out his Eliminator to kill them all in one go, before a crash is heard. They all begin to lower their weapons and he rolls his eyes. "What are you waiting for?" he asks, smiling slightly at the idea of having his own personal army of sorts. "Go!" He runs in the direction of the crash, grasping at air with his left hand before he realizes Rose Tyler isn't following behind him. He finds John Smith using a table to help himself stand up, a cut on his head. "What happened?"
As the man stands up, he points at the body chamber behind the Master and the time lord turns to face it. "The alien's alive." the Master says.
"Obviously." John replies, sarcastically, "It's a pig in a space suit, and it caused quite the mess, as you can see. Fantastic, isn't it?"
"Just wonderful." Metal starts to clatter. "It's still here, then?"
A soldier enters the room and when it spots the 'alien', it immediately fires and the pig runs out on its hind legs. John looks horrified. "Don't shoot!"
The Master raises an eyebrow, a bored look beginning to form. "It's just a pig."
"Exactly!" John replies, "It's not an alien. It's a pig. A frightened pig, mind you. The shooting'll just scare it."
"It's a pig." he repeats, deadpanning, as he follows John to the hallway where the soldiers are following the animal. He's walking, quite calm, compared to the man in the leather jacket who's probably running so fast his legs could fall off. By the time he arrives, the pig is dead.
"I told you not to shoot!" John is shouting, "It was scared. It's not even a real alien, it's just a pig!"
The soldiers ignore the doctor and the Master tries approaching him. "It's a mermaid." he says, awkwardly.
John raises an eyebrow. "I'm pretty sure that isn't a fish."
"Stupid ape." he mutters, "Victorian showmen used to draw the crowds by taking the skull of a cat, gluing it to a fish and calling it a mermaid. Now someone's taken a pig, opened up it's brain, stuck bits on, then they've strapped it in that ship and made it dive bomb."
John makes a face that looks pitiful and disgusted. "It must've been terrified." he gestures to the dead animal on the floor, "They've taken this animal and turned it into a joke." he's silent, before adding, "The technology augmenting its brain, it can't possibly be human."
The Master examines it. "Of course it isn't." he says, "Humans are too primitive for something like that."
John looks thoughtful for a second before nodding in agreement, not responding for a few seconds. "Aliens are faking aliens." he says, "Why would they do that?"
"Well," the Master drawls, "I suppose it's time to find out." He begins walking in the direction of the TARDIS, John Smith close behind. He turns around and stops him. "I never asked for you to come. Now, go along with life and mope over more pigs or whatever it is you do."
John ignores the insult, his gaze transfixed on the police public call box. "What's a blue box doing in here?"
"Waiting for me." he replies, "Why'd you want to know?"
"Nothing, it... It just looks familiar." he says, "I'm coming with you."
"On the contrary," the Master replies as he steps into the TARDIS doors, "No, you're not."
The TARDIS begins to fade and John doesn't know what his reaction should be. It's just another impossible thing on another impossible day with another impossible (-y annoying person), and he looks for the psychic paper in his possession. Sanchez just had to get hungover, so John just had to cover for him. He rolls his eyes. Why couldn't Harris have done it? He continues walking towards the exit of Albion, going back home to watch the news and find out what the next place to go to is.
Sitting in his jacket's pocket is a silver fob watch.
"Here's to the Martians!"
"The Martians!"
Everybody raises their drink and joins in on the cheer.
(Except for Rose, of course.)
She's sitting down in a chair, not really minding the festivities going on, making polite chitchat with some people that she doesn't even know every now and then. She hears the door open and realizes Mickey's standing in the doorway. She stands and runs over to him, throwing her arms around his shoulders in a hug. "I was going to come and see you." she says, honestly.
"Jackie!" Ru calls from the couch, "Now's your chance to apologize to Mickey!"
Jackie approaches the pair and scowls. "It's not my fault. She disappeared! What was I supposed to think?"
"Mum..." she starts, "What did you do?" Her mum disappears into the kitchen and she follows, Mickey behind her. She repeats her earlier question. "What happened?"
"You disappear, who do they turn to?" Mickey immediately starts, cutting Jackie off before she can speak. "Your boyfriend. Five times I was taken in for questioning. Five times. No evidence. Course, there couldn't be, could there? And then I get her, your mother, whispering around the estate, pointing the finger. Stuff through my letterbox, and all 'cos of you." Rose isn't sure who he's referring to in the last bit, her or her mother, but she feels guilty either way.
"I didn't think I'd be gone so long." she admits.
"And I waited for you, Rose." he says, his voice, steel and angry, "Twelve months, waiting for you and that alien to come back."
Jackie interrupts. "You knew about that bloke?" she asks, "Why didn't you tell me?"
Mickey shuts the serving hatch and the door, cutting them off from the living room. "Yeah, yeah." he says, "Why not, Rose? Huh? How could I tell her where you went?" Jackie raises an eyebrow. "I might as well, 'cos you're stuck here. He did leave you, didn't he? Oh, he's dumped you, Rose. Sailed off into space. How does it feel, huh? Now you are left behind with the rest of us Earthlings. Get used to it."
"What's going on?" Jackie demands, "You can't actually believe that man is actually an alien! He's mad, that's what he is! You both are!"
Rose ignores her and continues talking to him. "He didn't leave me." she says, "I left him."
"Just like you left me?" She's silent because she doesn't know what to say to that, and he continues talking. "After all, I didn't even get a proper goodbye. Just a 'thank you'. What the hell was that?"
She frowns and it turns into a full out grimace at the sound of the TARDIS. Mickey rushes outside, and so does Jackie, following him. She stays in the kitchen instead, not wanting to confront the Time Lord.
Rose can vaguely hear bits and pieces from inside. Things like, "that's a police box", and "it just came out of nowhere!" said by Jackie and Mickey respectively. She can hear her name being mentioned every once in a while, and she sincerely hopes that Mickey is able to hit him at some point too. Then, everything becomes silent for a while and she's hopeful because she thinks that maybe he's finally left her alone. A few minutes later, she realizes that neither Mickey nor her mum have come back yet.
She doesn't put it past him that he might've killed them by now.
It's at that thought that she gets out of the house and finds none of them there, but the blue box still stands in the alleyway. She takes a deep breath and swallows her pride, knocking on the door.
Jackie answers. "Rose," her mum starts quietly, "It's bigger on the inside."
"Yes, it is." Rose replies, "C'mon, they'll probably be looking for you back in the flat."
She grabs her mum by the hand as Jackie nods, prepared to leave the TARDIS. She can hear Mickey giving the Master a piece of his mind and she's proud of him because of it. "You ruined my life! They thought she was dead. I was a murder suspect because of you! Who the hell are you anyway? Just swooshing in and saving the day, then swanning off with other people's girlfriends! I bet you don't even remember my name!"
"You're right." she hears the Master reply, "I don't." In the blink of an eye he's preventing she and her mum from leaving the blue box and looking her dead in the eye. "Aliens are impersonating aliens. Don't you want to come?"
"I already told you–" she's ready to say no before he cuts her off.
"Well, sorry, then. Actually, I'm not sorry at all. You can't." he finishes grinning somewhat triumphantly.
"–No. I'm staying." she says, not exactly glaring at him, but there isn't any smile on her face either. "Have fun with the alien impersonators."
"Have fun on boring earth with your boring boyfriend and your boring house that isn't even bigger on the inside." he replies, childishly. All that's missing is him sticking out his tongue, and it'll be just like interacting with a toddler.
"You know what?" she says, "I will." She tiptoes to get a glimpse of Mickey. "Come on, Mick!" Mickey and Jackie go out first and she turns around to follow them before she feels a familiar hand grabbing her wrist. She's yanked into the TARDIS and the doors shut. She glares at him. "Open the door." she demands.
"No." he says, darkly. "I'm doing you a favor. You want to go."
"Yes, I do!" she shouts, frustrated, "I want to see the universe and not have to stay at home and wake up everyday knowing that there's something amazing out there that I'm missing out on! But you know what? I'd rather live a boring, domestic life than travel the universe with you, if you're just going to continue acting like this." She continues, on a tirade. "What went wrong? Christmas with the Gelth was fun, you have to admit it! We were fine! We were perfectly okay! And we were friends! What happened that made you change your mind?"
"You lied!" he exclaims in return.
"I've never lied to you!"
"Yes, you have! You said you know how I feel, remember? The day after we met. You told me you perfectly understand what I feel! And you know what? I believed you." his voice cracks for just a second at the last sentence but he continues, "And the truth is, this entire time you've been proving that you were telling the truth, but it was all just a fucking act!"
"No, it wasn't!" she protest.
"Don't lie to me again! You said you understand but you don't! No one ever does! I was perfectly fine before I met you, you know. I didn't care about anything, and now you have me running around saving the world like I'm some kind of hero." he spits out the last word like it's venom, "You're, you're trying to make me human when I'm not! You're trying to get me to feel human feelings when I shouldn't! I am better than some stupid ape! I am the last remaining Lord of Time!"
Her mouth forms an O in shock. "You're mad at me... for making you better?"
"You made me worse!"
"You don't have to be all by yourself, you stubborn prat." she says, "I'm here, remember? Maybe if you stopped being so bloody difficult, you wouldn't be so alone! You're like this because you push everyone away!"
The TARDIS is silent for a good few minutes aside from its occasional whirring and buzzing, before the Master finally announces, "Leave." His entire being is numb, and she thinks she is too.
The moment she steps out of the blue box, there's a spotlight on her. A helicopter spotlight. "Do not move! Step away from the box and raise your hands above your heads." Rose follows and in the corner of her eye she sees Mickey running away and she hears her mother calling her name before a group of soldiers hold her back. The Master steps out of the TARDIS soon after.
"What did you get yourself into this time?" he whispers to her.
"Of course it's my fault," she mutters, bitterly. "Apparently, I just make everything worse."
They don't talk to each other for until they get pushed into the posh police car waiting for them. If I knew it was going to be like this, being arrested, she thinks to herself, I would have done it years ago. "Where are you taking us?" the Master asks, "Prison?"
The soldier in the car laughs. "Prison? Ha!" he says, "You travel in the blue box, therefore you are the Doctor, yes?"
And here it is again with that Doctor bloke. Who the hell is he anyway? The Master lies easily. "I am the Doctor." he says, "I repeat. Where are you taking us?"
"Downing Street." the soldier replies, "10 Downing Street."
Rose nearly chokes on air. "What?"
The moment they arrive at the place their are cameras flashing and reporters talking. She can't help but look around and she notices the Master flipping one of them the bird at some point and she scoffs at his action. They enter the waiting room where a man is talking. Ganesh, she hears his name is. "Ladies and gentlemen, can we convene? Quick as we can, please. It's this way on the right, and can I remind you ID cards are to be worn at all times." he walks over to the pair of them and offers one to the Master, "Here's your ID card. I'm sorry, your companion doesn't have clearance."
The Master opens his mouth, if it was to protest, she'll never know as she interrupts him instead. "That's fine." she says, waving her hand dismissively. "I don't need to go."
"Great." the Master remarks through gritted teeth.
Ganesh escorts him away, but right before they both leave, the pair turn around and Ganesh speaks. "I'll have to leave you with security. Is that all right?"
A new voice interrupts the conversation. "It's fine," he says, "I'll look after her. At least then I'll be of some use."
"You again!" the Master exclaims, just as she turns around to face him. She's never seen the man before in her life, all big ears and leather. "You're not really a doctor, are you?"
The man looks somewhat annoyed. "'Course I am!" he replies, before turning to face her as Ganesh hurries the Master along. She spots the Master watching them over his shoulder as he walks away and she smiles somewhat fakely. "Doctor John Smith." he says introducing himself, "What's your name?"
"Rose Tyler." she replies.
He grabs her hand. "Well, then, Rose Tyler," he begins, "It's time to run." He leads her past crowds and people, knocking over various items before they arrive in an empty room and she doesn't even need to pretend to smile anymore after he lets go of her hand. He looks at the various shelves, doors and windows, skimming his fingers across every surface. "Why are you here?"
"I'm the companion of that bloke from earlier." she says.
"Which bloke?" he asks, "Ganesh?"
She smiles, genuinely amused. "No, the other one." she says.
"Ah," John says in recognition, as he stops for just a second to smile at her, "He's rude."
"You've met him?" she asks, giggling.
"A while ago." he says, "Can't imagine what someone like you is doing dating someone like him."
She blushes instantly. "We're not together." she denies instantly, and changes the topic. "What're you looking for?"
"A door. Or a passage. I'm not very picky."
"To where?"
"The meeting room, of course!" he scowls, "I was denied entrance. I've got the ID card," he says, lifting is jacket a little bit to show her the ID stuck to his jumper, and she sees his face in the picture, not smiling, with the caption Dr. John Smith, Greyhound 6 UNIT and she has absolutely no idea what UNIT is but she gestures for him to continue anyway. "But no clearance. I'm an alien expert, I've got every right to go in there."
Rose snorts. "You think you're so impressive."
He stops what he's doing to face her completely affronted. "I am so impressive!"
She laughs. After a few seconds, she decides to ask, "What's UNIT?"
John rubs the back of his neck awkwardly. He looks as if he's debating something with himself for a while, before the corners of his mouth tug up into a slight smile. "I suppose I could tell you. It's like an army, it's just that we deal with aliens instead of humans. 'Cept, I'm not very fond of guns, so I'm just a doctor."
"Wow." she says, honestly, "Working with aliens. You're right. You are impressive."
He continues talking, grinning triumphantly. "It might sound strange, but working with aliens has always been kind of easy. I see this alien and I just know what it is, like recalling a memory." he stops to chuckle a bit, "You probably think I'm mad."
"No, no, no, you aren't." she says, reassuring him. "It's very interesting."
Suddenly, a woman bursts into the door and interrupts their conversation. She holds up her ID. "Harriet Jones, MP Flydale North. Are you the Doctor?"
John shakes his head. "Better. I'm an actual doctor instead of just some bloke running around and using the name." he replies, grinning. "You've got his companion though." he adds, gesturing towards Rose.
"Are you an expert too?" Harriet asks Rose, "You know about aliens?"
"A little bit." she replies, honestly.
"I could help with that." John says, "What happened?"
Harriet immediately bursts into tears. "C-C-Come with me." she says, leading them to the Cabinet Room and as she walks in the empty halls, she tries recounting what had just happened to her. "His name was Oliver. Oliver Charles, and they just turned his body into a suit."
"Who did?" Rose asks.
"These aliens!" Harriet replies, "They just unzipped his forehead and there was this blast of blue light. They were using their bodies as a disguise!"
John interrupts. "Did you just say 'they'?" he asks, "There was more than just Oliver?"
Rose squeezes Harriet's hand reassuringly as they enter a different room and she lets go. Harriet chokes back a sob, and Rose tries to comfort her. "It's all right. I believe you. It's, it's alien. They must have some serious technology behind this. If we could find it, we could use it." She starts searching the room, checking under desks and tables, until finally finding a cabinet and opening the doors.
A body falls out, but it's more like just skin now and she steps back in horror. She nearly screams and John hears her and rushes to her side. "Rose? What is it?"
"That's, that's the–"
She gets cut off as a familiar person enters the room. Ganesh. "Harriet, for God's sake. This has gone beyond a joke. You cannot just wander." he says, walking into the room. Rose's hands cover her mouth at the sight and Ganesh soon walks over to see what the fuss is about as Harriet remains in a corner, and she's stopped crying. "That's the Prime Minister!" he exclaims.
"The Prime Minister's dead." Rose panics, "Oh my God."
John looks at her straight in the eye. "Calm down." he says, "Nothing's going to happen to you."
"Oh!" someone suddenly says, a voice that's strange and new to her, but definitely female. "Has someone been naughty?"
"That's impossible." Ganesh reasons, "He left this afternoon. The Prime Minister left Downing Street. He was driven away!"
The stranger laughs. "And who told you that, hmm? Me."
She reaches up to her hairline and reveals a zipper of sorts, and slowly unzips it. The room is consumed by a bright blue light and Rose is scared. "John?" she whispers, and he squeezes her hand just so she knows that he heard her. "Do you have any idea what alien this is?"
An alien starts to wriggle out of the human 'suit'. It's green and it looks horrible, with giant bug like black eyes. The alien flexes her three, long fingers and sighs with relief. She uses her talons to push Ganesh against the wall and Rose tries to stay as still as still as possible, and Harriet barely contains a scream.
John responds a few seconds after. "Not a clue."
The Master is bored.
He's in a room full of stuffy 'alien experts' who probably don't even know the difference between a Silurian and a Cerulian or their Valkari from their Viskili. Still, he listens anyway to the speaker at the front of the room. What's his name again? He knows it ends in -ith. Smith? Alith? He honestly doesn't know. "Now, ladies and gentlemen, if I could have your attention, please. As you can see from the summaries in front of you, the ship had one porcine occu–"
"That's not the important bit."
Everyone turns to face the Master (or at least, to them, the Doctor), and he knows that he's just interrupted something that they probably consider important. Ith raises an eyebrow. "Oh, really, Doctor?"
It's strange having people refer to him by Thete's title, because there is no way he is the man who makes people better. "You were going to investigate something in the North Sea, yes?" he asks, drumming his fingers on the table.
"How did you know about that?" Ith asks.
"Again, not the important bit." he says, "There's something down there, in the North Sea. You were going to have a look at it. What stopped you?"
"Surely this is more important!"
"Exactly." the Master exclaims, "Spaceships and pigs happened. It's just a distraction. Now, if you'll excuse me–" He stands up from his chair, ready to leave these people to figure out the whole thing on their own. He's figured it out for them, there's no need for him to stay, until, the man in the seat next to him farts. The Master makes a face. "What? No thank you for saving the world? Just someone farting?"
The man who did so speaks. "Would you rather silent but deadly?"
Ith removes his cap (Asquith! That's his name!) and begins unzipping something on his forehead. A zipper is right below his hairline and the Master is prepared to attack. The man does the same, as blue light begins to fill the room and the Master squints in response.
"We are the Slitheen." Green says as the green alien steps out of the skin, now shed onto the floor.
"Thank you for wearing your IDs," Asquith says, "They'll help in identifying the bodies."
The Master feels a sudden shock.
He sees nothing but black.
replies to guest reviews
*Guest: The Master's appearance in this story is somewhat of a question mark. I've never really decided, but it's definitely not Simm because that would be his next regeneration. However, I like to think that the Master's Yana regeneration was originally rather young (think around his twenties) but grew old as a result of his human biology. I don't describe the Master's appearance on purpose here, but everyone's free to picture him however they want. Thanks for reviewing!
*Lucy Saxon: Aaaand, you'll get to see whether or not Rose leaves him forever next chapter. Tune in for Chapter Five of Beating of the Drums! Hahaha, in all seriousness, thanks for reviewing, I appreciate it.
*Vree: Sorry I didn't update so soon, but here it is! Thanks for reviewing!
AN: *comes peeping out of a doorway* Umm... Hi? Look, I know that I didn't update in the longest time but this past week I had zero access to internet because I was out of the country, but I'm back now with an update that's 8 000 words long, so I hope that makes up for it. :) Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this chapter. Thank you for all the reviews! ~Bell