Disclaimer - I don't own Doctor Who.
Enter the Master.
The Time Lord looked at the screen in the darkened console room of his ship with interest as he watched his former schoolmate (though it was wrong to call their relationship something so mundane) battle her way through the crews of both the Spanish treasure ship and the pirate ship that had attacked. It was clear to both crews they knew they wouldn't be able to escape, especially with their opponent's firepower - already she had leapt into the rigging of the treasure ship and had proceeded to fire on the decks of both ships from higher ground. Both ships had suffered severe damage because of her weapons, more than would have taken from one of those simple muzzle loaded guns. He had been watching her for a while, following her through the Time Vortex, from one place in time and space to another, watching her plunder ship and planet. When he had heard she had been exiled from their homeworld, he had spent a lot of time trying to find her. He had been surprised in the manner of her departure from Gallifrey since, while he knew now she was capable of murder, she had long since begun ignoring that parasite Anzor who wasn't worth the energy for even him to waste time worrying about.
He had bigger fish to fry, as the humans said, with trying to build an empire in the stars. He had dozens of plans of course, but he would like to see them through with her by his side as his queen. In fact, he was uncertain just how long it had taken for the news she had left Gallifrey to arrive where he had been at the time. When he had heard she had left Gallifrey, he had spent some time looking for her. It was hard to find something without a good idea of where to look, but he was surprised that she hadn't tried to contact him.
Standing in the console room of his TARDIS, he watched with interest as she cut her way through the throng of human sailors - he had no intention of stopping her, he didn't care enough about the humans to get involved and besides he had plundered a few human ships and colonies in his own time - and he felt admiration stir within him.
The pair of them had been lovers during their time at the Academy, and not for the first time he wished he'd taken her away from Gallifrey when he'd had the chance, but he could make up with her for that.
She had not been easy to track, but when he had found trails of her presence in the universe, he had been surprised by how she practised piracy but he imagined she was learning her new trade. Theft was something that came easily to her, he knew that because he remembered the number of times she'd stolen something during their time at the Academy, and he wouldn't be surprised if she had stolen some of Ushas' research a few times.
But he had not expected this. He had become aware of her actions - stealing a submarine from the 21st century and bringing it back through time to a period where it would be virtually invincible, and she was using it to sink treasure ships in order to plunder them. That was something he could understand - while it was within her abilities to simply use one of the ships in this era, or disguise her own TARDIS to resemble a sailing ship, she knew the TARDIS's chameleon circuit couldn't copy weapons, and she would need them to attack and sink ships.
What he had not expected was to see his former lover throw herself into a fight with anachronistic weapons before putting one away and picking up a sword and fighting her way through.
The Time Lord smiled as he watched his lover, and he adjusted the controls so the scanner could zoom in so he could see her face. He was surprised to find her enjoying this since he remembered how much she preferred not to get too violent, but he sensed that while she could react violently she was still the same girl he remembered during their years back home on Gallifrey.
She had changed. She was more dangerous, she had probably spent a great deal of her time already with existing pirate and criminal groups in the universe, but it was hard for him to work out precisely where and when she had gone. It had taken him a long time to discover that she had hijacked the submarine from the 21st century and taken it back here. Earth had a very long history, and it was logical that she would have taken it back through time instead of forwards - the technology of the submarine was perfect for its era, but it was analogous to plucking a Roman war gallery from its time zone and putting it and its crew in the middle of the Second World War - they wouldn't stand a chance.
It had taken him a while for him to find the right period for her to be in, but when he'd arrived in this time zone where the Spanish Main was at its height, and piracy was practised here, it hadn't taken him long to find out she was here. He had done that easily enough by scanning the planet for any sign of atomic technology, and he had picked up the emissions of the submarine, and he had been watching her ever since.
The Time Lord had been a little bit bemused by the title she had chosen for herself.
The Pirate.
It sounded a little bit too obvious, really. But he sometimes had doubts about his own name that he had chosen for himself, even if it commanded respect in his mind. But for his former lover, it was clear she didn't really care about how others perceived her because of her name, and it wasn't entirely pretentious. She was a pirate, as these humans would attest too, and she was a ferocious opponent in battle. He wondered how she would feel about his offer for her to become his queen.
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The Pirate felt as if she were being watched. The was certainly something on the edge of her senses, but she was too caught up in the fight to really look for it. When she was finished with the crews of the pirate ship and the treasure ship the human buccaneers had come to plunder she would return to the TARDIS and run a scan. She dropped the sword in her hand with a little bit of frustration and whipped out her blaster and fired at the men coming towards her.
The quarterdeck of the treasure ship was in shambles. When she had climbed the rigging, she had ignored her fear of heights and hung her legs on one of the yardarms so she could swing like a bat and fired her blasters as the crews of both ships while she fired a few shots that badly damaged the pirate ship. Jose found himself struggling as he and his men along with the pirates were beaten back by this devil woman who seemed to have leapt from hell itself. With her strange weapons and then later the sword she had picked up during the battle, the woman had taken out a quarter of the fighters already before climbing up the rigging. The reason completely mystified Jose and the men who'd chased her up to the top of the mast, but when she'd begun firing down on them from above the answer was clear.
Jose leaned against the handrail as he watched the woman slaughter his men and the pirates before he regained his composure and rejoined the fight. He had seen many kinds of fights in his years at sea, but he had never encountered anything like this. The weapons this woman had were vicious and they didn't need reloading, the only thing she was poor at was sword fighting, though she made up for it with her brutality.
Esteban staggered towards him and leaned against the rail as well. Jose looked at his first mate with concern, seeing the exhaustion on his face and the way he was cradling an injured arm.
The two seamen remained where they were by the rail, regaining some of their strength and preparing to re-enter the fray, but watching as their men and the pirates fought against the woman who'd boarded the ship and attacked them. They watched as the captain of the pirates, dressed in a garishly coloured jacket with a hat with plumes of exotic feathers, wielding a massive sword. The pirate captain laughed as the woman stood there indifferently, and then he lunged for the woman….. who sidestepped his lunge, reached over his head and jerked, letting out a sickening snap. The pirate captain dropped to the quarterdeck with his neck snapped. Hidden from view behind one of the masts, Esteban and Jose tried to take stock of what they'd just seen.
"Who is that bitch?" Jose hissed.
Esteban shook his head as he leaned over the rail. "I don't know-wait, what is that in the water below?"
Jose glanced at his friend, wondering what in the name of the holy mother was going through his mind and where his priorities were since their ship had been invaded and their shipmates were being killed but then he saw what had caught his officer and longtime friend's attention.
In the water below the ship and moored by the wooden hull by some type of cable was a long, silver object.
"What is that?" Esteban whispered.
"I don't know, but I think that bitch came from this," Jose said, glancing over his shoulder. "I can't see her. Let's get down there. We can take her by surprise when she's finished with the ships," he paused at the thought of losing his ship and his crew, but it would be worth it just to kill the woman who'd slaughtered them. "Do you feel up to the climb down?" he asked his old friend.
Esteban knew there was no denying the idea was tempting, but he didn't know if he was strong enough to climb down. "I will do my best," he assured his old friend.
The two sailors nimbly but slowly down to the silver object. They found a tower jutting from the body and quickly found a hatch, passing a tube sticking out of the tower though they didn't know what it was, and they entered.
At the sight of the controls, the hatstand with a long bodysuit hanging up with some type of mask slung carelessly nearby, Esteban whispered.
"It's a ship, Jose."
"But if it is then why didn't we see it?"
"Maybe it's some new type of boat?" Esteban suggested though his tone made it clear he wasn't so sure.
The two sailors were about to explore the unusual craft and hopefully find a place to hide from the woman who'd attacked them when they heard a voice from behind them. "Oh it is definitely a boat," the voice of a man, rich and silky, said, "but it won't matter for you."
The sailors spun around and found themselves looking at a man who was wearing a black high collared jacket, black trousers and shoes. Esteban was a religious man and something about this man's sallow skin with the goatee beard which was as dark as his outfit and his large eyes with the high forehead made him think momentarily of Satan himself.
"What do you mean?" Jose asked, and Esteban winced at his friend's stupidity.
The man smiled, and that was when both sailors realised the man was holding an oddly shaped gun that was smaller than the ones the woman was armed with but smaller. "Because you are both dead," the man smiled and he fired his weapon in quick succession, and both sailors were hit at point blank range.
Jose looked up at the man weakly while he glanced at his wound. The wound was massive, blackened like a smith pouring molten metal into the wound. Jose knew he was dying, and he became steadily weak. "Who are you? Who is that woman?"
The man smiled down at him, regarding him almost kindly. "In reverse order, that woman is known as the Pirate, and I think she's better than those miserable amateurs that boarded your ship before she attacked, don't you think?" The man's mocking smirk became bigger if that was possible. "My name is the Master."
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On the ship, the Pirate looked down at the now dead wealthy merchants that hadn't taken part in the fighting with some regret before she turned and walked through the ship to the hold in search of survivors. She encountered a few of them, but they didn't have a chance of hiding from her. With the detector she had on her person, she easily managed to pick up the humans lurking below decks. The humans she found fought valiantly, but the Time Lady was worried, the feeling that someone she knew was nearby had not gone away but now she had the time to investigate, she probed with her mind because she was sure it was another Time Lord.
There was definitely something there, but she couldn't tell who it was. The other was blocking her, but she got the sense of amusement from the other Time Lord.
The Pirate went down into the hold, jumping down onto the ballast. With the crunch of gravel beneath her feet, she walked over to the chests that were chained to the walls. She reached out a hand to stroke one of the tightly bound chests before she moved away, and bent down. The Pirate dug through the ballast until she'd dug out a nice little hole, and she reached into her pocket, thankful for its extra-dimensional nature, and pulled out a small grey sphere with a white top. The Time Lady moved the top to the left, and then pressed the red button set into it, and she quickly rushed out of the hold, up onto the quarterdeck and over the handrail down to her submarine. But as the Time Lady was about to go through the top hatch she paused as she sensed the other Time Lord inside. The Pirate went through the hatch and sealed it tightly. She was going to be diving in a moment, but she hadn't taken more than three steps through the compartment when a familiar hissing sound caught her attention.
The submarine's ballast tanks were being opened. They were diving.
"I thought I'd save you the trouble since you've probably put a bomb on the ship," a voice called out.
The Pirate took out her blaster out of reflex and rushed to the bridge. She stopped in astonishment when she saw the bearded man standing tall and straight in front of one of the consoles. Their minds touched in a second, and she gasped. "Koschei?" she whispered, a smile growing on her face. But her smile disappeared a little bit when he shifted, not out of discomfort but out of annoyance. "My name is the Master now, just as you are the Pirate. Bit pretentious, don't you think?"
The Time Lady growled. "Oh and I suppose 'Master' if your average Gallifreyan title? What are you doing here, I've been looking for you and the others for months?"
That wasn't entirely true. After she'd escaped from Gallifrey after Anzor's framing of her, she had wandered the universe on her own for a while, all the time hoping to find some of the others from her Academy class who had left Gallifrey and gone renegade. But she hadn't actually gone out of her way to find them for long periods, just whims.
And it wasn't as if they hadn't known she had escaped. Time Lords were telepathic beings, and they knew what was going on back home enough to know she'd have escaped. The Pirate wasn't really bothered that she hadn't met any of the others, but she'd gone out looking for them out of a need for companionship - after spending decades and decades on Gallifrey being bored to death by her family and their need to brag, she had needed to meet other Time Lords who had her mindset.
The Master shrugged (something about his title worried her, but the Pirate couldn't completely put her finger on why it bothered her so much) and answered her questions. "I heard about one of your last raids, the K system if I remember correctly," he said, making the Pirate quirk an eyebrow. She had raided that system and plundered it completely before coming to Earth. "That was ages ago," she pointed out, "why didn't you tell me you were around?"
The Master smiled. "I wanted to surprise you," he said, stepping closer to the Time Lady. The Pirate sent him a rather bored look, but her lips quirked into a smile.
"You dove my submarine," she stated.
"I know you put a bomb on that ship. But is that all you want to do with your lives, Pirate? Plunder ships, plunder planets?"
The Pirate was taken aback by the question. She had often wondered whether or not there was more to her life than what she was doing for the moment. It was alright for races like humans, with their limited lifespans, but for a Time Lady where her lifespan was virtually insurmountable, there could be a wealth of things she could be doing that she didn't know about just yet.
"I haven't really thought about it," she said softly. "I like making things up as I go."
That was probably not the right thing to say, but truthfully it was all she could say for the time being.
The Master smiled, and she was instantly annoyed. She knew what he was thinking. He thought she was wasted doing what she was doing. But before she could say anything in retaliation, there was a chirp from one of the display panels. Ignoring the Master she went over to it and checked the readouts.
"The ship is sinking to the bottom," she said, though she didn't know why she was even telling him. She felt like she was being patronised by him, and it wasn't as if she didn't know what he was doing. When she had asked him what he was doing, they both knew she knew what he was doing.
The Pirate had heard rumours of a Time Lord going around causing all kinds of chaos, and she knew it was Koschei, though she didn't know why he was bothering that much. In many ways, the Master's activities were similar to Morbius' plans to conquer the universe and take the Time Lords out of the darkness. But the Master wasn't as obvious as Morbius. He was more interested in starting little interplanetary wars, or helping historical interstellar wars, sometimes supplying technology or intelligence that shouldn't have been provided. It wasn't enough to cause a major timeline disruption, so the Time Lords did not get involved.
It had surprised her a little bit, but not so much. When they'd been courting at the Academy Koschei had wanted more out of life, he had wanted to be able to command people like Magnus had, and he openly supported Morbius even when the other Time Lord's true colours were revealed. It had worried her a little bit, but he didn't do anything stupid.
The Pirate, along with the Rani and Millennia, were the only three female members of the Deca. As a result, they were sought after in a teasing, competitive way. The Pirate and the Rani had both been icy, but the Pirate had enjoyed the teasing. When she had lost her virginity to Koschei it had been a magical night, but she had always seen him looking at her with jealousy whenever she had done well in a test. It had frustrated her, she had tried to tell him that the tests were meaningless in the long run but he hadn't listened. Personally, the Pirate ignored the looks, but deep down they had bothered her.
"What are you going to do?"
The Pirate turned to him, rolling her eyes at the rather stupid question. "What do you think? I am going to salvage whatever is on that ship-," she announced, but the Master surprised her by chortling. "Is this all you are going to do?"
"What would you have me do?" she challenged him.
The Master gave her a smile and he walked towards her, slowly like a cat. The Pirate stood where she was, tensed up and ready for a fight, but to her surprise, the Time Lord leaned in and kissed her on the lips. The Pirate moaned into the kiss out of reflex as the Master deepened it. He pulled away.
"Come with me, after you've plundered the ship."
The Pirate narrowed her eyes, but she nodded regardless. The salvage of the ship was quicker with the Master helping her, but all the time she was in the water, she was still mystified by what he wanted to show her. When they were finished, the Pirate stripped out of her wetsuit slowly and re-donned her clothes, making sure her blaster was ready for anything; she didn't know what the Master was planning to do, but if he tried anything she'd shoot him.
When they were both out of the airlock, the Time Lords went to the bridge. "Your TARDIS or mine?" the Master asked.
The Pirate gave him a thin smile. "If you don't mind, I'd like to materialise my TARDIS inside your own," she said though she made sure it was a statement of fact. Non-negotiable.
The Master smiled as if he considered the matter of no importance, but she detected a slight annoyance in his eyes that only her long experience with him made clear. If he was hoping for her to ally herself with him, then he needed to work a bit more on his poker face.
Powering the submarine down, the Pirate prepared to leave, knowing the Master was waiting for her. She took her time, knowing Koschei didn't have a lot of patience but since she was toying with him she hoped he realised getting her on his side was not going to be easy.
When she was finished she headed for her TARDIS and headed for the console and began to power it up, and checking the surrounding space/time continuum for another TARDIS departure when the Master's face appeared in the scanner screen.
"Ready to leave?" he asked.
The Pirate nodded. "Get on with it."
The Master's face disappeared from the screen but not before she caught his annoyed expression. She sighed mentally, wishing Koschei would grow a pair already. Her TARDIS registered the dematerialisation, and she did likewise, but she materialised her own ship inside his own. It was easier for a TARDIS to materialise inside another while in the Time Vortex, but truthfully she didn't trust the Master well enough to keep his defences down while in real space.
As soon as her ship materialised inside the Master's TARDIS, the Pirate waited in case Koschei locked down her ship but there was no attempt. That didn't mean the Master wouldn't try something at some point. He might have taken an older model, but the Master was a genius. It had been years since she had left Gallifrey, and he had been out here longer than she had, and there was no telling what he had done to his own ship. She triggered the door control when she realised she'd put it off too long and it didn't look like he was going to try something new.
The Pirate walked out of her TARDIS and found herself in the console room of the Master' TARDIS The interior was black, and despite the lighting coming from the roundels there was something gloomy about it, there seemed to be shadows everywhere, waiting to jump out at her. The Master himself was standing by the console.
"You took your time," he observed.
The Time Lady shrugged her shoulders carelessly. "Where are we going?" she asked, studying the console behind him, but he blocked her view of the coordinate programmer.
The Master knew what she was doing, that was obvious. "It's a surprise," he replied.
The Pirate lifted an eyebrow. This was not going well. "Are you going to tell me what you've been doing since you've left Gallifrey?" she asked when she realised he wasn't going to give her a hint.
"I travelled. I was bored when I left home, so I wanted to see the wonders of the universe."
"I know how that feels, but what's changed?" She asked.
He became evasive. She sighed wearily and when Koschei was evasive he became annoyed.
"Much," he said, smiling at her hiding his annoyance before his expression became more thoughtful. "Do you remember Morbius, back home?"
"How can I forget him?" The Pirate replied, and unbidden memories she had locked away inside her mind came pouring out as she remembered how Morbius had risen to power, tried to force the Time Lords who had spent their time in power for 10 million years to re-enter the universe, and conquer it in the twisted belief the universe belonged to them.
What worried her was why the Master was even bringing him up, she had hoped he had put all that behind him. But apparently not.
What does the Master want? Stay tuned for the next chapter.
