Heading home to America (yes if you missed the memo before I am American yoooooo and I've been studying abroad in Italy for the last month) this Tuesday so updates will pick back up. WE'RE SO CLOSE Y'ALL.

Alison Docherty's repair shed was a mess, its shelves and counters stacked and piled with bits and pieces of equipment and tools. Docherty herself was a shorthaired older woman with a face full of thick, heavy lines. She wore a brown jacket over a darker brown sweater and a pair of fingerless gloves. A pair of goggles was wrapped around her forehead, flattening strands of her mousy hair. When Martha and Tom arrived, she was shouting angrily and hitting a old beat up monitor.

"Uh, Professor Docherty?" Tom called.

"Busy," the woman answered and picked up two wires.

"They, uh, they sent word ahead. I'm Tom Milligan. This is Martha Jones." He said her name warmly, as if he was expecting a response. People who knew of her treated her as a hero, with respect and almost reverence. Docherty, however…

"She can be the Queen of Sheba for all I care," Docherty snapped. "I'm still busy."

Martha glowered and scoffed. The whole bloody universe was at stake and this soon-to-be traitor was more worried about a screen? "Televisions don't work anymore," she reminded her testily.

"Oh, God, I miss Countdown. Hasn't been the same since Des took over. Both Deses. …What's the plural of Des?" She wondered.

Martha glanced at Tom, eyebrows raised, but he seemed just as lost.

"Desii? Deseen? …But we've been told there's going to be a transmission!" With a growl, she banged her hands against the monitor again. "From the man himself." Static appeared on the screen, flickering and rolling, but then morphed into a grainy, black and white image of the Master. "There!"

Martha stiffened.

The Master smiled into the camera. "My people. Salutations on this, the eve of war. Lovely woman. But I know there's all sorts of whispers down there. Stories of two girls walking the Earth, giving you hope. Well, one of those girls is dead and the other…well, she won't be alive much longer."

He knew. He knew Rose was dead. And if he knew then that meant…

He smirked and walked back to someone sitting behind him and the camera followed. "So I ask you…how much hope does this man got?"

It was the Doctor. Oh, God, where was the Bad Wolf? Had she followed them inside? Was she seeing this?

"Say hello, Gandalf. Except he's not that old but he's an alien with a much greater lifespan than you stunted little apes. …What if it showed?" he asked the Doctor. "What if I suspend your capacity to regenerate? All nine hundred years of your life, Doctor, what if we could see them?"

The Doctor looked at him apathetically. He didn't even seem to care.

Was this what Rose's death had done to him?

The Master pointed that hateful probe of his at the Doctor and, like the last time, the Doctor began to twist flail oddly, like he was a character on film being fast-forwarded, while time remained steady around him.

Martha's jaw trembled but she forced herself not to look away. This time, she would watch. This time she would see it all.

As he writhed, he slipped out of his chair and slowly his form seemed to shrink until sunk out of view. The hum of the laser screwdriver cut off abruptly and the Doctor's screams faded to nothing. Silence. The Master slowly approached the chair. "Doctor?"

No response. The Master looked irate as he rolled his neck and waited for some sign. The entire world seemed to hold its breath. He rubbed his mouth and looked at Lucy standing a few feet away. He leaned down to examine what was left of the Doctor on the ground and then after a moment, he raised back up, quite surprised. He smirked and walked back to the camera.

"Received and understood, Miss Jones?" he hissed. He glared at them for a second longer then switched off the camera and static filled the screen once more.

The monitor jolted, a dent appearing in the middle of the screen with dozens of cracks spiraling out of and around it as if it had been punched. A shower of sparks burst out of the monitor and the stench of burned wires and melting metal filled the air. Martha wrinkled her nose. Well, that answered the question of whether Bad Wolf was around.

Docherty let out a growl of frustration and shook the monitor. "Piece of junk!" she growled. "Why'd you go and do that?"

"I'm sorry," Tom whispered to Martha as the professor raged.

If the Doctor was still alive after all this time that meant the Master wanted him to be. And if this little show of his had killed the Doctor, like he'd thought for a second there, he would have been furious. Livid. But he'd been surprised. He'd smirked.

A smile spread slowly across Martha's face. "The Doctor's still alive."

Docherty gave the monitor a final whack then turned around. "And that's important, is it?"

"More than you can imagine. The Master doesn't keep just anyone as prisoner," she added as a jab.

The professor raised one eyebrow. "I guess not. What about you, Martha Jones? You just received a personalized threat from the Master. I should think someone such as yourself would want to keep far away from him. Coming back to England wasn't very smart."

"Maybe not but what I need's right here." Martha shrugged off her pack and wondered if Docherty knew exactly how literal she was being. "I came to you for a reason."

"Yes, I suspected so."

"A friend of mine has a sphere—" Martha began but Tom almost immediately cut her off.

"What?"

"There was a huge lighting strike in South Africa a few months back. Brought one of them down. Rebels managed to get it to a surviving UNIT branch in Europe."

Docherty, slack-jawed in disbelief, shook her head slowly. "So why come to me?"

"'Know your enemy,'" Martha quoted. Docherty stared and Martha smiled grimly. "Capturing a sphere is not the same as opening one. You're the only one left in this part of the world with the tools and the know-how to break its armor open."

Docherty nodded, looking relieved. "Okay. I'll see what I can do. Where's your friend with the sphere?"

"She's on her way here. In the meantime, I could murder a cuppa. If you got any."

"I'm afraid coffee is all I've got. Tea's reserved for the higher ups."

"Coffee sounds wonderful," Tom said with a smile.

Bad Wolf waited until night before she went to fetch a Remnant. She didn't want to risk anyone seeing what she was doing and it made more sense for someone with precious cargo to sneak in under the cloak of night. Finding one wasn't difficult at all. There were plenty of them circling the general area. She located a nearby male and soared towards it. Remnant minds were weak and pliant and all it took was an attack on the right part of its mind and it was unconscious and falling to the ground. She caught it with telekinesis and carried it back down to the repair shed.

She morphed into her second form. This one came from the brief time she had been awakened to protect the TARDIS when the Master began cannibalizing her. Rose's blonde hair was plaited back and she wore a brown bomber jacket, a dark gray shirt, a pair of jeans, black boots, and thick fingerless gloves.

Bad Wolf moved the Remnant around so it appeared to be held tightly in her hands then alighted on the ground. She passed through the tarps in front of the door and took a look around the shop. The three humans were over in Docherty's work area. Martha had produced the Archangel documents earlier and they were looking them over. Martha had removed her jacket, revealing a purple tank top, and was standing next to Tom. Docherty sat on a bench a few feet away. All of them were facing away from the door.

She walked towards them slowly.

"We could just take them out," Tom was saying.

"We could," Docherty agreed. "Fifteen ground-to-air missiles—" she turned to give him a wry look "—got any on you?" Her eyes flicked to Bad Wolf standing a few feet away and she recoiled visibly. "What the hell!?"

Martha became absolutely still and Tom spun around, hand going for his gun. Bad Wolf looked between them and did her best to appear surprised and took a step back. He sized her up for a moment then took note of the sphere in her hands.

"Someone should put a bell on you," he told her, withdrawing his hand. Bad Wolf grinned cheekily and winked.

Right. Humans made noise then they moved. She'd have to be more careful.

Martha turned around and smiled brightly. "You made it!"

Bad Wolf nodded and held out the Remnant.

"My God," Docherty breathed, rising to her feet. "You actually have one."

"You thought I was lying?" Martha questioned.

"Well…no, but…" she trailed off and shook her head. She took a deep breath, let it out, and walked over to her worktable. Martha and Tom followed. "Right. Set the little bastard down, then clear off, I need space."

Martha and Tom glanced at each other, rolling their eyes, and did as instructed. Bad Wolf crossed the room quickly, only too aware of how little noise she was making, but maybe they wouldn't be able to tell over the constant humming of the plant around them. She set the Remnant down on the table, pleased when it thumped, then backed away.

Docherty plucked a band off the table with a magnifier attached to the front and slid it around her head. She picked up a thin metal tool and went to work, feeling along the edges in the armor.

"So, what's your name?" Tom asked.

Bad Wolf glanced at him then looked at Martha expectantly. She'd had to know this question would come up but they hadn't discussed it any further. She couldn't use any of Bad Wolf's names or anything the Master's people could use to connect her to Rose Tyler since Docherty would undoubtedly report her presence as well.

"Sam," Martha answered.

"Nice to meet you, Sam." When she didn't respond, Tom raised glanced at Martha. "Um?"

"She can't talk," She explained. "She hasn't been able to until she was very little."

"Ah. Sorry."

Bad Wolf shrugged her shoulders.

"So, how'd you get ahold of the sphere?" Tom asked and then glanced at Martha. "Do you know?"

"She used to be apart of the CIA back in the day," Martha lied smoothly. "They called her 'The Ghost'."

Tom laughed. "I can see why. You definitely move like one." Bad Wolf smirked wickedly at him.

"Yeah, she's good at that," Martha agreed. "And she can't talk so even if someone caught her they'd never get anything out of her. Must be why UNIT sent her with the sphere. Figured she'd be the least likely to get caught and least likely to betray us, intentionally or not.

He nodded. "And you're friends?"

"Oh, yeah, we go back a ways."

"I think I might have it," Docherty interrupted them, still fiddling with the armor. "Some sort of magnetic clamp. Hold on…I just…trip the…"

The armor fizzed and opened the tiniest bit from the spot where she'd released the clamp, splitting into four parts. Docherty grinned, satisfied, ripping off her magnifier band and tossing and it and the tool to the side. Slowly, with shaky breaths and trembling fingers, she pulled the pieces down one at a time.

Bad Wolf sensed their heart rates spike as the armor was stripped away and they all crept closer to have a look. She hung back, knowing full well what they were about to see. A wrinkled, slimy human head with wires set into its flesh and a triangular machine that doubled as a voice box and a breather where it should've had a mouth.

Docherty gasped. "Oh my God!"

Martha and Tom stood on either side of her, all of them peering down at the Remnant's true form.

"What is it?" Tom whispered.

"It—it looks like a…like a head," Docherty said.

"It is a head," Martha replied. Her jaw worked soundlessly for a few seconds. "I—I think I might know… I've seen something like this before. A creature that was just a head. But he was way bigger…and way older…and it was a long, long way away. Maybe they evolve or something…"

Bad Wolf sighed. Well, Martha was right about the evolving part. Reaching for the Remnant's mind, she gave it a telepathic shock and it startled awake, the lights in its armor switching back on and its foggy blue eyes snapped open. Martha screamed and the three of them jumped back from it. But it couldn't hurt them with its armor disabled.

"It's alive!" Docherty gasped. "After all this time, how is it alive?"

Martha shot Bad Wolf an incredulous look.

"Martha…" the Remnant said, drawing the woman's attention back to it. "Martha Jones."

Martha stiffened and she looked up at Tom.

"It knows you," Tom murmured.

"Sweet, kind Martha Jones. You helped us to fly."

"What do you mean?" Martha asked it.

"You led us to salvation."

It was beginning to dawn on her, the horrible truth. Bad Wolf could tell. "Who are you?"

"'The skies are made of diamonds.'"

"No," Martha whispered in horror. She shook her head and backed away from it. "You can't be him!"

Tom and Docherty stared at her.

"We share each other's memories," the Remnant informed her. "You sent him to Utopia."

"Oh my God!" Martha exclaimed as she stepped towards it once more.

"What's it talking about?" Tom demanded. "What's it mean?"

"What are they?" Docherty whispered.

"Martha? …Martha? Tell us, what are they?"

She looked up at him. "They're us. They're humans. …The human race from the future."

They stared at the creature inside the sphere with newfound horror. Then Martha rounded on Bad Wolf who was leaning back, arms folded across her chest. "You knew!" she accused. "All this time you knew."

Don't tell me you didn't suspect at all. Bad Wolf told her telepathically. Why do you think I call them Remnants?

Martha's mouth opened and closed a few times. "I…I mean…I'd sort of worked it out, with the paradox machine. Because the Doctor said, on the day before the Master came to power, he said that he'd locked the coordinates. The Master had the TARDIS, this time machine, but the only other place he could go was the end of the universe. So he found Utopia. Yes, I'm a time traveler, don't ask," she said quickly, waving off the question bubbling up on Tom's lips.

"No, I was gonna ask what Utopia was."

"The Utopia Project was the last hope. Trying to find a way to escape the end of everything."

"There was no solution, no diamonds!" the Remnant blurted indignantly. "Just the dark and the cold. …But then the Master came with his wonderful time machine to bring us back home."

"But that's a paradox," Docherty argued. "If you're the future of the human race and you've come back to murder your ancestors, you should cancel… yourselves out. You shouldn't exist."

"And that's the paradox machine," Martha realized with another look at Bad Wolf.

Bad Wolf nodded slowly.

"What about us?" Tom demanded through his teeth. "We're the same species. Why do you kill so many of us?"

"Because it's fun!" And then the creature inside the sphere began to laugh. Long, insane laughter that revealed just how truly mad the Remnants had gone after Utopia had been nothing. They'd become the Futurekind they'd so desperately hated and feared, just in a different form.

Tom raised his gun and fired two bullets into the Remnant's head.

After that, none of them spoke for a while. They headed into Docherty's living quarters where the professor busied herself making more coffee. Martha went to sit on Docherty's bed and stared into space. Tom paced around in agitation. Bad Wolf sat on the ground, leaning as close to the wall as she could without passing through. They'd be less likely to notice how still she was if she was sitting on the floor. She reminded herself to breathe every few seconds.

Docherty offered her some coffee but she shook her head. Martha also turned down the offer. Tom took his though and continued pacing. Then Docherty sank into the brown leather armchair near it. She was the one to break the silence. "I think it's time we had the truth, Miss Jones. The legend says you've travelled the world to find a way of killing the Master. Tell us, is it true?"

Tom stopped pacing and turned around. Bad Wolf raised her head and looked interested.

Martha opened her mouth, closed it, then began. "Just before I escaped, the Doctor told me…about a weapon he knew of." She reached into her pack and pulled out something wrapped in brown paper. She unwrapped it, revealing three vials full of liquid—red, blue, and yellow—and set them out on the bed. "The Doctor and the Master, they've been coming to Earth for years. And they've been watched." From her pack she pulled a black case and started undoing the clasps. "There's UNIT and Torchwood, all studying Time Lords in secret. And they made this." She opened the case, revealing the gun with the long syringe-like tip that she'd received in San Diego. "The ultimate defense."

Tom shook his head. "All you need to do is get close. I can shoot the Master dead with this." He held out his gun.

"Actually you can put that down now." Docherty pushed against his arm. "Thank you very much."

"Point is," Martha said, "it's not so easy to kill a Time Lord. They can regenerate. Literally bring themselves back to life!"

"Ah, the Master's immortal. Wonderful." Docherty rolled her eyes sarcastically.

"Except for this." Martha carefully removed the gun from its case and picked up the blue vial "Four chemicals, slotted into the gun, inject him…" She grinned at Tom. "Kills a Time Lord permanently."

"Four chemicals?" Tom held up the red and yellow vials and took the blue one from her. "You've only got three."

"Still need the last one." Martha explained the chemicals being scattered across the world in various cities. Bad Wolf noticed Docherty close her eyes and take a deep breath. When she opened them, she noticed Bad Wolf staring at her intently. She quickly rubbed her nose with her hand and looked up at Tom.

"Then where is it?" he was asking.

"There's an old UNIT base, north London. I've found the access codes. Tom, you've got to get me there."

"Can do."

Tom rewrapped the vials while Martha stuffed the case back into her backpack and ordered Docherty to get rid of the Remnant before anyone saw. She slid her jacket back on and zipped it up, slung her backpack over shoulders, and stood up. Bad Wolf got to her feet as well.

"We can't go across London in the dark. It's full of wild dogs; we'd get eaten alive," Tom explained as they headed for the exit. Docherty followed. "We can wait till the morning, then go with the medical convoy."

"You can spend the night here if you like," Docherty offered.

"No, we can get halfway, stay at the slave quarters in Bexley."

Bad Wolf and Martha glanced at each other. There it was. The information drop they needed. Good boy, Tom.

"What about you, Ghost?" asked Tom.

She shook her head.

"Right. Well then, thanks for bringing…it." He glanced at Docherty's table. "And good luck to you." He held out his hand for her to shake but she just stared at him and he lowered his hand awkwardly. Then he turned on his heel and held extended the same hand to Docherty. "Professor, thank you."

She shook his hand. "Oh, and you. Good luck."

Tom headed for the door and Bad Wolf followed.

"Thanks." Martha kissed her on the cheek. She started to follow, but Docherty called her name. She turned.

"Could you do it? Could you actually kill him?"

Martha shrugged her shoulders and shook her head. "I've got no choice."

"You might be many things, but you don't look like a killer to me."

They stared at each other for a moment longer, then Martha turned around wordlessly, and the three of them left the repair shed.

Bad Wolf disappeared before they even reached the hole in the fence they'd come in through. Tom was flabbergasted but Martha assured him that was normal for her and not to worry. Bad Wolf flew back to the repair shed and hovered invisibly over the body of the Remnant and turned it to dust.

Docherty was already betraying them. She had a terminal hidden behind a panel labeled 'High Voltage' concealed behind a green curtain. The screen was blue with the Archangel Network symbol revolving in the center.

"Access: Priority One." The words 'priority one' appeared on screen. "This is Professor Alison Docherty."

"State your intent," a mechanical voice commanded through the speaker.

"First of all, I need to know about my son."

"State your intent."

"Is my son still alive?" she demanded.

"State your intent."

She seemed to reconsider for a moment. Then she took a deep breath and told it, "I have some information for the Master…concerning Martha Jones."

Bad Wolf listened in silence as Docherty told everything to the computer and whomever was listening on the other side. That Martha was back. That she'd seen the broadcast. That she had the special gun and was on her way to get the last chemical. That she would be in the slave quarters in Bexley tonight.

When she was done, the same voice from before thanked her for her service and the line disconnected.

"NO!" Docherty shouted. "NO! COME BACK! YOU PROMISED!" She seized the screen and shook it. "ACCESS: PRIORITY ONE! YOU PROMISED ME! ACCESS: PRIORITY ONE!"

The screen went black. She let out a wordless cry of anger and frustration. She tore the screen from the wall and threw it to the floor. The screen cracked on impact. Inside the panel, a few wires fizzed and crackled. Docherty covered her face with her hands and sobbed.

Bad Wolf retook her second form just outside the green curtain and telekinetically knocked a screwdriver off the desk behind her. Docherty jumped and looked up.

"Oh God," she gasped, wide-eyed. "This isn't—I wasn't—"

"I could kill you," Bad Wolf told her. "Right now. You wouldn't be able to stop me. You wouldn't even have time to scream. So think very, very carefully about what you say to me."

She opened and closed her mouth wordlessly. "I'm sorry," she finally whispered.

Bad Wolf's apathetic frown did not waver. She understood why the woman had done it, and they had been depending on it, but she was still a traitor. Part of her could not forgive that. "Alison Docherty, your son was killed months ago as a Remnant's plaything. You will live with this knowledge. That is your punishment."

Then she teleported away.

Spot the puns.

Also I'm nearly at 2000 reviews omfg *fans self*