Chapter 2: Recollections

"Oh love, just come in, already," Missy called out from inside.

The doctor immediately opened the door to find Missy sitting upon a rocking chair reading, her blouse undone by several buttons revealing her glorious breasts upheld by a laced black bra. Immediately he averted his eyes.

"What are you doing?" The doctor asked, not daring to look up, still.

"Well what do you think I'm doing?" Missy asked, removing her reading glasses and motioning to the book below.

"No, I'm not talking about…" the doctor couldn't get the image of her breasts out of his mind as he stole quick glances at her. He didn't want to admit to himself how beautiful she looked sitting there.

Missy chuckled and grasped her breasts with both hands sensually, "is my feminine figure making you uncomfortable?"

"Oh shut it," the doctor growled, making direct eye contact with her illuminating blue eyes.

Her grin mocked him, "now, now, love, no need to be rude…."

"I've known you our entire lives, Doctor," Missy continued as she stood up from the chair and placed the book upon it, "don't you think I'd know when you're physically attracted to a time lady? Your problem is that I so happen to be The Master." Her blue eyes pierced him as she said the last sentence.

"I don't know what you're talking about," the doctor insisted.

"Doctor," she quickly stepped before him and grasped his hands firmly but with undeniable gentility, guided him to the sofa couch that he suddenly become overwhelmingly terrified of.

He didn't take his eyes off her, nor did hers off his, and they sat down slowly, a little too close than what's conventional. They didn't say anything for several moments, their eyes just wandering over one another's faces, memorizing the new incarnation's structures, every line, every angle. Missy gently touched his temple with her softs fingers and his eyes shut gracefully in response There was the anger towards one another but also something far more profound that overshadowed the resentments and the doctor didn't dare even entertain the possibility.

Finally, Missy broke the silence, "I always know it's you by your eyes."

The doctor's eyes were still closed and his head bowed, he chucked softly. His two hearts beat longingly.

"It's the way they shine," Missy continued on softly, cupping his face gently, "brighter than the suns and moons of Gallifrey. You've always had it, even when we were younglings."

"I don't understand you," the doctor confessed, looking up at her finally, "you're so intelligent, far more than I ever could dream to be. You mock me with it, you endanger everything I love and challenge my intellect knowing full well that you could do everything I do much quicker and more efficiently. And you do all that you do in spite of me. You lack compassion towards those who you believe inferior to you and you've killed people, people that I've loved!"

"I know," Missy whispered. This time it was her turn to look away.

"Why? Why do you always do this to me?" The doctor grasped her head slowly in his hands to face him, "look at me, please."

She couldn't and there were tears forming in her eyes. "I…I was angry with you," Missy confessed quietly. "I was angry at what you had done."

"I had to do it, I had no choice. The Time War would have destroyed the Universe, torn it apart…."

"And so you destroyed our home," she said more aggressively, her eyes locking in with his, "everything that I have loved…And you..."

Her voice trailed off and she turned away from him, tears slowly falling down her face. She scoffed in remembrance, "you went on traveling the Universe with your human companions, as if it was nothing. I went into your timeline doctor and I saw them all: Rose, River, Amy…."

"The pain was too great," it was now the doctor's turn to choke on his words, "I was naïve and thought I could run from the pain, deny the pain, hide the pain, but it was always there…I'm guilty of genocide, all the blood on my hands…all the blood…."

Missy's chest was heaving, her breathing deepening as she, herself, fought back the pain. She had been systematically molded into the perfect weapon to counter the Daleks and when it came time to fight them and stop the Time War, she grew too frightened and ran to the ends of the Universe and hid like the Coward she was.

"If I had...if I had been the weapon Rassilon expected of me, the weapon they molded me to be, you would have never had to make the choice, Doctor. It's my fault. It has always been my fault…."

The Doctor reached his left hand onto her shoulder gently, turning her ever so softly but only to find Missy dead in the eyes.

"What did he do to you?" the doctor pleaded. He had never seen his childhood friend grow void in all the years he had known The Master.

"Missy?"

She looked at him, at first with sadness in her eyes and then anger. Before he was even aware, Missy had activated his vortex manipulator. He had three seconds.

"Bananas," Missy said wickedly, bearing her teeth at him before blowing a single kiss.

"Missy!" The Doctor called out as he felt the vibrations throughout his body.

And then he landed on the hard snow, staring up at his TARDIS. He punched at the cold ground with his fists and gritted in frustration. She had done it again, made him feel a fool. Yet there was elements that the Doctor couldn't deny, the truths that he didn't want to accept. He sat in the snow and recalled all the memories of his previous incarnation, even the One who betrayed everything The Doctor stood for. He recalled the Time War and how it had made Rassilon do unspeakable acts. What did he do to you?

His TARDIS phone rang, requiring him to pick himself up from the snow and run over. He hesitated before picking up.

"Doctor?"

Clara!

"Doctor, are you there?"

"Yes! Clara!" the doctor was so pleased to discover his beloved companion was calling him. If there was one person in the Universe who could cheer him up after what had just happened, it was her. His impossible girl.

"Well how about it, Doctor, let's go visit a faraway planet? I'm having a bit of a troubling day, can't seem to get Danny out of my mind and it doesn't help that some of his old students are in my class…."

"I'm already on my way," the doctor replied as he punched in the coordinates to her school into his console.

"Meet me in the janitor's closet, yeah?" Clara continued with a bit of urgency in her tone.

"I'm arriving now," the doctor said as his TARDIS landed in the abandoned closet. No one in the school used it, which the doctor found both convenient and ironic given its spacious room.

Large enough for his TARDIS to land, and really what is more important when conceiving the greatness of a room.

When the doctor opened the door, Clara was running towards him smiling, arms spread open and for the first time in over a century, the doctor opened his arms to embrace the hug.

"Oh, I've missed you," Clara said.

"And I, you," the doctor replied. "Let's get on, then."

The two climbed into the TARDIS and made their way towards another great adventure but all the while lingering in the back of his mind lived Missy. And all the while he could not stop thinking of the possibilities of what Rassilon and his counsel had done to his beloved friend. What did he do to you?