Day one hundred.
One hundred is a big number. I wondered if I should do something special to commemorate it. I hadn't seen the Master since we'd put together that the Doctor wasn't coming. I guess that's worth celebrating.
Day One-Hundred and seven.
"You can't tell anyone," one excited girl said to the other. She looked up and down the school hallway before leaning in, eyes bright. "My dad's working on something big."
"What do you mean?" the other girl's eyes grew big, "What is it?"
"If I tell you, you can't tell anyone," the first girl impressed upon her companion.
"Cross my heart, hope to die." She drew a rapid X over her heart.
The first girl cupped her hand and whispered in her friend's ear:
"My dad thinks he can prove time travel is possible."
The second girl laughed as if at a joke and turned away.
I lay on my back and drew pictures in the air. I missed drawing. What I would do for the pencils my mom had given me so long ago.
I drew the TARDIS. I would never see her again, and it hurt. I drew my mom. I missed her beautiful and kind face.
I remembered how she'd always taken care of us. Closing my eyes, I could almost hear her voice.
"Girls can be mean. Never be mean. Be better." Her words had given me what I needed to pick myself up after getting hurt by someone I'd thought was a friend.
Hannah was her name. I'd met her back when we kids were still in school, before things got bad.
I believed in the research my dad was doing and I'd told her about it in confidence, but she spread it around the school and made my family a laughingstock. I didn't even know what was happening until the principle asked to meet with me. Of course he'd only wanted to make sure I was ok and put an end to school rumors, but when I stood by what I'd said, that marked the beginning of our real problems in that school.
I had trusted her. I'd opened my heart to her and she turned on me.
"Girls can be mean." Our family soon learned that many people were mean.
I rolled over on my side and felt a tear slip onto the flimsy pillow under my head. Even after all this time I still felt the cruelty and betrayal of what she'd done. It had broken my trust in a way that kept me from opening up to anyone else. I'd never made another friend. Not until the Doctor.
Him coming into my life was a second chance at everything. A second chance at friendship – with someone I knew could be trusted. A second shot with the world. Going into isolation had been hard for my whole family, but while they were mostly content to research and write in private, I longed to interact with the world. I craved partnership in my work. And most of all I wanted to experience the world. To see the history I studied for myself. Travelling with the Doctor had made that dream happen in a way I hadn't thought possible.
I turned over onto my side. It would have been better if I'd stayed home.
Day One-Hundred and Eight.
Sharp pain in my arm forced me out of a fitful sleep. I whimpered sleepily, not wanting to face the morning light, but the pain was insistent and forced me awake.
I opened my eyes. It was still dark. Still night. I shifted and winced. There was definitely something on my left arm. Sitting up, I squinted at it, trying to see, then held it up to my window and gasped. Even in the pale light I could see the white and red of eight horizontal cuts, perfectly straight, on the underside of my arm from my wrist to past my elbow. I started to cry softly – not from the pain, but from the cruelty of it.
Holding my arm out in front of me, I got out of bed. It was strange that there was no blood, like they had already partially healed. Nevertheless, I wanted to cover it, if for nothing else than for my own peace, so I found my extra shirt and with effort, tore it into strips. I had nothing to put on the cuts, but I tied up my arm with the bandages anyway, just to cover them. It was more difficult than I thought it'd be and the wrappings were bulky, but I finally crawled back into bed, pulling my blanket over my head. I held my bandaged arm close to my body, cradling it. Comforting it, like I wished someone could comfort me.
Day one-hundred-twelve.
Still no word from the Master. It was unlike him not to gloat, but maybe this would be his new torture: to hurt me in my sleep and let me find the damage to my body on my own. He sickened me.
Day One-hundred-fifteen.
One morning I was woken early by banging on my door. I leapt into a defensive position and the door was thrown open by two guards who walked in and without pause grabbed my arms.
"Where are you taking me? What's going on?" I demanded.
They didn't answer, but escorted me out, through the halls, and to the ship's deck. There was the Master.
He gloated over me a moment and I glared back. If hate could burn, he would be dead.
"Let her go."
The guards released my arms. I hurried to tug my long sleeve down. I didn't want the Master to see the scars he'd made.
"Leave us," the Master commanded with a dismissive wave.
They obeyed and a moment later I was alone with the Master.
He circled me slowly, like a cat that has its prey caught but still wants to toy with it.
Eventually he looked me full in the face and smiled. "It's the big day!"
He laughed wildly and clapped his hands. Almost, he looked like a child on his birthday, jumping in innocent and gleeful anticipation for the surprises of the day. Almost.
"Well? Don't you want to know what my big plan is?"
"Wasn't your 'big plan' kind of messed up by the Doctor's no-show?"
He spread his hand with a shrug. "I'm flexible."
I shrugged, still avoiding looking at him. "So you're gonna kill me. Only question is why you waited this long."
"Now, just because the Doctor can't watch doesn't mean you don't still get to try the experiment."
"Yay." I said flatly.
"Actually it is pretty fascinating. It's a program I've spent years designing and it's one of my finest works. I'm really quite proud." He examined his fingernails. "And the cool thing is I've managed to boil down the software and download it into voila." He produced the laser screwdriver out of his pocket.
I flinched involuntarily.
"You know," the Master fiddled with the deadly device, "French doesn't really suit me. It's too Doctor-y. There's got to be some other good sort of announce-y word. Maybe 'ta-da' or 'hey presto!'"
I didn't react and the Master pouted. "Well you could at least try to look the tiniest bit impressed."
"What does this program do?" I asked.
"Well I could explain it to you, but that would take some of the fun out of it. After polishing the final design I worked very hard to program it specially to fit you and I would like it to be a surprise."
"You made it for me?"
"Of course!" he plastered concern on his face. "I'm so sorry if I haven't made this clear already, but you are…very… dear to me."
The sarcastic laugh burst out of me unbidden.
"Truly!" he insisted. "I've never had a human before. And you've been ever so interesting."
I stared him straight in the eyes. "I hate you."
He smiled, and it may have been the first sincere smile I'd ever seen on him.
"Good."
I wished I had something clever to say – something that would really, finally, hurt him.
"Let's get on with it." I said dully.
"You're the one that said it!" he grabbed the screwdriver and twisted for the right setting.
I shuddered despite myself.
"So I'll be honest, I'm really not sure what this might do to you if it doesn't work." He grinned wickedly. "But I'm fairly confident it'll be far more diverting if it does."
My heart raced, but I planted my feet and thrust out my chin, determined not to give him the pleasure of seeing my fear.
The Master raised the screwdriver and pointed it at me.
I closed my eyes in preparation for the end and thought of my family.
"Say goodbye to everything you are."
Then he shot me.
When the laser first hit me it felt like electricity. Everything burned. Then a sensation like stabbing icicles began in my lungs making every breathe hell. Almost instantly the pain drove me to my knees. My heart pounded wildly and I hugged my knees, desperate to stop the pain. I suddenly realized I'd been screaming.
As that was happening came the images. Blood and centuries, daleks and war, the end and still time spinning on. All of space…
Then the pain came full force and somehow forced me to stand. Every inch of skin, every vein, every organ, roaring, searing, slashing, stabbing pain.
And there was fire. So much fire.
After an eternity the flames died and I fell to the ground, incapable of movement or speech. The Master crouched next to me.
"I've given you some old memories," he murmured, "and something else: a timelord consciousness."
His smirk was audible.
"I've made you a monster like me."