Movement disturbed the silence. The Master let go of me and shuffled around, grunting and cursing. Then, finally, he shoved something aside and faint light fell through a crack, illuminating the dust under our table. It seemed to have protected us from the worst.

Groaning of strained metal, creaking of crumbling stone.

A loud stomp on the table and I winced, wrapping my arms over my head.

Buried.

We were buried alive under tons and tons and tons-

"Lumin! Get up!"

I dared to look at the light, the silhouette of the Master. He stood upright, so maybe we weren't completely submerged. A rumble again, more stones falling and I managed to move at last, crawling out from under the cover and into the night. Dust clouded my sight, collecting on my glasses. A torch lay on a rock, not bright enough to show the complete destruction, but enough to let me guess it.

The destruction was complete. As far as I could tell not a single stone sat where it was supposed to be. Splinters of wood that once were solid beams stuck out from the rubble. The upper floor had completely vanished, no trace of the room we had just stayed in remained.

If I had slept a little longer…

"Vienna! For fuck's sake, don't you dare to be dead!" growled the Master. "I'm not done with you yet." He climbed over stone and wood, buried into the debris at various places, constantly cursing.

Dust snowed down from a few remains of structure. Where were the houses around us? Why couldn't I hear people? No one came running, no one screamed in panic, no one cried in pain or begged someone to stay alive.

Silence.

Silence and dust and debris.

I sat down right where I stood.

"I swear to the Vortex, Salvatori, if you don't pop up already-"

There. A muffled cry. The Master heard it too and hurried to a pile near the table, kicking and tossing away everything until he had created enough space to grab the assassin and drag her out. Vienna coughed and bent over, completely covered in dust, but otherwise seemingly unharmed.

The Master grunted. "How nice of you to be still breathing."

"Worried… old man?" Vienna brought out between coughs.

"I hired you to do a job, not to die without my approval." The Master crossed his arms, tapping a foot in the rhythm of four.

"As compassionate as ever."

"For you always. Can you move? We should get out of here before whatever blew up half the town comes back."

Half the town? I looked left and right. Silence, rubble. Yeah, of course. This building wasn't the only one that got destroyed. The ones around us too, hidden in the darkness. And the ones next to them. And the ones-

"Your prisoner doesn't look like it, though," said Vienna.

The Master turned toward me, raising a brow. What did she mean? He climbed in my direction and reached down to help me up, but I couldn't really take my eyes off the scenario around us. It reminded me of video games I had played and how much fun those had been. I remembered the tremors and the building collapsing, burned into my mind. Here there was no old music playing for melancholy, here I didn't have a weapon on me to fight monsters, here I wasn't strong and I didn't have cheat codes and the whole building had collapsed above my head and would have crushed me if the Master hadn't-

"Lumin, hey!" He shook me by the shoulders. "Look at me!" And I did, reluctantly. Fire and darkness in those eyes. He would burn me. I flinched away, tried to escape, hide, wait and– he let go of my shoulders and grabbed my face between his palms, gently tilting it upwards. "I know how strong and stubborn you can be. So be it now. Please."

Strong and stubborn? When had I ever…?

"I won't allow you to stay behind. I don't care if you're shocked or traumatised, understood?" I blinked at him, stupidly. Something stirred in my chest, the memory of how to dissociate, get away, away, away from the fear, push it back, ignore it, lock it away. "I need you with me, my little light," the Master murmured. "You are mine. The fear can't have you."

Swallow. Breathe. I closed my eyes and drowned inside my own darkness so I could emerge into the world again. Numb, maybe, but functioning. He needed me? Was it a lie? Did it even matter? The words were on my lips and I didn't know where they came from. "Yes, Master."

He smiled - a warm smile - and leaned down, pressing a kiss to my forehead. He pushed another flashlight into my hands. "Good. Let's get out of here."

I attached the clip of the light to my hoodie and followed them, carefully climbing and sliding, dropping and slithering. My hands got cuts and bruises fast, but I barely took notice. The rubble had spread far in all directions and we had to get over the remnants of walls and stairs and furniture, stacked high as if a demon had had its fun with it.

"He's manipulating you," murmured Vienna next to me. "Old sweet talker he is. And then, when you don't look, he kicks you down into a pit."

"You have so much trust in me. I'm flattered," snickered the Master.

"In you? Always."

"I know," I simply said. "It's okay."

"Okay? How can that be… That is not okay! Whatever he promised you, you won't get it."

I shrugged, hopping down from a stone. "Yeah. He didn't, though. Promise anything, I mean. 'M just here' cause I want to be."

I came to a halt next to the Master and looked up, finding the shadow of a smile on his face. "It's the whole district." He nodded towards more debris that was only visible in the light of his torch. "Everyone must have gotten buried in their sleep."

"Yeah." I nodded. "Haven't seen or heard anyone."

"Horrible to think about it," said Vienna. "There might be people still alive though. We made it out, after all. Can't be the only ones."

"Tough. I won't stop to look for any of them. Whoever did this might want to make sure the damage is complete. And I want to be out of here before that happens."

Vienna heaved a heavy sigh. "Hate to admit it, but you're right. I'll alarm the militia as soon as we're safe."

How many might there be, I wondered. Buried and unable to escape the darkness, the pressure above their heads, the graves that wouldn't let them leave. Hadn't it been for the Master's quick reaction… I might have been one of them. A thought to better discard quickly, I decided.

It took a while, although time slipped from my awareness. The monotone act of climbing and slithering, stumbling and balancing kept my mind occupied. Daylight didn't return, but soon there came the noises of vehicles and the distant voices of people, shouting. Of course they had heard it. An explosion as big as this couldn't go unnoticed. The Master steered us away from them, much to my relief. I didn't want to talk to anyone and not only because I couldn't even understand them.

"Good, that took care of itself," said the assassin, watching the police and emergency services arrive. "But I could really need a shower and fresh clothes." She patted herself down in a vain attempt to get rid of at least some of the dust.

"Yeah, indeed. You smell."

"Hey, I don't! I did -"

"Of human."

"Oh." She got quiet and then fumed again as soon as she got aware of the underlying insult. "Gah! Why do I even bother with you? Should have shot you an hour ago."

The Master chuckled. "Because you are too curious. You know you will miss the whole conclusion to this mystery."

"But I'd get rid of you in the process and do the whole universe a huge service." Vienna suddenly stopped and pulled out her gun from the holster, pointing it right at the Master's chest. "So tell me one good reason not to do it."

She was serious. At least she appeared to be serious enough. My heart shot into my throat. She couldn't… could she? The gun gave off an ominous hum. She couldn't alter the timeline, right? A blue glow danced across the metal.

"Stop! No!" Without another thought I slipped in front of the Master, holding my arms out. The gun's muzzle almost touched my chest, hovering just a hand's width away. But I had no time to process.

"What're you doing?" Vienna pressed out, annoyed. Immediately the gun powered off and she lowered it. "That jerk would have blown up everything himself if it suited his stupid plans."

"Hm," came a nonchalant hum from behind me. "She's not wrong. Step away, little one." He laid a hand on my shoulder, lightly pushing, but I didn't budge. "Oh, don't be stupid. She won't shoot me and I'm not worth dying for." This time he grabbed me with both hands and left me no choice but to move away.

Not worth dying for.

His words lingered in the air like petrichor. I could taste them, feel them under my skin, whispered, thought, repeated, over and over again, for centuries.

"You're my only option to get away from here," I mumbled. "You die, I'm stuck here."

"Nah, bollocks." The Master snickered, but when he turned away, I also heard a sigh, saw his fists clench.

"I'd take you wherever you want," offered Vienna. Finally, she put the gun away and walked past us. "I have a ship. It's small, but it can get far enough."

"No need for that." The Time Lord followed, hands folded behind his head. "I'm sure the Doctor scans the planet for my life signs regularly. If they stop, he'll swoop in and get you guys out in no time. He is just too scared to do it while I'm still kicking. The coward."

"The Doctor is around too?" asked Vienna. "Oh, don't tell me, you're trying to murder him, again. And all this is just one big scheme to get to him."

"If only." The Master laughed. "The bastard did a good job of giving me reasons not to. But I would still appreciate getting away from this dumpster. It's a bit primitive for my taste."

"Whatever. You're probably lying anyway. Doesn't change that I can get Lucy out of here, safe and sound."

Out of here. She just assumed that was what I wanted. Of course she did. It was only logical, after all. The only person who didn't make any sense here was… me.

"'M not leaving," I muttered. "Told you, I'm here cause I want to be."

"You did. I won't even pretend to understand. But if he so much as tries to harm you, I will shoot him. And where are we even going?"

The Master didn't stop. "Away, isn't that obvious? This place will be brimming with action soon and I'm not in the mood to deal with any of it. My men will meet us on the way with a car. Unless," he tilted his head and gave the assassin a good look, "you want to get a taxi and point with bright flashing signs towards you obviously having crawled out from under the rubble." He didn't even wait for an answer and just snorted. "Yeah, didn't think so."

I sighed, shaking my head. Those two truly hated each other. "Is the whole way going to be like that with you two?"

We rounded a corner and finally most of the noises from emergency vehicles died down. A few still made their way to the scene, lighting up the darkness with their purple lights. I tried not to imagine how many dead bodies they were about to recover, nor why we hadn't seen a single soul on our way out. After all, it was impossible. Not everyone could have been asleep or in bad positions. It simply made no sense.

Didn't they see? The Master surely must have been suspecting something. Being an arse didn't make him stupid, after all.

Or maybe he knew, or at least suspected it. If you knew what to look out for it was hard to miss, although he had admitted to knowing nothing. A lie? If he really wanted to hide it from me, he surely could. My hand wandered to my chest on its own, feeling for the faint pulsing underneath it. A rhythm that wasn't that of my heart, a pulse that ran through black, inky void. During the last night it had started to emit a strange kind of black glow, however that was possible. And it hadn't stopped ever since.