The Master's Game (Doctor Who)

Crescendo

The third change was, that the Doctor offered to run several tests on the Master to find out where the drums might originate from.

But just as Roka was about to be rejoiced at this, she saw the Master's face turn sour.

"And what do you think you can do, what all those other doctors in all of time and space and even the Time Lords themselves couldn't, eh?"

"Weeell... uhhhh..." The Doctor rubbed his neck. "I've got the knowledge of the Time Lords and the tech from all over time and space." He grinned his toothy grin from ear to ear. "You know me, I'll figure it out!"

With a grunt the Master turned around, though, and simply left the room.

---------------------------------------------

By now Roka was absolutely sure that the drums had gotten worse, even though the Master still refused to even brush the subject. But with each passing day it happened more and more often that he was absent-minded, and easier irritated than usually, always given away by a slight twitching of his eyes that he could never completely hide.

Even the Doctor in his usually so unaware ways noticed something. Especially when the Master didn't react with mean remarks to what he said and simply stared into the air, as if he hadn't heard anything. Here and there he wordlessly left whatever room he was inside at the moment and vanished somewhere else where neither the Doctor nor Roka could find him for hours.

And always did he look a bit worn out afterwards. Actually, he did all the time. Some days less, but gradually more and more.

Once, as Roka was looking out for him, she actually found him in his quarters, sitting cross legged in front of the windows, head buried under his arms, not moving an inch otherwise. She had no idea if he was anywhere near responsive at the moment, or completely swiped away by the noise. At least he didn't react to her sneaking in again shortly after, and placing a plate with food and some water on the table. Roka then sat outside on the ground, back leaned against the door, and tried to occupy her worried mind with a book.

It worked astonishingly well, so when the door suddenly got opened she promptly fell backwards and glared perplex into a tired smirk.

"Told you not to be worr..."

"Shut up," Roka retorted and heaved herself up quickly, only to give him a mean stare. "I'm worried about you as much as I bloody want."

She poked a finger at him, or at least she tried to. But the Master evaded and instead let her stumble into the room, before he grabbed her collar in the neck, to prevent her from falling.

"Doesn't help," he remarked with a grin and sat her down.

"Why is it getting worse so fast?" Roka asked quietly and put her clothes back in order. "Only because of the Vortex?"

"No idea what you mean. It's the same as always." He shrugged and sauntered to the two big windows.

"I might be human, but that doesn't make me stupid, you know," she grumbled and scowled. After a while she nodded outside, where stars and nebulas hung in the vast nothingness of space. "Where is this?"

"Mhm... that's what I'm trying to find out. Doesn't look very familiar."

"Is it even a real place?" she wondered.

"No idea," he mumbled and rubbed his eyelids.

Roka leaned with folded arms next to him at the window, not able to move her thoughts away from the drums. Only when the Master stepped in front of her did she look up to meet a smirk.