Roda's Terrible Horrible No-Good Very Bad Month: Or, Whumptober 2025

by inborrowedpasts

Summary:

In which I decided a good way to stretch my fic-writing muscles was to whump my OC in many, varied ways. These stories are in no particular order, but I'll put content warnings and character lists at the top of each chapter, so please be advised. Written for Whumptober 2025. With thanks to Elisi and Leela, for reading first.

Chapter 1: Beg for Forgiveness

Summary:

Characters: The Redjay Rodageitarynxmososa (1st regeneration, tweens), Rassilon (pre-Rassilon/Ancient era)
Trigger Warnings: Child abuse (psychological and implied history), minor injury resulting in bleeding

“I– I didn’t mean to…!”

There were tears in Roda’s eyes as she knelt on the floor, two pieces of a broken alien dish clasped on her lap. She hadn’t meant to! She had only intended to look at the gift from the Draconian ambassador. She hadn’t even meant to touch it, let alone to break it. But her robes had gotten under her feet when she stood on her tiptoes, and she’d knocked it down with her elbow before she had a chance to try and react.

Lord Rassilon stood over her with a quiet fury on his face that made Roda feel very, very small. Not that she didn’t always feel small around him. He was Lord Rassilon, President and Founder of Gallifrey; the first Solar Engineer, a peerless politician, and slayer of the Yssgaroth and Zagreus. Who was she? Orphan Roda. Couldn’t focus at the Academy Roda. Never going to account for anything to anyone Roda. Clumsy Roda. And yet he had taken her in when nobody else had wanted her… this was how she repaid him.

A part of her wanted to cower. Another knew that her tears were yet another sign of weakness. More than anything else, she wanted to be anywhere other than where she was, whether that meant that she was a coward or not. Anywhere but under his glare, disappointing him, yet again.

“No. I do not imagine you did.”

Rassilon didn’t kneel down, or even make any move towards her. Roda could barely hold his gaze, as her hands shook. He sounded so… calm. Like it didn’t surprise him in the least bit that Roda had messed up, yet again. But she still flinched as he folded his arms across his chest, wincing as the edge of one of the shards of pottery dug into her palm. She pulled her hand away sharply, feeling blood trickle quickly down and between her fingers, staining her skin with her guilt.

“I can fix it! What–whatever I have to do, I will.”

“It cannot be fixed, Rodageitarynxmososa,” Rassilon’s voice began to darken. “It was an antique; the method by which it was crafted is long dead.” Roda felt her hearts catch in her throat. “...Did I not tell you to remain at the desk while I was in my meeting?”

“Y–yes, Lord Rassilon.”

“Were you not instructed,” he continued, “to touch nothing in my absence?” Roda swallowed. “Well…?”

“Yes, Lord Rassilon.”

“And did you obey these instructions…?” 

“...N–no, Lord Rassilon.” Roda bit down a sob, embarrassment and shame threatening to overwhelm her. “I – I didn’t. I just…”

She looked down at the growing flower of red that was tarnishing the pretty, broken thing she had already ruined, and shakily held the two pieces together again as if she could not only will them back together, but will time itself to reverse so that she had done as she was told. She – she had only wanted to see. She’d never seen anything from Draconian before.

“Whether or not you have seen its like before,” Rassilon said, suddenly breaking through her thoughts. Roda hadn’t even felt him in her mind; the realization cut her to the quick, only making her feel even worse. She was supposed to have practiced… “You should not have disobeyed me so fragrantly.”

“I – I know.”

“And yet you did.”

“I’m s–sorry.”

“...how disappointing.”

“I– I’ll make it up to you!” Roda begged, feeling sick with self-loathing, regret and a strange sense of… invasion? “Pl–please, my Lord Rassilon. I’ll do anything you want me to in order to – to make it up to you!”

“And what if you cannot?” Rassilon  snapped. Roda flinched again, resisting the urge to shield herself from her guardian. He wouldn’t hurt her… would he? And if he would, would she deserve it? She’d done wrong… “What then?”

“I– I– I don’t know, Ras– Lord Rassilon, I–”

“Silence.”

Rassilon shook his head. He swept his robes out of the way, his staff thumping on the ground as he rested it against his desk. Roda let out a small cry of alarm before she could stop herself as he abruptly crouched to the ground, landing hard on her backside as she moved away from him. For just a second, that seemed to give him pause. Roda looked up with eyes blurry with tears, still stumbling over her own words as the older Time Lord studied her.

“I – I really didn’t mean to,” she said, between shaky breaths, after what felt like a respectable time. She did her best to sound steadier, and less like a scared, embarrassed child. To sound like someone he could one day not be ashamed of. “It was an accident. I thought I – I could learn from it…” She swallowed. “I could… write to the Ambassador. I’ll p–pay. Somehow.”

Rassilon said nothing; only held out one hand. It took Roda a second to work out what he was asking. When she did she hurriedly handed him the broken pieces, looking at her bloody hands as he brusquely stood up again. He looked at the shards for a minute, before walking around his desk and dropping them into the bin with a final clink-clink of dismissal. He didn’t even spare her a second glance as he turned on his heel, heading for the door.

“I’m sorry…” Roda whispered, shakily.

If he walked out now… it was as good as saying she could never make it better. Another black mark on her record. As if she didn’t have enough of them by now.

Rassilon ignored her words.

“Finish your studies in your quarters. You will be summoned for mealtime.”

Roda curled up, hugging her knees to her chest as the office door slammed shut behind the Lord President. The room was too, too silent; for only a moment. And then the Time Tot’s chest began to heave as she gulped in great, gasping sobs.

“I’m sorry…” She whispered, to nobody in particular. To Rassilon. To her real father, years gone now. To – to the universe. A single, desperate prayer that she could be more than the failure she’d been today.

“I’ll be better…”

Chapter 2: Taking Accountability

Summary:

Characters: The Redjay (2nd regeneration), various alien NPCs (of canon and made-up species)
Trigger Warnings: Slavery, police brutality, minor (unnamed) character death, implied upcoming whump, whipping

There were some fights you couldn’t win, and some fights you shouldn’t have started in the first place. The Redjay stood at the front of a crowd of frightened protestors – pistol drawn and a whole load of people waiting with bated breath – and realised with sinking dread that this? This was both of those kinds of fights.

She didn’t dare risk turning her back on the police in front of her; not while she had a weapon drawn on them, and not while people were depending on her. It would all be over. Her TARDIS was miles away, and even if it wasn’t? There was no way she was running from a battle that she had started, especially when it was a battle that seemed impossible to win.

Roda had a pistol, and the Insettui had stasers, batons and electrowhips. The projectile weapon gave her the upper hand, but her arm wouldn’t last for long. Eventually, she would either have to shoot, or lower her weapon, and either would cause all hell to break loose. The problem was that she was the only one on the side of the rebels with any kind of weapon worth sniffing at.

Young and foolish, she’d incited a riot to free them all from unpaid labour in the mines, but she’d never done anything like it before. Not on her own. Every time she’d fought the law to protect someone else, it had been with Robin Hood and his Merry Men in front of her, and someone else laying out the plan. Most of the time, even farmers in medieval Sol-3 were equipped if not quite as well as, at least similarly to the knights and nobility that sought to keep them down.

The miners were not. All they had was mining gear that had been fashioned into makeshift weapons – and brave, strong wills. With a sinking feeling in both of her hearts, Roda realised that she was very close to leading them all to their deaths, if she didn’t think fast. All this time they had gotten by, and she had to stick her foot in without a proper plan. Without the help of experienced troublemakers, she was in over her head, in a bad way.

The Insettu that was clearly in charge (a tall, fuschia insectoid, with angrily snapping mandibles and a scorpionic tail that lashed back and forth) stepped forward, raising one of it’s pairs of arms to halt it’s companions. The other four behind it scuttled agitatedly but did as they were told. Roda narrowed her eyes, determined to look braver than she felt, but slowly lowered her gun when the Insettu did the same with it’s staser.

It looked her up and down, and it’s mandibles twitched irritably. It sheathed it’s weapon and instead pulled out a scanner, which it waved back and forth in front of her with a puzzled sort of look on it’s face. It whirred for a second, before a red light turned on with an echoing beep!

“You are not a miner,” it declared, addressing her not in the language it had been speaking to the other Insettui in, but clumsy intergalactic common. Roda raised an eyebrow, somewhat surprised by the gesture. “Why do you stand with the slaves?”

Anger washed over Roda, and she narrowed her eyes in disgust.

“Do you know how many Shadow Proclamation laws you’re breaking in this sector alone?” she asked, by way of reply.

She didn’t know the answer herself, if she was honest. (Or if the Insettui even cared about the Shadow Proclamation, for that matter.) But it was certainly more than one, she was sure. Slavery of a planet of any grade was generally illegal in any civilized sector of the universe; assorted miners from at least eight other planets of various grades, probably even more so. She tried not to be irritated that there was some sort of assessment for how much a person deserved to be a slave, or not.

The Insettu hissed and clicked at her, before responding. Roda heard the miners mumble behind her, their anxiousness like a wave lapping insistently at the back of her mind. They spoke at least three different languages, all muddling together in a way that overwhelmed the translation matrix from her TARDIS. It was impossible to catch anything but a stray word, and so she focused on the Insettu.

“We do not care, stranger,” it replied dismissively. “You will step aside,” it looked over her shoulder, “and indicate the ringleader of this uprising. Then you will be escorted off-planet. Your interference will be forgiven if you do not resist.”

Like Skaro I will, thought Roda.

“What will you do with them?”

There was a pause. “If a leader is identified,” it explained, “they will be executed for the example of others. Anyone who steps out of line will be beaten. The rest of the slaves will return to work.” It gave something that might have been a shrug. “The workforce will not be diminished unless it is necessary.”

“Fuck you! We won’t do your grub work any longer!”

“Wait– no! Stop!”

Roda’s warning fell on dead ears, as one of the miners suddenly broke ranks, pushing past her with a pickaxe raised over her head. Roda stumbled as she tried to grab their arm to stop them, but they were too fast for her.

The young woman – a Killoran, with a torn blue tunic and gingery fur that must have been soft and unknotted, once upon a time – swung her tool wildly, clearly expecting somebody to follow her, to back her up. Roda tried to draw her pistol, but she wasn’t fast enough. Before she could pull the trigger the Insettu leader swung it’s staser around. There was a bright blue flash of light and a sickening, wet thud. The Killoran hit the ground with a gaping wound in the back of their head; knees fist, and then face-down in a puddle of red.

Somebody gasped. Another began to sob. Another Killoran tried to break out of the ranks of miners to check on their companion – were they family? A friend? Roda felt sick to think about it – but was held back by a chorodon and a human. The rest of the miners were frozen in horror, as the reality of their aborted uprising suddenly hit them. Roda could have sworn she heard someone curse her name as she dove forward herself, but she knew before she was even crouching over the Killoran woman that they were dead.

There was no surviving a headshot like that. The only saving grace was that her death would have been instant. She rolled the woman over, blood staining her fingertips as she closed their eyes, whispering an apology that felt utterly useless on deaf ears.

Two of the remaining four Insettui had turned their weapons on her, demanding she stand. Roda heard them move, while the others yelled at the rebels, threatening them into staying where they were. Nobody dared move, anybody, all their drive dead with the Killoran. Her thoughts raced as she thoroughly lost control of the mess that she’d made, desperate to think up something she could do or so that would spare the rest of the miners. After all, forgiveness for her ‘interference’ was probably already blown, wasn’t it?

And then, it hit her.

“It was me!”

The words slipped out of Roda’s mouth before she could think better of it. This is the only way, she told herself. Her death is my fault. I have to do something.

The leader who’d spoken before slowly walked towards her, all politeness seemingly forgotten. It’s underlings parted to let it pass, as it aimed it’s staser at her in a silent order not to do anything stupid.

“Explain yourself, stranger.”

“Me! I’m the ringleader,” she repeated, this time making it clearer. She fished for a good lie; something believable, and not just ‘I hate what you’re doing and everything your mine stands for, and I stuck my nose in without thinking’. “Another mine sent me, to intimidate you into releasing your… slaves into our custody. From the – Malinda colonies.”

It was a completely made-up set of mines, of course. Or at least, she hoped it was. Last time she’d checked, the Malinda colonies were fairly barren of any marketable resources. She wasn’t good at making up bullshit on the spot. Robin had always done that. Robin, she grumbled to herself, mournfully, would not have fucked this up as badly as I have, either… And then a thought crossed her mind.

“I’m expected back.” She added hurriedly. “If I don’t report back within three hours…”

Roda felt as if the ensuing silence could have cut diamond. It seemed as though no one – on either side of the conflict – was willing to do so much as breathe.

After what felt like hours, the Insettu seemed to come to some sort of a decision.

“Get up.”

It gestured at her pointedly with the staser, indicating for her to step away from the body of the fallen Killoran and stand to one side. Pausing — trying to read it’s intention behind the bloody mandibles — Roda slowly did as she was told, hands raised in quiet, furious surrender. If this was about to go very poorly… well at best, she’d regenerate. At worst they’d clip both hearts and she’d bleed out... But she had to take the gamble that whoever was employing the Insettui – none of the miners had a name, outside of ‘the Foreman’ – wouldn’t risk an intergalactic incident by killing a competitor. Whatever else they did, she could handle.

Probably.

She looked at the surviving rebels. Their faces were still a mixture of fear, anger, and despair. But beneath many of the younger faces was still a trickle of hope. Hope that they would not be next. Hope that the once so inspiring stranger could still protect them. She couldn’t let them down.

I’ll come back with a plan, she promised herself, and them. If I make it out alive I’ll come back with a plan and I’ll actually free you all.

Another Insettu stepped towards her, snatching her pistol from her hands before she could protest. Two more grabbed her arms, twisting her away from the assembled rebels and pinning her palm-down to the dusty wall of the nearest hab-block. The last two stepped between them, weapons trained on the miners to stop them from doing anything to help her. Roda prayed they would take the hint and not do anything reckless, even while she dreaded what was coming.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the Insettu leader walk slowly towards her. It’s staser was now sheathed, thank Gallifrey, but her heart’s chilled as she saw it undo a harness and flick the electrowhip free of her belt. Electricity crackled around it, the air disgustingly acrid with it.

Several of the younger miners flinched. One yelped, devolving into startled tears that made Roda see red. How many of them had felt the sting of the whip before…? Their fear was palpatable. Every muscle in her instinctively wanted to fight and squirm free, sympathetic emotions triggering her instinct for survival, but she managed to stay still.

“You will be made an example of,” announced the Insettu leader. Roda opened her mouth to say something sarcastic, but managed not to at the final millisecond. No shit. “And you will bring a message back to the Malinda colonies.”

Roda didn’t make a sound. She didn’t nod. She didn’t agree. She only slowed her hearts, clenching her fists against the hab wall and bracing herself for the worst.

The two holding her still tightened their grips, their extra arms reaching to grip the back of her thighs and incapacitate her even more. A low growl began at the back of her throat – threatening them to keep their hands to herself, even as she reminded herself that with Insettui biology, they weren’t doing anything at all – but she managed to swallow it down. 

“Be thankful you are worth more than a slave,” one spat, gripping her too tightly. Roda scrunched her eyes closed against the stone and willed herself not to break out of their hold and start throwing fists.

They aren’t worth the effort, she reminded herself. Stand still. You can take this. Someone else might not. Own your mistake.

The electrowhip thrummed, followed by an abrupt whistling and a deafening crack.

The dust settled. Somebody screamed.

As the lash struck her back again and pain lacerated through her, Roda realised the voice screaming was hers.

Chapter 3: Isolation

Summary:

Characters: The Redjay (4th regeneration), the Doctor (4th regeneration)
Trigger Warnings: Trapped, mention of multiple non-permanent deaths, unhealthy substance consumption, dark humour/situation taken semi-seriously

Spending a month trapped in a time loop with the Doctor, the Redjay decided, was swiftly becoming one of the worst months of her entire life.

A day went like this: first, the door to the immense warehouse slammed shut behind them, nearly catching the Doctor’s scarf in its wake. (By day five, he was immediately snatching it up, thus avoiding eating dust.) The Doctor quipped about ‘hospitality’, even though he’d made the joke thirty two times already, and Roda tried to ignore him and checked the lock. (It was never unlocked, but old habits died hard. And anyway, there was a first time for everything, she supposed.)

They had, by now, exhausted pretty much every idea they had to break the lock, or force the door. They had also been down what seemed like a thousand different combinations of aisles and back rooms, all without managing to break the inexplicable loop that they had found themselves in. No matter what they did, the end result was always the same; even if they sat on the ground and did nothing at all. One or both of them died in some innovative and unpredictable way. 

Falling, fire, collapsed shelves, electrocution, paper cuts, small furry creatures from Alpha Centauri sleeping in the vents, suffocation, allergic reactions, internal bleeding, fast ball special from the unexpected contents of boxes… the worst had been the time blood toxins from a bug that had apparently stowed away in one of the boxes made them hallucinate the exit. The day after that had been… especially demoralizing.

At the stroke of the eighteenth hour of this planet’s solar cycle, it all happened again, and they were no closer to figuring out if it was personal or they were just really, really unlucky.

“Chin up, Redjay!” The Doctor slapped her heartily on the back, his toothy grin still spreading from ear to ear despite the situation. A part of Roda wanted to shake him, but at least one of them was still optimistic, she supposed. “It could be worse.”

Roda turned away from trying to find a cipher in barcodes and SKU codes for the nth time, one eyebrow raised. She had tied her pink hair — roots showing — off her face with an elastic band she’d found on the floor on day eight (it was always in the same place). It helped keep her cool in the humid, enclosed building, but also meant there wasn’t a mop of pink in her eyes when she tried to meet the Doctor’s eyes.

“How could it be worse?” She asked incredulously. “It’s been thirty two days — five hundred and seventy six hours and counting! — and we’re no closer to a solution.”

The Doctor rested one arm on the top of her head, using her as a leaning post as he peered at the shelf above her. He clucked thoughtfully.

“There could be a fire?”

Roda grimaced, but didn’t bother trying to dislodge herself from her appointed task as furniture.

“Days nineteen and twenty,” she reminded him. “You tried to hotwire the PA system and started an electrical fire.”

“Was that me?”

Roda shuddered. Yes. It had been. The fire had trapped them on the first day, so at least they’d passed out before succumbing. On the second, they’d avoided the fire only for the Doctor to get electrocuted by the combination of a loose wire and the sprinkler system.

“Well, maybe it was me,” the Doctor conceded, with the worst performance of sheepishness Roda had ever seen. “But at least we know how to disable the sprinklers now.”

“Right, sure,” Roda snorted. “Helpful. Can we find a disaster today that tells us how to disable the door lock?”

The Doctor guffawed. “That’s the spirit, Redjay!”

“I could do with spirits,” she countered. How could he be so… cheerful. She was ready to scream for an hour straight. “Something strong. Lots of ginger.”

“You know,” the Doctor whistled through his teeth. “We are in a storage warehouse.”

“…yes?”

“And there’s no telling what sorts of things one might find here,” he hummed, “if one were inclined to experiment with ingredients…”

Roda’s eyes widened as the penny dropped. “You don’t think…?”

“I did see a box labelled ‘ethanol’ the other day. Shall we go find it?”

“…ah, fuck it.” Roda ducked out from under the Doctor’s arm, and waved him down the corridor. “Lead the way, Doctor. It can’t be any worse than everything else we’ve dealt with.”

She would go on to eat those words. But for four excellent days, the high made up for a multitude of errors.

And then there had been the great aisle ninety three explosion of day thirty seven. All good things came eventually to an end. They avoided that side of the warehouse for a good week afterwards.

Roda found that she couldn’t stand the smell of burning ethanol for over a decade after they finally found their way out. But it had been a small price to pay to put a temporary bandaid on the maddening three months of isolation…

Chapter 4: Iron Rod

Summary:

Characters: The Redjay (6th regeneration), Wicinrondrometa ‘Wick’, unnamed Time Lords, unnamed assailants
Trigger Warnings: Backdrop of war, quasi-racism/resentment, grieving party taking frustrations out on the wrong/a convenient target, beating with a blunt weapon, bruising, broken bones, spitting

The Time War had taken its toll on the Redjay in the last century or so. In truth, it had taken its toll on everyone and everything.

Destruction and death spanned the entire universe on a scale that she couldn’t even fully grasp, but which was no less devastating for its impossibility. Roda had seen people grievously injured, that she had no idea the survival of. She had seen people suffer injuries that would affect them for the rest of their life; lost limbs, head trauma, paralysis. She had seen people die in front of her – most, if not all of them, innocent and undeserving – and she knew that there were people that she had met that she could no longer remember at all, because they had been condemned to the ranks of the Never-were.

It would have been a lie to say that it no longer affected her, but in a sense, she felt as if the horror and tragedy had left her unable to grieve. There was just… too much of it. Her hearts were exhausted.

She couldn’t even remember the name of the planet that she was standing on today. The squadron that she’d been assigned to by Rassilon – under the command of a no-nonsense Patrexi soldier from a military House – had landed a few hours ago, following reports of a Sontaran land invasion, but they’d been too late. Days too late. Half the planet burned – a wreckage that would take generations to rebuild, if at all – and what hadn’t been sacked by the Sontarans was barely of use to anybody.

Roda had been amongst the first on the ground. Though the Commander had ordered them back in time to try to stem the damage, the War was tricky. It even affected time itself, and the vortex had spat them out again, and again, and again too late by varying degrees, unable to do… anything.

They wouldn’t be able to stay long, she knew. They would be assigned a different task as soon as the Commander made her report. But Roda found that she couldn’t just stand idly by in the meantime, twiddling her thumbs while people desperately tried to salvage their lives.

For the past couple of hours, she had been helping clear rubble, digging people out of their homes and businesses and most harrowingly, a school. A couple of other soldiers had helped her at the start, but most of them had other duties. The civilians who’d been working with them had all left as well, taking loved ones home and tending to their wounded. It was just her and a young man left, a cousin of the Commander’s. She appreciated him staying, but couldn’t help but hate how young he was. Barely even ninety. Fuck this war.

The youth – Roda winced internally, realising she couldn’t remember his name – straightened up, wiping his sweat-soaked forehead with the back of his hand. His sleeves were rolled up past his elbows, and his helmet was discarded on top of a pile of misshapen rebar. (Roda had discarded her own armour long ago, finding she could work faster without it.) As hard as he was trying to work, he was clearly bone-tired. Roda touched him gently on the elbow, reassuring him with a smile when the unexpected touch made him jump out of his skin.

“Go rest,” she urged him, jerking her head towards where the fleet was parked. “I’ll finish up here.”

The man – boy, really – hesitated, and then shook his head.

“I should help, ma’am.”

Roda snorted. The whole damn squadron knows I’m a ‘traitor’. Sweet kid.

“I won’t be far behind,” she assured him. “People will need more help in the morning.” Whether they were there to help or not, that would always be true. “You’ll be useless if you can’t lift your arms.” He opened his mouth to protest, and Roda gave him a slightly more forceful nudge. “I’ll sit down for ten minutes if you head back to your time capsule. Deal?”

The boy’s shoulders sagged in resignation. “...okay. I’ll… ask Wick – uh, Commander Wicinrondrometa, if she needs help.”

“Good idea,” Roda encouraged. “Honestly, there’s not a lot more I can do either. I’ll just check the perimeter,” Gallifrey, when did I start sounding like a soldier? “Then I’ll be right behind you.”

As soon as the kid was around the corner, Roda was true to her word. Ten minutes, to the second. Then she gave a bone deep sigh, and began walking around the block, checking to make sure if there was anything that she’d missed.

It was slow going, and she tried to remember the last time that she’d had a good night’s sleep. Maybe she could put her TARDIS in auto-pilot whenever they left here, and try to catch up on a little of the debt. All depends where we go next, she mused, rounding a corner. But it was probably worth trying…

“Hey, Time Lord!”

Roda’s head jerked up, and she realised she’d practically been napping while she walked. She shook her head, trying to chase away fatigue as she looked for the sound of the voice. Did someone need her help? It wasn’t until her eyes landed on the young men leaning against a half wall on her left that she realised how dull her instincts were. No, they weren’t asking for help. They were angry.

“Fragging look at me when I’m talking to you!”

By this point in her life, Roda knew that she should have known better than to rise to the bait of someone yelling at her in the street. Doubly so when the people yelling at her had a perfectly good reason to be angry at the universe. But she ignored her better judgement and came to a stop, turning her head to listen to what they had to say.

If shouting at and insulting her was what they needed to do to work through their grief and anger, then it was a pretty small thing to give them.

“I’m listening…” she replied, tiredly. She held out her hands to show her las was sheathed, aware that everybody on the planet was probably jumpy right now. “Sorry, I was–”

“Save it, bitch.”

Roda’s eye twitched, as she bit her tongue to keep from snapping back. But as the three humans started walking towards her it wasn’t their shitty language that made her stop in her tracks, but what they were holding in their hands.

“Easy…” It wasn’t something she did often, but Roda dug into the last wells of her energy to lace her words with a little telepathic suggestion. Nothing overt, just a calming vibe; like something she would use if she wanted to help a child get over a nightmare. “I don’t want any trouble.”

“The frag you don’t.”

The man in front – a tall redhead, with a nasty scar across his face and a long braid that he flicked over his shoulder as he sneered at her – slapped the heavy metal pipe he was holding against his palm intimidatingly. Roda put a foot behind her, ready to make a break for it if they meant to do more than just scare her. The suggestion isn’t working. Am I too tired, or are they more psychic than I realised…?

One of his friends – shorter, with a vivid shock of green hair that got into his eyes – made what Roda assumed was an offensive hand gesture in her direction. 

“Y’always say you don’t want trouble,” Redhead continued. “‘Cept you Time Fraggers are the ones who brought the war to our system, aren’t ya?”

“I haven’t been here before today,” Roda replied carefully. I don’t know how the war reached this corner of the universe, but it gets everywhere, no matter how much anybody fights or dies. “I’m sorry.”

It was the wrong thing to say, she realised too late. The final young man – spiky black hair, muscles, and also holding a blunt weapon – spat at her, making the same rude gesture.

“Frag that,” he snapped. “Sorry doesn’t bring anyone back from the dead.”

Roda took another step backwards, her heel bumping into something that almost made her lose her balance. She hissed, clumsily stepping over the torn and twisted pile of iron that had tripped her up, having to look away from the men to see where she was putting her feet. His hand snapped out as Roda tripped, grabbing her by the collar and yanking her even more off-balance; she grabbed at his arm with both hands, shoving him away.

“Get your hands off me!”

“Sorry doesn’t stop the Potatoheads,” added Green Hair, ignoring her protests.

That one took Roda a second. Potato… oh. Sontarans. Right. But it wasn’t Sontarans she had to worry about, as Muscles stepped behind her, blocking her exit. Roda realised that she’d let herself get surrounded, and cursed under her breath. Shouldn’t have sent the kid away… It was becoming more and more obvious the three men weren’t going to be satisfied with just being loudly angry. 

She really wasn’t going to enjoy meeting the business end of those pipes, if she didn’t run, and soon.

“And sorry,” finished Redhead, looming over her as Green Hair grabbed one of her arms, twisting it behind her back and making her eyes water in pain, “doesn’t make me feel any better.” His eyes flashed with violent promise. “But beating the everliving frag out of you will.”

“It really won’t,” Roda hissed, eyes watering as she looked up at the ringleader. “Not in the morning. Not when you sleep on it…”

She knew, from experience. Pazithi Gallifreya, did she know that hitting things never helped.

“Yeah, well?” Redhead cracked his neck, shrugged, and hefted the rod over his shoulder like a baseball bat. “Let’s see about that, Time Lord.”

Roda pushed through the pain in her shoulder to try and squirm away, only for Muscles to grab her other shoulder and force her down on one knee. There was a brief skirmish in which she tried to bite one of them, took an elbow to the side of the head, and almost broke loose of both grips.

Roda was no stranger to a fight, least of all an unfair one. She’d gotten herself out of worse situations. But before she could slip free, Redhead brought his weapon down between her shoulderblades while her attention was on his friends. The air was knocked out of her lungs, and before she could get her hands back underneath her Roda hit the ground.

The first blow opened the flood-gates. Green Hair kicked her in the ribs as soon as she was down, and Roda couldn’t help but cry out in pain as the sheer force of his fury flipped her onto her back. She brought her arms up over her face just in time to stop Muscles’ pipe from catching her in the face, but a dagger of white hot pain began in the forearm that took the worst of the blow, and she knew instinctively that the bone was broken.

By sheer dumb luck, she landed a punch with flailing limbs as she tried to keep her assailants out of reach. An unsteady fist caught Muscles in the jaw as he tried to restrain her, and he stumbled away with a string of swear words that would have made even the most battle-hardened soldier blush. For a split second, Roda felt guilt in defending herself – these people had had enough, today – before Redhead brought his rod down on her back again, stopping her from rolling out of the way and trying to stand.

“Stop!” Roda’s yell fell on deaf ears, as a boot crunched down on the small of her back, grinding her face into the dirt. “I’m on your– augh!”

Another blow to the back put all her weight on the broken arm, and Roda’s pleas for a ceasefire turned into a scream. Another kick cracked ribs, and Roda saw stars. After that, she lost track of what hit came from where. Boots and pipes rained down on her, as hands grabbed at her clothes and hair, stopping her from curling up into a ball to defend herself, or to try and shimmy away. 

Another rib cracked. Had her shoulder been dislocated? The back of her head bounced off the asphalt. All three of the men were shouting things at her, but Roda could only make out stray words.

‘Fragging Time Lord’. Thwack!

‘Military bitch’. Thump!

‘Murderer’. Which way was up, and which was down?

‘Evil’. Something warm and salty trickled down the side of her face, stinging her eyes.

Roda felt gravel and rubble jab under her nails as she clawed at the ground to try and get away, half wondering if she passed out, would they leave her alone? Would they stop before she was on the brink of a regeneration, or just keep on going until there was one less Time Lord left to ruin their lives?

Through the agony and the anger and the alarm, she couldn’t help but wonder if she even blamed them. She couldn’t hate them, even as they beat her and broke her. The War had taken so much from so many people. Would she do the same, in their place? And then an enormous hand yanked her up by the back of her head, and it was all she could do to keep her eyes open as she blinked at three leering, grieving, vicious faces surrounding her. 

Redhead crouched down in the middle, his now bloodstained metal pipe resting casually over his shoulder. He tilted his head to one side, and then spat in her face.

“This is all… your… fault…” he snarled, wiping his mouth with the back of his thumb. His face seemed to swim in Roda’s vision as she tried to stay conscious, teeth bared in a reflexive threat. Ancient instincts still tried to scare away the danger, even if all she wanted to do was let go. “Y’all the same, Time Lord. Everywhere you go, death follows.”

Roda tried to say something in response, but it came out as a cough that seemed to punch her in the chest all over again. She clenched her eyes shut as she heard someone laughing, and then she was unceremoniously dropped to the ground once more. Unable to find the strength to catch herself she just laid there, breathing shallowly, dizzy and sore as she heard footsteps shuffle around her.

“Let’s see if one less Time Lord fixes shit.”

“Let’s not.”

Roda heard something whistle through the air, and then a thud. But the blow never landed. Something — or someone — stopped it. She didn’t have it in her to wonder why, or how; her thoughts instead overtaken by relief. That last voice… it was familiar. An accent of Gallifreyan nobility.

There was an exchange of words that Roda couldn’t focus on, and then the sound of swiftly retreating feet. A hand rested gently on her shoulder and she flinched, expecting another blow as she was slowly moved. Her vision was blurry, but the two figures knelt beside her both wore fuschia and gold. Time Lords. The kid she’d sent back to the fleet, and… someone else? She knew that she knew them, but couldn’t immediately pin the voice to a friendly face.

Roda tried to sit up, or explain. But the semi-familiar pair of hands shooed the young soldier out of the way, and scooped her up from the ground in a careful, careful embrace. A hurried, whispered exchange happened above her, and then she heard someone curse under their breath in Gallifreyan. 

For the first time in a very long time, Gallifreyan felt like safe.

Roda was cradled against cool armour, strong arms under her legs and supporting her back. She whimpered as moving jostled her broken arm, but whoever was carrying her carefully moved to take the pressure off it.

Soft, tight curls brushed against her forehead, followed by calloused fingertips on her temple and subtle, soothing telepathy. Numbing the pain, and temporarily cauterizing the nerve pathways making it impossible to think. To Roda, it felt like sinking into a warm bath after a hard day of work. But she knew that corkscrew hair, and it triggered just a twinge of edginess, still.

Commander Wicinrondrometa.

“M’sorry..” she mumbled weakly, feeling like a dumb, idealistic rookie who should have known better.

«Easy, traitor.» Roda bristled at the title, but the psychic voice softened out her edges with apologetic kindness. The figure sighed out loud, then ‘spoke’ again. «Easy, soldier.»

«Commander, I…»

«It’s okay. It’s over now. Try and rest.» Roda couldn’t have kept her eyes open even if she’d wanted to… but she did as she was told. «I’m going to take care of you now.»

«Thought you… hated me?»

The other Time Lady snorted. It almost sounded like a laugh.

«Don’t be ridiculous, soldier.»

«S’Roda…»

Roda, to her— to friends.

«…Roda it is, then.»

The last thing the Redjay remembered before darkness claimed her was Commander Wincinrondrometa’s gentle, worried eyes.

Beautiful eyes.

Chapter 5: Immortality

Summary:

Characters: The Redjay (8th regeneration), Jack Harkness
Trigger Warnings: Discussion of death and previous injuries, blasé attitude towards mortality, discussion of recent and past sex, flirting and foreplay, nudity

“Gimme ten minutes, and I’m down for round two if you are.”

The Redjay rolled her eyes, giving Jack Harkness a light thump on the chest as she chuckled. Gallifrey, but the man was incorrigible. Weren’t men supposed to need less time before rounds? Sometimes she wondered if Jack measured his schedule in increments between his sex life… but honestly, it was impossible to hold it against him. It was just who he was, and honestly? The sex was great.

“Maybe.”

“Just maybe?” Jack pouted. “I’m wounded.”

“You should have thought about that before you let me bite you,” Roda teased. “Anyway, I’m knackered….”

“Suit yourself. You know where to find me.”

Roda let herself roll onto the side of the small bed that he had in his under-office bedroom in the hub, and then curled up against him. Even if she wasn’t big, it was the kind of space you had to share to make it work. She didn’t mind that either.

Jack – like most humans – was warm. Owen had once joked that she was like a cat for the way that she stuck to his side, but Sol-3 was on average a lot colder to her than the desert planet that she’d grown up on, and she knew that Jack didn’t mind the physical contact. But he was also warmer than the average human. She suspected it had something to do with his metabolism, but medicine was hardly her area of expertise and so she’d decided not to look a gift horse in the mouth.

Regardless, it was nice to cuddle after sex, too. It was a relatively unfamiliar thing. For most of her time as an exile, most of her sexual encounters had been unplanned, quick and not with the kind of people who were there when she woke up in the morning. (And a lot of the time, if she was honest with herself, she was the one who wasn’t there when the other person woke up.) Which suited Roda just fine. For the most part, she slept with people for the, well, sex, and not for love. It was almost, but not quite, entirely transactional. Jack was one of the only outliers there’d ever been. The romantic element, in a sense, was the really exotic part.

But this wasn’t a time for thinking about past lovers. She was more interested in the one beside her. Roda laid half on top of Jack, the blanket over their lower halves, and listened to his chest. His heartbeat was the most wonderful sound in the universe to her, right now. Routine, grounding and there. All she wanted to do was lie here and keep on listening to it until the sun came up…

Da-da. Da-da. Da-da. Da-da. Just one heart, and a fragile thing. It was beating now, but earlier on… Roda closed her eyes, and nuzzled in closer. A situationship with an immortal was a tricky thing to be in, she mused. He was here now, and he was fine now, and he was alive now, but she – she was always scared of the day when the universe realigned itself around him, and decided to change that. And so for now, she deigned to reply to Jack, and just listened.

Da-da. Da-da. Da-da. Da-da. 

She was almost beginning to drift off – another cliché turned on its head, she supposed – when Jack squeezed her with the arm that was wrapped around her side, rousing her from her overthinking.

“I know the sex was great,” he began (if he did say so himself), chuckling as Roda made a fond — but exasperated — noise at him for disturbing her. “But that can’t be what you’re thinking about still.”

“It could be,” Roda protested, skirting the threat of talking about her feelings. “I’m surprised that wasn’t your first guess.” But her cheek remained pressed to her lover’s rising and falling chest, as one hand rested lazily to his jaw, fingers in a loose half-fist. “Where’s that Captain Jack Harkness ego?”

“Hey, I know I’m good.” Jack let a hand glide to the back of Roda’s head, playing with her hair. “I don’t need to be reminded. Not that it hurts.” Roda laughed again. “But I know you too…” Roda held her breath, as she realised that she hadn’t quite managed to distract him from asking difficult questions. This is why I don’t do pillow talk… “Something’s eating you.”

“It could be you…” Roda murmured, seductively. The hand on his jaw tiptoed south entirely, resting on his adam’s apple in a way that she knew got his blood pumping. There was a hickey there, that someone would probably tease them about in the morning.

Jack made a noise that suggested he was considering it, before dismissing the offer for now and pressing on. “Later.” It was worth a try. “Penny for your thoughts?”

There were thoughts. Roda had been doing her best to focus on the positive, instead of the things that worried her, but Jack had always been the best at getting her to open up about things that – whether she liked it or not – she shouldn’t really be bottling up until they began to fester. Sometimes, she wished he was less good about it; but then he wouldn’t be the man she loved, would he.

“You died twice tonight,” she explained, in a voice quiet enough that Jack almost had to strain to hear. “Once when the blowfish shot you, and then off the quay.”

Even though he’d had a shower when they got back to the hub, he still smelled just a little bit of brine. Owen had dove in to get him – to get his body, if only because Gwen had held Roda back, needing help of her own. (She’d been grazed in the shoulder by the second bullet that had been meant for, but missed, Jack. They’d cleaned that up too, and Jack had insisted on giving her the rest of the night off, even though he had been the one who died, and Owen had tried to send him home; pulling medical rank. Roda had been put in charge of getting him to rest, which she had, uh…

Well, she’d gotten him into bed?)

“Is that all?”

Roda almost began to cough incredulously.

“Jack!”

The immortal sighed, shuffling into a sitting position. When the Time Lady got her breath under control and made a sound of protest at being moved he took her along with him, letting her lie against him again and pressing a soft kiss to the top of her head. She felt the blood rush to the ears and cheeks, embarrassed at both her sentimentality and her reaction. Not to mention how much tonight had gotten to her… But if Jack thought less of her for it – which, she knew, he almost certainly didn’t – he didn’t say anything.

“So why tonight?” he asked, instead. “Did something else happen while I was…?” Jack let the sentence trail off, kissing her hair again. Roda gave a tiny shake of her head, and then craned her neck to look at him.

She shuddered. Jack’s blue lips, the water of the bay sticking his hair to his face, eyes open. Clothes still sticky with blood, but he’d woken up and quipped that hey, the salt would help rinse it out; as if wet wool was ever a good thing. It had been an awful way to see him. She’d almost regenerated by drowning between her third and fourth faces, and remembering the way that her lungs had burned underwater didn’t make it any better. Jack didn’t have a respiratory bypass, after all.

Sometimes, she kind of wished he was a Time Lord. But on the other hand, with his track record for dying, she’d have lost him long ago if he was.

“Not really, no,” she finally admitted, chasing the images from her mind. Da-da. Da-da. Da-da. Da-da. Focus on that. Focus on his immortality, not the time in-between. “Gwen got the kid with the Shock Rock,” another of Ianto’s nicknames for rift debris that actually came in handy, “and he went down pretty quick after that.” 

He was sleeping off a hearty dose of retcon downstairs, and then Roda would take him somewhere else. They couldn’t always avoid killing in the line of protecting Cardiff, but this one had been a new member to the blowfish ‘mafia’. Young, impressionable, and in over his head. There was a rehab she knew on a planet too far away for him to find his way back to Sol-3, once he graduated out of it. He’d called her sanctimonious – in much less savoury words, albeit – but it was better than a death sentence, wasn’t it?

There were more and more aliens on Sol-3 these days. Roda didn’t want the planet to become synonymous with xenophobia. Not only for them, but for herself, and for the Seeker, and for anybody else who might come to call it their home.

Jack nodded in satisfaction. She appreciated that he didn’t point out that they’d already been through all of this, during the debriefing he always insisted on after a mission. She’d not said anything he didn’t already know, if in different words; but it helped work through her feelings, which was probably what he’d been hoping for, she imagined.

“But…?”

He was insistent; pushy, but not mad. Roda loved him for it. Loved that he cared enough to ask. Loved that he didn’t just ask, but also listened. It felt nice to have somebody who actually gave a damn about her feelings. Largely unfamiliar, but nice. Damn it, but she wanted more of it. Wanted to make sure that he stayed close, for as long as he’d have her.

“But I still don’t like losing you,” she sighed, head bowed. “Wondering if this time you won’t come back. I don’t–” her voice caught in her throat. “Don’t–”

“Hey. Hey, ssh..”

Jack hooked a knuckle under her chin, turning her face up and kissing her gently on the lips. He followed it up with a kiss to the side of her mouth, and then her cheek, and then a playful nip of the tip of her ear that made Roda yelp, a ticklish laugh stopping the tears that had been threatening to well up. She grabbed his face in both hands so that he couldn’t do it again, and Jack glided his hands to her hip as she smashed their lips together and kissed him hard, and long. Until they both had to come up and catch their breath again, panting and flushed and Jack growing hard against her thigh.

The immortal kissed her again, adjusting his position enough to make something very clear.

“I’m right here,” Jack purred, getting right to the core of the problem and making her core dance both at the same time. “You have me. Now,” he caressed her thighs, “whenever you want me,” Roda kissed his neck, arousal chasing out the last of her anxieties for now, “and for as long as you’ll have me.”

“Is that a promise…?” she asked, hands now on his shoulders. She caught his gaze once again, and though she was flirting right back at him there was something deeply vulnerable still holding on in her tone. Something only Jack was allowed to see, and she knew it was selfish of her to ask it, and yet…

“I promise,” Jack assured her. “I’ll be here, Roda. But, God…” He pressed his face into her chest, and groaned. “Let’s finish this after. You said something about eating you."

After. There would be an after. There would always be an after. Or if not always, always enough.

Roda melted into Jack, her cares forgotten for the night. Da-da. Da-da. Da-da. Da-da. Her immortal wasn’t going anywhere. And fuck, but she was going to make damn sure of it a few more times before they fell asleep.

Chapter 6: Pinned to the Wall

Notes:

Characters: The Redjay (8th regeneration), Dr Hendryxk Kizeer, Captain Jack Harkness
Trigger Warnings: Dehumanization, implied trafficking, unethical science and medicine, anesthesia, impalement/crucifixion-like injuries, late rescue

Dr Hendryxk Kizeer couldn’t believe his luck.

By the time he was done preserving and studying them, his newest acquisition was going to be the greatest boon to his entire career. He could already envision the scientific papers he could write; fellowship awards; new funding; perhaps even tenure! His peers would froth at the mouth with jealousy when they saw what he had his hands on, and they did not. And all because of a few unsavoury connections finally paying off.

To do groundbreaking science, after all, you had to get your hands a little dirty.

A Time Lord. They were supposed to be extinct, and yet he had one in his laboratory. Of all the species the Exalted People had catalogued over the years, they had never learned anything about the endemic apex species of the planet Gallifrey, before its mysterious disappearance. It was just a shame that his suppliers only had one of them to offer, but he supposed beggars couldn’t be choosers.

He’d promised to pay extra, at least, if they could get their hands on another one. Especially if they could give him a breeding pair. (Or at least a genetic sample, if that proved too difficult.) Because if there was one remaining, so long after their planet had been lost, then it stood to reason that there must be more. If one of his contemporaries learned about the discovery and outbid him, he’d never forgive himself.

No. There was no sense in thinking about that. Not when he was the one who had one now.

She had apparently been difficult to subdue. He’d kept her sedated for the most part so far – he had miscalculated the dosage at first, and been treated to some no-doubt very impolite words. How she had known his language without having to hear him speak first was a fascinating question, and one Hendryxk added to his mental checklist as he patted her cheek with a growing fondness.

A most excellent specimen. Minimal scarring – just an unusual brand on one arm, and some ephelides across her face, torso and hands – and curiously, heterochromia iridum. (He wasn’t sure yet if that increased or decreased her value, but it would certainly make for an interesting genetic study. Perhaps he would be able to determine something about the distribution of iris pigmentation in humanoids in general! After all, his People had long theorized that Time Lords may have been  common ancestor for a great many other species…) She was a little on the slim side, but he could implement a dietary plan to put some weight back on her. Although perhaps it was simply an evolutionary change, since their species’ near-extinction? Only time would tell.

Hendryxk was most impressed, however, by the sheer vigour and determination she seemed to have. When she had woken for the second time, she had almost been able to free herself from the resin frame. An impressive feat, given how much smaller she was than the average Exalted. Unfortunately, she had sustained some nasty injuries in the process, despite his best attempts to secure her gently. They were out cold again, now, which was just as well; should she attempt the same thing again, he doubted she would get as far as she had. He didn’t want his specimen damaged any more than it already was.

The doctor removed the lid of a bottle of antiseptic cream and then pulled on a pair of latex gloves before getting to work. He began by applying it around the wounds made by the pins in her palms and feet; no sense in letting them get infected just because her struggle had got them bleeding all over again. And he had been so careful to cauterize them in the first place…

Once he was satisfied with that, he put the cream aside and reached for the metal tray containing an array of primed syringes. He selected the protein solution first, and tied a tourniquet around her upper arm before searching for a vein. This, and the handful of other drugs he had set aside, would help prevent muscular atrophy and organ failure. The concentrations might need some tweaking – he had had to make some assumptions about her biology, given the lack of information readily available about Time Lords – but that would come with time. He couldn’t neglect the regimen in the meantime.

The work was completed all too quickly, and he sighed wistfully. Well, there were more tests to be run, and hypotheses to test. For now, however, he had prior appointments that he had been unable to cancel. Securing the IV built into the specimen’s frame, he double-checked that she would remain unconscious while he was away, and tossed his gloves into a nearby bin.

“I’ll be back soon, Subject Alpha,” he promised, with a flash of glee in his many eyes.

He closed and locked the laboratory door several times – for good measure – and began whistling as he walked down the corridor. Nothing like the prospect of a good experiment to put a spring in one’s legs…

***

“Oh, sweet Gallifrey…”

The Redjay swore. And then she swore again. And then she swore some more in a handful of other languages, just for good measure. What had possessed her to get into this mess…?!

It had seemed like a good idea at the time, when she’d first found out about Dr Kizeer and his horrific ‘Collection’. She knew a little about the Exalted People – a race of superciliously intelligent, amphibious humanoids with ‘a somewhat laissez-faire approach to scientific integrity’, to quote the Seeker – but she hadn’t heard anything about them since before the Time War. To think that either the Exalted as a society condoned trafficking or at least, that they turned a blind eye to it, utterly disgusted her. And so when she had heard that he was getting in touch with a few fences she had worked with in the past in search of new specimens, well…

…it had seemed like a good idea at the time.

It had been a relief to learn that none of the people she knew from her more criminal days actually wanted to work with him voluntarily. (And she had managed to collate a list of people who would, and thus contacts she would never, under any circumstances, work with on a matter of principle.) From there, she had worked out a plan to infiltrate the good doctor’s collection and gather evidence to provide to The Appropriate People™ to bring him down, and keep him down.

Jack had originally shot down the idea, but had been convinced when Roda had told him more about what she had learned about Kizeer. He had insisted on keeping the Seeker on speed dial, and while Roda knew he would be even more reluctant to be involved than Jack was, she had to admit that the idea of a second pair of hands on deck wasn’t the worst thing in the world. All the same, she’d told Jack to keep the details vague, unless things went wrong. Best to keep as many people out of the man’s greedy hands as physically possible, she’d reasoned.

Things had gone very, very wrong.

Getting ‘captured and sold’ had been a part of the plan, that bit had gone… fine. Insomuch as allowing herself to be trafficked to a mad scientist was fine, she supposed. What Roda hadn’t planned for was not being able to get herself free, once she was on the inside. Now, instead of sneaking around his laboratory collecting evidence and samples – and perhaps breaking as many people out as she could, despite Jack’s insistence that it was better to get intel, be a hero later – she was instead trapped like a fly in a web.

Or more accurately, she supposed, like a butterfly.

Skaro, Karn and Mondas, her body ached. Sedated for the process or not, there was no world in which being impaled hand and foot by human-sized entomologist pins was not deeply, deeply painful. Every time she so much as tensed a muscle, the pain shot up or down the limb, and she could feel the sweat sticking her clothes to her body from the exertion of both trying to get loose, and then trying not to move at all.

Her hands and feet would heal. She knew that. A few hours in a Zero Room and perhaps some regenerative energy would be more than enough for that. But the emotional impact was somehow worse. As a marksman, an archer, a thief and an engineer, Roda used her hands for everything. The idea of losing the use of them – even temporarily – shook her, which was why she’d panicked when she’d first come to, in Kizeer’s ‘care’.

Pinning her to a wall like an insect, supported by her punctured hands and a belt around her waist was not only painful; it was also humiliating and dehumanizing. The Master had broken her fingers – and almost her will – more than once during the Year That Never Was and denied healing, and that had been horrible enough. But this was a line even he had not crossed.

She could smell dried blood on her wrists, as well as a disgusting chemical smell. Her palms felt greasy where she’d torn them up, and she felt groggy and nauseous. What else had been done to her, while she had been sedated? And how long had she been sedated for? It ate her alive that she didn’t know. There was an IV in her arm that hadn’t been there before, and the itch of injections in one elbow. Not an allergic reaction, thank Gallifrey… it occurred to her belatedly that the man no doubt had no idea what could kill her, and the idea of dying from aspirin poisoning again made her shudder. But to say she was uncomfortable was an understatement.

There was some kind of analgesic in her system. Roda could feel her metabolism trying to deal with it, but it wasn’t doing it fast enough. In one sense, that was a blessing; the pain was bad enough as it was. But it was doing nothing to sharpen her wits. Wits that she certainly needed, if she was going to try and get hold of Jack. Surely he’d worked out that something was wrong – she could only imagine she’d missed the time he’d given her to check in – but without eyes on the inside…

Roda groaned, and rested her head against the resin plaque of the frame she was suspended in. She wriggled her fingers and then her toes, relieved that they could still move, given the circumstances. At least Kizeer had been careful, she thought, bitterly. Careful, but also meticulous. After her latest bid for freedom, she was even more secure than before. Tied, anesthetized and demoralized. Great. Just great.

The Time Lady clenched her jaw, closing her eyes tight and counting to a hundred. A part of her wanted to just… panic again. To scream and shout and struggle, and get free no matter how much worse she made her mutilation in the process. Common sense told her to do her best to drown out the pain with other thoughts and try to make a plan. She’d been in worse situations before.

Probably.

Maybe.

…the point was, she would get out of this one. Of course she would. She just…

A fresh wave of dizziness hit her. Peeling her eyes open seemed suddenly so much harder. Roda groaned again, blinking and trying to shake away a fresh bout of exhaustion. She glanced to her side, catching a glimpse of fresh liquid moving down the IV, and into her arm. No..! Awake. She had to stay awake, if she was going to figure anything…

Her chin dropped to her chest, and she snapped it up again, desperately fighting the drowsiness. Hold out for Jack. Hold out. She shook her head, but she could barely keep her eyes open. The more time passed, the harder it was to stay awake. Kizeer wasn’t here. She had to – to think now, she had to – had to make a plan, or…

Before Roda could finish her chain of thoughts, the world went black again.

***

“Fucking hell..”

Jack felt like he was going to throw up. He’d seen some awful things through the Time Agency and Torchwood alike, but the room he was standing in came close to beating them all. Biting down the pile, he adjusted the small recording device he was wearing so that the Seeker could hear everything that happened, and set about figuring out how to get Roda down.

It was horrific, what had been done to her. When Roda had talked about this doctor guy keeping living ‘specimens’ for his study, he’d pictured something more like a zoo, or rats in a laboratory. A well-organized catalogue of alien species pinned to walls, suspended in some kind of goo or just outright in deep freeze hadn’t been at the top of any list of possibilities he might have come up with. He had a horrible gut feeling that it hadn’t been something Roda had known about, either; or if it was, he was going to have to have a go at her later for keeping this little detail out of her briefing about the situation.

To reach her, he had to stand on a table. Jack hissed through his teeth as he climbed up, shoving documents and vials out of the way, and got a better look at the state of her. The only reason he knew she was alive was that he could see her breathing, and feel her faint breath on the back of his hand. He sighed with relief, and kissed her damp forehead before reaching for the tools he had strapped to his belt.

Her clothes were stained red, as well as cloths and bandages strewn around the table, and he didn’t want to think too hard about what had been done to her before he arrived. There was no way in hell that getting her off the frame wasn’t going to hurt. Maybe it was a blessing that she wasn’t conscious for this.

Jack grit his teeth as he crouched down, starting with her feet. It took a moment to figure out the angle that the pins had been driven in – between bone and muscle, but just barely, and from the bruising it looked like she’d sprained something trying to get herself loose – but once he had it, it was just a matter of strength. Pliers helped to pull the implement out with minimal bleeding, and he spared a glance upwards to see if Roda was still out cold. Thankfully, she was. The pins had to stay in – like not pulling out an arrow, or a bullet – but at least she was now halfway free.

Right. Okay. Time to work faster. He was going to strangle her, when she was feeling better. Of all the idiot messes to get herself into…

The frame she was on was bolted to the wall, so he couldn’t lower her to the ground before trying to repeat the same action with her hands. And so when he did finally manage to squirm the pins loose, it was a less careful job. Whatever he’d done, it jolted his lover awake with a scream of pain that would haunt his dreams.

“Roda– Roda!”

Jack wanted to be gentle, but he knew the Captain Harkness voice would be the best to get through to her, right now. He wrapped arms around her waist, taking her weight as she thrashed her freed hands away from the resin, clumsily undoing the buckle that was at least not set through her before she broke her own back.

“It’s me – it’s Jack. You’re okay,” he promised, as the strap came loose and she all-but dropped into his arms. “I need you to calm down, that’s an order.”

Roda was obviously panicked, but she seemed almost drunk as Jack held her still. Like her limbs weren’t fully obeying her. Not entirely surprising, he supposed. On top of the fact that he had her in physical strength and she was wounded, it was easy enough to force her to keep her hands in place and not reopen her wounds before he could get her back to her TARDIS, or Alexandria. But God, he hated this.

Holding both her wrists in one hand, he lowered her to the table, kneeling as he pressed another kiss to her forehead. He rested against hers, letting her feel his thoughts; letting her feel that he wasn’t a threat, that he was worried for her, that he was relieved. Slowly, slowly, she fell still and slumped against him, until all Jack could feel was a weak shudder as she let her head rest on his shoulder and she began to cry.

“I’m here… I’m here…” Jack soothed, while still a little stern. “You’re alright, Roda. You’re gonna be alright.”

He squeezed her gently, as he reached around to unclip the IV. For now, he kept the needle in her arm, just snapping it free from the piping. But as he did so it set off an alarm, dousing the room in green flashing lights and a deafening siren.

Roda flinched, but Jack made sure she didn’t pull away as he reached for his vortex manipulator next.

“Jack, we–”

“I know. Gonna need you to hold that thought, Roda,” Jack ordered. “Gotta plug in some coordinates before that bastard comes back.”

She seemed to think about it, but after a moment, obeyed and crumpled against him. 

«I love you,» Jack thought at her. «But sometimes you are the biggest self-sacrificing idiot I know. And that includes the Doctor.»

He felt Roda laugh silently against him, but her hearts weren’t in it. It was better than nothing. Jack sighed to himself, setting the teleport to go straight to Alexandria and the Seeker. First aid first, taking this bastard out – and saving all the people Roda had got hurt trying to save – second. And then maybe, putting all of their stained clothes in an incinerator and having some hot comfort sex, before never thinking about this day ever again.

«Incorrigible.»

«I know.»

As the laboratory door slammed open across the room, Jack teleported away. If he shot Dr Kizeer the bird on the way out then, well… he figured he deserved it.

Chapter 7: Trapped With the Enemy

Summary:

Characters: The Redjay (8th regeneration), The Master (Simm)
Trigger Warnings: Restraints, backhanded compliments

Notes:

This chapter is dedicated to elisi, because I know she'll eat it right up.

“For what it’s worth, Redjay, I blame you for this.”

“Of course you do.” 

Of course he did. The Redjay sighed to herself; a hundred very unproductive things to reply came to mind easily, but nothing especially helpful. Although the way she saw it, the mess that she and the Master found themselves in was as much his fault as it was hers. After all as the saying went — it took two to tango.

“Gallifrey forbid we do something productive,” Roda snapped. “Let’s play the blame game!”

She’d been avoiding him lately. Or, it might have been better to say that for the most part, she always avoided him, but especially so since she and the Seeker had become an item. While she didn’t know the details of it, she was aware that the Seeker had drawn a line in the sand for his father, on her behalf. She was immensely grateful for it but all the same, didn’t feel much like pushing her luck. Not only because the Master couldn’t be trusted to put out a fire if he had a bucket of water in his hands, but also because knowing the Seeker, the ‘request’ to play nicely went both ways.

The Master had a nasty habit of bringing out the worst in her.

So, focusing on the situation at hand… it had been the worst kind of coincidence. They had both had their own personal reasons for being on Bezoar; that their wires had crossed was entirely accidental. What the Master was up to, Roda wasn’t sure.

For her part, it was supposed to have been a fairly routine heist. Uncover some evidence that the most powerful man on the planet was embezzling from the people, maybe copy some files, throw a spanner in his machinations. Digital Robin Hood-ing for the modern Time Lady, with a side order of breaking and entering. A contact on Pygmalion VII had clued her in to his involvement in their civil war, and after her anniversary dinner with the Seeker, she’d felt obliged to see if she could help.

If she hadn’t literally ran into the Master coming the other way down the same corridor of the man’s sky-mansion, she might have gotten in and out without raising any suspicion. Because of course they had argued, and of course that had raised an alarm. And now here they were: handcuffed back-to-back in what seemed to be a storage closet, and both incredibly pissed off.

“Don’t get snippy with me, dear.”

Roda set her jaw, hoping that even if the Master couldn’t see her glowering, he’d at least pick up on the vibe.

“Don’t dear me,” she half-growled, testing their restraints for perhaps the tenth time in as many minutes. It was hard to see what she was working with when she couldn’t, well, see. “This isn’t one of your games,” she grumbled. “This is serious.”

The Master made a noise that Roda couldn’t immediately pin down. It was either mocking her, or scoffing. Sometimes it was hard to tell, especially when she couldn’t read his facial expressions. But before she could begin to try and pry, he answered the question for her.

“I’m frankly offended you consider this amateur serious,” he sniffed.

Roda raised an eyebrow. Well, that certainly didn’t feel entirely like he was just trying to get a rise out of her. It began to dawn on her that he had two things to be offended by; both getting tossed in a makeshift cell – with her, that was probably annoying to him too – and apparently, professional… comparison? 

That, and he’d always been… possessive, where she was concerned. Hopefully it wasn’t just her ego talking when she wondered if part of what he was cross about was somebody else tying her up and roughing them both up in the process. Frankly, the Seeker’s insistence that they somehow needed each other was something she was happy to shelve for now, and possibly forever. Her lover was one of the most intelligent people she had ever met, but she was convinced he was wrong about that.

“Well…” Roda made a non-committal kind of ‘eh’ noise. “‘This amateur’ did manage to get toss both of us in a jail cell.”

“His lackeys did,” the Master argued. “Whathisname just directed from behind a wall of greasy muscle.” Roda chose not to point out that he was right, nor ask how he’d had any kind of business in the mansion at all without even knowing the git’s name. But the Master wasn’t finished with his complaining. “Either way, where’s the presentation? The villainous monologue? The…” He fished for a word. “All the jazz?”

Roda stopped playing with the cuffs for a moment, puzzled. She tilted her head, half-turning to try and look at her temporary companion in misery.

“Sorry,” she frowned. “Are you actually complaining about the lack of music?”

Of all the terrible people Roda had come across over the centuries, the Master was the only one who’d included a mixtape in his torture and misdeeds. There were a few songs she never wanted to hear again as long as she lived – including the entire discography of the Scissor Sisters. Luckily, she didn’t tend to listen to much music unless it happened to be on, anyway. But…

He couldn’t possibly consider that an actual key factor in his line of work… could he?

The Master sighed as if she’d asked an idiotic question. (In his mind, she probably had.)

“The accoutrements, Redjay. The devil’s in the details.”

“The devil’s handcuffed to a chair with me,” she muttered, ignored. Probably just as well. He’d probably preen at the comparison.

“I mean, really. What kind of self-respecting villain tosses their hostages into a storage room with a broken light bulb, a frankly disgusting amount of mold in one corner, no demands worth speaking about and not even a single mook outside the door?”

Roda thought about it for a while, and half-shrugged.

“One who cares about the end result instead of appearances?”

“Pardon me for having better standards than this… troglodyte.”

“That is hardly the important thing right now!”

“Well, I for one am offended by how I’ve been treated.” Roda could hear the pout in the Master’s voice. “And you should be, too.”

“I’m a little busy,” Roda snipped; not precisely because he had told her not to. “Be offended for us both — clearly you’ve got a bone to pick.”

The Master sighed dramatically. “It’s not my fault you don’t have enough self-respect to want for a better captor.”

At a loss for words — frustrated to have her suspicions about the Master’s behaviour towards her confirmed — Roda returned to her work. She’d been patted down before they were tied up, but they hadn’t confiscated every tool she had. A good old pair of lockpicks up her sleeve was sometimes just as effective as the more technological gizmos.

“Sometimes I wonder if you ever hear yourself,” she commented absentmindedly.

“Is that all you have to say?” The Master tsked. “And after I practically compliment you and everything.”

Irritation almost made Roda drop her lockpicks. Almost. She spoke through clenched teeth when she asked: “How was telling me I have no self-respect a compliment?”

“Saying that I think you deserve a better breed of adversary than this?” The Master squirmed in his chair, which made both of them move. Roda grit her teeth, peeking around to see that he’d just folded one leg over the other as if this was an average Tuesday for him. “It’s not that difficult to follow.”

“...Other help me…!” Roda would have thrown her hands in the air if she could. “That really is a compliment in your eyes, isn’t it.”

“I just said so, didn’t I?”

Maybe the Seeker won’t complain if I punch his father just this once, Roda mused. He is really, truly asking for it. In fact, she felt that stopping at just a single punch was showing a lot of restraint under the circumstances.

“Well,” Roda summoned every ounce of common sense in her body, instead of saying something sarcastic back at him. (There were a lot of things she could say, and a lot of equally backhanded comments. None of them would get them anywhere, even if she was sure they’d be incredibly satisfying, right about now.) “When you’re done being so magnanimous,” – okay, one little sarcastic comment wouldn’t hurt – “kindly shut the fuck up and help me with these handcuffs.”

The Master flexed his fingers, which turned out to be incredibly unhelpful. Roda swore as she readjusted what she was doing with the lockpicks, the tip of her tongue between her teeth as she tried to focus.

“Help you?” He snorted. “No, no, no. You are freeing me first.”

Roda rolled her eyes. “Not on your regeneration, Master.”

One of the picks slipped, and she tried not to get too excited. There was still a chance she’d break them, or drop it, or that the cuffs would just turn out to be the sort you couldn’t break into the way she was trying. She was… fairly sure that wasn’t the case, but she hadn’t really gotten a good look at them when she’d been trying not to let them be put on her, and the Master had already been sitting down at the time.

“First I’m freeing myself, then maybe I’ll help you.”

“Worried I’ll leave you behind?” The Master cooed. Roda would have elbowed him if she’d had an arm free.

“Worried you’ll kill me yourself,” she countered, casually. No need to let him know it was fifty percent true.

The Master sighed even more dramatically than before. But he at least moved his wrist to the side, which gave Roda a slightly better angle to work with. She didn’t bother thanking him out loud.

“Really, Redjay, it’s like you weren’t listening to a word I said.”

“I try not to, no,” Roda explained. Just… a little… more…

“If I killed you after somebody else caught you and tied you up,” the Master continued, clearly bristling from the slight hitch in his tone of voice, “I’d never forgive myself.”

“How kind of you…”

“Yes, precisely, you’re welcome. I want your inevitable defeat to be at my hands.”

One cuff hit the back of the Master’s chair with a satisfying clickity clack. It wasn’t freedom, but with one wrist loose, it would only be a matter of time. The Master gave a triumphant little laugh as Roda disentangled herself from her seat, turning around as well as she could so that she could face the entire setup and get a better look at how they’d been restrained.

The pair of cuffs around Roda’s wrist had been welded to the back of the chair she was sitting on, which in turn was connected to the Master’s. While there was a little bit of wiggling to be had, the furniture was bolted to the ground in turn; annoying, but par for the course when it came to buildings with hovercraft technology built into the foundations. It was that, or run the risk of a table going flying if the wind picked up, which wasn’t exactly what rich arseholes were looking for, Roda imagined.

Where’s River Song when you need her…? From the handful of times she'd met her, with the Doctor, she'd seemed like the kind of person who'd have had them out of this the second the door had shut.

Unfortunately, that meant that without either contorting herself into approximately the size of a spaghetti noodle or physically breaking the chain, getting herself free meant also getting the Master free. Lucky him. If she was honest, she’d entertained the possibility of leaving him to his own devices once she got herself loose, but had ultimately shelved it for the sake of the Seeker.

She’d known that dating the Master’s son was going to open a can of worms in the lives of the surviving Time Lords of the universe, when they’d gotten together. (Or, well, the day after. She’d been distracted at the time both by a new lover, and by the fact that the Seeker was grieving loss and change, and needed a listening ear.) But that didn’t mean she had to enjoy all the complications. Walking away while the Master was the one tied up in a storage closet would have been about as satisfying a memory to make as Roda could think of.

Thankfully for them both, the Master was willing to cooperate. Roda straddled her seat backwards, relieved that the other Time Lord let her move his arms about without protesting too much. The two of them finally fell into a focused silence, as Roda worked on the cuffs one-handedly, and the Master… stewed. Or sat and let her do his work for him. Honestly, the day Roda knew exactly what was going through his mind was the day she’d drink her weight in ginger to forget about it.

After a couple of minutes, she managed to get one of the Master’s hands free. He too-cheerfully turned when told to, resting his elbow on the back of the chairs and his head in his hand, watching her intently. Roda shot him a withering look, insisting that staring at her made the task more difficult than it had to be, but it didn’t dissuade him at all. He tapped one foot while she worked at the truly difficult bit, occasionally offering a point that ranged from begrudgingly useful to intentionally moronic, and kept up a steady critique of everything that he felt she – and their captors – were doing wrong.

When the reason why hit Roda, she couldn’t help but stop just to smirk at him. He narrowed his eyes, clearly not liking the idea that she’d come to some kind of conclusion about him.

“...what?”

“Oh, nothing,” Roda’s voice was practically sing-song, as she finally got her second wrist free. She hadn’t expected to find a way to do it, but rubbed the reddened skin as she straightened up and studied the Master in a way that she was sure would irritate him. “I just realised you’re jealous, that’s all.”

“Jealous?”

The Master spluttered, gesticulating wildly with his free hand. Roda nodded smugly.

“Uh huh. Sure.”

“Jealous of what, may I ask?”

Roda shrugged, leaning against the wall. “Because some two-bit politician with delusions of grandeur caught me, and you didn’t.”

“It’s not like I was here for you.”

“No,” Roda agreed. That much was probably true. “But it still pisses you off, doesn’t it? That’s why you’re being a good little megalomaniac right now instead of actively sabotaging me.”

“Don’t test me,” the Master hissed, leaning over the back of the chair to glower at her. The length of the chain, though, kept him from completely closing the gap; a fact Roda was perfectly aware of. Without the insurance, she probably wouldn’t have poked the hornet’s nest quite so blatantly. She just held his gaze defiantly – confidence bolstered, maybe, by the adrenaline of getting herself free of the cuffs – until finally the Master harrumphed to himself, and looked off into the middle distance.

“Now who’s focusing on the wrong thing?”

Counting that as a win, Roda returned to helping the Master out of the final restraint. He probably could have done it himself with one hand free, she mused, but she may as well finish the job now. The Master didn’t even bother to look at her, decidedly grumpy as he waited for her to be done. With him still – and even better, quiet – it didn’t take long, and Roda gave a cheeky little half bow as the Master stood up from his chair, and adjusted his cuffs with a sniff.

“Touché, Redjay.”

“I’ll take that as a thank you,” Roda chuckled.

The Master shook his head and turned his attention to the lock on the door, muttering something about how much easier this would be if he had his laser on him. Roda paused, and then went to go help him, reasoning that two eyes were better than one, and at least this meant that she had her eyes on his back, and not the other way around.

The door was probably just a deadlock, all things considered. There had been a few locks around the mansion that required biodata, but she was pretty sure that a storage closet wasn’t going to be one of them. Which meant that the real issue, now that they were standing, would be time. It had taken longer than she was entirely proud of to get out of the cuffs, and there’d been no indication of how long they were going to be left alone for. No ‘once I’ve enacted my maniacal plan, I’ll be back for you!’ or any other similar clichés. Just your run of the mill bastard caught off guard by a home intruder likely buying himself time to destroy anything pertinent they may have found before coming back to deal with them.

Which… hmm. Roda frowned. The more she thought about it, the more suspicious it seemed. Why hadn’t he killed them first, and done the clean-up later? Maybe there was more to this situation than her contacts had thought. After a moment’s consideration – and without naming any names – she said as much to the Master, who was busy searching the shelves for something corrosive.

“Glad to see you’ve caught up with the genius in the room.”

Roda made a pair of fists, but kept her voice steady by sheer force of will. 

“Yes, well. As the self-proclaimed ‘better breed of adversary’, what do you think he’s up to?”

“I think I have no reason to share that with you,” the Master smirked.

Roda rubbed her temples with her hands.

“Really looking to even the odds, aren’t you?”

“Well, now they aren’t in your favour,” the Master replied, not even bothering to hide it.

“They weren’t in my favour before!” Roda swore. “If you hadn’t noticed, we’re both still in here with only a nebulous idea of the reasons why–”

“Nebulous to you, perhaps…”

“–one lockpick, and…” Roda patted down her pockets, and held up the only other thing she’d been left. “A half-empty lighter.” She raised an eyebrow. “Unless you have something to offer to the toolkit.”

“I travel light,” the Master informed her. “And if you recall, they took the laser after I vaporized the first mook.” 

“All the more reason for them not to have just returned fire,” Roda said, through clenched teeth. “But, fine. If we’re playing that game, we’re still not even, because I got us out of the cuffs.” She crossed her arms. “So the door’s on you.”

“You’re insufferable.”

“Look in a fucking mirror,” Roda retorted.

“Language. Count yourself lucky,” the Master frowned, “that I’m not forgetting about my son’s little ultimatum. If I injure you now – which I could do, weapon or not!” Roda tried not to think about the fact that with his telepathy, he could certainly make a good try of it, “– the Seeker will return it tenfold on me. I’m not in the mood to inspire him to fratricide.”

“As if you wouldn’t make it look like an accident.”

“Don’t give me ideas…” The Master knelt down to examine the lock, and gestured at one of the shelves. “Pass me that lighter and the cleaning fluid on the third shelf.” Roda paused, and then did so, giving the Master a wider berth than was necessary. “Anyway, I doubt it would matter much to him. For my sins, he’s disgustingly attached to your wellbeing. I tried to tell him you’re a magnet for trouble – exhibit A, this mess – but apparently that’s ‘missing the point’.”

“‘The point’,” said Roda, making quotation marks in the air, “is that he’s a better man than you are, luckily for me.”

“Luckily for you, indeed.”

“Frankly if he was here to knock our heads together,” Roda added, “we’d probably be out of here by now.”

From the way the Master paused, Roda knew he agreed. Verbal sparring or not, it was frankly, the truth.

“Well,” the Master settled on at last, unscrewing the cap from the bottle Roda had handed him. “We’ll be out of here soon, since the apple didn’t fall far from the tree.”

Roda couldn’t help herself.

“Technically, he’s a better man because the apple has rolled miles away from the tree.”

“Now you’re just hurting my feelings.”

“Amazing!”

Roda clapped her hands together, stifling an actual laugh. From the way that he froze at his work – letting cleaner fluid splash on the floor, and splatter his shoe before he yanked it out of the way – the Master did not like the look on her face. It was decidedly affirming to be the one making him look at her with mistrust in his eyes, instead of the other way around, and she made a note to commit it to memory so that she could tell Jack about it later. She had the feeling he would appreciate it as well.

(This was about to be an utterly petty repartee. But, she would land one more hit in their sparring, all the same.)

“...what?” The Master asked, clearly trying not to sound hesitant.

Roda smiled innocently down at him.

“I didn’t know you had any.”

“Ah.” The Master narrowed his eyes, but Roda saw a small smile twitch at the corner of his mouth. He turned back to what he was doing, returning the lid to the cleaner and pushing it far away from the door. “Yes, yes, very droll. Now,” he wiped one hand clean on his trouser leg, and stood up. “In the spirit of cooperation, I just have one thing to say to that.”

“Yes…?”

The Master held up the lighter, his thumb resting with anticipation on the wheel and a mad glint in his eyes.

“Duck.”

Chapter 8: Dissociation

Summary:

Characters: The Redjay (Alternate Universe), The Seeker
Trigger Warnings: Dissociation, PTSD, mentions of war and death, mention of past injuries

Notes:

This is a rewritten/expanded snippet of an old chapter written mostly by Elisi, from her story ‘A Long Way From Sherwood’ wherein the Seeker of the main ‘verse meets Roda from another.

«What have you got behind there? Skaro?»

For endless seconds, the Redjay couldn’t breathe.

One Dalek had been a shock. Being told that her new ally called it friend had been an impossibility. But this? This was like being body slammed by a tidal wave; and the impact was too much for her already highly-strung nerves.

Staggering back Roda collapsed against a wall, unable to process the sight in front of her. Maybe she was losing it? That had to be it. She couldn’t be where she thought she was, let alone when. But this was too real. The sight, the smell, the dread pooling in the pit of her stomach like water poured over oil. Could a hallucination be this real?

She felt as though she couldn’t keep hold of herself. She pressed her fingertips to her eyes, a kaleidoscope of colour bursting to life. It hurt when she hit the ground, but that only felt more like hell, making it all too clear that if she could see it, smell it and feel it, then it had to be real. And I left my gun on the Seeker’s couch. Stupid, stupid Roda…!

The Redjay took a deep breath. But when she opened her eyes again, it was still there – the interior of a Dalek ship, something she had hoped to never, ever see again. Memories of the Time War threatened to overwhelm her, made all the worse by the vision of a Time Lord standing over her, laser in hand. Time ground to a halt, but Roda’s mind kept on going, as a hundred images bombarded her at once. 

***

She was standing in the console room of her TARDIS, freshly equipped with weapons created for fighting Daleks. Even still parked in the armoury, it hit her that this was real. The rumours of a war with Skaro that she’d heard about were reality, and all of the universe was held like a mouse over the gullet of a tiger, waiting to see who would emerge from the destruction.

***

Red dots – each of them a battle TARDIS, each of them with at least eight pilots – disappeared one by one from a monitor, while Roda gripped the counter so tightly that her knuckles bled white. Behind her stood Rassilon, rattling off instructions to a subordinate as if it didn’t affect him that each little marker no longer on the screen was more people added to the list of the dead, or worse, never-been. He would send her into the thick of it by the end of the day; she knew that when she was the one up there, he wouldn’t shed a tear.

***

Staring down the eyestalk of a Dalek, Roda’s arm shook with a fear she hadn’t thought possible in all her centuries of life. She had to shoot first. She needed to shoot first. It was a miracle that she was still alive to be having this argument with herself, and yet she felt pinned to the ground like her boots were full of lead. All she could hear was screaming and laser fire, as hundreds fell all around her, and she couldn’t move.

***

Wick raised a hand, fist tightly closed, as a handful of them crept into the furnace of a Dalek ship. If they didn’t succeed at sabotaging the machine within, an entire system would be engulfed. Thousands of Daleks would go down with their ship. Roda hadn’t realised how simple it was to rationalize death on that large a scale until she’d seen the front lines.

***

She had to get Wick back to her TARDIS! A Zero Room could undo this, or stop it, or slow it. She wouldn’t die! She couldn’t die! All Roda had to do was get her to some kind of life support, and she would open her eyes again. Hold her close again. Say her name again. It wasn’t that much blood. It could have been worse; the Dalek could have just vaporized her. And this wasn’t her last regeneration. Too many people had died in front of her eyes, but she couldn’t lose one more. Not when the universe had finally given her love again!

***

A Time Agent who was no longer a Time Agent. A man who couldn’t die, but she’d seen him die in front of her, and get back up a few minutes later. He’d said that they were friends, now; that whatever had gone down between them in the past was the past. Could she trust him? Did she even want to trust again? Did she even deserve to make a friend, when she had been unable to save her love, and escaped a War that should have been the end of her by sheer, dumb luck?

***

The Toclafane – Daleks by another name, it seemed. Destruction on a scale that should have seemed small, after Gallifrey’s loss. But how many children were there on Sol-3? Why should their loss shock her less, just because she’d seen death before? It was the Time War all over again.

***

Roda couldn’t breathe, couldn’t feel her bones, as she lay under the snow. The avalanche hadn’t come out of nowhere. Somehow, she knew that the Master was behind it. She was alive, but she could feel herself slipping into unconsciousness, her body conserving heat and energy by putting her under. But humans were so fragile. Ianto, Owen, Tosh, Gwen, Rhys… they’d be dead by now. She should have saved them. What use was a Time Lord in this new world without a home, if she couldn’t save anybody?

***

The Master stomped on her hand, breaking her fingers just to hear her scream. He beat her to the ground, and reminded her that in Gallifrey’s fall, he had risen. He shot Jack, and told her if she didn’t dance to his tune, he would kill him again until she did. He hurt her again, and he hurt Jack, and he hurt the Doctor, and he hurt the Joneses, and he killed and he laughed and he danced. Three hundred and sixty five days seemed like a millennium when it was all for one man’s entertainment. At least Rassilon and the Daleks hadn’t killed for fun.

***

A horrible year had been undone by the Doctor and his companion. But for a small few, it still happened. She would remember everything. Over half a billion dead. Two hundred thousand children. The Master had killed them all, even if time forgot.

***

And now the Seeker stood over her again, laser screwdriver in his hand. The Time War, the Year That Never Was, her childhood, memories she barely had access to anymore, things she would never forget if she lived a hundred, thousand more regenerations, all of them slipping out of focus. Holding onto a thought was like holding onto sand.

Was it the Seeker? He looked so much like the Master. When she blinked, it was the Master, a manic grin on his face, and then it was the Seeker again. He must have lied. He was the Master. And she’d believed him when he’d said that he was just his son… how could she have been so stupid, when her every instinct had screamed danger? But then he saved her life, when the Captain almost killed her. It didn’t make any sense…!

Roda choked down a sob, refusing to let him – whoever he was – see her break. He probably knows. Look at me. On the ground, shaking, every memory a bruise in their lungs.

She was on her TARDIS. She was on Gallifrey. She was on the Valiant. She was on a planet she didn’t even know the name of, holding her lover in her arms. She was on a Dalek ship. She was under the Master’s heel. She was in a cell in Torchwood, deep beneath the city of Cardiff. She was in a stranger’s TARDIS. Wherever she was, she was trapped.

This small planet of Time War refugees desperately clinging to life by destroying the life that was already there was going to be the straw that finally broke the Redjay’s back, and she couldn’t even breathe. 

It was the same. It was always going to be the same, just the same – she would never be free. The War, the Year, the pain, the fear, it would always follow her, and she was caught forever in a loop–!

«Roda…»

Except, the next bit didn’t follow the script in her head.

Chapter 9: Touch

Summary:

Characters: The Redjay (6th and 8th regenerations), Rassilon (Armitage and Dalton), Wicinrondrometa, throwaway randomly-named Time Lords, Owen Harper
Trigger Warnings: Implied past and current abuse, (brief) mention of sexual assault, unwanted physical touch, non-explicit nudity, gaslighting, minor bruises and scrapes

Notes:

"Just write some short, under 1k stories for Whumptober, Lee," I said. "It won't take long," I said. Mmm. 5.7k later, today's story ran completely away from me /o\

“So, who did that to you?”

The Redjay stopped reading the data tablet she was engrossed in, and went very, very still. That was… a dangerous question. She didn’t need to ask what it was that Commander Wicinrondrometa meant; but playing dumb seemed like the best course of action all the same.

“What?” she asked, more brusquely than she’d intended to.

I think it’s allowed, Roda mused to herself. I’ve been sent out here to the frontlines to do whatever it is that Rassilon wants me to do – he’d yet to elaborate – and as much as I hate being assigned to actual military, the Commander probably likes it even less. Roda didn’t know a lot about the woman, yet, but she’d already picked up on the fact that she wasn’t wanted around. A loomed and raised soldier forced to ‘babysit’ – her words – a traitor. It wasn’t a recipe for a happy relationship.

“Your face,” the Commander folded her arms across her chest, rolling her eyes. Had she twigged that Roda was being intentionally obtuse, or did she just not like repeating herself? Roda would have to find out, she supposed. “Who hit you?”

Ah. So we’re making the subtext text. Hard to impress, by the book and blunt. The more Roda learned about the Commander, the more sure she was that they would never be friends. Well, at least the secondment probably wouldn’t be for the rest of the damn War.

“It’s fine.”

Roda lifted the tablet again, keeping her expression neutral. A silent gesture to say ‘stop talking to me’. She rested her face in one hand, careful to shield – but not bump – the fresh bruise that was starting underneath one eye. It was tender. It was not fine.

“I just hurt myself,” she shrugged. “It really doesn’t matter.”

“Suit yourself,” the Commander snorted, throwing a hand up in the air and walking away. “I’m sorry I asked.”

Me too.

Roda turned all her attention back to the starmaps of the local area. If she was squinting at the tablet a little, or occasionally flipping to the next page with one eye closed well, then, wasn’t it a good thing that nobody else noticed.

*** 

“You bring this upon yourself, Rodageitarynxmososa.”

Roda hated when Rassilon used her full name, now that she was an adult, and had been exiled for thousands of years. It wasn’t who she was anymore. When he had branded her, named her traitor and exiled her, he had robbed her of the legacy of a Time Lord’s name. She wondered absentmindedly if he knew the loom-names of the Doctor, and the Master, and other exiles with reputations good enough to be thought of as renegades. (Or maybe it was just their era; more liberal, in so many ways.) Did he call them by their full names, or was it just her who deserved none of his respect?

It made her feel small as well. She was a long, long way from the orphan Time Tot he’d once known, even if he could still tower over her and overpower her easily. Years and regenerations and hardships had shaped her into a wholly different person. But Rassilon still behaved like he knew her, and worse, like he owned her. Forced to be around him, she felt like a disobedient child and her stomach tied itself in knots that she wished she could untangle and confront.

Her back was to the wall of his office, having staggered there when the slap to her face had almost knocked her down. Roda pressed her palm to her warming cheek gingerly. Her hearts were racing, and she knew that she was breathing quicker than she had been when she’d arrived for the debriefing. If anyone else had touched her, she would have given as good as she got. But when it was her once-upon-a-time guardian, all of her pride and confidence seemed to get locked in a box, the key tossed into the Oubliette of Eternity.

“...I know it isn’t the outcome you wanted, Ras–” Roda caught herself as she saw something furious flash behind Rassilon’s eyes. He closed the gap that had been made between them, his gauntleted hand twitching at his side. “Lord President Eternal.” She swallowed hard, feeling like a bug pinned to the wall by his glare as she repeated the principal points. “The Vultaran took QS-805; we couldn’t maneuver around their time-shields. The survivors…”

Roda’s shoulders sank. “There won’t be any. The Vultaran sent them to the Daleks for questioning.”

It had been a harrowing and exhausting day. Roda had succeeded at lifting the tech that she’d been ordered to steal, but the loss of life that it cost was chilling. (People she had started to get to know in the Commander’s unit, now gone. No more fights. No more conversations over meals. She’d even miss the sideways glances at ‘the traitor they’d been saddled with’.) She knew they weren’t there on QS-805 just for the Vultaran… but, well, she wondered.

Had Rassilon ordered the Commander to go there and assist the existing cantonment, like everyone had thought, or had that all been a cover to take something away from an ally of the Daleks? She didn’t want to think too hard about it.

Rassilon raised his hand towards her. Despite herself Roda flinched, but instead of striking her again he only grasped her wrist, pulling it away from her tender face. He took her chin between forefinger and thumb, apparently studying his handiwork. Fighting the urge to pull away, Roda let him turn her head this way and that. And then – in a caricature of gentleness – he placed his palm flat against her face.

His rage faded momentarily, replaced by the charm of his current regeneration; younger, handsome, charismatic, and eternally a politician as well as a commander. Somehow, it was far, far more hurtful than his anger. When he spoke, his voice was deceptively soft.

“You always were so careless with your words.” 

Tears had welled up in Roda’s eyes – no, not tears. Not for him. Never for him. It was just her eyes watering from the slap. – and he wiped them away with one thumb. Roda opened her mouth to say something – she didn’t know what, exactly – but he hushed her with a look.

“Clean yourself up,” he ordered, letting go of her and turning away. He walked over to his desk and rested both palms on the varnished wood, poring over papers and slates once again. “And then send Wicinrondrometa in to speak with me.”

Roda ran both hands over her face, flattened wayward strands of ginger hair and fixed her collar. 

Dismissed. As usual. Maybe he was right. There must be a reason they say not to shoot the messenger.

“Yes, Lord Rassilon.”

***

Wick – Commander Wicinrondrometa – had a small training room on her TARDIS. It was one of few ‘luxuries’ that she had, being the sort of person whose ship had the absolute bare minimum; a place to sleep, a place to prepare food, a place to shower and a place to store weapons. When the fleet was stationed at a temporary barracks, the soldiers were more or less allowed to come and go and use it as they pleased. The time capsule was smart enough to direct its pilot to the console room on entry, and anyone else to the gym, and back again, without being able to go any further.

Just in case. For the most part, Wick trusted her men.

Roda hadn’t expected to be assigned to her team as long as she had, but it had been a year or two, now, and there was no obvious sign that Rassilon intended to alter the arrangement. She was still summoned for the occasional bit of subterfuge – which she was unable to talk to anyone about, under pain of… well. He left it open to interpretation, but Roda had never seen fit to find a definitive answer – but it was steadily becoming clear that when he didn’t want to make use of her, she was to remain on the front lines with the rest of the soldiers.

She didn’t really care, if she was honest. The War had gone on for so long that she just wanted to be where she felt she could make even any kind of dent in the burgeoning devastation.

Today was one of the first times she’d slipped into the Commander’s training room. She needed to clear her head. While most of the people she lived alongside by now were at least accustomed enough to her presence not to be outright malicious about it – quite a few, Roda might even go so far as to consider friends by now – there was still the odd, younger upstart with a chip on their shoulder. Most of them were practically teenagers still; Roda didn’t think half of them should be in the military, but war was hell. But it was one of those all-but-Tots who had driven her into the training room.

She swung punch after punch at the padded leather square on the wall, taking her frustration out on the helpless equipment instead of the idiot she was actually angry at. Cliping on him would be a pointless endeavour. Not only was the Commander more likely to side with an actual soldier rather than one that had been thrust upon her, but Roda had just taken it anyway. It was hard to complain that somebody had punched you in the face when there were witnesses saying you took it, got up, and walked away without another word.

Frankly, she felt like a coward for not defending herself. But she was tired, and he hadn’t done any real damage, anyway. The kid punched like a wimp. Hopefully he’d do a better job in a fight with an actual enemy. Hopefully he’d grow up and learn who the real enemy was, too. Whatever. She had the gym to herself right now, and she’d put some ointment on the bridge of her nose when she headed back to her own TARDIS.

The steady process of falling into an exercise zen was interrupted by the arrival of unwanted company. Roda sighed in exasperation, doing her best to tune them out and stay in the zone. But before she could fall back into her rhythm, a hand clamped down on her shoulder.

She spun around – fists raised automatically to defend herself – but came face to face not with a possible threat, but the Commander herself and two soldiers standing behind her. One very woebegotten recruit, and an older, grey-haired Time Lord who had him by the ear and wore a very irritated expression; Neswin, and Impanx.

Wick didn’t say anything straight away. She stood calmly, looking very stern, until Roda lowered her hands and stood to something that – while not quite being attention – vaguely resembled standing to attention. She snorted, looking briefly amused by Roda playing soldier, before clearing her throat and raising an eyebrow.

“Rodageitarynxmososa.”

Roda pursed her lips. “...Roda is fine.” She’d said it a thousand times, but she supposed the Commander was just trying to be respectful about it. It was a far cry from the animosity they’d had to each other in the early days, and so she didn’t push the topic that hard, but being full-named still felt like she was being told off.

“Roda, whatever.” Wick jerked her thumb at the young soldier behind her, and then gestured at Roda’s purpling nose. “Care to explain what happened here?”

The older Time Lady looked at her feet, and then the ceiling, and sighed so hard that she felt it in her spine. She shook the fight out of her hands, and gave a small shrug.

“Neswin and I had a disagreement about the War,” she replied, dryly. The young man squirmed, his face red with embarrassment, but for the most part Roda ignored him. “And I came to the training room to work it out.”

Wick opened her mouth, but the veteran interrupted sharply before she could speak.

“By the Other, that’s not the full story!” Impanx protested. He let go of Neswin’s ear, nudging him forward. “Tell the Commander what actually happened.”

Neswin spluttered for a second, rubbing his tender ear. And then he pouted, looking away.

“Rassilon’s Exile provoked me.”

Roda’s eye twitched at the name, but she said nothing. Impanx, on the other hand…

“Womprat-fucking-shit!” he snapped, his language enough to make everyone stop and stare at him for a split second. “She was minding her own business and you got up in her space and told her she didn’t belong around proper Time Lords.”

“Well…” Neswin grumbled, half to himself. “She doesn’t, does she? She was exiled.”

“So you thought that meant you got to shove her around and hit her?”

“It’s not as though she fough–!”

“Quiet!!” 

Roda had been looking for a good point to either cut in, or slip away. It was strangely affirming to have someone come all this way just to stand in her corner, but if she was honest, she didn’t really know what to make of it. She made a mental note to thank Impanx privately, later on. Somehow. It really was an unfamiliar experience. But before she could either escape or speak up, the Commander had raised her voice, and all three of the other Time Lords had shut up at the power behind it.

Wick jabbed a finger at Neswin that evidently said ‘wait your turn’. He looked suitably chastised – or at least certain that the Commander was about to rip him a new one – and seemed to endeavour to make himself invisible. Impanx shot him as equally a dirty look as Wick had, and then hopped-to when Wick turned to face him, next.

“Just him?” She asked, sharply. The old Time Lord nodded. “Roda did nothing?”

“Aye. The girl,” Roda chose not to correct him about her age, “just took it and walked away.”

The answer evidently confused the Commander. Neswin shrunk more. Roda stayed very still. Inpanx folded his arms, clearly having achieved what he’d set out to do and having nothing more to say.

Wick was quiet for a moment – Roda would have killed to know what was going through her mind; the woman had the most impressive poker face that she had ever seen – and then finally her body language softened. She looked at Roda with something approaching curiosity on her face, or… concern? It made Roda feel even stranger.

“You just let him hit you?”

Roda hesitated, before silently shrugging and nodding. Wick paused again, and reached out a slow hand to check on the injury. Roda took a step back and away without even thinking, eyes widening almost imperceptibly. But to her growing surprise, the Commander held up her hand immediately. Was that… is she apologizing? Either way, she made no movement to examine her again, and the flutter of butterflies in Roda’s stomach turned into a whirlwind. Why does it matter so much that she let me be…?

“Why?” Wick asked, finally. “You wouldn’t have been punished if you were just defending yourself.”

The final piece of a shield built up around Roda’s hearts began to silently crumble, unnoticed by the Time Lady herself. Hating the way that her cheeks had begun to turn red, she cast her gaze to the ceiling. So much for a quiet work-out.

“I guess I’m just used to it.”

***

“Would you just hold still?”

Roda hissed through her teeth, but she did as she was told. Her back ached, and her face was absolutely filthy; not to mention a little bit scuffed up in turn. Eating dirt had not been on her list of things to do today, but she didn’t regret what she’d done to make it happen.

If she hadn’t done it, Wick might be dead right now.

Her commanding officer— no. Wick was more than that, now. Looking back, Roda couldn’t have said exactly when it had happened, but somewhere down the line they’d gone from hating what the other stood for, to tolerance, to camaraderie and finally… was it love, yet? Roda wasn’t sure. She wasn’t even sure if she was capable of love anymore, not since her exile and all of the years of her own company. But it was nice, whatever it was, and it was theirs, and it was more than friends. She couldn’t have dared ask for more.

Wick moved behind her, and Roda heard the sound of a cloth being wrung out into a metal tray. She dipped it in clean water once again, and the exile braced herself for the healing sting of the disinfectant. Knowing that the scrapes had to be cleaned up and the bits of rubble and glass taken out of her back and arms was one thing, but sitting still through the pain of it and just letting somebody take care of it for her was so anathema to Roda that it almost felt like a dream. To think that the person she’d trust to be doing it was the Commander was even more surreal.

“This is going to sting again.”

Roda huffed into the scratchy woolen blanket she was face-down on, failing to bite her tongue.

“Right, yes,” she snarked, perhaps a little unfairly. “Because I was convinced that the fourth pass was going to be a walk in the park compared to the first three.”

“Oh shut up….”

Wick clipped her sternly but fondly across the back of her head – one of the few places that didn’t hurt at least a little bit. But it wasn’t the worst she’d been hurt in her lives by far; in fact, it wasn’t even the worst she’d been hurt in this War, or since meeting Wick. But the Commander had declared herself responsible for Roda’s well-being and care and had insisted on looking after her personally once they got back to the fleet.

Roda had expected to be taken to the infirmary. Taking a left and being led to Wick’s quarters had been a… not entirely unpleasant surprise, but a surprise none the less.

The Commander was gentle as she touched the cloth back to Roda’s back, dabbing at the cuts and bruises. They would heal quickly enough, now that all the debris had been removed. Honestly, Roda felt as if her pride was more wounded by her body, but Wick needed to fuss.

She still very clearly blamed herself for the fact that Roda was hurt at all, which Roda couldn’t help but think of as quite stupid (but nice). The way she saw it, anybody else in their fleet would have done the same thing, if they’d been the one to see the incoming attack. Roda had just been the closest one to the Commander, and thus the first to tackle her to the ground before the projectile could take her out. Instead, it had only blown up the remains of a building and some Dalek casing that had been abandoned long before they arrived.

Somebody had taken down the attackers – a lone handful of Daleks, left behind – before they had a chance to fire again. For once, everybody had walked away from the fight. Wick should have been out there celebrating with her troops. Roda had tried to insist as much, to no avail. One of the only genuine victories they’d seen in the entire War, and she was wasting it in here with Roda.

The cloth was wrung out again, and then Wick sighed, and sat back. Roda lifted her head, checking if she was allowed to move, and then hesitantly sat up when Wick gave her a small nod. She reached for her tunic, opting to forego her bra, for now. But as she was about to roll it over her head Wick moved to sit down behind her, and put a hand on her shoulder.

“Wait a moment. I want to put some ointment on the worst of this.”

Shirt bundled up around her shoulders but now covering her chest, Roda laughed tiredly.

“C’mon Commander. I’m a Time Lord, not a porcelain doll.”

Wick unscrewed the lid of something she pulled out of her bedside table, turning Roda so that she was sitting straight.

“Yes, yes. You’re a very brave traitor.” Roda smirked to herself. Somehow when Wick said it, she didn’t mind it so much. “Oh so strong and indestructible with no help from anyone.”

“Exactly,” Roda pointed out belligerently. She took on a teasing tone right back, hoping to lighten the mood a little bit. I’d rather have some TLC in the form of making out until I don’t think about my back, she mused, considering just taking her shirt off again, and be done with it. “I really don’t get why you care so much about taking care of me.”

The Commander sighed. Roda could feel the shift in the air, even as Wick rubbed careful circles into some of the cuts and scrapes in silence, until the cream was fully absorbed. Neither of them said anything for a few minutes; Roda tried to work out what she’d said that had changed things. She wasn’t good at talking to people. That went even more so for people that she genuinely cared about. There were only a handful of them in the universe, and Wick had slowly – sneaking under her skin – become one of them. She didn’t want to mess it up…

Eventually, Wick put down the ointment. Roda turned to apologize for whatever she’d done, but the Commander began to slowly roll her tunic down, smoothing out a few wrinkles as she did so. Before Roda could say anything, Wick pressed a soft kiss to the back of her neck – just below her hairline – and something in Roda’s head short-circuited. Her hearts were in a vice; she couldn’t find her words; her hands suddenly felt clammy; it was incredibly embarrassing.

“I’m sorry no one’s cared about you before,” murmured Wick, wrapping her arms around Roda’s middle. “And thank you for taking care of me today.”

Roda continued to be at a loss for words, but she closed her eyes and leaned into the Commander’s touch. The other woman hummed contentedly, and the tension began to drain from Roda’s muscles. Maybe the two of them being here instead of out in the mess hall with the rest of the soldiers wasn’t so terrible after all.

***

As Roda buried her face in Wick’s curls, she realised that her tears had finally run dry.

A lot of bad days had caught up to her all at once, and as soon as she had materialized at the cantonment she had made a beeline straight for the Commander’s TARDIS. The last thing she had wanted was to run into literally anybody else, and let them see her with her hair a mess and an expression on the brink of tears. Nobody was allowed to see her at her most vulnerable, apart from Wick. Sometimes, not even Wick.

Rassilon had been in a bad mood when she knocked on his office door. Roda had known as soon as he ordered her to enter – an edge to his voice that was oh-so familiar from her childhood, even though he’d regenerated since she saw him last – but by that point, there had been no good way to slip away before she became the outlet for his ire. What she’d seen when the door locked behind her, though, was like nothing she could have prepared herself for.

Usually, when he’d been angry at her, it was a quiet disappointment. Not that he hadn’t raised his voice – or a hand, for that matter – to her before; it was just that he was usually much better at keeping his emotions under control. His fury was quiet, and all the more threatening for it because he would lash out and then walk away unruffled, so that nobody ever knew that he had been anything but the perfect Lord President, politician and guardian. He had controlled Roda all throughout her childhood with a carrot and stick that had kept even her in the blind to how abusive he really was. Especially her.

Today he had been brutal. There was a wild look in her eyes, and it had taken real effort not to run away. His office had been in utter disarray, and she could guess that he hadn’t slept in at least a couple of days. The War had not been turning in Gallifrey’s favour, and so she hadn’t expected him to be relaxed. But every loss was changing and warping him. He was beginning to look like a complete stranger, rather than an evil that had haunted her for her whole life. And that scared her.

Roda had considered not giving her report. In the end, Rassilon had made the decision for her and forced his way into her mind. He didn’t even need to touch her, so thoroughly had he rifled through it in her childhood. (There were things she couldn’t remember. Hours, sometimes whole days. Half memories that she had wondered for years if he had subdued; she knew she’d never know for sure.) But he was in a rage, and he had pinned her to the wall with a hand around her throat and paid no attention at all to the way that she froze like a deer in headlights.

She hated that she had let him do it. That was the worst part. But when her update had piled more bad news on top of existing bad news… well. Roda’s day had gone from bad to worse as well. For once, she would have been more than happy to forget it all.

The only mark Rassilon had left was a few buttons missing from her tunic and a ring of bruises around her throat. Thankfully, nobody had been between her landing point and Wick, who had taken one look at Roda and opened up her arms. That simple act of genuine concern and love had been enough to open the flood-gates, and Wick had only just managed to herd her into bed before she’d begun to howl.

“...I hate crying,” Roda murmured. Her throat was hoarse from tears, and she felt like she’d lost all the water in her body. Wick whispered soothing nothings and rubbed Roda’s back, moving her lover just enough that she could hear her properly without her hair muffling her. Roda rested her cheek on the Commander’s chest, and sniffled pathetically. “M’sorry.”

“You seem like you needed it…”

Wick sighed, but didn’t press for details. Roda couldn’t have appreciated the way that Wick got her to open up while respecting her privacy more. Because frankly, where Rassilon was concerned, there was nothing anybody could do or say  to stop him. Knowing more than she had been able to gleam from how Roda behaved after debriefings would only hurt Wick. Worse still, if she took into upon her noble heart to try and do something, Roda wouldn’t be able to protect her, and that was worse than anything he could throw at her.

Still, Wick wasn’t an idiot. She knew that people whispered about Roda, and she knew the way that the title of ‘Rassilon’s Exile’ followed her like a bad smell. Having seen Roda without her shirt on – and by extension, her exile brand – it didn’t take a genius to put two and two together. Ever since they’d become a proper sort-of couple that everyone else in the fleet sort-of knew about, Wick had been extra protective of Roda whenever she came back from a meeting on Gallifrey. She showed up without asking anything in return, and she always had her back. She was the only good thing to come of the War, and Roda held onto her like her life depended on it.

They cuddled in silence for a long time. Roda had her breathing under control, and her face had dried. Wick hummed a song she had once taught Roda – a lullaby from her mother – and played with her hair and rubbed her back. For her part, Roda simply closed her eyes and tried to get some kind of long overdue rest; obviously not actually asleep, but still and sedate and doing her best to lose herself in the moment. The only time either of them shifted was to free up a limb, or chase away pins and needles.

And then Wick asked the forbidden question.

“Why do you let him hurt you?”

Can I just pretend I’m actually asleep? Roda hid her face in Wick’s bosom again, groaning in exasperation despite herself. This – it was the very thing they didn’t talk about. The question that nobody was allowed to ask, and that she didn’t have a good answer for, anyway. What if Wick got angry? What if she thought less of her? What if she tried to change things? What if, what if, what if…

“Nobody would stop him,” she answered, eventually. Those four words made her feel even more exhausted than the rest of the day had. “It – it is what it is.”

Wick wrapped her arms around Roda tightly – almost too tightly – and rested her chin on the top of her head. Roda could feel the way she was holding her breath, and biting back words, but didn’t dare do or say anything in case she spoiled the moment, or scared her away. After what felt like an agonizingly long moment, Wick finally loosened her hold on Roda and pulled her into a long, tender kiss. When they broke to breathe, she rested her forehead against Roda’s with the saddest eyes Roda had ever seen.

“I would,” Wick promised, her voice full of conviction. Roda began to talk, but she spoke over her. “I know what you’re going to say, darling. But if you’d let me, I’d go to Skaro and back to make sure no one ever laid a hand on you again.” She gave her another quick kiss. “Nobody.”

Roda’s shoulders began to shake again, and Wick wordlessly let her cry. But this time, the tears didn’t come from sadness. For the first time in as long as she could remember, Roda realised that she actually believed there was somebody who would protect her. Somebody loved her, and Roda loved her back.

How was she supposed to live with that kind of responsibility?

***

“Jesus…” 

As Roda skated to the edge of the rink, Owen Harper shook his head in disbelief. Roda chuckled at the look on his face, as he leaned on the back of the seat in front of him, studying her with a funny look on his face. Appraisal? Respect? She couldn’t quite read it, but it wasn’t a bad look; and even if it had been, the Tiger Bay Brawlers had just won their bout against the London team, and there was nothing short of a rift invasion that could take that high away from Roda right now.

She unbuckled her jammer’s helmet as she came to a stop, tucking it under her arm. A little down the way the rest of her team were crowded around boyfriends (and one wife) and family, getting clapped on the back. She was happy for them, but Owen was the only one who turned up for all of her bouts, without fail, since he’d learned she was a part of the team. Roller derby was for her – she didn’t need anybody’s praise or approval – but it was still nice to know there was a friendly face cheering her on.

“What?”

She tipped her head to one side, still trying to read his expression. Owen gave her a small smirk, and Roda didn’t miss the way he looked her up and down. A bit of approval – he had told her he’d first come to the derby to pick up women, after all – but also a touch of ‘Dr Harper’ showing through. Roda ran a hand through her sweat-soaked hair, and punched him lightly on the shoulder.

“I’m fine, Owen. You should see the other jammer.”

“Yeah,” Owen snorted a laugh, but seemed satisfied with her condition. Just a few small bruises; nothing worse than she’d get in a practice game. It was the good kind of ache; the kind that came from a job well done. “That’s what I was swearing about.” Roda raised an eyebrow. “That last tackle looked like it was personal.”

“Did it?”

Roda looked up at the ceiling of the arena, choosing her words carefully. It had been personal. Or, well – not personal to her, but personal to the team. The last time they’d played against London, they’d invited the team to have drinks with them. Their current lead jammer – who had, at the time, been the reserve – had had a little too much and hit on one of Cardiff’s blockers. She had tried to explain that she was flattered, but married – her wife was right over there, at the bar – but the other woman hadn’t taken no for an answer. 

The rest of the London team had dragged them out of the bar, apologising profusely. Roda had expected them to kick her off the team, but when she’d come out onto the rink, well…

She hadn’t been any rougher than was within the rules.

“Let’s just say,” she said to Owen, voice low enough that nobody else would be able to hear them over the hubbub, “someone taught me long ago never to let anybody touch me or my friends without asking.”

“Say no more,” Owen nodded grimly, and then changed the subject. “Drinks on me tonight?”

“Let me just touch base with the girls.”

Owen reached over the barrier and clapped Roda on the shoulder. Roda squeezed his forearm in gratitude, and gave him a warm smile. The Tigers, Torchwood, the Seeker, the Doctor… it had been a long time since she’d been surrounded by so many people she could trust. It was one of the greatest gifts that life had ever given her. She put her helmet back on so that the ref wouldn’t tell her off for skating without it, and headed for the lockers on the other side of the rink with a contagious smile on her face.

Wick would have loved you all…

Chapter 10: Lips Sewn Shut

Summary:

Characters: The Redjay (4th regeneration), the Doctor (4th regeneration), Leela of the Sevateem
Trigger Warnings: Past injury being treated, lips sewn shut, archaic punishments

The Doctor had been hoping to introduce the Redjay to his friend Leela for some time now. Inexplicably, however, ‘some time now’ had always managed to be the ‘wrong time now’, and he’d never quite managed to get all of his ducks in a row, so to speak.

There had on one notable occasion actually been ducks, he supposed, which he and Leela had spent a pleasant afternoon feeding frozen peas to. He had also elucidated the numerous reasons why bread was an inappropriate choice despite what other people around the pond were doing. Leela had told him to shut up and feed the birds. Which he had, because Roda had given them a rain check and they had nothing better to do. Or at least, he had fed the ducks; he hadn’t stopped talking.

On what was either the eighteenth or nineteenth attempt to introduce the pair to one another, the Doctor had finally struck gold. Unfortunately it had been the kind of gold that was really more of a bright yellow hazard sign, in the form of Roda being utterly miserable and in need of their assistance. Always happy to be the dashing hero — complete with plucky sidekick — the Doctor and Leela had answered the call! He and Leela saved the day, got the pats on the back from the local populace and then promptly absconded with the Redjay in tow before the scale of property damage could be fully assessed by the constabulary.

She could have stood to look more grateful about it, he was sure.

“Really, Redjay,” the Doctor scolded, rummaging through the contents of his Zero Room for a sterile pair of scissors, or a good scalpel. “How do you manage to get yourself into these situations?”

There was no response — although it had been a rhetorical question. The Doctor paused, and turned to face her with a toothy, sheepish grin. The look that Roda was giving him could have curdled milk. He was suddenly acutely aware that he was between her and her arrows, and Leela and her knives.

“Ah. Right, yes.” He disappeared back behind a stack of metal containers before either woman could find something to throw at him. “Assistance first, conversation later.”

While Roda still — naturally — said nothing, Leela scoffed with enough indignation for the both of them. Out of the corner of his eye, the Doctor watched her walk over to the stool that Roda was sitting on and crouch down in front of her. The Redjay watched her cautiously, but didn’t move away. Leela put one hand on her belt, and another on the stool by Roda’s thigh, and the Doctor found himself rather surprised that Roda hadn’t kicked her for her troubles. She could be quite antsy around strangers at the best of times, and today was, erm, not the best of times.

“I am Leela,” his companion introduced herself, “of the Sevateem Tribe.”

Leela paused to let Roda take in the statement, seemingly choosing her words as carefully as approaching a nervous cat. Not the worst idea, really.

“Will you allow me to use my knife to help you?” She looked over her shoulder, glaring at the Doctor. “He takes forever to find ‘precisely the right tool’.”

The Doctor popped up from his hiding spot, waggling a finger at the women.

“For very good reason, Leela! You wouldn’t fix a flux capacitor with a quadratic wrench, would you.”

“I would not,” Leela agreed. “Because I do not know what either of those things are.”

Despite her predicament, Roda snorted a laugh. The Doctor shook his head, muttering under his breath. “Women…”

There was a beat, and then something soft and moderately heavy bounced off the Doctor’s head. He rubbed his crown, glancing around until he laid his eyes on a roll of bandage wrap, coming to a stop on the floor beside him. A second’s investigation revealed Roda, sitting with her arms folded over her chest and a pointedly-raised eyebrow, with Leela on the ground in front of her looking like she agreed with the projectile attack. Which, the Doctor mused, she almost certainly does. I’m almost surprised she didn’t beat Roda to it. Almost.

“Do not mock us, Doctor.”

“Perish the thought!” The Doctor held up his hands in surrender. “It’s just a cliché.”

“Then do not use clichés to address me,” Leela responded, before returning her full attention to Roda and repeating her earlier question. “Will you allow me to use my knife to help you?” She reached for her weapon while she spoke, showing the Time Lady what she was talking about.

Roda looked at Leela, and then studied the knife cautiously. Leela waited patiently on the ground, not holding onto the hilt and not making any quick movements. Finally, Roda looked up at the Doctor. Her nose wrinkled in concentration, and the Doctor heard her in the back of his mind.

«Is she good with her knife?»

The Doctor struggled not to laugh out loud, but his amusement was almost certainly obvious in his reply.

«Too good, if you ask me.»

Roda made a noise in the back of her throat, and then nodded at Leela. The Doctor opened his mouth to argue that a knife was not the tool for the job, but decided against it. It wasn’t as though Leela wouldn’t be careful, he supposed. And Roda seemed alright with it, which was the key bit; he didn’t want to imagine trying to make the Redjay do something she didn’t want to do, all things considered…

All the same, while keeping one eye on the two women, he decided to keep looking for a few things. Alcohol wipes, disinfectant, that sort of thing. Roda would probably baulk at some kind of jab in case of infection – who knew what kind of things were on the needle they’d used to do that to her – but she would hopefully at least agree to sit in a Zero Room for a while just in case. Maybe he’d offer her one of the spare rooms? He could sweeten the deal with some of that good ginger beer they got from Australia, the really spicy one…

Leela nodded to Roda, who had one hand on her leg, and the other holding on tightly to the edge of the chair. She had an expression of grim determination, as if she was steeling herself not to make a sound, or to hold still. Leela adjusted the grip on her knife before straightening up to give Roda’s predicament a closer inspection. As she gently turned Roda’s head up and to the side, the Doctor couldn’t help but grimace sympathetically.

It was certainly a nasty job they’d done on her. The Doctor hadn’t got the full story while they were still on the planet. It seemed that while helping people out with the strange doppelgänger virus that he and Leela had tidied up, Roda had run afoul of the villains who had synthesized the problem in the first place. It had turned out to be accidental, as it turned out, but she had evidently been in a position to expose them, and so they had accused her of ‘questioning the government’, the punishment for which was silencing the speaker. 

He had commented earlier that they could have cut out her tongue instead, and Roda had kicked him in the shin. A little violent, but not unwarranted, he supposed. He’d let it go this time, considering having one’s lips sewn shut was certainly no walk in the park either. 

If it weren’t for the fact that he knew Roda would be unhappy about it, he might have found some way to make their lives miserable in return for hurting his friend. Perhaps he’d think of something suitably harmless but irksome later on, but at least they’d be facing charges for the doppelgänger fiasco…

“Anything you need me to do, just say the word!” he announced, suddenly.

Leela looked up from Roda’s face for almost a full second to say: “stop talking”.

At about the same time, Roda spoke telepathically. «Don’t distract the woman with a knife.»

The Doctor huffed indignantly, but shut his mouth. Leela muttered something under her breath, before she put the tip of the knife to the surgical thread and slowly began to slice. Roda took a shallow breath in and out through her nose, doing her best not to move. The sharp steel had to be flush to her skin, without tearing it anymore than was necessary. And then there was the dried blood around the sutures, which made Leela’s job of finding the best place to cut all the more tricky. But slowly and carefully, she maneuvered the blade between Roda’s lips, and glanced up at her.

“This will hurt.”

Without waiting for a response, she pulled at the thread. Roda made a sharp noise at the back of her throat, but Leela – the Doctor knew – never kept her knives dull. There was a brief tension, pulling at the no-doubt tender skin, before the first knot gave and the thread twanged in two. Leela did the same again with the furthest thread on the other side of Roda’s mouth, miraculously not nicking her skin. It took a minute or two, but made the thread less taut, ensuring that the rest of the job would be simpler.

The Sevateem woman was careful, but as fast as she could be; whether she was picking up on Roda’s rising nervousness or just simply wanting to get it over and done with, the Doctor wasn’t sure. He finished collecting the things he was looking for, hearing Leela talking to herself while she worked, and the small hisses of pain that Roda let out as the thread was cut. At one point, he heard Leela say something that he recognized as an apology, followed by a mumbled word from Roda that suggested she could move her mouth a little bit, at least. He hummed with relief that the task seemed to be going well, resurfacing just as Leela was cleaning her knife with a cloth and Roda was gingerly opening and closing her mouth.

The Time Lady swallowed hard before managing to give Leela a weak smile.

“...thank you.”

“You are welcome,” Leela smiled back. “I will help you remove the ends of the threads.”

“No! No…” Roda raised a hand as she replied hurriedly, cupping one hand over her mouth. “S’fine. I can get this bit…”

Leela frowned. “You must be careful.”

“Mmm,” Roda agreed. “Thank you.”

“...very well,” Leela nodded once, and then stood up. The Doctor squeezed her on the shoulder as he passed her, giving her a warm look.

“That was a good job, Leela.”

Leela looked at him almost quizzically. “She is your friend. I did what anybody should do.” Her eyes narrowed. “It was a cruel thing to do to her.”

“Yes it was,” the Doctor agreed grimly. “But I’m sure she’s grateful.”

When he looked up again, Roda had a metal dish balanced in one hand, using it as a makeshift mirror. The Doctor shook his head in disbelief. What is it with some people and not using the proper tools? He rolled his eyes, knowing that there would be no arguing with Roda. Still, despite the blood that was welling up as she reopened the wounds, she seemed to be doing a good enough job. He reached over to deposit the antiseptic and alcohol wipes in arm’s reach without jolting her, before rejoining Leela a metre or two away.

“She is strong,” Leela said, once Roda was done with her side of the job, and holding cotton buds up to the cuts with a painful look on her face. 

“She is.” The Doctor chuckled. “The Redjay…” He looked for the right words to explain, without telling a story that wasn’t his to tell. “She’s had a rough time of it, yes.” He grinned broadly. “But, you see now why I thought you two should meet?”

Leela considered it for a moment. “Yes. I would happily fight beside her.”

“Oh, well, she’ll probably show off her archery skills once she’s feeling a little better,” the Doctor smirked. “Maybe you can convince her to take you to Sherwood Forest.”

“...why would I wish to visit this forest?”

“It’s sort of a second–” Roda stood up, and the Doctor turned his head mid-sentence to see what she was doing. She waved a hand at him that everything was fine, helping herself to something in his medicine cabinet. Ah. Iodine. Yes. He left her to it, and finished what he was saying to Leela. “Think of it as her second home. You’d like it, probably.”

“Probably?”

The Doctor pulled a face. “You might have to wear a wimple.”

“Nobody can make me wear anything I do not want to,” Leela protested sternly, pointing a finger in the Doctor’s face. He sighed dramatically and patted her on the head.

“Yes, yes… I imagine not,” he placated. 

It was very clever of him to think of introducing the Redjay and Leela. They would either get along like a house on fire, or together, set a house on fire. But he was sure once Roda was done licking her wounds, they’d be firm friends. Fighters, survivors, and two of the most incomprehensibly stubborn people he had ever met. But good people, nevertheless; they’d no doubt find plenty to talk about, and give him plenty of time to himself for an hour or ten.

“I need a drink.” Roda appeared at his elbow with a bloodstained mouth, and a rapidly less grumpy expression. “And a shower. Maybe not in that order?”

Leela took the lead before he could speak. “Come. K-9 will run you a bath,” she looked over her shoulder as she steered Roda towards the door.

“The… robot dog?”

“Yes. He is a good boy. And the Doctor will find food and drink.”

“Oh I will indeed, will I?”

The two women disappeared down a corridor without sparing him a second glance, and the Doctor shook his head in fond despair. Yes. This had been very clever of him indeed.

Chapter 11: Forced Reveal

Summary:

Characters: The Redjay (7th regeneration), The Master (Simm)
Trigger Warnings: Minor gaslighting, generally unsavoury plotting
Author's Note: This is a bit of a loose interpretation of the day's prompt, and not really whump, but it is a prelude to The Year That Never Was, so... it's also something I've been meaning to write for a while, in reference to a throwaway line in chapter 2 of this fic (which is much, much more whump-y).

“Torchwood?”

Harold ‘Harry’ Saxon, Prime Minister, was a perfectly normal – if suitably remarkable – human being. A graduate of Cambridge. Past Rugby Blue. Businessman. Author of a bestselling novel, ‘Kiss Me, Kill Me’. Founder of the Archangel Network. Former Minister for Defence. And of course, husband of Lady Lucy Saxon née Cole. He had had – as he would cheerfully tell any reporter who cared to ask – ‘quite an eventful life’ and was ‘more than ready to settle down and run the country’. 

But as a little-more-than-average man with a little-more-than-average life, of course Harold Saxon had no idea who or what a ‘Torchwood’ was. Some kind of charity, perhaps? A misspelt porn channel? The Master’s interest, on the other hand, was piqued. 

Firstly, there was the fact that he knew personally that Captain Jack Harkness – fearless leader of what remained of Torchwood after the little mishap down in London – was off galavanting with the Doctor and Miss Martha Jones. More than that, if everything had gone to plan, then the three of them would be dinner any time now for the incredibly short-lived Futurekind. He would shed a tear, but… well. No. He wouldn’t. After all, politicians were supposed to lie, it was practically in his job description now.

Anyway, with the Doctor indisposed – like a cockroach, he’d probably crawl out of the deadly odds the Master had thrown him somehow, he always did – or dead, and said Futurekind now his latest little spherical allies, the Master was well on his way to a maniacal scheme well completed. So it all came up Saxon, in the end. What was that things human said? ‘Treat yourself’? Yes, he could have a little intended manslaughter, as a treat.

“Alright then. Whoever they are, please patch them through…”

So if Jack wasn’t on the phone – and if he was, the Master was going to have to get creative about his plans for the Earth. But it didn’t seem terribly likely, because if Jack knew where to find him, then so did the Doctor, and there was no sanctimonious do-gooders at the door to 10 Downing Street, which meant his alibi had to be secure – then who was? One of his little team? If the Master was honest, he’d been disappointed to learn that they weren’t all running around like headless chickens without him to guide them. Or at least, he had been until he’d found out the reason why. 

Drilling the fingertips of one hand on the desk to the beat of the drums, he logged into the Archangel files with the other, bringing up some research that he’d done since taking office. There had been social niceties to observe; playing ball with the humans and their little ‘we don’t need the Doctor, we can look after our own planet thank you very much’ clubs. (Cute.)

UNIT was child’s play; he’d been misleading them for decades now, and his brand new face meant that he didn’t register on their radar at all. There was also the fact that he knew half of the staff by name, and didn’t consider the youngsters he wasn’t familiar with to be worth the time getting to know. None of them held a torch to Jo Grant, of course, and the Brigadier and Miss Shaw were both retired. 

He’d been unsure what to make of Torchwood, at first, but Harriet Jones had left lines of inquiry to begin with. Not that he’d really needed them, superb hacker that he was. But as it turned out there was no reason for him to worry; not only were they now on a much smaller scale than UNIT, they were also considerably less organized. He’d been ready to write them off immediately with some silly little wild goose chase to get rid of them before the day of his ascension, when something in the depths of their – not at all confidential, to him – personal logs had thoroughly grasped his attention.

It seemed they’d taken a page out of classic UNIT’s books, and recruited a Time Lord. And here he’d thought that they were all dead and gone, with just he and the Doctor left in their eternal waltz. There’d been obvious contenders for who else might have survived – the Rani, the Meddling Monk – but none of them were the sort to join a group like Torchwood. He’d considered whoever it was, they were playing some kind of long con; and would, as such, need to be either negotiated with or killed. The fake name and face in their records were unfamiliar but that didn’t mean anything in particular.

The ID photograph on file was of a woman of small stature, with heavy freckles and short, curly hair. Of Arab or Jewish descent, he’d decided, albeit clearly second generation, with a name like ‘Rowan Dale’. She was listed as being in her late twenties, no children or spouse, parents deceased, with an apartment not far from the centre of Cardiff. And, of course, human – but a higher level of security clearance had given him the information that it was an alias and revealed that she was a Time Lord, of course. Where a real name would go, there had been only ‘N/A’ written.

But in the security footage he’d watched – over a bowl of popcorn – they had referred to the Time Lady by name. The first time the Master heard it, he’d rewinded the feed no less than three times, in case he’d misheard one of Jack’s little humans. But no, it was clear as day. Roda. Now, that was a name he could put to an ‘old friend’ and fellow Time Lord. He’d spent some time confirming his theory, but when he got over his surprise, it was like Christmas and all the other human holidays all coming at once! Conquering planet Earth was coming with a prize at the bottom of the proverbial cereal box: the Redjay.

Ooh. He had to remember that line, when they were reunited. And if it was her on the line, then his day was about to get astronomically more interesting…

The utterly droll hold music that the government insisted on installing on his office line came to an abrupt hold, jolting the Master from his thoughts. Nobody spoke. He raised an eyebrow, catching the sound of shuffling papers and somebody muttering under their breath. Really, do I have to do everything myself…?

“Hell-o-oh?” He sang, innocuously. “Anybody there?”

“Right. Yeah.. hi.”

The speaker at the other end sounded, if anything, bored. Perhaps a little anxious. The Master rolled his eyes, trying not to let himself get too excited; they hadn’t said enough, yet, for him to recognize a particular voice from recordings, but it was obviously one of the women. Toshiko Sato, Gwen Cooper, or her.

An awkward silence followed the lackluster greeting, but in the background of it, the Master could make out what sounded suspiciously like some kind of tape recorder clicking and running. Tsk tsk, Torchwood. Phone tapping the Prime Minister… very naughty. Then, finally, the woman at the end of the line spoke again.

“This is Torchwood, calling. Am I speaking to the, uh…” There was a brief hesitation, as if the woman speaking wasn’t sure of the right term, which on top of the hint of a Gallifreyan accent being intentionally dampened, cinched it for the Master. It was the Redjay on the phone to him. How fantastically delicious that she had no idea who she was really talking to… “Prime Minister?”

The Master grinned to himself, throttling the urge to immediately give himself away. No, he had to be careful with this, play his cards right, get her right where he could snatch her. Was she invested in Jack’s team? Could he use them against her? Or were they just a means to an end, a way to lie low in the aftermath of the War? He’d have to up his monitoring of Cardiff, play nicely, and get all of his hens in a row to find out.

“The one and only!” He chuckled amicably, harmlessly. “Harold Saxon speaking. Prime Minister of The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.”

“Good, sure.”

The Redjay wasn’t generous with her responses, and the Master could clearly tell that even if she thought she was only speaking to Harold Saxon, this conversation wasn’t in her comfort zone. It made a lot of sense, of course; she probably wasn’t used to being on this side of the law, as it were. But of course she’d managed to find her way into the middle of Scooby Doo vigilantes.

“I had been hoping to hear from you sooner rather than later,” the Master prompted, putting just a little bit of impatience into his voice. Let her squirm a bit, even if it’s not the way I want her to squirm. “My predecessor mentioned you in passing,” he explained, pushing a pen around the table absentmindedly before using it to lightly rap the table, “once or twice. In passing.” Nothing like a little ego-wounding to off-foot an opponent, now, was there? “I’m sorry, but I didn’t catch your name?”

There was another pause, before the Redjay let out a little sigh. “Rowan Dale,” she replied, tone shifting to one a bit more confident. Lying came easy to her, he knew. “Acting head of Torchwood Three.”

“Acting?” The Master practically licked his lips, trying to sound concerned. “I do hope there’s no trouble I should be aware of?”

“No.” Her reply was quick – too quick. “Temporary restructuring, that’s all.”

“Of course, of course…” the Master soothed. So, if there’s no,” he lowered his voice to a conspiratorial whisper, “alien problems…”

He let the word alien hang between them, their little secret that only the two of them were in on. Torchwood and alien invasions, of course, of course! Nothing more than that. Oh, he couldn’t help himself. Perhaps she’d even get a little spike of paranoia, wondering what he knew, and what he’d do with the information, but there was no way she would ever work out the truth. It would be all the more damning when he got to reveal himself.

“To what do I owe the pleasure of your call, Miss Dale?” A beat. “Or is it Mrs?”

“Rowan is fine.”

“That didn’t answer my question,” he pointed out, casually. He could practically imagine a little twitch at the side of the Redjay’s eye, or a clenching of the jaw, before she continued.

“I am aware.”

The Master tried to put a little pout into his words. “I’m a married man, Rowan. I was merely making polite conversation.”

“And I’m a very busy woman, Prime Minister,” she quipped back, possibly through clenched teeth. “Anyway, I’m just calling to keep you abreast of any news.”

“Which is?” He asked, pleasantly.

“There is none,” she lied. “Except that Ja– Captain Harkness is on a sabbatical." Liar, liar, pants on fire! Although the Master had to agree that it was a pretty good lie, all things considered. Not easy to disprove, and sent the message that business was usual, even if it very much was not.

The Redjay hummed to herself, moving papers again.

“Also, our receptionist asked me to inform you that for the foreseeable future, any correspondence between our organization and the government will come from him.” The Master wracked his mind. Ah, yes, Ianto Jones. Jack’s little ‘boyfriend’. Good of him to step up to the plate and save the rebel Time Lady the horror of politicking. That is, if they even knew they were dealing with a criminal at all. “But that, uh, we’re anticipating a peaceful… quarter.”

Oh, Redjay… the Master had to bite his lip to stop from roaring with laughter. You don’t know how wrong you are! Plans on top of plans began to form in the Master’s mind; the icing on the cake of his intention to rule this pitiful planet. 

After all, it was already exciting enough that he would get to torment the Redjay when he ruled; on top of the Doctor, if/when he made it out of the year 100,000,000,000,000, and his two companions. He already had plans to swoop up Martha Jones’ family as bait, if he had to. Of course he had nothing in particular against them, but every good artist needed their tools, didn’t they?

But he also had the Doctor’s TARDIS installed on the Valiant and ready to be used for his conquest. If the Redjay had survived the War, presumably she had a TARDIS that he could take as well. A second one would be more than a little useful, especially one that wasn’t temporally locked like the Doctor’s currently was. Not that it would be easy to get around whatever isomorphic controls she probably had, but he’d have time to fix that.

No, this phone call that he’d anticipated to be boring at best and irritating at worst had turned out to be very inspiring indeed. To think he’d considered claiming he wasn’t in and getting them to leave a message…

“Well, that’s a relief,” he sighed, with all the gravitas of a human terribly concerned about aliens abducting him for probing experiments or tipping cows or turning the frogs gay, or whatever it was that humans thought aliens did when they weren’t strangely fixated on London. “Not that I’m not pleased to have met you, of course.”

“Of course…”

“So,” the Master twirled the phone cord around his finger giddily, leaning back in his chair. “Is that really all the news you have for me? No, oh, I don’t know, hot martian gossip? Little men from Venus making first contact?”

The Redjay mumbled something that might have been a swear word, although it sounded to the Master like she’d held the phone away from her face to do so. He smirked, especially when she replied simply, “no, Prime Minister.”

He shuddered in delight. It wasn’t Master, but it was almost as good; hearing her be so polite to him, calling him by his name. Patience. I just need to be patient, and I’ll get a taste of the real thing.

“–ve to be going, now.” The Master tipped his head, realizing that she’d kept on talking, and he’d momentarily zoned out. “Have a good day, Mr Saxon.”

“Made all the better by you, Miss Dale,” he crooned pleasantly. “Give my regards to the team.”

The Redjay hung up on him. The Master snorted, rolled his eyes, and then leaned back. He cracked his neck, put his feet up on the desk and allowed himself, finally, to laugh out loud. Oh, the day of reckoning couldn’t come soon enough…!

Chapter 12: Sacred Place

Summary:

Characters: The Redjay (6th regeneration), Toshiko Sato, Gwen Cooper
Trigger Warnings: Forest fire aftermath, mention of poaching/animal death, war mention
Author's Notes: This is loosely based on a real fire and a real tree. Despite the damage in 1903, the Shambles Oak had live upper branches until 1938, but was finally felled by a gale in 1961.

It was the year 1913. The Mona Lisa was recovered in Italy, after being stolen from the Louvre two years prior. Europe held its breath as conflicts and arms races and revolutions ignited, perched on the brink of the First World War. Woodrow Wilson was inaugurated President of the United States of America. Charlie Chaplin signed with Keystone Studios, beginning his acting career. Stainless steel was invented. And in Sherwood Forest, the Shambles Oak burned.

The Redjay had always preferred to think of it by its more historical name; Robin Hood’s Larder. It was an enormous tree in her memory — 7.3m wide, with enough space to comfortably hide twelve people inside without elbowing one another. (Slightly less successfully, when alcohol was involved.) It had sat in the middle of a small clearing, with broad-reaching branches she’d sat under in the early days of her exile, learning to make peace with her new reality (as well as how to fletch an arrow).

She had fond memories of the first time that the titular Robin had brought her to the great oak, pointing out the metal hooks that had been installed years prior in the hollow cauldron of the trunk. They had dragged a poached deer for what seemed like half the length of the forest, and Roda had spent most of the time wishing refrigeration had been properly invented. But the tree provided something that generally did the trick, allowing the outlaws in the forest to store good venison for the winter. 

It had been the first time it truly hit Roda that for all the trauma of her youth, she’d never had to worry about where her next meal came from. And so Robin’s less had thoroughly stuck, and even centuries after the last of the Merry Men left the forest the tree was a spot Roda would return to from time to time. Remembering things. Appreciating what she had, instead of mourning what she had lost.

The sight of the tree today struck her — and her philosophizing — like an arrow through the chest. 

Sherwood Forest had been her safe haven ever since her second regeneration. Before, even. The strange Time Lord of her childhood had introduced it to her when he’d guided her to Howard Pyle’s stories of Robin Hood; thus allowing her to escape into dreams of visiting it one day, when she hadn’t felt safe in Rassilon’s house. But she had first visited it when she fled Gallifrey, feeling as though she had nowhere else to go. Her childhood hero had taken her under his wing and helped her to re-find her feet, proving to be an exception to the advice to never meet your heroes.

In many ways, Roda felt like it had saved her lives. When she had found herself once again cut off from Gallifrey by an inexplicable time lock, it had been the first place she’d wanted to go. Other than, of course, where she couldn’t, and back to save…

I always wanted to take Wick here when the War was over. She shook her head, trying to imagine taking her lover to her sacred place only to see this instead. It felt like a final stark reminder that she would never take Wick anywhere again. Like that future had burned with the War, and the tree.

Roda forced herself not to take those thoughts any further. She thought they might break her, right here and right now.

She had earned Torchwood’s trust, after identifying — and helping them deal with — the nestene in the shopping centre. Or at least, she had earned enough trust to be allowed out of their basement; either because of her help, or because the Time Agent still insisted they were friends, now. (Roda… would need a bit more time with that.) Either way, she had said that she would return, albeit ‘eventually’, because running away and never returning felt too much like confessing to something. She had plugged in familiar coordinates without paying much attention to the date itself, only to step into a bad dream.

The Redjay stumbled, feeling like her legs would give out. Blindly reaching out, her palm found the rough wood of another tree, and she just barely managed to stay on her feet. The hollow of Robin Hood’s Larder was a wreck, and she couldn’t tear her eyes away from the charred mess. But she half felt as though her mind was somewhere else.

A wood burning stove or a bonfire was a pleasant smell. Earthy. Natural. Sweet, depending on the wood. Smoky, or even spicy and warm. Roda knew from personal experience that a more destructive fire was a different story. She’d witnessed homes and forests ablaze during the Time War. The smell was more foul; cloying, and strangely chemical. Tainted by whatever else had started the blaze.

She wanted to say that over the course of the War, she’d got used to the smell of fire and destruction. In a way, she had; but that didn’t mean how you felt about it ever got better.

There were no Daleks or nestene or sontaran or anything else in the forest — only the charred, twisted remains of some kind of metal, and something… red and white? But it was no different in many ways, and it made her stomach turn. The sounds and images of people screaming for their loved ones while fire blazed swam through her head, cutting her to the quick. She clenched her eyes shut, knuckles white as she leaned against the other tree, and tried to ground herself enough to put one foot in front of the other and take a closer look. It was awful, but guilt wracked her for how it hurt in a very different way to see the destruction of a place that she knew.

It took a minute before she could do anything at all. Taking a shallow breath to avoid taking in more of the lingering, acrid smoke, Roda took a knee in front of the oak tree. There was nothing cordoning it off, despite the small spread of the fire to surrounding plants, and the blackened ground. It was fresh, but not so fresh that the humans of the time considered it a danger anymore.

The metal turned out to be a kettle. It seemed older than the rest of the wreckage; had it been left there before whatever started the fire? Roda put it aside out of reach, letting her fingers stroke the burned rings on the inside of the tree. Rings upon rings. It was an old tree — had even been old when Robin used it. It still stood now, despite the destruction, but was this the beginning of its end? She knew how it felt. She was ancient and burned, too.

The red and white she’d spotted turned out to be scraps of a gingham blanket. There was charred food around it too, and glass bottles that had been blackened and partially melted. Somebody had had a picnic here, when the fire had broken out. With the kettle inside the hollow of the oak, it was easy to put two and two together and figure out what had happened. At least that meant the blaze probably hadn’t been malicious, but… Roda sighed, running one hand over her face. How could people be so careless with the world around them?

Despite her anger and hurt, she hoped that whoever had started the fire had at least made it out alive. That had to count for something. Even if it felt like they’d destroyed something sacred. Even if something beautiful was ruined. She knew that for all his fondness for the old tree, Robin would have felt the same way. ‘There’s other trees in the forest, my Red Lady,’ she could practically hear him say. ‘You can plant more trees, but you cannot grow people so painlessly.’

Robin Hood had been a cheerful, sometimes immature and immensely reckless man. But sometimes, he came out with the sagest things. Roda was glad of him, and it was true. There were other trees in the forest. There were other worlds she could find refuge in. But Robin, and Wick, and perhaps now, Torchwood – a potential new spot to call sanctuary – were more important than any place. Whoever had picnicked here probably had loved ones they’d gone home to, who felt the same way.

All the same… Roda decided to stay for a while, and mourn. It wasn’t what she’d come for, but it felt somehow like the right thing to do. A way to pay her respects. As heavy tears began to fall, she rested her forehead against the wood of Robin Hood’s Larder and let herself finally cry.

She hadn’t cried in a long time.

***

Later That Day…

“I’m sorry, Roda.”

Roda leaned on the back of Toshiko Sato’s chair, reading her computer monitor over her shoulder. Once she’d got back to the Hub, she had asked the tech-minded woman to look for records about the fire, when her own attempts to do so on her TARDIS – probably due to the fog of grief – had proved fruitless. Something of a wizard with the internet, Tosh had been able to find some old photographs and a newspaper cutting somebody had archived about the incident. There was also a page on some sort of crowdsourced website called ‘Wikipedia’ that had a few paragraphs on the history and final fate of the Shambles Oak.

Sighing, Roda rocked back on her heels, rubbing her upper arm with one hand. There was still charcoal staining her fingers and a few spots on her face, and she was aware that she smelled of burnt things. The next stop would have to be a shower, but finding out how the larder met its end had felt like the closure she needed, in the moment. The Time Lady glanced at the ceiling of the underground base, and then slumped a little, adrenaline finally beginning to flag.

“...It isn’t your fault.”

Gwen Cooper stood on Tosh’s other side, a thoughtful and sympathetic look on her face. Roda hadn’t exactly wanted her company at first, but she had to admit that the woman was not like other law enforcement that she’d met over the years. (She had said that to Ianto at one point, who had almost choked on his tea from laughing, and refused to explain what was so funny about it.) 

But Gwen was an emphatic young woman. Easy to be around, Roda supposed. She tilted her head to one side while she scrolled back up to read the part of the website that the Time Lady had glossed over, about Robin Hood’s history with the oak. Then she turned to look at Roda, a gentle expression on her face.

“Maybe it’s not our fault,” she began, cautiously. “But anyone can understand it.”

Roda raised an eyebrow, a little confused. “Sorry?”

“You know…” Gwen glanced at Tosh, prompting her to say something. The Japanese woman hesitated, pushing her mouse around the desk for a second before chipping in.

“Losing somewhere safe,” she explained. “We’ve all been there. First when you grow up, and then the day that Jack found us.” She glanced at Gwen out of the corner of her eye. “Or, vice versa.”

Gwen snorted a laugh, and rolled her eyes. “It’s not my fault you were all discussing a weevil attack out in the rain.”

“The point is,” continued Tosh, cheeks reddening slightly, “I may not know your pain. But I am sorry for your loss.”

“Yeah…” Gwen sighed, reaching out to squeeze Roda’s shoulder. The Time Lady surprised herself by letting Gwen do so, not even protesting when she was then maneuvered into a quick hug. “We’re here. If you need to talk.”

That… strikes home. Roda felt her hearts skip a beat at the realisation. Tosh and Gwen really seemed to mean it. They got it, even if they’d all lived such different lives. 

Roda looked over Gwen’s shoulder, not quite sure how to respond to any of it but feeling strangely touched. She swallowed hard and then returned the embrace for a few seconds, letting herself have it. And then she cleared her throat, relieved when Gwen freely let her step back. Roda looked at the ground, slight embarrassment washing away the worst of her blues.

“...thanks.”

“Anytime,” Tosh smiled warmly, putting her computer back into sleep mode with a few quick taps of the keyboard. She turned in her seat and then looked at Gwen. The two humans seemed to have some kind of silent conversation before Gwen nodded, and jerked her thumb towards the lift.

“So… Tosh and I go for drinks on Wednesday nights. The boys are on-call.” She rubbed the back of her neck. “Do you want to come with us? First round’s on me.”

Roda didn’t even have to think about it.

“I think I would.” She paused, and then lifted her shirt to sniff it. “Maybe after a shower, and a change of clothes.”

“I have something that might fit you in the office?” Tosh offered. Roda laughed dryly.

“No need. But thanks. My house is parked downstairs, remember?”

“Oh. Right.”

“But… maybe you could tell me more about how you got here,” Roda added, tentatively. “Torchwood, I mean. Y’know. Over drinks.”

Tosh and Gwen shared a look, and then both smiled. “Of course,” Gwen nudged Roda with her shoulder. “You’re one of us, now, aren’t you?”

Am I…? Roda couldn’t help but smile to herself, as she headed downstairs to where she’d parked; into the hollow that Torchwood had carved out in the middle of Cardiff, to make their safe place for the metaphorical winter. ‘You’re one of us, now’… the same thing that Robin Hood had said, so long ago.

Well. There were worse things to be.

Chapter 13: Insignia

Summary:

Characters: The Redjay (6th regeneration), The Master (Simm)
Trigger Warnings: Branded skin (previous), possessiveness/jealousy, manhandling, victim-blaming

“Oh! This is golden!”

Roda froze, feeling the draft of cool air on her now-exposed shoulder, where her shirt had torn. If the universe had any kindness whatsoever, the floor of the fucking ship would just swallow her up right now, and save her the inevitable ridicule and shame that was about to come.

It had begun like almost any other day on the Valiant. The Master woke up, his music came on through the speakers, and anybody else who had been able to sleep was awake, too. (Because Gallifrey forbid his subjects should get more beauty sleep than their master.) Roda had sat with her back to the wall opposite the door of her cell; counting the screws in the ceiling for the nth time, considering some new possible approach to escaping and waiting in exhausting anticipation to see if she was the punching bag of the day.

The waiting could go on for hours, or minutes. It depended on a lot of factors, only half of which Roda thought that anybody could possibly be privy to at any given time. And so for better or worse, she often found herself left alone with her thoughts, which was its own special sort of torture. For example today, she was thinking about how – if you counted the days on a standard Gallifreyan calendar – it was the anniversary of the day she had first been exiled from Gallifrey.

And so presumably, when the Master had graced her with his presence, it must have been in the forefront of her mind. Because while he had arrived with a spring in his step and his laser screwdriver tapping against the palm of his hand (no obvious plan in mind), he had somehow managed to hone in on the fact that Roda had something she didn’t want him to know about. And that? Well, that just wouldn’t do…!

There had been a skirmish. The Master had taken advantage of Roda being tired, hungry and already aching. Roda, on the other hand, had managed to get some sleep. Enough, in fact, that she’d been able to give almost as much as she got. Almost. The Master had ultimately overpowered her with a psychic lance that had off-footed her, dropping her to the ground with a hand on her head. In the fall, though, she had caught her shoulder on a piece of piping tightly clamped to the wall. The edge had turned out to be sharp enough to tear her shirt, but not break the skin – and the Master had literally stopped in his tracks when he’d seen what the rip had managed to expose.

“That’s private.”

Roda put her hand over her arm, swearing under her breath. The skin hadn’t broken, but it had scratched, and the skin where her brand was had always been sensitive. She hadn’t realised that the brace she usually wore to cover it up had moved down her arm in her sleep. (It was filthy, of course. The Master sometimes insisted on having her clothes washed – once, burned, but he’d at least brought her something old of Lucy’s instead – but usually, he just let her suffer. But up until now, she’d somehow managed to hide the strapping from him.) Without thinking she reached to yank it up, only for the Master to snatch her hand away to stop her.

Her hearts began to race in her chest – not out of fear, but out of humiliation. The Master didn’t scare her half as much as the prospect of anybody catching sight of what he was now looking at set her nerves on edge. Least of all when that somebody was somebody who would understand its significance.

“Oh, Roda, Roda, Roda…”

The Master cooed, crouching down beside her and resting his free hand far too close to the object of his fascination. He stroked her bare skin almost comfortingly as he ripped the torn fabric away from her arm for a closer look. It bared more of her skin and the shirt was now ruined, buttons skittering across the floor; but he wasn’t looking anywhere but her arm and Roda didn’t have it in her to care, anyway.

“You should know by now that nothing about you is private, to me. When you’re under my roof,” he teased – using his grip on her other arm to hold her still and put her brand front and centre between them – “you follow my rules.”

Roda grit her teeth, trying to come to terms with the fact that the more she tried to stop him looking, the more he was going to fight to do so. It wasn’t something that came to her instinctively. In fact, she would rather claw at his face until he could never lay his eyes on her again.

“You do remember I’m several thousand years older than you, right?”

“Details, details…”

The Master’s lithe fingers traced Roda’s exile brand like a blind man faced with braille for the first time. It made her shiver as he traced first the words – high treason, permanent exile – and then the more familiar Seal of Rassilon overlaying the Old High Gallifreyan circles. Even though for once, she wasn’t tied up or chained up or handcuffed – she could have torn her arm from his hold, if she really tried – Roda felt like she couldn’t move from where she’d been knocked to the ground. Shame held her in place. Shame, or the stupid, childish wish that if she sat very, very still she might disappear into thin air and go invisible.

And she knew there was no reason for the shame. She knew that what Rassilon had done to her was cruel, even by the standards of the Rassilonian Era. (The method of branding had been replaced with a tattoo, in Gallifrey’s more recent history. No less permanent, but more ‘humane’. And though she’d seen a handful of those tattoos since she’d left Gallifrey, none of them had ever  implied possession; only crime and title.) She knew that her exile was just a part of her life, after thousands of years, and not one that she had reason to feel guilty about. She had done more good than the harm she had been accused of, and she’d carved out a life for herself. 

But that little voice at the back of her mind was always there, saying ‘what if you’re wrong? What if it really is who you are? What if it really is all that you are?’

Because more than marking her as a criminal, it marked her like a child would a toy, or a farmer their cattle. It tied her to someone she never wanted to be associated with ever again. Rassilon was the only person she was relieved to imagine hadn’t survived the Time War that had wiped out their people. Whenever she caught sight of her reflection of that reminder in the mirror when changing, or the shower wall, or a still body of water…

A part of her would always wonder if she’d ever been free of him at all, or she’d just convinced herself that she was.

“Rassilon really was a bastard, wasn’t he?” If that line had come from literally anybody else, it might have seemed sympathetic. But the Master knew exactly where to stick his knives and twist them. Roda huffed angrily, because while he was right, she doubted he meant it as any kind of kindness. “Tell me,” he continued, “did this happen when he sent you away, or did he have you branded as a Tot and just add onto it when you disappointed him?”

And lo and behold, there was the knife. Even though she knew it was bait, Roda couldn’t help but react to it with a flash of anger. Because the Master knew nothing about living under Rassilon’s rule! He hadn’t been the Lord President when he was a Tot — Skaro, he hadn’t even been alive. And while Roda in turn had no idea what the Master’s family life might have been like growing up, he didn’t know what it was like to be in her boots. He didn’t know what she’d done to survive, or how desperately she had wanted to be what the bastard wanted her to be. He couldn’t possibly. He was just clutching at straws, unaware of how right he was.

“Go fuck yourself,” she growled; not caring what the repercussions might be. Thankfully, the Master seemed too hyperfocused on the brand to care. “I’m a Time Lord, not an animal.”

“You could fool me, sometimes.”

…biting the Master once or twice in the past few months didn’t count, Roda was sure.

“It’s an exile brand. I wasn’t exiled until my hundreds, you idiot.” She snorted. “Who in their right mind would do this to a child?”

“Am I supposed to believe you think Rassilon was in his right mind?” Roda opened her mouth, and then shut it again. The Master laughed bitterly. “But ooh, I really did touch a nerve, didn’t I…” His thumb lingered on the infinity-like symbol in the middle of Rassilon’s Seal, pressing down on it. “I knew what they called you, in the War.” Roda, again, said nothing. “‘Rassilon’s Exile’. You kept mum about that when we met on Peche, didn’t you. No matter — I can put two and two together and come up with four without your help. But…”

The Master let up his pressure on the brand, and fell into a contemplative silence. Pazithi Gallifreya help her, but Roda asked the obvious question before she could catch herself.

“But what?”

“But…” The Master’s teeth glinted as he rocked back on his heels and made Roda turn her head to meet his gaze. She set her jaw tight. “I’m right, aren’t I?”

Roda tchk’ed. “Are you ever?”

The Master ignored the retort.

“You actually did care about his approval. Fancy that…”

Roda’s shoulders sank. There was nothing to say to that which wouldn’t damn her more than she already was. Protest it? He’d see right through her. Confirm it? She had too much pride for that, and thought made her sick to the stomach. Tell him to shut it (again)? It was as much a confession as the last choice. Silence didn’t work, either, not really. But it was the best she had.

“When did that change?” The Master’s voice remained intimate and quiet, but he let Roda pull her face out of his grip without complaint. “Before the War? Earlier? After? Come on, Redjay, work with me here.”

“...no.”

“Oh, sometimes you’re no fun at all.” The Master shook his head with a rueful laugh. “I suppose that just means there’s more exciting secrets to unlock later. You see? We’re bonding,” he pretended to wipe a tear from his eye, “the Doctor would be so happy with us.”

Yeah, no. There was no chance of that. But Roda was steadily becoming done with stupid statements and questions. She ran a hand down her face and sighed, shuffling a foot or so back so she could lean against the wall of the small room. Idly, she counted her one blessing; chatty Master was less painfully than slappy Master, at least. He’d either get tired of this line of inquiry, or she could drag it out for a couple of hours and keep his attention on her, instead of someone else.

The prospect was tiring to think about. But… Roda sighed again. She was getting really sick of how often she had the thought ‘well, it’s better than nothing’ since arriving on the Valiant.

“Is there nothing I can do to convince you to spill more of the tea?” Roda lifted her head from her hands to shoot the Master a sardonic look. He smirked, but shrugged exaggeratedly and moved into arms reach of her again. “Can’t blame me for trying.”

“Can’t I?” Roda muttered to herself.

“Although…” The Master talked over her warningly, “Maybe there is something I can do to help you with this little mistake?” Roda looked at him cautiously, as he reached for his screwdriver once again. He’d stowed it after their earlier scuffle, and she really didn’t like where he was going with this. “Wouldn’t that make me a Good Samaritan.”

Roda growled under her breath, hating being made to feel as if the mark of her exile that had been literally forced against her was equivalent to a poorly thought out tattoo on a drunken binge. 

“Ooh, I know…” Ignoring her, the Master pressed the tip of his laser screwdriver against the brand; not turned on, but digging harshly into the skin as if he was making plans with it. An artist making laying out sketches on his canvas. “I could burn my own initials into your skin so that nobody gets the wrong idea about who owns you.” He hummed, looking at her out of the corner of his eye. “Do you think it’d be too gauche if I came up with my own logo? The Seal of the Master.”

“Nobody owns me,” Roda hissed, jerking away from him. “Not him, and certainly not you.”

The Master made a show of considering the statement, before clucking his tongue and shaking his head.

“Well, let’s think about that, shall we?” He tapped the laser against his chin. “You’re in my chains, on my ship, in the middle of my hostile takeover of the silly little planet you and the Doctor are so fond of.” He laughed to himself. “Where are we parked today? Spain? Mi planeta es mi planeta, and everything and everyone on it as well.”

“How should I know? It’s not like you tell your prisoners the flight plan of the day, is it?”

Roda had had the possessiveness argument with the Master what felt like a hundred times. It went nowhere, because the Master refused to believe anyone’s opinion but his own. 

But here and now, there was something he wasn’t considering. A fact that Roda hated herself – and which in bringing it up, she would be all but telling him she hated – but which would probably piss him off just enough that she found that right now, she didn’t actually care. After all, he’d already learned a secret she’d hoped someone like him would never find out. What else did it matter if he made some conclusions about it?

“It doesn’t really matter what you write on my skin,” she pointed out – half bitter, half smug. 

“You don’t like the seal idea, do you?” The Master sighed dramatically, missing the shift in tone. “Maybe I’ll sleep on it.”

“You do that,” snorted Roda. “But like I said – you know as well as I do that as soon as I regenerate next, it’ll all heal.” She sat up straighter and leaned in herself, am almost manic glint in her eye. “All of it, except for the exile brand.” She winked at the Master as his back stiffened “Jealous?”

The room fell silent. So silent that Roda could hear the machinery of the Valiant, her own hearts beating and the Master slowly breathing in, holding it, and then letting it go again. Without responding to her taunt he pushed himself to his feet; laser screwdriver hooked between his fingers as he clasped them behind his back and turned away from her. He began to pace, and Roda kept one eye on him, while relishing in the very rare occurrence of winning an argument in this accursed place.

She was playing a dangerous game. But if the Master was allowed to be immature and petty then she felt like she was allowed to as well. An eye for an eye. Yeah. The Doctor definitely wouldn’t be pleased with them if he found out about this conversation.

Which Roda couldn’t help but hope he wouldn’t. The Master liked to gloat, but he liked having something that the Doctor didn’t even more. She was pretty sure he wouldn’t run off to share what he’d learned with his old adversary. Her secret, ironically, was safe with him.

The silence dragged on, but the Master had stopped walking. He had been watching the cell door for a while now. Too long. He shrugged, cracked his shoulders, and looked over at Roda with a shark-tooth grin.

“Let me answer that question for you, Exile.”

Notes:

If anyone is curious, this is what Roda's exile brand looks like (albeit, not red):

Chapter 14: Organ Theft

Summary:

Characters: The Redjay (6th regeneration), Toshiko Sato, Ianto Jones, Ewan Sherman
Trigger Warnings: Cannibals, physical beating, background gore, unclean tools, brief skirmish, sexual language
Author’s Note: I’d be here forever (again) if I wrote the whole scene. So just assume that everyone gets away safely, the episode otherwise proceeds as usual, everyone gets their booster shots and Jack and Ianto get to burst heroically through the wall on the tractor together.

“Meat… has to be tenderized… first…”

Roda didn’t have to read Ianto or Tosh’s minds to be able to recognize when a plan was forming. She watched the man – Ewan, his wife had told him – run his cricket bat down the Tosh’s body and then turn on Ianto, clearly trying to decide who he was going to start with. Her two teammates shared a look as the cannibal turned to face her, and Roda tried to signal with her eyes for them not to do anything. She didn’t dare say anything out loud, in case she pissed off one of the villagers.

But her gesture was either missed, or ignored. Roda was the most recent addition to the team, she supposed. Everyone in Torchwood had been perfectly accepting and friendly, and Roda was beyond grateful to have found them. But even with this being one of the first times Ianto had joined them in the field, of course Tosh had more reason to trust him at her back than she did Roda.

Brave, stupid humans… sometimes she could really see why the Doctor had loved them so much.

Ianto threw himself at the cannibal’s back, shoulder-first, hands still bound behind his back. But as he did so, his wife – Helen – yelled out a warning. The man stumbled but recovered fast, spinning around and bringing his knee up, hard, right between Ianto’s legs. The Welshman gasped in pain, doubling over and dropping to the ground. Tosh tried to leap forward to help him, but Helen got her by the hair. There was a brief skirmish, during which Tosh looked like she wanted to step in to help. But Roda and Ianto both yelled at the same time.

“Tosh, run!”

She hesitated for just a second, before nodding grimly and obeying. Helen took off after her, shotgun in hand, while Ianto coughed and wheezed on the bloody floor. And that left Roda to protect him; there was no way on Sol-3 she was running too, and leaving her friend behind.

She had desperately wanted to step in before, but had been waiting for the right moment. Hoping that neither of them would do something rash — the irony was not lost on her — and that the three of them could put their heads together and come up with a plan. With the situation having turned so sour, so fast, this was the right moment. As Ewan crouched down in front of Ianto – forgoing his bat in favour of a cleaver that had been sat just out of their reach on top of one of the freezers – Roda stepped between the two men, lifted her chin, and raised her voice.

“Leave him alone and I’ll make it worth your while!”

Ewan froze with one hand on Ianto’s throat, his knee on her friend’s chest. Roda took a deep breath in, and out, making sure that she kept his attention on her instead.

“Don’t touch him again.”

The cannibal continued kneeling on Ianto for a second, looking at Roda less like a human, and more like some sort of predator. He sickened her. It was more like looking into the eyes of a weevil, or a macra; intelligent enough to weigh up the pros and cons of listening to her or killing her, but only in terms of his own pleasure. He was, Roda supposed — bile threatening to rise up in her throat — literally eyeing up which of them he preferred as his next meal.

And then he slowly stood up, slamming Ianto’s head against the ground as he did so. Ianto winced, looking up at the ceiling with a look in his eyes that screamed concussion. But at least he was breathing, which in Roda’s eyes, was all that mattered right now.

Standing right in front of her, Ewan towered almost a foot over her. Roda stood her ground, eyes alight with fury; she’d faced bigger bullies than this one. He leaned in close until Roda could smell his bad breath, and sneered.

“I don’t fuck my food,” he replied, lecherously. “And a scrap of meat like you?” He spat on the ground at Roda’s feet. “Even if I did, I like something I can hold.”

Roda tried not to gag.

“Touch my friend again,” she growled, “and I’ll make sure you regret it.”

Ewan roared with laughter. “How’s that, lamb? With your hands tied behind your back?” He grabbed her jaw, manhandling her to turn her face towards the chest that their guns had been locked in. “And us with all your little peashooters?” Roughly jerking her back to face him, Ewan leered again. “You’re helpless. You’ve got nothing to bargain with.”

“Alien meat.”

It slipped out of Roda’s mouth before she could think it through. As her own plan caught up with her mind, her blood began to run cold. The cannibal looked confused by the statement, his disgusting grin fading as he tipped his head to one side. 

“...what?”

Through the pain of his beating, Ianto picked up on Roda’s meaning too. She saw his eyes widen in horror out of the corner of one eye, as he tried to push himself onto his knees using his shoulder and the wall.

“Roda, don’t–”

“You said it yourself,” Roda continued, raising her voice to talk over Ianto. «Let me do this,» she thought at him as hard as she could; not liking trying to invade his surface thoughts, but with no other options to get her message across. «Please trust me.» She kept her eyes on Ewan as she spoke, though, and switched back to speaking out loud. “We’re just meat. And I bet you’ve never had alien meat before.”

Ewan snorted.  “Pull the other one, it’s got bells on it.”

Against her better judgement, Roda closed the final gap between them, so that her chest was pressed to his. She suppressed a shudder at the proximity, feeling the handle of the cleaver dig into her hip as well as his clammy skin. But it wasn’t as though her hands were free to use, and she had to make her point somehow.

“Put your hand on my chest.” The cannibal huffed again, and Roda resisted the urge to roll her eyes. “Not like that. Listen.” She steadied her breath – partial respiratory bypass – forcing herself to be more calm than she felt. “Count the heartbeats. There’s two of them.”

By now, Ianto was leaning against the wall; just about catching his breath, if more than a little worse for wear. Roda could feel his eyes on her, watching anxiously, and a little protectively. The psychic connection still faintly open, she did her best to reassure him that she knew what she was doing, even if it was only half true.

«When you get a chance – move.» Ianto’s eyes widened. Once he got over the surprise, he gave a sharp shake of his head. Roda reinforced the thought with as pleading a tone as she could manage. «You’re not abandoning me. Find Tosh, the others. Get Jack. Get help.»

A cold hand between her breasts shocked Roda out of focusing on the telepathy. She hissed in a surprised breath as Ewan placed his palm against her sternum, flinching just enough to make him laugh under his breath. But his attention was on her heartbeat, counting the double beat.

Roda watched his expression change from assuming she was lying, to confusion, to disbelief. Would he believe her? Would he think it was some kind of heart condition? What else could she do to convince him of the truth…?

“Well, fuck me,” he grumbled to himself. “S’one fucked up heart.”

“Hearts,” she insisted, uncomfortably.

“Could just be a ‘condition’,” Ewan pointed out.

Roda let out a tense breath. “Ribs.” She breathed in, trying not to think about meat. “Twenty six. Two more than you have.” The cannibal grabbed her sides, running his fingers down and counting  under his breath.

If I get out of this, Roda thought, grimly, thank Gallifrey for retcon. Because revealing what she was was very, very stupid. Stupid, but necessary.

Maybe Ianto and Tosh weren’t the only – hopefully brave – fools in the room after all.

“And if that isn’t enough, check my blood…”

“What is it,” the cannibal scoffed. “Fucking green?”

“...Orange-y.”

Roda half-turned, even if every instinct screamed at her not to turn her back on the man. She wanted to give him a better angle to make a light cut on her arm – something that wouldn’t bleed too much, aware that inviting a cannibal to make her bleed was pretty much asking for trouble – but he reacted by roughly grabbing her and shoving her against the wall. Roda cringed as her face hit stone and the plastic sheeting put up to keep their house clean, and hoped that this wasn’t all leading up to a knife between her extra ribs.

“If you don’t believe me, make a cut,” she half taunted, wiggling her bound hands. “Check it for yourself.”

It had the desired effect. The man was practically licking his lips, now. He might not believe her, but he was willing to test her words, at least. Or, eager to hurt her.

His cleaver was cold against her palm, far from properly sharpened. Roda couldn’t help but gasp as the tip dug into her forearm, and he sliced a long, shallow line halfway up to her elbow. She could feel warm blood beading on her skin, drizzling down towards her hands. Skaro, Karn and Mondas, she swore internally. This better not give me tetanus. 

Ewan caught the blood on his fingertips. Roda heard him sniff, and then lick it from his hand. She shuddered, closing her eyes and letting herself feel all the fear she was biting down, just for a second. The cannibal let out a disgusting, satisfied sigh. Roda couldn’t hear anything but her own hearts and his snuffling, but she really, really hoped that Ianto knew a good opportunity when he saw one. If he didn’t slip away to get help now, then he had no chance at all.

Dirty hands gripped her hair, stopping her from moving away from the wall. The monster practically purred in her ear, now.

“I’m gonna take my time carving you up…” He promised, voice low.

“Let my friends go, and I won’t fight back.”

“Maybe I want a little fight,” he chuckled. “Just a little, mind. When you run, the meat gets less tender.”

He pressed his nose to her neck, and took a deep breath that made Roda want to scream. With difficulty, she kept her mouth shut. “What’s the best cut of alien meat? Should I start with those hearts? Fry up your liver all special?”

The cleaver dug into her other arm, and Roda gasped in surprise. “Or should I just bleed you dry in front of your pretty little human boyfriend, before I kill him too?”

“I said take me inst–”

“Yeah, yeah… so fucking saintly. Problem is…”

Ewan snapped his teeth behind Roda’s neck, making her startle, and the blade cut even deeper. She turned her head to the side to get away from him, and could have sobbed with relief to see that Ianto wasn’t where she’d left him.

He’d got away. Help was coming.

“I never said I agreed.”

Oh, he’d be furious when he realised he’d been honey-potted– sort of. Roda swallowed hard. In the scheme of things, it was easy to just finally give in to the instinct to let her fear show, and play the terrified prey. The only person who’d see her shiver probably wouldn’t survive the night, once Jack got here. Forget retcon for him; she’d want to forget this day herself, and she wanted him dead, where he couldn’t hurt anybody else ever again…

“Human meat, alien meat…” The cannibal sighed. “You just gotta love a good, varied diet.”

Chapter 15: “You can take a break, if you just tell me that it hurts.”

Summary:

Characters: The Redjay Rodageitarynxmososa (1st regeneration), Jack Harkness Javik Thain
Trigger Warnings: Torture, interrogation, restraints, begging, gaslighting
Author’s Note: A missing scene from somewhere in the middle of the Redjay’s origin story. Featuring a familiar Time Agent who hasn’t taken a familiar alias, yet.

“I could do with a break. How about you?”

Rodageitarynxmososa vel Prydonus – who had never been called anything but that, except by people shortening her name, and who had definitely never been called anything as ridiculous as ‘the Redjay’ – felt ready to cry. She was tired, she was in pain, and she was scared. Scared and angry. If it weren’t for whoever in Gallifrey’s name ‘the Redjay’ was not turning up to face the music, she wouldn’t be living this nightmare.

The Time Agent who had arrested her and was interrogating her, on the other hand, seemed utterly unbothered by the last hour of… work. Because that had to be it, wasn’t it? This was just work for him, not the personal vendetta that it felt like to the young Time Lady. Torturing someone for answers and information was probably just an average day in the office for him. The only indication that he was as in need of a break as he was making out with a bead of sweat on his temple, and Roda was pretty sure that could be put down to the hot lamp overhead, more than exertion.

But, a break from the pain was a break from the pain. She forced herself to be grateful, and attempt to collect her thoughts, but a louder voice in her head really did just want to break down and start sobbing. Would it do anything? Would it convince him I’m innocent? Nothing had, yet. It was getting hard to believe he was as good an interrogator as he’d claimed to be, if he couldn’t tell when she was genuinely not lying.

She had no idea about the charges he’d thrown at her feet, nor where the data stick in her bag had come from – or for that matter, who had planted it – and she had not returned to the scene of any crime that she had committed because to the best of her knowledge, she had not committed any crimes at all! Did he truly believe she was that good of a liar? Yes, she had been raised by a politician, but Lord Rassilon wasn’t like that.

It felt as if he was determined to put the pieces of two jigsaws together, even if they didn’t fit; what he knew ‘the Redjay’ had done, and what she had done. But they couldn’t, and they wouldn’t, and Roda was beginning to feel like the attempt was going to kill her.

She lifted her head from her chest when the Time Agent spoke, looking for some kind of tell in his expression. He almost looked as if he pitied her, standing as he was with a hand through his hair, head tilted to one side. But she could see his taser still in his free hand, and she was practically still fizzing from its shock. If it was pity, it didn’t mean anything.

“I… I do,” she replied, throat hoarse and her words cautious. “Please.” Was it a trap? She really couldn’t tell anymore. Swallowing hard, the Time Lady did her best to sound less nervous than she felt; the point ruined a bit by stammering. “Wh-what’s the catch?”

The Time Agent moved to lean over her again, one arm outstretched against the metal back of the chair she was bound to. Roda flinched, and he let out a long huff of breath as he watched her closely.

“No catch,” he said, finally. There was still a bite to his tone, but it was almost gentler. “We can take a break, if you just tell me that it hurts.”

For what felt like an eternity, Roda was lost for words. ‘We can take a break, if you just tell me that it hurts.’ In what galaxy was that not a catch? What did he mean?

Of course it hurt. Sweat stuck her clothes to her skin, making the curls in her hair that weren’t glued to her face frizzy and out of control. She could smell burned fabric, where the taser had singed her clothes in places, and she felt like she’d spent an afternoon trying to wrestle a vortisaur on steroids; his fists had left bruises all over her torso. Her lip was split, too, where she’d accidentally bit down on it and drawn blood a half hour ago. It didn’t sting half as much, but the taste of salt in her mouth was just making her thirsty on top of everything else.

“Can I… have a drink?” Roda asked, cautiously. The Time Agent seemed to consider it for a moment, staring at her lips, and then shook his head.

“Not without our arrangement.”

Roda winced again, anger temporarily flaring up. “You’re a sadist!” she accused, disbelievingly. “Don’t – don’t I have rights? The CIA–”

“I told you already,” the Time Agent sighed, patting her condescendingly on the cheek. “All those little rules about extradition and cooperation don’t count for shit if I get a confession. I’m not a sadist – but if you like, I can call a friend who is.” The colour must have drained from Roda’s face, because he shook his head and laughed mirthlessly. “Thought not. Like I said before: I’m just the guy that they call when they need someone who can resist a pretty face.” 

Roda felt tears well up in her eyes. “But I – I’ve told you! I’m not who you think I am. I’ve done nothing to you!” Exhausted as she was, she could even feel his fifty-first century pheromones starting to get to her. “And — and I’m not flirting?”

“Cute. Usually? Love the virgin act. But, I am very meticulous at my job.” The agent’s hand turned, the back of his fingers stroking her face where he’d just been patting it. “We already know it was you, Redjay. This new, innocent little face doesn’t change that..”

“It isn’t a new face!” Roda insisted, desperately. “This is the only one I’ve ever–!”

She cried out in pain as the Time Agent backhanded her. Her head snapped to the side, her eyes widening in shock. It was all that she could do to remember to breathe; her hands gripping the arms of the chair like claws, as her sanity struggled to catch up with the situation. Roda could tell, dimly, that the tears that had been threatening to fall all this time were not rolling down her cheeks with abandon.

As she tried to get her breathing under control she realised the sound of whimpering had come from her. Her cheeks turned red with embarrassment as well as pain, but she couldn’t bring herself to move. The Time Agent put his warm hand in her hair, and she still couldn’t move.

“Y–you said we could take a break…” she whispered through tears, eyes tightly shut. She heard the Time Agent sigh to himself.

“I did,” he soothed; jumping from charming to angry and back to kind too fast for her to keep up. “But you’ve still not kept up your half of the bargain – just lied and called me names.”

“It hurts!” Roda forced herself to move her head, to look at him again. The words felt torn from her throat, but she couldn’t help it. She had no pride left. “It – it fucking hurts! I’m begging you, please believe me, please stop it!” Doe eyes looking up at her tormentor, she spread her palms as much as she could and just begged. “Please, you bastard. It hurts. I just want to go home.”

Rassilon would be furious with her. But whatever happened, it had to be better than this.

“What hurts is my feelings,” the agent sighed. “All my hard work, and we’re getting nowhere.”

“B-but…”

“So, I’m going to give you one more choice. Tell me you’re sorry for lying, and I’ll get you a drink.”

Roda looked at him through the tears, reminded of just how dry her mouth was — made worse by arguing. She begged with her eyes, but she was starting to learn not to interrupt him, yet. Not when there was more to come; he’d mentioned a choice.

“Nice, cool… soothing, right? Or…” The Time Agent pouted. “You can keep insisting you’re innocent, and I’ll find my second wind with this baby.” He patted his stowed taser, making Roda’s hearts pound in her chest. “Your choice.”

Roda didn’t know what to do. She was innocent; if she chose not to say it now, given the choice, would it come back to bite her later? Not, she thought to herself, that the truth has meant shit so far. But she was swiftly approaching the precipice of panic again, and the idea of more and prolonged pain — not to mention what would happen if she was actually charged — stilled her tongue.

On the other hand… she both was, and wasn’t sorry. She didn’t give a damn that the Time Agent’s feelings were hurt, except that when she didn’t give him what he wanted, he hurt her. Apologizing sounded like the path to the promised break — and after a drink and a rest, maybe she’d come up with an idea? — but it came with ‘admitting’ she was lying. Which she had been frantically trying to explain that she wasn’t. 

She was damned if she did, and damned if she didn’t. Roda knew it; he knew it. The illusion of choice was somehow far worse than she could ever have imagined.

And so, she let her head drop to her chest. The crying began to turn into quiet sobs, which as the minutes dragged on became hiccups. Embarrassed, confused and scared, she ‘chose’ to take either option by just shutting her mouth. As much as she wanted to beg and barter, she just… couldn’t bring herself to choose wrong.

“Fair enough.” The Time Agent made a noise that almost sounded like respect. Roda might have appreciated that, a few hours ago. But not right now. “Guess that means we’re going for longer after all.” He put a hand under her chin, making her peel her eyes open to look at him.

“Don’t say I didn’t give you a chance.”

Chapter 16: Permanent Marker

Summary:

Characters: The Redjay (8th regeneration), Owen Harper
Trigger Warnings: Field medicine, alien parasite, improvised tools, strong language, description of gore (think: John Hurt in ‘Alien’)

Notes:

Okay, so I guess we're into Whumpvember now.

“Fuck. Did it—?”

“Yeah. Get it out.”

Dr Owen Harper — and that was a real doctor, despite what Gwen or anybody else said, thanks — had seen a lot of bullshit since joining Torchwood. Honestly, more bullshit than one person should have had to see in a lifetime. Picture an amount of alien bollocks, and times that by three, and you came close to the kind of shit he had seen in Cardiff alone. And then there were the stories from Jack and Roda, the stuff in Torchwood’s files from the years before he joined the organization, and the cliffnotes of the true story about 2007 that the team had been given; starting with ‘who the fuck is this woman claiming to be Roda and why is her whole body different?’ 

Yeah: it was a fucking lot.

‘Regeneration’ was a whole different alien fuckery that as a doctor, he was both fascinated and horrified by. He’d joked about biopsying Roda’s cells once. Once. Obviously joking. And she had given him such a withering warning glare that he was surprised she hadn’t actually stabbed him, so he hadn’t brought it up again. Right about now, though, he was beginning to reassess his decision to drop the question of Time Lord biology. 

Roda had always been fairly open when the basis was need-to-know, he supposed. She clearly had her reasons for privacy, and didn’t they all have secrets, in Torchwood? He could respect that. And Jack knew some shit the rest of them didn’t, and there had never been an incident even when missions got particularly gnarly.

The whole… fatal-in-a-given-sense-of-the-word aspirin poisoning during a reversed paradox aside. But seeing as he’d been dead in the Himalayas when that happened, Owen felt pretty absolved of blame there.

But now he needed to know more than he already knew and more than he imagined she could tell him without diagnostics tools. So when they made it back to the Hub, you bet he was pulling doctor’s rank and making her undergo a proper medical.

Owen sucked in a breath through his teeth, and crouched down in front of where Roda sat on the floor. There was a dead alien — kind of like a weird woodlouse, if woodlice were the size of very fat housecats — on the ground beside them, riddled with bullet holes. But what Owen was worried about was the extended claspers and mouth… thing. (Proboscis? Something like that.) They had a couple of pretty gross bodies in the morgue that told him what that thing could do, and he really didn’t want the next body to be Roda’s. He didn’t think you could regenerate with half your torso gone.

“I don’t have my first aid kit on me right now,” he confessed, grimly. He had, when the night had begun. The giant louse’s mate had ripped it to shreds (it was dead now, too) and even if he had been able to salvage some, none of it was remotely sterile enough to use.

Roda swore, pressing the ball of both thumbs into her eye sockets. “Fucking… I really don’t care how, Owen, but get this parasite out of me before it kills me!” She moved her hands, tugging the torn tails of her plaid shirt out of the way to expose her midriff. There was a puncture wound where her…

Owen frowned, and blinked.

“You haven’t got a belly button?”

Roda swore quickly, under her breath. “No umbilical cord.”

Despite the gravity of the situation, Owen’s thoughts went into overdrive. He had so many questions. How had he never noticed it before? Why didn’t she have a belly button? Were Time Lords mammals? She’d seemed to have every other indicator that she was one, but now he was second-guessing himself. Did her planet – Gallifrey? It always made him think of Ireland – have mammals, or was that just Earth taxonomy? Was Roda hatched from an egg, if she had no umbilical cord?

Owen forced himself to focus on the task at hand, with immense difficulty. Right. Every other victim had had some kind of an entry point, which had hid the parasite until it was too late. Why had it chosen Roda, if there wasn’t one? Had it got desperate because they’d killed its mate? And what did that mean for her survival rate? 

Not, he thought grimly, that they had managed to save anybody yet. Owen was determined to change that.

“So where did the bug—?”

“I don’t know!” She threw one hand in the air, clearly exasperated; which, Owen supposed, was reasonable enough for somebody who had just been impaled. “Can we talk about Time Lord reproduction later?”

Owen nodded, storing the information away for later.

“Alright. Fuck. Fuck!” He swore, hitting himself on the head while he thought, before glancing at Roda. “Do you have anything sharp?”

She hesitated for just a second, before reaching for her toolbelt. “Laser box-cutter?”

…good enough. “That’ll do it. Cauterize while it cuts, too.” He began rifling through pouches and loops on the belt. “Scanner?”

Roda looked at him like he had two heads. “Are you kidding me? Who do you think I am, Batman?!”

“Hey,” he held up his hands in a peace gesture. “Twelve months ago you didn’t know who that was, so – kudos. Second, how the hell should I know what an intergalactic ex-thief keeps in her pockets?” Owen shrugged. “Could be standard fare on Venus.”

“Not from Venus,” Roda responded through clenched teeth.

“You know what I mean!”

“And no – I don’t carry a portable x-ray machine!”

“Calm down,” Owen said soothingly, finding some alcohol wipes in one of his pockets, as well as a sharpie, some gloves and a sandwich bag. Roda’s tools, on the other hand, seemed more geared towards breaking and entering, but Owen still laid out some kind of forceps that might come in handy, on top of the shirt that Roda had by now completely stripped off. It wouldn’t keep everything perfectly clean, but it was better than nothing. “I’ll work something out.”

“You stay calm when there’s an alien parasite gestating in your abdomen!”

“Roda.”

Owen grabbed one of her hands as he worked, forcing Roda to look at him. His voice was stern, but not unkind. He just had to cut through her panic. (The parasite had to be really freaking her out, he noted absently. He’d seen her keep her cool about things he would consider much fuckier than this, like the time with that village up in the hills… he shuddered at the memory, tamping it down until the crisis was averted.) Squeezing her hand, he only let go when he saw Roda take in a sharp breath, and then slowly exhale it and look at him more softly.

“Shut up and let me think.”

“Fine…”

She was still clearly unsettled, but at least she’d fallen quiet. Owen gave her his best bedside manner grin, before uncapping the sharpie with his teeth and holding it out for her to take.

“Alright. Good girl.” If Roda blushed at that then, well, Owen could be smug and read into it later. Later. “I’m gonna need you to show me where your internal organs are.” Roda hesitantly took the sharpie, glancing at her own freckled midriff. “I don’t want to risk nicking the wrong thing with a tool I’ve never fucking used.”

“...is this a bad time to tell you Gallifreyan Physiology was a couple thousand years ago?”

“Jesus, Roda.” Owen couldn’t help but let out a sharp laugh, even if he was focusing on calibrating her box-cutter. “You don’t look a day over three hundred.” She shot him a look, but the joke seemed to ease some of the stress. “Do you remember enough?”

Roda thought about it for a second, and then sighed to herself. “Pretty sure.”

“Guess ‘pretty sure’ is gonna have to be ‘pretty good enough’,” Owen smirked, continuing to try and lighten the mood a little bit despite his own discomfort. Damn it, he was really going to have to get Roda to sit down and let him do a proper physical. He had been nagging Jack about it for months now.

Still, Roda also knew perfectly well what was at stake. Owen helped her sit up properly – ignoring the way she tried to insist that she didn’t need his help – and then watched as she squinted at her torso. She pulled the cap off the sharpie with her teeth, leaving teeth mark in it as she bit down and began to make markings. A circle around the entry wound (Owen neglected to point out that was the one thing he was certain about), followed by a large ring that she explained was her reproductive organs. Good. Similar enough to a human, then.

She had him run his hands up her sides, then, and he helped draw lines about level with her extra ribs. And – extra ribs? He shook his head, commenting sarcastically that this was ‘exactly the kind of thing I’m supposed to already know about, as your doctor’. She’d thumped him and made a comment about already knowing one annoying doctor and not needing another. Presumably the same mysterious man Jack complained about, then, who they’d both told him a little bit about after the Prime Minister had shot President Winters (and turned out to be an alien whose son they sometimes babysat in the Hub).

Satisfied with the anatomy lesson on her torso Roda finally let her head drop to rest against the side of the alleyway. Owen came back from triple-checking that they weren’t about to be interrupted by a bunch of drunk girlies on the way home from the club, and pulled on fresh gloves. He thumbed the dial on the tool Roda had given him to work with, trying to get a feel for the weight of it and how strong the vibration was. 

“Really wish I could test how well this thing cuts before I point it at you,” he muttered. Roda grimaced.

“Well, it cuts metal,” she pointed out. Owen snorted.

“Right. So, gentle cuts, then?”

“Unless the parasite’s already killing me,” Roda quipped. “In which case, y’know, be as rough as you want!”

Owen’s lips curled up in a smirk as he crouched down in front of his co-worker and primed the tool.

“Careful, Roda. A man could get ideas with an offer like that.”

“Oh, shut up…” Roda scrunched her eyes shut, looking away with all the gravitas of someone who didn’t want to see the needle go in during a vaccination. If only it was as simple as that… “You’re as bad as Jack.”

“Nobody is as bad as Jack.” Owen rolled his eyes. “But lucky for you, I’m a much better doctor than he is.”

Something passed across Roda’s face. A proper grimace; not to do with the alien bug? Owen barely noticed it as he made the first cut, but stored it away under ‘things from their past that neither of them talk about’. He had a feeling that it had something to do with Jack, and that he didn’t really want to know what it was about, either…

Roda hissed in pain as the laser-like blade cut into her flesh. Her nose scrunched up at the smell of burned flesh mingling with the blood, and Owen did his best not to let it bother him, either. He could see Roda biting down on the collar of her flannel shirt, presumably to keep from making any more noise. He made a soothing hum in the back of his thumb, mumbling nothing in particular as he carefully worked around the instructions she’d sharpied onto her gut.

This, he thought grumpily, is definitely going somewhere in my top five least favourite surgeries. Once they got back to the Hub he’d clean her up properly, but first things first he had to make sure she made it that long and that the alien did not. Nicking the wrong thing because he didn’t know that it was there was not high on his list of priorities. 

Roda made a high-pitched noise of pain, as Owen was forced to cut deeper into the flesh of her torso. The doctor hesitated for a moment, giving her an apologetic look in return for the barely-concealed death glare she was giving him. Right, then… that wasn’t even the worst of it. There was already a lot of blood, and much more work to do. And so as he prepared for the next slice, he dug deep for the most casual, cheerful voice he could muster.

“So, are you hoping for a boy, or a girl?” 

Chapter 17: Internal Bleeding

Summary:

Characters: The Redjay Rohan (9th regeneration), Deborah Baxton
Trigger Warnings: Beating, internal injuries, blood and bruises, ableism, talk of occupation/racism

Notes:

Deborah Baxton (and all other OCs mentioned in this story) belong to delicatelyglitterywriter. This story is also set a long while after this story, so is very late in Roda's life.

“Machi, Rohan, what happened…?!”

The Time Lord formerly known as the Redjay – now answering, for the most part, to the name of Rohan – did not yet speak any of the myriad languages of the planet Viridis. He hadn’t been there long enough to pick up more than a handful of phrases and customs, and had been putting off updating the translation matrix on his TARDIS… But even without knowing the exact word that Deborah Baxton had just used at the sight of him, he was fairly certain it was in the category of words that she wouldn’t have used in front of her children. Guess that’s one more for the phrasebook, then…

Still, he’d have rather not learned it in this particular context. He felt as if he’d gone toe to toe with the biggest, meanest fucker at a wrestling match, and been returned to the bench beaten to some kind of pulp. In fact when he thought about it, he was pretty sure that he’d had a higher threshold for pain in previous regenerations? Surely he hadn’t let himself go in the centuries of self-imposed exile on top of literal exile? It wasn’t as if he hadn’t been busy in those years, and while he’d made sure that his past self was the one to suffer most of the consequences, it hadn’t been a walk in the park for him either. He’d taken a beating for his first regeneration, at the hands of someone who he now loved more than anybody in the world; he’d been in fights because his second regeneration didn’t have the reflexes yet to know that she was being followed; and that was just the tip of the iceberg.

He hadn’t expected that framing himself would be such a painful endeavour. 

Today, though, had not gone to any kind of plan whatsoever. In fact, it had gone the complete opposite of ‘to plan’ and he was just relieved that he’d managed to scrape his way out of the encounter without anybody checking his biodata or counting how many hearts he had. (He would, on the other hand, have to go back and make sure of that later. He couldn’t ruin hundreds of years of work by getting clumsy at the eleventh hour. But hacking and deleting antique Gallifreyan files wasn’t exactly a difficult skill for a thief with his particular skillset and background.) Luckily – for the broader plan – he had been mistaken for Viridisian. Unluckily, it had allowed him to learn firsthand exactly how some people were abusing their position of power.

Not, of course, that an invasion itself was anything other than an abuse of power. Rohan had been horrified to learn about the planet of Viridis, and what the Time Lords had done to it. It may have been after his time, but it wasn’t as though he hadn’t kept up with what had gone on back home, while in exile. How had he not heard about a President invading and colonizing other planets?! No, not a President – an Imperiatrix.

Which was even stranger; he’d never heard of anybody calling themselves that, after Rassilon’s rule. It was a term even older than he was. But strangest of all was the fact that even if the history books had deemed Viridis not important enough to record as part of Gallifrey’s history (which was not, in and of itself, that surprising) there had been nothing at all about a President Pandora, a Lady Pandora, an Imperiatrix Pandora, or in fact the incumbent President of this era of Gallifrey’s history anywhere at all. Not in books, not in curriculum, and not even in the Matrix.

Naturally, Rohan had been intrigued enough to find out the answers for himself. After all, that was part of the whole ‘mission’ that he had faked his death in order to complete. He had to both self-fulfill his own history, and dig through the rubble of the injustices that Gallifrey did not want the rest of the universe to know.

There had been… a lot of rubble. A lot of things that in a way, he almost wished he did not now know. But he did. And he would bring them to light, eventually. The watch that he always carried on his person burned a persistent hole in his pocket, waiting for the day that it would be sent to the person it was programmed to reach, and the day that Rohan would be able to return.

Right now, though… the Time Lord grunted, doing his best to shoot Nex Deborah the most reassuring and charming smile that he could manage, even though he was relatively certain that he looked about as bad as he felt. He took a step forward, gesturing with his chin to ask if he was allowed to come inside. She hurriedly moved to let him pass, but he didn’t miss her looking left and right down the street. Probably wants to make sure I wasn’t followed. Pretty sure I wasn’t. 99.9%. 

As he moved though, a knot in his side sent shooting pains up his side, and it was all that he could do to stumble into the doorframe before he hit the ground, his other hand pressed to a nasty bruise he was already sure was forming on his abdomen. Deborah moved lightning quick, slinging his arm around her shoulder and taking his weight, kicking the door shut behind them. She led him to the couch, turning on a bigger light than the lamp she had had lit before and laying him out with a worried tsk.

“Were you followed?” She asked, in a low voice. Rohan shook his head.

“No, Nex,” he grinned as best he could, even though one eye was half-closed. Of all the days not to have my Stattenheim remote on me… he chastised himself. Or even Jack’s vortex manipulator. I could have been back on my TARDIS without worrying anybody or having to walk back from the town at night. “Haven’t you heard? I’m very sneaky.”

“Yes…” Deborah shook her head with a sigh, although Rohan didn’t miss the way her shoulders sagged with relief. “Liliana keeps insisting you can sneak into our bedrooms at night and ‘put things in our minds’.”

“I don’t,” Rohan reassured, hastily.

Deborah gave him a sharp but gentle rap across the back of the head. “Of course not, dear. I’d have killed you by now if you were.”

“I wouldn’t…” Rohan coughed, wiping a smudge of blood on the side of his thigh. “... have it any other way…”

“I’ve told you a hundred times, just call me Deb.”

“Just… one hundred more times until I get it, Nex Deborah.”

The Viridisian ran a hand through her hair, her eyes glancing at the blood he had just coughed up. Rohan watched as her expression shifted from one of fond irritation, back to the earlier concern, and then into the face of a woman who could lead a rebellion. She gestured for Rohan not to try and sit up from the couch again, and disappeared into another room to ‘get some things’. Rohan didn’t need telling twice. He laid on his back and stared up at the ceiling, wishing that there was a good way to lie down that didn’t make some bruise or another ache. A part of him wanted to fidget until he got comfortable, while another part just wanted to lie still for the next two hundred years or so and feel sorry for himself.

Thankfully, his arrival didn’t seem to have woken the children. He remembered vaguely that Deborah had said Oreander was spending the night? He heard footsteps, and cracked one eye open to watch the mother hurry upstairs. Doors creaked slowly open and shut; ah. She’s checking, as well. When the Viridisian came back downstairs she had a first aid kit in her hands as well as a towel and shirt that looked too big to be one of hers or one of the children’s. She knelt on the ground beside Rohan, ignoring his insistence that he shouldn’t be the only one in a chair, and reached for the hem of his shirt.

“Can I take this off?” She asked.

Unaccustomed to people other than Jack and the Seeker being so gentle – and certainly unfamiliar with the kindness, in his years of absence – Rohan gave a small nod. Deborah began to undo the few buttons at his collar, before moving him just enough to pull the tunic over his head. When she saw his bared chest, she hissed in a sharp breath and said that same word again. Machi, or something. The probably-a-swear.

“What happened?”

Deborah repeated the question she’d greeted Rohan with, fingers gently exploring the map of bruises and cuts marking his body. There were older scars as well – he had been sparing his regenerative energy for emergencies, letting things scar instead of fully heal – and the only bit of skin still covered was the upper arm and shoulder covered by his black leather brace that covered his brand. The whole canvas of his skin, though, was nasty shades of black and blue; some just splotches of pain, while others more clearly came from boots, fists and batons. Feeling like both the biggest idiot on the planet – and also like he was some kind of hypocrite or arsehole in coming to Deborah for help – Rohan glanced at the ceiling again before mumbling his answer.

“Got on the wrong side of a checkpoint,” he replied; trying to sound calm about it, and not like someone who was well aware that this was the lived experience of anyone on this planet at any given time, and that he was the same species as the colonizers who did it. “I didn’t have my identification papers.”

Deborah paused, squinting at him with evident confusion.

“But you’re a Time Lord.”

“I…” Rohan swallowed hard, and coughed up more blood. He looked at it woozily, and then sighed again. “I told you. I’m… in hiding.”

“But you could have given a false name.”

He shook his head, expression sterner for a moment.

“No, I – more ‘in hiding’ than you’re thinking. And besides,” Rohan did his best to change the subject. The less the Baxtons or the Letils or anybody else in Aralas knew about him, the better. If they didn’t know anything, then they couldn’t be interrogated or tortured for answers that they would be unable to give. Ideally, there would be no finger of suspicion pointed at them anyway, but damned if he was going to bring further hell to their doorstep if he could help it. And it didn’t benefit him much, either. “I still wouldn’t have papers.”

Deborah stopped long enough to drop the cloth she had been using to clean up the blood on Rohan’s chest back into a small, sterile metal tray. She pinched the bridge of her nose, and then gave him the kind of disapproving look that she gave her children when they started trouble at school. Rohan felt not like a Time Lord who was thousands of years old but a child again, and bit his lip while waiting to see what she said. 

(Was this what it was like, to have a proper parent? One whose disapproval came from worry, and not because of disappointment?)

“They wouldn’t have done this to you if they knew you were a Time Lord.”

“...I know,” Rohan said, softly.

It wasn’t a truth he wanted to admit to; it felt shameful. Knowing that his people were capable of such cruelty towards other people just because they were a different species, or a culture that they’d decided was ‘lesser’. He had come to grips with his own privileged position in the universe over the years he’d been alive, and the ways that even as an exile, he still had more than so many other people. It was the reason that he had done what he did up to this regeneration, and why he was doing what he was doing now. Why he wanted to right every wrong he came across, but especially ones perpetuated by Gallifrey…

But on the other hand, there was so much about his planet that he still loved. And though there had been exceptionally cruel people in his childhood, and he knew Time Lords personally who were capable of horrific things in the name of survival or even just for fun, this wasn’t something that the Time Lords of his childhood would have done. Or at least, he hoped that it wasn’t. He wanted dearly to believe that they would have found the mistreatment of Viridisians abhorrent, and he knew that many of them would have. Gallifreyans, yes, but also Time Lords.

During the War…? When he had last been home? It was… complicated. Complicated in a way that made the physical pain in his chest worse. Rohan did his best to bottle it down again for now, because – yeah, that physical pain was starting to get worse.

“I didn’t correct them,” Rohan explained, as Deborah began checking him over for injuries that the blood had hidden. She gently pressed on bruises and scrapes, looking to see what was more than skin deep. Sometimes he winced despite himself, and she stopped, taking some strong-smelling cream out of her first aid kit and gently rubbing it in as Rohan continued his story. “I tried to keep my head down, but my accent is too…” He waved a hand. It was hard to explain. “They thought it was funny how broken my Vasi’ala was.”

He told the story as gently as he could, but it angered him almost as much as the beating had hurt. They had called him an idiot – in far less polite words – and demanded that he speak Gallifreyan. He had been slapped for his troubles when he had tried to speak Vasi’ala again, and then kicked when he went down, and then against his better judgement he had lost his temper and snapped out a particularly impolite sentence that he had seen Oreander get told off by his uncle for using. That was when the two soldiers had really let loose.

A few minutes into the insults and the beatings, he had tried to switch to Gallifreyan. But it was difficult to defend himself from blows from two men stronger than he was, and adopt an accent, and remember to speak a more modern Gallifreyan than the one he had grown up speaking. It had only made them laugh more to hear him say words in a way that was archaic even for this period of Gallifrey’s history; or conversely, unfamiliar from their roots in modern Gallifreyan that hadn’t yet developed. Saying nothing at all had proven to be just as fruitless as either language, and by the time he’d been left to lick his wounds when their superior told them to get back to work, Rohan had been forced to put all of his efforts into self-defence.

Somewhere in the middle of the fight, he’d been kicked especially hard, a little under the ribs. It had made him see stars and he had almost thrown up from the pain. Around that point, he hadn’t been able to fight back, even if he’d wanted to. (Which he did not; he couldn’t risk the chance of being thrown in prison, or properly processed, or being recognized by anyone as staying with the Baxtons.) That spot on his stomach hurt more than the rest, and when he stopped talking to catch his breath and Deborah gently pressed down on the horrible purpling bruise there, he almost went through the ceiling.

Later on, he’d be surprised he hadn’t woken the children. He knew he’d sworn so colourfully that it would have made any of his Academy tutors blush. Deborah struggled to hold him down as he gasped in pain, instinctively wanting to get as far away from the pressure on the injury as he could. A part of him remembered that she was trying to help. Another part was screaming that if something hurt that much, then something was very wrong, and they needed to get away and get somewhere safe and alone and away from anybody else and–!

“Rohan!”

Deborah had been talking to him in hurried Vasi’ala, quiet and calm like a mother soothing a child. But when she spoke ‘his name’, it was harsher, and broke through his wave of agonized panic. Rohan forced himself to make eye contact with the woman, sweat soaking his forehead and fresh specks of blood staining her hands and his collar from the coughing fit he’d had when he’d shouted out in pain. She breathed slowly in, and out. After a moment, he picked up that she was guiding him to do the same. It hurt, but Rohan forced himself to breathe in time with Deborah, even as he felt salt sting his eyes.

When he finally sagged against the couch again, it felt like all the energy had been leeched out of him. He had managed to stagger back to the Baxton house, but that well of adrenaline was well and truly gone, now. Not for the first time, he cursed the fact that he parked his TARDIS well away from the house, so that it didn’t attract any undue attention. (Maybe he’d have to change that… just in case. It was well-shielded, after all.) A Zero Room was what he needed, more than anything else. But the last few miles of walking had been absolutely beyond him by the time he’d reached Deborah’s door.

The Viridisian watched him kindly, dabbing at the side of his mouth with her sleeve, and then gesturing for him to stay still this time. Rohan gave a tiny nod, but watched intently as she gently massaged the area that had made him jump, trying to work out where exactly the pain was. (It seemed to radiate.) They’d ruled out broken ribs; they were definitely all only bruised. But it hadn’t occurred to Rohan until this moment that something else could have been broken instead of his ribs.

Deborah’s brow creased as a thought seemed to finally occur to her. She sat down on the end of the couch and brushed sweat-damp hair off Rohan’s face, and then pressed a kiss to his forehead seemingly automatically. Rohan felt his cheeks redden just a little, but reached out to take her hand, squeezing it gratefully. He coughed out an apology for lashing out, only to be hushed. Deborah rifled through her first aid kit, looking worried.

“Can you have…” She spoke the name of a medicine Rohan didn’t recognize. His face must have made his confusion clear, because she passed the blister pack over to him. Rohan stared at it for what felt like hours, willing the letters to arrange themself into something that made sense. Finally, he realised he knew the chemical name well enough, and nodded.

“Yes. It’s not aspirin.”

“No,” Deborah snorted bitterly. “We aren’t allowed to have that on hand.” She wiped a hand over her face. “It will help with the pain, but I think you should see a doctor.”

Rohan tried to sit up without thinking, and then immediately regretted it. He shook his head quickly. “No. No doctors. No hospital.”

“I know, I know…” Deborah pushed him slowly back down for a third time. “A Resistance doctor. Someone discreet.” She gestured to his blood, on her sleeve. “I think you’ve burst something internal. I can’t fix that with ointments and medicine.”

Rohan groaned, letting his head drop to the couch. “Pythia’s tits…” he mumbled under his breath. Deborah raised an eyebrow. “I should have brought my TARDIS.”

“You should,” Deborah scolded kindly, “have not picked a fight at a checkpoint.” She picked up a communicator on a table near the couch, swiping through contacts with her thumb. “Why were you even in that area?” 

Rohan pulled a face somewhere between embarrassment, being caught with his hand in the biscuit tin and frustration. “...I can’t say.”

“You can’t say?”

“I– well, it’s a… surprise?”

He was well aware how pathetic the argument sounded. There were so many times ‘I can’t say’ had been the truth in this regeneration, but this was ironically one of the few times where the stakes weren’t a matter of life or death. Even if his body disagreed with that assessment…

“Is this part of your ‘big plan’?” Deborah asked, with only a hint of sarcasm. Rohan felt rather like one of the children again. She did have an uncanny knack for weaseling information out of someone, in a way that almost – but not quite – made him feel bad for anybody who she might be actually interrogating. Almost. She seemed to have found who she was looking for on the communicator, however, and was idling with her finger ready to press the call button.

“No, it’s…” Rohan pinched the bridge of his nose. “Liliana said your birthday was coming up.”

Deborah opened her mouth, but only a surprised noise came out. She shut it again, glancing at the communicator as if it was suddenly the most interesting thing that she had ever seen in the world. But Rohan saw a small smile quirk up at the corner of her mouth, even though his vision was starting to feel darker, and more exhausting. It made him smile, too; and thankfully, it had surprised her into not asking any more questions. Good. I can maybe get someone to go pick up the thing I ordered without ruining it after all…

After a minute of silence, Deborah laughed under her breath. She stretched, and walked over to the kitchen. Rohan heard the tap running, and when she returned she held out a small mug of water for him. She held it to his lips, helping him to drink without letting him sit up properly.  Once he’d struggled down a few gulps, the Time Lord gestured at the communicator.

“You really don’t need to call anyone,” he insisted. “Just let me rest here for a bit then I can walk back to my TARDIS.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Deborah rolled her eyes. “I’m not letting you walk around at night if you might be bleeding internally, and I can’t leave the children to help you hobble there myself.”

“I wouldn’t have asked,” Rohan pointed out, honestly. She patted his head again, forcing him to take another sip or two of water before placing it down in arm’s reach of where he lay.

“I know. But you don’t get a say in the matter. Mother knows best,” she stressed, pressing the call button. “If I let you go home later and all this heals funny because of your Time Lord tech, the children will never forgive me.” She pointed a finger at him as it began to ring. “So no dying while I step out, okay?”

There would clearly be no fighting her on this. Certainly not when he could barely even stand, anyway. Rohan closed his eyes, and sighed.

“Fine. Maybe I’ll just… just have a nap. While I wait.”

“There’s a good boy,” Deborah hummed. 

The person at the other end finally picked up the phone. Deborah squeezed Rohan’s hand once, and then he heard her footsteps fade away. The lock on the door clicked open, and she stepped out. The draft of cool air was strangely reassuring, but Rohan still cuddled up into the cushions of the couch as all the aches and pains began to make him sleepy. That, he thought to himself, or it could be the painkillers starting to work.

With his hand resting on his sore abdomen, the Time Lord let his mind drift away. He could trust Deborah Baxton, and if she trusted someone, then he could trust them, too. It was just that trust didn’t come easily, and never had. It was strange to think that there were people in the world that he could trust, still; the people who he loved notwithstanding. Jack, the Seeker, the Doctor… would they forgive him for lying to them and leaving, when he finally returned? Would they be able to trust him anymore?

He tried to push the thoughts down, as uneasy unconsciousness rose up to claim him. He’d find out, one day. But to do so, he had to survive this one.

Just… a short rest would be fine. Deborah would be back soon. And he could rest up in the Zero Room once she was satisfied. But just five minutes for now, maybe. Since it was safe.

Chapter 18: Environmental Whump

Summary:

Characters: The Redjay (4th Regeneration), the Master (Ainley)
Trigger Warnings: Low temperature and cold-related risks/injuries, broken bone, unwanted touch

Notes:

In which I apparently endeavour to write Roda meeting the Master in reverse order, because I'm difficult like that. This chapter began with the villain being 'random NPC of the week', but then I had a better idea.

Roda was freezing.

Their hands were bruised from thumping on the door of the room that they’d been shut in, and they had only stopped trying to break down the door to try and conserve their energy better. It was cold enough that the blood on their knuckles had begun to freeze on their hands, dark and sticky. What hurt the most had been pushing against the ice, though, and the way that it made their palms sting. In fact, all of their body was beginning to feel the same, unpleasant ache. The sooner they got out of here – or more likely, were let out of here, for better or worse – the better.

Roda had never been a fan of winter. She had been led on a field trip up Mount Perdition once, during what passed for winter on Gallifrey; when the caps of the mountain had enough snow on them to be seen from the Citadel on a clear day. Even wrapped up in as many layers as she’d been able to get her hands on, she had hated it. Snow was cold and wet and strangely, sharp, and it had cut through to her skin whenever the wind picked up. When they’d returned to the classroom her nose and fingertips had been red, and she had felt the need to make another winter hike to see if, maybe, it had just been a bad first time.

Other planets were worse. She had been curious about the Ice Warriors on Mars after reading a book on Peladon, and hadn’t even stayed for an entire solar cycle. Robin and some of the Merry Men had tried to introduce her to games that you could only play in midwinter, and she had instead wrapped herself up in camp and sat with Marion and tried to pretend that the cold didn’t bother her. A past lover had teased her mercilessly about her tolerance for the cold, until she’d pointed out that he could help her warm up. By the third planet that had been too nippy for comfort, she had begun to keep a record of places that she had to either dress in more layers to visit, or were warm enough to be bearable. 

She was sure that she was an absolute baby about it. The Doctor seemed fond of snow, but then again, he’d also once told her that his Chapter House was on Mount Perdition, so that made sense. She didn’t agree with it, but she understood it. 

But when it came down to it, even for a Time Lord, Roda had an incredibly low tolerance for the cold. Roda groaned, tugging the sleeves of her shirt as far down as she could manage, and tucking in her fingers while she tried to work out what to do. It had been over an hour already, and she was too cold to think. The Master had chosen this punishment on purpose, she knew that for absolute certain. But was he trying to make it hurt, or just off-foot her? She could never fucking tell with him.

He might not have known that it was personal, but he knew damn well how it would be affecting her. The fact that he had a walk-in freezer on his TARDIS just ready to shove her into to ‘think about her actions’ spoke volumes. Or maybe he’d made it just for her. Great. How flattering. Did I really get to him that badly, the last time that we met?

The answer, she knew, was almost certainly. It wasn’t as if she knew him well, they’d only met one time on Peche – even if thwarting his plan had been a very involved meeting – but he felt like the kind of person who could hold a grudge until the heat death of the universe. Worse still was the fact that she’d humiliated him. Powerful people did not like to be reminded that they could be brought down as low as the people that they enjoyed lording over, and Roda had left him stranded on a low-grade planet without a functional TARDIS, waiting for the Shadow Proclamation and twiddling his thumbs.

“Well,” she grumbled to herself, rubbing her palms together. “Clearly he fixed his TARDIS, good for fucking him.”

Running into him today had been a mistake. Not that she could think of a reason why she’d run into him intentionally, but it wasn’t as though she’d been going out of her way to find trouble. Trouble, though, tended to find her even when she was keeping her nose down; as evidenced by her current situation. She had only been on Crown Royal – the planet she had run into the Master on, this time – because of the rift it had, that was ideal for refuelling a TARDIS that was running on fumes. Unfortunately, when she’d decided to kill two birds with one stone and get some actual kitchen supplies at the same time, she’d run into the Master in the marketplace. There’d been an exchange of insults, not at all thinly veiled threats, and then something in Roda’s gut had told her to run.

The Master had been faster, his staser set to stun, and she’d woken up here.

It clearly wasn’t a well-used freezer. The Master had left a crate of something in it with her, but once she’d broken into it, Roda hadn’t found anything especially useful. There were some stains she didn’t want to think too much about, and a couple of things in sample jars and test tubes that had enough dust on them that they’d very evidently been forgotten about. The room had probably been in stasis for a while, then, she decided – and for some reason, she was almost disappointed that it wasn’t special. But it did mean the chances of finding anything to help her break out were little to none, and naturally, he had taken her tools off her already.

At least she wasn’t tied up. She remembered him being very fond of rope. Her throat itched at the memory, and she pushed it down, resigning herself to waiting this mess out. It wasn’t cold enough to kill a Time Lord. Even with a physiology better designed for deserts – albeit, less so when the dome had been built over the Citadel, keeping out the sandstorms and letting people grow accustomed to a climate controlled living – they were still a hardy species. But there was still the risk of hypothermia, or falling asleep, or just generally being weakened. She didn’t want to be anything but at her best when facing somebody who had it out for her.

So, okay. Breaking the door down was out. There was nothing to break the seal, or the digitized lock. Nothing in the room seemed like it would be of any use, unless the unlabelled chemicals might possibly burn through the metal, but the odds that they’d burn through skin or combine and suffocate her in some way were too high to risk it. It hadn’t gotten any colder in the last hour or so, and at least she was dry. That meant the most sensible thing to do was – despite her every instinct – to sit still, save her strength, and make sure she only did what her body needed to stay alert.

Just… do nothing. While locked in a walk-in freezer in an enemy’s TARDIS, with very little idea of how angry he was at her. Yeah. This was not Roda’s idea of  a good day.

***

“Not enjoying your accommodation, my dear?”

It had been…

Roda frowned, peeling their eyes open with difficulty. How long had it been? She’d lost track of time, which given the circumstances, seemed like a very not good thing to have done.

But it had been a long time. A few hours, at least. A few hours of pacing back and forward in the cold freezer, doing her best to try to stay warm so that nothing important would seize up. She had slowed down her heart rate – the cold would have, anyway – and only moved as much as she needed to not to freeze, and then… right. She’d sat down, because the room had gotten even colder, and the idea of putting one foot in front of the other any longer had started to feel impossible. Had she fallen asleep? Shit…

Her hands hurt as she moved them, curling her fingers into tight fists as she looked up at the sound of the Master’s voice. In stark contrast to the ice forming on her clothes, he looked perfectly cozy in his leather gloves and long coat. He even had a fucking scarf on, which felt like adding insult to injury. It wrapped around his throat twice, and Roda entertained the possibility of choking the bastard with it, before deciding that she’d rather not stoop to his level.

That, and it was too damn cold to think about trying to overpower him.

“Your thermost-stat’s broken…” She managed to say, through dry, stiff lips. She wanted to lick them, but the moisture would just freeze, and crack. Her eyelashes were dusted with ice, too, she noticed, as she forced herself to stand up. Clothing caught on the ground and threatened to tear, but she managed to use the wall to get to her feet, and at least look the Master more or less in the eye while he gloated. “M-m-might want to fix th-that.”

“It’s rather difficult to sound glib when your teeth are chattering, my dear Redjay,” the Master smirked. Pazithi Gallifreya, he’s even more obnoxious than I remembered. “Didn’t your mother ever teach you to wrap up warm in bad weather?”

“I d-didn’t need to be taught common s-sense.”

“You could have fooled me,” the Master drawled. “Perhaps if you’d listened, you wouldn’t have gone off with strange men.”

Roda glared, too exhausted to think of a good comeback. The Master seemed almost disappointed by the lack of repartee, and honestly, as far as she was concerned, fuck what he wanted. The door was ajar behind him; not open, but if she could find the strength to push past him, maybe she could make a break for it. He had the advantage - this was his territory – but Roda was good at losing people. All she’d have to do would be to find somewhere warm to regain her strength and bide her time a little bit until she could hunt for the exit. She didn’t have a fight in her.

But then, if the Master had wanted her dead already surely he wouldn’t have returned to talk…? Roda felt as though her thoughts were usually much sharper than they were right now. It had to be the cold. So then, what was the Master’s game, here?

“No comeback? Shame. I expected better.”

“D-did you come here to-to criticize my wit–”

“You would need to have some,” the Master sniffed, “in order for me to criticize it.”

“Or d-d-did you have something to s-say?”

The Master paused, eyebrow raised, clearly irritated that Roda wasn’t quaking in her boots, or begging to be let out of the freezer, or anything like that. If he had expected it, then, well, he didn’t know her at all, either. And then, after what seemed like the longest silence of her regeneration, he slowly began to grin. It started in the set of his jaw, but reached his eyes, and she could have sworn his teeth were fanged as he looked down at her. Hands clasped behind his back he loomed like a hawk, all-but licking his lips.

“If that’s how you feel,” he replied, with gravitas, “then I’m sure I can leave you alone with your thoughts for a little bit longer.” Despite her best efforts, Roda’s eyes widened in disbelief. “It’s no skin off my nose, you know. I have all the time in the world.”

“You wouldn’t.”

“Wouldn’t I?” There was something dangerous in that smile of his. Like it was made of broken glass. “I assure you, my dear, there is very little I would not do to somebody who has betrayed me.”

Roda snorted in disbelief. “Betrayed y-you? We were n-n-never friends!”

“Oh, but you made me think we could be, didn’t you Redjay?” The Master reached out, stroking the back of one of his leather-clad hands down the side of her face. Roda’s nose wrinkled, but she glanced over his shoulder towards the open door, gauging how quickly she could knee him in the balls or something and run. If he noticed her look, the Master didn’t respond; but his fingers lingered on her jaw, almost tender. “You played me – how did you put it back then? Like a cheap harp?”

“F-fiddle…” Roda replied, carefully. “The ph-phrase is fiddle.”

“How cold.” Roda resisted her urge to roll her eyes at the pun. “I really did think we had something, you know. We could have been a power couple that would make Gallifrey kneel, if it weren’t for that silly little conscience of yours.” His hand moved lightning quick – Roda swore quietly, sure that if she had been less cold, she would have seen the gesture coming – and he grabbed her by the back of the throat, pulling her face so close to his that she could feel his breath. He studied her for a moment, before leaning in, practically purring in her ear.

“We still could be. All you have to do is say you’re sorry.”

Roda almost laughed. No. He really doesn’t know me at all, does he…

Or at least… she hoped not. She hoped that she had never given him the impression that she would seriously join him. That she was the kind of person who could stoop to the levels of cruelty that he seemed to relish, and who could treat other people like nothing more than means to an end. Did he truly believe he was offering her something that she wanted? It was impossible to imagine that he would honestly want them to be equals. Even if she could put aside everything that he seemed to stand for – and they could find some kind of common ground in their motivations, their wants, their goals – she wasn’t about to turn her whole life around to be the lackey of a man who called himself ‘the Master’ with a straight face.

She had been somebody’s pawn before. Moulded by Rassilon to take a seat on the Council for no reason other than cementing his power by strengthening the breadth of his allies. He had expected her to say ‘yes, Lord Rassilon, of course, Lord Rassilon, I agree with Lord Rassilon’ because he believed that he had raised her to never question him nor act against him. Rassilon thought that she would always be meek and unambitious and malleable. He was wrong, and if the Master thought the same thing, he was wrong, too. He might not think that was what he was saying, but it was what it would come down to.

Cold and exhausted or not, Roda was not so easily tamed as people seemed to take her for.

Roda reached up, pushing the Master’s hand away from her neck. She brushed it aside without him fighting her, but moving in the cold felt like she was wading through molasses.

“D-don’t t-touch me.”

There was a split second where the Master seemed surprised. As if he had genuinely expected her to change her mind and side with him after what had happened on Peche, no hard feelings. It was a small victory, and perhaps a petty one. But a victory nevertheless.

“I’m n-nobody’s second fiddle.” Roda narrowed her eyes. “L-least of all a b-b-bastard like you.”

The Master’s eyes narrowed. He straightened up, never taking his gaze off her, and shook his head with disappointment.

“Very well.”

He adjusted his collar and his scarf, and then carefully peeled off one glove. Roda tipped her head, unsure of what he was about to do, before he turned around to face a panel on the wall, pressing his first three fingers to it. A pale blue light scanned his fingertips, followed by a perky beep noise, and as he made a gesture like turning an invisible dial in the air Roda’s blood ran cold; literally. Sweet Gallifrey… he’d turned the temperature down further. He was going to leave her there. If she didn’t move now, she wouldn’t have a chance to get out at all.

“Let’s see if a little more time to yourself helps you sing a different tune, my dear.” The Master drawled, not even bothering to face her as he closed up the isometric panel once again. “After all, perhaps I’ve been going about this the wrong way. A redjay is a songbird after all, not a violini–!”

Roda didn’t let him finish what he had to say. With the Master’s back turned to her, she summoned up every ounce of frozen energy left in her and threw herself at him. Shoulder collided with shoulderblades with a solid thump, and the Master grimaced in pain as the force of her leap knocked him flat into the wall. He had to throw out both hands – one gloved, one not – to catch himself. Roda wasted no time with more words, even though there were plenty that she had to say. Forcing herself to work through the pain, she leapt for the door, jamming her fingers in the slight gap and trying to lever it open enough to slip through.

It was just about wide enough that she could fit enough to push with her back, not just her hands, when she felt a gloved hand weave through her hair and yank, hard. Roda screamed in pain despite herself, eyes watering as the Master pulled her bodily back like it was a catfight. She stumbled from the momentum, almost losing her footing; the Master took advantage of her step back to put himself between her and the door, and threw her to the ground like a discarded piece of clothing.

She hit the ground with a thud, the ice on the floor sending a chill down her spine. Roda rolled from the strength of it, coming to a stop on her side with her back to the Master, and fresh bruises forming. She braced herself for an attack – a kick, a punch, staser fire – but nothing came. The Master didn’t even seem to move closer towards her.

Ribs aching from the impact of the fall she forced herself to roll onto her back – intending to get back to her feet. As she looked up at the Master to see what he’d do next, she saw him grip the bridge of his nose with his bare hand; after a second’s hesitation he snapped it to the side, and back into place. A trickle of blood ran from his nostril to his top lip, smeared in his beard, and he looked down at Roda with more hatred in his eyes than she thought anybody had ever looked at her with before in her entire lives.

“You’ll learn to regret that,” he promised, darkly.

Roda got to her haunches, and snarled.

“I don’t l-learn fast.”

“Oh, don’t worry about that…” The Master stepped through the open freezer door, leaving her to the cold and solitude. “You’ll have plenty of time to consider how much you’ll regret denying me.”

The door locked with a click. Roda sank to the floor, and made herself as small as she could. She had no doubt that he would keep his promise. She was in for a very long, very cold wait…

Chapter 19: Living Weapon

Summary:

Characters: The Redjay (6th Regeneration), Rassilon (Armitage)
Trigger Warnings: Mind control, assassination, non-consent allegory

«Shoot Chancellor Rubis.»

Her body moved without her permission. One moment she was standing beside Lord President Rassilon – being seen, and not heard – and the next moment, her finger was on the trigger of her revolver. Her hand curled around the grip as if her life depended on it, because thousands of years of needing to protect herself had taught her that if you were going to draw a weapon, you drew it properly. But as the weapon was raised too quickly for any of the chancellors sitting around the ornate oval table to react, it didn’t feel like an extension of her body. It felt like an extension of somebody else’s.

That somebody was more than happy to remind her that where he was concerned, her body was not her own. It never had been, and at times, it felt as though it never would be. Because there was seemingly no corner of the universe in which she could run and hide, or escape his control; not if he wanted her back by his side, wanted to use her. He had let her believe for five regenerations that she was dismissed, discarded, thrown away, free. But as soon as the War had broken out, he had clipped a leash back onto what was his and brought it back to Gallifrey and to heel. And she hated it, almost as much as she feared him.

Her weapon wasn’t a standard-issue staser. She had been gone from Gallifrey for so long that she carried something that most Time Lords would consider primitive, and yet it was in some ways more effective than their advanced technology. It wasn’t something that was set to stun, and its handler – she – knew how to kill with it. There was a wet thud, followed quickly by another one. Two hearts, two shots. The order, the exact words, may not have been explicit, but their meaning was clear. For the unforgivable crime of telling Lord President Rassilon ‘no’, Chancellor Rubis was not intended to survive this room. She may not have been his executioner, but she was the weapon.

It wasn’t until the other people in the room began to panic that she even realised what she had done. In fact, she had barely even realised what had been done to her; she hadn’t been so much a prisoner in her own body, as no longer at the helm of it. The realisation that the one who had taken control of her mind had done so before she even had a chance to fight against it cut her to the quick.

The Redjay froze; her left arm still outstretched, and the barrel of the revolver still hot. The colour drained from her face as she stared at the body of the Chancellor. He looked as shocked as she felt, mouth open as if he’d been about to plead. The force of the bullets had forced him back into his chair, and he was slumped against it almost as if he’d fallen asleep there. But the twin blossoms of red staining the front of his cerulean robes painted a very clear and different picture. Even without her control, her aim had been true. Both shots had gone straight for the heart, and the only consolation was that he’d probably been dead before it had registered that he wasn’t going to regenerate. Before he’d felt too much pain.

She wanted to stagger back. She wanted to – to rush forward and staunch the bleeding, or check his pulses (even if she knew that she wouldn’t find any) or to at least apologize or defend what she’d done. She wanted to do something helpful. Everybody else around the table was either frozen in fear, or whispering to their neighbours; all of them side-eying her as if they would be next, but none of them daring to speak up about it. A woman whose name she couldn’t remember at the moment had blood on her hands, and had already confirmed what Roda knew to be true. She was the only one who dared to look angry, rather than scared; but even she wasn’t speaking up.

They all knew who had really pulled the trigger, even if they didn’t know how. Roda wasn’t stupid. She knew what everybody called her – the name that Rassilon no doubt encouraged. ‘Rassilon’s Exile’. Even the whispering behind her back and the rumours marked her as owned, even though more than half of the people who used the name knew nothing about her.

She had been expunged from the history books. Nobody spoke about how she had once been his ward, not his weapon. Nobody questioned what she had done to be exiled, or why she was a renegade, or who she was. If they knew that her House had once been vel Prydonus, no one knew why. She had checked it herself, accessing files from her TARDIS when she had first been summoned home. As far as Gallifrey was concerned, as far as her home was concerned, she only existed when it was convenient.

But despite the name she had been given by those few who knew that she existed – most people too busy in their own War efforts to care about what went on behind the scenes – Roda had no doubt that not one person around the table knew that she hadn’t wanted to kill the Chancellor. She hadn’t acted out of any sort of loyalty to Rassilon, or a desire to protect him from, what? Hurt feelings? It wouldn’t occur to them that the Lord President had reached out and enforced his control over her mind, and made her do it. Would their benevolent, fearless, renowned leader do a thing like that?

«Be still.»

It was just an order, that time. Rassilon was making it clear he was still in her mind. Roda didn’t realise until he spoke that her arm was shaking, and her jaw was set. His voice was cool, unfazed. Her discomfort was merely an inconvenience to him. Roda lowered her weapon and slowly holstered it, but she couldn’t make her body stop shuddering with horror at what she’d just done. What he had just made her do. What he had made her into. 

«Why?»

Rassilon didn’t even bother with her question. Why did you make me do it? Why did you use me? Why did you make me into a killer? Why did you assassinate him for something so stupid?

His voice was completely monotone, and she couldn’t help but wonder if he considered what he had to say a comfort, or if he simply did not care about her and Rubis both.

«You are a weapon. Weapons do not weep.»

Roda touched her cheek with her fingertips. They were damp. When had she started to cry? The fact that this – him, the murder, the situation, his control – had gotten to her that much was almost worse than what she’d done. Almost. (It was so senseless. Thousands of people were dying in this War. Why would he make it thousands and one!?) She swallowed a lump in her throat, wishing dearly that she could be as collected as Rassilon was, and pretend as if what she had just done didn’t bother her. But she had been used, in a way assaulted, and the guilt of it made her feel filthy.

«I’m not a weapon.»

Out of the corner of her eye, Roda saw Rassilon’s mouth tighten into a miniscule, satisfied smirk. It was just for a second – he had appearances to upkeep – but it was there. She wiped the tears from her eyes with the back of her hand and tried to regain her own composure. I have to keep it together. I’m not just a weapon, but I don’t want anyone here to see me cry. It took her a second – her hearts racing, her throat tight and nausea bubbling up inside of her. Rubis’ body still sat in his chair, and Rassilon was simply calmly sorting through the papers sat in front of him.

Roda put a foot behind her, wanting to turn and walk away. If she could just leave this room, then she could get to somewhere quiet, somewhere where people weren’t watching her, and she could deal with her emotions then. But before she could begin to turn, she felt the ice cold hand of Rassilon’s telepathy hold onto her once again. Her other foot joined the second, and she simply stood to attention, arms at her sides, gaze forward, standing at his side again as if she was unfazed as well.

She wouldn’t beg. He might force her to stay when she wanted to run, but she would not give him the satisfaction of making her beg to leave. 

«You will remain until the meeting is over.»

Roda could have nodded, or confirmed, but she did not. Her hands made fists at her side, but that was all that she could do. As Rassilon cleared his throat and called the war meeting to order once again, Roda did her best to still her thoughts and turn her mind off to what was happening all around her. She would not be any more complicit in war crimes than she was forced to be. This wasn’t something that she wanted to live with, if she had any choice.

If she was a weapon, then weapons did not weep. But weapons did not need to watch, either.

Notes:

With thanks to delicatelyglitterywriter for reminding me of this image:

Chapter 20: Symptomatic

Summary:

Characters: The Redjay (8th regeneration), the Seeker (2nd regeneration)
Trigger Warnings: Non-serious illness, ‘ignored’ symptoms

Notes:

For Elisi. A little comfort Seekjay.

“Roda, what a pleasant surprise! You should have told me you were visiting….”

The Seeker couldn’t help but smile as he stepped into the Library on his planet, arms laden with books. He had woken up with the strange desire to gather up all the ones that had been borrowed by this person or the next, and return them to their proper places. Honestly, he swore everybody else he knew had no respect for organization. The only reason he hadn’t tried to instil a proper categorization on the library itself was that the space was ultimately Roda’s — part of her little house in the South — even if it was on his property.

Even then, he’d begged her to let him. More than once. She was weakening, he was sure, it was only a matter of time. The perks of dating.

Tidying up would clearly have to wait, though, if he had a guest. He sat his stack down on a table near the door, his expression thoughtful. In many ways he was his mother’s son, and the Seeker was already planning out if he had Roda’s favourite coffee to hand, or if he should nip out and pick some up. But as he approached the chasmous armchair that his lover was sequestered in, wrapped up in a woolen blanket, he paused. 

Something was wrong.

“Roda…?” 

She didn’t stir that time, either. As he got closer, the Seeker could see that her face was ghostly pale, and despite the blanket she was under, she was shivering. He knelt down beside her favourite chair, pressing the back of his hand to her forehead. It was clammy with sweat, and burning hot. 

At his touch, Roda’s brow furrowed. She groaned in what he could now tell was a restless sleep, curling instinctively into her nest and away from the chill of his hand. After a second or two she managed to peel her eyes open, and blink at him blearily.

“Hnnn… Seeker?”

It seemed like it was a struggle for her to focus. To the Seeker, Roda’s voice sounded hoarse and weak, and his mind raced with possibilities. Had she contracted some alien virus he had never heard of? Something Gallifreyan? Had she been poisoned? Was she injured?

With all the reckless things Roda had gotten up to in the years he’d known her, it was impossible to rule anything out. But he had an obligation to her not just as a lover, but as a friend. If she wasn’t well, he had to do something.

“Ssh…” He pushed her hair off her face, and then pressed two fingers to the small of one of her wrists, fished out from under the blanket. Sure enough, her pulse was tachycardic. “Try and lie still. I’ve got you.”

“M’fine,” Roda protested tiredly. “S’just tiredness. Must have…” 

Her words were engulfed by a cough, which once it started, took a few seconds for her to get under control. The Seeker glanced at the table beside her and — finding some now cold coffee in a mug — insistently wrapped her hands around it and made her take a drink to wet her throat. She sipped it gingerly, and then continued before he could ask questions.

“Must’ve nodded off. S’nothing.”

“Roda.” The Seeker couldn’t keep the edge of chastisement out of his voice as he took the mug back. “You’re running a fever that far exceeds ‘nothing’, and you look — no offence, you look terrible.”

“Flatterer,” Roda joked halfheartedly.

And then she began coughing again, and snuggled deeper into her blanket like a turtle retreating into its shell. It was clear she didn’t have the energy for witticisms, for all she was protesting. There were bags under her bloodshot eyes, and her nose was red, not to mention the general air of illness.

As he placed the mug down on the table again, the Seeker spotted a handful of balled up tissues amongst her accoutrements. There was nothing out of the ordinary. The tissues, a dogeared book she must have been reading, her holster discarded on the ground. She was bundled up in a jacket and a sweater, both of which smelled just a little bit damp. She looked as if she wanted nothing more than to be left to return to sleep which was, of course, not happening until he had run some tests or at the very least, moved her to the bedroom.

“I feel fine. Dun’ worry.”

“How long have you been feeling ‘fine’?” the Seeker asked, raising an eyebrow.

A hypothesis was beginning to form… Damp clothes, lethargy, a fever, elevated hearts rate, a cough. Honestly, Roda. Sometimes you’re utterly impossible. He could have sighed with relief. Roda certainly wasn’t well, but she wasn’t dying after all, even if it might have felt like it to someone with better self-preservation skills than she had. Apparently not even ancient Time Lords were immune to the flu.

Roda’s eyes fluttered open and closed. She was trying to stay awake, and failing miserably. The Seeker stood up, and rolled up his sleeves. She wasn’t heavy at all. It would be easy enough to carry her to bed if she didn’t fight him on it, and from there he could more easily insist on playing doctor, lowercase ‘d’. Sterilizing everything could come afterwards, just in case this was some kind of alien virus instead of a more average cold. It wouldn’t do if he caught whatever his lover had. And he’d tell Jack to stay away until she was less peaky, just to be on the safe side. Not many other people dropped in on this half of the planet without warning.

The Seeker shook his head in fond concern, reaching for Roda’s arm to loop over his shoulders. He didn’t think she was going to answer his question anytime soon. At least that would make her easier to fuss over.

“Nevermind. You can tell me later.” He bent down, slipping his arms tenderly under her knees. “Let’s get you to bed and work on cutting down this fever, first.”

“Seeker…”

“Oh, no!” The Seeker pressed Roda to his chest as he straightened up. She rested her cheek against his hearts and despite her protesting, he could physically feel her relaxing. “If you even think about telling me you’re not sick, I’ll call Jack and have him tie you to the bed until you recover. Or even worse – I’ll call my uncle.”

It was a hollow threat and they both knew it. But Roda did as she was told, stifling a sneeze into her elbow. The Seeker wrinkled his nose.

“Maybe a warm shower and some fresh clothes, first…” He shook his head. “Honestly, at your age you should have known better than to fall asleep in wet clothes.”

Roda gave a tiny, tired shrug. “Slipped m’mind.”

“Hush,” he rested his forehead against hers for a moment and then started to make a beeline for the bathroom. “Rest your throat, love. I’m sorry I told you off.”

Roda was quiet for a few seconds, resting in his arms. And then the Seeker felt an insistent, but spent, prod at the back of his mind. He let his barriers down to listen to what his lover had to say, but had to bite his lip to stop from laughing when it turned out to be: «Don’t lie, you’re not sorry.»

“No, I’m not,” he chuckled, only a little exasperated with her. “But only because the people that I love the most in the universe had this uncanny knack for doing silly things that put their health in danger, and I have this strange wish that maybe one day they’ll listen to me and do something sensible with their time.”

As he continued to grumble, he felt Roda go even more still in his arms. She was tired, barely keeping her eyes open. He wondered if she’d only just gotten sick, or had been ignoring it and pushing through for a day or two before heading to one of her bolt holes. Knowing Roda, it was probably the latter, which meant that she’d probably been in her musty clothes for a while, now. Sighing to himself, he did his best not to wake her up as he felt her mental connection slip away, and the tell-tale signs of somebody beginning to fall asleep.

To imagine she’d trust me at a time like this… being somewhere or someone that a person was willing to go to when they could scarcely put up a fight was an honour indeed. He didn’t know how long their relationship would last, or what the future might be like between them, but he would take every second of her trust that she was willing to give him. It had been hard won in the first place, after all; but she was important, and he felt a warm feeling in his chest to be reminded that she felt the same way about him.

With the precious bundle in his arms, the Seeker detoured to the bedroom.

“Alright, love,” he whispered. “Fresh clothes, bed, then a shower…”

When Roda was bundled up in cotton pyjamas, blankets up to her chin and her face burrowed in a small nest of pillows, the Seeker leaned back against the wall to watch her. He’d woken her up just long enough to take some medicine for the flu and so he could take some samples just to be sure it was nothing else, and he’d coaxed her into drinking some more water, because it seemed like an important thing to do. Especially with the temperature that she was running. She didn’t look peaceful, really, but she was at least asleep, now. He could take care of her.

As he slipped out of the room and dumped her dirty clothes into a laundry basket, he reached into his pocket and sent off a quick text to Jack.

Have Roda on Alexandria. Flu. Won’t be at work for a few days. -S 

Then, he shut the door gently behind her.  “Rest easy,” he murmured, to the closed door. 

Time to do some cleaning up, and then those tests. And maybe a cup of tea for himself, after all. The Seeker sighed. Yes, loving someone was an honour. But god, was it ever exhausting as well.

Chapter 21: Hunted For Sport

Summary:

Characters: The Redjay (2nd regeneration), NPCs
Trigger Warnings: Unnamed character death, improper judicial process
Author's Note: Another incomplete piece, because this prompt has been giving me grief, but I think it makes a decent enough snippet/one-shot!

How she even managed to get into this sort of situation, Rodageitarynxmososa didn’t know. But ever since her run-in with the Time Agency and her exile from Gallifrey, misadventures like this one just seemed to keep. On. Happening.

It had been a couple of years since the time she’d spent in Sherwood Forest on Sol-3, and Roda had finally been beginning to feel as if she was back on her feet again. She had made peace (enough) with her exile, and the fact that she would not be going home anytime soon – if ever. The name of ‘the Redjay’ was one that she didn’t quite yet own, but which she had learned to make her own; finding strength in the way that Robin, Will and the others said it with fondness, instead of the way the Time Agent had said it with malice. How it would become synonymous with a wanted criminal she didn’t yet know, but she had decided that agonizing over it would only make her want to tear her hair out.

It was either going to happen, eventually, and the things for which she had been named ‘traitor’ would come to pass, or… it wouldn’t. And in a way, the idea of her life – and such a pivotal moment of it – becoming a paradox was scarier than the way it had turned out so far. She may never have been the model student Rassilon had wanted of her, despite all her efforts, but she’d paid enough attention at the Academy to know that she wasn’t willing to risk her existence on something like that.

That she had escaped the Oubliette of Eternity for her ‘crimes’ was one too many chances already to cease to be….

Since she had left Nottingham, things had come passably smoothly. Sometimes she ran into a wanted poster, and took it as a sign to leave a planet as quickly as possible. Sometimes, it had the face that she had now. Taller than before, pale skin, blonde braids, and a face that reminded her a little of one of her tutors, from her childhood. Robin Hood had once said she put him in mind of  ‘one of the Northmen of old’, which she had eventually learned meant people from another island on Sol-3 who had come to England by sea. He had asked if she was descended from them, at least until he’d learned that she wasn’t of Sol-3, at all.

Other times, she only recognized the name ‘Redjay’. On those occasions, she felt less threatened at least. It was easier to slide under the radar when you weren’t recognizable, so long as whoever had put up the posters didn’t know that her face had changed. All the same, she tried not to look too closely at those ones; both in fear of knowing her own future, and because it reminded her of the game of Eighth Man Bound she had played in the Academy, in a way that gave her the beginning of a migraine every time…

On one or two planets, she had found herself wrapped up in local events, which was where ‘this sort of situation’ tended to happen. Either she heard about something and felt like she had to help, if she wanted to live with herself, or she arrived at precisely the right time to get wrapped up in the wrong sort of thing. Or the wrong time and the right sort of thing, depending on how you looked at it. (She blamed her TARDIS; it had to be playing a part in it, she was certain, but just why it was determined to get her involved in things she couldn’t say…)

However it happened, once she was there Roda couldn’t just… leave. Not if there was something that she could do to help. Sometimes helping was as simple as creating a distraction at the right time, and other times she found herself having to learn a new skill on the fly. As it turned out, hacking wasn’t as hard as she’d thought it was, when she’d first been accused of it in the Peninsula… not that she had escalated to widescale robbing of banks, mind you. But for better or worse, she’d begun to pick up on some of the things that ‘the Redjay’ had been accused of what felt like so long ago and…

Well, she had some feelings about that. But if she was doing the right thing, wasn’t that what really mattered? After all, Robin Hood was an exile in his own country, too, and look at what he did. Robbing from the rich to feed the power. He was noble, and sometimes reckless, and despite what people said about meeting your heroes, Roda couldn’t help but feel as though she’d lucked out, there.

Noble and sometimes reckless was what she was turning out to be, as well.

And of course, there were also times where helping wasn’t simple or complicated so much as difficult. Maybe even impossible. Those were the times when things tended to go wrong; Roda had left planets licking her wounds, more than once, or relieved not to have ended up regenerating. 

Today felt like it was going to be one of those days. No, in fact – it was already one of those days. It had been one of those days since the moment she had set foot on Tridal 9-12.

Roda wasn’t sure how long she’d been running for, but her lungs were starting to burn. And if she was starting to get out of breath, then it had to be worse for the other people who were in the miles-long coliseum arena with her. She was a Time Lord; she could switch to respiratory bypass when she couldn’t run any longer, and conserve her energy a bit (even if she was hoping she’d have somewhere to hide by then, and work out a plan). They, on the other hand, were not. Or at least, not the ones she’d had a chance to talk to, but it seemed incredibly unlikely that there was another of her own people about.

A blue-skinned woman who she’d started out with – Andor’a, she’d said her name was – was from an amphibious species that she had told Roda the name of, but which she’d forgotten. The other two runners in their small group were small and furry, and their language had been too complicated for her translation matrix. Intelligent, but full of metaphors that were too culturally-bound to follow. What limited their run, though, was the fact that they barely pushed three feet tall.

Roda had lost track of all three of them almost immediately, in the resulting panic. She’d done her best to keep an eye on the people who had been thrown into this death game along with her; at least the ones who had been ‘released’ from the same gate that she had been. She’d not gotten a good enough look at the others, and frankly, she had no idea who was innocent and who was not. But in the chaos of being hunted for sport, that priority had fallen more by the wayside by the second.

As Roda gulped in a few quick breaths, she realised that she couldn’t hear more feet, or hounds. Tentatively, she slowed her run to a jog, scanning for somewhere that she could hunker down and recover. Had she managed to lose her pursuers, for now? The hunt must have cornered somebody else first; somebody with less stamina, or experience. It seemed too true – and a part of her felt awful for being relieved about it – as she laid eyes on a copse of overgrown plants, perhaps luck was smiling on her after all. Checking behind her a second and third time, she slipped into the overgrowth, and allowed herself to sink to her haunches.

“Fuck…” she murmured, as she took in deep, long breaths. This is a mess. Even for her, it was a mess.

Hunting criminals for sport. It was barbaric. In the holding cell – before she and the group of prisoners she had been sorted into had been released into the coliseum – Roda had thought of Gallifrey. At the Academy, they’d been taught about the many things that Rassilon, Omega and the Other had brought to pass, after overthrowing the Pythia. For a brief while, there had been the Death Zone, where the ‘Game of Rassilon’ had taken place to punish some of the worst criminals of their time. A bloody free-for-all against vicious aliens who enjoyed the hunt.

Rassilon had put a swift end to it, when he was the last Founder left alive. But Roda couldn’t help but think about it, from the ‘safety’ of her hiding spot. Had it been like this? Had there ever been people sentenced to the Game who didn’t deserve to be there? After all, she had been tried and sentenced for High Treason which she never committed. The idea that Gallifrey might have made other mistakes – or worse, like she suspected her sentencing had been, intentionally punished innocent people was… less inconceivable than she might have thought it was, in her youth.

She hoped it was just her own nerves today, making her think of the worst case scenario. She feared it wasn’t.

There had been no such trial for Roda on Tridal 9-12, nor had there been for Andor’a, so she’d claimed. Roda had been accused of theft; somewhat ironically, since she was now indisputably a thief, she’d done nothing of the sort. Andor’a’s husband had disappeared, and as the last one to see him she had been blamed. From the announcements Roda had half-heard from her holding cell, the other charges had a similar range from petty to severe. These death games were a sort of collective punishment where those who survived until the end earned a pardon, whether they were innocent or not. Death, or a chance at a reprieve. It was easy to choose… She wasn’t ready to die.

The overgrowth itched. Roda rubbed at her palms as she tried to stay as still as possible, carefully rolling down her sleeves to try and mitigate the worst of it. Not as far away as she would have liked, she could hear some of the ‘hunters’ who had also been released into the coliseum, as well as their hounds. She didn’t know if this was a job for them, or if they chose to be here for the thrill of it, but they repulsed her either way.

As she considered whether it was better to get moving again or stay where she was, a gut-wrenching scream interrupted her thoughts. Roda froze, hands cupped over her mouth to keep from making a sound. A moment later, there was a crackling noise, followed by a static-ridden tannoy announcement.

“T̵W̸O̴ ̷C̸R̶I̶M̷I̸N̴A̷L̵S̸ ̷H̷A̷V̸E̶ ̶B̷E̵E̵N̴ ̵J̶U̸D̸G̶E̴D̵.̸ ̷E̵I̷G̸H̴T̴E̶E̷N̷ ̸R̵E̷M̷A̴I̴N̸.̵”

Judged. Roda shuddered with unmasked disgust. Murdered was a better word. It hardly felt like an execution when they hadn’t even been given a trial. She had to make it out of here, and with as many people as she could rescue, if she could. She had no idea how she was supposed to know who had committed a crime and who had not, but this was beyond reproach. If – no, when she made it out, she would have to report Tridal 9-12 and its other colonies to the Shadow Proclamation, or whatever passed for law enforcement in this sector.

This abuse of ‘justice’ had to end.

Taking advantage of the announcement over the tannoy and the presumed chaos of whichever poor soul had been found and killed, Roda crept out of her hiding place. Twenty people in, and eighteen left. She had no idea how many people were hunting them, or how anybody else would behave if they ran into her. Would they help each other? She wanted to think so, but she’d been burned before, and by people that she knew far better.

She wanted to do as much as she could as well as escape, but as she began to look for something she could use as a weapon, or the perimeter of the coliseum, or anything else useful, she tried to talk herself into the fact that it might be everyone for themself. She knew by now that you couldn’t help everyone, and that some people didn’t want to be helped, but… well. Hopefully she could find Andor’a, at least? And the little furry guys? The people she’d begun with.

The Time Lady shook her head, and did her best not to let her nerves take over. Now that she could breathe, she could admit how scared she was. Not scared enough to let it stop her, but there was nothing adventurous or heroic about this. It was just cruel and unpleasant. Once she made it back to her TARDIS, maybe she’d just hunker down for a while, and keep her head especially low.

A branch not far from the bush caught her eye. It wouldn’t help much against a blade, but it might buy her enough time? It looked like something she could carry without tiring herself out – certainly lighter than a longbow – and in a pinch, maybe she could find a way to give it a sharp edge. It sounded like this hunt wasn’t expected to last long, if ten percent of the prey was already down. At what point would the games be ‘called’? An hour? A few hours? A day? She tried to remember the length of a solar cycle on Tridal 9-12. About eighteen hours, if her memory served. She could last without food and water that long; maybe hiding really was the best option, but could she trust that the pardon was real, and not just a carrot on a stick?

Slowly, she began to creep along in the direction she’d been heading at her run. The coliseum had to have an outer limit, a wall, a forcefield, somewhere that acted as a barrier. Getting herself cornered was a bad idea, but it would also help her narrow down what direction an attack would come from, and work out how to get past said barrier. After all, people had to get in and out some way other than the cells, surely? Hopefully the security – whatever it turned out – wouldn’t be a match for her, or any allies she found along the way.

Assuming she made it that far.

Series this work belongs to:

• Part 15 of The Exile