[Backdated to Tuesday - RL w/ the Master - If you take him back, you'll get what you deserve]

[timey_wimey]

Well, this was absolutely typical. Saved the world, Donna was brilliant, Haruhi was brilliant, Martha was brilliant... and then they get back to the TARDIS and discover that some circuit somewhere has blown, rendering the poor old girl, at least for now, unsafe to travel in. He didn't want her spitting them out in Jordan's world, 5 trillion years

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[doyouhearthem]

Unbeknownst to her, the Master was watching. He had been watching, must've been a quarter-hour by now, as the newly female Doctor tinkered with her TARDIS. Omega, but she was beautiful. He had always been drawn to the Doctor in some kind of primal, magnetic way... but this was different, something utterly irresistible.

It wasn't difficult to locate her once she mentioned 'saving the world' - pretentious sentiments as always. His ship was camoflaged nearby, and with her absorbed in her work it was easy to prowl up slowly, stealthily, his shadow spreading over her.

"Ooh, has she gone off again? One wonders how you can stand it..."

[timey_wimey]

She almost jumped in surprise. Almost. As it was, she just about managed to restrain herself to starting and looking up with wide eyes. Her first impulse was to snap something about how he had no business to be here, let alone appear out of nowhere - after all, it wasn't as if she wanted to see the Master. Not by a long shot.

But she couldn't ignore the slur on the TARDIS, first and foremost. She scowled and looked back down at the laptop. "She's fine, it's just a loose wire or something," she said testily, trying to at least look focused on her work. "Do I want to know how long you've been standing there stalking me?"

[doyouhearthem]

"About a good... oh, ten minutes," he murmured, bending to look over the Doctor's shoulder. "Bit long to be working on a loose wire for you, isn't it?"

He leaned in closer. "You know the last time I was in your TARDIS, I could hear a slight dissonance in your rotor hum. Perhaps that's it? I wouldn't mind being an extra set of hands..."

He had to keep himself from grinning. Oh, this was far too fun.

[timey_wimey]

Fun for some people, that is. She raised her eyebrows and shuffled a little to the left. "D'you mind, you're blocking my light. And anyway, the last time you were in my TARDIS, I don't seem to remember you being in any fit state to notice anything like that, let alone any slight dissonances."

That probably wasn't the smartest thing to say, she knew, but she wasn't about to let the Master inside the TARDIS, under the guise of helping to fix it or any other matter.

[doyouhearthem]

"You may not remember it, but there was a time where I was in a perfectly lucid state of mind," he said indignantly. "You let me go, didn't you?"

No no no, this wasn't the way to go about things. Not unless he wanted to just knock her cold and drag her away, and while that seemed like a good enough answer, it just wasn't sporting.

He sighed and crouched on his heels. "Oh that was rude of me, wasn't it. I'm just being an arse, I'm sorry, I just... it's hard," he said with a wince, trying his level best to look sincere. "I don't know how to act around you anymore. You're... you're so beautiful, it's not the same. Funny how that works, isn't it."

He looked thoughtfully at the Doctor's diagnostic readout for a moment and reached over, tapping a few keys.

"Try an auto-refactoring. Typically if there's an error in programming a TARDIS will fix it, but you've got to point it out sometimes."

[timey_wimey]

The only right response to all that was to give the Master a Look, which she did - she knew better than anyone that sincere for him was quite possibly worse than when he was acting insincere. "Come on now, flattery isn't gonna get you anywhere," she quipped, then leaned out of the way, annoyed, when he reached over to do a bit of jiggery-pokery with the laptop.

"Doing that, thanks!" she said after a moment, privately a little annoyed that she hadn't already thought of that herself. Of course she would have done it sooner or later, but she would have preferred it sooner, and now he had an excuse to stick around.

[doyouhearthem]

The Master drew back, stung. Here he was, trying to look sincere, trying to be reasonable, and she... rebuffed him. That never happened with human women.

He scowled. "So shall we shag in your ship or mine, then?"

[timey_wimey]

She fought to hold back a grin. So there it was. Not that she hadn't suspected that was what it was from the beginning, but there was something about driving the Master's blood pressure up that never got old, especially when she wasn't in the best of moods with him to begin with.

"Oh, come on. If that's what you really want, you're going to have to try a little harder than that. You can't just expect me to suddenly throw myself into your arms just because you feel like it."

[doyouhearthem]

The Master huffed a small laugh. "It usually works. Don't give me that look," he pointed his finger accusatorially. "I don't mean human women, I mean you. Now how many times have we - and what did I have to do? Nothing. You were lonely, or you were hurting, the little bleeding-heart you are, and all I had to do was be there. Now I'm supposed to woo you just because you've got a twat?"

He stood. "You're lucky this means something to me otherwise I'd curb your bloody computer and leave you stranded. Move over." He nudged her with his foot. "Oi, move over, I'll - I'll fix your TARDIS, how's that. Is that enough?"

[timey_wimey]

The Doctor had indeed just been forming her face into "that look", and she saw no reason not to complete the action now that she was halfway through it. "Considering that you've only suddenly started showing an interest again since I got one, I wouldn't say it was that far-fetched of an idea," she said, stung. "And why would I do that? I can fix my own TARDIS perfectly well on my own," she added, stubbornly holding onto the laptop even as she budged over slightly.

[doyouhearthem]

"Because you'll take hours and I don't want to wait that long," he griped, nudging her a little harder this time. "If I ran off with you now you'd be whinging about your busted-up TARDIS the whole time, and even I can't stand your complaining, much less in this reedy little voice of yours you've got now."

[timey_wimey]

It was a long time before she said anything else. Finally, her fingers relinquished their hold on the laptop and she set it down next to her.

"Alright. Fine. But don't pull any stunts," she said sternly.

[doyouhearthem]

"Oooh," he said in mock-seriousness, putting up his hands. "Better not take your eyes off me, Doctor, I might whip out a tow cable and drag her away."

He sat down with the Doctor's laptop and quickly began pounding away at it. He stared at the screen intently, saying nothing for some time - though making several disapproving noises as he poured through schematics.

"...You know the fact this cobbled-together thing has even held together this long is a testament to either your engineering ability or sheer dumb luck. I'm more inclined to think the latter. In any case," he sighed as he stood up, "It's nothing serious. Your directional circuit's lost its voltage. I can repair it - or you can, if you don't trust me enough to touch your precious TARDIS."

[timey_wimey]

"Where are you going to keep a tow cable?" she said, only half-joking. "Actually, no, on second thoughts, don't tell me, I probably don't want to know." She leaned against the TARDIS while she waited, never quite taking her eyes off the Master - saying that she didn't trust him with her TARDIS was a completely reasonable statement, because she didn't. Not by a long shot. Turning it into a Paradox Machine didn't exactly lend itself to trust as far as the TARDIS was concerned.

"Oh, is that what it is?" she said vaguely. "And as it happens, you're right, I don't trust you with her at all." She threw a meaningful look in his direction as she strode back into the TARDIS, pulling up a section of grating below the console. "Stay there, and don't do anything stupid!" she called back as she settled herself under the console with a toolbox and the sonic screwdriver.