The Roach Motel ("they'll check in, but they won't be checking out")

[cityship]

Inside the Vatican, the remaining free crew was putting the last finishing touches on their choke point/kill zone, or as someone had dubbed it, "the roach motel". They had cleaned out the first four rooms of both the Egyptian Museum and the Etruscan Museum on the floor above, so they could knock out the floor and shoot at the roaches below. That

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[fluffinasuit]

"Master?"

In front of him, the fighting continued but the Doctor was no longer even pretending to pay attention. Could it be...?!

It couldn't be! But it was, undeniably.

And it wouldn't be the first time that...

Or the last, most likely.

Without a glance at his compatriots or their enemies, the Doctor took off at a run, ducking and dodging as needed. He had to see.

[kindofscary]

The Master heard his call, and waited for him part-way. Fidgeting as he acquainted himself with his new flesh-suit, he spotted the familiar sight of a pin-stripe tent peg running at him.

A blissful look on his face, he whispered, "Doctor."

[fluffinasuit]

The Doctor, while perhaps not so pin-striped anymore, was still quite reminiscent of a tent peg, and definitely running. He didn't stop until he'd collided with the Master, wrapping the smaller Time Lord in a bear hug.

"Master," he said wonderingly, closing his eyes in case it all fell apart again.

[kindofscary]

Thanks to the suits, the collision came with less of a thud and more of a squish.

The Master exhaled with satisfaction, "I missed this."

[fluffinasuit]

"Why?" was the only thing that the normally verbose Doctor could think of to say. It was part of a lot of questions. Why didn't he stop Lucy? Why didn't the Master regenerate, if he was going to do this? Why had he, the Doctor, believed and mourned when the Master had died again?

Why? Why everything?

[kindofscary]

Still pinned by the Doctor's surprisingly sturdy embrace, the Master couldn't see much more than his old friend's neck, "I believe you're in a better position to answer questions. Where am I? What is this darling Stacy?"

[fluffinasuit]

He might as well get used to it; the Doctor wasn't planning on letting go anytime soon. Though he did loosen his hold.

"Biotechnological ship traveling through space/time/alternate universes, simultaneously, picking up unwilling, unsuspecting people, mostly soldiers. You didn't answer my questions."

[kindofscary]

"The question you're looking for is 'how?' though I can answer the other just as easily," he tried to find the Doctor's eyes this time, "I don't know."

He'd been perfectly happy in death. His final, irreversible victory. Only it wasn't so irreversible, and to his surprise he found himself naked, perplexed and covered in goo amid the depths of a biotech masterpiece. Now he had to think of some magnificent new way of emotionally destroying the Doctor.

[fluffinasuit]

The Doctor met the Master's eyes, sad, worried, and confused. "No one has the technology, I cremated you, it's impossible."

They were generally enemies. However, now was not the time to play those games; until something indicated otherwise, he was going to treat the Master as being on his side. "I've been informed that something killed the TARDIS."

[kindofscary]

"And who exactly do you believe resurrected me after my little tumble into the Eye, hmm? Who summoned me from the grave only to fight steel demons on the front line of the greatest and most terrible war ever seen?" he attempted a callous laugh, but due to the Doctor's depression of his rib cage, he barely managed a cough, "Someone has the technology, Doctor. I know that much."

To the second statement, he almost laughs again, "You should have part-exchanged that centuries ago. If she were really dead, you'd know. Now are you going to put me down or should we start sending out Christmas cards together?"

[fluffinasuit]

"The Council's dead, and we both know it." Finally, he did let go. "And if I was in one of those pods when it happened? They kept me from feeling you, Master. The technology defies the rules."

[kindofscary]

The Master retorted bluntly, "I slipped through the cracks in your massacre, who's to say another didn't? There was someone we both knew all to well who could do it. One who was particularly good at," his eyes rolled over the seething organic corridor, "... biology."

[fluffinasuit]

"We'd feel her. Unless you're suggesting that the Rani would turn herself human and still be capable of..." he trailed off, frowning.

It did sound rather like her. And well, their current 'leader' was female.

[kindofscary]

"You said yourself that they, whoever they are, blocked our psychic bond. Who's to say that if dear Ushas," he refused to use her chosen name. There was nothing regal about that woman, "had managed to mute our telepathic signal, that she couldn't do the same to her own?"

He began to pace, "Whoever's holding us has an awesome level of psychic attunement. I tried reaching in to see what I could find, but the door's just slammed shut. I've never encountered something so potent." And the Master prided himself on his psychic abilities, "Could she really create something like that?"

[fluffinasuit]

The Doctor shoved a hand through his hair, trying to think through the possibilities. "She built a giant brain once, you know. Oh, ages ago. It's, it's impossible... well, highly improbable... to guess what she could do by now, assuming her survival."

[kindofscary]

"Well she is a Time Lady," the Master affirms, "Improbability runs in the blood."

He shifted up a gear, "Rassilon, it makes perfect sense. She creates this- this- giant incubation facility. She stores her subjects in pods until they're ripe, then gives them this environment to study them in," his palm found his chin, "No. Nononononooo. Why wouldn't she contact us? Why would she use us as samples at all?"