x x x

"You never heard me break your heart,
You didn't wake up when we died.
Since I was lonely from the start,
I think the end is mine to write."

-September, Cry For You.

x x x

Chapter 5: Divergence

x x x

"So you know where he is?" the Master asked idly, watching the other- flawed- clones worked on manipulating the star.

The traitor in the red jacket was sitting on the floor, bound by handcuffs, and watching as if he thought he was the one who was in control here. "Why do you ask?"

"You were the one wearing the freak's coat, earlier." he hissed, "And I can smell him all over you, it's disgusting."

"Worth it, though. He's good at what he does." the traitor pointed out, unrepentantly, "And yes, I know where he is. Somewhere orbiting Earth. Problem is the when."

The Master rolled his eyes, "Are you talking about the freak, or the Doctor?" The original question had been about the Doctor.

"Both." A violent spark of electricity from one of the consoles the scientists were working at made them both jump, and the traitor yelled at them, "Oi, watch it! You want to get us all blown up?"

The Master struck him across the face, "I am the one who gives the orders. And the threats."

"So I see." the traitor said with a bit of a leer. It made the Master nauseous, and he quickly retreated to pace at the far side of the room.

"When are they, then?" he demanded.

"Hmm, 'bout half a decade ago. That's when Jack said it happened."

"It?" the Master demanded, not wanting to admit to his confusion.

"It." the traitor grinned, "Oh, you don't want the details. Captain Jack's involved, remember?"

He rolled his eyes in exasperation, "You sicken me."

"I am you."

The Master spluttered in indignant rage, and was seriously considering just executing this one. Except he was a useful source of information... he knew what the Doctor was up to, even if he hadn't admitted as much, yet.

"Systems ready, Master." one of the scientists said, interrupting the staring contest that was beginning between the currently homicidal Master and the infernally cheerful traitor.

He turned sharply to face them, "Then do it!" he ordered, "Open up the nuclear bolt. Infuse the power lines to maximum."

"I still think this is a Very Bad Idea." the traitor pointed out brightly.

The scientists immediately set about doing precisely as they were ordered. "Nuclear bolt accelerating, sir." one of them reported. Obedient little minions, probably had it beaten into them by Naismith when they were still human.

"Send the signal back, and the link becomes a pathway." He carefully placed the Whitepoint star in the device they- he- had designed to hold it. It lit up with a brilliant white light, and the sound of the drumbeat echoed electronically through the room.

"Well, now you've done it." the traitor muttered.

"Silence!" formerly-Joshua snapped. The Master himself was too busy listening and searching for the source, as their- his- device effectively tried to call back to the original sender.

"If only." the traitor grumbled with a dour tone that suggested they were all doomed.

The Master honestly couldn't bring himself to care, even if he had trusted the traitor. He needed to know who had done this to him, why and how this sound had been inflicted upon him. He didn't care if it did kill him... if it did destroy the universe, or even time itself.

He had to know.

x x x

"The vote is taken. Only two stand against, and will stand as monument to their shame, like the Weeping Angels of old. And the vanguard stands prepared, as the children of Gallifrey return to the universe. To Earth!"

She listened with tired resentment, but could feel no anger for him as he decreed the doom of an entire planet, for his own will.

Even with her eyes closed and hidden, the light was blinding as the path opened before them. And then with a sweeping wind, they were drawn through the pathway to the Earth.

Silence reigned, until a rather droll voice deadpanned, "That's it, we're dead. I would say it was nice knowing you, but... honestly, it wasn't."

She dared peer through her fingers to see the source of the voice sitting in restraints, against a nearby wall. Everyone in the room was identical, wearing the new face and old mind of one she had once known well.

"Lord Master." the Lord President said, approaching the clear leader of the group of them. The only one who had always been a Time Lord. He sounded quite amused by his scheme's fruition, and she idly considered the Master's history as child's-play in comparison, "It is a fitting paradox that our salvation comes at the hands of our most infamous child."

A rogue thought- entirely human, yet emanating from one of the copies- flitted through all their minds, and all turned as one to stare at the man in restraints, "Oops, did I think that out loud?" he asked, grinning darkly.

"I really should have just executed that one." the Master complained, clutching one hand to his head as if that thought was literally painful. While primitive, it still failed to offend any of the elder Time Lords the way it appeared to upset the Master.

"Aww, but you're just too narcissistic, aren't you?" the one in restraints crowed cheerfully. "Didn't you have a plan? Or was that just bullshitting?"

"Don't you dare compare my carefully laid out evil schemes to bovine excrement, you insignificant broken clone!" the Master snarled in a rage.

The prisoner chuckled at this.

"I grow tired of this game." the Lord President said darkly, and raised his left hand. She immediately covered her eyes properly, as the energy built and the Master protested in impotent outrage.

"Oh, that's better." a new voice said, "Your body's so... limited. Even if I already kinda miss the brainpower."

She cautiously peered through her fingers once more, to see that all the humans had been restored. The one who was restrained, to the eyes appeared older now, but still young and arrogant. And not quite the same as the other humans. He seemed to understand what had just happened. The others were simply confused and afraid.

"On your knees, mankind." the President commanded, and through fear and empathic compulsion they obeyed.

Except for the prisoner. He laughed. "Now you're speaking my language!" His thoughts were still clear as crystal, and just as clearly offensive to the Master, who grumbled threats of gruesome deaths under his breath, while glowering darkly at the human.

But then he turned to the President, clearly afraid also, "You said salvation, right? So I saved you." he said with forced and false confidence in his tone.

The President was not listening, however. She could feel it, as well, as he announced for all to hear, "The approach begins."

The Master showed confusion, "Approach of what?"

"I warned you bad things. You didn't listen." the human prisoner said idly, staring at the glass roof, where the President's gaze had turned. "Told you to make three backup plans. I only noticed one. Sloppy, that."

"Well someone talked through my attempt at an evil overlord monologue, you unnecessarily observant ape!"

"Never do the monologue." the human said with an exasperated sigh, "Just do the plan. That way you take them by surprise. Like blowing up their city when they think you just want to murder their boss. Looks on their faces, oh that was a fun day."

That distracted not only the Master, but also the President. They were all staring at him, now. Even she and her condemned companion were watching him with overt interest.

"You blew up a city?" the Master was the one to ask.

"Well, half of one." the prisoner admitted, "It was the principle of the matter. Dramatic statement." He looked around, feigning innocence as he asked blankly, "What?"

Then the roaring from above and the trembling of the ground drew their attentions back to the sky above. Gallifrey was appearing above the Earth... close enough for their atmospheres to brush against one another. It was both awe-inspiring and terrifying at once.

"That's-!" the Master stumbled over his own words, "No! No, that's impossible!"

"Planet in the sky... how original." the human sniped with a surprisingly honest degree of sarcasm, followed closely by a deliberate yawn. He was mocking them. Or perhaps, more accurately, he was mocking the President, as he seemed not even to have noticed her, her companion, or their guards.

The humans in the room were fleeing, as well now. All but the prisoner, who merely pulled himself to his feet slowly, still watching Gallifrey overhead, without much awe, nor any respect. In fact, he looked mildly bored.

The Master was desperate to earn favour, however, "This was me. I did this! I'm on your side!" he cried out to the President.

"Yeah. A pawn." the prisoner observed snidely, adding in a low mutter, "Dumbass."

"But this is fantastic, isn't it?" the Master insisted, "The Time Lords restored."

"War changes people... the Time War infinitely more so." the human- the only one left in the room now- said. It sounded like he was quoting someone else. "I don't know about wise, but it was a very clever man told me that. Why else do you think I ran from you, Master?"

The Master considered these words carefully, slowly turning to look at the human with much more care. But before he could come to any conclusion, the President spoke again, "We will initiate the final sanction. The end of time will come, at my hand."

"I can't get enough of that line, y'know." the human prisoner said with a smirk.

The President ignored him completely. "The rupture will continue until it rips the time vortex apart."

"That's suicide." the Master said sharply.

"We will ascend... to become creatures of consciousness alone. Free of these bodies. Free of time, and cause and effect... while creation itself ceases to be."

"Oh this just gets better and better." the human muttered, idly examining his own fingernails as if this was not of any real concern to him.

The Master, however, understood the dangers, and attempted once more to command the President, "Then... take me with you, Lord President. Let me ascend into glory."

"I dated a woman named Glory, once." the human said idly, "Now she made you lot look sane. Bloody genius, mind. Aren't they all, huh, Master?"

"You will desist with these interruptions." the President commanded him.

"Am I interrupting?" the human asked, feigning innocence with surprising ease, "Sorry, I thought my opinions were perfectly valid. I mean, this whole thing is downright insane, you know that, right?" He waved vaguely at the Master, with his bound hands, "And I'm not just talking about nut-job over here, I mean you as well. Lord President, is it? Of what, megalomaniacs anonymous? Can I join? I've always wanted to try my hand at world domination."

"Oh, shut up!" the Master snapped, as the President glared at the human.

But before either had the opportunity to respond, an unfamiliar beeping sound started, emanating from a wristband the human wore... and his eyes lit up with glee as he heard it. "Oh, do you hear that?" he asked, stepping forward now, behind the Master.

"I order you to desist." the President snapped, anger beginning to fray the edges of his authority.

"But you hear this, d'you know what this means?" the human crowed with pride. None of them knew, but no Time Lord would dare admit that. "It means- to use an old Earth analogy I always kinda liked- that a butterfly flapped its wings somewhere out there, forty-four years, three months and nineteen days ago... to the second..." the beeping was getting faster, more urgent, and he threw his arms over the Master's head, so as to grab a hold of him across the chest in spite of his wrists being bound. "Now here comes the storm!"

He pressed a button, and in a flash of reddish light they both disappeared.

She felt a wave of time rise up around them. This must be what the device had been warning the human of. As he suggested in such elegantly metaphoric terms, a small change had been made to history. This timeline was unravelling, falling apart around them... and quite suddenly the link snapped, throwing them all back into the Time War, once more.

Back where they belonged. To the fate that they had brought upon themselves, and rightly deserved.

x x x

The Master struggled against the traitor's grip, and as soon as they landed, he threw the human off him. Then he looked around. They were in a small abandoned pub-like building that reeked of death. He didn't have time to properly get his bearings, though.

Hadn't even the time to guess what planet he was on... because a second later, the TARDIS materialised before him.

She was in one of her 'chariot of a god' moods, all glowing with inner light, and generally showing off. The Doctor must be feeling righteous and proud of himself, then. Probably ready to gloat, even. He had just won, hadn't he? This had all been the Doctor's plan, right from the beginning, hadn't it?

The door opened, and out stepped the Doctor, closely followed by four humans. Three, he recognised on sight.

"This is the original one?" Martha Jones asked. The Doctor nodded, and she promptly slapped him hard across the face.

The freak, Harkness, was next. The Master was utterly mortified to find no violence forthcoming, however. No, the freak's assault was much more offensive to him. Harkness grabbed both sides of his face, and kissed him firmly on the lips.

The Master bit, hard, drawing blood. Mmm, sweet, nutritious blood. He tried to bite again, wanting to rip off flesh this time, but Harkness backed away before he could do so, grinning a bit smugly.

"He spent a whole hour trying to decide on the best way to wound you, and you just ruined it." the Doctor laughed.

"Not ruined at all. I've played worse with him." the traitor behind the Master said far too cheerfully, and Harkness nodded with a smug grin, completely unconcerned with his minor injury. In fact, he had the nerve to lick the blood off his lips, as if trying to taunt the Master's unnatural hunger. Assuming he even knew of it... but either way, it was working.

"Sick freak." the Master growled, looking around for an escape route, only to find himself surrounded. "And you're just as bad, traitor."

"Can't betray someone I was never loyal to to begin with. And my name is John Hart." the Master looked to see a far too smug grin on his face, "Oh, and about the saving your life thing... you're welcome."

x x x

The Vinvocci and their ship had disappeared. Clearly timelines had made it so they never came here. The small group who remembered were now gathered in the Doctor's TARDIS, recuperating.

The Master had been properly restrained, and was currently tied to the solitary chair in the control room. Jack was using the console to check Torchwood records, to see what difference their changes had made. Martha and Wilf were standing over near the door, trading stories about the Doctor.

This left Gwen, most unfortunately, in the company of John Hart.

"So what was it like, being him?" she asked, eyeing the Master warily as the Doctor chatted amicably and the Master ignored him quite avidly.

"Intense." John said distantly, "It's... sort of fading, already. Like a dream. Some bits still stand out, though." he looked up at Jack with a leer. Jack noticed it, but pretended not to. "There's something super-human about his brain, though. Like if I remembered everything, my head might explode." John continued idly, "Right, Doctor?"

"Shut it." the Doctor said with a glare. Wilf looked upset, but Gwen couldn't tell why.

"Very little has changed." Jack observed, from his vantage point at one of the TARDIS monitors. Gwen looked up to see him smiling faintly, "Just the obvious."

"Which is?" Gwen asked hopefully.

"Well..." Jack said, cheerfully, "Clement MacDonald never did go mad over the last forty years. Instead, he owns a small business dealing in unusual antiques. He's on our records, somewhere a few steps up from the likes of Henry Parker."

Gwen grinned at this news. It was wonderful, and brought tears to her eyes. She remembered seeing Clem die, right in front of her, and there had been nothing she could do. It made her heart skip to think that what they'd done had prevented that from ever happening, even if she did remember it.

She felt a hand on her shoulder, and looked up to see Martha smiling at her.

"I know that name!" Wilf said, eyes widening with realisation, "I remember... oh, that's odd."

"New information filters through, when time changes. If you're in the time-stream when the change happens, you never remember the original timeline. Takes a while for a time-traveller to recognise." the Doctor said, giving Wilf a faint smile, "You're pretty quick on the uptake, you are."

"He's part of my silver cloak group!" Wilf explained, seeming quite stunned at this new information that had somehow always been, "Scottish fella. Always could sniff out a real alien artefact from the phonies, that one."

Jack laughed at his choice of words, and Gwen chuckled, "I'll bet!" she cheered brightly, before descending into giggles.

John raised an eyebrow at her, "You'd think you lot had never heard of a paradox ripple effect before."

The Master looked right at him, and said bluntly, "They probably haven't."

"And that week in September." Jack said quietly. He looked up, eyes alight but shining with tears. Gwen had never seen him look so happy before. "Never happened."

x x x

The End

Author's Note: No, no epilogue. The next thing to happen here is to start a new series of each show... and this is meant to be a short-story. No, I'm not writing these alternate series', I've already got three epic projects going, plus real life. If anyone else wants to write it, though, I would love to read it.

Especially an AU of Miracle Day, with no Children of Earth before it. Now that could be a lot of fun. Okay, so there's a very slight one in a million chance I might change my mind and write that one... but don't hold your breath.