THE END OF TIME

Disclaimer I dont own Doctor who if I did I would bring the Timelords back and David Tennant would still be the Doctor

Chapter 4

Rassilon was stood in front of The High Council of Timelords, ready to address them all. "The vote is taken. Only two stand against -- and will stand as monument to their shame like the weeping angels of old!" He glared at the two Timelords with their hands covering their eyes -- The Doctor's parents. The apple never did fall far from the tree.

Rassilon knew that they would stand against him, he knew that they would support the Doctor; the Timelord who was responsible for destroying Gallifrey and using the moment. But they would stand and weep like the weeping angels of old would do and in the end they would be ashamed and would not share the glory that he, Rassilon would soon have.

To Earth

The Doctor finally snapped out of what he was doing, realising he was not the only one in the spacecraft.

Looking at them all, he finally spoke. "I just want you to know, you were all brilliant." He looked meaningfully at Wilf before turning to Jack. "And you were brilliant, "finally, he turned to Jenny, a grin spreading across his face. "And you were amazing."

He looked back at Wilf for a long moment, knowing that it was time. He took a deep breath... before leaping out of the Spaceship. He remained silent as he fell, the domed ceiling of the Naismith mansion growing ever closer by the second. With a loud sound of shattering glass, he crashed through the ceiling and landed heavily on the floor, right between the Master and Council of the Timelords.

The Master looked confused and shocked as he stared at The Doctor, the floor around him littered with shards of broken glass. The Doctor groaned in pain as he held the gun up, pointing it at the Timelords. His gaze was defiant, determined...his jaw set as his finger reached for the trigger...

But then, suddenly, his whole body was filled with scorching pain, fire burning through his brain as he fell to the floor, the gun falling and clattering across the hard floor. He clutched his head, gritting his teeth as he ordered himself not to scream. Was this it? Was this how it felt? Was this how it ended?

Rassilon stepped forward with a smug look on his face. "My Lord Doctor." He greeted, a false smile lighting his face. "My Lord Master. We are gathered for the end."

The Doctor lay on the floor struggling to get up. "Listen to me. You can't Rassilon!" He knew that his words would fall on deaf ears, but he had to at least try to stop him. The Doctor wished that it could be anyone but Rassilon standing there; the most evil and corrupt President that Gallifrey had ever had. But he had believed Rassilon had died long before the last great Time war. Although there had being a legend among the people of Gallifrey that said he had become immortal and one day would wake up again. But there was always the possibility that the Timelords had resurrected him just like they did with the Master.

His own cousin had suffered at the hands of Rassilon so very long ago. A life time ago, the Doctor was a different man then. But it still grieved him to know that Rassilon had forced her to stare into the untempered schism; that's where everything had started. That was what had driven the Master mad and what drove the Doctor to run and to never stop. His cousin had never being quite the same afterwards... she had been filled with fear and rage but he made her better. They were third cousins and had grown up together, but didn't really become friends until they were teenagers in the Academy. And then from there they had become inseparable until her death after the Time war separated them for good.

"It is a most fitting paradox that our salvation comes at the hands of our most infamous child!" Rassilon exclaimed. The idea that the Master would be the one to bring salvation to the Timelords was almost laughable.

"Oh he's not saving you. Don't you realise what he's doing?" The Doctor replied, eyeing them gravely.

"Hey, no, hey! That's mine! Hush... look around you. I've transplanted myself into every single human being," the various Masters began to smile, "Who wants a mongrel little species like them? Because now I can transplant myself into every single Timelord!"

"Oh, yes, Mr President, sir! Standing there all noble and resplendent and decrepit. Think how much better you're gonna look as me!" The Master carried on, grinning madly.

Rassilon took a deep, unsteady breath as he raised his left hand and the glove clicked loudly before starting to glow.

The smile vanished from the Master's face as Rassilon opened his hand. It glowed blue, and all of the humans began flicking their heads from side to side, as they did when they all became clones of the Master.

The Master suddenly started having a childish temper tantrum; much to the amusement of Rassilon.

"No, don't! No, no, no, stop it, no! No! No, no, no, don't!" He screamed. "It's not fair! You can't do this!"

"On your knees mankind," Rassilon demanded.

"Okay, that's fine! That's good because you said salvation! I still saved you! Don't forget that!" The Master said as he looked at the Timelords, eyes glinting with anger.

The Doctor knew this was going to be bad. For the Timelords to be standing there it meant that the Time-lock was broken and it wouldn't just be the Daleks coming through... but the Skaro Degradation, the Horde of Travesties, the Nightmare Child, that Could-Have-Been King with his Army of Mean Whiles and Neverwheres. That was what was opening right above the earth. And that only meant one thing... Hell on earth.

"Doctor!" Donna gasped, her head was throbbing and her face felt like it was burning up. "I remember... " She whispered.

The Doctor looked to The Master, his eyes spelling danger. "What have you done?" He yelled.

As Jenny and Jack ran into the mansion, the room started to shake violently. Jenny kept falling as she tried to steady herself.

"Doctor!" Wilf gasped, seeing the doctor laid on the ground. He rushed over, but then noticed the man in the glass chamber, clawing desperately at the impenetrable glass, trying to get out. But he couldn't. Because someone else had to go into the adjacent one...

Without thinking, he ran over, opened the chamber next to it...went in, and shut the door; releasing the man.

The Doctor looked and tried to call out, but it was too late. "Wilf! Don't!"

"The Approach begins... " Rassilon stated, admiring the scene before him.

"On your knees!" He pointed the gun at Jenny and Jack, warning etched all over his face.

"Just do as he says," said the Doctor. They was absolutely no way in hell that he was going to allow Rassilon to use that glove on his daughter.

"Approach of what?" asked the Master.

The Doctor gritted his teeth in pain and looked at the Master, who had an expression on his face that he hadn't worn in a long time. Fear. "Something is returning. Don't you ever listen? That was the prophecy! Something... not someone."

Donna managed to get to her feet, but as she tried to make a run for it, Rassilon raised his glove and Donna was thrown up into air. She screamed, arms flailing before she landed against the hard wall and was knocked unconscious.

"Donna!" The Doctor cried, "Are you okay?" She didn't reply and her eyes were closed as she slumbered against the wall.

The Doctor has lost count of the number of people who had died at Rassilon's hand with that glove; even his own people. Most of the Timelords didn't know the half of it; they didn't know how corrupt Rassilon was, but had still begun blindly following him into destruction.

"What is it?" The Master asked, dragging the Doctor's attention back to him.

"They're not just bringing back the species. It's Gallifrey; right here, right now." The Doctor replied, his voice laced with urgency.

"The rupture will continue until it rips the time vortex apart!" Rassilon exclaimed.

"That's suicide!" said the Master, knowing that if the time vortex was ever ripped apart then everyone would be destroyed, including the Time Lords. Realisation seemed to finally dawn on Rassilon as he stared straight ahead, his eyes haunted. It was suicide...he was on Earth now, he'd be crushed. His eyes widened as he saw his errors...how could he have been so careless? He searched desperately for a way out...well, if he was going...so was everyone else.

"We will initiate the final sanction. The end of time will come at my hand and we will become creatures of conscience alone, free of these bodies, free of time while creation ceases to be."

Finally, the Doctor looked directly at the Master. "You see what you have opened? This is what they were planning in the final days of the war! I had to stop them."

"Then take me with you, Lord President! Let me ascend into Glory!" The Master pleaded, looking away from the Doctor to Rassilon.

"You are diseased; albeit a disease of our own making. No more." Rassilon sneered.

"But join us, Lord Doctor and surrender the moment!"

Jenny stood up, unable to watch much longer. "How can you bear it? I can see all of it..." she paused, eyes wide, "The whole of the Time-war, all that happened... But in the end, the Timelords died for nothing." She said, staring at them. The truth in her words stunned the room into silence, all eyes on her.

If what her father had told her, then the Timelords were mad. She looked at Jack meaningfully and then at the Doctor, light glinting in her shining eyes.

The Timelords had been good people once... She could see deep down into their minds. She saw how corrupted they had become, how the Time-war had changed them right to the core. She could see all that was and all that could be... Tears filled her eyes and her throat went dry as she gazed at them all, her vision blurred by the tears as they rolled their way down her face.

"Who is the female?" Rassilon demanded, glancing between the Doctor and the Master for an answer.

But it was not the Master or the Doctor who answered him. "Jenny. I'm a Timelord." She told him through her tears, her voice proud.

Rassilon laughed as he pointed the glove at Jenny. "Dear, you're an echo, that's all. A Timelord is so much more. A sum of knowledge, a code, a shared history, a shared suffering... you have none of these things."

The Doctor pointed the gun at Rassilon. "I'm so old now," he told him gravely, "I used to have so much mercy. But you get one chance to stop this now. We are meant to be observers only."

He wondered if he would have the courage to actually shoot Rassilon or if in the end, he would he be too much of a coward. He needed Rassilon to listen. Why did other Timelords always ignore what he said? Like take the Master; no matter how many times he tried to get through to him, he was always trying to take over the world.

Maybe if he had never come to Earth then they wouldn't bear the brunt of all these conflicts with him and The Master. But then, the Doctor thought...if he had never come to Earth, then he would never have met many of his companions. He'd never have met Sarah-Jane, or Martha, or Donna...he would never have known Rose. He shook his head to himself...all of this was worth knowing them, even if in the end he had been forced to say goodbye.

"You fool, Doctor!" spat Rassilon, who was now full of rage. "How many times have you used your Timelord powers to be more than an observer? You are guilty of breaking that law!" he shouted, glaring at the Doctor.

"And you, Rassilon are guilty of not using your powers for good." replied The Doctor.

"Choose your enemy carefully. We are many, but the master is one." Rassilon warned him.

"But he's the president! Kill him and Gallifrey could be yours," stated The Master. The Doctor could feel the Master egging him on and he spun around, pointing the gun at the Master.

He had been promised Gallifrey so many times, had even been made President twice. Gallifrey could have been his so many times; he could have had complete control. He had been bribed so many times over Gallifrey, but he wasn't tempted. He'd seen them change from how they used to be to be power mad, intent on war and destruction. He refused to become like them.

"He's to blame. Not me." The Master pointed to Rassilon.

The Master stood there, wondering how any of this was his fault. It wasn't, was it? But as he stood there, staring at them all...something clicked into place in his mind.

"Oh, the link is in my head!" He exclaimed, looking around as everything began to make sense. "Kill me - the link gets broken... they go back."

"You never would you coward."

"Go on! Do it!" The Master spat, a challenge dancing in his crazed eyes as he looked at the Doctor.

But could The Doctor really do it? It hadn't always been that way... there was a time when The Master and The Doctor had been childhood friends back on Gallifrey. Pastures of red grass, stretching far across the slopes of Mount Perdition. They would run across those fields all day, calling up to the sky...and now he was pointing a gun at the Master, his childhood friend. He turned round again and pointed the gun at Rassilon.

"Exactly! It's not just me, it's him! He's the link, kill him!" The Master carried on pushing the Doctor.

"The final act of your life is murder... but which one of us?" Rassilon sneered.

Author note What will happen now will the Doctor kill the master or will he kill Rassilon?

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