Title: Gallifrey's Nightmare
Fandom: Doctor Who (2005)
Rating: Teen
Length: 300 words
Author Notes: Part of Darker Guardians, wherein the Doctor ran from the Time War and the Master fought. Triple drabble.

Summary: The Master muses on a TARDIS crewed entirely by non-Time Lords.

"They would be Gallifrey's nightmare." The Master is watching the vanishing pillar with a cruel amusement that makes Donna roll her eyes.

"Because they're human?"

"They're not Time Lords. Not of Gallifrey, yet they carry just enough genetic material from a Time Lord to be able to find and operate a TARDIS." The Master turns back toward his own ship, chivvying Donna ahead of him. "They'll do, to keep an eye on the Doctor."

"They'd best." Donna lets herself be herded only as far as inside the door before she sets her heels and refuses to move further. "How can they carry genetic material from a Time Lord, anyway? I thought you said it was impossible."

"The Doctor is very good at doing the impossible." The Master shrugs, stepping around her to head for the main console. "And the TARDIS they're piloting has some of the features of the sort that we were only just beginning to grow on Gallifrey when the Time War was closed off."

When the Master committed a double genocide to protect the rest of the universe. Donna sometimes wishes she didn't know that.

"You think the Doctor did that?" She grabs one of the bars the TARDIS had provided her in leiu of bothering with seats. It's ingrained habit by now, keeping on her feet through the roughness of a single-person take off.

"Not alone. He wouldn't have had the access to manage it." The Master sends them into the vortex, away from the other TARDIS. "There aren't many who would have bothered. It would have been unthinkable for most of them."

Donna lets out a small huff of acknowledgement, turning the words over in her head. She's certain the Master knows - or suspects - more than he's telling her. But she can live with that.