Father Zachary Adams looked down at his congregation as he began his weekly sermon.  As they contemplated his words he threw the switch on the 800 lbs of explosives hidden around the church, causing a huge fireball that was seen for miles around.

The Doctor looked at Yargrin’s finished handiwork.  “So what is it again?”

Yargrin repeated himself.  “It’s a karaoke bar.”

“Why did you think I wanted one of these?”  The Doctor asked.

“We’ll you’re always singing those songs and you sound better once I’ve had some alcohol so I combined the two.  There’s even a selection of alcoholic mineral oils for Lucy.”

“Lucy’s not allowed alcohol!”  The Doctor exclaimed.  “It’s a poison to her system, she has no liver anymore.”

“Oh, well there’s alcohol free mineral oil too.  Some of it is semi-synthetic too, just like she is.”

Rabbi Rachel Koslov was leading the prayers when she casually lit the fuse on a large pile of dynamite that destroyed her synagogue and all hose inside of it.

The Master sat alone in the console room of his TARDIS, watching the Doctor talking to her companion.  “Will you never cease this prattling Doctor?”  He was about to override the Doctor’s time machine when his own companion entered the console room.

“Don’t you know how to use a light switch?”  Judy asked.

“I prefer the darkness sometime.”

“I like them too.  I do believe in a thing called love, except all my ex-boyfriends were pigs.  Hey, who’s the hottie?”

The Master rolled his eyes at his companion’s sudden hormonal overload.  “I believe his name is Yarvin, or Targrin.  The reception is very faint.”

“I told you we should have bought a Sky system.”

“We’re over half the distance of the Universe apart.  I rather fancy that your primitive technology wouldn’t reach beyond it’s own solar system in a week never mind 8.5 billion light years in real time.”

“Maybe, but at least I’d get MTV.”  Judy pouted and stamped her feet.  “It’s not fair; you always blame me for your problems.”

Lucy couldn’t help but pick up the voice of the two arguing people on her receiver.  “This is better than the Archers.”  She listened as they argued about everything, from his failed plans to her shoes and their joint loathing for anchovy based pizza products.

Imam al Habib reached up to the sky as he praised Allah, before the semtex lined walls of the mosque detonated when he pressed the remote control device in his hand.

“And further more I did not have sex with the Monk in your bed just because you wouldn’t buy me those new shoes.  I kicked him out of bed and the TARDIS.”

“Well at least you show some taste young lady.”

“Don’t young lady me, I’m a woman.”

“You’re seventeen and a half.  Lucy you’re acting like a child throwing a tantrum.”

“I am not.  I’m just mad at you.”

“Why?”

“Because.”

“You could explain a little?”

“I’m too upset right now.  It’s a hundred little reasons, nothing that’d make sense to you.”

“My dear Lucy I am a reformed megalomaniac and homicidal maniac.  Do you think I don’t understand you?  I was drawn to you because I feel a connection between us.  It’s beyond simple understanding; we have so much in common.  I understand you far better than I understand my own children.  You’re someone I see the best of me within.  You have great courage and strength of will to do that which must be done no matter the cost.  You can make a difference to the Universe Lucy; you can help others who might otherwise have no help at all.  Sometimes that involves hard choices, terrible choices.  Even choices that the Doctor there baulks at making.  Is that an ABBA song she’s ruining?  For all the good she does she still thinks that just saying the words without meaning them will work.”

“Do I have to dress like you though?  Because that suit is so not me.”

The Master laughed.  “My dear you can be any kind of you that you dare to be.  I have faith in you.”

David Newton held the young man’s head under the water until the bubbles stopped and he stared blankly as the body floated away down the river on what had been a great day to baptise people.

Lucy turned off the soap opera after they made up.  “Why can’t they put realistic things on the radio these days?”  She put her faceplate on and went off in search of the Doctor.

Peter Chortle was a missionary, venturing deep into the depths of the rain forest to bring the word of God to the native tribes people.  Witnesses later swore that his body seemed to float up into the air before crashing back down and exploding in a cloud of dust and salt.

The Doctor finished her rendition of Dancing Queen and had a sip of her iced tea.  “You’re right Yargrin; it’s a wonderful addition to the TARDIS.”

Yargrin nodded.  “I read that humans liked this entertainment knowing that you liked humans I put the two together.”

“Well I know someone who deserves an extra large slice of cake.”  The Doctor headed towards the kitchen.  “So where shall we go to now?  Earth?  The Eye of Orion?  Earth?  Skaro?  I’ve been meaning to drop by and stop that silly little Thal civil war.”

“Anywhere is fine.”  Yargrin replied.  “Something always turns up wherever we go.”

“Yes, well it wouldn’t be a trip without a journey.  Sometimes I think that the old girl rather seeks out danger for us to resolve all those dangerous situations.  Ah, there’s Lucy now.  Did you recharge ok?”

“What?  Oh, no, I erm, I forgot.”  Lucy couldn’t get the words out right.  “Radio, I was listening, it was very good, the soap opera I mean.  I like them, soap operas.  I think I might have developed a fault in my confidence circuit.”

“You’re just flustered.”  The Doctor calmed Lucy down.  “We all get like that from time to time.”

“It was such a strange show, there were just the two characters and they were arguing a lot and also talking about you two.  It was very surreal.  I get the feeling that the male character was some sort of weird criminal mastermind who failed at everything he did and she was a shoe-obsessed brat with bad hair.”

“Did you get any names?”  The Doctor wondered.

“Yes, she was called Judy and he was just known as the Master.”

“I might have known.”  The Doctor muttered darkly.  “Well that’s it.  No more Miss Nice Doctor.”

“What are you going to do?”  Yargrin asked.

Lucy tried to shrug but she just didn’t have the shoulders for it anymore.  “I hope she leaves identifiable remains.”

“She’s onto us.”  The Master said to Judy.  “Pack your things we’ll live as hermits in a cave on the planet Ravalox.”

“I hate caves.”  Judy complained.  “Can’t we be castaways on a desert island?  I have a great bikini for desert islands.”

“No, we need shelter, water and food.  Maybe we can change our names and appearances and be refugees on the planet Waypoint?  No, she’d still find us.”

“She’s not going to hurt us, is she?”  Judy asked.

The temple was old, older than humanity certainly.  Where once creatures as unhuman as could be imagined once worshiped now humans come to worship and make themselves as unhuman as they want to be.  They are fell servants of the oldest evil.  The darkest nightmare.  From the time before man was the red hunger, the black heart, the foul pestilence of hate.  From the dark time they call forth the Disgracer.

Stacy Biggins had been an estate agent and a housewife.  Then she joined the cult and that night she killed her family and with their remains transformed herself into one of the Kin, more reptile than human now, from the waist down she is a huge snake and from the waist up she is like one of those Utah raptors from the cretaceous, when dinosaurs ruled the world.  She slithered across the cold temple floor on her snake-like belly, approaching the sacrifice and caressing him she mocks him.  “So good, so pure, so sickening.  Your life is almost over holy man.”  She wrapped her flexible snake body around the Buddhist monk, crushing the life out of him, but at the edge of death she releases him.  “You deserve no quick release.”  She slashed at his stomach with her claws, spilling his offal and innards in a pile on the floor.  “I offered you a part of the world and you rejected me.”  She slithered through the intestines, soaking her scales with his blood.  “Suffer the little humans, for they are naught but dust.”  Finally she began to tear him apart, with her teeth and talons.  “Rejoice, for the end of the world is here.”  She threw her blood stained hands into the air and called forth her god.  Then she fed on the bloody remains.

The Doctor strode purposefully into the Master’s console room.  “I’d like a word.”

Judy hid behind the Master.  “Save me.”

The Master smiled.  “It’s ok Judy; the Doctor is an old friend.  My best friend you might say.”

“Eeuw, you two?  Eeuw.”  Judy felt sick.

“No, nothing like that.”  The Master replied quickly.  “We’re just good friends, she turned me down, I mean we’ve evolved beyond that.”

“You were spying on me.”  The Doctor stated slowly.

“Well I was curious; you got the message didn’t you?”

“What message?  The postcard from the peeping tom society?  I was shaving my legs in the bath just this morning, were you watching me then?”

“No, I only got the message an hour ago myself.”

“He wanted to show me how useless you are at making decisions.”  Judy spoke up.  “That hair for starters, no way is that real.”

The Doctor glared at the spiteful girl in the black dress.  “Jemma is it?  My hair is quite real, you should take better care of your own.  I can see your split ends all the way from here.”

Judy examined her hair and screamed when she too saw the split ends.  “Oh god, no!”

The Master put an arm around his sobbing companion as he explained things to the Doctor.  “A message, from the White Guardian.  There’s some sort of ancient evil on Earth.  As I care little for that dreary world I had assumed that you’d already be making a mess of things and wished to show Judy here how not to resolve the situation.”

“I always win.”  The Doctor replied.

“Winning isn’t everything.”  The Master replied.  “Doing the right thing is important.  In this case you must find those behind this event and kill them all before they can bring forth the Disgracer.”

“The what?”  The Doctor chuckled.

“I know, terrible name.”  The Master smiled.  “But I figured that since you weren’t told and I’ve been educating Judy, we should pool our resources and get the job done right in half the time.”

Judy looked at her hair.  “I can’t go anywhere with hair like this.”

The Doctor looked at it closer.  “I’ve got herbal shampoos and conditioners in my TARDIS.”

Judy hugged the Doctor.  “You’re the best.”

The Doctor rolled her eyes and looked at the Master.  “Your urchin is stuck to me.”

Stacy rolled on the floor as she mated with her army of consorts.  She was their leader and as the tribes dominant female she had her pick of the males.  She took the fittest and strongest of them into her lair.  The rest were left to the other females, they were her loyal bodyguards and they too desired many males but not being the dominant female they were forbidden to let their eggs hatch.  Instead their eggs were used to create the foul potions they poisoned the world with and also formed part of their mind controlling abilities that allowed them to use the world’s holy few like puppets.  The Kin had once been human beings but now they disported themselves like animals, from their point of view it was proof of their superiority over the pitiful humans they had no desire to ever be again.  Shamelessly they began to breed in front of their captives, those chosen few that would either join the Kin or be food for them.

Yargrin looked at the Master.  “Do you enjoy killing?”

“Once, maybe, no not even then.  It’s a necessity.  I never held back as the Doctor did.  She always looked for other ways first.  I always knew when it was necessary and I acted quickly and with compassion.  I always saw murder as an inconvenience; it got in the way of the task.  I’ve suffered for my past and I’ll never make up for some of the things I had to do but there’s very little I could have done otherwise.”

“Tegan’s aunt?”  The Doctor replied casually as she saw to Judy’s hair.”

“Ah yes, Vanessa Jovanka.  One of the few deaths I genuinely regret.  I can never make up for it, can never make it right.  So I just do the best I can to save the lives of others.”

“While making cups of tea for everyone?  You did kill me once, remember?”

The Master nodded.  “Yes Doctor, at once Doctor.”  He got up and left the console room.

“You were hard on him.”  Yargrin said to the Doctor.

“Of course I am.  He killed me, no, he murdered me.”

“Now you want your pound of flesh?  Which is the worse crime?”

“At least the Master is honest.”  Judy spoke up for her father-figure.  “He’s never lied to me.  He told me all the terrible things he’s done in his lives.”

“Yes and you enjoyed hearing them.”  The Doctor replied.  “You like hearing about his past crimes, it makes you all warm and soft inside.  You two deserve each other, the grim reaper and his groupie.”

“Hey, that’s not fair.”

“Life isn’t fair.”

“You should hear him when he’s depressed and it all gets too much for him to bear.  You have to forgive him; he’s got too much pain inside of him for anyone to bear.  He doesn’t want it, he’d never ask for it.  He needs it; he’s being consumed by the guilt.  I’m afraid that if it gets too much for him to cope with then he might do something stupid.”

“Hmmm, I’m not promising anything.”  The Doctor replied.  “I’ll think about it, but remember I’m a scored woman.”

“If he goes postal we’ll be dead women.”  Judy replied.  “Not you Yargrin, you’d be a dead gorgeous, I mean dead bloke.”

Sandy approached the one volunteer who wished to join the Kin.  “Kneel, human.  You will give yourself to the Disgracer, fall utterly into his sickness and become Kinfolk to us.”

Brian knelt down and didn’t flinch as the monster threw up a sticky green fluid over him.  He didn’t want to die, he wanted to live.  He didn’t believe in monsters until he saw the one who had abducted him.  Now he just wanted to live.  He felt a burning pain all over his body as the fluid began to eat away his flesh.  He screamed in pain but the pain subsided and he felt his body changing.

“You are evolving, becoming.”  Sandy watched as the disgusting human figure was warped and changed into that of one of the Kin.  “Welcome to the Kin, join the others in preparation for the feast.”

Brian finally understood as the plans of the Disgracer filled his mind.  The simpleness, the elegance, the boldness, the utter evilness.  It made him more excited and hungry than he ever thought possible and he looked now at his former fellow captives as nothing more than food.  “I feel hungry.”

Sandy nodded approvingly.  “You will feast with us.”

Brian hissed at the humans and they started to cry when they saw the unholy beauty of his new body.  He slithered across the floor to where the other Kin waited to consume their food.

Lucy looked closely at Judy’s hair.  “That’s one thing I don’t miss, hair care I mean.  In many ways I’m better off not having any at all, except my eyelashes obviously.  I was always a compulsive mascara-junkie.”

“Can’t you tape falsies around your eyeholes?”  Judy tried to be sympathetic to the mostly mechanical woman.  “You paint the lipstick on quite well though.”

“The Doctor does that for me.”  Lucy confessed.  “I just take my face off and let her work her magic.  These hands are designed for heavy lifting, not sensible things like grooming.”

“At least you don’t have to wax your legs and you bikini line anymore.  I’d gladly swap places with you to get rid of all that hair.”

Lucy shook her head.  “No you wouldn’t Judy; don’t ever say anything like that again.  What they did to me was terrible, far worse than anyone should ever have to endure.  They tore me into pieces and kept me alive afterwards, there’s only scraps of me left alive in all this metal and plastic.  It’s the worst horror in the world.  You can’t imagine how many times I begged for death.  They cut my eyes out, then cut my arms and legs off and I could only scream in horror as I felt them cut my heart out and put a device in me as a replacement.”

“Maybe waxing isn’t so bad after all.”  Judy wondered why Lucy chose to stay the way she was.  “Couldn’t you get another, more feminine body?  Those huge metal hooters of yours just look so...fake.”

“That’s the irony of it all.  In trying to survive the Cybermen became fake people living fake lives.  Remember that Judy, they’re not people anymore.  I’m not a real person anymore.”

The Doctor rushed over.  “Yes you are real Lucy.  Don’t feel otherwise.  They took a lot away from you but they didn’t take you away.  You’re a real woman despite appearances.  If you start thinking you’re like them then they win.  That’s the true evil, to stop being who you are and becoming what they want you to be.”

“Yeah, be your own person.”  Judy agreed.  “Even if you’re an evil groupie, with boundary issues and no social conscious, be who you are.”

“Erm that’s not quite what I meant.”  The Doctor started to lecture.

“It’s ok.”  Judy cut the Doctor off.  “Life is about recognising who and what you are.  Changing something about yourself that you don’t like because you want to and improving other things.  My third nose job was a real life saver I can tell you.”

“I don’t even have a nose.”  Lucy replied.  “Apparently they experimented with them once or twice but they didn’t take off.”

The TARDIS materialised with the sound like that of a dying camel.  From it emerged one of the five occupants.  The Doctor insisted that the Master went first in case of accidental gun fire.  She’d had that problem once and didn’t want to go through it again, especially as she liked the body she currently wore.  “Is it safe?  Why don’t you go next Lucy?”

“I should have gone first.  I am bullet proof.”  Lucy had to stoop down as she exited the spaceship.

“I should have gone first.”  Yargrin muttered.  “I’m used to danger.”

“I just want to make the Master sweat.”  The Doctor replied casually.  “We’re perfectly safe.”

“I hate you.”  Judy pouted at the evil blonde bitch in rubbish shoes.  “Do you have to wear those shoes?  You look like you’re trying too hard to look like a born again teenager.”

“At least I have style.”  The Doctor replied.  “Wearing black all the time only demonstrates your lack of fashion skills.”

“I really hate you.”  Judy ran out of the TARDIS to be with the Master.

“Sometimes I just want to really slap her.”  The Doctor said to Yargrin.  “He lets her get away with anything.”

“She’s still a girl Doctor; she’s just testing the boundaries to see how you’ll react.”

“Maybe, but if she forces a confrontation between the Master and myself, then this joint adventure will be over before you can say solid left hook out of nowhere.”

Yargrin nodded.  “You have great martial prowess, but he is armed with a weapon.”

“Yes, I noticed the familiar bulge in his trousers.”  The Doctor blushed.  “I suppose I shouldn’t have looked so hard at the other one, but I am a woman after all.”

“Erm, this is the sort of conversation you have with Lucy.”  Yargrin replied.

“I know, but she’s not here.”  The Doctor followed her companion out of the TARDIS and locked the doors.

“Don’t I get a copy of the key?”  The Master held his hand out.  “In case of emergencies.  I’d hate to have to carry Lucy all the way back here only to be unable to open the door because I didn’t have a key.”

“Oh very well.”  The Doctor fished around in her handbag and pulled out the key with all of Penny’s girly key fobs still attached to it.  “Here you are.”

The Master looked at the key before pocketing it.  “Shall I lead?”

“Only when we’re dancing.”  The Doctor replied and set off.  “You can read the map though, if it’ll satisfy your ego.”

“It looks like we’re the map team.”  Judy said to the Master.  “We do have a map, don’t we?  I hate them myself.  I think they’re all basically wrong and designed to get you exactly where you don’t want to go.”

Yargrin drew his gun, before the Doctor confiscated it.  “Hey.”

“No guns, remember.”  The Doctor stashed the gun away in her handbag.  “This is Earth.  Remember they shoot people before asking questions here.”

Stacy flailed her arms and tail about as she began the final chant to summon forth the Disgracer unto the world.  She looked forward to obeying his slightest whim with utter glee.  The Kin would rid the world of its excess population; all its animals would be food for the true inheritors of the world.  Even those who had denied themselves of their true destiny would become naught but meat in her belly.  She truly believed in her god and her cause and once the world was purged of all the false gods it would be a better place for the one true religion to embrace the land and its people for all eternity.  “We your servants offer you the blood of our foes, the marrow of our enemy, and the offal of our rivals.  In your name we wipe them off this earth.  Their minds are weak and we control them to do your will.”  She concentrated and the metal floating device crashed down from the sky onto the place of false worship.  She heard the screams of the dying in her minds ear at it was wonderful.  “The final sacrifice is made, come forth like a plague.  You will be the pestilence that the world suffers; you will be the most magnificent ache the world will ever know.  We who were defiled in your image worship you and give you thanks for our abomination and our children already hatch to become the new generation of servants to worship you our most dank and decayed one true god.”

“It’s underground.”  The Master explained of the others.  “I only got a brief glimpse of it.  Some sort of crude building associated with primitive beliefs.”

“A temple?”  Lucy pondered.

“Yes, do you have any information in your brain?”  The Master looked at the Cyberwoman.  “The Cybermen have very detailed files on Earth, I…examined… one once.”

“Not a clue.”  Lucy replied.  “I do know a lot about you though; you’re not to be trusted.”

“I never did trust him.”  The Doctor said loudly.  “He’s a liar, a rogue and a scoundrel.”

“You’ve just described yourself Doctor.”  The Master replied.

“Ah, but I always win.”  The Doctor replied.

“I’m bored.”  Judy complained.  “Why do we have to do this anyway?  Just because some weird old bloke who looked like my granddad appeared to us and said we have a task to do for him.”

“He is one of the guardians of time.”  The Master explained.

Judy wrinkled her nose.  “He smelled funny, like a bottle of gin in an old folk’s home.”

“You show visit Gallifrey sometime.”  The Master quipped.  “Quite the collection of doddering old fools.”

Yargrin pointed to a mostly concealed cave mouth.  “There it is, it’s regularly used and they go to great pains to keep it hidden.”

The Doctor gave her companion a chocolate éclair sweet.  “Well done.  I would have missed that.”

“Me too.”  The Master agreed.  “You have unusually good eyes.”

“I’d have seen it.”  Judy muttered.  “I was just blinded by the awfulness of that bright pink suit.”

“There’s nothing wrong with it.”  The Doctor replied.  “Haana bought me this.”

“That explains everything then.”  The Master chuckled.  “A most gifted lady, but annoyingly persistent in her pursuit of other females.”

“Eeuw, that clingy lesbo?”  Judy remembered that time a strange girl called Haana had tried to pull her.  “I had to scrape her off with a can of mace.  She wouldn’t believe that I fancy boys.”  She looked at Yargrin and batted her eyelashes at him while she mentally undressed him.

Yargrin wondered why the human girl kept getting something in her eyes, he presumed they were sensitive to dust or something as it didn’t affect anyone else.

Stacy felt the approach of her god.  It was the best feeling in the world.  She could barely contain herself as the one who had given new and disgustingly splendid life to her was about to manifest.  She wanted the world to suffer and she wanted to make it suffer.  She was a creature of pain and torment.  She was a monster inside and out.  She was the high priestess of the most evil sect ever and it filled her with dark joy to contemplate the years of torture and executions that she would witness and carry out.

“This place is naff.”  Judy complained to the Master, except that he wasn’t there.  “Great, he wandered off and left me.”

Stacy’s head turned around to look at the vessel.  “You are the one?  I would have expected something taller.”

Judy screamed when she saw the horrible looking monster, but a beam of energy erupted from below to consume her body.  It burned and she felt something inside her head.  A presence.  A mind of teeth and pain.  She tried to fight it but it was hopeless, but instead of destroying her it absorbed her.

Stacy bowed down before her god.

Judy the Disgracer smiled at her servant.  “Don’t you think this body is a little too human?  I’d have preferred something with more arms.”  She concentrated and four more pairs of arms grew out of her torso.  Indeed her torso elongated to accommodate them and she replaced the soft vulnerable flesh with the iron-hard skin of an alligator, except for the face, as she knew there were a few mortals that she wanted to see suffer as they looked in awe and disgust on her corrupt and distorted features.  “I can’t wait to see their faces, and then I’ll eat their eyes.  Must do something about these legs though.  If I made you in my image then I should be a god you can love and fear.”  A few seconds later and her legs were gone, replaced by a huge snake’s body and tail.  The tip of the tail warped until it resembled Judy’s original face while her real face became more like that of a spinosaurus.  “Behold your god, Stacy.”

Stacy bowed.  “I am your humble servant; we will procure fresh meats for your pleasure.”

Judy’s human face spoke.  “There is meat already in my temple, bring it to me.  I will dine on the one called the Doctor.”

“Judy.”  Yargrin shouted out Judy’s name.

“Judy.”  Lucy called out.

“I should never have taken my eye off her.”  The Master berated himself.  “I should have realised that a petite girl in a black dress might get lost in a maze of corridors like this.”

“Yes, well we’ll find her.”  The Doctor tried to reassure her one time friend.  “She can’t have gone far.”

“Footsteps.”  Yargrin called out to the others.  “Those are her shoe size.”

“Yes, too small even for me.”  The Doctor mused.  “They’re going that way.  Something doesn’t feel right though.  It’s like we’re being expected to follow her.”

“A trap?”  The Doctor pondered.  “Maybe.”

“I sense it too.”  Yargrin agreed.

“I’ll scout ahead.” Lucy stated and set off in the direction of the shoes.

Judy waited as her quarry approached.  She looked down at Stacy’s newly hatched offspring.  So vicious and deadly, they would make excellent killers.  “You must train them well, feed them the best meats, do not over indulge them though, we don’t want them dependant, that’s a weakness.  Your children do me proud; all my children make me proud.  She looked at Brian, the most recently corrupted of all her subjects.  “Do you rejoice at the corruption brought upon you?  Do you give thanks for the ruination of your soul?”

“Yes my goddess, the foul beauty of my body is a testament to your magnificent corruption.”

Judy nodded.  “My children you are all young and eager to claim this world in my name.  Go forth and lay waste to mankind.  Drive them into extinction.  Those who will be turned will be spared; all others will suffer for their purity.  Let my pestilence strike them dead.”

“Not so fast.”  Lucy walked into the room.  “You’ll have to come through me first and I’m not on your menu.”  She picked up a large chunk of stone and wielded it like a club.

“I can hear sounds of fighting.”  Yargrin said to the others and grabbed the Doctor’s handbag off her.

“Hey, that’s private.”  The Doctor shouted and grabbed it back.

“Give me my gun, now.”  Yargrin demanded.

“No.”  The Doctor replied.  “You don’t need it.”

“No, I need it; I just don’t want to need it.”

The Doctor removed the gun.  “Here you are, you’re ready to have it now.”

“I don’t want it.”  Yargrin replied as he ran down the corridor, gun in hand.

“You’re using the Chronotis method of teaching I see.”  The Master mused.  “I too am armed.”  He removed the TCE from the pouch sewn inside of his trousers.  “I might use this.”  He handed it to the Doctor.”

“I’m not touching that!”  The Doctor exclaimed.  “Just drop it in the bag.”

Lucy clubbed the nearest creature with her weapon, swatting it against the wall.  “Do not persist, you are badly wounded.  You should seek medical aid for your injuries.”  However none of them listened and she was forced to kill the next creature by ramming the stone club through its chest.

Judy yelled at her creatures to attack the cyborg but their beautiful teeth and claws were ineffective against her metal body.  “Crush her, use the weight of your bodies to over power her.”

Yargrin ran into the room and opened fire at the creatures advancing towards his friend.  “Are you ok Lucy?”

“I’m fine.”  Lucy replied.  “I have minimal damage.  I had to kill.”

“You’ll be fine.”  Yargrin replied as he let off another blast of energy.  “The stun setting isn’t working.”  He changed it to kill and laughed as the shots wounded arms and bodies.  “Now we’ll see who’s so tough and mean.”

“Yargrin, don’t fight me.”  Judy knew that with Yargrin as her new high priest she’d win.  “Join me, fight for me.”

Yargrin looked at the creature.  “Judy?  I’m too late.  It got you.”

“It didn’t get me, I got it.  I am Judy the Disgracer.  Serve me, be my high priest and we will rule this planet.  My power will be yours to command, my children yours to father, my armies yours to lead and my victims yours to slaughter.”

“Judy?”  The Master gasped in shock when he saw what had become of his former companion.  “I’m so, so sorry.”

“Join with me Yargrin.”  Judy ignored boring old square pants.  “Become my most loyal servant.  I shall make you immortal, my eternal consort.”

“You could have all the power you want.”  The Doctor replied.  “You could rule this planet.

“You could succeed where I failed my boy.”  The Master recognised the Doctor’s tactics.

Yargrin looked at the Doctor, knew exactly what she wanted him to do.  He couldn’t.  “I’m sorry Doctor, I want this.”  He walked towards Judy.  “I’ll help you.”

Judy laughed.  “Approach me and I will corrupt you body, mind and soul.”

“No!”  The Doctor yelled, realising her little scheme had failed.  “Don’t do it.”

“He must.”  The Master held the Doctor back.  “To deny himself that power would be madness.”

Yargrin approached the massively altered figure of Judy.  “I am yours to destroy and remake in your image.”

Judy opened her main mouth and prepared to vomit forth her mutagenic slime.  However Yargrin took the opportunity to fire his gun directly into her vulnerable mouth.  “Noooooo!”  She screamed and thrashed on the floor.  “I will not be defeated.  I am a goddess.”

The Doctor moved forward to pull her stunned companion to safety.  However the Judy creature grabbed her left arm and bit it off.

“Doctor!”  The Master rushed over to the Doctor’s side.  “Don’t move.  I’ll stop the bleeding.”

“My rings, my best rings.  I got them off Jo you know.  Wonderful girl, nice taste in semi-precious gemstones.”

“Yes, stay calm Doctor.”  The Master propped the Doctor up against his knees.  “You’ll be fine.”

“It’s ironic; it was my best hitting arm too.  I taught Lennox Lewis to fight you know.”

“Yes, I know.”  The Master didn’t know quite what to say.  “Your friends are taking care of the situation.  We’ll just relax and talk about tea.”

“Tea?”

“Yes, tea.  We’ll need cups and saucers and cakes and plates and a dozen bowls of milk and a bucket of marmite.”

“I just want to tell you something, before I have a lie down, you’re...you’re my third best friend.”  The Doctor closed her eyes.

The Master looked over at Yargrin and Lucy as they wrenched Lucy’s crocodilian head off her body.  “I’m so sorry.”  He cast his eyes down at the ground.  “I failed both of you.”

“Nonsense.”  The White Guardian said,

“Where were you?”  The Master asked.

“I was redeeming your companion’s soul.  Nasty business.  I thought she’d over come her childishness, she did not.  She is at peace now.”

“How could I save her?”

“I don’t think you were meant to.  No, not even I know all the rules of the game and I helped establish them all.”

The Master looked down at the Doctor.  “Can you help her?  She’s injured because of me.  I asked her to help because I was too weak to do this alone.  She paid the price for my cowardice.”

“Asking for help is the sign of a strong mind.  If you were weak you would never have asked for help even if it meant your death.  You knew your own limitations and accepted them.  She need not bear the full brunt of today’s horrors however.  There is one way, but the price for you will be a lot higher than you can imagine.”

“I’ve already paid more than enough today.  Whatever it is I’ll do it, gladly.”

The Guardian caused an image to appear.  “This is a different possible ending.”

The Master watched an image of himself dying, the Doctor weeping over him.  “I never knew she cared so much.  I never knew I cared enough to notice before.”

The Guardian pulled the other Doctor out of her time.

“What’s going on?”

“I can replace your Doctor with his.”

“No.”  The Master replied.  “She is needed in her own time; I cannot make such an exchange.”

“Then you leave me no choice.”  The White Guardian sent the alternate Doctor and the Master into the other time stream and brought forth the alternate Master.  “I grant you regeneration.”

The dead Master regenerated and sat up, alive and well again.  “That was too close.  I thought I was dead too long that time.  My voice, what has happened to my voice?”

The White Guardian helped the Master up to her feet.  “And now, young lady, the price to be paid in full.”  He removed part of the Master’s left arm and attached it to the bloody stump on the Doctor’s arm.

The Master looked at the smooth stump of her abbreviated limb.  “This will take some getting used to.”

“At least I provided you with clothing suitable to your new incarnation.”  The White Guardian turned and walked straight through the nearest wall.

Lucy looked at the Master’s new appearance.  “I love those earrings.”

Yargrin helped the Doctor to her feet.  “We should get out of here.”

“My arm.”  The Doctor muttered as she awoke.  She looked at her arm.  “My arm?”

“I’ll explain later.”  The Master promised.  “I have a sudden urge to have a full and honest discourse with you, about shoes.”

Lucy led the way back to the surface.

The Master was walking back to the TARDIS when she finally realised that some things had changed dramatically.  “I have breasts!”

“You also have ginger hair.”  Lucy added approvingly; here let me carry you back to the TARDIS before you faint from the shock you seem to be suffering from.

“You’re not having any of my clothes.”  The Doctor muttered as she took in the Master’s new appearance.  “You always had to copy me.  I go to earth, you follow me.  I help save others, you help save others.  I give up standing to use the loo and now you copy me.  Next thing you’ll be telling me you like the company of men and contemplate getting a boyfriend.  I’ve had two and let me tell you evil megalomania aside they were great lovers.”

The Master rolled her eyes.  “Could you be anymore of a tramp?  At least I’m more femme than the Rani.”

Deep inside the temple Stacy moved out from her hiding place.  “You may have defeated the Disgracer but he will arise again and his armies will be legion.”  She watched as the recently hatched babies began to feast on the dead bodies of the Kin.  “I shall find a mate and together we shall breed a new regime of evil to rid this world of its false gods.  The false gods must fall for the one true god will return one day.”