The Master insists on having lunch first. "You'll have a clearer head on a full stomach," he insists. "Besides, I know you'll want to be civilised about this."
"All right. But I want to make one thing clear. I win, you don't starve him. Ever."
The Master sighs. "God, you're tedious. Do you know how long he's going to live?"
"Yes," the Doctor says. "And as long as he's your prisoner, he gets three meals a day. If you won't agree to that, there's no point in playing."
"Fine, whatever," the Master says, uninterested. "Now eat up. I'm sick of looking at your cheekbones."
The Doctor tries not to smile too smugly. He tucks into lunch. He figures two weeks of eating like this and he'll have some meat on his ribs again. Faster if they have dessert. "Do you have any more ice cream?" he asks, with a mouthful of steak.
"So, what's it going to be? One game or best two out of three?"
"Two out of three," the Master says, settling down at his side of the large Shogi board. "You can't whine about wanting another chance after you lose three times in a row."
"And neither can you," the Doctor replies. "Sente goes first."
"Indeed I do," the Master says, consideringly. He moves a soldier two spaces.
Standard opening. The Doctor does the same. Two moves later, the pattern becomes apparent. "Aigakari trap," the Doctor says, as he blocks the Master's attempt at his Honoured Horse. "You're making it too easy."
"Just lulling you into a false sense of security," the Master replies.
Three moves later, the Doctor frowns as the Master takes his first casualty, a flying chariot. The Master smirks as he plucks it from the board.
"Beginner's luck," the Doctor says.
"You're going to have to try harder than that."
The Doctor frowns at the board and plots ahead five moves. Proudly snaps a silver general up from under the Master's nose. It's the Master turn to scowl.
The game goes on. The Doctor has to admit they're well-matched, but the Master, for all his tactics, isn't quite as good as he is. But then, the Master didn't spend seven years stuck in 12th century Japan after his TARDIS broke down. There hadn't been much to do except play Shogi, avoid battles, and mess about with the Buddhists. As monks went they were no K'anpo Rinpoche, but it passed the time until he could finish the repairs and she could grow a fresh batch of transducer cells.
Piece after piece is captured and then dropped back in, promoted and un-promoted. There's two checks before the Doctor finally sees the checkmate and captures the Master's King.
"Gotcha," he says, and leans back proudly.
The Master looks irritated, but accepts the win. "All right. So you'll lose two times instead of three."
"Keep telling yourself that," the Doctor says, smugly.
"Keep gloating and win or lose I won't give you any food."
"Now, now," the Doctor chides. Grins and starts resetting his pieces.
The second round starts off well enough, but by halfway the Doctor is struggling. The Master managed to take both his bishops, and with four against him he's having trouble protecting his king, much less keeping his strategy intact.
Four moves before the end, he can see he's going to lose. He grits his teeth in frustration and sees it out, looking desperately for an out and not finding any. The Master takes his king with no small satisfaction.
"I so enjoy winning," the Master says. "Let's do it again so I can win some more."
"The deciding game," the Doctor says. "This one's mine."
The Master merely smiles at him. "I think it's sweet that you're still going to try. Shame you don't get points for effort."
"I don't need them," the Doctor replies.
The final game is even tighter than the first. For every move either of them makes, the other counters it. For every piece taken, its opposite number meets the same fate. There's several perpetual mates that need to be backed off on either side. What I couldn't do with a Drunken Elephant, the Doctor thinks.
There's a moment when his stomach knots as he thinks he's about to lose, but then, as if by magic, he sees the opening he needs. He takes it.
"Yes!" The Doctor takes the king, tosses it in the air and catches it. "I win. How do you like that, eh?"
The Master leans back, mouth drawn thin. "So you do."
"It was a hell of a game, I'll give you that." The Doctor grins broadly. "I could do that all over again. Not that I will, because that was fair and square. You have to keep your side of the bargain."
"I never intended otherwise," the Master replies. He reaches into his pocket and pulls out his phone. "Yes. Take him," he says, and clicks it off, tucks it away.
The Doctor frowns, concern sucking away his good mood. "What do you mean, take him? What do you mean?"
"I mean I'm taking away your pet," the Master says, smoothly. "I've decided you're far too worried about him, so I'm giving him a new home. Don't worry, he'll get his three square meals."
"You can't take him," the Doctor says. It feels like the ground's falling away, even though he's sitting down. "That wasn't part of the deal."
"It's for your own good. You know he was suffering, being with you. You wanted him to be with Martha. Since she's undoubtedly dead by now, I'd kill him for you, but as I can't I've done the next best thing."
"And what's that?" the Doctor asks, lightheaded.
"He's keeping up with the Joneses," the Master says. Smirks. "You should see your face."
The Doctor stands, shaking his head. The Master can't take Jack away, he can't. "Let me out of here!" he says, going to the door and tugging at the handle. It's locked tight. He pulls and pulls but it won't budge.
He turns to the Master with a snarl. "Give him back!"
"No," the Master says.
"You can't take him," the Doctor repeats. Panic fizzes at the edge of his thoughts. He can't go back to that cell, not without Jack there. He can't. He has to stop them from taking Jack. He turns back to the door, pulls at the handle, pounds on the door. "Let me out!" he shouts. "Let me out!"
"Interesting," the Master says. "But also annoying. Time for you to leave."
The door suddenly opens and the Doctor crashes through and right into one of the guards. There's a high-pitched whine and the Doctor screams as a million volts zap through his system. He collapses to the floor, twitching. The last thing he sees is the guard standing over him, taser in hand. Reaching down to shock him again.
He blacks out as the pain hits.
He comes to lying flat on his back. He's on the bed in his cell. His nerves tingle where he was shocked. He sits up.
Jack is gone, along with any trace he was ever here. He's gone. Panic wells in the Doctor's chest. Jack's gone Jack's gone.
He tries to pull himself together, but it's hard. It's so hard. He doesn't know why he feels so terrified but he does.
"Stop it," he mutters to himself. "You're fine, stop panicking."
Jack can't be gone. He can't. But he is. Assuming the Master wasn't lying, he's with Martha's family. Isn't that what he wanted? For Jack to be fed, for him to be somewhere else, somewhere safer than by his side?
He did want it. He does. But he can't bear this without him. He didn't realize how much he was relying on him, not until Jack was gone.
Damn the Master for this. If he'd lost, would Jack have been taken? Maybe, but maybe not. Maybe this is his punishment for winning. But it's worth it, surely, if it means Jack won't starve over and over because of him? Jack is his responsibility, and that means it's up to the Doctor to protect him. Not the other way around. He's not the weak one, not the fragile human.
Jack was right. He shouldn't have played the Master's game. He shouldn't have opened himself up to this. He was damned if he won and damned if he lost, and the only way to escape would have been not to play at all. It's impossible to win when the Master is setting the rules. He should know that better than anyone.
Even the mattress was changed so he couldn't smell Jack's scent. Bastard, he thinks, cursing the Master. Bastard. How did he know? How did he know taking Jack was the worst thing he could do, when even the Doctor didn't know?
What's done is done. The Doctor's on his own now, alone. That's what he wanted, wasn't it? No one has suffer by watching him suffer. He doesn't have to feel guilty about anyone else's pain. He doesn't need anyone. That's what he's been telling himself since he lost Rose. Since the Time War. He's better off on his own. He doesn't have to watch anyone else die if he's on his own.
He curls up on the bed, wraps his arms around himself. He'd give anything for Jack's warmth right now, his steadiness, his concern. But it's gone.
The next day, when the guards come to take him to the Master's suite, he refuses to budge.
"I'm not going," he tells them, angrily. "You hear me, Master? I'm not playing anymore."
One guard pulls out his taser, but the other stops him. Speaks in low tones into a walkie talkie. A few seconds later, they're gone.
The Doctor waits for them to come back, for them to try to force him out, but no one comes. Good, he thinks. See how the Master likes being alone. Give him a taste of his own medicine.
He curls up on the bed. Sulks and misses Jack, misses Martha. Misses his ship so badly. If he could only reach her, only tear out that horrid paradox machine, this would all be over. Everything would be fine. But they might as well be on Pluto for all that he can reach any of them.
The next day, the guards come again at the usual time. Once again the Doctor adamantly refuses to go with them, and once again they leave. It's the same the next day, and the next, and the next.
There's no food. He drinks water but that's all he has. Even if the Master gave him something, he isn't sure he'd eat it. He doesn't want anything from him, not when he knows there'll be a cost. He doesn't waste energy on pacing, on exercises, just lies on the bed and weaves thread after thread into the Archangel network. It's the only hope he has to hold on to.
The more days pass, the more everything feels bleak. He might not see Jack again until this is over, might not see anyone. The Master won't let him have anyone, he can see that now. That's why he took Jack away.
He didn't used to find it so hard to be alone. Before the War he preferred company but didn't need it, not like he does now. There wasn't that gaping emptiness inside him, in his hearts and his mind. Even the millions of humans tied into him through Archangel barely constitute a whisper.
Under normal conditions a week without food would be tolerable. As long as he was sitting quietly, it could even be part of a normal round of meditation. It would take forty days for him to become delirious, to risk regeneration. But this isn't normal conditions. His reserves were hardly replenished from three days of proper meals after a month of starvation and torture. His body used up so much to heal.
After ten days he can feel himself weakening but he still refuses to leave the cell. He knows the sensible thing would be to go to the suite, to eat to keep up his strength so he can save the world, but he can't bring himself to do it. He can't go back there and make himself vulnerable to another loss. He can't let the Master take anything else away, even if it feels like there's nothing he can take. There's always more to lose, and he of all people should know that by now.
On the sixteenth day, the Master stands outside his call.
"Is this some sort of hunger strike?" the Master asks. "Or are you actually going to sulk yourself to death because I took away your security blanket?"
The Doctor says nothing. He doesn't want to give the Master the satisfaction of hearing how weak he is. He doesn't want to engage in conversation with him knowing it can't lead anywhere helpful.
"If you insist on being childish, I'll wait until you go into a coma and then hook you up to a feeding tube. Won't that be a pleasant thing to wake up to? I might even leave it in for a while, just until you're fattened up. I prefer you strong enough for conversation at the very least."
Strong enough for torture, the Doctor thinks. That's what he really wants. The Doctor doesn't want to play that game, doesn't want to be strong so the Master can make him weak. He doesn't want to suffer that way again, screaming until his throat goes raw, every nerve alive with pain, no part of him that doesn't hurt. Especially now that when it's over there'll be no Jack to put him back together, to wash away the blood. He can't face recovering from that on his own. He'd rather starve.
After a few minutes of impatient waiting, the Master gives up and leaves. The Doctor closes his eyes but doesn't sleep.
The next day, the guards come again. But this time they don't talk to him, don't make demands. They just open the door.
Lucy walks inside.
She's traded the white for cream-coloured silk, traded the pink lipstick for red, but otherwise she seems the same. He wonders what she's been doing with herself all this time. If the Master kept them apart for a reason or if she was given some task in the conquering of humanity that kept her busy.
"Hello, Doctor," she says, in that slightly breathy voice.
The Doctor doesn't react. Lucy looks at him, then turns back to the guards. They hand her a tray and she carries it inside, and they lock the door behind her.
Everything on the tray would be easy for him to eat, the same as the food he was given after being tortured. He doesn't want any of it. He could go for a good week yet before any important organs started to falter.
"You can't pretend to be asleep if your eyes are open," she says, lightly. "It's not very convincing that way. And if you close them now I won't believe it."
"I'm not pretending anything," the Doctor croaks. His voice is rusty after so long without speaking. He coughs lightly, his throat dry.
"Here," she says, offering a cup half-full of what looks like orange juice. He wonders if the groves of the Americas are still there or of this is just frozen concentrate. He wonders if all this time the Master has been starving humanity the way he's been starving Jack. The Doctor could have demanded they be fed too, but he doesn't think it would have helped.
Lucy puts the cup back on the tray. "At least you're speaking. That's a start."
"Why are you doing this?" he rasps. "Why are you --" he coughs "-- helping him?"
"I suppose it must seem strange to you," Lucy says, a distant look in her eyes. "But I love him. He saved me, you see. From the evils of the world. From myself." She looks down at the Doctor, meeting his eyes. "I was once like you. Locked away, punishing myself." She reaches down and brushes hair from his forehead.
The Doctor turns his head away. He doesn't want her pity, her sympathy. She needs saving from the Master, not by him. "You're destroying your own species. Don't you care?"
"Yes. I'm glad."
The Doctor stares at her in disbelief.
When she smiles, there's madness in her eyes. "The Earth doesn't deserve your sacrifice, Doctor. It isn't worth saving."
"You're wrong."
Lucy shakes her head. "Harry's told me all about you. How you rejected your whole species for a better life. How you needed to leave them behind so badly." She gives a delicate laugh. "We both know that need to leave."
"I didn't want to destroy them."
"But you did," she says, gently. "We've made the same choices."
"No," the Doctor rasps. "They're nothing like the same."
She looks at him pityingly. "I know it hurts. But it feels so much better when you accept it. Harry showed me that. I believe he can show you, too." She looks away, stirs the mashed potatoes with her spoon. "Would you like to know how?"
The Doctor stays silent.
"I tried to kill myself," she says, almost dreamily. "My father had me taken away. It was very quiet and green, very beautiful, but it was a prison. Harry found me. He saved me. He killed my father for me." She smiles. "I was so grateful."
"How can you be grateful?" the Doctor says, aghast.
Lucy looks down at him, her eyes suddenly cold. "Because of what he did. My father... he blamed me for my mother's death. She died giving birth to me, so her life became mine. Do you understand?"
The Doctor nods, feeling a wave of disgust and pity. "I'm sorry."
"I became his perfect wife," she says, a quiver in her voice. "When I couldn't live with myself anymore, I tried to make it stop. Then I tried again. I could never take enough pills, you see. Not when he always knew where I was."
She looks away, stares at the wall, distant and almost vacant. "Harry hated the world as much as I did. That was what brought us together. For better or for worse." She looks down at him, focused again. "You need to eat. You must be so terribly hungry. It won't stop until the end. It only gets worse and worse, until one day you can't bear it anymore. It doesn't have to be that way."
She offers him the cup again, but he doesn't take it. She presses it to his lips.
"Please, Doctor. If not for yourself, do this for me. For Harry. We want you to get well."
She tilts the cup just so, and the Doctor can taste a hint of sweetness. He's so hungry, so tired, so tired of being alone. He hasn't felt any kindness since Jack was taken away. He doesn't want to die.
He parts his lips and a trickle of juice pours onto his tongue. It tastes impossibly good. He swallows in tiny gulps, the first liquid to pass his lips in days. He stopped drinking water when he felt too weak to stand and couldn't bear to crawl.
"That's better," Lucy says, almost motherly. She strokes his cheek with the back of her hand, fingers cool for a human but still warm to his senses. It reminds him of Jack and he feels something break in his chest.
Lucy takes the cup away. Wipes his lips with a napkin. "We'll try something solid when you've finished all the juice."
The Doctor says nothing, but he wishes he didn't feel so horribly grateful.
Even with Lucy's gentle coaxing, he can't manage more than a few spoonfuls of food. Anything more is too much after his long starvation. When it's time for her to go, the thought of being alone here again is unbearable. He misses Jack so much, but Jack is gone.
"You must feel so lonely," Lucy says, as if reading his mind. "You shouldn't have to stay in this place."
Suddenly there's a syringe in her hand. The Doctor's eyes widen in panic. He pushes himself away but hits the wall behind him.
"It'll be easier if you don't struggle," she tells him. "It won't hurt, I promise."
"Please don't," he rasps. He remembers the Master and his needles, the burning in his veins. He shakes his head slowly back and forth. "I don't want it."
She hushes him. "It'll be all right. Just be a good boy now." She takes his arm with surprising strength and pins it to the mattress.
A quick movement, a prick, and the Doctor feels the drug rushing through his bloodstream. It doesn't hurt but he can feel it dragging him down, down. He struggles against it but to no avail. His vision greys, fades.