It took Roka a moment to realize what he had just said, but before it could fully reach her brain the Master already shoved her to the side and took a look around. What did he want to remember her for? Surely not out of sympathy... although she had never before seen such a warm and honest smile on his face. Or had it just been a trick of the moonlight?
All she knew for certain was that it was horribly cold, and now that he had moved away she felt it gnawing on her relentlessly. She huddled herself deeper into her jacket and waited for the Master to finish his inspection of their surroundings. When he turned back to her, he raised both eyebrows.
"Mhm... the TARDIS is a rough two hour walk away," he stated, observing Roka. "And it will get a lot colder than that soon..."
She rubbed her arms and shrugged, smiling sarcastically. "Humans don't die that easily. But..." she looked around and picked up the knife from the ground. "I can make a fire. How long are nights here?"
"From this moment on... roughly three to four hours. Depending in which direction that thing here is swimming." He slightly stomped the ground.
Roka went to the pile of wood she had gathered earlier and prepared a fireplace, before she hit the knife against a stone. Not much later first flames started to greedily lick the wood and grew big enough to spread some pleasant warmth. She held out her hands to warm them up.
The Master sat next to her and sunk together. He looked exhausted and probably also not very eager to walk a long distance right now.
"You don't happen to carry anything edible with you?" she asked hopefully. But he only shook his head and continued to stare at the flames. "Well... the critters here aren't very shy... maybe I can catch some," she mused and got up to look around.
It wasn't hard to find something. There were creatures that looked like bunnies, but without visible ears. And they were peacefully sleeping next to some mushrooms. Some of those would be great too, but she wasn't in the mood to test her luck with them.
"Hold that. They struggle too much." She pushed one of the animals into the Master's hands.
He stared at it with a questioning look and then at Roka as she, swiftly and with a skilled move, stopped the struggling once and for all. The second rabbit landed motionless next to her.
"No qualms?" The Master eyed her curiously.
Roka shrugged and started to skin and gut the animals. "Doesn't help much with hunger. Hmm, interesting... seems like they don't have much blood. Weird creatures..."
"You did that before," he stated. "And not only once. Obviously."
She chuckled as she cut down some flesh and poked it onto sticks. "You missed a few parts when you were scrambling through my past. I lived a bit... feral for a while." Not long and the meat was emitting a nice smell. "Wanted to stay away from people."
"What for? They can't see you anyway." He leaned forward and grabbed one of the sticks, gulping down everything although it was still almost raw.
Roka gave him no answer. She only wrinkled her nose in disgust and rather waited, cleaning her hands in the grass. After a while the Master reached inside his jacket and got out two small water bottles of which he threw one in her direction. At least he knew something about basic survival, she thought smirking.
Time passed and the sticks got less and less.
"They don't taste too bad." Roka decided. "Better than squirrels."
"Tzz... be glad you never had to eat cachgrain. That's some nasty stuff. Tastes rotted, even if freshly butchered. But the Gholpiros love it. Bah!"
After that silence spread, only interrupted by the crackling of the fire and the noises of the forest. Foreign and still familiar sounds to Roka. Occasionally she threw more wood into the flames, but it really got a lot colder and soon she started to freeze again, clutching her knees and making herself as small as possible to keep her body temperature stable.
Tiredness overcame her, now that all tension had fallen off of her and she had halfway nodded away when she suddenly got pulled back. Something had grabbed her around her waist and dragged her, then she felt something warm at her back and arms around her. Perplex she looked up and into a grinning face.
"Gotcha!" the Master announced happily and put his chin onto her head.
It felt like her heart stopped for a second, maybe it really did, but then she relaxed and snuggled herself closer.
"You're weird," the Master mumbled on her head. "Shouldn't you try to get away?"
"Not ever." Roka sighed contently, not giving a damn anymore about right or wrong.
"Well... better for me then." He lifted his head and chuckled. "Makes it easier to look at the rest of your memories."
Now she tried to get away. But his grip on her was too tight and all struggle was in vain.
"I need some distraction. And I think... Living in the wilds, avoiding people. You have a secret, I can smell it."
"That's just your stinking ego!" Roka protested, but finally gave up. "It's none of your damn busyness."
"I still want to know." He snickered and waited until she held still. "But I'll put you to sleep anyway... as a precaution, so you can't do stupid stuff on me."
"Ugh, never again. Once in your head was really enough" Roka pouted, before she made herself comfortable once more. It was warm and if that was the price to be able to stay like this for a while...
"I was more thinking about putting you into your own head." He sounded as if he was grinning widely. "Ever had a lucid dream?"
"No. I tried, but it never worked." This made her curious though and she looked up. "Can you do that?"
"Mhm..." he grinned wider. "Sounds like fun, right?"
"Not if we have to run around in my memories," she countered sourly.
But the Master didn't hesitate and shortly after she felt fingers at her temples and once more her world faded into inky darkness. This time not for long. Colors and smells and images rushed by and suddenly she had to press her hands against her ears as a cacophony of sounds suddenly rained down on her. The traffic on the streets, laughing and screaming children, people chatting, phones ringing, wind rustling through trees. All of it at once and unfiltered. And when she opened her eyes there was exactly that around her. The park from the town she had grown up in, clad in fresh and brimming vernal colors. Even the tempting smell from the nearby snack stall filled the air.
There 'she' stood, eying a man who watched something nearby, only to steal away his food. Then she ran to the park, a smile on her lips.
"Aaaaw, that was mean," an amused voice behind her said.
Roka spun around, seeing the Master, and it made her remember. It was only a dream. Scenes blurring in and out, impressions hitting her, one after the other, making her even hold out a hand to stroke the bark of a nearby tree, only to touch nothing.
Perplex she stared at her hand. "This is weird." Her gaze wandered up to the Master's smiling face. "So real and at the same time... not. That's... amazing!" Excitement spread inside her. "I mean... it's in my head. All of this! And so detailed!"
"Calm down." He laughed. "I make sure you don't wake yourself up, but the more excited you get, the harder it is."
She nodded and took a few deep breaths. Weird how she had to do this in here, although she wasn't even a physical entity. Another, not so pleasant, feeling made her squint her eyes. A light tingling sensation right in the middle of her scalp. And suddenly they were at the house of her childhood again. This time she wasn't a child though.
The funeral of her father when she was ten, she hiding in the background, silently crying into the stuffed fox he had once gifted her. The only thing that was still hers.
She saw herself coming in and out of the house whenever she wanted, growing older, always carrying some books with her.
Her reading bedtime stories to her little brother, making her wonder if he ever realized that she wasn't just an imaginary friend.
More images passed by, so fast it was hard for her to follow. Nothing really exciting happened until the day she turned eighteen. The scenes slowed down. Whatever the Master did with her mind, he obviously could sense if things were in any way important to her or not.
She let out a deep sigh and watched her younger self slipping out of the house and, for the last time, closing its door behind her.
"What were you doing?" the Master asked, revealing that he wasn't in full control of this.
"One day I just left," she explained the scene. "The glitch got worse and eventually they didn't remember me at all... and if they did... well, it was hard to explain every time what I had done for the past weeks or months." Roka let out a dry laugh.
The tingling in her head was back and a moment later they followed her dream self strolling through the nearby city. That actually made her smile and even giggle, when she saw herself steeling new clothes, some outdoor equipment and food.
"Being a glitch has to have some benefits." She grinned. "Although I did get caught once or twice." The scene changed to the interior of a police station, where she was brought in. The police man talked to another one, probably explaining the situation, when he suddenly stopped and scratched his head, as if he couldn't remember what he had wanted to say. Both looked confused at each other and behind them Roka slipped out of the building again.
"That's cheating!" the Master called out.
"Yeeeah, I know." She giggled. "It was fun."
"Wait... so you lived on the streets?" He tilted his head, giving her a curious look. "You must be the only person to do that on purpose."
Roka shrugged. "I had no money. And I guess it's obvious that no one hires a person they keep forgetting. Which left me with two options... staying with my mother for the rest of my life, or..."
She took a deep breath and tried if she could manipulate the scenes herself. It worked and countless images of a whole year flew by, showing her enjoying the summer in the park with stolen books, her playing pranks on clueless people, her collecting leaves in autumn and also her using stolen ice skaters on the frozen river in winter.
The world was hers and hers alone.
"Freedom," she mumbled. "Not giving a damn about right or wrong, about consequences or anything else."
Carefully she peeked up and saw the Master smiling to himself and giving her a knowing look. "So that's why you wanted to come with me."
A smile whizzed over her face. The years with the Doctor had taught her morality and how important it could be to do the right thing. But in the end...
"Well... that's it." She shrugged and watched herself ice skating. "A happy life and one day I ran into the Doctor. See? No secrets."
Suddenly he tightly grabbed her head with one hand, his fingers pressing painfully against her skull, while the tingling sensation got almost overwhelming.
"Stop! Alright!" she yelled at the pain, but at the same time wondered why she could even feel it, since she was just a dream.
The Master released her without a word, but with a nasty smile on his face. Roka gave him a mean look, but brought up some new scenes. As long as she controlled them, she might be able to skip a few. If they didn't felt too important he probably wouldn't even notice.
"There are always two sites to life," she mumbled, while the dream showed herself stealing blankets. "The surface, where everyone has their normal job, car, apartment and family... And then there is the shadows..." Her dream self handed the blankets and cans with food to a bunch of homeless people. They made wide eyes and thanked her exuberantly. One skinny woman even hugged her.
"Oh my, you're such a disgustingly good person," the Master snickered.
"No, I'm not." Roka turned away, as more scenes unfolded.
She had tried to be though. Had thought with her invisibility she might make a difference where others couldn't. The shadows. The places where things suddenly take on such dark tones that it is hard to believe that one was still in the same city. And suddenly one is surrounded by a hell of drugs and prostitution, organized burglary and even murder. It was like flicking a light switch.
There she was, lingering at the edges of the light, eavesdropping on gangs to sabotage their operations. Waiting in alleyways to throw big stones at rapists and drug dealers. That had been a new, dark kind of fun, although she knew it wouldn't help much. These kinds of people never fully vanish.
And then one night she threw a stone a little bit too hard and it hit in a bad angle. The guy was dead immediately and his victim, a homeless looking girl roughly Roka's own age, shocked and screaming in terror. Roka had ran over to her to calm her down, to take her away from the guy and bring her somewhere safe.
They became friends. It was hard work to stay visible around her. Roka even build a gadget that emitted a sound and trained the girl to associate her with it. That way she only had to remotely trigger it and they could interact with each other almost normally.
Since then Roka stayed away from the shadows and took care of the girl, showed her how much fun a free and wild life like hers could be. Just sitting there, reading in the sun, watching the stars at night or the sundown over the river, while everyone else was busy with their hectic lives.
"So... she was your girlfriend then?" the Master suddenly asked.
Roka's heart dropped and the scenes vanished. She had completely forgotten about him, having been fully indulged in those memories.
"I... uhm..."
He leaned down to her with a chuckle. "I've never seen you blush before."
She trod back and shook her head. "No... no, it wasn't... like that. We didn't... I mean, we never..." Stopping herself from making it worse she turned her head away. "And even if, that's so none of your business!" she snapped at the Master, poking his chest.
He laughed even louder and ruffled her hair. "Calm down, I won't look."
"There isn't even anything to look at!" She crossed her arms. "And if you weren't such a... a... I can't even find a word that's mean enough! No one should be able to look so closely at another one's memories. It's just not fair!"
"Never said it would be. Although I'm surprised you sneaked around in such dark places. Doesn't really suit you."
"Probably better than you think," Roka mumbled. "Can we leave now?"
"You're so eager to get away." He grinned down to her. "I want to know why. But..." the grin faded slowly. "It's not necessary that you stay. If you don't want to."
She thought about it for a moment. Those weren't memories she wanted to relive... and none she was proud of. But the thought of having the Master wander around in here without her was even worse, so she shook her head and tried to bring up the next scenes. It was harder than she had anticipated and the images were distorted, like a glitched video file.
A hand was suddenly on her shoulder, warm and reassuring. Roka looked up and their eyes met for a moment. He nodded. He was there, and that thought alone calmed her down. Everyone but him would judge and push her away for what she had done. But compared to his life, hers was nothing but an interlude.
She took some deep breaths and also felt a light tingling again, before the images stabilized.
They had been together for a few months when Roka one day found the door to their makeshift shelter splintered open.
Shocked she ran inside, only to find her friend on the ground. Above her stood a man, a brick in his hands and a proud smirk on his lips as he watched the puddle of blood slowly forming under the girl's head. His hoody wore the symbol of a local gang Roka knew too well. The girl must have had something to do with them at one point.
But right now... right now Roka couldn't think about that. Her world turned dark all of a sudden, and all that was left was an all consuming rage as she jumped at the man and...
The real Roka turned her head away and closed her eyes, but it didn't help. The sound of cracking bones reverberated through the room. That had been an accident. Everything she did to him afterwards... hadn't. She had made sure to find out why he had been here and who had been involved in this beside him.
And after that... she had hunted them down. One by one, laid out traps and staged accidents.
By now she was shaking. There had been so much hate and rage inside her back then. At one point she had even contemplated getting rid of more than just those few. It would have been so easy. There had been nothing and no one to stop her.
And then there was laughter behind her. Loud and extensive. She looked up and remembered the Master, who obviously was more than amused about this. Finally he grinned at her.
"And I always thought you were such an innocent thing." He cupped her chin and his grin got wider. "Wondered how someone like that can be around me, see what I do... and not say a word. Not judge."
She peered away as good as possible. "I told you... I have no right to do so."
"Tell me..." He firmly grabbed her wrists and almost hungrily glared at her. "What is it you fear, my little ghost? To become a monster like me? Or is it..." He leaned to her ear and almost whispered, "that you enjoyed the rush of feeling a life ending in your own hands." She jerked away and tried to free herself from his grip, but he held tight, his grin wide and satisfied. "How did it feel?"
"Horrible!" Roka exclaimed, but it didn't need his sarcastic glint to make her tell the truth, making her stop struggling. "Way too good," she admitted, horrified of herself all of a sudden. "It's so... so much power. I... I almost couldn't stop, once started... That's why I bolted out of there. Avoided people at all cost for the next few years."
Finally he let go of her again and sped up her memories once more, showing her stealing some high quality outdoor equipment and leaving. Her way led her through many parts of Europe, before she eventually came back to Britain, until she traveled to the Scottish highlands, to the cliffs at the sea. There was nothing left for her, nowhere to go, nowhere to return to.
He watched her walking out to the edge, sitting there, awaiting the sunset, before...
"Why should I fear death?" she asked calmly. "Tell me, Master. Just a single reason." When she looked at him, there was no expression on his face. The amusement had gone and it looked as if he really was thinking about an answer.
A loud bang reverberated through the air and a blue police box rushed above dream-Roka's head. Just in time to keep her from taking this one step. Perplex she had looked up, had fell onto her bum and crawled backwards, away from the depths and the crashing waves below. Her head turned into the direction of the crash. Smoke came up from the trees.
And she ran.
"Because of all the things you would have missed otherwise," the Master suddenly said. "Writing the ending to your own story is never satisfying." He leaned an arm onto her
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