The TARDIS shook violently as the Doctor scurried around the console to stabilize their flight. Right now he was proving once more why he had never passed his flight exam at the academy, as the Master never got tired mentioning.

Hearing the familiar landing sound of the old lady made Roka smile though. That sound always was like a promise, a call to adventure. Especially this time, since the boredom was gnawing on her a lot more than she had ever imagined it could.

Very obviously the Master did have the very same problem, maybe even more since he also had to drown out the drums somehow. Both had worn him down enough to finally, and not without a bunch of protests and snarky remarks, agree to follow the Doctor outside to some adventure.

Maybe it also had something to do with Roka checking her ear-stud to find out she would be visible to everyone for at least the next fifteen hours or so. And then - just maybe - had been a tiny little bit annoying about it.

There had been rules though. The bracelets stayed at the Master's wrists, much to his and Roka's demise. But the Doctor had deactivated the shocks, so he wouldn't zap the other one by accident. However, they still would prevent the Master from teleporting.

Right now he leaned against one of the walls, arms folded and a sour look on his face as he was clearly not delighted about being defeated by boredom. Roka, standing next to him, was indulged in reveries about in what way this would end in some disaster, having not the slightest doubt that exactly this was about to happen. She peeked at the Master and moments later they grinned at each other, both having their own thoughts how this might end.

When the landing sounds faded and the Doctor opened the doors they found themselves inside a huge cave, filled with stalagmites and stalactites, that were spiralled by freckles of some slightly glowing fungi. From here it was hard to grasp the actual measurements of the place, but the eerie green glow showed enough to let one guess that it might reach thousands of meters into the stone. A turquoise shimmering stream of water slowly snaked a path through the ground. Roka crouched down to look inside and found patches of glowing algae softly waving in the stream.

"You must have dreamed seeing trapped people in here," the Master groaned as he took in his surroundings. Nothing indicated any signs of life apart from the plants. He rubbed the bridge of his nose and then folded his arms. "Whatever, where are we anyway?"

"Ahm, the Thekarat-G nebulae. Uncharted sector, very promising." The Doctor swiftly hopped to the water and ran a hand through it, before taking a sip and spitting it out again. "Wouldn't drink that. Not poisonous, but... err... probably not very good for your stomach either." He swirled around and jumped up to grab some of the fungi from a stalactite, lettings his sonic whir over it. "Doesn't produce spores, interesting. Very harmless... could use some as decoration... want to take some with you, Roka?" A toothy grin spread on his face. "I know you like collecting souvenirs."

"It will just rot away, Doctor." She smiled back. "But if we find some glowing stones I'll totally take one."

It was as if she had never been away and she snapped back into the usual adventurous mood that always overcame her when she was out with the Time Lord. Although back in the old days she had never been that enthusiastic, never enjoyed it that extensively. With a smirk she turned towards the Master. "Wipe that sour face away. This is actually pretty cool."

He did... only to replace it with annoyance. "It's a dull cave... nothing fancy about it."

"But it glows!" Roka spread her arms and grinned. She could see the slight smile playing around the corners of his mouth, although he seemed to try very hard to not enjoy this at all.

"Seriously... I showed you at least twenty glowing caves. How can they still amaze you?"

"They are all different." She shrugged.

"Aaaand!" The Doctor was done scanning the surroundings. "I actually went here cause I caught a signal. Can't decipher it, but it's not natural." He nodded his head towards where the water was flowing. "Come on, this way." He lead with brisk steps.

The Master sighed deeply and went after him, followed by Roka. Only a few hundred meters away the small stream bent around a curve and as they followed, they found themselves gaping into a pitch black chasm. None of the glowing stuff seemed to be growing there, but what kept it from doing so stayed a mystery. The stream flew down a steep slope, bordered by thin, slick paths to both sides. Carefully the Doctor led them down one of them, using his sonic as a light source as they left the radius of the fungi.

The path ended soon and lead them back to solid ground; the faint light from above hinted at another gigantic cavern. Eventually darkness fully engulfed them as they proceeded, deep and thick as if it were a living thing. The sonic's light cut through it as if through flesh, barely able to illuminate their surroundings.

Roka stayed close to the Master and eventually reached for his hand.

"Scared?" He chuckled.

"Not sure..." She tried to perceive her surroundings, but it was impossible. "It's just... a weird feeling, nothing else."

"Mhm... I know what you mean. Stay close." He clutched her hand firmly.

Some minutes later the Doctor finally halted and waved them over. Even on his face was some visible tension. He cranked up the sonic's power, but the light still barely managed to banish the darkness. It fell over the nooks, cracks and bulbs of an obsidian black stone wall. Lines and curves and dots and other patterns were etched into it, forming foreboding images of fish-like creatures, of small crab-like species with leathern wings and an allusion of something gigantic, that had to fill the whole rest of the darkness-engulfed wall.

"Impressive, ey?" The Doctor remarked with a grin. "The sonic tracks the signal to this place. It has to come from inside. But..." he moved a few steps to the side, making the light reveal more hints of the monstrous entity on the wall. Details that were hard to grasp, shapes and geometry that was too far away from anything Roka knew to let her even look at it for long without feeling her head spin.

"I... don't like this," she remarked in a whisper, moving closer to the Master. "Reminds me too much of Lovecraft."

"Och, don't tell me you find that stuff really creepy. That's not fair."

"Cthulhu is a lot scarier than you will ever be," she retorted, trying to sound sarcastic, but the strange feeling seemed to be closing in on her, like a pack of predatory beings.

He snorted, but pulled her in front of him, protectively folding his arms around her shoulders. Both watched the Doctor walking up and down the wall, until he found what he had been searching for. But even he was quieter now and a bit less fidgety.

"There!" He pointed towards a small round stone plate. As the two came closer they could see that it was littered with weird entangled symbols, shapes and slopes, like windings arms and fumbling fingers. "Any ideas how to open it?"

Now definitely interest the Master bent down a bit to study the symbols, his finger carefully tracing some of its lines and shapes. He then rotated the plate, letting a low grinding sound reverberate through the cave.

"Lovecraft might not even be too farfetched," he mumbled, concentrated glaring at the plate. "Maybe none of the old ones themselves, but... ancient. It's hard to look at it for long."

"Ah, so it wasn't just me," the Doctor noted, nodding his head. He started to bob up and down on his heels, glancing around as if he could actually see anything in the darkness. "What do you think?"

Roka watched the two and was more amazed about how the Master didn't bother with initiating a fight, but was instead fully indulged in deciphering the plate. She trod a little closer, but regretted it soon. "I literally get sick from watching those symbols for too long." She took a deep breath and turned away. "You're sure this is a distress signal, Doctor? Looks more like an ancient trap to me."

"Uhm... weeeell... could be, yes," he admitted, having an adventurous glint in his eyes though. "But it's rare enough to find something the TARDIS doesn't translate!"

"Means this is probably older than us," the Master mumbled, while rotating the plate in different directions. "Which is usually never a good thing. But I'm intrigued." The sound of stone grinding on stone filled the darkness for a while, as he tried out different ideas.

Roka turned around again and took a deep breath before she looked at the symbols again, determined to not let them play with her again. The dizziness came back almost immediately, but she fought against it, and slowly, as if it were a living thing, it backed off and eventually vanished completely. Now she could make out the shapes and realized fascinated that they really did move slightly, like inky tentacles, reaching around each other. Some entwined themselves, others got pushed away.

"May I?" she asked, suddenly having an idea.

The Master laughed, but made way to stand behind her with folded arms and an amused grin on his face.

"I might be wrong... but if we rotate it so that all the patterns intertwine..." It took all her strength to rotate the stone, but eventually she found a spot where it seemed to work.

"Surprise," the Master chuckled, when nothing happened.

"Wait until they grab each other." Roka held out a hand to stop him from coming closer.

"Grab... each other?" The Doctor sounded surprised and also a bit worried. "But they don't move."

"Congratulations, your ape brain got fried." A mean chuckle came from the Master, but when Roka turned around to look at him, his face showed concern. Then he pinched his eyes at her. "What do you see?"

Roka turned back to the stone and watched. "The patterns... they move and intertwine. It's almost done. But I couldn't see it before I fought back that weird sickness from before."

Suddenly the sound of stone grinding against stone returned, but this time a lot louder than before. The plate violently snapped into the stone with a loud bang and slowly the wall shifted, moved, opened up, grinding against the ground.

"You did it!" The Doctor jumped in the air and grinned widely.

Eventually the grinding came to a halt and they were left with a gaping maw of even deeper darkness, if that was even possible. With a last glance at each other the three entered the menacing shadow of the stone doors, ready to get swallowed and devoured by whatever nightmarish abomination might lurk inside the deepest and most ancient swarthiness of the slumbering stones. Come, come child, enter the shadows, don't fight them. Be one with us.

Roka bumped against the Master and got ripped out of her weird thoughts. The two men had stopped and stared at her, both having a mix of worry and curiosity on their faces.

"Wh... what are you staring at me?" she asked perplex.

"You, ahm..." the Doctor came to her, "just talked. And it wasn't any human language." He let his sonic whir over her. "Neither anything we two could understand... No readings..."

"Your shields are still weak... and something is playing mind tricks," the Master growled. "And it's not even me. I'll bring you back to the TARDIS."

"Whoa, no way!" Roka took a step back.

"We have no idea what we're dealing with." He folded his arms and grinned nasty. "There might be a lot worse things waiting than me."

Roka threw a pleading look at the Doctor, but he too seemed to be concerned.

"Damn you two!" she burst out. "I might not have some super powers like you, but I'm not... I can handle this! Stop protecting me. The both of you!" The last words were mostly directed at the Master. "I'm not going back."

"I don't know if we can protect you," the Doctor objected carefully, but at the same time his eyes wandered towards the Master, looking equally surprised and puzzled, as if he was astonished at how worried he was about Roka.

"Well, you could be of use in here. You see things we don't... and if it's even communicating with you..."

"No, Master! We can't just use her like that!"

"I don't mind," Roka grinned from ear to ear.

"But...!"

"Shut up, Doctor." The Master waved Roka over. When she was in front of him, he grabbed her shoulders firmly, lowered his head and stared her right in the eyes. "There is a way... Would let me see through your eyes and at the same time enable me to shield you."

"No!" The Doctor rushed next to them, a look of incredulity on his face. "That's too invasive!"

"Without her we might leave empty handed though," the Master objected. "And a place as old as this..." He waved a hand into the darkness around. "Wouldn't that be a shame? There could be riches beyond imagination... or weapons. Knowledge that could make me the most dangerous man in the universe." The thought made him grin.

"Reason enough to leave!"

"I too want to know what's in here." Roka smiled. "So, how does this work?"

"Mhm... it is a bit invasive... most Time Lords would even call it... intimate."

"He has to enter your mind!" the Doctor blurted out. "That's... you can't just do that!"

Perplex Roka blinked at him. "Why not? I mean... it's kinda unpleasant, but..."

The Doctor sighed and threw a warning and mean glare at the Master, probably guessing that he had done that with her at least once. He spoke to Roka, but looked at the Master while doing so, "Well, most telepathic species would equal an unauthorized intrusion in another one's mind with... well, almost like rape."

Was she imagining it, or had the Master's face just really taken on a slightly more reddish colour?

Roka folded her arms and pointedly glared at him, more amused than actually peeved, while he refused to look at her.

"Humans aren't a telepathic species!" he burst out, his eyes darting angrily between the two.

"Uh-huh," Roka made, her amusement growing when his head really did take on a darker tone. With a mean chuckle she trod to him and tugged at his sleeve. "Well, this time you have my allowance." She grinned. "I want to know what's inside this cave."

Finally he looked at her, his face cooling down again, and he arched a questioning brow. "Just like that?"

"It's... I guess not a big deal for humans." She shrugged with a smile.

"This is more than just mind reading though... it's..." He glared into her eyes, suddenly very serious. "Do you trust me?"

Roka gulped as she understood that the answer to this question would mean a lot more than just yes or no. Did she? Could she trust him, who had hurt her so often, who had never even once given her a reason to do so? She looked into his eyes, searching for an answer in them. Those ancient portals she couldn't take her own eyes off. They stood still, not twitching even slightly. And there was more, she could see it clearly, those depths that felt like glaring into the nightly sky, like falling endlessly into the darkness. It was a silent communication, no words could describe their thoughts, but she knew, knew that she would follow him to hell and worse places if he went there, saw and knew that he would let no harm happen to her, as long as he was able to prevent it.

Slowly, she nodded and smiled. "Yes, I do."

He grinned and placed a careful kiss to her forehead, like a seal, before he put the tips of his fingers at her temples. "I'll establish a psychic connection," he explained. "Whatever enters your mind, I will perceive it too. Worst case I can cut you off from it. It... err... also means..."

"He can sense literally everything you do. And also the other way around." The Doctor sounded not very happy. "I'm still against it. It's just wrong!"

"No, it's fine." Roka chuckled. "It's not as if there's anything left I could hide anyway." Her smirk got mean.

"I'll shield myself from you. You won't have to deal with my thoughts or anything else." He grinned back.

"Yah, be nice, or I'll bombard your mind with the worst puns I can come up with."

"That's all? I could put some very... interesting images into your mind." He leaned closer, cupping her chin, and in a whisper he added, "And not only images."

Roka blushed horribly, but couldn't prevent a grin.

"Then I'll send some nasty images back," she countered with an eye-nod towards the Doctor, satisfied seeing the Master's face drop in disgust.

"Ahem..." The Doctor came forward and shifted impatiently. "Don't want to interrupt, but could you two maybe... stop flirting and... I mean... I really want to know what's in there."

With an eye-roll the Master turned towards him. "Shut up. You don't even know what flirting looks like." But he turned around and gave Roka a wink. "Alright. Close your eyes."

Roka nodded and did it. Not even a second later something flushed her head. It wasn't like when she had entered his mind, there were no images or other foreign sensations. It felt like floating, like hovering in space, falling into eternity. A rush of adrenalin went through her body, cold and hot at the same time. And then he was there, right next to her, floating in the same space, although without any physical form, reaching an ethereal hand out to her. Without hesitation she took it and immediately felt a pull in her very essence as she got catapulted out of space and back into her body.

"You're all right?" the Master asked curiously.

Roka nodded, but wasn't so sure about it. She felt weird, lighter as usual and somehow as if there was something slightly tapping at the edge of her thoughts.

"That's normal. Just ignore it."

'Right, you can read my thoughts now...' she pondered and furrowed her brows. Could he feel that too?

"Yup. I can."

She opened her eyes and faced the widest imaginable grin on his face. The Doctor moved carefully around them, as if to make sure everything was all right. A bit of impatience was there too. And right as he opened his mouth to say something the Master raised a hand.

"Works. We can go on."

"You're okay?" The Doctor asked Roka.

She nodded. "Yeah, it's just a bit weird. Especially since that pervert over there can now read everything I think."

The Master snickered and gave her an expressive wink.

"Well then. On we go!" The Doctor grinned and lead the way, his sonic barely illuminating the darkness around.

After a while it seemed as if the light from it was dying down, but Roka realized that it actually got brighter around them. Here and there she was now able to make out vague shapes of... she had no idea of what. It weren't buildings, but also not statues. Their surroundings seemed to consist of a collection of gigantic weird artificial shapes, bending and twisting and spiralling in ways that made her feel sick again. Some of them were several meters thick or long and twisted themselves up into the darkness, that reached farther than she could even imagine. It felt like walking through a...

"...a forest of stone," the Master telepathically ended her thought. And loud he