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She's in bed, glasses perched on her nose, having a go at the cryptic crossword. Cliff usually gets to it first, and makes up his own (wrong) answers, but he's gone to see his sister in Surrey and won't be back until Wednesday. Jo's about to give up and go to bed when- there's a noise. She's not surprised- the boat itself is as old and creaking as they are, bought off an older couple in a flight of fancy four decades ago, and the river has a tendency to make it move almost constantly. But then there's a low thud, and the unmistakable sound of footsteps. An intruder.
She looks around, gaze settling on various objects before deciding them unworthy. Eventually she picks up a heavy copy of 'Birds of The UK (And How To Spot Them)' and, slipping on her slippers to mask the sound, she softly makes her way into the living room.
It's dark, but there's a full moon and the open curtains let enough light through to see by. She weighs the book in her hand- she reckons her aim's still good enough- and prepares to throw it at the intruder's head when the person in question suddenly turns around. The silver moonlight catches his hair and for a minute it looks like-
"Master?"
He turns around fully, offering a little bow, smiling in that strange way of his. She sees the moment he notices the book and realises what she was planning to do, because his smile grows until it seems almost genuine. He looks exactly like he did back in the '70s- same haircut, same smile, even the same bloody jacket.
He's holding a photograph from the kitchen table in his black-gloved hands. It's a relatively recent one, from a UNIT reunion a few years back- Major Bell had hosted, up in Norfolk, and almost all of them had been there. By unspoken agreement they'd left an empty chair off to the side, with a single green jelly-baby in the centre.
"Hello, Miss Grant. Or is it Mrs Jones now?"
There's a pause while she tries to remember whether the brownies Octavia gave her before lunch were normal ones or the kind that made you hallucinate the alien friend-slash-enemy-slash-whatever of your former (also alien) best friend in your kitchen, fifty-odd years later.
"Neither, actually," she says, because she can't quite figure out a way to make 'what the hell are you doing here' sound polite. His brow furrows slightly, annoyed at not knowing something, and she feels quite pleased about catching him out like that. "It's Mrs Grant now."
"Oh?"
"Well I'm married- which you know, obviously-"
"I believe belated congratulations are in order, my dear," he says, with a slightly- begrudging? - tone.
"Oh. Uh, thanks. But anyway, I did change my name to Jo Jones but it sounded a bit too much like a knock-off comic superhero, you know? Jo Jones …. Bird Woman or whatever. And Cliff wasn't all that bothered, and Sarah Jane's friend Rani- nice kid, wants to be a journalist- says that that's what all the modern women are doing nowadays so…" She's painfully aware that she's rambling but she can't seem to stop.
"So you changed it," The Master says smoothly, letting only the slightest hint of amusement bleed into his tone. He puts the frame back down, at just a slightly different angle, the bastard.
Jo debates throwing the book at him, but eventually decides against it. She doesn't know what he'll do to her if she does.
They stand there, in the dark, in silence, The Master seemingly content to wait. She shifts from foot to foot before giving up, leaving the book on the shelf.
"So," she says, because it's heaven knows how late at night, and The Master of all people is currently standing in her living room in the dark, and she could really do with a cup of tea. "I'll go and put the kettle on then."
He sits down at the kitchen table, fiddling with Cliff's half-finished embroidery, which gives her time to sort herself out. She goes through the motions; puts the kettle on, offers milk (and then rescinds the offer when it turns out that they only have curdled goat's milk), searches the cupboards of biscuits that aren't the horrible digestive ones that Cliff prefers. She finds half a loaf of lemon cake, and some homemade lemon curd, and sets it down on some chipped plates, and tries not to dwell on the fact that this is quite possibly her last meal.
"Tea," she announces, setting it down. "No biscuits, unfortunately, but I managed to find some lemon cake and curd. It's homemade."
"Thank you, my dear." He takes a sip, and reaches for a fork. Apparently, the gloves stay on. "It's homemade, you said."
"Cliff's been trying to teach me to bake- this is only my third? attempt that actually resembles a cake." She smiles to herself at the memory- Cliff's a decent cook, and she's long given up on trying to learn for herself, but she'd wanted to surprise Alistair with a birthday cake this year, and he'd done his best to teach her. They'd had fun, at least, and even though her first attempt had been completely inedible, it was worth the way she'd fallen a little bit back in love with him.
"I suppose you're wondering why I am here?"
"Of course I am! I haven't seen you since….since that whole deal with Atlantis."
"I see." She watches as he takes a bite of the cake, poorly disguises his disgust, and forces himself to take another bite, before washing it all down with a mouthful of tea. She looks away hurriedly, trying not to laugh, and tries a bit of her own slice of cake. It's not that bad really, although she's secretly quite pleased that he feels the need to pretend.
"Well, Mrs Grant, I'm afraid that you are going to die. Soon, in fact. Next Saturday I believe."
He says it with all the gravity of discussing an episode of The Archers. She feels slightly sick, and her hands start to shake. Jo wants to accuse him of manipulating her, of lying, but somehow she knows that it's true. He's telling the truth, and she's never been particularly scared of death but to face it so certainly, so soon... its awful. It's unfair. She's young- comparatively- and there's still so much she wants to do. There's so much she has to do- there's a protest next week in Brighton, another one in Manchester. She's got plans with Mike to do volunteer gardening in Epping Forest on Tuesday, babysitting Octavia's kids on Thursday, and she's got a monthly meet-up with Sarah Jane on Friday. There's government bills to campaign against, charities to raise money for- there's so much she still has to do.
"How?" she asks, not meeting his eyes.
"A heart attack, I'm afraid."
She laughs. She doesn't want to, really, there's nothing funny about this, but she laughs until there's tears in her eyes. She's fought Daleks and Cybermen and literal Dæmons, she's seen things most people could never dream of and she's survived. And now, she's about to die from something as simple as a heart-attack?
She covers her face with her hands and focuses on her breathing. When she's recovered enough to speak without crying, she looks up to see The Master bent over Cliff's embroidery. He is, rather unsubtly, shooting her occasional, slightly disturbed glances, only looking up when he's judged that she's fully regained her composure.
"I would like," he says, leaning in slightly, "to offer you an alternative." He leans back. "Not, I would like to clarify, a preventative, but simply…an extension. Fifteen years, or something about then."
"Why?"
"You are….Miss Grant, of all the humans I've met, you are the least objectionable. One might say I am even fond of you, as much as anyone can be fond of a human."
It's a backhanded compliment but she'll take it.
"So what, I'm just meant to believe that you're doing this for me out of the goodness of your heart? Is that what this is?" She doesn't give him time to reply. "I'm not taking it."
His eyes widen slightly in shock, obviously not expecting anything other than easy acquiescence.
"Miss Grant-"
"It's Mrs Grant, and thank you, but I'm not taking it."
Her previous horror has- not quite disappeared, but a calm, determined certainty has taken over, and the more she speaks, the more her conviction grows.
"Knowing you, this'll just be some- some ploy to help you take over the world, or kill everyone in it, or whatever stupid plan you've got instead of just calling The Doctor and asking him on a date, and I'm not letting you use me for that. I can't."
There's silence. She wonders how she's going to explain all of this to Cliff.
"Mrs Grant, whatever you believe about the nature of The Doctor and I's relationship is immaterial and- well, nevermind. I admire your resolve, my dear, but as much joy it would give me to be rid of the human race, my motives are purely altruistic here." She must look unconvinced, because he amends it to, "Well, mostly altruistic."
"Mostly altruistic?"
He sighs, and goes back to the embroidery. She hears the soft sound of the needle weaving in and out of the fabric, and below that the distant call of an owl.
"I am-" he appears to struggle with his words, and she's seen his plans go wrong time and time again, but she's never seen him look this lost. "Are you familiar with the concept of regeneration, Miss Grant?"
She makes a noise of assent and he continues.
"Time Lords- or Time Ladies, at that- traditionally have twelve regenerations. With the life that most of them lead on Gallifrey , it is rare that a Time Lord as young as I would have even passed their first regeneration. I-" he looks up, flashes her a smile. "I am on my last regeneration."
"I envy you humans, sometimes. With such short lives, you have no choice but to make peace with death. How does that Earth poet go? 'Because I could not stop for Death, he kindly stopped for me?'"
He sighs, and when he looks up she risks looking into his eyes. He looks so very very tired and very very scared. "Us Time Lords think we've conquered death, when really, we've just kept running. We fear death- most Time Lords on Gallifrey will reach 200 before they even witness a regeneration- and so, we fear living . I left. I wanted to live, properly live, but I'm just as afraid of dying as the rest of them."
There's nothing she can say to that, really. She's- she's scared, but not nearly as much as she was- it's more that she feels grief, preemptively, for the life she could have lived, and for Cliff, and for all her friends. She doesn't want to die, and she doesn't want the people she loves to go through her death either. Clouds have dimmed the moonlight and in the darkness, she tells him this, matching his rare vulnerability with her own.
He offers her, again, fifteen years. Enough time to make progress fighting the Government's new bill on fracking and lobbying against oil companies. Enough time to say goodbye, properly, to her friends. Enough time to perfect the lemon cake recipe, enough time to see Cliff complete his book. Maybe, a treacherous, naive part of her brain says, maybe enough time to see The Doctor one last time. It's impossibly tempting, and for once she believes The Master is being genuinely kind, genuinely telling the truth. But- she can't. She doesn't know what may happen, what knock-on effects it may cause. The Doctor told her once about a childhood friend of his, who's experiments with time nearly destroyed the universe more than once. She can't risk that. She can't.
He looks sad, when she refuses, but also admiring, and nods just once. He turns back to the embroidery, and Jo pours herself another cup of tea, thankfully still somewhat warm. He doesn't seem in any hurry to leave, and she's oddly thankful for the company, and in lieu of anything else to do, she talks. She talks for hours about this and that, about the news and the gossip, and when that runs out she tells him about the books she's been reading, and all throughout he makes comments that make her laugh despite herself. She asks him whether or not she should paint the boat yellow (yes) and is about to tell him all about the new orange flares she bought yesterday, when he gets up abruptly. She also stands up, wincing- her joints can attest to the fact that it has been a lot longer than she had realised.
The Master stands in front of her. His hands are glowing faintly orange.
"It's time, Miss Grant. I must get back to my Tardis."
She doesn't know what to say. "I- Go. And thank you."
He half bows. "Goodbye, Miss Grant."
"Master."
He turns to leave.
"Wait!" she says, and then, stumbling over her words, adds," I know you think he hates you, but go and see The Doctor. Go. It will- You tried to help me. Let me help you."
He looks unconvinced. "My dear-"
"Say hi to him from me, will you?"
"Goodbye, Miss Grant," he says, more firmly this time, but there's a hint of a smile in his voice this time, and she smiles sadly to herself and she watches him go.
She yawns, and then walks stiffly over to the table, with the intention of tidying the cups away. She's still not sure how she's going to explain this to any of them, least of all Cliff.
The embroidery is sitting on the table, and she holds it up to the window to get a closer look, blinking in the daylight. The Master's completed the rows of sunflowers, and below it, in ornate curling letters has sewn, 'In this short Life that only lasts an hour How much - how little - is within our power'. She rubs her eyes, and the traitorous tears in them. Tomorrow, she's going to have to deal with- with all of this , but first, she's going to sleep. She hopes he went to find The Doctor. After all he's done, he still doesn't deserve to die alone.