neverwouldiever | We can travel the universe forever. But not with that jerk.

After he'd waved to Donna's grandfather at her side and they'd closed the TARDIS doors, it was time to bring her up to speed on a few things. Especially considering that these things might take some time for her to comprehend and even more to accept. Quite a bit of it, really.

First he set the TARDIS on course, then he leaned back against the console, pinched his earlobe between two fingers and tried to decide how to start.

"So... You ever heard of Harold Saxon?"

Donna wasn't entirely paying attention to him. All of her luggage was still piled up in the console room, and she rummaged around to separate the light packages that she didn't want to carry from the things the Doctor would end up carrying. "Saxon... Saxon..."

It certainly sounded familiar.

"He's not one of those old blokes with the perfume, is he? Or... I know he wasn't on Britain's Got Talent. I know he wasn't." She glanced over at him. "Why? Who's he? Are we gonna go in time and visit him back when he was famous?"

She was all for the time travel. It was one of the reasons she was here, after all.

"...tell me when you're ready, I'll take you to your room." Or rooms, as the case might be, judging by the amount of luggage. Focusing on that before letting the insanity of Donna's rambling sink on. He wasn't sure whether the perfume or Britain's Got Talent seemed more horrifying in conjuncture with the Master. Possibly the latter, because that definitely sounded like something the Master would actually do.

Alright, alright. "How do you keep missing everything? Maybe you're the alien, Donna Noble, maybe you are." He rubbed the back of his head and shook his head. Focus. Alright, focus. "He was prime minister. Saxon. You know, that funny person you lot vote for, leading the country and what not?"

"Oi! Don't go on like that, Mr. Mars! Of course I didn't pay attention to stuff like that then! Prime Ministers are boring!"

Just for that, she shoved one of the heavier suitcases at him far harder than she needed to. He was a twig. She could snap him. And if he kept mouthing off at her, she just might.

"Lead the way, Dumbo."

Oh, he couldn't wait for her to meet the Master. Morbid curiosity, mostly, but damn. He would have said more, but since he had to carry his own weight in what he could only presume was bricks he just called out an "Oi!" and started to indeed lead the way. Might as well, he couldn't have his console room blocked off by insane amounts of clothes forever.

"The TARDIS tends to get the rooms right on the first try, but have a look." He headed down one corridor, turned a corner and opened a door, stepping in first to set the suitcase down. Before he could fall over. "How's that, Ms. Earth?"

She looked inside and turned her head both sides. "Bit small."

She didn't entirely mean it, though, judging by how she starts dragging her things inside and unpacking. "You'll get the rest, yeah?"

"Oh, yeah, sure. Time Lord, alien, bellboy. That's me." But even with that, he was out the door and it didn't take long until he returned with the rest of her luggage, fairly sure that he did some permanent back damage. "You could have left your rare metals collection at home." He hauled everything into the room and closed the door after stepping in completely, raking a hand through his hair.

"Now, listen. Donna. I have to tell you something. Something's a bit different since last time."

"Right," she said, not listening as she pointed to the bed. She was already unpacking the other suitcases, stacking them neatly against the wall for the Doctor to move. Or maybe she should do it. She didn't want to upset him so early in their adventures. And the pair of them were going to have many adventures; she was going to see to it.

At the change in his tone, though, she turned to face him. She takes in the suit (the same as last time), the shoes (the same as last time), the hair (the same as last time), and finally his face (also the same as last time).

"Oh, I'll just bet it has, alien boy."

Well, that made him feel oddly self-conscious. He tugged a bit on his hair and cleared his throat, straightening up as he searched for the right words.

"See, that Harold Saxon, he wasn't a very good man. Well, he wasn't even a man, really. Isn't. He kind of... You probably missed that, but he shot the president? Anyway, a lot of things happened and his wife shot him, but he survived that." That was a great summary, just leaving out anything that actually happened. "He's like me." Wait. "Well, actually he's nothing like me, that's kind of the point. But he's from the same planet I'm from. But he's done terrible things. He loves doing terrible things." This was going so well. "He's probably in the kitchen right now."

"He shot the president?" Donna gaped at him. "When the hell did that happen?" Had that happened when she'd been in Spain, too? Oh, no. Had she slept through it? Donna had slept through a lot.

Wait. What? What had the Doctor just said?

"HE'S WHERE?" She looked around and grabbed her hatbox from the stack of empty suitcases. "All right, Doctor. Just point me to 'im, and I'll take care of the rest. Stay behind me." She held the hatbox in front of her as if it were a shield; she could have waged war with the gods themselves.

"But first, tell me where I'm going."

"Well, in all fairness, it was the American president. I thought he was a bit of a pompous ass." The Doctor watched her in utter amazement, suddenly finding himself smiling in spite of himself.

"Donna Noble, ready to face the Master with a hatbox. There's one for the history books." He laughed and then just shook his head. "No. It's alright. I mean, not quite alright. See, this... He's called the Master, like I'm the Doctor. And he's... Something's not right with him. But I'll fix it. I promised. And until then I'm keeping an eye on him."

She immediately relaxed her stance, but only because he'd laughed at her and it had occurred to her that unlike the kitchen, she knew exactly where the Doctor was. Not that she would hurt him with a hatbox, but she had to acknowledge the temptation.

"What's he the master of? He's not the Prime Minister anymore. And what's not right with him?" She held up a finger as a thought occurred to her. "If he's a pervert, this door had better have a lock on it!"

"He's not a pervert!" At least that wasn't one of his worries where the Master was concerned. Not much. "Well... You're not his type." Hopefully closer to the truth. He took a step back, just in case he was about to get attacked by a hatbox, and shrugged.

"Technically he's not master of anything right now, barely even himself, but that's a bit of a sore spot at the moment, so you shouldn't bring it up around him. Anyway, I just wanted to give you a heads up. I'm sure you can hold your own against him, there's not that much he can do right now."

Donna's head twisted violently in his direction when he said she wasn't the Master's type. Inwardly, she might doubt she was anyone's type. She was too loud and brash and empty-headed, no matter how much she might have tried to grow since seeing him last. She knew that. But she also knew she'd never let on that she understood how undesirable she was. "What d'you mean, not his type?"

She drew her chin up haughtily. "And yeah. I can take him." She hadn't met him, but Donna had never met anyone she couldn't take.

"Well... I don't really know. I mean, his wife seemed fairly docile, bit sadistic, bit brain-washed. But she did shoot him in the end, so I don't know." The Doctor walked further into her room, grabbing some of her luggage to put it closer to her as she kept unpacking.

"Mostly he just does stuff to get my attention, so I reckon in that sense, you might be his type just fine. Doubt he's yours though. Kinda skinny."

"And you're traveling with him?" Despite her tone, she nodded in thanks for the other luggage.

She stuffed some sweaters into a drawer. "And what do you know about my taste in men? Not all the blokes I like end up trying to feed me to a giant spider, you know."

She watched him as she put some shirts away. Why would he travel with a man who sounded psychotic? Not to mention homicidal.

The Doctor sat down on her bed, since the chairs were effectively blocked off by her luggage. He raked his fingers through his hair, tugging on the tips slightly and offering a shrug.

"He's all I have. All that's left of my kind. And he wasn't always this way. I want to help him, you see?" He shook his head and decided that the other topic would likely end less awkwardly. For him, that was. "Oh, I know nothing of your taste, but 'skinny' doesn't seem to be it, so I took an educated guess."

"Rich. Rich is my type," Donna joked.

After a moment, though, her face fell, and she sank onto the bed beside him. "Think I'm swearing off relationships for a while, actually. Focus on other things." Not necessarily herself. That sounded silly.

"But all right. I'll be nice to the guy. For your sake." She grinned and bumped his shoulder with hers. "But I reserve the right to smack him if he gets handsy."

That did make the corners of his lips turn up and he bumped back against her, turning his head to look at her from the side. "That makes two of us." Swearing off relationships. Well. One way to put it, at least.

"And you have every right to smack him. Probably quite a bit of need, too." The Doctor ran a hand through his hair and let out a short chuckle. "Well... That said, we better decide where we go first. Past, future, all of the universe, what tickles your fancy?"

"Somewhere a goddess like me would fit in," she teased. "Which means someplace classy. Someplace grand. Someplace big." Her eyes brightened, and she waved her hands as she tried to think of a place.

But why was she bothering when the Doctor was there? "Well. You're the one with the travel box. Suggest something."

"Well, I'm sure you'd have no problem feeling like a goddess no matter where we go." He definitely was grinning at her, happy at the prospect of getting to show her something grand. There was nothing like seeing the universe through someone else's eyes, especially someone as great as Donna had already proven to be.

"Rome? Rome was pretty great. We'll just steer away from the orgies for now. What do you say?"

"Sure, if you want to take all the fun out of it," she said dryly.

Her faux-disappointment didn't last longer than a couple seconds. She looked back at him, positively glowing with excitement. "Let's go to Rome."

We can travel the universe forever. But not with that jerk.

Right after bringing Donna on board... Thread between Donna and the Doctor, possibly the Master late

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