Wynter could have been forgiven for having reservations about returning to the Matrix so soon after what had been meant to be the most permanent of stays, but she knew her duty. After all, it was a safe assignment, or safer, anyway- Sartia did have a rather homicidal record, but she was grateful just to be away from the front-lines.
She entered using the Presidential access codes she’d been temporarily granted and found herself in a blank, featureless world. It took a few moments to adjust but after that, it felt worryingly natural, a world with no walls or ceilings or certainties.
She strode off with her purpose in mind, putting such thoughts out of her head. She didn’t belong there anymore, she had a job to do.
Soon, there was someone standing in her path. She was dressed like a renegade, but Wynter didn’t think it was her target regenerated, somehow. She was too familiar, in the way of someone long forgotten, an old Academy acquaintance or the like.
She straightened, trying to look authoritative and formal, keeping her staser drawn. If the stranger was a renegade, she was likely to be just as dangerous, even if she was a dead one.
“I’m here to arrest—” Wynter faltered as her senses caught up, placing that vague familiarity. Her guard dropped at first, out of habitual respect, but then she hurriedly thought better of it- the Matrix plus Romanas where there shouldn’t be Romanas had never gone well in the past. “…Madam President? What are you doing here?”
She frowned, crossing her arms. “This isn’t fair on any level. You’re a projection of my future self, and you have all the knowledge of the Matrix. How is my choice meant to have any element of randomness?”
On one hand, Tre was an adult with an important job, and she’d never known an adult who wanted to play the games of children, but then again, she hadn’t known many adults who wanted to play games at all. At least not the fun kind, games of backstabbing and machinations had always been popular.
On the other, her job wasn’t exactly the regular kind. Nothing about Tre’s situation was regular, or fair. Ace had pointed out she had to be bored out of her mind, and the fact that they’d managed to get into the Matrix again at all meant she had to want to see them. The whole thing was Ace’s idea, but Mana was good at asking things, so she took the lead.
“Lady Tre,” She said with a polite bob of her head, only not using her full name because it was also her own, and reminding herself of that was just weird. People weren’t meant to share entire names, that was half the point of having names as long as they did in the first place. “Ace wants to play a human game, but it’s not the sort we can play by ourselves. And it’s some kind of collaborative fantasy game, so it requires more imagination than a machine can ever have.”
The whole world they were standing in was a pretty lie, formed of thought and borrowed memories, things that Tre had never seen for herself. A lack of imagination certainly wouldn’t be a problem. “Er, she can probably explain it better than me, if you’re interested?”
Mana was, theoretically, studying. She hadn’t absorbed a single concept in a good half an hour, but she couldn’t be said to be doing anything else, and that felt important. There were dozens of leisure activities she could do, she knew that, the Cardinal’s quarters were hardly lacking in technology or comfort, but she couldn’t stand the thought of spending time so wastefully.
Finally settling on a compromise, she picked up the folder containing her last few pieces of work, and looked around, uncertainly. “Tre? Can I...” she paused, feeling absurd, “come over for tea?”
Romana had been puzzled more than anything else when K-9 told her where their missing fugitive was, but supposed retrieving her would be a routine operation, and one best suited to herself- it wasn’t worth giving up a sensitive secret to some agent of Narvin’s just because Presidents weren’t strictly supposed to do anything even nearly risky.
She materialised herself with all the trappings of the Presidency- robes, headdress, sash, coronet, mostly subconsciously. She usually only ever went into the Matrix as a President seeking wisdom, rather than an individual, and the Matrix shades had seemed to take her more seriously when she was dressed for the occasion.
Romana stepped into the appropriate partition warily, mindful of the Daleks she’d left there, though according to K-9 it was perfectly safe to enter. “Tre?” She called.
#s 11 and 12 for Tre and Sartia, because we're no good at not-angst XD
Combined into that one AU eventuality we talked about:
Coming to this Universe had been a mistake.
It had been fun for a while, a Universe where Romana had died terribly early on, and it was another Prydonian from the class of 87.23421 that ruled with an iron fist.
It had all started to go wrong when the other Sartia had realised she had a doppelganger swanning about the place and having fun with borrowed power.
Her other infected self (there was something ancient behind her eyes, primal chaos masquerading as simple power-lust, and the kind of coldness that could freeze an exploding star) had had her brought to heel in the middle of an opulent court.
“There’s really no room in this Universe for another Sartia.” She’d said, and touched the Sash of Rassilon that hung around her neck.
Sartia had screamed. It felt like regeneration, but so much worse, her cells destroying and regenerating themselves over and over, never stopping, until it felt like her whole existence would burst, like her life was being undone in some higher dimension, erasing her from the Universe.
Distantly, she remembered an unsubstantiated rumour claimed the Sash could rip a Gallifreyan apart, if linked to their biodata. Her biodata was one thing her counterpart would have no trouble getting, but it wasn’t the kind of secret she’d be willing to die for.
“Stop.” Tre had hissed, apparently in a tone that not even an Imperiatrix could argue with, and the Sash had let her collapse.
When she’d woken, the other Sartia was gone, and Pandora wasn’t. There was only Tre, and she was different, something even older than her usual self lurking behind her eyes.
“I quite like it here.” she’d said, bright and cheerful. “We can’t leave this place leader-less, can we? Or a Leela without a Romanadvoratrelundar, or her more people-savvy equivalent, at least.”
Still exhausted, Sartia had managed to raise an eyebrow. “Leela.”
“Oh, don’t be jealous. You can be my Chancellor and official consort, and Leela can be mine. That works better for both of us, really, doesn’t it, you’ve always preferred the titles to the romance.”
Second in class, second to Leela for Tre’s affections, second-best to Pandora- for Rassilon’s sake, she was second-best to Pandora even when the choice was just between her and another Sartia.
Perhaps that would have seemed acceptable, rather than a personal failing vast enough to swallow her every other achievement whole, had she not been brought up to idealise perfection, to accept nothing less from herself or the Universe.
Worse, it made no sense. Of the two of them, she was the one with ambition that consumed her like a black hole, that couldn’t be pacified with wonder or friendship or whatever it was Romana had amused herself with while with the Doctor, why was she never the student Pandora wanted? And she was the one with the intellect that rivalled Romana’s own, and the shared past to go with it, why would Leela always be her first choice?
The only thing that made the situation more bearable, was that it started go out of Tre’s control all by itself. Once Andred was out of the way, Leela had wanted to leave, quite predictably.
Tre had it in her to let people go, she’d proved that enough in her days in the Matrix, but Pandora had taken root within her, and she’d never let go of anything or anyone, because that would be admitting that there was something in the Universe that didn’t, by rights, belong to her.
It would all end in tragedy even without her meddling, Sartia was sure of that. She also wasn’t willing to wait- more, she didn’t want it to be a tragedy of their own making, it had to be of hers, or it wouldn’t really be revenge.
She’d spent quite a while planning her next move, but once she’d finalised her plan, she moved quickly, and within a span, a servant had been bribed to drug Leela’s food. Leela would call it cowardice- lots of people would call it cowardice, she supposed, but it was just being practical. Better to survive the fight than to risk death for nobility or fairness’s sake.
She used her Chancellor’s override to enter Leela’s rooms, her hands quivering with adrenaline. Leela was, quite reasonably, on guard.
“I do not wish to fraternise with you, weasel-tongue.”
She smiled. “Leela, you don’t need to impress me with big words.”
“Because you will think me slow and stupid whatever I say?”
“That, and because I’m not here as your enemy today. I thought you deserved to know the truth.”
“You wouldn’t know honesty if it burnt out both your hearts.” Leela said, but there was a curiosity there, however wary and reluctant.
Sartia blinked, looking perfectly innocent. “Oh, I’m sorry. I just thought you might want to know what happened to your husband.”
Leela’s eyes narrowed and she closed the distance between them, unsheathing her knife in the meanwhile. “What do you know about Andred?”
“I know who murdered him- and it wasn’t me, before you get ahead of yourself with that knife. I have proof.” No proof existed in this Universe, of course- the Matrix, and the information it held, was too deeply in Tre’s thrall. She tossed a blank tape in the air. Leela moved to catch it, but not quite quickly enough, and it skittered to the floor, proof that her reflexes were compromised.
In the time it took a pigrat’s heart to beat, Sartia pulled out her staser, already set to lethal, and fired.
If Leela hadn’t had poison running in her veins, her senses already dulled, maybe she would have dodged, and Tre might have had to deal with an entirely different death.
As it was, it hit her squarely in the chest. Leela collapsed, with barely enough time to register what had felled her. Not the death she deserved, even Sartia could admit that, but it didn’t bother her enough to regret it.
She wasn’t quite sure how Tre was going to react, there were too many variables. This Romana was corrupted twice-over, once by a millennia in the Matrix, and now by Pandora, but had a great deal of control over the only thing Pandora had ever feared, and a more intimate knowledge of the multiverse than anyone on any other Gallifrey would be comfortable with.
That degree of power was everything Sartia had ever wanted. It was terrifying. It was both those things and more, but she’d never wanted to be its second in command, and she certainly wasn’t going to play second fiddle to a human. Surely Tre could never have believed that she would,
Tre thought she could have everything, that nothing in the Universe could be denied to her, not anymore. Sartia couldn’t wait to prove her wrong. Leela was hers- had been hers, and she’d been human, she’d never be a ghost in the Matrix, she’d only ever had one life to live and lose.
Though it wasn’t the wisest of choices, Sartia waited in her rooms. She wanted to watch Tre find the body, see her hurt, wound her just as Tre had her.
It’s not just the alien bodyguards Imperiatrixes should watch out for, she thought, and smiled.
“Your Grace.” said Sartia, with a respectful curtsy. It was grudging, really, but she thought she hid that well enough.
Romana was not the safest of princesses to curry favour with, but she was the only one available, and while she didn’t pretend to possess enough knowledge of the politics of state to know whether a sea-change was likely, it was within the realm of possibility. At least with a position as precarious as hers, she wasn’t likely to have much competition as far as ingratiation went.
Sartia had, to be honest, been expecting a more cowed woman than the headstrong girl who had last visited the house. Confidence was an easy thing to fake while surrounded by sycophants and lavished in finery, it was quite a different thing when all you had was a title and a tower. That was enough to make her intriguing in her own right.
“I hope these quarters are at least an improvement on your previous.” she said, wryly. A risk, perhaps, but even if it came across as impertinent, the consequences of such were the least they’d ever been.
Accessing information through the Matrix was nothing like reading a book, and she was more than used to it from far too many study sessions, searches for forbidden knowledge, and treasure hunts, that she had no need for symbolic representations. She just shut her eyes and learnt.
It had been a month, more or less, since she’d last talked to Tre, and she hadn’t left her rooms since- or, more accurately, hadn’t bothered turning them into anything more exciting.
Sartia didn’t open her eyes, though it was mostly for show- she’d finished her research not along ago, and had been mulling her options over for the past span. “Are you monitoring my reading materials, or is that a privacy I’m allowed, Wardess?”
