The Last Great Time War: part III

Rassilon's council, part VII

Things were not going well for Rassilon. The Renegade had taken about three hundred and fifty Time Lord colonies recently, which was about a quarter of the Time Lord Empire. Many Time Lords and timeships had defected. The NTA was no longer a single army with a handful of worlds, but a true force to be reckoned with.

"Our spies have informed me that the the rouge nation known as the New Temporal Alliance have executed Morbius," Rassilon said as he sat down at the table. "They held him for years, extracting as much intelligence as they could out of him before they killed him. They have likely learned valuable secrets. We must move quickly for our own security."

"We should be able to retrieve his timeline," said the Chief Engineer, "and bring him back to life. It won't be easy, but-"

"A waste of time," Rassilon said. "Bringing back the conquerors of the past was a failure. We need someone, something, that will not fail us. Something too mighty to fail us. It's time to enact Sanction 96."

"Sorry to interrupt," said a newer councilwoman, "but what is Sanction 96?"

"We create the Ultimate General," said Rassilon. "We retrieve the timelines of all the greatest military conquerors who were lost to time, but who would have prevailed given a proper chance. We blend these timelines together into a single powerful entity, one that will win all of our battles for us. It will be unstoppable, but bound to our will so it can never rebel. It will sweep away our enemies. The prophecies of the visionary confirm it."

"The feared one," said the Visionary as she scrawled crude Gallifreyan writing on to several sheets of paper with a fountain pen. "Rising, rising in might he cannot be stopped he is coming through the dark and the emptiness and the cold and the pain he is coming! The scourge of the Renegade he is coming!"

"Brilliant idea, Lord President," said Darkel II. "I fully support it."

"I'm sorry, my Lord, but we can't do that," said Chancellor Paradon. "It's bound to backfire! I have always supported you in the past, but these are dangerous and unpredictable forces that we're dealing with! The closest precedent we have to this is the timeline where the Dalek Emperor created the Nightmare Child for the same purpose as this on their side, but look how well it turned out!"

Rassilon stood up and held out his hand, and the glove on it glowed blue. Paradon floated up into the air, his feet just above the edge of the table.

"Please listen to me," Paradon said, sweating and trembling. The other members of the Inner Council sat silent as the grave, hardly daring to breathe.
"I have full respect and confidence for you and your leadership! I am only trying to avert a course of action that you might regret! Have mercy!"

"The only course of action you are making me regret," Rassilon said, "is keeping you alive this long."

"No, please NO! You can't kill me now, I have served you faithfully throughout this War I'm more loyal than anyone else please forgive me I-"

"SILENCE!"
Paradon clammed up. His jaw was trembling.
"I see through the lies now! YOU WERE PLOTTING TO BETRAY ME! I WILL NOT SPARE TRAITORS!"

Paradon disintegrated with a scream of agony.

"WITHOUT ME GALLIFREY IS NOTHING! NOTHING BUT SNIVELING COWARDS WHO DO NOT DESERVE TO EXIST! NOTHING BUT DIRT AND MUD AND DUST!"

Rassilon sat back down, and the blue glow faded. Nobody spoke for several more seconds.

"We're receiving a transmission, my Lord," said Darkel.

"If it's from Sontar again," said Rassilon, "I want that planet destroyed."

"No sir, it's him."

Rassilon pressed a button on the circular projector in the center of the table, and a hologram of the Renegade appeared.
He was old now, with most of the brown in his hair turning to gray and then white. His face was more deeply lined, and he had a scraggly beard. His black leather jacket was ragged and burned. His eyes still contained fire and war, but were tempered by all of the things he had seen. So many ghosts swirling around inside them.

"You must be very brave to contact me again," said Rassilon. "Or very foolish."

"Rassilon, you must believe me," the Renegade said in a gravelly voice.
"You do not know the true consequences of your plan! The walls of the universes are crumbling, the void and reality are blurring together. If you go through with this you will allow the lost potential of destroyed enemies in the void a path back into existence, and give birth to vicious fiends the likes of which we have never seen! The Eternals themselves warned me of this before they fled! Already the possibility of you enacting this plan has given these erased beings new influence on time and space! Stop now and send them back into non-existence!"

"Do not attempt to frighten me with fantasies and ghost stories, Doctor. Your message is all the proof I need to enact Sanction 96. You know it will defeat you and therefore you are trying to stop me. If we ever meet again it will be when your band of terrorists is destroyed. Goodbye."

Rassilon shut off the connection. There was no stopping Sanction 96. The Time Lords knew it, time itself knew it, and every time-sensitive being in existence could feel it. They could all hear the dark elated whispers emerging from the blackness beyond time, and the cold, cruel laugh of a powerful enemy, a laugh that could not be described in proper terms. A laugh that was not heard so much as felt.

Every time sensitive being heard these things, but many did not notice, for they blended in so well with their own twisted thoughts.