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ans99Characters: The Master & The Doctor (Ten)
Rating: Oh, look. Rocks.
Date: Present
Location: The grotto
It had been a sort of forever. The kind where your internal clock either ran sempiternal or didn't run at all. It was unsettling, tormenting, and especially... it was... annoying. One long looping tape of darkness and drumming. That was until the sun rose again, pouring through the dark places and making everything real again.
Everything still here, the whole mess.
Grotto walls. Grotto ceiling. Grotto fountain. Grotto bowling ball. Grotto locked gate...
The Doctor shifted his weight, back from one uncomfortable seated position to another; taking the grotto in again, the staleness gone and redrawn in light -- and maybe this time someone drew him a door, or at least a door knob.
Before the first edge of morning light had crept off the cave floor, the Doctor was on his feet again; hurrying back and forth as if it could die at any moment. He inspected every inch thoroughly, and would have done it again in thou. Except someone stole his sonic screwdriver and it was terribly hard to test for structural weakness via vibrational resonance with a pair of non-sonic spectacles.
He piled rocks high in a corner, trying to tower them up to a particularly cracked piece of ceiling. The bruises, and cuts he had gathered during the collapse were healing rapidly and besides a stiffness of joints that came from a self-induced lethargy; the Doctor felt better than he had all week. His rock tower, however, was looking a little shabby.
Failing that, he resorted again to physics -- or how much force will it take to break open a steel lock with a rock. Apparently the answer was... something more than this and he moved on.
Then the light began to creep up the grotto wall, and he was tired of all the struggling without hope and sat to rest against the pounding in his head. At first the drums were a source of anxiety, until that was all there was and he grew to enjoy them. Like the comforting constant idle of a machine's engine.
Like the hum of a TARDIS.
And in that rhythm the Doctor sunk back into sleep... while a shifting up above began cutting into his senses -- bleeding them out. Until the very lack of them raised tingles through the hairs on his arms. He waned back against the wall, eyes wide and fixed staring at the ceiling. Someone was up there. Digging down to reach him.
The Master cursed inwardly as he heaved another rock to the side of the grotto stairs, wondering just why he allowed the Doctor to become such a complete pain in the ass. Wondering if there was indeed a point where revenge just became too much work. His suit-- now on its third incarnation-- was already streaked with dirt and dust, and he sighed to himself.
He'd watched Sam and Martha from his bedroom window as they'd made their way towards the Rose Maze, helpless and naive as newborn kittens searching for their dam. Fair is fair, he'd thought, and laughed and laughed.
In all, circumstances had seemed to be improving. He'd had a shower, the first in he didn't want to think how long. New suit. The sun was out. The wild, horrific things he could barely remember were definitely gone. And with the enormous mess they'd left in their wake, nobody was about to stop him as he slipped out of the castle cheerfully. It was a nice day for a walk.
And he had places to go. People to punish.
His good mood had held right up until he'd reached the grotto; he'd even whistled most of the way, strolling easily with his hands in his pockets, running his thumb back and forth along the screwdriver absently. Right up until he'd reached... where the grotto should have been.
The Master had stared for a while at the sunken hole, where stairs slid crookedly into a messy pile of rocks and dirt, unable to process what he was seeing.
Then he was moving quickly, assessing the amount of debris-- and more importantly, what was still down there, in his own head, everywhere.
Of course he's still alive.
But he'd thrown himself into it anyway. As if it were important. As if he cared. Eventually he'd broken through the top layer. Which turned out to be the only layer, and thank Rassilon for that. He took some time to wipe the sweat off his brow, straighten his suit, and compose himself before beginning his descent.
The Doctor was up against the bars, squeezing his fingers around them. He'd already figured out rather quickly who was up there digging. What made his hairs stand on end. It was never a rescue, it was... the Master. Probably here to gloat, or taunt him. Throw a rock at him. All three?
And so why was he so happy to see him?
Okay. Just calm down. Get him close and grab him. Get the screwdriver. Get the hell out of here.
"Master," he choked his name out, barely a whisper of what he meant it to be. He tried again, "Master...! Master! Mas -- " he turned his head away, coughing out unsettled dust. His grip against the bars tightened along with his stomach, draining his knuckles white.
So much for calm.
An undeniable thrill of pleasure tiptoed up his spine with every repetition of his name, and the Master couldn't help but smile as he finally caught sight of the Doctor, pressed up against the bars of the gate. As you should be. He had to force himself to keep his pace even, deliberate.
Let me savor this.
He stopped just out of arm's reach of the bars and stared at him for a while with his hands in his pockets before he spoke, sounding smug. "You look awful."
The Doctor stared back at him, expression undeniably pleading. He loosened his grip on the bars, knowing the Master wouldn't dare come closer, and mostly he'd forgotten about being mindful and tactful and other things.
"I feel awful, too," he managed, casually sliding his hands in the pockets of his pants. He continued; eerily calm, like stating a fact, "I'll die here. I am so thirsty..."
He turned his eyes away, swallowing hard.
"Good." The word was out before the Master could stop himself, and he mentally pulled himself back a bit.
"I could fill you in on what's been going on out there." He shrugged unconcernedly. "If you're interested. Oh, what am I saying? Of course you are. It's been ages since you've seen Rose. Or Martha. Or--" He paused, squinting and tilting his head. "Y'know, I am honestly uncertain-- would you actually care if Sam Tyler were dead? Can't say I blame you if the answer's no."
He stared at the point where his eyes had ended up. Fixed on some miscellaneous object on the ground, and right then, at that moment, it was the most important thing in the universe. Was that a kiseru?
Still he listened to the Master talk over the pounding in his head, and at the mention of the names of those he loved, he raised his head back at attention.
"What happened? Out there..." he gestured a nod towards the exit. That damned exit. Open now, but still inaccessible.
Why'd you have to go and lock the gate?
The Master's eyes lit up. "They came, Doctor," he breathed. "So many of them. So many dead. Such anger." He looked far away. "It was really quite... something. Shame you missed it. Maybe you could have even saved some of them."
He blinked. "Oh. What else. Some sort of political intrigue, I think. A coup of some kind. But as with everything else in this nonsensical nightmare it's hard to tell for sure. Hungry?"
He pulled the apple out of his pocket.
The Doctor watched his eyes, feeling a great sadness fill his own. It didn't matter how the Master acted towards what he'd witnessed -- however impartial or aroused he appeared -- he could never believe he wasn't effected by it.
And he felt so sorry for him.
He ignored the apple, and how much he wanted it; stepped back against the gate and wrapped his fingers, again around them, forming what connection he could. "And Martha and Rose..." he fought against continuing, mentally preparing an empty place inside himself if this was their loss.
"Are they alive?"
"So you don't care about Sam," the Master mused. "Good to know." He looked at the apple, shined it against the lapel of his suit jacket, peered at the Doctor. "You didn't answer my question."
The Doctor ran his tongue against his teeth, frustrated with himself for allowing the Master to find holes in even the simplest of things. He retorted quickly to cover himself, "So is he dead? Is Sam dead?"
The Master looked at him, bored and not fooled in the slightest. "By now? Probably." He shrugged again, weighing the apple in his palm. "Well, if you're not hungry..." He took a bite.
The Doctor forced himself to stifle, unwilling to ask for the apple, to request from him that he could have it. Sure he'd ask him to let him out, he locked the gate after all. Shouldn't he be asked... told to open it? But the apple... too much like a favour. Everything about it made him uncomfortable.
He breathed easier now though. If something had happened to Martha or Rose, wouldn't he have said?
Maybe.
It was just Sam. Just Sam. Just Sam. Just Sam.
He tinged with guilt at the relief of someone else's demises, turning away to pinch the pain bleating behind the bridge of his nose.
"What happened to him?" he watched him sideways, he always watched him, no matter the distraction.
The Master made an inarticulate sound of pleasure as he chewed slowly, closing his eyes.
"Mm." He swallowed, studying what was left. "What is it they say about apples?" He looked up at the Doctor, wrinkled his brow in disappointment. "Oh. Guess that didn't work." He dropped the nearly whole apple, grinding it into the rubble with his heel.
He leaned in a little, squinting again, distracted. "What's different about you? Other than being decidedly smellier. Something--"
Something. Some sort of familiar echo.
Maybe I just ought to have...
No.
The Doctor followed the apple with his eyes, as if it were a target, or some sort of glorious prize. The pleasant look he gave the Master was so very pleasant, and so very fake, that he raised not one, but both his eyebrows; just to make sure the Master caught how disgusted he was with him.
"Nope. Didn't work. Sorry. You could, uh, try leaving. I live here, you know," he followed the apple down to the ground and watched it crush beneath him. He choked on his revulsion, as if the Master had just destroyed an entire galaxy.
What a waste.
The Doctor raised his head, meeting his eyes. Silent.
He stared at the Doctor a little bit longer, eyes narrowed in thought, before shifting back on his heels, appraising him more coolly.
"Be that way, then. See what good it does you. Nobody's coming for you, Doctor. Nobody left alive has even the slightest idea of where you are. Don't think I haven't seen to that."
He raised his chin in opposition, letting the Master's words roll off him and settle somewhere between the drums, "I'll get out myself then."
Simple
Except not really.
"But if you hurt them," his voice dropped from dark to voidless, "I -- don't even know what I could possibly say. Cause nothing, no words, could ever match what I'd do."
The Master smiled thinly, barely containing his rage. "Oh, I do believe you've done enough, wouldn't you agree? But luckily there is a dead horse available, if you'd insist on flogging one. Might be a bit of trouble getting it down here, but all you have to do is ask."
So my horse is dead.
The Doctor stared at him, breath quickening him into panic. Martha, Jack, Rose... he had to get out of here. He couldn't leave him up there in control of everything. He was thirsty, hungry, tired, sore, the drums weren't going to stop. He thought maybe they would, if he saw him again.
He clenched his teeth tightly, running his hands along the bars above his head. He could barely contain himself, if he could at all, "Let me out!!!" He leaned his weight into the gate, pushing himself away just as suddenly.
"Do you hear me!!?" he stormed over to the lock, grasping the chain tightly, rattling it against the bars. Offering it to him to unlock.
"Now!!"
Oh. Oh.
He stared back, something clicking into place. Something beating out of sync with his own rhythm, converging and diverging, like wipers on a car. Footsteps of lovers.
How--?
The Master was nearly relieved as the Doctor screamed, disrupting the silence that wasn't even really silence. Not close. "That's it. Let it all out," he murmured.
The Doctor paced crazily. Back and forth in front of the bars, stopping only in short turns to lay emphasis on some heavily handed word, "What's that mean... 'let it all out'?! What does that mean!? Let it all out!!? What are you saying!!? ...You can't keep me in here!!"
He ran a hand to his head, pulling on in his hair in the frustration of defeat. And as his hand fell limply down, his other raised pointed in accusation. "You know... I was trying to help you! The only reason I hit my head at all was because I was getting you out of here! And then you just had to go and lock the gate, didn't you!?"
He had to say it. To confront him with it. It hurt too much, and most of all, he didn't understand it. It didn't make sense to him in the balance of things.
The Master watched him pace, feeling an odd doubling that should have been reassuring. In reality it was slightly terrifying, as if he were on both sides of the bars at once. Am I here or there? And then, immediately following: Does it matter? Things were drastically overbalanced, the Doctor was receding, something else coming forward.
His smirk faded, and he swallowed, unable to do anything but stand and watch.
He was angry, yes.
He might have always been this angry, but he was finding that, through the drumming, it was harder to come down. The pounding increased rapidly, as did his being in it. He could have gotten lost in it, a perpetual machine where each mechanism heightened the effect of the other. Instead he became aware of that driving motion, and reached out to stop it.
His paces slowed in steps. Slowed slowly, shuffling steps, until he was in front of the Master, tired and worn by his own frenzy. The Doctor pressed his forehead against a bar, shutting his eyes for a moment to focus on his breathing. "Tell me, why."
He opened his eyes, and stared back into him, "Just tell me why."
The Master bit back the truth, pressing that lump of emotion down deep and forcing himself to gaze at the other Time Lord with a cold neutrality.
"This is for your own good, Doctor." He spoke softly, his voice nonetheless tinged with bitterness. "This is your fault." The Master seemed to relish the words for a bit before turning to go. He'd just started up the steps when he seemed to recall something else and turned back, smiling congenially.
"Oh. Any suggestions for dinner?"
The Master turned away, and the Doctor gave up on pretending it was easy to stand there. He leaned his back into the bars and let the cold floating feeling that suddenly took him, take him down sitting.
He listened to his steps, clashing within himself; an uprising of desperation against an ever present swell of pride.
The steps stopped shortly, and unable to look back, the Doctor swallowed his pride in exchange for the possibility of him, "Don't leave me."
"Please don't leave me."
He wore a mask of pity, trying to ignore how much the words stung him. Every time he'd had him, gotten what he'd wanted, and it just burned and burned and burned and it was never enough.
"Oh, Doctor." The Master tched. "I told you, I don't cohabitate." He made a face. "At least not with you."
"Just let me out then..." he spoke quietly, finally looking back at him, turning to his side against the gritty ground, "Will you ever stop?
"I'll get out. Whether you let me or not -- you know that. And then what? Same old back to panic, and bustling around each other like... planets bound by gravity and whatever this is, it's without end. It's without any end."
And whatever this is.
The Master's lip curled. "Then I'll end it this time," he said quietly. "Just as you've always wished."
His right palm was starting to sting, and he realized he'd been clenching his hand into a fist, the knuckles taut and white.
"Will you," the Doctor turned facing him, sitting up on his knees. The sunlight spilled down the stairs through the hole the Master had dug out. Only he himself was blocking it.
"I agree that our little games have grown tiresome." He trotted back down the steps, trying to slow them to a casual pace, despite the one in his head. Drowning his better judgment out-- or was it his better judgment finally coming forth?
The Master whipped out the sonic screwdriver matter-of-factly, stepping quite close to the bars and grabbing the lock. There was a sort of hissing, spitting sound as he touched the screwdriver to it for the space of a few seconds, quickly backing away as he was finished.
Far from being sprung, the lock's insides were now fused, effectively transforming it into a smoking lump of metal that would never in its lifetime again open. The Master returned the screwdriver to his pocket, grinning hideously at his own handiwork.
The Doctor watched him wide-eyed, more than hopeful he rose to his feet and met him at the gate's lock. He watched the lock melt before him, and the Master's face in terrible happiness.
That's it then.
"Wait, wait, wait!" He tried to move closer to him, pushing against the bars, "Are you sure? Are you absolutely sure this is what you want? I could die down here, I could really die. And I wouldn't even say anything, but..."
The Doctor eased up, breathing deeply before continuing, "it's just... when you died. I really didn't think I could go on any more. I just didn't think, I just didn't think I could. I did, obviously, I did, but I guess what I'm trying to say is: are you prepared to be that alone? Last of your kind, end of the line, nobody out there who even has an... inkling, I mean not even a vague idea of who you are?"
The Doctor grasped the bars, leaning in, "Can you live with that?"
He listened to what the Doctor was saying, sickened beyond anything else, his thoughts locked in a repeating mantra.
You don't understand. You don't understand. I already do.
The Master straightened, stiffened, drawing himself up tight to make sure nothing slipped out, before speaking. His words were clipped, all the emotion neatly cut off before delivery.
"I suppose I'll find out, won't I?"
He just doesn't get it.
The Doctor took in another deep breath, trying to find a better way to explain, to show him, "I don't think you understand what I'm saying. I couldn't let you kill me. I couldn't... do that to you."
He shifted across the bars, as if moving down the line a little would help him gain a better vantage point, "Look, just tell me...just tell me what you want. What do you want..." he raised a hand up as if silencing him before he had a chance to speak, "And don't say for me to die! Don't even say it! Just talk to me, please just talk to me.
"I'll do whatever you want," he added that quickly and without much consideration. He meant it though, he thought.
The Master was fairly trembling with rage at this point, but he forced himself to roll his eyes overdramatically. "Don't expect your inane babbling's going to get you out of this one, Doctor. And don't presume that I care-- about you, about Gallifrey. About anything. No. You are going to die down here, alone and afraid. As you should have done. It should have been y--"
He stopped himself as his voice rose, pain and anger naked on his face, and hardened his expression again, jaw clenched.
He couldn't take any more. He'd been emotionally exposing himself to the Master since he found out he was alive. He didn't regret it, no, because he knew -- decided -- long ago that if there a way, some way, to see him again, just to talk to him one last time...
He'd tell him everything. And he was getting dangerously close to everything.
And he hates me still.
And it's over.
Just accept it.
The Doctor mentally shut himself down. Something he usually did as standard in any even remotely revealing situation; it was easy. When he spoke next, his voice was drastically different, even toned and dull, "Alright then. I won't."
He stood there watching the Doctor, feeling him pull away gradually, the interwoven beats
(sometimes in sync, sometimes out of sync, like orbits, he was right, gravitational forces like chains)
from him. A tide that might never come back in, and he had never felt so relieved and horrified. Until he stood on the drying flats of his consciousness alone, just one rhythm looping through him.
The Doctor, feet from him, cold and alone. Some sort of dim reflection, some faint reverberation he could almost hear if he cared enough to.
"Consider yourself lucky," he heard himself saying distantly. "You deserve worse." The Master turned on his heel abruptly, headed for the steps again.
The Doctor gave a grim smile, "Luckiest Time Lord alive, that's me."
There he goes.
His eyes fell down the apple. He was so thirsty now, he wanted it still crushed and dirty. Whatever he was operating on when the Master was near him was gone, and he felt at once the sickness his optimism had been masking. He looked up again to see him leaving, and maybe he should say goodbye.
"Master?" He looked at him with honesty, and intensity and love. His voice flat and calm, "Take care of yourself."
The Master stopped cold as the Doctor called to him, not turning around. He closed his eyes, feeling the panic well up in him, and in the same instant cursing the distinct loss of control that always accompanied their encounters.
End it.
He forced himself up the steps, somewhere between a slow reluctant trudge and a frantic scramble. Something approximating normal, which was not even close to approximating how he was actually feeling. Only when he was nearly at the top did his footsteps pause, and the slow, heavy scraping sounds of rocks being rolled back into position commenced.
The Doctor began questioning himself against the scraping of the rocks, against the drumming. Just as he did after he watched the Master die. Now it looked as though he might die, and he felt like he could cry for the both of them.
What should I have done?
The light began to fade, slowly turning the grotto back to it's usual darkness.
What should I have said?
It's too late now.
He wished he hadn't said he hated him. He should have apologized for that, maybe. At least make sure he knew it wasn't true. He didn't want him living his life thinking that, that he hated him. It was too awful.
Again, it's too late.
Everything he had hoped for was gone, dying with the light. Everything he tried had rendered an opposite reaction from what he intended. His thoughts left him nauseated and he made a move to lay down. Just curl up on the ground and lay down. Instead he just stood there, half leaning on a wall, somehow knowing if he did, he'd never get up again.
The Master heaved the last rock back into place and sat back on the upper portion of the steps, thrusting his head forward into his hands and massaging his temples.
He kept going back to the Doctor's arms supporting him, the ground shaking, and sometimes he'd remember a growing pain in his chest, a wildfire spreading thick black smoke, and sometimes not.
The Doctor put me in the fire. Left me there. Watched me burncollapsecompressdrown, again and again, relief washing off him, it's over it's ended and that's how it happened, make no mistake, never to do with me, if it'd been anyone else, anyone. It'd be them he clung to.
And sometimes the two sets of memories would be confused, run together, a fractured timeline that made no sense to him and he wanted more than anything to just make it stop.
That's what I'm doing.
He knew on some level it was a lie.
The Master abruptly rose to his feet. He had work ahead of him, starting with recovering his things from Diagon Alley, and the stinging in his eyes was only irritation from the dust, the dirt, the Doctor's recent and hopefully permanent entombment.
He was, after all, quite an adept liar.
The Doctor stood locked in that position unable to deal with anything, his situation or combat his feelings of helplessness with attempts at thwarting them. He needed to get out, he just couldn't figure out how to care enough to try.
And when the night fell again, shutting down the light, he turned away from the last thing that offered any hope. Because he wasn't coming back, no matter how long he stood there for. He would have laid down now, closed his eyes and let himself get taken by the Master's drums. But something bristled at the corners of his perception, and he stood there dumbly with no real curiosity of it, just an acknowledgment that it was there.
It was much harder though, to stand so uninspired, when a yellow flick of light pulsed against the grotto floor, like a dying firefly.
Before he knew it, he was collecting other pieces. All fragments of the grotto, all connected somehow. He arranged them on the floor, seeing nothing but them, and when they didn't make sense to him, he rearranged them again.
Like glow in the dark shuffleboard.
Solo.
On your knees.
Without a cue.
The Doctor stared down at the pieces, now all arranged perfectly. A slab of wall spread across the floor, reflecting off his face in dusky gold hues. A network device, shattered and broken in the earthquake, but always here. He could feel the Master's presence burning from it, and for a moment he stayed there in it.
Stayed there in it
Until he was screaming.
Ros- Marth-
I ne--- ---- help
--- in a grotto It's near the no--- -----board
---- -- axe Locked --
Buried --
Be careful
The Doctor
(http://community.livejournal.com/nonevidence/93862.html#cutid1)
Rating: Oh, look. Rocks.
Date: Present
Location: The grotto
It had been a sort of forever. The kind where your internal clock either ran sempiternal or didn't run at all. It was unsettling, tormenting, and especially... it was... annoying. One long looping tape of darkness and drumming. That was until the sun rose again, pouring through the dark places and making everything real again.
Everything still here, the whole mess.
Grotto walls. Grotto ceiling. Grotto fountain. Grotto bowling ball. Grotto locked gate...
The Doctor shifted his weight, back from one uncomfortable seated position to another; taking the grotto in again, the staleness gone and redrawn in light -- and maybe this time someone drew him a door, or at least a door knob.
Before the first edge of morning light had crept off the cave floor, the Doctor was on his feet again; hurrying back and forth as if it could die at any moment. He inspected every inch thoroughly, and would have done it again in thou. Except someone stole his sonic screwdriver and it was terribly hard to test for structural weakness via vibrational resonance with a pair of non-sonic spectacles.
He piled rocks high in a corner, trying to tower them up to a particularly cracked piece of ceiling. The bruises, and cuts he had gathered during the collapse were healing rapidly and besides a stiffness of joints that came from a self-induced lethargy; the Doctor felt better than he had all week. His rock tower, however, was looking a little shabby.
Failing that, he resorted again to physics -- or how much force will it take to break open a steel lock with a rock. Apparently the answer was... something more than this and he moved on.
Then the light began to creep up the grotto wall, and he was tired of all the struggling without hope and sat to rest against the pounding in his head. At first the drums were a source of anxiety, until that was all there was and he grew to enjoy them. Like the comforting constant idle of a machine's engine.
Like the hum of a TARDIS.
And in that rhythm the Doctor sunk back into sleep... while a shifting up above began cutting into his senses -- bleeding them out. Until the very lack of them raised tingles through the hairs on his arms. He waned back against the wall, eyes wide and fixed staring at the ceiling. Someone was up there. Digging down to reach him.
The Master cursed inwardly as he heaved another rock to the side of the grotto stairs, wondering just why he allowed the Doctor to become such a complete pain in the ass. Wondering if there was indeed a point where revenge just became too much work. His suit-- now on its third incarnation-- was already streaked with dirt and dust, and he sighed to himself.
He'd watched Sam and Martha from his bedroom window as they'd made their way towards the Rose Maze, helpless and naive as newborn kittens searching for their dam. Fair is fair, he'd thought, and laughed and laughed.
In all, circumstances had seemed to be improving. He'd had a shower, the first in he didn't want to think how long. New suit. The sun was out. The wild, horrific things he could barely remember were definitely gone. And with the enormous mess they'd left in their wake, nobody was about to stop him as he slipped out of the castle cheerfully. It was a nice day for a walk.
And he had places to go. People to punish.
His good mood had held right up until he'd reached the grotto; he'd even whistled most of the way, strolling easily with his hands in his pockets, running his thumb back and forth along the screwdriver absently. Right up until he'd reached... where the grotto should have been.
The Master had stared for a while at the sunken hole, where stairs slid crookedly into a messy pile of rocks and dirt, unable to process what he was seeing.
Then he was moving quickly, assessing the amount of debris-- and more importantly, what was still down there, in his own head, everywhere.
Of course he's still alive.
But he'd thrown himself into it anyway. As if it were important. As if he cared. Eventually he'd broken through the top layer. Which turned out to be the only layer, and thank Rassilon for that. He took some time to wipe the sweat off his brow, straighten his suit, and compose himself before beginning his descent.
The Doctor was up against the bars, squeezing his fingers around them. He'd already figured out rather quickly who was up there digging. What made his hairs stand on end. It was never a rescue, it was... the Master. Probably here to gloat, or taunt him. Throw a rock at him. All three?
And so why was he so happy to see him?
Okay. Just calm down. Get him close and grab him. Get the screwdriver. Get the hell out of here.
"Master," he choked his name out, barely a whisper of what he meant it to be. He tried again, "Master...! Master! Mas -- " he turned his head away, coughing out unsettled dust. His grip against the bars tightened along with his stomach, draining his knuckles white.
So much for calm.
An undeniable thrill of pleasure tiptoed up his spine with every repetition of his name, and the Master couldn't help but smile as he finally caught sight of the Doctor, pressed up against the bars of the gate. As you should be. He had to force himself to keep his pace even, deliberate.
Let me savor this.
He stopped just out of arm's reach of the bars and stared at him for a while with his hands in his pockets before he spoke, sounding smug. "You look awful."
The Doctor stared back at him, expression undeniably pleading. He loosened his grip on the bars, knowing the Master wouldn't dare come closer, and mostly he'd forgotten about being mindful and tactful and other things.
"I feel awful, too," he managed, casually sliding his hands in the pockets of his pants. He continued; eerily calm, like stating a fact, "I'll die here. I am so thirsty..."
He turned his eyes away, swallowing hard.
"Good." The word was out before the Master could stop himself, and he mentally pulled himself back a bit.
"I could fill you in on what's been going on out there." He shrugged unconcernedly. "If you're interested. Oh, what am I saying? Of course you are. It's been ages since you've seen Rose. Or Martha. Or--" He paused, squinting and tilting his head. "Y'know, I am honestly uncertain-- would you actually care if Sam Tyler were dead? Can't say I blame you if the answer's no."
He stared at the point where his eyes had ended up. Fixed on some miscellaneous object on the ground, and right then, at that moment, it was the most important thing in the universe. Was that a kiseru?
Still he listened to the Master talk over the pounding in his head, and at the mention of the names of those he loved, he raised his head back at attention.
"What happened? Out there..." he gestured a nod towards the exit. That damned exit. Open now, but still inaccessible.
Why'd you have to go and lock the gate?
The Master's eyes lit up. "They came, Doctor," he breathed. "So many of them. So many dead. Such anger." He looked far away. "It was really quite... something. Shame you missed it. Maybe you could have even saved some of them."
He blinked. "Oh. What else. Some sort of political intrigue, I think. A coup of some kind. But as with everything else in this nonsensical nightmare it's hard to tell for sure. Hungry?"
He pulled the apple out of his pocket.
The Doctor watched his eyes, feeling a great sadness fill his own. It didn't matter how the Master acted towards what he'd witnessed -- however impartial or aroused he appeared -- he could never believe he wasn't effected by it.
And he felt so sorry for him.
He ignored the apple, and how much he wanted it; stepped back against the gate and wrapped his fingers, again around them, forming what connection he could. "And Martha and Rose..." he fought against continuing, mentally preparing an empty place inside himself if this was their loss.
"Are they alive?"
"So you don't care about Sam," the Master mused. "Good to know." He looked at the apple, shined it against the lapel of his suit jacket, peered at the Doctor. "You didn't answer my question."
The Doctor ran his tongue against his teeth, frustrated with himself for allowing the Master to find holes in even the simplest of things. He retorted quickly to cover himself, "So is he dead? Is Sam dead?"
The Master looked at him, bored and not fooled in the slightest. "By now? Probably." He shrugged again, weighing the apple in his palm. "Well, if you're not hungry..." He took a bite.
The Doctor forced himself to stifle, unwilling to ask for the apple, to request from him that he could have it. Sure he'd ask him to let him out, he locked the gate after all. Shouldn't he be asked... told to open it? But the apple... too much like a favour. Everything about it made him uncomfortable.
He breathed easier now though. If something had happened to Martha or Rose, wouldn't he have said?
Maybe.
It was just Sam. Just Sam. Just Sam. Just Sam.
He tinged with guilt at the relief of someone else's demises, turning away to pinch the pain bleating behind the bridge of his nose.
"What happened to him?" he watched him sideways, he always watched him, no matter the distraction.
The Master made an inarticulate sound of pleasure as he chewed slowly, closing his eyes.
"Mm." He swallowed, studying what was left. "What is it they say about apples?" He looked up at the Doctor, wrinkled his brow in disappointment. "Oh. Guess that didn't work." He dropped the nearly whole apple, grinding it into the rubble with his heel.
He leaned in a little, squinting again, distracted. "What's different about you? Other than being decidedly smellier. Something--"
Something. Some sort of familiar echo.
Maybe I just ought to have...
No.
The Doctor followed the apple with his eyes, as if it were a target, or some sort of glorious prize. The pleasant look he gave the Master was so very pleasant, and so very fake, that he raised not one, but both his eyebrows; just to make sure the Master caught how disgusted he was with him.
"Nope. Didn't work. Sorry. You could, uh, try leaving. I live here, you know," he followed the apple down to the ground and watched it crush beneath him. He choked on his revulsion, as if the Master had just destroyed an entire galaxy.
What a waste.
The Doctor raised his head, meeting his eyes. Silent.
He stared at the Doctor a little bit longer, eyes narrowed in thought, before shifting back on his heels, appraising him more coolly.
"Be that way, then. See what good it does you. Nobody's coming for you, Doctor. Nobody left alive has even the slightest idea of where you are. Don't think I haven't seen to that."
He raised his chin in opposition, letting the Master's words roll off him and settle somewhere between the drums, "I'll get out myself then."
Simple
Except not really.
"But if you hurt them," his voice dropped from dark to voidless, "I -- don't even know what I could possibly say. Cause nothing, no words, could ever match what I'd do."
The Master smiled thinly, barely containing his rage. "Oh, I do believe you've done enough, wouldn't you agree? But luckily there is a dead horse available, if you'd insist on flogging one. Might be a bit of trouble getting it down here, but all you have to do is ask."
So my horse is dead.
The Doctor stared at him, breath quickening him into panic. Martha, Jack, Rose... he had to get out of here. He couldn't leave him up there in control of everything. He was thirsty, hungry, tired, sore, the drums weren't going to stop. He thought maybe they would, if he saw him again.
He clenched his teeth tightly, running his hands along the bars above his head. He could barely contain himself, if he could at all, "Let me out!!!" He leaned his weight into the gate, pushing himself away just as suddenly.
"Do you hear me!!?" he stormed over to the lock, grasping the chain tightly, rattling it against the bars. Offering it to him to unlock.
"Now!!"
Oh. Oh.
He stared back, something clicking into place. Something beating out of sync with his own rhythm, converging and diverging, like wipers on a car. Footsteps of lovers.
How--?
The Master was nearly relieved as the Doctor screamed, disrupting the silence that wasn't even really silence. Not close. "That's it. Let it all out," he murmured.
The Doctor paced crazily. Back and forth in front of the bars, stopping only in short turns to lay emphasis on some heavily handed word, "What's that mean... 'let it all out'?! What does that mean!? Let it all out!!? What are you saying!!? ...You can't keep me in here!!"
He ran a hand to his head, pulling on in his hair in the frustration of defeat. And as his hand fell limply down, his other raised pointed in accusation. "You know... I was trying to help you! The only reason I hit my head at all was because I was getting you out of here! And then you just had to go and lock the gate, didn't you!?"
He had to say it. To confront him with it. It hurt too much, and most of all, he didn't understand it. It didn't make sense to him in the balance of things.
The Master watched him pace, feeling an odd doubling that should have been reassuring. In reality it was slightly terrifying, as if he were on both sides of the bars at once. Am I here or there? And then, immediately following: Does it matter? Things were drastically overbalanced, the Doctor was receding, something else coming forward.
His smirk faded, and he swallowed, unable to do anything but stand and watch.
He was angry, yes.
He might have always been this angry, but he was finding that, through the drumming, it was harder to come down. The pounding increased rapidly, as did his being in it. He could have gotten lost in it, a perpetual machine where each mechanism heightened the effect of the other. Instead he became aware of that driving motion, and reached out to stop it.
His paces slowed in steps. Slowed slowly, shuffling steps, until he was in front of the Master, tired and worn by his own frenzy. The Doctor pressed his forehead against a bar, shutting his eyes for a moment to focus on his breathing. "Tell me, why."
He opened his eyes, and stared back into him, "Just tell me why."
The Master bit back the truth, pressing that lump of emotion down deep and forcing himself to gaze at the other Time Lord with a cold neutrality.
"This is for your own good, Doctor." He spoke softly, his voice nonetheless tinged with bitterness. "This is your fault." The Master seemed to relish the words for a bit before turning to go. He'd just started up the steps when he seemed to recall something else and turned back, smiling congenially.
"Oh. Any suggestions for dinner?"
The Master turned away, and the Doctor gave up on pretending it was easy to stand there. He leaned his back into the bars and let the cold floating feeling that suddenly took him, take him down sitting.
He listened to his steps, clashing within himself; an uprising of desperation against an ever present swell of pride.
The steps stopped shortly, and unable to look back, the Doctor swallowed his pride in exchange for the possibility of him, "Don't leave me."
"Please don't leave me."
He wore a mask of pity, trying to ignore how much the words stung him. Every time he'd had him, gotten what he'd wanted, and it just burned and burned and burned and it was never enough.
"Oh, Doctor." The Master tched. "I told you, I don't cohabitate." He made a face. "At least not with you."
"Just let me out then..." he spoke quietly, finally looking back at him, turning to his side against the gritty ground, "Will you ever stop?
"I'll get out. Whether you let me or not -- you know that. And then what? Same old back to panic, and bustling around each other like... planets bound by gravity and whatever this is, it's without end. It's without any end."
And whatever this is.
The Master's lip curled. "Then I'll end it this time," he said quietly. "Just as you've always wished."
His right palm was starting to sting, and he realized he'd been clenching his hand into a fist, the knuckles taut and white.
"Will you," the Doctor turned facing him, sitting up on his knees. The sunlight spilled down the stairs through the hole the Master had dug out. Only he himself was blocking it.
"I agree that our little games have grown tiresome." He trotted back down the steps, trying to slow them to a casual pace, despite the one in his head. Drowning his better judgment out-- or was it his better judgment finally coming forth?
The Master whipped out the sonic screwdriver matter-of-factly, stepping quite close to the bars and grabbing the lock. There was a sort of hissing, spitting sound as he touched the screwdriver to it for the space of a few seconds, quickly backing away as he was finished.
Far from being sprung, the lock's insides were now fused, effectively transforming it into a smoking lump of metal that would never in its lifetime again open. The Master returned the screwdriver to his pocket, grinning hideously at his own handiwork.
The Doctor watched him wide-eyed, more than hopeful he rose to his feet and met him at the gate's lock. He watched the lock melt before him, and the Master's face in terrible happiness.
That's it then.
"Wait, wait, wait!" He tried to move closer to him, pushing against the bars, "Are you sure? Are you absolutely sure this is what you want? I could die down here, I could really die. And I wouldn't even say anything, but..."
The Doctor eased up, breathing deeply before continuing, "it's just... when you died. I really didn't think I could go on any more. I just didn't think, I just didn't think I could. I did, obviously, I did, but I guess what I'm trying to say is: are you prepared to be that alone? Last of your kind, end of the line, nobody out there who even has an... inkling, I mean not even a vague idea of who you are?"
The Doctor grasped the bars, leaning in, "Can you live with that?"
He listened to what the Doctor was saying, sickened beyond anything else, his thoughts locked in a repeating mantra.
You don't understand. You don't understand. I already do.
The Master straightened, stiffened, drawing himself up tight to make sure nothing slipped out, before speaking. His words were clipped, all the emotion neatly cut off before delivery.
"I suppose I'll find out, won't I?"
He just doesn't get it.
The Doctor took in another deep breath, trying to find a better way to explain, to show him, "I don't think you understand what I'm saying. I couldn't let you kill me. I couldn't... do that to you."
He shifted across the bars, as if moving down the line a little would help him gain a better vantage point, "Look, just tell me...just tell me what you want. What do you want..." he raised a hand up as if silencing him before he had a chance to speak, "And don't say for me to die! Don't even say it! Just talk to me, please just talk to me.
"I'll do whatever you want," he added that quickly and without much consideration. He meant it though, he thought.
The Master was fairly trembling with rage at this point, but he forced himself to roll his eyes overdramatically. "Don't expect your inane babbling's going to get you out of this one, Doctor. And don't presume that I care-- about you, about Gallifrey. About anything. No. You are going to die down here, alone and afraid. As you should have done. It should have been y--"
He stopped himself as his voice rose, pain and anger naked on his face, and hardened his expression again, jaw clenched.
He couldn't take any more. He'd been emotionally exposing himself to the Master since he found out he was alive. He didn't regret it, no, because he knew -- decided -- long ago that if there a way, some way, to see him again, just to talk to him one last time...
He'd tell him everything. And he was getting dangerously close to everything.
And he hates me still.
And it's over.
Just accept it.
The Doctor mentally shut himself down. Something he usually did as standard in any even remotely revealing situation; it was easy. When he spoke next, his voice was drastically different, even toned and dull, "Alright then. I won't."
He stood there watching the Doctor, feeling him pull away gradually, the interwoven beats
(sometimes in sync, sometimes out of sync, like orbits, he was right, gravitational forces like chains)
from him. A tide that might never come back in, and he had never felt so relieved and horrified. Until he stood on the drying flats of his consciousness alone, just one rhythm looping through him.
The Doctor, feet from him, cold and alone. Some sort of dim reflection, some faint reverberation he could almost hear if he cared enough to.
"Consider yourself lucky," he heard himself saying distantly. "You deserve worse." The Master turned on his heel abruptly, headed for the steps again.
The Doctor gave a grim smile, "Luckiest Time Lord alive, that's me."
There he goes.
His eyes fell down the apple. He was so thirsty now, he wanted it still crushed and dirty. Whatever he was operating on when the Master was near him was gone, and he felt at once the sickness his optimism had been masking. He looked up again to see him leaving, and maybe he should say goodbye.
"Master?" He looked at him with honesty, and intensity and love. His voice flat and calm, "Take care of yourself."
The Master stopped cold as the Doctor called to him, not turning around. He closed his eyes, feeling the panic well up in him, and in the same instant cursing the distinct loss of control that always accompanied their encounters.
End it.
He forced himself up the steps, somewhere between a slow reluctant trudge and a frantic scramble. Something approximating normal, which was not even close to approximating how he was actually feeling. Only when he was nearly at the top did his footsteps pause, and the slow, heavy scraping sounds of rocks being rolled back into position commenced.
The Doctor began questioning himself against the scraping of the rocks, against the drumming. Just as he did after he watched the Master die. Now it looked as though he might die, and he felt like he could cry for the both of them.
What should I have done?
The light began to fade, slowly turning the grotto back to it's usual darkness.
What should I have said?
It's too late now.
He wished he hadn't said he hated him. He should have apologized for that, maybe. At least make sure he knew it wasn't true. He didn't want him living his life thinking that, that he hated him. It was too awful.
Again, it's too late.
Everything he had hoped for was gone, dying with the light. Everything he tried had rendered an opposite reaction from what he intended. His thoughts left him nauseated and he made a move to lay down. Just curl up on the ground and lay down. Instead he just stood there, half leaning on a wall, somehow knowing if he did, he'd never get up again.
The Master heaved the last rock back into place and sat back on the upper portion of the steps, thrusting his head forward into his hands and massaging his temples.
He kept going back to the Doctor's arms supporting him, the ground shaking, and sometimes he'd remember a growing pain in his chest, a wildfire spreading thick black smoke, and sometimes not.
The Doctor put me in the fire. Left me there. Watched me burncollapsecompressdrown, again and again, relief washing off him, it's over it's ended and that's how it happened, make no mistake, never to do with me, if it'd been anyone else, anyone. It'd be them he clung to.
And sometimes the two sets of memories would be confused, run together, a fractured timeline that made no sense to him and he wanted more than anything to just make it stop.
That's what I'm doing.
He knew on some level it was a lie.
The Master abruptly rose to his feet. He had work ahead of him, starting with recovering his things from Diagon Alley, and the stinging in his eyes was only irritation from the dust, the dirt, the Doctor's recent and hopefully permanent entombment.
He was, after all, quite an adept liar.
The Doctor stood locked in that position unable to deal with anything, his situation or combat his feelings of helplessness with attempts at thwarting them. He needed to get out, he just couldn't figure out how to care enough to try.
And when the night fell again, shutting down the light, he turned away from the last thing that offered any hope. Because he wasn't coming back, no matter how long he stood there for. He would have laid down now, closed his eyes and let himself get taken by the Master's drums. But something bristled at the corners of his perception, and he stood there dumbly with no real curiosity of it, just an acknowledgment that it was there.
It was much harder though, to stand so uninspired, when a yellow flick of light pulsed against the grotto floor, like a dying firefly.
Before he knew it, he was collecting other pieces. All fragments of the grotto, all connected somehow. He arranged them on the floor, seeing nothing but them, and when they didn't make sense to him, he rearranged them again.
Like glow in the dark shuffleboard.
Solo.
On your knees.
Without a cue.
The Doctor stared down at the pieces, now all arranged perfectly. A slab of wall spread across the floor, reflecting off his face in dusky gold hues. A network device, shattered and broken in the earthquake, but always here. He could feel the Master's presence burning from it, and for a moment he stayed there in it.
Stayed there in it
Until he was screaming.
Ros- Marth-
I ne--- ---- help
--- in a grotto It's near the no--- -----board
---- -- axe Locked --
Buried --
Be careful
The Doctor
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