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It had been a couple of months since she’d faced the Master on top of the Eiffel Tower.
It felt like a lifetime had passed.
Every waking moment had been spent with him flickering at the back of her mind, a constant prodding weighing her down, a distraction, an annoyance, a reminder. It had always been this way, ever since they were children, with the Master running around and her being left in his wake. She hated it; after all this time he could still have that effect on her. Her name, Doctor, felt almost laughable at times, when he was the only prescription she really knew, and she couldn’t stop drinking the poison.
The ‘fam’ hadn’t noticed that something was different...
Okay, maybe they’d somewhat noticed.
Maybe they were asking her if she was alright every hour or so.
But for the most part, they'd left her alone. It was as if they knew that she didn’t want to talk about it, which, to be honest, was probably true. She’d been even less open with them than she’d ever been with her companions, which was for their own good (or so she told herself). She’d learned her lesson many years ago when nothing she ever did seemed to be able to protect her friends. It was as if they were cursed from the moment they entered the TARDIS, or, rather, that she was the one infecting them.
It was bittersweet. It didn’t seem to matter what the Master could do to them, how many lives he could destroy, how many times he caused her hearts to shatter, she always came running at the slightest suggestion that he was in danger. Hypocrisy ran through every fibre of her existence and yet she somehow bathed in the shame. The Doctor would follow him to the end of the universe a million times over and still find the capacity inside of herself to forgive him.
She supposed that was what it was like to unconditionally love someone.
It wasn’t like she hadn’t loved others before, or after; hell, Rose Tyler still held a strong hand over her hearts after so many years. Somehow, this was different though.
It was probably their shared history, but somehow she knew that no one would ever be able to consume her the way the Master did. She'd shared her mind with him as a child and still, that bond refused to face reality.
That he was never going to be the little boy she knew ever again.
She swung her legs off the edge of her bed with a huff and began making her way to the console room.
It was weird how different her current regeneration felt compared to her last one. Not because of the obvious change, but because of the little things. She was still considered to be relatively tall by human women’s standards but it’d been strange to adjust to the lack of height after what she’d become used to; she really needed to invest in more step ladders. The most appreciated change was the apparent youth of this body. She’d got used to living as an old man, but the convenience of appearing young never failed to amaze her. Movement was easier, for one, but people also treated you more seriously, in a weird sort of way.
Somewhat to her dismay, the console room wasn’t empty and she could see Graham sat on the floor with a drink of some kind, propping his back up against the control panel.
“Oh, Graham, it’s three-AM! What’re you doing up?”
“I could ask you the same, Doc,” he retorted, side eying her with a hint of a chuckle.
“Time Lords don’t need that much sleep,” she brushed him off. “You, on the other hand, should definitely not being drinking caffeine at this hour.”
She made a swipe for the beverage and only narrowly avoided spilling it all over the levers. He let her take it. Peering into the mug, she let out a surprised noise and raised an eyebrow in his direction.
“See, not caffeine.”
“I don’t know if I should be relieved or disappointed. Somehow, I think this is actually worse! Where did you even get beer from anyway?”
She watched as Graham let out a tired groan and buried his face in his hands.
“Do you know what it feels like to miss someone this much, Doc?” he asked.
She wasn’t entirely sure how to answer him this time. Openness hadn’t exactly been her strong point in recent years and she honestly feared what might happen if she did begin opening up now. Everything seemed to go wrong when her companions became too far involved.
The Doctor would be selfish today though.
She nodded in response.
“I know,” she said slowly, coming to sit next to him against the console. “I’ve felt it many times.”
He sighed once again and let his eyes rise to the ceiling.
“Does it get any easier? Over time, I mean.”
She shook her head, "No, losing people never gets any easier, but for each person, you do come to terms with it. Them being gone becomes more of a fact rather than a surprise. I’ve had over two thousand years to get used to it but, still.”
“You’re joking.”
“What?”
“You can’t be over two thousand!”
She resisted the urge to chuckle.
“Time Lords can live a really long time if careful,” she clarified, finding herself tempted to take a sip out of the mug of beer (she didn’t question why it was in a mug in the first place).
He stared at her in disbelief.
“There’s so much about you that we don’t know, Doc, and yet somehow I’m more confused after you tell us than I was before.”
She gave him a sad smile, reaching to one side to put the alcoholic drink down. Graham reached out for it in protest but she pushed it far out of reach and gave him a warning glance. It felt almost as though she could talk to Graham. Never in a lifetime would she want to burden either Yaz or Ryan with any of her baggage; Ryan was too sweet and she wouldn’t want to shatter the perfect illusion that Yaz seemed to have of her. Strangely though, talking to Graham seemed like it would be a good idea, almost as if the old man could understand her better.
“Well, I’ll try to explain best I can,” she assured him, tucking her short blonde hair behind her ears nervously. She watched as he rested his arms on his knees and drew both his knees in towards himself. He remained silent, and she couldn’t help but wonder if he was half-absent from their conversation and if the thoughts in his head were beginning to feel overwhelming, or if they felt like they might jump out of him if he didn’t keep them under a watchful eye.
She continued, “I’ve lost quite a few people in my time as a traveller; some literally in time, others because of my own miscalculations. Every time I think maybe I should just stop getting people into these situations, but... It gets lonely.
“A couple aren’t really dead, but they will be before the time I got to know them. I can never see them again, even with the TARDIS. I had a daughter once, but only for a day, and that face of hers haunts my mind when I remember how quickly she was torn away from me.”
And now it had started. She had started to unravel every carefully constructed barrier that she had placed between her and her friends. Now she couldn’t stop, it was all on top of her tongue and the words just seemed to come tumbling out. She wasn’t sure if she was even talking to Graham at this point, or if she was just saying it aloud to remain sane.
“I’ve been married a couple of times but it seems that all that has brought me is more pain; more to lose. Even when I want to just stay in one place it backfires and I lose them again. When I was nine-hundred I met someone who changed me forever. I tried to stop myself from getting her too swept up in it all, but she was so capable. Her family, her mum, took everything in with the caution you’d expect from any parent, but she still welcomed us back every time we jumped into her life. I felt like she carried every star, every planet, every time, and every world in the palm of her hand. I thought I’d take her home before it got too dangerous but I never wanted it to be the last adventure.
“It was as if, if I just ignored the awful feeling, we’d be able to just go on travelling together forever; the Doctor and Rose Tyler, in their little blue box, saving the universe one planet at a time.”
Graham had shut his eyes at some point during her ramblings, with no indication to whether he was still awake. The Doctor felt her breathing return to a more calm rhythm. Centuries had passed since she’d last been able to open up in this way to anyone.
“She’s elsewhere now,” she reminisced, allowing a couple of tears to run down her face and congregate uncomfortably under her chin. “With another me, and there’s no way I can ever see her again.”
It was undeniable that she missed Rose, every day of her life. She couldn’t help but wonder about her; would Rose even recognise her now? Was she in any way the Doctor that Rose remembered? She’d regenerated several times since they'd last seen each other.
Somehow, she actually hoped Graham was asleep because, after everything, she could still feel another revelation ready to leap out of her chest.
A realisation.
“But, in many ways, even that isn’t the loss that hurts the most,” she confessed, a sad smile adorning her face as her mind began to drift back many lifetimes. “After literally millennia, there’s still one loss which never fails to haunt my dreams and nightmares. They were so amazing; from the first day we met! They always had this light of brilliance around them, building and growing like an untouchable flame. It was like if I to achieve it, I'd just burn out.
“But they became everything I swore I’d prevent, everything I was trying to stop. There were times when I thought I could get through to them, and we’d go travelling the stars together, just like we promised we would as children.
“But fire spreads, and clearly that brilliant flame was too strong for them to contain. If they turned around tomorrow and told me they could change, I’d help them, again and again, until the end of our lives.”
“It’s the Master you’re talking about, isn’t it.”
A feeling of dread washed over her like a bucket of cold water.
“I- I thought you were asleep,” she dodged sheepishly. She wasn’t particularly one to swear (at least not in this regeneration) but if there was ever a time to, it was probably now.
Graham looked like he was holding back a small laugh, the cheek.
Yep, definitely swearing time!
“... Shit.”
The grey-haired man let out a chuckle. He looked surprised.
Not that it was particularly surprising to her. After all, she couldn’t even pinpoint the last time she’d openly used a human swear in front of someone. Embarrassment was flickering under her skin and it was mixing strangely with the panic she’d felt at the realisation that she hadn’t just been speaking into empty space. It was easy to forget that most humans couldn’t just switch themselves off when convenient. It made them so fragile, how they could struggle so much when it came to sleep, and, yet, they needed it to survive; they needed to surrender a third of their lives to an impossibly beautiful void. But, why couldn’t this have been one of those times that the void just happened on its own accord? Why couldn’t it work with her here?
She’d tried so hard not to unload her unending baggage onto her friends this time, only to have herself ruin it at the first convenient moment.
“Don’t tell the others,” she warned.
“About which bit?” he jested. “All of that or your potty mouth?”
“The... Stuff. Both, I suppose.”
Graham nodded.
“My lips are sealed, Doc. This’ll stay between us; from one old crumbly to another.”
A dry smile escaped her as she picked up the mug again and made her way to the TARDIS’s doors. With a final glance at Graham’s expression, she opened the door and threw the mug out, watching as it floated away, spinning like a bowling ball and disappearing into the depths of space. The man looked at her exasperatedly.
“Right, I’m off back to bed; you should too, even if you don’t need it. Take care of yourself, Doc.”
She didn’t take his advice.
As much as it would have been a sensible idea to get some sleep and forget everything for even a short period of time, she still wanted the ground to swallow her whole or to jump out of the TARDIS and into the infinite darkness of space. She wasn’t exactly what you’d call a sensible person.
And so, her mind drifted back where it should never have wandered at all. Back home, and back to him.
She awoke not even an hour later to find that she’d drifted off with her face unceremoniously smooshed against the controls and to the sound of crashing as the doors of the TARDIS swung open.
“Just thought I’d drop in.”
Any remnants of her tiredness disappeared in a flash. Using what little strength she could muster in her surprise, the Doctor pulled herself to her feet, holding onto the console to prop herself up. She stared ahead, wide-eyed, with her hearts pitter-pattering at an ever-increasing pace.
He was standing in the doorway, arms crossed and a triumphant grin across his bearded face.
The Master’s own TARDIS was parked alongside with only a foot’s distance of a jump. It was still shaped like a house, and she started to wonder whether the dumbass had also broken his chameleon circuit. She’d hardly put it past him. After all, they were far more alike than even she’d be willing to admit.
She stared at him in silence.
He smirked, “Weren’t expecting me, love? Don’t worry, I boiled my own kettle, and, well, there’s a lot more you can do with boiling water than just make a cup of tea. Bring your little pets out to say hi and I can show you.”
“How did you find me?” she growled, standing her ground but refusing to move any closer to him either.
“Hardly gonna tell you all my secrets, sugar. But, I found your little calling card earlier; I can catch your scent galaxies away.”
"Well, that doesn't sound creepy at all."
He glared.
She kept a careful watch over his movements as he began to walk around the side of the ship, stroking the walls as he went. The Master appeared to be biding his time, leaving her on edge but never quite actually making any attempt to close the distance.
“You know, I was beginning to get very bored earlier,” he began, nonchalantly pulling a small object out of his back pocket. “After a few trips and a few planets destroyed, well, I simply found it’s not the same when you’re not around to see it. But then, Doctor, I found this!”
He held up a small vial of dark liquid and swirled it around for effect.
“You really should be careful what you throw out; it was easy to locate you with this.”
Maybe throwing the beer out hadn’t been such a great decision on her part. It hadn’t even occurred to her in that moment that someone could use it to find them.
But, there it was, in a tiny glass container.
And, there he was, standing in her ship with that stupid, charismatic face of his. Between the hair, and the beard, and those dark eyes, the Doctor found that she could barely stand to look at him. He looked perfect, too perfect. The Time Lord was wearing a shade she could only describe as Missy-purple; it always seemed to suit him but drove her up the wall with frustration. The Master always seemed to get lucky with his regenerations (or maybe it was just her that thought that). Her own regenerations were often all over the place, but the Master seemed to seamlessly adapt into whatever the universe gave him.
Okay, maybe that was a slight lie, but when she ignored his instances of body-snatching he always seemed so beautiful.
She didn’t even know how old this Master was. Had he even been Missy yet? After all, he seemed so young and had his TCE again.
He stood, watching her; she could tell that he wanted her to respond.
“What do you want this time?” she bit out, reluctantly.
He chuckled, throwing his arms out in a clearly-practised manner.
“Is it so hard to believe that I simply wanted to visit my bestie? Really, Doctor, you need to have more faith in me.”
She wanted to wipe that smirk off of his face.
“You know as well as I do that you’ve got something planned,” she grumbled. “So, cut to the chase, why are you here?”
She had only blinked, but in an instant he was next to her, leaning down towards her ear.
“Not one for some fun and games? Fine, but you’re coming with me.”
She was sure that, if he were able, he’d have taken a photo of her expression to stash away for later. She turned to face him, the confusion being the only thing strong enough to burst through the tension. A pause passed between them before he brought his hand up to hold her chin, resting his thumb on her bottom lip, making her flinch.
She was tempted to try and bite it off.
“Come on Doctor,” he taunted, smiling mockingly and gripping more tightly to tilt her head up further. “Just a little trip out of the box; your livestock won’t even know you’re gone.”
She wanted to glare in defiance, she wanted to spit at him, she wanted to shove his beautiful arse back into his TARDIS and send him on his deadly way.
But nothing could be done.
The Doctor refused to sink to his level.
She would defend him, follow him, try to help him (try to fix him) until the universe ran out.
If that meant following him into his traps, she’d put up with it.
Nodding her head quickly, she clumsily manoeuvred her way out of his grasp and grabbed a small pad of paper and a sparkly clicky-pen.
“Dear fam. If I’m gone when you wake up, don’t panic!” she read out to him as she scribbled. “There’s a 30% chance that I’ll be perfectly fine!”
“Oh come on, it’s at least a 35% chance.”
“You flatter me, but I prefer to be on the side of caution these days.”
She signed her note with a couple of little kisses and left it on the console.
He was holding his hand out to her and she took it firmly, signing control over to him. The symbolism wouldn’t be lost on him; the Doctor wasn’t just following after him but sending a message that she was putting her faith in him.
He pulled her into his side with a tug, tucking his arm around her back to squeeze her shoulder as he led her into his own machine. It didn’t hurt, but still put a disconcerting taste in her mouth.
Flying with the Master was a strange feeling. Stylistically, he was less out of control and erratic than she often was, but he still left the parking brakes on. It would have made her chuckle to think about how similar they were in reality, but she wasn’t in the mood for any of that sort of empathy. After all, if even that small amount crept through it’d only be a natural continuation for it to begin on everything else he did.
She wasn’t always a good man (woman?). Sometimes she needed to stare at her own reflection, to gaze at blonde locks and brown eyes, to be reminded of Rose and what she'd taught her. There were days when Rose’s memory was all that kept her together, that stopped her from abandoning all morality and breaking time into pieces. On other days she’d remember how much Martha would have kept her in line, or how the Ponds’ would’ve guilt-tripped her into behaving herself, or how Donna would’ve kept her in line with just a pointed look.
Half a lifetime had passed since she’d seen them, but it’d been twice that amount of time since she’d last felt on the same footing as the Master.
He tugged her out of his TARDIS by the pinkie finger, applying just enough pressure to make the strain uncomfortable but not enough to do any damage. Stepping out onto the ground, regret began to set in along with the realisation of their surroundings.
Burning, flames, smoke, silence; he’d brought them home.
She was numb to the sight by this point, having dragged herself there to stare at it longingly for many weeks. Maybe he was trying to evoke a reaction out of her, but she wasn’t going to humour him.
“Less of a reaction than I was hoping for,” he stated, sounding less annoyed but more surprised at her lack of a strong reaction.
She almost snorted, “I’ve already seen what you’ve done; this isn’t anything new to me.”
“But I’m assuming you haven’t had a grand tour as of yet! Allow me, Doctor.”
He was holding out his hand again. This time, she hesitated. Nothing about the glint in his eyes seemed at all concerned by what he’d done to their home, and in a way that was still disconcerting, even though she knew that he could be like this. It wasn’t anything new for him to display an absence of empathy for the people he’d killed, but Missy had made an impression on her that she hadn’t felt in millennia, and she was still unsure if she could reconcile Missy’s image with what she was seeing now.
Tentatively, she held out her arm, trying not to hold her breath as he then proceeded to interlink them together. Her hearts were still pitter-pattering inside her chest, never quite quickening up but never slowing down. She allowed him to take the lead, acting almost gentlemanly as he took her on a gentle stroll. It would be an oddly calming gesture had they not been walking around the outsides of burning buildings, and stepping over what had once been red grass but was now charred and blackened.
“The blonde suits you,” he commented, picking up a clump with his free hand and twiddling it between his fingers. “It’s been a long time since you were a blonde.”
Resisting the urge to swat him away, she sent him a dry look, trying not to provoke him any further. At any moment the Master could change his mind about his behaviour and attempt to slit her throat or choke her to death just for the challenge.
“Oh come on, Doctor, you know I’m more inventive than that.”
It took a moment for her to realise that she was projecting her thoughts. A long time had passed since she’d needed to be constantly aware of a Time Lord’s abilities and she hadn’t even thought it necessary to shield her mind from telepathy.
“I didn’t say you weren’t,” she affirmed. “But you know better than to go digging in someone else’s mind without permission; you won’t always like what you find.”
He laughed, “Likewise, my dear, but sometimes you should take a note or two out of my book; it might get you somewhere.”
He’d dragged her past hundreds of burning buildings, with their arms still linked in a mockingly-intimate manner, as if they were newly-weds just taking a leisurely walk, forgetting the world around them and gazing into each other’s minds.
It wasn’t long before they exited the confines of the city and were once again standing on charred grass. He pulled her up what was once a grassy mound and sat them down on the remains of a cadonwood tree. Unlinking their arms, he took her hand simply in his and rested it on his knee.
A lump caught in her throat as she turned back to the fiery landscape.
The area he’d taken her felt familiar, obviously being somewhere they’d been before, maybe as youngsters, still with all the stars in their eyes, none of them yet seen.
“Beautiful, isn’t it,” he whispered, almost gleefully. “If you look over there, you’ll see where this all started.”
He lifted the hand that was still clasped with hers and pointed up in the direction of something. She followed his line of sight, realising in horror as the Academy came into focus.
“Up there, where we used to share a dorm.”
Leaping to her feet, she ripped her hand out of his grasp and stepped forward as if just a few feet would allow her to see it more clearly.
"I can't remember where I burned first on this forsaken planet, but I know that, from the moment we first met in the confines of those walls, this was meant to happen!"
She heard him stand up behind her and come to join her staring at the smoke and embers. As he wrapped his arms around her from behind, resting his head down on her right shoulder, she came to realise that the smell of smoke had infiltrated both their clothing and their hair. His beard tickled against her neck, and she wondered if he grew it for style or simply because he couldn’t be bothered to shave it.
“You’re still projecting your thoughts, you know, but you’re right; your hair does smell of smoke. I like it like that, actually! It doesn’t make it any less pretty, though; much better than the eyebrows you had last time.”
“So you have been Missy, then,” she blurted.
He nodded against her head, almost nuzzling her.
“Fun times, we had then. I was going to stand with you but some things got in the way and by the time I was ready you’d abandoned me.
“The pain settled right between the hearts, but it wasn’t long before I started searching for you again. I did a little bit of travelling, found some people you’d met; lots of them mentioned different girls, you Casanova, but one of the names kept reappearing.
“Rose. What a pretty name. Was she cute? Seems like you certainly thought so. After all, you did look at her like she hung the stars.”
She growled, “Don’t you dare mention that name!”
The Master chuckled, trailing a few light kisses down the side of her porcelain neck. She hissed at the sensitivity.
“You used to look at me that way,” he muttered. “I always thought you preferred your roses with thorns.”
She resisted the urge to just lean back into his embrace and forget what they were looking at. It would be so easy to just humour him, to humour herself, and ignore the rest of the universe.
“I still do,” she whispered, barely allowing the words to leave her lips.
He pressed another, longer kiss onto her jawline.
“You see all this, though,” he spoke, too softly for what he was gesturing. “I still won’t tell you why, but all of this was for you.
“I would burn the universe just to see the emotion on your face, because, after thousands of years, it’s the only thing I live for, and roses just won’t do it.
“Everything I’ve done, all my life’s work, my masterpieces, have been for you.
“Because fear is the most vivid emotion of all, and it’s beautiful when you wear it.”
The Doctor’s mouth fell open in horror, barely feeling a thing as he spun her around and captured her lips in a bizarrely gentle kiss.
“See,” he exclaimed, grinning widely at her with all his perfect teeth. “That’s the face I’m talking about.”
She ran.
Over the flaming ground, across the city she used to call home, away from the man she’d often thought to be her home. Blood rushed through her ears, pounding through her head, unrelenting like the now-pounding rhythm of her hearts. All the destruction, all the murder, all the agony, had been for her? What about the attempts on her own life? Had they really been just to see the fear? Maybe it was just impossible to search for sense in the mind of a psychopath.
The fire felt as though it’d infiltrated her lungs, the burn settling deeply as her respiratory bypass prepared to kick in. But she ran in spite of the pain, away from the pain, as fast as her body’s legs would carry her.
The Master’s TARDIS came into view as she slowed down, coming to a halt and panting as she placed a hand against the side.
She could take it.
She could leap inside and leave him here to burn along with their planet.
She could...
But she wouldn’t.
It didn’t take long before he caught up to her, and found her sitting, curled in a ball, next to the house-shaped vessel. He had clearly run after her, but not a hair was out of place. Despite the way that he was panting, being in a body that wasn’t a very fast runner, he still looked immaculate. Even with all his danger, he could be so beautiful.
“Glad you think so,” he panted, reminding her to try and close her mind off again.
The Doctor stared at him numbly.
“Take me home.”
He gave her a puzzled look and gestured behind himself.
“No,” she corrected. “To my TARDIS.”
He sighed at her deeply before opening the door and letting her walk inside. Turning her head away from him and staring at the interior, she refused to look him in the eye, even though she could feel his gaze on her back. She listened as he silently entered the coordinates into the system and pulled down the lever. Once he’d finished, footsteps gently plodded over to where she was standing, coming to a stop behind her.
“When you find out the truth, I’ll be waiting for you,” he said.
She choked out a small sob.
“I know you’re still in there somewhere,” she declared turning to face him and pressing a hand up onto his chest to feel that rhythm of four beats. “Whatever they did, I’ll find out the truth.”
She didn’t even have to stand on her toes to kiss him. It was so easy to just lean up and capture his lips in a moment of indulgent affection. The power-crazed man practically melted against her as he kissed her back, somewhat more frantically than before and yet somehow just as gently. It was as if their hearts were synchronising; four hearts and eight beats becoming one.
She pulled away first, watching almost too proudly as his eyes remained closed for a moment longer and he groaned out in protest.
“I want you to come back to me,” the Doctor continued. “But I won’t allow myself to blame myself for your choices. I never asked for any of this but I’ve given you more than enough chances!”
With a final press of her forehead to his, she turned her back on him and left him standing next to his console.
She slammed the door of her own TARDIS shut behind her and allowed an enormous groan of relief to leave her as she stretched out her arms in frustration. She wasn’t done with the Master (she didn’t think she ever could be), but from now on she’d only let him find her on her own terms. It’d been an oversight, thinking they could find some peace and quiet if they just floated in empty space for a while, but it seemed as though, wherever she took her friends, trouble was looking for them.
Allowing herself one last sneak-peek out of the door again, to make sure he’d gone, the Doctor gathered herself together and began walking towards her room instead. Remembering to pick up her note along the way, she allowed herself just a fraction of a second to remember the way his lips had felt against hers; like they belonged. She had to allow herself to be selfish sometimes, to allow herself to fantasise, otherwise, she might have gone insane, but she also knew that the universe was more important than her feelings and that she had to be stronger than herself for her friends' sake.
Upon reaching her room, she changed into some comfy pyjamas (perhaps for the first time ever in this body) and tucked herself in fully with only some of her short, blonde locks peeping out from the top of the duvet.
Graham was right, she decided. She should get some sleep.
And, just this once, she’d allow herself to fantasise.