For Eileen <3<3

[pawnofrassilon]

On a cold spring evening in Wiltshire, in the year 2011, a man falls to Earth.

Some children look up and think they see a shooting star that night. Adults, knowing that whatever it is is far too large, think it might be a comet or meteor. Or else they assume it's a trick of the eyes, an afterimage of a headlamp on the road. Some, oddly enough, think of angels. News reports are non-definitive.

Much like the film, the man isn't quite a 'man' at all-- not by the twenty-first century Earth definition, anyhow. He's alien, though it's only by the doubling of his pulses and the nature of his abrupt appearance in the first place that any human could tell.

Unlike the film, he isn't particularly concerned with saving his home world. Not anymore.

The Master lies very still for a long time, heedless of the fact he's crumpled up in the middle of an open field. He's fallen quite a distance, even for a Time Lord. And many of his injuries are much, much older than that. His clothes are little more than rags, torn to shreds and singed to the point of near purposelessness. If it's even possible, he's dirtier than ever. Exhausted. Parched. Hungry. So hungry.

Eventually it's the hunger that gets him up and keeps him moving. Feeling the click and slide of bones that are likely dislocated if not broken, the Master struggles to his feet, heaving and wincing in pain, his skin becoming momentarily translucent with the effort. He's in trouble, his energy stores dangerously low and his body in real danger of being ripped apart. But it's nothing a little snack won't fix. Taking a great whiff of the night air, he cracks a grin just short of sanity... and lets his nose lead him staggering through the darkness.

Comments

[a-lost-wolf.livejournal.com]

Rose watches the girl as she runs off, and shakes her head a little. She didn't know what that was all about.

"Well, they know you," Rose says to the Master, crouching down to look at the cuffs and see how they work. "Do you know them?"

[syncopath]

The Master is so weak he can barely shake his head, bewildered. Well, perhaps not too bewildered; he wouldn't be surprised if word of the Time Lords had gotten around. Or word about his own particular brand of magnificence.

Or it could be an old enemy.

He'll never tell Rose Tyler how relieved he is when she moves to the cuffs.

"Yes," he hisses urgently. "Let me loose. Before they get back. We can escape together." Or he can eat Rose and escape all on his own. Choices, choices.