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]

"They..." she says, her mind contemplating those symbols on the sphere, in a script so familiar to her.

"Time Lords? But... there aren't any. They're all dead! The Doctor said they're all dead!"

[syncopath]

He cocks his head and glares at Rose with a flare of impatience. "He lied. Now let me out!"

The Master renews his struggles, channeling most of his energy into the ankle cuffs. With a flare of blue light, they finally snap apart. He scrambles to his feet and makes a run for the door.

[a-lost-wolf.livejournal.com]

"NO!" she cries out, too late, too late before the agents open fire.

[syncopath]

The Master should probably consider himself lucky that this time, the guards are at least smart enough to aim low. Several of the shots hit him at shin level, exploding one knee and sending him down with a scream of absolute anguish.

[a-lost-wolf.livejournal.com]

Rose runs to him, kneeling at his side.

"You bloody idiot," she cries. "We can't let you go. You know we can't let you go."

One of the agents draws another weapon, a tranquilizer gun, and Rose holds up a hand. The Master has had so much sedative recently. Who knows how much his system can take?

[syncopath]

He scrambles away from her as best he can, gasping in pain. "You!" he hisses. "This is all your fault. Always messing about, messing, messing, messing with things you don't understand. And now they're going to find me. Now they know exactly where I am." The Master curls in on himself and clutches at his hair, his babbling drifting off to incoherence.

[a-lost-wolf.livejournal.com]

"Then why'd you touch it?" she demanded. "Why touch it if it was going to bring them here?"

[syncopath]

The Master looks up at her with pained eyes. Touching it had been more of an impulse than anything, responding to some deep, internal imperative. Because at the end of the day-- even at the end of the universe-- Gallifrey is still home.

"I had to know," he whispers.

[a-lost-wolf.livejournal.com]

There's a part of Rose that wants to reach out to the Master, to comfort him, to protect him.

"What will they do?" she whispers back. "If they come... when they come... what will they do?"

[syncopath]

He shudders, the drums in his mind pounding insistently. Is it just his imagination or are they getting louder?

"Worse things than you could even imagine."

[a-lost-wolf.livejournal.com]

Rose swallows, searches for something, anything to do to help.

"Let me stop your bleeding," she says finally.

[syncopath]

The Master gives her a long look, as if assessing whether he can trust her, and then carefully rolls onto his back, wincing.

[a-lost-wolf.livejournal.com]

Rose moves in closer and takes off her jacket. "Get me a med kit," she orders the closest agent as she rolls up the jacket and gently tucks it under the Master's leg to elevate it. When the agent returns, Rose opens the kit, tears open a packet of gauze compresses, and presses them to the wound, staunching the flow of blood.

[syncopath]

The Master hisses as she moves his leg, and then again as she presses against his knee. "I suppose I should thank you," he spits between gritted teeth, "And your trigger happy simpletons, for making it impossible for me to get away."

[a-lost-wolf.livejournal.com]

Rose grimaces a little as the blood seeps through the gauze. "We're talking about a race that's all but come back from the dead, and can travel through time and space. Do you really think you could run from them?"

[syncopath]

"I've managed so far." And even succeeded, until now. But Rose is right; this is no end of the universe. If the Time Lords return, travel between parallel worlds may as well.

The Master reaches out to grab Rose's arm with one blood-smeared hand and attempts to hold her gaze with his own-- which is becoming rapidly unfocused. "You can't let them find me."

[a-lost-wolf.livejournal.com]

"I won't," she says, promising in those two words much more than she has any idea how to deliver. "Just rest. I'll take care of it."

Somehow...

[syncopath]

The answer seems to satisfy him, or perhaps he's simply too weak to hold onto her any longer. Either way, the Master's grip relaxes and he lies back, watching her with eons of exhaustion in his eyes.

The other agents watch uneasily, remembering all too well what happened to the medic and to Anderson. One of them finally speaks up.

"We should get him to a more secure location, Tyler."

[a-lost-wolf.livejournal.com]

Rose nods, and looks up at her team members.

"I was thinking the crypts," she says. "We could put him in cryo-stasis, and bring him back when whatever happens with the Time Lords... or whatever... blows over." She stands, wiping her bloodied hands on her jeans. "Help me move him?"

[syncopath]

The agents hesitate, quite understandably... but also because although the Master's eyes have slipped closed, his left hand has begun tapping out the beat of the drums on his right, the cuffs clinking together ominously.

"Can't we just..." the agent trails off, not bothering to voice what they're all thinking. Can't we just let them have him? So far he's been little more than a pain in the ass. A creepy, dangerous pain in the ass.

[a-lost-wolf.livejournal.com]

Rose shakes her head.

"No," she says. "No, we can't. I promised. I promised."

Any of the agents can see she's trembling. She feels responsible, for this man, paradoxically both for what he's done and for his welfare.

"We'll deal with whatever happens on our terms. If they have a good reason to take him... so be it."

[syncopath]

"I don't get nearly enough for this," one of them mutters under his breath, but the three of them step close to the Master, one on each side, and one still training a weapon on the Time Lord. Just in case.

[a-lost-wolf.livejournal.com]

"On my count," Rose says as she takes the Master's feet. "One... two... three.... lift!" With that they all lift the limp form of the Time Lord and move to the door, through it, and carefully to another section of the basement. "Open a chamber," Rose orders the agent with the gun, and he obeys her, punching numbers into a keypad on the wall. There's a hiss, a release of cold mist, and a long, body-sized drawer slides out from the wall.

"In there. Come on... and... down." The agents ease the Master into the drawer, and Rose turns to a nearby console to program some parameters.

[syncopath]

"What's he doing?" one of them asks, still watching the Master's tapping fingers. They seem to be increasing in frequency, tapping that four-beat rhythm faster and faster.

The agent never gets an answer, at least not directly, because at that moment there's a cracking sound somewhere close by, as if lightning has struck. The perimeter alarms immediately start blaring.

The Master's eyes snap open.

[a-lost-wolf.livejournal.com]

"Bloody hell," Rose swears as she whips around from the terminal, pulling her weapon. "We're going to have to do it this way, then?" She glances down at the Master. "Are you going to hide or are you going to help us?"