A/N: Doctor Who and all related themes are property of BBC and not mine blah blah blah-ON WITH THE SLASH.
He wakes up to the smell: warm, subtle—a thousand life times all balled together beneath one skin. Time's cologne. It's a rich smell, a tender smell—one that caresses his lungs with each breath. And it is so aged, so laden, it is almost bitter. It clings on the edge of harsh and exquisite. And it presses itself presumptuously to the base of his nose.
His eyes open slowly, and are met at first with black, which fades with time—it's always time—to a deep, piercing blue. Everything about this new life is blue. Never has blue been so brilliant—with so many shades and hues as to put the spectrum to shame.
It takes a few more seconds, but before long his eyes adjust, and he can see the dim silhouette of the body beside him. It is this man—this bone weary traveler—who gives off the scent that rousted him awake.
The Master can't remember ever pressing his face into the Doctor's chest, but here he is all the same. Here he is, taking deep drags of the Doctor, his new-found drug.
He can remember the night before, even if only in dim, dazy flashes. Sweat. Heat.
The sounds, Doctor—your exquisite sounds.
But this... he doesn't remember this: when his frame became tucked tightly against the Doctor, the man's arms draped loosely across his back. He doesn't remember putting his nose to the Doctor's chest or drinking him in.
He can hear the Doctor's hearts, drumming at a counterpoint to the noise inside his head.
And in all of this, the Doctor's breathing is slow and even, undisturbed. His chin burrows in the Master's hair. He shifts, and his arms clutch just a fraction tighter, one rising up to the Master's shoulders and the other drifting down to his waist.
The Master's hands are fisted against the Doctor's chest. He takes a deep breath—buffeted and engulfed by that scent he can't escape from—and slowly, so slowly, he opens them, so that his palms press against the Doctor's ribs, his fingers splayed open against the skin.
The Doctor breathes, and the Master's hands rise and flex—only slightly—before they drift back down again.
The Master can't breathe for that smell—it takes the air from him, robs him of every last trace of coherent thought. A chill shakes through him, arching him closer, thrusting them together. The Doctor's thumb trails lazy circles on the Master's hip, the faintest of sounds rising in the back of his throat, all in his sleep—for the love of god, let him be asleep—and he holds the Master all the tighter.
It's then that the Master gives in—lets his shoulders relax so that he folds into the Doctor, presses his nose into the musky weight of the smell.
The smell of the Doctor—of nine hundred years. The smell of all his mad schemes and idiotic innocence. Of all of his years of guilt.
Everything about this man is blue. Blue as the walls of his mad little box.
Everything about this man is here, now, fast asleep in the Master's arms.
For now, everything this man is lies in his scent and his warmth and the blue. For now that's enough.
But things will be different—are always different—when they both admit to being awake.