Title: A Simple Sentiment
Author: kyrilu
Fandom: Doctor Who
Rating: PG
Genre: Angst/Drama
Summary: Those aren't stars in the sky. Doctor/Master. An AU of The End of Time, if the Master had traveled with the Doctor.
A/N: Really one-sided-ish, unfortunately.
The sky bleeds red, deep dark ruby-red, during the evening. Pockets of sunlight pries through clouds, the heavens agleam like the facets of a gem.
Theta feels the smallness of it all. He reaches up to the sky as if to take it down and sweep it into a dusty, forgotten corner along with the entire planet.
Out there, in Time and Space, the world is a wide, wide room, and so very, very big.
But listen.
A young voice, low and velvet and silky and soft, calling his name. The noise is from beside him, drifting into the shell of his ear as wind wafts from a long and lonely distance.
"I'm all right," says Theta, in reply to an unasked but inevitable question.
Then Koschei takes his hand and they run, run through the crimson grass as their laughter peals up into the sky.
"Those aren't stars in the sky."
The Doctor pivots his body round, and finds the Master's face in the darkness. There is only the lights of the night sky that guide his gaze, but even so, he sees the other man, but he doesn't. Not really.
"I know," the Doctor agrees, shoving his hands in his trouser pockets. "But they're like them."
A muffled thud. Something lands by his feet, tumbling unceremoniously through the bottle-green grass.
"I found this in the TARDIS," says the voice softly, laced with a hint of mockery. "Oh Doctor. Such childishness."
With exasperated wariness, the Doctor reluctantly shrugs his hands out of his pockets. He reaches down to retrieve the object, staring wide-eyed at the Master as he recognises it. He knows without inspection that it is a familiar well-worn book. His fingers brush over the title embossed on its binding, then over a bookmark sticking up from the pages, and he sighs, knowing too well which story it faces.
The Doctor's voice is caught in his throat. He forces himself to speak hoarsely. "The Death of Koschei the Deathless."
The sound of a strike of a match is heard. Sparks blaze in the night - in the air, on the grass. The Master's eyes glimmer in the flickering blaze of the light; but they too, are blazing as if the fire has caught them.
"You sentimental old fool," the man scoffs, his lips twisted into a sneer. "Do you, too, wish that the grass would be red? Think about it. Oh, it's so simple. Don't you remember the class about DNA and cross-breeding? If you found the right plants to fuse together, you could merely scatter the seeds on the wind-"
"Don't," the Doctor murmurs, his face twisted and contorted with conflicting emotions. "Don't," he says again, but the slight sharpness of his voice is gone, replaced with something vulnerable and plaintive.
The match the Master holds plummets to the earth in a showering arc of sparks, which sputter out as soon as the soil swallows them whole. Another match is lit, and it is bright, bright, bright once again. The Doctor's eyes try and adjust to the light, but he soon gives up and directs his sight to the sky once again.
The Master speaks softly, firmly. "Say my name."
The Doctor smiles a smile that doesn't quite reach his eyes. And it is what it is:a silent refusal, a broken promise - but that doesn't matter, there have been so many already.
Instead, he says, "No, those aren't stars. They're quasars - funny name, isn't it? Short for quasi-stellar radio source. Distant, distant galaxies somewhere out there with black holes in their centers. Gases in quasars revolve around those black holes, heating up and shining brightly."
Then the Doctor holds a hand out to one of the celestial twinkles, as if to touch it. Then he whispers, "Master."
But he speaks so quietly that he isn't sure that the Master could hear it. He says that name with a sort of fondness, nothing formal, but something so familiar and close. But even if the Master heard him, the Doctor knows he does not need to clarify what underlies the name.
Two children found out their meaning a long time ago as they ran across crimson plains of grass, bound by their joined hands and a connection only they could ever imagine.
The Doctor looks down at the book wrapped tightly in his grasp. He opens it, and by the aid of starlight, finds a blurred word - Koschei - almost leaping at him. The page it sits on is crumpled and crinkled; the ink is discoloured into a faded grey.
The word is a pale shade, a washed-out shadow of what it once was. A graveyard marking where tears have fallen and dried.
The match goes out, throwing the night into utter darkness.
It's almost as if the Doctor is alone.