Erm, so I realized that I was a bit vague on pretty much everything plot-wise. Sorry. I was trying to focus on the emotion bit, because EoT was so full of it and I wanted to keep that. Hopefully this chapter clears that up some, and if you're still confused I'm sorry, I'll try to fix it.
Enjoy!
0o0o0o0
Pain.
Unimaginable, burning pain.
At some point the Master sinks into unconscious bliss, but the visit with it is brief. The intense radiation, which had before been pulsing into his broken body, is free from the air. His resurrection has greedily disposed of the energy, and for the moment he will live. He isn't fixed, not by a long shot, but until another means of preservation can be cajoled from the universe, the Master will do anything to keep himself alive.
Anything.
"We're alive." The Doctor says, amazed. His childish wonder only serves as an irritation. The Master tries to untangle their bodies, and only succeeds in scrabbling ineffectually at Vinvocci glass and twisting a leg in a most uncomfortable position.
"Ah, isn't this just perfect." The Master hisses. "All that energy and I'm still as weak as a kitten." The Doctor grins and jumps to his feet with disgusting ease, offering a hand. The Master bats it away and growls, "And still so hungry."
"What, aren't you full?" the Doctor teases, "Ate up all that radiation, I barely had any." Then his tone turns serious. "Good thing you did, though I can't imagine it felt very nice, absorbing that."
"As radiation goes, it's not very pleasant." the Master agrees, "Nor very filling." The last words are accompanied by a predatory smile, but the Doctor is not threatened, and it devolves into a lick of the lips.
"What's that?" Wilfred exclaims, and the Master gives a low burst of laughter, tracing his teeth with his tongue. "What did he do?" He asks the Doctor, bewildered and, the Master thinks, very stupid. The Doctor really did have bad taste. "He really is a monster, just look at 'em!"
"Oh, stop it." The Doctor chides, even as he looks at the Master disapprovingly.
"Not very nice words to your poor savior, are they?" The Master says, clumsily drawing himself into a crouch by the Doctor's knees and assuming a hurt expression.
"I wouldn't call you that, not after what you did to all those people!" Wilfred argues, gesturing with a withered hand. The Master looks at him in disgust, and then, slowly, smiles.
"You think I'm a monster, old man?" He asks, and springs to his feet. He pushes open the glass door ostentatiously, and it responds easily to his command. Within seconds he is only a few feet from the human, head cocked at an angle. Wilfred backs away, none too subtly.
"Well I'll tell you something you don't seem to understand," The Master says forcefully and points without looking at the Doctor, "You think I'm a monster? That man, who all you humans seem to love is the murderer of his own people." He casts a quick glance towards the Doctor, who has frozen just outside the glass, a broken expression locked in place.
"Maybe so, sir, maybe so," Wilfred replies, and then gathers his courage as the Master watches. "But they did terrible things, didn't they? Just look at you, eh?"
"Just look at me?" The Master answers, voice dangerously soft. "YOU DON'T KNOW WHAT YOU'RE TALKING ABOUT YOU DAMN FOOL!" He lunges at Wilfred, blood pounding through his temples, demanding retribution. But his arms are caught from behind, and the Doctor restrains him. The Master lets the energy loose in his hands, planning to get at the human even if it kills him, but at that moment, something snaps.
He collapses, half-unconscious and still raging feebly. He loses the battle with darkness quickly, smothered in waves of pity and relief from the Doctor.
0o0o0o0
This time the smooth consolation of unconsciousness is much longer. But the quiet recesses of his mind are too tranquil, and it is this wrong that makes the Master stir back into uneasy consciousness. Before he even opens his eyes he knows he's in the Doctor's TARDIS, hanging about the vortex. He can also tell by the pitch of the TARDIS's background hum that while it doesn't have the tight efficiency of the newer models, it is oddly comforting. The Master opens his eyes and swings his legs into a sitting position.
"Hello." The Doctor greets softly. They lock eyes and the Master grimaces, holding a hand gently on his own skull.
"They're gone." He answers, and the melancholia slips in of its own accord. The Doctor waits for him to finish. "The noise in my head, the drums. Gone."
"Gone with them." The Doctor agrees, and the Master looks up sharply from where his eyes had fallen to the floor. There's something tight in the tone of the Doctor's words and posture that positively screams. Physically, perhaps, he is together, but his mind. His mind burns.
"They used us." The Master voices, and his concentration on the Doctor dims when he realizes the thing that makes his chest so heavy and hard to breathe is death. Everything is dying. His musings are interrupted by a shuddering inhale from the Doctor, whose eyes are red-rimmed and weary.
"Yeah. They did."
The hunger is tearing at him again, and a part of him is regarding the Doctor with purely carnal needs. He grits his teeth, and then laughs bitterly soft.
"I don't want to die either." The Master says, and for all the control he has ever worked for, these words are bare. Like facing those giant berobed elders and trying to explain the message booming behind his skull.
"You won't." The Doctor answers, savagely. There is memory behind those words, thick layers of it, that separate the Time Lord in front of him from the arrogant little student who had humiliatingly received a lower science degree than his own. It doesn't matter. The Master smiles.
"You may be a doctor, but you can't fix me." The Master chides gently.
"Then I'll find someone who can."
There is the fury again, and it almost hurts, the familiar reversal of emotion. When one is furious, the other is calm, except for those brief moments of understanding. The Enmity of Ages. What a weak title for reality.
"A doctor who can't save his patient and a master of nothing." The Master notes, half to get the idea off his chest, and half to see the look in the Doctor's eyes. To his surprise, the Doctor laughs bitterly of his own accord, and the Master smiles.
"Yeah, we make a good pair between the two of us."
"Not for long." The Master adds, still struck by the shock. The ideas that used to teem in his brain, lashed into a frenzy by the drums, are gone. They have sunk somewhere beyond his energy to reach, leaving him to silence. The only thing he can think is that he will die. Again.
"Don't say that." The Doctor orders, and the Master is silent. "I don't care if we have to travel to every corner of the universe." The Master jumps down from his bed to the floor, ignoring the weak feeling in his knees. He walks to where the Doctor stands, and furrows his brow.
"Not exactly the journey across the stars you promised." He says lowly.
"We'll make do."
0o0o0o0
He may be my favorite villain, but the Master is infuriatingly hard to write. Especially depressed!Master. I'll stop blabbing all over the story, excuse me. Reviews make me update faster.