Doctor Who
A Doctor/Master fan fiction

The Sound of Silence

     It was too much for him. He couldn't take it. The silence. There was nothing. The shock of the sound that he'd heard for most of his life being ripped from his skull was enough to drive him mad all over again. He panicked. So did I. It was terrifying. I had no choice. I knocked him unconscious.
     Carrying the Master back to the Tardis, I only hoped he would be calmer when he awoke. Hopefully he would recognize where he was when that happened. I laid him down in one of the bedrooms and left him there in peace.
     After a while of leaning against the Tardis console, resting my throbbing head and thinking about nothing, I noticed the Master enter. His boots thudded with a clang-clang as he trudged across the metal floor. For a moment I just looked at him and him at me. We said nothing. But when I caught sight of his sad eyes that were bloodshot and rubbed red I ran to him. I stopped in front of him, grabbed his shoulders and looked at him hard. I had no idea what I was looking for but when I found it I took him into my arms and held him close against me. His soul was still there, his sanity too, but now they were only shrouded in sorrow.
     Wrapping his arms weakly around my waist, he buried his face in my shoulder and said pathetically, "I want to go home."
     "You are home," I told him gently.
     "No," he whimpered. "To Gallifrey." Nostalgia hung on his voice.
     I never imagined that the Master would be falling to pieces in my arms, but he was so different now, pathetic and vulnerable. The drums no longer beat into his brain until he couldn't think straight and it was now that he realized there was no war to save him.
     "We can't. I'm sorry." I held him closer, if that was even possible. My hand ran along his back. "I know it hurts but this is your home now. Right here." Here, in the Tardis, in my arms, with me. He looked up into my eyes with tears in his own. The breaking of his two hearts showed across his face. "We're all that's left."
     Then, without warning, he pulled me down and pressed his lips to mine in a furious, desperate kiss.
     I did not fight. I wanted it too. He was all I had left of my home. I felt his two hearts beating with mine. And the way he tasted, I could not describe. He tasted perfect. He tasted like a Time Lord.
     He broke the kiss and looked deep into my eyes. His own were flecked with anger and deep, burning sadness.
     "I miss it," he hissed as if he expected me to fix it. But I couldn't. Oh how I wish I could but I couldn't.
     I leaned down and touched my forehead to his, gently running my fingers along the back of his neck. "So do I."
     Though I'm sure my eyes conveyed all the hurt of my hearts he did not look convinced. Instead he sighed and exchanged his expression for one of hopelessness and despair.
     "Come on. Let's go back to bed," I suggested. He nodded weakly and hung his head as if in defeat. I took his hand and together was walked back through the Tardis.
     About halfway back to the room, the Master grabbed my arm for support as he began to stumble. His hand went to his head.
     "Doctor…" he said weakly.
     I could only image what was going on inside his head as it scrambled to compensate for the drums which had left him so empty. Apparently it was enough to render him weak and dizzy. I wrapped an arm around his waist and his weight hung from my shoulder.
     We managed to get back to the room where he immediately collapsed on the bed and sighed into the sheets. When I crawled in beside him he did not argue, in fact he did quite the opposite. Wrapping his body around mine, he clung to me as if it would save his life. I held him back but he felt so pathetic and child-like in my arms it was just wrong.
     He rested his head against my chest, ear pressed directly above my two hearts. He listened. One two three four. One two three four. The heartbeat of a Time Lord. And he fell asleep to the sound of drums one last time.