5x08: Fjemir
5x08: Fjemir
(Medusa Cascade, 2008)
For about a week, relative time, the Doctor lets the TARDIS just float near the Medusa Cascade; even if there is nothing else to recommend it, it still has the spectacular view. He tells himself he's just making sure the rift doesn't open again. He makes a number of small repairs, fixing coils, messing with the settings of the TARDIS interior for a bit before deciding he's still quite fond of the honest organic look. He makes a list of all the other spacetime rifts he can think of; which ones are supervised, which ones are dangerous, which ones should under no account be left open for fear of debris from the Time War getting through. There are only three rifts that look in particular need of closing, but the Doctor considers a repeat performance of the Medusa Cascade affair and actually has to clamp down on panic. Stupid of him to let down his defenses like that in front of the Master. A human wouldn't even have been able to tell.
The really awful thing, of course, is that now when the Doctor's not paying attention -- making a list of the rifts on a spare bit of notebook paper, for instance -- he finds himself absentmindedly tapping out a neat little rhythm with his pencil nub. That should teach him to let the Master into his head for even a moment. He doesn't hear the drums, exactly, but their echo has imprinted into his neural pattern, and he hasn't yet made the effort to remove it.
The Master keeps himself scarce for most of that week, too; they run into each other once, both stopping by a kitchen at the same time. The Master is hunched over a plate of toast and very black coffee; the Doctor hastily puts together a sandwich and leaves before the silence reaches breaking point. He never once forgets the Master's there, though, even when they're on opposite ends of the TARDIS (as close as the TARDIS ever gets to having ends). Just once, the Doctor takes a bit of a nap, and awakens in total disorientation, thinking he must be on the Valiant -- reaches for the threads of the Archangel network and comes up with a mental handful of Time Lord technology instead -- so he must be waking from strange dreams safe in his bed at the Academy, except -- he recognises his TARDIS, feels lifetimes' worth of memories rush back in at him, remembers: this confusion is the natural result of having the Master here in this space with him, after so long alone.
Eventually he runs out of things to fix and tinker with, runs out of ways to go nowhere fast. With reluctant feet he heads out of the console room to find the Master, who, unsurprisingly, is holed up in the library. He's devolved from the seventh Harry Potter book to X-Men comics, the Doctor sees with raised eyebrows. He didn't know he even had X-Men comics. He entertains himself for a moment trying to guess who they rightfully belong to (his top three contenders are Mel, Mickey, and Susan) before the Master looks up and drawls, "Yes?"
"Cabin fever," the Doctor says. "Want to go out?"
The Master's grin tells him he should have thought more carefully about the phrasing, but all the Master says is, "Where did you have in mind?"
"Hadn't thought about it," the Doctor says, shrugging. It's a poor parody of casual, but at least he's trying. The Master sets aside his comic and follows the Doctor back up to the console room, both of them carefully staying at least a foot distant from each other. The Doctor opens his mouth to say something about closing up more rifts, can't bring himself to say it, and instead presses in the command for random coordinates. The readout is a place he's never heard of before.
He looks up at the Master. Threatening punishment if the Master tries anything will probably sound to the Master like some sort of challenge, but he can't say nothing. He thinks about saying, You don't have your own TARDIS anymore. He considers, Since it's only us left ... He remembers how he used to wish the Master would just go away, so someone else -- some other Time Lords less weighed down by centuries of complicated history with him -- would take the Master in hand. No, wait, that -- He's very glad he's not saying any of this aloud.
"Don't leave," he says. "Just -- please. Don't."
The Master inspects his nails idly. "Pretty please with a cherry on top?"
"If you like," the Doctor allows.
"This place better have really good ice cream sundaes, then," the Master mutters, but he shrugs and follows the Doctor out.
(Gvemisy, Omicron Five, 80,365,559)
The TARDIS, the Doctor discovers as he steps out, has materialised in some outer street of a city under a great dome, some kind of half-transparent force field. Superficially the layout is a bit like that of the Citadel on Gallifrey, but the sky overhead is a clear brilliant blue, and the place around them looks like nothing so much as the Emerald City as designed and built by industrious madmen with no concept of the law of gravity. Buildings soar out at improbable glowing green angles.
The Master steps out of the TARDIS after the Doctor and squints around. "Should I be expecting singing midgets at any moment?" he asks, then swears and ducks as an energy beam whistles past his head and leaves a tiny scorchmark on the TARDIS paneling. The Doctor puts his hands up at once. "Oh, for crying out -- How do you know that's even recognised as a gesture of surrender here?" the Master hisses, but he puts his hands up too.
It seems to do the trick. After a moment a few four-foot-tall, brilliantly yellow-orange creatures that have a passing resemblance to geckos edge out from behind a building, on their hind legs, using their tails for balance, and holding impressive-looking energy weapons wrapped in their arms. One of them keeps its brilliantly green eyes fixed on the Master while the other turns to the Doctor and says, in a reedy and unexpectedly girlish voice, "Explain your intrusion."
"Just travelers," the Doctor says. "We're just travelers. Happened by."
"How did you come through the Barrier?" it -- she, the Doctor would say at a guess -- asks.
"What, that dome you've got?" The Doctor shrugs, but lightly, avoiding sudden movement. "My ship doesn't travel by ... conventional means. Didn't even notice your Barrier was there. Sorry. Is that a problem?"
The creature hasn't blinked yet. Her head swivels a little so she can look at the Master for a moment too, and her next question is probably addressed to them both. "Do you come from Fjemir?"
"No, don't think so," the Doctor says. "Sorry, what's Fjemir?"
"This one," the other creature says in a different timbre. It has darker spots up its sides. Male? It -- he -- tilts his head at the Master. "This one has not yet spoken."
"We're not from Fjemir," the Master says, sounding bored.
"But they are from outside," the first creature says coldly. "They should be taken to the Consultation."
"Brilliant!" the Doctor says. "Only, sorry, like I said, travelers -- a bit lost. Where are we?"
"Gvemisy," the second creature says, somewhat suspiciously. "We are the Gvemir."
"Gvemisy! Brilliant." The first Gvemir is looking quite impatient, so he adds, "Sorry," and sets off in the direction she's indicated. Without looking he knows the Master is following. They're led up a winding glassy street between the shining emerald buildings. A few clouds scud by overhead and quite without meaning to the Doctor finds himself enjoying it: the bright colours, the beautiful day, the faint humming awareness of another Time Lord in his head. The presence of weapons still pointed in his direction are too routine to fuss him much.
At length they're led inside a building near the centre of the city; muggy inside, creeping green-and-purple plants threading their way up to the shining ceiling. A gently bubbling fountain sits in a pool in the middle of the room, and from all directions the gecko-like Gvemir are pouring in; evidently news travels fast in this city. Most of the Gvemir are unarmed, although a few sport peculiar spiky sequined headdresses. Somewhat to the Doctor's surprise, it's an unadorned Gvemir who comes forward. "Explain this intrusion!" she says, in much the same tones as a displeased schoolteacher.
"Well, I'm the Doctor, and this is --" He glances back at the Master, who merely gives him a cold annoyed glare. "This is Mr Saxon," the Doctor says, which makes the Master's eyes flare with what is at least that same annoyance ratcheted up. "We're just travelers, I've explained -- my ship isn't the sort that's stopped by the kind of barrier you've got up -- but if it's a problem, you know, we could leave, we won't take up your time."
The Gvemir listens to all this in silence, and when it's clear the Doctor's finished she blinks once, a filmy shutter vertically across her eyes, and says, "A prattler and a clown." She turns her attention to the Master. "And what has this one to say?"
Bristling visibly, the Master ignores this entirely. "What's Fjemir?"
Their interrogator -- along with much of the listening crowd -- hisses. "Do not speak its name!"
"That one did," the Master says reasonably, tilting his head in the direction of their captors. "What is it? A place? A person?"
"Fjemir is destiny," another voice pipes up: a male Gvemir, and wearing one of those peculiar headdresses, the Doctor's unsurprised to see. "You would do well to speak cautiously." This Gvemir shuffles forward, peering at them. "If they are of Fjemir, we would do well to speak cautiously too."
The Master looks visibly cheered at this development, but the Doctor says quickly, "We're not of Fjemir. We don't know what it is -- destiny, whatever that means when it's at home. We're just travelers."
"But from beyond the world," the Gvemir in headdress says, and, feeling that a bit of progress is being made, the Doctor nods, saying, "Yeah, that's right, from out there in space."
A murmur ripples through the crowd, and the female Gvemir with the air of authority balances straighter on her tail, gaining height. "Quiet!" she says. "Those not of the Consultation will now leave."
A sizable number of Gvemir trail out, leaving probably around twenty; among them, five are in headdresses. Their escort guard to this place has left too, the Doctor sees, but he's quite sure the remaining Gvemir, unarmed as they are, could hold their own quite well if they wished. They're all eyeing the Doctor and the Master with a great deal of speculation.
"If they come from beyond the world," ventures one of the smaller ones in headdress, "perhaps they are the Evolved."
A male wearing only a pompous air makes a derisive whistling noise. "There's no such thing. Besides, if that were true, they'd know of Fjemir."
"Yeah, yeah, hold up," the Doctor interjects. "I'm still not understanding this. Is Fjemir your word for destiny, or is it ... something real, what ...?"
One of the smaller Gvemir clears her throat, or at least makes an approximation of that sound. "The Cult of Evolution," she says primly, "believe that whomsoever survives the great perils of the World Beyond the Barrier shall grow in strength until at last they meet with Fjemir, who shall reward them greatly and make them one of the Evolved."
The Doctor blinks. "Hang on, evolution as religion?"
"It does have a certain appeal," the Master puts in dryly.
"But no one has gone beyond the Barrier in centuries!" blusters the pompous one. He falters.
"The great perils out beyond this Barrier of yours," the Doctor says slowly, "on the rest of this planet -- is that, I dunno, hyperbole, or is it really unsafe out there?"
"Only criminals are exiled beyond the Barrier," the first female Gvemir puts in. "The punishment is terrible. They're never seen or heard from again."
"Oh now, that's interesting," the Doctor murmurs. Likely as not, there's a second civilisation of Gvemir somewhere else on this planet, and he's starting to think he might like them a bit better than this lot. Except -- coldly reptilian as their eyes are, he sees fear in them, real honest fear, even in the headdress-bedecked ones he's beginning to guess are priests of Fjemir or similar. "Do you ... have to enact this punishment often?"
"Only once a generation," the leading female says. "It is a punishment terrible enough that most avoid crime."
"I see," the Doctor says, and darts a look at the Master, who returns it speculatively. It's the Master who says, "And coming into your city here unannounced, that's, oh, probably a punishable offence, isn't it?"
"It is unprecedented," the Gvemir admits. She observes them sharply. "Do you wish to go out and find the Fjemir?"
"That would be the idea, yeah," the Doctor admits.
The Gvemir shuffle a bit, nervously, and flow together into a huddled conference. The Doctor and the Master glance at each other again. "What d'you think?" the Doctor asks quietly.
"Either a legend, in which case we'll get a nice walk and a bit of a laugh," the Master says, "or this Fjemir thing really is out there. Some sort of huge beast, maybe, or a devised series of tests. Either way --" He shrugs.
"So we stop it," the Doctor says.
The Master snorts. "Course. Cos whatever it is, you're going to talk it down or tame it. Seriously, that's limited vision."
Before the Doctor can think of a suitable retort, the Gvemir flow out of conference and one in a headdress announces, "I shall lead you to the Perilous Way."
They follow him out of the chamber and briefly into the sunlight again, glittering with painful brightness off the buildings, before their guide leads them down one alley and another, progressively narrower. The Master, still squinting a bit, remarks, "They do like their dramatics here," and gives the Doctor a look of exaggerated puzzlement when he snorts a little at this observation.
At length they reach a little complicated-looking door set into the deep green of the outer wall. Their guide unlatches the door with a complicated series of gestures with his three gecko-sticky fingers, and scoots backwards swiftly. "Farewell," he says, and, after a moment: "Fjemir grant you Evolution."
"Thanks," the Doctor says, and ducks outside.
The force-field around the city is only vaguely perceptible from out here. A rustling song of insects rises from the violet grass, and the Doctor just stands there, grinning for a moment and breathing the clear air before the Master makes an impatient noise and sets off ahead of him. After a moment the Doctor follows him in long strides. The day is beautiful, if a little muggy; it's a terrible pity the Gvemir are too frightened to come out and enjoy their own planet. Patches of shade dot the rolling hills, and a brisk wind ruffles the Doctor's hair and sets his coat flapping. In the distance a green dot, some structure like the city but smaller, glitters and shines. The Master has already spotted it, and is making in that direction. In a few bounds, the Doctor's caught up with him.
"Slow down for a moment!" the Doctor says. "We're out of the TARDIS! Don't rush through it."
The Master gives him a sideways look. "Maybe I just want a bit of space," he says sharply.
"Oh. Right," the Doctor says, trying not to feel hurt, and falls back to walk at a more leisurely pace. He feels a bit of a fool, really; it's what Martha and Jack have been trying to say -- he might be one of the last two Time Lords in existence but that doesn't make the Master different. He's still the Master; for centuries he's torn up lives and planets, and running from the War was not an act of change, merely an act of preservation. Why he'd thought, for even a second, that after an extended while in his company the Master might change -- when even a year in proximity on the Valiant hadn't done any good -- when --
The Doctor stops in his tracks and looks around. He can't see the Master anywhere. "Oh, for --" he says aloud in frustration, because really, a moment's introspection and he just loses the Master, he --
He can't sense him. In his head. Nothing.
Without warning blind panic crashes down on the Doctor, literally collapses his legs under him so he sinks into the grass, gasping and shaking and trying to think, trying to think but without warning he's alone and he can't and it doesn't make sense --
Doesn't make sense, the small rational voice of the scientist repeats in his mind. Fact: it is likely that the Master has taken advantage of his meandering thoughts to run off. Fact: it is unlikely that he managed to spontaneously cease existing in the last minute. Fact: it is highly unlikely that the Master would be able to shut down either his own neurotransmitters or the Doctor's that would allow them access to a species awareness of each other. Fact: even if the Master can't perform that trick, it's still a neurological possibility. Therefore ...
The Doctor takes a few gulping breaths and closes his eyes. Steps into the field of his mindscape and searches for peculiar brainwave patterns, for suppressions. The adrenaline's all his own, and there's nothing wrong with the visual cortex, but there, just there, in his hindbrain where he'd miss it entirely except that ever since the War the Doctor's been acutely aware of it: the bundle for species awareness, all pressed in. The Doctor yanks all transmitters open without finesse in his haste, and the sudden awareness of the Master's existence slams him back into his physical self hard enough he chokes for a moment on a sob.
The insects are still buzzing, the breeze is still blowing, the landscape still looks gentle and friendly. The Doctor gets shakily to his feet, and now that he can sense the Master again -- an illusion of the brain, not the eyes -- he can see the Master too, only just a little ways ahead of him, staring back at him with something like naked relief on his face, the most open honest expression the Doctor's seen on him in hundreds of years.
So when the Doctor's own awareness was cut off, it severed the Master's too, intentionally or not. The Doctor understands this, if the Master doesn't yet, and he goes over to the Master as quickly as he can, says, "I think I'm going with the series of tests theory. Something just tweaked my neural pattern."
"And mine," the Master snaps, switching from surprise to anger so quickly the Doctor suddenly knows, not guesses, knows the Master was just as afraid as he was.
The Doctor looks at him for a long moment. Thinks: We could turn back. The Gvemir seem safe, if discontent, inside their domed city. Losing the Master, even for a moment -- And then the Doctor catches himself, actually setting the Master above all those people if only for a second, and twitches his shoulders, starting to walk again in the direction of the far-off green structure, guilty and unsure. When exactly is the greater good really the greater good, anyway? he wonders. In this case, yes, but in the Time War --
He and the Master freeze as one, spotting them: smudges on the horizon coming swiftly overhead with that unmistakable screaming hum, cruelly ripping the sound barrier. Dalek ships. They both cower down at the first pass, and a distant cold voice in the Doctor's head is saying It's not real, it's not real, and it does have the quality of a nightmare, cutting even through the shock. "It's not --" the Doctor says, a little panting gasp under all the terrible noise, and the Master's eyes are huge with fright but he says, "I know -- just keep moving towards that damn --" and they stumble, dragging each other along through the shared hallucination towards the distant structure, only the frantic hammering of the Master's hearts keeping the Doctor from losing his head completely.
Then the Dalek ships start shooting, great blazes of fire down into the grass, the insects screaming, and the Doctor gasps, "How can this not be real," but the Master's looking at him with confusion now through the terror. He stares outright as the Doctor flinches, a beam from the Dalek ship exploding into flames just yards from them; smoke fills the air, the world dissolving into sheets of fire and the Doctor can't help it; he crumples down again in the grass-turned-ashes, unable to move, dying in the conflagration --
And cool hands cradle his head, careful mental fingers picking apart the terror, deconstructing it to dissolving composite atoms, and the Doctor finds himself clinging to the Master's suit jacket shaking uncontrollably, while around him the wind hums gently over the violet grass. The ghosts of Dalek ships shimmer overhead like mirages.
He can't stop shaking, can't stand yet, but the Master's hands are still buried in his hair and neither of them are actually pretending dignity. After a moment the Doctor ventures, his voice trembling a little too: "It could kill. Just keep you trapped in the illusion until you starve, or your hearts give out, or you go mad."
"Exactly," the Master says, disentangling himself slowly and standing. The Doctor looks up at him, silhouetted against the sky with the phantom Dalek ships flickering behind him. "I'm mad already," the Master says, and grins, a brilliant smug grin that the Doctor can't help returning. The Master offers him a hand and the Doctor staggers to his feet, both of them chuckling as they set off again towards the place from which these hallucinations emanate.
Then the Master stops laughing abruptly.
"Right," the Doctor says, sobering. "Not funny."
The Master flinches, nearly imperceptibly.
"Are you all right?" the Doctor asks.
"Fine," the Master says, but it comes out almost a snarl.
"Right," the Doctor says, stepping away a bit to give them distance. Moment of solidarity firmly over. But the Master flinches at that, too, his face going pale with anger; as though everything the Doctor's doing is greatly exaggerated, or calculated to be hurtful, which -- Oh.
"I wasn't ... laughing at you," the Doctor ventures.
The Master swallows hard. "Of course you weren't," he sneers.
"It's playing up again," the Doctor says, a bit bewildered; maybe the Fjemir, whatever it is, has worked out that they'll be far easier to pick off apart from each other, and is trying to separate them. But the Doctor can't figure out why it's not trying to convince him of all the exaggerated, calculated-to-hurt things the Master's doing. Then he nearly laughs again, because of course, there's no illusion in that. Nothing the Doctor doesn't already know. He tries venturing nearer to the Master. "It's trying to draw us apart."
The Master laughs harshly. "As if for a moment I even wanted to be near you," he sneers.
"No," the Doctor says, patiently, "come here for a moment, let me fix --"
The Master laughs again, an awful mirthless sound. "Right," he says, "right, of course," and his face twists into something ugly, hateful and betrayed. Such a familiar expression. It wrenches the Doctor's hearts, and then they leap in terror, because the Master follows this with, "I hate you," and turns, racing away from the Doctor.
The only good thing about the whole situation is that he's running towards the Fjemir structure, not away from it. The Doctor swears and tears off after him.
The Dalek ships are back; after a moment, the fire too, so that the Doctor slips and stumbles on phantom ashes, telling himself furiously that it's unreal, the searing heat, his urge to cough against the smoke. A Dalek appears ahead of him, screeches "EXTERMINATE!" and the Doctor grits his teeth and bowls it right over, its disoriented and disturbingly realistic scream behind him actually funny for the most fleeting of seconds. Ahead of him the Master flickers out of sight -- out of existence -- and the Doctor does stumble then, a hammer-blow of loss, until still running he reaches into his mind and wrenches and the momentary flood of relief at having the Master back lends him a burst of speed.
Whatever's behind this is trying too hard now. The jumble of terror cuts into him viscerally, but the Doctor's mind is racing above it now, intellect on a higher plane than all his mad misfiring neurons, and the Master meanwhile is faltering, stumbling to a shaking halt. The Doctor catches up to him, seizes his hand and it's horribly slapdash work but he shoves the clarity into the Master's head, feels it slide straight past the drumming; the Master gasps and his hand goes bone-crushingly tight and they're running together across the whirl of violet plain under the bright sky, and then nearly without warning they've stumbled into a green space. Echoing. Quiet.
The Doctor leans back against a wall, coughing and gasping, trying to banish the phantom smoke. The Master falls back against the opposite wall and slides down to sit against its base.
"Oh do I hate you," he says conversationally.
The Doctor chuckles with relief. "Might've come up."
"No, I really do," the Master insists. "Ten minutes ago -- well. However long it was. When we started out I thought, what could you control with even the threat of this thing?" He gestures. Sitting in the middle of the room, pulsing contentedly to itself in the eye of its generated storm, sits a neat little box positively bristling with wires. "Fjemir," the Master says offhandedly, and goes over to it, looking down. Snorts. "Cult of Evolution. The stupid wanker that invented this didn't understand the first thing about evolution." He looks up at the Doctor. "Watch carefully."
"I'm watching," the Doctor says mildly.
The Master grins, a sharp savage grin, and brings his foot down hard right in the middle of the box.
A soundless explosion rocks the room and there Fjemir sits, broken and sadly spitting sparks from its wires. All the Master's hair is sticking on end. He scowls. The Doctor schools his face and manages to look appropriately serious.
"Oh, come on," the Master says, and stalks back out into the violet grass.
Following, the Doctor sees even from this distance that the protective shield's gone down from around the Gvemir city. After a moment he starts to see miniscule orange figures swarming up the buildings, and grins to himself, lengthens his stride until he's strolling along next to the Master.
"What now?" the Master asks after a moment. "Skulk off back to the TARDIS and miss any opportunity for praise and adoration, I expect."
"That's right," the Doctor says. They keep walking in silence. "Thanks," he adds, and glances over at the Master, who shrugs, a tight little shrug without looking at him. You were afraid, the Doctor thinks. I was scared you'd be gone, but you were scared I'd abandon you. He takes a deep breath.
"Actually," he says, "I know a moon restaurant that does really wonderful dinners."
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