Doctor Who ficlet: A Crack in the Skin of the Universe
Title: A Crack in the Skin of the Universe
Characters: The Master
Rating: PG
Spoilers: Doctor Who through 5x03, just barely.
Notes: ~600 words, a little experiment. Comprehensible? Interesting? Y/N?
It's on the other side, too, the crack in the skin of the universe.
There, as on this side, they are too busy to notice it.
But can you see it? Look! There, in that corner. Beneath your line of sight. Hidden in the rubble, pretending to be a break in a cornerstone. Did you see?
And another way it is like the crack on this side: it moves. Now it is tucked away amongst the folds of a great man's robes. Now, inscribed, ephemeral, in flame and smoke. Now, a sharp edge in the shell of the glass dome, a crack that spreads to meet the larger wound shattered out of the protective sphere by more conventional means.
It's following someone.
He's dying.
It's a war, and he's come home to finish it. He's come home, and he's going to use the last force of his life to defeat his own people, to ruin their final plan. In this war, as in his life, there is no victory; there are no victors.
He's paying them back for that, his people. For his life's misery.
He's also saving his friend, so he thinks. His friend, who has seen the split in the skin of the world, and refused to believe in it.
Two parts of space and time that should never have touched, pressed together. All across two universes. The wider, still living one, and the narrow hell of the dying Time Lords.
Two friends, each on one side of the crack, too frightened or ashamed or distracted to see.
The Doctor and the Master.
They think they have healed reality, but sending Gallifrey back has left a fault, with one on either side. To stitch it together, one must take a leap, and join the other. But the Master is dying, and the Doctor has only just died. Energy leaks from them like blood; time flows irretrievably. In the fire of the perpetual last day, the Master uses himself up, and falls.
There is a light, familiar as skin, and an exhalation.
Like the Doctor, the Master is made anew. He opens grey eyes, looks around--and there is the wound in space and time, a fracture like his very being, and he reaches out, and traces his fingers over the jagged line, feels the cool, wet air blowing through a bulkhead he knows is solid.
This is important. He knows it is.
Above him, Time Lords run amok, the Council has descended into anarchy, and screams fly as frequently as accusations. Statesmen, thousands of years old, struggle hand to hand with one another as their fear blows into the vacuum left by Rassilon's defeat.
The Master crawls on his belly, reaches for a tool he hopes still works, runs it over the world's fracture. The tiny crack comes apart, spilling light into his eyes.
He blinks it away, momentarily blinded, peering through to the other side. A young man in a bow-tie and a tall girl with ginger hair are looking back at him in astonishment.
"Hullo?" he calls through the crack. He wonders where and when it is. It looks quiet there, snow drifting slowly to earth and not mixing with rising ash.
The young man frowns. Recognition blossoms in the Master's consciousness. The young man leans in to the widened fissure, which must be much larger on his side. He too, looks uncertain, as though he knows...but doesn't want to know.
"Hullo," he says, as tentative as he ever gets. "What's this then?"
Characters: The Master
Rating: PG
Spoilers: Doctor Who through 5x03, just barely.
Notes: ~600 words, a little experiment. Comprehensible? Interesting? Y/N?
It's on the other side, too, the crack in the skin of the universe.
There, as on this side, they are too busy to notice it.
But can you see it? Look! There, in that corner. Beneath your line of sight. Hidden in the rubble, pretending to be a break in a cornerstone. Did you see?
And another way it is like the crack on this side: it moves. Now it is tucked away amongst the folds of a great man's robes. Now, inscribed, ephemeral, in flame and smoke. Now, a sharp edge in the shell of the glass dome, a crack that spreads to meet the larger wound shattered out of the protective sphere by more conventional means.
It's following someone.
He's dying.
It's a war, and he's come home to finish it. He's come home, and he's going to use the last force of his life to defeat his own people, to ruin their final plan. In this war, as in his life, there is no victory; there are no victors.
He's paying them back for that, his people. For his life's misery.
He's also saving his friend, so he thinks. His friend, who has seen the split in the skin of the world, and refused to believe in it.
Two parts of space and time that should never have touched, pressed together. All across two universes. The wider, still living one, and the narrow hell of the dying Time Lords.
Two friends, each on one side of the crack, too frightened or ashamed or distracted to see.
The Doctor and the Master.
They think they have healed reality, but sending Gallifrey back has left a fault, with one on either side. To stitch it together, one must take a leap, and join the other. But the Master is dying, and the Doctor has only just died. Energy leaks from them like blood; time flows irretrievably. In the fire of the perpetual last day, the Master uses himself up, and falls.
There is a light, familiar as skin, and an exhalation.
Like the Doctor, the Master is made anew. He opens grey eyes, looks around--and there is the wound in space and time, a fracture like his very being, and he reaches out, and traces his fingers over the jagged line, feels the cool, wet air blowing through a bulkhead he knows is solid.
This is important. He knows it is.
Above him, Time Lords run amok, the Council has descended into anarchy, and screams fly as frequently as accusations. Statesmen, thousands of years old, struggle hand to hand with one another as their fear blows into the vacuum left by Rassilon's defeat.
The Master crawls on his belly, reaches for a tool he hopes still works, runs it over the world's fracture. The tiny crack comes apart, spilling light into his eyes.
He blinks it away, momentarily blinded, peering through to the other side. A young man in a bow-tie and a tall girl with ginger hair are looking back at him in astonishment.
"Hullo?" he calls through the crack. He wonders where and when it is. It looks quiet there, snow drifting slowly to earth and not mixing with rising ash.
The young man frowns. Recognition blossoms in the Master's consciousness. The young man leans in to the widened fissure, which must be much larger on his side. He too, looks uncertain, as though he knows...but doesn't want to know.
"Hullo," he says, as tentative as he ever gets. "What's this then?"