Feel your poison running through me. Let me never grow old.

[neverstops]

Who: The Master, his Shadow and any unfortunates coming after him
When: Feb. 15th
Where: The Dark Hour
What: The Master and his Shadow do not see eye to eye
Warnings: Potential violence and language


[It won't be difficult to find, the Master's dungeon. If the flickering of damaged lights and flames does not attract the immediate attention of anyone who passes near, the steady four-beat drumming that comes from within will. The ship is massive, stretching up into the sky, Y.A.N.A. written across the side of it.

Within is a labyrinth of hallways, wires and broken panels strewn about, sparking at random intervals, warning lights flashing over the entirety of the ship. Plenty of dark corners and leaning broken pieces of wreckage casting shadows over the halls within. Shadowy black orbs of death and destruction patrol the area, cruelly giggling with delight in child-like voices whenever someone crosses their path.

If the 'rescuers succeed in finding their way to the center of the wrecked ship, they will be greeted with the highly advanced lab of Professor Yana. The old gentleman is carrying on a very one-sided conversation with the police chief, who is still pressed against the wall where he is sitting, glaring irritably at the other man. His glare has lost nearly all of it's venom in an effort to suppress the rising uncertainty.]

A calling to war.

[The professor laughs, throwing his head back, the sound manic and cruel.]

Shut Up.

You are nothing. Nothing but a tool. All this time thinking you had some purpose. Some great calling to 'repair' the chaos of the universe. What reparations could you possibly accomplish? Even your 'master' plans fail, every time. You never really wanted to succeed. You were just waiting for him. Waiting for him to stop you and tell you what your real purpose was. You push the blame off on anyone but yourself when it all belongs to you.

It has nothing to do with Him. It's the drums. Those blasted, bloody drums.

[The professor cackles again.]

Nothing more than a calling card of our dear old race. Waiting for us to make our final miscalculation. A pawn and a tool for their selfish purposes.

Comments

[riseup]

[ Oh, Thomas. You couldn't keep this one away if you wanted to.

John's near the front of the pack, Zillyhoo poised to strike any nasty shadows that could crawl out of the woodwork. The orbs had thrown him for a loop, and the boy looks more unnerved than he's been on past rescue missions. When the group comes to a stop and he looks, really looks at Thomas, John lowers his hammer. People have told him a lot of terrible things about his roommate, and the version he'd seen on the television had scared him sleepless the first night. But it doesn't matter — a relentless optimist, John still holds a place in his heart for Thomas. The Master. Whatever his name is.

He takes a gulp of air before speaking to the Professor. ]

You never told me what I should call you.

[neverstops]

You can call me The Master.

[The professor smiled, a sinister expression on the older man. The Master regarded his shadow with something like seething hatred. Why the hell was his past self interfering in his plans? Spewing nonsense lies? Clearly someone had stolen his image to taunt him and he barked a laugh, eying him back as coldly as he was eying John.]

Will you please, just, shut up.

Hush now, Daddy's talking right now. [And that is a very him-like thing to say, which is even more frustrating when he still can't bring himself to attack the not!him taunting him.]

Still, how sweet. Has he really got you that incredibly fooled? Then again, you are a gullible little sap, aren't you. I mean really, did you think all those people were wrong? That he was Thomas the nice roommate, the Police chief? [He snorts, derisive and amused all at once]

That's not even the saddest part. The saddest part is when he actually starts believing it.

Oh, we're very, very good at acting, and you are so easy, it's sad. It really is.

[riseup]

I didn't think they were wrong. I think that people can start new lives after they have been bad, and I thought that's what you were doing.

[ John doesn't even bother to refute being gullible and easily fooled. It hurts to hear, even if he knows it's true. Alien tells you to ride a rocket pack into space and you think you aren't going to die? Just saying. He shifts his weight and shoots a pitying look at the Thomas he knows. ]

Even if you have been totally evil, you can still figure out how to be good again—

[ Those clear blue eyes shift back to the Master's Shadow as he does his best to keep judgment from edging into his voice. He's never dealt with someone who's legitimately evil before. ]

But you have to accept yourself for who you are first.

[allons_y_alonso]

[The Doctor hasn't been of much help in the fights. He won't take a weapon, his sonic screwdriver won't work, and his telepathy isn't powerful enough to let him analyze the Shadows they've fought their way through, although his memory means he never forgets a strength or weakness once demonstrated.

As the Investigation Team spreads out after entering the room, he ducks out from behind them all, glancing around before looking directly at the Professor and the Master.]

I wouldn't say just a tool.

[neverstops]

Oh, Doctor. How good of you to finally show your face.[The Professor's smile is down right predatory and vicious. It is an expression no old man should be capable of making. And yet he still looks so weak and frail. He might fall over at any moment, just from a breeze.]

What are you doing here? [And the Master doesn't look at all happy to see him, either of them. The real Master peering up from his knees, masking any of the fear or doubt building up because he will not be weak in front of the Doctor. He will not beg for his help.]

[allons_y_alonso]

You ought to know by now. Wherever you go, I'll come after you.

[He adresses the Master first, then nods sideways to the Professor.]

But then, you already know that. I don't know how much you studied... this place, before you were brought here...

[He gestures around at their surroundings, and the Dark Hour in general.]

... but it's been one of my main areas of study. This is, by far, the most dangerous space on the island, and it's subtle. So I need you

[The Master]

to listen to me, bear with me, just trust me for only just a moment. And as for you

[The Professor, who he now turns to.]

I know who you are, what you are, and what you want. I can help you. I can help both of you. I am not your enemy right now. Either of you.

[neverstops]

You want to help? [The Professor's laughter was sharp and cruel, echoing through the darkness to melt into the drumming.] Oh, Doctor. You must have known this was coming. I am certain you did. Undoubtedly so. You've been keeping secrets, Doctor. Such great secrets.

[The Professor looks pleased and furious at the same time, and oh if that isn't an expression only the Master could really pull off, but the Master doesn't look convinced at all. Just rolls his eyes and growls because he is really tired of this hallucination. This nightmare of idiotic words and lies. Somehow this is probably the Doctor's fault, he reasons.]

Shut up. You don't know anything. And you.

[He glares at the Doctor, because denial or not, the Professor's words have been seeping into him for what feels like days now. Whispers that the Doctor knows. Has always known. The truth. The truth that HAS to be a lie.]

Trust you?

[Clearly another sentiment they do not exactly see eye to eye on but the shadow just laughs again, head tilted back with amusement because he knows. He knows the Master will fight the Doctor as long as he can, even faced with this. And he knows the Doctor must know it too.]

Oh but we do trust him. We trust him all the time. For as far back as we go. Oh, you fight it now, but you know it's true. He's the one person in this wretched universe whose opinions still matter, and even he is lying. Keeping the darkness there. Tell him, Doctor. Tell him about the drumming. Maybe he'll listen when it comes from you.

[The Master is glaring daggers at his shadow, and oh he would like to cut that tongue out of his mouth if this thing didn't look so much like him. Frail old man. It made him sick to look at. He was strong now. Younger and stronger and not some old oafish man wasting his time on a ship to no where. He was The Master]

[allons_y_alonso]

[It is, undoubtedly, a critical moment. And the Doctor... hesitates.]

You've already told him. Haven't you?

[He turns back, from the Professor to the Master.]

We all lie to ourselves. But you're not, right now. Or at least, this you isn't. But forget that. That's the important thing, the critical thing to realize right now, is that this isn't... some external force, some impostor, some past reflection. He is you, from inside your own mind. He can't tell you anything that you don't already know, and that's why it's so hard, so very hard to accept what he says.

I'm sorry. I am so sorry. But yes. The drums... I only learned just before I came to the island. Just moments before.

[neverstops]

[After everything he has been forced to sit through since his abduction by this thing, you would think this revelation would not have been quite as shocking for The Master. But for a solid moment he stares long and hard at the Doctor. He had been so set to disbelieve all of it, even if a part of him knew it was true.]

You did not think it might be important to share that bit of knowledge.

[The look he gives the Doctor filters somewhere between a scowl and a grimace. Everything the Time Lord's were aside, this was a pretty BIG deal. His entire life weighing out to a calling card to bring the council back was ... It was important. Shatteringly so.]

That thing can't be me. [Definitely a scowl. And denial. Heavy doses of it.] I knew nothing about this. Nothing

[The Professor is just watching with an amused stare, letting the Doctor and the Master dig their holes deeper together. The smug bastard.]

You're lying. Both of you. If it can look like me than who is to say it can't take on other forms. Get out. I don't need your help dealing with figments and lies.

[The Professor just laughs, looking far too pleased with himself.]

I did tell you he would say that. [It's hard to tell which one of them he is speaking to. Likely both.] So destructively stubborn.

[allons_y_alonso]

I'm sorry. I am so sorry. But I saw what learning that did to you. And here...you were blending in. Accomplishing good. A revelation like this, something that could have destabilized things... but mostly, I couldn't have you using it again. Undoing what I had to do. Has he told you that, yet? Has he told you why?

[Guilt keeps the Doctor focused on explaining himself, even though he knows settling the question of 'the real Master' is more important. Guilt for the death of a species makes it hard to stay in perspective.]