Like fire! Hellfire! [this fire in my skin]

[savagestime.livejournal.com]

[the Master skids to a halt when he appears on the Astral Plane, having apparently come in running. He immediately straightens out his clothing before addressing the Plane]

Right, so! Pompeii: very lacking in Super Soaker outlets. Anyone have a water gun handy?

Comments

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

Super soaker.

You can't just handle them with a regular water pistol?

[savagestime.livejournal.com]

We have to fight our way in; of course I need something better than a water pistol.

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

Fight your way in?

Isn't it easier just to crawl in the back way?

[savagestime.livejournal.com]

While I know that's your general philosophy in life, I'm afraid certain circumstances led to this becoming an impossibility.

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

What did you do?

[savagestime.livejournal.com]

Why is it my fault?

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

Well, it obviously wasn't my fault! Or his fault. He is me and I am him and I dealt with Pompeii without the use of a supersoaker!

[savagestime.livejournal.com]

Yeah, but he's not you, anymore, is he? You're not the same person. Oh, you're the same regeneration of the same man, but it's been over a year that he's lived with me. He's changed.

And haven't you, from the man you were before? Changed, that is. Or are you really still the same man who held my dying body in his arms?

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

We don't change that much, Master. Just look at you. You've got the smile and the smirk, but you're still the same bloke I fought in my third incarnation.

[savagestime.livejournal.com]

And are you still the man who watched me burn to death?

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

I would've saved you. I always try to save you!

[savagestime.livejournal.com]

You did not! Did you develop a selective memory after you destroyed Gallifrey? That fire wasn't the first time you left me to die! Or did you forget the missile strike on the Keller Machine and the time loop with the Axons? What of abandoning me to the Matrix after I saved you at your trial?

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

And you, causing me to fall off that tower, trying to drain my regenerations, kill me in Event One---and that's not even the beginning of the list!

And I'm supposed to feel guilty for not managing to save you from situations you created yourself?

[savagestime.livejournal.com]

You're supposed to stop pretending that you've always held an open hand out to me!

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

You don't want to be saved! Even after everything that happened, I still tried to take your hand to save you from falling into the Eye of Harmony!

[savagestime.livejournal.com]

After about nine hundred years, yes.

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

You certainly haven't changed. Still all talk and cruelty. I'm beginning to think you can't change.

[savagestime.livejournal.com]

Then give up. Run away. You always do; why bother changing that now?

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

While you cower and hide when your plans don't work out?

And you call me a coward.

[savagestime.livejournal.com]

You are one.

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

Then I suppose I'm in excellent company.

[savagestime.livejournal.com]

No, you're not, Doctor. You're still all alone.

[smiles at the Doctor briefly before walking past him, away]

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

[oh, that was not nice]

And you're still ultimately completely predictable. Tossing a jab while you walk smugly off?

At least you don't deny your own cowardice.

[savagestime.livejournal.com]

[stops, turning back to look at him]

I don't. But I'm happy with that.

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

[right, so maybe he was wrong about the predictable]

You're happy with that? How can you be happy admitting your own fears?