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Lapidary	By : Savaialian Category: 1 through F > Doctor Who Views: 1563 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own the Doctor Who fandom, nor to I make money from writing about it. I use their creations with due respect.

Chapter List
- 1-Lapidary
- 2-TWO
- 3-THREE
- 4-FOUR
- 5-FIVE
- 6-SIX
- 7-SEVEN
- 8-EIGHT
- 9-NINE
- 10-TEN
- 11-ELEVEN
- 12-TWELVE
- 13-THIRTEEN
- 14-FOURTEEN
- 15-FIFTEEN
- 16-SIXTEEN
- 17-SEVENTEEN
- 18-EIGHTEEN
- 19-NINETEEN
- 20-TWENTY
- 21-TWENTY-ONE
- 22-TWENTY-TWO
- 23-TWENTY-THREE
- 24-TWENTY-FOUR
- 25-EPILOGUE
- 1
- 2
- 3
“Is this your bedroom?” I asked, knowing full well it was. The room was drenched in his scent. It had the vanilla quality of sleep, adding to the copal in a pleasing way. I’d never smelled a place where he slept, so this was new.
“I sleep here at times, yes,” he confirmed, walking to a large closet. “I need to change clothes before I take you near the palace. I’m expected to wear the traditional garb of an emperor. Makes my subjects feel more secure.”
“They accept you, though,” I said, knowing that to be right even though I had nothing to back it up.
“Yes.” The Master took off his finely made shirt to reveal his finely made upper body. “In eight months I’ve eradicated a lot of starvation and money-draining, rich-bitch projects of government. These people were hungry.” He paused in taking off his trousers, looking up as if a thought had suddenly occurred. “I sympathized with that,” he said. “Even before the ravenous hunger I experienced from a botched resurrection I never starved people to gain control over them. It seemed gauche and pointless. Real hunger has a way of dampening fear, too.” He shucked his trousers, and I turned away before I could get a glimpse of his bits.
Not that I wasn’t a little curious.
“You can turn around, Mother Theresa,” the Master said dryly. “A svond doesn’t take long to put on.”
I turned to see him wearing a cheongsam nearly floor length, made of black silk. “Are you naked under that thing?” I blurted.
“There’s no such thing as underwear here unless you’re female,” he answered, putting on a white over-robe. Barefoot, he went to his mirror and had a look at himself.
“You look like you’re wearing a night gown,” I told him.
“Don’t be ridiculous. The colors would be reversed in that instance.” The Master ran a hand through his hair. He took a pair of black straw sandals from the closet and sat to put them on. He had nice feet, naturally. High arches, slim configuration, toes that looked like they’d never been squashed in shoes and boots, and perfectly pedicured. “Unlike you, I am able to wear a disguise.”
“You consider the robes of state a disguise.”
“Yes. They don’t have a word for ‘master’ here. This is a planet full of people who think it’s more noteworthy to remain a scholar. Even these so-called robes of state reflect their schools of learning.” The Master wriggled his toes before standing. “Now, we go to where I actually live, the palace. This tower is my ‘get away from it all’ place.”
“I didn’t see servants on the way in,” I pointed out.
“I’m never here longer than six or eight hours. Any more than that and I get pulled away to deal with something. The old emperor had really let things go, I tell you.” The Master led me back out and down, down, down. We hit bottom and he took me outside to a waiting, saddled animal. It did look a lot like a horse, I had to admit. But, it had paws instead of hooves, and scales instead of hair.
The Master took off the saddle and gave a short sigh. “If I didn’t like the clean air so much, I’d promote industrialization,” he said. “Get on behind me. These things are irritatingly hard to get used to, and you’ll fall off if you play guide.” With that, he grabbed a big handful of mane and vaulted on.
I did as he said, and immediately understood what he meant. The animal didn’t even feel like a horse, and its skin shifted alarmingly before snapping back to less tensile qualities. I grabbed the Master quickly, getting an arm around his waist. “I see,” I said in his ear.
He shivered. “Your voice is quite something else from a half inch away,” he said mildly, mysteriously. “Hold on tight, Doctor; there’s only one speed.”
We took off so fast I nearly fell off despite his warning. In six, hearts-stopping minutes we’d gone very far. I estimated that many miles. The palace came into view, and less than a minute passed before we were entering the courtyard. The Master allowed me to dismount, then followed suit. Three people took charge of his reptilian steed, and three more met him to talk as he walked inside.
The Master made short, efficient work of solving varied problems, speaking their language perfectly without the help of a TARDIS. He sent the men on their way after one of them made an inquiry about his harem. He gave me a look as they left, an expression of one part exasperation, one part humor, and two parts irritation. “They want me to fill it,” he said, though I saw he knew I’d followed everything. “I’m not interested.”
“Really?” I tugged at my earlobe as I considered that. “You had your hands all over Lucy Cole.”
“Lucy Saxon,” he corrected, leading me down a long, serpentine marble corridor full of paper covered oil lamps. “Don’t degrade her by forgetting I did actually marry her.”
“You care about the marriage rites of primitive societies?” I asked leadingly.
“It isn’t the ceremony, but the ownership,” he informed in a tight, hard voice. “Ownership is a more complete definition.”
“Well, fine, let’s drop that topic and go back to the harem,” I suggested. “You seem a bit… earthy this time around, for lack of a more polite definition.”
“You mean carnally inclined.” The Master took us down another corridor, then made a hard left. “A harem isn’t about meaningless sex, as much as it might seem that way. You’ve evidently never had one.”
“And you have?”
“Once was enough. It’s too much of a headache to even enjoy the rampant fucking. Someone’s always trying to get knocked up by the king, and then trying to promote their child over six others afterward. Also, assassins can have beautiful breasts. Lastly, finding good eunuch guards is damned hard.” The Master opened a door and beckoned me to look inside.
I saw about three dozen men and women milling about totally nude. “What?” I asked, an automatic lift to my voice and volume with pure startlement.
“Hopefuls,” the Master said. “When your résumé is getting starkers, it sort of simplifies things, doesn’t it?”
I couldn’t help it. I bent over double to laugh. He shut the door and tugged me down another corridor while I still chuckled.
Once we occupied yet another bedroom, the Master shed his sandals and stretched out on a huge bed covered in velvet blankets. “So, Doctor,” he said. “How long are you staying? Shall I order a guest bedroom prepared?”
Sobering, I sat on the edge and looked down at him. “You know I couldn’t possibly rest,” I answered.
“I promise this isn’t some ploy to destroy or humiliate you,” he replied easily. “I’m very busy with this project, and I could use your input.”
I stared at him in silent shock. He hadn’t admitted to thinking I was useful, not in that way, for a long time. I was so surprised that I spoke with no inclination to lie. “What are your projects?”
“Well, there’s step-farming, which the citizens aren’t convinced of, and the plans for the city’s aqueducts, plumbing, and ventilation,” he said, ticking things off on fingers as he went. “Also, the domestication of their food animals. They’ve got some notion it’s a good idea to keep the animals penned up for convenience and just chalking it up to nature when they peck and dismember each other.” He paused and rolled his eyes upward. “And, then there’s the schooling. They aren’t religiously opposed to including the females in their institutions, but it’s a near thing.”
“Well, I would expect you to simply order things the way you want them,” I said.
“You still don’t understand. When I said they have no word for ‘master’, did that only mean to you that they couldn’t understand my name?”
“Ahhh,” I said. “The title of emperor is like England’s queen. Powerful and powerless at the same time.”
“Yes. I can order all I like, but hard government simply doesn’t exist here, yet. This is practically an anarchy, and has been one since their civilization spawned from the seas.” The Master put his arms behind his head and twitched a foot in rhythm. “These people respect power, which helps a little, and they seem to understand that my edicts eventually cause beneficial change, now. Still, I welcome your help with them.”
“Rome wasn’t built in a day,” I conceded. I took his only chair and occupied it. First off, I couldn’t believe he actually wanted me here. Second, that he’d want my help. But, he did seem sincere. “So, are you making a go of this?” I asked. “Is this home, now?”
“For awhile. I’m running an experiment on myself as well as on this world.” The Master tapped one-two-three-four on his thigh a few times while he considered his words. “I don’t affect change in unselfish ways; that just isn’t my style. But, I’d like to be as complete as possible here. You know, give it my best effort.”
“You never give less than everything when there’s a goal in mind,” I pointed out.
“No, I usually only give eighty percent,” he corrected. “One hundred percent would have already made me the Master of all Matter, and you’d be dead, wouldn’t you? At the very least, enslaved.”
Disquieted, I only watched him and tried to come up with something intelligent to say. It was probably true that twenty percent more effort would have me dead by his hand, for he was a vicious, thorough enemy. I thought he’d kept me alive on the Valiant only because keeping me alive meant more suffering.
“What sort of experiment are you doing on yourself?” I asked at last.
“I’m trying to prove they haven’t ruined me,” he said, shocking me to my core. He’d meant our people, there. He meant the drums. “I don’t like the idea that they’ve won,” he added. “I’m independent, and I don’t appreciate being used, Doctor.” He sat up and looked out his large, picture window, away from me. “It occurred to me that you are the only person I’ve ever known who hasn’t tried to use me. You’ve been… reactive. You never start anything, just finish it.”
I dry swallowed. “I didn’t think you realized that.”
“There’s a lot I understood and knew but found difficult to focus upon.” The Master got up and began pacing, his lovely feet flexing bare upon the carpet covered marble floor. “This planet is my first attempt at full comprehension of myself. I only thought I knew me, Doctor.”
Oh, I knew what he meant. Standing before Davros, hearing what he had to say about me, had hurt. It had torn me down to nothing to look at myself with honesty. I was the biggest liar I knew, and I lied to myself as much as to others. The Master must have felt the same way once he saw he’d been driven mad and used as a tool of Time Lord treachery; I’d never gotten along with our people, but he’d had a real relationship of antagonism with them from start to finish.
“They always stifled you,” I murmured, watching his eyes move in my direction. “I thought they singled you out for stifling, actually. Made an example of you.”
The Master gave a short, sighing sort of exhale and stopped pacing. “You saw that?” He asked. “I wondered if that wasn’t a fancy of mine.” He opened his door and ordered tea I hadn’t heard of before, then shut it again. “So, will you stay a few days?”
“Yeah,” I heard myself say. “I’ll take a turn at diplomacy, see if I can’t convince people to let their daughters go to school, to treat the farm animals better, and to take a shot at step farming.”
“Excellent.” The Master walked to a medium sized gong by his door, picked up the strike and got ready to swing it down. “I’ll have a room prepared for you.”
I took the gong strike out of his hand and looked down at him. “You know I can’t possibly sleep without knowing where you are.”
He met my sober stare with one of his own. “You’ll be nervous if you don’t know where I am,” he reiterated. A small frown rippled through his handsome face. “What should I do, then? You can’t sleep in here with me.”
“Why not? Do you carry your selfishness that far? Your bed is huge. We wouldn’t even be close to each other.”
For my initial answer, the Master gave me a look that made me wonder what I’d missed. He angled his body, leaning to the left, away from me, and cocked a hip while tilting his head. “The bed isn’t as big as you think. My hunting cats sleep with me.”
I heard an omission. There was another reason he didn’t want me in here, even if that first one proved valid. It made me doubly suspicious. I crossed my arms to show I wouldn’t budge. “Here, or I get in my TARDIS and hare off.”
The Master’s narrowed eyes gleamed with an emotion I couldn’t pin down. He nodded, but reluctantly. “Well, I’ll introduce you to the cats, then. They should know you before you start hogging their side of the bed.”
I followed the Master all the way back outside, where he aimed for a copse of trees several hundred meters distant. “I said that nearly all the animal life on this planet is of a vegetarian frame, not all,” he reminded. “Only the emperor is allowed to keep these cats, and for some reason, only the emperor can control them. I can’t narrow it down. It’s a mystery.”
“That is odd,” I agreed. I felt thankful we hadn’t had to ride out to this small forest, but wondered why his estate was so widely scattered. He had his glorified office, a getaway tower, and a palace, but not clustered together. “Maybe the cats recognize the clothing? Are you the only one who dresses in a nightgown and dressing gown?”
“It’s a svond,” the Master said sourly.
“It’s a gown,” I insisted. “You’re even barefoot; you forgot your slippers.”
“Just shut up,” he shot back. “Your chatter will make the cats tense, and you don’t want that.”
I lagged behind a moment or two to take my shoes off as well, because the grass looked so tempting. I had to run to catch up, but I did like the rabbit fur softness under my feet. There weren’t any hard stones or sticks to poke me. “This feels good,” I admitted to him.
The Master glanced down at my bare feet and gave a reluctant, swift grin. “You’re such a hedonist at hearts. Better for you if you just admit it.”
“Maybe, maybe not,” I said childishly.
At the forest perimeter, the Master stopped us. He made a few clicking sounds with his tongue behind his teeth. “Announcement is better than bursting into their territory,” he said lowly. “Oh, here they come. Sometimes they make me go in after them. Cats are capricious animals.”
And so I watched as nine cats sauntered out of the woods, each one easily the size of an Earth wildcat. I estimated their weight at about sixty pounds, give or take. They were multicolored, and blended in with the forest play of light and shadow. Graceful, powerful, they surrounded the Master and took turns rubbing up against his legs for attention. He petted every one of them, going from head to tail in long, easy swoops that made them purr loudly enough to be heard from several feet back.
God, did this make a natural, familiar picture. The Master, in the middle of clawed, fanged cat beasts.
“Stay,” he told them, and untied himself from their knot. He backed out and came to me. “Put your arms around me. They need a demonstration that we’re a unit.”
I hesitated but a moment. This was my chance to hug him, something I’d always wanted to do, yet feared to initiate. The moment I got my arms around him I thought I’d burst. He felt everything and nothing like what I imagined. Strong, wiry, hard; I’d anticipated that. But, he also felt strangely vulnerable, like he needed protecting. That couldn’t be right. The Master was indomitable.
Yet… Yet, when Naismith’s men had grabbed him right in front of me, hit him in the neck with a needle, my stomach had dropped into my shoes. The way he’d collapsed, like a rag doll, his long and slender throat exposed in a way he’d never allow when conscious… It made me sick to even remember it.
Did my hope play a trick on me, or did he slightly relax in my arms?
“Okay,” he said softly. “Now, hold your hands out for them to sniff you,” he instructed. “Kneel down, or at least squat.”
The cats circled me. I admired their sinuous grace and power. They all examined me with their sense of smell. A few of them pawed at my clothing lightly. “Good,” the Master praised. “Your lack of fear makes them more open minded to you. These cats are more like wolves in their habits.”
“Then, which one is Alpha?” I asked, slowly standing back up.
“I am,” he answered. “But, in lieu of me, the one with the most black on her. She’s a brute.”
I spotted the one. She was indeed bigger, and longer. “You’re going to take up the most bed space,” I said.
The cat looked into my eyes, and I knew she understood me.
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Lapidary