A dull patina of melancholy and regret descends over the Master. He catches his own transparent expression of despair. He smiles grayly at Graham.
He knows what the old mortal is thinking. It sears him with shame, and with anger, with the urge to flare you don’t understand, but weariness wins today.
“There are many reasons, but none of them would formulate an excuse you’d accept. We are friends before we are enemies or even lovers. I would adore her, in any face, any gender, any age, and I would follow her over the impossible edge of the ever-expanding universe. I would wish to consume, to demolish, anything between us, for eternity. But occasionally all that ardor gets converted into toxic energy, and we fight. And she certainly gets in her punches.”
His smile grows a little more wan.
“I just realized. You don’t know. You’ve never seen her really lose herself to her temper, have you? Never seen people disregard her sermonizing and her interfering, and seen her,” his teeth grate on edge with the word, “sna-p.”
A hushed laugh escapes. Hushed, or breathless, with a knowing pain.
“Oh, my friend. None of you lot had better leave her when you see it. Or I will be the one to come for you.”
Graham has a ready platitude on his lips when suddenly, the whole demeanour of this other Time Lord changes. It nearly sends a shiver down his spine, and that glint in his eye tells the retired bus driver exactly why this man chose the moniker Master.
“No, can’t say I’ve seen her completely lose it. Gotten close a time or two, I wager, but never ‘snap,’ as you call it. Even when it happens, takes a lot more to scare me off than you might imagine. I might not be as experienced as you and the Doc in all this alien nonsense, but Sheffield on a Saturday night ain’t exactly all sunshine and daisies.”
He can’t promise that the other two will stay, especially if it comes to a point where it’s too dangerous for them to stay – in fact, Graham would be the first one pushing them out the door, in that case – but as for him, he’s been around the block a time or two. He’s seen desperate people lose their temper and their will to live, and he’s had to stand between them and tragedy more than once.
The Master leans in closely as Graham rattles off his truths with surprising aplomb, for a man of such a common trade. Sharp almond eyes narrow to slits. There are volcanoes behind his irises.
The interval passes. Koschei “resets” himself, twisting his head in an almost mechanical circle on his long neck. He shudders, and his feverish features settle into a mask of composure. He nods once, sharply.
“Graham O’Brien, I like you,” he renders his verdict.
Icarus 