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They're standing at the edge of a galaxy, looking outwards. She stares at the burning stars dancing in front them, like it's a private show the universe layed out for them. He stares at her.
The light reflects in her eyes, bounces off her cheekbones, off the tip of her nose, off her lips. She's all purples and yellows, painted rainbow by the vastness of space. Her coat's collar is turned inside out. He wants to reach out and fix it for her. He keeps his hands to himself.
Why look at the stars, he thinks, when he can just stand at her side and gaze in her light. How anyone could choose the uncaring, unfeeling aglamation of burning plasma over the curve of her jaw, he doesn't know.
She closes her eyes, opens them back up and turns away, walking to the Tardis. She holds the door open for him, spares one last longing look for the forever changing beauty he knows she'll never get tired of. She's in love with the universe. And he's in love with her.
She looks at him for a moment. It's incredible, he thinks, that after so many years, he still can't read her at all. He looks into her eyes and sees the same thread of stars spinning around one another they were looking at just a moment before. She's made of stars, he thinks, suns burning right under her skin. If he were to cut her open with a knife, she wouldn't bleed, she'd implode and take him with her.
Of course, he has cut her open with a knife before. And of course, he's had her blood on his hands before. And it’s just regular red blood, as the doctor laid bleeding out in his arms. It's all metaphors, and there's blood in her veins but stars in her eyes. He doesn't know what's in his own eyes, has been too afraid to look for a long time. He wonders what she sees in them.
She bends over the tardis controls, runs around the room, pulling levers and pressing switches. He doesn't help her, knows he isn't allowed to, but he thinks of how this isn't a ship meant to be piloted on one's own. He thinks of loneliness, of endless freezing nights, cold fingers curling around his hearts and pressing down.
They land, accompanied by the stupid swoosh sound he knows she loves so much. Because it tells people she's here, because she wants a crowd of friendly faces staring up at her like she's a god. And of course she is one to them, how could she not be? All happy smiles and bouncing energy, fixing every problem, and always with a funny quip to wrap it all up. Of course they all fall in love, with their butterfly life span and their little undeveloped brains. If you barely had a century of living, how could you not want to spend every second of it with the doctor? If you had an eternity, how could you not want the same?
She opens the door again, and almost smiles. Everything is red, and hot. He gets out of the tardis, feels a burning wind caress his face. They're in a desert, huge dunes surrounding them. Red sand dances all around them, scratching at his suit, getting underneath his fingernails. There are three suns up in the sky, and he feels their hot rays on his back.
It's beautiful, and he doesn't know where they are, has never been before. But he's not one of her little pet, so he doesn't ask, doesn't give her the satisfaction. She starts rambling about the planet's day and night cycle anyway, maybe just by automatism, maybe to fill the space between them. This huge terrifying space full of promises, kept and broken, full of unsaids and unknowns. He looks at her as she walks in big strides and waves her arms around like a maniac and can't help the fond smile that spreads on his cheek, doesn't try very hard to hide it either, doesn't care all that much if she notices.
She does notice, or feels his eyes on her at least, and stops, arms dropping at her side. She remembers who she’s with, steps out of the fantasy that he could be one of her little friends, that this is just a normal escapade where she blows some human’s mind by letting the stars enter it. She turns her back to him and puts her hands into her pockets. She starts to walk away, towards a huge crater. He follows her, pulled by an invisible string, that he doesn’t know how to cut, doesn't want to cut anyway.
Sometimes, this link between them is all loose. It stretches out for galaxies, and he stays away from her, death blooming at the tips of his fingers in some far away corner of the universe. Sometimes, like now, he’s kept on a short leash, and his heart stings when he can’t see her. It’s in those moments he’d do anything for her to look at him: burn entire planets, threaten her pathetic friends, form alliances he knows will fail with daleks or cybermen.
He doesn’t do it to rule the world, not really, knows in some part of his psyche his schemes will all fail. He does it because he forgot how to do anything else to catch her attention, because when the doctor looks at him with fire in their eyes, at least they’re looking at him and no one else. No more innocent little human holding his hand, all tender looks and soft kisses, no more fun little army of idiots ready to die for him. No, he wants the doctor to only have eyes for him, him, him. Because when he dies in his arms, at least the doctor can’t turn away. That’s how he wins, is what he thought at the time. But it didn’t feel like winning, it felt like dying. He doesn’t want to die in her arms, he thinks as she sits down at the edge of a crater. He thinks maybe he’d like to try to live in them, for a while.
He doesn’t know how to do that though, doesn’t know if he deserves it. He thinks of Missy’s hands being held between wrinkly fingers, thinks of hope and fear and longing in old grey eyes. He thinks of holding a young boy’s hand and pointing out stars to him, unaware of how many he would watch die. He thinks of going insane, drums banging in his ears, thinks of Gallifrey burning away.
He doesn’t know how he can hold so many different versions of them, standing side by side, holding each other, watching the other die, shouting, threatening, killing, kissing, laughing, in his head and not combust. He doesn’t know which version of himself he’s going to be, as he sits next to her, looks at the fold of her pants against her knee, keeps himself from reaching out and resting a hand on it.
“I love this planet.” she says, voice all quiet and soft, a confession made only for him.
“I used to come here all the time, by myself, when I thought it was gone. Gallifrey. It reminds me of it.”
She grabs a handful of red sand and watches it fall down between her fingers. He can see it, how this looks like an untamed and untouched version of their home. Can picture an incredible city in that crater over there, could hear the laugh of children if he closed his eyes and let himself. He doesn’t, heart hardened by centuries of loss. he doesn’t want to think of Gallifrey, of it’s shining skyscrapers and it harsh rules. He can’t let himself think of a small boy with stars in his eyes holding his hand under a school desk.
“How long has it been, since you last came here?” he says, and he wishes he could make his voice gentler, but it comes out sardonic and mean.
She doesn’t look at him, face closed. “I don’t know.” He hears the lie in her voice, but doesn’t call her out on it. One more white lie between them won’t make much of a difference. Out of nowhere, he can hear singing. Or no, not singing, he understands.The wind is passing through the dunes in such a way it produces a music-like sound. He’s been in places like this before, with naturally occuring music from the wind and topology. He never really appreciated them, deaf to anything but war drums.
She looks incredibly sad suddenly, like she’s a thousand light years away, like the full weight of her centuries of living came crashing down on her shoulders. He can’t bear to see her this way, a piercing pain encircling his hearts. So he gets up, brushes off some dust of his pants, and holds out a hand to her. She looks at him quizzically.
“Come on” he thinks, tilting his head in a silent invitation. She slowly puts her hand on his, mistrust blatant on her face, and he pulls her up and puts his other hand on her waist. Her whole body is tense, like she’s expecting a knife to end up between her ribs. And sure, he can’t exactly blame her for that, hasn’t exactly been the picture of trustworthiness before, but he still laughs at her :
“Come on doctor, you’re really gonna pass up an occasion to dance?”
She frowns at him but relaxes a little, and puts a hand on his shoulder. He slowly takes the lead, feet moving automatically to the alien melody. She sighs as she follows, slowly getting into the swing of it all. She always loved dancing after all, grabbing him by his wrists and pulling him close as a kid, body loose and wild, lost in the rhythm and pulling him into messy kisses. It’s not the same now, obviously, with a few thousand years on their back and half as many betrayals, but her hand still fits just right in his.
It really is a wonder, he thinks, that no matter the shape of their bodies, this always seemed so simple, so obvious: their fingers interlocking in the humblest show of affection. He thinks of old hands cradling his face, thinks of fingers reaching out to dry a single tear, thinks of pushing a tall man against glass and shoving her mouth against his. He wonders how he came so close to having this, to having it all, and how he lost it all to his own hatred.
He makes her spin, desperately, hopes that maybe there’s enough space between them for forgiveness as she lands back into his arms. Some of the sadness is gone from her eyes. Not all of it, of course, never all of it. The doctor could live a thousand millenniums more and they’d still carry sadness in their hearts. But he thinks she’s back here with him, instead of stuck in an internal world of pain.
He smiles, hopes it looks tender and caring, not evil and victorious. She almost smiles back, a twitch running on her lips. He wants to kiss her, so badly. Keeps himself tight inside his skin instead. He’s not Missy anymore, can’t throw himself out like she did, not after everything that happened, everything he did.
And so they dance, and she’s really getting into it now, the music carrying her feet off the ground, almost like she’s flying. She closes her eyes, and he knows her brain is filled with the melody. She was always so much better at this than him, letting herself go in the universe’s trusting arms. He was always too scared, and then too angry, too busy burning it all to stop and actually look. Always the one getting dragged along on aventures, always hesitant when asked to close his eyes and just listen. He’s okay with it, always prefered to keep his eyes open to look at her.
She's getting more confident as the music grows louder between them, and dips him low, her eyebrows raised, hair falling all over her face. When she pulls him back up, his breath stolen, he blinks wildly at her, tries to form a coherent thought, fails as she drags him along to the melody. It's quite incredible how she always manages to make him lose his mind. It doesn't matter if she's ruining his plans at the last minute or getting closer and wrapping her arm behind his neck, she always ends up being the one in control. For someone calling himself the master, he finds he doesn't mind all that much.
He forgets for a while, as she holds him and pulls him along. Forgets who he is, forgets what he's done. He lets himself believe the easy lie that their love is of the normal pure kind, the kind that tastes like honeydew and hot summer afternoons. Easy not because it's close to the truth, but because he wants it to be true so much his entire body aches. Oh how he wants to be forgiven in her arms, his sins all laid out in front of them with her as the sole judge of his soul. How he wants her to cradle his face in her hands once again and tell him it's okay, that he's everything she's ever needed, and more.
But a part of him rebels at the thought, spits on forgiveness. What is there even to be forgiven? To hell with her skew sense of morality and compassion for insects. If he had to do it all again, he'd burn the whole universe down in a heartbeat. That's who he is, fire and death and the whole world at his feet! No tender touches, bleeding hearts and solitary tears, no quiet half admitted confessions, no weaknesses.
She'd tell him he thinks like a dalek, tell him it's not weak to love, not weak to hope. He'd laugh at her, not a happy laugh between lovers, but a sardonic mockery of everything she holds dear. And he'd regret it immediately too, but would know it'd be too late to take back, would keep the mask of detachment on and grin at her pain.
It's how this all works. They're stuck in this cycle of pulling and tearing away until one of them breaks and the other is left to stand over the ashes and wait for them to come back. It's a dance really, he thinks as they stare at each other, arms extended, fingers barely grazing. A dance he's learned all the moves to, and sure, maybe he invented most of them too, but he still tires of dragging his body along to it.
He's getting sick of this game of theirs, all of their different ways to turn around each other. She's in his arms again, head resting on his chest, and he knows he's the only one really playing. He's the one constantly running, always finding new ways to bite or stab or burn the hand that he oh so desperately wants to take and hold on to.
He thinks maybe the fire and death and destruction aren't really who he is, but he's forgotten who's behind all that. He thinks of a scared little boy, thinks of an enraged man, of a sad woman, doesn't know how to reconcile them, doesn't know how they can all fit inside his ribcage without making him explode. She looks at him, entire world's dancing in her irises, and he thinks he'll die if she ever stops, thinks he only exists to be in her line of sight.
She puts her hand around his jaw, like she wants to learn this new face of his, and that sadness is back in her eyes, like a bottomless well. He's thinks he might get swallowed up in her grief, but is okay with that somehow, knows it's about as deep and painful as his. She strokes a thumb under his eye and he might die right now, regenerate into a whole new person who maybe won't have to carry all these ugly heavy feelings.
And then they stop dancing, and she's still holding him close, and she kisses him, all slow and so incredibly soft it kills him. His hearts are crawling up his throat and he'll be surprised if he doesn't puke at least one of them onto the red dust at her feet. He could cry, could fall to his knees and beg for her mercy right then and now, could run away and steal her tardis to go burn a world or two and his aching hearts with them. He kisses her back, slowly. Tries to be as tender as his raw angry self will allow.
Her lips are soft and wet and she's so incredibly beautiful like this, has always been beautiful of course, no matter the shape. But right now she's all open and laid bare in front of him, trusting in ways he feels he doesn't deserve. And a part of him wants to prove her wrong, to hurt and betray her so later he can laugh and say:
" See, I told you so! I wasn't worthy, and you were wrong to see the good in me, to love and to seek love, to trust. Because I'm made of hatred and burning rage and you'll only hurt yourself trying to touch me."
He holds her closer, runs a trembling hand through her hair, tries to not be the madman, and maybe not the scared boy or the sad woman either, tries to be what she actually needs, and maybe even wants. He tastes salt on her lips, and her cheeks are wet under his fingers. He lets her go, thumbs drying her tears. She closes her eyes, like she can’t bear to look at him anymore, and sighs, weariness settling in every corner of her being.
“What...What are we doing?” She grabs his hands, holds them up “What is this?” He doesn’t have the words to answer her, doesn’t know which way to lean yet. She drops his hands and walks away, back to the crater. He joins her.
“I don’t know. I think I want to do it with you though.” The words are so heavy on his tongue, he can’t believe he gets them out, immediately wants to snatch them back. They’re too disgusting, too needy, too honest, and so very unlike him.
She snaps her head at him, eyes wide and full of questions.He holds his breath, loses himself in her eyes, feels something snap. He wants to run away. He wants to puke.He wants to stab himself over and over again until he’s all out of regenerations. He wants to push her down on the red dusty ground and bury his hands inside her, wants to curl up in a ball and take residence between her hearts. He wants to kill her. He gives her hand a small squeeze, and they keep looking at the red sky.