Turlough had just stepped through the TARDIS doors when the Doctor started to dematerialize the ship. “We’re going to lose them!” he vehemently said, as though it were Turlough’s fault. “Hold on!”
The TARDIS suddenly lurched to the side, and despite the Doctor’s warning, Turlough was thrown to his knees. It took a few seconds for him to crawl up the incline and pull himself up at the TARDIS console. By then, the Doctor had righted the ship. “Why is he running?” Turlough asked. “Wouldn’t attacking us make more sense?”
“Don’t give him any ideas!” the Doctor replied. He pushed himself off one end of the console, running to the other end, pressing several more buttons. “I think I’ve caught their trail.”
It took only moments before the Doctor was operating the scanner. At first Turlough could see only stars and a black void in the middle. Then the picture fuzzed as the Doctor messed with the controls. The blackness focused and danced into the spectrum, pulsing a sick yellowish-black. “That’s a black hole!” Turlough exclaimed, surprised.
“It is.”
“But why here?”
“He wants to make certain my death is complete, this time,” the Doctor said in a low, controlled voice. “He’ll offer an exchange, I know it. Me for him.”
Turlough looked from the scanner to the Doctor. The Time Lord was gripping the TARDIS console so tightly his knuckles were white. “And you’re going to agree, aren’t you? That’s madness.”
The Doctor didn’t take his eyes off the scanner. His voice, when he spoke, was low and intense. “Turlough, I want you to imagine the most scared you’ve ever been.”
“Al
l right,” he said slowly, after a moment of hesitation.
The Doctor didn’t look at him, or even seem to be aware of him. “Now magnify that by twenty and you’ll know how afraid I am of losing Adric again.”
It was clear Turlough didn’t understand. “If he means that much to you, why didn’t you just rescue him yourself?”
At last, the Doctor tore his eyes off the scanner, focusing them on Turlough. There was a wild heat there that Turlough had never seen before. There was such a forceful power in those eyes that he took a step backward. “I’m just a Time Lord, Turlough. I’m not God,” he said, sounding strained. “He’s not even supposed to be in this dimension. I broke so many laws taking him out; he has no idea what I’ve done for him.” The Doctor’s voice sounded small and regretful.
“Doctor?”
Frustrated, the Doctor turned back to the TARDIS console. “There are Time Laws in place for everything that happens, Turlough. Everything. They aren’t just whims created by the Time Lords to stave off atrophy. Adric is from another dimension. In breaking every Time Law to bring him to our dimension, I effectively made it so I could never significantly alter his history again.” He glanced at Turlough and then exploded, “Oh, I can’t expect you to understand! You can’t grasp it, it’s a concept for Time Lords! You’re too feeble minded!” Off Turlough’s hurt expression, the Doctor leaned forward on the console, attempting to make it make sense to him.
“All right,” he tried again. “Imagine every person in the universe is a cup, a huge, immense cup. An ocean-sized cup, all right? And all the major actions of your life, from birth to death, serve to fill that cup, one droplet at a time. Most people never reach the top. Even if you should live to be a hundred thousand years old, your cup may only be half-full, because only the really, truly significant events in your life will register more than a drop.
“Now, Adric is from E-Space, Turlough.” Seeing that meant nothing to his companion, he elaborated, taking a breath to school himself into patience. “It’s the exact opposite of N-Space, which is our space. If you invert the coordinates of my planet, Gallifrey, into negative and at the same time managed to rip through a CVE, you’d end up on his home world, Alzarius. Alzarians, and anyone from E-Space, have cups too, these ocean-sized cups, all right?” he said, holding his hand out like a cup. “But E-Space is inverted from our space. Do you understand? Imagine that these cups are full when they’re born, and every action they make takes one droplet away. I realize it’s a very primitive analogy, but please bear with me.”
“I’m bearing Doctor, but I still don’t understand.”
“All right. The laws are in place because if you take an ordinary man from E-Space,” he made a pantomime of pulling someone off one side of the TARDIS console, “and bring them into N-Space,” he pulled his hands back to where he’d been before, “they still remain of that dimension. Their cups don’t magically reset, or invert, they just start operating in the manner of the new space. So Adric’s cup—a very full cup, because he’s so young—has been very slowly filling ever since he arrived in N-Space. I figured it shouldn’t be a problem. The TARDIS shields most of this interference, and Romana, a Time Lady friend of mine, worked out a way to shield herself too. I thought that, with minor adaptation, I could configure her concept so it would shield Adric as well.
“I was wrong. Still, by then, I had no way to take him back. To do so, I know now, would likely kill him, because of the recursive impact. He’d fold in on himself. But staying here, he’s in danger too. Once you or I fill our cup, we die. Death that way doesn’t happen often, but it can happen. If I had saved him, I would have created a big enough of a Time Disturbance to fill his cup. He’s Alzarian though, and wouldn’t have just died, he would have gone super nova.” He fixed his eyes on Turlough’s, and they were hard and unyielding. “I don’t use that term lightly. I very literally mean he would have ripped through space and time and created,” he looked over his shoulder, back at the scanner, “a black hole that would have eaten that black hole, and possibly this entire galaxy, for lunch. And it would have formed right in the middle of Earth.”
Turlough let out the breath he hadn’t been aware he was holding. “But if the Master saved him, why didn’t that happen?”
The Doctor scrubbed his face with his hand. “I don’t know, Turlough.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out the mash belt. “But somehow I’ve got the feeling the Master’s figured it out. Bringing us to a black hole . . . that’s too much of a coincidence.”
Watching the Doctor as he fingered Adric’s marsh belt and stared into the scanner, Turlough could only think of one thing to ask: “If you knew this might happen, why would you risk all of it to bring him to our dimension in the first place?”
The Doctor didn’t answer, he just stared intently into the vast maw beyond the TARDIS as if Adric had already gone nova and that was all that remained of him. Despite the silence, Turlough thought, just maybe, that he understood.
--
“What do we do?” Turlough asked at long last.
The Doctor tore his eyes off the scanner, blinking several times. “If I could pinpoint the exact location of the Master’s TARDIS, I might could materialize around it . . . possibly inside it.” He turned his back to the scanner, staring intently down at his control panels.
“Should we really stay so near a black hole?” Turlough asked.
“What?” The Doctor glanced at it over his shoulder, before shrugging. “We’re in a TARDIS. It won’t bother us.”
Turlough felt useless standing where he was, unable to help in any way. “He must know we’re here. Why doesn’t he contact us?”
“He’s biding his time. He loves to watch me squirm.”
“He must be very powerful if he could rescue Adric without creating a black hole.”
“Wait a minute,” the Doctor breathed. He looked at the black hole, before staring back at his controls. “Turlough, you’re brilliant! There isn’t a black hole here.”
“What?”
“There isn’t supposed to be a black hole here.” Turning around again, he pressed his back to the TARDIS console and gaped. “That’s the Master’s TARDIS!”
The screen fuzzed to white slowly and then the Master’s face filled it. The Doctor slammed his hand down on the controls and the sound calibrated, filling the console room with the Master’s dark laughter. “Hello, Doctor,” he finally said in a slow drawl.
“Return Adric to me this minute!” the Doctor demanded, stepping toward the scanner.
His outburst only made the Master laugh more. “I do enjoy seeing you so riled up, Doctor, and for such a small prize, too.”
“Name your condition. Your games bore me.”
“You know very well my conditions, Doctor.”
“Where is he? Let me see him; I must know he’s not hurt.”
“Very well,” the Master said. He stepped aside, revealing his hand, which was holding his Tissue Compression Eliminator pointed at Adric. Adric stood before the Master’s TARDIS console, but his arms were clearly bound in front of him.
“It’s madness to play with his life,” the Doctor said. “You’ll destroy yourself if anything happens to him.”
“It’s a trap, Doctor!” Adric suddenly shouted.
In one graceful movement, the Master spun completely around, striking Adric on the face with his hand. The force was so strong that it sent Adric sprawling to the floor. “I told you to be silent.”
The look in the Doctor’s eyes when the Master finally returned his gaze to him was shockingly intense. “I am a peaceable person, Master, but if you do that again, I promise I will hunt you down and see that you are finished off for good.”
“And you wonder why I rescued him,” the Master mused, pleased. “As if destroying something you love right before your eyes would give me any less pleasure than destroying you myself.”
“Hate me all you want,” the Doctor said in a voice that sounded old and hard, “but leave my friends alone.”
Without looking away, the Master reached down, grabbed a fistful of Adric’s hair, and hauled him back to his feet. “What is it about this one that’s so different, Doctor?” His voice was smooth and held a faint tinge of mirth to it, as though he already knew the answer. “You’d defy the Time Lords just to have him by your side, but not the laws of physics.”
“How did you rescue him?” the Doctor asked, his tone still icy and neutral. “It’s the one thing I haven’t been able to figure out.”
The question caused the Master to laugh deeply again. “If you haven’t figured it out, I’m certainly not going to tell you.” He shoved Adric forward, so the boy was between him and the view screen, then held the Tissue Compression Eliminator to the back of Adric’s head. “How exactly shall I do this?”
Adric squeezed his eyes shut. “Let him kill me, Doctor. I never should have betrayed you.”
“Let the boy go,” the Doctor demanded.
“I would rather see you break, Doctor. I would rather watch you fall apart.”
“I’m giving myself to you in exchange for the boy.” The Doctor still sounded firm, but there was a thin waver underlying his voice that was almost desperate. “You’ve got me where you want me, haven’t you?”
“Doctor, you can’t,” Turlough said in a half whisper.
The Doctor turned away from the scanner and began setting coordinates. “I can,” he countered. “Turlough, when Adric is safely on board, send the TARDIS to these coordinates. That’ll take you to Gallifrey. Ask to see Leela. She’s a friend of mine and will be able to help you both when I’m gone.”
“No, Doctor,” Turlough said. A little stronger, he added, “I won’t let you.” Summoning all his strength, he stepped forward, facing the Master. “Take me instead!” he shouted. “My life for Adric’s.”
The Master laughed, a strong, booming laugh of delight at the proclamation. “Such loyalties your friends have, Doctor!” The Doctor wasn’t looking at the Master anymore. His eyes were fixed on Turlough, staring at him in disbelief. “How about it then, Doctor? Would you exchange this boy’s life for that one’s?”
Without looking at the Doctor, Turlough said, “It’s all right. I’ll be all right.”
Horrified, the Doctor finally managed, “No! You can’t do this!”
“All right!” the Master said, gleefully. “I accept!”
“No!” the Doctor shouted, uncertain whether he ought to direct his anger toward Turlough or the Master.
On screen, the Master shoved Adric forward and turned to key in some instructions on his console. In that instant, instead of falling to the floor again, Adric spun around and slammed the full length of his body into the Master. The impact caused them both to careen into the floor, and out of sight on the Doctor’s scanner.
“Adric!” the Doctor screamed.
For a time, they heard only scuffling as the two skirmished on the floor. All too soon it was over, the Master returning to the scanner, dragging Adric forward again by his hair. He gave the Doctor his most wicked grin yet and said, “For that, this one most certainly die.”
Adric faced the scanner and focused his eyes on the Doctor. Instead of looking frightened or scared though, he just smiled a big, beautiful smile and held up his still-bound hands. Clutched between them was the long thin black cylinder that the Doctor instantly knew was the Master’s Tissue Compression Eliminator. Adric’s grin faded as he twisted around deftly, jabbing the weapon into the Master’s stomach. He fired.
The Master’s cry of “No!” grew more and more diminutive as he shrank down. Soon, he was off the scanner screen all together, and Adric’s attention was on the floor. He stomped his feet twice, very loudly, and then grinned up at the Doctor. “Let’s see him get out of that one.”
The Doctor physically staggered backward at the realization that the threat was over. After he took a moment to compose himself, he softly said, “Good job, Adric.”
The two stared intently at each other across the channel until Turlough cleared his throat. “How do we get him from there to here?”
The Doctor blinked out of his reverie, continuing on. “Adric, you remember how to fly the TARDIS?”
“I think so,” Adric replied, turning around to look at the Master’s controls. He set the Tissue Compression Eliminator on the top of the console.
“It should be just like flying my TARDIS, only easier, as he has as newer model. I’ll feed you our coordinates and we can dock.”
“We can’t dock with a black hole,” Turlough protested.
It was Adric’s turn to smile. “The black hole isn’t the Master’s TARDIS,” he explained. “It was a trap.” Off the Doctor’s uncomprehending expression, Adric simply said, “The black hole is me. I’m not entirely sure I understand, but the Master explained it, some. That you couldn’t save me because if you did, I’d turn into a black hole? Well, the energy I expelled did, but the Master somehow managed to make it appear here, in the middle of no where, instead of on Earth.”
The Doctor let out a strangled laugh, and then, with Turlough’s help, gave their coordinates to Adric.
The two TARDISes docked quietly and the Doctor stood for several moments before the door, waiting for the all clear to sound once they had a good seal. When at last he received the green light, he threw the switch on the door and stood there watching as they opened to reveal the boy.
Adric stepped through, onto the Doctor’s TARDIS and the Doctor stepped forward to greet him. For a moment, there was a degree of awkwardness. Adric started to raise his hand, to shake the Doctor’s hand just as the Doctor started forward to hug Adric. As soon as they realized they were doing separate actions, they switched, with Adric stepping forward to hug the Doctor as the Doctor began to raise his hand to shake. The mix up caused them both to laugh. Turlough averted his eyes politely, closing the door behind Adric and undocking with the Master’s ship.
“Adric, I’m,” the Doctor began, trying to properly phrase his words.
“I know,” Adric supplied, smiling even more despite the scuffs he’d received from his tussle with the Master.
Then, seemingly unable to help himself, the Doctor surged forward, catching Adric in half a hug as he pressed him against the now-closed TARDIS with a kiss. Adric’s hands immediately went up to clutch at the lapels of the Doctor’s dress shirt, but soon traveled up higher, to tangle in his hair.
Adric moaned into the Doctor’s mouth and it was at that moment that Turlough realized he wasn’t about to be thanked for his hand in everything. In fact, he was fairly certain at that moment he didn’t want to be thanked. So, shaking his head at the sight, he quietly slipped out of the TARDIS console room and went down the hall, hoping greatly that he was far enough from the console room that he’d not hear anything.
“Doctor,” Adric gasped as the Doctor finally released his mouth. He opened his eyes, staring at the ceiling trying to catch his breath. The Time Lord seemed less hindered by the oxygen depravation and was already kissing a trail down Adric’s neck.
“Need to see you,” the Doctor murmured into his collar.
Adric raised his arms up, cradling the Doctor’s head to his chest for a few seconds. He was, for the moment, too overwhelmed to think properly. “Slow down,” he breathed into his ear.
“No,” the Doctor insisted, turning his head so he could kiss Adric’s skin again. “No, Adric,” he said, pausing only to kiss his neck, “you don’t understand,” he continued kissing, working his way to the other side of Adric’s neck, “how many nights,” he managed before his hands found the edge of Adric’s shirt and began pushing it up and his thoughts were lost.
The Doctor eased one of his knees between Adric’s legs, pressing him both into the wall and into his own body. In a few moments, they wrangled Adric free of his tunic and the Doctor took no time at all to bow his head to the newly exposed flesh. His mouth darted over Adric’s right nipple while his hands explored the expanse of skin.
Adric threw his head back as best he could, tangling his hands in the Doctor’s hair again. He was grateful he was pressed against the doors for he was no longer sure he could support himself.
When the Doctor had spent considerable time lathing Adric’s nipple, he abandoned it to let his fingers tweak it so he could give attention to the other. The sensation caused Adric to writhe against the wall. He attempted to pull the Doctor closer and encountered the thick cricket jumper instead of warm skin.
“Off,” Adric managed to say just as the Doctor was about to drop to his knees.
“What?” he replied, finally lifting his eyes to fix on Adric’s.
The wanton lust Adric saw there nearly made his knees buckle. Such love in the eyes of someone so old and so powerful completely undid him, and the swollen lips coupled with the disheveled head of blond hair made him lose his thoughts all together. The words he was going to say were gone and instead he feebly tugged at the bottom of the jumper.
“Oh. Right,” the Doctor said thickly. He twisted slightly, pulling the jumper off in one fluid motion. It was soon haphazardly tossed to the floor. The Doctor started to unbutton his dress shirt, but Adric batted the Doctor’s fingers aside so he could shove the suspenders off the Doctor’s shoulders and attack the shirt’s buttons with his own small, nimble fingers.
The first expanse he saw of the Doctor’s chest sent a searing heat flashing across Adric’s face. He was painfully aware that meant he was blushing, but he didn’t care. The Doctor seemed to always swaddle himself in so much clothing that to see even a glimpse of what he normally covered up was a heading treat.
With great difficulty the Doctor let Adric unbutton his shirt. It was all he could do not to shove Adric’s hands aside and press into him again, but he had already been too greedy. This was Adric’s moment as much as it was his. It seemed to take forever, but finally the buttons were all undone and the Doctor closed his eyes as Adric pressed his hands against his chest and pushed the shirt off his shoulders.
The feel of warm hands against his sensitive skin sent the Doctor nearly into a fit. He shrugged the shirt the rest of the way off and bit his lip, giving Adric a little time to explore. Despite enjoying it, he found he was soon ready to move on. He got much more enjoyment from pleasing Adric than he did from Adric pleasing him.
So he bent and easily captured Adric’s lips again. This time he wrapped his arms around the Alzarian’s waist and let out a soft groan as Adric draped his arms around his neck and in the process pressed them closer together.
Adric’s tongue was small but surprisingly dexterous, exploring the Doctor’s mouth first inquisitively and then boldly. It was a practice the Doctor had heard much of but had not actually had much practice in. He had found it unpleasant, in the past, but discovered that exploring Adric’s warmth with his tongue was exhilarating in an entirely new way.
While they kissed, the Doctor’s hands frantically tugged at the hem of Adric’s pants, trying futilely to figure out how they were drawn up at the waist. After several minutes of tugging without success, Adric broke the kiss with a laugh. He brought one hand up to wipe at his mouth, and then reached down and quickly unlaced the hidden drawstring. “One final trick of the Master’s,” he teased.
The Doctor gave a displeased grunt at the mention of his peer but soon forgot about him as one final tug let the pants drop down to Adric’s hips. Shaking his backside Adric managed to make the pants fall down completely. He stepped out of them and kicked them aside.
The Doctor dragged his eyes down Adric’s body, stopping to take in the wounds that were still healing on Adric’s thighs and calves. He ran his hand over the expanse of Adric’s soft belly, down along side his hip and then very lightly over one of the gauze-covered wounds. “How are they?” he asked thickly.
Adric nodded, bringing his face forward to nuzzle at the Doctor while he explored. “Healing, but slowly,” he admitted.
In one smooth motion, the Doctor dropped to his knees, lightly brushing a kiss against each of Adric’s wounds. The touch was soft, but intense and Adric found one of his hands tangling in the Doctor’s hair for support. “I’m so sorry for all you’ve suffered, Adric.”
Adric laughed deeply. “If this is my reward for dying, I should do it more often.”
The Doctor looked up, letting his desires ebb for just a moment so he could focus completely on Adric. “I’ll never let that happen again,” he insisted.
The grip Adric had on the Doctor’s hair loosened and he stroked his fingers through it softly, marveling not only at the Doctor letting him do it, but fluttering his eyes, so obviously enjoying it. “I figured you might not,” he said, “though I won’t blame you if you don’t.”
The Doctor was done with the conversation; he knew he’d never let Adric be hurt again if it was at all within his power to stop it and he didn’t want to talk anymore, not right there and then. So he pressed his nose against the warm bulge straining against Adric’s underwear, and then half-captured it through the cloth with his mouth.
The stimulation made Adric sag, and was quite effective in making him forget about talking. The Doctor raised one hand to Adric’s abdomen, pressing against him there, helping to hold him up, while he continued to mouth at the boy’s hardness through his undergarment.
“Doctor,” Adric cried, his voice low and full of lust. His fingers tangled once more in the Doctor’s hair, tugging his head about as he did.
Satisfied with the reactions he was drawing from Adric, the Doctor casually reached up his free hand and pulled the boy’s pants down. They easily dropped to his ankles, but the Doctor’s eyes were focused instead on the boy’s rising erection. He smiled to himself, simply taking the time to look at it. It was slightly smaller than his, and carried a different sheen as it rose. The peppering of hairs at its base were darker and appeared slightly wiry than his own. The differences made him love Adric even more.
Noticing the boy was trembling slightly, out of need or anticipation or shame he didn’t know, but he reached out with his hand, lightly took hold of the erection and slid his hand down it, pushing his foreskin back completely and pressing his thumb against the underside, at the base. That done, the Doctor very gently licked a perfect stripe along the underside and up over the head. Then he pulled the whole first inch into his mouth, pressed his lips firmly against the ridge, and began swiping circles around it.
The noises Adric made in response were almost guttural. His hands dropped from grasping the Doctor’s hair to just holding his scalp and the Doctor could tell the boy was struggling hard not to lose himself entirely and begin to thrust. Deciding that this time there would be a chance for second time, the Doctor opted to help the boy out. Instead of prolonging the teasing, he shifted on his knees and took the rest of the cock into his mouth.
Smiling around it, he began to suck. The hand he had on Adric’s abdomen shifted around, to cup the underside of his buttocks. There, with just the most gentle of prodding, he conveyed to Adric that it was all right to give in to his body’s natural instincts.
The first thrust was wild and nearly made the Doctor lose the momentum all together. Not because he had choked but because Adric’s passion was so pure and eager it had almost made him laugh. Within a few more seconds though, the boy had found a good pace. He thrust eagerly into the Doctor’s mouth, and the Doctor twisted his head in the opposite direction while he used his tongue to bring the boy over the edge.
It didn’t take long; the Doctor hadn’t expected it to. One of Adric’s hands clutched his hair again. The other grasped his shoulder. The hand the Doctor had on the base of Adric’s cock relaxed, and then the flood came. He closed his eyes, concentrating on sucking and swallowing at the same time, without forgetting to breath. The boy went dry and the Doctor sucked him for several seconds more, until he felt the organ beginning to go flaccid.
Slowly he withdrew it from his mouth, kissing it several more times before finally looking up. Adric’s eyes were glazed over with the glow of orgasm, and his gaze was focused solely on the Doctor; the love that radiated out was so intense the Doctor had to actually look away before it embarrassed him.
He made the final, decisive move to take his supporting hand away from Adric’s backside, and the boy collapsed into a grateful puddle in the Doctor’s arms. For several seconds they both remained like that: the Doctor holding Adric, Adric a seemingly boneless lump in the Doctor’s arms. Then a shiver coursed through Adric’s body and he nuzzled into the Doctor’s chest. “That good?” the Doctor mused softly, placing his mouth at Adric’s ear to whisper.
The boy shifted in his arms, burying his face into the Doctor’s neck, and nodded as he clung to him. It didn’t take the Doctor much to figure out that, despite everything, Adric was now shy about what had just happened and was blushing fiercely. “Thank you,” he managed to mumble into the skin of the Doctor’s arm.
The Doctor smiled, stroking Adric’s hair contently. He wasn’t sure how to convey the fact that the one who ought to be doing the thanking was him. Casually he glanced around them, aware only vaguely that they were on the floor of the console room. “Hmmm,” he said softly. “I think we scared Turlough away.”
At those words Adric finally lifted his face out of the Doctor’s shoulder and looked around. He smiled anew, seeing their discarded clothing, and the console itself humming away in the middle of the room. Pulling back a bit, so he could see the Doctor’s face, he smiled at him. “We should have charged him.”
“Oh, come now,” the Doctor teased. “I’m sure he didn’t watch for long. He’s good at giving privacy when privacy is needed.”
Adric was blushing again, which the Doctor found endearing enough that he had to kiss the boy's cheeks in the vain attempt to make the scarlet fade.
“I can’t believe you . . .” Adric began.
The Doctor let his hands run down Adric’s bared back, to the curve of his bottom, and back up. “Believe it, Adric.”
Looking over the Doctor’s bared chest, he quietly said, “What about you?”
“Mmm,” the Doctor mused, eyes twinkling. “What about me indeed?” His grin broke into a warm smile. “Perhaps we can finish this in your bedroom?”
Adric nodded, smiling even brighter than before.
--
The Doctor and Adric awoke the following morning. When they finally got up and moving, they found Turlough in the kitchen eating breakfast. He looked up at them, noting their disheveled state and matching house robes and raised an eyebrow at the pair. “If you’re going to start on the breakfast table, at least be kind enough to let me know in time to save my waffles.”
The Doctor and Adric exchanged glances, grinned at the fact that they did it at the same moment, and then broke into laughter. “Good sport, Turlough,” the Doctor cheered, going to fix breakfast for himself and Adric. “Good sport.”
-the end-