Archive of Our Own ^beta

“I’m not,” the Master said, leaning against the doorframe outside May’s flat and giving her his best sad puppy look. He really had the eyes for that, this time around. 

“Get in here. Idiot.” She grabbed his sleeve, pulling him into the flat and shutting the door behind him. 

Grateful, the Master immediately made his way over to her sofa, sprawling himself out over half of it. They were friends. She was used to his behaviour. 

“Where’s Tasha?”

“Off visiting her parents for the weekend. You don’t really want her around for this sort of conversation, she can’t keep her fucking mouth shut to save her life.” May smiled, a fondness sparkling in her eyes that the Master knew almost no one ever got to see. “Love that idiot.” 

“Yeah, yeah, you’re the perfect couple,” he teased, and May snorted, wandering off into the kitchen. A moment later, she threw something at his head, and the Master reached up on instinct and caught a cold can of beer. 

“Drink. I’m not being sober for this. Why’d you even come to me for advice, anyway?” May perched herself on a stool in the corner of the room, crossing her legs and folding her arms on top of them. 

The Master considered that. The real answer here was that he couldn’t go to Cricket, and Tasha, as May had said moments ago, couldn’t keep a secret if you offered her a million pounds. But there was something a little deeper than that too, more sentimental. He just didn’t like to admit it. But he would. 

“You’re like me,” he said, shrugging. May snorted, making a start on her own beer. 

“I’m half a foot shorter than you, white, and a lesbian. Yeah. We’re really similar, Harry.” 

“Fuck off, you know that’s not what I mean,” the Master grumbled. May just smirked at him. They really were alike, sometimes. “I know it’s sentimental, but you’re the only person whose advice I can really trust on this. So don’t be a dick about it.”

“Fine.” She shifted on her stool, sitting forwards. “I won’t be a dick. Lay it on me. What happened with you two?”

He sighed, cracking open his drink and downing a good portion of it in a few large mouthfuls. It wouldn’t do much, but he’d take whatever help he could get with this. Emotions were hard enough as it was, let alone emotions layered behind having to hide most of the cause for them lest his friends think he was a lunatic. Or think he was being serious, and probably run away from him screaming. 

“I almost hooked up with Cricket last night.” He looked over at May, judging her reaction. She did not look surprised. Fair enough. Their flirting had not exactly been subtle. 

“Almost?” She raised an eyebrow. “What did you do, Harry?”

The Master sighed, rather dramatically. “Couldn’t stop thinking about my ex. We- me and Cricket- were in an alleyway, and every fucking thing I did, or he did, would just remind me of the D- of Jade. I fucked it, completely.”

“Yeah, you really did.” May grinned, and then stopped, probably when she remembered she was supposed to be helping him and not being a dick. “I mean, um. I’m sorry. What happened after that?”

“I almost cried on him.” Ugh. He was never admitting that to anyone else, ever. “Cricket invited me back to his place, we spent the night there. We didn’t talk, just...cuddled, I guess, then he passed out after about twenty minutes. I was...less drunk. Stayed up most of the night. Left before he woke up. I did leave him a note saying thank you. And a glass of water, because he’s gonna have a shitty hangover.”

He’d been quite nice about the whole ‘sneaking out at 6am’ thing, really. As nice as you could be about something ostensibly quite rude. The Master wasn’t quite sure what had possessed him to do that. Feelings again, probably. 

May hummed thoughtfully, downing the rest of her drink. “Shit’s fucked,” she offered, helpfully. 

“Shit certainly is fucked,” the Master agreed. 

For a minute or so, they both sat there in silence. It wasn’t particularly uncomfortable; neither of them were very talkative, and the Master could see that May was thinking. No need to fill the silence with pointless small talk until one of them had something useful to say. He tapped his boot against the sofa, in a rhythm far slower than his thoughts were moving. 

“Well, Cricket probably doesn’t hate you,” she said eventually. “Don’t think he’s capable of that, he’s far too nice.”

“Yeah,” the Master agreed, finishing off his drink and crushing the can in one hand. “He’s far too nice. Probably too nice for me.” 

“Don’t be so fucking pessimistic. Christ, anyone would think you’d killed someone.”

If only she knew. 

“Hm,” he said, because he wasn’t going to tell May about all the genocide, and he didn’t really know what else to say to that. 

“...I need another drink.” She stood up, crossing back over to the fridge. “I should start charging you.”

“You love me too much to do that,” the Master said, cackling as she lobbed another can at his head in response. 

“The day I admit to loving any man will be the day I die,” May said, glaring at him. Her gaze softened after a moment, though, and she shook her head. “Really though, you’re a good guy, Harry. You just...have a shitty ex. Lots of people do, you’re not that fucking special.”

“Trust me, this is a bit different to most-“

“Nope,” she interrupted cheerfully. “You just want to think it is, because you’re still obsessed. I told you, weeks ago, and I’ll tell you again. Obsessed.” 

The Master stared at her, quashing the urge to snap that she had no idea what she was talking about. Maybe she did have some idea. It had been decades since he’d last seen the Doctor, and on that occasion, she’d left him to be picked up by Nazi soldiers. He had no reason to be so concerned with what she thought of his actions. He’d even decided as much himself, last night, lying in Cricket’s bed. It was just...a resolution that was a lot harder to follow in the light of day. 

He opened up the beer can in his hands, and drank the whole thing in about ten seconds. 

“Fucking hell,” May said. 

“Fine, I’m obsessed,” the Master snapped. “How do I not be?” 

That, really, was the crux of the matter. He could decry the Doctor all he wanted, but that was useless if he couldn’t even kiss someone without picturing her. 

“Y’know, I was getting over a shitty ex when I met Tash,” May said, cracking open her own can. She took a drink that was rather more restrained than the Master’s. “I was just going to sleep with her once. Rebound, you know. Then I woke up the next morning and that mad fucking woman was cooking me breakfast. In my own flat. Just walk into the kitchen and see her frying eggs like she owns the place. And then she kinda...never left. And I didn’t want her to.”

“I don’t see how this helps me,” the Master said, folding his arms. 

“Huh. Um...yeah, I don’t know either. Maybe I need to stop drinking for now.” She set the can on the floor. “Remind me what the problem was.”

“I can’t stop thinking about my ex. Even when I’m trying to hook up with someone. Cricket.”

“Maybe you just need to get pissed,” she offered. “Really pissed. Alcohol’s good like that, stops you thinking. Or get high.” 

“Unless I stay permanently intoxicated, that’s not a very good solution,” he pointed out. 

“Aren’t you basically permanently intoxicated anyway? Aren’t we all?” May grinned. 

“Wouldn’t be having this problem if I was.”

“Hm. Fair. Other solution...” She leaned forward a little, fixing her deep blue eyes on him. “You have to learn to let go. Give up control, and it’s easier to...not think about what you don’t want to be thinking about. Accept that things are going to happen to you, and that you’re allowed to feel them. And once you’ve done that once, it’s easier to do it again, until you can be- almost your old self.” May looked down at the floor. She was fighting off something. The Master had the tact, at least, to not ask about what it was. If they really were alike, he could guess well enough. 

“Give up control,” he murmured. “That’s...difficult.” 

“It is,” May responded, almost immediately. A little too fast, perhaps. “It gets easier, I’m telling you. And- this is Cricket we’re talking about. There is absolutely fucking no one who will be nicer to you about this than that man.”

“Good point.”

“Yeah, I make those a lot. Everyone should listen to me.”

The Master laughed, shaking his head. That sounded more like the May he knew. Sometime, he’d have to ask her what had happened with this ex of hers. Unlike with him and the Doctor, she never brought this up. 

“I...still feel a little bad for leaving before he woke up,” he admitted, fingers drumming against his kneecap. Having emotions about humans was proving to be deeply inconvenient. 

“Call him. Apologise. Then use that to ask him out. Go get a drink, go to the cinema. Or just go to his place and fuck, I don’t know what you’re into. Could probably guess, but then I’d have to imagine it.” She pulled a face. 

“Go to his place and fuck...and give up control.” The Master closed his eyes, and tried to imagine letting a human have their way with him. Revulsion prickled in his stomach. 

Not just ‘a human’, his mind helpfully supplied. Cricket. He tried again, and there was apprehension, but it wasn’t nearly as disgusting a thought. 

“Keep your weird sex fantasies off my sofa,” May said. “I can fucking see what you’re thinking about, Christ, you’re obvious.”

“Shut up,” the Master said, cracking an eye open. “But...yeah, I might do that. Call him. See where it goes from there.”

“Whatever you do, don’t fuck up your relationship with him. We hang out too much, I can’t have everything being awkward when it’s all four of us. You better fucking be on your best behaviour around him.” May pointed a threatening finger at him. 

“I’ll be good,” he promised. Ugh. Good. There was a concept he hated to engage in. “...Got any more advice for me?”

“Remember that you’re not special,” she said, and the Master resisted the urge to immediately pout. “Everyone has the same shitty problems, we’re all fucked. Least we can do is help each other be a bit less fucked, but no one can do that if you start getting all high and mighty. You’re just like the rest of us, Harry.”

He sighed, centuries of life spent on planets May had never even heard of flicking through his mind. Did any of that really matter, though? Here he was, confined to the simple day-to-day life on Earth just like all of these humans. Maybe he wouldn’t age, maybe he had two hearts and a respiratory bypass, but functionally, that hardly mattered. 

“Yeah,” he admitted, closing his eyes again. It hurt to think about, but then again...it didn’t, not half as much as it had been stinging the Master for the past 34 years. It wasn’t so bad, being like these people. Being like his friends. “Yeah, I’m just like the rest of you.”

“Good,” May said, and there was a hint of warmth in her voice for once. The Master blinked his eyes back open, finding her smiling at him, just slightly. 

“Thank you,” he said, and the words came with surprising ease. 

The smile widened, just for a second, and then it was gone, overcome again by the usual fierce set of her face. “Don’t get all soppy on me. C’mon, Harry, you know Tash and Cricket are the soppy ones. I need you around to laugh at them with.”

“Aww, you need me?” The Master pressed a hand over his left heart, and the sweet moment was gone immediately. May scowled, shooting him a glare that could probably melt solid steel. 

“Fuck off. Fuck you. Hey. You want to go get pissed? Properly pissed? You look like you need it.”

“It’s three in the afternoon,” the Master pointed out. Maybe he did need it, though. 

May shrugged. “Bars are open.”

“Fair enough. Yeah, let’s go.” He stood up. Get drunk, go home again, wait for the buzz to wear off (or maybe don’t, not entirely, he needed the extra courage here) and then call Cricket. He could do that. 

May walked past him, grabbing his arm on the way to tug him towards the door. The Master let her, realising with surprise that he didn’t even have to suppress the urge to flinch when someone touched him anymore. Not his friends, at least. He was getting used to this. 

But that wasn’t such a bad thing, was it? These people cared about him, and understood him a hell of a lot better than the Doctor had ever tried to in recent years. Getting over her was not going to be easy, the Master wasn’t stupid enough to think that thousands of years of obsession, of love, would be cured in a few nights. Maybe not even a few years. But he could try. 

He wanted to try. He wanted to enjoy himself, he wanted to- to let go. And so he would, and damn the entire universe if it tried to stop him. 

He was going to be happy here.