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Despite their snobbishly superiority in the face of all things recreational—
Despite their distaste for all things whimsical—
Despite their stalwart aversion towards most forms of physical touch—
Time Lords did, in fact, dance.
***
Their dances were ritualistic, small groups pacing in tight circles around the hills lining the citadels as their feet traced intricate symbology into the red grass. Their processions wove out characters from old gallifreyan scripture; lines that spelled tidings of good fortune for all, supposedly magnified in strength by the number of participants involved. It was a deeply moving activity, albeit a purposefully impersonal one, done in favour of the universe’s collective good health rather than with any regard for individual desires.
Or, the desires of two.
It was no wonder then, that Koschei didn’t know what to make of the humanoids he saw swaying on the pixilated display of Theta’s old projector.
He had shut the door of their small dormitory behind himself, too weary from an evening of study to provide any words of warning regarding his imminent arrival, only to drop his bag in shock at the sight before him. Theta was propped up on the bed (on Koschei’s bed, no less) reclined on his stomach, hands under his chin and staring avidly at the projection directed at one of the stark walls of their dormitory room, blindingly bright against the darkness of the evening’s dusk.
The thump of his bag hitting the floor startled Theta from his trance. Koschei swallowed against the sudden dryness of his throat— in part, from the intimately clasped figures meandering about the screen, but far more from the way his roommate’s thin robe hitched up around his thighs as he clambered across the bed and towards the projector.
“It’s an old earth film, that’s all! I borrowed it from my mother when I left for the academy.”
Theta’s words had all the trappings of a casual explanation, but they left his mouth with the unmistakable tone of a shamefaced protest. Moreover, he didn’t miss the way his cheeks reddened as he fumbled to switch the recording off. The other boy was clearly aware of how lurid the scene appeared, claims of innocence aside.
“But what are they doing?” Koschei asked with genuine curiosity, stepping forward to slap Theta’s hands from the off switch so that he could continue to watch the ambulation on the screen. His breath caught as one of the figures’ hands migrated up from the other’s shoulders to rest lightly on their partner’s neck, caressing the skin it found there.
Positively scandalous, by standards of gallifreyan physiology. Even Koschei’s cheeks felt flushed at such a blatant display, and the sensitive skin of his own neck tingled.
Theta’s face was now so deeply red that it matched the hills beyond their window’s curtain. “They’re dancing,” he insisted in a pitched whine. But then he stopped himself, cocking his head in consideration as he re-regarded the scene. “Or at least, I think that’s what they’re doing. That’s what my mother said they were doing, anyways. It’s how humans like to do it.”
“Dancing? That?” Koschei scoffed, purposefully derisive to distract the other boy from his own growing interest in the scene. “That’s just obscene. Look at them, there’s only two of them there! And they’re not even spelling anything out! What’s it even for?”
“I think it’s just…to feel good?” Theta ventured tentatively, fidgeting with the hem of his casual underrobes.
Koschei himself felt suddenly sweltering in his heavy academic gown, uncomfortably stiff in contrast to the other boy’s relaxed attire. It was one of their days off, but he'd pulled himself from their afternoon chatter to finish up an extracurricular project in the temporal physics lab. Predictably, Theta had no such academic engagements, and he was unsurprised to find him still lounging in their room well past dusk. But he hadn’t expected to catch him doing anything like this.
If he had, he might have forgone his own work entirely. Or at very least, he would have returned far quicker.
“To feel good,” Koschei repeated in quiet disbelief.
Theta only nodded, and together they stood in silence and watched the scene play out. Watching as one human dipped the other into a low swing, arching their back gracefully before straightening up and spinning them beneath their arm, only to fall back into an embrace once again.
Was his breathing louder than usual? It certainly sounded so. Intrusively loud, in contrast to the quiet of their small room, and as anachronistic against the silence as the black and white scene appeared against the backdrop of their cluttered wooden floor and matching grey cots. He didn’t dare meet Theta’s eyes, lest the other boy somehow see that his interest extended far further than the explicit scene in front of them. “It can’t feel that good,” Koschei snapped back, self-consciousness turning the retort into something harsher than he’d meant it. “I mean, they’re still clothed! They’re not even moving very much. It’s boring!”
Theta’s face twisted defensively. “It’s not boring!” he insisted with a cry before stopping himself, reddening even further as he realised the statement inadvertently proved his own interest. Koschei couldn’t stop his eyes from swivelling to his face at the vehemence of his protest, regarding him curiously. “I mean, it’s not that bad to look at,” Theta amended quickly. “It must be nice, or else why would they do it?”
“I guess,” he capitulated, satisfied that he had won their unspoken competition to appear as unembarrassed and uninterested as possible. It wasn’t that he wanted to make Theta feel embarrassed about the film. It just felt crucially important that he knew how not embarrassed Koschei himself was, in comparison. (As well as not interested, neither in the figures on the screen, nor their dancing, nor in the other boy himself.)
Still, despite their mutually professed lacks of interest, neither boy made to turn the film off. Nor to tear their eyes from the screen as it continued. They both jumped in surprise when the projector eventually turned itself off with a click, having reached the end of the tape uninterrupted under their mutually enrapt attentions. The moment’s trance had past, and each second that followed fortified an awkward silence that Koschei’s mind scrambled to fill, to find something to say. Was it wiser to push past the topic entirely? Or maybe he should throw another passing barb at the other boy just in case, just to reiterate how unaffected and not at all uncomfortable he was.
Ultimately, his frantic indecision was saved by a tentative tap on his shoulder. Koschei turned, surprised to find that in his determination to not watch the other boy, Theta had managed to wander from the bed to his side entirely unnoticed.
“I think we should try it.”
Koschei felt himself blinking stupidly in response, mouth gaping as his brain attempted to wrap around the suggestion. “What?” he sputtered, instantly furious at how high-pitched and breathless the word sounded coming from his own lips.
Under his vacant scrutiny, Theta remained blushing but unabashed, stubbornly refusing to take the idea back. “Well, it can’t be that hard, can it?” he pressed, and it was clear that the attempt at reassurance was not only for Koschei alone. “I just want to see what all the fuss is about.”
For the life of him, he could not think of a single thing to say against that.
Nor could he bring himself to verbalise any agreement, however. He was afraid that if he opened his mouth to try, he’d somehow accidentally let slip all the details of his enormous, excruciating, and exquisitely pathetic crush on his insufferably charming roommate.
Theta must already know, mustn’t he? He could be infuriatingly absent-minded, but that did not mean he wasn’t singularly brilliant, in a way that his grades woefully failed to reflect. By now he simply had to know. Koschei himself felt like he was aching from it, like his infatuation was a fixed-timepoint fact. Like despite his best efforts to keep his mouth shut, his obsession for the other boy leaked out from between his atoms, growing from deep within his very bones.
Surely the whole universe must know by now; no one could be so blind.
In a flash of horror, he became instantly and infuriatingly suspicious that he was being teased. Maybe that was it all along, maybe this was just a cruel joke. Maybe Theta was making fun of him, taunting him with the idea of touching him, of standing so close—
“Unless you’re too scared, of course—”
“I’m not scared,” Koschei spat furiously, and it was the biggest lie he had ever told.
Praying that his hands weren’t trembling, he took a deep breath and crossed the last step between them, drawing himself up directly in front of the other boy’s watchful eyes. “It’s just boring, s’all. But whatever, we can try it. If you want to so badly.”
He must have imagined the way Theta’s breath caught at his nearness. His own idiotic hopes conjuring up the way Theta’s pupils dilated as they darted from his eyes, to his lips, to his hands, and back again. He’d have known by now if Theta felt even a fraction of his regard, he wasn’t stupid. After all, if the other boy had ever given him so much as an inch of romantic affection, he’d have ran with it a mile.
They stood in wide-eyed silence, locked in the uncertainty of their own decision, but far too stubborn to back down now that the gauntlet had been cast. But a minute later, he was forced to bring up the obvious first problem. “How…how do we start this then?” he muttered, eyes fixed firmly on his shoes as he scuffed nervously at the floor.
“I don’t actually know,” Theta admitted, brow creasing in confusion as he visibly racked his brains for the answer. “They were already doing it when the scene in the film started. But I think we just do it. Just need to grab each other and…move side-to-side, I guess?” In accordance with his own instructions, the boy reached out to place his hands on Koschei’s waist.
The pressure of his hands was so featherlight that in objective terms, it would’ve scarcely been detectable on any scientific scale. But he might as well have punched him straight in the gut for how winded and overwhelmed the simple gesture left him. Despite all rationality (and the multiple layers of heavily-starched academy gown between them) he swore he could feel his skin under Theta’s hands burning from the proximity alone.
“You need to touch me too, Kosch.”
Touch him? Touch Theta? On purpose?? While he watched??? The ringing in his ears was deafening as the unbelievable request reverberated across his mind, but that didn’t stop his treacherous hands from obeying immediately, bringing themselves to the other’s waist in a similar fashion. “Like this?” he asked, categorically refusing to let his voice waiver.
“Yes—!”
The word sounded both breathier and more earnest than Koschei’s ears had expected, and his eyes shot up, only to catch Theta biting the inside of his cheek to stop himself from speaking further. But just as suddenly, his expression fell uncertain once again. “Yes— wait actually, sorry no— I mean, it’s nice,” the words stumbled out of Theta’s mouth in an untempered rush before he managed to pause, taking a deep breath before continuing at more coherent pace. “Very nice. But— wasn’t one of us supposed to have his arms on the other’s shoulders?”
“Is that important?” Koschei asked weakly. His own voice was cracking under the strain of his desperation, and he pleaded with his fingers to not give into their impulse to trace greedy circles into the threadbare material covering the other’s hip. The heat he felt seeping through the other’s clothing was positively indecent, and he didn’t know how much longer he could stand it.
“I don’t know, maybe?” Theta cried out, exasperated at being bested by what had appeared so simple on screen.
“How do we know which of us is supposed to do it?”
“Um,” the other boy’s face scrunched as he tried to recall the footage. “I don’t know. I think maybe it’s the shorter one who does it?”
Koschei felt his own face sour, overwhelmingly aware that Theta’s recent summer growth spurt had pushed him to be the taller one, seemingly overnight. Just wait until his next body, he’d show him tall! “I’m not moving mine,” he snapped, both in defence of his height and as a self-protective measure. There was no way he would be able to withstand having his hands anywhere near the vulnerable stretch of Theta’s neck, already indecently exposed in his collarless underclothes.
Theta rolled his eyes, but apparently didn’t find the matter worthy of a debate. Without warning, the scorching weight on Koschei’s hips disappeared, only to be replaced by a new distraction as slim arms wound their way over his shoulders to clasp behind his neck.
Worse. Better. But also far, far worse! The ringing in his ears reached a deafening pitch as the bare skin of Theta’s forearms slid tantalisingly along the junction of his shoulder. In his rush to avoid the temptation of putting his hands on the other boy, he hadn’t stopped to think how much harder it would be to withstand Theta doing the same to him.
Surprisingly, other boy looked equally as stricken as he felt, eyes bulging as if he was shocked to see what liberties his own hands had taken. “What now?” he dared to whisper, and in that moment, Koschei could have throttled him.
Predictable. It was just so like him to drag Koschei into trouble, then leave him stranded with the consequences of navigating their way back to safety. “Now we move, I guess?”
And they did just that. They shifted their weight from foot to foot in tandem, so gently it was hardly perceptible, save for the squeaking of the old wooden floor underfoot. The remained like that, wordless and swaying in the dark for countless minutes. It was tremendously awkward, incredibly disjointed, and entirely—
Perfect.
For all their mutual hesitation, there was something delightfully heady about the act. It felt hedonistic, incredibly self-indulgent, and entirely in opposition to everything Time Lords held dear. It was such a blatant act of defiance that both boys found themselves predisposed to enjoy it on principle alone.
And of course, rebellious principles aside, there was the matter of his choice in partner.
Koschei took advantage of the moment’s tentative confidence to attempt to spin the other boy, like he’d seen the couple on the screen accomplish with grace. Only, that couple clearly hadn’t had Theta’s incoordination to contend with, not his own limited experience. As his feet twisted under the unexpected movement, the tip of his toe caught the back of Koschei’s own shoe, nearly felling them both. He managed to stop their descent with a painful jolt against the edge of a wardrobe that his shoulder would be feeling for days, the other hand catching firmly under Theta’s own waist.
Pushing aside his innate compulsion towards complaining, he contemplated the scene they now made. The near horizontal angle of Theta’s body was not unreminiscent of the low dip from the couple in the film. Sure, theirs might not be as graceful, but perhaps not such a catastrophic failure after all.
What did grace matter anyway, in the face of Theta’s breath rippling in a delighted laugh? In that moment, Koschei wasn’t sure that he had ever earned anything better. Although the noise’s proximity brought home how close their tumble had left them, closer even than they had been at the dance’s start. And Theta was just hovering there, looking at him, letting him take the full weight of his instability with so much affection and trust behind his eyes that he felt quietly pushed towards hysterics.
“I could drop you,” Koschei said, attempting to diffuse some of the crushing tension between them with levity, letting the other boy drop slightly in a feint. It was the coward’s way out, and he immediately cursed himself for breaking the intimacy of the moment, but after an initial squeak of surprise Theta brought them back to square one, obstinately refusing to be swayed by his attempt.
“But you won’t, won’t you.” It wasn’t a question. The other boy stated it like a fact, enunciated with care and without a moment’s hesitation.
And just what was he supposed to say to that?!
As Koschei had done embarrassingly often over the past quarter hour, he found himself silently floundering for an appropriate response. Theta took advantage of his stunned indecision to right himself, moving Koschei’s paralysed hands back onto his hips before sliding his own back across his shoulders and reinitiating their dance. He shivered at the feeling and couldn’t hold back a sharp intake of breath through clenched teeth. Any moment now, Theta was going to look down and jump away in horror when he noticed how reprehensibly hard their engagement had left him. He was going to ruin everything! Literal years spent inventing reasons to brush his hand against his roommate’s, jumping at every opportunity to bask in the undivided attention of his infuriatingly oblivious best friend, and now that Koschei had been invited to hold him, practically embracing him in the privacy of their very own room— it was all he could do to keep from fainting in terror. He was going to ruin the only relationship he'd ever held dear and he didn’t even have the guts to do it on purpose!
And yet…
Despite the fear, despite the fact that he could technically leave now with no clout lost, laugh it all off and rightfully claim that they'd given it a try— Koschei felt distinctly concerned that now, having finally gotten Theta in his arms, he’d never bring himself to let go. “Isn’t there supposed to be music?” he heard himself whisper into the room’s thick silence.
“Probably,” Theta replied, but he didn’t bother letting go to restart the film’s audio track. Instead, the hands clasped around the back of Koschei’s neck pulled him in infinitesimally closer. It was only when he was so close that he could feel the puffs of Theta’s breath on his own cheek that he realised his was quickened as well, into stunted gasps nearly matching his own panic. The dim evening light through a gap in their window’s curtain rippled across Theta’s face, and he watched as brown eyes tilted upwards, searching the ceiling for bravery he himself didn’t feel as the other boy readied himself to speak further.
“I think…”
This was it. Theta was going to tell him to leave. Any minute now his face would twist in disgust and he’d run away, and Koschei would never see him again.
“I think maybe we—”
Or maybe he’d try and let him down easy and that would be even worse! He would attempt to be kind about it. He’d give him that small apologetic smile he always gave pathetic things, like he was embarrassed on Koschei’s behalf, and it would kill him on the spot!
“—Oh for Rassilon’s sake Koschei, can you just kiss me already?!”
His brain screeched to a halt. “Thete,” he choked out brokenly.
“Please.”
Koschei must be dreaming. He must have tripped on the staircase back to their dorm and knocked his head. “Okay,” he whispered in helpless disbelief. As if he had any other choice but to obey such a request.
As if he ever would.
If Theta could be brave, so could he. Koschei steeled himself before pulling him closer in one sharp tug that surprised them both with its force. The warmth of the other boy’s body pressed flush against his own, the scrape of his cheek as it rubbed against his own stubble (the beginnings of a beard that Theta had laughed at his insistence upon growing only a month ago) it was all so immediately overwhelming that he felt drunk on sensations alone. He turned, using what little wherewithal he still possessed to realign their faces and do what he'd been tasked. The first pass of his lips against Theta’s own was merely a hint of pressure, hardly even a graze, and certainly nothing like a true kiss. Even then, the sheer incredulous reverence of the act left them both gasping.
But there would be no middle ground (not now, nor perhaps ever). The force of their next kiss felt like a possession, like the desire behind it sprouted from someplace far deeper within himself than Koschei's own consciousness. The scale of his need was almost frightening, as if left unchecked, it would refuse to settle for anything less than a consumption of them both. He knew that he was gripping too tightly now, pressing so insistently into the soft of the other’s waist that he’d surely leave him spotted with finger-shaped bruises, but he was utterly unable to stop. It was as if his fingers were deadset on pushing past the other’s thin nightshirt entirely, straight through skin and muscle alike, until his hands were buried in his very soul.
And somehow, unbelievably, in midst of it all, they continued to dance. And any growing concerns he had about the fervency of his own need sputtered to a halt the second he registered the matching weight of Theta’s own erection against him.
“How long?” Koschei’s voice sounded hoarse, as if he’d spent the past quarter hour screaming rather than lightly shifting his weight from foot to foot.
“Oh, years now.” Theta’s casual response broke off into a hitched gasp as their swaying fell out of sync, causing his arousal to grind against the edge of his hip. “Two years, at least. How about you?”
He had spotted the other boy immediately. The shock of blond curls was distinct and obtrusive against a sea of otherwise identical headpieces and severe children’s robes. He’d never forget it, their very first initiation ceremony and Theta had already lost his hat whilst clambering through a window to peek at the headmaster’s housecat. The boy was far too cheerful, and far too odd, and Koschei’s own hearts had been far too young to understand anything like romance. But his six years of life had given him a solid enough grasp on the word mine to recognise what was his when he saw it. “Oh, the same,” Koschei lied airily. “Who remembers that kind of stuff anyway. But wait— did you say two years? Two years?!” He was screeching now, the implications of the timeline setting in. “We could have been doing this for two whole years and you said nothing?”
“Neither did you!” came Theta’s indignant reply. “I thought I would die waiting for you to make a move, I’ve been trying to prod you into it for ages! You took so long that I started thinking maybe I had only imagined you having any interest in me after all!”
He supposed that was fair; the word ‘interest’ being a truly heroic understatement of his regard aside.
The silence between them was vibrant now, electrified by the bravery of their own admissions despite neither having a clue as to how to proceed. The moment’s previous tensions seeped away slowly, leaving them slumped and embracing in commiserative relief as they continued to sway. But soon, an entirely new sort of tension crept in. Something warmer, that left them both giddy with promise. Something that whispered promises of intrigue and provocation for the years that would follow, clenching tight in the bases of their stomachs. Something far better than fear.
“I think I like dancing,” Theta breathed against his ear, his mouth brushing over the fine hairs lining his temple, and in that moment, Koschei swore to himself that he would learn all there was to know about human dancing. He may never understand the other boy’s fascination with earthlings, but if mastering such outlandish customs allowed them to do this—if it piqued the other’s interest so thoroughly—if it allowed him to keep Theta pressed against him, looking down at him just as he was now—
Well, there were worse ways to pass the time.
His own breath stuttered as the other boy’s hands unclasped to stroke freely over the skin of his neck, broad strokes that travelled under his collar and behind his ear, stretching to trail across the sensitive line of his jaw.
“It’s not bad,” Koschei acquiesced in blatant understatement. He finally persuaded his own fingers to loosen their bruising grip on the other’s waist, if only to luxuriate in their newfound privilege to trail over the small of his back, inching downwards in a wordless request. At the low noise that pulled from the back of Theta’s throat, he abandoned all semblance of tact in favour of simply digging his fingers into the swell of his arse in one possessive swoop.
And still, they were swaying.
“How do we stop dancing?” he asked hurriedly, after another minute of victorious (and increasingly desperate) groping had passed.
Not that he wasn’t enjoying himself. Quite the contrary, in fact. But the only thing in the universe he wanted more than to never move from their current spot, was to move right this second. Move the clothes off their bodies, move their bodies to a bed, and move aside any iota of personal space and any atomic particle that dared to come between them.
(The only trick would be accomplishing any of that without moving his hands from Theta’s backside; something he suspected that he’d never be able to demand of himself in good faith.)
“I’m not sure,” Theta said, only half-listening and without a care in the world. He appeared far too taken with claiming territory across Koschei’s skin, intent on discovering all the places that could make his breath catch. “I suppose we can stop whenever we’re ready.”
***
Many centuries and a dozen regenerations later, in the privacy of his own TARDIS, the Master was forced to admit that in many ways, they never quite were.