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Fandomweekly Challenge 177 - Face to face
Title: Face to face
Fandom: Doctor Who
Characters: Jack, The Master
Author: m_findlow
Rating: M. Depictions of violence/assault.
Length: 1,000 words
Content notes: None
Author notes: Written for Challenge 177 - Nemesis at![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
fandomweekly
Summary: Jack is left to face the Doctor’s only enemy.
Jack was still reeling slightly from his resurrection as the pair of soldiers dragged him from the bridge of the ship. They hadn't even bothered with handcuffs. He simply hung limp and heavy between them as everything continued to ache.
Normally, it only took a few minutes for him to feel his old self after coming back from death, but whatever the Master had struck him with – to Jack's mind, it looked like a replica of the Doctor’s sonic screwdriver – but it had hurt like nothing he'd ever experienced. His whole body had, just for a few seconds before the world had gone black, burned with a bright white fire. Death was such a relief, but coming back had been anything but.
He'd never been in a situation where the Doctor hadn't fixed everything. Whilst Jack had learned to be a sometimes, but not very good, hero of the hour, it was the Doctor who could always be relied upon to save the day. To see the Master having used that same screwdriver device to age the Doctor thousands of years, leaving behind a shrunken and shrivelled shell of the man Jack thought of as his hero, had broken something inside Jack. All his confidence was shattered in an instant. As Martha had huddled over Jack's resurrecting body, telling him there was a plan, all he could do was make sure she got out of there to enact it. His own role in all of this was over. Without hesitation, he gave her his vortex manipulator – his most prized possession – and the only way for her to escape the Valiant. She was gone now and Jack was on his own.
There was no point fighting the soldiers that dragged him through the bowels of the ship. There was nowhere he could run where they wouldn't find him. He expected them to take him to some kind of holding cell. He didn't know the schematics for the UNIT vessel, but if the Master had designed them, as he so loudly crowed, then cells to hold his enemies would have been on the list.
Instead they surprised him by taking him further down into the steaming engine room, finally locating a spot where they could chain him to the overhead piping by his wrists, so that he hung uncomfortably from the metal gangway like a man without the gallows. And then they left him there, alone. But not for long.
‘Jack, Jack, Jacky,’ came the chillingly familiar timbre of the Master’s voice. He stopped and looked around at the Valiant's large engines continuing to whirr as it kept them hovering over the Earth, letting the chaos unfold many miles below them. He shoved his hands in his suit trouser pockets. ‘Looks like it’s just you and me.’
‘Who are you?’ Jack asked. He certainly wasn't Harold Saxon, Prime Minister. How had Torchwood missed that? He'd been ready to vote for the guy. Harold Saxon was nothing more than a fiction, made up to gain power over the entire country, and now, the world.
The Master cocked his head at Jack. ‘Haven't you been keeping up? I'm the Master.’ He shuddered a little, letting a shiver go theatrically down his spine, and then grinned. ‘I still love saying that.’ He took out his screwdriver and lazily traced it up and down Jack's torso. ‘Didn't he tell you about me? We go way back.’
‘But–’ And here was the part Jack couldn't understand. ‘If you and the Doctor are the only two Time Lords left…’
There was a pout. ‘Aw, you think we should be besties.’ He pinched Jack's cheek like an overbearing grandmother. ‘That’s so sweet.’ His fingers tightened until they were gripping Jack’s face painfully. ‘I hate the Doctor. Hate with every fibre of my being. I’d rather be the last of my kind for eternity than share this existence with him.’
Jack finally cried out and flinched out of the excruciating grip, before turning his head back to face the Master, expression thunderous. ‘So, what? You’ll just destroy the whole planet just to get back at him? Then what?’
There was a sudden and unexpected right fist driven right into Jack’s solar plexus, making him attempt to double over, but restrained by his chains, not able to do much more than curl himself into a slightly smaller shape as the force of the punch knocked the air out of him and made something inside his gut rupture with exquisite agony.
‘Stupid humans,’ the Master chastised. Then he paused. ‘No, but you’re not human, are you? Not from around these parts anyway. I apologise for taking it out on you. Being around all these simpletons for so long has been exhausting. It just makes you want to punch someone, doesn’t it?’ He didn't look the slightest bit like he was remorseful. ‘We’re different, aren’t we Jack? We’re special. We get to live longer than all of them.’
Jack choked out a laugh between trying to get his breath back and trying to breath through the new pain that was blossoming inside his gut. ‘I hope that’s not the sales pitch you’re giving me. Needs work. I’ve met psychopaths more convincing than you and–’ This time he was silenced by the Master’s screwdriver thrust his chin up, forcing itself against his windpipe.
‘I’m not expecting you to see things my way straight away. You goody two-shoes types never do.’
Jack’s adam's apple forced its way up and down as he swallowed against the pressure of the screwdriver pressed against it. ‘The Doctor will stop you.’
The Master barked out a laugh. ‘The Doctor. Doctor, Doctor, Doctor… What is it with you people? He’s nothing. It’s me you should be worshipping.’
‘Never.’ Jack hocked up a mouthful of blood-laden spit and ejected it as hard as he could into the face of the Master, knowing it would be the last thing he did before the Master killed him again.
‘I figured you’d say that.’
Fandom: Doctor Who
Characters: Jack, The Master
Author: m_findlow
Rating: M. Depictions of violence/assault.
Length: 1,000 words
Content notes: None
Author notes: Written for Challenge 177 - Nemesis at
fandomweeklySummary: Jack is left to face the Doctor’s only enemy.
Jack was still reeling slightly from his resurrection as the pair of soldiers dragged him from the bridge of the ship. They hadn't even bothered with handcuffs. He simply hung limp and heavy between them as everything continued to ache.
Normally, it only took a few minutes for him to feel his old self after coming back from death, but whatever the Master had struck him with – to Jack's mind, it looked like a replica of the Doctor’s sonic screwdriver – but it had hurt like nothing he'd ever experienced. His whole body had, just for a few seconds before the world had gone black, burned with a bright white fire. Death was such a relief, but coming back had been anything but.
He'd never been in a situation where the Doctor hadn't fixed everything. Whilst Jack had learned to be a sometimes, but not very good, hero of the hour, it was the Doctor who could always be relied upon to save the day. To see the Master having used that same screwdriver device to age the Doctor thousands of years, leaving behind a shrunken and shrivelled shell of the man Jack thought of as his hero, had broken something inside Jack. All his confidence was shattered in an instant. As Martha had huddled over Jack's resurrecting body, telling him there was a plan, all he could do was make sure she got out of there to enact it. His own role in all of this was over. Without hesitation, he gave her his vortex manipulator – his most prized possession – and the only way for her to escape the Valiant. She was gone now and Jack was on his own.
There was no point fighting the soldiers that dragged him through the bowels of the ship. There was nowhere he could run where they wouldn't find him. He expected them to take him to some kind of holding cell. He didn't know the schematics for the UNIT vessel, but if the Master had designed them, as he so loudly crowed, then cells to hold his enemies would have been on the list.
Instead they surprised him by taking him further down into the steaming engine room, finally locating a spot where they could chain him to the overhead piping by his wrists, so that he hung uncomfortably from the metal gangway like a man without the gallows. And then they left him there, alone. But not for long.
‘Jack, Jack, Jacky,’ came the chillingly familiar timbre of the Master’s voice. He stopped and looked around at the Valiant's large engines continuing to whirr as it kept them hovering over the Earth, letting the chaos unfold many miles below them. He shoved his hands in his suit trouser pockets. ‘Looks like it’s just you and me.’
‘Who are you?’ Jack asked. He certainly wasn't Harold Saxon, Prime Minister. How had Torchwood missed that? He'd been ready to vote for the guy. Harold Saxon was nothing more than a fiction, made up to gain power over the entire country, and now, the world.
The Master cocked his head at Jack. ‘Haven't you been keeping up? I'm the Master.’ He shuddered a little, letting a shiver go theatrically down his spine, and then grinned. ‘I still love saying that.’ He took out his screwdriver and lazily traced it up and down Jack's torso. ‘Didn't he tell you about me? We go way back.’
‘But–’ And here was the part Jack couldn't understand. ‘If you and the Doctor are the only two Time Lords left…’
There was a pout. ‘Aw, you think we should be besties.’ He pinched Jack's cheek like an overbearing grandmother. ‘That’s so sweet.’ His fingers tightened until they were gripping Jack’s face painfully. ‘I hate the Doctor. Hate with every fibre of my being. I’d rather be the last of my kind for eternity than share this existence with him.’
Jack finally cried out and flinched out of the excruciating grip, before turning his head back to face the Master, expression thunderous. ‘So, what? You’ll just destroy the whole planet just to get back at him? Then what?’
There was a sudden and unexpected right fist driven right into Jack’s solar plexus, making him attempt to double over, but restrained by his chains, not able to do much more than curl himself into a slightly smaller shape as the force of the punch knocked the air out of him and made something inside his gut rupture with exquisite agony.
‘Stupid humans,’ the Master chastised. Then he paused. ‘No, but you’re not human, are you? Not from around these parts anyway. I apologise for taking it out on you. Being around all these simpletons for so long has been exhausting. It just makes you want to punch someone, doesn’t it?’ He didn't look the slightest bit like he was remorseful. ‘We’re different, aren’t we Jack? We’re special. We get to live longer than all of them.’
Jack choked out a laugh between trying to get his breath back and trying to breath through the new pain that was blossoming inside his gut. ‘I hope that’s not the sales pitch you’re giving me. Needs work. I’ve met psychopaths more convincing than you and–’ This time he was silenced by the Master’s screwdriver thrust his chin up, forcing itself against his windpipe.
‘I’m not expecting you to see things my way straight away. You goody two-shoes types never do.’
Jack’s adam's apple forced its way up and down as he swallowed against the pressure of the screwdriver pressed against it. ‘The Doctor will stop you.’
The Master barked out a laugh. ‘The Doctor. Doctor, Doctor, Doctor… What is it with you people? He’s nothing. It’s me you should be worshipping.’
‘Never.’ Jack hocked up a mouthful of blood-laden spit and ejected it as hard as he could into the face of the Master, knowing it would be the last thing he did before the Master killed him again.
‘I figured you’d say that.’