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The air was thick with dust and heat a dry, restless wind that carried the scent of fur, blood and sun-scorched stone. Once, this world might have been beautiful. Now it was a hunting ground, ruled by beings both savage and graceful, creatures that moved like predators carved from light and shadow. The Cheetah People.
And now, one of them was him.
The Master — the great Master of Time — crouched upon a jagged rock, his claws idly tracing lines in the earth. His once immaculate hands had become tawny, furred, and trembling with an unfamiliar hunger. He could still feel the echo of regeneration energy deep within, suppressed and stagnant, trapped inside this decaying vessel he had stolen so long ago. Tremas’s body was failing him, rotting from the inside out.
He had come here searching for life, for strength, for immortality, for anything that would sustain him. And he had found it.
The virus of this planet was a gift and a curse. It seeped into his blood, reshaping sinew, sharpening senses, igniting instincts long buried. He could feel the power in his limbs, the sheer animal vitality singing through his veins. But beneath that thrill, something else was happening something far less controllable.
The Time Lord mind cold, brilliant, logical was beginning to fracture.
He licked his paw absently, the coarse texture of his tongue dragging against fur, and caught himself purring actually purring. The sound made him freeze, golden eyes widening in disbelief before narrowing with reluctant amusement.
“How… utterly demeaning,” he murmured, his voice a rough, velvet growl that vibrated at the back of his throat.
Yet the motion the grooming, the simple act was intoxicating. It soothed him in ways he could not quite explain.
He thought of the Doctor then always the Doctor. Loyal fool. Doglike in his persistence, his sentimentality, his endless need to chase. Of course he would prefer dogs. Dogs obeyed, adored, forgave. Cats had claws. Cats ruled.
The Master stretched languidly, tail twitching as he rose to his feet or what remained of them. His balance was feline now, lithe and deliberate, every motion a ripple of controlled grace. And yet inside him, two beings waged war: the calculating Lord of Time and the restless predator who longed to chase the dying sun across the plains.
One wanted to conquer the universe.
The other wanted to curl up and sleep.
One wanted to tear the Doctor apart.
The other… wanted to be held by him.
“Pathetic,” he hissed under his breath, though even he could not tell which half he was condemning.
When he found himself licking at his ankles again he forced his hand down and snarled.
“Enough!”
The word echoed uselessly against the empty, orange horizon. His tail lashed once in irritation. He had to move. He had to think.
But thinking was growing harder by the hour. The instincts were winning. His mind, his magnificent, terrible mind, was being drowned beneath the animal’s heartbeat.
He began to walk through the crimson sands, eyes scanning the horizon for movement. The twin suns had begun to dip, and the wind carried the howls of the others his kin now, whether he liked it or not. He could sense them hunting, smell their excitement in the air. A part of him, the wrong part wanted to join them.
No. He clenched his jaw. He would not surrender. Not to the virus, not to the animal, not to this cursed world. There had to be a way out. There was always a way out.
But even as he thought it, a strange, treacherous wish stirred in him the image of the Doctor’s TARDIS materializing in the distance, the familiar hum of its engines calling to him. And then, absurdly, a thought: If only he’d take me with him. As his cat, perhaps.
He almost laughed a harsh, bitter sound that came out more like a growl.
“No,” he whispered fiercely, shaking the thought away. “I am the Master… not some pet. I don’t need the Doctor. I’m on my own, lost in the wild.”
His claws flexed. His pupils narrowed. The world burned gold in his vision as the sun sank into dusk. Somewhere, deep inside, the Time Lord’s mind continued to scream, fighting to remain itself, but the beast don’t listening now.
And the beast was beginning to win.