FIC: The Agent's Tale (Valiant Tales)

Sep. 27th, 2008 at 12:40 PM

Title: The Agent's Tale
Series: Valiant Tales
Rating: PG
Characters: The Master (Simm), other characters
Genre: drabble
Spoilers: Minor spoilers for The Sound of Drums and Last of the Time Lords.
Summary: A series of drabbles about the people who lived, worked, and suffered on the Valiant during the Year That Never Was. 100 words according to MS Word.
Disclaimer: The sandbox belongs to RTD and the BBC. I'm just playing here, in the corner, making little sand-TARDISs.

I’m the Secret Service Agent who let President Winters be assassinated. Afterwards, I tried to kill Saxon, abiding by my oath to defend the Constitution “against all enemies”.

He played the genial host. “Where are you from?”

I lied. “Grafton, Idaho.”

Blue eyes froze my soul. “Denver, Colorado,” he corrected.

You know what happened. The Valiant hovered low for an excellent view. An audiolink let me hear the screaming. I mumbled, “Merciful God,” over and over, and hoped my execution would come soon.

Saxon said, “There is no God, but I am merciful. I’ll spare your life.” And he laughed.

Current Mood: tired

Comments

( 12 comments — Leave a comment )

wendymr

Sep. 27th, 2008 04:52 pm (UTC)

Oh god.

You capture the Master's brutality, his twisted-psychopath nature, so clearly in an economy of words - we really don't need any more to see it. It's this kind of story, elaborating on the horror that we saw on our screens, that feels so much more right than anything which turns the Doctor-Master relationship into something more than old enemies who are the last two of their species, and which try to turn violence and torture into something sexy. Here, you show violence for exactly what it is: something to repulse the reader - and the person the Master's showing it to.

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kensieg

Sep. 27th, 2008 05:00 pm (UTC)

Thank you for saying what I couldn't!

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lindenharp

Sep. 27th, 2008 05:42 pm (UTC)

First of all, thank you for the compliment. (I still want to be you when I grow up.)

I don't necessarily disagree with those who postulate a former sexual relationship between the Doctor and the Master, and who see a sexual element in the violence that the Master commits upon/for the Doctor. I don't have it in me to write those kinds of stories, and I don't think the violence can be sexy outside of the Master's twisted perspective.

The only other detail that I wrote about the destruction of Denver -- a sacrifice to the word count -- was that the flames were visible hundred of miles away.

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wendymr

Sep. 27th, 2008 07:26 pm (UTC)

I don't have any problem with the idea that the Doctor and the Master may have been lovers at one point, or that the Master's interest in the Doctor may still be that of a jilted lover (as one of my writer friends describes it) - perhaps I should have made that clear :) It's more that I've stumbled on rather too many stories where brutality and rape are portrayed in a way that's clearly intended to be erotic. As a result, for the most part I've given up reading anything that has the Master's name in the character list, unless it's by an author I trust absolutely not to do that.

(It's not peculiar to the Master, either; even when they involve my favourite pairings, I avoid other stories where violence is glorified or where sex comes close to rape - they're just not to my taste as a reader).

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lindenharp

Sep. 28th, 2008 12:13 am (UTC)

Okay. I see where you're coming from, and I agree. Those kinds of stories don't appeal to me.

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kensieg

Sep. 27th, 2008 04:59 pm (UTC)

Excellent drabble! Very evocative. I've been enjoying the whole series.

I've friended you, if you don't mind.

Edited at 2008-09-27 05:01 pm (UTC)

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lindenharp

Sep. 27th, 2008 05:44 pm (UTC)

Thanks for the kind words. Yes, friending me is fine -- I don't have any personal/private stuff in this LJ.

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kaffyr

Sep. 27th, 2008 05:28 pm (UTC)

You continue to impress me incredibly. This piece is tremendously brutal, in just the right way. As wendymr says, there's no disguising the monstrosity who engineered the Year That Wasn't.

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lindenharp

Sep. 27th, 2008 06:03 pm (UTC)

Thanks. Destroying an entire town to punish an individual or a small group is an ancient and dishonoroble Earth custom, as the survivors of Lidice could testify. The Master just took it to a greater level of horror, as befitting a member of a "higher" species.

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kaffyr

Sep. 27th, 2008 07:14 pm (UTC)

Point well taken.

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hab318princess

Sep. 27th, 2008 08:13 pm (UTC)

Again, just so much description in so few words. These are just incredibly fantastic.

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