Title: No More Tears
By: angstytimelord
Pairing: gen
Fandom: Doctor Who
Rating: PG-13
Table: 30_losses
Prompt: 30A, Dry Eyes
Disclaimer: This is entirely a product of my own imagination, and I make no profit from it. I do not own the Tenth Doctor. Please do not sue.

***

He didn't cry when his companions left him.

He hadn't cried when he'd had to make the decision to destroy Gallifrey.

He'd held back the tears when some of the people closest to him had died.

So .... why had he felt the need to let those tears find release when the Master, his greatest enemy, the man who'd wanted to kill him, had died in his arms?

It really didn't make sense, at least not to him. And he was the person who it should make sense to, wasn't he? After all, he should know his own feelings. After living for over 900 years, he should have at least an elementary understanding of his own emotions.

But apparently, he didn't. His feelings were still jumbled up inside him, some of them wanting to come out, raging and ranting against fate, others somewhere in the background, keeping to the shadows as though they were ashamed to come forward.

He'd remained dry-eyed through so many emotional turning points in his life. Why was it that this particular one had brought out tears?

Maybe it was because the Master was the only other Gallifreyan left in the universe -- and more than that, the only other Time Lord. The only other person alive who could understand something of what the Doctor dealt with on a daily basis.

Now, there was no one to understand him. No one to know what his life was like. No one who could relate to the terrible loneliness, the responsibilities that being what he was had thrust upon him. No one who could possibly know.

Of course, the Master hadn't really known, had he? His aims had always been so different from the Doctor's. He wanted to rule the world -- and sometimes to destroy it. The Doctor merely wanted what was best for it, to see the universe exist in harmony.

He knew which one of them was right. He knew that the Master had to be stopped, that he couldn't be allowed to continue to run free in the world, causing chaos wherever he went.

The Master had known that he wouldn't allow that. And he'd chosen death over being with the Doctor on a permanent basis.

That had hurt, more than anything else possibly could have. Being rejected by humans or by other races was something that he'd grown to expect. He wasn't like them; he was alien, no matter how much he might look like a human.

But to be rejected by one of his own .... that had been almost too painful to bear.

He'd tried not to show how much the words the Master had said hurt him. He'd tried to talk the other man into regenerating, into giving a life with him a chance. But the Master had chosen death over being with him in the way he'd planned.

He supposed he really couldn't blame the other man. To some, even death was preferable to being what they thought of as a prisoner. The Master was like that. His freedom would be more important to him than anything else.

It was understandable, yes -- but that didn't mean that the piercing pain of rejection wasn't still there. And that it always would be.

And still, through those hurtful words, he'd stayed dry-eyed.

Until the Master had died in his arms, despite his pleas to the other man to regenerate and take life as it came to him. Then, the tears had been unstoppable, raining down his face in spite of his best efforts to hold them back.

He'd sat there and cried, holding the Master's body in his arms. Why? He couldn't really have said; but he hadn't wanted to let the other man go. Perhaps he was merely trying to hold on to what he'd come to think of as the last vestiges of Gallifrey, of his home world.

That had been the last time he'd cried. Since then, he hadn't allowed himself the luxury of tears. He was a Time Lord; he didn't view the world as others did. He was the last of his kind, and he had to uphold that.

But sometimes it was hard. So hard. When he'd had to wipe Donna's memories, know that she'd never be able to see him again, know that the person he'd thought of as a sister could never be a part of his again, he'd wanted to cry.

He hadn't been able to. He'd had to seem as though he was making the best of it, to show regret, but not the searing pain of yet another goodbye to someone special.

And now, he was alone again -- his greatest fear, the one that always seemed to snap at his heels. It seemed unavoidable, at this point. He might as well accept the fact that he'd always be alone. There was no one to give him forever, no one who would always be with him.

It was too much to expect -- from Jack, from the Master, from anyone. They had their own lives and plans, lives that didn't include him. And he couldn't change what he was to be with them on their own terms. He had too much responsibility.

He would have to get used to being alone, possibly for the rest of his life. He had no choice.

The Doctor sighed, running a hand over his face and wishing that he could summon tears to the surface. He wished the could cry for all the people who'd been in his life and now weren't there any longer, for times that he'd never be able to bring back.

But he couldn't. The time for tears was past; he had to face up to the future, to his destiny, no matter what that destiny was.

He stood up, clearing his throat purposefully and striding to the console in the center of the Tardis' control room. He had no idea where he would go next, but it was time that he went somewhere and made himself useful.

Alone. As he was destined to be.

***