darkgathersin: (Default)
Theta ([personal profile] darkgathersin) wrote2009-03-22 07:07 pm

[Fic] Patience Is A Virtue (But You Can Only Wait For So Long)

Koschei isn't there when he wakes up. It's not unnerving though, not in the slightest and Theta stretches a little, snuggling onto the pillows as his muscles relax and nuzzling at the pillow that the other most often occupied.

It was still warm, still smelled like him.

A part of him wants to get up and find the man but the rest of him says that staying right here is the better option.

Koschei would find him eventually.


He fell asleep again but he didn't mean to. Really, he'd been expecting Koschei to show up and prod him into moving but that never happened, or he certainly doesn't remember being coherent enough to realize it happened and that was a little unsettling.

Not very, of course, he tries not to be very unsettled by the things he might not remember but it still leaves him feeling uncomfortable.

Poking around the console, he finds no note, no sign that Koschei had been there at all and he tries to remember again if maybe the other had told him early in the morning that he was taking off for the day but Theta's mind draws a blank and his hands shake just a little as he prepares the tea.


Days later, Theta finds himself staring at the console, waiting for it to give him an answer to a question he hasn't stopped asking.

When all he receives is a low, soothing hum from the TARDIS, he closes his eyes and takes a breath. Koschei would be back, he tells himself. Koschei is just tied up and he doesn't remember and that's all.


His lids grow heavy and Theta wonders if he should try and sleep. That's something he hasn't really done, getting a proper amount of sleep. A few weeks now? Maybe more. He doesn’t know, can't quite get a grasp on his sense of time.

The TARDIS dims the lights in the console room and his heart begins to race. He's not sure why but this feels so familiar, so much like how it used to be, the coming dark and before he can stop himself, he's calling out for Koschei, pleading for him because he doesn’t want to go alone.

The TARDIS automatically turns the lights back to their full brightness and she doesn't try and repeat that trick again.


The feeling never changes and he's not sue if he's grateful for that or not.

It starts creeping into his hearing first, a silence that he can't break through, that nothing can push back. It's so quiet, everything quiet and he misses the hum of the TARDIS and Koschei's voice and the sound of heartbeats.

Sight goes next. Everything's dark. So dark that he can't see the lights shining on the console, can't see how the TARDIS brightens everything to full capacity just for him.

Everything else just bleeds away after that, smell, taste and the very last is touch. He doesn't feel anything, can't feel the grates beneath his cheek, can't feel the cold, even though he's shivering.

He tries though, even now. He's trying so hard to stay there but he can't remember why, can't remember what's waiting for him at the end of the darkness.

And then in one moment, one brief shining moment, he remembers.

There's nothing there, not anymore.

When he falls into the dark again, into his strange sleep, he's almost relieved because at least then he won't feel so lonely.


Word Count: 577
Verse: Dismantle The Sun

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