Black Stars

...

The stars opened their dead eyes, and this side of the world was cold and empty again. If he could only feel it, he would shiver as he stared into the terrifying face of the night. All he could do now was sigh phlegmatically.

The Doctor hadn't seen that shimmering sky blackness since the night the Foundation found him. The stench of the Great Dying was still in the air then, but a light breeze was already blowing it away, giving it a clean and immaculate smell at last. Today, once again, he was almost suffocated by the stench of disease in the room of the only healthy person. He held his hand and watched him slowly walk away toward the dead stars. Maybe he was immune to the Plague, maybe he was just under the protection of the wheel of Fortune, who knows... it's too late to find out now. And now the Doctor stood on the porch and tried to see the soulless faces.

The man in the black suit took another drag, tossed the cigarette butt under his feet, and twirled the toe of his shoe. He looked expectantly at the former object 049, ready for any action of his ward.

The doctor glanced at him, then returned his attention to the empty, illuminated sky.

"The stars here aren't the same as outside the city. You won't see anything anyway," The shoe creaked nervously, and her arms crossed over her chest.

But the man in the suit doesn't realize that the black stars can only be seen in the yellow sky, they are lost in the diamond placer. The doctor tried for a few more moments to remember the incredible constellations that the masked lord had once shown him, but with a sigh of disappointment, he followed his escort companion.

.........

As he entered his room, the Doctor's gaze immediately fell on three snide voids framed by snow-white porcelain. They, too, noticed him, and began to sing him the only audible song.

"Good night, my love. How did it go? I hope these guys didn't bother you too much."

If he had had lips under that beak, he would have come over and kissed that faience brow in a matter-of-fact gesture. The thought was painfully slow and barely noticeable in the stream of tired consciousness. Instead, the Doctor stood and watched as the human androgynous creature dropped the book and bounced up to him cheerfully.

"It's... all right," the Doctor managed.

But the blackness of the eye sockets didn't believe him.

Maybe if he had had a human face that expressed absolute calm, then he wouldn't have been so puzzled by the eerie emptiness behind the mask. He would have lifted the corners of his lips a little, pouring all the remaining tenderness into the gesture, just to calm it down.

"Don't be so distant, dear. I just want you to be okay. So what really happened, huh?"

The swarming void tried again to gently crawl into the Doctor's soul, but he lowered his gaze. The feeling was similar to the way he had looked at the illuminated sky today, but now it was him who was looking at it, not him.

Deathly pale fingers tugged at the leather glove, forcing the rest of his body forward. If there had been an ordinary hand under it, the Doctor would have felt the sick cold of someone else's touch. But even without that, he knew perfectly well that the patient was more dead than alive. This girl... This was the only time he had allowed someone else to dictate the terms of the operation. And now this body of a young lady has become another mannequin under the Mask. Twisted, it no longer looked like its former owner, and it no longer mattered what this walking corpse had been before.

The Doctor sighed wearily.

"Is it that bad? Well, don't worry! Honey, you better get some rest, okay? I'll read to you..."

He'd been so mentally exhausted lately that he didn't want to interrupt the chatter, or resist someone else's touch, or even control his own stream of consciousness. Strange thoughts have been coming to the Doctor's mind more and more lately, and if he had driven them away before, today he has given in to them.

He began to get used to this strange clown and even seemed to believe in his stories about Alagadda. If it weren't for the memory lapses, he might still have memories of such a distant past, but no matter how hard he tried, the fog wouldn't clear. He could only hope that this strange mask wasn't lying, at least about the fact that he, the Doctor, had been in that city before.

The tall figure in black practically collapsed onto the bed, and another one sat down next to him. Blue eyes lazily watched the small androgynous from under their lashes. The body was painted completely pitch black with a strange acrid substance, and the mask on his face seemed wrong, ridiculous, and disproportionately large. "It should be clearly on the taller person. Taller than me... " floated through the Doctor's mind. And then something flared up, then went out, some distant memory: Lords always rise above the crowd.

Under a yellow sky and black stars.

A large glove rested on someone else's knee, drawing attention.

"Tell me about Alagadda."

The snide blackness of the eye sockets stirred uneasily in perplexity. It was as if it was asking if the Doctor really wanted to name it. But the blue eyes made it clear that everything was heard correctly.

"As you wish, my love, " and for the first time wanted to believe in an unmoving smile.

The black ice of the fingers lay gently on the huge hand.

And the story began to flow. The story of a beautiful, disgusting golden city. About its never-ending streets, ringing halls, deserted houses, quiet palaces. A king who will never leave his throne as long as he remains a prisoner of his kingdom. About his own citizens, who observe the perverse laws of the shining city. And of course about the incredible constellations of the yellow sky.

The story was lulling, rocking on the waves of intimate whispers, and now the Doctor saw firsthand the incredible sky above the incredible city. A completely irrational light was pouring from these darkest stars. In an incomprehensible way, they illuminated every street, cul-de-sac, and square. Nothing seemed to escape those black eyes.

But he knew, he knew, that it was not so! Nothing is impossible for the powerful, for the great Lords of the independent city of Alagadda. There is nothing they cannot hide from, nothing they cannot see. And as clearly as the Doctor saw the black stars in the yellow sky, so clearly did the Lord in the mask of Anguished once see his soul.

There's no need to hide from the truth now, is there?

He is not one of the Lords of Alagadda, so how can he hide from the all-seeing black eyes?!

They had noticed him, and he could no longer escape their gaze, nor forget their sinister, captivating radiance. Never, never again...

...

The small fingers slid gently over the snow-white beak.

"Sleep well, my dear friend."

If only the Doctor hadn't needed a normal human sleep, he would have noticed the snide, protective darkness watching over him again.