The Master Calls

Chapter 13

They drove back to the house and she went to her bedroom, deciding to get a shower. She stripped off her shirt and felt the ache in her shoulder, noticing that it was taped over with a gauze pad. She went and stood in front of the mirror and gently pried it off to get a better look at the wound.

She blinked in surprise. It had been a long time since she had seen an injury on herself that hadn't healed rapidly.

The wound was a bit smaller than her fist and still looked raw, the beginnings of a scab starting to form. The outer edges were bruised a purple and green color. This was going to take more than two week to heal fully. Even she had to admit that.

"Let me clean that and bandage it back up," the Master said from behind her.

"Can't we run the dermal regenerator over it? Help it heal quicker?" she asked, turning to him. Her horror vastly outweighed her embarrassment of facing him topless.

"I have been using the dermal regenerator," he said calmly.

Her eyes widened. "Really? And it still looks like this?"

"If it's any consolation, it looks better than what it did last week."

She turned back to look in the mirror. She had taken her healing powers for granted all these years, never imagining a day where she would encounter something that she couldn't heal from.

"Sit on the bed," he said softly.

She complied and he gently cleaned the wound and placed some salve onto it before patching it up with the gauze pad. He was clinical and methodical, his focus entirely on tending to her wound.

"Take a bath instead and try not to get it wet. I'll get the bags packed."

He stood to leave, but stopped and looked down at her, his eyes swirling with some emotion that she could not name. "I'm glad you're OK, Rose."

She smiled up at him. "Me, too," she whispered.

He smiled back and left, leaving her to get bathed and dressed.

An hour later she came downstairs, dressed in jeans, sneakers and a pale pink top. She shrugged on her leather jacket. In the kitchen she found food waiting for her on the table. It was simple, a Caesar salad and chicken. She hadn't eaten in two weeks and knew her stomach had shrunk. She made some tea and ate silently at the table, wondering idly where the Master was. She cleaned up her dishes and went to look for him. There were two suitcases waiting by the front door. She went up to his room, but he wasn't there. His room was neat and tidy, the bed made and everything in order. The room was dark, from black curtains and bedding, to the furniture of dark wood. There was no doubt that this indeed was his room.

She heard the door open and she went downstairs to find him. She stopped dead in her tracks. He stood before her in his expensive black suit, his bleach blonde hair now brown and styled all business-like. She blinked, not knowing whether she liked this looked. She kind of fancied the blonde hair on him.

"What do you think?" he asked stoically.

"You didn't really take my comment about your hair seriously, did you?" she asked.

"No. Yes. A bit. But the blonde reminded me of when I was absolutely bonkers. It came with a regeneration gone wrong, a regeneration that left me intensely insane."

She came up to him and cupped his cheek. "You're not that man anymore."

His hands came up and rested lightly on her hips. "I came very close, when I thought I had lost you. I would have murdered Luloxia and I would have dragged out her death, made her feel every ounce of pain I was feeling."