Title: Cruel To Be Kind
By: angstytimelord
Pairing: Tenth Doctor/Ten.5
Fandom: Doctor Who
Rating: PG-13
Table: 5, 12_stories
Prompt: 7, Kindness
Author's Note: The human version of the Doctor is being referred to as John Smith in this fic, since it's the Doctor's human alias and his clone needed a name.
Author's Note: Spoilers for Journey's End, somewhat. This is an completely alternate take on the ending of Season Four.
Disclaimer: This is entirely a product of my own imagination, and I make no profit from it. I do not own the Tenth Doctor, or his human clone. Please do not sue.

***

Jamie rested his forehead on his knees as he looked out at the view from the hilltop that he and the Doctor were sitting on, heaving a sigh. Every time he was on this planet, he tried to feel an affinity for it, but thus far, it hadn't been possible.

This was Earth, the place where others of his race resided, the place that he more than likely belonged more than any other. Yet he could never feel that he would be happy or comfortable here; it just didn't seem like a place he wanted to be.

He was human. This was the planet where he should feel the most at home, the most comfortable of any other place he'd been. But somehow, being here always made him feel uneasy, as though he could easily be left here and told to learn what it was to be human.

That was the stuff that his worst nightmares were made of. Jamie knew that the Doctor wouldn't dream of doing that to him; he'd talked with the Time Lord about his fears enough to be reassured that he would never be left here in that way.

Why, then, did he feel so uneasy when they were on this planet? The Doctor had no intention of making him stay here. There was no reason for him to feel this sort of apprehension. There was no reason for himto dislike being here, none at all.

Maybe Earth only made him feel so uncomfortable because he was so much like the humans here -- but yet, not like them at all. Yes, he had a human body; he couldn't deny that, as much as he wanted to at times. That part of him was just the natives to this planet.

But he didn't have a mind like theirs. He had a Time Lord brain, and always would. He didn't see things the way that humans did; he would never be like them in that respect. He would always think like a Time Lord, in spite of his human physiology.

The Doctor had certainly done him a kindness by taking him out into time and space and not expecting him to learn to live as a human, Jamie thought with an inward shudder. He could never do that, not even if something happened to the Doctor and he was forced into it.

That was an eventuality he didn't want to think about. Nothing was going to happen to his lover, he told himself fiercely, pushing the thought away from him and burying it in the back of his mind. The Doctor was safe, and he was going to stay that way.

Jack and all of the Time Lord's friends had thought that it would be best for him to learn how to live as a human, to be among humans -- even to have a relationship with a human who he didn't care for as anything more than friend. A life that he never wanted to lead.

They might have seen their proposal for how he should live his life as a kindness, Jamie thought, a scowl settling onto his features. But he would never see it in that way. For him, it would have been a fate worse than death.

He would have been separated from the man he loved, from the only way of life he'd ever known -- or wanted to know. That wouldn't have been a kindness to him -- it would have been the worst thing that could possibly have happened.

Jamie felt rather than heard the Doctor coming out of the Tardis to sit down behind him; he closed his eyes and leaned back into that protective embrace, letting the tension seep out of him as he felt the Time Lord's arms wrap around his waist.

"Is something bothering you?" the Doctor murmured, brushing his lips against Jamie's cheek. "You're awfully tense, love. And I've noticed that you don't seem to be like this unless we're on Earth. I think this planet somehow has bad connotations for you."

"I --" Jamie sighed, shaking his head. He didn't want to lie to his lover; the words he'd been going to say about how being on Earth didn't bother him the slightest died before he could speak them. "It does," he said softly, tugging absently at a handful of grass.

"It shouldn't," the Doctor told him, his arms tightening around Jamie's waist and pulling the other man close against his own slender body. "Jamie, you're human. You should feel a kinship with this planet. It's where others of your kind are, after all. Even if you're not among them."

"I hope that I never will be," Jamie blurted out, turning his head to look at his lover. "I don't want to learn how to be human, Doctor. I don't want to spend my life here. This isn't the place for me, whether I'm physically human or not. I'll never be like the rest of them."

"I know you won't, sweetheart," the Time Lord said, looking surprised by Jamie's outburst. "And I don't expect you to be like other humans. You can't be. You have a Time Lord brain. You'll never think like them. Earth isn't a place where you'd fit in."

"I don't fit in anywhere," Jamie murmured, voicing a fear that had been growing in him for quite a while. "I'm not a Time Lord. I'm not completely human. I don't fit into any one place. I'm something that there isn't any precedent for. I'm the only one of my kind."

"A human with a Time Lord brain," the Doctor said softly, raising a hand to stroke Jamie's hair. "Yes, you're the only one of your kind. The prototype. Just as I'm the only one left of my kind. So we do fit in somewhere, Jamie. We fit together."

"Did you think it would be doing me a kindness to take me with you?" Jamie asked, his voice trembling a little. "Is that why you wanted me to be with you? Was it more because you wanted to be kind than because you were falling in love with me?"

The Doctor shook his head emphatically. "No, that wasn't it at all," he said, his voice firm and strong. "Jamie, I took you with me because I wanted to be with you. Because I knew that you belonged with me, not with someone who didn't really love you. And not just to be kind."

"All of your friends thought it would be kinder of you to have me go with her," Jamie said, sighing again. "They didn't seem to understand that I belong with you. And that she only wanted me because I look like you. That wasn't love. It was .... greed."

The Doctor nodded, looking out at the vista spread before them. "Yes, it was," he said quietly. "There was no way that I was going to give you up, Jamie. I thought that I should at first -- but my hearts told me otherwise. And I had to listen to them."

"I'm glad you did, instead of listening to the people around you," Jamie whispered, turning slightly in the Doctor's embrace to rest his cheek against the Time Lord's shoulder. "If you had, then I might have been separated from you forever. I know that's what you wanted at first."

The Doctor shook his head, placing a finger under Jamie's chin and tilting his lover's face up to look into his eyes. "No, it wasn't what I wanted. It was what I thought I had to do. And yes,at the time, I thought that I'd have to be cruel to be kind to you. But I realised that I was wrong."

"It would never have been a kindness," Jamie told him, blinking rapidly to hold back tears. "I wouldn't have wanted to live like that. Not only in a place I didn't know, forced to be with a person I didn't love who didn't love me, but away from you. That would have been hell."

"It would have been hell for me to be separated from you," the Doctor whispered, bowing his head to brush Jamie's lips with his own. "Fortunately for us, I recognised that in time and took you away with me. And I have no regrets."

"Neither do I," Jamie said, closing his eyes and sighing in relief. The Doctor hadn't just taken him in as an act of kindness. The Time Lord loved him and wanted him; they were meant to be together. The other man felt that just as strongly as he himself did.

He was exactly where he belonged, and if fate was kind to them, he would never have to leave. Jamie looked out over the houses far below them, a smile tugging at his lips. Earth really wasn't that bad a place, really -- at least for people who were fully human.

***