Title: Pleasure Little Treasure
By: angstytimelord
Pairing: Tenth Doctor/Ten.5
Fandom: Doctor Who
Rating: R
Table: 4
Prompt: 92, Treasure
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.

***

The Doctor woke from sleep as though he was breaking the surface of calm, still water; no sense of urgency, nothing to pull him out of slumber with a shock and the immediate thought of some kind of danger. No, everything was calm, the air around him still and quiet, the silence broken only by the soft sound of his human counterpart's quiet breathing beside him.

He sat up slightly, moving closer to the other man and spooning behind him. Their bodies seemed to fit together perfectly -- which wasn't surprising, considering that they were both the same body. It was still a somewhat disconcerting thought.

Most people would probably consider the relationship that he had with his human self the most unusual form of masturbation they'd ever heard of. And who would think for a second that someone could fall in love with .... well, themselves? If he thought about it, there were so many odd things about their relationship that it was no wonder no one seemed to approve of them being together.

But he wasn't going to give this man up. The other Doctor was a part of him -- both figuratively and literally. What did it matter that they were essentially the same person? They loved each other, from the depths of their beings. They had been drawn towards each other from the moment of his clone's "birth," and who was he to deny those feelings?

They'd been together for a few weeks now -- well, give or take a bit of time. After all, time was what he had an abundance of .... and something that his human self didn't have. He was human. He would age, and eventually die -- and leave the Doctor alone again. Alone after experiencing the kind of happiness that he'd never thought he would find.

Why couldn't he be like everyone else he knew? the Doctor asked himself, swallowing back the lump that rose in his throat. Why couldn't he find someone to love him, settle in with them, and be happy? Why couldn't he find someone who would want to be with him, who would be willing to give him all that he would be only too happy to give them?

He didn't really have to ask himself those questions, did he? He sighed softly, closing his eyes and bowing his head, struggling not to let the tears pricking behind his closed lids escape. He couldn't have any of those things because of what he was. A Gallifreyan. A Time Lord. The last of his kind. And because he wasn't human.

People had said so often that they would give up everything for him -- and they'd always changed their minds. Would his human self do the same? Somehow, he doubted it. This man knew him through and through -- because this man was him. Half-him, at any rate. His memories, his mind. Even, to some extent, his emotions.

Everyone would eventually leave him. He thought he'd learned that lesson long ago, in a previous life that was so far behind him that the memories of it were hazy. He thought that had been burned into his consciousness from birth onwards.

But it was so easy to forget that, to make himself think that the humans he close to be his companions would gladly stay there forever. Of course they wouldn't. They were eager for the adventure he could offer them, the excitement, the novelty -- for a while. But they would always tire of it. Tire of him.

But this .... this was different. His human self would understand his fears of being abandoned, of being alone. He'd felt that same loneliness -- well, at least in his memories. Maybe not firsthand, but he knew what it was like. He knew what it was to feel alone in a universe that seemed to pair off everyone else two by two, like the story of animals on an ark.

One arm was draped over the other Doctor's stomach, his hand splayed on his human self's chest. He could feel that single heartbeat in his clone's chest; how did it feel to have only one heart? He could never begin to imagine it himself, but the other man had remarked on it more than once. He still didn't appear to be used to it.

How did it feel to have the mind of a Time Lord trapped in a human body? His own senses recoiled at the thought; once, there had been a part of him that longed to be human, and even though he didn't remember much of what he'd said and done when he was in a human body, he knew that he'd wanted to remain there, to have a life that wasn't dictated by what he was.

He'd had to give that up, and if he was truthful with himself, he probably wouldn't have been very good at being human for a lifetime, anyway. He was too entrenched in the life that he had -- even though there were times when he would have given anything in the universe to be able to throw off that mantle of responsibility and do what he wanted.

There was still so much for the two of them to face; the disapproval of all the people he cared about on Earth, and the disappointment of his friends. They'd somehow all thought that he was going to do the "noble" thing, the "right" thing. But he hadn't been able to -- no, for once in his long, long life, he'd been selfish, and taken what he wanted.

Besides, there wasn't only himself to think about. He'd done what his human self had wanted by keeping the other man with him. He hadn't wanted to go off to a parallel universe, to spend what life he had with someone he didn't love, pretending to be something he wasn't.

He wouldn't condemn anyone he cared about to a life like that. No matter what others thought, this man belonged with him, in his arms, in his hearts. So it might seem strange to others, this undeniable attraction between them. Maybe it proved that he was the most vain bugger in the universe, in any time. He didn't care. He was happy, and so was his human self.

For once, he was going to put his own happiness in front of others. He'd never allowed himself to do that before; he'd always given up what he wanted most so that others could have their happiness -- after all, they had such short lives, and he had .... much more. He wasn't like them. He never could be. That had been driven home to him time and time again.

But this time .... this time, things were different. He'd done the selfish thing, and now that he had, he had to continue to be selfish. He'd taken one step down this path, and he wasn't going to go back and change anything -- or give his human self over to what others considered right. No, he was going to stay on the road they were traveling, no matter how hard it might get.

The Doctor's arm tightened around his clone's waist, another soft sigh coming from his lips. He bowed his head again to brush gentle kisses against the other man's bare shoulder, his throat, his cheek. He had every right to this happiness. He'd lived over 900 years waiting for it -- and it was past time he stopped denying himself what he needed.

This man was his treasure, his hearts and soul, his .... he'd run out of words. He was everything that the Doctor had ever wanted, and there was no way the Time Lord would surrender that happiness. He'd spent a lifetime doing that. No more.

The Doctor slid an arm under his clone, wrapping both thin arms around the other man and pulling him close. It felt a little strange to be in the more dominant position; thus far, he hadn't been, not with this man -- and as it wasn't something he generally preferred, that had been fine with him. But now .... for some reason, he was wondering what it would be like.

What would it be like to make love to a man who was essentially himself? Would that give him any insight into what other men had felt when they'd been inside him? The Doctor pushed that thought away as soon as it occurred to him. No, he didn't want to think of what might potentially happen between them in those sorts of terms.

Thinking of his human self in that way almost seemed as though he was reducing the other man to the status of a human guinea pig -- someone to experiment with, a thing to be used to find out what others might think of him. And that would never work -- besides not wanting to reduce their relationship to something clinical, his human self wasn't him.

Or was he? No, of course he wasn't. They had the same memories, and his human self had the mind of a Time Lord trapped in a very human body -- something that wasn't going to be easy for him to deal with, whether he was with the Doctor or not. Eventually, that disparity had to cause him some problems. It was inevitable.

And the Doctor wanted to be there to deal with all of those problems. He wanted to be able to help his human self through them as much as possible -- and he was probaby the only person who might be able to do that. Well, he couldn't help the other man with his humanity. That was obvious. But he could help him with those memories that they shared, if nothing else.

Was he only grasping at straws, searching for a sustainable reason for why he'd kept this man with him? No, he told himself fiercely, closing his eyes and resting his cheek against the clone Doctor's shoulder. He didn't need any reason other than that he loved this man and wanted to be with him.

The human Doctor stirred, shifting his position slightly next to the Doctor. His eyes opened, his head turning to look at the Time Lord out of the corner of his eye. His expression was startled, as though he hadn't expected to find his lover nearly wrapped around him. He probably hadn't, thought the Doctor affectionately, bowing his head to press a gentle kiss to the other's soft mouth.

"I didn't mean to disturb you," he said softly, lifting one hand to stroke the other man's tawny hair back from his forehead. "I was just .... thinking."

"I know," his human self said, his voice equally soft. "I could feel your thoughts. It's like they're .... pushing against my mind, beating at whatever barriers I have between you and me. They're trying to get in -- and a part of me is afraid to let them. But another, larger part of me wants to let them in, even though I know it probably wouldn't be a good idea."

"No, I don't think it would," the Doctor said, frowning a little. "We're obviously much alike -- even down to our memories. But it wouldn't be a good thing to let what's separate in us meld into each other. You, my love, need to retain your individuality -- your humanity. And if you let my thoughts twine into yours, that might become much harder for you to do."

The human Doctor sighed, sitting up and running a hand through his hair. The Doctor watched him, leaning back against the pillows, keeping one hand on the other man's hip. There was something in him that didn't want to relinquish that touch; it was almost a physical pain to feel the other man sit up and to lose that full-body contact.

"Is something wrong?" he asked softly, reaching out tentatively to trail soft fingertips down the clone's slender back. His fingers stopped at the small dark mole directly between the other man's shoulder blades; only one more indication that they were exactly the same, at least outwardly. There were so many other things that made his human self different, unique.

The human Doctor shifted his position, turning around to face his lover. Instead of settling back down into bed, he moved to the right, turning the Doctor onto his back and straddling his lower body. Leaning down, he caught the Doctor's hands in his own, brushing a kiss against the Time Lord's parted lips, breathing out soft words as he did.

"Nothing's wrong except your doubts," he whispered against the Doctor's lips, placing his hands on either side of the Time Lord's face as he drew away. "There's nothing to doubt, Doctor. I'm here, I'm with you, and you don't need a reason to keep me here. No other reason other than that we love each other, we're part of each other, and we belong together."

"You can hear my thoughts?" The Doctor was startled at this new development, but he knew that he shouldn't have been. They were, after all, the same person -- in so many ways. It made sense that his human self would know what he was thinking, how he felt -- everything about him. And strangely enough, the thought didn't bother him in the least.

"Of course I can," his human self murmured, leaning down to kiss him again. "Why shouldn't I be able to? After all, I am you -- in so many ways. We have no secrets from each other, Doctor. We couldn't." He paused for a moment, his dark eyes meeting the Doctor's gaze. "You're my treasure too, you know. One that I never intend to give up."

"That's reassuring to know." The Doctor smiled up at his lover, feeling his worries dissipate and drift away. What did he have to worry about? In the end, all that mattered was how the two of them felt. This was his life -- his, and his human self. No one else had a say in it -- and this life was going to be what the two of them made it.

"And now that I have you right where I want you ...." The human Doctor's voice trailed off as his arms slid around the Gallifreyan, pulling him close and molding that slender body against his own. The Doctor couldn't answer; the other man's embrace took his breath away, reducing his speech to a soft, low moan.

Besides, he thought as he closed his eyes and gave himself over to his human self, they didn't need words. They seemed to be doing just fine at expressing what they felt without them.

***