Title: Come in From the Rain
By: angstytimelord
Pairing: Ianto Jones/Tenth Doctor
Fandom: Torchwood/Doctor Who
Rating: PG-13
Table: 4
Prompt: 13, Warm
Disclaimer: This is entirely a product of my imagination, and I make no profit from it. I do not own Ianto Jones or the Tenth Doctor. Please do not sue.

***

The Doctor burst into the interior of the Tardis with Ianto right on his heels, shaking his head and making tiny droplets of moisture fly everywhere. With a groan, he bounded up the steps to the console, leaning over it and pressing a few buttons.

"There," he muttered as both men felt the familiar displacement of time and space shifting around them. "I didn't expect London to be so damned inhospitable. Remind me to check the weather channel before we decide to go out without an umbrella, will you?"

Ianto couldn't help but laugh at the annoyed look on his lover's face. He knew that the Doctor usually didn't mind slogging around in the rain, but this downpour had caught them by surprise. If they'd had the foresight to carry some sort of cover, they'd have been better off.

But they hadn't -- and they'd gotten caught in the middle of a park in the rain. They'd simply been taking a leisurely stroll, enjoying themselves, when the rain had begun to come down in sheets, without any sort of warning whatsoever.

They could have taken shelter in the nearest café, or some place where they could have gotten dried off, but the Doctor had been in no mood to do so.

No, he'd been thoroughly disgruntled at getting caught in a downpour with no shelter. Ianto didn't blame him, really. His own shoes were soaked through, and he was sure that the Doctor's were as well. They were both thoroughly uncomfortable.

At least the Tardis had warmed the interior of the ship only moments after they'd stumbled in, he told himself, feeling grateful to her for doing so. She'd done it more for the Doctor's comfort than his own, of course, but that was only to be expected.

After all, she wouldn't want the Time Lord to catch a cold -- which, in spite of his Gallifreyan physiology, he still seemed ot be susceptible to. Ianto couldn't help smiling again at the thought that the common cold seemed to plague the entire galaxy, not just Earth.

The two of them really needed to get out of their wet things and get warm, Ianto thought to himself, glancing up at the Doctor as he bent to pull off his shoes and socks. The Time Lord had flung himself down on the couch, bending to take off his own shoes.

"It's not that bad, love," he soothed the other man, going to sit down beside him. "Yes, we're soaked, but we'll quickly get dry again."

The Doctor scowled, refusing to be cheered out of his bad mood. "Ianto, I'm squelching. And cold!" he added, rubbing his hands over his arms. "It wouldn't have been so bad if it was a nice warm rain. But no -- it was freezing."

He couldn't argue with that, Ianto thought ruefully. It had indeed been a cold downpour, and even though they'd hurried back to the Tardis as quickly as they could, they'd still been thoroughly soaked before they'd gone more than a few feet.

"Come on, sweetheart," he said, getting to his feet and reaching for the Doctor's hand. "Let's go get out of these wet clothes and curl up in bed. We both need to get warm, and I think we can both agree that's the best way to do it."

The Doctor sighed, letting Ianto pull him to his feet and wrap an arm around his waist. "You really don't want to let me be annoyed about this, do you?" he murmured, shaking his head. "You're determined to see the better side of the situation."

"Usually you would, too," Ianto told him, wondering why the Time Lord was so upset about the two of them getting caught in the rain. "Why are you in such a temper over this?"

"I just don't like the rain," the Doctor explained, running a hand through his wet hair and making a face. "I've had to deal with catching colds from being out in a cold rain before, and it's given me a distaste for being rained on. I'm like a cat, I suppose."

Ianto laughed, pulling the Time Lord close against him as the two of them headed into the corridor that led to their bedroom. "Somehow, I think there's more to it than that. You really seemed more put out about getting wet than merely because you don't like it."

The Doctor was silent as they entered their bedroom, starting to unbutton his jacket and strip it off, his shirt quickly following it. He'd unzipped his trousers and was sliding the clinging fabric down his long legs before he spoke again, his voice quiet.

"When I was very young, there were times when I would go out to play and not come in when it started raining. My father would tell me that I didn't have the sense to come in out of the rain, and that I would never achieve my dream of becoming a Time Lord if I didn't use my brain."

Now it was Ianto's turn to scowl; this was a part of the Doctor's personal history that he'd never heard before. He couldn't imagine a parent saying something so scathing to a child.

"He should never have said that to you," Ianto said softly, stripping out of his own clothes as quickly as he could and going to the bed, pulling back the covers so that the Doctor could slip under them before he did so himself and pulled the blankets closely around them.

"No, he shouldn't have," the Doctor sighed, resting his head against Ianto's chest as his young lover wrapped strong arms around him. "It strained our relationship from that moment on. It seemed that I could never do anything to please him."

"Not even after you became a Time Lord?" Ianto asked, unable to keep the question back. The Doctor shook his head mutely, and Ianto pulled him closer, wishing that there was some way he could comfort the small child that the Doctor had been so many centuries ago.

"Well, if you don't have the sense to come in from the rain, then I obviously don't either," Ianto mused, hoping that he could take the Doctor's mind away from that long-ago hurt. "I used to stay out in the rain when I was a child, and I was forever catching colds because of it."

The Doctor smiled, laying a hand on Ianto's chest as he snuggled closer against his lover. "I can just picture you a child out in the rain, with wet hair and dreams in your eyes."

Ianto laughed, nodding and agreeing with the Doctor. "I certainly had dreams. And I've been very lucky to have some of them come true," he whispered, pressing a soft kiss to the top of the Doctor's head. "Especially the one about finding someone to love."

"I've always had that dream, too," the Doctor told him quietly, tilting his head back to look up at the younger man. "And a day doesn't go by when I don't thank whatever deities might exist in the universe for letting me have that dream fulfilled."

Ianto was silent for a few moments, blinking back the tears that came into his eyes at the Doctor's words. Finally, he spoke, saying the only thing he could think of. "I don't need the blankets to keep me warm. Not when I can hear the warmth in your voice when you say those words."

"There are other ways for us to keep warm," the Doctor murmured, his voice husky and a bit breathless. "We've already compiled a pretty good list of things that are good for that -- but I'm sure that we can add a lot more to that list if we try."

"If this is the aftermath of getting caught in a rainstorm, then I think we ought to do it more often," Ianto chuckled as he rolled the Doctor over onto his back. He leaned down to kiss the Time Lord, forgetting all about the rain as he lost himself in a growing storm of a far different kind.

***