Title: Open My Eyes
By: angstytimelord
Pairing: Ianto Jones/Tenth Doctor
Fandom: Torchwood/Doctor Who
Rating: PG-13
Table: VRD challenge - Purple, 5_prompts
Prompt: Under a violet moon
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.

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Ianto leaned back on his elbows, looking up at the moon that shone down on the clearing that they had landed the Tardis in. He'd never seen a violet moon before; it was a strange and beautiful sigh, like many of the things he'd seen since he'd been with the Doctor.

There were times when he almost wanted to cry at the beauty of the world around him, a beauty that he'd rarely noticed before his travels with the Time Lord had opened his eyes. He had missed so much until the Doctor had shown him the wonders of the universe.

How many beautiful sights had he had the opportunity to see, and yet he'd looked right past them? Like the vista that was opening up before him as the moon rose higher in the sky, giving him a chance to see something that he'd never have thought about before.

There had probably been hundreds of sights that he'd had the opportunity to feast his eyes on in his life on Earth -- sights that he'd let his gaze wander past because he hadn't truly learned how to open his eyes and see the world around him.

And how many more would he miss in the future because he was thinking of something else instead of letting himself live in the moment? He wished that he had the Doctor's ability to see everything around him, to focus intently on the present moment in time.

He felt rather than saw the Time Lord leave the Tardis and come towards him; his lips curved in a gentle smile as his lover sat down on the blanket beside him. Ianto leaned back, resting his head in the Doctor's lap, still looking up at the violet moon high above them.

"What are you thinking about?" the Doctor asked softly, brushing a few strands of hair away from Ianto's face and bending forward slightly to kiss his lover's forehead. "You look as though you're lost in thought -- or just enraptured by the light of the moon."

"I was thinking that I've rarely ever seen anything so beautiful as the violet moon in this sky -- until I started traveling the universe with you," Ianto told him, his voice soft. "And wondering how much I missed in the world because I never really opened my eyes to it all."

"Opening your eyes to the world around you and being able to take it all in is an art, Ianto," the Doctor murmured, stroking a hand through his lover's hair. "It's hard to learn to keep all your senses alert to the world around you. There's so much to see."

"You can say that again," Ianto sighed, his gaze moving from the moon to the Time Lord's face. "I keep feeling that I've missed so much in my life because I haven't been focusing on the things that really matter, that I should have paid more attention."

The Doctor shook his head, a small smile on his lips. "You can't think that way, Ianto. You change as you get older, and so does your perspective. When you were younger, you concentrated on what you felt was important to you at that time of your life."

"And what was important to me then aren't the same things that I think are important now," Ianto said, heaving another sigh. "But still .... there's so much that I could have seen that I just overlooked. And I won't have the chance again."

"Oh? Are you so sure of that?" the Doctor asked him, raising an eyebrow. "Do you forget that you're with someone who travels through space and time? If there's anything in particular that you really feel you want the chance to see, we can go to that time and place."

Ianto felt foolish as he listened to his lover speak. How could he have forgotten that the Doctor had the ability to take him back in time? He'd be able to see all those things that he'd overlooked, everything that he'd let escape from his gaze.

Well, maybe not everything, he thought with a smile. There wouldn't be enough time in the world to see all the things he'd missed in his life. But there were things that he wanted to see that he knew he'd missed the first time around.

"Would you mind taking me back to some places I never really paid attention to when I was there?" he asked, reaching for the Doctor's hand. "I don't want you to feel that I'm using you to relive the past, but there are things I want to have a second chance to fully appreciate."

"Don't spend too much time looking back at what you've missed in the past, Ianto," the Doctor cautioned him. "If you do, then you'll never see the views that you could be marveling at today -- or what the view can be like in the future."

Ianto nodded slowly, contemplating the Doctor's words. Was the Time Lord right? Was he concentrating too much on what he'd missed in the past, rather than enjoying the present and turning his gaze towards what he could see in the future?

"I've seen so many things since I've been with you that I never would have dreamed of seeing," he told the Doctor, his tone filled with wonder as he looked back up at the violet moon, the purple rays shining down on them. "And I'm sure that I'll see a lot more."

"So does that mean that you don't feel you need to go back and look at so many things you may have missed in the past?" the Doctor asked with a smile, reaching for Ianto's hand and twining their fingers together. "That's your choice, love."

"I know it is." Ianto paused, then went on, sure that he was making the right decision. "But there are so many other things that I need to see -- and it would be a shame to miss anything in the present because I was so busy looking back at the past."

He smiled as his gaze followed the slow path of the moon as it drifted across the night sky. There would be a lot for him to open his eyes to in the future, and he was sure that all of the sights that were still ahead of him would more than make up for whatever he'd overlooked in the past.

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