Title: Changing Every Day
By: angstytimelord
Pairing: Tenth Doctor/Ten.5
Fandom: Doctor Who
Rating: PG-13
Table: 10_per_genre
Prompt: 7, Change
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 leaned his head against the doorframe of the Tardis as he looked out, reluctant to leave the ship without the Doctor by his side. It wasn't that he didn't enjoy being on Earth, but he much preferred to have his lover with him when he ventured out.

He really shouldn't feel that way, should he? The question was one that he turned over in his mind on a regular basis, and yet had no answer for. Yet he felt that he knew the answer, and that he never let himself admit to that because he didn't like what he would hear.

He wasn't afraid of being human. It simply wasn't what he wanted to be. He hadn't asked for this; he hadn't asked to have a body that would age and die quickly, and he certainly hadn't asked to be stuck in a body with only one heart.

Pressing his hand against his chest, he grimaced as he felt the single heartbeat against his palm. He supposed that he should be thankful that his heartbeat was steady and strong; there was obviously nothing wrong with the heart that was beating there.

But it was still only one heart. That was something that he didn't think he would ever get used to. It was still disconcerting to realize that there wasn't a dual heartbeat in his chest, that he didn't have all the abilities of a Time Lord.

It would be so much easier if he didn't have a Time Lord brain, if he was just .... a garden-variety human. Jamie allowed himself a wry smile at the thought. He had sprung from a part of the Doctor; one thing he would never be was normal, as long as he had the Doctor's memories.

And if he didn't have them .... Jamie closed his eyes, wishing that he could push these disturbing thoughts away and lock them into the back of his mind. He didn't want to think about losing that strong connection with the Doctor. The very idea was terrifying.

What did he have if he lost the Doctor? Nothing. That was what he would have had if he'd been forced to go away to a parallel universe with someone he didn't love and didn't want to be with, wasting his life in a relationship that was anathema to him.

If he had been forced into that relationship, it would have changed everything he was. He would have had to contort himself to fit what she wanted him to be, instead of being himself. And he would have spent his life being unhappy and wanting what he couldn't have.

It would have meant changing himself in every possible way, denying who he really was. That was something he couldn't do; he couldn't pretend that he wasn't in love with the Doctor and didn't want to be with him. He coudn't turn his back on the man he loved.

He was already so changed from what he was used to. He could still remember what it had been like to have the Tardis in his mind; her warm, comforting presence wasn't there any more, because he was now in a human body. He didn't have the Doctor's telepathic abilities.

The memories were there, but so much of what he'd been was gone. He wasn't a Time Lord, even though he still had the brain of a Gallifreyan; he was human, with all the frailties and failings of a human body. It wasn't a position he enjoyed being in.

Why had everything about him had to change? Jamie asked himself, clenching his fists. Why had he ended up with a body that he didn't want to be in? Why couldn't fate have simply duplicated the Doctor and given him someone who could be exactly like him?

That would have been too easy, he told himself, another wry smile flitting across his face. It would have been simple for fate to give the Doctor a perfect clone of himself, with no shortcomings and no obvious flaws. And that would have made his own life far too simple and comfortable.

He really didn't have the right to complain at all. After all, he was here, he was alive. If he was anything other than human, he might not be. Maybe this was what fate had intended all along, and if he wasn't what he was, then he simply wouldn't have come into existence.

And he had to admit that if he'd had to be in a human body, this one was certainly beautiful. The Doctor had loved this face and this body from the first moment he'd seen them, and Jamie had to admit that he felt the same way. He couldn't complain about being attractive.

But what did being attractive matter, when this body would inevitably age and die? Death came to everyone, of course, but it would come to him far too soon. And that would leave the Doctor alone, his hearts broken yet again by the loss of a loved one.

Jamie wished that he could wave some sort of magic wand that would change him from the human he was to someone who could be with the Doctor forever, who could give the Time Lord everything that he needed. A human couldn't do that, as much as they might want to.

But would the Doctor want him to change? Or was the Time Lord happy with him as he was, even though he was obviously flawed? Jamie bit his lip, trying to wrap his mind around a possible answer to that question, an answer that he couldn't formulate.

The only way to know for sure how the Doctor felt about him being human was to ask the other man. And he was hesitant to bring up the subject; he didn't want to upset the Doctor, or make his lover think that he was somehow to blame for giving Jamie a flawed existence.

He wanted to change what he was, but that wasn't possible. He was going to have to learn to live with having a human body, despite all of its flaws and annoyances. And he would have to get used to the fact that he would have a much shorter life span.

The Doctor seemed to be perfectly happy with him as he was, human frailties and all. The Time Lord hadn't expected him to be anything other than what he was, and Jamie was grateful for that. He just hoped that his lover would never expect him to be something that he wasn't.

He knew that if he was in another universe, he would be expected to be much more than he was, to live up to who the Doctor was. And he knew that he could never do that. He might look like the Doctor, but even with their shared memories, they were two different men.

He didn't want to be the Doctor. There was no way that he could be; in spite of what they shared, there was only one of him, and Jamie knew that his own slender shoulders couldn't bear the weight of all that the Time Lord had carried with him for centuries.

No, his purpose was to be there to support the Doctor, to be his companion -- and his lover. He had a place in the world, a place that no one else would ever be able to fill. The Doctor had told him as much, and he had heard the love and sincerity in the Time Lord's words.

And anyway, wasn't he changing every day that he was in the Doctor's world? Wasn't his lover giving him new experiences with each place that they visited -- even the places they had been to before? After all, he was seeing these places with new eyes -- human eyes.

He was changing. He was learning what it was to be human, without having a human here by his side to teach him. He was becoming human on his own terms, not simply taking what others told him was right and trying to live by those rules.

That wasn't a bad kind of change, Jamie told himself. The changes he was making in himself were making him a stronger person -- and equipping him for life in a human body. Because, like it or not, he had to learn to live with this body.

He might be human, but he was still a part of the Doctor. That was something that would never change; it was irrevocable, and he could cling to it as a kind of security blanket. No matter what else might change, that fact would always stay the same.

Jamie smiled as he turned away from the door to look back into the control room. He intended to face up to whatever changes the future might bring, and as long as he remembered that the man by his side would always be a part of him, he knew that he could meet those changes head on.

***