Title: Emotional Rescue
By: angstytimelord
Pairing: Tenth Doctor/Peter Carlisle
Fandom: Doctor Who/Blackpool
Rating: PG-13
Table: prompt_palooza
Prompt: 51, Rescue
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 Peter Carlisle. Please do not sue.

***

Peter leaned back on his elbows, looking up at the blue sky above him. It had been a while since he and the Doctor had visited Earth, and he always felt a certain nostalgia at coming back. It stirred something in him to be back on his home planet.

It still made him feel terribly sad that his lover would never be able to feel this way; the Doctor couldn't go back to his home, see it in living color all around him. Peter couldn't imagine what it was like to feel so alone, so cut adrift from one's home.

But the Doctor had him, and he was determined to make the Time Lord happy in every way that he possibly could. He thought that he was doing a fairly good job of it, though sometimes they did have their little disagreements. But that was only to be expected.

In fact, they'd had far fewer arguments than Peter had thought they would. When he'd been involved with women, it seemed that he spent more time arguing with them than anything else. But with the Doctor, those arguments were few and far between.

He'd been happier with the Doctor than he'd ever been with anyone in his life. There had been small disturbances in the complete peace of their existence together, but they were expected. The two of them could easily get past the small things.

Would there be larger disturbances? Peter didn't think so. After all, they'd been together for a while now, and neither of them had felt any kind of need to stray, or to indulge in petty jealousies or fears of their partner straying. It was the best relationship he'd ever been in.

When he'd first met the Doctor, he would have scoffed at anyone who'd told him that he would fall head over heels in love with a man. He'd have said that he only wanted the woman who'd been on his mind; that she was the center of his universe.

The Doctor had proven him wrong so quickly, Peter thought with an affectionate smile. It had only taken one night -- really, only one kiss -- for him to have his world and everything he'd thought about himself and what he wanted turned upside down.

If he was completely honest with himself, he'd been an emotional wreck on that night. He'd wanted to search for that woman; that was why he'd come to Las Vegas. But something had held him back, kept him from making a fool of himself over someone who no longer wanted him.

The small smile on his lips was replaced by a scowl at the thought. He hadn't meant anything to her. He'd only been a way for her to get away from a marraige she was tired of, a life she no longer wanted. There had been no love there, even though she'd pretended well.

He had only been a means to an end, and when she was tired of him, she'd thrown him away and gone back to her husband, the man she'd always managed to cling to even during the time she'd stayed with Peter. And she would go on to the next man to use after him, he was sure.

Her games had made him an emotional wreck, long before he'd met the Doctor. Why had he kept forcing himself to hold on for so long, even though he'd known in heart what she was really like? He had no answer for that question.

Yes, he did, Peter told himself with a soft sigh. He'd jumped into that relationship with both feet, letting lust carry him forward and mistaking it for love. No, he'd known that it wasn't love. He'd just been afraid to tell himself the truth and face up to it.

He'd closed his eyes to the knowledge that his relationship with her was essentially empty, that it was one-sided, that she was only pretending when he'd been sincere. And because of that, he'd invested far too much of himself emotionally, and had paid the price.

When the Doctor had first met him, he'd been in need of an emotional rescue. And that was certainly what he'd gotten, Peter told himself, the smile slowly reappaearing on his features. A rescue that had been completely unexpected, but welcomed nonetheless.

He would never have thought that he would readily give up his job, his home, and leave Earth to travel in a blue phone box. He'd have thought he was either barking mad or having some sort of drug-induced hallucinations to even consider it -- before he'd actually done it.

Now, the life he led with the Doctor seemed more real to him than the life he'd led for several years, working as a detective and focusing on his job. That life felt as though it had happened to someone else, someone who he didn't know very well any more.

And if he was honest with himself, he'd been more than happy to turn his back on it. He'd liked what he did well enough, but his job had never made him completely happy. Neither had the few relationships he'd been in, though they'd never meant much to him.

Until the last one. It had taken him a long time to recover from the haze of pain her leaving had thrown him into, Peter reflected, squinting as he looked up at the azure sky above him. But strangely enough, once he'd met the Doctor, she had seemed like ancient history.

He couldn't even remember her face now. And what was more, he couldn't have cared less. She was nothing to him; she'd been nothing more than ashes scattered somewhere in the back of his memory from the moment he'd laid eyes on the Time Lord.

If he had continued on in the life he was leading, he would be miserable now. He'd thought at one time that he wanted to win his former lover back, but he had quickly realized once he'd been with the Doctor that she meant nothing to him; he was only holding on to her out of familiarity.

The Doctor had given him everything he needed, and more. This man had taken him to his hearts, those dual hearts that beat in his thin chest. Peter never tired of hearing them thudding when he rested his head against the Doctor's chest after they'd made love.

No one had needed an emotional rescue more than he did when the Doctor had found him, he mused, taking a deep breath. He'd had so much pent up inside of him, so much that he hadn't known how to let out. And fate had brought his salvation right to his door, so to speak.

He could laugh at his hesitation now; why would he ever have thought that he wasn't meant to love a man? He'd fallen victim to the kind of prejudices he'd always scorned in others, at least for a very brief time. But he'd quickly gotten over them.

And now .... now, he was living a life that he'd never dreamed could be possible, a life that he almost feared at times was a marvelous dream that he would wake up from. But he hadn't wakened yet, and he hoped that if this was a dream, he would stay in it for the rest of his life.

Peter heard a soft footstep behind him; the Doctor had come out of the Tardis and was coming to sit down with him and look out at the beginning of a new day on Earth. A day that Peter wasn't an active part of, but was all too happy to gaze upon.

The other man sat down behind him, those arms sliding around Peter's waist. He smiled as he leaned his head back against the Doctor's chest, feeling the warmth of his lover's body next to his and the steady, strong dual heartbeats against his back.

The Doctor was still giving him that emotional rescue, every day of their lives together, and he probably always would do so. Though Peter knew that his heart was no longer in need to being rescued from a situation that made him unhappy.

No, his heart was exactly where it belonged -- held in the palm of the Doctor's hand, where he hoped it would stay for the rest of his life. And there was no other place he would rather be, Peter thought with an inward smile, closing his eyes and relaxing in the Doctor's embrace.

***