Title: Chained To You
By: angstytimelord
Pairing: Tenth Doctor/Ross Jenkins
Fandom: Doctor Who
Rating: PG-13
Table: 4, 50ficlets
Prompt: 17, Chained
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 Ross Jenkins, just borrowing them for a while. Please do not sue.

***

What was it that drew him so inexorably to the Time Lord? Ross asked himself as he turned over in bed, propping himself up on one elbow to look down at the slumbering man beside him. He'd never been able to put his finger on one particular reason.

He'd been attracted to the Doctor right from the first -- who wouldn't be? He was an incredibly good-looking man; Ross couldn't imagine anyone who had an interest in men overlooking the Time Lord. He wasn't someone who could be easily ignored.

Not only were his looks arresting, but he had a commanding personality; the Doctor was someone who would always be able to attract attention, no matter where he went. All eyes seemed to go to him when he was in a room, especially when he was speaking.

Ross had been drawn to that aspect of the Time Lord from the beginning; he was like any other person who had fallen under the Doctor's spell. But he knew that there was more to his being here than just his physical attraction to the other man.

There had been the lure of adventure, the promise of seeing places and times that he would never have been able to experience without the Doctor. Going into the past had always intrigued him, and with the Time Lord, he was able to actually do that.

And the places they'd been to! They had seen so many worlds that Ross had never known existed, had adventures that put anything he'd done with UNIT to shame. Being with the Doctor had already given him experiences beyond his wildest dreams.

If he hadn't chosen to come with the Doctor, he would have missed out on so much. He'd still be a soldier, a member of UNIT with nothing much ahead of him but more of the same. He would have settled into a comfortable rut, and stayed there for the rest of his days.

Of course, there would have been times when he'd have seen some adventure, but he'd never have left Earth. He'd never have discovered everything that he'd seen since he'd been with the Doctor. And he would never have fallen so deeply in love.

Love. That was what drew him to the Time Lord, and what kept him here by the other man's side. He was in love with the Doctor, more so than he ever would have thought he could be with anyone. Head over heels, completely, utterly and totally in love in every possible way.

He was chained to the Doctor in a way that was more permanent, more binding, than real chains could ever have been to keep him anywhere else. Those were chains of love that held him here, chains that he was more than happy to be bound with.

Ross never wanted those chains to break, or even to loosen. He'd never been as happy in his life as he was with the Doctor; falling in love with the Time Lord had helped him to find himself, had shown him what it was like to be completely selfless in his love of another person.

Those weren't chains that held him by the Doctor's side, he thought with a smile, reaching out a hand to smooth back a few errant strands of hair from the sleeping man's face. That was love, pure and simple. That kind of emotion wasn't a chain at all.

Love would never be a chain for him; he was here with the Doctor because he wanted to be here, not because he'd been coerced into it in any way at all. He knew the Doctor worried about that, but he needn't have concerned himself.

How could he ever want to be anywhere else, with anyone else? The Doctor was everything to him; even from the first moment they'd met, when Ross had looked into those big brown eyes, he'd known that this was the man he wanted to be with for the rest of his life.

He'd never really known what love was before he was with the Doctor. He might have thought that he'd been in love before, but nothing had ever felt like this. This was the kind of love that most people dreamed of, but were never lucky enough to find.

It wasn't a feeling of being chained, of being drawn to someone's side, Ross thought with another soft smile as he watched his sleeping lover. It was wanting to be there, versus feeling that he had to be. That desire to be where he was made all the difference.

In the past, he might have felt chained to the people he'd been with. It was completely different with the Doctor. He wasn't forcibly bound to this man. He was with this man because of love, not because he felt some obligation to be here.

Sliding closer to the Doctor, he wrapped his arms around the Time Lord's slender waist, closing his eyes and letting himself relax. Even if he was chained to the Doctor, he never wanted to break those chains -- because they held him right where he wanted to be.

***