Title: His Favorite Flavor
By: angstytimelord
Pairing: Tenth Doctor/Ianto Jones
Fandom: Doctor Who/Torchwood
Rating: PG-13
Table: 1, fanfic50
Prompt: 48, Sympathy
Disclaimer: This is entirely a product of my own imagination, and I make no profit from it. I do not own the lovely Tenth Doctor or Ianto Jones, unfortunately, just borrowing them for a while. Please do not sue.

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Ianto closed his eyes, holding the Doctor close against him, a soft smile curving his lips. He loved lying here like this, close to his love, feeling that all was right with his world. He had never felt such peace as in those moments when he could hold the Doctor.

But at the same time, there was always a little sadness that hovered around the edges of his soul whenever they were this close. It was as though he could feel all of those centuries that the Doctor had lived, all of that time alone -- and all of the people who had left him.

It was impossible not to feel sympathy for someone who had lived as long as the Doctor had, Ianto mused to himself. After all, what did long life mean, in the long run? It seemed to mean mainly that all of the people you loved would eventually leave you.

Oh, of course, they didn't want to leave, at least not always. Some of them were taken by death, which certainly didn't mean that they had intended to turn their backs. But it was simply the circle of life, one that nearly everyone had to accustom themselves to.

Now that he was immortal, he knew that he would never leave the man he loved. The Time Lord had finally found a mate who would never leave, never desert him. But it had taken a long road to get here, a road that Ianto had to wonder about.

They were fairly sure that the incident with the Rift that had helped him to find immortality hadn't been an accident, but had instead been engineered by the Master in an attempt to kill him, to take away the one person who the Doctor considered his soul mate.

It had been a concerted effort to destroy the Doctor, to take away what meant the most to him. Fortunately, it hadn't worked; Ianto was not only alive and well, but he now had seemed to gain the ability to be with the Doctor not just for his human life span, but forever.

That certainly wasn't what the Master had intended, if indeed he had been the one behind what had happened. But Ianto couldn't help wondering if that fiend was watching them now, somehow able to see them, and to make adjustments to his plans for the future.

The Doctor had been dealing with the Master for all of his life, since they were young boys on Gallifrey. How did one cope with an enemy who never seemed to go away, and whose malice was never-ending? How did you deal with someone whose hatred for you only became stronger with time?

Ianto shivered at the thought; he'd known hatred and animosity before, but never on the level of what the Master seemed to feel for the Doctor. He knew that such hatred came from a crazed, unbalanced mind, but it was still frightening to contemplate.

Maybe he should feel sympathy for both of them, Ianto told himself with a sigh. It wasn't easy to adjust to the knowledge that he was now immortal. Though it was something that a lot of people would wish for, he'd found that it was a hard concept to wrap his head around.

He still couldn't quite fathom the fact that he wasn't going to die, and that he would age very slowly. It would be a very long time before he looked his actual age -- if at all. He didn't know how many hundreds -- maybe even thousands -- of years old Jack was, and he definitely didn't look it.

But then, Jack was some kind of anomaly, wasn't he? Ianto shook his head, looking up at the ceiling as if he could see Jack's smiling face there. Certainly nothing about the man he knew as Captain Jack Harkness was anything less than extraordinary.

He couldn't be like Jack, but then, he wouldn't want to be. He was an entirely different person -- and the Doctor had been with Jack in the past, but had chosen him, Ianto Jones, to be his soul mate, and the one who he wanted to share all of the future with.

No, he wouldn't be Jack Harkness for all the money, immortality, or anything else that the world could offer. He was entirely satisfied to be who he was, simply because he was the man who the Doctor had chosen to be with, to give his hearts to.

So why did he feel that he had to feel sorry for himself in some ways? Ianto pushed that notion aside, giving a mental snort. Just a momentary aberration, he assured himself. He had no reason to wallow in self-pity, none at all. He had all that he could possibly ever want.

He really needed nothing else other than the man he loved here in his arms -- and the knowledge that the two of them would always be together. What did he have to feel sorry for himself about? Nothing, he told himself firmly. Nothing at all.

The people he should really feel sympathy for were those like Jack, who would more than likely never find the one they were meant to be with -- because they were spending so much time trying to sample all the different flavors that they never picked a favorite.

Well, he had found his favorite, Ianto thought with a smile, tightening his arm around the Doctor's waist and glancing at the man sleeping in his embrace. He had found the one who was meant for him, and he would never stray. He had no reason to.

His sympathy was all for the people who had never discovered their soul mates -- or didn't think that they had one. They didn't know what they were missing, he thought as he bowed his head to brush a gentle kiss across the sleeping Time Lord's forehead.

All that he needed was right here in his arms, and always would be. Nothing would ever tear the two of them apart; there was no situation that Ianto could possibly imagine that would ever make him forsake the man he loved, the man he was mated to in every way.

How could he feel the least bit sorry for himself, when he had so much more than he had ever dreamed he could? Indulging in self-pity seemed ridiculous; he should save his sympathy for those who truly needed it, he told himself firmly. He wasn't one of them.

His sympathy, from now on, would be for the Doctor's past, and for the people in that past who hadn't been able to stay with the Time Lord, whether they had wanted to or not. They had missed out on so much, but in a way, he was glad that they had.

If any of them were still here, then he more than likely wouldn't be. And that would have been a terrible loss, both for himself and for the man he loved. He wouldn't have found his immortality, the Doctor wouldn't have found his soul mate, and they wouldn't have found each other.

That was something he didn't want to contemplate, Ianto told himself. A life without the Doctor was a life that he wouldn't want to be living; he would end up like Jack if he'd never met this man, always searching for something more without seeing what was right there in front of him.

No, he had all that he could ever want, Ianto told himself, turning over onto his side and pulling the Doctor close against him, closing his eyes and pushing away all of the thoughts that had been plaguing him for the last little while. He needed nothing but this to make him happy.

He wasn't like Jack, always searching for the next person, never content with what he had. And he wasn't like the people in the Doctor's past who had left him voluntarily, feeling that they could never get what they needed to make them happy if they stayed.

He was himself -- and as such, he was the perfect mate for the man in his arms, just as the Doctor was the perfect one for him. That thought made Ianto smile as he drifted off into sleep, content in the knowledge that he would wake beside the man he loved, right where he belonged.

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