Title: While You Were Sleeping
By: angstytimelord
Pairing: Ianto Jones/Tenth Doctor
Fandom: Torchwood/Doctor Who
Rating: PG-13
Table: 1, 50scenes
Prompt: 01, Sleep
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 propped himself up on one elbow in the bed he shared with the Doctor, observing the man who was sleeping beside him. His lips curved into a smile as he reached out to gently brush a few errant strands of hair back from the Doctor's face.

The Time Lord was so beautiful when he slept, Ianto thought to himself, letting his eyes stray over his lover's face. Taken separately, his features might not be anything special to most people -- but all put together, they made up the most arresting face he'd ever seen.

The high cheekbones; the soft, yielding mouth; the long dark lashes that fringed deep, dark eyes; even the crow's-feet that crinkled into being around the corner of the Doctor's eyes when he smiled -- Ianto loved them all.

All of those small things made up the features of the man he loved, the man he'd given his heart to. No one could have been more perfect in his eyes. Ianto smiled wryly as he thought of what the Doctor would have to say if he put that thought into words.

He would say that perfection didn't exist, protest that he was so far from perfect that he'd never achieve that state of being, and admonish Ianto that he shouldn't think that way. But he would also blush and look down, a small smile on those tantalizing lips.

Oh yes, he knew that he was attractive, though he'd never admit that out loud unless he did it in a disparaging way. But Ianto knew that the Doctor liked how he looked -- though he doubted that the Time Lord liked his face, even if he wouldn't say so.

And he could study that face to his heart's content, lying here next to the sleeping Time Lord. He loved having this opportunity; when he was awake and aware, the Doctor was usually in perpetual motion, and Ianto couldn't really look at him.

How many nights had he laid here in their bed, watching the Doctor sleep and studying the man he'd fallen in love with? Too many to count, really. There was no way to calculate those nights, and he didn't even try. He just took them when he could find them.

He could never get enough of looking at the Doctor. It didn't matter if the Time Lord was awake and looking back at him with love shining out of those dark eyes, or if he was sleeping as he was now. He always looked beautiful to his lover.

Ianto let his thoughts drift back over other times he'd had his gaze locked intently on the Doctor's face; the most recent had been earlier that night, when they'd made love, their bodies locked together in the most primal embrace they could have.

The look in the Time Lord's eyes had been such a mixture of emotions that Ianto hadn't been sure he could read them all. Desire had been there; love, of course; and something deeper, something unfathomable that he didn't have a word for.

There had been more than that, too. But Ianto hadn't been concerned with trying to divine the other man's thoughts at the time; he'd been so lost in his own contemplation of the beauty that was spread out beneath him, offered up to him freely and completely.

After they'd made love, the Doctor had drifted off to sleep locked in his arms; Ianto had laid there and watched the other man breathe deeply, his fingertips drifting over the softness of the Time Lord's skin, wondering how he'd managed to get so lucky.

He'd never thought he was the sort of man to attract anyone special; yet he'd managed to have a man like Jack in his life for a while, and now .... the Doctor was beyond special. He was one of a kind, no matter what he might protest to the contrary.

Not that he could deny that he was the only one of his kind, Ianto thought, smiling at the direction his mind was taking. The Doctor was the last Time Lord, the only one. So he certainly couldn't protest that he was a special being.

How special, he might be able to protest -- considering that he would never think of himself in the way that Ianto did. Which was something they would always disagree on, but then, Ianto hadn't expected them to always be in perfect accord.

Ianto couldn't help but wonder if the Doctor ever did this; did he ever lie here in their bed and watch him sleep? He could see the Time Lord doing something like that, though he had a feeling that the other man's thoughts would be very different from his own.

The Doctor would probably think of the inevitable time when they would be physically parted; it would be something that his mind wouldn't be able to keep from turning to. He'd lost so many of the people in his life he'd cared for; he'd come to accept it as a fact of his life.

He desperately wished that he could prevent those thoughts from coming to fruition; if there was any way that he could somehow become immortal, as Jack had, then he'd take it, no matter if it might be physically painful.

Closing his eyes for a few moments, Ianto clenched his fists, wishing that there was some way he could physically halt the process of time. Each day brought him closer to the time he and his love would have to part, closer to the time when he would cease to exist.

He'd never thought about that before he'd met the Doctor. Death had seemed a long way away; and even when he'd thought about it in the course of his work with Torchwood, he'd almost accepted it with a sense of relief.

There had been so many times when he'd felt that he had nothing to live for, especially after he'd lost Lisa. Then Jack had been a part of his life, and that had sustained him, along with his work -- for a while, at least.

But then when he and Jack had ended, the hopelessness had started to crowd in again. He hadn't had much more in his life than his friendships with Jack and the rest of the Torchwood team -- there had been no one special in his life, and he'd just let himself drift.

The Doctor had changed all that. The man sleeping beside him now had burst into his life with the force of an exploding meteor, changing everything about the way he saw himself -- and the way he saw the rest of the world and everything in it.

He wasn't going to give that up, not until he absolutely had to. He would hang on to this life, until the last possible second. He wasn't going to leave the Doctor alone, not until he was forced to relinquish this life and all that he loved in it.

Ianto swallowed hard, tears coming to his eyes. How could he bear to leave the Doctor? It hadn't been hard to contemplate his own death when he hadn't felt that he had much in his life. But now, he had so much that he didn't want to even think about leaving behind.

What he worried about most was the Time Lord's state of mind when he was gone. He didn't want the Doctor to do something rash -- like ending his life because his soul mate no longer lived. The world needed him too much for him to throw himself away.

Clenching his fists again, he struggled to get a grip on his emotions. The Doctor wouldn't do that. He'd be devastated to lose the person he loved, but he wouldn't give his life away. He knew that he was needed in the universe too much for that.

At least, Ianto hoped he did. He didn't want to be the cause of taking someone away from a world that badly needed him, even indirectly. And he knew in his heart that when the time did come for the Doctor to lay down his life, the two of them would be together again.

He would never leave the Doctor -- not in spirit, anyway. They might not always be with each other physically -- but he knew that there would always be a part of him that remained with the Time Lord. A love like theirs would never fade, not even when they were both gone from this realm.

Ianto took a shaky breath, reaching up to wipe away the few tears that had trickled down his cheeks. He looked down at the Doctor again, glad that his love was sleeping soundly and that he had no idea of the disturbing thoughts that his lover had been entertaining.

The Doctor didn't need to know about those thoughts. He had enough of them in his own mind to grapple with; and Ianto didn't want him to be worried by his lover's anxieties. He was supposed to be watching over the Time Lord, after all, not adding to his troubles.

Leaning forward, he pressed a gentle kiss to the Doctor's forehead before settling back against the pillows and gathering the Time Lord's slender body into his arms. It was time that he slept, too, and put these thoughts out of his mind.

Closing his eyes, he surrendered himself to sleep, and within moments, he had joined his lover in the land of dreams. What he found there made a small smile curve his lips even in sleep as he held the other man close, entwined with him in spirit as well as in body.

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