The Trouble That Comes from Leaving a Time Lord Unattended

When Angel woke up, it took him several moments to remember why his body ached so much and why he had a general feeling of dread in the pit of his stomach. The dread, which came crashing back in full clarity, was twofold: Judith was missing, and the Doctor was staying at Angel's flat. Angel was genuinely not sure which worried him more.

He liked the Doctor; he did, in general. But the Doctor also weirded him out. He changed his face every other time they ran into each other, and with it his motives and personality. He was impossible to pin down, and slippery people put Angel on edge, even if this one had once looked at him with an affection that Angel felt in his bones and said that they were friends like it actually meant something.

Angel groaned as he sat up. He listened to his suspiciously quiet home, the sense of dread gathering thicker. Angel would be the first to admit to not knowing a great many things about the Doctor, but he was fairly certain that the only way the Doctor could be so completely silent would be if he weren't there at all.

Angel did not like that thought. Not that he was particularly worried about the Doctor's safety wandering around Galway on his own, nor was he worried about the Doctor getting lost or getting into trouble.

No, what bothered Angel about the Doctor being out there alone was much deeper and less caring than friendly concern. If the Doctor was out there, he was meddling. In Angel's town. Without Angel's say. And Angel's hold on his own territory was tenuous. The exact opposite thing of what he needed was a smiling, bumbling, idiotically-dressed alien taking over while Angel was sleeping.

Angel shuffled stiffly out of bed and checked his bandages. The bleeding had stopped. Angel made his way to the bathroom to tend the wound and splash some water on his face before getting dressed and deciding what to do next. He could start his routine early; pick up some blood from the hospital, talk to a few demons he needed to see… All the while keeping his senses alert for hints as to what the Doctor had been up to in the last several hours.

This seemed like the most agreeable plan, even though normally he would have waited an extra day or so while he healed. Angel was often surrounded by those who wouldn't hesitate to strike if they found the right weakness, so he decided to wrap a roll of bandages around his abdomen for the extra support.

He also ate briefly before he left for the extra bit of strength. Angel slipped a knife into his belt and hid it with his jacket, closing and locking the door behind him.

It was a full, slightly agonizing hour before Angel heard the explosion.

It wasn't too far off, but Angel still felt it more than heard it. The sewer shook slightly under his feet and the deep boom vibrated in his chest. Turning slowly, Angel tried to figure out where exactly the explosion had come from and how best to get there from his current location. He chose a tunnel and hadn't been traveling down it more than a few minutes when the sirens went by on the street above him. He sprinted after them, trusting the emergency vehicles to have a better knowledge of where exactly the fire was.

The tunnels twisted and turned, but Angel kept pace. The wound in his gut settled into a steady ache with his constant jarring run. Halfway around a twist in the sewer, Angel heard it: the telltale screech of the Doctor's sonic screwdriver. He came to a sudden stop and went still, gauging where he was in the sewer system and listening for another clue as to the Doctor's whereabouts.

It came in the form of the Doctor's voice. He had apparently come to a stop directly above Angel. "Umm..." the Doctor said. Angel heard the scuffing sound of shoes starting to run in several directions and coming to successive skidding halts.

Angel jerked into action. He leapt to the top of the sewer ladder and shoved the sewer lid up just as the Doctor dashed by. Endlessly thankful for vampire speed, Angel threw his arm out. He caught the Doctor by the ankle and hauled him - kicking, yelling, and generally flailing - into the sewer. Angel reached back up and slammed the lid shut like a battle shield whatever monster was up there. Angel dropped to the ground beside the Doctor, wincing from his still-tender stomach wound.

The Doctor sat up, sputtering water and looking around wildly. He held his left arm a bit stiffly, probably from hitting the ground at a poor angle. Angel refused to feel sorry about the movie-monster act that he'd just pulled. It had probably looked downright badass.

"Lost?" Angel asked, folding his arms across his chest and raising an eyebrow.

The Doctor's expression shifted from wide-eyed panic to brilliant smile almost instantly. "Angel!"

Angel smiled and reached out a hand.

The Doctor grabbed Angel's hand and pulled himself up, shaking the water out of his hair. "Completely lost!" he said, slapping Angel gently on the shoulder. "Now that you're here, I'm sure the whole thing will sort itself out."

"What did you do, Doctor?" Angel asked. He didn't need to see the mess to know that it was probably the Doctor's fault.

"Well..." the Doctor started, tugging Angel into motion and setting off at a light jog down the tunnel with Angel close behind, "you see, I went to see our lovely floating fishy friend. What's with us and fish Angel? Is it a thing now? Two's not quite a thing."

Angel growled.

"Right! So, I thought if we're ever going to coax the TARDIS back, we should probably make it so it doesn't get stolen again. Then we'd be right back where we started. Insanity is, after all, doing the same thing again and expecting different results."

Angel thought there might be another definition of insanity that was just a picture of the Doctor.

"So I found him at the power plant. I figured he still needed power to move forward with his plan, you see. I mean, without the TARDIS, he couldn't take over the world, but he might have a go at the West bit of Ireland. Which was exactly his plan." The Doctor rolled his eyes at Angel, to show how predictable this was. "We had words. And he might have forgotten that some valves were left on. Maybe because I turned them on and that's why he wasn't thinking about it. I think some of the city will be out of power for a bit. Sorry about that if it's your apartment. Anyway, his more loyal groupies have- had returned, and the ones that didn't get caught in the explosion are either running away or running after...uh...me." The Doctor came to a fork and headed for the right tunnel without pausing. Angel grabbed the back of his jacket and hauled him down the left path. "I haven't asked them. But they looked..."

"Upset?" Angel guessed.

"Exactly!" the Doctor agreed.

"Brilliant," Angel muttered. "I was really hoping I could get into another fight today. Maybe my other side will get impaled."

"Just keep running," the Doctor said, turning a corner and speeding up to a run. Angel kept pace, wincing at the pain in his side that was increasing back to sharpness. "We'll probably lose them."

"Yeah, for now," Angel agreed. "But we'll have to deal with them sooner or later. And what happened to fish-guy? Is he dead?"

"He didn't seem explosion-proof," the Doctor admitted. "I don't think he made it out." The Doctor just managed to duck his head before he ran into a pipe. Seeming to realize what he'd missed just as he passed it, he gave the pipe a little wave and kept going. "I vote we move all fights to later!"

Angel couldn't much argue with that; the pain in his side would definitely hinder the taking-care-of-it-now aspect of things. Also, that would give Angel a chance to deal with it in his own way. He wasn't sure what the Doctor's way was, although it was historically likely that the Doctor would just tell them to leave the planet. If they weren't locals, Angel could deal with that. But he knew at least some of them were locals, and the rules were different with other residents of Angel's own town.

So later was a good idea.

They jogged through the sewers, splashing through tunnels, and after the Doctor had taken several turns at random, Angel started to herd him toward Old Town. Eventually, they both slowed, the Doctor breathing hard from the exertion and Angel favoring his side heavily.

"Think we lost 'em?" the Doctor asked, squinting into the darkness behind them.

Angel couldn't hear the splash of following footsteps and took it as a good sign. "For now," he said, panting shallowly because it helped soothe the pain. "But let's keep moving." He led the way forward at a much slower pace now. When the Doctor seemed to have caught his breath back, Angel said, "So it this how it works, Doctor? Every time I wake up I have to come bail you out of trouble?"

The Doctor gave a short laugh. "I hope not; even I don't get in trouble every day. It's more like every other day. You can leave it if you like. I'm actually pretty good at this sort of thing."

Angel glanced over at the Doctor. "Leave it?" he asked.

The Doctor shrugged. He stepped around a large puddle and flopped his hand in the air. "If it's too much trouble," he said. "I get by."

"It's not too much trouble," Angel said. Actually, it was quite a bit of trouble, but trouble seemed to follow the Doctor like a wake. "It's kind of my job. You can leave it to me, actually."

Jumping over a pipe with both feet, the Doctor grinned, first at the resulting splash of water and then at Angel. "That's wonderful to hear," he said. "That you're back on the case. I've been worried about you."

"Worried?" Angel tried to brush it off with a chuckle, even though he stepped over the same pipe barely hiding a grimace. "I'm fine."

"So was I last time," the Doctor said.

Angel glanced over at the Doctor suspiciously. "Your last time or mine?"

"Yours," the Doctor said. "No fish people that time."

"Right," Angel said, nodding. Secretly, he tried to suss out what the Doctor was trying to imply about his "fine-ness." The Doctor certainly hadn't been fine the last time Angel had seen him, and Angel liked to think he himself was doing much better now than he had been at the time. He'd reintegrated with humans. Connected. Found purpose.

Was he not actually fine? Or was the Doctor that worried about his gut wound?

Angel looked over at the Doctor again. "What are you implying?"

The Doctor paused to direct his sonic screwdriver at an innocent bit of pipe. Nodding at the end of it like it had told him something, he looked over at Angel like he'd asked something odd. "Just that the last time I saw you, you weren't in a good place. I've had to wait a long time for this other shoe to drop. I've had to wait a few hundred years to confirm that you did start buying milk. Good for you, by the way."

Angel blinked at the Doctor, stunned. "You've been worried for centuries about whether or not I decided to buy milk?"

Grinning again, the Doctor continued on down the tunnel. "Not all the time," the Doctor said. "But it would occur to me. Particularly when we'd meet. I saw how much you loved your friends and I'd think, 'I hope he makes new friends in the future.'" The Doctor's expression softened. "I figured you'd be alright."

Angel followed the Doctor in silence for several steps, trying to wrap his mind around the events of their meetings as the Doctor must have experienced them. The last time they met in Angel's timeline would have only been the second (or the third?) for the Doctor. He hadn't really known Angel, and didn't have much reason to care, especially if he was just coming off the Time War. And yet he still wondered whether some vampire managed to make friends in the future.

Well, that had been the question of the night, Angel supposed.

"I am," Angel said eventually. "Alright, that is."

Looking Angel over like he wanted to confirm Angel's statement for himself, the Doctor finally nodded once in agreement. "You are," he said with a quiet authority.

Silence fell for a long time, except for the slimy dripping of water and soft sounds of their shoes. Angel wasn't entirely sure where they were going, though both he and the Doctor acted like they did.

"Are you?" Angel asked after a while. "Fine?"

"Oh, definitely," the Doctor said. "Great, even."

"Great," Angel repeated. "So...the ashes are settling, then?"

The Doctor fell silent. Some cruel part of Angel made a mental note that if nothing else, there was one way to shut the Doctor up. Their footsteps echoed along the tunnel around them for some time before the Doctor finally said, "You could say that."

So the Doctor had a ways to go before he could look at Angel and talk about the most tragic event in his life like Angel was his friend and had a right to know. Angel wondered how long it would take for him to get to that point. How much of a history they will have had before Angel drank him dry.

Angel could spot a shut door when it was slammed in his face, and a little relieved that this Doctor was that far away from potentially being murdered by Angel, Angel said simply, "Good." Silence fell again for a while as they wound their way through the sewers.

The silence was starting to edge toward awkward when the Doctor started talking again. Not about anything in particular, but more in what seemed like an aggressive form of verbal self defense. Like if he put several thousand words between him and Angel's last question, it would be forgotten by everyone involved.

He talked about the math of finding Judith in time. He talked about how the TARDIS used to be much more jumpy and by jumpy he meant that it used to just jump away. He talked about how many times he'd been on a submarine. He talked about an alternate dimension where Earth had exploded.

It wouldn't stop.

At the same time, the Doctor seemed to be acclimating to the sewer. It was a subtle change, but shockingly fast. He'd looked completely ridiculous when Angel had first hauled him down there looking entirely lost and nearly tripping or running into every little pipe that happened to stick out from the wall. Really, Angel admitted, he still did look ridiculous with his half-dry hair sticking to his face and most of him smudged with dirt, but now he looked at home and ridiculous. Instead of tripping over pipes he was jumping on and off of them like it was a game he remembered from childhood.

"So what's your plan?" Angel interrupted at one point just to get the Doctor to stop calculating the likelihood of the two of them encountering a fish alien for a third time.

The Doctor's speech and feet stuttered to a stop. "Plan?" he asked. "For what?"

Angel gestured behind them. "Explosion aftermath," he said. "Angry demons hunting you down."

The Doctor looked back down the tunnel behind them. "I thought they'd get bored of that," he said. Shrugging, he turned to face forward again. "I took care of the main problem. The rest will sort itself out."

Meaning, in reality, that Angel would sort it out. Which was admittedly how Angel wanted it, but the principle of the thing bothered him. "You mean you're going to let other people deal with the mess."

"Well," the Doctor considered that and finally concluded, "shouldn't they?"

Angel had to think for several moments about his answer. On the one hand, Angel believed that whoever made the mess should clean it up. On the other, Angel didn't want another incident like last night with the Doctor insisting that it was his planet, his rules, and Angel couldn't deal with things the normal, violent way he needed to if he wanted to keep control.

"I don't know," Angel finally said. "Forget it."

"I get things started," the Doctor said. "I'm a starter." He waved his hand like this was a dramatic proclamation. "The middle kills me. It's all details and years of the same thing and paperwork. And I hate endings." He shook his head. "Nope. I unstick the problem and then let everyone else get on with it."

Angel's teeth clenched together as he let that sink in. If it was just about Angel having to put a bunch of demons in line (again), Angel thought he could have let that slide as an annoying, rather rude quirk. But it wasn't just about reining in the demons; it was about getting Judith back, too. Was the Doctor implying that he wouldn't help Angel get Judith home if he had the means to leave?

What sort of friendship were they going to have, if that was his sense of loyalty? Angel could only imagine himself hating the Doctor more and more if he kept showing up, starting something, and never finishing it. Was it some kind of weird, chronologically-challenged poetic justice that Angel had ended their friendship before it began? The Doctor was certainly going to hate that ending...

Angel crossed his arms over his chest, just above the wound. "So if you had your TARDIS, you'd just…" He freed one arm to wave it vaguely before replacing it. "Go?"

The Doctor blinked. "I mean..." he said, "yeah. That's my life," he said, lifting one shoulder.

Angel nodded curtly. "Consequences be damned," he muttered, glad for the fortune that Judith was lost on the one thing that the Doctor was sure to follow through on. Still, it wouldn't hurt for Angel to start looking for his own way of getting her back. Since he was alone in wanting to get her back.

A grim expression crossed the Doctor's face. "I'm sure I'll pay for it," he said.

"I hope it's worth the cost," Angel replied shortly.

The Doctor fell silent again, his eyes focusing on the pipes that crossed their path. He moved with grace and ease, now; far from his bumbling, stumbling gait when Angel first pulled him down there. It was like any space or situation that contained the Doctor suddenly turned into something that inherently belonged to the Doctor.

Which was, Angel thought, also deeply annoying.

The worst part was that the Doctor would be completely oblivious to Angel's observations, which meant that if Angel used his normal, direct way of dealing with things, it would leave him looking like a violent, territorial- Well, okay, so it would leave him looking like himself, but in the worst possible way.

"You know," the Doctor said cheerfully, "it's not really that bad down here."

Angel glared sideways at the Doctor.

"It might be the company," the Doctor admitted, sounding no less happy.

Damn him, Angel thought. Sentiments like that made it much less appropriate for him to be upset.

"So you must be down here all the time," the Doctor continued, seemingly clueless as to Angel's mood. "Actually, it seems like it would make a pretty high traffic area. Is there a movement to clean the place up a bit, or does that ruin the atmosphere?"

"It's a sewer," Angel said. "It's not supposed to be clean."

"Ah, it would ruin the atmosphere then," the Doctor nodded in understanding.

"No," Angel said, a little more firmly than he meant to. "No, there is no 'atmosphere.' It's just. A sewer."

"Sewer's an atmosphere. You know..." the Doctor looked around. "Dank, dark...wet...there are a lot of bars that go pretty far out of their way for this."

"It's not. A bar!" Angel said, gesturing to emphasize his point. "It's a goddamn sewer!"

The Doctor spun around. Angel did not like the look on his face. "An opportunity then!" he cried gleefully. "Think of it, Angel: The Sewer Bar! You could serve nothing but scotch."

Angel gave the Doctor a look very similar to the ones he used to give Cordelia when she tried to convince him to care about shoes.

The Doctor held his smile against Angel's glare for a full ten seconds before it started to wilt. "Think about it?" he tried.

Angel walked on.

"A bit?" the Doctor urged, running after Angel for the three steps it took to catch up with him.

"No."

"It could be fun."

"No."

"I could help!"

"Oh, god, no."

"You're right," the Doctor said sounding like he'd just come to a deep realization. "I'd have to stick around...and do paperwork. Sorry, Angel, you're on your own."

Angel did not even dignify this with a response.

"So if you don't want to run a bar, what do you do, Angel?"

Angel took a moment to think about it. His mood had soured too much for any kind of talking, but this, at least, was partly what he was sour about. "I… I'm kind of..." He glanced at the Doctor. "This is my town."

"Is it?" the Doctor said, he rubbed his fingers together like he was feeling out the idea between them. He sounded interested and just a bit amused.

"Yes," Angel replied tersely. Actually, it was a bit of an exaggeration, but 'This is my section of town' sounded less impressive and a touch apathetic.

"So what does one do with a town?" the Doctor asked, still sounding like he was trying very hard not to make a joke. Angel wasn't sure if he should take it as such or not.

Angel shrugged. "Protect it," he said.

This was the better answer. In truth, Angel had taken over when he moved there simply because he wanted it quieter than it was. Sick of being jumped in the alleyways, he'd quickly made a name for himself (helped by a few of the older demons who recognized him as Angelus), and that name gave him power to frighten the underworld of Galway into some sort of order. After Angel had staked a respectable boundary that included most of the places he most often frequented (the Dragon's Crown being a notable exception), others had staked their sections, too, and now Galway was divided into provinces, of sorts. The only thing Angel demanded of his constituents was quiet above ground, and below he gave free reign. Human protection was an inevitable consequence for Angel having things the way he liked it.

Now, of course, Angel had more of an interest in the human side again, so his answer was more true than it ever had been. He didn't see the need to explain any of this, though.

"That is a good thing to do with a town," the Doctor agreed.

Angel nodded. When the Doctor didn't continue, Angel glanced over to find the Doctor watching him. The scrutiny seemed close enough that it made Angel uncomfortable with how much the Doctor might be seeing. Angel shifted and looked forward again.

The irritating prickle of watching eyes continued for a moment and then the Doctor shrugged and continued forward next to Angel. He allowed them to walk almost five minutes in comfortable silence before he spoke again. "So...where are we going?" he asked, and then added, "If we're not looking for bar locations..."

"Actually," Angel said, "we are. Or I am. There are some people I need to talk to at the Dragon's Crown."

"Brilliant! I love new people. Are we going to do negotiations?" The Doctor put an odd emphasis on the last word, like it was something he'd been waiting to try out in the real world and was barely containing his excitement about the opportunity that had just presented itself.

Angel hesitated. "Kind of," he replied. "But uh..." Angel glanced at the Doctor once up and down, taking in the Doctor's full sludgey glory. "Maybe you should go home and shower instead."

The Doctor glanced down. Some of his hair helpfully (for Angel, anyway) fell into his face, dripping water onto his nose. "Maybe..." the Doctor finally allowed, after a long and careful look at his own clothes. Angel suspected he was trying to make showing up to anything covered in mud sound like a good plan. Of course, if the Doctor wanted to, he'd probably just insist on going anyway, but Angel suspected he wouldn't. Death seemed like the only legitimate reason the Doctor recognized for changing clothes, and Angel suspected that he was probably particularly meticulous when it came to whatever outfit he had chosen.

Not meticulous about the choice of outfit, obviously, but meticulous about the execution after that choice had been made.

"If you don't mind..." the Doctor said.

"Well..." Angel said slowly, trying to keep himself from sounding too gleeful. "Alright."

The Doctor pushed his hair back again. "I could come meet you there..." he said, trying to salvage the situation.

"Better not," Angel said. "Ojn'ii doesn't like to be interrupted. I'll be home soon."

"I guess I could work on the lock feed on the device," the Doctor sighed.

"And take another measurement?" Angel asked hopefully.

"In a few hours, yes."

Angel sighed again. He stopped them at the entrance to a branching tunnel and pointed down it. "After 500 meters, turn right. Make the second left, and after the four-way intersection, it's the third ladder."

The Doctor nodded without pausing or repeating the directions to himself. He took a few steps down the tunnel and then turned. "Oh, Angel?" he called back.

Angel was about to continue on, but he paused and looked at the Doctor.

"Try to stay out of trouble," the Doctor grinned at him and set off down the tunnel.

Angel growled to himself. "Yes, mom," he called back, and then moved gratefully on down the tunnels alone.


When Angel returned home a little over an hour later, he found the Doctor on his couch wearing one of Angel's black silk shirts with a pair of Angel's dark trousers and looking utterly miserable about the whole thing.

Angel blinked once and shut the door behind him. Angel and the Doctor stared at each other for a long moment. "Why are you wearing my clothes?" Angel finally asked.

The Doctor glared at the corner where the washing machine was tucked away behind a closed closet door.

Angel also glanced at the same corner and noted the soft hum of the machine churning away. "Oh," he said. He looked back at the Doctor.

"It's broken," the Doctor finally said, his glare at the corner turning particularly malicious. "Doesn't even get stains out."

Angel frowned and glanced back toward the door concealing the machine. Angel always threw away his blood-stained shirts, so he really couldn't comment on the machine's stain-removal abilities. "Er..." he said. He scratched his head. "I could call a repairman..."

"That won't be necessary," the Doctor said dangerously. Angel wondered if he'd just discovered an issue big enough for the Doctor to consider it a problem. Angel swallowed nervously.

"Ohhh...kay..."

The Doctor tore his eyes away from the corner, but kept glancing at it as if he suspected it to try and make some sort of escape attempt if he didn't keep an eye on it. Or maybe the Doctor could kill technology from thirty paces with sheer ill will. Angel would not put it past him.

There was an awkward silence.

Finally, Angel said the only thing that he could think of: "Want some tea?"

The Doctor nodded his head with a few jerky movements like a crying child who had been offered an ice cream cone. Angel took off his coat and hung it up before ambling into the kitchen. He unconsciously put his hand to his bandaged wound as he did, now that it was safe for him to acknowledge it.

Angel fixed the tea and brought it out several minutes later. The Doctor was still pouting, now with his legs pulled up on the couch and the odd box in his hand. "The wavelengths aren't building very well," the Doctor said as Angel set the tea mug in front of him.

"Sorry," Angel said, though he wasn't entirely sure it was the appropriate response given that he didn't at all know what that meant.

"It's like she..." the Doctor stopped and looked up at Angel in a way that made Angel suspect that he'd only just then been noticed. "You made tea," he said with a tiny hopeful smile. He exchanged the device for the tea mug.

Angel gave the Doctor a look. "You told me to."

"And then you did. It's a good system. We should stick to it."

The Doctor took a cautious sip of tea. He made a face and looked like he'd like nothing better than to spit it back out. He glanced at Angel and made a very big show of swallowing. "Do you have sugar?" he said once he'd recovered.

Angel went back into the kitchen without a word and fetched the sugar.

The Doctor uncurled himself from his position on the couch and took the small bowl. He dug the spoon into the bowl and started shaking it lightly to level off the sugar. Once he was satisfied with…actually, Angel wasn't sure if the Doctor was trying to get a specific amount or just really into leveling off his sugar, the Doctor dumped the sugar into his cup and set to stirring. He glanced up at Angel as he did.

"So..." he started, but the oddness of the situation seemed to have caught up with him too. He gave up on starting a sentence entirely and looked back down at his tea.

"So..." Angel agreed. He considered simply getting a book and settling down to read. Instead, he asked, "So what about that measurement?"

The Doctor pulled his wrist up to look at his watch only to realize that he wasn't wearing it at the moment. He sighed. "We'll go in an hour and a half."

Angel sighed also and nodded, frustration building at his helplessness to help find Judith and bring her home. This was why Angel hated technology: reliance on it took away one's own power. Angel preferred magic for that reason. Magic was as potent as the practitioner, and Angel wasn't great at it, but being a supernatural creature did help the magic to at least do something, if not succeed. Angel suddenly stood up and went to his bookshelves. He pulled out a certain volume and settled back down with it, holding it up in such a way that the Doctor couldn't distract him.

Except that the Doctor was very distracting, even silent. Maybe it was the double heart rhythm. Or the blood that Angel could still smell.

His stomach clenched again with uncomfortably eager anticipation at the memory of how that incredible particular blood felt in his stomach.

Angel glanced surreptitiously over his book at the Doctor. He suddenly appreciated how difficult not aging was for people on the outside. He had no idea how long it would be for this Doctor before Angel would drink from to save his own life. He had no idea how long they had of "being friends" until one day the Doctor would stop showing up. Even if he survived, Angel was sure their friendship wouldn't. One person almost killing the other tended to end things like friendships. His stomach clenched again, but this time with guilt.

Angel went back to his book.


The Doctor hated being in other people's homes. Once the initial joy of exploring wore off, the whole thing tended to feel like he was trying to wear someone else's clothes. He was becoming increasingly aware of how out of place he was, how much this whole thing didn't quite fit and how it didn't really complement his eye color at all.

So really, it didn't help that he happened to be wearing someone else's clothes at the moment. He stirred his tea. Anticlockwise. Ten times. Setting the spoon aside, he tasted it and realized that he'd put too much sugar in. So it was going to be that sort of day.

Alright, he thought angrily at the tea, be that way, see if I care. He set the cup onto the table and tried not to think about how not-his his arm looked when it was all covered in black silk. Houses must be some sort of infection. It was the only explanation. Angel's flat was creeping into him, filling him with an unwelcome hollowness.

Maybe that was just Angel. He looked less than pleased that the Doctor was there, what with him holding his book at just the right angle to block the Doctor from view. Normally the Doctor managed to make his getaway before people started giving him that look...or lack of look. The maybe-if-we-ignore-it-it'll-go-away look.

The Doctor stood up.

The shirt slithered against his back: cold and indifferent and- Clothing is not a metaphor, the Doctor told himself and then wished for his bowtie back. Angel continued to ignore him. And he'd thought things had been going so well… He ran through the series of events in his head and tried to sort out when it had All Gone Wrong.

The internal debate ended in a two-way split between Angel dragging him into that puddle and getting him covered in mud (he was calling it mud in his head), and the TARDIS disappearing. He stopped pacing, suddenly unsure of when he'd started pacing, and glanced at Angel. Maybe he could ask Angel when it had All Gone Wrong.

Angel turned a page.

The Doctor sighed. Loudly. He glanced at Angel to check for a reaction.

Nothing.

He was going to die. He'd always known he was allergic to other people's houses and this was what came of it. It was going to be the death of him, the Doctor was sure of it. The world was going black. His hearts were no longer beating in sync. The walls were, in fact, closing in (he was going to have to look into that). There was this weird wishshshshing noise in his head.

No, wait, that was the washing machine.

The Doctor sat down again. He took a nice, deep, calming breath and told himself that maybe, just maybe, he was being a bit silly. Maybe Angel just liked reading and wasn't actively wishing him away at this very moment. Maybe the stains would come out of his shirt this time. Maybe the TARDIS would just be waiting for him when they got to that street again and he'd be...safe? Free? Home.

The Doctor ran a hand down his face.

"You can read, too, if you want," Angel said without looking up.

The Doctor glanced up, studying Angel's nearly motionless form. Perhaps, he dared to hope, Angel didn't completely hate him just yet. Who offered books to people they didn't like? Especially a choice of any in a whole collection of paper books in a time when they hardly existed anymore? He decided on a whim that reading sounded like a fantastic plan. "I think I will," he informed Angel, and stood again.

Angel grunted.

The Doctor decided to interpret that as, "No, really, Doctor, I'm concerned that you're not enjoying yourself entirely and want to be sure that you have something to keep your brilliant mind busy." He spoke Angel now.

He was feeling better already. The Doctor strode over to the bookcase and beamed at it. Not only was it full of books, but it was full of books that he hadn't read already. He read the titles over twice. Unable to make a decision, he closed his eyes and snatched a book at random off of the shelf.

It was old and written in Latin and had a nice weight and smell to it. Pleased with the result, the Doctor trotted back to the couch and flopped onto it. He took some time to get comfortable and ran his fingers over the cover, taking in its age. The pages were very old, so he was going to have to flip the pages slowly so he didn't damage it.

It took a full ten minutes, and by the end of the book, the Doctor wasn't quite sure if it was supposed to be an instruction manual or a sitcom. "Journals are great," he said, setting the book on the table.

Angel looked up. "You finished it?" he asked, clearly trying to tone down the incredulity.

"Why wouldn't I?"

Angel glanced at the book and then back at the Doctor. "It's over 300 pages."

It was 489 pages counting the odd bits in the back that no one really read. "Yup," the Doctor agreed. He paused, wondering why Angel was looking at him like that. Oh, wait, reading books by flipping through them often set off people's...well, they thought it was weird. "If I read it out loud it slows me down a bit," he said.

Angel shifted and stared at the Doctor an extra moment. "I have an extended eidetic memory, so I can read fast when I want to," he said after a moment. "But I like the process of reading each word. It's...relaxing."

The Doctor nodded, pleased that they'd found something in common. "It is," he agreed. "That's why I read them out loud sometimes, even if there's no one to read to." Well, sometimes he read to the TARDIS, but people thought that was weird, too.

Angel shifted like sliding out from under the conversation. "I have more journals if you're interested."

The Doctor grinned and rolled off of the couch. A minute later he returned with three books that he had selected purely for the complementary colors of their bindings. As he gently pulled open the first book he thought that maybe he wasn't deathly allergic to Angel's apartment.

After another moment, Angel said almost too softly from behind his book, "Thanks."

The Doctor glanced up and wondered if he asked what he was being thanked for if it would somehow ruin it. As far as he could tell, he hadn't actually done anything yet. He'd taken a measurement that Angel hadn't been pleased about before and he'd greatly exaggerated the likelihood of his being able to summon the TARDIS using a machine that had briefly scratched the surface of her consciousness. He scratched the back of his neck. "I didn't do anything," he admitted.

Angel shifted in his seat and remained hidden behind his thick tome. "You're being careful with my books," he said. "I appreciate that."

Oh. The Doctor glanced at the book in his hands. "Books have always been good to me," he said. "I've always been sure to return the favor."

Angel lowered his book enough to look at the Doctor, and he caught a glint that might be something like a smile in Angel's eye. Then Angel disappeared again, leaving the Doctor not-quite alone with his book.