'Numb'
Ianto went down to check on the temperature control settings for the hub. They had been playing up for a few days now, and although Jack had said he'd fixed the problem: two disconnected cables; Ianto wasn't convinced the problem was actually fixed- he was hot. Hotter than he would normally be in the hub and it was making him uncomfortable in his three piece suit. Not to mention it was also making Owen more grumpy than usual, although no one else had realised what was causing it.
Upon arrival in the room where the machine was situated, Ianto found that the climate machine, a heavy thing that took up half the room, wall to wall, floor to ceiling, had been pulled away from the wall slightly and had not been put back in its place. Jack he thought. Taking the opportunity, Ianto examined the back of the complex machinery, focussing on the main console and sighed at the grinding machine. There was a thick, green, slimy substance covering the entire back of it; the machine probably had not been cleaned in decades. Exhaling, Ianto stood up to go and find his cleaning supplies. He would clean up the back of the machine and then he would examine it himself properly, once he could see, for anything that Jack had missed while reconnecting the cables. He soon returned with his supplies: a bucket of warm soapy water and a scrubbing brush. Removing his jacket and rolling up his sleeves, Ianto began his daunting task. The work was rewarding, if a little messy. The green slime came away easily, but that also meant that it was going everywhere, including covering Ianto himself.
By the time Ianto had finished his cleaning task and inspection to his satisfaction, he was considerably hotter than before and had green slimy patches all over his skin and clothes. He decided to go and wash, before heading back up to the hub, where he could order lunch for the team. The last thing he wanted was an anecdote from Jack involving green slime, while they all settled down to eat lunch. Ianto wasn't sure, but when he pushed the heavy machine back up against the wall, he thought it sounded healthier. At least the machine was no longer grinding and cranking, instead it was emitting a steady, harmonious hum. Ianto also noticed that he could no longer feel the floor vibrating beneath his feet like he had earlier that day.
When it arrived, Ianto sat and ate lunch with the rest of the team, finishing just before everyone else (Jack was having seconds). He offered everyone coffee and at the murmured consent from the room, stood up to go and make it. However, as he stood up Ianto found his legs would not hold his weight and he collapsed unceremoniously to the boardroom floor.
Jack raised an amused eyebrow at the team before popping his head round the table to see the crumpled heap that was Ianto. "Hey! You're supposed to go down on me!" He grinned. Jack waited, watching as Ianto's wan smile changed to a confused expression, as he glanced at his legs beneath him. Next it flashed to one of worry, before increasing to a look of sheer panic as he met Jack's enquiring face.
"I… I can't feel my legs!" He exclaimed helplessly, looking suddenly rather more pale than Jack was used to. Immediately Jack pushed back his chair and knelt beside him. "What d'you mean? Since when? Owen- Get over here!" he demanded, meeting the Doctor's gaze above the edge of the table.
Owen joined the pair of them on the conference room floor and immediately began to examine Ianto. He checked his pulse, which was racing, but decided that could just be due to panic, since it wasn't everyday you lost the feeling in your legs. He dismissed it for now, but would check it again later. Owen then pulled a stethoscope from his pocket and listened to his chest. "Does it hurt anywhere? Any trouble moving recently? Back pains?" At each question Ianto shook his head, he was as clueless as the rest of them, he had no idea what had caused this sudden paralysis.
Finding his initial examination inconclusive, Owen made a decision, "Right Jack, can you carry Ianto to the medical bay? I'll give him a full check-up over there and run some tests... Find out what we're dealing with." Jack nodded and placing one arm under his knees and the other supporting his back, Jack lifted Ianto effortlessly in his arms. The young man tried to protest at being carried like a child in Jack's arms, but was ignored by the older man.
Once in the autopsy bay, Owen ran every related test he could think of on Ianto and a few more for good measure. Nothing he tried seemed to get Ianto's legs to respond, not even on reflex. He seemed to be completely paralysed, in just his legs. A machine which had been running a blood analysis beeped and some graphs appeared on the computer screens near Tosh's desk. Abandoning Ianto for now, Owen made his way over to the bank of screens. What he saw made him swear fluently.
"What is it?" asked Jack coming over.
"Ianto has a large amount of Paralexium in his blood," replied Owen grimly.
Before Gwen could ask the question that was on the tip of her tongue, Owen turned to her and answered it, "It's an alien substance which causes paralysis." He turned back to Jack, "I've only ever used it once on a flying creature, very similar to the mayfly- it wouldn't keep still so I used some of this stuff to temporarily paralyse it; only it's not meant for human consumption. Ever. It's very aggressive if not contained properly and I have no idea what kind of effect this is going to have on Ianto's body. At the moment it seems to be causing paralysis but whether or not this is a permanent state, or will simply wear off in a few hours I just don't know. It could even get worse."
Jack looked worried, "Is there anything we can do to get it out of his system?" he asked.
"There is one thing I could try, but I'd rather leave it as a last resort. I'm not even sure if it would work. For now we just keep a careful eye on him and hope his immune system can cope and will be able to fight it. If he gets worse over the next few hours, we'll have to act."
"Right Gwen, Tosh, go through the CCTV of Ianto this morning, see if you can find anything unusual that happened. Owen- run some more tests on this stuff in Ianto's blood; see if you can work out a way to reverse the effects, find out where it came from. You lnow the drill." The team scurried to their assigned jobs, eager to help their fellow team mate while Ianto sat, unable to move, on the examination table.
Gwen and Tosh were slowly going through the CCTV, but they had found nothing unusual at all so far, and frustratingly, Ianto wasn't always within range of the cameras in the main part of the hub. When Jack came over half an hour later the women were despondent. They had just seen Ianto disappear downstairs, off the CCTV and not return until just before their lunch had arrived. "Ladies, any luck?"
"There's nothing, Jack, we've watched all the footage Ianto is in, twice, but there isn't much of it. He spent most of the day down in the archives." Gwen responded.
"Well, have you got any other ideas?" they were both silent for a moment until Gwen's face suddenly lit up, like a flare. "Gwen, I'd recognise that expression on anyone- you got a brilliant idea for me?" Asked Jack, hope rising.
"Well, possibly…" Gwen frowned, thinking. "It's something we use in the police. Maybe, if we create a reconstruction of Ianto's movements throughout the day, something unusual will crop up, or Ianto may remember something he missed before."
"Gwen, that's brilliant!" said Jack, "Tosh can you organise that?"
Twenty minutes later Gwen was wired up with a miniature camera, and Ianto was sitting on the autopsy table, laptop balanced precariously on his numb lap, directing her over the comms, through his route that day.
"Take a right there, Gwen."
Gwen followed his instructions, through the archives, not having a clue where she was going and found herself staring at a locked, heavy metal door, which was set slightly further back than the rest of the doors down this corridor. "Where does this lead?" asked Gwen over the comms.
"To the Temperature Control Room. The code is three, four, one nine, seventy two."
"And how long were you in here for?" asked Gwen, punching in the recited code.
"Practically all morning. So if something unusual happened, this is the most likely place." Ianto shrugged, before leaning forward to see better.
The door swung open with a hiss and Gwen stepped inside the small, gloomy space, feeling the floor resonate beneath her feet and looking around as her eyes grew accustomed to the gloom. Once she could see, Gwen approached the large machine covering all of one wall and humming quietly. It seemed to be responsible for the quaking floor. Taking out a small LED torch, she shone it around, while Ianto explained how he had spent the morning cleaning and fixing the machine, which no longer had trouble regulating the main hub temperature. Under the beam of the torch, Gwen found a small sample of green slime lining the wall beside the machine. She decided to collect a bit, though Ianto was a little sceptical. "It's just the stuff that was covering the machine Gwen, I was trying to wash it all off. Must've missed a bit..."
"Does that mean you could have come into contact with this green slime?" asked Owen, who was only half listening to the conversation going on across the open channel of their comms. At Ianto's affirmative response, he replied, "then I want a sample. Bring it up Gwen." Gwen collected the sample and started making her way out of the underground tunnels. She paused at a junction, "Which way Ianto?" she asked, when the instructions weren't forthcoming.
"Hm? What?" Ianto asked vaguely, shaking off a sudden tiredness, "Left." Dubiously Gwen followed the instruction and stopped again at the next junction. "Ianto? Where am I going?... Ianto!" When there was no reply again, Gwen called Owen, "Is Ianto ok? He's been very vague the last couple of turns and now he's not answering me." The expletives Gwen could suddenly hear from Owen, followed by his bellow for their boss, was the only indication to Gwen that something had indeed gone wrong. Wisely, she didn't interrupt the commotion happening above her and just listened, until things calmed down slightly, then she called back over the comms once more. "Hello? Guys? I'm a little lost here, if someone could give me directions?" Gwen was relieved when Jack came on the line and started leading her out, getting her to retrace the last couple of wrong turns she had taken, before guiding her out the correct way. As soon as she was out, Owen took the sample Gwen had collected and started running tests on it. Meanwhile Jack kept vigil on Ianto's sleeping form and Gwen and Tosh sat on the couch to wait. When Gwen couldn't stand the waiting any longer, she went out to buy them all a coffee.
Jack watched Ianto's relaxed, sleeping form, marvelling at how innocent people looked in sleep. It was only because he was holding Ianto's hand in his that he felt the slight tremor that started, and then stopped, just as suddenly. "Ianto?" Jack called, squeezing the hand he'd felt move. There was a barely discernible twitch, as if Ianto was trying to squeeze back, before his eye lids fluttered. "Ianto? Can you hear me?" Called Jack again, rising from his seat, Owen came over to watch. He checked the monitors, before shining a light into Ianto's eyes. His reaction was slightly delayed, but Ianto pulled away from the light, before instead, looking towards the sound of Jack's voice.
His vision was blurred and he was exhausted, but he could just make out the familiar silhouette of his boss and lover. He smiled, the motion barely showing on his face, before he slipped into sleep once more. Meanwhile a small incessant alarm started up at Tosh's monitor, quiet at first, but gradually growing louder, until it could no longer be ignored. Tosh looked up and started towards it, barely reaching it in time to read the words:
BIOLOGICAL LOCK DOWN
IN 1...
SECONDS
Before it reached zero, and the entrance to the lower corridors shut itself, the gate before the cog door also shutting and locking with a resounding clang. Next the lighting in the main hub powered down until the autopsy room was the only brightly lit room and the monitors not in use cast an eerie, pulsating blue, glow. "What the hell just happened?" asked Jack, making his way from the autopsy room towards her monitor, which was showing graphs of the air concentration in the different levels of the hub. A small schematic popped up in a new window, highlighting an isolated room on the floors below, which was red, in comparison to all the other rooms around it, which were blue. "Isn't that the Temperature Control Room?" asked Toshiko, "Looks like it's in about the right place..." Before Jack could answer, the room on screen started flashing mauve, then red, then went back to solid blue. "Whatever it was, it's gone now." he replied.
THREAT CONTAINED
Flashed up on the screen, and the lighting in the main hub was restored. "…'ack?!" Cut Gwen's frantic, static-filled voice across the comms, "Jack what's ha'...ning" The gate which had previously locked itself in front of the cog doors swung open, and the cog door swung back to reveal a very harassed looking Gwen, running inside, all thoughts of coffee forgotten. "We had a minor situation Gwen, the hub went into temporary lock down, the situation has been contained now and we're back to full power." Just as he finished his sentence there came a blood curdling scream from the medical bay where Ianto was, which stopped abruptly as Owen injected a large dose of morphine directly into Ianto's blood stream.
Jack rushed back over and down into the medical bay where Ianto lay, his face pale and drawn, with a light sheen of sweat across the surface of the skin. "Owen, whatever you were planning, I think now would be a good time to instigate it!" Jack ordered. Owen nodded and dragged one of his large medical machines closer to Ianto. Next he pushed his wheeled chair towards Jack, "Sit," he commanded. Jack did what he was told and followed Owen around the room instead with his eyes. "Tosh, I need your help calibrating this machine, I've never used it on these settings before. Jack- roll up the sleeve of your arm please. Above the elbow." Again Jack did as he was told, still not quite comprehending what was going on. "How long does it take you to come back to life after you bleed to death?" Asked Owen abruptly, meeting his gaze.
"Eighteen minutes," Jack responded, swallowing and bracing himself for the worst.
"Too long. Right, well I've got 3 pints of blood, which means I'm probably gonna take three pints from you to be safe. It's probably gonna kill you, that ok?" Owen asked, not looking up from what he was doing. Jack nodded and put his arm out, "Yeah, okay". Owen set everything up and began taking Jack's blood, then he moved across to the machine Tosh was working on "Have you set it up?" Tosh nodded and Owen connected Ianto to it.
"What are you doing? What's the machine for?" asked Gwen, pre-empting Jack's questions.
"Filtering out just the Paralexium in Ianto's blood." Owen replied, "It's acting as a sort of dialysis machine, only much more advanced. Unfortunately, because the process is more complicated, Ianto's gonna lose blood much faster than the purified blood can be replaced. That's where Jack comes in. He's going to be donor to Ianto, until the process stabilises or completes." A hush fell over the team, until only the whir of the medical machine and the quiet, steady beep of Ianto's heart monitor could be heard. Owen had his eyes fixed on Jack's pulse monitor, watching for the moment when Jack would pass out. He was lasting much longer conscious than Owen expected, which led him to believe Jack perhaps had more pints of blood than the average male. Eventually though his head started to drop towards his chest and his pulse was dangerously low. "Jack, I need you to count down from twenty for me," instructed Owen, making his way over to Jack, ready to stop the blood transfer when he finally passed out.
"Twenty, nineteen, eighteen, seventeen, sixteen, fifteen, fourteen, thirteen, twelve," Jack's voice started to slur, "eleven, ten- eight…. Six..." Owen stopped the blood flow, glad that he had asked Jack to count down from twenty, instead of the usual ten, the normal rules of consciousness clearly didn't apply, the man had stayed conscious far longer than average. When Owen measured the number of pints he had taken, he was astounded to find he had closer to five pints of Jack's blood. Eighteen minutes later Jack gasped back to life. He was a little pale and pasty, but aside from that, seemed no worse for his ordeal. Owen connected him to an IV to help his body recover. "Did it work?" asked Jack hoarsely, drinking the water proffered to him.
"Don't know yet," Owen replied distractedly, still monitoring Ianto, but also working on a possible lead. He injected the young man with what he called a 'Xylose Infusion'. "It's a sugar that's found in a number of plants, but in a higher concentrate in our green slime, as well as the Paralexium I found earlier. It may act as an anti-dote." Explained Owen to the room at large.
Fifteen minutes later he jumped up, and approaching Ianto called the young man's name loudly. "The Xylose should have taken effect by now." he said, glancing at the monitors before calling Ianto again. He got no response, until Jack joined in, "Come on Ianto," he called, "Open your eyes for me sweetheart." Jack stroked the pale, slightly chilled face, coaxing a response from the younger man. "Come on Ianto, we need to see those blue eyes..." Slowly Ianto's breathing deepened before his eyes fluttered and opened. He looked pale, and exhausted, but managed a weak smile at Jack. The room at large breathed a sigh of relief. "You had us worried for a minute there mate," said Owen.
"I'll keep an eye on him for the next 24 hours, but he should regain the feeling in his legs within the hour, and no running after stray weevils for a while." Owen directed his last comment at Jack, who nodded. Ianto would be taking the next few days nice and easy under Jack's watchful gaze.
Several hours later Ianto was allowed to stand, with the support of Jack and Owen on either side of him, and walk unsteadily to the couch, after which he was tired enough to sleep again for another few hours. When he awoke again he felt much better and was able to make it to the kitchen on his own. He had just sat down in a seat beside his coffee machine to make a brew when Jack found him. "You're supposed to be resting." He said mock sternly, leaning on the door frame. Ianto looked round, a slight smile tracing his face, "I am! See- sitting down." Jack chuckled, he should have known they weren't going to keep him down long. "Do you want a cup?" asked Ianto. Jack grinned and nodded his agreement enthusiastically before coming over to help Ianto reach the mugs, milk and sugar which were in various currently out-of-reach places round the kitchen. Next he made Ianto stay put while he delivered mugs to Owen, who was still in the hub and the other two to his office. When he returned, he picked up Ianto and carried him to his office, smiling at the lack of protest, before depositing the young man on the couch in his office. "Owen'll be up in a minute to check you over." he said, handing Ianto his mug and sitting in his chair to continue the paperwork there.
When Owen arrived he gave Ianto a check up and a final dose of the Xylose solution, which Ianto turned away from, not liking the sight of the needle. Owen left with strict instructions for Ianto to rest as much as possible, before leaving the young man to doze lightly on the couch until Jack was ready to escort him home. Owen was pleased with the recovery he'd made and happy to leave for the night, as long as Ianto called if anything changed. Ianto didn't go home in the end, instead sleeping in Jack's bunk below the office. Where the older man joined him for a few hours before daybreak Ianto pouting at not being allowed to do anything.
Phew! Hope you like this. It's been on the back-burner for a while now, but finally I finished it!
Let me know what you think. ; ) Carrie
I think the idea originated loosely from: "Just Like A Man" by It's no longer as much related as it may have been, its morphed while I've been writing it. Anyway, if you're familiar with the story you'll probably recognise the seeds of the idea. ; p
April 2009