"Jack? Any luck yet?" Ianto asked over the comms.
"Almost had 'im. This one's slippery," Jack grumbled.
"Yeah. Keep me posted, right?"
"Course. You, too."
"I'm not the one ducking down dark alleys, hunting an alien with razor-sharp teeth and claws," Ianto reminded Jack dryly.
"Still," Jack said, raising the barrel of his Webley as he came up to a turn, "anything can -"
Ianto waited a moment when Jack didn't continue. He heard what vaguely sounded like a lorry revving and thought maybe Jack stopped talking because a civilian was present. There was more noise that went on for a few moments, something that sounded like radio static, which shouldn't happen over Torchwood's communication interface.
"Jack? You there?" Ianto waited again. "Jack?" No response. Could they have lost signal? Ianto was behind the wheel of the SUV, pulled over in a lay-by on Westgate Street, so there shouldn't have been a problem there. Jack's tracker showed him being only about a block away in a typically inaccessible alley off Quay Street. There shouldn't have been any issue with the tech keeping them in touch.
Ianto checked Jack's tracker again and found he hadn't moved at all in the last several minutes. Ianto's heart sank. He knew he shouldn't have left Jack out there alone. Even with his dislocated knee from a misadventure two days earlier, he could have provided better coverage for Jack out there than from the SUV. Ianto checked his gun, handcuffs, and pen-light, and grabbed a canister of extra-strength Weevil spray as he carefully got out.
Moving as quickly and quietly as he could, Ianto made his way toward Jack's location, hoping he wasn't going to have to climb any walls or gates to get into the back alleys. He sighed when he found the gates leading off of Quay Street were ajar. At least he wouldn't have to do any climbing, but it wasn't so good if the Weevil had got loose, again.
As he came around a corner, Ianto stopped short. Jack couldn't have had any chance at all – he was all but swimming in blood and even though some of the shallower slashes were already healed over, Jack's throat and abdomen were going to take a little longer to mend. It looked like the Weevil had got the drop on Jack and attacked from behind. Likely exactly when Jack was talking to him. It wouldn't have happened if he hadn't radioed in and distracted Jack, Ianto thought miserably.
He started to kneel gingerly, meaning to scoop Jack up in his lap and wait with him until he revived. If he came back before he was done healing, it was going to be absolute hell for Jack and Ianto wanted to be there to hold on to him.
Then he stopped. The Weevil was still out there, and it wasn't one he could let off with a warning if this was what it had done to Jack. It had to be stopped before someone who wouldn't come back to life got killed.
"I'm sorry, Jack," Ianto murmured, dropping a kiss on Jack's forehead. "Hang on until I'm back, ok?"
Ianto hurried back out to Quay Street and shone his torch light around. He followed the trail of bloody Weevil-tracks up toward Castle Street, bearing toward the park and river… naturally.
There was at least one small favour given to Torchwood that night: the Weevil Ianto was after wasn't very hard to find. It was sat there on the boat dock, an unidentifiable chunk of meat in one hand (most probably Jack's liver) and fishing in the river for something. Ianto hoped it was a bit of trash and not a duck or something. Either way, he had a clear shot at the back of the Weevil's head and wasn't about to waste it. The Weevil fell forward into the river, and normally Ianto would have put an intercept in place to get the body out of the water and into Owen's lab as quickly as possible – for the benefit of studying why some Weevil's turned particularly aggressive – but this one would just have to be fetched later, if at all.
Ianto hurried as much as he could back to Quay Street to look after Jack. It was starting to rain, and he didn't want Jack lying there soggy while healing. Only, when he returned to the dark alley corner where he'd found Jack, there was nothing but a pool of blood. Jack might have revived in the space of time that Ianto had been after the Weevil, but he almost certainly couldn't be healed enough to be running through the streets of Cardiff. Unless his ability to heal was evolving, he'd likely still be regrowing vital organs and like as not in excruciating agony.
Ianto's heart sank yet again and he bit his lip, tapping his headset. "Jack?" he tried quietly. "Where are you?"
Nothing.
Maybe he'd tried to get back to the SUV, Ianto thought, and pulled out his PDA to check Jack's tracker. Once again, Ianto's heart sank – Jack's tracker was moving along at a clip that suggested being in a moving vehicle, but there was no way Jack could drive (safely) in his condition. Ianto felt like sinking down to the pavement, huddling in, and just having a good cry in the rain. The whole night had gone from bad to worse and Ianto could only blame himself.
When Ianto looked down at the tracker again, he realized it had stopped, exactly at the nearest hospital. Someone must have found Jack and decided he needed transporting to a morgue. Great.
Ianto pushed himself to get back to the SUV and compose himself. Safely stashing his Beretta, Ianto rifled through the handful of fake IDs until he found one for an NHS official that would get him access to the hospital's mortuary facility.
As soon as Ianto parked in the hospital's carpark, he pulled a tarpaulin and sheet over the back seat and hurried into casualty with his fake ID clipped to his coat and an official looking portfolio tucked under his arm. A grave expression and polite but firm tone of voice, along with an expectant quirk of an eyebrow, got Ianto an escort to the mortuary.
He was beyond relieved when he entered to find the medical team hadn't yet started cutting away Jack's clothes. Jack's flesh would have likely healed over by then and it would have taken some doing to prise them away from a corpse that had bled to death with no gaping wounds. Ianto conjured up his most authoritative tone and ordered the room to be cleared.
"I'm about to conduct a post-mortem on what looks like a violent death and you want my team to drop everything?" cried the lead physician.
Ianto flashed his NHS badge and made a show of peering at the doctor's identification. "Correct, I'm afraid, Dr. Richards. Don't reckon your guest of honour will raise much objection, will he?"
"You can't just walk in here and – and – interrupt a medical investigation for -"
"Doctor. Are you familiar with the concept of hierarchy?" Ianto asked frostily. "Think of it like the army. You may be a Captain, but a Major has just walked in and given you a direct order. Now, unless you'd like to have another go as a Private, you'll do what I'm telling you to do. Of course, you are at liberty to take it up with my immediate superior as well. Nothing stopping you filing a complaint," Ianto said with a shark-like smile.
Dr. Richards stared gobsmacked at Ianto for a few long moments, then turned on his heel and stormed out, followed quickly by the other staff members.
Ianto breathed a sigh and quickly locked the doors. He pulled a stretcher over to the exam slab and started carefully shifting Jack onto it. From some experience at moving dead bodies, Ianto knew the thing was to get the feet moved first, then the upper body. He'd just got a hold under Jack's shoulders when Jack gave a shuddering gasp.
"Shit!" Ianto breathed, shifting his hold on Jack to anchor him as much physically as psychologically. Jack instinctively grasped Ianto's arms like he usually did when reviving, only much tighter than usual. "It's alright, Jack. I'm here, I've got you," Ianto soothed, feeling helpless as Jack continued to gasp and pant, obviously fighting against a tremendous amount of pain. "I'm so sorry, Jack, but I've got to get you out of here… and that means I need to move you onto a stretcher. And I know it already bloody hurts. Understatement, I'm sure. Just, please try to breathe and relax as much as possible, alright? On three?"
Jack gritted his teeth hard and nodded frantically. "Just do it," he bit out.
"Right." Ianto readjusted his grip and as soon as he had a firm hold, lifted Jack as smoothly as he could over to the stretcher.
Jack expertly forced down a cry of pain, turning it into a long, low growl instead and taking short, quick breaths as Ianto settled him on the stretcher and found a sheet to drape over him. "Where are we?" Jack asked, trying not to let his voice shake. "I was after that Weevil… what got me this time? Feel like I've been drawn and quartered."
Ianto grabbed the nearest lab coat and pulled it on over his suit, then unlocked a door, pushed the automatic opener and got behind the stretcher. "Not far from it. It was the Weevil. Must've got you from behind. Think it ripped out your throat and at least one of your abdominal organs. I found you like that when you didn't respond over the comms. Went after the Weevil, shot it by the river, and by the time I'd got back you… someone had found you and you wound up in the morgue."
"Fuck."
"Yeah. So, getting you out of here and had to piss off a post-mortem team to do it before you revived on the slab and, uh, going to have to wipe a lot of CCTVs and do a good bit of retconning."
"Wait!" Jack said as Ianto starting pushing him toward the doors. "I'll kill hospital cameras until we're outta here." He pushed up his sleeve to access his VM and pressed a few buttons. "Ok, go. The longer the cameras are down the faster they'll scramble to check anything unusual."
Ianto never realized before how incredibly slow hospital lifts could be, though he was immensely glad the corridors on the way to the carpark were mainly empty. As they approached the exit, Ianto wanted to smack himself for not considering the receptionist that would be stationed there to help with patients being taken home upon release. Jack definitely didn't resemble a patient being released.
"Wait here," Ianto said, rather needlessly as he parked Jack halfway down a corridor and sprinted ahead to the desk to tell the young man on duty that there was an emergency near the street entrance and he was needed to report there immediately. Ianto, still in his nicked lab coat, promised he'd cover the desk until it was sorted. Ianto was grateful that there were no questions asked and hurried back to Jack as soon as it was clear, after dropping a small dose retcon tablet into the receptionist's water bottle.
He wasted no time getting Jack out to the SUV and helping him into the back where he could lie down. "I'll get you back to the Hub for recovery, and then I've got to get back here and deal with that Dr. Richards and his team before it leaks that an NHS official stole a corpse," Ianto said, getting behind the wheel and maneuvering carefully through the carpark.
"Could just let it leak," Jack said, curled on his side in the back of the SUV. "As long as the cameras are wiped, no evidence, right?"
Ianto shook his head. "Would destroy that doctor's career. Unless you're wanting another miserable medic around the Hub. Easier to just retcon the poor man. He was only doing his job."
"Yeah. I know. But…. Look, call somebody else in. Owen, maybe. Since he knows his way around hospitals."
"He's not on duty tonight, it's just -"
"Please, Ianto?"
Ianto glanced up at the mirror. Jack's face was still a mask of pain. That decided it, then. As soon as he pulled up to the next stop light, Ianto speed-dialed Owen's mobile and told him he needed to get to University Hospital as quickly as possible, administer retcon to Dr. Richards' post-mortem team, double check the morgue for any missed evidence, and then get to the Hub to check that Jack was healing properly.
An hour later, Ianto had already done a scan on Jack and confirmed his suspicion that it was Jack's liver the Weevil he'd shot was planning to have for supper. He'd insisted that Jack take a hot shower and then bundle up in something comfortable and have a lie-down on the couch until Owen arrived to look him over.
By then, Jack was getting back to himself, insisting that he was perfectly fine, didn't need to rest, didn't need Owen to check up on him, and just wanted a cup of coffee.
Ianto had other ideas. "You're going to rest, and you're not having coffee until Owen says it's ok. You're just regrowing your liver, Jack. That needs to be able to handle caffeine consumption before you can have coffee. I don't know what could happen to you otherwise."
"I'm alright, Ianto, seriously. I'll just have a good night's -"
"You're not bloody alright!" Ianto shouted. "You died – horribly – and lost a major organ in the process. Now, you can bloody well take rest until your body's had sufficient time to recalibrate or whatever it does." Ianto saw the stunned look on Jack's face and softened his tone. "You're in pain, Jack. Please don't tell me you're not because I can tell, no matter how good you are at disguising it. And I know it's my fault, so please let me do what I can to take care of you?"
"Ianto… how could it be your fault? It was the Weevil that -"
"I should have been backing you up. Instead, I was sat useless in the SUV, distracting you by asking if you'd caught the Weevil yet, and then you ended up in the morgue because I wasn't there with you."
Jack sighed and reached out to wrap Ianto in his arms. "You have nothing to blame yourself for, nothing at all. You were in the SUV because you were injured and I didn't want you getting hurt further. You weren't being useless. You're the one who got the Weevil we were after, and you're the one who busted me outta the morgue. I'll be fine, Ianto, you know that. Yeah, ok, you're right, it does kinda hurt still, but I have a lot of experience with that. Don't worry about it."
"I hate it when you die, Jack," Ianto said tiredly.
"I know, but you can't blame yourself, ok? Please? And speaking of injuries, you must have put a lot of stress on that injured knee. Let's sit you down, get some ice on it, alright? I do want Owen to have a look at that," Jack said, walking Ianto over to the couch.
Ianto decided not to argue when he realized that his knee was aching and that he'd probably pushed it way more than he should have that night. Jack went over to the kitchenette to fetch an ice pack and to put the kettle on. He came back with two mugs of chamomile tea and passed one to Ianto before settling the ice on his knee.
"I think we should both have a late morning tomorrow," Jack said decisively. "Injuries sustained in the field. Recovery time warranted."
"Alright. But from now on, if I'm at least walking-wounded, you've got to let me cover you out there. We'll be ok if we have one another's back. And that doesn't just go for Weevils," Ianto said, reaching over to hold Jack's hand.
Jack looked ready to protest until Ianto added that last bit. Instead, he turned his hand over under Ianto's and threaded their fingers together.
"Maybe we should ring Owen and reschedule our appointments for tomorrow, yeah?" Ianto suggested. "I'm so tired at the moment I think I'd probably just sleep through an exam."
"Good idea. Let's just go get some good sleep," Jack agreed. "And for once, even I mean actual sleep."
"Knew I was right to be worried," Ianto muttered teasingly, slinging his arm around Jack's shoulders as they made their way up to the carpark that exited a block from Ianto's flat. By that point, he didn't even mind crossing the road with Jack in jim-jams and a dressing gown. The walking-wounded had to have some sort of concessions, after all.