Addictions: Mark 2
A/N:
D-W-F: This one was really really difficult for us to write. Obviously. As it took us months. This is version number 4. And it's got parts taken from the previous three.
This is also meant to be a fic about what Tosh went through, but we decided that it was more fun to pick on Jack and Owen more. So we picked on all three of them. Also, I do realise that we have really painted Jack and Owen as a pair of complete idiots, but it was just too much fun not to.
N.B. Jack's British accent is MEANT to be absolutely awful. He obviously has no idea about. . .the continent he lives in. Apart from the fact that it's in the middle of the Indian Ocean. Because everyone knows that.
Sazza: Sorry it took so long. No, really – sorry. We DO have reasons ... excuses...
You see, it all started with Wilting going to the middle of nowhere for a month.
Then DWF got writer's block...
And tried to pull out.
Numerous times.
Then we decided to rewrite it because it didn't work, and we were getting bored with the writing – it wasn't funny enough.
So we rewrote it.
Three times.
Fully at least twice.,
...
THEN wilting went and LOST THE WHOLE THING!!
So she had to piece together bits and pieces from rejects, and we stayed up late a few times to finish it.
So you'd better be happy. 22 pages.
WiltingFlowers: I'M SORRY!! I'M SORRY!! SORRY SORRY SORRY SORRY SORRY SORRY SORRY SORRY SORRY SORRY SORRY SORRY SORRY SORRY SORRY etc.
I would just like to make this clear: I did NOT lose the whole thing. I just lost the good half of the good copy. And – to make up for it – I did 16 pages. In two days. Mostly at 2 in the morning. So enjoy.
Dedication:
Addictions is dedicated to Mum, Aaron and Abbey.
Mum – for always keepin us in line . . . or at least trying to.
Aaron – for always being there to deliver a loving death threat (or three) whenever we're being idiots (which is often)
Abbey – for being the prototype for the very first in the Cures Series. We are so sorry.
Disclaimer:
We don't own it.
Yet.
Curing Addictions
By sazza-da-vampire, wiltingflowersandpinkribbons and doctor-who-fangirl.
It was a normal day. No Weevil sightings, or attacks in within the last…24 hours (although Owen suspected, this was not because of Torchwood's prowess at capturing the bloody things, but rather to the fact that they had found out what had happened to Janet last week and had decided to steer well clear of Cardiff for now.) No unidentified Alien Crap (fondly named UAC's by the team) floating around Wales for the last two weeks. And it wasn't even raining! Owen was having a fantastic day. But that was all about to change.
Because Owen had to go to work.
He swaggered through the tourist shop door, where Ianto was sitting behind the desk, as per usual. The unusual thing was that the young man was white, shaking and breathless; he looked like he'd just run a marathon. Not to mention he looked frightened of, well … something. He approached the desk where Ianto was seated.
"Morning teaboy. If I may be so curious as to ask what the hell you've just been doing? Wait. No. On second thoughts, don't answer that."
Ianto scowled darkly at Owen.
He then glanced nervously towards the cog door at the end of the corridor, looked back up at Owen, then back at the door and turned, absolutely terrified, back to the medic. "You can go in there if you really want to," he said, pointing with his thumb towards the door. "… but I wouldn't recommend it. Not pretty." And with that, Ianto turned his attention back to filing the paperwork, muttering under his breath about evil blob-writing, non-paperwork doing bosses.
At that moment, Owen was thrown forwards into the desk as Gwen came hurtling through the front entrance carrying a huge box of chocolate. She then pelted down the corridor and quickly slid the box through the door, before cannon-balling back up the corridor, smashing into Owen again, and dashing out the door to freedom. Owen soon found out why.
As he strolled down the corridor, he could feel Ianto's eyes following him. "Owen … good luck," he wished as the cog door opened and Owen entered the main hub.
His first thought as he walked in was that Myfanwy was throwing a tantrum. Ignoring the screeches echoing around the hub, he stooped to pick up a chocolate from the box that was currently lying on the floor, but immediately found himself lying flat on his back, staring upwards at a rabid Tosh. "Don't you daretouch my chocolate," she snarled like a wild dog. Owen looked nervously at her heeled boot – which was currently resting on his chest.
"Umm … Tosh? If I promise not to take your chocolate, can I please get up?" Owen asked, afraid. She scowled at him, and lifted her boot. Picking himself up of the floor he inquired as to why she had been screeching. "… I thought you were Myf!" he finished.
Tosh just looked at him, still scowling. "Owen. Do I look like a pterodactyl to you?" she asked, cramming a chocolate bar into her mouth.
And swallowing it.
Dangerously.
If it were at all possible to swallow dangerously. "NO! Tosh, I didn't mean that you looked like a … look, I just want to know what's the matter. Who made you so angry?" Owen had decided after being tackled that it was probably safest to remain reasonable.
Tosh raised her finger and pointed it towards Jack's office, where the blinds were drawn. "He ... stole ... my…" she whispered, death-staring the office and inhaling deeply before screaming the last word, "… CHOCOLATE!!" This frightened Owen, and he stumbled backwards, knocking some U.A.C to the floor. He bolted away from the crazy Japanese lady, to what seemed to be the safest place: Jack's office.
He entered the sanctuary of the Captain's study to find his boss sitting on the floor behind the desk, curled in a ball, eyes closed and hands with chocolate coated fingers covering his ears, and a mask of absolute terror painted across his features (which even Owen had to admit were perfect), muttering "I'm sorry - I'm sorry - I'm sorry," in a high pitched squeak. Jack opened his eyes when he heard the door close. "Is it over?" he asked apprehensively, in the same terrified squeak. Owen looked down at his boss. Pathetic.
"How late were you two out hunting Weevils last night?"
"Weevils? What Weevils? I didn't do anything to any Weevils. Why would I do that? How could I do that? I mean, after that thing with you, me and Janet?" Jack squeaked through his panic.
"I didn't mean …well, what were you and Tosh hunting last night to make her act like this?"
"… Like what?"
"Jack. Lovely, calm, level-headed Tosh just went off her nut at you for stealing a few chocolate bars."
"Oh … Isn't that normal?" Jack asked warily, the panic beginning to fade.
"No. Of course it's not!"
"Oh …. I thought that's how she always acts when I steal her chocolate."
"She never brings chocolate to work." Owen said cautiously, for he was getting more than a little worried by now.
"Yes, she does! Only-about-once-a-month." He said this last bit so fast, it sounded like one word. Apparently Jack speaks fast when he's scared, Owen noted. "But – she does, and I steal it; she goes mental, and she sends Ianto to buy some more, all before you get to work . . . you really should take more notice of your surroundings, Owen."
Owen just stood there, staring at his evidently insane boss. "I'll keep it in mind to be late more often," he muttered as he walked out, leaving his deranged boss to cower alone. Besides, it seemed to have calmed down outside now. Tosh was sitting silently at her desk, happily eating her chocolate, and Gwen was working away industriously at her computer. Ianto was still nowhere to be seen.
"Gwen? Would you like some chocolate for all your hard work?" Tosh asked, throwing a Mars bar to her.
"Where's mine?" Owen inquired, trying to give Tosh puppy-eyes. And failing.
Tosh looked at him and rolled her eyes… "Alright. You can have one. Because you were nice this morning and abstained from stealing my chocolate before."
As Owen caught the chocolate bar that was flying through the air towards his head, Jack's office door slammed open. "What about me?" Tosh's death-stare returned.
"No."
"Awww…Please?"
"NO! You already had one which you stole. WITHOUT MY PERMISSION!"
"Well, duh. Normally stolen things are taken without permission."
Tosh scowled at Jack. "You still aren't having one."
"Aah, c'mon Tosh. I'm your boss. You have to listen to me."
"NO WAY JACK!!"
"I WANT A CHOCOLATE FUDGE BAR!!"
"AND I DON'T WANT TO GIVE IT TO YOU!!"
"PLEASE!"
Owen watched on in disdain. Was this all Torchwood 3 had been reduced to? Squabbling over chocolate fudge bars? He turned his attention back to the argument.
"I'll share with Ianto."
"Ianto isn't here. Besides, Gwen delivered them."
"What? Where is he? Where's Ianto? He shouldn't be late. No excuses for sleeping in. I didn't work him that hard last night."
Gwen grimaced. "Jack. Please. Don't go there."
"Sorry. But where is he?" Jack was starting to wonder what Toshiko had done with his Ianto.
"S'ok Jack…I'm here." Ianto called, struggling through the doorway, his arms full of old files for Jack to redo.
"Anyway sir, I have a bone to pick with you … Have you ever filled out a paper correctly in your life? Honestly, I was going through the old files downstairs – 1925…disgraceful, 1910- TERRIBLE, 1914…Just because there's a war on is no reason to let your filing standards slip! How did you ever run this place without me? I'm sorry sir. But you need to do it all again."
"What? But that's over 100 years of paper work that I already filled out!"
"Correction, that's over 100 years of paper work that nobody can understand, all you've done is put little blobs under the headings! How is anybody supposed to know what splodges of ink mean? Do it again," Ianto smirked.
Jack replied to him sulkily, "I understand it."
"Oh. Really." It wasn't a question.
"Yes, really. It's in another language."
"Mmmhmm. Which one?" Ianto inquired.
Shit.
"Ummm…Welsh?"
Oh fuck. Not that one, not that one.
"…No….French."
Oh god. He was just going from bad to worse. Ianto was fluent in French too.
"Gallifreyan!! It's in Gallifreyan!!" Ianto's smirk grew.
"And tell me Jack , why is it in Gallifreyan?"
"…If I told you it was for security reasons so nobody could read them in case we suddenly were invaded by an evil race of purple flying thingy-ma-whats-its, it wouldn't work, would it?" he asked.
"No. Go back into your office, and don't come out until you've finished that paper work."
Jack angrily took the enormous tower of files from Ianto and sulkily retreated back into his office. Ianto turned back to Tosh, concerned. "Tosh?" he inquired. "Why were you angry with Jack?" Toshiko admitted to Ianto the terrible wrong that a certain Captain Jack Harkness had committed against her, and Ianto gave her a hug, and tried to console her for the loss of her chocolate, telling her that it would be alright, she had plenty now, and nobody was going to take it away from her. He received a Dairy Milk bar for his kind words.
Owen stood, thoroughly confused as he saw the fuming archivist enter the Captain's office to reprimand him, and hopefully to get across to him that he was NEVER to steal Tosh's chocolate again. It seemed to the young medic that Miss. Sato had an extremely severe chocolate addiction.
Which needed to be cured.
If she was going to act like she had done this morning every time somebody ate a Mars bar that wasn't technically theirs, then he definitely had to intervene.
He caught the sound of voices drifting through the not-quite finished sound-proofing in Jack's office. (Owen, Tosh and Gwen had ordered it be put there, so as to allow them to concentrate on their work, while Jack and Ianto carried on doing whatever it was they did in there.)
"Okay Ianto. Calm down."
"Promise me Jack. I need to hear you say those words."
"Oh. Alright. I promise never to steal Tosh's chocolate again. There. Done. Now will you finish my paperwork for me?"
"NO! I wasn't there, and I don't know what happened."
"But my hand hurts. I wanna do it later." Jack whined.
"Stop being a child. When I come back, I want to see at least half of that done. In your best handwriting."
Ianto came strolling back out of the office, a smile playing around his lips, he obviously enjoyed the power he held over Jack.
.
Two hours had passed, in which Jack had:
Done absolutely NO paperwork.
Been told off by Ianto for it.
Grumpily added a few blobs to the 1925 file about a blowfish invasion.
Been forcefully told by Ianto that he would not be getting anything from him unless he redid all of his filing properly.
Told Tosh off for being a chocolate-hog.
Had a thoroughly enjoyable conversation with Owen, about how best to cure Toshiko's chocolate addiction.
.
"So it's decided then," Owen said to Jack in a loud stage whisper. Behind the pair stood Gwen and Ianto, listening to the conspirators' whispered conversation, unacknowledged by the oblivious Captain and medic.
"I'll drag her off to the med lab to inspect that table she broke, and you steal her chocolate," Owen clarified.
Gwen and Ianto looked doubtfully at each other.
"Deal. Let's go, battle positions," Jack whispered back.
.
Gwen and Ianto continued to watch in horrified amusement as Owen leaped up from behind the desk that the two had been crouching under (in a 'Tom Cruise Mission: Impossible' type pose), and strode towards Tosh. His progress was watched the entire way by Jack, who had peeped his head over the edge of the desk to oversee the happenings.
"Tosh," Owen called to the grumpy tech genius. "We've got a bit of a problem."
Tosh glared at him. "What's that?" she snapped.
"Well, you see, we're down one table in the med lab because someone jumped on it the other day and broke it."
Tosh glared at him some more.
"Why are you telling me this Owen?"
"Because. Considering you were the person who decided that jumping on it was a good idea, I was thinking that just maybe, you might help fixing it."
Tosh's glare transformed into a snarl.
"Don't look so ecstatic to be pulling your weight, Tosh."
Snarling at him some more, Tosh stood up abruptly and began storming off to the med lab, a widely smirking Owen following her.
Once they were out of sight, Jack crept out from his hiding place and snooked (Jack wasn't sure whether this was a word or not, but it just screamed all things espionage to him… so he used it anyway) towards Tosh's chocolate supplies. Splitting them into three piles, (a sizeable portion for himself, a similarly sized mountain for Owen and the rest for Janet – because she never got any treats) he snuck back into his office, a half eaten Mars bar in his mouth and wrappers on the floor behind him.
Ianto looked to Gwen as the door to Jack's office swung shut. She wore an expression which matched his own in every detail. It was an expression which read, loud and clear, those idiots.
"How long do you think it'll take her to find out they've stolen it?" Ianto muttered.
"I'd give it ninety seconds. How long do you think it'll take her to kill them?" she replied.
"Two minutes maximum. But she better not make a mess, or you can guarantee that she'll be cleaning it up."
Silence reigned supreme for a moment. But it was broken by Gwen's hushed voice.
"How long do you think it'll take them to realize that she's only got PMS?"
"Jack, four to five hours. Owen . . . . quite possibly never."
The two continued to watch Jack as he darted in and out of his office, grabbing the chocolates which had dropped to the floor.
"I'd rather not be here when she turns to mini Nazi Tosh on the two of them."
"Then it's a good thing we've got better things to do." Ianto said, pointing at the mauve light he had just noticed was flashing on his computer, "sightings of a man with purple skin and three heads telling people about the upcoming attack of the locksmiths of doom."
"Locksmiths of doom? How do they come up with these things?"
"Some people just have way too much time on their hands."
And on that note the two exited their workplace, and rushed off to an extremely bizarre afternoon involving multiple hallucinations and a man who believed in the power of keys.
.
Back inside the hub, all was most certainly not going well. Unless you call Jack on the floor, either dead or dying with numerous chocolate wrappers obstructing his breathing, Owen hiding in the archives, buried under Jack's paperwork from 1974, and Tosh methodically searching the hub with a hockey stick – stolen from under Ianto's desk – in her hands ready to knock Owen out with, "going well".
For you see, the Japanese woman was bent on revenge. And she had no chocolate.
However, she had seemingly forgotten the fact that Jack would wake up any moment. And when he did, after first ridding his throat of the alfoil wrappers, he started plotting.
Again.
But this time he had two goals – cure Toshiko of her addiction, and not end up with both himself and Owen knocked out. Numerous times. Or at all.
Unlikely as that was.
Unable to think of anything which would result in he and Owen achieving those two goals in a glorious victory which would cause Ianto and Gwen to begin admiring him like the dashing action hero that he was, Jack looked around the hub, and realised how much of a mess the place was. Something which Ianto would not be appreciative of. At all.
And considering that last time Jack had made a mess in the hub and left it for Ianto to clean he had ended up deprived of his favourite activity with his favourite Welshman for three weeks, five days, sixteen hours and forty-seven agonising seconds, Jack was pretty sure that he had better clean this mess up. Pronto.
Now, if only he could get Tosh out of the way. After all, he couldn't come out of hiding to begin cleaning up if all she would do when she observed his liveliness would be to kill him again. Messily no doubt.
So how to get rid of the chocolate addict? He spied a few rolls of industrial strength duct tape lying nearby Gwen's desk. Well . . . it couldn't be that hard . . .
.
Owen finally plucked up the courage to leave his relative safety under the 1974 reports – the only part he'd been able to read seemed to blame the floods in Brisbane, Australia – and Cyclone Tracy in Darwin, Australia on Christmas Eve – as the results of some alien invasion, who thought that the continent was uninhabited. They were just 40 000 years too late, apparently.
And that was how long Owen had been there, hiding – he'd been bored enough to actually try to read the files he was using for protection!
He entered the main hub to see carnage everywhere, with Tosh taped horizontally to the wall, her hair a complete mess. She hadn't been placed there without a fight, for Jack's prone form was on the floor, half-wrapped in duct tape, with a head wound bleeding profusely. Owen spied the bandages lying nearby, apparently thrown there absentmindedly, and used them to staunch the blood leaking out of Jack's head.
Once Jack was dealt with, Owen turned to Tosh to inspect her for injuries. She seemed mostly unharmed, except for a large bruise on her left arm.
"So, are you getting over your addiction to chocolate? It seems he is using the tried and true approach – deprivation," Owen informed her cheerfully, receiving a painful head- butt which probably left a red mark on his forehead. "Oh, not so happy now, are we?"
Tosh growled at him menacingly, sounding for all the world like Janet in a bad mood.
"Get. Me. Down. NOW!!" she screamed at him, spit flying.
"No. I rather like the new decoration."
Tosh's screaming soon pulled Jack out of the murky depths of unconsciousness.
"Owen?" Jack whispered, trying to get his medic's attention. "Owen?! A little help?" Owen only glanced at his boss, before returning his attention to exacting revenge upon Tosh.
"You set those bees after me. You ridiculed me. I still have the marks."
"No you don't!" Tosh pointed out indignantly.
"Well, they're not exactly in places I like to show to the public, are they now? The bees. The Weevil. The Klominite."
"Absorbaloff!" Jack weakly corrected him.
Owen ignored the interjection. "The headache from the stairs. The sight you left me to."
"Hey! That was your own fault. You stressed me out." Jack interjected again. Owen was getting furious by now. He really didn't want to be thinking about the incidents of a few days before. "Not to mention the indignity of having the whole episode broadcast on channel four!"
Tosh blushed. She'd actually done that by accident.
Owen finally looked at Jack, and helped him up. They left Tosh strapped there as Owen tried to remove the duct tape, which refused to come out of his hair. Once it was mostly out, they set about cleaning, but only after Jack convinced Owen that he'd be drinking decaf for weeks if he left this muddle for Ianto.
.
Ianto and Gwen entered the hub a few hours later, to find the place in a state of total disrepair, with Jack and Owen lying unconscious in the middle of all the wreckage. So much for the paperwork. Ianto thought, as he inspected Jack's files on 1910. Nope, nothing. Just a few more blobs. Why am I always left to do everything? Well… Kudos to Jack and Owen for trying, as they obviously had, for Jack was wearing a floral apron around his middle and Owen was wearing a cleaning ladies' headscarf and a pair of rubber gloves. But how the hell had they managed to knock themselves out? It was evident that Tosh hadn't done it, seeing as Gwen was now attempting to remove her from the wall so she could go and search for her missing chocolate.
Ianto nudged Jack with his foot. No reaction. So he just left him there and set about assisting Gwen in tidying the hub. And locating the CCTV footage to find out exactly how Jack and Owen had ended up unconscious on the floor, in the middle of a ruined hub, with Tosh attached to the wall.
"Should we maybe move those two?" he asked Gwen.
"Nah … leave them where they are, they're cute like that. The apron sort of suits Jack, don't you think?" she replied, grinning at him, as she looked down in confusion at the file she was holding in her hand,1962 … "Ianto? What the hell is this supposed to mean?"
Ianto looked up slowly, dreading what he was about to see. When he laid eyes upon it, he nearly went into cardiac arrest. He'd never seen paperwork done so badly in his life! "Oh my god! Fuck, Gwen, I don't know. Take it away, it's killing me!" Gwen did as asked, looking down again at the series of random words and squiggles on the page … followed by a string of words: UrsulaAndressSeanConneryUrsulaAndressSeanConneryUrsulaAndressSeanConnery….
Yup. That pretty much summed up the thoughts that were running through Jack's mind continuously. James Bond. Also a synonym for Horny Bastard. Which … in Jack's mind was probably more of a question … who's up for it? Gwen smiled to herself as she put the file away, stepping over her Captain as she did so. One down, a million more to go, although she didn't quite know why she was bothering, the files were only going to have to be pulled out and redone by Jack again anyway. So why not concentrate on something more fun? Like … what were Ianto and Tosh laughing at over there?
Gwen walked over and leant on Tosh's reclaimed box of chocolate to look at the CCTV over Ianto and Tosh's shoulders – they, of course, had it on repeat and were recording the footage, and as Gwen watched, she began to understand why.
The CCTV showed high speed footage of Owen and Jack running around the hub, sweeping, dusting and generally trying to clean up their horrible mess. And for the most part they had no problems doing this. That was, until Owen brought the mop out.
Tosh, Ianto and Gwen began laughing all over again as they watched Owen attempting to take the mop out of the squeeze-and-pull bucket in which he had effectively gotten the mop head stuck. He continued to yank and pull at it every which way until finally the pole came loose from the head, came flying up, and hit Owen in the face. Owen staggered back, dazed, and ran into Jack, tripping them both over in the process, and knocking himself out on the hub's hard floor. Jack stumbled back after the shock of Owen smashing into him, slipped on a chocolate wrapper that they had missed, fell back, hit his head on the desk behind him, and was then covered by an avalanche of paperwork.
The three conscious members of Torchwood three looked at each other, tears of laughter streaming down each of their faces. It was Gwen who caught her breath first.
"Get me a copy of that," she managed to say through her giggling.
.
A new day dawned, and Tosh came in with copious amounts of chocolate once more. But this time, Jack and Owen were ready. And, after yesterday's disaster, they had decided that this time maybe a more well thought out plan would be a wiser idea.
Since depriving Tosh hadn't gone to plan, they had decided that plan B might be a more suitable option. The only problem with plan B was that one member of the duo had no idea what plan B was, due to the annoyingly bizarre way a certain Captain was attempting to explain it.
"So. There she is. Ready for plan B?"
"No Jack. I am not ready for plan B. YOU HAVN'T EVEN TOLD ME WHAT PLAN B IS YET!"
"Don't yell! She'll hear you and then plan B will go down the drain!"
"WE DON'T EVEN HAVE A PLAN B YET!"
"Yes we do!"
"WELL THEN WHAT IS IT?!"
"Sublimination!"
"You've been saying that for the last hour Jack! What the hell is sublimination!"
"It's plan B!"
"Plan B is sublimination. Yes, I've figured that out thanks. But what does that actually ENTITLE DOING?!"
"Subliminatory acts!"
"YOU'RE MAKING NO SENSE!"
"We're going to crack into her subconscious using subliminal messaging idiot!"
Owen looked at him.
"Oh. Then why couldn't you just have said that?"
"I did!"
"No you didn't! You just kept on muttering sublimination!"
"Yes. Sublimination. It's plan B. Just like plan A was deprivation. And if this one goes like that last one, then we'll move on to plan C."
"What the hell is plan C?"
"Tortureation."
"Jack. Tortureation isn't a word. Neither is sublimination."
"Really?"
"Yes."
"Oh. I knew that."
"Sure you did. You just like the suffix 'ation' don't you?"
"Maybe."
Owen just rolled his eyes at him and peered out of the office windows to observe the rest of the team. The sight was fascinating to say the least. Gwen appeared to be the only person doing work, the other two weren't even attempting to make it seem as though they were being productive.
Tosh was sitting at her desk, watching everyone around her with suspicion and hovering protectively over the mountains of chocolate which occupied the majority of her desk. But that was only to be expected considering the events of yesterday. It was Ianto who was really interesting.
The teaboy was wondering around aimlessly, muttering to himself, and casting various dark looks at Jack's office. Which was understandable. Ianto wasn't happy about Jack and Owen's blossoming friendship. Which may have had something to do with the fact that their exploits yesterday had left him with a sizeable clean up job. Not to mention that Jack had spent a good portion of last night racking up a huge bill on Ianto's phone, and then barely acknowledged Ianto when they began work this morning, preferring instead to talk avidly (and cryptically) to Owen about their next move.
So it was really no wonder that the Welshman was wondering just what his lover and the Medic had been up to in that office in the last hour.
Turning away from the movements of the rest of the team, Owen confronted Jack about a gaping hole in his 'sublimination' plan.
"Jack, how exactly are we going to confront her with subliminal messages telling her to stop consuming alarmingly large amounts of chocolate?"
"With these." Jack held up a flat board with two metallic blue devices sitting on it. The devices were tiny, and shaped like little crescent moons. In his other hand he held a standard earpiece.
"These," he began, "are locked on to Toshiko's DNA. They'll seek her out, and wrap themselves around her earrings, making it look like they're just a part of her jewellery. But really they're tiny speakers which will project sounds into her ears and her ears only. I've aligned them with the same frequency as our earpieces, and constructed a audio link between them. That way we'll be able to speak directly into her ear. Like those people who are trying to quit smoking, so they go to sleep listening to tapes which tell them that they're 'strong confident people who do not need cigarettes'. It'll work. You just wait and see."
.
Tosh was innocently typing away at her computer when a mozzie or something slammed into her ear. She smacked it away impatiently, and continued her work. A moment later, she was assailed by another insect, and this time she jumped up and screamed her hatred of bugs at the world.
"Stupid bugs! I hate those things! They're EVIL!!"
A smattering of laughter caught her attention. Tosh turned to see what was so hilarious. "What's so funny?" she snapped at Jack and Owen as their laughter turned to guilty smiles.
"Nothing,"
"Absolutely nothing."
"Positively nothing."
"Nada."
"Ziltch."
"Negative."
"Zero."
"The absence of things."
"Or events."
"Or... what's another word for events?"
"I don't know you're the doctor!"
"SHUT UP YOU FUCKING FREAKS!!"
"Sorry."
"No need for that sort of language, missy. Respect your elders."
"Jack. I. Have. NO. Respect. For. Horny. Old. Men."
"Hey! I'm a hot horny old man, there's a difference!"
"You wish."
"OWEN!! DON'T TAKE HER SIDE!! YOU'RE FRATERNISING WITH THE ENEMY!!"
"Like you haven't done that before, sir," Ianto came up the stairs with a pile of paperwork.
"Oh no. Tell me that's not what I think it is."
"It's not, sir. It's paperwork you've filled out correctly, but in a foreign language."
"Really?"
"No. You've got to do the whole thing from scratch."
"Dammit."
Jack continued sulking as Ianto turned and headed back into the archives. His depressed mood only worsened when he saw his lover returning to the main hub with yet more paperwork.
"Don't tell me I've got to fill that out as well!"
"You don't."
"Really?!"
"Yes."
"Wait . . . is this one of those things where you get my hopes up and then tear them down with one cruel, mean, funny and somehow hot sentence?"
"No."
"Really?!"
"YES!"
"Oh. Then what did you bring those up for if I've already done them?"
"You haven't."
"IANTO!! YOU SAID THAT YOU WEREN'T GOING TO DO THAT!! HOW CAN YOU MAKE A SENTENCE LIKE THAT HOT?!"
"You haven't filled these out, Jack! I have."
"So you're going to start doing my paperwork for me?"
"No."
"Dammit."
"This is all the paperwork that I have done for the last month," Ianto gestured towards the mountain of paper which was around the height of Jack's desk.
"So?"
"So, you have approximately fifteen hundred months worth of paperwork to complete.
Jack gulped. "Shit."
"That just about sums it up. Now – get to work."
And on that note the secretary left the hub to go and do . . . whatever it was that he did. Owen presumed (or hoped) that it was something to do with coffee and not something to do with whatever he and Jack were planning for tonight.
.
Tosh turned to look at Gwen. "Did you say something?"
"No, why?"
"Don't worry. I must be hearing things."
Tosh turned back to her work, and Gwen, far from convinced by her supposedly unconcerned response, watched her for a moment. Ten minutes later, Tosh jumped again. "Did you mention my chocolate?"
"I haven't said a word."
"Really? Then - "
Tosh stopped for a moment, frowning.
"What's going on?" Gwen asked, worried.
"Nothing . . . it's just . . . nothing."
Shaking her head, as if to try and rid it of mysterious voices which plagued her thoughts, Tosh turned back to her work, leaving a very worried Gwen watching her.
.
Meanwhile, in Jack's office, a large pile of paperwork was lying abandoned in a corner, and two brainless twats were rolling around on the floor laughing.
Owen managed to control himself for a moment, turned on the mic, and whispered, "All that chocolate will go straight to your thighs, you don't need this – you are a beautiful, strong, confident woman, you do not need chocolate to get through your day." Owen turned the mic off in the nick of time as he and Jack renewed their fits of laughter.
"Tosh, you need no such thing as chocolate, you are strong, you can quit easily. All you need to do is drop the chocolate bar ... " Jack said into his mic, as he noticed the Snickers Tosh held in her hand.
The twats peeked through the blinds of Jack's office as he said this, and so they saw first-hand the poor woman's reaction. A Snickers bar crashed to the ground as Tosh jumped up, saw Gwen, and lunged at her, demanding to know the secrets of her hypnotic technology.
Gwen, of course, had no idea what she was on about. "Huh? What?"
"HOW ARE YOU GETTING INSIDE MY HEAD COOPER?! WHAT RIGHT DO YOU THINK YOU HAVE TO INVADE MY THOUGHTS?! I'LL SPIFLICATE YOU!!"
"What??"
"Spiflicate. Transitive Verb. To destroy or defeat completely and resoundingly. To kill aggressively and violently. To cause someone grievous bodily harm or fatality. As noun – spiflication. The act of spiflicating." Ianto piped up, without looking away from his paperwork.
"That's freaky." Gwen said.
"It's just a word Gwen."
"Actually Ianto, I believe she was referring to your function as a walking dictionary," Tosh pointed out calmly, causing both Gwen and Ianto to note that the PMS-induced mood swings were abundant. Poor, poor twats. They'd be on the receiving end of one of her not-so-likeable moods soon.
"Oh. Okay then. I will choose to take that as a compliment. Now, Tosh, about these voices you've been hearing. Do they sound like Gwen's voice?"
"Ahh . . . no."
"Do they sound like the two morons upstairs?"
"Quite possibly," she mumbled through a bar of Nestlé chocolate and wafer.
"Well. There's your answer. Now stop threatening to spiflicate Gwen. Look what you've done to her."
They both glanced at Gwen, who was white with shock and shaking slightly.
Ianto pressed a cup of coffee into her hands. "Don't worry, she's gone to pick on someone else now. You'll be fine. You're safe now."
Gwen looked up into Ianto's face, her expression one of pure terror.
"My mother used to tell me that she was going to spiflicate me with hugs and kisses," she whispered.'
.
"Oh shit. She's onto us. Next thing you know she'll be treating us to her Darth Vader death grip."
"Yeah. She'll be spuflicationing us."
"Jack. It's spifflication. Not Spuflication. And anyway, that sentence makes no sense."
"BUT IT SOUNDS COOL!"
"Jack! Focus! How're we going to convince her that it's not us??"
"We make ourselves sound different!"
"Like . . . accents?"
"EXACTLY!"
.
Tosh had decided that although the events of yesterday were interesting, to say the least, she did not want to be taped to a wall again. So, she pretended to get back to her work, whilst actually planning her revenge on the idiots in Jack's office. But it wasn't long before the voices returned.
"You're a class bird. Highly shaggable." the most horrible attempt at a British accent she had ever heard whispered in her ear, "You don't bloody well need chocolate."
"It's just crap that yeh don' wanna eat. Have a curry or a kebab or. . .OWEN! What else do you people eat? . . .sommat." it continued, in what could possibly be anything between Manchester, Italian and Cockney.
"You don' need. . ."
"Jack!!" a voiced hissed in the background, "That is the worst accent I have ever heard. Stop it, right now! That is horrible!"
"But that's how you people think isn't it?"
"No! That's HORRIBLE!"
"You think you can do better Harper? Go ahead!"
"G'day mate," the voice started, turning into a horrible attempt at the stereotypical Australian accent, "Remember me? I'm yah conscience. And ah'm also a bloke. So lemme tell yah, us blokes like our ockas strong, confident and amazin'. They dun need no choc'late. So watcha think yah doin?? Go on! Git up of yah strine an stop relyin' on tha' choc'late. So, gitup, git goin' an hit the frog an' toad. If yah stick 'round here bein' all dingoes brekky over yah choc'late, you'll end up a few snags short of a barbie!! Aftah all - "
"STOP!! YOU'RE KILLING ME! OWEN THAT'S HORRIBLE!! WHAT IS THAT EVEN SUPPOSED TO BE??"
"Er . . . Australian?"
"Have you even been to Australia?"
". . . No . . ."
"EXACTLY!! STOP IT RIGHT THERE!!"
"Fine! You take over then!"
"Yooh are a strang vooman. Vhy do yooh think zat yooh nid chocolatteh?? VHY?Vhat has pozzassed yooh to bilive zat yooh need so much of zat dreadfal stuff! VHY MUST YOOH - "
Tosh was granted welcome respite from the horrible voices of her idiot boss and their idiot of a medic in the form of a flashing red alarm.
"Shit," she whispered, grabbing her jacket.
.
"SHIT!" Jack yelled, grabbing his jacket.
"Shit," Owen muttered, grabbing the mic and searching the office for his jacket (which Tosh had actually stolen and burnt late yesterday).
"No, Owen," Jack said when he saw the mic in Owen's hand, "we've got a barrage of Kudus invading the centre of town. We do NOT have time to continue with Plan B. We'll finish it after we figure out how these things got here."
"What the hell is a Kudu?"
"Do you want to look it up in Google? It's big antelope thing with massive twirly horns. And there's about fifty running around the city. Don't let them spear you, it hurts."
"You sound like you talk from experience."
"There's a reason I won't go to Africa anymore."
.
Apparently the Kudu had been abducted by a Molmooth Conglomeration's scientific experimental group. Annoyingly, finding out this information had been a long, slow and very smelly process, as the aliens had the tendency to say the first half of their name before anything they spoke, and followed it with the last half of their name!
As for the smelly, it's better not to know.
After a few hours, Tosh and Ianto put together a device which would emit a signal, bioprogrammed to attract the Kudu herds. Unfortunately for Owen, he'd been too engrossed in whispering into Tosh's ear with increasingly bad accents to notice that he hadn't moved from where Ianto had let loose the signal.
"AARGH!!" Owen screamed as he saw a massive, heaving, muscular Kudu galloping madly toward him. Soon enough, he was running from an entire herd of the creatures, and had to climb a tree to get away from the beasts.
.
Owen was found clinging to a rather high tree half an hour later. The poor guy had climbed so high so fast that he never thought about getting down.
So now he was stuck.
And Jack, Ianto and Gwen couldn't be bothered hiring a crash mat or safety net, so they were busily trying to coax Owen into dropping down towards the nearest branch.
Unfortunately, Owen didn't have the best hand-eye coordination, and ended up dropping past three or four branches before lodging, upside-down, in a gap between two branches.
It was about then that Tosh arrived, after giving the Molmooth scientists directions to Africa, and saw the current position of her crush.
"How did he get there? He looks like an idiot!"
"Well... do you really need to know?"
"So it's a funny story, then?"
"Very. Gwen, you have the floor."
"It all started with Owen being distracted, somehow. He didn't move when the rest of us did, after summoning the Kudus. So he ended up getting chased by a kudu – we were laughing at him from that building over there – and then the entire herd was chasing him, and so he ended up climbing the tree to get away. He climbed too high, and when we tried to get him to come down he fell."
"He fell? Wow, why am I not surprised?"
"Hey! I CAN hear you, you know!"
"Oh, weknow, Owen, we know."
"So who's going up there to get him down?"
"He'd kill any of us, so Jack, you can go."
"Gwen! You're sending me to my death!"
"No, she's not. We're sending you to your death."
"Not you too, Ianto."
Tosh, Gwen and Ianto suddenly looked at Jack with massive, evil grins on their faces. "Have fun," Gwen wished him.
Jack grudgingly began to climb the tree, as Owen renewed his efforts to unjam himself. However he may have been better off staying where he was, seeing as he shoved a little bit too hard and fell right out of the tree, attempted to grab Jack to use him as a lifeline – but ended up pulling him down as well – and the duo barely missed the fleeing Tosh and Gwen. Ianto wasn't so lucky.
.
Gwen took in the sight of her colleague. Lying on the hospital bed, he was in a horrible condition. The poor guy hadn't come out cleanly.
"Gwen?"
"Yes, Ianto?"
"Do the twats know that Tosh isn't addicted to chocolate?"
"No."
"Are you going to tell them that it's just PMS?"
"Why should I? This is more fun."
"True."
.
"I'm in for it now aren't I?" Jack muttered, pale faced, to Gwen, as she entered the waiting room, having been talking to Ianto.
"Yeah. You're screwed."
"Thanks Owen."
"Better go back to the hub, collect whatever it is Ianto's going to need over the next 7 weeks or whatever." Gwen piped up-scowling across at Jack – and then at Owen – just for good measure. She was fond of the teaboy, she didn't like to see him harmed. That, and it was because of these two twats that she'd have to go 7 weeks on bloody instant coffee.
"Yeah."
"So what'll he need?"
"Err. . .clothes. But he has them at home. . .coffee? Keys. . .a wheelchair. Telescope, incase his neighbours decide to do something suspiscious. Besides, he might get bored and there just happens to be a very pretty girl across the stree-"
"Jack. This is NOT Alfred Hitchock's 'Rear Window'. . .besides, like Ianto's going to want to look out his window at what his neighbours are doing. . ."
"Spoil all his fun why don't you? Besides what his neighbours do can be very interesting. I'll tell you that much."
"So he needs clothes and keys, and what else?"
"Me."
"No Jack."
"PLEASE!"
"Jack, with his injury, he won't actually be able to do much."
"That's easy, I could find a way to get around that."
"Err. . .Jack.I'm not sure that would exactly be beneficial to his recovery."
"Oh whatever. Shut up Owen. What would you know?"
"I'm a doctor!"
"Yeah? Well I'm older than you!"
"Yeah, but I am the only one here who holds a degree in medicine. I know for a fact that whatever it is you do wouldn't be good for him."
"You're just jealous because he's getting more than you."
"Shut it."
"…"
"…"
"Tosh?"
"Yes Jack?"
"Can I have a chocolate?"
"…"
"EVERYONE GET OUT OF THE WAY!!"
Translations for the Aussie accent – it's MEANT to be horrible, it was torture to paint our continent in such a light!
Ockas – An Ocka is like a yobbo in England . . . or White Trash in America. We put it in there as way of having Owen mix up the meanings. He meant Sheila. Which is a girl.
Strine – the name for the Australian Slanguage. Owen thinks it's something else entirely.
Hitting the frog and toad – FINALLY HE GOT ONE RIGHT!! (we think . . . he may have meant something different. Don't ask us!! We just wrote it!! We have no control over what he says!!) it means to hit the road. I.E. go for a drive.
Dingoes brekky – This means a drink of water and a look around. We think he means it to be very possessive. He has no idea about Strine.
A few snags short of a barbie – this literally means a few sausages short of a barbeque. Meaning, not all there in the head.
A/Ns:
Sazza: Are you happy? Please don't kill us. We already gave you our reasons for taking so long!
Wiltingflowers:
Okay, so! There it is. Hope you enjoyed it. Now, to help make up for the humongo wait, we're providing you with some top secret information:
Firstly, there will be six stories in the Cures Series.
Secondly, the next story, Curing Allergies, will focus on Ianto and will, hopefully, be up soon... ish.
To help placate you, we will be posting a parallel ... thing... called Cures Cast-Offs, which will be written versions of all the things we decided to cut out.
And that's about it. Sorry. Oh, and the thing with Ianto is payback for 'Boo Boo' and his dot message. – glares –
PLEASE REVIEW!! If you all do, we'll get the next one up in less than four months! :D And don't ask about Abbey being the prototype... we don't want to be sued... also, you won't understand the answer anyway. Although it involes sazza trying to drink water upside down. We have the video proof!
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ummmm
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REVIEW!! REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW!!
That means you, and you, and especially you.
BYE!!