Chapter Ten
I call 9, 1, 1, when I'm in a fix
When I need you baby I call 6, 6, 6,
I'm in trouble
- Trouble with Crickets by Alannah Myles
Ianto woke up lazily in his Egyptian sheets with his Aunt Eleri's quilt covering his feet. He opened one eye to glance at the nightstand clock – 5:23am, February 13th. "Damn," he thought, "I'll have to get to the shops early to get those chocolates Jack . . ." It suddenly dawned on him that he'd lost a day, maybe two and "where was . . . .." Ianto only had to shift slightly to realize Jack was behind him, sleeping quietly. Just to make sure, Ianto moved his hand behind him and ran it along the sleeping person's hip – Ianto would know that firm hip and thigh anywhere but Jack whispering, "Okay, okay but Ianto Jones, let me sleep just a while longer, eh?" and turned onto his other side affirmed that all was right with the world, at least for now. Ianto took in and let out a cleansing breath and eased out of bed. Whoever made sure he got to the bed was concerned about his or their modesty for he was wearing boxers. He grabbed a fresh suit combination from the nearby closet before heading for a shower but turned around long enough to cover Jack's back. "Don't forget to get that Ethiopian dark blend I like," Jack murmured as he snuggled within the sheet. Ianto halted a moment, taking it in another breath – normal, tender moments are tenuous when you work for Torchwood.
Ianto showered and left the Hub as quick and quietly as possible, with his diary firmly tucked under his arm. He knew Anwen would have the Williams' up soon and he wanted to get out without much sharing with Gwen and the others. If he timed things right, he could get the morning shopping, along with Jack's Valentine's gift tended to as well as do this rather complex entry before lunch. He could excuse his absence by bringing everyone back at the Hub bangers from Peg and Wigg.
"Haven't seen you much lately, Mr. Jones," greeted his typical morning barista, Marg.
"Yep, been busy." Ianto knew the college student had a crush on him and if he hadn't married Jack, he would have asked her out for she made a brilliant espresso. "Can I get a three bags of the Ethiopian and one of the Columbian?"
"No problem," she said, bending down just enough to pull the bags out of the nearby bin and expose the top of her breasts. "Your office mates must drink an awful lot of coffee, I reckon, Mr. Jones," she said with extra sugar.
"Yes," he answered, smiling slightly but not trying to encourage her flirting. "Could I get a large red eye too please?"
Marg winked, "Enough room for cream?"
"Not this time," Ianto replied while handing her the money, "Keep the change." He dashed to a faraway table, opened his diary, and quickly hung his Bose headphones over his ears like some huge "do not disturb" sign. His iPhone was in the mood for Chopin. He scanned at his last entry from the day before the wedding: I know I want this but what the fuck am I doing? What am I getting myself into? "Well, now I know," he said to himself before he started writing:
Deep down, you and I both know I'm typically a physical coward. I used to be pleased to wait for the team to come back instead of coming close to the danger. I'm more of a researcher, a librarian not a field agent. But when Jack first left us, then after Tosh and Owen died; after trips in submarines, to other Torchwood offices in India, Tel Aviv and the like, and after the original Hub was destroyed, I've grown a bit of a backbone. I had too – I just couldn't let Gwen and Jack down. Grin and bare it, Jones, I said to myself and that I did. But this time was different. Sarah was astute in bringing that herbal stuff – panic and trepidation are an ugly mix in this business. I was genuinely frightened. I was afraid not only of what we were walking into but whether any of us, Jack included, would get out of it alive. I am not so much writing this to serve as some direct record of what happened as much as a testimony to remind myself that I made it.
After two doses of Sarah's herbal mix, I was calmer, more focused but full of a kind of rage I didn't know I had. First, I was mad she drugged me (I forgive her now though). Second, I wanted to kill who or whatever stole my man. Third, and this is the most embarrassing bit, I was amazingly aroused by the idea of killing things, anythings. No wonder the IDF is so effective – I'm sure they give the recruits birth control shots and thick condoms along with this stuff! When Jack and I got back to the Hub, I reckon there was still some of it in my system because Charlye, Jack and I had sex for hours – I'm sore everywhere still. But, I get ahead of myself.
Sarah got us to her Paris military contacts, who were nearby the original blast spot, to help change into these industrial-style hazmat suits. Because the Paris police were still investigating, looking for dead bodies parts I presume, we didn't look out of place unless you followed us to the spot where we disappeared in thin air. Although I know she applied the tech we use to hide the external Hub elevator, I still have to ask her about how she got us into the expanse – she explained it before we left the café but that was when I initially acquiesced to the testosterone rush.
I was looking forward to destroying whatever it was that bothering my planet and interrupting my honeymoon. Sarah had said at the café that is was likely Davros was trying to take over the humans by controlling our own inclinations to kill one another. I didn't give a fuck. Daleks can die – I've seen The Doctor organize their destruction. Sarah also said something about getting evidence to prove what Daleks were doing, we had to do that before killing them. I really didn't give a fuck about that either. I guess that makes me a bad Torchwood operative.
She was straight on about the expanse – being in there was nothing like an off-world adventure, even though it had special definitive spatial markings, you felt more like Clooney and Bullock in 'Gravity' than DS9's Worf and Dax on some away mission. And the suits we had to wear were bulky and cumbersome one minute, then airy and light the next – you couldn't predict the gravitational pull but adjust as you moved. Sarah was right about another thing too - spray painting the hoses on the skin-tight oxygen masks different colors - without that, you couldn't tell one person from another.
We bounced and ground through the expanse in a straight line, keeping connected through what seemed like a sandstorm by a rope attached to our waists. I write 'seemed like' because although there was the sound of wind blowing and the air was misty like a Cardiff bay fog, the sand didn't so much swirl as it moved like it had a purpose. Everyone but Sarah was to keep a keen eye out for Daleks or terrorists in training along the way – I was at the end of the line, so I had to occasionally look behind as well. This was useless though because you could barely see more than 2' in front of your face – she probably told us to do this just to give us something to do while we followed her. Although we were pretty well tied up in our suits, bits got through and felt like tiny spiders having a medieval gouging feast on my skin. Sarah had warned of this too but it was extraneous information that just didn't seemed important at the time. I had to find Jack, get him out of wherever he was in that shit hole, and bring him home.
I really don't know how long it took to get to the rows of interconnected shacks and military-style camps nor how Sarah knew how to get there except it had something to do with tracking a SOS signal from Jack's vortex manipulator. We lined up against the wall of the first structure we came across, just as Sarah instructed in the café – Mickey and I on one side of the door with Gwen and her on the other – Sarah kicked the wooden door open.
Inside was storage room with lots of weapons, some alien energy shooters and some that looked like top of the line Smith and Wesson or Remington. Other boxes had what looked like bomb parts while others were definitely chemical weapon delivery systems. Other boxes had a skull and cross bones insignia and wording that looked Russian. No Jack, so I started toward the hall to the next room. Gwen slowed me down, signally that I could take the mask off. 'Ianto, we'll get to him in time,' she said, reading my mind.
'No we won't. Can't you hear his cries off in the distance?' She looked at me startled that I could discern his cries from that of the rest of prisoners, likely several meters away.
Sarah moved us on – past training rooms, sleeping areas, and a mess hall. We had to shoot our way through a group of recruits in one hallway who somehow knew we weren't terrorists in training like them. Firing my Heckler & Koch G36 rifle on full automatic was like Moses' parting the Red Sea. It was an exhilarating, terrifying rush that was better than sex and that says a lot when you're fucking Jack Harkness. Gwen, with all of her empathy, she looked uneasy killing, often seeming to aim to cause a clean, quick death then stopping ever so often to give a glance or two at her victims as she moved on, like a chaplain on an active battlefield (I recall her telling me on the plane, returning back to Cardiff when it was all over, that in some of them, she could hear cries for their mothers while the last thoughts of others were worries that their god would not welcome them). But, I liked it when I hit them in the head – the flying skull fragments were better than anything in a video game. I don't know if it was purely the drug or if the drug was opening me to something dormant inside me. It is likely the latter, if I'm honest though – hadn't Adam exposed the psychopath in me with his bloody hypnotic touch. At least then I felt guilty about what I imagined I'd done. But in the expanse, each gun fight got more and more thrilling until I started wondering if I had reached a body count large enough to get extra bonus points. I should talk to my psychologist about this.
After the third battle, Sarah had us quickly exchange clothes with the dead men. They were dressed like Star Wars stormtroppers, so I didn't realize each was of a different race until I took their helmets off. Sarah said something like it was likely none of them knew they were training next to someone who they'd likely blow up next week. 'More efficient,' she said. I didn't care. They looked the same dead anyway but now I wonder if you get to heaven from the expanse. Jack says there is no afterlife but still, us mortals have to wonder if that's true. Maybe he doesn't stay long enough for the angels to get to him or maybe, like EMTs constantly rushing to false alarms, they started ignoring his calls.
We kept roaming from area to area but no sign of Jack and no Daleks. There were what could be considered leaders – they wore the black uniforms, like a cliché from a 70s sci-fi show. My frustration was boiling and shots to the heads of the Stormtroopers was losing its thrill. Then, I heard moaning again but this time I smelled Jack's scent as well so I headed in the opposite direction of the group. I found Jack, or what was left of him, in a nearly empty, a poorly lit warehouse, hanging like a piece of pre-butchered cattle, his hands tied to a meat hook above a large bucket. I posted my rifle atop my shoulder and walked determinately to him. As I got closer the group, realizing I guess that I wasn't with them, entered the room. I heard Mickey, I think, calling me back in a loud whisper. He was saying something about a group of Daleks hidden in the shadows barrels on the other side of the space.
It wouldn't of mattered because by the time I got close to Jack, my determination shifted panic. His clothes were torn and heavily blood stained. It took me a moment to accept the fact that the majority of the blood was spilling from his jugular vein due to a deep cut around his neck which caused his head to tilt ghastly to one side. The bucket below him was more than half full and there were at least four completely filled and capped water cooler side containers of blood off to the side. Jack's face was grayish white, contorted and his eyes were rolled back. It wasn't that I thought he was dead – he often got that look before awaking from severe attacks. He was in agony but could not scream.
Davros rolled out from the shadows with his automaton entourage as I frantically searched for a way to free Jack. I didn't even hesitate, I just kept looking for something to stand on, some way to get Jack down. "Please, Mr. Jones, don't let me interrupt you."
"I don't believe you could stop me." I didn't even bother looking at him.
"I wouldn't dream of it," I believe he said. "We have everything we need from him. Mr. Harkness has outlived, if I can use that term, his usefulness after all."
Mickey found two chairs (I wonder what Daleks need chairs for?). I tried, like Jackie Kennedy in the Zapruda film, to hold Jack head down on his neck, thinking that doing so would make the rejuventive effects of his immortality happen more quickly and in the right spot first. When we finally got him down on the ground, Mickey gave me a hopeless look.
At this point, I had finally began recognizing how dreadful our situation was – Mickey and I on the dirty sand floor like a rescue operation off some television doctor show while Sarah and Gwen stood over us, guns drawn looking like half of Charlies' Angels - out manned and out gunned by the evil-mastermind and his henchmen. Of course, it was Gwen who had to fall back on the cliché superhero dialogue, "What have you done to him?!"
"I would think that was obvious my dear," responded Davros. "You see, and as I'm sure Mr. Jones already knows by now, Captain Harkness' blood has some unique qualities. Those qualities will be of much use to my Dalek children of the future."
"But you have your army, Davros," Sarah sneered. "You're controlling every terrorist organization . . . .."
"That money and technology could buy, yes I know," beamed Davros. His henchmen surrounded us but weren't as menacingly as one would anticipate, they left us with an escape move from behind. "Ah, but unfortunately it was an experiment gone wrong – quite unsuccessful actually. Science is often so much trial and error, wouldn't you say?" He looked directly at Sarah because . . . she was the alpha (sorry Gwen) and she lowered her weapon. Once she did, Davros waved his impish deformed hand directing Daleks to move back. "As I said, I have everything I need. Even Harkness is no longer of any use to us."
By that time, Mickey and I got Jack off the floor and onto a nearby table where Mickey was channeling Martha. I was useless for my Torchwood medic training was no more extensive than applying peroxide and an adhesive bandage even after working all that time with Owen. Mickey was doing his best but the neck was nearly completely severed and Jack wasn't healing.
Davros tossed salt to my wound by saying, "Although, I'm not sure he's going to do you any good either, Mr. Jones. Pity, didn't you two just get married?"
You know this hasn't happened in quite a while, the white outs, I mean – those times when I become so enraged that I blank out not remembering what I did to whom. Sarah told me what happened on the plane and that is all I can tell you now. Evidently, Davros' last line sent me leaping after him. I do remember the excitement of having my hands around his neck, the skin was surprisingly gelatinous and whatever counted for blood shifted below and above where my fingers were squeezing. I also remember enjoying the sense of control, knowing that I was killing him. I remember the shots of the energy weapons from Davros' children feeling like searing burns against my skin and the cold, gritty floor against the back of my head.
Gwen said the next part was "remarkable". I guess I got back up a few seconds later (which Mickey said gave Davros a shock) went back to Jack, a nasty gash in my lip, and kissed him. Then, although still unconscious, he began healing rapidly. Gwen said that I then threw Jack over my left shoulder and walked toward the exit saying something like, "I've got better things to do." I do remember getting a few rooms back toward the main entrance and having to put Jack down while I took out another slew of terrorist wannabies. I also remember noticing the wound on Jack's neck healing nicely before putting the masks on both of us, slinging him back over my shoulder and heading out again. Sadly, after that, I am at a lost, things are still quite a fog. I am sure that the others will fill me in later.
"I'm going on my first break, Anna," Marg said over her shoulder as she started toward Ianto's table. The older barista, who had witness the exchange while sweeping nearby, pulled Marge aside in hopes of preventing potential humiliation, "If you've got intensions toward that one, I suggest you shop elsewhere girlie!"
"What'd you mean? He's right cute and I'm single."
"Both are true but you're missing two key components," laughed Anna.
"What?" pouted Marge.
"If he's not in here alone, he's always here with some equally cute bloke and staring right lovingly at him as well."
"You mean, he's . . .."
"Yep, and for keeps too from what I can see," said Anna, nodding at the ring on Ianto's wedding finger.
"Damn!" replied Marge. "Why are all the good ones gay or married, or, hell, both!"
Ianto got back to the Hub at 12:15, dropped everything on the kitchen counter and rushed to get the bangers passed out to everyone in the conference room.
"Thank G-d, Ianto!" said Aliyah, "You got me the veggie one right?" He gave he a hurt look.
People began to eat eagerly in silence until Jack declared, "Time for a debrief!"
"I would like to toast Ianto Jones, myself!" said Gwen.
"Here, here!" chimed in Rhys while raising a giggling Anwen's hands.
"I mean nearly strangling Davros with your bare hands and carrying the boss single handedly across the expanse?" exclaimed Rhys. "You did The Doctor proud, bro!"
"If half of what Mickey and the others said really happened, well, you owe this guy a lot, Captain Harkness," added Martha.
"And I plan to repay him in spades!" responded Jack, as he pinched Ianto's ass.
To redirect the discussion, a blushing Ianto asked, "What happened to the expanse, to Davros? What about the terrorists?"
Sarah explained, "I closed the expanse with a few well-placed explosives at the entrance which triggered those within the warehouses. I don't think that expanse will be usable again and that set of terrorists will not be available to their respective organizations. I am not so certain about Davros however."
"What do you mean?"
"It is likely the explosion ended any further human experiments, however the bombs I planted were on a timer. We shot out of there behind you and thus don't know if or how Davros made it out. And if he had access to Jack's blood, he likely was already ingesting it and could have survived the explosion."
"And he can always use it to make more Daleks," Martha chimed in.
"True," said Aliyah, "but Ianto's experience taught us something about Jack's blood." She finished chewing and wiped her mouth. "Its effects don't last forever – you took several good shots to the chest, Ianto. It was your determination, adrenaline, and, needless to say, love for Jack that got you out of there – when Martha checked you when you got back, there was little if any of Jack's DNA left in you."
Ianto was again embarrassed. "I think I will leave the immortality to the experts in the future," he nodded at Jack, collected the discarded wrappers and headed to the kitchen.
Jack grinned, watching Ianto hurry off. He was deeply grateful to Ianto and had plans of his own for a Valentine's celebration tomorrow.
"What about the terrorist recruits? Isn't anybody going to warn the authorities?" asked Rhys.
"We shot most of them and those who didn't die then were disintegrated when the expanse collapsed," Sarah said. "The experiments with DNA enhancement went with them."
Aliyah sighed heavily then added, "Unfortunately, I went through my U.N. and international contacts. None of them seemed interested in the information we discovered – how alien forces were controlling their respective revolutions."
"Are you surprised? Humans like killing each other too much, just like I said in the beginning!" said Jack.
"You may be right, Jack," said Gwen sadly. "But we don't need any help."