Hello, Happy New Year! I hope everyone had a great New Years Eve, I was unfortunately working which is why this update is so late. They'll be one more part after this and then that'll be Countrycide wrapped up, I will have that up tomorrow. This chapter is pretty long as there's a lot I needed to cover, but I hope you enjoy my take on the episode. As always let me know what you think.
Thanks.
Chapter 20
Countrycide Part 2
It didn't take them long to reach the outskirts of the village, it appeared to be a pretty small place and looked fairly run down even from a distance.
"Has the suv moved?" Jack asked Ianto as they came to a momentary stop.
Ianto shook his head, glancing at the tracker before checking his watch.
"Not for an hour now." He told him.
The group continued on their way and arrived at the village a short while later, it didn't look any better up close than it had from a distance. If it wasn't for the tap with running water nearby Rose wouldn't have been surprised if the place had been abandoned.
"Tosh, Ianto, follow the signal and find the suv." Jack instructed, stopping and turning to face his team.
"Rose, Gwen, Owen, with me." He continued.
"Lets see if there's any room at the Inn." He said, turning and heading towards the pub.
"Be careful." Rose told Ianto and Tosh with a small smile before following after Jack.
The group headed inside and were surprised to find the place deserted despite the front door being unlocked. Rose made her way behind the bar and Owen leaned against the counter, looking across at her with a smirk.
"Pint of best please love, and er, yeah get one for yourself." He told her and she rolled her eyes.
"Where is everybody?" Gwen asked, opening the till and surprised to find it full of money despite the place being seemingly empty.
They followed Jack through a door that led to the accommodation area and split up, each heading off to search a different room.
Rose had her gun drawn as she walked into a kitchen area, the place was an absolute mess and there was a strange smell lingering in the air. The sound of a fly being caught in an electric trap caused her to turn, shining her torch ahead something caught her eye. Lowering her torch to the ground her face paled as she came across another mutilated body, she felt her stomach turn and rushed out of the room. Leaning against a wall in the hallway she held a hand to her stomach as she retched, thankful she had decided against having that burger earlier on.
"You ok?" Jack asked as he rushed up beside her.
She closed her eyes and shook her head, gesturing towards the room she had just left with a grimace.
"In there." She told him.
"Burger coming back to haunt you?" Owen asked with a smirk as he passed her and followed Jack into the kitchen. His smirk gave way to a look similar to Rose's as he came across the body.
"Oh my god." He muttered in shock.
Jack left the room, passing Gwen on route and gesturing for her to follow him as he quickly made his way out of the pub, closely followed by Owen and Rose.
"Jack what the hell is going on here?" Rose asked him, her gun raised as she scanned the area in fear of what they might find next.
"There's four houses we need to check too, Gwen, Owen you two take the ones that way and we'll head this way." Jack gave his orders and they all nodded.
"Let's take a look in there." He told Rose, gesturing to the house closest to them.
They made their way inside with their guns drawn, Rose wondered through the living room but stopped when she felt a puddle beneath her foot. She glanced down to find a small pool of blood on the floor, looking ahead she didn't need to go any further to know what they were about to find.
"What is it?" Jack asked her, coming to stand beside her with his gun trained ahead.
"There's another body in there." She told him simply.
"What did this Jack, whatever it is cannot be human, how far is this going to spread?" She continued, her voice starting to sound frantic.
"You gotta stay focussed." He told her, heading back towards the front door.
"Don't you ever get scared Jack?" She asked, turning to look at her friend.
"We need to check the other house." He said, trying to keep his voice even so she wouldn't sense the fear he also felt.
Making their way back outside, they headed to the next house. Jack stood to the side of the front door whilst Rose stepped forward and attempted to open it.
"Locked?" Jack asked after she pulled on the door to no avail.
"Locked." She confirmed with a nod, pulling the door open as much as she could and peering through the gap in an attempt to see if anyone was inside.
The door appeared to only be locked via a chain so she grasped the door handle tight before pulling it with more force. The door swung open and she stepped forward to head inside, her eyes grew wide as she was met with the barrel of a shotgun and had no time to react before the trigger was pulled. The force of the blast threw Rose back to the ground, her hand instantly went to her abdomen as pain shot through her.
"Rose!" Jack called out but she was in too much shock and pain to respond.
She gasped as she tried to catch her breath, the pain radiating from her stomach becoming near unbearable. She attempted to sit up but cried out and fell back as the pain only got worse. After a few moments it felt as though the pain was dissipating, she could no longer hear Jack's voice and she let her eyes shut as she felt a wave numbness take over.
Muffled voices reached her ears and before she knew it the pain was back, she clutched at her side and cried out again as the gunshots made her feel as though her stomach was on fire.
"What happened?" Gwen shouted in a panic as Owen came to kneel beside Rose and grabbed her wrist to check her pulse.
"Kid hit her with a shotgun." Jack told them as he dropped to the other side of Rose, slipping his arms underneath her knees and behind her shoulders her head fell against his shoulder as he stood.
"I gotcha Rosie, we need to get her inside." He said and Owen nodded.
He opened the door and led the way, moving things out of the way to make room for Jack to come through with Rose. They headed into what appeared to be a dining room and Owen swept clear a table so Jack could set Rose down.
"I'm gonna check upstairs." Jack told them after he had set Rose down, he gestured for Gwen to follow him and the pair headed off.
Owen grabbed a nearby pillow and set it under Rose's head before opening his case to retrieve necessary equipment.
"Bet you never thought you'd be glad to see me." He told her before reaching forward to try and check the extent of her gunshot wound.
She instantly recoiled at the contact, pressing a hand to her wound she turned away from him.
"No, Owen please." She begged him, trying to push his hands away from her before he grabbed her wrists and held her still.
"Listen to me, I'm gonna take a look at your wound now ok? Just stay calm." He told her, letting go of her wrists and trying once more to peel back the hem of her top so he could see her wound.
She winced as he moved her top, lifting her head to get a look at the damage her eyes grew wide as she saw the numerous tiny holes where the bullets had penetrated her skin.
"It could have been a lot worse, the bullets are lodged near the surface so you've been bloody lucky." He tried to reassure her, grabbing a gauze from his medical kit he covered her wound.
"Apply pressure." He told her and she complied, squeezing her eyes shut and biting down on her bottom lip as she tried to stop herself from crying out in pain.
"Another inch to the left and one of your vital organs might have been.." He continued, trailing off when he glanced up at Rose to find her staring back at him in panic.
He filled a syringe with pain relief and moved her hand so he could remove the gauze, she moved her now spare hand to his shoulder and grasped the material of his jacket, clenching her hand as he injected her with the painkiller. The pain in her stomach began to lessen almost instantly and became more uncomfortable than anything else as he began extracting the pellets.
"Do you miss being a doctor?" Rose asked him after a few quiet moments, wincing as he removed the tiny bullets.
"Excuse me I still am a doctor, I just don't deal with patients anymore, which is ideal really because that was the bit I always hated." He told her with a smile, one that she returned.
After removing the last pellet he held up the tweezers for her to see.
"Come on, I'm good." He said and if she wasn't in so much pain she might have laughed.
"Not bad." She told him.
He recovered her wound with the gauze and secured it in place as Jack and Gwen emerged from upstairs.
"What's taking Tosh and Ianto so long?" Jack wondered allowed, loading the shotgun he had found upstairs.
"The suv might be locked up or under guard." Owen suggested with a shrug.
"Or they could be dead." The kid chimed in and Jack turned on him with a glare.
"Sit down." He ordered.
"Tell us what happened here." He asked the kid.
"It's not human, look my mum won't know what's happened she was only expecting me back for the weekend." The kid continued and Jack sighed.
"Look, we'll get you home ok?" He promised.
"What are you gonna do? You can't fight them, they're too strong, the only thing we can do is barricade the door." He explained to Jack.
"We'll make base at the pub." Jack told them.
"What about Tosh and Ianto?" Gwen asked him.
"We need to figure out what we're dealing with first." He explained and Owen looked at him in surprise.
"What if it's too late?" He asked, his voice rising with fear as he considered what may have happened to their friends.
"They're not children, they know what to do." Jack told him, walking towards Rose.
"Let's go." He said and Owen sighed, stepping back from the table he packed his medical equipment away.
Standing beside Rose, she put her arm around his neck and he eased her up into a sitting position. She took a deep breath as he helped her get down from the table and he looked at her in concern as she tried to gain her balance.
"You good?" He asked her and she nodded, although when she attempted to take a step by herself she was instantly hit with a wave of dizziness.
Jack caught her before she could fall, wrapping an arm around her waist she braced herself with a hand on his chest as she waited for the moment to pass.
"I'm sorry about your friends." The kid said and they all stared back at him blankly.
"Move." Owen told him, waiting until he was moving towards the front door before following him.
The others followed, with Jack hanging back with Rose to make sure she was ok.
They weren't far from the pub and once they were all inside they checked the rooms to ensure they were alone before barricading the doors with tables and chairs. Rose had been given strict instructions to rest and the kid who's name they found out to be Kieran was lying down on a pew with his shotgun. She decided to make a list of all the things they knew about these creatures thus far to try and narrow down the possibilities of what they could be, grabbing a piece of chalk she began making notes on the board beside the dartboard.
"Have we ever heard of a species that strips its victims of flesh and organs?" She asked the others.
"What are you doing? You need to rest." Owen asked her with a frown.
"Compiling what we've got, seeing if it helps." She told him and he sighed, giving her a small nod he went back to helping the others.
"We have to assume the others that disappeared have been killed too." Jack chimed in.
"You think there's been seventeen deaths?" Gwen asked and he nodded.
"At least." He added and Rose made a note of it on the board.
"So this means the rift is spreading and its dumping aliens and psychos anywhere it fancies." Owen summarised, grabbing his gun and making sure it was loaded and ready just in case.
"Looks that way." Jack confirmed.
"Brilliant, this conversation had cheered me up to no end." Owen replied sarcastically.
Rose rolled her eyes and was about to respond to his sarcasm when there was a sudden knocking on one of the windows. Gwen's gasp caught the attention of Jack and Owen and Rose reached for her gun as she looked towards the window the noise had come from.
"Did you hear that?" Gwen asked the others and Rose nodded.
"Somebody outside?" Jack asked.
Before either had a chance to respond the sound of a glass breaking outside a window on the other side of the room caught their attention, followed by a shadowed figure passing by.
"He said they'd come back for him." Gwen told them, her gun raised towards the window the most recent noise had come from.
"Lets not jump to conclusions." Jack said calmly, peering through the curtains to see if he could find out who was outside.
"We don't know who they are or what their intentions are." He continued, walking back over to join the group just as the power cut out.
"I'm guessing not good." Rose chimed in.
The front door they had barricaded shut began to rattle as whoever was outside tried to get in, Kieran who had fallen asleep after they had arrived at the pub awoke at the commotion and stood instantly with his shotgun pointed at the door.
"They've come back for me, I told you they would." He told them in a panic.
"Kieran just come back here." Gwen told him, trying to keep the fear out of her own voice as to not scare him further.
The rattling stopped abruptly and there was a few moments of eery silence before the sound of a door handle being turned reached their ears. Jack followed the sound and realised too late that whoever these things were, they had gotten inside.
"Ok, so we forgot to check the cellar." He told the others grimly as the padlock on the door snapped almost instantly as whatever was on the other side began trying to force its way in.
He rushed to the door and struggled to keep whatever it was from getting in as the front door began once more to shake as more of them arrived.
"You can't let them in!" Kieran yelled.
"We've got this under control." Owen tried to reassure him to no avail.
"You don't understand, you don't know what they're like." Kieran told him, loading his shotgun as he took a step closer to the door.
"Get back!" Rose ordered as the barricade finally gave way.
Jack stepped away from the cellar door, firing numerous shots into the darkness until he heard his target fall. The pub was suddenly filled with the sound of breaking glass and gunshots as their attackers fired several of their own shots through the now open door. They all ducked for cover and Jack pulled Rose down with him, shielding her from the barrage of bullets flying above their heads.
Kierans screams filled the air along with the sound of gunshots and ignoring the continued gunfire Jack stood and fired his pistol through the door as the kid was being dragged away. Ignoring the pain that was returning to her stomach, Rose stood once the gunfire had ceased and rushed towards the door to go after Kieran only to be stopped by Jack as he held her back.
"It's pitch black out there, do you wanna get yourself killed?" He asked her, refusing to move as she tried to push past him.
"Get out of my way Jack!" She told him, her voice coming across harsher than she intended.
"Whatever is down in the cellar took three bullets, I heard it fall, once we know what it is then we'll know how to deal with it." He tried to explain and she just shook her head.
"You do that, I'll go after Kieran and the others." She said adamantly, taking a deep breath as she fought off another wave of dizziness, something Jack did not miss.
"You are wounded!" He reminded her, moving his hands to her shoulders to steady her in case she lost her balance.
"Do you think that's going to stop me?" She asked.
Meeting his gaze she could see the fear in his eyes, fear for what their friends might be going through or had already gone through as well as fear for what could happen to her if he let her go. He sighed and looked to Owen, he knew they'd be no way of stopping her but he'd be damned if he was going to let her go alone.
"Go with her." Jack told him and he nodded.
Jack looked back to Rose and if it wasn't for their current audience he'd have kissed her, they still had no idea what they were dealing with and he wanted to give her an extra reason to be careful. The Doctor had always called her jeopardy friendly and the last thing he needed was her trying to play the hero and getting herself hurt more than she already was.
"Be careful." He said and she nodded, her gaze flickered down to his lips for just a moment and he thought maybe she had the same idea he had but also decided against it. They would have time for that later, when they found the others and stopped whoever it was that had committed these murders.
He let her go and after sparing him one last glance she set off, Owen right behind her. They had no map or tracking device, only their guns for protection and a flashlight to find their way.