The stairs were steep and poorly lit so Jack, Owen and Tosh moved cautiously. Halfway down, Tosh choked, 'God what is that smell?' she asked as she covered her mouth and nose with the sleeve of her jacket.

Owen gave an experimental sniff, 'that, my dear, is the delicate aroma of rotting flesh and a subtle infusion of excreta.'

'Tosh, wait here' ordered Jack, 'Owen with me'

Uncharacteristically Tosh did not protest, instead positioning herself at the foot of the stairs, gun drawn, face grim.

The two men slowly entered the dimly lit cellar; the room was very cold and the smell was almost over powering. Twelve small cages, no more than 4 feet square lined the walls, six on each side; They were raised up from the floor so that any waste or bodily fluid could drain down into the shallow channels that ran the length of both walls. A slim, green hand grasped Jack's trouser leg as he walked by and a heavily accented voice whispered, 'please.' Jack pulled the lockbreaker from his pocket and unlocked the cage. Owen shouldered him aside and gently helped the occupant out. The alien that emerged was emaciated and covered in numerous burns and bites, he was also at least seven feet tall, the confined space of the cage must have be agony for him. Owen stroked the injured alien's face and made eye contact with him, 'I will help you,' he said slowly, 'but we need to free the others.' He held up a syringe, 'this is a universal pain killer and sedative, it will help.' Over his shoulder he could hear Jack translating his words into Galactic Common.

'Sank you'

Owen gave a soft smile and injected the drug watching as the alien's three eyes slid shut.

'Oh sweet goddess,' whispered Jack, as he got a good look at the alien's face, 'he's just a kid.' he glanced around the cellar, 'they are all just kids.' He raised his voice and spoke in Galactic Common, hoping at least some of the prisoners would understand him. 'We are Torchwood. We are here to help you. Do not be afraid, we will free you and care for you.'

A soft cacophony of moans and whimpers met his statement and more fingers and hands and, in three cases tentacles, reached through the cage bars in supplication. Owen looked around hopelessly

'Owen' Jack's peremptory shout pulled him back to the here and now, 'I have more patients for you here'

Owen never forgot the nightmare of moving amongst the twelve abused and wounded aliens. Blood of three different colours stained his pants and shirt as many of the prisoners were haemorrhaging from different orifices. Some had been beaten or burned, one or two had pressure sores from being restrained in painful positions. Once he had given pain relief and sedation to all of the captives, Owen straightened up and stared at Jack with tears in his eyes, 'gods Jack, there are so many of them. I don't know where to start. I don't know how to help.'

Without a word Jack pulled Owen into a warm embrace. For a very seconds Owen fell apart, crying quietly into Jack's shirt, taking strength from the other man. Eventually, Jack pressed a soft kiss against Owens temple and released him, taking a step or two back to look into his eyes. 'I know you, Dr. Harper, you don't let stuff like this beat you. C'mon Owen, think, if this lot came into A&E what would you do first?'

'Tri-triage' sniffed Owen, 'work out who needs to be stabilised for later, who can be treated immediately and who isn't going to make it.'

Jack hugged him once more, 'that's the Dr Harper I know and trust'

Owen looked around at the wound and abused aliens slumped on the floor of the cellar and his confidence waned once more, 'but Jack, these people need intensive care, we can't just take them to Cardiff Royal, I'm not familiar with the physiology of more than half of them and even the resources of the Hub may not be enough.'

Jack was on his way back to the stairs, 'Do what you can for these people' he said, 'make them as comfortable as you can, deal with what you can.'

'Where are you going?'

'I'm going to call in a specialist' said Jack.

Tosh watched as Jack and Owen cautiously made their way through the doorway into the stinking gloom beyond. For once, she was happy to allow Jack to exercise his protective streak – whatever was in that room she was certain she did not want to see it. For a while she stayed at the foot of the stairs and then it occurred to her that she could be of more use to Jack if she could find more information about the men running this operation. Stowing her gun she mounted the stairs to go back to the reception area where she was sure she had seen a computer.

As soon as she re-entered the reception the man that Jack had shot, who had recovered consciousness in the interim, began yelling at her, demanding that she get him an ambulance and report Jack to the police, he seemed willing to overlook the consequences to himself if she did. 'Oh do shut up' snapped Tosh, digging her stun gun out if her bag and placing it in a prominent position. The man subsided and contented himself with just lying on the floor and moaning quietly. Tosh booted up the computer and quickly gained access to the files contained within. She smiled to herself as she hacked into their membership list; she had spent the last few days thinking about how they could deal with these men. Straightforward handing them over to the Heddlu would raise too many awkward questions; she pulled a data stick from her pocket and happily set about sending a sort of reverse Trojan to the email address of everyone whose details were on the computer. Tosh had explained to Jack that a Trojan was non-self-replicating type of malware program containing malicious code that, when executed, carried out specific actions determined by the nature of the Trojan, typically causing loss or theft of data, and possibly system harm. Her reverse Trojan dumped data onto the hard drive of the victims computers, in this case evidence that the men were involved in a city wide paedophile ring. Tosh watched with satisfaction as her programme dumped images and e-mail trails into the computers of all low lives that frequented this repulsive place. She also alerted a contact in UNIT, these men would be arrested by the Cardiff police but their journey through the legal system and their eventual incarceration would dictated by UNIT. These men were going away and would never be seen again – she would make sure of it.

Jack emerged from the cellar just as Tosh had competed sending an anonymous e-mail to the sex crimes unit of the Cardiff police. He looked pale and shaken.

'Jack, how bad is it?' asked Tosh anxiously

'It's bad, it's very bad' said Jack somberly, 'we're gonna need help with this one.' he pulled out his mobile phone and dialled an extremely long number, it seemed like it rang for a very long time, Jack began to fidget. 'C'mon, pick up, pick up,' he muttered then he suddenly straightened up, 'hey Doc. I need your help. Use my signal to locate me and get here as fast as you can.' He disconnected the call and turned to Tosh with a look of relief, 'help is on its way.'

Just then Owen wandered back into the room, he looked shell shocked, 'Jack, you better come see this' he turned silently and without waiting to see if Jack was following headed back down to the cellar. Jack and Tosh exchanged glances and followed the traumatised medic.

At the cellar entrance, Jack stopped and grasped Tosh by the elbow, 'you don't have to come in you know, Tosh'

Toshiko shook her head, 'no I'll be OK. I need to do this'

Jack took held of her hand and led her into the room. Owen had been busy, he had liberated some bedding from somewhere and most of the aliens were resting on soft duvets and were covered with sheets and blankets. One or two had intra-venous lines in situ and quite a number had dressings covering wounds. Most of the prisoners were sleeping, or at least, dozing lightly; clearly Owen had made pain relief and sedation his priority, the medic appeared in a doorway at the end of the room that Jack had not noticed earlier. He beckoned, 'in here'

Jack and Tosh joined him and gasped in unison, the foul smell was much stronger in here and the source was obviously the dead three bodies that were dumped in the corner.

'Oh no' whispered Tosh.

'It gets worse,' said Owen grimly. He rolled one of the bodies over and shone his torch onto the face. Tosh gave a sift gasp of horror as the sightless eyes of Gwen Cooper stared up at her.

'Guess now we know why she dropped off the radar after we dumped her on the plas' said Owen, 'they must have picked her up almost immediately

'I thought you said the Retcon Plus would virtually make her comatose' said Tosh, 'what use would she be to them?'

'It would be like fucking a corpse' said Jack, bleakly, 'some people pay a lot for that.' A splinter of memory came back to him from his captivity in the hands of the Bo/ac. Occasionally certain prisoners would be fed a drug that paralysed them simulating death. The celebrants who demanded such a service were usually the worst of the abusers. Jack could still remember the agony that was both physical and mental

Tosh looked down, letting her hair fall forward to obscure her face, the pain in Jack's voice indicated that he had personal experience of such people, and she didn't want her sympathy to embarrass the Captain. To her surprise, Owen wrapped his arms around her, holding her tight against his thin wiry body.

At that moment a strange trumpeting noise reverberated through the cellar and a rush of wind tugged at the coverings of the wounded aliens. This was followed by the sound of a gruff Scottish voice echoing through the cellar.

'Jack? JACK!'

Jack smiled for the first time since they had discovered the cellar and its terrible contents

'He's here' he said.