Skeletons in the Closet
A Torchwood Fic
By: Tenshi-Chan
Part 5
Ianto moved about the Hub's kitchenette with some slight difficulty due to the stiffness he felt, but it was no where near the agony he'd been in only recently. Quite honestly, it was sheer bliss.
"You should be resting, not doing chores." Owen's normally snarky voice was softer than usual. There was the undertone of genuine caring that Ianto was not used to.
Ianto offered a weak smile. "I can't stand being idle. Something that's been conditioned into me, I guess. I start to get anxious if I'm left with nothing to do for too long."
Owen carefully grabbed Ianto's elbow and guided him back to the main Hub. "All right, but get off your feet. Relax on the sofa and I'll go see about rounding up a laptop so you can do some sort of research or something until Suzie gets in."
Ianto had to admit that it was a blessed relief to sit down. If he had known how understanding Jack and Owen were, he would have told them weeks ago about everything. He closed his eyes a moment, only to open them when Jack's distinctive foot fall approached him. He looked up at his boss who seemed to be regarding him.
Jack sighed. "All right. Here's how it's going to work today. If you don't feel up to seeing Suzie, that's fine and I understand. We'll keep your interaction with her to a bare minimum. Regardless, you are on very light duties until Owen clears you. All right? Owen and I will tend to cleaning the cells and feeding Myfanwy and Tosh will be bringing in coffee and doing the food runs. Suzie won't be an issue." He shook his head. "It's going to be tough until you're cleared for more active duty. Once you are, though, I want to start training you for the field."
Ianto blinked in shock. "You'll trust me enough for that?"
Jack smiled one of those dazzling smiles at him and nodded. "Your heart was in the right place. It was just your mentality that was misguided. Probably by the same thing you were struggling to save." He seemed more relaxed. "That is the kind of loyalty I'm looking for in my team. I just want to know if you could ever be as loyal to this team as you were to Lisa."
Owen called over. "Suzie's on her way in, Jack! We better get into positions."
Ianto eased himself onto his feet and looked around. The hub was tidy and he was pleased that he wouldn't have much to do. He turned and headed for the coffee machine.
Jack hoped everything went well today. The sooner this unpleasantness with Suzie was over, the sooner Ianto could get the rest he needed and deserved to heal. He picked up a file and started going through it. It was a report on something Tosh was working on, and Jack was pleased to see she was making a good amount of progress. He looked up as the Hub door opened and forced a smile as Suzie walked in. "Suzie! Good morning!"
Suzie gave him a smile in return. It looked sincere, but Jack saw that the smile didn't reach her eyes. She was more of a traitor than Ianto. Ianto had hidden the cyberwoman in the basement out of desire to save someone he loved. Suzie used Ianto as a guinea pig for no reason other than the fact that she had power over him.
Jack closed the folder. "I want a status update on what you're working on before Tosh gets in, when she can explain some of the technical terms she's using in her report." He put the folder onto Tosh's desk.
"Oi!" Owen called up. "Can I join you? Sometimes Tosh's technobabble gives me a headache the size of Big Ben!"
Suzie froze when she saw Owen. "Aren't you supposed to be watching Ianto?"
Owen nodded. "I am. Teaboy said he needed to feel useful. That working would help keep his mind off things. I was concerned because of his attempt to end his life, but figured that he'd be fine going about his set routine."
As if on cue, Ianto came into view walking carefully. Jack had always assumed that Ianto had done so to keep from distracting everyone with loud footsteps, but now he knew better.
Jack grinned when he saw Ianto carrying a tray with coffee. "Oh perfect timing, Ianto. You know you really didn't have to. I wanted you to rest. You are grieving, after all."
"I needed to feel useful, Sir," Ianto replied. He handed Owen his mug, placed Jack's on his desk and held Suzie's out to her.
Suzie took it, still smiling, if only slightly. She raised it to her lips, the three men watching her carefully. Then she paused and her smile disappeared. "What kind of an idiot do you take me for?" she asked.
Abruptly, she swung out with the hand holding the mug and bashed it against Owen's head. Owen crashed to the floor. Even as Owen was falling, Suzie was still moving, bringing her arm up and around Ianto's shoulders as her free hand pulled a sidearm from a holster hanging from the back of her belt. Her aim was steadily focused on Jack. "I knew something was up when you mentioned Ianto's girlfriend dying. I figured it was only a matter of time before my favorite test subject spilled his guts."
Jack held out his hands. "What are you planning on doing?"
Suzie smirked. "After I kill you? I'm going to delete the CCTV footage and take Ianto someplace where I can continue my tests." She tilted her head. "Pity about Tosh. She'll probably end up back in the UNIT detention facility since their agreement was with you and not Torchwood. I suppose I could contact them and renew the agreement because I really do like her."
Ianto gazed at Owen in shock. The doctor looked very pale and he was bleeding from a wound on his head. Ianto had no idea if he was just unconsious, or dying.
"And Owen?" Jack's tone stated he was trying to be reasonable. "He knows about Ianto's past."
Suzie tilted her head in consideration. "I'll think of something. I usually do, after all. You're the only one too dangerous to keep around. I've always hated how you talk about us like we're children playing with a pack of matches when you should have been teaching us how those matches work."
Jack's voice was calm. "Suzie. Put the gun down."
Suzie's voice was full of venom. "Why? So you can Retcon me to childhood? Don't you see? Ianto is a perfect test subject! He's cut off all ties with his family, and he was hired by Torchwood 1 and their tests and training procedures are more advanced than ours! He can withstand so much more than some of the vagrants off the street."
Jack looked positively ill. "Ianto isn't the first? How long have you been doing this?"
Ianto felt Suzie shrug. Her hold on him wasn't secure, but it didn't need to be. In the hand on his arm, he could feel a tiny alien device that was easily concealed, but would deliver a nasty shock if activated. He remembered it all too well and never wanted to be on the receiving end of one of those shocks again. His best guess is that it was the alien equivalent of a joy buzzer. Not fatal, probably just annoying to whatever alien race it belonged to, but it had knocked him out and made his limbs shake uncontrollably for hours after he had come to. That day had not been pleasant.
"Pretty much since you hired me. The technology needed testing." She grunted. "I'm done talking. Too bad you're too much of a risk. You're damn gorgeous." With that, she calmly pulled the trigger and shot Jack.
Ianto didn't see where Jack was shot, just that the man went reeling. He jumped when he felt a sting on his arm. Suzie had activated the device.
Suzie smiled sweetly. "I just need to keep you subdued while I delete the CCTV footage. In a few days, I'll come back. If there are any questions, I'll just say you attacked us all and that I'm keeping you in a cell."
The last thing Ianto saw before his mind was enveloped by blackness was Suzie's smug expression.
Owen groaned as he came to. His head hurt like he was experiencing a hundred hangovers at once. He brought his hand up and grimaced when it came away sticky and wet with his blood. He couldn't remember what had happened. He blinked when Jack entered his field of vision. "What the Hell happened?"
Jack had a cloth and dabbed at Owen's injury. "What's the last thing you remember?"
Owen furrowed his brows in thought. "Getting up to come in to work. Christ! How did I get here?" He looked around. "Where's Ianto?"
Tosh's voice floated down sounding thinck as if she'd been crying. "Suzie has him. I'm trying to follow where she went with him on CCTV, but she's good."
Owen closed his eyes. "Fuck! We have to find them! Who knows what she's got planned." Then he felt the sting of antiseptic and hissed. "Again I ask. What ... the HELL ... happened?"
Jack sighed. "We were going to retcon Suzie when she came in, but it looks like she knew what we were planning. She hit you with a mug and it looks like she gave you a mild dose of retcon so you wouldn't remember it. Then she shot me. She must have thought she killed me."
Owen gave Jack a sharp look. "You okay? Where were you hit?"
Jack took off his coat to show he was wearing something underneath it. It looked like the waistcoat he sometimes wore, but there were differences. the most noticeable difference was what looked like a dent over Jack's heart. "Just testing something out." He replaced the coat and started dressing Owen's injury while talking to Tosh. "After I finish tending to you, I'm going out to look on foot. I have a few contacts in the area. We have to get Ianto back as quickly as possible. Now that she thinks she has no one to stop her, she's not going to hold back with her testing like she has been."
Owen swallowed to keep himself from losing his breakfast. If what she had been doing to the Tea Boy was holding back, he didn't want to think of what she would do now. "Didn't Torchwood One implant tracking devices in their staff?"
Jack sighed and shook his head. "Thought of that, but it was only done for their field agents and Ianto was a junior researcher." He sighed and then snapped his fingers. "It's so SIMPLE it might work!" He spun and ran up the stairs. "Tosh ... try calling Suzie on her mobile."
"WHAT?" Owen sat up and winced at the wave of dizziness before he slowly stood and made his way carefully up the stairs. "Are you loony?"
Jack shook his head. "Suzie mentioned something about really liking Tosh and expressed a concern about what might happen to her. If Tosh calls her sounding frantic about finding me dead and you unconscious, she might be on the phone with Suzie long enough to get a lock on her."
Tosh stopped typing and hung her head. "I don't want to talk to her."
Jack sighed and turned placed a hand on her shoulder. "I know, Tosh, and I understand. Can you do it for Ianto, though? We need to get him back here where he'll get the treatment he needs."
Tosh sighed and turned to look at them. Then dug into her small handbag and pulled out her mobile phone. After activating the tracing program, she pressed a couple of keys and started to breathe rapidly to imitate the sound of someone panicking. "Suzie? Suzie, is that you? Where are you? I just got to the Hub! Jack is dead and Owen can't remember anything!" She sniffled and closed her eyes. "No. No I checked the CCTV and a whole block has been deleted! What happened?" Her fist clenched and Owen had to wonder what yarn Suzie was spinning. "What? Why would Ianto do that? I thought Owen and Jack were helping him deal with the loss of ..."
Tosh went pale and gave the two of them a look of horrified disbelief. "WHAT? Oh, my GOD! What was he thinking?"
Owen gave Jack a look and saw the man wince.
Jack held up both hands to Tosh in surrender and then a single finger in silent promise to explain.
Tosh nodded in understanding before turning her attention to the conversation she was having. "What's going to happen now, Suzie? What am I going to do? With Jack dead, there's nothing to keep me from going back to UNIT." He voice cracked with genuine fear. Then she scowled. "I don't know if they'll listen to you." He face went horrified, then she swallowed. "I suppose I COULD stay in the Hub for the rest of my probation period, but with Jack gone and Ianto in the cells, it'll just be you and Owen in the field." She glanced at the computer and noticed that the trace was nearly complete. "When will you be coming back? I'll feel a little better once things with UNIT are settled."
The computer noted that the trace was complete and Owen cleared his throat. "Oi, Tosh! Is that Suzie?"
Tosh looked over. "Yeah."
Owen held out his hand and smiled when Tosh handed him the phone. "Ta!" He held the phone to his ear. "Oi! What the bloody hell happened? One second, I'm getting ready for work, then I'm here with Tosh looking like someone shot one of her best friends dead and then I find out someone DID shoot one of her best friends dead."
Suzie was silent a moment before she answered. "Ianto attacked you and killed Jack before bolting. He must have deleted the CCTV footage because Tosh says there's nothing there. Once I saw what had happened, I ran right out after him. He's dangerous, Owen. Do you know he had a cyberwoman in the basement?"
Owen swore. "Bloody hell. What was he thinking?"
"It had been his girlfriend at one point. Jack killed it and disposed of the remains. My guess is he killed Jack for revenge. I'm glad he only knocked you out." She was silent a moment. "I think I have him trapped. Once I manage to restrain him, I'll bring him in so we can lock him in a cell." She was silent another second and, in a beautiful bout of acting, she queried. "Are you sure Jack's dead? I was hoping that I had just checked the wrong place for the pulse." The sadness in her tone would have won her an award.
Owen wasn't a bad actor himself. "Yeah. I'm gonna do an autopsy then get him in storage and have Tosh clean his office. You be careful, okay?"
"I always am. Later!"
With that, the call was disconnected.
As soon as Tosh had her phone, Jack sighed. "He thought he could save what he was convinced was his girlfriend, Tosh. For that, I can't fault him. If he had been keeping it with the intention of world domination, he would have been locked in a cell next to Janet or RetConned. And those were the better two options." He shook his head. "Whatever he did, Suzie was aware of it and used it to blackmail him into being her own personal guinea pig. No one deserves that sort of treatment."
Tosh was silent for a moment. "So he kept a cyberman in the basement thinking he could reverse the process and save his girlfriend?" When Jack nodded, the expression on her face became one of understanding. "Just like I stole those plans and built the sonic disruptor to save my mother." Jack nodded again and Tosh smiled. "I can't blame him, either."
Jack beamed then he clapped his hands together. "You have a fix on her?"
Tosh nodded and turned to the computer. "Sending her location to your mobile."
Jack spun and headed for the lift. "I'm going after her." He quickly checked his Webley and picked up a pair of cuffs before continuing. "Owen ... stay here in case she does come back. Tosh, if she moves, let me know. I'm bringing Ianto home with or without Suzie."
Owen watched him leave and whistled. "I'd hate to be in Suzie's shoes when Jack finds her."
Tosh, normally the sweetest of them all, snarled as if she were channeling the spirit of a dragon. "Whatever he does will be no less than she deserves."
To Be Continued ...
Author's Note: Earlier this year, I mentioned that there were some problems going on. I am sad to say that, shortly after my last major update, there was a death in my family. It's taken me this long to regain some semblance of normalcy. I hope to get back into a writing scedule soon. As always, my thanks goes to Keara for being a friend through this difficult time.
