They moved methodically through the tunnels under Cardiff. Jack was half a pace in the lead with Crys keeping step beside him. Owen and Gwen were the other party. They were circling round from opposite sides, Tosh had got the trackers going again and they were now trying to herd the Kalarian back to the Hub. Hammy and Tosh had nearly finished repairing the containment unit and Ianto was keeping an eye on them and the weight off his ankle.
The only problem with this plan, Crys mused as she followed Jack, was that they were using themselves as bait; which was definitely not her preferred method of operation.
There was a scuffling up ahead. Jack broke into a wide-eyed grin. Crys looked sidelong at him, she didn't really understand this guy; he was nuts, she was sure of that, but it was a fun sort of nuts. She wondered once again exactly what she had gotten herself into. Jack had given her a brief run down on this alien. It was all but immune to bullets and could shoot electricity from it hands. It was also an alien, that was the bit she was having trouble getting her head around; however, all the other explanations she had thought of made even less sense.
The Kalarian appeared, it gave a scream that sounded something like a dying animal. It made Crys's jaw ache. The Kalarian was at the end of a sub-corridor, maybe 5 meters away. Crys stared at it, taking in the solid green slightly catlike eyes, the greyish skin and the slit mouth. Her world view shifted, now she believed. It was nothing on Earth. She was still absorbing this was Jack grabbed her hand and turned to run. Now it was just a matter of hoping it took the bait.
Crys ran down the corridor as fast as she was able. She realised that Jack still had her hand, she yanked it back. He spared her a smile, or was it a smirk. They continued to run. She could hear the eerie noise that passed for the alien's breathing as it followed them. Suddenly the noise quietened; Jack stopped, turning back. Crys continued a few metres further along the corridor before stopping herself. It seemed that the Kalarian had given up chasing them. Time to convince it that they were worth bothering with after all.
Crys heard the crack of a gun firing as she drew her gun, she sighted on the alien; it was time to how the bullets Jack had given her worked against it. The bullets had been cast with copper threads running through them. Apparently, they would cause the Kalarian's nervous / charge build up system to short.
She fired and was pleased to see the alien stagger as her shot impacted with its mid-section. It staggered again as Jack's next bullet hit it. As she pulled the trigger a second time Crys idly wondered if he had waited for her to take a shot before firing a second time himself. Half dozen copper threaded bullets were enough to temporarily down a Kalarian, three or four were enough to seriously upset one.
It howled once more. This time it tried a blast of electricity, Jack stumbled back a couple of steps to lean against the tunnel wall, he seemed a little dazed but otherwise unharmed. He flasher her another grin, shoved himself away from the wall and started to run again. Crys joined him. The Kalarian was chasing them once again, this was a good thing, unless it actually caught one of them; in which case it was a rather bad thing.
It wasn't that far to the Hub, at least when they had walked out it hadn't seemed that far, the run back was taking a long time. Crys hoped they hadn't got lost. She was gasping for breath, she wasn't exactly unfit but; preferring short hard action; she didn't have the greatest endurance. Jack caught her up as they rounded the last corner to the Hub. Their eyes met, if Crys had had the breath she would have growled at him. She settled instead for a glare.
She glimpsed Ianto in the entrance to the Hub, he waved at them and gave a thumbs-up. Crys pushed herself to keep running, she could almost believe that she could feel the Kalarian's breath on her neck. She made it into the Hub; which seemed terribly bright after the tunnels. Her vision was starting to darken around the edges and her lungs hurt. She could see Jack gesturing at her, but it wasn't until he threw himself at her knocking them both to the floor, that she registered that he was indicating she should get down.
Crys heard a high pitched whine that sounded as if it were a cheap sci-fi special effect. When Jack let her look up she saw the paralysed Kalarian trapped by the containment beam.
She shoved Jack off her, none too gently. She was far too over heated and out of breath to be comfortable with someone pinning her to the floor. Jack got to his feet and offered her a hand up. She debated with herself for a long moment before taking his hand and allowing him to help her to her feet. To her annoyance she noticed that he wasn't breathing hard; at least, nowhere near as hard as she was. Once on her feet she found that he was invading her personal space, or maybe the other way around. It was then that Owen and Gwen arrived back, she felt their eyes on her as she yanked her hand away from Jack and took a couple of steps away from him. She saw, or thought she saw, a flicker of something that might have been resentment go through Gwen's gaze. Then again, it was hardly relevant since Gwen didn't like her anyway.
Hammy came over, he had been keeping his head down behind one of the desks but now he was bouncing with excitement.
"It worked! I did it!" Crys broke into a smile, there was something so honest and child-like about his expression that she couldn't help it. The grin and a ripple of relief went around the members of Torchwood. Jack stalked around the containment unit, staring at the captured alien.
"So, who wants to deal with this one?" he asked
"Me, me, me!" Owen said, acting like a four year old who had had too many colourants. Crys looked from Jack to Owen and than back to Jack.
"What do you mean 'deal with'?" she was pretty sure she could guess what he meant although to be fair most of her employers generally did not bother with euphemisms. She was mostly interested in seeing how they were going to kill it.
"If we give the Kalarian a large enough jolt it'll hit a high enough charge to be able to reach its pure energy state; then it'll be able to leave Earth." Ianto said. He was unrolling a heavy cable, when he finished he passed the end to Owen. Crys's gaze flicked from Owen to Jack and then to captive alien. To her surprise, despite the damage it had caused, it seemed that they weren't going to kill it. She leaned against a desk, knocking a couple of oddments to the floor as she did so.
"Owen walked forward holding the cable in one hand, he signalled to Ianto who flipped a large switch. The lights in the Hub dimmed. Crys had a sudden inkling of why there had been so many power cuts in Cardiff in the last few weeks. Owen shoved the cable with it's now sparking end into the containment field.
Crys wasn't sure if the Kalarian knew what was happening, the power cable connected with the alien's side. There was another horrible scream. Toash and Hammy clamped their hands to their ears. The Hub lights dimmed further, for a second there was blackness. When the lights came back up there was no Kalaraian in the cage. Owen sighed slumping at least two inches as he did so. He dropped the power cable which fell to the floor and lay there sparking for half a second before Ianto flipped the switch again. The tense air lifted slightly. Jack pushed off from the wall where he had been leaning. He rubbed his hands together.
"Toch, you and Hammy get the containment unit powered down. Hopefully we won't need it again in a hurry. Owen, you and Crys finish getting the med bay sorted out. Gwen you and I can go and reset the containment doors. Ianto…"
"I'll put the coffee on." The quiet Welshman surprised Crys by cutting off his boss. She wasn't quite sure what she had been expecting; but, apparently, this wasn't it. "How do you take your coffee?" The question was directed at Hammy and Crys, obviously he knew what the others wanted. They gave orders; four sugars and milk no sugar respectively; and then went about their assigned tasks.
As a general rule Crys took orders from one person at a time. Her boss changed by the job and was sometimes the same person as her guardee. Whatever the job Crys had one boss and she followed orders diligently. She was always on the outside of the team so she had had ample opportunity to study them. She had yet to see a team as dysfunctional as this lot. Jack was clearly supposed to be in charge. He'd make a pretty could boss, probably a fairly annoying guardee though. However, Gwen seemed to think that she was in charge; a clear recipe for disaster in Crys's book. The possessive looks she kept firing at Jack complicated the situation; especially as he was casting glances at Ianto and Owen was casting glances at Gwen. Tosh did not seem to be involved in this mess. Crys gave up trying to figure out the dynamics as she followed Owen to the med bay; it was clear that things were messed up and she didn't want to give herself a headache.
Crys was a little unnerved to find how easily she'd adopted a new boss particularly given what had seemingly happened to her last boss; she'd have to check on that. It wouldn't do to take on another job before her current one was discharged; especially as the new job wasn't paying anything at the moment.
She picked up another box and started gathering up the scattered contents. As she stretched to put the box back on the top shelf Crys noted Owen's gaze track up her body. She raised an eyebrow questioningly.
"You doing anything later," he asked. Crys shrugged.
"I've no plans. Any idea when we'll get out of here?" Her code strictly prohibited her sleeping with her boss or her guardee; especially if they were the same person. Anyone else was fair game with the amendment that there should be no romantic entanglements that would get in the way at work. Owen did not seem the type to get romantically entangled easily so… He shrugged eloquently.
"Owen!" Jack's yell cut across the Hub. Owen didn't try to answer Crys's question; and instead headed off to see what Jack wanted. The head of Torchwood 3 looked up as his medic approached. He dropped his voice. "So, Retcon? Or do we keep them?" Jack sounded relaxed, almost too relaxed for the situation. Owen was surprised by this but decided not to comment.
"Since when do you conduct a vote on these things?" He gave another shrug. "Since you are conducting a vote, I say 'keep 'em'."
Jack let Owen go and left to count the votes and make his decision. As he walked away Owen tried to work out how the other members of Torchwood would vote. Gwen would vote for Retcon; that was easy. Tosh would probably vote to keep Hammy but he had no idea what she thought about Crys. He'd voted to keep them but what would Jack and Ianto say? Owen had butted heads with Ianto more than once and knew despite his generally quiet nature Ianto held very strong opinions. He didn't trust his ability to guess what the other man would think. As for Jack; well, Owen had absolutely no idea.