Time passed. Ianto produced more coffee, and some amazingly fresh doughnuts. Where he had bought them from, and when, Gwen couldn't begin to guess - but she didn't ask. It was a bit too much like asking a magician how his tricks were done. Occasionally they passed other boats, sometimes close enough to speak to the people onboard, but none of their instrumentation seemed interested. Jack flirted wildly with everybody they met, throwing a few pertinent questions into the conversation as he went, but nobody sparked his suspicions - though Gwen was sure that he sparked more than a few. Another hour passed. It didn't seem as warm now, and Gwen was glad of her jacket. Another hour, more coffee, some neatly cut cheese sandwiches. The sky darkened slightly, but if there was rain on the way it was holding off for now. Ianto turned on a more powerful scanner, his face reflecting odd green lights from the display, and Gwen blinked away the protestations of her eyes. She had been staring at the little screen on the radar gun for too long. Only Jack didn't seem at all bothered by the passing hours, standing at the wheel, happily munching Ianto's cheese sandwiches, his long coat blowing softly around his legs, He flashed a grin at Gwen once, when their eyes met briefly, but he seemed to be saving his chatter for the people on other boats.
Another hour. Ianto glanced at his watch, and made some comment to Jack that Gwen only half heard. Something about short days and dark afternoons. Jack nodded, apparently unperturbed, and glanced at the gadget on his wrist.
"There's time yet," he said, and scanned the sky with what looked like a practised gaze. Ianto nodded back, and returned to adjust the scanners yet again. Gwen stretched her legs, and found herself wishing for something other than coffee. Hot chocolate would be nice. A big mug, with just a dash of brandy in it, or possibly vodka. A slice of something pleasantly high in calories would set it off nicely, she decided. Something sticky. It was a pleasant daydream, and one that almost made her miss the sudden alarm sound that rang out across the deck.
"About half a mile away, sir." Ianto sounded jubilant. "That's a land mile, not a nautical one. A couple of degrees..." He frowned, and pointed. "That way. Starboard?"
"That's port." Jack flashed him a grin. "We need to work on your nautical skills."
"I'm always ready to learn new skills, sir." The young Welshman returned the smile, before turning his attention to Gwen. "Are you picking anything up in that direction?"
"Hang on a second." She fiddled with the dial, turning the gadget to her left. "Yes, there's something. Several vehicles in the area... sorry. Several boats in the area, so I can't be too specific... but most of them seem stationary, and they're very spread out. Fishing boats, maybe?"
"Could be." Jack turned the wheel, setting them on their new heading. "Or tourists. Or smugglers waiting for a client. It'll be something small, though."
"Rowing boat small?" She peered at the screen, trying to be as accurate as possible. Jack laughed.
"You don't row further than you have to. Besides, if my information is right, they're going to need a bigger boat than that. Not as big as ours, though. Helps avoid being seen."
"You sound like quite the expert, sir." Ianto's tone was light, almost as though he were amused. Jack shrugged, his ready grin suggesting secrets.
"Never hear that old saying, Ianto? Set a thief to catch a thief?"
"Once or twice." The younger man showed no inclination to ask further, but Gwen turned to look towards Jack. He merely smiled at her, the way that he always did, and she knew that the conversation would be going no further in that direction. It seemed rather a shame.
"Do we have some sort of plan?" asked Ianto, before she could consider a different approach. Jack laughed.
"Hell of a time to ask. We're nearly on top of them."
"I did try to ask earlier. You suggested that plans weren't really your style."
"I did, didn't I. Play it by ear, okay? We have to see what they're up to, and I don't want to make them panic. Look natural. Like tourists or something. Get up close, and then..." He shrugged. "We grab them."
"And if they don't want to be grabbed?"
"I wasn't planning on giving them the choice. You stay out of sight. You're not exactly dressed for tourism anyway. Then if things get rough, you can play cavalry."
"I'm not exactly dressed for tourism?" Ianto's gaze lingered on the waistcoated vision from the forties, and one of his eyebrows arched skyward. "None of us is exactly the picture of a happy holidaymaker, sir."
"You think?" Jack didn't seem to have considered that possibility. "Anyway, they don't have to believe it for long. We'll have the drop on them before you can say 'Torchwood'."
"If you say so, sir." Ianto frowned. "I don't want to seem... hesitant..."
"It'll be fine. We board them, grab whatever they've got, get them to tell us who they're selling it to, and have this all cleared up in no time. You know who most of the buyers turn out to be. Half the wealth of the world and a tiny fraction of the brain cells between them. We scare them with a little display of how dangerous alien tech can be, and turn them loose with something to think about. Worked last time."
"Owen's hair was green for three days, sir. And he wasn't the only one. Several people in Swansea are still trying to find out who to sue for compensation."
Gwen couldn't help herself. "Green hair?"
Jack looked slightly shifty. "Only a few of them. And there was no lasting damage. I've worked out the kinks in the plan now, anyway. It'll be fine."
"I hope so." Gwen ran a hand through her hair, only half aware of doing so. "It'd take some explaining to Rhys."
"Okay, could I get a little confidence here, please? Nothing is going to turn green." Jack glanced at his wrist gadget, and then gestured to Ianto. "Get out of sight. We should be seeing them any minute."
"Yes sir." Grabbing some of the more visible pieces of equipment, Ianto ducked down below decks. A second later the coastline fell away slightly as they rounded a curve, and there ahead of them was a small brown boat. Gwen hid the radar gun as best she could, and tried to look like a tourist.
"I'm not exactly dressed for sunbathing," she pointed out. Jack eyed the sky.
"I'd be worried if you were. You still got any coffee?"
"Some." She caught on, sprawling as nonchalantly as possible with the mug in one hand. Jack turned the wheel lazily, and with the guiding hand of an expert, brought their own boat up alongside the other. Two men were inside, neither looking particularly welcoming.
"Hi!" Smiling his widest smile, Jack waved a hand in casual greeting. "You guys fishing?"
"No." The nearest of the two men, a slightly grizzled sort with several days worth of stubble, made no attempt to return the smile. "We're doing a geological survey."
"No kidding?" All wide-eyed American tourist, Jack flashed his bright white teeth and seemed almost to bounce with sudden enthusiasm. "I'm a geologist. Here on holiday with my wife." He gestured to Gwen, who smiled and waved. The second man began to look a little nervous.
"We're not really doing anything today," he said, as though worried that Jack was about to suggest he help them out. "We're just looking around. The real work will start in a day or two."
"Sure. You're doing some preliminary salinity tests on the water, I guess." Nimble and quick, Jack moved suddenly, leaping over the rail and into the other boat. "And here's your equipment. Look at this stuff, Gwen."
"This is a government vessel," growled the more grizzled of the two. Jack beamed at him.
"Sure it is." He bent suddenly, snatching something up off the deck with the speed of a striking snake. "See this, Gwen? First class piece of geological equipment. In a very broad sense."
"Put that down," demanded the second man. Jack's smile became just that little bit more taut.
"It's from Viros VII, a little mining colony about... oh, what... four hundred and sixty-seven thousand light years from here. That's just an estimate. See, the locals loved to dig for minerals, and everybody else in the universe pretty much loved to go there and steal everything. So on Viros VII they got real smart - and real violent. See this little blue switch? I press this right now, and France pretty much disappears off the map."
"I- You're crazy." The second of the two men backed away slightly, as though that might somehow help should everything be about to explode. "That's just junk."
"No, it's a weapon. Designed to warn whole civilisations that they'd better behave." Jack tossed the little device into the air a few times, his movements nonchalant, his eyes bright and hot. "Course, you know what happened to Viros VII?"
"What?" asked Gwen, rather feeling that she was expected to chip in. He shot her a white hot smile.
"Same thing that often happens when you play with fire. Let's just say there isn't any Viros VII anymore - or much else in that region of space. Just a whole lot of asteroids that didn't used to be there." He threw the box suddenly at Gwen, and she caught it in a sudden panic. "That one's missing the powerpack, mind. So I might have lied a bit about France."
"Then I think it's time you left." Drawing a gun from his jacket pocket, the first man levelled it at Jack. "I don't know who you are, but I do know that I don't want you on my boat anymore. Leave while you still can."
"He's threatening us." Jack gave rather a theatrical sigh. "And in a really clich? way. I'm almost insulted."
"In their defence sir, this kind of situation does tend to attract clich?." Sounding as calm as ever, Ianto's voice rang out nearby. Both smugglers turned, seeing a young man in an immaculate suit standing on the deck of the other boat. There was a very large gun in his hands, more cannon than pistol, and he had one eyebrow raised as though in question. His nerve apparently gone, the smuggler dropped his own weapon.
"Nicely done, Ianto." Frisking the pair, Jack indicated that they should sit down on the deck, then left them under the watchful gaze of his young associate. Gwen clambered over to join the larger party, looking at the collection of alien items with interest.
"Do you know what all of these are?" she asked. He crouched on the deck, picking up the various bits and piece in turn.
"I think so. Some of it's pretty run of the mill stuff. This is part of a navigational device for a spaceship. Probably safe enough, but if it falls into the hands of a bright enough scientist, there could be real trouble. Earth isn't ready for that kind of technological development. Certainly not with all the in-fighting that's still going on." He tossed the piece back onto the deck, and picked up another. "This is a child's toy. Like those electronic adding machines that human kids have. There are a couple of powerpacks for that bomb you've got there; various bits of weaponry; this looks like a medical scanner..." He frowned suddenly, and snatched back the hand that had been stretching out for something else.
"Trouble?" asked Gwen. He didn't look up at her.
"I don't know. Could be."
"Another weapon?" If it was worse than a bomb that could obliterate an entire country, then she wasn't sure that she wanted to know. Jack shook his head.
"Not a weapon, no. More like a computer interface, based on bio-chemical technology. They were banned right across the galaxy. Had a nasty habit of developing minds of their own."
"Lovely." It looked unpleasant, now that she came to think of it. There were metallic-looking tendrils dangling from it, and it looked unmistakably alien. "Is it safe?"
"Yeah, mostly I guess. Looks like there's a piece missing." He still didn't look hugely enthusiastic about picking it up. "Damned amateurs."
"I thought you said it was safe?"
"It's semi-sentient alien technology, and it can interface with anything electronic. It's never gonna be entirely safe." He pulled off his coat, wrapped it around the device, then tossed the bundle over the railing into their own boat. "If that thing is switched on, it could replace its own missing parts. And if you're a serious collector of alien technology, chances are you'll have something it can use." He turned suddenly fierce eyes upon the two smugglers. "Where was this lot going, huh? Who's your buyer?"
"We're geologists," insisted the second of the two men, looking distinctly uncomfortable. "We found that stuff when we were surveying the area."
"Yeah, sure. And I'm Marie Antoinette. Who were you taking this stuff to?"
"Lost property." There was a mocking smile on the face of the first man. One that was almost its twin flickered briefly across the infinitely more composed features of Captain Jack.
"Aw, look at him." The mockery in his voice was only slight, but it was plain. "We've got a real pro here, people. He's been around the block. Probably been arrested before. Maybe for smuggling cigarettes into Britain? Something a little bigger, maybe, that pays well, but not as well as trading in alien technology? He knows his rights. Knows that the authorities can't do anything to him. Figures that in an hour or two, his lawyer will have him back out in the big wide world, so he can get back to his old tricks. Well here's a little something to think about. We're not the police." In the blink of an eye he had covered the distance between them, and one steel hand gripped the front of the smuggler's coat. "You don't have any rights here. There are no rules, no laws, and nothing that we can't do. So..." A cold, hard pressure appeared suddenly on the smuggler's neck; the round, hollowed shape of a gun muzzle. "I'd talk if I was you. Me, I'm a live and let live kinda guy. I don't like to hurt people, but I will. Ianto over there, though... He really likes to get violent."
"Only when I'm hungry," interjected Ianto. Gwen almost smiled. Jack's lips twitched, but his eyes remained cold.
"And it's been a long, long boat ride, with very little to eat." He dug the gun a little harder into his prisoner's neck. "So tell me. Who are you and who are you working for?"
"Name's Hollis. Alan Hollis." The man was rigid in Jack's grip, his face taking on an unhealthy greyish tinge. "Listen, I just pass stuff on. I mean, the market's out there, so why not take advantage of it? Everybody needs to make a living. Right?"
"Sounds like a bribe to me, sir." Ianto spoke almost jauntily, apparently enjoying the idea of being the team's resident psychopath. Jack nodded.
"I agree. I think I've heard enough. You wanna take him below decks for a bit?"
"No!" Hollis struggled briefly, but the gun in his neck discouraged him from trying too hard. Behind him the other smuggler stirred restlessly.
"Don't talk to them, Alan," he muttered. Hollis swallowed as best he could with his throat obstructed.
"You want to switch places and try saying that? Game's up. Look, a while ago we found some stuff when we were out at sea. Yeah, we were smuggling cigarettes and that sort of stuff. Not exactly big players. What we found, though; we knew it was something special. We kept it for a bit. Tried to figure out what it was. Then when we were in France again a few weeks later, just as we put ashore, somebody met us right on the beach. Said he'd pay good money for what we'd got. Did, too, and after that we didn't look back. If somebody's going to pay us that kind of money for junk that nobody else wants, I'm not going to argue."
"Even though you've got no idea what you're selling, or what it's capable of? You've got no idea who you're giving it to, or what they're going to do with it?" Gwen's voice was sharp, and she realised that she had slipped back into her old police mode. Hollis scowled.
"It's just junk. It doesn't do anything. I don't know what your game is, with all this stuff about alien technology, but I do know that there no such thing as aliens."
"There's not, huh." Jack released him all of a sudden, and looked back towards the pile of bits and pieces on the deck. "Tell that to the owners of that little lot. They might be interested to know that they don't exist."
"Military stuff. It's military stuff, that's all." The second man sounded sullen, apparently angry at being caught out. Jack sighed.
"Yeah, whatever. Look, these two aren't going to tell us anything. No sense keeping them around. Get the rest of that stuff aboard our boat, Gwen."
"Right." She hesitated. "What are you going to do?"
"What do you think? Like I said, they're not going to talk. So we've got no use for them." He raised his gun again, and levelled it straight at Hollis. "Think you can scupper the boat okay, Ianto?"
"No problem." Ianto maintained a steady, affable smile. "I can make sure that it's never seen again, and them with it. You don't need to waste the bullets, sir. They'll drown sure enough when the boat goes down."
"What?" The second man had gone as white as a sheet. "You can't mean that. You can't... We have rights!"
"Not here you don't. Like I said, we're not the police. We're nobody official." Jack smiled down the barrel of his distinctly old-fashioned Webley revolver. "Which is better. It means we get to kill you, and never have to worry about doing any paperwork."
"Jack..." Gwen was looking back at him with widened eyes. "You can't do that."
"Why not?" Ianto offered her the same steady, unconcerned smile that he had been pointing at the two smugglers. "Think of the taxpayers' money that'll be saved if there's no trial. And think of how much easier it'll be for us, not having to explain what they're being tried for." He shrugged. "Besides, I like sinking boats."
"Ianto!" She looked aghast. "Jack, at least give them another chance!"
"They're not going to talk." He sighed, as though exasperated. "Yeah, okay. But they only get this one more chance. After that I let Ianto loose with the explosives." He turned sharp eyes back to the cowering pair before him. "Well?"
"I-" Hollis swallowed hard, looking from Jack to Ianto to Gwen, and lastly to his ashen companion. "We always sell to the same person. The man who contacted us that first time. We don't have a name, and we don't know anything about him, except... well except I don't think he's real." His eyes drifted to Jack's gun, pointing straight at him all the while. "I know how that sounds, but I'm serious. We never get close to him. We leave the stuff, he leaves the money, and we each pick up what the other's left. Except we never see him holding the money, and we never see him picking up the stuff."
"And I keep telling you, that doesn't mean anything." His companion seemed to be trying to distance himself from the story. "Just because you think you saw-"
"He walked through the rocks! Like they weren't really there!" Hollis's eyes were bright with pleading. "Look, I'm serious. I mean it. I was watching him, and he walked straight through them. Maybe they're not real, or maybe he isn't. All I know is, there's a local legend that says there used to be a witch living in some caves on the French coast, right by where we meet that man every time. And witches... witches do magic."
"You believe in magic, but not in aliens?" Jack shook his head. "No. Forget it. Ianto, get started on sinking the boat."
"No!" Hollis shook his head so hard it seemed in danger of coming loose. "I'll take you there! It's close to when we should be meeting him now. The man. You can see for yourself, but I'm telling you, you'll see the same as I did, if you look long enough. He's not real, and maybe that witch is."
"You're going to get us both locked up in the funny farm." The second man looked disgusted. "He's imagining things. We'd both been drinking a fair bit. Gets cold at sea, especially at night.
"Find out soon enough, won't we." Jack looked over at Gwen. "You got everything loaded up?"
"Not quite." She had stopped what she had been doing in order to listen to the conversation, but hurried now. Jack's eyes snapped back to Hollis.
"Suppose we believe you. That we're going to meet a non-existent man and a witch. How much stuff have you sold them already?"
"Not much. Another load this size, and some isolated pieces before that. We found this weird shipwreck. It's empty now though. I was hoping the witch might know where we could find something like it." He smiled nervously. "You believe me, don't you. About her."
"I always keep an open mind." Jack nodded suddenly, briskly. "Okay. You take us to the meeting place, and we'll see that you don't face any charges. You could get life for having this much alien stuff on your boat, but it's the buyer we really want, so I'm prepared to make a deal. If you co-operate."
"Life?" The second man sounded scathing, but there was uncertainty in his eyes. "No law I've ever heard of mentions alien goods."
"Don't want to broadcast the fact that there's aliens visiting the planet, do we." Jack looked back to Ianto. "Rum, I think. That's a good, sea sort of drink, right?"
"I believe so, sir, yes." Nodding his head in his oddly butlering way, Ianto bent to one of the bags that they had brought with them. Gwen was only mildly surprised when he produced a silver flask from one of them, and, giving it a quick polish, handed it to Jack.
"Thanks." Jack pulled off the lid, raised the flask in toast, and offered the two smugglers a roguish grin. "To partnership." He took a swig, then replacing the lid, tossed the flask to Hollis. The grizzled sailor looked to be all fingers and thumbs as he struggled to get at the liquid, and when he finally managed to open the flask, he made only a hasty, cursory gesture of acknowledgement of the toast, before downing a sizeable measure. His companion was no less thirsty.
"That's good stuff." Smiling shakily, Hollis wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. "You could fight witches with that."
"Maybe." Jack smiled disarmingly, and took back the flask. "Night."
"Night?" Hollis looked confused. "It's not ni-" He got no further, and slumped into an ungainly heap. His companion seemed about to react, but before he could do so, he too went limp. Without missing a beat, Jack began searching their pockets. "We got everything, Gwen?" he asked. She nodded, caught by surprise.
"Yes, I think so. What...?"
"The usual. Amnesia pill, with a good dose of sedative. When they wake up, all they'll know is that it's not a good idea to go boating drunk. You can tip off the coastguard if you're feeling generous. Make sure they don't get into trouble while they're sleeping it off."
"But all that talk..." She frowned. "It's not really illegal to-"
"Window-dressing, that's all. How could it be illegal to deal in alien tech?" He flashed her one of his disarming grins. "Think about it. Who'd make the law? And while we're on the subject of window-dressing, what was all that earlier? You thought I was really going to kill them."
"I... didn't." She didn't sound entirely convinced, and realised that she was blushing. "Well... you sounded convincing."
"I hope I did." He found a few pieces of paper in Hollis's pockets, but nothing else of note. The boat had no cabin to speak of, and there didn't appear to be a log. A single map proved to be the extent of the boat's paperwork, and picking it up, Jack climbed back over the railing. A few minutes later, the smugglers' craft was drifting away.
"Now what?" asked Gwen. "They didn't tell us where they were going to be meeting this 'non-existent man'."
"They didn't need to." Jack flipped open his wrist device, and turned in a rough half-circle. "They said enough. Over there, I think. There's something interesting right on the coast."
"New heading then, sir?" Ianto seemed to have settled into a new place at the wheel. Jack nodded.
"I think so. Gwen, call in. Get Tosh to sweep the area. Ianto..."
"Coffee's just over there, sir." Ianto had an eyebrow raised in dry amusement. "You know, one of these days you're going to swallow some of that stuff, and then we'll be in a right mess."
"No chance." Throwing the flask of doctored rum back into one of the bags, Jack retrieved the coffee and took a long drink. "You'd have to be crazy to swallow that stuff. Tastes of... industrial chemicals. And shadows."
"Thanks." Looking up, mobile phone poised, Gwen threw him a half-hearted glare. "Once upon a time, I drank some of that."
"Our first date." He smirked. "Maybe I've got a more sensitive tongue."
"I am not going to continue with that conversation." She pressed a button on her phone, activating the speed dial, and made a show of turning her back. Jack laughed.
"Full steam ahead, Ianto."
"Aye aye sir." The younger man adjusted the speed, then fell back into his customary silence. It was only when the shape of the coastline loomed large above them that he slowed the boat to a halt, and spoke up again.
"I take it that we wait here until we hear from Tosh?" he asked. Jack nodded.
"Makes sense. No lights though." His voice was barely a whisper. "And don't forget how well sound travels over water. It's nearly dark, too. Noise travels even better at night."
"And we don't want the witch to hear us." There was obvious amusement in Ianto's voice, despite its tiny volume. Jack smiled back at him, the dying light flashing against his eyes.
"Don't be too dismissive," he said, and there was a strange note of seriousness in his words. When Ianto opened his mouth to question him, though, Jack merely flashed him a quick wink, and turned away. Ianto frowned. He would never have expected Jack to believe a story of witches and non-existent men; but with Jack you could never be entirely sure of anything. That was probably one of the attractions, mused Ianto, though as ever, clouds gathered in a part of his mind. One of the attractions, yes - but just as surely, it was one of many, many dangers.
XXXXXXXXXX
Toshiko answered almost as soon as Gwen telephoned, her voice suggesting that she was pleased to have something to do. Gwen almost laughed.
"Surely it can't be all that slow in the office?"
"We're not exactly busy, no. Sometimes I think the exciting things only ever happen when Jack is nearby. How's it going on Jersey?"
"We're not on Jersey anymore. We're on a boat. By France, apparently. Jack seems to know what he's doing with a boat, so I'm taking his word for it." She sighed. "And now Ianto seems to know what he's doing with a boat as well. Sometimes I feel like the class dunce."
"Oh, ignore them. They're just showing off." Tosh sounded breezy, and clearly glad to be having a conversation. "Everything's alright, then?"
"I think so. We found the smugglers. They had some story about selling the alien tech to a witch who lives in a cave. Jack wants you to run a scan on the area. He said something about finding something interesting with his... wrist thingy."
"Oh, well. If his wrist thingy said there's something interesting, there's something interesting." Gwen heard the unmistakable sounds of fingers clicking on a keyboard. "Whatever it is, it's one hell of a gadget. Ah ha. Found you. Now, hang on..."
"Have you tapped into a government satellite again? Only we did get that memo..."
"Oh, I've fixed the program. They'll never know I was there." There was more clicking, as Tosh's agile fingers tapped out their commands. "Jack in a good mood?"
"He's talking about witches living in caves. I don't know if that's good or bad." Gwen frowned. "Why?"
"Oh, it's just... well with him and Ianto both gone, we sort of missed one of the pterodactyl's meals. When I arrived here this morning, I found it with half a sheep. And we're not really supposed to let it do that anymore. I thought you might like to tell him. If there's a good moment."
"We're about to go hunting through caves for a witch, and you want me to find a good opportunity to tell him that the pterodactyl has eaten another sheep?" She shook her head. "Why is it that lately every conversation I have sounds like the weirdest one ever? Alright. I'll try to slip it into the conversation somewhere. Provided you come up with something useful."
"I'm getting some data through at the moment. You'll have to give me a few minutes to look it over though..." Always easily distracted by reams of figures, Toshiko's voice trailed off a little. "Anyway, it was Owen's fault."
"About the data?"
"No, about the pterodactyl. Since you lot left he's been playing with that bloody basketball most of the time. Makes a hell of a racket, and the pterodactyl won't settle, then. You'd think it'd be used to Owen by now, but obviously not."
"Obviously." Gwen almost followed that with: 'Is anybody used to Owen?', but stopped herself just in time. Owen himself might be oblivious to it, but Toshiko carried quite a torch for him - and finding out recently that Gwen and Owen had something of a relationship had not been easy for her. It could so easily have meant the death knell for Gwen's fledgling friendship with the shy technician, and now that they were properly friendly again, she didn't want to risk ruining things. It was generally better to steer the conversation as far away from Own as possible. She smiled awkwardly. "So, er... are those readings giving you anything useful?"
"Yes..." Tosh trailed away again momentarily. "I'm getting two readings fairly near to you that I don't think could be caused by anybody local. The usual sort of local, anyway. Does Jack think that this is a collector?"
"Sounds like it. The smugglers said that they'd made several sales to whoever it is." Gwen had to smile. "The witch in the cave. Sounds like one of Enid Blyton's."
"Well, these readings do suggest that there's quite a bit of tech around. Nothing that any ordinary human should be running around with, certainly." Tosh's fingers clicked at the keys again. "There's one blip coming from the coast. Right on the coast. I can't be specific about what sort of device is causing it, but whatever it is seems quite power-hungry. It's causing some quite major fluctuations in the local electricity grid. Too random to make the authorities suspicious though, I should think. Then there's another reading that looks like it might be underground. Totally different in style. Your witch?"
"Sounds like it." Gwen sighed. "Great. So it looks like we're going to have to go underground as well. Thanks Tosh."
"Glad to help. Tell Jack that I'm sending a more detailed rundown to his laptop. And you lot be careful if you're going to go crawling around in caves in the dark. You don't have your medic with you."
"I know. Jack reckons Owen gets seasick, though, so I suppose it was best that we left him behind."
"Owen? Seasick? He didn't get sick when we were speeding around Cardiff Bay earlier this year, chasing some young lunatic in an alien glider. Despite Jack's best efforts."
"Really?" Gwen thought back to Jack's comment, and frowned to herself, then shrugged and managed a smile. "Must have got the wrong end of the stick then. Never mind. Thanks for all the help, Tosh. You want to talk to the others?"
"No, I don't think so, thanks. One of them is bound to ask after the pterodactyl." Gwen could see Tosh so clearly in her mind as the other woman spoke; seated by her computer, glasses on, her expression one of mild harassment when anything was keeping her from her beloved work. A recalcitrant prehistoric beast on a sheep-killing spree definitely came into that category. Gwen smiled.
"Speak to you later then. Bye."
"Bye Gwen." There was a click of the phone going dead. Gwen pressed the button to close the call at her end, then headed back towards the others.
"Well?" asked Jack. He and Ianto were standing side by side at the wheel, looking like the least likely pair of sailors ever. When had they become so comfortable with each other, she wondered. Things had been so fraught after the business with Ianto's girlfriend; but now there was barely daylight between them. Ianto's body language seemed to have changed entirely.
"She's sent some stuff to your laptop. Two readings, she said, that couldn't be caused by human equipment. One on the coast and one underground.
"The witch and the non-existent man," commented Ianto. Jack smiled.
"Looks like it." He retrieved a laptop from one of the bags, and flipped it open, pressing a button on his wrist gadget as he did so. Gwen guessed that that prevented him from needing a telephone line or a wireless hotspot, but she wished that she understood how. He flashed her a typically cheerful grin, and yet again she put off asking the question. Somehow she didn't think that he was really going to explain the gadget to her anyway.
"What you got?" asked Ianto. Jack tilted the screen so that the younger man could see.
"Some kind of projection device. Check out those wave patterns. I think our smuggling friend was right, and that man doesn't exist. He's a projection. Sort of a sophisticated hologram. Betcha."
"Toshiko said that there was no way to tell what sort of equipment it was," Gwen told him. Jack shrugged.
"Tosh and her computers are the best you'll find, but they don't know everything. Sometimes you need to have a little more first hand practical experience." He frowned down at the screen. "And there's our witch. She's not that deep, but I'll bet she's not easy to get to. She wouldn't want too many potholers dropping by for tea."
"You're talking like there really is a witch living down there." Gwen caught the glint in his eye, and frowned. He didn't really believe that - did he? He smiled at her; the lop-sided, one corner of the mouth smile that managed to mock and yet still look endearing.
"There's something down there, yeah. Somebody who wants to buy alien tech. Whether it's a witch, a woman, or an alien from the Planet Zog, I don't care. I just want to make sure that nobody is going to go blowing France off the face of the Earth, or worse. Ianto?"
"Sir?"
"Follow these co-ordinates. Gwen and I will go ahead, and you take the rear. Time yourself, and try to stay about twenty minutes behind us. I need you to be as quiet as it's possible to be, you got that?"
"Yes sir." Ianto hesitated. "Weapons?"
"Yeah. Bring at least two handguns with you. I want a back up. And bring a stun gun, too." Jack had already bent to the bag that held the weaponry, and was handing Gwen a stun gun as he spoke. She took the automatic pistol that he handed her as well, though she had never been very happy with a gun. They were fun to use on the range, but it was all rather less fun for real - especially since she had been shot herself. Jack flashed her a smile.
"You probably won't even need it. Nine out of ten times, these alien tech nuts are rich types who wouldn't say boo to a goose. Geeks with more money than they know what to do with. They couldn't hurt you if they tried."
"Of course." She smiled back, managing not to do it shakily. "Um... so if we're going ashore first... how do we get there?"
"Usual way people go ashore." He bent to a locker, and hauled out what looked like a big grey bag, tossing it overboard. There was a sharp hiss, a splash, and a second later an inflatable boat bobbed gently on the surface of the sea. "There you go. We all set?"
"Good luck, sir," Ianto offered. Jack smiled at him, and clapped him on the shoulder.
"You too. And you be careful. I'm not losing you out here."
"Of course not." Ianto smiled briefly, then turned his attention back to the wheel. "And don't forget the oars."
"Smart ass." Jack smirked, as though some highly predictable piece of innuendo was about to follow this comment; then instead he turned away, collected the oars from the locker, and threw them down into the boat. "Come on, Gwen. And keep it silent."
"Right." She climbed down as carefully and as quietly as she could, wishing that she possessed a fraction of the balance that Jack displayed when he followed her a second later. He bent to the oars, and without another word, took the little boat in to shore. Soon enough they were climbing out onto the beach, and Jack lifted the little boat out of the water, setting it down above the high tide mark. A glance at the wrist band, a quick look back out to sea, and then he was off, striding away to his left. Gwen had to hurry to catch up to him, struggling to be as quiet as she could.
It seemed to be an attractive place; what little she could see of it. The darkness, combined with the speed and urgency of their movement, didn't exactly allow for sightseeing - but it certainly looked like the sort of place that she might like to holiday in. The thought made her mind go back to Rhys, and she felt the by now accustomed burst of guilt. Poor Rhys. Living each day secure in a world of lies. How could she ever explain this to him, though? How could she go home at the end of this escapade, and explain to him what she had been doing, and why? That just wasn't the sort of conversation one could have with Rhys. He was a man of certainties and conventions. He wasn't a part of a world where an apparently immortal officer, who had been having adventures before he was born, went hunting for witches in a cave on the French coast. Rhys had trouble suspending his disbelief long enough to watch Wallace And Gromit.
They had been going for some ten minutes when Jack's wristband emitted a single, high-pitched beep. Jack came to a halt immediately, raising one hand to signal to Gwen to do likewise. She looked around, unsure what was going on.
"Trouble?" she asked, keeping her voice as low as she could. He shook his head, turning in a rough circle, eyes glued to whatever readout his mystical wristband possessed.
"A theory," he told her, then smiled suddenly, and strode away to his right. She followed. There was a short stretch of sandy beach where they were now standing, scattered with many rocks; and amongst them was a small, metal device. It was roughly rhomboid in shape, with many irregularities that Gwen was fairly sure were buttons - controls of some kind. Jack crouched beside it, and assuming that it was therefore safe enough, she did likewise.
"Alien?" she asked. It was a fairly redundant question. It certainly didn't look like anything that might have been made on Earth. Jack nodded.
"Teroan, actually. It's a leisure device. Projects images, sorta like holograms, but keyed into particular frequencies. Particular brainwaves, so that only certain people can see them." He nodded at it. "It could be transmitting anything right now, but we can't see it."
"The non-existent man," realised Gwen. Jack nodded.
"Exactly. Here." He tapped a few controls on the wristband, and a small, bright blue image floated in the air beside his arm. A man, sure enough, standing and waiting patiently on the beach. "That's a little of what the smugglers would be seeing if they were here right now."
"But how did it talk to them?" The little blue man blinked out of existence at the press of a button, and Jack shrugged.
"Couldn't be pre-programmed with key phrases, or it wouldn't be able to interact properly. It probably alerts a controller when the smugglers arrive, and he or she runs the speech program from a remote location. Which explains Tosh's second reading." He nodded, looking almost approving. "Good way of staying anonymous."
"When you have green skin and a long nose?" joked Gwen. Jack smiled.
"It's possible. Anything's possible. But if it's not a witch that we're dealing with, it might just as well be an alien. And an alien probably wouldn't want to be seen. Plenty of them look like us, but a whole lot more don't."
"Widens the playing field rather." She frowned. "But if she gets alerted when the smugglers come, she must know that we're here now?"
"I've been jamming it. Had some idea what to expect, after we got Tosh's report."
"So you think that our witch is..." She frowned, trying to remember what race he had named earlier. "Teroan?"
"No." He shook his head, looking away out to sea. "Not unless she's been here a whole lot longer than oughta be possible. The Teroans are all dead. Their whole planet was destroyed in a war, hundreds of years ago. They didn't have time travel, and they didn't have any colonies. I don't know of any that survived."
"I see." She wanted to ask him more - how it was that he looked so sad when he couldn't possibly have known either the planet or the people. How he knew about the war in the first place, or had ever come to hear of the Teroans - but she knew from experience that he would likely flash her a bright grin, and then change the subject completely. He was annoying that way.
"Come on." He stood up rather abruptly, and she followed him back on their original course. She had no doubt that he could find whoever had programmed the Teroan device, and had no doubt that following him was the right thing to do. He seemed distant now, though, and she wondered if it was worth trying to speak to him. He had pressed the need for silence, though, and she didn't want to be the one to initiate conversation as they grew closer to where they were going. In the event, it was him who spoke first.
"We need to watch our speed," he commented. "Lost a bit of time looking at that thing back there. We can't let Ianto catch up if he's going to be our rear guard."
"Okay." She sped up a little, though his own speed didn't seem to have changed. "Do you know how much further we have to go?"
"Not much. Horizontally, anyway." He flashed her a smile, almost invisible in an increasing darkness. She had lost all track of the time, but they were well on their way to nightfall by now. Usually Jack would have been wearing his bluetooth earpiece, which bore a bright blue light and consequently made him at least partially visible - but without it he was as invisible to her as she must be to him.
"Horizontally?" She realised what he meant, and groaned. "Of course. How far down is she?"
"Not that far. Creeping down tunnels in the dark is a great way to get overheard, though. If you want to stay up here...?"
"Are you telling me to?" She didn't like the idea of being left behind. He shook his head briefly, and she nodded. "Good. I'm coming."
He nodded as well, though slowly. "Okay. But once I give the word, no more talking. No more noise at all, you got that? And best draw your gun."
"What happened to rich geeks who are easy to shut down?" He had emphasised several times that there was usually no danger with dealers in alien tech. He shrugged.
"I abandoned that theory. Whatever we've got in that cave, I'm pretty sure it's not some rich guy with an awkward hobby. We have to find out what it is, and see what it's up to. I'd rather it not know we're coming."
"Of course." She followed him onwards again, until their trail led them to the mouth of a cave. It was large and dark and forbidding, and for a moment her nerve failed her. Thoughts of old horror stories flashed through her mind, but instead of some terrifying beast looming out of the darkness, she saw only Jack. He tapped at the controls on his wristband, and smiled his usual smile.
"Looks kinda forbidding, huh."
"We're going in there?" It struck her that they should have torches. Torches and ropes and helmets - the kind with lamps stuck on the front. Not the best way to arrive unnoticed perhaps - but far less disconcerting than standing here with an automatic pistol and a worrying lack of vision. To her surprise Jack shook his head.
"No. Too obvious. Too visible. People come here."
"They do?" It seemed an odd place to come. He shrugged.
"Wouldn't you? In daylight, at least. They come here, they have their picnics and their barbecues, and all that stuff. Any witch or alien beast hiding in a place like this would get found eventually." He shrugged. "Unless she eats the tourists."
"We've gone from rich geek to man-eating alien beast in the space of an afternoon. This isn't encouraging, Jack." She looked around. "Okay, so where do we look?
"This way." He swept his arm in a slow arc, until the wristband beeped again, then knelt down just past the entrance to the cave. "Where's a good way to hide a door?"
"Under a rug," she suggested, only half sarcastically. He smiled.
"True. I love a good trapdoor. But that's not what I meant. A really, really good place to hide a door is inside another one. Look." And he pulled aside some of the wiry beach grass that grew inside the mouth of the cave. There, almost on the ground, was a rough hole, far too small to crawl through, and half blocked by large rocks with sharp edges. Gwen frowned.
"We can't get through that," she pointed out. Jack merely smiled, and tapped once again at the wristband. The rocks blocking the hole faded away before her eyes, and she found that she was looking now at a hole that would be more than comfortable to pass through. She blinked.
"Holograms?" she asked, hoping to sound suitably au fait with such things. Jack nodded slowly.
"Sort of. A little more solid than that, but a similar idea. You ready?"
"Silent running from now on?" He nodded, then pulled something from his pocket and tossed it to her. It seemed to be a pebble, bright red, and clouded with silvery veins.
"Leave that at the entrance," he told her. "I don't want to lose Ianto. We might just need him keeping rearguard."
"Right." She watched him slide through the hole, the smooth movement showing his easy grace. A few seconds later he had gone, vanished into the darkness that lurked beyond. It was surprisingly easy to follow him, the hole leading to a passageway that seemed unnaturally roomy. She flattened the grass a little around the entrance, put the red pebble where Ianto should have no trouble spotting it, and then looked around at what little she could see of her new surroundings. Not exactly inspiring, she decided - and definitely far too dark. It wasn't as bad as it could have been, though, and the going underfoot was reassuringly level. A hand touched hers, and she smiled at the invisible face beyond it. This wasn't so bad. Not really. Whoever or whatever they were after, it would have no knowledge of their presence here; couldn't possibly guess that they were creeping now towards it, silent in the impenetrable dark. They would catch it by surprise, deal with it however Jack saw fit - within reason; she was good at making sure of that - and then they could all go home. She could return to Rhys, and ease her conscience at her lies. She could tell him how much she loved him, and make the guilt fade away, and tell herself that what she felt for Rhys was so much stronger, so much more real, than the things she felt for the walking enigma behind the hand now gently holding her own. It would all be alright, in just a few hours. Her world would return to normal.
She just wished that she could really believe all of that.
XXXXXXXXXX
Beneath their feet, something moved. Something that walked with a slow, heavy tread over rocks and stones and shells. The feet moved quietly, as though their owner were listening to other sounds above its own; unwilling to drown out the approaching steps with unnecessary noise. Two people were coming; two people who moved oh so quietly; or thought that they did. Two people who knew that something dwelled in the caves, and were coming here especially to find it. A tongue flickered in the air, tasting subtleties that most creatures would never have detected. Hormones, floating even from a distance; pheromones; sweat and skin and racing blood. Humans. Humans who came from above, determined and resolute, and completely unprepared. Black lips smiled a crooked, toothy smile, and the tongue that ran across them tasted something else; some other subtlety born by the warm, subterranean air. A man and a woman, but... not like the others. Not like the ones who usually wandered the beaches, with their buckets and their rods and their maps in plastic bags. The woman tasted of courage and guilt, like two halves of one life clashing in the middle. But the man... the man tasted of up and down and back and front. Of past and future and faraway places, and places further than that. He tasted of excitement and weirdness, and of things that shouldn't be, and the black, flickering tongue trembled in a moment of unfamiliar excitement. Such things, coming here of their own free will, so unsuspecting, so sure of their own secrecy. A soft, almost girlish giggle escaped the black lips. It was all so intriguing, so unexpected; and coming ever closer all the time. Feet scraped on rock, and a misshapen body moved onward through the cave. Back into the shadows. Back into oblivion to wait.
XXXXXXXXXX
In the world outside the caves, night fell in earnest. A fisherman found a drifting boat, where two men who smelt of rum slept the sleep of the newly innocent. Toshiko Sato, with no Jack to send her home, stayed at her workstation and watched the streams of data roll on by. In a fashionable bar, Owen Harper bought vodka tonics for a beautiful medical student, until they were both too drunk to do what he had been hoping for. An old drunk found an alien weapon, washed in by the Rift, and atomised himself and it without ever knowing what he had found; and a young boy, who should have been asleep in bed, watched through his bedroom window whilst a pterodactyl swooped and glided through the chill Cardiff air. And Ianto Jones, an automatic pistol in one hand, and a portable scanner in the other, stooped to look at a shining red stone that lay on a patch of flattened grass. He bent down to it, and it flickered in a familiar pattern, changing to a soft, strobing effect when he picked it up. One of Jack's toys, programmed to glow for the benefit of select biorhythms only, and all but invisible in the current darkness for anybody who was not Ianto. He slipped it into his pocket, then followed Jack and Gwen into the hole. He had no idea where he was going, and his heart raced uncomfortably. So dark, so silent. So alone. Jack was here somewhere, though, and that was enough for Ianto. Gun levelled at nothingness, he pressed on into the unknown.
XXXXXXXXXX
Although the ground underfoot seemed smooth enough, at times it sloped quite sharply. It wasn't easy to keep walking, completely blind, and make absolutely no noise. Every so often Gwen slipped slightly, and Jack had to steady her as best he could. It was easier for him, with all his experience, and all his training; but for an amateur like her it was almost impossible. Corners tricked them, lurking unseen; the roof lowered every so often, a trap for unsuspecting heads; occasionally the floor fell away, and Jack had to grope ahead to find where it began again. They were not travelling especially far, but so slow was the going that it seemed as though they had been walking for hours. Only when the tunnel widened out did he stop, peering into inky blackness in an attempt to see where they were.
It was at times like this, he mused, with a part of his mind that he knew should have been busy upon more urgent matters, that it would be useful to be an Urlond, for their kind communicated by scent alone. No worries then about being overheard. As it was he had to rely merely upon squeezing Gwen's hand, and hoping that she got the message. Wait here. Don't move. When he let go of her and moved onwards, she didn't follow. He smiled to himself in the darkness; a hard, taut smile. Things were still going okay. Which, he admitted to himself, with a slightly less hard smile, was usually the time when things began to go wrong. This time though, luck was apparently on his side. He pressed on, each foot placed carefully, each breath measured and as silent as physically possible. He could hear Gwen breathing behind him, loud in this weird, dark place; but he told himself that this was because he was hypersensitive to the sound, to her presence, to the need for silence. There was still no reason for anybody or anything to know that they were coming, and to be listening out for company.
A step. Did something move, off to his left? His gun swung to cover the unseen maybe, but there came no second noise. Perhaps he had imagined it. Perhaps it had been nothing more than an insect, crawling on loose stone. Other step. Silence. Other step. Still the silence reigned. The smile almost came back, then. He might be lost in the darkness beneath the earth, but perhaps the universe was on his side tonight. Another step. Something skittered in the blackness up ahead; something unmistakably alive. Instinct took over then; a whirlwind rush of motion born of hard training, hard living, and hard experiences on a thousand unforgiving worlds. He didn't need to see the danger to know that it was there.
The first that Gwen knew of the situation was a scraping of shoes on rock; a sharp, harsh sound in front of her and slightly to her right. Less than a second later, before she had time to react, a heavy force crashed into her, knocking her to the ground. She tried to fight back, before her instincts told her that it was Jack; before her senses were able to react to the familiar shape, the familiar feel, the familiar scent of the man who had changed her life. One of his hands was pressing against hers, checking that her gun was in her hand; the other was reaching for her mouth, pushing against it. She smelt the metal-and-polish smell of his old Webley revolver, still in the hand that was ensuring her silence; then hand and weapon were gone, and she knew that Jack was pointing the gun at something. What it was she couldn't tell. She couldn't see anything; couldn't move properly for Jack's weight against her. There was just silence and darkness, and rocks pressing into her back; just emptiness yawning around her, that only her imagination could fill. She strained her eyes, searching for something in the nothingness, hearing Jack's irregular breathing, showing her his tension and concern. He didn't get scared, or didn't seem to; she had asked him about that once. He could still be scared for her, though, and the thought of that; the thought of what might be out there, causing him to fear for her safety; made her pulse race even faster, and her imagination run into overtime.
"Visitors..." The voice came from somewhere off to their left. Gwen felt Jack move, and knew that he had changed his aim. A throaty, rough giggle scratched its way out of the darkness, this time off to their right, and again Jack's aim changed. Gwen heard the frustration in his breathing, and wondered what her own breathing was telling him. A shuffling sound stole the thought away from her, and her mind pictured a scuttling, many-legged creature crawling across the rocky floor. Her blood ran cold. The gun felt heavy in her hand, cumbersome and useless. She couldn't see where to fire it, and if this was some alien monster waiting to strike, her weapon wouldn't necessarily harm it anyway. The laugh sounded again, as though the creature behind it was taunting them with its invisibility. Jack muttered something under his breath that Gwen didn't catch - then suddenly in a flash he was gone. She felt the pressure move itself; his hand was no longer holding her, his weight was no longer against her. His footsteps thudded against the ground, and then, briefly, there was light; a flash as though from a flare. In a tiny second, Gwen saw Jack, silhouetted, a flash of fire apparently contained within his hand; saw the shadowed form of some weird, misshapen creature; then as darkness fell again she heard the Webley crash into life. Three shots rang out, and none of them ricocheted off the walls. For a moment she felt a brief burst of hope, before the taunting, hoarse laugh came again. A second later there came a grunt of pain from Jack, and the sound of a body falling.
"Jack!" Instinct told her that it was stupid making a sound, but common sense told her that whatever they were facing knew perfectly well where she was. Something moved up ahead, followed by Jack's voice, telling her to run. Run where? She didn't believe for a moment that she could find her way back out of here by herself, and certainly not whilst pursued by a creature that was clearly at home in the darkness. Instead she tried to grope her way over to her friend; but long before she could reach him, the laughter came again. It was right beside her this time; so close that she felt breath wash across her face. Stinking, rancid breath, hot and moist.
"Having trouble seeing?" The voice sounded female, but harsh and brittle, like a growl made of glass. Gwen swung around; felt something touch her face; and tried not to yell out. The laugh mocked her; Jack told her once again to run. Even if Gwen had intended to obey him, she couldn't, for as her eyes sought him, uselessly, in the dark, a hand wound itself around her arm. She struggled, lashing out and hitting something warm and hard. Something that gave her a brief, rough shake, then leaned close to her, and told her to close her eyes.
"Let go of me!" She fought back, but it was painfully obvious that her struggles were useless. The gun was twisted from her grasp, and something that felt like a finger touched her face. It pressed against one of her eyes, as the voice warned her once again to close them. This time, without quite understanding why, she did so. Immediately, as though a switch had been thrown, she felt sudden bright light pricking her eyelids. The world was dark no longer. Cautiously, fearful of what she might see, she opened her eyes once again.
They were in a cavern, bigger than she had expected, though the roof was not especially high. She could see no sign of what was causing the light; no bulbs, no lamps, no flames; just rocks everywhere. There were fossils set in the ground at her feet; stone eyes staring unblinkingly from the walls; and weird pieces of alien machinery piled in teetering heaps. Jack was some fifteen feet away, sprawled on the floor, staring up at her with clear frustration in his eyes. There was blood on his head, but he didn't appear to be badly injured. As she watched him, he rose to his feet. A little stiffly perhaps, but easily enough.
"I told you to run," he said. His eyes held hers, and she frowned. There was an intensity in his expression; a gleam that told her not to look away. The fingers that gripped her arm curled more tightly around her, and her frown deepened. Was he telling her not to look? She had thought earlier, when he had set off his brief flare, that she had glimpsed some misshapen creature. It couldn't really be that bad, though. She was sure of that.
"I couldn't run. Run where?" Warm breath crept across her cheek; stinking, fish-scented breath, that made her want to recoil. She held her ground. She was a member of Torchwood, damn it. She wasn't going to shrink away from whatever was standing behind her. Jack had given her fair warning, but she had her own mind to make up; and if she was about to be eaten, she wanted to know what by. Slowly, hoping to appear as unthreatening as mortally possible, she turned her head.
It looked female; in that first, hesitant gaze, that was somehow the impression that she got. About her own height, though slightly hunched, which suggested that she might be taller. Two arms, much like those of a human's, grew from humanoid shoulders; and a second pair, stunted - vestigial almost - seemed to project from the region of her collarbone. Her legs were the same - one pair apparently humanoid, a second, smaller and apparently useless, dangling from her hips. She wore ragged, greying clothes, but they did little to hide the strange mishmash of scales that replaced her skin in irregular patches. Only her head and her hands seemed free of the scales, but they were a pale grey in colour, creased and worn; her lips and tongue a necrotic black. A horrified gasp stuck somewhere in Gwen's throat, and her legs went suddenly weak.
"She doesn't like the look of me." The throaty, hoarse voice came from a mouth that stank of decay, and Gwen saw the black tongue - inhumanly long - flicker across ragged, grey teeth. A lumpy misshapen face stared back at her - no, not necessarily misshapen, thought Gwen. She had no way of knowing how this creature was supposed to look - and a set of surprisingly human-looking blue eyes glinted with mockery. Beside each, another appeared half-formed, bursting out of the skin like the pustules of some dreadful disease.
"What is it, Jack?" Fascinated, appalled, Gwen couldn't drag her eyes away. Somehow she always expected him to have the answer. Somehow he nearly always did.
"Our witch." He came a little closer, and one of the complete eyes, and one of the smaller ones, moved to track his progress. The black tongue snaked out of the mouth, clearly tasting the air. "You can see why she uses that hologram as a go-between."
"A necessary ploy. Most human minds are so small." The mouth dragged itself into a smile, that seemed to emphasise the lumps of the head. "But not yours." Gwen felt herself thrust aside, the talons on the hand that had gripped her making their mark as she was pushed out of the way. "You're different."
"Hey, what can I say? I've always been special." Jack advanced a little more, smiling all the while. "You're not so ordinary yourself. And you pack one hell of a punch."
"Pain is the simplest message to deliver." The tongue flickered again. "You taste of alien energies. Why is that?"
"Maybe I'm an alien." Still he came closer, moving slowly, casually. The black lips seemed to be trying to match his smile, but each attempt produced something ghastly and cold.
"No. You taste too human for that. It's more like... sauce, poured over a meal."
"Is that what we are?" asked Gwen. "Lunch?"
"I eat fish." The creature didn't look at her. "Wriggling eels and jellyfish. Usually."
"Glad I asked." Gwen tried to catch Jack's eye, searching for inspiration. Should they try to shoot this creature? Attack it some other way? He must have some plan, surely? He seemed focused only on their host, however, and didn't look Gwen's way at all.
"You're pretty dismissive of humans, but some of them are useful to you. We met your smugglers." A smile played about in the corners of Jack's eyes. "They won't be coming here again." An angry hiss came in reply, and the tiny, clawed hands of the second pair of arms waved and snapped at the air. "There something in particular you're after? Some piece of technology?"
"Are you offering to help me find it?" All four eyes blinked slowly. "No, you don't want to help me. I can taste your disapproval. Strange little man. Your blood smells so rich, so... odd. Perhaps I should eat you. See what else you taste of."
"I think you might find me a little hard to swallow." Jack's smirk seemed unhealthily cocky to Gwen, but she didn't say anything. He had the floor now - there was nothing for her to say. And perhaps, if she stayed quiet, she might be able to do something. Her eyes scanned the cavern, looking for the gun that she had lost. The creature hissed.
"You're very confident. But you're only human."
"And that's nothing to what you are, right?" For a second it seemed to Gwen that there was something else in Jack's voice, besides the verbal swagger. Pity? She dismissed the thought. Jack had no reason to pity this creature. All too frequently, Jack gave the distinct impression that he didn't pity anything very much at all.
"Do you know what I am?" There was a scratching of feet on rock, as the creature moved closer to Jack. Gwen's blood froze, but she kept her mind focused on her task. Find the gun. Then she could help Jack.
"I know what you are, yeah." This time Gwen was sure that she could hear pity in Jack's voice. "And I guess that means I know what you're trying to build, too." He turned away, heading for one of the piles of alien junk leaning against the wall. "Having problems are you?"
"Maybe." Quick as a flash she was beside him, one powerful hand gripping his shoulder. He felt the talons bite through his clothing, and stifled a wince. "There's a lot of information inside that head of yours, isn't there."
"It doesn't do too badly." He tried to break free, but found it impossible. "Look, it's not going to work. You've been trying to make something for a long time now, right? Months, gathering all the equipment you can, looking for that last vital piece? You're not going to find it. I'm sorry."
"No you're not." The hand gripped him more tightly, and he felt the blood run from his shoulder. "But it doesn't matter. You know what I need. You know how to do this." She dragged him closer to her, so that he could feel the heat of her rancid breath on his face. "You'll help me."
He shook his head. "I can't do that."
"Oh, you can." The black lips twitched into a smile. "Or your friend over there; the one who thinks she's being subtle about looking for her gun? I can have her dead at your feet before she can scream your name. Tell her to forget it."
"Gwen." Jack turned his head slightly, to see past the misshapen bulk of his captor. "Leave it."
"What?" She had seen the weapon, and moved now to pick it up. "You're giving in?"
"Whatever you think you can do with that gun, believe me, it won't work. Bullets won't do the job."
"Fought these things often, have you?" He was so infuriating at times, the way he seemed to know so much, but shared so little. Still so new to all of this, Gwen wanted more answers than he was prepared to give. He struggled briefly against the grip on his shoulder, sighing in frustration both at his own helplessness and her stubborn nature.
"Gwen, trust me. Forget the gun. Bullets aren't any good here." He was glaring at her now, his blue eyes fierce and intense. So bullets wouldn't be any good. Did that really mean that she wasn't supposed to try? Did he really expect her to stand back and do nothing? A thought occurred to her suddenly, and her hand went, instinctively, to where the stun gun was hidden beneath her clothing. Maybe he wasn't trying to make her surrender. Maybe he was trying to send her a message. Feigning acquiescence, she threw down her gun.
"Fine. Bullets are no good. I get it."
"Well done." The creature released Jack, pushing him against the wall. "I may not kill you now."
"Lucky me." Well aware that their captor's attentions were mostly tied up with Jack, Gwen let her hand move once again to the stun gun. She drew it silently, and without looking for any sort of confirmation from her companion, thumbed the switch from the stun setting over to kill. Better to be sure, she reasoned. There was not likely to be much chance of a second attempt with this creature - it was going to be the first shot or nothing. Thinking back to all those times on the shooting range; all those pieces of advice and lessons learnt in the field; she took careful aim, tightened her finger on the trigger, and fired. There was a flash of blue electrical energy; a powerful arc that made her retinas sting; and only with blurred vision did she see the result of her actions. Whirling, even as the gun was firing, the strange creature threw up all four arms to protect itself; the two tiny, useless ones as well as the more ordinary pair. Still held by one of her taloned hands, and hurled like a rag doll into the path of the blast, Jack took as much of the shock as she did, the blue light crackling between them like some maddened serpent. With a choked off cry, Jack went limp. The creature stared down at him as the light show faded, then let him fall. Gwen took a step back. She hadn't really thought this through all that well, she realised, as the creature bore down on her, apparently unscathed by the attack. Plan B. There had to be a Plan B. A clawed hand caught her arm and, despite her struggles, held on tightly. Or a Plan C? Plan C would be just as good. With Jack slumped on the ground, oblivious, and all weaponry apparently now rendered void, she couldn't think of anything at all. Almost the last thing that floated, somewhat inanely, through her head was that there was a scorch mark on the arm that held her. The stun gun had done some damage then, albeit superficial. Maybe this monster wasn't entirely impervious to harm. No sooner had this notion flitted through her mind then, to her considerable surprise, her captor raised a free hand, and delivered a perfect, powerful right cross that connected squarely with Gwen's jaw. Abruptly the world was one of darkness once again.
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It was so horribly dark; but Ianto was used to the dark. It had been his home away from home for so long, way down in the bottom of the Hub, where nobody else ever went. All those weeks caring for Lisa, hidden away, and half the time never daring to put on a light. Never knowing when one of the others might come looking for him. So he had grown used to the dark, using it to protect Lisa from herself as much as from discovery by the others. Keeping her from seeing herself. Protecting her newly sensitised eyes from too much light. Her vision had been so much better after the Cybermen had got at her, and without the full compliment of circuits and processors to help her use that heightened ability, she had found lights uncomfortable. The thought of her made the familiar dull ache rise within him; the confusing sense of her loss. He no longer knew quite when he had lost her; whether the person he had hidden within the Hub had ever been his Lisa, or had been just an enemy using him, until she was strong enough to make her move. All those confused feelings; all those mixed up emotions. The desire for someone to blame, the need for someone to hate; the guilt when it felt that he might be moving on. Confound the dark, and blast the bloody silence. He had to think about Jack and Gwen, and whoever else might be down here. He couldn't think about Lisa now. But he could never stop thinking of her of course; not entirely. Only, perhaps, when there was somebody there to help him.
He dragged his thoughts away from the past, focusing only on the darkness, and not what he saw within it. Tried to concentrate, to listen for any sound up ahead that might mean danger, or that might mean the presence of his friends. He had a clear sense of time usually, and had thought that he would know how far ahead of him they were, but somehow in this subterranean world such certainties slipped away. Had it been twenty minutes after they had left him that he had reached the shore? Had he matched his pace with Jack's? Was he moving faster than them now, or slower? Jack would move fast he was sure, but Gwen would probably slow him down. Ianto didn't want to close the gap too much. He had to hang back; had to be there as back up, and not reveal his hand too soon. Jack had told him to do that, and he didn't want to let Jack down. Jack was his leader. Jack was... Jack. Jack knew how to make that dull ache go away.
He heard gunshots as he walked. Knew the sound instinctively, and felt his heart do a dance inside his chest. Jack's gun - the sound of the Webley was distinct. There was no ricochet, which suggested that the shots had found a target - but who had fired them, and who had been the target? He stood still for a moment, listening for other sounds. Screams, perhaps, or further shots. Nothing. Nothing loud enough to reach him, anyway. The gunshots had been quite far away. Jaw set firm, he started on his way again, determined to maintain the same steady pace as before. If he ran he would fall. He would make a noise and give himself away. Jack wouldn't thank him for that; certainly not if it turned out that he had panicked over nothing. So he kept walking, kept his mind as still as he could make it, and tried to keep his breathing steady. The whole world must be able to hear his racing heart, he was sure; and he struggled to bring it back under control. Focus. Be calm. He was supposed to be the unflappable one, after all. He had to maintain that fa?de now.
The darkness increased as he walked onward. Further downhill; always away from the surface. He wasn't sure how he felt about that. There was a strange feeling of alienation; as though the rest of the world was creeping further and further away from him, and there was nothing that he could do to prevent that. Obstacles tried to trip him, and his progress slowed to a virtual crawl, but still he didn't let himself dwell on negative thoughts. The ideas came occasionally - so far from the surface; so far from escape; how could he hope to outrun some pursuing enemy when there were holes in the ground in front of him, and when occasionally the ceiling dipped down so low that he had to stoop? He had to feel his way all the time. This was no terrain in which to suddenly find yourself in danger - but these were thoughts that he had to quell. He could feel sweat pricking the skin between his shoulder blades, and he realised then that he hadn't even loosened his tie. He smiled at that; a tiny, invisible smile, lost in so much black. Owen would have something to say about that - Ianto, going pot-holing in a three-piece suit, the creases all still in the right places and the tie still knotted to perfection. Toshiko would roll her eyes and look disapproving, offering a word of support as though she really thought that Ianto's feelings had been hurt. And Jack would smile that small, suggestive smile that he had first produced within five minutes of their first meeting, and tell anybody within earshot why he approved so highly of Ianto's dress sense. It was a strangely encouraging little scene, conjuring up a warm, bright image of the Hub in the back of his mind as he walked. He missed the Hub. The security of it; the bright lights, the comfortably cluttered look of it, the feeling of knowing where everything was, and where everything should be. The sound of the pterodactyl high up in the ceiling; the smell of coffee and pizza and encroaching damp. Jack had asked him to come, though - out into the field, where the real action was. He hadn't been out on an assignment since they had nearly got themselves eaten by a bunch of villagers in the Brecon Beacons, and it was usually so easy, almost fun, to shut down dealers in alien tech. This wasn't quite what he had had in mind, he mused, as his head connected once again with a low hanging of rock, and he stubbed his toes for the fourth time in as many minutes. There had been gunfire up ahead, he couldn't hurry, he didn't know what he was heading towards, he didn't know what else was down here, he was entirely alone - and, he now discovered, he was up to his ankles in seawater. Brilliant. This definitely wasn't what he had envisaged, when Jack had first broached the subject. In fact he seemed to remember talk of sea breezes and a comfortable hotel; definitely no pitch black caves, soggy socks and the possibility of witches. But then that was Jack all over, really. He was down here somewhere, with a job to do, and something that had needed shooting. He needed Ianto, and was expecting him to come. That in itself was enough to keep the young Welshman walking. And tightening his grip on his handgun, he tried to quicken his pace.
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