Chap 2
"Rookies, use your breathers." Lisa commands as she walks away from the ship, her coat flaring out in the Mars wind, "We're not going to have air like Earth for 10 more years."
"Let's go." Ianto prompts the rookies to follow their leader.
"God, I hate this thing." Tosh sighs, grimacing as she takes a breath from the asthma inhaler style breather.
"You'll get used to it." Ianto assures her kindly, "Two years ago we were still wearing full-face breathers."
"Takes about a month to get over the headaches out here." John whines as he shakes his own. "Huh. So this is Shining Cardiff?"
"God, what a dump." Owen scoffs.
"First time in the boonies, eh, rookie?" Lisa laughs as she looks back over her shoulder to make sure they are following.
"Standard layout." John swaggers as only he can as he leers at Sato, "Just another shitty boomtown like all the others. Seen one, you can go home."
"You're always cold, you can't get a decent shower and they don't tell you a one-year contract here
equals two years Earth time." Ianto says in warning and John laughs.
"Gotta read the fine print."
John frowned and looked at the red dust covered buildings that were, in fact old ships that had landed after their final flight, never to lift off again "Where is everybody?"
"Yeah. Friday night," Lisa said, slowing her walk as she scanned, "the place should be packed. I mean, a whole 12 hours before sunup and there's money to burn, whores to fuck and drugs to take. Instead we got a graveyard."
"Maybe they're all inside spending their money." Tosh suggests.
"Me, I'm gonna get us squared away at the RecFac." Lisa said, turning to walk backwards as she addresses Ianto, "You and Sergeant Hart check in at the jail."
"Save some hot water for me." Ianto calls as he watches them wander off.
"Where were you before Cardiff?" Ianto asks John as they walk together towards the holding house, "Utopia. It was the arse end of the universe. A penal camp full of work-amnesty cutthroats."
"Sounds nasty." Ianto screwed up his nose in a way John found quite endearing, "I heard they were turning into cannibals. But you seem to be holding together all right."
"What you see is nothing." John leers with a wink and Ianto snorts, "I have numerous hidden talents."
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"Need some help with that?"
"You're persistent, aren't you?" Ianto huffed as he looked up at John from the security pad he was scrutinising.
"I've changed a few minds in my time. Not many of us breeders around. I'd hate to miss a chance to give it a go." John has noticed the way Ianto's trousers hug his butt and the tell-tale scent of a breeder in heat. "What do you say?"
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Once the outer door was open, Ianto strode in with John following appreciatively after, still scenting the air like a fine perfume was wafting just for him.
"Hello." Ianto calls out with confusion at the front desk, the place seems abandoned, "Anybody here?"
"Officer to front desk. I repeat, officer to front desk" John drawls over the PA system.
"Well, hello, Mr. Harkness." Ianto smiles as the CCTV shows a handsome man sitting patiently in a cell.
"No one's seems to be about." John leans in to look at the screen and covertly sniff "What do you make of it?"
"I don't know." Ianto feels a finger of dread shimmying up his backbone and he frowns.
"You want me to pop the lock and oust the prisoners?"
"What do you mean, pop the lock"?" Ianto asks incredulously, "It's a level-eight security door."
"I got a mystical way with locks and mechanical objects." John boasts with a wink, "There isn't a machine on Mars that doesn't love me."
"How about we check with the commander first?" Ianto stalls, still feeling something … odd.
"So, what do you do for fun, then?" John asks as they wander back outside to wait for the others, "Are you a gambler?"
"No, I'm short-time, sergeant." Ianto turns to face him as the wind picks up, "I believe in
saving my money. Wanna breed someday."
"Don't worry about that." John says condescendingly patting Ianto's butt, "I was gonna do it for free."
"Let me put it this way." Ianto says slowly as he steps away, "Maybe I'd sleep with you if you were the last man on Earth.
Ianto scans the vast nothingness then throw out, "But we're not on Earth."
"Oh, lover. Harsh" John chortles enjoying the banter. The lights flicker and Ianto turns to him showing uneasiness, "It's a voltage overload, most likely. You wanna check it out?"
"It's probably nothing. But, on second thought..." Ianto raises his weapon and steps out from the awning into the street, "Police officer. Anybody there?"
"This is not making me happy." John mutters as his lust is shunned, yet again.
"All right." Ianto slowly turns toward the location Lisa and the others had headed, "It's time to get backup."
"Jesus Christ. What are you doing?" John screams as a figure leaps from the side of the building and reveals itself to be Owen, "I almost killed you."
"What's going on?" Ianto demanded as he lowered his weapon.
"RecFac's a slaughterhouse."