Jack never truly knew how he would react when he sparked back to life, sometimes it was a long lazy float back to the world and felt like coming out of a daydream and sometimes he was blasted from a furnace with little of no control over what happened to him. This was one of the latter times which probably save Gwens life, the guy had his hands round her cheeks and she started to scream as his mouth opened wide to show what looked like the mouthpiece of a leach extending towards her face. Jack shouted and the rows and rows of teeth snapped back in his throat as he turned to face him, with difficulty Jack was getting back on his feet. The attackers stopped immediately and looked at each other, the one who sounded like a child in an adults body was clapping his hands like a loon.
"We don't need the woman, we can go home now, can we, I want to go home, can I be this one?" he said jumping up and down next to Tosh. The one acting as a ring leader circled warily round always looking Jack up and down.
"Well haven't we hit the jackpot here, two bodies that should get us home and three fresh young bodies for our son."
"What do you want?" snarled Jack trying to stare out the man speaking behind the women
"You." He said simply walking round him
"Why?" he said stalling for time "Who are you, perhaps we can come to some arrangement, help you get home?"
The gurgling laugh came again as the child like one lay down next to Tosh cuddling her like some life size doll.
"All will be clear soon, you will know everything that we know and we will know all you know." He moved again the rows of needle like teeth advancing out of his mouth, the other two seemed to take this as their cue to do the same thing.
Jenny heard the scream and the general shouting and gave up on the creeping along the metal balcony. She knew she was headed right to the end by the infrared view she had left downstairs so she ran till she was at the hinge side of the door and took a deep breath. Using her shoulder she slammed open the door and shouted.
"Put down any weapons or I swear to God I shoot first and ask questions later."
She quickly assessed the situation, three adult males, one rolling round on the floor scrabbling away from Tosh who was screaming fit to shatter glass, one crouching over Gwen with rows of teeth millimetres away from her face and one close to Jack with the same mouth piece extending close to his head. Her brain processed all the options in the nano second the shock entrance had gained her, this was a bad situation. If her reading of the room was correct these things weren't human anymore, the shell of the body contained a parasitic alien that entered the host and entered their brain sucking out all their knowledge, providing food and sustenance till the alien had taken everything it wanted leaving nothing but the lowest functions, the host would begin to show symptoms of dementia and the alien would seek a new refuge leaving nothing but a slobbering drooling mess. Gwarks, nasty little brutes, she thought they had been driven off the planet in her time but perhaps they were back and it seemed like they needed new bodies.
She computed the options, if she was lucky she would be able to kill two of the hosts but the regurgitated alien bodies would still be dangerous and past experience told her there was no cure once they got under your skin and boy could they move when they were threatened. With four of the team on the floor they were all sitting targets and she couldn't see how she could manage all of them.
"Baggsey mine" shouted the one next to Tosh and launched forward with surprising ease and her decision was made. With her left hand she reached round her waist band and pulled out the spare weapon and then threw it across the floor shouting Owens name.
"Above Gwen." She shouted as the gun skittered inches away from his hand and the apparently dead body suddenly revived cocking the gun and twisting his body to face Gwen, he loosed off a shot and winged the shoulder of the advancing body, adjusted his aim and blasted off three more rounds to the chest. Jenny turned slightly and saw the man that had been a simpering wreck less than three seconds before flying through midair straight at her the mouth piece extending. She had no time to aim but the explosive projectile smashed into the top of his skull taking bone and grey matter and plastering it liberally across the wall and floor.
"Destroy the parasite, do not let it touch you." She screamed emptying another four or five rounds into the body and then letting rip on the white maggoty creature until you could see day light through the floor where the bullets had gone though. It had ended up inches from Iantos head and the slime that had enveloped it was running onto the floor below. Owen followed her lead, Gwen was screaming hysterically trying to get away from the noise and acidic residue, the movement tightening the restraints even further against Toshs arms and legs. He stood legs slightly apart for balance, arms locked straight, both hands steadying the gun and his back to Jack. Sure the thing was no longer alive he went to go to Gwen, who had somehow managed to get both of them into a kneeling position away from the slime. There was a strangled noise behind him and he spun on the spot, his balance slightly affected by the length of time he had been immobile on the floor, and saw the rows of teeth sinking into Jack who seemed to be bending backwards under the weight.
"Oh no you don't" he shouted and went for the head shot.
The back of it's head exploded and it fell backwards the mouth piece still extended but it was obviously starting to shrivel. Jack's face was awash with blood where the pointed teeth had ripped at flesh, Jenny looked at him and then at Owen who seemed flush with the success of beating the final foe.
"Jack?" she asked quiet and questioningly, the pistol still held in a combative stance.
Owen flicked the safety on his own weapon and turned to Gwen grinning with his normal lopsided smugness. If she could have kicked her heels in frustration at not being in the fight she would have.
"He'll survive darling." Said Owen over his shoulder.
Jack was taking shallow, tight breaths as he rolled completely onto his back, his eyes misted by blood seeking her face.
"Jack?" she repeated
"Too. late. Do. it." He said heavily spitting blood
"Sorry." She said quietly as she raised the gun again
Gwen screamed and tried to lash out as the only other person could see what was about the happen.
Three shots rang out with the unmistakable sound of air whoshing out of a punctured lung and the horrific splintering of the thicker bone of skull as she shot Jack with clinical precision. Owen turned round too late to see the killer shots but caught the unmistakable view of the alien maggot regurgitating out of Jack's mouth and flopping onto the floor, it seemed to sniff the air and then started to move towards Tosh and Gwen at something approaching light speed. Jenny and Owen both turned their guns on the lump, obliterating it in an instant.
Gwen was screaming and shouting any obscenity she could think of in English and Welsh pulling and yanking at the binds round her wrists and ankles, her gaze fixed on the broken body of Jack. His face was difficult to describe from the injuries and the pool of blood from his chest had mixed with the previous pool to form a vast red lake. Tosh was shouting to Gwen about the pain she was causing her but Gwen was in a different place all together, she looked up at Jenny her face a mask of pure hate.
"What the fuck did you do that for?" the spit flew out of her mouth
For what seemed like an eternity Jenny stared back her eyes unfocused, but then like some cheap B Movie effect the world seemed to wrap round her then ping back into shape. She flicked the gun safety and did a quick scan of the room.
"Owen calm her down. Gwen get over yourself he'll live, Tosh hang on Owen's going to get you out and I'll take Ianto."
Owen advanced on the still shouting Gwen and took her roughly by the shoulders
"Don't make me slap you." He said with less than an inch of air between them. She snorted like a bolting colt and then deflated like a balloon as quickly as she had blow up.
"That's twice in less than five minutes Owen, remember when that last happened?" She said through a mass of tears that welled up from nowhere.
"Yep he'll be like a bear with a sore head and yelling for coffee from the café because Ianto isn't around. Now lie back down while I try and figure out how to get these things off."
"No I want to be with him when he wakes up, he needs someone there." She started to try walking on her knees but Tosh pulled sharply with her hands eliciting a sharp gasp from Gwen.
"I think they've broken my ankle and you're hurting me." She said through clenched teeth.
Gwen mumbled some sort of empty apology and let Owen help them both into a prone position, moving slightly gaining another whimper from Tosh so she could see Jack.
Jenny dropped onto her knees beside Ianto and felt for his carotid pulse, it was difficult to get to as he had been thrown facing the wall and his head was flexed downwards. She put her other hand on his chest and was rewarded with a slight fluttery movement of air and finally managed to get a weak and thready pulse. She shouted loudly in his ear and then pinched his ear lobe while trying to move his head gently back to open his airway.
"GCS is about eight" she shouted over her shoulder and then cursed when she realised the way his hands were tied behind his back was stopping her rolling him onto his back.
"Med kit" said Owen throwing his bag across the room as he started the gory task of trying to find some sort of key. He threw a glance at Jack who was sheet white and obviously not breathing, twice in that sort of time wasn't good for him and it could take him some time to come back round, God but he hoped it was soon because he didn't want to be the one to explain this one to Ianto.
"Is he going to be alright?" asked Toshiko in a small voice.
"I hope so." Said Jenny ripping open the back pack. "Knife?" she barked running her hand over the objects in the med kit trying to familiarise herself in record time.
"Ianto always has a Leatherman on his belt." Said Tosh quietly.
Jenny ran her fingers round his waist and found the pouch, she lifted his jacket, noted the trickle of blood and pulled out the cutting tool on the implement slicing through the stiff plastic causing his body to sag back slightly. She rolled him onto his back with infinite care and hissed when she saw the burgeoning bruise on his temple.
"What happened?" she asked to the room at large.
"You fucking shot him and now he's dead. Again" Shouted Gwen. Tosh pulled on the restraints again,
"She means to Ianto." Gwen fell silent again. "He head butted one of them, this one I think," she inclined her head to the human shell near her. "Then the thing punched him and hit him with his gun and I think kicked him as well." She sounded slightly sick
"Hang in there Tosh with two brilliant medics in the team we can sort this one in minutes can't we girl?" said Owen as he finally flourished an odd looking box from the bloody trousers of the ring leader. He turned it over in his fingers as Tosh nodded weakly, it was the same shiny metal as the restraints and had one thin side shaped like a curve, not a conventional key, but they were conventional cuffs.
"Pupils equal and reactive." Shouted Jenny, years of training and work had sent her into practitioner mode, she was telling her none existent trauma team what she had found, but countless injuries had taught the team the same script. She moved down his body and loosened the tie, flicked open the waistcoat and loosened the belt and waist band to let him breathe a little easier. She pulled up the shirt and winced when she saw the massive boot prints on his front and back, explain that at A&E.
Satisfied that there wasn't any discernibly life threatening internal bleeding she grabbed some oxygen and she tried to rouse him again, without much success. Owen looked over and satisfied himself that someone else could do his job at least as well as him and watched as she took the penknife and stabbed it into the plasterboard so she had a place to hang the IV from. Mental note to self, never get on her wrong side in the kitchen.
"Try holding it against the metal." Said Tosh trying to get his attention, the pain in her ankle was becoming unbearable. Owen grunted and tried to find some sort of central point, finding nothing he ran the box up and down the metal work, he looked at Tosh and realised she was sheet white.
"You all right Tosh?" asked Owen in an outwardly unconcerned manner garnered over many years of practice. Inwardly he was reciting every swear word he knew trying to break his own record for none repetition.
"I will be once you get me out of these." She said quietly "Hurry." She whispered.
Owen doubled his efforts to release the bonds, he moved the box up the metal work that held Tosh and was rewarded with a satisfying click, the tendrils started to uncurl and wound back. She pulled her arms back into a more natural position then let out an involuntary howl of pain when she moved her leg. With slightly shaky hands he tried to release Gwen, murmuring to Tosh to hold on, but couldn't find the right place again. He would have given up if Gwen hadn't been threatening to kill him but when he shouted back for her to stay still before he gave her a sedative he found the right place, it seemed the victim needed to be calm as well as having the key. Even before the cuffs had fully retracted Gwen was scrabbling across the floor on her hands and knees to Jack slipping on the dead leg the strange position had given her. Jenny looked over her shoulder at the noise and saw Gwen rocking slightly over Jacks broken body, gently pushing a strand of hair back into place on his mangled and bloodied forehead. He really was a mess, the circle of teeth had torn the flesh of his face and neck and her final shot had been through the right temple. Gwen looked up and caught her eye,
"What the Fuck were you thinking? Three fucking times, once would have done but no you had to shoot him in three fucking places, it doesn't make him any more dead you know." Her face was a mask of pure hate, her hands ghosted over the marks on his chest, Jenny had seen the same thing happen with grieving widows, it was very full on.
Owen scooted over to the open medical bag and pulled out one of two vials before settling on the right pain killer for Tosh,
"Need a hand?" he asked quietly looking at Ianto
"When you have a second, a friendly voice in his ear." She said pulling out an emergency blanket, "I take it we don't need to call 999?" Owen shook his head took another look at Ianto,
"Nah, we can cope with most things."
Jenny went back to Ianto, she needed to be sure she hadn't missed anything, she started picking over every millimetre of his body realising how much she had taken to using technology over the last 13 years. She looked over her shoulder, edgy about the fact she knew Gwen still had her personal sidearm, but she shouldn't have worried she was too wrapped up in Jack to worry about the world around her. Jenny reached over and pulled a few more items out of the bag, shuttling them across to Gwen,
"This might help." She said kindly, trying to breakdown the barbed wire that was being laid in coils around her.
Gwen looked at the objects on the floor as if they were radioactive before realising that gauze and saline pods weren't harmful, with shaking hands she snapped the top of the plastic vial and wet a square of gauze to gently wipe away the blood from his face.
"I don't think it's broken" Owen said to Tosh, the dose of morphine was taking effect and she no longer cared if it was even attached. The scientist in her wanted to know what was going on and she was already trying to get samples out of what was left of the maggots, Owen tried to stop her but realised this was the only way she could cope with what she had seen, humans turning into face eating monsters. He strapped up her ankle as best he could while she twisted around and gave up trying to help her while there were better things he could be doing. Moving back to the drama in the corner he quickly cast a glance over at Jack, wishing he hadn't as he saw the bullet casing eject from Jacks waxy skin. He knelt next to Ianto and felt the growing lump on Iantos forehead, it was at least ten minutes since he had been struck and in medical terms it wasn't looking exactly brilliant.
"If you don't wake up soon I swear I will post that CCTV footage on Youtube." He said loudly into Iantos ear. Nothing. He used his favourite trick of sternum pressure with no response. Now Owen was worried.
Jenny reached up and squeezed the fluid bag hard to try and help his blood pressure, sometimes you just had to wait it out.
"Trust Jack to wipe out just when we need him." Muttered Owen under his breath, Gwen gave him a look that would kill a second time but she kept on obsessively wiping every last speck of blood away from his face. Owen checked his watch and was about to suggest another option when he heard Ianto mumble slightly. He jumped on the movement and used all his medical wiles to drag him back to the real world.
Ianto felt like his head had been used for a rather violent game of all in rugby, and the mud from the pitch had clogged in his ears giving everything a tinny, swoshy sound. He could feel the light pricking his eyes as his body pulled itself back into reality, every step closer brought some new pain in a different part of his body. The only functioning part of his brain decided that it was all a bit too much and he could feel himself giving into the darkness again.
"Oh no you bloody don't, Jones open your eyes now or so help me god I will feed the Weevils on Vindaloo for a week."
Owens voice ground through the layers, Ianto felt like he was being dragged by a rope round his middle, oh god the pain in his abdomen was like knives. Breathe, his subconscious told him to concentrate on getting cool air across the flaming barrier around his chest. Another layer peeled off and he tried to gulp in air only to find something across his face, ever since the Brecons his nightmares included heavy Hessian across his mouth. Instinctively he brought his hands up to try and pull away whatever was on his face they were tangled in something held down by some giant squid.
"Ianto it's just some oxygen to help you breathe easier" He could feel hands holding his arms, the tell tale crinkle of the space blanket, in his head he was really struggling but all he could feel was a woman's feather light touch.
"Where does it hurt Ianto?" That was Owen, an anchor in the soup of his brain.
"Everywhere" he replied
There was a slight pause and he felt hands roaming over his body.
"Try again Ianto, a known language would help." Jesus but Owen could be annoying even when you were trying to stay unconscious.
"Open your eyes Ianto." A direct order, from a woman, not Gwen or Tosh, a heartbeat while his brain caught up, the new one. He tried to comply, a millimetre and the light stung his retinas like a million nettles, he clamped his eyelids shut to find them being forced open a bright light obscuring any view of the world.
"Ianto, pain, where?" Owens fall back when stressed was to become snappy, he must be stressed now.
"Everywhere." This time he knew Owen had heard him, he had lifted away the oxygen mask and was so close to his lips he could feel the cool air that hung around him these days. He heard a murmured exchange between Owen on one side and the Jenny woman on the other, he tried to curl up to release the tension across his stomach but he felt gentle hands keeping him flat then less gentle hands lifting his knees and shoving something underneath to ease the tension that way. He marvelled that the one thing his brain could pick out was the fact that it felt like leather, Owen had given up his precious jacket to help him.
A few more words were exchanged over him,
"What happened?" he asked breathily. He could remember getting out of the SUV and the poor Yucca, after that nada.
"The usual, evil murderous alien and you got in the way." Said Owen "Pain?"
Ianto groaned and tried roll on to his side again,
"Back." He thought again "Front." As he rotated his mashed temple came in contact with the floor and it felt like someone had laid into his skull with a poker again. The pain was so intense his stomach clenched and he saw stars, he was seeing stars he thought with the very small part of rationality left. The muscle contraction in his midriff stopped his breath, it was like every student hangover ever, he tried to push himself into a sitting position but he was too weak to hold himself up. Scrabbling round for purchase he grabbed onto the arm that was trying to help him, he clung to it like a drowning man would a log in a river.
"I'm going to be sick." He muttered between clenched teeth
The arm was trying to lie him down again but he fought against it, as things went at the moment the semi-prone position was marginally more comfortable than lying flat on unforgiving floor.
"Ok, it's ok Ianto try and calm down you aren't helping yourself, give me back my arm and I can help you." Jenny had a soothing tone, much better than Owen a bit like Jack really. Jack, Ianto couldn't remember hearing his masterful tone barking orders and he started fretting again. Outside his own personal bubble he could hear Jenny and Owen discussing him like a lab rat but he was beyond caring.
"Ianto we're going to sit you up, I'm going to sit behind you so you can rest easy, Ianto try and breathe normally before you pass out again." He looked like a bunny in the headlights as Owen and Jenny moved round and helped him rest back against her warm, soft flesh, Owen held a syringe and flashed a quick grin at him before adding it to the port in his hand. It felt cold going in and he could imagine it moving round his body, he felt more relaxed his head dropped back a little onto her collar bone.
"Hey don't get too comfortable I'm not a chair." She said jokingly "I don't do this for all my patients you know."
Owen was back again with his bloody light.
"Where's Jack?"
"Busy mate, otherwise engaged." Replied Owen quick as a flash. "How you doing Tosh?"
"I've no idea what these things were, they don't fit with anything on our database."
"Look around 1954, near earth parasites, sometimes when we thought we had wiped them out we wouldn't bother recording anything, might be under G. Unless we had some technology of note from them it didn't seem worth the time to fill in the paperwork."
Tosh nodded, with the extra information she would be able to narrow down the search, she lent back against the wall gritting her teeth and looked at Jack, shuddering. Gwen had cleaned away most of the blood but some of the ripped flesh still hadn't healed, including a particularly nasty looking tear around his left eye. Gwen had pulled him onto her knee and was now bent over him crying, Tosh checked the chronometer on her handheld, Jack had been down for nearly eight minutes now, that was a long time for him.
"Gwen we need to tidy up in here, get the bodies down to the SUV." Owen was quiet, normally by now she had dealt with the human casualties, given them a name worked out how long they had been missing and thought of a plausible cover story. She was much better at back stories than any of the others, that was the reason Jack employed her. Gwen just shook her head. Owen knew he wasn't going to move her so he went behind her and whispered in her ear.
"Just try and keep him quiet when it happens, Ianto doesn't need the stress."
Gwen nodded and moved a hand close to his mouth, she didn't like doing it but she thought Jack would understand.