When you were young and your heart was an open book
You used to say live and let live
But in this ever changing world in which we live in
Makes you give in and cry

Say live and let die

Paul McCartney and Wings – Live and Let Die

Countrycide: Part 2

Her head pounded and the floor beneath her was cold. There was noise like a drip next to her head and a shuffling a few meters away. Winter pushed herself up off the floor and pulled her hair back over her shoulders. The room was dark and foul smelling, her hands were coated in dirt from the floor that can't have been swept for at least a year. A groan to her side made her jump and she picked up the only weapon she could find. A poker.

Steadily she crossed the room only to find Ianto rubbing his head with one hand. She dropped the poker and pulled him up into a hug.

'Thank God you're here,' she murmured.

She helped him up and he stood blearily examining the room.

'You alright?' he asked.

'Fine, just a bit of a headache. You?'

He shrugged and glanced over at the door, 'I've been better.'

He picked his way over to the door and pulled at it while she picked up the poker she had been wielding. The door stood fast and Ianto turned around to face her. She sat down on some boxes shivering as he worked his way around the room, searching for a way out. When he came up with nothing he sat down next to her, slipped his jacket over her shoulders and picked up a thin crowbar from the side.

'It's my sister's birthday on 'Friday,' he told her, 'she's having a party, barbeque, if the weathers good.'

Winter watched him as he twirled the crowbar between his hands.

'I was going to go. It would have been the first of her parties I'd been to for seven years.'

'I'm sorry.'

It didn't seem like enough but it was all she could say.

'I was gonna invite you along,' he continued.

She looked sharply up at him.

'Thought if I could get you out of the hub for a while you might cheer up, you've been down lately.'

Looking back down at her converses she shrugged her shoulders.

'I've never done well with change.'

'Since we might die here anyway…'

She made to interrupt him but he shook his head.

'Since we might die here, I'd like you to tell me the truth.'

She bit her lip and nodded in a non committal fashion.

'Do you really think that kiss was a mistake?'

She pushed some hair back behind her ears and considered her answer. He was staring at her with that look, those big wide eyes. Oh what the hell. They would probably die anyway, like he said.

'No, I don't think it was a mistake. Not in the way I told you anyway,' she sighed. 'I have feelings for you, I know that, but I also know that after everything with Lisa... I'm not the right person to be with you. I have too much crap going on right now to expect you to deal with that and it's no secret I'm not exactly the most well-adjusted person.'

'So you're just going to make that choice for me then.'

'Yes. Because someone has to make a decision and I think I'm right.'

'So who should be 'be with me' then?' he asked.

'I can't tell you that.'

He nodded carefully. 'What about you? You said yourself you have feelings for me.'

'Oh, I'm used to being on my own, probably where I belong.'

'You don't believe that?'

'Don't I?'

'I hope not, because it's complete bullshit.'

She smiled despite the situation and lent against his arm. He slid it over her shoulders, pulling her in closer.

'I love you Ianto Jones, but I'm willing to bet someone else loves you just as much. It doesn't change how I feel but it makes me happy to know how happy they'll make you.'

'If we get out of here you mean.'

She opened her eyes and moved closer still, glancing around the room as if there was someone hiding in the shadows.

'Yes, if…'

They were silent for a while but it was all so still and quiet that soon every noise made them jump. Winter could feel the tension grow in Ianto's body and the waiting was slowly killing her.

The noise of Toshiko waking from her slumber on the floor made them both start. Ianto's voice was almost hysterical when he spoke to her, trying to lighten the mood.

'You know, I never liked camping.'

Tosh stood up and looked around getting her bearings, she checked for her side arm and looked around the room to see if it had fallen on the floor.

'Don't bother, they took the guns,' Ianto told her.

She produced a small torch from her ankle and shined it around the room giving them a better look at the situation they were in.

'Charming place they've got,' She commented.

'Judging by the sound reverberations and the air quality, pretty deep underground.'

Winter looked up from his chest and pulled the arm round her shoulders into her lap, grasping his hand hoping to bring any form of comfort she could.

'Chances of rescue?' he asked, Winter took a deep breath to prepare herself for the inevitable zero but Tosh had other ideas.

'We won't need rescuing, I haven't met a cell yet I couldn't get out of.'

Ianto nodded but neither of them believed her.

'What were they?' he asked.

Toshiko turned around from examining the walls and looked uncomfortable.

'I don't know, it happened too quickly.'

They both turned to Winter.

'All I saw was a cloak and cold looking eyes but it's too blurry to tell you anything about them. It forced me up against a wall and after that I didn't see anything.'

'You worried?' Tosh asked them both.

Winter just nodded, she didn't trust herself to answer the question without showing how utterly terrified she felt.

'A little.' Ianto replied, although his high voice and sweating palms told a different story, 'That body we saw in the forest?'

'Don't think about it,' she snapped, 'see if you can get that light to work huh.'

He looked up at the ceiling and got up to fiddle around with the light. Winter brought her knees up to her chest and closed her eyes gently rocking and imagining she was back in the hub and they were just locked in one of the weevil cells. Right now she'd take on two weevils single handedly rather than sit in the unknown down here.

'You're used to this aren't you, that facial expression, you all share, when things get a bit out of control, like you enjoy it, like you get a high from the danger.'

'You want me to apologise for that?'

'Don't you ever wonder how long you can survive before, you go mad or get killed,' he looked over at Winter and she saw the fear in his eyes, 'or lose a loved one.'

'It's worth the risk to protect people.'

'And who protects us?' Ianto shouted.

The sound reverberated off the walls and Winter only just managed to hold back the tears threatening to fall. She set her jaw and got up to stand in between the pair of them.

'That's enough, we're all scared and this, the fighting, is pointless. So stop it,' she snapped and then added, much quieter, 'please.'

They stood looking in opposite directions for a moment until Tosh broke the silence.

'God I'm hungry.'

Winter pulled a lolly she'd been saving out of her pocket and timidly held it out to Tosh. The older woman smiled but shook her head.

'You should have had that cheese burger,' Ianto joked.

'Not that hungry.'

Tosh smiled as she headed over to the other side of the room. 'What's that?'

Ianto span round and headed to meet her.

'You've found something?'

'It's just a shoe,' she replied.

Winter's heart sank and she wandered over to them, hands in pockets to stop them shaking but froze when she kicked something and looked down at it. 'There's one here too.'

Tosh shone the light over at it and swept the beam across the floor.

'There's dozens of them.'

'Oh my god,' Ianto whispered.

'How many people have been down here?' Tosh asked herself flashing the torch over the collection of shoes.

'And what happened to them?' Winter pulled Ianto's jacket on properly and zipped it over her dark green top as some sort of chill drifted over her skin.

Tosh turned the light on a large object at the other side of the room. 'A fridge?'

She picked her way over to it and grasped the side, pulling it open. The look on her face told Winter it wasn't what any of them had been hoping for. She slammed the door shut and turned around as if she didn't even want to think about what was inside.

Ianto stood up and looked at her questioningly. 'Tosh? What is it? What's in there?'

She just looked at him. He moved forward to look inside.

'Tell me!'

She tried to push him back but he forced his way through.

'I want to know.'

Winter jumped over the boxes to stand by him as he pulled the door open. The sight in front of her turned her stomach. Her knees buckled and she sat on the floor. The air rushing through her lungs, too warm, and the sounds around her distorted.

That was human flesh. Fat and muscle that had once been part of a living, breathing human. Her mind didn't need to hear what her older counterparts were discussing, it drew its own conclusions.

They were food.

TTT

She knew she was in shock but there was nothing else to wrap around herself other than the clothes on the floor and there was no way in hell she was doing that. She pulled the lolly from her pocket and shakily unwrapped it trying to get some sugar into her system. Ianto and Tosh were fussing about at the door, she wanted to join them but she couldn't bring herself to move. Suddenly there was a noise and she felt Tosh's hand on her shoulder. She bit off the rest of the sweet and threw the wrapper to the floor.

The door opened and Ianto grabbed the woman who walked in. She threw him to the floor and Winter yelled when she pointed the gun at him.

'Get off me you idiot, I'm not going to hurt you.'

Toshiko had grabbed Winter's poker and was now wielding it in the air. Winter crawled over to Ianto and pulled him off the floor. The woman held her hands up.

'You've got a gun!'

'I promise, I promise.' She looked frightened.

Toshiko tried to calm the situation a stand off would help nobody, 'Give her some space.'

They all backed off. And the lady thanked them, trying to get her breath back.

'Were you injured, when they took you?' she asked.

She reached forward for Ianto, 'Let me see, I'm a nurse.'

Winter pulled him back from her.

'Ok, ok. Does anyone else know you're here? Have you managed to call for help?'

'We don't need any more help,' Toshiko told her, 'There's three more of us in the village.'

The woman began to back off slowly.

'I can't help you. I'm sorry.'

'What do you mean?' Ianto asked.

'I've been sent to collect you.' She told them.

Winter whimpered slightly.

'I've got to take you to them.'

'Tell us what's going on,' Tosh said gently, 'we can help.'

The woman seemed to find this funny, she let out a little laugh and whispered.

'No one's safe, every ten years, it takes us again.'

'What takes you? What is it?' Tosh was growing impatient.

'The harvest,' she replied.

Ianto made a grab for her but she pushed the shot gun at his head and he backed off.

'No! please, you have to come with me.'

They looked at Tosh for a moment but when she dropped her weapon they knew she had no more clue then they did.

Slowly they walked out from the cell, the barrel of the gun pointed at their backs. Ianto wrapped an arm around Winter and she pulled her arms tightly over her chest. This was it.

They were pushed into what looked like a living room with plastic around the walls cutting them off from the other half. Toshiko turned around and begged the woman to help them but she refused and pushed them towards the plastic. They entered the cut off section and found themselves surrounded by blood covered plastic and wrapped meat, hanging from the ceiling.

'Tell us what these creatures are,' Tosh ordered, 'do they look like us?'

'How else are we gonna look?'

They span round to see a man staring at them through the plastic. He started to chuckle and the woman joined in. He pulled her towards him and kissed her hungrily. Ianto took his moment and ran for them, receiving a quick jab to the stomach as punishment.

Winter yelped and she longed to go to him but she felt paralysed by fear. The man grabbed some handcuffs and snapped them around Ianto's wrists at his back.

'There are three more out there,' Toshiko warned but he growled under his breath.

'Not a problem,' then he looked to the woman, 'how are they?'

'They're in a good state,' she told him, keeping the gun trained on Toshiko. He knocked her to the floor and began to tie up her hands. 'I think they're the best we've ever had.'

'Oh I forgot to tell you,' he said 'Caught the boy finally. Come on.'

He heaved a young lad off the floor. The boy struggled and begged but the man only responded to Toshiko's question of the boy's identity.

'He's meat,' he told them. 'I'm afraid we're all just meat.'

The woman placed the gun on the side and picked up some twine, tying it tightly around Winter's wrists. She saw Ianto lean over and say something to Toshiko but she couldn't hear the words. The woman tied the knot and forced her to the floor before following her husband out of the room. The older Torchwood members stood up and faced the man.

'What are you gonna do? Put us on meat hooks?' Tosh asked.

He looked at her carefully.

'No, not yet, you see meat, has to be tenderised, first.'

He ran a baseball bat over Tosh as if stroking her. Then he turned to face Ianto who smiled and then suddenly head butted him to the floor. The man punched Ianto and threw him to the floor grabbing a knife and turning to the woman.

'Leave her to me, put the other on the slow drain.'

Then he ran out of the room after Toshiko. The woman nodded and turned to look at Winter, smiling.

She pulled a sheet of plastic off a long wooden table at the back and grabbed Winter by the hair.

'Such pretty eyes,' the woman told her as she forced her to the table. 'Never had one like you before.'

She took out a knife and cut the bindings on Winter's wrists. She tried to push the woman away and run to Ianto but she grabbed the discarded bat and brought it crashing down onto Winter's back and then her head. The world spun and Winter felt nauseous as the, deceptively strong woman heaved her up onto the grey table and wrapped more string around her hands to restrain her to the table.

She heard Ianto groaning in the background and thanked the universe he was alright, for now. She whimpered at the sudden feel of a knife to her neck. The woman wrapped her filthy arm around Winter's head, to keep her still, she smelt of sweat and blood and it brought another wave of nausea.

A strangled cry left Winter's throat as the knife pierced her skin and she tried to kick the woman away but she held fast, licking her lips as blood seeped out of the careful cut. She reached up for a length of plastic tubing and, with a satisfied noise, she pushed it into the wound causing Winter to squirm. There was a bucket on a bench at her right and she grabbed it and placed it on the floor, taping the tube in place.

Winter knew what this was, she'd seen Owen do it to corpse in the morgue. Part of the embalming process was to drain the blood from the body. Ordinarily it required a pump but her heart was doing the job for them. She tried to struggle but the bonds were tight and the tube wasn't going anywhere. This was the part where she hoped for rescue and made her peace with every deity she could think of.

TTT

When the door burst open Winter was attempting to keep her heart beat at a slow, steady rate. She figured the faster it beat the faster her blood flowed from her body and the less time she would have to be rescued.

Unfortunately the sound of Owen and Gwen cursing was not what she wanted to hear. It meant they had been captured too and that left only Jack and Tosh out there to find them. A few tears slipped horizontally down her face and into her hairline. She felt sick and tired, very tired, and she didn't want it to end like this.

'Fucking hell! What the hell are you doing to her!'

She heard Owen yell at them. A slight burst of adrenaline allowed her to carefully move her index finger to prove she was still alive but she knew it wouldn't offer much comfort at all.

'Meat has to be drained.'

She felt a calloused hand brush over her cheeks and then hold her eyes open. She stared into the cold grey eyes for the second time and her heart beat involuntarily sped up. He grinned and left her to deal with the others.

'Who are these people.' That was Toshiko, so she was here too. That meant there was even less chance of help.

'This is our village.'

'The villagers are dead,' Gwen yelled.

Someone laughed.

'No,' Toshiko corrected. 'They're all involved, they've all been doing it.'

'This is our harvest,' the man confirmed.

'Only in the bloody countryside, you sick fuckers.'

Winter actually laughed at this comment, it came out as a slightly hysterical sob but something about Owen's comment calmed her a little. His harsh humour broke the feeling of segregation from the rest of the world. Suddenly it was just another day at Torchwood. Just another day where she was strapped to a table being drained of her blood.

There was a sound of scuffling and she heard Toshiko yell out for Ianto. Yes, yes! Where was Ianto she hadn't heard from him since she had been tied to the table but she had been too afraid to ask.

'Oh, wake up man.'

She heard a slap and a groan that she knew was Ianto. She let out a breath she hadn't realised he was holding, thankful that he was alive and, from the direction of the noises, just in front of her.

'Time to be bled.'

The man told them. 'I haven't got another table so we'll have to do this the old fashioned way, like veal, it takes a long time but it defiantly makes the meat taste better.'

Then the room began to shake. She could feel the vibrations through the table. There was an almighty crash and she felt shards of rock bounce off her body. There was a roar that rang throughout the room and several gunshots and then she heard the most wonderful sound in the world.

'Oh really?!' Jack's voice broke through the horror of the moment like her sword through silk.

'No Jack! Don't do it!' Gwen cried.

'These people don't deserve warnings!' he replied.

'Let me question him,' she asked. 'I want to understand, I have to know why, otherwise this, this is too much.'

Winter felt hands on her body and the tubing was carefully pulled out of her neck and replaced by a cloth. Hands wiping over her face and slapping it gently.

'Come on love. Fuck, that's a lot of blood. Come on Winter. Open those damn eyes.'

She squinted through blood and tears to see Owen undoing the bindings.

'Okay, okay, good. Don't sit up, you've lost a lot of blood.'

Her body lurched a little and he rolled her towards him rubbing her back as she dry heaved.

'You're alright,' he murmured.

'They're injured they need to get to the hospital,' Toshiko called.

'I say we leave them here, let them bleed to death, see how they like it.' Ianto said, blankly, pulling himself to his feet and helping Owen keep pressure on Winter's neck.

'Owen you control the bleeding then phone the police.' Gwen told him.

He glanced down at Winter who was now shaking violently then looked up at Ianto who nodded and took over propping her up on her side. They spoke again but it was too low for Winter to hear.

Suddenly Jack was by her head, his face stony. He looked down to the floor, presumably at the bucket of blood and something akin to dark panic passed across his eyes. He pulled the towel away from her neck and pulled out a clean handkerchief, pushing it gently onto the wound. Ianto found some tape on the sideboard to hold it in place.

Her eyes kept sliding shut, she still felt sick and lethargic but every time Ianto squeezed her hand and she opened her eyes to the nightmare again. Together both men manoeuvred her off the table and into Jack's arms and carried her outside. Ianto limping along by his side, occasionally clinging to his arm for support.

Slowly they left the house and he sat them down on the side of the grass telling her to wait for the ambulance so they could both be checked out. He slid his coat off and draped it over Winter, tucking it around her.

Ianto had walked as much as he could and lay down next to her. She clumsily reached out and gently stroked his hair and cheek with her right hand. Tears escaped her and discolouring the patches of blood on her face, dripping into her eyes and making them sting.

Without thinking she pulled him a little closer and pressed her lips against his. When he pulled back his eyes were open and he looked at her like a child looks at the moon.

'Thought you said you'd have to make do without me,' he croaked.

She couldn't face talking. Instead she just shook her head and gazed into his face until the police arrived.

TTT

The journey back was long but no one really noticed. Jack drove, with Tosh in the front passenger seat staring out of her window. Winter had refused to be locked up in the dark of the boot alone and Owen was clearly still worried about her condition, so Ianto volunteered to sit with her. He climbed into the boot and pulled her head into his lap, stoking his fingers through her hair, softly combing out the blood.

Owen piled the broken tents, rescued from the campsite into the central seat between himself and Gwen. They all hardly moving until they were back in the city.

When they pulled up in the Hub they hardly noticed. Only When Jack opened the door to the boot and gently picked her up did she move to put her arms around his neck and let herself be carried down to the med bay.

Later, newly stitched and supporting a rolling drip, she found herself sat around the conference table between Jack and Ianto.

Everyone was gazing in different directions. Jack sat at the head of the table, his hand on his mouth as if he was trying to think of what to say. Pip had crept in and, sensing the tension, had chosen to curl into her lap like a warm, furry pillow.

'What we saw today…' Jack began, 'I can't even begin to explain. That village showcased the absolute worst humans can be. You've all suffered from your exposure to that level of evil. I want you to know that I'm here. If you need to talk about what you saw and you don't feel you wish to with each other, then my door is always open.'

He took a deep breath and looked around the table. 'I won't tell you where to go now. I know that for some of you, home is the last place you would want to be after something like this so you are welcome to stay here at the hub. There's no work tomorrow. Take a day off. Watch TV, go shopping. Remind yourself of how brilliant humans can be. How, normal, they can be. The back to work next day.'

Everyone nodded and Jack got up and left for his office, his hand sliding across Winter;s shoulder in support as he went, leaving the room in silence. Ianto leant across the divide and into Winter's . She leaned against his side and Pip uncurled himself to reach up and grab hold of their hands, gently running his tiny fingers across them.

Tosh excused herself and Owen and Gwen got up from the table. He offered her a lift home and she nodded distractedly. Winter looked up and saw him take a long look at the deserted hub and the pair of them sat with the monkey. He shook his head and let Gwen leave before him turning around to mutter one sentence.

…

'Only in the bloody country.'

…

[Sonotalady: I know what you mean this one really scared me when I came out but that's defiantly what makes it such a good episode. Just the right amount of gore and shock with a bit of psychological fear in there. I went to Wales with my family on holiday and refused to go walking in the in Brecon. Wouldn't tell them why though I did say I'd go if they let me take the sword hanging on the cottage wall.]