17
.
.
The diseased shriek at Jack and Ianto, but Jack throws himself Forward while yanking on Ianto's coat, letting them both fall through the flimsy balustrade.
They land hard on the lawn between the two homes. Jack gras the Webley and stands beside the window on Johnny's house. Through the window he sees Johnny barrelling down the stairs.
Jack shoots Johnny with the Webley as Ianto fires a .38 beside him, shattering the glass. Ianto UNLOADS the clip into him.
The diseased townsfolk surround Jack and Ianto, grabbing them. Johnny, using the others' eyes to see, snaps his tentacle forward, wrapping it around Jack's neck, raising him up. Johnny screeches.
Rhiannon appears at the top of the stairs, clutching her bloody side. She has the pin in one hand and the grenade in the other.
With all her remaining effort, she lobs the grenade behind Johnny.
It EXPLODES.
Johnny's exploding flesh sends Jack flying backwards.
Rhiannon is thrown back.
Ianto yelps as he tries to break free and catch his falling husband.
Around the house, the diseased's eyes gaze lifelessly upward as they each plummet to the grass.
Jack unwraps what's left of the tentacle from his bruised neck and looks around at the dead diseased. Johnny's splattered flesh is around him.
Jack hears a quiet rattling sound. He looks around him. And then sees, down at his feet, what is actually a distorted piece of Johnny's cerebellum. Sticking out of a new organic slit in the cerebellum is the quill-like spore. It quivers and trembles upward, its little bulbed spurs popping out.
Then Ianto's foot smashes down on it with open malice.
Rhiannon crawls forward to look down through the smoke: most of the second floor has been blown away. Her mutated husband is just a mass of flesh and alien organs. She heads for the back stairs. Rhiannon comes around the side of the house, holding a paper towel roll to the slice on her ribs. She sees Jack and Ianto standing there.
She smiles.
"Hey." Ianto softly touches Jack, making sure he is OK.
Jack smiles too. "Hey."
They hobble down the town center. The leather bag is slung over Jack's shoulder. Everything around them is dead: the victims who were being feasted on, as well as the various diseased. The torture is over, but no life remains.
Jack finds an abandoned Nissan Maxima in the middle of the street, with the keys still in it.
"Rhiannon, over here."
In the Maxima now, Jack and Rhiannon pull around a toppled ambulance and through a spouting fire hydrant, and out onto the main road, Owen in the back now with wide eyes as he retells the horror in the locked car.
"Then they all fell over!" Owen finishes his tirade "It was dope."
.
.
The sun is bright and beautiful, glistening on the car.
Jack and Ianto breathe more easily and smile a little as they head up this long, barren road outside the city.
.
.
They pass through a small block of stores.
Rhiannon gazes out the window to see people - real, actual, HEALTHY HUMAN BEINGS: men and women and children – going about their daily chores. Tears come to her eyes.
Owen grabs Rhiannon's hand. She clenches his tightly.
"We can probably get some first aid and food at this gas station up here." Owen points out.
"Yeah. Good" Jack agrees.
The Maxima pulls into the station and stops.
Rhiannon and Jack pile stuff up on the cashier's counter - Band-Aids, gauze, alcohol; Power Bars and Gatorade. The cashier rings it up, staring at them because of their wounds. Ianto is waiting to pay, seemingly unscathed.
"Comes to 32.87."
Jack pulls money out of his pants pocket. As he does, Rhiannon glances down. His arm pulls up his shirt, and Rhiannon can see the black and yellow wound there on his stomach. She turns away, looking around, confused.
Jack pays, smiles at the cashier.
"There you go."
A stunned Rhiannon steps with Jack out of the station, moving toward the car.
Rhiannon stops.
"Shit. I- I forgot... I wanted to get aspirin."
She starts to move back inside. Jack stops her. "I'll get it for you. Ibuprofen or aspirin?"
"Aspirin."
Jack smiles and goes back inside. Rhiannon moves quickly with the bags of stuff toward the car. She asks Ianto to help.
Jack pays for the aspirin and walks out with it.
Jack walks out; the Maxima is still there. Jack gets in the driver's seat, puts his keys into the engine. "We'll just head up here into Bishopville, get checked up in the hospital. Then maybe we'll head off to Hollywood after all, huh?"
"Okay."
Jack turns to smile at Rhiannon. She's aiming the .38 at his face. Tears are streaming down her cheeks. He notices Ianto the back seat with a look of total fear, his hands tied.
"Please, Rhiannon. Don't hurt anybody …"
"You took Jack." She sobs.
"What?"
"Your stomach!" she points.
He lifts his shirt and stares down at the bruising, then back at her with confusion "So? You know I am a diabetic. See the needle marks? Different aged bruising?"
Her hand wavers.
"Shit" she sobs finally lowering the gun "I forgot."
"It's OK Rhiannon." Ianto assures her "If he became one of those things, Jack would still love me. Remember? Like Johnny did you… the thing would learn about Jack's love for me and the love you shared with Johnny… no offence… is nothing to ours."
"Ianto's right. Seriously… gross. Eww… you are his sister. I could never… eww."
"Sorry. Long day."
Ianto sighed and then added "We left Owen behind at the gas station, didn't we."
"Fuck."
.
.
And so, we end it here. Thanks for reading.