41
The interior was dark, silent and ominous.
"Lights" Owen muttered, "Toshi love, any lights?"
"It's dead love. I can't' make it do anything" came the rely over their coms and Owen sighed. "I know, you hate the dark. Come on, it's completely safe. Jack is there, right? Along with his little passenger? Would Ianto let Jack tag along when preggers if there was any danger? And Ianto is the pessimist right?"
"Come here" Ianto said, kneeling beside a bag he had been carrying and Owen started to giggle as Ianto rose with what looked like a vest, "Here. Put it on."
"When did you have the time to even make this" Owen giggled uncontrollably as Ianto started to reach for things and make a cracking noise, the little, long lights coming on showing that they were Fluro light sticks that were usually used by teenagers at raves.
"I found a whole heap of them under Alice's bed and in the trash. I knew the last disco at the school had been a nightclub theme, so these were left over. Typical child, she was discarding the rest. I was going to give it to you on Halloween but… well… there you go ya weird man, you."
Owen stood there with his arms out, twirling like it was a catwalk runway or something, the twenty or thirty little sticks throwing off green shards of light.
"OK… it's official. I like him" John said as he adjusted his own backpack "Where now?"
"Jack?"
"We need to get to the bridge. There we can retrieve the black box and get back off this thing, lock it back down and then see what data can be uploaded to another device." Jack said confidently, Toshiko already having told him that was the best idea.
"I am scanning… still no signs of life" Andy said softly, checking his gauges "I don't like this."
"Right. We seal this hatch in case there is something on here we are not picking up. We do not want it getting out, we place sensors and remote cameras here by the exit as well, Toshiko to watch in case someone or something flanks us." John said as he crouched to do so, "We will place sensors and cameras as we go, anything moves that is not us, we will know. But we would have flushed anything already with all your whinging."
"Seems prudent."
They moved slowly, clumped together and with purpose, Jack and John both holding weapons with safeties off, despite scoffing at Ianto both of them secretly thought of the Nostromo and the Ripley Reports. Jack had warned John not to say anything or Ianto would bench him.
"Stop" Ianor hissed, pausing to cant his head "Was that… was that something?"
"Tosh?" Owen hissed.
"Nothing." She replied "Likely the hull still settling after the impact damaged her structural integrity."
They continued, entering the bridge to find chaos, damage and bodies.
"Oh damn… they all fired on one another?" John stood looking around as Jack crouched to check the bodies. Ianto headed for where the box would be.
"It looks like… from the angle of their falls… the shots all came from about here.. by the captain's chair. He fired on them all?" Jack frowned; it didn't make sense.
"But there are no captain's pips here on the bridge. Where is he?" John demanded looking at the bodies "Fuck… he killed his crew and then… what…bolted?"
"Bolted. Bolthole" Jack muttered, looking at a door "Is he in there? Captain's Ready Room?"
"Awwww, do we have to open the door?" Owen whined.
"Owen, come help me get this box out" Ianto said, stepping back to let Owner into the space, then stepping between him and the door as his hands rose slightly in a 'stay back' motion.
"Ianto, how much strength have you got left if you need to repel something?" Jack asked.
"No much, but I only have to do it until you fire… right?" Ianto's eyes slid to him and Jack grinned back. "Jack? Can Johnty take point please?"
"Sorry love, my wristlet has the override code" Jack sighed "But I will step to one side and let John have the space."
"OK… open it" Ianto said, crouching more as Owen muttered to himself, not even aware of the conversation overhead.
Jack opened the door and froze in the doorway, slowly backing out as Ianto's stance changed from crouched to straight backed, the shock and horror in the bond telling him that there was no threat… but that Jack recognized something.
"Cariad?"
"I know him" came the flat reply, "Oh my god. He killed his entire crew… then himself. Christ, even his own daughter there by your feet… I … I don't know what to say now."
Ianto looked down at the young woman in her early twenties at the most, her face serene as she stared back up at him like one of Mica's dolls, her eyes sightless.
"Alex Hopkins… he was one of my trainers at the academy. He wanted me on his team but… I was too loose and breezy to settle for a regimented life" Jack sighed.
"Shit a brick, I remember him. He had the best shooting scores in the academy when we started training." John said behind him "You broke his record."
"Space sickness?" Owen asked, now standing there looking into the room at the slumped body and the viscera on the far wall that told of a head shot, Ianto the one who had taken his place to finally slide the box out easily, like it had been able to be slid the entire time, those screws and such Owen was loosening had nothing to do with it.
"Come on… it gives me the heebie-jeebies" Ianto said softly, his shudder going through everyone present.
"Ianto's right. There is no life here. We need to know what happened, report it and… give them a burial or something" Jack nodded turning to look at the man watching them through those hooded eyes "You OK lover?"
"Moderately unnerved but otherwise… still OK"
That said it all for everyone really.
Unnerved.