Torchwood: Divergence
Book Four: Hatchweliad
Chapter 13
When Gwen and Lois arrived through the cog-wheel door, Ianto was still on the couch only now Hardd was lying beside him with her head in his lap, and his attention was on the medical bay. There was a lot of laughter echoing up from down there, as well as an occasional yelp of pain, the victim sounding to be Turlough.
"Do we want to know?" Cooper asked, both her and Habiba pausing on their way to the Boardroom.
"New rule," Ianto stated as he looked their way. "All singing slugs must die. Apparently, once they hit full maturity, they stop singing and go from herbivore to carnivore. Turlough got a pop-up with a reference to it from the Archives right as you were leaving, went to check on the two in containment down in the Vaults and they decided he looked tasty. The teeth they grow are small but there're a tonne of them, like thousands of tiny hypodermic needles. And once they latch on, they don't like to let go. If you pull the slug off, the teeth stay imbedded like cactus spines."
"Is he okay?" Habiba asked worriedly.
"I think he'll be a bit embarrassed for a while and not keen to sit for lunch," the Scieron Changeling on the couch shrugged, unconsciously stroking the long fur of the quasi-undead canine tucked close to his side. "Seems they can also jump, and when he turned to pick up the bucket of beer he'd sat on the floor, both slugs went for the presented target. He removed them and gave them the beer treatment, but now Martha and Jack are trying to clear all the tiny, needle teeth left behind. So, it's been 'bend over and cough' for the past five minutes or so."
"Please tell me the CCTV is on down there," Cooper chuckled, glancing that way when the slug-attacked redhead swore colourfully in apparent pain.
"Yep," Ianto nodded with a tiny smile.
"Brilliant," the former PC grinned, finally heading for the Boardroom. "We'll come back to grab drinks. Maybe they'll be done by then."
"One of you should pull a spare pillow from the storeroom," Ianto suggested, his expression very serious. "Find a nice fluffy one to put on his chair in there. Label it 'Turlough's Tush Tuffet', and it'll be just for his arse till it heals. Can go seat to seat as needed."
"I can't believe you said that with a straight face," Lois giggled as she too moved toward the Boardroom.
When the two came back to get beer, water, and tea from the kitchenette fridge, Harkness was exiting the office with some folded clothing that he took over to the twenty-six-year-old still sitting on the couch.
"That's the pair," Jones nodded, absently rubbing one of Hardd's ears. "Should fit over the non-stick padding without too much bunching under the belt. And he can deal with a set of your briefs or go without, whichever best suits his current inconvenience. Shirt sleeves can be rolled up if he needs to."
"Did those things tear up his trousers and all that badly?" Gwen prodded, now somewhat alarmed.
"No," the Captain reassured with a barely concealed smirk. "But the slime they got all over the seat of his trousers, shirt tails, and briefs has set up like two-part epoxy, and any teeth that imbedded in the fabric aren't going anywhere… ever."
"Nice to have someone else destroy their clothing for a change," his partner murmured, gently nudging the dog beside him and reaching for his crutches. "Need to visit the loo. I'll meet you in the Boardroom. Put Turlough's ruined clothes in the green bin down there, and they can go in the furnace later."
Jack offered a steadying hand as the younger man gained his feet, then headed for the Autopsy Lab again. Ianto made his way slowly across the decking to disappear into the main lavatory, his little black and white shadow pacing in his wake to lie down outside the door. The drinks were pulled and placed in the room with the pizza, then Lois scurried to grab the suggested pillow, used a permanent marker to write the appropriate message on its replaceable cover, and got it into their co-worker's favoured chair.
Martha snickered when she came in and saw it, their leader simply grinned as he passed with Ianto and Hardd on the way to their seats. Finally, Turlough made an appearance, wearing a borrowed shirt with his own tie and a pair of their resident Changeling's older blue jeans. He looked at the starkly labelled pillow in his chair, smirked and shifted his gaze to the young Guardian at Jack's left hand.
"Must've been your idea," the redhead commented, gingerly settling onto the item. "Definitely your brand of humour, even if it isn't your handwriting. Comfy though."
Ianto simply gave his teammate a small crooked smile and slight nod, then everyone turned their attention to lunch. The meal was accompanied by a full recounting of the killer slug tale, complete with very comical re-enactments by their victim.
"So, why did you do an Archive search on the little beasts anyhow?" Martha asked when the laughter had finally died down.
"I was trying to see if there was a precedent for the vast numbers coming through lately," the young tech expert explained, grabbing another slice of the Veg Special. "See if there was any mention of a similar situation. Apparently the Rift is in their migration route and we get 'Slug Fest' every twenty years or so instead of the twenty or thirty individuals a year that normally end up here. Standing recommendation is to salt them into goo, because back in the 1940's a good-sized group evaded capture and got to the meat-eating stage. Kind of a mess to explain when they made it into Caerleon, where they ate Lady Binsley's prize winning rose gardens, and then ate her and her husband as well. Torchwood-London had to clean that one up, but Rellaphoran Singing Slugs have been on the 'kill' list since then."
"I didn't know that part of things," Jack admitted. "We always just preferred the beer drowning method as a rule here in Wales. Instant intoxication, death within sixty seconds, dissolved for disposal after five minutes, and no screaming like a demented teakettle the way they do with salting. I couldn't stand to listen to their singing, and the Commanders before me just said we didn't have the room or time to catch and hold the slimy pests."
"Well, we've got about another month of migration to put up with," Turlough informed them. "Then it should go back to a blessedly rare occurrence for a good span."
"Thank God," Gwen and Martha both said at the same time, causing more laughter.
Everyone was in a good mood as lunch finished up and Lois began cleaning off the table. Turlough offered to give her a hand, Gwen promised to put his special pillow at his workstation, and the rest of the team exited the Boardroom. Still brace and crutch bound, Ianto aimed for the couch once more and eased down with a wince of pain. Jack started over to check on him, and was surprised when Hardd met him halfway, grabbed one leg of his chinos in her teeth and pulled as though to hurry him along. Then she ran back to where her Shadow reborn charge sat on the couch, tugged at his track bottoms as well, then turned and trotted toward the office before looking back at the both expectantly.
"Ianto?" Harkness prodded, somewhat confused.
"Pain's buildin'," the Welshman replied through gritted teeth, his more pronounced accent indicating that the rising discomfort was rapidly becoming overwhelming again. "She knows."
"Let's get you back in the room then," the Captain suggested. "Gwen, can you grab his crutches for me?"
"Maybe I should just stay in there," Ianto breathed as the older immortal picked him up and hurried into the office. "Shit… breakin' bones isn't this bad."
"Here we go," Jack reassured, lowering the young Guardian down onto the bed once more and adjusting the pillows for him. "You get settled with Hardd, try to ride out this wave. Lemme make sure everything is okay with the team, then I'll come sit with you too."
"Team's fine," Cooper stated, handing him the Archivist's crutches as the little Scieron altered dog jumped up onto the mattress. "You sit with Ianto, give him a hand to hold and keep him warm if his fever spikes, yeah? I'll worry about handling alerts."
The former PC headed for the door, glanced back to see the American slide over onto the bed and put his arms around his partner as the shivering twenty-six-year-old met Hardd's glowing gaze and tranced out. She closed the door and moved through the office to the Hub. At least their friend hadn't hit the point of screaming this time.
Gwen returned to her station as Lois descended from the kitchenette on her way back to the TIC upstairs, Martha was down in the Autopsy Lab, and Turlough was already back working on the programme augmentation he'd started earlier. She re-accessed the files she'd been going through, hoping the young Welshman in the hidden bedroom would be healed soon, and that she could find some way to repair the rift she'd caused between them… even as a tiny selfish voice in her head told her not to bother fixing what she'd just break again, because there had to be some way to get what she truly wanted… eventually.
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AN: Yep… All Singing Slugs MUST Die! Poor Turlough…
There is a possibility that I may not be able to post next Sunday. My laptop battery went from working fine to "Replace IMMEDIATELY!" on Friday, and the soonest I can get it in for that is Halloween (of course). I don't know if it will be a quick process, of if they're going to insist on keeping it for several days like last time. I'll post the next chapter as soon as I get it back if that's the case. Your patience is greatly appreciated.
Thank you to those reading the story. And thank you to those who have followed, favourited, and reviewed. NM