Fic: The Sea After a Storm (72/?)
Title: The Sea After a Storm, Chapter 72
Rating: R
Warnings: Some violence
Spoilers: Season Two thru Reset (2x06)
Pairings: Jack/Ianto
Disclaimer: Torchwood, Doctor Who and all their wonderfulness belong to the Mighty Beeb and He Who Must Not Be Named. All ©'s to J.C. Wilsher for situations and dialogue borrowed from Reset. No infringement, only worship intended!
Summary: In which Martha gets into trouble at the Pharm whilst Ianto and Gwen attempt to rescue another victim of Reset...
Notes: Thanks again to everyone who's reading and commenting! Extra thanks to
wynkat and my darling beta both for helping brainstorm a fix to the enormous plot hole TPTB left in this craptastic episode. You can find all the previous chapters of The Sea After a Storm here. This is a sequel to Vizzini’s Rule and To The Pain. Thanks again and forever to my amazing beta and wonderful friend
thraceadams for all the help and support and beta work; any mistakes are mine!
The Sea After a Storm: Chapter Seventy-Two
Previously on The Sea After a Storm: The team got Martha prepped for her undercover op...
Ianto woke up to Jack shaking him gently.
"Is it five?" he asked, sitting up quickly and rubbing his face.
"Just after," Jack said. He slipped his arms around Ianto and pulled him close so Ianto was leaning on him. "Hmm..." Jack hummed contentedly. "Wish we could just stay here."
"Work to do, Captain," Ianto murmured although his boneless slump against his lover belied his words.
"True." Jack sighed. "I just sent Martha off to the Pharm. I really hate that she's going in alone."
"She said she can handle herself. You said she can handle herself."
"Yeah, doesn't mean I have to like it, though."
Ianto shifted slightly and kissed Jack's temple. "We'll keep an eye on her and she'll do great. Are Gwen and Tosh back yet?"
Jack nodded and moved so Ianto could get out of the bed. He sat there morosely studying the floor while Ianto splashed some water on his face, ran damp hands through his hair and slipped back into his waistcoat and suit jacket. When he tightened his tie, Jack sighed deeply and stood up, stretching his back.
Ianto looked him over with a practised eye. "Did you get any sleep?"
Jack shook his head. "Not really, but I dozed a bit on the sofa in Martha's suite. I'm fine."
Ianto disagreed with that last part but let it slide. He climbed the ladder to Jack's office, Jack close behind him.
"I've got Owen and Tosh with me on surveillance," Jack said as they headed out to the Hub. "Gwen's still working on the criminal angle, looking for proof of what the Pharm's really up to. Give her a hand?"
"Of course."
For the next few hours, not much happened. They watched over the surveillance as Martha bluffed her way into the Pharm as a clinical trials subject and then got settled, waiting for the place to shut down. Jack, Owen and Tosh handled the direct communications with Martha while Gwen and Ianto worked backward from the trials subject web page, trying to discover more about the victims. Once most of the Pharm employees had cleared out for the evening, Martha started her mission to get Torchwood in control of the computer systems. Ianto's attention was split between his workstation and Tosh's where the feed from Martha's contacts was being displayed. Martha made it through the maze of the Pharm's corridors and succeeded in getting Tosh the access she needed to take over the computers in short order.
"Gwen, take a look at this," Ianto called across the Hub, sharing his monitor with hers as she hurried back to her workstation.
He heard Jack say, "Martha, now we've got control, we can download all of this and go through it here. Get out of there pronto," and gave a sigh of relief that Martha was on her way to safety.
"I think this is it, Ianto! Great work!" Gwen called back to him. "Tosh, do you have that code-breaker software?"
"I'm sending the patch through now."
"Thank you!"
An alarm started blaring somewhere at the Pharm, the muted sounds of the klaxon audible over Martha's feed. Before Ianto could ask what was going on, Gwen had broken the encryption on the site he'd found and he watched the list of names appearing on his shared monitor.
"Jack? I've got the list of clinical trials subjects here," Gwen called out.
Jack hurried over to her workstation. "Meredith Roberts, Marie Thomas, Barry Leonard, all the murder victims."
Gwen's mouse movement on the screen triggered a pop up stating 'EXECUTIVE ACTION: BD' which caught their attention.
"Ooh, who's BD?"
"Executive actions?" Gwen asked when the pop up revealed a security photo of a Billy Davis.
"Old CIA terminology for assassinations," Jack explained. "The Pharm are running their own hit man, which is kind of unusual for a medical research facility."
Ianto caught a glance of a new name on the monitor and clicked to enlarge the photo. Gwen saw it pop up on her display as well.
"Wait a minute, there's a name here that we haven't seen before. Elin Morgan? She hasn't been reported missing or dead."
"She soon will be," Jack said darkly. "Take Ianto and pull her in."
"Will do," Gwen agreed, already pushing her chair back.
Ianto sent Elin Morgan's home address to his phone and then hurried to join Gwen on the way down to the garage. He pulled open the driver's side door and climbed in, tossing his phone to Gwen.
"Plug in the address?" he requested as he started the engine.
"Yep," Gwen replied.
They drove in silence for a bit and then Gwen leant forward and started typing into the onboard computer. A minute later, there was a blip showing on the map near their destination.
"What's that?"
"Billy Davis' mobile," Gwen said quietly. "He'll be at Elin's flat in three minutes."
Ianto downshifted for a little more power and stomped on the accelerator, taking the next turn on two wheels. They were at Elin Morgan's flat in just under four minutes. Ianto prayed they'd been quick enough. As they pulled to a stop, Jack's voice came over the comms.
"Status?"
Gwen replied. "On our way in now. We believe Billy Davis is already inside."
"Use caution," Jack instructed. "We've lost contact with Martha. We need you back here ASAP to brainstorm how we're going to get her out."
"Understood," Gwen said. They were at the front of Elin's flat now and tried the door, the knob turning easily under Gwen's hand and letting them in.
"He's definitely inside," Gwen muttered, drawing her weapon.
They heard a quiet squeak of bedsprings and ran for the back of the flat. Gwen burst through the bedroom door, shouting, "Hands above your head! Up!"
Ianto was relieved to see the syringe in Billy Davis' raised hands was still full - they'd gotten there in time. He didn't waste a moment, just stepped close to Davis and gave him the biggest dose his stun gun was capable of. Gwen bent to check on the apparently unharmed Elin Morgan and Ianto tapped his comm.
"Jack, we've got Billy Davis. He could help you get into the Pharm."
"And Elin Morgan?" Jack asked.
"Safe," Ianto said, getting a confirming nod from Gwen when he looked over to her.
"Great work. Bring in Mr. Executive Action, I'm sure we can find something useful to do with him."
Ianto almost shivered at the coldness in Jack's voice.
"How is she?" he asked Gwen after Jack had clicked off.
"Paralysed," Gwen said, holding up a small spray bottle. "By whatever was in this, I think. Elin, you're going to be okay, okay?" She gave the terrified woman a gentle smile. "We'll be right back, I promise."
She nodded curtly to the stunned body of Billy Davis and Ianto lifted him off the bed, following Gwen out of the bedroom. Once they were in the hall, Gwen turned to Ianto who hitched up Billy's dead weight.
"Oh, just drop him if he gets too heavy," Gwen said in a close approximation of Jack's cold tone. "How are we going to do this?"
Ianto took her advice and let Billy slump to the floor, though without actually dropping him. "What do you mean?"
"Well, Elin has a right to know what's really going on, but would she even understand right now? Jack said to bring her in but he didn't give me any details. She could die at any moment!"
"Ah." Ianto glanced back at the door to Elin's bedroom, thinking quickly. "I think our best bet right now is to sedate her. I don't know if that will slow down the Reset progression, but it might and it will definitely make transporting her easier on everyone. We don't have any idea how long the paralysis will last or if, as you say, she's even capable of understanding what we say right now."
Gwen paused for a moment, clearly trying to come up with a better plan. When she didn't, she nodded and said, "Okay, sounds good. Oh, but do we have a simple sedative in the SUV?"
Ianto nodded and bent to retrieve Billy Davis' body.
"Oh, wait!" Gwen cried. "Let me..."
When Ianto had Davis propped up again, Gwen took his hand, stripped off the latex gloves he'd been wearing and pressed his hand around the knob of the door to Elin's bedroom.
"Do that on the front door, too," Gwen instructed, her face set and cold again. "That way the police can pick him up for kidnapping at least."
Ianto nodded and hauled Davis' body to the SUV, tossing it into the boot with very little ceremony. He dug out the kit from the back and prepped a dose of sedative, without the added Retcon, and headed back inside. He found Gwen attempting to explain the situation to Elin although Ianto was sure she wasn't following a word of it. He dosed Elin and then carried her out to the SVU, laying her carefully on the back seat. Gwen followed more slowly, mussing up bedclothes and knocking over a few lamps on her way out, setting the scene for an abduction.
"Thorough," Ianto noted as she joined him in the car.
"We may never be able to pin the murders on him, but at least he won't get away scot-free. Let's hope he has some information that can help us get Martha out of the Pharm."
"Let's hope she's re-established contact and doesn't need our help," Ianto said. "As long as we're hoping for things," he added as he pulled away from the kerb with an angry chirp of the types, blue lights running.
Gwen tapped her earpiece. "Jack? We're on our way back to you with both Elin Morgan and Billy Davis."
"Excellent. We'll meet you in the garage, I have a plan for our assassin."
"And Elin?" Gwen asked.
"We'll have to work on that after we get Martha to safety," Jack said, dashing Ianto's hopes that Martha was back in communication with Torchwood. "Just get here as fast as you can."
When he clicked off, Gwen huffed and looked out the window. Ianto let her sulk for a moment, knowing she wouldn't stay quiet for long. Sure enough, a minute later, Gwen turned in her seat to look at Elin Morgan's unconscious body on the back seat.
"Sooner or later that Reset stuff is going to kill her, just like it did to Marie in the hospital. Martha told me what happened, a billion of those little mayfly bugs bursting out of her, it sounds just terrible!" Gwen shuddered.
"Ugh," Ianto said sympathetically. "It does seem a little short sighted to save her from execution only to leave her to die."
"Exactly!"
"But, as we don't currently posses a cure for whatever Reset does, I'm not sure how much we can help her." When Gwen made a wordless cry of protest, Ianto lifted one hand off the wheel and held it up in a placating gesture. "Hold on, hold on, I'm just working it out. We don't have a cure, that's a fact. But maybe Tosh can find something in the files Martha just got us access to that will have an answer. I wouldn't put it past Copley to have a cure and just decide it's cheaper or easier to kill the trials subjects rather than giving it to them."
"So what do we do when we get to the Hub?" Gwen bit her lip. "We don't know how long she has and Jack is just focussed on helping Martha."
"Yes, well, that's not a surprise. He's blaming himself for putting Martha in danger, you know that." Ianto checked the intersection ahead and then blew through a red light. After a long pause while he racked his brain, he suggested, "What if we try putting her into cryo-stasis? Give ourselves more time to figure something out?"
"That could work..." Gwen said pensively.
"It's not ideal but at least she won't be dead," Ianto said. If the cryo-freeze will be enough to stop the mayflies, that is, Ianto thought but, after a glance at Gwen's now hopeful face, he did not say that part aloud.
TBC...
. This entry was originally posted at http://buttononthetop.dreamwidth.org/109374.html. Please comment there using OpenID.
Rating: R
Warnings: Some violence
Spoilers: Season Two thru Reset (2x06)
Pairings: Jack/Ianto
Disclaimer: Torchwood, Doctor Who and all their wonderfulness belong to the Mighty Beeb and He Who Must Not Be Named. All ©'s to J.C. Wilsher for situations and dialogue borrowed from Reset. No infringement, only worship intended!
Summary: In which Martha gets into trouble at the Pharm whilst Ianto and Gwen attempt to rescue another victim of Reset...
Notes: Thanks again to everyone who's reading and commenting! Extra thanks to
wynkat and my darling beta both for helping brainstorm a fix to the enormous plot hole TPTB left in this craptastic episode. You can find all the previous chapters of The Sea After a Storm here. This is a sequel to Vizzini’s Rule and To The Pain. Thanks again and forever to my amazing beta and wonderful friend
thraceadams for all the help and support and beta work; any mistakes are mine!
The Sea After a Storm: Chapter Seventy-Two
Previously on The Sea After a Storm: The team got Martha prepped for her undercover op...
Ianto woke up to Jack shaking him gently.
"Is it five?" he asked, sitting up quickly and rubbing his face.
"Just after," Jack said. He slipped his arms around Ianto and pulled him close so Ianto was leaning on him. "Hmm..." Jack hummed contentedly. "Wish we could just stay here."
"Work to do, Captain," Ianto murmured although his boneless slump against his lover belied his words.
"True." Jack sighed. "I just sent Martha off to the Pharm. I really hate that she's going in alone."
"She said she can handle herself. You said she can handle herself."
"Yeah, doesn't mean I have to like it, though."
Ianto shifted slightly and kissed Jack's temple. "We'll keep an eye on her and she'll do great. Are Gwen and Tosh back yet?"
Jack nodded and moved so Ianto could get out of the bed. He sat there morosely studying the floor while Ianto splashed some water on his face, ran damp hands through his hair and slipped back into his waistcoat and suit jacket. When he tightened his tie, Jack sighed deeply and stood up, stretching his back.
Ianto looked him over with a practised eye. "Did you get any sleep?"
Jack shook his head. "Not really, but I dozed a bit on the sofa in Martha's suite. I'm fine."
Ianto disagreed with that last part but let it slide. He climbed the ladder to Jack's office, Jack close behind him.
"I've got Owen and Tosh with me on surveillance," Jack said as they headed out to the Hub. "Gwen's still working on the criminal angle, looking for proof of what the Pharm's really up to. Give her a hand?"
"Of course."
For the next few hours, not much happened. They watched over the surveillance as Martha bluffed her way into the Pharm as a clinical trials subject and then got settled, waiting for the place to shut down. Jack, Owen and Tosh handled the direct communications with Martha while Gwen and Ianto worked backward from the trials subject web page, trying to discover more about the victims. Once most of the Pharm employees had cleared out for the evening, Martha started her mission to get Torchwood in control of the computer systems. Ianto's attention was split between his workstation and Tosh's where the feed from Martha's contacts was being displayed. Martha made it through the maze of the Pharm's corridors and succeeded in getting Tosh the access she needed to take over the computers in short order.
"Gwen, take a look at this," Ianto called across the Hub, sharing his monitor with hers as she hurried back to her workstation.
He heard Jack say, "Martha, now we've got control, we can download all of this and go through it here. Get out of there pronto," and gave a sigh of relief that Martha was on her way to safety.
"I think this is it, Ianto! Great work!" Gwen called back to him. "Tosh, do you have that code-breaker software?"
"I'm sending the patch through now."
"Thank you!"
An alarm started blaring somewhere at the Pharm, the muted sounds of the klaxon audible over Martha's feed. Before Ianto could ask what was going on, Gwen had broken the encryption on the site he'd found and he watched the list of names appearing on his shared monitor.
"Jack? I've got the list of clinical trials subjects here," Gwen called out.
Jack hurried over to her workstation. "Meredith Roberts, Marie Thomas, Barry Leonard, all the murder victims."
Gwen's mouse movement on the screen triggered a pop up stating 'EXECUTIVE ACTION: BD' which caught their attention.
"Ooh, who's BD?"
"Executive actions?" Gwen asked when the pop up revealed a security photo of a Billy Davis.
"Old CIA terminology for assassinations," Jack explained. "The Pharm are running their own hit man, which is kind of unusual for a medical research facility."
Ianto caught a glance of a new name on the monitor and clicked to enlarge the photo. Gwen saw it pop up on her display as well.
"Wait a minute, there's a name here that we haven't seen before. Elin Morgan? She hasn't been reported missing or dead."
"She soon will be," Jack said darkly. "Take Ianto and pull her in."
"Will do," Gwen agreed, already pushing her chair back.
Ianto sent Elin Morgan's home address to his phone and then hurried to join Gwen on the way down to the garage. He pulled open the driver's side door and climbed in, tossing his phone to Gwen.
"Plug in the address?" he requested as he started the engine.
"Yep," Gwen replied.
They drove in silence for a bit and then Gwen leant forward and started typing into the onboard computer. A minute later, there was a blip showing on the map near their destination.
"What's that?"
"Billy Davis' mobile," Gwen said quietly. "He'll be at Elin's flat in three minutes."
Ianto downshifted for a little more power and stomped on the accelerator, taking the next turn on two wheels. They were at Elin Morgan's flat in just under four minutes. Ianto prayed they'd been quick enough. As they pulled to a stop, Jack's voice came over the comms.
"Status?"
Gwen replied. "On our way in now. We believe Billy Davis is already inside."
"Use caution," Jack instructed. "We've lost contact with Martha. We need you back here ASAP to brainstorm how we're going to get her out."
"Understood," Gwen said. They were at the front of Elin's flat now and tried the door, the knob turning easily under Gwen's hand and letting them in.
"He's definitely inside," Gwen muttered, drawing her weapon.
They heard a quiet squeak of bedsprings and ran for the back of the flat. Gwen burst through the bedroom door, shouting, "Hands above your head! Up!"
Ianto was relieved to see the syringe in Billy Davis' raised hands was still full - they'd gotten there in time. He didn't waste a moment, just stepped close to Davis and gave him the biggest dose his stun gun was capable of. Gwen bent to check on the apparently unharmed Elin Morgan and Ianto tapped his comm.
"Jack, we've got Billy Davis. He could help you get into the Pharm."
"And Elin Morgan?" Jack asked.
"Safe," Ianto said, getting a confirming nod from Gwen when he looked over to her.
"Great work. Bring in Mr. Executive Action, I'm sure we can find something useful to do with him."
Ianto almost shivered at the coldness in Jack's voice.
"How is she?" he asked Gwen after Jack had clicked off.
"Paralysed," Gwen said, holding up a small spray bottle. "By whatever was in this, I think. Elin, you're going to be okay, okay?" She gave the terrified woman a gentle smile. "We'll be right back, I promise."
She nodded curtly to the stunned body of Billy Davis and Ianto lifted him off the bed, following Gwen out of the bedroom. Once they were in the hall, Gwen turned to Ianto who hitched up Billy's dead weight.
"Oh, just drop him if he gets too heavy," Gwen said in a close approximation of Jack's cold tone. "How are we going to do this?"
Ianto took her advice and let Billy slump to the floor, though without actually dropping him. "What do you mean?"
"Well, Elin has a right to know what's really going on, but would she even understand right now? Jack said to bring her in but he didn't give me any details. She could die at any moment!"
"Ah." Ianto glanced back at the door to Elin's bedroom, thinking quickly. "I think our best bet right now is to sedate her. I don't know if that will slow down the Reset progression, but it might and it will definitely make transporting her easier on everyone. We don't have any idea how long the paralysis will last or if, as you say, she's even capable of understanding what we say right now."
Gwen paused for a moment, clearly trying to come up with a better plan. When she didn't, she nodded and said, "Okay, sounds good. Oh, but do we have a simple sedative in the SUV?"
Ianto nodded and bent to retrieve Billy Davis' body.
"Oh, wait!" Gwen cried. "Let me..."
When Ianto had Davis propped up again, Gwen took his hand, stripped off the latex gloves he'd been wearing and pressed his hand around the knob of the door to Elin's bedroom.
"Do that on the front door, too," Gwen instructed, her face set and cold again. "That way the police can pick him up for kidnapping at least."
Ianto nodded and hauled Davis' body to the SUV, tossing it into the boot with very little ceremony. He dug out the kit from the back and prepped a dose of sedative, without the added Retcon, and headed back inside. He found Gwen attempting to explain the situation to Elin although Ianto was sure she wasn't following a word of it. He dosed Elin and then carried her out to the SVU, laying her carefully on the back seat. Gwen followed more slowly, mussing up bedclothes and knocking over a few lamps on her way out, setting the scene for an abduction.
"Thorough," Ianto noted as she joined him in the car.
"We may never be able to pin the murders on him, but at least he won't get away scot-free. Let's hope he has some information that can help us get Martha out of the Pharm."
"Let's hope she's re-established contact and doesn't need our help," Ianto said. "As long as we're hoping for things," he added as he pulled away from the kerb with an angry chirp of the types, blue lights running.
Gwen tapped her earpiece. "Jack? We're on our way back to you with both Elin Morgan and Billy Davis."
"Excellent. We'll meet you in the garage, I have a plan for our assassin."
"And Elin?" Gwen asked.
"We'll have to work on that after we get Martha to safety," Jack said, dashing Ianto's hopes that Martha was back in communication with Torchwood. "Just get here as fast as you can."
When he clicked off, Gwen huffed and looked out the window. Ianto let her sulk for a moment, knowing she wouldn't stay quiet for long. Sure enough, a minute later, Gwen turned in her seat to look at Elin Morgan's unconscious body on the back seat.
"Sooner or later that Reset stuff is going to kill her, just like it did to Marie in the hospital. Martha told me what happened, a billion of those little mayfly bugs bursting out of her, it sounds just terrible!" Gwen shuddered.
"Ugh," Ianto said sympathetically. "It does seem a little short sighted to save her from execution only to leave her to die."
"Exactly!"
"But, as we don't currently posses a cure for whatever Reset does, I'm not sure how much we can help her." When Gwen made a wordless cry of protest, Ianto lifted one hand off the wheel and held it up in a placating gesture. "Hold on, hold on, I'm just working it out. We don't have a cure, that's a fact. But maybe Tosh can find something in the files Martha just got us access to that will have an answer. I wouldn't put it past Copley to have a cure and just decide it's cheaper or easier to kill the trials subjects rather than giving it to them."
"So what do we do when we get to the Hub?" Gwen bit her lip. "We don't know how long she has and Jack is just focussed on helping Martha."
"Yes, well, that's not a surprise. He's blaming himself for putting Martha in danger, you know that." Ianto checked the intersection ahead and then blew through a red light. After a long pause while he racked his brain, he suggested, "What if we try putting her into cryo-stasis? Give ourselves more time to figure something out?"
"That could work..." Gwen said pensively.
"It's not ideal but at least she won't be dead," Ianto said. If the cryo-freeze will be enough to stop the mayflies, that is, Ianto thought but, after a glance at Gwen's now hopeful face, he did not say that part aloud.
TBC...
. This entry was originally posted at http://buttononthetop.dreamwidth.org/109374.html. Please comment there using OpenID.