Ficlet: Risky Business
Title: Risky Business
Author: badly_knitted
Characters: Jack, Ianto, Team.
Rating: PG
Spoilers: Nada.
Summary: Torchwood can be a dangerous place, and not all dangers are immediately apparent.
Word Count: 500
Written For: Past prompts revisited, using Prompt 286: Risky at anythingdrabble.
Disclaimer: I don’t own Torchwood, or the characters.
Everything about working for Torchwood could be considered risky. For instance, Weevils were dangerous when provoked, but someone had to deal with the ones who turned rogue and came out of the sewers to attack people. Since only Torchwood was fully aware of their existence, the toothy aliens were naturally their responsibility.
Then there were all the weird, occasionally wonderful, and frequently downright hazardous objects and pieces of technology that the Rift sucked up and unhelpfully deposited in Cardiff. Most were hard to identify, so they all had to be handled with extreme care until the team could determine whether or not they posed a threat. Among the items that proved innocuous, such as alien toasters, data storage devices, musical instruments, and children’s toys, there were also some that required delicate treatment and secure storage. Bombs, grenades, projectile weapons and lasers, addictive substances designed for beings with a completely different body chemistry… the list went on and on.
As if that wasn’t enough, Weevils were far from the only aliens that showed up in the Welsh capital; they weren’t even the worst. Hoix would eat anything organic and were totally indiscriminate, as likely to eat people as they were to munch on the local vegetation, and even they were tame compared to some of the creatures who slipped through the Rift or came in spaceships, intent on invading earth, or enslaving the population.
Non-sentient creatures could, in some ways, be worse than the sentient ones. Just because something appeared appealingly cute and fluffy didn’t mean it couldn’t kill, sometimes deliberately and sometimes simply because it turned out to be venomous, or otherwise toxic to humans. Really, it wasn’t so surprising that the life expectancy for Torchwood field agents was so short, although Jack was working to change that with an expanded team and more extensive training than “Here’s a gun, this is how you fire it, don’t point it at the people you work with.”
All that being said, no matter how careful the team was, or what precautions they took, dangers could still crop up where they least expected to find them.
Ianto slumped on the sofa, looking very sorry for himself, and Jack couldn’t blame him. He had a mild concussion, a lump on the back of his head, a black eye, and a nasty cut above his left eyebrow that had needed three stitches. The wo
rst part was that he hadn’t even been doing anything remotely risky, except that this was Torchwood, and the usual rules didn’t necessarily apply.
Jack sat down gingerly beside his lover. “How are you feeling?”
“Sore, and my head aches.”
“I’m sorry.”
“What for? It wasn’t your fault.”
“I should have gone to fetch more staples myself. I just never would have imagined the stationary cupboard could be so dangerous!”
In reaching for the staples, Ianto had nudged something with his elbow and suddenly a shelf had collapsed, bringing a box of assorted office equipment down on his head, knocking him out.
The End
Author: badly_knitted
Characters: Jack, Ianto, Team.
Rating: PG
Spoilers: Nada.
Summary: Torchwood can be a dangerous place, and not all dangers are immediately apparent.
Word Count: 500
Written For: Past prompts revisited, using Prompt 286: Risky at anythingdrabble.
Disclaimer: I don’t own Torchwood, or the characters.
Everything about working for Torchwood could be considered risky. For instance, Weevils were dangerous when provoked, but someone had to deal with the ones who turned rogue and came out of the sewers to attack people. Since only Torchwood was fully aware of their existence, the toothy aliens were naturally their responsibility.
Then there were all the weird, occasionally wonderful, and frequently downright hazardous objects and pieces of technology that the Rift sucked up and unhelpfully deposited in Cardiff. Most were hard to identify, so they all had to be handled with extreme care until the team could determine whether or not they posed a threat. Among the items that proved innocuous, such as alien toasters, data storage devices, musical instruments, and children’s toys, there were also some that required delicate treatment and secure storage. Bombs, grenades, projectile weapons and lasers, addictive substances designed for beings with a completely different body chemistry… the list went on and on.
As if that wasn’t enough, Weevils were far from the only aliens that showed up in the Welsh capital; they weren’t even the worst. Hoix would eat anything organic and were totally indiscriminate, as likely to eat people as they were to munch on the local vegetation, and even they were tame compared to some of the creatures who slipped through the Rift or came in spaceships, intent on invading earth, or enslaving the population.
Non-sentient creatures could, in some ways, be worse than the sentient ones. Just because something appeared appealingly cute and fluffy didn’t mean it couldn’t kill, sometimes deliberately and sometimes simply because it turned out to be venomous, or otherwise toxic to humans. Really, it wasn’t so surprising that the life expectancy for Torchwood field agents was so short, although Jack was working to change that with an expanded team and more extensive training than “Here’s a gun, this is how you fire it, don’t point it at the people you work with.”
All that being said, no matter how careful the team was, or what precautions they took, dangers could still crop up where they least expected to find them.
Ianto slumped on the sofa, looking very sorry for himself, and Jack couldn’t blame him. He had a mild concussion, a lump on the back of his head, a black eye, and a nasty cut above his left eyebrow that had needed three stitches. The wo
rst part was that he hadn’t even been doing anything remotely risky, except that this was Torchwood, and the usual rules didn’t necessarily apply.
Jack sat down gingerly beside his lover. “How are you feeling?”
“Sore, and my head aches.”
“I’m sorry.”
“What for? It wasn’t your fault.”
“I should have gone to fetch more staples myself. I just never would have imagined the stationary cupboard could be so dangerous!”
In reaching for the staples, Ianto had nudged something with his elbow and suddenly a shelf had collapsed, bringing a box of assorted office equipment down on his head, knocking him out.
The End