Wishverse 1.02 - Part 3 (finished)
Aug. 7th, 2009 10:40 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
wiseheartTitle: The Many Departures of Gwen Cooper
Author: Soledad
Fandom: Torchwood
Category: Heavy-duty Gwen bashing.
Rating: This particular chapter is rated 16+, for violence. Personally, I find it a lot more harmful for young readers than moderate sex scenes..
Genre: Drama, I'd say. Plus a lot of dark humour.
Series: Wishverse.
Warning: repeated character death(s) in each chapter.
Timeframe: "Day One". Major spoilers. This is an AU, though.
Summary: Many different ways to get rid of Gwen Cooper, while keeping the episodes as canonical as possible.
Disclaimer: the usual: don’t own, don’t sue! Everything belongs to RTD and BBC. I used a great deal of rewritten original dialogue, though.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
EPISODE 02 – DAY ONE? NO, DAY ZERO! - Part 3
Author’s note: Continued from Part 2.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Whatever Ianto might have slipped their boss, it worked. In the middle of dinner, Jack suddenly left for the bathroom. As soon as he was out of hearing range, the others all turned their attention to Gwen.
“So what's he told you?” Owen asked.
Gwen blinked in confusion. “What about?”
“Himself!” Toshiko said. “Come on, the two of you are together all the time, talking, sharing… Surely he’s told you something?”
Gwen frowned. “You've been here longer than I have.”
“Yeah, but he doesn’t talk to us the way he talks to you,” Toshiko said. +We were banking on you! You’re his new prize pupil, his confidante.” She bit the inside of her face to suppress a hysterical giggle, seeing that Gwen actually believed it.
“You're a copper, trained to ask questions,” Owen added, and Toshiko almost fell off her seat, because they’d all seen just half an hour earlier how good Gwen was at interrogating a suspect. Well, all but Ianto, that is, but Owen had recorded it for him.
Gwen stared at them open-mouthed. “You don't know anything?”
“Not who he is, not where he's from, Owen confirmed. “Nothing, except him being gay.”
“No, he's not!” Gwen protested immediately, disappointment clearly written in her face. If they’d had any doubts that she wanted to get into Jack’s pants – which they hadn’t – they’d have the confirmation now. “Really, do you think?”
“No,” Toshiko said. “Owen does. I don't.”
“And I don't care,” Ianto added, which, again, nearly killed Toshiko on the spot. Because while Jack blatantly flirted with Ianto, and Ianto still played hard to get, it was also glaringly obvious that sooner or later, Jack would get what – whom – he wanted. He always did, if he really set his mind on it, and he was very determined in his pursuit of their teaboy.
“I've watched him in action,” Toshiko said. “He'll shag anything if it's gorgeous enough.” Hell, he’d even flirted with her when she’d got here. Had she been interested in casual sex, she could’ve had him. She just wasn’t that kind of woman. Not usually. And certainly not with her own boss, no matter how dashing the man might be.
She listened half-heartedly to the others’ playful banter about Jack’s true identity, finding Ianto’s CIA-theory especially hilarious. She was fairly sure that if anyone, Ianto knew more about their boss than he’d be willing to reveal. He’d worked for Torchwood One, after all, in a considerably higher position than his current one. They oughtta have had extensive files about all members in the headquarters.
The guessing was interrupted by Jack’s return, and in the sudden silence Gwen finally became aware of the fact that they’d been monitoring the girl’s cell all the time. That pushed her self-righteous button again, of course. She got up and walked over to the screen.
“What are we doing having Chinese while a girl fights for her life?” she asked accusingly. Toshiko rolled her eyes. This was exactly the sort of false sympathy they couldn’t use in their line of work.
“Actually,” Jack replied calmly, “while we've been eating, the computers have been running a full bio-scan on Carys, profiling her blood, metabolism, organs, skin, the works. So we can see what effect the alien's having on her. They've also been taking samples of the air in the cell so we can analyze any changes in the environment around her. Now, is that enough? Do you want more? Cos, uh, it gets kinda boring.”
Gwen very obviously hadn’t understood half of his explanation. But such little things wouldn’t deter her from following the right path… or what she thought was the right path.
“You've been hidden down here too long,” she declared in a condescending manner that made Toshiko want to hit her. Hard. “Spending so much time with the alien stuff, you've lost what it means to be human.”
Yeah, because snogging an alien-possessed girl was so fucking human, wasn’t it? Toshiko exchanged a look with Owen who, too, seemed ready to do something hurtful to their newbie. Even Ianto’s features hardened for a moment, but was that really surprising? The young man had survived the Battle of Canary Wharf, and this stupid cow wanted to lecture him about humane behaviour?
Jack was the only one to keep his nonchalant manner. “So remind us,” he said, pursing his lips to keep a grin from emerging. “Tell me what it means to be human in the 21st century.”
Needless to say that Gwen didn’t even realize that she was being mocked.
“All right,” she said determinedly and went on to work.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Toshiko was immensely grateful for Jack’s answer, as it sent Gwen into research mode and thus kept her out of their hair, so that they could work in peace for a while. Even though seeing her at Suzie’s old workstation still burned. Plus, she couldn’t understand why Gwen needed to print out every piece of insignificant crap she’d dug up while they had a perfectly good virtual whiteboard in the size of an entire wall to project, edit and order information on it.
Of course, that would have required slightly better technical skills than Gwen could ever hope to possess, and should she live a hundred years. And the ability to think on a slightly bigger scale. Or the ability to think, period. Because really, the idea of bringing in the girl’s father was beyond stupid. And that even before they would realize the threat those ultra-powerful alien pheromones meant for any man who came across them.
A threat Owen got to experience first-hand. Toshiko really tried very hard to feel sorry for him, seeing him naked and handcuffed in Carys’ empty cell. She failed. But Gwen making fun of him after having nearly snogged Carys to death herself was more than a bit hypocritical.
Every bit as hypocritical as Gwen’s lecturing Jack about a severed hand being more important to him than Carys’ life. Granted, Toshiko didn’t know whose hand it was (she wanted to ask Ianto many times, as Ianto always knew such things, no matter how bizarre they were, but somehow forgot about it every time), yet she’d figured out on her own that it somehow had to be connected to Jack’s mysterious past. He’d been truly devastated when the container had been broken, and only a stupid, self-righteous bitch like Gwen couldn’t see that it was a personal matter for him. So yes, a personal loss meant more to him than a dangerous alien on the loose – an alien who was on the loose thanks to Gwen’s own stupidity in the first place.
Owen’s experiment with the rat didn’t serve to calm tempers down, either, but that wasn’t really the doctor’s fault. They needed to find the girl, but Gwen refused to contact her former colleagues at the police, saying she couldn’t tell them to put out an APB for a woman possessed by gas knobbing men to death. Jack was annoyed by her lack of cooperation, but it gave Toshiko an idea.
“Do we know the full name of Gwen’s former partner at the police?” he asked Ianto through her headset, so that the others, who weren’t wearing theirs, wouldn’t hear.
“Just a moment,” Ianto apparently checked something on his own computer. “PC Andrew Davidson. Why?”
“Is there a call number?”
“Yep. You wanna contact him?” Ianto asked.
“Not officially,” Toshiko replied, “but we might have to, eventually. The police could be able to get to any crime scene a great deal faster.”
“Then we should perhaps contact someone higher up the ranks,” Ianto suggested.
“Nah,” Toshiko said. “We can’t Retcon the whole police department. Besides, this Andy character knows Gwen better than we do. He’ll understand that she means disaster waiting to happen. Just have him stand by, in case we’d need him.”
“Will do,” Ianto replied simply and broke the connection.
Toshiko turned her attention back to the rest of her team and found Gwen still trying to play profiler. It was utterly ridiculous, as she didn’t seem to have a clue what she was doing, aside from the near-religious zeal to ‘save’ Carys. All the actual answers came from the others, really.
“We have to think like her,” Gwen lectured, stating the glaringly obvious. “Put ourselves in her place. It's the only way to find her.”
“Except we don't know what her controlling impulse is by now – Carys or the alien inside,” Jack pointed out, rubbing his temples. “The last thing I saw was a fight for control.”
“The overriding factor for the parasite is to have sex,” Toshiko said. “It's a survival instinct – that's bound to be the strongest drive.”
“All right,” Gwen interrupted, not liking that someone else found an answer she’d been unable to find, “so you're Carys. You're desperate for sex cos that's what the thing inside you needs, but you know it will kill. Where would you go?”
Owen gave her a really dirty look. “I'd come round and shag you.” The others turned around and stared at him, apparently wondering whether he’d lost his mind, because really, nobody could be that desperate to get laid. He frowned. “What?! It's a joke! Can't I have a joke with my team-mates?”
Toshiko shook her head in disgust. “Right now? No.”
“So what are we talking about?” Jack asked. “Brothels? Lap dance clubs? Anywhere there's eager men?”
Toshiko thought for a moment, then remembered the last call recorded on Carys’ mobile phone and in made clink. “I know what I'd do,” she said slowly, looking at Owen with a certain evil glee.
Jack seemed to understand what she meant. “Do you have the address?” he asked. Toshiko nodded. “Okay, let’s go.”
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
When they burst into the ex-boyfriend’s flat, all they found was a pile of dust on the bed. Of Carys there was no sign. They returned to the SUV in a really pissed mood. Jack took the driver’s seat again.
“So what's our next move?” he asked.
Owen snickered. “Stop the entire city of Cardiff from shagging?”
Unlike the others, Gwen didn’t find that such a stupid idea. “Hmmm. Put bromide in the water supply?”
Jack shook his head. “Nah, too hit and miss.”
“Yeah,” Owen snickered again. “Besides, the water company got pissed off last time we did that. It took teaboy days of grovelling till he could slip them the necessary amount of Retcon.”
Gwen’s thought returned to the girl. “It could have used any body in Cardiff. Why her?”
“I just assumed it was random,” Toshiko said thoughtfully. “And it had to be a woman anyway, if that thing needs male orgasm to feed off of.”
“It's mining Carys' life to get what it needs,” Jack added. “We need to find her, because if that thing moves on, we might never get a chance to contain it.”
“So, what else do we know about her?” Owen asked.
Jack glanced at Gwen over his shoulder. “Anything you can think of?” he asked a little doubtfully. Toshiko suppressed a grin and looked at Gwen, too.
“What are you all looking at me for?” Gwen got defensive quite quickly, which was not surprising – she didn’t have a clue about proper procedure, after all.
“You did all the profiling, didn’t you?” Owen asked, his sarcastic tone leaving no doubt about what he really thought of her so-called profiling.
“I don't know,” Gwen snapped. “I don’t know, okay? Sorry.” She turned around to look out the window.
“She's really great under pressure,” Owen muttered. “Are you sure your octopus was that good in the sack?”
Jack gave him a quelling look. “Not now, Owen. There's gotta be something. What did you say Carys' job was?”
Gwen shrugged. “She's just a temp. Receptionist somehow.”
“Where's she working at the moment?” Jack asked. Gwen just shrugged again.
“I can pull her employment files up,” Toshiko intervened before their boss could have done something really drastic – like tossing Gwen out of the SUV. She put it in the computer and after a few seconds, she came up with an answer. “Conway Clinic.”
Owen stared at her in shock, which was a rare thing with him; he was a cynic. “You're joking, Tosh!”
“What's the problem?” Jack asked.
“It's a bloody fertility clinic,” Owen explained. “Sperm donors. An unlimited supply of orgasmic energy without all the build-up.”
“Perfect hit,” Jack agreed and accelerated beyond speed limits.
Toshiko texted Ianto, asking him to send the police to the clinic, hoping they could either detain Carys or evacuate the potential victims in time. Only a minute later she got from Ianto the reassurance that the police were on their way. It still meant to endanger the officers, of course, but at they couldn’t hope to arrive on time, so something had to be done.
In the racing SUV Owen reached over and handed Gwen a gun. She looked at it, then took it, holding it so awkwardly that Toshiko cringed in fear she might shoot someone by accident. “What's this for?”
Toshiko could see in the mirror Jack rolling his eyes. “Need a diagram?”
“I've never used a gun,” Gwen stared at the weapon with widening eyes. Jack seemed ready to explode out of sheer frustration.
“I thought you were in the police!”
“I was on the beat,” Gwen returned defensively. Jack shook his head.
“Carry it,” he said. You don't need to use it. But it can’t hurt to at least look like you were a professional.”
Owen snapped the cartridge into a second gun and handed it back to Toshiko. She took it with practiced ease. “You really ought to teach her how to shoot, Jack,” she said. “Right now, she’s a liability. She could get us all killed.” She deliberately spoke in a very low voice, one that Jack could understand due to much practice. Gwen, of course, didn’t even hear her remark – besides, her thoughts were elsewhere already.
“What do we do if we find her?” she asked, meaning Carys. “How are we going to get it out of her?”
Jack glanced at Toshiko. “Suggestions, Tosh? Found any weaknesses?”
“Judging by the test results, the gas needed a host because prolonged exposure to our atmosphere is poisonous to it,” Toshiko replied. “But our bodies are the perfect environment.”
“So, if we isolate it from Carys' body...” Jack trailed off, hoping that Gwen would get the idea. She didn’t.
“It won't survive for long,” Owen supplied. Jack nodded, a little calmer for the first time in hours.
“Sounds like we have ourselves a plan,” he declared.
“Force it to die,” Gwen added, finally getting it. Owen nodded.
“Just like it did those poor blokes, yeah,” there was definitely something like male solidarity in his tone.
“But what about Carys?” Gwen insisted, returning to her main concern like a dog to a rubber bone.
Owen looked at her darkly. “Better start praying we get to her in time.”
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
When they got to the clinic, the police car was already standing at the entrance. Andy and his partner were escorting several men out of the building, trying to get them to safety. Andy pointedly ignored Gwen, but apparently recognized Toshiko (perhaps given a clue by Ianto) and flashed her a wide smile.
“Miss Sato? We got your message. Your colleague said something about a psychotic chick attacking men…?”
Toshiko nodded. “Have you found her?”
Andy shook his head. “Nah, we thought it was more urgent to get these blokes out of harm’s way. I’ve called the rescue service, though; the receptionist lady has been knocked out cold.”
“Good,” Jack said in approval, having caught the gist of it. “Thanks for your help. If you can get these men safely away from here, we’ll take over the rest.”
“Sure thing,” Andy replied, smiling at Toshiko, then he turned back to his protégées. “This way, please! And don’t stop till you’re at least ten blocks away. Twenty would be better, actually.
The Torchwood team entered the clinic, rushing from room to room with their guns drawn. In Room #1 they found a black pile of dust on the floor. Toshiko checked Room #2 and found a stack of magazines and another pile of black dust. Looking into Room #3, she again found a pile of dust on the sofa. Gwen pushed the next room door open and found a pile of black dust on the exam table. She checked the next room and found another pile of dust on the red chair.
“Oh, God, how many more?” she moaned. Toshiko couldn’t even look at her. So many deaths, all because of her incredible stupidity, and she wouldn’t at least shut up!
“In here!” they heard Owen’s voice from downstairs. Toshiko turned around and rushed past Gwen, with Jack in trail, to get to Owen.
They found Owen in one of the side rooms, his gun pointed at Carys, to keep her away from a wide-eyed Andy who was just about to usher a half-naked man out of the room. Jack and Toshiko aimed at the girl too, who was babbling inane things about sex, beauty and fear… sounding strangely like Gwen during one of her rants, in fact.
Then she was hit by a wave of pain and fell to the floor. Gwen threw her gun away, nearly hitting Owen in the process, and knelt down next to her.
“The strain on her body's too much,” Owen said grimly, kicking the gun out of their reach, just in case. “Any second now, she's rat jam.”
Gwen grabbed Carys’ head with both hands, as if trying to see the alien through her clouded eyes, and shook her.
“Use me,” she screamed. “Leave Carys. Take my body as host. And just let her live.”
Jack grabbed her arm. “Gwen, you’re not making any sense!”
Gwen looked up at him with those big, wet, unnatural eyes again. “I'm stronger than she is,” she whined. “I'll last longer. You might be able to save me, I don't know.”
Jack stood up. “All right. Let’s give it a try.”
“Jack! You can't let her!” Toshiko protested. God knew, Gwen’s appetite for men was ravenous enough, even without sex-obsessed alien gas possessing her body. No man would be safe in the whole city…
Jack looked at her sternly. “Like she said... She's responsible for this,” he said and stepped back.
Gwen rose, too, making a heroic stance that would have put the heroine of any black-and-white B-movie from the 1950s to shame. “Come on, then,” she said, stepping back. “Do it. Leave her.”
Toshiko wanted to protest again, but the flash of a small, shell-shaped object in Jack’s hand stopped her. She understand the plan now, and slowly backed off.
Suddenly, Carys’ eyes opened, and she gasped loudly. The gaseous alien came out of her mouth and hovered in the air like a living, throbbing purple cloud. Then it moved on, heading toward Gwen. Gwen shut her eyes and braced herself. Waiting for the right moment till then, Jack finally tossed the inflatable cell on the carpet. The opened… unfortunately, Gwen chose exactly this moment to make a brave step forward, and got trapped in the cell with that roaring… thing, surrounded from all sides completely.
She opened her eyes... and widened them, as she realized her situation was hopeless. And widened them… and widened them… The gaseous creature swirled around in the inflatable cell angrily.
“Shit!” Owen swore. “What are we gonna do now?”
Jack shook his head. “I seriously don’t know. Why couldn’t she just stay where she was? The plan was idiot proof, it would have worked like a charm!”
“Because she’s Gwen-bloody-Cooper who always has to do things her way, that’s why!” Owen returned snidely. “How long can they survive in there?”
“Dunno,” Toshiko sighed. “That thing has just eaten half a dozen blokes; I don’t think Gwen really has a chance. We need to take her out of there, Jack!”
“No, we don’t,” Jack replied grimly. “At least seven people have died already, and it was her damn fault. I won’t set that thing free, so that it can keep killing people, just to save her.”
“Jack, you can’t let her die!” Toshiko protested.
“I can,” Jack said, his face stone hard, “and I will. That’s why I’m the boss. Someone has to make the hard decisions. Better me than any of you. I’m used to it.”
“I’m a bit worried how long that battery'll last for, myself,” Owen commented.
“I don’t think you’ll need to worry about that,” Toshiko said quietly. “Look…”
Inside the cell, the gaseous creature was swirling around, looking for a way into Gwen’s body, who was covering her mouth and nose as well as she could. It wasn’t nearly enough, though. More and more purple gas was leaking in through her fingers, until the whole thing had gotten inside her. Jack checked something on his wrist-strap.
“Oxygen levels are dropping quickly,” he said.
“Jack!” Toshiko all but begged. “Please, you can’t let her suffocate in there! I know she’s a disaster, but she’s still one of us!”
“You still don’t understand, Toshiko, do you?” Jack said harshly. “I don’t have any other choice! The only way to stop that thing is to let her die; it can’t survive in a dead body, and will die with her. I’m sorry, but it’s her or the entire male population of Cardiff… and beyond. We have to choose – I have to choose – the lesser evil."
Toshiko still wanted to argue, but suddenly the inside of the cell was illuminated by a bright purple light. In a spectacular show of sparks, Gwen burst into dust, falling into a small pile on the floor. The cell collapsed. Jack reached down and picked up some of the dust in his hand.
“You travel halfway across the universe for the greatest sex,” he mused. “You still end up dying alone.” He shook his head as he dropped the dust again.
“Are they both dead?” Toshiko asked quietly. Jack nodded.
“Yeah. Call Ianto and ask for standard clean-up procedures,” he then looked into the shocked eyes of Andy. “Constable, we might need your help with the clean-up this time.”
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Two weeks later Gwen Cooper was properly buried – only Torchwood knew that the coffin was empty. Andy and Toshiko supported a grieving Rhys and stayed with him overnight; then they helped him to move into another flat where he could heal and eventually begin a new life.
The people from the clinic were all Retconned and given false memories about a psychotic woman with a knife trying to kill them. They were all happy to have survived, but Conway Clinic stayed out of business for quite some time afterwards. Even the carefully edited publicity proved rather disastrous for them.
Carys had been moved to the sanitarium on Flat Holm; her mind just couldn’t take the shock and broke under the pressure – under such circumstances Retcon wasn’t an option, but at least she would be cared for as long as she lived.
Her father had been told that the drugs she’d been taking had turned her mad. It was the kindest thing they could have told the poor man. He took it hard enough as it was, but what else could they have done for him?
“So, that’s how Torchwood works, is it?” Andy asked a little doubtfully, having participated his very first team meeting in the Hub.
“Yep,” Toshiko answered, patting him on the arm. “You’ll get used to it.”
~The End – for now~
Author: Soledad
Fandom: Torchwood
Category: Heavy-duty Gwen bashing.
Rating: This particular chapter is rated 16+, for violence. Personally, I find it a lot more harmful for young readers than moderate sex scenes..
Genre: Drama, I'd say. Plus a lot of dark humour.
Series: Wishverse.
Warning: repeated character death(s) in each chapter.
Timeframe: "Day One". Major spoilers. This is an AU, though.
Summary: Many different ways to get rid of Gwen Cooper, while keeping the episodes as canonical as possible.
Disclaimer: the usual: don’t own, don’t sue! Everything belongs to RTD and BBC. I used a great deal of rewritten original dialogue, though.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
EPISODE 02 – DAY ONE? NO, DAY ZERO! - Part 3
Author’s note: Continued from Part 2.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Whatever Ianto might have slipped their boss, it worked. In the middle of dinner, Jack suddenly left for the bathroom. As soon as he was out of hearing range, the others all turned their attention to Gwen.
“So what's he told you?” Owen asked.
Gwen blinked in confusion. “What about?”
“Himself!” Toshiko said. “Come on, the two of you are together all the time, talking, sharing… Surely he’s told you something?”
Gwen frowned. “You've been here longer than I have.”
“Yeah, but he doesn’t talk to us the way he talks to you,” Toshiko said. +We were banking on you! You’re his new prize pupil, his confidante.” She bit the inside of her face to suppress a hysterical giggle, seeing that Gwen actually believed it.
“You're a copper, trained to ask questions,” Owen added, and Toshiko almost fell off her seat, because they’d all seen just half an hour earlier how good Gwen was at interrogating a suspect. Well, all but Ianto, that is, but Owen had recorded it for him.
Gwen stared at them open-mouthed. “You don't know anything?”
“Not who he is, not where he's from, Owen confirmed. “Nothing, except him being gay.”
“No, he's not!” Gwen protested immediately, disappointment clearly written in her face. If they’d had any doubts that she wanted to get into Jack’s pants – which they hadn’t – they’d have the confirmation now. “Really, do you think?”
“No,” Toshiko said. “Owen does. I don't.”
“And I don't care,” Ianto added, which, again, nearly killed Toshiko on the spot. Because while Jack blatantly flirted with Ianto, and Ianto still played hard to get, it was also glaringly obvious that sooner or later, Jack would get what – whom – he wanted. He always did, if he really set his mind on it, and he was very determined in his pursuit of their teaboy.
“I've watched him in action,” Toshiko said. “He'll shag anything if it's gorgeous enough.” Hell, he’d even flirted with her when she’d got here. Had she been interested in casual sex, she could’ve had him. She just wasn’t that kind of woman. Not usually. And certainly not with her own boss, no matter how dashing the man might be.
She listened half-heartedly to the others’ playful banter about Jack’s true identity, finding Ianto’s CIA-theory especially hilarious. She was fairly sure that if anyone, Ianto knew more about their boss than he’d be willing to reveal. He’d worked for Torchwood One, after all, in a considerably higher position than his current one. They oughtta have had extensive files about all members in the headquarters.
The guessing was interrupted by Jack’s return, and in the sudden silence Gwen finally became aware of the fact that they’d been monitoring the girl’s cell all the time. That pushed her self-righteous button again, of course. She got up and walked over to the screen.
“What are we doing having Chinese while a girl fights for her life?” she asked accusingly. Toshiko rolled her eyes. This was exactly the sort of false sympathy they couldn’t use in their line of work.
“Actually,” Jack replied calmly, “while we've been eating, the computers have been running a full bio-scan on Carys, profiling her blood, metabolism, organs, skin, the works. So we can see what effect the alien's having on her. They've also been taking samples of the air in the cell so we can analyze any changes in the environment around her. Now, is that enough? Do you want more? Cos, uh, it gets kinda boring.”
Gwen very obviously hadn’t understood half of his explanation. But such little things wouldn’t deter her from following the right path… or what she thought was the right path.
“You've been hidden down here too long,” she declared in a condescending manner that made Toshiko want to hit her. Hard. “Spending so much time with the alien stuff, you've lost what it means to be human.”
Yeah, because snogging an alien-possessed girl was so fucking human, wasn’t it? Toshiko exchanged a look with Owen who, too, seemed ready to do something hurtful to their newbie. Even Ianto’s features hardened for a moment, but was that really surprising? The young man had survived the Battle of Canary Wharf, and this stupid cow wanted to lecture him about humane behaviour?
Jack was the only one to keep his nonchalant manner. “So remind us,” he said, pursing his lips to keep a grin from emerging. “Tell me what it means to be human in the 21st century.”
Needless to say that Gwen didn’t even realize that she was being mocked.
“All right,” she said determinedly and went on to work.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Toshiko was immensely grateful for Jack’s answer, as it sent Gwen into research mode and thus kept her out of their hair, so that they could work in peace for a while. Even though seeing her at Suzie’s old workstation still burned. Plus, she couldn’t understand why Gwen needed to print out every piece of insignificant crap she’d dug up while they had a perfectly good virtual whiteboard in the size of an entire wall to project, edit and order information on it.
Of course, that would have required slightly better technical skills than Gwen could ever hope to possess, and should she live a hundred years. And the ability to think on a slightly bigger scale. Or the ability to think, period. Because really, the idea of bringing in the girl’s father was beyond stupid. And that even before they would realize the threat those ultra-powerful alien pheromones meant for any man who came across them.
A threat Owen got to experience first-hand. Toshiko really tried very hard to feel sorry for him, seeing him naked and handcuffed in Carys’ empty cell. She failed. But Gwen making fun of him after having nearly snogged Carys to death herself was more than a bit hypocritical.
Every bit as hypocritical as Gwen’s lecturing Jack about a severed hand being more important to him than Carys’ life. Granted, Toshiko didn’t know whose hand it was (she wanted to ask Ianto many times, as Ianto always knew such things, no matter how bizarre they were, but somehow forgot about it every time), yet she’d figured out on her own that it somehow had to be connected to Jack’s mysterious past. He’d been truly devastated when the container had been broken, and only a stupid, self-righteous bitch like Gwen couldn’t see that it was a personal matter for him. So yes, a personal loss meant more to him than a dangerous alien on the loose – an alien who was on the loose thanks to Gwen’s own stupidity in the first place.
Owen’s experiment with the rat didn’t serve to calm tempers down, either, but that wasn’t really the doctor’s fault. They needed to find the girl, but Gwen refused to contact her former colleagues at the police, saying she couldn’t tell them to put out an APB for a woman possessed by gas knobbing men to death. Jack was annoyed by her lack of cooperation, but it gave Toshiko an idea.
“Do we know the full name of Gwen’s former partner at the police?” he asked Ianto through her headset, so that the others, who weren’t wearing theirs, wouldn’t hear.
“Just a moment,” Ianto apparently checked something on his own computer. “PC Andrew Davidson. Why?”
“Is there a call number?”
“Yep. You wanna contact him?” Ianto asked.
“Not officially,” Toshiko replied, “but we might have to, eventually. The police could be able to get to any crime scene a great deal faster.”
“Then we should perhaps contact someone higher up the ranks,” Ianto suggested.
“Nah,” Toshiko said. “We can’t Retcon the whole police department. Besides, this Andy character knows Gwen better than we do. He’ll understand that she means disaster waiting to happen. Just have him stand by, in case we’d need him.”
“Will do,” Ianto replied simply and broke the connection.
Toshiko turned her attention back to the rest of her team and found Gwen still trying to play profiler. It was utterly ridiculous, as she didn’t seem to have a clue what she was doing, aside from the near-religious zeal to ‘save’ Carys. All the actual answers came from the others, really.
“We have to think like her,” Gwen lectured, stating the glaringly obvious. “Put ourselves in her place. It's the only way to find her.”
“Except we don't know what her controlling impulse is by now – Carys or the alien inside,” Jack pointed out, rubbing his temples. “The last thing I saw was a fight for control.”
“The overriding factor for the parasite is to have sex,” Toshiko said. “It's a survival instinct – that's bound to be the strongest drive.”
“All right,” Gwen interrupted, not liking that someone else found an answer she’d been unable to find, “so you're Carys. You're desperate for sex cos that's what the thing inside you needs, but you know it will kill. Where would you go?”
Owen gave her a really dirty look. “I'd come round and shag you.” The others turned around and stared at him, apparently wondering whether he’d lost his mind, because really, nobody could be that desperate to get laid. He frowned. “What?! It's a joke! Can't I have a joke with my team-mates?”
Toshiko shook her head in disgust. “Right now? No.”
“So what are we talking about?” Jack asked. “Brothels? Lap dance clubs? Anywhere there's eager men?”
Toshiko thought for a moment, then remembered the last call recorded on Carys’ mobile phone and in made clink. “I know what I'd do,” she said slowly, looking at Owen with a certain evil glee.
Jack seemed to understand what she meant. “Do you have the address?” he asked. Toshiko nodded. “Okay, let’s go.”
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
When they burst into the ex-boyfriend’s flat, all they found was a pile of dust on the bed. Of Carys there was no sign. They returned to the SUV in a really pissed mood. Jack took the driver’s seat again.
“So what's our next move?” he asked.
Owen snickered. “Stop the entire city of Cardiff from shagging?”
Unlike the others, Gwen didn’t find that such a stupid idea. “Hmmm. Put bromide in the water supply?”
Jack shook his head. “Nah, too hit and miss.”
“Yeah,” Owen snickered again. “Besides, the water company got pissed off last time we did that. It took teaboy days of grovelling till he could slip them the necessary amount of Retcon.”
Gwen’s thought returned to the girl. “It could have used any body in Cardiff. Why her?”
“I just assumed it was random,” Toshiko said thoughtfully. “And it had to be a woman anyway, if that thing needs male orgasm to feed off of.”
“It's mining Carys' life to get what it needs,” Jack added. “We need to find her, because if that thing moves on, we might never get a chance to contain it.”
“So, what else do we know about her?” Owen asked.
Jack glanced at Gwen over his shoulder. “Anything you can think of?” he asked a little doubtfully. Toshiko suppressed a grin and looked at Gwen, too.
“What are you all looking at me for?” Gwen got defensive quite quickly, which was not surprising – she didn’t have a clue about proper procedure, after all.
“You did all the profiling, didn’t you?” Owen asked, his sarcastic tone leaving no doubt about what he really thought of her so-called profiling.
“I don't know,” Gwen snapped. “I don’t know, okay? Sorry.” She turned around to look out the window.
“She's really great under pressure,” Owen muttered. “Are you sure your octopus was that good in the sack?”
Jack gave him a quelling look. “Not now, Owen. There's gotta be something. What did you say Carys' job was?”
Gwen shrugged. “She's just a temp. Receptionist somehow.”
“Where's she working at the moment?” Jack asked. Gwen just shrugged again.
“I can pull her employment files up,” Toshiko intervened before their boss could have done something really drastic – like tossing Gwen out of the SUV. She put it in the computer and after a few seconds, she came up with an answer. “Conway Clinic.”
Owen stared at her in shock, which was a rare thing with him; he was a cynic. “You're joking, Tosh!”
“What's the problem?” Jack asked.
“It's a bloody fertility clinic,” Owen explained. “Sperm donors. An unlimited supply of orgasmic energy without all the build-up.”
“Perfect hit,” Jack agreed and accelerated beyond speed limits.
Toshiko texted Ianto, asking him to send the police to the clinic, hoping they could either detain Carys or evacuate the potential victims in time. Only a minute later she got from Ianto the reassurance that the police were on their way. It still meant to endanger the officers, of course, but at they couldn’t hope to arrive on time, so something had to be done.
In the racing SUV Owen reached over and handed Gwen a gun. She looked at it, then took it, holding it so awkwardly that Toshiko cringed in fear she might shoot someone by accident. “What's this for?”
Toshiko could see in the mirror Jack rolling his eyes. “Need a diagram?”
“I've never used a gun,” Gwen stared at the weapon with widening eyes. Jack seemed ready to explode out of sheer frustration.
“I thought you were in the police!”
“I was on the beat,” Gwen returned defensively. Jack shook his head.
“Carry it,” he said. You don't need to use it. But it can’t hurt to at least look like you were a professional.”
Owen snapped the cartridge into a second gun and handed it back to Toshiko. She took it with practiced ease. “You really ought to teach her how to shoot, Jack,” she said. “Right now, she’s a liability. She could get us all killed.” She deliberately spoke in a very low voice, one that Jack could understand due to much practice. Gwen, of course, didn’t even hear her remark – besides, her thoughts were elsewhere already.
“What do we do if we find her?” she asked, meaning Carys. “How are we going to get it out of her?”
Jack glanced at Toshiko. “Suggestions, Tosh? Found any weaknesses?”
“Judging by the test results, the gas needed a host because prolonged exposure to our atmosphere is poisonous to it,” Toshiko replied. “But our bodies are the perfect environment.”
“So, if we isolate it from Carys' body...” Jack trailed off, hoping that Gwen would get the idea. She didn’t.
“It won't survive for long,” Owen supplied. Jack nodded, a little calmer for the first time in hours.
“Sounds like we have ourselves a plan,” he declared.
“Force it to die,” Gwen added, finally getting it. Owen nodded.
“Just like it did those poor blokes, yeah,” there was definitely something like male solidarity in his tone.
“But what about Carys?” Gwen insisted, returning to her main concern like a dog to a rubber bone.
Owen looked at her darkly. “Better start praying we get to her in time.”
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
When they got to the clinic, the police car was already standing at the entrance. Andy and his partner were escorting several men out of the building, trying to get them to safety. Andy pointedly ignored Gwen, but apparently recognized Toshiko (perhaps given a clue by Ianto) and flashed her a wide smile.
“Miss Sato? We got your message. Your colleague said something about a psychotic chick attacking men…?”
Toshiko nodded. “Have you found her?”
Andy shook his head. “Nah, we thought it was more urgent to get these blokes out of harm’s way. I’ve called the rescue service, though; the receptionist lady has been knocked out cold.”
“Good,” Jack said in approval, having caught the gist of it. “Thanks for your help. If you can get these men safely away from here, we’ll take over the rest.”
“Sure thing,” Andy replied, smiling at Toshiko, then he turned back to his protégées. “This way, please! And don’t stop till you’re at least ten blocks away. Twenty would be better, actually.
The Torchwood team entered the clinic, rushing from room to room with their guns drawn. In Room #1 they found a black pile of dust on the floor. Toshiko checked Room #2 and found a stack of magazines and another pile of black dust. Looking into Room #3, she again found a pile of dust on the sofa. Gwen pushed the next room door open and found a pile of black dust on the exam table. She checked the next room and found another pile of dust on the red chair.
“Oh, God, how many more?” she moaned. Toshiko couldn’t even look at her. So many deaths, all because of her incredible stupidity, and she wouldn’t at least shut up!
“In here!” they heard Owen’s voice from downstairs. Toshiko turned around and rushed past Gwen, with Jack in trail, to get to Owen.
They found Owen in one of the side rooms, his gun pointed at Carys, to keep her away from a wide-eyed Andy who was just about to usher a half-naked man out of the room. Jack and Toshiko aimed at the girl too, who was babbling inane things about sex, beauty and fear… sounding strangely like Gwen during one of her rants, in fact.
Then she was hit by a wave of pain and fell to the floor. Gwen threw her gun away, nearly hitting Owen in the process, and knelt down next to her.
“The strain on her body's too much,” Owen said grimly, kicking the gun out of their reach, just in case. “Any second now, she's rat jam.”
Gwen grabbed Carys’ head with both hands, as if trying to see the alien through her clouded eyes, and shook her.
“Use me,” she screamed. “Leave Carys. Take my body as host. And just let her live.”
Jack grabbed her arm. “Gwen, you’re not making any sense!”
Gwen looked up at him with those big, wet, unnatural eyes again. “I'm stronger than she is,” she whined. “I'll last longer. You might be able to save me, I don't know.”
Jack stood up. “All right. Let’s give it a try.”
“Jack! You can't let her!” Toshiko protested. God knew, Gwen’s appetite for men was ravenous enough, even without sex-obsessed alien gas possessing her body. No man would be safe in the whole city…
Jack looked at her sternly. “Like she said... She's responsible for this,” he said and stepped back.
Gwen rose, too, making a heroic stance that would have put the heroine of any black-and-white B-movie from the 1950s to shame. “Come on, then,” she said, stepping back. “Do it. Leave her.”
Toshiko wanted to protest again, but the flash of a small, shell-shaped object in Jack’s hand stopped her. She understand the plan now, and slowly backed off.
Suddenly, Carys’ eyes opened, and she gasped loudly. The gaseous alien came out of her mouth and hovered in the air like a living, throbbing purple cloud. Then it moved on, heading toward Gwen. Gwen shut her eyes and braced herself. Waiting for the right moment till then, Jack finally tossed the inflatable cell on the carpet. The opened… unfortunately, Gwen chose exactly this moment to make a brave step forward, and got trapped in the cell with that roaring… thing, surrounded from all sides completely.
She opened her eyes... and widened them, as she realized her situation was hopeless. And widened them… and widened them… The gaseous creature swirled around in the inflatable cell angrily.
“Shit!” Owen swore. “What are we gonna do now?”
Jack shook his head. “I seriously don’t know. Why couldn’t she just stay where she was? The plan was idiot proof, it would have worked like a charm!”
“Because she’s Gwen-bloody-Cooper who always has to do things her way, that’s why!” Owen returned snidely. “How long can they survive in there?”
“Dunno,” Toshiko sighed. “That thing has just eaten half a dozen blokes; I don’t think Gwen really has a chance. We need to take her out of there, Jack!”
“No, we don’t,” Jack replied grimly. “At least seven people have died already, and it was her damn fault. I won’t set that thing free, so that it can keep killing people, just to save her.”
“Jack, you can’t let her die!” Toshiko protested.
“I can,” Jack said, his face stone hard, “and I will. That’s why I’m the boss. Someone has to make the hard decisions. Better me than any of you. I’m used to it.”
“I’m a bit worried how long that battery'll last for, myself,” Owen commented.
“I don’t think you’ll need to worry about that,” Toshiko said quietly. “Look…”
Inside the cell, the gaseous creature was swirling around, looking for a way into Gwen’s body, who was covering her mouth and nose as well as she could. It wasn’t nearly enough, though. More and more purple gas was leaking in through her fingers, until the whole thing had gotten inside her. Jack checked something on his wrist-strap.
“Oxygen levels are dropping quickly,” he said.
“Jack!” Toshiko all but begged. “Please, you can’t let her suffocate in there! I know she’s a disaster, but she’s still one of us!”
“You still don’t understand, Toshiko, do you?” Jack said harshly. “I don’t have any other choice! The only way to stop that thing is to let her die; it can’t survive in a dead body, and will die with her. I’m sorry, but it’s her or the entire male population of Cardiff… and beyond. We have to choose – I have to choose – the lesser evil."
Toshiko still wanted to argue, but suddenly the inside of the cell was illuminated by a bright purple light. In a spectacular show of sparks, Gwen burst into dust, falling into a small pile on the floor. The cell collapsed. Jack reached down and picked up some of the dust in his hand.
“You travel halfway across the universe for the greatest sex,” he mused. “You still end up dying alone.” He shook his head as he dropped the dust again.
“Are they both dead?” Toshiko asked quietly. Jack nodded.
“Yeah. Call Ianto and ask for standard clean-up procedures,” he then looked into the shocked eyes of Andy. “Constable, we might need your help with the clean-up this time.”
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Two weeks later Gwen Cooper was properly buried – only Torchwood knew that the coffin was empty. Andy and Toshiko supported a grieving Rhys and stayed with him overnight; then they helped him to move into another flat where he could heal and eventually begin a new life.
The people from the clinic were all Retconned and given false memories about a psychotic woman with a knife trying to kill them. They were all happy to have survived, but Conway Clinic stayed out of business for quite some time afterwards. Even the carefully edited publicity proved rather disastrous for them.
Carys had been moved to the sanitarium on Flat Holm; her mind just couldn’t take the shock and broke under the pressure – under such circumstances Retcon wasn’t an option, but at least she would be cared for as long as she lived.
Her father had been told that the drugs she’d been taking had turned her mad. It was the kindest thing they could have told the poor man. He took it hard enough as it was, but what else could they have done for him?
“So, that’s how Torchwood works, is it?” Andy asked a little doubtfully, having participated his very first team meeting in the Hub.
“Yep,” Toshiko answered, patting him on the arm. “You’ll get used to it.”
~The End – for now~
