Mountain Madness

[aviv_b_artwork]

Title:  Mountain Madness
Author: Aviv_b
Originally written for torchwood_fest Bingo/Prompt/Exchange: Bingo
Prompt: Illness
Word Count: 1085
Rating: PG
Contains: Character illness, possible PTSD symptoms


Summary: Time resets following TYTNW, but the team members appear to be  remembering bits of their trip to the Himalayas.  Third of several related stories about the Team during/after TYTNW.  May be read as a stand-alone but follows Snow Blindness  (http://aviv-b.livejournal.com/145664.html ) and Avalanche (http://aviv-b.livejournal.com/146068.html
l).

Disclaimer: Not mine; Aunty B's and RTD's

The third time Tosh turned as green as the tea Ianto served her, Owen had seen enough.

“Medical bay, now,” he ordered.

“What? I feel fine. I just have lost my taste for tea recently.”

Owen didn’t believe her for a minute. “You had that same tea from the day I met you. Three in the afternoon, barring an alien invasion, you have that Gyokura green tea of yours. So what’s going on? Because I have to tell you that you are seriously pissing off Ianto. Not that I care about that, but it’s affecting his coffee making skills.”

She smiled. At least Owen was being honest. “Maybe it’s a bad batch,” she replied. “It doesn’t smell right for one thing.”

“Yeah? How’s that?”  Now if something was wrong with Tosh’s sense of smell, that was something he could work with.

“It smells bitter, almost like almonds.”

“I wonder if Ianto isn’t being a bit careless with the washing up,” Owen said. “He has been buying Gwen her favorite hazelnut flavored coffee the last few weeks. Maybe the flavor is somehow getting transferred to your infuser.”

Tosh shrugged. Owen’s voice was making her head hurt and she felt cold, really cold.

“Whoa,” Owen said grabbing her as she swayed on her feet. “You don’t look well at all.”

“I feel cold Owen, chilled to the bone.”

Owen ordered her to undergo a full exam and reluctantly Tosh agreed. He ran every test he could think of and used the Bekaran scanner to see if she was exhibiting any deep tissue damage. Every test came up negative. She had told him that she’d been having chills for a few weeks, starting shortly after Jack returned, but absent any concrete diagnosis, he had no choice to let her return to work .

As he came up the stairs from the medical bay, Owen mused that it was all very odd.  Not only was Tosh having chills, but Gwen had complained of her feet being cold as well. “And where is she,” Owen thought as he frantically looked around the Hub. He felt relieved when he spotted her coming out of Jack’s office. He was surprised to see how exhausted she looked. “She’s obviously not sleeping well either,” he realized. 

He stopped suddenly. This was the fifth time today that he had felt panicked when he momentarily couldn’t locate Gwen. “Get a grip,” he muttered. Their affair was long over so there was no reason for him to be concerned about her whereabouts in the Hub. Yet every time he came up from the medical bay, he found himself compulsively looking around to find her.

“Something wrong?”  Owen jumped, not having noticed Ianto coming to stand beside him.

“If I didn’t know better, I’d think you had some sort of cloaking device, the way you appear out of thin air.”

“Yes, it’s part of my secret ninja archivist skills,” Ianto snarked.  “As you’ve had occasion to remark, I did score at the top of my class in the ‘sneaky bastard’ category. Now where did Gwen go off to,” Ianto remarked looking around.

Owen felt his heart begin to race. “Is she hurt,” he asked frantically.

Ianto eyes narrowed as he stared at Owen. “Why would she be hurt? She just came out of Jack’s office a few minutes ago and I thought a nice mug of cocoa for her would be nice. She’s been having a problem with cold feet lately.”

Owen continued to scan the main area of the Hub looking for Gwen. He felt his whole body relax when he saw her coming up the stairs, presumably from the loo.

“I don’t want to intrude, but are you and Gwen at it again?”

Owen’s attention turned to Ianto. “What? Are you daft? That’s been over for months.”

“I see,” Ianto said, the expression on his face deliberately  neutral. “It just seems that you are very concerned about Gwen’s whereabouts lately.”

“Rubbish, absolute rubbish,” Owen retorted though he knew Ianto was right. But so what. He reckoned that as the team medic it was his responsibility to keep an eye on the health of his co-workers.

Later that night, out cruising at a local pub, he got struck with the urge to call Gwen. He couldn’t explain it, but he had to make sure she was okay. Dialing her mobile, he was surprised when it was answered by Rhys.

“She can’t talk to you right now, she’s, uh, a bit busy,” Rhys told him. The concern in his voice was obvious.

“Rhys is everything okay,” Owen asked.  When Rhys didn’t respond, Owen continued, “it’s the strangest thing, but I just had a feeling that she was in trouble. I’m sorry for intruding.” He went to end the call, but was stopped by Rhys.

“Wait! Don’t hang up,” Rhys said lowering his voice. “She’ll kill me if she finds out I told you, but she’s really not well at all. Having nightmares, and getting queasy and her feet are cold all the time.”

“Could she be pregnant?”  Owen was a bit embarrassed to ask, but he if she was, he had to know.

“First thing we thought of,” Rhys replied. “She’s taken at least two home pregnancy tests over the last few weeks and they are negative. So no, that doesn’t seem to be the cause.”

“Well I’ll have a look at her...”

“Look mate,” Rhys interrupted, “I told you she doesn’t want anyone to know. So don’t go talking to her about this tomorrow. Besides, it’s not like she’s the only one who is acting strange, you know. Tosh is cold too.  And, I don’t want to be rude but she says you are constantly looking for her and its giving her the creeps.”

“Yeah well, that’s cause I’m her medic,” Owen said defensively. He heard Rhys huff with irritation. “Don’t worry, I won’t single her out. It looks like this is a team issue and not related to any one member of the team.”

“Yeah, well if you can fix this, I’d be grateful,” Rhys said quickly and then hung up. Owen smiled. He could hear Gwen calling Rhys’ name right before the call ended.

Owen was convinced that something very serious was happening to the team. Trouble was, he had no idea what it was. But everyone was affected. Tosh and Gwen feeling cold and queasy, that could be a virus. But now Ianto was acting sad and well, almost like he was guilty of doing something terrible.

"Damn him," Owen thought, "if he's hiding another dangerous alien in the Hub, I'll kill him myself." 

His own behavior was strange as well. He thought he was over Gwen. Was he having regrets now that she was sporting an engagement ring? He snorted. Now that was daft. It was fun while it lasted, but she wasn't the first co-worker he'd shagged, and he suspected she wouldn't be the last. 

And Jack of course. He was practically giddy when he was with everyone, but Owen had walked into Jack's office after everyone else had gone home one evening and seen him in tears, looking grief stricken as he stared at a picture of the team. 

Owen was completely baffled.  But since everyone’s symptoms began not long after Jack returned, that’s where he would start.