Destruction: Chapter 2 - Collateral Damage

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RATING: PG-13 for this Chapter for some swearing
WORDS: ~ 2100
CHARACTERS: Ianto, Owen, Jack, brief appearances by Tosh & Suzie, Ocs - Brigadier Hamilton, Sam Shuster, Molly
SPOILERS: None, Not canon. This Chapter set pre-Series 1.
SUMMARY: Owen & Jack assist with search & rescue at Torchwood One after the battle at Canary Wharf

All that happens is that the destruction of human beings (unless they're Americans) is called collateral damage.  Harold Pinter 

Captain Jack Harkness, head of Torchwood Three was saddened but not surprised when he received the call from UNIT Brigadier Lloyd Hamilton. Torchwood One had fallen. Yvonne Hartmann and her insane ghost shift experiments had finally reached a disastrous end. He listened to the Brigadier describing the Cybermen invasion, the Dalek counter-attack and the intervention by The Doctor.

 

Most of the 2200 people working at Torchwood One were dead, but Brigadier Hamilton thought there might still be survivors.

 

“I’m sending a helicopter for you and your medic. Technically this is still a search and rescue operation at this point. But put the rest of your team on alert – we’ll need them down here in a few days to help retrieve any alien technology. And Captain, UNIT will be taking control of anything that even remotely resembles a weapon.”

 

Jack began to object. “Sorry, Captain, we’ve always had good working relations with you, but given what Torchwood One’s messing about has caused, we’re not going to let anyone from your organization have control over alien weapons”.

 

Jack was fuming, but he could understand the Brigadier’s position. “OK, we’ll be ready for the helicopter pick up at 01400 hours.”

 

Moving quickly, he scanned the Hub for his team. Suzie, Owen and Tosh were just returning from lunch through the tourist office entrance. They came in laughing and joking. Jack winced a little; this was not going to be easy to tell them.

 

He leaned over the railing outside his office. “Guys, I need you in my office now….its an emergency.” The three stopped laughing and looked up at Jack. Owen sensed that something was really wrong. “What, Jack, are you OK?” He ran up the stairs at full speed, Susie and Tosh following close behind.

 

“Time is of the essence, so I’m going to be quick and direct. Torchwood One has been destroyed. I don’t have many details but there are massive casualties and none of their facilities have survived intact. UNIT is sending a helicopter to take Owen and me to the site.  There still may be survivors so they need every medic with security clearance on deck. I’ll be coordinating with UNIT the retrieval of any surviving confidential files and technology. Owen, I need to you pack whatever medical supplies you think you’ll need.”

 

 “Tosh, look through your files and see if there’s anything in our archives that might be helpful and bring it up here. Yes, I know they’re in total chaos, but just do your best.” 

 

“Owen, give Suzie your house keys so she can go and pack up some clothes for you.” Owen grimaced to himself. “Great, just what I need, Suzie riffling through my stuff.” Out loud, he smiled at Suzie, “just pack what you think I’ll need; I can’t even focus on it.” 

 

Suzie took Owen’s keys and headed out of the Hub. “Guess I’ll finally find out whether Owen is a boxer or briefs kind of guy…just kidding.”

 

Within an hour Suzie had returned with duffel for Owen, Jack had a small flight bag packed and they had a small case of alien equipment to compliment Owen’s medical kit.

 

“Suzie, I’ll need you to take command here while I’m gone. Be prepared to come to London to help with the tech clean-up once the search and rescue is finished. That could be as early as tomorrow.   And Tosh, monitor the comms, we may need to contact you on a moments notice.” 

 

Tosh had been monitoring reports from Canary Wharf while they were waiting.   The casualties from the ‘terrorist attack” already exceeded a thousand people. Visibly shaken she admonished Jack. “Please be careful, I want both of you back in one piece.” Jack gave her a quick hug. “We’ll be fine, you just be careful too. Don’t take any unnecessary risks; work with the Cardiff police if needed; just retcon them afterwards.”

 

Jack and Owen went to a nearby soccer field to wait for pickup by the UNIT helicopter. The flight to Canary Wharf was tense. There was not much said beyond an exchange of names and occupations. The other three passengers were a pathologist, and two soldiers on leave who said that they were called back as part of the clean-up operation.

 

Brigadier Hamilton met the helicopter as it landed near Canary Wharf. Jack introduced Owen and wasn’t surprised to hear Hamilton tell them that Owen might not have much to do. 

 

“There have only been a handful of survivors; most have serious crush injuries and concussions, and they are all thoroughly traumatized. The last of them was transferred to hospital an hour ago.”

 

Owen felt a little sick, he could deal with dead aliens, but he really hoped they wouldn’t ask him to help out the pathologists. “How many?”

 

The Brigadier just shook his head.  “Living – we’ve pulled 25 people out but 3 have already died after being air-lifted to hospital. There may still be people alive and trapped under the debris but given the severity of the injuries we’re seeing and the difficulty of moving debris, we’ll be lucky if we find any more survivors.

 

“And dead?” asked Jack. 

 

“We’ve recovered about 1,300 bodies, not to mention numerous…uh, body parts.” That doesn’t include the five hundred or so fully or partially converted Cybermen who will, for the most part, be tallied as missing.”

 

“Missing?” Owen questioned.  Jack had explained to Owen about Cybermen and Daleks as they waited for their transport, but Owen didn’t understand how converted people could be missing. Jack shook his head; he knew what was happening.

 

“Dr. Harper, I know this is going to be hard to understand but once a human is converted to a Cyberman, even if it’s only a partial conversion, they could become active and endanger the planet. We have to euthanize them.”

 

“What, like an overdose? So why aren’t you giving the bodies back to the families?”

 

Jack sighed, looking at the Brigadier who nodded to him. “Owen, the danger is too great, there isn’t time to use sedatives; they are being shot. Where the conversion was minimal they can fix them up for the families, but you can’t expect them to return bodies that aren’t even human anymore.”

 

“You’re executing them, in cold blood.”

 

“Yes.”

 

“That’s inhumane Jack. How can you possibly sanction that?”

 

“Yes it is inhumane, but the takeover of the planet by Cybermen would be even worse.”

 

They stopped when they realized they had reached the site of Torchwood One. As bad as Jack and Owen had imagined the destruction at Canary Wharf would be, nothing could have prepared them for what they saw. An area about the size of a square block had been flattened. Jack was reminded of the Blitz thinking that he hadn’t seen anything this bad since then. There was literally not even a piece of a structure standing; everything had been destroyed. A few areas had small fires burning; firefighters were methodically extinguishing them. 

 

The Brigadier interrupted their thoughts and explained that search and rescue dogs and their handlers were being organized to systematically sweep the area and he’d like Owen to accompany one of the teams. “And if any converted Cybermen are found, you’ll radio it in and we’ll have our clean-up crew take care of them.”

 

“I just spent an hour riding in a helicopter with two executioners and a body snatcher, could this day get any better?” thought Owen.

 

Jack and Owen followed Brigadier Hamilton over to a large tented base area where operations were being coordinated. Owen was assigned to work with Sam Shuster, a soft-spoken middle aged man and his golden retriever Molly. Owen grabbed his medical kit while Sam put on a small backpack with food and water bottles for himself and the dog.

 

Owen and Sam talked a bit as they walked to the assigned area. Owen noticed Sam’s accent was not from the London area. “Ay, I live in Yorkshire, just in town visiting my brother and his wife. Heard about the terrorist attack and thought we’d come down and see if we could help. UNIT was pretty reluctant but Molly’s got lots of experience finding missing persons. Mind you, nothing like this of course, but she’s found a number of missing children, even a group of girl guides that managed to get themselves lost within a 20 minute walk of their campsite.

 

“So what happens if we find something?” 

 

“If we get lucky and find someone alive, we’ll radio back to base so they can have an engineering team analyze how to extract the person. We don’t want to go rushing around and trying to move things ourselves since the debris could shift and further injure the survivor or us. And we probably won’t have to worry about bodies, because Molly’s trained only to react to live scent. But if do find a casualty, we will mark the area for later excavation.  Once our teams are done, they’ll sweep the site with cadaver dogs.” 

 

They searched until there wasn’t enough light to see but found nothing. Another team had managed to locate and extract another survivor. She was in critical condition but it gave everyone hope that maybe a few more people could be found in time.

 

Jack had had an equally unfruitful afternoon, trying to sort through file access and encryption codes with the Brigadier. Everyone was exhausted when the work was halted for the night.

 

Jack and Owen were offered accommodations at a nearby base which they gratefully accepted. They were simple, but certainly no worse than the Hub.   Each had a small room with not much more than a bed, a tiny shower, and three hangers in an open closet. The rooms suited the men just fine. There were sandwiches and coffee in a mess hall nearby, neither of them ate very much.

 

The next morning they got up before dawn. Owen joined up with Sam and Molly again and they began their slow search of a new area.       

 

*********

 

Ianto struggled to wake up. He couldn’t see anything and he couldn’t move at all. Every part of him hurt; he had dirt and debris in his eyes, nose and mouth, and for a moment he thought he must be dead.  Then he realized he wasn’t. “Fuck, I’m trapped.” He had no idea that all of Torchwood One had been destroyed, how long he’d been trapped or whether anyone was looking for him.

 

He listened carefully and heard some voices in the distance. He tried to call out, but he wasn’t able to make any sound above a whisper. He struggled as hard as he could to move and was rewarded with white hot pain coursing through his body. He gasped at the pain as darkness closed around him again.

 

He came to some time later. Ten minutes, ten hours, he couldn’t tell. He heard some voices, soft, but close by. “Molly, what is it?” 

 

Ianto heard a dog whining almost directly overhead. He tried to call out again, but this time he couldn’t even whisper.   “Think, dammit, this may be your only chance to get out.” He tried to move but only his left hand wasn’t trapped. Maybe he could wave it and get someone’s attention but then realized he was fully underground and no one would see him. He began to panic a little, until an idea occurred to him. It was pretty crazy, but worth a try. He reached up with his left hand and began to scratch his fingernail on the concrete above him.

 

Molly whined again. Owen and Sam looked around the area trying to see what she was sensing. They used their torches to look into openings in the rubble but couldn’t make out anything.

 

Owen thought he heard something that sounded like the dog scratching but it was coming a foot or so away from where Molly was standing. “Sam, I think I hear something - can you get Molly to be still?” Sam signaled the dog, and she sat down and was quiet. Owen pulled out his stethoscope and began placing it on debris listening carefully. He gradually worked his way over to where he thought he heard the scratching and continued listening. 

 

“Sam, call it in, we’ve got a live one.”

 

“Are you sure?”

 

“Listen for yourself.”

 

Sam took the stethoscope and listened carefully. “Jesus, you’re right.” Sam backed away from Owen so he could relay the information to the base.

 

Owen listened again. Three short scratches, three longer scratches, three short scratches then a pause before the series repeated. Owen smiled as he thought, “S.O.S. You are one smart and lucky bastard whoever you are.” He didn’t know whether the survivor would be able to hear him but he yelled, “We hear you, we’re going to get you out, keep tapping, just keep tapping.”

Chapter 3 is here: http://aviv-b.livejournal.com/2505.html