Entry tags:
Torchwood: Fanfic: Alone and afraid
Title: Alone and afraid
Fandom: Torchwood
Characters: Tosh
Author: m_findlow
Rating: PG
Length: 498 words
Content notes: none
Author notes: Written for ![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
scifirenegade’s prompt "Any, any, A room of one’s own" at ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
fic_promptly
scifirenegade’s prompt "Any, any, A room of one’s own" at fic_promptlySummary: Tosh never thought prison would be this bad.
Tosh wasn’t sure what to expect as they marched her down the dark corridors of the UNIT prison, the heavy leg chains clinking as they dragged between her feet, with a secondary chain that ran up from them to attach between her cuffed hands. Why did they feel the need to put her in chains at all? She’d already been through three different checkpoints, all thick concrete walls with metal grating over any small windowed sections, and highly computerised security panels at each one, complementing the handful of armed soldiers that patrolled them. Even if she managed to shake off the two guards escorting her through the facility, she wasn’t going to get more than twenty yards before she hit an impenetrable door and a barrage of bullets. She doubted a fly could have escaped, let alone an unarmed, five foot two woman in a bright scarlet jumpsuit.
One more checkpoint and then in front of her was a large metal door. This one had no window in it for seeing what lay beyond it.
‘The prisoner will comply with all orders as directed to them,’ one of the guards said, as if addressing someone who wasn’t even in the room. He was of course talking to her, though she didn’t absorb the words. This was it, she realised with no small amount of horror. Up until now it had all been like something out of a nightmare, but the reality was coming crushing in all around her.
The door opened and inside there was nothing. No bed, no sink, no toilet. Just an empty concrete cell. She’d expected a prison full of inmates that she’d be forced to coexist with. Dangerous criminals who would see her for what she was – fresh meat, the new whipping boy, or worse. She thought she'd be sharing bunks with them, eating bland food at tables and chairs bolted to the floor with them, and maybe, just maybe, making friends with some of them.
Instead she was being confronted by something far worse. Solitary confinement. Her sentence had been life. Surely they couldn't mean to keep here in this tiny cell forever. This couldn't be what the rest of her life looked like. She was only twenty three. She could live another sixty or seventy years. Not in this place though, she realised. Not with only herself for company and nothing but bare walls and a cold, hard floor. She’d rather be dead than live the rest of her life that way.
Chains were unhooked and cuffs removed, and then the door clunked heavily back into place, with huge bolts clunking loudly into place, sealing her in. This was it. The price she’d have to pay for betraying her country in order to save her mother. This small room of her own where she’d live out the remainder of her days, however many of those might lie ahead. Today, for the first time, she questioned whether the price had been worth paying.
Tosh wasn’t sure what to expect as they marched her down the dark corridors of the UNIT prison, the heavy leg chains clinking as they dragged between her feet, with a secondary chain that ran up from them to attach between her cuffed hands. Why did they feel the need to put her in chains at all? She’d already been through three different checkpoints, all thick concrete walls with metal grating over any small windowed sections, and highly computerised security panels at each one, complementing the handful of armed soldiers that patrolled them. Even if she managed to shake off the two guards escorting her through the facility, she wasn’t going to get more than twenty yards before she hit an impenetrable door and a barrage of bullets. She doubted a fly could have escaped, let alone an unarmed, five foot two woman in a bright scarlet jumpsuit.
One more checkpoint and then in front of her was a large metal door. This one had no window in it for seeing what lay beyond it.
‘The prisoner will comply with all orders as directed to them,’ one of the guards said, as if addressing someone who wasn’t even in the room. He was of course talking to her, though she didn’t absorb the words. This was it, she realised with no small amount of horror. Up until now it had all been like something out of a nightmare, but the reality was coming crushing in all around her.
The door opened and inside there was nothing. No bed, no sink, no toilet. Just an empty concrete cell. She’d expected a prison full of inmates that she’d be forced to coexist with. Dangerous criminals who would see her for what she was – fresh meat, the new whipping boy, or worse. She thought she'd be sharing bunks with them, eating bland food at tables and chairs bolted to the floor with them, and maybe, just maybe, making friends with some of them.
Instead she was being confronted by something far worse. Solitary confinement. Her sentence had been life. Surely they couldn't mean to keep here in this tiny cell forever. This couldn't be what the rest of her life looked like. She was only twenty three. She could live another sixty or seventy years. Not in this place though, she realised. Not with only herself for company and nothing but bare walls and a cold, hard floor. She’d rather be dead than live the rest of her life that way.
Chains were unhooked and cuffs removed, and then the door clunked heavily back into place, with huge bolts clunking loudly into place, sealing her in. This was it. The price she’d have to pay for betraying her country in order to save her mother. This small room of her own where she’d live out the remainder of her days, however many of those might lie ahead. Today, for the first time, she questioned whether the price had been worth paying.