Torchwood: Fanfic: Full to overflowing

[m_findlow]

Title: Full to overflowing
Fandom: Torchwood
Characters: Torchwood team
Author: m_findlow
Rating: PG
Length: 1,338 words
Content notes: none
Author notes: Written for m_findlow's prompt "Any, any, overflowing" at fic_promptly
Summary: The hub has sprung a leak

Tosh stood there on the metal gangway, looking over the edge.

'What do you think?' she asked.

'Not sure,' Ianto replied, giving it an equally perplexing look. 'I've checked all our internal plumbing, but I couldn't find any blockages or broken pipes.'

They both peered further at the pool of water that surrounded the base of the water tower. It was usually about two feet deep, dirty and had a manky smell that they just couldn't get rid of. Ianto had the devil's own job of sluicing the foul looking moss off the base of the water tower, returning it to its gleaming silver. Now though, the water was at least four feet deep, rising up to meet the very edge of the concrete enclosing it, the metal gangway only inches above its highest point. Another few inches and it would be overflowing.

'It comes in from the bay, though, doesn't it?' she asked.

'Well, technically there's a pipe that goes under the plass which supplies fresh water up through the internal structure, and which then flows out of the top to spill down the surface. The water at the base collects from the pipe, but you're right, ultimately, it's channeled back out through a larger feed pipe that ends up in the bay. That said, water goes into the tower, flows down over the tower, and is supposed to go out the bottom.'

'So if that's the case, how is it going up now?'

Even as they discussed the matter, there was a gurgling down beneath their feet and the water level surged up another inch.

'I'm off to get some sandbags,' Ianto declared, disappearing, leaving Tosh to wonder how it came to be that the hub owned sandbags. They seemed to own a lot of stuff they didn't usually need, most of which was thanks to the rift dumping it on them.

Ianto spent the better part of the morning packing large sacks of sand all around the edge of the rift pool which was continuing to slowly rise. No one else seemed overly concerned about it, assured that it would somehow miraculously fix itself. Jack took one look at it and merely said 'Huh, never done that before,' before making his own disappearing act.

When the water started to overflow the small pool, soaking into the sandbags, and drifting across the floor in a slick sheen, the team agreed that they would have to start doing something about it, which only served to annoy their archivist, who had been telling them all that for several hours now.

'But what I don't get,' Gwen said, 'is why it's doing that.'

'Maybe it's backed up underneath where it's supposed to flow out,' Owen suggested.

'Only one way to find out,' Jack said. 'Someone's going to have to go down there and have a look.'

Four sets of eyes all stared directly at him, electing him unanimously.

'Oh, come on guys. Why me?'

'You're our brave esteemed leader, aren't you?' Gwen said.

'Well, yes,'

'And you're cleverer than us mere mortals,' Owen added.

'That is often the case,' Jack admitted, ignoring the thinly veiled insult.

'And,' Ianto added, 'no one else looks quite so good in a wetsuit.'

'Never were truer words spoken. Okay, you've sold me.'

Twenty minutes later, Jack was decked out in what could only be described as the world's tightest fitting wetsuit, leaving very little to the imagination. Owen checked the oxygen tank, whilst Tosh was outlining the blueprints that showed him where the ducts lead, and each of the major intersections with other bits of underground piping, in case he should take a wrong turn and get lost. As it was, the hub floor was entirely submerged, and they were hastily moving computer equipment out of the way where it wouldn't short circuit and electrocute them all.

'Your comms will have limited range down there, so try not to swim too far out,' Tosh warned. 'Hopefully anything down there will be fairly obvious.'

'Roger that,' he said, before stepping into the water that went halfway up his chest, and bobbing down below the surface, finding the outlet with his feet and pulling himself down inside it, disappearing from view in a mass of bubbles.

It was a tense wait, but eventually Jack resurfaced, needing help to get himself back out of the rift pool, which was now three feet deeper than when he'd left. The rest of the team were waiting for him on the second level gangway, throwing him a rope to help pull him out of the deepest part, before he paddled over to meet them.

'I think I found the source of our problem,' he said, pulling something out of his belt pack. It was metal and shaped rather like a banana.

'Hey, that's one of our anti-gravity clamps,' Tosh said. 'One went missing from my desk a couple of days ago. I just assumed someone took it.'

Owen and Gwen helped pull Jack up onto the gangway where he pulled off his snorkel mask and sat down.

'I think someone did take it, Tosh. Just not the someone you were expecting.'

'Who?'

'When you look at this, what does it look like to you?'

Tosh looked at him like it was a trick question. Luckily for her, Ianto quickly interjected with the flippant answer.

'A banana.'

'And who do we know who likes bananas almost as much as she likes chocolate?'

Ianto took the anti-gravity clamp and switched it off. As soon as he did, the water in the hub began to slowly recede. He looked at it again.

'I suppose she could have thought it was edible and taken it.'

'And then when she realised it wasn't food she's dropped it and it's landed in here, fallen through the pipes, and voila,' Jack finished.

'And it if was activated,' Gwen added.

'Yup. All the water in the pool weighs less and starts heading skyward.'

'So, we all nearly drown down here because of that stupid lizard?' Owen asked, annoyed that his sneaker was now starting to squeak from being wet.

'It's not her fault it looks edible,' Ianto countered.

'Maybe you should feed her properly.'

'Oh, and you can talk about misinterpreting food. At least she didn't try to blow us all up with inflatable soda!'

'Guys,' Jack said, trying to break up the argument before it got out of hand. 'I think we've all learned a valuable lesson not to leave stuff lying around. Dinosaurs don't know what anti-gravity clamps look like, much less that they're not edible. Luckily in this case, no harm was done.'

'Unless you count the cleaning up we'll have to do once this water goes back where it belongs,' Ianto sighed.

'Your pet, your problem,' Owen said, glaring at Ianto.

'Our pet,' Jack clarified. 'Don't think I don't see you sneaking her half a muffin when you think no one's looking, Owen. We'll all pitch in to mop up.'

It was no small job once the water had finally receded back down to its original level. Tosh and Gwen spent their time mopping up all the remaining puddles, whilst Ianto went back and forth removing the buckets full of water they were quickly filling up with their mops, leaving Jack and Owen to lug the doubly heavy sandbags back downstairs to dry it before they could be properly stored away. By the end of it, they were all very damp and very tired.

'If I never see another drop of water, it'll be too soon,' Tosh and, wearily flopping down on the sofa.

'Yeah,' Gwen agreed. Give me somewhere hot and sunny.'

'I'll just settle for dry,' Ianto added.

As reward, Jack took them all out to one of his favourite haunts which had nice open fireplaces, comfy armchairs and the best hot chocolate in town. I wasn't quite a dry, sunny beach, but it was the best he could manage, and no one seemed to mind it one bit.