Ficlet_zone Challenge 18 - Any which way

[m_findlow]

Title: Any which way
Fandom: Torchwood
Characters: Ianto, Jack, OCs
Author: m_findlow
Rating: PG
Length: 1,014 words
Content notes: none
Author notes: Written for Challenge 18 - Amazing Stories Reverse Fandom (You Gotta Believe Me) at ficlet_zone
Summary: Ianto is on his own and backed into a corner.

'You get those people out of there,' came the command from Jack over Ianto's earpiece. 'I'm not losing you. You get out and get away as far as you can.'

Ianto hated Jack right in that moment. How dare he make this about him surviving. He'd brought these people down here so they'd be safe from the thing three floors up, but now Jack was telling him to evacuate them. Didn't he understand it was too late? He'd been out there twenty minutes ago and the thing had started seeping through the walls of the corridor just outside. There was nowhere left for them to go now. They could take their chances but some of them were going to die.

He looked around the room full of people. They were mostly mothers and children, having been in the child care center on the second floor when he'd arrived. Putting them down here until the danger had passed had been his only option at the time, and had seemed like a good one. Now he was furious with himself for not doing something different. He didn't know what exactly, only that they had two alternatives. Stay down here and hope that reinforcements by way of Jack and the rest of the team would arrive to contain the creature, or to go out there and try and stop it himself, with absolutely nothing to fight it. His gun was useless against a creature that could seep through walls like alien slime, and whose very touch would eat through skin like acid, right down to the bone.

It wasn't fair of Jack to thrust this decision on him. He was forcing Ianto to make a choice to let some of these people die. In his mind that simply wasn't an option. They were all terrified as it was. Asking them to do anything was fraught with danger. And, he didn't mind admitting, he was a little terrified too.

'We have to go.'

'But you said we should stay here. That it wasn't safe out there.' That came from a rather mouthy young mother who'd taken charge of the flock earlier, helping him to corral them down here. If he recalled correctly, she'd shouted "move your fruity almonds!" Bless mothers for coming up with completely innocent substitutions for good old fashion Welsh swearing.

'I know, but-'

'Well, make up your mind. It's either safe or it isn't.' Okay, now Little Miss Mouthy was starting to be a right pain in the almonds.

'I never said it was safe. Not out there, anyway.' Out there it was bloody chaos.

'Well, that's a bit stupid then. Why on earth would we go out there?'

'Because you're all going to die down here!' He said it with such anger that he surprised even himself. He also said it rather more loudly than he'd intended, broadcasting it to all and sundry. He was going to lose his "sugar" at Jack and give him "fruity" what for if he made it out of here alive.

He expected the room to erupt in panic but instead they were deathly silent, hugging their children who were equally hushed and barely crying. Diplomacy in the face of adversity was not going well.

'I'm sorry,' Ianto apologised. 'I thought I was keeping you safe. My friends... They're not coming.' He felt awful just vocalising it. The team - his team. They'd always come to the rescue when things were dire, and now Jack was telling him he was on his own. He'd never been left on his own like this before. It wasn't fair of Jack to ask him to make this kind decision. How was he supposed to choose who got to live and who died? He might not even get a say in the matter, but if he sent everyone back out that door, that was what was going to happen.

He wasn't good at this hero stuff. Wasn't that why he'd been put on babysitting duties in the first place? He was emergency back-up. He was the SUV valet service. Nobody expected him to save fifty women and children from certain doom.

'You didn't mean it, did you?' one woman asked. 'Please don't let my little girl die.' She was hugging her daughter to her chest and Ianto felt his own chest constrict painfully. Kids. It had to be kids, didn't it? He'd never forgive himself if anything happened to them.

What would Jack do? Probably go out there and get eaten by that creature, given it terrible indigestion and then cause it to explode violently. Not really an option unless you were immortal and liked having your flesh melted off by acid.

He looked around the room in desperation. There just had to be some alternative. Bloody hell, though, it was a storage room. Single access point, not built to survive an alien slime invasion.

He spied a grate nestled into the wall just overhead. It was large. Large enough that if he could fit, so could everyone else.

'There's a carpark in the basement, yeah?' Little Miss Mouthy nodded.

A car park full of cars that could probably withstand a few drops of acid alien hitting their roofs as they sped out through the exit and out to safety.

'What are you thinking?'

'Every air ventilation system in the world has two key points. The roof and the basement.' He tugged at the grate, yanking it off the wall and peering inside. He shone the light from his phone down the dark tunnel, looking for any signs of seeping green goo. So far, their passage appeared clear. He turned back to face the troops. 'Anyone got their car keys?'

Twenty women rifled through handbags and held them up. Bless women for never going anywhere without their handbags!

'We're going through here,' he said. 'All of us,' he added for emphasis.

'In there?'

'I can't promise it's a sure fire thing, but it's better than staying down here. I need you to trust me, please. Someone made me promise that no one dies today.'