Title: Snowdon Peak Crash
Author: ardea_herodias
Pairing: gen
Rating: PG
Summary: The team is sent out to investigate an alien presence on Snowdon Peak. As usual, things go wrong, and only one member of the Torchwood team is able to help. Rating only because Owen has a potty mouth.

***

As far as Torchwood Three field calls went, this one was reasonably routine. In other words, it was ridiculously early in the morning, the sun hadn't even thought about coming up, it was snowy and frigid, and Jack was driving like a bat out of hell. About the only thing out of the ordinary was that Tosh was back in the Hub with a sprained ankle minding the comms. Ianto and Gwen were holding onto their seats trying not to be thrown to the floor. Owen was riding in the front passenger seat and shooting evil looks and swearing at Jack every time he did anything–foot to the accelerator, brake, turned the steering wheel, asked Tosh for directions, inhaled, exhaled, blinked–the lot. Typical.

"Tosh, anything else you can tell us?" Jack's voice crackled through his headset.

"Something small and definitely alien landed on the eastern slope of Snowdon Peak." Tosh replied. "You're about a third of the way there as the crow flies, but it will take you another hour at least."

"Are you kidding, Tosh? Jack's driving. We'll be there in record time with whiplash and all our teeth broken," interjected Owen. Somebody in the back seat choked back a laugh.

"Thank you Owen. As I was saying, it's not large, there isn't any sign that it has caused any kind of disturbance, and there's no massive media rush so far."

"Just get us there, Tosh?"

"Always, Jack."

Aside from Tosh giving out directions, the rest of the drive was carried out in complete silence. Gwen somehow managed to doze off. Ianto spent much of the drive looking out the window. When they were about 10 minutes away from the area of interest, Owen reached behind him to wake up Gwen. He noticed that Ianto was rubbing his ears as if they hurt.

"Tosh, we're not going to have to go all the way up the mountain, are we?" asked Jack.

"No, it's on the southeast slope, near a fairly well-marked bridle path. Perhaps a kilometer off the road or so, and you'd be walking downhill."

After driving to the closest point of approach, all four piled out of the SUV. The bridle path was obvious, as it was marked by stones on either side, and just as obviously covered with fresh snow. Owen took one look at it and dove for the boot of the SUV, digging through several gear boxes and tossing things on the ground behind him.

"Listen up. It's bloody cold out and we're on a mountain, so the chances of something going wrong are fairly high. That and this is Torchwood and we're chasing some unknown alien that didn't have the common decency or good sense to land in a civilized area, so that'll make the chances that this goes tits-up even worse." Owen tossed each of the other three one of the packages he'd dug out earlier. "These kits have two space blankets, four chemical heat packets, a small torch, and a small siren. If you get into any kind of trouble, put the blanket on and do what you have to do to stay warm. I can fix Weevil bites and broken bones and whatnot, but frostbite is permanent and bloody painful and I can't fix fatal hypothermia." He stuffed his kit into a small backpack and glared at the other three.

Jack nodded, his face absolutely serious. "We will stay together as a group. We don't know what this is, and we don't know what it will do. Otherwise, standard procedures apply. Don't shoot anything until we know what it is." He noticed that Ianto looked very pale and was rubbing his ears. "Ianto, what's wrong?"

"I'm fine, Jack." Owen's head went up and he stared hard at his colleague.

"Ianto, you're as white as a sheet and you're rubbing your head. What's wrong?" repeated Jack.

"I have a bit of a headache, started when we got to the mountain. It's nothing." Ianto shrugged, and after giving him a penetrating stare, Jack motioned for the team to start walking.

The four started down the path. Jack and Gwen walked in front, Owen following, and Ianto trailing behind. Jack was entertaining Gwen with a rather funny anecdote about a Weevil and an angry mother cat with three kittens. The Weevil, it seemed, had been so scared of a ten-pound calico moggy that it fell in a garbage bin, making it the easiest Weevil catch he'd ever had. Owen noticed that halfway through the story, Gwen started rubbing her ears. Remembering that he had seen Ianto do that on the ride to the mountain, he turned around to ask him if he were alright. And froze.

"Shit! Jack! Man down!" Owen ran back up the path, where some fifty meters before Ianto had silently keeled over into the snow. "Tosh! Give me vitals on Ianto now!" He dragged Ianto's unconscious form back onto the path, cursing, and nearly fell over when Jack picked up his legs. "God damn it, Jack, watch what you're doing!"

"Sorry! What the hell is going on?"

"Jack I'll let you know when I do. Tosh, come on!"

Tosh's voice crackled over the headset. "His breathing and pulse are elevated, like he's in pain, but his body temperature is fine. I didn't notice when he fell, there was no change between when you left and now."

"Bloody tea boy, so much for having just a headache and it being nothing." Owen pulled out one of the thermal blankets from his kit and rolled Ianto up in it. "Jack, where's Gwen? Normally she'd be fluttering around by now."

Jack opened his mouth, turned to look back down the bridle path, and said, "Oh, shit." He took off running.

Gwen too was lying unconscious in the snow.

"Tosh!" Owen's voice was sharp, "Gwen's vitals, now! And how far are we from this alien thing? Two team members falling down on a hunt doesn't make me feel nice and warm and fuzzy inside."

"Gwen's vitals are completely normal. She isn't even registering pain like Ianto was." Tosh's voice had a distinct tone of worry. "You're about 200 meters from the source of the disturbance."

Owen bit back yet another curse word as he looked back toward Jack and Gwen. Jack was sitting next to the unconscious Gwen, holding his own head in his hands and rubbing his ears.

"Oh no, no no no, Jack! Get up! Sod all!" He left Ianto lying face-up on the trail and ran towards the other two.

Jack was conscious but clearly in tremendous pain. His face was as white as a sheet and his hands shook as he rubbed at his ears. Owen ignored him–he was still conscious–and dragged Gwen back up the hill to lie next to Ianto. Putting her in the second space blanket, he lay the two side-by-side in a spooning position, hoping they would help each other keep warm. Then he ran back to Jack.

"Jack, what the bleeding hell is going on? Look at me!" Jack's pupils were heavily dilated and he flinched when Owen grabbed his head. "Can you speak?"

Silence.

"Jack!" Owen slapped him, hard, across the face. "Talk to me! What is happening to you?"

Jack moaned at the slap but otherwise had no response.

"Tosh!" Owen roared into his earpiece. "Ianto and Gwen are out cold and Jack is completely useless. Where is that fucking thing and what the hell is wrong out here?"

"Owen, what about you? Is anything wrong with you?"

"Aside from my bloody teammates bloody passing out on me in a snowdrift on the side of a bloody mountain, you mean?"

"Well, you have your usual sweet disposition, so I'll take that as you being unaffected. Is Jack still conscious?"
"Conscious, yes, able to do anything besides rock and moan like some crazy at a mental institution, no." Owen gave up trying to get Jack to walk as a waste of time, hooked his arms under Jack's arms, and dragged him back up the hill next to Ianto and Gwen.

"Okay, Owen, so what do Jack and Gwen and Ianto have in common with each other but not with you? Because whatever knocked them down either doesn't affect you or it hasn't affected you yet."

"Let's see...obnoxious, annoying, like to shag their coworkers..."

"Aside from that, come on."

"I dunno...wait...they were all rubbing their ears like they were ringing. Ianto complained of a headache, and Jack looks like he has a nightmare of a migraine right now."

"And you haven't heard anything?"

"No."

"Did Gwen seem to have a headache too?"

"I don't know, I didn't see. Jack and I just turned around and she was down." Owen grabbed Jack's survival pack, extracted yet another thermal blanket, and manhandled him into it. He pulled open one of Jack's eyes, and noted that his pupils were pinning rapidly.

"Do your ears hurt, or your head?"

"No! Oh, shit, Ianto, what're you doing..." His voice trailed off as Ianto sat bolt upright, rolled over, and began crawling on hands and knees down the trail.

"Owen? What's going on?"

"Poncy fancy suit boy has decided to walk down the hill! I'll talk to you in a moment, I've got to figure out what he's doing."

Owen lay Jack down next to Gwen, arranging them so that Gwen's back was curled up next to Jack. She was still out cold, although otherwise everything seemed normal. If he hadn't known better, he'd guess that she were asleep. Jack was still shaking and moaning and rocking himself. Fine, he'd keep him and Gwen warm that way.

Running to catch up to Ianto wasn't an option, given how slippery the snowy bridle path was. Not that it was necessary, he was crawling on hands and knees and still halfway wrapped in the thermal blanket. "Oi! What do you think you're doing?"

Ianto ignored him and continued to crawl downhill. Owen grabbed his shoulder. "Oi! Talk to me, mate!" Ianto turned his head and looked Owen full in the eyes. Owen nearly fell over in fright–he didn't know who or what was there, but it wasn't Ianto and it certainly wasn't human.

"Lost," said Ianto, in a high-pitched voice. He turned back to his crawling.

"Fucking hell!" Owen pulled Ianto to face him again.

"Lost. Cold. Lost. Lost. Scared. Lost. Hungry. Lost..." The words were coming from Ianto's mouth, but each word sounded like a different person speaking, and not a one of them the owner of said mouth. "Hurts. Scared. Lost. Lost! Hurts. Cold. Lost..." Doggedly, Ianto shook off Owen again and kept down the hill.

With a backward glance for Jack and Gwen, Owen followed Ianto. "Tosh, are we close to whatever it is yet?"

"Ten more steps and you'll be standing on it. What's wrong with Ianto? Are you still doing alright?

"I'm scared out of my mind and tea-boy is speaking in tongues. No clue what's wrong. What are we looking for?"

"Owen, I. Don't. Know." Her voice was strained.

"Well, what bloody help are you then?"

"Owen." That was Ianto; his voice was very quiet and and slow and sounded like he was speaking from a very long way away.

"Ah! Tosh, hold up. Ianto, what the blue bleeding fuck is wrong with you?" He looked back at Ianto, and noticed that one eye was clearly still alien crazy and the other eye had a human being looking back at him. If anything, that was more frightening than having him entirely possessed by aliens.

"Owen, I can hear it but I can't touch it. Lost. Cold. Lost. Lost. Hurts..." His voice faded for a second, and the strange alien babble eventually gave way to a deep voice with a Welsh accent. "If I touch it, it will kill me, and kill Jack, and kill Gwen. You have to take it back to the SUV. You have to take it."

"Take what, mate?"

"The spaceship. You're standing next to it." His voice was growing weaker.

Under the snow lay a downed alien spacecraft that Owen had assumed to be a rock. It was roughly the size and shape of a rugby football and the dull grey colour of pumice. Owen didn't think twice before grabbing it.

Ianto collapsed into the snow, screaming in terror. The voices raised themselves to a fever pitch: "Scared! Hurts! Scared! Scared! Help! Please!" Owen gripped it tighter as he stared at the writhing man on the ground. "Ianto! Talk!"

"Owen. Find the force." Ianto's voice sounded pretty forced itself, and was gritted through his teeth. The man looked like he was having a seizure, but at least the screaming was gone.

"Find the force? Who do you think I am, Luke Skywalker? I can't just wave my hands and say this is not the alien spaceship you're looking for! What are you talking about, you crazy Welsh git?"

"The force. Fell off the ship...when it fell...Hurts. Cold. Lost. Scared. Hurts. Coldscaredlosthurtsscaredscaredlostscared..."

Owen kicked around the snow before finding two small grey knobs, each about the size of a walnut. He carefully put down the spaceship (while entertaining murderous thoughts of kicking it for a converted try) and picked up the knobs. Immediately they snapped together: Jesus Christ! Owen thought. The force of their impact together nearly took his fingers off...

Force! Magnetic force field, fell off the ship...

"Ianto, I have the force, where does it need to go?" Ianto was lying on the ground rocking back and forth like Jack had, but he responded to the question by turning his head. "Answer me, man, we don't have all day!"

"Coldscared. Hurts...the Force goes on either side. The Force forms the two points. Lost. Scaredhurtsscaredcoldscared."

"Points? Right." Owen carefully examined the ship, leaving it where he'd lain it down. On either end, the pointy ends of a football, there seemed to be small indentations. Taking a deep breath, he separated the magnets and held them one at either side. And nearly jumped out of his skin when the ship began spin violently quickly between them.

"Power. Power. Force. Scared. Hurts. Power. Power. Power!" The voices coming from Ianto's mouth surged with excitement. The undertones of fear and pain were still there, but Owen could hear profound relief as well.

The spinning ship suddenly levitated off the ground before surging into the air and out of sight. "Good riddance to bad rubbish," Owen said. Out loud. He turned around to see Ianto awkwardly rise to his feet. "Oi, welcome back to the land of the living!"
"Thanks," replied Ianto, in a voice that was both strong and entirely his own.

Owen looked up the hill and saw Jack standing, looking dazed, and Gwen pushing herself into a sitting position. "You alright, mate?"

"Go see them, I can walk."

Owen looked at him. "At least you didn't try to tell me you're okay." He sighed. "Tosh! Whatever was going on is over, the aliens buggered off and everybody's awake now. Talk to Ianto, as he walks up the hill, will you? He's going to be all self-sacrificing and noble and all that shit when he really needs to be in bed."

Ianto looked at Owen and shrugged. "Jack and Gwen might need a doctor."

Owen ran up to Jack and Gwen to find them talking.

"...psychic attack, probably the worst I've felt in a long, long time. Don't know what happened but it's over. This was your first one, I guess?" Jack was holding her close to him, stroking her hair.

"The fear..." Gwen's voice was shaking. "It just hit me, like a brick wall. And I was trapped, and I couldn't get out of it."

Owen spoke up. "They didn't mean it."

"What?" Jack and Gwen both spoke at once.

"It wasn't an attack. Don't know where they were from, but they crashed and they were telepathic. An attack is on purpose, and once their ship was fixed they buggered off. Attacks don't work like that."

"So, Owen," Gwen asked, "how did you figure out what to do?"

"I had help." He gestured behind him to Ianto, who was sitting on a rock a short distance away, obviously trying to compose himself.

"How?"

"Ask him." Three pairs of eyes, plus Tosh's metaphorical (and eavesdropping) set, turned to face Ianto.

"Ianto?" Jack asked. The tall man obediently looked up. "What happened?" Ianto sighed and walked over to the rest of the group.

"I could hear them...but I knew it wasn't me. I was cold and afraid and my head hurt, but I knew what was me and what wasn't me." He swallowed. "I tried to tell Owen what they were telling me, and he fixed their ship and sent them home."

"Right," said Jack, "Into the SUV. We'll deal with this at the Hub."

0000000000000000000000000000000000000

On the drive home, Gwen sat in the front with the seat laid all the way back so she could sleep. Ianto sat next to Owen.

"Owen." Ianto spoke very softly.

"What, mate?"

"Thank you. You saved our lives."

"What the fuck are you talking about?" Owen was speaking in the same hushed tone as Ianto, but it was hard to keep his incredulity down.

"The ship. The aliens had our minds. If one of them died, all of them would have died, and it would have killed us. Jack would have come back to life, but Gwen and I would have been gone." He paused. "That's why you could touch the ship and we couldn't. If I'd touched it, the mind surge would have killed me, and because it killed me it would kill all the aliens and Jack and Gwen. You saved our lives." Ianto looked away.

Owen's mouth hung open. "How...what...are you serious?"

"Serious as a heart attack. Do you have any psychic abilities, Owen?"

"None at all."

"That's why, then," said Ianto. The two men looked at each other briefly, before returning to their own thoughts.

***