the new ice age [mihi, john & fiver]

[Mihira]

THE NEW ICE AGE
in which Mihira arrives

Retroactive thread; Saturday July 13th, 2010.

[Mihira]

blood to the extremeties runs cold
from my blue, blue heart

The vault had gotten colder since Fiver had left; a red light still blinked furiously in the darkness.

The metal crate was lying amongst the rest, nestled in a wooden box on a bed of sweet smelling straw. It looked like a coffin, the red light on the side illuminating the rough outer crate; it gave it a warm glow, despite the cold that emanated from it. It was advanced technology obviously, but it wasn’t like anything Torchwood Cardiff used – they didn’t know it for what it was, which was a cryogenics pod; a defrosting cryogenics pod. In transit, the pod’s cooling unit had malfunctioned; it had been slowly warming ever since, and the creature inside had begun to wake up.

Mihira’s eyes were open – wells of icy blue that were not yet in focus. Particles of ice clung to her dark lashes, falling in flakes as she blinked slowly. The ice was specially formulated – a mixture of alien and terrestrial chemistry that became oxygen as it defrosted, supposed to aid in the revival process. Normally, after defrosting, it was necessary to medically resuscitate those put into containment – technically, they were in a state of preserved hibernation. It was not, however, programmed to deal with a lifeform that generated an unusually high core temperature.

As the cold leeched away, Mihira’s body warmed – blood began to quicken in her veins, her over-large heart began to beat its normal rhythm, the electrical impulses in her brain began firing and bringing her back to life. She blinked again, a slow opening and closing that did little to dislodge the crusted ice – her eyes focused, looking into the darkness of her crate with a blank expression. Electricity flickered in her brain – she remembered being put into the crate, the scene playing out in her mind like a recording. She ignored it.

Her mind was already moving on, taking inventory of her situation; she was in the crate, she was awake, she was cold and she was injured. The last of these gave her pause – she could feel the pain, though it was almost a foreign object to her mind. The intense cold and quick defrost process had cracked her sensitive skin – she could feel blood welling up from these lesions. She would need to see the doctor, when she found him.

Curious things were going on in her alien brain; her internal balance of electrical signals and impulses had been interfered with by Torchwood India. They had altered her mind, made her programmable and, therefore, dependant on the signals by which they commanded her. Torchwood India was now destroyed, disbanded and, in short, gone – this was not good news for Mihira’s brain. As far as she could be, she was confused. Her hive mind felt the loss of a recognized superior with abject horror, and this translated into basic maneuvers – find out where she was, kill anything she came across, until she found a superior she recognized.

To aid this, she lifted an ice-encrusted arm; tensing the muscles to aid movement, she put her fist through the interior layer of the metal lid, causing a small lump o appear on the exterior shell. It would take her an hour to punch her way through the hybrid metal, but she was nothing if not single-minded.

Upstairs, in the middle of a meeting of very disparate minds, Fiver’s PDA began to blink urgently.

lyrics (C) bic runga

[Fiver Rye]

maybe in her wildest dreams she is a human
but anyone with brains can see she is the new one

Fiver was worried, and rightly so; when your scanners suddenly detect life forms where none were previously - during the week when you are alone in the Hub with no one but your small automatons and, now, John as-trustworthy-as-Judas Hart – it tends to be a justifiable panic situation.

He was now hurrying as fast as his spindly legs could carry him, a whirling dervish of brown cords and undone shoelaces; John followed behind and Fiver was too preoccupied to check him now, or even to think about processing the weapons that he had quickly scooped up and deposited on a desk, in any available space. What the hell could have got into the vault? Suffering Cylons, I was just in there… He paused at his terminal, swinging screens round, one hand to each keyboard as he checked for Rift activity. Nothing local - certainly nothing to explain a brand spanking new beep on the scanners.

“So, didn’t slip through…how could it have got down there, whatever it is?” He took out his PDA, still ignoring the scowling figure following him – his pacing movements and rapid steps meant that he paused, John caught up but already Fiver was moving again. This time he was heading back down to the vaults; something in his vastly overactive brain clicked that he was being followed so, as they walked down the final passage to the Artefact Storage, he waved an arm down a rather dingy hallway and said absently, “If you stay, your bedroom is down there, somewhere. No touching the camera, it’ll zap you.” He froze, then smirked, his eyes still on his handheld computer, “On second thoughts, touch the camera all you want.”

He continued on, muttering to himself quietly – randomly calculated prime numbers, interspersed with the occasional comment on the scrolling text on his screen, “Not human, not weevil, not sleeper, not any of the recognised templates…temperature has lowered in the room, motion sensor hasn’t activated…where the hell did it get in?” He pushed open the door, his quick step slowing as his anxiety was overcome by a coward’s natural caution. Were it not for John behind him, he might even have ventured a comical ‘Hellooo?’ into the vault.

As it was, he simply slid inside, flicking the lights on and looking round hesitantly – the room was filled with the sound. It was a steady, heavy sound; the dull thump of flesh, blood and bone against metal. It resounded in the vault like a half-heartbeat, making it difficult to locate when it came from. Fortunately, the red light on the crate was still blinking away, and soon Fiver was standing over it with a look of apprehension on his face.

“I’ve got a bad feeling about this...” He bent to get a closer look, only to jump almost a full foot back as the internal thud pushed the forming lump further out into the world. Whatever was inside was trying to get out, and with strength like that it was hard to believe it had peaceful intentions. He crouched reading the side of the box and scowling suddenly, “Great; India again. Never going to find the frakking paperwork on it.” He started searching the nearby crates, casting worrying glances back at the source of the foreboding sounds, “Must be some kind of cryogenics, it’s too cold not to be. Scan says it’s a deadlock seal, some kind of alloy…whatever’s inside doesn’t seem to care though. Just when all the happy shiny fits of rage team members are out, I get landed with this. First Encounters of the Crap Timing.”

Fiver was used to talking to himself – this time however, he had forgotten that he had an audience. An annoyed and sociopathic audience.

lyrics (C) amanda palmer
permission got for John bits

[Captain John Hart]

Finally, finally this day was starting to get a move on be a tad bit more interesting for him. As he had been relieving himself of his weaponry on his person,something seemed to alarm the tech boy. Sure he could have just wandered off on his own and left the kid to go scurry over to where ever the hell he was going, but to be honest, John was quite curious to what would have made such a pompous twit loose his head after some beeping. What? Was his lunch burning? Honestly, he thought that his expectations of this institute were a little bit low already. He would just have to have a stern talking to with Jack about all this. So he followed behind the young man, who seemed to be quite frazzled with all of this. John looked around casually, completely ignoring this little man's time of running around like a chicken with a goddamn head. He let out a low whistle as he followed behind the kid, peering around the building. It was awfully similar to the old one - whatever did happen to that one? He would have to find out eventually, when he cared enough to ask - full of fancy, shiny shit. Really was all of these impressive little toys needed? Jack always did like his toys.

“So, didn’t slip through…how could it have got down there, whatever it is?” the voice floated ahead pretty far, making John realize that he had stopped walking to sneer at some of the tools around the Torchwood building. He had his hand resting on some computer and hadn't noticed that what's-his-name had gotten ahead of him. He sighed, getting a bit tired of all this already, but continued to follow him again. "So where's the fire?" John asked, only to be completely ignored. The boy said something about a camera, he was amused by it... dear fucking lord this is getting terrible tiresome already. He stared at the boy for a second, trying to figure out just what the hell good he was supposed to be. Certainly not decoration; they must have some good taste around here. Entertainment? Hardly, John could barely stand him, and everyone knows how patient he is.

By this time they had reached some sort of storage room; answering his question he had a while ago about what the hell Torchwood did with all the crap they came across. Bloody pack rats with shiny toys; John rolled his eyes and let them land on the how cautious the secretary boy - damn, his name was probably something John should take the time to learn... oh well - was being. He sighed heavily, starting to get a tedious vibe from this. At this rate, he might as well shove the boy aside and strut in there to see what the hell was going on himself. "Cryogenics..." John repeated, after something inside the room decided to make itself even more known. Trailing in behind the kid, John moved around slowly, his hands reaching up behind his back. His fingers looped around a pair of Walther P-38s he had, ahem, picked up a week ago off a nice fellow. He wanted to spice some things up, maybe make this a bit more interesting. "So where the fuck is this thing we are looking for, whatever it is?" he hollered over at the other man. With a groan of resounding boredom, he kicked one of the boxes as hard as he could, hoping to brake that pretty little red blinking light it had. At the very least he could piss the kid off enough to make a little show for John.

[Fiver Rye]

maybe in her wildest dreams she is a human
but anyone with brains can see she is the new one

Fiver was not having the best day ever; in fact, he was beginning to regret getting out of his hammock that morning…not that it would have helped, seeing as it as the hammock under the Hub stairs, he still would have been at work, but perhaps he would be less cranky had he got an extra hours sleep.

Captain Cheekbones wasn’t helping.

No one had anticipated the psychopath turning up this early and without prior contact so, while the team people and their guns went to sort out an alien drug ring or whatever, Fiver was left to babysit the Hub. Which he was fine with; let the people with less valuable brains do the moving and shaking, and getting in the line of heavy and very fatal fire. He was here for the machines, so with the machines he stayed. Then the gun-toting retarded cousin turns up and his door, which he has to deal with, and now this?! Whatever it was, it was treading on Fiver’s last nerve – not that it as much of a threat, seeing as how when irate all he could really do was sulk and give everyone small shocks through their equipment. Gwen didn’t like that.

Keeping an eye on the container, he started reading the sides of the nearby boxes – finally is registered with him that the walking weaponry rack had spoken. He looked up, gestured vaguely, his eyes returning to the boxes even as he spoke, “If I knew where it was, I wouldn’t be looking – engage whatever tiny gland you use in lieu of a brain, would you?” He grabbed a crate, flicking his multi-tool around it carelessly and peering inside, his voice echoing woodenly, “We are looking for the crate of paperwork that accompanies the Box that Booms. My Hindi is vague at best, which is why I need to get said paperwork translated,” He paused to gesture with the PDA, since it had access to his patented universal translator which – he was pleased to add, even in his own mind – is now being used by every alien-related operation on the planet, as well as the covert division of the UN.

He opened another create, scowling at the insides as though his geeky anger could incite it to metamorphose into what he was looking for. He continued to speak, rifling through some papers and throwing a rather large and very pretty alien sabre over his shoulder as he dissected the next box, “The banging crate had a cartographic symbol painted on it – a blue circle with a few red…icicles? Here, see…” Fiver leaned over a pile of boxes to point at the image on the wood of the worrying item, “It’s followed by a sequence of Hindi characters, possibly the serial number or tracking code. Just look for that on crates, open ‘em and look for it on paperwork.”

He crawled back to where he had been searching, shooting a worrying glance at the protruding bump in the grey crate – it was becoming white as the metal strained and warped under the unrelenting, rhythmic blows. Like drums…

lyrics (C) amanda palmer
permission got for John bits