Title: Catching Monsters
Fandom: Torchwood
Author: badly_knitted
Characters: Ianto, Jack, Kathy Swanson, Owen, Mickey, Andy, Gwen.
Rating: PG
Word Count: 1805
Spoilers: Nada.
Summary: Sometimes, a bit of ingenuity is required in order to deal with what the Rift drops on Cardiff.
Content Notes: None needed.
Written For: Challenge 256: Restraint. Also for the ‘Monsters’ square on my bingo card.
Disclaimer: I don’t own Torchwood, or the characters.



It wasn’t only junk that fell through the Cardiff Rift. Sometimes Torchwood got useful pieces of tech, or antiques they could sell once the Rift radiation dissipated. Once in a while, what they got lumbered with was less of a thing and more of a living creature, although to be fair, some of those were best described as things.

This one had a definite air of thingness about it, all blobby lumpiness and flailing tentacles, and a less than friendly demeanour. That might have been the result of being torn forcibly away from everything that was familiar, dragged through a rift in space and time, and dumped unceremoniously on an alien planet, or it could simply be the creature’s normal personality, but either way something needed to be done about it fast.

It had shown up at mid-morning in the St David’s shopping centre, abruptly appearing in a flash of golden light. According to witnesses, of which there were over a hundred, the monster had promptly picked up the four nearest people in its tentacles and waved them about a bit before tossing them violently aside, resulting in a concussion, a broken arm, several cracked ribs, a bad nosebleed, two missing front teeth, and the sudden and unexpected relief of an ongoing back problem. Even the worst situations occasionally resulted in something positive; if the alien turned out to be merely scared ad confused rather than hostile, maybe it could find work as a chiropractor.

For the moment, however, Torchwood’s job was to capture and contain something that was behaving in a very aggressive manner. Looking at it from a safe distance, Ianto had a feeling that was going to be a lot more difficult than it sounded. The monster was a good eight feet tall even without taking into account the fifteen-foot long tentacles. He’d done his best to count them, but with all the failing the best he could manage was a rough estimate of somewhere between sixteen and twenty-four. The alien’s body, if it could be called that, was a lumpy mass the colour of raw beef, which kept changing shape, rather like a sack full of footballs. The only parts of their new guest it would be possible to get hold of were the tentacles, and they never stopped moving, lashing out at anything that approached, so that didn’t seem like a very sensible idea.

The police had cleared the upper floor of the shopping centre, so the only people up there now were the members of the Torchood team, minus Owen, Gwen, and Andy, who were on the floor below administering Retcon to the shocked shoppers. D.I. Swanson was at the top of the nearest escalator, both making sure that nobody tried to sneak past the uniformed PCs standing guard below, and watching Torchwood do their stuff. Not that they were doing much at present besides standing and staring at the alien.

“What is it?”

Jack was standing closest to Kathy and he threw one of his thousand-watt smiles back over his shoulder at her. “No idea, I’ve never seen anything like it!”

“Well what are you going to do with it?”

“Still working on that. First we need to restrain it somehow, preferably without hurting it.”

“It just injured four people,” Kathy reminded him.

“Three people,” Jack corrected her. “The fourth one’s feeling better than he has in years, or that’s what he told Owen.”

“Fine, three people.” Kathy folded her arms. “That’s still an act of violence.”

“We don’t know what this creature is; it doesn’t speak our language any more than we can speak whatever its native language might be, if it even has one. For all we know, it could simply be scared and trying to defend itself against what it sees as our threatening behaviour. Harming it has to be a last resort; we’re not in the business of killing innocent creatures for the crime of being abducted against their will.”

“You’re right, I’m sorry, it’s just when I look at it…”

“You see a monster rather than a victim. Not all aliens are monsters. That’s one of the reasons we have to keep our work secret; humans aren’t ready to know about the existence of extraterrestrial beings yet. What you need to remember is that we look as outlandish to it as it does to us. To it, we’re the aliens.”

“Do you think it’s intelligent?”

“Hard to say at this point; it might be, or it could just be a wild animal. Hopefully we’ll be able to work that out once we get it back to the Hub. Speaking of which…” He turned his attention back to his team. “Any ideas yet?”

“The nets are out,” Mickey said, watching the alien. “The tentacles would just slide through, a bit like trying to pick up cooked spaghetti in a colander. Might trap some, but not all.”

“Weevil restraints won’t work either,” Tosh added. “The tentacles narrow to a point; even if we could get close enough with every set of restraints we’ve got, and get them clamped them on, they’d just slip off again.”

Ianto looked around at the shops then held one hand out to Jack. “Give me your credit card.”

A mystified expression on his face, Jack did as he was told. “What d’you have in mind?”

“We don’t have the equipment we need so we’ll have to buy it, and I’m not about to use my own money; I’ll never get reimbursed. Better get Owen up here, see what he thinks about the possibility of sedating our friend, just in case my idea doesn’t work. In the meantime, I’ve got a bit of shopping to do.” Turning on his heel, Ianto headed into a nearby department store.

Jack tapped his Bluetooth. “Owen, leave the rest of the Retconning to Gwen and Andy, they can handle it. You’re needed up here.”

“On my way.” The medic’s voice came through the comm. unit so clearly it sounded almost as if he was standing right beside Jack.

Owen rode the escalator up after Kathy gave the nod to the PCs below to let him through.

“What’s up?” he asked as he arrived at the top, glancing briefly at the flailing alien.

Jack got right to the point. “What are the chances of sedating our guest?”

“Should be simple enough, just shoot it with the tranq gun, but whether or not that would kill it is anyone’s guess. Stick a needle in the body and the whole thing might explode, or it might have a bad reaction to the sedative; I don’t have a clue about this thing’s biology. I’d rather not risk it if there’s any alternative, at least not until I’ve had a chance to study samples of its blood and tissue.”

“Alright, we’ll hold that idea in reserve for now, only try it if we have to.”

Ten minutes later, Ianto returned, laden with shopping bags.

“Got any grub in there?” Owen asked hopefully. It was getting close to lunchtime.

“Sorry, Owen; essentials only.” Setting the bags down, Ianto started emptying them. Some beanbags, several large reels of coloured ribbon, and a couple of flat package that Jack thought might be sets of sheets, dark red. Quickly Ianto unspooled several yards of ribbon from each reel and tied a beanbag to the end of each one. Then he handed a reel to each person, roping Kathy in to help.

Jack accepted his reel with a puzzled frown. “What are we supposed to do with these?”

“Not sure yet if it’ll work, but we need to restrain the spaghetti creature without doing too much damage to it so we’re going to play maypoles.”

“Maypoles?” Owen snorted. “What’re you on about?”

“Just copy what I do. Owen, Tosh, and Kathy, circle left. Jack, Mickey, and I will go right.” With that, Ianto lobbed his beanbag at the creature, which snatched it out of the air and pulled it close. Ianto immediately took off running, circling the creature to the right and letting his reel of ribbon unspool as he went.

“I get it!” Tosh tossed her beanbag and as soon as the monster caught it, set off to the left.

Grinning, Jack joined in, then Owen, Mickey, and finally Kathy, running in circles, ducking under each other’s ribbons, until all the alien’s waving tentacles were safely restrained and it looked like some kind of bizarre multicoloured cocoon, wriggling and shimmying where it stood.

The six maypole dancers stopped, catching their breath, while Ianto made a few adjustments to the ribbon wrapping and tied off the loose ends. He returned to the others, smiling in satisfaction.

“Phase one complete; this won’t hold forever though so we’d better get a move on. Jack, Mickey, go and borrow a couple of stepladders from the hardware store over there. And Owen, see if you can get us four broom handles. Tosh, give me a hand with these?”

The flat packages turned out to be duvet covers, king sized. As soon as the stepladders were set up, Ianto and Jack climbed them and slipped the first of the covers over the cocooned creature, puling it down as far as it would go. Then, with everyone assisting, they laid the bundle down across the broom handles. Sliding the other duvet cover over the alien’s lower half was a bit more complicated, but they managed, making sure it was the opposite way around so the two could be snapped together in the middle.

Ianto straightened up and dusted off the knees of his trousers. “There, one monster, safely restrained and packaged for transport. We’ll take it down to the car park in the lift. It should fit in the back of Mickey’s van.”

“I still don’t get what the broom handles are for,” Owen said.

“To make carrying it easier of course.” Ianto plucked one last reel of ribbon from his shopping bags and used it to strap the wriggly bundle of alien to the broom handles, back and forth between them until there would be no chance of it sliding off.

“Ingenious,” Kathy said admiringly.

“I try,” Ianto replied with typical modesty. “It’s amazing what can be done with everyday items if you’re willing to think outside the box. Right, one person each end of each handle; let’s get our friend here back to the Hub. Owen can take a few samples when we get there and then we can put this fellow in a cell and let it untangle itself.

Jack nodded. “Well done, everybody; another successful capture, and with a bit of luck we might be able to send this one back where it came from.”

Picking up their captive, they set off towards the nearest bank of lifts. All in all, it was an excellent morning’s work.


The End