Slow Decay

‘There’s no video,’ she said, eyes closed, pressed into his chest and smelling the mixture of aftershave and antiperspirant that she knew so well she could tell Rhys apart from a dozen other men in a darkened room. ‘And we weren’t fighting in mud, so you can stop getting excited.’

‘I’m not getting excited,’ he said. ‘I’m just worried about you.’

‘That’s nice. I’m OK. I’ll be even better when I get to bed.’

‘You need to put some antibiotic cream on those scratches. Funnily enough, I actually have some you can use. It’s in the bathroom cabinet.’

‘OK.’

‘You’re not moving.’ His arms went around her. ‘What happened with Lucy?’

‘She’s in custody. In a secure unit.’

‘Will I have to make a statement?’

Gwen shook her head against his chest. ‘I don’t think so. There’s obviously something wrong with her.’ She brought her hands up and pushed herself away from Rhys. ‘Get yourself to bed. I need something warm to cuddle into.’

Rhys headed for the bedroom, pulling his shirt off as he went, and Gwen went into the bathroom. She reached for the door to the bathroom cabinet and pulled it open. Paracetamol, cotton buds, athlete’s foot cream, tampons… where the hell was the antiseptic cream?

OK, there it was, sitting on the bottom shelf.

Right in front of the blister pack that only had two plastic blisters on it, one of which was empty.

And Gwen knew with a sickening lurch in her stomach that if she turned it around, the foil on the back would have two words printed on it.

‘Start’ and ‘Stop’.

FOURTEEN

The Torchwood meeting next morning didn’t get off to a good start, as far as Toshiko was concerned. Owen was bruised and surly; Gwen was bruised and moody; and Jack was irritated at one or the other or both of them. And Ianto was Ianto, fussing around the coffee machine just outside the Boardroom, trying to adjust the temperature of the steam, until Jack eventually said, ‘OK: staff treat. We all need cheering up. We’re going out for breakfast.’

They went out through Ianto’s tourist information centre, and Jack led them to a Turkish-owned cafe that was perched on stilts out over Cardiff Bay. The waves were slate grey and topped with spume, washing over the pebbles that made up what little beach there was. Odd fragments of wood and plastic floated on the water’s surface, eddying back and forth as if they weren’t sure where they were going. A lone swan emerged from beneath the wooden pier that separated the water from the land, aloof and unassailable. In the distance, Penarth Head was almost lost in mist, grey against grey.

‘We’ve had a hell of a few days,’ Jack said after the waiter had taken their order. ‘I know it’s all looking bleak. It happens. Whatever’s going on here is complicated, and I don’t think we have all the answers yet.’

‘Nakitsura ni hachi,’ Toshiko murmured. At Jack’s questioning look, she added: ‘It’s a Japanese saying: “The bee always stings when you’re crying”. It means that things go from bad to worse before they get better. If they get better.’

‘I couldn’t agree more. And I think that part of the problem is that some of us have pieces of information that the others aren’t privy to. If we’re going to make anything of this mess, we need to share whatever we have. Who wants to go first?’

‘We have three people showing symptoms,’ Gwen said, her voice flat, her gaze aimed at the tablecloth. ‘Lucy Sobel and Marianne Till are both in custody in the Hub. We have to assume there are more people out there with this problem, whatever it is.’

‘Owen,’ Jack said, ‘what exactly are we dealing with here?’

‘I don’t know, exactly. Tosh’s computers are still processing the scans from that hand-held thing she knocked together. All I know from close observation is that the symptoms are extreme hunger leading to psychosis and exaggerated strength. Both Marianne and Lucy seem to be trapped in a mental state where the hunger is compelling them to attack people and eat them. Then their minds are glossing over the details and persuading them that they’ve been hallucinating. I suspect that whatever they are suffering from makes them suggestible, as well as psychotic. Blood work is normal, and there’s no outward manifestation of disease. I’m picking up no bacteria or viruses in the atmospheric checks, so I can’t see it being contagious.’

‘It’s not Tapanuli fever, then?’ Jack enquired.

Owen glowered at Jack. ‘I invented Tapanuli fever. It doesn’t exist. It’s not real.’

‘You sure? I only ask because I don’t think I’m inoculated. I missed that day at school.’

‘Look, I was trying to reassure her! I wanted to keep her calm!’

‘Right,’ Jack drawled. ‘That worked out well, didn’t it?’

The waiter arrived with their orders, and they stopped talking while the plates were set down: full English breakfast, with black pudding, scrambled egg, sausage, bacon and fried bread.

‘Should we be talking about all this?’ Ianto asked. ‘I mean…’ He indicated the waiter with a nod of his head.

‘Not to worry,’ Jack said. ‘I’ve got a blanking field generator under the table. Brought it with me from Torchwood. Nobody can hear us outside a six-foot radius.’

Ianto’s eyes widened. ‘You’re joking!’

‘Absolutely,’ Jack replied. ‘Actually, the waiter only speaks ten words of English, and three of those are swearwords. He can swear like a trooper in Turkish as well. In fact, last time I checked he could swear in fifteen different languages. I think he used to be a sailor. Then again, I think I used to be a sailor. There are periods in my life that are a bit vague. That’s one of them.’ He turned to Gwen. ‘Oh, and by the way, you didn’t say who the third person is who’s affected.’

‘It’s Rhys.’ She didn’t lift her gaze from the tablecloth.

Silence fell across the table. Nobody seemed willing to say anything. Eventually, Toshiko leaned across and put her hand on top of Gwen’s. ‘Then whatever this thing is,’ she said, ‘we will stop it. Owen will find a cure and Jack will make everything the way it was.’

‘And as an encore,’ Owen muttered, ‘peace in the Middle East and a resolution to the legal battle between the Americans and the Czech Republic over who brewed Budweiser beer first.’

‘Shouldn’t you be with him?’ Toshiko asked. ‘I mean, if he goes the way of the other two…’

Gwen winced. ‘What was I supposed to do — tie him to the bed? I wanted to stay with him, I wanted to protect him, but I couldn’t tell him why. He only took the pill, a day or two ago, so he’s probably not as far gone as the other two. And if there’s going to be a cure, it’s going to come from here. From us. Staying with him would just… just mean I was waiting for the inevitable. At least here I can pretend I’m helping. So — what’s the progress of this disease, if it is a disease? I have a vested interest now.’

Owen shrugged. ‘If they don’t get enough food, then they start eating themselves.’ He caught the bleak look on Gwen’s face and winced. ‘Sorry, but it’s true. Anyway, I dunno how far they could get before pain or blood loss made them pass out. Maybe both hands and both forearms. That’s just a guess. Then again, given that this thing, whatever it is, seems to affect the brain, maybe it changes the way they feel pain. If they used tourniquets to control the bleeding then there’s no reason why they couldn’t munch their way through both arms up to the shoulders and both legs up to the knees. If they were gymnastic enough, they might get halfway up the thigh. Lips would go as well, of course. They’d probably save the tongue for last, if only because tourniquets wouldn’t work and they’d choke on their own blood.’

Toshiko slid her plate towards the centre of the table. Suddenly she wasn’t feeling hungry.

Judging by Gwen’s white face, she didn’t feel well either. ‘And if they do get enough food?’

‘Then I just don’t know.’ Owen speared a piece of fried bread with his fork and bit the corner off. ‘There’s always the possibility that they just keep on going, but I think that’s unlikely.’