Torchwood First Born (10 page)

Sebastian stood impassively watching a dot matrix printer scream importantly away. He saw my expression. Ts it bad news?'

I nodded, telling him what Jasmine was planning.

'What do you think?' I asked him. I was interested to know. He knew more about the children than anyone.

There was a pause. He considered the question, politely and seriously. He neatly folded up the printouts, handing them over to me.

'It sounds like a bad idea,' he announced eventually. His voice was even. His face placid. But I could tell he was still thinking.

'What do you think will happen?'

'I do not like to speculate,' Sebastian admitted.

'But based on the evidence, the hosts will reject the Scions.'

'Yeah,' I said. 'And how will the Scions take it?'

'Bloody, bloody badly.' This was Tom, storming past like an angry little firecracker. 'Ciggie break.

Don't start a war while I'm gone, will you?'

He kind of had a point. I stood there, shaking slightly.

You know how sometimes you're so stressed, you just don't know what to do next? And then the longer you stand there, the gears in your brainbox grinding unhappily away, the worse it gets? This was one of those days. One of those terrible, I am going to do nothing, all-over-the-place days.

Sebastian made me a cup-a-soup and I gave myself the luxury of going into the hangar. I needed to see something beautiful.

G w e n

Getting the pram there was bloody murder. Let me make this absolutely clear - prams nowadays may have chunky wheels and look like you could go mountain-biking with one, but anything approaching an uphill slope on a gravel path and they start to behave like they're being pushed through porridge.

But I made it to the Weather Monitoring Station eventually. The afternoon drizzle was biting at my face. I'd pulled the special baby cagoule-canopy over the front of the pram, so Anwen looked like she was in some kind of slow-moving moon rover, being shoved along by a damp, fat bag lady.

The Weather Monitoring Station looked pretty much how you'd expect it to look. A collection of fairly unglamorous leftovers from the Second World War.

The armed forces had requisitioned a fair chunk of North Wales, picking out the really, really beautifully unspoilt bits, then built corrugated-iron and concrete sheds on them. This one even had a runway, crazy-paved with moss and those weird stink thistle flowers were everywhere. The whole base was surrounded by quite a nice-looking chain fence. Two sets. Modern.

Razor wire. Around a Weather Monitoring Station.

Because if there's one thing the weather needs, it's carefully protecting.

I found Tom standing on the other side of the chain fence, fiddling with his phone and smoking away. He boggled guiltily at me and looked like he was going to bolt back indoors.

I waved. 'Morning! Just taking the little one for a walk!'

'Here?' He was alarmed. 'Really?'

'Don't suppose there's any chance of a tour, is there?'

He shook his head. 'You must be joking.'

'I'm breastfeeding, I don't have time for jokes.'

We stood there. Separated by the chain fence. Like we were in one of those war films. 'I feel I should be pushing food through the fence to you,' I said. 'But I don't have anything.'

'Not even rusks?' he asked. 'I bloody love those.'

'No. She's too young.'

'Pity,' he sighed. 'I might have been persuaded.'

'Liar.'

He shrugged. 'Just trying to make you feel bad.'

He flicked his cigarette away. It spiralled through the air and landed on the runway with a
pfffst.

'So,' I asked, 'how's the weather?'

Tom held out a hand. 'Damp,' he said. He reached into his windcheater, pulling out his packet of cigarettes. Want one?' he asked.

'Nah.' I sighed. 'Even if I did, I'm probably not allowed one for another twenty years or so.'

'Is it OK me smoking?'

'In the open air, within ten feet of a baby?' I smiled. 'Mumsnet will hunt you down.'

He lit up and grinned at me. 'Drives Josh mad.

Officially, I gave up six months ago. Yet strangely, whenever I get home from work, I stink of it. Pretty sure he's on to me. But I just tell him that Eloise smokes like a chimney.'

'Eloise?'

For a second he blinked. He'd made a small error.

'Yeah. You must have seen her cruising around in the world's oldest jeep. She's my boss.' He leaned forward confidentially, his nose touching the chain-link fence. 'She is an American.'

'Here?' I boggled.

'I know. She's about 300 miles away from a mochachino or Ashtanga yoga. God knows how she copes.'

'So,' I asked, 'what's she doing here?'

He waved the cigarette at me in a naughty-naughty way. 'We have really interesting weather.'

'So interesting she's come halfway round the world?'

'Oh yes,' Tom's voice was dry. 'Along with a suitcase full of chunky knits and disapproval. She is an absolute delight.'

'I'll look her up.'

'Do,' said Tom.

We were silent for a bit. Not quite a comfortable silence. More a 'whose turn is it?' silence. I pointed to the flowers littering the runway. 'What are those things?'

Tom shrugged too casually. 'Weeds?'

'Rhys says the villagers call them stink thistles.'

'Good name,' Tom said.

'They're all over the village. I've never seen them anywhere else.'

'Ah.' Tom wasn't being drawn. 'Funny that.'

He finished the cigarette in one last, long exhale, the smoke meeting the drizzle in a big cloud like a snow globe.
Pfffst.
He jammed his hands in his pockets and looked at me.

'How are you?' he asked, his tone completely different. Serious. Worried.

'I've felt better,' I admitted.

'I'm still so sorry about the whole thing.' He paused, shiftily. 'If you want my advice...'

I smiled. 'Go on.'

'Leave.'

'Excuse me?'

'Please leave. Rawbone isn't a place to bring up a kid.'

I shook my head and smiled at him. 'You do know I'm staying put, don't you?'

'Yeah,' Tom admitted glumly.

We stood there.

'Go on,' I said, 'Let me in. Just for a quick look round.'

'Nice try.' He turned to go. 'Gwen?'

'Yes?'

What did you do? Before you came here? Were you really a policewoman?'

'Something like that,' I admitted. 'But I'm on maternity leave now.'

'Funny place to pick,' said Tom, and walked back inside the building, saying goodbye with a cheery wave.

Rhys

Perhaps I should have gone shopping after I'd found the school. As it was I felt a bit stupid creeping around the village with two bags of groceries.

Jenny's mum had been serving, and had loaded me down with lots of stuff. I noticed that there was now a whole shelf of nappies, antiseptic wipes, and jars of baby food proudly on display. Mrs Meredith had seemed crestfallen when I'd just bought baked beans and some toilet paper, so I'd ended up hunting through the nappies.

'Right then,' I muttered, aware that Mrs Meredith was watching me like an excited pigeon. 'What size are these?'

'Baby size,' said Mrs Meredith, a trace of uncertainty in her tone. 'Why, what do you mean?'

'Well...' I held up a packet. 'There are several sets of sizes - for a start there's three sizes of Newborn and then there's Baby Dry, but they kind of overlap.

You don't want to get that one wrong. What we really want is a size 3 in the Baby Dry, I reckon, but we've kind of been squeezing her into a Newborn size 2.'

I'd been waiting so long to get this stuff off my chest. I tried for a knowing chuckle.

Well, she's not turned purple yet! Truth be known, it's how we'll tell the difference between size 4 and size 4+ that's really worrying me. Then there's the fits - do you go for active or snuggle? Can't quite see which one this is. Can you?'

Mrs Meredith squinted and then sagged. 'I just ordered in nappies.' Her voice was miserable.

'Ah, not to worry,' I said quickly, and grabbed a pack of 84 of the things, hoping they wouldn't leak and bring down the wrath of Gwen on me. She always knows the right size of nappy to buy. Instinct.

'Is that all?' asked Mrs Meredith.

I picked up a tin of banana-and-custard baby food which, actually, I quite fancied the look of. I decided to take the opportunity to sniff out some intelligence.

'So,' I asked, super casual, 'there's a school in town?'

'Oh yes, dear,' she said. 'In the old village hall. We used to send the kids down to town, but nowadays that's quite enough...' She dried up, as though she'd said something wrong. Yet another half-truth.

She then hurriedly asked me a lot of stuff about Anwen, how she was doing, how she was sleeping, whether she was still being breastfed, how she took to the bottle and whether we put her down on her side or her back. She'd clearly been devouring the Daily Hate again, as she was as confused as me about the merits of lying her on her back. I sometimes wonder if that paper believes that the women of Britain are on the tipping point of revolution and the only way to prevent this is by keeping them worried about accidentally killing their children, opening the floodgates to foreigners or dropping dead from cancer.

Anyway, we were setting in for quite a good natter when I remembered the job at hand. Mrs Meredith gave me some fairly sketchy directions to the village hall, something like 'walk past the house that used to belong to the Richardsons - oh, of course, you've never met them, lovely couple, but they've retired now, then past the barns, along the old town road, past a clump of stink thistles, and within a couple of minutes you'll be there, can't miss it. Nice old building, it is, but it does get ever so draughty. They say the roof needs redoing but I've no idea how we'll ever afford to do that. You know how it is...'

I agreed that I did know how it was, thanked her, and left on manoeuvres.

There I stood, crouched low behind a notice board, looking at the village hall. It was the solidest building in Rawbone. If there were a nuclear blast, this would be where the cockroaches would hang out.

I slipped through the gate, crept down the path and towards the window. It was at this point that I realised I should have done the shopping later.

There's a reason you never see James Bond perched on a hotel balcony with a bag-for-life containing a pint of semi-skimmed, that week's
Inside Soap
, and 20 Bensons. Information: it is almost impossible to stealthily put down a carrier that's got tins of beans in it. It sounded like a metal cat falling off the roof.

Not even a ninja could carry it off.

I peered through the window. At a semicircle of teenagers. The children of Rawbone. Standing there at the front was Mrs Harries. She was scribbling on a whiteboard. The children were watching. I don't know what I'd been expecting, really.

This is a stupid thing to realise when you're standing on tiptoe, gripping on to a windowsill with your fingernails and pressed up against a window, trying to read the writing on a distant whiteboard. If I was looking for a heading labelled 'Invasion Plan'

then I was in for a disappointment. They seemed to be learning French.

I listened in to the lesson for a bit. There was something wrong about it. I was sure of that. They were all very good. Mrs Harries would start to speak and they would repeat it.
Ecoutez et repetez!
That was it!

The children continued their French lesson

'Il y a un homme a la fenetre!'

There was something... not quite right...

'Qui est I'homme qui est a la fenetre?'

That was it! They weren't waiting for a response.

They were speaking at the same time as Mrs Harries.

That was impossible, surely...

'L'homme qui nous espionne, il s'appelle Rhys
Williams'

What?

The children of Rawbone all turned to me and smiled. In unison. Mrs Harries waved. They all waved too.

Merde
, I thought.

Mrs Harries beckoned me in. Thoroughly rumbled, and feeling like I'd just been caught carving a weeping willy on my desk, I slunk through the door.

'Bonjour, Monsieur Rhys!'
chorused the children of Rawbone, grinning.

'Bonjour
,' I said weakly.

Mrs Harries started speaking.

'So what do you—' the children chorused simultaneously.

Mrs Harries held up a finger and shushed them.

They shushed her back and then giggled. 'Sorry,' she said. 'It's how they learn. It's brilliant, isn't it?'

'Uhhhh...' I began, but she cautioned me.

Think carefully before you judge us. After all, we're not the ones fogging up windows staring at teenagers. We'd so hate for you to end up on a list.'

She wagged a friendly finger and then rested against the table, her hands jammed in her coat pockets. She looked amused and at ease. I noticed that her body language was, just slightly, echoed by the Scions.

'So... ah...' I mumbled.

Tell you what, Mr Williams... the children will answer any questions you have for them. If you ask it...' She paused and smiled. If you ask it in French.'

'What's French for "bollocks"?' I said.

The children laughed. It was odd. All of them -

in the room together, ever so neat and identical and orderly and yet... just slightly... For instance, I could tell the ones who were Mrs Harries's children. Peter and Paul - their hair had a slight curl to it. There was an almost untidiness to them that you couldn't quite put a finger on, but all the same, you thought that another pass with the iron wouldn't go amiss.

And yet, all of them together, oddly identical. Black hair, clear blue eyes. Like if the Hitler Youth had gone to the Eisteddfod.

Suddenly aware I was the centre of attention, I shifted nervously. The children of Rawbone shifted.

One fiddled with a pen. Another whistled. A ripple of unease went through the room.

'Right then... I mean,
Maintenant.
Er,
oui?'

'Oui.'

'Pourquoi est tu...
no, sorry -
Pourquoi etes-vous
la?