Risk Assessment (8 page)

She picked the lock with surprising elegance, and stepped into the flat. ‘Goodness, how deplorable the living quarters of the urban poor,’ she sighed.

The last time Gwen had looked round an apartment at SkyPoint, it had been at its very best. Polished furnishings, mood lighting, the works. Now she found herself touring a flat by flashlight, with the knowledge that every step could be her last. It just seemed empty and rather sad – a sofa robbed of most of its leather coverings and all of its stuffing, kitchen cabinets sagging off the wall, bathroom eerily cold. And the wind. She shuddered.

‘Someone has left a window open,’ said Agnes.

Gwen wasn’t so sure. She crossed over. ‘No.’ The floor-to-ceiling window glass had gone. ‘It was sealed in with plastic.’ They were only on the first floor, but, standing overlooking the SUV with no hint of a safety barrier. . . she felt a slight twinge.

Agnes nodded. ‘All right, my dear. I think I get the point. Plastic is everywhere. I believe we’ve learned our lesson without needing to belabour the issue.’

They made their way down the stairs, the handrail sticky to the touch. Gwen realised her breathing was shallow. She was terrified, as though the building was about to collapse around them.

They got to the door, and Agnes paused, hitching up her skirts. ‘Get ready to run,’ she said.

Outside was the noise of rain – but a rain of glass, as panels, caught by the wind, fell down from the floors of SkyPoint. ‘It might, just might,’ gasped Agnes, ‘be safer to wait until every window has fallen out. But by that time, I rather feel there might not be much building left.’

And so, with a shrug, they ran for the car. Gwen decided that, if you added the danger of being decapitated to the horror of being eaten alive, it really wasn’t that good a day.

VIII

IN WHICH A GREAT PATRIOTIC

CONFERENCE IS HOLDEN

A light supper is taken, in which a truth drug is administered, and the deficiencies of the Undead are much discussed

Agnes swept into Torchwood, wiping the odd splinter of glass from her dress. ‘Jones,’ she barked, ‘I fear the carriage has sustained some damage. You will see to it, while I speak to your employer.’ And then she marched past, bearing down on Jack like an avenging angel.

Gwen winced in anticipation, but Jack was all smiles. ‘Agnes!’ he beamed. ‘What did you find?’

If his bonhomie withered under the strength of her glare, he did his best not to show it. ‘I would like a word with you away from your staff.’ She gestured to the door of the office. ‘Take a turn with me around the room, Captain,’ she commanded.

Ianto and Gwen stood outside, watching the row played out in mime. Ianto passed her a cup of tea. ‘Funny day, isn’t it?’ he said.

Gwen nodded, and took a sip of the tea. It was horrible.

Jack’s arms were flapping up and down like a bird and he was yelling, really yelling. Agnes’s face was tight with cold fury, a gloved finger pointing at him sharply.

‘Quite a woman,’ said Gwen.

‘Oh yes,’ said Ianto.

‘Do you think he’s going to cry?’ she asked.

‘Dunno.’

They stood and watched for a bit. And then Ianto went to clean the car, and Gwen went to Wikipedia plastic.

Under cover of night, the Vam rolled away from SkyPoint. It had feasted. It had grown. If you had uncurled it, you would have been faced (very briefly) with something like a mobile football pitch. It had learned much from SkyPoint, sampling a range of materials and working out which of them it could usefully consume. Truthfully, the Vam could eat anything, especially if it was a threat (and then quite slowly), but it had a preference for a few materials. And it had quickly sorted out what they were. Food didn’t have to be alive – if it simply required sustenance, as it now did, then this plastic was the perfect fodder. But if there was some life to be consumed as well, then that was joyous.

As the Vam undulated along the road towards Cardiff Bay, it considered its next move. What the Vam really needed now was a vast storehouse both of complicated polymers and livestock. Fortunately, it now knew about late-night shopping hours.

Gwen looked around the Hub. At Jack staring into a microscope, at Ianto doing something very pointedly at the other end of the building to do with paperwork, and at Agnes, staring seriously at a computer like a nun at a sewing machine.
In for a penny. . .
thought Gwen, getting up from her desk and crossing over to Agnes.

‘Yes?’ Agnes looked up, all teacherly, and suddenly Gwen remembered Mrs Wilson, who liked inviting the girls in her form round to tea. She’d choose four girls each week – invariably four who Just Didn’t Get Along and force them to cram onto a Viyella sofa, sipping milky tea from Charles and Di china and nibbling at over-margarined malt loaf while Mr Wilson loosed off silent-but-deadlies in the corner. This was a very bad idea but. . .

‘Fancy popping out for a bite to eat?’ she asked.

Agnes considered it. ‘A little light supper before things get really hectic? Why not! I hate thwarting on an empty stomach.’ She stood up, smoothed down her dress, and looked over at Jack and Ianto. ‘Capital idea. This is quite the best time to take an hour or two away for refreshment and reflection. We shall leave the menfolk to try and track down the threat. After all, I don’t think Captain Harkness does his best work with me breathing over his shoulder, do you?’ And Agnes winked, ever so slightly.

‘Come on,’ she said, ‘I could eat a horse.’

On the wrong side of the River Thames was a supper club that was frequented only by hoodlums, thuggees and outcasts from common criminality. It was exceptionally hard to get a reservation.

The Waxen Maiden had squatted in the Embankment for nearly two hundred years. Its rooms were cramped, the air repugnant, and the food regrettable. The one consolation was that the exorbitant prices guaranteed the silence of the staff.

At the far reaches of the club, along one of the foulest-smelling corridors, under the noisiest of railways lines, was the most exclusive salon the Waxen Maiden had to offer. Mr Jilks had overseen this particular room for nearly three decades, turning a blind eye to frequent depravity and occasional murder.

Born, literally, on the banks of the river, he’d known only a life of fighting and villainy. His face was latticed with scars, and his lips were twisted into a drooling grin. It was rare that he was beaten in a fight.

Tonight he was on extra vigilance. His guests were important, and he was standing guard outside with young Conradin, a man with the olive complexion and all the vices of the Turk.

Inside the salon, Mrs Magee was hurriedly ladling out a broth into worn china bowls before beating a hasty retreat. A collection of figures in suits sat staring at the remarkable man who was addressing them.

He was remarkably tall and portly, rather like a beer barrel wrapped in velvet. He had long white hair and an orange beard, and smoked glasses that flashed dangerously in the candlelight.

A portrait of the late Queen hung over the soot-encrusted fireplace, draped with a black sash.

‘In celebration of the accession of our beloved King, I have thrown together this supper club. This is a time when nations change like seasons, and empires quiver and fall like leaves in autumn. It is a period that can be marked only by a meal of great moment. You are aware that the dish of which you are about to partake is unique. No one has ever, in the history of time, eaten such a thing. You are all epicureans who have paid handsomely for this privilege, and you are to be richly rewarded. Even I have not tasted this creature yet.’

He gestured to something in the corner that rustled and twitched.

‘If only Mr Darwin could have been at our table. I’ve read in his journals that he feasted on Dodo. How he’d have enjoyed eating this. . . a creature from beyond our world.’

And he looked around the table and smiled. There was dutiful applause. The man bowed.

He picked up a sharp knife and pointed to the assembled diners. ‘I think the honour of preparing this alien should go to. . .’ The knife waved across the room and settled on a figure. ‘Well, Madam Squeers, as the only lady present. . . would you care to make the first cut?’

The woman stood, bowing stiffly, and acknowledging the jealous murmurs of the others at the table.

She took the knife ceremonially and observed it coolly. And then she turned to the diners.

‘It will be an honour,’ she said.

And she looked up, her face caught in the flickering light.

The tall man gasped. ‘You. . . you’re not. . .’

The knife made only the tiniest noise as it whispered past his windpipe, before making several darting movements around the table.

It was all over in seconds. The woman surveyed the diners slumped over the table, and cocked an ear to check that she hadn’t alerted either Jilks or Conradin.

She dipped a finger in the soup and tasted it. Too salty.

She turned, and advanced on the figure in the corner. It rattled with alarm, but she held the knife up to her mouth in a shushing gesture. ‘I am here to help,’ she said, bending down and slicing through the cords that bound it.

As she stood back, the alien unfolded, twitching arms like branches spreading out from a body made of toadstools and mossy tree bark. It shuffled towards her, sharp leaves whipping through the air. For a second, it looked like it was about to fall on the woman, and then it paused. Waiting.

She looked at it calmly, and spoke. ‘My names is Agnes Havisham,’ she said. ‘We have received your message. Help is on the way.’

They strode out of Torchwood into a night down the Bay. It was early evening – post-work drinkers trying not to stare at the woman in crinolines before deciding she was probably promoting a tourist attraction.

Gwen found them a cocktail bar/club/dim-sum parlour where the service was unobtrusive to the point of being non-existent. Agnes stared happily out across the Bay.

Gwen ordered beer for herself and tea for Agnes, then sat back. Mustn’t make it look like an interrogation, she told herself. And yawned happily. ‘What do you think of Cardiff?’ she asked.

‘Oh, magnificent what’s been managed here, don’t you think, my dear?’ Agnes said. ‘Cardiff really has made itself. Why, I remember the first time I came here was in. . . ooh, turn of the century before last. That Rift had opened up and the dead were walking the streets. Apparently it wasn’t the first time. Well, that was the local legend, anyway. Honestly, you’d have loved it – taking pot shots at the Undead without their grieving loved ones noticing. Oh, the mess!’ Agnes laughed, as though it brought back fond memories.

‘Oh, Zombies!’ Gwen laughed as well. ‘God, they’re the worst, aren’t they?’

‘Ah, you’ve met the Undead? No conversation!’ Agnes smiled.

‘Yeah, and no real plan other than shuffling around, eating people and stinking the place out.’

‘Tiresome,’ Agnes agreed. ‘And requires no end of explaining away.’

‘Oh, we don’t really bother with that so much these days,’ said Gwen.

‘What, my dear?’ Agnes’s cup paused halfway to her lips, and her eyes narrowed dangerously.

‘Well, these days the whole alien cat is rather out of the bag.’

‘Am I to reprimand Captain Harkness for this?’ Agnes asked.

‘Oh no. The Daleks invaded.’

‘Goodness!’ Agnes gasped. ‘I’ve seen lithographs, but never come across such fearsome mechanicals! And have you?’

‘Horrible,’ said Gwen. ‘But after that. . . well, everyone kind of knows about aliens. We still try and keep Torchwood a bit secret. But, you know, alien invasions and so on are now a bit like a rubbish one-night stand, you know. Everyone just prefers not to talk about it.’

‘I see,’ said Agnes. ‘And what is a one-night stand?’

‘Ah,’ said Gwen.

Agnes poured herself a cup of Chinese tea and noticed, with interest, the bottle of beer Gwen was necking. Her calculating look suggested that drinking straight from the bottle was somehow a little wrong.

Gwen made another guess. ‘And Torchwood Cardiff – what was it like in the early days?’

‘Well, my dear. . .’ Agnes looked thrilled to be asked. ‘Actually, I was influential in getting Cardiff a Torchwood base, don’t you know? It was before I became the Assessor – when I was down here shooting at zombies. I thought, “This thing’s ’appened before, and it may well ’appen again, Aggie, you mark my words.”’ She coughed slightly, and her voice resumed its normal timbre. ‘And I realised the Rift was strong enough and still very much dangerous. It was as though it had lain dormant for millennia but some space-time disturbance a few years earlier had just. . . shifted it slightly. Awoken it, you might say. Curious.’

‘I see,’ said Gwen.

‘And I was right – from then on it was. . . oh, you know. Elizabethan plague doctors walking the streets, a litter of alien objects, strange lights in the sky. . .’