Torchwood First Born (13 page)

The traffic goes past, making that neow-neow-neow noise that traffic makes when you're playing at cars as a kid.

Mary's face has lit up, but she's crying so much as she holds that kid. Holds Anwen like she's something wonderful. Which she is. Gwen's leaning, just a little, back against the car. She's not quite steady on her feet, but she doesn't want to show it. She wants to seem so normal. She wants to say that everything is OK.

Which it is definitely not.

Geraint lets go of Mary. His hand eases off her shoulder gently. I imagine he changes gear like that.

Ever so soft. He's a quiet man. I suspect the Cooper men all are. His glance is shifty, he wants to confide in me, and we step just slightly away from the three generations of Cooper Women.

We are standing next to someone else's mobile home.

The mileage on these things always worried me,'

he says.

I agree with him. There's little you can do other than agree with Geraint. He's never really held an awkward opinion in his life. He's never really disapproved of me, but then he's never really approved of me, either. He just gives me that little, nearly shy smile, like we're two people with the same problem, or the same brilliant secret. Gwen Cooper.

'How was it?' he asks. I'm guessing he means the birth.

'Bloody horrible,' I say. I don't go into detail.

'Right enough,' he grins.

We both pull a face. He sucks his teeth in. Like we're talking about a plumbing bill and not the miracle of childbirth.

'How is she?'

'Tired. Brilliant.'

'Good,' he says. He casts a drifting eye over at Anwen. 'Bit tiny, isn't she?'

'She'll grow up quick,' I say.

'Right,' Geraint nods. 'Gwen was a big baby.'

'Oh.'

'They do grow up. Takes you by surprise.'

We talk like that for a bit. Baby chit-chat. I'm standing there, trying not to cast an eye around too obviously, making sure the camper van shields us from any CCTV, watching out for any big black cars gliding silently along the slip road. Anything really.

At any minute, they're coming for us. I know this. But maybe not now. Not in a service station.

Not behind a camper van with an amusing bumper sticker.

'Proud?' asks Geraint suddenly.

Startled, I say nothing, and he studies me closely.

Guardedly. For an instant, I think he's going to say something wise. But he just nods.

'Don't worry,' I say to him. 'We're safe now. We've left it all behind.'

Geraint doesn't blink. 'Have you?'

'I hope so,' I say. 'I bloody hope so.'

'For her sake?' he asks. Looking towards Gwen.

Or Anwen. I'm not sure who.

But I know that we're starting a new life. I'm so bloody relieved about that. Sure, we'll be hiding in the shadows, but we'll be safe. Anwen will be safe.

G w e n

The hangar was full of a vast and growing plant, spilling from a bed of mulch into the furthest corners of the room. It twisted and stretched like something impossibly wonderful in Kew Gardens. Yet it was here, in a dark and draughty hangar in North Wales.

'We call it the Juniper Tree,' said Eloise. 'You know, after those fairy tales where babies are found lying under Juniper Bushes.'

'Yes... but what is it?'

Eloise smiled. 'Would you believe me if I told you it was alien?'

I nodded.

'Very good. That saves us some time. Well, it's more than alien. It's an alien spaceship. Of sorts. Or the remains of one. We don't quite know. I think...'

Eloise had warmed to her subject, and was leaning back against a bench. 'Many years ago we sent the
Voyager
probes out into space - complete with a little primer about the human race. Some drawings, a bit of art, maths and a few seeds. So that maybe, just maybe, if another alien species encountered us...

they would know us. I think this is like that. Another species' version of a probe. Or what they'd send back.

This -' she gestured at the vast plant — 'is their way of saying hello.'

I stared at the plant. 'Hello,' I said.

'Yeah,' drawled Eloise, nodding. 'But what a greeting! It's a viable, intelligent organism. When it landed... well, it was tiny. But from an acorn grew all this... And it became, well, an institution acquired it, and gave it to your government. They discovered what it could do. It makes the Scions, Gwen. The good Lord above knows how or why, but it does. What are little girls made of? Sugar spice and all things nice.'

'Slugs and snails and puppy dog's tails,' I finished.

We smiled at each other.

'My life is a bit odd,' laughed Eloise. 'But it's kinda beautiful.'

We stood in that room, looking up at the plant.

I'm not sure for how long. It invited you to just stare at it, like the first snowdrops in spring, or a budding rose about to push out its first flower. You could almost see it growing. Eloise walked around it, telling me how she could even use it to talk to the Tree's home species. 'But what would we say to them?' she laughed.

'Is it anything to do with the stink thistles?' I asked.

Eloise nodded, approvingly. 'No one quite knows what they are. When they first started showing up, we were quite worried that they'd grow into more Juniper Trees. But they don't. They never do much

- don't even flower. We tried getting rid of them and they just grew back.'

'How did it all start?' I asked. My voice was quiet, almost a whisper, like I didn't want to disturb the plant.

She shrugged. 'I think, like all government projects, the origins are lost in a muddle of paperwork and balls-up. All I know is that someone, somewhere, got me in a few years ago to take charge.'

'What had gone wrong?'

'Oh, nothing really.' Bullshit. Eloise was a bad liar. She was evasive, her gaze sliding off anything rather than look you in the eye. 'Just... well, it was quite an undertaking.'

'But why does the plant make the children?'

Eloise clapped her hands together. 'Oh there's the question. Maybe just because it wants to.'

'Yeah, but... but why are you letting it do it?'

Eloise's smile faded a bit. 'This is a village without children. We are giving them—'

Yeah, yeah, yeah. 'The next best thing. But why are you doing it?'

Eloise looked away.

'Come on, let's see how poor Billy is doing.'

He was lying on a cold slab, wrapped in leaves.

Leaves from the plant. His skin was no longer horrifically blistered, but instead a ghostly pale.

The calm and collected Sebastian was walking around the body, painting a thick green paste on the kid's flesh.

'What's that?' I asked.

'Pulp from the stink thistle plant,' he answered.

'It is stimulating the healing process and should stave off any long-term damage to the tissue.'

I stared at him. Handsome. Neat. Professional.

Utterly artificial.

'You're a Scion!' I realised.

'Yes.' He didn't look up from brushing the paste on like it was gold leaf.

'But you're not a child.'

'No. I am older.'

'But how much older? The kids don't grow up

'Not at the normal rate. I am 30 years old.'

'So what's your story?'

Sebastian

I woke up on 3 March 1981. I could see the
date
on a
calendar
on the
wall.
The
room
was
white
and
smelt
of
disinfectant.
It was
bright, lit
by
electricity.

I was lying on a
metal table.
Standing over me was a
woman.
She was
smiling.

'Well, that went rather well,' she said.

'Good morning,' I said to her, pleased with how my voice sounded.

She shook her head. Wrong. 'It is afternoon.'

'I see,' I said. I did not yet understand. Why am I here?' I asked her.

'That's what we're both going to find out.'

Her name was Elena Hilda Al-Qatari, although she never used her middle name. She was 36 years of age and from a place called Iran. She had studied at the University of Cambridge before coming here. 'Here' was, she admitted, 'going to take some explaining'.

'Can I get off this table?' I asked her.

'Are you going to kill me?' she replied.

I considered. 'No. Why would I want to do that?'

'Oh, you might,' she said. 'We just don't know.'

What do you mean?' I asked her.

We're different from you. So very different.'

Again, I paused.

Why? Is it because we have differently coloured skin? Is that it? Does your darker skin mean that you are superior to me, or that I am superior to you?'

She laughed. She had a rich, deep laugh. 'No, no, it's not that.'

'Is it that we are different genders, then? Which is superior?'

Again, she laughed. 'Oh I like you,' she said.

'Don't change.'

'But Elena, I am already changing. I am constantly changing. In the last 173 seconds I have learned 84, 85, 86 new concepts. Some of these concepts are beginning to interconnect, creating further new concepts. Is there a finite number of concepts for me to know? Tell me... How far apart are the places Cambridge and Iran?'

'Several thousand miles and about a hundred years,' she sighed, then frowned. 'No, ignore that.

I was being frivolous.' She saw my face. 'Wait.

Frivolous... It means that some of the information I told you then was not accurate but was intended humorously.'

'Why would you convey inaccuracy?'

'Because... because sometimes that is what we do as a species. Sometimes it is for humour, or for self-protection, or to manipulate or to deceive. To cover up our own ignorance.'

'I see. So many ideas. Then what piece of your statement was correct?'

'I'm not going to tell you,' she grinned. 'You're going to have to work that out for yourself.'

'That is harder.' I frowned.

'People are hard. You're going to have to learn that if you're going to become one.'

'I see. So I am not a person?'

'I don't know. You're... you're very new.'

'I am 205 seconds old. You are 36 years old. That means that you must know so much more than me.'

She stuck her hands in her pockets. 'Come on, you,' she said. 'Get down off that table, Let's see if you can walk.'

I spent the next 413 seconds learning how to walk. She said that I was a fast learner. I told her that she was a good teacher. She told me that I had learned one of the basic arts of polite conversation: the exchange of mutual compliments.

'So what am I?'

'You are an artificial construct. We found an elaborate extraterrestrial organism that was capable of creating a synthetic life form. We learned how to programme it with datasets. We were able to give it all the information necessary in order to create a synthetic humanoid. You are our first attempt.'

'I see,' I said. 'Someone was able to give it all that information? Whoever could do that would have to be very intelligent indeed.'

She smiled. 'Thank you, you're very kind.'

'Yes.' I smiled back. 'Now it is your turn to say something nice about me.'

A few days later, I had a visitor. Elena had taught me to say 'a few' instead of the exact time. She said that imprecision was
a good thing in conversation.

The visitor was a man in a long coat He was very handsome in that his features were very symmetrically arranged and in a pleasing proportion to each other, making him physically attractive. I could tell that Elena thought this as well, as I could now read her body language and some of her thoughts.

I wondered what this man's thoughts were.

'Cheeky,' said the man, wagging a finger at me.

'What?' I was innocent.

He shot a glance at Elena. 'You know he's telepathic, right?'

Her eyes widened with surprise. 'Why didn't you tell me...?' Her tone was accusing.

'Can't you read my thoughts?' I asked her. In truth, I had suspected that she could not. But I had known that this was a secret. I liked having a secret.

The man sat down. He had very neat hair and clear blue eyes. 'Hello,' he said. 'My name is Jack.'

'Hello,' I replied. 'I have no name.'

'Really?' He turned to Elena. 'We should do something about that, shouldn't we?'

She pulled a face at him. She was annoyed, I could tell. 'Sebastian,' she said after some thought.

'Really?' said Jack.

'Sebastian,' she repeated. 'Unless, that is...'

'No,' I said. 'I very much like the name. I am Sebastian.'

'Lovely,' said the man called Jack. 'So, Sebastian, why are you here?'

'I am afraid I do not know. No one has told me,' I said. And I was telling him the truth this time.

'Ah, well.' He looked cross. 'Do you... do you know where you come from?'

'I've asked him all this!' protested Elena.

'Yeah,' Jack puckered his lips. 'But I'm charming.

He may have been keeping something back.'

'I am not keeping anything back.'

'Right.' Jack looked at Elena and me. 'Right then.' He stood up. 'It's been very nice meeting you, Sebastian.' He nodded to Elena.

He came back a few months later.

'Hello Sebastian, it's your Uncle Jack. How are you?'

'I have learned to read and write in both English and Arabic,' I said proudly. 'I have also a basic understanding of geometry, algebra, geography and contemporary history.'

'Right.' Uncle Jack pulled a face. 'Have you, by any chance, learned to fire a gun yet?'

'No,' I said. 'What is a gun?'

'I see.' Uncle Jack looked cross. 'Let me just have a word with Elena.'

He left. I could hear them shouting.

Later, Elena came into the room. She was carrying a strange object. 'Sebastian,' she said, haltingly.

'This is a gun.'

I picked it up. It was quite heavy and made of metal. 'What is it for?'

She hesitated. 'It is for proving that you can point at a target from a distance. If you can mark that target then you are very clever. That is what the gun is for.'

She pinned up a set of circles on the far wall and handed me the gun. She showed me how to point it.