Exodus Code (23 page)

Gwen stirred, the ice-pack tipped onto the pil ow. Rhys reached across for it. Gwen’s hand shot out and she grabbed Rhys’s arm.

‘Kil me. Please.’

‘The moon gazed on my midnight labours, while, with unrelaxed and
breathless eagerness, I pursued nature to her hiding-places.’

Mary Shel ey,
Frankenstein

Whitehall, London, next day
AT 9 A.M. sharp, a severely coiffured woman in her twenties ushered Dr Trimba Ormond into Alan Pride’s suite of offices in Whitehal , directly between Horse Guards and 10 Downing Street. The London Eye was visible through the window, a perfect metaphor, Ormond thought, for the man’s position in government – there he was at the heart of everything, yet somehow maintaining enough distance to avoid having to tilt too far one way or the other.

The madness that was afflicting women worldwide had been bumped down the news agenda. The sporadic tremors and subsequent appearance of the strange geysers rising up from beneath the world’s oceans had captured the attention of the press, in Britain and abroad. Dr Ormond, however, was not about to let the issue slip from Pride’s radar. Over breakfast with her husband and daughter, she’d practised exactly what she was going to say to Mr Alan Pride.

‘I respect the position you’re in, Mr Pride, especial y in light of this recent oceanic event, but as far as we can tel these formations are benign. That is not, however, the case with this mental il ness that’s affecting so many women here and around the world. The public should be kept informed, and these women deserve to be treated with the ful resources that we can bring to bear.

To simply continue to say that these women just need to be sedated is neither a solution nor a palatable stopgap any more. The public has a right to know what we’re doing to find a cure, especial y given the increase in suicides among these woman and the rise in violent crimes towards their families. Are we simply going to wait until they al kil themselves and then hope that the problem wil disappear?’

Her daughter had found her argument convincing, but Ormond wasn’t sure a 10-year-old real y counted, or even much cared. Problem was, Ormond was becoming convinced that far too few people in positions of power did either. A few mad women was nothing compared to massive rock chimneys popping up across the world’s oceans. If even the worst of the papers had bumped the story to an occasional feature, what chance was there of engaging public interest in a few emotional y unbalanced women?

Ormond had wiped jam from her daughter’s chin, kissed her husband and let her driver carry her briefcase and her coat to the car.

‘Try to stay sane today,’ her husband had cal ed as she left. Funny man.

And now she was sitting waiting for a man who could decide on a whim whether those women sank or swam.

‘Mr Pride wil be with you shortly,’ said the assistant. ‘He’s on an overseas cal at the moment. Can I get you a coffee?’

‘Thank you. Black. Two sugars.’

Dr Ormond was sipping her second cup when the heavy office doors swung open and Alan Pride stepped out to greet her.

‘My apologies for keeping you waiting, Trimba.’

He proffered his hand, his shake strong and purposeful, placing the other on the smal of her back to usher her into his office. His hand on her back felt warm, his fingers strong. Dr Ormond felt a kick of desire low in her abdomen that took her quite by surprise. She let herself be guided to a round table, where she was surprised to see another woman, about her own age, already seated at the table. Ormond felt a flash of anger that she hadn’t been the first one to the table and she wasn’t going to have Alan Pride to herself.

Gracious, she thought, where on earth were these thoughts coming from?

She was happily married…

‘Dr Ormond,’ said Pride, pul ing out a chair for her, ‘this is Dr Olivia Steele, Director of Neuroscience at the Cardiff and Vale Health Board. She’s also an expert on issues of women’s mental health.’

Dr Ormond shook Dr Steele’s hand, feeling another jolt of desire shoot from her fingers to her toes.

This morning, she thought, is turning out… interesting.

‘I’ve asked you both to join me,’ said Pride, ‘because I’ve received some good news and some disturbing news about the recent wave of mental il ness among women in various parts of the world. As you know, Trimba, many of the international health agencies are at a loss for treatment and, honestly, so are we. Olivia, however, has brought me some new information and I thought in light of your position that you should be one of the first to hear it. I must, though, ask for a caveat: I need your signature on an Official Secrets document.’

As if she’d been waiting for her cue, the minister’s assistant marched through the double doors and set a sheet of paper in front of Ormond.

‘It’s standard procedure in such matters,’ Pride went on. ‘Olivia has also signed one. It simply states that anything you are about to hear about this “Masochistic madness”, as the press have label ed it, you may not reveal under any circumstances.’

‘And if I did?’ asked Ormond, guiltily realising as she spoke that she was only asking the question because she was annoyed that Dr Steele had signed the papers before her. Ormond’s desire had quickly turned to jealousy and she hated herself – and Dr Steele – for the shift.

‘If you did,’ smiled Pride, ‘then I’d have to kil you.’

He tapped the bottom clause of the document where it explained she would forfeit al rights as a British citizen, and she would be considered an enemy of the state. Ormond scanned the paragraph, and then signed the document, but she couldn’t quite shake the notion that Alan Pride might actual y have meant what he had said.

‘Thank you.’ Accepting the document, he co-signed beneath it and slid it into a folder sitting in front of him.

He tapped his iPad, the office lights dimmed and a photograph of a man came up on the white wal in front of them.

‘This is Captain Jack Harkness. The Captain and I have worked together in the past a number of times. He has a theory about what is happening to these clusters of women. If he’s correct in his assessment, then we may have a cataclysmic problem on our hands. I know this man’s history, and because of that I’m inclined to grant him his request.’

‘And what is he requesting?’ asked Dr Steele.

‘He’s asking for our silence and a boat load of sedatives.’

The Ice Maiden

Off the coast of Wales, a week or so before Isela’s shot
EVA STOOD ON the port side of the
Ice Maiden
, binoculars in her hands. Next to her, Hol is was leaning against the rails of the ship, his face tilted towards the heat of the late-afternoon sun, smoking a cigarette. Eva lifted her binoculars, scanning the distant Welsh coast, the ship anchored miles out to avoid detection from the British coast guard and the naval ships now surrounding the geyser.

‘It’s beautiful here,’ said Eva, ‘reminds me of home. This coastline is a bit like the Pacific Northwest.’

‘About the only thing in Wales that reminds me of home is the smel of fresh fish.’ Hol is flicked his burning cigarette over the side of the ship.

‘Hol is!’

He shrugged. ‘My bad.’

Turning from the sun, Hol is looked across the channel to the docks of Bridgend. ‘They better bring somethin’ tasty back with them. I’m getting tired of finding exciting things to make with frozen tuna and packets of scal oped potatoes.’

‘And I’m getting tired of eating them. Any idea who this person is?’ asked Eva.

‘He’s a friend of Cash’s from way back. I think they were on a mission together in the 80s. Al very secret and scandalous, if I know Cash.’

Eva caught sight of a fishing boat pul ing away from a distant dock and heading towards the
Ice Maiden
. ‘Is he a spy?’

‘Wouldn’t surprise me one bit, darlin’,’ said Hol is, pushing away from the side and heading to the steps down to the kitchen. ‘Whoever he is, they’l expect some dinner before we set off.’

Eva watched him climb below deck, and then she shifted back to watch a fishing skiff cutting through the waves towards them. Below her, Dana was preparing the landing deck and the ladder. Looking up, she waved at Eva directly above her.

Eva and Hol is had drawn the short straws and had been left on the ship with Finn. The rest of the crew had gone with Cash to get supplies and to pick up their passengers. Dana had drawn a new assignment that she had refused to share, even with Eva.

Cash’s reaction to reading the message in Welsh that had come across the teletype had been strange and completely in character. He laughed, swore profusely and said, ‘Nothing like making an entrance.’

He’d turned to Vlad and told him not to worry about who had infiltrated the computers, it was not an enemy and the power would return in a few minutes.

It had, and they’d stormed from the North Atlantic south to a port north-west of Cardiff.

‘So who exactly is crawling inside my hardware?’ asked Vlad, when the storm had abated and things below deck had returned to normal.

‘Torchwood,’ said Cash.

‘Never heard of them,’ said Eva.

‘I have,’ said Vlad. ‘Secret agency. Did some important stuff to get us al dying again. Ties to the CIA, right?’

‘Maybe.’

Cash had Finn alter their course and brought them directly to the south coast of Wales. Where they were heading from here was anyone’s guess.

*

‘Permission to come aboard,’ said Jack, saluting Dana, who stood on the platform next to the ladder, the wind buffeting her against the ship’s iron red hul .

‘Permission to do whatever the fuck you want to me,’ she grinned, throwing herself into Jack’s arms, her head barely reaching his chest.

‘Such a lovely way with words,’ said Jack, swinging her off her feet.

Rhys was standing on the bow of the fishing boat, his face blanched with worry, watching Cash, Byron and Vlad manoeuvre a stretcher with Gwen strapped to it onto the platform, where Dana attached a winch to the stretcher, then tilted Gwen to a standing position, her head flopping onto her chest. From the controls in the wheelhouse, Finn then hauled Gwen up onto the deck. Eva was waiting at the top, and made sure she landed softly, realising immediately it didn’t much matter. Whoever this woman was, she was completely out of it, comatose even.

On the platform, Dana turned to Cash and from her tiptoes, she grabbed his head and planted a long deep kiss on his lips. ‘Behave yourself. Or when I see you, I’l take even more of your money.’

‘Rhys has everything you’l need, Dana, and you can trust him completely,’

said Jack, lifting his bags from the fishing boat.

Rhys held out his hand and helped Dana on board the fishing boat. She lifted her bags and carried them down below.

Vlad picked up Jack’s bags and Cash took the heavier cases – weapons, assault rifles, he’d guess, if weight was anything to go by. But, who knows?

Jack’s diverse and unusual weaponry always amazed Cash and he knew better than to question its provenance.

Within fifteen minutes of the fishing boat docking with the
Ice Maiden
, Jack was the last one remaining on the platform. Rhys remained as close to the edge of the fishing boat’s bow as he could without tipping into the sea. His rain slicker was soaked and his face was wet with tears. The gulf between him and Jack and Gwen had never seemed so wide as it did at that moment.

‘I wish I could come with you. I could help,’ said Rhys, his voice choked with emotion.

‘I know you could, Rhys, but you need to stay in Wales for Anwen’s sake.

Mary isn’t up to it on her own, you know that, and if I need something done from this end I need to know I have you and Andy here to take care of it.’

Rhys nodded. When Jack had told him about the
Ice Maiden
, its mission and its crew, and how he thought it’d be safer if Gwen was with him on the ship rather than at the house, where she’d have to be under constant watch, Rhys had reluctantly agreed. In the middle of the night, they’d hustled Gwen to a Penarth hotel, not revealing to Mary that her daughter had been found and certainly not tel ing her she’d tried to commit suicide.

That morning, while they were transporting Gwen to the fishing boat they’d borrowed from one of Rhys’s mates, they’d listened to reports on the radio of four women suffering from the same madness as Gwen having taken overdoses and being found by loved ones too late to do anything but bury them.

‘Rhys, you have my word, she’l come back to you whole. I promise.’ Jack smiled, slowly saluted Rhys, then climbed up the ladder to the deck of the
Ice
Maiden
.

Drenched and despairing, Rhys clutched the stern of the bouncing fishing boat al the way back to the dock, watching bleary-eyed as the ship’s engines roared to life and the
Ice Maiden
glided across the darkening horizon back out into the Atlantic.

BELOW DECK THAT night the rest of the crew and its passengers – with the exception of Gwen, who remained sedated and strapped to a bunk in Dana’s cabin – sat around the table in the mess for a meal of shrimp étouffée, bottles of Jax beer from Hol is’s private stash, and, at Eva’s request, a fresh fruit salad. The food had kept them in smal talk, their taste buds trumping the crew’s curiosity about their passengers. The dishes had yet to be cleared, but Cash insisted that Hol is remain at the table with them for a little longer. Finn took charge in the wheelhouse.