Peter Anghelides - Another Life

‘Eight miles further up the M4,’ Toshiko explained. ‘The end of the same queue. But look at the weather.’

Jack looked as amazed as Gwen felt. ‘How?’

‘The effect is localised.’ More keystrokes. ‘Here’s the most recent satellite pass, about twenty-three minutes ago. It’s like a typhoon, but restricted within an eight-kilometre radius.’

‘Radius means a circle,’ said Jack. ‘So where’s the centre?’

Toshiko overlaid a pattern of lines on the satellite image. ‘From an analysis of the variables, it’s out in the Bay. And you can see from the Bay cameras that there’s nothing out there except for plenty of churning water and a crowd of seasick sailors.’

Gwen studied the composite image. ‘It’s underwater.’

‘It’s underwater,’ confirmed Toshiko. ‘Something must be coming through the Rift, below the surface. My projections show that if it continues then it will create tidal waves across the Bay. Maybe out into the Bristol Channel, too. The Wetlands Nature Reserve is flooding already-’

Jack laughed humourlessly. ‘Aptly named.’

‘And you saw what’s happening out there above the water. A couple of water taxis were sunk by freak waves. They’re struggling to prevent damage in the Roath Basin — the lightship berthed there has already smashed into the quayside.’

‘Yeah, great place for a lightship.’

Gwen laughed at Jack’s sarcasm. ‘You’ll never become a Blue Badge Guide with that attitude.’

‘The tourists wouldn’t like the stories I could tell them about Cardiff.’

‘Hello?’ interrupted Toshiko. ‘Do you want to see these data and schematics?’

‘Data,’ Jack said. ‘That’s like information, right?’

Toshiko gave him a freezing look. ‘Or I could just stop now. Go and do some more correlations of the variables on my own.’ She paused, as though to let this sink in. Jack affected to look contrite, and Gwen stifled further laughter. Toshiko continued: ‘The telemetry from the boreholes is so confusing, it’s as though water is flowing uphill. Thing is, even though there have been unexpected tidal surges way up the Rivers Taff and Ely, it’s all caused by this localised weather system.’

Gwen tried to put the information together in her head, and could see a flaw. ‘If it’s localised, then where is all this rain coming from?’

‘Think of it like a localised typhoon. It’s sucking water from the Bay. Dropping it back over the local area in this huge thunderstorm.’

‘So why’s the Bay not emptying?’

Toshiko looked at her, surprised. Gwen was started to feel like a slow pupil in the GCSE Geography class. ‘Where do you suppose the water there came from in the first place? Out in the Bristol Channel. And beyond that, the Celtic Sea and the Atlantic Ocean. Imagine that lot dumped all over the vale of Glamorgan.’

Gwen’s head was starting to spin. ‘But a typhoon ? A tropical storm, in Cardiff?’

‘And I estimate that it’s only Category 2 at the moment. The only good thing I can see is that the eye isn’t moving. It’s still out in the Bay. Or at least…’ Toshiko checked some more figures. ‘It’s encroaching very slowly. But whatever is coming through, it’s still coming.’

‘And there’s nothing to say that it won’t suddenly get a shift on,’ said Gwen. She thought about what Toshiko had explained to them the previous evening. The slow tsunami. Suddenly, it didn’t seem so slow after all.

Jack slapped his hands on the table, an unexpected sound that startled Gwen. He was no longer pensive, he’d reached his decision.

‘So, no Owen. We’ll have to work without him. Ianto, keep trying his number and locator. Gwen and Tosh, you’re gonna have to get out there into the Bay, find out what this thing is. Take the mini-sub, that needs two. And I’m going back to Wildman’s apartment. I’m gonna find those missing power packs if I have to tear the place apart. Hey, I may tear it apart anyway, it already needs a makeover. Apart from that, who can tell? There are too many variables at the moment.’ He thought about this briefly. ‘D’you see what you’ve done to me, Tosh? You’ve got me using the word “variables”. Now I know I’ve been sitting here too long.’ He picked up his greatcoat from a nearby chair where he’d draped it earlier, and prepared to leave.

Gwen watched Toshiko for a reaction. She was shutting down the various programs on her computer, getting ready to follow her latest instructions from Jack. But Gwen hesitated. Despite her police training. Despite that instinct to obey orders without questioning every detail. Despite the copper’s belief that the guv’nor assigns the jobs, picks the people, and doesn’t have to say why. Somehow, in Torchwood, that was different now. After handling the stuff that she had — that they all had — in the past couple of months, she’d begun to believe that asking the obvious questions was what kept you alive.

‘What about Sandra Applegate?’

Jack was shrugging his greatcoat over his shoulders. ‘What about her?’

‘D’you think she’s human?’

Jack gave them a wave as he left. ‘Enjoy your dive, ladies.’

Gwen wasn’t any more reassured as the door closed behind him.

Owen knew it wasn’t like brushing aside the local pointy-heads when he and the Torchwood team cruised into a scene of crime. When they knew that their reputation, their previous contacts, the whole look of them as they swept through the existing security cordon, was all the authority that they needed to operate unchallenged. The staff here would know nothing of Torchwood. There would be no scare stories, whispered among the staff as cautionary tales, of petty bureaucrats peremptorily brushed aside, or their careers stalled because they stepped in Torchwood’s way and got trampled.

‘I don’t understand, Dr Harper,’ said Majunath. ‘I thought you said you were the relief SHO for this evening’s shift?’ Was Majunath going to question his police credentials, now? Owen knew from his own former career in A amp;E that doctors relished the opportunity to put the police in their place when it came to clinical priorities. Majunath had his personal authority at stake from the moment that ID card appeared under his nose. And Owen needed Megan to see him in control, to show her how Torchwood was an organisation that could get things done, take control. An organisation that she would want to join.

It was the storm that saved him from Majunath’s suspicion. A fresh gurney stretcher crashed through the doors at the far end of the ED, with paramedics clinging to it as though they were launching a bobsled. It finally careered to a slippery stop beside Majunath. Both paramedics were drenched, water still cascading off their fluorescent jackets. The taller one exhaled upwards to blow the rain off his face and out of his floppy ginger hair. ‘Four more on the way,’ he explained to Majunath breathlessly. More water flicked onto the floor as he nodded at the unfortunate victim on the gurney. Owen noted quickly that the boy was probably early teens, unconscious, intubated, very cyanosed.

‘Water taxi capsized in the Bay,’ the paramedic was saying. He twisted the gurney through ninety degrees, and pushed it on through the doors of resus, all the while rattling off his diagnosis and the treatment he’d already given.

‘I thought we were trying to divert patients to Royal Gwent?’ Majunath snapped at the new arrivals.

‘Storm’s heading that way, too’ explained Megan.

Majunath groaned. ‘Swansea, then? St David’s?’

‘Well, this little lad is here now ,’ muttered the red-haired paramedic.

Majunath reacted immediately, professional once more. ‘I’ll take this one,’ he told Megan. ‘You and Doctor Harper take the next as they arrive.’ He snapped a swift glanced at his wristwatch. ‘You may need to extend your shift, I’m afraid.’ He bellowed into the air: ‘Auxiliary? There’s more water to mop up here.’ And then he was gone, the doors into resus flapping behind him.