Torchwood Long Time Dead (14 page)

He pulled his hand back and swallowed. He
needed to get this under control. He was behaving
like a teenage virgin, and it was a long time since
he'd been either of those things.

'I appreciate that you want to keep all this in
house, Commander,' Cutler said, 'and if it was
just soldiers that were dying then I'd let you. But
as there are ordinary people involved, could you
please keep me in the loop. It's my neck on the line
if there's no result. When you know who the hair
belongs to, I would very much like to sit in on the
questioning.'

'I'll have to check that with my superiors at
the Department.' Jackson's face was giving him
a definite no to the request, but Cutler hadn't lost
anything by asking. It had told him that there
were things they were doing at this site that they
didn't want the general public - the police even -

to know about.

'I will definitely give you a name, however,' the
Commander acquiesced. 'And after that we can
decide how best to proceed with progressing the
case.'

Cutler almost laughed.
Progressing the case.

Covering up, is what the old man meant. No
doubt the killer would be reported as having been
shot during arrest and then the Army and the
Department could do whatever they wanted with
him. It didn't come as any surprise. Cover-ups
were everywhere.

A barrage of sudden images assaulted him.

Night. A paedophile. He was sure. So sure. Wrecked

lives. Something. Something other. Lies. And then

all over again. Sad smile. Greatcoat. This is the

twenty-first century when everything changes.

Singing. Murder. Something other. Alien.
They
were too quick for him to grasp. But the tangled
memories scratched at his head again and he felt
a sharp jolt of self-loathing and despair. What
was that? That wasn't like him. He liked himself.

He was a good copper. What was it he couldn't
remember?

'Detective Inspector?' Commander Jackson

stepped forward, worried. 'Are you all right? You
looked as if you were about to pass out.'

The moment had gone, and the images with it,
and aside from a trembling in his legs and coldness
in his hands, he felt fine. He wanted a cigarette,
but his head was clear. Whatever he thought he'd
seen was gone.

'Yes, sorry. Long day.' He smiled awkwardly,
aware that Sue Costa was studying him

thoughtfully. 'I should have grabbed some lunch.

I'll get something on the way back to the station.'

'Make sure you do,' Commander Jackson said.

'What are you doing this evening, Detective
Inspector?' Sue Costa smiled at him, and for
a moment he wasn't sure what to say. Was she
asking him out on a date? Surely not...?

'The Mayor is having something of a bash,' she
continued. 'Perhaps you'd like to come.'

Cutler's skin flushed. Of course. Work. How
stupid
was
he? 'Email me the details, and I'll play
it by ear. I'll have to see if we get any more bodies
in. I doubt whoever's doing this has finished.'

He kept his tone light. 'They might just have got
better at hiding the bodies for a while.'

'The party would be a good place for us to talk
without looking obvious,' Jackson said. 'It's better
than you coming here every day. And I don't trust
phones. Paranoid probably, but stay in this job
long enough and a little paranoia will creep into
your bones. The last thing we want is an eagle-eyed reporter spotting you calling in and then
putting two and two together.'

'I'll do my best to make it,' Cutler said.

'I look forward to seeing you there.' Sue Costa's
dark eyes were smiling and there was a promise
in them, even if she wasn't aware of it herself. He
was good with body language, it was part of the
job, and he'd bet money that she was feeling the
same pull towards him that he had towards her.

How, he didn't understand, she was well out of his
league, but he had no intention of pointing that
out to her.

He was at the door when he turned, a thought
striking him. 'You haven't had anyone in your
team commit suicide over the past couple of days,
have you?'

'No,' Jackson frowned. 'Why?'

'Ah, nothing. Just another heap of weird I'm
looking into. Was hoping I could lay that one at
your door too.' He grinned at the Commander and
headed outside. His cigarette was lit before he'd
got to the barrier, and God, it tasted good.

Commander Jackson's eyes were blurring from
concentrated staring at the computer for so long. It
didn't make any sense. He'd been quite surprised
at the level of security around whoever the hair
on the dead bodies belonged to. He'd expected any
trace evidence the police might find to lead back
to them - this had all started with the death of
poor John Blackman, after all - but for even the
Commissioner not to be able to access at least
basic information was strange to say the least.

The head of the police should have found a name,
if nothing else.

Despite the tendency for the Department to be
seen as something of a shadowy organisation, in
reality it suffered the same bureaucracy issues
as all companies. People needed personnel files
and National Insurance numbers and bloody
pensions and, on top of that, most people - even
amongst those on site - were simply drones, for
want of a better word. Even his own file had basic
information accessible to some of the outside
world. His name and rank, if nothing else.

He clicked the command button again, and

got the same response he had on every attempt:
Tile Deleted.' He frowned. Files were never
deleted - in the movies maybe, but not in the real
world. There were always copies somewhere in
the sub-directories, because there always had to
be an audit trail in order to know whose arse to
kick when something went wrong. Thus far, he
wasn't finding anything, though. Not even basic
information.

'Is anything wrong?' Sue put a mug of fresh
coffee on his desk.

Elwood Jackson managed a small smile. As

surprised as he'd been by the liaison's arrival, he
was finding that he enjoyed having a woman - one
that didn't come in a uniform - around the place.

She made a good cup of coffee as well as having
somewhat amazing legs. The thought was sexist
but he didn't beat himself up over it. He'd watched
women die as bravely as men in battle and had
a healthy respect for the workings of the female
mind - he didn't see that there was anything wrong
in admiring their form too. As far as he could tell,
that was pretty healthy male behaviour.

'Nothing you can help with, I'm afraid. I'm
still trying to get some kind of ID on Cutler's hair
sample. So far it's proving tricky. You may as well
head home for the afternoon. I'll need you in fine
form tonight, because God knows, I'll be operating
on minimum reserves.' He winked at her. 'I'm too
old for late nights, and I've been a soldier too long
for much polite conversation. You're going to have
to take charge.'

'I can manage that.' She went behind her desk
and turned her computer off. 'Are you sure you
don't need me?'

'Absolutely.'

He waited until she'd left, and then picked up
the phone. He needed to talk to the Department.

There was something about this file that just
wasn't right. He needed to know who had been
deleting the records and when. He also wanted
the back-up paper file - he didn't care if it took all
night for someone to find it. DI Cutler wasn't the
only one who wanted this person caught.

There was the inevitable round of questions
that he didn't have the answers for - and he bit
back from snarling that if he had all the answers
he wouldn't need this information - and once he'd
satisfied his alleged superiors that he wasn't just
being remarkably stupid and his requests had
been logged, he put the phone down and enjoyed a
moment of blissful silence. He noted, with regret,
that the coffee Sue Costa had brought him now
had a cool film on its surface. He sipped it anyway,
needing the caffeine fix to soothe his throbbing
head and keep him awake. The phone rang

moments later and he let it peal out twice before
answering. So much for the quiet. His headache
faded instantly. There had been another murder
some time the previous night, not far from the site
in the busy bar area of the Bay. The poor man,
eyes exploded, had been found in an alleyway.

He put the phone down and contemplated

turning on the news to see just how much of a field
day they were having with it. So far, although it
had been impossible to keep the details of the
missing eyes from the public, they'd covered it
by saying that the eyeballs had been gouged
out. There was no reason for anyone to suspect
anything different - especially as the truth of
the near-liquidised brains pressuring the eyes
to explode wasn't exactly something that would
spring to mind. They were also lucky that none
of those who had found the bodies had lingered to
examine them closely enough to see that gouging
wasn't exactly what had happened. Most had
simply screamed and run to find help. He didn't
blame them for that either.

He took another swallow of the lukewarm coffee
and left the small television off. His phone wasn't
ringing so the police must have things under
control, and he hoped that they'd go through Sue
first, before coming to him. She seemed capable,
and she and Cutler had definitely liked each
other - he wasn't too old to notice that kind of
chemistry working - and that wouldn't be a bad
thing. He couldn't blame the DI for any irritation
at the Department's intervention into his case.

Cutler also looked bright enough to know that
if the investigation failed to reach a successful
conclusion, it would be Cutler who would get
the bollocking. Still, that wasn't either of their
problems for now, and at least Cutler was saved
the knowledge that kept Elwood Jackson awake at
night - that whoever, or
whatever
, was doing this
to the good people of Cardiff might be using some
kind of alien technology to do it. Nothing about
that sat well with him. If he'd been in charge of
this operation, he'd have had the whole place
filled in. The human race had enough dangerous
technology of their own, without playing around
with things they couldn't possibly understand.

'I think I like him, you see?' Suzie said softly as
she stretched out on the bed. Her skin shivered
against the chill of the sheets. The blood hadn't
quite dried yet and they were still sticky and
damp. Til have to kill him, of course, but I do like
him.'

She ran one finger down the cold, dead cheek.

Ts it still awful in there? Being nothing?' she
whispered. The dead man no longer looked so
much like Captain Jack Harkness. His face was
grey and slightly waxy and his skin hung slackly
around his jowls. Devoid of animation and quite
a lot of his blood, it was like lying next to a
stranger. They may only have known each other
a few hours, but Suzie thought that she'd got to
know him pretty well in that time. They'd drunk
together, laughed together, had sex together, and
then she'd tied him up and slowly killed him. You
couldn't get much more intimate than that.

She prodded the flabby flesh of his cheek.

Was this how she'd looked for all that time? The
natural coffee colour of her skin faded to sickly
blue as death and then the freezer took hold of
her? She should have looked at the pictures before
she'd deleted the file she'd eventually found that
day, but she simply hadn't had the time. Not that
it mattered. That Suzie Costello - the one who
thought that everyone else was better than her -

was long gone. This Suzie Costello had no intention
of dying again any time soon. She wasn't sure that
the thing inside would let her. She stared at the
man whose name she had forgotten - if she'd even
asked him for it - and although his mouth hung
open, no answer came out. She had a moment of
nostalgia for her old games with the Resurrection
glove. This one really hadn't wanted to die - it had
taken hours before he'd accepted it was inevitable.