by James Goss
He passes a sign advertising events on the ship. It is, gloriously, an old-fashioned velveteen board onto which little gold block letters have been pinned haphazardly. It tells him that there’ll be some poker in a function room. It mentions that there’s a small private party for someone’s wedding. It welcomes a car dealership who are on a trip. And it says that the cinema, in addition to screening some films from last year, will be showing a ‘health presentation’ in an hour’s time.
‘Health presentation?’ Bingo.
Back in the bar, appearing normal, Ianto sits down next to Lucky Debbie. She’s singing merrily away, and pats him on the arm. ‘You’re gorgeous,’ she says. ‘Kerry really likes you.’ She laughs, her breath rich with alcopop. She digs him in the arm. ‘You can get a snog, cheer you up. Cure the seasick!’
‘Can I?’ Ianto says, trying to sound enthusiastic. Kerry appears to be asleep at the table, slumped face down in a cake, the tinsel from her angel wings hanging loose in the breeze.
‘Yeah – when she wakes up. Bless ’er. I’m having a great night. Are you?’
‘Yes. Yes I am, thank you.’ Actually, yes, I am. Hmm.
‘Why are you on the boat? Business trip? A lonely travelling salesman?’
Ianto shakes his head. ‘No. Like I said – I’m a secret agent.’ Lucky Debbie barks with laughter and clinks his glass. ‘You’re full of it. Bless, what are you like?’
‘Well…’ Ianto demurs. ‘I did see that there’s a seminar on health in the cinema in a bit.’
Debbie makes an exaggerated yawn. ‘Right. And any minute now we’ve got a stripper booked if Kerry’s organised it right. What’d you rather see? A film about vitamins, or an oiled stranger stirring your pint with his tackle?’
Ianto considers. ‘Well, when you put it like that, I’d better just pop along and watch my vitamin film.’
Debbie laughs and nudges him on the shoulder. ‘Stay a bit more, eh? Who knows – Kerry may come round for a bit. Just one more pineapple juice. Stay…’
Ianto checks his watch.
Ianto walks into the cinema as the ship lurches quite alarmingly. He clutches at an old flip-down chair. He manages not to spill any popcorn as he sits down. He suspects that, just slightly, he might appear drunk and harmless. Or, as his auntie used to say, ‘tiddly’. Good.
He sneaks a look around himself. There are a clutch of people in the cinema, which has thin carpets thick with chewing gum and a pervasive, cabbagey smell of popcorn. There is an old couple in a corner. They have brought notepads. There is a bored-looking girl in the second row.
A single man, very thin and quite yellow, is sat on his own, coughing slightly. A little away from him is a bald, fat, middleaged man listening to an iPod and laughing a bit too loudly.
Projected onto the screen are a series of slides advertising amenities on board, special offers at the bar, and a range of interesting snacks available. Music is playing (the theme from Van Der Valk, on pan-pipes). There is an atmosphere of comfortable anticipation. He notices the old couple keep squeezing each other’s hands and bickering quietly. They remind him of his parents – perfectly content in each other’s company, passing the days in a series of complicated little arguments and score-settlings. The old lady reaches over and adjusts her husband’s shirt collar. She looks like the kind of woman ready to pounce on grandchildren with spittle and a tissue at the slightest hint of a stain. Ianto decides he likes them. What treatment are they here for?
He decides the thin, yellow man is dying – probably of about five different things. Perhaps the oldies were just becoming forgetful, or hoping to keep rowing for a few more years. Perhaps the bored girl had just wandered in. The bald, fat man might be looking to lose weight and gain hair. Who knew?
But what about himself? Ianto tries to think of something important he could be in need of curing. Perhaps he could just claim curiosity.
Van Der Valk fades away and the slide of the Balti Buffet chunks off. There is a blue screen, a fizzing, and then, of all wonders, an old VHS tape projects into life. The picture crackles, crackles, wobbles and then slow tracking snow drifts down the screen. With an abrupt final crackle, the feature starts. For a brief instant, Ianto is in darkness and about to see Indiana Jones with his father sat on his right, a small bucket of popcorn balanced between them and an orange ice lolly melting stickily over his knuckles.
The picture goes white, and a reassuring logo of cupped hands rising up around a globe appears. Synthesised music swells out, a tune of energy and warmth that sounds just like (and yet, for copyright reasons completely unlike) the theme from Top Gear.
A smooth voice pours over shots that track across an empty hospital ward, a crowded waiting room, and then through a garden where people of all ages walk in the sun. The tone is warm, upbeat and strident.
‘Welcome to Hope. We’ve got used to living in an age of miracles. Where the cure for everything is just around the corner. But what if you can’t wait until tomorrow? Well, we’re here to tell you about how we can offer you the medicine of tomorrow today. This is not a trial. This is not a placebo. This is real hope, a real cure – the stuff of dreams. What we are offering on this boat is not legal, but it is moral. We refuse to keep back a cure that works. This is not alternative therapy, homeopathy, or moonshine – this is the real thing. We’ve worked on a genetic therapy that offers real, rapid repairs of your DNA…’
At this point the screen moves from sunsets and a hopeful woman boiling a kettle while staring wistfully out of her kitchen window to exciting computer graphics of spinning molecules and then some science stuff of cells dividing. Ianto frowns, and sneaks a glance around the cinema. He was right – someone’s come in. Standing at the back of the room are a man and a woman. Both of them startlingly good looking. They exude health, prosperity and well-being. Their arms are linked and they stand watching the screen with rapt, smiling attention. Ianto recognises the woman from the newspaper article. He immediately decides they are involved. The woman catches his glance and smiles at him. Ianto does what he always does when a beautiful woman smiles at him across a room. He blushes and looks away and feels about fourteen.
‘… Our swift, non-invasive procedure is over in minutes, has no side effects, and the difference can be felt at once. We offer this treatment here on the Hope Boat as it is illegal in Britain. Rejected by the NHS as impossible to test and too expensive, we are only too happy to offer it here, in international waters. Simply sign up after this seminar, and a visit will be made to your cabin in the morning. Then, you can relax and enjoy a day’s sightseeing on the Emerald Isle, followed by a revolutionary cure on the voyage back to Cardiff. It’s that easy. And this treatment can work on all sorts of genetic ailments – from simple male-pattern baldness all the way through to cancer. We can make you better. No,’ a warm smile in the voice, ‘we will make you better.’
The picture changes to a warmly setting sun watched by a couple on a beach. And then fades to black.
The lights come on, together with a slide advertising the wide range of gnomes available in the duty-free shop. People stand up. The old couple look at each other, and squeeze each other’s hands. The beautiful people at the back have already left.
‘Well,’ thinks Ianto, munching on his cold popcorn, ‘that was the fishiest thing in the Irish Sea.’
‘And then?’ asked Gwen.
‘I signed up, and had a lovely day sightseeing,’ said Ianto. ‘I think I took loads of photos on my phone. The weather was a bit drab, but the girls were great fun.’
‘The girls? Lucky Debbie and Easy Kerry.’ Jack’s mockery was fond and only a little bit jealous. ‘Let me guess. You went drinking?’
Ianto shook his head. ‘Actually, we went to the zoo, a nice little tea shop, and Kerry found some rare editions she’d been hunting after for ages in an antiquarian bookstore.’
It’s late afternoon in a Dublin pub with a great view of the rain. Ianto reels. Lucky Debbie grabs hold of him. ‘Easy, tiger!�
� She ruffles his hair and helps him sit down. All around him, the wooden panels of the Dublin bar start to spin slowly.
Ianto shakes his head, and scowls. ‘I’m tired.’ He is much drunker than he intended to be.
Debbie grins and pinches his cheek. ‘You pass out, and Kerry will pounce. I’ve experience of that girl. Don’t give in to weakness.’
Ianto runs a hand through his hair. ‘Debbie, I’m hammered. I’m trying to do really important work here, and my head’s pounding. I have no idea what was in the meal we’ve just eaten, but three fingers of scotch aren’t helping anything. I just want a nap.’
Kerry staggers back from the ladies, giggling. There is a small trail of toilet paper stuck to the bottom of her shoe. She sits down opposite Ianto with a whumpf! and then pitches gently into an uneasy sleep on an open packet of pork scratchings.
Ianto squints a little to bring the table into focus. Spread across it are the slumbering remains of Debbie’s hen party. Through a forest of half-finished pints and abandoned pies he can see Debbie, who winks at him. ‘You’ll be fine, doll. What is this top secret mishun? You really a spy?’
Ianto shakes his head. ‘Oh no. I’m just the office boy, really. But… you know… I’m keeping an eye out. For a friend. Well, not really a friend – more a bastard, really. But he died. And it’s easy to remember someone fondly if they’re dead. Especially when they died twice, if you’re counting. Twice dead bastard.’ He giggles.
Debbie is nodding with the slightly glassy look of someone who isn’t even listening.
Ianto ventures on. ‘And Owen thought there was something wrong about the boat. And he was right – I think there’s some alien medical procedure taking place on that boat. And that’s never good. And I’m supposed to stay sober on a mission. But then I think I’m being followed. So, I decide to blend in by getting drunk with you. Which may not have been the wisest thing. So it’s Ianto Jones, secret agent, saving the Cardiff Ferry from an alien invasion, just a little bit legless. So yes, I guess in many ways it’s oh dear.’ He takes an ill-advised swig of his pint and grimaces. ‘Oh, this is going down like sick.’ He rests the glass on the table hurriedly. ‘Anyway – I’m very important. I’m saving Cardiff.’
Debbie nods again and pats his hand. ‘Phil was shagging Kerry a couple of months ago,’ she says, quietly.
Many hours later, they stagger onto the boat for the journey back. Kerry is throwing up into a bin to the disgust of customs officials. Debbie has a spring in her step and flashing plastic devil horns in her hair. Ianto is carrying a traffic cone.
He makes it back to his tiny little orange cabin and slumps down on the lower bunk, the traffic cone resting unsteadily by him. He sinks his head in his hands. ‘I am so hammered,’ he thinks sadly. ‘I’ve had a brilliant weekend, clearly. I haven’t let my hair down in ages. But I haven’t really saved the world.’
He wraps his arms round the traffic cone, and settles down for a sleep. At no point does he even notice the envelope resting on the floor.
The knock on the door wakes him. It is night and the throbbing of the engines pounds in his head. ‘Whu?’ he manages, unsteadily getting to his feet. He is praying it isn’t Debbie. Or, dear god forbid, Kerry.
Instead it is a small, dapper little man in a steward’s uniform. He has a drooping orange moustache that makes him look pleasantly like Asterix. ‘Sir,’ says the man with the perfect English of a Norwegian. ‘You are awaited in the Kielty cabin.’
‘Ah,’ says Ianto. ‘Thank you. Do you mind if I…?’ He gestures to the sink, where he splashes some cold water on his face and straightens his tie. Oh god, he feels awful. He grabs the complimentary bottle of water from the washstand and starts to drink it as they walk. His mouth tastes terrible as though… oh no. Has he been smoking? He really can’t remember. Lisa will kill him.
As they walk his brain does three bits of thinking. The first pieces of thinking it has done for almost twenty-four hours. The first thought is ‘Kielty’ – the name was mentioned in the newspaper story. Ross Kielty had apparently been a passenger, and spoke in glowing terms of the treatment. In the same article… something else familiar. The picture. He’d seen someone else in the picture. He tries to remember who. But it now seems obvious that the whole Hope Boat is an elaborate cover for something else.
The steward leads him to a door and then melts away. Ianto sadly swallows the last of the bottled water and knocks. A quite beautiful woman opens the door and smiles kindly.
‘Mr Jones?’ she says, holding out her hand. Her handshake is easy and strong. ‘Thank you for coming. My name is Christine. Do take a seat.’
He steps into the cabin – which seems to be the ferry’s equivalent of a stateroom. It is still the size of a small caravan, but feels almost palatial.
The woman, amazingly dressed and terribly calm, sits down opposite him, and smiles. She is half of the couple who had come into the cinema late. She is professionally friendly. ‘Now, briefly tell me what can we do for you?’
‘Ah,’ says Ianto. ‘Can you cure my hangover?’
Christine’s laugh is a sharp little rattle. ‘Oh, we can cure a lot more than that, Mr Jones. What was it that you came to see us about? Surely something more serious?’
Ianto sighs. ‘I don’t know. I read about the treatments offered on this boat, and I wondered… well. You see, in the last year I’ve lost my girlfriend and two friends. They all died. And everyone thinks very sad, but move on. But I can’t. I’ll be at work, and I’ll remember a conversation I had with her, or a row with Owen, just a little thing, and I’ll be stuck. I want that to stop. I know you can cure my body – but can you cure my mind? Can you make it so that I never think about any of them ever again?’
Christine reaches out a hand that brushes his lightly. Her smile is wan and melancholy. ‘Oh, Mr Jones. I’m sorry for your loss… deeply and sincerely so.’ A heavy breath, and then more warmth in the smile. ‘But you’ll be pleased to hear that we can help.’
‘Really?’ Ianto, just for an instant, thinks how nice it would be – never to think about Lisa back in his flat. To be able to water Owen’s plants without remembering him. Or dismantling Tosh’s complicated analyses of alien technology – studies that would never be finished, secrets that would never be unlocked. Just forget about them and move on.
Christine leans forward. ‘It won’t take long, and I promise it won’t hurt.’
‘Will it be now?’
She taps his wrist again. ‘So eager! But no – we prefer to have a pre-treatment meeting. Just to screen people, to make sure they’re really happy to take part and that they understand everything. And, also, there is the small matter of payment up front.’ Her smile assures him that, if it were up to her, there wouldn’t be such a thing as payment.
‘Oh, of course!’ Ianto has the bank details of a Torchwood holding account. He passes them over, and she hands him a little slip of paper, discreetly folded in half. He lifts it up, and looks at the amount.
For a second he forgets how tired and drunk he is and instead stares aghast at the figure on the slip of paper. These people could clearly charge anything they wanted. He guesses running a ferry as a disguise can’t come cheap. But still – this is…
He manages a rueful smile. ‘It’ll be worth it in the long run.’
‘Of course,’ Christine lays a reassuring hand around his shoulder. ‘Once these bank details have cleared, we’ll contact you later tonight with a slot for treatment. It should only take a quarter of an hour. Shouldn’t hold up your fun with the hen party!’ She nudges his arm and laughs warmly. Ianto returns her smile weakly. She’s just confirmed that he’s been watched closely ever since he got on the ship.
‘What do you use?’ he asks, suddenly.
Christine doesn’t even look startled. Her voice has an easy, practised flow to it.
‘There are various advanced gene therapies that have been developed which, for one reason or another, just aren’t ever going to be practic
al for conventional medical care to offer. Too expensive for the NHS, impossible to obtain through other channels. My husband and I have found a way of making these therapies available easily. We use a method of delivery that’s tailored to each subject. Our primary concerns are your health and well-being. We wouldn’t proceed if there was any risk to you, or any chance of the procedure failing. You are in safe hands.’
‘Well,’ thinks Ianto. ‘That was all guff. Deliberately reassuring flannel.’
He makes a face. ‘But are there any injections? I’ve always hated those.’
Christine nods. ‘Oh, me too! But rest assured – this is far less invasive and far more effective. We don’t even need to give you an anaesthetic. Less fuss than a filling. Can you believe it?’
Right, thought Ianto. That does it – they’ve definitely nicked something alien. Miracle alien cures are never good.
He tries to leave her cabin without looking furtive and strides down the corridor, fingering his phone. No signal. He waits round the corner and then, when all is quiet, slips past Christine’s cabin to the one next door, and listens quietly at the door. He can hear a man’s soothing tones and a woman crying quietly. He stands back in the shadows and waits.
Eventually the door opens, and the very handsome man who’d been with Christine stands on the threshold, ushering two figures out. It is the old couple he’d noticed earlier. They are clasping each other and smiling. The old woman has tears running down her smiling cheeks.
‘Now, you’ve nothing to worry about – just go and have a nice little lie-down, and by the time we pull in to harbour, you should notice some dramatic improvements. Just relax and feel the Parkinson’s melt away. No, don’t thank me any more – just settle back and enjoy the next few years together.’
The woman turns and grips Ross Kielty in a fierce embrace. She starts to cry again. Her husband gently takes her shoulders and leads her away. Ianto can hear them laughing as they walk off.
