Into the Silence t-10

by Sarah Pinborough

  'That was my problem.'

  'How do you mean?' Jack had read the file. He could figure out pretty much what had been going on in the policeman's head, but he wanted to hear it from him. He wanted to hear it from the Cutler that existed now, the man that had survived the aftermath of that decision. Making a choice was easy. It was the consequences that changed you.

  'I couldn't let an innocent man go to prison.'

  'Torchwood One was going to.' Jack felt no pride in that statement. 'And from what I read from the trial reports, Mark Palmer wouldn't have fought it too hard.'

  'Palmer's head was too messed up to know what was going on.' The small muscle in the side of Cutler's head twitched at his temple, the only indication that under the calm voice, his emotions were raging. 'By the time he got to court he was half-convinced he

  had

  killed those boys. Even if he didn't remember any of the murders.'

  Jack teased at the damp paper label on his water, peeling it slowly away, ignoring its reluctance to come free. 'You know, some people would argue that he wasn't really that innocent. That entity that invaded him simply acted out his desires. The things that were already longings in his head.'

  Cutler shifted on the stool. 'God, I hate this smoking ban. How are you supposed to drink and relax without a bloody cigarette?'

  Picking at the edge of the silver square, Jack pulled free a strip of the shiny surface declaring the water's brand, leaving a trace of white undercoat behind on the bottle.

  'But what do you make of that theory?' He wasn't letting go. He needed to understand this man that Torchwood One had seen fit to leave without dealing with him in some way, relatively pleasant or otherwise. He needed to peel away the surface and see if he was indeed the same man that had existed then. Because the same decision was coming his way when all this was eventually over. And he wanted to make the right one if he was going to live with the consequences.

  Cutler sighed. 'I think it's a pile of shit.' He sipped his drink. 'If you'll excuse the technical police term.'

  'I speak Police.' Jack smiled. 'How come, though?'

  'How come you're so interested?'

  Jack didn't shift his gaze from the policeman's own but flashed him a brief dazzling grin. 'I'd just like to know a little bit about a man I'm heading to the scaffold with. And the records made me curious. You'd be the same.'

  Where Jack's smile was all boyish excitement, Cutler grinned like a hungry wolf. 'Don't think I haven't done a little research on you.'

  'What did you find?'

  'A lot of password-protected, access-denied files in the system and some crazy stories on the net. Enough to let me know I don't really want to know what's going on with you.'

  'Fair enough.' Jack pulled the final strand of the label free and tossed it on the bar to be swept away by the bartender. It was a quiet night, and Jack thought the young man looked bored out of his mind. It would be great if he could just have the occasional moment like that. He lived in a world within the world, just like Gwen and Ianto. Cutler, however, was in purgatory, stuck somewhere in between.

  A lot of ordinary people got glimpses of the strangeness that the Rift created, but very few were forced to evaluate their own morality because of it. Jack had respected Cutler before he'd read the file. He was intrigued by the man now. It was a refreshing feeling.

  'So, tell me about Mark Palmer.'

  'I hounded him, you know.' Cutler stared thoughtfully at his own reflection in the mirror, and Jack wondered if he was looking for that ghost of the self he had lost a long time ago. 'After the first death, when the trail was leading back to him. Loner. Used to hang around the play area. Ideal suspect.' He frowned.

  'I could smell it on him; his guilt. Those three boys died within four days and he couldn't remember where he was for any of the times the boys went missing. Before the bodies were found, I camped outside his house. I rang him day and night to stop him sleeping.' He paused and swallowed. 'I was a complete bastard. I watched him pacing up and down in his living room, his hands in his hair, and I'd call and call and call, and if he answered I'd tell him what I was going to do to him when we had him. All from a pay-as-you-go mobile in a dummied-up name, of course. No trace. No police harassment blame. Poor sod was already going half mad and I was sending him the rest of the way. And then, after a few days, it was me that thought I was losing my marbles.'

  'What happened?'

  'It was about midnight. Palmer came out of his house and was on his front lawn. He was really agitated. Talking to himself, twitching. I thought he was cracking. I thought I had him. And then suddenly he stood totally still. His back straightened and all that anxiety went out of him. I could see it from the car. He changed. And when he turned round and strode to his car I honest to God thought someone had slipped me something or maybe the case had got to me and my brain was frying. His eyes were wide open and it was like looking into headlights on full beam. Bright white light poured out of him. And from his mouth too, when he opened it. It was insanity, but I was seeing it.' Cutler sipped again at his drink.

  'I followed his car, and he drove out to the woods where he parked up, hidden out of sight from the lane. He got out and took a shovel out of the boot before striding in this… over-controlled way into the darkness. I stayed pretty far behind, but those eyes lit up the way through the trees anyway, so I wasn't in any danger of getting lost. He was going to the bodies of course.

  'He dug like a machine, which I guess he was, looking back. His body was being used by whatever was inside him and those boys weren't buried in a shallow grave. By the time he was done, he was sweating and panting but he kept going until that light poured out of him. Then he collapsed. I watched him crying over the bodies while that light leapt and whirled and ran in and out of the dead boys, touching them all over again. I couldn't move. It was beautiful, but at the same time there was such…' Cutler struggled for the right word. 'There was such malevolence in it. Human evil is so much more mundane than whatever that thing was. Once it was done with the fun it was having with the corpses, it went back into Palmer. He reburied the bodies and drove home like an automaton.'

  'What did you do?'

  'Didn't sleep. Didn't call it in. I knew where the bodies were, I'd marked the three trees around them once Palmer and the thing inside him had gone. I sat on the sofa, smoked a lot, and drank a lot. I thought about the truth. The truth is out there, kept going round in my head. Mulder and bloody Scully.' He laughed, a dry, dark sound, like disturbed mud.

  'And then I went into work early and dug around in the system looking for whatever department had to deal with paranormal reports or out-of-the-ordinary crimes, and time after time "Torchwood: Classified" came up. I'd never heard of any section called that, so I kept digging and searching under that name. By 9.32, Torchwood staff and my DCI were standing at my desk wanting to know what my sudden interest was. And after a while, when my DCI had buggered off, I told them.

  'And the rest, as they say, is history. The bodies were found, Torchwood caught the entity or whatever that shite was inside Palmer, and a line was drawn under the whole thing.'

  'Except,' Jack cut in, 'all the evidence still pointed to Palmer. And the press had got hold of that.'

  'Yeah, some bastard constable leaked it. Thought we weren't moving fast enough on the arrest.'

  'Which you were busy trying to find a way to avoid.'

  'Yeah.' The barman replaced their drinks, though Jack couldn't remember seeing Cutler signalling for fresh ones. Maybe their expressions said enough for the man to know they'd settled in for the night. 'But then it was all over. People were screaming for his arrest, and as all the DNA evidence clearly stated that he was guilty our hands were tied. We arrested him. Poor bastard was a mess. And I understood why. When I'd first been watching him, so bloody convinced I had my man, I knew he was wrong on the inside. But what I had been too busy to notice was that Palmer knew it too. He'd known it all his adult life, I imagine. Yes, he wanted to h
urt those boys and do things to them that you and I just can't comprehend, and yes, he wanted to squeeze their lives away with his bare hands. He'd wanted to do things like that for as long as he could remember. In his head he was a sick bastard. But it was only in his head.'

  Pausing, Cutler ran one hand through his hair and looked at Jack. 'He never acted on his impulses. And I don't think he ever would have if that thing hadn't got inside him. He was too strong and he knew it was wrong. Imagine living like that. Hating yourself and your desires. No wonder he was a loner. The worst he ever allowed himself to do was sit and watch little boys playing in the park. He never talked to them. He never touched them.' He paused. 'Jesus. And then this thing comes along, gets inside him and wants to do it all. All those years of restraint, over. And all we can do is put him in prison for it?'

  Watching him shake his head, his brow knotted tightly together, Jack wondered if Cutler realised how animated he'd become. Behind all those defences, Cutler's anger still raged and Jack was glad about that.

  'You couldn't,' he said softly.

  'You're right. I couldn't. But the evidence was too great against him. So I waited until the court was in full session and then started a rumour in the press about tampered evidence. Planting of DNA. All that shit. It started to circulate. And when I got called to the stand and the defence questioned me on it, I did a big pretence of breaking down and then confessed. Said the pressure to get a conviction had been too much. They had no choice but to throw it out of court. Civil action found him guilty but he didn't really have a lot to lose by then. We gave him a new identity and sent him north for a new life. Not that it worked. Last I heard, he was a drunk, and after three suicide attempts he was sectioned off into some mental hospital. Probably the safest place for him.'

  'Would you do the same thing again?'

  Cutler stared angrily into the mirror. 'Yeah. I think I'm that dumb that I probably would.'

  'I'm surprised Torchwood One let you go so easily.'

  Cutler shrugged. 'They thought I'd handled the situation well. No running to the press or even my boss with tales of bright lights in the night. They figured I'd be useful on the force. If I heard stories of anything strange.' He smiled. 'But believe me, I don't think it was an easy decision for them. Looking back, I sometimes wonder what they might have done if they had thought I was a liability. Being young and stupid at the time I didn't give it any thought. But now…'

  'I think I can see why they left you the happy individual that you are.' Jack raised his bottle. 'Cheers.'

  Cutler clinked his JD against the mineral water. 'Your curiosity satisfied?'

  'A story's always better told than read. If it means anything at all, I think what you did was the right thing. And most people wouldn't have done it.'

  'Thanks.'

  'You were never tempted to tell your wife the truth?'

  Behind them, the jukebox burst into life, pumping out Britney Spears's 'Toxic'.

  'You learn about people in those situations. She believed the lie too easily. Made me see her more clearly. She wasn't worth the truth.' He turned on his stool and stared at the source of the over-loud music. 'Jesus. Can't a man even have a drink in peace and quiet? Why do we have to fill every thinking moment up with noise? All I bloody want is a couple of minutes of silence to let my brain get things in order.'

  Jack began to smile, and then froze. A couple of minutes of silence. He pushed the stool back and punched the bar, the thud full of vigour.

  'You gotta love that Britney!' His eyes sparkled and, with his grin bubbling energy, he leaned forward, grabbed Cutler's cheeks in his hands and planted a loud kiss on his lips. 'Two minutes of silence! You're a genius! Why didn't I think of that?' He grabbed his long coat from the seat on the other side and then stared at Cutler. 'What are you waiting for? Come on. Let's go catch the bad guy.'

  The detective stared at him for a long second before standing up. 'I've got no idea what you're on about, but I'm coming.' He drained his glass. 'And if you ever kiss me again I will have to terminate this working relationship with a knee in your bollocks.'

  Jack's laugh danced behind him as he ran up the stairs from the basement bar and up to the pavement. 'Say what you like, I'm a great kisser. You loved it. I can tell.'

  'Bloody Torchwood,' Cutler grumbled, but Jack could hear the humour in the gruff voice. 'Can't do anything like bloody normal people.'

  TWENTY-ONE

  Jack paced slightly in front of the Boardroom table in a narrow area that wasn't designed to incorporate a huge amount of pacing. Energy and excitement had been sparking off him since he'd bounded back into the Hub with Cutler in tow and, although it was almost midnight, Gwen's own foot tapped under her seat. Jack obviously had news — there was no way he would have brought Cutler if it hadn't been something important — but so did she and Ianto.

  'OK, so here's the new plan.' Jack finally stopped moving, letting Gwen's eyes focus. 'At 11 a.m. tomorrow, we're going to hold a city-wide, two-minute silence as a mark of respect for the deaths of Maria Bruno and the other victims.' He nodded towards Cutler, who was leaning against the corner of the wall. 'The police have been in touch with all the major news stations, and it's going to be hitting all the channels from now until daybreak.'

  'You think the whole of Cardiff will take part?' Ianto was back in his suit, complete with jacket, and looking contained and smart despite the bandage across his head. He flashed Cutler a suspicious glance, and Gwen knew why. Jack had to think the man was pretty special if he had brought the outsider into the Hub. And she could recognise a jealous look when she saw one.

  'They don't need to. Only the singers. Only the good singers.' Jack folded his arms across his chest. 'And they're the ones we need to do it.'

  Gwen knew she was tired, but she wondered if she was missing something. 'So, if all the singers have shut up, how's that going to help us catch the alien?'

  We can't afford to risk another civilian, but we have our own voice of an angel among us…' As Jack let the sentence trail off, Gwen turned to Ianto and waited for him to catch up. He did.

  'I'm the bait?'

  Jack grinned. 'If you're the only show in town, let's hope you'll be guaranteed an audience.'

  'Great.' Ianto's expression disagreed with the word. 'An audience that rips your throat out if you sing too well.'

  'We'll have the place covered and I'll be inside with you. And heavily armed.' Jack's grin had disappeared, his dark eyes intent. 'If we get the place rigged up right, he won't even get near you. You going to trust me on this?'

  Ianto nodded. 'Of course.' His eyes sat quietly grim in his calm face. 'And we don't have any choice anyway. We have to do it.'

  Gwen sat up in her chair, her impatience overtaking her. 'And you should have more notice of the creature's arrival this time round.'

  'How come?' asked Jack.

  Gwen grinned and glanced at Ianto, her own pride reflecting back at her from him. God, they were like children trying to impress their dad. But still, that was the truth. They both did want to impress Jack.

  'While you two have been in the pub, we've been pretty busy here, and not just eating pizza.'

  'Although I saw the box.' Jack raised an eyebrow. 'You did have pizza.'

  'Smart arse. We ate while we worked.' She pushed her dark hair away from her face. 'Anyway, just before Drew Powell was attacked, do you remember that I saw all those tiny flashes that appeared randomly across Cardiff on the Rift monitor? Just before the big one at the church?'

  Jack nodded. 'Go on.'

  'It got me curious, so I looked at the data for the other attacks. We'd seen there was a big spike just before each one, but because we were looking with hindsight-'

  'Retrospectively.'

  'Whatever. Means the same.' She glared at Ianto. 'Because we were studying the attacks retrospectively, we hadn't looked to see what activity went on just prior to the main Rift spike. So I went back a bit further.'

  A smile twitched at the
corner of Jack's mouth. 'You've been working on a computer all night? Is this the same Gwen Cooper who runs at the sight of a USB cable?'

  'It's the same Gwen Cooper who'll forget what she's trying to say if you're not careful.'

  'Keep going.' Jack's eyes twinkled. 'I'm impressed.'

  'OK, these outbreaks of tiny spikes were there just a minute or two before each attack, as if maybe the alien comes through in particles or something and then pulls itself together. But whatever the reason, what we found was that the tiny spikes aren't random. It's like a reverse explosion. The centre point between them is where the alien appears.'

  'Good work,' Jack said, but Gwen shook her head.

  'I haven't finished. That's not the good bit.' She leaned forwards slightly, her elbows digging into the table. 'Ianto and me have refined the system so that it picks up those early spikes more quickly and gives us the appearance location before the creature comes through. Should buy you about eight minutes, we reckon.'

  Ianto nodded. 'Judging from our test runs.'

  Jack stared at Ianto and then back at Gwen. 'You two figured this out yourselves?'

  Gwen shrugged. 'With quite a lot of help from Tosh's notes and bloody pop-ups.'

  'She'd be proud of you.'

  Gwen couldn't fight the smile threatening to stretch across her face. 'Or horrified. She was probably watching over our shoulders making sure we didn't break her precious computer. It was her favourite member of the team.'

  Jack grinned. 'She definitely thought it was more logical than the rest of us. And I think I'd agree with her on that.'

  Even Ianto gave a half-smile. Cutler stayed out of it, against the wall. This was their business, the sharing of a memory of a lost colleague. Gwen felt warm in her stomach, even if she knew the image was a childish fantasy. When you were dead, you were dead; there were no ghosts of Tosh or Owen watching over them. And if one day there was, it would just turn out to be some bloody alien or entity using their memories as a weapon against them.