by Guy Adams
'It's spreading out,' Alexander shouted, pointing at Gloria Banks's house next door. The structure seemed almost fluid, windows fluctuating between shattered holes and bright new glazing, giving the impression that the house was winking at them. Maybe it was pleased at the undulations that were taking place across its surface: cladding surging forth to be sucked back in again by the hungry bricks, clouds of cement dust exploded from the grouting as it moistened then aged. The blue-granite gravel that Gloria had taken such pride in was not serving her well, swirling and spluttering as it was whipped to and fro by the weeds that thrashed within it.
A crack appeared in the pavement just in front of Alexander's wheelchair.
'We need to be quick!' he shouted. 'Joe, fetch a couple of stones — not from there!' Joe had been moving towards Gloria's house. 'Idiot! Behind us. The disruption is less the further one goes from the house.'
Alexander turned on the contraption in his lap and pointed it towards Jackson Leaves. On the PDA screen he could see the swirls and eddies of chronons as the disruption fluctuated over the area.
Joe returned, holding out a pair of stones.
'Right,' said Alexander. 'Let's test this, shall we?'
He took the stones, weighing them gently in his palm as he scrutinised the PDA screen.
'Listen, the two of you,' he shouted. 'With this, I can see the disruption waveforms. They ebb and flow, yes? Like a tide… rippling towards us. If we're quick and precise, I should be able to guide our way, picking the point at which the waveforms are stretched thin and less dangerous… like… there!'
He threw the stone and, instead of disappearing as it had before, his good aim saw it sail through the disruption and break the glass of one of the upstairs windows.
'Aha! What did I tell you?' He threw the other stone and it followed the trajectory of the first, rewarding the three of them with the sound of more glass shattering. 'There is a route through the waveforms, see?'
He looked at them, but what he was saying was so far beyond their understanding of physics it clearly meant nothing. 'Look… just imagine we're on a beach facing the sea, OK? We want to get into the deep water but can't let the crests of the waves touch us as we go in. If they touch us we will die, so we have to jump them. You understand?'
'Like the seaside!' Joe shouted.
'I hate the bloody seaside,' moaned Hannah. 'You always get sand in your…'
'Yes!' Alexander roared. 'Just like the seaside. Now, Joe, you'll have to carry me on your back, the wheelchair will just slow us down.'
'Piggyback ride!' chuckled Joe, dropping down in front of Alexander's wheelchair. Alexander passed the waveform reader to Joe and clambered onto his back, holding the umbrella over both of them to keep the equipment dry.
'Hold the screen right out in front of us,' ordered Alexander, 'but remember it's not waterproof, so keep it under the brolly, yes?'
'Yep!' Joe stood up and gave Alexander a playful bounce. 'This is going to be fun.'
'I sincerely doubt that,' Alexander replied, staring carefully into the screen. 'OK, so we need to take two steps to our right…'
Joe did.
'And then forward four steps on my mark, one… wait for it… two — stick close, Hannah — three… now!'
'I hope the drug does make you do whatever someone says,' said Rob's voice on the speaker. 'If it does… well, that makes this easier.'
'No!' Gwen shouted, knowing only too well what he was about to do. She began kicking violently at the door, her hip and ankle flaring in pain with each blow.
'What do you mean?' asked Julia on the monitor, while Ianto yanked out the drawers in the old dresser, hunting desperately for anything he might use to force the lock.
'I love you, Julia, OK?' Rob promised, as, drawer after drawer, Ianto came up with nothing. 'Forgive me for what I'm about to do.'
Gwen swore. There was no way she could break through — the wood was too thick and she was working against the frame. She couldn't give up though. One last try…
Julia smiled. 'I do.'
Gwen ran at the door, roaring at the top of her voice. Just before she hit it, she vanished, space folding in on itself from the pressure of dimensional intrusion.
In the lounge, Rob sobbed and raised the mallet above his head before bringing it down with all his strength…
Gwen, appearing from the wall by the fireplace, barrelled into him, her momentum sending both of them to the floor.
Rob was quick to recover. He kicked out at Gwen, reaching for the mallet which had gone flying in the scuffle. His foot caught her on the hip, which was sore already from her attempts to break down the door, but she clenched her teeth against the pain and fought to stay close. The last thing she wanted was to give him the space to use his weapon.
Rob grabbed the taped shaft of the mallet, but reaching out had left him open to attack. Gwen utilised every ounce of combat training, following the cardinal rule of punch-ups: there's no such thing as a fair fight. She thumped him hard in the groin and, while he was curling into a ball, got one hand on the mallet. Her other hand found the back of his head, grinding his face into the carpet.
She pushed herself to her feet, yanking the mallet out of his hands and was about to hit him with it when a hand dropped onto her shoulder.
'Don't,' said Jack. 'It's not his fault.'
'OK,' said Alexander. They were now standing on the gravel forecourt of Jackson Leaves. 'That didn't kill us, then. How wonderful.'
'Time to build sandcastles?' asked Joe.
'Maybe later, my boy,' Alexander replied. 'Let's see if any of Jack's lot want to come out to play first, eh?'
Jack unlocked the dining room door to find Ianto standing there with his arms folded.
'When you've all finished being heroic in my absence,' he said, 'I'd quite like to have a go myself.'
'You can start by figuring a way out of the house, then,' said Jack.
'Oh,' Ianto wandered into the hall. 'That hardly seems fair… All Gwen had to do was beat up a workman.'
There was a knock on the door. Ianto turned to look at Gwen and Jack.
'Don't ask me,' said Jack.
Ianto opened the door, and a young man barged past him with Alexander on his back.
'Hello there,' the old man smiled. 'Did someone order a genius?'
TWENTY-ONE
'It's not his fault,' someone said, and Rob Wallace had to agree.
Opening his eyes, he was surprised to find himself back in his and Julia's old flat, cluttered but familiar, the place they had always lived together. Perhaps he had dreamed Jackson Leaves? It certainly felt like it. Pounding walls and ghostly visions… not the sort of thing that happened in a real house. Houses were normally pretty reliable places: bricks and mortar, mortgages and electricity bills.
He was thirsty. Stepping into the little open-plan kitchen, he ran his fingers over the jumble of magnets and notes on the fridge door. These were the things of proper houses, he thought, reassuring and colourful, postcards from Spanish beaches, shopping lists filled with loaves of bread and bottles of milk. Julia had bought one of those random 'build-a-poem' magnet sets, a jumble of words that you shuffled around to make new verse. He read her last effort: 'Wander out into the sky/ Ask your self the reason why/ Clouds that love are full to burst/ Open mouth and feel their thirst.' Rob smiled. It wasn't exactly Pam Ayres, but at least it rhymed. He pushed the words 'your' and 'self' closer together, trying to fix her grammar, but the gap remained obvious. He supposed it should be allowed.
He closed his eyes and shuffled the words around with his fingers, lining some up to form a random sentence.
He opened his eyes and read what he had made: 'Burst your love feel the sky and thirst.' Very poetic. He closed his eyes again and started dragging other words in from the cool white page of the fridge door: 'Show her no tears From a man who know His fears are real His death will show.' A lucky rhyme, but it was getting rather morbid…
He closed his eyes and shu
ffled them again. 'Show her a man who love death and tears / Burst the sky and know real fears.' No… he didn't like that game any more. The words kept making him feel as if there was a message in them, something he didn't want to know.
He opened the fridge, and looked for something cool to drink. There was a bottle of fizzy water, Julia's favourite. To him it tasted like pop with the fun taken out, but he was thirsty enough to drink anything, unscrewing the cap and drinking straight from the bottle. There was a bad smell in the fridge, something rotting. He had a poke around but couldn't find anything obviously mouldy, just a lot of different meats, damp and pink, perfectly fresh.
He closed the door and found himself feeling terribly lost in the middle of the kitchen. A ridiculous feeling in such a small space, but at that point he felt smaller. Felt, in fact, as small as one could be, stranded on the cheap black-and-white floor tiles as appliances towered over him — the jagged kettle, the sheer, silver austerity of the toaster, the towering black glass of the oven. He found his breath catch in his chest and reached for the radio, desperate to break the atmosphere with noise. He was momentarily certain that the cooking knives would eviscerate him for such a move, chop away his naughty fingers into little pink rings, but they stayed happily embedded in their wooden block, and the radio hissed into life as he turned the dial.
'Tie him up with that,' said an American voice.
'Tightly,' a woman added.
There was the screeching sound of heavy-duty tape being yanked from the roll.
Some sort of drama, perhaps? Or an advert? He wasn't sure what the sounds of a man being bound would entice him to buy. He tried changing the channel, but there was nothing else but static so he turned it back. He would have preferred music, but this was better than nothing.'
Julia's out of it,' the woman was saying. 'Someone will have to carry her.'
Where is Julia? Rob wondered, reminded of his wife by the characters in this strange programme — she always complained that Julia was such a common name, you heard it everywhere. He'd gone online to look up the name's origin; it was the feminine form of 'Julius' which meant 'man with downy beard'. He'd pulled her leg about that for weeks.
'OK!' the American on the radio shouted. 'Thanks to Alexander, we have a way out and all of you need to take it, now.
''Oh, shut up, you big bully.' Rob muttered, turning off the radio.
The silence was still uncomfortable, so he made his way out of the kitchen and across their little lounge to the television. There had to be something cheerful and breezy on, something to take the edge off his stupid nerves. At first he could find nothing but static, ghost images, half-shapes and jagged lines. Then, flipping through the channels, he found a picture: people all sat in a roadside café, an old woman talking to a soldier — at least Rob assumed he was a soldier, he was wearing an old uniform, certainly, though clearly he wasn't on duty as his collar was open. At the table next to them, a woman was dripping water all over the table and floor. Ridiculous. Perhaps it was supposed to be a comedy?
The camera moved to a close-up of the old woman, and Rob banged the side of the television, trying to improve the reception. The poor signal made it look like there were things crawling under her skin.
'That's it, Rob,' the old woman said, making him dart back from the screen. 'Hit me.'
Rob stabbed at the remote control with his index finger, desperate to flush the woman from the screen.
'No,' she whispered. 'Not like that… like this!'
She swung her arm, and Rob felt the sting on his cheek as if he had been struck.'
How did you-?'
She hit him again, his cheek glowing hot with it.
The radio suddenly crackled back to life.'
He's completely out of it,' said the voice of the woman he had heard before in the advert about tape.'
I'm not…' he said. 'At least, I don't think I am…''
You could have fooled us,' said the old woman on his television. 'Dead from the neck up… Isn't that what you are?'
He felt his cheeks turn cold and a pressure building in his sinuses.'
What are you…?' He ran to the bathroom, wanting to see his face in the mirror. It had lost its colour, turned the pale blue-grey of necrotic tissue. He rubbed it with his hands, and it felt thick and damp, like a verruca.'
Is that better?' the old woman asked from the next room. 'Is that what you like?'
Rob wanted to cry but knew that his dead tear ducts had no liquid to shed. He scratched at his cheek — wanting to feel something — and his nails filled with dead skin. He could just feel the touch of his fingers; perhaps his real face was still there, hidden underneath this useless hide? He began to peel, cautiously at first but then — as he realised it didn't hurt — in the biggest chunks he could get hold of. The sink filled with it, like cool, undercooked chicken meat, and soon there was nothing left for him to look at in the mirror but bone. There was no point in continuing to dig. There was nothing left of him.
He was lost.'
Rob?' Julia's voice, coming from the bedroom. 'Where are you, Rob?'
He made his way through to the poky room that was just wide enough to hold the double bed they had made their own. Julia lay on the rumpled duvet in her wedding dress. The gown had certainly known a happier day; now it was falling apart, shedding flakes of taffeta and lace like the peelings of sunburned skin.'
Is that you?' she asked, staring straight up at the ceiling.'
Yes… it's me,' Rob replied, touching the wet bone of his jaw and realising he must be beyond recognition. 'My face… something happened to it.''
Something always does, doesn't it, Rob?' she chuckled. 'There's always one problem or another, one mistake you'll never make again… Until you do, of course, over and over and over… I don't know why I bother with you.''
Please…' Rob was confused. Why was she being like this? 'Don't say that. I try so hard… I really want to make everything great… And I will, you wait and see, we'll make a real go of it in the new house…'
And suddenly he was uncertain again, did they even have a new house or was that the one he'd dreamed up? He hated to show his confusion but hated not knowing more.'
We do have a new house, don't we?' he asked her.
She made a scoffing noise in her throat. 'Not any more, you saw to that. So weak…''
I am not!' Rob scared himself with the ferocity of his shout; he hadn't known it was coming. He had to be careful of his anger, that was something he did remember. It was too strong sometimes.'
You see,' said the voice of the old woman from the television next door, 'that's your problem, always reining in your strength. That's why you lost the house, because you gave in.'
No. Rob began to shiver. He wasn't to let his anger loose. Anger wasn't strength, anger was…'
Turning yourself in circles,' Julia laughed, 'tying yourself in knots, so pathetic… How I hate you…''
Don't…' Rob felt the anger building.
' … hate you, hate you, hate you, hate you…'
'Please…' Rob's fingers were clenching, his jaw locking, muscles popping as they strained to be flexed.
'… hate you, hate you, hate you, hate you…'
'Pathetic man,' added the woman from the television. 'What are you for?'
'Shut up!' Rob shouted.
And woke up…
TWENTY-TWO
'I barely touched him,' said Gwen, as Ianto rolled Rob over and they both stared into his vacant eyes.
'You don't know your own strength,' Ianto replied. 'What should we do with him?'
'Tie him up with that,' said Jack, handing him a roll of gaffer tape.
'Tightly,' Gwen added.
Ianto tore a length off the roll and started wrapping it around Rob's wrists. Gwen moved over to the sofa. 'Julia's out of it. Someone will have to carry her.'
'Great,' Ianto sighed. 'Half of us need carrying out of here.'
'Or dragging,' Gwen muttered, eyeing Rob.
&
nbsp; 'You'll manage.' Jack smiled and stepped out into the hallway.
'OK!' he barked so everyone could hear him. 'Thanks to Alexander, we have a way out and all of you need to take it, now.'
'And what do you propose to do then, oh loud, shouty one?' asked Alexander, who was sitting on the stairs to give Joe's shoulders a rest.
'This house is the locus for something forcing its way into our universe,' Jack replied. 'Unless we do something about that, there's no point running anywhere — everything will cease to exist in the next few minutes anyway.'
'You have a plan, of course?' asked Ianto from the lounge doorway.
'Naturally,' Jack grinned. 'If the house is the door, then the easiest thing to do to stop anyone getting in is… get rid of the house!' Ianto stared at him for a moment and then nodded. 'Good. Fine. Great plan. Good luck with that, then.'
'I know what I'm doing, but I don't have time to discuss it. Trust me,' Jack replied, cupping Ianto's face and kissing him on the cheek.
'Wahey!' shouted Joe.
'Do excuse the boy,' said Alexander. 'He's enthusiastic to the point of agony.'
'I know the type,' Ianto replied, stepping back into the lounge. He stared down at Rob. 'I know you can walk,' he said. 'Nobody slips into a coma because they have their balls punched.'
'I have powers,' said Gwen.
'A way with testicles, certainly.'
Gwen dropped to her haunches by Rob and slapped him hard on the cheek. After a moment she did it again.
'He's completely out of it,' she said, walking out into the hall.
'Thank you, Nurse Cooper,' Ianto muttered, trying to wrestle Rob onto his shoulders.
Jack worked his way through the storage compartments in the rear of the SUV, grabbing a couple of packs of plastic explosive and a timed detonator, then walked back into the house.
'Definitely a subtle plan, then?' Alexander joked, spotting the explosive.
Gwen came out of the lounge.
'I need to borrow your friend,' she said to Alexander. 'Julia's a dead weight, and he seems a strapping lad.' She grinned at Joe, who, of course, grinned back.