Trace Memory

SIX

'Have we run out of Marmite?'

Great, thought Gwen Cooper. Man the hunter-gatherer, reduced to scouring around the kitchen asking his girlfriend if there's any Marmite left.

'I don't know, Rhys,' she replied, shouting down the hallway between their bedroom and the kitchen. 'Did we buy any?'

'I dunno,' said Rhys. 'I was going to get some the other day, but now I can't remember whether I did or not.'

He was standing in front of an open cupboard, wearing only his pants and a pair of slippers.

Man the hunter-gatherer, indeed.

Gwen wondered how the timeline of human development might look in illustrated form. It might start with monkeys dragging their knuckles across the floor, developing into upright cavemen brandishing clubs, and ending with an illustration of Rhys, in profile, standing in his pants and slippers and peering into a cupboard.

'Found some!' said Rhys. 'There was some behind the Oxo cubes in the cupboard.'

'How long's it been there, Rhys?' asked Gwen. 'It might have gone off.'

'Can Marmite go off?' asked Rhys.

It wasn't a question that Gwen wanted to bother herself with this morning, because this morning was her first day with a new partner. The last one had transferred to Bristol, and the one before that was now a desk sergeant. It almost felt like her first day on the job all over again.

'Rhys… What do you think?' she said, stepping into the kitchen. 'Do I look all right, or do I look a twat?'

Rhys looked at her and smiled, wiggling one eyebrow suggestively. 'Oh yes,' he said. 'Very fetching. Would you like to arrest me, officer? Why are you worried about what you look like?'

'Seriously, Rhys. Does it look all right?'

'It's your uniform, love. You wear it every day. It's not like you're going to a wedding.'

'I know, but it's just… Never mind.'

'You look lovely,' said Rhys. 'But then you always look lovely to me.'

Gwen smiled. 'Thanks, love,' she said.

Rhys smiled back and took a bite of his Marmite on toast. 'Funny this,' he said, with a mouthful of food. 'Sell-by date said fifth of March but it tastes fine. You'd never know.'

The corridors of the police station smelled of coffee first thing in the morning. Coffee and floor polish.

Sergeant Rowlands, an older man with more than a touch of the George Clooney about him (which had not gone unnoticed), walked her through the station, his longlegged strides leaving her struggling to keep up.

'You know who Andy Davidson is, don't you?' he said.

Gwen nodded.

'He's been with us for best part of a twelvemonth. Nice lad. Down to earth and all the rest of it. Don't get him onto the subject of TV or he'll talk your leg off.'

Gwen asked him where they would be going on patrol.

Town,' said Sergeant Rowlands. 'It's half term, so it should keep you busy.'

He walked her into one of the staff rooms, where a tall PC with fair hair sat reading The Sun.

'Andy, this is Gwen Cooper who I was telling you about. Gwen, this is PC Davidson. No relation to Jim. Why don't you two get yourselves acquainted and then I want you out there saving the good people of Cardiff from the forces of evil by half nine. OK with you?'

Gwen smiled, perhaps a little bashfully. She had sworn on her first day at the station that she wouldn't turn into a twelve-year-old girl when Sergeant Rowlands cracked jokes, but it was occasionally difficult.

'So… you got a boyfriend?' Andy asked as they took a left on the corner of Duke Street, opposite the edge of the castle walls, and drove down through one of the busier thoroughfares, lined on one side by market stalls and on the other by indoor shopping malls.

'What? I mean yes,' said Gwen. Partners for all of twenty minutes, and was he already hitting on her? Was this about to get awkward?

'Oh,' said Andy, as if he could read her mind, 'I didn't mean it like… It was just the whole getting-to-know-you chit-chat thing. No. Oh God, no. No, I just meant, like, "Have you got a boyfriend? Do you have any pets? Going away on holiday this year?" You know, that kind of thing.'

'Ah,' said Gwen, laughing and relieved. 'Yes. I have a boyfriend. Rhys.'

'Cool,' said Andy. 'I have a girlfriend. Her name's Kelly. Actually…' He paused as he took the car down through a pedestrianised area, waiting for gangs of shoppers and loitering teenagers to realise there was a police car behind them. 'Actually, we've only been seeing each other three weeks. But she's all right, like.'

He paused again as he pulled the car up next to the entrance of the St David's Shopping Centre and a flower stall.

'Which reminds me… It's our three-week anniversary today, and nothing says "I like you a lot and I'd quite like to see you again" better than a cheap bunch of flowers. Hang on a sec'

Andy jumped out of the car and ran over to the flower stall. Gwen watched him through the window, shifting awkwardly in the front passenger seat. Was this Andy's style? Her last partner had been infinitely less endearing; a woman with a face like an aggravated bulldog and little in the way of patience. Gwen wondered whether she had picked up some of her worst habits, especially when it came to patrol. When Andy came back to the car he put the flowers in the boot.

'Can't have them on the back seat,' he said. 'What would people think? So… What does Rhys do?'

'Rhys?' said Gwen. 'Oh, he works for Luckley's.'

'Luckley's?'

'Yeah. The printers.'

'He prints stuff?'

'No. He's in logistics.'

'Lorries, then?'

'Kind of.'

'Ah, right. Any kids?'

Gwen laughed nervously. Was Andy always this inquisitive? Or was he just nervously trying to generate conversation to prevent any awkward silences? She had a feeling it was the latter.

'No,' she said. 'God, no. We've just moved into a new flat, and with Rhys working all hours and my job… No. You?'

'No. God, no. Me with a kid? I'm hardly a responsible adult now, I mean, apart from my job and everything. I'm all right holding a baby for about five minutes, but then I get really nervous I'm gonna drop it on its head or something. I'm sorry… Did that come out a bit weird?'

Gwen laughed.

'I'm sorry,' said Andy. 'I'll shut up now.'

Luckily, before any awkward silence could develop, the radio crackled into life, and a voice from the station said, 'Lemur lemur seven eight, we've got a reported shoplifter at It Girls in the St David's Centre. That's a reported shoplifter, female, approximately twenty years of age. Apparently causing a bit of trouble. What's your location? Copy?'

'This is lemur lemur seven eight,' said Andy. 'Copy that. We're there now, so we'll go check it out. Over.'

Within seconds, Gwen and Andy were making their way through the shopping centre and, as was often the case, Gwen felt acutely aware of the attention their uniforms drew. Nobody stared exactly, but everyone looked.

Everyone adopted a slightly cagey air about themselves, as if trying to hide things, although she'd guess that most of them had nothing to hide. It was the uniform. The Kevlar jacket, telescopic truncheon and PAVA spray didn't make them any more endearing to the general public.

They could hear the disturbance outside It Girls before they reached the shop; there was a loud and almost incessant yelling, strewn with four-letter words beginning, invariably, with F and C, that had the other shoppers rubbernecking and stopping in their tracks.

Outside the entrance to the clothes shop, a girl with a pram was being restrained by a security guard while another guard, a woman, lifted items of clothing, complete with the labels, tags, and even the clothes hangers, from a bag beneath the pram.

'Can we help?' said Andy.

'Yes,' said the female guard. 'The alarms went off as this young lady was leaving the shop. When I asked if I could search her bag, she became abusive. When Rory asked her if we could search the bag, she threatened both of us.'

'I never stole nothing!' shouted the girl. 'You're lying! You're lying! You're a lying bitch!'

'Listen, calm down,' said Andy. 'Did you take anything from the shop?'

'I never stole nothing!' said the girl once again.

'There are four T-shirts, a skirt and a belt under here,' said the female guard. 'With the tags still on. And no receipt.'

'Is there anyone else with her?' asked Andy. 'Any friends or family?'

The female guard shook her head. Andy sighed.

'So that's it?' asked Gwen. 'She just has to turn up at the station? We don't arrest her?'

'You don't think I did the right thing?' said Andy, looking vaguely insulted. 'We've got her name from the ID she had in her purse, and we checked that she gave us the right address. What else could we do? There isn't a baby seat in the back of this thing, and we most certainly do not have a creche back at the ranch. If we'd taken her down to the station we'd have had to call social services, and believe you me that can get messy. No. She comes in to the station, and if she doesn't we can go out and arrest her. She'll probably get off with a warning, anyway. Unless she's some kind of master criminal wanted by Interpol. Like Carlos the Jackal or something. Which is a bit unlikely, in all fairness.'

Gwen stared down at the dashboard pensively. She'd said nothing during the whole incident; nothing to calm the girl down, nothing to the security guards, nothing to the shop manager. She'd stood by Andy's side like a pet dog, following him around the place, taking mental notes of everything she saw and heard, terrified that if she opened her mouth she'd say something stupid.

Something felt wrong; almost like a headache; a nagging sensation she couldn't shake.

They were now driving slowly along St Mary Street, the four lanes of which cut straight through the middle of the city, linking the civic centre and the northern edges of what was once Butetown.

Whether it was the sun in their faces, or her thoughts, or their conversation, Gwen wasn't sure, but neither of them saw the man before the car hit him, or rather he hit the car, slamming into the front left wing, his arms outstretched, screaming.

He was only a young man, dressed in strangely tatty clothes; homeless perhaps; but he looked out of his mind. Andy stopped the car abruptly, and they both stepped out into the street.

'Oi, mate…' said Andy. 'Where's the fire? You OK?'

'I'll kill him,' said the young man. 'I swear, I'll kill him. The girl, the Japanese girl, he was going to… Oh my God, I've got to go back there. Where am I?'

'Whoa, whoa, whoa,' said Andy. 'Slow down a minute. Who's stealing your thoughts? What Japanese girl? What's the matter? Tell us your name.'

'What's my bloody name got to do with anything?' said the young man. 'It's Michael. My name's Michael. Are you… are you meant to be the police or something?'

Gwen looked from the police car, with the word POLICE written both on its bonnet and along its doors, and back to Michael.

'Yes,' said Andy. 'We're the police. Now Michael, I want you to calm down and tell us what happened.'

'It was Japan,' said Michael. 'I was in Japan, and the city… Oh my God… The city…' He looked around himself, at the streams of traffic moving up and down the street, at the taxi cabs and buses steering their way around the stationary police car, and then he looked up at the buildings.

'Like this,' he said. 'It was like this. So many cars. But this… I know this street. Is this St Mary Street?'

Gwen nodded.

'Wait…' said the young man, looking at Gwen, 'I know you. You were in that place. Under the ground. I know you… No puzzle too puzzling, you said.' Andy looked at Gwen, who shrugged and shook her head. 'So…' he said, a trace of scepticism in his voice, 'you were in Japan? When exactly was this?'

'Just now,' said Michael. 'Ten seconds ago. Just now.

There was a man, in a bowler hat. He had… Oh, God… He had these teeth, and these eyes… And the girl Keeping one hand on Michael's shoulder, Andy turned to Gwen and whispered, 'We'll need to take him in if he's in this state. Probably Care in the Community. But he's a liability out here, so if you radio back to the station and tell them we're bringing him in, they can get on the blower to a psychiatrist. Saves us faffing about back at the station.'

Gwen nodded sheepishly and dived back into the car.

There was a trick to unlocking the door to their flat, but be damned if she'd managed to work it out yet. Every day, without exception, she'd find herself getting increasingly frustrated, wiggling the key from left to right, and then up and down. Trying not to push the key all the way in. Pulling the door back towards the door frame and pushing it away. Eventually, as was usually the case, Rhys opened the door for her from inside.

'Having trouble?' he asked. 'You know, you'll be buggered if I'm ever away somewhere when you get home.'

'Ha ha, very funny,' said Gwen, sarcastically.

'So…' said Rhys, 'how was your day?'

'Don't,' said Gwen. 'I don't want to talk about it.'

Rhys followed her through to the living room, where Gwen kicked off her shoes and threw her jacket over the back of one of the chairs at the dining table.

'Why not?' he asked.

'Because it was rubbish,' said Gwen, dropping herself down onto the sofa and putting her head in her hands.

'I was rubbish. I was just rubbish.'

'What do you mean, "rubbish"?'

'I mean I was rubbish,' said Gwen. 'I just followed Andy, my new partner Andy, I followed him around like this stupid bloody… toddler or something. Something was wrong. Everything that came up, I just froze. I didn't know what to do. I just stood there. I was useless. I was worse than useless. I was rubbish.

I don't know what was wrong with me…'

Rhys sat down next to her and put one arm around her shoulder. He stroked her hair and then pulled gently on her earlobe.

'You weren't rubbish,' he said. 'You aren't rubbish. You just had an off day.'

'Rhys, how long have I been there now? It shouldn't have been like today. It was like something was nagging at me all day. Like I had something else on my mind, but I can't work out what it was. Maybe I'm not meant to be doing this.'

Rhys looked at her, wide-eyed.

'Oi, now…' he said. 'None of that. You're good at your job. And it's what you've always wanted to do.'

Gwen nodded, tearfully. 'Apart from when I was six,' she said with a crumpled smile. 'When I was six I wanted to be She-Ra.'

Rhys laughed and, leaning forward, he kissed her on the cheek and then the lips. 'I believe in you,' he said, running his hand through her hair and smiling. 'You're so brave, doing what you do. I couldn't do it. I'd never pass the physical, for one thing!' He laughed. 'Did I ever tell you you're my hero?'

'Oh God,' said Gwen, pulling away from him and laughing. 'Bette Midler? Rhys… Are you trying to tell me something?'

Rhys laughed, falling back into the sofa. He looked at her again and smiled.

'I mean it,' he said. 'I'm so bloody proud of you.'

'We've all met him,' said Gwen. 'I knew I'd seen him somewhere before. You see so many faces, and you forget most of them. It wasn't until I heard what Tosh said. It suddenly made sense. We thought he was nuts…'

'So did we,' said Owen. 'Well, who wouldn't?'

'But why us?' asked Gwen. 'Why did he turn up in our pasts? And what about Ianto? And Jack?' She turned to Toshiko. 'The man in the bowler hat?' she said. 'It was real?'

Toshiko shrugged. 'I don't know,' she said. 'I'd forgotten everything until tonight. At first… when I saw Michael… I just thought it was, you know, déjà vu or something. Like I knew his face from somewhere, but I couldn't place it. But then… suddenly I remembered everything. All I know is that it felt real at the time, and if I think about it, I can hear that… that thing's voice, and I can smell its breath. It was just horrible.'

'So something's coming for him,' said Gwen. 'Michael said he'd seen a man in a bowler hat. Tosh, you've seen that too. Something's coming for him.'

'And I've got one other question,' said Owen, gravely. 'How do we even know we can trust him?'