No Substitute
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Chapter Four … The Ignorant Absentee
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( Approx. fifty six years earlier ….. )
Location : Central London, England.
Year : 2009
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"There was. They did. I mean. Oh, this is some creepy fucking shit, Kev."
The senior morgue assistant checking the details of yet another name-tag looked up to laugh disbelievingly at his co-worker. "Alright, Gav, the fingers moved ….. 'course they did." With a chuckle he stepped around the corpse and made a point of deliberately nudging his inexperienced young assistant closer to the body. "Exactly how many of those slammers did you down last night, mate?" He laughed, looking down to consult the information on his clip-board.
With the original look of horror still sitting firmly on his lackey's face, the older man stopped what he was doing to laugh at him again. "Come on yer daft sod," he grinned. "Shift yer arse and let me slip our mister, um …" pitching himself back at an angle he reached out for the tag again and this time made a better note of the name. "Oh, yeah, that was it …. our mister Jones, 'ere, into the fridge ….. you know, Gav," he laughed. "Just in case he decides to make a run for it."
Still staring down, seemingly transfixed by the peacefully handsome face, his understudy of the past eighteen months looked just about ready to pass out. "Oh, fuck! Look!" Eyes widening with fear, he gestured with a shaky hand for his boss to follow his gaze. "Honest, I swear to God, Kev, I just saw the eye lids move as well. SHIT!" Having already turned white, the young kid managed to send himself back at least five feet with just one jump.
Looking back at him, the older man heaved a huge, senior assistant-like sigh. They were already running late for lunch and his stomach had started to grumble loud enough for all three of them; the stiff included, naturally. Moving further along the sliding shelf; intent only on humouring the kid until he found a way to prove a more experienced point of his own, the head attendant glanced back at his assistant with one final eye-roll then peered downward.
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"Fuck Me!" He said quite categorically.
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Location : Windsor, Berkshire, England.
Year : 2009
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"Look, Mrs Davies, I appreciate your concern but this is highly irregular."
As, for the third time in as many minutes, the unimpressed woman opposite him sat back in her seat to thread her arms tightly together, the doctor in charge did his best to hold her stare. "Your brother, madam, is in a comatose state, the likes of which neither I, nor any of my colleagues, have ever witnessed before, and for his own well-being I believe it imperative that he remain at this facility."
"But this is England, you stupid man." She gasped, affronted. "He's Welsh! He should be at home with me, or at least at a hospital in Cardiff where he can have his family come visit him." As the burgeoning feelings of utter helplessness finally began to overwhelm her she gave a shudder then burst into tears. "I thought I'd lost him, doctor." She wiped at her eyes with the back of one hand. "But there I was, still grieving for my brother, when I get a call out of the blue from some jumped up, two-bit hack asking me how it feels to know he's still alive. Tell me, doctor," she barked abruptly in the hope that her becoming angry might mean she'd be given some sort of an explanation for things at last. "What's the world coming to if the bloody press are the first to pass on information like that?"
The suit and tie (she'd been wondering ever since she'd arrived, why he couldn't have worn a nice comforting white coat, just for her benefit ) on the other side of the desk, nodded as he leaned back in his chair. "Yes, I'm very sorry Mrs Davies, I can only agree with you; that was most unfortunate, and I have to say that the discretion of the hospital staff on that particular day was absolutely appalling."
"Yes, it was …" Rhiannon Davies agreed, her frame sagging; the accompanying sigh instantly prompting her to mourn the loss of her inner Welsh dragon. Was she really going to allow everything to become too much for her again? She wondered.
Reminding herself of who she was and why she was here, she straightened in her seat. "Look, I'm sorry," she told the man flatly, her self-control returning. "I didn't mean to shout at you like that and, please, don't get me wrong; because I really am happy about all of this. But what you have to understand is….."
She stopped speaking to stare sternly at the bald spot on top of his head; it appeared that the sheaf of paperwork on the desk beneath him was suddenly proving to be far more interesting than she was. After a few seconds of displaying a certain amount of arrogance, in presumably having noticed the distinct lack of chatter going on a few feet away, he looked up again, his eyes quizzical; a hint of confusion sitting there.
She allowed him a pinched smile before continuing.
"As I was saying," she started, purely just to let him know that she'd made a note of his rude lack of interest. "I won't feel that my brother is really back with me until he's home again." As the doctor dared to nod understandingly at her, she clasped her hands neatly together in her lap. "Me and my family?" She said pushing on; totally unwilling to shut up now that she'd finally found an avenue to vent along. "We've been to bloody hell and back, I can tell you. First my Mica and David, and every other poor little bugger on our estate, started with that whole hypnotic trance rubbish. Then some woman that my brother's never even mentioned before, turns up to tell me that he's been killed … and there she was, in my house the trumped up madam, talking away like she was Ianto's bloody best friend or something. Oh, and just to top it all off, I find out that the poor bugger's been killed by aliens. Aliens, doctor! Of all sodding things! Now you tell me …" She hurrumphed. "Where was I supposed to go with information like that, hmmmm? A Psychiatrist?" Arms folding onto her chest again, she fidgeted unhappily on her seat. "If you ask me, the whole wide world has gone bloody barmy." She finally decided.
Looking to her right, she gazed out of the window to see a fluffy white cloud floating by. Deciding that it was shaped almost like car, but one with no wheels, she became distracted by it for a second and found herself wishing that she could just climb out onto it and float away from this ruddy doctor and his rudeness and his damned red tape.
Remembering that her brother's needs were far greater than her own, she quickly got back to business with a resigned shrug. "But if that's how things are going to be from now on," she continued, picking up on her previous train of thought. "Then let them get on with it …and just as long those aliens stay away from Cardiff, well, they can do what they bloody well like, can't they!"
Very nearly choking on his moment of smug one-up-man-ship, outwardly the doctor was still smiling politely at his patient's sister, but in remaining to be amused by her comment he could only conclude that this annoying woman actually knew very little about her beloved Cardiff.
"All I want is for my family to be happy and to get my life back in order, doctor. Can you understand that?" Off again and fixing the man opposite with a challenging stare, she continued to make her point. "I want my husband to start smiling again. Is that too much to ask? I want my children to stop crying and …. and I want …. I want my Ianto baaaa …."
The very next breath caught at the back of her throat and brought with it the threat of more sobbing. Swallowing hard, she bravely controlled it. "Oh, God ….." She gasped, clasping a hand over her mouth in realisation. "We wasted so much time the pair of us, there's so much that I need to make up to him; so much that I want to say. Please, doctor, you've got to let me take him home to a hospital 'round our way. We could go private if necessary ….. that bloody place he worked for can pay for it. Yeah, how about we let the government show some recognition for how brave he …..."
With what little fight she had left finally fading, she crumpled in her seat; her shoulders heaving as she began to sob loudly. The doctor slid out a drawer and retrieving a box of Kleenex he skirted his desk to get to her.
After placing a comforting hand on one shoulder he offered her a smile and then a tissue. All three gestures were bathed in as much insincerity as one would expect from a person who had so dubiously slimed their way up one questionable career ladder. After starting out as one of your archetypal 'après-grad' city based goafers, he'd managed to achieve, with relative ease, the slightly more auspicious status of being a 'director's p. a. /standard arse-licker/dogsbody'. Then, in accepting a post which suited him more than he could ever have imagined it would, he'd become 'spin-doctor and fall guy extraordinaire', for somebody influential ( but not that influential ) within Whitehall.
This most latest step in his career; with it proving indisputably that it was not what he knew but who he knew, had seen him hungrily lap up the ridiculous amount of power that came with being crowned chief assistant to one of the three acting heads of security based within UNIT London. And other than the honorary doctorate presented to him by some colleagues in his previous post as recognition of his ability to spout copious amounts of bullshit in the shortest time, this 'doctor' had not one single medical qualification to his name.
Not that Rhiannon Davies needed to know that, of course. Up until two weeks ago, to him she was just one of roughly sixty million; just another nameless and faceless statistic. But this nameless and faceless statistic was now proving to be a monumental pain in his backside; the woman appeared to possess enough bull-dog spirit to serve an entire nation. Well, she would have done had she been English. He wasn't quite sure what the Welsh equivalent might be … he couldn't even recall if he'd ever been to Wales.
"Look … Rhiannon." Opting for the more personal approach, and watching her gratefully take another tissue from his box, he squeezed her shoulder for one final time before making his way back over to his desk. "I know this is going to sound harsh." He told her, retaking his seat. "But why don't you try focussing on just how very lucky you and your family have been with all of this? You do know that not one other person survived that attack, don't you."
Noisily clearing his throat, he looked down to avoid her gaze; afraid that she might see through the lie. One other person, her brother's colleague, had managed to escape from the building completely unscathed. But, of course, with that person being exactly who he was, the details of the man's remarkable escape had been conveniently misplaced. "I truly do appreciate your predicament," the 'doctor' carried on, this time almost cutting it in the sincerity stakes. "But the most I can promise you at the moment is that if we do start to see some dramatic signs of improvement, then I will push through the motion to have your brother transferred to Wales. But in the meantime …. I'm afraid your only option is to visit him here."
Rhiannon Davies did her brother proud, she sniffed away her sadness, blinked away her tears and heaving in a deep breath she gave a bright and dimpled smile. "Thank you. I know you'll do your best for him ….." She nodded. "And I'm sorry if I've been rude to you today, but …. I just don't know what to make of anything anymore; do you know what I mean?"
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As he escorted her from the building they shook hands and she thanked him again. Then with one of his well-practised smiles the 'doctor' left her at the main entrance to walk back to his office with something of a determined pace.
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"Hello, Commander?" He said urgently as the call was answered at the other end. "Yes, I've just seen her out. No, not good, Sir. I'm afraid she didn't by the bluff about his survival being a hoax; recognised the cover-up for what it was straight away, in fact. Our records show that Jones made a call to her just before he contacted the disused Torchwood facility in Battersea that day and during it he revealed that he had inside knowledge of the invasion, plus he warned her about the threat to his niece and nephew. So, of course, with her already knowing that he worked for the government in some capacity, well, let's just say, that, when confronted with even stranger news about her brother, it didn't take long for her to put two and two together.
His features winced at the reaction coming from the other end. "Well, she's agreeable, for now, to let the rest of her family believe that the report of his survival was a hoax," he put out by way of compensation for his boss. "But in my opinion getting her to sign the official act would be a complete waste of time. The woman appears to have no comprehension whatsoever of what the word secrecy represents; she's still insisting that her brother should be with his family in Cardiff …. and I don't need to tell you, Commander, of the complications which could arise if certain parties in that area were to get wind of his er ….. miraculous recovery, shall we say."
Nodding, he listened politely to his superior's take on the situation then sighed quietly before putting on his slimy head to agree. "Yes, I'm in total agreement with you, Sir, and I can only conclude myself that, somewhere along the line, the patient's relatives are bound to cause us a problem. It's just a shame that we didn't manage to contain the situation before that ghastly reporter became involved, although I suppose we should count ourselves lucky that it didn't make the nationals." Waiting once again for the other man to have his say, he listened intently then gave his usual nod. "Yes, it's all in hand; there's since been a retraction and an apology made by the local paper, and after a little coercion, plus the serious threat of them being bundled off in straightjackets to spend the rest of their time in an institution, the two members of hospital staff have sensibly announced that it was all part of a prank played for the benefit of a colleague."
Lifting the lid of an ornate box he took a cigar from it and continuing to listen intently, he commenced with the laborious efforts of trying to light the thing. "Well, I'm pleased to be able to tell you that as far as media coverage is concerned, the whole affair appears to be dying a death ….. if you'll excuse the pun." He chuckled, then after sucking in his cheeks he puffed out a hardly worth it waft of blue smoke. "No, Sir, as far as I'm aware, aside from that one John Doe report by that journalist friend of our two hospital employees, there have been no personal details for our patient released to the public. Though things would have been so much easier if the idiot hadn't gone ahead and made contact with the next of kin." He muttered as an aside.
Nodding again, he listened intently before sighing. "Oh, I agree Sir, and those idiots should have been dismissed for passing on information as they did. But we can't run the risk upsetting them, plus, in the end they did manage to convince the hack that it was all a sick joke."
Starting to look fairly pleased with himself a smile creased his fat cheeks into several folds as he began to deliver the only real piece of good news that he had. "So, in conclusion, Sir, I think we can safely say that, aside from Rhiannon Davies herself, and, very possibly, her immediate family, we appear to be secure again."
He leaned sideways to pull open a drawer further down then removing an ashtray from it he tapped the end of his cigar onto it. "Yes, I'm inclined to agree with you, Sir, that's exactly the course of action that I thought might be most appropriate. I'll contact the crematorium straight away to arrange the appropriate service."
Stretching further sideways to look down into the grounds, he watched on, satisfied, as a limousine pulled away with Rhiannon Davies tucked safely inside.
"Very well, Commander." He said, finishing off. "I'll contact you as soon as I have the details, and in the meantime I shall instigate the drawing up of the necessary paperwork and fake certificate, and then instruct the public relations department to issue the sister with the very sad news of her brother's failure to survive his unfortunate condition."
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( Approx nine months later … )
Location : Windsor, Berkshire, England.
Date : April …. 2010
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"They appear to be getting stronger every day."
Brushing her fringe away with the back of one wrist, Doctor Erin Maynard continued to stare, mesmerised by the fluctuating graphs in front of her. "It's almost as if his brain is re-setting itself, William." With a deeper frown forming and turning to her right, she addressed the tall man standing next to her in a more direct fashion. "These patterns?" She sighed, shaking her head at the screens again. "Have you ever seen anything like them before?"
Lips already pursed, the rather eccentric looking, yet quirkily handsome, colleague that she'd spent many a spare moment daydreaming over recently, winked quickly as he tapped his pencil against the side of his dark rimmed glasses. "Nope, Erin, can't say that I have, although, this has always been an unusual case."
He turned away from the monitors with a smile. "But, having said that, I didn't get to become the outstandingly brilliant consultant that I am today by not being open-minded." Taking a step back and folding his arms expectantly, he grinned cheekily at her. "Any helpful suggestions waiting to flood out of that bottomless pit of medical knowledge, Doctor Maynard?" He teased. "What, exactly, do you make of exhibit number one?"
"Oh, I do wish you wouldn't refer to him as if he's some sort of experiment …." she scowled, and beginning to frown again, she stepped up to the bed to gently brush a thumb over the back of their patient's hand. "He has a name, William, just like you and I, and I'm sure that underneath this quiet exterior of his, our Mr Jones, here, is just itching to get out of this bed and lay one on you."
The loud bellow echoed around the sparsely furnished private room. "Is that so?" He exclaimed, his genuine delight at the comment forcing him to double up with laughter. "Well, if you spot any signs of movement you will let me know before anyone else, won't you." He chuckled. "And just as an extra precaution I think that from now on I might wait for you in the next room."
Still chuckling away to himself, he lifted the clipboard from the end of the bed. After just one quick glance down at the notes he was looking straight back up again with a frown. "His details have been changed. Any ideas as to why he might suddenly have become Geraint Jones instead of Ianto?"
Obviously not happy about the situation either, with one brow lifting disdainfully, his date for the coming weekend wordlessly shrugged her shoulders at him.
"Up to their games again, are they?" He sighed in response, looking back down at the information with a shake of his head.
"All I can get out of anyone so far is that there was a mix up in admin when he came in." She sighed back at him. "All we're being allowed to know is that there was a simple mistake made with the name. Oh, and there are some extra instructions, if you'd care to look further down." She remembered, nodding for him to take a look for himself. "Apparently, the second he regains consciousness, we are to inform a certain doctor Grant, on that mobile number found, curiously enough, just below his name."
"Remind me again ….." Came the reply with a hint of amusement to it. "What exactly did he qualify in again? And anyway, why the urgency for somebody like Grant to know in the first place? I mean, even if our Mr Jones, here, does suddenly pull out of this, it's not as if he's going to be going anywhere in a hurry, is it?"
"Well, again, apparently ….." The doctor smiled back at him, raising her hands in readiness to wave the necessary speech marks in the air. "Our 'learned' colleague wishes to ask the patient a few important questions, which I can only assume will be relating to his miraculous feat of survival."
Deciding that, at that very moment, he really didn't want to be thinking about any of the questionable goings on happening outside of his medical facility, William Brand not so discreetly changed the subject. "How long has he been with us now?" He asked going back to the notes.
"He came in last July, so it'll be a year soon." She told him glancing almost affectionately over at their patient before looking back to find the consultant pawing his way through the paperwork with a frown. "So …. do you think we might be close to getting an answer, William? These new signs of activity have got to be a good sign, haven't they?"
Studying the monitors again before redirecting his gaze, a now soberly William Brand gave his answer. "For his sake, Erin, I really hope so. Because as more and more time passes, and with his activity levels increasing as rapidly as they are, if he doesn't pull out of this soon he's got more chance of losing out to a seizure than anything ….. and that would be a damn shame."
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( Approx. 14 months later … )
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Location : Windsor, Berkshire, England.
Date : June … 2011
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"Clear!"
As the upper body lifted from the table, and at least three other nursing assistants dashed into the room, the resident doctor and consultant standing on either side of the casualty shared a concerned look.
"Erin, are you quite sure it wasn't just an involuntary trigger? He has just crashed, after all." As he spoke, William Brand glanced along to the nurse taking charge of the transformer then nodded once at her before looking back to his wife.
"I'm telling you." She rushed out, her gaze alternating worriedly between her husband and their patient. "His eyes opened and something registered. Will, I'm not just saying this; I know for certain that when those eyes opened …. he saw me."
"Charging and …. Clear!" He shouted, taking her observations on board for a later moment.
As her husband's body wracked with the second effort, Erin Brand glanced up at the monitor then quickly back again. "William, I swear he came back. And for that one split second …. he saw me … I know he did." Becoming almost panic-stricken, and in a move which belied her usual show of professionalism, her eyes began to fill with tears. "We can't lose him now for God's sake!"
"I'll give it one more go." He told her before issuing the necessary instructions to the nurse next to him.
"Clear!" He warned again and the lifeless body beneath them jerked upward once more.
And with all of them in that room suddenly finding themselves holding onto that same, one small hope, nobody moved. Nobody even dared to breathe.
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Nobody, that is …
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Except Ianto Jones.
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tbc.
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A/N : I'd just like to thank everybody that's reviewed, followed and faved, so far …. Much appreciated.
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So …. just one more chapter to go … and I shall be back with it sometime after the spring bank holiday … ( ducks quickly to avoid low flying missiles. )
See you then …... bwb.