Chapter Text
Three twenty two on a warm Cardiff night was not when anyone wanted to be awake, least of all Owen Harper. He could sleep anywhere but not well, especially when it was too warm. He rolled over and heard Tosh mumble something.
“Can’t you sleep either?” He asked softly. She didn’t react so he assumed he was hearing things in his sleep deprived state. He closed his eyes and willed himself to just go back to sleep, ignoring the quiet hum of the fan in the corner of the room. After a minute he heard it.
Toshiko really was talking. “Bright.” She mumbled. She’d never spoken in her sleep before, at least as far as Owen knew.
“What’s bright sweetheart?”
“So bright… Burning… Help.”
He softly caressed her arm, trying to wake her. “Tosh? Tosh, wake up darling.”
“Stop… please.” She whimpered and twitched, in the grip of some kind of nightmare.
He sat up and spoke at a normal volume, giving up on whispering. “Tosh.”
She gasped, her eyes wide, very much awake.
“Woah, take it easy. You were having a bad dream.”
It took a moment for her to even realise where she was, shaking slightly as she calmed from her sudden awakening. “Wha-what time is it?”
“Three thirty. You alright? You were talking in your sleep.”
“I was?” She sat up and brushed her hair away from her face. “I just remember standing in this huge room filled with cogs. They were moving and something in the middle of the room, a box I think, suddenly lit up. Everything was so bright. It was like fire.”
“You’re probably just overheated.” He stood from the bed and walked out to get her a cold glass of water.
She took it with shaking hands. “Thanks. It was so real. I’ve never had a nightmare like that before.”
“It’ll be ok. Think you’ll be able to get back to sleep?”
“Probably not.”
“Want to watch a film or something? Being as we’re both awake and it’s hot as hell in here.”
She smiled and sipped her water. “That sounds nice.”
Tuesday mornings were generally quiet in summer. The kids weren’t stir crazy enough for frazzled parents to venture into the hidden little centre of leaflets and guidance. And the older visitors weren’t due a day out until Thursday. That meant it was office cleaning day and as far as Ianto was concerned it needed it. The place may have a slightly outdated look but that didn’t mean it had to be dusty. He climbed down off the short ladder from taking down the cobwebs from the corner of the room as Melody switched off Henry. Henry was a red vacuum cleaner. It wasn’t an official henry the hoover ™, but it did have a very nice set of googly eyes on the front and it could handle the kind of dirt that would turn an average henry into a box of metal and shattered plastic. The office didn’t need a deep clean but why do half of a job when you could do it properly.
“I’m thinking of reorganising the posters.” He said, placing the duster onto the counter and wiping the sweat from his brow. A slight breeze wafted in through the propped open door, making a few of the leaflets flutter.
Mel pushed Henry into the back room and tightened the knot that held her cardigan around her waist. “Really? Do you have something new to put up?”
“No, but I try and move things around once a year so it looks like I do.”
“The tourism board don’t like you, do they.”
“They like me just fine, but most places aren’t using posters anymore. They’re all clean lines and web links and we’re…”
“Eighties chic?”
“Trapped thirty years ago, yes.” He folded up the ladder and hid it behind the desk to be put away later. “What do you think?”
“Me?”
“Well, you work up here more than I do these days so you should have some say in it.”
“Ok then. Hmm…” She looked around. “It could be more symmetrical.”
“I’ve tried. The sizes won’t allow for it. It lasted a week before I just scrambled them up again.”
“Ah.”
“I could cut a couple of them down a little.” He spotted something new on the desk, a package wrapped in brown paper. “What’s this?”
Mel bounced over. “Oh I meant to open it. My nan was clearing out her loft and found one of my sketch books. There’s a kind of strange story behind it actually.”
“With you I wouldn’t expect anything else. Go on then.” He handed her a small bottle of lemonade that had been kept cool in a small fridge hidden under the desk. She took it politely and took a swig, feeling the cold go down pleasantly.
“Well, I was on holiday with my mum and dad, and we went to see my nan. She lived in kidderminster at the time. Anyway, we ended up staying for a few nights and one morning everyone woke up to find me sleeping on the lawn.”
He placed down his drink. “What?”
“Yea. Apparently I’d sleep walked outside in the night. I had this sketchbook held to my chest and I was out like a light in the middle of a fairy circle. Mum said I was running a nasty fever and I insisted my nan had to take care of the sketchbook. I refused to rest until she promised to keep it safe. She played along, bless her, and put it in the loft for safekeeping. I don’t have a clue what I drew in it. It could be blank for all I know.”
Ianto shuddered at the idea of waking up in a fairy circle. “Let’s have a look then.”
She tore open the paper wrapping to reveal an old, A5 sized, sketchbook with a sailormoon cover. It brought back a wave of nostalgia. She’d loved that book when she’d got it and had waited to use it until the summer holidays. She turned it over in her hands, noting the grass stain on the top left hand corner, before opening it up. Her name was messily written on the first page in sparkly pink gel pen.
“How old were you?”
“Fifteen I think.” She flicked through the pages seeing drawings of landscapes, cats, portraits. She paused at one page and her smile faded.
He leaned over to see what had brought her mood down, seeing an image of a familiar face. “Is that -”
“I… It can’t be.”
Owen leaned over Toshikos shoulder, looking closely at the project they’d been working on. She’d just finished assembling the components and it looked to be complete. Now they needed to do a live test and, if that went well, installation. Only problem is they needed to ask the subject first.
Tosh yawned and stretched. “Do you think she’ll be ok with this?”
“As long as we explain the risks then it’ll just be her choice. We’ve tested it every other way available right now.”
“Ok, I’ll send her a message to come down.”
The sound of footsteps approaching made them both look up. “That was quick.”
“Telepathy in action?”
Ianto was glancing around, looking for Jack, as Melody clutched the sketchbook to her chest.
“If you’re looking for Jack, he’s gone with Gwen to pick up a box.” Owen said. “Find something drastic up there?”
Melody looked down at the book. “We don’t know exactly.”
He looked at Tosh who shrugged.
“My nan sent me an old sketchbook… I drew in it while sleepwalking and the pictures… Well, they’re familiar.”
“How familiar? You’re not making sense.”
She opened the book and held it out, showing the pencil and chalk image of the face that looked just like Tosh. “I hoped it was a coincidence but…” She turned the page to show an image that was clearly Gwen, her face marred by some kind of mechanical implant.
“When did you draw these?”
“I was fifteen.”
“Are they some kind of premonition?” Tosh asked, a little worry in her voice.
“That’s the thing, I’ve never had a premonition like that before. The few that I’ve had have been mundane at most. This is like nothing I’ve ever done.”
“Do you remember what you were dreaming about at the time?”
“No idea. I’m not sure I even was dreaming. I just woke up in the garden and begged my nan to protect the book.”
Ianto frowned. “She woke up in a fairy circle with a fever.”
“Oh you’re just full of bloody surprises.” Owen sighed. “We’ll have to ask Jack when he gets back as, other than you, he’s the only one who knows anything about this kind of thing.”
Tosh took the book. “Would you mind if I held onto this?”
“Go ahead.” Melody said politely, calming a little.
Owen took the small device he and Tosh had been developing. “In the meantime me and you need to have a chat about this.”
“Oh? What is it?” She asked as she followed him down to the medical bay.
He pulled a stool over and sat. “This is a possible solution to your blood pressure problem when you push your telepathy.”
“Really? How?” She perched on the side of the table and studied the small device.
“Well, it’s kind of like a data stick. We plug this into one of the implants in your spine and it tells your nervous system that when you use your telepathy it can’t use that part of your brain I pointed out to you to do it.”
“That’s brilliant!” She beamed.
“Don’t get too excited yet. We’ve tested it the best we can, but this is all new territory so we can’t really predict any side effects. I’ll completely understand if you don’t want to risk it.”
“No, I want to try. It can always be removed can’t it?”
“At the first sign of trouble, yea. Plus I want to monitor you while it’s being used for a while.”
“So, where do we start?”
He turned and pulled what looked like a watch out of one of the draws and handed it to her. “Here. It’s a remote monitor. The second any of your stats go beyond healthy levels I’ll know about it.”
She wrapped it around her wrist and buckled it.
“Other than that, just lift the back of your shirt and I can plug this in.”
She pulled up the back of her shirt and he slotted the device into place. It clicked as it slotted perfectly into place. She didn’t feel anything other than the pressure when it was first placed. “Should I feel anything?”
“Not yet. It’ll only activate when it’s needed. Don’t know how we’re going to test it here though.”
“The simplest method would be finding someone who could combat my reading abilities and setting up a kind of sparring match, but I don’t know what kind of level everyone’s at.”
Jack turned the strange metal box in his hands, curious about how it opened and what was inside. It wasn’t made of any metal found on earth and it had a kind of vibration to it, like a low hum. It had been dug up during roadwork and as the energy readings it was giving off could give an average geiger counter a heart attack it needed to be contained. That didn’t stop Jack playing with it, but he did have the radiation sponge in his pocket to negate any damage.
Gwen sighed. “Why do people argue with us taking these kind of things, even after I tell them it could potentially kill them?”
“Greed? Curiosity? A death wish?”
“All of the above? Come on, Tosh and Owen should have finished their little project by now.”
He tucked the box under his arm. “They’re going to need me to test it.”
“Is that a problem? I thought you were Mr unreadable.”
“Only when she’s not actively trying to read my thoughts. I’m not sure what kind of level she’s at anymore and I’m probably rusty.”
“It’ll be fine. Where did all your confidence go, eh?”
He smirked. “Oh no, I just don’t want to hurt her by accident.”
“Suuuure.” She laughed and rolled her eyes. “You can test your brain of iron when this is locked safely away.”
He placed the box in the back of the SUV and walked around to the drivers seat. Gwen had a small mirror in hand and was checking her makeup. “You look beautiful as ever.”
“Oh shush.” She waved him off with a smile. “I scratched my face in my sleep last night.”
“How?”
“Rhys said I just sat up and started scratching like I had an itchy cheek or something. I must have been dreaming but it left red lines. Looked bloody awful so I had to cover them.”
“I didn’t see you as an active sleeper.”
“I’m not usually.” She slipped the mirror back into her bag. “Must have been something I ate.”