Chapter Text
Ianto placed down his book. He’d been taking a break to clear his head after working in the archives all morning. Melody sighed and flicked through a leaflet she’d been looking through for a while.
“Having second thoughts?” He asked.
“Hmm? No, no. I still want to go, I just… Something doesn’t sit right with me about what happened there.”
“A cannibalistic cult isn’t going to make sense. At least I hope not.”
“It just doesn’t follow usual cult mentality. Like, serial killers have certain things in common. A dysfunctional relationship with their parents, a traumatic upbringing, a head injury at an early age, cruelty to animals, a lack of empathy, a level of charisma. They usually have at least three of those. It’s the same with cults. They have a charismatic leader, a common goal, a kind of doctrine that they follow. The cannibals didn’t. What’s more if it was a generational thing then the rest of the village should have suspected something. They didn’t, they joined in. It’s like there was something else leading them.”
“You think something’s still there?”
“I just think something more was going on.”
He looked back to his book. “For your own sanity you should probably leave it alone. Some people just don’t follow the same thought patterns as the rest of us.”
“That’s the thing though, they do. Human minds are made of patterns. Everything can be followed back, even if the pattern moves in chaotic ways, it’s still there… Sorry, I know I should leave it. You’re the last person I should be saying any of this to.”
“No, I’m fine. It’s not as if we don’t go through awful trauma once a month anyway. I’m just surprised they didn’t bulldoze the whole place.”
“There’s been a whole rebuilding and PR project. They’ve even built a memorial garden for all those that went missing. It’s meant to be beautiful.”
“So, they’re throwing a medieval festival.”
“Well, it’s not as if there isn’t the space. It’s going to be massive from what I’ve heard.”
“Still camping?”
“The weather’s meant to be good so yea.” She slid the small box of chocolates over to him. “I just hope they get the construction before it starts.”
“I would have thought they’d have finished it by now.”
“They’ve had all sorts of problems apparently. Machinery breaking down, deliveries turning up days late, the whole thing’s been a mess.”
He studied the circle of chocolates in the box. “Have we found the chilli one yet?”
“Nope. Good luck.”
He took one and bit into it, pausing for a moment before relaxing. “Safe.”
“Maybe it’s a faulty box and they forgot the chilli one.”
“Why do you have so many of these anyway?”
“One of my old town friends works in a gaming shop and they got sent loads of these from one of their suppliers. Who knew that chocolate Russian roulette wouldn’t be a big seller in a store that sells to majoritively teenage boys who play magic.”
“So they sent them to you?”
“Yep.” She took one of the chocolates and chewed on it. “Found it. Not bad to be honest.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Want some water?”
“Naa. I can’t taste capsaicin so it doesn’t bother me.”
“Really?”
“Yea. Haven’t I told you that before?”
“No, but I’ll remember that for the next time we all go out for drinks. I can think of a few bets we could win.”
“No daring Owen to drink hot sauce.”
“Spoil sport.” He smirked, the twinkle of mischief still in his eye.
The next day was warm and peaceful. Brynblaidd looked charming, covered in brightly coloured tents and filled with a mix of families and staff dressed up in medieval clothing. Music filled the air, mingling with the smoke from the hog roast and multiple braziers, the smell of straw, grass, soot and food drawing people in. The place showed no sign of its morbid history beyond the thriving memorial garden. Candles, photos and bunches of flowers had been placed in front of the fountain at the centre. The water sparkled in the morning sun.
One area of the village had been fenced off as that was where construction was still going on and though you’d expect it to be ignored a huge crowd had gathered along one side. Melody walked over to one of the booth owners. “What’s going on?”
“The crowd?” The man asked. “It’s the strangest thing. One of the JCBs got turned on its roof last night. No idea how. None of us heard a thing.”
“That’s… Really strange.”
“You should have seen it when we all started setting up this morning.”
She nodded and glanced back to where Heather was trying to see above the mass of people. She joined her girlfriend and gently pulled her by the hand to somewhere quieter.
“What’s all that about?” Heather asked, pulling her bag higher on her shoulder.
“It’s a turned over JCB. Apparently noone heard a thing.”
“You don’t think it’s… You know.”
“I have no idea. It’s strange though.”
“Can you sense anything?”
Mel shook her head. “I’m doing my best to keep all the people out so there’s no way I can filter it. We’ll have to wait for tonight when it’s a lot quieter.”
“Maybe in a bit we can get a picture to send to Gwen or Ianto.”
“Good idea. For now there’s not much we can do so how about we go and find a few shiny things to buy.”
“You know a way to a girls heart.”
“Gemstones and swords. Works every time.”
Tosh sunk down into the plush coffee shop chair across from Gwen. They’d spent the morning looking at dresses for the wedding reception, more as something to do than necessity.
“I’m surprised you asked me to come with you. I would have thought you would have invited your bridesmaids.”
Gwen sipped her iced coffee. “They get to come to the wedding. This is my way of celebrating with you too.”
“I’m just sorry we can’t attend.”
“It comes with the job.” She shrugged. “You’re all invited to the reception if you can but please don’t bring any… Uninvited guests.”
Tosh smiled warmly. “We’ll be the ones keeping uninvited guests away.”
“I was wondering something. In the future do you and Owen plan on, you know.”
“Getting married? I know my mum would like that but I don’t think it’d be fair on Owen. It’d just bring up bad memories. Anyway, who would even attend? There’d be my family, Jack, Ianto and you.”
“What about his mum? Surely he’s got other family.”
She shook her head solemnly. “He doubts she’d bother showing up and he’s lost contact with any other parts of his family. They weren’t close.”
“Do you want to?”
“I don’t know. I always thought, when I was younger, that I’d get settled in a job and then think about finding someone I could settle down with… Life doesn’t work that way.”
“You still could if you wanted to. Not that you have to or anything but you two are serious now.”
“I think with everything we deal with, being together is enough. Who knows if we’ll even live long enough to get to a wedding. We’re both past the Torchwood mortality average.”
“You know if you add Jacks age to that it goes way up.” Gwen tried to lighten the mood. She always hated thinking about the life expectancy in her line of work. If you reached twenty five you were doing well. Beyond that and it was like death was lurking just around the corner, waiting for an opportunity to snatch you away. A buzzing from her pocket pulled her from her thoughts. A text from Heather.
Hi. You never told me I was dating a disney princess lol I go back to the car to grab a couple of bottles of water and this is what I come back to.
She smiled at the picture that was attached: Melody fast asleep under a tree on a picnic blanket, a squirrel eating the crumbs from her abandoned plate, a cow resting its head on her hip and a butterfly sitting peacefully on her hand.
“Awww.” Tosh said softly, peeking over. “Looks like they're having a nice time.”
Gwen shot back a text asking where the cow had come from and how she’d managed to not spook the squirrel.
I think it came from the next field over. Might have spooked over here when a JCB over on the building site got turned on its roof last night. Might wander over to see if there’s a farmer about. Don’t want daisy getting into trouble. The squirrel just took a lot of creeping XD. Hope you’re having a good weekend too.
She looked confused. “Turned over JCB?”
“Hmm? Medieval fairs have changed since I last went to one.” Tosh glanced up in surprise.
“Apparently it happened last night. Once sec.” She sent another message asking for more information.
One of the sellers said it was just sitting on its roof when everyone woke up. Like it happened without making enough noise to wake anyone up. Noone has any idea how it happened. I’ll try and get you some pictures in a bit. :)
Melody rubbed her eyes, yawning away what was left of her sleepiness and they both walked over to the fence line. Heather waved to a very confused looking farmer. He walked over and spotted the cow lazily plodding along behind them.
“There you are. How the hell did you get over here?” The man said, a mix of relief and exasperation on his face. “I don’t know what’s wrong with this place but the cows have been acting strange since we got here.”
Melody tilted her head. “Oh? We thought it might have been the noise from the building site.”
“Naa. They’ve been strange since I got here last year. There are parts of the field they won’t go and some nights it sounds like they think there’s a wolf walking around the barn.”
“Were they like that last night?”
“Yea. Was around six in the morning before they calmed down. I don’t know about all the murder but there’s something off about that whole village. It’s like the land’s rotten.”
“Has anyone else had issues with their animals?”
“Plenty. Old Toms dogs won’t even walk through. Anyway, thanks for bringing her over. Don’t want her ending up wandering into a tent or something.”
“No problem.”
He waved to them politely and went to open the gate to bring the cow back into its own field.
Mel sighed to herself. “I knew there had to be something going on with this place.”
“I told Gwen I’d get a picture of that JCB. Want to do that and then maybe set up the tent? If you still want to stay with all this I mean.” Heather said, looking to the other side of the field where the first line of tents began.
“Yea… Yea, I still want to stay. Let’s get those photos and find our camping spot.”
“And it could be all coincidence. I mean with the places history people are bound to get superstitious and maybe the JCB thing is a big prank the organisers are pulling. It got plenty of people looking and a mystery always brings in tourism.”
“True. We should know by tonight. Once everyone goes to bed I can try and read the place.”
“And I’m sure all your tech stuff should be able to work out a few theories about the JCB just by the photos if we can get any that are good enough.”
“Oh yea, Tosh is a magician with photos.”
“So when do we do the whole double date thing with her and Owen?”
“I’ll have to ask them… And convince Owen.”
“You can do it. I like knowing the people you spend all your days with.”
“I just like being able to go on dates and stuff, even if they do end in strange ways.”
“You can never say it’s boring.”