‘Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge?’ Jack quoted softly. ‘Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?’
‘T. S. Eliot?’
‘Damn. I thought it was A. A. Milne.’
Gwen laughed. It was such a typical Jack comment.
‘Which one: When We Were Very Obscure, or Now We Are Philosophical?’ she asked.
‘Ever read about those tribes in South America or on the Pacific Islands, back in the 1950s, just when long-distance air travel got started? After generations of nothing much happening, they suddenly started seeing things in the sky — big white birds that flew higher than anything else, and flew in lines straighter than anything found in nature. Sometimes the tribes just couldn’t cope with this visible demonstration of something unnatural, and they just disintegrated. Sometimes they worked the aircraft into their own religions, worshipping them. But they never stayed the same. Never ever stayed the same. Even if their witch doctors, or shamans or local wise men told them to ignore the big white birds, and called them into their huts whenever the birds passed overhead, the wise men knew. And that knowledge changed them. We all get tempted, from time to time,’ he continued. ‘That’s what the Rift does: it presents us with an infinite conveyor belt of consumer goods and cuddly toys that we’re just not ready for. We have to be strong, and put them to one side.’
‘I already knew that,’ Gwen said, almost talking to herself.
‘But now you understand it,’ said Jack. He walked forward, into the aquarium, and stood beside her. She could feel his closeness in the darkness, his warmth, his solidity. ‘These fish live so far down in the depths of the ocean trenches that only the faintest trickle of light can ever get to them. They live in almost perpetual night-time. They either have no eyes at all, or they have eyes that can amplify a handful of photons to a point where they make a coherent picture. But here, in this aquarium, we shine a light on them so we can see them. It’s a faint light, sure, but it’s more radiation than they probably get in an entire lifetime. And it burns them. It blinds them. Just so we can see them. It’s as if something alien landed here on Earth but couldn’t see us, or our buildings, or our landscape, without flooding everything with gamma rays. Forget the fact that it would kill us: they couldn’t see without it.’
‘I understand the analogy,’ Gwen said, ‘but I’m missing the point.’
‘The point is that we can’t observe without interfering. We shine a light into the darkness, and it alters things. Small things, big things, things we may not even notice. But we can’t stand apart from it. Everything we see, we change. Even here in Torchwood. We think we can stand away from the alien technology and what it does to people, but we’re people too. We can’t investigate without becoming involved. And we shouldn’t be able to. All we can do is be strong.’
She could see what he was getting at, but she wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction of acquiescing to his point, despite the guilt she still carried within her. ‘Very profound,’ she said.
‘Oh, hey, it’s not mine. Some guy named Heisenberg said it first.’
‘Heisenberg? Didn’t he brew beer?’
Jack shrugged. ‘In principle, yes,’ he said. ‘But it’s uncertain.’ He gazed around. ‘Every now and then I feel like I ought to close this thing down, but where would I put the fish and the tube worms and stuff? It’s not like Cardiff Aquarium has the resources to look after them. This isn’t an aquarium any more; it’s a retirement home for deep sea creatures.’ He sighed. ‘Come on — every time I come down here I leave feeling that a massive order to the local sushi bar is in order. Let’s tell Owen that the wasabi paste is just a mild kind of green tomato sauce.’
‘He’ll never fall for that again.’
‘Oh, he will. You don’t know Owen as well as I do.’
Jack gestured for Gwen to precede him. She looked around the aquarium again. The various creatures that floated in the tanks — incurious, in pain — ignored her leaving just as they had ignored her arrival.
‘I think there’s one more thing these creatures can teach us,’ she said.
‘What’s that?’ Jack asked.
‘They survive under extreme pressure. They’ve found a way to adapt and survive. I’m not sure we’ve learned that lesson yet.’
They walked away, back towards the Hub, towards life and light.
Behind them, the violet light faded away, leaving darkness behind.
‘I thought you were ill,’ Lucy said. ‘They said you phoned in sick this morning.’
Rhys tried to put a pained expression on his face. It wasn’t hard: he’d only had a couple of hours sleep, and every time he turned his head it felt like his brain was lagging behind by a few seconds. ‘I felt a bit off, this morning,’ he said weakly.
‘Hangover?’ She smiled, taking the sting out of the words. If Gwen had said that to him, he’d have automatically been bristling at the suggestion, whether it had been true or not. Which should, he reflected, tell him something about the state of their relationship.
‘Sadly, no,’ he replied. ‘I think it was something I ate.’
He’d asked Lucy to meet him in a juice bar near where they worked, guessing that with her new figure she wouldn’t want much more than a rhubarb and beetroot smoothie, or whatever they served in those places. She surprised him by suggesting they met up over a pizza at a local Italian-run restaurant. She surprised him even more by ordering a large Venetian with extra toppings.
‘Look,’ he continued, ‘I need to ask you something, but first you have to promise not to tell anyone.’
She put on a serious face. ‘I promise. Cross my heart and hope to die.’
‘That weight-loss clinic you went to — the Scotus Clinic? I went there too.’
Her eyes widened in surprise, and her gaze quickly flicked down to his abdomen. ‘But you don’t need to lose weight.’ She looked down at the tablecloth. ‘You’ve got a great body.’
‘You haven’t seen me naked,’ he said, then blushed furiously when he realised what he had said. ‘But seriously,’ he went on before she could say something like, ‘I’d like to’, which might lead to all kinds of problems, ‘I wanted to ask you about that pill they get you to take. Have you had any side effects?’
‘Actually, now you come to mention it, there have been a few.’ She waved vaguely at the half-eaten pizza in front of her. ‘I’m eating more than I ever did, but the weight is still falling off me.’
She was right. When she had walked into the restaurant heads had turned. Her figure was stunning, and her slimness meant that her breasts were truly amazing. And she was dressing to show them off, which she had never done before. Rhys’s reaction had been immediate and physical when he saw her.
‘I guess it’s something to do with the effect of the tablets,’ she went on. ‘They must alter the way your metabolism works. Your body must be able to process the foods and just take the stuff that you need, letting the rest just flow away.’
‘You make it sound so lovely’
She laughed, and it was a musical sound. A sound he wanted to hear more of.
‘There is something else,’ she said. ‘My stomach — it felt really tender for a few days after I’d taken the pill, but it settled down. I’m feeling great now.’
‘And you’re looking fantastic.’ There, he’d said it out loud now. ‘Have you taken the second tablet yet?’ he asked quickly, before she could react.
‘Not yet. I keep meaning to, but… but I’m scared that I might start putting on weight again, so I keep putting it off.’ She looked at her watch. ‘Oops. I should be getting back. It’s all right for you — you’re off sick. Some of us have to work for a living.’