Torchwood: Exodus Code

sling.
    The old woman fell back on her heels, knocking over two of the clay pots, their oils absorbed instantly into the soft wool rugs carpeting the temple floor.
    The man’s clothing was torn and bloodstained, but his bones were no longer broken, and the mass of tears and cuts to his legs and arms were almost healed. Gaia lifted the golden mask from his face, and both women looked at each other in astonishment, tears of awe filling Gaia’s eyes.
    The man’s face remained bruised, his eyes swollen, his lips cracked, but his face had no other injuries.
    ‘Have you ever seen anything like this… like this
being
in your experience, Gaia?’
    ‘Never,’ said Gaia, kneeling at the other side of the man, stroking the dark hair away from his forehead.
    Both women remained at his side, sitting cross-legged in silence until the sun fell completely from the heavens and dropped into the sea, and beams of moonlight filtered into the hut through the slits in the stones. The fire had long since gone out. When moonlight touched the top of his head, the Priestess slowly rose to her feet, her bones creaking. Gaia remained seated, her eyes closed, drifting in and out of sleep.
    The Priestess relit the fire, then touched Gaia’s shoulder. ‘It is time. Uku Pacha has opened. We must prepare for your descent.’
    For all of her young life, Gaia had been practising and praying for this honour, to be the one to guide the star man to the underworld so that the ancient prophesy might be fulfilled . Since the beginning of time, the Cuari had been the protectors of the mountain, first waiting for a guide to be born among them and then, when she was waiting, preparing her to accompany the deity.
    Gaia accepted a bowl of warm milk from the Priestess, drinking all of it without even noticing the dots of colour that danced before her eyes as she did. Returning the empty bowl to the Priestess, Gaia slipped her ceremonial hunting knife from its sheath. With trembling hands, she began the ritual that until this day she had only dreamed about.
    First, Gaia sliced the blade through the sleeves of the man’s coat, peeling back the cloth, exposing his shirt, braces and trousers. While the priestess removed his boots, Gaia stripped off his bloody clothes, tossing them into a pile near the temple door. The Cuari elders would take the clothes up to the mountain where they would burn them, sending the smoke into the mountain as a sign that he was coming. When he was naked, Gaia soaked a piece of cotton in warm eucalyptus oil, bathing his face and his body.
    Gaia had never seen a naked man until now, but the images on the walls of the temple and the glyphs on the ancient scrolls had prepared her for the sight. When she finished, she spread a blanket she had spent most of her childhood embroidering with a sleek black puma circling a giant condor. She spread the blanket across the man’s naked body.
    The Priestess crouched behind Jack’s head and painted the Cuari symbol on each of his temples using inks from the row of clay pots, while Gaia washed the man’s feet.
    Soon the air in the hut was thick and pungent, the aromas from the oils and the steam from the water basin clouding the space. The man moaned and stirred under the blanket.
    The Priestess looked at Gaia. ‘The time has come.’

13
    JACK HARKNESS OPENED his eyes. He sat bolt upright and inhaled. He was not breathing.
    Dead. Again.
    He had experienced this awakening too many times before. He knew what to expect.
    He inhaled. He exhaled.
    Nothing.
    No gasping. Nothing.
    Cupping his palm at his mouth, he exhaled again. Nothing. He wasn’t breathing. What the hell?
    Renso. The Hornet. The mountain. Jack’s chest felt light. He pressed his hand on his heart. Still beating. So maybe not dead.
    In limbo? Still healing?
    Strange.
    Jack took deep breaths in and out, but nothing went in or wheezed out from his lungs.
    So did that make him dead?
    Confusion rushed over Jack in a cold wave. Never experienced this before.
    And then the wisp of an image – a girl, the sun, a kiss, darkness.
    And so much pain. Jack gasped, the memory flitting away.
    Sitting up, Jack could feel he was lying on a platform of rock. He squinted, running his hands over the surface, eventually seeing he was on a lip of rock that ran the circumference of a massive stone chamber. The walls were black granite marbled with veins of silver that were pulsing in the darkness. Above him the chamber formed a square opening, a