Written
by Chris Chibnall
Produced
by Richard Stokes
Director
Andy Goddard
Music
by Ben Foster/Murray Gold
Additional
music by Automatic
Ellie Johnson, is a young, blonde haired
woman heading home to her Dad along a quiet country road, miles from anywhere
remotely civilised. Storm clouds pull
the dark night in and the roads become darker and even more desolate than
before. But Ellie is safe in the car,
with her radio playing ‘Monster’ by Automatic.
She’s reassured her Dad that she won’t be long. The signal is breaking up but she’s safe
in the car.
But lying in the road is a body!
It lies across the width of the road. Ellie could drive past, could drive on, call
for help at the next nearest village, but as the music plays to the bridge her
conscience won’t let her leave without first checking the body.
She gets out of the car grabbing the
baseball bat that she carries in the car at all times and edges carefully to
the hooded figure lying still on the road.
She calls to it, hoping for an answer but nothing. The night air is
cold. She gives the body a nudge with
the bat, it moves she nudges it again and realises to her horror it’s a
fake. Then the radio stops playing.
Fear grips Ellie as she makes her way back
to the car, bat raised, she sees the tyres are quickly deflating. Getting back
in the car stowing the bat on the passenger seat she reaches for the ignition
key, but it’s gone!
Panicked, Ellie manually locks the
driver’s door and phones for help, but there is no signal at all! She hears noises on the roof, but saw nobody
climb on the car, and just like those horror stories of old, Ellie fears the
worst!
She screams for the noises to go away, for
whatever it is out there to leave her alone.
When the locking system forces the locks up she reaches for her bat, as
the door opens and before she can do anything, she’s captured!
It’s daylight, early morning and the rain
freckles the windscreen. The Torchwood
Three team are following the route that Ellie took on her journey home. Captain Jack Harkness is driving, sitting in
the back are Toshiko, Gwen and Ianto and riding shotgun is Owen, who at this
precise moment is complaining about the fresh air and the smell of the damp
cold countryside. It’s all disgusting,
the further away from civilisation that they get.
As with all remote lay-bys there’s always
a service caravan selling hot food and snacks.
The SUV parks near hand and while Ianto orders the food, Jack, Gwen and
Toshiko pore over a map on the bonnet as Owen tries to warm up.
Jack relays to the team that there have
been 17 disappearances in the last 5 months, given the location Owen suggests
that given the area, they likely all topped themselves, knowing he’d do exactly
the same if he had to live out there.
Jack continues and explains that all the
people have disappeared within a 20 mile radius. As the Rift is increasing all the time it was
possible that it was dumping aliens all over the place.
As Ianto brought over
the burgers, he asked if Toshiko was certain she didn’t want one. Toshiko confirmed her dislike of take away
vendors such as this by telling him that “...a friend of mine called hepatitis
after eating a burger from one of these places.”
Jack abandons his burger. Locating
the area that Ellie’s last phone call had been picked up; he decides that it
would be the ideal place to set up camp, much to Owen’s disgust!
The location was set into a quarry, a
large area of flat land ideal for camping.
With a few tents already up, the team began unpacking. Carrying the heavy sack containing another
tent, from the SUV, Owen continued to whine about the fact they were staying
out of doors as oppose to staying in a hotel.
“What’s wrong with a hotel?”
“People are going missing around here do you
really want to stay in a place run by strangers?”
“Yeah coz sleeping outside is going to be so
much safer.”
“No other race in the universe goes camping,
celebrate your own uniqueness!”
The team are completely unaware they are
being watched from the trees!
As the team settle in, Gwen starts the
ball rolling by asking one of those ‘girly’ questions.
“Who was the last person you snogged?” As usual it’s met with the casual dry wit of
Dr Owen Harper. Gwen with the boyfriend
admits her last kiss was with Rhys, Toshiko surprises Gwen by admitting her
last kiss was with Owen, which even shocks Owen as he can’t recall the event.
“Outside the Millennium Centre, 3am,
Christmas Eve, waiting for a cab, I had mistletoe.”
When Toshiko threw the question to Owen,
she and the team were a little shocked to discover that it was Gwen he’d last
‘snogged’ and remarked to Gwen that it hadn’t taken her long to get her feet
under the table.
Passing the question along, Owen asks
Jack.
“Are we including non human life forms?”
Gwen laughs, never
certain that Jack is telling the truth.
“You’re a sick man Harkness...”
As the laughter dies down, Ianto opens up
and tells the team his last kiss had been with Lisa. An awkward silence falls across the camp and
Gwen apologises.
“Sorry that she’s dead or sorry you
mentioned it?” Ianto asks.
A further few awkward moments and Owen
suggests gathering wood for the fire.
Gwen offers to go with him, leaving Ianto alone with Captain Jack and
Toshiko.
In the woods, Gwen has a go at Owen for
his inability of keeping that snog to himself.
Aware that this has riled Gwen, he continues to tease her, bringing Rhys
into the conversation, suggesting that their sex life can’t be up to much if
she’s seeking solace elsewhere.
Gwen reacts by grabbing
Owen and slamming him against a tree, offering to lamp him one if he doesn’t
shut up. He returns this threat by
grabbing Gwen and slamming her against the same tree, and ups the ante.
“When was the last time you screwed all
night? When was the last time you came so hard and so long you forgot where you
are?”
Gwen struggles in his grip.
“Don't you ever think you're too familiar?
Whereas you and me... we're not cosy at all.
We'd be AMAZING. And that scares the shit out of you.”
A twig snaps and Gwen is forced back to
reality spots a figure in the trees watching them. They both struggle to tear themselves away
from the ‘moment’.
Breaking from the clinch, Gwen goes left,
Owen goes right, guns at the ready.
Every squawk, tweet, flutter of wings and Gwen is nervy but the stranger
has gone and Gwen and Owen find themselves facing each other. Over Owen’s shoulder Gwen makes spots
something lying beside a tree and they both investigate.
Using a sturdy tree branch, Owen edges
forward and lifts the sheet off, and quells his desire to throw up. A skeletal bloody body devoid of flesh lies
rotting with maggots crawling all over it.
As Ianto tapes off the scene, Owen gets
down to business.
Although it’s hard to say what may have
killed the victim, Owen is able to ascertain that it isn’t Ellie Johnson, and
that it was a middle aged male in his late 40’s or 50’s.
As the team deliberate on the cause of
death. The sound of a car engine breaks
their thoughts.
“Is that ours?” Gwen asks.
“Yep.”
Jack replies running back to camp.
Whoever has the SUV drives over the tents and destroys the campsite
before driving away.
During the clean up Owen apologises for
leaving the keys in the ignition, while Ianto, using Toshiko’s PDA has located
the SUV.
“Gunning at 90 I shouldn’t wonder. You steal a piece of equipment like that you
drive straight on till morning.” Says Owen.
“Actually no it’s been stationary for the
past four minutes. I’d go so far as to
say it was parked.”
It is obvious to Toshiko that this is an
elaborate plan, a trap, and Jack agrees.
They have been under surveillance since they arrived. Without a vehicle
they are now easy game. Gwen locates on
the map a small village, and taking what they can carry, set a course along the
Brecons towards the site.
A rundown village looks abandoned from
where they stand on the hillside and Owen wonders why anyone would live in such
a remote part of the country. Jack queries if the SUV has moved and discovers
it’s still parked.
Time for a closer look!
As the Torchwood team reach the village someone
is watching them from a grimy upstairs window.
The team splits up!
Jack instructs Toshiko and Ianto to follow
the signal and locate the SUV while he, Owen and Gwen see if there’s any room
at the inn.
The pub is in darkness, no money has been
taken from the till. Where is everyone?
With weapons drawn Jack takes the first
room after the bar while Gwen makes her way to the darkened kitchen. It has been abandoned for some time, food has
been left beside the stove, bread has been cut and left. The curtains are only
partly open letting some light into the room.
It looks to have been a busy kitchen at some point.
Behind Gwen the sound of buzzing bluebottles
is loud, then the zap of a fly killer nukes a fly above her head but her gaze
is drawn to the body on the ground, stripped of flesh in parts and left to
decompose. Gwen throws up.
As Jack rushes in Gwen points in the
direction of the body.
As Owen jokes about the burger coming back
to haunt her, his laughter turns to abhorrent shock.
“Oh my god.”
A door closes downstairs, and Jack calls
Gwen to follow him. Still reeling from
the body, Gwen retches. Although Jack
and Gwen can’t see anyone, they are being watched from a distance. Jack suggests they try the next house,
jumping over the low wall, Jack presses himself against the porch wall, while
Gwen grabs the door handle.
Entering the quiet
house, there are no sounds, only blood underfoot the closer they get to the
next room.
“Who did this Jack? Coz whatever it is can’t
be human. How far is this going to
spread?”
“Stay focused.”
“I should be at home having dinner with
Rhys, what am I doing here with you? Do
you ever get scared Jack?”
Back in the kitchen of the pub Owen
collects his final sample and straightens up, looking down at the body of what
can only be Ellie Johnson he hopes she put up a good fight.
Out on the hillside walking to another
isolated building, this time run down with boarded windows, Ianto and Toshiko
follow the tracking device linked to the PDA.
Heading around the back of the stone brick
building, fox cries can be heard along with the solitary pheasant. It’s a desolate, soulless place. As Toshiko turns, weapon ahead, dead game
birds hang on door knobs and trees, a hunter’s fare. Toshiko aims her gun at the figure coming
around the building, but it’s merely Ianto.
They’ve still further to locate the SUV,
and Ianto climbs the wall and heads on up, past the house, towards the
hill. As he turns back, Toshiko has
disappeared. Spooked he returns to the
house, scared, vulnerable, and calls out her name but hears nothing back. Scared, vulnerable and out of his comfort
zone, he goes in search of her.
Ianto turns back and forth, jumping at the
slightest sound, but something follows him up the side of the house and pushes
him to the ground.
Outside of another empty house Jack and
Gwen have found nobody alive so far and move to the next house. There is a catch on the door and it won’t
give. With a tug, Gwen pulls it open and
is shot.
The shooter is a young lad (Callum
Callaghan) with a pump action shotgun.
He’s terribly afraid that whoever has taken everyone else is going to come
back for him. The boy is called Kieran; he’s up visiting and upon seeing that
Jack is not a threat, despite yelling at him to lower his weapon, does as he’s
told. Jack returns outside to assist
Owen with Gwen, and carries her indoors to a dining table swept clear by Owen. Jack checks upstairs while Owen prepares Gwen
in order to remove the buckshot that has peppered her right side.
“There’s going to be a certain amount of
residue so just lie back and think of Torchwood.” Owen says looking over before continuing.
After a while, and as
Owen progresses in the removal of the buckshot...
“Do you miss being a doctor?” Gwen asks after a while.
“Excuse me, I still am a doctor I just don’t
deal with patients anymore that’s all...,” whispers “it’s ideal, that was the
bit I always hated.” After much fiddling.
“Ahh you beauty! Come on I’m good.”
“Not bad!”
Captain Jack Harkness ran back down the
stairs with the pump action shotgun belonging to Kieran. Time is getting on and there has been no contact
from Toshiko or Ianto.
As Owen tries to convince Jack that
perhaps the SUV is locked up somewhere, Keiran throws a spanner in the works by
suggesting that they could be dead, since everyone else is. Jack’s concerns are heightened when he
presses Kieran for details and learns that whatever is attacking people is not
human!
Jack decides that the safest place would
be the pub and suggests they head there.
Owen now fears for Ianto and Toshiko’s safety but allaying his fears,
Jack reassures Owen that they’ll know what to do.
“They’re not children.”
Toshiko awakens to find herself in a
building with limited lighting, dank and dark and with the feeling that they
weren’t the first, nor will be the last people to wind up here. Ianto is
already awake gripping hold of a large meat hook.
“You know I’ve always hated camping.” He says.
Toshiko searches for her weapon on the
floor is told by Ianto that whoever they were taken by have their weapons. She pulls the torch from her bag and shines
it around the room, looking for all possible escape routes.
“Charming place they’ve got.”
“Judging by the sound reverberations air
quality, pretty deep underground.” Ianto
replies fearfully.
Toshiko discovers blood on a metal slope
by a possible exit. Sensing Ianto’s fear she suggests he tries to get
the lamp working while she inspects the rest of the room. As Ianto’s fears set in about what lies ahead,
who the creatures were that took them, about the work that Torchwood do, about
the risks they take Toshiko defends it.
“It’s worth the risk! To protect people”
“And who protects us?” Ianto argues.
Toshiko can’t answer this and returns to
her search about the basement and locates a shoe, then another, following the
trail of shoes sees more.
“How many people have been down here?” She says spotting clothes as well.
Toshiko bounces the torch beams across the
walls on the opposite side of the room and spies a fridge. Curious about why a
fridge should be sat there goes to investigate.
She’s horrified by what she sees.
Toshiko quickly closes the fridge but
Ianto wants to see what she found. She
knows how sensitive Ianto is and wants to protect him, but despite all her
efforts he pulls open the fridge and stares at the contents on each shelf,
layers of body parts, some wrapped, others un-wrapped.
“We’re food!”
Meanwhile at the pub, Owen and Jack
barricade the doors while Kieran sleeps holding the shotgun. Gwen is compiling what evidence they have. Owen is still concerned about Ianto and
Toshiko but Jack is certain they’ll be alright, but if truth be known, he is as
worried as Owen.
“We have to assume the others have been
killed too!” Jack says
“So you think there have been 17
deaths?” Gwen says.
“At least.”
Jack replies lifting another piece of furniture to put against the door.
As Gwen updates the board glass is smashed
outside, a shadow goes past the window, another sound of breaking glass. The predators are outside.
“He said they’d come
back” Gwen says while Kieran still sleeps.
“Let’s not jump to
conclusions!” Jack says glancing back from the window.
“We don’t know who they
are or what their intentions are.” Jack
says, as the lights suddenly go out.
Owen has a feeling that whatever their intentions
are they won’t be good.
The rattling of the front door awakens Kieran
who sits up, weapon aimed. Calmly, Gwen
calls him towards her, suggesting he follow her voice. There’s a silence as the door handle ceases
rattling, footsteps disappear.
It’s a tense few moments till the door
handle to the cellar turns. All eyes
turn towards it.
“So we didn’t check the cellar!”
Jack grabs the handle of the cellar door
as it rattles loose of its chains and fires into the darkened room, just as Kieran
opens fire on the front door. As the
predators open fire back, Kieran begins screaming for ‘Help’ and is pulled
across the floor by his legs out of the building. Gwen attempts to go after him but Jack pulls
her back. Despite his protestations Gwen
is adamant that she has to do something.
Owen heads after her, while Jack deals with the predator in the cellar,
that he knows he hit.
Meanwhile Ianto and Toshiko look for an
exit from their prison. As Ianto begins
kicking the reinforced door, a light switches on the other side. As the bolts
slide back Ianto presses himself against the wall while Toshiko arms herself
with a meat hook.
A woman – Helen Sherman
(Maxine Evans) armed with a shotgun enters, and as Ianto tries to disarm her,
she manages to knock him to the ground yet still maintains her position with
the gun.
“I’m not going to hurt you...I
promise.” She nervously protests against
Ianto’s assault a few seconds earlier.
She enquires after their health and if they’d been injured when they’d
been brought in earlier.
“I’m a nurse.” She says, her voice low, almost a whisper, as
if scared to speak too loudly for fear of being overheard in the next room. She asks if anyone knew where Toshiko and
Ianto were, if they’d called for help, when discovering that Toshiko hadn’t,
she seemed relieved, but also interested in the fact that there were three more
people still out in the village.
Helen Sherman told the pair she was sorry
that she couldn’t help them, sensing their desperation to leave, to
escape. She told them that she had come
to collect them, when Toshiko asks her where and what is going on, Helen merely
laughs.
“No-one’s safe,” Helen says, “every 10 years it takes us
again...the Harvest!”
Ianto tries to take the gun again but
Helen waves the barrel in his face.
“Please, you have to come with me!”
Toshiko realises they have no choice but
to comply and drops the meat hook.
Jack runs down the cellar steps in search
of the predator. With weapon drawn and
torch in his other hand he scans the room.
He is shocked to discover body organs in glass jars on shelves. He locates a shotgun lying in a gulley, a
trail of blood leading off, and listens for sounds in the quiet of the cellar,
for the predator.
Locating the predator, the man unmasks to
reveal a human male, grubby with bloodied fingers from the gunshot wound to his
lower torso. He begs for his life. He offers to tell Jack everything if he helps
him.
The predator male is dropped onto the
barrel ramp as Jack searches for material to plug the wound and tie off the
blood supply to the leg, to stop the guy bleeding to death, before he’s had
chance to interrogate him.
When the predator goes back on his word
Jack removes the padding to the wound and snarls in the man’s face.
“You need to know something, a long time ago
I was pretty good at torture, see I had a reputation as the ‘Go to’ guy, my job
demanded it at the time see, so I know...” he removes his pistol, “where to
apply the tiniest amount of pressure to a wound like yours!”
The predator begs Jack to stop.
“It’s in your power to make me stop, just
tell me what I need to know coz in ten seconds I’m going to find a sharp
object...”
Realising is predicament, the predator
talks!
Stumbling painfully but supported by Owen
Harper, Gwen Cooper makes it to the road, as a Landrover Police vehicle drives
up. A young Police Officer (Rhys ap Trefor)
enquires after them.
“Who are you please?”
“Special Ops, Torchwood, have you heard of
Torchwood?”
“What’s that then, a band?” laughs the
copper.
Gwen enquires after the light over his
shoulder, and is told that it’s the big house, the village hall.
“That’s why I’m here. Constabulary
report!” Gwen and Owen push past him as
he shouts after them. “Where are you
going?”
Helen Sherman, leads Toshiko and Ianto at
gunpoint into the lit room. When Toshiko
begs Helen for their freedom she refuses, pushing Toshiko with the barrel of
her gun away, as Helen edges into her kitchen.
Toshiko towards the room where a sheet of polythene hangs partitioning
the two rooms.
“What’s that stench?”
Both Ianto and Toshiko peer through into
the butchers lair at bodies hung from the ceiling wrapped in polythene,
bloodied tools and equipment on benches.
“What are these creatures, do they look like
us?!”
“How else are we going to look?” Evan Sherman (Owen Teale) enquires standing
on the other side of the plastic sheeting in another part of the room.
Helen begins to laugh, hard. Enraged and horrified as Evan kisses his wife
Helen, Ianto charges at them in a bid to escape and is knocked to the ground by
Evan, and then cuffed for his troubles.
Helen mentions that there are three more out in the village. He asks her about the two that they have with
them, as he cuffs Ianto and makes good the rope on Toshiko’s wrists behind her
back.
“They’re in a good state...” she replies.
Evan remembers that he caught the boy
Kieran earlier and sits him up, removing the hood. Despite the boy’s desperate pleas that he
won’t tell anyone what is going on here, Evan is clearly not going to let him
go.
“What are you gonna do? Put us on meat
hooks?” Toshiko asks bitterly.
“No. Not yet. You see, meat has to be
tenderised first.” He lifts a baseball
bat and leering at the ‘food’ before him, licks his lips as he touches
Toshiko.
Ianto already having a plan up his sleeve
smiles at Evan before he headbutts the man, cracking his nose. Once again in a bid to escape he’s floored
and suffers a crack to the skull by Helen and the butt of her shotgun. But Toshiko has already left the building,
hands tied behind her back, she relies on her feet only to get her the hell
away from the house, hoping that Ianto made it out too. Evan goes after her, with the machete.
Toshiko breaks for cover as Evan looks
around for but running in the woods with little idea where she’s going, she
inevitably runs into Evan and is floored by the man, but she’s not beaten yet
and lands a direct kick in his groin bringing tears to his eyes.
Now it’s a chase to the death. Evan is not going to take that risk again and
as Toshiko falls and loses her balance on a soft bed of leaves, Evan puts his
hands around her throat and proceeds to strangle her.
He doesn’t stop when Owen cocks the hammer
of his pistol against his head and instructs him to stop. Owen kicks Evan away from Toshiko. Gwen and Owen learn that the villagers are
dead.
“They’re cannibalising the bodies!”
When Huw arrives, Gwen tells him he can
arrest Evan, which raises a laugh with the older man. Huw is hardly going to arrest his Uncle.
Owen stares down the barrel of the gun
held by the police officer. Gwen points
her gun at Huw yelling at him to drop the gun, while Evan insists that Huw
spreads Owen’s guts. With the odds
stacked against them, Owen forces Gwen to surrender her gun.
In the big house Toshiko sees a group of
people sitting at tables about to have a cup of tea, poured by Helen.
“Who are these people?”
“These are our villagers.” Replies Helen.
“Villagers are dead.” Shouts Gwen angered.
“No, they’ve all been doing it.” Realises
Toshiko
“This is our Harvest.” Says Evan.
Gwen laughs, sickened.
“Only in the bloody countryside, you sick
fuckers!” Owen says.
Angered by the comment Evan and Huw grab
the Torchwood team and frogmarch them through the polythene partition and onto
the ground. Gwen falls painfully beside
Kieran, glad to see he’s still alive.
Owen and Toshiko are on their knees.
Tosh asks after Ianto.
Evan pulls him to his knees, he’s
unconscious and gagged with a piece of cloth around his mouth. Slapping him awake Evan lifts the meat
cleaver.
“Time to be bled – like veal!” he says holding the cleaver against Ianto’s
throat. The team are horrified.
Suddenly the ground begins to vibrate, the
fruitbowl rattles, crockery, and the building begin to tremble. Releasing Ianto – into the arms of Gwen, Evan
stares at the red double doors of the building, angered that he was halted from
his work. Huw aims his gun as the doors
burst open and a ruddy big tractor crashes through!
As the tractor stopped Jack leapt through
after it, firing at everybody but his team.
Shot after shot with the pump action shotgun, cartridges flying,
villagers going down with shots to the knees and shoulders.
As the shotgun emptied he used his trusty
Webley revolver and floored the cannibals, even shooting the hand of the police
officer as he reached for his own pistol.
Nobody moved, but plenty groaned.
Jack grabbed Evan and pushed the revolver
under his chin, intending to finish the job as Gwen shouted for him to stop.
“No Jack.
Don’t do it.”
“These people don’t deserve warnings.”
“Let me question him. I have to understand. I want to know why otherwise this...this is
too much!”
“They’re injured. They need to get to a hospital.” Toshiko called from across the room.
“One hour Jack – don’t tell me you don’t
want to know too!” Gwen says.
In the Inn, Evan sits opposite Gwen at the
bar table while Jack sits as witness.
Evan’s appearance is different now from earlier, the meat lust, the mad
butcher of human flesh sits defeated in front of Gwen Cooper.
“The whole village was involved?”
“Every generation, our tradition, once a
decade, target those travelling through, those most likely to disappear and...”
“And butcher them.” Gwen says with disgust.
Evan stares at her without
expression.
“What sort of people are you that you wake
up in the morning and think ‘this is what I’m going to do.’ Why do you do it? Come on, make me understand!”
“Why do you care?” Evan asks.
“I have seen things you would never believe,
and this is the only thing I can’t understand.”
Evan
turns and smiles at Jack before looking back at Gwen. “So keep on wondering.”
“TELL ME?
I need to know why.” Gwen
demands.
“That’s enough.” Jack looks at Gwen before nudging Evan. “Time to go.”
As Evan is about to get up he looks at
Gwen, a tear moist on his cheek. “I’ll
tell you something if you let me whisper it.”
Gwen nods. “Cos it made me
happy!”
Back in Cardiff some time later and Gwen
sits with Rhys in their flat, watching the television.
“I had a good job before this. I thought in a year or two perhaps a
baby. I know Rhys would make a good dad,
and I could try for Desk Sergeant. Well
it was all sorting into place. And then
I met you lot. All these things, all
these things are changing me, changing how I see the world and I can’t share it
with anyone!”
As Gwen stares out across a city below
from her vantage point, wearing only a blue shirt, Owen stands behind her.
“You can now!”
Photo source:
BBC Torchwood 2006
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