He swore. "Tsebai! In the middle of the day?"

No one nearby but... surely the Begumi were not abducting people in broad daylight?  The Community Estates cast long shadows, but they were not especially dark.

Who could he call?  The UK branch was suspended.  999?   If Hsu brought in a bunch of Peelers they would all be killed.  MOD would have access to flashbangs and tear gas....  But the UK Security Helpline was useless.

Hsu had studied Bagumi for the now-defunct Taskforce but he had never encountered one up close.  Tenebrionids a major nuisance but not a military threat.   Officials didn’t care how the Bagumi kept the homeless population down, they just liked that there were less on the streets.  Cursing himself, he entered the utility tunnel.  Hsu was tall and muscular for a Korean man but he was an analyst, not a field agent.  He didn't even have a gun.

The tunnel led to a sewer access point.  Only a handful of LEDs provided light so he activated his phone's flashlight, half covering it with his hand. Fresh scratches on the wall here, long parallel lines.  Claws, not toolmarks.  The sewers smelled wet and cloying, like a thick cloth that smothered his face.  Hsu breathed through his mouth.

There was something moving in the tunnel?  A flicker of moving light and something large.   Human-sized.

There was a broken pipe wrench leaning against the wall.  The texture was gritty and gross but it made a reassuring weight in Hsu’s hand.   Swing the wrench at the creature, then dazzle it with the LED.  Yeah, a plan.  Drive it back into the sewers or if it had taken a human, startle the alien into releasing them.

(Hsu would not fool himself into believing that it could be the little girl.  She was definitely dead.)

The sound got closer.  Blood-red light reflected off of something...?  He steeled himself.   Count to three and then...!

Hsu burst around the corner with a yell and swung his wrench at head-height!  The figure jerked back, grabbed the wrench and pulled it out of Hsu's grasp then charged towards him!  Hsu fell backwards and scuffled his dress pants on the sewer floor.  His hand skidded on something soft and disgusting.

The alien loomed over him.  No, the human.

“That’s funny, you don’t look like an alligator.”   A young man in a green jacket sneered down at him. “Unless those high-priced loafers you’re wearing are gatorskin, in which case – fur is murder!”

The kid’s jacket had a rabbit fur fringe around its neck.

Hsu choked out “I thought you had been kidnapped!”

“What, kids napping here?  Worst babysitter ever; 1 star on Yelp!”

“What?”

“Other brands are available.”

The assailant was a sixteen year old boy with dirty blond hair and a nasty scar on his right chin.  His parka was a gallimaufry of patches and buttons; sports teams, brands, anime and political slogans layered over a battered 1960's coat.  The boy dropped the wrench.

Hsu asked “What are you doing here?”

“Being a winner.  Hey office boy why are you in a sewer?”

“I was looking for – hey!”

The kid didn’t bother to listen.   He walked back down the tunnel.  A red light flashed in his hand.

He has taped a red filter over the light on his phone, turning it into a night-tactical flashlight.  Because the red frequencies preserve your night vision.  Hsu, by contrast, was still half-blind.

He waited for his eyes to adjust, then followed.  “I don’t normally get attacked by strangers!”

“Wow. Your friends must be a-holes.” he echoed back.

There was a patch on the back of his jacket that said ‘THIS IS ME, LEAVING,’ and another declaring he was a JURASSIC PARK RANGER.  ‘Trust No One’, frowny faces, ZOMBIE SURVIVALIST and old 1970s TV shows.  Individualism via mix-and-match?

The kid reached a junction and looked back.  “Why haven’t you left?   Did you get lost on a straight line?   I could draw you a map but....”

“It isn’t safe down here.”

“Obviously not.  Maniacs swinging wrenches.  Do you have a name?”

“Hsu.”

“Yes.  Who?”

“Hsu.  My name is Hsu Jae-shin.”

“Wow. There’s a comedy routine that I will avoid mentioning.”

“Thank you.” he said through gritted teeth.  “You will be the first.”

“As usual, I am unprecedented.  Now stop following me around!”

The kid kneeled down by a cardboard box filled with bottles and jars as well as a stack of aluminium turkey trays.  One tray was already on the ground and partially filled with a clear substance.  He opened a jar and measured a thick drizzle of sharp-smelling liquid into it, followed by a small measure of viscus oil.  Finally he opened a can of fizzy drink and poured that into the tray as well.

Hsu’s nose winkled at the unpleasant odour. “ What is that?”

“Peppermint oil, valerian extract, engine degreaser and TAB cola.  Toothsome repellent.”

Hsu’s attention sharpened.  “Toothsome. You mean Bagumi!”

“Ratmen.  Freaky Sewer Zombies.  Are they really called bah-goo-mi?”  He never took his eyes off the tunnels while he packed up the box.

“They have a bunch of names.”  He sniffed near the tray.  The minty chemical stink was a bit like the spray used by agents of the Scottish House.  “Plague Weevil repellent.”

“What’s that?”

“The Bagumi showed up on Earth during the Black Plague. They eat dead flesh, so mass graves were a smorgasbord.  Plague Weevils, Deathvores, Scrats... there are a bunch of names.  They are most correctly called Tenebrionids.”

"Bagumi is Korean right?  What does it mean?"

"Burrowing Weevil."

The boy tossed a few sponge cubes into the tray to it wick more readily.   Then he turned to Hsu.  “You realize they aren’t insects, right?”

“It’s a translation error!  Catholic monks originally called them Tenebrio, which is Latin for ‘dark seeking.’  That same term was later used for the taxonomic family which weevils and burrowing beetles belong to and... texts got mistranslated.”

“That is incredibly stupid and I believe every word of it.  We call ‘em Toothsomes.”

“Not the worst description.”

“There was a card game with a monster that looked just like ‘em.  It was called a Toothsome.”

“If the creator based his monsters on myths or Dürer engravings then some of them will inevitably turn out to be real.  There is a Pokémon based on a Mahalta!”

“That’s an alien?”

“Yeah.  The Pokémon is– ”

The kid held up a hand. “Stop – you’re Big Pharma?”

“...as in the medical industry? No!”

“Uh huh.  Whoremaster then?”

“What?!”

“Hey, I try not to judge.   I bet Toothsomes clean up real pretty.  Give ‘em some lipstick and a titanium ring gag and bam – you’ve got a prom night!  Sure, the photos are going to be awkward....”

“Are you – do people actually...?” Hsu sputtered.

“Handcuff man-eating aliens to beds and have sex with them?  Uhh, yeah!”

“Toothsomes are sapient!  That’s not bestiality, it’s rape!”

“Oh, and humans are so beyond that, huh?  Glad to hear it!  And if you believe that I’ve got a mineshaft in Belgium to sell you.”

“Can you shut up?   It’s dangerous to be down here.”

“I would never have guessed!  All these Korean guys swinging rusty wrenches seemed perfectly safe to me.  Totally non-threatening.  Child-friendly even!” The kid made a running jump to the other side of the sewer tunnel.

“Look – what is your name?”

“Elim Green.  And talk more quietly!”

Right.  Toothsome were definitely using these tunnels.  With a grimace Hsu took a running jump across the tunnel and came to a sliding halt against the far wall.  “I know what I’m doing. You don’t!”

“And you came down here armed with a cell phone.  Nice call Spielberg.”   Elim set up another tray.

Hsu took a deep breath, which he immediately regretted.   Sewer stench.  He was pretty sure that rat was eating another rat.  “We should pull back and call someone to re-secure the door.  And these gates.  Add more bars.”

“Won’t the aliens just rip them out again?”  Elim cracked the can of TAB; harsh and hissing.

“Titanium bars and gates!  Like they use in Wales!”

“And anchor them to crumbling brick walls, huh?  Great plan.  My tax dollars well spent!”

“Mine too.   I’m a citizen.” he protested weakly.  “All we can do is make it difficult so that the Bagumi choose to hunt elsewhere.   Some place without people.”

“I am making it difficult.  I make these tunnels smell like TAB cola tastes.”

“That isn’t very effective!” he hissed.

Elim turned around, his eyes hard.  Then he tossed him a pink can of TAB soda.   “Drink it. I double dare you!”

“That isn’t the point!”

“I don’t hear you drinking!”  He sprinkled sponge cubes then packed up his box and again jumped to another side of the tunnel and another junction.  Hsu followed.

More signs of their trouble Toothsome on the wall.  “This is dangerous.”

“Drink!  Sound carries here and it will shut you up.”

The sound as he opened the can open was almost deafening.  Elim glared under his ragged bangs.

Hsu took a sip, then grimaced.

“See? What did I tell you?”

Hsu made a point not to say anything.   He let the kid do his thing.   Heck, maybe the repellent would work!

After a minute or two Elim asked him.  “You said Wales, right?”

“Yeah.  There was a big population there.”

“No Toothsomes in London until two years ago.  Why?”

“Climate change, we think.  London is several degrees colder than the surrounding countryside, which is not typical for big cities.  So the Toothsome are migrating.”

“Great.  So the one good thing to come out of England’s weather also brings child-eating rat aliens.”

“They eat adults too.”   He took another sip, then put the can down on a ledge.  “But mostly pets.  We try to herd them into places with a natural food source.”

“Like Welshmen?  That’s cold but I can’t argue with your choices.”

“The Cardiff tunnels are connected to the bay.   And it’s the home to the Mill Lane fatberg.”

“The who what when?”

“A couple tunnels in the sewer, due to pressure and temperature flow patterns have formed giant deposits of fat which clings to the ceiling.   A gooey, six inch thick layer of pink-white fat jiggling in the pipes like plaque in an artery.  Every greasy shit or pan of bacon fat down the sink... that is where they end up.”

“Fatbergs.  Just then I thought humans couldn’t disgust me any more.  Hand me your TAB.”

Hsu gave the boy the open can.  Things were stirred and the aluminium tray was shimmed so that it was level. His curiosity got the better of him.  “Hey Elim, how did you learn to do this?”

“Charity event in Ealing two years back... it was pretty worthless but one lady I met was cool.  We talked about homemade explosives and her theory about the invasion cubes.”  He have a beleaguered sigh.  “I learned more from her in two days than all of my teachers combined.  Who is we?”

“What?”

“Climate change, we think.  That’s what you said.   Who is ‘we’?”

“Oh, an intelligence taskforce.  I used to work for them.” Hsu wasn’t sure if he should admit this.  “That’s classified.”

“You got fired?”

“U.K. operations got shut down.”  Right after I transferred citizenship.

Elim blinked.  “They shut the whole thing down? Why?”

Hsu’s lips thinned. “Climate change, sort of. The taskforce reorganized with scientists in charge and our new commander was not shy about her opinions on that matter.  As a result our Taskforce’s budget was attacked by coal and oil lobbyists.  We struggled but when Brexit negotiations fell through international funding dried up and the whole thing just... shut down.   With one week’s notice.”

Elim snickered uncontrollably for thirty seconds.   When he picked up the box he grinned at him.   “You worked for the Men in Black?”

“Minus the guns.  I was a low-level analyst.”

“Great!  An alien fighter who doesn’t fight, just what I needed.  But you can file the paperwork for our new titanium bars!  That means you participated.”

Hsu winced.  “Actually I need to go through the new U.K. Security Helpline, just like anyone else.   And it kind of sucks so those could take a couple weeks.”

A muscle on the side of Elim’s jaw flexed.  Then he took a deep breath, smoothed down his oversized coat and nodded.  “Right. This is Brixton.”

One of the many patches sewn to Elim’s caught Hsu’s eye.  Three patches all in a row actually.  A yellow cartoon Tweety Bird, the NASA mission patch for the Window Observational Research Facility and a black remembrance ribbon.  The NASA patch had script in the Klingon language because –

“Canary Warf.  Your patches... Remember Canary Warf.”

Elim’s eyes fixed on him a hungry predator.  “Do you?”

“No.  But I know that I am supposed to.”

The ‘Battle of Canary Warf’ was an alien invasion which no one remembered.   It has been a simultaneous Code 96 and Code -7.  (Negative Codes were theoretical End of the World scenarios.)  Somehow humanity had survived.  Then a few years later....

Elim finally looked away.  “I thought that I was going crazy.  One day everyone just forgot.”

“How many people died?” Hsu asked, fascinated.

“12,000, first time.  But the grinders came back in 2009 and that time was a lot worse.  I hid in a water tower.  Inside, with an inflatable mattress.”

Hsu looked around the tunnels. “How are you not claustrophobic?”

Elim shouted “People died!  And then, some of them were just alive again!  And some of them were still dead but everyone thought they died in a car crash or something.  And some of them suddenly never existed.  My best friend forgot his aunt.   What did you do?”

“We didn’t do anything!  It was a Code Ninety-Six, crazy shit happens!”

“What the hell is that?   Use real-person words!”

“Another dimension or a parallel universe!  When Raven’s Rift closed – everyone forgot.”

“So why do I remember?” Elim demanded.   He was shaking.

Hsu took a long breath and tried to be gentle.   However abrasive he was, this boy was hurting.  “A very small fraction of people – one one-thousandth of one percent – still remember.  That’s about 600 people in the whole U.K. And about 3,000 worldwide.  We were the epicenter so more people remember here.”

Elim leaned back against the side of the tunnel, not caring for his coat. “I thought I was – That woman I mentioned? She was the only other person I met who remembered.  And I thought... maybe she’s crazy?  Just feeding into my delusions.”

“If you don’t mind me asking... what did she do?  When it happened.”

“Driving a monster truck with a bunch of nuns throwing explosives off the back.  But during the 2009 thing she – ”

A chittering hissing sound came from the tunnels and they both froze.

There was a Toothsome nearby.

Hsu pointed at Elim then put his hands at ear-height and shook them.

“What?”

“Loud.  It’s sigh language for you were being very loud!”

The hiss seemed to move to a different tunnel, but then the first hiss came back.  There were two of the monsters.

A third hissing growl joined the two behind them... and then another from in front of them; back by the entrance where they came in.

“We’re cut off.”

More guttural voices joined the horse behind them.

“Hey buddy, do you speak Tenebrionid?”  Elim asked hopefully.

“No one speaks Tenebrionid.  Not even other aliens.”

“Your stock isn’t exactly rising!”

“We have to rush the one up ahead.”

Elim nodded and put down the cardboard box and readied himself for action.  “This is a shitty day but at least it can’t get worse.”

A high-pitched human scream echoed down the tunnels.  It escalated in pitch suddenly in time with growls, telling a clear story – some kid had just been grabbed.

Hsu closed his eyes.

“First thing they taught me at the Taskforce – it can always get worse!”

Special Copyrights notice:

Torchwood: Pack Animals © Peter Anghelides 2008.  Toothsome, Mahalta and other elements from that story appear with the permission of the copyright holder.

Raven's Rift is from The Curse of Pantanas, collected in The Welsh Fairy Book by folklorist William Jenykn Thomas in 1908.  It is in the public domain.

The story Rat Men of Paris first appeared in More Fun Comics Magazine volume 1#8 in 1952.  It is in the public domain.