TimeRiders

by Alex Scarrow

  Karl cast his mind back. Yes, he remembered a curiously fused body. Remembered it had troubled him for a few nights, but then their high-powered weapons, their incendiary bombs, habitually produced all manner of twisted and unpleasant corpses. He’d had no time to reflect further on it; the business of governing a conquered nation had made sure of that.

  ‘Do you see, old friend… that’s them.’

  ‘Them?’

  ‘They know where we are… They know when we are. And they’re going to come.’

  ‘They? Who?’

  Kramer shook his head, that tremor in his jaw uncomfortably exaggerated now. Karl realized Paul must have experienced some kind of a nervous breakdown.

  ‘Our actions in history, Karl, have angered them. And now they’re coming to exact payment. To take their pound of flesh.’

  Karl frowned. ‘You are talking of other time travellers?’

  Kramer’s eyes, red-rimmed and glistening, widened. ‘I’ve seen it in my nightmares. Perhaps I glimpsed his face in the gap in space-time, Karl. When we travelled back to 1941. I must have seen his face then… in that swirling chaos between the present and past.’

  ‘Face? Whose face?’

  ‘The devil, Karl… Satan. Death. Chaos.’

  He regarded his leader in uncomfortable silence.

  He has gone quite mad.

  ‘Paul, there is no such thing as the devil.’

  ‘Oh, but there is. You and I stepped through a gap in space-time, a gap in the laws of physics… you and I may have stepped briefly, so very briefly, and placed our feet in Hell itself.’

  This has to stop. Paul is not himself.

  ‘And Hell has our scent now, Karl. It has our scent. It is seeking us and it will punish us.’

  Karl’s eyes stole away from Kramer’s intense face, and darted again to the atom bomb nestled in its metal support frame. He could kill us both with this device. Kill everyone aboard the command ship.

  Kramer turned and followed his gaze. ‘Yes, Karl. This device… you want to know what it is?’

  ‘You have an atom bomb linked to a time machine?’

  Kramer shook his head. ‘It’s not a time machine. I’d need things I can’t get my hands on in 1957 to make one of those. No… it’s a doomsday bomb. An atom bomb magnified infinitely by Waldstein’s displacement field.’ He pointed at the wire cage. ‘It will ensure a blast and gamma radiation that will wipe out every living thing.’

  ‘My God!’ gasped Karl.

  Kramer’s face creased with a playful grin. ‘It is a God-like thing, is it not?’

  Karl felt his heart thumping through his charcoal-grey tunic, through the silver eagle stitched on his left breast pocket.

  ‘Paul, this is… this is madness.’

  ‘I consider it a kindness, my old friend.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Yes… yes, a kindness. We mistakenly let some dark force come into the past behind us. Something evil… chaos itself. It is seeking us. It will come for you and I, and will come for every other soul in this world. I can see that now.’

  ‘Paul… listen. There are no angels, or demons, or –’

  ‘It will come for every soul in this world… because this is a world that should never have been. Every person living right now is living a life that should never have been.’

  Karl found his hand instinctively, slowly, reaching down for the pistol on his belt. Being merely decorative it was unloaded, but perhaps Kramer would not be aware of that.

  Am I really going to pull my gun on him?

  Yes. He needed Paul to come with him now, away from this contraption, where he could talk to him, where he could reason with him safely. And, if needs be, he would order a physician to provide sedatives for the Führer. The man needed to be calmed, desperately needed some sleep by the look of him.

  ‘You know, Karl, I wanted to make a better world, a better future,’ said Kramer, his tired eyes rimmed with tears. ‘Instead –’ he shook his head – ‘I believe I’ve condemned us all to something worse than death itself.’

  ‘But you are talking of supernatural things, Paul. Devils, angels, God, Satan – these are things that belong to the Middle Ages. You are a man of science, not some insane… priest.’

  ‘Perhaps the supernatural is what lies beyond our science? It is in that gap in space-time.’ A solitary tear rolled down Kramer’s gaunt cheek. ‘The fact is… I know the devil has arrived and is coming for us as we speak.’

  He’s gone too far.

  ‘I have to ask this, Paul… Is this device functional?’

  Kramer nodded. ‘It is.’

  I have no choice, then. Karl’s hand stole into his holster and with one fluid sweep pulled out the pistol. He aimed it at Kramer. The gun was steady. His voice wasn’t. ‘Paul… I’m s-sorry. You must understand I cannot let this go any further.’

  Kramer remained calm, his eyes on the gun. He smiled, not unkindly. ‘I’m afraid it’s something I have to do.’

  Karl cocked his gun. ‘Look, come with me, Paul. We’ll talk about this in your quarters. You and I –’

  Kramer calmly reached for the intercom on his workbench.

  ‘Paul! Please stop! I will shoot!’

  ‘I don’t believe you will, old friend,’ said Kramer softly as he thumbed a button on the intercom. ‘Security detail to my private laboratory on the double, please.’

  A tinny voice acknowledged the order over the desk speaker.

  Kramer looked up at him. ‘I’d hoped we could face this together, Karl. After all we’ve been through.’

  ‘Do you not see? You’re not well. You’re tired. You’re not seeing things clearly. Send the guards away and you and I can talk.’

  Karl could already hear the clatter of boots on the hard floor outside the lab. ‘Call them off, Paul. This is madness.’

  A rap on the double door, a muffled voice outside. ‘Security detail, sir!’

  ‘Enter!’

  Karl quickly lowered his gun. The SS Leibstandarte guards would shoot even him, the Reichsmarschall, if they saw a weapon raised at their beloved leader. The door swung open and five SS Leibstandarte entered. The oberleutnant leading them glanced at Karl, the pistol held loosely in his hand now aiming down at the ground.

  ‘Mein Führer? Is everything all right?’

  Kramer sighed, his shoulders sagging. ‘I’m so very sorry, Karl.’ He stepped around a nest of cables towards his friend, gently easing the unloaded pistol out of his hand and placing it on the workbench.

  ‘Paul,’ said Karl quietly, ‘you must listen –’

  Kramer put a finger to his lips, hushing him. He reached out and affectionately clasped his shoulder. ‘I consider you my closest friend… perhaps my only real friend, Karl. But this is too important a thing.’

  My God. He’s going to place me under arrest.

  Karl bit his lip, realizing it would be foolish to push Kramer any further right now. As second-in-command of the Reich’s invasion force, he might still be able to reason with the guards, the higher echelon officers… but not right here, not like this.

  Kramer took a step back. ‘Trust me,’ he said softly, barely more than a whisper for Karl’s ears only. ‘This is a kindness for you.’

  ‘Paul? What are you –?’

  ‘Oberleutnant?’

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘Execute Reichsmarschall Haas.’

  The young officer’s eyes widened in momentary confusion.

  ‘Do this right now, please.’

  What? He can’t be…!

  Karl was turning round to sharply bark a counter-order when two precisely aimed shots ended his life and scattered tissue and blood across Kramer’s workbench.

  CHAPTER 68

  1957, woods outside Baltimore

  ‘All right, Bob? You understand what you’ve got to say to them?’

  ‘Affirmat–’

  Liam raised a finger and cocked a scolding eyebrow.

  ‘Yes… I understand, Liam O�
�Connor.’

  ‘Better. This has to be convincing. You need to come across sounding sort of like some Old Testament prophet, and not like a bloody robot.’

  ‘I understand.’

  ‘You remember it all?’

  Bob looked down at the tattered sheet of paper in his hands, and Liam’s untidy handwriting littered with words crossed out, phrases rewritten, and written again.

  ‘It is stored in memory.’

  ‘Right, then I suppose we should get a move on.’

  ‘Correct,’ rumbled Bob, ‘Washington is fifty-seven miles south-west from this location. We will need to travel quickly.’

  Liam led the way out of Bob’s shelter and blinked at the early-morning sun piercing the branches and pine needles above them and dappling the hard-trodden snowy ground with pools of warmth and light. The camp was already stirring with activity, some of the men already up and reviving the smouldering campfire to cook breakfast and heat an urn of coffee.

  He could see Panelli interviewing more newcomers eager to join the fight, even more eager to catch sight of the legendary Captain Bob in action.

  Oh boy, they’re really not going to like this.

  ‘Come on,’ he whispered to Bob, ‘you better lead the way.’

  Bob strode past him towards the clearing in the middle of the camp. When he stepped out from under some low branches, the camp’s hum of activity died down to an expectant silence as they stared in awe at their magnificent heroic leader.

  The newcomers, about thirty of them, surged forward excitedly, keen to get a closer look at Captain Bob.

  ‘Hush!’ cried out Panelli. ‘It looks like he has something to say!’

  Bob stood beside the fire, legs planted apart, his hands on his hips – just as Liam had demonstrated – his cold grey eyes panned slowly across the people before him with a solemn gravitas.

  ‘The time has come for me to move on… O people!’

  Liam winced at the way Bob’s flat voice delivered the lines. It had sounded pretty good on paper as he was scribbling it out and reading it to himself. However, right now, with Bob belting it out in a one-tone voice, it sounded painfully embarrassing.

  ‘I have received a calling from above, to leave you now that my work here is done… and I am to form other groups of fighters across the nation to fight this evil invader. This dark force of evil. Satan’s army of minions and the devilry of their inventions and weapons.’

  Liam felt his cheeks colour.

  Maybe I should’ve left that bit out.

  ‘But you will continue the fight here. You shall continue God’s work. I, Captain Bob, captain of the Lord’s army, will return again one day. I shall return… and together we shall destroy the enemy and return freedom to this great nation,’ announced Bob with all the passion of a bored teacher taking morning registration.

  The forest was still and silent for a long time. Too long for Liam, who wondered if between his appalling creative-writing skills and Bob’s emotionless drawl, they appeared as ridiculous as he suspected they did.

  Then one of the men, the pious young corporal, dropped down on to one knee and gruffly said, ‘Amen.’ As did another, and another.

  Panelli looked down at them and, keen not to be outdone, did likewise. ‘Amen.’

  In ones and twos, the rest of the men standing there in the forest followed suit, dropping to their knees solemnly.

  Good grief, we’re actually getting away with this?

  ‘Your leader has spoken and th–’

  Liam nudged Bob’s elbow gently. ‘We should probably go,’ he hissed out of the corner of his mouth. ‘Whilst we’re ahead.’

  Bob nodded and stepped forward and gestured his hand in the way Liam had demonstrated in the tent. ‘Blessings upon you,’ his deep voice boomed to the man nearest him as he touched his shoulder. ‘Blessings upon you,’ he said to another as he strode past.

  Liam followed in his wake, smiling self-consciously at the men he passed by. ‘We’re uh… we’re going to leave now, to uh… you know, to spread the good word.’

  Bob led the way past this morning’s newcomers, all of them on their knees, all looking up at him with wide eyes.

  ‘Blessings upon you all,’ he growled tunelessly as he strode past them towards the camouflaged trucks.

  Liam nodded. ‘Yes. Keep up the good work, fellas,’ he said, cringing inside at how stupid that had just sounded.

  Bob was in the truck, turning over the engine with a loud rattling cough and a belch of exhaust fumes as Liam pulled himself up into the cab. Without a moment’s hesitation Bob slipped it into gear and the truck began to roll across the uneven forest floor towards the twin muddy ruts of forest track.

  ‘Ooh… that was awkward,’ Liam uttered, looking in the rearview mirror as the pale ovals of curious faces emerged from the undergrowth on to the track behind them, watching them leave.

  He felt something inside him. Sadness? Perhaps it was guilt. Those poor men would probably carry on the struggle without Bob, many of them dying as they did so, fighting for a future that wasn’t going to be.

  When they got back home, back to 2001, and Liam told Foster exactly where and when they needed to return to, to put history back on its correct course – and this Kramer was confronted and killed before he could change Hitler’s destiny – when that happened, this incorrect history would cease to be. Just disappear. And all the sacrifices those men had already made and might yet make in the coming days… it will all have been for nothing.

  Although Liam would never see it for himself, this world would shimmer and shift amid increasing waves of temporal instability, and then in the blink of an eye – pop! – it would become the 1957 it should be.

  Bob turned to Liam. ‘There is sufficient time to reach the rendezvous location in Washington DC. We have fourteen hours and fifty-two minutes.’

  ‘Great, thanks, Bob.’

  ‘However, there is a high probability that enemy units will stand between us and the rendezvous location. This reduces the estimated probability of our successfully getting to the rendezvous point to –’

  ‘I’ll stop you right there, Bob… if that’s OK.’

  The support unit looked at him expressionlessly. ‘You do not wish to know the percentage estimation of success?’

  Liam shook his head. ‘Uhh… no, not really.’

  CHAPTER 69

  1957, Washington DC

  It was after dark when they finally entered Washington DC. A curfew was in effect and the streets quiet and still, street lamps buzzing softly amid the hiss and patter of sleet drizzling down. They decided to ditch the army truck on the outskirts of the city when they spotted a roadblock ahead. The rest of the route into the city they navigated through DC’s subterranean network of sewers.

  Bob efficiently led the way, Liam following, grimacing at the stench of sewage and the sight of rats running alongside him on a brick ledge, eyeing him cautiously as they scuttled past.

  Finally, Bob cocked his head, his eyes fluttered. He took a left turn off the main tunnel. ‘We go up this access ladder. The co-ordinate stamp indicates a location fifty yards from this position.’

  Bob clambered up the ladder. At the top he gently, cautiously, pushed aside a round sewage cover. He poked his head up to check the lay of the land, then ducked back down.

  Liam was right behind him on the ladder. ‘Is it clear?’

  ‘There are no enemy units in line of sight. Please stay close to me.’

  ‘How long have we got until the window opens?’

  ‘Seventeen minutes,’ replied Bob as he pulled himself up.

  Liam nodded. A pretty close thing. But they were here in time and that’s all that mattered.

  He clambered up the ladder until his head was poking out of the manhole. He could see a four-laned boulevard. Nothing moved along it. The buildings on either side – rows of three- and four-storey town houses – looked occupied. Dull vanilla lights flickered beyond drawn curtains. Liam thought he s
aw the diffused silhouette of someone’s head and shoulders crossing in front of a bedroom lamp.

  People still living in the city, then.

  But subdued, cowed… frightened.

  Above in the night sky, still hovering like a dark thundercloud, he could see Kramer’s command ship in position above the White House. Several dozen searchlights lanced down from it, sweeping the sullen and silent city, hunting for any citizens foolish enough to dare break the curfew and step out into the night.

  ‘Come!’ whispered Bob.

  Liam pulled himself up, and scrambled across the empty road, joining Bob in the mouth of a dark and litter-strewn backstreet.

  ‘This is the location,’ said Bob. ‘Twenty yards along,’ he added, pointing to the end where garbage pails and boxes were piled against a wood-slat fence.

  They made their way down to the end, carefully doing their best to avoid kicking any loose clutter across the ground.

  ‘This is the location,’ said Bob, squatting down. He began shifting aside several wet cardboard boxes full of rubbish. ‘Recommendation: we clear this space of obstructions. Otherwise density warnings will prevent them from opening the time window.’

  Liam nodded and eagerly began to help. He suddenly realized, for the first time since they’d been sent back into the past, since things had gone so completely pear-shaped on the White House lawn, that they were actually going to make it home to 2001.

  ‘I owe you my life, Bob,’ he said, slapping the support unit on the back. ‘You got us here in one piece.’

  Bob tossed a wet handful of mushed cardboard and rotting refuse to one side. ‘Mission parameters will be met only when you and the data that has been acquired are successfully returned to the field office for analysis.’

  Liam grinned. ‘All right, Bob. I was just trying to say thank you, that’s all.’

  ‘Thank you?’

  ‘Yeah, you know… thanks. You rescued me. I reckon you weren’t meant to do that, were you? I’m pretty certain you should’ve gone through the back-up window six months ago, to be sure.’

  Bob’s eyebrows locked. His mouth opened and shut. ‘My mission priorities were… recalculated.’