Caitlin smiled and put her hand on his cheek. ‘No, quite the opposite in fact.’
‘But he didn’t.’ Josh found it hard to say the words. ‘He didn’t rape her… there wasn’t time.’ The idea that Lenin could have been his father sickened him.
‘Yet you’re still here.’
‘So?’
‘I think the knife was some kind of injector. I think he was inseminating your mother artificially.’
‘What does that mean? I’m some kind of test-tube baby?’
Caitlin frowned. ‘I don’t know. Show me the gun.’ She held out her hand.
Josh handed over the weapon. It looked like an old-fashioned pistol that had been heavily modified. There were additional buttons and dials fused along the wooden stock, as well as a small glass screen where the gunsight should have been.
‘It’s dead,’ Josh told her. ‘I tried to shoot him, but nothing happened.’
‘Probably locked to his palm print.’ She pointed at the handle. ‘There’s some crazy tech going on in this. It’s built on antiques to survive the transition, but the way its put together is definitely from the future. Same with the suit — very steampunk.’
‘So, someone sent him back to inject my mother?’
‘Yeah, I’m pretty sure he wasn’t your actual father.’
Josh looked relieved. ‘Then we need to find out who is.’
‘My parents thought you might say that.’
‘Did they have any better ideas?’ Josh asked, taking back the gun.
Caitlin looked nervously at the weapon. ‘You’re going to use that?’
‘It’s our only lead. We have to follow it.’
‘But it’s in the future. No one has ever travelled beyond the frontier.’
The lines of energy were unravelling as Josh felt the weapon’s timeline open. He could see paths that led beyond the present: they glowed with a different light, a pale effervescent blue that wove out into the maelstrom.
‘Do you trust me?’ he asked, holding out his hand.
‘Yes,’ she said, smirking. ‘You are the Paradox, after all.’
‘So, let’s find out what that means.’
He opened the furthest node and took them both into it.
To be continued...
Copyright © Here be Dragons Limited 2018
The right of Andrew Hastie to be identified as the author of the work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Design and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the Author, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchase.
All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead is purely coincidental.
5.4
September 2018
To everyone that believed I could.
Thank you
Foreword
For all those that may need a quick reminder…
Josh and Caitlin were arrested while trying to change the course of history. They had planned to steal the skull of Daedalus and stop Dalton Eckhart from opening a breach into the maelstrom.
This event signified the third Eschaton Crisis. A theoretical set of events that would lead to the end of times. As a result, the Order was put under martial law by the Protectorate and Dalton was made head of the Eschaton Division by his mother, Ravana.
Before the founder was placed under house arrest, he told Josh to go in search of his father, and with Caitlin he follows the trail into the future, leaving her parents with an injured Daedalus and an Order in chaos.
1
Coup d'état
Lord Dee stood silently in the centre of the Star Chamber while the other members of the council waved their ballot papers and called for calm. He was having trouble standing but refused the offer of a chair.
Dalton Eckhart smiled, as did his witch of a mother, Ravana, both taking great pleasure in this public humiliation as their Protectorate officers surrounded him and snapped the iron manacles around the old man’s wrists.
‘Order!’ declared one of the clerks of the court, but no one took the slightest notice. Everyone was shouting, and the entire chamber was up on its feet, protesting at what Ravana had just done. Thousands of members were trying to make themselves heard.
This, thought the founder as he stood stoically observing the chaos around him, was precisely what the Determinists had wanted — the collapse of democracy within the Order. Ravana had spent years waiting to take control. At the point she indicted him, Grandmaster Derado and the rest of the Draconian guild had stormed out, refusing to take part in the mutiny, and left her so-called “Eschaton Martial Act” to be passed by the others.
It was evident that she’d been working on the divisions between the guilds behind his back, insinuating herself with the weaker members of the High Council, creating, for the first time in its long history, disunity within the Order. That fact, more than the irons that were clamped around his wrists, was the thing that disturbed Dee the most.
Ravana walked through the jeering crowd that was gathered around him. They moved aside, no one brave enough to challenge her directly until she was staring into his face.
‘You’re a fool,’ she said with a smirk. ‘Trapped in the past.’
He looked deep into her eyes. ‘Better that than a world with no future.’
‘Take him away,’ she ordered.
The founder bowed his head and allowed her masked officers to escort him out through the crowd of protestors; he could only hope Joshua Jones had escaped.
2
Everything Changes
[Richmond, England. Date: 11.580]
Sim was still calculating the best escape route in his head when he grabbed his almanac and slide rule from his desk and hastily stuffed them inside his robes. He knew it was a mistake to go via the central hall, but he had to see it with his own eyes. His friend Astor had already warned him they were shutting down the difference engine, but he couldn’t believe it.
Word of the founder’s arrest had spread quickly through the Copernican news channels, and even though it was a shock, it paled next to the rumour that Professor Eddington had ordered the shutdown of the Copernican’s computing system in protest.
Breathing deeply to steady his nerves he walked towards the centre of the vast, complex machine that formed their headquarters. The corridors that wove between the clockwork mechanisms were full of analysts and statisticians running around like frightened children with no sense of direction. Some were carrying everything they owned: armfuls of journals, abacuses and strange collections of divination tools, while others wandered past with blank expressions following random people in the hope of finding someone who knew what to do, but no one did — the entire guild was in a state of panic.
When Sim reached the central computing hall, he heard a distinct change in the machine’s pitch. The usual clack and clatter of the gears were winding down, and then, for the first time in its history, the hall of Copernicus fell silent.
Everyone stopped what they were doing and listened — it was as if time itself had frozen. Sim reached the gantry that overlooked the main atrium and saw for himself that the hands of the enormous clock that hung at the far end of the grand hall were still.
The silence was violently broken by the sound of the Protectorate storming into the building.
From high up in the gantries, Sim watched as the black-armoured guards flooded into the hall, arresting anyone who got in their way.
‘We’ve got to go!’ begged Astor, pulling Sim away from the balcony. ‘Norman says Dalton is rounding up every Copernican he can find.’
Sim nodded to his friend and followed him back into their department.
‘Where are you goin
g to go?’ Sim asked while Astor packed a rucksack with random things from his tiny cupboard of a desk.
Astor shrugged. ‘Jefferson says the Protectorate want to control the continuum — that’s why Eddington shut it down. I’m heading for the library — going to find the most obscure book I can and hide out in the dark ages somewhere. They won’t go back there.’
Sim wondered how many Copernicans were thinking precisely the same thing. The dark ages was a period most of them chose to avoid, being a statistical black-spot in their models and one that most actuaries excluded from their equations. It was the perfect hiding place unless of course, the entire guild had all decided to head for it.
He had his own escape plan, one that had already factored in the likelihood of others doing the same. His analytical brain had processed many different possibilities and reached the only feasible conclusion — he had to go forward, towards the frontier.
Although they always treated the past as if it were a vast and unexplored territory, it was still only accessible via known artefacts, whereas the frontier, the point where the future becomes the present, was chaos to most Copernicans and they abhorred it, even though they spent most of their careers trying to predict it.
Sim had decided he would hide amongst the linears: that unfortunate part of humanity who had to take each day as it came — not knowing what might happen next. It was something he’d always wanted to try, ‘living on the edge’, as Lyra called it, but it wasn’t until he’d met Josh, that he knew it was something he had to do.
‘Where are you going?’ asked Astor, hefting his pack onto one shoulder.
‘Not sure,’ Sim lied, ‘but before I go, I need to find Professor Eddington.’
Astor’s face paled at the name. ‘Haven’t you heard?’
Sim shook his head. ‘What?’
‘They’ve taken him. He refused to hand over the keys to the map room. He’s been hauled off by Dalton’s Eschaton Division.’
That changes everything, thought Sim. Now he would have to follow Eddington’s orders.
‘Astor, I need you to do me a favour.’
Astor looked scared. ‘What?’
Sim scribbled a series of numbers onto a scrap of paper. ‘Find every book you can on the Eschaton and meet me at these coordinates.’
3
The Colonel
[Nautilus. Maelstrom]
Rufius’ breathing was erratic and his pulse rapid; if she didn’t know any better, she would have thought he’d taken a serious dose of amphetamines. Juliana Makepiece checked the clock and added another entry in her journal. Rereading her notes of the last few hours she could see he was deteriorating. His condition had declined dramatically since they’d pulled him out of the Cambridge mission.
‘Thomas, we have to put him outside,’ she said, turning to her husband. ‘Get him out of linear time.’
‘And do what exactly?’ he replied, looking out into the swirling maelstrom through the large circular window.
‘For starters, we could find someone who knows what they’re doing. I’m not a medic.’
Thomas walked over to join her. He looked tired; neither of them had slept much in the last two days, and the stress was starting to show. ‘But he was the last man to see Cat before she disappeared.’
‘I know darling, but if he stays in here any longer he’s going to die,’ she warned.
She looked over at the photographs of the timesuit scattered across the table.
‘Whatever technology that guy was using — I don’t think it’s a linear infection. Every drug I’ve tried so far simply reverts to an inert state. This pathogen isn’t following any known pattern.’
‘So who would know?’
She crossed her arms and frowned. ‘Not Bedlam. This is way out of Crooke’s field. We could go back and ask Dangerfield before he died, but I think our best bet is Alixia and the Xeno department.’
Thomas sucked air in through his teeth. ‘Alixia De Freis? She’s going to take some convincing.’
‘But in the meantime, we need to keep him in stasis.’
‘Where do you suggest?’
She looked up into the broiling clouds of chaos. ‘How about that battleship cemetery we found near Cassiopeia? That looked like it’d been pretty stable for a century or so.’
‘You mean the Cassandra nebula?’
She shrugged. ‘That’s why you’re the navigator.’
‘The one which just so happens to be where we stored the last of our chocolate supply?’
She held up her hands in surrender. ‘Well, you’ve got to give a girl credit for trying.’
He put his arm around her. ‘I do. I just hope our daughter has at least half your brains.’
‘She certainly didn’t get my taste in boys!’
Thomas smiled. ‘I thought he was quite a decent chap.’
She punched him in the arm. ‘Don’t lie. I know what you were thinking.’
‘His eyes were a bit shifty.’
4
Mother
[Protectorate HQ. Date: 11.890]
Dalton looked up from the latest report and smiled as his mother walked into her office.
‘Mother, how goes the war?’ he asked, getting up out of her chair and coming forward to greet her
She winced at his snide remark, turning away as he kissed her cheek. Any maternal instinct had long since withered, and a thinly disguised animosity had taken its place.
‘We have a lot to discuss,’ snapped Ravana, taking off her long Protectorate cloak and hanging it carefully on the neat row of pegs. ‘Who authorised the raid on the Copernicans?’
Dalton’s smile vanished. ‘I did.’
‘Stupid boy!’ She slapped him across the face. ‘Are you trying to undermine everything I’ve worked for?’
He stood, unmoved by the attack, the red mark flaring up on his skin, staring defiantly at her. ‘No, Mother, I was trying to ensure that we controlled the continuum,’ he explained through tight lips.
Her cheeks flushed as she tried to control her rage. ‘You arrested Eddington! The one man who may actually be able to resolve the Eschaton Cascade!’
‘He openly defied us by shutting down their difference engine! Surely it’s better that he’s in our custody.’
‘Is he? Do you honestly believe for one second that he will cooperate with us now?’
Dalton smirked. ‘There are ways to ensure his compliance, mother. But I don’t see why you still concern yourself with that ridiculous theory — it was just a means to an end — you don’t actually believe the sky is going to fall on our heads?’
She took her seat behind the desk and made a point of re-arranging the reports.
‘I do, and for better reasons than you could possibly imagine. While the Order still believes it’s a real threat we have their obedience; don’t give them any reason to believe otherwise. I will try and persuade Eddington to continue his research for the good of the Order. You will do your best not to disrupt the status quo any further. Are we clear?’
‘Yes, mother.’
He turned to leave.
‘Wait,’ she snapped.
Swearing silently under his breath Dalton span around on his heel.
‘Since you’ve already read the report, tell me what the situation is with the Draconians?’
‘They have retreated into the eighth. My agents tell me that they have set up blockades around all of the standard routes, and we’re working on alternatives.’
‘I was told they’re entrenched around the Great Breach.’
‘That’s one of their strongholds. Apparently, they’re concerned that the maelstrom is gathering its forces for another attack, but you know the Draconians — always looking for a fight.’
His mother’s expression hardened. ‘I know who I’d rather have at my side in a battle against the Djinn — at least Grandmaster Derado is taking the Eschaton seriously.’
Dalton glowered. ‘Is that all?’
She waved a hand
as if swatting a fly. ‘You may go.’
Dalton ground his teeth as he took the elevator down to the main entrance.
His mother knew nothing of his plans. She was just like the other members of the council, too wrapped up in the old ways to see the real possibilities. For him, the Eschaton Cascade was nothing more than a myth, invented by a paranoid group of Copernicans to validate their existence.
But it had its uses, like any religion; if enough people believed, it gave it credibility and power — and with power came control — the entire Order was now under Protectorate supervision, and the founder was under house arrest. Dalton had access to all the resources he needed, resources that could help him realise his dream — to find the Book of Deadly Names and the future that Jones had foreseen.
5
Mughal Empire
[Lucknow, India. Date: 11.764]
Eddington had told him to take the most obscure path from the Copernican Hall. Sim had taken a series of diversions from the Great Library before he found himself in Lucknow, during the Battle of Buxar, where he found himself walking alongside the army of the East India Company under the command of Major Hector Munro.
The road was lined with hundreds of wounded. Sim had adapted his travel robes to look like a priest and walked up the valley towards the fortified town.
The British forces had been outnumbered four to one by the combined army of the Mughals, Awadh and Mir Qasim — but the Indian allies had been uncoordinated; the boat bridge was still burning in the river below where Grand Vizier Shuja-ud-Daulah had destroyed it while retreating — abandoning the Mughal Emperor Shah Alam II and his men to their fate. Sim knew that Munro had lost less than forty of his European regiment and two hundred and fifty of the Indian Sepoys in the battle.
The Infinity Engines Books 1-3 Page 66
