by Alex Scarrow
Within the walls of the city, it had been the very definition of Hell itself. Liam felt queasy as images of the last few days flashed before his mind. Glimpses, frozen images, a slideshow of horror, splashes of blood and squalor.
Stop it, Liam. Think nice thoughts.
‘Surely they’re probing here already, are they not?’
Bob shook his head. ‘I have not detected any tachyon particles yet.’
‘That’s not right. They should’ve probed already.’ Liam looked up at the support unit. ‘Something’s wrong. Maddy always checks first before she opens.’
‘Affirmative. That is standard procedure, Liam.’
Liam shook his head silently. This was one place he really didn’t want to be stuck any longer than necessary. He had a memory of taking confession with Father O’Grady, his parish priest, a few years ago. Confessing to him guilty fantasies about Rosie McDonald, his schoolmate’s older sister who lived three doors down from him. Father O’Grady had given him chapter and verse about the temptations of Satan, and then gone on to describe in glorious detail the torments that awaited him in the underworld. Liam had gone home and that night had dreamed fitfully of the world O’Grady’s words had conjured up in his young mind.
These last few days he’d seen that nightmare world for real.
‘I am detecting precursor tachyons,’ said Bob.
‘Ah, thank Jay-zus for that.’ Liam felt relieved enough to try out a smile. Another minute and they were going to be back home and working out together how they were going to put an end to this nightmare timeline.
‘We should stand clear,’ said Bob, holding Liam’s arm and leading him several steps back. Liam turned to look up at their cart and the ponies. It was up the hill on the side of the track, where someone was likely to find it sooner or later. He was wondering whether they should have cut the poor animals free when he felt the puff of displaced air on his cheek. The branches of the olive tree hanging over them swayed and hissed excitedly.
Liam looked at the shimmering orb that had just appeared, hovering in front of them. He saw the familiar, welcoming, cool dimness of the archway and… there… he could just about see the flickering outlines of Sal and Maddy.
Sal burst out of the portal, running as she hit the ground. She lost her footing and tumbled into a patch of long grass. She was instantly up again on her feet. ‘Liam!’ Looking around frantically. ‘Liam!’
‘Sal?’ he called out to her. She spun round and saw him and Bob standing in the shade of the tree. ‘What’re you doing here?’
Before she could answer, Maddy was spat out of the portal, arms ahead of her as if she’d been taking a leisurely dive into a swimming pool. ‘-OOOOO!’ She hit the dusty ground and rolled head over heels.
‘Maddy? What’s going on?’
She scrambled to her feet, like Sal, spinning round, glancing in all directions to locate him. ‘Liam? Bob?’ She saw Sal. ‘Where’s Bob?’
‘We’re over here,’ Liam said. Then: ‘What the devil’s going on?’
She ignored his question for the moment, turning back to look at the portal’s shimmering image. ‘Oh God… close! Please!’ she muttered. ‘Close! Dammit!! Close! CLOSE!!’
‘Close?’ Liam looked at Bob then back at her. ‘Uh… why do we want it to close? Maddy? Are we not meant to be going back n-?’
Just then, as the sphere began to collapse in on itself, a third figure was spat out on to the dusty ground. Maddy screamed, backing away from it as it attempted to get to its feet. Only it had no feet. Just bloody stumps smoothly cut and cauterized above the ankle and one arm severed at the elbow by the edge of the force field as it began to collapse in size and winked out of existence.
‘ Who’s that? ’
‘Chuddah! It’s got a gun!’ said Sal.
Bob was the first to react, charging forward towards the footless figure, trying to steady itself on uneven stumps, wielding a pistol in its remaining hand. It fired off a shot at Bob, hitting home, a puff of crimson coming from his shoulder. But then Bob was upon it, throwing his full weight in and knocking it flat on the ground. They tumbled across the hard dirt, locked together in a lethal wrestler’s embrace.
Liam winced as the footless figure fired two more shots into Bob before he managed to knock the gun out of its hand. His eyes were trying to make sense of what he could see; it looked like two versions of Bob rolling around, squirming together in the tall, dry grass, kicking up clouds of dust between them.
‘Get the gun!’ shrieked Maddy. ‘Get the freakin’ gun!’
Sal stepped forward and scooped it off the ground.
‘Shoot it!’
She cupped the gun in both hands, a finger on the trigger, grimacing uncertainly as she tried to line up a shot on the right Bob.
‘Shoot it!’
‘I can’t… I… I’ll hit him.’
‘Give it to me!’ snapped Maddy. She wrenched it out of Sal’s hands and strode towards the two struggling support units; like a pair of giant pitbulls locked together, all rippling cords of muscle and entwined limbs. One then the other managing to get the upper hand. Bob was on top again now, this time holding the other support unit in a tight headlock and bracing his hold position with his legs spread apart as it flailed ferociously to struggle out of his grip.
‘Hold it still!’ Maddy yelled at Bob. She stepped forward, standing over the pair of them. ‘Hold IT STILL!!’ she screamed.
She aimed the gun and fired.
‘Jay-zus, be careful!’ shouted Liam.
She fired again. And again. And again. And again. Then the gun was clicking harmlessly in her cupped hands. The struggling stopped and as the dust began to settle, Liam realized he’d stood on the side uselessly, too confused by what he was seeing to be of any help to the girls. Cursing his moment of stupidity, he rushed forward.
Maddy collapsed to her knees, the empty gun still in her hands. She was gasping for air, or perhaps she was sobbing, he couldn’t tell. Either way she looked like an utterly spent force.
‘Bob!’ Liam pulled at Bob’s bloody shoulder. ‘Bob, you all right?’
His deep voice rumbled. ‘Affirmative. The damage is minimal.’
He sat up slowly on his haunches, releasing his grip on the other support unit. It flopped lifelessly to the ground.
Liam looked down at the thing’s head. ‘Jay-zus! It’s you… Bob. Your twin or something!’
‘Is it…’ Maddy panted several breaths, a ragged rattle. ‘Is that thing dead?’
‘Three well-placed cranial wounds,’ replied Bob. ‘It is quite dead.’
She sighed, dropped the gun into her lap. And this time Liam realized by the heaving of her shoulders she really was sobbing.
Sal came over to soothe her. ‘We made it, Maddy,’ she whispered. ‘It’s all over. We’re safe.’
Liam looked at them both, wondering which of a dozen questions spinning round his head to blurt out first. He ended up going with the obvious, catch-all question.
‘Anyone mind telling me what’s bleedin’ well going on here?’
CHAPTER 36
AD 54, 7 miles outside Rome
It took Maddy half an hour to get Liam and Bob up to speed on everything that had happened to them since she’d sent them off to Ancient Rome. ‘I’ve never been so scared,’ she concluded. She cast a quick glance at the dead support unit. ‘I thought we were going to die.’
Sal nodded. ‘So stupid. I kept thinking, “Why are Bob and Becks trying to kill us?” Even though I knew it wasn’t them.’
‘I would never harm any of you,’ Bob assured them.
Maddy looked at him. ‘Because it’s not a mission parameter.’
He nodded. ‘Correct.’
‘But, hang on! So who sent them support units after us, then?’ asked Liam.
‘I don’t know!’ Maddy shook her head. ‘I’ve got no idea, Liam. I just don’t know who would — ’
‘Maybe it’s someone we upset?’ said Sal.
&nb
sp; ‘Upset?’ Liam looked at her incredulously. ‘If that’s what upset does… I’d not want to know what totally hacked off gets us.’
Maddy waved him silent. ‘Someone wants us dead… who, though?’
‘Maybe someone doesn’t want us looking after history. Someone who wants history to be changed, all messed around.’ Sal took a sharp breath. ‘What if… what if this Roman contamination was linked to those support units? Somehow?’
Maddy stroked her chin, giving that some consideration.
Sal continued. ‘Maybe whoever came back here somehow knew all about the agency? About us? Maybe they wanted to make sure they took us down so we couldn’t undo whatever they’re up to right here.’
They looked at each other. A long, uneasy pause.
‘I think it was the message,’ said Maddy. She looked at the others. ‘Asking about Pandora. Someone other than Waldstein intercepted it.’
‘That’s not good…’ said Sal eventually. ‘That someone knows about us.’
‘They knew precisely where and when we are.’ Maddy pulled on her lip. ‘Not good.’
‘And those support units you were talkin’ about,’ said Liam, ‘they’re still back there? In our archway?’
Maddy nodded. ‘Quite probably trashing our place as we speak. Destroying everything.’
Liam looked up at her. ‘But this means we’re… we’ll be stuck here, then. Right?’
‘For the moment.’ Maddy sighed. ‘We’ll figure something out.’
He muttered to himself. ‘I’d rather have gone back and faced them crazy Bobs than — ’
‘I’m sorry, Liam! OK? I didn’t have time to organize another recall window. We were lucky to escape with our lives!’
He stopped. Accepted that. ‘Right. I’m sorry.’
‘Look… there’s still the six-month window,’ continued Maddy. ‘If they don’t smash the place up. If computer-Bob runs the recall sequence as scheduled.’
‘There’s a couple of them “if” words of yours, Madelaine Carter.’ Liam offered her an edgy grin. ‘That’s never a good sign.’
She returned it and nodded. ‘I’m not such a huge fan of embedded “ifs” either.’ She shrugged. ‘I’ve got no idea what’s going to happen back home. We might get the six-monther, we might not.’
‘I don’t want to stay here six more minutes… let alone months.’
‘Why?’ asked Sal. She looked around at the valley, the olive trees. ‘Seems all right to me. Nice and sunny and — ’
Maddy noted the look on his face. ‘Liam? Bob? Come on… what do you two guys know?’
‘This is a significantly altered timeline,’ said Bob.
‘Well, it looks pretty much what I’d imagine Rome to — ’
‘ This isn’t Rome,’ cut in Liam. He shook his head slowly. ‘This is a small valley full of wild olive trees. You want to see Rome?’
‘Well…’ Maddy looked around. ‘We can’t wait here for six months.’
‘It would be inadvisable to remain here,’ added Bob.
‘You’re right.’ Maddy pulled herself to her feet, brushing dry dirt off her jeans. ‘They might find a way to bypass computer-Bob’s security lockdown. Open another portal. We should move away from here.’
‘Affirmative.’
‘You want us to go back to Rome?’ asked Liam.
‘Well, where else do you suggest?’
‘How about anywhere?’
Maddy frowned. ‘Jeez, what’s got into you? Can’t be that bad.’
‘It’s bad.’
Maddy sighed. ‘Could we just get some clear, useful information out of you, please?’
‘It appears some sort of contamination event occurred in Rome approximately seventeen years ago,’ said Bob. ‘Something witnessed by many people, but it has become an interpreted event.’
‘Interpreted event. What do you mean?’
‘It appears that Emperor Caligula has manipulated the many different eyewitness accounts of this event to his own advantage. To create an accepted orthodox version of events.’
‘So, what’s the story?’
‘There are accounts of “a host of angels coming down from Heaven”,’ said Liam, ‘descending from the skies in vast chariots during some religious festival, seventeen years ago.’ He shook his head at how ridiculous it sounded. ‘They actually descended right into the middle of their largest arena during a gladiatorial show and they’re supposed to have announced that Caligula was a god. Their god, would you believe?’
‘What?’ Maddy looked at Sal. ‘Oh my — ! Did you just say “vast chariots”?’
Bob nodded. ‘Clearly vehicles of some kind. Modern technology.’
‘Someone’s gone big-scale,’ said Sal.
‘A large group of time travellers bringing with them… what? Tanks or something?’ Maddy shook her head. ‘The future’s getting careless.’
‘Or desperate,’ added Sal.
‘Just like that Kramer, then,’ said Liam. ‘But a much more ambitious version of his jolly jaunt.’
Maddy nodded. ‘And so, what? We’ve got some future power-junky jerk like that Kramer running the show now? Calling himself Emperor Caligula?’
Liam shook his head. ‘No. We think it’s still the real Caligula in charge.’
‘What about the time travellers, then?’ asked Sal.
Liam shrugged. ‘Gone.’
‘Information: the orthodox account is that the angels stayed for several years to prepare Caligula for his role as God, then returned to Heaven with a promise that one day soon he will be summoned there too.’
‘That’s the orthodox version,’ added Liam. ‘Ask me… I think he had ’em all killed.’
‘Liam is right. This would appear to be the most likely outcome. These “angels” have not been seen by anyone in over fifteen years. They most likely have been secretly executed by Caligula.’
Maddy looked at them both, then at Sal. A breeze stirred the olive trees and filled the long silence between them. ‘He’s clearly as mad as a box of chocolate frogs.’
‘You don’t know the half of it,’ muttered Liam. ‘Rome is…’ He shook his head. ‘It isn’t what I expected. It’s…’ He took a deep breath. ‘Rome… this Rome is the last place on earth you’d ever want to see again.’
‘But we will have to return, Liam,’ said Bob gently. He looked towards Maddy. ‘There is an unresolved time contamination. That is our mission priority.’
She looked at his hulking form. Yeah, that may be your priority, Bob. Not necessarily ours, though.
He was still working from code — programming that absolutely insisted this contamination was resolved before anything else. The agency’s programming. Waldstein’s. The guy who’d dropped all three of them into this never-ending nightmare without a word of warning… Without any support whatsoever.
‘Madelaine,’ insisted Bob, ‘this is our mission priority.’
She wandered over to the body of the clone on the ground. ‘Well, we can’t stay here, that’s for sure. We’ve got two things to deal with. This contamination. We’ve got to zero in on the jerks who caused it. The precise when and the where. My money’s on some idiot like that Kramer; some power-hungry moron who fancies himself as a Roman emperor.’
She hunkered down and studied the clone’s still face, its glazed grey eyes staring lifelessly back at her. ‘And then we’ve got this to deal with. I guess we’ll have to face that in six months’ time.’
‘ If the six-month window opens,’ said Liam. ‘What if it’s all smashed up back in the archway?’
Maddy shook her head. ‘I don’t think so.’
‘Why?’ asked Sal. ‘Liam’s right. They’re probably smashing it all up and we’re going to be stuck out here forever.’
‘I don’t think so. They wanted us dead, not on the loose somewhere in history.’ She looked at Bob. ‘What would you do? If you were them?’
‘I would assume an automated recall sequence was set up. I would wait in th
e field office for it to be activated. Then I would kill you as soon as you returned.’
‘Precisely.’ She looked at the other two. ‘We’ll get our six-month window. We just need to be ready to fight for our lives the moment we get back.’
Liam sighed. ‘I love being us.’
Maddy ignored him. ‘So, whether we like it or not, we’ve got six months to make use of. Let’s see what we can find out about this contamination. If it’s another Kramer, maybe there’s some modern tech somewhere? Another machine possibly. Who knows?’
‘Another gun would be nice,’ said Sal, inspecting the empty NYPD handgun. Useless to anyone, except perhaps as a club.
‘Yup,’ Maddy smiled. ‘That would be handy. Come on…’ She stood up. ‘We should go. Probably best not to hang around here any longer.’
They got to their feet and followed her out of the small valley, up the slope towards the cart and horses patiently waiting on the side of the track.
CHAPTER 37
2001, New York
As the portal snapped down to a pinprick of light then vanished, the high-pitched hum of the displacement machine dropped in tone. Then there was silence, except for the gentle chugging of the generator in the back room.
The two support units, Abel and Faith, regarded the feet and hand lying on the floor in front of them, both perfectly cauterized where shrinking reality had cut through their colleague.
‘System AI, please advise where the targets were sent,’ said Abel.
Computer-Bob’s webcam eye regarded them. His cursor blinked on the screen.
‘System AI, please advise where the targets were sent.’
Computer-Bob was running decision filters across his network; it was almost surprising really that neither of these mysterious support units could hear the change in pitch of his CPU fans.
Not on screen, but deep within a mind of logic gates and circuit boards, options presented themselves to Bob. Decision 1. Assist with enquiry — Note: authority code is valid. Protocol n235 invoked. (Assistance mandatory.) 2. Override valid code. Initiate system lockdown. 3. Lie.
