by Mark Robson
‘Time . . . you . . . die.’
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
‘Mornin’, sir. Everythin’ OK?’ Tony called out as the FWC patrol boat pulled alongside them.
Niamh looked across at the driver. His expression was hard to read. The dark glasses didn’t help.
‘Yeah,’ he drawled. ‘Just headin’ out to Monkey Island. You look like you’re on your way in from there. See anythin’ unusual?’
‘Unusual? What sort of unusual?’ Tony asked. ‘We’ve just paddled round the island. Didn’t notice anythin’ weird, though – you, sis?’
Niamh shrugged and shook her head.
‘Pretty keen for this time-a-day,’ the officer noted. ‘That’s a long paddle.’
‘Weather’s due to close in this afternoon, so we had to come out early. Won a bet with Carrie yesterday. She’s not the outdoor type. If I’d lost, I’d be readin’ some dull book now, but instead, she’s had to brave the water with me.’
‘Good for you,’ the man said, clearly not interested in the slightest. ‘Listen, I’m lookin’ for a girl about your age
‘You an’ me both,’ Tony interrupted, laughing. ‘Preferably a hot one.’
Niamh didn’t know where to look. She tried to look amused by Tony’s comment, but her smile was forced. Would it show? Her stomach was in knots, yet she could feel her face threatening to flush. Surely the man would notice?
Flashing a brief smile at Tony, the officer looked more irritated by his interruption than amused. ‘Not rightly sure what this one looks like,’ he said. ‘Just got a call from the Sheriff’s Office to come out here an’ look for a boat she stole from Summerland Key yesterday. Apparently, she’s English.’
‘There’s no boats moored at Monkey Island,’ Tony offered, back-paddling to stay parallel. ‘Jetty’s clear. I’d have noticed if it weren’t. Unusual to see boats out there.’
‘Anythin’ oceanside?’
‘Oceanside?’ Tony said, feigning surprise. ‘Nope. There’s nowhere to moor. S’pose it depends how big the boat is though. A small one could probably get in close enough.’
‘This is a thirty-two-foot cruiser.’
‘Yeah, right! Dream on!’ Tony laughed. ‘Only way you’d get a boat that size in close to Monkey Island on the ocean side is in about a thousand pieces. Too shallow. Reef would rip it apart.’
The man nodded. ‘That’s what I thought. I’d better go an’ take a look anyway. Enjoy your paddle.’
Niamh gave the man a sour look, which drew a genuine chuckle from him. He eased the throttle forward and turned away. Niamh noted that he watched to ensure he had taken his boat a reasonable distance from the kayak before opening up the power and accelerating away at speed.
‘Thank goodness he’s gone,’ she sighed.
‘Yeah, but we’re not out of the woods yet,’ Tony replied, digging in the paddles with renewed vigour. ‘If he finds the boat with no one in it, he’ll be back. If he’s got half a brain, it won’t be hard for him to put the pieces together. We’d better paddle for home as fast as we can.’
Niamh did not answer. She knew he was right. Rather than talk, she began twisting the paddle in the rolling motion Tony had taught her, doing her best to match his new rhythm. As she added what strength she could to his urgent strokes, the canoe sped through the water faster than ever.
To Niamh it felt an impossibly long way to Tony’s home beach. By the time they reached the shore near his home, she felt wrecked. Her arms were leaden with fatigue, her palms were red and threatening blisters, her back ached, her bottom was numb and her stomach and legs were so cramped that when she did find the strength to struggle out of the cockpit of the canoe, she couldn’t stand. When Tony told her they would have to carry the boat back to his house, she felt tears forming in her eyes.
‘I can’t,’ she moaned. ‘Everything hurts.’
‘Yes, you can,’ he assured her gently. ‘Don’t worry, it’s not far and the boat’s not heavy. Come on. You can do it.’
‘My legs don’t want to move.’
To Niamh’s acute embarrassment, Tony made her sit down on the sand and he began to massage her calves.
‘Where is it hurting worst?’ he asked.
‘Um, that’s it,’ she said quickly, unable to look him in the eye. It was too embarrassing. He had taken a huge risk for her, yet all she had been able to think about the entire time was how cute he was and what sort of a boyfriend he would make. Given her thoughts about him, the very idea of Tony’s hands kneading the worst areas of pain set her face flushing again.
Unlike some of the girls at school, she had never had a serious boyfriend. The most intimate she’d ever been with a boy was a bit of kissing in a quiet corner at a friend’s birthday party. That boy had turned out to have a one-track mind, and Niamh had not been interested in what he wanted. She’d dumped him the next day.
‘That’s great, thanks. I’m sure I’ll manage now,’ she said quickly, pushing his hands away.
‘Are you sure?’ Tony asked, surprised. ‘But I’ve not really done . . .’
‘Positive,’ she said, staggering to her feet. ‘I’ll be fine now. Thanks a lot. Now where to?’
‘Hey, look!’ Tony exclaimed. ‘No need to worry, the cavalry’s arrived. Carrie! Over here, quick!’
To Niamh’s intense relief, Carrie appeared through the trees and ran towards them, hair flowing behind her like a golden cloud.
‘Hi, Niamh,’ she enthused. ‘Glad to see Tony got to you in time.’
‘Only just,’ Tony said, his tone full of warning. ‘Carrie, we need to get the kayak out of sight as quick as we can. You’ve not seen Tessa around, have you?’
‘No.’
‘Good,’ he said firmly. ‘Don’t need any more complications. Gimme a hand, would you? Poor Niamh’s beat. Fisheries officer intercepted us on his way out to Monkey Island.’
‘Oh, shoot! You think he might come lookin’ when he finds the boat?’
‘Yep. We paddled flat out all the way back, but I doubt we’ve got long. Let’s get outta here!’
Niamh looked back out across the water towards Monkey Island and took a sharp intake of breath. In the distance she could see the fast-moving inflatable rounding the end of the island and turning in their direction.
‘Too late!’ she said. ‘He’s already coming this way. Run!’
‘No!’ Tony ordered, a calculating look in his eyes. ‘Niamh, hide behind those bushes over there. Quickly! Unless he’s got eyes like an eagle, he won’t be able to see who’s on the beach yet. Go with her, Carrie. Swap shirts and glasses, tie your hair back like Niamh has hers and then come back and join me. Let’s see if we can’t throw him off the trail.’
‘That won’t work!’ Niamh protested. ‘Carrie’s perfectly tanned and gorgeous. He’ll never mistake her for me!’
‘You don’t look that different,’ he said calmly. ‘Your hair is the same colour and length. You’re both slim. He’s wearing dark shades, so he’s unlikely to pick up on the difference in skin tone. Besides, it’s our best shot. Go! Quickly!’
Niamh and Carrie raced over to the nearby bushes, crouched down and exchanged shirts. Niamh couldn’t believe how naughty she felt. It was strange, but creating this little deception with Carrie felt more wrong than stealing the Mitchells’ boat. Perhaps it was because she was doing it with someone else, she thought.
‘I need your ribbon too,’ Carrie said, pointing.
Niamh untied it. ‘Let me help you,’ she offered. ‘It’s not easy to tie on your own.’
Moments later, Carrie had been transformed into as close a replica of Niamh as they could manage. Niamh looked her up and down. It was hard to imagine the man being fooled, but it was the best they could do.
‘Tony gave the reason you were out early as the approaching bad weather,’ Niamh said quickly as Carrie stood up to leave. ‘You went along because you lost a bet. If you’d won, Tony would be reading a book today. Oh, and act like you’re hurting. Believ
e me – I ache all over.’
‘Thanks,’ Carrie smiled. ‘I doubt Tony would have thought to tell me any of that.’
Niamh crawled as deep into the bushes as she could and listened. She could hear the drone of the patrol boat’s engine now. It was approaching fast. The foliage was dense, but Niamh could see splintered bits of the beach through the leaves. It was rather like having a selection of keyholes to look through, but not being able to get close enough to them to get a decent view through any.
Niamh tensed as the sound of the approaching boat’s engine dropped to a purr. Had he run the boat right up to the beach? She couldn’t see.
‘Hi there again, sir,’ Tony called out. ‘Did you find anythin’ ?’
Given that he was shouting, Niamh judged the man to be holding the boat away from the beach.
‘Yes and no,’ the man replied. ‘I found the boat I was lookin’ for in a hidden inlet, but there was no sign of the girl.’
‘Really? How’d she get it in across the reef?’
‘Narrow channel – bloody miracle, if you ask me. Seems hard to believe that a Limey tourist girl got such a big cruiser through that channel without sinkin’ it. Seems likely she had help from someone who knows the waters well. You sure you can’t help me, kid?’
‘Not me, sir,’ Tony shouted. ‘Didn’t even see the boat. Maybe she left the boat so she could hide on the island somewhere. It’d be tough to find her in the trees there, but unless she’s some sorta survival nut, she’d get hungry an’ thirsty pretty quick. I’m guessin’ if you go lookin’, she’ll turn herself in, if she’s there.’
‘What about you . . . Carrie, was it?’
‘That’s right, sir,’ Carrie called back.
‘Anythin’ you can tell me?’
‘No, sir. I was too busy concentratin’ on paddlin’ an’ thinkin’ on how to keep my arms from droppin’ off to worry ’bout much else. Next time I think about makin’ a stupid bet with my brother, I’ll be sure to remember how much losin’ this one hurt.’
No matter how she moved her head around, Niamh could not get a clear view of the patrol boat. Was the man convinced? The pause following Carrie’s answer seemed to drag on forever. What was he thinking? Had he seen through her disguise?
‘OK then,’ the man called out eventually. ‘Maybe you’re right. I’ll go get some help and have a team search the island. Thanks for your time. You kids have a nice day. An’ if you see or hear anythin’ of the English girl, be sure you report it to the Sheriff’s Office, you hear?’
‘Will do,’ Tony called back. ‘Good luck with your search, sir.’
At the sound of the powerful outboard motor gunning away from the beach, Niamh felt her body begin to relax. All the aches and pains, forgotten during the tension of the past couple of minutes, returned in force.
‘Oh, God!’ she groaned. ‘I can’t move.’
She heard Tony organise the lifting of the canoe and the approaching footsteps of the brother and sister as they carried it up the beach towards her hiding place. Still she could not bring herself to move.
‘Niamh?’ Carrie called softly. ‘It’s OK. He’s gone. You can come out now.’
Niamh whimpered as she attempted to slither backwards out from under the bushes. The slight rustle as she moved was enough to draw their attention.
‘There you are!’ Carrie exclaimed. ‘For a second there, I thought you’d gone an’ run off without us.’
‘I should have,’ Niamh moaned. ‘I could get you both into a lot of trouble. But I can’t move. It hurts too much!’
A moment later, the brother and sister were helping her out and onto her feet. Niamh had never felt so grateful. She hugged Carrie, tears of relief and pain rolling down her cheeks.
‘Thank you,’ she whispered. ‘Thank you so much.’
‘No sweat,’ Carrie replied, embarrassed. ‘It was fun. Come on. Let’s get you home and see about fixin’ you somethin’ to eat and drink. Can you walk OK? It’s not far.’
‘I’ll manage,’ Niamh replied, biting her lip against the stiffness and pain.
Mercifully, Carrie had not exaggerated. The house was no more than a couple of hundred metres away. Niamh did not notice much as they walked. It was hard to focus on anything other than the pain that was radiating throughout her body. As they approached the house, however, one thing did catch her attention. It was a tree with writing all over the leaves. Niamh had never seen anything like it before.
‘We call it an autograph tree,’ Carrie said, noticing Niamh’s interest. ‘Whatever you write on the leaves stays there for the entire life of the tree. Cool, eh?’
‘It’s a novel form of graffiti,’ Niamh agreed, giving her a weak smile. ‘I suppose the nearest equivalent back home is carving initials into the bark of a tree.’
‘Yeah, that happens here too,’ Carrie nodded. ‘But writing on these leaves doesn’t hurt the tree like carving into bark does and if you write something you later regret, you can just pull off the leaf. This one is a bit like a living journal for me.’
‘Really? In what way?’
‘She’s written all of her past boyfriends’ names on there,’ Tony interrupted, laughing. ‘She must have covered half the tree by now!’
‘Have not!’ Carrie said, sounding hurt. ‘Not quite,’ she added in a conspiratorial voice, giving Niamh a sly wink.
‘There’s a lot of names up there,’ Tony said with a shrug.
‘And can I help it that all the boys I’ve agreed to go out with have turned out to be dorks with one thing on their mind?’ Carrie asked. ‘I like to think of it as a visual reminder of what a bunch of losers the guys are around here. Most of them have lasted one date. Some didn’t even manage that. Losers, the lot of ’em.’
They reached Tony and Carrie’s home. It did not look as large as the Summerland Key house that Niamh’s father had bought, but it did look nice. Tony and Niamh put the canoe into the garage and ushered Niamh through a door at the back that opened into the main living area. Carrie took her by the hand and Niamh winced. The blonde girl turned Niamh’s hand over to see what had caused that reaction.
‘Oh, you poor thing,’ she said, looking at the line of red blistering skin across her palm and at the base of her thumb. ‘That’s gotta hurt.’
‘No more than most of the rest of my body,’ Niamh said. ‘I had no idea that paddling a kayak was such hard work.’
‘Well, let me get you a cold drink and then you can have a soak in a nice warm . . . Niamh, get down! Now!’
Niamh didn’t hesitate. She dropped to the floor, her heart suddenly hammering as the hissed warning sent a new wave of panic through her. What now? Had the Fisheries officer followed them here after all?
‘Tony! It’s Tessa. She’s coming up the drive,’ Carrie said urgently. ‘Shoot! What if she saw Niamh? What should we do?’
‘Damn it!’ Tony muttered. ‘OK, get Niamh through to your bedroom. Stay quiet, Niamh, OK? I’ll deal with Tessa.’
‘Stay low and follow me,’ Carrie ordered.
Niamh did as she was told, crawling as fast as she could. The carpet was mercifully thick and soft against her hands, but tears tracked down her cheeks once more as she tortured her aching muscles still further. Once out of the living room and into a short hallway, she got to her feet again and stumbled along it to where Carrie was holding open a door for her.
‘Feel free to lay on the bed,’ Carrie whispered. ‘Try to relax. I’ll be back as soon as I can.’
Niamh crossed the room to the bed and slumped down onto it. Just as Carrie began to close the door, she heard Tessa’s raised voice.
‘She’s here, isn’t she?’ she accused. ‘You went and got her! Are you crazy, Tony? What do you think you’re doing?’
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Sam’s first sight of the City of the Imperium took his breath away. From the crest of the shallow ridge it appeared to be a vast single geodesic structure covering many square kilometres of land. Its weird geometr
ic shapes and interlocking structures looked so alien that he could not help feeling that he had somehow fallen into a computer-generated image of the far future. From the very centre of the city soared a vast spike of a tower, like a javelin of the gods stabbing down from the sky.
‘Wow!’ he breathed. ‘Now that’s something you don’t see every day.’
There was a slight jolt as airbrakes deployed from the body of the train to begin the deceleration. They were still several kilometres from the edge of the city, but Sam had already seen how long it took to shed their momentum during their one brief stop at another station about an hour and a half earlier.
The journey had passed remarkably quickly. The exhilaration as the train had reached its amazing cruising speed had taken some time to dull, but gradually, he had adapted to the sensation of travelling at super high speed.
For more than an hour, the countryside had remained monotonously flat as they flashed up the full length of this alternate world’s Florida mainland. As the train sped ever northwards, gradual undulations in the terrain began to make the scenery more interesting. Everywhere Sam looked he found new things to marvel at. He found the great herds of enormous grazing herbivore dinosaurs to be particularly fascinating. It was only when he caught sight of the fourth or fifth such herd that he realised exactly what he was seeing. These animals were being farmed by the raptors. They were the equivalent of the cows and sheep in the human world. Raptor society and values were different to those of humans, but there were some fundamental elements that seemed to have developed along similar paths.
The train decelerated slowly as it approached the edge of the city. Rather like the door to the station, the monorail appeared to run straight through the outer city wall. It was not until they were very close and a crash seemed inevitable that an enormous section of the structure opened to admit them.
Sam could barely wait to see what wonders awaited within the city, but to his disappointment, the holographic camera view suddenly vanished as they passed through the outer wall. The clamshell doors to his alcove opened and he pushed himself upright. A glance back at the wall behind him revealed the apparently solid half-tube restored to its former smoothness.
