Extracted

by RR Haywood

  ‘Good point,’ Ben concedes, his mind whirling so fast he was missing some of the obvious connections.

  ‘So when does it happen?’ she asks again.

  ‘We, er . . .’ Roland starts to say in a voice much too slow for Safa.

  ‘What you do,’ Safa says, edging forward on her seat again, ‘is go back to twenty-one ten and check the world. If it’s all blown up then keep going back a year until you find when it isn’t all blown up and you’ve narrowed down the year . . . then what you do is—’

  ‘Safa,’ Ben cuts through when she finally draws breath. ‘Maybe we should just listen?’

  ‘We did listen,’ she says. ‘He said the world blows up in two triple one and—’

  ‘Twenty-one eleven . . .’

  ‘Whatever,’ she tuts. ‘So what I’m saying is they should go back a year at a time until they find out when the bad guys do the bad thing and phone it in.’

  ‘Germans,’ Harry adds with a nod at Roland.

  ‘Phone it in?’ Ben ask.

  ‘Yeah.’ She shrugs, pulling a face. ‘Phone the police or the Feds or the bloody KGB . . . I don’t know who but . . . the point is it’s not difficult to figure it out.’

  ‘Exactly,’ Roland says.

  ‘Exactly,’ Safa says, she sits back and crosses her legs as the room fills with a silence that grows heavier with the air of expectation. She shifts position, uncrossing her right leg from over her left and re-crossing with her left over her right as Harry coughs lightly and Ben stares at her. ‘You want us to do that, then?’ she finally asks.

  ‘Yes,’ Roland says firmly and very much relieved. The banter and use of humour at such a time of heightened stress is a good sign. It’s what soldiers and professional security people do. Black humour they call it. A way to alleviate the pressure and show an air of non-intimidation. He expected it from Harry and to a certain extent from Safa, but the fact that Ben is also doing it is a very good sign. Plus they haven’t gone mad and beaten him up either.

  ‘Coffees,’ Malcolm says from the doorway.

  ‘We eating now?’ Harry asks.

  ‘I brought some little bread cakes in,’ Konrad says, walking in behind Malcolm with a basket in his hands.

  ‘Take a few minutes,’ Roland says, standing up and heading for the door. ‘I need to get something.’

  Eleven

  ‘Okay.’ Roland comes back into the room, takes a coffee and heads round his desk with a glance to the now empty basket and Harry swallowing the last cake.

  ‘Did you want one, sir?’ Harry asks with a mouthful of bread cake. Ben and Safa sip their coffees from unpainted earthenware mugs. Both quiet, both pensive and both having just watched Harry demolish the entire basket of bread cakes.

  ‘No thank you,’ Roland replies in his cultured voice as he takes his seat and rests the large-screen tablet on the desk. ‘Now. I am going to explain the rest. In twenty-one eleven the world has been destroyed.’

  ‘We got that,’ Safa says.

  ‘Good. Now it wasn’t like that before . . . when the inventor first went forward fifty years, so we know something has changed but we don’t know what or by who, but we do know there was a replica device made.’

  ‘By who?’ Ben asks.

  ‘We don’t know,’ Roland replies. ‘Needless to say the inventor, on realising the danger, took steps to secure the device, which is why we are here. In the Cretaceous period.’

  ‘I’m lost,’ Safa says. ‘What’s this got to do with dinosaurs?’

  ‘It hasn’t,’ Roland says, puzzled at the question.

  ‘It’s, er,’ Ben says quietly, looking at his plain mug, ‘a place to hide?’ He glances at Roland, who nods. ‘The Cretaceous period spanned tens of millions of years.’

  ‘Got it,’ Safa says. ‘So we’re hiding here?’

  ‘Yes,’ Roland says.

  ‘How did you get the device here?’ Ben asks, trying to fathom out how you would transport the thing made to enable time travel through time and scratching his head in the process.

  ‘Good question,’ Roland says in genuine admiration as that hope continues to grow. ‘We didn’t. The inventor made a second one, which was brought here through the first one. That first one has now been destroyed.’

  ‘Okay, so let me get this right,’ Ben says slowly. ‘You built a time machine then fucked up when some other people made a time machine so you legged it into the very distant past to hide your time machine from everyone else?’

  ‘Er, yes . . . that is spot on,’ Roland says after thinking for a second.

  ‘And now you’ve realised that whoever made a second time machine has done something and destroyed the world by twenty-one eleven. Right?’

  ‘Yes,’ Roland says, smiling at Ben.

  ‘I’ve got that,’ Ben says then looks at Safa. ‘You?’

  ‘Yep,’ she says.

  ‘Harry?’ Ben asks.

  ‘Aye, now I do,’ he says, nodding at Ben, ‘but I didn’t get a word of what the officer said.’

  ‘I’m not an officer.’

  ‘So why are we here again?’ Ben asks.

  ‘Ah.’ Roland pulls a face and steeples his hands over the top of the tablet on the desk. ‘We realised that any impact on the timeline can have devastating effects on the future of humanity. We need you to find out what changed and stop it from happening and, if we are able, you will locate and destroy the other device.’

  ‘That’s great, but why are we here?’ Ben asks again. ‘Why us specifically.’

  ‘We have a program. An advanced software program developed after your deaths that enables us to pick out people with certain skills and knowledge that will be able to assist us. Neither I, nor Malcolm or Konrad,’ Roland says emphatically, ‘have the required skills to do this. You see, we discussed whether we should get historians, scientists or other experts and then we discussed getting you three first, which of course would be harder given your propensity for violence and . . .’

  ‘We’re not violent,’ Ben says, aghast at the implication.

  ‘I am,’ Harry says honestly.

  ‘Yeah, I can be,’ Safa says.

  ‘I’m not violent,’ Ben says, aghast at the implication.

  ‘In the end we decided to risk extracting you three first.’

  ‘Why don’t you just use your soldiers?’ Safa asks. ‘You know, the shit ones from yesterday that can’t fight. Those soldiers . . .’

  Roland’s face darkens. He shifts on his seat and drops his eyes for a second. ‘You killed three of those men outright,’ he says quietly. ‘And it looks like a few more might die . . . they were seriously injured when they left here and—’

  ‘And whose fault is that?’ Safa asks scathingly.

  ‘I know, I know,’ Roland says quickly, holding his hands out.

  ‘What the fuck did you expect? Two of us are trained to kill, you fucking idiot . . . you drugged us and let us wake up on our own!’

  ‘I said I know,’ Roland replies, the worry back in his features. ‘We’re already impacting on the timeline. Three men dead . . . more injured . . . this bunker . . . simply by being here is risking an impact on the timeline, but if we don’t do something the whole world will end. I’ve done the best I can. Nearly everything here is constructed from organic materials and . . .’

  ‘Electric wires,’ Safa states. ‘The shutters. The bathrooms are made from stainless steel . . .’

  ‘Yes, I said nearly everything. The walls are concrete and we believe they will erode without trace over the next hundred or so million years. They are not reinforced with steel but purely concrete. The wiring is a risk yes, as are the shutters, but extreme times call for extreme measures. Malcolm and Konrad have done what they can, but as I keep saying . . . there is no precedent for this and we cannot involve anyone else. Those men you fought with were hired help. They had no idea they were in the Cretaceous period. They thought they were in a prototype detention centre in Berlin. Good God! There are three of us doi
ng this. Just three and we only started a few weeks ago. Everything has been done in that time. The blasted concrete is still drying. We had no idea of the effects of oxygen toxicity and had to research and source medications. We had no idea if any bacteria on us can kill anything outside or the other way around. Trust me. Please just listen and trust me when I say this is being done on the fly as we go along.’

  Silence settles. Desperation and passion in Roland, who sinks back in his chair and lets whatever mask he held in place slip from his face. Pure worry shows. Pure, desperate anxiety etched into every line on his face.

  ‘The program selected you,’ he says, looking at each of them in turn. ‘Of all the thousands of people that could have been chosen you three were the ones selected. Forgive my bluntness, but you have each killed several times, many in the case of Mr Madden. You have shown courage in the face of adversity and an ability to remain calm and cool at times of great pressure. You are intelligent, or at least competent in the skill sets required. Two of you are trained investigators . . .’

  ‘Yeah,’ Safa says slowly. ‘I’m really shit at investigating . . . that’s one of the reasons I went for Close Protection.’

  ‘Insurance,’ Ben points out. ‘I investigate insurance claims.’

  ‘We checked, Mr Ryder. Your skills are entirely transferable to the task required, and of course your actions when you were seventeen and again at Holborn.’

  ‘There are thousands of people out there that would be better than me at this,’ Ben says, shaking his head. ‘Really, you’ve got the wrong bloke.’

  ‘Same,’ Safa says. ‘You need soldiers, not coppers. Use Special Forces . . . there must be hundreds of them that would jump at the chance . . .’

  ‘We need people we can extract without causing any damage to the timelines. One,’ he says, holding a finger up, ‘Special Forces soldiers are generally accounted for even at the point of death. Two, Special Forces soldiers would be even harder to extract than you. Three, current serving and most past serving Special Forces soldiers are not routinely known by software programs that we can access and know about. Four, the closest match to any Special Forces-trained soldier that we could find was Mr Madden and he is here with us.’

  ‘What’s Special Forces?’ Harry asks.

  ‘It’s what you are,’ Safa says, ‘or rather what you became known as later. SWAT then, or FBI agents . . . CIA?’

  ‘Same as Special Forces,’ Roland says, ‘you’d think there would be thousands, right? Wrong. There aren’t. No, there are thousands, tens of thousands, but when you drill down to being honourable, honest, reliable, trustworthy, being able to kill, keep calm, resilient, trained, disciplined and then dying at a point where they can be extracted, the numbers drop down and down until we’re left with a bare few . . . which is you three.’

  ‘Point,’ Ben says, holding his hand up. ‘I am not trained. I said that. I am not trained. I am an insurance investigator . . .’

  ‘The program matched you, Mr Ryder,’ Roland replies almost apologetically. ‘You had a one hundred per cent success rate, I believe.’

  ‘Everyone knows that,’ Safa says quietly, glancing at Ben, who blinks at her, then back to Roland.

  ‘In insurance. I investigated insurance claims. I’m not a fucking detective.’

  Roland nods at him, smiling sadly.

  ‘What about our bodies?’ Ben asks suddenly.

  ‘Mr Madden’s body was never recovered, which we all know,’ Roland says softly.

  ‘I didn’t know,’ Harry mutters.

  ‘Miss Patel’s DNA was found under the rubble but the ensuing explosions were so devastating it was recorded that she had been obliterated. In your case, Mr Ryder, again the explosion resulting from the front of the train striking the bomb vest was so contained within the tunnel that later collapsed that the heat within that confine destroyed all living tissue. Your DNA was never recovered, but then neither was the man you were dragging or the driver of the train. That was another factor in our selection methodology. There were others selected and, forgive me, but some were better, but their bodies, or parts of their bodies, were later recovered. To take them would be an impact on the timeline of humanity.’

  ‘But building a fucking big house in the dinosaur times isn’t?’ Ben asks, glaring at him. ‘Putting fucking electric wiring and shutters? You’ve probably got solar panels on the sodding roof. Are they going to erode? What if someone in the future finds a fossilised solar panel? What then?’

  ‘But they haven’t,’ Roland says in that soft tone. ‘We’re in the past now, Mr Ryder, but we still have access to our normal time . . . or the future from here . . . so we know nothing has been found from this site.’

  ‘But . . .’

  ‘And we also know that this location is swallowed by the ocean long before the first person ever walks upright. I think . . .’ he says, then pauses for a second. Emotion in the room. Raw emotion that is growing stronger by the second. He lifts the tablet and swipes the screen. ‘I think now is the best time to show you this . . .’ He thumbs an access code into the device. ‘The inventor recorded some footage . . . I think it pertinent to show you that footage. It is somewhat impacting and, believe me, it is not my intention to further distress you, but I think it may help you understand the gravity of the situation.’

  ‘What’s that?’ Harry asks, staring at the thin, flat object in Roland’s hands.

  ‘Like a TV,’ Safa says, ‘Ben said earlier about computers?’

  ‘This tablet is actually 3D enabled but I think, given the presence of Harry, standard two-dimensional footage will suffice . . . now the actual film was captured by a drone . . .’

  ‘A drone?’ Harry asks, alarmed at the prospect of there being robot soldiers in the future.

  ‘Small flying device,’ Safa explains. ‘Like a helicopter? Did you have helicopters?’

  ‘I know what they are, rotorcraft?’ Harry says. ‘Saw one once, useless thing.’

  ‘They got better,’ Safa says. ‘Much better . . . a drone is a very small one operated by a remote control. They put cameras on them to record the ground and the military use them to drop bombs and spy on stuff.’

  Roland waits for the explanation to finish, detecting there is already the beginnings of a bond growing between the three people in front of him. He turns the screen to face them, leans over the top and presses the triangle to play the footage. Audio fills the room. A slight hiss, then the sound of the drone blades whirling. The screen comes to life, showing an unfocused grey blur and the distinctive motion of a camera lens trying to focus. Harry blinks and leans forward. His attention as much on the tablet as what’s on the screen.

  The noise of the drone blades increases. The engine rising in pitch and suddenly there is the sensation of lift being given by the camera. Grey rubble underneath from a distance of a few feet. Less than head height. All three watch it closely as Roland watches them. Movement is gained, the drone goes forward and rises steadily. More broken rubble shows on the screen. It could be anywhere. It means nothing. Ben scowls, feeling like a cheap trick is being played. Safa more so, she lifts an eyebrow at Roland, who simply waits.

  The drone lifts higher. The footage pans out. A half-burnt child’s doll adds a dramatic splash of colour to the screen. Ben tuts. Safa rolls her eyes. Harry stares enraptured by the high-definition, pin-sharp footage.

  ‘Seriously?’ Safa asks.

  ‘Just wait,’ Roland says.

  They wait. They see more rubble. The drone rises to show a ruined building. Dirty brown and grey bricks, a slate roof, window frames and household objects scattered in the debris. Something from the start of a movie. The drone continues the rise. More ruined buildings come into view and what looks like a bog-standard street that could be from any western country. Houses broken and falling apart. Roads buckled, broken and pitted. Trees now burnt stumps. A lack of life. A lack of anything living to be seen. It could be footage from post-Second World War bombing raids in Germa
ny. It could be from any number of conflicts. It could also be a film set.

  The shot widens as the drone lifts higher. More streets come into view in much the same state. Just rubble and debris everywhere. The scale starts to become impressive. A whole bunch of streets ruined and broken. Cars and vehicles are spotted but with the height of the drone it’s not possible to see the make or style. Still the drone rises.

  The residential view of streets starts to change. Bigger buildings come into view. Still broken and laid to waste, but more commercial in appearance. Railway lines appear at the top of the screen as the drone flies on. Loads of tracks laid side by side but all twisted and broken. A huge roof of something lies smashed next to the tracks. Ben and Safa both edge closer with the first twinges of recognition.

  Beyond the tracks a tower block lies on its side. Debris smothers the roads. The scale of whatever devastation happened becomes more evident.

  ‘Shit,’ Safa mutters. The first capsule comes into view. Broken from the main spoke and lying away from the huge wheel that was once the London Eye. Capsules litter the ground everywhere. Some still attached to the spokes. Bricks, rusted steel girders, slabs of concrete everywhere. No grass though. No weeds sprouting through the gaps. A complete lack of any greenery. The edge of the river comes into view. The filthy brown water flows past sunken objects as the drone banks left. Westminster Bridge lies with the middle section submerged in the river. Chunks of buildings poke up through the surface of the water. The drone rises further still as the ruined Houses of Parliament come on to the screen. The iconic clock face of Big Ben lying amongst the masonry and spires. Everything broken. Everything ruined, filthy, dirty and lifeless.

  Ben’s heart hammers in his chest. Safa’s mouth goes dry. Harry just watches the screen, any emotion hidden, but his eyes are sharp with understanding. Roland watches them. Seeing the same thing as when he showed the footage to Malcolm and Konrad and no doubt a mirror of his face when he first saw it.

  London ruined. The capital gone. Iconic landmarks fallen and broken. No life anywhere. The whole of the vista looks barren. Not a blade of grass on the ground or a bird in the sky.