Time Riders tr-1

by Alex Scarrow

  Bob evaluated the small man. He could provide assistance in some way.

  ‘As you wish,’ he replied flatly.

  CHAPTER 53

  2001, New York

  Thursday/Friday? (I don’t know)

  Three days now. I think it’s three — it’s hard to tell. Thetins of food in the cupboard are running out and we’ll be going hungry soon.

  Foster and Maddy went out there a few times looking for supplies. They’ve not foundanything so far, just ruins and bones.

  And those creatures outside. We now know they’re cannibals.

  Foster found the leftovers of one of their own kind, half eaten… and nearby the bonesof loads of others. Those things seem to exist in small tribes, feeding off each other. WhenI think now how close I came to being taken… That creature running its hand through myhair must’ve been sizing me up! Working out if I could be eaten.

  I don’t want to die like that. I’d rather anything else. I keep expecting tohear them at any moment outside the garage door, scratching at it, trying to find a wayin.

  I’ve never been so jahully-chuddah scared in my life.

  ‘I… I don’t want to go out there again,’ whispered Sal.‘Never. Never again.’

  Foster could see the terror in the poor girl’s eyes by the gutteringglow of the candle on the table between them. The rest of the arch was lost in thedarkness.

  ‘We have to,’ he said firmly.

  ‘But… but, those things…’

  Those things had once been human beings. But something had happened. He suspected some sortof a nuclear war. There was plenty of blast damage, scorched walls and debris suggesting amoment of intense heat. Decades of radiation sickness would account for their pitifulcondition, anaemic complexion, the running sores, toothless mouths.

  ‘Foster’s right,’ said Maddy. ‘We can’t hide in hereforever.’

  ‘But… they… those things are… cannibals.’

  ‘Yes, we know exactly what they are,’ Maddy snapped.

  ‘Perhaps we might be able to communicate with them,’ said Foster. ‘If somesort of nuclear war happened in 1956 and we’re in 2001, then those creatures will be thegrandchildren of the few that survived. Post-apocalypse childrenwho’ve only ever known ruins and rubble. It’s possible the eldest of them mightjust remember some language.’

  ‘You’re kidding, right?’ said Maddy. ‘They dribble, they don’ttalk. They see us as a free-range meal.’

  Perhaps she’s right. Those things would probably kill thembefore he could find a way to communicate with them.

  He sighed. ‘All right, well… we’ve wasted enough time. I was hoping anothertime ripple would arrive, perhaps one that would improve our situation. But it looks like thisis what we’re stuck with. So we’ve no choice. We need to find some way to generatepower. Enough to reboot our computer system… and enough, if we can, to open a window andpull back Liam and Bob.’

  Maddy frowned. ‘Sounds like we’re gonna need a lot of power.’

  ‘Even if we only have enough to pull oneof them back, we might learn exactly where and when the timeline was changed.’

  She pulled her glasses off her face, and wiped the scuffed lenses. ‘But then we’dalso need enough power to send them back to that point in time to fix it, right?’

  ‘Yes.’ Foster managed a grim smile. ‘But, look, we’ll worry aboutthat when we get to it. One thing at a time.’

  ‘Oh jahulla, we’re so-o-o-o doomed,’ whispered Sal.

  ‘No, we’re not,’ he replied sternly. ‘If there’s one thingI’ve learned over the long years I’ve been here working for the agency, it’sthat everything is fluid… nothing is fixed. We can, we will… we must… change itall back. Do you understand? Failure is not an option.’

  Both girls stared at him silently.

  ‘Nobody’s going to do that for us. It’s down to us. If we just sit safelyin here until we starve to death, well then… that’s it. That world outside ourshutter doors is what will remain forever more.’

  He let those words hang above the table, their three faces caught in the flickering glow ofthe candle, still and impassive.

  ‘So… we have a generator in the back room where the clone tubes are. We need tofind some diesel fuel for it.’

  ‘Why don’t we have stores of diesel?’ asked Maddy. ‘What’s thepoint of having a back-up generator if there’s no fuel to run it?’

  Foster shook his head. ‘We used to maintain a store of diesel fuel… butthere’s something about the energy of our field office’s time bubble that corruptsit at a chemical level.’

  ‘Meaning?’

  ‘Meaning the diesel degrades. The fuel we have in the back room is useless. We need toget out there and find some more.’

  He was silent for a moment, listening to the haunting wind outside their shutter door moaningsoftly.

  It was Sal who broke the silence. ‘Then I… I guess we’dbetter get off our butts and start looking.’

  Maddy nodded. ‘Yeah. We’ve got your gun. Those creatures will keep theirdistance.’

  ‘Out there in New York somewhere — maybe in someone’s basement, in astoreroom — there’s got to be some diesel fuel.’

  Maddy nodded. ‘Right.’

  Sal pursed her lips pensively then eventually nodded too. ‘Let’s doit.’

  Foster reached out for their hands. Grasping them tightly, he smiled proudly at them.‘You know, I’ve got a feeling you two, and Liam, are one day going to turn out tobe a formidable team. The agency’s best yet.’

  The girls both managed a brave grin.

  CHAPTER 54

  1957, Prison Camp 79, New Jersey

  Liam tugged the coarse grey blanket tightly around himself, trying to seal in whatlittle warmth his body had managed to generate. He was beginning to lose track of how manyweeks he’d been there. He wasn’t sure whether it was four or five months now.

  Had to be about that.

  His eyes drifted across hundreds — no, thousands — of other people wrapped insimilar grey blankets and gazing out listlessly through the chain-link fences at the barrenwinter countryside around the prison camp.

  ‘Look, it’s just hard to accept… to believe,’ said Wallace, standingnext to him. He’d been quiet for a while. Cupping his hands and blowing on them as hethought things through. ‘I mean… yeah, I saw your friend, Bob, take Lord knows how many bullet wounds back there at the White House, and hejust kind of shrugged it all off. I can’t say I ever sawanything like that.’

  ‘So then you do believe me?’

  Wallace’s jaw was dark with a thatch of unshaven bristles. He scratched his chinirritably. ‘You’re really asking me to believe you’re from thefuture?’

  ‘Yes.’ Liam shrugged. ‘Well, actually I’m from 1912. But-’ he offered a tired smile — ‘yes… I came here from the future.’

  ‘And you say you came back to today… to 1956, to fix history sothat the Germans actually lost the Second World War?’

  ‘Yes. To correct history.’

  Wallace shook his head and laughed. A plume of his breath billowed out and quickly dissipatedamid the cool morning air.

  ‘That’s completely insane. Listen, I’m tellin’ you, them Nazis nevereven came close to losing that war. They took Poland, Belgium, France, Britain… the restof mainland Europe in the space of just two years. There’s no way on earth they couldhave lost the war. No way.’

  Liam shrugged. ‘Well, where I came from they did. That’s what I was told. Andthey lost badly. Their leader, the Hitler fella, is supposed to have made some pretty big mistakes, like starting afight with Russia at the same time as he was fighting the — ’

  Wallace scratched at his chin again. ‘Well… the old guy, Adolf, was pretty nuts.That much is true. That’s why there was a change at the top in ’44. That’swhen Kramer took command of Germany.’

  Liam turned to Wallace. ‘Tell me more about Hitler and this other fella, Kramer. I needto know more. See, all of these things happ
ened forty years afterI died and I’m doing my best to catch up and make sense of it all.’

  ‘Died? Oh yeah, you say you were on the Titanic,right?’ added Wallace sceptically.

  ‘Yes, on that bleedin’ — supposedly unsinkable- hunk of metal.’

  Wallace snorted. ‘You’re serious, aren’t you?’

  Liam sighed. ‘Just tell me about them, would you? Hitler and Kramer?’

  The man sucked in a deep breath.

  ‘Adolf Hitler was the leader of the Nazi Party. They came to power inGermany in 1932 because the country was bankrupt and broken and Hitler promised the people hecould fix things for them. And, for a while, he did too. He got that country going again andhis people loved him for it. But then… he started going a little crazy in the head, madwith the power, I suppose. He had his country build up their armed forces, and then it wasinevitable. In 1939, they invaded Poland. That started the Second World War.’

  ‘Second World War? So there really was a first one?’

  ‘The First World War? Yeah, of course. You want me to wind back and tell you all aboutthat too? It happened not long after you say you… uh… died.’

  Liam shook his head. ‘No… this is confusing enough for me already. Just carry onwith Hitler and Kramer.’

  ‘OK. So the Second World War started. The Germans took Poland, Belgium, France. Theykicked the British army out of France at a place called Dunkirk. And then they spent a yearjust digging their heels in and building up their defences. Over here in America, althoughPresident Roosevelt wanted to enter the war, Congress and the Senate stopped him and kept usout if it. Which, back then, I think most Americans thought was a pretty smart idea. Wefigured it was a European problem. Not ours.

  ‘So,’ Wallace continued, ‘there were rumours that Hitler had plans toinvade Russia next. He was certainly preparing something. I saw intelligence reports coming infor the president that the Germans were massing tanks and infantry in the east. Then, all of asudden, it’s like Hitler had a complete change of heart.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I mean, he decided not to invade Russia. In the earlysummer of 1941 the Germans and Russians, out of the blue, signed a peace treaty. And that wasthe very same year that Paul Kramer came to public attention as Hitler’s deputy. Thatwas an incredible and very sudden change of heart. Because it was well knownthat Hitler despised the Russians, Stalin, communists. We all thought they were the next onhis hit list.’

  ‘Do you think it was Kramer who changed his mind?’

  Wallace nodded. ‘Yes… yes, absolutely. I think Kramer had Hitler’s completeattention from the very first moment they met; he became his closest adviser, his deputy. Andthen three years later that sly dog Kramer kicked that crazy old lunatic Hitler out ofpower.’

  Liam looked at Wallace. ‘See, where I’ve come from — the future, the storyI was told is different. This Hitler fella stayed in power and he went and lost that world war. Died in a bunker, if I recall correctly. Took hisown life, I think. No mention of a Kramer.’

  Wallace looked at him incredulously. ‘And you’re saying in your history booksthere’s no Paul Kramer?’

  Liam nodded. ‘As far as I know.’

  Wallace stared at him, struggling to believe such craziness. ‘Good God, if only thatwere so,’ he replied, shaking his head. ‘The world has watched that man with batedbreath. He’s never put a foot wrong. He’s a genius and a madman. We’vewatched his empire grow stronger and stronger, his military technology become so much betterthan ours. An ever-increasing threat to America over the last fifteen years.’

  Wallace puffed air into his cold hands. ‘But we thought — we hoped — he’d leave us alone over here. There was a hope that Kramer wasfinally ready to sign a truce between the Greater Reich and America. That the cold war betweenus was over.’ Wallace sighed. ‘Turns out we were fooled.’

  Liam watched a couple of armed guards patrol the outside of the perimeter fence nearby, theirblack uniforms and death’s-head insignia covered by thick winter capes.

  Kramer? Is it him? Is he from the future?

  Liam shivered inside his blanket. ‘Listen, it’s just possible this Kramer issomeone like me… another time traveller.’

  Wallace laughed. ‘Look, your story is getting too far-fetched, kid. Even forme.’

  ‘Oh, I’m quite serious.’

  Wallace made a face. ‘Back there in the White House, I thought you and your buddy weremaybe Secret Service guys. That maybe there was something special or secret about you two. Now-’ he shook his head — ‘now… I’m sorry, I’m justthinking you’re some crazy kid with a little too much imagination.’

  ‘I’m telling you, time travel is possible.’

  ‘Then, you know what? Why don’t you go make a time machine and kill Kramer all byyourself?’ Wallace scoffed. He looked like he’d finally had enough of Liam’scrazy story.

  Liam sighed. ‘I’m just a dumb ship’s steward. Or at least I was. Anyway,even if I had the brains to actually make a time machine, I’d need to know where andwhen to go… to the very first moment Kramer entered your history.’

  Wallace shook his head. ‘Well, everyone knows that — except you, Isuppose.’

  ‘Uh? What do you mean?’

  ‘There’s an account of Hitler’s very first encounter with him. It’sin Hitler’s second autobiography, Mein Sieg… My Victory, the one he published in 1944, just before Kramer oustedhim.’

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘It was April 1941. It’s a well-known encounter. He describes Kramer as amessenger from God, an angel. Divine intervention, he called it. In his book he tells howKramer arrived in the dark of a wintry night at the notorious Eagle’s Nest. The night ofthe fifteenth of April, if my memory serves me well.’

  Liam felt his heart pounding.

  Oh my… that could be it. The time and place weshould have gone to.

  Wallace turned to go, then stopped. His gaunt face smiled, teeth showing through his darkbeard. ‘I guess I’d like to believe in your story, kid, that there’s abetter history out there somewhere.’

  ‘There is!’

  He laughed, puffing a cloud of breath before him. ‘Well, let me know when you find it,eh?’

  Liam watched the man turn and go, feet crunching across the snow, huddled in his own greyblanket. A bleak figure. As Wallace merged with the other prisoners, huddling for warmth,Liam’s mind turned to a possibility, a ray of hope. If he could only get thatinformation to Foster and Maddy… that particular place and date.

  Perhaps they’d also stumbled across this information somehow — this supposedinspirational meeting of Kramer and Hitler. Perhaps Bob had made it back through the scheduledportal and right now he and Foster were on their way back to put things right. Back to 1941 tofind this Kramer.

  And to kill him.

  It was a hope, wasn’t it? Something for him to hang on to.

  CHAPTER 55

  1956, command ship above Washington DC

  Karl Haas smartly saluted the two SS Leibstandarte standing guard either side ofthe doors to the Fuhrer’s observation deck. They snapped crisply to attention, andthen swung open the double doors for him.

  He proceeded down the oak-panelled passageway towards the second, inner, doors leading on toKramer’s extravagantly decorated quarters, the heels of his black leather jackboots nolonger clacking noisily on metal plating, but softly thudding against the luxuriously thickcarpet.

  What is wrong with Paul?

  Karl was becoming concerned with his leader. In the last couple of months, since their finalassault on Washington and the taking of the White House, Kramer had become very distracted. Itwas becoming increasingly difficult to convince him to attend the weekly situation briefingswith the regional Gauleiters and invasion fleet’s senior commanders. And when he didturn up he appeared not to be listening.

  It was even getting harder for Karl to see his old friend alone. With increasing regularityit seemed, Kramer insisted he was far too busy to see
anyone.

  What is wrong with him? Surely not that body?

  The worst it could possibly mean is that some future agent had tried andfailed to get to Kramer. A failed assassination attempt, nothing more.

  And the rest of the news was all good. Back home in Europe the people of Greater Germany wereecstatic with the newsreels they were watching in their cinemas. Footage of their invasionforces marching proudly through the streets of New York, Washington, Boston. Some of that goodcheer was evident even among the provinces of Britain and France… who, despite beingconquered over a decade ago, had come to realize the Fuhrer was a good man, intent onuniting all people, not enslaving them.

  The announcement of Unity Day, a day to celebrate the end of war and a uniting of the westernnations, had been met with rapturous approval by the citizens of the Greater Reich. Karl wascertain future Unity Days would be celebrated with street parties everywhere, people in everycity in every country of Kramer’s empire happy to draw a line under two thousand yearsof bloody history. Wars, crusades, religious intolerance, inquisitions, torture, ethniccleansing, holocausts — all of those dark things in the past now.

  He rapped his knuckles against the thick wooden doors, waiting until he heard Kramer beckonhim in. He pushed them open, stepped inside and saluted his leader.

  Kramer was sitting in the window alcove, looking down at a misty morning. He could just makeout the dome at the top of the White House poking through the pale blanket coveringWashington, the orange glow of street lamps along Pennsylvania Avenue and the pinprickheadlights of slow-moving cars making their way sluggishly to work.

  Presently, he turned to look at Karl and offered him a warm smile. ‘Good morning, Karl.How are you?’

  Karl relaxed his posture, dropping his stiff salute and stepping towards his leader, hisfriend. ‘I’m well.’

  Kramer shook his head. ‘It’s amazing how quickly normalityreturns, isn’t it? Out there… people go to work, go to school, visit theirfriends, their loved ones, just as they always have. They have a new leader, a new flag…but life simply goes on for them.’