Tomorrow's Guardian

by Richard Denning

CHAPTER TWENTY–FIVE – THE PORTAL

  "Mary, that’s awesome,” Tom grinned. She blushed and smiled shyly at him. Outside, the birds on the rooftop, spooked by some hidden threat, suddenly took off and scattered into the skies.

  “We have to do it,” Tom said, after a moment’s pause.

  “No!” Septimus exclaimed. “Just think about it, boyo. We haven’t any idea what is through that portal. All we know – all we believe – is that it leads to a room in Redfeld’s world: some kind of laboratory; a ‘projection room’. That sort of place belonging to the military would certainly be guarded in our world. I can’t see it being any less the case there, can you?”

  “I know. I know it’s a risk and it scares me, but we can’t leave Edward and Charlie in his hands,” Tom insisted. “We might as well not have rescued them in the first place!”

  Mary nodded, fervently agreeing with Tom. “I am frightened too, Mr Mason,” she said, “But they are our friends.”

  “I know all that. I agree, it’s just ...”

  “What?” Tom and Mary chorused.

  Septimus shook his head and said nothing. Instead he pulled back the sheet, swung his legs out of the bed and stood up. Or rather, he tried to stand up. As soon as his feet hit the floor he groaned in pain and slumped back to sit on the bed, holding his side and wincing.

  “Just what do you think you’re doing?” said an angry voice behind them. Doctor Makepeace had come into the room.

  “I’m just popping out for a moment, Doc – won’t be long,” Septimus said breathlessly, grimacing with pain.

  The Doctor’s face went red. He shook his head and pointed at the bed. “In! Now! You’re going nowhere for at least a day.”

  “But ...”

  “No buts, ifs or maybes around here. You had a bullet in your lung. I was able to Walk that out and start the lung healing, but if you move too much you’ll bleed to death. Into bed for twenty–four hours’ rest: no debate.”

  He turned to face Tom and Mary. “You two, get out now! I will tell you when it is safe to visit.” They were shooed to the door and stumbled downstairs.

  “Now what?” Tom asked.

  “We still must go, Master ... Tom, I mean.”

  “Just us two?” Tom thought about that for a moment then he nodded.

  “Yes you’re right. It must be us and it must be now. We don’t know if Edward and Charlie will still be alive this time tomorrow.” He took hold of Mary’s hand and sought the Flow of Time.

  Emerging onto a pavement in Trafalgar Square was like stepping into a whirlwind. The place was surrounded by crowds, kept away by a line of policemen and women and riot barriers. Journalists prowled around like predators on the hunt, snapping away with their cameras at anything remotely interesting. Beyond the barriers, Tom and Mary could see an inner line of yellow tapes marked POLICE – NO ENTRY surrounding the area where he and the others had fought Redfeld’s gang. Forensic scientists were collecting spent cartridges and even samples of blood.

  “Blimey. We’ve walked into a crime scene!”

  “The portal is still there, Master,” Mary said.

  Tom frowned, but let the ‘Master’ go by this time. Mary didn’t notice and carried on talking.

  “Truly I am certain I can open it, just as with a real door, but I think I need to be near to it; no more than a few feet away.”

  Tom looked back at the taped off area, the scientists and the police – many of whom were armed with sub–machine guns and dressed in flak jackets. He winced, “That could be a problem. How long do you think it will take?”

  “It may take some moments.”

  “Can you create a wall around us, whilst you do it?”

  “I ... I don’t think so, Master. I think I will be too busy.”

  Tom nodded, resigned to being ‘Master’; clearly it was too ingrained a habit for the young woman to change. He had no idea how Mary did what she did; she could not Walk as he and the others did, but her powers were unique and he just had to accept what she was saying.

  “Ok then,” he said, “this will be hard. We will Walk to just in front of the portal. I will distract the police whilst you get it open. We get through and we close it. You can close it, can’t you?”

  “Yes, I believe so, Master.”

  Exasperated, he tried one more time, “Mary – don’t call me ‘Master’; it’s Tom.”

  Mary nodded but she was looking distracted, her mind on the task ahead.

  “Ok; ready?”

  Again, she nodded and held out her hand. Tom took it and Walked the short distance across Trafalgar Square.

  “Bill, pass me the next bag will you ... oh my God!” were the words that greeted them as they materialised in front of one of the scientists. He was crouching down over the dried pool of blood that had once belonged to Septimus. He stared open–mouthed at the two youths who had just appeared out of thin air, right in front of him. Glancing behind, Tom saw another scientist, looking equally gobsmacked, standing next to some equipment cases on a table. Half a dozen armed police stood only a few feet away and these, attracted by the noise, had turned around and were also staring at them.

  “Mary!”

  “Shush, I am busy!”

  She was. In front of them a pinpoint of light had appeared and was already getting larger.

  “Armed police! Put your hands on your head and don’t move!” barked one of the officers.

  The portal expanded. It was now a foot wide and three feet high.

  “I said hands on head: now! This will be your last warning!” the voice grew more agitated. The scientists had scuttled off to the side and the police were closing in on him and Mary.

  Outside the riot barriers and yellow tape, the crowds had noticed the confrontation and fallen silent. Tom glanced around again: the portal was just a few feet away and was now large enough to jump through. Most of the police were gaping at it; one yelled, “Get down!” Those nearest flung themselves to the ground as if expecting an explosion. There were cries of renewed terror from the crowd.

  Right, thought Tom, they had no time to dawdle. He held on to Mary and reached out in his mind for the World Map. The link was there alright, but he was alarmed to find he could not move them through the portal. The map in his head simply did not extend through it. Of course it didn’t, Tom muttered, kicking himself. It was another world. There would be another map.

  “Hasten Master! We must flee,” said Mary, sounding very seventeenth century, and very scared.

  Tom nodded: time to worry about maps later, perhaps. He jumped through the portal, dragging Mary along with him. On the other side they crashed into two chairs, which they knocked flying, and their momentum carried them on under a bench. There, they lay for a moment, panting for breath. The portal was still open and three astounded police stood cautiously gaping through it.

  “Close,” muttered Mary, pointing her finger at the portal. With a resounding crack, it closed and the scene in Trafalgar Square vanished.

  “Phew,” Tom said. “Well done Mary, we made it.”

  They crawled out from under the bench and looked about. It was the laboratory that Tom had seen before, lined floor to ceiling with shelves crammed with machines and devices that Tom had no clue about. There was a door at the opposite end of the room, which he assumed would lead to the outside. One side of the room was taken up by a huge metallic screen where he presumed the image from the projector shone. He moved across to this strange looking device and examined it, but could not see how it worked, beyond having a row of switches and dials.

  “Now what do we do?” Mary asked.

  “We find Charlie and Edward and get home. First though, can you still feel the portal?”

  Mary nodded then hesitated and frowned. “Er ... yes, but it is getting faint. The weakness in the air is still there, but I fear it will not be for very much longer. We must make haste to locate our friends before ...” Her eyes widened and she turned to look at Tom, her face ashen.

>   “What is it?” Tom suddenly had the feeling that bad news was coming.

  “I am afraid to say that the portal has closed, Master. I can no longer feel it at all.”

  “But that means we’re stuck!”

  Mary nodded. “I fear so.”

  “It’s even worse than that, I’m sorry to say,” Tom said and now told Mary that he could neither feel the Flow of Time, nor see the map that allowed him to Walk them to other times and locations in their world.

  “So, we are stranded in Redfeld's world: in Fairyland?” Mary grimaced, her eyes wide with fear.

  “It looks that way,” Tom rubbed his eyes then he shrugged. “We’ll work something out. If Redfeld can come and go between this world and ours, so can we. But we can’t stay here. We must get away before ...”

  “Before what?” snapped a voice.

  They both spun round and gasped.

  Standing in the doorway was an officer wearing a similar uniform to Captain Redfeld’s, although this man was younger with fair hair. Behind him lurked three guards: all armed with rifles. The officer whipped out a Luger pistol from a holster at his waist and pointed it at Tom.

  “We shoot any spies we find in this garrison. You will come with me,” he ordered, gesturing with a flick of his Luger that they should come out of the room. Then he snapped his heels together, turned and spat an order to the guards. “Bring them for questioning!”

  The guards filed into the projection room and using their rifles prodded Tom and Mary out of the door and along a dimly lit corridor. It had many doors on each side and seemed to twist this way and that for a very long way through some sort of building. Tom tried to keep track of the direction in which they were heading, but after the first few turns it was hopeless. Unless he could find a plan of the building he did not stand a chance of finding the projection room again. In any case, how could they hope to get home without the portal?

  One more turn and they were walking along a gallery with large windows looking outwards from the building. Tom realised they were high up in a tower block and through the windows he could see a city spread out below them. The most obvious feature was a forest of tall chimneys belching fumes into the sky from hundreds of factories. The buildings in the immediate vicinity were also tower blocks, much smaller than the one they were in, which seemed to loom over all the rest, but they were made of the same dark granite, stained with smoke and very grim looking. On top of each one was a flagpole flying a red flag, which Tom recognised as being the Nazi–like flag bearing the thunderbolt symbol of the Twisted Reality. It was the only decoration or adornment he could see in the whole city. There were no neon lights nor any brightly lit advertising hoardings as Tom would expect to see in his own world; no statues to this nation’s past heroes, no parks and most certainly no tourists. Nothing, in fact, to break the bleak, monotonous view, with one exception: on one of the buildings there was a vast portrait of a man. He wore the Twisted Reality’s Nazi uniform and his eyes, whilst intelligent, showed no compassion, no mercy. They looked coldly out over the city with an imperious, almost contemptuous air.

  In the street below, Tom caught a glimpse of a column of marching soldiers: the army to which Redfeld belonged, he assumed. He looked back over the skyline. In the distance there was a domed cathedral, which looked oddly familiar, as did the tall tower with a clock on it in the other direction. Suddenly, Tom’s stomach lurched as he realised what he was looking at.

  “Oh my God: it’s London!” he blurted out, swallowing hard.

  The officer snapped his head round and glared at him. “Trying to pretend you don’t know what city you are in, now, are we? That will do you no good, boy,” he sneered.

  Tom did not reply. He had worked out exactly where they were. They were still in Trafalgar Square, but it was not as he knew it. In the Twisted Reality, the victorious Germans had built their London garrison in the Square right over the top of Nelson’s column. More than that, as he became aware of his location, he realised that he now felt a link once again to the map. Yes, he could feel it and yes ... he could now also feel the Flow of Time. It did feel odd, though; and the map was different! It was that same weird feeling he’d had before, like driving on the wrong side of the road. The seconds passing here were those of another world where history had played out differently and where another sun lit the skies. But odd as it might be, he felt just a little more at ease. They might be stuck in this Twisted Reality, but within it he could Walk if he needed to. He tried to wink at Mary to put her at ease, but she was looking out at the city, her face stark with horror and did not see his signal.

  Turning yet another corner, they emerged onto a further gallery, but unlike the others, this one was open to the interior of the building. They were now moving along a high balcony lined with pillars, looking down onto a central courtyard. High above them natural light filtered down through a glass ceiling. Below them the courtyard was dotted with statues of what were, presumably, heroes of the German conquest of Britain: officers, admirals and generals, who had achieved what the Germans in Tom’s own reality had failed to do.

  Amongst them Tom could see two figures that were not statues. One was sickeningly familiar and no surprise – it was Captain Redfeld. He was talking animatedly to another man, partially hidden behind a statue of a fat general. Ah, that statue Tom did recognise, for it was Herman Goering the Commander in Chief of the Luftwaffe, Germany’s air force in the war, and a close friend of Adolf Hitler. Earlier in the term, Tom’s history class had been shown a picture of him almost bursting out of his renowned pale blue uniform. Tom remembered thinking that he looked quite jovial, his fat face wreathed in smiles; not at all as he would have imagined.

  A few moments later their movement along the gallery shifted his point of view and he could see who Redfeld was talking to. His heart jumped and beside him, he heard Mary gasp.

  The new figure was wearing a German uniform of the type Redfeld wore, although with more braid and decorations – so presumably a senior officer. But of the face there could be no mistake: without a doubt it was the Professor.

  “Neoptolemas!” Tom gasped involuntarily.

  “Halt!” The officer walking behind him snapped an order. The guards stopped at once and Tom struggled to avoid colliding with the one in front. Mary did collide with her guard, but bounced off, wincing.

  The officer marched past Tom and opened a door. He stuck his head inside and then re–emerged. Grabbing Tom by an elbow he pulled him into the room. Then, with a shout of, “Keep her there!” to his men he slammed the door shut behind them both.

  Tom looked round. They were now in a room lit by a flickering bulb and full of filing cabinets. From the layer of dust on the tops of the cabinets Tom surmised the room was rarely used. It was unoccupied.

  The officer studied Tom for a moment before he spoke. “Tell me quickly what you know of Professor Neoptolemas. It is your one chance to stay alive.”

  Tom stared at him. Was this some kind of trick? What did this man know of the Professor – unless, of course, Neoptolemas was working with Redfeld after all and was well known to the rest of his army?

  “I thought we were to be shot as spies,” he mumbled to gain time, thinking furiously.

  “You might still be if I don’t get some answers I like. Answer me. How do you know the Professor?”

  Tom was silent. Was this man working for Captain Redfeld? Was it a trick to find out all he knew? But why drag him into a room full of filing cabinets to question him? That seemed very odd. The man must know that Tom had seen Redfeld and the Professor just moments ago. That and his reaction on the balcony, blurting out the Prof’s name, seemed to be the reason he’d been dragged in here. What was this man’s game?

  “What makes you think I will tell you anything? You are one of Redfeld’s officers. I won’t work for him, so why should I work for you? How can I trust you?” Tom answered in a defiant voice that he hoped did not reveal the fact that his heart was pounding like a sled
gehammer and he was terrified.

  “Do you know Captain Redfeld?” the officer asked.

  Tom said nothing.

  The officer studied him again for a few seconds and then Tom heard a pop as the holster of his pistol was undone and the Luger reappeared. The officer clicked off the safety catch and then pointed it at Tom.

  “Don’t shoot ....” Tom said feebly, raising his hands and feeling his throat tighten.

  The other man’s expression did not change, but he suddenly reached up and placed the pistol into Tom’s right hand, then stepped back.

  “What ...?” Tom’s mouth fell open. This situation was surreal. Slowly he lowered his arms and looked down at the Luger nestling in his palm.

  “You asked how you can trust me. Well now you can shoot me, if you want to.”

  Tom hefted the pistol and for a moment considered doing just that and then bursting out of the room to rescue Mary. Instead, he moved over to a filing cabinet and placed the Luger on top of it. He would probably only have shot himself in the foot, anyway.

  “Who are you?” he asked the officer. “And what’s all this about?”

  “Lieutenant Manfred Teuber, UK Special Security Detachment,” he said. The way he said Lieutenant sounded like ‘loytnant’.

  “I am also an associate, perhaps even a friend, of Professor Neoptolemas of the Hourglass Institute in your world!”

  Tom felt his heart give a jump and looked over at the pistol. Was this good news or bad?

  “My world? I don’t know what you are talking about,” Tom bluffed. The officer snorted.

  “Oh I think you do. You are not from this place are you? What you call ‘The Twisted Reality’. You are from Die Andere Welt – ‘The Other World’. You must be, because you mentioned the Professor by name and no one in this world apart from me, Captain Redfeld and a very few senior officers, know of the existence of Die Andere Welt or of the Professor. So you are from that world; either that, or you are working for the good Captain Redfeld ... and I’m a dead man!”

  “Then you are not working for Captain Redfeld?” Tom asked. The officer shook his head.

  “But you are working for Neoptolemas?”

  “Not exactly working for him; let us just say our aims often coincide.”

  “In that case, perhaps you can tell me exactly what his aims are in being here today, dressed in that uniform?”

  Teuber blinked and then actually laughed. “If you mean the man you saw just now, that was not Professor Neoptolemas. It was Colonel Heinrich Theilmann, also of UK Special Security Detachment, my superior and a very dangerous man.”

  “But he looks ...”

  “Identical to the Professor? Yes he does and no, I cannot tell you why, that is something you will have to ask Neoptolemas.”

  Tom nodded and thought of the three men who looked almost identical: the Professor, the Custodian and now this Heinrich Theilmann. How could that be and what did it mean? But there were other questions to ask, so he put that to one side.

  “So, you still haven’t told me, what aims do you and the Professor have in common?”

  Teuber sighed and took off his hat to rub a hand through his hair. Before answering, he replaced the hat and adjusted the peak carefully.

  “The Professor wants to protect your world – its past and its future from Redfeld, Theilmann and others who would change it to an image of this world. I too want change, but I want to change this world to an image of yours. I aim to undo much that went wrong here and make it a good world to live in again. The Professor and I have agreed that Redfeld must be kept away from your world and then one day maybe the Professor can help me here, in mine.”

  Tom nodded. That at least made sense. If, of course, the Professor was genuine and not in a conspiracy with the Custodian: to what end Tom had no idea. Teuber now waited expectantly and Tom realised that it was time for him to reveal some facts of his own; but what, exactly? He knew nothing about this Teuber bloke, did he? He decided to keep it brief.

  “My name is Thomas Oakley and yes, I am from ‘The Other World’. I did some work for the Professor rescuing two men and a woman. The woman is with me here, but the two men were captured earlier by Redfeld and brought here ...”

  “Edward Dyson and Charles Hawker?” Teuber asked.

  Tom nodded.

  “I know where they are.”

  Tom opened his mouth to ask more, but at that moment the door swung open and in strode Colonel Theilmann. Teuber jumped to attention, whilst Tom shivered. To be this close to the man who was the spitting image of the Professor was very unnerving: doubly so because he was wearing full military uniform and regalia. Theilmann glanced coldly at Tom and then turned to the officer.

  “What goes on here, Lieutenant?”

  “I captured these intruders in the guard room near the cells, sir. I was taking them for interrogation.”

  “Spies or saboteurs?”

  “I think neither, sir. It seems their father was arrested this morning for taking part in the strike in the docklands and the children here were trying to see him.”

  Theilmann turned his gaze on Tom and he felt as if the temperature in the room had fallen ten degrees. The intense gaze from those steely grey eyes was chilling, but worse than that, somehow penetrating. He felt as if the Colonel was peeling away any disguise and deception to seek out the truth.

  “Boy, if your father is a dissident and a trouble maker he will be punished and your family informed of his fate. As for you and your sister – you have broken into a secure base of high sensitivity. That will not go unpunished. You and your father ... and sister will learn obedience.”

  He looked back at Teuber.

  “Transfer them to the detention camp at Newbury immediately, Lieutenant.”

  “Yes sir!”

  Colonel Thielmann spun on his heel and marched out of the room. The door swung shut behind him.

  “Thanks,” Tom exhaled in relief as Thielmann’s footsteps receded. “But what will you do now?”