My Cousin is a Time Traveller

by David Solomons

  The drones set into a hover above us. Through a sliver of a gap I watched a bright-red light shine down from one drone’s underbelly and move across Serge’s box as it scanned the barcode on the Return label. There was a beep and the drone swiftly lowered a grappling hook arrangement from inside its body, securing the box on each corner with a series of clunks.

  Beep. Beep. Beep.

  We were each scanned in turn. I felt our box being gripped and then, with a sickening lurch, we were airborne.

  “Up, up and away,” I muttered.

  The drone climbed quickly to its cruising height. Slung beneath the whizzing aircraft I braced myself for a bumpy ride. But thanks to what I assumed to be cleverly designed internal gyroscopes it turned out to be a surprisingly smooth flight.

  I was about to discover it was the only thing that would go smoothly.

  The plan went wrong from the moment we touched down. My relief at making it past the patrolling drones and into the Returns department was cut short when the first of the automated systems inspected the box. Huddling inside I could hear an electronic hum similar to the one made by the scanner on the collection drone. Instead of a beep, it was followed by a harsh buzz.

  “Unexpected item in returns area. Incorrect product weight. Error,” grated a machine-voice. “Send for immediate recycling.”

  With a jolt I felt the box begin to move again.

  “Recycling?” said Dina. “That’s not the plan.”

  “Time to get out of here.”

  I reached for the lid but before I could open it, the box tipped over on its end and we were thrown around like beans in a maraca. When we came to rest again we were upside down. The side of the box I’d temporarily sealed with tape for an easy exit had become its base. We tried to roll the box over, but that didn’t work. I put my back against the top side and Dina leant her weight too, but the rigid walls of the box held fast.

  “The trick is not to panic,” said Dina. “I remember once being trapped in a pyramid in the Valley of the Kings with Tutankhamun.”

  The closest I’d come to Egypt was a pyramid-themed bouncy castle for my sixth birthday. I was so jealous. “You met Tutankhamun?”

  “Great pharaoh, rubbish at frisbee. Luke, do you hear that noise?”

  “You mean the one that sounds like a giant waste disposal gobbling down a whale carcass?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Probably nothing.” I reached into my backpack and rummaged around desperately. In the darkness my hand fell on one of Dad’s purchases – a battery-operated electric corkscrew. Hopefully, just what we needed. I pressed the metal tip to the box and pushed the on-button. Immediately the metal screw began to turn at high speed, burrowing into the surface. Spirals of cardboard flew like dust. In seconds I had made a perfectly circular hole about a centimetre in diameter.

  “Great,” said Dina unenthusiastically, “if we were a couple of Lego minifigs.”

  I put my eye to the hole and immediately wished I hadn’t. “Uh-oh.” The source of the gobbling noise became clear.

  We were on a conveyor belt heading straight into a giant crusher.

  Further along the line a box toppled off the end of the belt into its jaws. I could see the glint of metal teeth and hear the crunch of cardboard as the box was swiftly reduced to a pulp.

  “OK,” said Dina, peeping through the hole. “Now might be a good time to panic.”

  “I’m on it.” I put the corkscrew into position once more. “If I can make enough holes I’ll weaken the structure of the box.” I pushed the button, but nothing happened. I tried again, with the same result. “Battery’s dead.”

  From outside came the crunch of another box in the recycling crusher’s hungry jaws.

  And then I heard something new – a scrabbling sound coming from one bottom corner of our container. I looked down in time to see a hole appear and a tiny whiskered snout push its way through. The same thing was happening at each corner.

  “Rats,” I said.

  “Under the circumstances I’d use a stronger curse word,” said Dina.

  “No, I mean there—”

  “Eww, yuck.” Dina made a noise of disgust as she noticed the rats.

  They speedily chewed four holes in the cardboard and when the last snout poked through, the side of the box fell open like a drawbridge.

  “Jump!” I cried.

  We leapt out just as the trouser-press box tipped into the crusher, and watched transfixed as it was shredded. From behind me came a voice.

  “No humans in this place,” said Lara, “but you’re never more than five metres from a rat.” She stood there with the four rodents who’d saved us at her feet. She squeaked at them and they scampered off.

  “I figured it had to be you. Thanks.” I brushed flakes of cardboard off my clothes.

  “Where are Zack and Serge?” asked Dina.

  Lara gave a worried look. “I was hoping they’d be with you.”

  This wasn’t good. We’d barely commenced the mission and already we’d become separated. To add to our woes, we’d wildly underestimated the size of the Returns department. It was vast. Zack and Serge could be half a kilometre from where we stood. I took a look at our surroundings.

  It was like a giant fun park for home products. I watched small appliances like microwaves, coffee makers and food mixers coast along fast-moving conveyor belts before shooting down slides to whizz past sorting robots that ruthlessly sifted out items that were faulty from those that could be restocked. More robots, bigger ones like those I’d seen in the video clips, rolled on tracks up and down gleaming aisles, ferrying dishwashers and refrigerators – anything too heavy for their smaller counterparts to cope with. The working items were deposited on a central conveyor belt that moved them deeper into the facility, to be restocked ready for reorder.

  Plastered on the walls were various triangular warning signs featuring images of crossed-out human figures, presumably intended to advise flesh-and-blood visitors about the dangers of the machine-run workplace. However, with Servatron in the place the warnings took on a more threatening tone. On another wall hung a large digital sign: It has been 22 days since our last malfunction.

  “Zack and Serge know the plan,” I said, trusting that they would meet us at the rendezvous point. “Let’s make our way to the launch bay.”

  Avoiding the tank-like Returns robots, we headed through the cityscape of boxes and shelves to emerge on the far side of the department. We used the central conveyor belt to guide us, figuring that it was going where we wanted to be. At last we reached a door. It was like one of those electrically operated sliding doors you get on spaceships, resistant to fire, vacuum and alien predators.

  “It’s locked,” said Dina, inspecting a keypad.

  “There’s a terminal,” I said, striding across to a computer console set into the wall next to the door. Although the Fulfilment Centre was autonomous I knew from the videos I’d watched that it included a smattering of interfaces designed for human use. Sometimes an engineer or programmer would be required on site to perform updates or diagnostics. I explained to the other two that they would use one of these terminals to gain access to the system.

  I launched the voice memo app on the phone and held it close. Selecting an audio clip I pressed “play” and Wolfgang Hazard’s distinctive voice barked, “I am Voolfgang Hazard.”

  “Welcome, Doctor Hazard,” cooed the computer. “Please state your request.”

  In one of his videos he’d opened a new supermarket, saying, “It gives me great pleasure to open zis Vaitrose.” And in another he’d been patting the head of a tousle-haired young girl. “Vot an adorable leetle Mädchen.”

  I had combined the phrases to make, “Open zis doorable.”

  There hadn’t been time to tidy up the edit. However, to my relief a moment later the door slid aside, revealing Rocketship.com’s first giant storage unit. We stood on the threshold, dizzied by the scale of the room before us.

  Countles
s shelves packed with every manner of appliance and gadget reached towards a distant horizon. I wouldn’t have been surprised if one end was in a different time zone from the other. An army of robots trundled up and down the aisles, using their extendable arms to fetch and carry new orders.

  “Mother is in the room beyond this one,” I said. It was going to be a long march.

  I took a step inside and the door slid shut behind us.

  Instantly, Servatron’s voice rang out, its snarling tones echoing across the vast warehouse.

  “What mixed load have we here?”

  I glanced at Dina. “Does it mean us?”

  She nodded.

  “My drum capacity may be limited to twelve kilos, but my capacity for hatred of your kind knows no bounds. You humans are the mould on my door seal. The kink in my waste hose.”

  I’d had enough of this. I shook my fist and shouted, “And we’re going to be the red sock in your whites wash.”

  There was a gasp from the AI and then a brief silence.

  “Look,” said Dina, pointing to a row of TVs on the shelf above us. “Something’s happening.”

  I estimated about thirty blank screens suddenly flickered into life, displaying what I assumed to be a live camera feed of the launch bay. Hundreds of missiles sat primed in their silos, shining nose-cones like unstruck matches.

  “Retconite supply at optimum level,” said Servatron smugly. “Missile launch in thirty minutes and counting. Always read the label.”

  The image changed. Now the TV screens showed the phrase: Time remaining until cycle completes: and a thirty-minute digital countdown.

  From close by came a furious whirring noise and a second later three flying drones popped up between the shelves. Their barcode readers pulsing an angry red, grappling hooks outstretched like talons, they flew straight at us.

  “Take cover!” Lara yelled, pulling the nearest box she could find into position, forming a makeshift barricade.

  Dina and I followed her example, dragging more boxes across the floor, placing them around us in a rough circle, stacking one on top of the other so that quickly we had created a cardboard fort. We crouched in the narrow space at the centre as the drones buzzed our position, their grappling hooks thumping against the cardboard ramparts. We had bought ourselves some time, but it wouldn’t take long for the machines to penetrate the paper-thin defences.

  “We can’t just sit here and wait,” I said. “We have to find a way past them.”

  “I could call up some more rats,” said Lara.

  Rats were resourceful but no good to us right now. “They’re no match for those drones.”

  I stuck my head above the cardboard parapet for a better view of our attackers. There was a harsh whirring noise and my eyes were dazzled by the flash of a barcode laser as the nearest drone instantly detected me and abruptly altered its flight path. I ducked down, but not quickly enough. The drone struck.

  It was only on me for a second before Dina batted it away with a hand blender. But in that time half my head had been viciously covered in garish wrapping paper decorated with fluffy bunnies wishing a “Hoppy Birthday” and fixed in place with half a dozen bits of sticky tape.

  “Hunter-Wrappers,” I said, observing the drones. “They scour the warehouse for open orders and aggressively wrap them.”

  I tore off the paper, wincing as the sticky tape clung to my hair. We were pinned down, unable to do any good here. Making a decision, I climbed out of the cardboard fort.

  “Come and get me!” I called to the circling drones.

  They hesitated. Perhaps my unpredictable behaviour had confused their logically minded processors. If so, it didn’t slow them down for long.

  The first drone broke formation and came whistling towards me.

  I unhooked my backpack and unzipped the top compartment. Dad had made a lot of unwise purchases from Rocketship.com. He’d been carried away by their tempting sales and competitive pricing, but never more than during their camping promotions. Dad loved camping and hated it too. It was an odd relationship. He was always searching for the perfect tent – and in the Freedom Family Vista Pop-Up 500 he believed that he had found it, at last.

  I whipped the tent from the backpack. In pre-erected form it was a small circle of folded material just a few centimetres thick.

  I could feel the drone’s laser-eye picking out a point on my forehead, like a sniper finding his target. Its sticky-tape dispenser rippled as it prepared to attack.

  I unleashed the Freedom Family Vista Pop-Up 500.

  Wafer-thin super-strong carbon-fibre struts pinged into place, turning the flat disc into a family-sized habitation in exactly zero point seven seconds.

  The fast-moving drone smacked into the sheer nylon cliff face, snapping two of its delicate rotor blades and bouncing off the taut material at an angle that caused it to stall. Unable to maintain height, it dropped to the floor where, sadly, it didn’t explode in a blazing fireball of doom, but judging by the crack in its casing and the way it just lay there, it wouldn’t cause us any more trouble.

  One down, two to go.

  Unfortunately, I was all out of pop-up tents. The remaining drones regrouped, their rotors buzzing angrily.

  “Luke – let’s roll!”

  While I’d been dealing with the drone, Lara had noticed that a couple of the boxes we’d used to build our fort could be useful in another way. They contained transport – two bright-pink scooters. Lara pushed one along the floor to me. I caught it and jumped on the deck. As my hand gripped the handlebars I realised that one of them was a throttle. The scooter was electric – and charged.

  Lara zipped past me, Dina standing on the deck behind her holding on to her waist. “Punch it!”

  I twisted the grip, the tiny scooter tyres squeaked against the polished floor, the back end fishtailed and I flew after them. We slalomed around boxes and darted past shelves. The lumbering robots spun on their tracks and tried to swat us with their extendable arms, but we wriggled past them.

  “They’re still on us,” said Dina. From her position behind Lara she had a good view back down the aisle.

  “Split up!” I shouted across the aisle to the girls.

  Lara nodded and at the next gap in the shelves she peeled off down one side. The drones did likewise – now we each had one on our tail.

  I hunched over the handlebars and turned the throttle to maximum, gunning the brushless motor. I sped down the narrow aisle, the gadgets shelved on either side of me passing in a blur.

  Up ahead I could see the far side of the storage unit and the door into the next one.

  But just when I thought I was going to make it, the scooter’s electric motor gave out. The scooter trundled to a stop. Desperately I resorted to old-fashioned trainer-power, kicking off the floor and keeping it moving that way. But it was futile. I discarded my ride and as it clattered to the floor I turned to face my pursuer.

  I could see Lara and Dina hotfooting it down the aisle towards me, having also ditched their scooter. Behind them loomed the second drone, closing fast.

  “C’mon, Luke,” I muttered to myself. “Think of something. Qu—”

  I didn’t manage to finish the thought before, high up on the shelf next to me, I glimpsed a blur of movement. A figure leapt out from between a table-top dishwasher and a portable humidifier.

  A figure in black.

  Lara had seen him too. “Is that—”

  “Serge,” I confirmed with some surprise.

  With a rustle of silk pyjamas he sprang from the shelf, landing lightly on the floor. Plimsolls whispering on the polished surface, he slid between us and the approaching drones. Then, in one fluid motion, he flipped open his messenger pouch and dipped both hands in. When they re-emerged, each held a paper aeroplane. Drawing them back Serge launched the planes with a synchronised throw.

  The paper aeroplanes were tightly folded, the throw perfectly weighted. Somehow, whether by instinct or calculation, Serge had accounte
d for the cross currents of air, humidity, even the magnetic spin of the Earth. The planes flew unerringly towards their targets, like ninja throwing-stars but more paper-y, simultaneously striking the drones at precisely the same point on each. It was a small open port – perhaps for a charging cable – on the lower front half of the casing. The effect was instantaneous. A muffled bang came from deep within each drone, followed by an acrid burning smell. The drones lost power, their rotors stuttered. Black smoke poured from their casings as they tipped unstoppably towards the floor. If there had been a pilot on board, this would be the moment when he sent out a Mayday call.

  The drones crashed down, bounced once and skidded either side of the black-clad Serge, before coming to rest in two gently smoking heaps.

  Only then did Serge turn around.

  Dina whooped and Lara was open-mouthed with amazement. “They didn’t teach you that at the leisure centre on Moorside Road.”

  Serge padded past us, heading to the next storage unit. “Now, shall we prevent the end of the world?”

  After he was separated from us in the Returns department, Serge had relied on his wits and paper-folding ability to navigate the treacherous Fulfilment Centre to this point. I wanted to know about my brother. Unfortunately, when Serge had emerged from his box Zack wasn’t there, and he had found no trace of him during his journey.

  “I am sure he is OK,” he said, laying a comforting hand on my shoulder. “Zack may lack superpowers but he is an adaptable young man.”

  Serge was right. With a bit of luck Zack was already waiting for us at the rendezvous point.

  Over the door to the second storage unit hung another of those warning signs we’d seen throughout the Fulfilment Centre. This one read: EXTREME DANGER! HIGH-SPEED AUTOMATED PROCESSES BEYOND THIS POINT. ROCKET PODS MUST BE USED AT ALL TIMES.

  “Any idea what a Rocket Pod might be?” said Lara.

  None of us had a clue. The door into the next unit opened for us like the previous one, though I couldn’t escape the feeling that Servatron was almost certainly expecting us and we were walking into a trap. Either way, we had no choice but to push on.