TimeRiders 05 - Gates of Rome (8 page)

Rashim smiled. The stream had a habit of choking on its own internal mail system. ‘They can wait, Bubba. You better get off.’

‘Righto.’

‘Oh, Dr Yatsushita will be your owner-operator from now on.’

For what time he has left.

‘I understand. Goodbye, skippa. Have a great trip!’

‘Goodbye, Bubba.’

He watched the yellow lab assistant turn and waddle back towards the cubicles and desks and the blue-green glow of dozens of floating holo-displays.

‘Translation in five minutes.’ Dr Yatsushita’s voice. ‘Any non-Exodus personnel must leave the grid immediately.’

Rashim could hear the growing hum of energy being channelled into the hangar. From the ceiling above he heard the clank of chains and motors as the ‘cage’ was being readied to descend. The cage was a fine wire mesh, a curtain of conductive material that was going to be lowered all the way round the perimeter of the translation grid, like a stage magician hiding his assistant behind a veil before making her vanish. The energy that was going to be channelled through it was much more than the Cheyenne Mountain facility’s generator could handle. They were tapping several other nuclear reactors in Colorado for this, switching
whole cities off
to make this happen. Lights in Denver were probably winking off right now. Not that anyone still alive outside was going to notice, or even care.

The image of the liquidized girl from the media feed haunted him; nothing more than a huddle of clothes and pool of dark liquid developing a leathery skin. He wondered how long before the last isolated groups of humankind were infected. Before mankind was completely erased.

Perhaps without humans, the world will find a way to recover.

There was something a little comforting about that thought. Cities would descend into rubble and rust, and nature would find a way to rebalance the poisoned air, the toxic seas.
To eventually erase every last memory of us
. Another failed experiment. The dinosaurs had their time and mankind had his.

Whose turn next?

‘Lowering the energy cage.’

Rashim looked up and saw the wire mesh shroud slowly winching down, enclosing them all. Those who’d been last-minute stand-ins looked anxiously around them, unfamiliar with the translation process.

‘What’s that?
What’s coming down?
’

‘Relax,’ he called out to the corporal. ‘It’s just making a very
big Faraday cage round us. Generating a large shoebox-shaped energy field, wrapping us up for delivery.’

‘Like a parcel?’

Others across the hangar floor looked equally startled. Few of those standing among the grid squares had received any briefing at all about the process; even the vice-president had shed his media-friendly calm and was looking around anxiously.

Rashim smiled. ‘Yes … just like a parcel.’

He caught one last glance of Dr Yatsushita and exchanged a nod with him.

Yatsushita mouthed something. Rashim could guess what it was.
Don’t let them take over.
Then he was lost behind the shimmer of the curtain of fine wire mesh. The whir of motors finally ceased as the mesh touched the concrete floor.

‘Energy release in two minutes. Please ensure you are entirely
within
your grid markings.’

Rashim looked around and saw everyone else doing likewise, making sure they were standing in the middle of their squares. He was certain that in some cases it didn’t matter how carefully placed they were: they weren’t going to make it through alive. If their body mass varied too much from that of the candidate who
should have been
standing there, then … well, he had no idea what was going to happen to them. Lost. Turned inside out. He looked at the few children, at the baby squirming on the floor.

Stupid fools – bringing their children along.

He’d tapped in wild estimates for some of them.

‘One minute until energy release. Please now ensure you are standing as still as possible.’

He closed his eyes, feeling certain this was all going to end up being a ghastly, bloody mess. Too much haste. Too many fudged, guessed-at numbers. This wasn’t what he’d signed up
to either. Oddly, though, oddly … he realized he wasn’t scared. It was not as if there was anything left to lose. Not as if he was leaving behind any family or friends. Not as if he was leaving behind anyone or anything worth crying over. During the last week he’d watched, on a screen, a virus annihilate humankind. Watched it as if it was one of those old disaster movies people used to go to ‘movie theatres’ to see.

A virus that had erased humankind and nothing else.

A man-made virus no less.

We went and did this to ourselves.
There seemed to be some satisfying symmetry in that: after screwing up the world, we went and finished the job with ourselves.

The humming of the field increased and Rashim heard the crackle of energy arcing above their heads across the football-pitch-sized translation grid.

He heard Dr Yatsushita’s booming voice one more time. Couldn’t make out the words above the deep
thrum
of energy. He could feel the hairs on his arms lift, then the hair on his head rise with the build-up of static electricity all around him.

This is it.
A goodbye to everything – to the twenty-first century, to a world completely trashed by mankind. A goodbye to nations murdering each other over land, over food, over water … sometimes just over the colour of a person’s skin, a difference in faith, a method of worship, a political opinion.

As the power surged into the wire mesh and arcs of energy leaped across the translation grid mere inches above their heads, Rashim wondered if mankind really deserved this elaborate
cheat
, this second roll of the dice. Perhaps the only way to truly learn is to fail … and fail badly. That’s what Kosong-ni was: mankind’s lesson. Mankind’s EPIC FAIL. The few, if any, who survived that were probably going to be far wiser about the future than these people standing around him.

We made a mess of things … and what do we do? We run away from it.

He had a feeling all they were doing was rebooting civilization so that it could make the same stupid hash of things all over again. And again.

And again.

‘Excuse me?’

‘That tunic hanging up there,’ said Sal to the old lady. ‘Can we just take a closer look at it?’

‘The
Titanic
one?’

Maddy nodded. ‘That’s it.’

The old woman pulled a stool out from behind the counter, stood on it, wobbling precariously as she unhooked the hanger from the railing and brought it down for them. She pushed aside a small stack of second-hand books waiting to be priced and made space on the counter, then spread the jacket out carefully.

‘It’s almost an antique, you know,’ said the old woman. ‘It’s nearly ninety years old.’ She smoothed her wrinkled hands across the cloth. ‘Older than me even.’ She smiled.

Maddy and Sal stared down at it for a moment.

‘I don’t rent it out for fancy dress. And I really don’t know whether I’d want to sell it.’ She shrugged. ‘Except if the price was right.’

Sal leaned over it. ‘There. See?’ She pointed to the shoulder of the tunic. Maddy stooped over, adjusted her glasses and peered closely.

‘You’re right!’

It was there. So faint it was missable unless you were looking for it.

‘What is it, ladies?’

‘A stain,’ said Sal. ‘Red wine or something?’

The old woman lifted glasses on a chain and propped them on the bridge of her nose. She peered closely at where Sal was pointing. ‘Oh my … you know, I never noticed that before!’

‘Can I ask where you got it?’ asked Maddy.

The old woman straightened up, lifted off her glasses and let them dangle on her chest. ‘Well now. It was someone’s attic clean-out if I recall. A job lot I bought for this store. A box full of all sorts of dusty old things. Quite a surprise to find this among all the other bits. But you do find gems like this from time to time –’

Sal pointed towards the shop’s grimy window. ‘What about that bear?’

The old woman leaned over the counter to see what she was pointing at. ‘On the rocking-chair? The stuffed bear?’

‘Yes.’

‘Oh, I got all those soft toys from a day-care centre … I think.’ She looked back down at the tunic and the faint wine stain. ‘Fascinating. Isn’t it? Something like this … makes history come alive,’ she said to Maddy. ‘Almost like going back in time. You can try and imagine how that stain happened.’ The old woman’s eyes glinted with excitement. ‘Perhaps this crewman was busy delivering a glass of sherry to some duchess when the
Titanic
hit that iceberg and that’s where the stain came from!’

Maddy humoured her with a nod. ‘Yeah. That’s kind of cool.’ She noticed Sal was still staring at the soft toys on the rocking-chair. She nudged her gently. ‘Sal?’

‘Uh?’ Sal turned back.

‘OK?’

She nodded. Distracted.

A bell chimed and the shop door opened. A man entered
with a tuxedo and a ball gown carefully draped over his arms.

‘Ah! Mr Weismuller!’ The old woman stepped from behind her counter. ‘How was your lodge party?’

‘Come on,’ said Maddy. She took hold of Sal’s hand. ‘Let’s go.’ She led Sal out. ‘Miss? Thanks for showing us your tunic!’ she called to the old woman as they both squeezed past her customer and stepped outside. But she was already chattering away to him, barely noticing the pair of them leaving.

Outside on the pavement, Maddy shook her head. ‘My God! You were right. It is … it’s exactly the same!’

Sal was still looking through the window back at the soft toys on the rocking-chair.

‘Sal? What is it?’

She turned back to Maddy, a smile quickly spread on her face. ‘Nothing. Nothing. Just … uh …’ She changed the subject. ‘See, then? I told you. The tunic … what do you think it means? It means
something
, right? It definitely means
something
!’

Maddy nodded. ‘Yes … yes, it does.’ She realized it was better Liam wasn’t here with them. Both Liam and Bob had gone out to their local Barnes & Noble for some reading matter. Liam was adamant he wanted to read up on how to use computers and the Internet better. Maddy assured them there really was a book entitled
The Complete Idiot’s Guide to the World Wide Web
, that she wasn’t just being rude.

‘Do you know what I think?’ said Sal. ‘This is going to sound like I’m a complete
fakirchana
-head. But …’ She took a breath. ‘I think that tunic might be
Foster’s
!’

Maddy chewed her lip anxiously. Perhaps this was the right time to share what the old man had told her. Sal was so close to the truth … in a way. Secrets. She hated keeping them, particularly this one. It stank.

‘Sal … we need to talk about Liam.’

Sal looked at her sharply. ‘What? What is it?’

‘He’s … well, he’s not who you think he is.’

Sal looked shaken. ‘What?! What do you mean? Who is he?’

‘Let’s go get a coffee. Right now.’

‘Maddy! Tell me!’ She looked upset. No.
Frightened
. ‘Who is he!?’

‘I need a coffee first.’ Maddy realized she was trembling. Her legs felt like they were set to give way on her and she felt queasy enough to hurl chunks on to the pavement. ‘I need to sit down, Sal. I really need to. I need to gather my thoughts … and I need a freakin’ coffee.’

He found himself staring up at a cloudless blue sky. A rich, deep blue like the skies one used to see in old images from the beginning of the twenty-first century. Quite different from the perpetual discoloured cloud cover of 2070: the turbulent, sulphurous acid rain clouds, the ever-present smog above cities and refugee shanty towns.

Quite beautiful.

Rashim could feel the warmth of the sun on his face. Hear the whisper of a fresh, untainted breeze gently stirring the branches and leaves of trees nearby.

Is this Heaven?

He realized that was a pleasing notion. That Project Exodus had gone disastrously wrong, that every translation candidate including himself had died – torn to pieces by extra-dimensional forces – and this … this was the afterlife. His uncle, an imam, had once taken him aside and tried to describe what Allah’s Paradise would be like. It had sounded like this. And he’d scoffed at the man’s faith.

Maybe I was wrong. Maybe there is a God.

And that pleasant illusion could have lasted a while longer, lying there on his back and enjoying the deep blue above him, if it hadn’t been for the stirring of others all around him. It seemed like they’d managed to do it. They survived the jump.

With a weary sigh, Rashim slowly lifted himself up on to his elbows and looked around.

They were right on the flat ground of the receiver station, a field of swaying, olive-coloured grass. In the distance the glint of a gently meandering river and hills beyond that.

The correct location all right. But he couldn’t see any sign of the four receiver beacons, ten-foot-tall tripods with an equipment platform at the top of each one. Each one marking a corner of ground space the exact same size as the translation grid back in the Cheyenne Mountain facility.

He got to his feet, hooding his eyes from the sun. No sign of them. Rashim cursed.

We’ve overshot the snap range.

‘Where is this? Where
are
we?’

Rashim turned to his right. The corporal was standing beside him. ‘Where the hell is this?’

‘Where this is, is near Rome. But I’m not sure precisely
when
it is. The receiver station was deployed ahead of us in
AD
54,’ Rashim continued, more thinking aloud than answering the corporal’s question. ‘They should be right here, dammit, but I can’t see any of the beacons.’

‘
AD
54 …?’ The man rubbed his temples as if trying to push the idea into his head. ‘You mean like the year 54? Like fifty-four years after Jesus Christ?’