TimeRiders: City of Shadows (Book 6) (37 page)

Faith looked around the small courtyard. The
ground was cobblestones covered by mud and rotting vegetable peelings. Here and there
mildew-covered nuggets of faeces – animal or human, she couldn’t tell. Clearly
this small space was a dumping ground for the effluence and night-water that was tossed
out of the small grimy windows that punctuated the towering walls all around this
enclosed little courtyard.

She noticed a long wooden pole with a
crudely fashioned hook on the end, leaning against one of the walls. That, presumably,
was how the clothes were retrieved from the washing line. She also noted in one corner a
small wooden door that hung pathetically on failing, rusty hinges.

It took her no more than a few minutes to
retrieve the rags and change out of her modern clothes. She bundled them up under her
arm and would figure out a way to dispose of them later. Her bullet-shattered lower arm
and hand she wrapped up in a linen shawl. The blood had already coagulated and dried. It
would eventually heal: the skin would re-grow, the bone and tendon beneath would
re-knit.

The doorway took her into a narrow walkway
between damp brick walls, covered by a slanted roof of slate shingles that tapped with
the rain. At the far end she could see the grey light of this dull day. And a wide
street by the look of it.

At the far end she emerged on to a broad
cobbled road; rows of three-storey red-brick terraced homes, identical and equally as
drab and squalid-looking as those that had surrounded the dingy space she’d just
arrived in. The street was busy with people – people who didn’t look occupied.
Women sitting on doorsteps looking on as their children played in the street. A pair of
men smoking long clay pipes, standing beside an open fire in a grate, poking it to stir
the dying embers to life. All of them in rags.

She saw a sign. Presumably the name of this
street; flaking paint on rusting tin –
GREAT DOVER STREET
.

Faith crossed the street towards the fire,
approaching the two men. They didn’t notice her coming until she tossed her
clothes from the year 2001 on to the glowing embers. The synthetic fibres of her JC
Penney office clothes flared up almost instantly.

‘Hoy! Watcha think yer doin’,
love?’ Both men turned to look at her.

‘Fuel,’ she replied evenly,
‘for your fire.’

One of the men grinned around the stem of
his pipe. ‘Well, hello, m’dear.’ His red-rimmed eyes – one of them
opaque like a boiled fish-eye, a cataract – looked her up and down approvingly.
‘Now there’s a pretty, pretty thing.’

Faith offered her hesitant smile and picked
what she considered the most appropriate response. ‘Thank you.’

‘You ’ungry, love? Want
sumfin’ to eat?’

It had certainly been a while since
she’d had a protein refuel. ‘Yes. I am hungry.’

Both men looked at each other and grinned.
Then the one with the clouded eye turned back to her. ‘Well, I got a nice bit of
fish back in my ’ouse. An’ some cheese.’ He took a step towards
her.

Faith stifled the urge to adopt a combat
stance and chop at the man’s neck with the side of her good hand.

Blend in.

‘So ’ow ’bout you
an’ me ’ead back to my gaff.’ He nodded to one of the terraced houses
close by. ‘I only live over there. I’ll give yer a proper feed, love. Eh?
Put some colour in ’em cheeks of yours.’

‘Fish and cheese?’ Faith cocked
her head. Protein and fat. Perfect fuels for her body chemistry. ‘Those are both
suitable food types. Thank you.’

The man took his pipe out. ‘Tell you
what, love, ya don’t ’alf talk funny.’

Her lips flickered uncertainly. ‘I am
new in this place.’

‘New? Another foreigner, eh?’ He
reached and put an arm round her narrow waist. Faith decided to accept the overfamiliar
gesture – for the moment. It didn’t appear hostile or threatening so she let it
pass.

‘Come on, then, deary, come along with
ol’ Terry.’ He pulled her to him so that her hip bumped clumsily against his
leg. ‘I’ll look after ya, my dear.’

He tugged her firmly in the direction of his
house and Faith had begun to take a few steps with him when a female voice barked
out.

‘You leave that poor girl be, Terry
Matchins!’

He stopped and turned. ‘Ah, not
you!’ He spat a curse at her.

Faith saw a woman who could have been any
age between twenty and thirty-five – so very difficult to tell. The woman’s skin
was ruddy with rose-coloured splotches, several teeth missing and the rest an unpleasant
vanilla colour. She was short and slight with auburn hair tied up in an untidy frizzy
bun.

‘You better let her go! Or I’ll
box yer ears!’

‘She’s comin’ round mine
for a bit o’ supper. Ain’t ya, love?’

The short woman addressed Faith.
‘Love, that dirty ol’ goat’s not goin’ to feed yer anything that
you’d
want
to eat. Terry ain’t
got nuthin’
indoors but dirty intentions. He’s bloomin’ bad news is what ’e
is!’

Faith turned to look at him. ‘Is this
woman correct? You have no food?’ A cold glare and her face so close to his
presented a challenge that unsettled the man and his firm grasp on her waist loosened.
‘I … I just thought you was lookin’ a bit peaky, love. I thought
–’

‘I know exactly what you was
thinkin’!’ snapped the woman. ‘Go on, sling yer hook!’

The man bared brown teeth at her.
‘I’ll slice yer up one day, Mary! Next time yer so drunk ya don’t know
it’s night or day, I’ll give yer a ruddy scar to remember!’

‘Yeah, yeah! So you’re the
Ripper, are you?’ She stepped forward and pushed him. ‘Go on with ya! Go
pester someone else, you rancid old fart!’

The man laughed and shrugged, and returned
to his friend beside the fire.

The woman offered Faith a hand.
‘He’s right, though, you do look awful pale, love. I got some leftovers from
yesterday.’ She frowned firmly; a face that wasn’t going to take
‘no’ for an answer. ‘Come on, let’s fix you some food. You look
awful poorly.’

Faith extended a hand to the woman. A
handshake: she’d learned that gesture of formal courtesy from Agent Cooper.
‘Thank you. I am Faith.’

‘Faith, is it? Well, since we’re
doin’ introductions, I’m Mary. Mary Kelly. You’ll be safe with me,
love.’ Her ruddy face split with a smile that even Faith was able to judge with a
fair degree of certainty was entirely genuine. ‘Perfectly safe.’

14 December 1888, Holborn,
London

‘Oh my God!’ gushed Maddy,
‘I so-o-o-o love this!’ Her face was one big toothy smile framed by the
wisps of her strawberry hair and the lace of her bonnet. ‘All of this! These posh
clothes, this place! Don’t you think it’s so cool!’

Sal was fussing with her lace cuffs.
‘I feel like an idiot in this dress.’

Liam was in the same frame of mind as Maddy.
‘It feels like this could be our new home all right.’

Maddy sighed contentedly. Her first night in
Victorian London. ‘Yeah, it’s almost like back home.’
Home
.
New York. A strange choice of word for that place, that – home – since she’d never
actually had one. ‘Just as busy and bustling and vibrant as Brooklyn.’

‘Uh-huh,’ said Liam. His cheeks
puffed up like a hamster’s as he worked his way through a pork pie.

She looked around the open-top wagon with
its four small round tables and tall wobbly stools. There was even a serving counter on
the end, behind which a barista busied himself roasting coffee beans on an open skillet
over glowing coals. A whole coffee shop complete with its own canvas awning and
colourful bunting right there on the flatbed of an open horse-drawn cart.

She grinned. ‘Starbucks 1880s
style.’ She sipped steaming hot coffee from the mug cupped in her hands and
smacked her lips.
‘Actually, even better than Starbucks. I mean,
this is what I call fresh coffee.’

‘Aye.’

The meagre light of the overcast afternoon
was fading, the featureless December-grey sky becoming a deep ocean blue. Maddy watched
as one by one glimmers of flame winked on like fireflies in the gathering twilight; oil
lamps on the street, candles behind net-curtain windows. As evening began to settle on
Farringdon Street, it became a Dickensian painting; splashes of midnight blue for the
advancing evening shadows, and ambers and golds for the glowing pools of gas and
candlelight. And, with the evening almost fully upon them, it seemed to be getting
busier still.

‘They seem to like their
nightlife,’ said Sal.

Liam and Rashim had already spent a week of
nights here in London as they’d been setting up the new field office. Partly
because some of their banging around had been noisy enough that it kept attracting their
curious landlord. He’d turn up at their door like a bad penny with various excuses
as to why he was knocking. They soon realized that Mr Hook enjoyed his ale and was in
the habit of spending his evenings in one public house or another, so their lifting,
bumping and banging, bringing in bits and pieces of furniture to make it more like home,
was better done then rather than during the day.

Liam looked round the street. ‘It
is actually
busier than normally, so.’

As well as a number of well-dressed
gentlemen in top hats with elegant ladies on their arms – presumably quite usual for a
Friday evening – there were several loose clusters of working men blocking the pavements
further along the street. Liam presumed they were the overflow from various overcrowded
public houses: men enjoying their ale at the end of the working week.

Maddy’s mood had suddenly changed as her
thoughts returned to matters at hand. ‘We have to figure out what happened to
Becks,’ she said.

‘It must have been a translation
error,’ said Liam.

Rashim fussed with his glasses. ‘No, I
don’t think so. I checked and rechecked everyone’s mass index. Something
must have happened back in that school.’

‘Like what?’

‘Maybe a rat ran into her square or
something?’ said Sal.

Rashim jumped on that. ‘Yes, it could
easily be something like that … a rat, or a stray cat, or
something.’

‘So, does that mean she’s
somewhere here? Somewhere else in London?’

‘I don’t know, Maddy. It’s
possible.’

‘She could be wandering around looking
for us,’ said Sal.

‘Then we should have Bob and
SpongeBubba switch on their Wi-Fi signals. If she gets within – what is it, half a mile
range? – it’ll give her something to home in on.’

Rashim sipped his coffee. ‘But, Maddy,
it is also equally possible she experienced mass convergence somewhere. This London is a
dense place.’

‘She’d be dead, then.’
Rashim nodded.

‘Maybe something happened to her back
in the school?’ Liam looked at the others. ‘Maybe those meatbots finally
caught up with us.’

‘No.’ Maddy shook her head.
‘I’d say we probably lost them.’

The conclusion, then, wasn’t so great.
Her body was lost: a pulp of flesh somewhere in London perhaps fused into the
foundations of some building.

‘If that did happen, I just hope it
was quick for her,’ said Maddy. ‘That she didn’t suffer too
much.’

Losing their half-grown Becks, though, was
more than just losing a colleague. Friend even. Maddy felt that there might have been a
chance to ‘reason’ with her AI to finally agree to open that locked portion
of her mind. Somehow, having reinstalled her complete personality from the rigid binary
confines of a hard drive – an object that was never going to be reasoned with –
she’d begun to hope that enough things had happened recently for Becks to consider
opening up to her, revealing whatever message had been waiting two thousand years to be
heard. A message, by the way, specifically intended for her! She ground her teeth in
frustration. A message, Becks had claimed, that had been sent by her.

I sent myself a message from the
future.
Maddy shook her head, very much annoyed with her stupid future self.
Why did I freakin’ well decide I have to wait until ‘certain
conditions are met’ before I can learn what it is?

‘Rashim, do you think there’s
any way we’re going to be able to grow any new support units?’

Absently his fingers traced the felt brim of
his top hat held reverently on his lap. Clearly he relished the whole dressing-up thing
as much as she did. He’d even bought a fob watch on a chain to tuck into one of
his waistcoat pockets.

What a poser.

‘I think we’ll struggle to find
the components we need in this time. We could perhaps use a brewer’s cask for a
growth tube, but filtration pumps? Protein solution? We would need to take a journey
forward to obtain those things.’

‘And that’s a risk, isn’t
it?’ said Sal.

Maddy nodded. ‘Yup, we run the risk of
turning up on somebody’s radar if we do too much of that. We’ll have to
think about this. Meanwhile, the foetuses will stay viable in the freezer
unit?’

‘Provided the power supply does not fail
us,’ he replied, nodding. ‘Yes.’

‘I wonder if there’s something
special on tonight?’ said Liam. ‘A parade or something?’

They sat in silence for a while, all of them
contemplating the busy street. The barista, seeing their hushed conversation had hit a
pause for the moment, came round the side of his counter and over to their table.

‘Can I offer you ladies or gentlemen
anything else? Only I’ll need to be closin’ up and movin’ on
soon.’ He glanced at the gathering of men down the other end of Farringdon Street.
‘I’d rather be off before things get a bit frisky. I ’eard a whisper,
see.’

Liam nodded at the gathering of men.
‘What
is
going on down there?’

‘That’ll be another of them
gatherings,’ replied the barista. ‘Blasted anarchists and troublemakers.
They’re all worked up and makin’ a nuisance of themselves. All because of
that gentleman murderer.’