by Jack Heath
He led them up another corridor. They passed some screens with messages glowing on them: CAUTION, EXPERIMENT IN PROGRESS. Lara thought about the radiation symbol painted on the hull. Her lingering sense of dread grew and grew.
11:10
They passed another screen. CHRONOLOGICAL MISALIGNMENT.
Another: RECALIBRATING . . .
And another: FATAL ERROR.
Finally they reached a larger room where a wide screen showed a map of the submarine. A wall-mounted fire extinguisher was surrounded by hundreds of power cables that ran along the floor towards a glass podium in the centre of the room. On the podium was a boomerang-shaped device made of copper, the two ends plugged into wet-looking sockets.
‘I’ll try to work out where the survivors might be.’ Hannah went over to the screen. Lara and Dominic approached the boomerang.
‘What do you think that is?’ Lara asked.
‘No idea.’
‘Uh, guys?’ Hannah was pointing at the screen. ‘Check out this date.’
Lara’s eyes widened. LAST SYSTEM UPDATE: 2062-04-04.
10:40
Dominic squinted at the numbers. ‘That’s not a date. Must be some kind of code.’
Hannah nodded uncertainly. ‘Must be.’
But Lara didn’t think so. She looked around at the UV screens, the glass podium, the copper boomerang. This equipment wasn’t just advanced. It was futuristic.
‘It is a date,’ Lara said. ‘Look at all this tech. Think about the way the sub just appeared out of nowhere. I think it might be from . . . the future.’ The idea would have seemed ridiculous on the surface. But down here, it made a scary kind of sense.
‘Impossible.’ Dominic picked up the boomerang and examined it. ‘Just because we don’t recognise this stuff, that doesn’t—’
A recorded voice echoed through the sub. ‘BREACH IN TEST UNIT. SECURITY ACTIVATED.’
09:25
Lara backed away from the podium. ‘What does that mean?’
‘It means I shouldn’t have touched anything,’ Dominic said grimly.
Lara heard the clank of footsteps in the corridor outside. Getting closer.
‘Dixon?’ Dominic shouted. ‘Ames? Is that you?’
No-one replied. The footsteps kept coming closer.
‘We should get out of here,’ Hannah whispered.
‘Agreed.’ Dominic put the boomerang back on the podium. The wet sockets reattached themselves like leeches. But when everyone turned to leave, something appeared in the doorway.
The thing looked human, sort of. It had two arms, two legs and a head. But it was three-quarter sized—maybe 120 centimetres tall—and it had no face. Just a blank plastic mask with two holes for eyes. Instead of clothes, it wore a hard shell of armour. One of its hands had five fingers, but the other was just a hollow tube.
08:05
As Lara opened her mouth to scream, the robot raised the tube, and shot Dominic.
There was a bright flash and a sharp zap sound, as though the air in the room had been ripped in half. The blast hit Dominic like a bolt of lightning, sending him hurtling across the room.
‘What is that thing?’ Hannah shrieked.
The robot was already turning, lining up a shot. Zap! Another flash, and Hannah hit the wall alongside Dominic.
07:20
The robot swivelled to face Lara. The empty eyeholes focused on her. She backed away, terrified, until she bumped into the wall. A laser target quivered on her chest, right over her heart.
But the robot didn’t fire. It scuttled to the left. Lara instinctively sidestepped the other way, keeping the podium between her and it. It was like the robot wanted to zap her, but wouldn’t risk damaging the boomerang.
‘You came to protect that thing, right?’ Lara pointed at the boomerang.
The robot didn’t seem to hear her. It kept square-dancing around, trying to line up a shot. Its clawed feet made clacking noises on the steel floor.
‘I don’t want it,’ Lara said. ‘I don’t even know what it is. So just let us go, OK?’
06:55
The robot kept swivelling and side-stepping, angling the muzzle of its weapon back and forth.
Dominic groaned on the floor. Hannah’s eyelids fluttered. If the robot realised they were awake, it might zap them again, this time with more power.
‘Guys,’ Lara said. ‘Don’t move.’
The robot stopped dancing around, like it was thinking.
‘Dominic. Hannah,’ Lara whispered. ‘We’re in trouble. We need to figure out how to shut this thing down.’
06:10
‘What happened?’ Dominic moaned. ‘I blacked out for a minute. There was—what on Earth is that?!’
The robot swivelled around to face him. Raised its weapon.
‘No!’ Lara screamed. Desperate to distract the robot, she snatched the boomerang off the podium. It was ice cold against her palm.
The robot immediately turned to face her again. But it wasn’t willing to shoot. Not while she held the boomerang.
She imagined her escape route—out the door, through the corridor, down the ladder, through another corridor, and then down another ladder to the exit. Could Hannah and Dominic hide behind her the whole way? No. The robot would zap them.
So she would have to lead it away from them.
05:45
‘Get ready to run.’ Lara reached backwards with one hand, feeling her way across the wall behind her.
Hannah was awake now. ‘What’s going on?’
The robot edged closer to Lara, like a seagull approaching an unguarded bag of chips. Clack, clack, clack. Maybe if it got close enough, it could blast her legs out from under her without hitting the boomerang. Or aim high and zap her in the face. Fry her brain.
‘What are you going to do?’ Dominic demanded.
Lara didn’t tell him. For all she knew, the robot understood every word they were saying.
‘Just wait thirty seconds and then head for the exit chamber,’ she said. ‘Don’t wait for me.’
Still fumbling behind her back, finally she found what she was looking for. The fire extinguisher.
05:10
She wrenched it off the wall and pulled out the safety pin. ‘Run!’ she yelled, and then she squeezed the trigger.
Apparently extinguishers from the future worked the same way as present-day ones. The extinguisher kicked in her hands and a cloud of mist squirted out, swallowing the robot. Lara threw the extinguisher at it, and heard a satisfying thunk. She didn’t wait around to find out how much damage she’d done. She just sprinted through the fog into the corridor.
She emerged from the cloud of mist into the corridor and kept running. Lara could hear hissing and whirring from somewhere behind them. Clack, clack, clack. The robot was following.
Dixon’s voice came on the radio as she turned a corner. ‘Nobody on board. But we found some seriously weird stuff in the control room. It’s like—’
‘Head to the exit chamber,’ Lara puffed. ‘Quick!’
04:30
Dixon sounded uneasy about taking orders from someone who wasn’t his boss. ‘What? Where’s Dominic?’
‘He and Hannah will be right behind you! Don’t wait for me—I’m being chased by some kind of security robot.’
‘Say again?!’
‘Just get to the exit chamber!’ Lara snapped. She turned off the radio in case the robot could hear it.
Hiss, clank. It was right behind her. Lara held the boomerang behind her back like a shield, hoping the robot wouldn’t shoot.
The ladder to the exit chamber was just ahead. Lara couldn’t use it—if the robot didn’t follow her down, Hannah and Dominic would be stuck up here. And if it did follow, it could trap all the other divers on their way to the exit. Instead, Lara ran straight past the ladder, towards the escape pods.
The clanking footsteps accelerated, as though the robot could tell she was getting away.
03:20
Lara turne
d another corner. The row of pods was right there. She grabbed the valve on the closest hatch. Twisted it. The orange LED lit up. OCCUPIED.
The hatch swung open. Lara was about to climb into the escape pod when the robot zapped her.
02:50
A blast of electrified air hit Lara. It was like getting punched in the back. She tumbled forwards into the claustrophobic escape pod, her head colliding with the cushioned seat. The boomerang clattered to the floor. A tingling numbness spread across her spine.
The robot was sprinting towards the pod, empty eyeholes staring. Above Lara was a red button marked LAUNCH. She slapped her hand over it, and the hatch started to move.
Clicking like a giant insect, the robot leapt into the pod—but the hatch slammed closed, crushing its metal legs. The top half of it thrashed around, trying to get free. Lara twisted her face away as its hand whipped through the air, clenching and unclenching.
02:00
‘FASTEN SEATBELT,’ a recorded voice said. ‘FASTEN SEATBELT. FASTEN—’
Lara quickly found the straps and the buckle. As soon as she was belted in, there was a deafening whoosh sound. Lara found herself pressed into her seat as the rocket boosters ignited under the pod, pushing it away from the submarine.
‘POD DETACHED,’ the voice said.
01:45
The robot squirmed, its legs trapped in the door. Lara’s ears popped as the pod hurtled upwards through the ocean. She reached down, trying to grab the fallen boomerang. She didn’t want the robot to zap her again. But when she got a grip on it, she accidentally touched a button. There was a ZZROP sound, and suddenly the boomerang wasn’t there anymore. Had it slipped out of her hand?
The pod felt like it was shaking itself to pieces. Suddenly it burst out of the ocean . . .
And kept shooting upwards into the sky.
It was like a rollercoaster. Lara could barely move. Her brain was vibrating like jelly in her skull. She thought she might be sick.
Rip! The robot tore itself in half at the waist, leaving what remained of its legs jammed in the hatch. Its torso scrambled towards Lara. She screamed—
Then the pod disintegrated. The walls exploded outwards and the floor disappeared beneath her feet. Suddenly Lara’s seat was hanging in the sky a hundred metres above the ocean. She could see the Vanguard floating below. She could even see land on the distant horizon. The wind blasted Lara’s face.
00:05
The seat began to fall. So did the robot, twisting wildly in the air. Then there was a tremendous thump, and a parachute snapped into shape above her. The seat suddenly stopped falling.
00:00
The robot didn’t. It plummeted into the void, arms churning in the air. Lara watched it get smaller and smaller until it hit the ocean far below, and sank.
20:00
Screech! The car boot shook, waking Oscar up. He banged his forehead on the inside of the lid and collapsed back into the darkness, rubbing his face. What was that?
He stayed still and held his breath. Long enough to get dizzy in the suffocating darkness. At first he could only hear the faint roar of the ocean and the rumbling of the turbines. Then somebody screamed. Someone else joined them. Soon there was a chorus of panicked shouts.
Oscar hid his abuela’s journal under the pile of blankets and pulled the emergency release hatch. The boot creaked open. He recoiled—he hadn’t seen sunshine in eight days. Even through the canvas canopy which protected the cars from hail, the sun was blinding.
19:30
Blinking and squinting, he clambered out of the boot and looked around. Just rows and rows of empty cars. A big ute had slid sideways somehow and crashed into the little two-door sedan Oscar had been hiding in. No-one was up here. The yelling must be coming from below decks, or up the other end of the ship.
Oscar knew his way around. He had snuck out every night to unfold his legs and go to the bathroom. From here he could see the lift to the cargo hold and the fence which separated the car-transport section from the observation deck.
Oscar found himself leaning against the car. The deck was tilting. That was why the other ute had come loose from its moorings.
He walked down the slope to the safety railing, peered over the edge, and gasped. The side of the ship had been ripped open somehow. Water was flowing in.
18:45
Oscar’s eyes grew wider and wider. This was bad. He couldn’t keep hiding in the boot of a car if the ship was sinking. But nor could he get on a lifeboat. His face was on wanted posters all over Verde. Someone would recognise him.
18:35
On the other side of the fence, two men were peering over the safety rail, gawking at the damage. They looked like twins in their matching Hawaiian shirts, khaki pants and sunglasses. Binoculars dangled around their necks. They looked like tourists, which was weird. There were some passengers on this cargo ship, but none of them were on holiday—they just needed a cheap way to cross the Pacific.
So these men probably weren’t really tourists. Oscar’s skin crawled. Cops. He turned away and started walking back towards the cars, as casually as possible.
Too late.
18:00
‘Is that him?’ a voice said urgently.
‘Hey! Chico!’ another voice shouted.
Oscar kept walking as though he hadn’t heard. His heartbeat was getting louder.
‘Get that gate open,’ one of the men said. ‘Quick!’
Oscar snatched a glance back. The two men were running along the fence towards the gate. One of them had a ring of keys in his hand.
17:40
With growing panic, Oscar scanned his surroundings for somewhere to hide. The bathroom was too obvious. They were sure to check. The stairwell down to the cargo bay was too close to the gate. They’d grab him before he reached it.
He couldn’t go back to the sedan. If they saw him climb into the boot, they would get him and the journal. Oscar couldn’t let that happen. Not when he was so close to home.
The only other option was the lift down to the cargo bay. It was far enough away from the gate that they might not see him go in. Oscar started running.
‘Kid!’ one of the cops called. ‘We just want to talk to you.’
More cars had come loose from their moorings. They slid across the tilted deck, crashing into other vehicles and sending them spinning free. Oscar dashed through the shifting maze, darting between moving vehicles and leaping over bonnets. A hatchback screeched towards a sports car, nearly pinning Oscar’s leg, but he slipped out of the way just in time.
17:05
He reached the lift and stabbed the button. A creaking, groaning sound came from behind the lift doors. It sounded like the lift was stuck, maybe because the ship was at an angle.
He pushed the button over and over, frantic. The grinding continued behind the doors.
The gate clattered. Oscar turned and saw the two men sprinting towards him. All the cars were clustered at the lower side of the deck now, leaving a clear path. The men would be on him in seconds.
He pushed his fingertips into the gap between the lift doors and pulled. It took all his strength, but he managed to widen the gap enough to get his whole hand in. The doors gave up and slid all the way open, revealing the blackness of the lift shaft.
16:55
Oscar leaned forwards, peering down into the gloom. He could see the roof of the lift, stuck two floors below.
One of the men had nearly reached him. ‘Grab him, grab him!’ the other one yelled.
Oscar swallowed. Then he jumped through the opening.
The lift doors closed behind him as he fell, plunging the shaft into darkness. Oscar tried to grab the cables, but the friction burned his palms. Because of the ship’s tilt, he hit the wall halfway down, and slid the rest of the way.
16:45
Finally he crash-landed on the roof of the lift. The impact bruised his feet, knees and hands. But he didn’t think anything was broken.
No time to waste
. He could hear the two men fighting with the door above, trying to get it open again. Oscar felt around the greasy steel beneath his feet, trying to find a way into the lift.
16:00
Soon he discovered a trapdoor. He slid the bolt aside, lifted the lid and dropped into the lift with a dull thunk. It was a dirty industrial box, nothing like the carpeted and gold-trimmed lifts of the Verdan hotel he’d stayed in. His parents had spared no expense on his research trip. They had been thrilled that he was taking an interest in his family history. They would have been less thrilled if they’d known he was planning to steal a book from the vice-president’s personal library.
There were two sets of doors this time. Oscar couldn’t get them open with his hands. He wrenched a fire axe off the wall, wedged the blade between the doors and twisted them apart.
15:05
Finally he was out. He left the axe in the lift and let the doors close behind him as he walked into the darkness of the cargo hold.
There was enough reflected daylight to see hundreds of shipping containers, stacked all the way to the girder-lined ceiling. Too many for the bad guys to search. If one was unlocked, he could hide in it until they went away.
14:30
Oscar rounded a corner and stopped dead when he saw the gash in the side of the ship. The ocean was lapping at the floor of the cargo hold. One container had already fallen into the water, and others looked ready to follow. Oscar shivered as he imagined being trapped inside a sinking container. He would have to find one which was as far away from the hole as possible, and hope the whole ship didn’t go down while he was inside.
He moved between the stacks, passing abandoned forklifts and pallet-loaders. All the containers he’d seen so far were padlocked shut.
13:25
In the darkest corner, he saw something unusual. One of the biggest shipping containers lay on its side. The roof had been torn open. But the container was nowhere near the hole in the hull, so Oscar couldn’t work out what had caused the damage.
He walked closer. It looked like the damaged container had been used to transport pet food—thousands of dog biscuits had spilled out onto the floor of the cargo bay. The smell was overpowering. Through the shredded roof, Oscar could also see giant plastic water bottles, and what looked like a broken sun lamp.