Day of the Assassins

by Johnny O'Brien

  “Well, it will only work when the Taurus is at the right energy state, and also when there is a strong enough signal.”

  “What? Signal? Like a real mobile phone? Come on, sir, you’re winding us up.” Angus laughed. This couldn’t be serious.

  But Pendelshape pressed on. “It’s a bit more complicated, but you’re more or less right – look – that bar, there at the side,” he held up the device so the boys could see and pointed to one corner of the display on the time phone. “It’s greyed out at the moment, but when it turns yellow, you can exchange signals with the Taurus, text messages if you like: it means the Taurus here knows where you are… and it means you can time travel. When it’s off, you can’t do any of those things.”

  “Wow!” Angus exclaimed.

  “It’s off at the moment?” Jack asked.

  “Of course.”

  “But…”

  “This is all completely irrelevant. I’m afraid that none of it can be used… great tragedy.”

  “Why not?” asked Jack.

  “Not allowed. It’s known as ‘The VIGIL Imperative.’” Pendelshape sighed. “Rules, gentlemen, rules… which we must follow on pain of death. Literally.”

  Pendelshape sat back and clasped his hands behind his head while he continued his extraordinary story. “About fifteen years ago, a small group of physicists, associated with the nuclear research facility at CERN, near Geneva, conducted the first practical experiments in time travel. At first, very simple non-organic structures were transported backwards and forwards through space and time. Then, we started to experiment with more complex structures. We then moved on to the first organic material, then living creatures… and, finally, a human being. Up to this point the level of excitement among the group was incredible, as you can imagine. But then, one of the leaders of the group, Counsellor Inchquin, started to think seriously about the power of what they had created. Here was a technology that had the potential to change the past, and thereby change the future. In the wrong hands, or, even in the right hands, this could be catastrophic.” He paused. “Think about it.”

  “You’re right, you could go back and steal some money, no one would know…” Angus said, intrigued.

  “Of course. But I’m afraid that’s the least of it. Think about the pivotal moments of history, some of which have rested on small, even chance, events that have had huge consequences. These are the ‘what ifs’ of our history.” Pendelshape’s eyes opened wide in enthusiasm. “Think about it: what if Hitler had been killed in the First World War and had not become the leader of Germany? What if Gavrilo Princip had not assassinated Archduke Ferdinand? The list is of course endless – and fascinating. The consequences for us and for future generations, however, are difficult to comprehend.”

  Jack spoke slowly, trying to understand what he was hearing, “So you’re saying that these scientists created this thing… the power to time travel… but decided not to use it?”

  Pendelshape replied sadly, “It was debated. Despite the computer simulations that we could create to model the consequences of any changes made in history, most felt that it was too risky and that no one should be given the chance to exercise such power. Counsellor Inchquin felt this most strongly and led the group with this point of view.”

  “Who won the argument?” Angus asked, engrossed.

  “Who do you think?” Pendelshape said. “In the end it was decided that, although it was not possible to ‘un-invent’ the technology, it was possible to control it. VIGIL was formed and everyone agreed to abide by a strict set of rules. A code of conduct if you like. It came to be known as ‘The VIGIL Imperative’. All those in the know were forced to abide by it. The early Taurus experimental facility was closed down and, outside of a select group, it was suggested that the project had been an abject failure.”

  Jack looked around, “What’s this place then?”

  “It’s a replica Taurus made using components from the original machine. Although you don’t know it, yours is a rather special school: it secretly houses a working Taurus. All members of VIGIL have moved on to rather mundane jobs. I, for example, am now your history teacher. Rather appropriate don’t you think? And our Rector, himself a brilliant scientist, finds himself here as head teacher – during term time at least. But in fact he has a much weightier responsibility: to keep this facility permanently mothballed and secret, yet in working order so that the technology is preserved.”

  “Why not just destroy it altogether?”

  “That was certainly an option – but in the end the people who had worked so hard could not quite bring themselves to go that far. It was also anticipated that in the future, there might possibly be scenarios where it could be necessary to use Taurus. We might not even know now what these scenarios could be, but science moves very fast. It seemed sensible at least to retain the option to use it. But that’s not all…”

  “There’s more?”

  “Yes. There was also a small group with a different point of view to Inchquin and the others. They were led by the Benefactor and they believed that the technology could and should be used as a force for good.” Pendelshape paused for a moment and eyed Jack with an odd, enquiring look. He seemed to be thinking about something and lost concentration for a moment.

  “Benefactor – that was the name in your email,” Jack said.

  “Yes, Jack… and…” but before Pendelshape could continue, Angus butted in.

  “OK, hold it right there, sir… I’m not sure what this place is, but I have to tell you I’m finding it difficult to believe all this…” he glanced at Jack. “Very difficult – it’s a big joke – right?”

  Pendelshape’s eyes flashed in frustration. “Wrong. I know, Angus, it’s a lot to take in. But I must ask you to try. It is quite important… for us all. As you are about to find out. However, I agree it is reasonable to ask for some proof…” He looked round the room, then stood up and walked over to one of the shelves and started leafing through a thin folder.

  “Here. Maybe this will do it.”

  Pendelshape produced a small photograph and handed it to them.

  “So, Jack, remember our lessons on the First World War, the assassination in Sarajevo, the Black Hand… Gavrilo Princip… and all that…?” He looked down at the photograph knowingly, “Well…?”

  Jack suddenly realised what he was looking at. His heart jolted. It couldn’t be. But the image was unmistakable.

  It was an old black-and-white photo of four young men – grim faced and serious. One of them was the assassin from Sarajevo that Jack had seen in one of the early levels of Point-of-Departure – Gavrilo Princip. But on the other side of the photograph, to the far left, was a fifth man. Jack narrowed his eyes to be certain… he looked a little younger, but there was no mistaking him. The man staring out from the photograph was Dr Pendelshape.

  Jack slowly raised his eyes to Pendelshape who smiled knowingly at him.

  “So you see, boys, this photo was taken in Belgrade in the Balkans… in 1914. And no, it’s not a fake or a digital enhancement. It’s real. There’s me on the left. On the right is Gavrilo Princip, the man who shot Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo and triggered the First World War. To the left of Princip are two of the other assassins – Grabež and Čabrinović.”

  “And what about him?” Angus pointed to the fourth man standing next to Pendelshape.

  “Dani Matronovic. Lesser known – was killed before the assassination. History does not relate what happened to him. His sister took the photo,” his eyes glossed over for a moment. “Pretty girl… Anna.”

  Pendelshape flipped over the photo. “Their names are on the back – look.”

  Sure enough on the back of the photo, in Pendelshape’s distinctive scrawl, were scribbled the words – ‘Belgrade, Serbia, 1914’, followed by the names: ‘Princip, Grabez, Cabrinovic, Matronovic.’

  Angus just couldn’t believe it, “So you’ve gone back in time using that… thing?” He looked over at the Taurus
brooding silently behind the green glass of the blast screen.

  “Yes, Angus. Even though the purpose of VIGIL is to preserve the technology – and not to use it – everything still had to be fully tested. No point in deciding to keep the technology – unless you know it will work.”

  “But why did you go back then, you know, to 1914?” Jack asked.

  Pendelshape shrugged, “It was a pivotal point in history.”

  “Why you? Why did they choose you?”

  “I’m the historian, anyway, I thought it would be interesting…” Pendelshape’s eyes glazed over as he added, dreamily, “and I was right. It was incredible, to see even a tiny piece of what you had learned from a textbook, to see it, to smell it…” He smiled. “Keep the photo if you like.”

  Jack took it gingerly, as if handling a precious jewel, and stared at it silently for a moment longer, before putting it carefully in his bag.

  *

  Pendelshape pressed on more quickly now, trying to bypass interruptions from his bewildered pupils. He revealed more about VIGIL. He explained how the idea of hiding the Taurus in a school had worked well – the initial refurbishment of the school had been a good front for the early building work, with holiday periods providing quiet time for research and maintenance, and, of course, it was easy to maintain a staff of teachers, who were, in reality, scientists from the original Taurus team. It had taken them some time to identify an appropriate home for the Taurus – until they had finally found the quiet and secluded site near the hamlet of Soonhope in the upper Tweed Valley. The local community had been grateful for the sudden injection of cash that the endowment had provided and the creation of a new school on a rundown site. After a while, an increasing number of local pupils began to attend, assisted by generous subsidies. Pupil numbers had been kept low, ostensibly to preserve academic standards, but in reality, to free up faculty time for more important matters.

  As Pendelshape talked, Jack saw the expression on Angus’s face gradually change. His mouth was morphing into that warped, toothy grin that meant only one thing. Trouble. Sure enough, as Pendelshape paused for breath, Angus seized his chance.

  “So, sir… er, it all sounds great, but are you going to show us how it really works?”

  To Jack’s utter amazement Pendelshape replied, “Yes, Angus, in fact I am.”

  Jack nearly fell off his chair. Pendelshape looked at his watch nervously. “We’ve spent far too much time talking already. The truth is that unforeseen circumstances have arisen. This is why I have brought you here. I will explain why in a minute. I and, er, well, we have a kind of… mission to complete. But first, I would like you both to understand how it all works…” he smiled, “you know, just in case…”

  *

  A crack in the floor stretched from one side of the library to the other. A green glass barrier rose up from it, extending to the ceiling. They stood in front of it.

  “This is the blast screen. Press this…” Pendelshape clicked the device in his hand, “and down it comes.” Jack and Angus jumped back as, with alarming speed, the blast screen descended into the narrow aperture in the floor and the whole Taurus structure was revealed to them in its full glory.

  “Awesome,” Angus whispered reverentially.

  “Be careful. You don’t want to be standing over that blast screen when it goes up again. It could give you a nasty bruise in your nether regions.”

  Pendelshape moved over to one of the control panels and began typing at a keyboard. Soon they heard a slight rising hum. Pendelshape explained the basics of how the machine was operated. It was surprisingly simple. He showed them how you synchronised the time phone with the Taurus console by placing it in a special recessed pod. He showed them how you entered the Taurus through the surrounding girders from the gantry, and how you then positioned yourself on the steel platform by placing your feet between the etchings drawn into the metal. He reminded them of the limitations of the Taurus and its umbilical linkage to the time phone.

  “As you said Angus, its a bit like a mobile phone – you can only use the time phone when you have a signal. Remember that bar?” he indicated the little greyed-out display on the time phone. “When it’s yellow – you’re good to go – you can communicate, we know where you are and the Taurus can send you back and forth through time. When there’s no signal, you’re stuck – although the phone’s energy source will continue to tell you where and when you are.”

  “And if you lose the phone?” Angus asked.

  Pendelshape looked back at Angus with steel in his eyes, “Lose that time phone, Mr Jud, and you’re not only in history… you are history. No way back.”

  Jack was engrossed. “Can you go anywhere?”

  “There are constraints. The variability of the time signals through the space-time continuum is a major one. It’s like shifting sands. Periods of time open up and then close. It’s not as if all periods of time and all locations are accessible all the time. Then there’s ‘deep time’.”

  “Deep time?”

  “A specific constraint that exists along the lines I just mentioned. It seems that the Taurus is only effective at transportation from when you depart to more than about thirty years or so in the past. We call it ‘deep time’. Anything sooner is a sort of no-go zone. This also means you can’t travel back from the past to just before you left.” Pendelshape’s brow furrowed, “And there’s one more thing. We call it the ‘Armageddon Scenario’.” Pendelshape said the words quickly – as if he was hoping the boys might not even notice he had said them.

  “Well that sounds pretty harmless,” Angus said.

  Jack frowned, “What is it?”

  Pendelshape shrugged his shoulders nonchalantly, “Another part of time theory. It postulates that if you revisit the same point of spacetime more than once, you dramatically increase the risk of a continuum meltdown. At worst, the possible destruction of the universe – but in reality, probably not as bad at that – probably only the destruction of some bit of it.”

  “Oh – that’s OK then. Presumably it’s the bit we’re in?” Angus said.

  “Yes. Think of a bit of tissue paper. It’s like putting holes in it with your finger. These are like visits to the past using Taurus to particular points in time. The tissue will hold together for a while but too many holes and the whole lot will disintegrate. So best not to risk repeat trips in and around the same point. The precise parameters of this constraint are not known – and of course have not been tested.”

  Suddenly the pitch of the humming from the control room rose an octave. A number of lights around the console flashed on.

  Pendelshape smiled in satisfaction. “We’re in business! Right, gentlemen, before we go any further, I have to explain to you what we must do next and why we have decided to show you all this. It’s not a step we have taken lightly. You’re going to have to trust me one more time. I assure you, it is in all of our interests.”

  The boys glanced at each other nervously.

  Pendelshape marched over to the table and was joined by Angus, who wandered backwards slowly, still staring up, mesmerised by the Taurus and its surrounding apparatus of cables and pipes. Jack waited by the quietly humming machine, still trying to absorb everything that Pendelshape had said.

  “Jack, please, if you would come back over here, quickly…” Pendelshape gestured impatiently for him to move away from the structure. He took a deep breath, “The Taurus is already set so that we can travel back in time to somewhere I know and where we will be safe, before being picked up. The truth is…”

  But he did not finish his sentence.

  The heavy door at the far end of the control room swung open and through it marched Tony and Gordon. Over their usual uniforms, each was wearing an army flak jacket. From his position next to the Taurus, Jack could just make out some small silver lettering on each of the jackets. The lettering read: VIGIL Response.

  Behind Tony and Gordon were two other men – Mr Belstaff and Mr Johnstone – th
e games teachers. They wore the same get-up as the two janitors and moved with the same imposing power. But what alarmed Jack most was that, quite extraordinarily, all the men were… armed. If he had been an expert on military matters, he might have recognised the weapons that they carried to be Corner Shot APRs – one of the most advanced automatic weapons in the world. With their laser sights, video screens and swivelling gun-mounts, the machine pistols also had a special feature – they could shoot round corners. What on earth they were doing in the hands of the school janitors and the games teachers, Jack had no idea.

  The four men were followed by a tall slim figure with a bald head, poorly disguised with thinning wisps of silver hair. With his trademark black gown flowing from a pair of hunched shoulders he looked a bit like a carrion crow. Jack recognised him immediately. It was the school’s head: the Rector.

  He advanced towards Pendelshape and Angus, his face purple with rage.

  Pendelshape jumped to his feet. He looked terrified, “John… I’m sorry… I…”

  But the Rector shouted back, “Silence!”

  Pendelshape sank to his knees; he seemed to be… begging.

  “Please! I didn’t mean…”

  The Rector loomed over Pendelshape, “You idiot! I always had a sneaking suspicion about you. Didn’t you think we’d find out?”

  Pendelshape really was begging now, “Please, please. John… I didn’t…”

  “I should have guessed you might betray us. You and the Benefactor. A bad combination of hopeless romantic and dangerous lunatic…”

  “I’m sorry…”

  “MacFarlane. Deal with him.”

  From his position only five metres away Jack could not believe what he saw next. Gordon stepped forward. He had a sinister grin on his face – as if he was actually enjoying himself. He withdrew a large knife from a scabbard on his black belt. As he did so, he spun the serrated blade in one hand like a circus knife thrower. Suddenly Jack realised that he and Angus had been wrong. Tony and Gordon were not ex-traffic wardens. The theory that they’d been in the SAS was, in fact, the correct one.