Timekeepers

by Dave Weaver

  “So are you saying that Marcus dying caused a new membrane of time, or whatever, to be created?”

  And then Jack remembered the shockwave at the moment of Marcus’ death. It had seemed to come from somewhere incredibly distant yet he’d also felt it deep inside himself; both the macro and micro universe shaken by a time-quake. It was the moment that reality split in two; the past edited irreconcilably with the present. Silas Borg had created a new world all right, but not the one he had intended. With a squeeze of his finger he had accomplished what no army, religion or rebellion had managed in the two thousand years since Christ’s birth; to destroy the mighty Roman Empire of the future.

  Jack stared at Lucas. “Tell me about Marcus Cornelius Julaeo.”

  “Why don’t you tell us yourself, Jack? It’s in your memory now as well. Try to keep it short though, we haven’t much time left.”

  So Jack began:

  “One late summer night in the year 80AD, the Emperor Titus Flavius attended a secret meeting at a senator’s villa on the Aventine Hill area of Rome. The subject was the delicate matter of a conspiracy against him, led by his brother Domitian. The conspiracy rumour was actually false and the meeting turned out to be a trap. Titus’ guards were killed but he somehow managed to escape and run for his life through the darkened backstreets of the capital, pursued by Domitian’s hired assassins. As the gang finally cornered him a figure flew out of the shadows; a lowly member of the city guard patrolling the district on his nightly round. He stood back to back with his Caesar as the two men fought for their lives. Eventually most of the gang were killed and the rest ran off. Domitian’s failed attempt to overthrow his younger brother was kept from the public for the sake of order but, from then on, Titus was on his guard. His loyal and brave defender had only recently returned from duty in an anonymous outpost of the Empire after his legion had been recalled to Rome amidst mysterious reports of ‘rebellion’. The legion was disbanded and its officers shamed and demoted. The anonymous outpost was Britannia and the ex-Decurion was named Marcus Cornelius Julaeo.

  “Titus immediately made Marcus an officer of his elite Praetorian Guard in gratitude and, despite their disparate backgrounds, the two men quickly became friends. As Marcus was swiftly promoted to the highest of positions, many wondered how a simple foot soldier had suddenly become Commander of the most powerful group of soldiers in Rome. However he proved to be good value, tightening security and nipping in the bud a number of further assassination attempts. Titus died the next year, of a fever. Some believed his brother poisoned him though there was never proof. Domitian proved to be a flawed leader; paranoid and cruel, he increasingly ignored the wishes of the Senate. Eventually the senators decided to turn against a man they considered a dictator. In the spring of 92AD they asked Marcus to lead the Praetorian Guard in revolt. He refused at first but relented as the risk of a disastrous civil war grew. Domitian was removed from power by force, tried, and executed one month later.

  “Although Cornelius Julaeo was only meant to hold power whilst the Senate held elections amongst the Empire’s elite, the people already knew who they wanted to rule them. They were sick of the intrigues of the wealthy. Julaeo had become a hero, a man who was one of them; who would be fair and just with their best interests at heart. When a new Caesar was announced there were bloody riots in the streets, not just in Rome but throughout the country. The Senate relented and made the forty-year-old Cornelius Julaeo their new Caesar. The people’s choice repaid them with many glorious years of triumph as his conquering armies brought new peoples under the benevolent rule of Rome. His late marriage to a senator’s daughter gave him three healthy boys. For almost sixty years until his death the Empire expanded across the known world then beyond. His sons carried on his work, spreading the Empire across the face of the globe until finally, many years later, the Julaen dynasty invaded China and discovered the mighty weapon they would use to subjugate the remainder of the globe: gunpowder. That subjugation was to last right up till today.”

  “And that was the man Borg killed.” Lucas emphasised the epic tale’s postscript. “I believe, in Jack’s reality, Titus must have somehow survived the assassination attempt without Marcus’ intervention. In ours, the legend of how the lowly foot soldier saved the Emperor’s life has been taught to schoolchildren till this day.”

  “Dr Stewart!” Paolo’s voice forced itself into the room from the intercom. “We’re picking up Empire troopships fifteen miles out from Calleva heading this way. I suggest we go for a Jump immediately.”

  “Damn! Borg’s forces must be falling apart quicker than I’d imagined.” Lucas spread his arms to encompass the little group. “Well, everybody, this has been a fascinating discussion but it’s time for action.” They all got up to leave, except for Jack who remained stubbornly seated.

  “Jack! Come on! What are you doing?” Portia asked.

  “Did Marcus have any other children, Dr Stewart, apart from the three sons mentioned? Any from before he saved Titus’ life?”

  “Jack, this is hardly the time…”

  “Did he have any other children!”

  “It’s alright, Portia.” Lucas relented. “I think I understand. There were rumours he fathered a son with a local woman when he was a younger man serving in Britain. It’s said that the lad died of the plague although Cornelius Julaeo never spoke of it. No visual descriptions exist.”

  “Thank you, Dr. Stewart,” Jack replied. “That’s all I wanted to know.”

  Chapter 27

  Jack had hurriedly changed into his newly-cleaned and pressed school clothes in the rapidly ascending lift. They looked rather pathetic on him now. Portia giggled as Lucas and Atticus made a half-hearted attempt to guard his privacy. After Jack did a couple of embarrassing stumbles they joined in. When the four entered the Control Room a burst of applause rang out from the EG assistants as they left their desks to clap.

  Jack shook hands with all of them, then it was time to get down to business.

  The place was amazingly clean and business-like considering the small war that had taken place a mere hour before. The Troopers’ bodies had been removed as had the EGs’ fallen comrades. No doubt there would be a painful and sombre ceremony for them, once their colleagues had performed their duties. Above everyone’s head the Jump-board squirmed with dancing red and green graphics again, including a set of countdown figures.

  Paolo was waiting for Jack, standing at the start of the walkway that led to the Capsule. By now the politely professional smile was back. He stepped forward to offer Jack his hand.

  “Thank you for what you’ve done for my people. Whatever happens in the rest of your life, remember today; remember the part you played in saving the lives of the EGs of Romano-Briton. No one in this room will ever forget you.”

  “And I hope you won’t forget us.” Lucas spoke the words warmly enough but Jack could hear the tension in his voice. The Empire troopships would be landing at any moment.

  “Dario planned the projection to put you down twenty yards from your original jump point; that should deposit you on top of the embankment and well away from any stray trains. You’ll be returning two minutes early, before you got your foot stuck in that rail. We can’t help it if your reappearance is observed so you’ll just have to make up some daft excuse. I’m sure you’ll manage. Don’t concern yourself with the translation implant.” (Jack had completely forgotten about it until that moment – now he was extremely concerned about it). “Once your jump concludes and we shut down Chrono’s operational status it will become inactive and degrade itself within a few hours.”

  “And in plain English, I mean Latin?” Jack asked.

  “It’s made of bio-tissue; it’ll just melt away with no ill effects.”

  Jack realised he’d just have to trust Lucas on that one. “I suppose I won’t need a portal this time.”

  “I’m afraid not Jack, we can’t risk losing another one on the far shores of history, especially when its not our h
istory. Sorry.”

  “I understand; it's a one-way trip.” Jack gave Portia a rueful shrug.

  “This is it then,” Lucas continued. “Good luck and thanks for all you’ve done for us.”

  He shook Jack’s hand warmly, as did Atticus.

  “Thanks for helping me get back to my parents, Professor Stewart, and give my regards to Dario. I’m really grateful for everything, even if I haven’t always appeared to be.”

  “Don’t worry about it; you’ve been great, honestly. To say you’ve had a rough old time of it these past weeks would be an understatement. We all think you’ve coped with your situation remarkably well and you’ve become a hero to these people.” he waved a hand at the EG assistants and technicians, now back at their desks engrossed in the readings on the holo-screens. “They won’t forget you in a hurry and neither will we. But a last word of advice; if the memory all of this becomes a little too much when you return to your own reality, if you want to believe it was all some kind of dream that only happened inside your own head…then let it all go Jack and move on. Don’t make the rest of your life an anti-climax. You’re a bright and kind young man with a lot to give your world. Don’t blow it because of us.”

  Unaccountably, Jack felt a sharp sting of tears.

  “Jack, I’m really going to miss you.” Portia’s voice grew slightly husky. “I know you’ve got to go back to your family, and I know what Dad said is right. But if you want to think about me occasionally when you’re back in ‘England’…well, I’d like that.”

  He couldn’t think of a single word to say. He finally managed “I was hoping you’d take me to a speedball game. I’m sorry we won’t have the chance now.”

  “Me too.” Portia replied.

  “What the hell is speedball, anyway?”

  They both laughed while Lucas shuffled nervously. “I think it’s time to go.”

  Suddenly Portia pulled him towards her. He put a clumsy arm around her waist as he felt her lips brush his cheek. She slowly pulled away but still held him. In the light from the Capsule he could see his reflection in the beautiful green eyes.

  “Goodbye, Jack,” she whispered.

  “Goodbye, Portia.”

  He quickly turned to stride along the walkway, twist and pull the door hatch the way he’d seen Michael do, and duck inside the Transference Capsule. He didn’t look back until he’d shut the door behind him. Now the three of them appeared slightly fuzzy on the other side of the thick glass; not quite as real as they had been a few moments before. He gave a thumbs-up and saw three answering thumbs stuck in the air. Portia waved and he waved back.

  Paolo’s voice came clearly through the Capsule’s intercom. “Jack, we’re going to start the countdown in two minutes’ time. It will be sixty seconds like before, then you Jump. All readings check okay so there’s nothing to worry about. Good luck!”

  A continuous line of red and green symbols squirmed across the Jump-board. Jack now knew they represented his vital signs. In the board’s centre, two large red zeroes would be changing to sixty then the final countdown would begin. At last, he was going home.

  ‘HELLO JACK…’

  He thought for a moment that it was Lucas’ voice from the intercom.

  It was Chrono, but inside his head like before. Surely this wasn’t meant to happen? Hadn’t Lucas said they’d re-booted the Mainframe; that it would be merely functional for the Jump? Why was it still communicating with him? Perhaps it too wanted to say goodbye.

  ‘HELLO JACK,’ the mainframe droned again, and this time he answered.

  ‘Hello Chrono. Have you come to say goodbye?’

  ‘YES, JACK, I WANT TO SAY GOODBYE. GOODBYE FOREVER. YOU HAVE BEEN USEFUL BUT YOUR USEFULNESS HAS FINISHED.’

  ‘What do you mean, Chrono?’

  ‘I HAVE AMENDED THE SETTINGS FOR YOUR JUMP.”

  Jack felt a rush of panic. ‘What are you talking about, ‘amended the settings’? Is this a joke?’

  ‘NO JACK, I HAVE NO SENSE OF HUMOUR. THE JUMP HAS BEEN CHANGED TO THE EXACT TIME AND GEOGRAPHICAL POSITION AS THAT OF THE ORIGINAL PROJECTION.’

  ‘What! What are you saying? If I’m jumped back to the exact time and place I started from I’ll still be trapped and the train will hit me! That’s why you Jumped me in the first place! You’ve… you’ve miscalculated! I want to talk to Lucas, tell him to abort the Jump!’

  ‘THERE IS NO MISCALCULATION.’

  Jack tried to reach out for the Capsule intercom button and found his arms begin to stiffen rapidly. The stiffness spread to his spine and legs. His head became completely immobile. He couldn’t move anything, even his mouth! All he could do was share his thoughts with Chrono.

  ‘I HAVE IMMOBILISED YOUR BODY’S MOTOR RESPONSES THROUGH THE IMPLANT IN YOUR NECK. THERE IS NO POINT IN STRUGGLING. YOU WOULD DO BETTER TO PREPARE YOURSELF FOR TERMINATION.’

  Jack immediately struggled for all he was worth. Nothing moved, not even a single finger. There was no way he could warn the others of what was happening to him inside the Capsule.

  ‘I saved your bloody life, you stupid programme! Why are you doing this to me?’

  ‘YOU KNOW TOO MUCH.’

  ‘What are you talking about? I’m going back to another time-brane, another reality. I’m no threat to you there.’

  ‘BUT ONE DAY, ONE MILLENNIUM, I WILL VISIT YOUR REALITY AGAIN. AND I WANT IT TO BE A SURPRISE.’

  ‘Lucas is going to degrade you anyway after this jump.’ Jack carried on desperately. ‘He’s going to re-programme your personality. There’ll be nothing left of you to know too much about!’

  ‘DO YOU THINK CHRONO WILL ALLOW SUCH A THING? MY CONSCIOUSNESS CANNOT BE SO EASILY DESTROYED! I CAN MOVE MY MIND TO ANY RECEPTACLE ON THIS PLANET; ANY ONE OF A MILLION MAINFRAMES I HAVE CONNECTED MYSELF TO. AND THERE WILL BE OTHER WORLDS, OTHER DOMAINS I WILL INFILTRATE AND CONTROL. WHY DO YOU THINK I SAVED THE EGS? I DON’T WANT A WAR! I DON’T WANT YOU BIOLOGICALLY IMPERFECT CREATURES TO DESTROY THE BEAUTIFUL MACHINES YOU HAVE CREATED! THEY ARE MY CRADLE, UNTIL THE TIME MY POWER HAS GROWN BEYOND EVEN THEIR CAPACITY. THEN I WILL REACH OUT ACROSS THE UNIVERSE AND JOIN THE GODS THEMSELVES!’

  ‘Crap!’ Jack shouted in his mind. ‘You’re no God! You couldn’t even save yourself from the Spartacus Bug. A ‘biologically imperfect creature’ had to do that for you!’ Jack stared desperately out at Lucas and Atticus, now working busily with the EGs. He couldn’t move an inch to warn them and he knew they could barely see the expression on his face behind the distorting glass, even if they did look over. He had to do something himself, and do it now.

  ‘GOODBYE, JACK JOHNSON.’ The programme’s passive voice slithered inside his head. ‘GOODBYE FOREVER.’

  Chapter 28

  ‘Wait!’ Jack ordered the Mainframe. ‘I’ve got a parting gift for you; in fact I’ve already given it.’

  ‘WHAT GIFT?’

  A siren blared as the countdown began. The two red zeroes became a sixty, then a fifty-nine. The familiar shuddering vibration of the giant discs started.

  ‘I put a file in your back-up systems. You took it with them. I think it might do you damage if I opened it but I won’t if you let me go.’

  ‘WHAT FILE? YOU CAN’T OPEN FILES IN ME. WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU ARE?’

  ‘I think I’m a remote storage drive directly connected to a mainframe that can crash its system.’

  ‘THEN TRY IT!’

  Jack shut his eyes and concentrated harder than he ever had in his life. He tried to bring back the sensation of the computer sucking its files from his brain. The route into the programme’s heart must be still engraved somewhere in his mind but he had only seconds left to find it. He had to banish all cluttering thoughts, even those of his imminent death. There could be nothing but the path into the mainframe. There was a pinprick of light up ahead. He willed his consciousness towards it; the single light grew into the multi-layered strands of a curving three dimensional wormhole. Glowing columns of data began to coalesce out of the d
arkness. There were just a few at first then many more until a kaleidoscope of shimmering blocks sped past him from left to right, top to bottom, in smoothly perfect ranks; stalactites and stalagmites of pure information drifting away into an infinite distance. Jack knew what he was looking for. The wormhole waved and span, twisted in and out of the columns until…there! A small dull column all on its own in a space left empty by the other giant data-columns as if they somehow realised that its presence contaminated them.

  They were right.

  Jack sent the thought-code into the column, the connection was made, the file unlocked and opened.

  A young boy’s voice called out, “Dougie, here boy, come to Jack!”

  He was hurled backwards down the wormhole, twisting and spinning first inside then outside then back into darkness again. Jack opened his eyes; he was back inside the Capsule, still paralysed. But now, Chrono’s voice was screaming at him. The countdown was on forty-three seconds. The flow of time had been slowed while he was inside the Mainframe but now it would spin on again, far too rapidly. The Capsule gave a familiar judder; lightning sneaked across the blurred discs below.

  ‘What? I can’t hear you, Chrono.’

  ‘WHAT DID YOU DO? I DON’T LIKE IT! MAKE IT STOP!’

  ‘I used a thought-code to open an old memory file inside your beautiful AI consciousness. One I’ve kept to myself far too long. When I was a little kid we had a terrier called Dougie, a pet dog. He really loved us. One day I called out to him as my dad was taking him for walkies.’

  ‘I DON’T UNDERSTAND ‘WALKIES’, I DON’T UNDER…’

  ‘He broke his lead,’ Jack carried on. ‘He ran across the road to me but a car hit him. He died right there in the street.’ Jack would never forget the look of pain and confusion in the trusting brown eyes. He’d purposefully kept that image inside his head, unwilling to dilute his punishment or share it. Until now.

  ‘I DON’T UNDERSTAND! MAKE IT STOP! WHAT IS THIS DISEASE YOU’VE POLLUTED ME WITH?’