by Alex Scarrow
Some text flickered on to one of the screens.
‘If you get no signal for forty-eight hours, open a window anyway. Just in case, right?’
She hurried back across the floor and stepped into the sphere. Seconds later it collapsed to a pinhead and vanished.
The dark room was still and quiet once more.
Bertie settled back on his haunches. His mind was spinning like a Catherine wheel as he tried to make sense of what he’d seen and just heard.
… The year 1994 …
… How far back in time …
… Five hundred years? A thousand? Two thousand? …
All of a sudden he felt dizzy, light-headed. His mind was spinning, trying to interpret those overheard words into some sort of meaning he could grasp and make a rational deduction from. He thought he had it, thought he understood now what he’d just witnessed; though it was surely an impossible notion.
It seemed these people, these curious tenants, had a device that allowed them to travel backwards and forwards through the passage of time.
Bertie filled his open mouth with the bulbous knuckles of his fist, just in case an involuntary yelp of incredulity escaped his lips.
Chapter 36
1994, the cave, Nicaragua
Eighteen hours after first entering the cave they’d managed to set up the halogen lamps, running from the mini-generator. Which in turn was running on several jerry cans’ worth of diesel that Bob and Becks had been sent to retrieve from the rebels’ camp. The harsh blue light coming from the 500-watt lamps filled the cave with a brutally clinical glare that scared the shadows back into the deepest recesses. Nothing, no forensic detail, no faded scrawl was going to escape their unremitting light.
And through the night they’d searched the cave, every nook and cranny, every fissure leading off into smaller caves and wriggle-spaces so narrow they left behind skid marks of elbow and knee skin on the sharp edges of rock. They came across several clusters of human bones, which seemed to confirm Adam’s assertion that at some point this place had been used as a burial chamber. But, as it happened, there was no more mysterious writing to be found in the cave.
There was just that one small faint patch of glyphs.
Now they were sitting near the mouth of the cave, the generator silent, the lamps off. It was midday and the sky was heavy with tumbling grey clouds that rumbled irritably. They listened to the white-noise hiss of rain spattering against the rock-face outside, the echoing drip of moisture trickling down through the fissured roof above and plopping noisily into shallow pools on the cave’s floor.
A small fire crackled between them, its meagre warmth doing little to lighten the mood.
Maddy turned to look at Billy, standing at the mouth of the cave smoking his pipe and chatting quietly to Bob about something. She’d banned him from smoking that awful thing inside, the stink of his curious brand of tobacco made her want to retch.
‘So it seems this turned out to be a total waste of time.’ Maddy sighed and absently pulled strips of bark off a dried branch. ‘I’m sorry we dragged you away from your college digs, Adam.’
‘I’m not.’ He scratched at his chin. ‘Got me away from those morons I share the place with.’
‘But this has all been for nothing.’ She snapped the brittle stick. ‘I guess I was hoping there’d be something more here; that there’d be something in this cave that would explain everything. Well, at least give us a clue.’
‘Aye, well … it was a long shot, Mads. What’s that saying? A shot to nothing?’
The fire was beginning to wane.
‘Who says we need to know everything, anyway?’ said Sal.
Maddy looked up at her with raised eyebrows that were saying, Seriously?
‘Well, look at it this way, Mads,’ said Liam. ‘We escaped Mr Waldstein and his army. If we’re careful, the chances of him ever finding us again are close as damn to nothing. We have a comfortable enough home in London, we have our time machine and our source of energy … but most of all –’
‘We have our health?’ added Sal.
Liam looked at her. ‘I was just about to say that.’ The pair of them smiled.
‘Well, I’m glad you two are finding it so funny.’
Liam’s face straightened. The swelling from his beating had gone down, but the grazes and cuts across his cheek and temple were dark scabs, almost like pen drawings against his pale skin. With his tongue he probed the gap to the side of his mouth where the tooth had been knocked out and winced as he touched the sensitive gum.
‘Hey, stop fiddling with it, Liam, you’ll get an abscess,’ said Maddy.
The flames had quietened down to an occasional flickering tongue emerging from a bed of glowing charcoal.
‘I am serious, though,’ said Sal. ‘Why do we need to know what that message was? For all we know, it might have been a warning to us about that attack by those support units. But we survived. We’re OK. We could just …’
‘Just what, Sal?’
She shook her head and shut up, turned her gaze back to the fire.
‘Go on, Sal. Just what?’
‘It’s pointless saying anything. You just do what you want to do anyway.’
Maddy looked hurt. ‘No, I don’t. We’re a team, remember?’
‘Yeah, right.’ Sal laughed bitterly. ‘A team.’
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘You kept secrets from me and Liam. You decide stuff on your own without consulting us.’ She glanced at Adam. ‘And you choose who we let in on our group, and me and Liam just have to go along with it all. We’re not a team.’
‘That’s unfair!’
‘Is it?’
‘Hey!’ Liam cut in. ‘Ladies! Ladies!’
They both ignored him. ‘I don’t think we should’ve gone against Waldstein,’ said Sal.
‘I didn’t go against him!’ replied Maddy. ‘I merely asked him about Pandora.’
‘You didn’t just ask. You said we were no longer lifting a finger to save history until he told us everything.’ Sal looked up at Maddy. ‘You challenged him directly.’
‘That’s not true. I just want to know why we should deliberately steer mankind towards oblivion when we have the means in our hands to avoid that! Surely … just to know why? That’s not too much to ask, is it?’
‘The way I see it,’ Liam shrugged, ‘is we’re free to do what we want … go where we want. So why worry? Why care? Why not do our own thing?’
Both girls turned to look at him. He wasn’t helping. They sat in silence for a while. The rumble of thunder, the steady hiss of rain and drip-drip-dripping filled the uncomfortable silence.
‘History still has to go the right way,’ said Sal eventually.
‘That’s something I’m still trying to get my head round,’ said Adam. ‘You say it all ends up horrifically badly in 2070?’
‘It does,’ said Rashim.
‘… and yet your boss, Mr Waldstein, sets up the three of you in the time-travelling business to ensure just that happens. Surely he’d want something different?’
‘We’ve talked this over so many times between the three of us, Adam.’ Maddy shot a glance towards the mouth of the cave before continuing. Billy was still puffing away and gazing out across the mist-shrouded jungle at the swirling layers of low cloud. She decided this was a conversation that was digging deeper than she wanted. In truth, even Adam shouldn’t be hearing this. ‘I don’t know why, is the answer. Maybe he’s mad? The only person here who even knows what he looks like is Rashim. Right?’
Rashim nodded. ‘Everyone in my time knows … knew … about him. He was as famous as the theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking was in his time.’ Rashim stared at the glowing embers of the fire. ‘But he was a recluse. Very secretive. He vanished from the public eye during the last ten years of his life.’
‘But was he mad? Was he the kind of nut that would deliberately want to wipe out mankind?’
‘He never seeme
d that way to me. Not insane. He seemed passionate about fighting for our future. I used to listen to his speeches as a boy. I had a digi-playlist on my Palm-Boy of all his famous speeches. The one I listened to the most was his Montreal one: the last ever TED talk. He warned us of tough times ahead. Disastrously tough times ahead. But he insisted, even back then, that using time travel to sidestep these problems would absolutely be the end for us all.’ Rashim shook his head slowly. ‘I do not think he was mad. I know he was called many things – a bigot, a bully, a racist, a misogynist –’
Liam opened his mouth. ‘Mis–?’
‘Not keen on women,’ replied Maddy.
‘He used a scientist’s language,’ continued Rashim. ‘Direct, insensitive and brutally honest. Most people who labelled him with these terms heard only the language, the words he used … but did not listen to the message.’
‘And what was his message?’ asked Adam.
Rashim shrugged. ‘I think his message was this – it is in our nature to destroy ourselves, then rebuild. Destruction is a natural part of our life-cycle.’
‘For the son to become a man, the father must die,’ uttered Liam. ‘Just something I read somewhere.’
‘And quite apt,’ added Rashim. ‘I believe Waldstein was saying that mankind inevitably needs a purge, then a rebirth. That such a thing is unavoidable. It is the natural order. Not to be cheated … or dodged by some sleight of hand, by some trick of technology.’
‘I can see why he wasn’t that popular,’ said Adam.
‘Truth-sayers never are. They are often the pariahs of their time.’
Maddy hugged her legs. The fire had died down and she was beginning to feel chilly. ‘Look, I don’t know what to do, guys. Whether we should just cut and run and do our own thing. Whether we should carry on with Waldstein’s mission … but independently, off the radar. I mean, maybe he didn’t want us taken out, but someone else inside his organization did. We can’t know for sure. So maybe we have to continue doing what we were set up to do, but on our own. Or whether …’
‘I’m going to get some more firewood,’ said Liam. He got up and started gathering some of the dried detritus on the cave floor.
‘Or whether?’ prompted Adam.
‘Whether we should take the bull by the horns.’
Sal stared at her. ‘What do you mean?’
‘Whether we should find a way to talk directly to him. Face to face. If it was my asking about Pandora that caused him to decide we were a threat, then maybe I can convince him that we’re not going to – I dunno – expose him to the world, or put him in danger. We just want him to level with us.’
Liam returned with an armful of moss and twigs and casually dumped them on the embers. ‘There ya go.’
A thick coil of smoke quickly emerged from the mound. It became a choking column that billowed up, drifted across them.
‘Oh, genius!’ Maddy coughed and spluttered. ‘You just threw on damp stuff!’
Their cosy fireside gathering quickly broke up as they got to their feet and stepped backwards, wafting the thick smoke away from their faces.
‘Ah … sorry there, fellas!’ Liam called out.
Maddy flapped her hand and was wheezing. ‘Good job.’
The smoke had mushroomed up to the ceiling of the cave, and now it hung there like a layer of swamp mist: a low-hanging cloud looking for somewhere to go. Sal was staring up at it and noticed that it was finding some place to go.
It started to stretch out along the roof of the cave, tendrils of smoke feeling their way towards the back.
‘That’s really odd,’ she said, pointing up at it. ‘It’s like it’s being sucked.’
The smoke was thinning out now, becoming less defined, less visible.
‘Throw some more of that wet stuff on,’ she said to Liam.
Maddy nodded. ‘Yeah.’
Liam reached for another fistful of damp moss and tossed it on to some freshly exposed glowing embers. A new mushroom cloud of choking white smoke billowed out and rolled up to the ceiling, then swirled idly for a moment before following the same path along the roof as the first cloud.
‘There’s a draught pushing it to the back of the cave,’ said Maddy.
‘That means a flow-through,’ said Adam.
‘You mean, like, an exit?’
He nodded. ‘Maybe we missed it – another cave, another …’ His voice trailed away as he snapped on his torch and followed the thin tendril of smoke above as it curled and weaved and glided along the uneven contours of the ceiling towards the very deepest recess of their cave. The beam of torchlight picked out the very last threads of the smoke as it seemed to speed up and dart eagerly behind a large boulder.
‘Someone get Billy and his pipe!’ Adam called out. Shouts echoed back through the cave towards the entrance and a minute later Billy and the others were gathered there beside him.
‘What is wrong?’ asked Billy.
Maddy understood what Adam was thinking. ‘Just smoke your pipe and blow it out.’
He looked at her, bemused. ‘But you say to me no smoke in –’
‘Forget what I said, just blow a load of your smoke out.’
The guide shrugged and pulled on his clay pipe. The bowl glowed and they heard the soft crackle of burning tobacco. Then, cheeks now puffed up, he breathed out.
Adam shone his torch on the small cloud of tobacco smoke as it hung indecisively in the air for a moment, before lurching towards the rear of the boulder, like some clueless messenger boy suddenly remembering a long-overdue errand.
‘There’s more to this cave,’ said Maddy. She looked at the others, then at the boulder. ‘There’s more.’ She grinned excitedly at them. ‘And what’s more – it’s been hidden.’
Chapter 37
1994, the cave, Nicaragua
With one final grunt of effort, Bob managed to work the boulder several more inches away from the tunnel entrance that it was plugging.
There was a gap now, just wide enough for a head and shoulders, and with a little more effort, and no doubt some skin left behind, for a person to squeeze through entirely. For now Maddy was happy to just take a look. She shone her torch through the gap.
‘What can you see in there, Mads?’
She panned the beam around. It was a narrow tunnel, roughly triangular, tapering at the top. Veils of spider webs hung across it, which glowed like finely teased-out cotton wool in the beam of her torch. ‘Ewww … gross!’
‘What?’
‘Webs. Lots of them.’
From what she could make out, the tunnel looked like a natural fissure, but in places she picked out the scrape marks and pitted bites of what must have been the work of primitive tools. ‘It looks like a natural passage that someone has chiselled at in places to widen it.’
‘Webs?’ Rashim looked unhappy. He hadn’t made it past her first description. ‘Spiders? Creeping, crawling, stinging, biting things?’
‘Yes, spiders. Don’t be such a wimp.’ Maddy bent down, picked up a rock and then tossed it into the tunnel. The nearest veil of webbing vibrated as the rock tore a hole through it. The passage suddenly seemed to come alive with movement. Dark dime-sized silhouettes scuttled in quick stop-start motion down from above, along the radiating threads. Converging on the ragged hole, to inspect it for a catch.
Dozens of them.
Hundreds in fact.
‘All right, maybe the wimp approach might be best.’ She pulled her head and shoulders back out of the gap; dust and threads of web stuck to her hair.
She looked at Becks. ‘You go in there first and clear away those webs. OK?’
Becks nodded. ‘Of course, Maddy.’
‘And the spiders. Squish as many of them as you can find. And Bob?’
‘Yes, Maddy?’
She tapped the boulder. ‘Move this a bit more so we’re not skinning ourselves every time we squeeze through.’
Ten minutes later they were shining their torches down the passage. The
webs were mostly gone. Becks was covered in sticky threads, looking like a badly decorated Christmas tree. ‘It is clear now.’
‘OK, that’s better.’ Maddy turned to the others. ‘Shall we go take a look?’
She led the way. The passage was easily wide enough for two or three of them to walk side by side, but it was low enough that the tallest of them had to duck their heads a little. To her senses it seemed to be leading downwards, only the slightest gradient, but enough that she got the feeling that gravity was gently coaxing her forward.
As they slowly made their way along it their torches ranged across the rock surface. Chisel and scrape marks everywhere. But no more paintings.
It curved gently to the left for fifty yards. Ahead she picked out the faintest grey glimmer of daylight. ‘Look!’
‘I see it,’ said Adam. ‘So maybe this rock formation isn’t a plateau, but a thin ridge. A natural rock wall, and this passage cuts through to the far side.’
They made their way down to the end of the tunnel. It was filled by a dense wall of vegetation. Thin rays of daylight tiptoed their way through a thick lattice of vine branches and roots. Beyond the broad scribble of roots, Maddy could see shifting lime-green leaves, and through them one or two pale grey dabs of daylight. They could hear the gentle patter of raindrops outside on leaves, the echoing drip of water inside the passage. They could feel a ghost’s breath of fresh air stealing through on to their cheeks.
‘That looks like hundreds of years’ worth of growth there,’ said Adam.
Maddy pulled at the wall of gnarled old vine branches and shifting, heavy leaves. ‘Can’t see a great deal. Looks like just more jungle on the other side.’
‘I will cut through,’ said Billy, brandishing his machete. He proceeded to hack away at it, swinging with short economic downward swipes that quickly began to unravel the tangled natural lattice. Bob stepped in beside him, pulling away the loose roots and branches.
Adam panned his torch around the rock walls. ‘You’re right, Maddy. It’s been carved to make it wider.’