by RR Haywood
‘We’re standing down for tonight?’ Charlie asks.
Alpha nods. ‘I want to look at Mother’s plans for the extinct— For the next phase . . .’ He covers the slip of the tongue but knows they noticed.
‘Oops,’ Bravo laughs, waggling a finger at Alpha. ‘You almost said extinction then, old chap.’
‘Almost,’ Alpha says quietly, staring at the man, who beams at him while sitting back, as laconic as ever with his hands interlaced behind his head. ‘But I didn’t say it,’ he adds.
‘Good for you,’ Bravo says, holding his eye contact as Charlie, Delta and Echo look over, sensing the atmosphere like dogs in a pack seeing the leader being challenged for dominance.
Alpha holds position, staring at the unmoving and still smiling Bravo. ‘Problem, Bravo?’
‘None at all, old chap,’ Bravo replies with humour, but the eye contact holds and the edge shows in his voice.
Alpha should address it now. His professional response should be to take Bravo aside and speak to him privately, addressing the tone and way of speech while his gut instinct tells him to kill the man now and take his chances with Charlie and Delta, but the doubt is there. The worry that Kate will be left isolated and a target if it doesn’t work so he smiles instead, flooding his features with warmth.
‘I think we’re all getting on each other’s nerves a bit, eh? Come on, Bravo. Get rid of the glare . . . Go and beat someone at chess. I’ll be glad when this mission is done, lads.’
An easing back of the tension, not a great deal, but enough for the others to chuckle while sharing glances.
Alpha heads for the door, pausing at the side of Bravo to lay a hand on his shoulder. ‘Take it easy,’ he says softly.
‘Always do, old chap, always do.’
They barely look at him in the portal room and the blood still shows wet and crimson on the floor from Roger’s broken nose. ‘Get that cleaned up,’ Alpha snaps.
‘Will do,’ Gunjeep says, bringing the portal to life. ‘All yours.’
Kate stays silent, staring at the blood before walking after Alpha into the darkened office in 2095 and to Alpha standing with his hands on his head exhaling deeply with a look of intense worry etched on his features.
‘What happened?’ she asks.
He moves in close, pulling her in to press his mouth to her ear, not trusting that there isn’t a listening device somewhere, not trusting anything. He whispers the explanation as quickly as possible, telling Kate about Tango Two, about Echo and coming back through the portal and punching the technician.
‘Forget about Roger,’ she whispers, her arms wrapped round his neck to hold him close. ‘He’s a twat anyway, but wow on everything else. You did it . . . You made contact.’
‘She said they’re good people.’
‘They are,’ Kate asserts. ‘Everyone knows it.’
‘I’m going back to our third visit tomorrow . . .’
‘Why tomorrow? Why wait?’
‘I need time to think, Kate. I need to show Mother I’m not rushing or worried . . .’
‘Take me with you. We’ll tell Mother it’s a field trip and I’ll help convince Maggie . . . She’ll see I’m not an agent or anything.’
‘Not yet, it’s not safe . . . We’ve got to do this right, and what about everyone else in the complex? And that still leaves Bravo and Mother . . . These are dangerous people, Kate.’
‘Okay, it was just an idea . . . Whatever you think is right. Just tell me what you need and I’ll do it.’
‘We’d better get back. I’ve got an extinction plan to read.’
Twenty-Eight
Lambeth-not-Lambeth, 2111
They walk slowly through the early-morning chaos of a busy street getting ready for the day. A street full of noise and life with vendors guiding their floating stalls to position while calling out to each other and the store owners operating switches to draw their shopfronts back. The amplified sound of a radio DJ’s voice sounding in the air. Smells of cooking, of fried locusts and synthetic coffee wafting here and there.
‘An incredible place,’ Doctor John Watson says, marvelling at the sights. ‘Did you ever visit New Orleans?’
‘I did,’ Miri says, walking at his side. ‘And, yes, there is a similarity.’
‘In mood I’d say, in vibe, yes. The atmosphere . . . that community feel of the place.’
‘Morning!’ a vendor calls over. ‘Beautiful day again, Affas . . .’
‘Good morning,’ the doctor calls out, waving a cheery hand. ‘I say, old chap, where can we get some pastries and coffee to take away?’
‘Up the road, Affa. Stall on the right, big fella with huge boobs, best pastries in London! His coffee’s shit though . . .’
‘UNKNOWN ADULT MALE. THE USE OF REVOLTING, ABUSIVE OR INSULTING WORDS IS PROHIBITED IN THIS PUBLIC PLACE.’
‘Ah, piss off,’ the man laughs, setting it off again as a chorus of swear words are shouted up and down the street by vendors and hawkers.
They walk on with Doctor Watson chuckling at the sights and sounds while Miri stays mostly quiet as she works the problems in her mind. She thinks of Mother, of Alpha, of nuclear bombs and 25,000 people dying and how many more will perish or suffer before it ends, of how to reset it all and fix what Mother’s done.
The offer from Alpha to switch sides seems too good to be true and feels like a trap, like a hand is being played, but is it something she can use? They must stop Mother. That is the primary objective, but then they must also reset the changes made by Mother and stop them killing the Romans and dropping the nuclear bomb on London.
‘It was a grand evening though,’ the doctor remarks, drawing her attention. ‘And getting Bertie off the island for a few hours was very healthy for him.’
She nods, lending half an ear to his conversation. Safa was right yesterday; they needed that downtime and Paris was a good evening. Even if Emily did show off by ordering everyone’s food in fluent French. Miri did order her own at the very end, also in fluent French, which made Emily smart and everyone else laugh.
‘Good lord, is that our Ria?’ the doctor asks, stopping as they cross the mouth of a side street. Miri looks down to Jerry’s café and Ria sitting with a small group eating food at one of the tables.
‘It is,’ Miri says, her voice hardening.
‘And you can stop that look,’ the doctor tells her. ‘She’s young, let her live . . .’
‘She should not be using the device for . . .’
‘Miri, my dear, we dined in Paris, then slept on an island in the distant Mediterranean past and now we’re in London getting pastries and coffee for everyone else still asleep in the Parisian hotel we left them in last night . . . and by all accounts I have died twice, yet here I am. How is any of that not misusing the device?’
‘A good point succinctly made,’ she remarks with a respectful dip of her head. She stares again at Ria, watching the young woman laugh. She looks hard now, tough and lean and the survival instincts Ria learnt to stay alive for two years in the Cretaceous period show as she seems to feel the eyes watching her and turns to look up. The laughter fading from her face as she rises to her feet on seeing Miri and the doctor watching her.
‘Morning, Ria!’ the doctor calls out. ‘We’re just getting some pastries. Everything okay?’
‘Fine,’ Ria says curtly.
‘Great stuff. Come along now, Miri.’ He loops his arm through hers, leading her on and away up the bustling street so full of noise and colour and life. They stop at the stall to buy coffees and pastries, the doctor chatting away to the vendor while Miri watches and listens and thinks. They need a plan and they need one fast.
‘Be a shame to see this go,’ the doctor remarks, looking round with a heavy sigh as they walk back. ‘Still, can’t have despots changing time all over the place now, can we?’
Paris, France
The first thing Harry does when he wakes is remind himself where he is. He does it now and within a split secon
d he knows he is stark naked in a four-poster bed in a sumptuous hotel room in Paris.
He knows it’s morning by the sunlight coming through the windows and he also knows he was drinking heavily last night from the taste of gorilla shit in his mouth. He knows they ate a lovely meal last night in a big fancy restaurant where Emily showed off by ordering everything in fluent French. He remembers walking under what used to be called the Eiffel Tower, which is now called the Paris Tower and is a bit taller and in a different place. He knows all those things because they pass through his mind in a pleasant series of memories as he stretches languidly.
Then he remembers the other bit in one solid flashback as a graceful feminine hand gropes up his chest to his beard with an action that makes his eyes widen and his heart thump as he sits bolt upright.
‘Harry!’ Emily yelps, sliding off his chest.
‘Bugger . . .’
She snaps her eyes open to stare up at him staring down. ‘Oh shit . . . not again . . .’
‘Bugger.’ He lurches up and away as she groans and rolls on her back covering her face with her hands.
‘Shit . . . shit, shit, shit . . .’
‘Bugger . . .’ Harry grabs a door handle and walks into a closet.
‘Harry bloody Madden,’ she snaps, sitting up to glare at him backing out of the closet.
‘Eh, now,’ he says, holding his hands out to placate the angry look on her face.
‘Don’t you bloody “eh now” me, Harry bloody Madden . . .’
He backs towards the door, trying ever so hard not to look at her boobs jiggling as she rolls from the bed and comes up holding a shoe.
‘Oh blimey.’ He runs for the door, deciding, at that point, that escape and evasion are the best thing to do.
‘HARRY BLOODY MADDEN,’ she yells, running after him.
Malcolm stirs on the chaise longue in the sumptuous middle room of the suite, lifting his head to stare bleary-eyed at a naked Harry being chased by an angry naked Emily clutching a shoe. ‘Crikey,’ he mumbles, blinking himself awake.
‘Eh, now, you put that down,’ Harry says, running behind a large sofa.
‘You sod . . . you did it again,’ she yells, running after him.
‘Eh, now, miss,’ he says, going round one end of the sofa while she goes round the other.
‘Stop saying that and let me hit you . . .’
‘Crikey,’ Malcolm says, now sitting up on the chaise longue to watch them running naked circles round the sofa.
‘Ach, just put the shoe down.’
‘You seduced me again.’
‘No, miss . . . I did . . .’
‘You bloody did! You and your big manliness and hairy chest and beard . . . Stop running away, you shit . . .’
‘You seduced me,’ Harry bleats, scarpering out of arm’s reach.
‘What?! I did no such thing . . .’
‘You did,’ Malcolm says, watching the show with interest.
‘You did,’ Safa calls out from somewhere.
‘We all heard it,’ Malcolm says. ‘You said “Come on, Harry, I want you to sex me three times again” . . .’
‘I did not!’
‘You did,’ Safa calls from somewhere.
‘Aye,’ Harry says. ‘That’s what happened . . .’
‘That’s not the point and you lot can butt out . . .’ She realises the folly of running round the sofa and decides, being the highly trained agent that she is, to go over it instead and launches deftly, while naked, over the back to land on the cushions with shoe in hand.
‘Bugger,’ Harry says, running for the bathroom door and deciding, being the highly trained commando that he is, to go for the island and maybe swim out a mile from the shore until she has calmed down. He goes in fast with Emily right behind him and aims for the portal that was a few inches off the wall and bounces back with a yelp into Emily with a slap of skin on skin.
‘Crikey,’ Konrad says, blinking awake in the large sumptuous bathtub to see a naked Harry and Emily collide and fall to the floor in a tangle of limbs while a shoe sails through the air to land in the toilet.
‘Harry bloody Madden . . .’ she says, writhing underneath his body. ‘Get off me . . .’
‘I’m trying,’ he says deeply, floundering to get up with a face full of soft womanly bits.
‘Eh,’ Konrad says, looking at the wall. ‘Where’s the portal gone?’
‘Where’s my shoe?’
‘In the toilet . . . Er . . . the portal’s not there.’
‘Now, miss . . . let me get up.’
‘I’m not bloody stopping you. It’s not like you actually want to cuddle the morning after, is it?’
‘Ben?’ Konrad calls out.
‘What?’
‘The portal’s not there . . .’
Harry freezes, still on top of Emily as she goes still beneath him with her hands pressed to his chest and slowly they both look round to where the Blue should be.
‘Fuck,’ Ben says, running in to see the bare wall and the distinct lack of a shimmering blue light.
‘What’s happened?’ Safa asks, pushing in next to him in bra and knickers. She looks down at Emily and Harry as though it’s the most natural thing in the world to see them naked and virtually coupled on the floor of a sumptuous hotel bathroom. ‘Morning.’
‘Morning, Safa,’ Emily says, taking one hand from Harry’s chest to push stray hairs from her eyes.
‘Morning,’ Harry says.
Ben blinks at the wall, then at Harry and Emily, then at the shoe in the toilet and finally at a fully clothed Konrad lying in an empty bath.
‘No beds,’ Konrad says.
‘Oh,’ Ben says. ‘Why is there a shoe in the toilet?’
‘That’s my shoe,’ Emily says.
‘Oh,’ Ben says as the room bathes in blue from the portal blinking to existence like it was always there.
‘Morning, morning,’ the doctor calls out, bustling through it with a tray of drinks and a large paper bag. ‘Queue for the toilet, is it?’ he asks looking down at Harry’s bare backside in between Emily’s legs. ‘Croissant?’
‘Ooh, me please,’ Emily says, stretching an arm up. ‘Harry can’t have one. He seduced me again.’
‘He didn’t,’ Ben says, taking a croissant. ‘He really didn’t.’
‘Did,’ Emily says, blithely ignoring everyone saying otherwise while she bites into the pastry. ‘Share?’ she says, offering it up to Harry.
‘Yeah, this is just wrong now,’ Safa says, screwing her face up at the sight of them sharing food while naked on the bathroom floor.
‘We saw young Ria,’ the doctor says, covering his mouth with a hand while chewing. ‘Seemed very happy, until she saw us, that is, then she didn’t look so happy.’ He pauses to turn as Miri comes through the portal, a coffee in her hand and an unlit cigarette between her lips. A glance round then down to Harry and Emily on the floor and everyone else in underwear eating croissants.
‘Ah, well,’ the doctor says sadly. ‘Just be sure you get Ria out of there before you reset it. Shame though. World seems a nice place now. Still, I’m sure you chaps know what you’re doing.’
A look between Miri and Ben, a meeting of eyes and the worry is there, the fear that they are being equalled by an opponent who has as much skill and experience as them, one who has a time machine and one who is prepared to kill the world.
Twenty-Nine
Berlin, Bundesstraβe 2, 5 February 1945
Neither side have anything that could be called a plan. There’s no precedent for something like this. There’s no guidebook or rules for what happens when two opposing sides, both highly trained, highly skilled and highly experienced and both with time machines meet in a changed timeline with a heightened sense of distrust.
In building number twenty-five at one end of the street, Miri and her team gather to stare out of the grimy windows at the destruction below and down to building number eight where Alpha and Echo stand ready. Both sides also wa
tch Arch 451 because in approximately one hour the five agents will be coming through for their third visit to Herr Weber.
The tension mounts. All of them feeling the stress of it. One side took a night off and had fun in Paris, but that is now pushed to the backs of minds.
Alpha and Echo read through Mother’s notes on preparing for the use of modern thermonuclear warheads, combined with a release of anthrax in several high-density population zones, and the ease at which it can be done staggered both of them. Whatever they are going to do has to be done now because Mother needs just days to be able to carry out her extinction level event.
The immediate problem is that neither side can see the other due to the reflection of the glass and the light of the cold February day falling just so.
Who makes the first move? Who needs it most?
‘What now?’ Ben asks quietly, standing next to Miri at the window while the others hold back. ‘Should we signal?’
She shakes her head, winging it and feeling the rules of the game play out in real time. ‘Let them show first.’
In the complex, in the dark gloom of her office with her face reflecting the glow of the screens, Mother sits with her fingers steepled in front of her because she does have a plan. Mother has had a plan since this began and is feeling the thrill as the endgame now comes into view.
A knock at the door. She calls out to enter.
‘You wanted an update?’ the person asks politely.
‘Don’t fucking stand there gawping. Close the door and get on with it.’
The door closes and the figure strolls over to stand with hands in pockets and an eyebrow arched. ‘You look like shit.’
‘Is he ready?’
‘Alpha thinks he’s a hero and you’re a mad crazy bitch who is losing the plot.’
‘Is he ready?’ Mother asks again.
‘He’s ready alright. He’ll switch sides the second he gets the chance.’
‘Good. Make it happen.’
‘Now?’
‘Yes, now. It has to be now. The only option left is for Alpha and Echo to join forces with Maggie and use them for a combined attack on this complex. Do it now. We cannot delay any further and I want you there when it happens . . .’