TimeRiders 05 - Gates of Rome Read online

  ALEX SCARROW

  Time Riders

  Gates of Rome

  PUFFIN

  Table of Contents

  Prologue: 10 August 2001, Brooklyn

  Chapter 1: 2001, New York

  Chapter 2: 2070, Cheyenne Mountain, Colorado Springs

  Chapter 3: 2001, New York

  Chapter 4: 2001, Central Park, New York

  Chapter 5: 2070, Project Exodus, Cheyenne Mountain, Colorado Springs

  Chapter 6: 2001, New York

  Chapter 7: 2001, New York

  Chapter 8: 2070, Project Exodus, Cheyenne Mountain, Colorado Springs

  Chapter 9: 2001, New York

  Chapter 10: 2070, Project Exodus, Cheyenne Mountain, Colorado Springs

  Chapter 11: 2001, New York

  Chapter 12: 2070, Project Exodus, Cheyenne Mountain, Colorado Springs

  Chapter 13: 2001, New York

  Chapter 14: AD 37, 16 miles north-east of Rome

  Chapter 15: AD 37, 16 miles north-east of Rome

  Chapter 16: AD 37, north-east of Rome

  Chapter 17: 2001, New York

  Chapter 18: AD 37, Amphitheatrum Statilii Tauri, Rome

  Chapter 19: AD 37, Rome

  Chapter 20: AD 37, Amphitheatrum Statilii Tauri, Rome

  Chapter 21: AD 37, Amphitheatrum Statilii Tauri, Rome

  Chapter 22: 2001, Barnes & Noble, Union Square, New York

  Chapter 23: 2001, New York

  Chapter 24: AD 54, Italy

  Chapter 25: 2001, New York

  Chapter 26: 2001, New York

  Chapter 27: 2001, New York

  Chapter 28: 2001, New York

  Chapter 29: 2001, New York

  Chapter 30: 2001, New York

  Chapter 31: 2001, New York

  Chapter 32: 2001, formerly New York

  Chapter 33: 2001, formerly New York

  Chapter 34: 2001, formerly New York

  Chapter 35: AD 54, 7 miles outside Rome

  Chapter 36: AD 54, 7 miles outside Rome

  Chapter 37: 2001, New York

  Chapter 38: AD 54, Rome

  Chapter 39: AD 54, Subura District, Rome

  Chapter 40: AD 54, Subura District, Rome

  Chapter 41: AD 54, Subura District, Rome

  Chapter 42: AD 54, Rome

  Chapter 43: AD 54, Imperial Palace, Rome

  Chapter 44: AD 54, Rome

  Chapter 45: AD 54, Rome

  Chapter 46: AD 54, Imperial Palace, Rome

  Chapter 47: AD 54, Rome

  Chapter 48: AD 54, Imperial Palace, Rome

  Chapter 49: AD 54, Rome

  Chapter 50: AD 54, Rome

  Chapter 51: AD 54, Imperial Palace, Rome

  Chapter 52: AD 54, Imperial Palace, Rome

  Chapter 53: AD 54, 18 miles north of Rome

  Chapter 54: AD 54, Rome

  Chapter 55: AD 54, Subura District, Rome

  Chapter 56: AD 54, Imperial Palace, Rome

  Chapter 57: AD 54, Subura District, Rome

  Chapter 58: AD 54, Imperial Palace, Rome

  Chapter 59: AD 54, Subura District, Rome

  Chapter 60: AD 54, Imperial Palace, Rome

  Chapter 61: AD 54, Subura District, Rome

  Chapter 62: AD 54, outside Rome

  Chapter 63: AD 54, Imperial Palace, Rome

  Chapter 64: AD 54, Imperial Palace, Rome

  Chapter 65: AD 54, Imperial Palace, Rome

  Chapter 66: AD 54, Imperial Palace, Rome

  Chapter 67: AD 54, Imperial Palace, Rome

  Chapter 68: AD 54, Imperial Palace, Rome

  Chapter 69: AD 54, Imperial Palace, Rome

  Chapter 70: AD 54, Imperial Palace, Rome

  Chapter 71: AD 54, Imperial Palace, Rome

  Chapter 72: AD 54, Imperial Palace, Rome

  Chapter 73: AD 54, Imperial Palace, Rome

  Chapter 74: AD 54, Imperial Palace, Rome

  Chapter 75: AD 54, Imperial Palace, Rome

  Chapter 76: AD 54, outside Rome

  Chapter 77: AD 54, outside Rome

  Chapter 78: AD 54, outside Rome

  Chapter 79: AD 54, outside Rome

  Chapter 80: AD 54, outside Rome

  Chapter 81: AD 54, outside Rome

  Chapter 82: AD 54, outside Rome

  Chapter 83: AD 54, outside Rome

  Chapter 84: 2069, Project Exodus, Cheyenne Mountain, Colorado Springs

  Chapter 85: 2001, New York

  Chapter 86: 2001, New York

  PUFFIN BOOKS

  TIME RIDERS

  ALEX SCARROW used to be a graphic artist, then he decided to be a computer games designer. Finally, he grew up and became an author. He has written a number of successful thrillers and several screenplays, but it’s YA fiction that has allowed him to really have fun with the ideas and concepts he was playing around with when designing games.

  He lives in Norwich with his son, Jacob, his wife, Frances, and his Jack Russell, Max.

  Praise for TimeRiders:

  ‘A thriller full of spectacular effects’ – Guardian

  ‘Insanely exciting, nail-biting stuff’ – Independent on Sunday

  ‘This is a novel that is as addictive as any computer game’ – Waterstone’s Books Quarterly

  ‘Promises to be a big hit’ – Irish News

  ‘A thrilling adventure that hurtles across time and place at breakneck speed’ – Lovereading4kids.co.uk

  ‘Plenty of fast-paced action … this is a real page-turner’ – WriteAway.org.uk

  ‘A great read that will appeal to both boys and girls … you’ll find this book addictive!’ – redhouse.co.uk

  ‘Contender for best science fiction book of the year … an absolute winner’ – Flipside

  Winner of the Older Readers category,

  Red House Children’s Book Award 2011

  Books by Alex Scarrow

  TimeRiders

  TimeRiders: Day of the Predator

  TimeRiders: The Doomsday Code

  TimeRiders: The Eternal War

  TimeRiders: Gates of Rome

  Sign up to become a TimeRider at:

  www.time-riders.co.uk

  To my brother Simon for the kind use of two of my favourite literary characters, Cato and Macro

  PROLOGUE

  10 August 2001, Brooklyn

  Joseph Olivera gasped, air huffed in and out of his lungs in total darkness. The noise of his rasping breath bounced back at him from hard walls somewhere off in the black. He tried to calm himself. Steady his nerves.

  You knew what it was going to be like.

  Yes. He’d had that explained: the sensation of falling, the milky nothingness, the light touch of energy crawling over your skin like the probing, curious fingers of a pickpocket. Still, even though he’d mentally prepared for it, forewarned, Olivera had been cautioned by Waldstein that the first time was the hardest.

  But he hadn’t expected this. Pitch black.

  ‘Anyone th-there?’

  He could hear the drip of water somewhere, possibly from a low ceiling. And, faintly, a quiet rumble that increased in volume as it passed overhead and then finally faded to nothing.

  ‘Hello?’

  Just then another noise. A metallic rattle from behind him. Joseph turned towards it and saw a horizontal sliver of light appear. It widened, accompanied by the jangle of a chain, and Joseph recognized it as the bottom of some shutter door. He saw a pair of feet outside, cobblestones, a muted grey of diffused light.

  ‘Hello?’

  The feet shifted, a figure ducked down and looked under the shutter door. Joseph saw a paunchy middle-aged man with a beard and glasses, wearing shabby corduroy trousers and a green woollen cardigan
with leather elbow patches. ‘Hello?’

  Joseph squatted down so the light from outside could pick out his face. ‘Is this the right place?’

  The man with the beard chuckled. ‘Ahhh … you must be our new recruit.’ He ducked under the shutter, straightened up inside and walked to the side of the shutter, patting in the darkness until his fingers found a switch.

  A fluorescent light fizzed on above Joseph. He could see now he was in some brick archway. It smelled of damp cement and stale urine. In one corner he could see a pile of loops of electrical flex. Beside that, a dozen cardboard boxes that had the images of ancient-looking computers printed on the side. Early twenty-first-century bricks of clunky technology.

  ‘This … this isn’t the place, is it?’ asked Joseph.

  The man smiled and crossed the pitted dirty floor towards him, his feet crackling across shards of broken glass. ‘This is it.’ He offered his hand. ‘I’m Frasier Griggs by the way.’

  ‘Joseph Olivera,’ he replied.

  ‘I agree it doesn’t look much at the moment. Mr Waldstein, I presume, told you we’ve only just started setting up things in here?’

  Joseph nodded. ‘But I … I thought …’

  ‘You thought it would be something grander?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Frasier laughed again. ‘It’s all that’s needed.’ He looked around. ‘Good choice, I’d say. Nice and discreet. I don’t think it’s been occupied in years.’ He kicked an empty glass bottle aside. It skittered across a carpet of grit and rat droppings. ‘Unless you count vagrants and drug addicts, that is.’

  Joseph glanced at the cobblestones outside. ‘This is really 2001? I’ve really travelled back over half a century?’

  ‘Oh quite, yes. August the tenth, 2001 to be precise.’ Frasier spoke with an almost theatrical accent, what used to be called ‘British’ before that small nation vanished into the Euro-block.

  He walked towards the shutter and ducked down to look outside. Frasier followed him over, squatting down beside him. ‘This is Brooklyn. Tell me, Joseph. You ever see pictures of Brooklyn before they abandoned it to the flood waters?’

  Joseph shook his head. He only knew the outskirts of this once-fine city as a maze of waterlogged streets, collapsed rooftops sprouting weeds and struggling saplings.

  ‘Quite characterful and vibrant was Brooklyn.’ Frasier gazed at the graffiti-covered brick wall opposite, and above it a mixed urban skyline of cranes, factory roofs and warehouse apartments. He sighed. ‘I used to collect priceless antique CDs from about this time. Marvellous stuff they used to call “hip hop”. Big Daddy K? MC Kushee? Ever heard of those composers?’

  Joseph shook his head.

  ‘Ah well. It’s only old farts like me listen to that sort of thing now.’ Frasier nodded at the scene outside. ‘Thirty years from now all this will be gone. It’ll be nothing but a drowning ghost town. Abandoned ruins. Left to rot. Pity.’

  Above them was a warm blue, cloudless sky, criss-crossed with the vapour trails of distant air traffic.

  ‘Anyway, Mr Waldstein has already given you your brief, I presume?’

  Joseph nodded.

  ‘We’re sourcing as much of the equipment components as we can from the present. It’s safer that way. The less of a footprint we leave from our time, the better.’

  Joseph had noted the boxes of desktop computers. ‘Are those old machines powerful enough to –?’

  ‘Certainly. I’ll have to tinker with the network so their CPUs synchronize. And I’ll strip out that stone-age operating system and replace it with W.G. Systems software. Should be fine, though.’

  Joseph gazed across the East River at Manhattan.

  ‘Quite a sight, isn’t it?’ said Frasier. ‘This really was a beautiful city back in its time.’

  ‘Yes.’

  They listened to the wail of a distant police siren, the honk of the East River ferry on its way down to Governor’s Island, the faint boom of a passing car hi-fi, the gentle whup-whup of a helicopter high above.

  Joseph found himself sharing Frasier’s dewy-eyed wonder.

  Everything seems so much more alive.

  This was a mankind full of passion and energy. From here the future looked limitless, the possibilities endless. This is what the world looked like when it still had a hope. Joseph’s breath fluttered. It was intoxicating.

  ‘Well now … this field office of Mr Waldstein’s won’t sort itself out if we just sit here. There’s a lot to do.’ Frasier stood up and kicked a discarded McDonald’s carton out of the archway and across the cobblestone alley. ‘Is Mr Waldstein joining us today?’

  ‘Yes … he s-s-said …’ Joseph worked at containing his stutter. ‘He said he’d be along shortly.’

  ‘Good,’ said Frasier. ‘Because I need to ask him where he wants me to set up the displacement rack. Going to need to check the wiring for tolerance. And of course where to put the back-up generator.’

  ‘Where will I be setting up my equipment?’

  Frasier pointed into the gloom of the archway. ‘It’s in the back room. There’s another room. See that sliding door? Half a dozen Gen-Inc-5H bio-growtubes from our Salt Lake Genetic Research facility, and several hundred gallons of that disgusting growth solution. It wasn’t easy beaming that lot through, I can tell you.’

  ‘Is it assembled already?’

  ‘No! That’s your job. Anything else you need, except the foetuses of course, you’re going to need to source locally.’

  ‘Uh, right.’

  Frasier suddenly grinned broadly, his eyes wide behind the glint of his lenses. ‘Quite something, this project of his, isn’t it? Guardians of history and all that!’

  ‘Yes … yes, it is.’

  ‘You know, only three people in the entire history of humankind have actually travelled through time: Mr Waldstein, myself … and now you. Just think about it. More people have walked upon the moon than done what you’ve just done.’

  Joseph nodded, grinning. Frasier’s excitement was wholly infectious.

  ‘Lots to do, Joseph old chap. Lots to do. But first … how do you fancy a coffee? I spotted a rather nice coffee shop nearby.’

  ‘Real coffee?’

  ‘Good grief, yes! None of that awful vat-grown synthi-soya rubbish.’ He patted Joseph affectionately on the shoulder. ‘Give you a chance to see a little bit more of Brooklyn before we knuckle down to work. How about that?’

  ‘A coffee would be nice.’

  Frasier led Joseph back outside, worked the shutter door down to the ground with some difficulty and secured it with its rusty padlock. ‘That’s stiff. I might see if I can get the winch motor working. Don’t want to be hefting that up and down each time we step outside, do we?’

  The morning sun sparkled across the East River, spears of brilliant dappled light that made Joseph’s eyes moist. The inverted reflections of Manhattan’s proud skyscrapers shuffled in the wake of the passing ferry and above them a commuter train rattled across the Williamsburg Bridge towards Manhattan.

  Beautiful. Quite beautiful.

  He noticed Frasier enjoying the same view. ‘Oh, how rude of me!’ he said presently, offering Joseph a comic salute. ‘I suppose I ought to officially welcome you to our little “agency”.’

  Joseph self-consciously returned the gesture, feeling a thrum of growing excitement course through his body.

  What an incredible project.

  CHAPTER 1

  2001, New York

  Monday (time cycle 77)

  Something’s wrong. I know it. I think there’s something big going on we don’t know about. Something Foster should’ve told us and didn’t. Maybe he really wanted to, but couldn’t. Wasn’t allowed to. Maybe that’s why he left us?

  Sal put down her pen and looked around the laundromat. Just like it always was at this time on a Monday morning, it was empty. She was the only customer there, sitting on one of the row of plastic chairs facing a grubby window. She watched a removal truck out
side the window trying to squeeze past a kerb-parked yellow cab, the drivers of both vehicles winding down their windows and barking abuse at each other.

  Men. Always so aggressive. Sal wondered for a moment what a world free of testosterone might be like. Surely a better place without men beating their chests and acting like apes.

  She looked down at her notebook again.

  That thing. That stuffed toy. The bear. Somehow that’s at the heart of everything. I’m sure of it.

  The man that came through, that poor, twisted mess that was once a human being, she was sure he’d been trying to tell her something about the blue bear as he died. Something for her ears alone. She wondered how a stuffed toy, a threadbare, scruffy-looking one at that, could ‘mean’ anything to anyone – except comfort for some child.

  She scribbled again in her diary.

  And then there’s Liam’s tunic.