Gates of Rome tr-5 Read online

  Keep it simple for the morons out there.

  ‘The time machine — ’ he hated that term — ‘was designed to zero in and snap to on these beacons’ beams and use that to guide us in to the correct emergence point. But it, uh… it appears we’ve gone a little further back in time than we actually planned.’

  ‘And lost over a hundred of our people!’ Rashim turned towards the voice. ‘Someone messed this up badly!’ Vice-president Stilson glared like an Old Testament preacher.

  ‘Well now, look, Mr Stilson… this really isn’t a precise science. And quite honestly, with all the last-minute data changes coming in, and no time to recalibrate the EDT’s transmission program… Actually, I’m rather amazed that any of us survived!’

  Stilson shook his head angrily. ‘OK, I’ve heard enough. Look, I’m assuming authority from here on in. This is a damned mess already and we need to turn this around right now!’

  ‘What?!’ Rashim’s voice skipped up a notch. It was almost a yelp. ‘No! Look see, uh… Dr Yatsushita actually put me in charge of Exodus. He said that — ’

  ‘I’m afraid we don’t have time for this, Dr Anwar… isn’t it?’

  Rashim nodded.

  ‘Right, well, I’m the senior government representative of the North American Federation here. Which gives me executive authority. Like it or not, that puts me in charge.’

  ‘Dr Anwar…’ A woman. Civilian. He recognized her as one of the Project Exodus support staff. Not one of the candidates.

  ‘Yes?’ Rashim answered her quickly before Stilson could go on any more. ‘What is it?’

  ‘Do you know how far we’ve overshot the receiver markers?’

  Rashim nodded forcefully and tried his most authoritative face. Here was a question he most certainly had an answer for. ‘Yes. I was able to successfully record the decay rate of the tachyon field. It’s quite simple really. Tachyon particles decay at a constant rate, a very similar principle actually to something like carbon dating where

  …’

  Keep it simple.

  ‘Well, basically, to cut a very long and boring technical explanation short, ladies and gents, we went back about seventeen years earlier than planned.’ He scratched his chin and offered them a wan smile. ‘Which, actually, I think is quite impressive really.’ He ran a hand through his hair. ‘Given the last-minute metrics I had to guess at.’ He shrugged and smiled. ‘It could have been a lot worse than that really.’

  ‘Seventeen years out… over half our people lost and most of our equipment gone!’ Stilson stepped forward. ‘Good God, man! This is already a damned mess! I know what the precise plans were for colonizing the past… that’s ancient history now. We’re going to have to take stock and — ’

  ‘Uh, well now, Mr Vice-president, yes… of course we may have to play out the “deployment phase” slightly differently.’

  ‘You can say that again, Anwar. Looks like we’ll be improvising the plan from now on.’

  The group were silent. Few of them had been briefed on the details of Project Exodus.

  ‘All right, listen up, everyone!’ barked Stilson. ‘Gather round closer! I’m going to bring you folks up to speed on what you need to know. What I’m about to tell you has been classified for top-level eyes only. Outside of the Exodus technical team, the only other eyes on this have been those of the President, myself and the joint Chiefs of Staff.’

  Rashim noticed how easily Stilson could rally everyone round.

  ‘This project has been in development for over five years, funded by what remained of our defence procurement budget, for what it was. Exodus was… and still is… our plan to transplant our values, our knowledge, our wisdom on to the infrastructure of an existing, well-established and robust civilization. The Roman Empire.’

  Rashim heard the vice-president’s audience stir.

  ‘A panel of historical experts identified a specific moment in time in which to deploy Exodus. We were meant to arrive towards the tail end of the reign of a weak emperor. A guy called Claudius. A weak emperor struggling to maintain his position in power. Now… the plan was quite simple. To offer our services, our technology, to this guy Claudius in exchange for executive power. In effect to become his governing body. And eventually, on his death, to replace Roman dictatorship with American-style Republican democracy.’

  Stilson turned and looked at Rashim pointedly. ‘But it appears things have gone very wrong.’

  Rashim felt all of their eyes fall on him. ‘Uh… now, yes. But you see most of you here are the wrong people. That is to say, you’re all the wrong weights and sizes; it’s thrown all my calculations completely out! Which is why we lost — ’

  ‘Dr Anwar,’ said Stilson, ‘what we don’t need to hear are excuses or technobabble after the fact. What we do need to do is start rethinking our plan of action. We’re here in this time now and that’s what we have to deal with. So, what we need to start finding out is exactly where we stand. What the situation is seventeen years earlier. Can you at least tell us something about that?’

  Rashim looked at the man and the others gathered behind him.

  You’ve lost them already. You’re not in charge any more. He realized it wasn’t knowledge or wisdom that made a leader. It wasn’t being smarter than everyone else. And, by God, he could perform intellectual somersaults round most of these morons. No, it was something as simple as the deep cadence of a voice, a certain way of addressing assembled people. A way of carrying yourself. Authority. Entitlement. Stilson had that all right. And Rashim none of it.

  ‘Dr Anwar?’

  He sighed, slid open the panel of the h-pad on his wrist and a faint holographic display hovered in the air in front of him. ‘Yes… there we go. So.’ He swiped through a timeline with his finger. ‘Ah, here we are. We’ll be dealing with a different Roman emperor. Not Claudius, but…’ His fingers traced along a glowing chart line to a name. ‘Caligula.’

  ‘What data do we have on this guy, Dr Anwar?’

  ‘Uh… let me just look that up on my…’ He hadn’t had the time to read up on the historical briefing Dr Yatsushita had the project historians put together. Not really. If things had been a bit less of a frantic rush these last few months and weeks, he might have been able to give it a cursory read-through. His job was the metrics, punching the numbers — getting them all here in one piece.

  ‘Emperor Caligula? I can tell you about him.’ All heads turned towards someone in the crowd. By the fading light Rashim vaguely recognized the face: one of the candidates. One of the few people who was actually meant to be there instead of another last-minute gatecrasher.

  ‘I know all about Caligula… God help us.’

  Stilson gestured for the crowd to allow the man through. ‘And you are?’

  ‘Dr Alan Dreyfuss. Roman historian. Linguist.’

  ‘OK, then, why don’t you go ahead and tell us what you know, Dr Dreyfuss?’

  The man was in his thirties, narrow-shouldered with a pot belly, a shock of sandy hair above glasses and a salt and pepper beard grown, Rashim suspected, to hide a double chin.

  ‘Oh, Caligula…’ Dreyfuss began shaking his head. ‘Oh boy, this guy’s bad news.’

  ‘Bad news? What do you mean?’

  ‘He’s mad.’

  ‘Mad?’

  ‘Uh-huh. Totally. Completely insane.’

  The people stirred, unhappy at the sound of that.

  ‘But look, I think there’s a way we can play this guy,’ said Dreyfuss, smiling.

  Stilson pursed his lips and nodded appreciatively. He seemed to like this guy. ‘All right, Dr Dreyfuss, let’s hear what you’ve got.’

  ‘Shock and awe. We’ll make an entrance.’ Dreyfuss played the crowd almost as well as Stilson. ‘This guy made his own horse a senator, would you believe? This guy, Caligula, believed in omens, portents; he was superstitious, paranoid.’

  Dr Dreyfuss grinned. ‘We’ll make him believe we’re gods.’

  CHAPTER 16


  AD 37, north-east of Rome

  The two MCVs bounced energetically across fields of wheat, leaving broad paths of flattened stalks in their wake. Rashim held on to the handrail as both hover-vehicles slid across a rutted track into the next field.

  Their approach was relatively quiet; the deep hum of electromagnetic repulsors was almost lost beneath the clatter of strapped-on equipment bouncing against the carbominium hull. He watched the heads and shoulders of slaves emerge from the tall, swaying stalks like startled meerkats. Eyes and mouths suddenly wide with horror, then gone as they scurried away in fear of their lives.

  Ahead of them a wider track thick with carts on the way into Rome became a sudden carpet of chaotic panic as slaves and merchants scattered into the fields and horses reared and bucked in their harnesses. The leading MCV veered left, on to the track. This one wasn’t ruts of dried mud but a cobbled stone track. A proper road in fact.

  ‘ All roads lead to Rome! ’ Stilson’s voice crackled over the comms-speaker.

  Rashim wrinkled his nose and sighed in silent disgust at the blowhard idiot’s appalling cliche. He looked at the back of Stilson in the MCV in front, standing on the vehicle’s front gun platform like some buccaneer admiral on the prow of his square-rigged ship. The vice-president was punching his fist in the air with childlike excitement.

  You let that jerk take over. Congratulations.

  He looked at the combat unit sitting beside him on the MCV’s hull, T1-38 calmly resting across muscular forearms. He covered his throat mic. ‘Looks like someone’s having fun, eh?’

  The unit had the reflective sun visor of his helmet pulled down. Rashim couldn’t see his eyes, just the bottom of his nose and the mouth, chewing on protein gum with all the grace of a horse munching on hay.

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  To be fair, Stilson and Dreyfuss’s rejigging of the plan called for a display of bravado. They’d lost way too much of their ammunition, power-packs, equipment and manpower to guarantee being successful taking control of Rome by force. Two dozen combat units and whatever number of rounds of ammo they were carrying on their equipment belts were enough to make a spectacular display of firepower, but not much more. Certainly not enough to take on several legions and a city of one million inhabitants.

  ‘ Hell! We’ll give ’em a display of shock and awe all right! ’

  Rashim vaguely recognized the catchphrase Stilson and Dreyfuss were using, uttered by some puffed-up presidential moron long ago. Shock and awe. Make them believe the gods have come down to earth! That was basically their plan. Roll right into the middle of Rome, make a ton of noise, intimidate the lot of them and take over the whole show. Simple.

  All puff and posture. Smoke and mirrors. Bluffing it to the hilt.

  Right up Stilson’s street.

  The MCV ahead suddenly lurched upwards and glided over an abandoned cart left in the middle of the road. As they did the same, Rashim glanced down through the open turret hatchway at the passengers he could see crammed in down below. Approximately fifty of them, standing room only. They swayed queasily as their vehicle rose and dipped alarmingly, like a dinghy riding a rough sea. He was glad he was up here outside and not tucked away down there; he’d have thrown up by now. Hover-transports always made him travel-sick.

  ‘Sir!’

  Rashim turned to the combat unit beside him. He was pointing dead ahead.

  He followed the unit’s gloved finger and saw down the arrow-straight cobbled road, flanking rows of evenly spaced, tall, thin cypress trees like a welcoming guard of honour. Beyond them the first faint outline of the city; a long pale wall, and hovering above a sea of terracotta tile roofs that receded into a morning haze, a myriad of hairline threads of smoke from countless cooking fires and kilns, bakers, blacksmiths and tanneries stoked up for a day’s business climbed lazily towards a Mediterranean sky.

  Rome.

  ‘Rashim, you hear me?’

  It was Stilson. ‘Yes, I can hear you.’

  ‘Ready to give ’em a show they’ll never forget, eh?’

  Rashim rolled his eyes. The vice-president sounded insufferably excited. ‘You really want to put that, uh… that music on?’

  ‘Goddammit! Yes, of course I do. Stick it on, man. As loud as you can!’

  Reluctantly Rashim ducked down inside the hatch and nodded to the combat unit piloting the MCV. ‘Stilson says to put that music of his on now. Loudly.’

  ‘Affirmative.’

  Almost immediately his ears were ringing from chest-thumping decibels of noise booming out of the vehicle’s PA system. Stilson’s choice of music, downloaded from his personal media digi-cube. Awful-sounding old stuff he called ‘rock music’.

  The speakers mounted outside on the front of both MCVs blared and thumped, and a ragged-throated singer was screaming something about being born in the USA…

  CHAPTER 17

  2001, New York

  Maddy set the tray down on the table between them. A strong, milky, sugary, frothy latte for her, and a fruit smoothie for Sal.

  ‘So?’ said Sal impatiently. ‘What is it about Liam?’

  Maddy settled into the booth and leaned over the table, her voice low. ‘So, it’s something Foster told me about him. He’s…’ She shook her head. ‘This is so weird, it’s gonna really mess with your head, Sal.’

  ‘Jahulla! Maddy! Just tell me!’

  ‘Liam and Foster… they’re the same.’

  She pulled a face. ‘What?’

  ‘The same. They’re the exact same person.’

  Sal turned to look out of the window. There was a market outside: grocers, fishmongers and milling customers. They could have sat outside the cafe; it was certainly warm enough this Monday afternoon, but, with the market going on, far too noisy for their need to talk in hushed whispers.

  ‘The same?’

  Maddy nodded. ‘Foster was once Liam.’

  Sal’s mouth hung open. Catching flies, an expression her mom used to use.

  Maddy nodded. ‘That’s right… give it a moment to sink in, Sal. It totally fried my head when Foster first told me.’

  ‘But what?… So that means…?’ Sal stopped, cocked her head and frowned, then tried again. ‘Are you saying Foster was young like Liam?’

  ‘Exactly like Liam.’

  ‘Foster’s been working for the agency since he was sixteen?’

  ‘Ahh, yeah, I guess… well, kind of.’

  Sal chewed the top of her straw, nibbling ferociously at it. She stopped. ‘So this means Foster was once on the Titanic?’

  Maddy nodded. ‘I think so.’

  ‘And he was recruited like Liam was?’

  ‘I guess.’

  ‘So then who recruited Foster?’

  ‘I don’t know… I don’t know!’ She looked down at her hands, playing with the handle of her teaspoon, stirring the frothy coffee unnecessarily. ‘Maybe another Foster?’

  ‘ Another Foster?’ Sal looked up at her. ‘Like it’s a loop or something? Like our archway field, but bigger? Looping round and round? Does that mean there are other us? Other you s and me s?’

  Maddy shrugged. ‘I’m still trying to figure how this all works. Perhaps it was someone else who recruited Foster.’ She hesitated. ‘Waldstein even?’

  ‘This is so chutiya! This is really scaring me, Maddy. I don’t know what to believe, what to think.’ She laughed. ‘It’s a chutiya — crazy idea.’

  ‘What is?’

  Sal shrugged.

  ‘Come on, Sal. What?’

  ‘Those two jackets? Liam being Foster?’ She looked up at Maddy. ‘Maybe… this is so totally chutiya, but maybe we’ve all been here before.’ A nervous, jittery half-smile flickered on to her face. ‘Maddy, the team that came before us. Do you remember Foster saying there was that team that died?’

  Maddy’s coffee was midway between the table and her mouth. It stayed there. ‘Oh my God! You think that was us?’

  Sal shrugged. ‘My diary… you know my diary?�
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  ‘That notebook you’re always scribbling in, yeah.’

  ‘There were pages ripped out when I found it.’

  ‘I thought you bought it?’

  ‘No, I found it in the arch.’ She played with her straw. ‘I found it tucked in my bunk.’

  ‘And?’ Maddy shook her head. ‘These ripped-out pages…?’

  ‘I think it might have been me writing in the diary before.’

  ‘Oh…’ was all she could say. Then, ‘I’m not sure I like the sound of this.’

  ‘Me neither.’

  The pair of them stared at each other. ‘We don’t know anything for sure, do we?’ said Sal finally. ‘We’re like little test rats in a lab.’

  Maddy nodded. ‘Feels like that sometimes.’

  She looked out of the window at the street outside. Not for the first time she wished she could just walk away from all of this; trade places with just about anyone out there on the street.

  ‘All I know is… I trust you, Sal. And I trust Liam too. As long as we’re honest with each other.’

  Sal turned to her. ‘But you did keep things from us. The note from San Francisco with that Pandora message. And now this, Liam being Foster. You’ve lied to us! So how can — ’

  ‘I… you’re right.’ Maddy’s eyes dropped guiltily. ‘But I’m done with all the secrets. You know everything I know now.’

  ‘And you said that before too.’

  ‘Well, this time I mean it, Sal. Seriously. No more secrets. You know what I know.’ She reached out for Sal’s hand, but she pulled it away. ‘Sal?’

  ‘You seem to have picked up this job, though, Maddy… I mean really easily. Like maybe you’ve done it before or something. Like maybe — ’

  ‘ Easy? You’re kidding, right? Tell me you’re kidding. You think it’s been easy for me? Sheesh…’ Maddy could hear her voice wobbling with emotion. She shut up before that wobble became tears. Pressed her lips and took a deep breath.

  Don’t you dare cry, Maddy. Don’t you dare go girly.

  She sipped at her coffee, not even wanting it any more. They sat in silence for a while, both watching the market outside for something to do other than look at each other.