Time Riders

CHAPTER 49

2001, New York

‘Sal will be all right out there, won’t she?’ asked Maddy.

Foster was scrolling through their history database. ‘She’ll be justfine.’

They’d found her a plain dark-blue T-shirt and grey jeans. They belonged to a member ofthe previous team and were large on her, almost swamped her. But she stood out far less thanshe did wearing her favourite emo clothes.

‘No one will notice a little girl,’ he added. ‘She’s just a harmlesschild.’

Maddy shuddered. ‘It looks so grim, so grey and ordered outthere.’

She had stepped out with Sal briefly to get a glimpse of this alternate New York. The citylooked tidy and drab. The only colour amid the uniformly monotone towers was the stabs ofbright red from unfurled banners and pennants that dotted the city skyline.

Foster nodded. ‘It is grim. But, for an innocent child just walking around, perhapswalking home from school or an errand to a shop, it’s probably a great deal safer rightnow than it would be otherwise.’

‘What do you mean?’

He looked up from the screens. ‘I don’t imagine they have a crime problem, hmm?This is a fascist state. I think it’s a safe bet that muggersdon’t get away with a slapped wrist and a behaviour order in this version of NewYork.’

Maddy nodded. ‘I guess not.’

‘Anyway, back to business,’ he said. ‘I suggest we pick a return windowwithin the vicinity of the White House, not too far away but safely beyond any securityperimeter. We need to see whether they have a map of Washington in this new Nazi version. Thecity may be different, sections rebuilt.’

‘OK.’

‘So that’s the where. We need to now consider thewhen. I have a suggestion for that. We set it for the lastpossible time for their mission. Bob’s maximum mission durati-’

Maddy felt it. Light-headed, as if she was losing her balance.

The screens went blank and a moment later the fizzing strip light above them winked out,leaving them in pitch black.

‘What the — ?’

‘That was a time shift.’ Foster’s voice emerged from the dark beside her.‘A big one. I felt it as well.’

‘We’ve lost power,’ whispered Maddy. ‘That’s not good, isit?’

‘It means that whatever the world is like outside our fieldbubble, we’re no longer able to tap electricity from it.’ Foster balledhis fists with frustration. ‘In fact, the field generator’s down as well. Thatmeans there’s no forty-eight-hour flip-back. We’re well and truly stuck in this world’s timeline… whatever it is.’

‘I’m not sure I like the sound of that.’

‘We should take a look,’ he said quietly.

She heard his chair scrape on the concrete. ‘Come on.’

She stood up, her hands spread out in front of her.

‘This way.’

She followed his voice across the floor.

‘Keep coming.’

A moment later her fingers brushed the crumbling brick wall.

Foster cursed under his breath. ‘I hate winching this wretched thing up.’

‘I’ll give you a hand,’ said Maddy. She felt her way along the wall untilher fingers brushed the winch box. She found a space on the handle beside Foster’s frailold hand.

‘Let’s get to it, then,’ he said quietly.

They pulled on the handle and it creaked round. The shutter door began to crank up slowly andnoisily.

A faint afternoon light eased into the room, pushing back the absolute darkness behindthem.

‘Looks like another grey day in Manhattan,’ laughed Maddy skittishly.

The shutter inched up until it was waist height.

‘That’ll do, Madelaine,’ said Foster. ‘Duck down, will you, and takea look?’

She nodded. ‘Sure.’

She stooped down and peered outside. The backstreet was littered with rubble and twistedspars of rusted metal that looked like they had tumbled down from the bridge above many, manyyears ago. A tangle of coarse dry weeds emerged through it all and laid claim to the ground,nature clawing its way back.

Maddy slid under the shutter and stood up on the other side.

‘What do you see?’

She glanced up at the bridge above them, the one that had majestically crossed the HudsonRiver only moments ago. It was now little more than a creaking ruined web of rusted metalstretching across the river. In the distance the tall slab-like buildings ofthe Nazi-Manhattan she’d observed a short while ago as she’d let Sal out nowlooked like the crumbling stubs of rotten teeth. Bare skeletons of iron sprang from collapsedruins across the river. The sun hung low and heavy like a bloodshot eye peeking throughscudding brown clouds that looked threatening and toxic.

New York was utterly dead. An apocalyptic wasteland.

Something dreadful had happened here. It had happened decades ago from the look of the sparseand withered plant life that emerged here and there among the crumbling ruins.

‘My God, Foster… it’s… it’s the end of the world,’ shesaid, hearing her own voice catch, falter and die in her throat.

The end of the world.