CHAPTER 41

65 mil ion years BC, jungle

Howard noticed the young boy walking alongside him, sloshing through the warm seawater.

‘Hey,’ he said.

Edward smiled. ‘Hey. You always cal ed Leonard, or do your friends cal you Lenny?’

Howard shrugged; not a question he’d anticipated being asked. ‘Uh … mostly just Leonard,’ he replied. ‘My mom cal s me Lenny, but I hate that.’

‘I heard someone say your best subject is math.’

He nodded. ‘It was my –’ He stopped, inwardly cursing.

‘It … is … my favourite school subject. Always loved math. It’s like, wel , I dunno … I suppose it’s like a sort of poetry that only a few people get. If you know what I mean? It’s, like, exclusive.’

Chan nodded. ‘Yeah, I know what you mean. That’s why I like it. It’s something I know and other people don’t. It makes me feel kind of special, I guess. Maybe that’s why I don’t have any friends at school, cos they think I’m odd.’

Howard nodded. ‘Yeah, I guess I’m the same. A loner.’

He squinted up at the bright sun. ‘Never ever get picked for sports, because I’m the geek.’ He shrugged. ‘But that’s OK, cos I never liked sports anyway.’

OK, cos I never liked sports anyway.’

Edward nodded. ‘Me neither. It’s for jocks and dit oheads.’

‘Dit o-heads?’ Howard laughed. ‘I like it.’

‘You never heard that expression?’

Not in my time, he almost answered. But instead he just shook his head.

‘Hey!’ said Edward suddenly, and bent down to scoop up a curious twisted ammonite shel from the shingle.

‘See? There are even bigger ones of those,’ said Howard, nodding at some of the others, wading waist deep in the clear blue water, occasional y ducking down to pul shel s out of the water to admire them.

They walked on in silence for a while, going a lit le further into the warm water. Up ahead, leading the way and deep in conversation, Howard could see the two

‘agents’ – Liam and his robo-girl. He shook his head at the irony of it. Despite their turning up in 2015 to ‘save’ Chan, they were al on the same side real y, al trying to prevent the nightmare of time-travel technology from destroying the world. Same goal … di erent methods. He wondered how he’d never come across this agency in al the years of his campaigning, al the ral ies and protests he’d been to

… and no one, no one, had ever suggested, even as a joke, that there might be an agency out there actual y using time travel itself to combat the corruptive e ects of time travel. He wondered who was behind it, who’d set it up. Surely not the American government? Not any government, in fact. The international y agreed penalties for that were fact. The international y agreed penalties for that were severe. No politician would have the guts to risk having anything to do with time travel, because international law was brutal and strict on this mat er. It was an automatic death penalty for any involved. The great Roald Waldstein had been a powerful speaker on the horrendous dangers of it. A great man, an in uential man. Howard’s smal campaigning group had achieved far less. His group was lit le more than bunches of students in universities and col eges around the world.

But this secret agency, they were going about mat ers in the wrong way. At empting to repair history that had been damaged by careless travel ers? That was very much like trying to close the barn door after al the horses have bolted. No – worse than that … it was having to go out and hunt al those horses down then drag them kicking and screaming al the way back to the barn. On the other hand, his campaign group’s approach had been far simpler.

Destroy the possibility of time travel at its very root. Instead of closing the barn door, they were burning the cursed thing down with al the horses stil inside. He looked at Edward Chan. The boy smiled back at him then looked down at the lustrous pink and purple sheen of the shel in his hand. He stroked the smooth surface, then held it out. ‘You can have it if you want it, Leonard.’

Howard shook his head. ‘No, it’s er … no thanks.’

He has to die, you know that, Howard? Burn the barn, right? Burn it long before any horses get out. right? Burn it long before any horses get out. He realized he was delaying the necessary, put ing it o and put ing it o . And yet he knew it had to be done. In theory the future – the future after the year 2015 – must already be changing, must have changed by now. It would be a world where this boy vanished in an explosion and never got to ful l his destiny. It was surely a world where a man cal ed Roald Waldstein would never become the gurehead of an international campaign, never become a bil ionaire from al his other inventions, never become a household name. And, yes, this world would stil have its problems: dwindling supplies of resources, global warming, rising seas, migrating bil ions and dangerous levels of over-population. But … at least it would no longer have the ever-present threat of complete and ut er annihilation dangling over it.

He’d once heard a speaker at a ral y ask the audience what must lie beyond the dimension of space-time we al exist in. Is it Hel ? And to meddle with dimensions beyond what we know was surely no di erent from opening a door to the devil himself and inviting him right on in. He’d spoken of a medieval artist cal ed Hieronymus Bosch who’d claimed he’d once caught a glimpse of the devil and the underworld and painted endless nightmarish visions of what he’d seen. Perhaps, the speaker had said, perhaps what he’d glimpsed were dimensions beyond our understanding, a momentary rip in space and time. Howard shuddered at the thought.

You know the boy has to die, Howard. Burn the barn. You know the boy has to die, Howard. Burn the barn. Burn the barn. What are you waiting for?

He was so deep in thought he didn’t at rst register the voices from further up the beach. Voices crying out a warning, screaming a warning back at them.

Edward grabbed his arm and yanked him hard.

Howard’s thoughts were shaken away.

‘What the h–?’

‘RUN!’ screamed Edward, pointing his nger at something behind him. Howard turned round to see an odd-looking dark wave approaching him fast. Water rol ed down either side of an enormous grey hump, sliding up the shal ows towards him like a gigantic torpedo. He spot ed a large n at the top of the large grey hump –

large, very large … the size of a car, no, bigger – the size of a bus!

Edward was stil pul ing him back from the thing, trying to get Howard’s leaden ght-or-ight response to do something. Howard started to react, but far too sluggishly, too clumsily. He stumbled backwards over something in the thigh-deep water and an instant later was ailing on his back, his head underwater. Surfacing a moment later, splut ering for air, his legs scrambling to nd a steady footing below, al he could see now was an approaching dark cave, riding up out of the shal ow water at him like a freight train, a cave lined with stalactites and stalagmites of razor-sharp teeth and dangling tat ers of rot ing meat swinging between them.

‘OH NO!’ was al he could scream as the gliding mass of

‘OH NO!’ was al he could scream as the gliding mass of glistening grey hide nal y came to an abrupt rest and the cave, easily six foot across, snapped shut round one of his feet. He felt a vice-like grip on his ankle, the tough leather of his combat boots compressed agonizingly tight as something hard and sharp pressed from the outside. Then the beast began shaking its head vigorously from side to side and he knew bones had to be breaking and splintering in his ankle as he swirled through the water. Howard’s head was underwater. He felt pebbles, rocks and shel s grind painful y up his back, and knew that meant the creature was now manoeuvring itself back from the shal ows into deeper water.

He was holding his breath amid the tumbling

underwater chaos … and, for a eeting second, wondered why he was bothering to do so.

I’m gonna die. Surely bet er to breathe out now and drown than experience the agony of being ferociously dismembered by this thing?

Then, without warning the incredible pressure round his now-shat ered ankle was gone. He ailed with his arms to right himself, to nd solid ground on which to place his feet. He caught something with his hand, the rounded side of another ammonite shel . So that’s down. He tried to stand up and realized the creature must have pul ed him further out than he’d thought in those few seconds. Final y his head broke the surface and he realized the water was chest deep.

The air was thick with screaming voices and spray. The air was thick with screaming voices and spray. And the rst thing he saw was Chan, a few yards away, screaming abuse at the giant shark and jabbing his spear repeatedly at the creature’s nose. Its head snapped and swung from side to side, trying to get a grip on the fragile spear, trying to get past the spear to Chan, on whom it had decided to vent its frustration.

Howard waded through the water, painful y slowly, the chest-high sea in col aboration with the giant predator, wanting to slow him down. His one good foot kept slipping on the slimy rocks below, barely giving him enough purchase to make his way to shal ower water. Behind him he heard Chan stil hurling abuse and stil stabbing and prodding, and the hiss and roar of water turned frothy white by the enraged shark thrashing in the shal ows. Then he slipped again and fel under the water. He felt a hand under his arm, then another, lifting him clear again. It was the robo-girl.

‘Remain calm,’ she said emotionlessly.

‘What … about … Chan?’ he found himself gasping. She dragged him back to water shal ow enough for him to crawl on his hands and knees. Then she let him go and headed back into the sea.

He turned and sat in the gently lapping waves, exhausted and vaguely aware of the burning agony of snapped and twisted bones down at the end of his leg. He watched Becks splashing through the water towards where Chan was stil managing, incredibly, to keep the shark at spear’s length.

spear’s length.

That’s a very big sh, was the last coherent thought his mind managed to put together before the world seemed to slump over on to its side.

∗

Liam watched the young man as he came round. ‘Leonard?

How are you feeling?’

‘Hurts,’ he grunted thickly.

Becks leaned over him. ‘There are no broken bones, but your Achil es tendon has snapped and there is a signi cant contusion and several abrasions to your lower leg. This wil hurt, but it wil also mend.’

‘On the other hand,’ said Liam, ‘the bad news is your boot didn’t make it.’

Howard half smiled, half winced. A re crackled brightly high up on the beach, throwing dancing skeins of amber light and dark shadows across the shingle down to the softly lapping waterline.

Edward Chan joined them. ‘Hi,’ he said. ‘You OK?’

Howard looked up at him. ‘You … you saved my life.’

Edward shrugged. ‘I just poked my stick at it for a while.’

‘My God, we were lucky,’ said Howard, wincing again as he adjusted his position.

‘No,’ said Liam sombrely, ‘no, we weren’t. Ranjit’s missing.’

Liam vaguely recal ed he’d been at the back of their party, wading slowly through the water, fal ing behind the others. They’d foolishly al owed themselves to become others. They’d foolishly al owed themselves to become strung out al along the beach, enjoying the tropical sea like holidaymakers. They’d al owed themselves to feel a false sense of security with the peaceful at sea to one side and a wide open beach on the other.

‘Poor guy,’ whispered Howard.

‘That shark thing must have got him rst.’

Liam wondered about that. He’d been about a hundred yards back. Surely they would have heard the rush of water as that shark slid out of the surf? Surely they would have heard Ranjit scream? He looked out into the dark and wondered whether it had been that shark, or perhaps it had been those dark shapes he thought he’d seen earlier this afternoon, scat ering to the ground and disappearing like ghosts as he’d turned back to look over his shoulder. Now, was that real? Did I real y see that?

‘We were lucky,’ said Kel y, ‘that it only got the one of us. I mean, did you see the size of that thing? Bigger than a kil er whale.’

‘This is the age of the big predators,’ said Whitmore.

‘Big ones. The golden age for the giant carnivores.’ He looked ashen-faced, shaken stil , even several hours after the incident. ‘And we’re prey.’

‘It’s not the golden age for much longer,’ said Franklyn.

‘If this is sixty-ve mil ion years ago, then we’re near the end of the Cretaceous era. Something happens soon on Earth that wipes out al the big species. Fossil hunters cal it the K–T boundary. Beyond that thin layer of sedimentary rock, you don’t nd dinosaurs any more. Certainly not the rock, you don’t nd dinosaurs any more. Certainly not the big ones.’

‘Good,’ said Laura.

‘The big asteroid?’ said Juan. ‘That’s what kil ed them al , right?’

Franklyn shrugged. ‘It’s stil debated. Could have been an asteroid, or a super volcano. Or it could simply have been a sudden climatic shift. Whatever extinction event happened, the large species were extremely vulnerable to it.’‘It won’t happen while we’re stil here, wil it?’ asked Jasmine. She looked as unset led and shaken as Whitmore. Franklyn snorted dismissively. ‘Unlikely.’

‘So,’ Edward mut ered softly. ‘Now there’s only fteen of us. If no one comes for us, we won’t make it, wil we?’

The others huddled around the re heard that and it stil ed their quiet murmurings until al that could be heard was the soft draw and hiss of the waves and the crackle of burning wood.

Becks broke the silence. ‘Leonard, I have constructed a pair of crutches for you.’

Howard eased himself up on to his elbows. ‘We’re stil going on?’

Liam nodded. ‘Yes, we’re nearly there.’ He pointed up the beach. ‘Another four or ve miles around this bay and we should be there. It’s our only hope … so we’re going on.’Whitmore nodded. ‘Right. We can’t go back now.’

Laura shu ed closer to the re, hugging her shoulders Laura shu ed closer to the re, hugging her shoulders against the cool night air. ‘This wil work, won’t it?

Somebody wil nd your message and they’l come for us?’

Liam grinned. ‘Sure they are. They’re already looking for us. And hopeful y leaving them this message wil help them narrow down their search. Trust me … it’s going to work out al right.’ He looked at Becks. ‘Right?’

She nodded, seeming to understand that the others needed to hear something positive and certain from them.

‘Liam is correct.’