Time Riders

CHAPTER 58

2001, New York subway

They found what they were looking for in a locked storage cupboard towards the backof the storeroom: three large metal drums of diesel fuel that sloshed encouragingly as Maddystruggled to ease them out on to the floor.

‘They’re way too heavy. I can barely move them, let alone carry one all the wayback to our archway,’ she said.

Foster pulled a face. ‘You’re right.’ He considered the problem, his eyesdarting along the storage shelves for inspiration. ‘All right then, we can pour the fuelinto a load of smaller containers that we could carry between us.’

‘But how much will we need?’

The truth was he didn’t know. He’d never used the generator, never needed to sofar. Last time it had been checked out it had chugged away quite happily for a few minutes. Ifhe knew something about diesel generators, if he was a mechanic, he could have probably madean educated guess as to how much fuel they were going to need.

Thing was… what he did know was that the time-displacement machinery was going to needto charge itself up before they could use it. Since the power had been cut for quite a fewhours now the charge would be flat. It was probably going to need the generator running adozen, maybe twenty-four hours before they’d be able to do anything. He had no idea at all how much fuel they needed for that. Probably quite a lot.

The girls were looking at him, hoping he had an answer.

Come on… think. How much will we need?

That depended on what the plan of action was. As it stood, they needed to transmit a messagethrough time to Bob to arrange a new return window. Where andwhen they opened the window were factors that would decide justhow much of a charge the displacement machinery needed.

And even if they did manage to get Liam and Bob back they’d need enough energy to sendthem back to the correct time and place to try to fix history.

There were too many variables for Foster to work out precisely how much fuel they needed.

‘Foster? How much do we need?’ asked Maddy again.

‘As much as we can carry,’ he replied. And if that wasn’t enough, theywould have to come back down here and get some more. A prospect he wasn’t too happyabout, and the girls most certainly wouldn’t be.

He looked around. There were half a dozen jerry cans further along the bottom shelf. If theyemptied those out and filled them up with diesel, then between them they’d be carryingtwelve gallons of fuel.

Enough?

It would have to be.

‘See those jerry cans?’ he said, pointing towards them. ‘We’re goingto fill them all up. That’ll give us twelve gallons.’

‘That going to be enough?’

Maybe. I hope so.

‘Foster?’

‘Sure,’ he replied. ‘That’ll do us fine.’

Maddy nodded, satisfied for the moment with his answer.

‘The next thing we’re going to have to figure out,though,’ he added, ‘is how we’re going to carry those jerry cans back home.Filled, they’re going to be very heavy. We’ll have to take them between us, one ata time. That’s six journeys.’

Sal turned to them both. ‘Hang on, I’ve got an idea.’

They emerged up the stairs from the subway station. Between them they lifted thepram laden with sloshing cans of fuel up off the last few steps and on to the rubble-strewnpavement. The pram’s large old-fashioned spoked wheels coped far better with the rubbleand debris than some shopping trolley with tiny little castor wheels would have.

It was getting dark. Foster had intended for them to be back at base safe and sound beforetoo much of the pallid grey daylight had gone from the sky. But things had taken them longerthan expected.

Never mind. They were above ground now, and even though dusk was settling across the lifelesscity, the three of them felt happier out in the open than they had down below. They eased thepram through the cluttered street, feeling those eyes upon their backs… watching andwaiting.

‘We’ll be back home soon,’ said Foster quietly.

Sal nodded. It wasn’t too far now. Just down East 14th Street, a right on to 4th Avenueall the way down to Delancey Street, then left over the bridge and home.

Maddy grinned anxiously.

‘Just takin’ the little ol’ baby out for a stroll down the avenue,’she muttered with a shaky sing-song tone. ‘Uh-huh… Just minding our business andheading home. Oh yes indeedy.’ Her eyes darted from one darkwindow to another.

‘How about we do those things quietly?’ said Foster.

Maddy giggled, then shut up.

Nerves.

The wheels rattled noisily over a scattering of rubble.

‘I reckon we’re being watched anyway, Foster,’ she replied quietly.‘Might as well make ’em think we’re not scared.’

Foster nodded. Maybe she’s got a point.

‘Well, a good day’s work, I think,’ he announced loudly. ‘I got afeeling that the worst of this is over.’

Sal looked up at him. ‘Do you think so?’

‘Sure. We’ll get this lot back. I’ll crank up the generator, get thingscharging up. We’ll have a nice hot cup of coffee whilst we wait. How does thatsound?’

‘Wonderful,’ she replied.

‘How long will it take until we can try bringing them back?’ asked Maddy.

Foster made a show of shrugging casually. His eyes, though, were on the lengthening eveningshadows on either side of the street. ‘I’d say about twenty-four hours until wecan actually try opening up a portal.’

‘Twenty-four hours!’ Maddy’s voice bounced off the nearest walls andrippled off down the deserted ruins of East 14th Street.

‘But — ’ he smiled — ‘the good news is that we should be able totransmit a message through to the support unit and Liam much sooner.’

‘Bob,’ said Sal. ‘That’s what we agreed to call him.’

‘Yes, I’m sorry… Bob.’

‘So, how does that transmitting-messages-through-time thing work exactly?’

‘I’m no physicist, Madelaine, so don’t start throwing questions at me. Butthe explanation I was given is that it’s all to do with tachyon particles. They’reparticles of matter that can travel faster than light and thus are able to travel throughtime. If we aim them at roughly where we expect Liam and Bob to be, then Bob’s on-board hardware will detect them and decode the message.’

‘But they can’t send a message back to us?’

Foster shook his head. ‘No. The particles can only travel back through time, notforward.’ He snapped his torch on, throwing a cone of light down the darkening street.‘We know they’re somewhere around Washington, so we’ll aim the tachyon arrayin that general direction.’

‘It doesn’t need to be that precise, then,’ said Sal, ‘you know,aiming the signal?’

‘Well, the more precisely you can aim the particles, the fewer particles you need tosend, which means you need less energy. If we knew exactly wherethey were standing, it would take a lot less energy. So, if we keep the message nice and shortand spread the beam wide… it amounts to just about the same power burn.’

Maddy nodded. ‘I think I get it. It’d cost the same energy if we had a longermessage but used a narrower beam.’

‘You got it.’

They walked in silence for a little while, accompanied only by the sloshing of the jerry cansin the pram and the clatter of its wheels over the rubble-strewn pavement.

‘I hope Liam’s all right,’ said Sal. ‘I know it’s been only afew days since he went back, but it feels like he’s been gone for ages.’

‘He has… from his point of view nearly six months has passed.’

She frowned. ‘That’s just so weird.’

They walked in silence for a while as she struggled with the idea that Liam’sexperience of this crisis had stretched over nearly half a year. ‘So… so how longhave you been a TimeRider?’ asked Sal. ‘You’repretty old, so I guess you must have been doing it for a while?’

‘Long enough, Sal,’ he replied, ‘long enough.’

‘Does it all make sense to you, yet?’

Foster shook his head and snorted dismissively. ‘Does it heck. It still messes with mymind.’