Johnny O'Brien - Day of the Assassins

Who was Orion? And the email had mentioned someone else too — a ‘she’ — ‘Lynx’. A man and a woman who could not be named. More mystery.

Then, just before the Rector had stormed in on them, Pendelshape said that he had set the Taurus “so that we can travel back in time to somewhere I know and where we will be safe, before being picked up”. So Pendelshape was concerned about something. Concerned enough to have already planned using the Taurus — against VIGIL rules — to carry out some sort of escape. He must have set it to send them back to the Portsmouth naval dockyards — where Jack had been transported. Maybe that made sense. Pendelshape knew all about 1914 — he had proved from the photo taken in Belgrade that he had travelled back to this time before. So he would be on familiar territory.

But Jack was still no closer to understanding why any of this had happened. Why was the Rector angry with Pendelshape? Why had Pendelshape wanted them to escape to 1914 and why did Orion need to be ‘protected’? Somehow, Jack and Angus, whether they liked it or not, had become embroiled in something big — and something they did not understand. Now he was alone and he was scared. It wasn’t like being on the back of Angus’s bike — then you knew it would be over quickly, one way or another. But this was different. The fear Jack felt was an all-enveloping fear that seemed to suck away at you from the inside.

But Jack had always been good at thinking things through and solving problems. And he knew part of the trick was to try not to let emotion get to you. Information. He simply did not have enough information yet to solve the confusing list of questions, so he would put them to one side until he did. But there was one question he did need to answer and that was, what was he going to do now? He fumbled around for the time phone and, through the gloom, he flipped it open and read its telltale message:

Date: Saturday 20th June, 1914

Time: 11.00 a.m.

Location: English Channel

That was right, Pendelshape had also said that the phone had its own energy source, so it would continue to say where and when he was. The screen had a kind of mini SATNAV with a map. Jack noticed that both the time and location had moved since his last reading. It confirmed that they were sailing up the Channel. So he would always know where he was. That might be handy. The yellow bar was still off — greyed out. Until it went on again there was nothing he could do and the Taurus and the people who controlled it — the Rector for one — would not be able to locate him. So he should be safe. In fact, he thought ruefully, perhaps the best thing to do would be just to waltz out and… give himself up. Say he had got lost or something… and then the crew would have to look after him, until they could maybe drop him at a port. It was a risk, but if Tony and Gordon had managed to spot him and then follow him aboard Dreadnought , he knew he would be a lot safer in the hands of the Royal Navy. Wasn’t that why they were supposed to be there anyway? To protect people?

Suddenly, the door of the hold banged open and light streamed in. Jack crouched down as far as he could, but it was in vain. A moment later a large pink face loomed down at him from the pile of sacks above.

“Sir — you ain’t going to believe this…”

“What is it now?” A gruff voice answered. The first face was joined by a second, which was equally surprised.

“I’ve seen it all now. A stowaway!”

“What’s your name, son. How did you get in there?”

Jack stared back at the two faces and calculated that politeness was the best policy.

“Sorry, sir, I mean, I was with the loading gang, er, and kind of fell asleep…”

The two men looked at each other, and then guffawed loudly.

“Someone’s going to cop it for this! Come out of there for a start. What did you say your name was?”

“Jack Christie.”

“Well, Christie, we will have to report you; it’s lucky for you that we’re just on exercises. Better get you tidied up. And then, I’m sure we can make use of you.” Jack thought the man looked like a cook. He laughed again, nodding at the sacks around him, “There’s this lot to sort out for a start.”

And with that, he was marched from the hold and soon found himself seated at a small table outside the galley.

“You stay there.”

The cook went off, but the sailor, with the pink face, looked at him sympathetically. “Don’t worry lad… Navy has a fine tradition of young men at sea. Nelson himself. We’ll get a signal home to let them know you’re safe. You look famished — tell you what — one of the boys will get you something…”

The sailor hurried off but reappeared with a large plate of stew and potatoes.

After a while the cook reappeared.

“Your lucky day, my lad! Seems that you have an audience in the chart house. Captain wants to know your story, exactly. Security breach and all that. Jones will take you up. And then…” he pointed back up the corridor, “we’ll get you to work.”

The sailor led Jack through a maze of metal corridors and up and down a series of ladders.

“We’ll take a short cut through the Admiral’s lobby,” he said.

As they moved on, Jack saw two figures ascending a ladder ahead of them. They were dressed in sailor’s garb, but had packs on their backs. Jack’s worst fears had come true — Tony and Gordon had followed him aboard Dreadnought .

“We’ve been asked by the Bridge to take him from here,” Tony said with authority to the young sailor.

Jack turned to run, but in an instant, Gordon had his arm in a vicelike grip. “Not so fast, Master Christie. You need to come with us.”

The sailor looked bemused but shrugged and wheeled round leaving Jack alone to his fate.

Jack smelled Tony’s stale breath as he whispered sneeringly into his ear, “Any noise, any tricks and you are dead meat. You’ve caused us a lot of trouble.”

Gordon parroted, “A lot of trouble.”

“Right then,” Tony said, “we are hoping to have a Taurus signal in the next few hours. But you never can tell. In the meantime, we’ve got to find somewhere to hide on this floating dung-crate until we can return to civilisation.”

“So we don’t draw any attention,” Gordon added.

“That’s right, Mr MacFarlane, attention is bad. Tell the boy why attention is bad Mr MacFarlane,” Tony said.

Gordon looked at Jack sardonically, “Attention is bad, because it can lead to interaction with the ’istorical environment.”

“And why is interaction bad, Mr MacFarlane?” Tony asked.

“Because, Mr Smith, interaction can cause stuff to happen.”

“That’s right Mr MacFarlane. What stuff might that be?”

“Consequences, Mr Smith, in your space-time continuum.”

“Continuum, Christie. Do you hear that?”

“You don’t want to mess around with your continuum,” Gordon said.

“Or to be more precise, a small change now might have significant repercussions for the future,” Tony added. “And that’s where we come in… we’re here to help VIGIL sort out problems — like this one. Sort of tidy up any unfortunate mess.”

“Time travelling bin men if you like…” Gordon gave a little shrug.

Tony gave his colleague a sidelong glance, not sure whether he approved of this particular description of their important role.

He turned to Jack, “Do you understand, my friend?”

Jack didn’t. He was very scared, “But… I…”

Tony interrupted him, “So, to be sure we have no more interaction than we possibly need, we are going to ask you to help us… Mr MacFarlane?”

Gordon unzipped his rucksack. Jack could see that it was stuffed with all sorts of equipment… not least the carefully packed weapon. Gordon opened a small plastic case. It contained an array of medical equipment and Gordon removed a rather large syringe together with a small bottle of fluid. Carefully, he placed the needle into the top of the bottle and sucked up a small quantity of the liquid.