Alex Scarrow - The Doomsday Code

The document appeared beside his dialogue box.

› Identifying text sequences that have changed.

Bob began highlighting all the parts of the text that had been altered. Which was to say, most of it.

Adam began to read snippets of it aloud. ‘… 1194, King Richard returns from the Third Crusade … reclaims his kingdom from his younger brother, John … the siege of Nottingham, John surrenders and begs for King Richard’s mercy. King Richard executes his brother for high treason … has him hung, drawn and quartered … ’

Adam shook his head. ‘That’s still wrong. The correct version is that Richard forgives him, lets him live.’

‘You sure?’ asked Maddy.

‘Of course I’m sure! You never heard of King John ?’

She shrugged. ‘I guess I saw a Disney cartoon once with a King John in it. But then he was, like, a fox or a lion or something, so I didn’t take it too seriously.’

Sal had been reading ahead. ‘There’s no mention of this peasant rebellion of the north any more.’

The other two read on.

‘Liam said he’d stopped the rebellion in his message,’ she added. ‘But … if you look what it says there, England’s still going to end up disappearing.’

Adam resumed skimming the document. ‘… 1195, King Richard announces the Fourth Crusade. ’ He looked at the girls. ‘Well, there was certainly no fourth crusade. That’s new.’ He resumed. ‘ The Fourth Crusade is championed by King Richard, his goal again to retake Jerusalem. This time round there is little support for it, despite a Papal Bull being issued .’

‘What’s one of those?’ asked Sal.

‘The Pope basically announcing God says it’s a cool idea .’

‘ King Richard raises ruinous taxes, and incurs crippling debts to fund the crusade and, in 1196, leaves England for the last time … 1197, King Richard and eleven thousand knights and men-at-arms are massacred by Saladin’s army at the Battle of Al Karak. With no successor in England, and the country bankrupt, anarchy ensues … 1199, King Philip II of France invades … and so on .’ Adam shook his head. ‘Same result still.’

‘England gets gobbled up by France,’ said Sal.

‘This fourth crusade didn’t happen, you say?’

‘No. In normal history, when Richard failed to take Jerusalem during the Third Crusade, that was pretty much the end of the wars in the Holy Land. All the Christian kingdoms just sort of lost the appetite to fight for it. None of them could afford another crusade anyway. Fact is, in normal history, when Richard returned home he turned his attention to rebuilding his kingdom, reclaiming territories he’d lost to the French in Normandy. That became his sole focus for the last six years of his life, getting back the lands he’d lost while he’d been on his holy war.’

Maddy pursed her lips. ‘Hmmm … something’s changed his focus.’

‘Focus?’ Adam shook his head. ‘More like obsession. I mean, what’s going on there? He ruins his country, he bankrupts himself and he launches what looks like a suicidal last crusade. Why?’

‘He went mad?’ said Sal.

‘Some historians say he was already a bit loopy.’

‘Something new, then,’ said Maddy. ‘Maybe something that Liam’s caused? Maybe something to do with the Voynich Manuscript?’ She took off her glasses and rubbed her eyes. ‘If there’s some other time traveller back there … then perhaps something they’ve done?’

The others looked at her silently. There were no answers. Only questions.

‘OK … all right, here’s what we do. We send back another data package of this new version of history and ask Liam if they’ve got any ideas at all what’s suddenly eating Richard that he wants to go back to Jerusalem again.’ She put her glasses back on. ‘Meantime, we’ve still got the scheduled six-month return window if they want to use that, or, if they want to come back any earlier, they’ll need to send us a time-stamp.’

1194, Sherwood Forest, Nottinghamshire

‘So … the pig says back to the farmer, “If ye sees what I seen yer wife’s up to, ye’d ’ave a curly tail too!”’ Eddie’s ruddy face crumpled like an old rug on a smooth polished floor. The other soldiers behind him, those within earshot, cackled along with him like a bunch of fishwives, their voices echoing off into the forest either side of the track.

Liam looked at the captain of his escort. ‘Sorry, Eddie, I’m not sure I get it.’

‘Well, sire … See, the pig’s been watchin’ the farmer’s — ’

Behind Eddie, one of the soldiers suddenly lurched forward. He dropped his shield and started clawing with both hands at his throat.

‘What’s …? Whuh?’

Then Liam saw a bright spurt of crimson gushing from the young man’s flapping mouth, and for the first time noticed the stub of a crossbow bolt protruding from the front of his throat.

Eddie responded far more quickly. ‘FORM UP!’ His parade-ground voice filled the forest trail just as another dozen projectiles whistled through the air towards them. Two arrows thudded into the horse’s flank either side of Liam’s right thigh. The horse reared up and he rolled backwards over the beast’s rump to land heavily on the hard mud track. The horse bolted, leaving a wake of dust behind it.

Liam was winded, lying on his back gazing up at a rich blue summer’s sky punctuated by blurred slithers of movement — arrows and bolts passing overhead. He struggled to get a breath in him and then eventually, suspecting he’d spent the better part of a minute on his back, he hefted himself dizzily up on to his elbows.

Through a cloud of dust he could see his men, shields raised above their heads as they clustered around him, squatting down in a protective circle. The peace of the forest was lost in the deafening rattle of arrow tips clattering off their shields.

‘It’s an ambush!’ Liam struggled to gasp as he pulled himself on to his hands and knees.

Eddie looked back over his shoulder and nodded. ‘Worked that out, sire!’

Over the rim of shields, Liam could see their attackers now: flitting dabs of olive and brown rags among the trees and bracken. Impossible to guess how many of them but far more than his escort of twelve, he figured.

He cursed himself for not having Bob come along with them yesterday. But he’d been far more concerned that the rest of the column, laden with wagons of food and several bags of coins, made its way back to Nottingham Castle without incident.

Too cocky, by half .

He’d made the mistake of believing the bandits had fully moved on from Sherwood Forest. That he’d done a better job of shooing them off than he apparently had. If he’d only just taken Bob with him … even just another ten or twenty men?

You idiot.

One of Eddie’s lads grunted deeply and rolled flat on his back, an arrow through one eye. One of his legs twitched and drummed against the hard-baked mud as he went into shock.

‘Sire!’ barked Eddie. ‘We should keep moving!’ He nodded up the forest track, the way they’d been heading. He was right. They’d been well on the way home. Another two hours … and the forest gave way to open fields across a rolling hill down to Nottingham. If they kept in tight formation, kept their shields up, kept moving, they’d have a better chance than they would staying put here.

‘Right … yes!’ Liam nodded.

Eddie barked at his men, ordering them to tighten up closer together. ‘With me now!’ he yelled, and began to step forward. The other men followed suit, with Liam huddled in the middle, pulling the thick velvet cloak round his neck, as if it had any chance of stopping an arrow.