 
Quantum Jump

Contents.

Prologue

Chapter 1 The Forgotten Soldiers

Chapter 2 The Primary Cause

Chapter 3 Martineau

Chapter 4 Potdam 1997

Chapter 5 Dusseldorf 1997

Chapter 6 Finders Keepers

Chapter 7 Visitors

Chapter 8 Three Shades of Grey

Chapter 9 The Man who would start wars

Chapter 10 Sigmund Best

Chapter 11 The Café Baccus at Venlo

Chapter 12 Ash Dieback

Chapter 13 Goddard

Chapter 14 Ertgetsog

Chapter 15 Meeting of Illuminate

Chapter 16 The Bolshevik Hoards

Chapter 17 The Second Battle

Prologue

If you are reading this as a stand-alone novel, you might find the following information of interest.

Five people landed on Mars: (book 2)

Colonel Preston Ashton, NASA. (Ash.) Friends with Jake Jensen, they had served in a squadron of F-22 Raptors before leaving the USAF for NASA.

Colonel Jake Jennings, NASA. Ex-Raptor pilot.

Svetlana Danilenko, Russia. Expert scuba diver, took up with the Cosmonaut facility at Baikonur.

Squadron Leader Mark Singelton, RAF. Trained as a builder before joining the RAF. Most of the construction has been done by the Geralds, and other robots, but the human touch is essential, especially on the long journey to Mars and back.

Hoshi Masuto, Japan. Scientist.

Other characters in this story include Michelle Romero, a secretary at NASA, more than a friend to Ash.

Semeramis, (Sem), the Goddess of communications. One of The Illuminate, you will know of Semeramis; said to be the model for the Statue of Liberty, and the face on the emblem of Starbucks. She had control of something called Hilbert Space, a means of communicating more akin to telepathy than speech. (qv; Google it, it really exists).

The Marquis of Libeaux, known now as Marq. The family leader of The Illuminate, and only survivor from that family. Older than Zeus.

Mark Singleton was killed whilst on Mars, but he discovered a secret; a strange set of people on Earth had been behind the Mars mission. (book 3)

These people were The Illuminate.

This story is what happened to these people on Earth after most of The Illuminate; Romanov, Mrs Hapsburg, del Banco, Rockefeller, and Xanthros met a sticky end. (book 5)

But they left behind a secret experiment they had been toying with – a time machine. Unfortunately, only one human could use it – Marq. He was assisted in running this machine by Sem and an unknown number of humanoid robots called Geralds, who had been allowed to develop themselves – that is why they all looked the same.

There were six people who disembarked from the aircraft at Bergerac airport. Three of whom had walked on Mars. Hoshi Masuto had returned to her native Japan,

Marq took delivery of a Renault people carrier.

Ash and Jake rearranged the luggage in the back, whilst Michelle and Galina climbed in to the rear seats with Semeramis opposite them, all three women together.

'Have you been here before, Sem?' asked Galina.

'Yes, on several occasions. It has been under construction and development for fourteen years now.'

Michelle wanted to know,

'And it's all been kept secret all the time? Didn't someone notice a massive industrial development being constructed amongst them?'

'There was only one man, the local farmer. We simply bought his farm, and left him in it on condition that he does not speak to anyone about what is going on. The French are very good at keeping secrets.'

Jake joined them, and Ash sat with Marq in the front seats for the journey to Martineau.

The scientific setup in central France was well hidden. Even along the half mile drive from the D688 the buildings were not visible until right at the very end. A slight turn; and a dip in the landscape hid it from view, but the biggest part of the whole setup was hidden beneath fields of sunflowers in the surrounding countryside.

Suitcases were deposited in the hallway by the bottom of the stairs. Marq said to the group,

'I suppose the first thing to do is show you what we have here.'

They followed him into a room to the right of the hallway; away from the main part of the large house. To the left of this room was a short corridor with a bathroom on the left. Opposite the bathroom was a door; an ordinary door with an electronic lock. Upon opening it Marq showed the group into another small corridor. At the end was a door leading outside with a window looking outside towards a small building. On both sides of this passageway were what looked like elevator doors. Marc tapped a keypad on the right wall. Doors silently slid open; he led the group into the elevator.

They seemed to descend for quite a long time; but with no external reference points it was impossible to say how far down they descended.

The doors opened into a whole new world for the NASA employees.

'The whole setup extends far under the fields above in a circle over half a mile across.' Marq said, 'The main control centre is through here.'

He led them into an adjoining room. Here was the usual wall mounted display; this one showed a circle with blocks at various points around it.

Without realising it, Jake said,

'What's all this?'

'Wormhole Control Centre.' Marq said.

Jake looked completely askance at Marq,

'Whaaa?'

'We all have a conception of what a wormhole is, but to be sure we are all on the same page; a wormhole is the name we have given a place where there is a gap in the space/time continuum. This allows passage from one place to another without disturbing the time element normally associated; this means that time can stand still. We have now managed to harness this anomaly, to the result that we can now not only move without moving through time, but we can actually move back in time.'

Jake literally stepped back involuntarily, he looked at Ash,

'Well, that makes it so much clearer, don't it. Ash?'

Ash slowly shook his head as they went into another, smaller room. Inside they found a completely alien setup.

Marq led them to a side, where they found what looked like something that could be a human interface.

Ash asked,

'If there's room in there I would dearly love to come with you.'

Marq said,

'It isn't the room that's the problem; if you went back twenty years, say, you would emerge as you were twenty years ago – including what you knew twenty years ago. In fact you would be exactly the same person with the same knowledge; there would be no difference. This is the way nature avoids a paradox. I am different.'

Jake pointed out something,

'If it is not possible for Ash to travel back in time, how was Galina to cope on the way to Sirius?'

'That is a different time travel.' Marq replied, 'Galina would be travelling forwards about 100 years. Coupled with a kind of suspended animation called Statis that is possible.' He turned to Ash, 'If you wanted to travel back over 100 years, we can't use Statis in this case, but I can stand that – you would emerge at age minus 60 years.'

Jake saw the funny side,

'He's right, you know; your clothes wouldn't fit!'

Marq said,

'Now you understand the systems we have here, what do you suggest we do with it?'

Ash and Jake looked at each other querulously, not knowing what to say.

Eventually Ash pointed out,

'Am I right in presuming that this is to be some sort of experiment? A prototype as it were?'

'Yes, Ash. We have been working up to manipulating the time and place designating within the system. Now, here, I think we have reached all of our goals.'

Jake said,

'How about doing a trial drop at Dunkirk?'

'What date? Any particular sector?' Marq replied.

'26th May, 1940.' Jake said quickly, 'I heard that one of my ancestors died there on that day.'

Semeramis said,

'Interesting. Any more on that?'

'There was a place named.' He thought for a moment, 'Grand Sinth, or something like that.'

'Very well, Semeramis. Could you set up the equipment, the Geralds will help you, plus return contingencies? I must now get ready for my own leap into the past.'

Sem took some time to be as precise as possible. Marq changed into the World War Two uniform of a French soldier, and then took his seat as the others left the room.

..............................
Chapter One

The Forgotten Soldiers

In a village hall just outside Grande-Synth, only 6 kilometres from Dunkirk, an adjutant of the French Army greeted his new commander.

'This is a terrible situation.' The Adjutant began, 'Are the Germans going to stop to negotiate peace?'

The Lieutenant-Colonel did not respond as he sat down at his desk.

Presently he lifted his head and said,

'No. They will not be suing for peace; they fully intend to punish us for Versailles.'

He moved papers around on the desk,

'And it will be these poor men who will bear the brunt of it.'

He looked up again,

'Have you vetted all these men yourself?'

'Yes, Sir. But the orders that came down were a little – well, should we say obscure.'

'They had to be; would you like it to be your name that ordered these men to commit suicide?'

'But we are charged with passing the orders on.'

'Yes, and I would advise you to keep your name off any documents relating to this operation.'

The Adjutant shrugged,

'All these names - ' He held another list, 'they will surely know we passed the orders on. You cannot keep secrets as easily as that.'

'We will not be keeping the secret. These men are all volunteers, no?'

'Yes sir.'

'And when we asked for volunteers, what was the criteria?'

The Adjutant thought a little,

'It was stipulated that they should be single, and have no living relatives.'

'And why do you think that was so?'

'Is it because this is a dangerous mission?'

'Not exactly, Henri.' The officer put the papers down, 'This is a suicide mission.' He stood up, and moved closer to the Adjutant as his voice became lower, 'It looks like we shall be facing SS troops. They take no prisoners, when this sorry mess is over, questions may well be asked. We do not want civilians walking around asking 'What happened to my uncle?' and 'Who sent him on this death mission with no hope of surviving it?' even if the Germans are in control, and we lose, there could easily be recriminations. And these will not be nice.'

A commotion was heard outside.

Before either the Officer or the Adjutant could make it to the door a stranger walked in. This was a serious breach of security. The stranger could easily be a German in a cobbled-together French uniform – this one did not look familiar.

The man spoke French, but neither could place the accent. The Adjutant drew his sword; the Officer placed his hand on his pistol.

The man said,

'I have come from Wormhoudt. There are SS Totenkopf attacking the place – and we think they may be heading here.'

The Officer replied,

'What unit are you with, soldier?'

'I was separated from my unit; and became attached to Second Royal and Warwicks.'

'And your unit in the French army?'

'Part of the 21st Infantry Division, Sir.' Marq did not want to be more explicit.

'Did you volunteer for this assignment?'

'Yes, sir.' He put an added note of urgency in his voice as he continued, 'We have heard that the SS do not take prisoners. Well, they do, and then they murder them in cold blood; even the wounded.'

The Officer looked at him with renewed respect – a man about to die.

'Very well – what is your name?'

'Libeaux, sir.' Marq said as he reached for his papers.

'That will not be necessary. There is a copse of trees half a kilometre west of here. Report to the sergeant there.'

Marq saluted, did a smart about turn, and marched out towards the small copse of trees.

The Adjutant shuffled through papers,

'I can't find any mention of that man here.'

The Officer thought for a moment,

'Of course you won't find him there; he came from a different unit.'

The Adjutant shrugged his shoulders.

Marq found some sixty men busy hiding a French 75mm artillery piece in a clump of trees and brush.

He nearly walked past them; they were doing such a good job of concealing their work and equipment.

The tall Cyprus trees swayed gently as he approached. He couldn't help thinking,

'What am I doing here? How do I expect to change anything?'

Sergeant Maurice Bisson was a tall man from Nice. As soon as Marq saw him he was struck by the resemblance to Jake Jensen.

Marq had been practicing his French salute, but also protocol. He almost began a salute when he realized that you do not salute non-commissioned officers (NCOs).

The NCO looked askance at Marq's uniform,

'Escaped from your unit?'

'Pardon?'

'By the state of your uniform I don't blame you. We are expecting the Hun to come along this road,' he indicated a road less than one kilometre away, 'You can mount sentry duty on the left flank. If you see any enemy we must not allow him to get behind us.'

Marq did as he was ordered. As he lay there, watching the road, an eight-wheeled German scout car drove down the road, The French soldiers watched it go - the 75 remained silent.

Marq turned to a soldier on his left. He signalled confusion by holding an open palm combined with a shrug of the shoulders. The soldier held up an index finger, and then pointed at the road,

'Wait, monsieur, they will come, they will come.'

Less than four minutes later they heard the distinctive rumble and clank of metal tracks on a metalled road surface.

The soldier said in a low voice, which he knew was unnecessary,

'Now we wait for the best time.' He continued in an almost conspiratorial air, 'Panzer II. Two 20 millimetre cannon – but they cannot fire accurately on the move.'

First one, and then another Panzer appeared, and then another, and another. When they were certain they could see all of the tanks in the line the French opened fire. First the lead tank was hit, to stop the convoy, and then at the last tank to prevent them running back to cover in order to mount a counter-strike.

'These French gunners are good.' Marq thought as the ends of the convoy were sealed off.

The turrets of the remaining tanks began to swivel towards the coppice. The return fire was not enough to cause any consternation among the troops; They did not even bother returning fire; except for the 75. Another two Panzers were dispatched before their comrades began turning towards the 75 in the woods. That made no difference to the French; their artillery piece began to get in its stride. That left only four tanks. These were now heading for the French infantry. As they left the road they began down a small depression. The 75 hit one before it dropped out of sight. One more round was fired by the 75, and then to Marq's surprise 16 men took hold of the gun and carried it away, he was so amazed that he took hold of part of the gun near the hot barrel. 17 men carried the gun. Marq touched the barrel – then there were 16 again. He followed the gun to a clearing where a limber had been prepared for two horses to take the gun away. He heard the sound of the firing of the infantry's lighter anti-tank weapons. Each one gave a sharper, louder report than a normal rifle, there was then an explosion as the round hit the tank. Unfortunately most bounced off the armour. One tank was hit by a round square in the armour. The shell bounced off, but the hot splinters of metal inside ricocheted around until all the crew had been hit. The engine kept running, but the dead driver kept pressure on one lever; causing the vehicle to career around in mad circles.

Two left.

An anti-tank round caught one tank on the tracks, blowing them off. Otherwise the tank was still functioning, but it was dead in the battleground. The crew knew that they would not live long inside the tank; so they abandoned the vehicle. A hail of bullets surrounded the vehicle as the Germans tried to escape. No-one did. The remaining tank kept on towards the French lines. The French troops on the left wheeled out a small anti-tank gun for which they had no ammunition. The Germans did not hesitate. The turret turned to the gun, and raked it with 20mm cannon fire from its twin guns. On the right there emerged three French troops. Each man placed an explosive charge on the rear of the tank, and retreated back to the woods. As the turret swivelled round to rake the woods, the whole vehicle exploded.

The Frenchmen did not cheer. They simply went about their business of maintaining their defence line.

Marq stood back. He thought that he would look out of place if he tried to fit in because he had not been through the training these men had.

As he stood at the rear of the copse; he looked out towards open fields with clumps of trees here and there. Then he heard that now familiar sound of tracked vehicles. He knew these were not French tanks, or British. The Men in the woods began to turn the 75 to face this new threat when they heard a screaming reverberating through the woods.

With the burning Panzers on one side of the trees, it was obvious from the air that a battle had been joined here. Nine Ju 87 Stuka dive bombers struck the woods. They each carried five bombs. Marq dived for cover beyond the clump of trees. The men in the trees were all killed within one minute.

..............................
Chapter Two

The Primary Cause

Marq immediately realised the futility of his mission.

He returned to Sem and the crew at Martineau.

When the crew entered the room Marq had left the seat, so was able to greet them as they came in.

'Well, that was interesting.' He declared, 'Does the name Maurice Bassion mean anything to you?' he asked Jake.

Jake thought for a few moments as they moved into the control room.

Presently he replied slowly,

'Bassion. Bassion. My sister, Diane, did some research into the family, but I don't recognise the name from what she came up with.' He continued thinking whilst the others quizzed Marq.

It was Michelle who asked the obvious question,

'What was it like?'

'These people lived a life very different from us; that is for sure. They were fighting a war, and they simply treated it like any other job.'

Jake wanted to know about Maurice Bassion,

'This Maurice Bassion – I seem to remember a distant relative born in 1918, we thought his name was something like Morris. Passed down by word of mouth, that could be the same person.'

Sem noticed something,

'If he was born in 1918, that would make him 23 at the time of Dunkirk.'

'Well, all I can say is that he looked a lot like you.'

Jake was incredulous at this,

'You meant you saw him?'

'I spoke with him. He was obviously French, but I think we can safely say we found an early ancestor of yours.'

'And what happened to him?'

Marq held a hand out, palm uppermost,

'Sorry. There was nothing I could do. His unit were hit by a squadron of Ju 87s.' he turned to Sem, 'I fail to see how I could possibly alter the course of the war in this way.'

They dispersed around the room to sit at various places; some in front of consuls, others at tables, to think and ponder on the matter.

Michelle made coffee.

Eventually Ash came up with a suggestion,

'If one man can be held responsible for the Second World War, how would it be if you took him out?'

Marq picked up on this,

'You mean Adolf Hitler?'

'Yes, of course.'

Jake said,

'I heard once that he nearly got himself killed during the First War.'

Semeramis was already on the case,

'Yes, it was very close, apparently;' she consulted a computer consul, 'a private Henry Tandey almost shot Hitler, but held his fire when he saw that the German soldier was wounded.'

Michelle said,

'Is that true? It sounds like fake news to me.'

Sem said,

'It is true, confirmed by none other than Hitler himself.'

Ash said,

'Pardon? Hitler – the Hitler?'

'Yes. According to Neville Chamberlain, Hitler showed him a picture hanging on his wall in Berlin of a British soldier. Hitler said to the British Prime Minister – 'This is the soldier who could have killed me.''

Ash said,

'That is interesting. If you could find this soldier in 1917, or whenever it was, and get him to kill Hitler...'

'And I get my Uncle grandfather Morris back.' He turned to Galina, and mocked being upset, 'We do miss him you know – he was like a father to me.'

She laughed and pushed him away,

'You are two-faced. Until recently you said he was taken off everyone's Christmas list.'

'But now he may come back...'

Ash butted in,

'Will you two please take this more seriously?'

Marq said,

'Let us see what happens.'

Sem said,

'You mean that you are going?'

'It seems to be the only plan we have.'

Minutes later he was dressed as a British soldier of the First World War, complete with Warwickshire Regiment battledress, and 1914 model Lee Enfield .303 rifle.

Marq entered the machine, and Semeramis led the rest of the group away.

The selected date was September 26th 1918.

Marq had to find a Private Henry Tandey of the 5th Duke of Wellington Regiment. The place selected was a recently captured village of Marcoing. Not particularly conspicuous, the main thing that distinguished Tandey was the small maroon medal tag on his uniform denoting that this man had been awarded the Victoria Cross, as well as the Military Medal and Distinguished Service Cross. Marq knew that the British Army do not issue medals lightly; so a man with such a collection would be unusual. He began his search.

The battle of Cambria was over. The battle for Marcoing had been vicious with the Germans bringing up 5.6 inch naval guns to combat the new tanks the British were using. This caused considerable damage to the village.

Marq moved amongst the soldiers, looking for the medal ribbon. After about an hour of this he realised that this was no way forwards.

He stopped a random soldier in the ruins of yet another house,

'Do you know Private Henry Tandey?' he said in his best Midlands accent.

'You a messenger?' was the reply.

'Yes. Been given orders.'

'You better see the Adjutant.'

'Where is he to be found, then?'

The soldier looked at Marq with some suspicion.

'I can't give you that kind of information, soldier. You might be a German.'

'Don't talk so fucking stupid. Do I look like a fucking German to you, you pillock?'

The soldier looked Marq up and down,

'Well, there ain't no bullet holes in your uniform...'

'There will be in you if you don't help me soon.'

'Have you any written orders?'

'Of course I have – but they ain't for the likes of you.'

The soldier took a stride towards Marq,

'See that barn over there?' he pointed.

'Yes.'

'Well he ain't there, but our Sergeant is. Maybe you can show him your orders.'

'Right-o. Thanks' Marq adjusted his rifle strap on his shoulder as he turned towards the barn.

When out of sight of the soldier he took out his cell phone, tapped it a couple of times, and said to Semeramis,

'Sem, ask the astronauts if a sergeant is to be saluted.'

Sem asked Ash and Jake, both of which were military men. They both shook their heads. Jake said,

'Definitely not.'

Sem said to the phone,

'No.'

Marq was equally as brief,

'Right.'

The instrument was quickly secreted back from where it had been spirited from.

He entered the barn, and found a sergeant – the stripes on his arm made him stand out.

Marq marched up

to him,

'I'm looking for Private Henry Tandey.' He announced.

The sergeant slowly looked up and down the interloper. He held out his hand after stroking it down his trouser leg in a vain attempt to clean it,

'Papers.'

Marq took a scrap of paper from his blouse pocket. Without unfolding it he handed it to the NCO.

The Sergeant gave it back to him, and then pointed to an Officer on the far side of the barn,

'That's the Adjutant. If anybody knows where your man is, it's him – but I don't fancy your chances.'

Marq took a smart step back; and nearly saluted. He remembered in time, turned on his heel, then walked off in the direction of the Officer.

This time he saluted. Knowing not to use the American salute, he said to himself, 'Long way up, short way down.'

The Officer replied with the same salute.

Marq began,

'Sir. I have been tasked with finding Private Henry Tandey.' He said as he handed his paperwork over.

The Officer took the paper, examined it, and then handed it back, saying,

'Jolly good luck, old boy. I have no idea where he is; we are only now just beginning to regroup.'

This was beginning to look like a bigger waste of time than looking for a medal ribbon.

Marq decided to fall further into character. He ran his hand over his face, looked at his paperwork, and said,

'It's important that I find this man. You have not even got a rough idea where he may be?'

'Not the foggiest, dear boy.' He turned towards a group of soldiers, he called one across, 'Warrant Officer, do you know where this man's unit is?'

The Warrant Officer looked at Marq's shoulder flash, then his face.

The Officer said,

'Not that man; he has paperwork.'

The WO took the paper off Marq, read it, then handed it back, saying,

'There's a farm about half a mile from here – over in that direction,' he pointed, 'they are mopping up the last German resistance. You may find him over there.'

Marq thanked the man, and began to make his way across the blasted and ruined landscape.

Presently he began to hear the sounds of gunfire in the direction he was headed.

Clearing a small hill, he saw a small group of farm buildings on the horizon. A voice to his right called out,

'Get your bloody head down. We think there may be a sniper over there.'

Marq moved towards the voice, keeping his head down.

A soldier appeared, laying on the ground, rifle at the ready. He saw Marq, and immediately noticed his 'Warwickshire' flashes on his shoulders,

'What you doin' 'round here, mate?' the soldier asked, 'your lot are still in Cambrai, ain't they?'

Marq took up position alongside him before answering,

'I'm looking for a Private Henry Tandey.'

The soldier took a good look around.

'I think he's over on the right flank. But keep your head down; there are still Jerries all over the place.'

Marq raised his head to look where the soldier pointed.

'There you go again – GET YOUR FUCKING HEAD DOWN!'

Marq dropped.

The soldier looked at him,

'You're new to all this aren't you?'

'Is it so obvious?'

'Yes. Most people behaving like you do not last long out here.' He looked around again. Marq noticed that he hardly raised his head, just a quick blip up and then down quickly. 'Look, follow me, and try to keep your rump down too.'

He led Marq along the low ridge. A small ditch did not get in their way; it was used as further cover as the soldier showed Marq how to travel through an active battlefield.

A small ruined wall was used as they got closer to the action.

The soldier whispered to Marq,

'We never call out names this close to the enemy, and never creep up on any soldier. Keep station to one side until he sees you. Only then can you close in on his position.' He pointed out a soldier, 'I think that's him, but be careful – he's been in action for quite some time now, and that can make you jumpy. I've got to get back to my post.'

He began making his way back the way they had come.

Marq moved slowly towards Tandey.

He stayed back a little, edging closer, keeping close to the ground. The grass smelled sweet; he couldn't help be surprised at the pleasantness in the midst of such destruction.

Tandey noticed Marq as he drew closer. He continued watching the buildings.

Marq moved until he could communicate by speaking to Henry,

'Are you Private Henry Tandey 34506?'

'Yes, that's me.'

'Great, I've been sent to look after you.'

Tandey kept his watch on the buildings as he said in a quiet, calm voice,

'We got the Jerries on the run here; they ain't got much fight left in em.'

The men kept watch on the buildings until dark, and then withdrew to a more effective defensive position, where they met up with other soldiers of the 5th Duke of Wellington's Regiment.

The next day was September 28th – the day Marq was sent to deal with.

Tandey went back to a place close to his position of the previous day.

'Never go back to the same place,' He explained to Marq, 'you never knows if you were spotted the day before, and a sniper might have moved to get a shot at you.'

Fleeting glimpses of Germans were seen from time to time – some were shot, as chance occurred by the two soldiers.

Some hours into the day; Marq had lost track of time by now, a wounded German soldier emerged. Tandy drew a bead on him, but hesitated when he saw the man was wounded. Marq took a hard look at the man in front of them. The moustache helped identify him. There was no time to waste; the German waved thanks when he saw Tandy lower his rifle. He did not see Marq place his rifle butt in the firing position in his shoulder. The rifle crack was a surprise to Tandey. The German fell dead.

Marq said nothing to Tandy as he moved forwards. He knew he should be more careful, but was eager to get to the man he had just shot. Tandy followed, covering Marq as he dropped down to the body. Tandy thought he was looting when he saw Marq going through the dead Germans pockets. He called,

'You can get shot for that.'

Marq replied,

'Just checking.'

He withdrew a paybook from the German. Inside he saw the name Hitler.

Making sure the man was dead, Marq returned to Tansey. He simply said,

'My work here is done.'

Back at Martineau, in real time, as it were, Ash asked Semeramis,

'Will we know if and when Marq completes his mission?'

Sem looked around the room before answering,

'It is unlikely, unless something happened in the past to influence things today.' She suddenly seemed to get agitated as she continued, 'Where are Jake and Galina?'

Ash looked at Michelle as he replied,

'Who?'

'Jake and Galina.'

'Sorry; I don't know what you men – who are you talking about?'..................
Chapter Three

Martineau

Semeramis led Ash and Michelle down to the Control room at Martineau, and then along to the room where Marq had gone. This was the first Ash or Michelle had seen this part of the apparatus; Ash was expecting some sort of cockpit setup. What they found was quite a surprise. A battered leather chair was positioned at one end of the long room. Marq was monitoring some part of the machinery some way from the chair.

Michelle was fascinated by the chair; Marq noticed her taking an interest in it,

'You can sit in it if you wish.' He said.

She looked surprised, but hesitated not a jot. As she sat looking proud, and strangely ill at ease, Marq said,

'I'm sorry about the condition; it was brand new when we set off on this journey. It is made of Earthly materials, and therefore cannot easily withstand the rigors of time travel.' He looked around the group, 'Where are the other two?' the question seemed to be aimed at Sem.

She replied,

'Jake and Galina seem to have disappeared as a result of our activities here.'

Marq was surprised by this,

'What? Already.'

Sem said,

'Of course, what I found unexpected was the fact that Ash and Michelle have no recall of Jake or Galina.'

Marq looked at the two, then back to Sem. He thought deeply before saying,

'What can we do to get them back?'

Sem asked Michelle,

'Do you still have access to NASA files?'

'Yes; with the use of a tablet or terminal – providing that the passwords have not changed.'

Ash said,

'But if we do not remember them, what are the chances that they would be working in NASA?'

Sem said,

'It's just somewhere to begin our search. From there we can access other databases, and spread our net until we find them.'

Marq led them into another room, where there stood a row of computer terminals. He held out his hand,

'Knock yourself out he said.'

Michelle and Sem got to work on the computers. Ash said,

'What was the guy's name again?'

Marq said,

'Jake Jensen.'

'Do we have a date of birth, City of origin, or anything?'

Sem hit a few keys before saying,

'Luckily, yes. He was born in 1983. He attended Elementary School in Shreveport, but had to move a lot due to his father working for the military.'

Ash said,

'If we knew him before, but don't now due to time travel – why not go back and ask him?'

Marq replied with no hesitation,

'It doesn't work like that, I'm afraid.'

Michelle added,

'If we knew which college he graduated from we could search their yearbooks.'

She was looking at a computer screen when she said,

'It says here that Jake's father's first language was French – that must be why they settled in Shreveport.'

The men fell silent. The Marquis looked at Ash. Ash in turn looked at Michele,

'Pardon?'

'Jake's father. He spoke French – so there must be some sort of link...?'

Sem was more interested in more recent records,

'Is there any chance of tracing back through employment records?'

Michelle said,

'No problem; NASA holds full records of everyone who works there – they will still be in the Cloud, even if the parent organisation is no longer there.'

She tapped a few more keys, and then sank back in her chair,

'Damn! There is no record of a Jake Jensen in NASA.'

The other three looked disappointed.

Marq said to Sem,

'Sem, do you not recall anything he said about his education at all?'

'Sorry, we just did not socialise.' She began typing again, 'But I could put in an algorithm to look for this name across all databases.'

Ash asked,

'You have such an algorithm?'

'Not me personally, but the Long Lost Family teams put one together – let's see if I can access it.' She tapped some more. The screen came up with options to access records in 37 countries. 'Ahh, let us commence.' She selected the USA. 'There are 156 entries for the date given.'

Marq said,

'Well, that is somewhere to start; but I can't just pop off to each one in turn, can you filter out the ones who didn't go to Elementary school in Shreveport?'

Sem tapped some more. Only one name remained.

All three are now gathered around the one screen.

Ash said,

'Now drill down and find out as much as you can about him – why isn't he here?'

The screen gave a list of places of education, and then achievements. Ash ran his finger down the list, and read out loud,

'Shreveport Elementary 1989 to 1991, Ramstein, Germany 1991 to 95, Dusseldorf, Germany 95 to 96,' an element of surprise came into his voice as he read, 'he then went on to Potsdam in 1996, Sophamore, and then on to, ahh; this sounds more interesting – the college of astrophysics in Potsdam in 1997.'

Michelle was puzzled,

'If he is here, on the lists, why is he not here now?'

Marq replied,

'He probably took a different track in the changed world we have now allowed to evolve.'

Ash said,

'Speaking of which, what do we know of the world out there now?'

'Nothing.' Marq said, 'But I think we had better find out.'

Sem tapped the computer terminal keys, and a news report came on screen.

The reporter was telling about several cities in America having problems with abandoned cars. Footage was shown of wide streets lined with cars. The voice-over told of the move by many people to the use of small helicopters since legislation had been brought in to penalise people of single occupancy vehicles in an attempt to cut down on congestion.

The screen went back to the main anchor; who then moved on to foreign news,

'An astronaut has gone missing in Germany.'

Sem looked surprised at Ash.

He explained,

'The Germans have their own space program.'

Michelle moved over to another terminal,

'You may be surprised to find that Germany is a lot bigger than you expected.' She said, bringing a map of Europe on the screen.

Marq and Sem moved across to look.

On the screen they saw that Germany had expanded to take in Austria, Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia, Hungary – in fact Greater Germany now extended down the Adriatic, and across to the Red Sea again.

Marq was surprised to see this. He remarked,

'How did this happen?'

He did not expect Ash to reply,

'There have been some very clever politicians in Germany. The Weimar Party keep a sound hold on finances, and industry, making Germany prosperous. Whenever they get into power, the National Socialists threaten to invade a country, then the Weimar people step in to play the good guys, with the result that all these countries down the Adriatic invited the Germans in.'

Michelle was still watching the news. She called across to the other three,

'Hey – you guys may want to look at this.'

The reporter on the screen handed over to an OB. A German lady with natural blonde hair stood in front of a launch complex very similar to Cape Canaveral. The caption below the main picture said that this was the German launch site in southern Romania, at a place shown as Sinoe, and referred to as the Sinoe Launch Complex.

The lady began speaking in German, Marq was about to begin translating when English sub-titles began rolling,

'German astronaut Fritz Manning has disappeared. Last seen two days ago, he was training here at the launch facility somewhere in Romania. The authorities here say that he has missed three training sessions, but are not concerned about suspicious circumstances...'

Ash said,

'Bit of a coincidence?'

Marc replied,

'Perhaps, but I don't see how it could help us.'

'Maybe there is a link.' Ash said as he turned his attention back to the screen.

'Maybe this chap is in the same boat as Jake and Galina.' Marq said to Sem, 'What about Hoshi Masuto? Have you heard from her at all?'

'Not recently,' she said, 'at least not since you went off on your mission.'

'It may be a good idea to find out if there is anything different over there.'

'I should think there is.' Sem said quietly as she tapped on her cell phone. She looked at her watch, 'It will be mid-morning over there now – I'll give it a go.'

The phone rang as she put it on speaker.

'Hello, who is that?'

It sounded like Hoshi.

'Hi Hoshi, this is Semeramis, how you doing?'

'Pardon, I'm afraid that I do not know who you are; how do you know my name?'

Sem paused a moment. She looked at Marq.

'Do you suppose?...' He began.

Sem was back on the phone,

'Sorry about this, I'm from NASA. We are checking on certain people with regard to some research we are planning. You read micro biology did you not?'

'Yes, but I...'

'And are you involved in the Japanese space program?'

'The what? Japanese space program?' Hoshi sounded surprised.

Sem had to think on her feet now; tapping into expressions and inflections in Hoshi's voice,

'Yes; it is mainly in California at the moment. Can I ask, what is your present position?'

Hoshi thought for a moment, and then answered,

'I am engaged at the Fukashima plant – I cannot say more.'

Sem resisted asking the obvious question – 'So you didn't go to Mars?'

'Thank you for your time, I am sorry for the interruption.'

She was glad to finish.

Marq looked as if he understood; he said,

'It looks as if she's in the same situation.'

The news program continued,

The blond reporter continued,

'... he was one of the first Germans to go to the moon during the swastika debate of a few years ago.'

The transmission was terminated abruptly. The picture resumed in a studio probably in the USA.

'We apologise for the interruption; the Germans are still sensitive about some things, certain words are flagged up when broadcast from Greater Germany.' He moved a sheet of paper from one side of his desk to another before continuing –'and now to Sport; the Tampa Bay Buccaneers are still running second in the league this morning...'

Marq looked startled by this,

'Tampa Bay!' he spun round to Sem, 'Tampa Bay; the last I heard it had become part of the Gulf of Mexico.' He looked at Ash and Michelle, 'Does this mean the tsunami did not happen?'

Ash replied calmly,

'Oh, yes it happened all right. It devastated low-lying islands from Australia to southern Japan.'

Marq and Sem just stood in disbelief. Marq sank down into a chair. He turned to Sem and said,

'It didn't happen.' He held out a hand, 'How deep does this go? Germans landing on the moon - no East Coast Tsunami.'

Sem brought him back to the matter at hand,

'Are we going to find Jake and Galina, and bring them back to Ash and Michelle?'

Marq looked at Michelle – she didn't even look confused. He looked at Ash, who just shrugged his shoulders.

'Ok. But where do we begin?' he said, 'I don't suppose we can just ring him up, like you did with Hoshi?'

She considered this,

'Not too happy about that; what are you going to tell him? – We are looking at changing your life pattern, because in our world you landed on Mars? we don't even know if anyone went to Mars in his world.' Sem asked Michelle, 'What was the first job that Jake held?'

'What – in NASA?'

'No, after graduating.'

Michelle referred to her tablet again before replying,

'Not too clear here. You must understand that these are not NASA records.' More tapping and sliding, 'It appears he stayed at the same institution.'

'Where was that?

She looked up and looked straight at Marq,

'Potsdam.'

'Well, that's where I should go.'

Sem said,

'I don't know how the Hilbert Space syndrome will function through a worm-hole, but if you carry this period paging device it will help. You don't need to use it as such, just have it about your person, and it will help.
Chapter Four

Potsdam 1997

As he moved to Potsdam in 1997 Marq found himself travelling along a tree-lined road with amorphous blobs of colour, some amongst the trees, others representing buildings.

Vehicles were strange shapes, indistinct globules. He felt himself moving down a side street. There was grass down one side. He had to swerve quickly to avoid a grey shape in mid-air that looked like some form of rubbish skip.

The sky was a vivid shade of blue, but not in any disturbing way. He noticed that his instruments told him he was at 32 feet altitude as he continued down this street. Nothing very distinct here, so he elected to try another landing.

Back up to half a mile high he saw what looked like a large forested area to the south of the city centre. A clearing close to some interesting looking buildings semed like a good place to emerge; there were no people around, so he elected to make this his place to arrive.

As he walked into the city he felt strange. Not surprising, really. He looked at the 1996 model cell phone he needed to communicate with Sem. On flipping it open, he felt like saying 'Kirk to bridge.', but resisted the temptation,

'Walking into town.' He said, 'Any idea where I should start?'

Sem and Michelle were working out some sort of plan of action,

'Do you remember the College of Astrophysics in Berlin?'

'Yes I do.'

'There was a Professor Dolfo Aysher who had connections with Potsdam. Maybe you could use his name to get through the door, and then try to find our man.'

Marq shrugged his shoulders,

'What could possibly go wrong?'

Fifteen minutes later Marq climbed the steps into the College. Beyond the tall pillars, into the almost marbled hall he looked for some sort of reception desk. He began brewing up a plan of what he would say when he found someone who may be able to help him.

He was directed to an office a little way down a corridor. Here he found a bench-like counter with people working in the office behind.

When he entered the office there seemed to no-one monitoring the counter, but presently a smart woman came. She introduced herself as Kath, and asked him if she could help him. Marq said,

'Hi, I have been sent with a recommendation from Professor Dolfo Aysher of the College of Astronautics in Berlin. I am looking for a Jake Jensen. Would you happen to know if he is on this campus?'

She looked surprised and puzzled by this request. Before she could reply Marq decided a little more explanation might be in order,

'I don't know where to look, but if you could point me in the right direction I would be grateful.'

'One moment, sir.'

She went back into the office, spoke briefly with a colleague, and went to a computer terminal. She looked up at Marq, who was waiting patiently,

'Just accessing the records, sir. Won't keep you a moment.'

He nodded.

Seven minutes later the door behind him burst open. Two men in full length leather coats entered. Without hesitation they took Marq by both arms, and held him,

'Is this the man?' one of the men asked the office.

Kath nodded and said, 'Ja.'

Marq's hands were roughly tied behind his back with zip ties, and he was marched out of the building without a word being said.

He was bundled into the back of a van that carried swastikas and two strange letter 'Z'.

It all happened so fast that Marq felt as though his feet had hardly touched. He fell into the emptiness of the van. As the doors were slammed shut Marq had a quick look around the inside of the van. He saw that it was blank aluminium – no safety equipment, not even seats; only blank seamless walls. The doors slammed shut, and there was no light at all, no sounds, and no fresh air.

He felt the engine start, and was promptly thrown in the slippery darkness from one side to the other, front to back, after the first few pitches it all became senseless; he completely lost all orientation – there was no up, no down, only the almost constant sliding across the smooth metal floor in complete darkness; he didn't even know if his eyes were closed or open.

After only five minutes of this treatment Marq was violently sick. He didn't even know where it went; it was like being in a washing machine the movement was so violent. It was as if these people were throwing the vehicle around on purpose. His hands were tied tightly behind his back, so he couldn't even reach his pocket to retrieve the cell phone, but more importantly he couldn't protect himself from colliding with the hard metal walls.

Eventually they stopped. He had no idea of how long this treatment went on for, but he was glad it had stopped. The doors were thrown open, and bright daylight flooded in. Marq did not look his calm, confident self any more. Liberally splattered with vomit, he was also sporting a few cuts and bruises. Now blinded by the light, he shied away from the brightness. Rough hands grabbed him and dragged him out of the van. As he blinked in the daylight he saw the side of the doorway he was being pushed into. He glimpsed a sign that made his blood run cold – GESTAPO.

No-one spoke as he was unceremoniously bundled into what looked like a shower room with tiled walls and floor, once again, no seating was provided. On one side, the side he entered by, was barred with the obligatory cell door. Before he could even ask what he was supposed to have done he was hit with a high-pressure water jet. The blast thrust him into the hard tiled wall. He saw a little blood was running down the wall with the water. He didn't know that a red die was introduced into the water to make him think that he had been injured. The ice cold water hit him with so much force that it took his breath away as well as his feet from under him. He had no idea of how long this went on for, he was fighting for breath through curtains of water, or whilst his body was pounded with powerful water, that hit like steel.

When they had had their fun he was picked up from the floor, still fighting for breath, with his body reeling from the constant pounding, they thought it safe to remove the zip ties. These were replaced with handcuffs, and he found himself being attached to a bench in a reclined position. The bench was then raised from the floor, and his feet raised until he was at about 45 degrees. A wet cloth was placed on his face, and then water was poured onto it. He felt like he was drowning.

Marq lay there still fighting for breath when the cloth was removed. The bench was lowered to a horizontal position, someone released his bounds, and he was given a clean, fresh towel.

A man in full SS uniform, complete with jackboots and jodhpurs entered as Marq began towelling himself dry. The SS officer said,

'Who are you, and why are you asking questions in the University?' He tapped a short whip as he spoke.

'My name is Doctor Marq Libeux, I have come from Denmark, I am looking for someone.' He towelled his hair before continuing, 'What is the meaning of all this?'

The German strutted about with an air of arrogance,

'You were asking strange questions at the university.'

'What do you mean; strange questions?'

'No-one refers to Berlin any more, how could you not know that it is now called Germania?'

Marq was surprised by his slip-up. He took some time to reply.

'I studied under Professor Dolfo Aysher. At the time it was called the Berlin College of Astrophysics; old habits die hard.'

'So will you if you do not tell us the truth.' The whip was brought down on Marq's shoulder, 'Who are you working for?'

'I am not working for anyone. We astrophysisists are a close bunch – we do not like to lose tracks of people who work in our field.'

'Everyone has a master. Who pays you?'

'The University of Oslo. Do you see them as a threat to you in some way?'

'I don't know – suppose you tell me.'

His cohort then said,

'You spies come here with all sorts of stories.'

Marq was surprised by this,

'Spies? Is that what you think? You think I'm a spy?' he threw the towel down as he faced the two Germans, 'I am an astrophysicist – there are no secrets in astrophysics; apart from the ones we are all trying to unmask in nature and science. To that end we all work together – we pass each others' work back and forth freely.' He paused briefly, 'If you doubt this, you can read in any scientific paper all the latest developments in our field,' he stared fiercely at the Gestapo officers as he emphasised the point, 'We don't need to spy on each other; all we need to do is read scientific papers or go to a conference.'

'Whatever you do here in Greater Germany you must pass through our offices. You say that you are from Denmark?' The mood seemed to relax. 'I am surprised that your own Foreign Office did not notify you of this.' He turned to his colleague, 'Get the good Doctor some dry clothes.'

His colleague left the room. The remaining officer half sat on a desk as he said,

'Now – this person you were asking about. Who is it? We may be able to help.'

Marq thought for a moment, and decided to play for time,

'It's just someone I studied with back in the eighties.'

'Ja. Does he have a name?'

Thinking quickly Marq decided to throw a swerve ball,

'He was Scandinvian. His name was Xanthros.'

The other officer arrived with clothes.

The first officer thought for a moment whilst Marq got into the dry clothes. When he was ready he said,

'That's unusual – the informant at the university said his name was Jake Jensen.'

'That was his name at university – upon qualifying he took the sobriquet Xanthros.'

As he took the cell phone out of his wet clothes he remembered the Hilbert Space communications system. He flicked the phone open, as if to check it was still working. He knew it would be. As he closed the flap, he thought to communicate with Sem, without speaking,

'You there, Sem?'

'Yes. I have been monitoring the situation; you need to get out of there as soon as you can – there are rumblings in the background that don't look good.'

'Like storm clouds gathering?'

'Yes, exactly.'

'Then what, Sem?'

'Go back to the worm-hole portal. I think we had better think this through.'

'Easier said than done.'

Officer two pushed a chair towards Marq,

'Have a seat.' He said, moving menacingly close,

The first Officer removed his cap as he sat behind the desk. He continued the interrogation,

'You are a stranger here asking about someone who seems to have two names, and he has studied at a university in a city that is no longer known by the name you used. I think you will agree that all this looks suspicious.'

'All I am trying to do is look up an old friend.'

'And this is your mission, is it?'

'If you want to call it that.'

'I do. And who are you working for? What is the result of meeting up with this person?'

'I told you, the University of Oslo, but this has nothing to do with them.'

'And this' he looked at some papers, 'Jake Jensen, what is your interest in him? Does he work for the University of Oslo?'

'No, he doesn't. I told you we have lost touch, and I thought it would be nice to meet up again.'

'Ahh, you thought it would be nice? You travel from Oslo to Potsdam, no doubt at least passing Germania, which you failed to notice, on a mere whim. What do you take us for, Herr Doctor?' and then with more anger in his voice, 'Who sent you here?'

Sem contacted Marq via the Hilbert system,

'Marq, have you still got the cell phone?'

'Yes.'

'Good, it can act as a guidance for your end of the worm-hole.'

'Great. What do I have to do at this end?'

'Open it, type in the word 'Retourner', then hit zero.'

Officer one was getting impatient,

'Come, now Herr Doctor, who sent you, who do you report to?'

'If you want to see my whole credentials I can have them downloaded directly to you here.' He removed the cell phone, 'if I may?'

'Certainly, go ahead.'

As he began typing into the phone he said,

'I will just get on to the records department – where would you like the records sent to?'

He hit 'Zero' and disappeared.

When Marq arrived back at Martineau he looked surprised to say the least. And he was dressed in strange attire.

Sem saw the lights change on the outside of the door, telling her it was safe to enter.

'That's a dapper outfit you have on.' She said.

He looked askance at her as he got out of his seat,

'Not the finest, I must admit – but the orange patches certainly set it off.'

She said,

'I think we had better have a good look at what we are doing here before we go any further.'
Chapter Five

Dusseldorf 1997

'What are you doing with the cell phone?'

Michelle asked Sem, who was coupling the phone brought back by Marq.

'I am going to make it log in to computers and the Internet in the places we send Marq. And then make available to him the information he needs.'

'That sounds a nice trick; I can see that computers can be linked to the Internet, and your device there can be linked to them. But it is the man – machine interface that I don't quite grasp.'

'Actually, that bit is quite simple. I use what we know as Hilbert space to communicate with this device, and then...'

'Whoa, whoa, whoa.' Michelle interrupted, 'What, what exactly is Hilbert space?'

'Ahh.' Sem paused at the computer keyboard, 'One of the most familiar examples of a Hilbert space. Is the Euclidian space consisting of three-dimensional vectors, also known as an abstract linear...'

'Hang on a minute – I thought you said it was quite simple!'

Sem looked thoughtful before saying,

'Well, I suppose it is once you understand Euclidian space, Quantum Physics, and higher Mathematics.'

'Yes, I can see that. Needless to say that I do not understand these things.'

'Trust me, we have harnessed their theories, and made them work for us by crossing all dimensions at once – look upon it as a sort of more advanced WiFi or Bluetooth.'

'That I can grasp.'

Sem returned to the computer screen,

'Well, that is sort of what we have done; I am now integrating all these systems with this device, which already communicates seamlessly with Marq's brain.'

Michelle began to understand,

'So Marq will, in effect, be permanently linked with every computer via the Internet.'

'Yes. Our problem all along has been information overload but this thing here,' she tapped the cell phone, 'now has a sort of filtration device built into its software.

'Acting like a secretary I suppose?'

Sem thought for a second,

'That's a very good analogy.'

Marq entered the room,

'That was not pleasant; and mainly because I didn't know what I was getting into.'

Sem handled the cell phone as she said,

'Well, that shouldn't be a problem in future.'

Ash couldn't help interrupting,

'You mean in the past.'

Sem said,

'Oh, very good.'

'What have you done with the cell phone?' Marq asked.

'I have enabled it to connect to the internet automatically in the time zone you are in; it can then provide any information by Hilbert Bluetooth directly.'

He picked up the instrument,

'That sounds interesting.' He turned it over in his hand, 'how do I use it? The screen looks too small.'

'It's like voice activation – but by thought.' Sem told him.

Marq was suitably impressed, but was more concerned about his next mission,

'I think we had better think about what we are to do next. And currency can be problematic, too. They were still on the Deuchmark, in fact I'm not sure about what they were using, luckily Dollars are always good.'

Michelle referred to the computer screen that showed the bits of information about Jake's education and early employment,

'If you don't fancy Potsdam again, try Dusseldorf in 1996 or 7.'

'Sounds as good as anywhere else – at least I have some background knowledge now. Let's do it.'

Marq went into the room, Sem helped him prepare, and then left to join the others two rooms away.

The weather in Dusseldorf was overcast, the light not good. Marq emerged from an alley near the centre of the city. He saw a man across the street moving furtively. The man had a cloth cap pulled low over his face, and a greatcoat with the collar pulled up.

He met another man. They stood facing each other, speaking in low voices that Marq could not hear.

The first man began waving his finger about, and then they parted.

Something looked familiar about the first man, so Marq decided to follow him.

When they reached a main road the man seemed to relax; his head lifted, he folded his collar down, and adjusted his cap. By now Marq was on the opposite side of the road; he did a double take when he realised that it was Jake Jensen.

Marq followed him from across the street. He was thinking of what to do now. He called Sem,

'Sem, I've found Jake. I am presently following him through the streets here. Have you any idea how I am to make progress now?'

Sem was in the same room as Ash and Michelle.

'He's found Jake in Dusseldorf in 1997. He wants to know what to do next.'

'Has he spoken to him?' Ash asked.

'No. He wants to know what to do next; should he make contact?'

Ash thought for a few seconds,

'Do you know what time it is over there?'

'I can find out.' Sem quietly looked at the far wall. Seconds later she announced, 'four fifteen in the afternoon.'

Ash wondered,

'I wonder why he was not in class.' He turned to Sem, 'What day is it?'

She came back almost immediately, 'It is Wednesday.'

Marq came back on line,

'He is now going into a coffee shop. I am following him in.'

The place was not quite empty, but nearly. Jake sat in a corner; this place had more corners than normal. He began to drink his coffee alone at a table for two. There were empty places all around, Marq decided to sit where he could watch Jake from behind.

Five minutes passed, and then a young woman entered the café. She was thin, blond with a distinctive red beret. She bought a coffee, and took it across to Jake.

Marq silently contacted Sem,

'He's been joined by a blond woman. They seem to be getting on well; she's eating his cake.'

'Can you hear what they are saying?' Sem asked.

'Not from here.'

'Could you use the cell phone?'

Marq took the instrument from his pocket. He found a used cigarette packet, removed the silver paper from within it, next he programmed the cell phone to listening mode, and carefully placed it in the packet. Jake could not see Marq as he stood up, but the woman did. Marq was careful to keep at least one table between them as he walked to the counter. There he purchased a pack of cookies, and then began his journey back to his table. On the way he made sure that he passed a table close to Jake. Marq managed to place the cigarette pack in a place that would not be noticed.

As he regained his seat he heard the sounds picked up by the phone.

'The beret is a bit conspicuous, don't you think?' Jake said.

A female voice then said,

'Yes, but once discarded I almost disappear.'

'Is that what they taught you in field-craft?'

'Among may other things.'

Marq took a seat at his original table with his back to them now to avoid his face being seen. Unfortunately this meant that he could not see them.

Jake looked around casually, and continued,

'What do we know about these people? It looks as if they are up to something, but we don't even know if it will be in this city.'

The words were fed back to Martineau, where Ash and Michelle were pleased to hear the voice – but they did not realise why. It was as if their old friend's voice was coming back to them again. Even if he was speaking in German, and saying things they did not expect.

'Did you find anything about Ensslin?' he asked the woman.

'She is definitely involved. Meinhoff has been seen here in Dussledorf, as well as Baader.'

'You keep clear of these people, Rebecca; they are very dangerous.'

She smiled reassuringly,

'I did hear that they are planning an assassination.'

'Any idea who?'

'There is to be a meeting of scientists here in Dusseldorf. The name Werner von Braun was mentioned as a guest of honour.'

'The rocket guy?'

She lit a cigarette as she said,

'Yes, he must be 85 now; they intend giving him some award for running the German rocket programme from the start.'

He picked up the possibilities,

'And if this group of anarchists can disrupt this meeting they will cause mayhem, and give themselves publicity across the world.'

'Not to mention the damage it would cause if they plant a bomb there – it could set our plans back decades.'

Jake was surprised at this,

'A bomb! Is that what you've heard?'

'Yes; that is how these cowards work – they don't face anyone, they tend to leave bombs.'

Marq contacted Sem without speaking,

'Sem, I've tried to find out about these people on the Internet – but there is nothing on it; it seems almost empty.'

'That is because you are in 1997; the Internet is only six years old where you are – you cannot access the modern Internet via the wormhole.' She looked at Michelle, who was working a computer console, she nodded towards Sem. She got back to Marq, 'Michelle is on it now, I will let you know what we find out.'

'Ok. Waiting out.'

Marq took a silver dollar from his pocket. This was no ordinary dollar; this one had had the detail on one side removed, and then polished to a high shine. This allowed it to be used as a mirror, which meant that he could keep an eye on his quarry.

Rebecca said,

'I think the meeting is to take place in the Norvik Hotel's Conference facility the day after tomorrow.'

'That sound interesting, how do you know this?' Jake said.

'Modus operandi; that is how these people operate. They don't plant a bomb too far before an event because their timing devices get less reliable the longer the delay is. And the fact that the longer the device is in place, the better are the chances of it being discovered.

He looked at her with a more earnest look,

'You mean to tell me that you have been so close to these people to know that?'

She narrowed her eyes a little,

'Well – I wouldn't say close.'

Sem called Marq,

'We found a news item from 1997. It says that there was a bomb blast at the Norvik hotel in Dussedorf. Eight scientists were killed.'

Marq replied,

'Let's see about that.'

Marq did not wait for Jake and Rebecca to finish. He walked by them, casually picking up the cigarette packet that contained the cell phone.

He hailed a taxi, as he rode to the hotel, he contacted Sem,

If I can make a big change in what happened here, maybe we would get Jake back.' He pondered how he was going to make a difference for the good, 'Is there any way I or you can make a bomb detecting device from this cell phone?'

'I rather think you are getting a bit ambitious there.'

'Ok; the place will have been searched already, where could they hide a bomb in a short time? look into the news article and see if they give us any clue about where it was placed.'

'On it.'

Sem and Michelle consulted their computer terminals. Ash looked over Michelle's shoulder as the articles were examined.

Presently Michelle exclaimed,

'Got it. It says here that a device was placed under the stage in the main conference hall.'

Sem passed this information to Marq.

'I am about five minutes away now,' Marq told Sem, 'I suppose I should just pull wires out, and hope for the best.'

'Not a good idea.'

Marq got out of the taxi at the front of the hotel, upon entering he went to reception. He announced in fluent German,

'Herr Libeux from Der Homelandsecurity to do a final security check;' he flashed an official-looking card in front of her, and then he leaned forward to the receptionist, almost in a conspiratorial tone. 'We have had a tip-off.'

She almost took a step backwards,

'Where would you like to go, sir?'

'Under the stage area in the main conference room if you please.'

She pointed the way. Marq was glad to be left on his own for his mission.

Under the stage he found all manner of stage props, furniture and detritus. He stood back, studying the scene before him. With the use of a small flashlight he examined the dust layer on the stack nearest him. He drew his finger across the surface. This section had not been moved in months, if not years. The flashlight moved around the room.

'Where would I hide a bomb?' he thought as he passed through the area.

Carefully he examined the dust layers in every section. Dirt on one table had been disturbed. He looked at this area as he stood back, using the flashlight to aid his concentration. The items he examined were not really cleaner, but the dust had definitely been disturbed. Carefully he removed objects that looked as if they had been placed there recently. He examined and listened to each one until he came across a box that had no dust on it. He placed an ear to it. There was no sound coming from it. Carefully he removed the top. Inside he found scripts from a recent production of 'Return to Blackpool'. He breathed a sigh of relief.

'Nothing yet.' He reported to Sem.

She shook her head to let Ash and Michelle know.

'When he finds it, tell him not to move it. Most probably it will be equipped with a trembler to set it off if moved.' Said Ash.

Sem passed the message on,

'Marq, The device you are looking for may have an anti-tampering thing on it. Do not move it.'

Marq replied,

'Don't worry, I have so far resisted the temptation to throw things around down here.'

Even dust covered objects were handled with care. Marq reasoned that they could tap the bomb, setting it off.

Somewhere under the main stage, behind dusty desks he found a suitcase that looked out of place – it was clean. Carefully Marq removed furniture from around it to aid access. He took a deep breath, slowly lowering his head to listen to the case. A faint ticking could be heard. He stepped back.

'I think I have found it.' He reported to Sem.

.............................
Chapter Six

Finders Keepers

He shone the flashlight around the room looking for anything he could use. He wanted to simply erect a big sign saying 'BOMB', and then leaving an expert to get on with it. But he was here, and felt that it was his responsibility to stop this event from happening.

On a far wall he saw an axe – not quite what he was looking for. He had in his pocket a Swiss army knife – it would have to do.

He reported to Sem,

'This is an ordinary small suitcase, with clip fastenings.'

She repeated this to Ash and Michelle before asking,

'What is it made of?'

'Looks like leather, but I am sure it is some sort of cardboard.'

Ash said to Sem,

'Tell him not to use the clips to open it; that is where they always put anti-tamper devices.'

'Don't try to use the clips to open it; have you got anything to help you?'

'Swiss army knife.'

She told Ash, who said,

'Does it have a corkscrew?'

'Marq, Ash wants to know, does the knife have a corkscrew device on it?'

'Yes.'

Sem nodded to Ash.

'Advise him to carefully drill two holes in the corner of the case, on the top, nearest to the handle side.'

Marq carefully drilled a hole with the corkscrew. He was relieved to find that the case was indeed made of cardboard-like fibre, so old it held little resistance to the drilling.

Ash asked Sem,

'Does his knife have a nail file?'

She looked askance at Ash, but nevertheless asked,

'Marq, Ash wants to know if the knife has a nail file?'

Ash explained,

'We need him to begin to saw into the case. He needs to keep vibrations down to an absolute minimum. The teeth of a saw could set the thing off.'

Marq worked by the light of the flashlight. The nail file was slow going; he eventually managed to produce a line that could take four fingers in. He felt confident enough to steady the cut by inserting his fingers in, and then use the saw attachment to complete the cut. Next he began cutting along the long edge near the handle. He stopped before he reached the first clip – there may be wires here. He tried to see inside, there was definitely something wrong – wires could be seen running around inside. He decided to try using the knife blade to cut through the top of the case without impinging on whatever was inside. The top peeled back. Marq studied the wiring.

The Swiss army knife had small wire cutters, they would do nicely; the wires were very thin, so would cut easily. Gingerly he lifted the corner of the top. Shining the flashlight inside allowed him to see at least two wires going to the handle side of the case. This was not what he was looking for. An old clockwork alarm clock was crudely wired up; he was able to trace the wires back to what he was looking for – the detonator.

Marq found that he could either see the detonator, or touch it – but not both at once. There were three wires going into the detonator; this means that one may well be some sort of booby trap. So he decided against the wire cutting. This meant only one thing – remove the detonator. Or he could stop the clock, and let someone else deal with it. But no, that was not the way he worked. The detonator had to come out.

He cut more into the cover to gain better access to the explosives and detonator. More studying of the wires around the detonator, it looked to be the last thing to be inserted into the explosive. This made sense, because for safety's sake the explosive must be kept safe until the last minute; the best way to do that is to keep the detonator away from the explosive charge for as long as possible – he reckoned that the detonator was not inserted until the case was placed here, but the bomber had the advantage of having the lid open – Marq had to give himself more room to operate. He had two choices – either cut along the handle edge of the lid, but this meant getting very close to the wires that were no doubt part of the anti-tampering devices. Or he could cut along the bottom edge. But that would mean working very close to the explosives. He reasoned that this was the safest way to go. He began by using the knife blade to score into the fibre of the case top all the way across. When he felt that the blade was almost penetrating to touch the explosive he put the knife to one side, he took a firm hold on the beginnings of the new cut. Taking care to steady the bomb Marq gently eased the lid away from the body, tearing along the weakened edge.

Marq could now see the detonator, and get a hold on it. There were wires around which must not be disturbed. He gingerly took hold of the end of the detonator, and pulled. It moved a little way. He was very conscious of the wires attached. He moved his fingers slightly, and then pulled a little more. Gradually the detonator came out of the explosive. He breathed a sigh of relief as the small tube-like device with its wires still attached came free.

He looked around to see the safest way to move the detonator away from the explosives.

A door banged somewhere behind him.

He heard the sound of footsteps, at first he thought they may be on the stage above – but they were not.

He was suddenly Illuminated by several flashlights, accompanied with shouts of,

'Achtung, do not move.'

In the light's glare Marq could just make out that there were at least five people behind the flashlights. He presumed some had guns trained on him – in fact they all had guns aimed at him.

A man in a long leather coat advanced towards him.

'And what do we have here?' the Gestapo officer looked at the opened case and then back to Marq, who was still holding the detonator in his hand, with wires attached to the case. 'It looks to me as if you are planting a bomb. What do you have to say for yourself?'

Marq stood there with the detonator in his hand. It was still connected to the bomb by the wires, but it had to be close to, preferably touching, the explosive to set off the bomb.

A voice from behind one of the flashlights was heard to say,

'Why don't we just shoot him down now?'

Another voice said,

'Don't be stupid. He is standing by a bomb; he could blow us all to kingdom come.'

Marq said,

'I have not yet disconnected the detonator. Stand back whilst I deal with it.'

'No tricks.' The officer knew that some terrorists were suicidal, and happy to blow themselves up in the name of their cause. He continued, 'Do not think of setting off the bomb, you will only succeed in blowing your own arm off.' He addressed his colleagues, 'Everyone back. We can cover him from the far side of the room.'

As they scurried back Marq announced,

'I am not planting this, I am disarming it.'

'That is what I would expect you to say.'

Marq was tempted to leave the device for them to deal with, but decided that he had started, so will continue to make it safe. He now saw that there were four wires leading to the detonator. They went into a box before emerging as eight wires going to various parts of the bomb. He reasoned that these were trigger devices – the box must be some sort of distribution apparatus. But he now had to decide which wire to cut first. He studied the colours of the constituent cables; there were more pink wires than any other colour – so he decided that must be live. Or it could be the anti-tamper circuit. One will disarm the detonator, the wrong one will blow his hand off. He looked around for some device he could use to make the cutting a remote operation, but nothing came to hand. He studied some more. The mauve wires seemed important, but they probably all were. He traced the wires that led to the battery. Here things looked simpler; one wire was soldered to the hour hand of an old alarm clock, when this reached a small post on the face it would short out a circuit. But that was only one of three wires connected to the positive terminal. It was obvious that this wire would prevent the main detonation, but the other two must be to set off the bomb if tampered with – including interrupting the circuit. He then found the tremble switch – a simple device; but completely impossible to thwart because of its simplicity. Once again the pink wire was attached. To cut this would no doubt isolate the device; but by interrupting the circuit the anti-tamper setup may be triggered, and Marq's hand would be close enough to be blown off.

He positioned the wire cutters in place to cut all four at once, but then realised that as the wires were cut they would then short each other out – that was sure to set the device off.

A voice from the other side of the room came across,

'Do not try to escape; we have the whole building surrounded. My men have orders to shoot to kill.'

Sweat trickled down from Marq's forehead. He wiped it away with his free hand. He noticed that the Swiss army knife in that hand was shaking a little.

Why were there two pink wires going into the detonator? He studied the nest of wires again. There were mainly the pink wires, but mauve wires as well as white ones were also all over the system. He was in no doubt that some of these wires were dummies to throw anyone in his position off.

He carefully traced the white wire from the detonator, through to the box, and then out the other side as different coloured wires. Back at the detonator he reasoned that the pink wires must be power – one from the anti-tamper setup, the other one from the timer. If he cut the timer wire it would set off the anti-tamper circuit, but he didn't know which one to cut. The white wire might complete both circuits. He shrugged his shoulders, took a firm grip on the white wire, placed the clippers on it, turned his head away, then cut the wire. Next he cut the black wire, before dealing with the two pink wires.

He breathed a sigh as he placed the now loose detonator on the ground.

As he stood upright he took the cell phone out of his pocket. He flipped the lid open as he called across the room,

'It's safe; you can come out now.'

The sound of military boots came across the floor towards him as he typed into the phone the word 'Retourner'.

..............................
Chapter Seven

Visitors

'You didn't bring the bomb back did you?' Sem was not serious as she greeted Marq on his return, 'We have checked the records, and von Braun was not killed, there was no bomb at the seminar.'

'Well, I'm glad about that. Have they returned?' Meaning Jake and Galina.

'No, I'm afraid not. We have been searching the records to see if there could have been some other event which could be changed to alter things.'

'And what did you come up with?'

They moved into another room where Michelle was sitting at a computer console.

Michelle was looking over little known reports of events in the 1940s.

'There was a time in 1942 when the Nazis began what they referred to as their 'Final Solution' by deporting people they didn't like.'

Ash remembered the events being reported in America,

'I know, we took many of them, but that began in the 1930s if I remember my history lessons correctly.'

Michelle looked back at the monitor as she manipulated the text on the screen,

'Yes, sorry. In 1942 they began building camps.' She read on, 'This report says that vast car ferries were pressed into service to take thousands away from Germania. It doesn't say if they went voluntarily.'

Ash leant over her shoulder. The smell of her hair made his mind smile.

'Could you expand on this part of the story here' he pointed to a link imbedded in the words.

She clicked on the link.

A side story appeared, she read aloud,

'A Rabbi, Moshi Sandal said, "In areas where the National Socialists are strong we cannot stay. People have had all their belongings taken; they are then treated worse than criminals. They suffered at the hands of the Gestapo, and were then placed on trains – but these were not normal trains. They were cattle wagons and goods trains with no amenities for people. The trains then went to either Trieste on the Adriatic, or Danzic on the Polish coast." This was ethnic cleansing of the first order.' She turned to Marq, 'If we could change something about this, would that affect things in future?'

'Definitely. But what on earth am I supposed to do?'

Michelle continued reading,

'I don't think the main political party, the Democrats, were complicit. The Nazis were crafty in keeping these activities in areas where they had strong followings. Maybe there may be some way you could bring things to the attentions of the Democrats in government.'

They all stood stock still as they heard voices from the supposedly empty room next door.

Everyone looked at Sem.

Sem looked at the closed door.

Ash moved towards the door.

He took hold of the handle, looked at Michelle, then at Marq as he slowly opened the door.

Ash stepped quickly into the room.

He was followed by Marq.

What they saw gave them both a shock.

There in front of them were a group of German soldiers in full uniform, machine pistols at the ready.

'What the hell are you doing here?' asked Ash.

One of the soldiers, a sergeant Ash guessed, pointed his weapon at Ash and Marq,

'Our Kommandant will be here shortly to take control of this establishment.'

Ash and Marq looked at each other blankly, then at the armed men in front of them.

Sem put her head around the door, and was met with a cry of,

'Achtung!'

She froze to the spot.

One of the soldiers looked around as he said to the sergeant,

'We are under orders not to damage any equipment.'

The sergeant nodded and said,

'Ja.' He turned to the Americans, 'All of you, into the other room.'

They moved back into the room where they found Michelle sitting at a console.

The German waved his gun at her,

'You! Over there by the wall.' He turned to Ash, 'All of you. By the wall.'

He realised that there was even more equipment in this room than the last, so he moved everyone away from the monitors.

A crashing sound came from the room they had just left.

The door burst open again.

Two Gestapo officers came into the room. The full length leather coats and almost ancient trilby hats gave a menacing appearance; even the German soldiers showed due deference.

They were followed by a squad of the feared SS guards. As they entered the room their ranks parted as a high-ranking German officer strode into the room.

The classic jodhpurs had red stripes down them, jackboots tapped as the figure strutted in with Prussian arrogance.

He addressed the group of Americans,

'I am Reichfuhrer Heindric Himmler. I am now taking over control of this facility. You,' he pointed at Ash, 'What is your position here?'

Ash hesitated before answering.

Himmler did not. He drew his Luger, and pointed it at Sem,

'Do not take too long. I will shoot one of your colleagues in five seconds.'

Two SS men stuck guns into Sem's waist to prevent her running off.

'Ein, Zwei, Drei, Vier...,' he cocked the weapon threateningly, his finger began to squeeze the trigger.

Ash called out,

'Wait. I am an astronaut from NASA. We are American citizens, and are protected by our constitution, which is respected by your country.'

'You mean some parts of my country. I am not one of those soft appeasers who give in to everyone.' He pointed his Luger at Michelle,

'You, what is your position here?'

'I am a secretary with NASA.'

He turned to Sem,

'And you?'

Sem looked him straight in the eye, returning his arrogance with pure confidence, despite still having guns digging at her ribs,

'You already know me.'

Himmler looked askance at this, as if he had forgotten something important, and then been reminded,

'Ja.' He turned his attention to Marq, 'You, what is your role here?'

'I'm the driver.'

Himmler showed annoyance at this,

'Do not fool with me.' He moved closer to Marq.

Marq kept his cool, he slowly shook his head as he replied,

'No, I am not fooling with you; I am the driver – I drive this machine.'

Himmler turned to Michelle,

'Right, my dear, how does this machine work?'

Michelle looked nonplussed by this direct questioning. She looked across at Sem, who was still being held at gunpoint. Himmler pointed his Lugar at Michelle,

'You do know how it works, don't you?'

'It has something to do with the wormhole dynamics. No-one really knows exactly how it works.'

'Is that so?' he moved closer to her, 'It sounds to me that you are expendable.' He turned his attention to Ash, 'have you any more information on how it works?'

'The main crux is being able to govern the drop-off points and return dynamics.'

'You too are expendable.' The Nazi leader turned to the SS troops, 'Take them outside and shoot them.' He ordered.

Four of the SS troops drew their weapons and pointed them at Ash and Michelle. Sem and Marq stood in shock.

Marq said,

'Wait. They are essential to the working of this system. Not everyone knows exactly how this thing works, but there are many cogs in the working of the system as a whole.'

'Then you can train my men to operate it?'

'Why?'

'Why? Why? Because we need it to defeat the weaker elements in our government; the ones who are against our measures to create the master race.' He waved his Luger at the guards, who began taking Ash and Michelle out.

As they started moving, the guards began making involuntary and unwieldy movements. One dropped his gun as he fell to the ground. Another screamed as he convulsed uncontrollably.

Ash and Michelle looked at each other, not knowing what to do.

Marq looked at the main band of soldiers. There were now less than before.

The four who were to take Ash and Michelle out, disappeared too.

Himmler tried to raise his gun, but his hand would not stop shaking.

His legs gave way beneath him. He fell to the ground; dead.

.................................
Chapter Eight

Three Shades of Grey

To Ash's amazement Marq still looked unperturbed as he put the blue spectacles on. Michelle's eyes looked like ping-pong balls as they tried to take in what she had just seen.

Sem was still working at one of the keyboards when Marq said to her,

'We don't want any more of that, if you don't mind.'

The rebuke was in good humour, Sem replied,

'I think I know where the problem was, I am putting in a fix now to prevent it happening again.'

Ash took Michelle by the waist to another computer terminal to try to find something to take her mind off what had just happened.

They sat and watched the screen. An aerial view of a stretch of water showed some large ships in what looked like a fleet configuration.

'What is this, Sem?' asked Ash.

Sem looked across to their screen without moving from her chair, and then clicked a couple of times. The same picture appeared on her screen as she began drilling down to find the information,

'Mmmm. This was 1943. The Germans were moving towards Trieste in the Adriatic.' She tapped and clicked some more, 'Looking through news reports of the time it looks like the countries being absorbed into Germania were not best pleased. Even Austria was bullied somewhat by the Nazi part of the 'expansion' forces. These countries seem to view the whole process as being more like occupation by a belligerent force – especially the Jewish elements within the populations involved.'

Ash wanted to know more,

'So these ships are threatening, a show of force by the Germans?'

'On the contrary; they are supporting mass evacuations by the Jewish people.'

'Then, who the hell are they?'

Sem read on,

'They are a collaboration of all the countries that have strong Jewish elements in their population.' She closely examined the pictures, 'There are quite a few British battle cruisers – the aircraft carriers are French, British and American. The big ferries are actually Israeli, as are a lot of the support vessels and submarines.'

Marq moved across to another screen,

'This looks interesting. Sem, what system have you got here?'

She smiled as she replied,

'We have some early space exploration, by the Germans principally. This has allowed us to put some micro bots in orbit with no-one noticing.'

'What do you mean us?'

'Well, it was actually Mr del Banco and Xanthros.'

Ash and Michelle were surprised by this.

Sem continued with details,

'They called it their Zeus project, because they can watch over thing as if from the heavens.'

Marq tapped some keys as he said,

'And now, so can we.' The picture was transferred on to a big screen.

Sem continued tapping at the keyboard. Eventually she turned to Marq and said,

'We have only got basic pictures.'

Ash said,

'What does that mean?

Marq told him,

'What it really means is that we can only stand by and watch; we do not operate like that. We normally have the facility to look deeper into a situation. We need to be involved at many levels in order to influence events.'

Sem interrupted him,

'There seems to be a disturbance down there.'

She pointed at the ships on the big screen.

Ash said,

'Can we zoom in on this ship?'

Sem tapped some more. A slim grey ship seemed to be moving at speed, approaching the fleet. A fountain of water erupted in front of it – a shot across the bows. The destroyer altered course, looking to go around the fleet. Another fountain of water appeared, this time against the side of the ship.

Ash said one word,

'Torpedo.'

Marq said to Sem,

'Get me down there.' As he rushed into the transportation room.

'I suppose a post code is too much to ask.' She called to him as she attacked the keyboard.

'Trieste. Spatzi Sociali, Cavana Square, if you please.'

Ash and Michelle stood in awe as the machinery swung into action.

Sem saw them looking baffled,

'It isn't as complicated as it looks, you know.' Michelle watched carefully as Sem explained, 'In order for it to operate the whole system needs booting up. This main switch provides power, the machine then needs launching.' She moved to another machine, and pressed a button. 'Then we wait for it to sort itself out.' A screen flickered, and then turned white with faint grey lines. Sem touched another switch. The screen blacked out as if to start again. Various signs and letters flashed on, rolled, and blinked off. More letters, this time with instructions. 'See, it actually tells you what to do,' she pointed at the screen, 'see, press F2.' She tapped a key. The screen flickered into life again. 'And then it shows the default time and place. 'That is here, and now. We simply change the date and place we wish Marq to go to. And hey presto -.'

Marq sat inside a clear cubicle. This now filled with a white fug, and he disappeared.

In a small alley near Cavana Square, Trieste, Marq emerged. It was a short walk round the corner to an innocuous looking door. Marq punched in a code number to the combination lock on the door. He was faced with a flight of stairs, but there was no-one around on the ground floor.

In the first-floor office he found del Banco. Del Banco did not realise that there were differences between the Marquis of Libeaux he knew and the one before him.

'Good afternoon, Marquis. I thought you were in Scandinavia.'

They shook hands,

'I am,' Marq looked around the room, which was full of much more scientific material that you would expect for 1943, 'now, what is happening?'

They moved over to a wide screen tv. Del Banco began explaining,

'This is the German destroyer 'Gunther'. She has now entered the exclusion zone the allies have around their fleet.'

'Exclusion zone?' Marq asked this question more for the benefit of Semeramis, who was relaying the messages to Ash and Michelle.

'Yes. Whenever two or more capital ships move together they establish a belligerent exclusion zone because of the threat of guided missiles and aircraft. Anything coming closer than 5 miles will be met with force; in this case an Israeli submarine-launched torpedo.'

'Guided missiles? This is 1943.'

'Yes,' del Banco looked apologetic, 'We did give them some help there.'

'Did you now? And what about the situation here?'

Del Banco returned to the screen, he pointed at the massive car ferry; it looked like a city block painted in three shades of grey,

'This is an evacuation ship. There is also one in the Baltic. The persecution of elements of the populations is making it necessary for these people to leave en mass – they chose to do this before it is too late.'

'And what happens now? They have fired on a ship.' He scrutinised the screen showing the destroyer, it was now beginning to go round in large circles, 'what do you anticipate here?'

As he finished speaking two thin white lines came from the destroyer. A white cloud bloomed from one of the capital ships. The four fourteen inch guns in turret 'A' of HMS King George V all fired simultaneously from nine miles range. The fall of shot straddled the destroyer, one shell exploded almost alongside the greyhound of the fleet.

On the ferry four thin white lines signalled the launch of four missiles. These were self-defence weapons, aimed at the missiles launched by the Gunther, which were heading directly at the grey city block at almost the speed of sound.

Both missiles were stopped by proximity fuses within the ferry's weapons. As they reached the closest spot to the attacking missiles, they exploded, throwing hot metal in a disc through which the offensive missiles must fly, with disastrous results.

Another two Israeli torpedoes were launched at the Gunther. One had a malfunction of the guidance system, the other did not; it hit directly amidships of the destroyer, which began to list.

The King George V's 'B' turret opened up. The destroyer continued describing a wide circle in the sea. One of the shells hit the superstructure of the Gunther, which began to capsize as the smoke cleared.

Marq held out an upstretched palm towards del Banco,

'I think that answers my last question.'

Clouds began to obscure the picture,

Del Banco said,

'We will have to switch to infra red.'

The picture changed colours; the sea was dark grey-green, the ships became a fuzzy white colour.

Del Banco explained,

'If anyone fires there will be a bright flash.'

The destroyer began to glow brighter as the flames reached the outside of the ship.

A mass of bright white shapes appeared on the right of the screen. Marq counted 25, del Banco switched back to normal picture – there was no need to zoom in on the rapidly moving shapes; they were Junkers Ju 87 Stuka dive bombers flying above the clouds – and they were heading straight for the fleet.

Marq turned his attention to the large square shapes that he knew were aircraft carriers. On their decks small bright spots appeared as aircraft began running up their engines. These were interceptors, developed from the Spitfire.

And then the advantage of using the infra-red system came into its own. Bright flashes all over the fleet signalled multiple missile launches. Vivid pencil lines showed the missile tracks. Marq tried counting them, but there were too many, and they seemed to converge and cross each other. He turned to del Banco,

'This is 1943. Where did they get the technology for missiles?'

'It was the miniaturisation of valves, and the invention of the transistor that did a lot towards that.' Del Banco said.

Sem was following the situation closely, she punched in some requests to a separate computer,

'And in America Goddard did a lot of development work on engines.' She told Marq and the others in the room with her.

Marq asked del Banco,

'Are these guided missiles?'

Del Banco replied,

'Yes. They home in on the propellers of the enemy aircraft; a fast revolving disc makes a good target – the closer they get, the more accurate they become. They do not call them missiles – they are hittiles.'

'You have not answered my question – where did they get the technology for missiles?'

Del Banco was beginning to be evasive,

'Both the transistors and the radar systems were developed in South Africa by an Israeli company called XAN Industries.'

'Were they now?' Marq asked a rhetorical question, 'And may I have guess at what the name means?' Del Banco seemed to resign himself to what was about to come from the man he knew as Marqis, the leader of the family. 'Xanthros?'

Any further conversation was stopped by the first missiles hitting home. One by one the Ju 87s were brought down. In some cases the biggest piece of wreckage was hit by another missile. It only took three minutes to stop the attack. After which Marq turned to del Banco,

'Where is he now?'

'I believe he is on that ferry.' He pointed at the screen.

'Can you get me on that ship?'

'It is about two hours out.'

Marq looked at the screen, there seems no immediate danger, let's do it.'

'Of course, Marquis. I will contact Xanthros to give you clearance.'

'No. Don't do that. I want to surprise him.'

They made their way down to the wharf, on the way there they saw why the ferry was heading for Trieste; hundreds of cars filled every conceivable parking space, waiting for the ferry to take them away. Del Banco led Marq to the bustling dockside, where they embarked on an ordinary looking yacht. The ship they were heading for was not even on the horizon when they set sail. It was mid-afternoon, and del Banco said,

'There is a chance that they will be in blackout when we arrive.'

'You have radar do you not?'

'Not on this boat; it is too bulky and heavy for a vessel of this size.'

'How do you intend finding her?'

'They have radar, they can talk us in – let's be honest; she's big enough to find. And I have this.'

He led Marq down below decks, he drew back a curtain to reveal what looked like a blank wall. He pressed a hidden button, and the screen lit up. It was a direct feed from the screen they had been looking at in the control room ashore.

As the sun began to drop to the horizon behind the clouds, and darkness fell on to the sea, del Banco and Marq scanned the horizon for any sign of the fleet they knew they were heading for.

Marq it was who called,

'Ship ahoy. On the bow at 11 o'clock.'

By the time they reached the ferry it was completely dark. Discrete lighting allowed them to berth alongside the massive ship, and then climb up the docking ladders to enter the vast cathedral-like inside.

Del Banco spoke to the leader of the boarding party, who then led them up to the bows of the ship. Here they entered an elevator. Marq could not assess how many decks they passed before the elevator doors opened.

The seaman took them on to the bridge. He indicated a man standing on the port side bridge wing, looking out over the side of the ship.

Del Banco walked to Xanthros, they shook hands as del Banco said,

'I have someone here who would like to have a word with you.'

Xanthros nearly staggered backwards when he saw Marq.

Marq greeted Xanthros by shaking hands, but Xanthros was obviously on automatic.

'What brings you here?'

'It's a long story. More to the point, what brings you here?'

'These people need my help.'

'And exactly how have you been helping them?' the Marquis began to take on a more authoritarian tone, 'You know the rules about giving technology out.'

'These people are fighting for their very existence – the Nazis are trying to wipe them out, this is genocide. I cannot stand by and let it happen.'

'That does not excuse your cavalier attitude. There are systems in place to allow for exceptions in such situations.'

'There wasn't time. I made a field decision to help.'

'You made a decision to fly in the face of regulations. How much tech have you given away?'

'My company in South Africa is responsible for the production of transistors and infra-red guidance systems. That's all.'

The Marquis began to get annoyed at this,

'You mean that you have started a manufacturing proc...'

He was rudely interrupted by a rating bursting into the room,

'Sir, I think you had better look at this.'

He handed Xanthros a slip of paper.

'Thank you.' Xanthros opened the message.

He quickly moved across to another repeater screen showing the satellite image. Now because of the darkness the infra-red picture was being used.

The aircraft carriers were all launching aircraft.

The aircraft from the carriers were forming up. They expected them to return to their carriers, but they did not; instead they began to move not towards the direction from where the Ju 87s had come from, but in the opposite direction, Italy. The Marquis pointed at the right edge of the screen,

'Is that what they are going after?'

On the infra-red picture there appeared another mass of bright white dots, some brighter than others. Del Banco switched from the infra-red to the normal picture. He zoomed in to the formation, what he saw gave him a shock. There was good enough moon light to be able to pick out the shapes of aircraft with the brightness of clouds behind them.

'I don't believe it.' There, slowly tracking across the cloud-tops was a full air raid in the making, 'I heard that the Italians were developing a jet bomber for maritime strike, and here it is.'

The Marquis asked,

'Why is that so bad?'

'Because the Italians have developed a new anti-shipping missile for the aircraft.' Del Banco moved closer to the screen, 'Launched from high altitude, they have rocket engines, which take them to supersonic speeds. They can be launched 50 miles away from their target, long before they get in range of any defences.' He paused, 'And they are unstoppable, accurate and vastly destructive.'

Xanthros asked,

'How destructive? Nuclear?'

'No. They don't need to be. They use double explosive armour piercing munitions.'

The Marquis wanted to know more,

'What do you mean –'double explosive'?'

'They explode on contact with a ship; this then propels the warhead down into the vessel where it explodes in the innards.'

Marq looked around the ship they were on,

'Is this thing armoured?'

Xanthros said,

'No. you can't armour something this size due to the weight increase.'

Marq walked away from Xanthros and said to del Banco,

'Just what the hell have you done here?' he held out his hands in exasperation, 'And I suppose this ship is the real target?'

Del Banco replied quietly,

'Yes; all the others are escorts. They expected trouble...'

Another rating entered the room; he went straight to Xanthros,

'Sir, the Italian Main Battle Feet has set sail from Brindisi, and they are heading this way.'

'That's all we need. They have some serious battleships.'

Del Banco said,

'I don't think we need worry about them; by the time they get here there will be nothing left for them to attack.'

...........................

'The time is not right.'

Gus said as he stroked his finger over the Carabnieri badge on his cap, which he held in his hand to prevent it being seen.

Jake Jensen countered,

'The time is right – we must act now before this idiot drags us into a war –just to impress the bloody Germans.'

'There are less than 40% of us willing to fight.'

'All of you don't have to fight; just do not oppose us. With the backing of the Polizia de Stato we can pull this off. We are looking at saving Italian lives here.' They were in a small hotel in a quiet alley in Bari, southern Italy, Jake continued, 'The Battle Fleet at Brindisi has gone on to a war footing, it has already started, we hear that they are preparing to set sail for Trieste.'

'Some of our officers I am not sure of, but on the whole we are with you.'

'Good – that's all we need. Once we have rid ourselves of this menace things will be easier for all concerned.' Jake moved towards the door, 'We are ready for the revolution, I am now going to Naples to get things moving there, we are running with this now, Gus.' They smiled as they shook hands. Gus waited a few minutes before he followed Jake out into the Italian sunshine.

The uprising soon spread from Naples, and before Mussolini had chance to bring in support from Milan, the revolutionaries had taken Rome. The Senate knew this was coming, and they almost welcomed the diversion from going to war.

..............................

Xanthros spoke quietly to del Banco whilst Marq was otherwise engaged,

'Where the hell did he come from?'

'I don't know - he just appeared as if from nowhere – I thought he was in Stockholm.'

Marq turned to face them,

'I think you had better look at this.' He said. All three of them looked at the screen. On it they saw the aircraft turning around. 'I think my work here is done; the threat is receding, they will now be at peace.'
Chapter Nine

The Man Who Would Start Wars.

Semeramis was studying reports of the day on screen at Martineau,

'There's something wrong here.'

Marq was in the same room, he walked over to her,

'Yes...'

'Yes.' She turned from the screen and looked at him, 'Are you sure you killed Hitler?'

'Yes. Stone dead in front of witnesses.'

She shook her head gently,

'Well, it looks as if the war was not avoided.'

He focussed on her screen. There were historical reports of the way the war was progressing – the invasion of Russia, allied victory in North Africa, American involvement via Pearl Harbour, it was all there. Marc stared at the screen in disbelief,

'How? How did that happen?'

Semeramis and Michelle had been discussing events that Michelle remembered being told about at school. These memories will be altered every time Marq goes back in time and forces a change.

'The Nazi party was led by some other determined people back them' She explained as he drew up a chair, 'The feeling in Germany at the time was that they had actually won the First World War. The Nazis convinced vast numbers that because their country had not been invaded, and they had taken large chunks out of Russia and Poland in the east, they believed that they had actually won, and the Versailles Treaty was punishing them unjustly. They had suffered during the war, mainly due to naval blockades leading to real hardships within the population; this helped them to go along with the ludicrous theories put forward.'

'So what happened to start things off?'

'Just prior to the start of hostilities the Nazis thought they needed some provocation from their neighbours, so they manufactured some.'

Marq did not understand this,

'Pardon? You ain't makin sense.'

'The Nazis wanted to invade Poland, and we know they did. But before that they manufactured a reason to invade.'

..............................

The small radio station in Upper Silesia boasts the tallest wooden structure in Europe. Sender Gleiwitz was selected for special attentions by their own army on 31st August 1939.

Three days earlier the stations boss, Francisek Honiok, was visited by a strange Prussian officer.

Honiok was working in his office in the warm sunny morning of 28th August when his newly installed internal telephone rang.

He smelled the newness as he answered. It could only be his secretary in the room outside his office door, but Honiok answered as if it could have been anyone,

'Ja, gutten morgan. Vas ist los?'

'Gutten morgan, herr direktor, there is a gentleman here who would like to speak with you. He says he has come a long way.'

'Very well. Show him in.'

She raised from her chair after she had replaced the ear trumpet on its cradle,

'Bitte, he will see you now.'

The officer marched into the carpeted room. Heniok raised from his seat to shake hands. He felt he should say, 'Stand at ease,' but did not. He offered the tall Prussian a seat by waving his open hand towards a chair.

The military bearing did not slip as he took the seat.

Honiok could not help noticing the strange blue hexagonal spectacles. He was almost expecting a monocle.

'I have some rather disturbing news for you, I'm afraid.' The Prussian said.

Honiok's first though was that the military would be taking over his radio station.

The music of Semprini drifted in the background.

'Oh, yes. What is it?' Honiok said as he sat down again.

Marq chose his next words carefully,

'In three days' time there will be a raid on your station.'

The manager looked mildly surprised,

'A military exercise, I presume?'

'No. I'm afraid it will be the exact opposite. A group of soldiers will attack with the utmost violence. Their aim will be to kill as many as possible, cause mayhem and damage, and then actually plant bodies in here.'

'What?' The surprise had now turned to shock, 'Are we being invaded?'

Marq shook his head slightly,

'The attacking force will be your own countrymen dressed as Polish soldiers. They will in fact be SS men; so there will be no point in trying to resist – these people have no mercy.'

'But why? And - you said something about being dressed as Polish soldiers?'

'Yes, they will also bring drugged prisoners from Dachau. They are also dressed as Polish soldiers.' He paused to allow this to sink in, 'They are to be butchered after the event, and left to be found. The whole affair is a subterfuge to justify invading Poland.'

Honiok sank back in his chair.

'Wha... Wha... What can we do about this?'

'Absolutely nothing yourself. As I said, these men are SS. They cannot be stopped by civilians.'

'I don't know what to say. What should we do, die?'

'No, Herr Honiok, you and your staff must stay well away for the day. I have been in touch with a special unit of the Prussian Army in Austria. They do not want Germany to invade Poland, so they have volunteered to protect this establishment, and uncover the whole plot.'

Honiok looked relieved to hear this,

'Thank you. I will instruct my staff to take the day after tomorrow off; the 31st ?'

'Yes, the men of the Bundesheer will arrive during the day on the 31st. The attack is scheduled to happen that night.'

During the day of the 31st August twenty-seven members of the Jagdkommando arrived at the radio station. They moved into the establishment at different times, and in civilian clothes. In the mid-afternoon several boxes arrived by courier; these contained the arms and equipment the soldiers would need to protect the station.

By the time the sun went down they were ready.

Marq spoke with Honiok,

'The leader of the group who will be attacking you is a nasty piece of work known as SS-Sturmbannfuhrer Alfred Naujocks – in fact they are all pretty awful.' He turned to face Honiok, 'They will be bringing prisoners from Dachau camp. They will be used as Polish soldiers, to be killed on site to make it look more like a Polish raid – they don't expect to lose any of their own men.'

Honoik looked around at the Austrians, now dressed in black,

'I would say they were in for a surprise.' He looked back at Marq, 'Tell me, how do you know all of this detail?'

Marq just looked the man in the eye as he said,

'You would not believe it.'

On the second platform of the radio mast, 55 metres above ground; two soldiers lay in wait. Wachtmeister (sergeant) Frans Blocke was the observer, Kpl Heinz Fabe was the shooter, the sniper.

Bocke carefully scanned the area through his binoculars. The small town lay in darkness. In the distance to the north-east came the sound of vehicles. From his high position Blocke saw the lights of five vehicles. They had rigged up a telephone to the radio station, Bolke called up the station,

'Five vehicles heading this way.' Was the curt message he sent out.

'Hold your fire until you are sure of who you see. We will use your first shot as a signal to open fire.'

'Ja.'

The five vehicles drew closer. By which time they had dowsed their lights. This gave Blocke and Fabe confirmation that there was something sinister going on.

Blocke kept watching,

'Lead car presenting well, but second has better resolution.'

Faber did not respond immediately; he concentrated on looking down his telescopic sight. This is more powerful than the binoculars that Blocke was using.

After considering his targets Faber quietly said,

'Second vehicle.'

Blocke said,

'Fire when ready.'

Fabe stopped breathing. The vehicles rounded a curve in the road, now clear of buildings, he had a clear shot.

The rifle cracked. The high powered bullet took 2.7 seconds to reach its target.

The driver of the second vehicle did not register the smashing glass of his window. The shot hit him in the upper chest. The bullet tumbled more because of the glass impact – it did not exit directly, it thrashed about in his chest causing damage to vital organs.

The steering wheel spun out of control, causing the car to move out of the small convoy. The driver of the small truck behind the stricken vehicle had to swerve to avoid clipping the rear of the car. The lead car was clipped by the dead driver's car as it veered out of control, only to turn over on the side of the road, bursting into flames. The men inside were in no fit state to fight.

The lead car was driven by Alfred Neujocks; the man Marq had been sent to kill.

He wrestled briefly with the steering wheel to avoid being pushed off the road. The sudden movements of the vehicle meant that Fabe could not hold good resolution on the car or people inside. He asked Bolke,

'What next?'

'Not the truck – I think it contains innocents. Can you get the lead car?'

'Not easily. Rear car.'

Bolke levelled his binoculars at the last car in the convoy,

'Fire when ready.'

There was no reply.

Faber squeezed the trigger on his high-powered snipers rifle.

The gun cracked, bucked, and then Faber opened the bolt to release the spent cartridge with a wisp of smoke. He automatically placed another bullet in the open breech as Bolke surveyed the results.

The driver had been hit in the head. Part of the top of his head departed, covering the occupants in blood. The car ran into the rear of the one in front of it. Both vehicles stopped. The occupants got out, apart from the one who had just lost the top of his head. The seven SS men dressed as Polish soldiers began moving towards the radio station.

At the station the first car stopped. Four men ran up to the front door. Neujocks led the way.

Inside the building Francisek Honiok was about to lock the front door. Neujocks did not hesitate; he levelled his machine pistol at the unarmed manager. He was the first man killed in what was becoming dangerously close to escalating into World War 2.

As Neujocks dealt with Honiok his men rushed into the interior, which they expected to be a peaceful civilian establishment. They were cut down by Prussian special forces.

Three SS 'Polish' men fell without having chance to return fire.

Neujocks fell back onto a wall to hide from the gunfire further in the building.

Outside Faber spotted the seven men moving from the cars. He carefully drew aim on individuals within this group. Two fell before the rest took cover. There were now only five men approaching.

Bolke took up a rifle. He fired at the five men, who had heard the gunfire from within the building. One winced as he caught the shot fired by Bolke, and went down. His nearest comrade went to his aid. This meant that there were now three men moving towards the building, only Neujocks inside. Fabe fired again, and there were only two advancing when they saw the large bulk of Neujocks running out.

'It's a trap.' He cried.

The wounded soldier was being helped by his comrade when the retreat began. Three men had left the truck when they saw that the attack was being called off. One of them took a shot at Faber and Bolke on the tower. Bolke fired back, causing the enemy to scatter before returning to their truck. Neujocks and his remaining entourage got to the two remaining cars. As they drove off into the night Faber managed to get another shot off into the rear car.

..............................

In the hidden underground complex Semeramis contacted Marq,

'Did you get him?'

'Inconclusive, probably not. These people can run away fast.'

'Well, something happened a month later in Holland; they are now running to a place called Venlo to follow up on information about the British Secret Service.'

'Ok, Retourner.'

Marq gave the word to bring him back to France. Semeramis replied,

'Roger that – I need to catch up on this; it is complicated, as you would expect from double dealing.'

..............................
Chapter Ten

Sigmund Best

Semeramis and Ash were looking at a newspaper report on screen when Marq entered the room.

Ash said,

'There is precious little about the incident we are interested in – but here is a piece in a Canadian newspaper, one of the main agents had spent some time in Canada, so they ran it.'

Marq was interested,

'Could you run it off for me please?'

Semeramis turned away from the screen when he said this,

'You mean you want a hard copy?'

'Yes, if you don't mind,' he lifted his blue spectacles a little, and peered below them, 'I happen to like the feel of paper.'

She smiled as she said,

'I think you are taking on the habits of the 1930s.'

He conjured up a smoking pipe from somewhere,

'I don't know what you could possibly mean.'

Ash laughed uncontrollably; eventually he was able to say,

'Come on, Sherlock.' He handed him the printout, 'Here's today's paper for you.'

Marq sat at a vacant desk. Ash and Semeramis began ploughing through documents on line.

After some time Semeramis said,

'A bicycle salesman in Holland called Sigismund Best. Married, turns out he was the spymaster general of Branch Z of the British Secret Intelligence Service, SIS to its friends.'

Marq said,

'What, how does he fit in with the start of the war?'

'Not him directly – he was trying to stop it.'

'Sounds like a good chap.' Marq swung the pipe around like a conductor's baton.

Semeramis pointed at the screen as she continued,

'On October 21st 1939, about three weeks before war was declared, he was recruiting high-ranking German officers who were against Hitler's ideas of conquest.'

Ash turned away from his screen,

'Were there many?'

Michelle said,

'When I was at Uni I studied the Second World War. A lot of high-ranking German officers were very elitist; they did not like this jumped-up ex-corporal, failed artist taking over the running of the country, and taking it into a war that could be very unpredictable. There were one or two.'

Semeramis was working at her computer,

'It looks like he had some useful allies – here we have the Canadian connection; although it is a bit tenuous to say the least. Best was travelling with a Dutchman called Captain Klop,' she looked around at her comrades. A smile played on her lips as she continued, 'It's true,' she pointed at her screen, 'Captain Klop – you couldn't make it up. He was trying to hide his nationality to maintain his countries neutrality. So he was travelling as a Canadian by the name of Coppens. Apparently he spent some time in Canada, so that seems to be why the Canadian newspaper covered it,' she clicked her computer a couple of times, 'Yes, they seem to have thought the name Coppens was genuine, and he was a hero of a Canadian spy.'

Marq blew a cloud of smoke from his pipe as he asked,

'Right, what do you want me to do?'

Semeramis said,

'These three were lured into a trap by a chap called Schaemell, who turns out to be a 29 year old ex-lawyer by the name of Schellenburg.' A smile crept around her lips as she looked across at Ash, who was beginning to get confused, 'Pay close attention please; I will ask questions later. To return to the plot – Sigismund Best was collecting people who were disaffected about the Nazis, a lot of these were high-ranking German officers.' She scrutinised her screen, 'It would appear that this Schellenburg was one of these, but not the kind Best wanted. He was head of German Foreign Intelligence – he was out to find out as much about British Intelligence as he could, and then kill as many of its operatives as possible.'

Marq was following the story,

'So you want me to go in there and help this guy?'

'Sort of.' She thought briefly, 'Your main target is the same as last time – Alfred Naujocks. It is he who turns up with a dozen German SS troops to smash the Best spy ring once and for all.' She pointed at the screen as if that would in any way clear things up, 'There had just been an attempt to blow up Heindrich Himmler, one of the lead Nazis, he then ordered Schellenburg to kill Best and anyone with him. If you can stop that happening, the Nazi grip on power in Germany would be severely weakened.'

..............................

On October 30th 1939 Sigmund Best had set up a meeting with the man he knew as Hauptmann Alfred Schaemell. Neujocks once described this man as a 'namby-pamby, pasty-faced little man.' – not a picture of the normal SS henchman.

He was bringing a new recruit to the British secret agent. The man sitting in the car with Schaemell was supposed to be a disgruntled aristocrat who was keen to overthrow the Nazis. With a shock of pure white hair, and an old-fashioned elegance the man gave off an air of confidence, almost arrogance.

The meeting had been set up at a secluded spot near Arnhem, but Best was late. After waiting 45 minutes the Germans decided to give up. They were about to leave the rendezvous when the lights of another car appeared. They delayed leaving. The other car pulled up close to them, and three men moved in the darkness towards the Germans – but this was not the British secret agent they were expecting. It was the Dutch police. They came to investigate a strange car; it could be carrying people from Germany who had no right to be in Holland – the relationships between the two countries was at that time tense to say the least.

The local Chief of police himself came out to do the investigation.

There were three German officers in the car. They had all taken especial care to avoid carrying anything that would give away their country of origin, but the third man's Dutch was not as fluent as the others.

As they were bundled into the car, Schaemell quietly said to the third man,

'Try not to say anything.'

Their command of the Dutch language was good, but the German accent would definitely give them away.

They were taken back to the local Police Headquarters, where their luggage was thoroughly searched. Whilst this was going on they were instructed to empty their pockets onto a table.

This they did in complete silence. Whilst the police went through their luggage, Schaemell scrutinised the pile of pocket litter on the table before them.

The usual detritus lay there;

Wallets carefully filled with Dutch money, small piles of Dutch coins, handkerchiefs, combs, receipts, tickets, packet of aspirins, cigarettes, lighters.

The white-haired German with him did not notice anything amiss in the little pile, but Schaemell did; he realised that the aspirins were only issued to the SS, and carried the label 'SS Sanitaetschauptampt'. This would immediately give the game away.

Schaemell quickly looked around at the police present. They were all busy dealing with the luggage.

Without hesitation he picked up the aluminium packet, thrust it in his mouth, and swallowed hard. He hoped the packaging would protect his stomach from the effects of the drug within them.

Before he had chance to digest the pills properly there was a knock at the door. He was already an ashen colour from the aspirin incident when he saw the Dutch spy Klopp, who he knew as Coppens, entered the room.

Schaemell immediately knew what had happened – the British and Dutch had set them up for a fall. The allies suspected them - and if anything, like the aspirins, had given them away they would have been arrested. It was a test.

Coppens said to the Germans,

'We have been watching you for some time, now. We do not think for one moment that you are Dutch, as you say you are.' He turned to the Chief of Police, 'Thank you for your assistance, we shell take it from here.'

The police obviously knew Coppens better than the Germans did; they knew he was probably not a genuine Dutch bicycle salesman, but further than that they had little information. And here was the Dutch Chief of Police passing three German agents on to him, they could only presume that Coppens was working for some people or country – they hoped it was not as bad as their own Gestapo – but it may even be the Gestapo in this twisting, double-crossing world.

The white-haired German feared the worst. He was Kapitan-Leutnant Hans Kreutchner, from the U-boat arm during the First World War. He feared that if captured by their own side pretending to be Dutch, he could be accused of acting against the state, at least. And with the unforgiving nature of the young Nazi Party this was not a good prospect.

Coppens tried to explain the situation from his side as the car sped through Holland, away from the German border.

Schamell thought he could taste the aspirins he had swallowed. His throat was aching from the scratching the wrapper had done at the back of his throat. If one or two had leaked from their packaging he would be ok, but if the wrapping were to break down in his stomach he would be in big trouble.

'I'm sorry for that little incident.' Captain Klop said as he drove them straight west, into the middle of Holland

Kreutchner was more dubious than even Schaemell. The white-haired German officer leaned over to Schaemell and said quietly,

'Is it possible to make a run for it before we get any further away from Germany?'

He took hold of the door handle as the car slowed for a bend in the road.

Schaemell covered his other arm and said,

'How far do you think we would get? They would probably shoot us rather than waste energy chasing us.' He sat back, 'No, my friend we will just have to tough it out.'

They were then whisked away to the headquarters of the British Secret Intelligence Service (SIS) in The Hague.

Armed soldiers stood inside the inconspicuous-looking building. Schaemell, the leader of German Foreign Intelligence, was now in the hornet's nest. He forgot about the aspirins as his stomach took somersaults. Klop / Coppens took them into a room off a corridor.

The room was laid out for a feast or banquet. The Germans were astounded.

Best greeted them in perfect German,

'Gutten Tag, I am sorry there has been a little problem on your way here – but you are here now, and we would like to welcome you to the organisation.'

Schaemell completely forgot the aspirins as he took Bests offered hand, and shook it warmly,

'Herr Best, this is Kapitan-Leutnant Hans Kreutchner, from the Kreigsmarine.'

And so it went on.

The Germans were taken in to the bosom of the British Intelligence organisation, just where they wanted to be.

The British issued their new recruits with radios, with instructions to make secret communications as regularly as possible; but care must be taken to prevent the rest of the German authorities finding out about what they were doing.

Thus the very authorities the British were trying to hoodwink were actually in their midst.

The subterfuge lasted for weeks. More meetings were held; the Germans looked set to take good advantage of the Secret Service setup, they were garnering a lot of information about the British intentions within Germany.

The head of the SS, Heindrich Himmler, was especially pleased with Schaemell and his team, when an event threatened to disrupt proceedings.

A carpenter in Germany, Georg Esler was not happy with the way the Nazi Party were conducting things. There were places where the Social Democrats could not control the Nazi excesses. Esler, consistently hard up, and with communist leanings, was always against the way the Nazis kept trying to lead their country towards war. He reasoned that with the elimination of the leadership and as many party officials as possible Germany would have a better future.

As a skilled man, now working in an armaments factory, he was able to construct an elaborate bomb. This he planted in the Burgerbraukeller in Munich, where the Party were to hold one of their rallies on 8th October 1939. The main targets were the Nazi leaders – Goering, Goebbels, Heydrich, Hess and Himmler. Esler had spent days and nights building an elaborate bomb into one of the main columns of the beerkeller – there were expected to be 3,000 people there.

But the leadership he was aiming at were planning to attack France – it was the French who then had the biggest army and most efficient armaments production capability in the world; the Nazis would need to rely on the doddering leadership of the French first war mentality to give their planned blitzkrieg a chance. But more planning was required, and fog was threatening their flights back to Berlin. So they decided to cut the speeches down from over two hours each, so that they could make it back to the capital.

This threw Esler's elaborate timing out of the window. When the bomb exploded the crowd had begun to disperse, it did not kill any of the hierarchy. Eight people were killed by the explosion, with 65 or so injured.

Himmler escaped. He called Schaemell into his office two days after the incident.

'The Fuhrer believes the British Intelligence Service to be behind this atrocity.' Himmler demanded from Schaemell, 'Your people must have something to do with it.' He was trying to contain his rage, 'If they did not, then they must have known about it; or they are completely useless.'

Schaemell and his outfit knew nothing of Esler's plot, neither did the British – he was working as a lone wolf.

Himmler continued,

'If your command cannot at least predict something like this, what use is it?'

Schaemell attempted to defend himself and his section,

'No one knew what he was doing. My operations must not be confused with what one man on his own does.'

'Well then, what use is it?'

'We have the British in the palm of our hand; they are completely oblivious of our situation – we can get lots of information about their activities – spies names and objectives, resistance setups, code breaking. We don't even need to break their codes – they give them to us! This is an opportunity not to be missed.'

Himmler was not at the least impressed,

'The only opportunity not to be missed is the Fuhrerdirektiv you have been issued with; you will arrest these British and Dutch agents, they will then be interrogated, tortured, and executed – or you will. Seig Heil.'

Schaemell was backed into a corner. There was no option open to him but to obey.

He contacted Alfred Naujocks, the SS thug, and arranged for an ambush.

..............................

Author note:

Like me, Marq and Semeramis found all this information from 'War Stories' by Pal Boswell, Usborne Publications Ltd. In association with the Imperial War Museum.
Chapter Eleven

The Café Baccus at Venlo

A meeting was already scheduled for nine days later when Schaemell was to meet up with Sigmund Best, Captain Klopp, and Major Stevens, of Z Branch of the British Special Intellegence Service, SIS.

A nervous Schaemell sat in the Café Baccus with a German military man who had a large overcoat concealing his SS uniform. Venlo was in a strange 'no-mans land' between the German and Dutch border, although it was classed as being inside Holland.

He was about to start on his second brandy in a vain attempt to settle his nerves; he was not cut out for this kind of work – and it was all about to go pear-shaped.

The meeting was set for two in the afternoon – it was now almost half past two. They waited. So did the twelve SS troops over the border in Germany. They were not permitted to enter a foreign country under the laws of neutrality.

Best was known for driving a big Buick. This was in keeping with his image – he was a tall, elegant man with a monocle. In keeping with the fashions of the times he wore spats and a tweed suit.

The Buick did not show until three twenty.

Over the border in Germany Albert Naujocks stood waiting with the SS men for the Buick to appear. He stood close to the cars they had arrived in, binoculars constantly sweeping the scene across the border. Two giant 1934 model Mercedes Benz limousines were hidden from view from the Dutch side of the border.

As soon as he saw the Buick, he turned to his men and ordered two of them to mount the front fenders of the Mercedes, all armed with machine pistols, the first sub-machine guns. The windows of the car were open, the people inside leaned out with more machine guns. Naujocks took up position in the front seat of the lead vehicle. He shouted an order to move forwards, the vehicles accelerated, the men in the cars prepared to invade a neutral country, all guns blazing.

Best was not watching the road leading to Germany. He looked into the café as his tyres screeched to a stop. As he threw the door open he saw a strange man holding what looked like a weapon, the likes of which he had never seen before. It was a Panzerfaust – the German bazooka anti-tank weapon. The man tried to hide from the first vehicle, who's machine gunners were covering all angles. He levelled it at the second vehicle. He fired. A loud bang followed by a small rocket motor streaking out in front of an acrid smelling trail of smoke shot out to the Mercedes. The missile exploded on impact with sufficient force to destroy a tank. The Mercedes was a big, tough car, but it stood no chance. It almost disintegrated.

Best looked at the strange man; he noticed that he was wearing blue glasses. The man called out to him,

'It's a trap – get inside.'

Marq threw the Panzerfaust away, and took out a machine-pistol. Best withdrew a Colt .45 automatic as he turned to Klopp,

'Come on, keep your head down.'

They made a dash for the café. Major Stevens was on the wrong side of the car, and could only hide behind it.

As Best and Klopp rushed into the café, they found Schaemell and the German SS officer alone in the establishment. The SS officer had reacted to the sound of gunfire outside, and removed his civilian coat, revealing his SS personae. As he fumbled to get his Luger from its holster, Best shot him with one bullet in the middle of his chest. The force of the .45 shell knocked him backwards at a rate of knots; Schaemell almost fell backwards as he tried to stand up.

Best faced Schaemell. Marq called out,

'He's set you up.'

Best did not hesitate any longer. A bullet to the chest sent Schaemell reeling.

Machine-gun bullets stitched a ragged line across the wall as the invading Germans made their presence felt.

Marq, Best and Klopp ducked below tables. They looked at the smashed windows, and deduced that it was only a matter of time before the Germans came in, guns blazing.

Klopp said,

'Back way, before they find it.'

Marq said,

'What about the man outside?'

Best looked outside, Major Stevens was guessing where the Mercedes was, and kept himself behind the Buick. He had the presence of mind to open the trunk. Inside there were two Thompson machine guns and six grenades. He was now stuffing the grenades in his pockets. He used the strap on one of the guns to loop it onto his back, checked the other one was loaded and ready to fire. He briefly looked in the direction the Germans had appeared, and made a dash for the café door. He was half way when he heard one of the Germans open fire with his machine pistol. As the name suggests; this was based on a pistol firing on automatic – the barrel was not long; therefore it was not very accurate. The Thompson was. Stevens opened up without breaking stride. The .45 cal rounds ripped into the soldiers. Three of them were killed in the brief burst – Stevens did not even slow down as he barged through the door – gun still smoking.

He joined the three men as they made for the rear door. On the way Stevens took the gun from his back, and passed it to the nearest man – Marq.

Best was first to reach the rear alley. He quickly looked both ways. Klopp indicated which way to run. The four of them dashed out. As they ran they became aware of firing coming from behind them. Klopp and Best dived into the nearest doorway; Marq was more in the open. Machine gun bullets flew around him as he looked in vain for somewhere to take cover.

Stevens was last in, he pointed the Thompson down the alley without aiming, and let fly a fusillade of random bullets. They couldn't hope to hit anyone, but it kept the German heads down, and gave Marq chance to run for a bend in the narrow street.

Klopp began banging at the door. The Germans began to move towards the men. Marq looked towards the Germans with one eye. He recognised the bulk of Alfred Naujocks in the middle of the two soldiers.

The door opened, Klopp, Best, and Stevens quickly went inside. Marq could not hope to get across the open ground to the doorway. He looked down the alley, and then back at the pursuing Germans. They would be upon him in seconds if he did not move, and fast.

He began running down the alley. Then he noticed a bullet hit quite close to him; a bit too close, and then a bullet passed so close that he felt the air disturbed as it whizzed by.

'One of them must have a rifle,' He thought, 'this is getting close.'

One of the Germans dropped to one knee to take steady aim at the running man.

At the same moment Marq ducked into a doorway to catch his breath.

Naujocks saw his chance. He accelerated his step to a sprint – he could move fast for a big man. Before Marq realised what was happening the thug actually collided with him as he moved to restart his run. The both of them fell to the ground. Marq saw the barrel of a machine pistol in his face. The man with the rifle joined them. Naujocks stood over Marq, who was still on the ground. He took Marq by the arm and lifted him to his feet. Someone took the Thompson machine-gun from his grasp.

They were all out of breath after the chase.

The blue lenses in Marq's specs caught Naujock's attention,

'What have we here?' he moved to take the glasses.

Just then an explosion went off not too far away. Someone had thrown a grenade.

It was too far away to do them any harm, but Naujocks said to the man with the rifle,

'Go and see what is happening over there.'

With the rifleman leading the way all four began moving back down the alley.

Special care had to be taken when they approached the doorway through which Klopp and his allies had left the scene.

Rifleman moved across the narrow alley. He flattened his back to the wall as he approached the doorway. A grenade was sticking out of the top of his boot - he removed this, pulled the pin, and threw it into the doorway.

The resulting explosion kept the attentions of whoever was in the building to allow Naujocks to bundle Marq past the doorway. Marq felt the muzzle of the gun digging in his back as they ran.

Rifleman was still a few feet behind them when a burst of machine-gun fire took his head off.

The distinct sound of a Thompson resonated down the alley. Naujocks was holding Marq's left arm, the man with the machine pistol was behind them as they ran. He knew that there was a possible threat from behind, and tried to keep a wary eye on their rear, at the same time holding his machine pistol around the small of Marq's back.

Marq could feel that the man was very overworked, and decided he was going to take advantage of this.

When he felt that Naujocks was fully occupied, Marq threw his right arm behind himself, turning as best he could. He was right; the soldier was looking behind them. Marq quickly took hold of the barrel of the machine pistol, turned it to wrench it from the man's grasp before he had chance to tighten his grip.

In one swift move Marq swung the gun round to collide with Naujock's head. This knocked him off balance - he relaxed his grip on Marq's arm. The freed arm now allowed Marq to take full control of the machine pistol. He quickly spun it round to hold it in the correct manner to fire. The soldier he had stolen it from drew a dagger from his belt. Marq did not hesitate, but he could only take care of one man, his mission was still to dispose of Alfred Naujocks; so he pointed the gun at Naujocks' head, pulled the trigger and blew his brains out.

The soldier with the knife realised that he was now out-gunned. He turned on his heel, and began to run away from Marq. Then there was a burst of Thompson gunfire, and the man fell dead – the last of the German invaders.

Marq looked around himself. There was no-one around he quietly said to himself almost,

'Retourner.'

Marq reappeared in Martineau.

As Semeramis entered the room he asked her,

'Did that do the trick?'

She went to a computer display on a wall. She tapped the screen, which came to life.

'There is something not quite right here.' She said, 'There's no space race.'

'Whaaa? What do you mean?'

'The Germans have developments, led by Werner von Braun, the Brits are playing with something they call Prospero, and Blue Steel, but I can't find any evidence of American activity, or Russian for that matter.'

'Any ideas?'

'I have been talking to Michelle and Ash. Their memories change with every deviation you make.' She moved away from the screen, 'They say that because the war was avoided, the Russians did not lose millions of people – most due to political strategies. She consulted her own tablet, 'In 1947 they managed to get rid of Stalin; and instead of wasting vast amounts of money on military equipment, they became...'

Marq interrupted her,

'But what about the space race, and developments in America? Without it we could never get to Mars.'

She shook her head,

'I see what you mean.'

'Could I go back to the early days to find out what went wrong?'

'I think you'd better.'
Chapter Twelve

Ash Dieback

The setting was romantic, but Ash did not feel in a romantic mood as he and Michelle walked along the quarter mile drive to the road at Martineau.

As they passed the cherry trees and moved into open ground he looked back the way they had come,

Ash said,

'I have done some research on this Goddard guy that Marq says was the father of modern rocketry. He was no such thing. I found that he experimented with rockets in the 1930s, but he was ridiculed in the press, so he gave up.'

The warm French sun shone in their faces, promising a hot day ahead.

Michelle blinked as she turned to Ash,

'What are you thinking?'

He paused before answering,

'What if there were another way for things to turn out – one where America won the space race instead of Germany?'

'And you think that this guy Goddard may have had something to do with it?'

'Yes. I have seen some footage of the experiments Goddard was conducting with early rockets. Remember that in those days it was very much a matter of working out if the theory of rocket propulsion could be made to work – it would appear that he had problems with guidance and balance of the early rockets.' He didn't know if Michelle fully grasped the importance of that, so he continued to explain, 'Have you ever tried to balance a broom by the end, and keep it from falling over?' He held out a finger and moved it as if to balance something on it.

She smiled,

'Yes, of course. I used to be in the circus – that was how we did the dusting!'

'If you could take this seriously for a moment – that was the main problem with early rockets – stopping them from toppling over. Simply holding the broom was hard enough, but when you introduce a massive thrust pushing it upwards at the same time it becomes almost impossible – and most people in the 1930s believed it was impossible. It was not until the German A4 rocket in 1952 that the problem was resolved. But imagine what would happen if an American had solved this problem 20 years earlier.'

She looked sceptical as the turned their backs on the rising sun to begin their walk back,

'And was the answer possible in the 1930s?'

'Well – yes, theoretically. The main solution lay in the gyroscope; which had been known about since ancient Greek times. No, the problem will be metallurgical – guidance vanes must be held within the rocket blast...' he held his hands out to demonstrate - she knocked them aside,

'Whoa, whoa.' She interrupted, 'Why don't you tell him yourself? Goddard needs to know, not me.' She joked.

They both laughed as they walked among the walnut trees, back towards the house.

When they got back to the control centre there was no-one around.

Ash said,

'You know, that was not such a bad idea, maybe I should go and tell Goddard.'

'Pardon?' she said, 'What are you suggesting?'

'I should go back in time, like Marq does, and advise Goddard to keep going by providing a solution to his dilemma.'

'Don't be so... how?'

'You know how to boot this thing up.' He waved his arm at the machinery, 'I know about rocketry. I think we should give it a go.'

'What if something should go wrong?'

'What could possibly go wrong? Sem showed you how simple it is.'

'Yes, she did, but... and what about security?'

'Security – there is no security in the inner sanctum – you cannot have scientists interrupting their work every time they move from one room to another.'

'But...'

'But nothing; what could possibly go wrong? We've seen it done a few times – even the Germans from seventy years ago got the hang of it.'

Michelle still did not feel comfortable, but Ash's enthusiasm got the better of her.

Ash strapped himself into the seat as Michelle booted the machinery up. A faint hum came from the equipment. She had never heard this before. She looked nervously at Ash. He was becoming enveloped in white vapours. She thought there may be a leak, but then remembered that this was what always happened.

They exchanged waves as she left the room to execute the final stage from the safety of the next room.

A loud flash; and he was gone.

Marq and Semeramis came running when they realised that the machinery was in use.

They found Michelle watching the equipment shutting itself down.

Marq was first to ask,

'What happened? Where is Doctor Ashton?'

Michelle was calm on the outside as she replied,

'Ash has gone to find out what happened to the American space race.'

'He has done what? How?'

'He has gone back in time, like you do, to correct an omission.'

'What omission?' Marq was trying to keep calm.

'A chap called Goddard was experimenting with rockets in the early days, we found that he stopped. Because of that there was no space program in the USA.'

'When was this?'

Semeramis turned to look at the monitor, when Michelle said,

'1929.'

Marq was visibly shocked at this; he looked directly at Michelle's paling face,

'You don't know what you have done, do you?'

Michelle was shocked by this; she stepped back involuntarily, but could not find any words.

Marq drew a deep breath as he tried to calm himself before explaining things to Michelle,

'In 1929 Ash would have been aged minus 35. That is the age he would return to.' He thought for a second, walked away from Michelle, and then turned back to face her again. He almost sighed, and then shook his head as he said, 'I don't see how we can bring him back – he does not exist.'

Michelle spluttered,

'He must have existed, I remember him – surely if he had ceased to exist from before he was born, then how would I remember him?'

Marq looked at Sem,

'She has a point – I think. Does she?'

Semeramis thought for a moment, then turned to ask Michelle,

'How strong is your memory of Ash?'

'What a strange question to ask.' She responded.

'Well, ok; what about your memory of Jake, or Galina, or Mark Singleton. Perhaps you could use Xanthros as a bench-mark?'

Michelle sat down as she thought about this. Her hands were now shaking as she said,

'This is strange thing.'

Sem understood,

'That's true. But it could be important. What do you recall about these people?'

'Mark died on Mars. I can see and hear him as clear as yesterday, the same about Xanthros. But Jake is no too clear. Who is Galina?'

'What about Ash?'

'He's as clear as Mark and Xanthros.'

'That's encouraging.'

Marq saw the links with what Sem was trying to do,

'You are our link to the present – especially mine.' He didn't seem as annoyed as he was before. 'When I go back in time things can, and do, change. That is why it is dangerous for other people to try to use the transporter.'

'But... But... You do it with no problems.'

'I am not normal, that is how I get away with it.'

He paced the room.

Two Geralds came in, they began a conference with Marq.

Sem began to move towards the transporter equipment.

Marq held out his hand,

'No. Don't touch anything. Nothing must be disturbed. We need to examine everything for clues. We have to find out what exactly happened, how the machine handled the task, and is there any way we can get Ash back.'

Michelle sank down into a chair, and began sobbing.

Sem placed a hand across her shoulders to comfort her,

'It will be sorted out. We'll get him back.'

Michelle was inconsolable,

'Like we have got Jake back?'

She fully understood the problem.

Marq went into a room further back with the Geralds. Michelle had never been there.

Sem explained,

'He has gone into the memory banks to see if there is something there to help us.' She moved around to Michelle's front, 'This isn't like the Jake problem. With Jake something happened in the past to influence things, we are trying to find what it was – with Ash we know what happened...'

Michelle interrupted her,

'Yes; I sent him away.' The sobbing began again.

All Sem could say was,

'We'll get him back.'

Michelle said between sobs,

'How?'

'I don't know yet, but Marq and the Geralds are working on it.'

Just then Marq returned to the room, he asked Michelle,

'What date did you put into the machine?'

Michelle blinked away the tears as she said,

'You mean the destination date?'

'Yes. What date did you send Doctor Ashton to?'

'November 1929.'

Marq tapped a screen,

'This does not make sense.' He said. A Gerald entered the room, Marq turned to him, 'Can you make anything from this reading?'

Gerald looked at the readout Marq indicated,

'Destination date – 26th March 1967.' He turned to look at Marq, and then Michelle.

Sem had an idea. She said to Michelle,

'What was Ash's birthday?'

Michelle thought for a moment, then replied,

'March 25th as far as I recall.'

A smile crept across Marq's face as he realised what had happened.

He turned to Gerald and said,

'The Lifespan Protocol.'

Gerald did not smile. This was just a matter of logics and mathematics to him. He did not think about the man at the other end – there was no problem.

'Yes, the Lifespan Protocol would have detected the lifespan of the subject, and deduced that to travel back any further would be impossible.'

Marq continued to explain it to Michelle, her red eyes were now holding out more hope,

'You mean we can get him back?'

Gerald replied in a flat, matter-of-fact manner,

'Of course; there is no problem.'

Marq saw the opportunity to throw in some humour,

'Of course, there is always the chance that he will only be one day old.'

Michelle spun round to face him, horror on her face,

'What?? You mean he went back in time, to become only one day old. And may come back here as a baby?'

Sem twigged on straight away, so added,

'Do we have any diapers?'

Michelle looked at Gerald, but he never gave away any emotions, so she looked again at Marq, who was busying himself at the transporter. Finally, she looked back at Sem, who could not hold back a faint smile, but Michelle looked directly into her eyes, where she saw jollity beaming out.

'You...' Michelle saw the joke; 'You are the one who needs a diaper.'

Marq moved away from the transporter,

'Ok. Ready to retrieve traveller.'

They all moved out of the room as mist arose from the cooling elements around the chair.

Michelle was easily first to the monitor that viewed the Transporter Room. She held her head uncomfortably close to the screen as Sem moved to alongside her to watch as Ash re-emerged exactly as he had left.

As soon as he was visible through the mist, Michelle made a dash to the door, but there was a safety lock on it to prevent anyone inadvertently entering the Transporter Room whilst it was working. She had to wait; the door can only be opened from the inside until it was safe.

When Ash came into the room, he looked quite subdued, as Michelle threw her arms around him he said,

'What happened? It didn't work.'

'Where have you been?' she demanded.

'Nowhere; I just sat there for a few minutes, and came back in here.'

Just then Gerald came into the room, he said to Marq,

'We are making alterations to the machinery – one of us will now have to be with you when you transport.'

Ash looked confused.

Chapter Thirteen

Goddard

MOON ROCKET MISSES TARGET BY 238,7991/2 MILES.

This mocking headline in a local Worcester, Mass. newspaper refers to one of Robert Goddard's first attempts to get a rocket into space in 1929.

Marq and Gerald emerged in an alley in downtown Worcester. They made their way to the main street at the end. Boxes and crates were stacked up in the shade near the end of the alley. Marq used the wooden structures as cover. His hand fell on to one of the piles of crates. The sound of falling bottles and breaking glass gave away their position. He moved to get further into the cover of boxes – but that only made the situation worse. Then he found why. Behind the boxes and crates were four large wooden barrels, completely hidden from view.

Alerted by the falling crates and breaking bottles, a nearby crew came running at Marq. Gerald stood in the shadows as the gang began to look threatening. They carried Thompson machine guns and big knives.

Marq realised what was happening. He called across to Gerald,

'They must think we are the 'G men'.'

A man managed to get behind Gerald. He was carrying a shotgun, but didn't want to shoot at such close range – easier to simply hit Gerald from behind with the butt of the gun. The man raised the gun before Marq could warn Gerald. It all happened so quickly.

The gun butt landed square in the middle of Gerald's skull. The construction that made up Gerald's neck was not bone – neither did it behave like bone; the cranium was hardened steel, the neck was built of sensitive material that had been developed to react to anything that may cause a broken neck. What it did was instantly stiffen to protect itself. The result was a rifle butt hitting a man's head. The head did not move. The skull easily withstood the wooden butt. The butt shattered. Gerald just turned slowly, raised his left arm as he turned, and smashed the man under the left arm, which was raised to land the blow with the gun. Gerald's arm only broke three ribs. But they were propelled into the rib cage, collapsing the left lung completely.

The shotgun rattled across the alley towards Marq, who picked it up. He looked at the damaged wooden butt, then at the gang who were advancing on them. He again looked at the weapon in his hands,

'Your equipment leaves something to be desired.' He called across the Gerald as he took a firm hold on the gun, aimed, and fired.

The recoil was not pleasant. Without a butt to nestle into his shoulder Marq found that the gun nearly fell out of his grasp as it was fired.

He re-adjusted his grip, and fired again. He saw that every time he fired one or more of the attackers ducked into doorways, or took cover in some other way.

Seemingly out of nowhere a 1927 model Lincoln began bearing down on the gang. A man was standing on the running board with a machine gun. He let fly at the crew to keep their heads down. These were all experienced ex-soldiers who had fought in the Great War – they knew how to handle a gunfight.

They returned fire at the speeding car. One of the bullets from the gang hit Gerald in the lower left arm. He was not human; but neither was he indestructible. The .45 slug from the Thompson smashed the delicate circuitry within the forearm. There was no blood, but the limb was immediately rendered useless. Marq looked back at the gun battle. The gang had separated. The car screeched to a halt the men inside did not give chase, but fired down the various streets and alleys into which the gang had dispersed. Whist this was going on, Marq was not watching the main street. From this direction walked three men with guns – Marq did not even know they were there; the first he knew was feeling the barrel of a machine gun in his ribs. Another gunman pointed a 12 bore shotgun at Gerald's head. The gunman looked at Gerald's shattered arm,

'What the devil happened here? That a false arm?'

Gerald stepped back, and nearly fell over the crates when confronted in this way.

Gunman three, who was behind the first two said,

'These two didn't put up much of a fight did they?'

The man with the tommy gun in Marq's ribs moved back to prevent being hit by Marq as he turned around,

'We got a couple of weirdos here, Elliot.'

The man in the rear indicated Marq and Gerald as he said,

'Up against the wall. Hands up'

They were forced to face the wall, Marq placed his hands as high as he could, Gerald could only manage one arm.

They were frisked as the three men kept close watch both up and down the alley.

When they were satisfied that the two were not carrying any armament they were allowed to lower their arms and turn around.

To their surprise they found Elliot was stood back and smoking a cigarette.

'Who you working for?' he said as he tipped his trilby back a little.

This was the first indication to Marq that these were, in fact, the good guys.

The questioning continued as one of the men said to Elliot,

'Ain't Frank Nitty moving into Massachusetts?'

Elliot looked from Marq to Gerald and back,

'That right, boys? You working for Nitty? What are you? Some sort of scouting party?'

Marq began to help Gerald with his arm as he said,

'No, we are simple travellers, my friend has a damaged arm here, we need to get him patched up.'

The gunman watching Gerald said,

'Yeah. What kind of arm is that you've got there, mister?'

Marq answered,

'It is an experimental prosthetic limb. He lost his arm in the Great War. Now it is damaged.'

He moved over to Gerald, and tied the arm as if it were a normal broken arm.

The gunmen looked at Elliot. Before he could respond the '27 Lincoln appeared at the top of the alley.

As it stopped Elliot spoke to the driver,

'You all ok? Did you get anyone?'

'Yeah, I think we winged a couple, but George here stopped one.'

He indicated the man in the passenger seat, who was holding his upper arm, his fingers soaked in blood. He said to Elliot,

'It's ok, boss. Only a flesh wound.'

Marq looked at the man and said,

'Flesh wound or not, it needs seeing to; you could get lead poisoning.'

Elliot looked at Gerald and said,

'Do you need a hospital?'

Gerald looked surprised. He glanced at Marq, who said in reply,

'No, we have our own facilities.'

Elliot wanted to know more,

'Where?'

Marq had to think quickly as he began his reply he didn't know what was going to be said,

'We are working with Doctor Goddard at the University. That is where this arm was developed.'

The two gunmen who were keeping Marq and Gerald covered spoke to each other; one said,

'If these are Frank Nitty's boys, they are wearing funny clothes in Chicago.'

The other replied,

'You're right. Who would send a couple of guys out on a recon dressed to stand out.'

'And unarmed. In this area.'

Elliot said,

'If you two are not connected to the mob, what's your business around here?'

This was even more difficult for Mark to deal with because he had no idea of where they were.

'I am a scientist working out of the University helping this man, and others like him, to lead a normal productive life despite the fact that he has lost a limb.'

Elliot turned back to the driver,

'Take him back to the station and get to doc to look at his arm.' He turned to Gerald again, 'You sure you don't want a lift to get some attention?'

'No, I'm fine; it ain't real.'

Elliot said to the driver,

'Get this car out of here; somebody is going to come for these barrels. When they do, I want to be waiting for them.' He turned to Marq and said, 'Sorry you and your friend here got caught up in this. You were obviously in the wrong place at the wrong time.'

Marq was glad to be away from the area. Gerald now carried his left arm in a white triangular sling. As they walked onto the main street, Marq said,

'Are you OK with that? You can always go back and get it fixed.'

'No, I'll be fine. I like the wounded hero bit you spun them back there; it may be a good cover for us.'

They called a taxi, and asked him to take them to the University.

The taxi screeched to a stop on East 59th Street. Wide white steeps led up to 1362. Marq moved into the interior, he held the wooden door open for the one-armed Gerald.

As they moved around the university building, Marq did not feel out of place with his blue specs. Gerald did not look out of place either, because there were quite a few men carrying obvious damage done in the trenches of France only twelve years earlier

They found Robert Goddard in his laboratory working on a drawing board trying to design a new launch system for his rockets.

Marq didn't need to study the schematics to notice something that needed changing,

'I see you are relying on a long stick to keep the rocket pointing in the right direction.'

'Yes, until we reach flight speed I have no means of directing the rocket.'

'Hmmm; a tricky problem.' Marq pretended to ponder the predicament, 'Maybe if the rockets were bigger a steering mechanism could be inserted in the rocket blast to redirect the thrust in such a way as to keep the whole machine balanced.' He held his hands flat, and moved them like vanes.

Goddard pondered a moment,

'Never work; I have been working on such a system, but the demands are so fine, especially during blast-off,' he held out an upstretched palm, 'it is like balancing a broom on end, and then introducing vast amounts of power to the rear.'

'Yes, I know.' Marq also knew how these difficulties were overcome, 'But with size comes the opportunity to introduce more complex systems. For instance,' he thought of the German V2, which was only some twelve years away from launch, 'if your rocket were about 30 or 40 feet high, with a diameter of over five feet, there would be room inside for gyroscopes to automatically guide vanes in the exhaust.'

Goddard had been thinking along these lines for some time, and now here was someone who not only understood the problems, but had some ideas along the same lines.

He said,

'I have even found a material that would stand the tremendous temperatures; ceramics.'

Mark immediately realised that Goddard was much more advanced than he expected.

'How many are there in your team?' he asked the scientist.

'Oh, It varies.' He pondered, 'I think there are two machinists, and a couple of mechanics. I like to keep the numbers down to avoid attracting too much attention.'

Marq reflected on the image of the Saturn V rockets, and the Space Shuttle. He couldn't help thinking that there was nothing secretive about these projects.

He said,

'But you cannot keep things under wraps for long – a rocket 40 feet high travelling at over 3,000 miles an hour is gonna be noticed!'

Goddard smiled. He shook his head gently as he said,

'If only. The University would never sanction sufficient funds to buy the fuel, let alone the building of such a machine.'

'The papers you have so far published on rocketry have inspired people across the world, even in Russia people have taken up the baton, and are beginning to design rockets. But it is in Germany where there is serious backing for rocket science.' He prepared to take his leave, 'You must have confidence in your work, Doctor. Not only must you have the confidence, but you must show that you have. If people see that you command the respect of a sizable science department it is less easy for them to criticize you.'

'Who are you?' Goddard asked, 'And how do you know all this?'

Marq indicated Gerald as he said,

'We are but mere travellers, speaking of which, we must travel onwards. Goodbye Doctor.'
Chapter Fourteen

Ertgetsog

As soon as Marq and Gerald returned to Martineau, Gerald went off to get his arm fixed.

Marq met up with Ash, Michelle and Sem. Marq tapped a monitor. A large plasma screen on the wall flickered into life. A picture gradually appeared. It showed the scene outside across the sunflower fields. The picture was a live feed, this served two purposes, security; the people inside can see what is happening outside, the screen is so big and bright that it provides natural daylight, and the image gives the impression of looking at the actual scene. To help with this illusion there is a gentle breeze coming from around the frame. The scene is very restful and pretty. Michelle blinked, looked away from the screen, and then back again. By then the picture had completely stabilized. As she moved around the room the picture moved in the same way the real scene would – real 3D.

Sem was leafing through news and history channels. Marq looked over her shoulder,

'I suppose we are interested more in what has happened in the past; did we have the space race?'

She leafed some more, and without looking up said,

'Well – yes, but not the race you are thinking of.' Another swipe across the screen. 'You see, without the vast losses of the Second World War Russia did not develop in the way you knew; Stalin began to have the purges of anyone who threatened him, yes; but here is an interesting development.' She moved to another display, tapped it a couple of times, and then began manipulating the pictures on the screen. 'They don't give too much away, but here and there I can see that something is amiss. So reading between the lines a very indistinct pattern emerges.'

Marq looked from one display to another, then back,

'I don't see what you mean.'

'That is because you are only looking at what you can see; I am concentrating on what is not being said.'

He gave her a quizzical look.

'There is external influence here. It is hidden very well, but I detect some very powerful manipulations here and there. These manipulations are so powerful that they cannot be completely concealed.'

Marq looked at what Sem was looking at on the screen, and thought at first it was Russian, but soon realised that it was not normal Cyrillic script. The more he studied it the more convinced he became that this was completely alien to him,

'What kind of language is that?'

'An obscure version of Russian. All the information in the main sources has been sanitized, these people have been missed, and they tell a very different tale indeed.'

'In what way?'

Sem took a deep breath,

'The most obvious discrepancy is the names of those at the top – organizing the missions.' She moved from one screen to another, then another, 'Here. In Pravda; this chap is named as Boris Pasternack.' another screen, 'Here, I will translate, here his name is given as Stoneman. And here is another direct anomaly; Petr Rossya – in the old news media he is now named as Romanov.'

Marq was visibly stunned by this revelation.

'Don't you see? Stoneman is Rockerfeller, Romanov is Romanov. They are the Illuminate, with a pretty shoddy attempt to hide themselves.'

He poured over the news reports he could read.

Ash entered the room. Michelle ran across to him, they exchanged kisses. Marq briefly looked up from the screens as he said,

'Ash, have you been to Mars?'

'No; I just come from the John.'

'No, no, no! The mission, I mean. Were you on the mission to Mars?'

'Yes, of course I was.'

'Was there a Russian woman on it with you?'

'Not that I recall.'

'Does the name Galina Danilenko mean anything to you?'

Ash thought for a second or two,

'Nope, sorry.'

'Who was on that mission with you?'

'Jake, and there was a British guy; Mark – but I don't think he made it back. There was a Russian guy, he didn't make it either. A Japanese scientist by the name of Hoshi Masuto.'

'No Russian woman?'

'No, sorry.'

Marq looked at Sem,

'I think we have found our missing link – Galina Danilenko.'

Sem thought about this for a moment,

'Do you think something happened to prevent her being on the mission?'

'Certainly looks like it. And that could be what is blocking the way for Jake to be here.'

Ash said,

'So what can we do about it?'

'Not we, I'm afraid.' Marq looked around, 'I think my Gerald is out of commission for a while – so I will take another one with me.'

Sem said,

'What year do we choose?'

Marq looked back to the screens.

'There seems to be a lot of activity here,' he moved pages, 'but I think the trouble started here.' He tapped a screen.

Sem looked at it, and then compared what she had on the alternative pages,

'Who the hell is Muravey Ros? This name comes up in the old region, but not in Pravda.'

Marq said,

'I think we all know who that refers to – Xanthros.'

Sem said,

'And just what is his role in all of this?'

Marq continued looking at screens as he said,

'He seems to be behind the aggression against Japan.'

Gerald enters the room; he looked like a Russian,

'The Transporter is ready, Marq, you'd better get ready.'

Marq held up a hand to signify that he wished to finish this piece of research,

'I'm trying to find out who replaced Stalin after he was overthrown.'

Sem continued on her screens as she said,

'Ertsgertsog is the only name I can find.'

Marq was not surprised,

'It looks like he is calling himself Archduke; strange for a people who savagely overthrew their nobility in 1917.'

Sem asked,

'So when and where do you want to be put?'

Marq let his head rest back, away from the screens,

'Kirov was assassinated in 1934, that was when the Bolsheviks rose and toppled Stalin. Do we have any information on when this Ertsgetsog came along?'

Sem thumbed through pages and screens,

'In the obscure newsfeeds he seems to emerge just after the Japanese invasion through China.'

'What? I haven't come across that '

'No, Pravda suppressed it.'

'How the...? How can you suppress a bloody invasion?'

'The Russians can.'

Gerald interrupted; he was getting hot in the Russian clothes he was wearing. He took off his fur hat as he said,

'Marq, can we get a move on?'

Marq did not even take time to look at Gerald as he said,

'Gerald 45/H2, time is an illusion; when the Good Lord made time, He made plenty of it.' He turned to Sem, 'And when was this ghost invasion?'

She thumbed some more,

'1942. It looks like the situation was aggravated by military manoeuvres by the Russians in the border area with China. The Japanese say they were asked to bolster up Chinese troops.' She seemed to have no problem with translating the obscure language, 'Some Russians claim that the maps issued to their own troops were inaccurate, leading to insurgence by Russian forces.'

Marq at last looked up from his screens. He said,

'So the time is to be 1942. What about the location?'

Sem said,

'It looks like a straight choice between Moscow and Anastasivia.'

Ash said,

'Anastasivia? Why Anastavia? It's on the other side of the world.'

Marq replied,

'Because that is where Xanthros is operating from, and causing trouble with the Japanese.'

Sem was now catching up with events in the Far East,

'He need not have bothered.'

Everyone looked at her. Marq said,

'Pardon?'

'He need not have bothered. The Japanese have built up a battle fleet, and they take the Kamchatka Peninsula before the Russians can do anything about it.' She read on, 'Their carrier force attacked the Russian fleet before it had chance to sail, but I doubt if they would have been any use against the modern Japanese fleet. At the same time they landed troops on the neck of the peninsula, established a border there, and effectively annexed the Russian experimental stations.'

Marq wanted to know more; he always needed to know more,

'How did the Russians react to this?'

'They were livid.' She continued to leaf through pages of script on two screens. Ash stood back and marvelled at her capacity to take in information so quickly, 'They moved all of their air force to Siberia, got real buddy with the USA, who came at the Japs from the Aleutian Islands.' More flicking between screens, 'The counter attack was masterminded by Ertsgetsog, using the Bolsheviks.'

'I think we should look at this Ertsgetsog.' Said Marq as he looked up from the maps.

'Moscow, 1942 it is then?' Sem asked.

Marq returned to the screens,

'No.' he said trying not to tap the screen, 'There was a meeting here – Beloresk. I think we should emerge here.'

Three people went into the Transporter Room, only Sem came out.

...........................

The lower half of Gerald's face was a mass of beard. The hat hid any shape to his face, and wrap-around sunglasses were needed to protect from the glare of the snow in Moscow. They were looking for

Ertgetsog was in the map room of the Kremlin with military and civilian advisors.

Lev Bukharin stood resplendent in his army issue greatcoat,

'The Bolsheviks are now massing 750 miles from Moscow. They are close to the small town of Beloresk, where there is a small airfield.'

Ertgetsog followed Bukharin's finger on the large map on the table before them, Bukharin continued as he stabbed the area 'This is where Nikolai Oulianov, their leader, wants to meet representatives of the government.'

There was quiet around the room. Only five people were there, Ertgetsog looked at the other four,

'I cannot send anyone to such a meeting without going myself.'

Bukharin said,

'Are you sure it will be safe?'

'It will be.' He turned to directly Bukharin, 'You say the belligerents have not yet reached this area?'

'No, they look on it as neutral territory.'

'Well not for long. We will have a full unit of the Spetsnaz - parachute them in over two nights to secure the area.' He scanned the map before asking Bukharin, 'Do we have any armoured units nearby?'

Bukharin looked closely at the map,

'Here,' the finger stabbed again, 'some 45 kilometres from; Beloresk.'

'Get them moving.' Ertgetsog turned to a slight man in civilian clothes, 'How long do we have?'

The man replied with little certainty,

'Three days, but their terms of meeting are vague to say the least. It's as if they do not know where they will be.'

Bukharin said,

'That is understandable; they are a renegade group so far, and the easiest way to deal with renegades is to take the head off before they get big enough to be able to survive such action. They have to keep moving to avoid an assassination, either from outside or within.'

The airfield at Beloresk was a single strip, badly maintained. There was no way heavy military transports could land there – but the Russian version of an executive airliner would be able to drop in. The Antonov An-2, named Colt, was a single engine biplane – but not the Sopwith Camel kind; the engine was a massive 1,000 horsepower unit – a real workhorse of an aircraft, made to operate from roughly prepared strips of land.

This is where Marq chose to emerge. He learned that this was the place for an important meeting. He and Gerald blended in the best they could, luckily there were quite a few people around, and not everyone knew who the others were. Even different languages and dialects were being spoken. Marq's excellent command of all of them allowed them to get to a good position as the lumbering biplane came into view. The aircraft landed, and of the fourteen people who got out it, would be difficult for any possible assassin to work out which one would be the leader. Marq and Gerald followed the group, along with an unknown number of Russians into a barn of a building. Marq and Gerald moved with the Bolsheviks into the barn, where the established government began to address the crowd.

Bukharin began speaking – this was another tactic to throw off any possible assassin; the leader kept out of the limelight, even Marq and Gerald did not know which one of the Russians was the boss.

'Today we are threatened by the Japanese in the east, and the Germans in the west. We do not need to fight amongst ourselves. The Japanese are poised to take the Kamchatka Peninsula, next they will be after the riches in Siberia.'

At this point Ergsetgog took to the floor,

'You are moving towards Moscow now. Why? There is nothing there worth having. But Siberia – that's different. There are vast supplies of oil and coal – why let the Japanese take it? We are moving our air force and aircraft production facilities to the east in order to protect Siberia – now here is the opportunity for you to help yourselves, and us,

as a unified force to push these Japs out.'

Marq listened carefully to the words. There was something familiar here.

Then Ertgetsog removed his hat, the sunglasses came next – they were placed in the hat.

Marq's mouth dropped open. He nudged Gerald without even knowing it, and then he almost involuntarily said in a conspiratorial whisper,

'Holy Jesus wept!' he pointed to Ertgetsog, 'That's me.'

...........................
Chapter Fifteen

Meeting of Illuminate

The Bolsheviks had gathered in a large barn-like structure.

The number of people Ertgetsog and Bukharin brought with them was dwarfed by the number of Bolsheviks.

'I am not asking you to fall in love with people who you have looked upon as an enemy; just join us in fighting the common enemy – the ones who are even now attacking and taking territory from us in the east.'

The reaction to Ertgetsog's proposal met with a disturbing hum from the crowd. The general consensus was not difficult to discern, despite at least six different languages, plus twice as many dialects being used.

The mood was definitely hostile.

One of the team leaders within the crowd called loudly to the groups around him,

'The choice is simple; we can fight amongst ourselves, with dubious gains for whoever emerges as victors, or we can unite against the fanatical yellow dwarfs.' The hub-bub died down to hear the man, who continued, 'In order for us to conquer, we must join our forces together, and defeat this threat from Japan.' He looked directly at Ertgetsog, 'But what's in it for us?'

Before responding, Ertgetsog waited until all the Bolshevik heads had turned towards him. He put on blue spectacles and began to speak,

'This man is right. The yellow threat has already taken most of China, and is now threatening the Kamchatka Peninsula. Next we expect them to turn to Siberia with its vast coal and oil reserves.' He was pleased to notice the quiet respect the Bolshevik hoard was giving him, 'We can continue to fight each other, or we can unite against the common enemy – how do you think we would cope with the Japanese if we were engaged in knocking blood out of each other whist they creep in at our back door?'

He repeated this twice more in different languages for the benefit of people from far flung areas of Russia.

The leader called,

'I repeat my question on behalf of everyone here, WHAT'S IN IT FOR US?'

Ertgetsog looked at the small entourage he had brought with him, and then continued,

'One thing is obvious – we cannot fight this threat to our country – yes, I said OUR country, because it is yours as much as it is mine. Up to now we have been behaving as if it were mine or yours. It is big enough for both of us – and we must not allow the invaders take it from us.' He looked directly at the leader who spoke up, 'You ask what's in it for you? I'll tell you what is in it for you – power sharing. We will reach an agreement that is commensurate with what you put into the coming battle, the size of territory you gain, and the size of population within that area.'

The reply was swift, given the gravity of the situation,

'That is not enough. We also want the freedom to rule the area we take without hindrance from you, or any central government.'

Ertgetsog shook his head in disbelief,

'You mean that you want any territory, including Siberia, which you may hold now?' Ertgetsog was in a corner – he knew he needed these people, but they are asking for three quarters of Russia. That would mean they have won comprehensively. 'Equal share of the running of mother Russia, with control of any territory you take back from the Japanese – that includes any part of Japan.' He looked at the people before him, 'And remember; they have already taken part or most of Kamchatka.' The whole crowd seemed keen to hear more, 'We are already moving most of our air force to fight the Japanese. This force will be in support of you if you chose to fight for your country instead of fighting it.'

This last line caused some disturbance within the crowd.

Mark leaned closer to Gerald and quietly said,

'I think we had better got out of here.'

They moved towards the door.

As they got to the exit three burly Russians moved to bar their way. These were obviously Bolsheviks – the ubiquitous Thompson machine guns and belts of ammunition (despite these Thompsons being drum fed) were the nearest these ruffians came to a uniform. Ruffian number one demanded,

'And just where do you think you are going?'

The dialect was not familiar to Marq and Gerald, but they easily understood what the man said. The Rosetta chip within Gerald's brain worked out how to reply first,

'We have a long way to go, and have to organize a large force.' He used the nearest dialect to what was said; like someone from Liverpool being able to communicate with a person from Birmingham – the languages are virtually the same.

Marq waited for the aggressors to reply. He didn't have long to wait.

'And where is this army?'

Gerald's brain was a lot faster than Marq's – but nowhere near as inventive. Marq slowly said,

'That is for us to know, no-one else.'

The insecurities within the ranks of the Bolsheviks prevented co-ordinated attacks; each group did not trust the next.

Gerald moved forwards,

'So get out of our way, or you will find out...'

The butt of a gun hit him as he tried to finish his sentence.

Androids to not physically react the way humans do; they do not feel pain, their structure is not skin and bone, but something much stronger. He could have let the blow bounce off, but he has been programmed to react in a similar way a human would.

Marq moved as if to protect the felled man, but in fact he was covering the fact that Gerald was not damaged.

The man nearest to Marq was too close to take a swing, so had to settle for pushing him back. The man was a massive brute – so the shove was a bit more that that – Marq was pushed back into the room, where he was surrounded by more Bolsheviks.

The crowd now surrounded Marq. Gerald was outside of the ring around Marq, He saw what was happening, and tore into the rear of the circle. He was not too gentle; reinforced carbon fibre arms came crashing down on one head after another.

Gerald took hold of two of the men by the scruff of the neck, and then banged their heads together with such force the crowd nearby heard the crack. That only left the chap to his left; this was not even a threat - Gerald simply let go the neck of the guy on the left, and thrust out at him with such force that the man's head almost left his shoulders.  
A man with some authority pushed his way through the crowd. This man was Lomeshov - leader of a group of Bolsheviks nearest to the fight.  
'Stop this at once.' he demanded as he held out his arms to prevent others from joining in, 'What is going on here?'  
The room fell silent.  
People on the far side wondered why the diatribe had stopped at the front, where Ergetsog had been setting out the deal. He now looked towards the rear of the barn.

The crowd was not in any mood to be reckoned with; four men approached Gerald. The first one came at him with the butt of his tommy-gun. Gerald parried this away with ease, and then followed it up with a crushing blow with his right hand. This seemed to incense the rest of the men, three attacked him at once. The closest man was about to bring his weapon up to hit Gerald from below, but at the same time the assailant alongside him drew a knife that looked like a young sword. Instantly Gerald knew this to be a bigger threat, so instead of dealing with the incoming blow, he hit the knifeman squarely in the nose with a straight right hand. Blood spattered on all sides as the proboscis became flattened. The knife fell to the ground as the man's extremities – fingers, toes, seemed to emulate the fate of his nose. The upward thrust of a machine-gun butt then hit Gerald, but his left arm took most of the force of this; and he was able to parry the weapon. His reactions were so fast that he was able to twist his hand round in such a way as to be able to grasp the weapon, and wrest it away from the assailant.

The fourth attacker was not to be put off by all this. Standing a little further back he was in a good position to take a good hard kick at Gerald's genitals. This would normally fell a man. Gerald was not a man. He was also much heavier than a man. The blow landed in what the man expected to be a soft vulnerable area. His foot stopped dead. It was like hitting concrete. The man was by now leaning forwards to give more impetus to the kick. Gerald had the second man's machine-gun in his left hand. This was swung at the head of the kicker.

The rest of the crowd now descended on Gerald.

Meanwhile, Lomeshov reached Marq,

'Where are you going?' he asked.

'This meeting looks like it is over. We have a long way to go...'

Just then they were interrupted by the knife flying out of Gerald's attacker's hand. Marq caught this by the hilt, and waved it in front of Lomeshov's face. He nodded towards Gerald,

'Me and him have work to do.'

Gerald now pointed the Tommy gun at the approaching crowd, moving it from side to side menacingly.

Bukharin joined Lomeshov as Gerald moved the advancing crowd back with the threat of shooting a Thompson machine gun in close proximities.

This then allowed Marq to see the way out. He flashed the blade at Lomeshov and Bukharin,

'And you two are coming with us.'

Bukharin looked askance at Marq,

'Why are you doing this?'

Lomeshov took his arm, and led him outside as Marq replied, or so he thought,

'To stop this crowd from attacking us.'

The crowd was being kept at bay quite efficiently by Gerald with his machine gun. Some of them were amazed and astounded by the fact that this one single man had just taken out seven armed and dangerous Bolshevik warriors, and did not show any signs of the effort it must have taken.

They were not the only ones who wondered at this.

Once outside the barn doors Marq pointed at the aircraft standing close by,

'Into the aircraft.' He said to Lomeshov and Bukharin.

A member of the aircrew saw Bukharin and the others. Marq and Gerald deliberately looked unthreatening. Upon recognising Bukharin, and one of the others looked familiar, the aircrew opened up the aircraft, allowing the small group into the interior.

As they mounted the steps, Marq looked around at the Bolsheviks as they began to leave the barn to see what was going on. He knew they were safe inside the aircraft as long as they had a couple of leaders from either side.

He turned to Gerald and said,

'How did you do that?'

'What? Do what?'

'Clear away so many simultaneous attacks?'

'My designation is H2/45-C. The C stands for combat. We thought there may be some trouble on this trip, so they sent me instead of the standard model.'

Bukharin also had the same question, but to Marq,

'How did you do that? Was the beard a false one? It must have been.'

He thought Marq was Ertgetsog – in a way he was.

Lomeshov looked out of the window.

'And what are you going to do about that?' he said, pointing towards the crowd.

The Bolsheviks were now moving out of the barn.

Marq tried to answer Bukharin's question,

'What beard?'

But Bukharin answered with a different question,

'And what is the point of bringing us out here away from the main gathering of clans?'

Lomeshov then said,

'I don't know what you two are twittering about, but something is developing out there.'

They all looked out of the windows.

Ertgetsog has made his way through the crowd; he had with him three other people. The first thing Marq notices is that one of these has no beard – it is a woman.

He concentrates on this odd person.

The crowd of Bolsheviks continued to emerge from the barn.

Bukharin looked at the man in the lead, Ertgetsog. His eyes widened; he was sitting with this man, but he was outside too.

Marq looked at the bearded man standing next to Ertgetsog. The countenance on his face changed as he recognised the man,

'Of course - Rockefeller.' He looked at the woman with Ertgetsog, 'Mrs Hapsburg.'

Then he looked at the other man with them, 'Romanov.' He looked back directly at Bukharin and said,

'The only one missing is del Banco, that must be you.'

Bukharin / del Banco narrowed his eyes.

Speaking to himself he said,

'I don't believe this.' He opened the aircraft door, and called across Ertgetsog, 'You had better see this for yourself.'

But the communication was not all in speech, nor was it to only one man – four people immediately began to move towards the aircraft.

......... ....................
Chapter Sixteen

The Bolshevik Hoards

The inside of the Antonov was agricultural to say the least; the aircrew kept it swept as best they could, but the back of a 1960's Ford Transit would look more luxurious.

There were no normal airline seats – only wooden benches down the sides. There were also a few packing cases, some of which were held down with crude lashings that were nailed to the wooden floor.

They were hardly the salubrious surroundings for the occupants; given the power they wield.

Four people move towards the grey aircraft. They climbed the steps to be greeted by Bukharin. Marq stood in the doorway that leads to the cockpit; he was therefore silhouetted by the strong light that came from the cockpit.

Ertgetsog asked Bukharin,

'What is going on here?'

'I don't know.' Bukharin looked at Ertgetsog, almost in disbelief. 'But I think you will find it interesting.'

Mrs Hapsburg sat next to Bukharin.

Lomeshov said to Romanov,

'Please, comrade, sit down. I think you will find this to your advantage.'

He sat on a box near a window that offered a view out towards the barn. He could see people pouring out of the building.

Lomeshov cleaned the small window with the heel of his hand.

Most of the people moving about near the aircraft were strangers to him – but if he could have recognised groups he would have seen that the people Ertgetsog brought with him were now at the front of the crowd – directly between the aircraft and the crowd.

The aircraft door opened. Gerald emerged at the top of the steps. With a deft kick he dismissed the steps, which were collected by two of Ertgetsog's people.

'We are going to thrash this thing out – once and for all.' His voice seemed to carry to the rear of the crowd with no problem. The message was repeated twice, 'I know that you all have leaders who you trust, if they can make their way to the front we will rig up a sound system so that you can all hear what is being said, the people at the front will be able to speak to us inside here.'

Repeated again, and then to the leaders, in Russian,

'These negotiations will take place in Russian, do you understand and agree?'

Some of the leaders then realised that the people at the front were now taking more than expected notice of them. All of the people were bristling with armaments; the favoured weapon being the Thompson machine gun, but Marq noticed amongst them some of the new German MP42 – if anything kicked off now there would be a blood-bath – and the only winners would be the Japanese. The people in the aircraft knew this all too well.

Whilst Gerald was dealing with the crowd, inside the aircraft things were happening too.

Lomeshov was seated near the rear of the aircraft. Ergetsog was seated near a window, which he only glanced out of – he was more interested in the man in silhouette at the front of the cabin.

Marq stepped into the main cabin, and closed the door behind him. He looked at Gerald in the doorway talking to the crowd – he knew how long he had.

'You are all probably wondering exactly what is happening here.'

Ertgetsog was stunned at the sound of his own voice coming from this person, who looked very much like himself, but cleanly shaven.

The stranger (Marq) continued,

'There is not much time, so I will be brief. We have travelled here from the future. Our mission is to prevent events that could alter future developments. The main concern at the moment is the invasion by the Japanese. This is the only thing we are interested in dealing with.'

He looked at Gerald, who was just about finished.

'If you look into those three boxes you will find loudspeakers. If you could place these outside, near the crowd. And the box over there contains microphones for use in here.'

They could use Gerald as some kind of loudhailer – but some, if not all, of the people gathered there would think that it was only him speaking, and he was a stranger. If they heard their own leaders speaking they would be more likely to accept what was being said.

Marq began to explain what was happening. Before he got half-way through he detected unrest in the crowd outside. Gerald signalled him to stop. The people in the aircraft moved to the windows to see what was happening outside.

Marq joined Gerald in the aircraft doorway. There seemed to be something happening in the crowd to the right. Then Marq noticed people emerging from the fields further off to the right.

He turned to Gerald,

'What is the meaning of this?'

'Search me, good buddy. But they don't look too friendly.'

Marq stuck his head back into the aircraft,

'Comrade Lomeshov, do you know what is happening here?'

'Da.' He did not look happy, 'I was afraid something like this would happen. They are supposed to be fighting the Japanese.'

'Who the hell are they?' Marq was displaying an unusual amount of emotion.

'They are The Greek's people...' before he could explain himself further Marq interrupted,

'And just who is The Greek?'

Lomeshov shrugged,

'I don't know. All I know is he seems to have a lot of people behind him.'

They looked at the crowd. Fighting was now breaking out as the main constituents seemed to unite against the insurgents.

The people in the aircraft saw this too. Lomeshov wanted to get back out to his comrades. Gerald and Marq were pushed roughly aside as the big Russian barged past them. They too landed on the ground.

Marq said to Gerald as they stood in front of the crowd,

'Let's find out who this Greek is.'

There were now five people in the aircraft – all Illuminate working as Russians in one role or another. Marq turned to look at the doorway of the aircraft; he sees Romanov and del Banco drop down to the ground, quickly followed by Mrs Hapsburg, Rockefeller and Ertgetsog.

They follow Lomeshov into the crowd.

Ertgetsog calls to him,

'Comrade Lomeshov, my people are over there, can we work together to deal with this?'

Gerald called to the crowd,

'The Greek is coming over there.'

Lomeshov met up with his people, Ertgetsog with his. Gerald went with Lomeshov.

Marq was in communications with Gerald through the Hilbert Space.

'We need to outflank them.' He said.

The main part of the crowd moved to attack frontally to meet head-on.

Lomeshov and Ertgetsog moved off in directions opposite to each other. Del Banco was sent off to find a good vantage point to monitor the whole situation.

As predicted the attacking force concentrated their force in the middle to push forwards in the standard Bolshevik way. The main force at least combined their efforts in a way Ertgetsog had originally intended, but they did not know of the plans to encircle the Greek's force; so there was some dissention amongst some of the Bolsheviks, but they were by now more concerned with the main attack.

The two flanking forces moved out of sight of the Greek's force as they described a wide arc around to the sides. Because they had to move further than the central forces the battle had already begun when they arrived. But del Banco did not guide them to the sides of the attacking force – instead he moved them to positions just behind the sides of the battle.

With rifles and machine guns blazing the out-flankers laid into the Greek's forces.

Marq was on the right flank with Mrs Hapsburg. She somehow fitted in as a Russian fighter. Not normally aggressive in nature, she made the change into furs and adopted the personae.

They carefully picked their way through fields with their troops. There were only 34 of them, but with modern machine guns they carved out paths of disruption in the attackers, who by now realised that they were almost surrounded.

Marq fired a burst into a group who were taking shelter in a shallow ditch. He looked around, and saw a lightly armoured halftrack some 400 metres in front of him. This was not expected – and looked important. He approached carefully. With the armament they had they could not harm the vehicle from this range – they had to get closer. There were five of them in this group, dodging from bush to bush, valley to valley. One of their number was a young woman by the name of Sophia, it was common for Russian women to fight alongside the men. Marq led the attack on the half-track. He knew that if they got close enough the heavy .45 slugs fired by the Thompson machine gun would be able to penetrate the thin armour of the vehicle. Marq looked at the machine from cover. They were still too far away to hurt it, so had to remain under cover. He could make out a large machine gun on the top of the vehicle, and one at the rear; more could be poked out from within.

Mrs Hapsburg and Sophia made a dash to get to another piece of cover closer to the vehicle. A shot rang out. The woman fell. Mrs Hapsburg skidded to a halt, and went back to help Sophia, but she was dead.

A man now appeared on top of the vehicle to use the heavy machine gun on top. Marq and the man next to him both saw the threat together; and realising that the element of surprise was now lost, they both opened fire on the man on top simultaneously. He began to swing the gun round to face Marq and his group. The heavy machine gun had an armoured shield in the form of an arrowhead in front of it, but before the man could gain any shelter from it he was caught by a bullet. Another man went for the rear mounted machine gun, but was cut down by fire from others in the group. Marq then took advantage of a weapon peculiar to the Bolsheviks – the Molotov cocktail. He ran across open country before anyone else in the vehicle could bring fire to bear. The half-track had an open rear, so he tossed a bottle of petrol into the forward section of this, knowing that it contained the driver, commander, and any other important people.

A man almost fell out of the passenger seat. As he rose to his feet Marq knew who the man they referred to as The Greek was – Xanthros. Before anyone could do anything Marq heard the distinctive ripping sound of an MP42 from close to his rear. Xanthros fell down, almost cut in two by the rapid fire of the machine gun.

As if related to this action, the sound of battle began to die down. The insurgents now realised that they were completely surrounded, and about to be overwhelmed.

As Marq walked back to the barn he came across a group of people sitting on the grass. There seemed to be quite a number of children of various ages; this was a sort of kindergarten. He hesitated as he passed by a young boy. The lad said to him,

'You can't sit there, my mummy's sitting there – she will be back soon.'

'And what is your mummy's name?'

'Sophia.'

Marq did not know what to say,

'And where is your father?'

The young lad pointed towards the battle,

'I think he's over there.'

'And what is his name?'

'Ivan Danilenko.'

'Right.' Marq looked and sounded like he knew what he was doing, 'And who is his commander? Do you know?'

'Yes, comrade, I think his name is Lomeshov.'

'I know comrade Lomeshov, I shall find him, and get your father back here to you.'

'Thank you, comrade, but mummy will be here soon; I will be all right until then.'

'Right. You just wait here.'

With that Marq continued his way towards the barn.

As he dropped out of sight, he said to Sem over the Hilbert Space System,

'Retourner'

Chapter Seventeen

The Second Battle

As Marq rematerialized at Martineau he felt the strange familiarity laced with change brought about by the fact that he had changed things. Gerald did not return with him, it may cause problems for one person to signal the return without knowing where the other person is. Sem entered the room.

'Hi traveller, how did you get on?'

She had not had time to research anything yet.

'Do the names Sophie and Ivan Danilenko mean anything to you?'

He dropped some of his Russian furs as they moved into the control room. In there he found Michelle, but not Ash. He said to Michelle,

'Hi. Where's Ash.'

The reply shocked him,

'Who's Ash?'

Sem and Marq looked blankly at each other.

Marq realised what could have happened,

'I saw them kill Xanthros. What would that affect?'

Sem began operating a screen.

'There was a space program, but no mission to Mars. Without Xanthros there was no main driving force there.'

Marq asked,

'And what about the names Ivan and Sophie Danilenko?'

She looked askance at him.

He attempted to clarify,

'I met a young boy who had just lost his mother, her name was Sophie Danilenko – could that have been Galina Danilenko's mother or grandmother?'

Sem opened up another screen, and began working it. Eventually she said,

'Sophie was Galina's grandmother. The boy you met was Galina's uncle, but her father had not been born – he won't be now.'

Marq looked at Michelle.

'Sorry about all this – it looks like we are shrinking in numbers, not the desired result.'

Sem said,

'You had better stop this. All the changes you have made have resulted in more problems, not less.'

Marq reflected on this for a while.

'Maybe you are right. Any change we make seems to bring with it its own set of dilemmas; that is probably nature's way of avoiding paradoxes.' He paused to allow his brain to formulate what he was about to say, 'I know that this might sound like flying against what you are saying, but I think we have to go back again.'

Sem said nothing.

'Last time I went back, I employed a circling manoeuvre to outflank the attackers. As a result Xanthros was killed, also Galina's grandmother. This time I will have to avoid these two being killed.'

'But how can you? If you don't use the same tactics again... Who knows what will happen?'

'When we got behind their lines we came across Xanthros' Command vehicle. It was then that Sophie got hit, soon after, Xanthros bought the farm.' He placed an extended index finger on the table, 'All we have to do is avoid the Command vehicle.'

Sem turned to Michelle, and said with a smile,

'Promise me you will not disappear! It's starting to get pretty lonely here.'

Marq re-entered the transporter room.

His furs wrapped around the seat as he took his position. Sem checked everything was ok, and then left.

This time he found himself transported into the body of his former self, Ertgetsog. Now he was at the time just before the Greek's men attacked. This gave him a good advantage – because he knew what was going to happen.

He called Lomeshov over, but how could he tell Lomeshov that he knew there was going to be an attack?

'I have a nasty feeling about our left flank,' he said, 'There is a group over there looking restless.'

'Yes; they are a small representing group from The Greek, who are taking on the Japanese on Kamchatka. We don't all get on.'

'If anything should happen over there, the best plan of action would be to make two encircling moves – one on either flank of the attackers. Could you take your people to the south, I will take mine to the north.'

The scuffling began. Another force appeared in the distance.

The two forces began their moves. The main body of the Russians mounted a central defence as before. But this time Marq was Ertgetsog; he found that the Russian stayed more or less in the centre of things. He called to Gerald on the Hilbert Space System,

'Take the north section. There is a woman in that section who must be looked after. You will find a half-track – the commander in that is Xanthros. He must be preserved too.'

'Ok, boss. What are you going to do?'

This was not idle curiosity – these two must work as a unit to be most effective.

'I have someone else here to look after.'

With that he began looking for Ivan Danilenko.

The attack came. Gerald moved his section to the north. Lomeshov moved to the south.

Marq / Ertgetsog knew that Ivan would be with the section going north, so he made his way through the crowd in a northerly direction.

They curved round towards the east. They could not see the attackers, but sporadic gunfire told them that the enemy had been met somewhere over there.

Marq began asking for Ivan. Soon someone pointed him out. Marq moved alongside Ivan. He knew that Ivan would survive this battle – but he wanted to make sure.

They were moving in an easterly direction now.

Marq called Sem on the Hilbert SS,

'Sem, is there any way we could communicate with Lomeshov?'

'Not that I know of – I don't have his cell number.'

'Try his landline.' This attempt at humour was unusual out on the Russian Steppes.

'Not picking up.' She jokingly replied.

'Well, we will just have to wing it.'

Over to the south Lomeshov was keeping his group of 43 Bolsheviks from being seen by the insurgents. They too were now travelling eastwards, and about to wheel round to contact the vulnerable left flank.

Their surprise was so complete the enemy did not get chance to fire. Lomeshov called to them when they were only feet away from the position. The insurgents were covered comprehensively, and to even turn a gun in the direction of Lomeshov's men meant they would be cut down by the concentrated machine-gun fire.

This first outpost was shepherded behind Lomeshov. They were disarmed, as they laid their guns down one of them was heard to say,

'We didn't want to fight; we shouldn't fight Russians – we were supposed to be fighting the Japanese. It was the Greek.'

The prisoners were guarded by three of Lomesov's men, the remainder crept forwards. Another group was encountered. There was no sound of firing from the far flank, so Lomeshov presumed that the opposite flank had not yet been penetrated. The amount of armament assembled from captured soldiers was now getting embarrassing. Another two of Lomesov's people were dispatched with the prisoners to join their comrades.

Lomeshov's attack group was now getting well into the insurgents. The next group of enemy were too big, and well positioned to take prisoners. So Lomeshov decided to adopt strong attacking positions in preparation for a concerted attack from both sides at once. They had no idea how far away the opposite side, with Ertgetsog were. The positions adopted by Lometsov's soldiers were almost entrenched – this meant that the opposition forces would not only be taken by surprise, and they would not be in a good position to oppose the attack – Lomeshov's people only had to hold their positions and cover each other with cross-fire.

For what seemed like hours they lay in position, but it was only a few minutes before firing was heard in the distance, this was not in the direction of the main battle, so they knew the other flank was now under attack.

Lomeshov called to his group,

'Open fire!'

It had been arranged beforehand that the attack would be orchestrated into three separate groups. First the left group would open fire for thirty seconds, then the right flank when the enemy moved to take on the left flank. As they responded to the latest attack the centre group would mow down the remainder of the enemy, and then the whole of Lomeshov's force would move forwards. With the captured machine guns most of Lomeshov's force had two guns blazing at the insurgents. This battle did not last long. And then a lone man appeared to Lomeshov's left. Most of the insurgents had laid down their arms to prevent being wiped out – but this one man began moving towards Lomeshov, and then he was joined by another. They both had two Thompson machine guns each levelled at Lomeshov's position. The people being threatened began firing at the men, but to no avail – bullets seemed to bounce off the men.

A burst of .45 slugs from a Thompson at close quarters hit one of the men. His arm became detached, taking with it one of his machine guns. The gun continued firing. The shots went all over, luckily they did not hit anyone. But the man continued. Marq/Ergetsog saw this, and immediately knew what was happening. He called Gerald,

'We have here two early models of Gerald.'

'Where did he get them from?' Came the reply.

'God alone knows, but metallurgy in this time was not up to much, so they must have shortcomings.'

Just then the Gerald began to train his remaining gun towards where the shots had come from. This gave a soldier on his other side a chance to stand up to throw a Molotov cocktail. As he released it, the other Gerald shot him. But that did not prevent the petrol bomb from hitting its target – the head.

At first this seemed to have no effect. He continued walking and firing, but blindly now. Then the burning petrol penetrated the neck, burning through electrical equipment in this vulnerable area, and running down into the torso. There was no explosion, but some unusual flames began spurting from the stricken machine. The soldiers continued firing at it; so much so that the sheer weight of lead made it topple over backwards.

This led the rest of the soldiers to redouble their efforts to get the second figure. Heavy bullets hit the head. The eyes and mouth allowed rounds to penetrate the head, destroying the delicate sensors within. And then the inevitable Molotov hit him in the chest. Without sight he was unable to continue across the uneven ground. So he stopped. What was left of his logic circuits told him that he couldn't hit anything with the guns, so he stopped firing. Weight of lead hitting his front did the rest.

Lomeshov lost fourteen people in this attack. That left him with fifteen, luckily Ivan was not one of the casualties. These survivors were really heavily armed. And the opposition now had a good idea what was happening. But the fifteen kept up such a withering rate of fire that the Greek's people thought there must have been 50 or 60 soldiers in their rear. And they were fellow Russians who had just dealt with a threat even they did not understand – even though it was on their side. They were just about to ask for terms when a half-track emerged from the central area.

The Greek's men knew what this meant – so did Marq. Xanthros was coming to see what had happened to his robots. Xanthros's men were not happy with what they were being asked to do, so they turned on their leader. Now it was up to Marq to save his family member.

Marq/Ergetsog called across to Lomeshov, who was half standing some 30 feet away from him,

'Bring me the Greek.' He shouted.

He was nearly interrupted by an explosion in the rear of the half-track.

As Xanthros stumbled out Lomeshov reached the men closest to the vehicle.

'Don't shoot.'

The fighting had now ceased on both sides, so the men hesitated long enough to prevent Xanthros being shot.

The man known as The Greek was surprised to see Ergetsog, but he didn't know that it was also Marq.

'Just what do you think you are doing here?' Marq/Ergetsog demanded, 'You were supposed to be dealing with the Japanese, our real enemy.'

Then Marq used Hilbert SS, which 1942 Xanthros did not know of,

'You were supposed to quell the Japanese aggression, and bring them back in line with the rest of civilisation. You have already messed up with Atilla. I already have enough trouble holding these people together. You know that there is plenty of work for you to do in Africa, and the Arabs will be gaining strength soon, too. Do you want me to send you there?'

Xanthros was shocked to receive these words with nothing being spoken – but more than that he was being admonished by the Marquis of Libeaux – the head of his family.

But the Marquis was not finished,

'You were killed in the first attack here; I have had to return to correct that. There is work for you to do in the future – do not put yourself in the firing line again. Remember, we must not be noticed; that is our strength. And what do you mean by using robots that could not possibly be developed here? I should have left things as they were – with you dead.'

'I came here to gain more supporters.'

'So did everyone else. We all have a common enemy – and your answer is to attack and cause disruption within. What is this? Divide and conquer? Must I remind you that Africa awaits – that is where your plans are being carried out with disastrous results. I can send you back there if you do not desist with these disruptive measures.'

Gerald came on the line,

'I have Mrs Hapsburg and Sophie here, both safe.'

Marq replied,

'Good, make yourself scarce we are going home.'

Moments later, Gerald signalled that he was clear of other people.

'Retourner.'

They rematerialized at Martineau. Marq was surprised to find himself back in his original clothes.

As they left the Transporter Room, a general hubbub could be heard outside. As they walked into the room adjoining the Transporter Room voices were heard.

Ash said,

'I'm not sure about getting too involved here.'

'Do you have a feeling of deja vue?' Jake Jensen said. He was drinking coffee, and chatting to Ash. It was as if nothing had happened – to them nothing had happened out of the ordinary.

Sem was busy researching history to find out how things had changed. Michelle was alongside her in this quest – but for her it was more to ease her confusion. She had no recollection of things that had not happened, but there were fragments of memories of what she had experienced; the disappearance of Ash, and the others. But these were only dim half recollections.

Galina Danilenko was holding on to Jake's free arm. They looked for all the world like they had never been apart – maybe they hadn't.

Marq couldn't help smiling.

Sem asked him,

'What have you done? No – better not tell me.'

The End

