Dean Jordan and Sally Groves were true friends I realised. And for the first time since I’d come here, been embroiled in this world I had never known existed, I felt like I might just make it.

  I might just survive.

  Stuff Harding and Pratt and their immature vendettas. Eff Sebastian Winchester and his sanctimonious, festering hatred. And bugger Jack Evans and his mercurial mood swings.

  I had Dean and Sally. I had a team.

  We all took another sip of our whisky, nearing the bottom of our glasses. The rain continued to pour down outside. The fire crackled in the hearth. It was almost peaceful.

  And then the alarms went off, and thunder boomed outside the window, and forked lightning hit the ground in the distance where I was sure Michael had just been buried.

  “That can’t be good,” Dean said, and then we were running.

  20

  Out Of The Way!

  Jack

  I noticed the second Mimi arrived in the room. Dispatch wasn’t off limits to everyone. Flight crews had permission to be in here; to uplift coordinates; to check on changes to their schedules. But Mimi had been hiding since the hangar incident yesterday. And had disappeared entirely after Jessop’s burial this morning. Avoiding, no doubt, the accusatory glares she might have received at the wake.

  The fact that Sally Groves and Dean Jordan had been missing along with her was the only reason I hadn’t made an obvious arse of myself and formed a search party. She’d been in good hands. And still was, by the looks of it.

  Both Groves and Jordan flanked her as they rushed into the room.

  Mimi’s and my gazes connected and for a second the alarm disappeared; Dispatch disappeared. And then she broke eye contact, and sound and reality rushed back in.

  “Who’s flying?” Jordan asked.

  “No one,” Amanda replied. “It looks like…”

  “Like what?” I asked. She blanched. I almost rolled my eyes.

  “A rip?” Mimi whisper-asked. Over the sirens, it was hard to hear her, but she’d approached Amanda’s side, and the dispatcher had glanced up.

  “No, although one is forming,” the girl advised Mimi. “It’s…Sir,” she said. “It looks like a Lunik.”

  My eyes naturally found Mimi’s again.

  “Are you sure?” I asked Amanda, unable to look away from Mouse.

  “Very,” the dispatcher said. “Definitely a Lunik.”

  I forced myself to turn and look down into the hangar. Fawkes and Bauer were down there. I lifted up an intercom handpiece and dialled. Simon Cathcart picked up.

  “Hand me over to Fawkes,” I said. The engineering chief didn’t waste time with an answer. I watched Bryan walk across and take the offered handpiece down on the hangar floor.

  “It’s a Lunik,” I said.

  “Goddamn it,” he muttered.

  “Clear the hangar,” I advised.

  “On it.”

  He hung up and shouted at the staff; Techies, Security, and several Flight. All of them uniformly started heading toward the exits, with Dave Sanders urging them along from behind.

  I glanced over my shoulder and spotted the tail-end of a white overall-clad arse disappearing around the doorframe. Both of the orange ones had already stepped out of sight.

  “Fuck,” I muttered and looked back at the hangar. I needed to remain here and direct staff from the safety of Dispatch. Clive was black at Parliament, Winchester was locked in his room, Bauer and Fawkes were scrambling to clear the hangar itself.

  I could have paged Murray Holt or one of the other Surgeons, but by the time they got here, Mimi and her cohorts would have already made it to the hangar floor. I had to trust Fawkes and Sanders to keep them out of the firing line.

  But this was Mimi. And Lunik represented her family.

  “Fuck!” I said with more enthusiasm, banging my palm against the wall beside the observation window looking down on the hangar.

  The intercom buzzed. I picked up the handpiece, and Fawkes said in my ear, “All clear.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Everyone’s out.”

  “Have you seen Mimi?”

  “Mouse? No.”

  “Are you sure she’s not in the hangar?”

  “Goddamn it,” he muttered and hung up.

  I watched on as Fawkes, Sanders and two more of the security team reentered the hangar, then split-up. Sanders and one of his guys went one way, down the side of the hangar, Fawkes and another of Sanders’ men went down the other. Guns were drawn and ready. Eyes were darting all over the hangar, but there was no way to tell where Lunik would land.

  Time stretched. I was barely aware of Bauer and Holt coming to stand at my sides. Of the increase in Interns and Novitiates in Dispatch.

  “What’s going on?” Murray asked.

  I didn't reply.

  “Who are they looking for?” Belinda pressed.

  “They need to vacate the building,” Murray added.

  “If it’s Ivanov…” Belinda said but didn't finish her sentence.

  We all knew what Sergei Ivanov was capable of.

  “Come on,” I muttered, my hand fisted on the wall beside the window, my eyes straining to see movement in the shadows.

  Then stars formed and a nebula of space gas erupted, and a Lunik blinked into sight.

  Sanders and his man trained their guns on the module. Fawkes and his were out of sight, but I presumed they were covering the other side. The Vehicle hissed and emitted liquid oxygen gas. Even through the window, we could hear it clanking and clunking as if it was barely remaining intact.

  Nothing else happened. The hatch didn’t open. No one came out.

  And then a rocket engine roared, and the stars reappeared, and a nebula formed, surrounding the Lunik.

  Sanders started firing his weapon. His teammate was quick to follow. We didn’t understand why at first. Then Fawkes appeared, running pell-mell for the Lunik’s hatch as if he could stop it taking flight if he only reached its wheel.

  “What the hell?” Murray exclaimed.

  “Look there!” Belinda shouted and pointed off to the side where stars had started forming around Orion 3, 5 and 7.

  “Oh, shit,” someone muttered from behind us. “They’re stealing our Crew Vehicles.”

  My stomach dropped. Sanders and the men continued to fire. More security flooded the hangar. Fawkes reached the Lunik’s side.

  “Step back,” I murmured, my eyes trained on the mortifying scene before me, my heartbeat thudding inside. “Step the fuck back, Bryan,” I repeated.

  Stars began to form around Orion 1 and 2 as well.

  “Not the whole fucking lot,” Murray spat.

  Fawkes started turning the Lunik’s wheel, desperately trying to open the hatch.

  “Bloody fucking hell, Bryan!” I shouted.

  “Mein Gott,” Belinda murmured at my side.

  “Step back!” I yelled.

  And then the Lunik disappeared, along with five of our Crew Vehicles, and Bryan flew backwards across the hangar, landing in a crumpled mess against a mobile toolbox set of drawers.

  Silence reigned for all of a few seconds, compounded by the lack of the sirens blaring overhead.

  Then I turned around and pushed through the stunned crowd behind me and ran towards the hangar.

  Five Orions. Five fucking Orions! This was a nightmare.

  I tore into the hangar, noting several of Sanders men were surrounding Bryan’s body.

  “Out of the way!” I shouted, pushing through the gathered throng.

  I knelt down beside my best friend’s still form and reached out to check for a pulse in his neck.

  The world around me vanished and my breaths caught somewhere between my lungs and my lips.

  I lowered my chin to my chest and fisted my hands on my thighs and felt a depth of desolation I had never before experienced.

  “Is he…?”

  Mimi.

  I stood up and turned around and then reached for her. I didn't care who saw me clinging to a Novitiate as if she could save me from this horror.

  I buried my face in the crook of her neck, my arms holding her tight against my trembling body, and tried not to let the tears fall.

  She held me back and sobbed.

  21

  We Could Still End This

  Mimi

  RATS was in turmoil. No, not turmoil. Complete and utter shock. I had thought RATS in turmoil before when I’d returned in the alternate Orion 6, but this…this was bedlam. Pandemonium. This was turmoil at its absolute worst.

  Jack had entered crisis containment mode. All staff were confined to the premises. Dr Crawford had been interrupted and recalled to the Academy in the middle of his appointment with the Prime Minister. The local TV stations knew something was up with the Royal Academy of Time Surgeons and had parked their vans and buses out the front of the Academy’s gates.

  People walked around as if stunned. Blank looks on their faces. Voices were subdued. It hadn’t stopped raining.

  And Sally. My dear, lovely, softly spoken friend. Sally was broken.

  I sat with her in her room, on the side of her bed, as she stared into space and said nothing.

  Rain hit the window in ever increasingly hard pellets. My guard stood out in the hall. Dean would have been here, but he’d been called into the hangar. To make a new Orion module? To fix up both 6s? I didn't know; there hadn't been time to talk.

  Flight crews had been confined to quarters. Save for Surgeons who were all in a meeting with Dr Crawford. Hospitality was likewise locked away safely. Just Security and Tech were given hall passes. I’d had to plead and beg and offer up my firstborn to Palmer to get him to let me walk two doors down the hall to Sally’s bedroom. In the end, he'd taken one look at Sally as she’d walked past and just nodded.

  I’d follow her into the room and sat down on her bed over an hour ago.

  She still hadn’t spoken.

  I couldn't believe he was gone. Fun loving, laugh a minute, southern drawling Bryan Fawkes. I wanted to cry, but I was all cried out.

  Sally hadn’t yet shed a tear.

  I was worried. Not just about RATS and Ivanov and my family. They seemed to pale in comparison to Sally’s heartache. I was worried about my girl.

  “He kissed me once,” she said in a whisper.

  I just about damn near fell off the bed.

  “He what?” I asked, struggling to slow down my heartbeat. I was sure we’d be in for another hour of silence.

  “Don’t sound so surprised,” she said. “I was his Novitiate before Malcolm.”

  “I’m not surprised about that,” I muttered. “I’ve seen the way he looks at you,” I added.

  “Looked,” she said, and I wanted to cry. “Looked at me. And he only ever kissed me once.”

  I pondered the damage I could cause by pursuing this, but in the end, Sally needed to talk.

  “Why only once?” I asked.

  “He was mortified. Can you believe that?”

  I shook my head.

  “He jumped back like a scolded cat and just stared at me. Acted like I had kissed him. Which wasn't how it happened at all.”

  “I’m sure it was just a knee-jerk reaction,” I said, having no idea whether it was.

  Sally let out a half sob, half laugh. It sounded tragic.

  “He said a Surgeon couldn't fraternise with a Novitiate. I told him no one needed to know. Do you know what he said?”

  I shook my head again, thinking perhaps this had been a mistake; Sally was livid. Wasn’t that part of the grieving process? I know I had reached a level of anger at one stage when I had grieved my parents’ deaths.

  “He said it wasn't worth it.” Oh, dear effing God. “Not worth it,” she repeated, sounding so sad.

  “I’m truly sorry, Sal,” I offered. It was pathetic. I could do better than that. “But I saw the way he looked at you, and there’s nothing you can say that makes me think he didn't care.”

  “Oh, he cared,” she said, surprising me. “He just didn't care enough.”

  I didn't know what to say.

  “And then you came along,” she said. I bit my lip and stayed silent. “And Dr Evans fell so hard for you and everyone could see it. It was just there! He didn't try to hide it. Not really. You were worth it,” she said, stifling a sob.

  “You know what,” I said. “Fawkes sounds like a jerk.”

  She let out a little laugh.

  “I mean,” I added, desperate to make her smile. “How could anyone look at you and not fall in love. Christ! I’m half in love with you as is. And Dean, good God woman, Dean Jordan thinks you walk on snowflakes and dance in moonbeams and set the sun every single effing day.”

  She turned to look at me.

  “No, he doesn’t.”

  I stared at her. She couldn't really be that dim.

  But she didn't need the worry of Dean’s crush right now. The guilt would cripple her.

  “Well, maybe not quite like that,” I said offhandedly. “But he does like you.”

  She looked at me, and then a tentative smile curved her lips.

  “I hated him for a while, you know.”

  “Who? Dean?”

  “No,” she said, actually huffing out a laugh. “Bryan.”

  “I hate him too,” I said with not just a little dusting of my hands.

  “But then I kept dreaming about him.”

  I lowered my head and stared at the rug on Sally’s floor. It was bright and cheerful and extremely well worn. As if she’d brought it from home when she’d moved in here. I liked the rug, and I hated it. Because I had nothing of my own from home at RATS.

  “Bugger,” I said.

  “He said he didn't dream.”

  “That has to be a lie.”

  “Doesn’t matter. The dream was the kiss we’d shared. On repeat. Nothing more. Because there would never be anything more. Just that one bloody kiss and my mind playing it back to me on repeat.”

  “I hate those dreams,” I muttered.

  “One kiss,” she said. “That’s all I got. I was sure there was meant to be more.”

  “Oh, Sally,” I said.

  “And now…” she said starting to cry. “Now, I’ll…never…get…anything…more.”

  I wrapped her up in my arms and held her while she cried out her heartache. Cried for a man who she loved, who hadn’t loved her the way she deserved. I’d liked Bryan Fawkes. I’d really, truly, liked him. But at that moment, I would have punched the man in his face and kicked him in the balls if he’d risen from the dead.

  I started out the window and wondered what would become of us now. Sergei was winning. He’d killed a Surgeon, possibly was responsible for Jessop’s death in Japan. And he’d stolen our Orion modules.

  Perhaps he hadn’t been aware of the 6s. Perhaps he’d entered a command into the Lunik that came here before it had even taken flight, and couldn’t adjust it to accommodate the two Orions which had unexpectedly turned up at RATS.

  We could still go after him. We could still end this. Save Time. Find my family.

  I wasn't sure about RATS, but I didn't have a choice in the matter. If Crawford grounded those 6s, I’d have to steal one in the middle of the night.

  Nothing was going to stop me from going after my family.

  And as I looked down at my friend, whose tears had at some stage dried up, I realised I’d at least have a sidekick to fly with me.

  Sally needed to see this through to the end. She needed to lay Fawkes to rest.

  A part of me wondered if it was me who needed to lay loved ones to rest.

  And then I banished the thought.

  22

  And End It Now

  Jack

  “Is it orange?” I asked the dispatcher over the Comm unit.

  “Yes, sir and it’s getting bigger.”

  I sighed and rolled to a sitting position on the side of the bed. I’d had exactly one hour and fifteen minutes sleep. It was the reason why I hadn’t sought out Mimi’s bed. Somehow I’d just known I’d get woken by another crisis.

  “I’ll be right there,” I said and disconnected the call.

  Clive was already in Dispatch when I walked in. He handed me a cup of coffee.

  “Thank fuck,” I said.

  He commiserated with me by grumbling into his own cup.

  “It’s three times as big as when it first appeared, sirs,” Amanda said. Did the woman not get any sleep? She looked alert and focused as if she was starting a day shift. Not midway through a double.

  “Time?” I asked, savouring my liquid energy boost.

  “1967 Singapore,” the dispatcher said.

  The coffee immediately tasted bitter.

  “Fuck,” I muttered.

  “That date significant?” Clive asked.

  “Singapore is significant. Remember the first Orion 6? It travelled to us via 1945 Singapore. This can't be a coincidence.”

  “But the dates are different,” Amanda offered. Not many dispatchers inserted themselves into Surgeons’ conversations. But Amanda, I was realising, was clearly competent and very much present.

  It made me wonder if Susanne had wanted to offer input but not been brave enough.

  I shook my head. “Yes, but one dimension is enough to establish a connection between two flights.”

  “So, what is Sergei after in Singapore?” Clive asked.

  “That’s the question,” I agreed. “But we should also consider that he may be using an Orion, and this is our chance to reclaim it.” Reclaim one in any case.

  Clive grumbled incoherently and then slammed down his cup, sloshing coffee over the rim.

  “We can’t fly,” he said.

  “We have to fly,” I countered. “That rip is expanding, and Sergei has proven in the past that he doesn’t give a shit about Time. He won’t mend it. We have to.”