The Terminus (9 page)

“What the heck
did you say?” Gary asked his friend
when they were out of harm’s way.

“Only told him I’d seen his girlfriend snogging with the number two
on Hampstead Heath.

“But you don’t
know whether he’s got one. Let alone what she’s like!”

“I said, ‘your
girl-friend, mate... the one with the tits!’”

“But all girls
have… oh, Jesus, Mike, how on earth d’you get away with it?”

The truth was
Mike took everything in his stride; never the least flustered or fazed by
anything. A genetic absence of fear, Gary
often wondered.

Must study
him some day in the future
, he’d once told himself.
Check out his
DNA
!
Or do a PET scan of his brain!

Yeah, Mike
would be his most valuable resource in their plan to nick the Pentatron Tablet.

Gary
printed out information from his dad’s computer and returned to his room. Mike,
now wearing Redfor’s red tracksuit, was seated on the bed, a small booklet in
one hand and Redfor’s spectacles in the other.

“What the hell
are
you doing?” asked Gary.

“God’s Manual.
In Redfor’s pocket with his duck-freezing machine,” replied Mike.

He fiddled
with something on one side of the specs.

“Stop! Hand it
over!”

Gary
snatched the booklet away from Mike.

“Hey! Cool it,
Gary! Team work! Remember?”

“Sorry, mate.
What with… Beetie… you know!”

“Bloody right,
I do! Beetie this, Beetie that! Can’t you forget her, like Redfor said?”

“Nope!”
answered Gary, perusing God’s
Manual. “Give me those specs!”

“Like ‘please’
or something?”

Gary
glanced at his friend. Sometimes he wondered why Mike stuck by him. If only he
had a better way with people.

“Sorry, Mike.
Please
! I’m pretty tense. Not much of an excuse, I know. Thanks, by the
way. I do appreciate your help.”

“Team work?”

Gary
laughed.

“Sure! Man,
this is awesome! So well-written. Not the usual Japanglish crap. See here… you
can set the specs to the nearest split second. Right hand lens frame for moving
forwards into the future, left backwards in time. Press that little switch at
the side and everything returns to default mode… here and now ’cos it’s pressed
in. God must have made pre-adjustments to change the default time.”

He showed Mike
the other, identical, pair.

“Diaphragms
round each lens… six in all… and see those markings? As you turn them, they
slide past that tiny red dot. Your destination! The scale’s as close as you can
get to infinity in both directions, and logarithmic. With me?”

“Like...
sitting on this bed
with
you?”

“Never mind!
Working inwards, the diaphragms get more precise. Correct geological era…
millennium… century… year… day… down to the nearest split second. If only I
understood the science behind those experiments with the LHC!” Gary
stared into the distance, momentarily lost in thought. “The specs have to come
from the future, but…”

“Hardly
ancient Egyptian, Professor Brainbox!”

“No, Mike…
this Pentatron Tablet business from the past… p’raps the time-specs... but no…
they
must
’
ve
come out of the place in Stanmore that God’s gonna
build. They’ll have discovered a space-time wormhole with the LHC, like some
people are predicting right now, and God must’ve harnessed it.
Will
harness it. Expand it and break it up into quantum factions, control it. Oh, I
really wish
I could meet him!”

“And I really
wish
I
could meet up with that hockey-playing redhead!”

“Mike, you’ve
gotta take things seriously. Here, read this stuff on the tube. Your homework!”

“Back to
Regent’s Park, then? Watch a game of hockey?”

“

“Gary…”

“What?”

“Gary,
there’s a man from the future out in the shed. Don’t you think we should do
something about it?”

“Holy
Mackerel… nearly forgot! Go and amuse my mum in the kitchen and I’ll check on
Redfor.”

But the garden
shed was empty.

Later, en
route to the British Museum,
they discussed tactics. Gary had
been right about Mike. His friend would make an ace big time crook… if only he
weren’t so soft-hearted over people. He could imagine the boy immediately
handing everything back after a major heist because he’d feel so sorry for
those who’d been robbed… particularly if the victim happened to be a girl. He
visualised Mike adding interest to the returned goods in exchange for a first
date with her. Poor Mike! But would he be so desperate for a girlfriend if he
had even an inkling of the torment he, Gary, was suffering thinking about
Beetie the whole time? Sheer bloody hell!

They took away her blue
tracksuit. All she had to wear were those dresses and, in bed, a pink silken
nightdress with lace trimmings. Each morning and afternoon she’d be let out –
or rather,
told
to go out – into the garden.

This was on
the other side of the blue building away from the courtyard. When she first
went, in a yellow dress and high-heeled shoes, she stood and gawped for ages,
for she’d never imagined anything so beautiful. Plants everywhere! Some huge,
like those (trees?) of which the boy from the past had spoken, and the green
spreading expanse of lawn tempted her to run free and tumble on the grass –
only she didn’t dare. The clothes and shoes (why
did
the Chairman want
to make her taller with such high up heels?) restricted her like delicate bonds
and colourful chains; gorgeous, like the garden, but to tear or dirty these
would be unthinkable. Tottering, she walked with difficulty along the small
paths winding between the dappled flower beds. Sometimes she would stop and
twirl the skirt of her dress, aware of the fragrant scents of surrounding
blossoms caressing her body as she did this. Everything was wonderful… but
illusory. Her personal paradise was little more than a painted hell.

Already, those
daily injections had wiped out most of her memories of the Retreat. Her private
warden, the woman in the blue overall, often tested her:

“If only
Arthry were here, ay, girl?” She was usually addressed by the warden as simply
‘girl’.

“Who’s
Arthry?”

“Don’t you
remember?”

“No.”

“Blinker… and
others in The Retreat?”

“No idea who
you’re talking about.”

“The tunnels?
The gee-rats?”

“Yuk! What are
they? Sound horrid!”

In her cell
Beetie would receive instruction, only she was no longer ‘Beetie’. To the
Chairman she was ‘Belinda’. Belinda learned about a world beyond, in the
Terminus, even more wonderful than her garden. On her computer screen appeared
pictures of incredible buildings, palaces and fantastical creatures. Her own
food she enjoyed, but in the Terminus she was promised a daily feast of dishes
the mere sight of which made the girl’s mouth water. Each day, God-the-Chairman
would appear and tell her all manner of things. Gradually, she got used to his
face... his large, hard eyes and buck teeth. He spoke softly and sometimes read
her poetry: verses of love and what went on between a man and a woman in
private… the tenderness and the caressing. She began to look forward to his
‘lessons’ as he called those obligatory periods when she was forced to sit and
stare at the computer. He’d become her
only
friend.

One thing from
the past that injections could not erase from Beetie’s mind was the face of a
boy. His name had vanished though she seemed to recall this had been strange
like the boy himself. On closing her eyes his face appeared as clearly as if he
were in the room. His voice spoke to her, softly; she sensed the touch of his
hand and, oh, the feel of his lips against hers! She even remembered that
word... kiss. Why? Had this boy been with her in the past… or was he another
phantom from the Terminus? She thought not, though perhaps from a real and very
different world.

The Chairman
she considered her ‘friend’, but the warden in the blue overall her ‘fiend’.
Beetie was unable to soften towards her as she felt herself mellow to the
poetry-reading Chairman. The woman was sharp.
Not
just a robot. Somehow
she sensed something that Beetie was unwilling to let go of, and, like a
blood-hound from hell, she was going to find out.

“There’s a
boy, right? A boy from the past?”

“No!” insisted
Beetie.

“Belinda,
don’t lie to me. The Chairman doesn’t appreciate girls who lie. Only those with
minds as clear as a mountain stream.”

Beetie hadn’t
yet done mountains in her lessons. Besides, something inside warned her not to
say about the boy, her one and only secret and a key to true happiness to be
kept hidden at all costs.

“Come, girl.
We’ll take a little walk together. I want to show you something.”

Beetie slipped
on her high-heeled shoes and tripped along daintily behind the booted warden,
out into the courtyard. Other girls in dresses, all barefoot, either stood
motionless or sat on benches. Not one acknowledged Beetie.

“For a start
you’ll lose those ridiculous shoes if he finds out you’ve been lying. ‘Oh, a
mere nothing!’ you say to yourself? Well, maybe we need to get rid of your
smugness, eh? Follow me, girl!”

Beetie
followed the warden across the courtyard towards the bleak, grey building. The
door opened automatically and they entered a dark corridor before passing
through another doorway to a huge hall. The girl immediately clutched hold of
the woman, turned her head and heaved, covering her mouth.

“Had enough?”
chuckled the warden.

“Take me out!
Please
…
no more!” begged Beetie.

“Is Belinda
going to be a good girl and tell me everything?”

“Yes, yes!
Any
thing!”

Back in the
courtyard, Beetie took in lungfuls of air. Beads of cold sweat stood out on her
forehead, for the horror of what she’d seen inside the grey building had
reduced her to a quivering jelly of submission. The warden’s voice now sounded
distant and disconnected… but one she must obey at all costs.

“You still
remember the boy?”

Beetie nodded.
She didn’t want to. How desperately she’d wanted to guard her only secret, yet
slowly, guiltily, she nodded.

“Good! You can
tell the Chairman everything! Let’s hope you can convince
him
of a
reason for lying to
me
before!”

***

“Another thing
about these specs, Mike,” Gary
said. “In addition to setting a default you can close the wormholes in one
direction. Like a valve. Even on removing the time-specs you stay wherever you
are.”

“So?”

Mike’s head
was spinning. Gary hadn’t stopped
babbling as he tried to explain the theory behind proton-against-elementary-particle-collisions
and the bending of time. Periodically the other boy switched off and thought
about the redhead in Regent’s Park, but this only depressed him. How the heck
was
he
ever gonna get a girlfriend? Okay for Gary
to moan, but at least he’d kissed the Beetie girl he kept wittering on about.
What a daft name, anyway... Beetie!

“Only one solution, Mike!
We time-travel together, I bring
Beetie back with me, leave her here and return to the future for you.”

“No thanks,
mate! Not with giant rats about! I hate even smaller ones. We’ll have to do
this the other way around.
I
’ll bring her here and hop back… I mean
forwards… a few seconds later to collect
you
!”

“Whatever! The
point is, all three of us can come and go across the time barrier with two
pairs of specs.”

“Gary…”

“And we can
easily reach The Terminus where God’s gonna build his Research Institute. Find
out what the hell’s going on for Arthry’s sake.”

“Gary,
you weren’t listening to Redfor, were you? Your girl… I don’t like to rub it
in, mate, but seems you’ll not be seeing her again after what that dude said.”

“Nope!
Don’t believe him! Winding me up! Didn’t like the
man, anyway. Hiding something from me.”

“Think he’s
gay?”

“No idea. Just
uneasy about him even if he
is
in with Arthry. Mike, you’ll see what I
mean about the Retreat when we get there. With the Pentatron Tablet. Dunno who
to trust. Except for…”

Gary
looked away from Mike.

“Yeah, Professor Lover-boy!
Except for
the
girl.”

“They’re using
her, the bastards. Whoever’s behind this had better watch out!” Gary
paused, his face twisted by anger. “It’s all to do with The Terminus, Mike.
Has to be!”

“Gary,
I’ll go anywhere if the place is guaranteed rat-free!
Now,
this theft business?
Gonna want a diversion, right? Question is, where?
Are you certain the time-specs are accurate to the nearest split second?”

“Uhuh!”
Garry nodded.

“’Cos we’re
gonna need split second timing. Got an idea, but let’s have a recky of the area
first. Get a feel for the place.”

“Mike, you
sure you’ve never robbed a bank?”

“Would do if
it could buy me just a little time with a certain redhead. Right, here goes!”

“I’ll buy the
tickets, Mike! Found a load of dosh in Dad’s wallet. Borrowed a few notes... on
loan, like.”

“Waste of
money! Leave the bullshitting to me.”

As they walked
up the steps to the British Museum,
Gary agreed that letting Mike do
all the talking was a wise joint decision. His friend sidled confidently up to
the ticket desk.

“Ahem! We be
Romanian archaeology students. Arranged from our embassy, thank you. Big
agreement with Professor… er…”

He turned to Gary
for inspiration.

“What name he
making, big professor man in London?”

“Steven,” was Gary’s
barely audible response. He was hopeless at faking any sort of accent.

“Excuse me,”
said the woman, eyeing the boys suspiciously. She picked up a phone, dialling a
number whilst Gary stared at his
feet. Mike thumped the ticket-booth with his fist.

“No wanting
making angry, Professor Steven man.
He having
plenty
good connections in Romania.
Plenty important archaeology in us country.
Stones and
bones,
see!
He needing
us,
big Professor Steven man.”

The woman held
up her hand to silence Mike. Struggling to suppress a grin, Gary
feared his friend had gone too far.

“Professor Steven?”
she queried.

“Having big famous in
CERN
international cooperation.”

“Professor
Steven works in CERN?
How
strange!”

“
Romania
also!
Making for much young brain
development in
Romania
.
Professor Steven have big puff if get angry.
Very
big puff.
Go boom!”

The woman
raised her hand again. Mike shut up. Gary
peered fixedly at the floor to shield his mounting mirth.

“Okay! Right!
They look harmless enough to me!” she said into the phone.

Mike gave her
the cheesiest of smiles and Gary
covered a fake cough with his hand. The woman handed Mike two complimentary
tickets.

“Follow that
corridor,” she said. Mike put on a blank expression. “Corridor? You don’t
understand corridor?” she asked.

“Long tube?
Must crawl, I think.”

“No, you won’t
need to crawl. I’ll get an attendant to take you.”

Mike offered
another bewitching smile.

“Many
thankings from all of our deep hearts,” he said, adding a little bow.

The ticket
seller blushed.

“A pleasure! I
hope you enjoy the exhibition.” She beamed back at Mike. “I do like your
uniforms. Very flash!”

“Liking much
colours going archaeology studies!” Mike informed her.

“Quite,” she
said, unable to conceal her amusement.

Gary and Mike
followed an attendant to the exhibition hall.

“When making
arrived here, famous Pentatron tablet?” Mike asked the man. He stopped and Gary
walked on ahead, alone.

“Thursday.
No, I tell a lie. Wednesday. My day off. The
thing was here when I got to work on Thursday. Took ’em two days to rig up the
laser security. Biggest job they’ve ever had to do. You lads’ll know how
important the object over there is, of course, being archaeology students. Good
to see they’re training you lot young nowadays.”

“Many police
and much army I think to delivering here!” Mike suggested.

“Oh no! Would
only tempt armed robbers, ay? Security van at the back, three blokes with
coshes, and Bob’s your uncle! After closing time, of course. This place is
always teeming with people during opening hours, even with timed admissions.
Not like when I was a lad, I can tell you.”

“Is safer,
many people going around, am thinking!” Mike said.

“Suppose so!”

“Having
robbers sally forth not good if many people.”

The attendant
laughed.

“Funny way of
putting it, but yeah! Can’t have robbers ‘sallying forth’! So, where are you
two from?”

Mike paused.
He noticed his friend, standing in front of a glass case containing the
Pentatron Tablet.

“Vampire man
archaeology study place, ha ha!”

“Pardon?”

“He name of
study place of archaeology. Romania.
Vampire man!”

The attendant
scratched his head.

“Vampire man?
Dracula? Was he for real?”

“So so! Big
count. He name giving archaeology study place!”

“Ah! The Count
Dracula School of Archaeology, ay? Have to tell the missus that. Had no idea
Dracula actually existed… or that he was into archaeology!”

“Lot
of things no must say.
Bad vampire luck.
Ooooh!”

The attendant
drew back when Mike waggled his fingers at him.

“Okay! Right!
Enough bad luck already, thanks. Look... your friend over there! Think he wants
a word with you.”

Mike sauntered
over to Gary.

“See that facial
reconstruction?” the other boy whispered, looking at an artist’s impression of
a big-eyed, goofy Atlantean. “Just like him. Teeth. This is beginning to make
sense now. Got a time then?”

“Wednesday… after
closing. Round the back. Security van. Three guys with coshes.”

“Heavies?”