Magestic 2

Copyright © Geoff Wolak

www.geoffwolak-writing.com

Part 11

A new reality

After numerous stopovers around the Pacific for “engine” trouble, a tanned Susan and myself made it back to Canada as the weather turned cold. And we walked right into a list of complaints from Toby and Mary. They hadn’t missed us particularly, but they wanted to air their grievances against Cookie, Sandra, the hotel security in particular and the world in general.

‘Nice to see you too,’ I told Toby as he fired a million complaints my way. After ten minutes of listening patiently, and after my son had lost his bluster, I said, ‘So, to sum it all up: you were made to go to bed the same time as we make you, you were stopped from setting fire to the hotel and abseiling out the window, they didn’t let you shoot ducks outside, and you had to eat sensibly. That about cover it?’

Toby stormed off, sulking. Susan had been chatting to Mary in our suite, and joined me in the diner after my errant son had strode off cursing under his breath. At least he did it in English, and not Latin.

‘How is our little darling?’ I quipped.

She rolled her eyes. ‘They took her data-pad away, and Sandra slept on the couch to make sure that she didn’t sneak out and use anyone else’s. They restricted her to twelve hours use a day.’

‘Twelve hours? What cruel bastards they are.’ I faced Cookie. ‘I owe you, buddy.’

‘Never ... again, arse-hole!’ he carefully mouthed.

‘Perhaps the world is not ready for our kids yet,’ I told Susan, issuing a sigh.

We returned to the mundane, that of family life, family squabbles, and planning the future of this entire world. The next day I toured the factories, finding Goose and Super Goose production up, the planned decommissioning of the the lines put on hold till the back-log was filled, which would be in around five years time. Air travel was back at the fore, and our factories were flat-out busy.

The US military were still buying kit, and ordering more, re-organising its army in line with what we had started before the war. They were even recruiting for the professional units, now that wartime conscription had been ended. The new USAF, which was due to be created in 1947, was thrown together in a hurry, blue uniforms adopted, and they took delivery of eight F15s for training. There was to be no evaluation period, they were keen to press them into service as fast as humanly possible – for reasons best known to themselves. The first two B52 lookalikes had been delivered, plus one that had crashed on landing and bent a main spar. It had been cut-up, being sent down to them for training purposes.

Following our advice, training for the B52s would only be for those pilots with a great many hours of Super Goose flying under their belts, or similar experience on the Boeing Super Buffalo. Given how expensive the aircraft were, the USAF were taking no chances. They had created a base in the Nevada desert, not too far away in terms of flying time from our training centre in San Diego, and had agreed to combine its training with the RAF atom bomb crews. When RAF pilots were being instructed, US crews sat and observed, swapping seats at various points.

Hal and Hacker had returned from Scotland as the weather there had turned poor, their trainees flying back with them - all now based in Nevada, and the first US jet fighter pilots were being selected. Most of the candidates had seen service during the war in prop fighters, and the new fighter wing included three Canadians on secondment, and two former pilots of the American Brigade. The men were put through rigorous fitness training, Hal teaching them all about high-G manoeuvres - and how to breathe whilst squeezing muscles; the first G-suit was still on the drawing board, not yet in service. US pilots, fresh from flying our prop fighters, were soon sat in the backs of the F15s as Hal and Hacker introduced them to extreme speed.

I sent Hal a note about getting lost, and the Mexican border, just to be rude. His personal aircraft soon developed the caricature of a Lemming with goggles, the words underneath saying “Is this Mexico?” But I was jealous; that old man was training people to fly F15s and B52s, and I was checking the costs of making radios and TV sets.

Before the war, we had bought into many companies that we knew would do well in the years ahead, several to do with new technologies such as electronics, telephones and television. The first TV station was now ready and broadcasting around Seattle, just four hundred of our TV sets in operation. The large sets were enclosed in wooden surrounds, took a while to warm up, and were black and white, but people still marvelled at the new technology. Many TVs sat in the windows of shops wishing to attract a little business from passing housewives, the first few broadcasts a mix of news and music, big bands to be seen and heard. Everything was live, there was no magnetic tape yet, and long pauses between shows and segments were common.

Demand for our cars was great, and we now produced a cheaper variant, available for the average family. Still, Trophy was not Detroit, and we were not geared up for mass production, a deal signed with Ford to make that variant of our cars. That led to complains from other car manufacturers, and various senators and congressmen got in touch for a whinge. I was happy to see the technology released, and agreed deals for anyone who complained loudly enough.

Jimmy was still playing happy families with Dr Helen Astor, and a week after we returned home we received word that they had married in registry office with little fuss, Churchill himself as a witness. The news made every paper in the western world, and probably a few further afield as well, much further afield. The news would have reached 2047 quickly, both worlds, and gone around the globe in a matter of seconds. Susan and I felt a little put-out at the lack of an invite, but we understood Jimmy’s lack of interest in a media circus. I sent him a toaster and a rude note.

He now utilised a room in Dr Astor’s huge house as an office, a few people moving over from Canada, and some twenty guards patrolled the sizeable grounds, British police officers in uniform at the various gates – silver whistles in breast pockets.

Jimmy’s guards sent me images of the house and grounds when I requested them, Susan and myself scanning the pictures. The main house was not that dissimilar to our old house in Wales, the grounds ideal for both privacy, and raising a brood. They sent us an image of Jimmy on horseback with his new bride, others of Jimmy dragging two reluctant-looking donkeys with the two daughters on the back.

Dr Astor’s father was still alive and working for is in the Congo Parliament, and no doubt shocked that she had finally snared Jimmy, pleasantly shocked, and we caught an image of the family group, a large extended family, all on Dr Astor’s side. Jimmy still sent me messages, at least one a day, but rarely called. The messages were nudges and comments, but for the most part he left things to me.

One of those nudges I had half expected, and I was not surprised when Jimmy suggested I review progress in 1984. So three weeks after returning from my round the world jaunt I said goodbye to Susan and the kids, and set-off for Africa. There was a portal I could have made use of in Manson by sending a signal, a permanent base there now, but once through I would have to ask the US 1984 Administration to fly me to Africa, making use of their air bridge. For some reason, I figured that the journey would be safer in 1938, and hopped on the presidential-style Super Goose. We refuelled in Nova Scotia, topped up in London, and made the final leg in one go, landing on Mawlini’s concrete runway.

I had lunch with Mac and Ngomo, chatting about 1984 and what awaited me, then stepped through, the 2047 operators warned in advance of my plans. I jumped through with my bodyguards and my luggage, from the heat and dust, and into a clinically clean portal room.

‘I bet you get fed up with sweeping the floor all day,’ I told a technician. By the look on his face I figured I should exit quickly, bodyguards or not, and soon hit the hot sand of 1984, no concrete runway available. Ngomo Junior, dressed in desert pinks, approached as I stared across at a bus and two cars, all covered in black solar panels.

‘What you doing here, mate?’ I asked as I shook his hand.

‘I am reviewing the command structures and men,’ he said as he took off his sunglasses.

‘Time out the office you mean!’ I said, making him laugh.

‘You are not wrong, Mister Paul. And this is where the action is.’

He led me across compacted sand towards a long line of desert-pink tents, a soldier taking my bag. But these were not normal tents, they were inflatable structures specifically designed to keep men and equipment cool. Inside, we found a darkened room with a quiet hum, equipment buzzing, hushed voices of drone operators. Thirty men in short-sleeved camouflaged shirts sat behind flimsy metal desks, screens full of information, headsets fixed. I peeked at a screen, an A3 sized screen, with Ngomo Junior at my side.

‘That drone is off Iceland, tracking a German submarine,’ Ngomo Junior reported in a whisper, hooking his sunglasses on his top shirt button.

The operator informed us, ‘There’s an American surface ship nearby, sir, but they don’t see the sub.’

Lifting a hand, I felt the cooled air coming from a vent, and remembered my own time in such tents, fighting The Brotherhood on Jimmy’s old world. ‘I spent a long time in tents like these, right here in Mawlini.’

‘With the US Marines,’ Ngomo noted. ‘I read details of it, and I may have pinched an idea or two.’

‘No point in re-inventing the wheel,’ I said, and I wasn’t quite sure how I felt about being back. It had been more than ten years, but my time fighting The Brotherhood had left its mark in my psyche.

In the next tent I found the senior officers, plus a few civilian administrators, the men all volunteers from the pan-African parliament. They were mostly black Africans, just two of them white – but men who had been born and raised in Africa. You could tell by the accent.

‘How’s it all going?’ I asked as I sat at a large central desk made up of six flimsy metal tables, numerous maps laid out.

‘We are rebuilding Nairobi and a few of the principal Kenyan towns first, sir, getting the electricity back on. We extracted oil from a location north of here early on in the project, crudely refined oil being burnt at the power station north of Nairobi.’

It was a plan that sounded familiar. ‘And the power for this place?’ I asked.

‘Solar power, sir. And we have many electric vehicles here now, all with solar panels on their surfaces. We have a bus route from here to Nairobi, two services a day, and another route to Mombasa, others to the Congo.’

‘How far out have the Rifles pushed?’

Ngomo sat near me, pulling a map closer to the both of us with his giant brown hands. ‘We control the whole of Kenya, now most of Somalia, but we ignore the areas with few people. Outside of Mogadishu we set traps, and the fighters came out to us; a massacre of eleven thousand fighters. After dark we sent in small units, and they killed another six thousand, few fighters left moving around in the city.

‘Our people then moved up the coast, and took boats to sail across to Aden. There were many fighters killed in the port town, and that brought the fighters from the capital, thirty thousand men, all killed on the open road. We are now in the Yemen hills and moving north to the Saudi border, many fighters coming from all areas to engage us.’

‘You engage them with drones as well? We did.’

‘Oh, yes, if we see the convoy we damage the trucks. When we arrive there the fighters are thirsty and hungry, many walking off first.’ He tapped the Map. ‘Here, Khartoum, they sent forty thousand men south to meet us in Southern Sudan. We had five hundred men spread out -’

‘Against forty thousand?’ I queried.

Ngomo Junior nodded. ‘When the fighters slept in the night the drone aircraft attacked silently, most killed before the dawn; they never wake up because they sleep on the sand with the faces to the stars. None returned to Khartoum.’ He tapped the western areas illustrated on the map. ‘We are to the Congo, and Uganda is clear of fighters in the south. Rwanda is clear, and Tanzania is mostly clear. From Dar es Salaam they sent almost a hundred thousand men, but they moved across flat open land. Here we saw the uprising.’

‘Uprising?’ I repeated.

‘I learn from you,’ he said with a smile. ‘We shoot the Arab fighter first, and the men in charge. Then the African man stops and doesn’t want to fight. Many Africans turned around and shot the Arabs for us.’

‘They don’t like their Arab task masters,’ I noted, remembering my own battles.

‘We found many camps with many dead and dying Africans,’ Ngomo explained. ‘It is like the German camp for prisoners, all men like the walking skeleton, many bones from dead men.’

‘Concentration camps,’ I stated.

‘Yes, for people who are secret Christians, and do not do what they are told. We inject them, give them food, and now they fight for us.’

‘A new Rifles brigade of locals,’ I said, nodding approvingly. ‘Good. I started my first brigade in Zimbabwe.’

‘At Forward Base we have twenty-four thousand people, the reconstruction crews, but from both worlds.’

‘How many people are there in total from 2047?’

‘Sixty-eight thousand, including soldiers,’ Ngomo Junior reported. ‘At Forward Base they make tented cities, put up the solar power, the wind turbines, and hydro-electric power. They clear land and plant crops, and use the small gold coins to pay local people.’

‘Mining equipment?’ I asked.

‘Not much,’ a man said. ‘This world, this Africa, it was not like our world, no mining operations. This Africa is like 1900 Africa, not 1984. Dr Livingstone welcomed them himself.’

‘And the Americans?’ I nudged, smiling.

‘They land some equipment in Angola, and we tell them where the oil is in West Africa. Some aircraft fly to Nairobi, but not heavy equipment.’

‘And the US Navy?’

‘They landed two ships in Mombasa with aviation fuel and some grain, but we only have a few old aircraft from The Brotherhood, some small aircraft we bring through the portal in pieces.’

After the briefing, I followed Ngomo towards the canteen area, finding high walls of boxes that had been brought through the portals and stacked up, thousands of tonnes of equipment. As we approached the canteen, a line of buses appeared from thin air, their wheels on a metal ramp that defied gravity and the laws of physics. And I could see soldiers sat in the buses.

‘Fresh arrivals?’ I asked as we ducked into the cool and darkened interior of the officers mess tent.

‘From the other world,’ Ngomo Junior reported. ‘They will send the same number of soldiers as us, twenty-five thousand each.’

Men stood up for me, but I waved them down, soon grabbing a seat at another metal table, my shoes on a floor of sand. ‘How’s Lobster doing?’

‘He is holding the portal, and bribing the local German soldiers. It was they who killed the leaders in Berlin.’

‘Who’s in charge now?’

‘A General of the army, who says that he will hold elections in a year’s time, after the emergency has passed.’

‘I’ve heard that before. And the men pushing south?’

‘There are two main groups; one pushes down Italy in a line, one attacks these hills in a place called the Balkans. When they reach the ocean they will stop.’

‘Casualties?’

‘Twenty-three dead, a few wounds picked up along the way. And those killed were from car accidents mostly, when the truck or car have a problem in the hills. Not many shot dead. Some killed by German soldiers when they go to say hello.’

‘The Germans shot at our people?’ I queried, now angered.

‘They think the black soldier is the Arab soldier.’

‘And what happened to the German soldiers who killed our people?’

‘They were killed, all unit wiped out, only some men left alive, sent to say: please don’t shoot at us.’

‘And we’re helping the fucking Germans!’

A meal was placed down on a plastic tray with indentations for separate items, a cold drink provided, and I tucked in as cool air was squeezed out of vents above me.

After the meal I met many of the soldiers, enquiring after home towns, families and girlfriends. Rescue Force had a large presence here, and I found a few people that I knew, a few cold beers downed as we sat outside tents on metal chairs, chatting about rescues gone by, the medics all keen to hear of the early days of the force, of helicopter stunts and helicopter crashes. I found myself longing for those days, orange sunsets over Mawlini field, the air full of the sounds of Hueys coming and going.

I spent the night in the officers accommodation, their inflatable tents no different to the others, and ate breakfast again on wobbly metal tables, sand underneath my feet. After breakfast, I watched drones being carried through the portal in pieces, assembled and tested before being launched by four men throwing them like a kid’s toy plane – only bigger. Each drone stretched eight feet long and ten feet wide, but they were lightweight, their wings bending and flexing. With two large propellers silently working, the drones would dip then level off, slowly gaining altitude, their courses pre-programmed. These seemed quite different to those I had made use of.

‘They take anything up to four days to reach where they’re going, six days or more to Japan, sir,’ a man informed me. ‘They fly high to find winds going where they want, sir, like the Jet Stream, and then they be passengers for a quick flight. Europe is quicker, and Arabia; just a day. We launch in the morning so that batteries are good for night time, and the plane thinks it’s a vulture.’

‘Vulture?

‘They circle like the bird in the updraft and climb, and they find the warm air with the thermal camera, sir. They see the mountain range and the warm air, and stay nearby till they are very high up, sir.’

I stood and observed as another six drones were assembled and launched, one hitting the sand and having to be re-launched, four soldiers running like crazy through the sand to get enough speed to launch the over-sized toy. I watched the drones slowly circle and climb, and they did look like vultures, their flimsy wings bending and flexing. It was not a good omen.

Wandering into a drone-controllers tent labelled as “Mid East Ops”, I sat next to an operator and observed his screen. His drone was simultaneously tracking more than fifty heat signatures.

‘When the day gets hot, the camera not so good at seeing people, sir,’ the man informed me in a whisper. ‘Now, early morning is OK.’

‘Who are they?’

‘They’re fighters, sir.’ He zoomed in on a particular man, and I could just about discern the AK47 and headscarf.

‘Where are they?’

‘Jeddah, sir, a market. I’m seeing what they do, so that I follow the boss ... to his boss.’ He pointed at a screen. ‘This man is a big boss, sir.’

As I sat and observed, the big boss got into a jeep and drove away, the drone’s software tracking him. At a single-storey building the man stepped down, his image lost. But we could see people meeting in an internal garden courtyard before moving to a large tent.

‘A tent?’ I queried.

‘They like to sit in the tent and talk, and eat. It is the tradition.’

We zoomed in on the tent, the thermal images of the men within now fuzzy.

‘I think this man is boss for fighters in East Jeddah,’ the operator stated. He touched the screen, the drone indicating battery reserve power. Then he fired, twelve targets hit in just two seconds.

Zooming out a little, we could see other men running into the tent, soon to be seen carrying bodies out.

‘Could you ... set fire to the tent and carpets?’ I nudged.

With a grin, the operator selected a different type of laser, and duly set fire to the tent, the carpets and the cushions, blowing up a nearby jeep just to show off. After the same operator had destroyed numerous market stalls, I sat with Ngomo and had a cup of tea.

An officer came running, and time started to move slowly, the vultures circling above - and waiting some carrion.

‘Sir!’ the officer cried, as much towards me as Ngomo Junior, everyone now focused on the man. ‘A civilian Russian airliner is heading for Berlin, we’ve been tracking it. Pilots say that it’s a diplomatic flight, but we just detected radiation on board.’

I was on my feet, Ngomo as well. ‘A bomb?’ I asked.

‘It has the signature of a bomb, sir.’

‘How far is it from Berlin?’ I asked.

‘Only twenty miles, sir; it’ll land in five minutes.’

‘Alert all drone operators!’ I shouted at the officers. ‘This could spark a war!’ I stepped outside the tent in the brilliant sunshine, and lifted my phone, selecting the number for President Kennedy, who I was yet to meet – or even speak to. I squinted as I dialled.

‘Hello?’ came a voice.

‘Is that Kennedy?’ I shouted.

‘No, he’s asleep.’

‘Wake him up! Now! There’s a nuclear incident about to happen in Germany!’

‘Who are you, sir?’

‘I’m Paul Holton, right hand man to Jimmy Silo, and Berlin is about to suffer an atomic explosion. So fucking wake him!’

I paced up and down in the parched white sand as officers ran back and forth shouting orders. In less time than I had expected, Kennedy came on.

‘Paul Holton?’ he croaked out.

‘Yes, where are you?’

Kennedy cleared his throat. ‘I’m aboard Air Force One, on my way back from Los Angeles.’

‘Stay on the plane, go to Def Con One, but don’t fire your missiles.’

‘What’s happened?’

‘There’s a Russian airliner heading for Berlin, it’ll be landing in minutes, but we’ve detected that it’s carrying an atom bomb.’

‘A nuclear bomb?’

‘Yes, a Russian trick, to destroy Berlin and the German command structures whilst they’re weak.’

‘I’ve got to go.’ He hung up.

I dialled Lobster, getting his adjutant. ‘This is Paul Holton. Get your people undercover, there’ll be an atomic explosion in Berlin within minutes. Evacuate who you can through the portal, and close it down! Do you understand? Close the portal in minutes!’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Get to it!’

I rushed inside the tent labelled as “European Ops” and sat next to an operator. ‘Call up Berlin, wide angle of the city.’

The man did as asked. ‘It’s on thermal camera, sir.’

‘Zoom out. How high is that drone?’

‘Fifty eight thousand feet, sir. It high enough,’ he assured me. ‘And it EMP proof, sir.’

I sat staring at the grey street-map image of Berlin, feeling useless, nothing I could do to warn the people of the city in time. A few seconds passed, hurried activity heard behind me for a moment, then just hushed tones. The missile shield had been ready and in place for some time, and manned. Now, extra eyes peered at screens as the drones relayed information.

‘We can disable the aircraft, sir,’ the operator reminded me.

‘But not the bomb,’ I suggested. ‘You’ll just crash the plane and set it off in the city. Atom bomb controls are EMP proof.’

A bright orange ball filled the screen that I was staring at, the orange soon turning purple.

‘Purple is radiation, sir.’

‘Overlay the airport, and the portal,’ I requested, staring at the purple mass moving out over the city. The airport was indicated, in the northeast, the portal in the southwest.

‘They be OK, sir,’ the operator assured me. ‘They ... twelve miles from blast centre, sir, wind is north.’

‘It’s what comes next that’s the problem,’ I said as I stood. Outside, squinting in the bright sun, I dialled Kennedy.

‘This is President Kennedy,’ he now formally answered his phone.

‘Paul Holton. Listen, Berlin has gone, from a bomb on an airliner. The Germans may think it was you, so get ready, but don’t launch missiles! We’ll shoot them down.’

‘Will your shield shoot down their missiles if they try and retaliate against us?’

‘That’s what it’s there for, but nothing is a hundred percent. I’m going to track all their subs and aircraft just in case, and I’ll let you know if they try anything aggressive. Send the Japanese a message, and explain what happened. I’ll call you back.’

Thinking about Japan, I dialled the number I had for their leadership.

‘Hello?’ came an accented voice.

‘You speak English?’ I asked, suddenly feeling silly.

‘Yes, I am interpreter.’

‘Listen, an atomic bomb has destroyed Berlin; it was carried there on a Russian airliner. This is a Russian trick, not an American attack. Understand?’

‘Yes, I pass on this now.’

‘Tell your Prime Minister that if you launch missiles I will destroy your country. Do you understand me!’

‘Yes, yes, I understand.’

I lowered my phone, and heaved a sigh. ‘Fuck it!’

Back inside the tent, an officer said, ‘German subs are moving to periscope depth!’

‘They mean to launch,’ another man said.

‘Against who?’ Ngomo asked.

‘Disable them or destroy them,’ I shouted. ‘All of them!’

‘They have missile silos in Scotland, sir,’ a man informed me.

‘Destroyed them all,’ I shouted. ‘Do they have long range bombers?’

‘Yes, sir, in Norway.’

‘Destroy them on the ground or in the air, and destroy their submarine bases in Norway.’

‘Missile launched!’ an operator called, and I closed in on his station. ‘North Atlantic, east of Iceland. Engaging ... missile veering off course, losing height. Second launch ... engaging ... missile veering off course.’

‘Those missiles were targeted at America,’ Ngomo pointed out. We exchanged horrified looks.

‘Shit,’ I let out, frustrated and angered.

‘Sub destroyed, explosion in missile fuel tank,’ a voice announced.

‘Multiple launches,’ an operator announced. ‘Engaging missiles ... six missiles ... ten missiles launched ... missiles engaged ... veering off course, targeting sub, firing EMP.’

‘Missiles launched ... tracking twenty-two missiles ... engaging from five drones ... missiles veering away.’

I stood shaking, dreading what could come next, the sweat on my brow feeling chilled, my mouth now dry.

‘Scottish silos opening doors, firing at missiles now ... multiple ground explosions.’

‘Missiles launched from tracked sub, Baltic, targeting ... veering off, targeting missiles on sub ... sub destroyed.’

‘Activity at principal bomber airfields in Norway, sir.’

‘Targeting bombers on apron, engaging ... bombers on fire ... secondary explosions, twelve aircraft destroyed on the ground. Second airfield ... nine aircraft destroyed on the ground, fuel dump hit. Airfields out of action.’

It dragged on and on, but each of the missiles launched was successfully sent off course or destroyed, most dropping harmlessly into the sea. One missile dropped on Denmark, but its warheads failed to detonate. Several missiles, climbing high but off-course, were destroyed as they neared our drones, fuel tanks ignited by laser fire.

‘Sir,’ an officer finally called. ‘We think they had a hundred and twenty missiles ready to launch, and we’ve destroyed that number.’

‘Thank fuck for that. Keep destroying their military; aircraft, ships, subs, bases, everything.’ I stepped outside, and called Kennedy. ‘They launched a hundred and twenty missiles ... at you guys.’

‘At us?’

‘We shot them all down.’

‘My god.’

‘We’ve sunk all of their subs, blown up all of their missile silos, and destroyed all of the bombers. We’ll now destroy their entire military, just to be sure.’

‘You’ll destroy everything?’

‘Apart from infantry and tanks.’

‘We registered the launches, but the missiles lost track towards us.’

‘Then you can thank a little future American technology,’ I offered, now a little calmer. ‘Any word from the Japanese?’

‘They’ll not get involved, but they are at Def Con One like us.’

‘Don’t make a mistake, Kennedy. We came here to bring peace, not to sit by while you start a damn war. I’ll call you in an hour.’

‘We can’t just sit by while they fire at us, shield of not. It’s an act of war!’

‘If you launch your missiles ... we’ll shoot down your missiles. Look, Germany is finished, Berlin gone, and we’ve destroyed what’s left of their military. By dawn they’ll have nothing more than a handgun, you got that. Launch your missiles and you’ll have to buy some more, because they’ll all land in the Atlantic. But if you do launch you’ll lose my friendship. Got that?’ I hung up.

Desperate for a cold drink, I found a water cooler and took several gulps from a plastic cup. Back in the tent for “European Ops” I drew level with Ngomo as he received reports of the damage done to the German military machine. Fighter aircraft were being destroyed as they sat on taxiways, command centres being hit with EMP pulses, the remaining command and control structures hit.

Ngomo said, ‘The order to fire the missiles came from a base in Norway. We are attacking it now, but it’s under the mountain.’

‘Sir!’ an operator called. ‘Radio signal from a German submarine, in the Arctic, an unknown sub.’

‘It was under the ice!’ an officer reported.

‘Missile launched!’

‘Targeting missile ... at maximum range ... missile still on original course.’

‘Targeting sub with EMP, firing.’

‘Second drone firing at sub.’

‘Missile still tracking ... targeting ... firing ... no hit, missile still tracking.’

I watched in abject horror as the missile’s track was displayed, arcing across Greenland and down towards the east coast of America. I lifted my phone in slow motion and dialled Kennedy, alternating my gaze between the phone and the screen.

‘This is President Kennedy.’

‘There’s a missile tracking towards your east coast, we can’t stop it,’ I said in a horse whisper. ‘The sub ... it was under the ice floes. Do you have anti-ballistic missiles?’

‘Not worth a damn, we don’t,’ Kennedy admitted. ‘We’ve experiment with them, but they were never effective. But we have missiles that explode in low orbit and try and knock incoming missiles off course or with an EMP pulse.’

‘We’re still trying to intercept it,’ I informed Kennedy as I stared at the missile’s track, kicking a beetle with my shoe.

‘No additional missiles fired,’ came from an operator. ‘I think we affect the sub, sir.’

‘Did you hear that,’ I said into the phone. ‘That sub must have had a dozen missiles, but they’re not launching.’

‘Where’s the missile tracking to,’ Kennedy asked in a controlled tone, sounding resigned to the situation.

I closed in on the screen, the target highlighted. ‘Boston. Eighty three seconds left.’

‘There are three million people in the metropolitan area,’ Kennedy stated. ‘But the air raid sirens went off eight or nine minutes ago, so ... hopefully most will be undercover.’

‘We missed the sub under the ice,’ I flatly stated.

‘So did we. My generals assured me we knew where they all were, more or less.’

‘Sixty seconds,’ I read off the screen. ‘We can try and hit it on re-entry, but that’s almost impossible because of the speed, and its momentum will carry it to target.’

‘We lost many of our satellites, but we detected a dozen nuclear explosions in a high orbit. We think the explosions affected our satellites.’

Focused on the timer counting down, I idly commented, ‘The missiles probably detonated on time, thinking they were on target.’

Shouts from outside caught my attention, calls and cries, desperate cries. ‘Medic!’

I hung up and ran outside with the senior staff, around tents and towards the portal landing areas. There sat a smoking bus, at least half a bus, bodies and body parts in the sand, blood stains everywhere.

‘The portal closed while people were coming through!’ a soldier shouted.

I stood staring at the bizarre scene of half a bus, the edges frayed and melted, blood everywhere, a red goo on the sand, intestines clearly visible. Several soldiers were being worked on, limbs missing, the officers directing the medical work. Fortunately, there was a superbly kitted surgical tent fifty yards away, the survivors carried there quickly. That left the senior staff staring at the bus.

‘Contact them!’ I called, people now trying to do just that, to contact 2047.

‘No signal,’ came back from several directions as people ran about.

Ngomo stepped closer. ‘Could the bombs going off affect it?’

I shrugged. ‘I don’t know. Possibly.’

We spent five minutes standing next to technicians, who repeatedly tried to get a signal, a micro-portal always open when the main portal was closed. All three portals were tried repeatedly.

Then I received a call from Canada. ‘Sir, the portal closed prematurely, killed a man. Now we can’t raise them.’

‘Same here. It may be temporary, so just keep trying.’

I dialled Lobster, wondering what might have happened in Berlin.

‘Colonel Nbeki,’ he answered.

‘You’re alive,’ I let out.

‘Yes, sir. This facility is strong, sir, now all the men inside. We could see the flash and feel the wind blast, now we detect radiation close by.’

‘And wounded?’

‘Ten or more blinded by the flash, but we think their eyes can be better in a few days, sir.’

‘Did you close the portal?’ I asked, rubbing my forehead.

‘Yes, and now they open it for my men to go through.’

‘Thank god. Evacuate the wounded, but protect the portal, don’t let the Germans get hold of it; stand by to blow it if necessary. We’ve destroyed all the German subs and planes, so they won’t be happy with us.’

‘What happened, sir?’

‘A nuclear bomb was flown to Berlin on a Russian diplomatic aircraft.’

‘They play the trick.’

‘Get your wounded out, and keep me posted. Oh, and we’ve lost contact with 2047.’

‘No contact, sir?’

‘No, no contact. We’ll let you know. Out.’

I stepped across to Ngomo. ‘We still have contact with 1938, Lobster opened a portal.’

‘Is there a problem on our world?’ Ngomo floated. ‘A ... disaster?’

I stared back at him for several seconds. ‘We don’t know. We’re here now, so ... we make do.’

Stepping into the command tent, I approached the operator I had been previously stood behind.

‘Boston gone, sir,’ he reported.

I closed my eyes for a moment. ‘Any ... any more missiles?’ I asked after clearing my throat.

‘No, sir.’

‘Move drones to the ice floes, and search for any more subs. And try and block all signals from Europe.’ I turned away, gently tapping my forehead with my phone. Stopping at the tent’s plastic sheet doors, I turned and asked, ‘Have the Americans launched missiles?’

‘No, sir.’

That was a relief, at least. Outside, I stared at the phone, not knowing what to say to Kennedy. After a long minute staring at the phone, I dialled.

‘Kennedy?’ came an expectant voice.

‘There’s little I could say that will do any good at this point,’ I began. ‘But we can rewind history, go back and alter this.’

‘You can do that?’ he asked in a whisper.

‘That’s the benefit of time travel. But at the moment we can’t get a signal to our home world, the portals closed prematurely and killed a few people coming through, possibly as a result of the bombs going off here.’

‘They affected your portal,’ Kennedy stated. ‘We lost many of our satellites.’

‘We should have a signal through soon, and then we’ll know. But the portals are at the other end, not here. What ... what casualties are you estimating for Boston?’

‘The sirens went off ten minutes before the blast, and we have telephone contact with a few buildings in the city; most people were undercover thankfully. But the death toll will still be high.’

‘We have drugs that will treat radiation burns and radiation sickness, we’ll get them to you as fast as we can. Anyone who’s still alive today should make it.’

‘We’re arranging for the local civil defence teams to receive the drugs we have here, taking them from hospitals around the country.’

‘Are your Generals after revenge?’

There came a long pause. ‘They want to do something, and so will the people.’

‘The people, Mister President, will calm down and see sense. They’ll look at Boston ... and think what could have been. Without our missile shield you would have lost all of your major cities; they launched a hundred and twenty missiles towards you. Be thankful, Mister President, be very thankful.’

‘I understand the situation, but the military ... and the people.’

‘What, they’d like to roast a few million German women and kids would they?’ I snarled. ‘Germany was turning away from his leaders before this happened, its people rejecting its leaders. All it needed was time.’

‘The military will want to invade, to make sure it’s over.’

‘I guess that’s inevitable. I’ll send our US Marines through to Berlin and make a start at disarming them. They can also treat the wounded. So tell your Generals that you’ll invade, and we’ll assist you. But as soon as I get an open portal none of this will have happened.’

‘Hold off on that till we speak again.’

‘Excuse me?’

‘There’s ... a big picture here I need to look at.’

‘A big picture? You just lost Boston and maybe a million people.’

‘And as you pointed out, it could have been much worse. Look, if this had never happened, what would have been the course of events in Europe for the next decade?’

‘Germany would have changed leadership -’

‘Still nuclear armed.’

‘Well, yes, for a few years at least. But we would have negotiated away man of the weapons.’

‘They’d never have given them up willingly, even a civilian government, not with the Russian threat to them. We might have turned Europe around slowly, or we may have fought a war, conventional or nuclear. And despite what you say, you may not be around later on. This way we take Europe for the loss of Boston, hardly a shot fired. And the Joint Chiefs, they were pressing for a sneak attack on Germany while they were weak.’

‘That figures, you had the same idea as the Russians.’

‘So I’ll take these figures to stop a long war and an opposed invasion, if you’ll help.’

I heaved a big breath. ‘We’ll destroy what’s left of the German military, we would have done that anyway,’ I explained.

‘And Russia?’

‘Oh, don’t worry about them, I haven’t even started on them yet. By time I’m finished they’ll be back in the Stone Age.’

‘And Japan?’ Kennedy risked.

‘Are you out to dominate this world?’

‘My Generals are, I’m out for peace.’

I took a moment before answering. ‘Once Germany and Russia have been disarmed, we can move extra drones to Japan, and destroy their subs and missiles in one go, provided we can find them all.’

‘I can take that to the Joint Chiefs?’

‘You can,’ I reluctantly agreed.

‘I’ll call you back,’ Kennedy said before he hung up.

An hour later Jimmy called, the signal relayed through Berlin, a little distorted. ‘I know most of what happened, but where are we at now?’

‘The Russians set off a bomb in Berlin, as you know, and someone in the German command gave the signal to attack America, a hundred and twenty missiles launched, which is just about all of them. One got through and hit Boston, millions dead or wounded.’

‘And we’ve lost contact with 2047?’

‘Can’t get a signal.’

‘Not from here either, but the German portal is working, which means something has happened in 2047.’

‘A disaster their end?’ I thought out loud.

‘We’ll never know. But if it was something they could fix, even fifty years later, they would have still signalled by now. No signal ... means that they can’t signal for some reason.’

‘Could the nukes going off in orbit affect a portal?’ I asked, as much of myself.

‘The scientists here think that it could under certain circumstances, damage to sub-space. So it could be that 2047 is trying to call us, but we’re not receiving.’

‘But we can open a portal to you!’

‘That’s going backwards in time, 2047 is forwards. If we can’t reach them in a few weeks, then we could modify the German time machine to try and contact them. Maybe we just need to call home to fix it.’

‘How long would it take to modify that portal?’ I queried.

‘A year or so with the technology we have to hand,’ Jimmy informed me. ‘And we’d have to create a separate machine, or risk losing the link to here.’

‘The Americans have one here. We fried its electrical controls, but they could be replaced quickly enough.’

‘And then it would be under their control. No, most likely I would build it here, on this world, in Britain. British are too polite to invade other worlds.’

‘Well, it’s all premature; we could have the signal back tomorrow.’

‘How are the Americans reacting to the loss of Boston?’

‘Kennedy doesn’t want to unwind time, not now that we’ve destroyed the German military.’

‘He’ll invade Europe?’

‘Yes, and I’ll help. I’ll deal with the Russians as well, and start tracking all Japanese assets ready to destroy them. That’ll leave just America with nukes.’

‘Did you offer Kennedy a deal?’

‘I suggested we’d go back in time and stop the attack on Berlin.’

‘Which would leave the status quo; Cold War and mistrust for decades. Maybe the Russians did us a favour by bringing this all to a head; the Americans lose Boston, but gain Europe. But the White House will be our biggest problem in the future, not the other nations.’

‘They won’t listen.’

‘Nope,’ Jimmy agreed. ‘Best bet will be to develop Africa as a counter-balance, but that’ll take twenty years.’

‘Not the way this lot are going; there’re sixty thousand people here from 2047.’

‘I’ll call you tomorrow. Stay alert, this could all go wrong.’

‘Listen, there’s something I need to tell you. I knew about your son, Christopher, just not all the detail; I met him just before I jumped back and joined you. He said he would interfere in a small detail, but I couldn’t say or I’d cause a paradox.’

‘He spoke to Helen Astor a few months ago, and asked her to let me know the kids were mine – she wasn’t planning on doing that.’

‘Then 2047 must be OK; he came from 2064, he told me.’

‘Then it must be OK,’ Jimmy agreed. ‘Just a crossed line somewhere. If it was important, he would have told you – I’d hope. But ... but I don’t think my son did you any favours. He must have figured I’d take time with the family, which meant I wouldn’t be where you are now, and in the middle of a nuclear war. Maybe ... maybe this whole thing was to keep me out of it.’

‘And now I’m in it, right in it!’

‘You can escape to Berlin, hopefully, but yes, you’re where I should have been, your family here.’

‘I have the Rifles here, and there are US Marines, so we can fight our way up to Berlin and through to you if we have to. But first, first I’ll try and fix this mess.’

The portal area was cleared of the bus wreckage, blood-stained sand removed, metal surfaces washed down. If anyone opened a portal and came through, the area would now be clear.

I grabbed another cold drink and accepted an energy bar, before stepping into the tent for Russian Operations. I found just six operators, the men controlling just eight drones. ‘Right, listen up: I want you to find where that bomb came from. The Russians were not supposed to have nuclear bombs, so search for radiation spikes, and find the facility. In the meantime, I want you to destroy all Russian aircraft on the ground, civilian as well as military, and hit all their major cities with EMP. I want every military base hit, every command centre. Send them back to the fucking Stone Age!’

The operators glanced at each other, a little shocked, and then got to work.

I sat down and ate a meal with Ngomo at 6pm, no further missiles launched. The operators figured that they had found most of the German facilities, and had disabled or destroyed them. They were now hitting the missile and bomb assembly plants, military aircraft manufacturers, ships at sea, even tanks on the ground or individual trucks. By time we had finished, Germany here would be as bad as Germany in 1938.

Contacting Lobster, he sent a message through the portal, asking for all remaining US Marines to journey to 1984, but through the German portal, the only one working. There were some eleven thousand US Marines still in 1938, and all would now be part of disarming Germany.

I sat in a darkened tent later, on a bed allocated for me, and typed up a speech. Handing it an officer, I asked for it to be transmitted on all frequencies around Europe, and in all European languages.

‘People of Germany, and of Europe. Today, a Russian aircraft posing as a diplomat flight brought a nuclear bomb to Berlin. We, the time travellers, only spotted the plane’s deadly cargo at the last minute, and the bomb exploded over Berlin, killing many. As a result of that explosion, the Germany military wrongly believed the bomb to be an American missile attack, and they launched their missiles at America. All missiles apart from one were shot down. That lone missile reached the American city of Boston, where it killed and wounded millions of people.

‘America did not launch its missile in retaliation, and if they had done so we would have shot down those missiles. America will, however, now invade Europe with our assistance, to make sure that no further German missiles will be launched towards America. Soldiers from the future will assist with the disarming of German forces, and with the disarming of other nations in Europe that may be in a pact with the Germans as part of the Greater Germany.

‘Any nation that now breaks away and declares independence will be recognised as being independent of the Greater Germany, and will receive our support and our protection. Peoples of Europe, now is your time, your time to realise your freedom. If you show no aggression towards American soldiers you will not be harmed.

‘The Russian aggressors in this matter will be dealt with, and will pay a very heavy price for what they did. The Russian Army will not threaten Europe, so go about your lives and rebuild your nations in peace, a peace free of German rule. To those in Germany I say this: if you do not throw down your weapons you will be killed, killed by the soldiers who removed the Arab fighters. Make your choices soon.

‘A new day will soon dawn over a free and democratic Europe, and we will help you to rebuild. We will supply you with medicines, and technology to produce abundant energy. This is an opportunity for you all, a new beginning.’

That night, sat on my allocated bed, I considered that I was back in the shit, back at Mawlini in a tent and fighting The Brotherhood again, only now I had a nuclear war to contend with as well. A part of me wanted to fix this, but a part of me most definitely wanted to be back in Canada, making aircraft. Right now I would have been happy to find out what mischief Toby had gotten up to in school.

The next morning, I woke to find that several European countries had declared independence, and were now in touch with the American administration. France, Spain and Portugal, Iceland, Norway and Ireland had all broken away from the union they had with Greater Germany. It was positive news, and it lifted my spirits a little.

But then I considered the lack of contact with 2047, and if a disaster had befallen that world; my world. The lack of contact with Baldy’s world gave me hope, since the same disaster should not have affected both worlds. We even tried to contact Jimmy’s old world, a permanently manned presence at the portal there, but we couldn’t get a signal. I worried about my family in 2047, about Helen and the girls, and about people I knew, but I also thought about the waste of losing a world like that, and all the work that I had put into it.

My stomach turned as I considered possible scenarios, but the lack of contact with Jimmy’s old world suggested that the problem was here, this end somehow. We still had 1938, and that was peaceful, so retreat there was a possibility.

I worried about Susan and the kids, and sent them a message via Lobster, my new reality being that I would need to get to Berlin to jump through to 1938 and to see them. The Brotherhood stood between me and Berlin, as well as a few angry Germans. It was not even like we had any decent aircraft with which to reach Berlin.

After breakfast, I sat with the drone operators responsible for Russia. ‘Report,’ I said, little energy in my voice today.

‘We have found the bomb assembly plant in Siberia, near the Chinese border. It is in cave, tall mountains nearby.’

‘Impregnable then,’ I noted.

‘We’ve killed all the workers going in and out, and the people controlling the dam that powers the facility. The local towns have been hit with EMP, many people there killed, many cars and trucks set alight over the past twelve hours. If anyone comes from the cave, they will be killed, sir.’

‘Good. And the Russian leadership?’

‘They were in a place south of Moscow, sir, we tracked the radio signals. When they moved by car before dawn we killed them all.’

‘And EMPs?’

‘We hit twenty-four cities, sir, and Moscow. In the east, we hit the army close to the Japanese.’

‘Hit the Russian military right across the country,’ I ordered, and wandered next door.

Ngomo greeted me. ‘We think we have all German hardware destroyed, now attacking trucks and tanks.’

‘US Marines?

‘Four thousand near Berlin already, disarming the German soldiers and helping the radiation victims. More will fly to Berlin on the other world, many by boat, but many are in Japan in 1938.’

‘Long trip for them,’ I noted with a sigh. ‘When you’re happy that you have all the German missiles, move a few drones towards Japan, flying them across Russia, and destroy any military hardware as you go. Start building a list of Japanese assets, and check there’s nothing under the ice floes. Check the tally with the Americans. Oh, and disperse men from this place. Send tents and operators to other locations, hidden locations. One good nuke here and we lose control of these drones.’

Ngomo nodded. ‘I’ll send some to Forward Base, others to the desert ten miles away. They can dig in.’

‘Send some today, just in case the Americans do want to dominate this world.’

A Major approached. ‘Sir,’ he called, indicating for me to step away from the others. ‘Sir, we intercept and record the people in the White House, phone calls, and the Pentagon.’

‘And?’

‘A conversation, a General Mathews. He says that the Russian bomb on the plane, it was him – it was them, sir.’

‘How?’ I puzzled.

‘They give the bomb to the Russian before, to sneak into London by ship.’

I took a deep breath and blew out, staring past the officer and at lines of men lugging boxes. ‘It’s done, there’s nothing we can do about it.’

‘I don’t think the President knew about it, sir. Not the bomb for London, or the plane.’

I took a moment. ‘Who else was involved?’

‘The CIA man, sir, the Director. Do we say anything, sir?’

‘I’m not sure what it would achieve, the damage is done. Don’t mention it to anyone else, I’ll deal with it.’

‘Yes, sir.’

I had hardly time to take a sip of water when Kennedy called. ‘Are you up early?’ I asked.

‘Caught a few hours sleep, still on Air Force One, but at a military base. The news from Europe is positive, many countries coming over to our side.’

‘They’re not going over to your side, they want their independence, and they’ll not swap one imposed union for another. They’ll have free and fair elections, and be free countries to trade with whoever they like, or else.’

There was a pause. ‘That’s what we desire. But what of Germany, Austria and Czechoslovakia?’

‘Those you can invade and hold for a decade, till they’re ready to be free and independent. But holding them comes at a price.’

‘A price?’

‘Yes, you’ll have to pay for reconstruction, and to feed the people, or you’ll have ten years of people setting off bombs near American servicemen. Your aim, Mister President, is to convert them to happy democratic citizens, not to punish them or to keep them down. If you do try and keep them down then you’re just making next year’s enemy.’

‘Point taken. And Russia?’

‘Wiped out, they won’t be bothering anyone for a few decades. And if you invade that territory you deserve all you get. It’s vast, and you’ll just make enemies of them.’

‘We have no desire to invade Russia. What of the US Marines you mentioned?’

‘They’re already in Germany, disarming the soldiers. There’ll be little left for you to do when you get there.’

‘We’re calling up reservists, thinking about conscription as well.’

‘That would be over-kill. How’re you coping with Boston?’

‘Many people survived in basements, all walking out of the city, but all suffering from radiation poisoning.’

‘Our drugs will fix that very quickly.’

‘We now have thousands of medics there, the drugs flown in,’ Kennedy reported.

‘Think what it could have been like.’

‘There are a lot of folks around here doing just that, even the Joint Chiefs,’ Kennedy admitted.

‘Any desire to wind back time?’ I nudged.

‘We’ll stay as we are, unless you force a unilateral move.’

‘Don’t take this the wrong way, but I think you all learnt something from Boston, something you needed to learn.’

‘I think you’re right. Nuclear war is all about scenarios in computers ... till it hits you head on. Have you made contact with your world?’

‘No, which means it’s serious. At their end, they could take a hundred years to try and fix something, and they haven’t, so the problem may be here.’

‘Caused by the nuclear explosions?’

‘It’s possible, and right now it’s more than just a coincidence. Listen, while you’re on, can you send me oil-drilling equipment and mining equipment, around to Mombasa as quickly as you can. I need to make this continent a nation of consumers. That’ll boost world trade.’

‘We’re keen to do so,’ Kennedy assured me.

I took a moment, and a deep breath. ‘Are you alone your end?’

‘I could be.’

‘Do so.’

After a moment, he said, ‘OK.’

‘Did you sanction a sneak nuclear attack on London anytime recently?’

‘No. Why..?’

‘Your General Mathews and your CIA Director did. That bomb, the one the Russians used, it was supplied to them for an attack on London by ship.’

‘You ... have proof?’

‘Yes, but I don’t intend using it, neither would you. But ... if you asked me to arrange a heart attack or two, I would be amenable to it.’

‘Swept under the rug.’

‘The alternative ... is that you wake up dead one morning at the hands of your own people.’

There was a long pause. ‘Do what you feel is appropriate in the circumstances.’ He hung up.

I stood holding the phone and looking at it, a good thirty seconds, then decided to cause a heart attack or two, and from forty thousand feet. I gave the order. The next time the men stepped across a parking lot they’d fall.

I wandered over to the far side of the base, where our light aircraft operated from a strip of compacted sand. The aircraft appeared to be two-seaters, low wing, T-tail. Facing a pilot, I asked, ‘What’s the range on these?’

‘It’s a diesel engine, sir, but it also has solar power and microwave energy.’

‘Microwave?’

‘We can fire microwave up to it, sir, to give it some energy, and down from a drone.’

‘What’s the range on fuel?’

‘About five hundred miles, sir.’

‘And with solar power?’

‘Another two hundred, sir.’

‘And with drone microwave energy,’ I pressed.

‘If we have the drone in place, a thousand miles or more.’

I grabbed a data-pad from a pilot sat in a tent. Unfortunately, I found that Berlin was three thousand miles away. The Suez Canal had been blocked by The Brotherhood years earlier, rusted hulks left blocking the once-important shipping route. Sailing around Africa was a possibility, so was accepting a flight on a US military aircraft bound for Angola, thereafter a ship or further US military flight up to Europe.

I decided to stay, at least for a few months. This was important, fixing this place, and it was a critical time for this world. I made a happy home in the corner of the officer’s tent, grabbed combats and boots, and set up controlling both the global drones and the African soldiers. And this was all oddly familiar, sand everywhere, hanging my boots up at night.

I got a call through to Susan via Berlin, a long chat. She wasn’t happy, and worried for me, Mary concerned. Toby didn’t care, even to talk with me on the phone.

A month later, now tanned and a little sick of the desert, I took one of the light aircraft across to Forward Base, enjoying the rain I found there. A huge tented city greeted me, a few concrete or brick buildings already up, more again under construction in the distance. I called together as many senior people as could be quickly assembled.

‘There’s still no word from 2047, and it’s pointless speculating what happened there. We ... are here, and here we’ll stay till the job is done. You all know what to do, and what the priorities are. The Japanese will trade with us, so too the Americans and South Americans, as well as the new nations in Europe. So we need to get our ore, gold, and diamonds to the coast.

‘We should concentrate on gold and diamonds to start with, and make some money. That money can be used to hire ships, and those ships can move ore to the markets, as well as bring much needed equipment back. Disperse the people here so that we can drill oil on Zanzibar, and in western Africa, and rip-up unnecessary train track so that it can be laid through Rwanda, Tanzania and Kenya to Mombasa. That ... is the priority. The second priority is the track to Angola, which I understand is already underway.

‘It will take time, but the process will accelerate as the months go by. The Americans have promised more equipment, and some has already been delivered. We also have South American countries keen to trade with us, especially for oil, they’re even prepared to drill for it under license.

‘I can inform you that American forces have quelled Germany with the aid of our US Marines, and that some units of those US Marines have crossed into North Africa from Spain, fighting The Brotherhood there. Our own soldiers have moved into Saudi Arabia, and secured the oil producing regions in the east. American military units have landed, as well as oil drilling equipment.

‘Kenyan Rifles have moved from Europe into Turkey, removing the fighters as they go, and American warships have entered the Mediterranean. I can also confirm that in an odd move, ten thousand American enlisted men, and five thousand British enlisted men from 1938, have crossed to Berlin, and are assisting with peacekeeping there. Men from 1938 are assisting men from 1984.

‘Modern day American units have landed in Italy, and have given sea passage to the Rifles, across to Malta and Tunisia, a separate group surrounding Alexandria in Egypt, a third group marching on Cairo. The Americans have been made aware of oil in Libya, on the coast, and they plan on moving in and pumping it to boost the European economy – as well as make a buck.

‘Our work here is progressing well, and peace – of a sort - has been achieved. We’re talking to the Japanese, who now realise that we could destroy their nuclear arsenal. They’re willing, reluctantly, to decommission weapons for oil and trade.

‘I know that many of you would like to get a message home, we all would, but the work you’re doing here is vital for this planet. You all volunteered, mostly because everything back there had been done already. Here, the challenges are great, the work hard, but the purpose a noble one. Here, you can make a difference to the lives of people, a real difference.’

I spent almost four weeks at Forward Base, creating a mini-parliament, although we didn’t have the fine building that Rudd’s parliament enjoyed in 1938. The local workforce was keen and cheap, paid in cold coins, the gold mined by us in the Congo. We soon had an efficient internal economy, and a rapidly growing economy.

Then, one day four weeks later, an American transport landed, a large aircraft with four propellers. It disgorged mining equipment, plus a team of US diplomats, their liaisons to our kingdom in the jungle. That transport offered me a lift, and I packed up quickly, soon on a flight up to Malta with my original bodyguards, all of us now heavily tanned. We refuelled on Malta, American military jets now based there, and flew on north to Berlin in one leg, landing not far from the portal itself.

En route, I had chatted to the pilots about Germany, which was where the pilots were based most of the time. The centre of Berlin was still a no-go zone, radiation lingering around metal structures. Those who had survived the blast had been injected by either black-market drugs, or free drugs issued by Lobster and his men, most victims making a good recovery. The people of 1938 very kindly donated drugs and sent them through, most everyone that needed an injection receiving one.

The American Army had landed in Belgium, at Antwerp of all places, after most of the countries of Europe had declared themselves neutral. That Army moved unopposed to the German border, where they marched across finding little resistance. But in the weeks that had followed the crossing, hundreds of US soldiers had been killed in small skirmishes and ambushes, mines left under dirt tracks, or wired to lampposts. The US forces spread out north, US Marines already in the south and fighting die-hard Nazis in Bavaria.

By time the 1984 US Army had crept slowly towards Berlin, American and British servicemen from 1938 were holding the German border with Poland and moving south towards Czechoslovakia, the men having just come from another war-torn German landscape. They found the clothes here odd, the training shoes cool, and the electronic calculators fascinating. They took casualties in Czechoslovakia, but for the most part the indigenous peoples were starving and in no mood for a fight. A bar of chocolate bought valuable intel on resistance.

The US President of 1938 had organised food parcels, and an ant-like chain of men sent them through the portal. As I landed, those parcels were being placed onto trucks being driven by German soldiers in grey uniforms with armbands, the armbands signifying that they were now working for the US Army.

Lobster greeted me off the plane. ‘You still here?’ I asked him, shaking his giant black steak of a hand.

‘Yes, but now many soldiers, so we sit on fat arses and do little.’

‘Hand over to the US Marines, and move your remaining people to Africa.’

‘Thank you, sir. We need a little action to work off the calories.’

‘How is it around here?’ I asked as we boarded a jeep.

‘The people are hungry, not happy, they steal food and kill each other, but there is no war,’ Lobster reported as we drove around to the portal, my guards in a second jeep.

‘It’ll take time,’ I said with a sigh. ‘So will Africa. But we have a good little economy going in the Congo.’

‘And no word from home?’ Lobster asked.

‘No, nothing.’

‘Mister Jimmy, he builds a machine in Britain.’

‘Yes,’ I confirmed.

‘But I know something many people do not know,’ Lobster began. ‘We have now made contact with the scientist in Mister Jimmy’s old, from Canada. The scientist in Mister Jimmy’s old world, they dial up 2047, and they cannot open a portal either.’

‘No?’ I asked, not having known that contact had been made.

Lobster offered me a worried look. ‘No. They say it is like no time after 2047, in any place.’

Thoughts of Helen and the girls hit me like a punch to the chest, the thought that 2047 could be gone too terrible to bear. ‘Did they ... try our world at other dates?’

‘They cannot open to our world at any date, but can open to many other places,’ Lobster reported.

‘We’ll figure it out,’ I assured Lobster. ‘If not, we have enough work to do here. And when the work here is done, we’ll go somewhere else where they need us.’

‘The men think they must take wives here,’ Lobster broached.

‘Perhaps they should, old friend, perhaps they should. We may only have each other.’

I stepped through to 1938, US Marines greeting me. I found their senior officer, a Major. ‘Major, take control of the portal at both ends, the Rifles will move to Africa now.’

He nodded. ‘Any ... word?’

I knew what he meant, and I shook my head. ‘The African lads, they’ll take wives here. You and your men best get comfortable.’

‘You think it may come to that?’

‘If the people in 2047 had any way to contact us, anyway at all, they would have done so by now. Your men should prepare themselves for the worst.’

The Major nodded. ‘At least they’re here, and alive.’

‘You’d best prepare a speech,’ I told him before I jumped into a waiting car, one of those 1930’s cars whose rear doors oddly opened forwards; people getting in and out could bump heads.

From the airfield I flew direct to Heathrow, London, and by car to Jimmy’s huge estate, driving through the rain, the car chilly – as well as steamed up. I arrived just as it was getting dark, and was badly in need of a bath, so too the bodyguards. Jimmy found us rooms, the guards doubling up with their mates that worked at the estate.

After a quick wash in a dated room with high ceilings, hot water needing to be planned ahead for in 1938, I sat with Jimmy and Dr Astor in a huge period lounge offering a roaring fire, a bottle of beer opened for me.

‘So, Dr Helen Silo now,’ I told my hostess.

She proudly showed me the rings, engagement and wedding band. ‘I most certainly would have invited you and Susan to the wedding, but Jimmy desired a quiet wedding. The reception was here, all of the family members from far off parts visiting.’

‘So, how is married life?’ I asked Jimmy, a glint in my eye.

‘Its fine, but I sometimes feel that I should be ... elsewhere. I’ve been travelling for so long that it was hard to finally just stop. And with everything happening in 1984...’

‘I’m on the case, you take some time off.’

‘The Congo developing over there?’ he asked.

‘Rapidly, a good little economy going, and more and more American equipment arrives every day. And they’re drilling in Libya now that we’ve liberated it.’

‘The Brotherhood?’

‘They’re all heading to Mecca to protect it, as they did on your old world, and we’re killing them in the hundreds of thousands. Six months should see an end to it. I think Africa could be free of fighters in three months.’

‘That’s good news, at least,’ Jimmy commented.

‘And your time machine?’

‘Just up the road, at an old RAF base,’ he began. ‘We have most of the scientists from Canada, engineers from Trophy, British and American scientists, and a big budget. Some of your clever people flew up from Forward Base, and it’s making rapid progress. Unfortunately, the computer power is limited. It may take a year to get it right.’

‘And the power needed?’

‘There’s a coal-fired power station not far away, and it’s being adapted. It should be ready in time.’

‘How’s the post-war economy doing here?’ I asked, a glance up at a huge painting over the fire of someone in britches stood next to a horse.

‘Booming, thanks to us. They ordered a great deal of military hardware before the war – from local manufacturers, as well as during the war, and that ended unemployment in one go. Those men that had been conscripted haven’t been released yet, so it’s all going well on the job front. The Government here made plenty of money from us up to the war, and I loaned them money during the war, so Britain is far from where it should have been. Trade with Africa is helping as well.’

‘Germany?’

‘Slow,’ he admitted, making a face. ‘It’ll take time. But Yuri is involved now, busy building things, not least another little empire for himself.’

‘How’re the kids?’ I asked, easing back.

‘Fine, thank you,’ Helen responded. ‘And ... we have news.’

I faced Jimmy. ‘News?’

‘The stork will bring us another bundle,’ Jimmy informed me.

‘Four? You must like hard work.’

‘We have maids,’ he quipped. ‘Besides, they’re all gifted.’

‘Yes?’

Jimmy nodded. ‘All very bright. My daughters like to beat me up in a good game of chess.’

‘Toby can make home-made bombs,’ I admitted. ‘Only a matter of time before he sets fire to the hotel.’

‘Your daughter is gifted?’ Helen asked.

‘Yes, very bright. She can swear at me in several languages, but we lost her to a data-pad.’

‘Our girls have seen the computers,’ Helen put in. ‘But we do not yet allow them unfettered access.’

‘If I want some attention at bedtime,’ Jimmy began, ‘I have to throw the data-pad on the floor.’

I smiled widely.

‘I have a thirst for knowledge,’ Helen said defensively, blushing a little.

‘How’s Jack doing?’ I asked. ‘He done the embassy garden in Beijing yet?’

‘He speaks to Chairman Han often, and is allowed access to parts of the city that most foreigners aren’t,’ Jimmy replied.

‘And how is Chairman Han?’

‘Still in power,’ Jimmy carefully mouthed. ‘He’s granted Britain more land around Hong Kong, and set up that trade zone, where good little communists can play at being capitalists.’

‘Will that put them on a course for economic supremacy ahead of time?’

‘It may well do, but I’ll arrange trade-balance talks and treaties. And Baldy is doing a good job of communicating with Stalin, who’s now terrified that America will attack. Stalin had started his own nuclear programme, for but some reason the lights just keep going out.’

I smiled. ‘He’s years behind anyway. How’s the US administration behaving?’

‘Very well,’ Jimmy commended. ‘Better than I would have credited them with. And the nuke in Boston, 1984, that’s made all the papers in the States here, much talk about the dangers of nuclear war in the public arena. Our good president has even eased back on his own spending for missiles and strategic bombers; he knows we have drones.’

‘He expects us to deploy them here?’ I puzzled.

‘We can’t un-invent them,’ he said, holding his hands wide. ‘And the administration is being very practical in its approach, not least because a group of them visited Berlin and went through the portal. They had a good look at the aftermath of a nuclear strike, and even spoke to survivors. They also made a quick visit to the States, and learnt about the drone shield whilst over there.’

‘Some lessons are learnt by experiencing things, other lessons are learnt by watching others experience them,’ I commented. ‘When it comes to nuclear warfare ... better to learn by observing others.’

‘Should we offer additional help?’ Dr Astor asked.

‘The wounded only need to be injected,’ I told her. ‘The drug was invented to deal with radiation, on Jimmy’s first world.’

‘Jimmy has been revealing the story, chapter by chapter, each more amazing than the last,’ Dr Astor told me.

‘You should read the book.’

‘Book?’

‘His biography,’ I said. ‘Probably a copy on a data-pad.’

‘I had not realised that,’ Dr Astor told me, a glance at her husband.

Jimmy turned his head to her. ‘My dear, knowing everything about me at the start would be like buying a newspaper you’ve already read. Don’t be in hurry, or you may find me boring.’

‘I seriously doubt that you shall ever wear that label, dear,’ Dr Astor responded.

She left us ten minutes later, to check in on the kids.

Jimmy floated, ‘You ... dealt with Russia harshly.’

I eased back and took a moment. ‘They could have fucked up everything, and they nuked a city. And besides, I just sometimes think that diplomacy is over-rated when you outgun the other side ten to one.’

‘Now you’re starting to sound like an Israeli from 2010!’

I smiled. ‘Maybe. But there has to be a simpler way than just trying to persuade people not to destroy each other - and the planet.’

‘You’re as frustrated as I used to be.’

‘And now?’

‘And now ... if I live a few more years and fix a few small things, then it’s all a benefit. I no longer have any grand plans, or an urgency and desperation in my task. Now, if I can help ... fine, if not ... I won’t be losing any sleep over it.’

‘You’ve been at this too long,’ I quipped.

‘You think?’ he sarcastically asked.

‘Three hundred years? Yeah, it’s a long time.’

He took a moment. ‘If you go to another world after this, don’t lose hope, start at the beginning and work behind the scenes.’

‘That’s a long way off,’ I said. ‘Do you ... worry about 2047?’

‘Of course, I saved that world. But if my son visited you from beyond that date then they’re still alive and well, just not talking to us for some reason. And what we know about temporal mechanics we could write on a matchbox; it’s still a lot of guesswork.’

In my allocated room I called Susan. ‘Hey babes. Did I wake you?’

‘It’s mid-morning, so no. Where are you?’

‘With Mister and Misses Silo, at their small country retreat.’

‘She calls me sometimes and we chat.’

‘She’s expecting again.’

‘Yes, I know. I think Jimmy is making up for lost time.’

‘He’s after his own football team,’ I said. ‘Maybe he wants another son.’

‘He could adopt ours,’ she offered.

‘What’s he done now?’

‘He rowed himself across the inlet.’

‘All the way across?’

‘Yes, and back again, then told me about it.’

‘He’s getting stronger,’ I noted.

‘Yes, and he has a young lady friend, but she’s a good influence; she encourages him to study.’

‘Wow, our lad studying. He’s not studying bomb-making, is he?’

‘He hasn’t blown anything up for two weeks now,’ Susan proudly stated.

‘Progress. Next he’ll clean his shoes.’

‘We live in hope.’

‘And our precocious princess?’ I asked.

‘A bit better, since she now asks me questions and we debate things. She’s lifted her nose out of the data-pad.’

‘Before we know it she’ll be married and having kids, out of our hair.’

‘Don’t tease me, please.’

I laughed. ‘How’s life at the hotel?’

‘Quiet, most of the gang over where you are. Oh, Mac and Handy popped in, till they realised Jimmy was in Britain. After a few rude words they got drunk, then set-off for Britain.’

‘They went all the way there ... without checking if Jimmy was in?’

‘It’s Mac. I was impressed he got the right country! Which he didn’t, obviously. They want to go to 1984.’

In the morning I found Mac and Handy downstairs. ‘He’s in Canada,’ I told them, getting a few rude replies. Those rude replies caused Dr Astor’s Victorian housekeeper to beat Mac about the head with an umbrella, which amused us all greatly for ten minutes. Side bets were laid as to who might win the dust-up.

Jimmy allowed them to travel to 1984, but restricted them to Africa - in case they started a war. They were put in charge of raising local Rifles regiments, which pleased them no end, and would piss-off Ngomo senior no end. With Mac and Handy off to explore London in January, 1939, I said goodbye to Jimmy and his very polite kids, heading back for my own. Since Jimmy’s daughters referred to me as “sir”, I was tempted to ship my own over here for a year or two of British schooling.

A long eighteen hours later I landed in Trophy, met at the airfield by Susan. She drove us back to the hotel, and I caught up on the latest gossip. The following morning I sat in front of a mountain of paperwork, and sighed loudly.

A few weeks later, Jimmy sent me a report, and I read it on my data-pad. Seemed that a group of US soldiers from 1939 had beaten up a group of US soldiers from 1985, two of those from 1985 killed. The reason for the altercation was that the US soldiers from 1985, all reservists that had been called up, had raped and killed two German teenage girls. President Kennedy was insisting the men stand trial, our 1939 president refusing to allow that, and asking for the unit commander from 1985 to stand trial in Germany. A rift was on the cards.

US diplomats from 1939 then travelled to 1985, and made a comment that reached the press in 1985. ‘We obviously have different moral values, because where we come from America’s enlisted men don’t rape and murder young girls.’

Mid-west conservative America, 1985, went on the offensive, but against Kennedy, who was soon under pressure; popular opinion in the US was with 1939. Kennedy dropped calls for the men to stand trial, and agreed to have the 1985 unit’s CO court-martialled.

That led to tensions in Germany, but most of the American servicemen from 1939 were veterans, as well as men who had been injected by us many years earlier. The 1985 US enlisted men had never fired a shot in anger, and bar brawls were one-sided, 1939 beating the crap out of 1985.

The two armies were kept apart, different sectors of Germany patrolled, and peace was reclaiming between America soldiers - and their grandfathers.

I concentrated on making planes, which were much in demand, some time given over to radios, TVs, tanks and MLRS units, and I was often involved in atom bomb development and rockets. I also had an eye on Africa, reports from Rudd most days - and I got involved with Israel when necessary, kept an eye on Po claiming all the good land for himself, and even initiated trade with Chairman Han.

With a nudge from Jimmy, I gave more time over to Han, and nudged Po to trade more with the communists, and at good rates. I pinched Goose off the production line and sent them to Beijing, the first few internal routes soon operating. I found a dozen old Dash-7s and sent them across, and an inventory of Ngomo’s aircraft allowed me to send twenty-six assorted aircraft to China.

Our own airline added a weekly route to Beijing from Japan, mostly catering for diplomats, a second route created from Hong Kong. That led to a visit to Seattle by the US President, and a request for a chat.

I drove down to Seattle through the snow one morning, meeting the President and his team aboard his airplane, shoes wiped first. ‘Didn’t come all this way just to see little old me, did you?’ I teased as I entered the lounge and sat.

‘Campaigning,’ he responded with a smile.

‘Are we behind in our production levels?’ I quipped.

‘No, most things are on track,’ he confirmed. ‘No, we ... wanted to talk about China, communist China.’

‘What about them?’

‘We’re reliably led to believe that Chairman Han is a close friend of yours.’

‘He is, we’ve known him ... a very long time.’

They exchanged looks. ‘And the threats that China poses, that you described to us before the war?’ the President floated.

I accepted a coffee from an aide. ‘They should never materialise now.’

‘No military adventures by them?’

‘No.’

‘But they are communist, and would hope to influence others,’ the President pressed.

‘Are you afraid that your citizens will see their system as being better than yours?’ I teased.

‘Not at all, but communism does seem to be spreading.’

I eased back, and sipped my coffee. ‘On our world, and many others, communism evolved as it did here, but then the citizens of those communist countries desired a better quality of life. They saw the lifestyles of the decadent westerners, and were jealous. Communism collapsed from within, and on our world the Chinese communists started to behave like capitalists, but kept their authoritarian regime. That led to the development of Chinese middle-classes, and that unwound communism.

‘In 2010, on our world, China operated a communist government, but any citizen could open a business and make themselves into millionaires – an odd paradox.’

‘And this new trade zone that they’re creating?’ the Chief of Staff asked.

‘Will create a Chinese communist middle-class from day one,’ I explained. ‘Your main worry ... is not that they’ll start a war or export communism, it’s that they’ll develop a better economy than you.’

‘Better economy?’ the Chief queried, seeming sceptical.

‘On our world, they had developed the second largest economy by 2011, and caught up to you in 2022. They did that, because your US administration foolishly set poor trade laws and tariffs; it was cheaper to import the goods from China that to make them at home. And China, they sold goods to America at cost price or just under so that they could kill American industries. You have that all to come, and unless you have firm trade laws you’ll suffer.

‘That doesn’t mean that you should have unreasonable trade laws, just that you should keep an eye on it, because China will boost your trade significantly. What you need to do, is to allow US companies to import cheap Chinese products when you sell them expensive products, such as aircraft. But you have a decade or two before that process kicks off.’

The President took a moment. ‘And ... is there a route-map for our economy where we don’t lose the top position?’ he risked.

‘On our world, you grew beyond your means and collapsed. Do you want to grow quickly, or securely, or do you want to be the biggest economy to ever collapse and drag the world down with you?’

‘We would obviously wish to have a sustainable economy,’ they insisted.

‘Then you’ll need to keep the gold standard, move away from oil dependency by 1970, and to open factories in India, Africa and many parts of the world. It’s a small round planet, guys, and it’ll become very interconnected. If you want to keep American standards of living, then you’ll need to shave a few percentage points off India, China, and Africa. That’s achievable, and we’ll help, but we may have a shopping list of our own.’

‘Shopping list?’ the President repeated.

‘Do you have a pen and paper?’ I asked with a grin.

Is there anyone there?

Fourteen months after Jimmy had commissioned a time machine in Britain, it was ready, but there was little fanfare surrounding the first full-power test, security tight. Jimmy, myself and Churchill stood peering at a bank of data-pads as the power was gradually increased. A micro-portal was opened, the target being 1986 on the world where Kennedy’s Democrats has just lost at the polls.

‘Micro-portal established,’ came a voice. ‘We have the test signal. It works!’

A cheer went up as the three of us exchanged looks. Five minutes later they established a link to Jimmy’s old world, soon dialling home, to 2047.

The words ‘Unable to open micro-portal’ deflated everyone.

After a fruitless hour we left them to it, to keep trying. Still, we had a link to 1986 Britain, now a free and democratic Britain, but the trains most definitely did not run on time. Still, we were used to that.

Back at Jimmy’s estate, the three of us sat down for a cup of tea, and a planning session. Jimmy was now involved in UK politics, many pet projects running.

‘We have a surplus of gold,’ Churchill announced. ‘And we’ll grant our alter-egos a loan, which should boost their trade somewhat.’

‘And the Americans?’ I nudged.

‘We’ve declared the amount to them, on both worlds, and they’re not unhappy, since Britain will buy American goods on that world.’

‘Fair enough,’ I commented.

Jimmy said, ‘The 1986 British decommissioned the bomb assembly plants and two nuclear reactors, and coal-oil production is up sharply. It’s starting to have an effect.’

‘As it is here,’ Churchill put in. ‘A most significant and beneficial effect.’

‘And our cut?’ I asked Churchill, a little dig at him.

‘We shall now sail our cargo ships to Africa for free, as per the agreement,’ he responded, holding his gaze on me.

‘And Kenya?’ I nudged.

‘Will hold elections in six months,’ he confirmed. ‘Do you ... favour a particular candidate,’ he toyed.

I cocked an eyebrow. ‘We may have someone in mind.’

Smiling, Jimmy said, ‘Oil production in Zanzibar is growing steadily, Po taking much to Hong Kong.’

‘And selling it to his communist cohorts at a most reasonable price,’ Churchill less-than-subtly complained.

‘Which will boost trade in the region,’ I pointed out. ‘And keep the communists happy, and not on the war path.’ Now I held my fixed gaze on him.

‘Let us all hope so,’ Churchill responded. He faced Jimmy, ‘Now, I understand that the inaugural flight of the new passenger airliner will take place in Seattle, at the Boeing plant.’ He waited.

‘They built it,’ Jimmy pointed out.

‘But it was your design,’ Churchill countered. ‘Could we not have an early aircraft operating here?’

‘You’re not geared up to produce them yet,’ Jimmy insisted. ‘But the first production aircraft will fly New York to London.’

‘And how soon before British Airways take receipt of its new fleet?’

‘Three months,’ Jimmy responded. ‘Besides, you have more Africa routes than anyone else, and they all operate at capacity. Be thankful!’

‘Indeed we are, happy and grateful,’ Churchill mocked, Jimmy and me exchanging looks. ‘And what of bomber deliveries?’

‘You have twelve, eight more to be delivered inside a year, and then we’ll look at a redesign of the aircraft,’ Jimmy explained.

‘How long till you produce your own bombs?’ I enquired of Britain’s Prime Minister.

‘We believe another year more. And our American cousins? Are they accurate in the detail they provide us?’

‘They’ll have their own bomb inside of a year,’ I responded.

‘And their Air Force?’

‘Six hundred prop fighters in service, three hundred transports, and over eighty jet fighters,’ I listed off.

‘They, like us, believe air power to be the key,’ Churchill noted.

‘It is,’ I confirmed. ‘And right now the Russians are still flying biplanes.’ I waited.

‘We do not seek an arms race, we simply wish to be prepared.’

‘And respected around the world in business circles, because you have a powerful Air Force and Navy,’ I floated.

‘You might think that, I could not possibly comment,’ Churchill mocked, making us smile.

‘Have you struck a deal with Washington regarding electronics?’ Jimmy asked our guest.

‘Britain, 1986, will sell us the agreed items, verified and agreed by Americans in both worlds, and America 1986 will sell us the new computers. Since you had a hand in their design, it seems ... a bit cheeky of them to question our use of them.’

‘They don’t want them falling into the wrong hands,’ Jimmy pointed out. ‘Not in this time, or that time.’

‘And what of the troublesome communists in that time?’

‘After their aircraft were all destroyed,’ Jimmy began, ‘they realised what they were up against. They’ve struck a deal with Japan and the States over there. They’re not best buddies, but they are making progress.’

‘And Japan, 1985?’

‘They still retain a few nuclear weapons, but they’ve decommissioned their subs and many of their long-range bombers,’ Jimmy reported. ‘They’re now trading with America in a big way, as well as benefitting from coal-oil.’

‘And the Arab armies?’

‘Now contained, their ranks decimated,’ I said. ‘North Africa is clear, Turkey and Syria, Iraq, Oman. Saudi Arabia and Iran are still an issue, but they’re contained, and India is free of them at last.’

‘I believe the circumstances to be a parallel to your home world,’ Churchill noted. ‘Should we not be doing more there?’

‘That world suffered a nuclear war, the cities destroyed,’ Jimmy said, his head lowered. ‘It will take a hundred years to turn that place around.’

‘Then that is all the more reason to offer to assist our countrymen on that world,’ Churchill suggested. ‘The greater need ... dictates the greater response.’ He waited.

Jimmy eased back, thinking. Finally, he said, ‘You’re right of course, we should do more. Why don’t you put together a team, and send them to Britain on that world now that we have a portal here, to see what we can offer our countrymen.’

‘The President of The Republic of Texas, from that world, was reported to have visited 1986 America,’ Churchill commented. ‘And they have agreed a few deals I understand.’

‘They’re of a similar technology level,’ I said, making a face and shrugging. ‘But there’s only so much you can carry through a small portal.’

‘And the American attempts to create their own time machine in 1986?’

‘We’ve struck a deal with them,’ I said. ‘They won’t build one, and we’ll not turn the lights off in New York. Besides, they don’t want to un-do what they have.’

‘It could turn out worse,’ Jimmy commented. ‘So they’ll accept their circumstances and move on from here.’

‘Circumstances?’ Churchill baulked. ‘They dominate that world as the only super-power!’

‘Which is why they’ll keep what they have,’ I quipped. ‘And in case you hadn’t noticed, Britain is a small country losing its vast empire. Get used to them dominating here as well.’

Turning point

A few months later I met with the 1939 US administration in Washington, a meeting held at the White House with just the President and the Chief of Staff.

The President began, ‘Some here ... fail to see the wisdom of our contacts with the administration of 1986.’

‘Having problems ... are we?’ I teased.

‘We ... don’t see eye to eye on everything,’ the Chief politely stated.

‘Meaning that they try and dominate you because they’re from forty years into the future,’ I said. ‘And have a larger army - and nuclear missiles. They see you ... as children.’

‘They can be ... tiresome,’ the President noted.

‘Then work around them,’ I suggested. ‘Do what Jimmy used to do so well, and deal with the people directly. Make a few speeches, and don’t be afraid to upset them. Just because a person is older than you, and has a larger gun, doesn’t mean they’re smarter than you. An idiot with a big gun, is still an idiot – only a dangerous one.

‘The way you run things here is about values, and about the purpose of the office you sit in. By the people, for the people, someone once said. That has nothing to do with electronics from 1986, it has to do with the attitude of the people sat in great offices of state, and the values held by the people in it. You’re no less developed than they are, they’re over-developed and cynical. They had forty years to find peace, or to fight a war and win it. They screwed up both avenues, and sat staring at the opposition across the oceans.

‘They neither engaged their enemies, nor beat them in battle, nor outsmarted them. And if we hadn’t become involved when we did they would have suffered the same fate as Jimmy’s old world. You guys ... should not have any respect for them, quite the opposite.

‘On Jimmy’s old world, and to an extent on my world, America was the largest economy, the strongest military, but they made mistakes, lots of mistakes, some of those mistakes made because they thought their size and position gave then a god-given right to rule the world, or at least to be its leader.

‘They made a huge economic blunder with the petrol-dollar, and by 2015 they were so far in debt they had no way out other than to start a few wars. On Jimmy’s world they invaded a few small countries, each adventure a complete disaster, and they eventually brought down the world – because of their size. When the largest economy collapses, everyone else goes with it.

‘So don’t feel that you’re the poor cousin to 1986, you’re in a much better position. You can set your economy on the right road, and by time you get to 1986 you’ll be decades ahead of them, you may even catch them up in a decade or two with our help. Just never forget that power, and intelligence, don’t always go together.’

The Chief asked, ‘What’s life like, in 2047, here in the States?’

‘Life for the average person? It’s better than it was from the 1970s to say ... 2020.’

‘1970s?’ the Chief asked. ‘What happened at that date?’

‘Nothing specific, but I guess you could say that the civil rights movement and the race riots moved from quiet protesting - to setting off bombs and killing people. The Second World War years were good for people - the fighting aside, and so were the 1950s and 1960s, but then it all changed. By time you get to 1980 you’ll have an aggressive society, and walking down the street could result in you getting your throat slit for ten dollars, even in a nice neighbourhood.

‘New York used to have a bad reputation, till around 1996 when they cleaned up the streets. Before that New York City cops used to traffic narcotics and kill people; organised crime was common. But the mood of the people changed, and the guys in charge need the mood of the people to get things done.

‘I like this time period, and living in Canada and travelling around the States for the past ten years has been good, not in comparison to 2047, but in comparison to my youth, which I guess is where most of us form attitudes. Here, people are polite and friendly still, they look out for each other, crime is low – although the 1930s was regarded as the most dangerous period of your history. I’d say that the 1970s and 1980s were more dangerous, not to get shot or killed by gangsters, but just to be attacked and robbed in the street; crime was closer to home.

‘And guys, what your counter-parts have in 1986 ... is not worth being compared to here and now. I’ve seen their crime rates, and read a few reports. Over there, the people don’t walk the streets at night for fear of attack. So when you’re dealing with them, remember what you have, those aspects of your society I’ve found most appealing. Do yourselves a favour, and get a few comparisons going between them and you; crime rates, family values, teenage pregnancies –’

‘Teenage pregnancies?’ the President queried.

‘Over there, girls in high school often drop out when they fall pregnant. Girls as young as fifteen have regular sex, they smoke, and they drink in clubs till late.’

‘By God,’ the Chief let out. ‘That’s in store for us?’

‘You tell me,’ I carefully mouthed. ‘There’re plenty of folks over there that don’t approve, so all you need do is tap into that sentiment – and use it to beat-up the current administration. And guys, you fought a civil war to end slavery in this country. Maybe you need to fight another war now, a war with the moral values of 1986.’

A month later, a senior Whitehouse spokesman travelled to 1986, and gave a speech at a dinner in New York. ‘You may have more technology than us, but you’ve lost your moral centre.’

He went on to criticise the forty year Cold War, his comments making the papers – on both worlds. Fortunately, Middle America sided with him, calls for better governance and a return to moral values soon common in the media. It was something that was inevitable, but I had given it a nudge.

1940’s America then opened its doors to paying tourists from 1986, passports required, and rich people from 1986 journeyed to London, through the new portal and back to the States, a strange kind of tourist that sought out parents long since dead, grandparents to hug.

In some cases the parents had not met each other on 1986 world – aberrations in the time line, but overall the rich tourists found parents that were not just alive, but young with it. There was no risk of contaminating the time line or creating a paradox, so we gave our approval to it. One image that reached me was of a US Congressman sat fishing with his father, his grandfather, and his younger self. And now, thanks to a simple injection, the young lad in the image would not lose his father to cancer when the lad turned sixteen.

Stories like that lifted my spirits, the tangible benefits of time travel, not the drudge of politics. People could save their loved ones, and people could meet relatives long since dead and buried. Laws were enacted to stop direct interference if it was harmful, such as a son confronting his father’s future mistress in favour of his parents staying together. New laws allowed for all cases of sudden wealth to be investigated.

Contact

My ex-wife, Helen, looked up from her desk as every screen and phone started to bleep or trill. Her assistant rushed in. ‘They have a signal!’

Helen eased up, now six months pregnant, six months after the last time she had seen me, and we had shared a bath. Stepping through to the outer-office, in the Goma Pentagon building, people were now at the window, church bells sounding out in the distance.

An hour later the odd news was confirmed, odd looks exchanged.

‘It’s better than nothing,’ Helen’s assistant suggested. ‘And they’re all safe and well.’

‘Twenty-two years have passed on the world that Paul’s on,’ Helen noted.

In the morning, Shelly called Helen as my dear ex-wife sat eating breakfast on the patio at the mansion. Helen lifted the data-pad and touched the cartoon image of Shelly waving.

‘Mum?’

‘Yes?’

‘Where are you?’

‘Just sat on the patio having breakfast. Any news?’

‘Lots of news; good, bad and ... interesting,’ Shelly reported. ‘Radio signals were intercepted overnight, a great many. Are you sat down?’

‘Of course, I don’t eat standing up.’

‘Mister Jimmy Silo and his wife announce the engagement of their eldest daughter.’

Helen stared wide-eyed at Shelly’s image. ‘He married!’

‘He did, and we never got to pick out hats,’ Shelly toyed. She stopped smiling. ‘There’s more. Mister and Misses Paul Holton announce the engagement of their son, Toby, to the daughter of a US Senator.’

Helen glanced out over the lake. ‘What did I expect, they were cut off for twenty-two years?’ Now she faced Shelly. ‘For all they knew we were dead. And let’s face it, we all thought they were dead.’

‘There’s more. Han ... is running China as the chairman of the Communist Party there.’

‘Han?’

‘Yes, Mister Han. And Timkins, that little perisher I sent to keep an eye on Jimmy, he was a member of parliament, then the Minister for War during the Second World War, and served twelve years as Prime Minister!’

‘Little Timkins? Crikey.’

‘And Uncle Jack ended up as Ambassador to China. Anyway, there’s something else.’

‘What’s that?’

‘The world that Jimmy and dad travelled to is now part of a three-world political and economic union; the technologies have been synchronised, their portals locked open. And get this: the world where it’s 1960 is reported to have a level of technology equivalent to 2020 here.’

‘2020? How could that be?’

‘A great many people went through, so we can assume that they didn’t just grow the economies slowly. Seems that they have portals where trains go through from one world to another, around twenty portals in use.’

‘Twenty portals? And in use? My god, what was Jimmy thinking?’

‘We’ll find out; they’ve just sent someone through at Mawlini.’

‘I’ll be heading there after breakfast.’

‘Take it easy,’ Shelly urged.

‘Yes, mum,’ Helen mockingly said towards our daughter. Lowering the data-pad, Helen took in the view of the lake, a fine day promised. Turning her head, she beckoned a waiting maid. ‘I’ll need a flight to Mawlini. This morning, please.’

‘Yes, ma’am,’ the maid conferred before trotting off, leaving Helen staring out over the lake.

The news spread quickly around my old world, Baldy’s world being notified. After all, they had almost as many people unaccounted for. Helen flew across to Mawlini on a private jet, a few members of the Pentagon Parliament along for the ride, and stepped down to a gathering crowd. A limo brought her to the portal’s control room, officials rushing about.

‘Ma’am,’ one offered, pulling out a seat.

‘What news?’

‘We can open a portal to a point twenty-two years after the previous date of contact, but no sooner. This makes us believe that whatever happened to deny us access to that world was a factor of time as much as space.’

‘In English, please.’

‘Something happened, and now it’s cleared.’

Helen stared up at the man for several seconds, a motherly disappointed look offered.

‘They’re aware of us now,’ the man sheepishly offered. ‘Comms traffic established. A group of technicians stepped through three hours ago, everything fine with the portal, it’s stable. And we’ve opened up secondary portals in Canada, America and France.’

I had been in Canada when the news hit, Susan and I having finally deciding to make our home there. A year after the British portal had failed I had commissioned a large house, a very large house, complete with indoor heated pool, and we moved across to it, the hotel returning to something resembling a hotel.

When Jimmy and his family were in Trophy they would stay at the house, but Cookie and Sandra had no desire to wait on our kids, and had elected to remain at the hotel. They took on the roles of international coordinators, and supervised visitors to the factories – and there were many. Presidents and Prime Ministers would often visit, Cookie and Sandra playing at being dutiful hosts whilst the rest of us got some peace away from the politicians.

Over the years, my kids had sometimes stayed at the hotel, sometimes when we kicked them out, sometimes when they ran away, and sometimes when they had been out partying and didn’t wish to face us drunk. Susan and I had married when Mary turned sixteen, a lavish affair attended by many of the great and the good, an August wedding to make sure we had the weather. A flyby of noisy jets and bombers signalled the cutting of the cake, and we had honeymooned in Tahiti aboard a yacht loaned to us. And, when Mary turned eighteen and went off to college - Toby busy learning to fly on weekends, Susan and I had decided to have more kids.

One cold winter’s night, Doc Graham performed a C-Section and delivered twin girls, and we could not have been happier. Both girls were gifted, talking at twelve months and solving puzzles at two years old. But, unlike their older siblings, they were the quiet and shy intellectual types, always keen for a hug from their old man.

Now, I lifted an A3 data-pad and dialled Jimmy. His face appeared, the backdrop of a roaring fire in a stone fireplace. ‘Are there any ... time issues here?’ I broached.

He took a moment. ‘No one wants to rewind, not here. The Germans on the second world have made rumblings, but they’ve now got an excellent economy and a very clean and orderly country. We’d never get a consensus.’

‘They’ve only advanced six months in 2047, now 2048,’ I stated, and waited.

Jimmy made a face. ‘There’ll be issues, not least the number of their people who now have grown children, many are grandparents of toddlers. But the folks over there know the time difference.’

‘And your plans?’

‘To stay here for a while, see what happens,’ Jimmy replied. ‘See my grandchildren toddle around, work on the UN and the World Economic Group. Still some work to be done there.’

‘And your old world?’ I nudged.

‘Yes, I may go back and work on it. Plenty to do there still, but a million emigrants a year arrive there from the other worlds.’

‘Susan and me, we’re heading over to Manson now, Shelly is meeting us there.’

‘Be good to see her, it’s been a while.’

I grabbed Susan, left the girls with the nannies, and jumped aboard a helicopter bound for Manson, our latest Trophy helicopter and not unlike the Augusta I once learnt to fly. This helicopter, however, was made of composites, could land safely on water, and rarely suffered a mechanical problem. Our security followed behind in two armed helicopters, advanced Hueys, and we made good time to Manson, stopping at the permanently manned base. No one had come through a portal in twenty-two years, but a small detachment had remained, just in case.

We walked across to the portal event horizon, finding it open and sparkling around its edges, a dozen reporters from 2047 milling around with cameras. Seeing me, they all rushed over, a million questions fired.

I raised a hand and offered them a flat palm. ‘I’ll make a brief statement, till I have all the facts.’ I took in the cameras, Susan taking a step back. ‘It’s been twenty-two years this end, twenty-two years since we last had contact with you, and I guess you’ve been as worried as we were. The 1938 war against Germany and Japan was won by Britain and America as you may know, and since that time no major wars have been fought on this world.

‘The world of 1984 suffered a nuclear attack on Berlin at the hands of the Russians, and that led to a very tense period. We used our drone aircraft to destroy the German military, then to disable the Russian military, but not before the American city of Boston had been destroyed with a heavy loss of life. As an historical footnote, that destruction galvanized public opinion against nuclear weapons, a shift in American policy.

‘The world of 1984 became peaceful, Japan negotiating away its weapons for much-needed trade concessions. The Chinese communists were a problem for a decade or so, but are now valuable trading partners, and peaceful. Here, China is an economic super-power, and peaceful. And you’ll be glad to know that electric cars are used by eighty percent of the world’s people, electric buses now law in most countries.

‘We also have a close working relationship with Jimmy’s original world, and many millions of people from these worlds have emigrated there, to help rebuild it. Here, on this world, we have safe airliners made of composites, advanced coal-oil technology, nuclear energy, and solar energy. We have orbiting satellites, and our Earth Space Station was launched five years ago, its astronauts drawn from many countries.

‘It’s fair to say that the people who came here from 2047 had read the book of Jimmy’s life, and knew a thing or two about fixing worlds. They did a great job, especially in Africa, the continent now the world’s largest economy. People of 2048: these worlds have survived, and they have thrived thanks to the help they received, my role – and Jimmy’s role, being limited. The rest was done by other travellers.

‘Where’s Mister Silo?’

‘He’s at his home in England, with his wife, Lady Helen Astor, their five children, and one grandchild – due any day now.’ I swivelled to Susan and gestured towards her. ‘This is my wife, Dr Susan Blake, and we have two grown children and two young daughters. We live in the Canadian town of Trophy.’

Shelly stepped through with her security detail.

‘If you’ll excuse me, I have family, so keep your distance.’ I led Susan on, a big hug from Shelly for her dad. ‘It’s been a while.’

‘It must be odd for you, thirty years,’ Shelly noted.

I nodded. Turning, I introduced Susan, and they shook before hugging.

‘We have something to discuss, father,’ Shelly began as she led us away. ‘You know that bath you took with mum, just before you stepped through the portal..?’

I frowned my lack of understand, and it had been thirty years.

Shelly continued, a glint in her eye, ‘Well, mum is six months pregnant, and you – you rogue – you’re the father.’

‘Oh,’ was all I could get out, a look exchanged with Susan. ‘Well,’ I added, suddenly stuck for words. ‘It was years before I met Susan,’ I said defensively.

‘Could be a scandal,’ Shelly teased.

I heaved a big sigh, a look exchanged with Susan. ‘C’mon,’ I said. ‘We’ll show you our house.’

Shelly’s security detail lugged her cases, and their own, and we chatted at length as we flew back to trophy, landing on the lawn.

‘Very nice,’ Shelly commended as she took in the house. ‘It’s almost like a Canadian hotel, but subtly different, and with a hint of Japanese.’

Inside, Cookie and Sandra were waiting, big hugs and big smiles shared with Shelly. Sat around a coffee table, we caught up on many years of separation, the news all on our side since little had happened in 2048, photograph albums dug out, many of the snaps black and white. The albums displayed the hotel in Kenya, the first lodge here in Trophy, the hotel being built, the factories, the launch of new aircraft, the birth of Mary, then Toby, now colour images of our girls. Shelly wanted to see the girls, and the nannies brought in our twins, our little ladies shy as usual. They impressed Shelly with greetings in several languages.

Toby arrived a few hours later, still dressed in his flight suit, a cap on sideways. Now just over six foot, he looked tall stood next to me as he greeted his step-sister.

‘Apparently, you were a difficult child to raise,’ Shelly teased.

‘I never blew anything up that didn’t deserve to be blown up,’ he retorted. ‘And Cookie and Sandra, they got extra pay for putting up with me.’

‘It was never enough!’ Cookie complained.

‘You sound Canadian,’ Shelly told Toby. ‘Do you think of yourself as Canadian?’

‘My passport says so,’ Toby said.

Hal arrived a short while later, looking old and moving slowly. ‘My god, Hal, you’ve aged.’

‘Thanks for noticing,’ he quipped.

‘We should get you an injection,’ Shelly offered, clearly concerned.

‘They all ran out around here, and Jimmy’s blood had little effect on me,’ Hal explained. ‘So I’ve been taking it easy.’

‘Go back soon, Hal,’ Shelly urged, clearly concerned. ‘How’s Hacker?’

‘Dead, I’m afraid,’ Hal reported. ‘His plane went down in a storm eight years back, no sign of him.’

‘And the others?’ Shelly asked.

‘All still around, I think,’ Hal reported to her.

The household staff cooked us a meal that evening, five courses, and we allowed in two cameramen from 2048 for ten minutes, shots taken of the gathering. It wasn’t quite the end of an era, but it felt like it.

At Mawlini, Helen had spoken to a handful of Kenyans returning through the portal, and then simply ordered her security detail to follow. She waved people aside and stepped through, a crowd greeting her at the other end, soldiers lined up at the edge of Mawlini runway.

Turning, she could see many buildings, and had to do a double-take to check that she was in the right place. Both the UN hotel and the Rescue Force hotel had been faithfully re-created, as well as many other buildings. But in the distance, several glass towers sparkled.

She walked to a waiting car and jumped in, asking for a view of the base, soon in the rooftop bar and peering out as Doc Graham drew near.

‘You need a seat, love?’ he asked.

Helen turned and smiled widely, a hug given leaning forwards. ‘This place has been re-created almost exactly as the original.’

‘Nostalgia,’ Doc Graham said. ‘For some around here it’s almost religious fervour, others just want to know how to get home when drunk. You ... seem to be heavily pregnant.’

‘Paul’s.’

‘Paul’s?’

‘We shared the bath water before he stepped back through the portal.’

‘Ah. You know he’s married here?’

Helen nodded, hands on her hips and her bulge pushed forwards. ‘And four children. How about you?’

‘I’m on my second marriage, three kids. But Ngomo has the record.’

‘Record?’

‘Twenty-six wives, sixty kids.’

Helen stared at Doc Graham. ‘Do they live together?’

‘Some do. There are a few here, some in Nairobi, some in New Kinshasa.’

‘New Kinshasa? You gave it the same name?’

‘This place would spook you; it’s all laid out the same, streets named the same, bars, the works. If you’re a drunken time traveller then this place could be very confusing.’

They sat, cold drinks brought over. Helen pointed. ‘That sign is the same; Sandy View Bar.’

Doc Graham smiled. ‘Some days … some days I come here and I feel right at home, and some days -’ He stopped smiling. ‘- some days it hits you hard, as if you’ve lost something very precious. Odd, really, a very mixed set of emotions.’

Helen slowly nodded her head, and sipped her drink, a jet fighter gliding by. ‘That looks familiar as well.’

‘They are. Why re-invent the wheel.’

‘So, how’s it been?’

‘We did what we set out to do, and we brought peace,’ Doc Graham proudly stated. ‘We also fixed Africa, now the largest economy, and Rescue Force plays its role as it did in our time, now over sixty thousand staff worldwide.’

‘And world politics?’

Doc Graham made a face. ‘There’ll always be arseholes who want to screw things up, or to make some money and hide it away, but overall it’s pretty good. There was no petrol-dollar crisis here - the gold standard was maintained for currencies, electric cars and buses early on. But Jimmy would tell you what really made a difference, and that was putting the Americans of 1938 together with the Americans of 1984.’

‘Putting them together?’

‘Jimmy allowed them diplomatic contact early on. The people from 1984 were like our world, and they pissed off the people from 1938, who held old-school values. So they clashed across a whole range of things, and the 1938 mob won out. They made the 1984 mob behave themselves, more so than Jimmy and Paul ever could have. And the 1938 mob got to see what a nuclear war looks like, its aftermath, and what a Cold War looked like.

‘After that they changed their attitudes on many things, and the rest was easy enough. No Cold War, not much communism around, free and fair trade, Russia involved.’

‘And Mister Han?’

‘Chairman Han of the People’s Republic, in office for twenty something years - and idolised by his people.’

‘Jimmy manoeuvred him into power?’

‘Nope, Han killed Mao and put himself in power,’ Doc Graham said with a smile.

‘I would never have believed him capable of something like that, he was always so quiet.’

‘He’s been here, reviewed the rescuers and the training facility,’ Doc Graham proudly stated. ‘He suits the role, and it suits him somehow. Oh, and Jack was the Ambassador to China for eleven years; his kids grew up there. Han visited Britain, stayed with Jimmy, Jack and everyone around for a piss up after the Chinese stiffs had been dismissed for the evening.’

‘And how’s Mister Sykes?’

‘Old, suffering a bit, he needs an injection, but all we have now is blood product, and Jimmy injecting him again didn’t help.’

‘I see that young Timkins did well for himself,’ Helen noted.

‘Jimmy nudged him towards becoming a member of parliament, and he ended up as Prime Minister, served as long as Churchill. They’re still good mates, and they all meet up at Jimmy’s place once a month.’

‘I was surprised that Jimmy finally stopped and married.’

‘Well, bit of a story there. Dr Astor and Jimmy had a fling, in Nairobi when I was there, and we brought Dr Astor into the group. She was bright anyway, and Jimmy injected her when she fell ill; saved her life. Anyway, she asked me all about freezing sperm one day -’

‘Freezing sperm?’

‘From a medical point of view, but she meant for herself. She tricked Jimmy and produced three kids, and he never knew till his son -’

‘Christopher, yes, I met him.’

‘Well he went back through time and told Dr Astor to inform Jimmy about the kids. In his timeline ... well, Jimmy never knew till they were grown.’

‘He said that he was Jimmy’s son, but little else,’ Helen commented. ‘He spoke to Paul before he came back. Was he responsible for throwing the book about time travel to the Germans?’

‘No, figured you’d know who did that?’

Helen shook her head. ‘He didn’t mention it at all.’

‘He seems to have been here, but he wasn’t the guy who jumped through from 1984 to 1938.’

‘We have a way to contact them, so maybe I’ll ask.’

‘So Jimmy was told he had three kids, and decided to make an honest woman out of her. Nice set of kids as well, all very posh and proper, a right little bunch of blue-blooded aristocrats.’ Doc Graham took a moment. ‘You ... looking forwards to another kid?’

‘Yes, is the answer, because they grow up too quickly. Right now, a quiet night in with just me and the baby in the bath would be great. I’ll ease back on work, right back.’ She took in the airfield. ‘Maybe it’s time to take a step back. I’d like to just be a mum, and not a politician.’

‘There’re a few places over here where you’d get some peace,’ Doc Graham suggested.

Helen studied Doc Graham for a moment, then simply tipped her head to the side. After greeting many people, all keen to see her again, she enquired about flights to New Kinshasa. A flight was quickly laid on, a military transport, but a comfortable one for officers, not for cargo. They lifted off an hour before sun-down, and flew into the setting sun, arriving over New Kinshasa in the dark. Helen peered down at the twinkling lights of the city, a city almost as big as back on my world.

From the airport, they drove her and the security detail down the main highway and to the best hotel, Helen soon on the thirty-second floor and staring out across the city, many of the buildings familiar. With a large red wine in her hand, she sat for hours, just watching the city’s light show below.

Shelly had spent the night with us, and all of the following day. That evening, Susan and I packed a case and returned with Shelly to the portal in Manson, passing through with many other people returning to 2048, and soon on a comfortable airliner bound for Africa, for Goma Hub, Baldy and his wife for company.

Baldy had worked hard to ease Russia into the world of commerce, and had done a good job, immersing himself into the language and culture. My other self surprised me. His kids were grown up now, but he remained with Mia, and we chatted as a foursome as we progressed through the night towards Goma Hub.

We landed in daylight, the world turning ahead of us, and to a bank of reporters and cameras. After a few words for the press, images taken, we moved as a group to my old mansion, Helen now back here in 2048.

I hugged her as best as I could in her condition. ‘So,’ I let out with a heavy sigh. ‘A bun in the oven.’

She tipped her head and forced a quick smile. ‘I’m looking forwards to some time off, just me and the baby, and maybe in 1960, New Kinshasa.’

‘You’d be relatively unknown,’ I said. ‘Well, fairly unknown-ish. And I could visit my offspring once and a while.’

‘You’ll stay there?’ Helen asked me.

I nodded, Baldy nudging me aside to hug Helen.

‘What did the nasty man do to you, eh?’ he said, a mock-scowl my way.

‘He knocked me up and left me,’ Helen complained, a worried looking Mia needing a translation, followed by some careful explanations of time and space.

Slipping away, I walked into the garden, to a patio area I knew well, a sudden surge of emotion washing over me, a strange mix of sadness tinged with that feeling of visiting my parent’s house after I had moved out. I smiled at the scene, taking in the lake.

‘Who are you?’ a young girl demanded.

I found a face that became a body in a white dress, emerging from behind a bush. ‘I’m Paul Holton.’

Liz appeared at the edge of the garden. ‘Dad!’ She trotted quickly over.

‘One of yours?’ I asked of the girl as I hugged my daughter Liz.

‘No, Shelly’s granddaughter.’

‘That makes me me feel ancient, and I didn’t recognise the girl.’

‘You’ve been gone thirty years or so,’ Liz pointed out, and led me into the house, a family party on the cards. The granddaughters all puzzled Baldy as food was brought out, and we moved onto the patio, tables assembled. Neighbours and friends arrived, and I greeted people I had almost forgotten, dozens of knee-high kids darting between our legs.

At 1am I found myself alone on the patio, and I walked to the end of the concrete jetty, taking in the distant lights of the city, my emotions a jumble. Where my life had been now somehow bled into where it is, and worlds and cities melted into one, a confusing feeling. Where was home? I cursed the human condition of getting old, and of the advancement of time. Why couldn’t things just stand still for a while?

Back in the house, I found Helen enjoying some late night ice cream. ‘Will you be OK?’ I asked, sitting opposite.

‘I’ll take a step back from the world for a while, recharge my batteries, and I may live in 1960. Your early adventures in the 1930s appealed to me as well, a simpler time.’

‘You’d have liked Canada in 1930, a kind, polite and respectful people who said Sir and Ma’am, who ate pie in roadside diners and opened doors for ladies.’

‘I can see why Jimmy made the trip,’ she commented, spooning out a section of ice cream adorned with a sprinkling of nuts.

‘Be nice if they could make a machine that froze time, if you could wake up each day and the kids were the same size and age as the day before, if it all just stood still.’

Helen considered that. ‘It hits you sometimes, time moving on, that ideal image of a family Christmas fading more each day. The old house seems like a million years ago. When I go there now I find it hard to picture things.’

‘That’ll be the drug; it kills old brain cells and creates new ones. But maybe that’s a good thing.’ I lifted a spoon and pinched some ice cream.

‘You seem happy with Susan,’ Helen broached.

‘We’ve had our moments, but we get on well. Fact is, we both work and travel a great deal, so we’re glad when we can shut the door on the world and just be together.’

‘I met someone, before you made me pregnant, but ... well, it’s difficult here.’

‘That’s why Susan and I did well; no reporters or pressure, a quiet town in Canada.’

‘Maybe that’s what I need, to find a world where it’s 1930. I’d miss the girls and the grandchildren, but -’

‘They could visit,’ I suggested.

‘What’ll Jimmy do?’

‘I’m not sure. He did say he’d visit this place, but after that ... I think he’ll stay in Britain-1960 for a while, and then do some work on his old world.’

‘Is he ... happy?’

I studied my ex-wife as she spooned out ice cream. ‘I think so. I think he is ... contented, and I think he needed a break. But in the last five years he has become more involved in politics, his kids grown up and marrying. So...’

‘Maybe he’ll move on,’ Helen finished off, and she finished off the ice cream.

In the days that followed, Susan visited a great many people that she knew. Time had passed for her, but not for them, so it was all a bit odd for her. Her parents were emotional, Susan more so, the other Susan not quite knowing how to handle her own self, the family dog given a big hug and extra doggy biscuits. We toured the volunteer compounds, the parliament building, and held many interviews, recounting what had happened on the other worlds.

And, seven days after arriving back, the world stopped when Jimmy and his family stepped through the portal at Mawlini, my presence here eclipsed. Dr Astor seemed a little overwhelmed, as did his five grown kids. They walked as a family to the waiting bank of cameras, a lengthy interview given. I watched it live from the mansion, Helen very curious about Jimmy’s wife, and seeming a little jealous.

Jimmy reviewed Rescue Force personnel at Mawlini, and inspected the Rifles at length, flying down to Nairobi late that evening. They spent the night at our old hotel, Rudd back for a visit and arranging things, Anna and Cosy back with their large and extended families, all now at the hotel.

In the morning, Jimmy insisted that the gang from the hotel join him, and Cosy and Anna, plus Rudd, accompanied Jimmy in a bus with a glass dome, a tour of the city’s crowded streets, the crowds waved at. At the Government buildings he met again the leaders, a short interview given. Collecting his family, he flew across to Goma Hub, and copied the move on Baldy’s world, the weather OK for a dirigible. They floated over the city, everyone out and waving, an hour and a half of slow movement that ended in a speech.

‘People of New Kinshasa, people of Africa, and people of this world,’ he dramatically began. ‘The past forty years has taught me not that this is a small round planet, but that the universe is not so large, and that this modern planet cannot live in isolation of other worlds.

‘There are many worlds, unknown to us, that are probably experimenting with time travel, and someday one of them may succeed. If they do, then they may present a great danger to us, even without realising it. A traveller, sent back to our early history, could destroy this world. For that reason, I will be urging the government here, and on other worlds with time travel capability, to began immediately a census of all worlds that could be contacted, and if they are experimenting with time travel.

‘Further to that, I suggest that we place spies on each world to see what they are up to, and that those spies report back any possible dangers. We cannot risk what we have built here, so we must know if anyone else is on the verge of opening a portal.

‘Where I have just come from, three worlds are now tied together, and that group may be expanded soon to worlds that I previously visited. We are all human, we are all one large family, no matter where we live, what planet and in what time. And what we each do may affect the other branches of mankind.

‘When the call came to help Africa, to help remove The Brotherhood and to rebuild, many people from this time volunteered, and they did so because most of the problems here have been solved. I am aware of four planets where the problems have not been solved, and I’m calling again for volunteers to go to those worlds and rebuild them. Ladies and gentlemen, I will be looking for two million volunteers in the next six months.’

At the mansion, we all exchanged looks; it was a big number.

Jimmy continued, ‘There are worlds where I could visit, or someone like me could visit, and take a hundred years to slowly fix things, or we can do it another way. Those worlds that have suffered a war or breakdown should be helped directly. On the world where it was 1984 we deployed a great many drone aircraft, and we prevented a nuclear war. We intervened directly, and we should do so again where necessary, to end suffering, and to prevent future suffering.

‘My purpose ... is no longer just my purpose. My purpose, of trying to save worlds, is now your purpose, and there is no more noble a calling, no more worthwhile a task for anyone, than trying to fix the world around them, and to help those less fortunate. That is a purpose that has no end, and a purpose that gives our lives meaning; to answer all of the questions, to fix all of the problems, and to keep going.

‘And one of those problems, that no one here is yet openly debating, is overcrowding. People of this world, there are many planets that have plenty of space, and are in need of help and re-population after nuclear wars. I strongly urge the governments here to consider the movement of populations to where they are needed, and where we know there is space for them. This is a new age, and a new dawn for mankind, an age when the advanced help those in need, yet help themselves along the way. Thank you.’

At the mansion, I faced Susan. ‘He means to re-populate the worlds that he visited, the ones that were destroyed in a nuclear war.’

‘They’re just barren waste-grounds, so why not.’

Jimmy and his family joined us at the Mansion, rooms found, Jimmy taking in the lake from the patio with a cold beer in hand, Helen showing Dr Astor and her daughters the house.

‘I seem to remember more bushes,’ Jimmy commented.

‘Maybe Helen altered them,’ I said with a shrug. ‘It felt odd for me, coming back here. You get used to a place, then you get used to another place.’

‘It took a while to get Astor Manor in shape, radiators and flushing toilets,’ Jimmy commented. ‘It took years. Cold in the winter, and cold in the damn summer as well.’

I smiled at the image of dated Victorian houses, and their ablutions. ‘I built a sauna and Jacuzzi early on, double-layer walls with insulation, wood panelling on the interiors - with an air gap. Toasty in winter it is.’

‘I sometimes have images of Canada, after I arrived the first time, damp sleeping bags that smelt terrible, shivering till you fell asleep.’

‘That was a while ago.’

‘Not in spatial terms. I could unwind to it, so it’s still there, somewhere in space and time, still happening. Hard to think in linear terms sometimes.’

I nodded to myself. ‘Helen may go and live in 1960, get away from here.’

‘Be a bit quieter, she’d not be hounded there. Over there they take us for granted now,’ Jimmy commented before sipping his beer.

A guard approached. ‘Sir, a visitor, at the side gate, Mister Christopher Silo. And, sir, he look like you.’

Since Jimmy’s son was in the house, and not a visitor, we guessed who it may be.

‘Show him out here, please,’ Jimmy instructed the guard, and a minute later the Jimmy lookalike strode out in a suit, appearing older than when I had seen him previously, and now a carbon copy of his old man.

‘Father, Uncle Paul,’ he offered, a handshake for me.

‘You’re a chip of the old block,’ I said.

‘What date are you from?’ Jimmy asked his son.

‘2068, or thereabouts. I travel.’

‘And the book thrown to the Germans?’ Jimmy asked.

‘Thrown through by a disgruntled Russian President in 2064, someone you clashed with – will clash with, or may clash with. He figured you’d be there just as war broke out, and either get yourself killed, or receive the blame for a nuclear war. We got wind of it, so Peter and I went through, arriving before the book.’

‘And Peter worked his way into the German time programme,’ I noted. ‘Not bad.’

‘Peter had – will have – a German lady wife,’ Christopher explained. ‘He altered the time machine so that it would open earlier, not just before the war, but they were onto him, someone discovering his Jewish heritage.’

‘The cover story,’ Jimmy stated. ‘But not that he was a traveller.’

‘The cover story was a little too good,’ Christopher noted. ‘He jumped through when they performed a power-test, knowing he had three seconds. Portal was closed before he hit the floor on the far side.’

‘And coal-oil?’ I asked.

‘We knew it would have an effect on European output, not huge, but an effect. And we needed to hang around and see how things developed.’

‘How did you get across?’ I puzzled.

‘I didn’t, I jumped back and forth with the help of your other you.’

‘Baldy,’ I stated.

‘Yes, but not bald where we come from. He helped us when he knew the story, and we approached him because we knew what he was about to do. He knew for decades and didn’t say anything.’

Jimmy faced me. ‘You’re quite the little actor.’

‘I learnt from the best,’ I quipped, bowing my head theatrically. Facing Christopher, I asked, ‘What’ll you do now?’

‘Go back to my travels, save a paradox.’ He faced Jimmy. ‘Father,’ he said with a slight head-tip, and walked away quickly to the side gate.

‘You ... and he get on alright?’ I broached.

‘We do at the moment, but the children are ... British and reserved, not ones for hugging and kissing. Besides, if he’s anything like me he’ll be a grumpy old sod.’

The following night I had Shelly’s Marina cleared of everyone apart from members of the Rifles, past and present, the men now in suits, and with wives and girlfriends.

At a bar normally frequented by rich young traders, I hugged Lobster, a silent nod exchanged, and shook hands with Ngomo Junior. I raised my glass. ‘To absent friends.’

‘Absent friends,’ was echoed by sixty men.

I toasted again. ‘To the Rifles.’

‘The Rifles,’ they loudly endorsed.

My third toast was understood by many, but only those of us who had gone through it. ‘May the fight go on forever.’

1984, London.

‘Paul Holton?’

Paul looked up from his desk at McKinnleys, two dozen traders shouting in the background, phones ringing but unanswered. ‘Yes?’

‘I’m Chris Silo, and I understand ... you have a room to rent.’