nevertheless, Jack could see his index finger slowly squeezing the trigger of the pistol. There was a yellow flash and a loud crack as the gun fired. Jack braced himself — but the impact from the bullet didn’t come. Instead, it had buried itself in the wall of earth to his left. The boy held the pistol up again, this time both index fingers wrapped round the trigger and squeezed a second time… there was a click. The gun was empty.
At that moment, a second German soldier loomed from behind the lip of the crater. Even at that distance, Jack could see that he was stockier than the boy opposite. The soldier surveyed the scene and quickly descended into the crater moving with speed and confidence. Reaching the bottom of the hole, he bypassed his young comrade and marched directly through the puddle to where Jack lay. The soldier reached down to the bayonet hanging on his belt and fastened it to the end of his rifle, which he now lifted up and pinned under Jack’s chin. Jack was helpless. This was it.
Suddenly, out of the corner of his eye, Jack detected a large, fast-moving blur descend from his side of the crater. The German soldier half-turned, momentarily distracted. The blur moved with uncanny speed. Jack recognised the figure. Angus! The soldier had no time to react. Angus launched at him with a crunching rugby tackle. Jack was first to his feet and grabbed the soldier’s rifle. The tables were turned.
The soldier stared back defiantly from his prostrate position on the crater floor. Then he reached to grab something from his back.
“Don’t even think about it,” warned Jack, raising the rifle and inching the glistening bayonet towards the soldier’s face. He thrust the bayonet forward — instinctively copying the soldier’s action against himself a few seconds earlier. But Jack misjudged, and the serrated steel edge of the seven-inch blade made contact with the lobe of the soldier’s right ear, slicing right through it. The soldier whimpered in fear. Jack recoiled — alarmed at the ease with which the injury had been inflicted. Angus was now up on his feet. The soldier stared, pleadingly, first at Jack and then Angus standing next to him. A moment before, he had seemed like an automaton — a killing machine. But now he was helpless and terrified. Contrary to what Jack had first thought, he could not have been that much older than either Jack or the boy soldier who still sat quivering on the opposite side of the crater. And there was something else about the soldier lying at their feet, something about the face… and now with the injured ear… Something odd. Jack waved the rifle and shouted a second time.
“Go! Go on, get out of here!”
For a moment, the soldier looked confused and stared back at them questioningly.
Jack raised his voice, “Go! Now! The British will be here soon.”
Euphoria spread across the soldier’s face — it was if he had been re-born and his humanity restored. He scrambled to his feet and staggered through the water to the other side of the crater. He stopped briefly to haul his young comrade to his feet. Then, supporting his friend, he clambered up the opposite side of the crater and away.
Jack was shaking, “Er, thanks Angus.”
Angus was silent and stared at the opposite side of the crater.
“You OK? Look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
“I think I might have.”
“What?”
“That soldier… I’m sure…” Angus stopped mid-sentence and rubbed his eyes. “Doesn’t matter… Come on, we can’t hang around. It’s dangerous here.”
“Where’s Pendelshape — did he make it?”
Angus jerked his head to one side, “He’s behind me. He’s OK.”
They looked round, and sure enough, Pendelshape’s head loomed into view above them on the crater lip.
“Come on boys — the bombardment has stopped. We need to get out of here.”
“Really? I thought we might hang around and maybe do a bit of shopping,” Angus said to Jack as they dragged themselves back up to the top of the crater. The smoke was clearing steadily and a weak sun was starting to wink through. They seemed to be on a slightly raised part of the battlefield.
Jack couldn’t believe his eyes. They were in the middle of some sort of extraordinary lifeless moonscape of craters and mud as far as the eye could see. There were no trees, there was no grass… nothing. On either side of them in some places not more than a hundred metres apart, embankments of earth signifying the position of the two armies’ front line trenches, snaked towards the horizon. Barbed wire was strung out along each trench — in some places there were gaps where it had been cut or blown apart. As Jack gained his bearings, he began to notice that, strewn haphazardly about the landscape, were dead bodies. In some cases their position was only signified by a discarded rifle or a helmet or a flapping piece of material. But they were there. And it was clear that some of them had been there for a long time. He’d been staring for ten seconds. But he’d already had enough.
“Look — they’re retreating,” Pendelshape gestured over to the German lines. In the distance they could make out the figures of hundreds of men picking their way from the German front line. “They’re evacuating following the bombardment. Come on… we can take refuge in there.”
They followed Pendelshape and careered forward thirty metres to the German lines. First Pendelshape and then Jack tumbled over the side, landing on the fire step above the bottom of the badly waterlogged trench.
“It stinks in here,” Angus said.
Pendelshape glanced left and then right. The trench was deserted apart from a single corpse that lay face down in the water only metres from where they had landed.
“Quick — over there.”
A small bunker had been honed from the earth on the opposite side of the trench and they stepped inside gingerly. A makeshift bed had been set up in the subterranean room and there was even a small table and chairs. There were papers strewn everywhere and a chess set lay on the table with the pieces scattered.
“Should be safe here for a moment.”
Jack sat down on one of the chairs, “I’ve had enough. Let’s see the time phones… now!”
First Angus, then Pendelshape placed their time phones on the table. The telltale yellow bar on each of them was burning fiercely.
“We still have a signal — we can get out of here. Now!”
Pendelshape seemed to hesitate, “Well, hold on…”
Jack was incredulous. “You’re not seriously suggesting that we hang around?”
“Well, now we are here…”
Angus interrupted him, “Sorry, sir — you’re mad if you think we’re staying.”
“Yes — I think we’ve seen enough already,” Jack added.
Pendelshape replied, “Good. As you have now observed, the consequences of war are indeed horrific… so we can travel back… back to your father now?”
Jack couldn’t believe it. Pendelshape seemed to be almost… smiling. It was at that moment, seeing that smile, that Jack knew he couldn’t go along with Pendelshape or, for that matter, his father.
Jack spoke calmly but there was steel in his voice, “In the last week, we have been shot at, chased half way around Europe and seen three good people… friends… die and now you’ve brought us here. You and Dad have taken terrible risks with our lives and those of many others… for your own… ambition.”
Pendelshape stood up, “But we have to change history; we have to change it so it’s all better, so it’s all good… don’t you see? We must…”
“You might think you have to, so might Dad. But I don’t.”
“What do you mean?”
Jack’s heart was pounding, “We don’t want anything to do with this. We’ve got our own lives to lead. We belong in the present and we should stay there,” Jack tried to steady his voice, “Look — I think what you and Dad have done is…” he shook his head, “…incredible. Really. Creating the Taurus. All that. But it’s dangerous. Just one example — Angus and I worked out that if we had done what you and Dad planned — he wouldn’t even exist.”
Pendelshape waved his hand dismissively, “We can fix that… it would just be another variant of Simulation 0107…”
“The point is: we belong in the present. I know that puts me at the mercy of the Rector and Inchquin and VIGIL.”
Pendelshape was incredulous, “What? But they might kill you!”
“No they won’t. They would only threaten that if you and Dad were to use your Taurus. If you don’t — they
