Late the following morning, prefect Gratus stepped from his tent to pronounce that the captives would be marched across Galilee to the slave market in Philippi. Three centuries of the Twenty-third would take them there, along with the lictor Titus to see to the sale. Those men would be paid a bonus from the proceeds of the sale with the balance going into the coffers of the prefecture. The remainder of the legion, under the command of the tribune Purpurio, would see the prefect and entourage safely back to his palace.
The young prisoners, tanners, metalsmiths, orchard workers, students, and carpenters, were unhobbled and marched from the camp under guard to follow the road north to Syria and slavery.
The prefect watched the growing dust cloud with what Purpurio thought was a fragile smile of avarice.
8
The Ocean Raj, Somewhere South of Cyprus
Morris Tauber was incredulous at the level of credulity his sister expected from him.
“You expect me to believe this?” He laughed.
“With everything we’ve been through the past year,
I would have expected you to have a more open mind,” Caroline said.
“Having an open mind doesn’t mean I can’t still be analytical, Sis. I can be broad-minded and still know sheer insanity when I hear it.”
“Samuel saved us from those Harnesh guys who took us to the future. To the future, Mo! You believe that, right?”
“I believe it. As incredible as it is, that’s the only explanation that makes sense.”
“It’s not an explanation,” Dwayne put in. “It happened. To us. In the future.”
They were down in Morris’s lab below decks aboard the Ocean Raj. It was fashioned from the walls of Conex containers and reinforced by girders welded in place by the ship’s crew. To any casual inspection, the main deck and holds below were filled with stacks of the steel cargo containers. But they formed a shell that covered a multi-level lab complex including a control center, mainframe computer cold room, a shielded mini-reactor, and the large chamber where the Tauber Tube rested around its raised walkway.
While the rest of the team vanished to the four corners of the world, Dr. Tauber remained on board to take advantage of the solitude to fine-tune the time-challenging device he and his little sister had created. And, in any case, someone with the knowledge needed to keep an eye on the mini-reactor had to be on hand. Parviz and Quebat, the expat Iranians with a fatwa on their heads, were taking a train tour of Scandinavia, and Morris monitored their stolen nuclear device.
The big container ship was anchored in international waters well away from the shipping lanes. Boats and his mostly Ethiopian crew were here as well and collecting their paychecks for doing light maintenance and spending the rest of their days loafing.
“So, Samuel knows things, Mo,” Caroline said. “He’s from the future. He’s seen stuff we can’t imagine, and he already knows how the movie ends if we don’t act.”
“If he can travel through time so easily, then why doesn’t he do this himself? Why does he need the help of a bunch of wildcat treasure hunters?” Morris said and took at a seat at his computer console and began fiddling with connections inside a CPU tower he’d taken apart.
Caroline grabbed the seat back and yanked him away from the console. She spun him in the chair and leaned on the arms to put her face inches from his.
“We’re off the grid, brother. Our movements through space and time are not accounted for by Sir Neal and his people. They know about Samuel, and it’s all he can do to stay one step ahead of them. I’m not asking you to believe anything. But this is major, or I wouldn’t be asking you to set it up. It’s important, and we need to do it.”
“But those men on Rhodes who took you and Dwayne,” Morris said quietly. “They knew about us.”
“And they’re dead,” Dwayne said. “For them, the trail went cold right there. That timeline is a dead end for Harnesh and his group. We are still off their radar.”
“Have you asked the other Rangers if they want to involve themselves in this? There’s no treasure this time,” Morris said.
“We haven’t put it to them yet.” Dwayne shrugged. “But they have plenty of cash. They might agree to a freebie. I know Jimmy will. He’s still disappointed he bailed on our last outing.”
“Well, we still have operating capital. So, if you can convince the others, okay” Morris said.
“I love you, bro!” Caroline leaned closer and kissed him on the forehead.
“Only because I always give in to you eventually,” he said as she stood up, releasing his chair to roll back.
“It’s the basis of our relationship.” She grinned.
“If this Samuel really knows about future events, did you ask him any questions?” Morris asked.
“Like what?” Dwayne said.
“Like whether Sis is having a boy or a girl.”
With a groan, Dwayne smacked himself on the forehead.
9
Bern, Switzerland
The guys agreed to meet Dwayne in Bern, and Caroline finally agreed to check into the private clinic there.
“I don’t like hospitals,” she said.
“It’s more like a resort, babe,” he assured her. “You put your feet up and concentrate on making our baby.”
“I like making our baby, but I don’t want to be babied,” she said before he left her in the lobby in the care of a concierge.
“Give it a chance. I’ll be back in three hours,” he promised and went back to the limo.
After being shown around her private suite, a needle hot shower followed by a massage, a pedicure, and a lunch of fruit cup, mahi-mahi bruschetta, and herbal tea, Caroline decided that being babied wasn’t so bad after all.
Lee Hammond booked the Rangers a sub-basement conference room at
