plan to channel a significant amount of psammeticum directly into the tower, at high altitude. Its gaseous form is diluted in a high oxygen atmosphere, so by the time it reaches the earth’s surface, it has lost much of its potency. By collecting it in a slightly thinner air, we will conserve an enormous amount of psammeticum energy.”
“Yes, I know that. The spire receptor has been gathering it for years.”
“Only the cosmic trickle-trifling amounts.”
“So how much are we talking about? These comets you speak of?”
“That’s classified.” She glanced at Wallingford, who merely rolled his eyes. “The comets’ second close pass, in a decade’s time, will shower the earth with approximately five times that amount,” she said. “By then, our towers will be significantly higher, our storage units more sophisticated. We will be able to stockpile an extraordinary volume of psammeticum, approximately a trillion times that which we currently collect from the meagre cosmic trickle. So you see, Professor, why these great edifices reach for the sky.”
He scrubbed his face with weak, aching hands. “Admirable, but why all the secrecy?”
“Why, exclusivity of course. If our enemies got wind of it, they might try to steal our thunder as it were. Or even scupper our operation. No, it is best they think of the Leviacra as eccentric British follies. In a decade’s time, they will learn the truth soon enough. A new age of science will be upon us.”
Such grand ideas and yet Cecil cringed at the thought of anyone wanting to amass that much energy. A volatile thing like psammeticum stored in tanks, sent through pipes like natural gas? The potential for devastation was incalculable. He’d already witnessed its unpredictability during the first time jump. But if that was their intent, at least it wasn’t as sinister as most of the theories he’d heard over the years. At its heart, it was a scientific endeavour-a frightening and megalomaniacal one, but scientific nonetheless. And until he could figure out a way to escape his prison, he would aid them to that end, if only to help make the collection process safer for the men and women working on the project. Scientists all.
“And the towers we found in prehistoric Europe?” He began to fill in the gaps. “A large-scale attempt to harvest some invaluable comet-stuff brouhaha across time?”
“From what we have ascertained through geological study, several pieces of the largest Atlas comet broke off and hit the earth in the early Cretaceous Period. The comets themselves skimmed our atmosphere. The sublimation that occurred filled an entire hemisphere for months. When we first found the collapsed towers, I was as puzzled as you, Professor Reardon. But now it makes perfect sense. We are destined to achieve large-scale time travel, and our future successors in this endeavour will be even more ambitious than we have dreamed.”
“Maybe, but they failed, didn’t they? The towers were empty and decrepit. The dream you speak of seems fraught with more dangers than anyone can predict. Is there such a thing as too much ambition?”
She grinned cruelly. “You mean like trying to conquer fate in order to bring back one’s deceased wife and son?”
Cecil’s blood flamed. He jabbed a forefinger at her. “If you ever mention them again, I’ll finish what I started in the factory.” He thrust out his chin and began to rub it tauntingly. “You’d best stay out of my way from now on, Gorgon. I’m warning you.”
“Enough!” Wallingford stepped between them, raised his hands in the manner of a traffic policeman. “I shall make all the arrangements you asked for, Professor. In the meantime, are you satisfied with our disclosure?”
“For now.”
“Very well. We shall leave you to rest. Good day.” He escorted his chunnering colleague out of the room, quietly berating her.
Cecil knew he’d won a victory. Why not gloat a little? “By the way,” he called after them, “I’d like a full English breakfast, eggs over-easy, plenty of toast. Throw in a couple of hash browns, as well. See to it, will you?”
He laughed at Miss Polperro’s snarl, then lay back against his pillow and surveyed his empty room. He thought of young Billy and Tangeni heading northward to Tromso, and Verity and Embrey wandering the deadly wilds of the Cretaceous, marooned forever unless he could somehow use his newfound influence and figure out how to reach them.
Until then, he could never truly rest, for he would be as much a prisoner as they.
One week later…
An arrowhead formation of geese flying in from the coast reminded Cecil of the first time he’d seen the Hatzegopteryx, high amid the clouds. They’d appeared no bigger than ordinary seabirds.
All life is about perspective, he thought. Dozens of airships littered the sky, and London city below seemed quiet, restful, oblivious.
He pulled the main gear lever on the side of his clockwork knee joint to its zero tension setting, rendering it limp. Reclining on a deck chair on the eighty-first floor balcony outside his quarters, Cecil gave a contented sigh. It was the first sunny day since his incarceration in the tower and he was determined to make the most of it. He put on his spectrometer goggles and set the lenses to medium tint. A cool glass of sarsaparilla perspired on the stool next to him. First he opened yesterday’s morning edition of the Daily First, one of the few newspapers that reported overseas news as thoroughly as events at home. He longed for news of Billy and his African aeronaut friends.
Killer Dinosaur To Be Displayed In London Museum
That front page headline struck him as the closing of a significant chapter in his life. The wild and indomitable baryonyx, master of its own world, was here a showpiece in a museum. Nothing now remained of his terrible adventure except in his mind. He skimmed through the article until he came to:
“…it cut a swathe of destruction across Southern England for three days and nights. The rampaging beast reached as far as Winchester before it was finally shelled by artillery during its slaughter of dozens of men and women engaged in a traditional countryside hunt.
“‘The baryonyx was the apex predator of its time,’ said Miss Agnes Polperro, representative of the Leviacrum Council and one of the few survivors of the Westminster catastrophe. ‘Its brief acquaintance with mankind is smeared with tragedy…for man and beast. It is fitting that everyone be allowed to see this great hunter in its original, ferocious glory, for as we are masters of the twentieth century, so too did he rule over prehistory. He is one of our great predecessors.’”
And yet, Embrey and Verity still had his kind to contend with. Would that Cecil had a second factory all to himself, where he could reproduce his time machine and bring them back post haste. But that secret he must keep indefinitely. The Council was looking over his shoulder at every turn, and they must not gain control of time travel. The five-past-eight phenomenon had already revealed the damage this meta-science, still in its infancy, could wreak upon the natural order of time.
“Professor, these just arrived for you.” His personal assistant handed him a telegram and a slender package about fifteen inches by eight in size.
“Thank you.”
“Can I get you anything else, sir?”
“No thank you. That will be all.”
His assistant nodded and left. Cecil immediately retrieved the telegram from its already-opened envelope- those security stuffed shirts never let anything pass unmolested. The note read,
PROFESSOR R HOPE YOU ARE WELL THOUGHT YOU MIGHT LIKE TO RESUME OUR LUNCHTIME GAME YOU WERE ON TOP OF BIGGEST LADDER STOP ROLLED FIVE PUTS ME BELOW YOU ON SQUARE DIRECTLY ABOVE THE BROWN SNAKE STOP YOUR TURN PROFESSOR
He leapt up in his seat and ripped the packaging off what had to be a Snakes and Ladders board. “Billy!”
But who had helped the lad send a telegram? Tangeni? Sorensen? This had to be some sort of cryptic message. Yet there was nothing unusual about the squares they’d indicated on the board. He checked the back. The only inscription, made in handwritten silver ink, read, Property of Ebony Eyes Bookstore.
It’s a puzzle. Nothing to do with the actual board itself? All right, then it must be a code of some kind.
He scrutinized each and every word, paying particular attention to those that might appear normal to anyone else but unusual to him. Lunch, biggest ladder, below you, directly above the brown snake, ebony eyes. There were two brown snakes on the board. “The” brown snake had to have some other meaning. A literal one? What might that signify to Billy, Tangeni and himself? Snake? Dinosaur? Brown dinosaur? The baryonyx on display in the British Museum!
Directly above that? He wasn’t allowed outside the tower and they must already know that. Above the museum itself then? That seemed to fit. He was on the tallest ladder-the Leviacrum tower-and they wanted him to
