TW03 The Pimpernel Plot NEW (3 page)

BOOK: TW03 The Pimpernel Plot NEW
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The shots frightened the horses and they bolted. Corderro leaped up on the sideboard of the coach and the runaway horses hurtled through the city gate. Bibot’s men raised their muskets and fired at the coach, hitting Corderro several times.

He managed to get the door of the coach open and threw himself inside, where he collapsed onto the floor of the coach and lost consciousness.

The crowd at the gate had panicked at the shots and they scattered, fleeing in all directions. The army captain lay dead in the middle of the street with a bullet through his heart.

Clutching at his chest and coughing, Blakeney stumbled weakly through the gate in a vain attempt to follow his coach. He managed about one hundred yards before he sank down to his knees at the side of the road, retching blood. The hooves of the captain’s rearing horse had crushed his chest and with every step, his splintered ribs hastened the inevitable. Blakeney spoke his wife’s name and collapsed into a ditch. His eyes glazed over. The Scarlet Pimpernel was dead.

 

Chapter
1

Biologically, Andre Cross was in her mid-twenties. If her age were to be reckoned chronologically, however, she would be well over fourteen hundred years old. She would grow older still, now that she had been given antiagathic drug treatments.

Given all of this, it was difficult for her to accept the fact that by the standards of the 27th century, she was still little more than an adolescent.

If asked, she gave her biological age, which was twenty-six.

To do otherwise meant getting into complicated explanations.

It would mean revealing that she had been born in the 12th century to a couple of Basque farmers who had died when she was still a child. It would have meant explaining that she and her little brother, Marcel, had gone out alone into the world to become itinerant thieves, surviving as best they could, which meant that they were almost always starving. She would have had to explain that she had learned to pass as a young boy because, as vulnerable as young boys on their own could be young girls were even more so. If all that did not already strain credulity, there was the matter of their having been befriended by an aging, addle-brained knight errant who had taken them both on as squires so that he would not be alone and so that they could care for him. In return, he had trained them in the arts of knighthood (for he had never suspected that Andre was a female). While Marcel was a bit too delicate of frame and disposition to be very good in the skills of chivalry, Andre had excelled at them. She was possessed of an indefatigable drive and under the doting guidance of the senile knight, she had transformed her young and coltish body into a well-coordinated, broad-shouldered, muscular physique. Nature had not endowed her with a voluptuous figure. She was slim-hipped and small-breasted. A life of hardship and physical toil had given her the sort of shape that was not traditionally associated with feminine beauty. She was wiry and unnaturally strong, which had made it easier for her to carry on her male masquerade into an age when most awkward girls began to develop into graceful women. When the old knight died, she took his armor and, swathing her small breasts in cloth, she assumed the role of a young “free companion,” a mercenary knight. She took the invented name of Andre de la Croix and eventually found service with Prince John of Anjou at a time when he plotted to seize his brother Richard’s throne.

She found herself involved with time travelers from the far future, although she had not known it then, nor would she have understood it if she had. She knew nothing of time travel and she was ignorant of the Time Wars, a highly dangerous method of settling conflicts in the future by sending soldiers back through time to do battle within the confines of armed struggles of the past. Her first knowledge of such things came from a deserter from the Temporal Corps named Hunter, a man with a stolen chronoplate who helped her to avenge her brother’s murder and then took her ahead through time to the Paris of the 17th century. There, ironically, she once again became involved with the machinations of people from the 27th century, this time taking a more active part in their activities on what they called “the Minus Side.” If not for her, two soldiers named Lucas Priest and Finn Delaney might have died. They repaid her by granting her request and taking her with them to the time from which they came.

Even explaining that much to people would have meant omitting many details and inviting further questions, so Andre Cross (for that was her name now and, indeed, she could no longer recall the name she had been born with) did not bother with any explanations. A small handful of people knew her true history. As far as everyone else was concerned, she was just an ordinary young woman of the 27th century who had

enlisted in the Temporal Corps and been assigned to Lt. Col. Forrester’s elite First Division, better known as the Time Commandos.

When she had first arrived at Pendleton Base, at the Temporal Departure Station, she had been completely overwhelmed with future shock. She had understood literally nothing of what she had seen and had been badly frightened, in spite of warnings from Priest and Delaney to expect a world of seemingly inexplicable miracles. Now that she was returning to Temporal Army Command Headquarters, she still possessed an unbridled fascination with the new world in which she found herself, but it was no longer an awesome mystery to her.

Since her arrival in the 27th century, she had been in the hands of specialists, being prepared for her new life at the Temporal Army Medical Complex in Colorado Springs. Firstly, and most importantly, it had been necessary to determine whether or not her temporal transplantation would have an adverse effect upon the course of history. The first part of this question had been settled when it was discovered that, due to an injury sustained in combat at some time in her past, she would be unable to bear children. The second part took a little longer, but exhaustive research and the correlation of findings made by members of the Observer Corps on the Minus Side satisfied the investigators that Andre’s removal from her natural time would not constitute a threat to temporal continuity.

That opened her way to a new life as a soldier in the Temporal Corps. However, it had been only the first step.

It had been necessary for her to receive immunization treatments, followed by the carefully administered program of antiagathic drug therapy that would extend her lifespan far beyond what she had believed to be possible. That was followed by a long series of tests designed to establish a psychological profile for her, after which she underwent surgery to receive the cybernetic implants that would enable her to function as a temporal soldier and allow her to be implant-educated to compensate for the knowledge she lacked as a result of her primitive origins. They had viewed her as a blank slate and the programming had progressed in slow and carefully controlled stages, during which she was assiduously monitored to make certain that at no point was there any danger of sensory or cerebral overload.

After the long process had been completed, she had emerged as a full-fledged citizen of the 27th century, computer-programmed to take her place in the modern world and trained to assume her new role as a private in the First Division. She had the lowest rank of any soldier in that vaunted cadre, but she had already participated in one of the most important missions in the history of the unit. While she had still been back in 17th-century Paris, she had worked with Finn Delaney and Lucas Priest, as well as agents of the TIA, to help foil a terrorist plot against the Referee Corps. As a result of her performance, Forrester had personally invited her to join his unit and to be trained to work alongside Priest and Delaney.

As she rode the lift tube up to First Division Headquarters in the Temporal Army Corps HQ building at Pendleton Base, she was looking forward to seeing Priest and Delaney once again.

When she had completed her training and preparations at the Colorado Springs facility, she had contacted the First Division administrative offices, requesting that Priest and Delaney get in touch with her as soon as they were able. Shortly thereafter, as soon as they had clocked in from an assignment, she received a message from them.

“Private Cross is herewith ordered to report to the First Division lounge, TAC-HQ building, on 1 January 2614 at 2100 hours. Congratulations are in order. Major Lucas Pnest and Staff Sergeant Finn Delaney, First Division, TAC.” She smiled when she saw them waiting for her at a table by the huge window that comprised the outer wall of the First Division lounge. It was at the very same table that she sat with them when she first met Colonel Forrester and had her first taste of a drink called Scotch. It had helped to numb her senses somewhat as she gazed out that window and saw the shuttles floating by like great steel birds while, far below, soldiers massed down in the atrium, looking like insects from the great height at which she gazed at them.

Priest and Delaney saw her coming and they rose to their feet to greet her. Andre saw that there was a sort of centerpiece upon the table consisting of a medieval broadsword crossed with a 17th-century rapier. Above the juncture of the two swords, in a little velvet-lined box, was a golden division insignia, a stylized number one bisecting a horizontal figure eight, the symbol of infinity.

She marched up to the table, snapped to attention, and gave them both a sharp salute. Lucas grinned, picked up the insignia, and pinned it to the collar of her green transit fatigues.

Both men then stood to attention, returned her salute, and then each of them gave her a most unmilitary kiss.

Though the kisses were affectionate in nature, rather than passionate, she was nevertheless taken by surprise.

“What’s wrong?” said Lucas, seeing her expression.

“Nothing,” she said, smiling, “except that’s the first time either of you have ever kissed me. In fact, that was the first time I’ve been kissed since I was just a child.”

“Well, don’t let it go to your head,” said Finn, “both of us can do much better. How are you, Andre?”

“Well, thank you, though I still have a great deal to get used to. It hasn’t yet ceased to feel strange to come across things that I have absolutely no experience of and suddenly discover that I know all about them.”

“It probably never will cease to feel strange,” said Lucas.

“It’s something all of us experience at one time or another.

Believe it or not, you’ll grow accustomed to it. It’s what soldiers call ‘subknowledge.’ You’ll learn to live with it. In fact, you wouldn’t survive for very long without it. None of us would.”

“You’ve come through with flying colors,” Finn said. “I spoke to that officer who was in charge of your case—”

“Colonel Hendersen,” she said.

“Yes, that’s the one. He said he was damned sorry to have to let you go. You’re the most radical case of temporal relocation in the history of the corps. He said that we’ve had people relocated further back in time before, on the Minus Side, but evidently no one’s ever been displaced and permanently assigned to Plus Time. He was bending over backwards trying to get you reassigned to his unit.”

“He wasn’t the only one,” said Andre. “The recruiters wanted to get their hands on me, as well. Evidently, as an example of the type of woman that soldiers could expect to meet on the Minus side, I’d be a good inducement for enlistment.” She laughed. “Never mind that it would be misleading, I found the whole thing extremely funny. Women are certainly treated far better in this time than in the one I came from, but I suppose that some things will never change. The recruiting officer practically turned himself inside out trying to get me to sign some papers and he was quite upset when I told him that anything I did would have to be cleared through Col. Forrester first. By the way, where is the old man? I was hoping he’d be here.” Lucas grinned. “Just make sure you never call him ‘the old man’ to his face! He wanted to be here, but he couldn’t make it. Something came up and he was called upstairs, which means that either Delaney’s up on charges again or there’s a good chance we’re going out soon.”

“Does that mean that I will be included?” Andre said.

Finn flicked her collar up with a finger, the side with the division insignia on it. “That makes it official,” he said. “Meanwhile, there’s still a part of your education that’s been sadly neglected.”

Andre frowned. “But I was assured that my programming was quite complete,” she said.

“All except for one thing,” said Finn, “and that’s something implant education can’t take care of. Now that you’re a soldier, you’re going to have to learn to drink like one.”

“Are you implying that I’m deficient in that department?” she said with a smile.

“Well, let’s say that you have yet to prove that you are not,” said Finn, chuckling.

“That sounds like a challenge.”

Finn grinned. “Name your poison,” he said.

Andre looked at him with amusement. She knew that Delaney was a prodigious drinker, but she also recalled that there was one drink in particular, preferred by Col. Forrester, that Delaney truly loathed. She hadn’t tried it, but she recalled Delaney saying that it took a deathwish and a cast-iron stomach to be able to stand it.

“Red Eye,” she said.

Delaney looked aghast. “Oh, no!”

Lucas burst out laughing. “Ten chits says she drinks you under the table,” he said.

“Okay, you’re on,” Delaney said. “Only let’s make it more interesting. If you want to collect, you’re going to have to match us drink for drink.”

“I think that I can make it still more interesting,” said Andre.

“It’s been years since I’ve had a man and the last one left a great deal to be desired. We’ll all go drink for drink and if one of you wins, I’ll take him to bed.”

The two men raised their eyebrows and exchanged glances.

“But suppose you win?” said Lucas. “Unlikely a possibility though that may be,” he added.

Andre smiled. “Then the two of you will pool your resources and purchase me the services of a Class 1 male courtesan.”

BOOK: TW03 The Pimpernel Plot NEW
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