Behind Enemy Lines (12 page)

D
USK WAS
setting in once Riq awoke to the announcement that the train’s conductor would be coming through the cabin soon to check passports. He hadn’t asked for them at France, and so Riq had forgotten about the chance they might be needed. But if they were caught on board without passports, they risked being arrested in Berlin. An image of the concentration camps passed through his mind. The horrors that happened there were hard enough to have read about in school. He didn’t want to see them. And he couldn’t let the Nazis get the Infinity Ring.

Sera had also been awoken by the announcement and was barely halfway through a yawn when Riq grabbed her hand. “C’mon.”

Sera followed him out of her seat. “Where are we going?”

“You heard the conductor. He’s coming to look at passports.”

“Now? Are we in Berlin?”

“No, but by the time the conductor checks all the passengers, we will be.”

The passenger cars were connected to one another by covered vestibules that made it safe to move from one car to another. As the conductor entered their car from the front, Riq pressed Sera toward the vestibule behind them.

“We can’t avoid him forever,” Sera mumbled. “And we’re almost at the back of the train anyway.”

“Don’t worry,” Riq said. “I have an idea.”

Once they were in the vestibule, Riq shut the connecting doors. The vestibule was constructed of thick steel, but an access door was provided to allow engineers in and out in case of emergencies. As far as Riq was concerned, this was a pretty serious emergency. The clatter of the train upon the tracks was louder here, which didn’t make it any easier to do what had to be done next. He pulled the door’s lever, hoping it wouldn’t alert the engineer as would happen on a modern train, and then slid the door open.

Sera stared down at the ground, moving so fast the rocks and brush were just a blur beneath them. “You’re crazy if you think I’m gonna jump.”

“We’re not jumping,” Riq said. “But when we boarded, I noticed a ladder on the back of this train. You just have to swing your body around to reach it. I’ll hold on to you and keep you safe. Then you help me get onto the ladder. We’ll ride the rest of the way from there.”

Sera smirked. “Jump onto a ladder while we’re moving at a hundred miles an hour? What happens to our kinetic energy if we fall?”

“Forget physics and ask yourself what happens when that conductor asks for our passports.”

“Better to be arrested than do a high-speed hello to the ground!”

Voices from inside the car in front of them grew loud enough to be heard even from where Riq stood. He and Sera peered through a small window and saw two young men standing in the aisle. “No passports!” The conductor blew on a whistle and immediately two Nazi soldiers entered. They each grabbed one of the young men and roughly escorted them into a forward car. Riq didn’t even want to think about what would happen to them next.

“That’ll be us if we don’t get on that ladder,” Riq whispered.

He and Sera darted back from the window as the conductor looked their way. Riq doubted he could have seen them — it was dark in the vestibule, so they should’ve been lost in the shadows. But then the conductor straightened his jacket and started walking toward them.

“Now!” Riq said.

He put his hands on Sera’s waist and planted his feet to keep himself inside the vestibule while she leaned out from the train.

“I can see the ladder,” Sera said. “But I can’t quite reach it.”

So Riq held Sera with one hand and with the other, he braced himself to lean even farther out of the vestibule. The train lurched over a bump in the tracks, and Sera was jolted out of his grasp.

“Sera!” he cried.

After a terrifying moment, she peeked back at him. “I almost fell just now. And just so you know, this is worse than all of Dak’s bad ideas put together! Now give me your hand.”

Riq squeezed out of the train as far as he dared and slid the door most of the way closed behind him. With his longer arms, he reached over to the ladder without too much trouble and felt Sera’s hands on his, supporting his weight as he swung toward her. Riq’s feet slipped and slid on the ladder rung, but Sera immediately moved her hand to his belt and pulled him up until he was stable.

Riq tried to reach back to shut the door, but just as he did the conductor entered the vestibule. Riq motioned for Sera to climb, so they would be out of sight if the conductor somehow peered around the corner. They heard him grunt and pull the emergency door open wider. A long moment of silence followed while he was probably looking around for any sign of why it might be open. Finally, he closed the door and Riq was sure he heard it latch again.

Riq and Sera were near the top of the ladder now. Wind, dust, and occasional bits of gravel rushed at them, making it impossible to keep their eyes open, and it wasn’t much easier to breathe.

“We’ll be safe here,” Riq said.

“If we don’t freeze or fall off or get whacked by something flying through the air first,” Sera said. “Anyone who knows Newton’s third law of motion knows how dangerous this is.”

“Uh, anyone who knows anything would know how dangerous this is,” Riq countered.

Sera adjusted her grip again. “I knew getting into Berlin would be hard, but I didn’t picture it like this.”

“That’s funny,” Riq said, “because when I pictured it, I thought things would be even worse.”

As the ride continued, Riq gradually changed his mind. It was better out here than under arrest by the Nazis, but not easier. His shoulder, which had finally stopped bothering him from when he dislocated it in Baghdad, was starting to ache again. His eyes were dry and dusty, and he had so much grit in his mouth he could taste it. But Sera was holding on tight with her elbows locked on the ladder and face nestled into her shoulder. She didn’t complain or whine, even though he knew her arms must be getting as tired as his were. If she didn’t complain, he knew he couldn’t either. At least, not out loud.

At last, the train began to slow as it pulled into a station just outside Berlin. Riq and Sera jumped from the ladder before it had completely stopped so they would be out of sight from the people standing on the platform. Looking back over his shoulder as they walked off, Riq decided that was a good idea anyway. He saw a lot of Nazi uniforms on the platform and was in no hurry to get any closer to them.

Then one of the Nazis looked directly at them and whispered to the others with him. They turned to look at Riq and Sera and one of them reached for the baton at his waist.

“We’ve got trouble.” Riq grabbed Sera’s arm and started to lead her away. “Just act casual.”

“Casual?” Sera hissed. “Nazi soldiers are watching us and you want me to act casual?”

Pretending to wave to someone on the train, Riq turned momentarily and saw the soldiers picking up speed behind them. Casual wasn’t going to work. This was quickly turning into a full-scale reason to panic.

“Get ready to run on three,” he muttered to Sera. “One. Two. Now!”

Sera was already on her way when he took off. But where were they supposed to go?

“Over here!” A woman stood in front of a small alcove. She was Sera’s height and wore a tight bun, and she carried with her a black umbrella that she opened and held behind her. “Get behind me!”

Riq looked at Sera, who shrugged and got behind the wide umbrella. He wasn’t sure it was safe, but he knew for a fact that getting caught by the Nazis was worse. So he followed and stood with Sera, both of them pressed tightly against the wall.

“Guten Abend,”
an officer said to the woman. Riq’s translator had kicked in by then, but he already knew that was the phrase for “good evening.” The officer continued, “Have you seen two children run past here, a boy and girl? They snuck rides on the train.”

“I did see them!” The woman pointed down the platform. “They ran that way only a minute ago. If you hurry, you’ll catch them!”

When the officers had run past, the woman lowered her umbrella and turned to them. “Stole a ride aboard a train?”

“No!” Sera said. “We had tickets. We just . . . we just had a problem along the way.”

The woman pressed her thin lips together until they nearly disappeared, and then said, “The Nazis should have more important work than chasing children around. Be more careful next time, my dears.”

She started to walk away, but Riq said, “Maybe you can help us again.” He pulled out a paper from his pocket with an address written on it for the Abwehr Headquarters in Berlin. As the headquarters for German spies, this was where Kuhlenthal would take Major Martin’s papers. It was also where Dak had planned to go. Riq held the paper out to the woman. “Can you tell us how to get here?”

She looked at the address. “Abwehr? That’s no place for children. Especially at night.”

Sera’s hand went to the sack holding the Infinity Ring. “We’re only meeting a friend near there. Nothing special.”

Now the woman smiled down at them. “It’s nearly curfew, and you shouldn’t be out on the streets. You’ll never make it there on time.”

Riq eyed Sera. “Maybe we could sleep here at the train station tonight.”

Sera’s expression begged Riq to find another way. He knew she was worried about Dak, and she was right. They couldn’t stay here.

The woman puckered her lips while she thought, then said, “My husband is waiting outside with our car. I suppose we could drive you to the headquarters, if you are sure your friend will be there to meet you.”

“We’ll be able to find him,” Riq said, as much for Sera’s benefit as the woman’s.

The woman escorted Riq and Sera out of the train station and led them to a car waiting near the curb. After she talked to her husband through the window, she nodded at them and opened the door to the backseat, ushering them forward.

Riq began to climb in, then froze. Behind him, Sera did the exact same thing.

Already seated inside, another woman lowered a mirror as she finished applying oil-black lipstick around her mouth. She eyed the kids with a cold glare that turned Riq’s feet to ice.

“Get in,” she said. “We’ve been waiting for you.”

S
ERA’S INSTINCT
was to run, and she knew Riq would be right on her heels. But before she could move, the driver stepped from the car to stand directly behind her, casting an imposing shadow. It was Anton, and he pushed both her and Riq forward, forcing them into the car. She considered yelling for help, but who was going to come? Those Nazis? They weren’t any better.

Riq went in first and Sera sat against the outside door. Quietly, she slipped the Infinity Ring’s bag between her seat and the door. If they had a chance during the ride, she would pass it to Riq to slip inside his jacket, where it would be less noticeable.

“Where are you taking us?” Riq asked.

“Abwehr Headquarters,” Tilda said. “Isn’t that where you wanted to go? Isn’t that where we’ll find your friend Dak?”

“We’ve already found him!” the woman with the bun said from the front seat. “The minute he steps out of Colonel Von Roenne’s office, he’s ours.”

“But he isn’t stepping out of there,” Tilda said. “You had plenty of chances before! That boy is smarter than you gave him credit for, Cleo.”

“It’s not that,” Anton said. “We can’t just go wherever we want in the building. Even the SQ doesn’t have that kind of freedom with the Nazis.”

“But an eleven-year-old boy does?” Tilda asked. “Well, it doesn’t matter now, because once Dak knows I have his two best friends, he’ll do anything to save them.” Her eyes flicked to Sera and Riq. “He’ll even undo all the damage I’m sure you three kids have caused here.”

“We’re only fixing history back to how it’s supposed to be!” Sera said. “It’s the SQ that interfered.”

“Anton and I have been spying on the British for years,” the woman said. “And we’ve been spying on the Nazis since their rise to power. All of this was so that when the time came for us to turn the war to the advantage of the SQ, we would be ready. Nobody will win this conflict but us!”

“You’re destroying the world!” Riq yelled. “Every time you pull history off course from how things are supposed to be, you destroy it a little more.”

“I can save it,” Tilda said. “I have the tools now . . . with me as the head of the SQ, not only in our present time, but in the past and for all of the future.”

“There is no future,” Sera said. “Not unless you let us go.”

Tilda was joined in her laughter by the man and woman in the front seat. “Let you go?” Tilda asked. “After so much trouble to find you, why would I do that? I’ve been waiting for years to find you.”

“Years?” Sera asked. That didn’t make sense.

“In your travels, you went to the year 1850, in America,” Tilda said. “Do you remember?”

Of course Sera remembered. In their work to save Harriet Tubman and the Underground Railroad, they had also played a role in saving one of Riq’s relatives. When Riq saved Kissy and John from the SQ, he had done more than change their history. He had changed his own.

Sera turned to stare at Riq as all the pieces of his secret fell into place in her mind. Suddenly, she understood why he had refused to return to the present to get a new SQuare. Why he acted so gloomy every time they talked of their future lives. And why his Remnants were like black holes.

To save history, Riq might already have sacrificed himself.

He looked back at her, and without a word seemed to know why the tears had welled in her eyes. He only smiled grimly and gave her hand a squeeze.

“So what if we were in 1850?” Riq asked. “We’ve been a lot of places.”

“Yes, but you met someone there,” Tilda said. “Someone very important to me.”

“Ilsa,” Sera whispered.

Speaking the name sent a shudder down her spine. Ilsa had nearly destroyed the entire Underground Railroad. But even worse, she had gotten hold of the Infinity Ring long enough to travel forward in time with Sera to see the Cataclysm. Rarely a night passed when Sera didn’t have a nightmare connected with what she had seen.

“Ilsa is my great-great-great-grandmother,” Tilda explained. “Not the first in our family to be SQ, but certainly a fine role model to me.”

“And are your other role models vultures and snakes?” Riq asked. “Because you seem to have a lot in common with them, too.”

Tilda ignored him and continued. “After Ilsa had her experience of time travel with you, she wrote a letter about everything she knew, everything she had seen. It was passed to her daughter, and to hers, and so on, and eventually came to me. I never understood what it all meant, until after you disappeared from Hystorian headquarters. I was ready for you the next time you returned.”

“If Ilsa wrote that letter, then she must have explained what the future is like,” Sera said.

“Of course she did,” Tilda said. “And now I know how to prevent it. I must destroy Aristotle, the interfering fool who started the Hystorians in the first place. If the Hystorians are not there to oppose the SQ at every turn, we can set history on its proper course much earlier and avoid all these Breaks you people like to go on about.”

“That’s not how it works,” Sera said. “You’ve got it all backward.”

Tilda only laughed. “Believe what you will, Sera. But the best thing you can do is give up now. Let Dak trade away this war to get you and Riq back, and then you three find a cozy place in time to enjoy the rest of your lives. It’s better that way.”

“I can’t do that,” Sera said fiercely. “I have to save history. And even if my parents are SQ, I still have to save them.”

Riq flinched with surprise, turning his head toward Sera, but this time she wouldn’t meet his eyes.

“Can you?” Tilda asked. “How can you possibly save them from me?”

Sera slumped in her seat. For all they had been through, all they had done, Tilda’s question sat like a weight on Sera’s chest. She wasn’t sure that anything could save her and Riq, her parents, or the entire world from what Tilda was about to do.