TimeBomb: The TimeBomb Trilogy: Book 1 by Scott K. Andrews Page A

have checked in?’
    ‘That’s correct, sir.’
    Sweetclover shook his head, puzzled. ‘Then why blow it up, if it’s not a diversion? Motorbikes don’t just spontaneously combust.’
    The gatekeeper cleared his throat and nervously offered an opinion. ‘Perhaps it’s a warning, sir?’
    Sweetclover shook his head, annoyed. ‘Of what? No, while we’re standing here gawping at this wreckage somebody is doing something they don’t want us to know about. Check the perimeter again. And you’ – he gestured to the riot guards – ‘come with me.’
    Sweetclover turned on his heels and began walking back to the main building followed by the five hulking soldiers, who, although not marching, still walked in step. After a few paces, Sweetclover stopped dead.
    ‘Unless …’ He turned back to address the gatekeeper. ‘Has anybody come through the gate in the last half an hour?’
    ‘No, sir.’
    ‘Not a delivery van, or a courier of any kind?’
    ‘No, sir, you were the last person through the gate.’
    Sweetclover nodded and turned back to the building, took one stride, paused and turned back again.
    ‘You mean when I returned with the prisoners two hours ago in the vans?’
    Now it was the gatekeeper’s turn to look puzzled. He shook his head. ‘No, sir, when you came through twenty minutes ago. On foot.’
    Sweetclover was running back towards the complex before the gatekeeper had finished talking.
    The sound of five pairs of heavy boots running in perfect unison echoed off the cold, white walls behind him.
    Steve swiped the card through the reader, tapping his foot impatiently as it processed the card’s ID. Before the door had slid even halfway open, he had turned sideways and slipped through into the room beyond. Kaz followed quickly, keeping his eyes on the corridor as he backed inside, making sure they weren’t discovered.
    The door closed behind him and Kaz turned to see a darkened room with a huge array of electrical equipment ranged across one wall. Lights and monitors flickered, needles vibrated in semicircular dials.
    ‘What’s that?’ he asked Steve, who had rushed to the bank of machinery and was typing a series of commands into a keyboard.
    ‘Mind probe,’ he replied as he typed. ‘Built from scratch using local equipment. Local in time, I mean. A normal mind probe, one from the period in which it was invented, is about the size of a small briefcase … ah, got it.’
    The machinery whirred and clicked and a small solid-state hard drive popped out. Steve grabbed it, threw it on the floor and shot it with the stubby light gun he had used to disable the guard earlier. The drive smoked and buckled as its destroyer looked up at Kaz and smiled.
    ‘One down. Now they have no record of your memories. Your family is safe. For the time being.’
    Kaz didn’t think he had any shock left in him, but these words sent a fresh chill through his bones. ‘My family? What you talking about?’
    ‘No time. Come on, next we need Jana’s chip.’
    But as Steve hurried back to the door, Kaz held out a hand and stopped him. ‘They were going to use this information to hurt my dad?’
    Steve nodded, impatiently. ‘Only as a way to hurt you. But they can’t because the drive’s fried. As long as we don’t get ourselves recaptured by standing around chatting when we should be running, you’re both safe.’
    Kaz shook his head. ‘That’s not what I meant. What about the guard who was there? He heard everything. When he wakes up he can report what I said.’
    ‘Don’t worry about him,’ replied Steve, dismissively. ‘He won’t be telling anyone anything. Now can we go, please?’
    As Steve pushed past him and swiped the card to reopen the door, Kaz realised that Steve had never answered his question about whether the guard was dead.
    ‘Split up,’ yelled Sweetclover as he burst through the main doors into the lobby. ‘Sweep the building floor by floor, room by room. If you find the impostor,