Time Riders: The Doomsday Code Read Online Free PDF Page A

aside. ‘Sal, you sure about this?’
    ‘I felt something … and this shouldn’t be here.’ She nodded, tapping the poster. ‘Unless it gets taken down before Tuesday.’
    ‘But why would they?’ Maddy checked the date. The movie wasn’t out until 15 October, just over a month from now. ‘They run these posters right up until release week.’ She turned to the others. ‘Anyway, I’ve never heard of this movie. And I’m pretty sure Leonardo’s never been in a – a chase-y, spy movie like this. I’ll give this a look-up when we get back.’
    Becks nodded firmly, an untidy tress of dark hair flopping across her face. ‘This isn’t right.’
    He watched them go, picking up their pace as they strode purposefully across Times Square.
    Don’t lose them. Whatever you do, don’t lose them.
    He matched their pace, weaving between the stop-start yellow cabs and ignoring the insults hurled out of the drivers’ windows at him.
    Don’t lose them … not now, not after all this time.
    He only recognized two of them: the girl with the glasses and the frizzy hair, and the tall athletic girl with long dark hair. The other two seemed to be friends. Close friends by the look of their body language. And they’d stopped and been studying a poster for the movie, hadn’t they?
    The movie, The Manuscript , was just another Hollywood cop-out: a cheesy chase movie with big explosions and stupid slow-motion gunfights and the obligatory baddy with an English accent.
    They were heading down Broadway now, the three girls and the boy, passing by a noisy gaggle of middle-aged women – tourists by the look of them. He lost sight of them for a moment and began to panic.
    Don’t lose them, whatever you do!
    He caught sight of the tall girl with the dark hair again, striding like an athlete on platform heels that added another half a dozen unnecessary inches to her height. He gasped with relief as the other three emerged through the tangle of women. He decided to close the gap on them, unwilling to risk losing them because a pedestrian light went against him, or they’d turned a corner and took a side street before he could re-establish a visual.
    Too long he’d been waiting to see them again. Way too long to lose them now.

CHAPTER 6

2001, New York
    Just as Maddy had promised, the archway was there as they’d left it, and not empty and disused nor occupied by alternate versions of themselves giving them grief for causing some weird time paradox.
    She pulled the shutter down once they were all inside. ‘Gonna need a coffee here. I think I need a caffeine hit.’
    ‘Affirmative,’ said Becks.
    ‘I’ll go check on Bob,’ said Liam. ‘See how the fella’s coming along.’
    Maddy nodded distractedly as she made her way to the computer station. ‘Now let’s see what’s what,’ she muttered as she sat down in the chair and swivelled round to face the monitors. A dialogue box popped up.
    > Hello, Maddy. How was the musical performance?
    ‘We call it a gig , Bob.’
    > How was the gig?
    ‘It was cool, very cool and I’ll tell you all about it later. Right now I need to hook into the external Internet link and do a search.’
    > Affirmative. External feed active.
    She pulled up the system’s search engine and tapped into their connection with the World Wide Web. ‘What was the name of that movie again?’
    ‘ The Manuscript ,’ said Sal, taking a seat beside her.
    She pinched her lip. ‘Like I say, never heard of it. And, sheeesh, I love DiCaprio.’
    The search engine spewed out a page of hits, every last one to do with the movie: reviews, good and bad, mostly bad; entertainment news and dedicated film sites all chattering about Leonardo. She picked a website she used to regularly tap into from her bedroom back in 2010, Ain’t-it-Cool-News. She smiled at how primitive it looked back in 2001.
    Good ol’ World Wide Web Version 1.0.
    … directed by Don Rowney, a change of pace and direction for the director who normally