Time Snatchers Read Online Free PDF

room, dining room and mission briefing room. It also has a large walk-in closet with a full wardrobe of clothing for different centuries and places and cubbyholes for each time snatcher where Nassim puts our clothes for upcoming missions. But since he doesn’t knowmuch about women’s clothes, Abbie and Lydia are allowed to pick their own.
    Immediately I notice that the old water cooler has been replaced with one of those new rock water fountain ones. According to Uncle, waterfalls, even small ones, are supposed to be calming and improve the chi of the room. I’m surprised to see something so fancy in the lounge. It’s not that Uncle can’t afford it. But when it comes to spending on us time snatchers, he’s usually on the cheap side.
    I grab a drink from the new fountain and gaze out the small window. One thing that hasn’t changed is the view: solid brick everywhere you look. When I was eight, I managed to open the window, reach across and scratch my name in the brick with a pair of scissors. Uncle found out and I spent the next three days cleaning the kitchen, lounge and bathrooms. Which, when I think of it now, seems a light punishment compared to what would happen if I pulled the same stunt today.
    “Long time no see, Caleb. Try to steal from any other agents lately?” says a voice.
    It’s Frank, standing just outside the doorway.
    I take a long drink of water before I speak. Winning an argument with Frank is a bit like trying to catch a fish with your bare hands. Even so, there’s no way I’m going to let him walk all over me.
    “You’ve got it backwards,” I say. “You stole from me, remember?”
    Frank laughs his annoying, superior laugh, and then says, “You’re right. I stole from you. But only because you were taking way too long to do a simple snatch, so Uncle sent me to get the job done.”
    I don’t believe him for one second. Apart from the fact that he’s changing his tune—when we were on the roof together he claimed that it was supposed to be his snatch—there’s no way Uncle would send him to finish my snatch. Would he?
    I throw a mask over my emotions and gaze past him. What’s taking Nassim so long? I wish he would hurry up and finish his report so I can get out of here.
    “Aren’t you curious about where everyone is?” he asks, ending my peace and quiet.
    “No,” I say.
    “They’re lugging bags of garbage to 2059,” Frank says. “I would have joined them, but Uncle’s asked me to do a special job for him.”
    I look back out the window. Did he say “everyone”? That can’t be. I’m supposed to meet up with Abbie for our mission to 1826 France. Of course, Uncle could have reassigned her to garbage duty. Either that, or Frank’s lying.
    “Don’t you want to know what the special job is?” he says.
    “Not really,” I say, knowing that he’ll tell me anyway.
    “Sure you do,” he says. “It’s a collection. I get to take the Time Pod. Want to come along?”
    Frank’s pressing my buttons. He knows I can’t stand hearing about collections, which is just a fancy word for kidnappings. It’s Uncle’s latest project: snatching young homeless kids from the streets and training them to be time thieves. Since a wrist patch can only transport the person wearing it, Frank has to take the Time Pod—a time travel machine that looks like a big steel drum from the outside but on the inside has seating for up to four people.
    Uncle’s got this grand vision of a hundred kids working for him, snatching stuff from across the centuries so that he can satisfy the growing demand for memorabilia from the past. He says he’s doing these kids a favor, that without him, they’ll just die on the streets. But I don’t buy it. Just because they’re street kids doesn’t mean their lives are free for the picking.
    According to Abbie, he’s already got seventeen new recruits. Most of them are four or five years old. You’d think that there would be a lot of escape attempts. But