Samurai steal, p.1
Samurai Steal, page 1
Samurai Steal
Paulene Turner
First published 2024 by Salty Dog Press
Copyright © Paulene Turner 2024
The moral right of the author has been asserted.
ISBN: 978-0-6457308-8-3
eBook: 978-0-6457308-9-0
All characters and events in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the publisher. The work may not be used in any manner for purposes of training artificial intelligence technologies to generate text, including, without limitation, technologies that are capable of generating works in the same style or genre as the work, without the author’s specific and express permission to do so.
Salty Dog Press acknowledges the traditional owners of the country in which we live and work. We pay our respects to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Elders, past and present.
For Tash, who finds the ‘money shot’ in every story
Also by Paulene Turner
THE TIME TRAVEL CHRONICLES
Secrets of the Nile
Revenge of the Black Knight
Shoot-out at Death Canyon
Black Tides
Chapter 1
Of all the bad experiences I’ve had in my time travels and high school life so far, going to Riley’s funeral was the worst.
It was at the cemetery where we’d buried Grandpa a few years before. But today there would be no burial as there was no body. It was just the setting of a headstone to commemorate Riley Sinclair, an extraordinary seventeen-year-old boy who had vanished without trace five months before.
His family needed “closure”, Mum said. They’d been going insane wondering what had happened, hoping every knock was him coming home, every phone call would bring news that would lead to him.
But in their darkest moments, they could never have imagined how bad the truth really was. Every night I saw it as I closed my eyes to sleep—my friend dangling, lifeless, from a gallows on the river Thames, London, 1717, after being hanged as a pirate.
It was a warm day in the Serenity Memorial Gardens. Sunshine filtered through the weeping willows, making light dance on the well-tended lawn. The air was perfumed with just-cut grass and roses. A pretty place for such a grim gathering.
More than a hundred people stood around the headstone. Riley’s mum and dad were up front. Mr Sinclair had his arm around his wife’s shoulders, their personal problems set aside for the day. Riley would have liked to have seen that.
Our high school class was there, uniforms freshly pressed, with a cluster of teachers. A group from Riley’s martial arts class in white tunics stood next to some scientists from the government science lab where he’d worked on a few projects.
A knot of older men and women, shabbily dressed, were on the right—clients from the soup kitchen where Riley and I worked. Sid, one of our regulars, had cut off the long grey plait he’d spent a lifetime growing in tribute to Riley.
Samantha Lee, his sort of ex-girlfriend, was at the back of the crowd, her face puffy from crying. When she caught my eye, we nodded to each other, our usual hostilities absent in a moment of shared grief. I hadn’t seen Samantha around the corridors for the last couple of months. I heard she’d shifted schools.
Gran and Gus stood with my parents. Dad had come back from an overseas business trip especially for the service.
I was up front, my friends so tightly crowded around me I could barely breathe.
Everyone was locked into their own memories of Riley, the amazing boy with the surfer hair and super-scientific mind. He was a student, a classmate, sparring partner, colleague, friend, brother and beloved son. Sobs and sniffles peppered the air. Most cheeks were wet with tears. Some, like our maths teacher, Mr Gleeson, stood stiffly by, trying to contain their sadness, only to be overwhelmed by a tsunami of grief. The sight of that chunky all-logic man slurpy with tears almost made me lose it.
Almost.
My eyes were as dry as the Sahara in summer. And I was determined they’d stay that way.
“Are you okay, Maddy?” whispered Lauren, beside me.
“Fine,” I said.
In the silence that followed, I felt my friends exchanging dubious looks.
“If you need to get a drink of water or anything,” said Jamie, on my other side, “just let me know.”
“I’m okay.”
And I was. Because Riley was not dead. He couldn’t be.
I’ll admit that after witnessing his hanging that day in the pirate era, I had believed he was gone and I fell into a pit of sadness so deep, so dark I thought I’d never resurface. And Peterson’s disappearance after that last time jump we did together only made it worse.
But when I thought about it later, in a cooler moment, I remembered what Sherlock Holmes used to say—that when you eliminated the impossible, whatever remained, however improbable, must be the truth. The fact was that Riley, working with Peterson (aka future Riley), was way too clever to be outsmarted by the likes of Captain Hastings Broadbent or any organisation of clowns from the future trying to steal his time machine (aka Recall). So that “show” back there in the pirate era and Riley’s continued absence from our own time had to be part of some bigger plan—one he and Peterson hadn’t let me in on. Which was slightly insulting. Did they think I was a leaky lips who couldn’t keep a secret?
Conclusion: Riley wasn’t really dead.
The principal, Mr Harding, spoke first, about what an extraordinary student Riley was and how much he might have achieved in the field of science, the good he might have done for the world if he hadn’t been “taken from us too soon”.
A couple of teachers talked of his “gentle nature” and “great potential”.
Ms Robotham, our English teacher, sobbed into her hands and accepted a clutch of tissues from a box held by the new Head of Science beside her.
Which reminded me...I glanced round at a cluster of trees behind us to see if Johnno, our old science teacher, might be lurking behind a tree trunk. I couldn’t see him. He’d want to be here, I knew. Riley was his favourite student. And Mr Johnson had proven himself a friend in the pirate era. But the police were still looking for him after the jail breakout we’d arranged before the Wild West trip. They were very keen to question him on the subject of Riley’s disappearance. Though, I knew he had nothing to do with it.
When all the teachers and his science colleagues had spoken, Tanya, Riley’s sister, got up to speak on behalf of the family. Looking frail, in huge sunglasses covering half her face, she talked about how much she loved her brother but how, being his sister, she never really told him. “Now I’ll never get the chance to say it.” At that, she broke down completely—along with three-quarters of the people there.
But not me. I clenched my jaw and repeated the mantra in my head: Riley is not dead. He’s not dead. At least he’s not dead now, but he will be when I get hold of him.
A cool breeze on my cheek was the first I knew about the tears sneaking out of my eyes. As I wiped them away, I felt Jamie watching me.
“I think I’d like that water now,” I said.
He laced his fingers through mine and led me away from the gardens to some buildings in the centre of the grounds. I found the bathroom and splashed my face a few times.
“Where are you, Riley?” I whispered, leaning over the basin, to my reflection. “This has gone on long enough. Show yourself.”
The click of a toilet stall opening and footsteps approaching made me catch my breath. I was half-smiling by the time I looked up. But it was a dark-haired woman who began fixing her makeup at the mirror beside me.
Not Riley.
“Who are these shady people all around the place?” my friend Courtney asked as we had tea and cakes in the Comfort Cafe after the ceremony. “Riley wasn’t a spy, was he?”
I shook my head. “As if.”
Courtney was an aspiring journalist and editor of the school’s news website. And way too observant these days. I knew what shady people she was talking about. There were half a dozen guys among the crowd, in expensive-looking black suits, not seeming to belong to any particular group. Once or twice, I saw one of them touch their ear and move their lips, like they were communicating through earpieces. I was pretty sure they were agents of Recall, the mysterious organisation trying to seize control of time travel. Presumably, they were here to see who turned up and make sure Riley really was dead. Ghouls!
But I couldn’t tell Courtney any of this. She wasn’t clued into Recall or the whole time travel thing. And the fewer people who knew about it, the safer the world would be.
“What an imagination you have, Courtney! They’re probably scientists he worked with at the CSIRO.” Though I knew there was no way a scientist could afford a suit that nice.
As I reached for an egg sandwich, I had this weird tingling feeling at the back of my neck. I spun around, expecting to see Riley there in disguise. My eyes combed the crowd. Once, twice, three times. But I couldn’t see him.
“Are you okay?” Jamie touched my shoulder.
“Fine.” I tried to summon up some annoyance that Riley w
“You know, Riley was your friend,” Jamie said softly. “It’s okay to let something out.”
At those words, I crumbled, like a castle built on sand. Spluttering out sobs and egg sandwich. Mum swept in and scooped me away with Dad trailing after us.
“Oh, Maddy!” she said. Falling into her arms, I cried and cried. And couldn’t seem to stop. Where did all the water come from? When I’d barely drunk anything all day. I spluttered out a laugh as I realised I was starting to think like my scientific friend, Riley.
Who was, for whatever reason, no longer with us.
Chapter 2
I didn’t go to school the next week. I barely had the energy to drag myself out of bed most days. For months, I’d hung on, jaw locked, refusing to give in to the sadness lurking there. Now that wave of pent-up emotions came crashing down on me. Grief, guilt, regret. I was drowning in it.
Mum came into my bedroom at regular intervals offering tea and my favourite—chocolate cheesecake from a Crows Nest cafe. But I had no appetite. Messages and cards arrived from people wishing me well, saying they were thinking of me.
At one point, Mum came in and told me Samantha Lee was outside and wanted to see me.
“She says she’s Riley’s ex-girlfriend,” Mum said, eyebrows raised. “I didn’t know he had one! Anyway, she seems very upset, poor girl, and wonders if you could have a brief word with her?”
Samantha was the last person I wanted to see. We’d had some “awkward” moments in the past year, which I didn’t want to be reminded of. And hearing how upset she was didn’t make me feel any more sympathetic towards her, only annoyed. What gives her the right to be as upset as I am?
“No, I can’t!” I said, putting my face in my pillow. “I can’t! Send her away!”
I listened as Mum went out to deliver the bad news. I heard mumbled voices and Samantha shouted out: “PLEASE, MADDY!”
But Mum stayed strong, despite the girl’s tears, and firmly refused her entry on the grounds that I was “not up to it”. Which was the truth…but not the whole truth.
As the door closed, I sighed with equal parts relief—at not having to face that scene—and guilt—that I’d let the girl down when she may have really needed me.
An hour or so later, Mum brought in an arrangement of colourful roses in a box.
“Shall I read the card?” She unpinned an envelope from the waxed paper wrapping. I expected her to exclaim that it was from Jamie or my three closest friends—Lauren, Courtney and Chi. Instead, she frowned, turned the card over and began looking inside the arrangement itself.
“That’s odd,” she said.
“What is?”
“There’s no name. It just says: Sorry for your loss.”
I sat up and grabbed the card, turning it over in search of some clue as to who’d sent it. “Is it usual to send flowers to the close friends of...you know?” The person who died.
“Not that usual,” said Mum. “But whoever sent them was very thoughtful.” She stroked my hair. “Anyway, you get some rest.”
I’d been sleepy before but now I was wide awake, intrigued by the flowers, which would have cost quite a bit. Who would spend so much and send them anonymously, missing out on the credit?
I picked up my phone for the first time in a few days and saw that Jamie had left heaps of messages. So, I called him.
“Did you send me flowers?” I came straight to the point.
“Flowers, err, no. Should I have?”
“No, of course not. We’re just friends.”
“Yeah. But, you know, if ever you wanted to re-evaluate that…? No pressure or anything.”
“Gotta go.” I hung up quickly. This was not the time for that conversation. I wasn’t sure it ever would be, though I suspected the subject would come up again soon. And I had no idea how to answer him.
I texted Lauren.
“Look whose fingers are working again!” she joked.
“Did you or the girls send me flowers?”
“No.”
Weird.
“Feel up to a visit?” she asked.
“Maybe later.”
“I should warn you, Courtney is very keen to see you. She thinks you might want to say something about Riley for the school news page.”
This was beyond a joke. When one of your closest friends began stalking you for a story.
“Thanks for the heads-up,” I said.
But Courtney wasn’t the only one with questions for me.
At 3pm, a pungent scent drifted into my bedroom—burnt food of some sort, though I couldn’t identify what. Not long after, Mum peeked into my room. She had this awkward smile on her face and spoke in a Play School voice, which made me suspect someone was outside my door, listening.
“Maddy, sweetie,” she said, “the Sinclairs are here. They wondered if you felt up to a chat. If you don’t, just say so.”
I didn’t. They were the last people in the world I wanted to talk to. But how could I send them away?
“I’ve made Anzac biscuits,” she added.
Mum, cooking? So that was the burning smell.
By the time I got myself together, she had the Sinclairs settled on the sofa with coffee. Then she excused herself, saying she needed to shop for tonight’s dinner. Leaving me alone with Riley’s parents.
Mrs Sinclair looked pale and thinner than usual with red-rimmed eyes as if she’d been crying. Mr Sinclair sat on the edge of the sofa like he was about to spring up and leave, or launch himself at me, hands around my throat and squeeze. I nodded and tried to smile as I slipped into an armchair. The plate of warm, blackened biscuits on the coffee table before us seemed grimly appropriate for the occasion.
“How are you, Maddy?” Mrs Sinclair asked.
“I’m okay.” I exhaled. “That was...err...a lovely service the other day.”
Mr Sinclair nodded. “There were a lot of people there I’d never met before.”
“Did you know them all, Maddy?” Riley’s mum asked.
“Not all of them, no.” Riley had a lot going on in his life that didn’t include me.
“Well, if you didn’t know them and you were his closest friend...?” said Mr Sinclair. Now it was my turn to nod. And keep nodding, like one of those bobble-head figurines. “I mean, you knew more about him than either of us.”
Still nodding, waiting for the question…
“So, what do you think happened to Riley?” he asked.
There it was. We’d had this conversation before but this time it felt different. I sensed he wasn’t going to settle for my usual vague responses. I took a sip of water and tried to get my thoughts in order.
“I’ve asked myself that,” I said. “And I can’t come up with an answer.” I bit into the biscuit, which was rock hard and had a bitter aftertaste.
“I heard you tell someone you didn’t think he was really gone for good,” Mr Sinclair said. Beside him, Riley’s mother barely blinked as she observed my response.
Crunch, crunch, crunch. I swallowed the burnt chunks all at once, trying not to wince as they scratched my throat on the way down, then took another slow sip of water. “Well, that’s my hope, anyway—that Riley will prove us all wrong and turn up again one day.”
Mrs Sinclair broke down then. Sobbing, howling in anguish. “We had the ceremony because we thought it would give us closure,” she gulped out. “But it didn’t. I keep expecting him to walk through the door.”
“The only way we’ll get closure, Maddy, is if you tell us the truth,” said Mr Sinclair, leaning forward. “We know you’re holding something back.”
Both sets of eyes pinned me where I sat, like an insect on a display board. There was anger and pleading in their looks.
“What was he up to before he disappeared?” Mr Sinclair demanded. “The pair of you always seemed to be whispering about something.”
