Free Ships and Stings and Wedding Rings by Jodi Taylor Page A

braced myself because I could see what was coming.
    â€˜And …?’
    â€˜And I lost it.’
    â€˜Where?’
    She couldn’t bring herself to say it. ‘Not … here.’
    â€˜You took a gun on assignment?’
    â€˜Yes.’
    â€˜To Ancient Egypt?’
    She nodded, miserably.
    â€˜But why? You had two security guards.’
    Yes, she did. One more than normal, but there were special circumstances attached to Elspeth Grey and Tom Bashford. They’d gone missing in 12 th -century Jerusalem and were eventually discovered in Roman Colchester, only minutes before Boudicca’s army crashed down upon the town, hell-bent on obliterating everyone and everything within it. Something like that can take some time to recover from.
    Bashford had apparently picked up the threads of his old life with no problems at all, but Grey, who had been the one who battled to keep them both alive while he’d been semi-conscious, had been having problems. It had taken her a year to pluck up the courage to re-enter a pod. I’d selected her for the shipbuilding assignment specifically because it would be quiet and uneventful. And I’d allocated her an extra security guard. To make her feel safe. There were no wars, no plagues, no famines, and no civil unrest at that point in Egypt’s history. All they had to do was record the various stages of shipbuilding and anything else they thought might be useful, stay out of trouble, not die, and return to St Mary’s. All of which they appeared to have achieved, no problem at all. And now – this.
    Keeping my voice steady, I said, ‘What did you take?’
    She swallowed and whispered, ‘A Glock.’
    Shit. Glocks don’t have a conventional safety catch. They have safe action designed to prevent the weapon accidentally discharging, should it be dropped or banged, but if you pull the trigger, it will fire. Because that’s what it’s designed to do. And now we had one in Ancient Egypt. Just waiting for someone to pick it up, wave it around, and blow someone’s head off.
    We’re not allowed to kill contemporaries. Think of all the thousands of people who must be descended from one single person living say, three thousand years ago. Now imagine that person never lived long enough to have children. What would happen? Would all those people disappear? Some would never be born. Others would be the product of different parents and all that would work its way down to the present day. Suppose Grey herself suddenly vanished, never having been born. And if she’d never been born then she couldn’t go back to Ancient Egypt to leave the gun that was the cause of all the trouble. What would happen then? At the very least the Time Police would come down on us like the proverbial ton of bricks and at the very worst, we’d be looking at the ‘P’ word.
    Paradox.
    With two security guards to keep her safe, why on earth would she feel the need to take a weapon? At the very most, historians are allowed a stun gun to defend themselves. Our normal defence strategy is to run like mad away from any trouble. Obviously, it would be nice if we could rely on not getting into trouble in the first place, but we’re St Mary’s and that’s not really a reasonable expectation.
    â€˜Elspeth,’ I said carefully. ‘Tell me about your problem.’
    The door opened and Bashford entered.
    Without turning my head, I said, ‘Go away.’
    He closed the door behind him. ‘With the greatest respect, Max, no.’
    I’d never actually had someone defy me before. They would stand in front of me and argue themselves to a standstill – that’s the definition of an historian – but I don’t think I’ve ever actually had someone look me in the eye and say no.
    He said, ‘I can explain.’
    â€˜No need. Miss Grey is about to do that. Continue, Miss Grey.’
    â€˜No, Max