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Timewreck Titanic
Timewreck Titanic
Timewreck Titanic
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Timewreck Titanic

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April 14th 2012:

A fleet of ships have gathered in the North Atlantic to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the most famous maritime disaster of all history.

Suddenly, a pulse of light engulfs several of the ships, who find themselves on an open ocean dotted with icebergs. Desperately trying to make contact with the outside world, they detect no satellite or radio signals, except for a single vessel just off to the north, who is sending out messages of distress in archaic Morse code.

Her name is the RMS Titanic. She has struck an iceberg and is sinking.

Displaced a century into the past, the ships of the Titanic Memorial Fleet find themselves suddenly intervening in the very disaster that they had gathered to remember.

Can they change the outcome of this night?

Should they even try?

What will be the consequences of introducing modern ideas and technologies into a world ill-prepared to handle them, on the brink of a century of catastrophic war and change?

And can they ever go home?

LanguageEnglish
PublisherSea Lion Press
Release dateJul 15, 2017
ISBN9781386927631
Timewreck Titanic
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    Timewreck Titanic - Rhys B. Davies

    This is a work of fiction. While ‘real-world’ characters may appear, the nature of the divergent story means any depictions herein are fictionalised and in no way an indication of real events. Above all, characterisations have been developed with the primary aim of telling a compelling story.

    First published 2012.

    Published by Sea Lion Press, 2017. All rights reserved.

    Dedicated to the members of

    www.alternatehistory.com

    whose feedback and thoughtful critiques made this edition possible

    PROLOGUE

    FLIGHT 401

    The North Atlantic

    Monday, April 15th 1912, 3.30am local time

    Mayday, Mayday, Mayday. Air Station Elizabeth City, this is Coast Guard Flight 401 declaring a mid-air-emergency. We believe ourselves to have been heavily damaged during a flyby of the Titanic Memorial Fleet, are losing fuel and are down to two engines. Our position... estimated position, is 300 miles south-southwest of Halifax, now turning north and attempting to reach Nova Scotia, please respond. Hello, Hello? Elizabeth City, please respond...

    ...can anyone hear me?

    *

    Marconi Wireless Telegraph Message

    Captain Haddock, ‘Olympic’ – Please ascertain full situation and report as soon as possible – Franklin, New York.

    *

    Come on boys, faster, swing those boats out!

    I say, Officer, what’s all with the hullabaloo?

    We’re going to the aid of another ship sir; please keep yourself and your wife clear. You there, keep those lines straight!

    The agitated clatter of the lifeboat gear played over the voices of passengers and crew alike, men shouting instructions to try and make themselves heard. There were groups of them spread out along the boat deck working at the lifeboat stations, cranking away at the windlasses. Above them towering funnels belched out thick clouds of black smoke that trailed for mile upon mile behind the ship like an angry welt on the face of heaven. The night was clear, but the stars were veiled behind swirling spirals of a strange blue and green light that washed across the sky in waves, sometimes coiling into arcane eddies.

    Captain Herbert Haddock stood at the side of the bridge of the Royal Mail Steamship Olympic, his thick mutton-chop whiskers rustling in the ship’s headwind and hands tightly clenching the rail as he stared up at the unnatural lights that writhed over the ocean like shimmering snakes, lending everything a sickly pallor. Entranced, he watched in silence, until the sound of footsteps on the wooden deck alerted him to the approach of the Officer of the Watch.

    Engine room reports that she’s sped up from nineteen to twenty-one knots, the man said softly. The Chief Engineer assures me she’ll go to twenty-three once the auxiliary boilers are brought online.

    His voice was hushed with awe and reverence at the sight, and Haddock nodded in understanding, his mouth feeling dry as he forced words out of himself.

    What do you make of it?

    Honestly sir, I don’t know what to think about any of this.

    Reluctantly Haddock turned his eyes away from the illuminated heavens, a grim smile on his face.

    I’ve been sailing this Western Ocean for over thirty years, and have never experienced anything such as this, he said with quiet conviction, and as if thinking in unison they glanced behind themselves, at the groups of men swinging the lifeboats out high over the black water surging past far below. Through the deck Haddock could feel the engines racing ahead, churning relentlessly deep in the heart of the ship. The rail was trembling slightly beneath his resting hand as he mentally calculated their rate of travel.

    We need to go faster still... he said at length, turning to face forward again. At twenty-three knots it will still take us almost a full day to reach the spot where she is sinking. We would not arrive before eleven o’clock tomorrow night.

    What else can we do, sir? the Officer replied, his words tinged not with disrespect, but with a quiet despair. She’s over five hundred miles away; we can’t just slice that distance in half, no matter how much steam we put to the engines.

    He swallowed.

    And sir, given that no-one seems to have heard from her in the past hour, she may have sunk already.

    Impossible... Haddock’s hands clutched at the rail as if in desperate need of strength. We all know that modern shipbuilding has gone beyond that...

    Olympic charged on into the dark. Somewhere, far out beyond the horizon, her twin sister Titanic had struck an iceberg and was sinking.

    Overhead the sky continued to burn with brilliant colours.

    *

    It was an aurora, the most incredible he had ever seen. By all accounts it should have been impossible. Not for the first time Gareth King shook his head and swallowed back a malignant dread gnawing at him. In fifteen years flying both planes and helicopters for the United States Coast Guard, he had never seen an aurora this far south on the Atlantic. It was a stunning sight.

    Mayday, Mayday, Mayday. Is anyone out there? he messaged.

    The hiss of static on the radio seemed to perfectly match the slow-boiling lightshow being played out above. But in contrast to the burning sky, the ocean beneath was as dark as an open grave. And it stretched out on all sides, an endless pane of black glass reaching right to the dim horizon.

    You don’t land a Hercules HC-130J on water, you crash it!

    His training’s sole piece of advice on making an emergency water landing bounced around persistently in King’s head as he fought against the controls, struggling to correct how the damn plane kept trying to pull to one side. Reaching for the trim controls he glanced across the vacant co-pilot’s seat to the window beyond. Two of the Hercules’s four turboprop engines were off to that side, slung under the wings and roaring away, struggling to keep the plane airborne. Turning his head in the opposite direction King saw the other two engines idling, the propellers freewheeling in the airstream. A dim glow visible through holes torn in the engine cowlings suggested lingering fires.

    Warily, his eyes slid back to the controls in front of him, hazard lights blinking owlishly from the avionics display. Low fuel warning, multiple hull breaches, loss of hydraulic pressure, and the possibility of fires in the two stalled engines were just the most prominent of them. Worse yet was that those glaring warnings were the only activity coming from the instrument panel, as the other displays, the computerised communications and navigation screens, were alarmingly blank, or littered with nonsensical error messages.

    The plane was dying. As if voicing its pain, it buffeted through a patch of turbulence and the strained airframe took up the motion, its stringers and ribs rattling and creaking arthritically. Once again the yoke tried to snatch its way out of King’s hands and he winced, glancing down. Through a glass panel at his feet the ocean’s surface was alarmingly close to the plane’s belly, the black waves faintly outlined with the same effervescent light that glimmered on the edges of his vision, and he spared himself a glance up through the windshield, as if to confirm he was not dreaming.

    The colours in the sky were not the Northern Lights, he knew that much.

    Something incredible and terrible had happened to him and his crew, he was now convinced. Slowly his gaze fell back to the darkened navigation computer as he wished he knew where they were.

    Air Station Elizabeth City, please respond, he tried again. This is Coast Guard Flight 401, returning from the Titanic Memorial wreath-dropping. We are lost over the North Atlantic, critically damaged and loosing fuel. Hello! Hello!

    *

    Captain! a new voice broke into Haddock’s thoughts, as one of Olympic’s two wireless operators came running up, a sealed envelope in his hand. Sable Island just relayed us another urgent message from New York, sir!

    Thank you Bagot, Haddock replied, and bypassing protocol he plucked the envelope directly from the younger man’s hands and tore the seal open.

    Herbert, he read aloud, noting with surprise the use of his Christian name, which perhaps suggested just how serious the situation was. Please confirm rumours that various ships have already reached Titanic – Franklin.

    That would be Phillip Franklin, Vice-President of the White Star Line shipping company, owners of both Olympic and Titanic, and head of the line’s American operations. Haddock tried to imagine the crowds gathering outside the company’s New York offices on Broadway, anxious for news and hounding Franklin for answers where he had none to give. He did not envy the poor man, and wondered whether the scene was being repeated outside Oceanic House, White Star’s London offices.

    Well Bagot? Haddock folded the slip of paper up and nodded towards the wireless operator. You’re better qualified to answer than me. What are ships up ahead of us saying?

    Honestly sir, Bagot replied, pausing to swallow. "It’s a mess. Some are saying that Titanic has sunk, others are saying she’s under tow by a German oil tanker, and one ship is insisting that Titanic’s boilers exploded, blowing her to atoms and causing... this".

    He pointed at the aurora overhead. The only thing that they agree on is what we saw ourselves.

    Haddock nodded. Olympic had been peacefully steaming east, following the same course travelled by all the great transatlantic liners, when just a few hours ago the horizon ahead of them had suddenly lit up for a second with brilliant light. Bagot and Moore, the wireless operators, had at the same time reported the loudest, rudest ‘X’ imaginable, a term in their trade for atmospheric interference. Moments later the two of them had come to the bridge in a near-state of panic, as when they had sent out messages of enquiry as to the source of the flash, they had received within seconds a faint cry for help from Titanic. Olympic’s sister, five days into her maiden voyage from New York to Southampton, had been in a collision with an iceberg it seemed, and was floundering. Haddock had immediately ordered all steam to the engines, and instructed Bagot and Moore to ascertain Titanic’s full situation. But not long had passed before this impossible aurora had begun to manifest itself over Olympic, playing havoc with the Marconi equipment and closing off direct communication.

    Very well, Haddock said at last. Do you have a spare form on which I can write a reply?

    Yes sir. From one of his waistcoat pockets Bagot produced a scrap of lined paper, letter-headed with the crest of the Marconi Wireless Company. Using the rail as a rest for his pen, Haddock quickly jotted down a message.

    ‘Franklin, New York. Lost contact Titanic 0200. Endeavouring to re-establish communication by Cape Race and other ships. At last word, Titanic flooding in forward compartments, women and children being set off in boats.’

    After a lengthy pause, in which he struggled to give structure and form to the conflicting theories bobbing around his mind, he scribbled in a final line: ‘Reports other ships taking aboard Titanic’s passengers remain unconfirmed – Haddock, Olympic’

    There. It was hardly anything Franklin did not already know, but for the moment, it was all he had to offer. As Bagot ran off towards the wireless room to put the message out, Haddock gazed along the deck, watching as the men swung out Olympic’s boats in readiness to receive survivors, and for a second wondered if his fellow captain, EJ Smith, was witnessing the exact same vignette aboard Titanic. The chattering of the ratchet windlasses, the shouts of men heaving on ropes, and the anxious expressions of the first few passengers to come out on deck, roused by the racket. Overhead the safety valves on the funnels would be roaring with deafening volume, venting the ship’s full head of steam, and the deck would be slowly but noticeably trimming down as the bow began to settle into the icy Atlantic...

    He shivered, wondering for a moment what he would do in Smith’s place.

    *

    Like a dying creature trying to end its own misery, once again the plane yawed sickeningly to one side and King had to force the controls over to keep it from going into a spiralling dive. Momentarily he wondered what his flight instructors would say about trying to fly upside down, and clenched his teeth to not laugh. Holding himself against the yoke, he reached out with one hand and again sought out the trim controls. Ballast pumps whirred somewhere to aft, and in fits and starts, struggling all the time against him, the ailing plane came back onto an even keel. King once again took in the dead engines, the useless telemetry screens, the sickly aurora, and struggled to make sense of events.

    What’s happened to us?

    They had been passing over a group of ships, the Titanic Memorial Fleet, flying low and fast, putting on a show for the passengers watching on from below. Just as King was bringing them around to drop the first of several commemorative wreaths, something on one of the ships had, he suspected, exploded directly underneath them, peppering the Hercules’ underside with debris. The two portside engines had immediately burst into flames, and King had been struggling to keep the plane from plunging into the Atlantic when something... else happened, a pulse of brilliant light that seemed to knock out every display in the cockpit. For a moment he had been struck with the terrified realisation that they were flying blind.

    That was when he had seen the aurora suddenly manifest overhead, giving him enough light to make out the outlines of the ships wheeling outside the windows, off which he had taken a best-guess heading and turned back towards what he hoped was the American Eastern Seaboard.

    With a sudden grunt someone climbed into the seat next to him. His co-pilot, Lieutenant Connie Ramirez, a resourceful woman whose striking features were currently screwed up with concentration and suppressed anger.

    Everything checks out behind, sir, she said bluntly as she strapped herself into the safety harness and then reached up, resetting the circuit breakers on the overhead switchboard. After a moment’s attention directed at the navigation console, which still mocked them with glassy blankness, she scowled and began repeating the procedure.

    Trying setting them to AUX, King suggested, and Ramirez grunted that she already had. After another minute’s silence, in which she made a final attempt to cycle the power and recover navigation, she fell back into her chair with a shout of anger.

    "Shit! No navigation, no GPS, no radio! We don’t know where we are or which way we’re headed, and can’t even get a positional fix from the stars!"

    Her abrupt unprofessional outburst stopped when she caught the warning glance King was directing at her.

    Sorry, she held up a hand in apology. It’s just... no, it’s nothing.

    Pulling herself together she sat forward to check what few instruments still worked.

    Only about fifteen minutes worth of fuel left, altitude is thirteen hundred feet, and our bearing is approximately 340 degrees from magnetic north. She paused, seeing the magnetic compass in front of her swinging in sick arcs from side to side, and managed a faint grin. Either that or we’re headed for Bermuda.

    The two of them laughed nervously at the joke, and as their chuckles petered out Ramirez turned to stare upwards through the glass canopy at the aurora.

    Do you think that thing up there is what’s messing with the instruments?

    Maybe, King said. Or maybe we took something to the transceiver when that ship exploded. Try hailing Elizabeth City again, Lieutenant.

    Nodding, Ramirez repeated their distress calls; that they were losing fuel and altitude, flying north in the hopes of making landfall, with only minutes left before they would be forced to ditch at sea. King sat in silence as she tried multiple channels, staring forwards towards what he hoped was the horizon. Briefly he glanced past Ramirez towards her window; if that was east, then dawn should soon be making itself felt. Should he climb higher to increase their chances of getting a sun sighting and a fix on their position?

    As if in answer, the steady rhythm of the propellers was suddenly broken, the turboprops rasping like chainsaws. The cockpit bounced violently in time with the struggling engines, before they snarled back into howling life, running on dregs and fumes.

    Calls for help silenced, Ramirez removed her helmet and pulled the radio headset off her head, allowing her short-cut hair to fall free. King noted, not for the first time, that the Lieutenant was an extremely attractive woman, and wondered at what had led her to becoming a United States Naval Aviator.

    The Hercules continued to fly into the dark, engines howling in the void between blackened sea and fractured sky, while pilot and co-pilot stared in wonderment at the trails of light writhing like fighting snakes.

    It’s beautiful, Ramirez said with reluctant awe. Like flying in space.

    *

    Yes Mr Fleming, that’s what I said, Haddock spoke into the telephone that connected Olympic’s bridge to the main engine room. I want you to squeeze off the steam and hot-water lines to the cabins, and so conserve that power for the engines. A little discomfort for our passengers is no bother if you can draw a few extra knots from the ship.

    He ended the call with the Chief Engineer and, restless, paced through the bridge and out onto the boat deck. In his pocket he carried the latest message the wireless operators had picked up from Titanic’s vicinity.

    It was something they had overheard, a bit of gossip flashing between two other ships, but Moore and Bagot’s alert ears had snatched it out of the ether.

    ‘Carpathia approaching Titanic’s position – has sighted 1000 foot ship named Oceanic.’

    It was amazing how much a single line of text had shaken him. Carpathia, a ship he also understood to be racing to Titanic’s aid, belonged to the Cunard Line, White Star’s closest rivals on the North Atlantic. Haddock knew her captain, Arthur Rostron, to be a no-nonsense fellow, and for him to declare that he had sighted a 1000-foot long ship named Oceanic was like being presented with proof of the existence of sea monsters, both exciting and unnerving. All the more so in that Haddock’s last command before taking over Olympic was named Oceanic, and while a fine ship, she was in no way a thousand feet long, being not even half Olympic’s size. Indeed, there was no ship in the world a thousand feet in length. Titanic, at just shy of nine-hundred, was currently the largest vessel in existence.

    All the facts considered, he could only conclude that something bizarre and inexplicable was taking place around where Titanic was sinking. It was on that strength that he had ordered steam diverted from passenger comforts to the engines, and had the lifeboats swung out even though they were still many hours from Titanic’s position. Out in the night there was something terrible and possibly dangerous, and he was charging headlong into that danger to render assistance. Many of Titanic’s crew, picked from the best White Star had to offer in its talent pool, were known to him, either by name, reputation or acquaintance. Some, like Captain Smith and Purser McElroy, fondly nicknamed the Eastern Despot, were good friends. He would not allow them to face this alone.

    With his hand pushed into his pocket, the Marconigram tight in his grasp, Haddock headed aft along the boat deck, arriving at the wireless cabin. Moore was taking his turn at the headphones, and a growing stack of messages was growing around him, while Bagot was down on his knees, sorting the correspondence into small clusters on the floor.

    Well gentlemen, have there been any more ‘strange’ messages? Haddock asked as he entered.

    The two men shared a glance, before shaking their heads.

    No sir, Moore ventured. "No one’s heard from Titanic in hours, and now they’ve lost touch with Carpathia as well."

    You can’t say that she’s sunk as well?

    "No sir. The next nearest ship to them is the Mount Temple, and the Old Man on her says that something is interfering with his wireless. So what we think is that something is jamming both Titanic and Carpathia’s signals."

    Before Haddock could respond, Moore stood up from his wireless key, a scrap of paper in hand.

    "There’s this too sir. When we got that message about a ship named ‘Oceanic’, well, we thought it was a bit odd, and so we put out a question asking if anyone knew where ‘our’ Oceanic is right now."

    Haddock nodded. Oceanic was hard to misidentify. He himself had last laid eyes on her in Southampton two weeks previous, the venerable liner having been laid up for want of coal. In light of the recent miners’ strike, many of White Star’s ships had been temporarily withdrawn from service so that their fuel supplies could be scavenged for more prestigious vessels, like Titanic, and Oceanic was among those whose sailings had been cancelled.

    Well we just got this back, Bagot continued, offering him the message. Trying to hide how his hand trembled, Haddock took the Marconigram. It was from Benjamin Steele, White Star’s Marine Superintendent at Southampton, confirming that Oceanic was still moored there, her coal bunkers empty.

    Very well; understand that the contents of these messages, he waved the unnerving missives, are to remain secret to the three of us.

    He realised the command was unnecessary but felt it important to say. No one ship had the range to broadcast right across entire oceans, instead relying on a relay system of passing on each others’ messages. Any station listening in on Moore and Bagot’s traffic would have heard that there were now apparently two Oceanics, one of which was impossibly large. He had no doubt that Philip Franklin and Ben Steele would be chasing down the same questions at the same time, along with every other White Star official on both sides of the Atlantic. The only ones not privy to the ‘secret’ would be most of Olympic’s passengers and crew.

    He was just stepping out onto the deck when from far ahead the bell in the crow’s nest rang out several times, the code to signal that the lookouts had sighted an object. Before he could even pause to comprehend, Haddock found his feet carrying him onto the bridge with full speed. One of the junior officers was on the telephone that connected to the crow’s nest, and as he ended the call his eyes were wide and his face pale, even by the ever-present corpse-light of the aurora.

    "Captain, lookouts report navigation lights off to the south-east, and... they say they’re in the sky!"

    Haddock felt his mouth fall open in incredulity. In the hushed silence that followed he heard only a soft creak from the decking as the helmsman turned to look over his shoulder at them, his face now equally drained of colour. Turning, Haddock strode out onto the exposed bridge wing, where the Officer of the Watch was peering off to the south-east, a pair of binoculars pressed to his eyes.

    I see it sir, said in astonishment, his body as rigid as a figurehead. This sounds impossible – but I think it’s an aircraft, a flying machine!

    *

    You like science-fiction, right Connie? King said abruptly.

    Pardon sir? Ramirez answered.

    "Science-fiction, Star Trek, that anime junk from Japan, you’re into all that, correct?"

    Yes... Ramirez replied hesitantly.

    "Have you ever seen Close Encounters of the Third Kind?"

    She nodded.

    There’s this bit at the end, King continued, where the aliens give back all the people they’ve abducted over the years. Some of them are Navy Airmen, from Flight 19.

    You’re hoping aliens are coming to rescue us? she smirked, eyebrow arched wryly. Isn’t Flight 19 that Bermuda Triangle story?

    "Not exactly; Flight 19 was a group of Grumman bombers that vanished off of Fort Lauderdale in 1945, during a training exercise. Their planes turn up at the beginning of Close Encounters, in the desert."

    Okay, she nodded in understanding. For a few seconds the cabin buffeted, and King focused on the controls, but then loosened his grip and rolled his eyes in her direction.

    "Well, I was always a wild-west, cowboys and pioneers kind of boy, but I read about Flight 19 in Argosy magazine as a kid. Scared the shit out of me, almost made me swear off the dream of being a pilot. But I always wondered where those planes went. Did they get lost and wreck at sea, or did they..."

    He trailed off, and both he and Ramirez turned to regard the aurora. It truly was like flying under a nebula, as if they had warped into a picture from the Hubble Telescope. King’s voice reflected the awesome sight, sounding like that of a man in prayer.

    ...well, did Flight 19 possibly go somewhere like this?

    The engines spluttered again, and the two of them reached up to adjust the fuel flow and squeeze a few more seconds of flight time out of the plane. With the impending ditch postponed, Ramirez reached behind her seat and produced a wreath.

    Sir, Jenkins gave this to me while I was checking the electronics. He never got a chance to drop it before things went to hell.

    King glanced over at the wreath, one of three the plane was carrying. Red, white and blue ribbons had been twisted into the laurels, and attached to it was a small placard. It would have been his job to read the message inscribed on it, and he had committed the words to his memory.

    The reason we’re here, isn’t it?

    I suppose it is... Ramirez regarded the wreath, and respectfully laid it at her feet. Then she jumped in her seat. Sir!

    What is it?

    We just flew over something; I saw it through the floor viewport!

    King moved to ask whether she was sure, but the look of conviction in her face brooked no argument. He nodded and hauled on the stick, guiding the limping plane into a banking turn. Put your helmet back on, Lieutenant.

    Ramirez was already pulling the grey plastic fishbowl back on, clipping it into place and reaching forward to rest her hands on the throttle levers, adjusting the power to help King make the turn. Both of them peered forward, until they spotted a small cluster of lights, almost lost in the expanse of the ocean.

    You were right, Lieutenant, King exhaled in hope. We’ve found a ship.

    The engines spluttered again, and this time did not recover, continuing to choke on the fumes as the plane began to shudder into its death throes.

    Shut off engine three, King said sharply. Let engine four have whatever fuel’s left.

    Sir?

    Prepare to ditch, Lieutenant! King ordered as he wrestled with the controls. We’re aiming for right alongside that ship!

    Ramirez hauled back on one of the throttles and gently pressed the other forward until engine four’s gasps steadied up into a final burst of power. Without waiting for King’s order she reached forward and lifted the safety latch on a button marked ‘flares’, then rested her finger over it.

    Wait, Connie. Not just yet. We’re going too high and too fast. I’m going to try and bleed off some airspeed through several turns and passes. Wait until we’re down at their level before igniting the flares. And when we do, wave like Hell!

    *

    Good Lord... Haddock breathed slowly. Explosions, an aurora, and Titanic sinking amid mystery ships. What else did this night intend to throw at him?

    Over the roar of Olympic’s bow-wave, they could hear a rising drone, like the swarming of hundreds of bees, the sound peaking as the immense aircraft flew right over them. As it passed overhead, he gazed up and saw its elongated black hull, from which two long horizontal wings extended. The craft was clear as daylight against the light-show above, and now was turning back towards them.

    It’s immense, sir, the Officer of the Watch said softly. Quadruple screws, and a wingspan of at least a hundred feet.

    Haddock slowly scratched at his head, a nervous habit of his, and he felt his eyes widen until he supposed he resembled a confused child struggling to comprehend. Only three years ago the French aviator Louis Blèriot had become the first man to cross the English Channel by aeroplane, and he understood that an American woman, Ms Harriet Quimby, aimed to reproduce the feat in just a few days. The public were wild with adoration for these dashing adventurers, but when Haddock had seen images of Blèriot’s self-designed flying machine, the EX-1, he had reacted with a private and cynical laugh at the opinion widely proclaimed, by figures who should know better, that these fragile machines of canvas and wood, so prone to the temperaments of wind and weather, would someday replace the battleship and the ocean liner as engines of war and peace.

    Now he felt like a man being force-fed his own words, as crew and passengers alike began to notice the gigantic aircraft now coming back towards them with the unstoppable will of a bullet. Haddock ducked instinctively as it soared over Olympic, roaring angrily, cutting through the liner’s smoke trail and scattering the black exhaust like an infant would his colouring paints. For a moment, as it eclipsed the aurora overhead, the ship’s lights were reflected in the aircraft’s silvery underbelly, and then Haddock saw red flames gushing from underneath one of the craft’s wings and realised something was severely wrong.

    The binoculars! he shouted, hand extended, and quickly they were pressed into his grasp. Raising them, he aimed the lenses towards the quick-moving aircraft, which was now listing heavily to one side and turning back towards Olympic. Despite its speed, it seemed to be handling sluggishly, like a ship fighting against a jammed rudder, and as it presented its side to him he confirmed his suspicions; three of the four propellers were without power, lazily spinning in the air current, and black smoke interspersed with bursts of fire were pouring back from two of the engines.

    Half-hidden by the streaking exhaust, he could see the words ‘US Coast Guard’ painted on the side of the hull.

    The aeroplane made another pass, this time well off to Olympic’s side, coming low down enough to throw up spray from where it skimmed over the surface. Then, in a series of hissing spurts, a cascade of white flares burst from the underside of the wings, burning with bright flames where they touched the water. Conjoined to them by trails of smoke like the wings of an angel, the plane climbed away again, heading out several miles before beginning another limping turn. Under the swirling light of the aurora it was staggeringly beautiful, but it was evident now that the craft was in trouble as it turned back towards them. And in the light of the flares, Haddock had caught a brief glimpse of one of the crew through the glass canopy of the cockpit, face obscured by a bulbous helmet, but waving frantically through an open window, palm turned to the ocean below.

    He’s going to try and land on the water... he said, before spinning on his heel towards the wheelhouse. Hard a starboard! Turn the ship right around!

    *

    If they haven’t seen us, they’ll have spotted that! King said, fighting the Hercules through their last banking turn, the plane almost right on its side. Glancing down he saw the port wingtip pointing straight down at the water like a hydrofoil. Get back into the aft fuselage and strap in with the rest of the crew, Lieutenant!

    But I...

    Do it, Connie! It’s not a suggestion!

    Yes Sir! Ramirez said, instinctively responding to an order, but then pausing to add Good luck, Gareth.

    Grabbing the wreath, she vanished into the depths of the plane. Completing the turn, King pushed the controls over and held them there, and the plane rolled back level with sluggish speed as engine four turned its last, dying with a final scream instead of asphyxiated spluttering. Now they were gliding, only a few hundred feet over the water, and the lights of the ship were just a mile straight ahead, and coming closer with every second. One hand flying to the flap controls, King glanced up and down several times, trying to keep an eye on the altimeter while steering close enough to the ship for the crew to be rescued without actually hitting the damn thing.

    Well, let’s see if you can land one of these at sea.

    *

    Olympic was turning hard, heeling over and digging her bow into the water as she made the emergency left-hand turn under full power, but it was still not fast enough.

    Full astern on the portside engine! Haddock bellowed, eyes fixed on the approaching plane. He heard the engine-order telegraphs ringing, and after a terse few moments felt the ship lurch as the port propeller swung into reverse and began backpedalling furiously. Now Olympic started to shudder and shake, deck bouncing underfoot and her stern pitching as engines and rudder worked together to swing her around as quickly as possible. Glancing aft, Haddock saw the lifeboats hanging away from the side of the ship like pendulums and passengers clinging to anything upright in order to maintain their footing.

    Well, this is bound to drag everyone out of bed, he thought to himself, before turning and striding ‘up’ the canting deck and through the bridge, several crewmen trailing behind him.

    Rudder amidships! he ordered as they came out on the port bridge wing. The helmsman straightened up the wheel and on momentum alone Olympic completed the turn, now travelling parallel to the aircraft, which was rapidly overhauling them from astern. The flying machine had brought its nose up slightly, adopting what Haddock hoped was a proper attitude for a water landing, and was now coming in with eerie silence; the engines had failed.

    Full astern! he yelled. Emergency stop!

    The crashing sound of the main and emergency order telegraphs chattered from within the bridge, but Haddock’s eyes were glued to the plane, now so close that the binoculars were unnecessary. Like an albatross on the glide it reared back, spreading the broad underside of its wings to snatch at the air, and for a moment it hung over the water, impossibly vast and heavy.

    Then the underside of the tail smacked into the water and ploughed up a huge furrow of foam.

    *

    King felt the Hercules’ flat ducktail dig into the sea, the sudden resistance throwing him into his restraints so hard it felt like they had grounded onto a beach. For a second they skidded along, nose in the air and black water flashing by beneath his feet, then the Hercules lost its grip on the sky and fell forward, burrowing its nose into the ocean as the cockpit caved in.

    Lieutenant Commander Gareth King died instantly, hit in the face by a wall of water at over a hundred miles an hour. But he had managed to put his command down on a level keel, and for the first crucial seconds after splashdown the airframe remained intact.

    And then the speeding Hercules listed heavily, and the portside wingtip and one of the burning engines dug hard into the water, dragging the fuselage over. The wings sheared off, propellers flying free like decapitated flower heads, tumbling across the surface of the ocean. The flooded cockpit tore away, and the shattered remains of the fuselage, shipping water, sank in less than a minute.

    *

    Haddock stared, along with what felt like the entirety of the ship’s complement. Vast crowds had gathered on deck just in time to see the whole aircraft plunge underwater like a torpedo as it landed. With a sickening crack the two wings broke away, fluttering like giant steel butterflies and turning several cartwheels before they smashed back into the water.

    And then, silence. The aircraft seemed to have vanished into the Atlantic. Haddock felt his own heart pounding as underfoot Olympic’s engines jumped in time with it. Finally they arrested her momentum and the liner came to rest, a backwash of water cascading down past her bows in twin arcs, like a dog panting with its tongue hanging out. Mercurial coils of light roiled in the sky, mockingly silent as they looked down on mortal suffering.

    Sound on the whistles! he shouted. Call out to any survivors!

    Someone jumped to the whistle cord and hauled down on it. Olympic bellowed, the brassy notes of her whistles proud and strident in the empty night. A pause, a lingering silence in which no answering cry or signal came from the crash site, and then they were blown again.

    Haddock swallowed, looking towards where flickering pools of floating fire, fuel oil he supposed, formed a ring of flame that marked the point where the plane had finally sunk. He wondered how many crew, or even passengers, had been travelling aboard the machine, and as Olympic roared aloud for a third time, he feared none had survived.

    And then, like a hoisted standard, a green flare shot up from the ocean, trailing a stream of sparks as it arced across the water. His breath caught in his throat for a second, before he spun and pointed at the first of his officers.

    Launch lifeboat number two immediately! he ordered, before turning like a top to call into the wheelhouse. Dead slow ahead!

    Slowly, her engines turning over warily, Olympic edged towards the expanding circle of burning fuel, and finally pushed through, the flames lapping with futile hunger against her steel hide and achieving little except blistering the paintwork. Inside the ocean was eerily still, with little sign of wreckage. Haddock thanked the heavens that they had seen fit to swing the lifeboats out now as boat number two, loaded with eight men to man the oars and an officer at the tiller, slithered quickly down the lifeboat falls and smacked into the water, before pulling off into the dark void beyond the glow of Olympic’s state-of-the-art electrical lighting.

    State-of-the-art, Haddock laughed snidely to himself. An aircraft, which even when crashing travels with a speed and endurance that defy my comprehension, mystery ships over a thousand feet long, and here I am thinking of a simple electrical installation as being state-of-the art.

    *

    Ramirez did not remember how she escaped from the crushed fuselage of the plane; when her senses returned to her she had found herself treading water, pinning an unconscious Ensign Jenkins to her chest with one arm. Ensign Orion was there too, waving from only a few feet away and buoyed up by his lifejacket like an orange Michelin Man.

    And then a deafening roar burst across the water, and she had looked up. The nearby ship was hailing them. Pushing wet, matted hair out of her eyes she had pulled a flare gun from the belt on her flight suit and fired it into the burning sky. Then there was nothing to do except to wait for rescue, and fight against the urge to close her eyes...

    Then, without warning, a heavy wooden oar splashed down in the water beside her head, the shouts of men’s voices shaking her back into reality. The hull of a lifeboat bumped gently into her shoulder.

    Two men in the water here!

    Another to this side!

    Careful there, watch where you put your oars!

    Strong hands grabbed a hold of Jenkins and hauled him head-first out of the water. Kicking her legs, Ramirez turned and got a hand on the lifeboat’s gunwale. Right in front of her was a metal plate bolted to the wooden hull, cut in the shape of a white star on a red flag. She knew it from somewhere.

    Wait, go back Connie, you’re running ahead of yourself. This boat is made of wood. It’s being rowed by men with oars.

    Something here was not right. Fumbling, she found the button on her lifejacket that triggered its built in torch, and with its beam to provide light found herself looking up at a man dressed in a ye-old-time sailor’s uniform, complete with a wide collar and Donald Duck’s Fauntleroy hat. The words White Star Line were stitched in gold on the brim.

    Did I hit my head...? she thought groggily. White Star... isn’t this the scene from the movie where Jack dies?

    They stared at each other for what felt like forever, and then the man’s face lit up in disbelief.

    Sir, this one’s a woman!

    Don’t hang about man, was the shouted reply. Pull her in!

    They were gentler with her than they had been with Jenkins, easing her up with soothing words like up you come miss and you’ll be alright now. Ramirez would have objected to the benevolent sexism, if not for the fact that her eyes were fixed on the ship they hailed from, which was now slowly manoeuvring closer; it was large, but not massive, maybe a medium-sized cruise liner, because it definitely had too many lights on it to be a freighter. Once again it bellowed, its voice the baroque note of a steam whistle, not the rude tones of an air horn. She blinked...

    ...then the mystery vessel came into the light of one of the burning puddles of fuel, and she gasped with shock. Four pillar-like funnels rose from its back, and the lines of the hull were sleekly cut in a style a century out of fashion to her eyes. It was a profile instantly recognisable.

    She turned to her crewmates. Jenkins was unconscious, but Orion was sitting upright, staring mouth agape at the vessel looming towards them. He was clutching at one of the memorial wreaths as if it was a lifebelt, and looked insensible.

    Is that what I look like as well? she thought, forcing herself to shut her mouth and pulling herself upright, trying to act as Lieutenant King would have done in her place. Some of the men crewing the boat sat back in surprise when they saw the Naval Aviator wings carried proudly on her chest, along with her name and rank.

    Thank you for rescuing us. I’m Lieutenant Ramirez, United States Coast Guard, she began, and took a deep breath. "What the fuck is the Titanic doing here?"

    Now it was their mouths that fell open, though she was not sure if it was due to her gender, her rank, or her strategic use of language.

    On reflection, it was probably not the most diplomatic First Contact scenario.

    *

    Haddock could hear the subtle reverberations of hundreds of footfalls on the decks below as people climbed through Olympic’s hull to her promenades. It seemed as if the entire ship was already on deck, and he wondered where all these people were coming from, and where they found the energy to climb all those stairs. Speaking for himself he suddenly felt haggard, as if he had aged ten years in just a few hours.

    If a few Marconigrams and some pretty lights in the sky did this to me, I can’t imagine what EJ Smith is going through right now on Titanic... assuming she’s still afloat.

    Before he could explore that thorny path of thought further, a series of bright flashes out on the water drew everyone’s eye.

    Boat Two is hailing us by Morse-Lamp, sir, an officer interpreted on everyone’s behalf. Three souls brought safely aboard.

    His words were spoken loud enough for several passengers to overhear, and they repeated them at a shout to their travelling companions. Someone gave a cheer, and others took it up and leant it their voices, until it seemed the very ship itself was roaring lustily in appreciation of the mysterious aviators’ salvation.

    Excellent, Haddock felt himself nod. Instruct them to return to the ship; we’ll have the doctor prepare to receive casualties.

    Wait sir, there’s more... the officer’s mouth twisted as Boat 2’s lamp continued to flash in the dark, and then he slowly twisted around to face Haddock. He had a look of a man falling off into an abyss from which he could not climb out. His mouth moved, but the cheers of the passengers drowned him out. Haddock nodded towards the cab on the bridge wing and the two of the crossed over into its sheltered interior.

    Now tell me, what is wrong? Haddock said, his teeth biting into his lip like a schoolboy about to be thrashed.

    Captain... the officer said, and then paused to pull off his cap and wipe away the sweat on his brow. His skin was pale and clammy, like a fish pulled straight from the water.

    Herbert, he said at last. The survivors believe the year to be two-thousand-and-twelve.

    *

    Olympic’s safety valves were blowing off loudly by the time the last of the survivors had been brought aboard. Rather than draw the fires while the ship was stationary, instructions had been sent down for as full a head of steam as possible to be built up, and from the surplus pressure erupting from the valves, the boilers in the bowels of their ship were being pressed to their limit.

    Mr Fleming, this is the Captain! Haddock was again using the telephone to the Engine Room, shouting to be heard over the roar of venting steam. "Do you remember my last order? Well I want you to carry it out to the fullest. We’re going to be making a full-speed dash for Titanic’s position now, and I require every knot you can coax from the engines. Shut down all but the auxiliary dynamos if necessary, get every man available working the furnaces, but I need a sustained twenty-four to twenty-five knots from her and I’m granting you power to do everything possible to make it happen short of tying down the safety valves."

    The future. The year 2012. While a small part of him still clung to the hope that this was all just a mass misunderstanding, and that the crashed aircraft’s crew had simply been left delusional by the impact, the rest of him was already charting a course forward through these new waters. He might not have been as dashing or famous as his colleague, EJ Smith – ‘the Millionaire’s Captain’ – but let no-one say that Captain Herbert Haddock was not qualified to helm a ship.

    All have been brought aboard sir, came the report from aft on the Boat Deck, where Boat 2 was being secured into place. And one wishes to speak to you.

    Very well... Haddock moved to the centre of the bridge, straightened his cap, and folded his hands behind his back, maintaining an image of calm decorum.

    The person presented to him seconds later was dressed in a baggy orange pair of overalls, and carried a bowl-shaped helmet under her arm. Stepping onto the bridge, she stopped and saluted crisply.

    Lieutenant Connie Ramirez, United States Coast Guard. It’s a pleasure, Captain.

    Haddock returned the salute. "Captain Herbert Haddock of the Olympic, it is our pleasure to be of assistance to you, Lieutenant."

    Their mutual salutes completed, Haddock reluctantly reached forward and extended a hand in greeting. Normally when meeting a lady for the first he would take her hand gently and motion as if to kiss it, but now he and Ramirez simply shook hands. Her grip was firm, hinting at considerable physical strength hidden beneath the concealing uniform, and from her bearing he suspected that, in spite of her youth, she was of a greater maturity than some of his junior officers.

    A female soldier, he noted in amazement, seeing the gold wings sewn to a patch on her breast, and an aviator as well.

    She was also evidently Hispanic, and Haddock, against his best instincts, was impressed by both her smart presentation and evident intelligence, contrary of his expectations of anyone outside of the Anglo-Saxon race; he could see that her bright eyes were now darting around the bridge, taking in as much detail as possible.

    Had any woman of his own time presented themselves in such a manner and form of dress, Haddock would have immediately requested that she return the uniform she had surely stolen to its rightful owner, but this Ramirez carried herself with an erect discipline that spoke of a genuine military training. And her confidence went beyond vulgar brazenness; it was evident that she considered it her right to be considered the equal of a man, not something she was forced to prove.

    I’m not familiar with the United States Coast Guard, he admitted. What happened to the Americans’ Revenue Cutter Service?

    We are their successors, sir, founded in 1915, she replied, and he saw a flash of pride in her eyes, tempered by what he supposed was a growing realisation of their situation. But we continue the traditions of the ‘First Fleet’. Or we will, I suppose...

    I see, Haddock smiled nervously, wondering at how to adjust tenses to the circumstances of time travel. But his mind was already turning over these new concepts and scrutinising them like a jeweller might a rough gem, searching for facets and where to cut.

    Lieutenant, do you know what the date is?

    No, sir, Ramirez replied, and he indicated that she should follow him to the chart room, where he showed her a calendar.

    April 15th, 1912, she said slowly. We’ve moved exactly a hundred years in time...

    Amazing... Haddock wondered to himself. And intriguing; if they are coastguards, then what was their aircraft was doing so far out to sea? Perhaps they were on some form of patrol, or a rescue mission?

    He felt his mood darken at the sudden reminder of Olympic’s own circumstances, and opened his mouth to speak when he saw that Ramirez had turned her attention to the ship’s log, lying open on a stand. The time-traveller slowly extended her fingers and brushed them against the most recent entry, which detailed the events of the last few hours.

    Titanic, she breathed, palm now pressed against the log as if to confirm it was real. Oh, my God...

    The tone of her words was of mixed awe and dread, and struck at Haddock with frightening force. More worrying though, was that he now realised Ramirez was carrying a wreath in one hand. In the dim light of the wheelhouse he had assumed the ring-shaped object to be a lifebelt of some kind, but he could now see clearly that it was a tightly woven hoop of leaves, as one might place on a grave...

    He felt a sudden chill, a grim fatalism gnawing at the fringes of his mind as his thoughts gave structure to disparate thoughts.

    One hundred years from now, on this very night, this woman was flying over the Atlantic, bearing a wreath of commemoration... oh Lord above, please don’t say that...

    At that moment the bridge telegraphs all chimed, signalling that the Reciprocating and Turbine Engine-Rooms were standing by, and Haddock turned and strode into the wheelhouse with a sudden, electrified energy, as if fighting against the current of history.

    "Helmsman, resume course! All engines, ahead full! Make for Titanic with all speed!"

    Two of the officers stared in surprise at his sudden orders, and then they sprang forward and forced the telegraph levers over to their stops. One, clearly sensing Haddock’s intent, even leapt to the emergency telegraph and shoved it to ‘Full Ahead’, lending further weight to the order. Seconds later the roar from the safety valves cut out as steam surged into the main reciprocating engines, which began to pound away within the hull, mightily flexing their iron sinews. The deck trembled, and far forward, Haddock heard a rising roar as Olympic began to push a bow wave. The ship noticeably surged forward as the turbine engine powering the central propeller came on-line, and the foaming rush grew louder, laced with the sound of cascading spray.

    Engine room reports all ahead full, sir! Making revolutions for seventeen knots, and rising!

    Send word to the pursers and chief stewards in all three classes, he instructed, eyes fixed forward to where the first light of dawn was drawing the line of the horizon. "They are to place notices in each of the main companionways explaining that we are making full speed for Titanic on a mission of mercy, and that any discomfort suffered by the passengers is in the aid of saving lives. Instruct them to hand out additional blankets if necessary, and have the galleys prepare a steady supply of hot food and drinks to keep those who need them warm, but make it clear that we shall not reduce speed under any circumstances until we have reached Titanic."

    Now Olympic was storming into the chase, full steam ahead and no holds barred. Exiting onto the bridge wing, Haddock was struck in the face by a blast of cold air. The roar from forward was hungry and relentless as the ship cleaved through the swells, shovelling miles under her keel and engines racing away below like forty thousand galloping horses wrestled into harness. By mid-morning, when the remaining boilers came to full pressure and the engines had limbered up, Olympic would be travelling flat-out, as had never been asked from her before. Hopefully they would be able to make up the time they had lost in rescuing Ramirez and her crew.

    Hopefully we will be able to make any difference at all, Haddock thought to himself as he turned and beckoned to Ramirez, who loomed in the wheelhouse door like a grim spectre of doom. She was still carrying the wreath.

    "Lieutenant, your flight took you out to the site of Titanic’s sinking," he said bluntly. It was a statement of fact, not a question.

    Yes sir, she dipped her head. "Our service has dropped a wreath in commemoration of Titanic every year for the past century. And because this was meant to mark the centenary, we were not the only ones participating. There was an entire fleet of ships gathered over the wreck site."

    Is that so? Haddock said grimly as he visualised what she was describing. Might I see it?

    Hesitant, and seemingly unwilling to relinquish the wreath, she instead plucked a small card from it and placed it in Haddock’s hand. With not a little dread, he read the message inscribed on it.

    Good Lord...

    Slowly, his mind reeling, he lowered the card and cleared his throat.

    Fifteen hundred lives? Is there nothing that can be done to avert this... catastrophe? There is no-one close enough to aid her immediately?

    I’m not sure... to my knowledge, she would have sunk over an hour ago by now, and help did not arrive until dawn.

    Haddock slowly removed his cap and rubbed at the thin strands of hair on top of his head, and then paused, an idea blazing bright in his mind like a flare.

    Lieutenant, he said softly. Were you the only craft to have been moved in time?

    She opened her mouth to reply, and then paused, the light of realisation dawning on her face.

    No. I’m sure how many might have been brought along, but immediately after we... shifted... I looked out of a window, and I’m pretty sure I saw the lights of the largest ship of the Memorial Fleet.

    "Was her name Oceanic?"

    Ramirez looked at him, one eyebrow lifted in curiosity. Haddock hoped fervently for several seconds, and then she tipped her head in confirmation.

    Yes sir, it was.

    Haddock trembled. Then there is still hope.

    He looked down at the card in his hands, and this time he read the inscription aloud.

    It is with great respect and reverence that we commemorate the 100th anniversary of the sinking of the RMS Titanic on April 15th 1912, remembering the 1500 souls who perished on that fateful morning. Presented on behalf of the International Ice Patrol by the United States Coast Guard, in association with Project 401 and the Titanic Centennial Expedition. April 15th, 2012.

    He prayed that it was a prophecy that would not come to pass.

    Smoke pouring from her stacks, powering across the darkened ocean beneath the broken sky, Olympic charged towards the morning.

    ACT ONE

    TITANIC CENTURY

    CHAPTER ONE

    From: j.laroche@cml.net

    To: admin.mckinn@project401.net

    Subject: ETA Seguin Laroche

    Sent:18:45, April 14, 2012

    Bonsoir, Mme McKinn

    I’m not sure if this will reach you, but it’s worth a try. Apologies for not having contacted you sooner to confirm our ETA, but we have been having some technical difficulties with our radar which has taken up my time. It also seems to be affecting our radio and satellite uplink, about the only thing still working on the ship is the compass!

    Unfortunately, besides these issues, the weather has not been with us, so we are running several hours late, but we are doing our best to make up for what we’ve lost. We’ll make about twenty knots once the seas abate, and expect to reach the Memorial Fleet just in time for tonight’s ceremonies.

    Thank you again for extending an invitation to Compagnie Maritime Laroche to participate in the Titanic Centennial. Although I’ve never been able to confirm my suspicions of a family link to the disaster, I know my father and grandfather would both be honoured by your graciousness, and we aim to not let you or their memory down.

    Yours

    Joanna Laroche

    Captain, MV Seguin Laroche

    *

    On the evening of April 14th 2012, the wild North Atlantic was a field of writhing gold scattered with diamonds, white-capped waves sparkling as they fought each other in the light of the setting sun. A lone cargo ship valiantly fought her way east, white letters on her green hull declaring her to be the Motor Vessel Seguin Laroche. Turned head-on into the weather, the ship surged into cresting waves, each slamming against her bow and breaking over the containers stacked in regimented formations on her decks.

    The brisk wind lifted the spray high enough to reach the bridge, and pelted it against Joanna Laroche’s turned back, even as it tried to snatch the baseball cap stencilled with the rank of ‘Capitaine’ away from her head.

    Can you see any damage, Pierre? she struggled to make her herself heard over the wind and rolling waves, hands clenched tightly onto a railing as she called upwards towards the mast, where the ship’s electrical engineer had secured himself to the radar assembly. Struggling to hear his reply she felt the deck jump under her feet, and braced herself as the ship took a wave nose on, sliding over into the following trough. For a second she felt the engines race away as the propeller was hoisted out of the water, and then with a roller-coaster surge the ship slammed back down, water exploding around Joanna as eighty thousand tons of metal plunged into the sea. From her position high up on the compass bridge, an exposed platform perched atop the wheelhouse, the ocean below looked dark and hungry, foam from the ship’s wake running over the waves like saliva. She did not want to imagine what it was like for the electrician, secured by a carabiner to the spire of the mast, hundreds of feet above the waterline, where the motion of the ship would be at its worst.

    But despite the thirty-foot seas and the wind, Joanna was not afraid. The North Atlantic was a capricious road to travel, and both she and the ship had weathered it together many times. It was simply part of their job.

    "That’s

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