The e-mail he received disclosed a report about a new nine-headed geoglyph, a massive drawing in the earth created thousands of years ago, from a friend in the U.N. who oversaw worldwide heritage sites. The 175-square-mile region in which the famous Nazca lines were found had been declared a world heritage site in 1994. The very first Nazca drawings, discovered in 1929, didn’t reach true worldwide fame until planes began flying over the desolate region and people began spotting more geoglyphs—a lot more. From the air, massive line drawings in the desert floor emerged that could not be discerned from the ground. Some, reaching lengths of a thousand feet, could not be seen in their entirety below an altitude of fifteen hundred feet. The geoglyphs came in all shapes and sizes, from spiders to monkeys to men and deities. The discovery of any new geoglyph in the region was immediately reported to the U.N., not because important information might have been gleaned, but because even though the region was officially “protected,” looters still pillaged most finds long before researchers set foot in the country.
As a precaution, all archaeological finds had to be cataloged, researched, and removed to secure locations before news of a new find reached the looters, who would descend like vultures. The geoglyphs rarely held anything more interesting than potsherds and crude digging tools, but surveying and photographing the ancient drawing before the image was marred by the looters’ tire tracks was equally important.
During the initial aerial photography session, a large stone that looked like half an egg rising from the desert at the end of the odd creature’s central neck leaped out at the photographer. A geoglyph with a three dimensional feature had never been found before. The following day, a team hurried to the site, inspecting the stone and the area around it. All were amazed when they found an inscription on the stone, but no one could read it, though one young college intern recognized the language—Greek.
The discovery had been made one day before Pierce received the e-mail. Given his previous work with the U.N. World-Heritage Commission and his expertise on ancient civilizations, Pierce had been called to the scene. After three plane flights and a long, bumpy, and dusty jeep ride, he arrived on site, where a small base camp had been set up on the hill that overlooked the glyph. He’d exited the jeep only ten minutes ago and, upon seeing the nine-headed glyph, had run down the hill to where he now stood. He stared at the Greek inscription on a stone that couldn’t possibly have come from Greece, which meant that someone from Greece had been to Peru, to this very spot, more than two thousand years ago.
He turned to Molly McCabe, the U.N. heritage commission archaeologist who’d first documented the site from the sky. The Irish woman had been researching the glyphs since the late eighties and had spent more time in the desert than anywhere else. Generally, the Nazcan geoglyphs were her area of expertise, but she couldn’t even recognize Greek, let alone read it.
“You’re sure the site was untouched? This has to be a hoax,” he said.
“No tire tracks for miles around,” she said. “You can’t hide those here. No wind. No rain. No erosion. Once something scratches the surface it stays scratched. That’s why the geoglyphs have lasted for thousands of years. If someone had been out here in the past two thousand years with a vehicle or so much as a donkey, the evidence would still be plain to see. I suppose someone could have walked here, but only a fool would do that.”
“Why’s that?” he asked, as he gently brushed the inscription clean.
“It’d be a death sentence. You couldn’t carry enough water to get you here and back to the world without dehydrating. You’d be a dried-out husk within a month.” McCabe huffed and ran a hand through her long, gray ponytailed hair. “So?”
“So...” he said. “What?”
“What the hell does it say?” she said, throwing her hands up.
“Right. Sorry.” Pierce usually took his time with new discoveries. If he had things his way the whole glyph would be fenced off then segmented into a grid of strings so the location of any discovery could be marked and later scrutinized. He preferred to work slowly and methodically, but he also understood that time was an issue. With each passing day they risked word reaching looters, who had perfected the art of the nighttime raid, focusing on expensive research equipment as much as ancient relics.
He looked at the inscription again, marveling at the text.
Εδω ειναι θαμμενος το θηριο πιο ασχημη. Φλογα και το ξιφος του Βορρα εκανε αθανατο κεφαλι, παντα κατω απο την αμμο και πετρα. Να προειδοποιησει ολους που διαβαζουν αυτα τα λογια. Λαβουν σοβαρα υποψη τους φρουρους 'ανοικτα ακρα και να κρατησει στεγνη τη γη φοβουνται σας μετα το τερας και τη γευση τους μεγαλειωδεις εκδικηση.
The carving was crude, but the stone, like the surrounding desert, hadn’t been weathered in two thousand years. The inscription was still as legible as it had been when it was first inscribed.
He translated the lines of text, writing down letters in his small notepad without reading the results in full. McCabe bounced a nervous leg next to his face as he crouched to translate the lowest line. He glanced at her leg and noticed it was quite fit for a woman in her fifties.
“Twenty years ago, George, you might have had a chance,” she said with a grin. “Now I prefer men my own age.”
Pierce smiled and made a final note. “You can’t make an exception for me, Molly?”
“George,” she said, leaning close to his face.
“Yeah?”
“Read the damn inscription.”
Pierce chuckled and read through the inscription that he’d translated. His face fell flat. “It’s a hoax.”
“George, I guarantee you, this is not a hoax. What does it say?” Her voice was a barely contained shout.
Pierce read from the small notepad. “Here is buried the beast most foul... Fire and sword did sever the head immortal, forever entombed beneath sand and stone. Be warned all who read these words. Heed the screaming guards within and keep dry the earth lest you wake the monster and taste its mighty...vengeance.”
McCabe’s brow furrowed. “It’s a grave?”
Pierce rubbed his eyebrow while he thought. Then, like a horse at the races, he bolted back up the incline. McCabe chased after him. Gasping at the hot, dry air, they stopped at the top of the hill where the U.N. World-Heritage base camp had been set up—a small village of tents and trucks. He turned around and looked at the geoglyph with new eyes, which quickly widened. “It’s the Hydra.”
She squinted. “Hydra?”
Pierce looked at her, his orange-tinged brown eyes blazing. “The Lernaian Serpent. The nine-headed swamp-dragon. Child of Typhon and Echidna.”
She shook her head. It was all gobbledy-gook to her.
He took her by the shoulders and spoke quickly. “Herakles—”
“Who?”
Pierce sighed. No one knew the man’s real name anymore. “Hercules. He was the bastard son of Zeus and Alcmene, a human woman. Because of this, he suffered the wrath of Hera, Zeus’s jealous wife, who eventually made him go insane. He killed his wife and children. To overcome the madness he stayed at the court of King Eurystheus, seeking purification. He remained there for twelve years and during that time faced twelve trials, or labors. His second trial pitted him against a nine-headed creature called the Hydra. He killed it by—”
He froze like an ice cube defying the intense heat of the Nazca plains.
“What is it?” she asked.
“He killed it by severing its central head—its immortal head—and cauterizing it before it could grow a new body.” The possibilities spun through Pierce’s mind as he continued speaking in a monotone trancelike voice. “Most legends say that he buried the head under a large stone. How old is this site?”
“Carbon dating came back at four hundred to fiv
e hundred B.C., why?”
“Some scholars, including me, believe Hercules was a real person who lived around four hundred fifty B.C.” His eyes widened. “The time fits. Boating in Greece became very important during that time period. Their victory at the battle of Salamis against the Persians was primarily because of their naval might. It might actually be possible that an expedition lead by Hercules reached the shores of Peru.”
“The ancient Greeks had sailboats?” she asked.
“Yes,” Pierce said, rubbing his eyebrow. “Cargo ships. They weighed up to one hundred fifty tons and made the Greek empire very rich from trade. But it may not have been a cargo ship. There was one ship at the time, renowned for its crew and vast explorations. You may have heard of it. The Argo.”
She stifled a chuckle. “As in Jason and the Argonauts? I saw the movie, George. Ray Harryhausen may have been a genius with clay, but it’s just a story.”
Pierce looked at her, grinning. “You should do some research on scientists the U.N. sends to help you, Molly.”
McCabe’s smile vanished. “What...?”
“A year ago I discovered an ancient Greek crew manifest for a ship named the Argo in a tomb dated to four hundred B.C. Looters had taken the major artifacts, but the manifest, along with other rotting documents, remained hidden in a crevice. Forty men were listed on the manifest. One of them was Hercules.”
“Why didn’t I read about this?” she asked. “Didn’t you publish?”
“The manifest was stolen.”
“By who?”
He shrugged casually, not wanting to retell the story about the two cloaked men who broke into his lab, knocked him unconscious, and stole the manifest, or explain who he thought they were. Nor did he want to tell her about the Antikythera excavation and the sunken ship they’d found, despite its bearing on this conversation. His trust took time to earn. “Who knows? But I promise you, it was real. Hercules existed. He wasn’t the son of Zeus, but he lived and breathed...and maybe, just maybe, visited Peru. The proof could be down there.” Pierce pointed to the stone.
McCabe grabbed his shoulder. “George.” He met her eyes, which were squinting as she smiled. “We need to get under that rock.”
He nodded slowly, still stunned.
“And George,” she said. “We’re going to need security. If word of this gets out there will be no stopping the looters. They’ll come in numbers a U.N. badge can’t repel.”
Pierce snapped out of his haze. “If you have a satellite phone, I know just the man.”
3
Ostrov Nosok, Siberia
Four invisible specters slid across the frozen sea. Concealed from head to toe in white, military-issue thermal armor, the Delta team moved toward their target—a terrorist training camp. The Aden-Abyan Islamic Army had opted for the deserted wasteland of Russia’s Siberian north rather than the boiling deserts of their native Yemen. It was unknown how long the camp had existed or if Russia knew of its presence, but one thing was clear...
“It’s time to blow this place sky fucking high,” said Stan Tremblay, call sign “Rook,” into his throat mike, which allowed the others to hear him despite the whipping arctic winds. “Talk about maximum shrinkage—it’s so cold out here I might have to change my name to Susan.”
The four prone figures shook slightly with laughter. From a distance they would be indiscernible from the surrounding snow and ice, of which there was an abundance surrounding the U-shaped island. Up close they’d look like nothing more than clumps of snow, disturbed by the wind. The only fault in their camouflage was the two one-inch slits in their antiglare snow goggles, but an enemy would have to be within five feet to see the aberration. By then it would be too late.
A dull roar from behind caused the group to become motionless once again. Shin Dae-jung, call sign “Knight,” focused on the noise. A vehicle was approaching quickly across the ice, coming from behind and closing on their target. “Motion on our six,” he said. “Heads down. Don’t move.”
The four Delta operators planted their faces in the snow, judging distance and speed from the whine of the engine and the vibrations in the ice beneath their bodies. It was going to pass by them—and close.
“Deep Blue, this is Knight. Do you see incoming target?”
After a faint hiss and click, the cool voice of a man they had never met, yet who watched out for them from above via satellite, came loud and clear through the team’s specially modified AN/PRC-158 personal role radio. The radio, which could be used for both voice communication and data transmissions, contained GPS chips that allowed the team to be tracked around the world. The only catch was that there was a one-second delay. “Copy that, Knight. Zooming in on him now. Still one hundred yards out. Looks like two on a snowmobile. They’re heading straight for you.”
“Are they a problem?”
“Armed, but not looking for a fight... Wait. Queen, you’re about to become roadkill. Might want to roll to your right.”
“Copy that,” said a crisp, feminine voice. Zelda Baker, the lone female member of the team, call sign “Queen,” waited motionless as the snowmobile and its two occupants barreled toward her.
“Two rolls to the right,” Deep Blue said. “On my mark. Three...”
She tensed, waiting for the signal and hoping that Deep Blue took the one-second delay into account. The vibrations in the ice shook her jaw and the sound of the engine roared in her ears.
“Two...”
For a moment she wondered if she’d hear Deep Blue’s signal over the racket, but then a voice came through, loud and clear, “Go!”
Queen rolled twice to the right, keeping her limbs tight and movement quick, she buried her face in the snow just as the snowmobile passed on her left, its track rolling over the edge of her sleeve. A moment later, the whine of the engine slowed and then idled.
“No one move,” came the whispered voice of Deep Blue, as though the men on the snowmobile might hear him through the team’s earpieces.
Twenty feet from the team, the two men turned around on their seat. They scrutinized the snow with squinted eyes. Their bodies were concealed behind thick layers of thermal garb and furs. Each had an AK-47 strapped to his back. As the engine idled one of the men stood and held his AK at the ready. He stepped toward the team, scanning the snow.
The voice of Deep Blue returned. “When I say your name, it means they’re not looking at you and I want you to take the shot.”
The heartbeats of the four Delta operators remained steady and strong, each waiting to be given the signal that would trigger the taking of two lives. Not that either man’s death would weigh heavily on any of their consciences. These men were murderers and terrorists and the team’s whole purpose for being here was to kill every last one of them. But the plan had been to catch them all inside the facility while they hid from the elements, and blow them to bits, not to engage them in an unnecessary firefight. Under normal circumstances a Tomahawk cruise missile strike would do the trick, but being on Russian soil, a missile attack would be interpreted as an act of war. Better to hit them from the ground and keep things off the radar...literally. By the time the Russians discovered the site, it would be nothing more than frozen ashes.
“Hold on,” Deep Blue said. “You’re clear.”
None of the four heard the engine rev up or leave, but if Deep Blue said they were clear, they were clear. All four looked up just in time to see the closest man slump to the ground, a gurgle escaping his slit throat, which loosed gouts of blood onto the snow. Behind him stood a white wraith, staring at them through two thin slits.
“Miss me?”
“King, how in the hell did you get here?” Rook said as he stood.
Jack Sigler, call sign “King,” cleaned his faithful seven-inch KA-BAR knife in the snow. Behind him, the second man was leaning on the snowmobile, a slow trickle of blood still draining from his neck. “Been here for five minutes. Wanted to see if you guys talked about me behind my back.”
“Bullshit,” Rook said, dusting the snow from his white, second-generation FN SCAR-L assault rifle with attached 40mm grenade launcher. Out of the five, he was most in love with his weapons, which also included two .50 caliber Magnum Desert Eagle handguns, one strapped to each hip beneath his snow gear. They were as children to him—very deadly children.
“Motion at the target site,” Deep Blue said. “Looks like you’ve been made.”
King lifted the head of the man who had died upon the snowmobile; his blood had already frozen in a pool around the vehicle. He opened the man’s jacket revealing his slit throat and a throat mike. “Damnit. I’m getting really tired of these third-world jerks getting their hands on this kind of technology.”
“It’s the damn private sector,” Rook said. “Highest bidder gets the tech. They don’t give a rip who gets killed as a result. If they don’t pull the trigger, innocent blood isn’t on their hands.”
King reached into his pocket and pulled out a small device with a touchpad and small screen. “Won’t be any innocent blood spilled today.” He began punching buttons as he spoke. “How many outside the complex?”
“None yet,” Deep Blue said, “but you’ve got a Sno-Cat with five, maybe six unfriendlies on their way out.”
“Copy that,” King said as he finished pushing buttons. Behind him, the island transformed into a volcano as a plume of fire and smoke mushroomed into the air, accentuated by a resounding boom. A shock wave kicked up a wash of snow that momentarily obscured their vision. When the snow cleared, a smoldering island lay in the wake of the blast, with several secondary explosions from fuel supplies still erupting across the land. But at the center of it all, charging straight for them, was a white, tank-treaded Sno-Cat. One man leaned from the window, taking aim with an AK-47, while two men on top brought their own AKs to bear. All three began firing.
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