by SJ Hailey
‘That is Katherine, my ex-fiancé. I can tell by her walk.’
‘Really? Well Laurent, that may work to our advantage. How much does she loathe you?’
‘You see this black eye?’
‘Well that is excellent. Go over and start a conversation.’
‘I don’t think she will want to chat, the woman detests me. She could shoot me.’
‘And I could shoot you if you don’t do as I say.’
‘Merde.’
Katherine was checking instruments; she had been outside replacing the burnt oil in the right nacelle. Now she had to make sure she had done it right.
She returned to the tail section, saw Christophe standing halfway down. Katherine could not believe he was standing there, brazen. Without hesitation she drew her sidearm.
‘Christophe! What the hell are you doing here?’
‘Just passing, thought I would see how you are?’
Mastasson was already in position by the side door.
‘I really think you should holster your weapon Katherine.’
She looked sideways without moving, seeing Mastasson aiming at her head.
‘If you shoot, you will bring down the other people I have with me.’
‘You only left the island with Archer, and I have many people in position at the complex, who have reported nothing. You’re bluffing.’
Katherine was not, but she did get information from Mastasson on their successful deception, he was unaware of the other teams.
‘Christophe remove her weapon and tie her up.’
She knew that to resist would do no good, she could take out one of them, but she suspected Mastasson would kill her anyway.
Christophe smiled, ‘How nice to do this again.’
Katherine‘s response was venomous, ‘You wish.’
This time he slapped her across the face, striking her jaw and cheekbone. He looked back at her hoping to see tears, but instead, Katherine spit out some blood, and looked straight at him, ‘you just reminded me what did I ever see in a snivelling rat like you.’
‘And if you continue you back chat it will be worse.’
Katherine did not answer, her face showed that the pathetic efforts at intimidation from Laurent would not bother her, she was trained for this. He was no threat at all. The party of three moved off, heading towards the complex, she would wait for her moment.
Debra was about to signal all her people to move, when a lookout called, a familiar animal call, but nothing to raise the attention of their unwanted guests. Debra retrained her binoculars on the direction of the call, and saw the reason for the warning.
Archer moved to get line of sight with the caller, and spotted Katherine and Laurent, with Mastasson pushing them along. His temptation was to aim his M4 and blow The General’s head off, then Laurent’s, but he was concerned someone may get one shot off, risking Katherine was not worth it. He waited. Everyone waited, the small group moved up onto the wall, heading for Enzi’s position.
Jacob had not seen Mastasson approaching and began to move with his small band of La gente de la luz azul. He checked on the sentries that Enzi had posted, all of them looking out into the jungle, none of them at the complex and its silver dome. He told them to check their necklaces and all move quickly. If anyone fell, or if he was shot, then someone was to grab his bag and keep going. They all knew the priority was the amulets, and ensuring their safe delivery was vital.
The four of them moved rapidly across the silver surface of the complex, halfway to the hatch they were spotted, not by a sentry, but by Mastasson. He called out across the artificial basin, ‘Jacob, so nice of you to deliver my amulets.’
As he finished the comment Enzi’s men opened fire.
Archer could see Jacob running out onto the complex, heading for the dome, Mastasson appeared near Enzi’s position, as soon as The General called out Enzi’s men opened fire. Archer presumed they had not been ordered to, and they stopped almost immediately, but not because of any instruction.
Jacob could not believe his luck or lack of it, as bullets rained down on them from above. He expected the hot burning of one entering his leg or arm, but nothing happened. He looked back to check if anyone else had been hit, but the members of La gente de la luz azul had not even slowed their pace. The bullets bounced off them, Augusta Fabiola smiled, ‘Keep running, the necklaces will protect us from any projectile!’
Jacob did as the lady said; miraculously they all reached the hatch unscathed.
Enzi shouted and swore at the hired guns for opening fire, then was dumbstruck by the effect on their targets.
‘Enzi, still taking the difficult road?’
‘General, these men are undisciplined, but why did they not hit their targets?’
The General smiled, Laurent took advantage of the distraction and broke free tumbling down the wall, landing badly, injuring his arm. Jones raised his weapon, but Mastasson pushed it away, ‘Leave him, he is of no use.’
‘But he is getting away.’
‘To where? He is following Jacob, who is no friend of his I’m sure.’
Laurent ran across the complex, surprised at the lack of gunfire from Mastasson, perhaps he did not care, or perhaps he underestimated him. He held his arm, suspecting he may have broken it, the adrenaline numbing the sensation for now. Either way Christophe was glad when he reached the open hatch, the sunlight did not penetrate far inside. He dropped down the first few steps, his eyes adjusting to the dark stone and dim blue light. He stepped further inside, lingering to look back at Enzi’s position, and seeing no movement. With renewed confidence he stepped down towards the bottom of the first flight of stairs, and then something hit him.
Katherine looked over as Laurent disappeared inside the hatch, envious of his temporary freedom. Mastasson looked at her chest, ‘You have something under there.’ He gestured with the knife, briefly moving it away from her neck.
‘Don’t even think about it, you would not live to tell.’
‘I have something like it.’
He pulled out a necklace identical to hers, but with some blood dried on it, ‘Laurent collected it from a young man. Unfortunately he dropped it in the cockpit en-route, I do not think he noticed.’
The burning sensation in Laurent’s arm was like he had been slammed with a hot fist, pain resonant on his skin. He looked around for his assailant but saw none, before he could step down, another hit to his leg, this he saw. The blue light was a blink, like a flashbulb on a camera, but the result was less pleasant. There was a two-inch hole through his leg, starting just above his knee and exiting behind his thigh. There was no blood, just smoke coming out of his leg, he was shocked checked his arm, another hole identical size.
He grabbed at his chest, expecting to feel the crystal necklace, but it was absent. He panicked, turned to run back up to the hatch, he made three steps and was hit again, the other leg. The impact removed his kneecap, blowing it off into the wall, his canvas trousers spattered with burnt flesh and blood. With both legs injured and one arm, he scrambled back up the last four steps sheer will and survival instinct overriding the blinding pain. Another jolt hit his lower back, coming out of his groin, he screamed out, his voice echoing up into the walls. Now in agony he got his hand up onto the top step, using every last effort to escape the invisible attacker.
Mastasson could see Laurent coming back up, smoke rose off his body, his screams echoed in the space of the complex. He borrowed Enzi’s binoculars for a better view, and commentated to the audience, ‘It would appear that Laurent has discovered this place has a defence system. You neglected to mention that Katherine, how naughty of you.’
Laurent had reached the surface, he saw daylight, just. The final bolt came from below and behind, and hit him in the back of the neck, just below his seventh cervical vertebrae, exiting out through his forehead, the hole clean, cauterised and smoking.
Mastasson saw the death shot, a beam of blue light hitting the back of Laurent’s neck
, and killing him as it left the front of his skull. The archaeologist slumped forward, his lifeless body smoking in the dimming daylight.
‘Katherine I think I know why you need a necklace?’
Jacob was unaware of Laurent’s demise at the surface; he was more concerned with returning the amulets to their rightful guardians. The inner chamber was majestic and mysterious but now the activity inside was frantic. He gave his bag to Augusta Fabiola, and she in turn issued the amulets to the other two people Lucio Andres and Dalia Maria. She left the fifth amulet in the bag, passing it to Osvaldo Roderigo, who nodded in appreciation. No instructions were spoken; everyone knew their job and carried it out.
Jacob walked over to Osvaldo Roderigo, ‘How’s Kevin doing?’
‘He’s inquisitive, intuitive, like his mother.’
‘Yes he reminds me of her, is he coping with the responsibility?’
‘Yes Jacob, very well, you helped bring him up right.’
‘Thanks, I do wonder. Do you have children Osvaldo?’
‘Yes, grown up and moved to the cities years ago. I see them on birthdays and holidays.’
‘Do you miss them?’
‘Of course, I will miss them?’
Jacob noticed the mistake, ‘You said will, not do?’
Osvaldo Roderigo did not justify his apparent error, but continued, ‘The fifth amulet Jacob, there is something I did not tell you about the price of its use.’
THIRTY NINE
The thunderstorm was beginning to develop an attitude above the jungle. Clouds were charging from the movement of water vapour, and the convection of warm and cold air mixing. Several miles below Mastasson was about to move towards the complex, when the first offensive shots arrived.
Archer had taken aim at Enzi’s men as planned. Debra moved her team over to the second section of the complex wall. Past a large gash in the side, probably caused by a fallen tree; long since rotted. Michael had placed one of his modified robots in this section of collapsed wall, and disguised it. As Archer fired on the hired guns, two of them went down; his shots hit them in the chest. The rest dived for cover and fired back randomly, unaware of their targets. Archer was already moving position, his inexperienced enemies wasting bullets on an empty space.
Jones ordered two groups to move around and flank the assailants, using the wall for cover. Two groups of five men moved stealthily along the side of the steep mud brick wall, stepping cautiously to avoid tipping off their prey. Archer and Debra continued to rain fire down on the remaining positions, giving Jacob more time.
The complex was about to be brought back to life after decades of slumber. The three amulet holders moved over to the small black pyramids in the floor, placed their crystal into the tops and waited. As before the amulet’s all but disappeared into the geometric stones, the obelisks ascended. Within a few minutes four jet black obelisks in the centre of the chamber, glowed with blue glyphs, each sitting on the corner of a square. Each one had an alcove cut into the side, two point five metres high and one metre wide, no alcove faced another so the people could not see each other when inside.
Augusta Fabiola, Dalio Maria, and Lucio Andres all stepped into the obelisks and a barrier came up over the entrance, like blue translucent glass.
Jacob knew they were all busy, but his curiosity was almost overwhelming, he asked Osvaldo Roderigo what the obelisks did.
‘Each obelisk has a separate purpose, but contributes to the whole. The one Kevin is in is for tracking all objects that surround or intersect the Earth with their orbits, it identifies threats. It also launches the cloud seeders for the preparing the storm.
‘Sorry, cloud seeders? You know how to modify the weather?’
‘We don‘t, whoever built this place did, and this complex uses that technology.’
‘So the other obelisks?’
‘Yes, sorry. The second sets the co-ordinates in space for any threatening object, all three dimensions. The third one the amount of energy that would be required to destroy it, taking into account the material and density of the object. The fourth manages the amount of energy coming into the complex and the ideal moment to release it.’
‘Like when the broken necklace wiped out my lab?’
‘Yes that was an uncontrolled burst, this is much more actively managed, and on a larger scale.’
‘How large?’
‘The positive lightning hits we have are more frequent and last longer in contact with the ground.’
‘Positive lightning, I have heard of it, only discovered relatively recently. The output of the strikes is far higher than normal lightning?’
‘Yes it last milliseconds longer, and the discharge can be up to three hundred giga-joules, per strike. To give you an idea, one giga-joule is equivalent to the amount of energy released by one ton of TNT.’
‘Dear God.’
‘Exactly.’
‘Where does it strike? Not here?’
‘No, we have four conducting towers out in the jungle, each one feeds through crystal conduits under the ground and they meet beneath our feet.’
‘So we are standing on the focal point?’
‘Exactly, you will see soon.’
‘So this blue crystal is the conduit, and the black is the insulator?’
‘In basic terms yes, I do not understand the details fully, but I have a sufficient grasp to operate the system.’
‘How big are the conduits?’
‘Two kilometres long, eight metres across, we have to walk in them to check for cracks.’
‘Now that I would like to do.’
‘Another day my friend, another day.’
On the surface Debra’s team had seen Enzi’s men moving on their position, they were not camouflaged, standing out against the emerald backdrop. Even at two hundred metres away she could see and hear them, stomping their way incautiously through the undergrowth, but Debra knew to close and she would be seen. The clouds above had turned a deep grey and were moving across and upwards, the wind increasing at ground level. Above the gunfire, they could feel the vibrations of thunder, frequent and strong.
Jones noticed that one group had stopped firing, and presumed his team had taken them out. The sky had darkened overhead, but he knew that heavy storms in the area were common. He tried to radio the team to confirm neutralisation of the target, but all he got was static, the thunderstorm interfering with communications, because of the amount of radio waves it was generating. He turned his redundant radio off.
Debra watched as the group moved down to the lower part of the wall, she presumed they had not located her position, but would be able to move more effectively at ground level. This was a wise tactic, they had also spread out, putting some distance between each other, one man now outside her field of fire. Should she trigger the trap now, or wait until the last man had entered? The scout at the front was only a few dozen metres away, even with her camouflage he would see her soon, her thumb hovering over the remote trigger. He stepped closer his rifle levelled at her position, she could not wait.
Jones had seen no gunfire from either position for a few minutes, and presumed victory was his.
‘Enzi, the area is secure.’
‘Thank you Jones.’
But the respondent was not Enzi, but Mastasson, ‘I will be leaving now Mr Enzi, I suggest you remain here, I will return shortly.’
‘Where are you going?’
‘To the complex, to the heart of the mystery, I want my amulets back.’
Enzi was concerned, ‘You mean our amulets?’
‘No Enzi, I mean mine, you are no further use to me.’
For the first time in twenty years, Enzi took hold of a gun, snatching it from Jones’ hand and firing at Mastasson’s face without hesitation.
Jacob was astonished at the wealth of knowledge hidden for all these years, but respected why. A device like this could threaten countries, or destroy them.
‘How many times have you discharged it?’
‘Well honestly, this will be the first. The device is not used often, only when necessary.’
‘Well I hope you practised.’
‘We have, don’t worry.’
Of course Jacob knew that was easy to say, with masses of raw power sitting below their feet, he hoped that they got it right, first time.
‘How much energy do you think is below us?’
Osvaldo Roderigo calmly answered, ‘We estimate it is thousands of exa-joules. Roughly the total energy consumed by the United States in one year. Sometimes we need it all, sometimes we don’t.’
Enzi’s shot ricocheted off Mastasson’s head, back into his shoulder. Enzi fell back in surprise reflexively pressing his hand onto the bloody shoulder, the bullet left a large exit wound due to its tumbling trajectory. Jones attended to the wound immediately. Mastasson gloated, pulling out his necklace, ‘You see, I have Laurent’s necklace, so nothing can harm me. I will be leaving now, and neither you, nor your mercenaries can stop me.’
Mastasson stepped confidently down the wall, Katherine walking before him, her hands tied tight. Archer could see him moving. Now was the time.
Enzi’s men could see someone in the bushes ahead, they levelled their weapons, ready to give one large burst across the area, whether man or beast, they would rip it apart. They never heard the explosion, it was only fifty metres away, above them, pointing down the wall. The American’s call them claymores, they have many titles but only one purpose, death. The cluster of ball bearings were packed against an explosive charge sitting on a sheet of steel. This caused all the force of the explosive to travel towards the target, taking the ball bearings with it. Anything within fifty metres was dead, guaranteed, one hundred metres, survival was still unlikely.
Debra did not have to check on the four men that had attempted to ambush them, she knew they were dead. No screams, no pleading, the high speed steel shredded their bodies at such close range, no one survived. The man nearest to her turned, he was outside the arc of fire from the claymores, but close to Debra’s hide. He knew no one would be firing those weapons from behind him, so he pulled his gun in tight to fire. Debra’s ever present handgun drawn as she fired the claymores, by the time the remaining scout had realised and prepared to fire, she had stood up and put two bullets into him, head and chest. The man fell back; weapon and corpse rolling down the steep wall, joining his comrades. Michael was stunned by her efficient ferocity.
