Drake took it all in; the hovering heavy-lift chopper, the twenty or so men attaching the chains; the way the others were pinning his people down; and then: something else.
Vladimir and Saint stood just inside the ragged hole, supervising their men. As he watched Vladimir turned to the chopper pilot and gave the sign for two minutes.
And then he gave the sign for up.
Maybe it meant something else, but Drake wasn’t taking any chances. He spun, took a deep breath, and screamed at the team.
“Forget them! We have to grab the capstone. These madmen are going to start up the machine.”
Most of the SPEAR team turned, Karin too. Luther and Molokai continued to take out hidden enemies. Pine was looking over and so was Dino.
He gestured again. “If the pyramid is the weapon, the capstone is the key. Once placed, it’ll power up. We can’t afford to let that happen!”
He surged forward, running headlong into danger. Dahl was at his heels, Kenzie too. They evaded bullets, dodged a grenade. They went through three men as if they were made of dough. Alicia joined them and then came Smyth and Hayden. They were deadly karma, angels of death.
They passed by the chopper just as it began to thunder, rotors spinning harder, rising slowly off the floor. From inside the tomb came a terrible and tremendous grating roar, the sound of age-old stone being moved, being dragged, being torn out of its resting place. The pilot poured on the power. Mercs came surging out of the hole, desperate not to get crushed. Vladimir and Saint came with them.
They ran straight into the SPEAR team.
Drake met Saint head on, not even slowing momentum as he timed a headbutt to perfection. If he’d been wrong even by a millisecond it could have ended disastrously but it ended with Saint recognizing him and receiving a shattered nose bone and cranium at almost the exact same time.
Saint fell instantly, the shortest bout in history.
“That’s how you fight.” Drake spat on the jailor and fight orchestrator. “That . . . is how you fight.”
Dahl rammed into Vladimir, taking the merc boss right off his feet and carrying him ten paces before using that incredible momentum to throw him into the jagged pyramid wall. Vladimir struck hard, twisted, and screamed from the pain caused to his back. He went down like a sack of spanners, inert. Dahl leapt over to ensure the job was done.
Drake fought more mercs, sending a punishing blow to stomach and then chin. But again, they chose not to engage; all running past him without acknowledgement.
“This is becoming annoying,” Alicia said. “Are we even visible?”
“Well, they’re sure feeling us.” Kinimaka wrenched his hand out of a folded merc’s stomach, moving aside as the man dropped at his feet.
Another bunch ran past. Drake fought with one and then the most horrendous screeching that he’d ever heard rang out. The chain grew taut, the chopper strained, its engine groaning. It rose by the meter. The huge chains grumbled. And then, through the hole, Drake got his first glimpse of the ancient capstone that had been formed to top the Great Pyramid.
It came through the hole, dragging blocks and showers of mortar with it, a small pyramidion in contrast to Khufu’s but looking large and deadly to Drake. It swung free, lifted by the chopper, passing close to Drake’s flying body as he dived aside. Kinimaka ducked under it, caught in its shadow for many seconds, leaving Drake with the paradoxical wish both for the chains to hold and to break—but not right now.
The capstone, still shining, still covered by white polished cladding, swung under the chopper and then began to rise faster as the pilot learned its weight and dimensions. The mercs fought hard now, their primary job done, and the SPEAR team communicated as best they could.
In battle.
The capstone rose higher. Drake looked to their last chance; the grounded choppers.
“Dahl!” he cried. “With me!”
CHAPTER FORTY THREE
Drake and Dahl, Alicia and Mai raced together for one of the black helicopters.
They passed Luther and saw him nod, acknowledging their perilous bravery and offering support. They passed Hayden and Kinimaka, the big man back to back with his oldest living friend, striking mercenaries left and right. They passed Yorgi and Crouch with guns, keeping men at bay and helping the others. They passed Smyth and Kenzie, one looking like he wanted to get this fight out of the way as soon as possible and the other wishing she had joined them.
Even took a step their way.
But Smyth needed help and she jumped back in, supporting him.
Perhaps there was a major hope for her yet.
Drake climbed into the pilot’s seat of the first helicopter; Dahl the second. As one they fired up the engines, letting the rotors turn. Alicia pointed out a stockpile of weapons in the back that the mercs hadn’t even used—RPGs, grenades and loaded guns.
Above, the giant capstone moved up the side of the huge pyramid, hefted by the big-lift chopper. Drake moved the cyclic controls so that his own bird lifted and then took off. They took to the air, chasing the capstone up the sloping wall, aiming to get alongside the big helo.
Alicia, watching as they drew closer, said, “Y’know, I’m quite excited to say this, Drake. Just put me on that big chopper.”
“Bit busy now, Alicia.”
“Oh, har har, Quick as a flash, Drakey.” She readied her gun, slamming a new mag in and pointing the barrel out the window.
“Not bothered about saving them,” Drake said. “Take the pilot out if you can.”
“On it.”
Dahl came up too, visible in Drake’s eye line, his helicopter rising up the other side of the Sikorsky. They passed the capstone and then the bulk of the bird, drifting around to the cockpit. Below, Drake could see a sandy plain of death, blood and battles to the death. Up here, it was all noise, concentration and maneuvering.
*
Hayden fought in the midst of it all, stopping mercs where they ran and watching Kinimaka’s back as much as he watched hers. They pivoted, spun as if on a hinge, a well-rehearsed, experienced dance. As best they could they watched out for the other members of the team.
Yorgi and Crouch stayed put, well defended, but the others moved frequently, not wanting the enemy to grow comfortable with their position. Smyth crawled along some ruins, the wall barely taller than his back, with bullets glancing off it. Occasionally he would bob up, squeeze off a few rounds and then shift to the next place. Kenzie used her speed and skill, stepping up to an enemy, wrenching his gun aside and breaking his nose with the barrel.
Hayden knew these men had lost their leaders—she’d seen what Drake and Dahl had done to Vladimir and Saint—but concluded they must have been promised some final bonus, something extra if the capstone met the top of the Khufu pyramid.
She made them pay dearly for that decision.
Kinimaka was moving slower than normal, still in pain from the bullet strikes. She sympathized but this wasn’t the time for pity. When he faltered she was there for him. When he winced in agony she took the man that was targeting him.
When he fell to one knee, she used his immense shoulders as a bench to rest her gun.
She saw Drake’s helicopter riding high, chasing the big Sikorsky and the swinging capstone up the giant pyramid. The capstone shone so brightly it blinded her, glorious white light shimmering as it played backward and forward with the sun. Kenzie cut across her vision then, again using a merc’s weapon as a club and no doubt missing her sword. In truth, the SPEAR team were well dug in. It was the mercs that had made themselves exposed.
And what of Karin? Hayden saw her running and switching positions in perfect routine with her team. But where had she been until now? And why was she so suddenly here? The questions would have to wait.
Luther fought at the fringes with his team. Pine and Carey ran in tandem, perfectly in tune, covering each other’s backs and communicating with ease. Molokai raged among a knot of mercenaries, taking bullets but ignoring the impact as
if they were made of foam, not lead. Hayden had to assume he’d gotten hold of some new kind of body armor. Even a glancing bullet should stop a man, but she’d seen it in the past where Drake had ignored a bullet impact and kept going on sheer adrenalin. But Molokai . . . the man was savage.
The metal hand was a brutal claw he used to devastating effect. One touch or grip of that hand signaled the end for the man on the receiving end. In the other, a high-caliber weapon pumped lead into everything nasty that moved. Hayden saw three men mown down in just a second, and then three more. Molokai held a man up by the neck, his terrible claw constricting his throat until his legs stopped kicking.
“Not keen on our new playmates?” Kenzie asked as she slid to a sandy halt a meter to Hayden’s left.
“That is a different level of fierce,” Hayden pointed out. “Luther and Molokai are . . .” She shook her head.
“Exactly as advertised,” Kenzie reminded her. “We were told their reputation. Well, Luther’s at least.”
“I guess.”
Hayden focused on the moment, rather than watching Luther and Molokai’s rampaging. The band of mercenaries was thinning out now, and several were hanging back, shading their eyes as they stared at the topmost height of the Great Pyramid.
Hayden looked that way too, just as Kinimaka and Kenzie gazed up. The capstone was approaching the top; the doomsday weapon minutes from being completed. Drake and Dahl struggled to get close, beset by gunfire and buffeting winds. Where it all ended up from here was anyone’s guess.
Hayden stayed close to Mano.
*
Gently, Drake feathered the stick and floated alongside the pilot’s window. He saw a skinny white man with grizzled hair and a thick moustache. Drake saw the dirty yellow teeth when he bared them.
The pilot stuck a HK casually out the window.
And opened fire.
Drake pulled back, letting Alicia return the favor but not wanting to lose the engines. It wasn’t the fall that bothered him, it was losing the chance to prevent the enemy laying the capstone.
The Sikorsky continued up slowly as if nothing was occurring, an incredible spectacle against the Great Pyramid with Drake and Dahl’s black choppers flying alongside. Guns poked out of many windows and gunfire was exchanged. Bullets laced the skies and indiscriminately sprayed holes in the metal sides. And now Drake saw one more anomaly—a black drone with mini-cameras mounted on its sides tracking the Sikorsky and watching.
Watching everything.
“Fucking FrameHub,” he said. “They’re recording all of this.”
“Teenagers at play,” Alicia said. “Don’t worry, we’ll get ’em.”
Drake looked askance. “Will we?”
They had reached the very summit of Khufu’s pyramid. Drake took his chopper away to give Alicia a clearer shot. Her bullets passed by as the Sikorsky pivoted to get directly over the top. Dahl and Mai struggled to get a better shot, beset by a gunman nestling in the other chopper’s rear seats.
“Grab the controls,” Drake heard Dahl’s voice over the headphones.
“What are you going to do?” His voice was wary.
“Just be ready.”
A crosswind buffeted the birds, battering their sides and tail rotors. The capstone was now directly over the top of the pyramid and began to descend. Drake saw the very top of the Egypt’s great wonder of the world, a flat gray plateau of rock.
Dahl kicked at the door of his helicopter, and watched it break free and tumble to the desert far below.
Drake tutted. “You know there are door handles?”
Dahl didn’t answer. Mai was behind him, using the stick to keep the bird as stable as possible. The Swede sighted one of the RPGs over his shoulder and rose to full height, balanced on the skids.
Mai had one hand holding his belt. Her head was low.
The Sikorsky saw the weapon and tried to evade, but it was too late and far too slow. Dahl allowed an extra moment for the weapon to balance, for the air to still, for his mind to dispel all other distractions.
He breathed.
Then pressed the trigger. The backdraft blew out the door behind him. The grenade flew unerringly at the Sikorsky, exploding against the side and sending a billowing surge of flame through the entire bird. Within seconds it was disintegrating, blazing, falling out of the skies. The chains holding the capstone folded and the unblemished pyramidion was falling out of the skies, catching the light and shining like the sun as it tumbled and plummeted, plunging through flaming bits of fire as it fell, smashing aside broken lumps of metal, destroying the Sikorsky’s blazing cockpit as it, the heavier object, fell faster, approaching the desert floor at terrible speed.
Drake watched Dahl climb back inside and then flung the chopper into a dive, desperate to get back on the ground. He saw the horrendous impact of the capstone, the hard, sandy ground buckling beneath it and sending out waves of force and a plume of dust that spiraled into the sky.
He landed the chopper quickly and jumped out almost as soon as their skids touched the ground. Alicia was tooled up with some of the new weapons and threw a fully-loaded HK to Drake as they passed the chopper’s tail-rotor.
Dahl landed a moment later and caught up.
“That is one big-assed coping stone.” He laughed as they jogged past the fallen capstone. “Gonna look good on somebody’s gate post.”
The black drone currently hovered over it, no doubt streaming the scene in real time back to FrameHub’s lair. As they passed, Mai took a bead on it.
“Wait,” Alicia said. She walked right up to the drone, nodding amiably as it angled toward her. Slowly, she sighted it up with her new Walther PPK. Leaning forward, she spoke slowly.
“Hashtag this, motherfucker.”
She pulled her trigger, blasting the drone out of the sky and into a dozen pieces.
Death, fire and blazing fury surrounded them. They saw none of it, but raced through the turmoil to help their friends.
CHAPTER FORTY FOUR
When the capstone and the helicopter came crashing down, the leaderless mercs lost their nerve and their courage.
Luther helped chase them off, backed by Molokai, Pine and Carey, helped by Karin and her crew. They took out another half dozen before they managed to jump into their vehicles and race back for Cairo, tails firmly between their legs.
In the aftermath, Drake walked carefully to the side of the Great Pyramid, sitting and waiting until the SPEAR team gathered around him. That seemed to be the cue for Luther and Karin to join them, followed by their colleagues.
“It was a close call,” Yorgi said with a straight face.
Crouch planted himself down in the sand, still feeling the effects of Vladimir’s torture. “I think a few months off now would be good.”
Drake nodded, but eyed Luther. “I guess that all depends on the big man.”
Luther looked torn. “What you guys did here today—it’s truly heroic. Never seen the like of it. Trouble is, if I don’t follow my orders then I become a fugitive too.”
Alicia held up a water bottle. “Cheers. It’s fun.”
“You all do seem to be happy with your lot,” Luther admitted.
“Sure,” Alicia said. “Every day I get to wake up, laugh with and fight alongside my friends. What could be better than that?”
“Not much for a soldier,” Molokai admitted, checking out his metal claw and flexing it to ensure it hadn’t been damaged in the battle.
“I bet you have some story,” Alicia said.
“Much more than you could ever imagine.”
“Oh, I dunno, I can imagine some pretty wild scenarios. Just ask Drakey.”
Molokai partly unwrapped the rags from about his face, showing skin partially eaten away and hanging loose. “Do I win?”
Alicia whistled. “Yeah, pal. I can’t even imagine what happened to you.”
“Leprosy is what happened, but that’s a whole different story.”
“You’re a leper? I didn’t
. . . I don’t even know what to do with that information.”
“I was a leper,” Molokai said. “And I appreciate the honesty.”
Drake watched the big Sikorsky burn, looked over the bodies of dead mercs and heard rubble falling from the ragged hole that now existed at the base of the pyramid. The sun was looking like it might finally be thinking about setting, but that didn’t bode well for the good people of Cairo.
“FrameHub,” he said. “Have a big payload of sins to answer for. Tracking them won’t be easy.”
Karin Blake stepped up. “I can help with that. I want to. Those bastards have gotten in the way of my agenda, but I can’t stand by and see them do again what they’ve done to Egypt and Greece. Ending them must come first.”
Drake wondered what her agenda might be, but agreed. There would be time to talk and discuss later. The thing he found hardest was sitting alongside a man he’d just fought with, bled with and admired—the same man that was threatening to end his freedom.
“You game for it, Luther?”
“I have to say,” Hayden spoke up before the soldier could answer. “We should talk to Secretary Crowe first. She put herself in danger contacting us and her wishes were somewhat different.”
Everyone nodded, including Luther.
Soon, Crowe was back on the line, enervated when they explained what had transpired at the pyramid. Again she reiterated her views on Tempest and the weapons of the gods that they sought.
“The Sword of Mars,” she said. “The Chains of Aphrodite. The Flail of Anubis, The Dagger of Nemesis, the Waters of Neptune, The Key of Hades, The Forge of Vulcan, and more. It’s a global hunt, no holds barred and utterly deadly. Believe me, nothing you’ve encountered so far will come close to this.”
“We’re somewhat up against it,” Dahl said diplomatically.
“The splinter group, Tempest, are incredibly well connected. It says a lot that the US Secretary of Defense has to creep around, making covert phone calls. I couldn’t even get next to the President without arousing suspicion as I believe one of his aides to be a mole. But I do know that if we let them gather the weapons of the gods, we’re all dead. Or may as well be.”
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