by Mark Alpert
“No, wrong answer. There’s something called belief, Mr. Swift, and I believe in the Redemption.”
“There’s still time . . . to evacuate the cave . . . and disable the—”
McNair punched him in the face, just below his left eye. The general’s knuckles smashed into his cheekbone. David heard the smack, then felt a sharp arrow of pain. His ears rang and his skull rattled. The pain quickly spread to his eye socket and forehead, and he felt a fresh, blistering agony in his fingers as well. Trapped between his back and the muddy ground, his hands felt like they were burning. There was sulfuric acid in the mud, too.
McNair bent over him, rubbing his knuckles. “You’re the most stubborn sinner I’ve ever met. Even now at the very end you won’t admit you’re wrong.”
“Please . . . please listen . . .”
Before he could say another word, McNair grabbed the front of his shirt and dipped him in the pool again. David tucked his chin against his chest, trying to keep his head as high as possible, but his back touched the surface and the water engulfed his hands and forearms. The pain was tremendous, as bad as submerging them in boiling water. He flailed desperately, screaming, “NO, NO, STOP!” But McNair wouldn’t lift him out of the pool.
David must’ve lost consciousness for a few seconds, because the next thing he remembered was being dropped into the mud again. His arms were jerking uncontrollably. He frantically tried to pull them out of the burning mud, straining so hard he thought his bones would snap. And then he felt something else, something that instantly focused his mind and tamped down the pain. The rope that bound his wrists together had loosened. When he pulled his arms now, he could feel the cord stretching. He remembered Yellowstone again and the hole in his pants. The same thing was happening now to the rope around his wrists. The sulfuric acid was burning through it.
McNair grabbed the front of his shirt once more. “All right, this is your last chance. If you won’t open your eyes, I’ll take them away from you. You understand, Swift? If the next thing that comes out of your mouth isn’t a plea for forgiveness, I’ll put your head under the water and you’ll have a couple of bloody holes where your eyes used to be.”
David nodded. At the same time, he continued jerking his arms. His hands squirmed under his back, tugging at the cords and pushing them deeper into the burning mud. “Okay,” he gasped. “I’m sorry. Very sorry. Please forgive me.”
The general leaned closer, lowering his face until it was right above David’s. “Are you mocking me?”
David shook his head. The pain was making him nauseous again. But the cords were loosening. Just a little more. “No, I swear! Please, God, forgive me!”
McNair stared at him, wrinkling his nose in disgust. Then he turned away from David and called out to Morrison, who stood in the shadows thirty feet away. “Sergeant! The prisoner has apologized for what he’s done. Do you think we should forgive him?”
And while McNair waited for an answer, David’s right hand slid free. The pain in his fingers was excruciating, but he managed to dig them into the mud beneath his back. He grasped a burning handful and flung it in the general’s face.
McNair fell backward, his hands covering his eyes. Morrison shouted, “Hey!” and started running toward them. David’s legs were still bound at the ankles, so he stayed on the ground and rolled like a barrel, moving away from the shallow Sour Tub and toward the edge of the deep underground lake. Then he tumbled into the water and began to swim.
36
MONIQUE STOOD BEHIND THE PILOT’S SEAT IN THE HELICOPTER’S COCKPIT, leaning over Olam’s shoulder. For most of the flight Michael had stood beside her, eagerly inspecting all the dials and switches on the MI-8’s instrument panels, but a few minutes ago he’d gone back to the cabin to look at something else. Now Monique gazed out the cockpit window at the Kopet Dag, which stood like a dark wall at the southern edge of the desert. As the helicopter flew closer, she could see the gray flanks of the mountains, the ridges that rose precipitously from the desert floor. She also saw the massive spurs jutting sideways, and the rock slides that fanned down the slopes. And when they were quite close, less than a mile away, she saw the breach in the wall. A paved road climbed from the desert to a narrow gap between two ridges. This was the mountain pass that led to Kuruzhdey.
“Interesting,” Olam observed. His grasped the MI-8’s control stick with his right hand and flipped a switch on the overhead panel with his left. “The road is empty. And it’s almost two o’clock in the afternoon. You’d usually see at least a few cars or trucks at this time of day, yes?”
Monique gazed at the highway below. Olam was right, there was no traffic whatsoever. “What do you think? Someone’s blocking the roads?”
“It looks like the whole area has been evacuated. There was no movement in the village we just passed.”
“Well, if the Turkmen Army is cooperating with Brother Cyrus now, they could easily clear the area. But why the hell would they agree to do it? What’s in it for them?”
Olam shrugged. “Money, I suppose. Or maybe they were intimidated. The Qliphoth are very powerful. They seem to have friends everywhere.”
Monique recalled her first conversation with Olam, back in Shalhevet, when he’d warned them about the Qliphoth. “Devils, right? That’s what the word means in Hebrew?”
“Literally, it means ‘shells’ or ‘husks.’ The Sephirot shine God’s light on the universe, and the Qliphoth block the light.” He extended his hand toward the cockpit window, pointing at the mountains up ahead and the deep shadows between them. “But the Kabbalah tells us that even the Qliphoth are part of God. They serve a purpose, too. When we break the Qliphoth, when we crack open the shells, God’s light shines even more strongly, yes?”
Monique nodded, although she didn’t really understand him. She’d never had much use for religion. The concept of God had always seemed unnecessary to her, like the luminiferous ether that was once believed to pervade the universe. She’d learned to make her own way in life, without help from God or anyone else. But now her atheism was starting to waver. At this point she was willing to accept help from any corner. So as Olam guided the helicopter into the mountains and the other MI-8 trailed a quarter mile behind, Monique offered a silent prayer. If anyone’s up there, she thought, now’s the time to show Your face. Stop this crazy fuck Cyrus from destroying Your Creation. And please save David. Please save David.
THE WATER WAS WARM AND DARK. DAVID SWAM DOWN TO THE ROCKY BOTtom of the lake, sweeping his arms in long, powerful strokes, his muscles remembering the long-ago days when he’d swum for the Stuyvesant High School team. His burned forearms hurt like hell, but the pain eased as he glided underwater and put some distance between himself and the Sour Tub. The sulfuric acid was so diluted in the lake that he could even open his eyes, although he couldn’t see anything in the dark water. He kept swimming in the same direction, heading toward the grottoes on the far side of the lake. His feet were still bound, so he pumped his legs like a mermaid’s tail and pulled himself forward with cupped hands. He stayed underwater until his lungs were bursting, then quietly surfaced and took a quick breath. Then he dove again.
The second time he surfaced he found himself inside one of the grottoes. It was so dark in there, he could hide in the recesses and no one would see him. He heard water lapping against a rock wall, so he headed for the noise and bumped against a ledge that was a couple of feet below the surface. He clambered onto the ledge and pulled up his knees so he could tug at the rope around his ankles. Luckily, these cords had also gotten splashed with sulfuric acid, and after several seconds he was able to loosen them and slip his feet out. Then the pain in his arms returned with a vengeance. He held them above the water, glad that he couldn’t see his burned skin in the darkness. But he could see the glowing hands of his watch, which was still ticking. It was 1:49. Eleven minutes until detonation.
He heard shouting from the other side of the lake, about two hundred feet away. In the glare f
rom the floodlights he saw soldiers running toward the Sour Tub, where McNair and Morrison were still crouched. The soldiers huddled around them, some of them talking into their radios. Then three of the soldiers removed their boots and began taking off their uniforms. They’re going to dive into the lake and come after me, David thought. The only question is whether they’ll find me before the bomb goes off.
He pushed himself away from the rock wall and started swimming diagonally across the lake, heading for the tent where Little Boy was. He knew it was insane—the tent was surrounded by armed guards. And now that he’d assaulted General McNair, it was even less likely that any of the soldiers would listen to him. But he didn’t know what else to do. He swam as fast as he could, and in two minutes he was treading water in the part of the lake that was closest to the tent. He was about thirty feet offshore and the tent was another forty feet from the lake’s edge. He was close enough that he could see the faces of the soldiers.
“Hey!” he shouted. “There’s a bomb in that tent! Do you hear me?”
The soldiers saw him. They stood there for a moment, just staring. Then six of them started jogging toward the lake’s edge.
“No, you have to get out of here!” David shouted. “Everyone has to get out! There’s a goddamn nuke in that tent and it’s gonna—”
A bullet streaked into the water a few feet to his left. David ducked below the surface and dove to the lake bottom, swimming away again. Jesus, he thought, it’s hopeless. All the soldiers would die in the blast, and he would, too. Cyrus had planned the operation too well. It was impossible to stop it now.
David stayed under as long as he could. He knew the soldiers were waiting for him to come up and would probably blow his head off when he did. But no shots rang out when he finally surfaced. Instead, he saw Sergeant Morrison swimming toward him, very fast. The soldier’s tattooed arms stroked furiously, slapping the water, and his blond head skimmed the surface like a bullet.
David dove again, heading for the dark grottoes. He went deep and glided underwater for at least half a minute. Then he rose to take a breath, but at the point where he thought he would break the surface he banged his head against something. The blow disoriented him. Twisting in the pitch-black water, he raised his hands and felt slippery limestone above him. He’d swum into an underwater cave. He turned around and tried to swim out, but he immediately smacked into a rocky wall. Clawing at the rock, he turned parallel to the wall and swam alongside it. He tried to rise to the surface and bumped his head against the cave’s ceiling again. Panicking, he swam in the opposite direction, his arms flailing. He couldn’t hold his breath much longer. His chest was tight and dense and burning and he felt an overwhelming urge to open his mouth and let the black water rush in. His whole body convulsed with horror.
Then he raised his head one more time and broke free of the water.
He took several sputtering breaths. Then he noticed that Sergeant Morrison wasn’t anywhere nearby. And there were no soldiers shooting at him from the lake’s edge. In fact, he wasn’t in the underground lake at all. He was in the oval pool in the adjacent chamber, the one he’d seen after coming down the backdoor tunnel with Nicodemus. David realized he must’ve gone through an underwater tunnel that connected the oval pool to the lake in the larger chamber. Turning to the left now, he saw the shaft of light from the circular passageway between the chambers, where Sergeant Morrison had kicked him in the ribs. But the sergeant was no longer at his post, of course.
David swam to the rock shelf at the edge of the pool and heaved himself out of the water. Then he looked at his watch, but its face was cracked—he must’ve smashed it against the limestone while he was struggling underwater. The glowing hands had stopped at 1:54.
Breathing fast, he peered into the darkness, looking for the backdoor tunnel. Jesus, what he wouldn’t give for a flashlight! After a few seconds, though, he felt a cool draft in the chamber and followed it to a five-foot-high opening in the rock wall. He stepped into the tunnel and was about to begin the long, dark climb to the surface when he heard a shout behind him. He turned around and in the dim light he saw Sergeant Morrison in the oval pool, swimming toward the rock shelf.
“HEY!” Morrison shouted. “HEY! HE’S ESCAPING!”
OLAM WAS GETTING FRUSTRATED. HE FLEW THE MI-8 DIRECTLY ABOVE THE Kuruzhdey district, but neither he nor Monique saw any trucks or Land Cruisers in the mountain pass below. There were wooded ravines and arid plateaus between the steep ridges and even a few concrete structures scattered along the paved road, but no vehicles or people or movement of any kind. Olam spotted a radio tower on a summit a few miles away, but when he flew closer to investigate he saw only a small shed at the base of the tower, too small to hold Excalibur. So he circled back to Kuruzhdey and inspected the mountain pass again, flying below the ridges and inside the ravines and checking every cliff and promontory. Monique got a sinking feeling in her stomach. Maybe Michael had misheard Angel when he’d revealed the name of the True Believers’ destination. Or maybe Angel had lied to Michael, or just said the wrong name by mistake.
Then Olam pointed at the ground. “Ah, look over there! You see the tracks?”
Monique looked down at a sandy plateau between two parallel ridges. She saw a few brown clumps of vegetation on the ground, but nothing else. “What tracks?”
“It’s a landing zone! It looks like a pair of large helicopters took off from there not long ago.”
She leaned a little closer to the cockpit window. Near the middle of the plateau was a circle of ground where the sand had been disturbed. No, two circles. And several converging tracks led from the circles to an indentation at the base of one of the ridges. “You’re right,” she said. “Something happened here.”
“Let’s take a look, yes?” Olam picked up the radio transmitter and said something in Hebrew to Lieutenant Halutz, the pilot of the helicopter behind them. Then they started to descend.
DAVID SCRAMBLED UP THE SLOPING TUNNEL. THERE WAS NO LIGHT AT ALL and the tunnel’s floor was a rocky chute, covered with shifting slabs and stones, but he lowered his head and pumped his legs and leaped forward into the darkness. He planted his feet blindly and groped the tunnel’s walls. Every ten yards or so he stumbled to the ground and yelped in pain as his burned forearms scraped against the rock, but he didn’t stop, he couldn’t stop. He thought of his journey down this tunnel with Nicodemus and Hatchet Face and tried like hell to remember how long it was. A thousand feet? Two thousand? And he thought of his broken watch, the hands stopped at 1:54. He had no idea how much time had passed since then.
Then he heard shouts again, echoing up the tunnel. The rocky walls suddenly turned visible, catching the stray light from the flashlight beams that were lancing behind him. He ran faster now because he could see the stones underfoot, and he wasn’t afraid of the soldiers anymore, he wasn’t afraid of anything except that gun tube at the bottom of the cavern, the steel pipe filled with fifty kilograms of uranium. And as he ran he shouted, “BOMB! BOMB! BOMB!” and he thought again of Lucille rushing out of the Turkmen depot, hooking one arm around him and the other around Monique and shoving them both out the door. Then he saw the mouth of the tunnel, the blessed circle of light, and with a great yell he charged forward and burst into the open air.
But he didn’t stop running. He dashed across the flat ground at the foot of the mountain, heading for the shelter of a ravine on the other side of the road. He crossed the strip of asphalt and hurtled down a sandy slope. Then he felt a push from behind, and a pair of tattooed arms encircled his waist. Sergeant Morrison tackled him and they tumbled into the ravine together, jouncing along the ground until they crashed into a clump of dry bushes. David landed on his back, the wind knocked out of him, but Morrison clambered to his knees and raised his fist. His blond head was silhouetted against the sky, and above the sergeant’s shoulder David could see the top of the mountain they’d just escaped. Morrison pulled back his arm, aiming carefully. But before he could th
row the punch, a vast rumble shook the roots of the Kopet Dag, and the mountain behind him began to fall.
37
THE PRESIDENT WAS SLEEPING SOUNDLY IN THE WHITE HOUSE MASTER BEDroom when the Secret Service agents burst in and turned on the lights. Agent Thompson—the president’s favorite night-shift agent—came to the bed holding a maroon bathrobe. The other agent threw off the bedcovers.
“I’m sorry, Mr. President,” Agent Thompson said. “We have to leave right now.” He grasped the president’s elbow and lifted him off the mattress.
“What?” He was groggy and confused. He wondered where his wife was, then remembered she was at Camp David with the girls. Jesus, he thought, what time was it? “Come on, guys, I’m in my boxers. Let me get—”
“We have clothes for you on Marine One, sir.” Thompson and his partner helped the president put on the bathrobe, guiding his arms through the sleeves. Then the agents hustled him out of the bedroom and down the hallway.
As they quickstepped toward the stairs, Thompson raised his left hand to his mouth. “Thompson to Blowtorch,” he said into the microphone on his shirt cuff. “We have Renegade. Heading for the South Lawn. Over.”
The president was wide-awake now and starting to worry. There had been false alarms before, when the Secret Service had rushed him out of the White House because some idiot in a private plane had flown into the protected airspace. But never in the middle of the night like this. “What’s going on?” he asked.
“Don’t know, sir,” Thompson replied. “But we’re taking you to Andy.”
Shit, he thought. This was no false alarm. Andy was the code name for Andrews Air Force Base, the field where Air Force One was stationed. Whatever the nature of this emergency, the Pentagon had deemed it serious enough to warrant moving the commander in chief out of Washington.
