The Genesis Cypher (Warner & Lopez Book 6)

by Dean Crawford

  A silence followed Hellerman’s reading as he watched Ethan and Lopez for their reaction.

  ‘Could just be more drug–addled ravings,’ Lopez said, dismissive as ever. ‘There’s a whole industry that’s been built up over the predictions of people like Nostradamus or whatever, but nothing they’ve ever written has been proven to be a true prophecy.’

  ‘I agree,’ Hellerman replied, ‘but this tablet was written thousands of years ago and contains nothing that suggests the author stood to gain anything. I did a little checking of things, and came up with this.’

  Hellerman held out the piece of paper he had been carrying with him.

  ‘The stars traversing the sky at night could refer to modern satellites in orbit, catching the light of the sun after it’s already set. A second sun shines over the north could refer to the recent meteor that came down over Russia: it was supersonic debris and the shockwave shattered windows for hundreds of miles. The great vault I believe is a reference to the diamond mines of southern Africa – so many diamonds have now been mined that they sit in warehouses piled roof–high and are technically worthless. Companies like DeBeers keep them secret to artificially inflate the price of diamonds on the market.’

  ‘Pity Muhammar doesn’t know about that,’ Lopez said to Ethan with a nudge.

  ‘What about the rest?’ Ethan asked Hellerman. ‘Blood falling from the sky? How is that possible?’

  Hellerman grabbed a newspaper article and showed it to Ethan and Lopez.

  ‘The land of the ice running free is a reference to the Arctic, which due to climate change is now ice free in the northern hemisphere’s summer and allows for the passage of ships. As for the blood falling from the sky, this article is from Kerala in India: blood red rain fell there in 2001, confounding experts who claim to have found alien DNA inside the rain that even looks like blood cells.’

  Hellerman gestured to another article.

  ‘Giant tortoises guarding the walls of Canaan: Canaan is what is now known as Palestine, and here we have images of tanks outside the wall that Israel is building to block the Palestinians inside, apartheid all over again.’

  Even Lopez was now paying close attention as Hellerman went on.

  ‘The only thing I can’t figure out is the line about the earth rising to swallow the sky, which may possibly refer to a volcano or similar, and words from human skin. However, I don’t have to elaborate on what the great union might mean.’

  ‘The Soviet Union,’ Ethan said. ‘It might be a prophecy of the return to Communism for Russia, of Putin’s rise to power.’

  Hellerman nodded.

  ‘The most important thing to remember here is that although the Russians were able to steal the photographs of the tablet, they only got images of one side.’

  Ethan grinned. ‘Then they’ve only got half of the information.’

  ‘That still might be enough for the Russian president or those working for him to get close to what they’re searching for,’ Hellerman warned.

  ‘And if he’s sending people out based on similar prophecies, perhaps by the girls they’ve abducted, then he will merely be seeing himself as fulfilling his destiny regardless of what wars may come between Russia and victory.’

  Ethan leaned close to the screen.

  ‘We’re moving, now. Do we have a contact here we can trust?’

  ‘I’ve already deployed him,’ Hellerman said. ‘His name is Talal and he will meet you at Akroum near the border. Hurry, I don’t know what’s going on here but General Nellis hasn’t returned from a meeting with the President and I know that Homeland are breathing down his back. Watch yourselves.’

  ***

  XXIX

  Akroum, Lebanon

  ‘This is as close as I can take you without us being monitored by the border patrols.’

  The battered old truck clattered to a halt by the roadside in a cloud of dust as Ethan climbed out of the cab. He paid the driver, a farmer who had agreed to drive them out to the north, while Lopez and Talal hauled their kit from the rear of the vehicle. Ethan stood back and watched as the truck turned about and drove away into the distance, abandoning them on the lonely hillside.

  ‘Great,’ Lopez said. ‘Now what?’

  ‘We walk,’ Talal replied, a rather skinny Lebanese DIA agent who Ethan figured had been hired for his local knowledge rather than his field skills. ‘The Syrian border is only ten kilometres to the north.’

  ‘Only ten,’ Lopez echoed as she shielded her hands to look up into the burning blue sky. ‘That’s a relief, ‘cause I thought it might be a long way and all. Like five kilometres.’

  ‘Stop complaining,’ Ethan smiled as they set off. ‘You said you could do with the exercise.’

  ‘Yeah but there’s nothing and nobody out here if the exercise gets too much,’ Lopez pointed out.

  Ethan knew that they were in a remote and poor area of Lebanon. Some forty miles north of Beirut, they had travelled out through Qubayyat and Aandaqet to this barren region named after one of its highest mountains. Talal gestured with animated enthusiasm as they trekked along a dusty old road heading north.

  ‘This mountainous region is abundant with archeological sites and remnants from Phoenician, Greek, Roman, Byzantine, and Islamic civilizations,’ he explained. ‘There are rock necropolises and ancient tombs made of stone slabs and carved into cliffs. Down there in Akroum itself you will find a Roman temple and a large Byzantine church dedicated to Mar Shamshoum al–Jabbar.’

  ‘That’s fascinating,’ Lopez grumbled as they walked. ‘I didn’t know you were a professor as well as a DIA agent. Where do the traffickers hide their cargo before trying to get out into the Mediterranean?’

  ‘We don’t know yet,’ Talal admitted, ‘but we’re sure they come through here with stock bound for Europe, mostly the sex trade but some general slaves too.’

  Ethan winced at Talal’s casual reference to the horrendous suffering that the girls being smuggled out of Syria went through, but as it had seemed when he had been in Iraq, the scale and frequency of the suffering became so great that people became almost desensitized to it, as though it were a normal part of their lives. Sure, they detested it, but nobody was shocked any more.

  ‘Ah, here, look at this,’ Talal said.

  Ethan saw a well preserved temple before them, the cella of which was divided by a gigantic arch. Nearby were the ruins of a larger temple, reduced to what looked like foundations in the desert.

  ‘Wadi es–Sebaa,’ Talal announced grandly, ‘the Valley of the Lion. These are monuments that date back to the Babylonians!’

  Ethan could see two massive obelisks standing on the hillside, one representing a figure wearing a tiara and confronting a lion that was standing on its hind legs. Ninety feet or so further up the hill was a conical stele that looked oddly out of place.

  ‘What’s that?’ he asked Talal.

  ‘Shir as–Sanam,’ Talal replied, ‘or the Cliff of the Statue. Nobody knows who built it, but presumably the Babylonians were busy here.’

  Lopez stopped near something lying in the rocks, and she leaned down and picked up what looked like a rusted shell casing that she showed to Ethan.

  ‘Looks like the Babylonians weren’t the only ones busy out here,’ she said.

  Talal looked at the shell and nodded. ‘The Lebanese Shia group Hezbollah sent its fighters on an offensive along Lebanon’s eastern border with Syria, fighting alongside government forces to dislodge opposition forces from strongholds in the mountains near Qalamoun.’

  Ethan looked up sharply at the surrounding hills. ‘Qalamoun is a fair way south of here.’

  ‘The area is important for the Syrians for securing a key road which connects the capital Damascus to Homs, and then on to President Bashar al–Assad’s stronghold of Latakia on the western coast,’ Talal said. ‘The rebel forces are guerrillas, using this region as their hideout.’

  Lopez was also keenly searching the hillside for signs of enemy combata
nts who would not hesitate to abduct a westerner for the leverage it might give them in the conflict.

  ‘If Hezbollah is operating out here, we can’t predict how they’ll react to us if we’re spotted,’ she said.

  ‘The US Government is providing funds to Hezbollah fighters,’ Talal said, ‘to help prevent Syria’s war from spilling over into Lebanon, but we all know what Daesh want, and that’s as many people and countries at war with each other as possible. We must tread carefully.’

  Even as he spoke, Talal’s cell phone rang in his pocket and he answered it. Ethan listened to the lively discussion in Arabic as Talal gesticulated and asked questions, then he shut the phone off.

  ‘We’ve got radio traffic from out of Homs,’ he reported. ‘Some big shot Russian colonel there has just led a convoy out of the city with military escort.’

  ‘That must be our guy Mishkin,’ Lopez said.

  Talal nodded. ‘The frequency is heavily shielded but your National Security Agency is passing all Signals Intelligence from this region to the Lebanese government and they decrypted it. The report mentioned Operation Orakul.’

  ‘The same one in the reports we saw,’ Lopez said’.

  Ethan nodded.

  We’re going to need some support of our own,’ he said as he reached for the satellite phone. ‘Hellerman’s got Apache helicopters on stand–by waiting for our call.’

  ‘Your call could be traced,’ Talal warned. ‘The Russians are probably assisting the Syrian forces in the same way the Americans are helping us.’

  ‘That’s a chance we’re going to have to take,’ Ethan said as he dialed a number. ‘We can’t just stroll to the border and snatch these girls out from under an armed escort without support.’

  Lopez narrowed her eyes at him. ‘What did you have in mind?’

  Ethan raised a hand to forestall her as the line connected.

  ‘Warner, operations, three–five–zero–nine–four: request immediate close air support.’

  *

  Defense Intelligence Agency,

  Washington DC

  ‘Warner, operations, three–five–zero–nine–four: request immediate close air support.’

  The DIA’s ARIES Watch Station picked up the signal immediately, the call being broadcast live over the tanoys inside the watch room. Hellerman leaped out of his seat and dashed across to the terminal pool as he checked his watch.

  ‘Seventeen hundred twelve eastern seaboard time,’ one of the pool operators replied to Ethan’s call, ‘fourteen hundred twelve local. State resources.’

  Ethan’s voice replied, his tones easily recognizable as though he was in the same room.

  ‘Infantry plus attack helicopters, as fast as you can. Local intelligence suggests movement of civilians under duress by Russian forces to the south west of Homs.’

  Hellerman grabbed the microphone as he replied.

  ‘Engaging Russian forces could result in an international incident.’

  ‘Being caught red handed abducting children out of Syria against their wishes is the justification,’ Ethan replied briskly. ‘The Russians won’t sing about it as long as we have evidence of what they’ve been doing. Target our satellite signal and get on it, because by now the Russians will know we’re here!’

  Ethan shut the line off in customary style, leaving Hellerman no choice but to go along with the plan.

  ‘Do it,’ Hellerman said to the operator. ‘Any assets within range, low profile essential.’

  ***

  XXX

  Syria

  Aaron Mitchell lay prone against a low ridge as he peered through a pair of collapsible binoculars down into a shallow valley. The city of Homs was visible to the east, a gray smear in the haze that sparkled as distant windows reflected the searing sunlight.

  A single arterial road travelled out from the distant city and snaked its way through the empty deserts past the settlement of Khurbat Gazi and on toward the coast at Al–Hamidiyah. At a point just a mile west of where Mitchell lay the road passed within a mile of the Lebanon border, demarked by the Al–Kabur river. Like so many of the world’s borders it was guarded, but sufficiently vast that it was easy for small groups to slip through as they fled the savage civil war raging throughout Syria.

  Mitchell watched as he waited, and behind him he heard the soft noises being made by a number of highly trained operatives who had been hired by Garrett and Jarvis to assist him. Aaron was still a fine field operative, but he was getting too old now for the rough and tumble of direct confrontation with armed soldiers, especially when they were likely to be as numerous as the Russian contingent due to pass this way.

  ‘They’ll be using civilian vehicles or Syrian military trucks,’ he briefed the ten men behind him. ‘The Russians have a legal presence in Syria but they won’t want to alert the media or the UN to anything else they’re up so it will have to be a small convoy, nothing that attracts too much attention.’

  ‘If they’re stealing children out of Homs for Russia,’ one of the soldiers asked, ‘why would they transport them west? Wouldn’t they head north toward Chechnya or Georgia?’

  ‘They’re heading for Bassel Al–Assad International Airport,’ Mitchell explained. ‘It’s held by the Russians, who will take the abductees they wish to keep with them to Russia and sell the rest to dealers who will transport them into Europe. They won’t risk going too far north first because of the threat from rebel forces both here and in Chechnya, so they’ll head west to the coast first and then north. This location is the best position to sell off any unwanted baggage to smugglers inside Lebanon before they move on.’

  Mitchell turned to look at the men behind him.

  ‘We won’t have long before the Lebanese authorities are alerted to any firefight here on the border. They’re already nervous of any advance made by the Islamic militants of Daesh toward the Mediterranean and will likely react with extreme aggression if they locate us. Our purpose is to hit the Russians hard, grab the girls and get the hell out as quickly and quietly as we can.’

  To that end, Mitchell had positioned his team to the north of the main road, Syrian traffic being driven on the right and thus passing them by at close range. Banks of trees close to the river provided cover, and the river itself a simple escape route. Four compact Futura Commando assault inflatables waited by the river bank, selected for their ability to provide a quick getaway into Lebanese territory where the team could call in an extraction via road using Garrett’s virtually limitless financial power.

  Mitchell checked the road again, only sparse traffic heading east but a somewhat busier flow passing them by headed west, away from Syria. He settled in again and waited patiently in the stifling heat, grateful for the limited shade afforded them by the trees. As long as they spotted their target far enough in advance and no local hero was stupid enough to get in their way, Mitchell and his men would be mission–complete and out of the area long before the Russians could mount an effective defense.

  *

  ‘See anything yet?’ Lopez asked.

  Ethan shook his head as he crouched in the bushes on the south side of the main road, watching the flow of traffic heading past them.

  ‘They’re gonna be in unmarked vehicles to avoid attracting attention. If they’re smart they’ll have a couple of cars out front and in vanguard to give covering fire if the main convoy is attacked, so we need to pick those off first.’

  Talal and Lopez watched as Ethan pulled a pair of hand grenades from their kit.

  ‘Subtle as ever,’ she observed. ‘And once we’ve presumably heroically brought an armed Russian convoy to a halt with just a couple of rifles and some grenades, then what?’

  Ethan gestured to the road before them.

  ‘As long as no idiot gets in our way, we can use smoke grenades to block the view of their support guards and hit the main convoy hard and fast. We cross under the highway on the riverbank and get to the truck. The sooner we alert the Lebanese to our presence the
better, as they’ll be under orders to repel any armed troops they see near the border.’

  ‘And our own support?’ Lopez asked.

  ‘The Russian and Lebanese both know what an Apache attack helicopter looks like and they know to run when they see one,’ Ethan assured her. ‘We make as much noise and smoke as we can, use the Lebanese to cover our escape with the girls and then the Apaches to extract us and get into RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus.’

  Talal frowned.

  ‘So we’re using the Lebanese to fight the Russians, and then hoping they’ll both run away when the Americans arrive?’

  ‘Clever, no?’ Ethan grinned at him.

  Lopez rolled her eyes, and then her gaze fixed on something further up the road.

  ‘Incoming.’

  Ethan turned and saw a pair of four–ton trucks still some way off in the distance. The only thing that marked them out as unusual was the fact that they were more or less identical in size, color and markings. Although that could have been the result of perhaps the transport of goods or livestock out of Homs, it was a fact that Syria’s civil war meant that it was hardly a haven for exports of anything other than frightened refugees.

  Ethan peered into the distance and spotted a pair of cars moving ahead of the trucks, close together.

  ‘That’s the one,’ he said confidently. ‘Be ready.’

  Talal looked nervously at Lopez. ‘They’ll be armed.’

  ‘They always are,’ she replied wearily as she pulled an AR–16 assault rifle from their kit bag and checked the weapon over before slamming a fresh clip in and cocking the weapon. ‘Best you get your head down and make for the truck. Get the engine running and be ready to meet up with us facing in the direction of away from here, got it?’