But King’s eyes were focussed on one thing only.
The sole occupant of the ghost ship.
“Benny,” Raine hissed angrily. “We’ve gotta go. The soldiers could be here any second.”
But King wasn’t listening. “It’s him,” he said reverently. He knelt down in front of an obscure mound of vegetation and began to carefully peel back the growth. Gently, layer by layer, King peeled back the living cocoon of jungle life to reveal the skeletal remains of a large man beneath. Just as he had expected, the tarnished remains of a brass sword and dagger hung from rotten scabbards around its waist. “It’s him,” he repeated. “It’s Kha’um.”
A noise whipped Raine’s attention around to the hole they had entered through. The flash of red feathers revealed a bright parrot taking flight.
“That’s great,” he said through clenched teeth. “Now it’s time to-”
“He’s holding something,” King interrupted. Raine’s keen eyes scanned their surroundings, searching for danger, while King’s expert fingers uncovered the skeleton’s hands.
Raine did a double take when he saw what he was holding. “Another mask?”
King carefully extracted the second mask from the dead man’s grip and examined it. He removed the first from the purse he had hastily tied back together and compared the two.
“It’s very similar to the one we found in the temple,” he explained and sure enough Raine could make out the similarities- the distorted, near-human shape, the large eye holes, the bared teeth. The colour, however, was quite different. Instead of the blood-red glow of the mask found in Xibalba, the second mask’s metallic composition was a much more subtle, slightly ochre tint. It was also composed out of a single piece of metal, rather than a composite of two.
“It’s a fake,” King realised. “A copy of the real mask. The Xibalbans must have fashioned it to use as a decoy, in public ceremonies or when it was a risk of being damaged.” He glanced sadly at Kha’um’s remains. “He came all this way to find the final piece of the mask, only to steal a fake.”
Raine shrugged. “You can’t win ‘em all,” he said and started for the exit.
“Hang on, what’s this?”
“Now what?!” Raine snapped, swinging around. His irritation was lost on King as he pulled free the skeleton’s other hand. In it, he grasped a single, flat piece of bone, polished smooth. It was roughly four inches in length but both edges had been cut into a knobbly shape.
“What is that?” Raine asked.
“It’s a map,” King said wondrously.
Raine frowned, unconvinced. “Looks like a hair-comb if you ask me.”
“It’s a tactile map,” he explained, closing his eyes and feeling the contours of the bone. “These edges are carved to depict a coastline. A number of cultures use them for navigating in the dark. Trust me, it’s a map.” He opened his eyes and stared at the piece of bone, noting a slight circular depression on what he assumed to be the bottom edge. A metaphoric X. “It’s a treasure map.”
Raine raised a sceptical eyebrow, but before he could utter a response a definite crunch of underbrush sounded from the far side of the ship’s hull. Both men spun to face the sound and saw a human-shaped shadow dash down the ship’s length.
“Now it’s really time to go,” Raine told King and this time the archaeologist did not protest.
They crept low and fast towards the hole and Raine went through first, wary, watching, scanning the jungle. Deciding it was all clear, he gestured for King to follow.
They stepped out of the ship’s shadow and-
Six men in jungle-camouflaged NBC suits burst out of cover from behind the trees and from beneath the underbrush, weapons raised. They shouted at them to raise their hands and, totally surrounded, they had no choice but to comply.
“United States Special Forces!” one of the masked soldiers declared. “Identify yourselves.”
A wave of almost uncontrollable relief washed over King. “Thank god,” he sighed, noticing the iconic Stars and Stripes of his country’s closest ally’s flag on the man’s arm. “I’m Doctor Benjamin King, part of the Sarisariñama Expedition.”
“Where’s the mask, Doctor?” he demanded brusquely. For a moment, King thought about resisting but, totally surrounded, what could he do? Slowly, he removed the lady’s purse from over his shoulder, suddenly feeling very conscious of the less-than-masculine shade of pink, and handed it to one of the soldiers.
The soldier efficiently ran a radiation detector over the two masks he discovered within and the oddly shaped map. The fake mask and the map produced little more than a bleep from the handheld device, but the original mask sent it crazy, a constant clicking noise reverberating out. “Over five hundred thousand Curies,” he said to the leader. Another soldier stepped forward and dropped a black, hard-shell rucksack from his back. He unclipped the air-tight seal and placed the irradiated mask into the padded interior.
“Bag the whole lot,” the leader ordered, just to be on the safe side.
As the team hastily packed away all of the materials, the soldier with the detector scanned Raine and King. He looked back at the leader, his expression hidden behind his NBC’s hood, but the confusion in his voice was evident. “I’m only picking up about thirty Rads in each of them. That’s not possible. Most of the science team has sustained a dose of about six hundred Rads.”
Without being requested, another soldier double-checked the first’s readings. “I concur. No more than thirty Rads. They’re clean.”
The leader nodded and proceeded to remove his suit’s hood to reveal an ugly face with puckered skin and a nose broken many times. “We’ve been searching everywhere for you, Doctor King. The expedition base camp is secure. Medical teams are attending to the sick and evac choppers are on their way.”
It’s over, King sighed, his mind suddenly catching up with the messages of pain and exhaustion his body had been trying to feed it for hours. It was all he could do not to crash upon the ground and weep.
The leader turned to Raine. “Identify yourself, mister.”
King snapped his head around to look at the man he had just faced life and death with. We’ll find somewhere secure for you to hide until they arrive. Then I’m out of here, his words repeated in King’s head.
But Raine had never had the chance to get away.
He kept his head down, staring at the ground, his face lost in shadow.
“I asked you a question!” the soldier shouted, unused to his orders being ignored.
Slowly, Raine raised his head. King heard a gasp of surprise and then another soldier stepped forward, ripping his own hood off his head to reveal the smooth, handsome features of a young African-American.
“Boss?” the man asked, shocked.
“Boss?” King repeated, glancing at Raine.
At that moment, the team leader slammed the butt of his rifle into the side of Raine’s head, knocking him out cold.
21:
It’s All Politics
United Nations Headquarters,
New York City, U.S.A.
There was chaos in the United Nations Security Council chamber as the Chinese Permanent Representative fought off the indignant attacks from the other fourteen member states.
Alexander Langley kept his silence, trying to hide the bemused expression which twitched at the corners of his mouth.
His nation’s actions, the Chinese representative argued, differed in no way to the actions that any other nation, having intercepted the information the Sarisariñama Expedition had sent to UNESCO, would have taken.
“How convenient was it then,” Ambassador Chal Chan had said at one point, “that the United States happened to have a Special Forces team within range of the beleaguered scientists when their mayday came through?”
All eyes had turned to Langley. Tall and lean, his dark skin betraying his African ancestry, Alexander Langley had a kind face and an ever-ready, wry grin.
Just into his fifties, there was no denying that there was more salt than pepper in his close-cropped hair. Crows-feet seemed to wander at will around his eyes and a couple of pale ‘age spots’ had appeared on his cheeks in recent years.
Of course, the Chinese representative was right. The U.S. Special Forces team was very conveniently located to be the first rapid response team on site.
He had known the moment he had stepped into the Oval Office two days ago that far more was going on upon the summit of Sarisariñama than an outbreak of Weil’s Disease. He had listened with a mixture of shock, fear and interest as the CIA Director had, at the President’s request, told him about the tachyon radiation that had been detected in Karen Weingarten’s body.
Emitted from an ancient artefact which the expedition had unearthed only the previous day, the tachyons, he was told, had the potential to unleash an uncapped amount of energy.
A bomb, the likes of which the world had never seen.
Of course, Langley wasn’t naive enough to think that the U.S. Government, especially if the Agency was involved, didn’t want this technology for itself. He had been on the ground in enough missions the world over to know that the morals of Washington were no higher than Moscow’s or Beijing’s. But the United Nations had been alerted to the situation, and that meant they couldn’t just swoop in and steal the mask without creating the same international crisis that the Chinese had managed to stir up.
In fact, by having Langley be the one to talk to the U.N. Director-General and the President of the Security Council, requesting an emergency session, the U.S. had not only saved face, but had also stepped up onto the moral high ground. They had sent a rescue team, securing both the mask and the stricken scientists and overseeing their evacuation to the States.
He knew that, secretly, it must have galled President Harper to hand over the Moon Mask to U.N. custody, despite his grandiose speech about international cooperation.
“Unlike the splitting of the atom, it will be down to all nations to decide the fate of the tachyon,” he had proclaimed in a closed session.
It was all politics.
In response to Chal Chan’s accusation, Langley had spoken the truth. “Very convenient, Mister Ambassador,” he replied, smiling.
Now, chaos reigned in the ‘Norwegian Room’, the unofficial name for the Security Council Chamber. Gifted by Norway, a huge mural depicted a Phoenix rising from the ashes, symbolic of the rebuilding of the world following World War Two.
It was in this room that the third such war had come perilously close to being declared on numerous occasions in the decades since. Now, Langley feared another ‘close-call’ was on the horizon.
China’s actions could not go ignored or unpunished, yet in so doing, this hornets’ nest would only get stirred up even further.
Demands were shouted out by indignant representatives, calling for vetoes on Chinese trade, cuts to aid, the withdrawing of loans from the World Bank. Some even called for China’s expulsion from its permanent seat on the council, citing its appalling human rights record as further evidence for such a drastic action.
But Alex Langley was a firm believer in the old adage about keeping one’s friends close, one’s enemies closer.
China was one of the ‘Big Five’, the only five countries who had a permanent seat on the Security Council, alongside Great Britain, France, Russia and the United States. It was also one of the world’s fastest growing economies and had the potential to one day become the world’s second superpower alongside the United States. At least, as part of the Security Council, America and the U.N. could keep a close eye on them.
But, for now, the arguments which had slipped into a slanging match were getting off track. The current Security Council President, the representative from France, had been unable to reign in the uncontrolled outbursts for the last three minutes. Now, voices carried across the room, angrily shouting at one another, some in support of China, others strongly against. The president struggled to make his high pitched voice heard over the clamour and failed miserably to restore order.
Alex Langley had the Security Council members exactly where he wanted them.
“Mister President!” he called out, his voice calm, smooth and confident. Those around him heard his words and quietened slightly. It had a knock-on effect. Only a very few of the most experienced, and foolhardy, ambassadors dared to go it against this U.S. representative.
Coming from a military background, with no history of diplomacy or politics behind him, Langley’s appointment to the post two years ago had been a shock to all. Many had laughed at his inexperience. All who had done so had come to regret it.
“Mister President,” he said again, his voice ever-so-slightly louder, carrying above the few muted debates that continued.
“Mister President,” he said one last time, his tone, despite its calm, challenging anyone to dare talk over him. All fell silent now, every pair of eyes watching Langley’s commanding figure.
“If I may suggest Mister President,” he began, looking directly at the Frenchman. “While no doubt China’s actions deserve some form of reprimand,” Chal Chan tried to speak up but Langley carried on as if he had not heard. “Currently, it should not be the Council’s top priority. This emergency session was called to examine and evaluate the security risk represented by the source of the tachyon radiation, and to determine the best possible way of securing and if needs be, nullifying said threat.”
The President, a balding man who struggled to be five foot three, peered nervously through mousy eyes hidden behind crescent-moon spectacles. Langley expertly hijacked control of the proceedings.
“You may continue, Mister Langley.”
Langley smiled, as though he needed permission. “As we have all been briefed,” he began, removing his own reading glasses so that they dangled from a cord around his neck, and stepping onto the main floor of the chamber. The large, circular tables surrounded him and he slowly turned to encompass all involved. “The source of the radiation is actually a deity carving, a . . .” he consulted the notes he held in his hand, peering through his glasses then dropping them to his chest again. “A Moon Mask,” he read.
He looked through his glasses at his notes again. In fact, there was no need to. He had memorized the entire document.
He was nothing if not a showman.
He had also taken the liberty of speaking to Doctor Benjamin King, after reading all the material he could on his and his father’s theories.
“Based on the mythological name, Xibalba, the archaeologist who discovered the city where the mask was found believes that it may have been constructed by an ancient race of seafarers, people he calls the . . .” Again, he checked his notes. “The Progenitors. And that these Progenitors, these early civilisers of mankind, divided up the Moon Mask into several pieces because they knew the power it contained should not be controlled by any one person, or nation.” He looked pointedly at the Chinese delegation.
“This is all irrelevant,” the Russian ambassador spoke up. Langley talked over him.
“There is nothing irrelevant about it, Mister Ambassador. Doctor King’s theory has, by his own discoveries, been validated enough for me to believe it whole-heartedly. I’m no historian. I don’t claim to understand half of what the man told me in his interview. But I trust what he said. That some ancient race divided up the mask. Millennia later, a descendant of that race tried, and almost succeeded in finding all the pieces. Now, we have one piece, but the rest of it is out there somewhere.”
Again, he directed his gaze to the Chinese. “I would hope we have all learned from the events of the last days and can trust our respective countries to work together. But, need I remind you that another group of as yet unidentified persons is also after the mask. They know it exists now. And it won’t be long before every terrorist cell, religious fanatic and international black-market arms-dealer tries to find the rest of it.”
“What are
you proposing?” the British ambassador asked.
“I would have thought that would be obvious,” he stated. Perhaps it was his military background that made it obvious to him. Out in the field, he couldn’t afford to second-guess every decision, to sit down and discuss every scenario or to rely on others to make the uncomfortable suggestions, all in the name of politics.
He wasn’t a talker. He was a man of action. And right now, it was action that the Security Council, indeed, the world, needed.
He spelt it out for them.
“We need to find the rest of the mask.”
Several murmurs drifted from the mouths of the delegates.
“And how do we go about doing that?” the German representative asked. “It says here,” he held up the same briefing Langley had memorised, “that, if this Doctor . . . King is correct, then the mask was scattered across the known world thousands of years ago. How do we possibly begin looking for it?”
“That’s just the thing, Ambassador,” he grinned. “We don’t have to. Because, someone already found it for us.”
Twelve hours previously
“My name is Alexander Langley,” the grandfatherly-looking man had introduced himself as. Grandfatherly or not, however, Benjamin King felt the uncontrollable urge to punch him.
His frustration had been building since the moment the American soldiers had found him in the Venezuelan jungle and taken Raine into custody. He wasn’t sure how he felt about their rough handling of the other man. On the one hand, Nathan Raine had saved not only his life, but also prevented the Moon Mask from falling into the hands of the Chinese and the unidentified soldiers in black. On the other hand, however, he had also taken him hostage at gunpoint- never the best way to endear oneself to another.
He hadn’t seen Raine again since the helicopter had ferried them back to the summit of Sarisariñama. There, just like the rest of the expedition, he had been led behind a privacy screen that had been set up, stripped naked and forced to stand in what amounted to little more than a paddling pool while he was hosed down and scoured with rough brushes to clean his irradiated skin.
Moon Mask Page 19
