The Forbidden Tomb

by Chris Kuzneski

  A journey into protected land.

  Protected by the priests and the government.

  At the turn of this century, Egypt declared most of the territory surrounding Siwa, some 7,800 square miles in all, to be a protected area. The distinction limited the amount of development that could be undertaken and at the same time boosted the number of tourists wishing to experience the area’s pristine beauty. Under normal circumstances, Papineau would have gladly greased local palms to ensure that they had the finest accommodations, but such behavior was entirely out of the question on this trip. They wanted to blend in, not stand out, and big-spending foreigners would be noticed.

  With that in mind, they avoided the city altogether and set up camp on the outskirts of Siwa. They were not alone. There were hundreds of natives in cloth tents who preferred the old ways of desert caravans to the modern conveniences of hotels. And the government allowed it. As long as campers adhered to the conservative cultural restraints of the area, no one would give them a second look.

  Just to be safe, Cobb and McNutt waited until sunset to begin their rekky.

  * * *

  Cobb dug his foot into the soft, loose sand, watching as the chilly nighttime breeze swept it away. He breathed deep, noticing the faintest tinge of salt that drifted with the wind. Though they were hours from the sea, the vast salt lakes a few miles to the north produced the same scent. Cobb ignored the smell and concentrated on the ground beneath him. He instinctively gauged its texture, calculating what type of footing it offered.

  The knowledge that came from an on-site investigation – things like the direction of the wind and the traction of the soil – was why rekkys were so important to him. Any piece of information gained might be the one that saved his ass in an emergency.

  Cobb and McNutt scanned the area through their night-vision goggles. They had already sidestepped dozens of guards on roving patrols during their steady approach through miles of surrounding desert, but they knew there were plenty more out there. So far, the men they had encountered had disguised themselves as groups of nomadic traders and Bedouins, but there was no reason to believe that there weren’t lone assassins waiting to ambush them in the night. Fortunately, even the shadow men’s finely honed ability to see in the dark was no match for next-generation military optics.

  When Cobb and McNutt arrived at their destination, they could finally see what all of those men were protecting. Everywhere they looked, there were telltale signs of a structure buried beneath their feet. Ductwork popped up from the ground in an irregular pattern, allowing fresh oxygen to be pulled in while poisonous carbon monoxide was vented out into the atmosphere. There was even a trio of massive condensers capable of pulling moisture from the air. With the addition of a microbial filter, these giant dehumidifiers could be used to produce drinking water from the arid winds of the Sahara.

  And above it all hung the canopies of camouflage tarps and netting.

  To the average observer, the efforts for concealment looked unfinished and haphazard. But Cobb and McNutt knew that the disguises only needed to fool people at a distance. Whoever had taken these measures was only concerned with protecting the site from an aerial view. The guards took care of the rest. No one foolish enough to actually visit the site had ever made it back to describe what had been found.

  Cobb and McNutt had every intention of becoming the first.

  Cobb broke radio silence to verify that everyone was ready. ‘One minute to target,’ he whispered. ‘Status?’

  Sarah answered from the makeshift command center that Garcia had assembled in their tent. ‘Bored beyond belief.’

  Cobb knew her crankiness was because of him: he had refused her request to join their rekky. It wasn’t because he didn’t trust her skills – she had more than proven her worth over the last few months – he simply didn’t think there was a need for her on this operation. This wasn’t an infiltration. This was reconnaissance. Despite her incessant lobbying to get in the game, Cobb had sat her on the bench.

  ‘Hector, you with me?’ Cobb asked.

  ‘Ready when you are,’ Garcia replied.

  ‘Okay. We’re moving in.’

  While the others listened in, Cobb and McNutt made their way toward their target, a low, flat shed where Garcia believed they would find the communications system that serviced the underground bunker. If they could hack into the network, they would have access to the entire facility.

  They scurried across the sand while keeping a watchful eye for tripwires and IEDs, but neither expected to encounter any. Between the harsh climate and the terrain, few people ventured this far from the safety of Siwa. The brutality of the desert coupled with rumors of deadly boogeymen meant that uninvited guests were seldom, if ever, an issue.

  When they reached the shed, they ducked low and glanced in all directions, searching for any sign that their movement had drawn attention. Eventually, McNutt looked at Cobb and shook his head. There were no signs of life or detection.

  They had made it inside the guarded perimeter.

  They were standing in the eye of the storm.

  McNutt let the others know. ‘At primary.’

  Cobb lifted a hatch on the side of the enclosure, giving him access to the circuitry inside. He crawled into the shed and slithered through the tangled web of cables, searching for the clues that Garcia had explained to him earlier. Once he found them, he was sure that Garcia was right: this was the nerve center of the compound.

  ‘Target confirmed,’ Cobb whispered. ‘Please advise.’

  Garcia walked Cobb through the process of linking his equipment to the system that they had found. And even though Cobb was a layman compared to Garcia, it took him less than five minutes to install the hardware.

  Back at the tent, Garcia smiled when his monitors came to life. By physically hacking the signal, he now had access to everything on the network. ‘Nicely done, sir.’

  ‘We’re good?’ Cobb asked.

  ‘GoldenEye is live. I repeat: GoldenEye is live.’

  Cobb ignored the movie reference and focused on what really mattered. He wanted a preliminary report on the facility. ‘Anything we need to know?’

  Garcia grimaced. ‘It will take me a while to sort through all of the data feeds, but I can tell you one thing for sure: the bunker is a hell of a lot bigger than we thought.’

  72

  Saturday, November 8

  It was well after midnight by the time Cobb and McNutt reached their camp on the outskirts of Siwa, but they knew no one would be sleeping. It wasn’t caffeine that would be keeping them awake, it was the surge of adrenalin that all of them felt now they were back in the field. It was a good thing, too, for each of them had duties to tend to in their effort to rescue Jasmine.

  Having already survived one massacre, Manjani had no intention of pressing his luck a second time. He opted to stay on the yacht with Papineau, who would be piloting the boat across the Mediterranean toward Siwa. If Cobb, McNutt, and Sarah failed to accomplish their goals – if they were captured, killed, or otherwise defeated by the shadow warriors – it would be up to Papineau to send in reinforcements.

  Unless, of course, he decided to cut bait and run.

  He had put one team together. He could always do it again.

  In his mobile command center, Garcia pored over the streams of information that he was receiving from the hacked communication lines, while Sarah kept a watchful eye through a narrow slit in the tent for any unexpected visitors.

  She glanced away to check on Garcia. ‘How’s it going?’

  Garcia shook his head in agitation. ‘It’s fine! But this isn’t exactly ideal, you know. I’ve got exabytes of data to comb through, and just two computers. That’s like telling a chef to cook a fifty-course meal with only a pot and a pan.’

  ‘First, settle down. I wasn’t criticizing; I just asked how things were going. And second, don’t mention food. I’m freakin’ starving.’

  ‘I’m just saying that I’m wo
rking as fast as I can.’

  Garcia wasn’t exaggerating. If he’d had access to the array of technology at his home, the expensive gear back in Fort Lauderdale, or even the full complement of devices on the yacht, he could have made short work of the information he was pulling from the enemy’s network. But with limited equipment in a tent in the desert, the process would take considerably longer. Even with his backup laptop pressed into service, it would still take hours to sort through all of the raw feeds streaming through the system.

  ‘And I’m sorry if—’

  ‘Shhhh,’ she demanded. ‘Someone’s coming.’

  She wrapped her fingers around the grip of her pistol as she glanced at her phone. The program she was running was linked to several motion-detectors that McNutt had buried in the sand around the tent before he had left. The tiny capsules, filled with drops of mercury, were known as rattlers because they would rattle under the pressure of a foot hitting the ground. According to the sensors, someone was approaching.

  Sarah was a split second from ordering Garcia to turn off his computers and to grab a rifle when they heard a familiar voice in their ears.

  ‘Stand down. It’s just us,’ Cobb said.

  ‘Copy that,’ she said, relieved.

  A minute later McNutt emerged from the blackness of the open desert and stepped into the tent. ‘Honey, I’m home. What’s for dinner?’

  Cobb entered a moment later. He skipped the pleasantries and cut right to the chase. ‘Have you found anything useful?’

  ‘Sure,’ Garcia answered. ‘At least I think so.’

  ‘Show me,’ Cobb ordered as he took off his gear.

  Garcia tapped his keyboard, and the single image on the screen instantly split into a grid. Each of the eight squares offered a different feed from one of the cameras inside the bunker. He waited for Cobb to gulp down some water before he started his briefing.

  ‘There are hundreds of camera angles being routed through the system. It looks like every inch of the place is accounted for. Not the best news if you’re trying sneak in without being seen, but pretty damn useful if you’re trying to map the structure.’

  He punched in a different command, and the screen switched from video feeds to an unfinished architectural rendering.

  ‘What am I looking at?’ Cobb asked.

  ‘By analyzing all the footage and matching where the angle of one shot intersects with the next, I was able to piece together a rough schematic of the bunker’s layout.’

  Cobb was impressed. ‘Is that everything?’

  Garcia shook his head. ‘Like I said, there are hundreds of angles to look through. I still haven’t seen them all.’ He pointed to the map. ‘That was drawn by the computer. I just had to choose the right parameters to tell it what to look for as it scanned through the feeds. As you can see, it’s still compiling. That’s why the map’s unfinished. It will keep adding details as it continuously analyzes the incoming feeds.’

  Cobb stared at the map, appreciating the advantage it gave them. If they could get inside, they would know their way around. ‘Nice job, Hector. Really nice.’

  ‘Don’t get too excited,’ he replied as he selected a particular camera feed. ‘Take a look at this.’ He spun on his makeshift seat to face the others. ‘You too, Josh.’

  Sarah wasn’t about to be left out. The three of them crowded around Garcia to see what had caught his attention. Once he enlarged the footage to fill the whole screen, they could see that he had located a depository of some kind. Inside row upon row of wide wooden crates were stacked from the floor to the ceiling. It appeared that each box was marked with a serial number spelled out in a different language.

  Sarah squinted at the image. ‘What am I looking at?’

  McNutt’s eyes bulged from his head. ‘Holy. Fucking. Hell.’

  ‘My thoughts exactly,’ Garcia replied.

  ‘I still don’t get it,’ Sarah admitted.

  ‘Weapons,’ Cobb told them. ‘Lots and lots of weapons.’

  McNutt pointed at the description emblazoned on one of the crates. ‘Those are Ribeyrolle 1918s – French rifles used to lay down suppressive fire.’ He tapped a different label. ‘STENs, a nine-millimeter submachine gun.’ He pointed yet again. ‘These are—’

  Sarah chuckled. ‘You can barely speak English, yet you can read all these foreign labels?’

  ‘STENs are English. It’s an abbreviation honoring the guys who designed them: Shepherd, Turpin, and Enfield.’ Despite Sarah’s comment, McNutt’s tone was playful, not cocky or defensive. There was nothing he liked more than talking about weapons – except using them, of course. ‘It’s an impressive collection.’

  ‘That much I understood,’ Sarah replied.

  McNutt shook his head. ‘It’s not just impressive because of its size, it’s impressive because these are antiques. Most of these guns date back to World War Two.’ He pointed to a final crate. ‘Like the Maschinengewehr 30s. MG 30s haven’t been used since the 1940s . . . by the Nazis.’

  Though most of the battles in Egypt during World War II were fought along the Nile, the Western Desert saw its share of action as well. At one time or another, British, Italian, French, Greek, South African and German soldiers all took up arms in an attempt to capture Siwa and/or control the area extending north to the Mediterranean. Unfamiliar with the challenges of the Sahara, hundreds of these men were never heard from again.

  Few were prepared for the heat of the desert.

  And none were ready for the shadow warriors.

  ‘It gets worse,’ Garcia said as he changed the feed.

  This time, there weren’t any crates. Instead, they saw an entire wall whose shelves were stocked with large packages of what appeared to be reddish clay.

  ‘Look familiar?’ Garcia asked.

  Unfortunately, they all recognized the compound.

  It was Semtex.

  McNutt whistled in amazement. ‘Forget about a single block. That’s enough to take out the whole damn city.’

  ‘They’re stockpiling supplies like an army,’ Sarah said. ‘But why?’

  Garcia tapped a few keys. ‘I can’t tell you what the guns are for, but let’s be clear: they’re not like an army – they are an army.’

  As he scrolled through the feeds, they got a much better sense of the underground structure. There were barracks filled with beds, dining halls crowded with tables, even a library lined with books. Though there was certainly a generator powering the bunker – they were staring at a computer feed, after all – such luxury did not extend to every aspect of the facility. Simple oil lamps lit the majority of the space, giving the footage an ominous hue, as if they were staring at an ancient castle.

  Despite the dim lighting, each room was buzzing with activity.

  Throughout the facility, robed men tended to their duties of preparing food, sweeping floors, and refilling the lamps that lined the walls. Regardless of the task, they went about their business with humble efficiency. Every act seemed to have a purpose. And every disciple seemed to know his place.

  It had the look and feel of a monastery.

  Only these monks would kill for their cause.

  Cobb stepped away from the computer and pondered their situation while McNutt and Sarah grabbed something to eat. Cobb had seen enough to know that they needed a plan – one that didn’t involve them charging into certain death while Garcia watched on his laptop. Even with tricks and surprises, he knew it would be impossible to take on the vast number of soldiers below without an army of his own.

  There had to be a way to get inside.

  All Cobb had to do was figure it out.

  Before he had the chance, Garcia leaped from his chair and pointed at the video as if he had seen a ghost. ‘Jack! Look at this! Now!’

  Unsettled by his urgency, everyone huddled around the screen.

  There, chained to the wall, was Jasmine.

  73

  The arrangement between Cobb and Hassan was simple: Cobb wanted
to rescue Jasmine without being chased by goons, and Hassan wanted to kill the men who blew up Alexandria. Though they weren’t exactly working together to accomplish their goals, they had agreed to assist each other for the time being.

  Or, at the very least, stay out of each other’s way.

  Cobb still had plenty of reservations about Hassan, but he knew the gangster had one thing at his disposal that he didn’t have: a legion of gun-toting thugs who would happily charge into battle if it meant winning favor with their boss.

  With this in mind, Cobb had placed a call to Simon Dade, who was running down leads of his own in Alexandria while being shadowed by the giant Kamal, and told him to get word to the crime lord about the compound in the Western Desert.

  As for details, Cobb would only provide the GPS coordinates of where to meet, rather than directions to the bunker itself. Cobb knew it would take several hours for Hassan to rally his troops and drive across Egypt. This had given Cobb and McNutt plenty of time to do a rekky, tap into the surveillance system, and formulate a plan of attack.

  By 4 a.m. the caravan from Alexandria had made it to the staging ground a few miles east of the bunker. Cobb had chosen this particular patch of desert for its proximity to the thoroughfare that ran between el-Bawiti and Siwa. The spot was accessible, yet secluded. It was far enough away from the bunker to avoid the enemy’s patrol, but it was close enough to mount an attack. And their arrival in the dead of night would give them at least a few hours before anyone questioned their presence.

  Hassan’s men were ready for battle.

  All they needed was a target.

  When Cobb arrived at the rendezvous point, he expected to see an assortment of beat-up trucks and a ragtag group of criminals. Instead, he saw a fleet of Humvees lined up across the sand and scores of men in desert camouflage. For a moment, Cobb wondered if the Egyptian military had somehow gotten wind of Hassan’s activity and had moved in to intercede. But then he saw Kamal, whose unmistakable size stood head and shoulders above the others, and instantly understood who these men were.