by Joseph Silva
Jake, his own light shining as they approached the chalet, said, “Our timing was off. A couple hours the other way and we’d have been here when this edifice was still extant.”
“It would have had the Red Skull inside it then,” the girl reminded him.
“You know, everybody wants to be a celebrity these days. Magazines like ours and People encourage that,” said Jake. “Maybe I should just ask the Skull if he’d give me an interview. We could promise him the cover.”
“Have to find him first, Jake. He has, to use a phrase that often turns up in your pieces, flown the coop.”
“No, when I use that cliché, I brighten it up by saying, ‘He’s flown the proverbial coop.’ ” Stopping at the foot of what had once been the front staircase to the building, he pointed back the way they had come. “I don’t think SHIELD knows where he went either.”
“The fact that they’re here, though, proves that this is something big.”
“I told you that back in L.A., Mandy.”
“So now I believe you,” she said. “Of course, seeing half the town come crashing down around our ears helped convince me, too.”
“That’s ‘come crashing down around our proverbial ears.’ ” Jake paused and frowned, rubbing a knuckle across his chin. “Nick Fury and Captain America working on this caper. Yeah, we got us one of the biggest yarns of our respective careers.”
“But it’s not going to be exclusive much longer. Lots of our media colleagues are going to be hitting town any time now.”
“First time the mystery quakes have hit so close to home. Sure, that’s news,” he said. “But we have a hell of a head start. And we aren’t going to lose it.”
“Okay, what’s our next step?”
“We start poking around in this chalet, making like Sherlock Holmes and Nick Carter,” said Jake. “Because in order to track this thing to a finish, we need us a clue.”
“We’ve got an awful big area to dig through, Jake.”
“All we need is one little clue.”
She nodded, smiling. “Going to be like looking for a needle in the proverbial haystack.”
Twenty-Four
“Yes, I want to.”
“Going to be a strain on you, Caroline, and—”
“Hey, let’s can the gab, huh? She’s already agreed ta do it, Cap.”
“I can stand whatever I have to. Since I can’t consciously recall anything to help you find my father, then I think I’d better try this.”
“Terrific! Lemme escort ya to the ESP chamber, kiddo.”
A vast room, several stories high, packed with huge, complex mechanisms and computers. Most of the machinery was so advanced that your average scientist had hardly begun to dream of it, much less invent it.
Wearing a borrowed SHIELD jumpsuit, Caroline Crandell made her way across the glossy noryl plastic flooring.
“Bet ya never seen nothing like this,” said Fury, his cigar upthrust in a confident manner.
“No, I haven’t.”
With Cap’s help, Caroline sat down in a padded metal chair. The chair was rigged up, in myriad ways, to an enormous machine behind her and also to a compact computer. Her pretty face was very pale now, and there were sooty shadows underlining her cheekbones and sad eyes.
Indicating the machines, the computer, and the bustling lab techs, Fury boomed, “What we got here is a gizmo that allows us to tap in on what ya got hidden in your noggin, see? Now when we quizzed ya earlier ya said ya couldn’t remember nothin’. That’s what you think, kid. In yer brain is everything ya ever heard or saw. What we can do here in the ESP chamber is dig what we want outta yer subconscious.”
A faint blush touched the girl’s cheeks. “There are some things I’d rather—”
“Don’t panic, sweetheart. We can direct our probe, get right at the stuff that pertains to what we’re after. Anything else stays strictly confidential.”
“I’ve seen this work before,” said Cap while he helped Nick attach various straps and electrodes to the girl. “It’s relatively painless, Caroline, and pretty effective.”
“Okay. I’ll try anything that’ll help save my father.”
Several white-clad technicians had converged on the area. At a nod from the smoking Fury they began to twist dials, flip switches, nudge toggles. Lights lit up all over the polished face of the central machine, and the computer began making a low, purring hum. Everything clicked, clattered, whirred, chattered.
A bearded young man in a spotless white jumpsuit approached Fury. “We’re ready to roll, Nick.”
“What ya do now,” Fury told the girl, “is shut yer peepers an’ relax. It’s gonna feel almost like yer asleep.”
Caroline let her eyes shut. “Yes, I do feel . . . drowsy . . .”
“I’m gonna start askin’ ya questions. You don’t answer ’em with yer voice. The machine’s gonna find out and tell us.”
“You mean you’ll get a printout of my thoughts?” she asked in a sleepy voice.
“Better than that. It’s gonna talk to us, ain’t it, Meech?”
The bearded young man nodded. “Right, Nick.”
Fury shifted his stogie from one side of his mouth to the other, leaning close to the docile girl. “When ya was there in the chalet, kid . . . ya musta heard some of the Skull’s flunkies gabbin’. You don’t consciously remember, but I’m bettin’ ya got some info stashed in your cabeza. Gimme a name or a fact or anythin’.”
“Klise,” said a metallic voice. It came out of a speaker grid that was dangling above the dozing girl’s head.
“What’s Klise?”
“He’s . . . Texas . . .”
“What else?”
“. . . nothing . . .”
“C’mon! Ya must know more.”
The girl shifted in her chair, moaning faintly.
“. . . one night . . . they talked . . . outside room where I had dinner sometimes . . . didn’t know I was there . . . Klise is . . . important man to them . . . he’s going to cooperate . . . satellite . . . important . . . Fourth Reich . . .”
Meech interrupted. “Just got something out of data backup, Nick.” He waved a sheet of flimsy paper. “A Herman Klise lives in Houston, Texas, and he’s chairman of the board of a very big outfit called Texon Telecom Industries. Klise is noted for his extreme—even for Texas—right-wing political views. He’s funded some neo-fascist groups over the last few years. The U.S. government isn’t too fond of him, but because of the excellence of the Texon satellite components, they have to deal with him.”
“Why’s Klise tied in with the Skull?” mused Fury.
Captain America said, “Sonic weapons mounted in a satellite would give the Red Skull the opportunity to destroy any place on the globe.”
“Nell’s bells! Ya gotta be right, Cap.” He took a few thoughtful puffs of his cigar, then addressed himself again to the girl. “Anything else? Any little but of scuttlebutt ya mighta overheard, kid?”
The girl stirred in the chair like a child in a troubled sleep.
“Kesselring . . . Kesselring will see to the tech . . . supplies . . . ship to . . . island . . . Kesselring can get whatever components . . . island . . .”
“What island?”
“. . . sleep . . . I was asleep and they were talking in the corridor . . . about Kesselring . . . components . . . so dim . . . the island . . .”
In the chair Caroline’s eyes drifted open. “I feel very . . .” She slumped, her body pressing against the various restraints.
“That better be all for this session,” said Cap.
“Yeah, but—”
“He’s right, Nick,” said Meech. “There’s a tremendous stress factor involved in using the ESP gear. On top of which, this young woman is already in a weakened condition.”
“Okay, okay, unhook her.”
Captain America saw to that; then he lifted the unconscious girl into his arms. “I’ll take her back to her quarters. Send one of your medics to look after her,” he said
. “When I get back, Nick, we can talk. I happen to know who Kesselring is.”
“So who?”
“A shady electronics wizard who’s holed up in Spain at the moment.” Cap started for the exit. “He must be supplying the Skull with what he needs to build his sonic weapons.”
“Okay, but what about the dang island? Where’s that?”
“We’ll have to ask Kesselring.”
Twenty-Five
From the veranda you saw, at first, only the luxuriant tropical foliage, the tall palm trees gently swaying in a warm breeze, a wide stretch of yellow beach glowing in the sunlight, and the calm blue Pacific beyond. A more careful scrutiny revealed that a good deal of the greenery was camouflage, masking complex gun and missile installations. The golden sand covered bunkers, and off among the palm trees stood barracks which were disguised to suggest a thick jungle.
“A highly trained army of two thousand men,” said the Red Skull, gesturing toward the hidden barracks with one gloved hand. “Drilled to perfection, each man believing passionately in our ideals.”
“I didn’t realize,” said the gaunt Dr. Crandell, who was slouched in a wicker chair, “that you had anything resembling an ideal.”
The Skull laughed. “I believe in power, Herr doctor, in absolute power,” he said. “I believe the world was meant to be ruled by stern-minded Aryans. All inferior races must be suppressed or destroyed, all liberal and sentimental creeds wiped out. I am working, as was Hitler before me, for a clean, well-ordered world.”
“Hitler was insane,” said Crandell in his weary voice. “Like any madman, like Napoleon and the rest, he came to the end that inevitably awaits all fanatics.”
“Hitler was betrayed from within,” said the Red Skull. “Such a fate can’t befall me, Dr. Crandell. When I so much as sense the possibility, I eliminate that person. There is not a man on this island who is not one hundred percent behind me.”
Crandell gazed out at the afternoon Pacific with listless eyes. “And where exactly is this island? You kept me drugged during our journey here.”
“Let us simply say my island is somewhere in the South Pacific,” replied the Skull. “A mere speck on the charts. No one suspects what lies here, doctor, or what will soon happen to the world.”
“Haven’t you done enough? You’ve destroyed cities, slaughtered thousands, made your filthy profits.”
“Surely you don’t still think we adopted your sonic weapons to our uses merely for the money we could collect? For the fools who were so eager to destroy their enemies?” Rising out of his wicker chair, the Red Skull strode to the railing and rested his gloved hands on it. “What those petty dictators and pathetic tyrants did, dear doctor, was help finance the field tests of your weapons. My motives have nothing to do with monetary profit.”
“But you told me—”
“I told you whatever it was necessary to tell you in order to achieve the results I wanted,” the Skull said patiently. “Now, I require your further cooperation. The major part of our campaign is about to begin.”
“I don’t want to do any—”
“Beside the point. I need you. You must work out the plans for installing your sonic weapons in an orbiting satellite—”
“A satellite? You are insane. How do you expect you can launch a satellite without drawing the attention of—”
“Please, doctor.” A dry chuckling passed through the grinning crimson mouth. “Our satellite is already in orbit—one of the communications satellites developed by the Texon company. We have only to install the necessary weaponry.”
“Only install, eh? And how in blazes do you think you’re going to get—?”
“A shuttle is scheduled to make a rendezvous with this particular satellite in just five weeks, Dr. Crandell,” the Skull informed him. He turned to stare at the frail scientist. “We have arranged to have that shuttle craft at our disposal. You have only five weeks, Herr doctor, to work out all the necessary details.”
“No,” said Crandell. “I see what you’re up to now, Skull, and—”
“I intend to establish the Fourth Reich.” Deep in the sockets of the crimson mask his eyes glowed. “Envision this if you will, dear doctor. One fine morning, a little over five weeks hence, the proud city of London will be struck with a massive quake. In minutes it will be reduced to no more than a pile of ruin. Yes, in just a few minutes we will have accomplished what all Hitler’s missiles failed to do in World War Two. Then, before the stunned world can even understand what has happened, Paris will suffer a similar fate. The Eiffel Tower will fall, the whole city will turn to dust.” He laughed a long grating laugh. “Perhaps I shall also smash New York City. Yes, that would be most impressive and highly satisfying. To destroy that decadent place, all the sweaty millions of inferior humans who dwell there in filth. All the killers and thieves and radicals. To crush them all beneath brick and stone and concrete, to send their steel and glass towers slamming down on them . . . ah, that would be fine.” His gloved hands sounded like sandpaper as he rubbed them together joyfully. “I have a dream, doctor, a dream of Armageddon. And you are going to help me fulfill that dream.”
With effort, Dr. Crandell stood up to face the scarlet scourge. “I shall do nothing more for you. Nothing!”
Very casually, the Red Skull reached out and slapped the scientist across the face. “So you think now.”
Crandell staggered back, bumped into his chair, and fell to the planking of the shadowy porch. He lay there, sobbing quietly.
The Red Skull looked down at him and laughed.
Twenty-Six
The Texas night was warm, the sky was overcast. Thick shadows surrounded the high stone wall where Captain America stood.
He glanced up some ten feet above him to the top of the wall. There was no evidence of an alarm system. Attaching his shield to his arm and taking a deep breath, he scaled the thick stone barrier.
He moved with amazing speed and agility. Pausing on the top, he rolled over and dropped to the ground among the high, thick shrubbery.
The walled-in Klise estate covered three acres. The main house stood on a slight hill some way off. It was a vast conglomeration of white concrete and glass, and its lights were glowing through the many trees that filled the grounds.
Cap suddenly became aware of a thumping sound. A moment later he saw a black German shepherd galloping across the night lawn toward the spot where he stood.
The animal was making an angry growling sound. It didn’t hesitate at all; its charging run changed to a leap and it came hurtling toward Cap’s throat, its jaws slavering.
But the sharp fangs never got to do their job. Instead, the creature’s skull connected with the hard surface of the red, white, and blue shield.
Giving one surprised whimper, the watchdog fell into the bushes. Out cold.
Staying in the shadows beneath the trees, Captain America started off toward Klise’s mansion. He’d already checked on the businessman’s whereabouts, and he knew Klise was at home tonight.
The first guard was relatively quiet. Gun in hand, he was padding cautiously down across the night lawn, his eyes ticking from side to side.
He noticed nothing unusual until all at once a large round metal disc was sizzling right at him from out of the darkness.
“Awk!” was all he managed to say as he was struck in the throat by the edge of the shield.
Then Captain America was upon him. Three well-delivered punches and the guard was unconscious. He never felt the powerful arms that were dragging him across the grass to dump him into the underbrush. His belt served to truss his wrists together behind his back, and his handkerchief made an effective gag.
Captain America nearly reached the house before he encountered the next guard.
This fellow, a large crew-cut blond, tried to be a bit more clever. Aware that something must have happened to the watchdog and his colleague, he was determined to take the intruder by surprise.
As Cap passed beneath the sturdy oak
s near the lighted study, the guard dropped down on him from above. That is, he was trying to drop down on him.
But Captain America had sensed his presence a good ten seconds before he fell. Somersaulting forward with ease. Cap once again was not where he was supposed to be.
The guard smacked into the ground, hard. He lost his balance, teetered backward as pains shot up through his legs, tumbled to one knee and then went tipping flat out on his broad face.
“Going to get grass stains all over your clothes that way,” said Cap quietly. With the flat edge of his hand he dealt the stupefied guard several chops to the neck.
Sufficient to send the man into unconsciousness.
Cap was dragging the guy into some nearby shrubbery when a half dozen floodlights blazed on. The harsh beams of three of them caught him the way a spotlight catches a performer.
“Come on in,” invited a drawling voice in the darkness. “My gun and I are right anxious to chat with you.”
Meanwhile, in Barcelona, Nick Fury was not having a good time at all.
The fighting had been fun for a while, though he didn’t especially enjoy all the Spanish insults. The guy who had really annoyed him was this one, now stretched out cold in the shadowy alley. He’d called Fury gordo. And Nick wasn’t even any heavier now than he had been when he was a young man. Well, maybe a few pounds. Guy called him old, too. That really rankled.
Unlike his buddy Captain America, he hadn’t had the advantage of spending years in a state of suspended animation. He was pushing middle age, okay. No need to rub it in.
“Ya jerk!” he admonished, picking up another of his attackers and using him to bowl over a couple of new ones.
This was getting boring.
He’d already decked about six of these palookas. Now another half dozen or so were swarming all over him. Using fists, saps, clubs.
Every time Fury polished off a couple of the goons, two more popped up. It was like that guy Hercules when he had his bout with that watchamacallit that kept growing new heads.
Ducking a wildly swung hunk of two-by-four, Fury brought a fist up into the groin of one of his opponents.
