Sweat was pouring off Hassar’s forehead. “I did not know what it was.”
“You lie,” Al-Iblis said. “You have been here too long. You wonder what secrets the Highland of Aker holds. You are a fool. You do not even know who Aker is, do you?”
Hassar was thrown off by the question—all Egyptologists knew who Aker was. “Aker was the lion-god who guarded the gates of the horizon and allowed the sun to enter the sky each morning and leave each evening.”
Al-Iblis laughed, but there was no humor to it, and the harsh sound sent a chill down Hassar’s spine. “A god! Aker was a bureaucrat given a job which he did only too well.”
Hassar was totally still, afraid to intrude on the thoughts of the creature in front of him. He could not see the face hidden by the dark hood, and he had no desire to. As far as he knew, no one had ever seen Al-Iblis’s face. The name was a legend in the Middle East, a figure that Western intelligence agencies had a skimpy file on, who skirted around all the terrorist groups; a name mothers used to scare their children into going to bed.
Al-Iblis took a step closer to Hassar’s cowering form. “If it is to be about gods, then so be it. The time for pretense is fast fading. You must seal off the Plateau with your soldiers and allow no one in, no matter what happens. I will deal with the infidels. Is that clear?”
Hassar’s head bobbed in agreement. “Yes, Master.”
Moscow
D - 2 Hours, 10 Minutes
“Captain!” Yakov’s voice echoed through the cavern.
Turcotte had the duffel bag full of files, grabbed those he deemed important with only a cursory examination of the diagrams or photos enclosed. “What?”
“I think this is it.”
Turcotte rushed to the center of the chamber, where Yakov was standing over a crate he had smashed open.
The Russian lifted out a metal box as Turcotte arrived. It was steel, inlaid with gold and black bands, about two feet long by ten inches wide and high. The top was hinged. Looking closer, Turcotte recognized the black bands as being made of the same metal as the mother-ship and other Airlia artifacts.
Yakov had the box in his hands, turning it around, looking at it from all angles. “According to the invoice, this was recovered from beneath 77 Wilhemstrasse in Berlin on the first of May, 1945.”
“And that means?” Turcotte asked.
“77 Wilhemstrasse was the address of the Reichskanzlei. Underneath it was the Fuehrerbunker.”
“Hitler’s bunker?” Turcotte already knew the answer. “Where he died?”
Yakov held the case next to his head and shook it lightly. “It’s heavy, but nothing’s moving that I can hear. Look…” Yakov rubbed off some of the dust and dirt that covered the top of the box.
There were markings on it. It took Turcotte a second to recognize them. Not high rune characters, but Chinese. He tapped the top. “That’s the same character that was on the obelisk marker in the Ethiopian cavern where we found the ruby sphere.” He remembered Nabinger’s translation. “Same name. Cing Ho. The Chinese explorer who went to Africa and the Middle East in 656 B.C.” Turcotte turned the clasps and opened the lid.
A long sliver of highly polished metal, two feet long by less than four inches across at its widest, the edges razor sharp, tapering to a needle point at one end and a round hole at the other for the acceptance of a shaft. “The Spear of Destiny,” Turcotte whispered as he grabbed the shaft end and lifted it out of the case. “We need—” He was interrupted as the door to the chamber imploded and the sharp crack of plastic explosive going off ripped across the room.
Turcotte shoved the Spear back in the box and dove to his left, swinging up the AKSU as he moved. He blindly fired a burst in the direction of the door and heard the crack of bullets coming back in his direction. Lying on his belly, he peeked around the crate he was using for cover. He saw several men in camouflage smocks slip through the now-open door. Turcotte fired a three-round burst and one of the figures slammed against the wall and slid to the floor, leaving a trail of blood.
The reaction was swift as a hail of bullets ripped into the wood around him, scattering splinters and causing Turcotte to press so hard against the floor that he could distinctly feel the buttons on his shirt push into his chest.
He heard a pistol firing and knew Yakov was giving him covering fire. He slid backward, putting more distance between himself and the invaders. Having relocated, Turcotte rolled onto his back and pulled two grenades off his vest. If there was one lesson he had been taught in Ranger and Special Forces school and had had reinforced in combat, it was to move swiftly and decisively when ambushed. Turcotte knew there was no time to “let the situation develop,” as Pentagon briefers liked to say.
“Yakov!” he yelled.
“Here!” Somewhere to Turcotte’s left as he lay on his back.
“The ladder in six seconds on my go. Flash-bang in five.”
“I’m ready!”
“Go!” Turcotte yelled as he pulled the pins. He tossed both grenades, arching them just below the ceiling toward the door. He squeezed his eyes shut while he pressed the palms of both hands over his ears.
Even with that, his ears rang as both grenades exploded. Turcotte jumped to his feet and dashed for the ladder, firing the AKSU one-handed over his shoulder.
Out of the corner of his eye he saw Yakov’s large form moving in the same direction, also firing.
The bolt on the AKSU closed on an empty chamber as Turcotte reached the ladder. He took it two rungs at a time, climbing up. He could hear bullets cracking by, but he hoped the camouflaged men were firing blindly, the grenades having done their work. He reached the top and was almost shoved through by Yakov climbing up between his feet.
They sprawled onto the top of the bunker. Turcotte reached for the hatch to slam it shut, but Yakov’s large hand grabbed his arm. “Wait a second,” Yakov growled, his head cocked, listening. His other hand pulled two HE grenades off his vest. They looked like OD green Ping-Pong balls in his large hand. He let go of Turcotte’s arm and pulled the two pins, still waiting.
Voices were yelling below in Russian. There were a couple of bursts of automatic fire. The sound of movement. Yakov tossed both grenades through the opening and then slammed the hatch shut. Turcotte heard the explosion through the metal and the immediate screams of the wounded. Yakov turned on his penlight and stuck it between his teeth. The Russian whipped his belt off and looped it around the handle, ensuring that the hatch could not be opened from below.
“Do you have the key?” Turcotte asked.
Yakov tapped his chest. “Inside my shirt in its case.”
“Now what?” Turcotte asked Yakov as they slowly stood.
“The power, the air, must come down here somehow,” Yakov said.
“I think we came down the air shaft,” Turcotte noted.
“Let us take a closer look.” Yakov was already walking toward the edge of the bunker. Turcotte followed.
“One thing you must understand about Russians,” Yakov said as he shined his light along the cavern wall, slowly walking along the edge clockwise, “is that anyone building a shelter like this would plan a second way out. There is no other reason to have the hatch in the top, is there?”
Turcotte could think of several reasons, but he saw no point in disagreeing. Yakov stopped so suddenly that Turcotte bumped into him.
“There.” Yakov was shining his light at a six-inch-wide metal beam that spanned the ten-foot gap. At the far end, a dark opening waited. “Let us leave this place,” Yakov said as he stepped onto the beam and gingerly made his way across.
Turcotte waited until the Russian was on the other side, then followed.
CHAPTER 24
Giza Plateau, Egypt
D - 2 Hours
“They’re stalling at UNAOC. The Russian Ivanoc now chairs the committee, and he’s afraid. It’s as if everyone is holding their breath hoping this deadline passes and nothing happens.” Lisa Duncan had just arrived back
from Cairo, to find Mualama still sitting between the paws of the Sphinx, impatiently waiting. “Why do you not call for some help of your own?”
Duncan had considered calling in the Special Forces team from Area 51, but she had a feeling the Egyptians would react violently to such a blatant transgression of their national boundaries. And she wasn’t exactly confident that Mualama knew where he wanted to go or what he expected to find. An exact definition of what the Hall of Records would look like had been one fact absent from all the information the archaeologist had given her. Overriding that reasoning, though, was the fact that she wanted the team free to be able to help Turcotte, since it looked like he was more likely the one on the trail of the needed key.
“Everyone’s afraid to rock the boat—And who the hell are you?” Duncan was looking over Mualama’s shoulder at the robed figure that had just appeared out of the darkness.
“My name is Kaji.” The old man’s face was like part of the desert, his skin dark brown, full of deep lines. A worn turban was wrapped around his head, a gray robe over his frail shoulders.
Mualama turned in surprise. “The same Kaji who was with Professor Nabinger under the Great Pyramid?”
“There has always been a Kaji here. My father, and his father before him, and thus it has been for as long as there is a memory.”
“You were with von Seeckt when he opened the lower chamber of the Great Pyramid,” Duncan said.
“What does that matter?” Kaji asked. “That is the past.”
“It matters,” Duncan said. “You took von Seeckt’s dagger. Did you take anything else from the Germans?”
Kaji considered her. “You have something in mind?”
“I don’t have time to play,” Duncan said. “Did you take the Spear of Destiny from them?”
“No.” Kaji looked at Mualama. “You have been searching for many years. I have heard stories of the tall black man who travels far and asks many questions.”
“And your people have been trying to hide the truth from me every step I took,” Mualama said.
“My great-grandfather went with Burton into the Roads of Rostau and never returned,” Kaji said.
Duncan forced her way between the two men. “What do you want with us?” she asked Kaji.
Kaji shifted his gaze from the African to her. “I understand you have found something else. A key.”
“Christ!” Duncan exclaimed. “Is there any such thing as a secret anymore?”
“I know all that happens on the Highland of Aker,” Kaji said. “Do you have the key?” he pressed.
“Yes,” Duncan said.
“Then nothing is safe, and as it has been told through the generations of my family, it is time,” Kaji said. “I will take you to see what it is you seek.”
“I seek the Spear of Destiny,” Duncan said. “Is it here?”
Kaji’s answer was blunt. “I do not think so.”
“Then we’re wasting our time here,” Duncan said.
Mualama placed a large hand on her shoulder. “There is nowhere else to go. Your friend Turcotte is on the best possible trail for the Spear. What lies hidden here could be just as important.”
Duncan considered that. “Why is it time now?” she asked Kaji.
“No one has ever had the key before,” Kaji said simply.
“What is it the key to?” Duncan pressed. “The Hall of Records?”
“The truth,” Kaji said.
Duncan checked her watch. She knew there was nothing else she could do right now about the Spear—it was in Mike’s hands. If she could find something here, it might give her some leverage with Lexina. “All right. Let’s find the truth.”
Kaji extended a hand toward the causeway that led from the Sphinx to the Great Pyramid. “This way.”
Moscow
D - 2 Hours
Sweat had soaked through Turcotte’s shirt, drenching his combat vest. The access tunnel Yakov had discovered had immediately turned into a vertical shaft about fifteen feet wide that went up as far as the light from the small penlight could illuminate. Thin metal stairs ringed the shaft, and they had begun the long trip up.
Turcotte had no idea how long they had climbed, and the light showed no end yet. Even Yakov had to stop now every twenty or thirty sets of stairs and lean against the wall to catch his breath. Turcotte’s calves burned as he forced himself upward, one step at a time.
“Wait,” Yakov gasped, halting once more.
Turcotte didn’t have the energy to answer. Yakov turned off the penlight and the shaft was plunged into darkness. At least for the first minute. Then Turcotte noticed that he could make out, very faintly, the stairs above. “There’s a light on above us,” he noted.
Yakov nodded. “The top of the shaft.”
“Where do you think we’re coming out?” Turcotte asked.
“With the luck we have had,” Yakov said, “I would say the middle of Red Square during a military parade.”
“Our luck’s bound to change,” Turcotte said.
“But not necessarily for the better,” Yakov commented, then began climbing toward the light.
The Giza Plateau
D - 1 Hour, 50 Minutes
Kaji swung the gate open, the dark tunnel leading into the Great Pyramid beckoning.
“Why do you have access to the Pyramid?” Duncan asked as Kaji locked the gate behind them.
“I am the wedjat of the Highland of Aker,” Kaji said, as if that explained everything.
“What about Hassar?” Mualama asked as they headed down the entrance tunnel. “Hassar is a lackey of a government which fears secrets of their own past,” Kaji said.
Duncan was overwhelmed simply by the aura of the surroundings. The light from their flashlights disappeared into darkness far down the tunnel. She thought of the age of the Pyramid, the first men who had walked down this corridor when it was completed. The weight of stone above her, the sheer massiveness of it all. Even being on the deck of a Nimitz-class carrier was nothing compared to this. The sound of their shoes on the stone echoed off the rock walls and then into silence.
Kaji pointed. “That is the way up to the Queen’s Chamber, the Grand Gallery, and the King’s Chamber beyond.” He nodded his head toward a narrow tunnel that descended. “That is the way we must go.”
They went down. Duncan knew this was the way that von Seeckt must have gone over fifty years earlier. She imagined the SS soldiers scurrying down the same tunnel on their secret mission, and that brought to mind all that von Seeckt had told her.
Kaji suddenly stopped and put his hand on one of the stone blocks on the right side of the tunnel. The stone rotated, and a secret tunnel was opened to them.
“It has been many years since anyone has gone this way.” Kaji ushered them through.
They hustled down the tunnel, passing between the smoothly cut stone walls. Kaji paused once more, opening another stone block. Duncan could see that two tunnels, one on either side, were now open.
“To the right links back up with the lower chamber of the Great Pyramid,” Kaji said. “Where your von Seeckt and the Nazis found the black box.”
“If you are a Watcher, why did you guide the Nazis there?”
Kaji coughed and bent over to catch his breath before answering. “I didn’t. They knew where they wanted to go without needing assistance from me. I went along to see where they went and what they would do. And they were too many to stop. And by allowing them to find one of the six divisions of the Duat, the other five remained secret. Sometimes trade-offs must be made.” He pointed. “We go to the left.”
Duncan glanced at Mualama. She had a feeling both of the men were holding something back. She saw little reason for Kaji to guide them to the Hall of Records, and she didn’t think that Mualama had told all he knew.
She noted when they were no longer in the Pyramid, as the walls changed from stone blocks to a tunnel bored through solid rock.
“We are heading toward the Sphinx?” Mualama asked.
<
br /> “Yes,” Kaji answered shortly.
“What is that noise?” Duncan asked, hearing a distant roar.
“The River of Aker.” Kaji was walking steadily down the tunnel, his leather sandals shuffling along the dusty floor. “The Nile makes a loop under the Highland and then back again.”
“How far do these tunnels go?” Duncan asked.
Kaji suddenly stopped and was looking at the wall on the right side. “I have not traveled all the tunnels, so I do not know.” He pressed his hand against the wall and the outline of a stone appeared, then slid up into a recess above. Duncan had never seen the likes of that technology, and she knew it had to be Airlia.
Kaji motioned for them to go through. They squeezed past and he followed, the door shutting behind them, the outline melding into the rock and disappearing.
Kaji began hacking, and Duncan knew from the sound that he was seriously ill. When he was able to get his breath, he pointed down the tunnel where darkness waited. “The Hall is that way.”
Duncan shined her flashlight where he pointed, but it was as if the very light was being sucked into the darkness. “What is that?” she asked.
“The Old Ones had strange ways,” Kaji answered. “You must go through the darkness to come into the light.”
“I think you should go first,” Mualama said.
Kaji shuffled forward and disappeared into the darkness.
“Do you trust him?” Duncan asked.
Mualama shook his head. “No. I believe his great-grandfather tried to kill Sir Burton down here.”
“Thanks for letting me know that now.”
Mualama stepped forward. “But we will never know what is on the other side unless we go.” He disappeared, leaving Duncan alone.
She stepped forward toward the darkness. It was unlike anything she had ever seen, as if the light were being absorbed by the air. Her ears popped from a decrease in pressure as she continued forward, moving by feel, totally blinded. Her stomach spasmed as she almost fell to her knees, but she forced herself to continue moving. The experiences reminded her of the feeling she’d had when Majestic had operated the gravity drive of the mothership in Hangar Two.
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