“This is the”—Kopina paused, thinking how to describe it—“consider this the M16 of space.” She held it out to Duncan. “Its official designation is the MK-98.”
Duncan took the weapon and almost dropped it. “How heavy is it?”
“Empty weight is thirty-eight pounds,” Kopina said. “Each magazine adds about ten pounds.”
Duncan hefted it, hands on the pistol grips. She knew Turcotte would find this most interesting, but it just seemed like a heavy piece of machinery to her.
“It will be easier to handle in space,” Kopina said. “No weight there.”
Duncan put it down on the table with a thud. “What does it shoot?”
Kopina picked up a two-foot-long cylinder that was about the same diameter as the MK-98. She touched a button on the side and a two-foot-long section on the top sprung open. Leaning the end of the barrel against the tabletop, Kopina pressed the cylinder into the well. She swung shut the cover and it latched into place.
She picked up the gun and aimed it at a six-by-six beam set inside of a concave concrete range against the wall of the hangar. The muscles in her arms bulged as she handled the weapon.
“Laser aiming sight,” Kopina explained, flipping a switch. A red dot appeared on the six-by-six. “You also have to turn on the gun’s main power.” She flipped another switch on the side. A loud whine filled the air. “Now we’re ready to fire.” A small light turned green near the switch.
Kopina pulled the trigger. There was no explosion, but rather a loud ping as the gun fired. Splinters flew in the target and then chips flew off the concrete in the rear. Kopina put the gun down and led Duncan to the beam. There was an inch-wide hole in the front that went straight through to the back. There was a three-inch divot out of the concrete retaining wall. Duncan couldn’t see what had caused the damage.
Kopina looked around, then picked something up and held it out to Duncan. It was a shiny piece of metal, an inch wide, six inches long, with both ends pointed. “This is the round. Depleted uranium, very hard.”
“What gives it velocity?” Duncan asked as they walked back to the table holding the gun. She knew that depleted uranium rounds used in the Gulf War were being blamed for some of the Gulf War Syndrome.
“Springs.”
“Spring?” Duncan repeated.
Kopina smiled as she tapped the MK-98. “Yep, you could consider this the most powerful spear gun in the world. The spears are a mite small, but I wouldn’t want to get hit by one. The technical term, of course, is not a spring gun, but a ‘kinetic-kill’ weapon.”
She pulled out the cylindrical cartridge. “There’s ten rounds just like this one, being held under high tension. When you pull the trigger, the spring is released and the round is fired. The barrel is electromagnetically balanced so that the round goes right down the center, never touching the walls and thus not losing any velocity and staying exactly on course. That’s why you have to turn the gun on — to charge the barrel.”
“How fast does it fire?” Duncan asked.
“As fast as you can pull the trigger,” Kopina said, “which is not as fast as you can pull the trigger. It’s as fast as the ninety-eight will allow you to pull. The trigger locks up until the barrel is set. The cylinder also rotates, aligning a new round. You can fire once every one point seven seconds. It will be attached to the firing arm of the TASC-suit.” She slid aside the back plate of the gun and showed Duncan. “See these adapters? They go right onto the end of the TASC-suit arm.”
Kopina slid the place back. She moved down the table to another weapon that looked very similar to the MK-98. “This packs a bigger punch. Works on the same principles as the ninety-eight — spring-fired — but the round is different.” She picked up a black pod, about six inches long by two in diameter. “This is the round. It’s not solid. Rather, it’s filled with high explosive. I’d test it for you, but it would piss off the NASA people if I blew the wall of the hangar out. This is the MK-99, and they’re taking a few of these with them.”
“I still don’t understand why the military is in on this,” Duncan said. She found it strange that the TASC-suit and its helmet were so advanced yet these weapons so primitive in comparison. She remembered Yakov telling how The Mission had controlled human development, increasing one thing while taking away in another.
Kopina turned her back on the weapons. “That’s a question I don’t have an answer to.”
* * *
“Who are you?” Che Lu asked.
The figure in the black robes finished directing the mercenaries to deploy around the entrance to the tunnel above their heads. Che Lu and Lo Fa had been forced inside the tomb at gunpoint, carefully using the ropes to get down the slope to the large storage area inside the mountain tomb.
The light had come on as they entered, just as it had the previous week when they’d come from the other direction, through the tunnels of the tomb.
They were inside a large open space. Metal beams rose from the nearest wall, curving overhead to follow the dome ceiling around to come down the far side, which was hard to see because of the obstructions in the way. There were numerous black rectangles spaced across the floor ranging from a few feet in size to one over a hundred meters long by sixty high. There were other shapes scattered about here and there also. The far wall was over a mile and a half away.
To the far right a bright green light glowed, brighter even than the one overhead. Che Lu knew that inside of the room that green light came from was a guardian computer, hidden behind a wall.
At the base of the sloping tunnel they had come down, the mercenaries were building a barricade pointing machine guns toward the outside. Che Lu wondered how long it would be before the People’s Liberation Army returned to the area in force and what would happen then.
“My name is Elek,” the figure replied, pulling a hood down, revealing pale skin and sunglasses.
“What do you want here?” Che Lu demanded.
“Perhaps the same thing you want,” Elek said.
“The lower level,” Che Lu said. “Can you get past the ghost guard?”
“The ghost guard?” Elek bared his smooth white teeth in a quick smile. “I can get past that with the proper information and equipment.” He lifted a long thin hand and pointed. “You recovered Professor Nabinger’s notebook, did you not?” Che Lu knew there was no use lying. “Yes.”
“And what did he discover?”
“He believed Artad and other Airlia are in the lowest level.”
“What else?”
“There was something about the power of the sun.”
Elek nodded. “Very good.” He yelled some more commands at the mercenaries. “Come with me,” he said to Che Lu and Lo Fa.
They followed, guards with weapons ready surrounding them. There were a half-dozen control panels of the type Che Lu now associated with the Airlia, hexagon-shaped patterns filling the surface with Airlia high rune symbols inside of each hexagon.
Elek walked right up to a console in the front of the room, facing a wall where the trace outline of a door was visible. Che Lu knew the guardian was behind that door.
“You are with Artad?” Che Lu asked. She remembered what Nabinger had said after making contact with the guardian behind the wall.
Elek said nothing.
“STAAR?” Che Lu tried.
“Very good,” Elek commended her. “STAAR is one of many names we have had over the years.” He put his right hand on the console. A red glow suffused the black top, outlining more high rune symbols. A new group of hexagons, fitted tightly together, appeared. Elek’s hand flew over the pattern, touching.
There was a loud humming noise. A crack appeared along the edges of the door in the far wall as it began to slide upward. Che Lu noted that the mercenaries brought their weapons up. Lo Fa had not said a word since they had encountered the mercenaries and their strange leader.
Elek disappeared into the next room. Che Lu and Lo Fa followed. A six-foot-high pyra
mid, the surface glowing with a golden haze, rested in the center of the room. Elek stopped and looked at it. Che Lu picked up in him the same reverence she felt when in the presence of her ancestors’ tombs; a deep reverence.
“What are you going to do?” Che Lu asked.
“We need the power — the ruby sphere.”
“The ruby sphere was destroyed,” Che Lu said.
“One of the ruby spheres was destroyed,” Elek said.
“The second one is down there?” Che Lu pointed to the floor.
“It had better be,” Elek said.
Elek walked forward and placed both hands, palms out, on the glowing gold surface. Within a second, he was completely covered by the glow.
CHAPTER 16
The patrol was making good time. They were moving along the east bank of a river. The patrol crested a tall, grassy ridge and Toland halted briefly to peer about. He could see a long way in every direction, and there was nothing. No sign of civilization. They could be the only people on the face of the planet, based on the information his senses were giving him.
Toland glanced at Baldrick. “Got a reading?”
Baldrick pulled his pack off.
Toland gestured for Faulkener and the two remaining merks to form a close perimeter.
Baldrick was opening the plastic case when one of the men leapt to his feet, cursing. A thin strand dangled from his right arm.
Toland whipped his machete out of its sheath and dashed toward the man. With one sweep of the blade he cut the snake in two just under the head, which was still attached by its teeth to the man’s arm.
“Hold still!” Toland ordered. “You’re just pushing the venom through you.” Toland carefully reached and spread the teeth, pulling the head off. He knew the make — a krait. He pushed the man to the ground. “Take it easy.”
Toland knelt down to the man, whose screams had descended to gasps of pain-filled breath. “Easy, man, easy.” He shifted around to the side of the man, one hand on his shoulder. With the other he brought up the Sterling, out of the man’s sight, and holding the muzzle less than an inch from his head, fired a round into his brain.
Baldrick didn’t react.
“Do you have a fix?” Toland demanded.
Baldrick pointed. “Five kilometers that way.”
“Let’s move.” Toland got to his feet.
As they left behind the body, Faulkener moved over next to Toland. “Well, more for each of us now.”
“I know,” Toland repeated. He felt warm, and his head was throbbing. He looked down at his hand. There were faint traces of black under the skin. He remembered the bodies being carried by the patrol they had ambushed.
“You all right, sir?” Faulkener asked.
“No.”
* * *
“I got you!” Waker yelled out, startling the men and women in the other cubicles in the NSA surveillance room. “I got you!” he repeated, his fingers tapping keys quickly.
On his computer screen the silhouette of the South American continent appeared, then grew larger, the edges disappearing, the computer focusing in on the west-central part. It narrowed down to a spot just over the border from Bolivia in Brazil, a hundred kilometers west of the town of Vilhena.
Waker quickly summarized the information and sent out a priority intelligence report to Duncan via secure Interlink.
* * *
“T-minus three hours. The count has resumed. Perform T-3 hours snapshot on flight critical and payload items.”
The same voice carried over the launch pads on either end of the United States. Lisa Duncan heard them as she peered once more over the papers that had been faxed to her by Major Quinn.
The partial history of The Mission was interesting, but what she really needed was a location and he had not yet uncovered that. She thumbed quickly through all the information that had been forwarded. She paused as she saw the e-mail from the NSA.
She frowned. Someone had piggybacked a GPS — ground positioning satellite — signal in the area near the border between Bolivia and Brazil. Even as she was looking at it, the printer attached to her computer chimed and another sheet slowly came out.
Same thing. Slightly different location. This one pinpointed a spot. It was in the very west of Brazil. Duncan took a pencil and slowly wrote on a pad of paper:
Tiahuanaco.
The Mission.
Coming from Spain in the fifteenth century.
The Airlia.
STAAR.
Guides.
Yakov and Section IV being destroyed.
Guardian.
Dulce.
Easter Island.
Che Lu and Qian-Ling and a second ruby sphere.
Duncan paused. If there was a second ruby sphere then—
“The next planned hold is at T-minus two hours. Go for flight crew final prep and briefing.”
Duncan’s eyes flashed toward the window. The space shuttle was ready. If there was another ruby sphere, then the mothership could still be used for interstellar flight. If it could be repaired — but hadn’t Kopina said they were going up to get a breathable atmosphere inside?
Duncan picked up her SATPhone and dialed the number for Turcotte in South America.
* * *
The mechrobots continued to do the guardian’s bidding. The hole in the floor of the chamber had reached the thermal vent. A power system to tap that was being built two miles down.
Under the black shield guarding Easter island, all was progressing quite well.
* * *
Elek stepped away from the guardian. His dark sunglasses turned in the direction of Che Lu and Lo Fa, but before he could say anything, the tough-looking mercenary leader spoke.
“We got trouble,” Croteau said. “My man in the top says he can hear tanks and other heavy equipment. The Chinese army is back, and they’re pissed seeing all their buddies dead.”
“Your men have mined the entrance?” Elek asked.
“Yes, but that doesn’t stop them from dropping satchel charges in here or even gassing us like you did them.”
Elek walked past Croteau to stand in front of Che Lu.
“Where is it?”
Che Lu stepped back, feeling the malevolence coming off of him. “Where is what?”
“The key.”
“I do not have a key.”
“Search them,” Elek ordered Croteau.
Croteau did the job quickly.
“They don’t have any key,” Croteau said. “We’re wasting time here. We need to get out, if we still can.”
Elek shook his head. “No, we will make the time we need.” He headed back into the control room. As they entered, an explosion rumbled through the cavern.
Croteau was listening to the small FM radio on his combat vest. “The PLA is attacking!”
Another explosion came amid the sound of automatic weapons firing. Elek stood at the main control panel. He ran his hands over the hexagons. A loud rumbling noise overrode the sounds of battle. Croteau dashed to the door and looked into the cavern.
“You’re shutting the inner door!” he exclaimed.
“We need time,” Elek said.
“But I left ten men up there!” Croteau’s right hand came up, the submachine gun pointing at Elek.
“I am the only way you will get out of here alive,” Elek said. “And sealing the tunnel was the only way we are going to stay in here alive. There were no other options.”
“Goddammit!” Croteau exploded. “You don’t just leave men to die like that.”
“You do it all the time,” Elek said. “It’s called war.”
* * *
Turcotte ripped off the suit, passing directly into the isolation lock, then into the habitat. Yakov had imagery and intelligence printouts spread out on the floor in front of him. Kenyon was looking through his microscope.
“Where’s Norward?” Kenyon asked.
“At the hospital in town.” Turcotte told them of the tear in the suit. The USAMRIID m
an did not seem surprised or particularly upset. Of course, Turcotte knew both Kenyon and Norward had had more time to think about such a fate, just as a soldier was more prepared to go into battle. “We’re all going to get this thing if we can’t figure out its vector and come up with an antidote or vaccine,” Kenyon said.
“Anything from your headquarters?” Turcotte asked.
“I can’t get through to Fort Detrick,” Kenyon said. “It will take time for the vector experiments to work.”
“We don’t have time,” Turcotte said. He looked at Yakov. “What do you have?” Yakov drew a circle. “The satellite came down somewhere to the west of here. I think—” He paused as the SATPhone rang.
Turcotte picked it up. “Turcotte.”
“Mike, it’s Lisa. We’ve got something.”
Turcotte listened as she told him about the strange transmission picked up to their west. He got the grid location from her.
“There’s something else,” Duncan said.
“What’s that?”
“Colonel Carmen, my friend who authorized the USAMRIID mission, is dead.” Duncan went on to tell Turcotte of the phone conversation.
“So someone’s covering up on the Stateside end” was Turcotte’s summation of that information.
“Looks like.”
“Can you get me any help?”
“I can try,” Duncan said. “What do you need?”
Turcotte rattled off a quick list of support.
“I’ve already got some of that moving. I talked to Colonel Mickell at Bragg already.”
“Good. What about the shuttles?” he asked her. “Have you figured out what is going on?”
“I think someone wants to get the mothership, because there’s a second ruby sphere hidden somewhere, maybe in the lowest level of Qian-Ling.”
Turcotte considered the situation. “That’s putting the cart before the horse,” he said. “Whoever wants the mothership has to survive the Black Death first.”
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