by John Lyman
Zamir threw up his hands. “What would you have us do, Eduardo ... nuke the site in Turkey on a supposition that the Antichrist is about to appear? I’m afraid the best we can do at this point is to have the Turkish authorities look into the matter. Turkey is a sovereign country ... one we happen to be on friendly terms with, and we can’t just go charging into their territory on a hunch that some kind of supernatural event is about to occur in the hills outside one of their villages.”
“What about just dropping me off along the coast of Turkey somewhere?” Eduardo countered.
“Even if we could get you there in time, you’d be all alone,” Zamir said, “and you’re hardly in any condition to go traipsing around the countryside by yourself right now.”
Zamir’s stoic façade began to break when he saw the look of pain on Acerbi’s face. “Look, Mr. Acerbi, I’d like to help you, but this is out of our hands. The Turks have some very competent people in their intelligence service. We’ll contact them and have them send some people up into the hills around that village you described. They can get there a lot quicker, and if they see anything strange they can deal with it right then.”
“Don’t bother. They wouldn’t stand a chance against what’s out there.” Acerbi’s breathing became more labored. “I think by now my motives are obvious. I want to save my son. But the implications of an Antichrist turned loose on the world will soon become even more obvious. We are rapidly approaching the climactic end to thousands of years of preparation by a liar and deceiver who has tormented mankind for as long as we have existed on this earth, and things are about to get much worse. The final act in this celestial war between heaven and hell will be the transition of my son into the one who has been prophesized in Revelation. The dark star has risen, gentlemen, and may God have mercy on our souls.”
Zamir hunched his thick shoulders and breathed a sigh of resignation. “After we contact the Turkish military, we can take you to a spot off the coast of Italy, Mr. Acerbi, but I’m afraid that is the best we can do for now. The world situation is spinning out of control and we’ve been ordered to return to Israel as soon as possible.” Looking up at Bagrov, the Mossad chief turned and walked right into Leo and Pope Michael.
“Might as well drop us off too, Danny,” Leo said. “The pope wants to return to Rome.”
CHAPTER 36
Moving through the immense space, Ben and Daniel were unable to take their eyes off the colossal sphere rising above their heads. Below them, down in the steaming, hissing pit filled with miles of fiber optic cable, they could feel the heat being generated inside the monstrous computer, making it feel uncomfortably warm for anyone who stood too close to its silvery-black composite shell.
Tapping Ben on the arm, Daniel pointed to a computer terminal built into the wall behind them. After waiting for a technician to pass, he moved closer, and right away he spotted several USB ports and a row of slots below the screen. While Ben kept watch, Daniel quickly removed a flash drive from his pocket and plugged it into one of the ports. Immediately the screen came to life and requested a password.
I should have known better! Daniel stared at the flashing screen in horror. If he didn’t enter a password soon the computer would trigger a security alert that would most likely prompt someone to check the camera monitoring this terminal. He quickly unplugged the flash drive, but just before he walked away he decided to hit the eject button next to the top slot. To his amazement, a metallic-looking blue disk slid out. Peering defiantly at the camera above his head, he pulled it out and shoved it into his pocket.
Walking away from the terminal, Daniel saw Ben unzip the top of his clean suit and remove a pair of heavy-framed glasses from his shirt pocket. Looking up at the sphere, he slid them on and pressed a tiny button located along the inside of the earpiece, triggering a miniature camera embedded within the frame.
Panicked about his encounter with the computer, Daniel moved next to Ben. “We’ve probably got less than a minute before they notice I just triggered a computer security alert, and they have me on camera.”
“Yeah, I think we’ve seen enough. Lets ... Ben suddenly stopped talking and his eyes widened as he looked over Daniel’s shoulder. Standing right behind him was the bearded man they had seen driving the yellow Lamborghini.
“What are you doing?” the man asked in a thick Russian accent. It was Ilia Sokolov.
Ben could feel the hair rise up on the back of his neck as he glanced sideways at Daniel.
“Why are you looking at him?” Sokolov’s face reddened. “I asked you a question. What are you doing down here?”
Before Daniel had time to weigh his options he pulled the crystal from his pocket. “We found this crystal in the back of the truck. We thought you might be looking for it, so we brought it down here.”
Sokolov’s face melted with a look of relief as he reached out and took the crystal from Daniel’s hand. It was like watching a father hold his newborn baby for the first time. “Do you realize what you have done?”
Ben instinctively moved his hand to the zipper of his clean suit so he could reach the pistol hidden in his waistband.
“You’ve just saved us from a disastrous delay!” Sokolov smiled as he held up the crystal.
“We would have brought it down here sooner, but we weren’t sure what it was,” Daniel continued. “What is that thing anyway?”
Sokolov’s eyes narrowed to thin slits. “A strange question coming from an elite guard. You should know better than to ask questions like that.” He paused as he studied the two Israelis. “I don’t believe I recognize your accents. Where are you from?”
“Canada, sir.” Ben said quickly as a drop of sweat dripped from his hairline.
“I thought all our recruits came from Europe.”
“I was living in Europe when I was recruited, sir.” Ben’s interrogation training was kicking into overdrive. Like everyone else in Team 5, he had been taught to think on his feet in case he was captured or questioned during a mission.
“Where were you recruited?”
“Paris, sir. I was in the Legion.”
“Ah, a Legionnaire. We were watching you in Iraq.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“My unit was on the ground in Iraq during the first Gulf War to observe the tactics of your so-called coalition army.”
“KGB?”
“Another probing question from this inquisitive Canadian.” Sokolov paused as he studied the two men. “Actually, I was attached to military intelligence as a computer specialist. An old GRU instructor at the academy once told me that the Legionnaires would have made formidable adversaries if we had ever been forced to deal with them on the field of battle, but as observers we never got the chance to find out. Too bad, really ... I always wanted to find out what it was like to shoot someone. I suppose I have a penchant for destroying things.” Sokolov broke into a high-pitched laugh that echoed around the concrete walls, but as soon as the laughter faded his eyes took on the unwavering gaze of a predator.
As Sokolov looked up at the sphere, Ben and Daniel stood frozen and watched as ion-charged particles of dust floated up around his face before being vented outside through one of the many exhaust ducts. It was like standing in the room with a wild animal that could sense your fear, for it was quickly becoming evident to the two Israelis that they were dealing with a very dangerous and unpredictable psychopath.
Looking away from the sphere, Sokolov re-focused his attention back on the two men standing before him. “You may go. But next time call me before you go wandering around down in secure areas. Is that understood?”
“Yes, sir. It won’t happen again.” Ben started to salute but caught himself at the last second when he remembered that salutes varied in style from army to army, and using the wrong kind of salute would mean a sure trip to an interrogation room with a crazy Russian who, by his own admission, always wanted to know what it felt like to shoot someone.
Turning around, Ben and Daniel walked s
lowly through the exit door without looking back. Stripping off their white cover suits, they grabbed their weapons and waited for the large, vault-like door to swing open before heading up the stairs at a pace that seemed agonizingly slow. Trying to take each step at a measured pace, Ben was acutely aware that the cameras were watching them, and that even now the Russian was probably checking to see if any Canadians had been hired by his security force.
As soon as they reached the top of the stairs and exited the cooling tower, the two men took off at a dead run across the flood-lit open space until they reached the side of the maintenance building. Trying to slow his breathing, Ben grinned at Daniel. “That was fast thinking down there, my friend.”
“I thought you were going to be furious with me for giving up the crystal,” Daniel said, “but from the looks of that Russian guy I thought it was our only option.”
“Sometimes we have to make trade-offs. I have a feeling they would have found it anyway, because I could tell the man was starting to get suspicious. We were probably seconds away from being searched by the goons standing behind him. You probably just saved the mission, Danny Boy.”
Jerking open the door to the maintenance building, Ben and Daniel were greeted by the relieved stares of a dozen Israeli commandos. “We were starting to get worried, Captain,” Efron said. “Five more minutes and we were coming in after you.”
“You wouldn’t believe what’s down there,” Ben said excitedly. “The palace is just the tip of a very large iceberg. There’s a fortress beneath us, and we’re standing on an ant hill that’s about to start swarming after they take a look at their cameras and discover that Daniel was messing around with one of their computer terminals. In a few minutes the ants are going to start flowing from their nest, and we need to be out of here before that happens.”
“What about the kid?” Efron asked.
“No time. This place is one giant maze and we don’t have any intel on where they might be keeping him or even if he’s still here. If we stumble upon him on the way out ... grab him. Otherwise, we’re out of here.” Ben looked around at all the disappointed faces staring back at him, because to the men of Team 5, going home without achieving all of their mission objectives was like walking off the field before the end of the game.
“I know what you’re all thinking,” Ben said, “but our primary objective comes first, and we’ve got to get the pictures I just took back to Tel Aviv.”
“What was it, Captain ... what did you guys see down there?”
“The queen ant,” Ben grinned. “A big fat queen ant. They’ve got the mother of all computers down in their little ant hole, and there’s no doubt in my mind that these are the people behind the computer worm that just struck our country.”
Efron was beginning to look like a tiger that hadn’t eaten. “Why don’t we just blow it now?”
“For one thing we’d need a lot more explosives, and our bosses back in Tel Aviv might have other plans in mind. We just stumbled on new technology that supposedly doesn’t exist yet, and this site could be an intelligence goldmine.” Ben peered out through the window at the floodlit courtyard around the palace. “How many guards outside?”
“Only two, sir. They’ve been out there for the last thirty minutes.”
“Anyone else?”
“Just the guy in the Lamborghini and a squad of soldiers that walked past us about fifteen minutes ago.”
“Yeah, we just had a nice chat with him down at the bottom of the ant hill, and I don’t relish the idea of striking up a new friendship with a psychopath. Our time here is up, because by now the Russian has probably seen the camera footage and discovered that our cover story is full of holes. In a few minutes all hell is going to break loose, so we need to get moving, and we need to do it right now.”
Ben looked over at the radio man. “Send another burst transmission to the choppers and have them take off and fly in over the highway. Tell them to be on the lookout for a truck being chased.”
Sergeant Efron winced. “What’s on your mind, sir?”
“Like I said, we’re out of time. We’re going to grab that truck out there and smash our way through the gate. Leave a satchel charge in here and set the timer for four minutes. That’s how long we’ll have to take care of the guards outside and make it out of here. We’ll throw another one out by the gate. The explosions should slow down anyone trying to follow us. After that all bets are off. Since I’m still wearing one of their uniforms, I’ll go first and distract the guards while the rest of you follow.”
Looking back at his men, Ben opened the door and stepped out into the floodlit courtyard. As soon as the first guard spotted him, Ben stopped to light a cigarette. “Nice night.”
The guard slung his rifle over his shoulder and walked closer. “Yeah, at least they found whatever it was they were looking for. Now everyone’s awake and they want us to change that tire before our relief shows up.”
Ben froze when the guard pointed to the flat tire at the back of the truck.
“You ever change a tire on one of these things before?” Ben asked.
“No, and from the looks of it we’ll be here for another hour.”
“Well, you’re in luck, because I’m your relief. My partner will be along in a minute. We’ll take care of the tire.”
“But you’re in the elite guard. You guys never stand guard duty.”
“Looks like we’re going to tonight. Orders from the top. Something big is going on.”
“Must be. Sure you don’t want us to hang around?”
“I’m positive. Get some sleep.”
“Thanks, buddy. I owe you one.” The guard motioned to the other soldier and they both strode off toward the palace with their rifles slung casually over their shoulders.
Immediately the Israelis came flooding out of their hiding place. “Change of plans,” Ben shouted. “We’ll have to take the second truck in line. This one’s got a flat.”
Efron quickly made a mental calculation of the distance between the maintenance building and the palace. “There’s not enough room to drive the second truck around this one.”
“Then we’ll push the one with the flat out of the way. How much time until the satchel charge goes off?”
“Three and a half minutes and counting, sir.”
“Better hustle then.”
As Team 5 jumped into the back of the second truck in line, Sergeant Efron hopped into the driver’s seat and hit the gas. Backing up against the front bumper of the truck with the flat, they spun the disabled vehicle into the side of the palace just as loud sirens began wailing all around the compound.
“Sounds like the gig is up,” Ben shouted, jumping into the seat next to Efron. “Ram the gate and keep on going.”
Looking back through the side window, Ben could see dozens of soldiers running across the open area between the cooling tower and the maintenance building. “Step on it, Sergeant!”
Efron spun the wheel and pushed the accelerator all the way down just as a flurry of bullets began zipping into the back of the truck. In front of them, flashes of gunfire erupted from the walls, shattering the windshield just as the front bumper crashed through the gate. With steam pouring from bullet holes in the radiator, they threw out a second satchel charge that exploded ten seconds later, collapsing the walls by the gate and leaving a large crater in the road.
Behind them, through the dust and debris from the explosion, an open jeep with a machine gun mounted behind the driver came roaring out of the compound. Swerving around the smoking crater, the jeep began gaining on them as the machine gunner began pouring fire into the back of the truck carrying the Israelis. Instantly one Israeli soldier was hit in the shoulder as the others began spraying the highway behind them with every weapon they had, while inside the compound, they could see soldiers climbing into trucks just as the maintenance building exploded in a billowing tower of fire.
Balancing his weapon on the rear tailgate of the truck, an Israeli commando
let loose with a shoulder fired rocket, hitting the jeep behind them dead center. The resulting explosion lifted the jeep up into the air in a showering burst of metal and flame before it fell back to the side of the road in an unrecognizable heap of twisted wreckage.
From the walls of the compound, bullets continued to rain all around them as a rocket-propelled grenade flew past the truck, barely missing them.
“They’ve got our range,” Ben shouted to Efron. “The next one probably won’t miss!” Looking back out his side window, Ben ducked when two dark shapes flew by overhead. Seconds later, the two choppers released all of their rockets against the west wall of the compound, reducing the entire area to a smoldering heap of rubble.
Focusing on the road ahead, Efron pushed the smoking truck up the highway and around a curve in the road until it finally chugged to a stop in a billowing cloud of steam. Jumping from the truck, the Israelis began sprinting up the sides of the highway, mindful of the fact that there were still roving 5-man weapons teams lurking in the nearby dunes.
As the adrenalin flooded their systems, they swiveled their heads and peered out into the surrounding desert with their night vision goggles. They didn’t have to wait for long as gunfire erupted from the top of a dune. The Israelis hit the dirt as bullets flew over their heads. They were pinned down with no cover, and as Ben raised his head, he saw a chopper rise up behind the dune and pour a stream of fire from a roaring mini-gun into the 5-man team that had just spotted them.
Seconds later, the choppers set down in the middle of the highway, and in less time than it took to send a text message, two helicopters full of grinning Israeli commandos were speeding over glowing moonlit dunes en route to a warship waiting off the Iraqi coast in the Arabian Sea.
CHAPTER 37
Low black clouds were blotting out the sea around them as Francois Leander piloted the thirty-five-foot cabin cruiser through building waves toward a small island ten miles off the Italian coast. Sitting in the small cabin below the pilothouse, Anthony Morelli was pouring over a sea chart with two Swiss Guards in an effort to locate a tiny dot on the map pinpointed by a source in the Israeli embassy who had told them they would find Pope Michael waiting for them there.
