Hugo nodded. "Guns and ammo can be found in the arsenal room at the entrance of the hangar."
"Then you have my permission to recruit any and everyone who wants to see their loved ones again."
Hugo looked his brother in the eyes. "It is not my place, brother, to ask them to fight and die. You are the leader of our new destiny. You are whom they respect and venerate. You ask, and they will follow."
Karl stared into the faces of his brother and two sisters, seeing his own expression of foreboding in their eyes. With a mind as cold as an iceberg and a heart of stone, he had no misgivings about ordering his people to lay down their lives so that he and his siblings might survive.
"Assemble them," he said to Elsie, "and I will tell them what they must do."
Leaving four of his men who were not hurt seriously to tend the wounded and stand guard over the surviving security guards, Cleary and twenty-two able-bodied men of his remaining team, led by Pitt and Giordino, who knew the way to the hangar, entered the main tunnel in tactical formation, with two of Garnet's Delta Force acting as forward flanking scouts.
Lieutenant Jacobs was more than surprised to meet up with Pitt and Giordino again, and even more amazed to find that they were the madmen who'd driven the Snow Cruiser into the battle zone only minutes before Cleary and his men would have ended up like Custer and the Seventh Cavalry at the Little Bighorn.
Moving cautiously, the column rounded the first bend in the tunnel and moved past the deserted construction equipment and the doorways leading into the empty storerooms. Walking through the ice tunnel seemed far different to Pitt and Giordino than when they had careened through it in the Snow Cruiser. Pitt smiled to himself at seeing the long gouges in the ice caused by his reckless driving when escaping the armored Sno-cat.
When they reached an abandoned tow vehicle, attached to a small train of four flatbed cars that had been used to haul supplies and cargo throughout the tunnel labyrinth, they halted their advance and used the equipment for cover, as Cleary questioned Pitt and Giordino.
"How far to the hangar from here?" he asked.
"About another five hundred yards before the tunnel opens into it," Pitt answered.
"Is there any place between here and there they could set up a barricade?"
"Every ten feet, if they had the time and blocks of ice. But I doubt they could have built anything substantial in the few short minutes since they lost their battle for the facility." He pointed down on the ice.
Besides the rotund indentations from the tires of the Snow Cruiser, the only other tracks came from a single snowmobile and the footprints of several men that suggested that they had been running from the battle.
"Can't be more than a dozen security guards left. If they intend to mount a defense, it will have to be within a hundred yards of the hangar."
"Don't forget the Sno-cat," said Giordino quietly, "the one you didn't mash into scrap."
"There's another one of those devilish vehicles still lurking around?" growled Cleary.
Pitt nodded. "Very well could be. What's in your traveling arsenal that can disable it?"
"Nothing that will penetrate its armor," Cleary admitted.
"Hold up your men, Major. I think I see something that might be of use."
Pitt rummaged around in the toolbox of the tow vehicle until he came up with an empty fuel can. He found a steel pry bar and used it to perforate the top of the can. Then he took the bar and punched the bar through the bottom of the tow vehicle's fuel tank. When the can was full, he held it up. "Now all we need is an igniting device."
Lieutenant Jacobs, who was observing Pitt's actions, reached into his pack and retrieved a small flare gun used for signaling purposes at night or in foul weather. "Will this do?"
"Like a beautiful woman and a glass of fine Cabernet," said Pitt.
Cleary raised his arm and swung it forward. "Let's move out."
There were no haunting fears of the unknown now, no urgencies or trepidations. Flankers moving like cats, followed by men unshakable and committed, bent on avenging friends who'd died back at the control center, they advanced into the tunnel like wraiths under the obscure light refracting through the ice. Pitt felt a swell of pride, knowing that he and Giordino were accepted by such men as equals.
Suddenly, the flankers motioned a halt. Everyone froze, listening. An engine's exhaust faintly heard in the distance signaled the approach of a vehicle. Soon the sound grew louder and echoed through the tunnel. Then twin lights appeared, their beams dancing on the ice before rounding the bend.
"The Sno-cat," Pitt announced calmly. "Here it comes." He pointed at one of the nearby empty storerooms. "I suggest you and your men get inside quickly before we're all exposed by the headlights."
A terse, quiet command, and twenty seconds later, every man was inside the storeroom, with the door cracked open an inch. The lights grew brighter as the Sno-cat trod its way through the tunnel. Just behind the storeroom door, Pitt crouched with the fuel can clutched in both hands. Behind him, Jacobs stood poised and ready to fire the flare pistol, and behind him, the entire team primed and ready to pour from the storeroom and lay down a hail of lethal fire on the occupants of the Sno-cat or any guards who might be following on foot.
Timing was critical. If Pitt threw the can too soon or too late and the guards inside survived, the entire Special Force team was trapped inside the storeroom like ducks in a closet, and would be wiped out in less time than it would take to tell about it. Jacobs had to be on target, too. A miss and it was all over.
The Sno-cat came closer. Pitt judged its speed at about ten miles an hour. The driver was moving cautiously. Through the narrow slit between the door and frame, he saw no sign of guards following the vehicle on foot. "She's coming too fast for support to follow behind," Pitt reported softly to Cleary. "My guess is they're on a scouting mission."
"They carry four men," Cleary murmured. "I know that much."
Pitt shied his head and closed his eyes to keep from being temporarily blinded by the bright lights of the Sno-cat. It was so close now he could hear its treads crunch against the icy floor of the tunnel. With infinite caution, without using any sudden movement that might catch the eye of the vehicle's occupants, he inched the door open. The front end of the Sno-cat was now close enough to the storeroom that he could hear the muted beat of its engine. Nimbly, focused, and precise, he threw the door open, raised himself to his full height and hurled the gas can into the open compartment of the Sno-cat. Then, without the slightest suggestion of a pause, he ducked to his side and dropped to the ice.
Jacobs was not one to let the grass grow under his feet. He was aiming the flare pistol before Pitt cast aside the door. A millimeter's adjustment and he fired, the shell missing Pitt's head by the width of two fingers a heartbeat after the fuel can sailed into the open Sno-cat and splashed its contents inside.
The interior erupted in a holocaust of flame. The horrified guards, their uniforms ablaze, leaped from the Sno-cat and rolled frantically on the ice to smother the fire. Even if they had been successful, their lives would not have been spared. The men of Cleary's command who had suffered so appallingly from the guards earlier were not in a benevolent mood. They burst from the storeroom and put the guards out of their agony in a flurry of gunfire. The Sno-cat, now hardly identifiable as a mechanical transport, lurched driverless through the tunnel, grazing the slick walls of ice that did little to slow it down.
No time was spent inspecting the death scene. Cleary regrouped his men and got them moving again.
Not one man turned and looked back or showed a sign of remorse. They pushed on through the tunnel, anxious to end the nightmare and punish those responsible. With a conscious effort of will, Pitt rose to his feet and leaned on Giordino's rock-strong shoulder for a few steps until his legs worked efficiently again, then set off after Cleary.
When his radio calls to the Sno-cat went unanswered and the sounds of gunfire reverberated from the tunnel, Hugo Wolf assu
med the worst. With no more armored vehicles, he had one more hand to play before the Americans reached the hangar and engaged in another free-for-all battle with his eight remaining security guards. He had little confidence in the small army of engineers, who hardly knew how to handle weapons or had the fortitude to shoot down another human, especially a trained professional who was shooting back. What he was about to attempt, Hugo thought morosely, was the last throw of the dice.
He walked over to where Karl, Elsie, and Blondi were conversing with Jurgen Holtz. Karl turned and looked at Hugo, seeing the dark expression. "Problems, brother?"
"I believe I have lost my last armored Sno-cat and four men who were not expendable."
"We've got to hold out," said Elsie. "Bruno is on his way with two aircraft and is scheduled to arrive five hours from now."
"Three and a half hours after the ice shelf breaks free," Holtz remarked. "The activation sequence for the ice machines has begun and there can be no stopping it."
Karl swore softly. "Can we hold out until then?"
Hugo stared at the tunnel leading to the mining facility as if he were expecting an army of phantoms.
"They can't have but a handful of men left. If my guards can eliminate them in the tunnel or at least whittle them down to a pitiful few, then between the rest of us, we easily have enough firepower to stop them for good."
Karl faced Hugo and laid a hand on his shoulder. "Regardless of the outcome, brother, I know you will have conducted yourself bravely and with honor."
Hugo embraced Karl, then moved off to join the last of his guards and lead them into the tunnel. They were followed by a tow vehicle pulling a flatcar loaded with a fifty-five-gallon drum and a large six-foot-diameter fan.
The Special Forces team stopped short of the last bend in the tunnel before it straightened and ran another fifty yards into the hangar. A light mist appeared ahead that seemed to grow thicker as it rolled through the tunnel and began to envelop the men.
"What do you make of it?" Cleary asked Pitt.
"Nothing good. We encountered nothing like it when we passed through here with the Snow Cruiser."
Pitt raised a finger as if testing for wind. "It's not a natural phenomenon. Not only does it have a strange smell, but it's being sent by some sort of mechanism, probably a large fan."
"Not poisonous," said Cleary, sniffing the mist. "Part of our training is in recognizing toxic gas. My guess is they're laying a harmless chemical on us to screen their movements."
"Could be they're short on manpower and making a desperation play," suggested Jacobs, who came up alongside the major.
"Close up," Cleary ordered his men through his helmet radio. "We'll keep going. Be ready to take whatever cover you can find, should they advance and fire out of the mist."
"I don't recommend that course of action," Pitt warned him.
Cleary simply asked, "Why?"
Pitt grinned at Giordino. "I think we've been here before."
"And done that," Giordino added.
Pitt stared appraisingly at the mist, then put his hand on Giordino's arm. "Al, take one of the Major's men, run back to the tow vehicle, and bring back its spare tire."
Cleary eyes reflected curiosity. "What good is a tire?"
"A little subterfuge of our own."
Minutes later, a tremendous detonation tore through the heart of the tunnel. No flame or swirling smoke, but a blinding flash followed by an enormous shock wave that crushed the confined air before it shot away like a missile through a pneumatic tube. The explosive sound came like a giant clap of thunder before it rumbled away and its echoes slowly faded.
Very slowly, stunned by the sheer density of the shock, his ears ringing like cathedral bells, Hugo Wolf and his eight remaining security guards staggered with numbed senses to their feet and began to advance through mounds of fallen ice, expecting to find nothing but the disintegrated bodies of the Americans. The sheer concussion was far beyond what they'd expected, but their hopes were buoyed into thoughts that their enemy had been eliminated.
Rounding the bend and using flashlights to penetrate the remnant of the mist and vapors from the explosion, they slowly moved forward until they could distinguish bodies lying gruesomely in and under the ice dislodged from the tunnel's roof. Hugo's eyes wandered from figure to figure, satisfaction and elation rising inside him at the sight of the dead Americans. Not one had survived. He looked down at two men who were dressed as civilians and wondered who they were and where they had come from.
They were lying facedown, and he failed to recognize them as the two men who'd driven the abominable vehicle that had caused so much death and destruction at the control center.
"Congratulations on a great triumph, Mr. Wolf," one of his guards complimented him.
Hugo slowly nodded. "Yes, but it was a triumph that came with too high a cost." Then, mechanically, he and his men turned their backs on the seeming carnage and began walking back to the hangar.
"Freeze!" Cleary shouted.
Hugo and his men whirled around, aghast at seeing dead men suddenly leap to their feet with their guns leveled and trained. He might have surrendered then and there. Any sane man would have seen that resistance could only end in certain death. But Hugo, more on reflex than with a stable mind, threw up his gun to fire, the guards following his action.
The Special Forces weapons roared as one. The security guards managed to fire only a few frenzied rounds before they were cut down. Hugo stumbled backward, stood motionless in his tracks, his face contorted as he dropped his gun and stared through shocked and glazed eyes at the neatly spaced bullet holes that crossed the stomach of his black uniform from chest to waist. Finally, with sick certainty that he had failed, and knowing he had only a few seconds to live, he crumpled to the ground.
The gunfire had died away, and Jacobs, followed cautiously by his men, began inspecting the bodies and removing all weapons clutched in dead hands. Pitt, with his Colt hanging loosely in his right hand, came over and knelt at Hugo's side. The leader of the Wolf family's annihilated security force became aware of a presence and stared up expressionlessly.
"How did you know?" he murmured.
"Your people used the same booby-trap trick on me in the mine in Colorado."
"But the explosion. . .?"
Pitt knew the man was going, and he had to get it in fast. "We rolled the spare tire and wheel from a tow vehicle down the tunnel, tripping the wire to your explosive charge. We then took cover in a storeroom. Immediately after the blast, we ran out and scattered ourselves in the ice debris caused by the concussion and played dead." "Who are you?" he whispered. "My name is Dirk Pitt." The eyes widened briefly. "Not you," he whispered. Then the eyes froze open and his head slumped to the side.
<<46>>
The explosion, followed by a storm of gunfire, resounded through the tunnel and into the hangar like thunder rumbling from the other end of a drainage pipe. Then the racket abruptly stopped and the sounds ebbed, until an ominous silence spread and hung heavy inside the hangar. Minutes passed, with everyone standing frozen, staring into the yawning darkness, waiting with uneasy trepidation. Then the eerie stillness was broken by the approaching sound of footsteps echoing along the ice floor of the tunnel.
A figure slowly took form and walked into the refracted light falling through the roof of the hangar. A tall man, holding a stick with a white rag flowing from the top, advanced toward the semicircle of a hundred men and women holding guns, every muzzle pointed at the stranger. A scarf was wrapped around the lower half of his face. He walked directly up to Karl Wolf and his sisters, stopped, and pulled away the scarf, revealing a craggy face darkened with bearded stubble and haggard with fatigue.
"Hugo sends his regrets, but he is unable to join your little bon voyage party."
There was a moment of incredulous confusion throughout the hangar. Blondi stared in amazed fascination. Elsie's face took on an expression of shock and baffled rage. Predictably, Karl was the first to
recover and come back on keel. "So it's you, Mr. Pitt," he said, observing Pitt through suspicious eyes. "You're like a curse."
"Forgive the casual dress," said Pitt cordially, "but my tux is at the cleaners."
Glaring at Pitt, her blue eyes furious, Elsie stepped forward and thrust an automatic pistol into Pitt's stomach. He grunted in pain, stepped back, and clutched his midriff, but the smile never left his face.
"You will notice," Pitt spoke tautly, "that I am unarmed and carrying a flag of truce."
Karl pushed Elsie's gun hand away. "Let me kill him," she hissed venomously.
"All in good time," he said conversationally. He looked Pitt in the eves. "Hugo is dead?"
"As we say back home, Hugo bought the farm."
"And his men?"
"In the same category."
"Were you responsible for the destruction of my aircraft?"
Pitt looked around at the smashed aircraft and shrugged. "I drove rather recklessly, I must admit."
"Where did you come from?" Wolf asked sharply.
Pitt smiled, ignored him completely, and said, "I suggest you order your people to lay down their weapons before they get hurt very badly. More than enough blood has been spilled here today. It would be the height of stupidity to add to the carnage."
"Your men, Mr. Pitt, how many of the American force are left?"
"See for yourself." Pitt turned and made a motion with his arm. Giordino, Cleary, and his remaining twenty men stepped from the tunnel into the hangar and spread out in an even line nearly ten paces apart, guns held at the ready.
"Twenty against a hundred." Karl Wolf smiled for the first time.
"We're expecting reinforcements momentarily."
"Too late," Karl said, firmly believing that Pitt was desperately attempting to save himself through deception. "The nanotech systems created to break away the ice shelf have been activated by now The world is headed for a cataclysm as we talk. Nothing can stop it."
Atlantis Found Page 50
