The Atlantis Trilogy Box Set- The Complete Series

by A. G. Riddle

  Dorian slammed the helicopter door and watched the hordes of swarming people grow smaller as he and his special ops team rose above Valletta.

  “What’s our destination, sir?” the pilot called back to him.

  Dorian pulled out his phone. No messages.

  “They went west,” he shouted. “We’ll have to look for their helicopter. Try the cities first.”

  In the catacombs of St. Paul, below the city of Rabat, Kamau walked in front of Janus. The tall African led the way with an assault rifle. The beam from the flashlight he’d strapped to the gun barely illuminated the wide tunnel. The glow from the lantern Janus carried behind him didn’t help much.

  “Where are you from, Mr. Kamau?” Janus asked quietly.

  Kamau hesitated, then said, “Africa.”

  “What part?”

  Another pause, as if Kamau didn’t want to answer. “Kenya, outside Nairobi. Now we should—”

  “Near the birthplace of the modern human race. I think it’s only fitting that we should have someone from east Africa on our expedition, hunting for the one African who changed history, who set humanity on its course.”

  Kamau turned back, shining the flashlight in Janus’s face. “We should remain silent.”

  Janus held a hand up to shield his eyes. “Very well.”

  In another part of the catacombs, Dr. Chang walked just ahead of Shaw. The British soldier had made Chang walk first. “For safety,” Shaw had said.

  Chang stopped and swung the lantern back to face Shaw.

  “Are you recording our path?” Chang asked.

  “And leaving breadcrumbs, Doctor. Keep moving.”

  The lantern light only half-illuminated Shaw’s face, and in that instant, Chang thought the man, who was likely in his early thirties, momentarily appeared much younger.

  The face—that younger face—Chang knew it. Where had he seen it?

  Years, decades ago. Right after he had delivered Kate from her mother’s body, from the tubes.

  In the memory, Howard Keegan, the Director of Clocktower and one of two members of the Immari council, sat behind a massive oak desk in his office. Chang fidgeted nervously in the chair across from him.

  “I want you to do a thorough exam of the boy you extracted from the tube. His name is Dieter Kane, but we call him Dorian Sloane now. He’s having some trouble getting… acclimated.”

  “Is he—”

  Keegan pointed his finger at Chang. “You tell me what’s wrong with him, Doctor. Don’t overlook anything. Just give him a full workup and come back here, understand?”

  When Chang had finished the examination, he returned to Keegan’s office, taking the same seat in front of the gargantuan desk. He unfolded his pad and began making his report. Physically, quite fit. Two centimeters taller than the average for his age. Several recent bruises. A few significant scars, also recent… Chang looked up. “Do you suspect abuse?”

  “No, for God’s sake, Doctor! He’s the abuser. What the hell is wrong with him?”

  “I’m afraid I don’t—”

  “Listen to me. Sixty years ago, when he went into that tube, he was the sweetest kid in the world. When he came out, he was as mean as a damn snake. He’s a borderline sociopath. That tube did something to him, Doctor, and I want to know what it is.”

  Chang just sat there, unsure what to say.

  The side door to the study burst open, and Dorian ran in.

  “Stay out, Dorian! We’re working here.”

  Another boy ran in behind Dorian, bumping into him. He peeked out from behind Dorian’s shoulder. The face.

  The two boys retreated, pulling the heavy door closed behind them.

  Keegan sat back in his chair, pinching the bridge of his nose.

  Chang hated the silence. “The other boy…”

  “What?” Keegan leaned forward. “Oh, he’s my son, Adam. I’m raising Dorian as his brother, hoping it will help give him some stability, some sense of family. Dorian’s own family is dead. But… I’m scared to death that Dorian’s darkness, his sickness, will infect Adam, corrupt him. And this is a sickness, Doctor. Something is very, very wrong with him.”

  Chang was back in the stone corridor, the memory gone, the dim light returned. He stared at Adam Shaw, the half of his face he could see. Yes, it was him. Dorian’s adoptive brother. Keegan’s son.

  “What?” Shaw demanded.

  Chang took a step back. “Nothing.”

  Shaw closed the distance on him. “Did you hear something?”

  “No… I…” Chang grasped for words, some excuse. Think. Say something.

  Shaw smiled slowly. “You remember me, don’t you, Chang?”

  Chang froze. Why can’t I move? It was like some invisible snake had bitten him, and a paralyzing venom was coursing through every inch of his body.

  “I was wondering if you would. It’s too bad. Martin remembered me too.”

  “Help!” Chang yelled out, a split second before Shaw drew the knife from his belt and slashed quickly across Chang’s throat and windpipe, spraying blood on the stone wall and sending Chang to the ground, gurgling, clasping his opened throat, fighting for a breath that wouldn’t come.

  Shaw wiped the bloody knife on Chang’s torso, then stepped over the dying man. Shaw placed an explosive on the floor of the tunnel, quickly armed it, and ran deeper into the tunnel.

  Kamau stopped at the sound. It sounded like a cry for help. He turned to Janus. The man had something. A weapon?

  Kamau raised his rifle.

  A blinding light, brighter than anything Kamau had ever seen, assaulted him. A sound, not a vibration, some sort of tuning fork went off in his head. He fell to his knees. What was Janus doing to him? He felt as though his head were swelling, as if his brain were exploding from the inside out.

  Janus stepped past him without a word.

  The cry for help stopped David in his tracks. Who was it? The killer was making his move.

  The sound was close. An adjacent tunnel? An intersecting tunnel?

  Kate’s voice was a whisper. “David—”

  “Shhh. Keep moving.” He led the way, racing through the tunnel now. Before, David had paused at every opening, sweeping his assault rifle left and right.

  Now speed was the key, putting some distance between them and the sound, getting to a safe, defensible position.

  Up ahead, the tunnel ended in a large burial room with a stone table that had been carved out of the rock.

  David slowed his pace, his mind wondering what to do. Turn back?

  He came to a stop, and an eerie feeling ran up his back. He moved to turn, but a voice called out, “Don’t move.”

  85

  St. Paul’s Catacombs

  Rabat, Malta

  David held his hands up. He could feel Kate’s eyes on him, watching his lead, wondering if he would turn and fire on the man behind him. David wanted to, but he didn’t know who or how many were back there.

  Another voice broke the silence, a voice David knew.

  “Lower your weapons. They’re the ones we’ve been waiting for.”

  David and Kate turned slowly, focusing on the young man who stepped from the shadows of the tunnel.

  “Milo,” Kate whispered.

  “Hello, Dr. Kate.” Milo nodded at David. “Mr. David.”

  “Come with me,” Milo said. He turned and led the way through the tunnel, two heavily armed soldiers—Knights of Malta, David assumed—flanking him.

  The tunnel opened onto a large square, stone room that was much larger than the other burial chambers. A half dozen guards stood around the room, guns at the ready.

  At the end of the chamber, a stone box lay on a slightly raised altar.

  Kate rushed to it and unslung the backpack. She turned back to the soldiers. “Can you lift the top off?”

  Milo nodded to them, and four guards released their guns and moved to the box.

  “Milo, how did you get down here?” David asked.

&nbs
p; “It is a long story, Mr. David, but let’s just say… that I wouldn’t want to do it again.”

  “Yeah, I know what you mean.”

  At the altar, Kate was leaning over into the stone ark, working on something. David walked up beside her and peered into the box. Through the faint light, he could just make out the bones of a single person.

  Beside him, Kate manipulated a device David didn’t recognize, something from the pack. He knew she was collecting a genetic sample, but he had no idea how.

  He turned to the men spread out around the altar in the room. Milo stood silently in the center of them. David thought there was something distinctly different about this young man he had first met at the monastery in Tibet. A maturity, a poise.

  David glanced back at Kate. “You have what you need?”

  She nodded.

  “Milo,” David said, “we need to get back to the surface, to our computer, where we can process the sample.” He paused. “We think there could be a killer down here.”

  “We will be fine here, Mr. David.” Milo nodded toward the soldiers. “They have been guarding this place for a very long time. And they can see you safely out of the catacombs.”

  Several soldiers broke from the pack and stood at the opening to the tunnel that led to the surface. David and Kate fell in behind them.

  Out of the corner of his eye, Dorian caught a glimpse of a helicopter on the ground. An Immari helicopter.

  He pointed at it. “There! They have to be close by.”

  As the first rays of sunlight broke across the tunnel, David realized that he no longer heard the guards’ footsteps behind them. He glanced back, but the guards were gone. He shook his head. Add it to the list of mysteries, he thought.

  At the surface, Kate raced to the computer, set down her backpack, and quickly began working.

  David checked the magazine in the rifle, a nervous habit, and paced the room, never taking his eyes off the entrance.

  “What happens now?” he called over his shoulder to Kate

  “I need to upload the new dataset to Continuity and hope they find a therapy from it.”

  “How long?”

  She rubbed her forehead and stared at the screen. “I don’t know—”

  “Why not?”

  She glared up at him. “Well my brain is pretty much fried at this point, and Janus did the last round—he’s much better at this than I am.”

  He took a second to tear his eyes away from the tunnel. “Okay, okay. I just think… that expediency is the order of the day.”

  A chirping sound broke the tension.

  “What’s that?”

  Kate took the sat phone from her pocket. “There’s a voicemail.”

  Kate set the phone on the table and resumed typing and scanning the computer screen. “You listen to it if you want. I hear expediency is the order of the day, and I have work to do.”

  David glanced at the phone, then swiveled back around to the tunnel and raised his weapon. He made a mental note not to pressure Kate when she was working, and not to use ridiculous phrases that might come back to haunt him.

  Deep in the cave, beyond the light, he heard footsteps. They were faint, cautious, as if someone were approaching the entrance—someone who didn’t want to be heard.

  David got Kate’s attention, raised his finger to his lips, and sidestepped away from the opening, taking a position outside the tunnel. He pointed his rifle at it, ready to fire. It would be Shaw—he was sure of it, and he would be ready.

  Dorian leaned into the cockpit and eyed the Immari helicopter that sat in the square below.

  “Put down beside them?” the pilot asked.

  “Of course. May as well send a text message saying where we are. Or light a flare.”

  The pilot swallowed. “Sir?”

  “Put down somewhere else. They could be waiting near the helicopter to ambush us. We’ll survey the ground by foot.”

  Dorian checked his phone again. No messages. Why?

  Was Adam dead?

  He hoped not. That would be the final loss, the very last family he had, his only relationship. His brother. The only person in the world he trusted to capture Kate Warner. And he was somewhere in Rabat, Dorian could feel it. But why? What was here? Dorian was sure history could be his guide, reveal the exact significance of Rabat, but who gave a damn? History was so much work.

  “Do any of you know the history of Rabat? Any significant cultural points?”

  The soldiers turned to him, blank looks on their faces.

  The pilot called over the intercom, “Mdina was the Roman capital in ancient times. The Phoenicians and the Greeks before them governed from there as well.”

  Who fills their head with this useless shit? Dorian thought. “Very interesting… But we’re not in Mdina, are we? What’s in Rabat?”

  “They buried their dead here.”

  “What?”

  “The Romans placed a premium on sanitation. And safety. They built walls around their cities and wouldn’t let the dead be buried within the walls. Rabat was a suburb—”

  “What the hell are you saying? Get on with it!”

  “There are burial chambers here. Ancient ones. The catacombs of St. Paul.”

  Dorian considered this. Yes, it was exactly what David and Kate would be here for—dead bodies, ancient genetic clues to the cure. How many thousands of years were buried below this ancient city, in the stone chambers used over the ages? Had someone hidden an ancient body among these burial chambers, cloaking it, hiding it in plain sight? It didn’t matter. All he needed was her, the code, the knowledge in her mind.

  Slowly, the figure emerged from the darkness. David gripped the trigger. He depressed it slightly, ready to fire.

  The man emerged from the tunnel, his hands raised.

  Janus.

  Kate stood from the table. “Thank God. I need your help.”

  Janus closed the distance to her. David instinctively followed the scientist with his gun.

  “You found it?” Janus asked.

  “Yes—”

  “The Ark—from the Tibetan tapestry? It was here? All this time. The alpha. Adam?” Janus asked.

  Kate nodded.

  “Extraordinary…” Janus mumbled as he eyed the computer. “May I?”

  “Of course, please.” Kate stepped aside.

  “Where’s Kamau?” David called, over his shoulder.

  “We got separated after the scream.”

  “He’s alive?”

  “I certainly hope so,” Janus said, as he typed on the computer, his eyes scanning back and forth.

  A minute passed with David focusing on the tunnel entrance and Kate and Janus staring at the computer.

  Janus nodded. “This is it—the point of origin, the first human to receive the Atlantis Gene. If we combine the genome with those bodies from the bubonic plague and survivors of the Spanish flu outbreak, it all makes sense. I think they can isolate all the endogenous retroviruses from this dataset.” He turned to her. “This is it, Kate.”

  Kate grabbed the sat phone and plugged it into the computer. She worked the computer. “It’s uploading.”

  Janus paced away from the computer, toward the entrance to the tunnel.

  “You can’t go down there,” David said.

  “I am afraid I must,” Janus answered. He turned to David. “For a scientist such as myself, this is the opportunity of the ages. The first human of a wholly new tribe, the genetic cataclysm that began all that came after. The history, the science. Despite the risk, I have to see it with my own eyes.”

  “Stay here—”

  Janus slipped into the tunnel before David could stop him.

  Kate disconnected the sat phone from the computer and dialed quickly. David took up position between her and the tunnel’s entrance.

  Paul, I just sent a new data set—Yes—What—No, I didn’t check the message.

  Kate’s eyes went wide. “No… I… thank you for letting me know. Call m
e back when you have the data.” She ended the call. “Janus and Shaw. They’re both fakes.”

  From the tunnel, David heard footsteps approaching the opening. He raised his gun, ready to fire, but the figure emerging from the darkness stopped.

  86

  St. Paul’s Catacombs

  Rabat, Malta

  Kate focused on the tunnel entrance, trying to see who was coming. The figure stepped out, his arms in the air.

  Kamau.

  He stood in the entrance of the tunnel, fighting the light with his arms as if it were drowning him.

  “Are you okay?” David asked.

  “I… can’t see.”

  David rushed forward and helped Kamau out of the tunnel and to a chair at the long table where Kate sat. She thought he looked disoriented, weakened somehow.

  “What happened?” David asked.

  “Janus. He blinded me with a light weapon. It disabled me for a while.”

  David focused on Kate. “He could have manipulated the data.”

  Kate opened her mouth but stopped when the sat phone began vibrating on the table. She snatched it up and answered quickly.

  One result—no—I think you have to—I agree, Paul—Call me back when you know.

  She ended the call. The one therapy was their only shot. But…

  “They found one therapy,” she said. “They’re going forward with it. They don’t have any alternatives.” She stared at David. “We need to talk to Janus.”

  David walked closer to Kamau. “How bad is your sight?”

  “Getting better. Still blurry.”

  He’s putting up a front for his commanding officer, Kate thought.

  David handed him an assault rifle from the table. “I want you to shoot anything that comes out of that tunnel.”

  He turned to Kate. “Chang is dead, I’d bet on it. It’s just Shaw and Janus down there. We know where Janus is going. I’ll bring him back.” To Kamau, he said, “When I’m at the tunnel entrance, I’ll call ‘Achilles coming out’ before I exit.”