Assault on Atlantis

CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR

The cloud of radiation reached the southeast suburbs of Moscow and crept inward, the most successful invader of Moscow since the Golden Horde of the Khan many centuries previously. Between Moscow and Chernobyl, the land was more scorched and dead than even the Mongol invaders had accomplished.

To the east, panic was beginning to ripple through Europe. People stared at wind reports with intensity, noting every little change and hoping against the realistic words of the scientists that something would happen to forestall the curtain of death that was coming toward them.

THE SPACE BETWEEN

Dane hovered just above the top of the Shadow Sphere, slowly turning and looking in all directions over the Inner Sea. Earhart was by his side.

“Nothing,” Dane reported.

Instead of replying, Earhart opened her suit and stepped down onto the surface of the sphere. She carefully walked down to where the black water met the craft and knelt.

“Be careful,” Dane warned.

“Something’s coming,” Earhart said.

“What?”

“We’ll see it when it gets here.”

Out of a crew of one hundred and eighteen, ninety-six had volunteered. From that number, Anderson had picked two of his reactor specialists, given the nature of the task. The two men had suited up in the bulky radiation suits and now were ready, standing in the holding area in front of the large hatch that was in the first shield wall between the front of the sub · and the rear. One of them carried the wired skull, the other a large hatch wrench. The hatch was unbolted and they stepped through; the hatch shut behind them. They moved down a short passageway and opened a second hatch, moved through, and shut it behind them. They were now in the emergency operations room for the reactor. They’d both been here before on maintenance checks. Inside a suit, a man could safely work in the room for thirty minutes.

They moved to one side where there was another hatch plastered with red warning signs. The man with the wrench opened it, and the one carrying the skull stepped through. He waited as the other man slipped inside, closing one hatch be· hind them and then opening the next one, again covered with warning signs.

The sailor with the wrench paused before the final turn and looked back at his partner. Peering through the clear plastic visors of the headgear they stared at each other for a few moments, knowing what the next action would bring. Neither d a word. The sailor turned back to the door and twisted the wrench. The hatch opened. Although there was no apparent difference, both men cringed, as if hunching down inside their suits would make a difference. They knew they were being bathed in radiation from the reactor core, but it was an instinctual reaction. They moved to the core and the one with the skull put it in position as Frost had directed.

Both jumped back as they were bathed in a bright blue light The skull was the source of it, the intensity so strong, they couldn’t look at it for more than a second before turning their eyes away.

The captain s voice came over the intercom. “Are you men all right? We’ve just picked up a fifty percent power drop in reactor strength.”

They stared at the skull, which was now pulsing with blue power, realizing that somehow it had tapped the reactor core of that much energy in an instant. They also knew that if it was holding that much power, it had to be giving out radiation far beyond the ability of their suits to block. One of them checked the small card clipped to the outside of his suit. It was bright red, meaning they’d just received a fatal dose in an instant.

“We’ve got a problem, captain,” one of them called out.

“What is it?” Anderson’s voice echoed through the core.

“This thing is hot now. Very, very hot. If we remove it from the core and bring it forward of the shields, it will contaminate the rest of the ship. At fatal levels.”

In the control room Anderson turned to Frost. And waited.

Frost was seated in a battered metal chair, his white hair unkempt. “The skull has the power to open the gate large enough for the submarine to pass through.”

“To where?”

“To where we must go.”

“And then?”

“I can’t see that far.”

“That’s pretty slim.”

“It’s all been pretty slim, but if you had not listened to me, you all would be dead by now along with everyone else.”

“Not much of a life here.”

Frost waited, letting the emotion run out of Anderson. Finally the captain sighed. “All right.” He keyed the intercom and gave the orders. Every man on the ship heard them and knew what they meant.

When the intercom went silent, the sailor who’d carried the skull. In went over to the wall and grabbed a set of metal tongs. He went back to the core and picked up the skull, holding it between the metal jaws. “Clear the way,” he called out; the message was picked up by the live speaker and transmitted through the ship. Forward of the reactor, a pathway was cleared of all personnel, not that the steel bulkheads were any safety against the deadly rays being emitted by the skull.

The two men quickly retraced their steps, exiting the reactor and sealing all hatches behind them. After the months of being crowded, they found it strange to move through the ship with no one else in sight. They reached the base of the sail and found the hatch to the ice cap open. They moved outside without hesitation, a snowstorm beating against their radiation suits. They didn’t look over their shoulders as the hatch was slammed shut.

They moved forward of the Nautilus about a hundred yards to the point where they couldn’t see their ship anymore through the swirling snow. Both halted. The one holding the skull hesitated, then put it down on the ice, expecting it to melt through and disappear.

It didn’t

Instead, as soon as it was released. The skull rose up and came to a hover four feet above the ice, unaffected by the strong wind that blew by.

The skull shot out bolts of blue into the descending snow. Directly in front of the two sailors, the air crackled and snapped. Both men took an involuntary step backward as a,lack oval three feet wide by six feet long, opened. It began to grow larger.

A crashing noise from behind diverted their attention for a moment. The large bow of the Nautilus appeared, smashing through the ice. Someone was on top of the deck, waving at them. They walked closer. A slab of ice being broken lifted both of them higher. They staggered to remain upright.

A sailor on the front deck held out a loop of cut hose. The first man lifted his arm, hooked and caught hold of it. He was swung onto the deck. The second did the same, just as the nose of the Nautilus hit the black circle. The three men were silhouetted by blue against the black.

As if pulled through, the Nautilus increased speed and snapped out of sight, and the man who had rescued the two suited sailors screamed in agony.

Earhart jumped to her feet as a wall of black water surged up and toward the sphere. She slipped as the water crashed over her legs. Dane grabbed her arm and held on, half expecting kraken tentacles to attack. He blinked as the blunt gray nose of a submarine of a type he had never seen appeared fewer than fifty feet away. It was coming straight toward the sphere, and Dane helped Earhart farther up to the very top.

The bow of the sub hit the sphere with a solid thud, bringing the craft to a dead stop. There were three figures on the front deck. Two standing, dressed in bulky yellow suits streaked with black as if they’d been hit with a blowtorch. The third was prone, unmoving, his uniform and skin fried. Another casualty in the war. Dane found he felt little for whoever the man was-no, that wasn’t quite right he realized, it was more he couldn’t afford to focus on it, to allow himself to feel. He realized it was a sad state of affairs, and death was just a small speed bump in events.

Dane now saw the writing on the side of the sail: Nautilus.

“I think we’re about to meet Mister Frost,” he said to Earhart.

A hatch on the side of the sail clanged open and several men came out of the submarine and made their way forward. Foremost among them was an old man with white hair. Dane and Earhart walked down the sphere until they were next to the high bow of the Nautilus.

“Mister Frost?” Dane asked.

Frost nodded. “How did you know?”

“I’ve seen you-and this submarine-in a vision.”

“Then do you know what happens next?” Frost asked.

‘1 haven’t seen it,” Dane said, “but we need to get this”—he pointed down at the sphere—“to an Earth time line where we can gather something from the air, then return with it back to my time line.”

Frost stared at him, obviously understanding little of what Dane had just said. He could see the crewmen gathered around their dead comrade.

“We still don’t have power,” Earhart said.

Dane turned to her. He felt old and tired. “Actually, I think we might have enough power to take the first step.”

“Where?”

Dane nodded toward the Nautilus. “There.”

“The reactor?”

“The crew.”