Atlantis Gate

CHAPTER 7

Reizer had never been so tired. She’d rationed her water bottle, but it was empty now. She knew dawn wasn’t far off but it was hard to tell as her eyes were numbed from the fierce red glow of the fire-walls that surrounded her. She was so tired that she worried she would make a wrong turn. As near as she could figure, she was half way out of the plain, but it had been a circuitous journey, going along lines, circling around flaming figures. Twice she had chosen wrong and ended up at a dead end, her way barred by high walls of fire. She’d noted that the wall was higher along the straight lines and wedges, lower on the figure lines.

She passed around the end of the tail of the monkey and saw a straight line of fire in front of her. She felt despair, realizing that although she had walked almost the entire night, she had moved just slightly over a mile from where she had started. She estimated she had walked over seven times that.

She turned about in a circle, confirming her location, knowing she didn’t have the energy to continue on after another mistake. Her eyes widened as she realized where she was. Near the base of the main line, where it met the wedge. And the flame was different here, darker in color, a scarlet red. Higher. Three times as high. And there was a blackness in the center of the flame in the wedge. A dark, black circle that ate the light and drew in the nearby flame, consuming it.

Reizer staggered as her eyes were mesmerized, trapped by the darkness. She felt as if her soul were being ripped out of her body. She had no idea what was in that darkness but she feared as she had feared nothing before, not even when she’d been in Berlin when the Russians overran it. She had always thought that had been hell on Earth, but looking at the black sphere she sensed an evil inside of it that transcended even that nightmare.

She took another step backward, unknowingly closer to the wall of fire behind her. Then another. Her subconscious could feel the heat, but her aware mind could only be repelled by the sheer evil of that dark hole.

She stopped. Then took a step forward. And another. Being drawn against her will toward the darkness.

“There,” Dane pointed at the small glowing dot on the thermal imager of the Combat Talon, almost lost among the overwhelming glow of the fiery images.

“What?” The targeting officer was mesmerized by the numerous patterns displayed on a scale never before seen.

“There she is,” Dane said.

“Who?”

“We need to save her.”

“Who?” the targeting officer repeated. The dot had disappeared and Dane wondered for a moment if he’d really seen it.

Dane had flown from the Devil’s Sea to Hawaii in the back seat of a Navy F-16. Then he’d been transferred to one of the few remaining SR-71 Blackbirds and crammed in behind the pilot on a supersonic flight to Lima. He’d been met there by the Combat Talon, which had been sent from anti-drug missions in Colombia to meet him there on landing.

The MC-130 Talon was based on the airframe of the venerable Hercules C-130 cargo plane. It had four engines and a wide, stubby body like the C-130, but had been extensively upgraded. Four Allison T56-A-15 turboprop engines powered the plane with each producing almost five thousand horsepower of thrust. The true key to the plane was the sophisticated electronics, which allowed it to fly in all weather at low level. The pilots could use terrain following and terrain avoidance radar, allowing to fly ‘on the deck’ at high speeds, avoiding both obstacles and enemy radar.

The plane also had a contraption called the Fulton Recovery System. Two steel whiskers extended out from the bottom of the nose of the plane. Their purpose was to snatch a steel cable attached to a balloon on one end and a person on the ground on the other. The cable was snagged, then reeled in, recovering the person from the ground.

Right now, the Talon was at five thousand and had just gone ‘feet-dry’ over the coast of Peru. As Dane had crossed the Pacific eastward, he’d felt both pulled and repulsed. He knew there was evil ahead, but also sensed inside the evil a person in need. It reminded him of all the search and rescue missions he and Chelsea had been on. When disaster, usually the result of human stupidity, occurred, he and Chelsea had been called in to find those who had survived.

Dane clicked the transmit button on the headset he wore. “Do another fly-over of Nazca. Thermal imaging. I’m sure there’s somebody down there.”

He made his way to the cockpit, climbing up the few steps and looking over the shoulder of the navigator at his display. They’d all seen the satellite imagery of the burning lines so it was no surprise as the imaging screen showed them once more, bright red lines and shapes covering the plain five thousand feet below.

“Hard to find a person’s image among all that,” the navigator said. He fine-tuned the display as he spoke. “Funny thing is those flame lines are very hot, but they’re not giving off much side-way heat. Almost as if they’re being contained. I’ve never seen anything like it.”

Dane still felt strongly that there was a survivor below, even though he had no idea what the lines of fire displayed represented.

“Any image at body temp?” he asked.

“I’m going to fade out the temperature range for the lines,” the navigator said.

Dane clutched the handrail and the plane banked. The pilots were now settling into a racetrack, circling the Nazca Plain.

The lines slowly disappeared and all that was left was one tiny orange dot. “There’s your person.”

Dane took another step up into the cockpit to get the attention of the pilot in command. “Here’s the plan.”

Reizer focused the small percentage of her brain she still had conscious control of into stopping her slow movement forward. For a moment, her body came to a halt. But then like an alcoholic who’d been dry for days and was offered a drink, her left foot shuffled forward toward the darkness.

There was a strange noise above her, one she couldn’t immediately place, then she realized it was a plane.

But then her right foot moved forward.

Dane stood, pressing a hand against the headset. “Open the back ramp.”

“You’re crazy!” was the response from the loadmaster.

Dane tugged on both leg straps, making sure the parachute was tight to his body as he headed toward the rear of the plane. “Open the Goddamn ramp.”

Dane threw the headset to the floor and waited. He was rewarded with a swirl of air coming into the cargo bay as a crack opened up between the back ramp and the top of the rear as it began to recess into the tail section.

The crew chief was maneuvering a bundle in a torpedo shaped plastic case onto the ramp, attached to a steel cable with a static line. Dane attached his own static line just behind the bundles. The ramp locked down level. The night sky, strange looking with the red glow from below, beckoned. They were low, just below five hundred feet, to insure better accuracy. Dane didn’t have a reserve because if the main didn’t open there wouldn’t be time to deploy a second.

Dane didn’t want to jump. He’d done hundreds of parachute jumps in the Special Forces. That wasn’t the issue. The danger and evil below was what repelled him.

But he could feel the old woman, lost, drawn into the darkness.

The light turned green and he followed the bundle off the ramp. His feet met air and he free-fell for three seconds, then the static line deployed the chute, jerking him abruptly. He caught a glimpse of the bundle’s chute ahead and below, then saw he was headed toward one of the lines of fire. His hands grappled with the toggles on the front risers, trying to turn. The chute gave way reluctantly.

Three seconds after the chute opened, Dane was less than fifty feet up, descending rapidly, less than thirty horizontal feet from a twenty foot high wall of fire. He pulled both toggles, dumping air.

His feet touched down less than ten feet from the flame, the leading edge of the parachute hitting it, being incinerated in the process. Dane stumbled forward, the chute caught in a breeze, tugging him forward toward oblivion. His hands scrambled at the quick releases located on the front of his shoulders. He flipped open the metal plate, fingers searching for the small metal loops he had to pull to release the chute from the body harness.

He stuttered another step toward the fire, feeling the heat on his face. One finger caught the loop and pulled. The other was still searching as he took another forced step forward. The chute was half incinerated as it collapsed into the fire and that was what saved Dane from the flame, the chute losing form and power as it was destroyed. He jerked backward with all his strength, falling onto his back, still feeling a pull on the one shoulder, until he popped the second quick release.

He lay on his back, breathing hard for several moments. The first thing he noticed was that there was no sound. The flames were eerily silent. He lifted his head slightly. The wall was if a blast furnace was caught between two panes of glass. The fire swirled, but he noted that it was overall moving from left to right, as if there was a destination for it.

Dane got to his feet. He didn’t take off the parachute harness. He looked about for the bundle, hoping it hadn’t been caught in the flame. Instead of the bundle, he saw an old woman about forty feet away to the right, standing absolutely still. Looking past her, he spotted what had her mesmerized, the black hole into the flames were swirling.

“Hello!” Dane called. He’d read the data on the Nazca lines on the flight across the Pacific. “Doctor Reizer?”

She didn’t appear to hear him and Dane was startled as she took a step toward the black hole. He broke into a jog, heading toward her. “Doctor Reizer?”

Still no acknowledgement. She took another step toward the darkness.

Dane reached her and laid his hand on her shoulder. She started and turned in surprise.

“Doctor Reizer?”

She blinked, her eyes regaining focus, then she nodded. “Yes. Who are you?”

“Eric Dane. I’m here to get you out.”

“How?”

“Come with me,” Dane gently took her elbow with his hand and led her back toward where he had landed, knowing the bundle would be in that area. He pulled a small black book out of his pant side pocket and turned it on, activating the receiver. It immediately began beeping and the small screen showed an arrow pointing to the left.

Dane and Reizer went down a small incline and then he saw the bundle lying among the rocks and stone. He knelt next to it and opened it.

“Who are you?” Reizer asked as Dane worked.

“I’m an American. I’ve been—” Dane paused as he’d never quite explained his strange role to anyone—“been fighting the force inside the gate.”

Reizer looked over her shoulder at the dark sphere drawing in the flame. “It is evil, isn’t it?”

“I don’t know much about good or evil,” Dane said. “I just know that whatever is behind that doesn’t give a damn about us. And it appears we are in the way of whatever it is trying to do.” He laid out a steel canister, then heaved a large nylon bundle out on the ground, unfolding it. “Do you have any idea what is causing these lines of fire or what they are?”

“The old ones — the lines and wedges — are more powerful than the newer ones, the animal images. I’ve always picked up a sense of power about this place. Something I’ve never experienced anywhere else.”

Power. Dane thought about that. The Shadow always seemed eager for power. But he had no idea what kind of power it was drawing off the Nazca Plain. He attached a hose from the canister to a valve on the bottom of the nylon. Then he made sure the looped steel cable inside the container was attached to the bottom of the deflated balloon. He took the loop at the free end of the cable and, using double locking snap links, attached it to the center point on the front of his harness.

“What are you doing?” Reizer asked.

“Getting us out of here.”

“I think there is a way to walk out,” Reizer said. She pointed. “If we go around the tail of the monkey and then go south—” her voice trailed off.

“I’ve seen the images from the sky,” Dane said. “There’s no way out of here except that way—”he pointed up.

“How—” Reizer began, but Dane shushed her, the small earpiece crackled.

“Dane, this is Talon Six. Status?”

“Inflating,” Dane said.

“Don’t forget to turn the beacon on,” the pilot reminded him.

Dane cursed to himself as he went over to the balloon and switched on a small electronic beacon. He’d almost forgotten. He went back to the helium canister and twisted a knob. “Inflating,” he repeated.

The balloon began to inflate, growing in size.

“Where’s the basket?” Reizer asked.

“There isn’t.”

Her eyes followed the thin steel cable at the base of the balloon into the canister and then the trail end to Dane’s vest. “You’re joking.”

“Afraid not.” The balloon was half full and lifting off the ground. Dane pulled another harness out of the bundle and held it up. “Turn around and put your arms out.”

“Oh my, this is not good for an old woman,” Reizer complained, even as she did as he asked.

Dane slipped the harness over her shoulders, then squatted. He ran one of the legs straps through. “Hold this in your left hand.” He grabbed the other strap. “This in your right.”

The balloon was full and lifting, uncoiling the cable. Dane went around to Reizer’s front and quickly connected the leg straps, pulling them tight, hearing Reizer grunt as he did so. There was no time for niceties.

The earpiece came alive. “We have the beacon. Are you ready? Over.”

Dane grabbed a small piece of nylon webbing that had double snap links at both ends. He hooked one set into his chest connection point. “Ready,” he said as he attached the other end to the connection point on Reizer’s harness.

“Are you sure this will work?” Reizer asked. They both could hear the airplane in-bound.

Dane had been pulled out ex-filtration points during his time in Vietnam this way, usually by helicopter, instead of the Fulton, but one time he had actually done the Fulton. “Yes.”

“Will it hurt?”

“It’ll be a fun ride.”

The pilot’s voice intruded. “Ten seconds out. Are you green? Over.”

“We’re green,” Dane said. He reached forward and gathered the tiny old lady in his arms. The sound of the plane was growing louder.

Two hundred feet above them, the pilot of the Talon had the beacon centered and fifty feet above the plane on the low light vision television screen he was using to fly. “Five seconds,” he announced. “Four. Three. Two. One.”

On the ground, Dane felt nothing for about two seconds as the slack was pulled out of the cable. Then he was jerked straight up into the sky, almost losing his grip on Reizer.

The force vector on the cable was vertical for about three seconds, lifting them over a hundred feet up, then they were pulled horizontally, behind and below the Talon.

“We have a lock on the cable,” the pilot announced. “Cutting balloon free.”

A set of metal shears closed on the cable, just above where clamps held tight between the whiskers. They snapped shut and the balloon was released. The cable below the plane slowly went from vertical to horizontal until Dane and Reizer were bouncing about in the air almost a hundred and fifty feet directly behind the plane.

The loadmaster in the rear of the Talon had locked down a small crane and winch onto the open rear platform as soon as Dane had jumped and he was ready. He lowered the crane, then reeled out a small length of cable with a hook on the end. As the plane with its two human attachments roared through the sky at a hundred and fifty miles an hour, he fished for the Fulton cable.

“Are you all right?” Dane had to scream to be heard above the air whistling by and the roar of the plane just ahead of them.

There was no verbal reply, just Reizer’s head nodding into his chest. Dane tried to look at the open back ramp, but the wind was too strong, causing his eyes to tear up.

The loadmaster snagged the cable on the fourth try. He slowly lifted until the Fulton cable slipped into the crane’s mouth. Then he clamped down on the cable with the teeth of the winch. For insurance, just in case something went wrong, he also secured the Fulton cable with a loop of cable fixed to the plane.

“I’ve got it,” he announced. “Disengage the nose lock.”

The pilot flipped a switch.

Dane felt his stomach lurch as they both free fell for a second, then were jerked forward once more.

The loadmaster hit the control for the winch and the cable was slowly reeled in. As the two got closer to the ramp, he had the crane lift up so that they would clear the edge.

Dane saw the tail of the plane above his head as he and Reizer were slowly drawn into the cargo bay. The wind decreased as the plane enveloped them. He bumped against the floor and tried to gain his feet, but was unable to. Hands were on him, holding him steady, pulling Reizer out of his arms.

“We’ve got them,” the loadmaster announced. The back ramp slowly went up sealing them off from the outside world.

Dane allowed the men inside to unhook him and strip the harness off. He turned to Reizer to see what kind of shape the old woman was in, hoping the trip hadn’t killed her.

She was smiling, thanking the Air Force crewmembers. She saw Dane looking at her. “I’ll have to do that again sometime. Most fun I’ve had in decades.”

Dane slumped back on the cargo web seating, exhausted. The Talon banked and headed for the nearest landing strip at Ica. Behind and below it, the Nazca plain burned fiercely in the night. Then, in an instant, the flames roared up into the sky over a thousand feet high, still narrowly caught in their channels.

Chernobyl was a ghost town for the second time. A light breeze blew down the empty streets and over cooling tower number four, pushing death with it. Nothing lived within twenty miles in an elongated teardrop that was spreading to the northwest.

Thus there was no one to see when the black triangle reappeared in the center of the ruined tower. Two Valkyries floated up out of the top of the triangle, their white forms slowly appearing. Between them they held a black cylinder about five feet long and two feet in diameter. The front end tapered to a point, while the rear ended in a flat surface.

When they were completely clear of the triangle, they hovered in place, slowly turning until the point of the cylinder was pointing at tower number 3, a quarter mile away. The cylinder began to change at the rear, the black shifting to gold. When it reached the point, a golden ball began to form, growing to five feet in diameter. The golden ball remained still at that size for several seconds, then it suddenly shot forward.

The ball hit tower number 3 and seemed to be slowly absorbed into the cement at the same rate the cylinder had changed. Then the tower imploded, releasing a cloud or radioactive gas into the air.

The two Valkyries didn’t notice; they were already pointing the weapon at tower number 2.

Alarms were ringing as Foreman ran into the control center. “What’s happening?”

“Activity at Chernobyl,” Ahana reported.

“What kind?”

“The Russians don’t know but their monitoring equipment has picked up a large spike in radioactivity.”

“I thought tower 4 was almost depleted,” Foreman slid into a chair at the conference table.

“It is. There seems to be—“ Ahana paused as her computer chimed and she checked the report. “The other towers seem to have been destroyed.” She held up a hand, anticipating Foreman’s next question. “It will be bad, Mister Foreman. The Russians fear they will have to evacuate Moscow. If they can accomplish such a task before the radioactivity reaches their capital.”

Foreman didn’t seem too concerned. “Radioactivity or tectonic action, the clock’s ticking.”

The captain of the FLIP entered and went straight to the CIA agent. “We’ve been ordered by the navy to evacuate the area.”

Foreman didn’t even acknowledge him with a glance. “Any muonic activity in our gate?” he asked Ahana.

She checked her screen. “Nothing.”

“We hold in place,” he told the captain.

The captain had already seen Foreman ignore the navy once. “Sir, I must protest. The navy is responsible for our—”he never finished as a loud chime sounded from Ahana’s computer. She spun in her chair to face the screen.

“Activity. Here.”

Foreman jumped to his feet. “Get us out of here!” he yelled at the ship’s captain.

“Back us off, all weapons systems at ready.” Captain Stokes remained in his leather command chair, issuing the orders in a calm voice. “Sonar?” he asked.

“No contact, just the warning from the FLIP of muonic activity.”

The operations center of the Connecticut was bathed in a low red light, allowing crewmen to more clearly see their computer screens. It was a long way from the days of World War II submarines with cramped conditions and water dripping from pipes, looking more like a high-tech computer lab than the nerve center of a submarine.

“Range?” Stokes called out.

“Four thousand,” the executive officer replied. “Speed fifteen knots and increasing.”

“Contact, contact,” the sonar man called out. “At the edge of the gate. Coming out. Large.”

Stokes forced himself to stay seated although he was tempted to walk over and grab a set of headphones.

“Range?” he asked.

“Four thousand.”

“Speed?”

“Not clear yet.”

Stokes turned his seat slightly. “XO?”

“We’re four thousand, five hundred meters from the gate. Speed twenty knots and accelerating.”

He turned in another direction. “Radar?”

“I have the contact, sir. It’s big. Very big. Range four thousand and holding steady.”

Stokes knew that meant the contact was coming toward his ship at the same speed. “Helm, ahead full.”

The Connecticut’s true top speed was classified. Stokes had gotten the submarine up to over thirty miles an hour.

“Target still maintaining distance,” the radar man reported.

Stokes had read the intelligence on encounters near the gates. He knew that if this was the large sphere — and it appeared to be so — then he would shortly lose all his electromagnetic power. He was prepared for this encounter.

“Helm, zigzag course. XO, launch mines on schedule.”

The submarine began cutting hard turns, left and then back to right. From the rear deck of the Connecticut, a dozen MK-40 mines were released one by one, the zigzag pattern spreading them in an arc behind the ship. The disadvantage of this tactic was that he wasn’t getting away from the pursuing craft as quickly as possible. But the reports had indicated that the sphere was able to travel at speeds in excess of fifty miles an hour, which meant it could easily overtake his ship. The mines had no electromagnetic parts and had been specially designed to explode on contact.

“Three thousand five hundred meters and closing,” radar reported.

“Time to impact?” Stokes asked.

His XO had a stop-watch out, an anachronism in the high tech center but one Stokes had insisted on, given the possibility they might lose their high tech gear any second.

“Thirty seconds.”

Stokes looked about the control center, proud of the professionalism of his crew as they went about their tasks.

“Twenty seconds,” his XO reported.

“Range three thousand and closing,” the radar man called out. “Target speed is forty-five knots and accelerating.”

“Ten seconds.”

Stokes noted that his sonar man had taken off his headset in precaution.

“Five. Four. Three. Two. One.”

Stokes fingers dug into the arms of his command chair as he tensed. Nothing.

“Past one,” the XO reported, looking at the stopwatch.

“Radar, is the target still coming?” Stokes asked.

“Yes, sir.”

“Approaching two. At two and—”the XO’s next words were cut off as an explosive wave swept over the Connecticut, immediately followed by another. A cacophony of sound hit the submarine as the final eleven mines went off one after another. A cheer broke out in the control center.

“Radar?” Stokes yelled, his voice cutting through the celebration.

Before the radar man could reply, the control center became pitch black, the cheers cut off as abruptly as the light.

“Battery power,” Stokes ordered.

Dim red lights came on, bathing the room in a much darker light. Stokes could tell by the feel of the ship that the engines had stopped.

“Contact is closing,” the radar man reported as soon as his system was back on line.

Dead in the water — a phrase no captain, whether he is on board a surface ship or submarine, wanted to hear. Stokes stood.

“XO, take the center.”

He could see the blood drain from his executive officer’s face. He was the only other man on board who was privy to their last ditch plan. There was no time for Stokes to comfort the man. He made his way forward, toward the cruise missile storage area. He could feel the eyes of crewmembers on him as he passed through compartments. They all knew the submarine was stopped and had heard the explosions. Stokes entered the storage area where a half-dozen Tomahawk cruise missiles rested in their bins.

“All systems are off-line, sir,” the chief petty officer in charge of the missiles reported as Stokes entered.

“Clear the area, chief,” Stokes ordered.

“Sir?”

“Clear the area.”

“Aye, aye, sir.” The petty officer hustled his men out of the compartment. Stokes swung shut the hatch behind and dogged it closed.

He then went to a plastic case secured to the middle of the floor. He pulled a key from around his neck and unlocked the case. He paused as the ship shuddered, then canted to the left twenty degrees before halting. He’d seen the video of what had happened to the Revelle, the research ship taken in by the sphere and he knew his ship was now sharing the same fate.

He flipped open the lid, revealing a powerful array of batteries along with a laptop computer that was off. He pushed the on button for the computer, then took a lead from the case and went to the nearest missile. He attached the lead to a port on the side of the cruise missile, then went back to the laptop.

Stokes cursed when he saw that the computer hadn’t booted. All he had was a screen full of unintelligible lines of numbers and letters. He unhooked the computer and grabbed a clacker, similar to the one used for Claymore mines. He quickly screwed the wire into the clacker.

Stokes paused as he heard the sound of metal tearing, then screams coming from the center of the ship. He took a deep breath, then squeezed the clacker, sending a burst of power to the cruise missile.

He cursed when nothing happened.

Then a golden glow suffused the compartment and he collapsed.