The Mission

CHAPTER 16

The patrol was making good time. They were moving along the east bank of a river. The patrol crested a tall, grassy ridge and Toland halted briefly to peer about. He could see a long way in every direction, and there was nothing. No sign of civilization. They could be the only people on the face of the planet, based on the information his senses were giving him.

Toland glanced at Baldrick. “Got a reading?”

Baldrick pulled his pack off.

Toland gestured for Faulkener and the two remaining merks to form a close perimeter.

Baldrick was opening the plastic case when one of the men leapt to his feet, cursing. A thin strand dangled from his right arm.

Toland whipped his machete out of its sheath and dashed toward the man. With one sweep of the blade he cut the snake in two just under the head, which was still attached by its teeth to the man’s arm.

“Hold still!” Toland ordered. “You’re just pushing the venom through you.” Toland carefully reached and spread the teeth, pulling the head off. He knew the make — a krait. He pushed the man to the ground. “Take it easy.”

Toland knelt down to the man, whose screams had descended to gasps of pain-filled breath. “Easy, man, easy.” He shifted around to the side of the man, one hand on his shoulder. With the other he brought up the Sterling, out of the man’s sight, and holding the muzzle less than an inch from his head, fired a round into his brain.

Baldrick didn’t react.

“Do you have a fix?” Toland demanded.

Baldrick pointed. “Five kilometers that way.”

“Let’s move.” Toland got to his feet.

As they left behind the body, Faulkener moved over next to Toland. “Well, more for each of us now.”

“I know,” Toland repeated. He felt warm, and his head was throbbing. He looked down at his hand. There were faint traces of black under the skin. He remembered the bodies being carried by the patrol they had ambushed.

“You all right, sir?” Faulkener asked.

“No.”

“I got you!” Waker yelled out, startling the men and women in the other cubicles in the NSA surveillance room. “I got you!” he repeated, his fingers tapping keys quickly.

On his computer screen the silhouette of the South American continent appeared, then grew larger, the edges disappearing, the computer focusing in on the west-central part. It narrowed down to a spot just over the border from Bolivia in Brazil, a hundred kilometers west of the town of Vilhena.

Waker quickly summarized the information and sent out a priority intelligence report to Duncan via secure Interlink.

“T-minus three hours. The count has resumed. Perform T-3 hours snapshot on flight critical and payload items.”

The same voice carried over the launch pads on either end of the United States. Lisa Duncan heard them as she peered once more over the papers that had been faxed to her by Major Quinn.

The partial history of The Mission was interesting, but what she really needed was a location and he had not yet uncovered that. She thumbed quickly through all the information that had been forwarded. She paused as she saw the e-mail from the NSA.

She frowned. Someone had piggybacked a GPS — ground positioning satellite — signal in the area near the border between Bolivia and Brazil. Even as she was looking at it, the printer attached to her computer chimed and another sheet slowly came out.

Same thing. Slightly different location. This one pinpointed a spot. It was in the very west of Brazil. Duncan took a pencil and slowly wrote on a pad of paper:

Duncan paused. If there was a second ruby sphere then—

“The next planned hold is at T-minus two hours. Go for flight crew final prep and briefing.”

Duncan’s eyes flashed toward the window. The space shuttle was ready. If there was another ruby sphere, then the mothership could still be used for interstellar flight. If it could be repaired — but hadn’t Kopina said they were going up to get a breathable atmosphere inside?

Duncan picked up her SATPhone and dialed the number for Turcotte in South America.

The mechrobots continued to do the guardian’s bidding. The hole in the floor of the chamber had reached the thermal vent. A power system to tap that was being built two miles down.

Under the black shield guarding Easter island, all was progressing quite well.

Elek stepped away from the guardian. His dark sunglasses turned in the direction of Che Lu and Lo Fa, but before he could say anything, the tough-looking mercenary leader spoke.

“We got trouble,” Croteau said. “My man in the top says he can hear tanks and other heavy equipment. The Chinese army is back, and they’re pissed seeing all their buddies dead.”

“Your men have mined the entrance?” Elek asked.

“Yes, but that doesn’t stop them from dropping satchel charges in here or even gassing us like you did them.”

Elek walked past Croteau to stand in front of Che Lu.

“Where is it?”

Che Lu stepped back, feeling the malevolence coming off of him. “Where is what?”

“The key.”

“I do not have a key.”

“Search them,” Elek ordered Croteau.

Croteau did the job quickly.

“They don’t have any key,” Croteau said. “We’re wasting time here. We need to get out, if we still can.”

Elek shook his head. “No, we will make the time we need.” He headed back into the control room. As they entered, an explosion rumbled through the cavern.

Croteau was listening to the small FM radio on his combat vest. “The PLA is attacking!”

Another explosion came amid the sound of automatic weapons firing. Elek stood at the main control panel. He ran his hands over the hexagons. A loud rumbling noise overrode the sounds of battle. Croteau dashed to the door and looked into the cavern.

“You’re shutting the inner door!” he exclaimed.

“We need time,” Elek said.

“But I left ten men up there!” Croteau’s right hand came up, the submachine gun pointing at Elek.

“I am the only way you will get out of here alive,” Elek said. “And sealing the tunnel was the only way we are going to stay in here alive. There were no other options.”

“Goddammit!” Croteau exploded. “You don’t just leave men to die like that.”

“You do it all the time,” Elek said. “It’s called war.”

Turcotte ripped off the suit, passing directly into the isolation lock, then into the habitat. Yakov had imagery and intelligence printouts spread out on the floor in front of him. Kenyon was looking through his microscope.

“Where’s Norward?” Kenyon asked.

“At the hospital in town.” Turcotte told them of the tear in the suit. The USAMRIID man did not seem surprised or particularly upset. Of course, Turcotte knew both Kenyon and Norward had had more time to think about such a fate, just as a soldier was more prepared to go into battle. “We’re all going to get this thing if we can’t figure out its vector and come up with an antidote or vaccine,” Kenyon said.

“Anything from your headquarters?” Turcotte asked.

“I can’t get through to Fort Detrick,” Kenyon said. “It will take time for the vector experiments to work.”

“We don’t have time,” Turcotte said. He looked at Yakov. “What do you have?” Yakov drew a circle. “The satellite came down somewhere to the west of here. I think—” He paused as the SATPhone rang.

Turcotte picked it up. “Turcotte.”

“Mike, it’s Lisa. We’ve got something.”

Turcotte listened as she told him about the strange transmission picked up to their west. He got the grid location from her.

“There’s something else,” Duncan said.

“What’s that?”

“Colonel Carmen, my friend who authorized the USAMRIID mission, is dead.” Duncan went on to tell Turcotte of the phone conversation.

“So someone’s covering up on the Stateside end” was Turcotte’s summation of that information.

“Looks like.”

“Can you get me any help?”

“I can try,” Duncan said. “What do you need?”

Turcotte rattled off a quick list of support.

“I’ve already got some of that moving. I talked to Colonel Mickell at Bragg already.”

“Good. What about the shuttles?” he asked her. “Have you figured out what is going on?”

“I think someone wants to get the mothership, because there’s a second ruby sphere hidden somewhere, maybe in the lowest level of Qian-Ling.”

Turcotte considered the situation. “That’s putting the cart before the horse,” he said. “Whoever wants the mothership has to survive the Black Death first.”

“The Airlia on Mars don’t have to worry about that,” Duncan said.

“True,” Turcotte acknowledged. “But what about whoever is helping them? These Guides?”

“The guardian didn’t care much about the people it used on Majestic-12. Humans are just tools for it.”

Turcotte thought about that. “Yeah, but if the second ruby sphere hasn’t been found yet, the guardian still needs those tools. Maybe they’re securing the mothership for a different reason.”

“I don’t…” There was a pause from Duncan’s end. “Oh my God. Major Quinn told me something and I didn’t think it was important, but maybe that’s why there’s a rush to get to the mothership.”

“What?” Turcotte asked.

“Quinn got some information off the hard drives about The Mission, but it’s old stuff, although it does back up Yakov’s claim about The Mission being around a long time. I’ll forward you a copy. I’ve told him to try to find something more recent.

“The only other solid thing they’ve gotten out of STAAR’s hard drives you recovered from Scorpion Base was that they were doing a keyword search with the word ark. Maybe the rush to get to the mothership is to use it as an ark. The gravity drives still work, so it could land on Earth and get back up into orbit without having the ruby sphere.”

“Like Noah’s Ark,” Turcotte said.

“So the chosen ones can survive the Black Death and do the Airlia’s bidding.”

Turcotte looked across the habitat at Yakov, who was following his end of the conversation. “Like they’ve done before in the past. Culling out the human race to make it controllable. And if the Black Death spreads and kills everyone at NASA, then there’s no one there to launch the space shuttles to secure the mothership. I think that has to come first.”

“We can’t let that happen, Mike.”

“Get me that support,” Turcotte said.

Lexina looked at the crater, trying to imagine a mountain here. She had seen images of this place before the destruction. It had dwarfed Mount Kilimanjaro in size and bulk.

She was near the center of Ngorongoro Crater, a most intriguing spot in north Tanzania. Ngorongoro was the second-largest crater on the surface of the planet. Over twelve miles wide, it encompassed over three hundred square miles, including Soda Lake in the center. The crater was over twenty-two hundred meters above sea level, the top of a huge, ancient volcano that had been worn down, obviously much further than its cousin to the east, Mount Kilimanjaro.

The crater was a spectacular place, considered by those who had made the arduous journey there to be almost an unspoiled Garden of Eden. Even if one reached the rim, which was not easy by itself, the steep, almost vertical rim of the crater made travel into the crater very difficult. There was only one overgrown road that switchbacked its way down to the interior floor. The land was mostly open grassland, although near the rim there was thick forest. Soda Lake was a broad expanse of water, but it was not deep, less than four feet in most places. Because of its isolation and the relative lack of human intrusion, the crater teemed with wildlife.

She reached into her pack and pulled out a small gray device about six inches long by three wide and one deep. The top surface was covered with hexagons. She knew she was close enough now, but the big question was whether there was anything left here.

Lexina pressed a pattern on the device and the hexagons were lit from behind with a green light. She then tapped out a code and the front edge of the device glowed orange.

Slowly she turned in a circle, holding the device at arm’s length. She completed one complete revolution. Then she tapped in a new code. The front shifted from orange to red. She again began turning, holding the device out. It had been so long and the obvious destruction so great, she expected nothing.

Thus when there was a beep from the device and a bright scarlet line appeared in the center of the red, she didn’t stop, but completed another circle. When the device repeated its report as she faced in the same direction — toward the center of the crater — she stopped. She began walking forward in a perfectly straight line, ignoring the bushes that grabbed at her cloak.

Soda Lake came into view, and the device still pointed her forward. As she approached, she pulled her backpack off, holding it with one hand. With the other, she removed her black robe. Underneath she wore a tight, gray bodysuit. She stuffed the robe in her backpack as she walked.

She didn’t pause, striding right into the lake, feeling the cool water splash around her ankles. She had studied this area before going on her trek and knew the lake covered a large amount of area, but it was very shallow, never more than four feet deep.

The device kept her on an unerring straight line. The shore was soon far behind and the water just above her waist, slowing her slightly, but she kept moving. A flock of birds resting on the water took off in startled flight at her approach. Off to her left front, beady eyeballs in large gray heads watched her warily. She knew the water buffalo were to be feared, as they were unpredictable in their behavior, but her course wavered not in the least. She passed within twenty feet of the water buffalo.

The beeping on the device was growing quicker, the pauses less. Despite that, she was startled when her right foot touched nothing and she fell, the water going over her head. She kicked, coming back up to the surface and backed up, regaining her foothold on the bottom.

Carefully she felt in the murky brown water with her foot. There was a smooth cut in the bottom. She traced its circular pattern to the left until she had outlined a round hole in the bottom of the lake twenty feet wide. The entire way, the device in her hand pointed to the center. She turned the device off and put it in her soaked backpack, making sure the top was sealed.

Lexina took a deep breath and then dove headfirst into the hole. Her legs kicked as went straight down. She could feel the pressure building on her ears as the seconds went by and still she descended. She let air out of her lungs in a trickle of bubbles, going ever deeper.

Then her outstretched arms hit something smooth and flat. Her fingers scrambled in the murky water, searching. They closed on a semicircular metal object sticking up from the flat surface. She gripped it with her left hand and continued to feel around with her right.

Her lungs were low on air; she’d been under now for over a minute. Her fingers hit a thin, raised ridge of metal, less than half a millimeter high. She traced it, running into a junction where three ridges went off at exact angles. Exploring further, she realized she had a series of hexagonals.

Her lungs struggling, her mind beginning to blacken with lack of oxygen, she felt out the entire series. There was one in the center with six surrounding. Quickly she hit the code she had memorized long ago.

The rod in her left hand swung up, the surface underneath it rising, pushing her upward. She scrambled to avoid being caught between the hatch and the side of the tube. A bubble of air blew past her, too quick for her to even consider trying to get any.

She pulled herself around the hatch that had opened. She scrambled around, feeling the walls, searching for the controls to close it. She realized she had to find it in the next couple of seconds or shoot for the surface, and even as she thought that, her fingers touched a similar pattern of hexagons on the wall. She hit the code. She could feel water sweep by her, forced by the hatch closing.

Now she was trapped. The last of the air in her lungs dribbled out of her mouth. Her mind flickered, going blank, when she was slammed against the metal wall by a rush of water. Then all went dark.