The Reply

CHAPTER 18

Power from the solar panels was pouring in, a waterfall of energy that filled the guardian computer and its subsystems. It began accessing and opening other programs that had long rested dormant.

Two programs had priority, one biological, the other mechanical. Even deeper than the computer under the surface of Mars was a cavern lined with rows of black, coffinlike objects, each just over ten feet long by four in diameter. For the first time since they were sealed, the black metal protecting each pod slid back, revealing layers of silvery, magnetically charged material that peeled back one by one until finally a clear material was left, tightly wrapped around the bodies that had been preserved.

They were all tall, male and female, between six and seven feet, with short torsos and inversely long arms and legs. The heads were half again as big as a human’s, with red hair covering the scalp. The skin was white and unmarked.

The air around each body began to crackle with electric static as the fields that had preserved them for so long were slowly reduced; all except for twenty of the eighty. Twelve of those twenty had failed and the bodies inside were mummified. The other eight were to remain asleep as a security measure.

Mechanically, power was diverted into the chamber closest to the surface, just under the object known as the Fort. Lights went on and a half-dozen ships were illuminated in their glow. Neither bouncer nor mothership, these lay in between. Each rested on the smooth rock floor, like an upright bear’s claw, tapering up and curving slightly to one side until it reached a razor-sharp point. Each craft was over two hundred meters high and forty around at the base. They all pointed slightly inward, the grouping making an image like the paw of a very dangerous animal. The skin of each ship was flat black, so black that it absorbed all light and reflected nothing back.

A bolt of golden light arced from cables crisscrossing the roof of the chamber down to each ship and they began to power up.

Turcotte, Nabinger, and Duncan walked into the A-team’s isolation area and were immediately challenged by one of the men, who demanded to see their identification cards. As Turcotte was pulling it out his wallet, Zandra stepped in front.

“Captain Turcotte, Professor Nabinger, and Dr. Duncan are all on your access roster,” Zandra said. “As a matter of fact, Captain Turcotte is the mission commander.”

A short, muscular soldier with graying hair walked over, looking none too happy. “I’m Chief Harker. I wasn’t told that someone would be taking over my team.” Harker had a deep gravelly voice that had smoked too many cigarettes and drunk too much whiskey. His leathery face was crisscrossed with wrinkles and lines, but his gray eyes were sharp and focused on Zandra.

“You were told to follow any orders I gave, right?” Zandra asked. “That’s correct.”

“Then Captain Turcotte is in command.” Zandra turned. “I leave you all to get acquainted, but don’t waste time. You depart in less than two hours.” She walked out the door, leaving Turcotte and the others under the gaze of the six Special Forces soldiers.

“Are all of you going on the mission?” Harker asked.

“Myself and Professor Nabinger,” Turcotte answered.

“Professor of what?” Harker demanded.

“Archaeology,” Nabinger said.

“Archaeology,” Harker repeated. “Then maybe you can tell me then why we’re infiltrating Communist China to get into a tomb.”

“I’m sorry—” Nabinger began, but Turcotte stepped forward.

“There’s information in the tomb about the Airlia,” Turcotte said.

“I thought—” Nabinger started to speak, but Turcotte interrupted him once more.

“These men are risking their lives to help us,” he told Nabinger. “The least we can do is give them the truth.”

“Sure, no problem with me, but the ice queen in the other room might not like it,” Nabinger said.

“The professor here,” Turcotte continued, “is the world’s foremost expert on both the high rune language and the Airlia.”

“Hey,” one of the younger soldiers said, “you’re the guy who made contact with that guardian computer, aren’t you?”

“Yes, he is,” Turcotte said. “But right now you need to get us up to speed on how you plan on getting us to the tomb.”

Harker turned and walked over to one of the plywood boards. “This is the operational area,” he said.

Turcotte was impressed with the quality of the Aurora imagery. It looked as if the pictures had been taken with a zoom lens out of an aircraft at three hundred feet. Not for the first time Turcotte wondered who was behind all this. Zandra claimed to be CIA, but every contact Turcotte had ever had with that agency had demonstrated nothing like the efficiency being shown by Zandra.

“My intelligence man, Sergeant Brooks, is working on the enemy situation in the vicinity of the target,” Harker said, drawing him out of his reverie. “We got a lot of information that we’ve been trying to process into intelligence.”

Harker glanced at the closed door, then back at Turcotte and Nabinger. Instinctively, Turcotte knew what was bothering the warrant officer; it was what would be disturbing him if he were in the other man’s shoes.

“Listen, we’re all in this together,” Turcotte said. “I’m in command, but all that means is that this mission is my responsibility, Chief. You still command your team and I’ll follow whatever plan you’ve come up with to get us in there and out.”

Chief Harker seemed to relax ever so slightly. He pointed about the room. “Chase there is our commo man. He’s coordinated with Zandra or whatever the hell her name is on times, message formats, codes to be used, and equipment. We’ll be using SATCOM and we have unlimited access. We’ll be carrying two sets. Chase will have one, I’ll have the other.”

Chase had short, sandy hair and a red face. He was slightly overweight with large muscular arms. He was carefully coiling up a set of cables, taking all the care the mother of a newborn would over her infant.

“We got FM rigs for each person to wear for interteam commo,” Harker continued. “Throat mikes, voice activated, earplug. See Chase to get yours rigged.”

Harker moved to another table. “Pressler is our medic. He’s done a medical profile on the area of operations, but we don’t plan on being there long enough for native flora or fauna or diseases to be a problem. We’re more concerned about man-made medical problems like bullets. He’s got a cut-down M-3 aid bag he’ll be carrying. Also, I’d like for you two to be rigged with two IVs on a vest inside your shirt like we all wear. One’s blood expander, the other’s glucose. They can save your ass from going under if you’re in shock.”

Turcotte nodded. He could tell Nabinger and Duncan weren’t following half of what the burly Green Beret was telling them, but Turcotte planned on sticking close by the professor throughout me mission and Duncan had only to be concerned about what happened back here.

For the first time in a long, long time, Turcotte felt at home. Even when he’d been inbriefed into the Nightscape security force working at Area 51, he’d felt like an outsider. But he understood these men and how they operated.

“What’s the threat?” Turcotte asked.

“It don’t look good,” Harker said. “The PLA, People’s Liberation Army, got several units deployed in our area of operation. Looks like there’s some real shooting going on between the PLA and Muslim factions. Also, that Zandra lady said that the people we’re supposed to link up with are locked inside the tomb, so that means things are stirred up a bit in our AO.”

Harker pointed at a spot on the side of the mountain tomb. “This is the only entrance we know of. As you can see, the PLA got a couple of vehicles parked in the courtyard and a machine position set up here, on the side of the mountain right above the door.”

“How do you plan on getting in?” Turcotte asked.

“Two stages,” Harker said. “First, my snipers reach out and touch someone, taking out the machine-gun position. They’ll keep firing until we get noticed. Then the rest of us go in and clear out the guys left alive on the doorstep. Then my engineer, Howes, has got charges prerigged that he says can blow the doors and get us in.”

“What weapons are you carrying?” Turcotte asked.

“Two Haskins .50-caliber sniper rifles with MP5-SD3 as personal weapons. Two Squad Automatic Weapons for firepower, and two M-203’s for some indirect fire. You can ask your lady friend for whatever you want to carry. Whatever we’ve asked for, she’s gotten, including some demo stuff my engineer has only read about.”

“Okay,” Turcotte said. “How are we infiltrating?”

“Ass end of an MC-130 at four hundred feet,” Harker said.

“Four hundred!” Nabinger spoke for the first time. “I thought it was going to be five hundred.”

Harker laughed, a rough sound like pebbles grating together. “Four hundred, five hundred, hell, that’s only talk. For the real deal we’ll be lucky if that crew goes up above three hundred feet to drop us. They’re going to be staying as low as they can to keep their butts from being seen on Chinese radar.”

Seeing Nabinger turn pale, Harker slapped him on the shoulder. “Don’t sweat it, Prof, we came up with something that’ll make your landing nice and soft.” He led them over to another photo of the tomb and the surrounding terrain. He tapped on the photo. “That’s where you’re going to jump.”

His finger rested on a small lake about two kilometers from the tomb, on the same side as the entrance. Turcotte knew what Harker meant about a soft landing, although he also knew there was a downside to parachuting into a body of water at night.

“The MC-130 navigates by reflected radar images,” Turcotte explained to Duncan and Nabinger. “The smooth surface of the lake gives a very large signature that the plane can easily find, so that’s good. Plus we can look out the back and double-check we’re in the right place before we jump.”

“Fucking-A on that,” Harker said.

Turcotte knew what the other man meant — anyone with any time in Special Forces had been on drops from MC-130’s where they landed miles from the intended drop zone.

Turcotte slapped Nabinger on the back. “You don’t have to worry about having to learn how to do a parachute landing fall or breaking your leg.”

“No, just drowning,” Nabinger muttered.

Turcotte thought it best to avoid that topic right now. “What about exfiltration? Had any time to look at that?”

Harker scratched his jaw. “Well, that’s another story. There are several places we can use for PZs.”

“PZs?” Duncan asked.

“Pickup zones for helicopters,” Turcotte explained.

“Like I said,” Harker continued, “there’s plenty of PZ locations. What worries me, though, is that the warning order said we were going to have two MH-60’s take us out. Now, I may not be the brightest guy in the world, but I do know a little about the Black Hawk. I know that it doesn’t have the range, even with external tanks, to make it from here to the target area and back. Not even close. I’m kind of curious how they think they’re going to do this and who’s flying the mission.”

“Maybe they’ll in-flight refuel,” Turcotte said. “Some of the specially modified Task Force 160 Black Hawks have that capability.”

“Yeah, the choppers might have the capability,” Harker acknowledged, “but I doubt very much the Air Force is gonna put one of their tankers over Chinese airspace.”

“I’ll talk to Zandra about it and see if I can get more information,” Lisa Duncan said.

“Well, if the Air Force gets us in the right place,” Harker said, “I’ll get you in the tomb.”

Turcotte, Duncan, and Nabinger looked at the imagery and maps of the mountain that was Qian-Ling. “It’s big,” Turcotte noted. “Any idea how far it extends underground?” he asked Nabinger.

“None. As far as is known, no one’s been in it since it was sealed.” “Great,” Turcotte said.

A woman’s voice cut in. Zandra had walked in while they were talking. “Your gear is waiting and the plane is landing, so I suggest you get moving.”

As they left the room, Nabinger shook his head and spoke in a voice only Turcotte and Duncan could hear. “You know, this is kind of bizarre, don’t you think?”

“What is?” Turcotte asked.

“Well, here we are, using the best technology man has, to get into an ancient tomb in China, to try and find out about the Airlia. Maybe, like Kelly said, we aren’t ready like Aspasia thinks we are if we can’t even agree with the Chinese government to let us take a look without having to sneak in.”

“There’s no doubt mankind is not united enough to join arm-in-arm with some advanced alien race,” Turcotte said. “But that’s not what worries me.”

“What does concern you, then?” Duncan asked.

“What worries me,” Turcotte said, “is whether mankind can get its shit together enough to fight an advanced alien race if we have to.”

“All of you except Ki stay here,” Che Lu ordered. “He and I will go back the way we came and try the right passageway.”

They had taken the left passage another half mile past the light shaft, only to find it ended abruptly in a smooth stone wall. The disappointment weighed heavy on the students and Che Lu, but she knew better than to give in to the weight. She had turned them around and led them back to the shaft of light.

“If we find something, I will send Ki back.” Che Lu didn’t want the others shuffling behind her as she explored down deeper. She knew it was only a matter of time before one or more of the young students gave in to their fears and became a liability. At least the daylight would give them some comfort, although she knew night would be falling soon.

Taking the bamboo stick and all the flashlights but one, she and Ki headed back the way they had come, the light off to conserve it, using the stick along the wall to search for the intersection, since they had already passed this way and knew it to be safe and smooth.

“We’ve lost a hundred meters in the last two hours,” Tennyson reported, his voice echoing through the cramped interior of the Greywolf.

“Keep your eye on the gauge and let me know if we lose more.” Commander Downing wasn’t worried about depth right now. Condensation was forming on the interior of the submersible, adding to the chill that was seeping in from the outside. He had the battery heaters off, conserving power, and keeping the foo fighters from reacting to any indication of energy, but he knew he couldn’t do it indefinitely without it getting so cold inside that they would become hypothermic.

Downing twisted his head and looked out the small portal into the dark water. There was nothing for almost five minutes; then, right on schedule, one of the foo fighters drifted past, its glow the only source of light other than the two emergency lights inside the sub.

“Damn,” Tennyson muttered, looking over his shoulder. “What do you think those attack subs are doing?”

“They’re waiting, just like we are.”

“For what?” Emory asked from his console.

“For something to happen,” Downing said. “Either the foo fighters will do something or go away.”

“So we’re waiting on those things,” Emory said.

“Actually,” Downing said, “I think we’re all waiting on Aspasia to wake up and sort this all out.”