“And Karsten offered it for sale?” Patrick scowled, trying to make sense of it all.
“Sam did, using Karsten’s personal e-mail,” Purdue clarified. “Karsten has no idea that the Magician, Mr. Raya, is coming to procure his next prime diamond from him.”
“Oh, that is good!” Patrick smiled, clapping his hands together. “As long as we can get the remaining diamonds to Master Penekal and Ofar, Raya cannot release any other surprises. I hope to God Nina and Sam managed to get them.”
“How do we get hold of Sam and Nina? My devices got lost in the circus back there,” Patrick asked.
“Here,” Purdue said. “Just scroll down to Sam’s name and see if the satellites can connect us.”
Patrick did as Purdue asked. The small speaker clicked erratically. Suddenly Sam’s voice crackled faintly on the speaker, “Where the hell have you been? We’ve been trying to connect for hours!”
“Sam,” Patrick said, “we’re on our way from Aksum, running on empty. When you get there, could you pick us up if we send you the coordinates?”
“Look, we’re in deep shit here,” Sam said. “I,” he sighed, “I sort of… capped a pilot and hijacked a military rescue helicopter. Long story.”
“Geeezuss!” Patrick shrieked, throwing his arms up in the air.
“They just landed here at the airstrip at Dansha as I forced them to, but we’re about to be arrested. There are soldiers everywhere, so I don’t think we can help you,” Sam lamented.
In the background, Purdue could hear the rotor clap of the helicopter and people shouting. To him it sounded like a war zone. “Sam, did you get the diamonds?”
“Nina got them, but they will probably be confiscated now,” Sam reported, sounding absolutely miserable and enraged. “Patch through your coordinates anyway.”
Purdue’s face contorted in focus, as it always did when he had to make a plan out of a predicament. Patrick took a very deep breath. “Out of the frying pan.”
33
Apocalypse over Salzkammergut
Under the drizzle, Karsten’s vast, green gardens rolled in perfectly kept beauty. In the gray of the rain, the colors of the flowers seemed almost luminescent and the trees towered in majesty in lavish fullness. For some reason, though, all the natural beauty could not deter the heavy sense of being lost, of being doomed, that loomed in the air.
“Christ, what a miserable paradise you live in, Joseph,” Liam Johnson remarked as he parked the car under a shadowy clump of silver birch and lush firs on a hillock above the property. “Just like your father, Satan.”
In his hand he held a pouch containing several cubic zirconias along with one rather large stone Purdue’s had assistant provided, as per her boss’ request. Under Sam’s direction, Liam had visited Wrichtishousis two days before to collect the stones from Purdue’s private collection. The lovely, forty-something lady managing Purdue’s money matters had been kind enough to warn Liam about disappearing with the certified diamonds.
“Steal these, and I will cut off your balls with a blunt nail clipper, alright?” the charming Scottish lady had said to Liam as she handed over the pouch he was to plant in Karsten’s mansion. It was a fond memory, indeed, as she looked the type as well — sort of… Miss Moneypenny meets American Mary.
Once inside the easily accessible country estate, Liam recalled his scrutiny of the house’s blueprints to find his way to the study where Karsten did all of his underhanded business. Outside he could hear the sub-par security men chatting with the housekeeper. Karsten’s wife and daughters had arrived two hours before and all three had retired to their bedrooms for some recuperative sleep.
Liam made his way into the small lobby at the end of the ground floor east wing. He picked the lock of the office with ease and gave his surroundings one more spy before entering.
“Holy shit!” he whispered when he snuck in, almost forgetting to keep track of the cameras. Liam felt his stomach churn as he closed the door behind him. “Nazi Disneyland!” he gasped under his breath. “My God, I knew you were up to something, Carter, but this? This is next level shite!”
The entire office was adorned in Nazi symbolism, paintings of Himmler and Göring, and several busts of other high-ranking SS-High Commanders. Behind his chair, a banner hung on the wall. “No way! The Order of the Black Sun,” Liam affirmed as he crept nearer to the awful sigil embroidered in black silk thread upon red satin cloth. Most disturbing to Liam was the looping video clips of awards ceremonies held by the Nazi Party in 1944, continually playing on the flat screen monitor. Inadvertently he turned into another painting boasting the hideous face of Yvetta Wolff, daughter of Karl Wolff, Obergruppenführer of the Waffen-SS. “This is her,” Liam muttered quietly, “Mother.”
Get your shit together, lad, Liam’s inner voice urged. You don’t want to spend your last moment in this pit, do you?
For a trained Black Ops specialist and technological espionage expert such as Liam Johnson, cracking Karsten’s safe was child’s play. In the safe Liam found another document with the Black Sun symbol on it, an official memorandum to all members that the Order had tracked down the exiled Egyptian Freemason, Abdul Raya. From an asylum in Turkey, Karsten and his associate High Level members had arranged for Raya’s discharge after research introduced them to his work during the Second World War.
His age alone, the fact that he was still alive and well, were all unfathomable traits that evoked the admiration of the Black Sun. In the opposite corner of the room, Liam also fixed a security feed monitor with sound feature, similar to Karsten’s own private cameras. The only difference was that this one sent feeds to the security office of Mr. Joe Carter, where it could easily be intercepted by Interpol and other government agencies.
Liam’s mission was all an elaborate job to incriminate the backstabbing MI6 leader and expose his closely guarded secret via live television stream as soon as Purdue activated it. Along with the information Sam Cleave obtained for his exclusive report, Joe Carter’s reputation was in serious peril.
“Where are they?” Karsten’s shrill voice echoed through the house, startling the sneaking MI6 intruder. Liam quickly put the pouch of diamonds in the safe and closed it as swiftly as he could.
“Who, sir?” a security staff member asked.
“My wife! M-m-my daughters, you goddamn imbecile!” he barked, his voice passing by the study doors and whining all the way up the stairs. Liam could hear the intercom sound next to the looping footage of the monitor in the office.
“Herr Karsten, there is a man here to see you, sir. His name is Abdul Raya?” a voice announced to all the intercoms in the house.
“What?” Karsten’s squeal sounded from upstairs. Liam just had to chuckle at his successful framing job. “I don’t have an appointment with him! He is supposed to be in Bruges, wreaking havoc!”
Liam crept out the doors of the study while listening to Karsten’s objections. That way he could keep track of the traitor’s location. The MI6 agent slipped out from the lavatory window on the second floor to avoid the main areas now frequented by paranoid security staff. Laughing, he jogged away from the evil walls of the horrible paradise that was about to host a ghastly standoff.
“Are you insane, Raya? Since when do I have diamonds to sell?” Karsten barked as he stood in the doorway of his office.