THREE
The U.N.C.L.E. attacking force supplemented by interceptor planes and jet fighters overhead, left the mining community of Granite River a few minutes before daybreak.
Napoleon Solo, weak, frost-bitten hands encased in heavy mittens, fatigue covering him like a blanket after a restless night, had arrived a few minutes earlier in a jeep driven by Emmett. Despite loud protestations from the men present, concerned over his appearance, Solo perversely insisted he was leading the attack, no matter what happened.
The force consisted of roughly a hundred men, specially trained in this type of assignment, flown in from various parts of the country. There were several jeeps, three large canvas-covered trucks, and an arsenal ranging from handguns to small mortars.
Mounted on two of the jeeps were strange-looking black boxes, somewhat larger than fruit crates, and containing a multitude of dials and gauges. Both boxes were covertly watched over by skilled U.N.C.L.E. technicians from New York City.
Upon seeing the boxes, Solo knew immediately how Waverly planned to penetrate the concrete and-steel fortress. Each was capable, he knew, of producing a type of Laser beam, specially modified by U.N.C.L.E. scientists. The beam, used only on rare occasions by U.N.C.L.E. because of the awesome destructive power it possessed, was able to disintegrate, according to intensity, any metal or substance known to man.
Napoleon Solo, riding in the lead jeep, led the convoy up the mountain road. They encountered no resistance. When they reached the end of the road leading upward from Granite River, they found a second road, its entrance well hidden, that would deploy into the mountains to the right. This second road had been apparently built by THRUSH, since neither of the forest rangers professed any knowledge of it.
The convoy entered this second road. Overhead, one of the U.N.C.L.E. intercept jets radioed via the short wave band in Solo's jeep that no THRUSH opposition awaited them outside the entrance to the fortress. Solo reasoned that THRUSH had lookouts in the immediate area, and that they knew of U.N.C.L.E.'s pending arrival, and of the jets. Apparently, he decided, THRUSH felt their fortress was impenetrable, and were content to stave off the U.N.C.L.E. attack from within.
They came in sight of the sloping granite wall that hid the entrance to the fortress minutes later. Acting with well-organized speed, the U.N.C.L.E. force began to mobilize. Men dismounted from the trucks and jeeps, weapons were loaded, and the boxes housing the deadly Laser beams were carefully lifted to the ground and placed in readiness.
One of the jets, fighter-equipped, made passes directly overhead, waiting. When the U.N.C.L.E. unit was at attack-ready, Solo turned to where the technicians hovered about the Laser boxes. The mountain road was still and silent. The tension in the chill, snow-tinged air was electric.
Napoleon Solo gave the command. Buttons were pressed simultaneously on the black boxes. They began to glow with a violent purplish light, blinding if looked at directly, and a low, humming sound came from each. The light and the hum lasted only a single instant, and then the boxes became still again.
The lower portion of the granite wall before them, and the concrete-and-steel behind it, disintegrated.
In that single instant the Laser beams were trained on the wall, a gaping hole appeared there almost magically revealing the warehouse Solo had been in the day before It had been jammed with THRUSH guards, waiting there. Those who had been unlucky enough to be directly in front of the entranceway had caught the glancing impact of the Lasers, and lay now on the concrete floor. Some were dead, others terribly burned by the radiation The rest milled about in panic, the suddenness of the assault turning their rank into chaotic confusion.
The U.N.C.L.E. force, led by Solo, attacked under protective cover of a burst of machine gun fire from the jet above, spraying the mountain road in front of the entrance.
They encountered almost no opposition from the frightened THRUSH guards. The element of surprise, and the awesome destructive power of the Lasers, had made the U.N.C.L.E. penetration of the fortress a quick and, for them, bloodless one.
Leaving some of the agents to guard the prisoners they had taken, Solo led the remainder to the elevators against the left-hand wall. One of the technicians went to the control board behind the partition to the right, found the levers operating the elevators there and brought them all to basement level.
A group of agents rode to each of the three remaining levels of the fortress for search-and-seizure operations. Solo went to the top floor, the laboratory and manufacturing plant.
A state of confusion reigned there. The scientists, workers and guards there were well aware of the U.N.C.L.E. invasion, and were attempting to organize themselves when Solo and the U.N.C.L.E. agents with him emerged from the elevators.
Solo shot one guard, brandishing a machine gun, in the leg, and one of the other operatives winged a white-coated man with a revolver. After that there was no resistance.
Solo, after the THRUSH men had been herded into one section of the laboratory, went immediately to the private lab of Dr. Sagine at the far end. He found it deserted.
"Where is Sagine?" Solo demanded.
The THRUSH men were stony-faced.
Solo singled out a hawk-faced little man with frightened eyes, grabbed him by the scruff of his white-smock and dragged him of to one side.
"Better talk, friend," Solo said. "You will eventually, you know. We have ways..."
It did not take much persuasion on Solo's part to learn that Sagine had left the fortress some time late the previous day, bound for the town of Pardee, in Utah, to supervise the introduction of the salt chemical into the Colorado River. Solo then questioned the man carefully, asking which of the scientists present knew of the formula for the chemical, and of its antidote, and how the antidote was administered. The frightened little man relinquished the answers almost gratefully.
Solo then checked with the balance of the U.N.C.L.E. force on the lower floors. He was told by the leader of each group that everything as under control, that prisoners had been taken.
U.N.C.L.E. now controlled the fortress fully.
One of the U.N.C.L.E. agents in the warehouse also informed Solo that a search had revealed hundreds of jars of chemical there, ready for transportation. The agent had questioned one of the captured guards and had learned that THRUSH had not as yet transferred any out of the fortress. They were waiting to receive word as to the success of the Colorado River venture. As soon as that word had been given, the chemical was to be shipped by helicopter to a hidden THRUSH Air Base near by for distribution throughout the world.
Solo immediately used his communicator to contact Mr. Waverly, waiting in New York, and told him that the assault had been a success. He relayed what the little man had told him about Dr. Sagine, and that his earlier conclusions concerning THRUSH knowledge of the salt chemical and its antidote had been accurate...one of the captured scientists knew the formulas and how they were used and regulated.
"Good," Waverly said, "Mr. Solo, our agents from Salt Lake City have conducted a successful raid on a THRUSH camp in Pardee, Utah. They have confiscated several jars of the salt chemical and what, according to one of the scientists they had captured there, was the antidote. There was no sign of Dr. Sagine, the agents report. If the THRUSH personnel in Pardee knew where he was they weren't talking."