Alongside earning her degree, Nadia also underwent intensive training by Spetsnaz soldiers. She had been deployed on a handful of missions under the ‘guise’ of a gap-year following her studies, but her superiors’ main interest lay in the work her father was doing on tachyons. Tachyon-energy, she had told them, could be used for so much more than creating a near inexhaustible energy supply for Russia. It could be used for so much more than even developing a bomb of awesome destructive power.
Tachyons were the key to unlocking time itself.
But her father would not share this knowledge with Russia. Instead, when they tried to take it by force, the ignorant pig had destroyed all his research.
That night, the soldiers had come. Days later, Nadia had fled the wrath of Russia and sought political asylum in the arms of her enemy, Great Britain. There, she had rebuilt her life, knowing that she could never again step foot on Russian soil. An exile until the day she died. All because of her father’s misguided sense of pride and honour.
But that had all changed in her lab on the summit of Sarisariñama when she had detected tachyons being emitted from the Moon Mask. It was her key to redemption.
She had contacted her former Spetsnaz handler and negotiated a deal, signed by the President and the Prime Minister themselves. If she could get them the power of the tachyon, they would grant her a full pardon. She could return home, and return to active duty, serving her homeland.
The SOG idiot, West, had been easy to manipulate. While still in New York, preparing for the mission, he had been approached and seduced by a Russian agent. Men were so easy to play. A ‘chance’ meeting at a bar, a torrid, heated encounter in a cheap motel then the promise of millions of dollars and he was on board. He knew nothing of Nadia’s involvement of course but he served to be the exact decoy she had needed. When her encrypted communiqués to Moscow had been picked up, she had shifted the blame to him, allowing her to work freely until all the pieces of the mask were discovered.
But she had discovered something more. Something so much more.
The shark attack had been unexpected and terrifying, but she was a master of manipulating events in her favour. The attack had given her the opportunity she had needed to return to the boat without suspicion, contact the Spetsnaz team that had never been far away, and escape with her life. Sid’s death had been unfortunate and she hated herself for it. Likewise, slipping her bloody glove into Raine’s equipment had been regrettable but again necessary.
The Spetsnaz team had rendezvoused with the Ushakovs in the Kuril Islands where the other equipment Nadia had requested had also been waiting. The Foreign Intelligence Service, or SVR, had received information from within the States detailing the exact position of the Eldridge. Of course, the SVR and their predecessor, the KGB, had known all about America’s own tachyon experiments and Project Phoenix but no one, not even Nadia herself, had been able to create more than a single tachyon particle until the Moon Mask had been discovered.
It was the endgame at last. The cold war which had never truly ended between east and west was finally coming to a head. And Russia would emerge the victor.
Thanks to Nadia Yashina.
The pilot worked the Ushakov’s controls and brought the ‘flying submarine’ about. Narrow and cramped, the plane was in no way luxurious but with no time to commit the forces that China had to attacking the U.S. fleet, the two experimental planes had been the best option. Designed to fly low at near super-sonic speeds, they had covered the distance from the Kuril Islands in no time and evaded detection until late. As the American and Chinese planes fought their dogfights above, the two pilots had loaded the command into the on-board computers. Both planes had slowed almost to stalling point. Their wing flaps had redirected their noses towards the waves before the wings themselves had retracted back and locked into position on the fuselage. Then, like kingfishers diving in for the kill, they had torn into the storm-tossed sea.
Now, hydraulics in the locked-back wings caused them to move to the pilots’ commands and they were steered beneath the aerial battle, streaming through the gloom towards the GPS coordinates of the Eldridge.
When she saw the barnacled hull of the ship beneath the water, her heart skipped a beat.
She was close.
So close.
As her pilot steered the submerged vessel into position, she clutched the hard, lead-lined rucksack containing the fake Moon Mask even tighter.
Her time had come.
The first shot slammed into the bulkhead behind Nathan Raine’s head.
His reactions were fast and he dropped to the deck, swinging his P-90 up. He pulled the trigger and his bullet slammed into the U.S. Marine’s shoulder, spinning him around. It wasn’t fatal, but it would keep him—
A second bullet exploded out the back of the young man’s skull, splattering brains and gore over the bulkhead behind him.
Raine spun to Langley. “What the hell are doing?!” he demanded. “He’s American!”
“He’s the enemy,” Langley replied, eyes hard.
Three more marines hurried forward and opened fire. Automatic weapons fire strafed the walls, spitting up sparks. The invading team scattered, hurrying for cover.
They were inside the superstructure, having made it across the deck undetected. The dull grey corridor was pocked by several doors but the team had ignored them, heading straight for the central stairs which zig-zagged their way up to the bridge. There, they would find their objective. An auto-destruct sequence programmed into a designated computer. A fail safe. Should the Eldridge’s commander decide that the experiment below had gone awry, his orders were to activate the destruct sequence. Explosives set at structural points around the ship would detonate. Water would rush into the carcass and drag the vessel beneath the waves. Eventually, she would sink into the deepest place on earth, the Mariana Trench, from where any possible tachyon detonation would be cushioned by billions of gallons of seawater and crushing pressure.
Langley’s plan was simple. Get to the bridge. Active the self-destruct and get the hell off the ship before it, and the Moon Mask, were lost forever.
The fire intensified as yet more marines converged on their position. The ship was lightly crewed for fear of a repeat of the Philadelphia Experiment’s grotesque outcome but the files Langley and Rasta-Man had downloaded indicated that there was still a team of twenty marines on board, undoubtedly alongside Gibbs and the SOG team. Raine had already made certain that Langley and his team knew that Rudy O’Rourke had saved him and King and was not to be harmed. Yet, killing any US Marine felt inherently wrong to him. They were soldiers, simply following orders.
Just as he had once done.
Raine dived and rolled into the protection offered by the metal stairs. Booted feet thundered down them as more and more marines spilled onto the deck.
Bill had taken cover behind a T-junction in the corridor. Every few seconds he would swing around the corner and fire. Every shot landed on its target, blasting mercilessly through the marines body armour. One went down, then another. They fired back on full auto and the sound was deafening in the enclosed environment.
More gunshots came from the left where Raine realised Langley had taken cover through one of the doors. He lay on his belly and fired into the corridor, taking out first the soldiers’ feet then, as they fell, finishing them off with a headshot.
Godfrey sprinted down the corridor and dived behind a shipping pallet piled with food outside the door to the galley. A bullet slammed into his hip just as he dropped behind the cover and Raine heard him scream in agony. One marine let loose on full auto and his bullets tore into the food tins and containers. Splashes of pummelled produce splattered over the bulkhead and Raine realised Godfrey wouldn’t last long under the onslaught.