Eventually, Cobb had decided that testing the accuracy of the map outweighed the risks. The odds of encountering the kind of elite hacker who could even identify a GPS signal — much less track it — were ten thousand to one, at best.
That is, if the technology even worked in the depths of the city.
They wouldn’t know for sure until they tried it out.
Prior to the team’s arrival in Alexandria, Cobb and Sarah had searched the district for non-traditional access points to the tunnel system and had found one in the subbasement of an apartment building. It had everything they were looking for: a wide grate to load equipment, ridiculously inadequate security, and virtual privacy.
Cobb cleared his throat. ‘Sarah and I are walking up to the entrance now. We’re in play in three… two… one…’
At zero, Sarah grabbed the doorknob and picked the lock faster than a senior citizen could turn a key. A second later, they were walking into the building.
‘Impressive,’ Cobb whispered.
‘I know,’ Sarah bragged.
They hustled down a flight of stairs and found themselves in a long hallway flanked by storage lockers for the residents. They quickly planted a small, wireless video camera above the lockers and made sure Garcia could see the feed. Then they made their way across the width of the building, silently hoping that none of the tenants was in sudden need of the spare lamps, battered suitcases, or rusted bicycles that cluttered the bins.
Fortunately, on this night, their path was clear.
When they reached the end of the hall, Sarah easily picked the lock on the boiler room door. They slipped inside and locked the door behind them.
‘Holy shit,’ she said as she turned on her flashlight and walked down the stairs. Steam hung in the air like a sauna.
‘What’s wrong?’ Garcia demanded.
‘It feels like Florida in here. Someone get me a towel.’
Cobb smiled as he planted a second camera just inside the door. Not only because her comment was accurate, but because he knew all of that steam needed somewhere to go — and that was why they were there.
The moisture drained into the ancient aqueducts below.
Cobb lifted the iron grate off the large drain in the floor. Sarah lowered herself into the hole first, bracing her body against the walls to control her descent into the tunnels below. Cobb followed her lead, easing the grate back into position as he did.
They dropped to the floor, one after another.
Both prepared for the worst, but they were alone in the darkness.
Cobb clicked on his flashlight and updated his team.
‘We’re in.’
Hundreds of miles away, a warning light flickered.
The moment the grate had been lifted, it had triggered the motion detectors that were actually embedded in the hollow iron. These tiny sensors could not only register vibration, their internal accelerometer could also calculate their orientation. The advanced technology could be used to determine if someone had merely stepped on the grate or if it had been removed entirely.
It was one of many security measures that had been placed throughout the cisterns.
The data collected from these devices was continuously fed to a remote system hidden amongst the rolling dunes of the Sahara where the signals were monitored by a massive computer that displayed real-time information from every corner of the underground labyrinth. If the lower levels of the city were breached in any way, the men who guarded them were instantly alerted.
No one got in or out without their knowledge.
It was the only way to protect their secrets.
With a simple text message, the personnel in the desert notified their contact in Alexandria of the impending threat. If further action was needed, it was his responsibility to ensure that appropriate measures were taken.
His men were always at the ready.
All they needed was a target.
17
The need for fresh water has always been a vital concern for the people of Alexandria. Most of Egypt is barren desert with few natural springs, and the ancient inhabitants of the city had no means of utilizing the salt water of the Mediterranean.
Fortunately, the Nile River has provided an inexhaustible source of drinkable water. With the help of man-made canals, the waters of the Nile were diverted into cisterns located throughout ancient Alexandria. There, the sediment slowly sank to the bottom, leaving clean, palatable water that could sustain the population.
The earliest cisterns were little more than square chambers cut into the sandstone, but when the Romans arrived in the second century BC, the simple stone pits were replaced by elaborate works of masonry. Before long, private reservoirs built of hand-fired bricks were the standard throughout Alexandria.
The following centuries brought a steady rise to the city’s population, and with it came the need to move away from the shallow cisterns that could only serve a few families each. The newer cisterns near the outskirts of the city were designed with entire communities in mind. They consisted of a series of grand chambers that penetrated more than three stories into the earth. These cavities were reinforced with a honeycomb of massive stone pillars connected by elaborate marble arches. Much of the stone had been repurposed from the ruins of ancient buildings and temples, which gave the underground vaults a grandiose, almost majestic feel.
All told, the network of cisterns was a colossal undertaking that was unrivaled in its day — not only as a feat of engineering, but for the sheer beauty of its design. And yet thanks to the destructive nature of the Fools of Alexander, most of it was hidden from the general public.
Jasmine didn’t know what she would see when the video from Cobb’s and Sarah’s flashlight cameras started to appear on her computer screen, but she wasn’t expecting the system to be so impressive. ‘Oh… my… God. It’s amazing.’
Sarah had to agree: there was something awe-inspiring about the scene. Those who had constructed this vast system of water collection had done so with the same pride as those who had built the grandest of cathedrals. She found it hard to believe that something so majestic could be hidden away just below the surface of the city.
She looked at Cobb. ‘What now?’
Cobb shrugged. ‘Beats the hell out of me.’
She laughed at his honesty.
They swung their lights around the space and tried to solve the riddle. There were no walkways or stairs. And as far as they could tell, the only way to navigate across the cistern was to shimmy along the narrow arches, hugging the wide pillars that blocked their path. One slip, and they would fall thirty feet to the bedrock below.
‘Any suggestions?’ he asked.
‘Maybe we can jump.’
‘To where? The floor?’
‘No. One level down.’
He grimaced and shined his light on the walkway below. It sat on top of a row of arches that sat on top of another row of arches that seemingly grew out of the floor itself. From this distance, there was no way to gauge the strength of the ancient stonework. It looked solid enough, but there was always a chance that the whole structure would simply collapse if they leaped to the arches below. Still, they needed to find a way down to the bottom level. That’s where they would find the tunnels that once allowed water to flow from one chamber to the next. According to the map, the tunnels would grant them access to the entire network of cisterns and the foundation of the ancient city.
‘Jasmine,’ Cobb said via his earpiece. ‘Do you see another way down? I don’t want to test the strength of this stone if we don’t have to… Jasmine, are you there?’
Transfixed by the images on the screen, she took a few seconds to snap out of her daze. ‘Sorry about that. According to my research, there should be a ladder carved into the wall itself. Look at the base of the ledge you’re standing on.’