“We will fly low level across the Sinai to the Gulf of Suez. At that point, the MC-130 pilots have several possible routes to the target and they will decide the safest one to take depending on electronic intelligence of Egyptian air defenses at the time. All routes put us over the drop zone, DZ Nile, located here, two kilometers upstream on the Nile from the underground river which we have designated as Route Alpha.”
Turcotte held up a hand, causing the captain to pause. “Two klicks upstream? Why so far?”
“I’ve talked to the navigator for the MC-130 on a secure SATCOM link,” Graves said. “He says they go any further to the north, they will most definitely be spotted. It gets crowded very fast as you move north toward Cairo. As it is, they think they have a small window to get us over the river with a steep bank, a long enough flight over it to get all of us out, then they will have to bank hard again to get over the desert and out of sight.”
“How long will it take us to cover two klicks swimming?” Turcotte was trying to remember the times he’d done what special forces called maritime operations. Two kilometers was going to take a little while, even wearing the TASC-suits.
“We won’t be swimming it, sir,” Graves said. “The TASC-suits have fittings for propulsion units. Based on other operations we’ve conducted underwater using the suits, we can make it to the opening of Route Alpha in under ten minutes.”
Turcotte caught the note in Graves’s voice. He knew that the captain had everything locked down from the second they took off in the bouncer to the moment they entered that tunnel, but from there this mission was an unknown. And that bothered the officer. Turcotte now knew why Yakov had been hammering at him to slow down, to read the translation of Burton’s manuscript, to gather intelligence. For just a moment, Turcotte considered whether they should scrub the evening’s mission and delay it for twenty-four hours. Then he thought of Lisa trapped somewhere under the Giza Plateau and he knew they had to go.
“Continue with the briefback,” Turcotte ordered the team leader. The operational briefing was depressingly short.
There was a lot of “playing it by ear” once they got in the tunnel. So much so that even Turcotte had to acknowledge the scarcity of good intelligence. Exfiltration was also iffy with no backup to the helicopters from the peacekeeping force.
To balance the lack of planning and intelligence, Turcotte felt they had an advantage with the TASC-suits. Duncan had been told that the suit had taken four billion dollars and fifteen years to develop under a covert research program funded by the black budget. She’d confessed her concern to Turcotte that Majestic-12 and Area 51 had a lot to do with the technology that went into the suit — appropriated Airlia technology.
The briefback was over and Graves was waiting for any questions. Turcotte only had one. “Are we all set?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Good. Let’s get the gear ready for loading.” He noted that Yakov had entered the room for the latter part of the briefback. The Russian came over to him once it was done.
“The professor has translated more of the manuscript.”
“How much?”
“Another chapter.”
“Is it important?”
“We don’t know what’s important or not yet,” Yakov said.
Turcotte stretched out his back, feeling the strain of memorizing flight routes, emergency rally points, primary and alternate exfiltration points, code names, call signs, radio frequencies — all the details needed for the upcoming mission.
Turcotte bowed to the inevitable and followed Yakov to the elevator. The descent was made in silence, each man left to his own thoughts. Yakov wasn’t going with them, despite his protests. He was too large for any of the TASC-suits. Besides, Turcotte wanted him here at Area 51 to monitor everything that was happening.
Che Lu was sitting in her seat and it appeared to Turcotte she hadn’t moved since last they were there, although he knew she had been working with Quinn on Nabinger’s coordinates. He assumed she hadn’t come up with anything since she didn’t say anything.
Mualama was at the computer, and he silently pointed to the screen where the opening of a new chapter was displayed.
BURTON MANUSCRIPT: CHAPTER 4
After so many years of inactivity by The Mission and The Ones Who Wait, the destruction of the base at Ngorongoro triggered a burst of activity by both sides.
First — Egypt. Probably fearing retribution, The Mission removed their Guides from Egypt, ending the Second Age and ushering in the time of the Pharaohs, humans who took over the reign.
The long reach of The Mission was still present, though, as the plans for the Highland of Aker that Isis and Osiris had drawn up almost six thousand years earlier were revived. The Pharaohs built the massive pyramids we still see today on the Highland. The purpose of these was uncertain to Watchers at the time, although the best guess was that they were to guard the entrances to the underground passageways. When they were first built, they were covered with a sheathing of white limestone that could be seen for many, many miles.
“Nabinger told us the purpose of the pyramids,” Turcotte said to Yakov, who was also reading his copy. “They were a beacon, sending a radar signature from their smooth, flat surfaces into space.”
“But think what that means,” Yakov said. “The Mission had no other way to communicate into space.”
“Maybe they were trying to get ahold of Aspasia on Mars,” Che Lu suggested.
“But if they had access to a guardian,” Turcotte said, “they wouldn’t need to do that.”
“But maybe they didn’t have access anymore,” Yakov said.
“Remember the message Kelly Reynolds sent here?” Turcotte said. “The vision of the top of the Great Pyramid being removed — maybe that was the master guardian.” He shook his head. “But that doesn’t make any sense.”
I learned from Kaji that there were six major chambers — Duats — cut underneath the Highland of Aker. But even the Pharaohs and their priests were not aware of this. It was no longer the priests of the Neteru or the Horus-Guides that watched these chambers, but the line of Kaji. The rings they had from their time as the wedjat still worked on the doors of the Airlia. It is obvious that The Mission did not trust the pharaohs to guard their secrets, as much as they trusted secrecy, and the Watchers stepped into the vacuum. The Mission was aware that the Watchers did this. Why else would Al-Iblis have sent me after Kaji? But they did not fear the Watchers, so they were not concerned.
With Egypt abandoned by The Mission and The Ones Who Wait base at Ngorongoro destroyed, where did the two groups go? This was the issue that plagued the Watchers for hundreds of years.
The first hints came with the development of civilization in China, far removed from the cradle of the Nile and the Middle East. It seemed too much of a coincidence that such great strides were made in that far-off land so suddenly.
I believe, based on what I have learned, that The Ones Who Wait set up their new headquarters somewhere in that land. The Mission remained somewhere in the vicinity of the Mediterranean, its influence felt throughout the civilizations that began to arise in that area.
A new phase of the Airlia civil war was ushered in, with both sides extending their tentacles into human civilization, trying to guide it in the way each deemed best for their side.
However, through all this, the Grail, I believe, remained inside the Hall of Records. To discover more, I had to travel to the Middle East.