“How do we open it?” Elek asked.
“We don’t.” Lexina stepped back. “The process is automated and works on its own schedule. This is beyond us.”
“Perhaps if we access the guardian—” Elek began, but his words were cut off as the black surface slid open, revealing a silver material that immediately peeled back in several layers until all that was left was a body encased in a clear material.
“It is not Airlia.” Elek pointed out the obvious. The body was human, less than five and a half feet tall; a male with Chinese features. He was dressed in a richly embroidered silk robe, dragons breathing fire swirling about the material. Lying next to the man’s right hand was a spear, the head of which was of highly polished metal, a replica of the Spear of Destiny that Lexina had used to access this chamber.
The air inside the tube crackled with electromagnetic static as the field which had preserved the body for thousands of years was slowly reduced in power.
Every cell of Lisa Duncan’s being was in pain. It had started with her hand inside the Black Sphinx chamber. Then up her arm, into her chest, and throughout her body. On the helicopter ride, all she could see was the top of the cargo bay through the haze of tears brought on by the agony as the pain spread through her entire body.
She had no idea where she was, although she was vaguely aware she had stopped moving and been taken off the helicopter. She was on her back, of that she had some sense. But the pain — she had never experienced anything even remotely close to it.
Her brain could tolerate it no longer, and her conscious mind shut down as she slipped into a state closer to a coma than anything else.
Across the room, Aspasia’s Shadow looked at her body on the bed. The priestly accoutrements had been removed and were neatly piled next to him. They were inside a small room, the walls carved out of brown rock. The Ark rested on the floor and Aspasia’s Shadow’s eyes shifted from Duncan to the Grail’s container. He was tempted. Such a temptation he had not felt in a long time, but he had waited millennia to gain possession of the Grail — he could wait a while longer to see if it still functioned, to see what it did to Duncan, if the ancient prophecies would be fulfilled. In the meanwhile, he removed his black cloak and dressed in the priest’s clothes.
Reluctantly, he left the room. One of the two guards on the outside came inside, standing just inside the door, to keep watch on Duncan. Aspasia’s Shadow checked for the third time, making sure the man knew his order — to call as soon as there was a change in Duncan’s condition.
Then Aspasia’s Shadow went down the corridor and entered another chamber hewn out of the brown stone. In the center a golden pyramid glowed — a guardian computer. A chair, more a throne, was set just in front of the guardian. Aspasia’s Shadow sat down and the golden glow encompassed him.
Through the alien computer he made contact with Easter Island to be updated on all that had happened there since he had left The Mission to pursue the Grail. He saw that the forces there were just about ready for action. He issued orders to be implemented as soon as all preparations were completed.
The rebuilt F-14 did what designers at Grumman had known it was capable of but never expected to see — execute a double digit G-force turn. The fact that the maneuver snapped the neck of the man in the cockpit didn’t bother the guardian computer controlling the plane in the slightest. Pilot-less, the plane nosed over and crashed.
Taking the data into consideration, the guardian prepared the next pilot better, enclosing him in a suit it designed to take the forces involved. Another rebuilt F-14 went up and began running through the same tests.
The plane made several more high-G maneuvers, then lined up on the Easter Island runway and came to a landing any carrier pilot would have been proud of. It taxied down the runway and came to a halt beside the full complement of F-14s that had been captured on board the Washington, all modified to the same specifications.
A mile off the south shore of Easter Island, the Jahre Viking loomed like a half-mile-long wall. Smaller boats from the Washington had been commandeered to bring the people who were needed ashore. Others worked at menial tasks on the ship as a flow of nanomachines did the bulk of the important work.
The nanomachines were building two huge doors by the expedient method of removing metal atom by atom. Behind the doors they were preparing they built a watertight seam at the same level. The first several compartments behind the doors were dissolving, the metal being used to reinforce the hull around the large open space being designed inside. The forward quarter of the ship was being prepared as a large open space, accessible through the doors.
Deep under the Rapa Kara volcano, Kelly Reynolds became aware of a new presence communicating with the guardian. A force that was issuing commands to the alien machine, something she had not experienced before, even when it had been in communication with the guardian on Mars.
For a moment, the link from Mars spiked in activity, trying to shut down the new link, but the new connection was more powerful, closer. At first Kelly thought it was the master guardian reestablishing its control, but then she picked up the presence of a mind, a human mind, behind the new guardian and she realized that was the controlling force.
Aspasia!
The name echoed in her consciousness. How could it be? And human? Aspasia was Airlia. And he was dead.
In her fear of being discovered and the uncertainty about what was going on, Kelly retreated, releasing her toehold in the data stream and hiding in the shell of what remained of her body.
“It doesn’t look good.” Major Quinn slapped down a black-and-white photograph on the conference room table. The air was heavy; the only change from before was that Mualama was back at work, his fingers hitting the keys even more furiously than before as he translated. Quinn pointed at the man in the water. “This was taken eight minutes ago. That’s Turcotte.”
He put a second photograph on top. “This was taken six minutes ago.” They could all see the Egyptian patrol boat next to Turcotte. The next picture showed him on board the deck of the boat, surrounded by soldiers. “What about the rest of the team?” Yakov asked. “Any sign of them?”
“Negative.”
“Can you get someone in Washington to contact Cairo and try to get Turcotte released?” Yakov asked.
“Washington has been screaming at Cairo about the AWACS getting downed,” Quinn said. “Now the Egyptians have captured an American soldier, illegally in their country. Also, they let those helicopters get out of their airspace. Someone holds a lot more leverage with the Egyptian government than we do. I think the time for negotiating is long past.”
“What do you recommend?” Yakov asked.
“We need to wait and—” Quinn began, but Che Lu slapped her palm on the table, getting their attention.
“We cannot wait. The Navy SEALs who went under the shield wall on Easter Island have not been heard from. The Ones Who Wait are inside of Qian-Ling with the key to the lowest level.” She tapped the photograph. “Turcotte has failed in his quest of rescuing Duncan, and I see no Grail in his hands as this boat picks him up.” She turned to Quinn. “You must get beyond thinking only of your country and think globally. There is a country, is there not, that would have a very good intelligence system in place in Egypt?”