“Somebody else has been here,” he said. “A short time ago. Either they were doing a recce, like us, or…”
Drake stopped what he was doing. “Or what?”
“Or they left something behind. What the hell is that?”
CHAPTER THIRTY TWO
Dudley grinned from ear to ear, a smile so wide it threatened to split open the corners of his mouth, turning him into an evil clown.
“Aye, aye,” he cackled. “The gang is all here. Time to die, I tink.”
His brother, Malachi, stood staunch as ever by his side. “You’d better ring yer Pythian mates first, Callan. Them boys gonna make us richer than the Queen of England.”
Dudley nodded knowingly. “Aye they are,” he said, taking out a slimline smartphone and pressing a speed dial preset. All seven members of the 27-Club stood around a window on the fourth floor of an apartment building half a mile away from Hsinchu Harbor, powerful binoculars either set to their eyes or resting at their chests. The Pythians’ plan had always seemed masterful; now it was also proving inspired.
Dudley waited for the call to connect, imagining what he could do to the SPEAR team right at that very moment, then wishing he could watch the devastating real-time effects. His eyes flicked momentarily to the wireless device that sat on the otherwise bare, rickety table behind them.
An explosive daisy chain? Fuuuuuuuck! The thought made him want to dance for joy. Even more, it made him want to act on impulse.
Luckily, the call was answered on the next ring. “Yes?”
“I have me finger on the trigger. Are we a go?”
Tyler Webb’s sharp intake of breath said not. “Wait, just wait. The Chinese agreed to the Peking Man ransom only an hour ago. I have men en route now to acquire the Z-boxes from them.”
“Men?” Dudley repeated, looking around. “But we’re all here.”
“I do have other men,” Webb said caustically. “I’m sure you understand that your methods, whilst they do bring me great joy, have their time and place. A twitchy, strained meeting between the Chinese Politburo’s closest guard and the Pythians’ armed representatives is not that place.”
Dudley cackled. “We’d just blow ‘em to hell and take the feckin’ boxes.”
“Quite. The good news though is very good news. The Peking Man has effectively purchased our Z-boxes. The Chinese have a healthy interest in Mu, but it’s an interest trumped by their higher aspirations. I have to say it is as we all thought.”
“Taiwan knows too?”
“They do now. But too late,” Webb said with a smile in his voice. “And they won’t be able to deny that they knew about Mu. Wait…” Webb sounded like he was taking another call.
Dudley stared impatiently at the handset, wondering if he should just throw it out the window and get down to using the wireless device. Then Malachi, reading his brother’s mind, put a reassuring hand on his shoulder.
“Remember, brother. Our plan. Make sure them boxes are comin’ here.”
Dudley nodded, memory jogged. “The Z-boxes,” he said into the dormant speaker. “When will they be here?”
“Good news,” Webb came back on the line, “my men have successfully exchanged the Z-boxes and are on their way to you now. Please get them here as soon as possible. And Mr. Dudley…?”
“Aye?”
“You can detonate that device now.”
CHAPTER THIRTY THREE
Drake swam over to Kearns, perturbed at the Seal team leader’s obvious horror. The man appeared to be quite simply dumbstruck, not an emotion normally associated with any Special Forces soldier. Kicking his flippered feet he closed the gap in seconds, twisting his body to glide in.
“What ya got, mate?”
“Explosive device,” Kearns said after a moment. “And it looks like it’s been daisy chained.”
Drake felt his blood run hotter. “What?”
Through the comms shouts of disbelief went up.
Kearns swam as close as he dared, Drake at his side. Together they peered at the small, black circular object, noting the blinking red light on its cover.
“The positioning.” Kearns indicated the nearby underwater structures, mostly buried beneath the sea’s accumulated sediment. He flicked his body sideways, following his own circuit and soon unearthed another device, its light also blinking. “The mad, crazy bastards have mined this entire area to explode and it’ll take your lost kingdom with it.”
Drake stared into the dark depths of the ocean. “I don’t see how they can detonate. That thing’s wireless and wireless signals don’t work down here.”
Kearns held up a hand. “You clearly haven’t been keeping yourself up to date. Whilst it’s true that radio waves carry the wireless signals and are sluggish in water, cutting edge research has developed a prototype that relies mostly on sound waves. A large underwater modem emits chirps that can carry almost a mile. That means—”
“All they need is a boat up top,” Drake cut him off abruptly. “Oh crap, are those lights flashing faster?”
“Move! The good news is that those underwater modems are slower than the old dial-up systems. We have a few seconds.”
“Seconds!”
Drake kicked out, angling his body away from the chain of devices. Was this what the Pythians wanted? To blow up the ancient civilization that they had just found? Had the Chinese refused their offer?
What was going on?
Alicia’s black shape darted past, sleek as a seal. Dahl was already scissor-kicking upwards, bubbles streaking all around him. The Seal team ascended in their wake, but then Kearns drew them up short.
“Slow down, people. Ain’t no quick escape here unless you want the decompression to kill you. Move sideways as fast as you can to escape the blast radius.”
Drake quelled a surge of horror. Depending on the number of devices — and judging by the first two’s distance apart they were going to add up to a shitload — it was unlikely that they would escape the blast radius.
“Move!” Kearns cried, already swimming for his life.
Hibiki took a phone call, the number revealing it was his contact within the Chinese Politburo. Heart thumping, he assumed this must be regarding the outcome of the special emergency meeting in Beijing.
“Guys,” he said. “Sorry, I have to take this.”
Only Yorgi acknowledged his words. Mai and Grace were nestled together in an intense heart to heart — which to Hibiki’s light relief was now actually producing one or two genuine smiles — and Chika was perched on the edge of a tractor tire, staring out to sea.
A sharp voice came through the handset. “Hello?”
“Yes, I’m here. Sorry.” Hibiki heard a sound like rolling thunder behind him and frowned at the skies. The clouds were white and the heavens were blue, not stormy and gray.
“You must act quickly or we’re all doomed. My government… I am shocked by the arrogant greed of my government.”
“What is it? What have they done?”
“Placed themselves before our history. Put avarice and desire before our citizens. Government is but a ravenous glutton, consuming the energies of its greatest natural resource — its public, its society. We are doomed.”
“I don’t understand.” Hibiki almost ducked as thunder cracked again in the bright blue skies.
Mai glanced straight up from her tête-a-tête with Grace. “Oh no.”
“Dai, listen closely to me. We don’t have much time and but a small chance. The inner circle have decided they want Mu destroyed so that they finally have a clear-cut reason to go to war with Taiwan. It’s happening now. They’ve wanted this for years and its finally happening.” The man sounded like he wanted to cry.