“If we find something, I will send Ki back.” Che Lu didn’t want the others shuffling behind her as she explored down deeper. She knew it was only a matter of time before one or more of the young students gave in to their fears and became a liability. At least the daylight would give them some comfort, although she knew night would be falling soon.
Taking the bamboo stick and all the flashlights but one, she and Ki headed back the way they had come, the light off to conserve it, using the stick along the wall to search for the intersection, since they had already passed this way and knew it to be safe and smooth.
“We’ve lost a hundred meters in the last two hours,” Tennyson reported, his voice echoing through the cramped interior of the Greywolf.
“Keep your eye on the gauge and let me know if we lose more.” Commander Downing wasn’t worried about depth right now. Condensation was forming on the interior of the submersible, adding to the chill that was seeping in from the outside. He had the battery heaters off, conserving power, and keeping the foo fighters from reacting to any indication of energy, but he knew he couldn’t do it indefinitely without it getting so cold inside that they would become hypothermic.
Downing twisted his head and looked out the small portal into the dark water. There was nothing for almost five minutes; then, right on schedule, one of the foo fighters drifted past, its glow the only source of light other than the two emergency lights inside the sub.
“Damn,” Tennyson muttered, looking over his shoulder. “What do you think those attack subs are doing?”
“They’re waiting, just like we are.”
“For what?” Emory asked from his console.
“For something to happen,” Downing said. “Either the foo fighters will do something or go away.”
“So we’re waiting on those things,” Emory said.
“Actually,” Downing said, “I think we’re all waiting on Aspasia to wake up and sort this all out.”
CHAPTER 19
The members of the Special Forces team and their two straphangers finished loading their rucksacks onto the floor of the MC-130 and seated themselves along the right side of the plane on the cargo webbing seats. To Turcotte’s eye the team looked like a group of seals out of water, as they all wore black dry suits over their camouflage fatigues.
In the bustle of loading onto the plane Turcotte had not had a chance to talk to Duncan alone. Just a hurried good-bye and good luck and then the back ramp had come up, sealing them off from the outside world, and the turboprop engines kicked into life. Turcotte felt a little out of sorts, and he shook his head to clear it of extraneous thoughts and focus on the task at hand.
Turcotte had coordinated several checkpoints en route to the drop zone. The loadmaster in the back of the aircraft would relay the checkpoint number from the navigator to him as they crossed each one, keeping him oriented to where they were on the route. At checkpoint one, where the aircraft dropped altitude and headed for the coast of China, Turcotte would have the team start their inflight rig to put their parachutes on. The last checkpoint was six minutes from the drop zone, where Turcotte would start his jump commands.
Turcotte glanced at Nabinger, who looked most uncomfortable in his dry suit. The professor was probably beginning to regret his enthusiasm about Qian-Ling and what might be hidden in the tomb. Turcotte knew that Nabinger would regret it even more when the plane began its low-level flight across China. Pressler, the medic, started passing out Dramamine pills to those who wanted them. Turcotte knew the Dramamine would help reduce the motion sickness that was an integral part of any MC-130 flight. He made sure that Nabinger downed one.
The wheels of the MC-130 lifted off the tarmac and the plane roared into the night sky.
Duncan watched the plane until it was no longer visible. Then she walked back to the operations center. She looked at Zandra, hunched over the communications console for a few minutes. As she walked behind her, Zandra finishing whatever she’d been doing, then turned and faced her.
“Time to work on the plan to get them out of there, don’t you think?” Duncan asked.
Zandra pressed the tips of her fingers together. “Certainly. It’s already being done.”
“By who?”
“By a responsible agency,” Zandra replied.
“Who are you?” Duncan asked.
“I told you—”
“And I know it’s bullshit,” Duncan said. “I’ve been around Washington a long time and I have some connections. You’re not CIA. Hell, you’ve got more clout than the CIA. It would have taken the Agency a week to get that Air Force plane here to fly that mission and a ton of paperwork, but you had it here with less than twelve hours’ notice and with authorization to send it into Chinese airspace.”
“The authorization came from a presidential directive,” Zandra said. “You can verify that if you wish.”
“Not from a directive issued by this President,” Duncan said.
“Nevertheless, I do have my authority from a presidential directive,” Zandra said, “and you are required by law to support me.”
“Your execution of this mission does not bear the stamp of the CIA or any other government agency I’m familiar with,” Duncan said. “Nor did the Rift Valley operation.”
“You question me because I am efficient?” Zandra asked.
“I question you because I want to know who you really work for,” Duncan said. “And I’ve told you that,” Zandra said.
“What I’d really like,” Duncan said, leaning close to the other woman, “is for those people you just sent to be brought back. They are not expendable, do you understand?”
Zandra didn’t blink or avert her gaze. “I understand quite clearly.”
Che Lu and Ki had passed the four-way intersection twenty minutes ago and continued straight through, taking what had originally been the right-hand passage that headed deeper into the mountain tomb. At first the passageway ran straight and slightly down, but now it began to do wide turns, right, then left, then back right, going down at a steeper angle until Che Lu suspected they were below the base of the mountain and into the Earth itself.
It was slow and tense going as the fear that any second they might trip another trap weighed heavily on their psyches. Despite her fear Che Lu was amazed at the length and exact construction of the tunnel they were moving down. The walls and floor were perfectly smooth and the tunnel seemed to go on forever.
Of course, she’d had to reevaluate her entire frame of reference about the tomb since seeing the holographic alien figure in the main tunnel. Ancient Chinese workers had not carved this tunnel out of rock. She had been so concerned simply about survival that she had not taken the thought farther than that, but as her mind went in that direction she felt the very roots of her knowledge base suffer tremors of uncertainty.
What was true now? What was the real history of her people and the people of Earth, for that matter?
“There!” Ki huffed, suddenly halting.
The tunnel widened ahead, opening into a chamber, the far end, sides, or ceiling of which their weak flashlight could not reach. Ki looked over his shoulder. “What now, Mother-Professor?”
“We go in, follow the wall to the left so we don’t get lost.”
But that wasn’t necessary, because as soon as they stepped out of the opening of the tunnel, a very dim glow appeared high above their heads. Both instinctively stepped back, afraid, but the light went dark.
“Ah,” Che Lu spat out. She was tired of this tomb’s games. She stepped forward several paces into the chamber. The glow came back, growing stronger with each passing second. Soon it was as if a minisun were hovering about a quarter mile above their heads.