The first thing she did was introduce him to two men from V Squadron, code-names Chief and Sparky. As he spoke to Hart the two men unloaded some pretty serious equipment from the cargo door at the side of the plane.
“At least tell me what the ‘V’ stands for, Olivia!” he asked her.
She ignored him, and ordered the men into a Jeep Cherokee waiting at the side of the plane. “We have a lot of planning to do, Joe, and you’ve been out of the game for a long time.” She glanced at his stomach.
“That’s pure muscle,” he said, and meant it. “You cheeky cow.”
“Same old Joe Hawke.”
They drove across the base to an outbuilding she had already arranged with the base commander. As they drove, Hawke watched the Greek air force personnel shuffle about their business and he thought about how it didn't matter where you were in the world, a military base always had the same features.
It reminded him of all those years he’d spent as a commando in the marines and even as an SBS soldier. Life was simpler back then, in the squadron.
“These places never change, do they?” said Scarlet. She too was peering at the base over her sunglasses and presumably recalling her SAS days before she joined the Secret Intelligence Service.
They went ahead of the others and waited in a non-descript military briefing room normally used by the senior officers at the air base.
Moments later Olivia Hart strode into the room with Alexis Pavlopoulos, the base commander. He was a solid-looking military officer with a square, clipped hairstyle and dark brown eyes. After a few brief words of introduction they turned their attention to the attack on the yacht.
“It’s been a long time, Olivia,” said Pavlopoulos, kissing her on both cheeks and warmly shaking her hand.
“Indeed it has, Alexis. Is your air force still flying paper aeroplanes or have you graduated to real ones yet?”
Pavlopoulos was undeterred by the barb. “I heard a few days ago that the Royal Navy was making yet more cuts,” he countered. “Apparently you do not even have one aircraft carrier at sea. A sad end to what was once the world’s most powerful naval force, don't you think?”
For a moment there was silence between them, and then they smiled and briefly embraced once again. All was good.
“You know each other?” Scarlet said.
“We go back a long way,” Hart said.
“I trained with the commodore here when I was a junior officer,” said Pavlopoulos.
They took their positions at the table and Pavlopoulos suddenly turned to the matter at hand. “Now, I’ve been briefed by Commodore Hart here about the situation, and of course the Minister of National Defence here in Greece has confirmed everything and given me clearance to assist you in the capture of Hugo Zaugg. I can tell you that our government is very keen to question him about his activities in our territory, particularly the islands.”
“Your government will have to get in line,” said Hawke. “There are a lot of people who want to get their hands on Zaugg.”
“We can argue about that later,” Hart said. “We have to catch him first.”
“Quite,” Pavlopoulos said. “And so on that note, I would appreciate any information you can give me.”
Hawke spoke first. “The first thing to say is that those bastards are holding three of our team hostage, and I’m not too keen on them getting killed in the crossfire. The assault team are all in this room, so everyone pay attention.”
Hawke described Lea, Ryan and Sophie to the others.
“The basics are that Zaugg has made a push to locate the vault of Poseidon, which we now believe is a real location. He also wants to secure the contents of the tomb.”
“The contents?” Pavlopoulos asked, raising an eyebrow.
“They depend on who you ask,” Hawke said. “But most people agree it contains pretty much the biggest treasure known to man, especially in the form of gold and precious stones, particularly diamonds, rubies and sapphires. Some of this treasure we think was collected by Poseidon himself, but the rest was probably a tribute to him after his death.”
“Or disappearance,” Scarlet added quietly. “He was supposed to be immortal, after all.”
“And this is what Zaugg wants?” Pavlopoulos said.
“Partly. We know Hugo Zaugg is already rich beyond most people’s dreams — worth hundreds of millions of dollars at least. The gold in the tomb would be priceless though and clearly it would increase his wealth beyond measure.”
“So what is his motivation?” Pavlopoulos looked at them each in turn, studying their expressions carefully.
Hawke said: “There’s some dispute about this, and that depends on how you interpret the phrase ‘ultimate power’. Some scholars think it refers to his trident which had the power to cause earthquakes and tsunamis on an unprecedented scale and unlike anything we’ve seen in our time.”
“This is the worst possible news,” Pavlopoulos said.
“You’d think so,” Hawke said, “but it gets worse. Professor Demetriou here has interpreted the phrase ‘ultimate power’ to refer to his immortality.
“His immortality?”
“Poseidon was a god, and that means he was immortal.”
“You cannot say was immortal,” Scarlet said. “Immortal means he is still alive, doesn’t it?”
“Not necessarily, my dear,” said Demetriou. “It just means that you will live forever if left alone. If someone cuts the head off an immortal they’re hardly going to grow another one, are they?”
Hawke thanked the professor for the image, and started to speak when Scarlet suddenly interrupted him.
“Look, the upshot of it all is we’re up to our tits in trouble and we need some help.”
“Thanks for that, Cairo.”
“Well, let’s just get on with it!”
“What are his forces?” Pavlopoulos asked.
“There’s a second in command by the name of Dietmar Grobel, but we know next to nothing about him. Under him is a former member of the German Special Forces named Heinrich Baumann, a total psycho by all accounts. He was running another nutcase by the name of Vetsch but we took him out in Geneva.”
“So who’s on the boat?”
Scarlet spoke next: “It’s impossible to know exactly, but Zaugg, Grobel, Baumann and however many men with guns he can accommodate, presumably.”
“And Zaugg’s the turd at the top,” Hawke added.
“There’s that word again,” Demetriou mumbled.
“You’re sure?” Hart asked.
“What do you mean?” Hawke asked.
“Maybe someone’s pulling Zaugg’s strings, is what I mean.”
Hawke considered the thought for the first time, but put it out of his mind. “If there’s someone higher than Zaugg then we’d be talking political class.”
“And your point is?”
“Let's not go there, Olivia.”
Pavlopoulous looked considerably more anxious than when he’d walked into the room a few moments ago. “Okay, I can give you one chopper, a new Eurocopter Cougar with two crew.”
“Excellent,” Hart said. “They seat twenty, don’t they?”
“We should be able to take them with twenty,” Scarlet said, considering the logistics of it all with undisguised delight.
“You’re not getting twenty of my men,” Pavlopoulos said sharply. “I’ve been cleared to give you three.”
“Three?” Hawke said, disappointed.
“The Minister wants this kept small and extremely quiet. Do I make myself clear?”
“Perfectly clear, Alexis,” Hart said, calming the situation. “And we’re very grateful for your assistance. Aren’t we, Hawke?” Her look told Hawke they were all very grateful, so Hawke nodded reluctantly.