The Spear of Atlantis (Wilde/Chase 14)

by Andy McDermott

  ‘That’s an admirable goal. I wish New York would do the same thing.’

  One particular car was raised on a stand. ‘Another project I am working on with Gideon,’ said Fadil, striding towards the sleek futuristic vehicle. ‘The Raiju. This is a mock-up, but we are testing the real thing in Dhajan right now.’

  ‘It looks pretty fast.’ The car was an aggressive wedge that seemed crouched to attack even while stationary, banks of blade-thin wings resembling razor heads running the width of its nose and tail.

  ‘It is very fast!’ he confirmed proudly. ‘There have been electric supercars – this will be the first electric hypercar. It can accelerate faster than a Formula 1 car, has active aerodynamics and ground effect to keep it on the road . . . and it can even drive itself. Level five autonomous driving, it is called. It can do everything a human driver can, faster and more safely – it does not even need a person inside it.’

  ‘Doesn’t that kinda defeat the purpose of a car?’ Nina said, peering through the gold-tinted windows. The interior had an unusual layout; the driver’s seat was on the centreline, two others further back on each side. ‘And there isn’t much space for groceries.’

  The Emir chuckled. ‘There are two ways technology can advance, Gideon tells me. By starting at the bottom and working up, little by little – or by shooting for the moon. Little cars,’ he indicated the smallest of the other vehicles, an uninspiring blobby pod, ‘may be more practical, but this is more fun.’

  ‘I suppose you’ll be driving the finished version.’

  ‘I already have driven it. And it is, well . . .’ His features lit up with boyish glee. ‘I have Ferraris, I have Lamborghinis. But this is something else.’ He gazed lovingly at the low-slung mock-up, then turned back to Nina almost with embarrassment. ‘But you have not come to see this! Let us go on to the Atlantis exhibition.’

  ‘After you,’ she said, amused.

  They continued aft to a set of closed doors. ‘The exhibition will be opened to the public after your lecture,’ the Emir explained. ‘Monsieur Agreste?’

  The Frenchman went to the black glass panel beside the entrance and held up his ID card. The green symbol flashed in acceptance, and the doors unlocked with a mechanical clack. He opened them.

  ‘After you,’ the Emir said to Nina. She entered – and stopped at the sight greeting her.

  She had known what to expect, as she had personally discovered no small number of the exhibits, but her host had spared no expense on their presentation. The hall was decorated in the style of an Atlantean temple, the walls almost hidden behind carved columns and bas-relief replicas of statues. But even they could not overshadow the main attractions. Dozens of items recovered from Atlantean sites all around the world, from small pieces of jewellery all the way up to a sarcophagus cast in the rare gold alloy known as orichalcum, glinted under spotlights. Glass cases housed the most valuable exhibits, but even these were positioned and lit to the best possible effect.

  ‘This is amazing!’ she said, delighted.

  ‘Thank you,’ the Emir replied. ‘I wanted a most impressive display.’

  ‘You succeeded. It’s absolutely stunning.’

  ‘Again, thank you. And I am honoured to have you tell me about these marvels.’

  Nina smiled. ‘The honour’s mine.’ She was reassured that the entire priceless collection was covered by multiple security cameras. ‘So . . . where would you like to start?’

  ‘At the beginning. What did you first discover, and how did you find it?’

  She looked around, spotting with both pride and faint embarrassment a large portrait of herself on a display stand of her own books and DVDs, before seeing pieces of an ancient orichalcum sextant in a case. ‘A lot of my initial work was mathematical,’ she began, leading him towards the navigational instrument. ‘I used references to sizes and distances in Plato’s Dialogues to calculate where Atlantis could have been situated in the Gulf of Cadiz . . .’

  Elsewhere on the ship, a monitor showed Nina, the Emir and Agreste crossing to the sextant’s case. It was a live feed from one of the hall’s CCTV cameras, but the woman watching it was not on the bridge, nor in the Atlantia’s security centre.

  She glanced at a second screen beside it. This showed a corridor outside the hall – not the one from which Nina and her companions had entered, but another further aft. A click of a mouse and the view changed to a different hallway. The door near the image’s centre bore a prominent ‘NO ENTRY’ sign.

  The woman’s fingers danced over a keyboard. A message flashed up demanding a passcode. She entered six digits, then typed more commands – and the closed door slid open, revealing a white-painted crew access corridor beyond.

  ‘Escape route is open,’ she said into her headset. ‘Dr Wilde and the Emir are both in the Atlantis exhibition with the Frenchman.’

  ‘Get rid of him,’ a man replied. ‘We are ready to go when you give the word.’

  ‘Stand by,’ she said. ‘I’ll take care of Agreste; then you can deal with Dr Wilde.’

  4

  Nina continued her tour through the history of Atlantis, showing the Emir the various exhibits. ‘This statue was recovered from the Temple of Poseidon at the heart of the Atlantean capital itself,’ she said. ‘It was brought up from eight hundred feet underwater.’

  ‘Magnificent,’ said Fadil, before going to another display case, leaning over the velvet rope cordon surrounding it to peer at a sword. ‘And so is this!’ The hilt was made of gold, orichalcum and silver, precious stones worked into it, but the blade itself was a bluish steel, free of corrosion even after thousands of years on the ocean floor. ‘Is this really from Atlantis? It could have been made yesterday.’

  ‘It really is,’ Nina assured him. ‘It’s been cleaned and restored, of course. But the blade hadn’t rusted at all. The Atlanteans were very advanced in metallurgy; some of their artefacts would be hard to duplicate, even now.’

  ‘May I hold it?’

  Nina hesitated, unsure of protocol. Normally she never let the public handle relics, but the Emir was hardly an ordinary visitor. ‘I, ah . . . I suppose so?’ she said, glancing at Agreste.

  The Frenchman was less circumspect. ‘Your Majesty, the cases must remain closed.’

  The Emir raised an eyebrow. ‘Even for me?’

  ‘I am following your sister’s instructions.’

  ‘Ah, Alula,’ the Dhajani sighed. ‘Always trying to control her brother. I cannot convince you otherwise?’

  Agreste shook his head. ‘I am afraid not, Your Majesty.’

  ‘As you see, Dr Wilde,’ said the Emir, turning back to the case, ‘it is a myth that Arab rulers have absolute power!’

  Nina smiled, about to move on when Agreste’s phone buzzed. ‘Excuse me,’ he said, taking the call. ‘Oui? No, I am with the Emir. I cannot—’ He listened to the caller with growing annoyance. ‘Very well.’ He disconnected. ‘Your Majesty, I apologise, but there is a matter I must attend to in person.’

  ‘A security issue?’ asked the Emir.

  ‘It is nothing to worry about. I will return as soon as I can.’ He went to the exit, using his card to open it. ‘I will lock the doors after I leave.’

  Fadil grinned. ‘Do not worry, we will not steal anything!’

  Agreste did not return the smile as he departed. The lock clacked behind him.

  ‘We’re locked in?’ said Nina. ‘Hope there isn’t an emergency.’

  ‘Do not worry. My personal code can access any system on the ship. Including,’ the Emir added mischievously, ‘these cases.’

  ‘Even after what Mr Agreste just said?’

  ‘He is only a functionary, and Alula is a minister in my government – but I am the Emir of Dhajan! This ship sails under a Dhajani flag, so while we are in international waters, it is Dhajani territory. My power may not be absolute, but,’ his smirk widened, ‘it is still considerable. Now, let us see . . .’

  He moved one of the stanchions suppo
rting the rope. Mounted upon the case’s side was another touchscreen. He brought up the keypad, then slowly tapped in the same code he had used on the bridge. A lock clunked. ‘There,’ he said, swinging down the case’s glazed front. ‘That is security glass, it can stop a bullet. Nobody will steal anything from here.’

  ‘As long as you remember to close the case,’ said Nina, decidedly uncomfortable as he took the sword from its mount.

  He held it up to the light in admiration. ‘If there is trouble, the most valuable exhibits will retract into the ship’s vault underneath us.’

  She was not mollified. ‘Wouldn’t it be cheaper and easier just to hire a guard?’

  ‘Computers never sleep, and cannot be bribed,’ he replied, examining the blade’s edge before carefully replacing the weapon.

  ‘They can be hacked, though.’

  ‘This ship does not run on Windows XP! One of Gideon’s companies programmed the security systems. They are very secure.’ He closed the case, the lock clicking.

  ‘Unless someone’s got your secret code.’

  ‘I am the only person who knows it, I assure you. I have not even told Alula. Some secrets are for the monarch alone.’

  Nina considered reciting it to let him know she had seen him type it in, but decided there was no way she could do it without sounding insulting – and besides, he was already crossing the room to another exhibit. She trotted after him.

  The woman watched the monitor, tracking Nina and the Emir. ‘Okay, they’re approaching the marker,’ she said. ‘Security cameras along your route going down . . . now.’ She hit a key. The second monitor showed a grid of CCTV feeds; red crosses appeared in the corners of several, though the pictures remained. ‘Move!’

  The doors of a row of four cabins near a secondary stairwell opened simultaneously. Two men emerged from each, all clad in black and carrying silenced handguns and Tasers. Each tugged a form-fitting balaclava mask over his face.

  The last to cover up was at the head of the line: Hashim al-Asim, the man who had watched Nina and her family pass before planting a bomb. ‘We are on our way,’ he said into a throat mic. ‘Be ready to detonate.’ Gun at the ready, he led his men down the staircase.

  On the bridge, an officer noticed that several security monitors were blank. ‘Hey, some of the cameras are down.’ He tapped commands into his console, frowning at the result. ‘No faults registering.’

  ‘It could just be a glitch,’ said another man. ‘Maiden-voyage gremlins.’

  ‘Maybe.’ But the problem was in a passenger area, which automatically made it a safety issue. The officer began a deeper diagnostic check, searching for the problem’s cause.

  Eddie burst out of the water in front of Macy. ‘Raaaaar!’ he growled, splashing her. ‘Shark attack!’

  ‘Daddy,’ she said, unimpressed. ‘Sharks don’t growl.’

  ‘What if it’s a tiger shark?’ He grinned, then sloshed to the shallows. They were in one of the swimming pools on the long atrium deck, a family-oriented play area replete with waterspouts, artificial islands and a wave machine. The deep end was the landing area for several spiralling waterslides, people hurtling through the tubes with whoops and screams, which were echoed by those whizzing down the zip-line overhead. ‘Olivia!’ he called. ‘You having fun?’

  Olivia was doing a relaxed backstroke in a smaller, more sedate pool nearby. ‘I’d prefer a longer lap, but yes. How’s Macy?’

  ‘Loving it,’ he replied. His daughter had positioned herself over a waterspout, squealing as it gushed up beneath her. ‘Hey, love – you want to race me down the slides?’

  ‘It won’t be fair,’ Macy protested. ‘You’re heavier, you’ll go faster than me.’

  ‘Yeah, but I’m bigger, so I might get stuck! Shall we find out?’

  She considered it, then beamed. ‘Okay!’

  ‘All right, let’s go!’ He dived back into the water beside her.

  ‘Now these,’ said Nina at the next display, ‘are more recent discoveries.’

  The case contained several items, but the Emir regarded one in particular. ‘I recognise this! I bought it for Macy.’

  The object in question was an Atlantean trikan. Its disc-shaped body was made of orichalcum, with a circle of dark polished stone inset at the centre, while the ornate blades around it were of a similar blue steel to the sword. ‘This is one of the originals Macy’s toy was based on,’ Nina explained. ‘Although I say “based on” in the loosest possible sense. The one in the movie can change direction in mid-air, snatch things out of people’s hands, all kinds of crazy stuff. The real one isn’t nearly as exciting. We know it was used as a weapon because we’ve found references in Atlantean texts, but as for how . . . well, no one’s figured that out yet.’

  ‘A cross between a boomerang and a yo-yo, you said.’

  ‘That’s in the movie. In real life, nobody’s got it to work. It does have a wire like a yo-yo,’ she indicated where it was attached to the protective metal handgrip, ‘but there’s too much friction for it to uncoil properly. The toy version works a lot better, ironically. The Atlanteans may have had some way of lubricating it that we haven’t discovered – or it might not be used like a yo-yo at all.’

  ‘I am sure you will find the truth.’ Fadil moved on from the trikan to another golden disc. ‘Perhaps you will find the truth about this too, despite what you said at dinner.’

  Nina gave him a wry smile. ‘So you know what it is.’

  ‘One of the marcadores de lanza, yes. Does it really show the way to some great secret of Atlantis?’

  ‘That’s what its creators claimed, yes.’ The spear marker was a flat circle slightly over eight inches in diameter and half an inch thick. One side was blank except for several square indentations, while the other bore the angular characters of Atlantean text. Even for someone who could translate the language, they were difficult to read; the lines wove snake-like around dozens of circular holes punched seemingly at random through the disc.

  ‘Are the holes a map of some kind?’

  ‘Possibly. I’m told that the other marker has pegs on its back that fit into the slots in this one, so they were clearly designed to work together. But nobody’s come up with an explanation yet.’

  ‘I see.’ The Emir smiled conspiratorially, then moved the rope cordon aside. ‘I am sure Mr Agreste will not mind if I take a closer look.’

  ‘Y’know, he probably will,’ Nina said, but he was already entering his code to unlock the case. ‘I, ah, think it would be better if you wore gloves to handle it.’

  He gave her a gently patronising look as he opened the front panel. ‘I do not think a few fingerprints will hurt it. But if you would prefer to show me . . .’

  She grimaced inwardly, but couldn’t really refuse. At least this way she could minimise the amount of cleaning required. ‘Okay,’ she said. ‘But if Mr Agreste comes back in, I’ll tell him you ordered me to do it!’

  He laughed. ‘I will take the blame, do not worry.’

  Nina smiled, then moved to the marker. She had seen it before, in Seville, having been invited the previous year to view the newly discovered trove of Atlantean artefacts, but it had still been undergoing restoration. Now, it gleamed beneath the display case’s lights, the dirt of millennia removed. She picked it up carefully by its edge.

  ‘Astonishing,’ the Emir said as she turned it for him to see. ‘Eleven thousand years old. An entire history we never knew about until you uncovered it.’

  ‘The clues were there all along. Nobody believed them, that’s all.’

  ‘You did. And you were right.’ He narrowed his eyes to pick out the inscribed characters. ‘Could you hold it higher, please? It is very hard to see.’ Nina raised her hands, backing up to catch the marker in a spotlight’s beam. ‘Ah, thank you.’ He regarded the text, then continued: ‘And there is still more to discover. Do you believe anyone will ever find these spearheads?’

  ‘Like I said at dinner, if they really are som
e kind of weapon, it might be better if nobody does. But if anyone can, I’m sure it’s the IHA.’

  He nodded, then gestured for her to return the marker. ‘If you are quick, Mr Agreste may not even realise what we have done.’

  ‘What you have done,’ Nina corrected with a smile, stepping back towards the open display—

  ‘Now!’ the watching woman snapped, stabbing at the keyboard.

  The metal cylinder concealed in the planter detonated with a loud bang, thick grey smoke gushing out. More devices hidden around the Atlantia also exploded.

  Alarms wailed, but it was not the grenades that had tripped them. These went off in every part of the ship simultaneously, the woman’s intrusion into the liner’s computers activating a global fire alert. The initial reaction of the eight and a half thousand people aboard was bewildered surprise . . . followed by growing panic as they realised the emergency warning was not a drill.

  ‘What the hell?’ gasped the bridge officer as his console lit up with multiple alerts. ‘We’ve got fire alarms all over the ship!’

  Another man frantically typed in commands. ‘None of the temperature sensors are showing anything.’

  ‘I’ve got smoke alarms on Decks 5 through 10 . . . and now on Deck 4 . . . Deck 11 too. Something’s wrong. Find the captain!’

  Nina looked around in shock. ‘What—’

  More sirens shrilled, this time inside the hall – and the display cabinets began to lower with surprising swiftness into the floor.

  The Emir had one hand on the open case. He lost his balance as it dropped away, clutching for support at the velvet rope – only for its stanchions to topple under his weight.

  The open pane was sheared off and smashed as the cabinet reached floor level, then retreated through the deck into a steel chamber beneath. The Emir fell on top of it and was carried downwards, dragging the rope and several of its support poles with him before tumbling off and hitting the floor with a bang.