Ancients: An Event Group Thriller

by David L. Golemon

  “Push the button one more time,” Krueger said with his chin almost touching his chest in despair.

  Mendenhall repeated the process and they heard an electric motor, obviously battery-operated also, start to hum, and then the far eighty-foot-long wall parted in the center and slowly slid back in two sections on hidden tracks.

  Instead of watching the false wall divulge its secrets, Collins watched Krueger. He sniffled and wiped a hand across his sweating face, but his eyes weren’t concerned about the secret door. Jack watched as the man’s eyes quickly darted to the desk once more and then just as quickly looked away. Collins saw that the desk sat in front of one of the basement walls, and beyond that wall one would assume was dirt and rock. As he looked back, Krueger was again sobbing, but once again he saw the man’s dark eyes glance at the desk.

  “Jesus, you’ve been a busy little thief, haven’t you?” Mendenhall said as spotlights illuminated a treasure trove of ancient and not-so-ancient artifacts.

  Collins and Everett stepped forward and looked at the commodity trader’s extensive collection. There were special pieces sitting atop pedestals from the third and fifth dynasties of Egypt. Lights shone down on armor dating back to the days of Alexander. There were oil paintings from the Renaissance. Other displayed jewelry had been stolen from collections around the world. Crowns of kings long dead. Collins activated his com link.

  “Recovery Three, you can bring the trucks in now.”

  Jack turned to Krueger, who was still being held by Will. He stepped up to him, raised his double chin, and looked him in his watery eyes.

  “Your cooperation will be noted and the prosecuting authorities will be notified.”

  “But you’re thieves! Why … what—”

  “To further enhance the chances your team of defense attorneys have of getting you acquitted, do wish to tell us about the second room now?”

  The man’s face drained of blood right before their eyes. His thick lips started to tremble and his eyes widened. All at once, he wasn’t timid or frightened any longer; he was mad.

  “You bastards, you’re dealing with things beyond your concept!”

  “Seems you hit a nerve, Jack,” Everett said.

  “Will, reach in and push the same button again. I think our friend is hiding his real treasure in another location. This room here is nice, but X doesn’t mark the right spot, does it, Mr. Krueger?”

  As instructed, Mendenhall pushed the button again. This time there was a loud whine of an overgeared motor, and as they watched in amazement, a large circle in the center of the floor separated from the surrounding concrete and started to corkscrew down into the earth. The opening was about sixteen feet in diameter and started spinning faster as they watched. They could see the threads of the giant screw-type elevator as it spun and descended farther and farther. Jack could see that a man would use those threads as a winding staircase to enter the real treasure room.

  “Now we know why his security system was so expensive,” Jack said as the whine of the large motor stopped.

  “Jesus,” Everett said, looking from Krueger to Jack. “This guy and his engineers should have been working for us.”

  “You don’t know what you’re doing. You’ve just killed us all.”

  Everett feigned shock at Krueger. “Now that’s a scary statement. Care to expand on it?”

  Krueger closed his mouth into a tight line and looked away. His eyes did not follow Jack as he walked to the opening in the floor. Everett caught up with Collins and they both went down into the true light of the ancient past.

  When they reached the bottom of the screwlike stairs, they couldn’t believe what they were looking at. Row upon row and stack upon stack, layered a hundred thick, were scrolls of every shape and size. They had been neatly placed on specially designed mounts in hermetically sealed glass cabinets. As if they had entered an old library, Jack and Carl took in the most amazing collection of ancient writings they had ever seen.

  The room was temperature and humidity controlled and they saw plastic clean-room suits, of the sort they had used on occasion when working with Europa, hanging on pegs in the corner. There were examination tables and viewing stands. In a clean area fifty feet to the rear was what Jack recognized as an electron microscope. There was a rolled-out scroll on the glass top in the process of examination; it was covered in thick plastic to protect it from any dust particles that filtered into the room.

  Also lining the walls were a hundred different flags. Some were emblazoned with a symbol reminiscent of the swastika, different only in small and varying ways. The one constant symbol on every flag was the shape of a large golden eagle. Some had straight and unyielding outstretched wings, and others had the wings turned down.

  “Holy shit—is this guy Krueger for real?” Everett asked, staring at the strange banners.

  Jack shook his head as he moved on. Also arrayed on one of the walls were several large relief maps from ancient times, sealed in the same manner as the scrolls. There were signs beneath each, warning of severe shock if the frame was touched. Jack stepped up to one and examined it more closely. It was an ancient depiction of Africa before the continent of Antarctica had separated from it. The rest of the world’s continents had just broken away from one another and were in the process of moving as depicted in the next four wall-mounted maps.

  Everett turned to the rear wall and looked at a strange chart that had millions of lines running through a mosaic relief of the African, European, and even North American continents. The strange lines wiggled through the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. Beneath this ancient diagram was a small table with a computer and a stack of research materials laid out upon it. Everett quickly rifled through it and then turned to face Jack.

  “It looks like someone was trying to interpret this chart. Just what in the hell is this?”

  Collins didn’t answer. He was standing at the farthest end of the chamber, looking up at a giant glass-enclosed map that was by far the largest object in the room. A large spotlight shone upon it and illuminated the frame’s meticulous construction, which showed specially designed nitrogen and air evacuation hoses built into it.

  “Jesus,” Carl hissed as he saw the huge map.

  Everett walked over to where Jack was standing and staring upward. He saw what looked to be the ancient Mediterranean. The map looked as if it had been painted on some form of exotic paper. He could also see the age-induced crumbling around the edges and corners. While the obvious age of the map was a striking feature, it was not the one that held the colonel’s attention. Everett had to take a step back when he saw the ancient depiction. It showed a large island, made up of four distinct circles of land radiating outward from a center island, that was surrounded by the great inland sea that was one day to be known as the Mediterranean Ocean.

  “What in the hell?”

  “Mr. Everett, contact Group and inform them that we will be bringing some things back to the complex. We cannot let the FBI have these. I will let Agent Monroe know he’ll have to prosecute Mr. Krueger with what stolen items he finds upstairs. I’m sure there is enough.”

  “Right. Uh, by the way, Jack, are you thinking what I’m thinking?” he asked as his eyes centered on the island that should not have been in the middle of the sea that would someday be known as an ocean.

  “You don’t have to just think it,” he said as he reached out and touched the gold plate beneath the twenty-by-fifteen-foot map of a world long gone. “I think this spells it out quite clearly.”

  Everett stepped closer as Collins moved away so that he could read the plaque. Carl closed his eyes and shook his head.

  “Yeah, I don’t think the FBI would truly appreciate the value of this room as much as our people would.”

  The gold plaque glittered in the illuminating spotlight and both men looked at it and felt numb inside.

  Engraved on the plaque was only one word: Atlantis.

  An hour later, the servants were in the process of b
eing moved to a safe house where they would be informed of their possible prosecution for assisting their employer in his theft of stolen antiquities. That should worry them enough to guarantee their cooperation and silence, Jack thought.

  Ernie’s Fix-it Shop had just replaced the last door and fixed and replaced the fuse box. The Event Group specialists had cleaned up nicely and were just packing up when Special Agent in Charge Bill Monroe was allowed inside the mansion for the first time.

  “Bill,” Collins said as he stepped toward the man with his hand outstretched.

  The FBI agent shook Jack’s hand.

  “Colonel, I hear you took quite a haul?”

  “Enough so that you’ll get a nice little commendation in your Bureau file.” Jack released the man’s hand and then gently pulled him aside. “Look, this Krueger—there’s far more to him than meets the eye. You need to find out all you can on him. He has stuff here that’s pretty damn spooky and he keeps saying that we’re all dead men for finding it.”

  “Isn’t that usually a standard statement tossed about by scared rich men?”

  “There’s something in his eyes, Bill. I can’t touch on what it is, but this guy is not scared of being prosecuted; he’s afraid of something else.”

  “All right, I’ll get what I can out of him. But too much might attract attention to who I really work for, Colonel.”

  “Don’t give yourself up to your FBI. Just get what you can and hold him as long as possible until the Group can examine some of the more obscure items he has. Can you get a judge to recognize that he’s a flight risk and not allow bail, at least for the time being?”

  “Yeah, I think we can pull that off for a while. So, I only get the upper room of artifacts and you get the really good stuff Ryan’s loading up—that right?”

  “Sorry, Director Compton says this other room’s contents are off limits until researched by the Group. Don’t worry, you’re getting some great stuff, Billy. Hell, there’s a crown in there that belonged to Charlemagne.”

  “You’re kidding?”

  Jack Collins just smiled and walked into the darkness beyond the lights.

  PRIVATE FLIGHT 1782 ZULU OVER THE ATLANTIC OCEAN

  William Winthrop Tomlinson came from an old line of wealth that stretched back far before the Revolutionary War in the United States and then even further back in Europe. It would have taken a specialized team of IRS agents approximately a hundred years to unravel the intricate web of hidden properties and ownerships to discover the fact that he was three hundred times wealthier than the public figurehead who led the nation’s and world’s periodicals on that subject. He had used that family wealth wisely. He was now the most powerful man in the Coalition. Money was never an object to attain; it was a means to gather what he really craved—power, the power of rule.

  Tomlinson was watching the dark sky outside his window as his private Boeing 777 streaked across the night sky, heading to New York. The remains of his salad and bottle of wine were still in front of him on the ornate cherry table.

  He did not look around when one of his assistants leaned over with a fax. He absently continued to look out the wide window.

  “Sir, this is quite important,” the young assistant stated quietly.

  The expensively attired Tomlinson still watched the night sky. Ignoring the man at his side, he merely held up his left hand and accepted the fax. He waited until the assistant had turned silently away and gone back to the office areas of the large aircraft. Then he reached out, lifted the crystal wineglass, and sipped the two-hundred-year-old vintage that came from his private stock in the belly of the giant plane. After savoring the deep richness of the wine, he finally looked at the paper in his hand.

  0023 hours: Silent alarm tripped at storage station JC-6789. Security dispatched from New York City at 0031 hours by air. Observed a US federal agency raid upon property. Artifact examiner Krueger was removed from property in restraints. Artifacts confiscated and removed from secure location. Instruction require. —L.M.

  Tomlinson raised the wineglass and drained its contents in one large gulp. His eyes were steady but belied the fact that his insides were crawling. He squeezed the wineglass almost hard enough to break the exquisite crystal, but then used his formidable willpower to calm himself. He pushed a call button beside the window frame.

  “Yes, sir?” the assistant asked as he stood beside the large leather-covered chair.

  “Signal our main asset in New York and order her to take care of this development in Westchester.” Tomlinson looked at the assistant for the first time and his blue eyes were penetrating. “By any means necessary. There will be no expenditure of funds or personnel too extreme to that end. Is that clear?”

  “Clear, sir.”

  “And inform Dahlia that this information is for my eyes only. The rest of the Coalition is not to be informed as of yet. In addition, I want her most up-to-date research and information on the Atlantean Key, and the plate map currently ongoing in Massachusetts, to come directly to me. I want all Westchester materials recovered as early as possible and the name of any agency involved in the raid on Coalition property. An extreme effort on this front is required, and I stress once more, regardless of losses.”

  The man nodded and quickly turned away to fax the instructions to New York.

  Whoever was responsible for this action in Westchester was about to be introduced to the wrath of the new chairman of the Juliai Coalition.

  SITUATION ROOM THE WHITE HOUSE

  The president stared at the situation report from Korea. As a former general, he understood the dire consequences of an unstable man and his shaky regime that held a nuclear trigger in his hands. The sit-rep said there had been a limited artillery exchange between the Second Infantry Division and Korean shock troops lining the border. Almost a hundred Americans and South Koreans were dead and a like number of Northern troops.

  The intelligence reports that had flooded his desk in the last twelve hours were full of long fitness reports of Kim Jong Il, but what was not printed was the fact that no one really knew where the man was coming from, or where he was going, and in international politics that wasn’t good.

  “How do we stand on getting the Second Infantry Division reinforced?”

  The chairman of the Joint Chiefs opened a file folder and read from a report. “We have the 101st Airborne Division on alert for deployment, as well as the 82nd fast-response units. But I’m afraid they were scattered for the July Fourth holiday and will take at least forty-eight hours to recall and deploy.”

  The president looked at Kenneth Caulfield and grimaced. “That’s it, Ken? What about moving more air force units into Kempo from Japan—how are we looking on that front?”

  “We have sent elements of the Third Tactical Fighter Squadron in from the Philippines, where they were conducting joint maneuvers with that government. We’re also moving the John F. Kennedy and George Washington carrier groups into position off the coast of North Korea, but that will take more than four days.”

  “Jesus, can the Second ID hold if the North comes across the border?”

  Caulfield lowered his eyes and shook his head. “Six hours’ defense is estimated without tactical-weapons authorization.”

  The president looked stunned.

  “We still have hope of the ceasefire holding as we make our case at the UN,” said National Security Advisor Nate Clemmons. “But Kim is still claiming that we and the South Koreans were responsible for the seismic activity off their coast.”

  “What about the ships depicted in this surveillance footage of theirs?”

  “CIA traced the ship’s registry on each of the three vessels in question. They are registered to the Mid-China Oil Corporation, with exploratory permits issued legally from Seoul.”

  “Is there any scientific authority in the world that could prove this ridiculous theory he’s spouting about these ships or aircraft being responsible for an earthquake? I mean, does Kim have any firm ground to stan
d on here?”

  “In his country’s weakened state, Mr. President, does it really matter? We are dealing with a wounded, very paranoid man here. Forget about walking softly; we have to hit this bastard with a heavy stick and do it before he has the advantage of tank divisions on the south side of the thirty-eighth parallel,” General Jess Tippet, commandant of the Marine Corps, said, facing the others around the long table.

  “As of this moment I want every single entity of our armed forces breaking their asses to get the Second Infantry Division some help. Strip whatever forces you need to strip. I also want our best minds working on this earthquake crap that he’s thought up as an excuse to move south. I want a firm and decisive answer if this seismic thing could possibly be a manmade event.”

  EVENT GROUP WAREHOUSE 3 SEVENTH AVENUE, NEW YORK CITY

  The warehouse used for East Coast storage was a temporary-use facility only. Items recovered from digs, or in this case the raid on the Westchester mansion, could be secured and a precursory examination done before the trip out to the Nellis complex and the secure labs and vaults there.

  While Jack and his recovery team took a needed rest, five stories below street level, the items recovered in the raid were getting their initial examination by an East Coast Event team of technicians called in from their various universities. These scientists and techs had the highest of security clearances and all worked for the Event Group in one capacity or another. The leader of the forensic effort was Professor Carl Gillman of NYU. He would work the archiving of the scrolls and artifacts until a better-equipped team from Event Group Center could arrive on station.

  It was after Jack had received four hours of rest that Gillman tapped him on the foot. His eyes opened and he looked around before sitting up.

  “Sorry to wake you, Colonel, but you have an urgent call from the director.”