Jack nodded and placed his feet on the floor. He rubbed a hand through his hair and then took the offered phone.
“Collins.”
“Jack, Niles here. I just wanted to let you know that the president has just placed the armed forces on full alert.”
“The Korean thing getting worse?”
“Yes, to put it mildly. As a department in the federal government, the alert affects us also. I have a C-130 standing by at JFK airport for your team. I also want all written materials, scrolls, and maps you recovered last night to be brought to Nevada. I could only squeeze one plane out of the air force due to the situations in Iraq and Korea, so for now we have to leave the bulk of the artifacts until the next flight. Professor Gillman will remain there and catalog what we don’t take now. Clear, Jack?”
“Yes, sir. We’ll get the scrolls, maps, and ourselves out now.”
“As for the security element for what items stay in New York, are we good on that point?”
“We have building security in place, plus I’ll only take Everett and Will Mendenhall back with me. I’ll leave Lance Corporal Sanchez here with the rest of the assault team until we get the rest out.”
“Whatever you think best, Jack. Sanchez is quite ready for more responsibility; he’s a good man.”
“A kid really, but a very capable marine.”
“I understand we have some interesting stuff. Carl Gillman is in the process of sending us a video feed of some of the more fascinating discoveries. Do you have any idea why he has requested Sarah and a geologic team to stand by here?”
“No idea; I’ve been out for a while.”
“That’s fine. I also understand our friend Mr. Krueger is to be charged this morning in federal court. Monroe said they filed fast to keep him in jail while other charges are sought. Good work, Jack. We’ll talk soon.”
Jack handed the cell phone back to Gillman and then fixed the professor with a tired look.
“Doc, Director Compton said something about you requested a geologic team to stand by for your video feeds?”
Gillman removed his glasses and ran a hand through his thin and graying hair.
“Besides the existence of several pieces of very ancient jewelry, pottery armor, and the treasure trove of ancient scrolls and books, we have something that is baffling the hell out of our team here. It has something to do with the earth’s plate movements. Strange stuff. We just want a geologist to look these charts over so we can know how to catalog them. So, nothing earthshaking, just strange.”
Jack just nodded his head and yawned, ignoring the pun by Gillman. “Is the complex locked down, Doc?”
“It’s buttoned up tight as a drum. Your men are even shutting down the loading dock and lobby areas.”
“Good. Listen, a part of my team is taking the scrolls and maps out of here this morning, but I’m leaving a large security contingent here under Lance Corporal Sanchez. So everyone watch out for wolves at the door.”
Gillman watched Jack move off, yawning, to wake the others to load the scrolls and maps and leave for Kennedy, then he moved off himself to return to the most wondrous discoveries he had ever seen. The most interesting of which was a large world chart that had thick lines running through the continents and oceans that just so happened to dissect in many areas of the known tectonic plates. How ancient man had known about these was a puzzle that was driving him and his small team mad.
Little did Gillman know that, over a hundred years before, Professor Peter Rothman had dubbed this particular chart the Atlantean Parchment just a day before he was murdered by a man from the Juliai Coalition.
Now, over a century later, that same Coalition was using the Atlantean Parchment in conjunction with an ancient weapon known as Thor’s Hammer.
OYSTER BAY NASSAU COUNTY, NEW YORK
As Special Agent William Monroe sipped his coffee and read the morning paper, he heard the town’s garbage truck outside and then frowned as he heard the clatter of his trash-can lids being tossed like Frisbees into his driveway and then the loud crash of the cans themselves onto the ground. He closed his eyes in frustration as he lowered his paper, then he looked toward the stairs, where he heard his wife moving around. The garbagemen must have awakened her, because it was a good two hours before she was due to get up.
Monroe just shook his head. He moved to the front door with coffee cup in hand, preparing to enjoy chewing on someone’s ass for waking his wife, and for tossing his garbage cans just as if he could afford to buy new ones every week.
As he opened the door, he was shocked to see two men in casual clothes standing on his porch. His hackles rose immediately as the sense of danger hit him like a Mack truck.
He dropped his coffee cup and tried to slam the door closed but the two men were fast and he was hit and knocked backward into the entrance hall and then before he could recover was wrestled to the floor. One of the large men hit hard him hard on the face just as he saw through the still-open door the garbage truck move slowly down the street. As his head rocked backward from the blow, he was amazed at the normalcy of things just outside the horror that was happening in his home.
Monroe was stunned, but he was determined to get upstairs somehow. He was roughly turned over, and as the front door and the view of that normal world was cut out of his view, he felt a plastic wire tie being zipped to his wrists behind his back. He was frustrated beyond measure but tried to keep his cool. He had to allow his wife, Jenny, time to realize what was happening. He was pulled roughly to his feet as blood dripped from his mouth and stained the white bathrobe he was wearing.
He heard his bedroom door close upstairs and he closed his eyes. He just knew that Jenny was going to walk right into the middle of what was happening to him. But then again, he had the single ray of hope that his wife had the gun that was kept in the nightstand next to their bed.
Monroe was picked up then and led into the living room, where he was pushed to his knees. He raised his head just as he heard the soft padding of feet on the stairs. He looked up and his heart sank as he saw that it was a woman dressed in a nice pantsuit with a black overcoat. Her hair was blond and she walked with an air of confidence into the living room. She looked from the two men to himself and then sat on their couch and leaned forward with her gloved hands resting in her lap, one on top of the other.
The FBI agent lowered his head to try to get some sense of the situation. His hair was pulled roughly upward so that he faced the woman.
“Pay attention to the lady, she has words she wants to say,” the larger of the two men said, leaning over Monroe’s right ear.
“For you, Special Agent Monroe, this morning will not turn out as well as you’re now hoping,” the blond, very elegant-looking woman said as she held Monroe with her eyes and slowly removed her gloves, one finger at a time. “But for your wife, Jenny, who is now being detained upstairs, there is still hope that she can live beyond this day. Do you understand what I am saying? Just nod your head; no need to speak, as there will plenty of time for that later.”
Monroe did as she’d instructed, giving a single dip of his chin.
“Good, we are off to a wonderful start. Your little foray into Westchester County last evening was beyond your scope of charter and expertise. I want you to tell my associates here who it is you are working for, and don’t bother saying it was an FBI investigation because we have people in your field office that claim they had no knowledge of your actions. Your deceit may pass muster with your superiors, but I assure you it will not with me.”
The woman, having stated what she had to state, slowly stood and looked at her wristwatch.
“Be very forthright, Agent Monroe, and your wife will be alive in the coming weeks, months, and years to mourn your passing. If you lead these men falsely, they will not kill your lovely wife without very much pain and humiliation. All we need to know is where the artifacts are and who it was that assisted you in your daring raid. Okay?” She smiled and nodded at the two men and
then walked through the living room and disappeared.
The two men pulled him to his feet and led him into the kitchen. They sat him in a chair and then closed the curtains on the sliding glass doorway that looked out into his backyard. Then one of the men went to the kitchen table and moved a chair over to face him, and then sat down. He was smiling.
An hour later, the two men reported to the woman, who had relocated not far away in Islip, New York. They passed on the required information they tortured out of the FBI agent. What they had learned was almost unbelievable. They asked for instructions about the wife and they received them.
The man closed his cell phone, then reached out, and expertly sliced into the throat of Agent William Monroe, severing the jugular vein with ruthless precision. Then he stood slowly from his chair and made his way toward the stairs and the bedroom.
UNITED STATES FEDERAL COURTHOUSE CENTRAL ISLIP, NEW YORK
The new federal courthouse was situated in the middle of Long Island. The giant white concrete building had been constructed not for beauty but with security in mind, and all who passed by it had to shake their heads at the ugly monstrosity where federal justice was meted out.
William Krueger was waiting in a holding cell in the lower level of the courthouse. The orange jumpsuit they had issued him was four sizes too small and he could not even unzip the tight-fitting collar due to his handcuffs.
There were two other men waiting with Krueger to see a federal judge. One was a large black man with a shiny bald head who looked about with the soulless eyes of a career criminal. The other was what Krueger would have called normal-looking. His hair combed neatly, he looked as if a tailor had fitted him for his prison jumpsuit.
There were three guards in the holding area. Two sat behind a large desk and another walked a slow path between the three holding cells, of which only theirs was in use. Krueger watched as the guard looked in quickly and then moved off. He could not figure out what he was looking in the cell for: after all, the three of them were handcuffed to a chain that was bolted to the floor in front of them. They couldn’t scratch their noses even if they wanted to.
Krueger was watching the large black man when he heard a noise in the corridor leading to the holding area. He figured that it was the courthouse guards coming to take him in to see his lawyer before he was to be arraigned. From what the guard had told him earlier, that was the procedure.
“Good morning,” an unseen voice said to the guards.
“Morning,” a female voice answered. Krueger figured that it was one of the guards from behind the desk. “Where’s Stan?”
“He called in sick, so they got me moppin’ in his place.”
Krueger heard the sounds of a janitor and he relaxed. He heard the guards go back to an earlier conversation as the janitor went about his work.
The black man with arms the size of tree trunks was squeezed into his jumpsuit almost like Krueger was, only his discomfort was due to being muscle-bound. The man was looking at Krueger as if he were a bug that had just crawled out of his kitchen cabinet. Krueger immediately looked away.
Outside the cell, as the conversation continued between the two guards at the desk, Krueger heard two loud popping noises as if someone had hit a hollow cardboard tube. Then he heard running and then another hollow pop and then a clattering noise. As he looked around, he saw the thin white prisoner, who had a limited view of the area in front of the cell, lean back and then saw his eyes go wide. Krueger now became concerned.
A shadow fell inside the cell as a man stepped up to the bars. The three prisoners looked around wildly as they saw that the man was armed with what looked like a handgun with a long tube attached to the end. He was dressed in a janitor’s jumpsuit and even had an ID tag with his picture on it. He looked from face to face and then raised the silenced weapon and fired twice into the small white prisoner.
“Hey, what the—”
The large black prisoner had tried to stand as he spoke but the chain held his cuffed hands and body close to the bench he was sitting on. He was then caught in midquestion by two bullets fired directly into his forehead. His head jerked backward. Then, just for certainty, another round went into his temple. Despite the silencer, the noise was loud enough that it echoed into the hallway and into the rest of the holding area.
William Krueger leaned as far away as his restraints would allow. He could only hope that the loud reports would bring someone running. However, that hope was fleeting because he knew exactly why that man was there. He also knew that the man would not fail at what he’d been sent there to do. He had expertly shot the three guards and then his cellmates. The silencer had worn out its insulation and had become very loud, which meant that the assassin had never intended to get away with his murders. Krueger’s eyes were wide as the dark-haired man looked straight at him.
“I was told you would understand the price of failure, Mr. Krueger.”
The fat man started shaking uncontrollably. “But … but … you’ll die too,” was all he said.
“That was a forgone conclusion long before today. What is better than to send a dead man to kill another?”
There were sounds of many footsteps running down the hallway and shouts of more guards. The assassin did not bother to look away from the cell. He simply raised the handgun and fired four times into the head and face of William Krueger. The Coalition had just made a public statement of their intention to come out of the shadows and protect what was theirs.
The assassin reached through the bars and tossed the smoking weapon into the cell, were it hit the body of William Krueger and then clattered to the floor. Without hesitation, the man turned and left the holding area and made his way to the back door.
Outside the courthouse, the blond woman watched from her expensive car as the federal building was hurriedly evacuated. Once outside, workers and visitors alike were held in an area just to the left of the white-painted fortresslike courthouse for questioning. As she watched, she saw guards and United States marshals swarm the interior of the building.
The woman started her Mercedes and slowly left the large parking area. She did not smile or gloat on how good she was at arranging things like the assassination. She did exactly what she was paid for—to fix problems.
She slowly turned her car out onto the street and made her way to the Southern State Parkway for her trip into New York City, where she had another job to do before she moved to her next location in Boston. This next venture was also to be a public statement by a power that was far beyond American law enforcement to thwart. It was against an entity that was as secret as the Coalition she worked for—the Event Group.
EVENT GROUP WAREHOUSE 3 SEVENTH AVENUE, NEW YORK CITY
Two Mayflower moving vans backed into the large loading dock just a half hour after a nondescript truck removed the scrolls and maps—and the three-man security element of Jack, Carl, and Will—to JFK airport. The back of the Event Group–owned Freemont Building was deserted, with the exception of a guard in his shack overlooking the dock area.
A driver stepped from the first moving truck and hopped up to the dock. He was carrying a clipboard and was wearing the livery colors of Mayflower Transit. He looked around and waited.
The guard-shack door opened and a man stepped out wearing a standard security uniform. He placed a cap on his head and stepped toward the man who was looking at him with a smile.
“We don’t accept deliveries at this address, son,” the man said as he eyed the two trucks.
“Actually, my boss called and said that we had a pickup at this building.” He made a show of looking at his clipboard. “Yeah, says right here, the Freemont. There isn’t another building with that name on this street, is there?”
“No, but you may want to check back with your—”
A seven-inch knife in between his ribs cut the guard’s words off as effectively as if he had shut off a radio. The man who had come up behind the guard was the driver of the second truck. The first man
laid his clipboard down and then reached out and raised the sliding door of the first large moving van. As he did so, thirty-five men exited quickly. All were dressed in black Nomex and all had black hoods on their heads. It was exactly the same uniform that Jack and his men had worn for their raid the night before in Katonah.
A three-man team ran to the guard shack and another group to the large sliding doors of the loading dock. The first group smashed the communications-and-monitoring console in the guard shack and the second group placed quarter-pound timed charges against the base of each of the two loading doors that led into the warehouse. Each thirty-five-man team from the two trucks lined up on either side of the two doors just as two loud pops sounded, freeing the doors from their interior lock slots. As one man from each team slid the doors up, the rest ran into the dark interior.
Lance Corporal Jimmy Sanchez had been part of the Event Group for four years and loved the detached duty. He was moving up fast and the work under Colonel Jack Collins was challenging, to say the least. Being a veteran of the Event in the desert and the expedition down the Amazon the preceding year, he had come to be a trusted member of the security team that Collins had forged since he’d begun work for the Group. He’d even heard from Will Mendenhall that he was to advance in pay-grade to sergeant in the fall.
As Sanchez started to move, the ceiling lights flickered just as the sound of automatic gunfire erupted somewhere below them. He immediately ran to the wall-mounted phone and picked it up. There was no dial tone. He then reached into his pocket for his Group cell phone and punched only one number. It would alert all Event Group personnel that an emergency had arisen, which meant that the security team should come running to their aid. It also sent an automated message via satellite to Nevada, where the emergency alert would be relayed to Group Center.
Sanchez tossed the phone to the nearest wide-eyed technician.
Ancients: An Event Group Thriller Page 12