Guardians of the Four Shields: A Lost Origins Novel

by A D Davies

  “Then we go somewhere else,” Toby said. “Stop it remotely from an orb that is connected.”

  “If we have time,” Charlie said, plugging her satellite phone in to a mini laptop computer that she’d evidently stashed earlier. “We won’t get to Scotland or Kenya in time.”

  “I have a map,” Bridget said, tapping the paper on which she’d written her notes, which Prihya now held. “I can’t remember it, but I think I got it all down. Let the others know.”

  Both Prihya and Charlie spoke at once. “We can’t.”

  They looked at one another.

  Charlie went first, working the laptop and checking the sat-phone. “We lost local comms when you entered the chamber. Power spike. We can’t contact the action dudes that way. I’m trying to re-establish our own system.”

  “Oh.” Bridget looked to Prihya. “What about you? What’s up?”

  Prihya was staring at the paper. Toby did, too, and his face paled. Sally Garcia looked and immediately glanced away, leaving Charlie to mimic Toby’s shock.

  “What is it?” Bridget demanded.

  Prihya turned the paper to Bridget. All her notes, her writing, a comprehensive account of all she’d seen, she had scribbled not in English, but in the Witnesses’ language. The same runes and glyphs they’d struggled to interpret for several months.

  “Let’s just hope the others can deter the Koreans,” Toby said. “Or we may have a bigger problem on our hands.”

  And then, as if Toby had orchestrated the timing to coincide with his comment, an alarm blared.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  As he ran, Jules could only make out shadows at the periphery of the tree line. Not even his keen senses and processing power could pinpoint every soul on his tail. He had no option but to keep going.

  To make things hard for them, he’d left the rudimentary track and converted to cross-country. It wasn’t difficult for someone who had traversed oceans of rooftops and scaled walls across modern cities, seeking the smallest handholds, reacting to shifts in the temperature and viscosity of the next surface. At least here it was consistent. The biggest danger was a thick weed or bramble escaping his attention and snagging his foot.

  But Jules was nothing if not pragmatic, so his path remained as elevated as he could manage, picking up his feet in an almost comic manner when he burst across a stretch where roots, logs or rocks offered no foothold. At times it was as if he was racing through an assault course’s tire section. It barely slowed him.

  Barely didn’t mean not at all, though, and the men and at least one woman he’d spotted stuck to trails beaten out by animals or humans, attempting to flank him. It took a mighty effort to split his concentration in two, with 75% dedicated to maintaining his course and monitoring his pursuers, while the other 25% recalled the topography he’d witnessed earlier.

  The radio came to life, an exasperated Dan asking for a sit-rep. Now Jules was nearing the curve, the land sloping down into the shallow valley, they had a line of sight for the signal. He considered not replying for a few more yards, purely out of obstinance, but he was trying to leave that old self behind and be a mature member of society. A mature member of society playing catch-me-if-you-can in the forest.

  “On my way,” he said. “Bringing some friends.”

  “About time. ETA?”

  “I got no idea where you’re set up, so that’s a kinda—” Jules cut himself off as he ducked under an unexpected branch. He rounded a trunk, sprang up to a sturdier one, swung off this, and landed on the next mound before breaking out into open ground. “I’m at the jetty.”

  “Grab the skiff, second from the end. It’s fueled and ready.”

  “And a big chalk ‘J’ next to it, gotcha.”

  A steep grassy hill led down to the jetty, although twenty yards to his right there was a staircase. Jules stuck to the slick grass, lost his footing twice in three seconds, so used it to his advantage and launched himself forward onto his butt.

  He lay flat, like on a water slide, and sluiced the next fifty yards before friction dented his progress and the angle evened out. Without stopping, he leaped to his feet, a glance over his shoulder showing his pursuers were well on his tail.

  At sharp reports of gunfire, he started zigzagging in his run, steering clear of repeating his pattern. Bullets ripped up the turf, some pinging into the slow-moving river.

  Short-range pistols.

  The shooters running or aiming hastily.

  The target moving away and in an unpredictable pattern.

  Jules figured Dan, himself, or maybe Charlie could be a danger under those circumstances, but it’d take a lucky shot to even wing him if the six Koreans he’d pinpointed were as average as he’d seen so far.

  Probability aside, they might get lucky.

  Concentrate on getting to the boat.

  The pier floated on a pooling section, where the water’s path widened enough to drop its current to a trickle before picking up again downriver. There were four waka taua—Maori war canoes—moored at the shallowest part, lashed to the mooring first for the benefit of paying customers. Then came Jet Skis and a couple of tug-like motorized boats, and finally the two skiffs—small boats with motors on the rear.

  As Jules’s boots pounded the unsteady wooden platform, now unable to bob and weave due to the limited space, he asked, “You disabled the other boats here, right?”

  No one replied for a moment, then Harpal said, “Actually, we were kind of in a rush.”

  “Needed to scatter the staff,” Tane added. “Couldn’t have ‘em getting caught up.”

  Jules had noted the absence of people but hadn’t given it much thought. He drew his gun and fired at the Jet Skis’ fuel tanks as he passed, but a volley of shots from the land prevented him from taking them all out.

  The five men and single woman were on the same level, less than twenty yards from the jetty.

  I got another ten yards. That’s five seconds with no cover.

  Then I have to start up the motor—add on five to ten seconds.

  Acceleration in these boats is non-existent, so…

  Assessing his options took Jules the time between two near-miss gunshots from the shore. He would not make it to the skiff, let alone bring the Koreans with him on the other one.

  Instead, he dove into the water.

  The sudden drop in temperature gripped him harder than he’d expected, and he cursed his sluggish brain for not firing a warning. A consequence of relaxing into city life? Or a reminder that crossing dangerous people in pursuit of a greater purpose was a bad idea?

  Whatever it was, the self-analysis would have to wait. He concentrated on not passing out in what felt like an icy tomb, found his bearings, and swam upwards.

  He broke the surface, a headache hitting home while his entire body tried to shut down, urging him to curl up and shiver or seek warmth.

  He denied his body that request, instead reaching up to one of the intact Jet Skis. Because they were intended for emergency use, the keys were still in the ignition, so he started it up while half-submerged.

  Rounds flew, gunshots closer. The jetty wobbled with the weight of Korean agents rushing forward.

  In a smooth, sloshing motion, Jules gunned the engine, which pulled him along. He used the sudden acceleration to swing his leg up and onto the vehicle like a cowboy mounting a moving horse. To use what little cover there was, he swung it around to the front, the skiffs narrowing his exposure but not concealing him as it generated a foot-high wash.

  Jules watched the six agents bear down on him. The lead pair drew their beads. Even with him hunkering low and half-over the side, they surely wouldn’t miss.

  Come on, come on…

  He’d only got the lightning-quick guesstimation wrong by a second, but it was enough to spike his adrenaline. The wave from his wash rolled beneath the attackers and destabilized the floating dock enough to send even the most skilled marksman’s shots high and wide. It didn’t send them tumbling,
but it was sufficient to save Jules’s skin and give him a hefty head start.

  “Coming to you fast,” Jules reported.

  “How fast?” Dan asked.

  “However fast a Jet Ski can go at top speed.”

  Through the spray and his shivering body, Jules checked behind and—as expected—they were manning crafts as he had done, doubling up. One piloting, the other to fire his way.

  They’d be slower but could get close enough for a shot. If they kept in a straight line.

  How long did he have until they were in range?

  Ummm…

  Nothing. No idea how to calculate that. His teeth simply chattered in reply. His brain seemed to be saying, Sorry, no math today. Get me warm again and maybe we’ll talk.

  “They’re on me,” Jules said. “How far downriver are you?”

  “Half a kilometer,” Tane answered.

  Concerned about stray bullets, Jules assumed.

  The enemies were coming, a straight line of three crafts—two Jet Skis and a slower but steadier boat, one of the six-man skiffs with the motor. The formation gave Jules less to aim at if he chose to stand and fight.

  The bend in the river came up fast, which Jules leaned into, keeping central, away from shoreline hazards. He was shivering so much he found it difficult to hold on.

  A couple more minutes… that’s all he needed to last.

  Gunshots commenced. Less frequent than before.

  Low on ammo—they were carrying snub pistols to conceal them, so would struggle to pack spare rounds too. Probably enough for this job, though, if he didn’t concentrate.

  “Turn hard right now,” Tane ordered.

  Jules blinked three times, looked down at his hands and wondered why he was still going forward. Oh yeah, because he hadn’t told his hands to change direction.

  He did that and rode the water like a motorbike on a racetrack, his knee skimming the surface before straightening up and zoning in on his destination. Dan and Harpal were right there by an overhanging tree, manning a more luxurious motor launch than anything left at the jetty.

  Dan gave him a thumbs-up, and Harpal set off toward the middle of the river.

  From the other side, another engine roared, an identical craft to Dan’s, holding Tane Wiremu and Bobby Arono. They arrowed into an intercept course and in seconds the concussive chatter of automatic gunfire filled the air.

  Jules struggled to focus, huddling alone, before seeing he had to get moving.

  Keep moving, keep going.

  He rode the Jet Ski toward the action, and by the time he reached Dan and Harpal, the shooting had ended. A five-second skirmish.

  The two Jet Skis were down, unmanned and floating with idling engines. Two bodies floated nearby, motionless. The pair in the skiff were now unarmed, riding toward Dan’s boat, as instructed.

  Tane and Dan guided the captives to the shore, and Jules followed them in, beaching all four vessels. Tane and Dan kept a tight bead on the detainees, although Jules had no clue what they were going to do with them. Only Tane spoke Korean, but what good would interrogating them do?

  “Any more?” Tane asked.

  Jules forced his jaw to work, suppressed the chattering teeth as best he could, but he couldn’t stop hugging himself. “My recce got interrupted. Couldn’t nail them all. Some are tied up at the club, some—”

  “Hold on. Comms are back up.” Dan nodded at Harpal to cover the supplicant agents who hadn’t yet said a word. He shrugged off his coat and passed it to Jules, then frowned as he listened to his other ear. Dan was still the only one with one of LORI’s subvocal ear buds, directly in touch with Charlie and Bridget. “Are you sure?”

  “What’s happening?” Jules asked, wearing the coat but still as cold as he’d ever been in his life.

  Dan glared daggers at the pair of Koreans. “We weren’t the ones creating a distraction. They were.”

  “The lab?” Tane said.

  “They’re at the perimeter. Tie these assholes up and leave ‘em. We’re needed up the mountain.”

  Chapter Thirty

  The alarm continued throughout the facility, dampened for the giants in the rainforest below, but it had been audible for several minutes. Charlie had scrambled to get the comms back up and needed to wake Phil to achieve that. She hadn’t known exactly what the problem was, but Prihya said it wasn’t good. There had been no time to digest the fact Bridget had written an essay in a dead language that even she didn’t understand, and there was certainly no time now.

  Racing up to the security hub as Phil worked his groggy magic back in England, Charlie had guessed what the alarm meant: the boys had failed, and Project Ahua was under attack. Accessing the room with two security personnel remaining confirmed it.

  “I don’t know how they got so close,” one of them said.

  The others gathered inside with Charlie, who scanned the monitors. Men were emerging from the undergrowth outside with guns, body armor, and equipment that looked like a cross between a sniper rifle and a fishing rod.

  “Defenses?” Charlie said.

  “Us two.” The guy heading the monitoring station flipped a thumb between him and his colleague. “We have two armed personnel on each entrance and four on the rainforest level emergency exits. But how did they get so close? We monitor the entire area.”

  “Because we didn’t think like them,” Toby said. “We didn’t consider what must now look like an obvious tactic.”

  As the ingeniously ret-conned power source reached its limit, Ah Dae-Sung ordered the men to leave the plain, battered sliver of the ancient shield in plain sight, where they could retrieve it later. They’d shaved a length off one of the metal shields they found during their initial quest, beat it out to cover one square meter, and used the portable power source with its highest yield to manipulate the energies into useful functionality. Two dozen patriots had died during the experiments, but today’s successful incursion made those deaths worthwhile.

  It had done its job, as had the way his people had feigned incompetence back in the village. The amateurs from this “Lost Origins” group, or whatever they called themselves, had fallen for it, and the twelve-strong strike team hidden in the forest since the previous night could move in.

  “The Executive was correct,” Pang Pyong-Ho said. “A uranium battery and a crescent-shaped crystal.” He checked the Geiger counter. Not a sound. “Completely depleted after half an hour. What power must it take to protect a whole country?”

  “The power of an entire civilization,” Dae-Sung replied. “You have the layout?”

  Pyong-Ho showed him the e-tablet, a crude rendering obtained from a beacon as ingenious as it was secret. Another of the Executive’s prototypes that would come in handy in the new world.

  “You.” Ah Dae-Sung pointed at a fat man with a long, stringy mustache—an expert addition to the strike team. “Are you prepared?”

  “I will need a maximum of fifteen minutes,” the man said.

  “Good.” Dae-Sung addressed the other twelve and counted off ten of them. “Attack, now. Infiltrate if you can. Kill as many as possible. Do not stop until they are all dead, or you are.”

  Charlie watched the fight kick off, a bird's-eye view from cameras mounted on lattice towers that resembled radio antennae. Phil had reestablished the link with Dan, and she’d hit him with the warning and a plea for help, but she feared it would come too late. Already, the volcanologists’ shack—a point that doubled as an Ahua security post—had been taken, the two men guarding it killed. The six infiltrators in body armor proceeded directly along the crater’s rim and engaged a second pair—these the last line of defense before they could descend to the helipad that gave them access to the interior.

  Spreading out while staying low, the team advanced with military precision, as efficient and smooth as any special forces unit Charlie had observed. This was no hastily assembled assault.

  “They know where they’re going,” Charlie said, rounding to glare at
Prihya.

  Prihya shook her head, pumping her arms. “What do I have to do to prove to your people that I’m not doing this?” She looked at Toby, pleading with wide eyes. “You believe me, don’t you?”

  Toby swallowed. “Well, yes, I… Yes, I think so, I…”

  Prihya tore herself away and turned to face the panic rooms. “I suppose I’m not allowed to hide with you either.”

  “What makes you think we’re going to hide?” Bridget asked. “Charlie can handle herself, and I can shoot—”

  “We have to hide,” Charlie said, patting the two security personnel on the shoulder. “You, too.”

  “We can’t.” The head guard was tracking the battle up top. “They’re coming. We can’t hold them off. Our security keeps out trespassers and the occasional conspiracy theory nut. Not an army.”

  “All the more reason,” Toby said.

  The head guard stood and crossed the room to open a locker, removing a submachine gun. “Kara, this isn’t your job. Sort these people out—”

  “Nope.” The other guard was already out of her seat, making for the weapons locker. “It’s a bottleneck up there. We have the advantage.”

  The head guard smiled as if he’d known this would be the result. To Charlie, he said, “Help yourself to guns here. But bed down. We got a distress signal out to HQ. The cavalry is on its way. Just hold out long enough, and you’ll be fine.”

  “What about you?” Sally said, fretting suddenly. “What about all the others?”

  “The people dying?” Charlie said, sensing a shift inside herself. “It’s horrible, isn’t it?”

  “Good luck, folks,” Kara said as she and her boss exited the way they’d all entered—through what looked like a strong, secure door.

  Charlie ran back through all she’d seen so far and approached Prihya where she waited until Prihya held her eye. “I’m sorry. You were never the insider.”