Ancients (event group thriller)

by David L. Golemon

  Jack and Carl jumped from the boat and quickly and silently made their way into the scrub that lined the river.

  Ryan watched them disappear and had to remind himself that those two men were probably the most formidable and deadly military officers he had ever met. Colonel Collins was a former Special Ops genius and Captain Everett a highly decorated SEAL, but still, heading into an unknown situation blindly with only one 9-millimeter handgun was madness.

  The African leader held a small young black woman by the back of the neck. He shook her and threatened her with a machete. Her professor lay dead at her feet. His blood had already disappeared into the hot sand of the riverbank. Another woman was dead; her body lay across a large equipment trunk, and her head was five feet away. Nearby, boy was having his wounds tended to by two Ethiopian students in one of the ten tents that had been placed around the center of their dig. Six of the mercenaries were tearing through marked and tagged objects, reading the tags hastily and then throwing them away. They were obviously looking for something in particular.

  The other five men were standing in a loose circle around the Ethiopian camp. Again, the large leader shook the young black student and shouted a question. Her tearful eyes never left the hovering machete as she cringed at the pressure on her neck. As the man lifted the machete above her head, she suddenly screamed out an answer. The other students, made up of half male and half female, shouted out and cried in support of the girl. As the leader let off the pressure on the girl's neck, she straightened and spit blood in the man's face. The man spit back as the girl screamed out a long blast of profanities at him.

  "Dammit, they're going to kill those kids, Jack," Everett said from a small knoll where he and Collins had stationed themselves. "Who are these bastards?"

  "I think they're Sudanese. It sounds like they're speaking Dinka."

  "Dinka or pig latin, doesn't matter, Jack--we have to move. That girl's just about the bravest kid I've ever seen."

  "Easy, Carl. This asshole has a purpose in mind. This isn't a normal crash and raid," Jack answered softly. "Look at those men: they're looking for something specific," he said as he pushed back from the rim of the knoll and lay on his back in the cooling evening.

  "Our own team is here for, what, some speculation about an ancient flood washing up artifacts in the Nile basin?"

  "Yeah, that's what the predig report stated. Why, what are you thinking?"

  "It's just strange that these ass-bites don't look like they would know the difference between Tupperware and a Ming vase. They want something they know could possibly be here ... or maybe in the American camp. Either way, you're right, we have to do something about this. Our people won't be ready to go soon enough, so it's deal with them here or deal with them with our people on the line."

  Everett nodded as Jack slid back down the knoll, and he followed. He knew that Collins was just using the American field team as an excuse to get these murdering bastards now, and he wasn't about to let those kids get killed down there. That's what he liked about the colonel. When right was right, the "book" went right out of the nearest window.

  "And what do I do as you guys risk your life, sit here and mind the boat?" Ryan asked incredulously as Jack finished his hastily planned rescue.

  "No, Mr. Ryan, you're the most important part," Jack said as he reached into the boat and brought up the boom box and thrust it at the naval man. "Pick some appropriate music and cause a stir on the river and just get their attention. Without a distraction our little raid will end up like the St. Valentine's Day massacre."

  "And when I get their attention?"

  "Then you're welcome to improvise, Mr. Ryan," Jack said as he, Mendenhall, and Everett hopped over the side of the boat and made their way stealthily back to the small ridge. Then he held up his right hand with three fingers raised: three minutes until they would need the distraction on the river.

  Jason Ryan watched them leave, then shook his head and hoped that he improvised just a little faster than those mercenaries with the automatic rifles did. Jesus, he thought, all this just hours after a celebratory drinking binge. Ryan loved his job and the men he worked for; besides, where else could you kick ass on bad people before dinnertime?

  Once they were in place on the knoll above the Ethiopian encampment, Jack removed a small knife and extended the blade. He looked from Everett to Mendenhall and then nodded.

  "Don't be late, guys. When you see me move, take out the fastest-reacting threat elements. I would say the ones shooting at me would be a good start."

  "Jack, I don't mind telling you that this plan is a little risky. I mean, depending on two men who have just a tad more alcohol than the legal limit in them to hit moving targets, well--" He let the statement fall off.

  "Not up to it, swabby?"

  "You know, Jack, since the president promoted me two ranks, I officially outrank you?"

  "Read the small print, swabby, me boss, you little man: when you take over, you can take all the risk."

  "He's right, Colonel, you're taking a knife into a gunfight--"

  The stern look from Collins made Mendenhall close his mouth quickly.

  "We don't let children die when we're around. No diplomacy and no red tape, clear?" he said as he looked from man to man.

  Both nodded.

  Down below in the camp, the search continued for whatever it was the mercenaries were looking for. The students were cowering against one another, and the African leader was still holding the small woman by the throat, only by now he had stopped shaking her. Just as Jack was about to move off to the far side of the encampment, from which he would make the initial strike, there was a ringing coming from the vicinity of the leader. As they watched, the large man dropped the woman and she sprawled to the sand and just lay there holding her throat. He reached into his vest and brought out a cell phone. Everett strained, trying to listen.

  "Yes?" the man said in English.

  Everett slowly brought back the slide of his Beretta and chambered a round as he listened.

  "Nothing like you described. I'll take pictures on my phone and send them to you. How am I to know the period of the piece if found?"

  Everett turned to Will and whispered, "Whatever happens, we try and get that cell phone, we may just have gotten a break in finding out who's paying this dickhead."

  Mendenhall nodded as he clicked off the safety of his 9-millimeter and took aim on the man nearest the students who held an AK-47.

  The leader angrily slammed his cell phone shut and pocketed it. Then he screamed a question at the cowering woman at his feet as he slowly raised his machete. Everett had just taken aim but he held his fire, per his orders, and forced himself to lower his weapon.

  The leader got a strange look on his face as he looked at the river. He tilted his head, listening, and then gestured for two of his men to move toward a thumping noise coming from the water.

  "Oh, shit," Mendenhall said as he looked at the Nile and saw the diversion Ryan was attempting to pull off.

  "Un-fucking believable," was all Everett could say.

  The loud sound of the motor was nothing compared to the amplified music emanating from the boom box that Ryan had fixed with wire to the tarp support. The 1970s band the Eagles blared out their hit "Take It Easy" as Ryan tied off the steering wheel and placed the boat in a slow circling spin in front of the Ethiopian encampment. All eyes were on the small, shirtless man in Bermuda shorts standing on top of the boat's awning with his arms splayed before him as he balanced himself as if he were surfing the boat. It spun crazily in the river to the sound of the rhythmic song written about hitchhiking through Arizona. The former naval F-14 Tomcat pilot had lost nothing of his sense of the dramatic since joining the Group. He was still just as crazy as the men who had recruited him.

  The mercenaries were stunned by the sight. This American fool was obviously drunk and playing games with them.

  "Shoot him!" the leader screamed out in Dinka as he brought the machete back u
p to strike the cowering girl.

  Before the man could act on his murderous thrust toward the prone woman, something burst from the brush and slammed into the Sudanese leader. Jack brought down the small pocketknife with tremendous force directly into the man's neck. The blow immediately froze the machete in midair. Once the killer started to fall, Jack turned and threw the knife at the nearest armed man he saw. The knife, though not a lethal blow, struck the merc in the chest just below the collarbone, but it caused enough injury and shock that the man dropped his weapon.

  On the river, Ryan heard the first distinctive AK-47 reports coming from shore and had the audacity to continue balancing himself for a moment on the boat's tarpaulin cover. Then, with the better part of the show over--his part, anyway--he grabbed the steel frame and flipped over the top and into the boat just as 7.62-millimeter rounds started striking the wooden boat. As Ryan struggled with the knotted line on the steering wheel, a sharp crack severed it and knocked it from his hands. After suddenly discovering that he had control of the boat again, he jammed the throttle to its stops. All the while, the Eagles continued to play loudly, drowning out the shouts and curses of the mercenaries onshore.

  Everett sighted the first of his targets. A tall, very thin man was just turning to take aim at Jack and the young woman he was hurriedly helping to her feet. The 9-millimeter round caught the man between the eyes just to the right of his nose. At the same moment, Mendenhall outdid Everett by dropping two men who were already firing on Ryan. Both rounds struck the men in the backs of their heads. Others had turned their attention to their leader and were starting to take aim at Jack.

  Carl and Will opened fire in earnest, hoping to drop as many as possible, but they were torn between the men with rifles and those who were starting to turn their attention, and their machetes, on the Ethiopian students.

  Jack pushed the small woman away and charged the nearest man threatening the students. As others started to succumb to the withering fire from the knoll, Jack struck the nearest man and drove him into the ground, pounding at him with his fist. One of the young students tried to reach for a fallen machete to assist Collins, but immediately another mercenary got between him and the weapon. Then the assailant was brought down by a round from Everett.

  The leader, who had been the first man dropped in the makeshift assault, started crawling away unnoticed. The killing blow that Jack thought he had inflicted guaranteed only a slow death--too slow to stop the man from doing what he needed to do. As he stumbled and tried to stand, he brought out the cell phone and struggled to his knees, just as Mendenhall and Everett shot down the last of his men. He opened the cell phone and, with his wound bleeding nastily, smashed it against a rock. Then he raised his arm to throw the remains into the river; but he hadn't noticed the changing sounds from the river as the angle and loud sounds of "Take It Easy" had changed direction.

  Unknown to everyone, a stray bullet had finally found its mark and struck Ryan. The heavy round had only grazed his temple, but it was enough to leave him dazed and to send the large boat straight to the riverbank. The bow struck the small rise of sand and sent the boat full speed into the air. It rose over the scrambling students and the shocked face of Collins, who was pulling a machete out of the hand of the man he had just killed.

  "What the hell?" Everett started to cry as the large boat, its motor screaming with exertion and traveling at thirty-five knots, went airborne by thirty feet.

  As they all watched, the boat came down with a crash right onto the Sudanese leader, catching him in midthrow. The boat crushed him underneath as it split in two, sending the unconscious Ryan flying into the top of the nearest tent. Just like that, the assault was over, as quickly as it had started.

  Collins rushed over to see if Ryan had survived his improvised diversion. Everett came down from the knoll with Mendenhall covering him and started checking the bad guys for life.

  In all, the assault by the Event Group security team had taken less than two and a half minutes.

  Half an hour later, as the sun was just dipping below the Ethiopian horizon, Jack, Everett, and Will Mendenhall, with the help of the Event Group dig team, assisted the stunned Ethiopian students. In the distance came the gentle thump of helicopters coming from Addis Abba, to the south.

  Collins was kneeling beside a bandaged Jason Ryan and was angrily shaking his head.

  "When I say 'improvise,' it doesn't mean to stand on top of a boat and have people shoot at you, Ryan."

  "Did you like the choice of music? That's all that matters, Colonel."

  Jack smirked and shook his head as he stood. "Yeah, as a matter of fact I did."

  Ryan then grimaced, as he allowed one of the women of the Event Group to assist him to his feet.

  "Jack, the doc says that we have four army Blackhawks inbound to take everyone out, courtesy of the American consulate. The Ethiopian government has been notified about the assault on their university students and the doctor also said that Niles was quoted as saying, 'Leave those idiots in Ethiopia, I have no need for them back in Nevada,' " Carl said.

  "The director's not happy with our choice of vacation spots, huh?"

  "Not exactly." Everett started to turn away and then stopped. He tossed Jack a small black object. "The head asshole was using this just before you started to play Tarzan with your knife. It's broken, but with a little bit of Event Group magic it may lead us to whoever was running this team of mercs."

  "Colonel, I have someone here who would like to say thank you," Professor Leekie said as she placed her hands on the shoulders of the young African student who had put up the brave front against the leader of the mercenaries. "Colonel Collins, Captain Everett, I would like to introduce you to Hallie Salinka, daughter of Ethiopia's vice president, Peter Salinka."

  "I ... would ... like ... to--"

  That was as far as the young woman could go. She broke down crying as she threw herself into Jack's arms. She sobbed uncontrollably and Collins knew that she was still feeling the shock of the assault. He looked at Everett, not really knowing what to do, but Carl did not offer any advice. He just watched the scene stoically. Leekie placed a hand over her mouth as she imagined the terror this child must have endured. Feeling awkward, Collins finally and very slowly reached up and patted the girl on the back. Slowly her sobs lessened and then Leekie pulled her away.

  Jack watched as Leekie slowly led the bloodied girl away. He looked at the cell phone in his hand for a long moment before he pocketed it. Lord, I know it's too much to hope for, but let me have that number. I want to have a very intimate conversation with the person on the other end of that call.

  3

  EVENT GROUP CENTER NELLIS AIR FORCE BASE, NEVADA

  The hidden complex that housed the Event Group sat a half a mile below the desert scrub of Nellis Air Force Base. Its location underneath the northern firing range was not by accident. The mere fact that you could end up setting off one of the experimental missiles deployed by the air force was reason enough not to go snooping in the area. The complex had been finished in late 1944 by the same design team as had built the Pentagon complex. They had used the expansive natural cave system that dwarfed its more famous cousin in Carlsbad, New Mexico.

  Housed along with the military and science teams that made up the secretive Event Group were secrets that the world had mostly forgotten or that lived on only in folklore and legend. Behind thousands of banklike vault doors and inches of reinforced steel, the secrets of world history, once buried in time, were studied and cataloged. The charter of Department 5656: to make sure mistakes and civilization-altering moments from the past were never again repeated. The Group had been in existence officially since the time of Teddy Roosevelt, but their roots went far deeper, extending to President Abraham Lincoln.

  The president of the United States handled the Group personally. The person who occupied the Oval Office--that person alone was trusted with the secrets studied in the ancient cave system below the sands of the hi
gh-desert airbase.

  For every sitting president since the time of Woodrow Wilson, the first tour of the magical wonders of the Group, a subdepartment of the National Archives, always amazed and usually won over a new president.

  The current director of the Event Group was Professor Niles Compton, recruited from MIT. Compton had been chosen by his predecessor, Senator Garrison Lee, and groomed specially to become the head of the most secret agency in the world outside of the American NSA.

  He escorted the newly elected president past the third-vault level of the underground complex.

  "Apart from the fact that you have artifacts like the Roswell saucer, something that may or not be Noah's Ark, and several items that include the bodies of historic figures, just where does it say you have achieved your mission, that you have been a deterrent to those who would harm our nation by studying past events?"

  Niles Compton studied the newly elected president. The commander in chief was at the very least studious. It was a well-known fact that he came from an intellectual family and his platform of budget restraints and checks and balances had gotten him elected. Niles had his work cut out for him.

  "Let us take the Ark as an example. Did it tell us anything about religion other than it fit the dimensions and design as stated in the Bible?" Niles shook his head. "Absolutely not. What it did lead us to is the now well-accepted science that the Middle East was most definitely flooded around thirteen to fifteen thousand years ago, which has led the scientific community to the conclusion that it was caused by a seismic event or a nonterrestrial occurrence like a meteor strike. Thus, we monitor the movement of the earth for patterns like they may have faced thousands of years ago. Our policy of tracking large bodies out in space is another example of what we have learned, just from this one Event."

  Niles knew that the president needed this information to make a sound judgment when it came to budgeting hidden money for his department. Thus, he brought out the heavy guns on the initial tour.