The Grail a5-5

by Robert Doherty

  He felt the inner padding of the suit mold against his body. His fingers fit into the command pads at the end of the arms.

  “Power on,” he ordered.

  The screens on the inside of the helmet came alive and he could see the interior of the combat talon, lit with the red night-lights.

  “Low light enhance,” Turcotte said.

  The screens flickered, then he could see more clearly as the mini-cams on the outside of the suit went to night-vision mode, the computer enhancing the available light. Turcotte had a slightly curved screen four inches directly in front of his eyes that filled his field of vision and on standard view gave him the view that would normally be right in front of him. He could give commands to have the screen display other camera angles.

  He also had a small flip-down display halfway between the screen and his left eye that was made of clear plastic on which was reflected whatever data from the computer he wanted. During the testing Turcotte had immediately developed a sharp headache from trying to watch the screen and read the data. He’d talked to Apache gunship pilots who had a similar display built into their helmets and they’d told him it took months to develop the ability to naturally do both. They didn’t have months to prepare for this mission. Turcotte felt a moment of doubt, which he quickly squashed.

  Carefully, Turcotte stood. They’d attached an interesting appendage to the end of the legs: a flat platform that extended forward about ten inches. It gave stability like feet, but built into the center of each “foot” was a six-inch-wide hole in which a small turbine fan was mounted — the propulsion device once they were in the water.

  Power for the TASC-suit came from banks of advanced lithium batteries built into the armor of the suit. To Turcotte that was the major disadvantage — they had four hours of operating power, then they would need to recharge. They had to be in, rescue Duncan, recover the Grail, and be out on the exfiltration aircraft in less than that time. Graves’s plan, the best his team could come up with during the isolation, had estimated three hours to do all that. But they were working with a lot of unknown variables, such as the rather glaring question of where exactly the Black Sphinx was located and how to get to it. From experience in Special Operations, Turcotte knew everything always took much longer than one planned.

  With the aid of the airplane’s loadmaster, a pack was attached to the lower back of the TASC-suit carrying gear Turcotte had specified. Above it was placed the specially designed parachute that would allow them to drop at very low altitude.

  Turcotte then had a Mark 98 attached to his left arm. Extra ammo cylinders were strapped along his chest, down to his stomach. He was glad to have the power of the suit, because he estimated he was at twice his normal weight. He checked the hookups to the trigger and sight. The trigger was activated by his left forefinger inside the suit, and the laser sight picture would be duplicated on screen for him.

  On his right arm was placed a “hand.” It was controlled by moving his hand inside the end of the arm, which relayed to the metal fingers. Also on the mechanical hand, securely fastened to the middle “finger” with wire, was Kopina’s Watcher ring.

  He was ready to go.

  * * *

  “Area Five-One-Six is in the alley and clear so far,” the EW officer told Zycki. He pointed at a spot on his screen. “The only problem spot is this radar site here. They might get an echo from the plane as it hits the Nile.”

  “Can you cloud it?” Zycki asked.

  “Yes, sir. I’ve got the frequency and I’ll run some interference when the Talon gets close.”

  “Any other unusual activity?”

  “We tracked a private jet into Cairo five minutes ago that was flying low level on an end run around the Sinai. We’re not sure what that was about.”

  “Concentrate on One Six.”

  * * *

  Turcotte was amazed at the technology and what it could do. Sitting on the seat, he could look in all directions without moving, just by accessing the various mini-cams on the exterior of the suit.

  Looking about the cargo bay was surreal. Not only because he was viewing it on screen, as if he were taking part in a movie, but also because of the mission they were going on.

  Black-suited, seven-foot-tall figures moved about, getting rigged, checking their gear.

  A voice came over the FM net. “Twenty minutes till drop.”

  CHAPTER 14

  Giza

  Lisa Duncan stirred as she heard the thud of boots coming down the tunnel. She stood, stretched, and felt the pang of hunger in her stomach. Worse, though, was the dryness in her mouth. She was parched and knew that she could not go on without water for much longer.

  She went to the veil and edged it aside so she could see. Aspasia’s Shadow stood there, a pair of soldiers behind him. One had an intricately carved wooden box in his hands.

  “You were here when this place was built, weren’t you?” Duncan asked before he could say anything.

  Aspasia’s Shadow nodded. “I was here. Aker, one of Aspasia’s lieutenant’s, hollowed out the six chambers. He bore the tunnels to link them. He placed the Black Sphinx in this chamber and directed the carving of the stone sphinx above. This was long before the time your scientists think the stone sphinx was carved. This area was very different then. It was a lush land, fertile for many miles where there is now desert. That was why we chose to come here after Atlantis.”

  “If you helped build this, how did you lose control of it?”

  Aspasia’s head snapped toward her, anger in his eyes. “I was betrayed.”

  “How? By whom?”

  “By Aspasia, of course. He removed something I needed to rule. His machine was afraid I would get too powerful while he slept.”

  “What was taken?”

  “The master guardian.”

  “To Mars?”

  “No. It was hidden here on Earth. I have searched long and hard for it, as I have searched for the key to the Grail. And you wonder why I care not for those who still live on Mars? They cared little for me all these years. But now my time comes!”

  “There are some who won’t allow that,” Duncan said.

  Aspasia’s Shadow laughed. “Do you know what you are?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “What humans are?”

  Something was at the edge of Duncan’s consciousness, just like it had been when she had first seen the Grail. She knew more than she could bring to her conscious mind, which scared her. How had she gained this information?

  “We’re intelligent beings who deserve a place—”

  “Intelligent?” Aspasia’s Shadow laughed again.

  Duncan remembered the strange planet she had seen in the vision from the Ark. “I’m standing here, where you want to be. If I’m not intelligent, what does that make you?”

  The smile was gone from his face. “Are you ready to negotiate?” Aspasia’s Shadow asked, the words echoing in the chamber.

  “Are you making me an offer?” Duncan asked in turn as she stepped outside. Aspasia’s Shadow held up a canteen. “Would you like to drink?”

  “What do you want in exchange?”

  “The Grail.”

  “You’re joking, right?”

  “I never joke,” Aspasia’s Shadow said. “You will not last much longer without water.”

  “Then I die here, but at least you don’t get the Grail.”

  “Those who you work with don’t know who you are, do they?”

  “I will not give you the Grail,” she repeated.

  “Perhaps if I made you a better offer,” Aspasia’s Shadow said, “you would change your mind.”

  “There is nothing you can offer me that will get me to give you the Grail,” Duncan said.

  “Do not be too sure of that,” Aspasia’s Shadow said. “What if I give you the greatest treasure one can give?”

  “And what do you believe that to be?”

  His answer was succinct. “Immortality.” He signaled and
the soldier with the box stepped forward, knelt and placed it on the floor several feet in front of him. He opened the lid, then went back to his position.

  Duncan took a step forward without thinking, then halted. She felt the weight of the essen on her shoulders, the crown on her head. She could see the two stones set inside the box. “What do you have?”

  “The Grail is worthless without these. They were called the urim and the thummin, long ago by those who really didn’t know what the Grail was — just like you. Those names are as good as any. Even I no longer remember their real name.”

  “The Grail isn’t worthless without those.” Duncan was trying to collect her thoughts. “It just won’t work without them. But the Grail still has value. We are still in a standoff.”

  “‘Work’?” Aspasia’s Shadow repeated. “What exactly do you think the Grail does?”

  “Why don’t you tell me?”

  “If I give one of the stones to you,” Aspasia’s Shadow asked, “will that end the standoff?”

  “And allow me safe passage out of here with the Grail and stone?” Duncan knew it was foolish even to ask.

  “Of course.”

  “Now you lie.”

  “Perhaps. But you will die of thirst if you persist.”

  “Then the Grail remains safe in here.”

  Aspasia’s Shadow snorted. “For how long? Do you think you wear the only set of priest’s clothes? I am sure I can find another set. Or get through the guardians by other means. It will only be a matter of time, and that variable is on my side.”

  “Then wait for me to die,” Duncan said.

  “You do not ever have to die.”

  That gave Duncan pause. “What exactly does the Grail do? I know it is an Airlia machine, but how can it give a person immortality? That is not natural. How can eternal life be manufactured?”

  “The Grail does more than just give eternal life,” Aspasia’s Shadow said. “But turn the question around. Why is there death? Perhaps it is death that has been manufactured? Perhaps it is death that is not natural?”

  CHAPTER 15

  Airspace Egypt

  “Ten minutes!” Captain Graves’s black form was the rearmost figure in the cargo bay. The loadmaster was dwarfed by him, a slight figure in a green jumpsuit holding Graves’s static line.

  “Go to rebreathers,” Graves ordered.

  “Rebreather on,” Turcotte ordered. The computer on his back immediately sealed the suit’s air inlet on the back of the helmet and switched over to the internal rebreather.

  “Stand up.” Graves gave the command quietly, knowing that each man could hear him clearly through the suit radio.

  Turcotte stood, reaching up and hooking his left arm over the steel cable that ran the length of the plane.

  “Hook up, loadmaster,” Graves said, a departure from the normal procedure. Because each man had weapons attached to the end of their arms, the loadmaster had to go down the line, remove their snap hook from the parachute, and attach it to the static line cable.

  Turcotte felt a slight tug as the loadmaster did his. He turned, making sure it was secure.

  “Check static lines.”

  “Sound off for equipment check.” Graves gave the next jump command, but then once more he added something. “And I mean all equipment. If your suit isn’t working right, now is the time to say something.”

  Turcotte, the last man in the stick, nudged the man in front. “OK.”

  The word was passed up the line until the man right behind Graves announced, “All OK, jumpmaster.”

  Graves turned to face the rear of the aircraft. Turcotte, through the suit’s external sensors, could pick up the change in flight speed as he staggered slightly and quickly adjusted. The plane was slowing to drop speed.

  “Three minutes,” Graves announced.

  Turcotte watched the screen just in front of his face as it showed a dark crack appear at the junction of the top of the rear. The crack widened as the ramp came down until it reached a level position with the floor of the cargo bay. Graves knelt, then lay belly down, and slid over, sticking his black helmet out into the one-hundred-and-twenty-five-mile-an-hour wind.

  Looking past Graves, Turcotte could see dark desert a hundred and fifty feet below. An occasional light, bright as a flare, dotted the landscape here and there. He knew they were east of the Nile coming in low over the desert.

  The plane dipped down even lower and banked hard right. A dark black ribbon lay below. The Nile. Turcotte felt a familiar wave of anticipation. For just a second he remembered his last jump. Over China, also over water. Peter Nabinger was the man next to him, and he’d helped the archaeologist get over his fear. And now he was going where Nabinger had considered his home — Egypt, the center of the mysteries that had consumed Nabinger’s life. And the archaeologist had never made it out of China alive.

  Turcotte shook his head to get rid of the thoughts and was immediately reminded of the fact that he was encased in a thick, hi-tech suit. The screen in front of him shimmered for a second and he felt dizzy. Then he regained his composure.

  “Ten seconds.” Graves’s voice had gone up, and the shout hurt Turcotte’s ears. “Stand by.”

  Graves edged forward to the end of the ramp, a hulking figure looking down. The red light above the ramp reflected a deep glow off all the men in front of Turcotte. He blinked as it changed to green.

  “Go!” Graves didn’t attempt to keep his voice down, screaming the command as if they were on a normal jump and he had to try to be heard above the roar of the engines. But the green light and Graves stepping off into the night sky reinforced the command more than volume could.

  Turcotte shuffled forward, barely noticing the strangeness of the suit encompassing his body as he focused on the edge of the ramp. Then he dropped.

  The MC-130 had gone up to less than three hundred feet above the flat black surface of the Nile, the lights of Cairo ahead, not far in the distance.

  Turcotte dropped like a rock, the weight of the suit adding to his descent. The static line reached its end and pulled out the three parachutes packed in the rig. Their abrupt deployment jerked Turcotte from terminal velocity into a somewhat controlled descent.

  “Down view,” Turcotte ordered. The flat black surface of the river was just below. In five seconds he hit the Nile and was under water. He cut away the parachute and it quickly sank.

  “GPS link and team display on,” Turcotte ordered. The dark screen in front of him gave way to a display of the local area. A small red glowing dot in the center was his own position. A dozen other green dots were the rest of the team. A yellow arrow pointed in the direction they had to swim to get to the tunnel entrance — downstream with the flow of the river.

  Turcotte oriented himself at a depth of five meters. Gingerly he turned on the propulsion units, while trying to maintain the same depth. It was a case of trial and error as he moved. By the jerky movements of the green dots, the others were experiencing the same learning curve as they traveled downstream.

  * * *

  “Two stones indicate to me that the Grail does two things,” Lisa Duncan said.

  Aspasia’s Shadow nodded. “Ah, you are indeed showing some intelligence.”

  Duncan ignored the barb. “One is immortality, or at least that’s what you claim. What’s the other half?”

  “That is more difficult to explain,” Aspasia’s Shadow said. “Is not immortality a great enough gift? Never growing old, never getting sick, having all the time in the world to do the things you’ve always wanted to do?”

  “In a world run by you?”

  “Somebody has to run things for you humans. Look at what a mess you’ve made doing things on your own.”

  “How much on our own have we been over the ages?” Duncan retorted.

  * * *

  The propulsion unit worked well as Turcotte closed the distance to the tunnel entrance. It had just appeared on his screen as a yellow circle about two hundred meters awa
y. He reached it and waited for the other team members.

  “IR lights and IR imaging,” Turcotte ordered, switching off the GPS link, which would be cut anyway as soon as they went into the tunnel. The screen cleared and then was replaced by a greenish glow. The infrared lights mounted on his suit penetrated the dark water about ten feet. Turcotte could see the others as they also turned on their lights and infrared cameras. Black forms floating in the water, they waited as each man was accounted for. Turcotte could feel the tug of the water, wanting to draw him into the eight-foot-wide hole in the bank of the Nile.

  “All present,” Graves finally reported.

  “Follow me,” Turcotte said. He turned, went into the tunnel, and entered the second gateway to the roads of Rostau. The water carried him along. He hit the side of the tunnel, tumbled, regained his balance and orientation, and continued on.

  The tunnel widened and Turcotte could stand, chest deep in the surging water. He stayed on the rebreather, though, uncertain when the tunnel would narrow once more. Burton had not gone this way, so all he could hope was to keep moving forward until he found the shaft Burton had come down. He walked forward, the team following, shifting his screen view to up every two steps, then quickly back to forward as long as he saw a roof over his head.

  He was beginning to get the feel of the suit and his gait was getting smoother as he penetrated farther under the Giza Plateau. The tunnel was about fifteen meters wide by three high, the walls showing a smooth cut under the IR light.

  “Hold on.” Graves’s voice was almost a whisper over the team net. “Anyone hear that?”

  Turcotte held up his right arm, signaling for everyone to halt. “Audio magnify to maximum,” he ordered the computer.

  He could hear the river, like a thunderous waterfall, going by. And there was something else. The sound of metal on stone a rapid clicking noise. And it was getting louder.