Xavier gave a slight nod, a tell she knew all too well. And one he knows I'll see, she thought. What was he up to?
"If they're behind it, then this is where I need to be."
With his cane under his arm, Calderon clapped his hands. "Well spoken. But still, Nina please keep an eye on him." he sighed. "Now, anyone with the ability to see things that aren't right in front of them, please follow me into the theater of the stars. General McAdams, proceed with the rescue, with all haste."
"Yes sir," McAdams said, obviously annoyed at being told to do what he was already working on.
The boys skipped and ran ahead of Calderon who didn't even look back to see if Nina and Xavier were following. She stood her ground as Xavier calmly walked by. Without looking at her, he whispered: "We need to talk…"
"Talk?"
He glanced back, and in his eyes she saw a fear that almost stopped her in her tracks. "Actually, you need to see for yourself." He shot a look ahead toward Calderon, then hesitated. Suddenly, his hand was out, reaching for hers.
What's he got to show me? She found herself reaching to him, longing to meet his hand. To clench it, squeeze him, pull him to her. A rush of emotions, her brain a mess. First Caleb, then her boys. Now Montross. Her emotions were in flux, she wasn't thinking clearly. For a moment, she had the intense desire to be out somewhere in a dark alley, stalking her target with a machine pistol. Something violent, practical and with purpose.
But this…
Inches away, and Calderon's voice interrupted them.
"Hurry along, these visions aren't going to see themselves!"
Xavier pulled his arm back, then wheeled around, presenting a calm face once more. In his shadow, Nina followed. Her arms trembled and her hands opened and closed again, feeling nothing but the chance that slipped away.
What did he have to show me?
Somehow, she knew she was going to find out, but by then it would be too late.
4.
Caleb used the waterproof pouch to hold his clothes, then secured it around his waist, over the swimsuit. Tight-fitting and too European, Caleb thought, groaning and wondering which of the male keepers would have been able to fit in this one.
He tried not to think of the others. How many were left? Hideki and Rashi gone. Robert and Lydia. Four of the seventeen. The others had to be up above, or traveling to Alexandria to survey the damage. Or, Caleb thought, if they had some sense they were getting to their safe sites, communicating by untraceable phones and waiting to be sure they weren't being targeted again. When this was over, he would have to reunite the Keepers and rebuild a sanctuary somewhere else. They still had plenty of work to do, made more difficult by the destruction of so many original copies of the early documents. But everything they had scanned was still intact, waiting for their interpretation, secrets awaiting revelation.
At this moment, Caleb rued that he hadn't spent more time with the ancient scrolls; and now, when he most needed the lost wisdom, it was going to be up to his underprepared son to find out what he could, to find something to save them.
After donning his mask and strapping on the air tank, he closed and secured the supply cabinet, then punched in the code to open the hydraulic door set in the floor. It was built into the end of this reinforced tunnel, which extended for nearly a mile under the city, and another two hundred yards under the harbor. He stood on the edge and waited for it to slide all the way open, revealing a staircase below. He descended, and in the small concrete chamber below, he pulled a red lever, which closed the door above him and released the clamps on the far wall, raising it slowly, letting in the waters of Alexandria Bay.
Caleb braced himself, feeling the rushing wave over his shins. He held his arms outstretched at his sides, and imagined he was back under the Pharos Lighthouse, in the testing chamber, secured by chains and waiting for the flood that would prove him worthy to pass the second test. He thought of Lydia. He thought of his mother, of the early members of the Morpheus Initiative who had lost their lives down there.
This was nothing as intense, but he still had to keep his footing as the waters rose up past his waist. He kept his focus on the door, halfway up and rising. Bits of seaweed floated, along with a grey-eyed carp, swimming against the pull. The water rose up to his chin, and then he put in the regulator, took a deep breath, prayed Alexander was okay, then dove under and swam for the exit.
The door would close three minutes later, and the chamber would slowly drain. But by then, Caleb would be fifty yards farther away, heading toward the Ras-El-Ten peninsula. Heading for the edge, where Qaitbey's fortress stood guard over the foundation of the ancient Pharos.
He swam slowly, maintaining a depth of about forty feet. For the most part, he kept his attention upwards, counting the dark hulls of the boats, but mindful of the ropes and chains that anchored them. He gradually ascended. Thirty feet. Twenty. Closing in on one boat in particular. The closest one to the fortress.
Odd that there weren't more boats in the vicinity, as it was always a popular spot for tourists to come and snap pictures. A lot of them still remembered the incident eight years ago when a treasure-seeking team of Americans went diving, searching for an entrance to a mythical lost chamber under the original Pharos Lighthouse—only to encounter some sort of deadly fate, leaving their bodies to wash up, in pieces. The government subsequently outlawed scuba diving in a fifty-yard radius of the fortress, a law that Caleb was now flagrantly violating.
But he didn't have time to waste. He needed a boat. And with the tragedy and the destruction consuming the city's attention, Caleb felt he stood a good chance of being able to commandeer this boat from its owners and put it to better use.
As he surfaced at the back of the boat, which turned out to be a 26-foot Inboard Cruiser, bright red, he started fighting a queasy feeling. Maybe it was just the color, but Caleb had a sudden sense of danger, as if he had just stepped onto a street without bothering to look for traffic. His head spun as he took out the regulator and breathed normally, reaching for the ladder. Should have RV'd this-
He debated dropping back down under the waves and searching for another vessel, but then he heard something clicking from above. Something that sounded familiar to him after being around so many soldiers and military types in the past week.
It was the sound of someone chambering a round.
Even the way it was done sounded familiar, just as familiar as the sound this particular gun made. A Beretta.
Her weapon of choice.
"Damn," Caleb said, looking up into the brilliant blue sky a moment before a silhouette obscured his view.
She looked like just another sexy sunbather, wearing a thin bikini that matched the color of the boat. She even smelled like tanning oil; and her hair was pulled back in a tail that whipped from side to side in the wind.
Nina Osseni held the gun steadily aimed at Caleb's head. "Hi honey. I was wondering when you'd bother to show up."
#
He reached a hand up for her to take, but she just backed up, keeping the gun on him. "Sorry, but given our history, I'm not about to touch you right now. Just come on up here and have a seat."
Caleb hung on the ladder, his mask up on his forehead. He was calculating his chances of diving and getting under the boat, then descending out of her reach. "If I say no?"
She sweetly smiled and shook her head. "You're not that quick, lover."
"Don't call me that."
"Move. We have things to talk about. Our boys saw that you'd try to make for the fort."
After a wistful look down into the suddenly clearing water, and a yearning glance to the fortress, he climbed. Slid off his air tank, peeled off his mask and kicked free of his fins; then he stood there, dripping onto the boat as she sized him up.
She whistled, almost giggling. "I'm guessing you had to borrow a suit for the swim."
Caleb narrowed his eyes at her. "You're making jokes?" He pointed over his shoulder to the mainland, where helicopters ro
amed over the ruins of the Bibliotheca Alexandrina. "Right after that just happened?" His hand clenched into fists. "Nina, what have you done?"
Her grin evaporated. Her eyes darted to the disaster site, then back to her prisoner. "I… I'm still sorting it out. Still figuring…"
"Your place in Calderon's world?"
"My place," she said through clenched teeth, "is with my boys."
"Our boys." Caleb leaned toward her. "Nina, listen. If I had only–"
"Looked? If you had bothered, or if Lydia hadn't completely distracted you?"
"I know. I would have seen you, but I had no idea. I wasn't even thinking of questioning it. You were dead, I thought. Why would I want to relive that? Why would I look for you, only to see you die again?" His eyes pleaded, and this time, at last he really meant it. "I would have, Nina. I would have gone to the ends of the earth to save you."
She snickered. "Touching. But we both know that once you found out I was working for Waxman, you were glad I was gone."
"I'm not going to argue anymore. If you're not going to let me go, then shoot me if it'll make you feel better."
"Oh it would, Caleb. It really would. But I think Jacob and Isaac really want to meet their daddy, and I can't deny them such a simple pleasure." She took a seat opposite him on the deck, crossing her silky tan legs slowly while she leaned forward, casually holding the .45. "But first, there's the matter of Giza's subterranean labyrinth. Senator Calderon tasked me to find out exactly what you learned down there."
Caleb cocked his head. "Why? Couldn't he get the boys to RV it?"
Nina didn't move. "Their minds are… a little OCD, I'd say. Getting them to focus is like teaching a golden retriever to play chess in a park full of kids throwing balls." She absently tapped the gun's barrel against her front teeth. "Now, why don't you tell me what you're up to? What is it you and Xavier thought you could do to stop Calderon? Stop a man who could do…" she motioned to the devastation on the shore "…that?"
Caleb smoothed back his thick wet hair, and his eyes locked on hers. She didn't need the gun to make him feel like he was at her mercy. Just like when they had first met, he felt out of her league, humbled by her beauty. Only now, he could see something else behind her eyes: the calculating, catlike fury and selfishness that Nina possessed in abundance. But he held onto a hope that just as Caleb had changed after he had discovered he had a son, maybe some grand lycanthropic transformation would work her over, reforming her. But it didn't seem likely.
"Go to hell," he whispered. "You want to find out, you know what you have to do."
"Oh," Nina said, tracing her lips with the gun's barrel, "you'd like that, wouldn't you?"
Caleb stood up. "Again, I'm not here to talk, and I'm not here to help you. Do what you need to do, but I won't be a willing subject."
Nina stood beside him, taking the bait without realizing she'd just been hooked. Smiling, she reached for him and said, "Just the way I like it."
#
He felt a burning rush as she grabbed his wrist, and then she was turning him towards her, and the sun was behind her, blazing through her hair, and her face disappeared into the blackest shadow as she leaned in.
And then her lips were on his, her tongue opening his mouth, her lungs sucking in his breath. He squirmed in her grasp, even as he felt the electric chill of her curves against his wet chest, her legs encircling his calves, pinning him in place as she took his thoughts. His memories, his essence.
But this time, he was prepared. His mind was focused.
She may have thought she was taking from him, but this time, he was the one giving.
#
She saw it all, just as he had mentally prepped it, as if he had loaded the projector in his mind, and had it playing in an infinite loop so that anyone that poked their head in for a look, would see…
A massive ripple of energy, nearly invisible but sparking as if roiling with electromagnetic charges at war within the ether, a wave tearing through New York City, blasting the skyline apart, cutting a swath through the island, tearing across the harbor and splitting the waters, causing mirror-image tsunamis, parting before the Statue of Liberty which seemed to wince before being struck. It shatters, arm, torso and crown tossed in separate directions, caught up in the flux and separately pulverized.
Then—ascent, and a satellite's view. The ripple tears across the globe, leaving a path of destruction from an origin point somewhere in eastern Alaska. But then… the clouds are massing, swirling over the northern hemisphere, lighting up from within, periodically bursting with intense flashes. Massive auroras are appearing in the upper atmosphere, as if an unseen hand works with vibrant watercolors, splashing them in broad brushstrokes over the world's skies. Breathtaking. Beautiful.
The earth trembles. Wobbles unsteadily. In breaks of the clouds, the land masses seem to be shifting. Major sections tearing free. Waters spilling over entire countries. The globe shifts the wrong way. The poles reverse. Flipping, as if something has completely unsettled the core, scrambled it and shut off the dynamo at the center of Earth's molten center, then jump-started it again.
The vision draws sideways so that the Earth is out of the frame, and its companion pulls near. The Moon. Silvery, lustrous, complacent. So bright…
...on one side. But we're nearing, soaring around, towards the darkness. Towards…
#
The vision ended in a searing ball of light. Intense white that turned to yellow, then dimmed… and dimmed. She couldn't get her bearings, but Nina felt as if she were weightless. Still in space. Still…
Then it dawned on her. She couldn't see, not yet. Not with the glare of the sun still tearing at her eyes, but she knew all the same. She was in the water. In the damn harbor. With… a vest on? And—a regulator stuffed into her mouth. She was breathing the tasteless but pure air from a scuba tank.
That meant…
Shit!
She tried to spin around, awkwardly lashing out with her hands. Where was he? How did she get out here?
But then she realized it.
He had been ready for her. He knew she'd try to pry the truth from his mind, and he was ready.
But with what?
What the hell was that?
She floated, and her vision gradually returned along with the sound of a motor, a familiar motor, departing swiftly.
Damn Caleb.
#
Lucky, he thought, steering the boat the last few yards, coasting into the dock, where two youths waited with ropes to reel and tether him in. I got lucky. Nina had her guard down, and never considered that Caleb could show her anything that would literally send her reeling.
Let her stew on that, he thought as he disembarked and gave the boat-hands a tip out of the purse Nina had left behind. He took that with him, wrapped in a towel that he tucked under his arm.
Happily, she had also left her cell phone on the seat. He quickly made his way into the shadow of Qaitbey's Fortress and took it out, preparing to dial Phoebe. But first he glanced out into the harbor, where far out there he thought he could make out Nina, starting to swim for the rocky shore. He knew it was probably a mistake to let her live. But he wasn't a killer. He could no more strap weights to her chest and dump her, unconscious, into the harbor, than he could strangle a sleeping cat. Not to mention the newfound connection they shared. But while he couldn't kill her, only incapacitate her for a time, neither did he believe they could work together.
Hopefully what he had shown her would cause her to second-guess what she had been told. Or at least, to start to question whose side she was really on. But he wouldn't count on it.
He had work to do.
On the second ring, Phoebe picked up and once she heard his voice, relief flooded hers. "Big brother! Glad my vision wasn't wrong, and you're still alive. How's Alexander?"
"Safe, for now. But listen, we need to move fast. And I don't want them tracking this call. I need your help. Can you get me out of here? Where are you, I trie
d looking, but only–"
"Saw something blue?" Phoebe's voice was giddy, like she had just opened a favorite present. "We got ourselves one of those shields!"
"A what? And who's we?"
"You won't believe me. Orlando and I, we're on a plane, nearing…"
Caleb heard an unfamiliar voice yell out and cut her off: "Don't say where we're going!"
"Oh right," said Phoebe. "Kind of defeats the purpose of a shield. Anyway, we're with some others with similar interests. Been recruited, you might say. We'll find a way to get you here discreetly."
"Phoebe, listen. That can wait. If you've got access to discreet transportation—and I can only cringe and guess why—then have your new friends have a jet waiting for me at the Alexandrian airstrip. I need to go to New York City. I'll explain later."
"Oh, I bet it's something to do with the statue!"
Caleb held out his hand for a cab, as soon as he reached the end of the promontory and back toward the street.
"You wouldn't believe what we've seen," Phoebe continued. "And we're about to learn a lot more, I'm guessing, but already it's out of this world stuff."
Caleb caught her emphasis, and immediately thought of the artwork down under the pyramids, the strange remnant technology, and his and Xavier's visions.
"Okay, just tell me you can get the plane."
"I think so. Go, and we'll have it ready. Just for you?"
"Yeah, Xavier's let himself get captured."
"What? Why?"
"Said it was to buy us our escape, but I know he's got something else in mind. He needs to get into Calderon's camp, probably has to do with something he's seen. But all that's out of my hands. I need to get the one thing I know can help us."
"All right, big brother. Get to the airport, do your thing. We'll see you when we see you. In the meantime…"
"You're in charge of the Morpheus Initiative, Phoebe. I trust you. And if you trust these new friends, then you have my confidence to bring them in on what we know. Pool your resources. If I fail…"
The Cydonia Objective (Morpheus Initiative 03) Page 14