Death of a Pharaoh

  He watched with pride as the team unloaded four jeeps, several tons of ordinance and a large camouflage tent in record time. The attack was scheduled to begin just before dawn and with luck it would be over in ten minutes. His men would have another quarter of an hour to mop up, scan the features of every victim to a computer station with sophisticated face recognition software, photograph any bodies that matched the profiles of the targets and abandon the scene before police and first responders arrived. He calculated they would be airborne before 9 am local time. He would trigger explosives planted near Léopold Sédar Senghor International Airport, a military barracks and a popular market just as they took off. He was certain local forces would be overwhelmed with four major disasters at the same time.

  At 6.29 am, he marked t minus one minute and waited for the gates of hell to open. Sixty seconds later, in perfect military coordination four Russian AGS-17 grenade launchers, six portable RPO-A missile launchers armed with thermobaric warheads and numerous machine guns vomited death and destruction in a classic case of overkill. Sergei worried for a moment there would be nothing left for his men to scan.

  It was already dawn. Ryan and Tony decided to try to get some sleep. The sound of distant gunfire changed their plans.

  “That’s some heavy shit,” Tony declared. “Full alert,” he barked into his radio.

  When he turned back Ryan was laying on the floor in convulsions. His first thought was that he had been hit by a stray bullet but there was no sign of blood.

  “Zach, wake up,” he yelled.

  A groggy Zach sat up and rubbed his eyes, “What’s up?”

  “Something’s wrong with Ryan, I think he fainted.”

  Sporadic shots replaced the rapid automatic fire in the distance. Tony had a sickening feeling that they were coming from the area of the compound.

  Sergei watched the live feed on a monitor as his squad leaders breached the exterior walls. Resistance was virtually non-existent. He soon spotted the telltale muzzle flashes of well-aimed single shots that indicated his men were eliminating any survivors. At 6.38 he received confirmation that the compound was secure and with no casualties among his forces. He expected the results of the first scans at any moment. Sergei smiled for the first time in weeks. Killing civilians was like sex without a condom. You slipped in easy, finished fast and pulled out without a mess.

  The Georgian’s initial ecstasy was short lived. Only one of the bodies matched any of the four priority targets. He ordered his men to repeat the scans on all the male victims. So far, they had only identified the owner of the property, a Senegalese national named Chief Assane Mbaye. The Consortium would not be happy if the three Americans on the list escaped the attack. Their intelligence was obviously flawed. If the repeat scans confirmed the miss, he’d have no choice but to abort the mission and return to the aircraft. The possible capture of the multi-national assault team loaded down with Russian and Chinese manufactured weaponry by Senegalese forces would create an international incident with severe ramifications.

  He almost regretted that he no longer served in the Russian military. After such a failure they would court martial him and banish him to a labor camp in Siberia. The Consortium would not be so lenient. As his jeep sped toward the rendezvous point at the airport, he was already making plans to offer his group as mercenaries in any one of several conflicts active in North Africa. There was always work for his kind.

  Zach shone a flashlight into Ryan’s eyes, “His pupils aren’t responding,” he announced, “but he seems to be breathing alright.”

  Tony detected the concern in his voice and this from a man who had just lost his mother a few hours ago.

  “What do you think it is?”

  “It’s similar to what happened when they killed his grandmother,” he explained. “Some terrible event just took place and he’s absorbed all the pain. I think he’s in shock.”

  “Will he be OK?”

  Zach didn’t have an answer.

  Tony’s radio squelched followed by a voice that warned of a vehicle approaching fast. He drew a pistol from his holster and gave it to Zach.

  “We can’t lose him,” he warned as he raced out of the room and scrambled up the ladder to the roof.

  They could see the headlights of the fast-approaching jeep but it was still too dark to make out the occupants. Tony ordered his men to shoot to kill if they came under attack. In the distance, he could see the flames from what he knew was Chief Mbaye’s compound. All of his men had family who worked or lived there but their faces betrayed no emotion as they tracked the vehicle speeding toward them. His right index finger caressed the trigger of his automatic rifle. He had killed nine boys with his fists but never anyone with a gun. He knew he wouldn’t hesitate now. Static came over the radio. Someone was trying to raise him.

  “Tony, this is Ethan. Hold your fire!”

  “Stand down,” he shouted to his men.

  The jeep pulled up and screeched to a halt. Tony leapt out and helped Mariam who seemed in distress.

  Tony guided them into the beach house where they stared at Ryan laying on the floor. Mariam ran to his side and put his head on her lap. Zach got up and joined the others.

  “Someone attacked the compound,” Ethan reported. “I doubt there were any survivors.”

  He glanced over at Mariam. They understood. All her family were there.

  “We thought you were in the compound,” Tony said. “Gracias a Dios.”

  “We had a flat tire and were three blocks away when we heard the first mortar rounds. We headed straight back here.”

  Tony placed a hand on his shoulder, “You made the right decision or you’d be dead as well.”

  “What happened to the Pharaoh?”

  “Just like back at Sullivan,” Zach commented. “I think he felt the pain of the victims and even worse he probably thought you and Mariam were among them.”

  “A military transport flew overhead about two hours before dawn and Ryan told me he picked up a vision of a man with a large scar.”

  “From a plane?”

  Tony nodded affirmatively.

  “Did he say which side?”

  “The left, I think.”

  “Sergei Grigorievich Chibirov,” Ethan put a name to the face. “We’ve been tracking him for weeks. He’s a mercenary for the Consortium. Georgian and ruthless. He’s wanted for war crimes in Afghanistan. Our last intel had him in Sudan a few days ago.”

  “Not anymore,” Tony stated.

  Several large explosions made the ground shake under their feet.

  Sergei detonated the bombs only moments before takeoff. While they taxied, he sent a cryptic message to his employers informing them of the botched mission.

  The jet assist kicked in with less than two hundred meters left of the runway. The landing gear almost clipped a peeling water tower at the edge of a small farm. The wings of the giant metallic albatross groaned in protest as the pilot made a gut wrenching turn to head for the ocean on the same heading they had used to land. On the left, they could easily detect the smoke and fire from the destroyed compound and the three diversionary blasts. The fire caused by the bomb at the market, usually packed at this hour, had already spread to a nearby shantytown. Many civilians would die that morning for nothing.

  The same people who had been rattled out of their beds several hours earlier, now watched as the transport soared overhead. Ethan, Tony and Zach raced to the roof of the beach house just in time to see it fly past at an altitude that spoke volumes of the skill of the pilot. More than one of them were tempted to aim a few rounds at the fuselage out of revenge but they were all dedicated Servants of Ma’at. Those who turned away snapped their heads back in disbelief when a bright orange fireball enveloped the fuselage. The violent explosion tore the plane apart and sent tons of flaming debris cascading to the blue waters below. A fishing boat quickly sank after a chunk of the landing gear tore a catastrophic hole in the wooden keel. It appeared the Consortium now had a
policy of zero tolerance with failure.

  A coded message arrived at the secret base of the mercenary forces in the Sudan. The man, who only moments earlier sent the signal to detonate the hidden explosives on the ill-fated transport plane, learned of his appointment as the new commander of the expeditionary forces. He had expected the news. His very presence betrayed the Consortium’s lack of confidence in his predecessor, a victim of inbred Soviet arrogance.

  Johannes Botha should have led the operation from the very beginning. After all, with two decades commanding Special Forces in apartheid South Africa, he had an impressive resume of successful covert operations and multiple slayings; including several members of the armed wing of the African National Congress who because of him would never embarrass the nation serving as State Ministers or Ambassadors. Killing uppity kaffirs was his specialty. He’d worked on the planned assassination of Nelson Mandela in 1992 before the commie loving American president sent a team of Secret Service agents to beef up his security and ruined everything. Those Kennedys were to blame, even if Bush made the decision. It was little wonder that God-fearing patriots in that country had taken aim at so many of that negro-loving family. Born in Rhodesia, he moved to South Africa at an early age and had never once uttered the name Zimbabwe. He had a pathological hatred of black leaders, who he considered several links short on the evolutionary scale.

  While the Georgian mentally masturbated over rocket launchers and helicopters, he had quietly built a network of contacts at the highest levels in the police, military, government and high-tech industries throughout the continent. Johannes understood how the monkey mind functioned. If the ex-prison faggots were still in Africa, he’d find them. The badly planned operation in Dakar killed everyone and destroyed any evidence in the compound. There was no one left to interrogate. He would have tortured a few of them before wasting any bullets. The incompetence of the recently deceased Colonel was a setback; but he was certain it was only temporary in nature.

  Chapter Thirty-two

  Twenty-four hours after the disastrous attack on the compound, Ethan chaired a meeting of the survivors at the beach house. The Pharaoh’s condition was still critical and doctors advised against moving him until they could study the data from a portable neurosensing device scheduled to arrive later that day.

  Tony, Zach and Mariam accompanied Ethan around the modest kitchen table. Herbert Lewis joined them by video conferencing on a secure satellite feed along with the Foundation’s medical team. For added security, Ethan’s men draped and sanitized the background to ensure nothing gave away their location. The mood was sombre but determined.

  Since earlier that morning, doctors monitored the Pharaoh’s vital signs through remote software. The high-tech headset implanted with electrodes to collect data on brain activity passed through customs in Dakar that morning around the neck of an American tourist who informed the officer that he was listening to Didier Awadi and looking forward to his visit to Senegal to discover his roots.

  Ethan began with a moment of silence for the victims then continued with a report on the attack. He tried to remain impassive. Everyone had lost a friend or relative and there was no room for emotion. There were thirty-seven fatalities in total, including nine children and fourteen women. Three families lost every living member. Chief Mbaye was among the losses. Only eight of the dead were armed. Senegalese authorities handled the autopsies and they would not announce the results for several days but anecdotal evidence suggested that almost all the victims expired from a single gunshot to the head. Ethan’s security team lost a dozen members and apart from Tony and Zach, only ten remained. Fortunately, the safe house counted on a well-stocked armoury and ammunition was not an issue.

  Herbert Lewis briefed the group on the murder of Zach’s mother and stepfather. His investigators determined that the FBI discovered the cell number used by Zach’s brother several weeks ago but they needed a call of at least 90 seconds to get around the firewalls of the foundation and perform a triangulation. It appeared someone planned Mrs. Adams’ death solely to provoke the call. Herbert suspected that a mole in the FBI passed the information to the Consortium.

  Ethan watched Zach while the Vizier spoke. His eyes grew misty when Herbert mentioned his mother’s death but he was holding up well under the circumstances. Ethan had excused him from the meeting that morning but he insisted on attending. It was a credit to his dedication.

  Herbert updated them on the preparations for the coronation that now took on added urgency. Everyone agreed that when the Pharaoh recovered from the shock of the attack, getting him safely to his enthronement would present major obstacles. The least of them, the presence of their archenemy, Sanctus Verum, in the vicinity of the old Royal tomb. As long as they persisted in their desperate search for the remains of the Pharaoh Jesus of Nazareth, they could not guarantee the security of the Pharaoh in Egypt. Herbert had instructed the project leader to develop a plan to neutralize the Vatican agency. The team in Dakar had enough on their plates already dealing with the Pharaoh’s condition, the Consortium and their mercenaries.

  The only good news was that Operation Baal had achieved spectacular results, as evidenced by the brutal reaction of the Consortium. Dr. Golding’s team calculated that the economic losses would set back their evil agenda by almost three years. An acute lack of liquidity due to massive margin calls forced them to sell important assets at far below acquisition costs. The wounds were not fatal but without major injections of cash in the coming weeks, they would be unable to continue with their nefarious plan.

  It was the only ray of sunshine in what was otherwise a dark day in the history of the Servants of Ma’at. They adjourned while they waited for the arrival of the neurosensing device. Ethan felt it was better not to mention to the others the greatest concern as expressed by Dr. Wilkins in a private phone call that morning, the possibility of brain damage due to the intensity of the sensory episode that the Pharaoh experienced at the time of the attack. The pain he described during the transfer of powers on the death of his grandmother might have crippled a lesser mind and Ryan didn’t even lose consciousness at the time.

  No one on the team of neuropsychiatrists working with Dr. Wilkins dared to place a magnitude on the intensity of the suffering required to send him into a coma.

  Lord Thoth was as alarmed as his colleagues were by the dramatic turn of events on earth. Since the attack, the dream file of the Pharaoh had remained blank. It showed no data whatsoever; not even a scribble. The circumstances suggested two possibilities – a complete lack of brain activity or that the coma somehow prevented the Pharaoh from entering into REM sleep. They had not designed the system to record any other state. Either eventuality was worrisome but should Nkosana not recover, the future of the world looked very bleak.

  Chapter Thirty-three

  Private Study, Abdelaziz residence, Cairo, Egypt: 08.32 EET October 24, 2016

  Mustafa read the top-secret message from Herbert Lewis with deep concern. The attack in Dakar and the current condition of the Pharaoh had sent shockwaves throughout the organization. The unspoken fear that the young Pharaoh might never recover in order to be crowned was something he refused to accept. He could not believe that the Gods would allow such a thing to happen. Still, he found himself praying more than was normal for him these past few days.

  The Vizier commanded him to develop a plan to take care of the Sanctus Verum problem. It was not easy to come up with a solution. As part of the project to transfer the mummies of the True Pharaohs to the new tomb, he had commissioned a study of the state of each body using the very latest scientific tools, including portable CAT scans. The condition of some of the older relics was a problem for the transfer but one mummy in particular kept him awake at night. His experts were especially concerned about the corpse of the Pharaoh Jesus of Nazareth. The wooden coffin inside the stone sarcophagus had deteriorated and collapsed onto the body. Several splinters the size of large stakes penetrated the wrappings and threa
tened the integrity of the remains. The mummy itself was in acceptable condition but required restoration and stabilization inside the sarcophagus. There was a major risk of damage from any movement and his experts warned of even transporting the sarcophagus by truck. It was out of the question to attempt to remove the mummy from the sarcophagus in situ as it was hermetically sealed and the exposure of the ancient body to air might have a disastrous impact on the remains.

  It was obvious to all that the best solution to the unwelcome presence of the Vatican forces was the removal of the mummy of the Pharaoh Jesus to a secret location outside of Egypt. Everyone agreed but up to now, no one had presented a viable plan for getting the enormous sarcophagus out of the country without causing irreparable harm to the mummy of a God.

  Mustafa convened a committee to look into the question of where to take the body. They recently submitted four suggested final resting places, each offering adequate accessibility and superb security. All of them outside of Egypt and three were in Europe. Normally, the Pharaoh would make the final decision before his coronation. Regardless of the location, it was imperative that they transport the remains to a laboratory to unseal the sarcophagus in aseptic conditions where experts could restore and fit it with a new high-tech coffin to protect it during further transit. His technicians sourced a truck with a platform equipped with highly sophisticated computerized shock absorbers for transporting volatile explosives.

  Unfortunately, there was only one road leading past the secret entrance to the current tomb and the Swiss employees of Sanctus Verum controlled it twenty-four hours a day. They obtained government permission to search all vehicles passing their headquarters due to a rash of pipe thefts in the area that threatened to leave the region without a drop of water. If they attempted to bring the truck across the rock-strewn terrain to avoid the Swiss, it would greatly challenge the shock absorbing technology that was only designed for paved roads. They were certain that Sanctus Verum would detect the movement of the truck in any case and make the safe arrival at the laboratory in Cairo impossible.