He looked at the coordinates that had been time stamped onto the first picture he pulled out of the envelope. Then he cross-referenced those coordinates with what he was looking at. He shook his head and then reached for the phone. He called the number he had memorized in just the last two days.
“Johnson,” came the reply on the other end of the phone.
“I have the trace report,” Vickers said as he continued to look at the picture of the high desert surrounding Nellis Air Force Base.
“So, where do our mysterious heroes live and work?”
“Before I give you the answer, I have a question, and it comes directly from our British friends.”
“Go ahead.”
“They want to know what preparations you’ve made in connection with the Perdition Hacienda. If we complete this assignment for them, there will be no end to their gratitude, which may come in handy for our new operations.”
There was a brief silence on the other end of the phone. Then the large man who had just arrived home from Texas cleared his throat. “You can pass it on to those interested parties that the hacienda will cease to exist in just about twenty-seven minutes, compliments of the government of Mexico.”
“And this will eliminate any possibility of the drugs getting out into the open?”
There was a small laugh on the other end of the phone. “You can say that, yes.” The man became silent as he waited. He knew he didn’t have to press the man at Langley for information on the trace because the man he had tagged outside of Nuevo Laredo was now under intense scrutiny by one of the darkest forces in American intelligence.
“The tracer report says that your target landed at Nellis Air Force Base in Nevada, and then according to what amounts to guesswork, the hard target vanishes beneath the high desert.”
“Obviously I can’t get a straight answer out of anyone in Washington. I don’t send my men anywhere on guesswork. That kind of stuff went out of favor a long time ago. If you want us to recover what was taken from that hacienda, you damn well better get me some reliable intel as to who these people are and who they work for. We were lucky to get the body of Guzman reduced to ruins, but they have a sample of the product your British friends want destroyed. Now, I’ve been doing a little homework myself. The man who led the rescue attempt across the border, I thought I recognized him, but couldn’t place him until now.”
As Hiram Vickers waited, his incoming e-mail chimed. He opened it and then saw it was from the very same man to whom he was speaking at this very moment. He clicked on the attachment and a picture began downloading.
“Find me this man, and I’ll find that jar they took out of Perdition’s Gate. Don’t find him, and I guess the Brits’ dirty little secret will not be so for long.”
Hiram regretted having told the Black Team operative everything about who requested their assistance. But the new operating parameters of the Black Teams prohibited them from operating without the full range of intel on their prospective target. He knew this man was determined to keep the Men in Black far more secretive than they had been in the past before they had been dismantled by the federal authorities.
As Vickers watched his computer screen he saw a herky-jerky video of what looked like a C-Span broadcast. As the camera zoomed in on a man in the uniform of a United States Army officer, it cleared up and then the picture froze as the generated name came on below the frozen picture of a big man as he packed up a briefcase with papers. Vickers saw that the video had been purloined from a C-Span broadcast of a senate hearing on the Afghan conflict. Then he looked at the name on the bottom and a flitting memory came to him.
“I think this will help a great deal, if you’re sure this is the man you tagged?”
“Anyone in our line of work knows exactly who this man is and what he brings to the table. He’s dangerous, not only to me, but to you and anyone who crosses him. If he still has Perdition’s Fire it will be hard to get from him. Now send me what you have so I can work from my end.”
“Right,” Vickers said and then terminated the call. He looked closer at the sun-hardened features of the man frozen in time on his monitor. He then glanced at the printed name below the picture as he placed the yellow envelope and its contents under his arm in readiness to forward what he had to the Black Team in Denver. He reached out and hesitated before he turned off his monitor, but not before Hiram Vickers memorized the hard features of the man.
The C-Span freeze-frame of the soldier known six years before as Major Jack Collins faded to black.
EVENT GROUP COMPLEX
NELLIS AFB, NEVADA
Jack sat at his desk inside the security department cut off from the rest of his people. He stared at the computer screen for the longest time in an attempt to make the words he had written make sense. They were words he thought he never would have placed end to end in his entire life.
They had been in the complex for the past eight hours, and he was waiting for the call that would send him into the director’s office. Collins closed his eyes in an effort to make the last few words in the document he had written fade away along with the sight of them.
A knock sounded at the door.
“Come in,” he said as he leaned slightly toward the monitor and spoke softly as Captain Carl Everett entered his office. “Europa, file and code document 1877, security one, Collins.”
“Document filed, Colonel Collins,” answered the Marylyn Monroe voice, one that Collins had finally gotten used to. He had hated it, but finally came to terms that everyone in the complex liked the sexiness of the computer-generated voice synthesizer.
“Jack, we have an update on Ryan,” Everett said as he watched Collins lean away from the computer terminal.
“Is he screaming bloody murder yet?”
“You know he is. He said to tell you that if he’s to stay put in the hospital he wants a transfer to one that has better-looking nurses.” Everett watched the colonel’s face for any reaction.
“Tell him he’s damned lucky to have been moved from Texas to Las Vegas, and if he’s not careful, you’ll send him right back there.”
Carl noticed that Jack said he would have to send him back, not Jack himself. Everett smiled and took a seat without Collins offering it to him.
“Other than that, what are they saying about our flyboy?”
“He’s doing better than expected. He’s sore as hell and has two dueling scars he can thrill women with, so all in all the kid got off lucky.” Everett smiled hoping to get Collins to react to something. “I didn’t know hearing about the security department’s loss in our football game had upset you that much?”
Jack didn’t hear the question and looked at his second in command. “Excuse me?” he said.
“Okay, what’s going on? You’ve been in here since we came home. Sarah’s been in twice and even Charlie Ellenshaw dropped by to collect his winnings from the game and wanted to see you, but you told him to go away. I guess you sort of hurt the fuzzy-haired guy. You’ve been locked up in here doing God knows what—so, what gives?”
Jack took a deep breath and then looked at Everett. “Did you get to Doc Gilliam and have that shrapnel taken out of your shoulder?”
“I’ll get in line behind you as soon as you get that hand checked out. In case you didn’t notice, you have a bullet hole in it.”
Collins looked at his bandaged hand and then looked back at Everett. “I have to stop by the director’s office first. You want to tag along?”
“As long as it’s on the way to the infirmary, sure,” Everett answered as he watched Jack leave his chair for the first time in hours.
Collins led the way from the security offices, nodding at a very tired Will Mendenhall as the lieutenant sat at his desk adjusting the security roster for the absence of Lance Corporal Udall and Jason Ryan.
As they gained the hallway just to the left of the elevators, Jack turned to Everett.
“How many men do you have on our French friend down in the infirmary?”
“Two in the room, two in the hallway.”
“As soon as he’s able to be moved, put him in isolation down on level eighteen, with only a cot and a blanket.”
Everett nodded as they waited for the elevator. “The president wants Farbeaux turned over immediately to the FBI. He says now that we have him, he’s going to stay a guest of the United States for a very long time.”
Jack looked at Everett and then raised his left eyebrow. “I want you to conduct the debriefing of Colonel Farbeaux. The president doesn’t get him until that’s concluded,” he said as the elevator doors finally opened.
“I thought you would have wanted to have that little conversation with Henri?” Carl said as he watched Jack step into the elevator. Finally, when no answer came from his boss, Everett stepped in beside the colonel. “Europa, level seven, please.”
“Level seven.”
The elevator started up on its air-cushioned ride as Jack leaned back against the rear of the glass car.
“Europa, location of Director Compton, please,” Jack inquired as he closed his eyes once more.
“Director Compton is currently on level seventy-two, specimen vault 789000.”
“Location of Lieutenant McIntire, geology department?” he asked next.
“Lieutenant McIntire is currently conducting research on geological abnormalities found in current volcanic cones in the Central Pacific.”
“Have Lieutenant McIntire stop her research and join us on level seventy-two at the appropriate vault please. Now stop the elevator and take us to level seventy-two.”
“Yes, Colonel,” said Europa as the elevator came to a very fast and hissing stop. Then as Collins looked at Everett the elevator reversed and started down into the bowels of the Event Group Complex.
“You going to tell me what’s going on?” Carl asked.
“Any word yet on the properties of that magic elixir we took out of Perdition?” he asked instead of answering his friend.
“They haven’t touched the sample yet. The director wants some of our people currently on assignment to be in on the opening phase of the research. He’s also recalled the former head of our infectious disease department who now works for the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta. The doctor and his daughter are on the security clearance list. So I guess if the director is recalling old personnel back into the fold, this stuff must worry him to no end.”
“The director thinks it may be a virus?”
“He doesn’t know yet, but he says if a reaction can happen that fast on Guzman, he can’t take any chances.” Everett turned and faced Collins. “But I guess you would have known that if you had read the same report I did.”
“Patience, Captain.”
As the elevator doors slid open and Europa announced their desired location, Jack shook his head when he thought Carl was going to ask another question. Both blue-clad men stepped into the hallway on level seventy-two and went directly to the security arch that led to the vaults. One of their security men was at his station at a small, clear desk and stood when they approached.
“Is the director still in the vault area?” Jack asked as he placed his hand on the glass security scanner and had his prints and the moisture content in his hand analyzed for his DNA. Europa cleared the colonel for entrance and then did the same for Everett.
“Yes, sir. He and the assistant director are classifying several new artifacts that have been transferred down to the new vault level.”
Jack went down the curving, plastic-lined hallway that hid the granite strata underneath. Level seventy-two was one of the newest vault areas in the complex and was just now starting to fill up with the treasures of the world’s past.
Collins ran his large hand along the wall as he headed toward the only vault door open on this level. Everett watched him and noticed that it was like Jack was taking it all in for the first time.
“We’ve done, I mean, the Group has done good things here, right?” he asked before stepping up to the open thirteen-foot steel door.
“If you mean has the Group fulfilled its charter? I think so. How many parallels in history have we uncovered that may have averted a war? Given the president something extra that he would never have known if it wasn’t for the Group? Yeah Jack, we’ve done some very good things. Everyone at the Event Group, past or present, has all done what was asked.”
Jack just nodded his head and gave Carl a ghost of a smile. “That helps.”
Everett watched Jack knock lightly on the sill of the giant vault door and then step over the threshold. He was about to follow when he heard a voice that usually gave him pleasure.
“Hey, Captain, we having a clandestine meeting down here?”
Everett smiled as he took in the battered face of Sarah McIntire. Both of her eyes were black and blue and the right was still nearly closed. She had a large bandage on her head where she had received sixteen stitches from Dr. Gilliam just two hours before. He lost his smile as he realized at that moment why they were there. It didn’t enter his mind until he saw the shape that Sarah was in. It all clicked as he allowed the diminutive McIntire to enter the vault first.
Jack was impressed with this particular acquisition they had uncovered in a small valley just inside the South African province of Natal. The vault was lined with artifacts and weapons from a period of revolt in what was once a part of the British Empire—Zululand.
Collins watched as Niles turned toward him with pride. He and Assistant Director Virginia Pollock were standing near a glass enclosure with hydrogen hoses running into it. There was another hose that fed the small enclosure with humidified air to keep it at a constant 67 degrees.
“What have we here?” Sarah asked in that never-ending wonder she always had for the vault areas of the complex. Collins turned and looked at his beaten but happy Sarah McIntire and wasn’t surprised at the wonder of a schoolgirl as she took in the new find.
“Actually, you can thank the colonel’s department for this one. They went on a hunch and raided a very wealthy South African gentleman and relieved him of this and other valuable historic finds. It turned out that this gentleman still longed for the days of apartheid. He stole everything here and was responsible for one of the most blatant grave robberies of the twentieth century,” Niles Compton said as his eyes flitted from Sarah to those of Colonel Collins. Niles patted the glass enclosure. “You’re looking at the remains of a great king, at least in most of the world’s eyes. Here is a man that took on the British Empire in their more heady days. His body was stolen from a simple gravesite back in 1981. No one even realized the theft had taken place.”
Jack smiled at Sarah and both he and the lieutenant turned to study the body inside of the enclosure. Everett stayed back and just watched. Not the enclosure, Niles, Virginia, nor Sarah, but Collins.
Sarah rubbed up against Jack as she looked at the shriveled but somehow still proud corpse of a man from their past.
“Say hello to the onetime king of the Zulu nation,” Niles said proudly. “I give you Cetshwayo—the man who defeated the British army at Isandlwana, Transvaal Province. It amounted to the Empire’s version of Custer’s Last Stand. It would be like us standing here looking at the body of Crazy Horse.”
Jack’s eyes moved from the body lying in its enclosure to the weapons lining the vault’s walls. There were spears, muskets, and lion’s skins, along with zebra skin shields. Large crates of more short-handled spears and artifacts sat on shelves.
“This man had all of this stuff in his possession?” Sarah asked as she smiled and looked at a far-away Jack.
“All of it. We were mostly interested in collecting the stolen remains. The president wants to make it a gift to the Zulu people, after—”
“We study and release,” both Sarah and Virginia Pollock said at the same time. They knew Niles wouldn’t give anything up until the old king had been documented from head to toe for their records.
Niles lost his smile when he looked from the enclo
sure to the face of Jack Collins. He cleared his throat and then his eyes traveled to those of Carl Everett. He patted Jack on the shoulder. “So what brings you down to my territory, Jack?” he asked, knowing full well what was about to happen.
Jack turned and walked over to the far wall and Europa’s temporary computer terminal.
“Europa, are you online?” Jack asked, looking at the blank screen that would one day soon hold a talking tour of the vault they were now standing inside.
“Yes, Colonel Collins.”
“Please give me a hard-copy printout of document 1877, security Collins, please.”
Without comment, Europa did as ordered and started printing out the document Collins had been working on since his return to the complex. He waited out the moment in silence and then pulled the single page from the printer. He handed the single paragraph to Niles, who refused to look at it. Instead he nodded at Virginia and she moved out into the rock-lined hallway. Niles followed.
“Before we see what Jack’s brought us, I want to show you a few more things of recent acquisition,” Niles said as he waited for the three people to catch up with him and Virginia.
All of the vaults on this level were brand new. Niles walked to a large vault thirty feet away and then slid his ID card down the security lock.
“I had these flown here from our original complex inside Arlington National Cemetery.” Niles swung open the door and waited for his people to enter.
Sitting on tables and on the vault’s floor was what remained from the evidence taken in the 1916 raid on Perdition’s Gate.
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