by Chuck Dixon
“Don’t even try giving me that ‘environmental study’ shit,” Boats said. He was standing inside Dwayne’s space.
“I told you, Dwayne,” Jimbo said, and jacked the last round from his rifle.
“Told Dwayne what?” Boats said.
“Jim said you were smarter than you look,” Dwayne said.
Boats’ eyes narrowed. He wasn’t sure how to take that.
“Tell him the whole thing,” Jimbo said.
“Why?”
“I want to see the look on his face.”
Dwayne laid it out for Boats. He told him about the Taubers’ very special device and the trip they had taken to a lake valley in prehistoric Nevada, and all the wild shit they saw and experienced there. He shared how they lost Rick Renzi. He told him about the golden idol. He laid out the whole Sir Neal Harnesh scenario, and why they needed to stay on the move. He explained to Boats about why they were in the Aegean and where they planned on going and what they hoped to find there.
Boats took it all in. When Dwayne was done, Boats poked through his pockets for a crumpled pack of Marlboros. He lit one with a gold lighter engraved with the SEALs eagle. He took a drag and let out smoke that trailed away astern in the wind their forward progress was creating.
“Bring me back something,” he said at last.
“Like a t-shirt?” Jimbo said.
“No, you dumb pogue.” Boats grinned. “A sword, or something cool like that.”
“Not a problem,” Dwayne said.
24
Left Behind
Morris needed sleep, only he knew it would not come. Instead, he was sitting in front of his computer array down in the Tube chamber. He wore two sweaters and had a blanket over his shoulders. The rings encircling the walkway were coated in inches of ice that had condensed on the steel like a skin. The temperature was just above freezing and the air painfully dry. He scrolled from screen to screen with red-rimmed eyes.
It was always like this when he had an unsolved problem. Sleep was pointless and restless and ultimately futile. His mind could not rest while any detail was left inconclusive. The first trial of the Tube was aimed at a random day in the past. The return trips used that first foray as a base point—a benchmark. For this new expedition to work, he would need to reach a certain date in a certain year. The insertion team had to manifest to a designated day in the past with perhaps a forty-eight-hour window of error.
Technically, theoretically, the problem had been solved for him by the Vestergaard Equation. It was an obscure algorithm worked out a decade before by an even more obscure Danish mathematician named Bode Vestergaard. It sought to create a workable equation that could be applied to the concept of, then strictly theoretical, time travel. The Dane theorized a device much like the Tauber Tube and created a series of equations that was broken into twelve sub-formulas and included thousands of symbols. It made the quantum field theory called second quantization look like high school algebra.
Morris applied the equation when he created his Chronus program for tuning the Tube’s field intensity to reach desired targets in the past. It certainly worked out in rough results. He aimed for exactly one hundred thousand years in the past and was only off by a year and four months. That would not do here. He would have to punch the hole for a manifestation in May, 240 BC. He could shoot for earlier and use that as a kind of milestone. Then adjust back closer to the optimal date. That first shot would have to land before the first day of May. If he miscalculated and the team manifested later than May there would be no second shot. The test shot they made was set for 1000 BC to reduce any possibility of an error that would make their hunt for Praxus’ treasure impossible.
For reasons he and Caroline had yet to work out, each trip back created a barrier that could not be crossed. Once they had manifested at one date, that date became a boundary that prevented any further sojourns to periods deeper into the past. That was the reason Caroline chose the earliest date for which she could find chronological references this exact. There would be no travel past that point. It was the fatal flaw in their miraculous device—each usage limited their scope. They were shrinking their options toward the present with each implementation.
To Morris’ mind, it was all worked out. But that was only numbers and models. It was all headwork and keyboard time with no fieldwork. He could be off only a few days, and all of this would be for nothing. Caroline’s theories weren’t theories any more. They worked. God, did they work. Now it came down to Morris’ skills to conjure the desired results.
The screens before him weren’t telling him anything. The longer he stared at them, the less sense they made. Would he even notice an anomaly or missed symbol if there were one to be seen?
The hatch in the wall behind him swung inward with a muted squeal. Caroline entered wearing a parka.
“Chilly,” she said.
“I made hot chocolate, but it goes cold before I can drink it,” Morris said. He turned in his chair to look at her. He welcomed the interruption. His little sister would break him out of this intellectual loop that was chasing its own tail in his mind. But she looked more troubled than he was.
“I heard from Jane in London,” she said. Jane was a friend Caroline made at college. She took a teaching position and was now a professor in—was it archeology? Anthropology? Morris could only remember that she was a chubby girl who came from money of some kind.
“Oh, the bones,” Morris recalled.
“Jane emailed me a full report on her findings. She’s a dear and didn’t ask any questions, though I know she’s dying to.”
“She found a cause of death, then.”
“Yes,” Caroline said quietly. “How old a man would you say Renzi was?”
“I’m not very good at that.” Morris shrugged. “I’d say about my age. Thirty or thereabouts. He was a heavy drinker, so maybe younger.”
“Jane studied the ossification of his skull sutures; where the plates come together. She also examined his cortical bone structure and degenerative changes in his joint sections.”
“Sounds thorough.”
“Rick Renzi was sixty years old when he died,” Caroline said.
“We can’t go back,” Morris said. He stood behind Caroline, who had taken a seat at the computer station.
“I know.”
“The last test. We set a barrier point we can’t go past.”
“I know that, Morris.”
“Have you told Dwayne?”
“I can’t. I can’t tell him his friend lived into old age waiting for someone to come for him. He lived out his life just waiting in that horrible place.”
“Then we carry this with us. It’s just another secret to keep.”
“I know I have to,” Caroline said. “But I’m not sure I can.”
25
Ojos Verdes
The man at the door had eyes as green as a summer pond.
“Lynn Renzi?” the man said.
“Are you from the school?” Lynn said, standing at the partly open front door. He had not knocked or rung the bell. She only sensed he was there when his shadow crossed the windows that faced the front walk.
“I’m not from the school,” the man said.
“Because I sent a note with my daughter. Ricky hasn’t gotten over the flu, so I’m keeping him home until Monday.”
“I’m not from the school,” the man said again. He leaned forward, and she opened the door to allow him into the living room. Lynn got no vibe off this guy. He was well-dressed and professionally polite. He might be one of those guys Dwayne Roenbach had told her could come around asking questions.
He didn’t take a seat. His eyes roamed the room, taking in the toys on the floor and the magazines and catalogs in messy piles on the sofa and coffee table. The sound of TV cartoons came from a room somewhere deeper in the house.
“Is your husband home?”
“My husband is dead.”
The man stood silent.
“Who are you with? Can I see some
ID? One with a picture?”
“I don’t carry pictures of myself.” The man was regarding her now, not looking away, not blinking. He glanced at her protruding belly. She was five months along.
“I’m going have to ask you to leave,” Lynn said.
“I’ll leave when you’ve answered my questions,” he said. There was no change in tone. He was stating a fact, and she had to accept it.
She eyed the cell phone on the side table. She thought of the pump shotgun leaning in her bedroom closet. She thought of Ricky Jr. watching Disney on the TV in the family room. She did nothing.
“When did your husband die?”
“A couple of months ago.”
“Did he know a man named Lee Hammond? Or Dolan Carter?”
“He was in the army with a guy named Hammond.”
“Did you ever meet this guy?”
“No. Ricky would tell me stories.”
“Stories. What kind of stories?”
“You know, the kind of stories guys tell. Bullshit stuff. I didn’t believe half of it.”
The man stood considering that.
“Did he tell any other stories? Maybe stories about other men he served with?”
Lynn tried not to react, but her fingers clenched.
“Have any of them been to see you? Any of your husband’s army buddies?”
“Are you IRS?”
“I am not with any government agency.”
“You aren’t allowed to lie about that, right? If you were with the tax people, you’d have to tell me.”
“I am free to lie with impunity.” The man did not smile, but Lynn sensed this was some kind of joke on his part. She felt uneasy but not frightened. She sensed he wasn’t going to harm her as long as she answered honestly. Unless he asked about the money. Then she’d lie her ass off.
“Dwayne Roenbach was here. Maybe six weeks ago. He hasn’t been back.”
“Do you expect to hear from him again?”
“I don’t ever want to see that son of a bitch again,” Lynn spat. She wanted this guy and his creepy-ass eyes out of her living room.
“Can you write down a phone number?”
“Sure.” She picked a Barbie coloring book up off the sofa. She reached over the cell phone to get it and, for a second, thought of trying to palm it. But this guy seemed like he was on his way out.
She leaned on an end table and took down the number the man recited on the cover of the book.
“This number doesn’t look right,” she said. “It’s right. Read it back to me.”
She did.
“If you hear from Mr. Roenbach or any other man your husband served with, would you promise to call me?”
“Yes, I will. Who do I ask for when I call?”
“I’m the only one who will answer at that number.” He stood to go but did not move to the door. She stepped past him to shove the screen door open.
When he was gone Lynn sank onto the sofa with the coloring book clutched in her hand. She could hear Ricky’s giggle over the squeaky cartoon voices in the other room. The green-eyed man didn’t ask if she had a phone number for Dwayne Roenbach. She wondered if she would have lied about having it. He didn’t ask about the money. This was all about some guy named Hammond.
It wasn’t until later that day that she realized that the visitor hadn’t touched anything with his hands. He dictated his number rather than writing it for her or handing her a card. He waited until she held the door for him to leave.
Richard Renzi was dead. That came as a surprise to the man with the pond-green eyes, but he didn’t show it. Surprises were so rare for him that he didn’t know how to react to them.
He eased onto the highway and drove across the border into Kentucky toward the airport. He drove the speed limit, gloved hands at ten and two o’clock on the wheel. He called ahead on his SAT phone. The charter jet was waiting.
Everything on Hammond turned up a dry hole. The man had simply vanished. That wasn’t an easy thing to do these days where everyone on the planet left a dense trail of data behind them as they moved through life. It was especially difficult to hide from anyone with the resources the green-eyed man had. Endless resources. Deep resources. He turned to Hammond’s history and began looking into past associations. Hammond had no family and no record of employment after his discharge from the Army. It was if he had walked through the gates of Fort Bragg and disappeared.
But Hammond’s military records were public, for the most part. It was no problem to work up a list of the men he had served longest with. Hammond was part of a Ranger unit that had seen deployment after deployment in Iraq and Afghanistan. The same dozen or so names kept appearing in his records.
The man with green eyes visited the widow of Richard Renzi. He had Renzi’s histories at hand, such as they were. In every scenario, the official connection with Hammond ended when Renzi left the Army. But now he had another name. Roenbach.
Like Hammond, Renzi’s current public record ended six months ago. He held no job. He paid no bills. He did not use his credit card, or even his car. There were no phone calls from any numbers associated with him. His wife said he died. There was no record of that either. No obituary. No church services. No hospital or insurance records and death certificate. Renzi had a life insurance policy, but the company had not been notified. His wife mentioned money—money from Roenbach.
He left the rental on the tarmac and boarded the waiting Gulfstream. They were wheels-up within fifteen minutes, and the man opened a laptop while a dour steward set a drink in a heavy tumbler by his hand. The gloves stayed on.
A cursory search on Dwayne Roenbach turned up a recent history similar to Hammond and Renzi’s. Six months ago, he dropped off the grid. He checked out of a motel in Las Vegas and was never heard from again. It was easy to assemble a list of former US Army Rangers with a similar recent history or lack thereof.
Charles Pierce Raleigh and James Smalls. Both had personal histories that suddenly ended within days of each other six months before.
But no one, no one, drops out completely. They maintain some kind of association somewhere. Girlfriends, family, favorite places. Everyone circles back to re-cross their own path at some time.
“What destination have we plotted for?” the man asked the steward.
“We’re scheduled for Las Vegas, sir. Landing by five o’clock.”
“We’ll need to enter a new flight plan. Tell the pilot to find the county airstrip nearest Dothan, Alabama.”
26
The Island
The Ocean Raj sat at anchor two miles off the coast of the tiny island of Niso Anaxos. Small as it was, it was the largest natural body in that part of the Cyclades. Smaller islets, too tiny to have names, ranged away north in an arc of rocky points that were little more than perches for birds. The sea was shallow along this archipelago, and the Raj rested at the deepest anchorage Boats could find in proximity to their destination.
There were no other vessels in sight. The only other ships they spotted on the way here were container ships similar, to the Raj and one cruise ship. In each case, the other ships were only visible as tiny white shapes against the horizon and only in sight for moments. The fishing season for pickerel, anchovy, and horse mackerel in this part of the Aegean would not open for months.
The island was six miles across at its widest point with about twenty miles of coastline. It was rocky to the south with narrow sandy beaches along the north. A rocky point jutted into the Aegean off the northern shoreline forming a curved promontory that sheltered a shallow harborage. The rest of the island was mostly flat and rocky with wild fig and mastic trees growing in dense clumps here and there.
There was no permanent population. The only manmade structures were a wooden jetty with some frame shacks walled with rusted corrugated sheets. There were ruins of some kind, of shrine or burial cairn built from set stone and partly buried in dunes.
Boats was at the tiller of the Raj’s own inflatable. It was a Chi
nese model with twelve hard seats and twin outboards. The four passengers held on white-knuckled as Boats opened the throttle and skimmed the fifteen-foot craft over the white caps and around the horn for the calmer waters of the sheltered cove.
He pulled the boat up onto the shallows of a broad white sand beach. Jimbo and Dwayne helped him pull the boat up onto dry sand while Morris and Caroline waded ashore. Boats secured a line from the inflatable to a shell-encrusted concrete mooring post set in the sand for that purpose. A faded old fishing smack lay overturned and half-buried in drifts. Curious sea birds approached and retreated toward and away from the newcomers like a feathered tide. Boats skimmed a clamshell their way, and they took to the air in a squawking mass to settle on the rocks above.
“So, this is your treasure island,” Boats said. “Looks like someone’s been here before you.”
He was right. There were signs of recent excavation all over the beach. Even the wind and tides had not erased all, of the holes dug and the heaps of sand dotting the beach. There were rusted shovels discarded by disappointed fortune hunters. Jimbo found a metal detector with a bent shaft lying in some seagrass.
“This is considered to be the most likely place for the Phoenician crew to have hidden their goodies,” Caroline said. “It’s out of sight from the sea, and the rock peak makes for a good landmark. The other popular spot is a rock cairn inland. It’s been dug up over, and over again for centuries. I think it postdates the Phoenicians’ arrival here.”
“A cairn? That’s like a grave, right?” Dwayne said.
“No one’s buried there. No remains have ever been found,” Jimbo said.
Dwayne glanced at him.
“What? The fobbits aren’t the only ones who can Google,” Jimbo said.
“It was probably built to set a lamp or signal fire on top of,” Caroline said.
“Fobbits?” Morris said.