The Citadel Read online

  "All right," the old man agreed. "I will wait for more information."

  Which Fatima knew to be a lie. He would be on the satellite phone as soon as she left, contacting his superiors. But that is what she wanted. She nodded back at him and walked back out the door.

  As she grabbed her helmet off the motorcycle seat, she noted a van blocking her in. Fatima put the helmet on, cranked the engine, and waited for the driver of the van to take the hint and move. After thirty seconds of nothing she beeped her horn. She couldn't make out the truck's occupants through the tinted windshield.

  "Damn it," she muttered as she got off her bike, walked up to the passenger side and rapped on the door. The cargo door slid open and a man leaped out, wrapped her in a bear hug and rolled with her back into the rear, the door sliding shut.

  Fatima kicked backward, feeling her boot strike home, but the man holding her didn't make a noise. She desperately struggled, but her arms were locked to her side with a grip of steel. She felt a prick in her wrist and looked down to see a needle sliding into her flesh. She watched as the plunger descended.

  The last thing her conscious mind processed was the van pulling out into traffic.

  CHAPTER 5

  Oahu

  "This could all be a setup," Tai said as the plane lifted off the runway.

  Vaughn had his eyes closed. "At least if it is, we're going first-class."

  "Why should we believe anything Royce tells us?" Tai asked.

  "Why shouldn't we?" Vaughn asked in turn. He opened his eyes. "I don't know what the truth is about anything. But even when I was in the real Army, I wasn't too sure about the truth either. Were you?"

  Tai sighed. "I believed in what I was doing."

  "I believed in my team," Vaughn said. "But it got shot up doing a mission on orders that I wonder about now. My brother-in-law was killed. Men who trusted me, trusted my orders, died. And now I can say 'I was just following orders.'"

  "Oh, bullshit," Tai said. "Now you're getting into where the ultimate truth is. What it is. A bunch of crap."

  "Then what are we doing on this plane?" Vaughn asked. "Why are you here?"

  Now it was Tai's turn to close her eyes. "I want to find out who is behind all this. I want to find out who got your brother-in-law killed, and my sister too. And I want to make them pay."

  Surprisingly, Vaughn laughed. "That, I can understand. Revenge. But you think we're going to make the slightest bit of difference?"

  "We did in Hawaii."

  "All right." Vaughn nodded. "We did. And we will here. Or freeze to death trying."

  Tokyo , Japan

  The head of the Far East Table stared out the window and pondered recent developments. Bad news comes in three, and he had just received the third part.

  Kaito being killed in Hong Kong.

  Being summoned to Geneva to discuss the I-401 and someplace called the Citadel.

  And now Nishin disappearing in the Philippines on a simple assassination mission to avenge Kaito's death.

  He looked down at his desk and the flimsy report on I-401. It had indeed been commandeered by the Far East Table near the end of World War II to be sent on a covert mission for the Organization.

  And that was all the report said.

  He picked up the secure phone and punched in number two on the speed dial. The call was bounced through satellites to the United States, specifically the Nevada desert.

  The call was answered on the third ring. "Yes?"

  "Have you received a summons to Geneva?"

  "Yes. I will be departing shortly."

  "Regarding the Citadel?"

  "Yes."

  The head of the Far East Table reined in his irritation. "And what do you know of it?"

  "It's in Antarctica. It was initially established in 1947, the same year the place I am right now was established. But somehow information about it was compartmentalized even from the Table to a large extent. One of our agents, who you know-David Lansale-was the one who did this. And he raised the issue by sending information about it to the Abu Sayif."

  "I tried to have Fatima killed, but my agent has disappeared."

  The voice on the other end took on a gloating edge. "I have a man in the Philippines who has just captured her. He will terminate her after interrogation."

  "We must do more than that," the head of the Far East Table said. "When we go to Geneva, we must present them with a plan to completely wipe this issue out."

  "What do you propose?"

  "We alert resources to be prepared to intercede in Antarctica as needed. I will do what I can on my end, but you have more available to operate in that part of the world."

  There was a short silence. "All right. I will do that. I will see you in Geneva."

  Manila

  Fatima had been coming awake for brief interludes over the past hour, but every time she approached lucidity a large wave of blackness again engulfed her. This time, though, as she opened her eyes, she could actually think. There were vague memories flitting about her brain, trying to tell her something had happened over the past hour that she needed to recall, but try as she might, no concrete memory could form. There were disturbing visions of what seemed like very bad dreams, but as she took in her surroundings, the present nightmare banished thoughts of worrying about the immediate past.

  With slow sweeps of her eyes, she checked out the situation. She was lying on the floor in a filth-strewn room-the walls an eclectic splatter of spray paint and punctured Sheetrock. A single lightbulb burned in the ceiling, casting long shadows through the room. A wooden door beckoned to the world outside. Her wrists were handcuffed behind her, the steel cutting into her skin uncomfortably.

  She was considering sliding her hands down her back and pushing her feet through, to at least get her hands in front of her body, when the door opened and the man from the van walked in.

  Fatima was truly worried now because the man made no attempt to disguise his identity. That meant he was not concerned about her identifying him in the future, which meant she did not have a future. He had hair cut tight against his skull, his bright blue eyes emanating both intelligence and malice. The fact he was not Filipino was of concern also.

  After staring at her for a few minutes, he finally broke the silence and spoke in an Australian accent: "Good day, Miss Fatima. You don't have to worry. I've already gotten what I needed from you." At Fatima 's confused look, he smiled. "It's part of the miracle of modern medicine. The first shot I gave you caused unconsciousness. The second one made you talk." He squatted down and gazed into her eyes. "You don't remember talking and giving me the coordinates, do you?"

  Fatima didn't answer. She curled up in a tight ball, her knees to her chest. The man poked her in the shoulder. "There's no need for you to play stupid with me. It was foolish of you to go to the North Koreans. Don't you think that shop is watched all the time? I know quite a bit about you. Part of the perks of the job. You told me everything I asked. You told me some quite interesting personal information about yourself."

  Fatima closed her eyes and starting rocking back and forth. He slapped her on the face. "Don't tune out on me." He smiled, but it was only a moving of muscles in his face that didn't touch the coldness of his eyes. "It's kind of like looking into someone's soul when they're under. Imagine being able to ask someone any question you want and get an honest answer?"

  His eyes were flashes of blue, catching the light from the flickering bulb above him. He pulled a pistol with a suppressor on the muzzle out of a shoulder holster. He put the muzzle against her temple and stared deep into her eyes. They remained like that for almost a minute, a lifetime for Fatima, who had stopped breathing, every nerve in her body screaming.

  Suddenly he pulled the pistol back. "Most people consider you a terrorist. If it didn't violate my orders, I could turn you over to the Americans, dead or alive, and get a nice bounty. But then I would be dead also. Still, it is tempting."

  Fatima muttered something under her b
reath.

  "What was that?" the man demanded.

  She whispered to herself again. The man knelt next to her and grabbed her shoulders, pulling her to her knees. "Talk louder."

  Fatima leaned forward, pressing her chest against his.

  "That's not going to work," the man said, but he didn't pull back.

  Fatima moved her body up and down slightly. She could feel him beginning to grow hard. "Not in the head," she said in a low voice.

  "What?"

  "Please don't shoot me in the head."

  The man laughed. "Why not?"

  "Please. I'll make it worth your while not to."

  The man pushed her back roughly and stood up. He moved a few feet away and stared at her, his eyes flashing. Fatima forced herself awkwardly back to her knees and shuffled toward him. He backed up until he was against the wall. She felt the skin on her knees tear as she moved, but tried to keep a lustful look on her face.

  She pressed her head into the man's crotch.

  "I asked you about this," he said. "I know what you like."

  Fatima gave what she hoped was a good approximation of a sexual moan. With her teeth, she unzipped his pants, not an easy maneuver. He reached down and grabbed her head as he entered her mouth.

  Fatima bit down with every ounce of energy she had. The man screamed and doubled over. She whipped her head out of his grasp and rolled away from him. As she did so, she brought her knees to her chest and slipped her hands over her feet to put them in front of her body. She jumped to her feet and ran at him then, swinging her hands like a club as she did. The blow knocked him sideways, still doubled over. She leapt on his back, looped her manacled hands over his head and pulled back tight on his neck.

  He gasped for breath and tried to shake her off. He twisted the hand with the gun and pulled the trigger, the round ripping through Fatima 's shirt but not hitting her. He fired again as she kept the pressure up. Then he straightened and threw himself backward against the wall, slamming her into it, but she didn't let go.

  He dropped to his knees, finally letting go of the gun. Fatima kept the pressure tight. He fell forward, taking her with him, but still she didn't let go. It was too quick. Sure enough, after a couple seconds of playing dead, he suddenly rolled, pinning her beneath him. But she sensed his strength weakening.

  Then he was still.

  Fatima counted sixty to herself as she kept the chokehold with the cuffs. Slowly she let go. Awkwardly, with her bound hands, she searched his pockets until she found the key for the cuffs and maneuvered it out. Then, holding it in her teeth, she unlocked herself. Hands free now, she searched his pockets and found a United States diplomatic passport, which she kept. His name meant nothing to her. The fact that it was a diplomatic passport confirmed what she had suspected: once more the long hand of the United States was after her. It was a good thing she was leaving the Philippines for a while.

  Without a backward glance she left the room and headed out of the abandoned warehouse.

  Washington , D.C.

  The Intelligence Support Agency was a branch of the Pentagon that tried to coordinate the massive flow of data that poured in from all the various intelligence subdivisions of the military. Hundreds of analysts sat in cubicles scrolling through data on their computers, trying to separate intelligence from information. The former was usable data, the latter not. They also handled intelligence requests from the various parts of the military trying to coordinate with the rest of the military-industrial complex so that the right hand could at least have a clue what the left hand was doing.

  Bob Festoon was a third of the way through his in-box when he came upon an encrypted request from Majestic-12 Area 51. It caught his interest because rarely did anything from Majestic come through here. So rare were its communiqués and so little was known about the organization that there were some who said it didn't really exist-that it was just a cover-up for something else.

  Festoon had even tried accessing data on both Majestic and Area 51 and discovered little even in the ISA's highly classified database. Area 51 was a place whose real purpose was unknown and whose existence was officially denied, yet there had been shows on A &E about it. Majestic-12 was shrouded in even more secrecy.

  There were many theories, and Festoon was familiar with most of them. There were those who claimed the government had contact with aliens at the site and they were trading for information and technology. The more radical theorists stated that the items of barter from the human side were allowing the aliens to conduct mutilations on cattle and other livestock and also to abduct humans for various experiments. There were some who even claimed that the aliens were interbreeding with the humans.

  Another theory was that Area 51 was the place the government was testing its own latest supersecret aircraft. Festoon knew for a fact that the F-117 Stealth Fighter had been test-flown out there for years before being revealed to the public. The latest "secret" plane that was being tested was called Aurora, and estimates had the plane flying anywhere from Mach 4 to Mach 20 and capable of going high enough to place satellites into orbit. Festoon had seen three references to Aurora in official top secret message traffic, so he was confident that it existed. However, the official government line still was that Majestic-12 and the Area 51 complex didn't exist.

  Festoon finished decoding the message and then stared at it for a few seconds before turning to his computer:

  Request all information on Antarctic Base, code-named Citadel.

  Established 1949 by military during Operation High Jump.

  ASAP

  He accessed military records and quickly searched the database. After twenty minutes of fruitless effort he was convinced of one thing: there was no record in the ISA's classified database of the Citadel.

  Which made it likely, Festoon thought, that this Citadel didn't exist. The Intelligence Support Agency was lavishly funded by the Pentagon's multi-billion-dollar black budget and accountable to no one but the National Security Council, its tentacles reaching into every domestic and foreign source of information. The ISA was more than a gathering agency, though. It also acted on the information it received, implementing numerous covert actions in the name of national security both in the United States and overseas.

  The ISA had numerous contacts throughout the business world, men and women in critical places that the ISA worked with, also forwarding the interests of the military and, concurrently, the massive industrial complex that supported the military. It was the covert arm of the military-industrial complex that President Eisenhower had so feared, and its power was far greater than even those briefed on its existence dared believe.

  Festoon encoded the information given by the computer and its conclusion that the Citadel didn't exist and electronically dispatched it to Majestic-12. He also filed a routine report on the request and put it in the massive pipeline of such reports that circulated throughout the ISA. He picked up the next piece of paper in his in-box and went to work on that.

  Oahu, Hawaii

  Royce listened to the satellite phone ring and ring and knew that things had gone wrong in the Philippines. The initial call from his agent after capturing Fatima had been succinct, and the news about her going to the North Koreans was startling and troubling. The fact that she also knew about the bombs was just as bad.

  He hit the End button and dialed another number of a contact in the Philippines. He ordered the man who answered to check the warehouse where the first agent had been interrogating Fatima.

  Then he sat back in the chair and considered the situation. He was in the observation post of a rather unique bunker complex built on Fort Shafter on the outskirts of Honolulu. Built during World War II, when the fear of Japanese invasion of the island was very real, it had housed an air defense coordination center, tunneled deep in a lava ridge line. Now it housed the WestCom Sim-Center, which stood for Western Command, Simulation Center. It was the place where the major commands of the United States military in the Pacific theate
r played their war games using sophisticated computer simulations. It was currently empty, as no war games were being conducted, the military being more occupied with the real wars going on in Afghanistan and Iraq.

  Royce typed on his laptop keyboard, which he had linked by Firewire into the Sim-Center's mainframe. On the large video display in the war room below him, a map of Antarctica was displayed. For the first time, Royce felt irritation with his friend David Lansale. What the hell had David done down there? And why was Lansale, even after death, playing him off against Fatima and the Abu Sayif about the Citadel?

  He typed in another command and the map shifted, showing the Korean peninsula. One of the most critical military spots in the world that had the potential to go hot very quickly.

  Royce sighed. He knew that Vaughn and Tai would be landing in New Zealand soon, but this was growing much faster and much more dangerous than he had anticipated. His desire for knowledge about the Organization had to be balanced against external threats, and now those threats were growing larger.

  Royce cleared the front screen. Then he began typing in a message to his contact in North America.

  Auckland, New Zealand

  Vaughn threw their bags into the back of the pickup truck, while Tai handed them to him. It was hard to believe their seemingly never-ending flight from Hawaii was finally over.

  Vaughn didn't know what to make of Logan. About six-foot-two, tanned, with blond hair that Vaughn was sure the man spent quite a few dollars getting worked on, he had those rugged good looks that would have made him perfect for one of those beer commercials kayaking down white-water rapids while several beautiful women awaited him at the other end. Vaughn didn't like him in the slightest. There was a curious intensity about him that was offset by a very congenial, perfect smile that he shined on Tai as often as he could.

  He did have to give Royce credit for one thing: he got them around customs and their gear into the back of the pickup without being checked. And he noted the hard cases already under a tarp in the back that held the weapons and other illegal equipment he had requested.