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  "Our friend there" — Turcotte pointed at Aspasia's Shadow, lying on the floor, the fresh blood behind his head contrasting with the pale skin that was already beginning to heal around the edge of the wound — "rigged Easter Island for destruction. There're about ten thousand people trapped there."

  "What can we do?"

  "Save them," Turcotte said.

  "Don't we have other priorities?" Yakov asked.

  Turcotte stared at the Russian. "You mean other than saving people?"

  "Saving the planet?" Yakov countered.

  Turcotte laughed, months of worry and strain seeming to fall from his face for a moment. "We've already done that several times." The smile disappeared. "First things first. Let's do this, then we'll worry about Mars and Artad and the Swarm and every other Tom, Dick, and Harry who threaten us." He headed for the main corridor. "Come on. Let's get this thing moving." As he entered the corridor, he broke into a dead sprint.

  CHAPTER 8: THE PRESENT

  * * *

  EASTER ISLAND

  For thousands of years, Airlia scientists had watched worlds being formed, carefully studying the mechanics of creation. In doing so, they'd also learned the opposite: how to use that information to damage or even destroy a planet. They'd tracked the evolution of a planet's birth at various stages and that data was stored inside the guardian computers. What Aspasia's Shadow had prepared on Easter Island as part of his revenge was based on that information.

  In the beginning, Earth was merely a cluster of small rocks that came together 4.6 billion years ago as a result of the minute gravitational forces of those rocks. Six billion years later the collection was bombarded by asteroids and meteorites. That lasted millions and millions of years, producing immense amounts of energy, which in turn produced extremely high temperatures that reduced the entire planet to molten rock. It has been cooling ever since and still has not completely recovered, 4 billion years later.

  Earth is currently at a stage where its interior is divided into layers depending on the extent of cooling. There are four major layers: the inner core, outer core, mantle, and crust. Inside, the rock is still molten and in flux, producing a magnetic field. The Airlia had learned that almost all planets with living creatures were at the same stage of inner flux. The Airlia had learned to tap this source of power for propulsion for their craft whenever they were within such a planet's field.

  Dead planets such as Mars and the moon had no intrinsic electric and magnetic fields because they were cold and solid. On a dead planet, generators inside the Airlia ships had to produce their own fields at a great expenditure of energy.

  The surface of Earth is a very thin skin representing less than .2 percent of the planet's entire mass. The skin under the continents is five times thicker than that under the oceans. However, since Easter Island is so isolated in the Pacific, it has only a very thin layer of planetary crust beneath it. Thus, the molten outer core is only six miles below the island's surface, where molten rock bubbles at four thousand degrees Celsius.

  Deep under Rano Kau, the southwesternmost of the volcanoes that dotted the surface of Easter Island, a shaft had been dug by Aspasia's Shadow's mech-machines through hardened lava, extending downward until it reached molten rock. The shaft had originally been dug to tap the heat as a power source.

  Aspasia's Shadow, however, after millennia of war and deception, had learned always to be prepared for disaster. One of the first things he had done after arriving on the island was prepare both an escape plan — which he had executed via the bouncer — and a destruct plan, which he had activated just prior to departure. At the bottom of the shaft, just above the glowing magma, he'd placed several five-hundred-pound bombs scavenged from the American fleet.

  By themselves, the bombs weren't a threat to the island. He'd detonated them just before getting on the bouncer, and the effect had not even been felt six miles above. But the explosion had achieved what he intended, widening the energy tap beyond a controllable size. Under extreme pressure, liquid rock was now pouring upward into the vent.

  Dormant for thousands of years, Rano Kau was now in the first stages of eruption.

  Such an event would devastate Easter Island and kill all that lived there. However, Aspasia's Shadow had planned for something much more devastating to happen. Easter Island was merely the first domino in his scheme.

  MOUNT ARARAT

  Turcotte settled into the center seat in the pilot room of the mothership. Not long ago he had flown Aspasia's mothership into orbit, so he was somewhat familiar with the controls. He pressed his hand down on one console, and the curved wall in front of him gave a panoramic view of the chamber outside.

  "Do you know what you're doing?" Yakov asked.

  Turcotte responded by pressing his other hand down on one of the hexagons covered with rune writing. The floor beneath them shuddered as the ship's electromagnetic planetary drive was activated for the first time in over ten thousand years. The massive craft lifted off its cradle and was airborne.

  "How will we get out of this place?" Yakov asked, hands grabbing on to the back of Turcotte's oversize chair, knuckles white.

  Again, Turcotte answered with action, turning the prow of the mothership toward the hole the Talon had made in exiting. It was, of course, much too small to accommodate the mothership, but Turcotte had to assume that a craft designed to travel interstellar distances would not be greatly inconvenienced by a rock wall.

  He was proven right as the black alien metal hit the cavern wall, knocking stone aside without slowing. Seeing clear sky ahead, Turcotte slid his palm forward and the mothership moved out of the cavern.

  "Question," Turcotte said.

  "Yes?"

  "Which way is quicker? East or west?"

  "I think they are approximately the same," Yakov guessed.

  Now clear of Ararat, Turcotte accelerated while gaining altitude. "We'll go east," he announced.

  A pair of Turkish jets were visible on the display, but unlike their colleagues who had intercepted the bouncer, these were racing away as quickly as possible, the pilots obviously spooked by the tremendous size of the mothership.

  "Do you know how to open this thing up?" Turcotte asked Yakov. "Access all the cargo bays?"

  "I got you in here," Yakov said. "I think I can figure it out. Quinn gave me the manual that Majestic assembled on the other mothership at Area 51."

  "We need to get about ten thousand people in," Turcotte said.

  "I'll see what the Master Guardian suggests," Yakov said. "Do it."

  Yakov left the pilot room, heading back toward the Master Guardian. Turcotte reached out and tapped another control, then suddenly frowned. He'd learned to fly the Area 51 mothership using instructions written up by scientists working for Majestic who'd studied the craft for over half a century. But he realized this felt familiar, as if he had done it more than once. But that couldn't be, he thought. He was still exhausted from his experience on Everest and he felt that his mind must be playing tricks on him.

  Aspasia's Shadow's eyes slowly opened. The muscles in his arms and legs bulged as he strained against the ropes binding him. To no avail. Turning his head, he could see the large Russian once more in contact with the Master Guardian. Even though his body was human, Aspasia's Shadow considered himself Airlia, or perhaps more accurately, beyond both species, especially now that he was immortal. He was unique, a new breed. But these humans. He had fought them for millennia and, despite his projected disdain, there was a part of him that grudgingly had to grant that they had something unique themselves. To have defeated both him and Artad in the race for the Master Guardian and mothership! And before that to have destroyed Aspasia and his fleet. Simply amazing. And years ago, to destroy the Swarm scout ship, musing it to explode over Tunguska — that had been a surprise. He realized now, too late of course, that he should have paid more attention to that warning sign, but he had been too focused on the Ones Who Wait and maintaining the status quo of their covert c
ivil war.

  Yakov stepped back from the Master Guardian and looked down at Aspasia's Shadow. "Do you wish to tell us now how long Easter Island has?"

  Aspasia's Shadow shrugged. "I don't know." As Yakov's hand went toward the pistol at his waist, he was quick to add, "That's the truth. I opened a seismic fault deep underground. Rano Kau will become active. Soon. How soon, I cannot tell you."

  Yakov cocked his head as he regarded the creature at his feet. "Why did you do that?"

  Aspasia's Shadow blinked, as if asked why he breathed air. "It is what a commander must do in retreat. Destroy all so that the enemy gains nothing."

  "A commander of what?" Yakov asked.

  To that Aspasia's Shadow made no response. Yakov started to walk past him, shaking his head.

  "Wait!" Aspasia's Shadow called out.

  Yakov paused.

  "You must deal with me now," Aspasia's Shadow said.

  "Why?"

  "Do you want to save those on Easter Island?"

  "We'll do that without your help."

  "Perhaps you will," Aspasia's Shadow acknowledged. "But can you save all who live along the Ring of Fire?"

  "The what?"

  "The Pacific Rim," Aspasia's Shadow clarified. "Easter Island will be just the beginning. It will start a chain reaction of volcanic eruptions and earthquakes along fault lines around the entire Pacific. The western United States" — he smiled — "say good-bye to Los Angeles and San Francisco and Seattle. Japan — devastated. Your own Russia — Kamchatka smashed.

  "Tens of millions dead," Aspasia's Shadow continued. "If you think the death and destruction from the Third World War was grievous, it will be nothing compared to what is coming. Unless, of course, we make a deal, and I stop it."

  Yakov's right hand snapped forward, his fist slamming into the side of Aspasia's Shadow's face. He walked out of the chamber without a word, the door sliding shut behind him.

  EARTH ORBIT

  Artad glanced at the tactical display. A terribly primitive space habitat was shown. Most strange — was this all these humans had managed to achieve in terms of conquering space in over ten thousand years? He was tempted to destroy it as they passed by. But it was so backward and offered so little threat that he ignored the impulse. The humans would pay a much greater price.

  He reached out with a six-fingered hand and tapped the controls, bringing a view of Earth's surface into focus. He centered the screen on China and nodded as he saw the Great Wall meandering across the countryside. His Shadow, acting as ShiHuangDi, had completed the construction of the wall over twenty-three hundred years ago, shaping it to match the Airlia High Rune symbol for HELP. An indication of just how desperate Artad's followers had been. Over twenty-four hundred kilometers of wall built in just about ten years.

  Looking for help from the skies that had never come.

  Artad shifted the view to forward. They were moving away from Earth, picking up speed. The navigator had laid in a course for the fourth planet in the system. A dead world where they had placed their original communication array and defensive grid, both of which were destroyed during the civil war.

  One of his Kortad alerted him to something the sensors had picked up. He switched to view to whatever it was that had been spotted. He sat up straighter in his command chair as the bulk of a mothership floating in orbit was identified, over a thousand kilometers away. He ordered an adjustment in the Talon's course to intercept.

  Within a few minutes the Talon was alongside the much larger ship. He knew it was Aspasia's, and he'd taken in the report from the guardian describing how Aspasia's fleet had been destroyed by the humans. Still, the gaping hole in the side where the ruby sphere and nuclear weapons had been set off by the humans was startling. Artad knew the construction of the mothership and what it could sustain.

  Artad noted the unusual quiet among his bridge crew as they also viewed the damage. How had all this happened, he had to wonder. It was difficult to believe that humans, acting on their own, could have accomplished such destruction.

  Artad shook off these disturbing thoughts. He ordered a boarding party to be prepared to see if the ship was salvageable. High above the Earth's surface, the Talon and derelict mothership floated in orbit.

  EASTER ISLAND

  The lieutenant had hastily rigged the device from parts off the carrier Stennis. The instruments and transmitter were inside a metal case. Foam rubber had been duct-taped around the case, leaving only room for a wire antenna to poke out.

  The device, and the lieutenant who had been given the task based on his academic credentials, had been flown to Easter Island on board an F-16 at max speed. The C-2As had just barely dropped off their first load of refugees on the carriers and were being refueled for a return flight. The lieutenant's job was to try to get an idea of the potential danger and how much time they might have.

  "Steady," he called out as two Marines edged the device up the thermal vent that had been dug in cavern floor.

  The lieutenant checked the various displays he had that received information from the instrumentation he had loaded inside the case. Everything seemed to be working.

  "Drop it!" the lieutenant yelled.

  The Marines tipped it over and it fell into the opening.

  Even though he knew the data was being relayed via SATCOM to the fleet, the lieutenant called out what the gauges told him. "One hundred meters. One ten degrees."

  He licked his lips and called out the next set of readings. "Five hundred meters. One hundred eighty degrees.

  "Eight hundred. Two-ten. It must be free-falling," he added.

  "One thousand. Two-forty.

  "One-Five-Zero-Zero. Three hundred." He did a quick mental calculation as he watched the numbers move. "Through a mile down and no obstacles."

  He stared at the displays, not quite believing how quickly the case was falling. It was indeed free-falling. He glanced over at the opening, which was only about a meter wide. How wide was this vent below? It had to widen considerably for the case not to have hit the sides.

  "Two kilometers. Five hundred degrees.

  "Three kilometers. Seven-fifty.

  "Five kilometers. One thousand.

  "Seven kilometers. Two thousand.

  "Nine kilometers. Two thousand, five.

  "Ten kilometers. Three thousand."

  As if he felt the intense heat, beads of sweat were on the lieutenant's forehead. He blinked as all the displays went dead. He quickly hit several buttons, getting the last readings before they disappeared. "Final numbers: eleven thousand, six hundred forty-two meters down. Temperature. Three thousand eight hundred degrees. I would assume it hit molten magma." He opened up a geographic survey that had been faxed to the carrier upon request. "The crust is around twelve thousand meters thick here. Gentlemen, we've got a vent straight down to the outer core, which appears to be rising under pressure."

  AIRSPACE SOUTH AMERICA

  "Talk to me," Turcotte demanded.

  Quinn sounded distracted, which Turcotte imagined he must be, as the officer was overwhelmed with data. "Uh, there's a report from the fleet. They sent some kind of probe down the thermal vent. Appears to go all the way to the outer core. And they think the magma is rising in the vent."

  "So Aspasia's Shadow speaks the truth for once." Yakov was disappointed.

  "About the vent," Turcotte said. He turned to the mike. "What about this Ring of Fire stuff?"

  "That's the term," Quinn began, "for the fault lines along the various tectonic plates of the landmasses that meet with the suboceanic plates of the Pacific. It encircles the entire Pacific Ocean. Along these fault lines you have volcanoes, both active and inactive, and areas prone to earthquakes. It runs along the California coast, down along the western edge of South America—"

  "Wait a second," Turcotte interrupted, looking at the screen in front of him, which showed the coastline of South America that Quinn had just mentioned. "Easter Island's a long way from South America. How can it b
e part of this ring?"

  "There's a plate between South America and Easter Island and the Pacific Plate," Quinn responded. "It's called the Nazca Plate. Easter Island lies on the juncture of the Nazca Plate and the Pacific Plate. That fault line also extends north and links with the South American plate fault line and becomes the fault that runs along the West Coast of the US.

  "This thing runs along the bottom of the Pacific, to New Zealand, through the Philippines, to Japan, up along the West Coast of Russia and along the Aleutians. Over nineteen thousand kilometers long."

  "Back up," Turcotte said as he passed over the shoreline and the mothership was above the blue water of the Pacific, continuing to head west at great speed. "What the heck is this plate tectonic stuff?"

  "It's a relatively new discovery," Quinn said. "The surface of the Earth, the crust, is made up of nine major plates, like the Pacific, and a dozen smaller ones, like the Nazca. It's basically a crust of hard rock floating on the molten outer core. And each plate is moving, which produces one of three effects along the boundaries. When they go away from each other they form a split where material, usually magma, comes up and forms a ridge. When they collide, one plate slides under the other, producing what's called a subduction zone. You were just at one of those zones — the Himalayas are the product of a subduction zone created by the Eurasian Plate meeting the Indian Plate. And the third is where the two plates are moving in opposite, parallel directions — the San Andreas Fault is an example of that. You've got all three types along the Ring of Fire, so you've got volcanoes and very unstable regions. When San Francisco got leveled in 1906, that was a relatively minor disturbance of the Ring — same as when Mount Hood erupted."

  "Can one of the volcanoes erupting on Easter Island start a chain reaction?" Turcotte asked. "Those other events didn't."