The Reply a5-2 Read online

  “Look!” Ki cried out.

  Che Lu looked in the direction he was pointing. There were three men moving between several of the large objects, about five hundred yards away, moving toward their position.

  Che Lu instinctively grabbed Ki and pulled him back. The men were out of sight now, behind something. Che Lu took a deep breath.

  Ki had pulled a small knife out of his belt and was gripping it with white knuckles.

  “Put that away,” Che Lu said sharply.

  “But—”

  One thing Che Lu had definitely noticed about the figures was the AK-74 weapons each held. Che Lu slowly looked around the edge of the next machine, Ki right behind her. Looking ahead, she could see one of the men about eighty yards ahead, halted and silhouetted against the green light source.

  Where were the other two? Che Lu thought. Her instincts were tingling. Turning, she froze, looking into the end of two AK-74’s. Che Lu looked from the muzzles to the heads; they were not Chinese, that was for sure. She combined the weapons with the camouflaged smocks they wore and made a guess as to their origin.

  “Please do not shoot,” Che Lu said in Russian.

  The taller of the two replied in perfect Mandarin. “Who are you?”

  “I am Professor Che Lu of Beijing University. And you are?”

  “Colonel Kostanov of the Russian Republic. How did you get in?” “We blew open the main doors.”

  Kostanov raised an eyebrow. “Are they still open?”

  “No. The army shut them behind us. We are trapped.”

  Kostanov smiled, revealing even teeth. “Ah, then you join us and our party, eh, Professor? You are either very brave or very foolish to be here so poorly equipped. Or perhaps you know something about all this”—his weapon made a small arc—“that we do not know?”

  Che Lu shrugged. “What I thought I knew about this tomb is obviously not true, so I think I know nothing you do not know. But I find it curious,” Che Lu continued, “to find Russians inside one of China’s most ancient archaeological sites.”

  “That’s the least of the strangeness you have found here,” Kostanov said. He shrugged. “I suppose I ought to just kill you both right now and continue on with my mission. Unfortunately, since I am unable to do the latter, I suppose I won’t do the former; for the moment that is.”

  “Why are you here?” Che Lu said.

  The muzzle of Kostanov’s weapon lowered and his free hand encompassed the chamber. “You need ask?”

  “How did you know this was here?”

  “High runes,” he answered simply. “We are not complete idiots. We can read some of them. More now that Professor Nabinger has made some of his findings public.”

  “How did you get in?” Che Lu asked.

  “A side tunnel leading directly to this chamber.” Kostanov pointed to the side of the chamber opposite where Che Lu and Ki had come in. “You came in from there?” he asked, directing his hand toward the tunnel they had come out of.

  “Yes.”

  “That was closed yesterday,” Kostanov said.

  “You can’t get out either?” It was a question she had to ask even though Che Lu knew the answer, and now she knew why the army had been here and why her door had been blocked so quickly.

  “No. At least not the way we came in,” Kostanov answered. “We went up to the door but it was sealed from the outside, as we already knew. The other tunnel led nowhere….” His voice trailed off.

  “And the main way down, you tried that, did you not?”

  Kostanov nodded. “I lost one of my men there.”

  Che Lu pointed. “And the green light?”

  “A control room of some sort,” Kostanov answered. He smiled. “We have not been foolish enough or desperate enough to start pushing buttons whose function we do not now. Not yet,” he added.

  “How long have you been in here?” Che Lu asked.

  “Three days now. It was dark when we came in. Nothing stirring. But two days ago the power came on in the control room and this room when you entered it. Perhaps you had something to do with that?”

  “I wish I did,” Che Lu answered, “because that would mean I could get us out of here.”

  “How long have you been in here?” Kostanov asked.

  “We entered less than a day ago.”

  “You are not as well supplied as we were,” Kostanov noted, “but we have reached your level now, as our food and water are gone.”

  “What is all this?” Che Lu asked.

  “I don’t know,” Kostanov said. “We have been unable to get into any of the containers. Some seem to have machinery inside that is operating. Others are silent.” His shoulder shrugged under the camouflage. “Your guess is as good as mine.”

  Che Lu pointed. “Let me see that control room.”

  CHAPTER 20

  Inside the Mars chamber the program was running without a glitch. With a gentle sigh of air the inside of the chamber equalized with the pressure inside one of the crypts. The last of the material covering the body was gone.

  Eyelids flickered, then opened. Bright red eyes peered up at the roof of the chamber. A six-fingered hand reached up and grasped the side of the container, then tightened, pulling the upper half of the body up. The alien stared about the chamber, taking in the other silent crypts. It came back to the alien then: She was the first. The program would wait on her before completely waking the others in the first echelon. She was to make sure the time was right.

  * * *

  In New York, a large collective sigh of relief was released by the UNAOC staff as a new message from the Guardian II computer on Mars was received and began to be transcribed on the large screen in the front of the conference room. The relief transformed into enthusiasm bordering on hysteria as the latter part of the message was deciphered.

  APOLOGY FOR ENERGY DISCHARGE THAT CAUSED YOUR ORBITAL CRAFT TO MALFUNCTION IT WAS ACCIDENT

  ALL SYSTEMS ARE FUNCTIONING HERE

  WILL DEPART THIS PLANET FOR YOURS SOON

  WILL LAND ON YOUR PLANET IN TWO OF YOUR ROTATIONS PLEASE INDICATE WHERE OUR LANDING SHOULD BE

  ASPASIA

  Peter Sterling stood up and addressed the rest of UNAOC. “The Earth has forty-eight hours to prepare the reception.”

  * * *

  At Cube operations Kelly Reynolds studied the intelligence reports that were forwarded to her via Quinn from many points around the globe. Much was happening and much would happen in the next two days.

  The impression was that the excitement of those in the UNAOC conference room mirrored the excitement that was breaking out all over the planet as the realization that aliens would be landing on Earth in forty-eight hours washed over the world’s peoples.

  Kelly could tell that on the whole, the excitement was positive. The story of Aspasia’s battle against the rebels five millennia ago, as transmitted to Peter Nabinger from the Guardian I computer, had now trickled its way into even the remotest corner of the planet. Hope had been ignited in the hearts and minds of the vast majority of Earth’s population that there would soon be technological advances that would end war, famine, disease, pollution, and the other problems that ravaged the face of the planet.

  The isolationists geared up to mount protests, but Kelly knew they were battling the inevitable, as there was nothing they could do to stop the wave of anticipation.

  Still, Kelly knew, all was not good. Sometimes the human race made her want to tear her hair out. There were those who also saw the next forty-eight hours as critical. Reading between the lines, many humans believed that the Airlia would help the UN impose peace on the planet, and since the current state of affairs was unacceptable to certain groups, they surged forward in revolt, terrorism, and rebellion to grab as much as they could before a status quo was invoked.

  It was clear to Kelly Reynolds and the intelligence analysts what some of those events would be. In the Middle East there would be massive uprisings in the Occupied Territories. According to the CIA
, Iraq was preparing to launch another assault into Kuwait, one that was certain to be immediately smashed by U.S. and Allied air power flying from carriers in the Gulf and airfields in Saudi Arabia. Several ethnic regions of Russia would rise up in rebellion, and according to analysts, Moscow’s weary reply would most likely be to pull its troops out of the areas and wait to see what the coming of the Airlia would bring.

  In Central and South America revolution was getting ready to break out in several countries. In the United States some right-wing militia groups were preparing to conduct acts of terrorism, protesting the United States’ participation in the UN and UNAOC. The FBI and ATF were already moving to preempt those acts.

  Of more particular notice to Kelly, in China, the long-persecuted Muslim minority in the west had already seized several armories and, with the help of Taiwanese special operations units, had risen in revolt against the central government in Beijing as Taiwanese warships cruised close to Hong Kong harbor, raising speculation that Taiwan might attempt to attack the former colony. Kelly knew from reading the analyses that the small island state could never seize and hold Hong Kong, but agents in that part of the world reported that destruction of the strongest part of China’s new economy was more the goal of the Taiwanese.

  China. Kelly’s gaze focused on that word. What was happening there? What was in the damn tomb? Now that there was definite time-line for the arrival of Aspasia, her anticipation was rising to an almost fevered pitch. She knew now that there was no way she could stop the mission, but she could pray, and that she did with all her heart, that the Airlia would arrive to find a united world to greet them and that her friends would make it out of China alive.

  * * *

  Turcotte felt the aircraft bank and experienced a slight change in air pressure as the plane descended rapidly. He unbuckled his seat belt and walked down the plane. Leaning over Harker, he signaled and then yelled in the team leader’s ear, “Time to rig.”

  While Harker started rousing the team members, Turcotte tapped Nabinger on the shoulder and pointed to the rear of the plane. Turcotte undid the cargo straps holding down the parachutes and rucksacks. He and Harker passed the chutes out, a main and reserve to each man.

  Turcotte and Nabinger buddy-rigged each other. Turcotte went first, slipping the harness of the main over his shoulders and settling it on his back. He then reached down between his legs as he directed Nabinger to pass a leg strap through to him.

  Turcotte hooked the snaps and made sure it was properly seated. He then crouched and tightened both leg straps down as far as they would go. The submachine gun Turcotte had gotten from Zandra was slung upside down on his left shoulder using the sling and tied down with some eighty-pound test cord. Turcotte rigged the reserve over his belly, attaching it to D-rings on the front of the harness. He passed the waistband to Nabinger and directed him to run it over the sub and through both straps on the back of the reserve. Turcotte then cinched it tight on the right side, insuring it had a quick release fold in the buckle.

  Turcotte put his small rucksack on the web seats and pressed his reserve down on top of it while he reached in and hooked the two eighteen-inch attaching straps up to the same D-rings the reserve was attached to. Turcotte liked having the ruck attached as tightly as possible to prevent it from swinging up and hitting him in the face when he went off the ramp. Turcotte then attached the fifteen-foot lowering line for the rucksack to the left D-ring.

  Turcotte signaled to Harker, and swaying in the aircraft, the Special Forces warrant officer quickly ran his hands over Turcotte’s equipment, starting from his head, working down the front, and then going to the back, again working top to bottom. He never let his hands get in front of his eyes as he methodically worked his way around the equipment.

  Harker released the static-line snap hook from its location on the pack closing tie on the back of the parachute and ran the static line over Turcotte’s left shoulder. He hooked the snap hook onto the handle of the reserve, where Turcotte could get at it to hook up to the static-line cable when the time for that came.

  Finished, Harker tapped Turcotte on the rear and gave him a thumbs-up, signaling he was good to go. Turcotte then helped Nabinger rig and the jumpmaster inspected the increasingly nervous professor. He got the chute on Nabinger, then tucked swim fins in the waistband of his parachute and attached to the jumper with cord.

  “You’re good to go,” Turcotte told Nabinger.

  “Oh, that’s reassuring,” Nabinger said.

  “Seconds thoughts?” Turcotte said. “You can stay on board and fly back if you want to.”

  “No. I’m going. I’ve got to see this. I just wish we could have picked a more comfortable mode of transportation.”

  “Hey,” Turcotte said, “this is the most fun you can have with your pants on.”

  “I very much disagree with that assessment,” Nabinger said, slumping down onto the web seat.

  * * *

  Che Lu looked about the room, her eyes adjusting to the green glow given off by the numerous control panels. They were slightly taller than waist high, black, with green glowing surfaces covered with high rune writing.

  “As I told you,” Kostanov said as he walked beside her, “this room was completely dark when we came in here, but it powered up forty-eight hours ago.”

  “You haven’t tried any of these controls?” Che Lu asked.

  “Not yet,” Kostanov said. “We have no idea what they are for.”

  Che Lu stopped at a console at the front of the room, a long curving black affair that faced the smooth rock wall. She pointed. “There seems to be a door there.”

  Kostanov nodded. He’d seen the faint trace in the rock face.

  “Perhaps something on this panel opens it,” Che Lu continued.

  “Perhaps,” Kostanov said. “But there are a lot of places to push and perhaps if you push the wrong one, we end up like my man who was cut in half.”

  “If only I could talk to Nabinger,” Che Lu muttered as she ran hands just above the glowing high runes.

  “My radioman can’t transmit through rock,” Kostanov said. “We’ve tried even knowing that, but we get nothing.”

  Che Lu turned to him. “What if you had an open shaft to the sky above?”

  Kostanov stepped close to her. “You know where there is an open shaft?”

  CHAPTER 21

  The loadmaster leaned over and yelled in Turcotte’s ear.

  “The pilot wants to talk to you,” he screamed above the plane’s roar. He passed his headset to Turcotte.

  The pilot’s voice came back through the wires from the cockpit. “We’ve just picked up some SATCOM traffic from UNAOC. Aspasia sent a message saying he’ll be landing here on Earth in two days.”

  Turcotte acknowledged. He leaned over and informed Nabinger.

  “Jesus,” Nabinger exclaimed. “Two days? That’s not much time.”

  “We’ll be out of here before then,” Turcotte reassured him.

  “I hope so.”

  Turcotte looked around the cargo bay. Everyone was awake now and fidgeting. The ride was getting extremely bumpy as the pilots used their sophisticated electronics to keep the aircraft down in the radar cluster of the terrain.

  Turcotte was sweating under his dry suit. He hated waiting and having his destiny in someone else’s hands. He’d feel a lot better once they were on the ground. He turned back to Nabinger and gave the professor a smile. The older man was white under his dark beard, beads of sweat trickling down the side of his face.

  “It’ll be all right,” Turcotte reassured him.

  “Just get me in the tomb,” Nabinger said through clenched teeth.

  * * *

  Duncan threw her cigarette to the concrete floor of the hangar and ground it out with the toe of her shoe. She went over to the commo terminal and restlessly looked through the message logs. She stiffened as she noted one of the messages.

  “Find something interesting?” a voice behind her asked.
>
  Duncan turned to find Zandra towering over her. “What’s STAAR?”

  “STAAR?”

  Duncan held up the message log. “You received a message two hours ago from someone or something with that code name.”

  “And you never heard of it and you have the highest security clearance possible in the United States,” Zandra said, her eyes hidden behind her sunglasses. “Correct?”

  “Correct,” Duncan said, her jaw clenched tight.

  “Well, Doctor, you don’t have a need to know.”

  “Goddammit—” Duncan began, but Zandra raised a hand, cutting her off with clipped words.

  “Don’t! Not only don’t you have a need to know, this is bigger than you, bigger than the United States.”

  “We’ll see about that,” Duncan said, turning for the door.

  “Wait!” Zandra called out. There was a beeping sound coming out of the radio. “What is it?” Duncan asked as the other woman sat down in front of the device and typed into the keyboard.

  “We’ve intercepted a message from China,” Zandra said. Duncan looked at her watch. “They can’t have jumped yet.” “They haven’t,” Zandra said. “This is from someone else.”

  “Where?”

  Zandra was looking at the information being relayed to her. “It appears that whoever is transmitting is inside Qian-Ling.”

  “What the hell—” Duncan began, but again she was cut off by Zandra. “Shut up for a minute and let me decipher this.”

  TO: SECTION FOUR

  FROM: GRUEV

  TRAPPED INSIDE

  PLA HAS SEALED EXITS

  SUPPLIES LOW

  LINKED UP WITH PROFESSOR CHE LU BEIJING UNIVERSITY

  MANY AIRLIA ARTIFACTS

  NEED HIGH RUNE TRANSLATIONS PLEASE ADVISE

  “Who is Gruev and what is Section Four?” Duncan asked, having patiently waited while the words came up on the screen line by line.

  “Section Four is the Russian equivalent of Majestic-12. Gruev is the code name of one of their operatives.”