Area 51: The Truth (8 page)

“I’m heading for Mount Ararat,” Turcotte said. “I want to see what kind of mess Yakov’s gotten himself into. Keep looking for Duncan. I want to find out what the hell her story is. There’s another layer to all this that we don’t know yet.”

Mount Ararat, Turkey

Yakov stepped back from the Master Guardian and staggered, almost falling off the narrow platform on which the red pyramid sat. He blinked, reorienting himself from the world the guardian had shown him to the real world.

The large Russian smiled broadly in victory. He’d shut down the Easter Island, Qian-Ling, and Cydonia guardians. The damn aliens—both sides—were minus their base of power now.

Yakov had spent most of his adult life serving in Section IV, the secret Soviet organization that had tried to keep track of the aliens and their minions just as the American’s Majestic-12 had. It had been a mission fraught with danger. Yakov vividly remembered going into the wreckage of Section IV’s base on the remote island of Novata Zemlaya, seeing the bodies of his comrades, killed by the Ones Who Wait, Airlia-Human clones who had waited millennia for Artad to be reborn. They’d done that to recover something from the Section IV archives. Today he had paid them back for that deadly deed.

The room he was in was deep inside the mothership, a perfectly round chamber encompassing the Master Guardian. He had sealed himself off from the rest of the ship as Artad’s troops were on board and had almost caught him before the Master Guardian was activated. The mothership was buried in a cavern deep inside Mount Ararat, hidden from sight for over ten thousand years.

Yakov heard a buzzing noise and reached into his pocket, pulling out his SATPhone. “Yes?” “This is Quinn. Turcotte’s coming to your location.”

“And how will he get to me?”

“I don’t know. Can you move—” Quinn’s next words were lost since Yakov turned his head to the right as a loud thud echoed through the mothership. The sound was repeated a few seconds later. Yakov put the phone away and placed both hands on the side of the Master Guardian, making contact with the computer. He sorted through the rush of images that assaulted him, searching for some information on the current status of the mothership. He zoomed through several internal views until he received one relayed from a monitor in the cavern, looking down on the mothership just as a third thud reverberated through the ship.

At first he saw nothing, then, near the nose, he spotted a clamp to one of the Talons withdrawing, slamming back into the hull of the ship, just as a fourth thud announced the action. The rapierlike ship floated free of the mothership and rose a few meters. Yakov tried to access a connection with the Talon via the guardian but he reached a dead end. He realized the Kortad must have cut any control the Master Guardian could have over the warship.

But they were still trapped in the chamber, Yakov knew, as he turned his attention to any controls for an exit from the large cavern. At that moment, a golden beam lashed out of the nose of the Talon and struck the side of the cavern.

Turcotte looked down on Mount Ararat, noting the still-smoldering ruins of armored vehicles on the lower slopes. He could see other tanks and armored personnel carriers on the roads approaching the mountain. Several helicopters with Turkish markings flitted about, but he ignored them.

He’d gotten the coordinates for the mothership cavern from Quinn and he edged the bouncer up the Ahora Gorge toward the spot. As he got close to a half-mile-high rock wall, he abruptly pulled back on the controls as the rock exploded outward with a thunderous roar.

A car-sized boulder hit the left side of the bouncer and the craft flipped from the impact. Turcotte had both hands on the controls and he stopped the rotation and leveled out, just as the nose of a Talon appeared in the large hole that had just been blasted.

He held the bouncer still as the entire two hundred meters of alien craft carefully exited. It had the same black metal skin as the mothership and was thirty meters wide at the base, tapering forward with a slight bend to a needle point at the front. Once clear of the mountain, the Talon turned to the east and accelerated away.

Turcotte keyed the radio. “Quinn, this is Turcotte. A Talon just exited Ararat and is heading east. I need you to get Space Command to track it. Over.”

“I’m on it,” Quinn responded.

Turcotte pushed forward on the controls and entered the cavern, seeing the mothership below, partly covered with debris near the front. He saw the other Talons parked on the outside and the empty space where the one that had just left had been stored.

Yakov “saw” the bouncer enter through the hole the Talon had just exited. He accessed controls for the mothership and opened a hatch to a cargo bay not far from the room he was in. Then he headed for the exit to the Master Guardian room.

Turcotte saw the hatch opening on the side of the mothership and guided the bouncer to it. He entered the mothership, the hatch closing behind him. He set the bouncer down and unbuckled from the pilot’s spot. He held Excalibur in one hand and the MP-5 in the other as he climbed the ladder and exited the bouncer.

The cargo bay was practically empty except for some debris littered across the floor. Turcotte walked over to the nearest pile. Broken clay pots and a leather sandal. Very old. He frowned, wondering how that had gotten in here. A door slid open and he smiled as he saw Yakov’s massive form filling the opening.

“Old friend,” Yakov called out. He walked forward, arms spread wide, and Turcotte allowed himself to be caught in the Russian’s embrace.

Yakov let go and stepped back. He saw the sword. “Excalibur?” Turcotte nodded. “Yes.”

“Stupid question,” Yakov said. “If you did not have it, I would not have been able to accomplish what I did.” His smile grew broader. “We have defeated the bastards finally.”

“Who was in the Talon?” Turcotte asked.

Yakov spit. “Airlia. I would assume from Qian-Ling as there were Chinese forces with them. They came here to get the Master but we beat them to it.”

“Where are the others?”

Yakov’s smile disappeared. “All dead. The Airlia and the Chinese almost defeated us. Many brave men gave their lives.”

More casualties. Turcotte had lost count of how many had died battling over control of Airlia artifacts. He silently made a promise to those who had given their lives that once this war was finally resolved, he would make it his mission to ensure that the Airlia legacy did not interfere ever again with the human race.

“There’s a problem,” Turcotte said.

“There is always a problem,” Yakov lamented. “It is something a Russian learns to accept as a child. What is this new problem?”

“The Airlia on Mars are building what Kincaid thinks is a communications array on Mons Olympus. He doesn’t think it’s quite done yet, but it’s close to being finished.”

Yakov considered that information. “So. If Artad gets on that Talon and makes it to Mars, and they finish the array, he can communicate with his home world and bring more Airlia here.”

“Yes.”

“That is a problem,” Yakov acknowledged.

Turcotte felt faint and staggered, the Russian grabbing his shoulder and steadying him. “Are you all right?

Turcotte ran his hand across his forehead, feeling the perspiration. He was burning up. “Just a little woozy.”

“‘Woozy’?”

“Too much altitude and temperature change, too quickly,” Turcotte said. “Where’s the Master Guardian?”

Yakov indicated for Turcotte to follow him as he turned and headed down the corridor, staying close by his side. “What about Aspasia’s Shadow and the Grail?”

“The nanovirus is nonfunctional,” Turcotte said.

“I know. I shut down his guardian, which controlled it. All the subordinate guardians are shut down, including the one on Mars. That should delay their efforts there.”

“My navy has regained control of the two lost task forces. The combined fleet is heading toward Easter Island. Without the guardian, Aspasia’s Shadow has no shield and little power. Quinn says he’s fled the island on a bouncer, but they are tracking him. We ought to be able to deal with him and recover the Grail. The fleet can rescue Kelly Reynolds.”

Yakov frowned as he reached the door to the Master Guardian chamber. “You should not underestimate Aspasia’s Shadow. He has been around for a very long time and faced adversity before. Plus, we must assume he has partaken of the Grail and is now immortal. Also, what about the Guides? Even with the Easter Island guardian shut down, they still have the mental programming they received. And I am sure there are more scattered around the world.”

“The Guides are few in number,” Turcotte said as he paused in the entrance, looking at the glowing red pyramid. “Without the nanovirus, their power is limited.” His thoughts went to Lisa Duncan, who had also partaken of the Grail and then been kidnapped, by who, he had yet to find out. “Have you picked up anything on Duncan’s whereabouts from that thing?” he asked.

“I have not tried,” Yakov said. “I have been busy with other matters. I will also check to see if there is any information on this array.” He walked across the gangway to the pyramid and placed his hands on one side.

Turcotte had no desire to meld with the Master Guardian. He’d touched a regular guardian once before, in the secret base at Dulce where Majestic had been conducting bio-experiments on people they abducted. The direct contact between his mind and the alien machine had repelled him on a visceral level.

“Nothing,” Yakov said after about ten seconds. “The only thing”—he frowned, his eyes closed—”strange. Very strange. I’m getting some images that were relayed from the other guardians once the Master activated before I shut them down.”

“Images of what?” Turcotte asked.

“Something in the sky. Moving. Black. Spherical main body with six extensions. Some kind of spacecraft.” Yakov paused, then continued, “It’s exploding. High over endless forest. Ah, I have seen forest like that before. I know what this is.” He let go of the Master Guardian and stepped back, turning toward Turcotte. “Remember General Hemstadt on Devil’s Island?”

It seemed to Turcotte that the destruction of the Mission’s base of operations had happened long ago, though it was actually relatively recent. They had narrowly stopped the Mission’s attempt to wipe out mankind with a deadly virus. “Yes.”

“His last words before he killed himself were about Tunguska. In 1908. I just saw the explosion that occurred there. It was caused by the craft I described getting hit by some sort of energy weapon.”

“An Airlia weapon?”

“No. It appears to be a human weapon.”

Turcotte felt a stir of excitement. “What kind of weapon? Who made it?”

“I can see if the guardian has stored that information,” Yakov said, “but more importantly at the moment, there was an escape pod from that alien craft. Survivors.”

“What does that have to do with Lisa Duncan?”

“The Master Guardian confirms that neither Artad nor Aspasia’s Shadow have her—at least their guardians had no information on that and they were interfacing with their computers up until I shut them down. Its best estimate based on the available data is that she has been taken by the survivors in that pod.”

“Who?”

“The Swarm.”

Turcotte felt his skin tighten as he recalled the gray orb inside the tank that he and Yakov had seen at Section IV. That had been even more repellent than the contact with the guardian at Dulce. “Where are they?”

“I don’t know. Let me see what else it has.”

Yakov leaned against the Master Guardian, searching for more information. Turcotte radioed Quinn, telling him to get every bit of information he could on Tunguska and what had happened there in 1908. And what had managed to destroy the Swarm craft.

Yakov kept his hands on the Master but turned his head and called out to Turcotte. “The array they’re building on Mars is indeed for communications. It’s a little confusing, but the impression I’ve picked up is that with this array they can reach the Airlia Empire relatively quickly.”

“That’s all we need,” Turcotte muttered. Yakov frowned. “Something’s happening.” “You could be a little more specific.”

“Another bouncer just entered the cavern,” Yakov said. “A hatch is opening near the front in another hangar.”

“Can you override?”

Yakov shook his head. “The Kortad damaged the mothership’s control room before they left, cutting off the Master Guardian from complete mothership control so they could take the Talon. The only way to control the ship is from the control room.”

“Who’s in the bouncer?” Turcotte asked as he checked his MP-5 submachine gun, making sure a round was in the chamber and he had a full magazine.

“The only person I know who has one is Aspasia’s Shadow,” Yakov said. “Unless some have been removed from Area 51.”

Turcotte realized that his asking a question with such an obvious answer indicated that he wasn’t functioning at a very high level. “Can you get us to the hangar that just opened?”

Yakov removed his hands from the Master. “Yes.” He ran for the exit to the room and turned right in the central corridor, Turcotte on his heels.

“Remember, my friend, if it is Aspasia’s Shadow, he has partaken of the Grail,” Yakov said over his shoulder, as they raced down the passageway.

“We’ll see how immortal he is after I blow his head off,” Turcotte muttered, one hand tight on the MP-5, the other holding Excalibur. He felt a line of sweat soaking the middle of his back. His vision went blank for a second and he staggered, but his sight returned as suddenly as it had gone and he continued behind the Russian.

After six hundred meters, Yakov skidded to a halt in front of a door. He hit a panel on the side and a door slid open.

“Here.” Turcotte tossed Excalibur to the Russian, who caught it by the handle and looked at it with less than enthusiasm. “I’ll take point,” Turcotte said.

“How nice of you. And I am supposed to back you up with this?” Yakov held the sword in front of him.

“Better than nothing,” Turcotte said, remembering Mount Sinai, which was the last time he’d entered a place with Yakov holding a gun. That had ended with Yakov “killing” Lisa Duncan while trying to stop Aspasia’s Shadow from stealing the Grail. Neither man had known at the time that she had partaken of the Grail and was immortal. Of course, Turcotte realized, they hadn’t really known at the time that Duncan wasn’t who she had appeared to be either.