Pandora's Curse - v4 (27 page)

“You knew about this?” she asked, gratefully pulling on the stained garments.

“Other than the reactor that powered the facility, the Sno-Cats, and the men’s personal gear, everything was abandoned here. I wasn’t sure we’d find these but I knew there’d be something we could use.”

A minute later he found some boots. He started to feel like they had a chance. He handed Anika a cigarette lighter.

“Don’t tell me you smoke.” She scowled with disgust.

“Never, but I carry a few when I’m on an expedition like this. Boy Scout training. Can you make us a fire?”

While she got to work, he wandered around the garage. He noted that in one corner of the room sat a large fuel cylinder for the military’s Sno-Cats. He rapped it with a hammer left on a workbench. The dull thud indicated it was at least half full. A long coil of rubber hose with a standard nozzle hung from a bracket welded to the tank’s support cradle. At the far end of the workshop was a series of wide doors that had once led to snow ramps to the surface. Next he played his light on the trussed ceiling fifteen feet over his head, discovering several large air vents. They were more than big enough for what he had in mind. All he needed now was a ladder and a long pole, like the center post for an army tent. He found both items in a utility closet.

The smell of burning wood was becoming distracting. It would take a while to reach a dangerous level but it was a constant reminder that on the other side of the fireproof doors was an out-of-control blaze.

Anika huddled next to the fire she’d built from packing crates, cupping her hands as if receiving a gift from the flames. “Strange to think this would feel good after the run through the hallway,” she joked.

“We’re not done yet. It’s time to put an old adage to work.” She shot him a questioning glance. “Fight fire with fire.”

After he explained what he had in mind, she had only one question. “How do you know the diesel will still burn?”

“Fuels don’t lose their combustibility over time, just their efficiency. Once we drain the sediment and water from the bottom of the tank, we’d be able to fill our own vehicles with it and suffer just bad mileage and burned piston rings.” That was an exaggeration, he knew, but it was close enough.

“Let’s do it.” Anika got to her feet, convinced because Mercer seemed so certain. He’d said earlier that he trusted her. For now, she had no choice but to reciprocate.

Mercer set his ladder near the largest of the air shafts, climbing up to remove the circular grate protecting it. The vertical tube was more than large enough to accommodate him and Anika. Flashing his light upward, he could see the vent had been battered and dented by glacial movement, but it was still clear for a good fifteen feet before becoming clogged with ice. He estimated that there would be ten additional feet of snow above it before he could see daylight.

Anika spent her time unfurling the fuel hose, using some rope she’d found to secure the end of the flexible pipe to the tip of the ten-foot tent pole. Her knots were tight and professional. While Mercer checked the spigot attached to the tank, she used his pocketknife to cut the gas nozzle from the hose. The rubber was brittle but remarkably resilient, demanding all her strength.

With the tank resting four feet above the polished concrete floor, Mercer knew it was gravity driven rather than relying on a mechanical pump to fill the vehicles that were once stored here. Without the restricting nozzle, an arcing jet of diesel would spew from the hose once he opened the tap.

“Are you ready for a test?” Mercer asked Anika, who was fifteen yards away, silhouetted by her flashlight.

“Okay.” She pointed the open end of the tube away from her, not knowing how powerful the stream would be.

“Here we go.” Mercer needed both hands and the considerable power of his shoulders to crack the initial seal on the spigot. Once the wheel began to turn, it spun freely.

“Jesus!” Anika screamed in surprise, prompting Mercer to close the tap quickly.

He raced to her side. “Well?”

She raised the focus of her flashlight, following the shimmering wet streak staining the floor. The trail led for fifty feet before it vanished beyond the light’s range. “Powerful enough for what you had in mind?”

“Overkill.” Mercer laughed, delighted that his idea might just work.

He sobered quickly when a thick wave of smoke reached them. The temperature in the garage was starting to climb. The doors segregating the garage from the rest of the base weren’t nearly as fireproof as Mercer had hoped.

“Get on the ladder,” Anika said, already in motion. “I’ll operate the valve.”

Mercer moved the ladder away so he could hold the hose under the air vent while staying away from the fuel that would be pouring back down. High above the floor, the air was fouled with smoke. He pulled the collar of his coveralls over his mouth, but the musty cloth was ranker than the air.

“Just give me the word and I’ll start the fuel flowing,” Anika yelled, her voice echoing.

Mercer heaved the pole into position, resting the tip into the vent shaft to balance it, the hose tied to it dangling to the floor and away toward the storage tank. Bracing himself against the sturdy ladder, he could maintain a firm grip without the pole’s weight becoming too much to hold steady. By pressing the end of the pole into his stomach, he managed to free one hand. Once Anika turned the tap, he would need that hand for only a moment.

“Open her up.”

Through the pole he could feel the attached hose pulsate as diesel fuel surged toward the outlet, forced across the garage and upward into the vent shaft by the tremendous impetus of its own weight. His makeshift flamethrower shuddered, nearly dislodging him from his perch before he got a better grip. In a rush, diesel climbed the hose and exploded up the shaft, splattering the underside of the ice plug like it had exploded from a fire hydrant. As soon as the fuel started falling back to the floor, Mercer snicked open the Zippo lighter and tossed it into the incendiary liquid raining from the roof.

The fuel ignited in a concussive whoosh, an explosion of orange and red and black that blinded him before he could turn away. It looked like the exhaust from a rocket motor. Even from ten feet away the heat was intense, and Mercer felt sweat begin to pour into his eyes. Beneath him, the widening lake of fire found the gutters cut into the concrete and began to run in rivers to underground waste tanks.

Amid the flaming fuel draining from the vent, water too began to flow, ice that had melted under the brutal thermal onslaught. Mercer had no way to judge how quickly the ice plug was being dissolved, but each second brought an acceleration to the amount of water diluting the fiery pool.

“It’s working,” he heard Anika shout over the noise of the fire.

“Did you have any doubts?” Mercer grinned down at her. He looked like a demon backlit against the pillar of flames.

Swept up in the euphoria of the moment, Anika returned his cocky smile. “Not for a second.”

With the burning fuel ducted into the drainage hollows under the floor, Mercer’s fear of starting a fire worse than the one they had just escaped were unfounded. He let the flaming jet of diesel bore into the ice for five minutes before shouting to Anika to kill the flow. They didn’t need to wait for him to move the ladder under the vent to see they had been successful. Shining into the puddle of flames on the floor was a perfect circle of daylight.

They were through!

It took a few minutes for the fire on the floor to extinguish itself completely, and as it died they could see smoke being drawn up the vent from deeper into the base.

“It’s just a matter of time before someone fighting the fire at the main entrance sees smoke billowing out of this vent and comes to investigate,” Mercer said, looking up at the sky.

He turned to Anika. She had an enigmatic smile on her face, a mixture of astonishment and respect.

She placed her arms on his shoulders and drew him down, planting a feather-soft kiss on his cheek. “That’s twice you saved me. Now I owe you.”

Mercer’s heart tripped. He believed she was going to kiss him on the mouth. He thought he had recognized that look and for a selfish moment he wished she had. But he was glad she hadn’t. Shared danger did strange things to people, created instant bonds, and he’d learned that such passions weren’t real. The emotions were usually nothing more than the aftereffects of adrenaline and relief.

He recalled some of her accomplishments that Igor had mentioned, realizing that she probably handled this kind of stress much better than he did. It was his own relief he’d seen reflected in Anika’s expression, not hers.

“We’re even.” His gruff tone covered his embarrassment.

From above, a voice called, “Hello.” It was Erwin Puhl.

Startled that their signal had been seen so quickly, Mercer checked his watch. Thirty minutes had passed since the fire had started, more than enough time for the expedition members to begin combating the subterranean blaze at the facility’s entrance.

“Erwin, it’s Mercer.”

“When you weren’t leading the firefighting efforts, we feared you were trapped down there. Is Dr. Klein with you? No one has seen her in a while.”

“Yeah, she’s with me. Can you lower a rope? The smoke is getting pretty thick, and the heat’s rising.”

“Back in a minute.”

“Hurry. Once the flames break through the fire doors protecting the garage, there’s going to be one hell of an explosion.” Mercer eyed the diesel tank hulking behind the wavering glow of Anika’s campfire. “Also warn the others who are working at the main entrance to clear the area.”

Ten minutes later, they were pulled up the air vent by the winch mounted on the front of a Sno-Cat Ira had driven out to rescue them. “Everyone’s back at the base camp,” Ira said as they jumped into the boxy vehicle.

“Let’s go. We’ve only got a few more minutes. The fire doors can’t hold much longer, and it must be over a hundred degrees in the garage already.” The drop in temperature from inside to out had left Mercer light-headed and trembling.

Ira didn’t need to hear anything further. He put the Sno-Cat in gear, twisted it around on its axis and tore off across the ice, feathers of churned snow blooming from under its treads. He circled around the long access trench near Camp Decade’s entrance. Smoke streamed from deep underground and a huge swath of snow was stained with soot.

He braked once they reached the mess hall a quarter mile away. Mercer was just stepping down when out across the frozen plain, the fuel tank erupted like a volcano, vaporizing a ragged eighty-foot circle of glacier. Chunks of ice the size of automobiles blasted into the sky, propelled by a towering column of flame. The concussion hit a second later, rocking the Sno-Cat on its suspension and tossing Mercer onto his backside.

Powdered ice drifted for many minutes before falling back to earth. When the last of the snow finally settled, smudge continued to billow from the hole, smearing the pristine horizon.

“What the hell were you two doing down there?” Ira asked sharply after hauling Mercer back to his feet.

Mercer fingered the scrap of paper they’d retrieved from Jack Delaney’s dead fingers. “I’m not sure yet.”

A
s if enraged that its power could not rock the great cruise liner, the North Sea surged ferociously, generating huge waves that would have swamped a commercial fishing boat or pitched the largest freighter. Because of her wide-spaced twin hulls and tremendous length, the
Sea Empress
had several distinct wave patterns under her at any moment and their opposing crests and troughs canceled each other out. This phenomenon allowed her to sail serenely under the pewter skies as if the swells were nothing more than ripples.

Father Anatoly Vatutin had spent the first days of his journey safely in his cabin, having an occasional light meal sent to him rather than venturing to one of the many restaurants or eating in the vessel’s four enormous dining rooms. He’d left word with Bishop Olkranszy, his superior, that he hadn’t felt well since the ship had gotten under way. That wasn’t far from the truth.

Vatutin had come from peasant stock, with farmer’s hands and shoulders like a plow ox. Yet his imposing size, fierce countenance, and unwavering strength masked the fact that he possessed a delicate stomach. Even the ship’s gentle motion made him ill. Such was his dedication to his mission that he rode waves of nausea stoically, spending hours either in his bunk or hunched over the toilet bowl.

He skipped the Universal Convocation’s elaborate opening ceremonies and what some said had been the most beautiful papal blessing ever given. His rare forays to the deck to get fresh air were all under the cover of darkness, and he intentionally avoided any of the attendees he saw. Vatutin had become a nonentity at the most famous meeting in history and he was glad for it.

He had only one thing in mind. The icon.

Other than the waiters who brought him broths and bread and calls from Bishop Olkranszy inquiring about his condition, the only person Vatutin had spoken with was a cardinal named Peretti who was the pope’s secretary of state, the Vatican’s number two man. Peretti had been charged by the pontiff with returning thousands of religious artifacts belonging to other faiths that the Catholic Church had in its possession. He was the only person at the Convocation that Vatutin cared about.

Because of the sheer volume of items being returned, only a portion of the hoard was actually on the ship. These were the most precious relics — ancient texts, rare books, the most valuable statues and icons. Peretti’s shipboard office had been deluged with requests from various people to obtain an item early in the voyage rather than at its end, which had been the plan. In the name of cooperation and fellowship, Peretti had granted all such requests, detailing a dozen
floreria,
members of the Vatican’s technical services department, to search through the shipping containers stored in the vessel’s holds.

Peretti’s office had finally gotten to Father Vatutin’s request, and now he found himself following the broad back of a
floreria
. The workman wore crisp coveralls and had a pair of white gloves tucked into his belt for handling the more fragile objects. While the worker strode with arm-swinging ease, Vatutin shambled down a carpeted hallway with one hand brushing the wall for balance, although the ship was rock steady. His mouth brimmed with saliva.