Temple of Fire (9 page)

Beneath the
Temple
of
Kalpur-Az

Ruins of
Raj
Kithune

 

Titan Six entered a vast underground chamber below the temple of the sun god.

“It’s huge!” said Hawkeye.  “This space extends for fifty yards in every direction.”

The red glow the team had seen in the stairway was the lurid glare coming from dozens of fires.  The chamber was bordered on two sides by the stone foundation of the temple above.  The other two sides were limestone and granite outcroppings.

“The blast shattered some of the foundation,”
Madison
observed, pointing to the limestone and granite.  “It’s a wonder the entire temple hasn’t already collapsed.”

A large fireball erupted from the floor twenty yards away, knocking the team to the ground.

Madison
staggered to his feet, took a black cylinder from his backpack, and planted it in a crack in the floor.  He flipped a switch on the side of the device, which came to life, lights blinking along its smooth, black surface.

Madison
nodded grimly after several minutes and then stood.

“Touchdown was correct,” he said.  “There are pockets of gas under this temple, although a lot more than anybody suspected.  Just two hundred meters below where we’re standing, the temperature is five hundred degrees hotter than it should be.”

“I think you guys should get over here,” said Shooter, who had moved close to one of the chamber’s limestone walls.

Hawkeye, followed by
Madison
, limped to her position.  The three lay on their stomachs and peered through an underground fissure in the floor of the chamber where offerings to
Kalpur-az
had once been stored.

“Son of a bitch,” Hawkeye muttered.  “This isn’t a temple of the sun.  It’s a temple of fire.”

The Titan members gazed at a geological chamber below the one they now inhabited.  It descended far into the bowels of the earth.  Rivers of lava flowed around raging fires, the flames of which shot up every few seconds as gas escaped from deep recesses in the earth.  Pools of black oil bubbled up from below, occasionally erupting into lakes of fire.

“U.S. Petroleum created a literal hell,”
Madison
said, “but their theory of
abiogenic
oil was dead on.  They tapped into the Deep Biosphere. 
Oil rich, to say the least, but also rich in natural gas deposits.”

“Did their drilling techniques do this?” asked Hawkeye.

“It’s wasn’t their technique,”
Madison
answered.  “Any sustained drilling three miles below this area would have destabilized the geology.  The fact that this city was here was the wild card.  The city contains plenty of air pockets — the rooms in all the temples and pyramids and dwellings — making the ground far more unstable than most drilling sites.

“But that’s only one factor that caused this shit-storm.  The air pockets, combined with the escaping gas, are responsible for the raging fires.  A simple equation: fire, gas, and oxygen equals explosions.”

“So the city is going to be destroyed?” asked Shooter.

“No!” cried Ambergris over the COM sets.  “It must be preserved at all costs.”

“Joshua, you don’t understand the ramifications of what I’m saying,”
Madison
said.  “This city is going to be consumed in less than a day, maybe even in a matter of hours.  But it’s not just fire that’s going to level it.”

“Cut to the chase,” said
Caine
.

“What we’re witnessing in this cavern extends for miles down into the earth.  Everything is going to collapse.”

“Isn’t that a good thing?” asked Hawkeye.  “The city will be lost, but this whole damn pit of hell will be sealed up.”

Madison
shook his head. “No.  Not sealed.  The pressure created by the collapse is going to trap megatons of energy that will rebound in an explosion far more powerful than anything the human race has ever witnessed.”

“How powerful, Christian?” asked
Caine
.

“As powerful as the blast that created the underwater
Yucatan
crater sixty-five million years ago. 
The one that caused the extinction of the dinosaurs.”

“What you’re telling me,” said
Caine
,
“is that mankind is going to be wiped out.”

“Exactly,” said
Madison
. 
“Extinction.”

Tremors deep in the earth shook the cavern.

“Let’s get out of here,” Hawkeye said.  “We need to regroup on the surface.”

The team made their way up and out of the Temple of
Kalpur-az
. 

 

86
^TH
FLOOR,
Jin
Mao
Tower
,

Shanghai
,
China

 

Dressed impeccably in an Armani suit, Li
Soo
Yang stood before the double-plated window that served as the office wall overlooking the heart of
Shanghai
.  The
flatscreen
behind him announced with a gentle chime that he had an incoming video call.

“We have penetrated the crater, sir,” said
Saturo
Aiko
.  “My troops are recording all data from the city, which we shall transmit to Dominique
Caine
when we are finished.”

“Well done,” said Yang.  “Dominique is interested in studying the extent of technological influence, if any, the Ancients had on later cultures that their descendants created.”

“Understood.”

“Tell me of the geological situation,” said Yang.  “We have decided to pursue any information pertaining to
abiogenic
sources of oil.  Dominique has discovered alternative energies while interpreting The Genesis Code, but they will take time to develop.”

“My team’s lead scientist tells me that there is a vast reservoir of oil beneath the crater, but we have only begun to investigate the scientific ramifications of the blast.”

“Very well,” said Yang.  “Keep me informed.”

The
flatscreen
went blank.

 

Outside the
Temple
of
Kalpur-az

Ruins of
Raz
Kithune

 

“It’s getting hard to see,” Hawkeye said.  “The wind is picking up.”

“Sandstorm,” said
Madison
.

“Three figures approaching you from the west,” said Touchdown.

Hawkeye, Shooter, and Madison raised their rifles as they hid behind a toppled stone column.

From the haze of dust and sand, Gator and Tank emerged.  They were accompanied by a man wearing a cavalry hat.

“We’re okay,” Tank said.  “This is Will Langhorne.  He’s a geologist stationed over in Elko.   All three of us were captured by Chinese Dragons.  Gator pretended to be having trouble breathing.  We overpowered the guards, found our weapons, and exited the temple where we were held using a tunnel that
Will
found.”

The maverick tipped his hat.

“Pleased to make your acquaintance,” Langhorne said.

“Sorry to interrupt the introductions, gentlemen,” said Touchdown, “but I show Chinese targets all around you.  They’re stationed on the tops of various temples and the observatory.”

Bullets tore through stone representations of lions and eagles.  Titan Six fired blindly at a forty-five degree angle, aiming for the tops of the temples.

“Take cover on the southern side of the
Temple
of the High Priest!” Hawkeye ordered.

Assault rifles and machine guns from both sides sent rounds into the air and down at the earth.

A grenade exploded in the area between the
Temple
of
Kalpur-az
and the
Temple
of the High Priest.

Titan Six ceased fire as they reeled from the explosion.

“The sandstorm’s getting worse!” screamed Gator.

“More than a sandstorm,” yelled
Madison
.  “It’s a desert twister.  It’s causing a whiteout.”

The Chinese kept firing.

The wind howled as sand swirled around Titan Six, spinning the team members around like small action figures.  The wind drove them against the stone edifice of the high priest’s temple.

With the sound of a speeding freight train, the twister rose from the crater, revealing all Titan members prostrate on the sand.

Six Dragons loomed above them, rifles at the ready.  The soldiers parted as their commander walked forward.

“We meet again, Hawkeye,” said
Saturo
Aiko
.  “It is better to engage in combat than tend a garden, is it not?”

 

Temple
of the High Priest

Ruins of
Raj
Kithune

 

Quiz had tracked the whereabouts of his team members from the EFV.  He was on top of the massive portico in front of the
Temple
of the High Priest.  He saw his team below, lying on the ground and at the mercy of the Chinese.

This is Shooter’s gig.

* But you’re the one with the advantage. The job falls to you. *

What if I miss?  Or hit one of Titan Six?

* And what if you don’t? *

Quiz curled his fingers around the trigger of the semi-automatic rifle.  Having scoped the Chinese, he counted down from three and began firing.

He felled three commandos in rapid succession.  The other three escaped behind one of the stone ruins.  Commander
Aiko
vanished in another direction, a blur that seemed to move faster than was humanly possible.

* * *

 

Titan Six climbed to its feet, dazed.

“Let’s get back to the EFV,” said Hawkeye.  “And thanks, Quiz. 
Nicely done.”

“Don’t mention it.”

“What’s that?” asked
Madison
, wiping sand from his eyes. 
“On the ground.”

Hawkeye looked at the sand floor of the crater.  “It’s a grenade! 
A little parting gift from
Aiko
.
  Run!  Follow me!”

Titan Six ran the length of the
Temple
of the High Priest.  They rounded its back corner as the grenade exploded.

Langhorne had brought up the rear.  He tumbled head first onto the ground and didn’t move.

“Gator and
Tank,
go get him,” said Hawkeye.

The team retreated to the EFV.

 

Titan Six

Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle

 

Titan Six removed their helmets and sipped Grace Nguyen’s energy supplements, which were definitely not available Over-the-Counter.

“So what the hell do we do?” asked Hawkeye, massaging his right leg.  “This whole dog and pony show is about to get blown to hell.”

“I’ve been making some calculations regarding the extent of the impending blast,”
Madison
said, motioning to the black cylinder he had inserted into the underground chamber beneath the Temple of
Kalpur-az
.  “Based on the data I collected, the explosion will create a dust cloud extending forty thousand feet into the atmosphere.  The cloud would be approximately six to seven hundred miles in diameter.  At that altitude, prevailing wind currents will carry it around the entire world in two to three weeks.”

“The beginning of nuclear winter,” Quiz said.  “The much tamer explosion at
Tunguska
in 1908 spread dust in the atmosphere for weeks, but this is going to be far worse.  Sunlight will be blocked from the earth for hundreds of years.”

“I don’t see how this can be averted,”
Madison
said, resignation causing his facial features to sag.  “The Genesis Code is in all of us.  Maybe a few survivors will start from scratch yet again.  We now know it’s happened several times before.”

* Now is the time to tell them about our special cargo. *

“There may be a way to avert this,” Quiz said. 
“A limited thermonuclear detonation.”
  His youthful appearance and demeanor were at odds with the gravity of his statement.

All eyes in the EFV fixed on the young scientist and soldier.

“Are you mad?” asked
Madison
.

“A small, tactical nuclear device is in the back of the EFV,” Quiz replied.  “And no, I’m not mad.  I’ve made my own calculations.  A sufficient nuclear charge, if placed correctly, might seal much of the underground rock formations by fusing them
into a geological strata
several miles thick.”

“What kind of correct placement are you talking about?” asked Hawkeye.

“I’ve been reviewing the helmet cam footage of the underground cavern below the Temple of
Kalpur-az
.  I would need to drop the device in what appears to be a very deep natural shaft between two of the lava flows.”

“Impossible,” said Shooter.  “There’s no way you could suspend yourself above that chamber.”

Quiz glanced knowingly at Hawkeye.

“Actually, there is,” said Hawkeye, “although doing so would be tantamount to suicide.”

“Correct
me
if I’m wrong,” said Quiz, “but Titan Six doesn’t exist to play it safe.  Besides, we either do this or we can kiss civilization goodbye.”

“We’d have to shoot a high-powered cable across the cavern,” Tank reflected, “and hope it grabs hold of rock on the other side.  Then Quiz would have to attach himself to the cable and position himself over the lava.”

Hawkeye nodded.

Madison
removed the tactical nuke from its case.  Pentagonal in shape and four feet long, the weapon’s casing was made of chrome and titanium.

“I’m not a weapons expert,”
Madison
said, “but I see one glaring problem.  There’s no detonator for this thing.”

“It was meant to be detonated from the
Alamiranta
,” Quiz said, “but since communication with the ship keeps cutting in and out, I don’t think we can rely on the
Ops
Center
.”

“Then it can’t be done,” Gator said.  “We need to get out of here and back to the ship.”

Quiz
unwrapped
the blue crystal.  “We might be able to use this,” he said.  “It’s called the
Ruba-schal
.  I ran some tests on it when I got back to the EFV.”

“The what?” said
Shooter.

“The
Ruba-schal
,” Quiz said.  “It was almost certainly made by the Ancients, although what the
Nizians
used it for is anybody’s guess.  It amplifies light by a factor of a hundred, but I’m fairly sure that the Ancients used it as a power source, or perhaps as part of a much larger power-generating device.  What I do know is that if a laser beam inside the thermonuclear device is aimed at the crystal, its lattice structure would become highly unstable.  It would begin to generate enormous power.  If we connect it to the nuke, we’ll have our detonator.”

Caine’s
voice interrupted the discussion.

“Proceed with Quiz’s plan,” she said.  “I told Quiz to prepare for such an eventuality before the team left the
Alamiranta
.  But there’s one problem.  More Chinese have infiltrated the crater.  I don’t see how we can pull off such a delicate maneuver with a thermonuclear device without their cooperation.  We simply don’t have enough firepower on the ground to take them all out.”

“I can take you to
Aiko
,” Will Langhorne volunteered.

“That’s all well and good,” said Touchdown, “but twenty Dragons are advancing on the EFV.  I don’t think you can just stand on top of the vehicle and explain the crisis in a calm, rationale voice.”

“Obviously not,” said Hawkeye.  “But I can buy us some time.”