The Thirteenth Legion (A James Acton Thriller, #15) (James Acton Thrillers) (24 page)

Dawson
opened up the new images. “These are better.”

“Much,”
agreed Niner as he zoomed in, Dawson doing the same. He and Leather leaned in
closer, examining the area, two red dots indicating the last known location of
the professors, the entire area rock with little else, the ring road in the
bottom of the frame. “I’m not seeing anything, are you?”

Leather
shook his head, then pointed at a sliver in the photo, leading from the ring
road to the dots. “Is that a road?”

Dawson
zoomed in the photo some more. “Can’t be. It’s way too narrow to fit a
vehicle.”

Atlas peered
at their screen. “Some sort of lava tube or whatever they’re called, the top of
it eroded away maybe?”

Spock
nodded. “Or a channel cut by glacier runoff. That could mean it’s hollow
inside, big enough to hold a vehicle.”

Niner
opened his mouth to say something when he stopped, pressing a finger to his
headset. “I’ve got that call from Langley.”

Dawson
motioned to the speaker at the center of the table and Niner activated it.
Dawson leaned in. “This is Zero-One, you’re on speaker, all trusted personnel.”

“Hello
Zero-One, Control Actual.” Dawson smiled slightly, recognizing the voice of the
analyst he had dealt with on several previous occasions, Chris Leroux. He was
young, though good at his job—in fact, excellent at his job. He had the added
bonus of being a good friend of Dylan Kane’s, and if Kane trusted him, Dawson
did too. “I’m calling about your request to retask a bird on that area. As this
is a semi-unauthorized mission, I wasn’t able to get that for you, but the
regularly scheduled bird just flew past. I’ve got footage streaming to you
now.”

Dawson
pointed at the laptops and Niner nodded, pulling up the stream and spinning it
around so everyone could see. “I’ve got that footage now, Control.”

“Good.
As you can see, there’s nothing obvious there. Just a bunch of volcanic rock.
But watch what happens when you switch to thermal.” The stream suddenly
switched, everything a dull blue or black, with several large red and yellow
hotspots. “You see the hotspots?”

Dawson
nodded. “Yes.”

“Obviously
those shouldn’t be there. They’ve done an excellent job at heat dispersion, and
if you weren’t looking for something, you’d just dismiss it as either volcanic
activity of heat retention from the sun.”

Dawson
pursed his lips, glancing at the others. “But we’re sure it’s neither.”

“Yes. No
matter how much you want to hide things, you need some sort of exhaust for your
ventilation system. In cases like this, you try to pipe it away from your
location so if it’s discovered, at least your main site is still secure.”

“But how
do we know these heat sources are from exhaust ports?”

“From
this image, you can’t. But as the satellite continued, we got an angle shot.”
The screen changed and a new image appeared. “Do you see it?”

Dawson
leaned in then smiled, his head bobbing as he leaned back so the others could
look. It was clearly a rectangle, clearly manmade.

“Looks
like a grate,” observed Atlas, his booming voice excited. “I think he’s found
it.”

 “That’s
our assessment as well,” said Leroux. “This appears to be their final
destination, and the facility appears to be underground, which would explain
why their tracking devices stopped transmitting.”

“We’ll
be heading there in less than an hour.”

“Understood.”

“Any
signs of sentry guns? After what happened in London, I don’t want to be walking
into a wall of lead.”

“We’ve
been going over the images and we haven’t been able to find anything, however
that doesn’t mean they’re not there. The ones they used in London were designed
to be completely hidden until it’s too late.”

Dawson
frowned, everyone exchanging glances. He hated automated defenses, which was
one of the reasons air support was so important. Bomb the shit out of an area,
and you had a good chance of taking out any sentry guns.

That
wasn’t an option in Iceland.

“Any
signs of a way in?”

“Nothing
beyond the vent.”

Dawson leaned
in, examining the image. “What’s the scale on that? Can we fit?”

“You can
definitely fit through the opening. No promises as to the rest of the way, or
where it goes. They’ll probably be monitoring it so you’ll need to bypass any
security.”

Niner
leaned toward the speaker. “Any idea where they’re getting their power?”

“Good
question.”

“Of
course.”

Leroux
chuckled, Atlas punching Niner in the shoulder. “Respect, dude!”

“There’s
no evidence of any wind or solar, and not enough heat is being vented for diesel
or some other type of fossil fuel generator.”

“Batteries?”
suggested Spock.

“They’d
still need to be vented, and to be charged. But, we did find this.” A new photo
appeared showing the waterline and some sort of manmade structure extending
into the water.”

“What
the hell is that?” asked Niner.

“Our
guess is they have some sort of tidal generator, and the electricity is fed
into the facility through wires underneath this covering.”

Dawson
nodded. “So if we cut those, they go dark.”

“They’ll
probably have some sort of battery capacity that will kick in, but someone will
definitely poke their head outside to take a look.”

Dawson
smiled. “And that will tell us where the damned door is.” He checked his watch.
“Okay, anything else?”

“Not at
this time, but we’re still going over the data. If we find out anything, we’ll
contact you.”

“Good.
We leave in thirty mikes.”

Denier Installation, Iceland

“My God, I feel like I’m on the set of a James Bond movie!”

“Thanks,”
replied Chaney, he leading Acton and Laura deeper into the buried facility. “I
have to admit that every time I come here, I get goosebumps.”

It was
everything Acton could do to keep his jaw shut, each new glimpse causing it to
drop, Chaney freely answering all their questions as they walked through
massive open areas with vehicles, piping, ducts, cable bundles and more, along
with dozens upon dozens of personnel in color coded jumpsuits. It was a marvel
of modern engineering, built inside what appeared to be long dormant magma
chambers.

“This
must have cost a fortune,” said Laura, her head on a swivel just like his.

“It
did.”

“Where
did you get the money?”

“The
Triarii is very wealthy.”

“Yes,
but you’re not the Triarii.”

Chaney
tossed a smile over his shoulder at her. “Noo, but many who controlled the
purse strings joined us.” He extended his hands to either side, encompassing
the sight before them. “It’s the dawn of a new age, Professor, and many of our
people wanted to join us in our quest. This entire facility is a dream taken
form, a means to an end we’ve been seeking for two thousand years.”

Acton
stared at what appeared to be massive capacitors. “And when it’s all over, and
you’ve either proven or disproven your theory, what then?”

Chaney
paused, turning to face them. “I would hope we could find peace among ourselves
and reunite, stronger than ever, knowing once and for all the answers to the
questions we have been asking for so long.”

Laura
looked at him. “You truly are convinced this will work.”

“Absolutely.”
He smiled, leaning slightly toward her. “And Professor, I think you are too,
otherwise you wouldn’t be here.” He tilted his head toward Acton. “And you as
well.”

Acton
smiled slightly, wagging a finger. “Don’t mistake my being here for anything
other than self-preservation. Scientists were afraid that if they detonated the
first atomic bomb, it might start a chain reaction that would destroy the
entire planet.”

“Yet it
didn’t.”

“No,
after a bunch of mathematics, they were
pretty sure
it wouldn’t. Yet
they weren’t a hundred percent, and they went ahead anyway.”

Laura
nodded. “And many feared turning on the Large Hadron Collider would create a
wormhole that would consume the planet.”

Chaney
chuckled. “And again, it didn’t.”

Acton
shook his head. “I’m not sure if that thing’s at full power yet, so the jury
might still be out on that one.”

Chaney
laughed. “Sceptics. Think of it this way, Professors, if a wormhole is created,
none of us will care, will we?”

Acton
grunted. “We will for a few seconds.”

Chaney snorted.
“And I’m sure they’ve got someone on a kill switch, just in case they spot
something odd.”

Acton pulled
in a slow breath, any levity gone. “And that’s why I’m here. I kill this if
anything strange happens. Agreed?”

Chaney
bowed. “Absolutely. We’re here to learn, not destroy. Tonight is the beginning
of what will be a fascinating chapter in humanity’s history.”

Laura’s
eyes narrowed as they resumed walking. “Haven’t you already had time for
experiments? You’ve had nine skulls now for days.”

“Our
scientists have been working hard on getting things ready for today’s final
experiment. The machine is only now ready to go online, which was why we
triggered the endgame when we did. We now have all thirteen skulls, and the
machine that we’ve been working on for a decade is ready.”

“What
machine?” asked Acton.

“One designed
to safely harness the energy released by the skulls.”

Acton
shook his head, giving Laura a look behind Chaney’s back. “Energy you’ve never
actually witnessed.”

“Personally,
no, but we know what happened in London in 1212. That disaster won’t be
repeated.”

“If only
three
skulls destroyed half of London, how could you possible hope to
handle
thirteen
?”

Chaney
stopped in front of a set of doors, flanked by two guards with very serious
looking FN P90s. “With this.” The guards pulled open the doors and they stepped
inside.

Acton
gasped, his jaw forgotten, his mouth agape. They were standing in a large
control center, ringed with monitors and workstations, the only gap the door
they had just entered through. It was stark white, the only color from the
displays, all showing various readings, of what, Acton had no clue. The floor
was translucent, and below them was bare rock, the chamber they were in,
mounted on pylons driven into the ground below, large springs coiled at the
midpoints, suggesting the entire structure was designed to handle any type of
seismic event that might be thrown at it.

Laura
gasped. “Oh my God!”

He
turned toward her to see her head tilted back as she stared above. He looked
and his eyes shot wide open, his chest tightening at the sight. Thirteen
telescoping arms surrounded the structure in a circle, all equally spaced, all
but four with a crystal skull mounted to the end. Each of the empty arms had
teams in cleanroom suits working to mount the newly arrived skulls.

He
hugged himself, cold, noticing Laura doing the same.

Chaney
smiled. “See, even I’m shivering, and it’s worse now that all thirteen are
here.”

Acton
willed himself to stop shivering. “It’s cold in here, that’s all.”

Chaney
laughed. “There’s no convincing you, is there? But yes, it is cold. The
scientists say electricity conducts better in the cold. Outside this chamber,
where the skulls are, will be lowered to near absolute zero when they’re ready.”
He held out his hand. “Please, feel free to look around and ask questions.
We’re all friends here.”

Acton
nodded, beginning to stroll around the perimeter, peering at the displays and
listening to the scientists’ conversations as he passed by. He glanced over at
Chaney, who stood in the center of the room. “I can’t believe you haven’t tried
to unite at least a few already.”

Chaney
handed a tablet back to one of the scientists. “Trust me, the temptation was
there, but we knew without the proper equipment in place, we’d just end up
destroying the facility. It’s only now that things are ready.”

Acton
motioned at the skulls above. “And just how will all this protect us?”

“We’re
expecting a massive energy surge that this chamber has been designed to absorb
then project away harmlessly. As soon as we see any reaction, we’ll pause,
analyze the data, then continue. Your job will be to hit the kill switch if you
see anything that concerns you that we don’t see, or if you hear someone
ordering things killed.” Acton felt his chest tighten at the responsibility,
Chaney picking up on his unease. “Don’t worry, Professor, anyone here can halt
the experiment, it’s not all on your shoulders. You just have an additional
switch that can kill things. A safety valve for our enthusiasm, shall we say.”