Atlantis Found (67 page)

The gunfire had died away, and Jacobs, followed cautiously by his men, began inspecting the bodies and removing all weapons clutched in dead hands. Pitt, with his Colt hanging loosely in his right hand, came over and knelt at Hugo’s side. The leader of the Wolf family’s annihilated security force became aware of a presence and stared up expressionlessly.

“How did you know?” he murmured.

“Your people used the same booby-trap trick on me in the mine in Colorado.”

“But the explosion . . . ?”

Pitt knew the man was going, and he had to get it in fast. “We rolled the spare tire and wheel from a tow vehicle down the tunnel, tripping the wire to your explosive charge. We then took cover in a storeroom. Immediately after the blast, we ran out and scattered ourselves in the ice debris caused by the concussion and played dead.”

“Who are you?” he whispered.

“My name is Dirk Pitt.”

The eyes widened briefly. “Not you,” he whispered. Then the eyes froze open and his head slumped to the side.

46

THE EXPLOSION, FOLLOWED BY a storm of gunfire, resounded through the tunnel and into the hangar like thunder rumbling from the other end of a drainage pipe. Then the racket abruptly stopped and the sounds ebbed, until an ominous silence spread and hung heavy inside the hangar. Minutes passed, with everyone standing frozen, staring into the yawning darkness, waiting with uneasy trepidation. Then the eerie stillness was broken by the approaching sound of footsteps echoing along the ice floor of the tunnel.

A figure slowly took form and walked into the refracted light falling through the roof of the hangar. A tall man, holding a stick with a white rag flowing from the top, advanced toward the semicircle of a hundred men and women holding guns, every muzzle pointed at the stranger. A scarf was wrapped around the lower half of his face. He walked directly up to Karl Wolf and his sisters, stopped, and pulled away the scarf, revealing a craggy face darkened with bearded stubble and haggard with fatigue.

“Hugo sends his regrets, but he is unable to join your little bon voyage party.”

There was a moment of incredulous confusion throughout the hangar. Blondi stared in amazed fascination. Elsie’s face took on an expression of shock and baffled rage. Predictably, Karl was the first to recover and come back on keel. “So it’s you, Mr. Pitt,” he said, observing Pitt through suspicious eyes. “You’re like a curse.”

“Forgive the casual dress,” said Pitt cordially, “but my tux is at the cleaners.”

Glaring at Pitt, her blue eyes furious, Elsie stepped forward and thrust an automatic pistol into Pitt’s stomach. He grunted in pain, stepped back, and clutched his midriff, but the smile never left his face.

“You will notice,” Pitt spoke tautly, “that I am unarmed and carrying a flag of truce.”

Karl pushed Elsie’s gun hand away. “Let me kill him,” she hissed venomously.

“All in good time,” he said conversationally. He looked Pitt in the eyes. “Hugo is dead?”

“As we say back home, Hugo bought the farm.”

“And his men?

“In the same category.”

“Were you responsible for the destruction of my aircraft?”

Pitt looked around at the smashed aircraft and shrugged. “I drove rather recklessly, I must admit.”

“Where did you come from?” Wolf asked sharply.

Pitt smiled, ignored him completely, and said, “I suggest you order your people to lay down their weapons before they get hurt very badly. More than enough blood has been spilled here today. It would be the height of stupidity to add to the carnage.”

“Your men, Mr. Pitt, how many of the American force are left?”

“See for yourself.” Pitt turned and made a motion with his arm. Giordino, Cleary, and his remaining twenty men stepped from the tunnel into the hangar and spread out in an even line nearly ten paces apart, guns held at the ready.

“Twenty against a hundred.” Karl Wolf smiled for the first time.

“We’re expecting reinforcements momentarily.”

“Too late,” Karl said, firmly believing that Pitt was desperately attempting to save himself through deception. “The nanotech systems created to break away the ice shelf have been activated by now. The world is headed for a cataclysm as we talk. Nothing can stop it.”

“I beg to differ,” Pitt said, his tone purposefully neutral. “All systems were shut down ten minutes before they were to be set in motion. I’m sorry to disrupt your plans, Karl, but there will be no cataclysm. There will be no New Destiny, no Fourth Empire. The world will go on spinning around the sun as before, far from perfect, with all its man-made weaknesses and frailties. Summer and winter, blue skies and clouds, rain and snow, will continue uninterrupted until long after the human race has ceased to exist. If we become extinct, it will be from natural causes, not from some outlandish scheme by a megalomaniac bent on world domination.”

“What are you saying?” Elsie snapped in growing alarm.

“No need to panic, dear sister,” said Karl, his tone a shade less than congenial. “The man is lying.”

Pitt shook his head wearily. “It’s all over for the Wolf family. If anyone deserves to be indicted by a world tribunal for attempted crimes against humanity, it’s you. When seven billion souls find out how you and your family of ghouls tried to exterminate every man, woman, and child on the planet, you’re not going to be very popular. Your giant ships, wealth, and treasures will be seized. And if any of your family members
do
escape a lifetime in jail, their every move will be closely watched by international intelligence and police agencies to ensure that they won’t have any ambitions for a Fifth Empire.”

“If what you say is true,” Karl said with a sneer, only slightly diminished by uncertainty, “what do you plan to do with my sisters and me?”

“Not my call.” Pitt sighed. “Sometime, someplace, you’ll be hanged for your crimes, for all the murders you’ve ordered of those who stood in your way. My satisfaction will be sitting in the front row and watching you drop.”

“A most provocative illusion, Mr. Pitt, and most intriguing. A pity it’s pure fantasy.”

“You’re a hard man to convince.”

“Give the order to fire, brother,” Elsie demanded. “Shoot the vermin. If you don’t, I will.”

Karl Wolf stared at the weary and battle-exhausted veterans of Cleary’s command. “My sister is right. Unless your men surrender within the next ten seconds, my people will cut them down.”

“Never happen,” said Pitt, his voice hard and abrupt.

“One hundred guns against twenty? The battle will not last long, and there can only be one conclusion. You see, Mr. Pitt, too much is at stake. My sisters and I will gladly sacrifice our lives in the name of the Fourth Empire.”

“It’s stupid to waste lives for a dream that’s already dead and buried,” Pitt said casually.

“The hollow statement of a desperate man. At least I will have the gratification of knowing you’ll be the first to die.”

Pitt stared at Wolf for a long moment, then glanced down at the automatic rifle in the madman’s hands. Then he shrugged. “Have it your way. But before you get carried away with blood lust, I suggest you look behind you.”

Wolf shook his head. “I’m not taking my eyes off you.”

Pitt turned slightly to Elsie and Blondi. “Why don’t you girls explain the facts of life to your brother?”

The Wolf sisters turned and looked.

Every neck in the hangar turned and every pair of eyes looked toward the rear wall and the entrance of the far tunnel. If there was one thing the hangar was lacking, it wasn’t an arsenal of automatic weapons. Another two hundred had joined the drama being enacted around the wrecked aircraft. Two hundred nasty-looking Eradicator rifles all aimed at the backs of Destiny Enterprises engineers and scientists and held in the hands of men whose faces were hidden by helmets and goggles. They were ranged in an orderly semicircle, the front row kneeling, the back row standing, dressed in Arctic battle gear similar to that worn by Cleary and his team.

One of the figures stepped forward and spoke loudly with authority. “Lay down your weapons very slowly and back away! At the first sign of hostility, I will order my men to open fire! Please cooperate and no one will be hurt!”

There was no sign of hesitation or resistance. Far from it. The men and women who made up the scientific team for Destiny Enterprises were only too happy to rid themselves of weapons few of them knew how to operate properly. There was an almost universal sigh of relief as they backed away from the Bushmaster rifles and raised their hands in the air.

Elsie looked as if she had taken a knife in the heart. She stood with a stunned, uncomprehending look on her face. Blondi, her eyes stricken and bewildered, looked as if she was going to be sick. Karl Wolf’s face went tense and hard as stone, more angry than fearful at the certainty of seeing his grand plan to launch a new world order suddenly evaporate.

“Which one of you is Dirk Pitt?” inquired the leader of the newly arrived Special Forces.

Pitt slowly raised his hand. “Here.”

The officer strode up to Pitt and gave a slight nod of his head. “Colonel Robert Wittenberg, in charge of the Special Forces operation. What is the status of the Ross Ice Shelf operation?”

“Terminated,” Pitt answered steadily. “The Valhalla Project was shut down ten minutes short of the ice-cutting system’s activation.”

Wittenberg relaxed visibly. “Thank God,” he sighed.

“Your timing could not have been more perfect, Colonel.”

“After making radio contact with Major Cleary, we followed your directions through the opening in the ice you smashed with your vehicle.” He paused and asked as if in awe, “Did you see the ancient city?”

Pitt smiled. “Yes, we saw it.”

“From there it was a routine run with full battle gear,” Wittenberg continued, “until we arrived at the hangar and assembled before anyone turned and noticed us.”

“It was touch and go, but Major Cleary and I managed to keep everyone’s attention focused away from your end of the tunnel until you took up your battle position.”

“Is this all of them?” asked Wittenberg.

Pitt nodded. “Except for several of their wounded back at the control center.”

Cleary approached, and the two warriors saluted before shaking hands warmly. Cleary’s smile was tired, but the teeth showed. “Bob, you don’t know how happy I am to see your ugly old face.”

“How many times does this make that I saved your tail?” Wittenberg said, humor in his eyes.

“Twice, and I’m not ashamed to admit it.”

“You didn’t leave much for me to do.”

“True, but if you and your men hadn’t shown up when you did, you’d have found half an acre of dead bodies.”

Wittenberg stared at Cleary’s men, who stood gaunt and weary but still vigilant, watching every move made by the Wolf personnel as they dropped their rifles on the ice floor and gathered in hushed groups near the wrecked aircraft. “It looks like they whittled you down some.”

“I lost too many good men,” Cleary admitted grimly.

Pitt gestured to the Wolfs. “Colonel Wittenberg, may I introduce Karl Wolf and his sisters Elsie and . . .” Not knowing Blondi, he paused.

“My sister Blondi,” Karl intervened. He was a man in the middle of a nightmare. “What do you intend to do with us, Colonel?”

“If it was up to me,” growled Cleary, “I’d shoot the whole lot of you.”

“Were you given orders concerning the Wolfs after you captured them?” Pitt asked Wittenberg.

The colonel shook his head. “There was no time to discuss political policy regarding prisoners.”

“In that case, may I ask a favor?”

“After all you and your friend have done,” replied Cleary, “you have but to name it.”

“I’d like temporary custody of the Wolfs.”

Wittenberg gazed into Pitt’s eyes, as if trying to read the mind behind. “I don’t quite understand.”

But Cleary did. “Since you were given no orders concerning the disposition of prisoners,” he said to the colonel, “I think it only fitting and proper that the man who saved us from unimaginable horror have his request honored.”

Wittenberg thought a moment before nodding. “I quite agree. The spoils of war. You have custody of the Wolfs until such time as they can be transported under guard to Washington.”

“No one government has legal jurisdiction over any individual in Antarctica,” said Karl arrogantly. “It is unlawful for you to hold us as hostages.”

“I’m only a simple soldier,” said Wittenberg, with an indifferent shrug. “I’ll leave it for the lawyers and politicians to decide your fate after you’re in
their
hands.”

 
WHILE the newly combined Special Force teams secured the mining facility and rounded up the captives, eventually placing them in confinement in a workers’ dormitory, Pitt and Giordino unobtrusively herded Karl, Elsie, and Blondi Wolf along the huge doors that covered one wall of the hangar. Seemingly unnoticed, they suddenly forced the three Wolfs through a small maintenance door that opened onto the aircraft runway outside. The sudden surge of cold air came as a shock after the sixty-degree temperature inside the hangar.

Karl Wolf turned and smiled bleakly at Pitt and Giordino. “Is this where you execute us?”

Blondi seemed as if she were in a trance, but Elsie stared at Pitt scathingly. “Shoot us, if you dare!” she spat savagely.

Pitt’s face was masked by disgust. “By all that is holy in this world, you all deserve to die. Your whole despicable family deserves to die. But it won’t be me or my friend here who will do the honors. I’ll leave that to natural causes.”

The revelation suddenly struck Wolf. “You’re allowing us to escape?”

Pitt nodded. “Yes.”

“Then you don’t see my sisters and me standing trial and going to jail.”

“A family of your wealth and power will never step into a courtroom. You will use every means at your command to cheat the gallows or a life behind bars and go free in the end.”