God's Lions - The Dark Ruin (28 page)

“I’m sure our reinforcements are being kept busy,” Childs said, “and if you radio our position anyone listening will know exactly where we are.”

“Radios!” Leo suddenly blurted out.

“I beg your pardon, Cardinal?”

“Radios ... the radios the soldiers are carrying.” Leo grabbed the corporal by the shoulder. “Did your commanders broadcast any casualty reports after the explosion?”

“No, sir ... they haven’t had time.”

“Good. Now ... can you tune into a frequency that’s not being monitored?”

“Yes, sir ... we have a lot of empty frequencies, but if we use one of those no one will hear us.”

“That’s exactly what I’m counting on.”

The soldier looked confused. “What are you thinking, sir?”

“I want you to make a false broadcast stating that we were all killed in the mess hall explosion, and it must be broadcast on a frequency that’s not being monitored by your people because it will only confuse them. The people who are looking for us are probably using a computer to scan every frequency available to your forces, which means they’ll probably pick up our fake transmission on an unused frequency.”

“You think they’ll call off their dogs if they think we’re all dead?” Alon asked.

“It’s worth a try.”

“That’s a brilliant piece of thinking, Cardinal.” Alon winked at the two soldiers. “This man really missed his calling when he decided to become a priest instead of a soldier.”

The corporal’s eyes widened. “You’re a cardinal?”

“Yes, and the man who just lifted you off the floor is my boss. That’s Pope Michael, and we need to guard him with our lives.”

The young soldier’s mouth gaped open as he stared up into the pope’s blue eyes. “Well, if that don’t beat all. We heard on the tele’ this morning that you was missin’, sir. And to think, all this time I thought you was a soldier like us. What in the world is going on around here?”

“That’s classified, corporal,” Childs said quickly. “If anyone ever asks, you never saw any of these people here. Now, let’s get going with that fake broadcast because we need to move out.”

“Right, sir.” When all was ready, the corporal changed the frequency on his radio, and in his most official-sounding voice, he pretended he was calling his commander with the news that no one inside the mess hall had survived the explosion. After pausing for a moment, they all heard two mysterious clicks, confirming their suspicions that someone was listening.

“Keep your eyes peeled for any movement,” Childs said. “If this radio thing works, we might just catch ourselves some rats coming out of their nests.”

Moving out of the machine room, the soldiers stepped out onto a small concrete balcony that overlooked an enormous cavern that stretched out several hundred feet below them. A series of stairs led five stories down to the cavern floor, and from their position near the roof of the cavern, they could see every movement within the gigantic space below. For a minute nothing moved, and then, near the exit door at the bottom of the cavern, they spotted two men carrying automatic rifles as they climbed down from their perches in darkened crevices along the walls.

Inching forward on the concrete balcony, the two Special Forces soldiers took aim at their targets just as a third man armed with a long sniper rifle stepped from the shadows on the opposite side of the cavern.”

“Whoa, didn’t see that bloke!” the corporal whispered.

Crawling up behind the two soldiers, Alon withdrew his pistol and took a bead on the third man. “On the count of three, we all shoot.”

The corporal checked the distance through his rifle scope. “That’s too far for a pistol shot, sir.”

“We don’t have any other choice,” Alon said. “If I miss, the gunfire will probably distract him long enough for you to get a bead on him with your rifle after you take out the first two targets.”

“It’s worth a try, mate. Let’s do it.”

At the count of three, all three men fired their weapons. The two armed men by the exit door dropped instantly, but the man with the sniper rifle was just too far away. Alon’s pistol shot missed. Stunned by the sound of a bullet whizzing by his head, the remaining gunman ducked down and aimed his long rifle up at the balcony, but before he could get off a shot the corporal swiveled his rifle and squeezed off two quick shots, dropping the man in his tracks.

“Nice shooting, corporal,” Alon said, holstering his weapon. “Thanks.”

“Any time, mate. Let’s get these people out of here.”

From their elevated perch, they all made their way down five flights of stairs to the cavern floor and stopped. Spread out before them were rows of red velvet seats that faced a concrete stage.

“What’s all this?” Ariella asked.

“This is the auditorium,” Childs said. “Because of the cavern’s immense size and natural acoustic properties, they’ve been holding concerts down here since Victorian times. Come on, let’s spread out and head down through the aisles. These seats will give us some cover if there are any more surprises waiting up ahead.”

The thought that they might be in the crosshairs of a sniper rifle made the hair on their necks stand out as they slowly made their way toward an exit that now seemed very far away. Passing between the rows of red seats, the tension matched the humidity of the cave as they peered into the shadows looking for phantoms in the thin shaft of light that marked their only way out.

Suddenly the corporal stopped and motioned for everyone to get down. In the light shining from the exit, he had just spotted the end of a rifle barrel jutting out from a small alcove by the door.

Immediately everyone began moving behind the seats to the walls along the sides of the auditorium. They had almost made it to the far side of the cavern when eight heavily-armed men entered through the exit door and stopped to look around. Using only hand signals, their leader stationed two of his men by the exit, while the remaining six began spreading out as they headed toward the stage. They had barely taken five steps before they discovered the bodies of their three comrades.

“We’re running out of options here,” Alon whispered to the corporal. “Only four of us are armed ... we wouldn’t stand a chance against that many men with assault rifles. Give me your pistols.”

“What’s your plan, mate?”

“We need to even up the odds a little, and two people in this group are ex-Special Forces soldiers.” Alon pointed to Lev and Doug Peterson. Without hesitating, the two soldiers handed their pistols over.

Taking a deep breath, Alon peered over one of the seats. “We can’t go forward and we can’t go back, and since they’ve found the bodies of their men, they know someone is down here. Maybe now would be a good time to break radio silence and call for backup. They already know someone is down here.”

“I already tried, but I couldn’t get through. It looks like they’re jamming our radios.”

“Great. They’re one step ahead of us. Is there another way out of here?”

“There’s another cavern below, but there’s no way out.”

“At least it will give us a place to hide for awhile. You have timed radio checks, don’t you?”

“Yes, sir ... every ten minutes.”

“Good. When your commander doesn’t hear from you in the next few minutes, he’ll realize something’s wrong and send reinforcements. How do we get down to that other area?”

“There’s a tunnel behind that big boulder behind us, but we’d have to make it across twenty feet of open space without being seen, and there are thirteen of us, including the old guy ... who by the way looks like he’s on his last leg.”

“Don’t worry about him, Corporal. He always looks like that.”

“I heard that, Mr. Lavi,” Eduardo whispered.

“Sorry, Mr. Acerbi.” Alon motioned to Childs and pointed to the boulder concealing the tunnel entrance just as a couple of the men who had just entered suddenly began walking in their direction.

The corporal’s face hardened as he looked back over his shoulder at Childs and Alon. “Looks like we just ran out of time.” Pulling two smoke grenades from his webbed combat belt, he handed them to Alon. “We’re going to toss a couple of shrapnel grenades at the two blokes headed this way before we start laying down covering fire. As soon as we do that, you pull the rings on those smoke grenades and leave them on the floor here while all of you run for the tunnel. Pass the word on ... and do it fast.”

“What about you two?” Alon said.

“We’re going to keep anyone who pokes his head up pinned to the ground until you people make it into the tunnel. Don’t worry, mate. We’ll be right behind you. We go on the count of three.”

Alon slapped the corporal on the shoulder, but just as they began passing word of the plan down the line to the other members of their group, one of the men walking toward them pointed and shouted to the others. There would be no time to count to three as the corporal and the other soldier immediately threw their grenades and ducked down while Alon pulled the rings on the smoke grenades.

The explosions from the shrapnel grenades shook the cavern and took out the men who had been walking toward them, and as clouds of red smoke filled the area, the two British soldiers rose up and began laying down a burst of automatic covering fire as the group ran for the tunnel entrance.

As soon as he was sure everyone had made it into the tunnel, Alon stopped in front of the large boulder next to the entrance and squinted through the billowing red smoke. Gunfire continued to erupt all around him as bullets ricocheted off the surrounding rocks, but there was no sign of the British soldiers. Looking off to his left, he could see flashes of gunfire through the smoke coming from the direction of the exit door. He quickly dropped to one knee and steadied his pistol before empting his clip. The flashes stopped.

Glancing back off to his right, he breathed a sigh of relief when the two soldiers emerged from the smoke at a dead run, and within seconds all three men had made it safely behind the boulder just as a small explosion rocked the area and showered the rock protecting them with razor-sharp shrapnel.

“Sounds like they’re returning the favor with some grenades of their own,” the corporal said.

Alon slapped another clip into his pistol. “Yeah. I figure we just took out half of them, but these guys are fanatical.”

“Terrorists?”

“Could be. They’re obviously dedicated and well-trained. Let’s keep going and pray that reinforcements come looking for us soon. I’m almost out of ammunition, and there’s not much telling what other tricks these guys might have up their sleeves.”

Ahead of them, the others had made their way through a short, twisting tunnel into a brightly lit cavern filled with conical, multi-colored stalactites suspended from a porous limestone ceiling. Aside from the beauty of the space, the first thing they noticed was the absolute silence interspersed only by the sound of dripping water echoing inside the chamber all around them.

The sudden quiet was a welcome diversion from the hail of bullets they had all been dodging only moments before, but the momentary reprieve from the violence behind them was only a cruel illusion, giving them time to ponder their fate and wonder at the fact that someone wanted them dead. Whoever was after them had no qualms about sending an organized group of men on a seemingly suicidal mission against a fortified position full of Special Forces soldiers. Someone wanted to make sure they never lived to see the light of day again.
The only question was—why?

As soon as Alon and the two soldiers entered the cavern, an enormous explosion in the tunnel behind them knocked them to the ground. For a moment it felt as if all of the air had been sucked from the cavern as the lights flickered off and a wall of dust and rocky debris shot from the mouth of the tunnel, leaving them all in choking darkness as they struggled to breathe through the fine grit that swirled around their heads.

“That was no grenade!” the corporal shouted in the darkness. Switching on his flashlight, he slowly crept back to the tunnel entrance. “They blew the tunnel!” he shouted over his shoulder. “We’re trapped down here!”

Alon picked himself up off the floor and, with Leo and Childs following, they walked up next to the corporal and peered inside. Having worked in a mine before, Leo could tell right away that the damage was extensive. The roof of the tunnel had completely collapsed, leaving a wall of crushed rock that was compressed so tightly that not even light could penetrate from the other side. Even under the best of circumstances, it would take days to clear the debris, and then there was still the matter of structural integrity and the possibility of a secondary cave-in.

“No grenade could have done this much damage,” Alon said, squinting in the dusty haze. “Probably a satchel charge.”

“A what?” Leo asked.

“A satchel charge, Cardinal. It’s a backpack-like explosive device military demolition teams use when they want to breech a fortified position made from stone or reinforced concrete. Satchel charges usually contain a very strong explosive ... something like C-4. These guys came prepared. They were probably going to use it to blow the maintenance tunnel, but we made it to the machine room before they had a chance.”

“What now, Leopold?” They all turned to see Pope Michael standing next to the corporal in the dusty gloom behind them.

“I have no idea, Your Holiness, but we’re definitely not going anywhere for awhile.”

“Where are we anyway?” Alon asked.

“I can answer that question for you, mate,” the corporal said, stepping over some rubble. “Back in World War II, the cave above us ... the one they call
Saint Michael’s Cave
, was being prepared for use as a military hospital. The engineers decided they needed to create an alternate entrance to improve air circulation and provide an emergency exit in case of an airstrike, but when they were blastin’ the rock for the new opening, they discovered this deeper cavern. It’s called
Lower Saint Michael’s Cave
.” The corporal glanced at the pope. “Quite a coincidence your bein’ here, sir, if you don’t mind me saying. I mean, what with your name being Pope Michael and all.”

The pope’s smile stood in stark contrast to the black soot that covered his face. “I found it an interesting coincidence myself. Are there any other ventilation tunnels down here?”