Hot Zone (19 page)

"That's it. It's not as exciting as it seems, Jordan."

"This isn't exciting enough for you, Ice? You must be either a real boring or real exciting date."

"Don't go on them much. It's tough when you spend most of your time on a boat full of men."

"For some."

"Yeah. No Navy jokes okay."

"Didn't say a word." Jordan smirked.

Twenty-feet away Ice spotted another tunnel that ran off to the right. In his mind that would be the perfect place to make an attack on the approaching victims. Ice stopped moving, Jordan did the same. He motioned Jordan to the side pointing for her to get down. He step softly, trying to make as little noise as possible knowing all the while that if the Frenchman was around the corner he would have heard them approach.

Coming up to the turn, Ice got down on his stomach. He pulled a small dentists mirror with extendible arm and held it out so that the mirror angle up and into the tunnel.

Jordan crouched hard against the wall as she watched Ice Work. There was fear running through her but the longer she spent with Ice the more she felt as though he wouldn’t allow anything to happen to her. He was a large, muscular man. It would take a bus to stop him. A couple of French soldiers weren't going to do it. At least that was her hope.

Ice squinted his eyes, trying to adjust to the dark as he peered hard into the small mirror. When he didn't see anything he raised himself off the ground and turned to Jordan. "All clear."

"Which way do we go?"

Pointing down the new tunnel, Ice said: "That way."

"You sure? "

"Yeah."

He wasn't.

* * *

Yanick watched as his pursuers turned into the tunnel. He had been banking on it. That was what he had wanted to do, until he realized that they would probably do the same. He had sat ahead in the tunnel just beyond the split, listening to the Americans make small talk. As they approached, their green glow lighting up the tunnel, he had dropped back further and watched as the soldier cautiously cleared their new route.

Satisfied they had headed far enough down the new tunnel, Yanick quietly made his way back and began to follow them.

The tables had turned. The hunt was back on.

27

Roo, Ghost and Jansen made quick time through the tunnel. They wanted to catch up to the Frenchman and make quick work of him so the threat was gone. Three on one should be a breeze but if this guy was legion as Roo had suspected he would be tougher to take out.

Roo had spent three months on a training drill in far northern Australia in a joint exercise with the Foreign Legion. It was supposed to be an attempt by both the French and Australian government to show the public the two countries were passed their differences when it came to the nuclear testing.

The exercise proved to be a disaster.

Soldiers from neither camp got along, there were many scuffles, fist fights, practical jokes gone too far and more than a little tension throughout the three months. What Roo discovered from that experience was that the French
were
tough and were not to be underestimated.

It was a widely held belief in military forces around the world that the Foreign Legion was not a force to be reckoned with and would never be on the world stage. Roo knew that this was false, but he was amongst a very few who did. He knew Ice and the rest of the team would not take this encounter lightly but he wanted to make sure the men understood exactly how dangerous a Legionnaire could be. They fought to the death.

Though he only saw four of them in the water when he was fired upon, Roo did not find it hard to believe more could be coming. Especially if the ones pursued on the surface by Skip and Storm had made it back to Mururoa. The three remaining would be difficult enough.

Something Roo had noticed about the weapons the French were carrying that was unusual was the power of their spear guns and the fact that the spears were not connected like a typical diver’s gun. The spear guns were more like cross bows.

They did not have rubber recoil leads attached to the spears, instead they carried extras in a sack on their backs, allowing them to reload quickly and if possible retrieve the ones they fired. So while they were outmatched in the weapons department, they would still be able to be competitive in a combat situation.

Their one disadvantage was that eventually they would lose all their spears. That had to be one of his first priorities.

Get the spears!

The men came to the end of the tunnel, which opened into a large cavern. It was at that moment that Roo knew they were not in some lost civilization that had sunk to the bottom of the sea some thousand years before but rather something much more modern.

The cavern looked like the beginning of a mine. In the green glow of their light sticks they could see old pick axes, spades and miners helmets scattered throughout the room. The walls had been carved out in places as had the ceiling, piles of rocks were everywhere. On the far side of the cavern he saw that another tunnel lead away from them. Two very large drill rigs used for boring tunnels into thick rock sat motionless. From Roo’s position it looked as though whoever used to work this mine was in the middle of working then suddenly vanished.

The place sent strange feelings through Roo. It took him a moment to realize what it was he was feeling.

It’s like a haunted house.

Roo felt as though someone or something was watching his every move. Yet he didn’t believe it was the Frenchman.

It was something else!

Roo began recalling Ghost’s account of the bird monster or pissed off psycho bird as he had so eloquently called it. Looking up into the deep holes in the ceiling he could easily imagine this creature hiding out up there, waiting for its next meal.

Taking care with their steps as they walked around the room, the men were baffled by what they’d stumbled upon.

“
What is a mine doing at the bottom of the ocean?” Ghost asked.

“
I don’t know mate. This whole thing is like a bad acid trip.” Roo said.

“
What about you.” Ghost said to Jansen.

“
It’s not what I expected to find but I have a theory.”

“
Wait a minute” Roo said. He spotted something beyond the second drill machine.

It was a railway track! At the beginning of the track sat a four-man manually propelled cart that was operated by pushing up and down simultaneously on the center column. Such modes of transport had been used on regular railway tracks since the early days of the railroad when workers needed to get to a certain location on the track for repairs.

The tracks disappeared into a dark hole which was barely large enough to fit the cart and would be even tighter with four men standing on it.

“
Taking bets on where that goes?” Ghost asked.

“
I don’t want to know where that goes right now; we have other things to worry about.”

“
Pete?” Ghost asked.

“
Well wherever that ends it can’t be good. We’re nowhere near any land. It could just take us to another cavern like this one.” Jansen said.

“
That’s not in the cards. We have frogs to squash. Keep moving, towards that tunnel on the other side of the room. Ghost, you stay here, make sure he doesn’t come up behind us. We’ll meet you back here.” Roo ordered.

“
You got it.”

“
Watch your six, man.”

“
I’m too busy watching yours. I’ll be fine.” Ghost said

The two men bumped fists then Ghost stood and watched Roo and Jansen disappeared into the darkness of the tunnel.

Ghost was alone again. Just the way he liked it.

28

Grosjean found himself in a maze of filing cabinets and desks. He was in the offices where he had first been shown blueprints of the underwater community. His higher-up’s words rang in his ears: “burn them.”
Marc, if anyone ever finds their way down here you must stop them. Destroy them and destroy everything in these offices. No one must ever tell the truth about this place. Do you understand?

He did understand. He knew all too well the consequences of the world finding out the truth. He did not want to be the one to fail in his mission to keep the dark past hidden.

Grosjean searched the desks until he came across a book of matches then went about lighting the contents of each filing cabinet. He made sure everything was going to burn until nothing but ash remained.

This also gave Grosjean the added advantage of keeping the Americans from discovering the offices at all. Once it was obvious the place was on fire no one would dare enter into the room. The smoke alone would be enough to suffocate anyone who tried.

Grosjean was satisfied his job was done. The papers began smoking heavily, it was only a matter of time before the room would be engulfed in flames. He armed his spear gun and left the room through another door, beyond that the tunnel that connected the mine shaft directly to the offices.

He didn't know it yet but he was on a collision course with the intruders.

* * *

Roo and Jansen skirted quickly through the tunnel. Soon they came across a smaller tunnel that cut off the main tunnel to the right. The men stopped in their tracks.

"Another tunnel. It's like a fucking maze down here." Jansen said.

"We got a fifty-fifty shot Pete. The wrong decision here could screw us."

"You better not make the wrong decision then."

"
Me?
Wait a sec. When you first approached us where did you come from?"

"Another tunnel. The one Ice went into when we all scattered."

"What was down there? None of this looks familiar to you?"

"Roo, I had this tiny piece-of-shit flashlight. I could barely see the ground with it, let alone the differences between the tunnels."

Nodding, Roo responded: "Yeah yeah mate, I guess you're right. You must have been shitting your pants in the dark like that. Especially with those monster birds."

"You have no idea. And you know what else? The longer we stay down here the closer we get to coming into contact with one. They're everywhere."

"Great. Okay then. Let's take this tunnel off to the right and see where it leads us. With any luck it won't be into the claws of a monster bird." Roo said.

* * *

Moments after the men took off down the new tunnel, Grosjean rushed past the branch off and headed straight for the mine shaft. From there he could make his way back to the central dive cavern and with any luck run into one of his other men. He needed to know the status of the Americans. One way or another he had to stop them from leaving. If his men or the birds didn't do it he would have to do it himself.

* * *

From the pilots seat of one of the boring drills Claude spied the American standing guard and watched on as he continued to check both entrances into the mine shaft but never once looked over towards where he was Claude was hiding.