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A long, hard hour later, Sam stumbled into the Chilean station, quite literally. He face-planted against the side wall of a building that he couldn’t even see for the snow that had drifted against it.

It was empty.

Worse—it had been burned, almost to the ground. Black smoke drifted in the strong wind. He could no longer see the mountains as the weather had swallowed them up.

Who did this …?

“I have an idea who,” Sam said to himself, thinking of Solaris. He instinctively looked around, as though he might appear right there, a tall dark figure emerging from the white gloom, but there was nothing but the remains of the base.

He looked back at his footprints and saw shiny bullet casings at his feet. A gunfight had raged here. He looked closer at a burned hut. It was crude, and the fire was not the result of a flame weapon but explosives that had blasted a hole in the wall.

This wasn’t Solaris. This was someone else …

He walked around, using his ice axe as an anchor in the wind, searching for signs of where they’d cut through the ice.

Find it—and find the way through. Wherever those ruins are, I’m going to bet that’s where Hans and Alex are
.

Sam stepped forward once more and fell feet first into a hole in the ground.

And fell.

And fell.

As he frantically threw out his arms to slow his descent, he made his Stealth Suit expand, feeling it inflate inside his snowsuit as he plummeted down and down …

XAVIER

“What is it?” Maria asked, looking up at the ceiling that seemed as large as the night sky and filled with as many stars.

“It’s the rock,” Dr. Dark said.

“Granite,” Phoebe said. “The weight above us is squeezing the quartz crystals in it, creating immense pressure and the result is this glow.”

“Like glow worms, or fireflies,” Rapha said.

“The earth is a magical place,” Poh said with wonder.

“Yeah, I think you’re right,” Cody muttered, staring at the ceiling.

“This is very like what I saw with Sam,” Issey said, “in Japan. A room that glowed. The crystals somehow conducted the electricity—and there was a chair, when Sam sat in it, he completed the circuit.”

The others nodded, remembering Issey and Sam’s story from their adventure in Tokyo and on Ghost Island.

“There are things about this planet,” Dr. Dark said to them all, “that we have no idea about. Not because we don’t know it. But because we’ve forgotten it and it’s been hidden from us.”

“Dad?” Xavier said. “What about the map? Will the map show us where we need to go?”

Dr. Dark smiled. “There’s only one way to find out.”

Xavier followed his father through the large water tunnel they now found themselves in. This one certainly pre-dated the Romans—there was no smooth lining on the walls and ceiling, and it was big enough for a bus to drive through. The water was ankle deep in spots. There were stains on the walls that showed at times, long ago, it had been filled to the roof with fast-flowing water.

“This goes under the pyramids?” Xavier asked, walking next to his father.

“In a way,” he replied. “Eventually, I should say. Though I didn’t bring my GPS with me last time. Big mistake.”

“Wait, last time?” Xavier said. “You’ve been down here this far already, on your own?”

“I, ah …” Dr. Dark looked to his son then back at the others who were a few steps behind, the glow of their caving headlamps bobbing up and down as they walked. “The maze?” he said.

“Yeah.”

“I went there, two days ago.”

“And?”

“And—I got out, this morning.”

“Two whole days! You were lost in there for two
days?
” Xavier forced himself not to shout and bring the others’ attention to their conversation.

What are we doing down here?

“It’s a complicated maze,” Dr. Dark explained.

“Did you find anything?” Xavier said.

“Oh, yes, plenty.”

“But?”

“But—well, let’s say I didn’t find what I expected to find. And I can’t remember every twist and turn I took in there. My flashlight ran out of power after the first day.”

“You …” Xavier looked back at the others, then to his father and said in a low voice. “You can’t remember?”

Dr. Dark shook his head.

“And you were trapped in the dark all that time?” Xavier said.

“Yes.”

“And now you want to go in there again, and take us with you?”

“But I know where I’m going now.”

“What?!” Xavier exploded, unable to keep the volume down this time.

“Shhh, you’ll make the others nervous.”

“
I’m
nervous!” Xavier said quietly, looking back at those behind them. “How do you know we’re not going to get lost again?”

“Trust me, Xavier,” Dr. Dark said. He gave Xavier a long, searching look.

“Well,” Xavier mumbled. “It’s not that I don’t want to trust you, Dad, but …”

“Please, son.”

Xavier was floored to witness his father’s vulnerability.

He’s asking me for help
.

For the first time ever
.

“OK, I guess if you’re sure you know where you’re going.”

“I do, I promise,” Dr. Dark said. “Look! There it is!”

The water at their feet spread out to a thin film on the floor as they came to another large cavern. Not a natural cave, Xavier could see, from the uniformity of the walls and ceiling carved out of the rock and the square edges all around. Maybe it had been some kind of natural waterway once, and it had been enlarged years later.

Before them was an underground river, a stone bridge crossing it.

“Over there!” Dr. Dark called out, pointing ahead with his flashlight. “That’s the way to the maze. We’ve found it!”

EVA

They drove the snowcat for half an hour and stopped. The engine was on, the heater on full, the gas gauge at half full—good for another few hours at least.

“What is it?” Eva asked.

“The GPS is down,” Lora replied, tapping the screen on the dashboard.

“How can the GPS go down?” Arianna asked. “It’s a satellite system—it’s always working.”

“Not if the satellites aren’t working.” Lora looked at another GPS unit, this one handheld. “Not if they go down.”

“How can a satellite ‘go down’?” Eva asked.

“If it’s destroyed,” Lora said.

“Who can do such a thing—destroy a satellite?” Arianna asked. “Surely not Stella, not Solaris? Only a country could do that—a big military, with a missile. Right?”

“I’m not sure about that,” Lora said. “I’m not sure what anyone is capable of anymore.”

They fell silent, the four of them contemplating this new possibility, this new escalation. The only sounds were the rumble of the huge engine and the whir of the heater.

“Surely no country or government
would
do that?” Eva asked. “Imagine the international uproar if they did.”

“But if it’s only communication down here in Antarctica that’s knocked out, that might be something you could get away with—at least for a while. Who would know?”

“There are not many people here to raise an alarm,” Arianna said, looking out the window.

“I doubt it’s a nation striking against us,” Lora said, her tone changing as though something now made sense. “Since the race went public, the Director and the Enterprise have been keeping a close eye on global communication about it, and there was a disturbing amount of corporate interest.”

“So you mean big businesses want a piece of the action?” Eva asked.

“It makes sense to me,” Lora said. “Some global companies have more money, resources and power than countries. And they’re not making money for the good of mankind. They might see the potential in harnessing the Gate’s power—”

“Look!” Arianna pointed out the window.

Through the snowdrift, there was movement. Snow bikes—a dozen of them, heading toward them fast.

Lora slammed the ’cat into gear. “I don’t know who they are, but we’re not getting into a conversation with them out here.” She drove the snowcat at full speed but it was not fast enough. Eva looked out the windows and saw that the bikers were not only chasing them, they were catching up.

The snow bikes were the vehicle equivalent of wolves. Up close, they resembled dirt bikes, with big spikes on their wheels. The riders each had guns strapped to their backs, and wore white and grey camouflage.

PING! PING! PING!

Bullets hit the snowcat’s thick outer skin and ricocheted off.

“They’re trying to bully us into stopping,” Lora said, her foot flat on the accelerator. “There’s little they can do otherwise. This beast weighs a good ten tonnes and is made of thick steel.”

“Well, they’re definitely a pest,” Eva said. “And while they’re out there, we can’t stop.”

“I know,” Lora said.

Eva could see that she was concentrating hard. “Where are you headed?”

Lora tapped the compass in front of her. “There.”

“The US base?”

Lora nodded.

“You know where that is?”

“Not too far at this speed,” Lora replied.

“But that’s near the last known location we had for Alex, right?” Eva said.

“We can’t lead these guys to him, or Sam,” Gabriella said.

“But what if we
do?
” Eva said. “Lead them toward Alex, I mean. If he’s with Hans, and Stella and her guys are headed there too …”

Lora looked up from the controls. “One way or another, we’re going to find someone to make these guys think twice.”

ALEX

“This way,” Alex said.

The room beyond the wall was a vault. It was a room that seemed to hold things from several eras—a small wooden sail boat, barrels of whale oil, an ancient-looking stack of rough-hewn lumber. It was cooler in there, the lava was clearly not near the rock surface under his feet, and there was a cold wind.

“How’d all this
get
here?” Alex wondered as he walked over to a corner of the room.

“Travellers, over time,” Hans replied. “Sometimes the ice caves and lava tubes led out to inlets at the sea. They must have found this cavern and left what they needed for future expeditions. Or perhaps they hid things here, hoping to come back later to get them. There—look!”

He pointed ahead, where some light trickled in from a spot in the ceiling.

Alex looked back to the wrecked wall—it had looked exactly like the wall in that cave he’d found out in the snow, near the thermal lake. The realization hit him like a brick.

Those smooth walls sealed off the pyramid complex. The cave I found was just another part of this complex, but I was coming at it from the other side. Now I’m inside
.

“It’s here,” Alex said, pausing by the boat. He looked around it. It could not have sailed here from far—it must have been a lifeboat for another, larger ship. “But I can’t remember exactly.”

“Spanish, or Portuguese, I’d guess,” Ahmed said, closely inspecting the craft. “Fifteenth century, probably—from when they were sending ships to the far reaches of the seas, discovering the world.”

“That fits our timeframe,” Hans said. He pointed to it. “Search it, top to bottom. Tear it apart if you have to,” he ordered his men.

To Alex’s dismay, the men took to breaking up the boat with gusto.

“You’re destroying history!” Ahmed cried out, desperately taking photographs as the men dismantled the boat.

It took them only a few minutes to unearth a wooden chest, which Alex recognized as more of his dream flooded back.

“Wait!” Alex said.

“What is it?” Hans replied, preoccupied with a golden spear that he’d found among a stack of old weaponry.

“I remember!” Alex said, looking around. “My dream—we’re not alone!”

“What?” Hans asked.

“I remember standing here, like this, talking about this wooden ship, and then …”

“Then?” Hans said. “Who comes? What does it mean?”

“He means,” a voice said. “Your days of treasure hunting are over.”

Alex looked up. Stella stood there, leaning over the edge of the tunnel above, her rogue Agents leering down with her.

“Really?” Hans said, then, quicker than Alex could have believed, he pulled out a grenade, yanked out the pin and flung it upward over the edge of the hole above them.