Storm Over Saturn (18 page)

Whoever was fighting down here, it was a fight to the death. He was soon within a half mile of the front line. The stink of cordite was almost overwhelming. He came upon many more examples of two Nazi soldiers locked in a death embrace; each one was more baffling than the next. What was going on here? Were the Nazis in the blue uniforms battling impostors, enemy soldiers who were dressed in black Nazi uniforms? That didn't make sense, either, not with a battle of this gargantuan scale. But what could be another explanation?

Suddenly his ears were pierced right down to the drums. The noise was so intense, and came so quickly, Hunter found his hands on the side of his head, trying to keep the sonic blast out. He dropped to his knees as an enormous shadow went over him an instant later.

It was one of the bombers. The ones he'd seen flying overhead at very high altitude. But this monster was coming in no more than one hundred feet off the ground. It was decorated with many swastikas, and it had bombs attached all along its belly and wings. In a world of disturbing visions, this one was especially so. The soldiers all over the battlefield had turned their weapons up toward it and were firing at it. Suddenly the air itself seemed full of lead.

But something else was wrong here. This huge aircraft—its wingspan had to be at least 500 feet long—was on fire. Its fuselage, its tail section, and more than half its dozen propeller engines were all in flames. It wasn't swooping low to bomb the troops in front of him, though. It was in the process of crashing.

And the reason for this was soon evident. Trailing the plane down was a small squadron of fighter aircraft, weird designs with weird engines propped atop their fuselages and racks of missiles and machine guns taking up the entire underside of their wings. These aircraft were still firing into the bomber, even though the plane was about to impact at any second. But again, despite the impending doom, Hunter could see the insignia on these attacking planes… and incredible as it seemed, yes, they, too, were marked with swastikas.

He dove into the nearest trench, knocking the dead away so he might hang on to one more moment of life. The big airplane hit a second later, not 500 feet down the road from him. He saw the tail section break off and cartwheel backward right over his head. A string of crewmen, all of them engulfed in flames, came tumbling out of the resulting hole.

The impact of the airplane shook the ground so much, many of the skeletons around Hunter fell to pieces. But then, a heartbeat later, there was another, even fiercer explosion. This one even more powerful.

Hunter looked up through the bones and saw a sea of red flame go over the trench. The heat was so intense, it sucked up some of those skeletons that had not turned to dust and took them away with it. It was all Hunter could do to stay down, hug the ground, for to be caught up in that firestorm would have surely been the end of him, fantasy world or not. The noise was almost as horrible. His ears were bleeding again. And it went on for what seemed like forever. It felt like his skin was peeling away, the heat was so intense. His battered eardrums were ready to burst. Where the hell was sister morphine now that he really needed her?

Then, just like that, it was over. No more sound. No more fire. No more skeletons getting one last free ride into the heavens. Hunter stayed down low. One minute. Two minutes. Three.

Finally, he got the gumption to lift his head, to look out over the top of the trench.

But he was met with a cloud of cordite before he was halfway to the edge. He fell back down to the bottom of the trench, near suffocation, the stink was so thick. He held his breath another minute, two, three. Until he could hold it no more. If the next deep breath had been more cordite, he would die on the spot.

But it wasn't cordite—not entirely anyway. It was air, or what passed for air on this crazy place. He finally gathered the strength to pick himself up again and peek over the edge. What he saw would stay with him for the rest of his life.

There was nothing left. Not for a mile on either side of him. The land itself, wiped clean.

The bomber? Now it, too, was dust. How much gunpowder had it been carrying? Tons? Enough to equal an atomic bomb?

Whatever the case, it had left a path two miles wide in which nothing existed anymore. What was left was yellow dust. Bombs, gunpowder, bodies, and wreckage reduced to yellow dust.

And this dust now covered one of the roads that led directly to the mountain they called Valhalla.

It took him an hour to get to the base of the mountain, another hour to climb it.

When he reached the top, he found that the castle wasn't a castle at all. It was a prop, a facade in this fake world. Walls, turrets, even the moat was fake. What's more, he saw no indication that any of the Nazi soldiers from either side had even ever been up here. All that fighting—for nothing?

Why? Why had these mental pukes fought so hard? What was up here that was so valuable? Was there a hall of mirrors inside this place? He had to find out.

He walked through the fake door and entered a hall. This place was so phony, the floor was still covered with unused nails. The wind whistled as it blew through the cracks in the thin veneer of fake wood. The walls were bare. No mirrors here.

In the middle of this hall was a pedestal, on top of it was gold box. Gold paint, that is, flaking off in many places. Hunter studied the pathetic-looking lock holding its flimsy top shut. He blew on it. It snapped open.

He brushed the remains of the lock away, opened the box, looked inside… and then laughed. That's when it all came together—the secret of this particular attraction. This Hall of Mirrors. More proof of the creator's strange sense of humor.

This place was not so much another world as it was another kind of hell. A Nazi hell. A place where Nazis went to die. A place where they were doomed forever not to rape and pillage the innocent and defenseless of the world, but to fight and kill each other. Over and over and over again. A world of mirrors—Nazis looking at themselves. Seeing the hate, unable to do anything but battle themselves.

And what were they fighting for? This unattainable thing that was secured with a lock that would have broken off with a sneeze. If any of them ever made it to the top and looked inside the box, this was their prize: a photograph of the original Nazi, the first monster of them all, Adolf Hitler.

In a dress…

Hunter walked out the back door of the castle, over a rickety bridge that spanned the empty moat, to the edge of the mountain.

The view from here was spectacular, even if the scenery consisted of little more than miles upon miles of utter devastation. Hunter could look down not just on this local battlefield, but on many other battlefields off in the distance as well. This spot was probably the best vantage point on the entire moon, if one liked watching Nazis kill each other. And that's exactly what the last person up here had been doing.

On a small outcrop of rock located at the far eastern point of the peak, Hunter found an old wooden table and chair. There was a plate on the table holding a few crumbs of what had been a very dark loaf of bread. An empty bar glass beside the plate still contained a few drops of a clear liquid. Hunter put one of the drops to his tongue. This was not water made to look like liquor. This was the real stuff. Vodka. A very strong brand.

Beside the glass was an ancient corncob pipe. Its bowl was filled with tobacco ash. Hunter stuck his finger into the bowl and found it was still warm.

Damn
, he thought.

He put it all together and came to the only logical conclusion. The Mad Russian had sat up here and watched what to any Russian would have been considered the ultimate in entertainment: Nazis killing Nazis.

And judging by the warmth of the pipe, Hunter had missed him by only a few minutes.

At last, the quadtrol helped him find the next ticket booth. Whether it was a case of proximity, or design, or both, he located it just a mile away, down the other side of Valhalla mountain, and through a field that had seen some fighting in this crazy war, but judging from the rust of the wreckage, not for some time.

The ticket booth was just like the others: a simple structure made of the fake wood, barely enough room inside for him and the PC. The sign above the door announced the next attraction as:
Chyzol Tainü Mir
—
Smozesh li ti viderzat eto peklo
. Or, in English: Alien Mystery World*—Can You Take the Heat?

Hot or cold, after spending time in this bizarre war heaven, Hunter was ready for anything, just as long as it was far away from here. More important, he was hopeful that he was closing in on the Mad Russian. That he might be right behind his quarry as he moved through his own dizzylando. Riding the rides, just as Hunter was.

Hunter turned on the PC and went through the boot up process that was now routine. Name. Password. Punch the ticket. Get past the security walls. Fill in hobby. He didn't bother to take one last look around this time; he'd seen enough of this Nazi quagmire and was anxious to move on.

He hit the Enter button.

"Do you have your water. Comrade?"

Hunter looked up into a bright, brutal sun to see five men dressed in full battle gear staring down at him.

Each was wearing a one-piece, sand camo combat suit equipped with built-in radio, belts for carrying ammunition, survival kits and flare guns. Each was also wearing a combat helmet that covered the entire head down to the neck, and featured only a slim red glass visor to look out from, and carrying an enormous assault weapon complete with laser range finder and bayonet.

These five individuals looked like something Hunter might have encountered in just about any corner of the Galaxy these days. Mercs, soldiers of fortune, space pirates. Ready to rock.

But these people were not contemporaries. He knew that much, simply by eyeing the tiny red badge each man had attached over his left breast pocket. It showed a small red star surrounded by a yellow field, and the Cyrillic letters: SPZ.

Hunter didn't need the quadtrol to tell him what these three letters meant. He'd seen them before.

Spetsnaz
..

Russian Special Forces.

So it was the Russians again.

But then he looked down at what he was wearing and was in for another shock: he was dressed exactly as they.

"Comrade… I ask you again. Do you have your water? Or are you already suffering from the heat?"

All Hunter could do was nod, as the reality of the new situation flooded in. Yes, he was most definitely among the Reds again. But this time, instead of fighting them, he was one of them.

"Do not short change yourself or us by bringing too little," the man asking him the questions said in broken English. He was obviously the leader here. "This American desert is much more harsh than any in our country. Even more so than in Africa or Iraq."

Hunter dismissed this man's concerns, at least temporarily, with an impatient wave of his hand. He took a quick scan of his surroundings, trying his best to take in as much as he could.

They were in the deep desert, there was no doubt about that. They were standing next to a motor vehicle that had the word
Caravan
on it. It was dusty and beat up; its rear hatch was festooned with bumper stickers. One read, We Drove the Alien Highway. Another, ET Come Home! Next to the van were six piles of clothing: civilian pants and shirts made of polyester, flip-flops, sandals, and sneakers. Even over 5,000 years, Hunter knew these clothes represented the worst in American tourist wear. The metal tag on the rear of the van contained a collection of numbers. Above them, the word
Nevada
.

Hunter put it all together. The dusty van, the corny bumper stickers, the trashy outer wear. This was an undercover Spetsnaz team that had successfully stolen into the U.S.

But why?

And why was Hunter one of them?

They walked… and walked… and walked, across the desert, leaving the Caravan by a ditch and burying their trashy civilian clothes nearby.

It was close to noon and the heat was past unbearable. Hunter was astounded, as he dripped with sweat, how this place—this dizzylando attraction—could seem so real, feel so real, and be so damn hot. He was the last in line, his only saving grace being that for some reason his weapon wa,s not the same size as the huge hand cannons the five men in front of him were carrying. His was a simple AK-47 assault rifle, the standard issue combat weapon for Russian soldiers some 5,000 years before.

On several occasions, the squad leader called them to an abrupt halt, freezing them in place. The leader would then switch on a device he had connected to his weirdo battle helmet. It was a sound amplification gadget. Only once did they take any action as a result of this. He had them all lie flat on the ground as an aircraft of some kind flew overhead nearby. Hunter was in no position to look up and see just what kind of airplane it was, but the sound of its propulsion units sounded very familiar.
Jet engines
, he thought.

They walked into the early afternoon. There was absolutely no talking among them, and they remained separated about fifteen feet from each other. Hunter was tempted on more than one occasion to sneak the quadtrol from his pocket and take a quick reading. But instinct told him that to be caught with such a device by these characters might lead to bad things. He knew after the last ride that death was a distinct possibility within the dizzylando. He decided to bide his time and pick his spot.

They reached the bottom of a small mountain range and finally, the leader gave the signal that they could take a break. Hunter began chugging his water as if he was carrying an unlimited supply but quickly stopped himself when he saw the others were simply sipping off their canteens, savoring every drop. Still, there was no conversation between them. Whatever mission these men were on, Hunter got the definite impression that they knew what they were about to do, inside and out, and thus talking about anything was unnecessary, which was good for him. He had no idea what he would say if they had asked him a question or simply wanted to chat.

The break lasted just five minutes. Then it was time to climb the mountain. Up they went, over rocks, through crevices, and across precipices that seemed about a mile wide by the time Hunter got to them. This exercise took nearly two hours, but finally they reached the top. On the other side, a vast desert wasteland stretched out before them for miles. It was not empty, however. Far off in the distance, perhaps a dozen miles away, they could see a collection of innocuous white buildings with a gigantic runway next to them. The brutal heat nearly covered these buildings in an impenetrable haze. Nevertheless, they seemed oddly familiar to Hunter, not just in his present life, but in his former one as well.

This place… what is it called again?

They started down the other side of the mountain, and here he found his answer on a sign attached to a ten-foot-high chain-link fence. The sign read: This Is a Restricted Area. Deadly Force Is Authorized… Groom Lake Military Reservation.

Groom Lake
? Hunter thought. Again, very familiar.

Neither the sign's warning nor the fence itself fazed the Spetsnaz soldiers. They fastened a small boxlike device to the chain-link and attached two wires to a handheld battery. If the fence was electrified, or more likely, wired with motion detectors, then this doodad would prevent those who might be monitoring it from detecting them.

Once attached, the men simply cut one strand out of the fence next to the device, and one by one, scrambled through.

They walked for another three hours, passing through the most brutal heat of the day.

Reaching the perimeter of the base, they skirted the edge of the massive runway, hitting the deck several times to avoid detection from aircraft flying overhead. Finally they climbed the small mountain west of the hidden base. It was from here that they got their best look at the facilities below.

There were perhaps two dozen buildings. White, square, and unimpressive, all together they made up the equivalent of several very small city blocks. There were also a number of larger buildings that were undoubtedly aircraft hangars. Various fuel tanks and support huts made up the rest of the place. They could see very few people moving around down there.
Only a madman would be out in this heat
, Hunter thought. But these days, he was certain he now qualified.

The squad leader ordered them to take up positions along the top of this mountain. Thank God they were able to stay in one place. The squad leader then pulled out a device that looked like an early version of a GPS locator and overlaid a grid across its readout screen. This overlay was labeled like a map.

Try as he might though, Hunter was unable to catch a glimpse of the overlay's name.

So the mystery of just where he was continued.

They lay up there until night began to fall.

Only once the sun had gone down did the base below them come to life. Lights turned on, ground vehicles spotted. Sounds of machinery and engine noise echoing faintly across the desert. Hunter remained still the entire time, it was the only thing to do. His quadtrol was burning a hole in his pocket, but again he resisted the temptation of taking it out.

What did this long, sweaty trek in the desert have to do with finding the Mad Russian? The man he sought certainly wasn't one of these five guys. Even what little he could see through their face masks, he knew none of them fit the grainy image on the back of his ticket. But did they know him? What would happen if Hunter asked—and they didn't? Bad things might result. Or would they? He tried to stifle all these voices in his head. Tried to stop himself from thinking too much.

Wait for your opportunity
, his instincts told him.
You might be close to something here
.

Don't panic.

Bide your time.

See how this scenario plays out.

The noises from below increased as the night arrived in earnest.

They observed strange aircraft being towed out of the hangars and brought into others, test bays where the doors were quickly closed tight behind them. Now the bizarre noises really began, as Hunter imagined these aircraft, which he could see only as shadows, had their propulsion systems run up.

At one point, these noises became so loud, it seemed as if the entire mountain was shaking. Hunter kept his eye on the squad leader this whole time. He was alternately watching his primitive GPS device and another gadget that was sewn into his combat suit but had a small speaker attached by wire to his right ear.

This went on for another hour or so. Finally, the leader held up his hand and got the attention of the rest of the squad. He'd received some sort of information through his earpiece. Suddenly it was time to move.

More hand signals, and the squad was up again. Hunter had no idea what they were about to do. True, he saw no weapons, indeed no guards at all below in the familiar secret base. But he couldn't imagine it being completely undefended^—at least in the real world, if there was such a thing anymore.

But they did not begin a long climb down the mountain. Instead, they started moving across it. Up and over more rocks, across more crevices, moving quickly yet quietly, trying not to disturb even the smallest pebble. They were soon at a position northwest of the center of the base and looking right down on the test hangars.

Despite his precarious position, Hunter was amazed at the Spetsnaz team's dexterity and stealth capabilities. While his subconscious was still working overtime trying to bring him back a hint of a memory about this place—he knew he'd seen it, maybe even been here before—he was certain that it was a very high security zone and obviously a strictly classified area. Yet, in the midst of this dizzylando anyway, the Russian special forces team had successfully breached its security boundaries, its biggest one being its insanely remote location, and now sat looking down on the place. Strictly on a military scale, it was impressive.

But Hunter's grudging admiration for these Slavic ghosts was actually premature. Because no sooner had they reached this perch overlooking the base, when a land vehicle roared up right behind them.

It was a small black truck of some sort, huge tires and all kinds of body reenforcements that allowed it to climb mountains. It was on them so quickly, Hunter thought they were dead meat. But no one in the squad panicked. They simply laid down their huge weapons and put their hands in the air. Two men stepped out of the vehicle. One was armed with an M-16 rifle, the other with a video camera. A moment of tension passed, then the leader of the infiltration squad started laughing.

"Well, OK, we buy the beer this time!" he yelled to the men now just ten or so feet away. "You caught us… but we got damn close!"

The rest of the squad relaxed. Two guys lit cigarettes. The two men from the vehicle smiled, too, but it was obvious they were still a bit confused. As was Hunter. The squad leader took out a pass and handed it to the two security guards.

"We're Delta Team Six," he said in a very thick drawl. 'Testing the security line… Call us in, will you? And tell our CO what kind of suds you drink."

Hunter stood up finally, took off his silly helmet, and ran his fingers through his very dirty hair. He knew this had been too easy. For them to sneak into such a classified area undetected until now—there had to be a gag. A punch line. And this was it. The Mad Russian was displaying his odd sense of humor once again. This wasn't a real incursion. These weren't real Russians. It was all a big joke. A test. An exercise.

Right?

Wrong… because the moment the man with the M-16 rifle let down his guard, two of the squad members were on him. They forced him to the ground and beat him unconscious. The man with the video camera—he was the one making the call to the team's nonexistent CO—dropped it and began to run. But the two other Spetsnaz guys were on him very quickly, too. Taking him down with their fists and gun butts, he, too, was soon beaten cold.

The Spetsnaz soldiers went through the guards' pockets, taking their wallets, watches, radios, and ID badges. They pushed the truck over the other side of the mountain. It landed, out of sight, into a crevice with a dull, almost noiseless thud.

The team quickly reconstituted itself and began moving down the side of the mountain, but not before the squad leader turned to Hunter. He indicated the two unconscious security guards and drew an imaginary knife across his throat

"Execute them quickly," he whispered harshly to Hunter. "Then catch up."

With that, the five Spetsnaz men disappeared down the other side of the mountain, leaving Hunter sitting there, mouth agape.

Damn
…
now what
?

He knew if he didn't hurry and catch up with the others as ordered, they would certainly come back looking for him. And then his cover would be blown. But would that really make any difference? Could he call a halt to the mayhem here, just as he did earlier on the moon that recreated a bizarro version of World War Three? There was no way of knowing. But something told him these Russians would not play along like the last ones did. They seemed too committed, too serious…