The Citadel (12 page)

Area 51

Dyson, the head of the North American Table, was pressed back in his seat as the Gulfstream Jet roared down the runway that cut across the dry bed of Groom Lake. The plane needed only a fraction of the seven-mile-long concrete to get airborne.
He looked once more at the negative reply from the ISA concerning information about the Citadel, then put it down on the table in front of him. The potential embarrassment if the place did exist, and held four MK-17 thermonuclear weapons, was great. The fact that it was causing him problems with Geneva was also very bad.
The secure computer link buzzed, and words began scrolling across the screen. The message was brief and to the point: his agent in the Philippines had been found. Dead. And there was no sign of Fatima. Which meant she was free with the information Lansale had sent her. And he had no doubt where her destination would be: the Citadel.
If the Abu Sayif got its hands on the four Mark-17s—well, he didn't want to dwell on that.
But the information was even worse than that as the message continued: Fatima had met with a North Korean agent prior to being picked up by Royce's agent. Which meant the scant information he had about The Citadel and the bombs was probably en route to Pyongyang.
Dyson checked his contacts and began making calls to begin maneuvering resources south toward Antarctica in preparation for possible intervention.

CHAPTER 6
South Pacific

The small freighter cut through the ocean heading southeast. Fatima stood on the bridge, Araki to her right, and looked ahead at endless ocean. The captain was in his chair to her left, the helmsman in front of him. The ship appeared old and rusted, but the engines were perfectly maintained, and the ship was cruising at a much faster speed than its appearance suggested it would.
"You have no idea who this man you killed worked for?" Araki asked.
"He was American," Fatima said.
"But that does not necessarily mean he was working for the American government," Araki said.
"Then who?" Fatima asked.
"Now you are playing me for the fool," Araki replied.
"Nishin was from the Organization," Fatima said. "Why would they have a second person there? It was too soon for someone from Japan to fly in if they discovered that Nishin was missing. So the American was on the ground already, waiting for me. If they were from the same Organization, why didn't they work together?"
"One was Japanese and one American," Araki said. "Perhaps the Organization has many arms to it?"
"Likely," Fatima allowed. "But he questioned me about the Citadel, of that I am certain. Why would he do that if the Organization built the Citadel and he was from it?"
To that, Araki had no answer. They stood there in silence for a while, feeling the ship roll as it punched through the waves.
Finally, Fatima spoke. "The only way we figure out what is going on is to find the base and subsequently figure out why the Organization built it, why it is so important that someone is willing to kill to hide its existence, and why Lansale sent me that information."
"Since you escaped, we're a step ahead of them," Araki said.
"Maybe," Fatima said. She turned to Araki. "Tell me what information you've withheld."
Araki sighed, then spoke. "David Lansale. I've heard of him. Before I came to the Philippines. His name was in the intelligence packet I was given."
Fatima nodded. "He parachuted into Japan during the Second World War. During the Doolittle raid. Met with representatives of the government to negotiate the Golden Lily."
Araki stared at her. "So you know more than I do."
"It appears so."
"Then perhaps you might tell me where we are going now?" Araki asked.
"Antarctica."
"We still have the problem of actually locating this place," Araki pointed out.
"We will try to go to where the I-401 and the two German submarines were abandoned," Fatima said.
Araki frowned. "Those submarines were left under the ice cap. They could have sunk to the bottom. Even if they are still locked in the ice, the ice moves, doesn't it?"
"It is all we have," Fatima simply said.
"And what will we do when we get there?"
"It is not a question of what
we
will do," Fatima said.
Araki stared at her. "What do you mean?"
"Do not worry yourself," Fatima said with a smile. "Just remember that the enemy of my enemy is my friend."

Airspace, South Pacific

"Roger, Earth First South Station. Passing point of no return and coming in. Out." Brothers turned in his seat toward the five passengers cramped in the back and yelled over the whine of the engines. "Weather is satisfactory all the way, so we're continuing on."
Burke, Smithers, Vaughn, Tai, and Logan sat amidst a jumble of equipment, with scarcely room to move an elbow. Vaughn had his eyes closed, trying to catch some sleep, but it was eluding him so far. He could hear Tai and Logan talking. Tai was trying to learn about operating in Antarctica, and Logan was trying to learn about Tai. Burke and Smithers appeared to be sleeping.
Vaughn opened his eyes. "How long have you worked for Royce?"
Logan was startled. "I don't rightly work for him. I do jobs for him when he calls."
"Why?" Vaughn asked.
Even under his tan, Logan's face flushed visibly red. "He pays well."
"And?" Vaughn pressed.
"And what?" Logan said angrily.
"What's he holding over you?" Vaughn pressed.
"Nothing," Logan snapped. He pulled his heavy Gore-Tex jacket tighter around himself and put his hood up. "I suggest we all get some sleep. We're going to need it." He shut his eyes.
Vaughn glanced at Tai. She shrugged and then closed her eyes also.
Two hours later Brothers's voice intruded over the numbing roar of the plane. "There's Antarctica."
Vaughn, along with the others, peered out the right side. "That's Cape Adare," Logan announced. "It's where the Ross Sea begins to the west. It's well over one thousand kilometers across the opening of the Ross Sea to the other side. The international dateline actually cuts right through the middle of the sea."
Dark peaks, streaked with snow and ice, poked through the low-lying clouds, overlooking the ocean. To the left, the sea ice stretched unbroken as far as the eye could see through a few gaps in the clouds.
As they continued south, more peaks appeared along the coast they were now paralleling as the ocean turned into the Ross Sea. Logan called the ranges out as they went by: the Admiralty Range; the Prince Albert Mountains; and finally, the Royal Society Range.
Brothers began to drop altitude as a single massive mountain appeared straight ahead above the clouds, set apart from the others to the right. "That's Mount Erebus. Earth First South Station and McMurdo are both set on the base of Erebus on the far side. It, along with Mount Terror, make up most of Ross Island. Captain Ross, whom the island, the sea, and ice shelf are all named after, christened both mountains after the two ships that he used to explore the Antarctic," Logan explained.
"He had a ship named
Terror
?" Tai asked.
Logan laughed. "Yes. Interesting history to that ship. First, as Americans, you'll be thrilled to know it was originally outfitted as what the British called a bomb vessel, carrying heavy mortars. It was one of the ships that shelled Fort McHenry in the War of 1812 and inspired that fellow to write your 'Star-Spangled Banner.'
"But more importantly, the ship's later history is a lesson on how brutal conditions are here and in the Arctic. In the 1830s the
Terror
was on an exploration mission in Hudson Bay when it got caught in the ice. The ship was pressed over fifty feet up the side of a cliff by the pressure of the ice on its hull. It was repaired and was Captain Ross's second ship—he was in command of the
Erebus—
on his expedition down here from 1840 to 1843.
"They successfully did that mission but weren't so lucky on their next one to Baffin Bay. The ships were last seen entering the bay and then not heard from again for over a decade, until someone found both ships, completely abandoned by their crews and icebound. Not a single one of either ship's crew was ever found. One hundred percent casualties. Their bodies are still buried somewhere in the ice, as are a lot of other bodies."
"We're going down," Brothers yelled over his shoulder.
Tai was startled. "What?"
"We're going in for our landing," Brothers qualified with a smile.
"Smart-ass," Tai muttered.
"We don't have much of a runway," Brothers told them as they descended. "We land on the ice on the Ross Ice Shelf itself, as it's the flattest thing around. The reception party should have marked out a reasonably good stretch for us. We don't need much," he added in way of encouragement.
Vaughn watched the slopes of Erebus come closer, and then the plane punched into a thick cloud layer and all view was blanketed. Suddenly, the clouds parted and they were in the clear again. The plane was very low now, and Brothers banked hard left, over land.
"That's McMurdo Station!" Logan yelled. Vaughn pushed his face up against the glass and looked below. The sprawl of buildings and numerous large storage tanks surprised him—McMurdo was much larger than he had imagined. Somehow he had pictured something out of the old science fiction movie
The Thing
: a few Quonset huts huddled in the snow. At a rough guess he would say there were at least forty buildings down there.
"All right. Everyone buckle up." Brothers swung out over the ice now, very low. They roared over a snow tractor with a large red flag tied off to the top. Brothers pulled up and did another flyby. A man on top of the tractor was holding a green flag pointing in a northeasterly direction.
On the third pass, Brothers finally dipped his wings down. With a hiss and then a steady rumble, the skis touched the ice, a thin mist of snow pluming up on either side. Gradually, they slithered to a halt. Brothers turned the plane around and taxied it back to the tractor. Vaughn could now see that the tractor had a flatbed trailer hitched to it with several drums piled on top.
The silence as Brothers turned off the engines was as shocking as any loud sound. They'd lived with that noise for many hours. As their senses adjusted, the steady whine of wind bouncing off the skin of the plane became noticeable. With the airplane's heater off, the temperature immediately started dropping inside.
"Everyone bundle up." Logan was cinching down his hood.
Vaughn pulled his own cold weather equipment out of his duffel bag. He was wearing a Gore-Tex camouflage parka over Patagonia Pile jacket and bib pants that zipped on the sides and the crotch. Tai wore the same thing. Logan and his two men's outer layer was bright orange. They all had polypropylene underwear next to their bodies to wick away any moisture from their skin. Large rubber cold-weather boots—Logan had referred to them as Mickey Mouse boots—covered their feet. The boots had a layer of air trapped in them that insulated the feet remarkably well, but Vaughn knew from experience they also brought about a lot of foot sweating, which had to be carefully monitored.
Brothers swung open his door, and the blast of cold air slammed into Vaughn's lungs with one quick gulp. Brothers scrambled out and Vaughn followed suit, his feet crunching into the snow. Despite his cold weather training in Special Forces, he'd never felt such cold. The air stung his face, the only exposed part of his body. His skin rebelled, trying to shrink from the pain of the cold, and he felt his muscles tighten, as if he could make himself smaller and that would in some way make him warmer. He forced his muscles to relax.
The other members of the party piled out and stood looking around. To the north, Mount Erebus was a solid wall reaching up into the cloud covering. To the south, an endless line of ice disappeared where the clouds seemed to touch down. To the west, the Royal Society Range blotted out the space between cloud and ice. They looked amazingly close, as if they could be walked to in an hour or two, yet Vaughn knew from the map that they were almost a hundred miles away.
The tractor kicked into life, drawing his attention away from the scenery. It roared up, treads clattering, placing the trailer alongside the plane. The driver, looking like a bear in his bright orange garments, waved down at them, pumping his fist. He seemed to be in a bit of a rush.
"Let's offload," Logan called out.
As they busied themselves transferring the gear from plane to trailer, Smithers used a sledgehammer to drive ice pitons into the ground. One for each wing, one for the tail, and one for the nose; Brothers attached a rope to each piton to secure the plane to the ice.
Once all the equipment was off the aircraft, Vaughn watched as Logan gave Tai a boost up onto the wooden platform that made up the floor of the trailer. She tried to get as comfortable as possible among the bags and cases. Vaughn and the three other members of the party climbed on board, and all grabbed on for dear life as the driver threw the tractor into gear and roared off toward the looming form of Mount Erebus.
Logan leaned over to put his face between Vaughn and Tai. "Welcome to Antarctica."

Democratic People's Republic of Korea Embassy, Manila

The ambassador's aide frowned as the secretary entered the meeting room and hurried over to his chair. "Mr. Choegu, there is an urgent message for you," she whispered in his ear.
Making his excuses to the delegation of trade bureaucrats from Singapore, Choegu walked swiftly to his office. The encoded message sat on the center of his desk, only the word URGENT readable in Han Gul, the rest in unintelligible seven letter groups. He turned and unlocked the safe behind his desk and pulled out the onetime pad.
He wrote the letters out in longhand as he deciphered the message on a single sheet of paper with a hard plastic board underneath in order not to leave an impression copy. As the words coalesced into meaning, Choegu felt both excited and confused.
—ABU SAYIF SAY THERE IS AN ABANDONED AMERICAN MILITARY BASE IN ANTARCTICA.
—BASE IS SUPPOSED TO CONTAIN NUCLEAR WEAPONS.
—WILL CONTINUE TO MONITOR AND RELAY INFORMATION AS SOON AS POSSIBLE.
—ABU SAYIF WILL BE IN CONTACT WITH MORE INFORMATION SOON.
—RAWSS.
Choegu knew who Rawss was—one of their deep cover agents in Manila. He didn't even try to sort out the various pieces of the puzzle. He immediately pulled out another onetime pad and transcribed the letters of the message verbatim as quickly as his hand could write.
Done, he rapidly walked up the stairs to the fourth floor of the embassy building. A guard with an automatic rifle stood in front of a steel door. Despite his rank and stature, Choegu had to show his identification card to the guard, who knew perfectly well who he was.
Satisfied, the guard opened the steel door and Choegu stepped inside. Another steel door awaited him. An eye appeared at the small peephole, and he once again showed his identification. The door opened and he entered.
"Sir?" the man who had let him in asked.
Choegu held out the piece of paper. "Send this immediately."