The Forbidden Tomb (49 page)

‘Don’t get too excited,’ he replied as he selected a particular camera feed. ‘Take a look at this.’ He spun on his makeshift seat to face the others. ‘You too, Josh.’

Sarah wasn’t about to be left out. The three of them crowded around Garcia to see what had caught his attention. Once he enlarged the footage to fill the whole screen, they could see that he had located a depository of some kind. Inside row upon row of wide wooden crates were stacked from the floor to the ceiling. It appeared that each box was marked with a serial number spelled out in a different language.

Sarah squinted at the image. ‘What am I looking at?’

McNutt’s eyes bulged from his head. ‘Holy. Fucking. Hell.’

‘My thoughts exactly,’ Garcia replied.

‘I still don’t get it,’ Sarah admitted.

‘Weapons,’ Cobb told them. ‘Lots and lots of weapons.’

McNutt pointed at the description emblazoned on one of the crates. ‘Those are Ribeyrolle 1918s – French rifles used to lay down suppressive fire.’ He tapped a different label. ‘STENs, a nine-millimeter submachine gun.’ He pointed yet again. ‘These are—’

Sarah chuckled. ‘You can barely speak English, yet you can read all these foreign labels?’

‘STENs
are
English. It’s an abbreviation honoring the guys who designed them: Shepherd, Turpin, and Enfield.’ Despite Sarah’s comment, McNutt’s tone was playful, not cocky or defensive. There was nothing he liked more than talking about weapons – except using them, of course. ‘It’s an impressive collection.’

‘That much I understood,’ Sarah replied.

McNutt shook his head. ‘It’s not just impressive because of its size, it’s impressive because these are
antiques
. Most of these guns date back to World War Two.’ He pointed to a final crate. ‘Like the Maschinengewehr 30s. MG 30s haven’t been used since the 1940s . . . by the Nazis.’

Though most of the battles in Egypt during World War II were fought along the Nile, the Western Desert saw its share of action as well. At one time or another, British, Italian, French, Greek, South African and German soldiers all took up arms in an attempt to capture Siwa and/or control the area extending north to the Mediterranean. Unfamiliar with the challenges of the Sahara, hundreds of these men were never heard from again.

Few were prepared for the heat of the desert.

And none were ready for the shadow warriors.

‘It gets worse,’ Garcia said as he changed the feed.

This time, there weren’t any crates. Instead, they saw an entire wall whose shelves were stocked with large packages of what appeared to be reddish clay.

‘Look familiar?’ Garcia asked.

Unfortunately, they all recognized the compound.

It was Semtex.

McNutt whistled in amazement. ‘Forget about a single block. That’s enough to take out the whole damn city.’

‘They’re stockpiling supplies like an army,’ Sarah said. ‘But why?’

Garcia tapped a few keys. ‘I can’t tell you what the guns are for, but let’s be clear: they’re not
like
an army – they
are
an army.’

As he scrolled through the feeds, they got a much better sense of the underground structure. There were barracks filled with beds, dining halls crowded with tables, even a library lined with books. Though there was certainly a generator powering the bunker – they were staring at a computer feed, after all – such luxury did not extend to every aspect of the facility. Simple oil lamps lit the majority of the space, giving the footage an ominous hue, as if they were staring at an ancient castle.

Despite the dim lighting, each room was buzzing with activity.

Throughout the facility, robed men tended to their duties of preparing food, sweeping floors, and refilling the lamps that lined the walls. Regardless of the task, they went about their business with humble efficiency. Every act seemed to have a purpose. And every disciple seemed to know his place.

It had the look and feel of a monastery.

Only these monks would kill for their cause.

Cobb stepped away from the computer and pondered their situation while McNutt and Sarah grabbed something to eat. Cobb had seen enough to know that they needed a plan – one that didn’t involve them charging into certain death while Garcia watched on his laptop. Even with tricks and surprises, he knew it would be impossible to take on the vast number of soldiers below without an army of his own.

There had to be a way to get inside.

All Cobb had to do was figure it out.

Before he had the chance, Garcia leaped from his chair and pointed at the video as if he had seen a ghost. ‘Jack! Look at this! Now!’

Unsettled by his urgency, everyone huddled around the screen.

There, chained to the wall, was Jasmine.

The arrangement between Cobb and Hassan was simple: Cobb wanted to rescue Jasmine without being chased by goons, and Hassan wanted to kill the men who blew up Alexandria. Though they weren’t exactly working together to accomplish their goals, they had agreed to assist each other for the time being.

Or, at the very least, stay out of each other’s way.

Cobb still had plenty of reservations about Hassan, but he knew the gangster had one thing at his disposal that he didn’t have: a legion of gun-toting thugs who would happily charge into battle if it meant winning favor with their boss.

With this in mind, Cobb had placed a call to Simon Dade, who was running down leads of his own in Alexandria while being shadowed by the giant Kamal, and told him to get word to the crime lord about the compound in the Western Desert.

As for details, Cobb would only provide the GPS coordinates of where to meet, rather than directions to the bunker itself. Cobb knew it would take several hours for Hassan to rally his troops and drive across Egypt. This had given Cobb and McNutt plenty of time to do a rekky, tap into the surveillance system, and formulate a plan of attack.

By 4 a.m. the caravan from Alexandria had made it to the staging ground a few miles east of the bunker. Cobb had chosen this particular patch of desert for its proximity to the thoroughfare that ran between el-Bawiti and Siwa. The spot was accessible, yet secluded. It was far enough away from the bunker to avoid the enemy’s patrol, but it was close enough to mount an attack. And their arrival in the dead of night would give them at least a few hours before anyone questioned their presence.

Hassan’s men were ready for battle.

All they needed was a target.

When Cobb arrived at the rendezvous point, he expected to see an assortment of beat-up trucks and a ragtag group of criminals. Instead, he saw a fleet of Humvees lined up across the sand and scores of men in desert camouflage. For a moment, Cobb wondered if the Egyptian military had somehow gotten wind of Hassan’s activity and had moved in to intercede. But then he saw Kamal, whose unmistakable size stood head and shoulders above the others, and instantly understood who these men were.

Hassan hadn’t rounded up a bunch of street thugs.

This was his personal battalion.

Cobb approached the lead car – an opulent Mercedes-Benz G-Class fit for a prince – and sensed that all guns were trained on him. Kamal quickly stepped forward to cut him off before Cobb could knock on the tinted window. From that action alone, he knew that Hassan was sitting inside the luxury SUV.

‘Where’s Simon?’ Cobb asked as the two men came face to chest.

‘Safe,’ Kamal replied. ‘In car.’

Cobb shook his head. ‘Tell your boss that Simon comes with me. You don’t need him anymore. Tell him that once Dade is free, I’ll lead you and the others to the Muharib stronghold. You can kill them all as far as I’m concerned. I just want the girl.’

Kamal retreated to the Mercedes and spoke through a crack in the lowered window. A moment later, the rear door opened and Dade exited. As he walked toward Cobb, it was clear that he had expected his host to kill him and bury him in the desert.

‘Well, I guess I owe you again,’ Dade said.

‘Nope, just Sarah,’ Cobb replied. ‘She was worried about you, by the way.’

‘Good to know. Where is she?’

Cobb smiled as he extended his hand. ‘She’s sitting this one out.’

Dade thought the greeting was odd until he felt the small earpiece in Cobb’s palm. He fought the urge to smile as he took the device and slipped it into his ear while he pretended to adjust the stocking cap on his head. ‘Sorry I missed her.’

Sarah laughed in his ear. ‘Don’t worry. We’ll meet up soon enough.’

Kamal, oblivious to the deception, was growing restless. He hadn’t driven all this way to stand around while Dade chatted with Cobb.

‘No more talk. Time to fight.’

Cobb nodded in agreement. ‘Have your men grab whatever they need. We go the rest of the way on foot.’

Kamal shouted instructions in Arabic, causing five trucks’ worth of men to assemble beside him. They were heavily armed and bouncing with anticipation.

Cobb pointed toward the Mercedes. ‘What about your boss?’

Kamal shook his massive head. ‘He stay here.’

Cobb shrugged. ‘Okay then. Follow me.’

* * *

Ten minutes later, Cobb ordered the men to hold their position at the edge of the patrolled territory. It was as far as they could go without risking an ambush. He knew the shadow warriors were out there in the night, ready to defend their land at all cost.

Cobb stared into the darkness. ‘Okay, Josh. Help me out.’

McNutt stared through his scope from a half a mile away. From his vantage point atop a small dune, his night optics gave him a clear view of the scene. ‘On it, chief. You’ve got men approaching. Directly at your twelve.’

Cobb looked straight ahead, trying to see the men that McNutt had spotted. But he saw nothing but sand. ‘I can’t—’

His voice cut off as the shadows seemingly materialized in front of him. One moment they weren’t there; the next a half-dozen were heading his way.

Then six became twelve.

And twelve became twenty.

And suddenly, they were everywhere.

A sound like thunder rolled across the desert as Kamal opened fire. A single shot was all it took for the others to know that the battle was on. A second later, Hassan’s men fired multiple rounds into the night. Bullets sprayed in every direction as the enemy swarmed, forcing the men to defend themselves from all sides. They tried to fend off the shadow warriors as best they could, but their efforts seemed to be in vain.

No matter how many times they shot, the ghosts just kept coming.

Armed with nothing but ancient blades.

* * *

McNutt watched as the shadow warriors rose from the sand, as if they had emerged from the Underworld itself. It was a pretty neat trick, one that kept him on his toes as he carried out his one and only responsibility: protecting Cobb from harm.

As wave after wave of swordsmen charged toward Cobb, McNutt zeroed in on those who posed the biggest threat. With each squeeze of the trigger, another enemy fell – most with a gaping hole in his head or chest.

‘Chief,’ he said, ‘permission to shoot both sides?’

‘Not yet. Let the gunmen help us for now, but if they turn on me at any time, you do what you do best.’

McNutt grinned. ‘Sweet.’

* * *

From their base camp near Siwa, Garcia ignored the firefight that raged in the desert and focused on the activity below. His map of the stronghold wasn’t entirely complete, but it was getting close. By cross-referencing the video feeds that he was watching with the blueprint of the compound, he could determine where the troops were headed.

Earlier, while combing through the footage, Garcia had noticed a series of narrow cylinders that rose from the bunker up through the sand. At first he thought they were ventilation shafts, but when he saw someone climbing toward the surface, he understood their true purpose. They were access tubes. Like the tunnels of the Viet Cong that stretched across Vietnam, these access tubes provided the Muharib with multiple entry and exit points all across the desert landscape.

‘Jack, you’ve got twenty more climbing to the north.’

* * *

Right on cue, nearly two-dozen warriors appeared. Cobb watched as they stormed in from the hidden shafts just beyond his view.

Despite their cache of artillery, the Muharib carried only swords. The weapons had served them well for centuries, and there was no reason to believe their tradition would fail them now. In their time of need, they relied upon what they knew best.

They preferred ancient blades to antique guns.

Garcia continued his analysis. ‘The numbers are looking pretty good. This might be the best chance we get. Most of the men have gone topside.’

‘Copy that,’ Cobb said with his hand to his ear. ‘We’re a go for phase two. Repeat. Go for phase two.’

* * *

Dade had arrived unarmed, but that quickly changed during the course of the battle. He borrowed a rifle from one of the dead goons and fired it at anyone with a sword.

Though he was grateful that Cobb had rescued him, he wondered if he wasn’t better off back in the Mercedes with Hassan. He was tempted to head back to the car when he heard Cobb’s command to commence with phase two.

‘What the hell is phase two?’ he asked.

It was Sarah who answered. ‘Simon, listen closely. Turn west, and sprint like your life depends on it . . . because it does!’

Dade looked to his right and hesitated, seeing nothing but desert. He assumed it was filled with assassins, just waiting to cut him down. ‘To where?’

‘To me!’ Sarah shouted. ‘I need your help. Now!’

He took a deep breath. ‘On my way.’

* * *

As Dade sprinted forward, Cobb began his retreat.

It wasn’t an act of cowardice; it was part of the plan.

Even though the shadow warriors had taken Jasmine and blown up the city, Hassan’s men weren’t exactly saints. He had heard the stories of how they ruled their territory. He also knew that they hadn’t followed him into the cistern to help him out. He was sure that they had been sent to kill him and his team, and he sensed that they still might try once the battle was over.