Area 51 - The Reply Part 12

Kincaid knew what it was, but the sheer size was unbelievable. "Solar panels,"

he said. Solar panels were used on most of the probes and orbiters to supply power, so Kincaid had more than a pa.s.sing knowledge on the subject. He pulled a calculator out of his pocket and began punching in numbers.

"Jesus," he muttered when the last figure came up on his screen. Human solar panels that big145.

would produce enough power to run New York City, and Kincaid suspected that the Airlia probably had better-engineered panels. "What the h.e.l.l is going to need that much power?" he asked out loud, but no one in the control room had an answer.

He looked up at the four large, shiny triangles that now lay where the pyramid they had formed once stood. Squinting he could just make out something in the center, underneath where the apex of the pyramid would formerly have been.

"Is this the best resolution the IMS can get?" he asked.

"Yes," one of the technicians answered him.

"Any idea what's that dark thing in the center of the panels?" Kincaid asked.

"Not yet. It's hard to make out, given the light contrast from the panels and Surveyor's distance. We should know when Viking goes over."

Duncan held a piece of paper she'd just received from a runner from the Navy communications center on the island. "We've got authorization to go into China and find out what Che Lu is uncovering in the tomb."

"From who?" Turcotte asked.

She read the paper. "The National Command Authority under an ST-8 security clearance."

"I've never heard of that clearance," Turcotte said.

"We are instructed to get in and out without causing any international incident," Duncan noted.

"Easier said than done," Turcotte said.146.

The others were all gathered around the small TV, taking in the spectacle of the Airlia solar panels.

Duncan was thinking about the problem. "We know that China is not going to let us come in. We aren't even going to bother to ask. We're going to have to go in on the sly and get out without being noticed." She looked at Turcotte. "And that, Mike, I believe, is your department. According to this we'll be met at Osan Air Force Base in South Korea by a CIA liaison who can help us get to the tomb and link up with Che Lu."

Turcotte stood. "Let's get moving."

"No," Kelly Reynolds said, standing in their way, her feet planted wide apart.

"I don't think we should do this."

"Kelly-" Nabinger began, but she cut him off. "It will only cause trouble. Aspasia will be here soon. Why can't we wait? If this tomb holds Airlia artifacts, then they belong to him. If it's where the rebels are, then we shouldn't disturb it. Again, that's his problem."

"Like the fight between the rebels and Aspasia wasn't the problem of the people of Atlantis?" Nabinger asked.

"Peter's right," Turcotte said. "We can't sit around and be spectators. We're involved."

"Don't you see?" Kelly asked, grabbing the front of Turcotte's camouflage shirt. "Don't you see that you're doing the same thing you did in Germany?

People are going to get hurt for no reason."

Turcotte's face went hard. He grabbed her hands and held them inside his.

"This is different."147.

"Stay here with me and wait," Kelly pleaded, looking from Turcotte to Nabinger to Duncan.

"We can't," Lisa Duncan said. "We have to do our jobs just like you have to do yours."

"If I had done mine after we got Johnny out of Dulce," Reynolds said, "he wouldn't be dead. Instead I went along with you while you did your jobs, as you put it. I'm not doing that again."

"We're not asking you to," Duncan said. "This will be a cla.s.sified military operation. All I ask is that you not report anything about it."

"I can't do that," Reynolds said.

"Kelly"-Turcotte slowly removed her hands from his shirt and let go of them- "if you report this, the Chinese will know we're coming and people will die.

Namely us."

"If it's the only way to stop you, I will report it," Reynolds threatened.

"You're not going to stop us," Turcotte said. "We're going in no matter what you do."

"d.a.m.n it!" Reynolds exclaimed. "Why? Why does it have to be the U.S. against China? The Russians and the ship they hid? The South African corporation and what they hid? Why do we fight and lie among ourselves? We won't be ready, like Aspasia thinks we are, if we keep doing this. Human against human."

"It isn't about human against human," Turcotte said. He stepped around her.

"It's about finding out the truth on our own." He walked out of the tent, the others following, leaving Kelly Reynolds alone and listening to the sound of the storm batter the tent.148.

Inside Qian-Ling, Che Lu and the remaining students had backtracked their way to the doors they had come in. In the dim glow of the flashlight she could see that the doors were indeed shut, and even with everyone pushing they couldn't budge the metal.

A quick check of the meager supplies they had brought in revealed they had enough water to last perhaps four or five days at best if they were very conservative.

Light was perhaps the biggest problem. Among the seven of them they had eight flashlights. Che Lu estimated even using only one at a time, they had less than sixty hours of light left.

"All right," she said to the frightened students who were huddled together around the one lit flashlight like moths around a fire. "We cannot get back out this way. Perhaps Lo Fa will come back, but I do not think so. We are on our own."

"Who would do this to us?" one of the young girls, Funing, wailed.

Che Lu had considered that and accepted the obvious answer. "The army."

"But why?" Funing asked.

"Because someone ordered them to," Che Lu said. "Someone in Beijing must have realized that they shouldn't have issued us the permission to go in, and this is the easiest solution." She kept to herself the disturbing news Lo Fa had pa.s.sed to her.

"We're going to die!" Funing cried out.

"We're not dead yet," Che Lu snapped, "so quit your crying. I've been in worse situations than this." She pointed down the main tunnel. "There were two side tunnels. They have to go149.

somewhere. From the ancient records there are supposed to be miles of tunnels in this tomb. We can find another way out."

"But what about what happened to Taizho?" Funing cried. "We could walk into the same thing!"

"We will be careful." Che Lu took a bamboo pole that one of the students used as a walking stick. "Tie a cloth to this. Then we hold the pole out in front of the first person like this," she demonstrated, "with the cloth hanging down.

That will trip any beam like that which killed Taizho."

"And if there are beams in both side tunnels?" Funing asked.

Che Lu was growing weary of the girl. "Then we truly are trapped and then we will die," she said. "But we don't know that right now and we won't until we act. So get to your feet!"

"I will take the pole," Ki said, surprising Che Lu.

"Thank you," she said.

"Let's go," Ki said, and headed down the tunnel toward the intersection, one of the other students slightly behind him, holding the flashlight. The rest of them followed, single file, like blind ducks in a row.

"Look at this," Nabinger said, holding a piece of paper the driver had given him. They were in a HUMMV, being driven to the airstrip where a plane Duncan had requisitioned waited for them. The squeak of the windshield wipers added to the unhappy mood inside. Nabinger was in the front150.seat next to the driver, while Turcotte and Duncan were in back.

"What is it?" Turcotte asked.

"The translation of the Chinese characters on the stone that my friend just faxed back to the Naval Operations Center." Nabinger read it to the others. "It reads: Cing Ho reached this place as directed. He did his duty as ordered."

"Who the h.e.l.l was Cing Ho?" Turcotte asked.

"I'll have to look it up once we get airborne," Nabinger said, turning back to the front.

Turcotte felt a nudge in his side. He turned to Duncan, who leaned close so she could speak to him without being overheard. "I'm sorry about what Kelly said. About Germany. She said that to get to you. To stop you from doing the right thing."

"You know about Germany?"

"It's why I chose you to infiltrate Area 51," Duncan said.

"Because I was part of a f.u.c.ked-up operation that got a bunch of innocent civilians killed?" Turcotte asked. "Don't be an a.s.shole," Duncan gently said. "You didn't kill any of them. And you stopped the man who did as quickly as you could."

"I was there."

"Give me a break, Mike," she said. "More importantly, give yourself a break. I picked you because you refused the medal they offered you for the 'f.u.c.ked-up operation,' as you called it. Because you took personal responsibility."

The brakes squealed as they pulled up to the stairs leading up to their plane. As Turcotte151.

started to get out, he felt Duncan's hand on his shoulder, causing him to pause.

"And remember," she said, "the facts show I chose the right man."

Major Quinn had been working on his laptop for the past three hours, weaving his way through the various codes and numbers that made up the Department of Defense satellite communications system. He had finally found what he was looking for, but the information did more to confuse the situation than clarify it.

The strange woman, Oleisa, was making satellite communications back to a ground station located somewhere in Antarctica. A station that, other than having a routing number, did not exist in any government records, cla.s.sified or not, that he could find, other than a reference to an organization named STAAR.

Quinn leaned back in his chair and thought for a moment. Then he typed some new commands into his control console, accessing the security camera that was in the part of the hangar Oleisa had taken over. He wasn't surprised when the screen came back blank and the computer informed him that that camera had been taken offline.

. "All right," Quinn said to himself, enjoying the challenge. "There's got to be a mention of STAAR somewhere. And I'm going to find it." He turned back to his laptop and began typing. Then, suddenly, he paused. Antarctica. There was a connection between that continent and Majestic-12. And there was someone who knew about that152.

connection: the-only surviving member of the original twelve members of the committee.

Quinn knew where he had to go now: the base hospital at Nellis Air Force Base where that man, Werner Von Seeckt, former n.a.z.i and SS scientist, was being kept alive by machines.153.

Chapter 14.

"Will Kelly report our mission?" Duncan asked.

The three of them were in the forward part of the 707, left alone by the Air Force crew. The takeoff from Easter Island had gone smoothly, and now they were heading toward Osan Air Force Base in South Korea as quickly as possible.

"No," Nabinger said, "she won't." "What makes you so sure?" Duncan asked. "She wouldn't put us in harm's way." "Seemed to me," Duncan said, "that her take on it was that we were putting ourselves in harm's way." She looked at Turcotte, who hadn't said a word since they'd boarded. "What do you think?" "I don't know. I don't think she will." "I can give the order to shut her off from the outside world," Duncan said. "To have her put into custody."154.

"Then what's the difference between us and Majestic?" Turcotte asked.

"Point made," Duncan said. "I'm just a little worried, is that all right?"

"I'm worried too," Turcotte said. He didn't want to dwell on Kelly Reynolds and the way she had been acting. "When is Viking going to be over Cydonia?"

Duncan looked at her watch. "Five minutes." She pointed to the rear of the plane. "We can access the secure link to Viking and get the images it sends back. At least we'll be up to speed on that."

Turcotte and Nabinger followed her down the aisle and through the door into the communications section. Rows of computer consoles filled the s.p.a.ce between the bulkheads, and the light was turned down low, emphasizing the glow from the screens. Turcotte recognized the plane as a command-and-control version that the Air Force kept deployed around the world.

"Over here," Duncan said, leading him to a particular computer. A young Air Force lieutenant was seated there, her screen empty except for a cursor.

"Hook us in to the NASA downlink from Viking, Lieutenant Wheeler," Duncan ordered.

"Yes, ma'am." Wheeler quickly typed in several code words. Her screen cleared, then a dire warning came across the screen telling anyone who had gotten this far that they were violating federal law if they were looking at this screen without proper access and to stop now.

Then the warning was gone.155.

>JPL: REPOSITIONING NEAR COMPLETE. T-5 MINUTES.

"Is that our time or Mars time?" Turcotte asked.

Duncan was confused, but Lieutenant Wheeler figured out what he was asking.

"Our time, five minutes," she said. She looked up at Duncan. "It takes two and a half minutes for a radio or data transmission to make it from Mars to Earth.

Five minutes for us is two and half minutes for Viking plus two and a half minutes for the transmission to reach."

>JPI_: T-3 MINUTES. IMAGING SYSTEMS.