The Secret of Excalibur

Although Mitchell could have reached the internal door release, he needed both hands to fly. Chase switched Excalibur to his right hand. Wind battering him, he stretched up for the handle with his left, fingers straining . . .

He reached it. The door popped open, banging against its frame in the slipstream. Chase jammed his arm into the gap, pushing his head and shoulder inside. ‘Eddie!’ Mitchell shouted. ‘Where’s the sword?’

‘I’ve got it!’

‘Then get in!’

‘No! We need to take out that chopper!’

‘Are you crazy?’ yelled Mitchell as he made another sharp turn. The door swung open, then flapped back to bash painfully against Chase’s shoulder. ‘It’s a goddamn gunship! This thing isn’t!’

‘You’ll have to improvise!’ Chase looked ahead, seeing taller, newer buildings rising above the old Soviet blocks. A long string of lights picked out the skeletal outline of a crane between them, another tower under construction. ‘That crane! Drop me on top of it!’

‘What?’

‘It’s the only way to get rid of him! Do it!’ Chase hunched back down and slammed the door, cutting off Mitchell’s objections mid-word.

The Kamov was still behind them, having moved to see what Chase was doing. He wondered what the pilot would make of the fact that he had deliberately shut himself out of the cockpit.

He had something else for him to think about. ‘Hey!’ Chase screamed, looking back and waving Excalibur out from the side of the helicopter as it ascended. ‘You want this? Then come and get it, dickhead!’

A spotlight flashed into dazzling life on the Kamov’s nose, locking on to Chase. The sword glinted in the harsh blue light.

The crane’s long, orange-painted jib swept past, the MD 500 pivoting to fly almost sideways along its length. Chase looked down. He was at least two hundred feet up, the ground around the crane’s base strewn with girders and concrete blocks and other things not remotely likely to provide a soft landing. ‘What the fuck am I doing?’ he asked himself as he leaned out from the skid—

And jumped.

The helicopter was only a few feet above the jib, but the impact as Chase slammed against the tubular metalwork was still like a baseball bat to his chest. One foot slipped. Clinging to a diagonal cross-member, he dropped, sliding down it like a fireman’s pole, and thumped painfully to a halt straddling the lower horizontal beam.

Grimacing, he dragged himself back up. Mitchell’s helicopter had peeled away, but the Alligator was still there, having overshot Chase when he jumped and now performing a rapid aerial pirouette to come back after him.

He stood upright, feet on the beam as he gripped the upper support. The top of the tall vertical tower was about thirty feet away. He started for it, Excalibur clanging against the orange metal as he moved crab-like along the jib.

A hot wind, reeking of burnt fuel, whirled around him. The Kamov drifted down on the other side of the jib, its blinding spotlight shining into his face. Chase lowered his head, using the upper beam to shield his eyes as he advanced. Through the glare he could make out the pilot in the cockpit - and the Alligator’s cannon, mounted on the gunship’s stubby starboard wing. It was slaved to the pilot’s head movements, turning to track Chase, making ever finer adjustments to its aim. One shot was all it would take.

Only ten feet to go, less, but the cannon was locked on to his chest, the pilot grinning with expectant triumph—

The wind suddenly rose as Mitchell brought the MD 500 down on top of the Kamov.

The smaller helicopter’s landing skids instantly disintegrated as they hit the gunship’s upper rotor disc, but the blades themselves were also smashed, one shooting outwards like a javelin over Chase’s head. Unbalanced, the Alligator began to spin, its tail swinging round . . .

Towards the crane.

Chase desperately leapt along the jib as the chopper veered towards him. He lost his grip on Excalibur, the sword falling away. But it was already forgotten as he threw himself at the tower—

The Kamov hit.

The whole crane shook as over nine tons of metal and composites slammed sidelong against it, swinging the jib round far faster than its screaming gears could take. Rapid-fire bangs erupted from the helicopter’s rotor shaft as explosive bolts blasted all the remaining blades free, followed a fraction of a second later by a much louder detonation as the canopy blew off and the pilot shot skywards in his ejector seat on a trail of rocket flame.

With nothing to hold it aloft, the Kamov plummeted to earth, its momentum spinning it away from the base of the crane before it smashed into a pile of girders and exploded. Even dangling from the top of the tower, Chase felt the heat from the expanding fireball.

The entire crane was shuddering from the impact. A ladder ran down the centre of the tower, smoke from the burning Kamov boiling across it. Chase scrambled for a foothold, then squeezed through the framework to the ladder. Breathing the smoke wouldn’t be healthy, but it was the only way down—

A sound like a shotgun blast above him. He snapped up his head - and saw one of the jib’s diagonal cross-members shear loose at one end, the weld splitting under the strain.

Another strut broke, then another. The entire jib sagged, bending under its own weight. It was a chain reaction, each failed spar putting more and more pressure on the others.

Chase stared in horror, then desperately tugged his jacket’s cuffs over his hands. The crane would give way at any moment . . .

With an ear-splitting shriek of tearing metal, the jib folded like paper, ripping apart where the helicopter had collided with it and spearing towards the ground. The tower lurched, the massive concrete counterweights extending out behind the operator’s cabin pulling the whole thing over.

Like a giant redwood felled by a lumberjack, the massive crane slowly but inexorably began to topple.

The leather of his jacket covering his palms, Chase squeezed his hands round the outside of the ladder - and jumped off the rungs.

And fell.

Using his feet as guides against the vertical stiles, he plunged down the core of the shuddering crane.

The falling tower picked up speed, buckling. He was no longer falling vertically - the crane was leaning at five degrees, ten, the horizon rising above his line of sight as the ground rolled towards him.

The leather protecting his hands shredded as he sliced over the joints of each section of ladder, but he couldn’t slow down - he was still too high to survive the fall.

Twenty degrees, thirty, metal twisting and tearing all around—

With an explosive boom of shattering concrete, the tower ripped away from its base.

Chase was still slithering down the ladder, but now he was on top of it as it hurtled towards the horizontal. He shot through the oily smoke, opening his stinging eyes to see the muddy ground rushing at him with increasing speed. Now he squeezed both hands tightly round the stiles. He felt the heat of friction through the leather as it tore and burned, slowing his descent, but maybe too late—

The crane smashed down.

The protruding counterweights hit first, sending a whipcrack ripple down the length of the collapsing structure. Chase bounced from the ladder and slammed against the framework above him, then thudded back down on to the rungs as the wrecked crane came to rest.

He lay unmoving, sprawled over the broken ladder. Concrete dust wafted over him. The echoes of the impact died away, for several seconds the only sound the crackle of the burning helicopter.

Then Chase coughed.

‘Fuck . . . ing hell . . . fire!’ he wheezed, dragging himself through the bent framework to lie in the mud. He was less than twenty feet from the crane’s base, his descent having slowed as the tower toppled. But he had still hit the ground as if dropping face-first from over ten feet up, with all the pain that entailed.

The mere fact that he’d been able to crawl from the crane told him nothing major was broken, but there was a nasty throb in his left arm where it had been injured a year earlier. His head hurt too; he rubbed his forehead and realised he was bleeding, another deep slash to add to the one he’d received jumping through the window at Vaskovich’s mansion.

The thought of the Russian cut through the fog of pain. Chase sat up. He had no idea what had happened to Nina. And as for Mitchell, and Excalibur . . .

Both the latter questions were answered within seconds of each other. A buzzing roar came from above as the MD 500 descended, the stubs of its wrecked undercarriage like broken insect legs. As he watched the helicopter drop into the construction site, he saw Excalibur sticking out of the mud near the crane’s base like a gleaming grave marker. Which, for Chase, it almost had been.

Still breathing heavily, he hobbled to the sword. A moment of effort was all it took to pull it from the ground.

He had Excalibur.

But his body ached too much for him to feel triumphant. Wearily, he turned to see the helicopter hovering unsteadily over a large pile of sand. Before Chase could wonder what the hell Mitchell was doing, the MD 500 dropped sharply, smacking down on its belly atop the soft pile. It squirmed deeper into the sand as the rotors kept spinning, but Mitchell had already shut down the engine and dived from the cockpit, rolling to the bottom of the heap and running as fast as he could on his injured leg towards Chase. Behind him, the helicopter wobbled, then finally tipped over. Its rotors thudded through the sand, kicking up a huge gritty spray before being brought to a stop.

‘Bloody hell!’ Chase cried. ‘Took a bit of a chance, didn’t you? You could’ve been puréed!’

‘Can’t wait around,’ Mitchell said grimly, taking out a phone. ‘I didn’t have any other way to land, and there’s already police and fire trucks on the way, I saw them from the helo. We’ve got to get out before they arrive. You okay?’

Chase indicated his torn clothing and bloodied skin. ‘Oh, absolutely fucking top! What about Nina?’

‘I don’t know. You had the relay - I lost contact with her as soon as we moved out of range. Come on.’ He called a number as he hurried towards the site’s main gate, issuing rapid orders. Chase followed, the sword in his hand.

An hour later they were in an American safe house, an anonymous apartment in an equally anonymous block a few miles from the crash site. They had got clear just before the police arrived, hurrying through the darkened streets until being picked up by the same driver who had taken them to Prikovsky’s warehouse - although his gleaming SUV had been replaced by a much more discreet old Volkswagen Golf.

‘So do you know what’s happened to Nina?’ Chase demanded as Mitchell concluded another call. He himself had called Prikovsky, learning that while his girls had all left the mansion, Nina had not been with them. That didn’t mean she hadn’t got a lift back to Moscow with someone else, but his concern was rapidly growing.

‘Not yet,’ Mitchell snapped. ‘Vaskovich is moving, though - his private jet just took off from Vnukovo airport. It’s a safe bet he’s aboard.’

‘Probably doesn’t want to be around when the Russians start asking why one of their shiny new gunships just crashed in the middle of Moscow. I bet that bloke Mishkin’s wishing he hadn’t taken the job. It’ll be a bugger to explain.’

Mitchell was about to say something when his phone trilled.

‘Yes,’ he said, eyes widening as he listened to the caller. ‘Yes, put him through. It’s Vaskovich,’ he added to Chase.

‘Put it on speaker,’ Chase said. Mitchell frowned, but did as he was asked.

There was a click of connection, then a voice came from the phone. Vaskovich. ‘Are you there, Jack?’

‘I’m here, Leonid,’ Mitchell replied. The background whine suggested that the billionaire was indeed airborne in his jet.

‘You’ve stolen something from me. You and Chase. I assume he’s there.’

‘Yeah, I’m here,’ said Chase. ‘If you’re wondering where Dominika is, I dropped her off on the way back from your party. Sorry about messing that up, by the way. Seemed like quite a good bash.’

‘Yes, it was,’ Vaskovich said, clearly irritated behind his veneer of calm. ‘But that doesn’t matter. I’m having another party here in my plane. For a very special guest.’

A cold fear swept over Chase. He knew who Vaskovich meant. ‘If you fucking hurt her—’ he began, before Mitchell signalled him to shut up.

‘Is she all right, Leonid?’ the American asked.

‘For now. You have something I want, I have something you want . . . or at least that Chase wants.’

‘Let me talk to her,’ Chase demanded. He glanced over at Mitchell, daring him to try to silence him, but the DARPA agent had a thoughtful, almost calculating expression.

Whatever he was thinking, Chase didn’t care, forgetting about him as he heard Nina’s voice. ‘Eddie? Oh, thank God you’re okay! I didn’t know what happened, just something about a helicopter crash!’ ‘Yeah, just another day working for the IHA. Are you all right?’

‘I’m fine. I’m sorry, they caught me on the way out.’

‘There is a reason why real secret agents do not appear on chat shows,’ said Kruglov sarcastically in the background.

‘I recognised her,’ said Vaskovich, ‘but not soon enough, unfortunately. Her disguise was very effective. Still,’ he went on, tone hardening, ‘I have her now. I want the sword, Jack. Deliver Excalibur to my mansion within the hour and I’ll release Dr Wilde. Otherwise, I may have to . . . drop her off.’

‘Why the mansion, Leonid?’ asked Mitchell, holding up a hand to cut off Chase’s furious response. ‘I assume you’re on your way to Grozevny. Why don’t we save you some time, deliver Excalibur to you there?’

Vaskovich laughed mockingly. ‘Yes, I’m sure you’d love to see my facility at Grozevny, Jack. That was your plan all along, wasn’t it? It’s a good thing for me that Aleksey never trusted you.’

‘I’m not going anywhere. Dominika shot me in the leg.’

‘Are you okay?’ Nina cut in.

‘It’s more than just a flesh wound this time,’ Mitchell lied, giving Chase a faint smile. ‘But I was thinking Eddie would be a better person to deliver it. He doesn’t know anything about earth energy, or care either . . . and I’m pretty sure that if I tried to stop him getting Nina back, he’d kill me.’ Another smile. Chase returned it, with just a hint of sincerity.

‘Why should I trust you?’ demanded Vaskovich.

‘It doesn’t matter, because I won’t be there. Eddie will. And like you said, you’ve got something he wants. And you’ll have what you need to make your system work, right there.’

Kruglov muttered something in Russian, clearly distrustful, but after a moment Vaskovich spoke again. ‘You have a jet?’

‘Yes.’

‘Then I’ll arrange for the airspace to be cleared. But know this: if the plane goes off course, it will be shot down. If anyone other than Chase and the pilot are aboard, they will all die, and so will Dr Wilde. If Excalibur is not aboard, everyone dies. If there is any kind of deceit, everyone dies. And so will you, Jack. Don’t think you are beyond my reach, even in America. Am I clear?’

‘Pretty fuckin’ crystal,’ said Chase, scowling.

‘I will arrange for your jet’s safe passage,’ Vaskovich said. ‘Chase?’

‘What?’

‘You may not believe me, but I am a man of my word. If you bring me Excalibur, you will get to marry Nina. Whenever that may be. But if you betray me . . . you will both die.’ There was a click as the line disconnected.

‘You think we can trust him?’ Chase asked.

Mitchell snorted. ‘Doubt it. But it doesn’t matter - I was lying too. I’ll be on the plane with you.’

‘Wait a sec - if they find you, they’ll kill all of us.’

‘Don’t worry!’ He gave Chase an enigmatic smile. ‘I’ll be aboard when it takes off - but I won’t be when it lands.’ He clapped a hand on Chase’s shoulder. ‘Come on. Let’s go rescue your fiancée.’

27

The aircraft taking Chase and Mitchell north from Moscow was not the State Department plane in which they had flown to Russia, but a smaller Cessna Citation Mustang business jet, conspicuously lacking any kind of corporate markings. Chase suspected it was normally used for discreet, private transportation of US intelligence operatives.

A group of which Mitchell was now undeniably a member.

‘So,’ said Chase as Mitchell opened one of several plastic cases stacked in the jet’s cabin, ‘you were a spook all along, were you?’

‘That a problem?’

‘Depends on the spook. So the whole scientist thing, was that just a cover?’

‘Hell, no,’ Mitchell said firmly. ‘I really do have a PhD in high-energy physics. Would never have been able to convince Vaskovich I’d be useful without it.’

‘And how long’s DARPA been running its own intelligence operations behind everyone else’s back?’

‘A while. It’s better if nobody else knows. We do whatever’s necessary to ensure America has a decisive technological advantage over all other countries - and keep it that way.’

‘By force.’

‘If we have to.’ Mitchell took a rifle from the crate - a weapon of a design Chase had never seen before. He tossed it to the Englishman. ‘Case in point. Check it out.’

Chase turned the futuristic gun over in his hands. A cursory examination revealed it had two separate magazines, one flat along the top and the other set into the stock. The handgrip was positioned forward of both mags in a ‘bullpup’ configuration. ‘Looks like something from Judge Dredd.’

‘The XM-201 Advanced Assault Rifle, one of DARPA’s new toys.’ Mitchell brought out a second, identical weapon for himself. ‘Two hundred rounds of caseless high-power propellant in the buttstock, and a top-mounted helical magazine with five twenty-round feeds for mission-variable three-point-six-millimetre munitions.’ He moved a selector switch on his gun. ‘Standard copper-jacketed, tungsten penetrator, explosive, or plastic nonlethals. Normal loadout is forty standard rounds and twenty of each of the others per mag, but I thought the plastics would be kinda pointless for this operation.’

‘Three-point-six-mil ammo?’ Chase asked dubiously. ‘You won’t get much stopping power with that.’

‘You’d be surprised - although we haven’t tested it on a live human target. Yet.’ He gave Chase a meaningful look. ‘It’s also got a three-round twenty-five-millimetre grenade launcher linked to a computerised laser rangefinder. Just lase the target, tilt it up and the sights’ll tell you when you’re at the right arc angle. Viewfinder with ten-times scope and night vision here, built-in Identify-Friend-or-Foe system to cut down on friendly fire—’

‘Now there’s a gadget you Yanks actually need,’ Chase said mockingly.

Mitchell shot him a sour look before continuing. ‘Hold it in firing position.’ Chase hefted the weapon and did so. Mitchell tapped at a small keypad set behind the sights. A green LED lit up with a bleep. ‘There. It’s now biometrically coded to your hands. Only authorised users can fire it. And if it falls into enemy hands, there’s even a coded self-destruct signal that melts all the electronics to prevent duplication. Pretty cool, huh?’

Chase lowered the gun. ‘Not really.’

Mitchell seemed surprised, even a little affronted. ‘Your professional opinion?’

‘Yep. All the gadgets mean it’ll eat batteries, which means more crap you’ve got to cart about with you, fancy electronics are the first things to break in the field, this mag in the stock makes it too bulky, having switchable ammo paths into the receiver means it’s more likely to jam, the carrying handle’s too far forward and I bet it costs a fucking fortune. You’ve made a gun that does twice as much as an M-16 . . . for ten times the price.’ He grinned. ‘Typical American toy.’

Mitchell grinned back. ‘Hey, how else are we supposed to keep increasing the stockholder value of our arms industry every quarter? Anyway, it’s at least five years from service, maybe even ten. You know how much the brass hate change. Even for the better.’

Chase shrugged and put down the rifle. ‘Think I’ll stick with the old school, thanks.’

Mitchell shook his head. ‘Not for this mission, you won’t. There’s another reason why I wanted these. When Vaskovich’s earth energy system is running - which it will be as soon as he gets Excalibur - it puts out a huge magnetic field. You go in there with a gun made of steel, and it’ll be pulled right out of your hand.’ He patted the body of his XM-201. ‘This baby’s made of polymers and ceramics, nothing magnetic. And even the electronics are shielded. When the system’s running, there’s only one kind of gun that’ll work in there. And we’ll have them.’

‘You’ll have them, you mean,’ Chase corrected. ‘I don’t see Kruglov letting me stroll in there with one of these. And speaking of that, how’re you going to get in there?’

Mitchell indicated a case. ‘Another DARPA toy.’ He checked his watch. ‘In fact . . . I should start prepping it about now, so give me a hand.’

The case contained what looked like a large, hard-shelled backpack. Mitchell slid the rifles into a compartment inside it, then climbed into a black one-piece flight suit and zipped it up. He donned the pack with Chase’s assistance. ‘Latest thing we devised for airborne special ops,’ Mitchell told him as he fastened an electronic control unit to his wrist. ‘And this one is going into service, within the year. It’s a glidewing - we wanted to call it the Batwing, but we’d probably have some trademark problems if we did. Can carry a SEAL and all his gear. Once I’m in freefall, the wings extend - they’re carbon fibre - and I can glide way further than I could in a HAHO parachute jump.’ He put on a cheesy commercial announcer’s voice. ‘But wait, there’s more!’

‘Are these engines?’ Chase said, seeing cylindrical protrusions on each side of the pack.

‘Yep. Mini-turbojets, three hundred pounds of thrust between them. There’s about fifteen minutes of fuel, but I can use them in bursts to gain height and glide. Then when I want to land, I just pop the ’chute. A good pilot can hit a fifty-foot target area from over a hundred miles away.’

‘And you’re a good pilot?’

‘Not bad. The controls are very intuitive - just pretend you’re Superman.’ He smiled, then became all business. ‘After I bail out, I can land in Vaskovich’s facility without anyone even knowing. Then I’ll come find you and Nina.’

‘What about extraction? How are we getting out?’ One of Vaskovich’s demands had been for their jet to take off and return to Moscow immediately after delivering Chase - and being searched for uninvited guests.

‘It’s all taken care of. Trust me.’

Chase didn’t like being left in the dark - especially when his and Nina’s lives were on the line - but it was clear that Mitchell wasn’t going to tell him anything else until he had to. Some kind of US incursion into Russian airspace would explain why he was being so secretive - Chase couldn’t reveal information he didn’t know.

Mitchell finished strapping on the pack, then took a full-face helmet from the case. ‘Okay, I’ll kick the cases out before I bail so nobody wonders what was in them - you’ll have to close the door after I jump. Try not to fall out, huh?’

‘And you remember to pull the ripcord before you hit the ground,’ countered Chase with a grin. ‘You know, for a navy man, you’re not such an arsehole after all.’

‘Oh, I’m an asshole,’ said Mitchell. ‘I’m just on the right side.’ He clapped Chase on the shoulder, then donned the helmet as the pilot called a one-minute warning from the cockpit. ‘Okay, here we go!’

Weighed down by his equipment, he moved to the cabin door as Chase brought over the empty cases and secured himself to the wall. ‘Thirty seconds!’ the pilot shouted.

‘See you down there,’ said Chase. He pulled the lever to open the hatch.

The noise and wind were horrific - even though it was slowing and descending, the Cessna was still cruising at over two hundred knots and nine thousand feet. Gripping the door frame, Mitchell booted the cases out, then hurled himself into the black void. He was snatched away by the slipstream, barely missing the jet’s low wing as he fell.

Buffeted by the freezing wind, Chase pulled the lever to close the hatch. Shivering, he returned to his seat, hoping Mitchell knew what he was doing.

Ten minutes later, the jet was on the ground.

Vaskovich was taking no chances; before Chase was allowed to exit, three armed men came aboard and searched the aircraft. All they found were the pilot, Chase, and the aluminium case in his lap. After frisking him thoroughly for concealed weapons, they waved him out at gunpoint.

Even though the wind was low, the cold hit him hard. Grozevny was on the very rim of the Arctic Circle at the entrance to the Barents Sea, situated on the edge of the marshy tundra about a hundred and eighty miles from Archangel’sk, the nearest city. During the Cold War it had been a naval base, a hiding place for the Soviet Union’s ballistic missile submarines. Now, that perverse non-conflict long over and the base’s secrets laid bare for anyone with an internet connection and Google Earth to see, it had passed into the hands of one of Russia’s new oligarchs.

As Chase stepped on to the runway he saw the cold sea off to the north, a cliff rising up along the curving coastline to the east. About a mile away, a long L-shaped jetty protruded into the waves from its base. He guessed the sub pen was under the cliff. Beyond it, the ground rose to a small hill, at the top of which was a brightly lit building, but it was too far away for him to make out any details other than its size, which was considerable.

More of Vaskovich’s men surrounded the jet, weapons at the ready. Kruglov stood at the foot of the steps, Maximov beside him. ‘Is that the sword?’ Kruglov demanded, pointing at the case.

That Kruglov hadn’t killed him on sight suggested Vaskovich intended to honour at least part of his deal. Chase opened the long case, revealing Excalibur nestled on a bed of foam within. ‘Where’s Nina?’

Kruglov glanced in the direction of the distant building, then indicated the nearer of two black Mercedes GL Class SUVs. ‘Get in.’

Sandwiched between Maximov and another guard in the back seat, Chase was driven along a road on the coast. The view ahead confirmed what he’d thought: the jetty was indeed connected to the sub pen, a vast concrete arch set into the cliff face, lights blazing within. The jetty ran from the end of a dock on the pen’s far side, a rusty crane overlooking the water.

To Chase’s surprise, the dock wasn’t empty.

The little convoy drove along a road at the base of the cliff and into the pen itself, giving him a grandstand view of the colossal vessel within. It was a submarine, a Typhoon-class ballistic missile boat, the largest type of sub ever built. As big as a Second World War aircraft carrier, only six Typhoons had been constructed by the Soviets, and just a single example remained in active service, the others either scrapped or supposedly held in reserve. Chase now knew where one had ended up.

But whatever the Typhoon’s purpose here, it wasn’t as a weapon. The vessel wasn’t seaworthy: a large section of deck aft of the squat sail had been removed to expose the twin pressure hulls within, dozens of heavy-duty electrical cables leading out from the hole to a pylon by a tunnel entrance on the opposite side of the dock. It wouldn’t be going anywhere in a hurry - at least, not if it wanted to stay afloat.

The SUVs drove over a bridge at the dock’s rear, then back along the other side of the sub to stop at the tunnel. ‘So what’s this?’ Chase asked as he got out of the Mercedes. He mimicked Sean Connery in The Hunt For Red October. ‘You going to shail into hishtory?’

Kruglov ignored him, directing him into the tunnel towards the lower terminus of a funicular railway rising out of the grim concrete cavern. The track was steep, ascending the hill above at a steady forty degree angle. A boxy carriage waited for them at one of the two gates.

Everyone entered the carriage, all guns pointed at Chase as it began to climb the track. He looked up the hill as they emerged from the tunnel. A second car was descending from the top of the track, the two linked by cables and counterbalancing each other. A road followed a long zig-zag path up the hillside from the base, the funicular sometimes passing over, other times under it on its ascent. To each side, the hill was covered by what at first glance he thought was a forest of leafless trees . . .

‘Christ,’ he said, seeing what they really were. ‘Your TV reception must be pretty crappy if you need that lot to get a decent picture.’

The ‘forest’ was man-made, metal: a vast antenna array stretching round the entire hill and on to the tundra beyond. The receiver for Vaskovich’s earth energy station, Chase realised, like the American HAARP facility Mitchell had described, only on a much greater scale.

He got a better view of the large building on the hilltop as they approached. It was circular, with a domed roof resembling an observatory. More electrical cables were draped down the sides of the dome like morbid streamers, linking it to the array.

The funicular reached the upper station. Two more waiting SUVs took the group the few hundred metres across the freezing hilltop to the facility. Inside, Chase was hustled through the building’s blank corridors to what resembled an airport’s security screening station. Warning notices in Cyrillic plastered the walls; he had no idea what they said, but the stylised symbols accompanying them suggested danger from both high voltages and magnetism. A thick line of striped red and yellow was painted on the floor.

The station was manned by two men in orange overalls. When Kruglov stepped up to them, one man ran a sensor wand over his body while the other monitored the results on a screen. The machine bleeped several times. With a look of resigned annoyance, Kruglov emptied out his pockets, placing all his metallic belongings, including a gun, in a plastic tray. The first man ran the wand over him again. Satisfied with the result, he put the tray in a nearby locker and waved Kruglov over the painted line.

The process was repeated with the other members of the group.

Chase went next, having to turn over his watch, keys, phone and - to his irritation - leather jacket. The teeth of its zip were steel, susceptible to magnetic fields. The titanium pins in his left arm initially caused some consternation, but once it was determined they were non-magnetic he was sent through. Presumably the plate in Maximov’s skull was also non-magnetic; if not, he would get very attached to the machinery when it was switched on.

The one item that set off warnings yet was still allowed through was Excalibur. Carrying the case, Chase was led from the entrance into another room beyond, the facility’s control centre.

Waiting for him was Nina.

The makeup and dress from the party were gone; she looked pale and vulnerable in a set of ill-fitting overalls. ‘Eddie!’ she called, relieved, but also worried. Vaskovich, standing beside her, was now in complete control.

‘Hi, honey,’ Chase replied. He was just as delighted to see her, but forced himself to remain outwardly cool. ‘You okay?’

Nina made a sarcastic noise. ‘Oh, super fine, really! Apart from the prison outfit.’ She plucked at her baggy orange one-piece.

‘Yeah, I think the black rubber number definitely wins out.’ He turned to Vaskovich. ‘I brought the sword. Now let her go.’

‘Show me,’ said the Russian. Chase opened the case. Vaskovich regarded Excalibur with a look somewhere between awe and greed, then carefully lifted it from the foam, holding the polished metal up to the light. ‘I wasn’t sure if you would really do it. I have a hard time believing Jack would let it go so easily.’ Suspicion crossed his face. ‘Let’s be sure he really has.’

He clicked his fingers, and one of the control room technicians hurried over bearing an electronic device. Vaskovich carefully placed the sword on a table; the technician clipped a pair of electrodes to it, then switched on the gadget. He watched its display for several seconds, then nodded to his boss.

‘It really is Excalibur,’ said Vaskovich, sounding almost surprised as he picked up the weapon again. ‘A genuine high-temperature superconductor.’

‘If I say I’m going to do something, I do it,’ Chase told him.

‘And so do I. You can have Nina back, Chase - after I test my system with the sword in place.’

‘Don’t seem to recall that being part of the deal,’ said Chase icily.

‘I think it was implied.’ Vaskovich smiled slightly, then handed Excalibur to another technician, who climbed down a ladder leading through an opening in the floor. ‘Take a look,’ he said proudly, striding to the room’s glass wall and opening his arms wide to encompass the much larger chamber beyond. ‘This is what I have been working for. This . . . is the future.’

The control room overhung the edge of a huge concrete-walled circular pit, a hundred feet across at its top and over twice as deep, narrowing as it descended. Overhead was the dome, the cables Chase had seen earlier hanging down through open louvres to the vast machine below. A hexagonal framework running down to the base of the pit supported a series of massive rings of electromagnets, suspended from electrical insulators. Outside the frame were three catwalks, one just below the level of the control room, a second midway down, and the third near the bottom of the apparatus. A small elevator platform was descending the framework, the technician taking Excalibur down to the lowest level. It was unmistakably some kind of generator, but on a truly enormous scale.

Chase wasn’t impressed, however. ‘Yeah. The future of war.’

Vaskovich shook his head. ‘Do you know the purpose of war, Chase? The true purpose? It has nothing to do with ideology, or morality. It is about resources. Right now, it is all about oil. But there will be wars for other resources in the future - gas, uranium, even water. Control the supply of resources, and you control entire nations.’

‘But you already do,’ said Nina, stepping forward to join Chase and taking his hand. ‘You control a huge chunk of Russia’s oil and gas reserves. You already have that kind of power.’

‘Oil and gas will not last for ever,’ Vaskovich said. ‘I know what governments say, even here in Russia: that peak oil production is a long way away. But I know the truth - we have already passed that point. The price will only go up from now on. You think over a hundred dollars for a barrel of oil is expensive? Soon it will be two hundred. Then three.’

‘And you get to profit from it all,’ Nina said scathingly.

To her surprise, Vaskovich responded with anger. ‘No! What use is money if Russia freezes and starves? This is my country - my homeland! I will not let that happen!’ He calmed slightly, looking back out over the generator. Below, the technician was carefully lowering Excalibur into a piece of equipment at the bottom of the pit. ‘This will change all that. This will change the world - and Russia will take her rightful place as its leader.’

‘By threatening to blow up everyone else with this thing?’ Chase asked.

Vaskovich rounded on him, angry again. ‘This is not a weapon! Whatever Jack has told you, it is a lie. This is a generator, a power station - which turns the earth’s own natural energy into that power. It is clean, it is safe - and it is limitless. With more of these stations built on the points where the lines of energy converge, I can power the whole of Russia, for nothing. A productive use for my billions - my gift to my country.’

‘Which won’t exactly hurt your political ambitions,’ Nina realised.

Vaskovich smiled triumphantly. ‘Who wouldn’t vote for the man who restored Russia to greatness? And it is a war Russia has already won. Anyone else who wants this technology will have to come to me - because I am the only person who has it.’ He looked through the window. Excalibur in place below, the technician was ascending again. ‘And now, I can make it happen.’

He issued an order in Russian. The technicians turned to their consoles, activating the system. Vaskovich’s attention was on the machines; Chase surreptitiously looked round for any opportunity to escape. Kruglov and Maximov, he saw, were watching him. A corner of Kruglov’s wide mouth twitched mockingly - the Russian knew exactly what he was thinking. He opened his jacket and revealed a knife, with a black carbon-fibre blade. Non-metallic. Chase mouthed ‘Fuck off ’ at him, then returned his attention to Vaskovich.

A deep electrical hum rose in volume. The sharp tang of ozone filled the control room as the air took on a strange, almost tingling quality, literally charged. Nina flinched at a sudden lightning-flash from above, a crackle of electrical energy arcing between two of the cables descending from the dome. More bolts flicked across the generator as the power rose.

Vaskovich pointed out a particular digital indicator. It read 0.34, and rising. ‘This gauge shows the system’s power level,’ he explained. ‘Right now, all the power is coming from the submarine’s nuclear reactors.’

‘That’s what it’s for?’ Chase asked in disbelief. ‘You’ve got the world’s biggest missile sub downstairs, and you’re using it as a generator?’

‘It produces nearly four hundred megawatts of power. But even if we fed all of Russia’s electricity into it, it wouldn’t be enough. Not without the superconductor.’ He looked at the gauge again, which had now reached 0.47. ‘The highest it has ever gone is zero point seven two. If it goes higher, then the superconductor is working - it is channelling earth energy into the generator. But it will still consume more energy than it produces . . . until the gauge reads one. That is the point where the process becomes self-sustaining. ’

‘And then what?’ demanded Chase.

‘And then . . . you can leave.’

Nina regarded him suspiciously. ‘You’re really going to let us go?’

‘Your fiancé gave me his word that he would bring me Excalibur. I gave him my word that I would release you in return. I have what I want - there is no need for more violence.’

‘Maybe you should’ve thought of that before you sent your little gang of psychos out to get it,’ Chase snarled, with a hate-filled glance at Kruglov.

‘If Jack had not been working against me, I would not have had to. He is as much to blame for what has happened as I am. For what it’s worth, I regret the loss of life.’

‘What, and you think saying sorry makes everything all right?’ said Nina bitterly. ‘You hypocritical bastard. Just because you send other people to do your dirty work doesn’t mean your own hands are clean!’

But Vaskovich was no longer listening, his attention focused on the gauge. 0.68 . . . 0.69 . . . More electrical flares lit up the huge chamber, the hum of the machinery rising in pitch. 0.71 . . . 0.72 . . .

‘It works!’ Vaskovich cried, elated. The gauge now read 0.73, and kept climbing. He rushed over to one of the consoles, speaking in rapid, excited Russian to the technician. Despite herself, Nina found herself becoming caught up in the moment, willing the reading higher. It passed 0.90, 0.91. Vaskovich hurried back and leaned intently over the console, the digital figures reflected in his glasses. 0.96, 0.97 . . .

It stopped.

The gauge remained constant at 0.97. Vaskovich’s face fell in confusion, then anger. He shouted an order to the technicians, jerking his hands upwards in an unmistakable ‘More!’ gesture. One of the men shook his head.

‘What’s wrong?’ Nina asked.

‘I don’t know.’ Vaskovich darted from console to console, shoving the technicians aside to work the controls himself, with the same lack of results. ‘It should be working. The superconductor is channelling earth energy into the system - why isn’t it working?’

‘I know,’ said a voice from above.

Everyone looked up to see Mitchell standing on top of the generator’s frame, having descended by rope through one of the dome’s louvres. He aimed his gun at Vaskovich, and fired.

28

The window shattered. Vaskovich’s right thigh erupted with bloody holes as bullets ripped into it. The oligarch collapsed, screaming.

Chase was already moving, shoving Nina towards the ladder. ‘Go!’ he yelled, despite being unsure if there was another way out of the generator chamber. To reach the door of the control room she would have to pass Kruglov and Maximov, and he wanted to give Mitchell a clear field of fire.

Another burst of gunfire took out two of the technicians at their consoles as Mitchell descended the rope. Chase ran to pull him in through the broken window.

Nina scrambled down the ladder. Kruglov saw her go, pulled out his black-bladed knife and raced after her. She jumped to the catwalk below and looked round. A third of the way anticlockwise round the catwalk a walkway led to a passage set in the vast pit’s concrete wall. She ran for it as Kruglov leapt down behind her.

Chase hauled Mitchell into the control room. The American fired the XM-201 again, a rapid sweep of shots killing another technician and taking down three of the guards. Maximov threw himself into the cover of another console as bullets seared past him.

‘You miss me?’ Mitchell asked. He indicated his shoulder: the second rifle was attached to the harness on his back. ‘Brought something for you - oh, shit, look out!’

‘Fuck!’ Chase dived one way, Mitchell the other, as the console Maximov had been hiding behind was hurled through the window between them and crashed down into the pit. The huge Russian charged at them. Mitchell managed to get off another shot, blasting a chunk of shredded meat from Maximov’s upper arm.

It didn’t even slow him. Instead, he grinned and seized Mitchell in his massive hands, slamming him to the floor.

Chase jumped up. Mitchell was pinned down by Maximov - and both rifles were trapped beneath him.

And there was still another guard to deal with.

The surviving technicians were running for the exit, but the guard barrelled straight at Chase, intending to shoulder-barge him out of the broken window. Chase held his ground. He waited until the Russian was almost upon him, then feinted to the left. The guard instinctively moved to intercept him—

Chase instead ducked right, swinging a hammer-blow punch that smashed into the man’s jaw. The guard reeled, throwing out his hands to stop his fall - only to impale his palms on the spears of glass. He fell through the window, dropping past Kruglov to plunge screaming into the depths of the pit.

Nina heard the terrified yell and looked back, fearful that it had been Chase. It only took a glimpse of the falling figure to see that it wasn’t, but that glimpse also told her Kruglov was gaining. She raced for the walkway leading to the opening.

Chase ran back to help Mitchell. Maximov was choking him, thumping his head repeatedly against the floor. Lacking weapons, Chase snatched up a chair and smashed it over the Russian’s broad back. The chair broke apart, pieces scattering, but Maximov just let out a grunting laugh.

‘All right,’ Chase growled, ‘how about this?’ He delivered a brutal kick to one of the giant’s kidneys.

On anyone else it would have decisively ended the fight, but instead Maximov’s back arched with pleasure. ‘Daaaaaa!’ he gasped, insane smile widening in ecstasy.

Mitchell was turning blue, and Chase was out of ideas . . .

Wait!

If Maximov felt pain as pleasure, then . . .

‘Can’t believe I’m doing this,’ Chase muttered as he moved behind Maximov and reached down to his sides, fingers outstretched - to tickle him.

It was as if the Russian had received an electric shock. He released his grip on Mitchell’s throat and jumped to his feet, face twisted in rage. ‘That hurt, little man!’

Chase backed away. On the floor, Mitchell gasped for air, moving weakly. The XM-201 lay across his stomach. Come on, shoot the bastard! ‘No wonder you always look so fucking grumpy,’ Chase said, trying to keep Maximov’s attention off the gun. ‘Must feel like a kick in the bollocks every time you have a wank.’

Through the window he saw Nina running along the catwalk, with Kruglov not far behind. Mitchell, groaning, rolled on his side . . . and the gun slid to the floor, forgotten as its owner struggled to breathe. Shit!

Chase looked from the rifle to Nina, to Kruglov, then back to Maximov. He was out of time. ‘Ah, fuck it!’ he spat as he launched himself at the Russian, ducking under his grasping hands to smash a fist into his stomach, hitting him again and again. ‘This’ll put a fucking smile on your face!’

‘Da, little man!’ bellowed Maximov, the sheer fury of Chase’s attack actually forcing him backwards. He raised one arm, hand clenching into a fist. ‘Do!’ The hand slammed on to Chase’s back. ‘It!’ Another blow knocked him to his knees. ‘Again!’ The final punch dropped him to the floor.

Winded, Chase looked up through pain-filled eyes, and saw Mitchell struggling to all fours behind Maximov. The gun lay beside him, still forgotten.

But Maximov didn’t know that . . .

Chase tipped his head back further, and smiled up at the Russian. Maximov stopped, confused. ‘If you like pain,’ Chase wheezed, ‘you’ll love this! Jack, now!’

Maximov’s eyes widened. He whirled, expecting to see Mitchell pointing his gun at him.

Instead, he found the American kneeling at his feet.

Chase sprang up and rammed his shoulder against Maximov’s backside, driving him forward. The huge Russian staggered, tripping over Mitchell - and toppled through the window. He fell past the first catwalk to bounce off the second level with such force that the walkway buckled, plunging into a nest of cables beneath it. He jerked to a stop, hanging upside down by one entangled leg, barely conscious.

Mitchell managed to stand, picking up his rifle. ‘What happened?’

Chase didn’t have the time or the inclination to explain. ‘Give me a gun!’ he snapped instead. Nina had just disappeared into a side corridor, Kruglov right behind her. Mitchell pulled the second XM-201 from his back. Chase grabbed it from him and ran painfully for the ladder.

‘Eddie!’ called Mitchell in a warning tone. Chase looked back to see him pointing at one of the large rings inside the still running generator. ‘Don’t damage the magnets!’

‘What’ll happen?’

‘Bad things!’

‘Good tip,’ Chase said with a crooked smile before dropping down the ladder.

Nina ran along the concrete corridor to find herself in a room - with no exit. It was a storage area, the striped red-and-yellow line on the floor indicating the limit of the generator’s magnetic field. Beyond it, at the far end of the room, was a rack of firefighting and other emergency equipment. Some of it appeared to be made of steel; presumably other, non-magnetic alternative metals were either unsuitable or too expensive.

She rushed to it and grabbed a fire axe. Kruglov’s running footsteps behind her changed from the clang of the walkway to the flat slap of concrete. He was in the passage—

Nina spun and hurled the heavy axe at the entrance. It arced down, falling short of Kruglov - then suddenly changed direction in defiance of gravity as it crossed the painted line, instantly picking up speed and shooting down the corridor. Kruglov dived sideways with a startled yelp, the axe barely missing him as the intense magnetic field snatched it into the generator chamber. It slammed against one of the rings of electromagnets with an echoing bang.

She shook off her momentary amazement, looking for another weapon, but Kruglov was already back on his feet, the matte-black knife in his outstretched hand as he ran at her. ‘Suka! ’ he hissed.

Nina doubted it was a compliment. She tried to back away, but had nowhere to go. Trapped, she brought up her hands to protect herself. Kruglov sneered, moving closer - and Nina swung at him, managing to land a glancing punch against his chin as he jerked away in surprise. ‘Yeah, fuck you too!’

Kruglov blew out an angry breath, then lunged again. She tried to twist his knife hand away from her, as Chase had taught her, but the Russian was ready. As Nina grabbed his wrist, he spun and drove his other elbow against her jaw. She cried out in pain, dazed. Kruglov wrenched his arm from her weakened grip, and cracked the haft of his knife down on the back of her head.

She staggered. Kruglov pulled her up in a choke-hold, pressing the knife against her ribs. He dragged her back down the corridor.

Chase stopped running and brought up his gun as Kruglov emerged from the passage, Nina held in front of him as a shield. He looked through the rifle’s sight, trying to line up the crosshairs on the Russian’s head. But Kruglov was a constantly shifting target behind his hostage - and Chase couldn’t see where he was holding his knife. Even if he hit him, Nina might still be fatally wounded.

Kruglov reached the catwalk and slowly backed away around it. Chase advanced on him. ‘Let her go, dickhead!’

‘We’ve done this before, haven’t we?’ Kruglov responded with a cold smirk. ‘You know I am willing to kill her. So drop the gun.’

Chase came to a standstill near the catwalk junction. He stood for a moment, the rifle still fixed on Kruglov . . . then tossed it to land at Nina’s feet. She stared in shock at his surrender.

Kruglov glanced at the high-tech weapon. ‘One of Mitchell’s toys? I look forward to killing him with it.’ He quickly slipped the knife back into its sheath and pulled Nina with him as he bent to pick up the gun. ‘But you first.’

He groped for the rifle, eyes flicking down - and in the split second he was looking away, Chase winked at Nina. She looked back, confused, but already preparing herself for whatever happened next.

Kruglov straightened, the gun in his hand. Smile widening, he pointed it at Chase and pulled the trigger.

Nothing happened.

He tried again. The trigger clicked faintly, but the rifle remained inert. His smugness changed to anger as he realised he’d been tricked.

Nina took advantage of his distraction to twist and ram the point of her left elbow into his stomach. Kruglov jerked back, losing his grip on her.

Chase ran to tackle him. Kruglov batted Nina aside with the rifle, slamming her against the catwalk railing. His free hand swept over the gun, hunting for a safety catch or some other release mechanism—

It found the firing button for the grenade launcher.

Chase was still several feet away. He had no idea if the grenade launcher also had a biometric lock - Mitchell certainly hadn’t programmed one with his handprint.

And the flash of uncertainty on his face was all Kruglov needed to know he still had a chance . . .

The Russian whipped up the XM-201 and fired just as Chase hurled himself on to the walkway leading to the storeroom. The grenade shot past him. It hit the main catwalk some fifteen feet away and exploded, ripping apart an entire section and sending it crashing down into the pit below.

The blast sent Chase reeling, almost flipping him over the safety railing. The grenade might have been small, but it was still powerful, enough to take down a wall. He looked back. Nina was pulling herself upright; Kruglov had an expression of almost maniacal glee on his face as he realised the full power of the weapon. ‘Nina! Get to Jack!’ Chase shouted, sprinting down the passage towards the storeroom entrance as the ex-KGB agent lined up a second shot—

Concrete shattered just behind him, knocking him off his feet. He hit the floor hard, bouncing over the painted line to end up sprawled before the equipment rack. Coughing, ears ringing, Chase looked round, and saw the room was a dead end.

A silhouette appeared in the entrance, shrouded in dust. Kruglov. And he knew Chase had no way out.

Chase stood to challenge him anyway. ‘Fight to the end,’ he told himself. He reached into the rack, hunting for a weapon, even if it was just a club.

He realised what some of the equipment was made from . . .

‘I like this gun,’ said Kruglov. ‘It even has a little screen telling me how many bullets I have left. And how many grenades. I see I have . . . one. That should be enough.’

Chase faced him as he emerged from the drifting cloud of concrete dust, watching his expression intently. ‘Well, you’d better use it, then. ’Cause if you don’t, I’m going to shove it up your arsehole and pull the trigger.’

Kruglov merely smiled his oily, frog-like smile one last time. ‘If you insist.’

His eyes narrowed in anticipation of the shot, finger tightening on the firing button—

Chase dived to one side.

The grenade barely missed him, streaking between the shelves to explode against the wall. The rack blew apart, equipment flying across the room—

Over the painted line.

The spinning pieces of steel all suddenly accelerated in mid-air, yanked inexorably towards the powerful magnets in the chamber outside - with Kruglov in their path.

The Russian screamed as the tools hit him, screwdrivers stabbing deep into his flesh, larger items smashing against him with bone-cracking force and sweeping him backwards down the passage. With a final cry he slammed against the generator - only for the cylindrical fire extinguisher that had buried its end in his abdomen to continue onwards and burst out of his back. Spewing blood, Kruglov slithered down the length of the cylinder impaling him, before gravity reclaimed its hold. He fell into the pit, smashing off the middle catwalk and spinning down to the bottom with a decisive crack of bones.

Chase didn’t hear it; in fact, he couldn’t hear anything except a disorienting clamour in both ears, the grenade explosion having all but deafened him. He opened his eyes to find himself crumpled almost upside down in a corner. A spanner was embedded in the wall just above him. Lumps of smashed concrete and pieces of equipment were scattered across the room.

He flopped on to his side and weakly clicked his fingers next to one ear. On the third try, he thought he heard a faint snap through the ringing. At least he hadn’t been permanently deafened.

Kruglov was dead - but was Nina safe? He pulled himself upright and shakily crossed the room. The XM-201 lay in the passageway. He picked it up, then staggered along the walkway.

Kruglov’s first grenade shot had destroyed a large section of the catwalk, too much for him to jump the gap; he would have to go the long way round to return to the control room. Nina looked down at him through the broken window. She shouted excitedly, but Chase had no idea what she was saying. He yelled what he hoped was ‘I’m okay!’ to her, then began the long plod round the catwalk.

‘Looks like he’s all right!’ Nina told Mitchell, who was crouching beside the wounded Vaskovich.

‘Great,’ Mitchell replied, with an odd lack of enthusiasm. ‘So, Leonid - you want to know why your system didn’t work?’

Vaskovich, clutching his wounded leg, glared up at him through pain-clenched eyes. ‘Go to hell.’

‘Afraid I’m on the side of the angels. Seriously, though, aren’t you curious?’ He gestured at the generator, still flickering with bursts of electrical energy. ‘You were so close, your people made it work despite all the disinformation I was feeding you about DARPA’s system. And you even got Excalibur, you got the superconductor. But there was one thing you were missing, which even I didn’t know about until we found the sword in England. Want to know what it was?’

‘What?’ Vaskovich gasped.

To Nina’s shock, Mitchell pointed at her. ‘She’s what you were missing. She’s the key to making the whole thing work. Something about her body’s bioelectric field - I’m not sure exactly what, but we’ll figure it out. But without her to energise the sword, all you’ve got is a nice shiny antique.’ He stood. ‘Anyway, now you know.’

And before Nina realised what was happening, he shot Vaskovich in the heart. The Russian convulsed, then fell back, dead.

‘Jesus Christ!’ Nina screamed. ‘What the hell are you doing?’

‘My job,’ he told her emotionlessly. ‘The whole purpose of this mission was to terminate Vaskovich’s operations, and secure Excalibur.’

‘You knew all along,’ she said, anger growing as her shock subsided. ‘You knew he didn’t build this place to use as a weapon.’

‘Of course I knew.’ He lowered the rifle and stepped over Vaskovich’s body towards her, reaching into a pocket.

‘Then why did you have to kill him? And all these other people?’

‘Because we can’t allow anyone but us to have this technology - for any purpose.’

‘You’ve got your own system, haven’t you?’ she realised. ‘DARPA’s built a generator just like this one.’

‘We have,’ said Mitchell. He looked out of the window, seeing Chase about two-thirds of the way round the catwalk. ‘Only problem is, it doesn’t work either. But it soon will. Eddie! Eddie, can you hear me?’

The noise in Chase’s ears had subsided enough for him to pick out his own name, even if the rest of Mitchell’s words were unclear. He stopped and looked at the control room, cupping a hand to his ear to indicate that he had trouble hearing.

‘Looks like he’s a bit deaf,’ said Mitchell. ‘Let’s see if he can hear this.’

He raised his rifle again, and fired.

Deafened or not, Chase could still tell when someone was about to shoot at him. He threw himself back out of the line of fire as a burst of explosive bullets detonated against the catwalk, spitting fragments of metal.

Nina lunged at Mitchell to knock the gun away. His left hand clapped against her arm and she felt a sharp stab of pain, followed by a spreading coldness. He pulled back his hand, revealing a plastic disc at the base of his middle finger held in place by a ring. A short spike protruded from its centre, smeared with her blood.

She stumbled back, numbness taking hold of her limbs. ‘What - what’ve you done?’

‘I need you to do something for me,’ he said, his voice seeming to come from the end of a long pipe. ‘But I didn’t think you’d do it voluntarily.’

‘You son of a . . .’ she managed, before her knees buckled. She hit the floor, but didn’t feel it, as darkness consumed her senses.

29

In cover behind one of the generator’s supports, Chase cautiously peered at the control room, and saw Nina fall out of sight. ‘Fucker!’ he hissed, aiming at Mitchell and pulling the trigger.

No response. He switched to a different ammunition and tried again. Still nothing.

Mitchell shouted something. He strained to hear. ‘IFF, Eddie!’ called Mitchell, holding up his XM-201. ‘You can’t shoot at anyone carrying one of these! You can’t, anyway - I disabled the lockouts on mine—’

Before he could finish, Chase aimed above the American and unleashed a stream of explosive bullets into the control room ceiling. The digital ammo counter fell from twenty to zero in little more than a second, the rifle vibrating in his hands like a chainsaw. Mitchell dived away from the rain of debris. Chase tracked him, switching to armour-piercing rounds in the hope that the gun’s sensors would be blocked by the low wall at the base of the window and let him shoot Mitchell through it, but the weapon just clicked uselessly.

The screen suddenly flashed red. A pungent burning smell hit Chase’s nostrils, and he tossed down the gun as acrid black smoke gushed out of it, the polymer frame sizzling and blistering. Mitchell had remotely activated the weapon’s self-destruct, reducing its electronics to molten slag.

He ducked back behind the support, waiting for Mitchell to return fire now that he was defenceless. Nothing happened. An electrical flash from above, and he knew why - a line of electromagnets ran down the other side of the column. Mitchell was serious about not wanting to damage them.

Which might give him a chance to reach the control room. If he stayed close enough to—

A muffled thump gave him an instant’s warning, just enough time to shield his face before a grenade blew out another section of catwalk ahead of him. Chase was knocked on his back by the blast. He scrambled back behind the protection of the magnets and saw he was completely cut off from the control room, trapped on the severed walkway.

Mitchell surveyed the scene, looking satisfied. He moved back across the control room and hoisted Nina over his shoulder.

Chase thought he was going to take her to the exit, but instead he climbed down the ladder to the same level as the Englishman, then boarded the little elevator leading to the bottom of the pit. Still carrying Nina, he began his descent.

Chase watched, powerless to stop them. He eyed the generator again. The vertical supports were separated from the magnetic rings by heavy-duty insulators, but he had no idea how much power was flowing through the rings themselves - and they were the only way he could reach the catwalk beneath the control room. One wrong step, and he would be fried.

The elevator passed the dangling, semi-conscious Maximov and reached the bottom of the pit. Kruglov’s body lay to one side, but in the centre was the frame holding Excalibur. Mitchell carried Nina over to it. He put down his rifle, then manoeuvred her into position next to the sword. Taking hold of her wrist, he crouched, holding out her hand to touch the hilt . . .

‘No!’ Chase yelled, afraid she’d be electrocuted, but too late. Mitchell squeezed her limp fingers around the sword—

There was a dazzling flash of blue light as Excalibur glowed brilliantly. Above Chase, the size and frequency of the electrical arcs suddenly increased.

His eyes squeezed almost shut against the glare, Mitchell nevertheless kept his grip on Nina’s hand. ‘What do you think, Eddie?’ he shouted, barely audible against the rising hum of the machinery. ‘Pretty cool, huh?’

‘What the fuck are you doing?’

‘I’m making Vaskovich’s system work. Too bad he didn’t get to see it, but hey!’ He lifted Nina’s hand from the sword; the glow instantly vanished, but the noise of the generator remained constant. ‘Yes! It’s passed the threshold - I was right!’

He lowered Nina to the floor, then shrugged off his flat backpack and opened it. Inside was another piece of metal, which Chase recognised as the largest section of Caliburn. Mitchell carefully slid the broken blade into the frame next to Excalibur, the two swords touching. Then he brought Nina’s hand back up to touch Excalibur. It glowed brilliantly once more - and Caliburn lit up too, though much less brightly. The electrical hum began to rise again.

Mitchell withdrew Nina’s hand. The blue light disappeared, but the noise of the generator continued to climb. He grabbed Excalibur by the hilt and yanked it out of the system, leaving Caliburn in its place. The roiling electrical discharges kept flashing across the dome. He put the sword in his pack and pulled it over his shoulders, then bent to lift Nina, took up his rifle and returned to the elevator.

‘Gonna have to say goodbye, Eddie,’ he said when he reached the top level. ‘It’s nothing personal, but I can’t leave anybody who knows what I was doing.’

‘I honestly fucking don’t!’ Chase shouted back, keeping behind cover. ‘So, you going to shoot me?’

‘In a way. This whole place really is only one step away from being a weapon - the antenna array can draw in power, but it can also pump it out. Millions of watts of it. Now there’s a superconductor in place - not as effective as Excalibur, but it’ll do - and the reaction’s become self-sustaining, the system will just keep on drawing in more and more earth energy. I’m going to let it all out - in one blast.’

‘You’re going to blow the place up?’

‘Might as well get some empirical data for DARPA’s own system! I’ll set the array to heat up the ionosphere directly above, then fire the system’s entire output into it - and the focused earth energy will bounce straight back down and destroy the whole facility.’

‘Nice and neat,’ Chase said sarcastically. ‘What about Nina?’

‘I’m taking her with me - I need her alive. At least, until I find someone else who can make the effect work. So long, Eddie.’ He clambered back up the ladder, carrying Nina.

‘Shit!’ Chase searched desperately for some other way out of the generator room. Nothing presented itself. Above, he caught occasional glimpses of Mitchell as he operated the consoles. The intensity of the flashes above him increased, electrical bolts coiling across the machinery like liquid snakes.

He ran to the end of the broken catwalk. A twisted section across the gap hung down, a drooping tongue of grillework protruding from it. He might just be able to reach it . . .

He hurried back to give himself a run-up. A glance at the control room: Mitchell was no longer in sight. Was he still programming the system, or already fleeing with Nina?

Her name spurred Chase on. He ran. The floor clanged beneath him as he reached the edge of the damaged section and leapt across . . .

Falling . . .

Falling short.

He threw out his arms, clawed hands smashing painfully against the hanging section. One slipped away - the other hooked into the grille. For a moment he swung as the catwalk section buckled under his weight.

Then the whole thing tore loose and plunged into the pit.

The mid-level catwalk flashed past—The plummeting walkway section crashed against it. The impact flipped him round, tearing loose his hold on the grillework and tossing him under the catwalk, still falling.

He hit a bundle of cables, tried to wrap his arms round it, failed. His hands slipped over the thick insulation, each successive line popping from his grip and bringing him ever closer to his death beside Kruglov below . . .

He caught the last cable.

Pain seared through his shoulder as he jerked to a stop. The cable bounced above him, shaking him like a doll. Gasping, Chase managed to bring up his other arm and secure himself with both hands.

For all the good it did him. He was still hanging over eighty feet up with nothing but concrete and metal to break his fall - and a countdown to destruction already ticking away above.

‘Well, this isn’t good,’ he muttered.

Much to his surprise, he got a response: a groan. He twisted to see Maximov still hanging by one leg in another skein of cables above and to one side. The huge Russian blinked blearily, then focused on him - and his face twisted with upside-down fury. ‘You!’

‘Yeah, me,’ Chase said. ‘Oh, shit,’ he added as Maximov reached down, stretching for the cables beneath him.

His hand wrapped round the topmost of the bunch. ‘You try to kill me. Now I kill you!’

‘Nonono, shit!’ Chase yelped as Maximov tugged at the cables, trying to shake him loose. ‘This whole place is about to blow up!’

Maximov replied with what from his tone could only be the Russian equivalent of ‘Yeah, whatever’, pulling the cables harder.

‘No, listen, you stupid bastard!’ Chase cried with growing desperation as his hold began to slip. ‘Mitchell’s fucking betrayed us all!’

‘Ha! Serve you right for trusting him!’

One of Chase’s hands was jolted loose. ‘Whoa, fuck!’ he gasped. The pit whirled below him. He tried to regain his grip, but couldn’t reach the juddering cable. ‘Vaskovich is dead!’ he shouted desperately, running out of ideas. ‘And if you don’t get out of here soon, you’ll be dead too!’

That got a reaction, Maximov pausing mid-shake. ‘The boss is dead?’

‘Mitchell killed him! The whole thing was a set-up - he’s killed everyone to cover his tracks. We’re the only ones left - but if we don’t get out of here, we’ll be dead too! Look!’ He pointed frantically up at the furious auroral display flashing across the dome. ‘It’s going to fucking explode any minute!’

Maximov’s expression went from anger to concern. ‘You not lying?’

‘No, I’m not fucking lying! We’re both going to die unless we help each other!’

‘If I help you, how do I know you will help me?’

‘You’re ex-Spetsnaz, right? Special forces? I’m ex-SAS - special forces. Same job, just different bosses! You’d trust your squad mates - so trust me, please!’

The Russian considered this, sluggish thought processes almost visible on his face. Finally: ‘What you want me to do?’

‘Pull me up! Then I can climb up to the catwalk and pull you up!’

Another agonisingly slow moment of thought. ‘Okay. I help you. But if you don’t help me, I kill you! Even if I have to rise out of grave to do it!’

‘Just pull me up, for fuck’s sake!’ With the cable no longer being shaken, Chase was able to reach it with his other hand. Maximov waited until he had a firm grip, then strained to lift the heavy skein until Chase could reach across and pull himself up the cables in the larger bundle above.

‘Okay, let it go!’ he ordered. Maximov released the cables. They dropped back down, and Chase braced his feet against them. With a foothold, it was a relatively easy task for him to scale the tangle of wiring until he reached the stability of the mid-level catwalk.

The vertical track of the elevator was not far away. He looked at Maximov, still entangled below. Part of his mind reminded him that he would have a much better chance of escaping alive if he left now, alone.

He ignored it. He’d given his word.

A metal bar lay on the floor a few feet away, a broken piece of the fallen catwalk. Chase grabbed it and ducked under the railing, extending the bar out below him with one hand as he gripped the handrail with the other. ‘Hold this!’ he shouted. The noise of the generator had risen to a piercing screech, energy crackling back and forth across the dome.

Maximov bent at the waist, trying to reach up for the bar. Chase strained to bring the end closer to his grasping fingers. He was just short, barely two inches away. ‘Come on!’

‘Can’t - reach!’ gasped Maximov, tendons bulging in his neck. He was so overmuscled that his own body was limiting his movement, unable to crunch any tighter.

‘Can’t reach?’ Chase’s voice changed to a mocking drill-instructor bark. ‘Yes, you can reach, you great Russian pansy! Spetsnaz? Shitsnaz, more like! Bunch of fur-hatted nancy boys, poncing about in the snow—’

With an enraged growl, Maximov lunged upwards, and his hand clamped round the end of the bar. ‘Ha! Yes!’ Chase cried, pulling back with all his strength to lift the Russian. Maximov gripped the railing, then reached down to unravel the wiring round his ankle before climbing on to the catwalk.

Chase ran to the elevator controls and hammered at the call button. The platform began to descend. ‘Come on, come on!’ he called to the Russian. ‘Sorry about the Shitsnaz thing, by the way.’

‘No problem,’ Maximov rumbled. ‘But maybe one day I tell you what we say SAS stands for, eh?’

The platform arrived; they jumped aboard even before it stopped, pounding at the controls. After an apparent eternity, it ascended again. Electrical arcs flashed past them, the very air seeming to tremble as the power built up.

They reached the top catwalk. Chase leapt from the elevator and rushed up the ladder to the control room, Maximov right behind him. Mitchell had gone, and so had Nina. The only people in the room were corpses.

And two soon-to-be corpses if they didn’t get out, fast. ‘Leg it!’ Chase yelled.

They raced through the checkpoint, Chase flicking an anguished look at the locker holding his belongings before running on to the doors, the darkness outside now pierced by unearthly flashes of light. They crashed through them and sprinted out into the cold.

The funicular station was ahead. The car they had ridden up in was gone, its empty counterpart just arriving at the summit on the adjacent track. Beyond it, great fluid coils of energy danced over the hundreds of antennas on the hillside, sparks spitting from their tips. He could see his own shadow ahead of him, not cast by the spotlights around the facility but by something far brighter, less stable, more deadly.

It was about to blow—

Chase reached the crest of the hill and dived headlong over it. With a blinding flash and an earth-shaking crack of thunder a wall of lightning blazed directly upwards from the antenna array, a sheath of unimaginable energy surrounding the entire facility.

The flash lasted only a moment, many of the antennas melting, but as Chase rolled down the scrubby hillside he was already protecting his ears, knowing there was more to come.

A spear of intense blue-white light lanced down from the heavens into the dome, which exploded into splinters as the beam seared through it to hit the machinery below.

All the remaining earth energy still in the system was released at once. The generator disintegrated, the force of the blast shattering the concrete walls of the pit and ripping a massive crater out of the hilltop. The circular building above was pulverised, the shockwave reducing the entire structure to rubble in a split second and hurling it outwards in a huge swelling ring of destruction.

The force of the blast hit Chase through the ground itself, a colossal whump from within the hill knocking him into the air in a shower of soil and stones. He landed hard on a leg of the road below amidst a blizzard of churned earth, having just enough time to realise that he was almost beneath the steeply sloping trackbed of the funicular and roll into whatever protection it offered before the shattered remains of the generator building fell round him.

A cloud of choking dust swirled downhill. The ground shook again, a continuous bone-shaking drumming like an artillery barrage as debris smashed down all around.

Then it began to fade.

The rain of rubble fell to a drizzle. Chase sat up and coughed, squinting through the dust as the cold wind from the coast gradually wafted it away. The entire hillside was spotted with fires where molten metal from the twisted, blackened antennas had dripped on to the grass.

He stepped out from beneath the track. The slope above him was shorn to the bare earth, the topsoil and grass blown loose by the explosion. Below, the lights of the dock still shone brightly. The submarine pen had been built to withstand anything short of a direct nuclear strike. There were other lights closer to him: a vehicle on a lower leg of the road, lying on its side.

He heard a muffled Russian curse. ‘Hey!’ Chase shouted, scrambling down the hillside to the source of the swearing. ‘Thingy, Bulldozer! You okay?’

Maximov was slumped against one of the track’s supporting girders, covered in dirt. He dizzily raised his head and peered at Chase. ‘Oh. Is you.’

‘Can you move? Are you hurt?’

He grinned. ‘Da. What was that? It was like . . . fire from God!’

‘It wasn’t God, it was Mitchell. But I’m going to kick his arse straight to God when I catch him. You still with me?’

Maximov nodded, and Chase helped him stand. ‘What are we doing?’

‘Going after Mitchell. He’s kidnapped Nina and stolen the sword - and I’m not going to let that bastard have either of ’em. Come on.’

They picked their way down the hillside between the fires and warped antennas, following the funicular railway. The sea breeze had by now cleared most of the dust, giving Chase a better view of the base. He saw movement on the jetty.

‘Shit!’ Even though the figures were only tiny at this distance, Chase knew there was only one person who would be carrying another over his shoulder - especially when the person being carried had long red hair.

It was clear where Mitchell was taking her. A couple of small boats were moored at the far end of the wooden pier. The DARPA agent’s escape route wasn’t by air, it was by sea.

He had to go after him - or stop him from leaving with her.

‘We’ll never catch him!’ Maximov said, but Chase was already thinking otherwise as they reached the overturned car. It was another Mercedes GL Class, a man whom he recognised as one of the control room technicians hanging bloodily through the broken windscreen. He had escaped Mitchell’s onslaught and tried to drive to safety, only for the SUV to be flipped over by the subterranean shockwave. As they got closer he realised the engine was still running, fumes putt-putting from the exhaust.

‘How strong are you?’ he asked the Russian. ‘Are you like Arnold Schwarzenegger strong?’

‘Arnie? He is girlie-man compared to me!’ Maximov said proudly, flexing his massive arms.

‘Great! Then you can help me tip this thing back over!’

They reached the Mercedes, Chase grabbing the front wing and Maximov taking hold of the back as they forced the two-ton SUV back on to its wheels. ‘You will never get there in time. The road is too long,’ Maximov protested as the vehicle tipped over and bounced upright.

Chase opened the dented door and dragged out the driver’s corpse. ‘We don’t need roads.’ He climbed in and fastened the seatbelt. The cabin was strewn with broken glass and the airbags hung limply from their compartments, but everything else appeared to be working. ‘Coming?’

Maximov squeezed into the Mercedes and gave Chase an uncertain look. ‘Can we make it?’

‘We have to.’ Mitchell was now about a third of the way down the jetty. Chase pointed the SUV down the hill. ‘Let’s off-road!’

He stamped on the accelerator.

The Mercedes leapt off the edge of the road and bounded down the steep, bumpy hillside. Chase yanked the wheel back and forth to guide it through the antenna forest.

The next leg of the road was coming up fast. Chase swerved, hitting the frost-cracked asphalt in a shower of soil. The SUV shot over the edge of the embankment, airborne for a moment . . . then slammed down on top of the funicular line.

He aimed the car straight down the steel track. Maximov swore again, bracing himself against the dashboard. Chase glanced at the jittering speedo. Over sixty kilometres an hour and quickly picking up speed - and his foot wasn’t even on the accelerator.

But he couldn’t slow down, not yet. Mitchell was now over halfway along the jetty with Nina.

The track was perfectly straight, heading to a vanishing point at the bottom of the tunnel. The semicircle of light was partially obscured by a dark box - the funicular car, blocking his path. And there was a gap between the two tracks, making it impossible for him to swing into the open lane.

He looked to the side. Just before the tunnel was a concrete expanse running to the edge of the cliff. Some kind of fuel storage, tall cylindrical tanks lined up along it.

No choice—

Now he braked, pushing the pedal down as hard as he could and turning sharply. Tyres and brake discs shrieked in unison. There was a horrific bang as the wheels crossed the steel track, then the GL Class was clear, slithering sidelong down the rough slope before flattening a chain-link fence and hitting the concrete so hard it almost flipped over.

Chase frantically spun the wheel to apply opposite lock. The SUV wavered on two wheels for a moment before thumping back down on all four - heading right for one of the fuel tanks.

He yanked the wheel back the other way. The Mercedes skidded, spinning round . . . and stopped. It was actually touching the white-painted tank, the door panel bent inwards.

Maximov winced when he saw how close they had been to an explosive collision. ‘Next time, I drive.’

‘No, this is where you get out,’ said Chase. ‘Unless you want to go swimming.’ He jerked a thumb towards the low wooden fence at the edge of the cliff.

Maximov’s eyes widened. ‘You are mad!’

Chase threw open his door. ‘Mad? I’m fuckin’ furious!’ He quickly reversed past another fuel tank, and sliced the door off the Mercedes with a crunch of tearing metal. ‘Seriously - out!’

The Russian had no further arguments, hurriedly flinging open his own door and rolling out. Chase didn’t even wait for him to close it, instead slamming the SUV into gear and flooring the accelerator. The tanks flicked past as he picked up speed, the black sea coming into view over the edge of the cliff.

As did the lights at the end of the jetty.

Chase adjusted his course, aiming straight for them - then ploughed the Mercedes through the flimsy fence and off the edge of the cliff at over eighty kilometres an hour.

He threw himself out as the GL Class rolled in mid-air, the water rushing up fast. He had barely enough time to twist into a dive before hitting the freezing sea just short of the jetty.

The SUV continued onwards without him. A fraction of a second after Chase splashed down, it nose-dived into the pier and exploded, blasting the end of the wooden structure to pieces - and cutting the shocked Mitchell off from the boats, knocking him on his butt less than thirty feet away.

He dumped the unconscious Nina on the planks and jumped up, staring in disbelief at the burning wreckage before looking at the water. Only one person could have been driving the SUV. ‘Eddie!’ he roared, unslinging the XM-201 and running to the jetty’s edge to point the weapon at the expanding splash below. ‘Fuck you, Eddie! Fuck you! ’

Stunned by the cold, Chase was only just struggling to the surface when the water above him erupted with sizzling spears of metal and froth. Cheeks bulging as he held in his breath, he desperately swam back downwards as Mitchell kept firing into the dark water. The 3.6mm bullets only reached a depth of a few feet before the water slowed them to a non-lethal speed, but they were still hot, a couple like cigarette burns against his shoulders.

Mitchell exhausted the twenty rounds in his current load. He was about to switch the gun to different ammo when he remembered he had something more powerful.

Chase was already expecting it. He swam deeper, heading for shore as fast as he could—

The 25mm grenade smacked into the water, sank four feet deep - and detonated.

A spherical shockwave blasted outwards at the speed of sound. Its upper half reached the surface in a fraction of a second, sending a huge plume of white spray into the air. Beneath the surface, the shockwave continued to expand, much more powerful and deadly in dense liquid than in air.

However fast he swam, Chase had no chance of outrunning the blast. A grenade tossed into a swimming pool could kill everyone in it through hydrostatic shock alone - his only chance of survival was to be moving directly away from the epicentre, feet towards it to spread out the impact along his body, as the shockwave swept past him. If it hit him squarely, he would be dead, organs ruptured . . .

The blow was horrific, a crushing pressure pummelling him from all sides and knocking him into an uncontrollable tumble. Air was forced from his lungs. He spun limply into the darkness.

Above, Mitchell surveyed the foaming surface for any sign of life. Nothing. He waited a little longer to be sure, then shouldered his rifle, picked up Nina, and hurried back towards the submarine dock.

30

Chase had no idea which way was up. Freezing salt water stung his eyes as he forced them open. No sign of any lights showing the way to the surface, nothing to be heard except the hiss of billions of tiny air bubbles swirling around him.

He was running out of air. In the SAS, he had been able to hold his breath underwater for over five minutes, but without regular training his capacity would have decreased, and he didn’t know how much air the explosion had driven out of him. All he knew was that there wasn’t much left, pressure rising in his chest and his heart beating faster . . .

A new noise - a deep, booming splash. Close by. Mitchell’s last grenade. He braced himself for the explosion—

It didn’t come. Instead a huge hand locked round his arm and pulled him to the surface. He burst out of the water, gasping for air, and saw the grinning Maximov beside him. ‘Did - did you jump off the cliff ?’

‘If little man like you can do it, hey! No problem for big Russian like me.’ He swam for the jetty, pulling Chase after him. ‘Mitchell went in the dock with your wife.’

They reached one of the pilings and clung to it. ‘She’s not my wife. Well, not yet.’

‘No? So when is wedding?’

‘Why does everyone keep asking that?’ His breath regained, Chase climbed up the piling. He heard echoing gunfire from the sub pen - explosive rounds. What was Mitchell shooting at? A few seconds later came a much louder detonation. The last grenade.

Maximov dragged himself from the water. ‘What is he doing?’

‘Dunno, but we’ve got to get in there.’ Aching all over, Chase shook off some of the water soaking his clothes. The cold sea wind was already slicing through him; if he didn’t get into cover soon he’d be at risk of hypothermia.

They limped down the jetty, the pen’s brightly lit interior coming into view. The Typhoon’s broad black bow rose menacingly above the water, the squat sail set way back behind the ranks of missile tubes. Chase saw people running along the opposite side of the dock. He guessed Mitchell’s gunfire had prompted them to flee, but there was no sign of the American himself—

The submarine started moving.

Only slowly at first, but the rising wash of water over its bow was unmistakable as it angled away from the dock. Mooring lines hung limply down the side of the hull - Mitchell had used explosive rounds to sever them.

An echoing crash came from the sub as a gangway slid loose and fell into the water. Further aft, smoke drifted across the dock. The aftermath of the grenade explosion, Chase realised: a bollard had been blown apart, all the lines connected to it shredded.

The Typhoon was free - but Mitchell hadn’t cut the power cables running from the sub’s reactors through the hole in the hull. They slackened as the submarine slid past the pylon on the dockside, but it wouldn’t be long before they pulled taut again.

The vessel’s stern came into view, its giant propellers churning up the water on each side of the high rudder. The screws were mounted inside metal rings to shield them from damage by objects in the water, putting paid to Chase’s faint hopes of entangling them in the cables.

And his chances of even getting aboard the sub were rapidly diminishing. By the time it drew level, it would be too far from the dockside for him to jump on to the casing - and if he fell in the water, he would be swept into the screws. The protective rings were more than large enough for him to be dragged inside and torn apart.

No way to get aboard . . . except for the crane at the end of the dock.

It was turned away from the submarine, jib pointing along the jetty. But if it could be brought round . . .

‘Can you turn this?’ Chase asked, running to the crane. Its paint was scabbed with rust, the machine apparently unused for some time. But there was a crank at its base that still seemed to be in fair shape.

‘Da, but why?’

‘Because I need to get on that sub.’

‘What if it is too short?’

‘Then I’m fucked! Come on, turn it!’ He started scaling the rusty frame.

Maximov released the brake, then gripped the crank and strained to turn it. ‘It won’t move!’

‘Shake it loose!’

With a growl, Maximov pushed and pulled at the recalcitrant crank. It screeched horribly, then began to turn. ‘It’s moving!’

‘Great, keep it up!’ As Chase ascended, the jib slowly rotated, flecks of rust falling on him like sharp-edged snowflakes. He looked across at the Typhoon. The bow had already passed him, the massive submarine picking up speed.

A crunch of metal echoed inside the pen. Some of the electrical cables had torn loose from the sub, but others were holding firm, the pylon buckling as they were pulled taut. Sparks flew as the cables twisted against each other, then the pylon’s legs gave way and the whole thing crashed to the dock, dragged along as the submarine moved into open water.

‘Come on, come on!’ Chase yelled. The jib had turned through about thirty degrees, but he needed it to go much further. He reached the jib, clambering along its top as Maximov kept working the crank. The Typhoon’s missile tubes rolled past below. ‘Faster!’

Maximov roared as he pushed harder. The jib picked up speed, but Chase realised he was out of time. The submarine’s sail had almost reached him, and by the time he got to the end of the jib and climbed down the cable the stern would have passed.

Instead he ran along the jib.

One slip and he would fall to his death. But he kept running, feet clanking along the weather-worn metal until he reached the end - and leapt from it, arms and legs still pumping as he flew through the air . . .

Chase slammed against the rear end of the sail, slithering down the steep black wall to crash on to the rounded hump at its base. He rolled painfully down it, ending up skidding on his back down the wet stern. Barely missing the edge of the hole cut in the hull, he picked up speed on the sloping casing, one of the churning propellers rising out of the water just ahead—

His hand bashed against a recess in the hull. He reflexively grabbed it, swinging around with his feet just short of the enormous bronze blades. Freezing spray sluiced over his body. Gasping, he pulled himself forward.

An ominous crack. He looked towards the sail . . .

Another overstretched power cable ripped loose from the reactor. Chase ducked as it whipped over his head and tore a chunk as big as a man out of the rudder before splashing into the sea. The pylon was still being dragged along the dock, sweeping up smaller objects as it went.

It reached the crane. Maximov, who had been watching Chase’s battle for survival in frozen fascination, suddenly realised the danger he was in and fled along the jetty as the wrecked pylon crashed into the crane behind him. The Typhoon was now moving at near running pace, the impact shaking the crane to its foundations. Another cable tore free in a shower of sparks - but the remainder were firmly secured, thirty thousand tons of submarine jolting as if it had run into a wall.

With an earsplitting screech, the crane was wrenched from the jetty and toppled over. It fell into the water, pulling the pylon with it. Both broken structures sank, sweeping the cables across the submarine’s stern.

Chase pulled himself up and vaulted them as they sliced over the recess. ‘Jesus!’ he gasped, seeing them pile up against the ring shrouding the propeller. The safety feature had done its job - not that it helped him. The Typhoon was now clear of the dock and heading out to sea at an increasing pace.

He staggered up the stern and reached the gap in the casing. The Typhoon consisted of two long titanium pressure hulls mounted side by side like a catamaran, enclosed in an outer steel shell. Looking down, he saw where the inner hulls had been cut open to facilitate the decommissioned vessel’s new life as a mobile nuclear power station, cables running through them. Some of the gaps were large enough for him to fit through. He dropped into the opening.

Behind him, unnoticed, water crept up the stern as the weight of the wreckage being dragged behind the submarine pulled its back end lower and lower, waves sloshing towards the hole in the hull . . .

Chase slipped through a gap to land on the deck beneath - and found himself facing a huge radiation warning symbol on a bulkhead. He instinctively clapped both hands protectively over his groin and looked for the quickest possible way out of the reactor room.

An open hatch led forward. He moved through it, the low thrum of the driveshafts turning the screws fading behind him. There were no other sounds of activity. Presumably the sub only had a skeleton crew, just enough to operate the reactors rather than actually take it out to sea. Either they had got off, or Mitchell had killed them.

He guessed the sub’s control room would be under the sail, where its commander could use the periscopes. He headed forward until he found a ladder to the next deck, and crept up it.

The faint sound of someone talking reached him. Mitchell. Chase couldn’t make out what he was saying, but from his clipped tone it sounded as though he was issuing orders. Was he sending a radio message?

He quietly advanced through what turned out to be the sonar room, seeing the first physical sign of Mitchell’s presence, a splatter of blood on one of the pale cream walls. A few more steps and a body came into view, a man slumped over a hatch entrance. A large wrench lay beside him. Chase picked it up - any weapon was better than none - and peered through the hatch.

It was the control room. Two long tubes ran down from the ceiling through large circular holes in the deck to the level below: the sub’s periscopes, both lowered. At the front of the room was a pair of seats before banks of instruments and almost aircraft-like controls. Another corpse was slumped in one, blood trickling down the seat back. Mitchell must have forced the luckless sailor to get the sub under way before killing him.

Chase couldn’t yet see Mitchell - but he could see Nina. Still unconscious, she lay in a corner beneath a bank of computer screens. He watched for a few seconds until he was sure that she was breathing. Then he heard movement from the other side of the room, and slowly leaned further round the hatch.

Mitchell stood before what he assumed was the communications console, his back to him. The XM-201 was propped beside him. As Chase watched, the American unzipped the pack containing Excalibur and took out the sword to examine it.

Chase assessed the situation. If he could get close enough, he could smack Mitchell over the head with the wrench and knock him out - or kill him, either was fine. But the rifle was within easy reach of the DARPA agent, and apart from a faint hiss of static from a radio the control room was all but silent. It would only take one footstep, one slap of wet clothing, for him to be heard.

There wasn’t much choice. He couldn’t wait for ever - Mitchell definitely wasn’t planning to sail the Typhoon all the way back to the States. Someone was meeting him, either a ship or another submarine.

Hefting the wrench, he stepped through the hatch and moved behind the nearer of the two periscopes. Glancing through the hole in the deck he could see the handgrips and eyepieces in a compartment below, ready to rise at the push of a button. Mitchell was about ten feet away. Close enough to rush him?

A small noise caught Mitchell’s attention. Chase ducked back, but it wasn’t him the American had heard. The sound had been a faint scrape of metal. Mitchell stared intently at a piece of equipment resembling a weighing scale, low-tech in the computerised control centre. Chase realised it was a mechanical inclinometer: a weighted pendulum, a simple but near-foolproof way to determine the sub’s angle of climb or descent. As he watched, the pointer slowly moved. The Typhoon’s bow was gradually rising - or the stern was sinking.

A chill ran through Chase as the implications of that hit home, but then Mitchell took a step closer to the inclinometer, Excalibur still in his hands. His eyes were fixed on the pointer.

Chase saw his chance and crept round the periscope behind him. Mitchell turned, about to put Excalibur down on the console - and his eyes locked on to Chase’s, reflected in the sword’s polished blade.

Chase jumped back behind the periscope as Mitchell snatched up the rifle. He expected gunfire, but nothing came. He quickly realised why. Even if Mitchell switched to armour-piercers, shooting the thick titanium casing of the periscope would result in a potentially lethal spray of ricochets.

But he only needed take a few steps round the periscope to have a direct line of fire.

‘God damn, you’re persistent, Eddie!’ said Mitchell, dropping Excalibur on the console and moving towards him. A couple more steps and he would be exposed—

Chase slapped his hand on the periscope controls.

With a hiss of hydraulics, the metal tube rapidly rose into position. Chase dropped, hurling the wrench under the bottom of the periscope. It cracked into Mitchell’s knee and clanged to the floor.

Mitchell staggered back in pain. Chase rushed at him. The rifle came back down, but too late, as Chase tackled the taller man at the waist and slammed him back against the console. Excalibur spun to the deck and dropped into the hole beneath the raised periscope.

Chase swept out an arm, knocking the XM-201 from Mitchell’s hand. He was about to drive his fist into Mitchell’s crotch when a knee rammed into his face. His nose cracked, hot blood gushing over his lips.

‘Oh, you fucker!’ Chase roared, whipping up his head and catching Mitchell under his chin. The American’s jaw snapped shut, and he spat out blood. Chase punched him twice in the stomach, doubling him over, then smashed a fist into his mouth and knocked him backwards. ‘Not such a - fucking pretty boy - now, are you?’ he shouted as he delivered three more brutal blows to Mitchell’s face, his own knuckles splitting with the force of the punches.

But Mitchell was far from down, an arm snapping up to block Chase’s final attack. The heel of his palm hit the Englishman’s jaw like an axe, and as Chase reeled Mitchell kicked him in the stomach and knocked him back against the periscope. He hit one of the handgrips, the tube spinning round and pitching him to the deck.

Face swollen and bleeding, Mitchell shot Chase a look of rage, as if about to leap at him and continue the attack with his bare hands - before diving for the fallen rifle.

Sprawled on the floor with no cover, there was only one place Chase could go—

Bullets clanged around him as he threw himself into the hole and smashed down on the unyielding floor of the periscope compartment below. He scrambled forward as Mitchell ran to the edge of the opening and kept firing, ricochets pinging and sparking off the bulkheads. He was now moving uphill, the Typhoon undeniably tilting down at the stern. But that was far from the forefront of his mind as he reached an open hatch - and saw something few Westerners had ever seen.

The Typhoon’s missile bay stretched out before him, three decks high and the better part of two hundred feet long. He was on a narrow catwalk round the uppermost level, looking down at the ten pairs of launch tubes sandwiched between the two cylindrical pressure hulls. Even though the tubes were empty, the whole dimly lit chamber exuded menace, a symbol of fearsome destructive power.

But a much older force of destruction was also in the room with him. Seawater sloshed through the aft hatches on the bottom level, foaming waves creeping forward as he watched. The lowest deck was already flooded, water gushing through the hole in the hull, and the deluge would only speed up as the ever-growing weight dragged the stern deeper under the surface.

A thump behind him. Mitchell had just jumped down from the control room. Chase rolled under the heavy hatch and kicked it with both feet. It slammed shut on Mitchell’s rifle. Something cracked. The American forced his way through the gap, snarling down at Chase and swinging the XM-201 round to point at him—

Click.

Mitchell’s finger tightened round the trigger, but no bullets emerged. He tried again, then fumbled with the ammo selector. It refused to move, the mechanism damaged.

‘Told you it’d break!’ Chase shouted, delivering another forceful kick and crushing Mitchell against the jamb. He let out a gurgling groan. As Chase prepared to strike again, he pulled back into the periscope chamber. The hatch clanged against the frame.

Chase stood, wiping blood from his face. The submarine was now tilting down by about ten degrees at the stern, the leading edge of the water halfway along the missile bay. Dealing with Mitchell was rapidly becoming a secondary priority - he had to find a way to get himself and Nina off the sub.

With luck, Mitchell would now have a few cracked ribs. Chase swung open the hatch - and jerked away as Excalibur slashed at his head.

If Mitchell had been hurt, he wasn’t showing any signs of it. He thrust again, Chase leaping aside to avoid taking the sharp tip in his face.

Mitchell advanced, expression furious beneath the blood. Chase jumped back as Excalibur stabbed at his abdomen. Another attack, this one slicing upwards from groin to chest. Chase grimaced and retreated more quickly. He glanced over his shoulder, only to see that the catwalk came to a dead end at a large control panel.

Mitchell saw it too, a mocking sneer on his split lips. He jabbed at Chase’s chest, forcing him back still further. Chase saw nothing he could use as a weapon or to fend off the blade. He was literally about to die by the sword.

He reached the control panel, trapped. Mitchell drew back Excalibur for a killing thrust—

The deck trembled, a deep metallic groan echoing through the submarine. Wind suddenly blew around the huge chamber, water surging through the hatches with much greater force than before. Something clanged back and forth across the missile bay with a sound like a rifle shot - a rivet popping loose under the strain.

The bow had risen out of the water, nothing supporting it as the stern continued to drop, causing the massive vessel to flex.

It was going to sink, very soon.

Mitchell gripped the handrail to steady himself, and struck.

31

Chase was no longer there. He flung himself off the catwalk. The blade ripped his wet shirt, slicing a gash in his shoulder as he fell - to plunge into the water flooding the chamber.

Even with the water to cushion his fall, he still thudded against the deck, the impact knocking the breath from him. The force of the incoming water swept him against one of the missile tubes. He grabbed a pipe and pulled his head above the churning surface, coughing.

He looked up, seeing Mitchell glaring down before the American hurried back to the hatch. He hesitated, then turned and ran up the catwalk towards the bow, the sword glinting in his hand.

Chase knew why Mitchell had paused. He had boarded the submarine with two prizes, but considered only one of them irreplaceable. He was taking Excalibur, leaving Nina to drown.

Chase dragged himself through the water until he reached a ladder, and climbed it, freezing water streaming off him. More almost animalistic moans sounded around him. The submarine was still dropping at the stern, the flood now at the missile bay’s forward bulkhead.

He was on the catwalk. The thought of going after Mitchell didn’t even occur to him; instead, he ran back to the periscope compartment and went through the hatch at its rear to find himself at the base of the control deck ladder once more. A cold, sinister wind blew past him - air being displaced by the rising water.

By the time he entered the conn, the Typhoon was tilting up by over fifteen degrees, loose objects sliding down the deck. Nina was still in the corner. Chase searched the room for a first-aid kit. He spotted a small cabinet marked with a green cross and pulled out a plastic case before going to her. He pawed through the Cyrillic-labelled contents before finding what he was after: smelling salts. He cracked the ampoule under Nina’s nose.

No reaction for a moment. Then:

‘Gah! Wha’ the, what, shit!’ she mumbled, trying to squirm away from the stinging vapour before blearily taking in Chase’s battered, blood-streaked face. ‘Oh, my God, Eddie! Are you okay?’

‘You should see the other guy,’ he said with a pained grin.

A long, mournful groan rolled through the room, followed by a series of rifle-shot cracks as more rivets broke. The submarine shuddered, the pointer on the inclinometer rising faster. Nina surveyed her surroundings, then tipped her head in bewilderment to match the angle of the room. ‘We’re on the submarine,’ Chase told her.

‘Why?’

‘Long story. But we need to get off it, because it’s sinking.’

‘What!’

‘Yeah, I thought that’d wake you up.’ He helped her stand.

‘Well, how do we get off it?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Can we get up into the, what’s it called, the conning tower? Maybe there’s a life raft!’

‘Worth a try,’ Chase decided. He had seen another ladder aft of where he had entered the control deck; the only place it could go was into the sail. ‘Watch your step - the whole thing’s going down at the arse. This slope’s only going to get worse.’

‘Where’s Jack? And Excalibur?’

‘Last I saw, he was running for the bow, with the sword.’

‘Why didn’t you stop him?’

He shot her a look and cupped his hands as if comparing two weights. ‘It was a tough choice - you know, bit of tin, woman I love!’

‘Oh, all right - aah!’ Nina’s foot slipped, and she stumbled down the tilting deck to hit the aft bulkhead, now well on its way to becoming the new floor. Chase gripped one of the plotting tables and made his way to her as she peered through the hatch. ‘Er, Eddie?’

‘Yeah?’

‘I can see water. That’s supposed to be on the outside.’

He looked past her. Water was indeed rising up the floor of the sonar room. The ladder he’d seen was already submerged. ‘Buggeration and fuckery! Okay, Plan B.’

‘You have a Plan B?’

‘No, but if you do that’d be bloody fantastic!’

More loose items crashed on to the deck. The radio handset on the communications console swung on its coiled cord. The submarine was now close to thirty degrees down by the stern, and the rate of tilt was increasing. The inclinometer clanked as it reached its limit.

Nina jumped away from the hatch as a first wave splashed through it. ‘Okay, how about we close this?’ She slammed the heavy metal door and spun the locking wheel a couple of times, then pointed at the dangling microphone. ‘What about that radio? Can we call for help?’

‘Call who? The Russians won’t be able to reach us in time - assuming they don’t shoot us on sight for sinking one of their nuclear subs!’

‘Maybe not, but they might be able to tell us how to get out of this thing.’

‘If they speak English—’ Chase began, but Nina cut him off.

‘Is that a phone?’ she asked, jabbing a finger at the piece of equipment mounted next to the radio. It looked like a later addition to the control room, not as utilitarian and military in design.

‘Yeah, a satphone.’

‘Great!’ She battled her way across the room, using the firmly secured legs of the plotting table as steps before clambering over the periscope to reach the console.

‘Who you gonna call?’ Chase asked as he followed, confused.

Nina resisted the near-automatic urge to cry ‘Ghostbusters!’ in response. ‘Someone who knows about submarines! What time is it in New York?’

Chase looked at his wrist, but saw only skin; his watch had been confiscated at Vaskovich’s power station. ‘I dunno - late afternoon?’

‘Hope he’s still in the office . . .’ She picked up the receiver and held it to her ear, then pushed a green button on the phone. She heard a bleep. ‘Yes!’ She dialled a number from memory and waited, adjusting her precarious position as the room tilted around her.

A click, then a hollow hiss of static. ‘It’s working!’ she cried on hearing a ringing tone. Another few seconds and she got an answer from the IHA’s receptionist in New York. ‘Lola! It’s Nina Wilde. This is an emergency - I need you to put me through to Matt Trulli at UNARA right now!’

To her credit, Lola didn’t waste time asking any questions, but immediately dialled Trulli’s extension. Another ringing tone, two rings, three . . .

‘Hello?’ said Trulli.

‘Matt! It’s Nina!’

‘Hey, what’s up?’

‘Oh, nothing much. Just that Eddie and I are trapped aboard a sinking Russian submarine.’

Even with the time lag of a satellite link, a reply was a long time coming. ‘Really?’

‘Yes! Really! You said you’d been on a Russian sub - so tell us how to get off this one!’

‘I’ve been on a Russian sub, but they’re all different. What kind is it?’

‘A . . . a big one! Eddie, what kind of sub is this?’

‘A Typhoon,’ Chase told her.

‘A Typhoon,’ she repeated. ‘We’re in the bridge and we can’t get to the ladder behind us because it’s flooded!’

‘When you say bridge, do you mean the observation deck in the sail, or the main control room?’

‘What?’ Nina shook her head in exasperation. ‘The second one! Matt - we are going to die! Get us out of here!’

‘I’ve never been on a Typhoon - I was aboard a Sierra!’ Trulli protested. ‘I’ve read about ’em, though. Hang on, let me think.’

Nina gave him exactly three seconds. ‘Matt!’

‘Okay, okay! If you can’t get up into the sail, there’re supposedly escape pods on each side of the control deck.’

‘Supposedly?’

‘The Russians don’t exactly put the plans on the Internet! But there are big hatches in the hull, and everything I’ve read says they’re for escape pods.’

‘Okay! Great! How do we get to them?’

‘I dunno! If there’s no direct access to the sides, you’ll have to go forward or aft and double back to them.’

Nina glanced at the aft hatch. ‘Going back’s out. This thing’s sinking ass first.’

‘Then you need to go forward.’

She looked ahead - and up. The forward hatch was now above her, the floor at forty degrees from the horizontal. ‘Yeah, I was afraid you’d say that.’

‘Nina!’ Chase warned, pointing at one of the panels in front of the dead sailor. He had realised it was a depth gauge some time ago, but ignored it, with the Typhoon on the surface. Now, though, it was starting to tick down . . . and with increasing speed. The sheer volume of water in the stern section was outweighing the buoyancy provided by the remaining air in the bow. ‘We’re going down, and not in the good way. Time to go!’

‘Matt,’ Nina said, ‘if you’re right about this escape pod, you’re going to get such a great thank-you present from us both.’

‘And if I’m wrong?’

‘Then it was nice working with you! Bye!’ She dropped the handset and pulled herself up the consoles.

Chase was right behind her. ‘Escape pod?’

‘Hopefully. He says there’s one on each side of the control room.’

‘Shit, then they’re probably flooded by now.’

‘There you go with that British pessimism again! Stop it!’

The forward hatch hung open. Nina braced herself against a console and stretched to grab its frame. Chase pushed her up from below until she was able to wriggle over it, then climbed after her. They found themselves in a narrow passage running across the sub; a closed hatch led forward, but Nina was more interested in the routes to the left and right, which as Trulli had suggested headed back along each side of the control room. ‘This way’s not flooded,’ she said, looking left.

‘This way is!’ Chase yelped as seawater reached the top end of the other corridor. The sub was now at a forty-five degree angle, walls turning to floors, the water flowing with increasing force along the welded corner where the two joined.

‘Oh boy.’ Nina ran left and looked down. ‘Eddie! I think I’ve found it!’

Chase joined her. The hatch at the far end of the corridor was closed, keeping out the water - however temporarily. About ten feet below them was another hatch set in the side wall, this one hydraulically operated. A large button on a panel beside it glowed with a green light. ‘Great, but we’ve still got to get to it,’ he said as the water gushed past their feet and spewed into the passage like a waterfall.

One side of the passage was lined with protruding metal boxes - electrical switchgear. Chase climbed down them until he reached the level of the hatch, then leaned across. Water splashed over him from above. Some of it sprayed into the boxes, causing a bang and a flash of sparks. Nina shrieked. Chase winced and shifted his grip to something he hoped was non-conductive, then pushed the button.

The hatch hissed open. Through it Chase saw another, smaller hatch opening more slowly, beyond it a white-painted cylindrical chamber. ‘Is it the escape pod?’ Nina asked.

‘Either that or a Portaloo. Come on!’

Nina gingerly descended. The water was coming faster now, rushing down the steeply sloping floor to churn against the bulkhead below. More spray found its way into the electrics - something further down the passage exploded, sending a cloud of smoke swirling up past Chase. Flames crackled briefly before the rising water extinguished them.

Chase brought up a hand to help Nina, directing her towards the open hatch. ‘Come on, quick—’

The entire submarine shook, titanium and steel groaning as if in pain. A wave burst over the top of the corridor, hundreds of gallons of freezing water cascading down on them. Hanging halfway across the passage, Nina was hit by the deluge and slipped, sliding down the sloping deck.

Chase’s hand flashed out, snagging the baggy sleeve of her overalls. A seam tore, but he clenched his fist tighter round the bunched material as Nina swung below him. Water drenching her, she managed to clamp her hand round the edge of the hatch and shakily pull herself back up. ‘Thanks,’ she gasped.

He gave her a relieved smile. ‘Didn’t want you to miss the wedding.’

‘Uh-huh. And when’s that going to be, exactly?’

‘Oh, don’t fucking start,’ Chase moaned, pushing her through the hatch. He followed as more water gushed down the corridor, the dying submarine moaning around them.

Nina had already found a control panel by the hatch, helpfully annotated with diagrams beside illuminated push buttons. She hit each in turn.

The inner hatch rumbled shut, closing with a clang. Nothing seemed to happen for a nerve-racking moment - then the escape pod trembled as its compartment flooded. The hatches on the Typhoon’s outer hull retracted, and with a thunderous bang of compressed air the pod was blown free of the stricken sub.

Nina was thrown against Chase as the pod abruptly righted itself. A digital depth gauge rapidly counted down to zero, and before they had a chance to recover a whoosh of spray over the hull and a bobbing motion announced that they had reached the surface.

Deeper booms and thumps came from below as the Typhoon finally hit the seabed. Nina looked worriedly at Chase, pushing her sodden hair off her face. ‘What about the sub? What if the reactors explode?’

‘They won’t,’ Chase assured her. ‘That’s not how they work. And sub reactor casings are tough, they should be able to recover them without too much crap leaking out.’ He stroked her cheek, then took in the pod’s interior. As well as the hatch through which they had entered, there was another in the ceiling with small portholes set beneath it. ‘I think this is the bit where M and Q are supposed to catch us having a shag.’

Nina huffed. ‘Y’know, freezing seawater doesn’t really put me in the mood.’

‘Does wonders for your nipples, though.’

‘Hey!’

Chase chuckled tiredly, then levered Nina off him and stood, pointing at a protective plastic cover over another panel at one end of the pod. ‘See if there’s a radio under that.’

Nina lifted the cover as he looked through the portholes. There was indeed a radio beneath it - and more besides. ‘I think this thing’s got an engine,’ she told him. ‘There’s a wheel and a compass.’

‘See if you can start it.’ Chase peered out towards the shore. The glaring lights of the sub pen stood out clearly against the dark cliffs - as did the burning hilltop where Vaskovich’s facility had stood, a thick pillar of smoke and dust lit from below by the flames. ‘Jesus. Jack really fucking wrecked the place.’ He wondered what had happened to the DARPA agent; Mitchell hadn’t run for the Typhoon’s bow out of panic. He’d had a plan. Chase turned, looking out to sea.

Something in the distance stood out against the horizon, a barely discernible line of white in the dark water. Waves washing against a floating object.

The clatter of an electric starter was followed by the low chug of an engine. ‘Pretty neat, huh?’ Nina said.

‘Yeah. Are there any binoculars down there?’

She searched the compartment beneath the controls, finding a medical kit as well as what Chase had asked for. ‘Let me fix those cuts,’ she said, handing him the binoculars.

‘In a minute.’ Chase scanned the horizon. ‘Well, fuck me.’

‘What is it?’

‘Jack’s got a ride home.’ Through the binoculars, he could now see the cause of the line of waves - another submarine. A faint red light lit up an open hatch from below, figures moving around it to pull an inflatable life raft out of the water. Though Chase couldn’t make out the face of the figure climbing from it, the sword he was holding was a dead giveaway.

Once Mitchell was aboard, the other men dropped the raft back into the water and climbed through the hatch. A wash of reflected light briefly passed over the sail as it closed, letting Chase pick out the number 23 painted on the black metal before it vanished in the darkness. The sub began to move; he tracked it until it disappeared under the surface, which it did with surprising speed.

‘The bastard had a sub waiting for him,’ he told Nina. ‘Soon as it’s clear of Russian waters, he’ll probably get picked up by a chopper and taken to . . . well, wherever the fuck he’s going with Excalibur.’

‘God.’ Nina sat, rubbing her hands over her arms to warm them. ‘The whole thing was a set-up, right from the start. And Jack was, what, a quadruple agent? The hell? Shit,’ she added as a thought struck her, ‘I bet he was the one who got Vaskovich to kill Bernd - that way he could be sure I’d help him find the sword.’

‘It’s not over,’ said Chase, eyes narrowing. ‘He was going to take you with him as well. He’ll want to get you back; he needs you to make his own system work. And his is a weapon.’

‘Jesus. So what do we do?’

Chase looked through the portholes again. ‘First thing we do is get back to shore.’

‘It’ll take a while,’ said Nina, examining the controls. ‘This thing’s not exactly a powerboat. The speedo only goes up to five!’

‘Well, it’ll give you time to patch me up.’ Chase sat heavily on one of the bench seats.

Nina turned the pod towards the sub pen, then took the medical kit and sat beside him. ‘You know, you were right about Jack. He was after my body. Just in a really weird way.’

‘Yeah. I can’t believe I got jealous of that arsehole. Sorry about that, by the way. Ow.’

Nina finished dabbing one of his cuts with antiseptic. ‘Apology accepted. Just don’t do it again, huh?’

‘Oh, I won’t. Next time some bloke tries to chat you up, I’m just going to lamp the bastard.’

Nina laughed, a little uncertainly. ‘Wait, no, really?’

‘Nah, I’m just—’

‘Taking the piss, gotcha. Anyway, you don’t need to worry about other men.’ She gently kissed his cheek. ‘Thank you.’

‘For what?’

‘For everything. I just realised what you were trying to tell me in London, at the embassy. About not wanting to lose me.’ She kissed him again. ‘Thank you.’

‘What made you realise?’

Nina smiled. ‘Oh, y’know, just that you’d sink a nuclear submarine to save me. Most women don’t have a fiancé who’d do that. So I’m pretty sure I’ve found the right one.’ She applied a plaster to his face.

Chase lifted an eyebrow. ‘Only pretty sure?’

‘Well, there is still that whole won’t-talk-about-his-past deal . . .’

‘You know I can’t. Official Secrets Act and all that.’

‘I don’t mean the SAS stuff,’ she said with a pointed look.

‘Right.’ Chase sat in contemplative silence as Nina continued to patch up his injuries, waiting for him to find the right words. ‘The thing . . .’ he began, and hesitated.

‘It can wait,’ she assured him. ‘We’re not exactly in the ideal surroundings here.’

‘No, I need to get this out. The reason I never talked to you about my family is . . . because it hurts. There, I said it.’ He let out a breath. ‘It’s nearly twenty years ago, and it still fucking hurts. My mum was dying of cancer right in front of me, and my dad . . .’ Chase’s fists clenched. ‘My dad had a fucking affair! He was with some other woman while my mum was dying. So after she did, I just left. I didn’t want anything to do with him.’

‘So that’s why you never talk about him.’

‘Your dad was a role model,’ Chase said, voice bitter. ‘Mine was everything I didn’t want to be. I never talked about him ’cause I didn’t want to be reminded of him . . . and I didn’t want to think that I might be anything like him.’

Nina had paused in her treatment to listen; now, she gave a final dab to his last cut. ‘I don’t think you are,’ she whispered, kissing him.

He returned it. ‘Thanks.’ It was only a single word, but it told Nina the depth of his gratitude.

They sat against each other as the lifepod continued its sluggish voyage home.

To their surprise, they weren’t met by armed and angry Russians as the pod finally bumped against the jetty. Instead, Chase opened the top hatch to find Maximov waiting for them. ‘It’s okay, he’s on our side,’ he assured Nina as he helped her out. ‘I think.’

‘Uh-huh,’ Nina said uncertainly.

‘What happened to submarine?’ Maximov asked. ‘Whole front end came out of water like - like whale!’

‘Well, it’s sleeping with the fishes now,’ Chase told him. He saw a handful of people waiting at the dock’s cavernous entrance. ‘What’s going on?’

‘They were going to fly away in the boss’s jet.’ The big Russian grinned menacingly. ‘I persuade them to stay, wait for army or navy or whoever to arrive.’

‘But we’ve got to get out of here,’ said Nina. ‘Jack’s got the sword. We need to go after him.’

‘Can you get us back to Moscow?’ asked Chase.

Maximov looked puzzled. ‘Da, in jet. But I said, we wait for army to arrive.’

‘No, seriously, that would be a really bad idea. You know who they’re going to blame for all this? Whoever they find. You’re Russian, you know the drill - bag everyone in sight and worry about who actually did anything later. And if we’re all under arrest, we can’t stop Mitchell getting away.’

‘You have point,’ said Maximov. ‘Okay, I take you to plane, get you back to Moscow.’

Nina shivered. ‘Anywhere, as long as it’s warm.’

The lights were on in Pavel Prikovsky’s warehouse, but it was far from warm. The gate was open, the door ajar.

‘Stay in the car,’ Chase warned Nina. Vaskovich’s jet had been equipped with a gun cabinet; the fact that it had a combination code presumably known only to Vaskovich and Kruglov made no difference to Maximov, who simply ripped off the door. Both men drew their weapons and cautiously advanced across the yard.

Chase peered through the door, seeing one of Prikovsky’s men lying in a pool of blood. It had coagulated; whatever had happened had taken place some time ago. It couldn’t have been Mitchell, then . . . but it could have been men acting under his orders.

The warehouse was silent. Chase held up three fingers as a signal to Maximov, mouthed a countdown, then burst through the door, the Russian covering him. He swept his gun from side to side. No movement. No life.

They made their way through the stacks of boxes to Prikovsky’s office, passing another corpse slumped against a forklift, his chest a ragged mess of bullet holes. Prikovsky was slumped over his desk, dead eyes staring at the door as they entered. ‘Oh, Jesus,’ said Chase softly. Prikovsky had hardly been a friend, but he had still come through for him, and this was his reward. The Russian had been shot in both legs, but the actual cause of death was easy to see: a metal pole protruding from his back, plunging down through his chest and the table below. Someone had held Prikovsky in that position in order to impale him, leaving a very clear message.

Chase knew he was the intended recipient. A piece of paper had been taped to the pole, three words printed on it in large bold capitals.

CALL YOUR SISTER.

‘Shit,’ Chase whispered, filled with utter dread. He hunted for a phone, and found one that had been knocked from the desk by Prikovsky’s struggle.

‘What does it say?’ Maximov asked.

‘The fucker’s going after my family!’ Snatching up the phone, Chase dialled 44, the international dialling code for Britain, then Elizabeth’s number. He waited anxiously for the connection to be made, the phone to start ringing . . .

The answer came on the second ring. ‘Lizzie!’ Chase snapped. ‘Are you okay? Is Holly all—’

‘Eddie, oh, my God!’ Elizabeth cried. ‘They took her, they took Holly!’

‘Who? Who took her?’

‘I don’t know, they wore masks! They said they were watching, that if I called the police or spoke to anyone else they’d kill her - that I had to wait to hear from you!’

Chase smashed his gun down on the desk, splintering the wood in his barely contained fury. ‘Mitchell, you fucking little shit, talk to me! I know you can hear me!’

A click, then a familiar voice on the line, an eerie electronic distortion behind it. ‘Hello, Eddie.’

‘Let Holly go, right now,’ Chase barked. ‘Or I will fucking kill you.’

‘Save your threats, Eddie.’ There was another noise under Mitchell’s voice, the whine of an aircraft’s engines. He was no longer aboard the submarine.

‘It wasn’t a threat. It was a promise.’

‘Don’t waste my time and I won’t waste yours. I want Nina. Or rather, I need Nina. I know this is kinda drastic, but I needed to show that I’m one hundred per cent serious.’

‘By kidnapping a teenage girl?’ Chase cried. ‘The British government’ll go apeshit!’

‘The British government will shut the fuck up and do as they’re told, like always. But they won’t even need to hear about this if you do what I tell you. Bring me Nina, and you get your niece back.’

‘Eddie, what is it?’

Chase whirled to see Nina standing in the doorway. ‘That fucker’s kidnapped Holly!’

‘Is that Nina?’ Mitchell asked as she reacted with shock. ‘Put her on, Eddie.’

Tight-lipped with anger, Chase put the phone on speaker. ‘She’s here.’

‘Nina, hi. I’m sure you’ve guessed what I want already, but I’ll tell you anyway so there’s no ambiguity - I want you to turn yourself over to my people. In return, I’ll let Eddie’s niece go.’

‘Your people?’ Nina said in disgust. ‘Kidnappers and killers? I’m ashamed to be an American right now. DARPA’ll be finished when this gets out.’

Mitchell almost laughed. ‘You still think I actually work for DARPA? I didn’t realise you were so naive.’

‘A black project,’ Chase growled.

‘Blackest of the black. This is way too important to be put in the hands of any official agency. Or politician.’

‘So you’ve just unilaterally declared yourself the guardian of American interests?’ Nina asked, appalled.

‘Someone has to do it. But I’m not here to debate idealism versus realpolitik - I’m here to do a job, and for that I need you. Get back to England. Once you’re there, call this number again. We’re monitoring it; I’ll hear you. And then we can make the exchange.’

‘No!’ Chase shouted. ‘You want me to trade my fiancée for my niece? Fuck you! I can’t - I can’t make a choice like that!’

‘I can,’ Nina said quietly. ‘I’ll do it.’

‘What?’

‘I said I’ll do it.’

‘No you fucking won’t!’

Her voice was firm. ‘I have to. And you know it. It’s the only way to get Holly back safely. She’s your niece . . . and she’s going to be mine too.’ She took his hand. ‘She’s going to be part of my family, Eddie. And you have to do whatever’s necessary to protect your family.’ She turned to face the phone. ‘Jack, we’ll do it. I’ll do it. If I have your absolute assurance that Holly will be released unharmed.’

‘You have it,’ Mitchell replied. ‘Now get to England. And make it soon.’ The line went dead.

Chase swept the phone off the table. ‘Fuck! I don’t fucking believe him, he’ll kill her anyway. He can’t risk anyone finding out what he’s done.’

Maximov grunted. ‘The man is a shit. I should have crushed his head! But at least you know he is not all-powerful, or he could have left men here to wait for you.’

‘Powerful enough,’ Nina said, worried. She shared a look with Chase, a look that betrayed their fears for Holly . . . and each other.

32

England

The New Forest covered over two hundred and twenty square miles, a national park beginning ten miles east of Bournemouth that contained some of England’s oldest heaths and pastures. But it was in one of the swathes of forest that gave the region its name that Nina and Chase now waited, Elizabeth’s car parked in a clearing. Chase had checked the area in satellite photos; the nearest house was over a mile away, the spot Mitchell had selected for the exchange as isolated as it was possible to get on the densely populated south coast.

Night had fallen. The only illumination came from the car’s headlights, casting stark shadows across the ground. Chase surveyed the trees, but couldn’t see anyone.

He knew they were not alone, though.

‘I hear something,’ said Nina, looking northwards. It took a few more seconds before Chase was able to pick it out, his hearing still not fully recovered from the pounding it took in Russia. But the whine and chatter of an approaching helicopter was unmistakable.

It came in low, a flickering light through the trees before it swept into the open, turning side-on to the car as it descended. A man leaned out of a door, directing a circular antenna at them.

‘Get rid of the gun, Eddie.’ Mitchell’s voice boomed from a speaker as the chopper hovered just above tree level. The antenna was part of a millimetre-wave radar system, showing the helicopter’s occupants exactly what Chase and Nina were carrying under their clothes. ‘And Nina, that thing in your left pocket, I assume it’s a tracker. Ditch it. Then both of you step away from the car.’

Chase tossed his pistol beside a fallen log as Nina reluctantly took out the piece of electronic gear and placed it on the car’s roof. They walked further into the clearing. Another few seconds as the man concluded his radar scan, then the helicopter touched down in a miniature hurricane of dust and leaves, the rotors still whirling at takeoff speed.

Holly stepped out fearfully, Mitchell lurking behind her. ‘Uncle Eddie!’

‘Holly, are you okay?’ Chase shouted.

‘She’s fine,’ Mitchell said. ‘Nina, walk toward me. I’ll send the girl. Careful, now.’

Nina took a step, then paused and looked back at Chase. ‘Eddie . . .’

‘I’ll find you,’ he said softly. Then, with a not entirely convincing attempt at a casual smile: ‘By the way, you doing anything next May? Maybe around the fourteenth?’

Her answering smile was entirely genuine. Loving. ‘I am now.’

‘Don’t miss it.’

‘Don’t let me.’

‘Enough with the schmaltz,’ Mitchell’s amplified voice snapped. ‘Nina, get over here, now.’

With a last glance at Chase, Nina walked towards the helicopter. Holly came the other way, desperate to break into a run. As they passed each other Nina whispered, ‘Do whatever Eddie tells you.’

She reached the helicopter and looked back. Holly had just met Chase. ‘Get in,’ Mitchell shouted from the cabin. Trying not to show her fear, Nina climbed inside. The radar operator grabbed her wrists and handcuffed them, then shoved her down beside Mitchell.

The engine noise immediately rose, the helicopter ascending. Nina stared out of the window at the two figures on the fringe of the headlight beams as they fell away. ‘Get us to the jet,’ Mitchell ordered the pilot. ‘I want the other helo fuelled and ready by the time we reach Scotland. We’ve got a lot of work to do - I want a full test of the system by tomorrow night.’

‘What about Eddie and Holly?’ Nina demanded.

‘I said I’d release Holly unharmed,’ said Mitchell with a hard expression. ‘After that . . .’

Nina’s eyes narrowed hatefully. ‘You son of a bitch.’

‘I do what I have to do.’ He sat back as the helicopter picked up speed over the dark forest.

The sniper was less than two hundred feet from Chase, but at thirty feet away he would still have been invisible, even in daylight. Draped in multi-textured layers of mottled camouflage, he blended perfectly with the scrub and bushes of the forest floor. Even his rifle looked more organic than manufactured, the brown-painted barrel and its fat suppressor wrapped in twigs to break up its shape, the telltale reflective lens of the scope concealed beneath drooping leaves.

He flicked them away, taking in the full view through the sights. The crosshairs were almost perfectly centred on Chase’s head. He raised himself higher on his elbows as he adjusted his aim and prepared to fire. Chase was moving slightly, talking to the girl, but not enough to throw off the shot.

With the helicopter gone there was hardly any wind, and at such a close range the effects of the suppressor and ballistic drop on the bullet would be negligible. He took them into account anyway, lifting the crosshairs fractionally to just above Chase’s eyeline. The bullet would hit the dead centre of his skull, and blow it apart.

After Chase, he would move on to the girl, who would be so shocked that she would be paralysed, easy prey. Two targets, two shots, two seconds.

Two deaths.

He braced himself, holding his breath to minimise the movement of his body, making the final delicate adjustments to his aim, finger caressing the trigger . . .

Firing—

As Chase ducked.

The silenced shot hissed over Chase’s head and thumped against a tree. The faint click of the sniper rifle’s action told him the direction from which the shot had come, but he already knew.

‘Jesus!’ said Peter Alderley’s tinny voice in his right ear as he threw Holly to the ground beneath him. ‘Could you leave that any later?’

Chase didn’t reply, rolling into the partial cover of the log and dragging Holly with him. ‘Stay here!’ he hissed as he grabbed his gun and crawled on his belly through the leaves and mud to the other end of the fallen trunk. If the sniper were any good - and Chase didn’t doubt it - then he would already have reloaded and be seeking to reacquire his target, surprised by his apparent precognition or not.

‘He’s still in place,’ Mac said over the earpiece. ‘Tracking left, looking for you.’

‘Wait, he’s doing something with his gun,’ Alderley added. ‘He just switched something on, maybe night vision or thermographics.’

Chase didn’t need to see the radar image the two men were viewing somewhere inside MI6’s London headquarters; he could picture it perfectly in his mind’s eye. The sniper would be lying behind cover, a log or a tree stump, somewhere with direct line of sight through the trees to the original position of his targets. He wouldn’t move unless he absolutely had to.

Which meant Chase had to make him move. The synthetic aperture radar satellite orbiting some three hundred miles above could see through tree cover and even the ground, but it could only keep its unnatural gaze on one particular spot for a limited amount of time before its trajectory carried it out of sight. If he hadn’t located his enemy by the time the satellite passed out of range, he would be left blind.

And then dead.

‘One minute to range limit,’ said Alderley. ‘Come on, Chase, nail the silly bastard, he’s just lying there!’

‘Never faced a sniper, have you?’ Chase growled as he reached the end of the log. The next available cover was behind a tree maybe ten feet away - ten feet in which he would be completely exposed. ‘Talk to me, what’s he doing?’

‘Switching aim between each end of the log,’ Mac told him. ‘Waiting for one of you to move.’

‘Which end’s he aiming at now?’

‘Yours.’

Chase hated himself for what he was about to do, but knew it was the only chance of saving himself and his niece. ‘Holly,’ he said in a loud whisper. ‘When I say now, very quickly stick your hand out from the end of the log and then pull it back again. Okay?’ Although confused and scared, she nodded. ‘Okay! Ready, set, now!’

Holly thrust her hand out into the open.

Chase was already moving even as she pulled it back into cover, bursting out from behind the log towards the tree. The thwack! of the bullet striking wood and the soft clack of the rifle reached him simultaneously. Holly screamed as smashed bark rained over her.

‘Stay down!’ Chase yelled. Even the best snipers in the world needed a moment to reacquire a target after the jolt of firing, and the flash of his movement between the trees would force the other man to change his aim, slowing him further.

But not by much.

Chase slammed against the next tree a split second before a bullet did, broken wood spitting at his face.

‘Forty seconds,’ Alderley announced, voice tense.

‘Where is he?’

‘Five o’clock from you, about forty metres,’ Mac told him. ‘Aiming at your cover.’

‘Left or right side?’

‘Left.’

Gun raised, Chase jerked to the right, exposing his arm and shoulder and drawing the sniper’s aim, then immediately lunged back to fire two shots round the left side of the tree. Another rifle bullet smacked into the trunk, his adversary thrown off by the return fire, just as Chase had hoped.

He sprang from cover once more, this time not stopping. The undergrowth crunched beneath his feet as he ran between the trees, curving round towards the sniper’s position—‘Thirty seconds!’

‘He’s moving, you’ve spooked him!’ Mac cried at the same moment. ‘Going right from his original position, crawling - no, he’s up, he’s on his feet.’

Chase reached another tree, throwing himself against it. ‘Position!’

‘Four o’clock from you, still moving right, still moving - shit! Eddie, he’s going for your niece!’

‘Twenty!’ Alderley said. ‘Chase, move it!’

Chase risked a look. He could see nothing moving in the unreal half-light from the car’s headlamps. ‘No visual! Where is he?’

‘Coming up to your three o’clock, still moving - no, he’s dropping, taking aim—’

‘Shit!’ He ran directly for the still unseen sniper, gun held out ahead. ‘Guide me in!’

On the radar image, his outstretched arm would act as a pointer, letting Mac direct him towards his target - if he was fast enough. ‘Left!’ snapped Mac. Chase turned slightly, trees flicking past. ‘Left, left - straight, straight!’

‘Ten seconds!’

Chase fired, and kept firing into the undergrowth ahead.

No hits, and he was running out of bullets and time—

‘He’s moving!’ Mac said. ‘Changing aim, changing aim!’

No need to ask who the new target was. Chase was down to three bullets, two, one—

‘He’s hit!’ shouted Mac. No triumph, just an immediate warning. ‘Gun, gun, gun!’

At close range a sniper rifle was a liability, but it wasn’t the man’s only weapon. Chase saw a flicker of movement ahead, a bush that wasn’t a bush shifting, a glint of light catching dark metal—

He fired his last shot.

‘Contact lost!’ Alderley almost gasped. ‘Chase! Did you get him, did you get him?’

‘Yeah, I got him,’ Chase announced, kicking the pistol out of the sniper’s hand. But there was no threat: his last bullet had hit the man in the neck, tearing out a ragged chunk of muscle and tendons that now hung gelatinously by a flap of skin, blood gushing blackly over the camouflage. He was still moving weakly, but he would be dead within a minute or two even if Chase had been inclined to do anything to save him.

There was an audible exhalation of relief through the earpiece. ‘In that case,’ Alderley said after a moment, ‘you can expect a bill from Her Majesty’s Government for the satellite time. Should only be about, oh, a million pounds or so.’

‘They can knock it off the reward for recovering Excalibur,’ Mac said. ‘Eddie, are you all right?’

‘Fine,’ Chase replied, turning his back on the dying sniper and hurrying back to the clearing. ‘Holly, are you okay? Holly?’

He found her still lying by the log, trembling. ‘Holly,’ he said, crouching to take her hand, ‘it’s okay. Are you all right?’

She slowly looked up at him, tears running from her wide eyes. ‘Uncle Eddie?’

‘Hi.’ He managed a smile. ‘Come on, love. Let’s get you back home to your mum.’

He lifted her carefully to her feet. She hugged him and pressed her face into his chest, sobbing.

‘It’s all right,’ he assured her. ‘It’s over.’

But he knew it wasn’t.

‘I take it the sniper’s not talking,’ Mac said in his ear, following the same line of thought. ‘Peter and I can deal with the local police for you, but how are you going to find Nina now?’

Chase guided Holly to the car, face set. ‘There’s still someone else. I’m going to have words.’

Hector Amoros jolted awake, sitting upright and reaching across to switch on a lamp.

‘Ay up, Hector,’ said Chase coldly from the chair he had pulled up beside the bed. He had a gun in his hand, not aiming it directly at the director of the IHA, but needing only the smallest movement of his wrist to do so.

‘Eddie!’ Amoros exclaimed. ‘What are you - how did you get in here?’

‘Ways and means. I wanted a chat while you were still in London. About your mate Jack Mitchell.’

Amoros’s expression tightened a little at the name. He looked more closely at Chase as his eyes adjusted to the light of the hotel room. ‘My God! What happened to you?’

Chase indicated the cuts and bruises on his face. ‘Like I said, Jack Mitchell. Turns out he wasn’t what he said he was.’ Now the gun pointed at Amoros. ‘But you knew that, didn’t you? Right from the start.’

‘I don’t know what you—’

‘Don’t! Don’t even fucking try to deny it. Jack set this whole thing up, getting the IHA involved so that he could find Excalibur before the Russians did. And with him being a navy man, and you being a navy man, you were great mates right off the bat. You’d do anything to help each other out, right?’

‘That’s not what happened,’ Amoros said firmly. ‘I might be retired from the navy, but if the Pentagon asks for something it’s still my duty to give it to them. Most of the IHA’s funding comes from the United States. You know that.’

‘He who pays the piper, right?’ said Chase with a sneer. ‘Well, you know what tune he’s playing now? It’s called “I’ve kidnapped Nina and stolen Excalibur so I can build a big fuck-off WMD”.’

Amoros sat straighter, shocked. ‘He’s kidnapped Nina? What are you talking about?’

‘Kidnapped Nina, tried to kill me - and my niece. Because he didn’t want to leave anyone alive to talk about this black-ops superweapon he’s built.’

‘And you think I had something to do with it?’ Amoros asked.

Chase regarded him with flint-hard eyes. ‘If I did, you’d already be dead.’ Amoros tensed, knowing he meant it. ‘But you know more about Jack than you’ve let on. I want to know where he is.’

‘All I knew about Mitchell was that he was ex-Special Forces intelligence, now supposedly working for DARPA, and that I’d been told to give him total co-operation in the interests of national security. That came from the highest level at the Pentagon.’

‘Well, it seems Jack doesn’t take his orders from the Pentagon. Seems he doesn’t take them from anybody. He’s got his own little black operation, and he tells the Pentagon what to do.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘He got picked up from Russia by a sub. An American sub, inside Russian territorial waters.’ Amoros reacted with clear surprise. ‘I saw the hull number,’ Chase went on. ‘I looked it up - SSN-23, Seawolf-class attack sub, USS Jimmy Carter. Mitchell’s old boat. And funnily enough, it’s been modified for Special Forces operations. Be a bit of a coincidence if it just happened to be there.’

‘There’s no way he could have that kind of authority,’ protested Amoros. ‘Even black projects report to somebody.’

‘Doesn’t seem to bother him much. He had a little rant about what he was doing being too important to leave to politicians. The bastard’s gone rogue, Hector - and he’s got Nina, and the sword, and everything he needs to make his weapon work. I’ve seen one like it in action; it’s pretty fucking nasty. So I need you to help me rescue her - and stop him.’

‘How? I don’t know where he is.’

‘Someone does,’ said Chase, leaning back in the chair. The gun drifted away from the former admiral, very slightly. ‘He might be running a black project, but he’s using regular military assets as well. Intel and civilian ones an’ all. The sub, helicopters, jets, cars, even the weapons he’s requisitioned - there’ll be a paper trail, somewhere. Somebody at the Pentagon knows how to find him. You must still have lots of old mates there. Get on to them.’

Amoros shifted uneasily. ‘That would mean I’d be revealing knowledge of a black project I wasn’t cleared for. I wouldn’t just lose my post for that - I could go to prison for it.’

The gun moved back. ‘At least you’d still be alive to go to prison.’

Amoros stroked his beard, considering it. ‘I’ll . . . make some calls.’

33

The Norwegian Sea

Nina jumped from the bunk as the cabin’s steel hatch was unlocked and swung open.

‘Whoa, now,’ said Mitchell, his open palm snapping up to intercept her fist just before it smacked into his face. He closed his fingers round it and forced her arm back down. ‘Guess it’s true about redheads having a bad temper.’

She narrowed her eyes in pain as he squeezed her hand; then she lashed out with one foot at his kneecap. He jerked back, her heel barely missing him. ‘I’m going to kill you,’ she promised.

‘No you’re not,’ Mitchell replied, unconcerned. ‘Let’s go.’

‘Go where?’ The initial helicopter flight the previous night had been short, transferring to a private jet at Southampton airport that then flew the length of the country to Wick, on the north-eastern tip of Scotland. Another, larger helicopter was waiting for them there, quickly taking off and pounding northwards over the dark wastes of the North Sea, the flares of oil platforms below the only markers of the passage of hundreds of miles. Eventually even these fell behind, nothing outside except blackness.

Until a ship appeared ahead, a blazing beacon of lights in the void. It seemed to be a cargo vessel, the main deck loaded with stacked containers. The chopper landed on a pad overhanging the stern, and Nina was bustled through the ship to the windowless metal cabin. After being released from the cuffs, she had been left by herself.

Her fear for Chase and Holly gradually gave way to a simmering fury. Despair would get her nowhere. What she had to do now was stop whatever Mitchell was planning, and make him pay for everything he had done.

‘To Excalibur,’ said Mitchell. ‘It’s in place, the system’s ready . . . there’s only one thing we need.’

‘Me.’

‘Yup. Let’s go.’

There were two large men accompanying Mitchell, one with a pair of handcuffs attached to his belt, but they weren’t needed; Nina was all too aware that even if she broke away from her escorts, there was nowhere for her to go. Instead, she examined her surroundings for anything that might help her as they descended through the superstructure. A momentary glimpse through a porthole told her it was again dark outside, a whole day having gone by.

They passed below the level of the main deck and continued to descend. ‘So I’m guessing this isn’t a regular container ship,’ she finally said, faux-conversationally.

‘You got that right,’ Mitchell answered. ‘By the way, this is the Aurora - I didn’t get a chance to welcome you aboard last night.

Guess my manners are slipping. Made entirely out of non-magnetic steel and titanium. It’s DARPA’s latest toy.’

‘I thought you didn’t work for DARPA.’

He smiled. ‘DARPA paid for it - only they don’t even know it. That’s the great thing about having an agency where most of its budget is off the books. It’s hard to challenge the construction of something if no one even knows it exists.’

‘So you’re basically just stealing money from the government. ’

‘Hardly.’ His expression became colder. ‘When it comes to the defence of the United States, any expenditure is justified. And any price is worth paying.’

‘Including murder?’

‘Maybe you should ask Eddie about that,’ he said sarcastically. ‘He didn’t exactly go around handing out candy and flowers while he was defending his country.’

‘He’s nothing like you.’

‘Yeah, you’re right - because he just did what he was told, went where he was sent. Killed who he was told to kill. I’m being active. I’m taking care of threats to my country before anyone even knows they exist. You should be thanking me for what I’m doing.’

Nina laughed incredulously. ‘Y’know, I really don’t think I want to be indebted to you. Or anyone like you.’

‘Then it’s a good job we never ask for those debts to be paid. What the hell would you know about making sacrifices for a greater cause, anyway?’ He shot her a scathing look as they continued down another flight of stairs. ‘My work cost me my marriage, but I’d do it all again, because it has to be done. What’ve you done? Poked around in the mud finding trinkets. And don’t give me any crap about it being for the benefit of humanity - it was all for your own personal glory, don’t try to deny it.’

Nina snorted. ‘A little defensive there, Jack, ain’cha? All those lonely nights getting to you?’ Mitchell ignored her, prompting her to let out a self-satisfied ‘Hah!’ under her breath as they reached the bottom of the stairs.

He went to a large metal door and pushed a button beside it. It slid open with a hydraulic hiss. ‘This is it,’ he said, directing her inside.

Nina stepped through to find herself in a control room, surprisingly similar to the one at Vaskovich’s facility. There was even a view through a large window out at another huge piece of machinery . . . but where the Russian generator had been built vertically, descending into the hill, this one lay horizontally, running along the length of the cavernous hold. The rings of electromagnets, more of them than in the Russian system, receded hundreds of feet into the distance. Knots of cables wrapped around everything like black veins gave Nina the feeling of being inside a monstrous biomechanical ribcage.

At the far end of the hold, spotlights picked out a gleaming silver cross at the bottom of the final ring.

Excalibur.

‘This is our earth energy generator,’ Mitchell announced proudly, ‘and it’s better than Vaskovich’s system in every way. For a start, it’s mobile; the lines of energy aren’t limited to dry land. They occur at sea, too, and we can move the ship to wherever the flux convergences are the strongest.’ His smugness increased when he saw that Nina was unable to conceal her awe at the scale of the structure. ‘So what do you think?’

‘I’d be a lot more impressed if it hadn’t been designed to kill people,’ she said acidly, taking his smile down several notches. She turned to a large screen on one wall which displayed a map of the North Pole, the shapes of the continents distorted around it. She located the United Kingdom near one edge of the map and looked polewards from it, seeing a green circle marked with longitude and latitude co-ordinates in the sea at the edge of the Arctic Circle between Norway and Iceland. ‘So that’s us, huh? I take it we’re not freezing our asses off in the middle of nowhere without a good reason.’

‘Damn straight.’ Mitchell went to one of the consoles, waved the technician manning it aside, and entered commands into the computer. More symbols appeared on the map: groups of green circles and red triangles in the open ocean between Russia and the polar icepack. ‘The red symbols are Russian warships.’

‘Red Russians? Gee, that’s original.’

‘I didn’t pick the colours. But the green symbols are the two carrier strike groups we’ve deployed in the Arctic Ocean, the Enterprise and the George Washington. I know you haven’t exactly seen much CNN for the last week, but I’m sure you remember that the Russians are being kinda belligerent about their territorial claims at the pole. There’s a lot of oil and gas up there, and they want it. They want it all.’

‘And you don’t want them to have it,’ said Nina, realising. ‘You’re going to sink their ships, aren’t you? You’re going to use this thing to blow them out of the water without anybody ever knowing who did it.’

‘Not exactly.’ Mitchell’s smug look disappeared, replaced by one of grim determination. ‘I’m going to use it to sink one of our ships.’

‘What?’ Nina gaped at him. ‘You want to blow up an American ship? Why?’

‘If one of our carriers gets attacked, it’ll automatically be assumed that it was by the Russians, and the other ships in the strike group will retaliate. We’ll take out the bulk of the Russian polar fleet, including their carrier, the Admiral Kuznetsov - their only carrier.’

‘But - but the Russians have nukes!’ Nina cried, horrified. ‘If you do this, it’ll escalate into World War Three!’

‘No. It won’t. The Russians don’t want Moscow to be nuked any more than we want to see New York go up. So after the initial skirmish, the hotlines’ll get real hot for a while, then things’ll gradually cool off. But the job’ll be done - the Russians will be out of the game. After that, there’ll only be one power in the Arctic. Us. We’ll control the resources up there, not them.’

‘But what if you’re wrong? What if the Russians don’t back down?’

‘Then,’ Mitchell said in a chillingly matter-of-fact tone, ‘we’ll have to deal with them. But it won’t come to that. The loss of the Enterprise’ll make it obvious to the world that we were the victims.’

Nina was appalled. ‘You were an American naval officer! How can you even think about attacking one of our own ships?’

‘The Enterprise is fifty years old, and about to be decommissioned and scrapped anyway. This way, at least she serves a purpose for the good of the country.’

‘And what about the crew?’ Nina demanded. ‘There must be thousands of people on an aircraft carrier!’

‘Over four thousand.’

‘And are their deaths for the “good of the country” as well?’

‘I’m not taking this lightly,’ Mitchell insisted. He indicated the other people in the control room. ‘None of us are. But when those sailors signed up they took an oath to serve and protect the United States of America, and by securing those resources from the Russians that’s exactly what they’ll be doing. It’s all about power - the power to protect our future.’

‘Yeah, I’m sure their families’ll see it that way,’ Nina said angrily. ‘You really think the American people would approve of what you’re doing?’

‘Yes!’ said Mitchell. ‘Yes, I do. They want security and stability and cheap gas and American Idol, and they don’t want to get their own hands dirty to have it. I’m the one who gets my hands dirty, I have to live with it. But I will live with it. Just like all the others who’ve been doing the same thing for sixty years. Because we know we’re right.’

‘My God,’ Nina said despairingly. ‘You’re worse than Vaskovich. You honestly think you’re some kind of patriot, don’t you? You know what you actually are? Completely fucking batshit insane!’

Mitchell regarded her silently for a long moment, then went to a locker and took out one of the futuristic-looking assault rifles she had seen him use in Russia. Before Nina realised what he was doing, he shot her in the thigh.

She dropped to the floor, screaming and clutching the wound. The 3.6 millimetre bullet had gone cleanly through her right leg, Mitchell deliberately aiming to miss the bone and any major arteries - but it was still agonising. ‘Jesus Christ!’ she shrieked. ‘What the fuck are you doing?’

‘It’s just a scratch, a flesh wound,’ he replied with cold sarcasm. ‘I only need you alive. I don’t need you unhurt - and to be honest, I’ve had enough of the sound of your voice.’ He put down the rifle and turned to the startled occupants of the control room. ‘Stick a Band-Aid on that wound, then get her into position. It’s time.’

‘How much further?’ Chase asked over the incessant buzz of the propellers, surveying the darkness below.

Amoros checked the plane’s instruments. ‘It can’t be much further, if it’s where my contact said it was.’ He gave Chase a look of concern. ‘Eddie, we’re getting close to the fuel limit. If we don’t find this ship in the next ten minutes, I’m going to have to head for land.’

Chase wanted to order him to stay out for as long as it took them to locate Nina, but knew it was pointless. The Piper Seminole that Amoros had managed to wangle from another UN agency had already burned through more than half its fuel; even landing in nearer Norway rather than returning to Scotland would be cutting it fine.

But he was sure Nina was out here. Amoros had made use of his Pentagon connections to probe more deeply into the recent actions of Jack Mitchell, and though it had taken several frustrating hours the name of a ship had eventually been provided: Aurora. Chase suspected that whoever gave Amoros the name had put their entire career on the line by doing so, but the former admiral had a lot of good friends in the military - and a lot of favours he could call in.

The Aurora itself, when they looked up its details, seemed unremarkable: a container vessel of slightly under nine hundred feet in length, registered to a Panamanian shipping company - almost certainly a front. Why Mitchell would have taken Nina aboard, Chase wasn’t sure, but Amoros’s sources suggested that he had.

So Chase was going aboard too.

If they could find the Aurora in time.

‘I don’t know what you think you’re going to do,’ Amoros said, glancing across as Chase gave the pair of pistols he was carrying a final check, then attached a sheathed combat knife and two hand grenades to the webbing round his chest. ‘There’ll be an entire crew aboard, not just Mitchell.’

‘They won’t have any problems if they stay out of my way,’ Chase told him. ‘I’m just there to get Nina.’

‘And then what? Put a gun to the captain’s head and tell him to turn for port?’

‘If I have to. I’ll figure it all out when it happens.’

Amoros was about to offer his opinion of Chase’s tactics, or lack thereof, when he spotted something in the distance. ‘I see a ship. Eleven o’clock.’

‘Got it.’ Chase scanned the cold sea through a pair of powerful binoculars, quickly picking out a cluster of lights in the ink-black void. ‘Container ship, could be the Aurora.’ The barely discernible flag at the stern looked Panamanian, but it was hard to be sure. ‘Get in closer.’

Nina’s leg was being bandaged, but she was offered no painkillers. Her body fought her mind, wanting to shut down to find relief from the burning in her thigh, but she refused to cave in to it, doggedly resisting unconsciousness.

‘Is she ready?’ Mitchell asked impatiently.

‘Almost,’ replied the man securing the last of the bandages.

‘Bring the reactors up to stage one power. We’ve wasted enough time.’

‘Reactors?’ Nina asked. ‘This thing’s nuclear?’

‘From decommissioned Los Angeles-class subs. The generator needs a lot of power at start-up, just like Vaskovich’s.’ Mitchell turned to one of the technicians. ‘Once we’re steady at stage one, deploy the antenna array. Then charge up the magnets—’

‘Sir!’ called another man from across the room. ‘Radar contact changing course, coming straight for us.’

‘On screen,’ Mitchell snapped, facing the large display on the wall. The map zoomed in on a smaller area around the Aurora’s position. A yellow square was slowly moving towards it from the south. ‘What is it?’

‘Propeller aircraft, course track suggests it came from Scotland.’

‘Identify it!’

‘Got the transponder code, checking the tail number . . . It’s a United Nations plane, sir. Attached to the Oceanic Survey—’

‘Son of a bitch,’ Mitchell hissed under his breath. ‘It’s Chase, it has to be.’ Nina’s heart jumped at the name. ‘Someone at the Pentagon’s been talking to Amoros. God damn it!’

Even through her discomfort, Nina managed a smile. ‘Oh, you’re in trouble now.’

Mitchell glared at her. ‘Get her into position,’ he ordered. ‘And take down that plane!’

Chase finished fastening his parachute straps and used the binoculars to take another look at the ship. It was now close enough to show that the flag was indeed that of Panama, and after a moment the name painted on the bow finally came into focus.

Aurora.

‘That’s it!’ he said. ‘Okay, fly over it, I want a closer look.’ He glanced at the altimeter and saw that the Seminole was at slightly over seven thousand feet. When he was ready to jump, he would get Amoros to descend by a couple of thousand; he had no way to judge the wind, and wanted to minimise the chances of being blown away from the freighter.

He looked back through the binoculars. The Aurora took on greater clarity as they approached. There was a helicopter on a pad behind the superstructure, which was unusual - most ships of the type would use the space for additional cargo - but the rest of the vessel seemed normal, high stacks of multicoloured containers filling its huge main deck.

Movement caught his eye: someone emerging from the superstructure and crossing to the edge of the open wing bridge . . .

He wasn’t going for a smoke.

‘Shit!’ Chase gasped. ‘Incoming!’ Amoros stared at him in disbelief. ‘They’ve got a Stinger!’ The man was hefting the tubular anti-aircraft missile launcher over his shoulder, lining up the heat-seeking head on their plane . . .

‘Jump!’ Amoros shouted. ‘Eddie, go!’

‘But—’

‘Go!’

With a last look at Amoros, Chase pushed open the door and flung himself out. The freezing wind was like a blow to the chest; he tumbled through the air before throwing his arms and legs wide to stabilise himself. The ship rolled into view, a splash of floodlit colour amongst the darkness.

Orange light flared from the wing bridge. A Stinger missile leapt from the launcher, a spot of fire at the head of a column of smoke.

The Seminole had already banked away, Amoros turning hard in an attempt to break the Stinger’s lock. Chase knew his chances weren’t good. The Stinger could take down fighter jets - a civilian twin-prop would be an easy target.

The missile spiralled upwards as Chase fell, its sonic boom pounding him as it passed. He turned his head to track it—

The Stinger hit the Seminole’s port engine and exploded, the wing blowing apart in a swelling fireball of burning fuel. The cabin windows flared white as an inferno swept through the fuselage, then the remains of the aircraft rolled in flames towards the hungry sea below.

Chase had no time to think about Amoros. He was dropping fast, and the Aurora was still some distance ahead. He had no choice but to deploy his parachute - but if he was seen he would be an easy target, and he might still fall short of the ship . . .

He pulled the ripcord. Nylon hissed out of the pack, blossoming above him into a dark rectangle. The harness snapped tight round his chest and shoulders.

Had it slowed him enough? Or was he already too low?

He guessed he was at about four thousand feet, but in the darkness it was difficult to be sure. He pulled the control cords, trying to give himself as much forward momentum as possible.

All he could do now was hope.

‘Got it!’ the technician said. ‘Target is going down. It’s on fire.’

‘Monitor for distress calls,’ Mitchell ordered. ‘If there are any, jam them.’

Nina’s brief elation turned to horror, part of her mind now wanting to follow the desire of her body and simply switch off to escape a new pain: loss. But again she refused to surrender.

If Chase was gone . . . then she had to stop Mitchell.

Somehow.

‘It just hit the water,’ said the technician a few seconds later. ‘No radio messages.’

‘Keep monitoring just in case. And deploy the antenna array.’ Mitchell pulled Nina roughly to her feet. She gasped in pain. ‘You wanted Excalibur?’ he said. ‘It’s yours - for the rest of your life.’

Chase willed the parachute to stay aloft. He was almost in range of the slowly moving Aurora, just a few hundred feet away, but was still losing height too rapidly. He strained to hold his position, trying to eke out every last foot as he aimed for the containers . . .

They moved.

For a moment he was stunned, unable to take in what was happening. The container roofs were opening, each swinging up and round in a mechanical ballet like some monstrous transformer toy. More mechanisms came to life within, gleaming metal spears rising up and extending as their upper sections sprouted into giant alien sunflowers.

The entire top layer of containers was nothing more than a disguise for an antenna array, smaller than the one surrounding Vaskovich’s facility but more dense, more complex, hundreds of glittering collectors ready to draw in the earth’s own energy . . . then unleash it.

And Chase was falling right into them.

He pulled the cords, trying to swing away from the antenna field towards the stern. It meant travelling further and running the risk of falling below the level of the deck, but it was better than being impaled as he landed. ‘Come on, come on, shiiiiit—’ Too low, moving too slowly . . .

He thrust his feet out as he swept into one of the still-deploying antennas with a rattling clash of metal. The parachute swooshed over him, already collapsing as he was brought to a near-stop - the antenna was stronger than it looked, bending but not breaking.

He fell, grabbing for one of the extended ‘petals’ to stop himself dropping into the pitch darkness inside the container. It twisted under his weight, creaking and screeching at its hinge, but didn’t give way. Half tangled in the parachute cords, Chase crashed against the antenna’s column. He flung his arms round it, sliding down as if on a fireman’s pole before hitting the metal floor.

The parachute was caught in the antennas, flapping in the wind. He pulled the release and shrugged off the harness, then drew one of his guns with one hand, a small torch with the other.

What looked on the outside like a collection of individual containers was revealed as nothing more than a framework supporting a façade. The whole array was now fully raised, extending high above the open roofs. Chase directed the torch at the floor, which turned out to be a solid deck. That meant the containers below were fake too, a shell with something hidden inside. The antenna array gave him a pretty good idea what. The whole ship was a floating version of Vaskovich’s earth energy facility.

Only Mitchell had designed this one for destruction, not production. And if the antennas were now in position . . .

He ran through the metal forest towards the aft superstructure, hunting for a way in before anyone aboard realised they had a visitor.

Mitchell and his two guards half carried, half dragged the struggling Nina along the length of the hold, the generator’s magnetic rings hanging threateningly overhead. Excalibur waited for them at the far end on what Nina now saw was a platform mounted on a crane arm that would lift it up to the centre of the ring. ‘You’ll be staying with us for a while,’ Mitchell told her. ‘At least until we can find someone else who can energise the sword.’

‘Gee, I feel so special,’ Nina snapped. ‘Didn’t you think about testing your own people before moving into kidnapping? You know, keep it in the psychotic, traitorous family.’

‘I did. Nobody worked. I would have gone wider, but trooping hundreds of people through the ultra-secret weapons platform and asking them to hold King Arthur’s sword to see if it glowed might have raised a few questions.’

They reached the platform. Excalibur had been diligently polished, not a speck of dust on it. It rested point down in a black frame of carbon fibre, held in place by a clamp round the cross-guard. And there was another clamp, larger and more box-like, open and waiting round the hilt. Nina felt a chill. Inside the clamp was an indentation . . . just large enough for her hands to fit inside.

Mitchell saw her growing look of horror. ‘Yeah, I thought you wouldn’t hold it voluntarily.’ He nodded, and the two men pushed her closer.

Nina struggled to wrest her arms from their grip, keeping her fists clenched. ‘If you think I’m gonna stick my hand in that thing—’

Another nod. The man to her right punched her injured thigh. The resurgent pain hit Nina so hard that she almost blacked out.

By the time she started to recover, it was too late - her hands had been prised open and placed round Excalibur’s hilt, and the clamp closed with a decisive snick.

‘No!’ she cried, trying to pull free. ‘Lemme go!’ But the box was tight round her wrists, hard edges cutting into her skin. Both hands were pressed against the cold metal of the sword, and the blade was shining brightly. Charged with earth energy, the molecules along its edges aligned into a single line of sharpness, it could cut through almost anything.

But that didn’t help her. The clamps round the guard and hilt held it in place in the frame, locked solid.

Nina wanted to kick Mitchell, but the pain in her wounded leg was too intense for her to move it. All she could throw at him was spit and invective. ‘Fuck you.’

Mitchell irritably wiped away the glob of her saliva from his left eye, and was about to operate the platform’s controls when an urgent voice crackled over the walkie-talkie of one of the guards. He took it from the man and listened, eyes slowly widening first in surprise, then sudden anger. ‘Find him and kill him!’ he snarled. ‘Now!’

Nina’s eyes widened too, with something she hadn’t expected to feel again - delight. ‘Eddie, huh? You’re screwed now!’ she crowed.

‘There are forty people on this ship—’

‘Tough luck on them.’ Stung, Mitchell hit the controls to elevate the platform. Trapped, alone, Nina was lifted to the centre of the vast generator.

34

Ahatch at the rear of the fake containers led into the superstructure. Chase went through it, gun covering the passage beyond. No sign of anyone. So far, so good—

An urgent, honking alarm sounded, a voice booming over the PA system: ‘All hands, intruder alert! Repeat, intruder alert!’

Not so good. The parachute must have been spotted.

Chase drew his second gun, a Heckler and Koch USP Expert now in each hand. It wasn’t his preferred choice of weapon, but the .45-calibre bullets would be more than adequate at close quarters.

Not knowing Nina’s location, he decided to start with the most logical place. If Mitchell planned to fire the weapon, he needed both Nina and Excalibur to make it work, and the hold was the only place large enough to house the earth energy generator. He prowled the corridors until he found narrow stairs leading down, and started to descend—

Someone was running towards him.

Caught halfway down the steep flight, Chase hooked his arms over both banisters and slid down the stairs with his guns held out in front of him. An armed man was below; Chase fired twice, knocking him back in a spray of blood. He reached the end of the banisters and clanked on the deck, seeing another man and taking him down with a single shot to the head before spinning at a sound behind him and blowing away a third.

He hurried forward. Though an open hatchway at the end of the corridor he saw more stairs leading down—

A man leaned out from behind the hatchway and fired at him. The bullet zipped past Chase’s head as he threw himself sideways, shooting back. Both shots clanged uselessly against metal.

Shadows darted across the wall beyond the hatch, more men on the stairs—

He fired another shot to encourage them to stay back as he looked for cover. There was a hatch in the wall - he pulled it open, using it as a shield as more gunfire spat from the end of the corridor. The hatch jolted as bullets slammed into it, coin-sized dents erupting across the metal.

Shouts from behind. More people were coming after him.

He was about to be pinned down . . .

With no other choice, he jumped through the door and slammed it behind him.

The room beyond was a storage area. Some of the stacked equipment resembled the magnets of Vaskovich’s generator, and he also saw a pack containing a glidewing like the one Mitchell had used to reach Grozevny. But he didn’t care about the room’s contents - only that there were no other exits.

Unless—

A large duct emerged from the ceiling, feeding fresh air into the enclosed hull - with another vent in the wall below it. Chase raised both guns and blasted the vent cover to pieces. He jumped on a pile of boxes and bashed the broken louvres away, then clambered inside.

The duct was wider than he’d expected, and he felt a warm breeze against his face as he scrambled along it. It wasn’t so much for ventilation as for cooling, to let hot air out. He heard the hatch being thrown open behind him. More shouting as men burst into the room and found nothing but hardware - but it wouldn’t take a genius to figure out where he’d gone.

He aimed one gun back at the vent entrance, moving as quickly as he could towards the light coming through grilles in the duct floor ahead. Another shout - someone had seen the open vent. He glanced backwards. A head appeared in silhouette within the rectangular opening. A shot from the USP, and the head disappeared in several different directions at once.

A fusillade of bullets would come along the vent at any moment—

He reached the first grille, getting a brief sense of a cavernous space beneath before smashing at it with his pistols. The thin metal immediately buckled. He kept striking it until one end broke away from the frame and it swung loose.

There was a girder several feet below. Not much, but it was all he had. He dropped through the hole as shots ripped into the duct walls just above him.

He hit the beam and slithered down it, the metal tilted at a steep angle. One of his guns spun away to the floor far below as he grabbed the support, both legs hanging over a long vertical drop.

Pulse pounding, he saw he was hanging from the framework supporting a horizontal copy of Vaskovich’s system. One of the huge rings of electromagnets was suspended from the other side of the beam by massive insulators. More rings stretched away along the length of the hold to—

Nina! She was slightly below him at the far end of the generator, trapped on an elevated platform with Excalibur. He wanted to call out to her, but couldn’t, unwilling to give away his position.

Though it wouldn’t be long before he was found.

He pulled himself up, finding a foothold. The generator didn’t seem to be active yet - but with the antenna array deployed, it wouldn’t be long. Could he sabotage it?

The gear attached to his webbing clinked against the support. An idea formed . . .

‘What the fuck?’ Mitchell ran to the control-room window, staring in disbelief at the figure climbing down a support beam. ‘He’s in here!’ He snatched a headset off one of the technicians and yelled into its microphone. ‘Security! He’s in the hold, on the generator! Get your asses down here, now!’ Grabbing the XM-201, he raced down the steps to the deck.

Chase saw him coming as he jumped from the frame and stood beneath the magnetic ring. He had his remaining pistol in one hand . . . and a grenade in the other, fingers lightly gripping the safety handle. He held his arms wide to make sure Mitchell could see what he was holding. There was still a chance he might just shoot him anyway, but as he’d hoped the American was being cautious, not wanting to risk any damage to the generator.

‘Hey, Jack!’ he called as Mitchell drew closer, rifle raised. ‘Nice boat!’

‘Put the pin back in, Eddie,’ said Mitchell angrily.

‘I dunno, I’m curious. You said bad things’d happen if the magnets got damaged - sounds like it might be worth seeing. Or you could let Nina go and we’ll just leave.’ He looked up at the platform. Nina had seen him by now, watching the distant scene play out.

‘That’s not really an option.’ Mitchell clicked the ammo selector to a new position and took more precise aim. ‘I can blow your whole arm off at the shoulder, Eddie - and who knows, your hand might even keep hold of the spoon. Even if it doesn’t, the magnets will survive, they’re tough.’

‘So tough that you need a room full of spares?’ Chase countered. ‘Let Nina go, or I blow this place to buggery.’

‘And you with it?’

‘If that’s what it takes.’

Mitchell shook his head. ‘No. I know you by now, Eddie. You’re all about the mission, just like me - and your mission’s getting Nina out of here alive. If you blew yourself up, your mission’d fail, and I know how much you hate that.’

‘We’ll see.’

Mitchell just smirked. Other men ran up behind him. Some were armed with XM-201s, others with more conventional side-arms. Mitchell glanced at them, then erupted in anger. ‘What the hell are you doing? Non-magnetics only in here! Get out!’ Realisation crossed his face, and he turned back to Chase. ‘You were reported as carrying two guns, Eddie. Where’s the other one?’

‘No idea,’ Chase answered truthfully. ‘I dropped it, could be anywhere. No telling how much damage it might do if it gets pulled into the magnets, eh?’

‘Spread out,’ Mitchell ordered his men, keeping his gun aimed at Chase. ‘Foreign object sweep. There’s a gun around here somewhere - find it.’

Chase adopted a casual, not-a-chance expression, but it wasn’t long before one of the men called out and recovered the fallen USP from behind a skein of cables. ‘Bollocks,’ he muttered.

‘Nice bit of improvisation, Eddie,’ Mitchell said, ‘but it didn’t work. You’ve got nothing. Now put the pin back in.’

With a resigned shrug, Chase flipped the grenade round in his hand to reveal that the pin had been in place all along, hidden by his thumb. ‘Worth a try.’

‘Search him.’ Two men went to Chase and frisked him, taking his few remaining belongings. ‘Okay, get those out of the field limit. Move it, Eddie.’ He jerked the XM-201 towards the control room.

‘Not going to kill me?’

Mitchell smiled. ‘Oh, hell yes. I just don’t want any bullets flying around in here. Go on.’

Chase looked helplessly up at Nina, then started for the control room, Mitchell tracking him with his gun. All but one of the other men exited the hold ahead of them, the last also aiming a rifle at Chase as he followed him to the stairs. ‘So what’re you going to blow up? Iran? Russia? Venezuela?’

‘Close with the second one,’ said Mitchell as they entered the control room. ‘Are we at stage one power?’

‘Yes, sir,’ a technician answered. ‘We’re at the convergence point of five flux lines, and already drawing zero point three seven from them. Everything is green.’

‘Then fire it all up. Full power.’

The technicians worked their consoles in unison, the deck trembling as a thrumming electrical rumble began to rise. Mitchell moved to watch one display in particular, a digital readout of the system’s power, just like the one in Russia. It climbed smoothly past 0.50 as power was fed in and the magnetic field increased in strength, channelling more earth energy through the system.

Through the superconductor. Through Excalibur.

Chase could still see Nina at the far end of the hold, pinned in the bull’s-eye of the last ring. The sword glowed ever brighter in front of her. Unable to shield her eyes with her hands, she turned her head away from the glare.

A bolt of electricity sizzled across one of the nearer rings, dancing between the magnets. Other flashes built up around the generator, the sharp smell of ozone hitting Chase’s nostrils. ‘Will she be okay up there?’

‘I wouldn’t have put her there if it was going to kill her. I need her alive.’ The gauge ticked rapidly past 0.80. ‘Confirm antenna alignment.’

‘Confirmed, sir,’ a man replied. ‘Ionic reflection is calculated and set, and we have target lock.’

Mitchell nodded. 0.90 flicked past, 0.95 . . . ‘We’ve reached threshold!’ he exclaimed, banging a fist on the console as 1.00 came and went without pause, the numbers climbing at an increasing pace.

‘Confirmed!’ said a technician with equal excitement. ‘The process is now self-sustaining, and rising along the predicted curve.’

‘Magnetic field status?’

‘Firm, and also rising.’

‘Keep it going,’ Mitchell demanded. ‘Ready firing sequence.’

Chase watched Nina as electrical flares crackled around her, and then his gaze moved across to the support beam on which he had landed after dropping from the duct. Staring intently at one particular spot, he whispered, ‘Come on, come on . . .’

Mitchell looked sharply at him. ‘What was that?’

‘Oh, nothing,’ Chase said. ‘Just that, you know I had a hand grenade when you found me?’

‘Yeah?’

‘When I came into the hold, I had two.’

Mitchell whirled to stare up at the beam, opening his mouth to issue a frantic command—

Too late.

Chase’s other grenade had been hanging by its pin from a hook supporting part of the generator’s miles of wiring. As the magnetic field rose in intensity, the grenade’s steel casing was pulled towards the nearby ring of electromagnets, dangling perpendicular to the floor below. At first the pin held, but as the invisible force grew stronger and stronger, it began to bend . . . before breaking.

The grenade shot across the gap and smacked against a magnet, its safety handle springing loose and clanging beside it. The fuse counted down the seconds, three, two, one—

The explosion blew the electromagnet to pieces. Shattered fragments were snatched up by the intense magnetic field and whirled around the generator to slam into other components, tearing them from their supports. Massive electrical arcs seared across the hold, sparks and flames gouting into the air where they struck.

Another magnet overloaded and exploded, debris smashing the control-room window. Mitchell dived behind a console - and Chase spun and drove his fist into the face of the stunned man guarding him, mashing his nose up into his brain with a hideous crunch.

He grabbed the dead man’s XM-201 as he fell. It was useless to him as a rifle, the biometric lock in place. Instead he stabbed at the button of the grenade launcher.

The grenade shot across the control room, hitting a console in the opposite corner. Technicians were sent flying by the blast, one man backflipping through the broken window like a rag doll. Chase ran for the door, firing another grenade to take out a second set of controls. He saw Mitchell scrambling across the floor and was about to send the final shot at him, but a nearer console blocked his aim - if he fired, he would be caught in the blast himself. Instead he jumped through the door and unleashed the last grenade at the big screen on the wall, the computer map vanishing in a storm of pulverised liquid crystal.

He raced down the stairs into the hold. The man who had been blown out of the window was draped brokenly over the first ring above him. Chase ignored the gruesome sight and sprinted along one side of the generator, tossing the rifle away.

Shielding his eyes from the arc-welder brilliance of the electrical bolts, he ran towards the platform holding Nina.

‘Shut it down!’ Mitchell screamed at one of the surviving technicians. ‘It’s overloading, shut the goddamn thing down!’

‘I can’t!’ the man protested. ‘It’s self-sustaining! The system’s locked into its last command - it’s just going to keep on building up power until it blows. The only way to stop it is to take out the superconductor!’

‘Or the person holding it,’ Mitchell growled, looking through the swirling smoke towards the far end of the chamber. The glow of Excalibur was clearly visible - as was Nina, still locked to it.

He hunted for his gun. It lay under a burning console, flames blistering its casing. ‘Maybe you were right about it being too easy to break, Eddie,’ he said, before darting to the window. A glance down into the hold told him that Chase had abandoned his stolen XM-201, his handprint not in the gun’s memory.

But Mitchell’s was.

‘Do whatever you can to stabilise the system,’ he snapped at the technician as he ran for the door.

The temperature was rising fast as more bolts of electricity sizzled across the generator, but what Chase hadn’t been prepared for was the smell. The stench of burning paint and melting plastic assaulted his nose and eyes, everything the arcs touched outside the magnetic rings instantly flashing into flames. Some of them came too close for comfort as he ran along the hold, forcing him to stop until they died away. His vision was blotched by vivid after-images of nearby strikes.

He held back as another bolt stabbed at the wall, molten blobs of metal spitting out from it, then dashed past and reached the crane. ‘Eddie!’ Nina warned from above. ‘Jack’s coming after you!’

Chase looked back. Mitchell had retrieved the rifle and was running along the hold in pursuit. But he held his fire, not wanting to risk hitting another magnet and making the situation worse.

There was a panel near the platform’s base. Chase worked the controls. With a hydraulic whine, the platform descended. Nina came into full view as it dropped the last few feet. He saw the bandage on her right thigh. ‘Jesus! What happened?’

‘That son of a bitch shot me, that’s what happened! Get me out of this thing!’