The Tomb Of Hercules

10

Chase led the way, using the wooden props supporting the tunnel as cover to check ahead. Fang and the other man were already lost in the darkness.

The ceaseless noise of the excavators faded as they went deeper underground, but Nina heard more mechanical clamor ahead.

“At least nobody’ll hear us coming,” Chase remarked. He could see lights in the distance, a larger space that was the source of the rumbling. Fang and his companion were briefly silhouetted against the electric glare, then they rounded the far end of the tunnel and passed out of sight. “Okay, I think we can move now. But keep to the sides, just in case.”

He increased his pace to a jog, every so often looking back to make sure nobody had entered the tunnel behind them. It didn’t take long for them to reach the other end.

Chase warily peered around the last prop to see a large rectangular chamber. Three more circular tunnels led in different directions deeper underground. How they had been dug was now obvious; a large boring machine squatted on caterpillar tracks near the chamber’s center, its complex array of interlocking conical drill heads covered with jagged metal studs to rip apart the rock and earth.

But that wasn’t the machine responsible for the noise.

Conveyor belts emerged from each of the three tunnels, depositing the clumps of rubble they carried onto a single, broader conveyor that ascended almost twenty feet in the air to feed a huge crusher below. The pulverized ore then entered what Chase took to be some kind of processor. He couldn’t see what went on inside it, only that most of the ore was discarded, spat onto a large pile in one corner of the chamber. Whatever was being mined ended up in black metal drums, a number of which were arranged on a pallet.

Behind the whole affair were several portable cabins, stacked on two levels. A series of yellow-painted catwalks connected them to the crusher assembly.

“What the hell is this?” Chase wondered. “Why would you hide a diamond mine in a diamond mine?”

“I don’t think it has anything to do with diamonds,” said Nina. She crouched, using her thumb and forefinger to pry something out of the wall.

“Jesus,” Chase gasped. Nina held a stone about the size of a pea. It was rough, uncut… but unmistakable.

A diamond.

“I just saw it, right there.” She moved a few feet back down the tunnel, then pointed. “And there’s another one.”

“My husband always did brag about this being the richest mine in the country, maybe even the world,” said Sophia. “If diamonds are that easy to find, it seems he wasn’t joking.”

“But these have just been ignored,” Nina pointed out. “Whatever they’re mining in here, it must be more valuable than diamonds. But what is?”

Chase looked back at the metal drums by the processor. “Let’s find out.”

He hefted his gun and moved quickly towards the three-foot-high drums, keeping a careful eye on the cabins. Sophia followed. Nina hesitated, then shoved the uncut diamond into a pocket and ran after them.

Chase examined the unmarked drums. Their tops were firmly secured by wing nuts screwed onto protruding bolts. Judging from the distance of the bolts from the outer edge of the drums, the containers were at least two inches thick.

Thick enough to contain something dangerous…or shield it.

Already starting to get a nasty idea of the purpose of the processor, he looked around, seeing an operator’s console and, below it, a toolbox. He opened the box and took out a monkey wrench. “Keep an eye on the cabins,” he told Sophia and Nina as he holstered his gun, then clamped the wrench onto one of the nuts and pushed hard. After a few seconds of straining, the nut turned.

Chase unscrewed it as quickly as he could, then repeated the process on the other bolts. Finally, the lid was free. He had to strain again to lift it aside, the metal as solid as a manhole cover.

They looked inside, to find…

The barrel was full of crushed gray ore with a silvery sheen. “Definitely not diamonds,” said Nina, about to pick up a piece.

Chase grabbed her wrist. “Don’t.” The tone of warning in the single word chilled her to the bone.

“Do you know what it is?” she asked.

“Yes. I know.” His expression was hard, a look she hadn’t seen on him for a long time. A stony, focused determination. Chase was now 100 percent business. “It’s uranium.”

Nina flinched back. “Are you sure?”

“I’ve had some experience with WMDs, so yeah. I’m sure.” He shoved the lid of the barrel back into place. “We need to leave. Now.”

“But what about the map?” Nina asked, looking up at the cabins.

“Fuck the map,” Chase said coldly. He screwed the nuts back onto the bolts. “We’ve got to get out of here and contact the U.N., warn them what we’ve found-and do it before anyone realizes we were here. If we get caught, we’re dead.”

Nina’s anger at Chase was overcome by fear. “But uranium’s mined all over the world-”

“And every mine’s monitored really closely,” he interrupted. “The International Atomic Energy Agency knows exactly how much uranium’s in circulation-and where it came from, and where it went for processing. If terrorists got hold of a nuke and set it off, there’d be slightly different radioactive traces depending on who made it, ’cause there are different ways to make weapons-grade uranium. So you can trace the bomb back to its source.” He tightened the final bolt. “But if you’ve got a supply of uranium nobody knows about, that cuts the trail right at the start. And if you can process it as well…”

“My husband has industrial facilities all over the world,” Sophia said. “If anyone has the resources to build a secret processing plant, he does.”

“Which means he could make nukes and sell them to terrorists or rogue states without anyone ever knowing about it-until one goes off.” Chase turned the final wing nut as far as he could, then tossed the wrench back into the toolbox. “Come on, we’ve got to go.”

Nina didn’t move. “Wait-”

“No,” Chase snapped. “Forget your map; it’s not important anymore.” He grabbed her arm.

“That’s not what I mean! Don’t you hear it?”

Realization crossed his face and he looked at one of the tunnels. A chugging came from it, getting louder-

A squat little truck burst from the tunnel mouth. Four men in dirty overalls and hard hats rode on top of it. One of them glanced across at the processor-and reacted with shock at the sight of the three unfamiliar people standing by it. He grabbed a walkie-talkie from his tool belt and shouted into it as the driver swerved the truck towards the intruders.

“Fuck!” Chase whipped out his gun and fired. The man with the walkie-talkie flew off the back of the truck, blood spewing from his chest. The driver hurriedly changed direction, heading for the tunnel leading outside as the other miners flung themselves off the vehicle and ran for cover.

An alarm honked furiously, adding to the racket from the machinery. The man’s warning had been heard.

The cabin doors flew open, men running along the catwalks. Fang appeared in one of the windows.

He saw Nina…

And smiled.

“Run!” Chase yelled, shoving Nina towards the exit. Sophia was already sprinting ahead. He raised his gun again, aiming at the driver. If they could steal the truck, it would give them a head start down the tunnel-

Automatic weapons fire crackled behind them. The ground ahead of Sophia suddenly erupted into geysers of dirt and stone chips, blocking her path. She threw up a hand to protect her eyes from the stinging debris, having nowhere to go but back to the processor. Nina shrieked and ducked behind the machinery as more bullets hit near her feet.

Chase whirled and looked up at the cabins. Men were charging down the steps, and on the upper level the man he’d seen with Fang was now crouched with an MP-5 submachine gun, firing another burst.

He wasn’t trying to kill the intruders. He was trying to contain them, prevent them from escaping.

Chase fired two shots, but the gunman rolled along the catwalk, the Magnum rounds punching holes in the wall of the cabin above him.

More MP-5 fire from another angle: Fang, joining the attack from the cabin door. Unlike the other man, he wasn’t aiming to miss, tracking Chase as he threw himself headlong into the cover of the processor.

“Jesus!” Chase gasped as bullets clonked against the heavy machinery just behind him. Nina and Sophia were hunched against the crusher a few yards away. “They want you alive!” he shouted.

“What about you?” Nina cried.

“Not so much!” He popped his head around the corner of the processor for a fraction of a second, the brief glimpse showing him what he needed to know. Fang was running down the catwalk towards the other end of the crusher, while the other man crouched with the MP-5 aimed down at his hiding place. He expected bullets to follow, and he was right, rounds ripping into the steel casing of the machinery-

The firing stopped.

Chase had been counting the shots almost on a subconscious level from the moment the first was fired. An MP-5 magazine held thirty rounds, and now they were gone, requiring a reload.

He didn’t allow one, whipping out from cover and firing a single shot that exploded square in the center of the gunman’s chest as he fumbled for a new magazine. The man fell backwards, dead.

“Eddie!”

He whirled to see one of the mine workers round the crusher and grab Nina in a bear hug. She struggled and kicked, thrashing against her captor-meaning Chase couldn’t risk taking a shot…

Sophia smashed the man on the back of his neck with a large wrench. The crack of bone could be heard even over the noise of the crusher. He instantly collapsed, but took Nina down with him, landing on top of her.

“Sophia!” Chase warned. Another man ran under the conveyor and lunged at her-only to spin back as Chase shot him. Sophia gave him a quick look of thanks.

Then her eyes flicked up to something above him-

Chase was slammed to the ground as a man jumped onto him from the catwalk above the processor, knocking the Wildey from his grip.

Sophia dragged the unmoving body of the mine worker off Nina and pulled her to her feet as another two men ducked under the conveyor belt towards them. With Chase disarmed, the two miners from the now departed truck had been emboldened and were running at them from the other direction.

Chase saw his attacker’s knee flash at his groin and just barely managed to twist his hips away in time to turn an incapacitating blow into a merely eye-watering one. “You fucker!” he spat, lashing out with his leg. He caught the man’s shin, knocking his foot out from under him and dropping him face-first onto the ground. A blow of Chase’s own elbow against the back of the miner’s skull resulted in a satisfying splat of blood and teeth.

He looked for Nina and Sophia, seeing them racing up a set of stairs to the first level of the catwalk. A moment later, the four men running for them converged at the base of the steps. Two of them went after the women-the other pair charged at him.

No time to look for his gun. The first man was unarmed, the second wielding a steel pipe. Chase jumped up to face them, fists raised.

They moved apart to take him from two directions at once. The one with the pipe made the first move, savagely swinging it at Chase’s chest and forcing him to jump back-into the reach of his companion.

He grabbed Chase from behind, trying to pin his arms down at his sides as the pipe pulled back for another strike…

Nina ran along the catwalk-then screeched to a halt as she saw another man coming around the far end, crossing above the base of the rising conveyor belt. “Oh, crap!” The two men chasing them were now on the catwalk, the first raising his hands to seize Sophia as he rushed her. She brought up one arm in a seemingly futile attempt to block him.

The miner grabbed it-only for her to suddenly twist free and take hold of him. Before the startled man could react, she made a fast quarter-turn to her left to haul him closer, and with shocking force drove her right arm up directly beneath his elbow. There was a horrible crunch as his arm abruptly bent the wrong way at the joint.

His screech of agony was enough to halt the other two men on the catwalk in their tracks. Sophia released him, then grabbed the handrails like parallel bars to push herself up and slam both feet square into the squealing man’s chest. He flew backwards, colliding with the mine worker behind him and sending them both tumbling.

Nina gaped at her. “Eddie taught me that,” Sophia said by way of rapid explanation.

“He didn’t teach me that!”

Chase was faring less well than either of his pupils. The guy pinning his arms was strong, and he couldn’t break free. The pipe swung-as Chase bent forward, flipping his captor over his back. The pipe smashed against the man’s skull below the protection of his hard hat with a ringing crack.

Chase rolled and threw the limp miner to the ground. Frozen by the horrified realization of what he’d just done to his comrade, the second man had no time to respond as Chase tackled him to the ground and delivered three brutal punches that flattened his face into pulp.

Sophia shoved past Nina and grabbed a small fire extinguisher from a hook by a ladder. She advanced on the man ahead, brandishing the extinguisher like a club. He hesitated for a moment, then cautiously moved towards her.

“What are you doing?” wailed Nina. The man with the broken arm was still screaming, but the other guy was already getting his breath back, pulling himself up.

“Go! I can handle him,” Sophia replied, not taking her eyes off the miner as they closed on each other.

“But I can’t handle this guy!” Nina looked around in desperation. There was nothing she could use as a weapon, and the recovering miner was between her and the stairs. No way down…

Which meant her only escape route was up.

She scrambled up the ladder, the dusty rungs clanking beneath her feet. It led to a small inspection platform at the very top of the conveyor belt, overlooking the crusher-and there was a second ladder on the other side, going back down.

The ladder shook. The man was climbing after her. Fear rising, she quickened her ascent.

Chase got up, searching for the two women. “Oh, fuck,” he muttered, seeing Sophia facing off against one man near the far end of the catwalk as Nina scaled a ladder running up the support of the conveyor belt, a second man climbing after her.

Not good.

He spotted his gun lying under the metal framework supporting the processor, and ran for it.

Sophia was only a few feet from her adversary now. The man was watching her movements cautiously, trying to anticipate her next action. She gripped the extinguisher more tightly, waiting for the right moment.

Nina was almost at the top of the ladder. Its shaking increased, her pursuer getting closer.

Chase reached for his gun and snatched it up. Then he ran back into the open, aiming up at the man climbing the ladder-

A new noise echoed through the chamber, deep, fierce, booming. Twin plumes of greasy exhaust smoke spouted like devil horns from the drilling machine in the chamber’s center as its engine roared to life. With a crash of gears, it lurched forward on its tracks, moving frighteningly quickly…

Straight at Chase.

“Shit!” Spotlights between the clusters of drill heads burst into life, pinning him in their beams as the massive machine advanced. He fired a shot, blowing out one of the lights. But neither the driller nor its operator were affected. As if angered by his attack, the drills began to rotate, showering fragments of crushed rock in all directions. He turned and ran for the processor.

“Eddie!” Sophia shouted, her voice drowned out by the noise of the driller. The miner took advantage of her distraction to make his move-

Nina reached the top of the ladder, looking back down from the vertiginous platform to see Chase running away from the boring machine, Sophia grappling with the mine worker-and her own adversary still climbing after her.

She gripped the single railing and crossed the platform. The conveyor belt rumbled underneath her, the gaping maw of the crusher below its end. Her hand reached the hooped metal guardrail at the top of the second ladder…

And she saw another man below. He had emerged from one of the cabins, retrieving the MP-5 dropped by the man Chase had shot, taking aim-not at her, but at the processor, which Chase was about to run around!

“Eddie, get back!” she screamed.

Even over the racket of the driller, Chase heard his name and instantly assumed that whatever Nina was yelling, it was a warning. He threw himself back against the processor as bullets ripped past him. Another shooter on the catwalk. Pinning him down.

The driller rumbled around the processor behind him, turning on its treads like a tank with a shriek of grinding metal.

There wasn’t enough room for Chase to double back between the drills and the processor. And if he tried to go around the other side of the driller, he’d be exposing his back to the waiting gunman…

Sophia struggled with the man on the catwalk, each trying to wrest the fire extinguisher from the other. She lashed out to kick him in the crotch, but he jerked sideways, catching the blow on his thigh. He gave her a sneering smile for trying such an obvious attack-and she clapped her hand down on the extinguisher’s handle, blasting a jet of freezing carbon dioxide into his face.

The man gasped, only making matters worse as the choking vapor entered his throat. He let go of the extinguisher, and Sophia bashed its thick rounded end against his forehead with a dull clonk.

She jumped over him as he fell and ran around the corner of the catwalk-

And froze.

Fang stood in front of her, his MP-5 raised. “Lady Sophia!” he said. “Please, drop the extinguisher and come with me.”

With no choice, she tossed it over the railing onto the rising conveyor belt, where it was rapidly whisked away.

Nina saw Sophia surrender and swore before turning to descend the ladder. If she could get down to the next level, she might be able to distract the gunman so Chase could get out from where he was trapped-

A hand clamped around her right arm and yanked her back up as if she were a doll. The miner dragged her onto the platform and savagely twisted her arm behind her back, pinning her down against the metal grillwork floor as he pressed one knee into the base of her spine.

She flailed her free arm at him, but to no effect. The dirty surface of the conveyor belt rolled past beneath her. He pushed her arm up higher, pain ripping through her straining tendons. She cried out-

The machine rolled ever closer to Chase, its lowermost drill heads kicking up a blinding spray of mud and stones as they scraped along the chamber’s floor. He looked around the side of the processor, only to flinch back as a bullet smacked into the machine. Heart racing, he loosed another shot at the driller in the desperate hope that he might get lucky and hit some vital component, but it just sparked uselessly against spinning metal.

He had only seconds to choose between being shot, or crushed, or both-

Flaring spots of pain danced in Nina’s vision as the man’s remorseless hold threatened to break her arm, but she saw something through them, rushing past below the grill.

She grabbed at it, not knowing or caring what it was, only that it was her last chance, and swung up her arm-

With a flat thud of metal against bone, the fire extinguisher smacked her tormentor squarely on the temple. Blood spurted from a deep gash as he lurched sideways, only to bounce off the handrail and topple off the open side of the platform…

Into the crusher.

It didn’t even pause as the screaming man fell into its maw, the human body far less resistant than rock. There was a brief wet crunch, then it continued working as if nothing had happened, only now with its rollers and cogs streaked red. The gray rubble being spewed onto the pile turned pink.

Nina didn’t have time to think about the horrific sight as she sat up, her right shoulder burning. She looked down at the processor. Chase was still trapped, the gunman pinning him down, and the drilling machine continuing its advance-

“Dr. Wilde!”

The voice was huge, distorted, booming from loudspeakers. She didn’t recognize it-but then she saw Fang on the walkway below speaking into a telephone handset. His gun was trained on Sophia, standing a few paces away.

“Dr. Wilde!” he repeated. “I know you have the rest of the map! Give it to me, or I’ll kill Lady Sophia!”

“Not a chance!” Nina shouted back. Sophia looked affronted. “Kill your boss’s wife? I don’t think that’d look too good at your next pay review!”

Even from a distance, she could tell from Fang’s expression that she’d called his bluff. But then his face changed. Another malevolent smile. “Then give me the map…or Chase dies!”

No bluffing this time. Filled with fear, Nina looked at the drilling machine. It had slowed its advance on Chase… but was still moving.

“Give me the map!” Fang shouted. “Or he will die! Give me the map!”

“Nina, don’t do it!” Chase yelled. Trapped against the processor, the driller only feet away, he raised his gun and readied himself for a final kill-or-be-killed exchange of fire. “Don’t give it to him!”

Nina tore off her backpack and held it out over the crusher. “Let Eddie go, or I drop it! And nobody gets the map!”

Fang said nothing for a moment, engaged in some internal debate. “Give me the map, and you will all live!” he decided. “Otherwise, you all die! Your choice, Dr. Wilde!”

Clinging to the railing with one hand, Nina extended her other arm as far over the crusher as it would reach. “I swear, I’ll drop it! Let him go!”

“If you drop the map, the Tomb of Hercules will be lost forever! Nobody will ever find it! Is that what you want?”

“Nina!” Chase shouted. “Drop it! Whatever Yuen wants it for, you can’t let him get it!” He was backed as far as he could go along the metal face of the processor, the drill heads still advancing, spattering him with dirt.

Nina shook the backpack. “Let him go!”

“If you give me the map, you have my word that you will not be harmed!” Fang countered. “Think about it! Is the Tomb of Hercules worth your lover’s life?”

Chase prepared to spring out and fire. “Drop it!” Three, two, one-

“Okay!” Nina screamed at Fang, pulling the pack back over the platform. “Okay, okay! I’ll give you the map! Just let him go!”

“Stop the drill!” Fang ordered. The boring machine stopped moving, its lethal prow less than a foot from Chase. The clanking and screeching of the drills wound down. “Chase, you can come out now. You will not be harmed… if you surrender.”

Chase balled his fists in anger, but cautiously looked around the corner as ordered. The gunman still had the MP-5 trained on him, but didn’t fire. Raising his hands, he dropped his Wildey before walking into the open.

Fang’s voice rolled around the chamber. “You made a good decision, Dr. Wilde.”

Nina slumped, trembling with sudden exhaustion as adrenaline and emotion crashed on to her. Even though she, Chase and Sophia were still alive, she knew that her decision would turn out to be anything but good.