The Atlantis revelation

45

Serena set the Otter on autopilot so she could collect herself after the devastating loss of Benito and before whatever end-of-the-world madness she and Conrad would have to deal with now. They would need to land on the water near the coast of Israel and find some way in, if they didn't get shot down first. But that was for Conrad to figure out, because she could barely think at all.

She looked over at Conrad in the copilot's seat. The entire flight, she felt him keeping one eye on her and one on Lorenzo, who was fast asleep in the rear of the cabin.

"It doesn't stop, does it, Conrad?" she asked him. "The death, the violence, the evil in this world?" She couldn't hold back anymore, and she burst into tears. "He was like a brother to me. My only real family." She started weeping uncontrollably in a way she hadn't for years. She knew Conrad had never seen her like this because she had never seen herself like this. Not even in her private moments. But it was as if something had broken inside.

"I can't do it, Conrad," she said. "I'm all used up. I have nothing left."

Conrad held her in his arms as best he could with their seating arrangement and brushed the wet hair away from her eyes. "What matters is what's required of us," he told her softly. "I need to know what Gellar told you."

"I told you what he told me," Serena said sharply, realizing that she wouldn't get much more in sympathy and that Conrad was right. "He wants to build a Third Temple and seems to think he's going to start very soon. The only place to build it, according to Orthodox Jews, is on the Dome of the Rock."

"Which is considered Islam's third-holiest shrine and where Al-Aqsa Mosque sits," said Conrad. "You destroy the mosque, and all hell breaks loose. I get it. Gellar gets what he wants, and the Alignment ultimately gets what it wants. But tell me about this whole Uriel thing."

"That's what doesn't make sense," she said. "In the Bible, there's an angel who guards the gate back to Eden with a flaming sword. Some traditions specifically reveal the angel's name to be Uriel."

Conrad nodded. "So you figured that Midas was bringing the Flammenschwert to Uriel."

"But it doesn't make sense with Gellar," she said. "He wants to destroy the Dome of the Rock and build a Third Temple for the Jews. The Flammenschwert turns water to fire. But there's no water in Jerusalem. No lakes, no rivers, nothing. The ancient Jews depended on precipitation from the skies, collecting rainwater in tanks and cisterns."

He looked at her and said, "You're forgetting the Gihon Spring and the network of tunnels beneath the Temple Mount."

She knew where he was going and liked to see him enthusiastic, but this wasn't realistic. "The Gihon Spring isn't really a river. That's why they call it a spring."

"It could be enough," he told her. "Back at the EU summit, Midas was pitching his mining technology as a means to extract water from the desert. Some kind of tracing technology that could reveal underground rivers and aquifers with thermal imaging."

Suddenly she saw it all. "There's going to be plenty of thermal energy after he sets off the Flammenschwert."

"The Temple Mount is honeycombed with well shafts, including one I've seen directly under the Dome of the Rock," Conrad told her. "All you have to do is position the Flammenschwert somewhere in that underground spring system, and boom-you destroy the mosque on the surface and maintain the integrity of the Temple Mount foundations. It's like a neutron bomb."

Serena said, "I suppose it would almost look like divine judgment. It's brilliant, really."

Conrad nodded. "Gellar gets his Third Temple. The Alignment gets its Crusade when it rises to defend Israel against the Arabs. And Midas gets the water and technology rights." Then he looked her in the eye. "How much do you want to bet that the warhead from the Flammenschwert is inside one of the globes Gellar took back to Israel? He's probably placing those globes inside some secret chamber under the Temple Mount right now."

Serena switched off the autopilot and took the steering column. "We have to warn the Israelis."

"Which Israelis?" Conrad asked her. "We could be warning the very people who are perpetrating the plan, like Gellar. We need to know for certain who's not Alignment, and right now, except for me and you-actually, just me-we don't even know that. We need to get to Jerusalem on our own."

"I have friends in Gaza," she said. "Catholics who helped me run food relief supplies through the blockades the Israeli coast guard set up. They could get us official work permits and fake IDs and smuggle us into Israel. I'll have to splash down within a few miles of shore, though."

"Now you're talking," he told her as she leveled off and prepared for their descent.

Then a voice from behind said, "No water landing, Sister Serghetti. You will take us to Tel Aviv."

She looked over her shoulder at Lorenzo, who had a gun pointed at her head and was glaring at Conrad.

"Now the weasel shows his true colors," Conrad said, unusually calm. "You gave me up to the police on Rhodes, didn't you? Told Midas I came so he could go and kill Serena and you could take her precious medallion?"

Serena stiffened as she felt the barrel of the gun at the back of her neck. "Lorenzo, tell me this is a moment of fear overwhelming your faith-that what Conrad said isn't true."

"Tel Aviv," Lorenzo said, waving the gun between her and Conrad. "Then you will hand me the Dei medallion before General Gellar's men take care of both of you."

"I think you should stick with your vow of silence," Conrad said.

Lorenzo pointed the gun at Conrad, pulled the trigger, and heard the click of an empty cartridge. Lorenzo frantically searched his pockets.

"I've got your bullets in here," Conrad said as he pulled out his Glock from under his shirt and shot Lorenzo in the head.

Serena didn't scream as she gripped the steering column tightly with both hands to keep herself and the Otter steady. But she shivered as she felt Lorenzo's body slide to the floor of the cockpit next to her. And the smell from Conrad's discharged Glock made her ill.

"Looks like the Dei wants you dead, Serena. You should think twice before going back to Rome."

She couldn't look at him. At either of them. She focused on bringing the Otter down for a safe landing off the waters of Gaza.

Conrad, however, was already on his phone. "Andros, it's me."

She could hear the voice on the other end shout, "Mother of God! Where are you?"

Conrad glanced at her while he talked. "I'm a few miles off the coast of Gaza. I need to get in."

"Why?" asked Andros.

Conrad said, "You see that explosion at the EU summit?"

"I told you not to come back to Greece, my friend," Andros said.

"Well, at least I got out," Conrad answered. "Now I need a ride into Gaza. You must have ships making runs here."

She couldn't make out what Andros was saying.

"Jaffa's no good," Conrad said. "Gaza. You must know someone in these waters. Someone who can meet us and take us ashore. Someone you can trust." After a minute, Conrad said, "Fine."

"Well?" she asked him when he hung up.

"Andros says he has just the man for the job. He'll meet us one kilometer due west of the breakwater at the beach north of the port."

Two hours after they splashed down, the twelve-year-old Palestinian shipowner Andros had promised finally arrived in his yellow wooden sardine boat and brought them ashore. His white T-shirt said: TODAY GAZA…TOMORROW THE WEST BANK AND JERUSALEM.