The Forbidden Tomb

41

Under the cover of darkness, Cobb piloted their yacht into the Mediterranean Sea. He knew that the devastation in Alexandria would draw the attention of the world media. Even worse, every nation with reconnaissance satellites under their control would have them focused on the region, looking for anything suspicious. Many of these satellites had sophisticated optics capable of reading the numbers off license plates from two hundred miles above the ground. Tracking something as large as a human would be easy.

All they needed was a target.

Cobb was determined to avoid the cameras circling overhead. He knew that every harbor and marina would be scrutinized, with the identity of each boat being compared to the registry from its home country. Vessels flying foreign flags would be of particular interest to the Egyptian government. As a port city, Alexandria’s coastal waters offered the same access to terrorists as they did to tourists, and even though no one would be looking for his team specifically, most of them were listed in military databases.

He knew any of their faces could trigger a red flag.

Spotting all of them together would be cause for alarm.

So they opted for international waters.

He was by no means at ease, but at least he knew that no one could take them by surprise. They could see ten miles in every direction, and the radar could warn them of approaching aircraft and other ships before they even came into view. The move had cut off their access to the city, but it had also cut off the city’s access to them. And until they figured out their next step, the isolation was worth the inconvenience.

Once the yacht was anchored, Cobb headed below deck to the forward lounge. He brought a tray of snacks with him. His team had been working non-stop and he sensed that they needed a break. ‘Any luck?’

Sarah looked up from her stack of notes, her expression conveying her frustration before she even spoke. ‘Not yet. But I’m still looking.’

Cobb nodded and set the tray of food on one of the tables. Other than a few bathroom breaks, she hadn’t left the room in over a day. She had spent most of her time studying the video footage that Garcia had pulled from Cobb and McNutt’s flashlights, with an emphasis on the mysterious men from the tunnels. She studied their clothes, their movements, their methods, and every other noticeable detail, hoping to match their wardrobe or tactics to other known forces in the Middle East and beyond.

So far, she had come up empty.

‘Here,’ Cobb said as he tossed her an orange. ‘Eat something.’

She nodded her appreciation. ‘Thanks.’

A moment later, McNutt bounded into the room. His bulging eyes, disheveled hair, and breathlessness told the others that he too hadn’t gotten much rest. It was also clear that a massive dose of caffeine was now pushing him through the fatigue.

Cobb stared at him, concerned. ‘Are you okay?’

‘I smell food,’ McNutt shot back. He lunged for the tray and grabbed a sandwich that Cobb had actually made for himself. A look of pure pleasure spread across McNutt’s face as he stuffed it into his mouth. ‘Oh, man, this is good. What is this?’

‘Mine,’ Cobb said.

McNutt wiped his mouth with his forearm. ‘Well, you did a wonderful job. It’s really, really good. Do I taste mustard?’

Sarah shook her head in disgust. ‘You know, there’s a whole pantry of things to eat. Not to mention a stocked refrigerator. You don’t need to barge in here and take ours.’

McNutt took his next bite. ‘I didn’t come for the food. That was just a bonus. I came here because I think I can help you.’

She eyed him suspiciously. ‘Help me with what?’

He plopped down on the couch across from Sarah. ‘I’ve got a lead on the explosives. Well, kind of… I mean, maybe.’

She didn’t have time for games. ‘What the hell does that mean?’

Cobb had faith in McNutt’s abilities, but he understood Sarah’s frustration. The Marine’s delivery needed some work. ‘Josh, what are you talking about?’

McNutt could sense their annoyance. This wasn’t the time to be ambiguous. Too much was at stake. ‘I can almost guarantee that the Semtex was made in the Czech Republic, at a company called Explosia.’

‘Explosia?’ she scoffed. ‘You’re making that up.’

‘I swear I’m not,’ he assured her as he continued to eat. ‘That’s the actual name of the company. It’s located in Semtín, a suburb of Pardubice in the Czech Republic. They invented the compound in Semtín — that’s where Semtex gets its name — and they’re still the world’s leading manufacturer of the stuff. They make at least a half-dozen different varieties, and there’s no shortage of buyers.’

Cobb knew that explosives were often marked with unique chemical or powdered metal tags that labeled specific batches. These taggants, as they were called, were like encoded messages that identified the origin and purchaser of the material. If they could determine the taggant, then all they needed was the manufacturer’s paperwork. They could simply compare the marker that had been detected to the entries on their master list, and that would give them the name of the buyer.

Cobb cursed himself for not taking a sample of the compound when he had a chance. ‘If we can get you a forensic report, can you trace the signature?’

‘Probably not,’ McNutt answered. ‘But that’s okay. We don’t need to go through all of that.’

‘Why can’t you trace it?’ Sarah asked.

‘And why don’t we need that information?’ Cobb added.

McNutt answered Sarah’s question first. ‘You probably won’t get a trace because taggants weren’t mandatory in Semtex until recently. And even then, the regulations only apply to new Semtex. There are still warehouses full of older, unmarked Semtex that has yet to be sold.’

He turned toward Cobb. ‘The reason it doesn’t matter is because the explosive is only part of the equation.’

Cobb didn’t understand. ‘How so?’

‘Well, when I learned that you can’t trace Semtex, I looked for something else that might help us.’ He opened the folder he had brought with him and held up a picture of a detonator attached to a bomb pack. ‘And I found this.’

Cobb recognized the image. It was a close-up shot of the timer used to synchronize the explosions in the cisterns.

McNutt didn’t wait for questions. ‘It may look like an ordinary digital counter, but it’s not. It’s one of a kind. It’s made in Tunisia by a company named Mecanav. They make ships, of all things. This sucker actually belongs in the instrument panel of a high-end marine display.’

Sarah tried to connect the dots. ‘I don’t get it. Why is a Tunisian boat timer being used to detonate explosives?’

McNutt smiled. ‘Convenience.’

He pulled out a map of Northern Africa and pointed at the small country of Tunisia, which sat at the tip of the northern coast. He ran his finger south into Libya.

‘Remember Muammar al-Gaddafi — the whack job who ruled Libya for, like, forty years? Under his leadership, Libya became Explosia’s biggest and most-important client. The Semtex that they received was technically the property of the Libyan Army, but most of it ended up on the black market.’

Cobb needed specifics. ‘How much are we talking about?’

‘A scary amount,’ McNutt replied. ‘At least seven hundred tons. And that might be a conservative estimate. Some experts put that figure at well over a thousand.’

Cobb groaned. For Sarah’s benefit, he put the number into perspective. ‘Remember the Lockerbie bombing in 1988? A few ounces took out an entire airplane.’

Sarah was familiar with the incident in Scotland, having studied it extensively during her training with the CIA. She knew about the damage not only to the plane, but also to the two hundred and fifty-nine people who had lost their lives.

McNutt didn’t let her linger on the past. ‘Libya is a hotbed for the Semtex market, but it doesn’t have the manufacturing base to supply the rest of the components needed to construct a bomb. The nearest source of reliable electronics is Tunisia, their neighbor to the north. Namely: Mecanav. Entire truckloads of these timers have disappeared as they made their way from the company’s assembly plant to the shipyards. They almost always turn up on the streets of Tripoli or Benghazi.’

McNutt tapped the picture of the timer to reinforce his next point. ‘Forget about the tomb, this is where the real money is. You could buy an entire boat for the same price that just a few of these timers go for on the black market.’

Cobb finally had the whole picture. It might have taken McNutt a few minutes to get there, but it was worth the wait. The Libyan border was less than three hundred and fifty miles from Alexandria — close enough for a team to get in and out in less than a day. It meant that they could narrow their investigation.

‘Sarah—’

She cut him off. ‘I can limit the parameters of my search. I’ll focus on groups operating out of Libya, specifically those who have a track record with explosives.’

‘Well-financed groups,’ Cobb added. ‘If the timers are that expensive, there’s got to be some big money supporting their efforts. The way they blanketed the whole network of cisterns, they certainly weren’t worried about the cost.’

Sarah grabbed the laptop she had been using to pull up research material and attacked it with renewed vigor.

Though it was only a minor breakthrough, Cobb felt the need to compliment McNutt. ‘Nice job, Marine. Well worth the price of a sandwich.’

McNutt smiled and burped. ‘Thanks, chief.’