The Pharaoh's Secret

65

Scorpion drove the Land Rover across the same desert he’d been forced to walk in the blazing sun. Brief flashbacks of the pain and anger that had sustained him on that trek intruded on his thoughts. Occasionally, he saw mirages in the shape of men, who vanished like ghosts.

His mind switched to the Americans, the men from NUMA, who had all but destroyed the organization in a matter of days. He would hunt them. Even if Osiris was finished and Hassan’s last-ditch effort had failed, he would hunt them — until the end of his days, if necessary.

Hassan sat in the passenger seat, staring at the monotonous terrain, in silence. From time to time, the wind gusted, pelting the SUV with fine grains of sand, as the sun baked the land from high overhead.

As the pumping station came into view, Scorpion brought the Rover to a halt.

“Why are you stopping?” Hassan demanded.

“Look.”

Hassan pulled out a pair of binoculars and trained them on the low-lying building. His older eyes weren’t as sharp as Scorpion’s, but through the binoculars he could plainly see the Gazelle helicopter sitting on the pad.

“It’s ours,” he said.

“What is it doing here?”

To think others had escaped and come here was too good to be true. He pulled a transceiver from the glove box and dialed up the Osiris frequency. He was about to call it when he saw the lab technicians come out of the cinder-block building with a cart. From it, they transferred crates of plastic boxes to the helicopter. A man in Egyptian military fatigues directed them.

When the work was done, all four climbed aboard the helicopter and the rotors began to turn. The Gazelle took off and began to climb as it traveled east.

“They’ve taken the antidote,” Hassan said. “But at least they’ve gone.”

“They’ll come back before long,” Scorpion noted.

“I only need a few minutes to reprogram the pumps and make it impossible for them to counteract the order. Let’s move.”

Scorpion shifted the Rover back into gear and they began moving once again.

In the underground chamber, Kurt waited. For a long while the only sound was the endless thrum of the pumps. Joe had hidden himself in the control room.

When the machinery in the elevator shaft sprang to life, it was startlingly loud. Kurt looked up. In the dim glow he saw the elevator car moving. It was a tiny square high above, dropping with surprising speed. Halfway down, it passed a light embedded in the side of the wall. The illumination flared against the bottom and side of the car, then vanished again.

Kurt pressed back into the rock, holding still in the dark, as the car passed him and continued down another thirty feet before it stopped at the ground level.

Kurt had put down his AR-15 in exchange for a pistol — in this case, a Beretta Cougar .45 automatic.

The front gates opened with a slight clang. Two men walked out. Kurt immediately recognized Hassan. He assumed that the other man had to be Scorpion. Both had guns drawn as if they were expecting trouble. Hassan held a snub-nosed pistol, Scorpion a long-barreled sniper’s rifle.

“We seem to be alone,” Hassan said, holstering his pistol.

“That may not last,” Scorpion said.

Hassan nodded. “Find a spot to cover me in case our military friends come back. This won’t take long.”

Scorpion looked around, studying the room. He came to the same conclusion Kurt and Joe had: the only place to cover the room was from the rigging around the elevator shaft. Slinging the rifle over his shoulder, he climbed onto the scaffolding exactly where Kurt had ascended it.

From his position in the dark, Kurt could have killed them both, but he hoped to take them alive. Still, his finger pressed ever so slightly against the trigger as he kept the weapon aimed at Scorpion’s head.

Hassan crossed the floor as Scorpion took up a position on the scaffolding ten feet beneath Kurt. From there, he could watch the entire room and see into the control room. He never looked up. Even if he had, he’d never have seen Kurt, his eyes were still adjusting to the dark after driving across the blinding sands of the White Desert.

He settled into his perch and pulled the rifle off his shoulder and held it almost casually.

Hassan paused at the door to the control room, looked around and went inside. He moved cautiously and then vanished from sight.

Scorpion waited. A sniper’s job was to wait and be still. But his mind would not be still. Thoughts from the past intruded. Voices. He could hear Shakir insist he walk across the desert. He could hear the American, the one named Austin, demand he throw his rifle into the teardrop bay on the coast of Gozo. He’d been just about to take a shot.

He told himself he should have fired, should have killed him then, if not earlier. Perhaps he should have killed him instead of Hagen at the fort. But those were not his orders. He would not wait a third time.

In the stillness, his senses seemed heightened. The hum of the pumps was soothing. But it should have been changing by now. What was Hassan waiting for?

Scorpion blinked hard, trying to get his eyes to adjust. He saw green flares in the blackness, left over from the glare of the desert sun. He shook his head and focused on the task at hand. He had to protect Hassan. He had to stay sharp.

He forced his mind to be quiet and stared into the control room. Finally, he saw a figure emerge from the deeper section and sit at the controls. The image was blurred at first, but then it came into focus. It wasn’t Hassan. It was Austin.

How? he thought. How was it possible?

He stared and brought the rifle up to his shoulder.

The helicopter, he decided. Of course. Austin had tricked them again. He’d arrived first and waited in the control room. And Hassan was probably already dead.

Scorpion gripped the rifle, his normally cold blood burning. He raised it to his eye, matched the sights against Austin’s silver hair and exhaled. When his body was still, Scorpion pulled the trigger.

The shot rang out, straight and true, hitting Austin in the center of his back and killing him instantly. He slumped forward in the chair.

Scorpion took a breath and scanned the room for Austin’s partner. He had to be somewhere close. He swung the rifle from side to side.

As Scorpion scanned the rest of the chamber, the door to the control room flew open with a bang as the chair was shoved through it by another figure. The chair rolled across the stone floor and Scorpion saw his mistake. It was Hassan he’d killed. Not Austin.

He aimed the rifle at the figure pushing the chair but was jumped before he could fire.

Scorpion swung around and saw that it was Austin who’d grabbed him. He brought the rifle up, but the barrel hit the corner of the wall before he could bring it on target. The space was too constricted. He lunged forward, headbutted Austin and tossed the rifle away, pulling out a knife.

Scorpion had just shot Hassan dead and was now fighting like a man possessed. Kurt aimed the pistol, holding it close to his body. Scorpion held his knife and made a move toward Kurt.

Kurt fired, hitting Scorpion in the arm that held the knife. Scorpion fell back, dropping the knife. He grabbed onto the scaffolding with his uninjured hand. The knife clattered to the ground beneath them.

“Surrender!” Kurt demanded.

Scorpion ignored him and pulled another weapon from his pocket, a set of brass knuckles with a triangular knife attached to the front. Hassan had given it to him upon his promotion. The knife shape was meant to represent the reborn power of the pharaohs and the Pyramids. All of the Osiris assassins were given one.

He slipped it onto his fingers and clenched his fist in a ball.

“Don’t!” Austin shouted.

Scorpion lunged forward and Kurt fired again, hitting him in the other shoulder. Scorpion reeled and barely kept his balance. He lunged again and this time Kurt shot him in the calf.

Scorpion hung on by sheer determination. If he could just reach Austin, they could embrace in death.

Kurt could see the obsession in Scorpion’s face. “Don’t you ever give up?” he shouted.

Scorpion grinned. “Never!”

He lunged again, but Kurt fired without hesitation, hitting Scorpion’s unwounded thigh. Scorpion’s leap was cut short. He fell down the shaft, slamming against the top of the car and tumbling off it and onto the cavern floor.

He died looking up into the darkness.