Authors: Jack Du Brul
The Medusa stone (26 page)
Gianelli whirled. "You had better well hope so!" Spittle flew from his lips. "Mercer's satellite phone is missing, which means the government is going to know about us shortly. I need those stones. We still have time, but not much."
The men and machines continued to rip apart the mounds of dirt and rock that covered the entrance. If anything, Hofmyer's time estimate was too generous. To Gianelli's eye, it appeared that the tunnel would be cleared in two hours, maybe less. One of the South African miners had come up with the idea of using the pumps brought to empty the earlier Italian workings and use them to power a water cannon. The apparatus was turned on while Giancarlo watched, water drawn from a rain-created lake that had grown to enormous proportions. The high-pressure jet tore into the debris like a drill, washing away soil and smaller rocks.
Yes,
he thought,
maybe this won't be too bad after all.
He hoped Mercer had survived the cave-in so he could watch the man die a much slower death. The idea gave him a grim satisfaction.
he thought,
maybe this won't be too bad after all.
He hoped Mercer had survived the cave-in so he could watch the man die a much slower death. The idea gave him a grim satisfaction.
Mercer didn't have a good plan for eliminating the four other Sudanese guarding the pit. He wanted to avoid a firefight, since he and Selome had only two guns and a finite amount of ammunition. While waiting for inspiration, providence provided for him. The white miner--Mercer recalled the man's name was du Toit--started up from the pit floor, heading for the tunnel exit and his own investigation. Hidden as they were, the miner wouldn't see Mercer and Selome until he was almost on top of them.
Selome read Mercer's intentions and crossed the tunnel to take up a position to prevent du Toit from bolting. The South African walked between them, his flashlight aimed straight ahead. Mercer stepped from around a large boulders, his AK held low across his belly, the barrel pointed at du Toit's groin.
The South African raised his hands so quickly that his knuckles scraped on the low ceiling. Selome made a tiny scuffing sound as she came up behind du Toit, and if anything, the miner's hands pressed tighter against the hanging wall.
"Smart choice," Mercer said softly. "Now, we're going back to the pit and see if you can convince the guerrillas to do the same thing. Nod if you think that's a good idea."
Du Toit bobbed his head vigorously, though his eyes never left the 7.62mm aperture of the AK leveled at his genitals.
"That's good, because if you aren't convincing, you'll be the first to die."
Mercer stood at the top of the working pit, holding du Toit by the shirt collar, and gave a bellowing, primeval yell. The four Sudanese swiveled their guns to the duo standing ten feet over their heads but held off firing. Selome quickly crawled forward to cover the guards with her own AK.
"Drop your weapons!" she shouted in Tigrinyan, and when one of the Sudanese who understood the language did so, the others followed suit. Eritreans near the guards scrambled to retrieve the assault rifles.
Many of them had been freedom fighters just a few years earlier, and they handled the weapons with easy familiarity, forcing the Sudanese to their knees and asking Selome if they could kill them.
"No," she called. "We need the ammunition for later, and these dogs may have value when we get out." She looked at Mercer and repeated what she'dhat led to the floor of the mine. He sat at a table used as the underground office, clearing away rock samples and mining gear with a sweep of his arm. "I estimate we have another three hours before Gianelli breaks through, so first we need to put another roadblock in his way. And then we've got some serious mining to do."
"What's your plan?" Selome joined him.
"First thing is to send some men to drag that safe in here with us. Then we need to drop more of the tunnel hanging wall, close to where it reaches the pit. There's more than enough explosives here for the job."
"Didn't you say something to Hofmyer about needing to channel the explosions away from the chamber to avoid destroying the main dome?"
Mercer chuckled,. "Hofmyer might be a miner, but he's no geologist. That dome's been here for a billion years, sitting near some of the most active fault lines on the planet. If earthquakes haven't destroyed it by now, it'd take a nuke to damage it today."
"So we replug the tunnel. I'm guessing that's to slow Gianelli again?"
"Correct."
"And what will we be doing while he's digging?"
"I told you, we're going to vanish into thin air." Mercer slid the Medusa pictures from his kit bag and carefully unfolded them. When he found the one he wanted, he showed it to Selome.
She studied the unintelligible jumble of lines and swirls and splashes of color. "I'm sorry, but those pictures make no sense to me."
"If Alice had a photograph like these, she never would have gotten lost in Wonderland." Mercer grinned. "I'll explain it all in a while, but first we need to get these men working. We'll split into two teams, so you'll have to do double duty interpreting for me unless anyone else here speaks English."
Twenty minutes later, Mercer had a gang of ten men standing in the tunnel. He'd used a can of fluorescent spray to mark where he wanted holes drilled into the ceiling and fashioned a piece of metal wire as a depth gauge. There were about thirty bright orange spots spread along a hundred-foot section of the tunnel. Through Selome's translations, he explained that he wanted half the holes drilled straight upward and the other half at an angle. Angling the holes would direct the force of their explosives in a more random destructive pattern. The holes didn't need to be any deeper than the wire gauge. He left instructions to be told when the first fifteen holes had been drilled so he could place the charges needed to bring down the hanging wall.
He watched for several minutes to make certain the men knew what he wanted and was pleased at how proficient they had become with the drills. Each one weighed a hundred pounds and they were as long and unwieldy as railroad ties, yet the Eritreans worked them with the expertise of seasoned professionals. Water from a tank lubricated the drill's cutting heads, and chips of rock and mud began pouring from the ceiling in a steady drizzle. One of the men paused to wave at Mercer when he removed the drill from the first completed hole.
"Hit it again, man." Mercer slapped him on the shoulder and the miner started boring into another of the painted marks.
Mercer left them to their task and returned to the table with the Medusa photographs. Selome had laid out some food and water for him and he ate while studying one particular picture. She sat close by, watching him as he worked but he paid her little heed. His face was a mask of conark wi agent, was interested in the mine--according to what Mercer had said--but Habte could guess at the man's interest in him now. He had made an earlier, unsuccessful call to Dick Henna on Mercer's satellite phone. He'd spoken for a few seconds before realizing that the recorded voice he heard was telling him he had a bad connection and to try the call again. The Israeli must have overheard him responding to the unfamiliar device. Habte cursed his own stupidity for not calling farther from the mining site. If he was going to alert Henna quickly, Habte didn't have much leeway to wait out the sniper. He had to get clear to make that call.
Skirting an ancient landslide, Habte saw something across the plain that gave him an idea, and he wondered if the sniper would allow him to do it. Walking across a thousand yards of open land with a sniperkendth="1em">
Ignoring the hundred-foot hole beneath the head gear's lattice of struts, Habte leaped onto one of the supports, scampering up ten feet without pause, ignoring the slashes in his skin made by the scaly surfaces. He nestled the satellite phone into the crotch of two beams and clung tightly, his silhouette hidden in the tangle of metal. He doubted the Israeli had seen this mine before and was certain the sniper would not be able to resist the urge to peer into the stygian mine shaft.
Ignoring the hundred-foot hole beneath the head gear's lattice of struts, Habte leaped onto one of the supports, scampering up ten feet without pause, ignoring the slashes in his skin made by the scaly surfaces. He nestled the satellite phone into the crotch of two beams and clung tightly, his silhouette hidden in the tangle of metal. He doubted the Israeli had seen this mine before and was certain the sniper would not be able to resist the urge to peer into the stygian mine shaft.
The sniper had shouldered his long rifle and moved slowly, an Uzi rucked hard against his flank, the bulbous night-vision gear resting on the top of his head. His body was shrouded in a ghillie suit, a camouflage garment made of hundreds of sewn-together rags that from a distance of a few feet looked like an innocuous shrub. With the amount of rain that had soaked the suit, Habte estimated the soldier was carrying an additional thirty pounds, and his movements would be slowed by the encumbrance.
A bolt of lightning cast a sizzling light across the sky, and the Israeli rolled to the ground, coming up against the camp building, covering his exposed right side with the machine pistol. Habte's suspicions were confirmed; the man's movements appeared lethargic. At this range, there was enough ambient light for Habte to watch the Israeli clip the goggles over his eyes for a moment to peer around the camp and into the building before slipping them off again. He'd studied the head gear for an instant but didn't notice Habte.
As predicted, the sniper seemed more interested in the mine shaft as the only other logical place for his quarry to hide and began crawling over for a better look. Habte estimated he had only a few seconds to wait before springing on the soldier.
The sound was sharp enough to carry over the storm's fury and so incongruous that Habte waited until it sounded again before reacting. The sat-phone was about to ring for a third time when Habte snatched at it, clumsily dislodging it from its resting place and knocking it from his perch. The Israeli was equally startled, but there was nothing clumsy about his movements. He rolled on his back, bringing his Uzi to his shoulder, and when the phone rang again, he adjusted his aim. His reactions were instinctive. He fired off a quarter of the magazine, a long tongue of fire leaping from the compact weapon as bullets pinged off the steel scaffold.
His aim, however, was directed at the falling phone and not at the dark figure poised in the murk above. Habte leaped from the tower, propelling himself out into the night, landing yards short of where the Israeli lay on the muddy ground. The sniper scrambled to trigger the Uzi at the apparition rolling toward him. He took just a second too long, and while Habte's lunge lacked force, it was enough to foul the weapon's aim. A harmless spray of 9mm rounds streaked into the sky.
The phone had survived the drop and hadn't been hit by the opening fusillade so it rang again.
With the Uzi clamped between the two struggling figures, Habte had the advantage. The Israeli grappled with him, but Habte's wet skin gave him no handhold. The Eritrean grabbed a hank of the ghillie suit and started to shake the sniper vigorously, slamming his head into the mud. Even when the sniper tried to hook an ankle around Habte's and roll them to gain the upper hand, his feet just slid up Habte's bare leg. Yet Habte couldn't get enough of a grip to force the writhing agent's face into the ooze to drown him, so they continued in a macabre parody of lovemaking, both moving against each other, arms and legs entwined.
The advantage shifted when the Israeli grasped the dangling bunch ofsqueezed them with all of his strength. Habte howled, arching his body in an effort to break the grip, but the sniper held on with the tenacity of a remora. Managing to free one hand, Habte wrapped his fingers around the Israeli's throat and angled the sniper for a vicious head butt that shattered teeth and forced blood to pool in the soldier's mouth. Choking on his own blood and with his wind pipe almost crushed, the sniper started to die, his grip on Habte's balls loosening.
Habte maintained the pressure long after the sniper stopped struggling and only stood when he felt that all the life had been crushed from the body. He studied the face and recognized him as the driver of the car parked outside the Ambasoira Hotel when the Sudanese and the Israelis had clashed in Mercer's room. Habte wished it was the Israeli team's leader lying here covered in mud and soaked with his own blood, but that would have to wait.
The phone's ring shocked Habte, and he lifted himself painfully from the ground and found the small device half buried in the mud. It had landed about an inch from the lip of the mine shaft.
Habte snapped it open and pressed the button to accept the call. His voice was a painful wheeze. "Hello, you have reached the phone of Philip Mercer. He's been buried alive. May I help you? My name is Habte Makkonen."
The men working to clear the mine entrance heard and felt another explosion deep within the earth, a jolt that shook the ground. In the pause that followed, Gianelli asked Joppi Hofmyer if he knew the origin of the subterranean detonation. The South African had no answer, and rather than speculate, as Gianelli seemed to want, Hofmyer put the crews back to work. It took another forty minutes to clear the entrance enough for a man to slip inside.
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