Turcotte felt the aircraft bank and experienced a slight change in air pressure as the plane descended rapidly. He unbuckled his seat belt and walked down the plane. Leaning over Harker, he signaled and then yelled in the team leader's ear, "Time to rig."

While Harker started rousing the team members, Turcotte tapped Nabinger on the shoulder and pointed to the rear of the plane. Turcotte undid the cargo straps holding down the parachutes and rucksacks. He and Harker pa.s.sed the chutes out, a main and reserve to each man.

Turcotte and Nabinger buddy-rigged each other. Turcotte went first, slipping the harness of the main over his shoulders and settling it on his back. He then reached down between his legs as he directed Nabinger to pa.s.s a leg strap through to him.

Turcotte hooked the snaps and made sure it was properly seated. He then crouched and tightened both leg straps down as far as they would go. The submachine gun Turcotte had gotten from Zandra was slung upside down on his left shoulder using the sling and tied down with some eighty-pound test cord.

Turcotte rigged the reserve over his belly, attaching it to D-rings on the front of the harness. He pa.s.sed the waistband to Nabinger and directed him to run it over the sub and through both straps on the back of the reserve. Turcotte then cinched it tight on the right223.

side, insuring it had a quick release fold in the buckle.

Turcotte put his small rucksack on the web seats and pressed his reserve down on top of it while he reached in and hooked the two eighteen-inch attaching straps up to the same D-rings the reserve was attached to. Turcotte liked having the ruck attached as tightly as possible to prevent it from swinging up and hitting him in the face when he went off the ramp. Turcotte then attached the fifteen-foot lowering line for the rucksack to the left D-ring.

Turcotte signaled to Harker, and swaying in the aircraft, the Special Forces warrant officer quickly ran his hands over Turcotte's equipment, starting from his head, working down the front, and then going to the back, again working top to bottom. He never let his hands get in front of his eyes as he methodically worked his way around the equipment.

Harker released the static-line snap hook from its location on the pack closing tie on the back of the parachute and ran the static line over Turcotte's left shoulder. He hooked the snap hook onto the handle of the reserve, where Turcotte could get at it to hook up to the static-line cable when the time for that came.

Finished, Harker tapped Turcotte on the rear and gave him a thumbs-up, signaling he was good to go. Turcotte then helped Nabinger rig and the jumpmaster inspected the increasingly nervous professor. He got the chute on Nabinger, then tucked swim fins in the waistband of his parachute and attached to the jumper with cord.

"You're good to go," Turcotte told Nabinger.224.

"Oh, that's rea.s.suring," Nabinger said.

"Seconds thoughts?" Turcotte said. "You can stay on board and fly back if you want to." "No. I'm going. I've got to see this. I just wish we could have picked a more comfortable mode of transportation."

"Hey," Turcotte said, "this is the most fun you can have with your pants on."

"I very much disagree with that a.s.sessment," Nabinger said, slumping down onto the web seat.

Che Lu looked about the room, her eyes adjusting to the green glow given off by the numerous control panels. They were slightly taller than waist high, black, with green glowing surfaces covered with high rune writing.

"As I told you," Kostanov said as he walked beside her, "this room was completely dark when we came in here, but it powered up forty-eight hours ago."

"You haven't tried any of these controls?" Che Lu asked.

"Not yet," Kostanov said. "We have no idea what they are for."

Che Lu stopped at a console at the front of the room, a long curving black affair that faced the smooth rock wall. She pointed. "There seems to be a door there."

Kostanov nodded. He'd seen the faint trace in the rock face.

"Perhaps something on this panel opens it," Che Lu continued.

"Perhaps," Kostanov said. "But there are a lot of places to push and perhaps if you push the225.

wrong one, we end up like my man who was cut in half."

"If only I could talk to Nabinger," Che Lu muttered as she ran hands just above the glowing high runes.

"My radioman can't transmit through rock," Kostanov said. "We've tried even knowing that, but we get nothing."

Che Lu turned to him. "What if you had an open shaft to the sky above?"

Kostanov stepped close to her. "You know where there is an open shaft?"226.

Chapter 21.

The loadmaster leaned over and yelled in Turcotte's ear.

"The pilot wants to talk to you," he screamed above the plane's roar. He pa.s.sed his headset to Turcotte.

The pilot's voice came back through the wires from the c.o.c.kpit. "We've just picked up some SATCOM traffic from UNAOC. Aspasia sent a message saying he'll be landing here on Earth in two days."

Turcotte acknowledged. He leaned over and informed Nabinger.

"Jesus," Nabinger exclaimed. "Two days? That's not much time."

"We'll be out of here before then," Turcotte rea.s.sured him.

"I hope so."

Turcotte looked around the cargo bay. Everyone was awake now and fidgeting.

The ride was getting extremely b.u.mpy as the pilots used their227.

sophisticated electronics to keep the aircraft down in the radar cl.u.s.ter of the terrain.

Turcotte was sweating under his dry suit. He hated waiting and having his destiny in someone else's hands. He'd feel a lot better once they were on the ground. He turned back to Nabinger and gave the professor a smile. The older man was white under his dark beard, beads of sweat trickling down the side of his face.

"It'll be all right," Turcotte rea.s.sured him.

"Just get me in the tomb," Nabinger said through clenched teeth.

Duncan threw her cigarette to the concrete floor of the hangar and ground it out with the toe of her shoe. She went over to the commo terminal and restlessly looked through the message logs. She stiffened as she noted one of the messages.

"Find something interesting?" a voice behind her asked.

Duncan turned to find Zandra towering over her. "What's STAAR?"

"STAAR?".

Duncan held up the message log. "You received a message two hours ago from someone or something with that code name."

"And you never heard of it and you have the highest security clearance possible in the United States," Zandra said, her eyes hidden behind her sungla.s.ses. "Correct?"

"Correct," Duncan said, her jaw clenched tight.

"Well, Doctor, you don't have a need to know."

"G.o.ddammit-" Duncan began, but Zandra raised a hand, cutting her off with clipped words.228.

"Don't! Not only don't you have a need to know, this is bigger than you, bigger than the United States."

"We'll see about that," Duncan said, turning for the door.

"Wait!" Zandra called out. There was a beeping sound coming out of the radio.

"What is it?" Duncan asked as the other woman sat down in front of the device and typed into the keyboard.

"We've intercepted a message from China," Zandra said.

Duncan looked at her watch. "They can't have jumped yet."

"They haven't," Zandra said. "This is from someone else."

"Where?"

Zandra was looking at the information being relayed to her. "It appears that whoever is transmitting is inside Qian-Ling."

"What the h.e.l.l-" Duncan began, but again she was cut off by Zandra.

"Shut up for a minute and let me decipher this."

TO: SECTION FOUR.

FROM: GRUEV.

TRAPPED INSIDE.

PLA HAS SEALED EXITS.

SUPPLIES LOU.

LINKED UP WITH PROFESSOR CHE LU.

BEIJING UNIVERSITY.

MANY AIRLIA ARTIFACTS.

NEED HIGH RUNE TRANSLATIONS.

PLEASE ADVISE.229.

"Who is Gruev and what is Section Four?" Duncan asked, having patiently waited while the words came up on the screen line by line.

"Section Four is the Russian equivalent of Majestic-12. Gruev is the code name of one of their operatives." "You seem to know a lot about this."

"I do. Our intelligence sources tell me he led a small team into the tomb several days ago. The Russians didn't hear a word from them after they entered and a.s.sumed they were lost."

"Why didn't you tell us that someone from the Russians had already gone inside?"

"You didn't have a need to know."

Duncan gritted her teeth.

"Listen," Zandra said, "you'll find out all you need to in due time. In the meanwhile we need to get word to Turcotte and his team to link up with Gruev.

They can work together."

"Well, at least now we know why the PLA is sitting on top of the tomb," Duncan said, her own tone heavy with sarcasm.

Turcotte held six fingers aloft. "Six minutes!"He extended both hands, palms out. "Get ready!"

The team members unbuckled their safety straps.

With both arms Turcotte pointed at the team seated along the outside of the aircraft. He pointed up. "Outboard personnel stand up."

The members of Team 3 staggered to their feet in the wildly swaying aircraft, using the static-line230.

cable and side of the aircraft for support. Turcotte reached out and gave Nabinger a hand.

Curling his index fingers over his head, representing hooks, Turcotte pumped his arms up and down. "Hook up!"

Turcotte watched as each man hooked into the static-line cable. As jumpmaster, Turcotte was already hooked up and facing the team as he screamed the jumpmaster commands. The load-master was holding on to Turcotte's static line and trying to keep him from falling over as Turcotte used both hands to pantomime the jump commands.

"Check static lines!"

Turcotte checked his snap link and traced the static line from the snap link to where it disappeared over his shoulder. He then checked Nabinger's.

"Check equipment!"

Turcotte made sure one last time that all his and Nabinger's equipment was secured and the connections made fast on their parachute harnesses.

Turcotte cupped his hands over his ears. "Sound off for equipment check!"

The last man in line, Chief Harker, slapped the man in front on the rear and yelled, "Okay." The yell and slap was pa.s.sed from man to man until Nabinger.

Turcotte gave him a big thumbs-up and yelled, "All, okay!"

"Yeah, right," Nabinger muttered, leaning against the side of the plane.

With all the jump commands, except the final "GO," done, Turcotte gained control of his static line from the loadmaster and turned toward the231.