Clive Cussler - Treasure of Khan

Gunn unzipped his dive bag and pulled out his glasses, shoes, and a small digital camera. Beside him, Pitt had retrieved his .45 and the two handheld radios. He made sure the volumes were turned down low, then clipped one to his belt and handed the other to Gunn.

"Sorry we don't have enough weapons to go around. You get in a bind, then give us a call," Pitt said.

"Believe me, I'll be in and out of there before anyone has a chance to blink."

Gunn's task was to sneak into the lab and photograph the seismic device, grabbing any documents he could along the way. If there were workers about, then he had Pitt's order to abandon the effort and wait by the bridge. Pitt and Giordino had the stickier objective of entering the main residence and locating Theresa and Wofford.

"We'll try to rendezvous here, unless one of us doesn't make it out cleanly. Then we'll head for the garage and one of Borjin's vehicles."

"Take this, Rudi," Giordino said, handing Gunn his crowbar. "In case the door is locked ... or an overinquisitive lab rat gives you trouble."

Gunn nodded with a humorless grin, then grabbed the crowbar and skulked off in the direction of the laboratory. He wanted to curse Pitt and Giordino for bringing him here, but he knew it was the expedient thing to do. They had to try to rescue Theresa and Wofford. And to simultaneously document the seismic array meant it was a three-man job. Heck, it was a hundred-man job, Gunn thought, glancing skyward in hopes that a company of special operations forces would magically parachute into the compound. But the heavens only offered a few scattered stars, struggling to twinkle through a light haze of clouds.

Gunn shook off the prayer and moved quickly across the open compound, dashing from shrub to shrub where cover availed itself. Only while crossing the entryway road did he slow down, crawling across the gravel road at nearly a snail's pace so as not to create an audible crunch underfoot. He followed Pitt's directions, moving past the illuminated open garage. The tinkling sound of banging tools told him that at least one person was up performing late-night mechanical duties.

He moved on toward the adjacent lab when the sudden braying of a horse froze him in his tracks. He could detect no movement around him and finally decided that the sound came from the horse stables at the end of the building. He studied the lab and was relieved to see only a few dim lights turned on on the lower level. Some brighter lights glimmered from the upstairs windows, and he heard the faint sound of music coming from above. The living quarters for the scientists who worked in the lab obviously were upstairs.

Checking again to see that no horse patrols were nearby, he crept to the glass entry door and pushed.

To his surprise, the door was unlocked and opened into the test bay. He entered quickly and closed the door behind him. The bay was illuminated by a few desk lamps and buzzed with the hum of a dozen oscilloscopes but was otherwise empty. Gunn noticed a coatrack near the entrance and grabbed one of several white, long-sleeved lab coats hanging on the hooks, which he slipped over his own dark jacket.

Might as well look the part, he thought, figuring it might be enough to deceive someone looking in from outside.

He walked to the main corridor, which stretched the length of the building, and noticed the lights were turned on in a few scattered offices. Fearful of being caught in the open hallway, he hesitated only a second, then stormed down the hall. He walked as fast as his legs could move without breaking into a run, keeping his eyes forward and face down. To the three other people still working at the late hour, he was just a quick blur past the window. All they could tell was that it was someone in a white lab coat, one of their comrades, probably on the way to the bathroom.

Gunn quickly reached the thick door at the end of the hall. With heavy breath and heart pounding, he flipped the latch and shoved. The massive door swung open quietly, revealing the huge anechoic chamber inside. Towering in the center of the room under a bright circle of overhead lights was von Wachter's acoustic seismic device, just as Pitt and Giordino had described it.

Thankful to find the chamber empty, Gunn climbed through the door and up onto the catwalk.

"We're halfway home," he muttered as he pulled out the digital camera. Noting the handheld radio on his belt, he silently wondered how Pitt and Giordino were faring.

If you can provide a distraction from the front, then I should be able to slip around and surprise them from the side," Pitt whispered, studying the two guards standing like bookends on either side of the main residence door.

"A visit from my pet monkey should do the trick," Giordino replied, patting the heavy red pipe wrench dangling from his belt.

Pitt lowered his head then released the safety on his Colt. That they would have to subdue the front-entry guards in order to gain entry to the residence was a given. The challenge would be to do so without firing a shot and alerting the small army of security forces that Borjin kept on the compound.

The two men moved quietly along one of the reflecting canals that flowed toward the house, advancing in short quick bursts. They dropped to the ground and crawled to a rose bed that circled around the residence's main covered entryway. They were within clear sight of the guards as they peered through a bed of ivory yellow Damask roses.

The guards stood leaning against the residence in a relaxed state, accustomed to the uneventful grind of the night shift. Save for an evening walk or a late return from Ulaanbaatar, neither Borjin nor his sister were seldom seen after ten o'clock.

Pitt motioned for Giordino to stay put and give him five minutes to reposition himself. As Giordino nodded and hunkered down in the rose bed, Pitt silently looped his way around toward the far side of the entrance. Following the rose bed, he reached the entry drive and, as Gunn had done, gently stepped his way across the crushed gravel. The grounds were open from the road to the house, and Pitt moved quickly across the area, running low to the ground. The front face of the house was dotted with shrubs, and he ducked behind a large juniper bush, then peeked through it to the front porch. The guards stood as they were, oblivious to his movements in the dark just a few dozen yards away.

Creeping forward, he picked his way bush by bush until reaching the edge of the covered portico. He kneeled to the ground, tightened his grip on the .45, and waited for Giordino to start the show.

Seeing no suspicious activities by the guards, Giordino gave Pitt an extra minute before moving from the rose bed. He had noted that the column supports for the portico roof offered a perfect blind spot from which to approach the porch. He inched to one side until one of the columns blocked his view of the guards, then stepped out of the rosebushes.

As he figured, if he couldn't see the guards, then they couldn't see him, and he angled his way right up to the back side of the column. The front door was less than twenty feet away, and he would have a clear shot at either guard. Without saying a word or making a sound, he casually stepped from behind the column, took aim at one of the guards, then hauled back and flung the pipe wrench like a tomahawk.

Both guards immediately saw the squat Italian step into view, but both were too startled to react. They stared in disbelief as a red object tumbled through the air at them, smashing one of them in the chest, cracking his ribs and knocking the breath out of him. The buffeted guard fell to his knees, wheezing a moan of shock and pain. The other guard instinctively stepped to his aid, but, seeing that his partner was not injured seriously, stood up to charge after Giordino. Only Giordino was no longer there, having ducked back behind the column. The guard stumbled toward the column, then stopped when he detected footsteps behind him. He turned in time to see the butt of Pitt's .45 strike his temple just beneath his helmet.