Andy McDermott - The Hunt For Atlantis

“Arr, matey!” said Chase with a nasty smile as he raised his hands. “Going for the pirate look, are you?”

Starkman regarded him coldly. “I see your sense of humor’s as lousy as ever.”

“Don’t you mean you half see?”

Starkman’s face tightened for a moment before he turned his attention to Nina. “Dr. Wilde! I’m so glad to meet you again.”

Chase and Kari both moved protectively in front of her. “Leave her alone,” Kari snapped.

Starkman raised an eyebrow. “Kari Frost. Never thought I’d meet you in person. Hajjar should have taken Giovanni up on his offer, it would have saved us all a lot of trouble.” He gestured with his gun, his men advancing. Overhead, the helicopter circled-followed by a second Halo, the downdraft from the two enormous aircraft setting the trees thrashing as if caught in a hurricane.

“What happened to the Indians?” Nina demanded.

“Most of them ran off,” said Starkman. He looked over at the corpses. “The smart ones, anyway. Some of them actually thought they could take us on.”

The other men started to search Chase, Kari and Nina. “What do you intend to do with us, Starkman?” asked Kari, her eyes narrowed. “Kill us?”

“Yup.” The casual way in which he said it turned Nina’s blood to ice. “But first, I want to find out what’s in that temple.” He turned away as he took a radio from his belt, giving Nina a better look at the piece of hardware on his back. It was a grappling hook, as she’d thought, but it was protruding from what looked like a fat-barreled shotgun. Most of his other team members were similarly equipped. “Eagle Leader to entry team, come in.”

“What is it with you Yanks and eagles?” Chase taunted. “I had you pegged as more of a budgie.”

Starkman clicked his fingers. One of his men, a mountain of muscle almost a foot taller than Chase, balled his fists together and clubbed the Englishman at the base of his neck. Chase dropped to his knees.

“Eddie!” Nina gasped.

Starkman looked surprised. “On a first-name basis with the clients, Eddie? Or… is she something more? You should be careful about that, you know what happens.”

“You shut your fucking mouth,” Chase growled. Starkman smirked, and seemed about to say something else when his radio crackled.

“Entry team to Eagle Leader,” said the man on the other end. “We’re in the temple, and we’ve located the stolen artifact. It’s in a smaller chamber behind a statue. Jason, this place is incredible!”

“I’m sure it is,” Starkman said dismissively. “What else have you found, Günter?”

“You won’t believe this, but there’s a map here, an actual map! It’s scribed onto a huge orichalcum sheet on one wall. It shows the location of Atlantis!”

Starkman became a lot less dismissive. “How accurate is it?”

“The continents are quite distorted, but recognizable. And there’s something else, Jason. The map… it shows the positions of landmarks relative to Atlantis. We can use them to work out Atlantis’s exact position!” The man’s voice became more excited. “The northern mouth of the Amazon is marked as being at latitude seven south, just as it said on the artifact Yuri stole, and the Cape of Good Hope is at… there are six dots and an inverted V. We know from our archives that this symbol first appears after eight single units, so it must represent nine. Nine plus six equals latitude fifteen.”

“The Cape ’s at thirty-four degrees south,” Starkman informed him. “The top of the Amazon delta’s at about one degree north.”

“A difference of thirty-five degrees, then, with fifteen minus seven, eight Atlantean units of longitude between them. So one unit is thirty-five divided by eight…” The radio fell silent for a few seconds as he made the calculation. “It’s 4.375 degrees!”

“So what latitude is Atlantis at?” Starkman asked.

“Let me check on the laptop… 4.375 multiplied by seven is 30.625 degrees, and add one degree to account for the position of the delta… Atlantis is located somewhere between thirty-one and thirty-two degrees north!”

Starkman gave Nina a mocking look. “That’s quite a way south of the Gulf of Cádiz. Guess we didn’t need to worry about your theory after all.”

Nina said nothing. The map in the temple had clearly placed Atlantis within the Gulf of Cádiz. The shapes of the continents had been inaccurate, but surely the Atlanteans couldn’t have been that far out?

Günter spoke again. “Even allowing for errors-the Atlantean system is not as precise as ours-a sonar sweep of the area should only take a few days.”

“And then we can make sure nobody ever finds Atlantis,” said Starkman with rising excitement. “Good work, Günter. Plant the thermite charges and prep for evac. Melt the place down.”

“You’re going to destroy it?” Kari cried, appalled.

Starkman fixed her with a cold stare. “We’ll do whatever we have to do to stop people like you and your father from finding Atlantis.”

“The greatest archaeological find in history, and all you care about is destroying it so your insane boss can keep the knowledge for himself?” said Nina, her fear overcome by her utter disgust. “You make me sick.”

Starkman snorted in disbelief. “Jesus. You really don’t have a clue what’s going on, do you?”

“Why don’t you enlighten me?” she sneered.

“You think your friend Kari here and her dad are looking for Atlantis as a hobby?” said Starkman. “You know how much money they’ve spent? Tens of millions of dollars, maybe hundreds ! Even for a billionaire, that’s one hell of a hobby!”

“We’re doing it for a good reason,” said Kari. “Unlike Qobras.”

“I know what your reasons are. That’s why I joined up with Giovanni.” He looked questioningly at Nina, then back to Kari. “But does she know? Did you even bother to tell her why you’re so desperate to find Atlantis?”

“As long as they don’t want to destroy it, that’s good enough for me,” Nina told him. Kari gave her an admiring look.

“You might have changed your mind,” Starkman said as his radio squawked again. “Not that you’ll get the chance now.”

“Eagle Leader, we’ve got everything we need. Setting the charges,” said Günter.

“Roger that.” Starkman looked up. The two Halos were still following their slow circle, about two hundred feet above the ground. He switched radio channels. “Chopper two, this is Eagle Leader. Move into pickup position.”

“Roger,” replied the pilot. One of the helicopters wheeled lazily about to head for the temple. More ropes dropped from its side.

“Well, I guess this is the end,” said Starkman, looking back at his prisoners. “Sorry about this, Eddie, but I’ve got my orders.”

“You can take your fake sympathy and shove it up your arse, you two-faced twat,” Chase snarled. “I should’ve let those al-Qaeda wankers kill you in Afghanistan.”

“The world’ll be glad you didn’t. Good-bye, Eddie.” Starkman gestured to his men, who forced Nina and Kari down onto their knees next to Chase.

Nina felt the cold, hard barrel of a gun touch the back of her head. She closed her eyes…

And heard a hissing noise.

Thok!

The man behind her let out a wet, bubbling gasp before crashing to the ground. Nina opened her eyes to see spears and arrows flying overhead. One of the men behind Philby took an arrow to his leg. He grimaced, then reached to pull it out… only for his eyes to bulge wide. Fingers spasming, struggling to breathe, he collapsed.

Poisoned!

Starkman whirled-and was hit in the chest by another arrow. But it struck only his Kevlar body armor, not flesh. “Open fire!” he shouted, taking cover by the nearest hut as he raised his UMP-40 and unleashed it into the surrounding trees.