Matthew Reilly - Area 7

1-A1) disabled per

\ low power

protocol

area 7

295

TIME KEY ACTION OPERATOR

SYSTEM

RESPONSE

08:38:00

18:58:00

09:04:43

09:08:00

09:18:00

39:28:00

WARNING

Aux System

Auxiliary

rapacity: 25f WARNING:

Auxiliary

power

capacity: 15C

Lockdown

special

release

command

entered

(terminal

3-A2)

WARNING:

077-01E

Aux System

Auxiliary

power

capacity: 10%

WARNING: Aux System

Auxiliary

power

capacity: r)°/o

WARNING: Aux System

power

rapacity: 0%

lerminal 1-A2

responum

Terminal 1-A2

Door 62-E

opened

utiate system

ate system

reboot?

Commence

system

shutdown

"Jesus, we've been running on auxiliary power since

eight o'clock!" the senior console operator said.

Colonel Harper stepped forward. "But that should have

kept us going for at least three hours, enough time to reboot

the main power supply."

While they spoke, Caesar gazed at the computer screen,

at the entry:

296 Matthew Reilly

09:04:43 Lockdown 077-01E Door62E

special opened

release

command

entered

(terminal

3A2)

The "77" prefix indicated a member of the 7th

Squadron. "E" stood for Echo Unit; and "01," its leader, Cobra

Carney.

Caesar's eyes narrowed. It appeared that during the last

lockdown window period, Cobra Carney had opened Door

62-E--the eastern X-rail blast door down on Level 6 ...

Jerome Harper and the radioman were still debating the

power situation.

"It should have, yes," the radioman said. "But it appears

the system only had half power: when it kicked in, so it only

lasted an hour and a half--"

The senior man's monitor blinked out. It was the last

one to go.

Then, all at once, the overhead lights in the control

room went out.

Caesar and the console operators were devoured by

darkness.

Caesar spun, turned to look out through the windows

overlooking the enormous ground-level hangar. He saw the

bright halogen lights running along the length of the hangar

shut off in sequence, one after the other after the other.

The hangar--and all its contents: Marine One, the destroyed

cockroach towing vehicles, the blasted-open

Nighthawk Two, the overhead crane system--was consumed

by inky blackness.

"All systems down," someone said in the darkness.

"The whole complex has lost power."

down in the AWACS plane on level 2, libby gant and

the others were preparing to head up through the underground

area 7

base, to locate and take out Caesar Russell's control

room, when without warning every single light in the subterranean hangar went out.

The gigantic hangar was plunged into darkness.

Pitch darkness.

Gant flicked on the pencil-sized flashlight attached to

the barrel of her MP-10. Its thin beam illuminated her face.

"The power," Mother whispered. "Why would they cut

the power?"

"Yeah," Juliet said, "surely that would only make it harder to find us."

"Maybe they had no choice in the matter," Gant said.

"What does this mean for us?" the President asked

coming up beside them.

"It doesn't change the plan," Gant said. "We're still going

for the command center. What we have to figure out

though, is how it affects this environment."

At that moment, from somewhere deep within the bowels

of the complex, they heard a scream--a wild scream; human,

but at the same time, somehow not human; the

terror-inspiring howl of a seriously deranged individual.

"Oh, Jesus," Gant breathed. "The prisoners. They're

out."

FIFTH CONFRONTATION

3 July/ 0930 Hours

UNITED STATES AIR FORCE

SPECIAL AREA (RESTRICTION) NO.7

0930 HOURS

GROUND LEVEL: Main Hangar

LEVEL 1: Hangar Bay

LEVEL 2: Hangar Bay

LEVEL 3: Living Quarters

LEVEL 4: Laboratories

LEVEL 5:

LEVEL 6: X-rail platform

ABOUT TEN MINUTES BEFORE THE POWER WENT OFF AT AREA 7,

a chunky CH-53E Super Stallion transport helicopter was

sinking slowly through the aqua-green water of Lake Powell.

It made for a peculiar sight.

With its tail section completely blown apart, the chopper

sank rear end first, almost vertical, its open loading ramp

swallowing water by the ton. Against the hazy green backdrop

of the water all around it, it looked as if the Super Stallion

was free-falling in silent ultra-slow motion.

Thin streams of bubbles weaved their way to the surface

above it—the same bubbles that were being watched by the

two Air Force Penetrators hovering above the lake.

Shane Schofield and Buck Riley Jr. stared out through

the sinking helicopter's Lexan windshield—looking straight

up.

They saw the water's surface high above them, rippling

like a glass lens, fifty feet away and getting more and more

distant.

Beyond the distorted lens of water they could make out

the twin images of the Penetrator attack choppers hovering

above the surface, waiting for them to emerge, if they dared.

In the water all around them, a bizarre yet extraordinary

underwater landscape revealed itself. Giant boulders rested

on the lakebed, desert trails that had once been dry land

twisted and turned, there was even a giant submerged cliff

that soared upward, disappearing above the water's surface.

The submerged desert world appeared as a ghostly pale

green.

302

Matthew Reilly

Book II turned to Schofield. "If you've got any more

magic escape plans, now would be the time to use them."

"Sorry," Schofield said. "I'm all out."

Behind them--or rather, below them--water was flooding

up into the cargo bay. It rose quickly through the hold,

entering the helicopter via the wide-open loading ramp and

any other orifice it could find.

Thankfully, the cockpit was airtight, so at seventy feet

down, the still-sinking helicopter reached equilibrium--and

an air pocket formed in the upturned cockpit, the same way

a drinking cup submerged upside-down in a bathtub will

form an air bubble.

The helicopter glided downwards until, at ninety feet, it

hit the bottom.

A billowing cloud of silt exploded all around the Super

Stallion as its destroyed tail section impacted against the

floor of the lake and came to rest--still upright--against a

massive submerged boulder.

"We haven't got much time," Schofield said. "This air

will go bad real fast."

"What do we do?" Book II said. "If we stay, we die. If

we swim to the surface, we die."

"There has to be something ..." Schofield said, almost

to himself.

"What do you mean?"

"There has to be a reason ..."

"What are you talking about?" Book II said angrily. "A

reason for what?"

Schofield spun to face him. "A reason why Botha

stopped here. In this spot. He didn't stop here for the hell of

it. He had a reason to drop anchor here--"

And then Schofield saw it.

"Oh, you cunning bastard ..." he breathed.

He was staring out over Book II's shoulder, out into the

murky green haze of the underwater world.

Book II spun, and he saw it, too.

"Oh my God ..." he whispered.

There, partially obscured by the aqua-green mist of the

area 7

water, was a structure--not a boulder or a rock formation,

but a distinctly man-made structure--a structure which

looked totally out of place in the green underwater world of