The Doomsday Key (Sigma Force 6)

“Down here…a warhead…We’ll try to…”

Static cut off the rest.

Before Monk could relate the bad news to Creed, a rumbling echoed over the mountains, accompanied by the whining roar of snowmobiles.

They all turned.

Down the mountainside, a cluster of vehicles slowly wound up from the lower valley, heading their way.

Monk lifted his binoculars and focused on one of the snowmobiles. Men were double mounted. While one drove, the other had a rifle up on a shoulder. They were all dressed in polar suits. Snow-white, with no military insignia.

A stray Norwegian soldier had somehow made it halfway down the mountain already. He waved at the approaching party.

A rifle cracked.

Blood spattered against the white snow.

The soldier dropped.

Monk lowered his binoculars.

Someone had come to clean house.

1:09 P.M.

Painter didn’t know if his radio transmission got out. He had plugged the SQUID into the wall and hoped for the best.

All he could do now was run.

He pushed a caterer’s serving trolley ahead of him. Strapped on top with bungee cords was the warhead. He sprinted up the hundred and fifty yards of the tunnel.

The LED display glowed back at him.

04:15

As he ran, he watched it tick down below the four-minute mark. At last, he spotted the outer blast door at the top of the exit ramp. It had been left open by the guard who had peeked out. Chunks of ice had spilled inside, but beyond the door was a solid wall of broken glacier.

With a surge of speed, he shot up the ramp. He wanted the charge placed as close to that opening as possible. Reaching the top, Painter shoved the trolley cart toward the door, spun on a toe, and sprinted in the opposite direction.

At least it was all downhill from here.

He fled, breath gasping, trying to lengthen his stride.

If he couldn’t stop the bomb, he might as well make use of it. He didn’t know how thick the plug of ice was over the door, but the warhead’s thermobaric payload was unique. The initial blast could help break some of the ice; then, as the cloud of fluorinated aluminum ignited, the searing heat would vaporize and melt more. But it was upon the secondary blast wave that Painter pinned all his hopes.

The biggest threat of a thermobaric bomb was its sudden and massive burst of pressure. Exploded inside caves or closed buildings, the pressure wave would travel outward and kill around corners and far down passageways. It pulverized and sheared flesh. Burst eardrums, exploded lungs, squeezed blood out of every orifice.

Painter hoped it could also blast out that plug of ice, pop it free like a champagne cork.

But, of course, without crushing them all to pulp in the meantime.

As he hit the bottom of the tunnel, he sprinted into the lower cross passage. He skidded around the corner and sped to the center air lock.

He ripped the door open, heard the pressure pop, then slammed the hatch shut behind him. Air valves in the ceiling chugged to bring the pressure back up. As Painter crossed the air lock, the door flew open ahead of him.

Senator Gorman held it and waved Painter into the seed room. “Hurry!”

Painter dove through. Gorman closed the door with a steel clang.

A crowd gathered around the door, keeping together despite the size of the vault. The seed bank itself was unremarkable, just a cavernous room full of numbered shelves. Identical black storage bins filled the racks, like a warehouse club that sold only one item.

Someone in the group was counting down loudly.

“Eleven…ten…nine…”

Painter had barely made it back in time. After breaking the air lock seal, he prayed the pressure had a chance to rebuild in time. Their best chance to survive the coming blast was to fight pressure with pressure.

If the air lock didn’t hold, they’d all be crushed.

“Eight…seven…six…”

Karlsen pushed through to join Painter. His eyes were wide. “Krista’s not here,” he said, as if Painter knew what that meant.

Someone else did. “Krista…Krista Magnussen? Jason’s girlfriend?”

Anger flashed in Senator Gorman’s voice.

Painter shoved the two men apart. “Later.”

First, they had to survive.

The countdown continued.

“Five…four…three…”

21

October 13, 12:32 P.M.

Bardsey Island, Wales

As Gray prepared to descend into the crypt, the true heart of the storm rolled over Bardsey Island. It was as if the gods themselves warned against violating the tomb.

With a crack of thunder, the skies opened up. Rain poured down in large drops that shattered like bombs upon gravestones and markers. To the north, lightning crackled in forking chains.

“I’ll go first,” Gray said between thunderclaps.

The boy Lyle had run to the nearby chapel house to fetch a rope. But with the rain falling so hard, Gray feared the tomb could flood before any of them had a chance to search it.

The crypt’s opening was a hole in the ground about two feet wide, barely enough room for one person to climb through. It dropped seven feet to a stone floor. Below, it was wider, maybe twice as large as the opening. He couldn’t see more without going down.

Grabbing the sides, Gray lowered himself into the hole. He used his legs to brace himself, then dropped the rest of the way down. He landed in a crouch and freed his flashlight.

He stared up at the others’ faces.

“Be careful,” Rachel said.

“Let me know what you see,” Wallace added.

Both Kowalski and Seichan hung farther back.

Gray clicked on his flashlight and searched the main shaft. The sides were natural rock archways that framed brick walls, slightly inset. He imagined coffins and moldering bones behind those bricks. And perhaps one of those bodies was Lord Newborough’s.

As rain sluiced down the walls, Gray took the time to examine each surface. He ran his hands over them, searching for loose stones, some indication that Father Giovanni had been here and discovered something.

“Well?” Wallace called down.

“Nothing.”

Rachel pulled away, but her voice reached him. “Lyle’s coming back with the rope.”

Gray turned his attention to the fourth wall. Here the bricks framed a low archway, barely taller than midthigh. Crouching, Gray shone his light down into it. The space was plainly meant to hold a coffin. Afterward, the archway would have been walled up like the others. But currently the niche was empty.

He knew the hole had to be important. This wall faced the ruins of the abbey’s tower. Dropping to his hands and knees in the pooled water, Gray crawled into the niche. It was deep. Beyond the opening, the bricks disappeared and solid rock surrounded him. Gray worked slowly to the back of the tomb.