Up ahead she thought she could hear something other than the sound of turbines. It creaked and cracked, as an open fire would. Slowly she progressed, walking ten or so feet and then stopping to listen. Her ears sensitive to the slightest change in sound, and expecting to hear someone come out to grab her at any moment, Billie clenched her fists.
But no one came for her.
She continued walking through the passageway. It was long. Much longer than any submarine she’d ever been on, not that she’d been on many. Still she expected that whatever type of submersible she was aboard, required hundreds of people to sail — but despite walking for several minutes now, she’d seen no evidence of anyone.
I’m on a deserted ghost ship?
Billie wasn’t immediately certain that she preferred that any more than discovering it was swarming with submariners. At least then, she’d have answers. Besides, if they didn’t let her die in the first place, that meant they needed her alive.
Determined to take control of the only thing left to her, she decided not to continue slinking around quietly like a cat in an alley.
She whistled loudly.
The sound echoed through the empty hull.
“I’m awake! You may as well come out. I know you don’t want to kill me, or else you wouldn’t have dressed my wounds. So come out!”
There was no response.
A thousand tiny prickles teased the nerve endings of her skin. Perhaps she really was on a ghost ship. But why? Why go through the trouble of abducting her — healing her — only to abandon her below the surface of the ocean?
No, someone will come.
But they didn’t, so she continued walking through the passageway. Although narrow, it had nearly six feet of head room above. That meant she was most likely on an American sub — after all, no other navy in the world believed in such luxuries for its sailors.
At the end of the room, she saw an old man who most likely was nearing his early eighties. He was sitting and reading a book in a recliner chair. Next to him was a large heat light, built to look like a fire.
It crackled, like a real fire.
The man smiled warmly, but did not stand up as she approached.
“Hello Dr. Swan. I was hoping you’d wake up soon. We have a lot of work to do and it’s time we get started.”
Billie looked at the old man. “Started? What are we doing?”
He carefully placed a bookmark in the old leather-bound book he’d been reading and then closed it. With an omniscient grin, he replied, “Why, saving Atlantis, of course.”
Chapter Fifteen
“So, that’s what this is about.” Billie looked at the old man, her fear replaced with curiosity, as confidence dawned on her that she could probably kill him with her bare hands. “You heard that I had a new lead and decided that you could reap the rewards?”
“Reap the rewards?” he asked, a curious look on his face.
“The golden city. Or, city covered in the gold rich alloy, Orichalcum.”
Laughing, the man sat up and said, “So you don’t know then, do you?”
“Know what?”
“Atlantis, my dear, for the most part, was stolen nearly 150 years ago.”
“How could you possibly know that?”
“I should know. After all, it was my grandfather who did the stealing.”
“So, if you didn’t kidnap me to find the treasures hidden inside Atlantis, why am I here?”
“First of all, I never kidnapped you. I protected you from them. And I would have thought you’d be more grateful for it, on that matter.”
“Then can I leave…” she began to protest, but he stopped her.
“Second. We need to find Atlantis, before they do, and stop the countdown, which we both know you started.”
Billie already knew the precise location of Atlantis. She’d been there only just last week. But instead of finding answers, she had found more questions and discovered that she had inadvertently restarted a timer that should have been permanently stopped.
But there was no way she was going to let this man know.
“Who are they?”
“They…” the man coughed. A deep throaty cough. “They call themselves the Phoenix Resistance. And have served a useful purpose for nearly 11,000 years, too. They protected the secret of Atlantis. But, like all brotherhoods, they are run by people. And people, well — let’s face it, people are corruptible, ignorant, and most of all, stupid.”
Billie examined the man’s appearance and decided that he could be dying. Maybe lung cancer or something. Hell what did she care? The man had kidnapped her.
“What happened to them?”
“Over the course of that time, the Phoenix Resistance, in the process of trying to maintain the secret of Atlantis, managed to lose it altogether on three separate occasions. The most recent, of course, being nearly 200 years ago, when their plan to bury it ended in its disappearance entirely.”
She repeated the words “Phoenix Resistance.” She’d never heard of them.
“For the most part, they carry on, biding their time, until evidence of its reemergence comes into light. As it did with your recent discovery of the looking glass and the existence of Atlantis.”
“How could you possibly know of that?”
“Let’s just say that money’s not a problem for me. And, I keep tabs on a number of leading archeologists around the world, just on the off chance that such an event occurs, sending into motion a dangerous set of events.”
“What events?”
“Why, the end of the world of course.”
Billie couldn’t hide her response. “So, it’s true then.”
“Yes, and given that you entered all but the inner sanctum last week — that means that we now have a little under five weeks remaining to save the world.”
“Who are you?” she asked.
“My name’s Edward Worthington, and my grandfather, Hank Worthington, stole the great wealth of Atlantis, before he too discovered its secret. He decided to bury its very existence, so that no others should fall into the trap.”
Billie sat down.
“Okay, Mr. Worthington, if what you say is true, why didn’t you simply contact me? Why did you go through the effort of nearly getting me killed?”
“Ah, that I’m afraid I brought upon you, but had no idea I was doing so until it was too late.”
“What do you mean? You didn’t realize you ordered one of your goons to try and kill me?”
“No, you see, I paid a man who specialized in rare and often unattainable products. I sought his assistance when I discovered that you were on the close tail of finding Atlantis. Unfortunately, I had no idea that the very man I employed just so happened to be a sleeper cell for the head of the Phoenix Resistance. I fear something you did while you were in Amsterdam triggered something that made him realize who you were, and why I was after you.”
“Who was after me?”
Mr. Worthington brought up a picture on a hologram in front of them. The man was in a blue suit, clean shaven, and carrying a suitcase. He appeared quite handsome, had he not been trying to kill her or at least abduct her only yesterday.
“His name is Andrew Brandt. This was him three days ago when I paid him 5 million dollars as a down payment to bring you to me.”
Her eyes looked at the man for a second and then realized she’s seem him before. “The man with blond hair in a red baseball cap!”
“Excuse me?”
“He was at the National Archives center in Amsterdam!”
“That’s possible.”
“But now we need to find Atlantis, before they do. And the clock is ticking.”