The smell of dust and decay filled the room. Sealed for close to seventy years, the feeling of intruding on hallowed ground seeped into Mitchell’s thoughts. However, this wasn’t hallowed ground. What had been going on in this room was criminal.
Mitchell shone his light around. He was surprised to see that the room was far larger than he expected. Dug well back into the side of the volcano, the room resembled an old, abandoned factory. Rusted-out pieces of machinery filled the spacious room. Several dusty worktables covered with tools, unfinished projects, and design drawings were lined up neatly against the left side of the room.
Behind Mitchell, Yuri easily slipped inside while Jackson fought to force his frame past the heavy metal door. A couple of seconds later, a panting Jackson stood beside Mitchell.
“Well, I’ll be damned,” said Jackson as he looked at relics of a war long past spread out throughout the room.
“We don’t have too much time,” said Mitchell to his friends. “Nate, I need you to watch the door, while Yuri and I try to find out what we can on what exactly was being built in this room.”
Jackson nodded and then made his way back to the door. He turned off his flashlight, and dug out his NVGs and placed them on his head. No point in advertising their whereabouts any more than they had to, reasoned Jackson.
Yuri headed for the nearest table and was about to pick up a dust-covered book when Mitchell grabbed his hand from behind.
“Wait a second,” cautioned Mitchell as he shone his light along the table. Pulling Yuri a couple of steps back, Mitchell pointed to the desk. The shadow of a thin trip wire led back to where it had been tied to on the old book. Mitchell followed the wire along the table and saw that the wire was connected to a hand grenade placed inside a small wooden box. As soon as Yuri would have picked up the book, the trip wire would have released the safety clip on the grenade, allowing it to detonate, killing Yuri and anyone else unlucky enough to be close by.
“Jesus, I never saw that,” said Yuri, his voice shaky and scared.
“Luckily, I saw plenty of these in Afghanistan. They’re easy to find if you know what you’re looking for,” said Mitchell calmly.
“I’m a pilot and a smuggler, not a soldier like you, Ryan.”
“Well, I still need you in one piece to help us discover what was going on in here. Why don’t I lead and you follow in my footsteps?”
“Da, brilliant plan,” replied Yuri, wiping the sweat from his brow.
Carefully, Mitchell began to methodically search each table against the wall, looking for any more booby traps, while Yuri tried to find anything that might help solve the mystery.
Jackson peered over his shoulder as Mitchell and Yuri began their search. They were moving far too slow. It would take them hours to search the room at the pace they were going. It was only a matter to time before Cypher’s goons caught up with them and the last place he wanted to be was trapped in a room with no way out.
A couple more minutes passed. So far, the search had turned up nothing of value. Mitchell was beginning to think that they were wasting their time and that they should leave when Yuri tapped him on his shoulder. Mitchell’s eyes widened when he saw hanging from a strong metal winch was the oddest bomb he had ever laid his eyes on. It looked like something from a Jules Verne novel or a cheap science-fiction film. This had to be the device the Russians had been working on when the war ended. It was about seven meters in length and had large tail fins on the back of the bomb to keep it stable as it fell, but the nose of the weapon was what caught his attention. A large tapered drill with rows of sharp teeth for digging through rock was not what Mitchell had ever expected to find on a bomb. The shell of the bomb was open. Shining his flashlight inside, he could see that the device was unarmed. The explosive charge had never been placed inside the deadly bomb.
“Ryan, look past the bomb,” said Yuri as if he had just seen a ghost.
Mitchell moved his light and almost jumped back when he saw the skeletal remains of five men. Their empty eye sockets seemed to be staring right at him, sending a chill down his spine. They looked like they had been tied to their chairs and then shot in the head, one by one. Their old white lab coats had turned yellow with age and hung loose off their bones.
“The Russian scientists, I presume,” said Mitchell.
“This place is creeping me out,” said Yuri, looking over at his dead countrymen.
Mitchell had to agree. The room was like being inside a tomb lost to the ravages of time. “Come on, let’s see if we can find something on the corpses, and then get the hell out of here.”
After quickly checking the skeletons for booby traps, Mitchell and Yuri began to go through the dead men’s clothes, looking for anything, no matter how small, that might help them.
With a look of disgust on his face, Yuri reluctantly pulled open the dusty lab coat of the skeleton nearest him. His discomfort rose as he looked into the empty chest cavity of the skeleton. He was about to move onto the next man when he spotted something out of the corner of his eye lying on the floor beside the chair. Carefully bending down, he saw that it was a thick wad of paper, rolled up tightly. He reached over, grabbed hold of the paper and picked it up. Blowing off the years of dust, Yuri waited for the thick cloud to dissipate.
A second later, a smile emerged on his face. “Ryan, these are blueprints for the bomb.”
“Are you sure?”
“I can read Russian. Trust me; these were probably hidden in the coat of the poor soul tied to this chair. When his body decomposed, they must have fallen to the ground and laid there ever since.”
“Thank God, let’s get out of here.”
The sound of Jackson opening fire startled both Mitchell and Yuri, who instinctively went for their weapons.
Their time had run out — they were trapped.
37
Tara broke out in a cold sweat the second she heard the sound of automatic gunfire tearing through the air.
In front of her, the lead thug’s head snapped back. Blood and gore splattered the tunnel wall.
With animal-like reflexes, she jumped back, disappearing safely around the corner of the tunnel.
Another burst of gunfire hit the concrete wall where she had been standing barely a second ago, striking the wall harmlessly.
“What happened?” asked Atsuko, her voice betraying her fear.
“We lost the man on point,” replied Tara coldly.
“We should get out of here before anyone else dies,” said Atsuko.
Tara looked into Atsuko’s terrified eyes. “Not yet, Miss Satomi. We haven’t finished what we came to do.”
With that remark, fear turned Atsuko’s mouth drier than the Sahara under a blistering noonday sun. She wasn’t a fighter. She knew that she couldn’t wrestle a weapon away from one of the guards if she tried. Atsuko knew she was going to die soon.
“Talk to me, Nate,” called out Mitchell.
“The bad guys have found us. Dropped one, but I saw another dive for cover. Not sure how many of them are out there,” replied Jackson.
“Close the door and get back here.”
Quickly throwing his weight behind the door, Jackson pushed the heavy metal door closed. Outside, he could hear the sound of bullets ricocheting off the door. It was far too thick for any small-arms fire to penetrate.
Carefully making his way over beside Mitchell, Jackson removed his NVGs and wondered what his friend was thinking. He had just closed the only way in or out of the room.