White House Press Briefing regarding the “Flash Flu” Outbreak

Adam Rice (WH Press Secretary): Good morning everyone. I’m going to read a brief statement, then I’ll take a few questions. “The President and his administration are taking steps to assess and address the health concern the media is referring to as ‘The Flash Flu.’ Earlier today, The President ordered the CDC to dedicate all available resources to assessing the threat. Pending the results of that assessment, the White House may take further actions to ensure every American’s safety.”

Rice: The President has said repeatedly that closing the borders is a last resort. We know what the impact would be on American businesses, both large and small. Look, we understand there’s a public health issue here. But there’s also an economic risk. Closing the borders poses a very real risk to the American economy. The flu may affect many Americans, but closing the borders would definitely cause an immediate recession that would endanger more Americans — especially those at or below the poverty level — than a flu outbreak. We’re taking a balanced approach here. The President is not going to put anyone at risk — whether it’s at the hands of the flu or a trade recession.

Reporter: What’s your official response to the reports from Asia, the Middle East, and Europe?

Rice: We’re taking them seriously, but we’re also conducting a careful, balanced review of the information. We’re still working with incomplete information, and frankly, we don’t think all of it is reliable.

Rice: Look, as for the videos on the internet, it’s one of those things, you know, where you’re going to see the worst. No one makes a YouTube video about themselves sitting at home, healthy as can be, eating cereal or doing aerobics. They, you know, make these videos when there’s something sensational. We’ve all seen them at this point, some Japanese guy sitting at a sushi bar and puking blood everywhere, a lady at the grocery store collapsing in the vegetable aisle with white ooze running from her nose and fingernails. Hey, look, we’ve seen them and there are going to be more of them. If you live your life based on what you see on YouTube, you’re going to make some pretty poor decisions, and that’s what we’re trying to avoid here. It’s not even clear if these videos are real, and if they are, they could be related to any number of acute health issues.

The sunset over the Bay of Gibraltar was breathtaking. Soft shades of red, orange, and pink met the deep blue water of the Atlantic in the distance. About 100 yards away, the harbor ended and the rock rose out of the sea and land. Its gray and black clashed with the burning rays of sunlight sliding down its side.

Kate pulled the glass door back and walked out onto the tile-covered porch four stories above the streets of the harbor. Below her, armed guards patrolled the large house. A warm Mediterranean breeze engulfed her, and Kate leaned against the rail.

Behind her, she heard a wave of laughter erupt around the table. David’s eyes met hers. He looked so happy there, sitting among the dozen other Clocktower Station Chiefs and Agents — the survivors of the fall of Clocktower; now, “The Resistance.” From out here, if she didn’t know any better, she’d think it was just a reunion of old college friends, kidding, sharing stories, and planning tomorrow’s escapades for tailgating and a big football game. But she knew they were making plans for the assault on Immari Gibraltar’s headquarters. The conversation had veered into technical discussions of tactics, debates about the building’s layout, and questions about whether the schematics and other intel they had were reliable. Kate had drifted out onto the porch, like a new girlfriend who clearly wasn’t part of the core group.

On the plane ride from India, she and David had talked openly, for the first time without any guards or hesitation. She told him about losing her child; how she met a man who disappeared into thin air at almost the moment she’d gotten pregnant. She left San Francisco for Jakarta a week after the miscarriage, and she had thrown herself into her work and autism research in the years that followed.

David had been just as forthcoming. He had told Kate about his fiance dying in the 9/11 attacks and how he was badly injured, almost paralyzed; then about his recovery and his decision to dedicate himself to finding the people responsible. A week ago, Kate would have brushed off his assertions about the Immari and a global conspiracy, but she had just nodded on the plane. She didn’t know how the pieces fit together, but she believed him.

They had slept after they talked, as if the release had brought the respite. But for Kate, it was a sporadic, restless slumber, mostly because of the plane’s noise and partly because it was hard to sleep in the chair. Every time Kate awoke, David was always asleep. She imagined he did the same, watching her until he fell asleep again. She still had so much to say to him. When she woke up the last time, the plane was making its final approach at the Gibraltar airfield. David gazed out the plane window, and when he saw that Kate was awake, he said, “Remember, don’t say anything about the journal, Tibet, or the China facility until we know more. I’m still not sure about this.”

Clocktower agents swarmed the plane the second they landed, and they were whisked away to the home. She and David had barely said a word since.

Behind her, the door slid open, and Kate turned quickly, smiling, hoping. It was Howard Keegan, the Director of Clocktower. Kate’s smile faded instantly, and she hoped the man hadn’t seen it. He stepped out and closed the door. “May I join you, Dr. Warner?”

Keegan stood beside her at the rail, not leaning and not looking at Kate. He stared out into the darkening bay. He was clearly in his 60s, but he was fit. Robust.

A chill ran through Kate. She tried to lighten the mood. “You’re that confiden—”

“I am. Tomorrow’s outcome has been planned for years now.” He motioned to the streets and the guards below. “Those aren’t Clocktower agents. They’re Immari Security. As are the guards inside. Tomorrow, the last of the non-Immari agents within Clocktower will die, including David.”

Kate pushed off the rail and looked back at the table where the men were still laughing and pointing. “I don’t un—”

“Don’t turn around. I’m here to make you an offer.” Keegan’s voice was a whisper.

“His life. In exchange for yours. You will leave here tonight, in a few hours, when everyone has knocked off. They’ll go to bed early; the raid is at dawn.”

“Am I? I don’t want to kill him. I’m genuinely fond of him. We’re just on different sides of the coin. Chance. But we want you, badly.”

“You survived the Bell. It’s the key to everything we’ve done. We have to understand it. I won’t lie; you’ll be questioned, then studied, but he will be spared. Look at your options. We can simply kill those agents inside right now. It’s messier, here in a residential neighborhood, but acceptable. We’ve held this operation open too long as it is, waiting, seeing who would come in, hoping he would call. There’s more. If you’re clever in your negotiations, you may be able to free the children, or perhaps trade yourself for them. They’re being held at the same facility.” Keegan looked Kate in the eyes. “Now what’s your answer?” She swallowed and nodded. “Ok.”

“There’s one more thing. From the recordings on the plane. You and Vale mention a journal. We want it. We’ve been looking for it for a very long time.”

A surge of relief swept over Robert Hunt when he saw the snowmobile parked outside the small, white-walled barracks at Drill Site Seven. He parked his snowmobile and ran inside. The men were warming themselves beside the wall heater. Both rose when he entered.

“I know. It’s ok,” Robert said. He surveyed the room. Exactly like the last six. He glanced over at the radio. “Have they called—”

Robert thought about what to say. “What did you tell them?” The answer would tell him where they shook out in all this.

“We didn’t answer the first call. The second said they were sending backup. We told them you were working on the drill, and we needed no assistance. What did you see?”

The last question sent Robert’s mind racing. What if they’re testing me? What if they talked to the employer and they have orders to kill me? Can I trust them? “I didn’t…” Winters started.

I’ve worked an oil rig in the Gulf my whole life, and I know we ain’t drilling for oil, so why don’t you tell us what you saw?”

Robert sat at the small table with the radio. He suddenly felt so tired. And hungry. He pulled his hood off, then his gloves. “I’m still not sure. There were monkeys. They killed them with something. Then I saw kids, in a glass cage.”

Kate tried to estimate the distance between the balconies. Four feet? Five feet? Could she make it? Below, she heard a guard walking by, and she crept back into her room. She listened. The “crunch, crunch, crunch” of fine gravel under the man’s feet slowly faded into the distance. She returned to the balcony.

She stepped to the edge and put one leg over, straddling the rail, then cartwheeled the other leg over. She stood on the four inch lip outside the rails, which she held with both hands behind her back. Could she make it?

She reached a leg out, holding the rail with one hand, like a ballet dancer in a lunge during a high note. She extended as far as she could, felt her grip slipping on the rail, and almost fell. She reeled back just in time and slammed back into the rail. She was going to break her neck. The other balcony was just out of reach — less than two feet.

She leaned back against the rail and was about to jump for it when the door on the other balcony slid open and David walked out. He drew back at the first sight of her, but then, after recognizing her, he walked to the rail. He smiled at her. “How romantic.” He held out his good arm. “Jump. I’ll pull you up. I owe you one.”

Kate glanced down. She could feel the sweat on her hands. David held his arm out over the rail. It was a few feet from her. She jumped, and he caught her and pulled her over the rail and into his arms. Then it all happened so fast, like a dream. He swept her into the room, not bothering to close the door. He tossed her on the bed and climbed on top of her. He pulled his shirt off and ran his hands through her hair. He kissed her on the mouth and pulled her shirt up, only lifting his face from hers long enough to pull the shirt past her face.

Kate watched David’s chest rise and fall. It was a deep sleep. She made her decision.

She put her clothes back on and quietly exited his room, slowly closing the door.

The voice frightened her. She turned — Keegan, standing behind her, wearing an expression of… sadness, disappointment, regret?

“It’s true.” Kate cracked the door, revealing David lying on his back, a sheet covering only the lower half of his body. Kate gently eased the door back. “We didn’t talk at all.” She looked down. “I was saying goodbye.”

30 Minutes later, Kate watched the lights of Northern Africa out of the window as the plane flew south toward Antarctica.

David opened his eyes. He was still naked, lying in the same place he’d fallen asleep. He felt the bed beside him. Empty. Cold. Kate had been gone for hours.

His former mentor handed him a note. “It’s around 2am. We found this note in Kate’s room. She’s gone.” David opened the note.

Don’t hate me. I have to try to make a trade for the children. I know you’re attacking Immari Headquarters this morning. I hope you’re successful. I know what they’ve taken from you.

“We think she left several hours ago. Anyway, I thought you should know. I’m sorry, David.” Howard walked to the door.

“Wait.” David eyed him, thinking. What option did he have? “I know where she’s gone.”

“We were given a journal in Tibet.” David dressed as he spoke. “It contained a map of the tunnels below the Rock; there’s something down there, something they need.”

“I don’t know. But I think she’s gone after it — to use it to trade. What’s our status?”

Thirty minutes later, David was leading the final 23 Clocktower agents in the world through the tunnels under the Rock of Gibraltar. He had told the men that he had to go — that he had to find Kate — and that he might be delayed in joining the assault. His role was largely ceremonial anyway. His wounds, especially the leg wound, disqualified him from playing an active role in the assault. He would be at a desk watching the screens and readouts, coordinating the men during the operation.

His fellow agents had agreed unanimously: they would stay together, investigate the tunnels first, recover Kate, then resume the original plan.

The boon from the chamber in the tunnels could offer some tactical advantage in the main operation.

They had anticipated little resistance at the warehouse, and they weren’t disappointed. The warehouses weren’t even guarded. Or locked, although they had been. The Clocktower team found a common combination lock, the kind used on high school lockers, laying on the ground, snapped in half. Clearly Kate’s work. Apparently Immari had abandoned the site a long time ago and regarded it as low-value. The lack of security still made David suspicious.

The entrance to the tunnels was just as the journal described it — and in almost the same condition. A black tarp had been thrown off the opening, and the lights leading into the mine were on. Inside the tunnels, there was one change: an electric car system, like a monorail tram with single cars, had been added to provide swift, safe transport through the tunnels. Each car held two passengers, and the team piled into about a dozen cars, with Howard and David riding in the first car. After the dizzying spiral down into the mine, the tunnel straightened and began forking. David hadn’t anticipated this — he had assumed the Immari would have closed any dead ends. The map in the journal was of the inside of the Atlantis structure; he had no idea which way to go at the forks. There was no choice; they began dividing their forces and unfortunately, the rail lines kept forking until David and Howard rode alone, hopefully on the right track.

The plan was to rendezvous at the entrance in one hour. That would still leave time for the pre-dawn raid at Immari Gibraltar.

David stared straight ahead as the tunnel’s lights flew by in an endless monotony. What was he missing? Howard worked the car’s controls, managing their speed. Somewhere, far off in the distance, three faint, rapidfire pops rang out. David looked over at Howard, and they shared a knowing glance. Howard slowed the car and they waited for more sounds, hoping to discern the direction.

They waited. The tunnels were quiet. What to do? The sound was clearly gunfire, but David wasn’t in fighting condition and Howard was in intelligence, but he was a manager, not a soldier. Neither could offer any real resistance. In fact, they would probably be in the way.

Five minutes later, they heard another bout of gunfire, but they didn’t stop. Five minutes after that, they reached the room that opened onto the Atlantis structure. The steps lay in the center of the room, fully uncovered. To the right was the jagged opening the journal had described. David could also see the rest of the structure, but it was mostly smooth dark metal. Massive iron I-beams reached high overhead, holding the rock and sea at bay.

David looked up, studying the area above the stairs. There was a huge dome and a place where the structure’s overhang had been cut away from above.

Howard walked to the stairs, put his foot on the first step and looked back at David.

Without a word, David hobbled forward, moving up the stairs, leaning heavily on his cane. As he grimaced and climbed, an overwhelming sense of déjà vu engulfed him. The tunnelmaker, Patrick Pierce, had also been lured down here under the guise of rescuing someone, only to be trapped himself. David crossed the threshold with Howard following closely. He stopped and studied his mentor’s eyes. Was he missing something? What could he do about it now?

Inside, the structure was illuminated with LED lights that ran along the floor and ceiling. The corridors were about eight feet tall — not cramped, but not exactly spacious. They also weren’t square. The bottoms and tops of the corridors curved slightly, giving it an oval shape, except the curves formed in sharper angles. Overall, the halls felt like the corridors of a ship — a Star Trek ship.

David led Howard down the corridors, following the mental image he had formed of the map. Memorizing maps and codes was one of the quintessential tools of trade craft, and David was good at it.

The structure was incredible. Many of the doors to the rooms were open, and as they passed by, David saw a series of make-shift labs, like something you might see behind the glass of a museum, where curators carefully studied or restored historical artifacts. Apparently the Immari had dissected every inch of the structure in the past 100 years.

It was surreal. David had only half-believed the tunnelmaker’s tale, had thought that perhaps it was just that — a tale. But here it was.

The false wall to the chamber was coming up — just around the next turn. As it came into view, David felt himself holding his breath. The chamber was… Open.

“Kate,” David called out. There was nothing to lose. Anyone inside could hear his cane clacking on the metal floor from a mile away, so they didn’t exactly have the element of surprise.

David crept to the edge of the chamber’s opening and peered inside. The room looked like some sort of command center. A bridge, with chairs dotted along smooth surfaces — computers? Something more advanced?

David moved into the room as carefully as he could. He pivoted around, leaning on his cane, scanning every inch of the room. “She’s not here,” he said. “But the journal, the story was true.”

Howard stepped inside the room and hit a switch behind him. The door to the room hissed closed, sliding from right to left. “Oh yes, it’s quite true.”

David studied him. “You’ve read it?” David again wrapped his fingers around the gun tucked in his belt.

Howard’s face had changed. His usually mild expression was gone. He looked satisfied. Confident. “I’ve read it, yes. But just out of curiosity. I knew what it would say because I was there. I saw it first-hand. I hired

Kate sat on the small plastic bench and stared at the white walls. She was in some sort of lab or research facility, but she had no idea where. She rubbed her temples. God, she was so groggy. Somewhere over the South Atlantic sea, a man had walked back into the plane and offered her a bottle of water. She had declined, and he had proceeded to hold her down and cover her mouth with a white cloth, the type that promptly induced unconsciousness. What had she expected?

She stood and paced the room. There was a small slit in the white door, but the window revealed only the hallway outside and a few more doors like the one to her room.

One of the long walls of the room had a rectangular mirror, recessed a few inches into the wall. This was no doubt an observation room, similar to the ones in her lab in Jakarta, except infinitely more creepy. She stared at the mirror. Was someone in there, watching her right now?

Kate squared her body to the mirror and looked into it as if she could see the mysterious man behind it — her captor. “I did my part. I’m here. I want to see my children.”

Kate thought. She would have no leverage after she revealed what she knew. “I want to see them first, then you release them, and I’ll tell you.” “You’re not in a position to negotiate, Kate.”

“I disagree. You need what I know. We both know your drugs won’t work on me. Now, you show me the children, or we’ve got nothing to talk about.”

Nothing happened for almost a minute, then on one side of the mirror, a video flickered to life. That part of the mirror must have been some sort of computer screen. The video showed the children, walking in a dark hallway. Kate stepped closer to the mirror, holding a hand out. Ahead of the children, a massive portal opened, revealing only darkness inside. The children walked through. The video paused with an image of the portal closing.

“You’ve read the tunnelmaker’s journal. You know about the structure in Gibraltar. There is a similar structure twenty times larger here. We think it’s eight times the size of Manhattan, almost five miles wide and 50 miles long, and it’s two miles below us. It’s been there, beneath two miles of ice, for countless thousands of years. The children are inside.”

The screen in the mirror switched to a close-up image of the children before they crossed the portal. It zoomed in on packs the children carried. There was a simple LED readout, the type you see on alarm clocks — a series of digital numbers. A countdown.

“The children are carrying nuclear warheads in those packs, Kate. They have less than thirty minutes left. We can deactivate them remotely, but you have to tell us what you did.”

Kate stepped back from the mirror. It was insanity. Who would do this to two children? She couldn’t trust them. She wouldn’t tell them. They would only hurt other children; she was sure of it. She had to think. “I need some time,” she mumbled.

A few seconds passed, and the door swung open. A man wearing a long black trench coat stepped robotically into the room and… Kate knew him.

How could it be? Flashes of expensive dinners, her laughing as he charmed her, a candle-filled apartment in San Francisco, him unbuttoning her shirt, his head moving down her, kissing her stomach — a stomach without a scar. And the day she told him she was pregnant — the last day she ever saw him… until now, here.

“You—” was all Kate could manage. She stepped back as he marched into the room. Kate felt her back hit the wall.

“Time to talk, Kate. And call me Dorian Sloane. Actually, let’s dispense with the aliases. It’s Dieter. Dieter Kane.”

David watched the man pace across the room, the man he had known as Howard Keegan, Clocktower Director, the man who now claimed to be Mallory Craig.

“That’s true, I did. And we’ve been looking for his journal almost as long. Pierce was an extremely clever man. We knew he sent the journal to the Immaru in ‘38, but we weren’t sure it made it there. I was curious what he would say, how many secrets he would reveal. When you read it, weren’t you curious about the deal he made with us? Why he stayed, working for The Immari for almost 20 years after the Spanish Flu killed his wife and unborn child? What did he call it? His ‘deal with the devil.’” The man laughed.

David slipped the gun out of his belt. He had to keep him talking, at least a bit longer. “I don’t see what it has to do with you.”

“Yes, but he didn’t fear death. You read the journal’s end. He would have welcomed it, would have killed us all in a blaze of glory. We had taken everything from him, everything he loved. But his love for his child was more powerful than his hatred. As I said, Patrick Pierce was very clever. The second he emerged from the tube, he knew what they were. Hibernation tubes, suspension chambers. In that makeshift hospital in the warehouse above us, he made a deal. He would put Helena’s dead body in one tube, and Kane would put Dieter, his dying son, in another tube. Both men became obsessed with medical research. They dreamed of the day they could open the tubes and save their loved ones. Of course, Kane’s ideas were more radical, more racially charged. He became obsessed with finding a way to survive the Bell. He took it to Germany, and… you already know about the experiments. We knew Pierce was working against us, planning something. In 1938, right before Kane’s expedition, he demanded Pierce go into a tube while he was gone.”

“We would have liked to, but as a I said, we knew he had written a journal, and that he was making other plans against us. We assumed their execution was contingent on his death, so we were in a tough position. Kane didn’t trust him, and Pierce didn’t have a choice — we had something he valued much more than his own life. But he made a smart deal. He demanded I be put into the last tube — he knew I would unravel his plans and kill him in his sleep. While Kane was gone, we would both be put on ice. We would be brought back when Kane returned or in 40 years, whichever was sooner. Kane had laughed when Pierce demanded the 40year clause. He never dreamed he wouldn’t return, but of course he didn’t. We only found his sub a few weeks ago in Antarctica. And Pierce and I woke up in 1978, in a different world. Our organization, the Immari, was practically gone; only the shells of our corporations and certain overseas assets remained. The Second World War had decimated us. The Nazis had appropriated many of our assets, including the Bell. I set about rebuilding Immari, and Patrick resumed his role of thwarting me. I began by reviving the organization I founded, my division of Immari, the world’s first global intelligence organization. You’re familiar with it. Clocktower. The Immari intelligence branch.”

“I am not. You know it. You saw the messages we sent in ‘47, the ones embedded in those New York Times obituaries. Why would Immari messages be marked with the words clock and tower? You had to have realized then, when you saw the decoded messages — or perhaps even before. Somewhere in the recesses of your mind, you’ve known what Clocktower was from the second you heard how many agents were under Immari control. You knew it when the cells fell so quickly. Think about it. Clocktower wasn’t compromised by Immari, it was an Immari division, a unit with one purpose: to gain the trust of the world’s intelligence bureaus, to infiltrate them fully, to ensure that when the day came, when we unleashed the Atlantis Plague, that they would be powerless, utterly blind. Clocktower had one other purpose: to collect and contain anyone who was on to the Immari master plan — people like you. The entire time you’ve been at Clocktower, we’ve been watching you, trying to find out how much you know and who you’ve told. It’s the only solution. People like you don’t break under interrogation. And there’s another advantage. We’ve found that, over the years, most agents join us when they learn the full truth. You will too. That’s why you’re here.”

Kate shook her head. How could he be here? She wouldn’t cry. All she could manage was, “Why?” Her voice cracked, betraying her.

Dorian’s expression changed, as if remembering something frivolous, a needless item he’d forgotten at the grocery store. “Oh, that. Just repaying an old debt. But that’s nothing compared to what I’ll do to you if you don’t tell me what you treated those children with.” He moved closer to her, forcing her into the corner of the room.

Kate wanted to tell him now, to see the look on his face. “Cord blood.” “What?” Dorian took a step away from her.

“I lost the baby. But a month before I did, I had embryonic stem cells extracted from the umbilical cord, just in case the child ever developed a condition that required stem cells.”

“It’s true. I used an experimental stem cell treatment on the children, using stem cells from the embryo of our dead child. I used them all. There aren’t any more.”

“I removed the firing pin,” Craig said. “I knew you would be able to tell the difference between a loaded and unloaded gun, so it was the best choice.

“I’ve already told you. I’m here to recruit you. By the time we’re done talking, you’ll know the truth and you’ll finally—”

“I’d rather not, David. Good men are hard to come by. There’s another reason: you know more than anyone else. You’re in a unique position to—”

“You know why I joined Clocktower, what the Immari took from me. What you took from me.”

“Not me. Dorian. Dieter. Granted, I used Clocktower to make sure no intelligence agencies got wind of the plot, but he planned 9/11. It was his brainchild. He was obsessed with searching those mountains for his father. He desperately needed some kind of closure. It wasn’t the only reason. As I said before, our organization was in shambles when I awoke in 1978, and we were still recovering in 2001. We needed money and a global cover to resume our work.”

“It’s true. When I awoke in 1978, I ordered his tube opened, and he walked right out, as healthy as he could be. The tube must also be some sort of healing device, a medical treatment pod of some sort. But its powers are limited to treating the living. I watched as Patrick Pierce, who had been as stoic as a judge for the past 20 years, crumbled into unimaginable grief as they pulled Helena’s still-dead body from the tube. He relived her death all over again. But medical technology had come a long way, and we were able to save the child inside her.”

Kate studied Dorian’s face. Confusion? Disbelief? Regret? He stared at the point where the wall met the floor, thinking.

Then he focused on her, grinning an evil, unkind grin. “That was very clever, Kate. Of course you are very smart — when it comes to science. But not when it comes to reading people.” He turned away from her and paced toward the door. “You’re just like your father in that way. Brilliant, but foolish.”

What was he talking about? Her father died 28 years ago. Dorian, or Dieter, or whatever his name was… he was a madman. “You’re the only fool here,” Kate said.

“Am I? All of this is your father’s fault. He unleashed all of this. He killed my mother and brother and forced my father to undertake a risky mission to save the world, a mission from which he never returned. There’s your why Kate. I’ve dedicated my whole life to finishing my father’s work and to righting the wrongs your father did to my family; and today, you’ve given me the keys to finally do that.”

A security guard, or some sort of soldier, burst in the door. “Sir, we’re under attack.”

David’s mind raced. He said his thoughts aloud, almost mumbling them. “Kate Warner is Patrick Pierce’s daughter? How—”

“I thought new names were in order. If anyone ever connected us to the events during and after World War I, it would have… complicated our lives. Pierce took the name Tom Warner, and Katherine for his newborn daughter. He told her that her mother had died in childbirth, which was actually the truth. Dieter became Dorian Sloane, and he became obsessed with the past and his father’s legacy. He was a hateful child. He had seen so much pain, and he was all alone in an age he didn’t understand. Imagine, a seven-yearold boy going to sleep in 1918 with the flu, when his parents and brother were alive, and waking up 60 years later, in 1978, healthy and all alone in a strange world. I tried to be a father figure to him, but he was so troubled, so isolated. Like you, he dedicated his life to striking back at the people who had taken the ones he loved, to killing the people who had changed him and ruined his life. For him, that was Tom Warner and the Atlanteans. Unfortunately for all of us, Dorian is very capable. And he had support within the Immari organization. To the Immari, he was the heir and savior returned, living proof that the plague and the Bell could be beaten, that the human race could survive. It all went to Dorian’s head. He grew into a monster. He’s planning to reduce the human race to a select few, the genetically superior, what he believes is his tribe. He’s already unleashed the plague. The apocalypse is happening now, as we speak. But we can stop him. You can kill him, then I alone will run the Immari organization, with you at my side.” Craig watched David, hoping for some indication of how his former apprentice would react to the offer. “I’ll take you in as a prisoner. I know him. He’ll want to gloat, to debrief and torture you himself. I’ll give you a means to kill him when you’re left alone with him.”

David shook his head. “That’s what you want? This whole charade? You want me to kill Sloane — to put you on the throne?”

“Don’t you want to? He was responsible for 9/11. He’s your enemy. And you can save Kate. She’s there with him now. He will hurt her. He hurt her before, in San Francisco. The baby — it was his. There’s more, but the bottom line is that you can save her. Only you can save her.” Craig let the words sink in for a long moment, then turned and paced the room. “Think about it, David. You know you can’t win. You can’t fight us. The gunfire in the tunnels, those were the sounds of my Immari Security agents killing the last of the Clocktower loyalists. They’re all dead. You’re all alone down here. You can’t defeat the Immari. No one can. The world is already fighting the plague. You can’t prevent catastrophe. But we can change things, from inside Immari. We can shape the world to come.”

David considered the offer — his own deal with the devil. Then he looked around the room, for a weapon of some kind. There was something — the wooden handle of a spear, sticking out of the wall. The wood and iron spear looked so out of place here — in a room of strange metal and glass and technology David couldn’t begin to imagine.

On the other side of the room, a hologram flickered to life, like a 3D video of some sort.

“We don’t know for sure,” Craig said. He walked closer to the area where the hologram was forming. “Some sort of videos, holograms, on repeat. They play every few minutes. I think they show the past, what happened here. They’re the other reason I brought you down here, to this room. They are the secrets this room holds. We think Patrick Pierce hadn’t yet uncovered them when he sent the journal in 1938. Or, this is another theory, he had found the room, but nothing worked until he came out of the tube in 1978. We’re still sorting it out, but as you’ll see, we believe he saw them at some point in the seven years after he resumed his work as Tom Warner. We don’t know what they mean yet, but he went to great lengths to keep them from us. We think they’re some kind of message.”

Kate looked up at the sound of the second explosion. She tried the door again. Still locked. She thought she smelled smoke. Her mind raced through Dorian’s crazed allegations and the videos of the children walking into that massive structure… with the packs strapped to their backs.

The door swung open, and Martin Grey stepped quickly into the room. He grabbed Kate by the arm and pulled her out into the hall.

“Stay quiet. We have to hurry,” Martin said as he led her down the white-walled corridor. They turned a corner, and the corridor ended in what looked like an airlock on a space station. They proceeded through the airlock and a gust rushed past them as they ventured into the large room beyond — some sort of hangar or warehouse with a high, arched ceiling. Martin squeezed her arm and led her to a stack of hard plastic crates where they knelt and waited in silence. She heard voices at the end of the room and the engines of heavy equipment — forklifts maybe.

Kate heard his footfalls stop abruptly as he reached the men. His voice rang with an authority and force Kate had never heard from her adoptive father. “What the hell are you doing?”

“The station’s been breached. If it falls, whatever you’re doing here won’t matter. He’s called for you. You can stay here if you like. It’s your funeral.”

Kate heard more footfalls, moving toward her; then they passed her and moved out another airlock. There was just one set of footfalls now — Martin. He walked deeper into the hangar and spoke again. “He’s called for everyone—”

More footfalls, running, an airlock opening and closing, and Martin was back. “Come quickly, Kate.”

Martin marched her past rows of crates and a makeshift control station of some kind, with a bank of computers and a wall of screens. They showed a long ice corridor and the opening she had seen the children walk through.

Martin’s eyes were soft, sympathetic. “Get into this suit. I’ll tell you all I can in the seconds we have left.” He motioned to a white, puffy space suit hanging on the wall beside a group of lockers. Kate began slipping into the suit, and Martin looked away from her as he spoke.

“I’m so sorry, Kate. I’m the one that forced you to produce results. And when you did… I kidnapped those children. I did it because we needed them—”

“Yes, to get past the Bell, to get inside the Tombs — the structure two miles below the ice here in Antarctica. Since we began studying the Bell, we’ve known some people can resist it longer than others. They all die, but a few years ago, we identified a set of genes involved in resistance — the Atlantis Gene — we call it. The gene heavily influences brain wiring. We think it’s responsible for all sorts of advanced cognitive abilities, problem solving, advanced reasoning, language, creativity. We, Homo sapiens sapiens that is, have it; none of the other subspecies of humans have it — that we’ve found. It’s how we’re different. My theory is that the Atlanteans gave it to us around 60,000 years ago — around the time of the Toba Catastrophe. It’s what enabled us to survive. But we weren’t quite ready for it. We were still very much like our great ape cousins, acting on instinct, living in the wild. The strange thing is, we think it’s activated by a sort of neural survival sub-routine, the fight-or-flight center of the brain. That mechanism activates the Atlantis Gene — focusing the mind and body. It could be why we’re a race of thrill seekers and why we’re so prone to violence. It’s so fascinating.” Martin shook his head, trying to focus. “Anyway, we’re still trying to understand how it works. Everyone has the Atlantis Gene or at least some of the genetic components for it, but activating the gene is the problem. For some minds, geniuses, activation is more frequent. We think these genius moments, these flashes of insight and clarity are literally like a light bulb flickering on and off — the Atlantis Gene activates, and for the briefest of moments, we can use the full power of our minds. These people can activate the Atlantis Gene without the fightor-flight circuit breaker. We began focusing our research on minds that had this sort of sustained activation. We observed activation in some minds on the autism spectrum — savants. That’s why we funded your research. It’s why Dorian was… forgiven… if you will, for his transgressions — he had steered you into an area of Immari interest. And when you succeeded, when the children showed sustained Atlantis Gene activation, I took the kids before he could find out. I created other distractions, with Clocktower, to keep him busy.”

“Yes, as a backup plan, in case I failed. I had already sent a message to David revealing the Immari double-agents working as Clocktower analysts, and I was trying to tell him that Clocktower itself was the Immari intelligence agency. I had hoped the war for Clocktower would consume the Immari, giving me time to do my work. I kidnapped the children, hoping to keep you out of this, but I underestimated you. And how quickly Dorian would react. I tried to give you clues when we met in Jakarta, during my theatrical rant in the observation room. I wasn’t sure you could put it all together. Then, Dorian’s men had you and… the entire situation spun out of control. It’s all my fault.”

“Trying to make contact. My goal has been to find a therapy that activated the Atlantis Gene, allowing us to enter the Tombs and greet the Atlanteans as they awaken, not as murderers, but as their children, to ask their help in managing humanity’s growing pains. To ask for their help with fixing the Atlantis Gene. We’ve found some other… interesting aspects of the gene, mysteries we still don’t understand… There isn’t time to explain, but we need their help. That’s what you have to do, Kate. You can cross into the tombs. You’ve seen what Dorian’s plan is. You must hurry. Your father gave his life for this cause, and he made so many sacrifices for you. And he tried so desperately to save your mother.”

Martin shook his head. “Of course. I haven’t told you. The journal, it’s your father’s.”

“It can’t be…” Kate searched Martin’s face. Her mother was Helena Barton? Patrick Pierce was her father? How could it be true?

“It’s true. He was a reluctant member of the Immari. He did it to save you. He put you in the tube, inside your mother that day in the field hospital in Gibraltar. He emerged in 1978 and took the name Tom Warner. I was already a staff scientist for the Immari, but I was wavering… the methods, the cruelty. I found in him an ally, someone inside the organization who wanted to stop the madness, someone who favored dialog over genocide. But he never trusted me, not fully.” Martin stared at the floor. “I’ve tried so hard to keep you safe, to honor my promise to him, but I’ve failed so miserably—”

Behind them another explosion rocked the facility. Martin grabbed the helmet to the suit. “You have to hurry. I’ll lower you down. When you get inside, you have to find the children and lead them out first. Whatever you do, make sure they get out. Then find the Atlanteans. There isn’t much time left — less than 30 minutes until the bombs the boys are carrying go off.” He ushered her to another airlock at the end of the warehouse. “When you get outside, climb into the basket. I can operate it from here. When it reaches the bottom of the ice shaft, run through the portal, just as the children did.” He locked the suit helmet in place and pushed her out of the airlock before Kate could say another word.

When the outer airlock opened, Kate saw the iron basket hanging from the crane’s thick metal cord. It swayed slightly as the Antarctic winds blew through it, barely catching the iron mesh on the sides.

She waddled over to it with some effort. The wind almost blew her over as she reached the basket. The handle was hard to work with her fat fingers, but she managed to get inside. As soon as she closed the door, it began descending into the round hole.

The basket creaked, and above her, the round circle of light shrank with every passing second. It reminded Kate of the end of a cartoon, where the final scene is gradually covered with black as the circle shrinks to the size of a pin and finally winks out into full black. The squeaking basket was an unnerving soundtrack to the darkening descent.

After a few moments, the basket began moving faster and the last sliver of light above disappeared. The speed and disorienting darkness gave her a sick feeling in her stomach, and she braced herself against the basket. Not much longer, she told herself, but she had no idea. It was two miles deep.

Then there was light — a smattering of faint sparkles below, like stars shining on a clear night. For a moment, Kate gazed down at them, admiring their beauty, not thinking about what they actually were. Stars, she thought. Then her scientific mind slowly, subtly began rifling through the possibilities before settling on the most likely candidate: tiny LED lights that had been dropped to illuminate the bottom of the hole. They lay there in a random pattern, glowing in the blackness around them, as if guiding Kate on a cosmic journey to some unknown planet. They were almost… entrancing—

Kate felt the basket falling faster. And faster still. The thick cable attached at the top of the basket grew slack and gathered in waves above her. She was falling — free falling. The cable had been cut. The basket drifted over, toward the ice wall of the round shaft. When it hit the wall, the basket would flip end over end. She would die as the basket cartwheeled into the ice floor below, pile-driving her into it. If the fall didn’t kill Kate, the thousand stabs from the shattered steel basket holding her would.

David stared at it. The colors were vivid, and the hologram almost filled the room. It felt like he was there. He saw a massive ship rising out of the ocean. The Rock of Gibraltar came into view, and David realized the scale of the machine. The Rock looked like a pebble next to it. There was something else — the location of the Rock was wrong. It was inland, not on the coast, and the land extended beyond the Rock and to the right of it, all the way to Africa. Europe and Africa, joined by a land bridge.

Craig paced closer to David. “It’s just as Plato described it, a massive island rising out of the sea. We’re still trying to nail down the time period, but we think this holomovie was made about 12-15,000 years ago. It was certainly some point before the last ice age ended. We’ll know more as soon as we estimate the sea level. Plato’s account says the island sank 12,500 years ago, so that could be about right. And you’ve noticed the size of the vessel.”

“Yes, and a small one at that. We think the structure is over 60 square miles, that is, assuming the rock is the same size today as it was 15,000 years ago. The structure, or piece, as you say, that we stand in now is less than 1 square mile. The vessel in Antarctica is over four times larger, about 250 square miles.” Craig nodded to the hologram. “The next movie reveals what this vessel is — we think.”

David watched the massive ship move to the shore and stop. The hologram flickered, as if someone were changing the reel in an antique movie projector. The ship was still there, but the water had risen some. Just beyond the ship, on the edge of the coast, there was a city, if you could call it that. Primitive stone monuments, like a series of Stone Henges radiated out from the ship in semi-circles. Huts with thatched roofs dotted the landscape. A huge bonfire burned in the middle of the stone structures and the hologram zoomed in. A band of humans wearing thick furs were dragging another human, no, an ape. Or, something in between. The ape was tall. He was naked and fought wildly at the captors at his sides. The humans around him bowed as he neared the fire.

From the ship, two flying objects launched. They looked like chariots, or space-aged Segways. They floated a few feet above the ground, racing towards the fire. When they reached it, the humans backed away, bowing and facing the ground.

The Atlanteans dismounted their chariots, grabbed the savage, and injected him with something. They wore some sort of body armor with helmets covered almost entirely by mirrored glass, except the rear part. They threw the ape-man across a chariot and rushed back to the ship.

The hologram flickered again, and the scene changed to the inside of the ship. The ape-man lay in the floor. The Atlanteans were still in their suits, and David couldn’t tell, but it seemed as if they were saying something to each other… the subtle body language, a few hand gestures.

Craig cleared his throat. “We’re still scratching our heads on this one. Bear in mind we only saw them a few hours ago when we got the map from the journal and accessed the chamber, but we think this is a video of the Atlanteans interrupting a ritual sacrifice. The man is a Neanderthal. We think our ancestors considered it their duty to hunt down every man not made in the image of God and sacrifice him. Some sort of early racial cleansing.”

Craig snorted and shook his head. “Kane thawed him in the early thirties, the second he had the Bell operational. We had a time with the power supply. They ran a series of experiments over a few years. They even tried to recreate the ape-man by breeding humans with chimpanzees - his insane humanzee project. Kane finally lost interest when there was no progress. He fed him to the Bell in ‘34.”

“No, even after countless thousands of years in the tube. So of course we were shocked when Kate Warner did. We think it has something to do with the tubes, but whatever it does only works on our subspecies. The tubes somehow activate the Atlantis Gene. Whatever she treated the children with has to be connected to the tubes in some way. Our theory is that every human has the Atlantis Gene, but it’s only activated sporadically, and by a select few. Clearly the Neanderthal didn’t have the genetic precursor.”

“The gene, no. The working theory is that they didn’t need to. Neanderthals were bigger and stronger than us. And they had bigger brains.

They may have even been smarter than us 60,000 years ago. Either way, we know they were cold-weather great apes that resided in Europe, farther away from the TOBA volcano. They probably weren’t in much danger from the eruption, so the Atlanteans didn’t need to save them. But you all probably figured all that out.” Craig nodded to the hologram. “Oh, here’s the money-shot, as they say.”

The image moved out of the lab to an outdoor shot again. Behind the ship, a massive tsunami rose in the air. It must have been 100 feet taller than the ship, which could have easily been 200 feet tall, based on its height relative to the Rock of Gibraltar. The wave washed over the ship and into the primitive city, destroying it in one violent sweep.

The ship was listless, and the wave carried it into the city, flattening the stone monuments and huts as it went. Then the waters receded, dragging the ship with it — more than half the ship was still under water. It dragged the ship out to sea, and sparks flew along the bottom as it skidded against the seafloor below it. Then the hologram flashed red and white as a massive explosion erupted below the ship, ripping it in two, three, now four pieces.

“We think it was a giant methane pocket on the seabed. It exploded with the force of a dozen nuclear warheads.”

The water was rushing back over the broken ship, and the image returned to the lab and the Atlanteans. One of them had been thrown against the bulkhead. The body was limp. Dead? The surviving Atlantean hoisted the Neanderthal like a rag doll and shoved him into a tube. His strength was amazing. David wondered if it was the suit or his natural strength.

The Atlantean turned to his partner and hoisted him up. The image winked out as the man left the room. The hologram followed him as he ran through the ship. He was thrown about — no doubt as the waves rocked the ship and it floated lifelessly to the bottom of the sea. Then he was in the chamber where Craig and David now stood. He worked the panels for a moment. He didn’t actually touch the controls, he merely worked his fingers above them as he held his partner on his shoulder.

“We think he’s activating the Bell here. An anti-intrusion device to keep animals like us out. It makes sense. Then he powers off the computers. We’re still scratching our heads at this next part.”

On the hologram, the room was almost dark except for the faint glow of emergency lights. The man stepped to the rear of the room and touched something on his forearm. A door slid open before him. David followed it with his eyes — the door was there, but it had the spear in it now. The Atlantean looked around, paused, and walked through. The door shut behind him — with no spear in it.

“Don’t bother.” Craig shook his head, as if disappointed. “We’ve tried. For hours now.”

“Not sure. A couple of scientists think it’s the Spear of Destiny, but we’re not sure. We think Patrick, or rather Tom Warner, had it down here, trying to cut a hole in the door or something.”

David edged closer. “The Spear of Destiny?” David knew what it was, but he needed to buy some time and distract Craig. “Yes. You don’t know it?” David shook his head.

“Kane was obsessed with it, and Hitler after him. The legend is that the spear was stabbed into the side of Jesus Christ as he hung on the cross, killing him. The ancients believed that any army that possessed the spear could never be defeated. When Hitler annexed Austria, he took the spear, and he only lost it a few weeks before Germany surrendered. It’s one of the many artifacts we collected over the years, hoping it, or anything else from antiquity, would provide clues to the Atlanteans.

“Interesting,” David said as he grabbed the end of the spear. He pulled at it, and he felt the door move, if only slightly. He pulled harder, and the spear came free. He dropped his cane and lunged through the door as Craig pulled his gun out and began firing.

“No, don’t shoot them!” Dorian yelled into the radio, but it was too late. He watched the second man take two shots to the chest, and the third fall from shots to the shoulder and abdomen. “Stop firing! I will shoot the next idiot who pulls the trigger!”

The gunshots ceased, and Dorian walked out into the open space toward the last man. At the sight of Dorian, he began crawling for his gun, leaving a trail of thick blood as he went.

Dorian jogged to the gun and kicked it to the far wall of the lab. “Stop. I don’t want to hurt you. In fact, I’ll get you some help. I just want to know who sent you.”

“Yes—” Dorian’s ear piece crackled, and he looked away from the dying man.

One of the station techs came on. “Sir, we’ve ID’ed the men. They’re ours — one of the drill teams.”

“I saw…” The man was losing more blood now. The shot in the gut would do him in soon.

“Oh for God’s sake,” Dorian said. What was the world coming to? Even oil rig operators were bleeding-heart softies these days. He raised the gun and shot the man in the head. He turned and walked back to his Immari Security unit. “Clean this up—”

“Sir, something’s happening in portal control.” The soldier looked up. “Someone just launched the basket.”

Dorian’s eyes drifted toward the floor, then darted back and forth. “Martin. Send a team — secure the control station. No one leaves that room.” A thought ran through Dorian’s mind: the basket was launched.

The Immari security agent took out a tablet, tapped at it, then looked up, “less than fifteen minutes.”

She might still reach them. “Cut the cord on the basket,” Dorian said. It was a fitting end. Kate Warner — Patrick Pierce’s daughter — would die in a cold dark tunnel, just as Dorian’s brother Rutger had.

David fell to the floor as the bullets ricocheted off the iron wall behind him. He spun around, crouched, and held the spear point-forward over his shoulder, like some prehistoric hunter ready to stick his prey when it emerged from the sliding door.

But the door didn’t open. David exhaled and sat down on the floor, giving the wounded leg a rest. He didn’t see how Patrick Pierce had done it — all the walking around down here.

When the pain subsided, he got to his feet and took in his surroundings. The room was similar to the one he had just left — the iron-ish gray walls were the same and so were the lights at the top and bottom of them. The room seemed to be a lobby of some sort. It had seven doors in all, fanning out in a semicircle, almost like a bank of elevator doors.

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