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Smiling troopers, heavily armed, marched through
the streets lined by weeping crowds.
The Nazis knew well the uses of propaganda, d1e
winning of a war by conquering the spirits of the
enemy. The victory parade and the announcement of
world unification were more effective than a dozen
cities consumed by nuclear fire.
Thunderous Seig Heils shook New York City's
skyline and the brown-uniformed Hitler made a
speech at the base of the Statute of Liberty. He was
the conqueror of Europe, of America, of Asia and
now the leader of the entire world. He was the epit-
ome of the destiny of the superman, who could afford
to be magnanimous. The world was at long last
united, with no more national borders or disputes
over territory or religion. It all belonged to the Third
Reich now.
They used everything they knew-or had been
taught-to establish a global empire; assassination,
myth, treachery, superior armed might and a ruthless
campaign of terror that brought about the deaths of
millions.
And then there were the others, hidden away, se-
cret, shadowy, their existence only hinted at in an-
cient manuscripts and legends, who knew the Third
Reich's victory had only been the first phase of a plan
conceived millennia ago.
THE SMOOTHLY SURFACED blacktop road cut through
board-flat desert. The armored Mercedes they had
requisitioned was several years old and needed a new
coat of paint, and the .,triangle symbol of unification
decal was peeling at the edges, but the diesel. engine
purred smoothly.
The fireworks display was long over by the time
Grant braked at the first of three security checkpoints.
In the near distance, the gigantic dark bulk of the
Archuleta Mesa blotted out a huge portion of the star-
speckled night sky.
After a quick inspection, the guard waved the car
through, and Grant steered past the sentry kiosk and
the machine-gun emplacements. Kane secretly con-
sidered that such security precautions were a bit ex-
treme. There had not been a truly major conflict since
the pacification of the Russian-Japanese Federation
in 1960. Even the last spot of bother, the border up-
rising in Canada, had been little more than a series
of skirmishes, barely qualifying as a bush war.
If Roamer rebels or saboteurs wanted to breach the
defenses of the Purity Control Foundation, buried
deep beneath the mesa, they wouldn't come force,
through the checkpoints. They'd" sneak ill' overland,
through the miles of uninhabited desert and mesquite.
And if they managed to make it past the motion and
heat sensors that ringed the perimeter and actually
got inside the place, they would require a vast knowl-
edge of the complex security measures and protocols
that not even Kane had.
The car passed through gates in three twenty-foot-
high cyclone fences, each one topped by curls of
razor wire. Armored guards on foot and astride mo-
torcycles constantly patrolled between the fenced
perimeters. Brilliant halogen floodlights left no
square foot of ground unilluminated,
After Grant drove through the third and final gate.
the Arculeta Mesa loomed above them like the tomb-
stone of a Teutonic god. The top of it glowed with
lights. like a crown of stars.
A sentry motioned them to drive onto a great
rimmed disk of gray metal. Grant guided the Mer-
cedes to the center of it, parked and turned off the
ignition. Brigid. sitting between Grant and Kane.
looked around wide-eyed. In a strangely hushed
voice. she asked. "Now what?"
With a grinding rumble, the disk began to descend.
the metal rim forming the lip of a vertical tunnel.
They sank into utter blackness. then the shaft walls
began to shine. casting the interior of the vehicle in
a soft light.
Kane had visited the facility several times, twice
in the company of Grant. but he still found the
method of entering it impressive and a little intimi-
dating.
With a protracted hiss of compressed air, the lift
disk jolted to a stop. A lighted observation platform
stood before them. A tall, lean man stood at the rail-
ing. He was more than just gaunt, he was cadaverous.
His erect figure wore the funeral-black uniform of the
Reich military, his high-boned face starkly pale
above the dark clothing. A high-peaked cap sat at a
jaunty angle on his hairless skull. his eyes invisible
behind the dark lenses of sunglasses. An array of sil-
ver insignia pins twinkled all over his tunic.
As Grant. Kane and Brigid disembarked from the
car, the man looked vaguely surprised. even a little I
unsettled, to see Baptiste. The three of them snapped
off stiff-armed salutes, and the cadaverous officer on
the platform returned them rather laconically.
"Captain Baptiste," Field Marshal Thrush said in
an uninflected, well-modulated voice. "I didn't ex-
pect you, although in retrospect, perhaps 1 should
have."
Chapter 16
The cryptic remark did not confuse Kane as much as
enrage him. The underlying vibrations in Thrush's
flat oily voice made his hand reflexively move to-
ward his holstered Sin Eater. With a conscious effort,
he checked the movement, frightened by "What felt
like an instinctive, visceral reaction. The field mar-
shal was his commandant, and though Kane feared
him, he had never felt hatred for a moment.
Thrush turned away from the railing, making a
sharp, autocratic gesture. "This way."
The three officers moved off the metal platform,
their boots striking chiming echoes from it. The air
smelled clean and fresh, but it held a faint, tart chem-
ical scent, too. Kane glanced up at the small circle
of starlit sky above. He felt as if he were standing at
the bottom of a gargantuan drainpipe.
A short flight of stairs on the far side of the ob-
servation platform led down into a wide, white cor-
ridor, lighted by very bright neon strips inset into the
ceiling. Men and women in white and pale blue
Reich uniforms strolled along it. A number of them
were small and compact of figure, with delicately fea-
tured faces that seemed to be all brow, cheekbone
and chin. The craniums were large, but not inhu- [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]