The Storm

  CHAPTER 20

  JINN AL-KHALIF STRODE THROUGH THE HALLS OF HIS CAVE in a state of fury. He kicked the door to his sprawling office open and threw a chair aside that blocked the path to his desk. Sabah entered behind him, shutting the door with more care.

  “I will not be summoned like a schoolboy!” Jinn bellowed.

  “You have not been summoned,” Sabah insisted.

  “They contact you unannounced, tell you they’re coming here, and that they expect to see me!” Jinn shouted. “How is that not being summoned?”

  Jinn stood beside an impressively large desk. Behind him, visible through a glass partition that acted as the rear wall to the office, the production floor of his factory could be seen twenty feet below.

  Here and there in the “clean room,” men in protective hazmat-like suits were calibrating the machines, preparing to produce the next version of Jinn’s microbots. The lethally redesigned batch was destined for Egypt and the dam.

  “They made a request,” Sabah said. “Considering their tone and actions of late, I thought it necessary to promise your presence.”

  “That is an act of insolence!” Jinn shouted. “You do not promise for me.”

  Many times in his life had Jinn felt the type of rage that filled him now, never before had it been directed at Sabah.

  “Why, as we get closer and closer to the goal, do all my servants seem to be losing their minds and forgetting their places?”

  Sabah seemed on the verge of speaking but held back.

  “You’ve already said enough,” Jinn told him with a dismissive wave. “Leave me.”

  Instead of bowing and departing, Sabah stood taller.

  “No,” he said plainly. “I have taught you from a young age, ever since your father died. And I have sworn to protect you, even from yourself. So I will speak and you will listen and then you decide what to do when I am through.”

  Jinn looked up in shock, enough so that his instinct to kill Sabah for disobeying him was checked.

  “This consortium,” Sabah began, “they’ve given billions of dollars to your effort. And they are powerful men in their own right, bound to flex their muscle every now and then.”

  Jinn gazed at Sabah as if mesmerized, listening as he often had during the years.

  “The fact that they come as one suggests danger,” Sabah continued. “They’re unified.”

  Jinn looked around his office. There was little in the way of decor. But weapons of the past were displayed on one wall, a curved scimitar caught his eye.

  “Then I will kill them all,” Jinn said. “I will cut them to pieces with my own two hands.”

  “And what would that get us?” Sabah asked. “They have not come alone. Each brings a squad of armed men. In total numbers they are almost equal to our own. It would bring only war. And even if we won, others would undoubtedly investigate, perhaps even seek revenge.”

  For the first time in a great while, Jinn felt vulnerable, cornered. If they had known what they were stirring in him, they would not have pressed the issue.

  “This could not have come at a worse time,” he said. “We have other guests to prepare for.”

  “They will be dealt with,” Sabah insisted.

  “Fine,” Jinn said. “What do you suggest?”

  “We must send a message that does not start a war. I suggest we show them what they want to see. One to see it closely, the other to observe from a distance.”

  A sinister look came over Sabah’s face, and Jinn began to understand. He had to discount Sabah as old and out of touch, but no more.

  “Order the test bay flooded,” Jinn said.

  “It has been configured to simulate the attack on Aswan.”

  A smile crept onto Jinn’s face. “Perfect. Proceed with the demonstration. Give them a front-row seat. It would make me very happy for them to see more than they bargained for.”

  A flash of understanding appeared on Sabah’s face.

  “I will do as you command,” he said.

  Jinn looked back through the glass partition to his workers below. They moved here and there. The machines were operating again, running at full capacity. At the end of the production line a trickle of silver sand had begun to fill a yellow plastic drum. Beyond it, fifty-nine other drums waited. They would carry the latest batch of his horde. And if Jinn was right, they would break the will of Aziz and force Egypt’s military leaders and their wealth back into his hands.

  CHAPTER 21

  KURT REACHED THE TOP OF THE BLUFF A FEW SECONDS ahead of Joe. He studied the layout.

  The landing pad was set up three-quarters of the way to the front edge. A Russian-made helicopter sat in the center of the pad. The cargo door was rolled back, and a pair of men dressed like guards sat in the open doorway, sharing a cigarette and talking.

  Glancing around, Kurt saw no one else. “Can you get them both?”

  Joe nodded. “Two birds with one stone,” he said. “Or, in this case, multiple wires.”

  Kurt was glad to hear that. He pointed to the far side of the copter. Joe moved that way, clinging to the side of the bluff like a rock climber.

  When Joe reached a covered spot beside the gray machine, Kurt pulled the cloth of the caftan across his face. He stepped from his own hiding spot and walked toward the men, holding his hands out and muttering something about a lost camel.

  The men snapped to attention and moved toward him. One put a hand on his sidearm but didn’t draw it out, perhaps because Kurt looked like a local, perhaps because he had his hands up as he spoke.

  “Nãqah, nãqah,” he said, using the Arabic word for female camel.

  The men seemed utterly baffled. They continued toward him looking angry, never seeing Joe move in behind them.

  “Nãqah,” Kurt said once again, and then watched as the men stiffened and dropped to their knees.

  They fell forward silently. Reveling Joe grinning and holding a Taser, which he’d fired into the two men.

  “Oh where, oh where has my little nãqah gone?” Kurt finished.

  “Great thing about Tasers,” Joe said, “they work so quick, people can’t even yell out.”

  The coiled wires were still attached, and when the men began to move, Joe zapped them again.

  “I think they’ve had enough, Dr. Frankenstein.”

  Joe switched the power off, and the tension left the two men instantly. Kurt was on them, jabbing a tranquilizer dart into each and watching their eyes roll up in their heads. As the men went limp, Joe pulled out the Taser wires and helped Kurt carry the two back to the helicopter.

  They piled the men inside, climbed in after them, and then slid the door shut.

  A few moments later the door opened. Kurt and Joe came out dressed in the guards’ dark blue clothing, complete with kaffiyehs that covered their faces and hair. While Joe pretended to watch the helicopter, Kurt looked around for the tunnel he’d seen.

  He discovered a cut in the stone and followed it to a ladder that dropped straight down. At the bottom he found a door made of steel with an electronic sensor lock above the handle. It looked familiar, like the locks in any hotel.

  “Let’s just hope we have a reservation,” he said to himself as he rummaged through the guard’s pockets. Finding a card key in one, he slipped it in the card reader and pulled it out. When the light went green, he turned the handle.

  “Easy as pie,” he whispered.

  Propping the door open with a small rock, he climbed back up the ladder and whistled to Joe. A moment later they were in the tunnel and taking a steep set of stairs downward.

  “Into the rabbit hole,” Kurt said. “Just keep an eye out for the Jabberwocky.”

  “What exactly is a Jabberwocky again?” Joe asked. “I was never quite sure.”

  “It’s something bad and scary,” Kurt said. “You’ll know it when you see it.”

  They descended the stairs and came to a warren of tunnels. They took one that angled downward and came to another crossroads.


  “I feel like I’m in an ant farm,” Joe whispered.

  “Yeah,” Kurt said. “I can just imagine giant people watching us through the glass.”

  They moved down the tunnel to another intersection.

  “Which way?” Joe asked.

  “No idea,” Kurt said.

  “We either need a guide or a map.”

  Kurt’s brow wrinkled. “If you see a lighted display that says ‘You are here,’ be sure to let me know.”

  They found no such thing, but then Kurt noticed something else.

  Up above, a series of pipes ran through the tunnel. Power conduits and possibly water or natural gas. All the things a production center needed.

  “We need to find the factory,” he said. “I’m thinking we follow the power lines.”

  They moved along a tunnel, tracking the conduits. It led them to a larger hallway, wide enough to drive a car through. A pair of men dressed like them walked toward them, coming from the opposite direction. Kurt forced himself to remain relaxed as they approached. Nevertheless, he was ready for a fight. But they passed without a word, and he breathed a little easier.

  At the end of the tunnel they came to an open section of the cave. Concrete flooring had been put in, and a dozen tables surrounded by chairs filled the space. It was lit up brightly. A far wall had refrigerators and sinks stacked against it.

  “Congratulations,” Kurt said. “We’ve found the mess hall.”

  “And I’m finally not hungry,” Joe said.

  Groups of men sat at three of the tables. Strangely, they looked nothing like Jinn’s men.

  “All kinds of people here,” Kurt whispered. “We better keep going.”

  They moved on, following the pipes and conduits until they reached a glass wall. It looked down into a cavernous space. The lighting was low, but from what they could see it looked like an Olympic-sized pool sat down below. A large shape took up the middle.

  “What is this, a health spa?” Joe whispered.

  “It won’t be if we get discovered.”

  “That’s a big tank,” Joe said. “Reminds me of our simulation tank back in D.C.”

  “Curiouser and curiouser,” Kurt said, quoting Alice from the Lewis Carroll classic. “These guys must be modeling something. Currents or waves or something.”

  “What’s with the setup in the middle?”

  “No idea,” Kurt said. “But let’s get a closer look.”

  They found a door and slipped through it. Stairs led down to a locker room of sorts. White hazmat-style uniforms hung in stalls.

  “Time for a wardrobe change,” Kurt said.

  “You think these are necessary?”

  “For camouflage,” Kurt said. “And if there are any of those microbots down here, it might be good to have a protective layer on.”

  In a minute, Kurt and Joe had each donned hazmat suits, pulling them on over the uniforms they’d stolen from the guards.

  They moved out onto the pool deck and stood at the surface level. Kurt noticed the object in the center was not a model ship or even the depiction of some coastline but a wide curving object wedged between the two sides. The water level was high on one side of it but far lower on the other side and constricted to a narrow, irregular channel.

  He and Joe descended one more flight of stairs and opened a door. They now stood below the water level, looking into the tank and the cross section of the obstruction through the tank’s clear acrylic side.

  “I’ve seen this before,” Kurt said. “It’s an embankment dam. The top layer is crushed rock and sand. The gray core in the center is most likely waterproof clay. The bottom liner is known as a cutoff curtain. It’s usually made of concrete, designed to keep the water from seeping under the dam.”

  He pointed to the high water behind the dam. “They’re even filling the high side like it’s a reservoir.”

  “Why would these guys be modeling a dam?” Joe asked.

  “I’m not sure, but I have a feeling we’re not going to like the answer.”

  The sound of a generator starting up caught their attention. A moment later the main overhead lights came on and the room brightened. Through the water Kurt saw the distorted shapes of other men in white hazmat suits on the far side of the pool.

  “We better look busy,” Kurt said.

  Joe grinned. “I’m pretty sure there’s an exit sign I need to inspect.”

  “That sounds like a job for two.”

  They climbed back up the stairs and slipped out of the observation dugout. Back on the pool deck, they waved to the men across from them in identical suits, received a wave in return and then entered the locker room once again.

  “What now?” Joe asked.

  Through a window Kurt saw another group entering the room. These men were dressed sharply in fine Arab clothing. Another man dressed in white was pointing out this and that to them. A bearded man in a plain gray caftan trailed behind them.

  “That’s Jinn,” Kurt said, basing his guess on a surveillance photo he’d seen.

  “Who are these other guys?” Joe asked.

  “They look like dignitaries on a tour,” Kurt said.

  Jinn led the Arab men around the pool and over to the very stairway Kurt and Joe had just ascended. They went down to the underwater viewing area.

  “They’re here for a demonstration of some kind,” Kurt whispered.

  “I hate to sound like the reasonable one,” Joe began, “but maybe we should beat a hasty retreat while they’re otherwise occupied.”

  Kurt shook his head. “Sage advice, my friend. Except we now have a front-row seat, and they’re about to show us what they’re planning. I think it behooves us to stick around, keep the suits on and try to blend in.”

  “Behooves us?”

  “It was the word of the day on my calendar last week. Never thought I’d get a chance to use it.”

  “Glad to hear you’re expanding your vocabulary. But what if something behooves one of them to ask us what we’re doing here? Or to perform some task we don’t know how to do, like turn some big machine on?”

  “We’ll just press a lot of buttons, throw some switches, and pretend we’re incompetent,” Kurt said.

  “Go with our strengths, then.”

  “Exactly.”

  Kurt would have tried to reassure Joe further, but additional machinery starting up dragged his attention back to the window.

  He saw Jinn gesturing and speaking, but he couldn’t make out the words through the glass.

  “This is like watching TV with the mute button on,” Joe said.

  At the far end of the pool, a large yellow drum was being secured to a hoist and lifted by an overhead crane. By the caution they showed, and the fact that only the white-suited men got anywhere near it, Kurt figured he knew what was in that drum.

  “Sound or no sound,” he said, “I think we’re about to see a show.”

  CHAPTER 22

  IN THE CAVERNOUS BAY SURROUNDING THE TANK, JINN’S words to Mustafa of Pakistan and Alhrama of Saudi Arabia echoed with a strange dissonance. He’d managed to be gracious and munificent—at least in his own mind—despite wanting to choke them with his bare hands. But he was ready to send them a message. In fact, he’d decided to send two.

  Sabah leaned closer. “Separate them,” he whispered and then stepped back, remaining behind Jinn and out of sight.

  Jinn did not react to the words. He had agreed to this show on Sabah’s request. But he would decide what must occur now.

  “You see in the tank before you a mock-up of the Aswan High Dam,” he said. “It will soon be the focal point in a demonstration of my powers.”

  “I don’t understand,” Alhrama said.

  “General Aziz has emboldened you with his refusal to pay what he promised. He has his reasons, but prime among them is the dam. As long as it exists, Egypt has a five-year supply of water stored up. But Aziz has little understanding of either my power or my wrath.”

  Ji
nn lifted a radio to his mouth and pressed the talk switch. “Begin.”

  The machinery spooled up again. The crane shifted and moved the barrel out over the water and into its final position. A cable attached to the bottom half of the yellow drum was reeled in and the drum began to tip.

  The silver sand began to pour out; millions upon millions of Jinn’s microbots, pouring into the tank and dispersing like sugar in tea. The water began turning murky and gray.

  “Give the command,” Jinn said.

  In a control room high above, someone pressed a button and sent out a coded command.

  The murky water began to stir. The gray cloud coalesced into a tighter pattern and then moved toward the edge of the dam like a dark spirit drifting through the water.

  “What’s happening?” Mustafa asked.

  “The dam is made of aggregate,” Jinn said. “Easy to put together and held in place by its great weight, but not completely impervious.”

  As he spoke, the silver sand adhered to the edge of the dam in two separate places: one spot near the top of the dam and a second about one-third the way down the sloping wall. After a minute or so, the progress of the tiny machines became noticeable in the cross section of the dam.

  “Remarkable,” Alharma said, “the speed with which they penetrate.”

  “The actual dam is much thicker of course,” Jinn pointed out. “But the effect will be the same, it will only take longer. A matter of hours, I should think.”

  Within minutes the leading fingers of the horde had reached the central core of the dam. Progress slowed dramatically, but the etching continued until a pinprick had been bored through to the other side.

  In another minute or two the sand had reached the right edge of the aggregate and broken through. A trickle of water began, quickly accelerating. Soon the weight of the water behind the dam was forcing out a jet of liquid through the tiny gap.

  “This effect will be heightened in the real event,” Jinn said. “The weight of the water behind Aswan numbers in the trillions of tons.”