Seven Ancient Wonders - Matthew Reilly [47]
The waterway itself was also deadly. Fed by the surging tide outside, small whirlpools dotted its length, ready to suck down the unwary adventurer who fell in, while two lines of tooth-like boulders blocked the way for any kind of boat.
Spanning the watercourse was a beautiful multi-arched aqueduct bridge built in the Carthaginian style, but sadly it was horribly broken in the middle.
As a final touch, vents in the walls spewed forth plumes of steam, casting an ominous haze over the entire scene.
Wizard raised a pair of night-vision binoculars to his eyes and peered down the length of the great chasm.
The world went luminescent green.
In deep shadow at the far end of the cavern, only partially visible beyond its twists and turns, he saw a structure. It was clearly huge, a fortress of some kind, with two high-spired towers and a great arched entrance, but because of the bends in the chasm and the haze, he couldn’t see it in its entirety.
‘Hamilcar’s Refuge,’ he breathed. ‘Untouched for over 2,000 years.’
‘Maybe not,’ West said. ‘Look over there.’
Wizard did, and his jaw dropped.
‘My goodness . . .’
There, wrecked against some rocks in the middle of the waterway, lying half-in half-out of the water, was the great rusted hulk of a World War II–era submarine.
Emblazoned on its conning tower, corroded by time and salt, were the Nazi swastika and the gigantic number: ‘U-342’.
‘It’s a Nazi U-boat . . .’ Big Ears breathed.
Zoe said, ‘Hessler and Koenig. . . ’
‘Probably,’ Wizard agreed.
‘Who?’ Big Ears asked.
‘The famous Nazi archaeological team: Herman Hessler and Hans Koenig. They were experts on the Capstone, and also founding members of the Nazi Party, so they were buddies of Hitler himself. In fact, with Hitler’s blessing, they commanded a top secret scientific expedition to North Africa in 1941, accompanied by Rommel’s Afrika Korps.’
Big Ears said, ‘Let me guess, they were after the Capstone, they disappeared and were never heard from again?’
‘Yes and no,’ Zoe answered. ‘Yes, they were after the Capstone, and yes, Hessler never returned, but Koenig did, only to be caught by the British when he arrived, on foot, in Tobruk, staggering out of the desert, starving and almost dead from thirst. I believe he was ultimately handed over to the Americans, who asked to interrogate him. Koenig would ultimately be taken back to the States with a bunch of other German scientists, where I believe he still lives.’
West turned to Wizard. ‘How far behind us is Kallis?’
‘Five minutes at the most,’ Wizard said. ‘Probably less.’
‘Then we have to get cracking. Sorry, Zoe, but you’ll have to continue the history lesson on the way. Come on, people. Dump your bigger scuba tanks, but keep your pony bottles and your masks—we might need them.’ A pony bottle was a small handheld scuba tank with a mouthpiece. ‘Wizard, fire up a Warbler or two.’
The First Staircase (Ascending)
West and his team took the left-hand cliff-path.
It quickly became a staircase that rose and twisted up the left-hand wall like a slithering snake. After a minute of climbing, West was 80 feet above the swirling waterway below.
At two points along the ascending stone staircase there were four-foot gaps that preceded stepping-stone-like ledges.
And facing onto those ledges were wall-holes just like the one that Fuzzy had neutralised at the base of the quarry in Sudan.
West didn’t know what deadly fluid these wall-holes spewed forth, for the Nazis had—very conveniently—neutralised them long ago, riveting sheets of plate steel over the holes, then laying steel catwalk-gangways over the gaps in the stairs.
West danced across the first catwalk-bridge and past the sealed wall-hole.
Whump!
A great weight