Trojan Odyssey

Huey turned fractionally and shot Pitt a look usually reserved for the insane. "You're joking. That place is guarded tighter than Area 51 at Groom Lake, Nevada. I couldn't fly within five miles without a security aircraft chasing me away."

"What goes on down there?"

"Nobody knows. The installation is so secret, the Nicaraguans deny it exists. What began as a small facility underwent vast expansion in the past five years. The security measures go beyond extreme. Huge warehouses, and what some people think are assembly areas, were constructed. Rumor has it there is a housing section accommodating three thousand people. The native Nicaraguans used to grow coffee and tobacco on the islands. Alta Garcia and Moyogalpa, the main towns, were torn down and burned after the Nicaraguan government forced the people off their land and relocated them in the mountains to the east."

"The government must have a heavy investment in the facility."

"I don't know about that, but they've been extremely cooperative in allowing Odyssey to operate without interference."

"No one has ever sneaked through Odyssey security?" asked Pitt.

Huey smiled tautly. "Nobody who lived."

"It's that tough to penetrate?"

"The entire island's beaches are patrolled by vehicles equipped with high-tech surveillance gear. Patrol boats circle the island, assisted by helicopters. Remote sensors detect movement along every path and road leading to the complex. It's said Odyssey engineers perfected sensory equipment with the ability to smell a human approaching the buildings, and distinguish them from animals."

"There must be satellite photos?" Pitt persisted.

"You can buy them from the Russians, but they won't tell you what goes on inside the maze of buildings."

"There must be rumors."

"Sure, lots of them. The only one that has any substance is that it's a research and development installation. What they research is anybody's guess."

"It must have a name."

"Only what the locals call it."

"Which is?" Pitt had to prompt.

"In English," Huey finally replied, "house of the invisible ones."

"Any reason?"

"They say it's because everybody who goes in is never seen again."

"The local officials never investigate?" asked Pitt.

Huey shook his head. "Nicaraguan bureaucrats keep a hands-off policy. The word is that Odyssey management has bought off every politician, judge and police chief in the country."

"How about the Red Chinese? Are they involved?"

"They're everywhere in Central America these days. They contracted with Odyssey about three years ago to build a short canal through Lake Nicaragua's western shoreline at Pena Blanca, so deep-water cargo ships can enter and exit."

"The nation's economy should have profited."

"Not really. Most all of the ships that use the canal are from a Chinese cargo fleet."

"COSCO?"

Huey nodded. "Yeah, that's the one. They always dock at the Odyssey facility."

Pitt spent the rest of the trip in silence, his mind sifting through the myriad of contradictions and unknowns of Odyssey, its strange founder and even stranger operations. As soon as Huey set the helicopter down at his company hangar two miles outside Managua, Pitt walked off by himself and called Admiral Sandecker.

As was his style, Sandecker minced no words. "Haven't you taken off for Washington yet?"

"No," Pitt replied smartly. "And we're not going to."

Sandecker knew something was on Pitt's mind and he went into neutral. "I assume you have a good reason."

"Are you aware of a huge secret facility built and owned by Odyssey on an island in Lake Nicaragua that sits directly over the tu

"The closest I can come is a report I read on Odyssey expanding a canal from the ocean into the lake to allow entry for cargo ships." Sandecker paused. "Come to think of it, the report was vague on the dock facilities the Nicaraguans were building at the port city of Granada a few miles east of Managua."

"The report was vague because the dock facilities were built at Odyssey's complex on the island of Ometepe for their private use only."

"What have you got in mind?" asked Sandecker, as if already reading Pitt's mind.

"I propose Al and I go into the complex and investigate their operation."

Sandecker hesitated. "After your narrow escape from the tu

"We're getting good at breaking and entering."

"Not fu

"We'll come in from the water."

"Don't you think that they have underwater sensors?"

"Actually," Pitt said pontifically, "I'd be surprised if they didn't."

35

Ten minutes after Sandecker conversed with Pitt, the admiral was staring at Hiram Yaeger in abject incredulity. "Are you sure about this? Your data must be in error."

Yaeger was immovable. "Max is not infallible a hundred percent of the time, but on this one I believe she's right on the mark."

"It's beyond belief," said Gu

Sandecker slowly shook his head, jarred by what he read. "You're saying the tu

"According to Max's computer model, eight degrees by the time it reaches Europe."

Gu

"Let us not forget the effect of the Gulf Stream on the east coast of the United States, and the Maritime Provinces of Canada," added Sandecker. "Every state east of the Mississippi and along the Atlantic shore could suffer a cold as bitter as that in Europe."

Gu

"The Atlantic Drift's warm surface water is controlled by temperature and salinity," Yaeger explained. "As its tropical waters move north, it mixes with the cold water coming down from the Arctic, where it becomes dense and sinks southeast of Greenland. This is called a thermohaline circulation. Then it gradually warms again and rises to the surface as it reaches Europe. The Gulf Stream's sudden drop in temperature could also cause the thermohaline circulation to collapse, a state that would accent the crises and last for several centuries."

"What would be the most immediate results of such an event?" asked Sandecker.

Yaeger spread several papers across Sandecker's desk and began quoting the data. "Death and disruption would run rampant. In the begi