Black Sun

He smiled. “You’ll end up old and lonely like me.”

“I can think of worse things,” she said. “Where’s Hawker?”

“He’s gone,” Moore said.

Her heart dropped. This could not be happening. If Hawker vanished into the haze she might never find him again.

“You’ve got to be kidding me. Did he say where he was going?”

“No,” Moore replied. “But he’ll check in when he gets there.”

“What are you talking about?”

“He took the deal,” Moore said.

She was very surprised. “You’re serious?”

“Uh-huh,” Moore said. “Now, I just need to find someone to be his contact. Someone who might be able to keep him under control and out of trouble. I was thinking Carson or Palomino or …”

She glared at him. “You give that job to anyone but me and I will kill you right here and now.”

“Well,” he said, false shock covering his face, “since I can’t even afford a funeral these days … I guess the job is yours.”

CHAPTER 70

Hawker was riding shotgun in a Bell JetRanger as it crossed the Everglades of South Florida and descended toward the tarmac in an isolated corner of Miami International.

Someone in the NRI or CIA had telegraphed his whereabouts to the State Department, part of the cover he would now maintain. As a result, U.S. marshals and members of the FBI were undoubtedly searching for him, possibly even in Miami. To keep the cover clean he would have to stay on the run. He was used to that.

As the JetRanger descended, Hawker gazed across the flat expanse of Florida. The air was warm and humid, an incredible difference from frigid Washington. To the west the sun was setting, a giant orange ball once again, falling through the hazy sky.

The latest estimates had the poles returning to normal after thirty-seven days, and a similar event as not likely to occur for another five thousand years.

In the meantime, the aurora that had sprouted over central Mexico was being watched closely, guarded by an impressive phalanx of military hardware but left alone. All involved agreed that ignorant interference in the device would only risk its failure.

Yuri had been carried back to San Ignacio and buried on holy ground, a martyr unknown to most of the world. Perhaps as it should be.

The JetRanger touched down at the center of the helipad. The pilot pointed across the ramp, to an old, unadorned cargo jet.

Hawker shook the pilot’s hand and grabbed his pack. He jumped out of the helicopter and made his way across the apron to a forty-year-old DC-8, retrofitted with new engines.

The plane carried no markings. But the men who stood outside it were most definitely retired military. Thirty-year vets by the look of things: weathered, confident faces, gray buzz cuts and steely eyes.

Hawker walked up to them.

“There’s trouble,” the captain said. “You must be our passenger?”

Hawker nodded.

“My name’s Samuels,” he told Hawker, shaking his hand. He pointed to the man across from him. “This is Halle, my copilot. And for God sakes don’t tell us your name. We’d have to go through six months of brainwashing to get it out.”

Hawker smiled; there was something undeniably positive about these men. And he had a sense that they’d been told he was one of the good guys.

“What’s the plan?” Hawker asked, assuming something had been set up.

“We take you anywhere you want to go,” Samuels said. “I have ten thousand miles of gas and a tanker standing by in every direction in case for some reason that ain’t enough for you.”

The captain looked across the airport to the setting sun. “What I don’t have is time. We have to be wheels up by sunset, with or without you. So, whoever the hell you are, you’re cutting it damned close.”

Hawker glanced over his shoulder. The sun was just touching the horizon. If he was right, the FBI was on its way, chasing a hot tip as to his whereabouts, someone’s bright idea to make sure he didn’t change his mind. It was okay; he had no intention of changing it now.

“Let’s go,” Hawker said.

“Where to?”

“I’ll tell you when I decide.”

The captain nodded and ushered Hawker aboard.

Taking a seat in the passenger compartment of this particular aircraft was not much different than being part of the cargo, so Hawker chose the jump seat behind the pilots instead.

He strapped himself in as they ran through the checklist and received expedited taxi clearance.

Several minutes later the roar of the engines a

Three-quarters of the runway behind them, the plane rotated and finally broke free from the earth.

The old bird climbed at a steady pace, engines roaring, the cabin shaking and rattling around him. He felt a sense of kinetic energy, of freedom and gathering momentum. His world had changed. It had been painful and destructive, but he’d come out the other side. He wasn’t sure what the future held, but he would rush forward to meet it, much as he was rushing forward now, surrounded and enveloped by something greater than himself. He was part of life once again, instead of death. And for the first time in years the darkness had left his soul.

EPILOGUE

High desert of Nevada, three months later

Arnold Moore stepped out of a gray four-wheel-drive Humvee with the USAF logo stamped on the door. He stared at the open expanse that stretched out before him. It was the same type of barren terrain he’d seen on the journey between Groom Lake air base and Yucca Mountain, with one minor difference. This was the desert in its natural state—unscarred by bomb craters, piles of rubble, or endless rounds of weapons testing.

In the distance, whitish salt flats shimmered in the morning sun. Beyond them lay rugged mountains the color of chocolate, as if the endless waves of heat had blackened them over time.

To his surprise, Moore found it beautiful, majestic, awe inspiring.

As he admired the scenery, a second man exited the Humvee behind him. Moore turned to Nathanial Ahiga. “Ready for a hike?”

“I really think I’ve had enough of climbing,” Ahiga said.

“No ladders this time,” Moore said. “I promise you.”

With Ahiga following, Moore took to a winding trail that snaked up the side of a weathered hill, about a hundred and fifty feet high.

“I thought you might want to see this,” Moore said. “In a way it was your idea.”

“My idea?” Ahiga said.

Moore nodded. “I was trying to figure out what we should do, based on what they sent back to us. You told me it was the other way around. That our descendants weren’t asking us to do anything, but were responding to what we asked of them. That being the case, I thought we’d better send them a message. Just to be sure.”

They crested the hill. Ahead of them, a deep circular section had been hollowed out. In the center, a hundred feet below, stood a tall, thin obelisk, gleaming like polished silver.

“You’re leaving them a marker,” Ahiga said.

“The Maya called them Stelle,” Moore said. “According to McCarter they carved stones like this around most of their major monuments. Ours is made of hardened titanium, covered with a layer of clear Kevlar, but the principle’s the same.”

He pointed to the side facing them. Markings could be seen in the surface.

“The larger details of what occurred have been engraved on its sides, laser cut and protected, in four different languages. English, Russian, Chinese, and—out of respect for those who kept the legend alive—Mayan hieroglyphics.”

“The Brotherhood of the Jaguar,” Ahiga said.

Moore nodded. The small sect had kept the truth alive as they journeyed from South America to the jungles of the Yucatan and the surrounding countries. Protecting the secret of the stones, passing it on in the best way they could, energized by the feeling given to them by the stones themselves.