The Illuminati Sanctum (The Relic Hunters 6) by David Leadbeater (best mobile ebook reader .txt) 📕

The eyes flicked from side to side, panicked.

“Unless you decide to be an asshole.” Cassidy put in. “Then we’ll feed you to the sharks.”

Her threat didn’t help. Bodie held his handgun up, letting the man catch sight of it, a gesture which stopped all movement. Cassidy rolled the guy over, zip-tied his hands and ankles, then placed a strip of tape across his mouth. When she climbed off the guy, Bodie frowned at her.

“You enjoyed that way too much.”

“Shut up, freak.”

They trussed up the second guy and transferred him to the first guy’s room before checking the place for any means by which they might free themselves or communicate with the outside world. Then, satisfied, they locked the door behind them.

“It’ll be an uncomfortable few hours,” Yasmine said. “But they’ll get over it.”

Bodie nodded and ran back up to the top deck, looking for Jemma. They found the raven-haired thief at the wheel, taking stock of the controls and the instrument display. Lucie was at her side, lending advice.

“We good?” Bodie asked.

“Piloting this won’t be a problem,” Jemma said. “But you might wanna take a look at the sub. No point setting off if we can’t work the bloody thing.”

“Fair point.” Bodie turned away and, with Lucie and Yasmine, made his way back onto deck and toward the personal sub. Yasmine had thought to grab whole bunches of keys from a hanger in the cabin and now tried them all, finding the right set at the fourth attempt. Bodie lifted the small, bulbous entry hatch and climbed inside, finding a neat, cramped and luxurious interior with three seats. He took the center pilot seat and studied the controls.

Cassidy leaned through the top of the hatch. “Any good?”

“I see speed, propulsion, thrusters, time, life support. Lots of controls. Oxygen monitoring. Battery life.” He clapped his hands. “It all seems pretty simple. You aim it with these things.” He tapped two paddles, and don’t crash with these.” He indicated the thrusters.

Cassidy closed her eyes. “There’s not a chance in Hell I’m going with you.”

Bodie had already decided Jemma and Lucie would be the best copilots, Jemma for her quick wits and ability to plan well under pressure, and Lucie for her knowledge of the ley lines and their mission.

“Get in,” he told them ten minutes later. “We’re going back to Atlantis.”

CHAPTER THIRTY

They anchored far away from the secure zone that the authorities had raised around the dig site of Atlantis, barely able to see the blazing lights through the murk and the dark. Bodie noticed with relief that there were other vessels dotted about the seas too, hoping to get a closer look at what was going on. It was a difficult area for the authorities to police, since Atlantis was effectively in international waters.

Bodie had Jemma drop anchor well away from the other boats, and prepped the sub. When Jemma and Lucie climbed aboard, and leaned nervously back into their seats, the space became claustrophobic, despite the efforts the manufacturers had made to imitate space and light.

Bodie gave Yasmine a signal, and soon several motors began to grind, inching the sub away from the yacht and out over the water. Above, a gantry rolled out, to which the sub was attached, strong cables holding it in place. When the sub was far enough away from the yacht, the gantry lowered it into the water. Bodie bobbed on the surface, looking around. They were in touch with Jemma in the cabin, who was scanning the seas by sight and by radar.

“We good?” he asked.

“All good,” she said.

Bodie flicked a switch. The submersible slipped under the Atlantic’s rolling waters, and everything went dark. Hurriedly, Bodie flicked on some lights. The spherical cabin provided a first-rate view but, so far at least, there wasn’t a lot to see. The underwater world felt as alien as it did awe-inspiring. Bodie used the descent to get to grips with the simple controls, hoping that the craft could go deep enough.

Lucie had made a note of the coordinates where the ley line intersected the sunken ruins. It was on the eastern edge of the raised underwater shelf, one of the higher points. Bodie was too focused to count the hours, but he did keep an eye on their remaining battery charge and life-support.

“The seabed is coming up,” Lucie said way too early.

Bodie nodded, trying not to smile. “Don’t worry. Unless there’s bad traffic down here, we’re not gonna crash.”

“Bad traffic?” Lucie was too nervous to see the joke.

“He means sea creatures,” Jemma said. “Megalodons. Kraken. Maybe even Atlanteans. That kind of thing.”

Lucie grimaced and went back to consulting her notes. Truth be told, if Bodie hadn’t been concentrating so much on piloting the vessel, he’d have been nervy too.

An impenetrable, rushing dark reflected off their lights and had surrounded them for some time now. An occasional large fish or shoal darted past and away from them. Bodie followed Lucie’s instructions, guiding the submersible through the pitch-black waters until they floated less than fifty feet above their destination.

“Can we see below?” Jemma asked.

“I can tilt it,” Bodie said.

Both Jemma and Lucie made noises of discomfort, but Bodie pushed the level to tilt the sub anyway. The light penetrated the murk only so far and Bodie was forced to travel another twenty feet at that angle, prompting even more squawks of concern from his two cranky passengers.

Slowly, the wonders lost for so long on the bottom of the sea materialized. Bodie glimpsed the excavation so far with amazement. The rocky floor of the ocean had been transformed into a range of crumbling edifices and stunted ruins, a misty collection of skeletal buildings and relics, the remnants of the once great civilization. Seeing