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great deal of speculation about what other deadly devices might be secreted somewhere around the planet. The destruction of the Majestic-12 bioexperiment facility at Dulce, New Mexico, by a ray from a foo fighter indicated that there were weapons the Airlia had that many governments would dearly like to get their hands on. Weapons that the UN would like to get under positive control before an irresponsible party gained hold of them.
    The message Professor Nabinger had received from the guardian about the civil war among the

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    Airlia indicated that they'd had a weapon powerful enough to have wiped the Airlia home base, known in human legend as Atlantis, off the face of the Earth so effectively that it had become only a myth.
    "More specifics," Duncan said.
    "I don't have more specifics," Kostanov said. "As I told you, we never made it to the target. This happened in early 1989, and as you know there was much turmoil and change in my country that year. We were never able to relaunch another mission. You now know as much as I do."
    "And the target is?" the British lieutenant colonel asked.
    Kostanov shrugged. "That is for your intelligence people to tell you. I gave them the location. I assume they have better pictures than I had ten years ago."
    Duncan gestured at a woman in a gray three-piece suit who had been sitting along the wall while Kostanov spoke. She now stood up. She was tall and slender with jet-black hair, cut tight around her head, framing an angular face. She appeared to be in her mid-thirties, but it was hard to tell as her skin was perfectly smooth and pale.
    "My code name is Zandra," the woman said. "I represent the Central Intelligence Agency."
    Zandra held a small remote. She clicked a button. A long-range satellite photo appeared. "Northeast Africa," Zandra oriented them quickly. She clicked and the shot decreased in scale. "Southwest Ethiopia, near the border with Kenya and Sudan. Very inhospitable terrain. Largely uninhabited and largely unexplored."
    Turcotte nodded to himself. That fit the pat-

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    tern. The Airlia had picked the most inaccessible places on Earth to hide their equipment: Antarctica, the American desert in Nevada, Easter Island. Always where it would be difficult for humans to get to and survive.
    "The most significant terrain feature in this part of the world is the Great Rift Valley. It starts in southern Turkey, runs through Syria, then between Israel and Jordan where the Dead Sea lies; the lowest point on the face of the planet. It goes from there to Elat, then it forms the Red Sea. At the Gulf of Aden it splits, one part running into the Indian Ocean, the other going inland into Africa, to the Afar Triangle. The lowest point in Africa, the Danakil Depression, which is where our target is, lies directly along the Great Rift Valley.
    "From there the Rift Valley goes south, encompassing Lake Victoria, the world's second largest freshwater lake, before ending somewhere in Mozambique."
    Another click and there was a tiny square in the center of a deep valley, high mountains on both sides and a river running in the center. The next shot and they could see that the square was a fenced compound next to the river. The vegetation was sparse and stunted.
    "That's your target. According to legal documents we've traced, that compound is owned by the Terra-Lei Corporation, which is headquartered in Cape Town, South Africa. They own a variety of interests, and they claim this compound is a mining camp. It's been there for sixteen years. Our satellites have never shown any mined material leaving. The only way in or out is by plane or 43

    helicopter or a hazardous three-day trip by all-terrain vehicle from Addis Ababa.
    "The interesting thing about Terra-Lei is that the only sort of mining operation, if you could call it that, they've ever been associated with has been sending mercenaries into Angola to attack diamond mining camps. Terra-Lei's main business is arms; manufacturing, buying,