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When this was done, Cassidy pulled the raft back to a position immediately
below the conduit, and Ferracini climbed back up, bringing the main fuse cord
with him. The gases were densest at the bottom of the shaft, and his cheeks
were streaming inside his mask. The nervous tension and the effort of his
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labors below were causing him to breathe heavily, and he could taste acrid
fumes in his throat. He was starting to feel dizzy.
Cassidy had more fuse ready to attach to the cord that Ferracini brought up.
Paying it out behind them, they began climbing the conduit. The conduit was
steep, but having been tunneled down from Hammerhead rather than drilled, it
was roomy enough for them to proceed steadily; also, its floor was cut into a
series of stepped working levels, which helped offset the grade.
Ferracini's eyes were stinging, and he was struggling against an urge to
cough. He opened the oxygen valve of his rebreather wider, which gave some
relief; but he knew at the same time that this would exhaust its supply
sooner. He was too muzzy-headed to calculate how long he had, or to really
care that much. Keep plodding on-one, two, three, up a step; one, two, three,
up a step. It would be worse after the next charge went off-more
pressure...Hoped he'd be able to keep going till they got out..
Oh, Christ, have to fight the SS then...Keep plodding on- one, two, three, up
a step..
After a hundred feet or so they crouched on the conduit floor Cassidy lit the
fuse, and they covered their heads and ears.
Back in the outer chamber, the needle of the sampling valve pressure gauge
jumped in the light of Payne's flashlamp. "That's it!" Payne said. "They've
blown the shaft."
"They seem okay so far," Lamson relayed across to Ryan, who was still at the
hatch.
"They've blown the shaft."
"They've blown the shaft," Ryan told Warren and Knacke outside.
By the cover into the inner chamber, Payne and Lamson tensed and rechecked
their equipment. When the needle dropped again, it would mean that the
coverplate of the conduit underneath Hammerhead had been opened. That would be
their signal to open up the inner chamber and go through.
Deep below, Ferracini and Cassidy were following the long grade of the conduit
upward-under the perimeter fence of the main plant complex; under the
high-security zone around the Citadel; under Hammerhead. Ferracini was
drenched with perspiration mixed with the grease. His head reeled, and he
stumbled. Cassidy gripped him firmly and steadied him on his feet again.
In Gestapo Headquarters, Berlin, Heinrich Himmier was screaming into a
telephone at the SS
file:///F|/rah/James%20P.%20Hogan/Hogan,%20James%20P%20-%20The%20Proteus%20Ope
ration.txt (171 of 203) [2/4/03 10:58:32 PM]
file:///F|/rah/James%20P.%20Hogan/Hogan,%20James%20P%20-%20The%20Proteus%20Ope
ration.txt general commanding the Citadel garrison. On the far side of a table
littered with construction plans, the two engineers from the Todt Organization
were staring with appalled faces at the drawing spread out on top.
"They're not coming through the plant, you imbecile. They're coming under the
plant! Do you understand me? Under it!...Well, get the dolts down from the
upper levels..
Rassenau is wasting his time in the Munitions Compound. They're not in the
Munitions
Compound. They're coming in through number three waste shaft...Yes, we've got
him on another line, and he's sending his troops there immediately But they
may already have gone down. You must secure
Valhalla..
What?...No, you fool, I've already told you that those shafts don't matter
There's another one leading right up your asses! They're going to come up
right underneath you!"
Even as Himmler was shouting, a steel plate blew off a sealed opening on the
lowermost level of the Hammerhead complex, and red-brown gas exploded out in
every direction. Two hooded, black-clad figures wearing masks and brandishing
submachine guns emerged, and the personnel in the vicinity started collapsing
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and choking.
While back in the waste shaft, two more figures were already on their way, [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]