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Sacred Stone

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

SACRED STONE

A Berkley Book / published by arrangement with Sandecker, RLLLP

No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

For information, address: The Berkley Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

ISBN: 1-4295-9964-2

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SACRED STONE

CAST OFCHARACTERS

JUAN CABRILLO:

Chairman of the Corporation

MAX HANLEY:

President of the Corporation

RICHARD TRUITT:

Vice President of the Corporation

THE CORPORATION TEAM (OPERATIVES) (in alphabetic order)

GEORGE ADAMS:

Helicopter Pilot

RICK BARRETT:

Assistant Chef

MONICA CRABTREE:

Supply and Logistics Coordinator

CARL GANNON:

General Operations

CHUCK “TINY” GUNDERSON:

Chief Pilot Fixed-Wing

MICHAEL HALPERT:

Finance and Accounting

CLIFF HORNSBY:

General Operations

JULIA HUXLEY:

Medical Officer

PETE JONES:

General Operations

HALI KASIM:

General Operations

LARRY KING:

Sniper

FRANKLIN LINCOLN:

General Operations

BOB MEADOWS:

General Operations

JUDY MICHAELS:

Pilot

MARK MURPHY:

General Operations

KEVIN NIXON:

Magic Shop Specialist

TRACY PILSTON:

Pilot

SAM PRYOR:

Propulsion Engineer

GUNTHER REINHOLT:

Propulsion Engineer

TOM REYES:

General Operations

LINDA ROSS:

Security and Surveillance/General Operations

EDDIE SENG:

Director of Shore Operations/General Operations

ERIC STONE:

Control Room Operator/General Operations

THE OTHERS

LANGSTON OVERHOLT IV:

CIA officer who hires the Corporation

HALIFAX HICKMAN:

Billionaire industrialist

CHRIS HUNT:

U.S. Army officer killed in Afghanistan

MICHELLE HUNT:

Mother of Chris

ERIC THE RED:

Legendary explorer

THE EMIR OF QATAR:

Leader of the country of Qatar

JOHN ACKERMAN:

Archaeologist who locates the meteorite in Greenland

CLAY HUGHES:

Assassin hired to recover the Greenland meteorite

PIETER VANDERWALD:

South African death merchant

MIKE NEILSEN:

Pilot hired to fly Hughes to Mount Forel

WOODY CAMPBELL:

Drunk in Greenland who rents Cabrillo a snowcat

ALEIMEIN AL-KHALIFA:

Terrorist planning to bomb London

SCOTT THOMPSON:

Leader of the team on the

Free Enterprise

THOMAS “TD” DWYER:

CIA scientist who discovers the meteorite’s danger

MIKO “MIKE” NASUKI:

NOAA astronomer who assists Dwyer

SAUD AL-SHEIK:

Saudi procurement official for the hajj

JAMES BENNETT:

Pilot who transports the meteorite from the Faeroe Islands to England

NEBILE LABABITI:

Terrorist for London operation

MILOS COUSTAS:

Captain of the

Larissa,

the ship that delivers the bomb to England

BILLY JOE SHEA:

Owner of a 1947 MG TC Cabrillo borrows to chase the bomb

ROGER LASSITER:

Disgraced CIA agent who delivers the meteorite to Maidenhead

ELTON JOHN:

Legendary musician

AMAD:

Young Yemeni who will deliver the bomb

DEREK GOODLIN:

Whorehouse owner in London

JOHN FLEMING:

Head of MI5

DR. JACK BERG:

CIA doctor who forces Thompson to talk

WILLIAM SKUTTER:

Air Force captain who leads the team in Medina

PATRICK COLGAN:

Army warrant officer heading the team to recover prayer rugs in Riyadh

PROLOGUE

FIFTY THOUSAND YEARS ago, and millions of miles from Earth, a planet was twitching convulsively to herald her destruction. The planet was ancient but her eventual demise had been cast from the start. She was an unstable orb with poles that constantly shifted polarity.

The planet consisted of rock and magma with a metal core. Over the countless eons since it had formed and cooled, an atmosphere was born. The gaseous layers were comprised of argon, helium and some hydrogen. Life was born on the surface of the planet—a low, base form of microbe.

The planet never really had a chance to develop complicated life forms. The microbes consumed oxygen molecules to multiply, keeping the surface and atmosphere barren of cells that could evolve. The planet’s surface rock turned into superheated liquid mush as each revolution around its sun drew it closer toward the fiery furnace. The planet revolved not in a spin around her axis like Earth, but rather in an ever-increasing barrel roll as the poles shifted, and the melted rock surface began to spread like lava from a volcano.

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