Temple of Fire Read Online Free

true, the oil supply might be unlimited given the active nature of carbon compounds in the earth’s mantle.”
    “That’s correct,” said Caine .  “And U.S. Petroleum was drilling a well in Nevada to see if they could tap into this abiogenic source.  They’ve lost contact with the drilling site, where their CEO just happened to be visiting yesterday.  Our infrared satellite images indicate that there has been a powerful explosion at the well, although we can’t get any truly clear images.  Infrared does show, however, that there is a crater at least two miles wide where the drill was burrowing into the ground.  Your mission is to do a little recon and then see if you can stabilize the geological activity.  The drill seems to have tapped into some volatile gases.  I’ll need an Ongoing Threat Assessment.”
    “Got it,” said Hawkeye.  “We’ve handled oil and gas situations before, although usually to secure deep ocean wells from terrorists.  Any indication that the well was sabotaged?”
    “Unknown at this point,” Caine answered.  “U.S. Petroleum is baffled, but it wants us to give a quick response before Wall Street oil speculators can destabilize the market.  It also wants to keep the feds at bay for as long as possible lest our client’s new drilling technology be suspended.”
    “Understood,” Hawkeye said.
    “And by the way, you’ll see an EFV aboard the Globemaster .  It will be dropped near the crater after your HALO.  The Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle, which you will use to approach the crater, has some unique stealth characteristics.”
    “Titan Six is a go,” Hawkeye said.  “Quiz and Dr. Madison are ready for their first HALO jump.”
    Quiz gave Hawkeye a thumbs-up.  In reality, he and Dr. Madison, despite recent training, were terrified.  HALO stood for High Altitude, Low Opening.
     

The Nevada Desert
One Mile from the Former Camp of U.S. Petroleum
     
    Will Langhorne got his backpack and gear from his Cherokee and threw some camouflage netting over the Jeep.  Wearing a gas mask, he began to hike to the rim of the crater.  The air on the southern rim was beginning to clear somewhat, but it was foul with gas, and dust storms hampered visibility.  Also, smoke was still escaping from the crater.
    Slogging through terrain badly scarred by the blast proved difficult.   The sand was scorched, and Langhorne had to haul his body over ridges that hadn’t existed twenty-four hours earlier.  He also had to step across fault lines that had split the desert floor in a hundred places, carving deep crevices where gas seeped up like poisonous, malevolent genies.  Like his namesake from the nineteenth century, he was roughing it.
    The occasional aftershock did nothing to bolster his confidence.
    Still, he was determined to reach the site before anyone else.  Whatever had happened at the well was nothing that was taught in Geology 101 at any university.
    He approached the crater rim with extreme caution.  He lay on his stomach, peering into the wide chasm below.  What he saw made him gasp.  One of his hunches while mapping the area with GPR had been dead-on.  He rolled onto his back, hyperventilating.  In a reflex born of self-preservation, he ripped off his gas mask and took deep breaths.  Gas from below filled his lungs.
    Langhorne felt dizzy.  Clutching his gas mask tightly, he tried to stand, but the ledge beneath his feet crumbled, and he plummeted into the yellow haze below.
    He rolled downwards on a steep incline, his backpack and gear cushioning the hard jolts his body took as it slammed against unforgiving, jagged rock.
    He came to rest one hundred meters below, his ribs bruised and aching.  His bloody face was covered with abrasions.
    And then he passed out.
     

Bridge
Aboard the Alamiranta
     
    Twelve-foot swells from Beatrice lifted the bow of the Alamiranta high into the air.  The great vessel pitched and yawed as the typhoon overtook it.  Driving rain