Countdown: The Liberators-ARC (38 page)

D-68, Assembly Area Alpha-Base Camp, Amazonia, Brazil

To the west, farther from the river bank, in one of the tents that had been set aside as a sort of senior leaders' mess and club, some of the commanders, senior noncoms, and staff were singing one of those vile German war songs they seemed so fond of.

At least, Phillie Potter thought as she left her girls' tent to make her way through the nearly pitch black, at least they're not in an Irish mood tonight. God, those songs are so depressing. I wonder why the hell they seem to cheer the boys up. There are a lot of things about soldiers I will never understand.

She'd learned to stop for a minute or five, light depending, to let her eyes get accustomed to the darkness before she tried walking. She still did, even though she'd grown used to the path to Stauer's tent by walking it every night.

Finally, just able to make out enough of the tent and vehicle silhouettes to orient by, she started to step off. She'd also learned, the hard way, to give the tents a wide berth as their guy lines were always anchored some distance past the tent wall. Fortunately, the corduroy street Nagy and his engineers had put in helped to keep her on the right path, and without any unexpected holes to break an ankle in. She came to an ATV she recognized not by any distinguishing feature of its own but by where and how it was parked. Even if that hadn't been there, she could hear from a different tent than the one she sought the sergeant major, plus George and Webster, talking in normal voices. She turned there, off of the corduroy and onto some familiar sandbags, then slipped through the double canvas barrier, through the netting, and into the light.

"Wes," Phillie said, head facing toward the tent's dirt floor, "we need to have a long chat."

"Shoot," he replied, looking up from some paperwork he'd been about.

"It's . . . it's . . . I don't know where to begin."

He thought she looked seriously nervous, very unPhillielike, as a matter of fact. "Sit," he said, pointing toward the cot. "Think. Relax. Talk when you're ready."

"I thought I was ready. But . . . " Phillie sighed. "Nothing to it but to do it, which is to say, not to do it."

Now Stauer was very confused. "To do what?"

"It. You know, the wild thing? Make the beast with two backs? Make love? Fuck. I mean we can't. Not anymore. Ummm . . . fuck, that is."

He smiled; this was very unPhillielike. "Okay. Just out of curiosity, why?"

"It's the girls," Phillie almost moaned. "Those Romanian ex-slave girls. I laid down the law to them: ‘You will not get laid. Period.' How can I do it when I told them they can't?"

Stauer smiled at the irony. "You seemed pretty put out yourself when I first told you no."

Her head rocked. "Yeah. I know. But that wasn't so much the sex; I was mostly hurt because I thought you didn't love me anymore. And . . . "

Yes?"

"Well. I've been learning a lot here, even if I don't understand it all. And . . . one of those things I've learned is that I have to command myself before I've got the right to command anyone else."

Stauer's smile changed from ironic to something approaching idyllic. "Did I ever tell you what a great girl you are, Phillie?" he asked.

She sniffed slightly. This whole conversation was hard. "Not in those words exactly. Well, not outside of bed, anyway."

"Well you are. And for a lot more reasons than what you can do in bed." The smile disappeared, to be replaced by a very, very serious expression, like someone in deep concentration or-as she would insist later-someone attempting to shit a brick. "Moreover, since I'm not getting any younger, what say that when this is over we get mar-"

He couldn't finish the sentence because Phillie was on her feet, racing the short distance across the tent, throwing herself onto him and, in the process, knocking them both to the mud. After that she was too busy covering his face with kisses for him to get a word in edgewise, except when she said, "Yes!"

"-ried?" he finally managed.

"Yesyesyesyesyesyesyes!" She pulled back from showering him with kisses long enough to ask, "Umm . . . you want a quickie before I become a nun? A blow job, anyway?"

He laughed and reached up to stroke her hair, saying, "Oh, hon, you have no idea how much. But . . . courage of your convictions, Phillie. It can wait."

She laid her head down on his chest and whispered, "Thank you, Wes. That was the right answer."

In the next tent over, Sergeant Major Joshua stuck out one hand, palm up, saying, "Pay up, gentlemen." With fairly bad grace, Webster and George pulled out their wallets, peeling off, each, fifty United States dollars.

"How the fuck do you do that, Joshua?" Webster asked.

"Got to know people in our business, First Sergeant. Got to pay attention. Got to have had Sergeant Coffee come tell you a story about a young woman being assimilated into the military, what she said to some young girls, and what such a woman is likely to do."

"Bastard," said George, sotto voce, as he counted out two twenties and a ten. "How about a bet on something else?"

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

Africa is a cruel country; it takes your heart

and grinds it into powdered stone-and no one minds.

-Elspeth Huxley

D-61, Bajuni, Federation of Sharia Courts

Buckwheat thought the city was almost amazingly green compared to the bulk of the area.

"We get an annual monsoon here," Wahab had explained, while driving their Hummer through . "Mind you, that's always followed by an annual drought so the green doesn't last. Then again," the native African sighed, "nothing very good on this continent lasts very long. Still, we used to grow a lot of grain in this valley and could again.

"At least for a while, we could."

"Until the next round of civil war?" Buckwheat asked.

"Until the next round of civil war," Wahab agreed, swinging the steering wheel over to pull through a gate in a wall fronting the street. That turned out to be a mere shortcut. He kept on going through a courtyard then popped out on another street, on which he took a right. As if to punctuate Wahab's admission, a volley of gunfire burst out from what had to be a stadium, ahead and on the right. The gunfire was followed by screams and then a small mob of people exiting one of the stadium gates.

"Stop," Fulton said, holding his left hand up, palm forward. Once the vehicle had halted, he stepped down from the Hummer and walked to the stadium gate, now clear. A young man, perhaps eighteen years old, sat beside the gate, with his back against the stadium wall. His head rested on arms folded across his bent knees and his body shook with sobbing.

Buckwheat looked inside, through the gate, carefully.

In the middle of an athletic field, barely visible for the fifty-odd young men surrounding her, was a girl in a red dress, buried to her waist and with blood pouring from her head and face. All of the young men were armed, rifles slung across backs and fist sized rocks in hand. Perhaps a thousand people filled the nearest seats in the stands, watching the punishment.

The girl wasn't screaming, though she rocked back and forth as silent tears rolled down her cheeks. The tears left clear furrows in the blood. She could have been anywhere between twenty and thirteen years of age, though Buckwheat guessed it was most likely closer to the latter. As he watched, one of the surrounding young men threw a small rock, striking the girl on the front of her neck and forcing her back. She began to gasp, as if trying to suck air in through a windpipe that had suddenly swollen. The men taunted her, imitating her strained gasping.

Wahab walked up, bearing a rifle in one hand. "What is happening? Who is that girl?" he asked the weeping young man sitting by the gate.

"My sister," the boy forced out. "She was raped and they found her guilty of adultery. My . . . sister." He broke down in sobbing once again.

"What was that?" Fulton asked. When Wahab explained, he shook his head and said, as he often did, "Thank God my multi-great grandpappy got dragged onto that boat."

"Give me your rifle," he demanded of Wahab, holding his hand out.

Wahab shook his head, tightened his grip on the weapon, and said, "No. There is nothing you can do for that girl. It is the law. It is a rotten law, but it is still the law. And those men slowly killing her will still kill her, and also you, if you interfere. I would be . . . sorry to lose you, Buckwheat."

Tightened grip or not, Fulton reached out with snakelike speed, snatching the rifle from Wahab's hands. As he settled into a kneeling supported firing position, his left side resting on the left edge of the gate, Buckwheat said, "They're too intent on pulverizing that girl to even notice me until I open fire. You've got two minutes. I suggest you go get some more ammunition for this and the other rifle. I intend to see just how far your chief's protection will extend to those who intend to rescue his son."

A sort of low moan, punctuated by occasional rifle shots, permeated the air above the stadium floor. The moaning came from the survivors of what had been fifty-three young men, formerly engaged in stoning a girl. The bulk of the men had been shot in the back, some when firing first began and others as they fled that fire. With each shot the volume of moaning grew less.

Bang. Robert Buckwheat Fulton walked gingerly across the grassy field, his rifle generally pointed toward the ground. Bang. Every few steps, he would stop and fire another round-bang-into the head of someone who appeared to him to be still breathing. In all, he did that eleven times-bang-before he reached the spot where an older brother dug with bloody hands to free a younger sister from the pit into which she had been half buried. Wahab followed, his rifle up towards the now empty stands.

"How?" he asked, repeatedly. "There were fifty of them! More than fifty! How?"

"President's Hundred," Fulton said, in explanation, as he took aim at the head of another breather just past the girl. The retired sergeant's voice was pure ice. Bang. "Camp Perry, Ohio. Motherfuckers never had a chance." Bang. He looked down at someone who was not only breathing but conscious. "How do you like it when someone else has a gun and can shoot, asshole?" Bang.

"Oh," Wahab said. He looked over at the girl and said, "We can go now, Robert."

Bang. "Has the kid got his sister free?"

"No point. I mean, yes, but . . . she's dead."

Fulton bit his lip. "I see." Bang.

"Come on, Robert, we must go meet the chief and our attachments to your force."

"Sure. Be just a few more minutes . . . Hey, want a little cat's meat, motherfucker?" Bang.

D-53, Bandar Qassim, Ophir

"I hear there was a disturbance down in Bajuni," the old sept chief, Taban, said to Gutaale at the evening majlis in the latter's palace courtyard. "No one seems to have any details, but apparently a frightful number of young men were put to death by Khalid's decree."

"It's all falling apart down there," Gutaale said confidently. "Even faster than I predicted. Soon we'll be able to take it all."

Taban shook his head doubtfully. Even so, he had to admit that seizing the other chief's only son and heir had been masterful. Or at least, I can't point to any one thing that hasn't worked out as Gutaale predicted. The lands we have demanded have been evacuated and turned over. Unrest is apparently rife in the enemy capital. Khalid's position is said to be crumbling. Still, it doesn't feel right. And I can't explain why.

D-44, Suakin, Sudan

The sun wasn't quite up yet, nor had the muezzin begun the call for prayers. Under a bare lightbulb, in his own quarters, Labaan dipped his canjeero, a thin, pancakelike bread similar to Ethiopian injera, into a side dish of beef, cut small and boiled in ghee. Ordinarily, breakfast, or quaraac, was his favorite meal. This one . . . wasn't. Neither, come to think of it, did I enjoy yesterday's, or the day before's, or any lately. Nor lunch nor supper either.

His fingers dipped the rolled bread, dipped, dipped, then simply opened up and dropped it into the bowl. Standing, Labaan walked toward the part of the building wherein his captive and his gifted slave girl were kept. The guard on the door nodded, respectfully, which nod Labaan returned. The bare coral walls weren't really something one wanted to rap one's knuckles against. Instead, Labaan made a little coughing sound to announce himself.

"Are you and the girl decent, Adam?" Labaan asked.

In answer, there was a rustling of cloth, as if someone were hurriedly dressing, then the hung fabric covering the door was pulled partway aside. Adam, wearing a clean white robe slid out sideways through the narrow opening, closing the door covering behind him. It was dark in the room, Labaan could see.

"Makeda is sleeping," Adam said. "I don't want to wake her."

"You'll spoil the girl, young Marehan," Labaan said chidingly. "But never mind. Even a slave can sleep in sometimes. I assume you haven't had anything to eat yet." The older man inclined his head, saying, "Come on."

The guard wasn't there for the girl; he was there for Adam. As the captive followed Labaan along the coral floor, the guard stepped in behind, his rifle at high port. After all, the boy wasn't chained.

At his own quarters, Labaan motioned for Adam and the guard both to have seats on the floor. The guard laid his rifle down on the side opposite the boy. There was no reason to throw temptation his way.

Once they were seated, Labaan retrieved his dropped piece of canjeero and popped it into his mouth. With his other hand he indicated the tray holding the bread and the bowl of beef. Adam hesitated until the guard reached over, ripped off a piece of the bread, rolled it and dipped it, scooping up some of the beef.

They ate in silence for some time until Labaan said, "I have been thinking about the . . . security arrangements, Adam, and I had a thought."

Adam raised one eyebrow, inquisitively, but said nothing.

"There is a thing the Europeans have, maybe the Americans, too; I'm not sure. It's called ‘parole.'"

"Which is?" Adam asked.

"Your ‘parole' is, among other things, your word of honor that you won't try to escape. I've watched you for some time now. You're a good boy, a good man, really. If you gave me your word you won't try to escape then I can dispense with the damned, bloody shackles. Give you more privacy." Feel like less of a heel, though you don't need to know that.