Genocide of One: A Thriller (29 page)

“This is the most recent satellite imagery taken over the Congo,” he said.

Eldridge, Stokes, and Gardner stared intently at the image. It was from inside the
jungle, a monochrome scene that could have been shot during the day or night. The
Operation Guardian personnel were approaching the end of the U-shaped line of huts.

“We believe this hut is Nigel Pierce’s.”

“Based on what?” Rubens asked.

Hewitt enlarged one section of the image. “There’s a geometrical structure concealed
in the hut. A solar electricity panel.”

“I see.” In the Congo jungle, where there was no electricity, Pierce was using solar
energy to power his computer.

Using a laser pointer, Diaz highlighted the four operatives one by one. “The one with
the medical kit is Meyers; Garrett’s the one with the communications gear. And of
the remaining two, the taller one is Yeager.”

Rubens turned to the military adviser. “Colonel, what do you make of their movements?”

Stokes frowned. “They look like they’re going to kidnap him rather than kill him.”

As the soldiers maintained a defensive circle, Yeager half leaned inside the hut.
And then all movement ceased. Ten seconds elapsed, during which nothing happened,
then Kashiwabara switched to a pistol and came in beside Yeager. The two of them moved
violently, as if reacting to something, but because the upper halves of their bodies
were inside the huts the details weren’t clear.

“Here,” Hewitt said, rewinding and playing the scene over and over. “A corner of the
image gives us a clue what was happening.”

The view switched to the rear of the hut, where a tree was enlarged. The image was
enlarged further, down to individual pixels, and the screen became a gray rectangle.
“If you play this scene in slow motion, you’ll see this.”

It was at first a black square, then one frame glowed gray and slowly resolved itself
back to black.

“The temperature of one part of the tree trunk went up for an instant. This isn’t
a natural phenomenon. A red-hot flying object bored into the trunk.”

“Meaning?” Eldridge said impatiently.

“From the movements of the two men in the hut, it appears that Kashiwabara fired his
weapon, Yeager interfered, and the shot missed its intended target. I can’t determine
the precise path of the bullet, but I would estimate a thirty-degree upward angle.
Also, when Kashiwabara exited the hut, his pistol was not in his holster but hidden
away. I think he did this because they realized they were being observed by infrared
satellite.”

“Why did they realize they were being observed?” Stokes asked dubiously.

Eldridge looked flustered and glanced over at the brilliant person who’d come up with
the operation.

Rubens knew the situation was spiraling out of control. The satellite imagery was
being hacked. The United States was already facing a huge national security threat.
And that was not all. The Burns administration had fallen right into the trap. They
weren’t the ones controlling this top-secret operation. Nous was. Rubens ordered Diaz
and Hewitt out of the room and sat there in silent contemplation, elbows on the table,
his head in his hands.

Operation Nemesis had begun with Nigel Pierce’s e-mail. When he sent it he must have
known that it would be intercepted by Echelon. The point was to see how the White
House would react to news of the next stage in human evolution. Pierce and Nous, surrounded
as they were by hostile armed forces in the depths of the Congo jungle, must have
held out hope that the American government would try to protect them.

But the Burns administration had chosen to wipe out this superhuman race, leaving
Pierce and Nous with only one choice: to escape to the outside world. They had to
obtain military power. But even if they wanted to hire mercenaries, the Pentagon kept
watch on the activities of private defense contractors. That would be impossible.
So they decided to turn to the assassins sent out on Operation Guardian.

It wouldn’t be hard to persuade Warren Garrett to join them. Garrett must have already
sensed that the White House wanted to get rid of him. The only way for him to survive
was by betraying his employer.

There must have been a selection process at work to pick the remaining three. Candidates
who didn’t meet the standards were killed in Iraq, one after another. Secret US information
was hacked and leaked to Muslim extremists, who then attacked the US contractors.
And Yeager, Meyers, and Kashiwabara moved to the top of the list.

Rubens still couldn’t fathom why a former US pararescue soldier and a Japanese mercenary
were chosen. Yeager, however, was easy to figure out. Kento Koga’s actions made it
clear: the former Green Beret member was told there was a cure for PAECS. In exchange
for saving his son from the disease, Yeager turned against his own country.

Behind this plan lay a network linking Pierce in the Congo with Japan and America.
Seiji Koga had met Pierce while conducting virology fieldwork in Zaire and was drawn
into the plan. After his death, his son, Kento, carried on the work developing a drug
to treat the disease. But no matter how much Nous’s intellect was involved in this,
it was debatable whether a cure for PAECS could be found. There just wasn’t enough
time.

Unable to stand the silence any longer, Eldridge spoke up. “What are you thinking
about?”

Rubens hesitated. What should he tell him, and what should he hide? What should he
do to minimize the casualties? With the mercenaries now won over to Nous’s side, helping
rescue them meant letting Nous survive. But wouldn’t that put the United States, and
all mankind, in danger?

Dawn in the jungle was chilly.

Voices filtered out from the line of huts in the fog-shrouded Kanga camp, but no one
was outside yet. The Pygmies must be warming themselves inside, for lines of smoke
drifted up from the thatched roofs.

While it was still dark, the soldiers of Operation Nemesis had gone back deep into
the jungle to retrieve their backpacks, so they had only been able to nap a short
time. But for Yeager something else besides the lack of sleep kept his body chilled—concern
about his son. A week had passed since he’d last had news from Lydia.

“Guardian sure is the perfect name for this operation,” Garrett said as he laid his
equipment down under a tree. “We’ve definitely become guardians. Of that anthropologist
and that Akili kid.”

And guardians of my child, too, Yeager thought.

“I can’t wait to meet Akili,” Meyers said innocently.

“You’ll be disappointed,” Mick replied coldly. “He’s creepy.”

“What—do you hate kids or something?” Yeager said, teasing him.

“That thing’s not human.”

“No; I’m talking about human children.”

Mick stared at Yeager, trying to discern the reason behind the question. “I hate weak
people. People who get hit and don’t hit back and just cry. They make me sick.”

“I bet you were like that when you were a kid.”

Mick’s eyes flashed hatred for an instant before his usual thin smile returned. “No.
I got back at them real good. After I became an adult, I mean.”

Yeager understood now about this dark shadow that possessed Mick. In order to not
cry when he was beaten, to be able to hit those who abused him, Mick must have turned
to steroids to bulk up and then later gone overseas to train as a soldier. Only someone
who had been terribly abused and hurt as a child would go to such extremes.

Footsteps sounded, and a tall man’s silhouette loomed out of the fog, coming toward
them. But the mercenaries’ eyes were drawn to the tiny figure walking beside Pierce.
All Akili wore was a pair of makeshift shorts, so they could see his whole body. From
the neck down he was a typical three-year-old child. But his eyes and that massive,
swollen forehead were not human. Those eyes that had frozen Yeager with their piercing
look the night before were still, even first thing in the morning, as forceful as
ever. This grotesque child, holding Pierce’s hand, its head swaying back and forth
as it walked, looked unreal, like some monster from the movies.

“Cuter than I expected,” Meyers said.

The other three looked at him. “You’re kidding, right?”

“No, I’m not. His eyes are like a cat’s.”

They were catlike, come to think of it, but Yeager didn’t see anything cute about
it. In front of Akili he felt the same discomfort he experienced when shown some grandiose
religious painting and forced to feel awe in front of it. “Give me dogs any day.”

“Yeah, you’re right. He does sort of remind me of a cat,” Garrett said. “He seems
like he’s seeing right through me. Maybe he’s more like a lion than a cat.”

“Definitely a lion,” Mick said in a low voice. “That kid is dangerous. We should get
rid of him.”

“Don’t get any ideas,” Yeager cautioned.

“Good morning,” Pierce said cheerfully as he came up to the group. “Gentlemen, let
me introduce Akili.”

The men crouched down and peered at the boy, who stared back with upturned eyes and
a stern expression. Pierce told him the names of his new guardians, the mercenaries,
one by one, but Akili’s expression didn’t soften.

“Does he know English?” Garrett asked.

“He understands it, but his pharynx hasn’t fully developed, so he can’t speak yet.”
Pierce showed them the laptop he had tucked under his arm. “When he wants to say something
he types it out on the keyboard.”

This form of communication seemed particularly out of place where they were—deep in
the jungle, in essentially uncharted territory. “Akili,” Yeager said, speaking directly
to him. “Is what Pierce says true?”

Akili immediately nodded. The other men, taken by surprise, called out in amazement.

“Can you really break codes?” Garrett asked.

Again Akili nodded.

“How?”

Akili looked up at Pierce and motioned for the laptop. The anthropologist handed it
to him, and Akili’s tiny hands began to move. As he typed, using two fingers, letters
appeared on the display.

Even if I explained how I break codes you wouldn’t be able to understand
.

A wry smile came to Garrett’s face. “Doesn’t give us much credit, does he?”

As he watched Akili’s movements, Yeager felt a vague doubt rise in his mind. The boy’s
typing was so slow. In addition to the question of whether the child had the intellect
to hack the military communications network, these dull, sluggish movements raised
doubts about whether it was physically possible. “Can you cure PAECS?”

Akili nodded.

“How do you treat it?”

Akili answered using the laptop screen.
First I create software to develop a drug, use that software to design the drug, and
then actually synthesize the compound
.

“Who made the software?”

I did
.

Yeager considered this. Was it possible that Akili had been drilled to just type in
preset responses, a series of letters, to certain questions and answers?

“There’s one last thing I’d like to confirm,” Garrett asked, seeking Yeager’s permission.
“I want to corroborate what Pierce is saying.”

“What do you have in mind?” Pierce asked.

“Can you get all the people together?”

“What for?”

“If you want us to protect you, just do what I say.”

Pierce looked none too happy, but he turned toward the camp and yelled out something
in the local language.

People began to come out, looking toward them to see what was going on.

Yeager and the others went over to the middle of the central clearing of the camp
to wait for the Pygmies. The forty-some people approached, seemingly not on their
guard. The Pygmies, who only came up to the mercenaries’ chests, smiled bashfully.

Karibu
, many of them said, and when Meyers, not knowing what it meant, repeated the word,
they burst out laughing.

“
Karibu
means ‘welcome,’” Pierce explained. “
Habari
means ‘hello.’”

When Yeager and the men said
habari
, the Mbuti faces grew even more cheerful, and they repeated the greeting back.

“I told them you’re friends.”

Garrett looked around the assembled group and slowly began speaking to them in what
sounded like Swahili. The CIA agent had been the first to be selected for Operation
Guardian and had apparently drilled himself in the lingua franca of the region.

“Does anyone speak Swahili?” he seemed to be asking. Half the people raised their
hands. Garrett continued questioning them, then beckoned to one man. The man, who
looked to be about thirty, had a sad expression. He was wearing a worn-out T-shirt
and shorts and was just over 140 centimeters tall, about average size for an Mbuti.

“His name is Esimo. He says he’s Akili’s father.”

After Garrett’s explanation, Yeager and the others looked intently at the little man.
Other than the fact that he was far shorter than Westerners, he looked like an ordinary
person.

“I have something I want to ask, too,” Meyers said. “Can you ask him if Akili has
any siblings?”

Garrett nodded and asked Esimo in Swahili. Accompanied by various gestures, Esimo
began relating his story—a sad one, judging by the expression on his face. Garrett
seemed to have trouble completely following him, and after much back and forth was
finally able to translate.

“He doesn’t have any siblings. Esimo’s first wife got sick when she was pregnant.
He asked the
mzungu
—white doctors—to cure her, and they took her to a hospital far away. But she never
came back. She apparently died.”

“Mzungu, mzungu,” Esimo repeated, pointing at Mick. To him Asians and Caucasians were
apparently in the same category.

“Then Esimo’s younger brother was bitten by a poisonous snake and died, so he took
his brother’s wife as his own. That was Akili’s mother. But right after Akili was
born she had terrible hemorrhaging, and she died.”