The Chimera Sequence (34 page)

“Wait,” Leila said. “How did it get to the Congo? Why the gorillas?”

“You’re better off asking Baba about that.”

“Should I?”

“No.”

“Then what?”

“Leila, what is Baba’s position?”

“Okay…” Deputy Minister for Nuclear Energy. She still didn’t see how it was related.

“And what is the biggest hurdle standing in the way of his success?”

Leila knew she should have stayed better informed about Iran’s nuclear ambitions, but the topic usually fell into the conscious denial category with the rest of her family history. “Something about the centrifuges?”

He shook his head, clearly disappointed with her inability to make the connection. “Raw materials. We haven’t had a legal source of uranium for decades.”

And then Leila saw it, the whole messy story unfolding itself before her. The sour taste of vomit crept into the back of her mouth. Could her father really have been so shortsighted? To believe this was the best route to nuclear sovereignty?

“Sohrab, are you there?” Her sister-in-law’s shrill voice cut through the night.

“We need to get you out of here,” he whispered. “Before it’s too late.”

Cole was still awake. Not because of the vicious mosquitos that wouldn’t leave him alone, or the achy throbbing in his swollen hands. Annoying, sure, but nothing worse than he’d slept through before. No, he was awake because of the crazy story the FDLR captive had told them earlier in the day.

America
.

This final piece of the puzzle only came out after even more persistent questioning, just minutes before Lukwiya returned to retrieve him. The captive’s dying friend heard the two Arab tourists repeating the word to each other several times during their long trek up into the park to find the gorillas. When asked why they were so interested in America, all the men would say was that they were heading there next.

If true, and there was no good reason to doubt it, the story needed to be passed on to people who could act on it. Not buried here in the jungle.

He had to escape.

The camp had been quiet for at least an hour. Cole stood up and crept to the tent’s opening a few feet away. A dark human form lay across the space. With most the camp sick now, this kid was all they could spare to guard him.

Bad decision. But then, they probably didn’t think a white guy would be stupid enough to try anything alone out here in the jungle.

Cole watched him for several minutes. Definitely asleep. But how light a sleeper? He felt along the dirt floor at the inside edge of the tent. The afternoon’s rain meant his fingers came up sticky with wet mud.
There we go
. A rock. He tossed it through the cool night air, right over the sleeping guard and against the side of an overturned plastic bucket about ten feet away.

The man stirred, his small black hand moving slightly against the stock of the old rifle held closely against his chest. But that was it. His eyes never opened. The breathing pattern didn’t change.

Now or never.

Cole took one final look around the tent for anything that might come in handy. No such luck. They had taken his backpack, weapon, and even the KA-BAR Mark 2 holstered to his calf. Assholes. That seven-inch blade had been around the world and back with him. He scooped up a handful of the richly scented soil—so different from the hard-packed rangeland of the Wyoming prairies back home—and smoothed it over his face and arms. Within seconds, he was a different man, capable of melting into the night.

Cole lifted a leg high, extended it out well past the guard’s free hand, and placed it toes first on the ground outside the tent. Not a sound. The other leg wasn’t quite so easy, thanks to a cowardly kick to the knee from Lukwiya during his laughable attempt at interrogation the night before, but Cole still managed to lift it silently over his sleeping captor.

The moon was already low in the sky, but it still cast enough light to make things dangerous. Cole reached the shadow of another tent in three long strides. He inched around a corner, careful not to let his back brush against the canvas.

Now to get oriented.

He’d been blindfolded on his way through the camp the night before, so he had no frame of reference to work with. On one side, the tents opened up into what looked like a central gathering point. The other direction looked more promising—just a few rows of large tents, then a tall dark forest edge looming against the clear night sky. Easy enough to get that far, but what kind of perimeter fencing would be there? Not electrified, that much was obvious. Concertina wire? Tough to navigate, but nothing a few sutures couldn’t mend.

But what about Innocence and the Danish doctor? Not an easy decision. Cole knew he’d have a better chance of successfully finding his way out of Virunga with the park ranger by his side. But the risks of going tent to tent looking for his fellow captives were too great. That would be a good way to get them all killed.

The tree line beckoned. Time to move.

Cole heard it before he took the first step. A dull thumping roar he’d recognize anywhere.

But he wasn’t the only one.

A shout.

Change of plans.

And he hit the dirt.

“Let’s move.” Captain Jake Russell spoke softly into his throat mic. “Stay in the trees until I give the word.”

It had been a long afternoon and evening, hiding out in the oppressive jungle while waiting for just this moment. Jake still couldn’t believe that his little Kony-hunting expedition had blown up so quickly, first into a rescue mission and now a full-spectrum antiterrorism operation with global implications. Biological weapons from Iran, here in the Congo? There were some seriously messed up people out there. Not a surprise, that realization, but it did feel good to know that his team was about to play a key role in something way bigger than themselves.

He caught a glimpse of Mikey and Rico crawling through the understory about twenty yards ahead. His night vision goggles reflected their moving bodies in an eery yellow-green glow. Some of the guys were pissed that their role had shifted from primary assault force, but Jake was okay with letting the big guns go in first. At least for Rico, their new role monitoring the perimeter and preventing anyone from slipping away could end up being a lot more fun. Pity the fool who found himself on the wrong end of the dog’s combat tracking experience and nasty bite. Maybe even Kony himself would do them the honor?

The Ospreys were close now, the sound increasing every second as their tilt-rotors shifted into an upright position to allow for stationary hovering.

Shit was about to hit the fan.

Cole did his best to burrow into the soft earth against the outside of the tent. The camp was quickly becoming a frenzied hive of activity. Much as he wanted to jump up and start shouting—
I’m here!
—his SERE school survival training was engrained too deeply to let him make that rookie mistake. Better to lay low, shelter in place, and wait for the rescuers to come to him.

A pair of skinny bare legs ran right by Cole’s hiding spot, one foot landing just inches from his face. Would have been so easy to reach out and grab it, make quick work of the unsuspecting teenage rebel and come out with a weapon in his hands. But then what? It would only make him more likely to get shot in the coming chaos.

And chaos it was. Angry shouts of running men. A child’s scream. More legs running past him in both directions. Crazed anticipation, but no real action yet.

A single shot rang out. Cole raised his head just slightly and saw the dark silhouette of a lone rebel, holding a rifle above his head with the muzzle pointed into the sky.
Good luck with that.
The shot was followed by a quick burst, faint pings of metal on metal just audible over the deafening roar of the Ospreys.

The response was instantaneous—a low growl emanating from the belly mounted mini-gun on the closest aircraft—and the foolish boy was cut down where he stood. It was like the earth rose up to swallow him, a cloud of soil and rock flying into the air with the impact of the 7.62-millimeter shells fired at over three-thousand rounds a minute.

And then the whole camp exploded around him. Blinding white light and deafening booms. Cole felt like someone hit the power button inside his head, and for a split second he worried that this was no rescue mission at all. They were blowing the whole place up, sanitizing the earth from the dual scourges of the virus and the Lord’s Resistance Army. Even as the thought flew through his throbbing head, Cole knew he was wrong.
Flashbangs.
The M84 stun grenades were the first and often only weapon used in this type of rapid nighttime assault, shocking surprised targets into submission with only the occasional burst eardrum to worry about afterward. They’d done wonders in the mud hovels of Afghanistan, often leaving a room full of militants wetting their pants and begging for mercy. Now on the receiving end of their simulated destruction for the first time, Cole could understand why the devices were so effective.

As his vision returned, he began to see the forms of his rescuers fast roping in from two hovering Ospreys. A true air assault. At the same time, an amplified male voice shouted from the heavens. “Lay down your weapons. You are outnumbered and outgunned. Get on the ground, face down, hands on your head.” The voice spoke slowly and clearly, first in English, then French and something else. Maybe Acholi?

But it wasn’t going to be that easy. Another set of legs ran by and then stopped. A man threw himself down against the same tent, just ten feet ahead of Cole’s own position. The fighter set up his AK in front of him, aiming right into the main clearing where the Americans were still coming off the ropes.
Screw shelter in place.
Cole wasn’t going to sit and watch his own guys get mowed down by this bastard. Not only that—any returning fire would have a good chance of taking Cole out too. He brought a leg up under himself and dove forward, one elbow coming down hard on the top of the fighter’s head, while his other arm knocked the weapon from the man’s unsuspecting hands.

The elbow wasn’t enough. Cole’s chest landed squarely on top of the fighter’s back. He was shouting, trying to turn over, but Cole’s combatives training—the Army’s hybrid martial art loosely based on Brazilian Jiu-Jitzu—came back to him fast. Cole brought both hands up along the man’s shirt, gripping the collar tightly and pulling it against the underside of his neck. Then a quick rotation of the wrists, and the pressure was on. The man kicked wildly for a couple seconds, then went limp.
To kill or not to kill
? Cole let go. This kid was not the real enemy.

The sound of the Ospreys faded a bit as they moved up to a higher altitude. Time to let the guys on the ground do their thing.

And then a voice—a good southern American voice—rang out behind him. “Think I found our guy!”

It was really happening. Much as he hated to admit it, Vincent Lukwiya knew that this was the end. Twenty years hiding out in these jungles, and now the game was up. At least the prophet wasn’t around. The Americans wouldn’t be that lucky.

Lukwiya looked out into the darkness. The shouting of his ragtag bunch of fighters was dying down, along with the scattered gunfire that represented their worthless efforts to fight back. They were foolish, but not stupid. Maybe some of them even realized that the assault could turn out to be more of a rescue in their case. Not for Lukwiya, though. He wouldn’t get off that easily. Especially not after his recent business dealings. Was that how the Americans finally tracked him down? He knew he’d stayed in one spot for too long, but he couldn’t just leave the mines. Not when the uranium was his only thread of hope left.

Time to move. Only thirty meters separated his accidental hiding spot in the pit latrine from the camp’s front gate. The odds weren’t good, but he had nothing to lose. Better dead than extraordinarily rendered to some lonely Egyptian prison for torture. Or worse.

It was impossible to see very far beyond his hiding place, but the straight line between him and the gate looked clear.

Go.

Lukwiya leapt out of the tiny aluminum outhouse, legs pumping faster than they had in years.

Twenty meters.

His left calf burned, the old knot of scar tissue from his one real battle wound stretching painfully.

Ten meters.

The forest rose up sharply on either side of the narrow dirt road just beyond the gate. If he could just make it into the trees, he would be safe.

Freedom.

He dove into the dense vegetation. There was no indication that the invaders had even seen him. No bullets flying at his feet or shouts in his direction.
Maybe there’s still a chance.
After a minute to catch his breath and listen, he stood up into a crouch and started pushing through the darkness. His exposed skin stung from the ever-present nettles, but he didn’t care. As long as he didn’t run into a sleeping snake or prowling leopard, he would be just fine.

Lukwiya looked back. The lights from the camp were barely visible through the trees. He would only go a little ways further, then hole up for the night.