by Matt James
Logan liked to think of himself as somewhere in between them all. He had some pretty messed up nightmares, like jumping from very tall buildings, but hadn’t actively tried to end his own life. Even being on the better side of the PTSD Bridge, Logan still wasn’t the same man he was before he ordered those kids dead.
After the Iraqi incident, Logan couldn’t forgive himself. A lot of the men returning home were dealing with similar issues, having seen friends and innocent civilians die, but he believed himself to be solely responsible for the deaths of two teenagers, personally handing out the kill order.
He had instructed his team to hit them with everything…and they did. The SAS didn’t screw around when it came to any type of terror cell, even one that used children on the front lines, or as brainwashed delivery boys in this particular case.
The men in charge back home in Australia called it ‘collateral damage,’ feeling none of the remorse Logan felt. After the words were spoken, Logan had to be restrained by a fellow soldier, his number two, Gray Fitzpatrick, or ‘Fitz’ to anyone who knew him. Logan would later tell one of his shrinks of the vision he had of ripping his commander’s throat out and chucking the bloodied mess out the window.
More meds were recommended.
The next day Logan resigned from the army, stating that he no longer believed in what they fought for. But that was a lie, Logan cared more than anyone what his country stood for. He just couldn’t face the facts that he was too scared and heartbroken to go back out into the field.
What if I had to do it again? he asked himself. He decided the best way to prevent it from happening again was to not be involved in it anymore. But again, he knew better. If it wasn’t him leading a team into a shitstorm, then it would just be someone else doing it. Someone less qualified most likely.
He lived off his savings for a year and was eventually contacted by a long, long distance number.
The hell? Logan thought, seeing the strange number. He’d gotten used to seeing odd numbers calling him lately. He’d been late paying several bills and had even stopped paying some others altogether.
He almost didn’t answer it, but something inside him told him to do so. “Logan?” The voice on the other end asked when he silently answered. “You there, baby brother?”
“Yeah…” he said, sighing at the way his older sister, Cassidy Jo Reed—or CJ as she preferred—greeted him. It was her way of teasing him after all these years, even though she knew he wasn’t exactly someone who should be messed with. It’s what made it so fun for her. Logan was a very dangerous person and she knew it.
“What’s going on, Cass?” he asked, getting to the point. He really wanted to get back to the twelve-pack he had on ice. Drinking was the only medicine he believed in. He didn’t necessarily abuse it, but it was the only thing that calmed him down when things got dicey mentally.
“Well, actually,” she said, “I have a job for you.”
“A job?” Logan replied, coughing, choking on his lager. “You…cough…called me about a job…in Africa?”
There was silence on the other end and Logan thought he lost the call. Sat phones did that sometimes, like the one his sister was calling from, but CJ was still there.
“A big job,” she said, emphasizing the bigness of it.
“How big?” he asked, skeptical.
“Huge. The current lead game warden, Charlie, is set to retire and he asked me for a recommendation. He specifically requested if I knew someone with a background that would help keep the bastard poachers out here on the plains in check. A real and I quote, go-getter.”
“What’d you tell him?” Logan replied, honestly a little curious.
“I said, shit yeah I do, he’d be perfect.”
Logan sat up, scratching the beard that he recently started to grow. He figured it really didn’t matter how clean shaved he was anymore. It’s not like he had anyone to impress that would give a damn.
“So, let me get this straight,” he said, standing. He began to pace the room as he continued. “You want me to leave Melbourne and move out to Tanzania and take over as the game warden of the Serengeti National Park?” He breathed. “You do realize I don’t even know what the hell a game warden actually does?”
CJ snorted a laugh but stopped after a couple of loud guffaws. “Logan, slow down, you’re overthinking this. Charlie is still six months out from calling it a career and will be here to walk you through the paces of the gig.”
Logan calmed at hearing the current warden would still be around for a little while. But still…
“Look, CJ, I—” He didn’t get to finish.
“We need to know by tomorrow morning.”
“Tomorrow?” Logan asked. Bang! “Ow, dammit!” He hopped around his apartment holding his busted toe, having just kicked the edge of his coffee table.
“Um, Logan?” CJ asked, listening to her brother empty his dictionary of curses into the phone. “You okay?”
Logan relaxed, flexing his toes. “I’m fine, but dammit that hurt!” He regained his composure a little. “So…tomorrow, huh?”
“Yep,” CJ said, laughing a little. “There are other internal candidates, but none of them are good enough. The only one capable is a real jagoff—name’s Quinn—a real beast. Physically I mean, not mentally. The man is as dumb as a box of rocks inside a bull’s body.”
“So, what you’re saying is… I’d be doing you a favor?” Logan asked, a smile creeping onto his face. “Is that it?” He could tell by the way she talked about it there was something uncomfortable between CJ and this Quinn fellow. It seems CJ may have gotten a little frisky with a co-worker recently.
“Sort of…” CJ replied, sheepishly. “But it’d also be a fresh start for you and something you could be constructive with.”
He knew what constructive meant. She was speaking to his abilities as a soldier, a leader, and a man of action. A man who could get the job done.
“Ugh,” he groaned, scratching his chin again. “Shit, CJ... Okay look, tell the ole’ codger to give me a week to pack and get there.”
“So, you’re in?” CJ asked, her voice rising an octave with excitement. “Seriously?”
Logan stopped pacing and turned to the closet door off his bedroom. Inside was everything he brought with him from the SAS and then some. He could have started a small war with what he had collected over the years.
He gave the dead-bolted door a smirk. “I’m in.”
2
Tanzania, Present Day
“Georges! We’ve found them!”
Georges Boluva, leader of the expedition, stubbed out his cigarette and hurried over to the dig. When he arrived he smiled at what he saw. They had struck their professions version of gold. Twin tusks stuck out of the dry dirt like those of the skyscrapers he’d read about. If they had time to extract them…
We are going to be rich, he thought, smiling wide, revealing his stained yellowing teeth. He could already feel the money bulging in the empty pockets of his worn, faded jeans.
He turned and shouted orders to the others. “Clear off the rest of it! I want it fully uncovered and ready to move by nightfall!”
No one argued with the seemingly impossible task of raising and extracting the ivory in that short a time. They all knew the consequences of their actions here today if the Aussie caught them. It had been hell for people like him and his men to make a living in these parts since the newest warden had taken over. Rumors had it that he was a former soldier back in his homeland.
It doesn’t matter, Georges thought, shoving another cigarette in his mouth, lighting it. The Serengeti is a very big place. We ‘should’ be fine. Not even the great guardians could see everything.
Should…
The word frightened him more than anything, but the reputation the walezi had was warranted. The Guardians, as they were called by the locals, had done a spectacular job to some, reducing the number of deaths caused by man by almost half since taking over nearly a decade ago.
Georges looked back down to the massive skull staring back at him, its hollow, lifeless eyes burning holes into him. It made him smile, though. These were already dead and by the looks of them, they’d been here for quite a while. He and his men couldn’t be charged with the killing of these creatures. Something else had slain them. Something Georges’ grandfather had told him about before dying when he was a boy.
There had been a legend of an ivory stockpile dating back to World War Two, but no one had been able to find it. Most had been looking for it in Northern Africa, where the Nazis were known to have ventured, eventually setting up various bases of operations. Egypt was the most popular locale to search.
“We just need to go where no one has looked yet,” Georges had said to the men now with him. “The stories suggest they may have gone even farther south than originally recorded.”
And so, they went south, back to his grandfather’s home in Tanzania. They had searched for months, asking every local tribesman they could find about the mythical treasure trove. It was only until recently that they had found any hard evidence that the burial even existed. But did it still hold its wealth…or had someone claimed it already?
They had stumbled upon a group of men making their way west to Lake Victoria to fish. One of them was easily in his eighties and confirmed that his own father had seen a line of trucks push through these parts in the forties. The Nazis were supposedly headed to where the park now sits.
“Have you looked for it?” Georges asked the old man.
The elder man shook his head. “Never—for it is cursed.”
“Cursed?” Georges asked, skeptical.
“By a demon,” the old man said. “Brought to these lands by the Germans.”
Georges thanked the man for the information and went on his way. He specifically remembered the look of fright in the old man’s eyes that day as he looked up from the bull elephant’s vacant stare. A faint breeze tickled his neck in the waning hours of daylight, causing his skin to break out into goosebumps.
Damn ghost stories, Georges thought, looking down at his arm. He then again peered into the animal’s empty eye sockets, second guessing himself for writing off the legend as myth so easily. Legends had a way of holding some truth.
He stepped up to the edge of the large pit, surveying his men’s work. Three large bulls, tusks and all, had been uncovered, along with a variety of other animals. None of them interested him like the elephants did. He and his men were here for one thing and one thing only. Ivory.
A scream quickly snapped him out of his thoughts as he saw two of the diggers scampering back, frightened by something in the mass grave. Their wide eyes held pure terror in them.
“What is it?” Georges asked as the men climbed out of the burial. “What did you find?”
Daudi was the first to speak. “We found bodies, Georges.”
“Of course, there are bodies, Daudi,” Georges replied, laughing. “What did you think you would—”
“Not those,” Daudi interrupted. “Those…”
The frightened man pointed back down into the pit, towards the bodies of the other animals. Next to what may have been an extremely large cat of some kind, was a boot.
A boot? Georges thought. Why is there a boot in my dig—
He realized what it must be. He leaped down into the site and carefully stepped over an excessively large, half buried cat, kneeling where his two scared comrades had fled from. He dug into the earth with his bare hands and found a pant leg. He then moved up and brushed aside more dirt, revealing a belt buckle.
Filled with an anxious nervousness, Georges quickly cleared the body, finding an all too recognizable emblem on the man’s sleeve—one that was easily recognizable around the world.
“It can’t be…”
He reached for the soldier’s insignia and pulled. The corpse’s entire left arm came away with the movement, making Georges fall backward and wince as something scraped against his hand. On his back, he leaned up and inspected the wound, finding only a superficial cut. It was nothing he had to worry about as long as he cleaned it out immediately.
The webbing between his thumb and forefinger came away with a droplet of blood. He quickly stuck it in his mouth, stopping the bleeding instantly and winced. It tasted like metal, and dirt, and something he couldn’t identify. He spat the grit to the earth beneath him and started to stand.
Ugh, he thought, regretting his quick instinct to clot the bleeding with his mouth. The taste was truly awful.
“Georges,” called Daudi, “you okay?”
He went to wave off his friends but stopped as he saw something strange happening to the nail of his thumb. At first, it slowly darkened, like he hit it hard, bruising the underside. Then, it quickly turned black as if about to fall off, but it didn’t. It started to grow, forming into a point at the end.
What?
He then experienced a horrible pain in his other fingers, as if someone was pulling all of the nails of his right hand out at once. He screamed in agony, howling into the hot, dry air.
As he wailed, his teeth began to ache, like they too were being pried from his body. Blood flowed down his chin and onto his shirt as the agony continued, sending Georges into a comatose-like state. He fell, blacking out from the pain, but caught himself before he struck the ground.
What? he thought, but his question quickly vanished. Another sensation took root, taking the place of his worries, and it was infinitely more powerful. Hunger.
Daudi and the other man, Jengo, rushed to his aid but stopped when Georges sat back on his knees and looked up to greet them. They just stayed there, mouths agape, at the sight in front of them.
Meeting their fear-filled gaze, Georges smiled, kneeling in the dust of the dead, revealing his still forming fanged mouth. The teeth were as black as night, like his fingernails, and his eyes were quickly changing—turning the color of blood.
The only thing Daudi and Jengo could think of was that the demonic presence that obviously haunted this place took over the other man’s body and—
Georges attacked before either man could verbally question him. He slashed and ripped at them with his newly formed claws and dagger-like teeth.
Neither man stood a chance.
Once both men were dead, Georges cocked his head to the side and grinned. He could hear the others coming to investigate the noise.
He would kill the others.
And then feed.
3
“Sir!” A man yelled from the corner of the command center, his voice laced with a Swahili accent. “We have reports of poachers in the plains. Jan is en route but only has one other man with him.”
Logan turned. “Who’s with Jan, Mo?”
The local man, Molambwe Monembu, also known as ‘Mo,’ stood, retrieving a Mossberg 590A1 tactical shotgun from the weapons supply rack. His station, which was mostly compound security, was surrounded by screens and computer monitors. He faced north through the tinted glass windows of the third-floor Observation Deck.
The rest of the third floor was built like a huge studio apartment. It was one massive room with no partitions, minus the cubical-like desks arranged around its interior. Logan’s workstation was in the center of the room, surrounded by a dozen weapons racks and supply closets. Not only was he the leader of his team, but he was also its weapons expert…for obvious reasons. Instead of making his men maintain their own weapons, Logan charged himself with doing it. It was a hobby of sorts and the intricate tinkering helped him with his PTSD.
It was normal and monotonous work to him and kept his mind busy and off the alternative. His perfect therapy. He ditched the twelve-packs after coming to Africa. An active duty soldier—of any kind—needed to be in both peak physical and mental condition at all times. Alcohol squelched both, but he was also human and did like to indulge in the occasional adult beverage during his off hours.
“It’s Fitz, sir,” Mo replied, loading the weapon. “He said to send in the
cavalry.”
Logan’s eyes went wide at the prospect of Fitz, the man he’d known for fifteen years, calling for help. The two men were close from their days in the SAS, and when he came calling about a job after he retired, Logan immediately hired him as his new second in command. Just like the old days, Logan thought.
Like Logan, Fitz was never the same after they took out the truck full of munitions and its four sellers…including the two teens. It was his and Logan’s bullets that finished the job and neither one of them fully recovered. Fitz held it together better than Logan did, enough so, to stay in the army, that is. The other man, like Logan, still had the occasional nightmare, spurred from the horrible memory of that day.
“Alright, Mo, saddle up. Get Saami and Pandu and make for the roof. We’re taking Kipanga for a ride.”
Mo’s face lit up when Logan mentioned their newish transport helicopter, a retired military Blackhawk. Kipanga, meaning hawk in Swahili, was a recent edition to the SDF. Mo had emphatically asked to be its pilot too, having experience in the air.
The Serengeti Defense Force—the SDF—was Logan’s pride and joy. He formed the paramilitary group two years after establishing himself as lead game warden. The ten-man crew quickly became the most feared unit in all the Serengeti National Park, having been retrained and handpicked by Capt. Logan Reed himself.
Besides CJ, Mo was his first recruit. He was a pilot from across the northern border in Kenya and was a natural for the team. He steadfastly believed in the conservation and protection of the animals in the park so much, he’d been arrested several times for buzzing hunting parties with his small prop plane. He eventually crashed the plane and was subsequently arrested again. It would be the last time he’d be incarcerated, though. CJ begged her brother to help Mo, respecting the local man’s drive and over-the-top compassion. Logan agreed to CJ’s request, trusting her judgment of the man, bailing him out of jail on the condition that he’d come to work for him.