Night of Knives

by Jon Evans

  Night of Knives

  Jon Evans

  Published: 2010

  Tag(s): "Jon Evans" "Night of Knives" thriller Africa Congo Uganda Zimbabwe technothriller action adventure travel

  Part 1

  Congo

  Chapter 1

  "I think something's wrong," Susan says.

  It takes some time for the words to trickle into Veronica's mind. She is too busy breathing to pay much attention to anything outside her body. Her lungs feel on fire, her feet are alive with blisters, her mind is lost in a fog of exhaustion. She doesn't even think to wonder why they have stopped until she registers the concern in Susan's voice.

  Veronica lifts her head, looks around, tries to re-engage with the world. It seems like they have been trekking forever in this damp heat, up this steep and muddy trail. They are still in deep jungle. Montane rainforest, technically, but it feels like jungle, in the most alien and forbidding sense of the word. There is a reason this is called the Impenetrable Forest. The vegetation here is so violently, densely fecund that even the greenery has greenery: roots and branches are covered by moss, vines hang on vines, the boulders that dot the trail look like verdant hillocks. Leaves and ferns glisten with water from recent rain. Birds chirp, monkeys hoot, water burbles, clouds of pure-white butterflies flutter through the damp air. Only a few shafts of light fall through the massive canopy trees into the dense thickets below.

  Ahead of them a walkie-talkie emits a burst of static, followed by a half-dozen sentences in some African language. Their guide holds the walkie-talkie close to his ear. In his other hand he holds his panga, a viciously curved machete. He looks carved out of ebony, short and powerfully built. After a pause he pushes his radio's red TALK button and speaks in a slow and careful voice. Veronica can't remember his name. Something biblical.

  "What happened?" she asks Susan. "Why did we stop?"

  The blonde British girl shrugs. "I don't know. I think he saw something. On the ground."

  Veronica looks down and sees nothing but mud and underbrush. But then she is a city girl, while their guide has spent decades tracking gorillas through this rainforest, he can probably deduce volumes from a broken twig she wouldn't even notice. She had total faith in him when they departed park headquarters, he seemed so tough and self-assured. Now his voice sounds uncertain.

  She looks around at the others. The Canadians, Derek and Jacob, are about ten feet away. Derek stands erect, breathing easily, his lean and muscled body already ready for further exertions. She can see the dragon tattoo coiled around his left bicep. Veronica has hardly admitted it to herself, much less anyone else, but Derek is the real reason she is here. Jacob is beside him, his pale, lanky, goateed form doubled over with hands on knees, gasping for air. Veronica feels sorry for him, but also grateful that she is not their foursome's weakest link. Susan looks like a model, willowy and fine-boned, and Veronica expected her to wilt like a fragile flower; but it seems she's tough, too.

  The rest of their gorilla group is far enough behind to be invisible, but Veronica can hear the rustling of the hanging vines and underbrush as they catch up. The Brits appear first, Tom and Judy, slow and portly and middle-aged but surprisingly durable. They look like they're still enjoying themselves. Diane and Michael behind them do not. The two fiftysomething Americans are thin but not fit, and Diane in particular looks haggard. The Ugandan guards bring up the rear, two men in camouflage uniforms with scary-looking rifles slung over their shoulders.

  "What's this then? Elijah finally call for a tea break?" Tom asks, hoarse but cheerful. Elijah is their guide's name, Veronica remembers. "Why start now, just when we're having so much fun?"

  "We don't know yet." Susan too is British, but her clipped upper-class accent is entirely unlike Tom and Judy's broad syllables. "He saw something on the ground."

  "Gorilla dung?" Judy asks, excited.

  Susan frowns. "I don't think so."

  "Then what?"

  Elijah's walkie-talkie crackles with new life, and everyone goes quiet.

  "What's the story, mate?" Tom asks, when the disembodied voice falls silent.

  Elijah shakes his head. "Silence, I beg you. Give me silence."

  His low singsong voice is hypnotic. They obey. Elijah turns in a slow circle, peering intently into the jungle, so dark and overgrown it feels almost more like a cave than a forest. The idea makes Veronica uneasy. She doesn't like confined spaces.

  Veronica glances back at the guards in time to see them exchange a tense glance. A tendril of anxiety slithers into her gut and begins to tighten into an icy knot. Susan was right. Something is wrong.

  Elijah completes his rotation, considers a moment, and says quietly, "We must turn back."

  It is Michael, outraged, who breaks the silence. "What? No. We can't go back now."

  "You may return tomorrow."

  "No. Out of the question. We have to go to Kampala tomorrow, we've got a flight the next day. We are absolutely not going back now. We've already climbed an hour, we're already here. They can't be far away now. You said it would only be an hour."

  "Really, Michael, if he thinks it's better -" Diane begins, looking like she wishes she had never come to Africa.

  He cuts her off. "We paid four hundred dollars each, for a full hour with these gorillas, and we're going to stay here until we find them. You can bring these other folks back tomorrow. My wife and I need to see them today."

  Veronica winces. She hates being around Americans like Michael, the ugly tourists who give her country a bad name. Elijah is wholly responsible for their collective well-being, in this jungle literally on the edge of civilization, and Michael is berating him like he would a dishonest taxi driver. He reminds Veronica of her ex-husband Danton at his worst. She wants to shout at him but knows it wouldn't improve the situation.

  Elijah doesn't answer directly. Instead he barks out something in an African language, and both guards unsling their rifles. Michael takes a step back, eyes wide, as if they might respond to his demands with gunfire.

  Elijah says, "We go back, all of us, now."

  "What's going on? Poachers?" Derek sounds icily calm.

  "Yes, poachers," Elijah agrees quickly. "Now go."

  The group turns around and begins to retrace their trail, moving fast, any remaining reluctance snuffed out by the sight of readied weapons. They move through silence, the birds and monkeys have all ceased their chatter. Veronica is right behind the guards. She can see the tension in their muscles, and feel her heart thumping rapidly inside her ribcage. She tells herself that nothing will happen, this has nothing to do with her. Just poachers hunting gorillas, they won't come after tourists, and even if that were to happen, they have two armed guards with them, they'll be fine.

  She jumps as the silence is broken by a loud crack from somewhere within the jungle. It sounds like the breaking of a sturdy branch. Veronica thinks she might have seen a camera flash. One of the guards twitches, slips on the mud and falls face-first only a few feet ahead of her.

  "Stop!" Elijah shouts. He sounds alarmed now. Frightened. "Fall down! Fall down, all of you!"

  None of them obey. Veronica turns to stare at him, unsure that she even heard him correctly: fall down? Elijah's eyes are wide and he is waving his arm violently as if miming a falling tree. He grabs Jacob by the shoulder and actually shoves him to the ground. Beside him, without further encouragement, Derek drops gracefully into a push-up position. Tom, Judy, Michael and Diane, closer to the guards, stand frozen in place.

  Veronica turns back towards the fallen man. An awful notion has birthed in her mind. The world seems to be moving in slow motion. His uniform is now thickly stained by a dark liquid, and he is twitching erratically, like some kind of broken machine. The other guar
d seems to have disappeared into the jungle.

  "Down!" Derek shouts. "Everyone get down!"

  The fallen guard's breath is fast and shallow, blood is seeping from his torso into the dark mud beneath him. Back at park headquarters, only an hour ago, Tom and Judy started talking to him, and he told them proudly he had five children. Veronica knows she should try to help him. She is the only person here with medical training. But she doesn't move.

  Another hollow crack erupts from the jungle, louder and closer than the last, from where the other guard disappeared. It is followed quickly by two more, even louder, even closer. Veronica slowly starts to back away from the fallen guard, telling herself it's too late, she can't do anything for him. Then she sees movement in the greenery beyond him, less than ten feet away, and she freezes again.

  A levelled rifle emerges from the jungle, held by a short and wiry man dressed in rubber boots, ragged khaki shorts and a black Tupac Shakur T-shirt. His face is marked with vertical scars. His gun is aimed directly at Veronica, she can look right down the dark eye of its barrel.

  Foliage rustles like paper as other intruders advance through the shadowed jungle all around. The pungent scent of gunpowder fills the air. Veronica stares disbelievingly at the gunman before her, as if he might be a hallucination. She feels very cold.

  Chapter 2

  The intruder stoops to take the fallen guard's rifle. He is so close Veronica could take a single step forward and touch his hand. She feels paralyzed, barely able to breathe. He takes the weapon and stands back up, waiting for something.

  Veronica forces herself to move, to turn her head and look at the others. There are more intruders among them, she can't tell how many but the jungle seems alive with motion, there must be at least eight or ten. Most look similar to the man who stands an arm's-length away from her, but two of them are much smaller, like children. All of them are armed. Banana-shaped ammunition clips protrude from their battered wood-and-iron rifles.

  Two of those weapons are pointed at Elijah. He and the rest of the gorilla group seem to have turned into statues. The one exception is Derek, who as Veronica watches draws himself up slowly from his push-up position into a tense crouch. His eyes dart in all directions, as if looking for an avenue of escape, but one of the smaller intruders watches him carefully, keeps his weapon aimed straight at Derek's heart.

  She hears a slithering sound behind her and turns to see two more intruders dragging the other guard out of the jungle by his legs. His limp arms trail behind him like loaves of bread. His face is masked with dripping blood and somehow distorted, Veronica can't make out exactly what happened to it and doesn't want to.

  She knows she should be terrified, but she feels more horror than fear. She is not yet frightened for herself, not in her blood and bones. So far it is all too dreamlike, too strange, surreal and silent. It feels like everyone is playing a part, going through motions scripted for them long ago. Surely this performance will soon be over and everyone involved will go back to their regularly scheduled lives.

  The guard lying before her stops breathing. It is nothing like a movie death scene, it is far more stark and simple.

  One of the intruders speaks. She can't see his face, he is aiming his gun at Elijah, keeping his back to Veronica. The words are in an African language. Elijah hesitates. He looks thoughtful. Then he pushes the red TALK button on the walkie-talkie and begins to speak quickly. About ten words in he is silenced by a loud burst of gunfire like a whole string of firecrackers going off.

  Veronica closes her eyes involuntarily against the bright flashes. When she opens them again Elijah lies dead or dying on the ground, his rag-doll body torn by a dozen wounds. It takes her a moment to understand. He was told to put down the walkie-talkie, or maybe to tell it reassuring lies, and instead he told park headquarters what was happening, and was killed for it.

  The man who spoke to Elijah, and then murdered him, starts barking new orders. He sounds angry, thwarted. Veronica cries out with pain and dismay as the intruder standing above grabs her arm and half-drags, half-leads her to their leader. The rest of the gorilla group is similarly escorted, arranged into a rough line, then forced onto their knees in the damp undergrowth.

  None of them dare to resist. This doesn't feel unreal any more. It feels very real and very immediate. It feels like they are all about to die. Veronica doesn't know what to do, she can't think, she feels weak and sick, like she has the flu. Her mind seems stuck in neutral, unable to move.

  "We have money," Michael says weakly. He pulls his money belt out and tugs open its zipper with fumbling fingers. "You can have it. American passports. Everything. You can have it all."

  The intruders' leader takes two quick steps towards him and kicks him in the stomach like a soccer player taking a free kick. Michael doubles over and makes gagging noises. Money spills from his hands. Diane begins to shriek, but tentatively, she is panting for air and can't get enough air in her lungs to really scream, and when the man who kicked her husband turns menacingly towards her, she chokes and falls silent.

  There are men behind them now. Veronica feels strong hands on her arms, dragging them behind her back, pulling them together. Then she feels rope against her wrists. A bolt of panic surges through her. She will be utterly helpless, she has to do something - but there is nothing to be done. The rope tightens, is knotted. Hands fumble at her waistband. She fears she is going to be stripped and gang-raped right there, but she is soon released. The man goes on to Jacob beside her. He too looks sick with terror.

  "It's going to be okay," Derek murmurs to her. He manages to sound a little like he means it, even though his arms too have just been bound behind him.

  "Silence," the leader hisses at him, pronouncing it the French way.

  Derek nods, but it's a nod of acceptance, not submission. Veronica is glad she is beside him. He seems to radiate strength.

  Soon they are all bound, and all connected by lengths of yellow rope tied to their belt loops, a poor man's chain gang. Veronica wriggles her hands and tugs her arms, but the knot on her wrists is tight and secure, there is no escape. The position of her arms is uncomfortable and her shoulders have already begun to ache.

  "Allez," the leader says, and then in accented English, "We go. We go fast."

  He begins to pull them to their feet. Veronica dares to look directly at him for the first time. He is big even for Africa, over six feet tall and broad-shouldered. His cheeks are marked with vertical scars. What was once his right eye is now an empty crater of scar tissue. His face is drawn into a tight expression, as if he is in pain. Like the rest of his men, he carries a gun on his back and a panga dangling from his belt; unlike them, he also bears a looped-up whip that makes him look a little like a black Indiana Jones.

  Once they are all on their feet, he and three of his men begin to lead their roped-together prisoners off the trail and into the underbrush. Derek is at the front of the chain, and Veronica second. The other four abductors follow, leaving the three dead men behind. One of the small men acts as navigator, guiding everyone else through the opaque jungle. He's maybe four feet six, but he has a goatee. It takes Veronica a moment to understand. Not a child. An adult pygmy. His features are finer than the larger men, his skin is lighter, and he marches barefoot through the jungle. The trail he leads them along, if it is a trail, is entirely invisible, but somehow they avoid the worst of the tangled vines and dense undergrowth, and the men in front rarely have to use their pangas.

  * * *

  Veronica remembers sitting in her Kampala office and reading Wikipedia articles about the Impenetrable Forest, just after she accepted Derek's invitation to come along on this weekend expedition. According to Wikipedia, pygmies used to live here, until the Ugandan government expelled them in favour of the jungle's more lucrative denizens, the gorillas. Now the pygmies are the lowest of Uganda's low, despised and dispossessed. She remembers how hearing Derek's voice made her a little dizzy and lightheaded, when he called and inv
ited her to come. The memory is so vivid it is almost like she is actually back in Kampala.

  She tries to drag herself back to the present, but her mind is buzzing like a insect trapped in a jar, constantly ricocheting in new directions, bouncing again and again off the sheer terrifying enormity of what just happened. Nobody speaks as they move westwards, along the ridge instead of up it. It isn't as physically difficult as climbing, but the muddy ground is slick and uneven, especially when they cross little streams, and keeping her balance is a real challenge with her arms tied behind her back. Veronica never appreciated before how much her arms contributed to walking. Her legs are already tired, and soon she is sweating and breathing hard again. The exertion clouds her mind, but in a strange way also makes it easier to think, absorbs some of the white-noise panic that at first drowned out any coherent thought.

  They are travelling west, towards the Congo border. That makes awful sense. This national park is right on the Uganda-Congo frontier, and the eastern provinces of the Congo are among the few places on earth with no real government, home to a civil war that began almost a decade ago and still simmers despite the presence of UN peacekeepers. These men must have come from that land of lawless anarchy to capture white tourists. The thought gives Veronica hope. Even if rescue doesn't arrive, these men will want to ransom their victims, that is why they have been captured and not simply killed and looted. She is helpless, but at least she is valuable.

  Ahead of her, Derek slips on mud; and as he turns to right himself, he twists his head and mutters to her, "We need to slow down and mark the trail. Pass it on."

  He keeps walking, a little slower now. Veronica understands. It will take at least half an hour for a rescue party to get from park headquarters to where they were ambushed. Then their rescuers will have to follow this hidden pygmy route through dense jungle. That will take time and luck; they need to help with both.