Night of Knives

by Jon Evans

  Light flickers from up the ridge, light like a gunshot, but there is no sound. The two men following her turn to look. There is another flash, and another, they seem to be coming every two seconds. The men speak briefly. Then they return to her trail. They heard her, she realizes too late; they noticed somebody stopped running after the gunfire. They know she is close to the path.

  Light from their flashlight washes over her. She cringes away as one of them exclaims triumphantly, and suddenly they are both standing over her, aiming their light directly at her face, speaking to one another in surprised tones. Veronica curls into a fetal position. All she can see of them is that they wear jeans and leather boots, good quality, these men aren't poor. One stoops, grabs her arm, pulls her roughly to her feet.

  "No," she says weakly, knowing there's no use in fighting back, trying to resist by going limp, like a child. "No. Let me go. Let me go."

  She makes a pathetic attempt to pull away. In response the pressure on her increases, her arm is pulled behind her back and forced upwards until she cries out from the pain. Her shoulder feels like it is on the verge of dislocation. Veronica is hyperventilating, panting like an animal. It is all she can do not to stumble and fall as her abductors march her back to their vehicle.

  Chapter 26

  Her captors are laughing now, exchanging eager banter. They propel her across the road and shove her hard against its wall of the matatu, she gets her free hand up just in time so that it instead of her face absorbs most of the impact. Then that arm too is grabbed and forced painfully behind her back. She is dragged alongside the matatu and bent headfirst over its hood. She kicks out feebly, tries to wriggle free, but it is no use, and then her arms are forced higher, agony arcs through both her shoulders, and she screams.

  Her arms are allowed to lower a tiny amount. Veronica stops trying to resist, she just lies there numbly, moaning, her arms held behind her back, the matatu's hood against her face. Its engine is still warm from the drive. A single powerful hand pressing down on her arms keeps her pinned face-down. Her captors discuss something. She doesn't understand their words, but she gets the idea that one of them is arguing in favour of something, and the other is reluctant, but eventually gives in.

  Moments later something metal touches her temple. She swivels her head instinctively so she can see what it is. A gun, a pistol, held to her head. The second man fumbles with the zipper of her jeans. Veronica tries to think of something to say to make them stop but the only sounds emerging from her mouth are helpless animal grunts. She tries to fight but there is too much weight on her; the more she tries to wriggle free, the more her shoulders howl with pain.

  The button pops free. She whimpers as her jeans and underwear are yanked down to her knees. She hears a loud grunt, then, and unexpectedly, some kind of warm, thick liquid splashes over her lower back, and the flashlight that has illuminated her goes careening into the night. The hand on her wrists and the gun against her head pull suddenly away. As Veronica reflexively stretches out her arms, releasing her tortured shoulders, she hears a horrible gurgling sound, and then a man falls right on top of her, his whole weight pushes her into the hood for a moment before he rolls limply away, leaving her free.

  Veronica stands, turns, and screams again. In the dim light of the fallen flashlight she can see there is blood everywhere, blood all over her legs and lower body, and two men lie dead at her feet. A third stands in the darkness, she can't see his face but the panga in his hand is wet with blood. She instinctively turns to run, but her jeans trip her up and she falls hard on one of the bodies. Veronica scrabbles away, clumsily pulling her jeans and underwear back up, gasping with shock and horror. The third man picks up the fallen flashlight and illuminates himself. It is Rukungu.

  "Be silent," he hisses.

  Veronica somehow manages to get to her feet. She is shaking so violently that she has to lean on the matatu to steady herself.

  Rukungu inspects her. "Are you wounded?"

  She shakes her head.

  "The other men will return. They have Kalashnikovs. We must run, not fight."

  Veronica takes three deep breaths, recovers enough of her self-possession to stand unsupported. "Yes. Okay. I'll follow you." Her voice sounds foreign to herself, an old woman's voice.

  * * *

  By the time Veronica and Rukungu begin their descent back to the refugee camp, his water bottle is empty, her throat aches with thirst, her head hurts and she is dizzy with exhaustion. Her adrenalin has drained away, she is covered with the blood of two dead men, all she wants is a Gatorade and a shower and a warm bed. She forces herself to keep marching onwards after Rukungu. Going downhill requires less effort but more attention, and she staggers frequently. Every step causes both her shoulders to pulse with dull pain, but she doesn't think there's any serious damage or dislocation, both her arms seem to work fine, they just hurt.

  "Veronica," a cautious voice calls out. "Rukungu."

  Veronica stops, amazed. Rukungu aims the flashlight and picks out Jacob, seated slumped on a big boulder, covered in dirt. Veronica sways with relief. He's okay. He got away. She finds the strength to rush up to him and hug him.

  He hugs her back clumsily. "Are you okay?"

  "Fine." She manages a smile. "Lot better than I look. How'd you find us?"

  She is not terribly surprised when he holds up his trusty hiptop. "GPS. I backtracked to our route up, recognized this rock."

  She looks down and realizes this boulder he is sitting on is the same one beneath which Rukungu's panga was hidden. She also sees Jacob's water bottle, still half-full. She grabs it, takes a few deep swigs, and passes it to Rukungu, who finishes it."

  Jacob says, "I had to dump my camera. I turned on the flash and put it on automatic, threw it downhill, they went after it instead of me." Veronica nods; those were the flashes she saw. She's impressed by his presence of mind during a crisis, but then she's seen it before, in the Congo. There is an iron core beneath Jacob's geeky exterior. "Had to leave the spectrum analyzer too. That's fifteen thousand dollars down the drain."

  "You're alive."

  He smiles. "Good point. Cheap at the price."

  "Never mind the pictures. We got away."

  "Oh, I've still got the pictures, I took out the memory card before I tossed the camera. What happened to you?"

  "Two of them got me." Veronica turns to look at Rukungu, who waits silently a little distance away. "He killed them."

  "Jesus."

  "Yeah."

  "What do we do now?" Jacob asks.

  "I think we should go. Just go, right now. They'll know we went back to the camp. Rukungu messed up their matatu, they'll be stuck there for awhile, but I think we should get out of town before they call for help."

  "They probably already have - oh, right. I blocked incoming calls at this base station. Maybe they called Kampala for help, but they can't have called anyone local. See, I'm a genius."

  Veronica smiles wryly. "I never doubted it."

  "All right. Let's get the hell out of Dodge."

  * * *

  Veronica and Rukungu wait on the road that leads to the gate while Jacob returns to the administrative center for the Toyota. She can't be seen there covered in blood, and while Rukungu has restored his panga to its hiding place, he too might provoke unwelcome questions. She wonders what Susan will think of the sudden disappearance following their sudden appearance. They'll have to send her a text message or something, try to explain.

  Headlights bob and jostle down the road from the camp. Veronica breathes with deep relief. She was worried the soldiers wouldn't allow Jacob to depart by night. The Toyota pulls up beside them. Veronica opens the passenger door - and Rukungu opens the back door behind her.

  She stops and looks at him, surprised. "Are you coming with us?"

  Rukungu looks betrayed. "Derek said he would take me back to Kampala."

  Jacob looks like he wants to protest, but the man just risked his own life to save Veronica's
, she isn't about to argue. "Fine."

  They both get in. Jacob gives her a Snickers bar with a ta-da! flourish. She groans with desire, rips it open, then hesitates, breaks it in two, and gives half to Rukungu, who accepts it without a word. She suddenly remembers sharing a Snickers bar with Derek in the Congo, in that cave behind the waterfall. Their one almost-kiss. It is like remembering a high-school boyfriend.

  There's a blanket in the back seat, and Veronica drapes it all over herself and checks the mirror. Fortunately there's hardly any blood on her face, and a little spit clears it off. She and Rukungu pretend to sleep, which is not at all difficult, as Jacob drives up to the gate. The gate guards are initially reluctant to allow them to depart, and demand to see all their ID cards. Jacob first claims they have lost their ID, and must rush to a sudden emergency in Kampala; when that fails, he offers them a kutu kidogo - meaning "little gift," or more loosely, "bribe" - of two fifty-dollar bills. The restrictions on who may exit UNHCR Semiliki are suddenly relaxed and the Toyota waved through. Veronica suspects Jacob overpaid; this is a refugee camp, not a prison.

  "You can wake me up in an hour or so if you need me to drive," she says as they bump down the roller-coaster road that leads away from the camp. She doesn't really mean it. Veronica just wants to close her eyes and wake up in civilization. It is too easy to imagine obstacles that might leap into their path: road disasters, mechanical problems, more gunmen. They are in wild lands on the very edge of civilization and anything could go wrong. All she wants is to get safely away from the Congo border to Fort Portal.

  When Veronica finally opens her eyes again, woken by the dawn, she sees, to her piercing relief, that that is exactly what has happened. She would never have believed that the sight of this dirty, dusty town would be so welcome. She feels like a passenger on the last helicopter out of Saigon.

  * * *

  "You should sleep," Veronica says.

  Jacob shakes his head. "There's an Internet cafe down the road. I want to go see what we've got."

  They are back in the restaurant at the Ruwenzori Travellers' Inn. Veronica feels almost alive again: freshly showered, dressed in clean clothes, at least halfway rested, and there is a plate of toast and a cup of of Nescafe on the checkered tablecloth before her. Jacob sits opposite her.

  "When was the last time you slept?" she asks.

  "Don't worry about me. I'm used to all-nighters. As you can see." He indicates the trilogy of caffeine before him: his own Nescafe, a cup of 'African tea' - English Breakfast steeped in boiled milk - and a cold bottle of Coke. "Maintaining productivity while sleep deprived is key to hacker credibility. I feel like I'm back in university."

  Veronica looks at him suspiciously.

  "Really, I'm fine. While you were showering I texted Susan, told her we had to head back to Kampala because you were malarial, and I turned on that base station again. Let me just finish these and we'll go see if they've opened. Their hours say they opened half an hour ago, but, you know, Africa."

  "Where's Rukungu?"

  Jacob shrugs. "Up in his room, I guess."

  The Travellers' Inn is under construction, half the building is blocked off by sheets of canvas hanging on two-by-fours, they were only able to annex two rooms when they checked in. It was somehow wordlessly understood by all of them that Veronica and Jacob would take one and Rukungu the other. The reasonably comfortable rooms cost ten dollars a night and boast balconies that look onto the cloud-capped Ruwenzori. The bathrooms are a little primitive, but to Veronica's joy, soap was provided and the hot water seems everlasting.

  "He said he was one of Athanase's men," Veronica says. Jacob nods. "Do you think that means he was … "

  "I don't know. But he's old enough. And it would explain why he's so good at killing people. Does it matter?"

  Veronica doesn't answer. She owes the man upstairs her life. But she can't shake the awful suspicion that Rukungu is interahamwe, that he participated in the Rwandan genocide, massacred helpless innocents, women and children, just for belonging to the wrong tribe. Surely that has to matter.

  "Rukungu's the least of our problems," Jacob says. "He's the only person other than Prester we know for sure is on our side."

  "How do we know that?"

  "Because if he wasn't we'd be dead right now, wouldn't we?" Jacob finishes his coffee, drops five thousand shillings on the table, and picks up his Coke bottle. "Let's go."

  * * *

  The Internet cafe is small but clean. Its six monitors are hidden beneath a big glass table, tilted up towards the user. Jacob ignores the monitors and drops to his knees next to the nearest computer. The nursing mother who runs the cafe watches him curiously as he peers at its carapace. To his relief there is a USB port. These machines are old but not antiques.

  Veronica sits down at the next computer over.

  "Don't log into your email," Jacob cautions her. "Strick might be looking for us, they could conceivably track your Internet use to Fort Portal. And keep your phone off, don't make any calls. I'm pretty sure Mango is safe, I monitor who accesses that system, but no sense pushing our luck. And calls to anyone else would definitely be trouble."

  He reaches into his pocket, pulls out the memory card rescued from his camera, and folds it in half, revealing a USB connector. He plugs the card into the computer and sits at the computer.

  "How much trouble do you think we're in?" Veronica asks uneasily.

  "I don't know. Maybe I'm being paranoid. Maybe we're actually on the run. Whoever those guys were last night, they have high-level connections, and it won't take too much asking around the camp to find out who came to visit and then suddenly disappeared. Strick probably already knows what happened."

  "Shit."

  "Well, maybe it was worth it. Let's see what we've got."

  The first few pictures are fuzzy and useless, blobs of orange light outlining vaguely human shapes and the white blur of the matatu, and Jacob fears the worst. Then they began to resolve into much better, in-focus shots. He grunts with relief as he scrolls through the pictures. About thirty are usable.

  "Go back through them," Veronica says when he is done. "There's one in the middle. Back a couple. There!"

  Jacob nods. "Good eye." This is the only in-focus shot where the short but immensely muscular man is turned towards the camera with his face lit. He taps at Photo Viewer's magnifying-glass icon, zooming in, pans up to the face.

  "That's him," Jacob says dully. "That's the guy who killed Derek."

  "Yes."

  "Fucker took his dishdash off for this job. Wonder why. There was one shot after this -"

  He scrolls a few pictures forward, to a moment when the metal boxes are in the Humvee, but the doors have not yet been closed, and a flashlight is being shined on their coffin-sized shapes. Jacob taps the magnifying glass again, three times, to maximum zoom, and pans right over to the boxes. The writing on them is too blurry to read, and Veronica groans - but when Jacob zooms out one step, the four largest figures suddenly condense into something readable, if mysterious:

  И ГЛА

  "Looks like Greek," Veronica says, perplexed.

  "Or Russian. Cyrillic. Let's get Google to translate." It takes Jacob a little while to find the characters in a form that can be pasted into Google's online form. "Here we go. Means needle in Russian." Jacob shakes his head, mystified. "Needles in a haystack, eh? Seriously big ones if they need boxes that size to carry them."

  Veronica says, "Wait a minute. What's the phonetic translation?"

  "The phonetic? Why?"

  "Is it Igloo?"

  Jacob brightens, nods. "Wikipedia should have a cross-reference page." They have to wait a few seconds, the Internet connection is slow, worse than a phone line. "Here we go. Bingo. You're almost a genius. Not Igloo, Igla. Whatever that means. I guess we can Google and see -" He switches back to Google, types igla, and hits return.

  "International Gay and Lesbian Aquatics," Veronica reads the first result aloud. "Somehow I do
n't think that's it."

  "No. But look, here's Wikipedia. '9K38M Igla-1, which has the NATO reporting name SA-16 Gimlet.'"

  He clicks on the second link. The page loads. As Jacob reads, his eyes get very wide.

  "'The 9K38 Igla is a Russian/Soviet man-portable infrared homing surface-to-air missile,'" Veronica reads aloud, softly. "Oh my God."

  Jacob feels dizzy. Zanzibar Sam. SAM. Surface to Air Missile. The enormity of this discovery is far beyond what he expected. "Holy fucking shit. Boxes of them. Look at this picture, they're not that big, there must have been probably four in each of those boxes."

  "Oh my God," Veronica repeats.

  "This is a big deal. This is a really big deal. If those are going to the terrorists -"

  "Going? They're gone. They've got them. They're in the Congo already."

  "They can shoot down helicopters with those. Or airplanes. Smuggle them into Kenya or back to Entebbe and blow up whole airliners full of tourists. Al-Qaeda on the loose with two boxes of man-portable anti-aircraft missiles. I'd say that's pretty fucking close to a worst-case scenario."

  She says, "We have to tell someone."

  "Yes. Of course. We have real evidence now, pictures of missiles being smuggled. And Prester saw them too."

  "Let's show these to Rukungu, see if he knows anything. He might recognize some of these guys."

  "Good idea. Then we better get some rest. Long drive ahad of us. Back to Kampala and straight to the embassy. Sooner we tell the whole fucking world about this the better."

  "Strick's at the embassy."

  "Not for long," Jacob says grimly. "Not by the time we're done."

  * * *

  "Yes," Rukungu says tersely, looking at the hypermuscled man on the computer screen. "I know this man."

  Veronica looks at Rukungu and wonders what he's thinking. When she knocked on his door and entered his room he was standing on the balcony, staring at the Ruwenzori mountains. The bed was mussed, and there was water on the shower floor, but otherwise there was no sense that his room was occupied. She wonders why he didn't even collect his possessions before leaving the refugee camp. As far as Veronica can tell he has his clothes, his phone, his rubber boots, and nothing else in this world.