Savage (Jack Sigler / Chess Team)

by Jeremy Robinson

  He didn’t move. There was already a lot of the man’s blood on him, symbolically and literally. What difference would a little more make?

  Queen gazed in silent disbelief at the man they had so badly failed. She squeezed her eyes together for almost a full minute, but then she opened them and sat a little straighter.

  “Okay. Let’s talk about what happens next.”

  “Next? We blew it. Game over.”

  “Knock it off,” she said, her tone sharper than usual. “You can have a pity party on your own time. We’ve still got a mission.”

  “What mission?” he said slowly, through clenched teeth.

  “Helping him…” She pointed to Mulamba’s still form, “…save his country. That’s what we agreed to do, remember?”

  Rook took a deep breath. “How do we do that now?”

  Queen leaned over the body and searched it, producing the envelope from the Stanley archive. A corner of the yellowed paper was stained dark red. She slipped the folded papers from inside and began reading.

  Rook shook his head. He didn’t see the point of chasing after Mulamba’s mythical lost city now. It had been a long shot to begin with, and now that Mulamba was gone, the impact of any discovery they made might be negligible. But as Queen finished reading the first page and handed it to him, he straightened up and began reading aloud.

  July 19, Friday, 1878

  Tonight I revealed the secret I have borne these past eight years, the story that Livingstone told me on the occasion of our first meeting, and which has burned in me like a fire in my belly. Yet I feel no sense of relief, but only deep dismay.

  It occurs to me now that I have never put to paper my reasons for keeping secret the true account of what happened that day, and now that His Majesty, Leopold II of Belgium, has demanded that I destroy the record of that meeting and the story I have never told, I feel I must defend the decisions I have made, if only that future generations may judge my behavior.

  As the years have passed by, I have variously tried to rationalize my decision to keep Livingstone’s tale to myself. I told myself that he was ill, feverish when he spoke and surely not altogether in his right mind. To reveal what he said would only tarnish his well-deserved reputation. The truth, though, is that I kept the story to myself purely as a matter of selfishness. Livingstone told no one else of the Cave of the Ancients. I am certain of that now, and I foolishly believed that if I could find their city without acknowledging that he found it first, my own fame would exceed even his. Alas, if I had revealed the truth, perhaps I would have found the funds necessary to locate the Cave.

  Were these good reasons to keep the story of that fateful day a secret? I do not know. The Ancients may have been nothing more than a fever dream. Livingstone never spoke of them again, after that night. Had I published the account exactly as it occurred, I have no doubt that I would have found investors willing to fund an expedition to search for the Blood Lake and the Cave of the Ancients, but that does not mean I would have found it.

  I do not regret that I have chosen to exchange this uncertain reward for the more profitable adventure of taming the Congo. Nevertheless, I cannot help but wonder what sights I might have seen.

  Rook took the rest of the pages from Queen, who had already finished reading them. These were on different paper. The handwriting was slightly different, though clearly written by the same person.

  November 10, Friday, 1871

  Success. I have found Livingstone.

  It is a bittersweet victory, for he is not the man I had hoped to find. When Selim espied him, I did not want to believe that this weary old man was indeed the Great Livingstone. He was sickly and pale, with grey whiskers and moustache that did not completely hide weeping ulcers on the skin of his face. He wore a blue cloth cap, and had on a red-sleeved waistcoat and a pair of grey tweed trousers, but all were worn and shabby, and hung on his frail body like a beggar’s rags.

  In that moment, what I would not have given to have this meeting take place somewhere in the wilderness, and not here with so many to bear witness. He came close, and my courage deserted me. My heart beat faster as I contemplated the horror of embracing him as I knew I ought, and it was only through great effort that I did not let my face betray my emotions in front of the Arabs. Rather, I advanced slowly toward him, feigning a dignity that I did not possess.

  Coward that I was, I stood at a distance and called out, “Is it you, Livingstone?”

  I cannot recount accurately what he said to me then, for he was mumbling and I understood little of it. He seemed oblivious to the others, but he led me away, into the mud-walled house where he was convalescing. There was a sort of platform that served as a veranda, looking out over the square, where many natives had gathered to watch this historic meeting of two white men. Livingstone sat on a straw mat, with only a goatskin between himself and the cold mud wall. Little wonder his health was in such a state.

  I told him of my journey to find him, but his attention wandered. Finally, I asked him directly, "Where have you been all this long time? The world has believed you to be dead."

  “I am trying to find the Nile,” he informed me, sounding very irritated. “Did you not know this?”

  I told him that I did. “I would hear of your travels.”

  At this, his face became pinched. “I did not find it,” he confessed. “But what I did find—” At this, he seemed to regain a measure of strength, for he sat up straighter and addressed the Arabs. “I would speak privately, if you please.”

  I could see that they were displeased, though whether it was the request or the Doctor’s manner, I cannot say. I have heard that he is greatly opposed to the Arab merchants for their trade in black slaves, but this has not stopped him from accepting their hospitality. Nevertheless, I sent them away so I might hear what he had to say.

  “I have dared tell no one of what I discovered,” he began, speaking in the low voice of a conspirator. “Of those who found that place with me, none still live.”

  I imagined that he was speaking in a general way about the interior, where he had been wandering these many years, but this was not the case.

  “Many days to the east, about four hundred miles, if I reckoned correctly, there is a volcanic mountain, which the natives call ‘the Mountain of God,’ but in its shadow is a lake straight from Hell itself. The water boils and is red as blood. Any living thing that touches the water turns to stone.”

  This declaration struck me as the ravings of a feverish mind, but I continued listening.

  “The lake is not deep, and the water rises and falls as the tide. While taking the measure of the western shore, I chanced upon a stone footpath, exposed by the water’s retreat. The path led into the lake, which I thought strange, until I realized that it continued to the mouth of a cavern, which was almost completely inundated by the bloody water.

  “I became obsessed with the riddle of that path. Who had laid it? What was in the cavern? I concluded that the path must surely have been laid before the lake formed, or perhaps when its shoreline did not reach so far, which surely meant that it was many centuries old, but the cave and the answers I sought, lay beneath the surface of the poisonous water, beyond reach.

  “Though it pains me greatly to admit this, one morning, without my permission, several of my bearers took it upon themselves to swim into the cave. Only one of them returned, a good lad named Mgwana, and he was nearly dead when I found him. ‘Baba,’ he told me—it is the word for Father, and a title of great honor and affection—‘I have seen the place of Watu Wa Kale.’ That is their word that means Old People, but I took it as meaning the Ancients. He told me many things he had seen before he died, turning to stone in my arms.”

  The recollection greatly taxed Livingstone, and he asked to take his leave. I prevailed upon him to take a portion of quinine from our stores. After he retired, I recorded this account to the best of my ability, but I think it almost certainly an invention of his fevered mind. He is a devout
man and his story seems like something from Scripture; I am reminded of the wife of Lot, who was turned into a pillar of salt, and of Moses turning the Nile into blood.

  I shall ask him again when the fever has passed.

  November 11, Saturday, 1871

  The quinine proved efficacious for Livingstone. His strength returned, and he was much more alert on the occasion of our next meeting. We spoke for many hours, and I recounted the stories of my travels, which having already recorded herein, I will not repeat. Livingstone related more of his travels, a great many things, which I will endeavor to record at greater length.

  The matter of the Blood Lake and the Cave of the Ancients weighed on me heavily. I asked the Doctor if he remembered telling me the story. He replied that he did not and that I should dismiss anything he might have said as a feverish delusion. Yet, there was something in his eyes and the way he urged me to forget and destroy all mention of the Cave, that now makes me wonder if there is not something more to this story, after all. Does the Cave of the Ancients exist? And if it does, what sort of wonders might it contain?

  I shall have to learn more about this, but I do not think Livingstone will speak of it again.

  Rook lowered the papers and looked at Queen with a shrug. “That’s it? A crazy story about a cave and a lake that can turn people to stone? I don’t think that’s what Joe was looking for.”

  “You’re right,” Queen said. She stared at Mulamba for several seconds, then reverently crossed his arms over his chest. “He was very brave. I wish this could have been something we could…”

  She trailed off and Rook realized she was listening to something that he couldn’t hear. “Aleman? What’s he saying?”

  Queen took out her phone and tapped a few commands on the backlit screen. “Okay, you’re on.”

  Aleman’s voice was soft, nearly drowned out by the persistent hum of Crescent’s powerful turbofans. “First, I’m really sorry about what happened. It was just bad luck. There’s nothing you guys could have done differently. That probably doesn’t help much right now…” He took a deep breath. “Second, I don’t know anything about this Cave of the Ancients, but I might be able to help you out with the lake.”

  “The lake is real?” Rook asked. “A lake of blood that turns people into stone? No way.”

  “Way. I read about it in New Scientist. There’s a lake in Tanzania—Lake Natron—where the waters are almost pure alkaline. There’s a bacteria that turns the water red, like blood, but the really creepy thing is what happens to birds that fall into the water. The lake is full of dissolved lime, the same stuff that you use to make cement. The lime destroys organic tissue almost instantly, but in the process, it reacts, to form limestone. There are pictures of these birds that have literally turned to stone. I don’t think Livingstone—no pun there—was making that part up. And it’s about four hundred and sixty miles east of Ujiji, where Stanley met Livingstone.”

  Queen’s eyebrows came together, accentuating the angry red Death Volunteers brand imprinted between them. “And if the lake is real, then the Cave of the Ancients might be real, too?”

  “It’s worth checking out,” Aleman suggested. “And…it might not be such a bad idea to get off the radar, as it were.”

  Rook sighed and tucked the diary pages back into Mulamba’s pocket.

  “Hakuna matata.”

  31

  Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo

  Asya tried to dodge away from the shot, but succeeded only in getting partly behind one of the Congolese soldiers, who had been guarding the hostages. Favreau’s gun barked, and the unlucky soldier burst apart in an eruption of blood that rained down on the horrified onlookers. Asya stumbled back, as if slapped by an unseen hand, and collapsed clutching her side.

  King’s world closed in like tunnel vision. In that instant, he was completely defenseless. Favreau could have turned her gun on him and he would have died without taking a single defensive measure. He saw only Asya, his sister, awash in blood, unmoving.

  He reached her side like a man wandering in a fog and knelt down. His hand hovered above her, but he was afraid to touch her, to confirm that this was reality and not a bad dream. But she was breathing and moving. She was still alive, and that was more than he had dared to hope.

  Most of the blood was not hers, but some of it was. After devastating the Congolese soldier, the overpressure bullet had kept right on going, punching into Asya’s lower abdomen, just above her left hip. The wound was ugly, a ragged bloody hole as big around as the base of King’s thumb.

  Some disconnected analytical part of King’s brain recognized that Asya was alive because most of the bullet’s kinetic energy had been expended in the initial impact with the soldier. There still had been plenty of velocity left in the round, but it had already used up the deadly one-two punch of the powdered heavy metal core. That was of little comfort to King. Asya was not dead, but she was badly wounded, and if she didn’t get immediate medical attention, which he was in no position to provide, then her death would be slow and agonizing.

  But the realization that she was alive helped clear away some of the fog. He found Asya’s pouch containing emergency medical supplies—a basic rule of giving aid was to always use the injured person’s med-kit first. The pouch was soaked with blood, but the foil and plastic packaging had kept the inner contents relatively sterile. He tore open a field dressing and pressed it to the wound. It wouldn’t be enough, he knew, but it was a start.

  As his tunnel vision diminished, his awareness of the situation in the assembly hall returned. Favreau was still holding both the gun and the detonator, her eyes dancing with excitement.

  “What will you do now?” she asked. She wasn’t gloating; the question was sincere. She had made her move, and was now desperate to see what his counter would be.

  King was wondering about that, too. If Asya had been dead, he might have just killed the Red Queen and to hell with the consequences. A few hundred dead in the palace seemed like a small price to pay to permanently end Favreau’s psychotic game. But Asya was alive, and that changed everything.

  He knew what he had to do.

  “Asya, can you hear me?”

  Her eyes found his. “Yes. Son of a bitch, that hurts.”

  “I need you to hold pressure on the dressing. Can you do that?”

  She nodded, winced and then put her hand over the blood-soaked gauze pad.

  He slid one arm under her legs, the other around her back and sprang to his feet. Without another glance at Favreau or anyone else, he turned and ran for the exit. There were shouts behind him, but loudest of all was the Red Queen herself, telling her men to let him go. He didn’t count this as a lucky break, and certainly not an instance of mercy on her part. This was a game to her, and she had let him go only because she wanted to play with him more.

  He burst through the doors and ran toward the atrium. The battle between his small force of Republican Guardsmen and the army troops loyal to General Velle and Favreau had ended, or perhaps moved elsewhere. He had told the Guardsmen to engage just long enough to provide cover for him to reach the assembly hall, and then to fall back, but there were only six of them and dozens of soldiers. Maybe they were all dead.

  There were two ways out of the Palais: the front door, which led out onto the streets of the Gombe commune—territory held by the rebels—or out the back door, where a short jog across the palace grounds would bring him to the river.

  “Blue, is that gunboat on its way?”

  “Affirmative. Mabuki says they’re a few minutes out.”

  “Back door, then…” He fell silent as he saw a group of people emerging from a door halfway between where he stood and the rear entrance. It was Favreau, the enormous bomb slung across her back, leading a small procession that included several of her steroid-infused mercenaries and two hostages—acting President Gerard Okoa and United States Senator Lance Marrs. Favreau guided the group toward the doors. She met King’s stare for
a fleeting second, then turned to join the rest of the group.

  “Forget the boat. I’m leaving through the front door.”

  “King you ca—” Deep Blue caught himself. “Not the front door. Go back into the west wing. There’s another exit at the far end. Stay in the shadows. I’ll guide you through.”

  King turned back into the corridor, following the prompts that flashed in the display of the glasses. As he passed through the west exit, he heard the sound of the helicopter, its rotors spinning up for take-off.

  The front of the palace crawled with soldiers, many of whom were busy setting up fighting positions for the coming confrontation with General Mabuki’s Republican Guard forces. Favreau might have fled the scene, but the revolution was just getting started.

  As the helicopter lifted her into the sky, Monique Favreau flipped a wire-safety clamp over the dead-man remote for the RA-115, closed her eyes and allowed the tension and exhilaration of her confrontation with the relentless American to drain away. He was proving to be every bit the adversary she desired, and she was very much looking forward to their next encounter.

  “Where are you taking us?” The demanding voice belonged to Marrs, the politician from the United States. She opened her eyes and fixed him with a withering stare. He recoiled a little, but after a lifetime of getting his way, Marrs didn’t have the good sense to know when to shut up. “Was he right? Is Consolidated Energy behind all this?”

  When she saw that her Medusa gaze was not going to silence him, she turned away and tried to ignore him, but he pressed on.

  “God damn, it is true, isn’t it? Listen, it’s not too late to fix this.”