Payback

by J. Robert Kennedy

  And now she was about to do something already making her stomach sick with the thought of it. She stepped into Zone One, it a little emptier now than it was earlier, those who had tested negative to the blood test immediately moved into another part of the building where they would be tested again until she was certain they weren’t infected.

  But it was at least a little encouraging. The village had been thoroughly searched and all symptomatic people had been brought to their makeshift clinic. Koroma’s soldiers would be searching the village every day now, looking for previously asymptomatic people. If they could contain things for three weeks, then they might just beat the outbreak.

  But dozens more would die before then, of that much she was certain.

  Including perhaps the patient she was about to move into Zone Two.

  She pushed aside the sheet protecting her patient and felt tears flood her eyes as the innocent little five year old girl looked up at her, fear in her own.

  “I need you to come with me,” said Sarah, her voice cracking as she held out her hand. She knew the tiny creature didn’t understand her but her intent was clear, and with the innocence only a child could possess, she quickly rose from her makeshift bed where she had been playing with a threadbare homemade doll, and took Sarah’s gloved hand. They stepped out from behind the sheet and Sarah looked toward the entrance to Zone One, the squeak of its door drawing her attention.

  “Papa!”

  The little girl darted toward Koroma who stood in the doorway, but Sarah tightened her grip as her captor dropped to his knees, the anguish clear on his face. He held up his hands, urging his daughter to stay back.

  “Pickin!” he gasped. “Stay!” He said something in Krio and the little girl’s tugs on Sarah’s hand eased somewhat, finally subsiding as her shoulders slumped in defeat.

  Koroma looked up at Sarah, his eyes pools of tears. “Will she live?”

  Sarah shook her head. “I don’t know. I’ll do everything I can to save her.”

  Koroma rose to his feet, a single tear racing down his left cheek. “You do nothing for her you wouldn’t do for anyone else.”

  Sarah’s stomach felt hollow, bile filling her mouth as his words echoed in her head.

  She nodded then turned, pushing the sheet aside separating Zones One and Two, leading the now sobbing little girl into a chamber filled with the sights and sounds of the sick and dying. She put her on a donated mattress nearest Zone One, the tiny bed separated from the others with a hanging sheet she had set up earlier to help protect the child from the visual horror surrounding her.

  “You’ll stay here,” she said with as much reassurance as she could muster, pointing to the bed. The little girl wiped her tears away with the back of her hands then lay down on the mattress, curling into a little ball, hugging her doll and squeezing her eyes shut.

  Sarah adjusted the sheet to try and provide as much privacy and protection as she could. Taking one last look at the little girl, she made for the rear of the building, quickly checking on each patient to see if there was anything she could do to help them, but beyond filling water glasses, there was little.

  And one more was dead in Zone Three.

  She exited the rear of the building and waited while she was sprayed down with a bleach and water solution by one of Koroma’s men then removed her equipment, a check list read out by the same man in heavily accented English. She at last headed for the showers, locking the door behind her. Stripping out of her clothes she turned the water on, leaning against the wall as the cool liquid spilled down her back, then turning around and sliding to the floor, she began to sob as selfish thoughts flooded her mind.

  Please God, let that little girl live long enough for them to find us.

  A cry erupted from deep within and she bent over to her side, vomiting with shame.

  FBI Washington Field Office, Washington, DC

  Master Sergeant Mike “Red” Belme sat across from a clearly terrified man he had come to think of as “The Urinator”—at least until his identity had been established. Tutu Magoro. Not a citizen yet, but in the process of getting it. He was a legal immigrant with a valid green card and worked as a taxi driver for the past two years as well as the nightshift manager at a drycleaner. Clean record, no wife or kids, just a young man struggling to scrape out a life for himself.

  A poor man in a rich country.

  He often wondered if immigrants thought of this fact. In their own countries they might be poor, but they were equal to most of those around them. Any opulence or excess was usually limited to the ruling class, the other 99% living in true abject poverty—not Western style poverty.

  But in America, or any other Western democracy, if they came here with no relevant skills, they quite often were relegated to minimum wage jobs that barely paid enough to live on, and didn’t in the big cities where immigrants tended to congregate. When Walmart’s own employees cost the taxpayer over six billion dollars in government assistance every year, there was clearly a problem.

  Minimum wage in high cost of living areas simply didn’t cut it.

  Which meant those occupying these low paying jobs, quite often immigrants, were poor.

  Dirt poor.

  Surrounded by opulence and excess.

  Ignorance is bliss.

  He often thought it had to be worse knowing you were poor compared to most of those around you than actually being just as poor as everyone else and never knowing any better. If you were safe with your belly full, happy in your ignorance, was emigrating really the best thing to do? If you never knew what a flat screen television was or had lived all your life not knowing that high speed Internet access and McDonalds drive thrus were the norm elsewhere, were you really any worse off not having them?

  Fleeing war, oppression, hunger—those were always legitimate reasons. Trying to provide a better future for your children? Always. But to come to America just to be poor in a rich country? He saw so many people simply scraping by but unwilling to improve themselves—both American and foreign born. He knew people who would work two, three even four jobs to try and make as much money as they could to support themselves and their families, trying to set a little bit aside so that one day they might start their own business, buy a small home or put their kids through college so they wouldn’t suffer the way their parents had.

  He admired those people.

  Greatly.

  Like this man sitting in front of him. He was working two jobs, keeping his nose clean, even had accumulated several hundred dollars in a Chase savings account despite sending a sizeable chunk of his weekly paycheck back to Sierra Leone to help support his mother.

  A poor woman in a poor country.

  The uncooperative, confrontational manner displayed by their other suspect, Ahmadou Ballo, contrasted sharply with Magoro. Red had been trained to read people, and all his training and intuition was telling him that this man was either completely innocent, or an unwilling participant.

  He was betting on the former since unlike the others, Magoro came from Freetown.

  “You know why you’re here?”

  The man shook his head, his eyes darting away for a moment, the sweat beaded on his forehead trickling into his eyes.

  He squinted, the salty liquid clearly causing his eyes to burn.

  Red turned to the FBI guard standing at the door. “Why don’t you get our friend a glass of ice water and a towel?”

  The guard nodded and stepped outside, returning a moment later having apparently passed on the request. Red made a show of reading over the file on Magoro, using his pen to highlight several points of little interest, merely toying with Magoro’s mind, making the man think there were things in the file that were of concern.

  There was a knock followed by the guard opening the door, a pitcher of ice water with two glasses carried in on a tray by the poor lackey not senior enough to pass the request down to an underling. It was placed shakily on the table, the man clearly never having spent any time as a
waiter, then the towel, held over his arm almost giving him a touch of class, was handed to Magoro.

  The man tentatively took it, almost scared to look at the man.

  “Th-thank you.”

  The delivery boy didn’t say anything, instead leaving with a bit of an annoyed glance at Red. Red merely smiled and nodded, pouring out two glasses of water. He put one in front of Magoro then took a long drink from the other.

  He gave a satisfied sigh, the sound enough to encourage Magoro to drink from his own glass then towel off his face.

  “Better?”

  The man nodded, still averting his eyes.

  “Good. Now, you said you don’t know why you’re here, but I think we both know that’s not true. I highly recommend you simply tell me what you know. If you’re guilty, we’re going to find out anyway, so not telling us simply makes things worse for you in the end. But if you’re innocent, not telling us will get you in trouble that you don’t deserve to be in. And if you get a criminal record for not cooperating with Federal authorities, then you can kiss your Green Card goodbye, because you’ll be on the first flight back to Sierra Leone.” Red leaned forward slightly. “So what’s it going to be?”

  The man gulped, the sweat already returning to his forehead. “I-I want—”

  He stopped then looked at the door, shifting in his chair uncomfortably.

  “Listen,” said Red, his voice lowered. “Between you, me and the lamppost, your friend, Mr. Ballo, the one who threatened you, is going to prison for a very long time. Any threats he made against you are worthless, he’ll never be able to touch you.”

  “He has friends.”

  “Good, that’s good. If you tell us who they are, they too won’t be able to touch you.”

  Magoro shook his head. “They’ll kill my family back in Sierra Leone.”

  “Not if we take them all down, and believe me, we will. Nobody commits a terrorist attack on our soil then lives to tell about it for very long.”

  Magoro leaned forward, his head dropping as he stared at the floor. “I don’t know what to do. I have nothing to do with this, all I did was go to the center to get the name of an immigration consultant who could help me with my citizenship application. Then you showed up.”

  “That sounds completely innocent to me.” Red leaned back in his chair. “Then what do you think Mr. Ballo was talking about when he told you to say nothing?”

  Magoro shrugged. “I don’t know.”

  He didn’t sound convinced.

  “Oh, I think you do. Perhaps you overheard something?”

  Magoro tensed, his sudden, momentary inhalation catching Red’s ear.

  Bingo.

  “What was it you overheard?”

  “Nothing,” Magoro mumbled.

  “Listen, this can all be over very quickly if you just tell me what you overheard. They’ll never know you told me anything, and we can put you in Witness Protection if you want.”

  Red wasn’t sure if that last part could actually be done—he didn’t have the authority. But lying to witnesses withholding information on possible terrorists gave him a lot of leeway. And judging by Magoro’s interested expression, it might have just been the right inducement.

  “I heard them talking in the back when I came in.”

  “What were they saying?”

  “They were talking about the kidnapping of the Vice President’s daughter.”

  We have a connection!

  “What did they say?”

  “Nothing, really. I heard one of them yelling that they should kill her now so the Americans—I guess you—stop looking for her. That’s when they heard me talking to Camara in the front and they got quiet. This Ballo guy came out to see who I was, then you came in.”

  “And you heard nothing else?”

  Magoro shook his head. “No, nothing. I don’t know these people. I’ve only gone there maybe three or four times since I arrived in America. I didn’t join the center because I wanted to become American, not a hyphenated American.”

  Hyphenated American. I think I like this guy.

  “So you can’t tell me of anyone else who might go there?”

  “No, except my friend who got me the job at the drycleaner. He’s the one who told me about the center.”

  Red pushed his pad of paper and pen toward Magoro. “Write down his name, address and phone number. We’ll want to talk to him.”

  Magoro hesitated, his mouth open but no words coming out.

  “We won’t tell him about you, we’ll just say he was seen at the center while it was under surveillance.”

  Magoro seemed satisfied, quickly scribbling the information down, pushing the pad back. “When can I get into that Witness Protection thing?”

  Red rose, picking up the pad and files. “I’ll get back to you on that.”

  He left the room, leaving Magoro alone with the guard. Spock was in the hall waiting for him.

  “Anything?”

  Red nodded. “Not much, but we know for sure they’re connected to the kidnapping of the VP’s daughter.”

  But how that helped them he wasn’t sure.

  Somewhere in Sierra Leone

  Sarah took Tanya by the arm and led her into the office area where their electron microscope had been set up. Closing the door, she quickly swept the room with her eyes, making sure they were alone.

  “What is it?”

  “It’s Koroma’s daughter.”

  Tanya gripped her chin between her thumb and forefinger. “Oh no! Did she test positive?”

  “Yes. I moved her into Zone Two a little while ago.”

  “Does he know?”

  Sarah nodded. “Yeah, but he said not to give her any special treatment.”

  Tanya’s eyes popped wide. “Are you kidding me? We have to do everything we can to save her! She could be our ticket to survival for the next few weeks!”

  Sarah sighed in relief, happy Tanya was thinking the same way she was, it making her feel a little better that she wasn’t alone in her morally questionable thoughts of self-preservation. “I agree. That’s why I put her in the very first bed on the left side. We’ll always treat her first to limit the risk of further exposure. I hung a sheet to give her some privacy and additional protection.”

  “Why? Is there any doubt she’s infected?”

  Sarah felt a knot in her stomach at the thought of a false-positive. But the test had been conclusive. “I just want to make sure she doesn’t accidentally pick up another strain, you know how this thing is mutating.”

  Tanya nodded slowly, squeezing her chin harder, the tanned skin turning white. “Yes, yes, we need to do everything we can to save her.” She tugged at her chin in frustration. “But we don’t have the supplies we need to save any of them!”

  “I know. We’ll keep her well hydrated and fed, but if the infection takes over, there’s not a whole lot we can do without IV supplies.”

  “Can they get them?”

  “I asked that Mustapha guy and he said he would look into it, but I’m not confident.”

  Tanya dropped into a nearby chair, her death-grip on her chin released as she lowered her head between her knees, her long, curly blonde hair dangling toward the floor, hiding her face. Sarah sat across from her, in front of the microscope, looking at her friend. Tanya’s skin was a healthy looking golden brown, or at least what used to be considered healthy looking in the West. Now the paranoia of skin cancer was scaring too many people into avoiding the sun. She glanced at her own hands, the California sun she lived under having turned much of her regularly exposed skin light brown. She had to confess she loved the look and other than avoiding getting a sunburn, she made no effort to shun the sun when she had the chance to get outside of the ER.

  And in the Ukraine, the skin cancer scare hadn’t taken hold yet, Tanya on her rare time off basking under the African sun, soaking up every ray she could, her skin after two months California gold, her naturally blonde hair even more so.

  She�
�s a beautiful woman.

  Sarah wasn’t one to obsess about looks, but she did take care of herself and according to her husband, who could be faulted for being a little biased, she had “a crackerjack ass and a great rack”. At least that’s how she had overheard him describe her to one of his buddies on the phone recently when discussing an upcoming high school reunion. She had felt disgusted and titillated at the same time, and while cooling her jets in the bathroom, found herself looking at her body in profile, smiling at her pleasant bumps.

  And forgave him, putting her “crackerjack ass and great rack” to good use as soon as he got off the phone.

  He didn’t know what hit him.

  She smiled at the memory.

  “What?”

  Her eyes returned their focus to Tanya who was now looking up at her. “Huh?”

  “You’re smiling.”

  “Was I?” She paused as her daydream quickly faded, trying to hold on to it for one more moment. “Just thinking of home.”

  “Me too.” Tanya sighed, leaning back in her chair. “If we can keep this little girl alive, it might give them time to find us then we can both get home.”

  At least she hasn’t given up hope.

  Sarah hadn’t either, but she had to admit with each passing hour what spirit she had left was being gradually drummed out of her. The pressure of dealing with the sick and dying, of having no support team, of worrying about what might happen if they were left without Koroma to protect them, and of worrying about when Koroma would decide he didn’t need them anymore, it was all quickly getting to her.

  “I don’t know how much longer I can last,” she finally whispered. Her head dropped as she rested her elbows on her knees. “I just pray they find us soon. You said Koroma was leaving for the United States. I’m afraid he’s going to kill us before he does.”

  Tanya shook her head. “There’s no way. As long as that little girl is alive, we’re alive.”

  Sarah looked up at her friend. “I wish I had your confidence.”

  “Think about it. He lost his wife and son and look what he did! He’s kidnapped us, killed Jacques, stolen supplies from his government and committed God only knows what other crimes. There’s no way he’s going to let his daughter die after doing all that!”