The remaining militiaman tried to crosscheck Snow in the face with his rifle, but Snow sidestepped the man’s attack, crashing the top of his forehead into the soldier’s jaw, knocking him out.
Nixon silently cheered him on through his duct-taped mouth. He had to make it. Someone had to make it. If anybody could get out of this situation it was him. He was a Devil Dog to the core.
The first soldier recovered, scrambling upright, and Nixon prayed that he would trip or fall or anything. Please, if there is a God. His prayer was cut short as the rebel brought the butt of his rifle down in the middle of Snow’s shoulder blades, sending him crashing to the ground before he could open the door to the vehicle with his teeth. The grizzled warrior’s frame slumped, stunned by the blow. Another soldier grabbed his other arm, and they dragged him over to the fence.
Snow moved slowly as if his feet wouldn’t obey his mind, and struggled clumsily against his captors, but he gained no leverage.
He screamed when they forced him into the waiting hands of the infected, and Nixon knew he would never forget it. The piercing wail of a man who was ripped to shreds in mere moments.
Nixon felt like he owed it to the man to watch his last acts here on earth. Most things go out the window when you stare death in the face. A fearless warrior can defeat a hundred enemies and only lose to one, and that will be the one battle no one forgets.
Fingers scratched at him and hands ripped away at his combat uniform. Mouths clamped down on his exposed flesh. Skin from muscle, muscle from bone, bone from ligament and organs from body. The people on the other side literally pulled him through the fence piece by piece. The staffers turned away and Nixon bowed his head as Snow finally disappeared.
The man had fought to the bitter end. Somebody threw up through the gag in his or her mouth and the room began to stink of stomach bile. People sat back down, defeated. There was no reason to look outside any more. The only things that had come from outside were death and more death, and the diplomats were done with hope.
A sense of helplessness washed over the room. A group of people could only take so much. The helicopter crash, the assault, being held hostage, the death of their greatest warrior; each blow knocked the wind from their sails like a sucker punch to the stomach. He felt it too. The weariness of the past few days had been too much.
After thirty seconds, Colonel Kosoko spoke softly and somberly. “I need to speak to one of you who is a doctor.”
The blood visibly drained from Joseph’s face.
“I know there must be at least one doctor here.” Joseph looked terrified, but nodded and stood. At least Joseph isn’t just lying there in fear as the terrorist executes more hostages.
The commander removed Joseph’s gag. “You must be the man I am looking for,” Kosoko said, wrapping an arm around Joseph’s shoulders. Joseph gave Nixon a backward glance and nodded timidly.
“Yes,” he mumbled.
“Very good. No reason to be so down Joseph. You have done a very good thing. You saved everyone from some very unpleasant circumstances.”
KOSOKO
US Embassy Kinshasa, DRC
Colonel Jacobin Kosoko pushed the fear-stricken doctor ahead of him into the embassy kitchen. Why were doctors always so frail? Maybe it had something to do with their immense intelligence. Or perhaps they neglected their bodies as they were so consumed with the knowledge of others.
A couple of his Free Congolese Brigade guardsmen, each wearing a different colored beret, saluted as he walked by. He guessed the protocol gave them something to hold on to; some semblance of order. At this point, it was about survival, but his survival meant paying lip service to the hierarchy of order he had established. He gave them a quick salute on his way past.
Kosoko had the back kitchen turned into a makeshift field hospital, where a single patient lay. The sight of the patient made fire boil in Kosoko’s veins. He pushed the doctor toward the patient.
“Help him.”
He pointed at his son, who was a lankier version of himself. Kosoko wanted to shout with rage seeing him lying there strapped to the stainless steel kitchen table; tied down like a dog. His people were not dogs. They were not meant to be bound, muzzled and caged. They were meant to be free and wild. They were the princes of this world.
Kosoko’s son Ajani, strained against thick leather belts turned restraints, his feet, hands, head and body pushing against them. Bloody bandages hung limply around his arm and neck. He deserved better; he deserved life. The American doctor would help him. The Americans had powerful medicines.
“Remove his gag,” Kosoko commanded.
His soldiers gave him a fearful look, contemplating whether his wrath was worth getting close to his sick son.
“Do I not speak plainly? Remove his gag.” Kosoko gestured, pointing at his son.
Timid feet shuffled. They had been fighting almost non-stop for days against the demons in human flesh outside. They had seen a number of their brothers torn to pieces. His men were not stupid. They knew a bite from one of the creatures would be their doom.
“Remove his gag or I will remove your hands.” His machete scraped free from its sheath. Kosoko could almost hear it cry for insolent blood.
The men hesitantly set about loosening Ajani’s gag. One of his men’s hands shook, spinelessly trying to loosen the gag without getting close. Ajani pulled hard on his restraint, taking a chunk out of the coward’s hand. Blood streamed out of the wound. The soldier fled backwards eying his hand as if it had betrayed him.
Kosoko flexed his hand gripping his machete handle. Idiot.
“No, please Colonel. I’ll be fin-.”
Kosoko cut off his insulting remark by swinging his machete deep into the man’s neck. The soldier’s eyes widened in shock as his blood spurted forth, free from the confines of his body. Kosoko swung again harder, anger driving him, releasing the soldier’s head from his torso.
Weaklings couldn’t get anything right. He bent down wiping the blade on the soldier’s uniform. They would all be dead by now if he hadn’t led them out. Enough of them had already been killed.
He dismissed the other militiaman who was eager to find a task to take him out of sight.
The doctor stood there jaw gaping. “You understand the necessity of such action, do you not?” he said, standing upright sheathing his blade. The doctor nodded dumbly. He swept a hand over Ajani’s cool graying forehead not fearing a bite from his son.
“Many of my men have had to be executed in such fashion to contain the spread of the curse.”
But, the order doesn’t apply to my son. The American doctor would fix Ajani. The Americans had the money, and the money bought the medicine. Americans had medicines to fix every ailment imaginable. They could even cure AIDS.
Kosoko wiped some of the fresh blood off of Ajani’s uniform. He still wore his green and black fatigues encrusted in dried flaking blood from when he was infected. No one had been able to change his clothes since then, when the monsters had overrun Kosoko’s base.
“Two of our own men did this. They sank their teeth into his forearm and neck, like demons. When they would not release him, I shot them both in the head like rabid dogs. Spineless bastards.”
The doctor nodded still standing back from the table.
Ajani had stood there shaking, bleeding profusely. A confused look of betrayal upon his face, as if to say, ‘Father, why are you letting them do this to me?’ The feral men tried to take him down to the ground with his flesh in their teeth their necks straining for leverage. Their white eyes almost glowed in the dark.
A mournful wail filled the room as if Ajani were trying to speak. Kosoko pet his son’s head causing Ajani’s milk colored eyes to stare feverishly up at him.
“When was he bitten?”
“Three days ago. My people think it is a curse. My men call them ‘dongola misos,’ a native Lingala term. Do you know this?”
The doctor looked up from examining his son’s chest. “I speak
French, but I have an interpreter in the field to translate Lingala.”
Kosoko nodded. The doctor was learned in things other than the human body.
“What is a dongola miso?”
“You do not have these in America?” Kosoko was curious of the American culture.
“No, we don’t.”
“The dongola miso is a monster with scary eyes; at least, that is how the legend goes. My mother would tell me when I was a child that if I didn’t go to bed on time they would take me in the night. If she had used these monsters, I would have,” he said with a sad grin. I never imagined them like this as a child.
The doctor frowned at the story, or perhaps it was at his son.
“How quickly did he succumb to his illness?”
“Within an hour.”
The doctor looked like he had choked on something.
“Why do you grimace?” he said confused by this man.
The doctor ran a hand through his long hair.
“I do not understand. You have seen the affliction that plagues my son before?”
“Yes, near the Congo River, but they turned over a period of days not hours.” The doctor moved around the table.
“And they acted fearless. Attacking with no regard for their own safety? They were relentless in their assault?” the doctor asked.
Kosoko met the doctor’s eyes. “Yes, they did.”
Ajani clicked his teeth together fresh blood still on his lips. Even the bravest man showed some hesitation when staring down the barrel of a gun.
The doctor gave him a fearful look. He feared the condition that tormented his son. Kosoko did not fear anything, but he feared this. He had seen it, and it corrupted everything it touched. He had lost over half of his command on the thousand-mile journey to Kinshasa.
“So you can fix him then?”
The shaggy haired man looked up through his glasses, hesitating.
“Do you have a son of your own, doctor?” Kosoko asked.
“My name is Dr. Joseph Jackowski. And no I do not have any children.” Joseph’s eyes cast downward. My doctor friend is ashamed by his lack of family.
“Ah, you see. You wouldn’t understand unless you had a son of your own. You would understand why I would do anything to help him. Why I would kill anyone to save him. Even you my good doctor. I had others, but he was my only true son. If you value your life, you will help him.”
Kosoko watched Joseph, as he checked Ajani’s vitals. It was clear that his son was still alive. Anyone could see that, with or without medical training. The doctor placed his forefingers on Ajani’s wrist and then, shaking his head, he moved his fingers to the side of Ajani’s neck.
Joseph turned to give Kosoko a sidelong glance with intelligent and frightful eyes, removing his glasses and rubbing his brow.
“There is no way around it. This man is clinically dead.”
Kosoko motioned towards Ajani. “That is not true. He walks, he makes noise, and he eats. You said yourself this is a virus. Cure him, or I will feed you to the dongola misos.”
Kosoko wiped Ajani’s forehead with a wet cloth. Ajani’s eyes blinked rapidly and his mouth snapped open and closed. His skin grayed, as if the man already stepped in the grave. No.
His beloved son. Kosoko had given everything to Ajani; his only true legacy. One day he too would run the Brigade, acquiring more wealth and power; perhaps even his own country. His son’s eyes flickered wildly as Kosoko’s hand moved closer.
“He has no heartbeat. He is not breathing. Unfortunately, I know of no cure. Many things could cause such a response. The body can continue to fire neurons through the nervous system after death. I can’t explain this disease, but I may be able to figure out how it works given enough time,” Joseph told him.
“Figure it out over time? I want you to fix him now,” Kosoko growled, throwing the cloth. He didn’t look at Joseph as he spoke.
“If you cannot help him, then I have no use for you.” He snapped his fingers, and his guardsmen grabbed the doctor by the arms.
“Wait, please.”
Kosoko signaled for them to take him away.
“Wait, wait,” he shouted as they dragged him out of the room.
“Bring his head back without his body. It will provide me with more value than the two pieces together.”
Kosoko would trade the American hostages for the medicine, and if they didn’t want to trade, he would kill the hostages and wait for his next opportunity.
The doctor stuttered. “If. If you give me some time, I, I can come up with something. I’ll start by cleaning his wounds. Yes. That should help. Bring me some bandages.”
Kosoko grabbed the doctor by the throat, making the weak man’s eyes widen. “You do that, you pathetic little man. Fix him, if you value your life. I know I will make it through this, but it’s you I’m not so sure about.” He smiled at the shocked doctor. If Kosoko was anything, he was a survivor.
KINNICK
Arlington, VA
The buzzing of his work phone on the nightstand, awoke the Undersecretary of Political Military Affairs, Michael Kinnick. The clock next to his bed read 4:39 a.m.
Kinnick rubbed the sleep from his eyes as the concerned officer at the other end of the line explained the situation. He pressed the end button, sighing heavily. Things had gone from bad to worse.
“What is it, honey?” His wife rolled over in the bed concern for her husband shadowing her voice.
“Nothing, honey. I have to run into work now. It’s going to be another long day. I’ll give you a ring when I’m on my way home.”
She turned over in a docile manner, her dark curls delicately falling on the pillow. “Be careful,” she mumbled drifting back into sleep.
Kinnick had been in emergency meetings throughout the previous day. The situation was bad. Very bad.
Undersecretary Kinnick threw his phone into a lockbox outside the secure SCIF. He scanned his encrypted badge, as he had done a hundred times before, and entered the conference room.
Nervous eyes watched him as he tossed his jacket onto the back of his chair. His team sat around a long, oval-shaped table.
Everyone avoided his eye contact. Papers shuffled. Somebody coughed nervously. Their body language told him they were skittish, uncomfortable at best. Kinnick had very little patience for waiting. Ignoring what he considered to be their piss-poor body language, he broke the ice.
“What have you got for me?” He leafed through an intelligence file. He licked his fingers and thumbed through the documents. When no one responded, he looked around the room at his staff of civil servants, military personnel and his personal aide, Jackie. He tried to avoid staring right at her. He received blank stares from the others, while a few gazed intently at the papers in front of them, as if they were some sort of protective shield against their responsibility to assist him.
Yesterday, it was just protests in the streets. People could always find something to protest against – a movie, a picture in a newspaper. Shit, I could protest about the coffee they served in the cafeteria, not that anyone would listen. It wasn’t enough of an injustice to televise, but maybe if I framed it correctly - the possibilities were endless. He had to constantly remind himself to be cognizant of other people’s cultural sensitivities, especially when Americans were in harm’s way. The end goal was the safe return of American diplomats from abroad.
He took a deep breath. “Okay, let’s start small. Who’s responsible for the attack?”
A young intern with gelled hair spoke up from the back, surprising Kinnick. He tried to remember his name; Hunter or something.
“The country has been experiencing significant unrest. There are five large unrelated rebel groups, along with a dozen or so insignificant parties. Our best guess is it’s one of them.”
One of five. Great.
“Okay, has the Congolese government sent us anything from their side?” Sometimes he had to spoon-feed them until they could get the ball rolling on their o
wn.
Hillary, a civil servant in her thirties showing a bit too much cleavage, said: “I’ve been trying to contact various government entities there since this came down the pike. I haven’t gotten any straight answers. One said it’s Muslim rioters in the streets; another said rebels have taken the capital. Still another said a military coup. They stopped answering the phone about four hours ago.”
Muslim rioters in the streets? Military coup? Rebels in the capital? All spelled potential disaster. “Hillary, I’m going to need you to confirm the lead that there are Muslim rioters in the streets, or that this is in some way connected to al-Qaeda, seeing as ninety-six percent of the DRC’s population is Christian.”
She gave him a shy nod, which Kinnick ignored. Either way, they had already taken the initiative to evacuate the staff and military units posted at the embassy. Christian or Muslim, if his colleagues were in danger he wanted them out of there.
He nodded at Jackie for another cup of terrible coffee, who hopped to it immediately. She looked a bit bookish, but performed her job adequately.
Kinnick had been in the Air Force for twenty-one years before he crossed over from Department of Defense to Department of State. He had achieved the rank of Colonel, so he was no novice to conflicts in failing states. He had served in Somalia in the nineties before the shit hit the fan in Mogadishu or, as the soldiers had named it, ‘the Mog.’
He had switched over to the State Department in 2003, after his country had become embroiled in the affairs of two other conflicts. The differences between the cultures of State and Defense were dynamic, but he had always felt a little more diplomatic than his peers at Defense. It comforted him to know he could open a can of whoop ass on anyone of his staff. He continued to eyeball some of the smartest people he knew. They had the information for him, but he would have to pry it from them piece by piece.
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