Vultures in the Playground

by A. Sparrow

  And then it happens all over again six years later but this time the perpetrators are apprehended. So what does de Marazul do? He pardons them. Lets them go from prison on the promise they would behave. He was such an old softy—a soft target, from White’s perspective. And the old man wondered why these coups kept happening.

  Taking out such an incautious fellow would be cake for White. No challenge at all. The man would never know what hit him. But with Black at the fore, he might never get the chance to display his skill. Black had inside access and weapons that were precise and clean. If Plan A failed, he probably had a Plan B, which made White’s presence super-redundant, a Plan C at best.

  Still, he should be grateful that the consortium called on him at all for this backup task. It meant that he was showing up on their radar again, getting back into their good graces. If he just stayed calm and kept his hands clean, better work would follow. He might as well kick back and enjoy himself.

  These damned Portuguese. This place reminded him of Luanda and Maputo twenty years ago. Parts of it looked like a cheaper, more run-down version of old town Lisbon. Stucco and tile everywhere. Ornate posts and railings. Window boxes. A plaza with a pocket cathedral.

  What did he expect? The place wasn’t even really African. The islands had been uninhabited when the Portuguese stumbled onto them in the sixteenth century. All who walked here were either Portuguese, descendents of the Angolan and Cape Verdean slaves they brought to work the cocoa plantations, or some mix of the two. Even the music sounded like something you’d hear in some village up the Tagus River in Portugal.

  The jitney passed dumpsters and trash barrels overflowing with waste. Some of the dumpsters had been set on fire to consolidate the trash. They smoldered like steel volcanoes. Was it always this filthy here? Or were the sanitation workers on strike?

  “Turn here,” he said, and they passed down a road with a channelized stream running down the middle of it. There were dogs everywhere, and nearly as many pigs, picking at fly-speckled piles of garbage.

  Seeing all those pigs got his appetite going. Between all the Muslims and Orthodox Christians in Addis, it was next to impossible to find good pork. And it would be nice to have a meal without that fooking injera crap for once.

  “Okay, that’s enough,” he told the jitney driver. “Take me back to the hotel.” He was staying at the Marlin Beach, a great spot for surveillance. The main road between airport and town passed right in front, so when the president’s motorcade passed, he would know. Across the road, there was a nice, if littered, beach to walk at sunset if he was feeling contemplative.

  The driver turned back towards the bay. They passed a massive crafts shop in a warehouse where the wood carvers seemed to outnumber their customers fifty to one and turned left at the Hotel Miramar, where the president was known to take dinner on occasion.

  They buzzed along the whitewashed railing that topped the seawall. Schoolchildren in uniforms were taking dips in the waves. A dog trotted along the road ahead of them in the middle of the lane weaving from side to side, oblivious to the traffic. The jitney driver slowed, unwilling to pass it with a column of trucks coming the other way.

  “Out of the way, you fooking cur!” White tossed his half-empty beer bottle. It glanced off the dog’s shoulder and crashed against a post. The dog yelped and cowered, raising a paw.

  As they screamed by, White couldn’t stop laughing.

  Chapter 24: Príncipe

  The sun was barely up when Hodges came into their bungalow banging on a pan. “Rise and shine. Rise and shine. Another half hour and it’s all aboard my boat.”

  Melissa groaned from the top bunk. The rickety frame rattled as she rolled over. A paperback plummeted, slapping hard against the plank flooring. Melissa followed, leaping down and landing like a cat, her beach towel from the day before draped over her shoulders.

  “How’s that shower tent?” she said.

  “Eh. A little rustic, but nice.”

  Archie had been awake for some time, having showered in the dark under a gravity fed rain cistern, its water still tepid from yesterday’s sun. It was so nice to feel clean again, but the near absolute humidity ensured that the stickiness returned in a matter of minutes. It wasn’t so hot – maybe eighty degrees or so—but the air was about as thick as Moises’ stew.

  “My laptop’s hooked up to secure satellite if you want to check in.”

  “Check in?”

  “Yeah. You know. With your black card?”

  “Oh yeah! Right.”

  “Here. I’ll get the site pulled up so all you have to do is plug in your code.”

  Archie sat down in front of a laptop computer that looked like it had been built to withstand improvised explosive devices and had done so several times. Its magnesium case was singed and gouged and dented, the corners chipped, its ‘x’ and ‘?’ keys missing.

  The image on the screen was spare—just a blinking white text field floating in a sea of grey. He retrieved the black card from his pocket and typed in the alphanumeric sequence, and then pressed return.

  A light grey status bar appeared in the dark grey sea and grew in fits and starts until its entire length had darkened.

  The word: ‘CONFIRMED’ appeared on the screen. A series of new codes scrolled down beneath the words: ‘KEYS OF THE DAY’. He had no idea what to do with them, but scribbled them down on an ATM receipt he found on the floor, just in case they might come in handy.

  A large, blank text field blinked at him beneath the codes. It was tagged with the words ‘STATUS REPORT.’ He was afraid to type anything lest the style and content contrasted with whatever the real Agent Black would have written, but he didn’t want to leave it blank, so he typed : ‘OK’ and clicked on a button labeled ‘SUBMIT.’

  Another field popped up: ‘ENTER PERSONAL KEY.’ He typed in one of the codes he had written down. ‘INCORRECT. TRY AGAIN?’ came up in red.

  Melissa came up from the shower tent, her hair sodden and dripping, its moisture darkening her blue dress.

  “Ooh. I should check my Facebook.”

  “Um. I don’t think this is that kind if computer. You’d better ask Mr. Hodges. I’m not sure if—”

  “Breakfast is served!” Hodges called up from the dock. Archie peeked out the door. A card table had been set up with three plastic chairs.

  “Come on, let’s eat. You can do your social networking later.”

  They went downstairs and surveyed the offerings. There was some fruit, some strange, dense egg-y things, fire-toasted hunks of bread that could have passed for pieces of granite and some kind of blackish jelly. “So what do we have here?”

  “The usual,” said Hodges, tossing his ditty bag into the boat. “Turtle omelets. Urchin roe.”

  “Excuse me?” said Melissa.

  “Sea turtle eggs with seaweed. It’s pretty good, actually.”

  “Is it legal here to … uh … poach—?”

  “Poached, fried. Don’t matter. Still comes out like rubber.” Hodges chuckled. “Nah, I know what you’re asking. Beats me, though. Probably no less legal than shooting monkeys. Doesn’t stop Moises.”

  “Kinda chewy,” said Archie, taking a bite. “But not bad.”

  “Archie! These come from sea turtles. They’re probably endangered.” Melissa helped herself only to a piece of papaya and a hunk of bread.

  “Archie? Huh? You guys are pretty slick. Like method actors, staying in character, 24/7.”

  Archie threw Melissa a glance intended as a warming. She shrugged and bobbed her head.

  “You know … I hate to admit it, but that monkey stew last night wasn’t half bad,” said Archie. “Kind of reminded me of rabbit.”

  Melissa rolled her eyes. “We shouldn’t be encouraging this.”

  Hodges chuckled. “Yeah, well. Don’t tell Moises. He’s got a big enough head already.”

  Archie dunked a piece of bread in some of the fruit juice to soften it. His eyes wandered to the oil explora
tion map of the Gulf of Guinea that was stuck to the card table with transparent contact paper. He noticed that Bioko formed the third point of an equilateral triangle, north of Bome and Príncipe.

  “Jeez. We really went out of our way to come out here. I didn’t realize we’re gonna have to double back. We could have gone straight to Príncipe.”

  “Yeah. Sorry about that,” said Hodges. “I didn’t think we had clearance to proceed just yesterday. Turns out, we did. I really apologize. The comm on my boat is a little iffy sometimes.”

  Archie took a deep breath. “That’s okay. I guess. Just means a longer boat ride. I guess.”

  “Of course it’s okay,” said Melissa. “It’s more than okay. Otherwise we wouldn’t have gotten to meet Moises and see your marvelous place. It’s so pretty here.”

  “Pretty lonely, darling. Let me tell you, it’s pretty fucking lonely. Sometimes it’s months between ops. Just me and Moises and Natalia. Oh, and hey. By the way. Moises brought another briefcase down from Moka for you.”

  “Don’t tell me. Black titanium.”

  “How’d you guess?” Hodges smirked. “They must have gotten a bulk shipment of these things. But I think they’re great. I use one as a tackle box.”

  “See Arch? We wouldn’t have gotten this briefcase if we hadn’t come here.”

  “Oh, it would have found you,” said Hodges. “By hook or by crook. It would have found you.” He slid the briefcase next to Archie’s feet.

  Archie could only stare at it. He couldn’t bring himself to open the latch.

  ***

  The cigarette boat cut through the smooth seas like a switchblade through jelly. The clouds alternately thinned and thickened but never seemed to clear. The sun remained lost above them, a fuzzy patch of brightness. In some ways, Archie was grateful. At high noon, so close to the equator, an unfiltered sun would have fried them.

  The sketchy skies did not dissuade Melissa from sunbathing. She stretched out on the deck boards behind Hodges on a towel that was looking quite dingy. Hodges kept sneaking glances at her ample bosom.

  “Jeez, Melissa,” said Archie. “What’s the deal with you and the sun? You bask as much as a freaking lizard.”

  “I’m a snake woman!” She wiggled her tongue and hissed.

  Hodges shook his head. “You’re really something, Black. You give hope to us regular guys.”

  “How do you mean?” said Archie, sitting on a cushioned storage bay.

  “I mean look at you, you’re not so tall, not at all ripped, and yet the things you do are like … legendary. That shit you pulled off in Kuwait. I mean you were younger then, but still.”

  “Yeah, well. It wasn’t easy,” said Archie, hoping he didn’t come off sounding too awkward. He pretended to busy himself with the contents of the new briefcase, swinging it up onto his lap, snapping the latches.

  He had been afraid to open this one. It was quite a bit heavier than the others. He worried about what it might contain. When he lifted the lid, the first thing that caught his eye was a pocket protector stocked with a row of what seemed to be pens. He peeled off a bright yellow warning sticker emblazoned with black type in a block font: ‘CAUTION! WEAPONIZED.’

  He read the fine print underneath. These were not what they seemed. Only the Sharpie held ink. The other ‘pens’ were actually spring-loaded flechette projectors tipped with stalked barbs of porous steel saturated with lethal doses of botulinum toxin. The tips were designed to break off under the skin. The toxins were encased in rapid release liposomes, the dose sufficient to cause total respiratory failure within five minutes.

  The case contained guns as well—serious guns this time. An FN Five-SeveN pistol with high velocity, body armor piercing rounds. A tiny Heckler and Koch MP5K machine pistol with plenty of ammo.

  A sleeve contained maps and schedules of President de Marazul’s daily activities. Other maps focused on the interiors of the presidential palace and several public office buildings where he regularly conducted business. There were even sketches of his garden numbered with the sequence in which he usually watered his own plants. Completing the file was a list of restaurants and drinking establishments that he frequented and a statistical breakdown of his likelihood of visiting them on a given day.

  There were no specific instructions. All of this material was simply paint and brushes for the master. The contractors were going to let Black decide how exactly to get the job done.

  Obviously, they had intended Black to exploit Archie’s prior associations in STP to help him get close to his target. STP was such a small country, that there was basically only one degree of separation between Archie and de Marazul. Several malaria control and Ministry of Health folks that Archie had close relations with the president, who was known for his informality and lack of pretense. Archie himself had met the man briefly at a reception for his monitoring and evaluation team.

  How Black ever expected to pass for Archie was another question. Sure they shared similarities in stature and facial structure but it was not as if they could be mistaken for one another, unless maybe to an African who focused on the superficial and thought all white men looked alike. But that kind of thing was more likely to happen in the provinces, not with a prominent government official.

  And once he got close to the president with a weapon, what then? Would he put a knife to his throat? A bullet in his chest? And then what? How would he get away? Surely, the President had bodyguards. Would he have to kill all of them, too?

  Archie caught himself dwelling on these morbid details and it repelled him. All of this imagining himself as Black pretending to be him was getting confusing. Who was Archie Parsons now? He felt like a different man altogether from the man who left Ghana. It was almost as if he had been possessed by Black’s ghost.

  But maybe it was important to go through the steps Black might have taken. Who knows? Hodges might ask him his plans. Having a realistic answer might help maintain his cover until he could get close to de Marazul.

  He worried how he and Melissa would escape São Tomé once the president had been warned. Obviously, they could not depend on Hodges for a ride once their cover had been blown. Perhaps he could have Melissa book some flights to Lisbon and then time his meeting with de Marazul for the very last moment before the flight boarded. It might be hours or even days before the contractors figured out what had happened and by that time they could be thousands of miles away.

  But that plan could be too tricky to pull off. It was presumptuous to expect a sitting president to conform to Archie’s schedule and not vice versa. What if their meeting was delayed or cancelled? And even if not, what if the contractors sussed them out in time to have some of their not-so-friendly operatives waiting for them at the Lisbon airport with briefcases stocked with some of the same lovely toys?

  From what Archie remembered, some flights to Lisbon stopped in Cape Verde to pick up and drop off passengers. Maybe they could catch a freighter to Mauritania, from Nouakchott bus north to Morocco and then a ferry to Spain.

  Cape Verde. That was the ticket. Loads of islands to disappear into. Arid. Scrubby. Scads of space. They could see anyone coming for miles.

  ***

  They reached Príncipe just before dusk. The cigarette boat drifted up beside a yacht at the most amazing beach resort Archie had ever seen. Bom Bom, it was called—white sands, turquoise water. Boardwalks crossed several channels, connecting islands. The lodgings looked immaculately maintained and almost mystical with their airy porches, weathered beams and mossy thatch.

  The place made Archie feel embarrassed and unworthy, but any fancy hotel in the developing tropics tended to do that. Hodges said the owner, who was South African, was quite loose with the immigration formalities. He had an arrangement with local officials, lubricated with Euros, to allow quests to float in and out of his resort unannounced. He kept his guest registers discrete and his services lavish.

  The man had made his wealth through blood diamonds, obtained
in arms trades with UNITA rebels. His original intent had been to build a humble fishing lodge for him and his friends, and indeed they had managed to set six world records for billfish and wahoo. The place had blossomed into a world class resort for jet-setters.

  “I’m in Heaven,” said Melissa, wandering in a daze past a crystalline lagoon.

  Archie followed a few steps behind. “Gee Mr. Hodges, you could have found us a nicer place to stay.”

  “Not possible,” said Hodges. “This place is the tops. I spend all my leave time here when I’m not in Houston.”

  “So. We push off again tomorrow?”

  “Bright and shiny. Enjoy the luxury while you can. The place we’re going tomorrow is not so nice. Guarantee, though it’ll be fully secure, not to mention strategic.”

  “Oh? What’s it called?”

  “Boca,” said Hodges.

  “Mouth?”

  “Boca do Inferno—the mouth of Hell.”

  Chapter 25: Alive

  A nervous sweat chilled Gus’ armpits and trickled down his side. He was in the middle of one his canned talks for a corporate workshop, explaining how his department managed training for local law enforcement institutions in host countries.

  He spoke as if in a trance. His eyes flitted about the meeting room but made no contact with any souls, resolved no faces. He clicked through his collection of outdated PowerPoints, showing eager young policemen learning how to disarm attackers and subdue rioting crowds.

  Gus hated public speaking. He wasn’t particularly good at it, but it was a large part of his job description. Over time he had evolved a competent if mechanical method of presentation, covering all the high points and throwing in a corny joke or two to let him know whether his audiences still breathed.

  He always began his talks with a description of the center and its operations. As the third speaker of the day, it was probably a redundant thing to do, but it never ceased to amaze him how many people who worked for member companies had no clue regarding the center’s existence or mission. It always amazed him how many presenters got it wrong, misunderstanding the mission of their own organization.