For a moment, he agreed with Julie’s sentiments when she had first heard about his decision to leave the service and work for the tree huggers, as she had called the humanitarians he wanted to join. Right now, he could see that she had been right. This had all been a mistake. He again berated himself for the naiveté that had brought him here and which was now putting his family in danger.
“Screw this.” Tom cursed.
He jumped up out of his hiding spot and leapt forward, whipped on by self-loathing and exasperation, the likes he had never experienced.
Thorny branches lashed and tore into his clothes and arms, but he didn’t care, swatting them away like flies. No sooner had his step gained momentum, a shadowy figure, roused by the unexpected flurry of movement stumbled into view. Close enough now to realize the shadow was standing on two feet, Tom used his momentum to run straight through it. He felt himself connect with its mass in a dull smack, spinning both him and the form into separate directions. A moan rose into the night, its pitiful pitch loud enough to wake both the living and the dead anywhere within the immediate area.
Tom felt himself collide with a nearby tree, instantly breaking his stride and almost his shoulder, as the full weight of his body pushed in behind it. Grunting in pain, he had trouble staying on his feet, his legs threatening to buckle, and the wind knocked clean out of his lungs.
Behind him, whatever it was, regained its balance, and he could hear its shuffles increasing in pace as it tried to cover the distance. Spinning around and getting low like a rugby player about to engage in a scrum, Tom propped one foot against the tree behind him and got ready for impact.
The figure was much closer already, and its features faintly visible in the fading moonlight. He could see its eyes, bare and blank, the same stare he had seen in the other recently deceased. The place where its mouth had been was but a gaping hole. Its lower jaw was completely gone, along with, from what Tom could make out, the entire side of its face. Whatever had once been its clothing had been shredded, torn away by thousands of thorns in the underbrush, revealing nothing but a black mix of leathery skin, dried flesh, and caked blood. It reached out with its emaciated arms, bits of sinew, muscle, and flesh hanging from them like tussles off a human-leather jacket.
Coiled like a spring, Tom waited for the last moment when the creature would be just about to touch him. He watched as it staggered unevenly, driven forward but by the raw desire to consume. Its arms now inches away, its body stiffened with excitement, and an almost victorious moan emanated from the opening where its mouth once had been.
With one final reach, it was almost upon him when its forearms disappeared into thin air with a noisy thwack. Tom thought he could see a brief look of surprise flicker in the dead creature’s eyes. Another thwack and its head disappeared from view, sending the rest of the corpse back into the dirt as another shadow rushed past him.
“Don’t move.” A voice instructed Tom from somewhere in the bush behind him. “Stay put. There may be more of them.”
The voice sounded like it came from a boy or at least a very young man. Tom thought he detected a French accent. Whatever it was, it seemed almost friendly.
“I’m getting a cramp over here.” Tom, remained crouched, one leg propped up against the tree.
“You’ll survive. Now shut up and listen.” The voice came back, more firm and decisive than before.
Uncomfortably frozen in his position, Tom complied. The unidentified man and he stood still, listening in the dark for further movement.
Alas, after a few minutes, the underbrush remained still. Nothing moved, but the branches of the man now approaching him from behind. His shadowy outline rounded the tree and knelt down next to the corpse. The blade of a large machete glistened in the chalky moonlight, and Tom could make out dark stains along where it had made contact with the creature’s arms and head. The man seemed to be wearing the same fatigues as the rebels, and yet, his demeanour lacked the cold-heartedness of battle-hardened raiders. Instead, he moved and spoke with a softness that was certainly uncommon for someone in his obvious profession.
”So, I guess you’re the white guy they kept back in that hut, huh?” He quizzically looked Tom up and down. “Nice night for a walk?”
Tom could see his white teeth shine brightly against his dark skin. He felt confused. He had fully expected to yet again face the barrel of a gun forcing him to return to camp, but the man seemed to have no interest in this at all. Instead, he was making small talk.
“You know, they would have shot you if they had caught you. Actually, they still will if they do. So where do you think you are going? What’s your plan?”
The young man seemed genuinely interested, almost amused by Tom’s surprise, which no matter how hard he tried, he was unable to hide.
“Nairobi.” Tom shrugged.
As much as, here in the middle of the Congo as far away as one could get from what might be referred to as civilization, it seemed ludicrous a statement, it was the truth.
“Family?” The man asked in return; it was the only thing that made sense.
“Yeah,” Tom replied, increasingly unsure where this awkward conversation was going.
He needed to leave and leave now. Urgently. With the first hint of a new day already ever-so-slightly on the horizon, the risk of discovery by the infected or worse by the still sleeping rebels was growing by the minute. Impatiently, he shifted his weight from one foot to another.
“I can see you’re keen to get going,” said the man, casually poking the creature’s corpse with his machete. “But without help, you’re not even going to make it to the border. Either my friends back there or those things here will eat you alive first.”
He pointed the machete in the direction of the camp and then away from them into the bush.
“Help?” Tom asked, not without sarcasm.
The thought of this man, this rebel who was part of the problem that had plagued this region for decades and nearly responsible for his own demise, helping him get back to his family, seemed crazy, almost darkly comical. “What kind of help? From you? I have nothing to give you. Not here, not back in Nairobi, so why would you help me?”
Tom dusted himself off and stepped away, ready to turn and walk. “And I am not going back to the camp. You can try to take me, but even that pocketknife of yours isn’t going to make me.”
Tom was ready to fight, to run away, or whatever. His options were shrinking.
“Take it easy!” The man lowered his machete and held out his open hands. “Nobody is going back there. Least of all you or me.”
He stood up and likewise patted the dirt from his clothes, then wiped his blade on the corpse.
“You don’t know me. But I know who you are. So you are going to have to trust me when I say ‘trust me.’” His white teeth gleamed again in a broad smile against his dark features.
“You know what ‘trust me’ means where I come from?” Tom raised an eyebrow.
To his surprise, the man chuckled, putting his hand over his mouth, only just managing to suppress a full-on laugh.
“You are funny. But all jokes aside, we need to go.” And with that, the man turned around and waved for Tom to follow.
Tom looked back at the camp and his surroundings, then to the man who had already begun making his way through the thorny bush. He had to make a choice.
The arrival of dawn made the decision for him as its first glimmer crept towards them from the horizon. Tom ducked, bent, and weaved as the two tried to progress as fast as they could through the labyrinth of the thicket of thorns and weeds.
The sun was already up when they eventually paused near a small rock formation that sat in front of a dried-up water hole surrounded by withered fever trees. They had heard gunshots shortly after they had left the camp, but since then, it appeared nobody had followed them, the rebels probably too busy moving on or fighting more of the creatures the two had seen a few of along the way.
They had moved in
silence, with the man taking the lead rather competently and only occasionally disappearing from sight to climb a tree or a rock to get a better idea of their surrounds. Now they had dropped down into the dusty bed of the waterhole and leaned against the red rocks.
“I am Amadou, but my friends call me Lee.” The man held out his hand, and Tom shook it.
After what had been a few hours’ walk, he had decided to give him the benefit of the doubt for now, or at least until he knew who exactly he was dealing with.
“I’m Tom,” he replied, and for the first time, he smiled a guarded smile.
“It is nice to meet you. In broad daylight anyway,” Amadou said with almost endearing genuineness, never letting their surrounds out of his sight.
He was rather tall for a local and lanky to boot, giving him all the appearance of a Kenyan long-distance runner instead of a Congolese rebel. He had shown great agility and speed during their early morning escape, slowing down several times to allow Tom to catch up; something that initially made Tom angry at himself for not having kept in shape as much as he used to, but then also shown him that the man was someone who could probably be relied on to go the distance, as long as he was on your side. Tom breathed deeply, taking full advantage of the brief reprieve, while Amadou kept watch.
“Why do they call you Lee?” He asked, eyes closed as he relaxed against the rock face. “It’s not exactly a Congolese name. And you’re not Chinese, are you?” Tom teased.
“Me, Chinese? Not really.” Amadou grinned from ear to ear. ”I have never seen a black Chinese man. I just like to watch movies.”
Amadou jumped up. Tom tensed, startled by the sudden move.
Amadou began waving his arms around and kicking his legs, fighting invisible assailants. He turned, faced Tom, and pointed his outstretched arm towards him, showing the palm of his hand. Tom raised his eyebrows. He knew what was coming. He had seen his share of Kung-Fu movies back on base, where selection had been limited to a dozen or so tapes. Amadou rotated his hand until his palm faced upward and then bent his fingers back and forth, taunting, inviting Tom to a match.
Finally, he flicked the side of his nose with his thumb and tilted his head back and forth sideways until his neck cracked. Then he just stood still, his eyes sparkling and looking at Tom like a kid who had just finished his part in a game of charades.
“Bloody hell, I get it now: You’re Bruce Amadou!” Tom grinned as he fought fits of laughter, holding his broken ribs.
Amadou took a deep theatrical bow.
“Bruce Lee. I used to watch all of his movies and then practice his moves.” He shrugged. “The others would make fun of me. And the name, as you would say, stuck.”
“And a good and noble name it is. And quite catchy, too” Tom composed himself, feigning sincerity as not to offend. ‘Amadou, aka Lee.’
Thank you, Tom.” Amadou smiled from ear to ear and took another bow.”
They both sat back against the rock, taking a few more minutes before what they already knew would be hours of hard slug, which would only stop once night time or some sort of insurmountable obstacle would halt any hope of progress for the day.
“Where are we headed?” Tom felt compelled to ask, given he had been following more or less blindly. ”I know we said Nairobi, but I mean for now. Here. While we are still in the Congo.”
Amadou thought about it for a moment, scanning the horizon as if reading a map.
“We are heading south first and then east, to the border of Uganda.”
“Uganda?!”
Tom tried to trace Amadou’s route in his mind, using what limited geographical knowledge he had acquired.
“Why are we going south first then? Can’t we just keep going east, through Uganda and eventually into Kenya? Would seem like the shortest route?” He sat up and crossed his arms with concern.
“Look.” Amadou used his finger to draw a map in the sand. “Yes, we can go east, but we will need to cross northern Uganda. You think this place is bad? Northern Uganda is full of bandits and people with guns. Cattle rustlers and thugs. No military. No support. Just folks like you, staggering around the landscape trying to right the wrongs of the world.”
Amadou’s insight surprised Tom. Word of who he was had indeed gotten around.
“And on the other side. Here, in northern Kenya.” He poked his finger at a spot across from the line that represented the border. “You get into Turkana. If you know anything about Kenya, you know what happens there. More bandits. More people with guns. Even the government has no control over what happens there. Plus the roads in all these places are very, very bad. There is no transport, nothing there we can use.”
He drew a big cross through the rudimentary map in the sand and looked at Tom.
“You, you want to get to your family quickly, no? Me, I may not have a family, but I want to get away and live. So in a way, we both have the same goal. But we are not going to achieve it by going north.”
He likewise crossed his arms, waiting defiantly for Tom to respond.
“Ok, so what is south?” Tom relented.
He knew Amadou was right and decided not to argue with a man who had lived his entire life in these parts. Amadou levelled the sand in front of them and began to redraw his map.
“You see, here?” He drew some sort of oval shape.
“This is Lake Albert. We can cross it. It is what refugees do all the time. There are many boats. And if this thing starts spreading, they will close the land border anyway. They always do when there is a crisis.”
“On the other side, here.” He drew a web of lines extending from Lake Albert further into what he had labelled with a large U for Uganda. ”We have many, many options. We can go to Kampala, or we can just go east towards Bungoma and then Eldoret.”
“You see, this is already Kenya.” He hovered his stick somewhere to the right of where he had indicated the border crossing before drawing a large circle, perhaps a yard or so away from it. ”and here is Nairobi.”
“Why are you doing this?” Tom asked, watching Amadou, fixated on his improvised map, internalizing it and picturing every landmark along the way in his mind.
“Why are you helping me? I mean, you are a….you are one of them, are you not?” Tom had to know if he was to even remotely trust this man, who less than a day prior had still been part of something Tom despised more than anything.
Amadou looked up and stared at him for a long time, his eyes conveying such deep pain that Tom almost regretted having asked the question. Then he turned away and gazed at the horizon.
“They came to my village when I was 6 years old.” His voice was now very soft, almost fragile. “First, they killed my father where he stood. Then they raped my sister in front of my mother. Then they took me and made me do the same to others.” He hung his head. “Me and the other boys did not want to do this, of course. So they put needles into our arms, gave us drugs, and we lost our souls.” Amadou got up and took a step from the shade into the sunlight. He looked at the sky above.
“You say that I am one of them…one of them.” His voice was full of hatred now. “What do you know about his world?”
Tom could see him wiping his face. And with that, Amadou started walking away, not once turning back. Tom walked quietly, a few yards behind, as the sun reached its scorching zenith, turning everything not able to hide or withstand its rays into dust.
Tom would not broach the subject again, that much he knew already. He had heard enough.
They continued south as Amadou had suggested, walking in silence, only here and there communicating by sign language when one of them would spot a creature or two stumbling forlorn through the countryside, its aimlessness and hunger for the living the only things that set it apart from themselves in the wilderness.
Eventually, the foliage grew denser again as they entered into the national park. Still southbound, Tom wondered how long it would take before they would finally turn east towards Lake Albert, but thought it better t
o leave any questions for that evening’s camp or later. He knew they were still days away on foot, and there would be plenty of opportunities to speak with the former child soldier when the time was right. He hadn’t really thought about it before but guessed that’s what Amadou’s story had meant. He was an adult now, but he would always remain a child soldier. The unspeakable acts of cruelty that came with this would be etched into his soul forever.
Tom had read articles about child soldiers and seen movies. He even had seen some on his way over from Kinshasa, but for some reason, these had always seemed unreal to him; their stories always something news reports and documentaries were made of, not something that he had ever thought to come into contact with, let alone turn into a story he now somehow felt part of. He wanted to apologize and explain, but there was little he could offer other than admitting his own ignorance; something which was already as blatantly obvious as the scorching sun that burnt down on them.
They walked for hours and hours, skirting the forest just where they could blend in with the foliage, more or less hidden from sight, dead or living. They found water intermittently, thanks to Amadou’s skills and knowledge when it came to just about everything around them. At one point, when things had seemed dire for a while, and Tom had almost collapsed from heat exhaustion, Amadou was quick to introduce him to plants the locals used to nourish or heal themselves.
They all had colourful names. One, he called ‘Ndawa ntongo,’ or as he translated it ‘medicine of the morning,’ while another was named ‘Muberebere,’ or ‘breast-like,’ making both men chuckle, as they squeezed white liquid from the fruit.
There was an abundance of flora the Congolese, or at least those with traditional knowledge used to heal virtually every ailment known to them and cook up a feast at the same time. Even with Tom pushing as hard as he could, his injuries still dictated the overall pace and made frequent stops inevitable, during which Amadou would disappear, only to return moments later with yet another example of the virtual smorgasbord the forest provided to someone who actually knew what they were doing.
The Virophage Chronicles (Book 1): Dead Hemisphere Page 12
