Whiplash

Da

“Go! Go! Go!” yelled Boston. “Past the truck! Past the truck!”

Abul needed no urging. He stomped on the gas as the soldier’s companion raised his gun. The bus leapt forward. The right fender scraped against the side of the troop truck as Abul fought to keep it on the road.

One of the soldiers leapt onto the back of the bus. Boston turned and fired, pumping three bullets into the door. The man fell off, dead.

Abul jerked the bus onto the road behind the truck, barely keeping it upright as the shoulder gave way on the left. He let off the gas and cranked the wheel desperately, staying with the curve. A man ran at the bus from the side, and Abul lowered his head, hunching over the wheel and praying to Allah to deliver them.

Behind him, Da

“Up,” Da

The soldier didn’t understand. Da

“You’re a lieutenant?” said Da

The soldier didn’t understand.

“Ask him his name,” Da

Abul was too busy driving to translate.

“Hey, Abul, who is this guy?” Da

The soldier turned and spat blood to the floor. He worked his tongue around his teeth, trying to see if any had been broken. He’d been shot once when he was seventeen; the punch in the face felt worse.

“Stop the bus,” said Da

Abul did so, his foot heavy on the brake. His hands were shaking.

“Ask him his name and his unit,” Da

“What is your name?” said Abul from his seat.

The soldier didn’t answer the question, merely staring at Da

“Open the back door, Boston,” said Da

“What are you going to do, Colonel?”

“Get rid of him. He’s of no use to us.”

“You must kill him,” said Abul. He jumped up from his seat. “Shoot him. Shoot him.”

“I don’t think so,” said Da

“You will kill him or he will kill you. He will kill me,” said Abul.

“You come this way a lot?” said Da

Abul had already resolved that he would never drive this way again, but that was irrelevant. The soldiers were fierce and predatory; they would certainly want revenge for this sort of embarrassment.

“Kill him,” said Abul.

“I don’t know, Colonel,” said Boston. “Abul may be right. They aren’t going to interpret mercy as a good thing here.”

Da

“How old are you?” he asked.

The soldier had no idea what he was saying.

“Abul?”

Abul translated. The man simply shrugged. He wasn’t able to answer the question accurately, and would not talk to a devil for anything. It was one thing to lose his life—everyone did, some more quickly than others—and a much different thing to lose his soul, which he knew would last forever.

“Get the door, Boston,” said Da

“Mr. Rock,” said Abul, appealing to Boston. “To let him go now—foolish.”

“So was not paying him,” said Da

“You remember me. My name is Kirk,” he told him, using one of his aliases. “Kirk. You screw with me, next time I blow these off.”

He jammed the gun hard enough to make the kid suck wind.

Boston opened the door at the back. Da

“Go,” Da

9

Eddd, Sudan

WHILE DANNY FREAH WAS DECIDING HOW TO BEST IMPRESS the Sudanese army that he was not a man to be messed with, Nuri Abaajmed Lupo was another two hundred and some miles to the south, doing his best not to be noticed by one of the army’s most ferocious opponents, a rebel by the name of General Mohamed Henri Wani—Red Henri, in the local slang, because of his red hair and his unusual French given name.

Nuri had traveled to a village some fifty miles west of the base camp, intending to be back before Da

As an outsider, Nuri was immediately suspect. He was dressed in the loose white garb worn by nearly everyone else in the village. His stubble beard and swarthy skin made him look Arab, like about thirty percent of the population. But the population was so sparse that locals knew instantly who fit and who didn’t, and their glances toward Nuri gave him away to the two bodyguards.

Nuri told them enthusiastically that he had been hired to help a scientific team looking for dinosaurs in the foothills nearby. It was the same story he’d told the café owner and everyone he’d met. The bodyguards—two boys barely fourteen—weren’t very impressed.

“Sit there,” said the taller one, pointing to a small wooden chair near the side of the room. “Hand over your gun.”

Nuri handed over his AK-47. Few men traveled without weapons here, and the rifle raised no extra suspicions from the bodyguards.

The question for Nuri was whether to hand over either of his pistols. He finally decided that he would give up his Glock, and lifted his long shirt to reveal its holster.

“Why do you have a pistol?” asked the tall bodyguard. “These monsters you dig up—they are dangerous?”

Anywhere else in the world, the comment would have been meant as a joke. But the rebels were uneducated and largely naive about anything beyond their limited experience. They also tended not to joke with strangers.

“Yes,” said Nuri, his voice grave. “Some men have been killed by them. The medicine is very strong.”

“You should have the general protect you,” said the bodyguard, meaning Red Henri.

“It would be a great honor.” Nuri bowed his head. All he could do was hope that the young man would forget the suggestion.

Red Henri had gotten his nickname as a young man, when his hair was red. It had since thi

After the sun set, Nuri thought the visit would be canceled and they would be let free. But darkness had no effect on Red Henri’s itinerary. They all continued to wait, bored and barely awake.

Finally, about twenty minutes after midnight, an ambulance siren sounded in the distance. The guards immediately snapped to attention, prompting everyone in the place to rise and stand. The proprietor, a short man with caved-in cheeks and a right ear that looked as if it had been bitten off, rubbed his hands nervously by the door.

The siren grew louder. A blue flashing light stroked the darkness outside. The guttural roar of mufflerless trucks and a heavy bass beat vibrated the walls and floor of the house. Nuri couldn’t place the beat until the motorcade pulled up in front. It was the bass line of an American rap song, an obscure Beastie Boys tune more than two decades old.