African Dragon (5 page)

9.

The bus coughed and sputtered as they drove, but kept going. Mackey was driving at just about top speed, almost sixty, on the paved road that led out of Lubumbashi. The steering was similar to driving a boat, with Mackey working the wheel like crazy just to drive straight. Cascaes laughed as he watched him drive.

“Nice ride, boss. You pay more than twenty bucks for it?”

Mackey flipped him the bird and kept looking straight ahead, trying to find the sign for the road to the railroad station.

“Hey, Mac, for real—is this hunk of junk going to make it all the way to Lake T?”

“Not a chance,” said Mackey. “I rented this piece of crap from a guy at the rail station. We are taking the train back to Kalemie, which, if we hustle, we’ll make by about ten minutes. It took three hours yesterday to get here. If you think this truck is a piece of shit, wait till you see the train.”

Cascaes laughed and held on to the door as Mackey swerved all over the road, avoiding people on bicycles, people walking livestock, people with chickens on their heads, people everywhere. It was all he could do to stay on the road and maintain some kind of speed. The rest of the group in the back were mostly quiet, just soaking it all in. The sights and sounds of a new country—new languages being shouted in sing-song mixtures of local dialects mixed with French; goats, cattle, and chickens being moved along the road, each with its own smell and noise, little corrugated steel shacks that were homes and businesses, wood fires with things being cooked and sold—it all painted a sign that said “you are in Africa now, so forget everything you ever thought you knew.”

Mackey got them to the train station and pulled the truck-bus-jalopy up in front of the same place where he had rented it for forty dollars Canadian. He turned off the engine, and they all laughed as they listened to it cough itself to death slowly twenty seconds later. The same African man that had rented him the truck also ran the small rail station. There was no train.

“Did we miss the train?” asked Mackey in decent French.

The man laughed. “No, mister. She late again. She always late.” He laughed and walked away, leaving them there to unload all of their crates. Moose and Ripper did most of the heavy lifting, carrying crates by themselves that four men at the airport had trouble moving together.

Theresa brushed by Moose and whispered, “That’s my man,” as she watched him work. He and Ripper were the two biggest members of the group, and they were both unusually strong.

Mackey disappeared inside the rail station and returned with a case of Coca-Cola. It was warm, but it was wet, and in sealed green bottles. He started tossing them out to the group, ladies first.

“I’m not sure what year these were made in, but it’s wet and won’t give you malaria.” The coke didn’t taste anything like what they drank at home, probably because it was made in South Africa instead of Atlanta, but it was a welcomed treat just the same.

The train arrived over an hour later, well past the posted arrival time, but the man in the station smiled and told Mackey they made good time. After some discussions with the man about loading their cargo, and the extra money that entailed, they boarded the train. The cargo was put on an open flat car, and the group sat on top of the boxes. The other choice was going inside the one passenger car, which was built to hold fifty passengers, but instead held eighty, along with goats, chickens, a large steer, several crates of pigeons, boxes of supplies, and smelled worse than the Bronx Zoo lion cage on a hot day in August. Besides, they had to guard their cargo anyway, and sitting on it would be a perfect way to keep an eye, or butt, on it.

After a day and a half of rebreathing stale airplane air, the members of the team smiled and enjoyed the warm sunshine and fresh breeze as the train chugged along out of Lubumbashi. The steady rocking and clackety-clacking of the train had them all ready to fall asleep within a half hour. They stretched out on top and between the crates, wherever they could find room. The entire flatcar was theirs. Mackey and Cascaes sat against one of the boxes, their legs over the side of the car.

Mackey spoke quietly. “Man, I thought Paraguay was messed up until I got here. In a little over a week, I’ve heard enough stories to make me want to quit the human race.”

“Yeah, Deirdre from the Africa desk gave us a little slide show to try and prepare us mentally for this trip. Not stuff you can forget too quickly.”

“Yeah, well, with all due respect, the slideshow isn’t going to prepare you for
shit
. There are more diseases than people out here. Everywhere you go, people are sick or homeless or starving. I’m not talking about Lubumbashi—that place is like a first class hotel compared to the countryside. Most of the villages are made out of mud with thatched roofs like they were made a thousand years ago. Every few months, some group of maniacs raids a village and kills everybody and steals everything they can carry, and there are no police outside the cities, really. This country is fucked, man.”

“Yeah? So what the hell are we doing here?” asked Cascaes.

“It’s called uranium, maybe you heard of it. They make big fucking bombs out of the stuff. Apparently, the Chinese would like it. All of it.”

“Any news?” asked Cascaes.

“Yeah. Lot’s of it. Never sure how reliable any of it is, but a dollar will buy you hours of stories. And an MRE might get you a friend for life.”

Cascaes thought back to Jesse’s speech about the people fighting for a sandwich, not for a political agenda. He asked, “So you hear anything about the Chinese or Nigel disappearing?”

Mackey closed his eyes and pointed his face to the sun, catching a ray. “Lots of talk about the Chinese and the People’s Army of Congo. Just say ‘PAC’ around here and people shit in their pants…or loincloths, whatever the case may be.”

“And?” asked Cascaes.

“And evidently, the rumors are true. Chinese agents are spreading lots of money around. They opened a ‘humanitarian aid station’ not far from Kalemie. When did you
ever
hear of China doing a humanitarian mission?”

“Uh, never,” said Cascaes.

“Exactly. I drove by there to see what was going down. Couldn’t even get close, man. ‘Security guards’, they’re calling them. Security guards my ass. There was a whole fuckin army down there, all carrying new Chinese machine guns. Even had pretty little yellow berets so they could resemble an actual army. We’ll go pay them a visit one of these nights. You brought night vision equipment, right?”

“Affirmative. When the stories came in about the size of the PAC, the company was kind enough to double our combat load. There is also a float of marines heading to the coast, although I’m told they most likely won’t be allowed to land.”

“Too bad,” said Mackey. “Give us a couple of rifle companies and we could wipe the slate clean in two days.”

“Hell, Executive Outcome took Angola with a group not much bigger than what we have now.” Executive Outcome was a group of mercenaries hired by the Angolan government to bolster their army. Oil companies had also hired them to secure the oil fields from UNITA forces during the war. It was estimated that a force of some five hundred mercenaries defeated a rebel army over ten times its size.

“Yeah, well, I spoke with Director Holstrum himself last week. He specifically told me not to start World War Three with China.”

Cascaes grunted.

“So anyway, China is giving away food and money to anyone who will join the PAC, and the DRC government doesn’t want to face the music yet. Instead, they are asking the UN to send peacekeepers for fear of increasing instability. They asked that same great organization for help securing the uranium mines six months ago. You see any white trucks that said ‘UN’ on the side? ‘Cause I sure didn’t.”

“Yeah, I seem to have missed those little blue flags, too,” said Cascaes sarcastically.

“Right. And while the DRC government sits around waiting for the UN to come rescue them, China is going to help build an army to overthrow their ass.”

“Well, we won’t be bored,” said Cascaes. “Any hits on Nigel?”

“Unfortunately, that’s been a dead end. Maybe if he had been a white guy, somebody would have noticed something. He just totally disappeared. My guess is the Chinese took him. If he
is
still alive, he’s either in China or down at their little aid station surrounded by a few thousand guerrillas. Either way, it doesn’t look good.”

They sat in silence for a while, contemplating being captured by the Chinese. They independently decided in their own heads that they would die fighting first. Cascaes finally broke the silence.

“You see our new home away from home yet?” he asked.

“Yeah. That’s where I’ve been staying this past week. Hot and cold running crocodiles, ants bigger than small mice, lots of rocks…hmmm…am I missing anything?”

“Sounds charming,” said Cascaes.

“Actually, it isn’t that bad,” said Mackey. “There are a few small cabins and a large building for the fish right on the lake. Two generators actually work, and they run the pumps and plumbing for the fish tanks. We use them at night for electricity, but we also have kerosene lamps. It gets a little buggy around dusk, but the Canuks we bought the place from were kind enough to leave us insecticide bombs that we use almost every other night. Sleeping may be a little tight.”

Mackey looked around to make sure no one was listening. “Hey, you hittin’ that?” he asked, meaning Julia.

Cascaes smiled. “Hey, man, I don’t kiss and tell.”

“But if you
did
tell?” asked Mackey, who had met Julia at the same time as Cascaes and also found her to be drop-dead gorgeous.

“If I
did
tell, I’d tell you that she is everything you could possibly imagine,” Cascaes said with a big smile.

“Uh, oh,” said Mackey. “This doesn’t sound like a guy getting laid. You are in
love
, my man?”

“Big time,” said Cascaes.

“Holy shit,” said Mackey. “I’m gonna’ have to pick a fight with the Chinese just to keep you focused.”

Cascaes laughed. “What about you? You getting laid?”

“Shit,” said Mackey dramatically, “It’s been so long for me, the last woman I was inside of was the Statue of Liberty.”

***

Shen Xun-jun stood at the head of the parade ground inside the aid station. He was not one to make sarcastic comments or jokes. Mr. Shen was an immensely intimidating figure, far beyond what would be expected of his five foot six and one hundred twenty pound stature. The man was perhaps sixty, but with his tight oriental complexion, looked younger. His face was a permanent scowl, and when he put his hands on his hips and stood with his stiff posture, people walked on eggshells around him. He didn’t speak, really—it was more of a bark. He would shout short orders at the men that worked for him, who in turn would snap salutes and run to do whatever he had instructed. Their obvious fear of Shen Xun-jun was contagious. When Shen Xun-jun snapped at them in Chinese, they would in turn scream orders in French to the PAC soldiers, who complied immediately. The African soldiers figured if these Chinese officers were afraid of him, there must be a reason. And there was.

Shen Xun-jun did not wear the uniform of a Chinese “shao jiang,” —equivalent to an American major general—although that is what he was. He wore the khaki style reminiscent of the Japanese uniforms of early World War Two, right down the balloon pants and leggings. It bore no markings, other than a small red star on the short billed khaki cap. The same was true of his nine officers, who ranged in rank from sergeant major (liu ji shi guan) to colonel (shang xiao).

While none of the officers wore rank insignias, the PAC soldiers addressed Shen Xun-jun as “shao jiang” and the rest of the officers as “xiao.” While xiao was a shortened form of several different ranks mixed into one, (shang xiao, zhong xiao, shao xiao) the PAC soldiers couldn’t keep them straight and lumped the officer’s ranks together. The Chinese, who had no respect for the PAC soldiers, could have cared less
what
they called them as long as they did as they were told.

Shen Xun-jun had started his army career twenty years earlier, and half way through his career had ended up in Army Intelligence. Now a special officer in the CELD (Central External Liaison Department), he had been given the assignment of putting together a force of Congolese rebels large enough to take down the current regime. With only nine officers and endless amounts of cash, food and weapons, Shen Xun-jun had exceeded the CELD’s expectations. While they had anticipated a minimum of ten months to a year to put together an operation of this magnitude, Shen Xun-jun had an army training and hungry to fight in less than five months. Because his operation was so heavily supported with food, flown in almost weekly, his army had swelled to almost ten thousand around the country, including over six thousand in his central training center which was very thinly disguised as an aid station. Perhaps the most heavily guarded one on the planet.

As Shen Xun-jun stood on the parade ground in the hot African sun, he watched companies of soldiers training around his camp. They ran in formation around the perimeter, carrying brand new Chinese machine guns. Many of them had taken off their shiny new black boots because they had never worn shoes before, and they were constantly tripping. The Chinese let it go, so long as they kept their berets on and kept their weapons spotless.

They were a primitive bunch, in Shen Xun-jun’s opinion, but certainly capable of deposing the shaky regime that currently ran the country. As long as the other African nations stayed out of the fight, which they most likely
would
since they had their
own
problems, the revolution had a great chance of success. The leader of the PAC, an educated man named Mboto Kangani, had promised the Chinese government carte-blanche once they controlled the country. With a puppet government running what would become “The People’s Republic of Congo,” China would have complete access to all of the nation’s vast natural resources.