Blue Warrior (8 page)

“We don’t need any Malian uranium, that’s for sure, or Niger yellowcake, for that matter.” Senator Bolt was a staunch antinuclear activist. His home state of Washington became alarmingly concerned about nuclear catastrophe after the Fukushima disaster. Environmental activists up and down the Pacific Coast were monitoring Fukushima’s Texas-sized debris field floating toward California, and feverishly testing local habitats for cesium and other fatal contaminants. Locals carried Geiger counters and posted their findings on YouTube. Officially, the federal government wasn’t concerned. Privately, Bolt was losing sleep over it. He was a leading member of a bipartisan antinuclear power caucus
in Congress that had gained an upper hand after the Japanese catastrophe.

“No, but we do need REEs, and we’ve just learned that a Chinese mining outfit recently discovered a vast new deposit of them, particularly of lanthanum,” the analyst said. “By the way, that information is for your ears only. Highly classified.”

“The whole damn meeting’s classified,” Bolt complained. The old Vietnam antiwar protestor turned environmentalist had long argued against all closed-door government meetings, particularly of the intelligence committees. He’d first come to Capitol Hill as a staffer for Frank Church during his famous CIA hearings. He’d heard firsthand what kind of havoc was wrought by too much governmental secrecy.

“REEs?” Smith asked, incredulous. In the old cowboy’s mouth, the “EEs” was drawn out like a long pull of saltwater taffy. “What the hell are R . . . E . . . Es?” Smith turned in his chair and glowered at Fiero. “I suppose
you
know?”

Fiero smiled. The CIA analyst had just confirmed what she needed to know. Or, more accurately, what she already knew. Her secret source had informed her about the massive new REE deposit two days before.

Third objective accomplished.

“Rare earth elements, I believe,” Fiero said. “But I’m no expert.” She smiled at the analyst, her signal to him to fill in the details.

Fiero pretended to pay attention while the analyst droned on about REEs. She was already plotting her next move. Greyhill had no political incentive to invade Mali. She would have to give him one.

12

In the air
Southeastern Zimbabwe

5 May

T
hanks to a phone call from Judy earlier, the Aviocar was fueled and prepped at the Maputo airport and waiting outside of its hangar when Pearce and Judy braked in a screeching halt in front of it. Fifteen minutes later, they were cleared by the tower and in the air. After leveling off at cruising altitude, Judy patched Pearce through to Margaret Myers at her home in Colorado.

“Troy? It’s Margaret. Can you hear me?”

“Loud and clear,” he said, wincing. He rubbed his aching head. He and Myers hadn’t spoken since the day she’d resigned the presidency the year before. She had resumed her duties as CEO of her software company, and he assumed she was too busy to reach out to him. Pearce had been busy, too, but that wasn’t the reason he never tried to contact her.

Judy listened in on the conversation through her headphones.

“I’m sorry to have chased you down, but I didn’t know who else to turn to. I tried to pull some strings for Mike on my end, but I couldn’t make it work. I knew I could count on you.”

“What’s his status?” Pearce asked.

“He’s reported as wounded and in serious but stable condition. He needs immediate evacuation.”

“Who made the report?”

“Female, unknown. But I’m working on it.”

“Then how do you know this is the real deal?”

“Only two people in the world have my private cell number. Mike is one of them.” She didn’t need to remind Pearce that he was the other person with that number, even if he never used it.

“Could be a trap,” Pearce said. “Targeting you. Maybe they tortured him for the info. Maybe he’s already dead.”

“Maybe. You willing to let it go?”

“No.”

“Me neither. But I’m not the one putting my butt on the line. It’s not as if they would’ve expected me to personally fly in there. And they wouldn’t know who I’d send in to do the job—maybe the Marines. They made no demands, gave no conditions. Just said ‘Hurry.’ Doesn’t sound like much of a trap to me.”

“We’re not talking about brain surgeons. If some joker is looking to create an international incident, they’ve got the perfect megaphone with someone like you involved.”

“Even if it is a setup, I’m still willing to stick my neck out on this thing,” Myers said. “Obviously, so are you.”

“It’s Mikey we’re talking about. God knows how many times he pulled my bacon out of the fire.”

“I’m glad you’re the one on the ground out there, Troy. And I heard about your man Johnny.”

Troy hesitated, pushing away the memories. Didn’t want to talk about it. “You have a plan, I take it?”

“Pulling some things together for you now. Everything should be in place by the time you land in Niamey.”

“Mikey’s in Niger?” Pearce asked.

“Mali. But Niamey’s your jump-off point. It’s the best I can do on short notice.”

“What’s Early doing in Mali?”

“Not sure. The GPS coordinates on the cell phone that made the call came from the Kidal region. That’s Tuareg country.”

“The 2012 Mali civil war was about them, wasn’t it?” Pearce asked.

“It’s complicated, but yes. What time is it now on your end?”

Pearce lifted his bruised wrist to check his watch. His fists still ached from the fight in the bar. He wiped the dried blood off of the watch face. He just couldn’t leave it behind. It was the only thing he had left of Annie. Something she’d touched. Never should have bet it.

“Zero-three-zero-five, local.”

Judy tapped in Niamey, Niger, into the GPS navigator. “About fifteen, maybe sixteen hours flight time. Three refueling stops, too. Better add another three hours, minimum.”

Pearce frowned. Not good. That was a long time for a wounded man to wait for an exfil. But there was nothing to be done at this point. He hoped Early really was in stable condition.

“I’ll call you as things firm up on my end,” Myers said. “Good luck to both of you.”

In the air
Northwestern Zambia

Six hours and twelve hundred miles later, Judy tapped the fuel gauge. “Know any good gas stations around here?”

Pearce shook his aching head. Sober, but hungover now. “No, but I have a Shell card if you find one.” He glanced out the window. The morning sun behind them bathed the savannah below in a sweet, golden light. “Postcard Africa,” Judy called it. A small town hugged the Zambezi River in the bottom of their windscreen.

“That’s Mwinilunga. Nice little place.”

“You know it?”

“I grew up in this part of the world, remember?”

“They got a Starbucks?”

“No, but I have a friend who lives about five miles north of here. He has an airstrip we can use. And by ‘airstrip’ I mean a stretch of flat ground and not too many trees nearby.”

“McDonald’s has pretty good coffee. Or Hardee’s. And they’ve got biscuits. Either of those will do.”

“Whit will have coffee, for sure. Probably a batch of antelope stew, too.”

“Sounds like a winner. I don’t suppose he has any fuel?”

“Whit runs the Aviation Mission Fellowship station. He should have plenty.”

“You know everybody around these parts,” Pearce said.

“The missionary community is pretty tight-knit, and missionary aviators even tighter.”

“You ever think about going back to that life?”

Judy ignored the question. “I checked your manifest. You’ve got a delivery to Fort Scorpio due in about an hour. What do you want to do about it?”

The Aviocar still contained the special-delivery packages for the “Recces,” the South African special forces. Johnny was supposed to run that training, too.

“Gonna have to disappoint them.”

“Buckle up. We’re heading down.”

Minutes later, Judy flared the nose and wings as she landed the boxy airplane. The Aviocar’s fixed tricycle landing gear absorbed the grassy field with hardly a bump. She taxied over to the hangar. Three ancient Cessna 172 Skyhawks were parked neatly in a row on the far side of the building. They were all painted in the mission’s famous Florida-orange paint scheme. Their old logo—a cross, a Bible, and a dove—had since been painted over and replaced with a simple
AMF
in black letters. It wasn’t just a marketing gimmick. Too many Islamic extremists had taken potshots at “infidel” planes in the last year to ignore the problem.

“Interesting paint jobs,” Pearce said.

“They paint them bright orange so that when they crash we can find the bodies more easily and send them back home.” She flashed a smile. Soldiers weren’t the only people with guts.

A big man in stained coveralls and a crew cut ambled heavily out of
the open hangar door, like a bear walking on two legs. He stuffed an oily rag into a rear pocket as he approached the plane.

Judy and Pearce stepped out of the cargo door, stretching out their tired muscles.

“Judy!” The big man dashed over, surprisingly fast for his size. They hugged. Judy nearly disappeared in his massive embrace.

“So good to see you, Whit.”

“You, too, sister. Who’s this?” Whit’s green eyes beamed through a pair of rimless glasses. His hair was so blond it was nearly white, and the bristles in the crew cut were as thick and stiff as a shoe brush.

“Whit, this is Troy Pearce. Troy, this is the Reverend Whit Bissell. He runs the AMF division in central and west Africa.”

Whit thrust out a meaty paw. “Great to meet you, Mr. Pearce. And call me Whit.”

Troy took it. The man’s hand was a vise. “Name’s Troy. Mr. Pearce was my father.”

“I just put on a pot of coffee back at the house. Should be ready in a jiff. You two want to clean up while we wait?”

“We need to fuel up and get going, Padre. We have an emergency.”

“What kind of emergency?”

“A friend in trouble. We need to go get him,” Judy said.

“What kind of trouble?” Whit asked. He frowned with pastoral concern.

“Not the kind of trouble you can help with,” Troy said. “Unless you’re handy with a—”

“We can use your prayers, Whit, that’s for sure,” Judy interrupted, throwing Pearce a nasty glance. “And a refuel.”

“I can pray, but I’m not sure how much fuel I can spare. How far are you going?”

“Heading up north. Cameroon,” Judy said, lying by omission. “We’re bone-dry and we need a full tank to get there.”

“How much is a full tank?”

“Five hundred and twenty-eight gallons,” Judy said. “And 80/87 avgas is fine. We don’t need the fancy stuff.”

“Sorry, but I can’t spare it.”

Pearce pointed at an old GMC fuel truck parked a hundred yards away on the far side of the airstrip. “Is that thing full?”

“Half.”

“That must be, what, fifteen-hundred-, two-thousand-gallon capacity?”

“Two thousand.”

“So we take five, we leave you five. What’s the problem?” Pearce asked.

“We’re glad to pay for it,” Judy said.

“It’s not that, though we could surely use the donation. The problem is, we need the gas. We do a lot of medical missions and emergency transport. Just got back from one yesterday, as a matter of fact. And I’m the fueling hub for two other agencies. Avgas is hard to come by in this part of the world. When the refinery has it, I have to make a six-hundred-mile round-trip to go get it, and they say it will be another four to six months before I can restock. I’m sorry, but I can’t do it.”

“Our friend is in trouble, Whit. We really need that fuel.” Judy laid a hand on his forearm.

Whit shrugged. “I understand, but I’m sorry.”

“I think Jesus wants us to have that gas, Padre.”

The missionary’s broad back stiffened. “I don’t take kindly to blasphemy, Mr. Pearce.”

“I’m not blaspheming. I’m quoting scripture.”

“Excuse me?”

“Sermon on the Mount. ‘Give to every man that asketh of thee; and of him that taketh away thy goods ask them not again.’ So I’m just askin’—can we please have that fuel?”

“No. I’m sorry. There are too many other lives at stake.”

“Our friend’s life is at stake, too,” Judy said.

“Then I’ll pray for him.”

Pearce stepped closer. “There’s another verse, Padre. Something like, if a man strikes your face—”

“Troy
.
”
Judy’s eyes flared.

Whit didn’t back down. “You’d rob a mission? We’re doing the Lord’s work here.”

“Didn’t David eat the Bread of the Presence from the tabernacle?”

“The Devil can cite chapter and verse, too.”

“Then pray for us sinners, Padre, but only after you help me get that damn fuel loaded.”

Whit tugged on his ear, then laughed. “You might be a horse’s ass, Mr. Pearce, but somebody’s darn blessed to have you as a friend.”