The War of Immensities (80 page)

“It won’t
happen to you, Harley. The journey will kill you.”

“You don’t have
any choice, Brian,” Thyssen smiled. “Didn’t they tell you that the
zone encompassed this whole island. I’m just another pilgrim
now.”

Sierra Leone.
It was the only place to go. Straight on, the way they had been
going. Andromeda suddenly discovered that she knew it with a
certainty that frightened her. And why? Because her ancestors had
been born there. She was going home and taking her people with
her.

“You gotta be
kidding,” Brian said. He had flown in, on his way to Lake Chad to
take over, and was stopped because they said he could go no
further.

“Why else have
we been going this way so relentlessly?” she replied.

“Because it’s
on the way to Lake Chad.”

“We can’t go to
Lake Chad. Wagner’s mongrels have taken over there.”

“Maynard is
gathering an assault force…”

“You expect me
to lead my people into a war zone.”

“I understand
Sierra Leone has a war of its own,” Brian said. “And is one of the
most impoverished and over-populated places in the region. Hardly
the promised land.”

“It’s
home.”

“Bullshit! You
said yourself you were born in Trinidad.”

“Sure I was.
But Sierra Leone is my spiritual homeland.”

Brian Carrick
knew, better than anyone, that when matters turned spiritual, all
reason had failed and there was no point in further argument.
“Okay. So how the hell are you going to get there from here?”

“Downriver. We
have hundreds of boats, then overland.”

“Through the
Cameroons? The most rugged place with the steepest mountains in the
world. There’s no hope.”

“Then we’ll
stay in the boats and sail around…”

“River boats
and canoes in the Atlantic? Be realistic, Andromeda. It can’t be
done.”

“Some folks
said we couldn’t get this far.”

“And you have
and your people are stuck in the mud and exhausted. They can’t go
any further.”

“It is the only
place to go.”

“Maynard will
be ready to go in the morning.”

“I will not
lead my people into a war.”

“Just hold
on.”

“Sierra Leone.
And it is time to go now.”

But the rain
poured throughout the night and the pilgrims became increasingly
bogged and weary. At dawn, the sky was clearing. Captain Maynard
had gathered his forces, and Brian joined him. Maynard’s plan was
as simple as possible. Refuel, rearm, reinforce, and get back to
the airstrip on the Plain of Confrontation as quickly as
possible.

“He’s only got
about fifty men with small arms at the moment. A few rockets and
grenade launchers. The longer we delay, the more time he has to
build up his troops and his equipment.”

He was
undoubtedly correct. Already intelligence reports regarding bands
of rebels closing in on the airstrip were coming in, and a NATO
fighter had forced a Caribou to land after it refused to identify
itself. It was loaded with Stinger missiles and other heavy
weaponry.

“If he’d got
his hands on that lot, it’d have taken months to dig him out.”

“Why not wait?”
Brian suggested. “The US air force is coming to do this.”

“We can’t wait
for them. It has to be sorted now,” Maynard said. Suddenly everyone
was in such a hurry, Brian was thinking. “You might need the extra
firepower.”

“We have all
the fire power we need, and think of the damage that an air strike
might do the facility anyway. We have the troops and the guns to do
the job—we go in now.”

“Not without me
you don’t,” Brian said.

“Nor me,” said
a quiet voice from the shadows.

“Fabrini! How
the hell did you get here?”

“The UN has
taken over moving the pilgrims here from Brazil. There was nothing
left for me to do there. This seemed to be the place to go.”

The Italian,
with his drooping moustache, armed to the teeth as always, a
one-man army, Brian smiled. “Maybe we got enough firepower after
all,” he grinned at Maynard.

Joe Solomon was
a prisoner still, facing an astonishing array of charges relating
to his fund raising efforts—he had somehow become one of the worst
white collar criminals in history. But he was a prisoner with
privileges—presently his cell was a guest room in the White House.
Eventually, inevitably, there came a late night visitor—a secret
service man knocked on the door, and President Grayson hurried past
him and entered the room, closing his guardian outside.

“I wanted a
private word with you, Joe,” he said, as if he thought he needed
permission.

“Certainly, Mr.
President,” Joe smiled.

“I’d like to be
able to say that there’s something I can do to help you with your
legal problems, but unfortunately such matters lie beyond the scope
of my powers.”

Grayson moved
across the room and stood by the window, gazing through the bars,
out into the darkness beyond.

“Perhaps the
courts will be lenient when they realise it was all done in a good
cause. This situation is so unique, it’s hard to say what will
happen.”

“One of three
things will happen, Mr. President. Either nothing will happen at
Lake Chad and everyone will go home and I will spend the rest of my
life in one of your excellent prisons. Or else everyone at Lake
Chad will be killed by the earthquakes caused by the
singularity—thus proving its existence—whereby I doubt that any of
us will live long enough for my case to make trial. Or else,
Thyssen’s plan will save us all, which ought to indeed create
serious confusion amongst your most experienced legislators. I’m
fully prepared to face each possibility.”

“In third case,
I won’t be much of a president if I cannot arrange you some kind of
pardon.”

“In the light
of things, it is a small consideration.”

“A fourth
possible outcome has arisen, Joe. Right now, there is a fire-fight
occurring on the Plain of Confrontation. Intelligence reports are
unclear about who is fighting who, but it does raise the
possibility that the pilgrims might never get to the focal point.
Whereby nothing will be proven.”

“A battle, hmm?
I’ll bet Wagner’s cut-throats have something to do with it.”

“That is
considered likely. Which poses the question of US military
intervention.”

“It would be
wise to figure out which side you are on first.”

“That is a
luxury a president cannot always afford. The urgency of the
situation directs that perhaps we ought to go in and clear the area
of all fighters, and get the pilgrimage underway again.”

“So where is
your dilemma.”

“The
alternative is to let matters take their course.”

“I see. How
does that involve me?”

“I needed to
speak to someone with absolute and unquestioned faith in Thyssen.
Something that, one way or another, all of my advisers lack.”

“And you think
that might be me?”

“You, with the
things you’ve done, have shown remarkable faith in him.”

Joe smiled
sadly and shook his head. So it had come down to this. He wondered
if he should have been surprised. All sorts of lies that he might
tell occurred to him at that moment, but he firmly decided that he
had told his last lie, if indeed he had ever told any. This was the
most powerful man in the world, and he needed the truth. “I’m
afraid I must disillusion you, sir. I have never liked nor trusted
Thyssen. I think him to be the worst scientist on the planet. He
proceeds with guesswork and assumptions at all times. He changes
his mind and his plan and tells everyone something different. Faith
is not possible.”

Grayson stared
at him for a long time. “Good Grief. Is that what you really
think?”

“It is.”

“But you stole
billions for him!”

“Not for him. I
don’t know why I did it really. It was there to be done. It was
great fun. It was a deathwish. And maybe, just maybe, it might save
a great number of lives. But I never believed it and I still
don’t.”

“Joe, I am
horrified.”

“Would you
rather that I had lied to you?”

“No. No, I
appreciate your candour. But it doesn’t help much with the decision
facing me.”

“Yes it does.
You must do what you believe, Mr. President. Don’t do it because
you believe in Thyssen, or don’t believe. He’s not God. He’s just a
man. You must decide how it feels for you. In your heart, do you
think this terrible thing is real, or not. Just like I did. I had
the choice between living out life as a cripple with a limited
expected lifespan, or else maybe being a hero who saved the world.
It was always a very easy choice.”

“Mine is not so
easy.”

“Yes it is. If
we survive, you have the choice between trying for a second term as
a fair enough president, or else as the greatest of all
presidents—the one who made the decisions that saved all humanity.
It, too, is an easy choice.”

“I begin to see
how you persuaded all those people to part with their money,
Joe.”

“You really
don’t have any choice, Mr. President. The pilgrims are going to
Lake Chad anyway. Either they walk into a war zone or else they
don’t. It’s simple.”

“I’m beginning
to wish I had never embarked upon this conversation.”

“It’s what
happens when you associate with known criminals, Mr.
President.”

Within hours,
Maynard—now aided by Brian Carrick and Fabrini—had thirteen
helicopters full of assault troops and five gunships to cover the
assault. And in addition, US Marines from a carrier in the Atlantic
and UN troops from several locations around Africa were on the way,
but they would take a day or two to arrive. Maynard’s assault
troops would have to take and hold the position until then.

Kevin Wagner,
atop the scaffold platform that served as a control tower, knew all
that. His computer scanners were picking up messages from all over,
for it was all being done in such haste that there was no security.
He could listen to the reports flowing back and forth on his own
radio and understand their intention. He expected it all anyway.
What it lacked in security, it made up for in speed. He had not
imagined that Maynard would be able to gather a sufficient force
and return the day after he had been evicted. And he did not expect
that the US and UN would be willing to commit themselves militarily
without the usual diplomatic dithering. But he was ready and
confident anyway.

“It’s all
right,” he told Magambo, the rebel leader who was his lieutenant.
“My men will be able to hold them off until your main force
arrives.”

“They will be
much outnumbered,” Magambo fretted. “And be against superior
firepower.”

“But we are a
superior species and will fight like the supermen we are,” Wagner
assured him.

In fact his men
had little time to prepare any serious defence, and they had only
the weapons that they had brought with them.

“It would be
against history and against evolution if we were to be defeated,”
Wagner explained. “Always, the superior being prevails over its
fore-runner. To lose would be against nature.”

Admittedly, the
interception of the Caribou was a bitter blow. Maynard would arrive
before any of the extra equipment now.

“Still, we have
only to hold them off until your forces arrive,” Wagner said
assuredly. Magambo shook his head doubtfully.

Soon Maynard’s
airborne assault force appeared in the southern sky. They were
coming straight in, intending to land on the airstrip and assault
head on. It was just the sort of fight Wagner was sure he could
win.

Almost as soon
as Wagner’s perimeter forces opened fire, a rocket hit one of the
helicopters and it limped toward the ground, trailing smoke.
Immediately, all the others took defensive action, and turned away,
and soon disappeared back over the horizon.

“See how easy
it was,” Wagner smiled. But he knew that wasn’t true. Maynard would
not have given up so easily. Unless, of course, it was the chopper
bearing him that was destroyed, the smoke from it’s ruins rising
out of the plain as the sunset came on.

“Tell the men
to stay alert. They may be back,” Wagner warned.

He listen to
the radio interceptions in the control tower to try and establish
what had happened. It had been too easily. Surely they expected
that much resistance. It was strangely silent.

“Extinguish all
lights. They may try a night assault.”

Toward
midnight, he heard the first distant gunshot and knew he had been
right. Before he could get outside and try to assess the situation,
sporadic gunfire was bursting out all around the base. Magambo ran
behind Wagner as he hastened to his command post to try and
establish the nature of the assault. Tracer rounds sliced through
the night all around, along with the dazzling blossoms of
explosions. He already guessed what had happened. The heliborne
assault had been a feint. In fact they had landed their troops just
out of sight of the airstrip and come in overland under cover of
darkness.

Already, after
the initial onslaught, the firing was diminishing. In places, it
had stopped altogether. Wagner reached his tent and got on the
radio, seeking contact with each of his posts in turn. The first
two did not reply at all, the third offered only frantic babbling
from which the word Americans was most prominent.

“You promised
that USA would not fight,” Magambo fretted.

“Those aren’t
US troops.”

“Who else could
they be but American soldiers. You have betrayed us.”

“It is not the
Americans. It was just Maynard and his men returning. Our troops
will be able to fight them off,” Wagner seethed.

He kept
pressing buttons, shouting call-signs, getting no further response.
Maybe the radio was faulty.