Ebola K: A Terrorism Thriller: Book 2 (28 page)

Getting his zipper up and his belt tightened with one hand presented a problem that Austin hadn’t anticipated. At the moment, Austin only had one hand available for doing things. In his other he held a gift for The General. After some struggling with the zipper to get it partially up, he cinched his belt snug and tucked the end back inside his pants to hold it secure enough so that he could return to the kitchen pavilion.

Surprised that he’d even managed to get a result, given the conditions, Austin walked back through the trees and came out by the hostage hut. In the clearing, the guard was no longer eating. He was no longer sitting. He was staring angrily. Austin smiled, covered his loaded hand with his empty one, and pushed them against his belly. “I’m okay now. I’m okay. No problems.”

Austin looked away from the guard and headed toward his monkeys, still by the cook fire. The Guard didn’t follow, but he didn’t sit either.

“Are you okay?” Sander asked.

“Yes,” Austin answered.

Sander cocked his head and furrowed his brow.

“Something in the water, I think.” Austin stepped over the log on which his cooked monkeys were leaning. He glanced up at the guard who had just sat back down, going back to whatever thoughts kept him occupied when he was guarding the mzungu hostages.

Austin heard the sounds of men moving through the forest on the other side of the camp. The two guards over there half-raised their weapons and watched the trees. The guard who’d been keeping an eye on Austin stood back up. They were concerned, but not alarmed. No guns had been fired. The General was probably returning.

Austin took the opportunity to kneel down by the monkeys. He laid a hand on a plump one, still warm from the fire and moist with its own cooked fats. He rubbed his hands together then rubbed them up and down on the warm monkey’s legs, arms, and torso. He moved to the next monkey, not sure if the slippery mess on his hands was monkey fat or not. He rubbed the second monkey.

“You.”

Austin nearly fell over as he jerked around to look at the source of the voice. The guard was standing over him, irritated again. He spat a string of syllables.

Austin looked to Sander. “What’d he say?”

Sander said, “He wants to know what you’re doing.”

Austin looked at the monkeys. He looked at the guard. He looked back at the monkeys and rubbed a hand across a third monkey’s back. “Tell him I’m brushing off the burned pieces so the monkeys will taste better.” Austin yanked a small flake of burned crust, grimaced at it, and threw it on the ground.

Sander said something to the guard.

The guard pointed at Austin and said something back.

Sander said, “Stop.”

Austin took his hands away from the monkey. Was he busted?

Sander said, “He says he likes the burnt bits. Leave them.”

Austin looked up at the guard, smiled widely, and said, “Okay. Okay.” He picked up the two monkeys he hoped he’d infected and carried them to the pavilion. The guard went back to stand by his tree.

When Austin stepped up into the pavilion, Sander pointed at a table. “Lay them there.”

Austin nodded toward the noise coming from the far side of the camp. “I guess everything is cool.”

Nodding, and pointing at the forest behind them, Sander said, “If it wasn’t, these guys would already be running into the woods that way.”

Austin took two more trips down to the fire to bring the remaining monkeys under the pavilion.

“Help me with these yams,” Sander said.

Austin looked over at the guard to make sure that his attention lay in the other direction. Austin whispered, “Don’t eat the monkey tonight.”

“What?” Sander asked.

Austin caught Sander with a serious look. “Don’t eat the monkey. Not a bit. Okay?”

With a look of confusion, Sander nodded, and said, “Okay. No monkey. Help me with these yams.”

When all the rebels were back in camp, Austin had trouble hiding his giddiness. He didn’t know if his plan was going to work. He only knew that he felt a sense of power at attempting to retake control of his life. The monkey meat had a thin layer of Ebola virus. If enough of those virions were viable, then one of the rebels might get infected. Austin only needed one. One victim would spread it to the others. It would be Kapchorwa all over again only with sick people who deserved their fate. Austin might be walking out of the rebel camp by the end of the week, maybe next week, free.

Austin prepared a plate for The General. That part of his houseboy duties didn’t disappear after The General killed Min and ransomed Wei. Austin tore pieces of meat off the first monkey he’d infected, spooned some yams onto the plate, and carried it out of the pavilion.

The General sat on his execution log, watching the fire, laughing with those who sat beside him or stood around nearby. No one had yet eaten. The General always ate first. That was the rule.

Austin stopped in front of The General and presented the plate.

The General looked it over, smelled it, smiled, and accepted. He then looked over Austin’s shoulder with a question on his face.

Austin looked back to his left. Inexplicably, Sander stood there, not back in the pavilion with the food where he should have been, but right behind Austin with a pained expression on his face.

What the hell?

Panic rose in Austin’s blood. He smiled at The General and stepped away as though to go back to the pavilion, as he always did after serving The General.

Sander looked at Austin one more time and said, “In light of my ransom problems, General, I must beg you to hear an alternative deal.”

The General laughed. “I am intrigued.” He reached onto his plate and picked up a piece of meat.

Sander nearly jumped forward with an open palm.

That shot the tension right through the roof, and several of the rebels were immediately on their feet. Everybody froze.

“Please,” Sander begged, “don’t eat yet. Hear my proposal first.”

Austin couldn’t believe what he was hearing, what he was seeing. He inched toward the pavilion, hoping to sneak out of sight. He eyed the woods. How close would he have to be to the tree line before he made his sprint?

The General’s smile was gone. He was suspicious. “Why not eat?”

“Allow me, please,” Sander said. “I have information that I want to trade for my freedom.”

Austin took two more quick steps. He stopped when a hand grasped his shoulder. It was the guard, who’d been watching him and Sander cook. No surprise, he wasn’t happy.

“What information?” The General asked.

“I will trade it for my freedom,” said Sander.

“I will judge whether your freedom is worth this information,” said The General.

Sander looked around while he considered his position. He licked his lips. He wrung his hands. He delayed.

The General’s face showed his impatience, and just as he started to speak, Sander interrupted him, quickly blurting, “I trust The General’s judgment and fairness.” He gulped a big breath. “Don’t eat the meat. It’s been poisoned.” Sander slumped and took a half step back.

Shit.

The General jumped to his feet, his face twisted with rage but he said nothing. He poked Sander in the chest with his finger. He poked him a second time, but with his fist, knocking him back a step. He punched him hard in the chest again, knocking Sander back to the edge of the fire. In a venomous voice, The General said, “Tell me everything.”

In a flurry of frightened words, Sander pointed at Austin and told The General exactly what Austin had told him, and what he’d seen Austin doing, when he was for some odd reason running his hands over the cooked monkey carcasses. The guard, who’d seen Austin do it, confirmed.

The unhappy rebel dragged Austin over and pushed him down to his knees between The General and the fire pit.

Sander started to say something else, but a raised hand from The General silenced him. The General glared down at Austin and spat the words, “You would kill me after all the kindness I have shown you?”

“No he’s—”

The General cut Austin’s words short when his boot kicked Austin’s stomach. Austin fell and rolled perilously close to the flames. The General kicked him twice more and stomped on his back.

The kicking stopped, when Austin was struggling for breath and racked with pain.

The General knelt down beside Austin and put the barrel of his pistol to Austin’s head. “Tell me the truth and I’ll let you die without pain.”

Austin struggled for breath and said, “Sander lied.”

“Lied?” The General laughed. “Two lying hostages.” He jumped to his feet and theatrically asked the audience of his soldiers, “What am I to do?”

None of them responded. Everybody knew the question was rhetorical.

The General knelt down beside Austin again, used the barrel of the pistol to push Austin’s head against the ground and said, “Tell me more, Ransom.”

Having caught enough of his breath to speak, Austin said, “I lied to Sander. I told him the meat was poisoned so that he wouldn’t eat it. So there’d be more for me, after your men ate what they wanted.”

The General laughed again, “Is that so? Is that so?” He stood up.

Sander shouted, “He’s a liar. He poisoned it. I saw him do it. Don’t eat it!”

The General yanked Austin up to a sitting position and smiled wickedly down at him. He pointed to his plate, which lay on the ground nearby. One of his men jumped to retrieve it. He handed it to The General.

With the plate coming his way, Austin guessed The General’s intent. It wasn’t a Mensa test question. The General was going to make him eat the suspect meat. Any hesitation to do so would earn Austin a bullet in the brain. In that moment, Austin learned just how far he was willing to go to save his life.

The plate passed in front of Austin, and before a single word came out of The General’s mouth, Austin grabbed a handful of the monkey meat, stuffed it into his mouth, and started to chew.

The General was stunned, clearly expecting a different outcome.

Austin swallowed his mouthful and greedily took another handful, stuffing it into his mouth and chewing.

Laughing, The General took the butt of his pistol and bashed Sander in the side of the head. “Fool.”

Sander crumbled to the ground, covering his wounded skull with one hand, while raising his other to defend against a second blow. No second blow came. The General turned back to his seat, telling Austin, “Finish your plate, then—” he stopped.

He spun back around, looked down at Austin, and said, “Stop eating.”

Austin froze.

To Sander, he said, “Eat the rest.”

“But,” Sander started to say something, then froze his face in fear.

The General leaned over Sander and in an acid voice said, “Eat.”

Sander took the plate from Austin and with the greatest reluctance put a small bite of the meat into his mouth.

The General raised his pistol and pummeled Sander again. He fell. The plate spilled. The General looked at Austin. “Get him another plate. A full plate.”

Austin hurried back to the pavilion, filled a plate with a big helping of monkey meat, and brought it back out.

“Hand it to him,” The General told Austin.

Austin did so.

The General leveled his pistol at Sander. “Eat it all. Quickly.”

As Sander ate, the soldiers started to jeer and bet on whether he’d finish. The General simply watched with no expression on his face. Austin watched The General, wondering what was to come next, and wondering if Sander was going to earn more justice than he deserved for his betrayal of Austin’s secret.

When Sander finished eating the meat, he laid the plate on the ground and looked at it with a sickly expression.

Don’t vomit, Austin silently pleaded. If you vomit, they’ll think the meat is poisoned. That would be the death of them both.

“Sit.” The General told them. “Both of you.”

Sander dropped down. The General silently watched them. Minutes passed. The rebels watched too, at first, looking for whatever The General was looking for. After a few minutes of nothing happening, they got bored and went back to talking amongst themselves.

For what may have been a half hour, The General simply watched Sander and Austin. By that time, the men were starting to grumble. They were hungry and Austin was starting to worry. Though it was Sander who spoke up and took center stage by delaying the meal, any rebel with half his wits about him knew the dinner fiasco was Austin’s fault.

Eventually, The General stood back up, walked up in front of Austin and Sander, and said, “You’re not going to die, are you?”

Shaking his head, Austin said, “It’s not poisoned.”

The General turned to a few of his men and said something in Swahili. The men ran up to the pavilion and started putting together a plate for The General. It only took a moment. He motioned more of his men to come. He pointed at Sander and Austin and said, “I don’t like to wait for my meals. Teach them a lesson. Put them in their hut when you are done.”

The first blow on the side of his head was the only one that Austin felt.