On Target

“We’re not friends.”

Oryx sat back down and wiped his face, smearing the sheen of sweat across his forehead. The soft firelight danced over his ebony features in the reflection of the dampness. “I think we are more than friends. We are almost brothers.”

“You need to take a look in a mirror.”

“I mean, our sensibilities are similar. As is our chosen course of action. We both kill, and we both have decided that it does not bother us to do so.”

“You’ve all but eradicated a people. You and I are not—”

“So then it’s not the act of killing that bothers you. It’s merely the scale of the killing. But I could counter- argue that what I do, I do through political policy, not with my own hands. I think it takes more cruelty to kill a man, face-to-face, than a people via laws and declarations of war. You are the more dangerous man here. Just think how many people you would kill if you ran a nation, an intelligence service. You would slaughter everyone you were against.”

Bakri Ali Abboud, president of Sudan, leaned very close now, his head just above the burning wood, the sheen of sweat glowing across his face. “Just like me . . . brother.” He smiled. “You and I, Mr. Six, are the same thing. Eradicators of the debris of humanity.” Oryx let the phrase hang in darkness a moment. “Only I am better at it than you, so I am deemed more evil than you. Interesting how one’s perspective commands one’s concept of right and wrong.”

Gentry stoked the fire with a long stick. He recognized that it was the opiate in him causing him to continue the conversation. “You were better than me, but the party is over. You’ll be locked up for the rest of your life.”

Oryx smiled again.

Court eyed him in the firelight. “You don’t seem so worried about spending the rest of your days behind bars.”

“Oh, if that were truly going to be my fate, I would be extremely disturbed, I can assure you. But I will not spend the rest of my days behind bars.”

“Not if I change my mind and shoot your ass right here.”

President Abboud laughed, low and rhythmic. “I don’t know if you can operate your weapon in your present condition.

“Try me.”

“No, no,” Oryx waved his hand. “I am happy to have you for an escort to Europe.”

“To prison,” Court said.

“Oh, for a few months, I’m sure you’re right. But offers have been extended to me, offers that I have refused until now, that will allow me to seek exile in any one of many third-party nations. The Ivory Coast is close to home, but at the moment I am leaning towards a certain Caribbean island that has been suggested. I enjoy the occasional cigar, though I pray you do not tell my wives.”

Court sat up straight, still Indian-style, against the wall of the shack. “Bullshit.”

“Diplomacy,” answered Bakri Ali Abboud with a smile.

“The Europeans are going to let you walk?”

The president shook his head slowly. He exposed his teeth in a smile. “Not just the Europeans. The Americans, too.”

Gentry was gobsmacked. He knew he was way too fucked-up to evaluate the micro-expressions set off by the president’s limbic system, to check for clues of deception. But the bastard unquestionably seemed sure of himself.

Abboud’s smile remained, but through it he said, in an exaggerated American accent, “As you said before. Nobody tells you nothing, eh, Mr. Six?”

“Why?” Gentry’s voice cracked.

“For the good of the world,” Abboud chuckled again. “What do you think would happen if I were assassinated in my hometown by SLA rebels? A civil war ten times larger than what we have now, except this would be worse. China wants their oil, so they will back my successor just as they did me. But Russia will support a military coup of the civilian successorship, and they will aid our neighbors to the west. Chad will invade, take north Darfur, and hand the bulk of the oil there to the Russians as payment. The IDP camps will be threatened, and UNAMID will be forced out, since the original agreement was with me and not with the government of Chad. China will push my successor towards a total war with Chad to retake Tract 12A, and my successor is, fundamentally, a weak man. He will submit to their will in ways that I would never agree with. China can own him with weapons and power and money.

“One year after I am gone, East Africa will be the center of a superpower conflict, tens of thousands will be dead, another million uprooted.”

“But won’t kidnapping you have the same effect?”

“There will be short-term chaos, but I will agree to terms that have been offered to me in secret for three years now. If I reveal details of Russia’s illegalities here in the Sudan, if I tell my followers, directly and forcefully, that the Russians are prepared to fan the flames of war against us, then there will be no Russian influence on the citizenry, and consequently, no civil war. If there is no civil war, then it is doubtful that Chad would invade. I can even let it be known that China was involved in my kidnapping. This will hurt Chinese interests in the region and return the minerals of the Sudan to the Sudanese.”

“China had nothing to do with this kidnapping.”

Abboud shrugged. “My followers will believe me. There is evidence to back me up, as well. Chinese Special Forces have been secretly training my troops in Port Sudan, to provide security to Tract 12A along the Chad border. China has known good and well that Russia covets their oil, and they knew that Russia wanted me dead. I can convince the Sudanese people that China and I had a disagreement, so they decided to get me out of the picture by trading me away.”

“That’s brilliant.” Court said. It sickened him to say so.

“Thank your coworkers. This was all part of a CIA plot, a plot to get me to voluntarily turn myself in to the ICC. As I said, I turned their offer of exile down.” He shrugged his shoulders good-naturedly. “So here you are to enforce the offer.”

“So you are more beneficial alive than dead.”

Abboud shrugged. “Apparently so. You get me out of here alive, and I will play my part. As you said early this morning in Suakin, you and I are on the same team. Only you did not know the truth of that statement.”

The Thuraya phone rang.

FORTY-FOUR

“Hey, Zack.”

“You back with us, or are you still high as giraffe nuts?”

“I’m good to go; sorry about before. I was hurting pretty bad and accidentally pulled the wrong dosage of —”

“Forget it. We’ve got a problem. This whole op just went tits up.”

“What happened?”

“Langley says we greased some Chinks.”

“Say again?”

“We killed some Chinese guys.”

Court thought back to what Oryx had just told him. “Combatants.”

“No doubt, but apparently that’s still a no-no.”

Court knew who they were. “Special Forces, here training the Sudanese up in Port Sudan.”

“Yeah, that’s what Denny thinks. Probably from their Flying Dragon unit. Sudan Station didn’t even know they were in country.”

“Shit, Zack. How bad is it?”

“It’s not good, from the sound of it. Langley is dealing with the White House right now. The White House