us, he slit our throats and leave the bones for the hyenas. He want this land for
“You think you can hide from the drones.”
“No. You right. We gon’ stay right here. Die like men. All of us.” Wizard poured himself a fresh finger of Johnny Walker Blue and reached for Wells’s glass. Wells covered it.
“Keep me. Gwen and Hailey and Owen didn’t ask for this.”
“Anyone ever ask to die, mzungu?”
Wizard’s eyes glinted from the scotch, but his voice was steady and Wells knew better than to argue anymore. He wondered if he could overcome Wizard despite his fever, make a play for the hut with the hostages, but the Somali rested his hand lightly on his pistol.
“Been friends ’til now. Keep it that way.”
Even if he disarmed Wizard, he’d die before he got to the hostages, and they would, too. So close and yet so far. Maybe the SEALs would arrive in time and hit the camp perfectly and they’d all live. But Wells didn’t think so.
“You want something done right, you’ve got to do it yourself,” Wells said.
“What that?”
“I said I’m going to learn plumbing when I get home. The basics, anyway. Expecting Anne to clear the drains is ridiculous. Can I have some water? There’s some in my pack.”
Wizard handed him a bottle. Wells forced himself to sip. He’d find a way through this night yet. He wondered how many hours he’d spent in rooms like this, huts and cells and airless apartments in the places anyone with a choice left behind. Such a strange way to spend a life, and yet he’d picked it freely.
“You Muslim, Wizard?”
“Little bit.”
“That sounds about right. Me, too.”
“Ditas, too, but they shoot us all anyway. They don’ care what Allah think. Hey, mzungu, how come you didn’t shoot me on the hill?”
“I didn’t come here for you. I came here for them.”
“But I tol’ you on the phone no way.”
“I thought I could change your mind.”
“You wrong.”
“Figured that out my own self.” Wells leaned back against the wall of the hut, closed his eyes. He didn’t expect to think of anything except the pounding in his head, but when he opened them he had a plan. He forced himself to stand, took a deep breath to clear his head. “Wizard. What if I can get rid of Awaale? Kill him. Will you let me have the
“No more Dita Boys?”
“I can’t promise that, but with your help I can kill Awaale at least.”
“And pay ransom?”
“Ransom, too. That’s ambitious.”
“They kill Samatar—”
“The guard.”
“Yah. I need something to show my men.”
“Forty thousand shillings.”
“Forty thousand dollars, give or take. Not too bad for one day’s work. And I’ll throw in my lifesaving idea for free.”
Wizard sorted through the pack until he found the money, bundled up and dry in a Ziploc bag. “Okay. What your idea, mzungu?”
“First things first. You have a way to reach Awaale?”
25
LANGLEY
The drone pilot was no taller than Shafer, muscled up the way short guys so often were. Like he thought he was fighting for real instead of with a keyboard. He had slick black hair combed straight back. His name was Augustine Tomaso. Shafer couldn’t believe anyone outside the Old Country went for names like that anymore. He wanted to ask Tomaso,
The actual flying was the easiest part of piloting a drone. Unlike fighter jets, unmanned aerial vehicles were underpowered and designed to fly slowly and smoothly. The Reaper’s long wings gave it plenty of lift. Its onboard software rejected commands that might make it stall or spin out. Overriding the software was possible but rarely necessary. CIA and Army drones could even take off and land on their own—and they had a better safety record than Air Force drones, which pilots controlled during takeoff and landing. The gap didn’t give Shafer much confidence in humanity’s future.
But the pilot wasn’t entirely useless. His real job was making sense of the flood of information from the drone’s cameras, heat sensors, and radar. Both the drone and the computers that controlled it from the ground had software filters to process the data. But the software couldn’t tell a kid holding a stick from a guerrilla pointing an AK, or a wedding party from a terrorist meeting. When three pickups filled with armed men broke off in three directions, the computers couldn’t decide which was the most important to follow. Not yet, anyway. And tonight, when Wells asked for the Reaper to annihilate a row of technicals, the software didn’t know that the right move after the bomb hit would be a pivot back to the center of camp to see how the White Men reacted.
“They’re going crazy out there,” Tomaso said. “See?”
Shafer didn’t. Worse, he wasn’t sure where Tomaso wanted him to look. The pilot’s workstation was straight out of a Wall Street trading floor, a half-dozen computer monitors offering different feeds. The smallest screen, on the far right, replicated the altitude, speed, and heading of the drone’s flight against a plain blue background.
“What am I looking for?”
“They’re huddling up.” Tomaso pointed to a cluster of reddish shapes on the thermal cam. “If we wanted mass casualties, this would be the time. Put a bomb in there, it’s seventy-five percent KIA, WIA.” Tomaso knew the outlines of the mission, that the hostages were probably in the camp and an American operative was nearby, but no details.
“Not on the agenda.” Not yet, anyway.
“Looks like this guy’s talking.” A red splotch that Shafer now recognized as a man stood in the center of the thermal cam, surrounded by dozens of similar streaks. Tomaso clicked on the man, surrounding him with a white border.
“Now, he moves anywhere, we’ll go with him. It’s a long shot. Let me see if I can get anything from the optical cam. Be nice to see his face.” Tomaso pulled up yet another menu on another screen and ran through a series of commands. “Clouds still too thick.”
The red figure grew taller. “What’s that?” Shafer said.
“Raising his arms. Rousing the troops, maybe.”
Shafer wondered what this man who called himself Wizard was telling his soldiers. Probably trying to calm them after the shock of the explosion. Whatever he said didn’t take long. The clot of men broke up, and the white-
