'The double alpha helixes?' Kelly said.
'Right . . . and here the corkscrewing middle section,' Nate said, tracing the screen with his finger.
'So?' Kelly asked.
Nate turned and reached to the ground beside him. He picked up a stick and drew in the dirt, speaking as he worked. 'The middle corkscrew . . . spreading out in double loops at either end:' When he was done, he glanced up.
Stunned, Kelly stared at what Nate had drawn in the dirt.
Manny gasped, 'The Ban-ali symbol!'
Kelly stared between the two pictures: one, a high-tech computer map; the other, a crude scrawl in the soft dirt. But there was no disputing the similarity. The corkscrew, the double helixes . . . It seemed beyond coincidence, even down to the clockwise spin of the molecular spiral.
Kelly turned to Nate and Manny. 'Jesus Christ.'
The Ban-ali symbol was a stylized model of the same prion.
1 1:32 PM.
Jacques still had an unnerving terror of dark waters, born from the piranha attack that had left him disfigured when he was only a boy. Despite these deep fears, he glided through the swamp with nothing but a wet suit between him and the toothy predators of this marsh. He had no choice. He had to obey the doctor. The price of disobedience was worse than any terrors that might lurk in these waters.
Jacques clung to his motorized attack board as the silent fans dragged his body toward the far shore of the swamp. He was outfitted in an LAR V Draeger UBA, gear used by Navy SEALs for clandestine shallow-water operations. The closed-circuit system, strapped to his chest, rather than his back, produced no telltale bubble signature, making his approach undetectable. The final piece of his gear was a night-vision mask, giving him adequate visibility in the murky waters.
Still, the dark waters remained tight around him. His visibility was only about ten yards. He would periodically use a small mirrored device to peek above the water's surface and maintain his bearing.
His two teammates on this mission trailed behind him, also gliding with tiny motorized sleds held at arms' length.
Jacques checked one last time with his tiny periscope. The two bamboo rafts that the Rangers had used to cross the swamp were directly ahead. Thirty yards away.
In the woods, he spotted the camp's fire, blazing bright. Shadowy figures, even at this late hour, moved around the site. Satisfied, he motioned to his two men to continue on ahead, one to each raft. Jacques would drift behind them, on guard with his scope.
The trio moved slowly forward. The rafts were tethered to the shore and floating in waters less than four feet deep. They would all have to be even more careful from here.
With determined caution, the group converged on the rafts. Jacques watched above and below the surface. His men waited in position, hovering in the shadows of their respective rafts. He studied the woods. He suspected that hidden in the dark jungle were guards, Rangers on patrol. He watched for a full five minutes, then signaled his men.
From under the rafts, the men produced small squeeze bottles full of kerosene. They sprayed the underside of the bamboo planks. Once each bottle emptied, the men gave Jacques a thumbs-up signal.
As his men worked, Jacques continued to watch the woods. So far, there was no sign that anyone had noticed their handiwork. He waited a full minute more, then gave the final signal, a slashing motion across his neck.
Each man lifted a hand above the water and ignited a butane lighter. They lifted the tiny flames to the kerosene-soaked bamboo. Flames immediately leaped and spread over the rafts.
Without waiting, the two men grabbed up their sleds and sped toward Jacques. He turned and thumbed his own motor to high and led his men off in a swooping curve out into the swamp, then back around, aiming for a spot on the shore a half-kilometer from the enemy's camp.
Jacques watched behind him. Men appeared out of the wood, outlined by the burning rafts, weapons pointing. Even underwater, he heard muffled shouts and sounds of alarm.
It had all gone perfectly. The doctor knew the other camp, after the locust attack, would be spooked by fires in the night. They would not likely remain near such a burning pyre.
Still, they were to take no unnecessary chances. Jacques led his men back toward the shallows, and the group slowly rose from the lake, spitting out regulator mouthpieces and kicking off fins. The second part of his mission was to ensure the others did indeed flee.
Slogging out of the water, he breathed a sigh of relief, glad to leave the dark swamp behind. He fingered the unmangled half of his nose, as if making sure it was still there.
Jacques slipped out a pair of night-vision binoculars. He fitted them in place and stared back toward the camp. Behind him, his men whispered, energized from the adventure and the successful completion of their task. Jacques ignored them.
Outlined in the monochrome green of his night scope, a pair of men-Rangers, to judge by the way they carried their weapons-slipped away from the fiery rafts and called back into the forest. The group was pulling back. In the woods, new lights blinked on. Flashlights. Activity bustled around the campfire. Slowly, the lights began to shift away from the fire, like a line of fireflies. The parade marched toward the deeper ravine, up the chasm between the flat-topped highlands.
Jacques smiled. The doctor's plan had worked.
Still spying through his scope, he reached for his radio. He pushed the transmitter and brought the radio to his lips. 'Mission successful. Rabbits are running.
'Roger that:' It was the doctor. 'Canoes heading out now. Rendezvous at their old camp in two hours. Over and out:'
Jacques replaced the radio.
Once again, the hunt was on.
He turned to his other men to report the good news-but there was no one behind him. He instantly crouched and hissed their names. 'Manuel! Roberto!'
No answer.
The night remained dark around him, the woods even darker. He slipped his night-vision diving mask back over his face. The woods shone brighter, but the dense vegetation made visibility poor. He backed away, his bare feet striking water.
Jacques stopped, frozen between the terrors of what lay behind him and in front of him.
Through his night-vision mask, he spotted movement. For the barest flicker of a heartbeat, it looked like the shadows had formed the figure of a man, staring back at him, no more than ten yards away. Jacques blinked, and the figure was gone. But now all the jungle shadows flowed and slid like living things toward him.
He stumbled backward into the waters, one hand scrambling to shove in his regulator mouthpiece.
One of the shadows broke out of the jungle fringe, outlined against the muddy bank. Huge, monstrous . . .
Jacques screamed, but his regulator was in the way. Nothing more than a wet gurgle sounded. More of the dark shadows flowed out of the woods toward him. An old Maroon tribal prayer rose to his lips. He scrambled backward.
Behind his fear of dark waters and piranhas was a more basic terror: of being eaten alive.
He dove backward, twisting around to get away.
But the shadows were faster.
1 : 51 PM.
With a flashlight duct-taped to his shotgun, Nate followed near the rear of the group. The only ones behind him were Private Camera and Corporal Kostos. Everyone had lights, spearing the darkness in all directions. Despite the night, they moved quickly, trying to put as much distance as possible between them and whoever had set the rafts on fire.
The plan, according to Captain Waxman, was to seek a more defensible position. With the swamp on one side of them, the jungle on the other, it was not a secure spot to wait for whatever attack the fires would draw down upon them. And none of their group was delusional enough to think another attack wouldn't come.
