Mike Maden: River of Gods

A thousand feet above the herd, Sandra’s Silent Falcon drone was still making a lazy figure eight, its camera still pointing at the big female. Had the rhinos any inclination to gaze skyward, their famously poor eyesight wouldn’t have allowed them to notice the aircraft at its current height, but even their excellent hearing couldn’t have picked up its whisper-quiet motors, not even at two hundred feet.

But a four-wheel-drive ground vehicle? That caught the herd’s attention, though nobody stopped feeding. Heavy, tube-shaped ears perked up and rotated in unison in the direction of the engine rumbling toward them from a distance. As the sound edged nearer, heads lifted warily. The big bull grunted, then turned and trotted heavily for a nearby stand of acacia trees for shelter. The others followed swiftly behind him, the trumpeting calves falling in line behind their mothers. The female with the yellow tag took the rear and felt the bee as it zipped past.

Only, it wasn’t a bee.

It was a bullet. Then a hundred.

The air roared with gunfire.

Men shouted.

The bull had led them all into a trap.

The tagged female ran. Her flanks suddenly stung with heat. Her sides ached as if tree branches were thrust into her ribs. She bellowed in pain.

They were all bellowing.

Except the babies. They cawed like birds, high-pitched and keening.

The tagged female dropped to her knees. Saw the flash of metal in her dim eye. Searing pain exploded in her snout as the machete blade thwock ed into the bone just above the horn.

Two dozen men. Black, like shadows, swarmed the herd. Rhinos down. The men circled them. Arms swinging, blades chopping. Blood and skin and bone flecked into the air with each strike. Men pulling hard on the horns while others chopped at the roots. Panicked eyes rolled white in shock as blood seeped into the grass.

And then the big bull roared.

He was on his knees but still swinging that giant horn and roaring, knocking a shadow man to the ground.

More gunfire. The bull’s guts spilled into the grass.

And the last baby screamed.

The Land Rover bounced over the uneven terrain, but Johnny kept the pedal floored. He kept one eye on the GPS locator on the dashboard and one on the windshield.

Sandra pointed at a thick stand of acacia trees looming in the distance. Bright red burning bush creepers flowered brightly in the tree branches. “They must be in there.” Sandra had lost visual contact with the herd when the video feed was cut but the falcon was still tracking them, apparently. A handheld tablet monitor was in her lap now.

Johnny yanked the wheel hard to avoid a fallen log, then pointed the Land Rover toward the acacia stand. A path of beaten-down grass wound around toward the back. “Looks like our rhinos were here after all,” Sandra said, nodding at the grass track.

The Rover sped around the bend and past the first tree. Johnny slammed the brakes.

The man standing in his way was Chinese, tall, broad-shouldered. His face was edged and hard, but creased with a smile. He was focused intently on the dark gray Silent Falcon fuselage high above doing loops, guided by the radio transmitter in his hands. He didn’t budge despite the Rover’s skidding stop just ten feet from him. He wore green camo without insignia, but his bearing was pure military. An operator, Johnny guessed. Special forces. They all looked the same, no matter where they came from. A combat knife was strapped to the man’s leg.

“Who is that?” Sandra asked, pushing open the door.

Johnny grabbed her wrist. “No, stay here.”

“I’m coming with you,” she said.

“You wait here. I’ll check it out. This is my rice bowl, remember?”

“Careful, Johnny. Please.”

“I’m a cop. I’m always careful.” He flashed her a smile.

Johnny shut the door behind him and approached the lone Chinese. Johnny’s Glock 19 was in his waistband at the small of his back. The smiling man finally turned his gaze toward him.

“An expensive toy,” Guo Jun said, nodding at the sky.

“Not a toy. A camera, watching everything you do.”

“And recording it, too, I’m certain,” he said. “I should like to see the pretty pictures.”

“Then buy your own.”

“Why should I? I have yours now.” Guo looked back up at the Silent Falcon.

“Because it doesn’t belong to you. It belongs to the World Wildlife Alliance.” He threw a thumb over his shoulder. “To that lady in the truck.”

“She won’t be needing it anytime soon, Johnny.”

Johnny startled at the sound of his name but hid it. “If you’re going to say my name, say it correctly.”

“And how is that?”

“For dickheads like you, it’s Mr. Paloma.”

“Too bad your name isn’t Troy Pearce. I was hoping to play a game with him today.” Guo’s eyes were still fixed on the plane.

“What game?” Johnny slipped his gun hand toward his back.

Guo tossed the transmitter at Johnny.

Instinctively, Johnny caught it, worried about crashing the drone overhead. A steel fist punched his chest, knocking the wind out of him. He dropped the transmitter into the grass. Looked down.

Saw the carbon blade wedged in his chest up to the hilt.

Johnny grabbed the blade as he crumbled to his knees, gasping for air. His darkening eyes saw the smiling Chinese still crouched in a throwing stance, throwing arm extended, fingers pointing at him like an accusation. A swarm of Africans burst out of the trees behind Guo, flashing long blades.

Sandra called his name, but her muffled screams seemed far away.

Lake Massingir

Mozambique

1 May

Pearce tossed the last empty bottle of Preta by the neck like a potato masher grenade. It whistled through the air until it finally splashed into the water. It joined a half-dozen other empty bottles bobbing around the lake like forlorn sailors lost on a dismal sea.

Pearce sighed. The wind wasn’t letting up, the fish still weren’t biting, and now he was out of beer.

A truly shitty day.

His ears perked up at the sound of distant thunder, mechanical and regular. Chopper blades hammered low on the eastern, treeless horizon.

Pearce watched the diving speck racing toward him, barely ten feet above the deck, about a mile out. Within moments the helicopter took shape; a Bell JetRanger, if memory served. Nose down, full throttle, the single rotor kicked up a pair of misty wingtip vortices off of the lake surface that melted away in the gusting wind.

Thirty seconds later, the helicopter flared, rotated ninety degrees, and hovered a hundred feet away from Pearce. The rotor’s downwash battered Pearce even from this distance, and he fought to hold on to his boonie hat. Bright yellow letters on the black and white zebra-striped fuselage shouted Air Safari! as the passenger door slid open. The pilot was clearly fighting the crosswinds on the lake as the bird struggled to hold position.

The man in the passenger seat wore a light blue linen suit without a tie. He waved a cell phone in the air, then tapped on the screen. Seconds later, Pearce’s cell phone signaled a text message: “Pearce?”

Pearce glanced back at the helicopter and nodded heavily. His phone chimed again.

“DIGNAM, US EMBASSY.”

Great Limpopo Transfrontier Park

Mozambique

The Air Safari! copter cycled down as Pearce and Dignam hunched beneath the blades, racing toward the burned-up Land Rover. Dignam briefed Pearce on what little he knew on the flight over. The CIA station chief, Jack Hawkins, had remained on scene, afraid to leave before Pearce arrived. Six Mozambique park rangers in floppy hats and faded green fatigues stood in a loose perimeter scanning the horizon, clearly skittish, rifles high.