Scott Mariani - The Devil’s Kingdom - Part 2 of the best action adventure thriller you'll read this year!

Ben did know. Either Gerber would spiral into a depression from which he might never resurface, or Khosa would simply decide he was of no use to him, and sign the death warrant.

The next morning at six, the door was unlocked and a pair of Khosa’s militia infantrymen marched into the room, accompanied by an older man in his mid or late thirties whose authoritative demeanour, if not his uniform, marked him as their superior officer.

Ben had already been awake for an hour by then. He’d managed to chase the blackness of his mood away by forcing a hundred press-ups out of himself, followed by a hundred sit-ups and a thorough inspection of their room and the view from the window. He’d taken another long, hot shower, then changed into the clean khaki T-shirt and combat trousers from the pile of clothing that had been left for them. Tuesday had just finished in the bathroom and Jeff was lounging on his bunk with his hands clasped behind his head and a whimsical look on his face. Gerber appeared to be asleep, in the same position he’d curled into the night before. Ben had in fact checked earlier to make sure he wasn’t dead.

‘I am Captain Xulu!’ the officer barked at them. The troopers stood either side of him, holding their AKs in a sloppy rendition of the high-ready position that would have been something to rectify, if Ben had had any real intention of helping to train Khosa’s army. The last thing the world needed was an effective fighting force with a rabid psychopath like Khosa at its helm.

Ben stepped towards Xulu and faced him up close. Xulu was an inch shorter, at around five-ten, and paunchy. He was like a smaller, fatter version of his general, without the ferocious facial scarring but doing his best to make up for it by acting tough.

Ben eyed him coldly and said, ‘Doesn’t this army teach you to salute a superior officer? You’re talking to a major.’

Xulu returned the stare with a nasty grin. Every second or third tooth in his mouth was capped with gold. ‘You are not in my chain of command, soldier. I take my orders from General Khosa, Colonel Dizolele, and nobody else.’ He pursed his lips and added, ‘The General thinks you are a great warrior. Me, I think you are just another muzungu bastard who thinks he can deceive us. I do not salute muzungu shit.’

Ben and Jeff had known each other a long time and could communicate on a level that wasn’t quite telepathic, but not far off it. Might just have to kill this one , Ben knew Jeff was thinking from the set of his jaw.

Soon , Ben’s return glance told Jeff.

Jeff twitched one eyebrow and gave a tiny jerk of his chin, indicating as clearly as if he’d spoken it out loud, Why wait? Let’s pitch the fucker out of the window, snap the necks of these worthless two, take their weapons, and storm the building. You know you want to.

Ben gave a half-smile. The idea had merit. Its time might come, but that time wasn’t now.

The silent conversation between the two men wasn’t lost on Tuesday Fletcher, but it went straight over the head of Xulu, who planted his hands on his hips and glared around the room. His disapproving eye settled on Gerber. ‘You! Old man! You should stand up when I speak to you!’

‘He isn’t well,’ Ben said. ‘Leave him alone.’

‘Is he drunk?’ Xulu demanded. ‘Is he sick? What is wrong with him?’ He reached out to grab Gerber’s arm and yank him off the bunk.

‘He has the simian herpes genitalis virus,’ Ben said. ‘Caught it from a macaque in Addis Ababa. Very contagious.’

‘Makes your bollocks shrivel up and drop off,’ Jeff said, pointing downwards. ‘And everything else down there with them, if you’re really unlucky.’

‘Pretty grim,’ Tuesday added, pulling a face. ‘You can get it just by touching an infected person.’

‘We’re all vaccinated against it,’ Ben said. ‘If you’re not, I wouldn’t get too close.’

‘But the infection only lasts a little while,’ Jeff concluded. ‘He’ll be fine by tomorrow.’

Evidently not much of a doctor, Xulu had quickly pulled back his arm and now stepped away from Gerber’s bunk with a disconcerted frown. ‘Very well. He is excused duty for today.’

‘And what duty might that be?’ Ben asked.

The nasty gold smile. ‘You will soon find out. Come with me.’

Three more soldiers awaited downstairs in the lobby, to escort them to the armoured personnel carrier parked in the street in front of the hotel. Ben was able to get a better look at the six-wheeled APC in daylight and recognised it as a Chinese Type 92. Essentially it was a small tank, except it was fully amphibious. Hardware like it wasn’t cheap to come by, even in central Africa where military-grade weapons of all shapes and sizes could be had for a few dollars.

‘I wonder what surprises are in store for us today,’ Jeff mused as they walked from the entrance. The sun was already hot, burning a hole in the early morning clouds over the city.

‘Surprises are foolish things,’ Tuesday replied. ‘The pleasure is not enhanced, and the inconvenience is often considerable.’ He caught Jeff’s look and shrugged. ‘It’s from Emma .’

‘Who the hell’s Emma?’

‘You know, Jane Austen?’

Jeff looked blank. ‘Sounds like you know some strange women.’

But Tuesday was right about the pleasure not being enhanced as the three of them were made to clamber inside the stuffy, baking-hot interior of the APC. The three-man crew was already in place and the additional five soldiers, plus Xulu, plus their three charges, made twelve people crammed in like herrings in a cask. ‘Anybody farts in here,’ Jeff muttered, ‘and he’s dead meat.’

Captain Xulu sat near the front and gave orders to the crew as the hatch was slammed down above them and the heavy vehicle got moving. From his cramped fold-down seat in the back, Ben was able to peer out through a bulletproof-glass porthole. The sight of the empty city streets rolling by was even more surreal in daylight than when they’d first arrived. ‘There’s no way Khosa built this place,’ he said, voicing his thoughts from last night in a low tone that only Tuesday and Jeff would hear. ‘His resources don’t stretch this far, nothing like it. And if they did, he’d have spent the money on building a proper military base.’

‘Then again,’ Jeff said. ‘Khosa’s as loony as a shithouse rat. If anyone’s capable of it, he is.’

‘He might be loony, but he’s also got a plan. I don’t see how this place fits with it.’

‘If he didn’t build it, then who did?’ Tuesday asked.

Ben shook his head. ‘And whoever did, why would they let him take the place over? You don’t create something like this and leave it empty with just a bunch of crazies with guns running around the streets. There’s got to be an angle.’

Tuesday thought about it. ‘What if a property developer built it as an investment, and then Khosa and his boys just muscled in and took it from him? For all you know, the poor sod’s buried in the hotel gardens.’

‘Do you know what the average Congolese makes per year?’ Ben said. ‘Six hundred dollars. These people couldn’t afford a broom cupboard in this place. What kind of luxury property development can possibly pay off in one of the world’s poorest nations?’

The APC rumbled on through the deserted city, using the whole road as there was absolutely no traffic. For a full twenty minutes they saw not a single motor vehicle or sign of life except for a pair of hyenas that had slipped through the perimeter and were running through the streets foraging for scraps. The turret machine-gunner decided it would be fun to have a pop at them, and for a few seconds the shell of the vehicle was filled with the deafening hammer-drill noise of sustained fully automatic fire. From the laughter of the crew, Ben guessed they must have hit something; then as the APC rumbled on he saw the carcass of one of the animals lying in a blood pool in the road. The other had fled.