The white Toyota four-door pulled slowly into the truck stop at four fifteen a.m., its headlights off. The power was out here, of course, so the huge lot in front of the gas pumps was pitch black, the truck stop closed and locked, the patrons and workers having fled to their homes for safety.
The Toyota rolled to a stop on the northern side of the lot, its engine idling.
Isaac Opoku sat behind the wheel, wiping the sweat of stress from his brow. He’d been on the road for four hours, though much of the time had been spent pulled in behind buildings along the roadside. Every time headlights approached them, Duff had told Isaac to get off the road, and then Duff radioed Malike half a klick behind them to do the same.
The closer they got to the capital, the more vehicles they’d seen, and this made for slow going.
Duff held his AK at his shoulder now in the front passenger seat, the muzzle resting on the dashboard in front of him and his finger hovering near the trigger.
And directly behind Isaac, Nichole Duffy’s rifle was pointed out the open rear door at the darkened building.
They were still several hours’ drive from the capital at this pace, and they had no idea what they’d find when they got there, but for now they just sat in the car, waiting for something to happen.
Suddenly, three sets of headlights turned on in the mist, just fifty yards in front of them on the other side of the lot. The lights were blinding to the trio in the car that had been driving dark for hours, but after a moment to acclimate, Isaac Opoku flipped on his own lights and began driving slowly forward.
One of the three sets of headlights pulled forward as well, and both Isaac’s and the other vehicle finally stopped in the center of the lot, about fifteen yards apart. Headlights were again extinguished, and Duff climbed out of the vehicle, put his AK on the seat, and walked alone through the mist to a large black SUV with his hands away from his body.
Six men, all Black and formidable looking, all carrying short-barreled rifles, stood outside the vehicle. Five of them seemed to be posting security, while the sixth man stood by the driver’s-side door of the SUV and gave Duff a little nod when he approached.
He spoke with an American accent. “You’re Josh Duffy?”
“That’s me.”
“I’m John.”
Sure you are, Duff said to himself. Out loud, he said, “We appreciate the help.” He took Isaac’s walkie-talkie off his belt and spoke into it. “Ben, all good here. Come to us.”
The Ghanaian responded immediately. “Two minutes away.”
John said, “We’ve got three vehicles; one is an armored van that’s decked out on the inside as an ambulance. Four litters in there if you need them. We’ve got a nurse and trauma supplies to treat the wounded during the trek back to the embassy.”
“Our wounded are in the other vic, they’ll be pulling up in a minute.”
The man gave a little smile. “You’re not wounded? No offense, but you look like you lost a fight with a mountain lion.”
“Been a long day, a longer night.”
“I can see that.” John continued, “This vic and the other Yukon we brought are armored, as well. I have ten Local Guard Force guys with me in all.”
The other Yukon idled twenty-five yards back next to the van, and Duff imagined that men from that vehicle were watching the south for any threats.
Duff turned around and waved to Isaac’s car, and soon both Isaac and Nichole got out and began walking over. As they did so, Duff asked, “What’s the road like between here and the capital?”
“It’s great if you like gunfights,” John said.
“What if you don’t?” Nichole asked as she approached.
John looked at her a moment, then took a step closer. “Nichole?”
“John? Thanks for coming.” She looked to her husband now. “You met John Sunday briefly at the cookout.”
Josh had met a lot of people in the past two weeks, but even though he didn’t remember this guy, he said, “Oh, yeah.”
The African American nodded. “You make a hell of a good smash burger.” To Nichole he said, “We ran into a column of probably three dozen vehicles heading south about twenty klicks from the city. We hid out on a dirt driveway while the column passed, continued north, and then a few minutes later we heard gunfire behind us.”
“So the fighting is in the city now?”
“Yeah. I just talked to my COS and he told me two columns of rebels have hit, one from the N4 and the other from the N1. Unknown how many enemy we’re talking about, but we’re getting reports of mortar attacks in the city, far away from the approaching columns. With the power off it’s tough to get good intel, but it’s safe to say we’re going to have a dicey time getting back to the embassy.”
Isaac stepped into the conversation. “We passed probably fifty shot-up or burned-out wrecks, many of them police cars on the way down here from Akosombo.”
“There’s another fifty behind us,” John said, then added, “Plus anything that happened after we passed by.”
The pickup driven by Benjamin Manu and containing the injured pulled into the lot, its own headlights turned off. The truck pulled up next to Duff, but he quickly waved Ben on towards the van, telling him they would help with the wounded.
John told Duff they’d all leave in the armored vics in five minutes, so Duff and Nichole walked over to Isaac, who had gone back to stand near his car.
Duff said, “Look, man. You are more than welcome to turn around and go home, but if you come with us in the van, the nurse will be able to check your gunshot wound. She’ll do a better job than you’re going to find up in Atimpoku. No offense.”
Isaac laughed. “None taken.” Isaac stood there thinking in the darkness for a moment while the others loaded up. “Okay. I’ll leave my car here.” He shrugged. “It will be stolen, probably.”
Nichole said, “Buddy, America will buy you a new car. I can promise you that.”
Duff overheard. “I’ll give you ours.”
Isaac laughed a little, then walked towards the van. “See you in the capital.”
Nichole and Duff climbed into the Yukon driven by John, and soon they all began heading south again, towards Accra.
Three hours later, a dawn mist reduced visibility on the N6 highway between Kumasi and Accra, but anyone on the road could tell that something was coming this way.
The two-lane highway was lined with little shops, stores, factories, wooden-stalled markets, and other businesses, and even with the unrest in the city and the power outage in the nation, a few people had already begun their daily toil.
Until just before seven a.m., when a rumbling from the north turned heads, pausing everyone from their tasks.
As a fresh crackle of gunfire came from the city behind them, General Kwame Boatang’s force from Kumasi appeared out of the ether to the north, heading south in a massive convoy. The Central Command column stretched a mile and a half, and it was composed of three motorized mechanized infantry battalions, totaling over twenty-five hundred troops and one hundred twelve combat vehicles.
In the front, a pair of Navistar Defense Husky tactical support vehicles with Belgium-made machine guns in their top turrets rolled side by side, using both the southbound and northbound lanes, causing the light morning traffic to disperse into parking lots and driveways to avoid being crushed.
The Huskys were closely followed by eight BTR-70 eight-wheeled armored personnel vehicles, each loaded with ten troops and also fitted with mounted guns on the roof. Behind them, the first dozen up-armored Toyota pickups rolled past, with gunmen in the beds, rifles sticking out of the windows.
More Huskys followed, more BTRs followed the Huskys, and more pickups followed the BTRs.
Rows of Ural off-road 6×6 covered troop transport trucks carried more infantry behind all the armor, thirty to a vehicle, and behind them came the support trucks. Tow trucks, gas trucks, water and food trucks, extra ammunition, and two mobile field hospitals lumbered past.
And finally, at the rear of the column and protected by another half dozen Huskys and four BTR troop carriers, were three BTR-50 command vehicles.
General Boatang wore his combat fatigues, his body armor, and a helmet, and he rode in the second command vehicle along with four of his captains, who were constantly on their radios trying to pinpoint enemy strongpoints in the city ahead of them.
Boatang’s satellite phone rang and he answered it, conferred quietly a moment, and then hung up. Looking to his officers, he told them to proceed to Black Star Square, on Accra’s coastline with the Gulf of Guinea, and to expect resistance along the route.
None of his staff knew where he was getting his intelligence, but all of them knew to trust it, and to trust their leader.
They entered the city itself at seven fifteen a.m.; the lead trucks reported the sounds of gunfire ahead, and ten minutes later they radioed that they’d had a brief engagement with a pickup truck full of rebels in front of a timber market.
The enemy vehicle was destroyed, four confirmed KIA, and Boatang told his captain to inform the lead trucks to keep going.
More gunfire was reported in minutes, a skirmish by a city park, but the rebels weren’t set up to defend themselves from behind, and they were summarily routed by the first armored vehicles of Central Command.
The captain reported another success ahead, and Boatang suppressed a smile. All was just as Kang had promised, and he imagined Professor Addo was just about now realizing he’d been set up.
“Xiansheng? Xiansheng? I am sorry, sir. I’m very sorry.”
Kang Shikun opened his eyes and looked up at Chen Jia as she knelt over him. “What is it?”
“Professor Addo is on the satellite phone. I am sorry to wake you.”
Kang lay on the bed in his makeshift office, wearing his shirt and pants and shoes. Looking at his watch, he realized he’d dozed a couple of hours.
He felt rested and energized.
Taking the satellite phone from the young woman’s hands, he waved her out of the room, then stood and headed towards the balcony for his first good look at the city in the morning light.
“Good morning, Professor. What news do you have?”
Addo was angry, perhaps panicky. “What news? You tell me! My men are being slaughtered. Central Command is here!”
“Preposterous. I just confirmed Boatang and his troops remain in garrison.”
“Then who has attacked my N4 column from behind? They have armor, and a lot of it! We still have another two kilometers until we arrive in Black Star Square. We don’t stand a chance.”
“Calm down, Professor. I’m certain the situation is not as dire as you make it out to be.”
“Southern Command put up more resistance than you assured us of. And now Central Command is attacking our flanks!”
Kang imagined that Addo had only learned the military usage of the term “flank” in the past few months while being trained by Sentinel operators. Central Command was not attacking the flanks, it was attacking the rear, but Kang did not correct the rebel leader.
He said, “Professor. Right now over sixty Sentinel operators are in the capital in a dozen squads, and they are making war on government troops.”
“I don’t see them anywhere.”
“Possibly because you aren’t at the front lines.” Before Addo could respond to the thinly veiled recrimination, Kang said, “Let me reassure you. We have everything under control. You are needed alive for my plan to be successful.”
Addo screamed, “Tell it to Boatang!”
After taking a moment to smile, the Chinese intelligence officer said, “Continue on to Black Star Square. Once there, make a short video. As we’ve discussed, claim the city is already in your hands.”
“But it’s not.”
“Not yet.” Kang continued, “Once you’ve done that, I want you and a few bodyguards to break away from your main attack and to come to my location, bring me the video, and we will use satellite Internet to broadcast it to the world.”
“I should remain with my men. Fighting.”
Addo, Kang realized, was putting up token resistance to the idea of him leaving the battle lines. He wanted a way out, but he wanted to look like a military leader. Kang said, “You will still be in command of your troops. Plus, we are very secure here. While your main force continues fighting, with Sentinel’s help, of course, we will keep you personally out of the line of fire. When the smoke clears, you and your remaining Dragons can proceed directly to the presidential palace.”
Kang knew Addo would jump at the chance to leave the fighting, to leave his boys behind, to get somewhere safe to wait out the rough stuff before he was installed as president.
The thirty-five-year-old Ghanaian said, “Yes. After my speech I’ll travel with a few men, take a civilian car, and come to you. Where are you?”
“Head north from Black Star Square. I am in the hills overlooking the city. I won’t give you an address, just call back when you reach Aburi, and I will direct you to us.”
Addo said, “We are fighting for our lives here, Kang. Talk to Condor, get us more Sentinel help, especially down at the square.”
“I will see what I can do, Professor.”
Kang hung up the phone. And then he just sat there at his desk wondering how long he’d be able to convince Addo that things were going just the way he had promised.
Not much longer, was his conclusion. He just needed Addo to make that speech and bring it here, and he needed his people in the next room to circulate that speech around the world, and then he needed General Boatang to rout the hapless Western Togoland rebels.
Addo would die, of course. Likely right here in this office, at the hands of Tremaine, Kang told himself.
The thought gave him no pause at all.
But a new thought entered his mind, and it did fill him with concern. He called out to Jia, and she came into the room. Her oversized sweatshirt looked like she’d been sleeping in it for a week, and her eyes were red.
“Yes, sir?”
“Where is Tremaine?”
“He’s in the city, sir. He is working on his operation by the U.S. embassy. I expect to hear more soon.”
“Very well,” Kang said. No, killing Addo did not stress him in the slightest. But what did stress him was the fact that Conrad Tremaine’s missing Sentinel computer threatened to derail the entire operation.
He shook his head, dispelling the thought. No, Tremaine had a good plan to get the device back, and all would soon be well.
He headed for the bathroom to wash his face with cold water and to prepare for the greatest day in his life.