In the changing tent, Jenna shucked Aubry out of his clothes. “We’ve got to get the hell out of here. How long did you say that you’ve got?”
“They sa-said that the stuff will take effect within s-seventy-two hours, giving me t-time to get the hell out.” Aubry quaked, his body on the thin edge of adrenal overload.
Bloodeagle nodded. “Then let’s assume that the window is actually a tenth as long. And that the exit hole they have for you is corrupt.”
“I’m s-supposed to take a jeep waiting for me on the west side of the fairgrounds. Drive s-south to a little farming village, and make c-contact with a private air shuttle.”
“Forget it.”
“W-why?”
“Because they’ll be in diplomatic communication with Swarna’s successor.”
“S-so?” Bloodeagle opened a small suitcase.
“All right—lie down.”
“You’ve been t-trying to get me to do that for years.”
“Don’t flatter yourself.” Bloodeagle set up a miniature disrupter. It hummed, broadcasting electronic chaff. Aubry lay down, and the NewMan went to work with a hand-held scanner.
Electronics. Bloodeagle saw the false shadow outline equipment, and the translators hooked into the language centers of Aubry’s brain. There was nothing that he recognized as dangerous, except …
He tensed. “I’ve got a tracer here. I’ve got to disable it fast.”
Bloodeagle took out a laser scalpel and focused the beam onto Aubry’s leg. Aubry’s world dissolved into a red flash, bordered by white. There was a moment of searing pain, as the beam burned through Aubry’s leg, through the muscles, and into the capsule.
“It burns….”
“No time for anesthetic, dammit. Just hold on … got it.”
The tracer fuzzed out. The whining noise died. Bloodeagle sat down heavily, tanned face pale. “Now … listen, Aubry. When the shit hits the fan, America’s going to scream innocent. That’s why STYX gave Harris his way. You’re a civilian, and black—and Koskotas is a racist bastard. They probably had six different scenarios running, including entering a ringer in the Swarnaville Sport and Arts Jamboree. Your Nullboxing background made you perfect. Not just because you would be willing to go in and do it, but because they could claim that you had a motive to assassinate Swarna that had nothing to do with American policy. But there is classified shadow-imaging tech implanted in your femur.
“If you are caught, analysis of the imaging gear will prove that you were given high-level assistance. This would give Swarna’s successor leverage—he won’t make favorable deals with America. It’ll push PanAfrica further toward Japan.”
Jenna and Jacobs went to work, sealing the wound with synthetic skin, numbing the tissues, bandaging. Aubry hissed with pain, then steadied himself.
“Who … oh shit! Who would that successor be?”
“No idea. Ibumi was his only acknowledged child. Swarna’s office is a political/economic creation, and PanAfrica might go belly-up. Japan will back someone, probably Kanagawa. Kanagawa is minister of public works, and a Yakuza boss to boot. America will back someone—probably De Thours, the Dutchman. Minister of finance,”
“Not a black African?” Aubry said quietly.
“Are you kidding?”
“What about Tanaka?”
Bloodeagle shrugged. “No political ambitions that I know. His obligation is to Swarna—but he belongs to the Yakuza. He will probably back Kanagawa.” He tapped Aubry’s leg. “For America to successfully back the Dutchman, she has to claim innocence. Therefore, if there’s any risk of your being caught, you’ll be terminated. I can block the signal. I pulsed the bomb’s processor, scrambled the codes. I can do that—once. It’s a built-in safety precaution. Prevents an enemy from triggering destruct codes—for about two days. That’s how long it will take them to run through all the codes, at the rate of a thousand per second—that’s the fastest the receiver will take them.
“But we’ve got to get the bomb out by then. Otherwise, the explosives will trigger, and there isn’t a damned thing that I can do about it.”
Aubry sat up, and winced. He tested his leg, cursed, then said resignedly, “Better than being dead. I guess. Thanks, Miles.”
“There’s only one thanks I want. Getting out of here alive. Let’s go.”
The three of them shook hands with Jacobs. Aubry looked at the little man. “Why did you do it? Wasn’t Azziz your fighter?”
Jacobs shook his head. “I’m hired help. Azziz’s manager had an … accident. I’m a backup. Nullboxing’s a rough game over here—controlled by the government. Two of my guys died matched against state-bred boxers.” His smile was small, weary. “I just wanted to get my own back.”
“You have a way out?”
He tapped his chest. “Bad heart. Maybe a year left. No money to get a new one.”
Aubry took his hands. “But can you get to America?”
“Maybe. There are ways. But why bother? Here, there. Now, later … what’s the difference?”
Aubry squeezed his hands until Jacobs’s eyes popped with pain. “Because if you get there, find the Scavengers. Talk to Promise Coutonou. Tell her what you did for me. They’ll get you a new heart.”
Jacobs looked into Aubry’s surgically altered face, and after a long breath, he nodded. “The Scavengers. I’ve heard of them. Then you must be…?”
Aubry nodded.
“Shit. You would have been great, kid.”
Aubry gave him a brief, firm hug—and then turned and left with Bloodeagle and Jenna.
Jacobs watched the tent flap flutter behind them. He was alone now. Soon, no place on this continent would be safe for him. But Jacobs had a soft, speculative look on his face, and a feeling in his tired heart that he hadn’t had for years.
Hope.
The microdot had dissolved. The nanoassassins had been busy, attacking bones, stealing material to build the generations to come. There was an artificial cyst the size of a pinhead lodged near Swarna’s right ear, near what physiologists refer to as the tenth, pneumogastric, or vagus nerve. There, behind a biologically neutral membrane, they massed for the attack.
So far, Swarna felt nothing.
Their jeep was twenty miles from the border of the Central African Republic. From there to Daglia was the work of a few hours, and Daglia was large enough, and international enough, to hide them.
“The tracer is blocked. Jeep is clean,” Jenna said. Her long brown arms were sure on the wheel. “And canopied. Unless they knew where to look for us they couldn’t pick us up with their best satellite. We’re just another jeep. On the other hand …”
Within Swarna’s body were countless scouting nanobots, searching for microtumors, weak arterial walls, damaged nerve cells. They constantly repaired, rebuilt, and remained alert to the possibility of invasion.
The vagus nerves are uniquely important to the human body. They emerge from the cranium as a flat cord of woven filaments, carrying messages to the organs of voice and respiration, and the stomach and heart as well. They are, therefore, an ideal target.
The cyst fluttered, and the first few hundreds of nanoassassins crept out into Swarna’s body. They were scouts, designed to appear innocuous, disguised as friendly nanobots, exchanging proper protocols until the moment that they would become instruments of destruction.
But their vast numbers guaranteed some minute percentage of errors in duplication. And the inevitable finally happened.
Near the posterior pulmonary branch of the pneumogastric, one of the monitoring nanobots nosed against an invader. It sent a microsecond recognition signal checking for program corruption in its brother …
And received static in return.
Swarna’s monitor nanobot sent out an alarm. There were dangerous rogue or alien nanobots and an unidentified, near-critical biomass near the vagus nerves.
The monitors were free-radical destroyers, were cancer-cell destroyers, but were tied in with central processing to the extent that they could send back information for that processor to evaluate.
And it did send in a report.
Mere seconds after it did the biomass broke open, and billions of killer cells spread into Swarna’s system, in an action both precipitous and deadly.
Swarna’s biomonitor sounded an earsplitting alert.
Reflexively, Tanaka said, “Code two-two,” and the pilot immediately changed his heading. Then Tanaka was with Swarna, checking his vital signs with a hand-held monitor.
“Nothing …” he said, suspicious.
Phillipe Swarna sat back into the seat of the transport plane, and a puzzled expression spread over his face. He clapped a large palm over his stomach.
“It is odd,” he said quietly. “I feel …”
Kanagawa, minister of public works, leaned forward. “Are you certain there is something wrong? A little indigestion…?”
Tanaka glared murderously.
“I feel …” Swarna groped for words. Suddenly he sucked in air massively, and couldn’t exhale it. His fingers clawed at his heart, and his face swelled, purpling. His eyes rolled back up in his head, and suddenly, as if with some masterful effort of will Swarna had managed to retake momentary control of his breathing, he screamed.…
The nanoassassins operated in three main groups. One attacked and took control of the vagus nerves, one sped for the spinal column, and one for the brain itself.
In all cases, they began broadcasting mutinous signals, and triggering every pain response in Swarna’s body.
Die, they said.
Or that is what they would have done.
But the biomonitor that kept Phillipe Swarna alive was alert to the possibility of such an invasion. One of the invading cells was captured by an artificial phagocyte, and taken to a capsule the size of half an aspirin, for analysis. The threat was perceived almost instantly, and reserve phagocytes were releasing into Swarna’s system.
The battle was joined.