Callsign: King

18.

King could see, in his mind’s eye, the seven zombie-like members of the original research team, rushing from the depths of the cave, responding to the threat to Felice. They were like warrior bees, instantaneously mobilizing to defend the queen.

But before that could happen, the man assaulting Felice abruptly fell back, as if he had received an electrical shock. He then got to his feet, and turned woodenly toward his comrades. Although the latter were poised to shoot King, their eyes were drawn to the would-be rapist. There was no fear in their eyes; instead, they seemed amused, as if they thought their friend was playing a joke. King knew better; in the icy white glow of the electric lantern, he could see that Felice’s assailant now wore the same blank expression as the zombies in the cave.

Moses must have noticed it as well, for he scrambled back as if the approaching man was a venomous serpent. The man ignored him and advanced toward his comrades- former comrades, King thought-his face and body language betraying nothing of his intent. One of the rebel fighters said something in Amharic, perhaps asking for an explanation for the odd behavior, but none of the three Ethiopians seemed to sense that something had gone very wrong.

The only answer came in the form of an attack. The changed man approached the closest rebel and started raining blows with closed fists.

The rebels stumbled back, gripped by confusion, and for a moment did nothing to intervene. The punches were brutal, filled with primal energy, and the target of the attack was rendered senseless before he could so much as raise a hand in his own defense. The two remaining rebels, still unable to process what was happening, leapt forward to restrain the man, but he wrestled free of their hold and began directing his fury at them.

At last, the two rebels seemed to understand that their friend now meant to kill them, and as one of them also went down under a rain of fists, the remaining man brought his Kalashnikov rifle to bear. He took a couple steps back, and then took aim.

Before he could pull the trigger however, reinforcements arrived. The seven zombies emerged from the cave and descended on the gunman like warrior ants. The rifle discharged with a thunderous crack, but the bullet zipped away into the night sky as the man went down under the combined weight of his assailants. From the midst of the tangle of bodies came the sickening crunch of bones breaking.

All of this happened in a matter of seconds, time in which King sorted through his options like a bad hand in a poker game. Moses had fled the scene, running flat out toward the parked SUVs. He would be no help, but despite his betrayal, King wasn’t ready to count the young idealist as an enemy. Felice was probably safe; the zombies had come in response to a threat to her safety. Their sole purpose seemed to be protecting her from harm, but King got the impression that they no longer possessed any ability to discriminate friend from foe.

But in the cave, they had responded to her commands; would that work again? Or would approaching Felice make him the primary target of the zombies’ wrath?

As he pondered this, he contorted his body and threaded his legs through the circle formed by his bound wrists. There was no time to wrestle with the knots, but with his hands now in front of him, he would be able to use them in his own defense. It wouldn’t count for much if all seven-make that eight-of the zombies attacked en masse.

He jogged over to where Felice lay. She was sobbing, but did not appear to be in the grip of another episode of catatonia. He knelt beside her. “Felice. It’s okay now. You’re safe.”

She looked up at him, her eyes wild in the grip of an adrenaline fugue, but after a moment she began looking around to verify what he was telling her.

“You’re safe now,” he repeated. The sound of footsteps scrabbling on the hard lava rock signaled that his actions had not gone unnoticed. “No one is going to hurt you. But you need to call them off.”

“Call them…?”

“The zombies.” He winced at his use of the term, but didn’t know what else to call them. “Tell them to stop. Send them back to the cave.”

Comprehension dawned. She glanced over his shoulder at the approaching horde and raised a hand.

The crunch of footsteps stopped immediately and an eerie silence descended over the plain. King looked back cautiously and saw the group arrayed around him, only a few feet away. He breathed a tentative sigh of relief, but when he looked back at Felice, all he saw was horror. Her eyes were riveted on the form of the man who had, only a few moments earlier, been trying to rape her.

“What have I done?” she whispered, hoarsely. “I did that to him. I made him that way.”

“You protected yourself.”

She shook her head, and then hugged her arms around her torso as if fighting back a wave of nausea. “I thought that it was something that happened to all of us when we found the remains in the cave…that we were all changed by what we had discovered…but that’s not…it was me. I did this to them. I destroyed their minds.” She looked into King’s eyes again. “I can’t control this.”

“Yes you can.” He put every ounce of certainty he could muster into his tone, but deep down he wasn’t sure at all. “You didn’t change me. You were being hurt and you fought back. That’s all. You have to believe that.”

He could tell that his words failed to convince her, but it was a start.

“We should get out of here,” he said, rising to his feet. “You have some answers now; you know what happened. There’s nothing more for you here.”

She considered this for a moment, her eyes still fixed on the semi-circle of motionless zombies, then gave a weak nod. As if responding to the gesture, the group abruptly turned and filed back into the cave.

Relieved, King finally turned his attention to the ropes that bound his wrists. The knots were pulled tight, but appeared to be fairly simple. He tugged them loose with his teeth, and in a matter of seconds, was able to wriggle free. He then helped Felice to her feet and together they moved toward the parked vehicles.

Moses was waiting for them, his hands spread in a gesture of contrition. “Please,” he said, as if to forestall an act of retribution. “I never meant for that to happen. You were not to be harmed.”

King wasn’t sure how to respond, but to his surprise, Felice spoke first. “I believe you. And I understand why you felt you had to do this. I wish you had told us what you wanted in the first place. It would have prevented all of this from happening.”

Moses was as speechless as King.

“The cave is dangerous,” Felice continued. “I know you believe that it represents a source of wealth for the future of Africa, but it’s not safe. You must see that.”

He nodded dumbly.

She held out a hand to him. “I haven’t forgotten that you rescued me once. I remember it all now. Let me return the favor.”

Almost tentatively, the young Ethiopian took the proffered hand. King kept his expression neutral, doing his best to hide his reservations. He doubted that they had anything more to worry about from Moses, but a betrayal was nonetheless a betrayal. And there was no telling how far the ripples of that action would spread.

As if to underscore what he was thinking, the unmistakable sound of helicopter turbines-distant but nevertheless growing closer-became audible. King scanned the horizon in all directions and quickly located two sets of green and red aircraft lights approaching from the east.

It was of course highly unlikely that the helicopters belonged to the Pan African Army of Freedom, or any other ragtag rebel group, but that was of little comfort to King. As far as he knew, there was only one other group that knew the location of the cavern: Felice’s former employers at Nexus/Manifold.

For the first time since getting free of his bonds, it occurred to King that he had not armed himself. He had no idea what had become of his MP5. The bodies of the three rebel fighters, and the AK-47s they had wielded, lay some fifty meters away. The Dragunov rifle was presumably still in its case in the SUV, but there almost certainly wasn’t enough time to break it out and assemble it before the helicopters arrived. Even the attempt might provoke a hostile response; it was a sure bet that they were already under scrutiny from observers in the aircraft.

“Change of plans,” King declared. “Back to the cave.”

Felice was visibly shocked at the suggestion. “What?”

“No time to explain.” He took her hand and began striding purposefully across the open area toward the mouth of the cave.

It was already too late. One of the craft swooped down between them and their destination, flaring its rotors and buffeting them with a blast of artificial wind. King held up a hand, partly to deflect some of the grit that was blasting into his face, and partly to shade his eyes from the high intensity spotlight that stabbed out from the helicopter, transfixing him and Felice like bugs on a pin. The message was crystal clear: stay put. There didn’t seem to be any alternative.

But then, as the turbines were shut down, returning the night once more to silence, King heard a familiar voice reach out from the center of the blazing light. “Jack? Is that really you?”