Vixen 03

17

Although it seemed as though his head had barely hit the pillow, Hiram Lusana had been asleep for seven hours when he was roused by the knock at his door. The wristwatch on the bed table read six o'clock. He cursed, rubbed the sleep from his coffee-brown eyes, and sat up.

"Come in."

The knock came again.

'I said, Come in," he grunted loudly.

Captain John Mukuta entered the room and stood stiffly at attention. "Sorry to wake you, sir, but section fourteen has just returned from its reconnaissance of Umkono."

"So what's the emergency? I can study their report later."

Mukuta's eyes remained fixed on a spot on the wall. "The patrol experienced trouble. The section leader was shot and lies critically wounded in the hospital. He insists on reporting to you and no one else."

"Who is he?"

"His name is Marcus Somala."

"Somala?" Lusana's brow knitted. He got out of bed. "Tell him I'm coming."

The captain saluted and left, softly closing the door behind him, pretending not to have noticed the second shape curled beneath the satin sheets.

Lusana reached over and pulled away the top sheet. Felicia Collins slept like a statue. Her short Afro hair gleamed in the half light and her lips were puffy and parted. Her skin was the color of cocoa and her conical breasts, with their dark, full nipples, heaved with each deep breath.

He smiled and left the sheet off. Still half asleep, he weaved into the bathroom and splashed handfuls of cold water on his face. The eyes that stared back from the mirror were streaked with red. The face around them was lined and haggard from a night heavily laced with liquor and sex. He tenderly patted the battle-worn features with a towel, returned to the bedroom, and dressed.

Lusana was a small, wiry man, medium boned and lighter skinned than any man in the army of Africans he commanded. "American tan" is what they called it behind his back. And yet any remarks about his color or his offhand stateside manner were not uttered out of disrespect. His men looked up to him with a primitive sort of awe of the supernatural. He had the air of assurance that most lightweight fighters have in their early careers; some might call it an air of arrogance. He took a last fond look at Felicia, sighed, and walked across the camp to the hospital.

The Chinese doctor was pessimistic.

"The bullet entered from the rear, tore away half his lung, shattered a rib, and exited below the left breast. It is a miracle the man is still alive."

"Can he talk?" Lusana asked.

"Yes, but each word drains his strength."

"How long -5'

"— has he to live?"

Lusana nodded.

"Marcus Somala has an incredibly strong constitution," the doctor said. "But I doubt if he can last out the day."

"Can you give him something to stimulate his senses, if even for only a few minutes?"

The doctor looked thoughtful. "I suppose speeding up the inevitable will not matter." He turned and murmured instructions to a nurse. who left the room.

Lusana looked down at Somala. The section leader's face was drawn and his chest rose shallowly with spasmodic breaths. A maze of plastic tubing hung from a rack above the bed and ran into his nose and arms. A large surgical dressing was taped across his chest.

The nurse returned and carefully handed the doctor a hypodermic. He inserted the needle and pushed evenly on the plunger. In a few moments Somala's eyes fluttered half open, and he moaned.

Lusana silently motioned to the doctor and his nurse and they withdrew to the hall and closed the door.

He leaned over the bed. "Somala, this is Hiram Lusana. Do you understand me?"

Somala's whispered voice came out hoarse but with a trace of emotion. "I do not see well, my General. Is it really you?"

Lusana took Somala's hand and gripped it tightly. "Yes, my brave warrior. I have come to hear your report."

The man on the bed smiled thinly, and then a haunting, questioning look came into his eyes. "Why… why did you not trust me, my General?"

"Trust you?"

"Why did you not tell me you were sending men to raid the Fawkes farm?"

Lusana was shaken. "Describe what you saw. Describe everything. Leave out nothing."

Twenty minutes later, exhausted by the effort, Marcus Somala lapsed back into unconsciousness. By noon he was dead.