Rare Earth (26 page)

T
he sound started with a single voice.

Oyango half sang, half shouted the words. He called from behind the nearest ruins, beyond the slender river that ran black and putrid by the right-hand fence. The storm and the stillness seemed to open for this one voice. The tone was not softened by the ash. Instead, it was magnified. It went on and on. It grew louder with each passing second.

Oyango's final word ended in a long drawn-out hum. When he finally went silent, the response came from all around them.

Yebo
. Affirmative. More than yes. A unified declaration.
Yebo
.

Oyango spoke again, only this time the words were shouted by two voices. Oyango on the hill to Marc's right, Philip to his left. The half-sung words lasted maybe thirty seconds.

Yebo
.

The assassin weaved about, aiming his gun at ghosts.

Uhuru demanded, “What is this nonsense?”

The third time Charles joined in as well. As did a hundred other throats. Or perhaps twenty thousand, who could tell?

Marc knew what they were saying because Charles had told them as they left the warehouse. The words came from the third chapter of Joshua, “This is how you will know that the living God is among you.”

Yebo
.

Then silence. Even the humming inside the encampment was gone.

“Open the gates,” Marc said.

“Get
away
from here!” Uhuru spun around and yelled at his gunman. Or rather, he tried. For at that moment the heavens were split by a blast of sound, a detonation that shook the earth, or so it seemed to Marc. Uhuru and his assassin cowered down, heads covered by their hands. And then the sound struck again.

All around them, the villagers came into view. The numbers were no longer important. The falling ash magnified their numbers and heightened the moment's intensity. Each of them carried long, slender instruments made of plastic. They were called
vuvuzellas
, infamous noisemakers that disrupted soccer matches and political gatherings across the continent. Marc was aware of all this, and yet down deep, beneath the veneer of modern logic, he saw something else entirely. He witnessed a multitude beyond count, all of them armed by a force that turned their puny instruments into a conduit for holy might. And divine vengeance.

Marc's entire being resonated with the next trumpet sound.

He watched the people begin to march. They moved about the encampment, snaking through the ruins and the poisoned stream and the slag heap. Blowing their vuvuzellas as they marched. The falling ash turned them into spectral shapes, making it seem as though a hundred thousand others had joined them. That was true of their noise as well. As though they were no longer the source of the sound. As though it were not a sound at all.

It was power.

It surrounded. It assaulted. It dominated. There was room for nothing else.

Up and down the encampment's central lane, the doors opened and people spilled out. The Chinese wore distinctive jumpsuits of pale blue. They rushed over and clustered by the open-sided warehouse containing the four transport choppers. They shouted and screamed and waved their arms. The pilots shrugged and pointed, first at their engines and then at the falling ash. They could not fly.

Then the earth joined in the blasting, resonating din.

That was how it seemed to Marc, like the earth had decided to sound its own trumpet.

The volcano expelled a massive blast of flame. The fire shot up, spearing the clouds overhead. And then a seam opened, which spilled a river of fire. Straight toward them.

The Chinese technicians quite literally freaked out.

They poured over Uhuru and his gunman. They clawed at the gates. There were so many of them, they could not work the gates' lock.

Marc did not care whether they could hear him or not. He shouted, “You are all under arrest.”

As soon as the gates opened and the tide of blue-suited Chinese started pressing forward, Levi and Karl Rigby and a team drawn from Crowder's and Kamal's men rose from their hiding places beyond the first trench. Levi was the first inside the gates, followed swiftly by Marc. Crowder and Kamal directed their team to snare the fleeing Chinese, wheel them about, and lash them with plastic ties.

Levi shoved his way through. Marc ran at his side. He had to force the name from his constricted throat.

“Kitra.”

They found her in the fifth building they searched.

The medical unit was jammed with extremely ill patients. Kitra and Serge and a local doctor worked the rows. They rose from their positions over various beds with weary reluctance, as though they had heard neither the trumpets nor the eruption.

Levi embraced his daughter first because she was closer. Marc stood just inside the doorway, halted by the swell of emotions.

Serge was a taller version of his father. But his broad shoulders were supported by a rail-thin frame, and his face looked almost skeletal. Deep plum-colored patches were dug into the skin beneath his eyes. He watched his father and did not move or wipe the tears streaming down his own face.

When Levi turned to his son, Kitra started toward Marc. Hesitantly at first, then in a rush that ended with her flinging herself into his arms. Marc buried his face in her hair. This was the feel of her, strong and feminine and warm and weary. He felt her heartbeat racing against his own. And never wanted this moment to end.

T
hey needed only a week to build the second camp.

The fields on the other side of the forest were transformed into a hive of activity. Temporary structures and generators and satellite dishes sprouted from this new virtual city. The drone of choppers formed a constant backdrop to every passing day.

Marc stayed in the old camp because that was where the elders chose to remain. Kitra occasionally returned to the medical facility but spent most of her time at the new camp. Levi helped oversee the camp's development. Serge did what he could to help his sister, but his captivity at the extraction facility had left him brutally exhausted. He spent a lot of time in one of the new portable cabins, resting and eating and resting some more.

At Philip's request, Kitra served as a key negotiator in the settlement talks. These discussions grew to where they included representatives of the United Nations and the Kenyan government and the elders of almost three dozen displaced villages. The Americans were there as well, yet officially they served only as observers. Still, everyone involved knew the senior man represented the White House, and his word carried sufficient weight to move things forward.

The Chinese government lodged official protests. When the press used this as a lever to pry more deeply into the entire affair, the Chinese went oddly silent. For Marc it was like watching a predator retreat inside its cave. Waiting.

The negotiations took place at the new camp, because Philip and Oyango and the other elders insisted, and the Americans backed their request. The elders and Kitra and Walton and Marc all wanted to keep Nairobi at a distance. And the newcomers to the Kenyan government agreed. The risk of corruption and illicit underhanded acts were still very real.

The meetings dragged on and on. But Kitra did not mind. In fact, despite the long hours, Kitra seemed to grow more alive and energetic with each passing hour. By the eighth day, Levi had taken to sitting with the elders beneath the massive baobab tree while his daughter remained sequestered with the committee, poring over documents and arguing the minutiae of several agreements. Marc remained with Levi, or walked the perimeter with Kamal's and Crowder's combined team.

Lodestone was under investigation, their worldwide assets frozen, their operations in Africa shut down. Boyd Crowder had personally accepted assignment as head of all commercial security forces operating in Kenya. He had taken over one of the new camp's square white huts as his temporary headquarters. Kamal was to become one of his senior officers, while Rigby was promoted to chief of operations. Marc saw less and less of them.

Everyone felt the press of silent foes, the pressure to either complete this or face defeat. The threat of attack spurred them on. On the tenth day, word filtered out that it was done.

A feast was held beneath the forest's dead limbs. A combination of nations and peoples joined together as first the Kenyan delegate and then the UN security chief and then Philip and finally Oyango spoke. They asked Marc to say a few words as well, but he declined. As did Levi. It was left to Kitra to address the gathering. Marc only half heard her words. She sounded so authoritative. So much in her element.

A Kenyan corporation had been formed. It would hold all licenses for the extraction and refinement of the rare earths. This would be done in joint venture with an Israeli corporation. Kitra and Levi Korban were to be designated as officers. The Israeli shares were to be held in trust by their community.

The evacuated villages would be relocated and restored. The process of returning the people from the camps and from Kibera had already started.

One third of all profits from the corporation were to go to the villages. And their children. And their children's children.

As Kitra spoke, Marc watched another chopper rise off the new landing pad and disappear. He knew it was only a matter of time before hers took off as well.

Which meant that he was ready when she approached him that evening and asked if they could take a walk. As ready as he would ever be.

A gentle sunset wind blew steady from the east, pushing the volcano's cloud away from them. They passed under the first dry limbs, and she said, “This is where it all started. You enlisted the help of men who had no reason to trust you, and you brought order to the camp's chaos. You protected the weak. You made friends where the people had been taught to treat all outsiders as threats. As enemies.”

Marc took her hand and did not speak.

“I have watched you time and again, Marc Royce. And each time I feel more strongly what I sensed the first time I laid eyes on you.”

He wanted to ask, but decided silence was better.

She said, “I knew that you were the man I had thought I would never meet. A man strong enough to accept me for who I am. A man who would not be threatened. Who would love me as I am, and as I hope to become.”

“I couldn't help but dream of hearing you say those words,” he said.

“And I lay awake through all the nights since meeting you,” she replied, “fearing we would never know a time that was truly ours.”

He said, “The whole time I was in Israel, I listened to you speak. Not in words, but to my heart. And I knew I had a choice. Either I came with you, or we would not have a future.”

“You cannot ask me to live anywhere else. I would despair. Our love would die before it had a chance to live.”

“That was the most important lesson I brought back with me from Israel,” he confirmed. “Understand the move and do it with my eyes wide open or not at all.”

They drifted through the trees, taking their time. Knowing each step was vital, each word. Overhead, the white limbs reached out and carved a secret scroll upon the sunset. He wanted to sweep her up and promise her the world and his life both.

Finally she said, “You have touched the secret parts of my soul, Marc. The parts no one else will ever know exist.”

He shivered through a long breath. “I am bound to a different land, Kitra.”

“I know,” she said with mournful softness. “So well. I know.”

He stopped walking and turned toward her, but she did not meet his gaze until he cradled her face in his hands. “I feel a calling to my own homeland, as strong as what you have for your own.”

“I know this also,” she whispered. “All too well.”

“I have to do as God calls. I have spent the days since we returned praying. So far, he has not answered.”

“He will. This I know. And when he does, I pray he changes your heart.” Her smile trembled. “I know it is a selfish desire, and I don't care. Know this also, Marc Royce. I will wait for your decision.”

He was still trying to shape his response when she leaned forward and kissed him quickly.

When they parted, it was to hear her say, “Only do not make me wait too long.”

Davis Bunn
, a professional novelist for over twenty years, is the author of numerous national bestsellers with sales totaling more than six million copies. His work has been published in sixteen languages, and his critical acclaim includes three Christy Awards for excellence in fiction. Formerly an international business executive working in Europe, Africa, and the Middle East, Bunn is now a lecturer in creative writing and Writer in Residence at Regent's Park College, Oxford University. He and his wife, Isabella, divide their time between the English countryside and the coast of Florida.

You will find more about the author and his work on his website,
davisbunn.com
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