Luca rubbed his hand across his face, wiping away the last of the rain. He hadn’t spoken to Joshua in a couple of years, but he could still remember the stuttering phone conversation they had had. Joshua had been in Lahore, about to head off with one of the Pakistani relief teams into the Hindu Kush. He could still remember the excitement in his voice. It was his first proper assignment with MSF.
Luca looked up.
‘How does Jack even know Josh is still alive?’
‘They found some of his personal effects in the river. I don’t know what exactly, but he certainly thinks there’s a possibility.’ René paused. ‘I’m sorry, Luca. He told me you two were close.’
Luca nodded, his gaze turning back to the fire.
‘Yeah, we grew up together. Went to the same schools and all that, but we lost contact when I started doing expeditions. Funny, Josh was always off trying to save the world, while I was only ever interested in trying to conquer it.’
The bitterness in Luca’s voice made him almost spit out the words.
‘Well, whatever the hell happened,’ René said, levelling his eyes at him, ‘we need your help. Joshua was last seen in the Eastern DRC outside a pissing little city called Goma. By all accounts, it’s a sprawling mass of poverty, run by smugglers and gunrunners.’ He reached across and slapped Luca’s knee. ‘I’m sure you’re going to love it.’
Luca looked shocked. ‘What do you mean, love it?’
‘Are you deaf as well as wet?’ René asked with a mock scowl. ‘It’s a mountainous part of the Congo, full of volcanoes
and
steep cliffs. No one can get in there because the terrain is so harsh. But you, you’re one of the best damn’ climbers in the world. Be a “piece of cake”, as you used to say.’
Luca raised his hands as if trying to push Rene away.
‘I’m sorry, René, but I don’t climb any more. You’ve got to find someone else.’
‘For Christ’s sake, Luca! I wouldn’t have dragged my arse across the Himalayas if there
was
someone else. Do you have any idea how long it took to track you down?’
‘I’m sorry,’ he replied, avoiding his friend’s gaze. ‘Really, I am, but I have work to do here.’
‘Work? You call this work! It’s like the bloody labours of Sisyphus!’ René flicked his cigarette into the fire in disgust. Then he paused for a second, his voice softening as he tried a new tack. ‘Look, Luca, back in the day, I saw you climb things that I didn’t think were even possible. There wasn’t anyone around who could match you on a technical route. I know it’s still inside you. You’re just a bit out of practice, that’s all.’
Luca stared into the embers of the fire. There was a long pause before he finally spoke.
‘That’s just not me any more.’
‘But … Joshua?’
‘Tell Jack I’m sorry. Tell him … tell him you couldn’t track me down. Please, René, just tell him something, OK?’
With that, Luca swung himself off the bench and pulled his coat up from the floor, shoving one arm through the soaked sleeve. He was halfway to putting in his other arm when René stood up and moved in front of the door,
grabbing
his wrist. His colossal body filled the entire frame both lengthways and widthways. Luca tried to ignore him, forcing his arm forward, but it just jerked uselessly in Rene’s bear-like grip.
Their eyes met and René leaned forward, squeezing Luca’s arm a little harder.
‘It’s time for you to stop punishing yourself,’ he whispered. ‘You can’t keep blaming yourself for Bill’s death.’
Luca froze.
‘Bill wouldn’t want you to …’ René began, but fell silent as Luca’s expression was wiped clear of any uncertainty or doubt. His eyes seemed to harden. Anger clouded his vision, making his whole body suddenly tense. René could see the vein on his neck pulse as a terrible rage built within him.
Gradually releasing his grip, René edged back a pace until his shoulders pressed against the wooden uprights of the doorframe. In that instant, he realised he had suddenly become an absolute stranger to Luca. He no longer had any idea what his old friend was capable of.
‘Luca,’ he whispered, trying to keep his voice level. ‘You’ve got to let Bill go …’
‘Stop saying his name!’ Luca thundered, shunting René backward with his outstretched hands. Every fibre in his body seemed to combine with tremendous force, sending René crashing through the rickety wooden door and out into the rain outside. He staggered back on the wet porch, winded by the blow, his chest heaving as he tried to catch his breath. His right foot slipped off the step, sinking down into the mud and sending him spinning round on to his hands and knees.
At first, René stayed stock still, letting the rain run off the crown of his head and down his cheeks. Then, slowly, he tilted his head to one side, eyes widening as he stared back towards the hut. Luca was there, silhouetted in the doorway by the dull light of the fire. Violence simmered in his gaze, then with a jolt he seemed to regain his senses. Stumbling out of the hut, he grabbed René under the arms, forcing him up on to his feet once again.
‘I’m so … sorry,’ Luca stammered. ‘I don’t know what came over me. I just reacted.’
René held on to him, trying to pull himself up to his full height. A stabbing pain shot through this chest and he breathed out a long, winded gasp.
‘I’m sorry,’ Luca repeated. ‘Forgive me, I just …’
René nodded, slowly regaining his breath. They looked at each for a moment before a pained smile passed across René’s lips.
‘Guess you’re not as skinny as you look,’ he said. Then he put his hand over Luca’s shoulder and together they hobbled back to the shelter of the porch. With mud splattered over the palms of his hands, René signalled to Luca to pull out his cigarettes from the top pocket of his jacket and he quickly took one out, sliding it between René’s lips as he patted his pockets for a lighter. They both stood hunched over, with their forearms resting against the porch rail and their heads just beyond reach of the rain. As René finally sparked the lighter, he looked down at the cigarette. It was already sodden, drooping in a crooked arc.
‘About time I quit anyhow,’ he said, spitting it out into
the
mud. ‘One thing’s for sure. The old lady isn’t going to be too pleased about her door.’
Luca’s eyes switched back to where the door swung loose on its hinges. Smoke from the fire curled out through the gap.
‘She’ll be OK. I know her from before and we can sort it in the morning. Listen, I am sorry about what happened. I didn’t mean to hurt you.’
René nodded again, remaining silent for a moment before turning fully towards him.
‘You do know that going to the Congo isn’t just about saving Joshua, don’t you?’
Luca stared, trying to guess his meaning, but René looked back towards the rain and avoided his gaze.
‘This is about finding yourself again, Luca. And you know something? Sometimes life has a habit of finding you, no matter how hard you try and hide from it.’
Luca sighed heavily, his eyes fixed on the sodden cigarette resting on the mud.
‘The truth is that I’m scared to go back. Out here, I never need to explain myself to anyone or justify what happened with Bill. Every day, I get up and I carry the loads. That’s all anyone expects of me. Here, I just
am
.’ Luca paused, letting his shoulders sag as the energy drained out of him. ‘Now, suddenly, you’re asking me to go back to it all. Go back to normality.’
René shook his head, a wolfish grin forming on his lips.
‘You really are an idiot, aren’t you? I’m asking you to go into one of the most war- torn, shit holes on earth … and you’re talking about going back to “normality”!’
He clasped his hand over Luca’s shoulder, drawing him back into the hut.
‘Normality!’ he repeated, shaking his head again. ‘I’ll never understand what goes on in that thick head head of yours. Now come on, let’s get out of this weather and talk more inside. There’s still half a bottle of brandy left and we should drink it before the old lady serves any more of that filthy tea.’
THE STRETCHED OUTLINE
of the Mercedes Maybach passed like a shadow beneath the raised security shutters and nudged its way into Beijing’s traffic. As the 6-litre V12 engine powered forward, the car crossed Beihai Bridge, passing the tourists in their yellow paddleboats on the lake, and sped out towards the north-western suburb of Haidian.
General Jian sat in the white leather interior staring out through a rear window. His eyes held an identical sheen to the car’s blackened glass, polished and opaque, concealing everything from the outside world. They lazily took in the chaos of China’s greatest city while his mind reviewed each detail of the meeting he had just had. He could picture every movement, every feature of the three committee members from the People’s Liberation Army, as he’d submitted his latest report on the progress of the satellite launches. For the last two years, his division of the PLA had been responsible for the implementation of the Beidou Navigation System – the Chinese military’s new version of
the
American Global Positioning System, or GPS as it was more commonly called – and, as ever, the committee wanted him to account for every last yuan spent.
But it wasn’t the results of the meeting that stayed in his memory, more the minutiae of it. It had always been like that for him, every situation recalled in infinitesimal detail; the two scuff marks on the Vice-President’s right shoe, the pale tan line on the Under-Secretary’s third finger where he had recently removed his wedding ring, and the soft intake of breath from the President as he had scanned the accounts. The General could picture it all as if replaying it in slow motion, and he’d been correct in assuming that none of the committee suspected anything about his plans for the twentieth satellite launch. There had been not the slightest trace of suspicion.
Bringing his right hand up to his neck, Jian absentmindedly scratched a patch of dry skin poking out above the starched white of his collar. He couldn’t remember when the itching had started, but felt sure that it must be connected with the resurgence of his headaches. They seemed to be an almost daily occurrence now; a low-level throbbing at his temples which never quite seemed to dissipate entirely before the next one set in.
Taking four paracetamol from the packet on the seat beside him, he washed the pills down with a sip of bottled water, before switching his gaze to the dark blue evening suit hanging over the opposite door. He could smell the subtle aroma of dry cleaning still pressed into its sleeves and, leaning forward in his seat, he unbuttoned his shirt and stripped off
his
trousers. He was about to pull a clean shirt over his shoulders when he caught sight of his own reflection in the darkened partition glass between the rear seats and the driver. For a moment he just stared at his large, ungainly body, studying it as if he were a surgeon about to make the first incision.
Despite their size, his arms lacked any definition, protruding from his shoulders in straight vertical lines like piping, while his stomach sagged slightly over the sides of his hips. Leaning forward so that his face was only a couple of inches from the mirrored partition, he ran his tongue against the sharp edges of his teeth, making a mental note to get them whitened again. He then surveyed his high cheekbones and wide-set jaw. There was only a smattering of Mongolian blood in his veins, but those bastards at the Guild never let him forget that he was not one of them, no matter how high in the ranks he climbed. But all that would soon be an irrelevance. Only a few weeks from now he would be rid of them once and for all.
Jian reached up and gently scratched the discoloration across the upper part of his neck. The skin was flaking off, revealing a darker patch just beneath the surface. For a moment he prodded at it, wondering what on earth could have caused it. He should have someone take a look at it, but right now there wasn’t the time. Once the twentieth launch was complete and the money secured, he’d get it seen to.
A loud ringing echoed through the car and Jian pulled back from the glass, pressing the speaker button on the central seat bar.
‘General, I have a message from Secretariat President Kai Long Pi.’
Jian inhaled deeply, always amazed by the speed with which his movements seemed to be known to the Guild. He had only just left the building.
‘The President has instructed me to inform you that Mr Xie will be visiting you today.’
‘Mr Xie?’
‘That is correct, sir. You will be updating Mr Xie on the Goma Project. He will be at your private residence in one hour’s time.’
Jian’s lips curled in disdain. He always despised the presumption in Kai’s secretary’s voice.
‘I have an extremely important matter to attend to. I shall be there at 1400 hours.’
‘But, General, Mr Xie …’
‘Mr Xie can wait a couple of hours. I am quite certain such a busy man will have plenty of ways in which to occupy himself.’
There was a pause before the voice replied.
‘Very well, General. I shall let him know of your delay.’ The secretary signed off, putting extra emphasis on the word ‘your’.
Jian slammed his finger down on the button, cutting the line. Every new contact with the Guild only seemed to enrage him further. It was the impotence of his own position that was so infuriating. They were financing the entire Goma Project, and rarely a day went by without his being reminded of that fact.