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  Akil shouted at Crocker, pointed down, and gave him a thumbs-up. Mouthed, “Look.”

  CT, Gator, and Crocker turned to the side windows simultaneously. Crocker straightened and raised an open hand—the ready sign. The men slammed mags into their weapons, and checked the gear on their combat belts and vests.

  Minutes later, Akil, from the window farther down the fuselage, shouted, “Boss! I see ’em now! Take a look.”

  Crocker chose the vantage of the large bubble window up front. Roughly 150 meters ahead, he made out a Hilux at the end of what looked to be a convoy of vehicles. Leaned into Martins and shouted, “There they are! There. Past that slope!”

  “Yes!”

  “Tell the pilot to buzz over them, so we get a better picture of what we’re dealing with, but cut the lights first.”

  Martins nodded. Communications flew between Crocs One and Two. The pilot killed the headlights, banked, and slowly caught up with the column fifty meters to the right. From a parallel vantage, Crocker counted five or six vehicles.

  Militants in the trucks responded with automatic weapons fire that started light and quickly built to a frenzy.

  “Taking fire!”

  “Hold on!”

  Several bullets slammed into the side of the Mi-35P, causing Martins to lower his head into his lap, and the pilot to bank sharply right. So sharp that the strap holding Crocker to the bench broke, and he had to hold on to the lip with both hands.

  Fuck…

  The copilot opened up with the helo’s twin 23mm chin-mounted articulated double-barrel guns. Made a huge fucking racket that pounded in Crocker’s head.

  All the while, he was trying to focus on the trail of sparks from the insurgents in the column so he could ascertain exactly what they were dealing with—two Hilux Toyotas armed with .50 cals carrying six militants each in back. Then a transport truck with more armed militants, several shouldering RPGs. Then an open truck with what appeared to be hooded figures on benches, then another Hilux and a jeep in front.

  Couldn’t be sure he was seeing the entire column because of the far-right angle, mist, and trees. Went forward past the major, crouched behind the pilot, and shouted, “Closer! Bank left! Come up behind it and rip the two Toyotas to shreds!”

  The bleary-eyed pilot looked back at him like he was crazy. The copilot, with headphones over his ears, was still occupied with the twin 23mms.

  “Closer! Closer, closer! Bank it in! Isn’t this baby armed with Hellfires? Hellfire missiles! Direct your copilot to fire them. Fire them now at the rear two trucks before they seek cover!”

  The pilot gave in slightly—another thirty meters max. When the mist cleared, it was enough for Crocker to see the open truck better. The hooded figures seated in the bed appeared to be unarmed.

  In a split second, he put the image together with the intel about the arms exchange and what he had heard about Boko Haram’s kidnapping of schoolgirls, which continued to be the talk of human rights activists in Nigeria, Europe, and the US.

  Decided he didn’t want to take a chance. Leaning over, grabbed the copilot’s shoulder, and shouted, “Hold fire! Hold your fucking fire! They’re carrying hostages! Women…Schoolgirls…Ndi inyom!!! Ndi inyom!!! Hold fire!”

  Chichima heard the roar overhead and felt the excitement of the men in the pickup behind them. She lowered her head and held her hands in her lap. They’d been coarsened by months of fetching wood and water, cleaning floors and latrines, and other menial tasks.

  Her hands took her back to her mother, who often said: “You must judge a person by the work of their hands.”

  She imagined her sitting in front of the outdoor stove making egusi soup. Her little twinkly eyes like precious stones. The gap between her front teeth making her look like a mischievous girl.

  “Mother…”

  The rain grew angry. A low roar came from the clouds.

  Chichima watched as her mother started the egusi soup with palm oil poured into a cast-iron pot, then add chopped onions, and a large bowl of squash and melon seeds. She saw the wood fire burn, and flames lick the sides of the pot. Familiar smells that reached her nose. Blood rushed into her stomach.

  “Mother?”

  “However long the night, the dawn always breaks.”

  “Mother…You want me to add the locust beans?”

  The truck bounced and jerked left and right. The girls huddled together.

  Her mother turned back to her and smiled. Strands of dark hair peeked out from her green and yellow dhuku. Her mother’s skin was more mahogany-colored than hers, but she carried no shame about that and used none of the popular bleaching products on her skin. In Igbo culture, yellowish and reddish complexions like Chichima’s were considered more desirable.

  “Ugliness with a good heart is better than beautiful.”

  “Yes, mother. I know that…”

  She sat in front of a mirror, running a brush through her hair, appraising her features. Her cheekbones were too wide, her mouth too long, her nose too wide and flat.

  The ugly black locust beans had been flattened, wrapped in shiny green moimoi leaves, and left to dry by the oven. Chichima slid the beans into the pot and the pungent smell that reminded her of dirty socks brought tears to her eyes.

  “Why are you crying, girl?” Her mother smiled. “The beans mean no harm.”

  “It’s silly, mother. I know.”

  The truck picked up speed and slid on the wet grass, flinging the girls off the bench and onto the floor. Chichima picked herself up. Tasted something familiar in her mouth.

  “Chichima?”

  She thought the popping sound she heard came from the beans bursting in the hot oil, and the whispering in her ear was coming from her younger sister.

  “Ugoulo…Sweet Ugoulo, the stove is hot…”

  Her sister was a daydreamer who amused herself by playing with dolls and making up stories. Their mother complained that she was too distracted to help around the house.

  Chichima turned to shoo her sister away, and was surprised to see another familiar face.

  “Navina, what are you doing here?”

  “Chichi…Chichi…”

  Her lips trembled and she couldn’t get the words out. When Chichimi looked past her face, she saw that they weren’t in a kitchen by the yard. They sat in the bed of a truck in the dark.

  “Are you hurt, Navina?”

  It was a ridiculous question. All of them had been violated in one way or another.

  “My leg…It’s numb…”

  Things became clearer. She realized that pops weren’t coming from the stove. The men were shouting, gesturing, and shooting at something in the sky. A roar filled her ears.

  Her friend pointed up. “You hear that, Chichi?”

  “I hear it, yes.”

  A smile spread across Navina’s face.

  Chapter Six

  “A friend is someone you share a path with.”

  —African proverb

  The wind buffeted the lead Mi-35P helicopter left and right. Even though they were out of range of the rebels, and the helo could probably shred them to pieces with the 23mm and Hellfire missiles it carried, the excitement—verging on panic—of the Nigerians inside had not let up. Major Martins, the pilot, and copilot were shouting back and forth in Igbo and occasional English. Lieutenant Peppie was the only one who remained calm.

  Crocker crouched beside Martins, trying to restore order.

  “Listen…Major, listen…We’re fine…More than fine. We’ve got the advantage…We need to stay calm. We need to rescue those girls.”

  Crocker had been briefed about the estimated three hundred schoolgirls that Boko Haram had kidnapped the past several years. According to rumor, many of them had been raped and then sold as sex slaves in neighboring Niger and Cameroon.

  “Girls?” Major Martins responded. “What girls?”

  “The girls we saw in the truck!”

  “How can you be sure they’re not rebels dresse
d as women?” the major asked. “The Boko Haram are clever. Very clever…We can’t do anything without reinforcements, or orders!”

  Somebody was shouting hysterically over the radio in one of the local dialects. Crocker assumed it was the pilot of the second Mi-35P.

  “No, Major. Listen…There’s no reason to panic. This is what we talked about in terms of maintaining situation awareness.”

  “We’re outnumbered. I have assessed that now. We have to turn back!”

  “No!” Crocker shouted. “No reason for that…We’re out of range of their guns.”

  He could still hear occasional gunfire in the distance, and so far the terrorists hadn’t fired any RPG missiles, which were a standard and ubiquitous part of any rebel arsenal. Maybe that had to do with the cloud cover, which was significant, or the difficulty of shooting at a moving target.

  “Very dangerous,” the major snorted. “Too much risk! We have orders only to do observation. We must turn back.”

  “Risk?” Crocker shouted, trying to control his anger. “We’ve got helicopters. They’re armed with machine guns and Hellfires. We’ve got the advantage…”

  “Dangerous. Too dangerous!”

  “Those are your schoolgirls down there, Major. Nigerian schoolgirls.”

  The major seemed to take this as an insult. Turned and shouted over his shoulder, “We’re turning back!” Meanwhile, a man was shouting hysterically over the radio in the major’s lap.

  All the lessons Crocker and his men had imparted about controlled breathing, mental focus, and effective decision-making seemed to have flown out the window.

  Psychological and physiological tests performed on Crocker and the other members of Black Cell revealed that their pulse rates actually slowed when under extreme stress, their GSRs dropped and their EEGs quickly accentuated. Also, their brains responded by injecting liquid nitrogen into their systems, forming a blanket neural cull of all surplus feral emotion. They reacted the same as astronauts and serial killers when subjected to stress.

  Unlike serial killers and other psychopaths, the SEALs also had something psychologists called “arousal control.” Instead of killing their emotions, they kept them on a leash.

  Crocker was practicing arousal control now, focusing on managing the Nigerians and looking at the bigger picture—figuring out how to free the hostages.

  He was so tuned in that he appeared tuned out. “We can’t turn around,” he responded to the major. “That’s not an option. We’ve got to stop the terrorists one way or another.”

  The helo pitched back and forth. The major, pilot, and Lieutenant Peppie were all screaming into radios at once. Crocker assumed they were communicating with the second helo and possibly AFSF headquarters in Abuja.

  “Instruct the pilot to continue to the border,” said Crocker.

  “To what purpose?”

  “We have to assume the men in the trucks are Boko Haram.”

  Major Martins nodded. “Yes. Boko Haram! Yes!”

  “They’re meeting someone near the border,” he continued. “They’re going where they’re going with a purpose.”

  “Yes. Yes.”

  The pilot had taken the helo farther up. Shouting through the radio continued. Crocker glanced over his shoulder and saw Akil with a finger in Lieutenant Peppie’s chest, as if he were in the process of making a point.

  “Looks to me like they’re going to exchange the women for weapons,” Crocker said. “We don’t want that to happen. Do we, Major?”

  Major Martins seemed momentarily distracted by a message on his cell phone.

  Crocker wanted to slap the phone away, but controlled the impulse.

  “Major…Major, my role is to give you my best advice. That’s what my men and I are here for. So let’s proceed west and see what’s up.”

  The major looked confused. “West?”

  “Yes, west. Let’s see where the weapons exchange is going to take place.”

  “Farther west, no! We are not permitted to cross the border. That’s not good!”

  “Major, I never said I wanted us to cross the border. We’re going to proceed farther west and see what we find.”

  Lieutenant Peppie leaned and spoke into Major Martins’s ear as he considered. Whatever he told him seemed to have an impact, because the major turned to Crocker and nodded. “Okay…” he said. “Okay…Let’s take a look.”

  Festus Ratty Kumar sat in the passenger seat of the lead jeep, a pair of stolen Halcyon motorcycle goggles over his eyes, headphones on his ears, an AK clenched between his knees, bouncing up and down, and singing off-key to the song “King Kong (Remix)” by one of Nigeria’s top rappers, Vector, featuring Reminisce and others.

  “King of my city, kam bu King Kong…”

  He rocked back and forth totally plugged into the song. Oblivious to the rain, the gunfire, and the beating of helicopters overhead. The Nigerian military didn’t scare him. They never had. Should the helicopters attack from overhead, he’d shoot them down. If they landed soldiers, he’d wipe them out.

  Vector and Reminisce had actually collaborated on the song to settle a longtime feud. It had risen to number one on the charts, and was a favorite on Festus Ratty’s playlist.

  “I can’t lose…Competition should have known, right?”

  Awon, the driver, wearing a camouflage hat, grinned out of the side of his mouth and, turning to Festus, said, “Run that mafia swagger. Believe the kingdom, brother! Never run away from a fight.”

  Ratty flung an arm overhead and snapped it to the beat.

  “Fire! Papa, papa, papa…FIRE!”

  A .50-caliber machine gun pop-pop-popped in one of the trucks behind him. Awon threw his head back and laughed. He was also high on purple drank, or sizzurp.

  Ratty didn’t need any more than the possibility of a mix-up to get him going. Didn’t have a care in the world. Wasn’t worried about any danger, or what lay ahead.

  He buzzed with excitement, completely jazzed in the moment, raindrops spattering his neck and face, and totally believing in himself and God’s will. Didn’t care that the enemy had found him, and were circling in helicopters overhead, and could call in air strikes and reinforcements. They didn’t have the power of belief that he had. They didn’t have the magic coursing through their systems.

  “Believe the kingdom…Shooting non-stop omo see machine gun…”

  When the enemy struck, he trusted that Allah would be in his ear, advising him, and leading him to victory, or he wouldn’t. Maybe God was a trickster, too.

  Even if things should go wrong and he and his men were slaughtered, it would be God’s will. And Festus Ratty was certain he would be greeted warmly at the fountain of paradise.

  Allah in his white and purple robes would pat him on the head, wink, and say, “You’re a gangster, Festus Ratty Kumar. You’re my king.”

  The truck that Chichima and her fellow schoolgirls rode in slowed, turned into a small oval clearing, and stopped. As it did, her mind jostled, and slipped back in time to that night in April when the truck carrying her and the thirty other girls had stopped in the Sambisa Forest. All of them were sick and exhausted. Many of them stood in shock, their eyes focused on some awful thing in the future, as they were unloaded and forced to stand in a line in a clearing.

  She was seated now. Raindrops pelted her face and water dripped down the back of her burqa.

  Before there were stars glowing ominously overhead, monkeys howling from the trees, and a woman in flip-flops and a dirty skirt and blouse offering them water from a bucket.

  Now there was just a truck sitting in a muddy clearing, thick foliage, and rain. The shooting had stopped.

  Back then the water stunk and many of the girls drank too much or too quickly and got sick. The smell was so disgusting that Chichima had wanted to leave her body.

  She still wanted to leave it.

  What is the difference between then and now? she asked herself.

  “Hope” was the answer that reso
unded in her head.

  Two years ago in another clearing, she had willed herself to stand and bear witness to everything, so one day she would report what she saw, and her report would make people angry, and inspire them to take action.

  Now she expected nothing. She sat still and listened to the gentle ping of raindrops off the metal bed of the truck. She wanted to wipe the water away from her eyes, but her hands were bound behind her back.

  Navina leaned in to her and whispered, “Why are we here?”

  “Why? I don’t know.”

  She closed her eyes again and remembered how, one by one, the girls had been led to a primitive latrine to wash and relieve themselves. She was afraid to run, scared that the armed men would shoot her in the back, or should she escape, get lost in the bush and be devoured by wild animals.

  She thought that if she was smart she could outwit her captors. Maybe out of the dozens of men she would find one who was sympathetic. Maybe a government plane or helicopter would spot them from the air. Anything could happen…

  Like her father, she had been baptized a Christian. In the Bible, she’d read, “The Lord delights in those who fear him, who put their hope in his unfailing love.”

  Where was it? Where is it now?

  She was amazed at how much she had been able to endure. In her memory, she stood in line again as a short, wiry man stood on a tree stump and lectured them in Kanuri, the language of roughly seven million Nigerians, and one Chichima didn’t understand. It wasn’t Navina’s tribal language, either, but she’d learned a little from relatives, and translated as best she could.

  He said, “You are the girls who insisted on attending school when we have said boko is haram. One day you will thank us because we have liberated you. You can’t understand what I’m saying now, because you’ve been brainwashed. God has a destiny for all of us, and now that destiny can be fulfilled.”

  The words frightened her then, but no longer. The leader of the armed men, who was introduced as the Leopard, stepped forward and started gesturing wildly, and speaking in a fearsome jumble of anger and swagger. It reminded her of a video clip she had watched of Adolf Hitler addressing a rally.