“Yogi’s hairy sphincter!” Rook spun on his heel and grasped Queen’s arm with his free hand. He bolted for the open gate, Queen at his side, nearly outpacing him.
The ground vibrated beneath their feet as the Carcharodontosaurus started after them, pounding the earth with its massive bulk. Queen felt its hot breath on the back of her neck. She told herself it was just her imagination, but then she heard the click of its jaws snapping shut and felt something brush against her hair. It’s right there! Even a moments delay would seal her fate.
Rook pivoted hard to the right as they reached the gateway, pulling Queen out of the way of another chomp. The dinosaur’s momentum carried it forward, skidding through mounds of its own refuse, but it recovered far more quickly than Queen would have believed possible, whipping its tail around for balance as it turned toward them and charged again.
While Queen looked over her shoulder at the rampaging beast, Rook searched for a place to hide. He angled toward the open doorway of a small structure that, like everything else they’d seen, was constructed of rocks stacked and slotted together — a three-dimensional puzzle. They slipped through the portal and headed for the deepest corner of the stone hut.
The hut had no roof, or if there had been a roof, it had long since collapsed, but this was something Queen discovered only once they were inside. The Carcharodontosaurus probably could have easily reached over the top of the low wall and snatched them up in his powerful jaws, but it evidently had little experience hunting prey in its own lair. It tried to follow them through the door.
The beast got most of its massive head through the opening, but Queen and Rook were just out of reach. It reared back, then thrust forward like a striking viper. When its bulky torso slammed into the surrounding door frame, the entire wall collapsed inward.
Queen pressed back even harder into the far wall, as a shower of loose stone fell at her feet. With the resistance of the barrier suddenly gone, the dinosaur shot forward into the middle of structure, crashing to the floor, half buried by the aftermath of its intrusion.
Rook pointed to the huge gap where the wall had been and shouted, “Go!”
Without waiting for Queen, he charged to the predator’s left side, leaping across the uneven pile of stones, while the beast struggled to recover. Its monstrous head started to move, tracking Rook, and Queen saw her opening. She sprinted off the wall and slipped past on the creature’s right.
“Ideas?” she shouted as she chased after Rook. Behind her, the Carcharodontosaurus thrashed free of the hut, tearing down the rest of the structure in the process.
“You mean other than run?” Rook shot back. “Sorry, that’s all I’ve got.”
But as Rook headed for the open gate again, she saw that there was a method to his madness. Out in the open, they might be able to outmaneuver the gigantic beast. Operative word, might, she thought, but given the circumstances, an imperfect plan was better than no plan at all.
Rook slipped around the corner, through the opening, and because Queen was just a couple of steps behind him, she didn’t have time to react when he came to an abrupt stop. She collided with him and bounced back like she’d hit a brick wall. Rook did not appear to have noticed. He was just staring straight ahead in complete disbelief.
“Damn it, Rook.” She sprang back to her feet, poised to resume running. “What the f—”
The curse died on her lips. Until that moment, she would have thought herself incapable of astonishment. She had witnessed dinosaurs walking the Earth. What could compare to that?
A figure was charging toward them. He was drenched in blood, teeth bared in a rictus of pain or fury, perhaps both, howling like some kind of Viking berserker.
But that was not what stunned her into paralysis.
It was the fact that she recognized him.
45
The Red Queen stepped down from her chariot and into the wreckage of what had been, just two days earlier, the camp of the science expedition. The scientists had been looking for a way to transform Lake Kivu’s natural gas reserves into a bounty of cheap energy for the Congo region, empowering the developing nation to rise to an equal footing on the great global game field. Joseph Mulamba was not wrong in believing that the thirteen cubic miles of methane at the lake’s bottom would play a pivotal role in how the game played out. His mistake was in thinking that it was the prize that would go to the victor. Favreau knew differently. The lake was not the prize. It was the pawn that she would maneuver to checkmate her enemies.
General Velle stepped out of the helicopter right behind her and looked with disdain at the burned out husk of a truck that sat in the middle of the camp. The ruined tents had been cleared away to create a landing zone for the helicopter, but the canvas skins along with all the other detritus had been heaped up in a pile at the edge of the clearing. The bodies of the science team were probably there as well, mixed in with the rest of the refuse. A few had escaped into the forest, but a relentless search had run them to ground. The latest report was that the survivors were holed up in a nearby cave. Favreau did not think they would be of any consequence, but she knew better than to leave anything to chance. She had directed General Velle to send more rebel fighters to reinforce the pursuit.
The perimeter of the camp was ringed by a dozen Type 63 armored infantry vehicles, representing most of the fighting force Velle had sent into the Kivu region at her earlier behest. Along with the regular DRC Army troops loyal to Velle, there were fighters representing a plethora of loosely organized rebel groups, some of whom had been operating in the area since the Simba Rebellion of 1964. Most had been rebels in name only, fighting to protect their criminal enterprises — poaching mostly. More often than not, they were paid by corrupt government and military officials, like Velle, to maintain order in the region. The alliance with the rebels had been a critical factor emboldening Velle to make his bid for control of the country. Although he could only count on a small portion of the legitimate military in distant Kinshasa to support him, he fielded a combined army of fighters in the east. Nevertheless, he made no secret of his displeasure at having to move his base of operations to the edge of the country.
“I cannot rule from a tent,” he complained.
Favreau kept a cool expression, though inwardly she was weary of having to explain herself to the pompous officer. “This is where the power is,” she told him, gesturing out to the lake. “If you had stayed in Kisangani, you would have been vulnerable.”
“To whom?”
She patted him on the arm. “General, you must think that I underestimate your importance in all of this. I want you to be the ruler of this country as much as you do. But victory will not be achieved by open war. To win, you must force the Western nations to make your new government legitimate.”
“And why would they not do so? I am offering them exactly what they want, full access to the natural gas reserves.”