The service concluded and the attendees filed past the casket to pay their last respects. Mr. and Mrs. Somers went last, after which King escorted them to a waiting limousine that would take them to the wake. As the car drove off, another limo arrived. Out stepped the former President, Tom Duncan — Deep Blue, joined by Domenick Boucher and Lew Aleman, none of whom could afford to be seen attending the funeral of a soldier with whom they had no public reason for being associated. To do so would raise questions and defeat the point of having a black organization. The three walked with King back to the few remaining at the cemetery: the Chess Team members and the staff of Endgame. Everyone who knew the truth about who Bishop had been and all that he had done.
Duncan — Deep Blue — unexpectedly assumed the position of attention and called out in a low but commanding voice. “King.”
King likewise came to attention and took a step forward. “Yes, sir?”
“Assemble for roll call.”
King felt a surge of emotion as he grasped what Deep Blue was doing. He pivoted and faced the gathering. “Chess Team, fall in.”
Queen, Rook and Knight moved forward, their expressions revealing that they understood as well, and formed a line beside him, intentionally leaving a gap between Queen and Knight.
King wasn’t sure what to do next. They had never established a protocol for this eventuality. It occurred to him that Deep Blue was now doing exactly that.
“King?”
King took a deep breath. “Here, sir.”
“Queen?”
Queen followed King’s lead. “Here, sir.”
“Knight?”
“Here, sir.”
“Rook?”
“Here, sir.”
“Bishop?”
Silence.
Deep Blue allowed a moment to pass. “Bishop? Somers?”
Another pause. “Bishop, Erik Somers?”
King had to struggle to find his voice. “Bishop, Erik Somers, is not here, sir.”
In the pause that followed, the only sound was of someone softly crying. Then Deep Blue did something that King did not expect.
“Pawn?” There was a stir of confusion. “Pawn, Machtchenko?”
Asya overcame her surprise and quickly stepped forward. “Here, sir.”
Deep Blue studied her with a look that evinced both solemnity and pride. “A piece has left the board, but Pawn, having demonstrated exceptional valor, has advanced. Will you take Bishop’s place, Asya Machtchenko?”
Asya stared back at him, stunned.
In a less formal tone, Deep Blue added, “According to the rules of chess, a pawn may be promoted to any of the first rank positions, even if that piece is still in play, but I think one Queen is more than enough.”
Asya nodded, dumbly, though whether she was agreeing with Deep Blue or signaling her acceptance was anyone’s guess. Deep Blue took it as the latter. He reached out and pressed a carved wooden chess piece into her hands.
“Welcome to the team, Bishop.”
CODA
With more than a million inhabitants, Goma, on the northern tip of Lake Kivu, had seen more than its share of ethnically fueled violence. The recent political unrest that had gripped the nation had very nearly fanned the smoldering embers of old tribal feuds to life again. For several tense days, only the heavy presence of foreign peacekeepers had kept the situation from devolving once more into chaos. Gradually though, as news of the fantastic discoveries nearby had reached the ears of the populace, the lingering animosity had given way to a unifying sense of hope. Instead of fear, a spirit of anticipation gripped the city.
Felice Carter was only peripherally aware of what was happening in the world outside her laboratory. She found solace in her work, the only thing that kept her from reliving the tragic ordeal of those days spent hiding in the forest and what had happened after. But that was not the only reason she had sequestered herself in the laboratory on the campus of the University of Goma. If her research bore fruit, and she fervently believed it would, it would usher in a new era of energy production. It would mean an end to reliance on fossil fuels and the inherent exploitation of the natural resources of developing nations to fuel the ravenous appetites of the global energy market.
After sequencing the DNA of the E. coli variant she had discovered in Lake Kivu and in the soil of the cavern near the Ancients’ city, she had gone to work identifying its weaknesses. The bacteria was well-suited to large scale biofuel production, but if it was unintentionally introduced to the surface world, either through a natural disaster, such as the long-dreaded lake eruption, or through human error, such as a mishandling of the bacteria at one of the biofuel production facilities that were now in the planning stages, the result would be a runaway ecological catastrophe. Her goal was to identify the best ways to shut down the extremophile quickly, and thereby ensure that, even in a worst case scenario, the organism could be tamed.
Thus far, the gram-negative bacteria had shown a vulnerability to the antibiotic ampicillin, but medical history had taught scientists the danger of relying on a single cure. So before she was willing to release her research, Felice wanted to make sure that there were many different ways to kill the organism.
She bent over a line of petri dishes that hosted colonies of the bacteria grown in agar and began adding carefully measured doses of streptomycin to each. The DNA map indicated that the extremophile had the same vulnerability to the broad spectrum antibiotic as more common variants of the bacteria, but this test would reveal whether the organism had other defenses hidden in its genetic code.
“Dr. Carter?”
She frowned but did not look up until her task was finished. Kabika, a nursing student who had volunteered to work as her lab assistant, was standing in the doorway.
“There is a man here to see you.”
Felice frowned. In the last two weeks, she had been inundated with phone calls and e-mails from scientists and biotech upstarts in every corner of the globe, all eager to reap the benefits of her work. This was the first time someone had actually bothered to come see her in person, but she knew it probably wouldn’t be the last.
“Tell him to make an appointment,” Felice said, turning back to her experiment. “Sometime next year, maybe.”
Kabika approached the table, her forehead creased with uncertainty. “This man is very insistent. He says that he is a friend.”
“A friend?”
“Yes. He said that you promised to help him.”
Felice stared back at the young woman, trying to make sense of the request. Promised to help? Could it be David?
No. David had been whisked off to Kinshasa to give a full account of his discovery of the cavern. And besides, she certainly hadn’t made any promises to him. In fact, she could think of only one man that…
All thoughts of experiments and antibiotic therapies momentarily forgotten, Felice ran for the door.
A NOTE FROM JEREMY ROBINSON
Dear Reader,
I wanted to take a moment to thank you for reading SAVAGE. I hope you have enjoyed this brand new Chess Team adventure. If you did enjoy the book, please show your support by posting a review at your online retailer. E-book websites work on algorithms, meaning the more people review my books, the more the e-book retailers will recommend them to other readers. And the more people buy my books, the more I get to write them, which is a good thing for both of us (assuming you enjoyed the book). If we can get SAVAGE moving off the virtual shelves, there will be many more Chess Team adventures to come.
Thank you!