Total pages in book: 153
Estimated words: 140965 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 705(@200wpm)___ 564(@250wpm)___ 470(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 140965 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 705(@200wpm)___ 564(@250wpm)___ 470(@300wpm)
The others murmured similar sentiments. He didn’t reply. What was there to say? He had never considered himself a sentimental man. In fact, he tried not to feel much at all, but living in Louisiana with his GhostWalker Team, emotions had crept in whether he wanted them to or not. He’d learned at a very early age that it was better to push feelings aside and use logic for every decision. Emotions fucked things up in ways that could be very, very bad.
Still, there was Trap. The man was a genuine crazy-ass genius with Asperger’s. Super-high IQ and wealthy as all hell. Didn’t have a clue about social cues. Draden had been the one to clue him in as often as possible. Trap didn’t let many people in and neither did Draden, but they’d been there for each other.
Tell Trap he’s the best. He’ll do fine. Tell him— He broke off, shocked that he was choking up. He loved the man like a brother. Shit.
I got it, Joe said.
Draden let the forest close around him as the sound of the helicopter faded into the distance. He wasn’t worried about being alone. He was used to it. He’d been alone most of his life, even in the midst of a crowd. He could handle that, no problem. He began to move fast toward the village of the dead. It was very small, only a few families, many related to one another. He was a very fast runner, but that would spread the virus through his bloodstream much quicker. Still, it might not be a bad idea just to get it over with. He played with that idea as he jogged, his animal senses flaring out to uncover anyone that might have been left behind to keep an eye on him.
He pulled up the facts about the village and region they’d been briefed on. The village’s name, Lupa Suku, meant Forgotten Tribe and he thought it very apt from everything he’d read about them. The village was so remote, it wasn’t even considered a sub-district of Rambutan. He knew that driving southeast from Palembang the thirty-four and some miles to Rambutan, villages along the road were more and more scarce. Eventually, that road became nothing more than a muddy broad path lined on either side by trees and brush. A few cars and buses shared the road with bikes and animals until it disappeared.
So remote, Lupa Suku could only be reached by bike, boat or animals such as a domestic ox. It was impossible during the wet season to get any motorized vehicle through. Heavy items tended to get stuck in the thick mud, so it was necessary to move everything via water. Most used a small boat to access the village via the Banyuasin River.
According to the briefing given by the representative of the Indonesian government, primary trade consisted of fish and rice. There was a small copper mine that was kept a secret by the locals. The copper was mined by hand a little at a time as they had no modern machinery. The government had turned a blind eye, acting as though they knew nothing about that little mine or the fact that the villagers traded the copper to poachers who came to the area looking for exotic birds. Money meant little to the villagers, so they tended to barter for the things they needed.
Draden figured bartering was how the terrorists had introduced the virus. It was possible that the virus had occurred some other way, via bugs or animals, but he doubted it. The WHO had been trying to find a source, but the fact that the nearby terrorist cell had used the dead villagers for an ambush, killing nearly all the WHO doctors and their workers, tended to make him believe they were responsible.
The terrorist cell was organized for being fairly new. Their job was to topple the government and unlike others targeting police officers, they had chosen to undermine the people’s confidence in their government by introducing a hot virus. Draden and his team believed the village was their first large test. There had to have been other smaller experiments.
Lupa Suku was the perfect village to test the virus on. The people preferred to do their trading via boat, didn’t allow outsiders to come to their village without a good reason or an invitation. They were secretive, mostly, the government thought, because they had the copper mine and didn’t want outsiders to know about it. They were very self-sufficient and lived in accord with the animals in the forest. Very peaceful, they used their weapons only for protection.
During the times of the year when the rain made it very difficult to travel, the tribe went weeks without being seen by others. Lupa Suku was located a quarter mile inland of the river and couldn’t be seen by passersby traveling on the water, which, again, made them a perfect target. The village kept boats docked and a sentry to watch over the area and call out should there be trouble. A virus would go unseen by the sentry.