Odin got close to her face. “You’re going to be all right.”
The pain was incredible. “Oh, God. Let me see it!”
“No, lay back.”
She could feel someone cutting through her pant leg.
Odin turned. “Mooch, how’s it look?”
“Femoral artery—close to the pelvis. Tourniquet’s out. Keep the pressure on. Here.”
She felt another pain as something was jabbed into her leg. And then a soothing feeling came over her. A warm sensation. Calm.
Odin’s face was right next to hers. He seemed calm too. Normal. She was fading. Her consciousness was ebbing.
“Pass me that Hespan.” The tearing of plastic.
Foxy’s voice. “How is she?”
A serious look crossed Odin’s face.
McKinney felt her vision narrow. Darkness ebbing in like rising water over her face. Hands on her side. Then on her back.
“I need to contain this bleeding. Or she isn’t going to make it.”
McKinney’s focus faded. She tried to speak, but she was so tired now. She sank below the waves. Into the blackness. Into silence.
CHAPTER 22
Sanctuary
Linda McKinney awoke to a warm breeze wafting over her face. As her eyes came into focus, she could see gauzy white curtains trailing away from a row of tall windows, undulating with the flowing air. The sun shone in, blinding white. She lay beneath a crisp linen sheet in a proper bed with a sturdy headboard made of rough-hewn pine. Clean down pillows cradled her head. Thick wooden beams traversed the ceiling above her. The walls were of mortared stone. This was an old place. A cross hung from the wall above the bed, and along the wall nearby were framed icons of saints and sepia-toned photos of brown-skinned, black-haired ancestors in starched collars and black dresses.
McKinney felt a sting in her hand and noticed an IV drip running from a needle taped in place in the top of her right hand. It led to an IV bag on a stand nearby. Her right leg felt tight near her pelvis, as though wrapped in bandages—and a biting pain came to her from somewhere deep in her upper thigh. She felt the tautness of stitches.
There was a gentle keek-keek sound.
McKinney looked to the footboard. A large raven regarded her and extended its wings. It then ruffled its throat and head feathers. Caw.
McKinney’s voice came out hoarsely. “Muninn.” She wasn’t sure why she knew the bird was female. Perhaps it was something in the bird’s manner. She just felt like she knew.
The raven cawed loudly several times, then flew off between the gauzy curtains and out the window.
There were footsteps, and the heavy bedroom door opened to reveal an elderly woman with a deeply tanned, timeworn face. Her long gray hair was wrapped tightly, and she wore a dress of rough brown cloth with a richly embroidered white apron and collar.
McKinney nodded to her.
The old woman spoke soothingly. “Kehaca ti ictok.” She held up one hand.
McKinney tried to remember what Spanish she’d mastered on previous expeditions to South America. But then, she’d spent more time in the Amazon basin. Portuguese wasn’t going to help. Even so, this didn’t sound like Spanish. She cleared her throat and spoke in slow English. “Where is this place?”
The old woman smiled kindly, holding her arm and patting it gently. “Ni we-wen ci.” She turned to the heavy oak door bound by black iron hinges. “Lalenia! Lalenia!” The old woman’s powerful voice startled McKinney. Dogs barked from somewhere outside. McKinney tried to sit up a bit in bed.
More footsteps, and in a moment the heavy door opened again, revealing a much younger Latina in jeans and a white shirt. Her long black hair was tied back to reveal a beautiful almond-shaped face with mocha brown skin. She approached the bed and smiled, motioning to the old woman as she spoke in that same language. “Wala seh yanok Ratón.”
Then the younger woman turned to McKinney and spoke in Spanish-accented English. “How do you feel, Professor McKinney?”
McKinney looked around the room. “Weak. Where am I?”
“You’re in Tamaulipas near Kalitlen.” At McKinney’s blank stare she added, “Rural Mexico.”
“How long have I been unconscious?”
The young woman leaned over to say something quietly to the elderly woman, who nodded and left. The young woman then approached the side of the bed, producing a penlight from her shirt pocket. “You’ve been unconscious for several days. You lost a great deal of blood, and we’ve been rebuilding your platelet count.”
McKinney kept her eyes open as the woman checked her pupil dilation with the light. “I got shot.”
“Yes, I know. The bullet nicked your femoral artery.” The doctor lowered the penlight. “You were very lucky the damage wasn’t worse.”
McKinney remembered wrestling with a hellish toy—one whose brain she’d helped design. “Yes.” She felt suddenly very tired.
“Mooch is a talented surgeon. He was able to stop the bleeding, but it was close. And having O-positive blood probably saved your life.”
“Who are you?”
The woman placed a hand on her own chest. “I am Doctor Garza. You can call me Lalenia. We are in a very remote part of Mexico here. We don’t engage in formalities.”
“Your English is excellent.”
“I went to medical school in the States.”
“What was that other language?”
“That was Huastec, a Mayan dialect. My family has owned land here for generations. Rosario taught it to me when I was very young.”
“Medical school. Your parents must be proud.”
The young doctor became subdued. “My parents are no longer with me.” She took McKinney’s pulse, listening for several moments.
The door opened again, and this time a well-toned and muscular African-American man with a smooth bald head entered. He wore a Nike tank top shirt and cargo shorts. He was a striking male specimen in perfect physical shape. But what surprised McKinney was that he was missing both his legs beneath the knees. In their place were metal alloy prosthetic legs that he employed with such grace, she would never have known it if he weren’t wearing shorts. The prosthetic limbs ended in brightly colored running shoes that he apparently tied on just like anyone else.
Lalenia brightened considerably when he entered. “Ratón, look who’s up.”
The muscular man smiled a tight, distorted smile as he walked to the end of McKinney’s bed. She could see now that the right side of his face was disfigured from a grievous wound whose scar tissue pulled at the side of his mouth. A horrendous scar ran along the side of his head to a stunted ear. He also appeared to be missing his right eye and had in place a false eye as black as onyx. He placed his hands on the footboard and she could see he was missing several fingers from his left hand as well. He had once been a handsome man, but he seemed not to notice.
He met her gaze and nodded. Then he spoke in a deep, mellow voice. “So, you’re the one who broke out of Odin’s isolation facility.” He started laughing midsentence. “That shows dash, Professor.”
McKinney stared at him. “Ratón . . . Mouse. You’re Mouse.”
“You’ve heard of me.”
“A man named Ritter mentioned you. He made it sound as though you were—”
“Dead?” He nodded. “On paper, I guess I am.”
Lalenia walked over and kissed him on the cheek. “Not even close, baby.”
McKinney could see how much they cared for each other. Whatever scars he bore, Lalenia clearly did not see them.
Mouse focused on McKinney. “You ran into some difficulties back in the States.”
“Are we safe here?”
“Safe is relative. From them, perhaps, but only because you’re in the middle of a war zone. The cartels killed thirteen thousand people here last year. There’s more killing going on here than in Afghanistan.”
McKinney was at a loss for words. “Are you serious?”
“Most Americans have no idea ho
w bad the fighting is down here. This will be JSOC’s next battlefield, Professor. Mark my words. Mexico’s constitution might prohibit U.S. boots on the ground, but there are workarounds.”
Odin walked in suddenly from the open doorway. He was wearing a faded gray T-shirt and jeans. He nodded to McKinney and let a slight grin escape. “I was worried about you for a while there.”
McKinney suddenly felt the reality of the situation. “I’m still worried about me. I can’t go home. And how long until they send machines here to kill us?”
He met her gaze and nodded grimly back. “Get some rest, Professor.”
* * *
Exhaustion came quickly to McKinney for quite some time, and she slept often. A week later she was sitting in the courtyard of a substantial-looking stone hacienda with a terra-cotta tile roof, enjoying the sunshine. The Christmas holiday and New Year’s had already come and gone, and she was morose with worry for her father. And for her brothers as well.
McKinney watched local children playing soccer in a dusty road nearby. She could see them through a wrought iron gate in a stone wall that enclosed one side of the courtyard. Their shouts brought back memories of Adwele playing with schoolmates in Tanzania. She wondered how he was coping with her sudden disappearance. Reaching out to him now would only put him in danger. She was helpless to do anything.
Instead, she stared into the distance. Beyond the houses were steep forested mountains, with clouds towering overhead. It was beautiful, but all she could think about was how to get back to her old life—and how impossible that now seemed.
Odin’s voice broke her reverie. “They said you were up and about.”
She looked up to see him standing in a nearby doorway.
“How are you feeling?”
McKinney shrugged. “Physically better. Psychologically, not so much.”
Odin came up clutching something wrapped in a burlap sack. He laid it on the table between them and sat in one of the rattan chairs next to her. Then he poured a cup of coffee from a steel pot nearby.
“How do you know about this place?”
“Years ago. We came down on an operation for the GWOT.” Seeing her confused expression he added, “The Global War on Terror. After 9/11 there were concerns about terrorists crossing the border, arms smuggling, that sort of thing. Turns out, the weapons were being smuggled the other way—from the U.S. to Mexico. We got caught up in a drug war.”
McKinney studied him. “You perplex me.”
“Why?”
“I just . . . why do you seek out war?”
He shrugged. “It’s what I’m good at. And there’s a bond you develop in war that’s hard to find in civilian life. People you can trust your life to.”
“But why get involved in Mexico’s drug war?”
“’Cause we were here. There’s a small number of vicious people destroying Mexican society to smuggle drugs into the U.S. Killing judges, reporters, men, women, children. We helped the locals who were trying to stop it. Those weren’t our orders, but we weren’t about to stand around and do nothing.”
“And Mouse?”
Odin nodded. “He met Lalenia. She refused to leave after the cartels killed her parents and her brothers and uncles. After they met, Mouse was always looking for an excuse to return here.”
“Is that how he . . . ?” She gestured to her legs.
“IED. Central Asia. A few years back. Lalenia came up to Virginia to help him through physical therapy.” He pondered the memory. “Mouse was my commander, Professor. Team leader before me. He taught me everything I know. I needed his advice, and a safe place to regroup.”
“Apparently they think he’s dead.”
Odin nodded. “He’s a legend down here. El Ratón—the Mouse. The cartels respect him. They found out the hard way that he’s an expert at insurgent warfare. He trained the locals to defend their land. To push the cartels out. Before that they were finding a dozen bodies in the street every morning. That’s over now.”
McKinney sat listening to the kids playing soccer for a while. The children laughing—untroubled by the momentous events of the world.
She gestured to the covered object in the center of the table. “What’s in the sack?”
“Something you should see. I didn’t want to alarm you until you were better.”
“I’ve been alarmed ever since I met you.”
“Okay, then . . .” He unfolded the burlap to reveal one of the black weaver-drone quadracopters that had attacked them in Colorado.
A slightly irrational fear gripped her. It was clearly dead—damaged and missing half its rotors. As a scientist, she was angered by irrational fears, so she tamped it down and leaned forward to look at the drone.
The core of it looked mostly intact, although none of the rotors at its four corners was still whole. The spikelike metal feet protruded menacingly, clearly sharpened like metal thorns.
“We managed to reconstruct this one by cannibalizing parts from the two that got into the plane cabin.” He picked up the lightweight device. “It wasn’t difficult. I get the feeling these were meant to be assembled by semiskilled workers. They’re modular, cheap. Mostly dual-use off-the-shelf parts. Circuit boards. Memory chips. Batteries. Optical sensors.”
She extended her hand, and he passed the dead drone to her. McKinney’s curiosity had already bested her anxiety, and she peered into its recesses, rotating it around. The broken propellers flopped around at the ends of wires. Her nose caught the peppery scent she remembered from the Colorado swarm. “There’s that smell again. Like cayenne pepper. I’d like to know the chemical composition.”
Odin nodded. “Mouse knows a few local chemists. Ex-cartel people. I’ll see if he can get it analyzed.”
She kept sniffing and traced it to nozzles next to a row of silvery capsules in the frame. They looked like the nitrous oxide cartridges used for whipped cream or the CO2 propellant in paintball guns. “Four capsules. Like the chemical glands of a weaver. Mixing them in varying proportions to communicate different messages. That would match ant behavior. It’s how they lay down a pheromone matrix.”
“So they were leaving a trail.”
“It’s probably how they incite each other to attack. Each new arrival at a scene reinforces the attack message by spraying more pheromone. But that also means they’d need some way to read each other’s chemical pheromones.”
“Like an electronic nose.”
“Right.” McKinney ran her finger along one of four forward-facing wire antennas that were studded with tiny microchips.
Odin peered closely right next to her.
“Weaver ants—ants in general, actually—have dozens of sensilla on their antennas. They detect all sorts of things, chemical traces, heat, humidity. If these devices are running my weaver model, then they’d respond to numeric pheromonal input values. It’s virtual in my simulations, but here it could be a concentration measurement received from a hardware sensor. Weavers also transmit information to each other by touch, vibration.” She ran her fingers along each antenna, noting half a dozen small nodules.
“They transmit data to each other physically as well?”
McKinney nodded. “It allows them to move information through the swarm separate of the pheromones.”
“And we wouldn’t be able to jam that communication with radio countermeasures either.”
“I suppose that’s true of both the chemical and touch communication. But also, I was wondering how they found us—how they detected we were in the house, and where.”
“I was wondering about that too. These stupid little bots outperformed any system I’ve ever seen. We were wearing cool suits to hide our thermal signature and AD armor to conceal our human shape and faces. That fooled the sniper stations in the hills, but not these bastards. I was thinking maybe they reacted to noise or movement.”
McKinney shook her head. “If they’re using the weaver model I created, they’d focus on organic compound sensors. Ants have receptors
in their antennas that help them identify food. Maybe—”
“You’re saying they smelled us?”
“Or tasted us.” She sighed. “I know it sounds silly, but that’s part of what weavers do when they swarm. They detect food sources by trace chemicals—in much the same way as they read each other’s pheromone messages.”
Odin seemed to be contemplating something. “It doesn’t sound silly at all, in fact.”
“What?”
“There’s a technology—well known in counterterrorism work, used by customs and Homeland Security. It’s called ‘C-Scout MAS.’ We used it while hunting for high-value insurgent targets.”
She examined one of the dead drone’s antennas. “I don’t know it.”
“It’s an electronic nose that sniffs the air to detect human presence. Apparently there are fifteen chemicals that indicate human presence by the breath we exhale—things like acetone, pentane, hexane, isoprene, benzene, heptane, alpha-Pinene. You get the idea. They appear in a specific ratio wherever people are breathing—the more concentrated it is, the closer people are or the more people there are.”
“You’re saying this technology is currently in use?”
“The detectors were on a microchip.”
She manipulated the articulated antennas on the dead drone. “Then maybe these drones find people in their vicinity by the gases we exhale—just like weavers would detect food. That would actually work well with my model. They could be coded to identify whatever they’re hunting by chemical signature—moving toward greater concentrations of the target scent and away from decreasing concentrations. That relatively simple algorithm is how my model works, and it manifests itself as complex hunting behavior when scaled up to a swarm of stigmergic agents.”
“We were breathing fast. Keyed up. We must have seemed like glowing neon signs to these things.”
McKinney was already looking more closely at the drone’s innards.
The drone had an aluminum tube frame, in the center of which was a wire box acting as ribs protecting the core. There was a stack of computer boards there, vision sensors all around, thin antennas—both leading and trailing—and wiring. Then along both sides were what looked to be steel cylinders—four in all.