Chapter 23
Vince stepped out of the taxi after their two hour ride down N6 to the Burkina Faso border. Brad exited the other door. Vans topped with high bundles and side access ladders filled the dusty parking area. Vince looked around at multicolored buses loading and unloading people in their harlequin clothing. Many waited on foot in the lineup at the border gate. With Aahil up at Agadez still, Brad had convinced Vince to come meet Keith. His balloon co-designer turned out to be here in Africa, in the country next door to Niger. One of his overseas contracts again, Brad said, but Keith was short on details. Other than he had design work in both Mali and Burkina Faso.
“They’re coming from the city of Wagah?” Vince asked.
“Yeah, Ouaga,” Brad said. “In Burkina Faso.”
They would chat, and Brad figured he’d tease out of his friend what Tamanna refused to talk about—the larger Sahel project. With device bags slung over their shoulders, they found a place in the line.
For most of the taxi ride, no matter how Brad wanted to talk flying, Vince kept him on project details. The thing he did want to hear more on were those surface drones they’d both seen. Keith was aeronautical too, so he would know more.
Brad whistled as the line shuffled forward.
“So he’ll be in a white SUV?”
“Yeah, him and another guy.” Brad glanced down the line of people ahead, searching through the chain link grid for Keith on the other side.
“So your theory is he’s working on a sulphur balloon project, just like us.”
“Yup.”
“Makes sense I guess,” Vince said. “A Green Sahara in Mali would go a long ways politically just like in Niger.”
“Green pasture instead of sand. Grass for your goats.”
“We signed confidentiality agreements, remember,” Vince said. “Your ever think he probably did too?”
“We just got to get the guy talking,” Brad said. “We blow the lid on Ms. Meacham and her secrets.”
They walked through the border gate, showing their papers to the guards and out the other side. Brad broke into a grin when he saw the doors of a white SUV open and Keith getting out with another fellow.
“Keith, you dog,” he whacked the fellow’s shoulder. “Got your message and here you are.” He gripped Keith’s hand, introducing Vince.
“And this is Sanoo,” Keith waved to the brown skinned man beside him. “He’s on my engineering team.”
They walked slowly back to the SUV.
“We needed to see this end of the desert,” Keith laughed. “You used to the aridity?”
“We flew south from Agadez, up near the Sahara yesterday,” Brad said. “So this, my friend, we call humidity.”
The engineers hopped into the vehicle, Sanoo in the front where he spoke to their driver in another language. Minutes later they stopped in front of the Kantchari restaurant and Sanoo guided them in to a table.
“How’s the wife and kids?” Brad asked Keith.
“I dunno, wife’s working now.” He shrugged. “Kids are in school. You?”
“Yeah, about the same,” Brad said. “Vince has a daughter, like you.”
“Ahh,” Keith smiled. “How old is yours?”
“Seven.”
“Mine is nine. Cool.”
They glanced at the menus and Sanoo gave them a running commentary on the options.
“So what’ve you got for a contract Keith?” Brad asked. “In Bamako?”
“You know Brad, I’d love to tell you,” Keith said. “But we can’t. They had us sign the no talk papers on this one. Sorry.”
“Nothing to do with our balloon design?” Brad squinted at Keith. “I’m calling your bluff, dude.”
Keith shook his head, running a finger across his lips. Brad told him the details of the balloon Aahil’s cousin had found. All those languages and a familiar build. Maybe their design, but modified enough to talk about.
Keith kept his poker face, feigning interest but shrugging through the whole story. Keith and Sanoo knew nothing about balloons with Arabic writing blowing around the northern deserts of Chad.
“The country of Chad lies far to the east,” Sanoo said. “On the opposite side of Niger across the Sahel.” Vince saw Sanoo’s eyes light up as he spoke of African geography.
“The probability of finding a balloon drifting all the way across Niger would be close to nil,” Vince said.
“Precisely my friend,” Sanoo said.
“We just wanted to get outta town,” Keith told Brad. “And grab a little social time in this desert.”
Brad looked at him. “Humid here,” he raised his beer glass. “Good to see you.”
Keith clinked his beer glass on Brad’s. Sanoo appeared to watch the custom, clearly not his. He busily consumed his meal instead.
“You wanna see desert?” Brad said. “You gotta go up north. Come to Agadez.”
“Burkina Faso approaches desert conditions,” Sanoo said. “But Mali stretches far up into the true Sahara. Our northern desert city in Mali has the name Timbuktu. That much we will tell you.”
“Timbuktu,” Brad said. “No such place. Now I know you’re full of it.”
“Full of what my friend? Truly, a place mark on the map,” Sanoo said. “Along our Mali to Algeria road. As in Niger, your road follows from Agadez. Through the land of the Taureg.”
“Hey, our driver Aahil,” Brad said. “He’s Taureg.”
“Yes,” Sanoo said. “Then he will know.”
Brad and Keith got into some chit chat on the good old days back in America and Vince engaged with Sanoo.
“Do you have any kids Sanoo?” Vince asked.
“Yes, my wife and I have three small sons.”
“Cool.” He had to smile. “Like Keith, I...we have a daughter.”
“This is very good,” Sanoo smiled. “The wonder of children makes our future.”
The coffee arrived dark and thick.
“How about drones?” Brad asked. “You guys seeing any surface recon units around?”
“You in the rich world have been watching us here in the poor world for decades.” Sanoo said. “You have satellite imagery through which you can confirm Timbuktu.” He turned his visiscreen to show Brad. “And you have drones to take photos of us as we live.”
“The U.S. has high altitude drone bases in Africa,” Keith said. “The Chinese have more than one—they’ve got a major base in the South Sudan.”
“So drones are common.”
“Drones everywhere, Brad,” Keith nodded. “Rumour has it the CIA, the KGB and British M5 run recon surface units. The story goes surface drone operation is standard training for any sleeper agent they assign to a developing country. But locals operate them too. That’s just a part of life here.”
“That would mean drones in any HICCC country,” Brad looked at their faces quickly. “You guys heard of them, right?”
Keith and Sanoo looked at each other, but remained quiet.
“The trick then is to know the purpose of surface drones,” Brad said. “’Cause I don’t think they’re taking tourist photos.”
“A camera will be taking our picture at this moment,” Sanoo said. “Look at the corners above us, or the light fixtures. A camera mounted on a drone becomes mobile, that is all.”
“Mobil and communicating with the missile platform above.” He told the story of the repaired roof at the horse tracks in Niamey.
With lunch finished, and the afternoon wearing on, they walked back out to the vehicle. Keith and Sanoo would return to Bamako before nightfall, but first they gave the other two a lift back to the border.
“Alright, good talking to you,” Brad nodded
With all around waves, Vince walked with Brad towards the line up to border cross the other direction.
“So whatta we got?” Brad said. “Great lunch and Timbuktu is a real place.”
“And those drones we’re seeing are not imaginary,” Vince said.
“The drones
we gotta know about are the purposed missile targeting,” Brad said. “That would be our concern.”
“You think Keith and Sanoo designing sulphur release?” Vince asked.
“Yup, good chance they’re doing same as us,” Brad said. “And our projects are gonna morph together into Phase III.”
As he walked, Brad looked as if he were thinking along another angle, like he could have asked more. Vince was almost surprised this happy go lucky guy could become so intent on proving a conviction. Brad keyed in a message on his jPad.
They passed through the border gate.
“I dunno, wait,” Brad said. “We need a way to detect those missile support drones. I should have pushed Keith on that—that’s not part of nondisclosure and he knows that.”
Brad turned back towards the border fence, and Vince followed him back to the chain link fence. They hung their fingers high in the wire and could see the white SUV still parked in the dust, not moving.
“He likes back seat work,” Brad said.
“Connect with him on Holo-Skype,” Vince said. “You can read his body language there.”
Keith must have been watching them as he rolled down his window to look out. He raised his hand with a thumb up. Brad gave him a thumb to the side signal, and then waved for him to come over to the fence. The white vehicle door began to open.
Vince frowned as all the drone talk seared into a thought of camouflage everywhere—a flash of reconnaissance drone eyes watching from all corners. His mind sliced through quick time as he heard the delayed scream he somehow knew came from above. His picture of Keith and Sanoo both waving, with their children—their children were not here—skipped to the next millisecond frame of a scorching blasted fire hole in the dust. White fender pieces scattering to the sides in a chatter of clicked instance fractals and as real time set back in, so did the real screams.
Brad stood stunned, face ashen. Vince looked, matching his shallow breathing, and knew their world would never be the same. A delayed flush of air blew past their faces following the explosion shockwaves, wiping any vestige of pleasant afternoon smile from Brad’s face.
BALLOONS