It was a long shot, but Langley said the station in Mongu had to do something, so quick plans were made and a team from the special section was sent out to Central Africa. A new war lord had risen in the remote province to the east, and, as remote as the province was, it was about the most important region to U.S. interests in the whole of Africa.
The magic word was uranium.
The province was laced with it, providing probably the largest known largely untapped deposits of the most precious element in the world. And now it was controlled by a crazy, upstart war lord who was showing the finger to the central government and picking and choosing among all of the offers for mining the stuff.
General Kirungi of the Banyao was a monster of a man—in both size and temperament. He'd gotten the nickname "the gorilla" because of his size and his lack of sophistication or care for political correctness or diplomatic niceties. He was a law unto himself and had a reputation for simply killing anyone with his bare hands who stood in the way of his voracious appetites. He was said to be seven feet tall—although no one had gotten close enough to him with a tape measure to verify that—and he was a mountain of a man—big bellied and fat assed, but it was all deception; it was all hard muscle. He was a dark chocolate brown, but his body was covered with blue tattooing, reflecting that he had emerged directly from the jungle to push all men aside in his province and had become a virtual king in his little fiefdom.
The United States, naturally, wanted to ensure that they were able to acquire the uranium in his province—or to keep it away from select others if they couldn't have it themselves—although Kirungi had been teasing and holding them off for more than a year—just as he was doing with the Russians and Chinese and Indians and Iranians. The rumor was that he was most amenable to the offers from the North Koreans, although U.S. intelligence analysis had concluded that he had floated this rumor himself to pique the interest of the West. Although Kirungi was called dumb and primitive by many, wily and maverick actually would hit closer to the mark.
The man had propelled himself to center stage in Africa so precipitously and in such a short time that there virtually was nothing known of his background. All that U.S. intelligence had to go on was that he was the first-born son of a local tribal chief, who had sent him to a private all-boys school in France, where he had been expelled for sexually assaulting three students. All of the students were males and redheads. This was all the analysts had found in his background other than that he had an assistant who followed closely behind him and made everything happen that Kirungi wanted to happen. Shisa was of the Bamasaaba rather than Kirungi's Banyao, but there was a tie between them. Shisa was married to Kirungi's favorite daughter, who he indulged in every way.
That was it; that was all U.S. intelligence had to work with, and establishing U.S. supremacy in access to the uranium was thus a chancy possibility—but it was something they had to try.
The provincial capital of Kalaibo was overrun with mining engineering teams speaking a cacophony of languages when a two-man team from the Belgian-based international consortium Agorabasse arrived in the city. Eric Scanlon, documented as a Canadian, was a distinctive man. He had blazing red hair and a cocky countenance despite appearing to be a good ten years younger than he was. He was slight of build, which helped explain his in-your-face cockiness, and he moved like a dancer, although this was more because he had been an Olympic gymnast and had maintained the physique of one. He dressed flamboyantly for the dusty plains rimming the jungle forests of Central Africa and exuded more than his share of self-confidence.
His assistant, Brian Townsend, traveled under an Australian passport, and he was as different from his boss as he could be. Tall and hulky, dark and handsome in a square-cut fashion. He was the quiet one, but the one with an open, friendly smile. The one comfortable in wrinkled bush jacket and khaki shorts and combat boots; the one carrying all of the equipment.
General Kirungi's first sighting of Eric Scanlon was in his favorite male bordello on the outskirts of Kalaibo. Kirungi had made his choice for the night and was being led back to the best room in the house when he passed an open door and heard moaning and murmuring that was not in the local dialect.
Eric Scanlon was laying on his back in a black-leather sling suspended from the ceiling by chains, with his alabaster legs spread and lifted in a harness and a large-boned local African stud with a thick cock fucking him in slow strokes.
Kirungi's attention was riveted on the young Westerner's flaming red hair—both the mop of curls on his head and the finer curling at his bush—and by his diminutive size. He was also mesmerized by the sounds of pleasure the man was voicing in the fuck. Kirungi's cock went immediately at attention, and, in short order, he left his choice for the evening barely conscious on the floor of the bordello's best room, unable to close his legs and of no use to the establishment for several more days, and backtracked to get another look at the redhead.
Kirungi couldn't get the redheaded Westerner out of his mind while he was taking his pleasure, but when he returned to the room where he'd seen him, the man was gone.
Three days later, though, Eric Scanlon, with Brian Townsend in tow, was sitting in Kirungi's office, doing what he could to charm the tribal chief—which didn't take much, since Kirungi had spent the three days obsessing over Scanlon's red hair and alabaster skin and his moaning at the fucking of an African stud. Kirungi had put out feelers on who this man could be, and his assistant, Shisa, who was standing by the door during this meeting, had worked his magic and moved the paperwork for Scanlon's requested meeting with the provincial chief to the top of the pile, moving him past petitioners who had been waiting for their audience for weeks.
Kirungi was cagey in the discussions, speaking of possibilities and mentioning gigantic sums and suggesting that they did need to talk further on it. Then, as the empty-talk negotiations drew to a close, Kirungi suggested that Shisa take Brian Townsend to his own office and offer him a beer and talk about uranium as an element and the mining techniques thereof, topics that Kirungi admitted bored him—that he had some higher-level discussions yet to conduct with Mr. Scanlon.
"Twenty-five or thirty minutes, that's all I'll need," Kirungi said.
When they were alone, Kirungi leaned over the top of his desk, exuding an image of a massive man who made the desk look like children's furniture, although it was well over standard size, and stared directly into Scanlon's eyes.
"And did you enjoy the fuck at the Kojo House, Mr. Scanlon?" he asked, with a smile.
Eric Scanlon looked scandalized and worked his jaw as if he couldn't think of a thing to say at this direct and shocking question.
"No need for games, Mr. Scanlon," Kirungi continued. "I saw you there, and I heard you. You were enjoying being fucked by a big African cock."
"On occasion, yes, I do enjoy it," Scanlon said, and to show Kirungi he had fully recovered his wits, he fished a pack of cigarettes out of his top pocket and lit one up with a lighter from his trouser pocket. He blew a ring of smoke in the air and then lowered his face and gave the African tribal chief a sardonic smile.
"And did you enjoy being fucked at Kojo House, general?"
"I don't get fucked, Mr. Scanlon. I fuck. And I have a bigger cock than anything you can buy at Kojo House. I would like to fuck you."
"Oh really? And would we do that at Kojo House?" Scanlon asked, keeping his voice at bantering level. This was a dangerous part of this game.
"Here. Now. I can split you and have you groveling at my feet in twenty minutes," Kirungi said. "I think you will enjoy it as much as I do." And the way he said it reflected that he totally believed what he had said. "$200 U.S. and all of the cocks you want at Kojo House. How does that sound? I know you asked for the biggest cock they had at Kojo House. I can give you what you want. And perhaps the second time you will want to pay me for it." He sat back in his chair and gave a hearty laugh. Scanlon wondered if perhaps he had spent all morning devising that joke.
