And not just the trees.
The rafts of fungi spread into huge shelves along the trunks, looking wide enough to park a car atop. Elsewhere, across the valley floor, the mushrooms now hung their caps higher than Kowalski’s head. Many of the growths also shone with a bioluminescence, in hues of crimson, azure, and yellow. The foxfire, as it was termed, was due an oxidative enzyme, luciferase, which emitted light.
Kowalski rubbed an eye with a knuckle. “I think those hallucinogens are kicking in.”
Benji appreciated this sentiment. “It’s like we’re stepping into Tolkien’s Middle-earth.”
Kowalski pointed a thumb toward the tiny hunters. “And we’ve brought hobbits.”
Benjie sighed and shook his head. He reached toward a wide span of fungus that extended over the path. As his fingers brushed along its underbelly, the glow brightened.
Amazing . . .
Kowalski tried to do the same with the shining gills under a mushroom cap. But as he touched it, the frills went dark, and the mushroom stalk pulled its top away. Startled by the movement, Kowalski shied back with a grimace.
“What the hell . . .” he muttered.
Benjie was just as shocked. He knew some plants could move, could respond to touch or shift toward sunlight. He searched the forest, noting the gentle breeze stirring the leaves of the canopy, rustling branches. He blinked and stumbled a step, looking all around. He lifted a palm.
No wind.
The air remained still, heavy with moisture. He studied the movement through the canopy. The shivering of leaves extended ahead of them, the branches waving in the same direction. Behind their group, the forest lay quiet.
It’s responding to our passage. Almost like it’s sending a warning ahead.
Benjie drew closer to the others, fearful of who the forest was alerting.
Gray also noted the movement around them as the forest seemed to wake. “Have you seen anything like this?”
Benjie shook his head. “Venus flytraps and bladderworts can close on prey. Mimosa pudica, a tiny fernlike plant, will curl its leaves if touched. Even flowers open and close on their own.” He waved a hand. “But all this . . . maybe the virus infects plants, too. Maybe what grows here has been equally altered.”
Kowalski pointed to the left. The loam rose and fell, as if snakes were burrowing through there. The ground split at one point, opening enough to show something woody tunneling underground.
“I think that’s a root,” Benjie said. “Or maybe a subterranean vine of some sort.”
Benjie followed its trajectory. It looked like something was retracting it back, pulling it toward its source, which lay ahead of them.
“She knows you’re here,” Tyende said.
None of this motion seemed to faze the pygmies or their four-legged companions. They continued through the forest on either side, flowing with it.
Benjie studied the phenomenon around him. His initial terror subsided to a wary fascination. “I read somewhere that plants should be considered more like slow-moving animals. Ones that operate on a time frame alien to us, a slower dimension that spans years, centuries, even millennia.”
Kowalski waved at a patch of mushrooms that withdrew from their passage, like a woman pulling back a skirt. “Those don’t look slow to me.”
Benjie conceded this. “Bear in mind that plants are not passive spectators to life. In fact, they’re highly responsive. They’re attuned to magnetism, to gravity, to both sunlight and starlight, to insects that chew on them, to toxins that harm them. Even sound. One study recorded the munching of a caterpillar and played it near a plant. The leaves responded by producing a surge of chemicals to ward off those supposed attackers. And you can see that everywhere in the plant world. Biochemical cascades that combat or mitigate threats. And though you might not see it, they are responding. They compete for territory, search out food and water. They can also evade predators or even capture prey. So, again, don’t consider plants to be inert or even docile.”
Benjie recognized that he was prattling on again, hyperfocusing on a topic.
Gray, though, encouraged him. “Could any of this tie into the virus? Could it be this forest’s way of reacting to a threat?”
Benjie shrugged, but he enjoyed the speculation. “Maybe. Plants do harbor viruses of all sorts. But could something have weaponized one of them? I don’t know. The natural world is full of innovative survival strategies, especially when it comes to dealing with threats. And we certainly count as that. We wreak all manner of damage. From pollution, to deforestation, to wanton destruction of habitats.”
The discourse was cut short as the path took a sharp turn to the left.
Tyende stopped there and pointed his staff toward a dense section of the woods ahead. It looked like an impenetrable wall, a natural fortification that split the forest. The curving road tunneled through the barrier. A brighter glow flowed back at them from the far side, illuminating the cobbles.
Benjie caught a heady whiff of a flowery perfume, redolent with an undertone of a richer musk. He couldn’t say why, but he sensed an ancientness to that scent, as if the prehistoric world had exhaled toward him. Something primal in him responded, a warning that chilled through him.
We don’t belong here.
But it was too late. There was no turning back.
Tyende made sure of that. He urged them to continue down this road. “She waits for you.” As Gray passed, he offered one final warning. “But know this. If you are found wanting, you will not leave here.”
24
April 25, 8:18 A.M. CAT
Belka Island, Democratic Republic of the Congo
Tucker crouched once again under a deadfall at the north end of De Coster’s private island. Only this time, he and Kane weren’t alone. Frank, Monk, and Charlotte huddled alongside them. The group looked like the survivors of a shipwreck, soaked to the skin, bone-tired—which he realized was actually true. He pictured the barge crashed on its side in the jungle.
It had taken them all night to follow the river back to Belka Island. The jungle fought them every step of the way, as did their exhaustion. Still, they had forged on, determined to thwart De Coster before he erased all evidence of his involvement and disappeared.
Through breaks in the forest, the skies to the east shone dully. The sun had risen an hour ago, though remained hidden. A pall of thick smoke from the bomb blast had spread and covered the area. It hung as low as the treetops, smelling of oil and burned wood. It cast the first light of dawn into a hellish dark orange.
Thankfully, De Coster’s plan to have the island bombed at dawn was clearly running behind schedule. Tucker didn’t know the source of the delay, but he imagined the thick smoke had something to do with it. The wind had changed direction overnight, blowing upriver from the mine. Helicopter engines did not fare well in air choked heavily with dust and dirt. De Coster and his men were likely waiting for the worst of the smoke to clear.
Tucker stared up at the sky, perturbed. By now, he would’ve expected some response to the blast. News helicopters, a military response. Then again, the mine was hundreds of miles into the heart of the Congo, a territory run by De Coster and his billions. The bastard certainly had the resources to quash any inquiries, especially in a poor region already contending with a spreading plague.
If anyone hoped to stop him, it would have to be Tucker and the others.
Accepting that, Tucker opened his waterproof go-bag and distributed their weapons. He holstered his Desert Eagle and passed Monk the smaller Browning that the man had stolen. He turned to Charlotte and held out the Sphinx S3000, a blued steel 9mm she had lifted from a dead soldier on this very island.