394: Chapter 394 The Pawn is Killed

"The third step." He moved the laser pointer to the east coast of the African continent. "Mozambique opposition forces. The 'Islamic State Central Africa Province' still has remnants in Cabo Delgado Province, and the old conflict between FRELIMO and RENAMO persists. Our military cooperation office in Maputo has an unused 'Counter-Terrorism Assistance Fund' of 14 million USD—transferred through a private security company in South Africa to two opposition armed leaders in Cabo Delgado Province. Their mission is: before the Federation of Myanmar proxy gains a foothold, wipe him out."

Abramovich finally raised his eyes: "Once this money is traced back to us, it will be ironclad proof of interference in a sovereign state."

Barrett took off his glasses and wiped the fog off the lenses with a tablecloth. His eyes looked smaller without the lenses, the skin around his eye sockets slack and sagging, but the light in his pupils lacked the cloudiness of an old man—it was a cold hardness condensed from over seventy years of experience.

"This is not diplomacy. This is strangulation." He put his glasses back on. "Strangulation requires hands, not documents."

At the end of the long table, the woman in the dark gray suit spoke for the first time, her voice as calm as if she were reading a legal clause: "President Nyusi of Mozambique—have we contacted him?"

Barrett shook his head. "Nyusi is still watching. His education system just accepted a donation of Dawn chips, but half of the senior military leadership is taking our money. He will hesitate until the very last moment."

"Then let him hesitate." The woman closed the file in front of her. "People who hesitate do not take the initiative. All we need to deal with is that retired major who is still planting flags on the beach."

Barrett pressed the button on the desk communicator. A low male voice came through the communicator, and the hum of a ship's engine could be heard in the background: "Funds for 'Operation Savannah' have been transferred for the first time through an intermediary. The recipient is Jare. He has 120 men under his command and is familiar with every dirt road and coconut grove around Mueda. He is asking for 300,000 USD—half paid upfront, the other half upon completion."

"Time," Barrett said.

"He says they can finish assembling by tomorrow night." The voice in the communicator paused for a moment. "Additionally, we have landed a 'technical consultant' at Maputo airport—Harper. A veteran of the CIA Africa Division, he has served in both Somalia and Mali. He will be responsible for coordinating with the Chief of General Staff of the Mozambique Defense Forces to ensure that the government army's clearing operation is synchronized with Jare's raid."

Barrett released the communicator button, stood up, and walked to the world map on the conference room wall. His finger tapped the location of the Mozambique Channel, slid down, passed the 20th parallel south, and stopped at the small tip of land in Cabo Delgado Province that extended into the Indian Ocean.

"A four-hundred-year empire, collapsed in five years—Greenberg got the result right, but the reason wrong." He did not turn around, his back to the twelve silent people at the long table. "The empire did not lose because it lacked aircraft carriers or chips. The empire lost because—the opponent's pieces are always placed on the board one step ahead of us."

His finger pressed hard against the map, his knuckles turning white.

"This time is different. This time, we will pin the pawn to the sand."

Mueda Village, dawn.

The sun rose from the Indian Ocean, sunlight passing through the gaps in the broken branches of the coconut grove, shining on the Federation of Myanmar flag at the top of the abandoned lighthouse. The flag had been blown by the sea breeze all night, and a layer of fine salt frost had formed on the edges, shimmering with tiny crystalline reflections in the morning light.

Joao stood on the beach under the lighthouse, facing a group of fishermen who had walked from Mueda Village. They wore tattered T-shirts and sandals made from tire rubber, holding fishing nets—the mesh too large, the ropes tied with countless knots, old nets that had been mended again and again. Leading them was an old man in his sixties, hair completely white, spine hunched, his left hand missing the little finger and ring finger—those were shattered by rubber bullets from a security company during a conflict over a natural gas project in 2017, then amputated by an intern with rusty surgical forceps at the village clinic.

The old man stared at Joao for a long time, then asked in Makua: "That flag—whose is it?"

Joao replied in fluent Makua: "Ours."

"I have never seen it."

"Today is the first time you see it. Tomorrow you will remember it. The day after, you will know that it is the only flag that will not use bulldozers to push down your village, will not use contracts to cheat you out of your fishing grounds, and will not point a gun at you to make you press your thumbprint on a deed of indenture."

The old man was silent. Behind him was a young woman holding a child; the child was feverish, cheeks flushed, breathing rapidly. Joao crouched down, took a portable medical kit from a waterproof box, retrieved a cooling patch and oral rehydration salts, and handed them to the woman. The woman looked at him, then at the old man. The old man nodded.

Joao stood up and said to the old man: "Under the lighthouse, there is a batch of anti-malarial drugs—artemisinin combination therapy, enough for two hundred people. There are also rations, high-protein compressed biscuits. No money is needed. No need to sign anything. You just need to tell everyone in the surrounding villages: the lighthouse is lit, come here and take them."

The old man looked at him, the cloudy whites of his eyes turning yellow under the direct sunlight.

"What do you want?"

"Ask again when you trust me."

Gunshots rang out again from the direction of the village—this time it was automatic fire, an AK magazine emptied in three seconds, the sound bouncing and refracting through the coconut groves, making it impossible to tell the exact distance. Joao did not turn his head; his eyes remained fixed on the old man.

The old man listened to the gunfire for a moment, then said slowly: "That is Jare's men. They come once a week, wanting fish, money, and young men to become soldiers. If we don't give it to them, they open fire—shooting at the roofs, at the boats, at the dogs."

"After today, they will not come again."

When Joao said this, his tone had no emphasis, as plain as saying "the tide will recede at six o'clock." He turned and walked toward the lighthouse; the stone steps were stained with white seabird droppings, but his bare feet made no sound as he stepped on them.

At the top of the tower, the flag was still fluttering in the morning breeze. The salt frost on the surface of the flag was getting thicker, and under the sunlight, it had begun to turn white, as if sea salt were crystallizing into a thin layer of armor within the fabric fibers.

The morning in Mueda Village began with the smell of fish.

After the tide receded, the wreckage of seventeen fishing boats sunk by cyclones was exposed on the mudflats—keels broken, planks soaked by seawater until they turned gray-black, barnacles growing into dense white hard shells on the wood. The women stepped barefoot in the mud, bending down to pick up crabs and clams left in the crevices of the reefs after the tide went out. Their fingers were bleached white and wrinkled from the seawater, with mud and sand permanently embedded under their fingernails.

Joao set up a folding table under the old breadfruit tree at the entrance of the village. The tabletop was a hatch cover dismantled from a discarded fishing boat, and the four table legs were coconut tree trunks of varying lengths, tied together with wire. On the table were three waterproof boxes—one containing anti-malarial drugs, one containing high-protein compressed biscuits, and one containing oral rehydration salts and povidone-iodine cotton swabs.