Genius--The Revolution Page 2
“Cai knows what she’s doing,” Rex said. “Cai is the smartest, most selfless person I’ve ever met,” he continued, pulling Teo to the side. “We wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for her. Truth is, Cai’s the only one who can stop Kiran. You’ve been trying for years.… It’s time to let someone else take charge. Cai can do it.”
I wanted to hug him then and there, but it started to pour.
I motioned for everyone to follow me down a narrow alleyway between two gaudily lit cell phone stores. In Beijing, cell phone stores are nearly as common as noodle houses. We stopped beneath an awning to get out of the rain.
“I’ll be back in two minutes,” I told the guys.
Darting into one of the cell phone stores, I asked the young woman with spiky hair working the counter for a cheap, prepaid cell. Nothing smart. Nothing touch-screen. She handed me a Nokia knockoff the size of a small notebook. It came with an access code she scribbled out on a piece of paper and enough minutes to make a quick call. I paid and made my way back to the boys.
“My friend is called Rodger Dodger. She’s somewhat of an activist, somewhat of a journalist. What she does is very dangerous. I can’t guarantee she’ll be willing to help us out, but she’s helped me before.”
Teo narrowed his eyes, suspicious.
“I need you to trust me on this,” I told him.
Rex elbowed his brother.
“Fine,” Teo said. “Make the call.”
Getting to Rodger Dodger meant calling through a series of numbers. She’d cloaked her location through a Beijing bank that instantly forwarded the call to a bakery in Nanjing that pushed the call through a call center in Suzhou before a young man’s voice answered the phone in English. “Hello?”
“Painted Wolf calling for Rodger Dodger,” I said.
“One second.”
There was a series of clicks before the line picked up again. I realized at that moment that I’d never actually talked to Rodger Dodger. All of our communication had been by text or encrypted e-mail. I knew a few vague details about her—young, female, educated—but could not put a face or a voice to the name. And it was an odd name. Where on Earth would she have come up with Rodger Dodger?
“Painted Wolf,” she said. “You’re back in China.”
“Yes,” I said, “and I need some help.”
“I noticed a lot of chatter on the feeds. Someone picked up a still of you on the street in Beijing earlier today; lot of rumors going around. Hope you’re keeping your head low like usual.”
“I’m trying,” I said, “but it’s not easy.”
“Tell me about it. So what do you need?”
“Can’t say over the phone. Any chance we can meet?”
“Sure,” Rodger Dodger said. “There’s a dumpling place a few blocks east of where you’re standing right now. I’ll meet you there in an hour.”
I couldn’t help but look out, past Rex, Teo, and Tunde, into the crowds passing by. Even though I knew Rodger Dodger had likely just pinpointed my location using pings from a cell tower or some sort of tracking program via the line, there was something spooky about the fact that she knew exactly where I was.
“Okay,” I said. “See you then.”
I hung up and pulled the cell’s SIM card.
Then I crushed it under my shoe before tossing the cell into a storm drain.
“So,” I asked the boys, “who’s up for dumplings?”
2. Rex
6 DAYS UNTIL SHIVA
If Kolkata seemed crazy crowded, Beijing had it beat.
I was thankful I wasn’t attempting to navigate the city alone, but, regardless, the experience was a blur of neon lights, rain, steam, and glass and steel.
I won’t lie: I loved every minute of it.
That sounds strange, considering the pressure we were under. But at that point I’d gotten used to it. Being on the run, chased across continents, stressed that every hour might be your last moment before a life behind bars, had become familiar. Routine even.
That’s crazy to say.
But it’s true.
I will say that it wasn’t the adrenaline surge of constantly being on the verge of being arrested that I loved but the fact that I was with family. Having my best friends at my side made me feel secure, and having Teo right there next to me made me confident. Even with the crowds and the rain beating down on my head, I felt stronger than I had in weeks.
Call it the big brother phenomenon.
Ever since I was little, I’d looked up to Teo. I’d turned to him for the answers that Papa or Ma couldn’t give me. Usually, he had them. When some kid at school gave me a hard time, Teo always offered to “talk” to the bully. He could see I was upset even before I’d registered the emotion. He was there when I felt lonely.
That’s probably why his disappearance hurt so much.
That’s certainly why having him back felt so good.
Still, I knew getting into the groove again wasn’t going to be easy.
Teo hadn’t exactly offered up every detail on what he’d done while he was gone, but whatever it was had made his rough edges that much sharper. Perhaps it was just stress, but he definitely had a shorter fuse.
And I wasn’t going to tolerate him taking it out on Cai.
The fact that he doubted her was one thing. Considering what Teo had been involved in over the last couple years, I didn’t expect him to go along with all of our plans right away. It was the way he did it that got to me.
As we followed Cai to the dumpling place, navigating a warren of wet side streets, my brother walked slower than the rest of us.
I dropped back beside him.
Something had his hackles up.
“Why’re you acting like this?” I asked him.
“We’re in China, Rex. This is the most surveilled state in the world. Everything we do here is recorded. Maybe there isn’t someone watching the footage as we speak, but our being ghosts isn’t going to last very long.”
“Cai is the real deal. She lives here. This is her playground.”
“And her little friend? I still don’t trust her.”
Well, Teo, if you don’t like our methods, you can do your own thing.
But there was something else bothering him.
“Tell me the truth,” I asked Teo in Spanish. “What’s up?”
“We’re wasting crucial time trying to get Cai’s dad out.”
“What? No. We need to make things right. Tunde’s entire village was under the gun. Cai’s father is in detention and might never step foot out of prison again. And Ma and Papa aren’t getting home without our help. We’re the only ones who can fix it. There’s nothing more important right now.”
Teo stopped walking. “What about Kiran? Seems pretty important to me.”
“We’re going to stop him.”
“If we don’t…?”
The others continued ahead before Tunde noticed we weren’t following. “Everything’s okay,” I told Tunde. “Just give me and Teo another minute.”
Tunde nodded. “Okay, omo. But just a minute.”
I turned back to Teo.
“We’re going to stop him. We will. We have to.”
Teo and I locked eyes for a moment. I wanted him to know how serious I was. How he needed to let go of his stranglehold on the decision making.
“Fine,” Teo said. “For now.”
2.1
An hour later, we were all squished into a booth at the dumpling place.
It was a small shop with flashing neon lights in the window and greasy tabletops. But the smell! It was an aromatic heaven inside that restaurant. We’d been in China for several hours, but I hadn’t gotten the sense that I was truly in another country until we’d stepped into the dumpling place.
Every scent rang out clear as a bell, and I could not stop my mouth from watering. As we were all starving, we decided it would not hurt to indulge in several rounds of xiao long bao, the steamed soup dumplings. They were insanely delicious.
“I thought you had blue hair,” she said to Cai.
“Rodger Dodger?” Cai asked in response.
“At your service,” the girl replied, her English pronunciation flawless.
Teo groaned audibly.
“She’s a little girl,” he said, motioning to Rodger Dodger.
I shushed him.
“I’m going to tell her what we’re up against,” Cai told me.
Then, in Mandarin, she gave Rodger Dodger a rundown of our situation. I didn’t know much about Rodger, but I assumed Cai trusted her. Only thing she’d mentioned was that they shared a common goal—exposing corruption and malfeasance, soldiers in the same war.
“Well, I don’t think I can clear this person’s record,” Rodger Dodger said in English to all of us. “I don’t have that sort of access. But I do think your plan of getting him transferred is possible. Still, it’s going to take a significant amount of time to plan properly.”
I glanced over at Cai. She looked downcast.
Stressed about her dad.
That’s when I got an idea, something a bit out of the box.
“I think I got it,” I said. “We go after Terminal first. Naya stole all that data; if we can find her trail, it’ll lead us straight to Terminal. If we find them, we can clear Wolf’s associate’s name. Everything we’ll need is with Naya. I say we get the data and then use it to bring Terminal to its knees while we clear Wolf’s associate.”
Rodger Dodger thought over the suggestion and then looked to me.
She said, “I think it’s our only option.”
“Sounds complicated,” Tunde said. “I want to get Naya just as much as you all do. But there are just as many moving parts in this plan. We do not know where Naya is, to begin. And there are a lot of worries dealing with Terminal—”
“And a lot of risks,” Teo said from the other side of the table.
Cai and Rodger Dodger turned to him.
“Don’t forget, we already saw Wolf’s, uh, associate this morning. You were in the detention center, close enough to touch him. It didn’t work. And the only reason we’re not in a jail cell right now is because our digital prints are still blacked out. We’re still, for all intents and purposes, ghosts. We need to stay that way. The second we’re recognized on a video feed or a log-in, then Kiran will vanish. Right now, we have the upper hand—he’s scrambling. I think it’s not in our best interest to get this person out now. We have to take down Kiran first.”
No one said anything.
Teo took the opportunity to continue. “We have everything we need,” he said. “We can use my bio-computer drives. It won’t take long to access them. Then we’ll be able to interrupt Kiran’s final moves before—”
“I disagree,” Cai interrupted. “I think Rex is right. We need to go for Naya and Terminal. It seems the easiest, most logical route.”
Tunde cleared his throat.
“I am sorry, omo. But Teo has a point. We should hit at Kiran while his defenses are down, and then we can circle back around for Naya, Terminal, and the associate in the detention center. I worry that if we do not take this opportunity to strike at Kiran, the door will close.”
“I disagree,” Cai said. We were at an impasse.
“So,” Teo said, hands on his hips, “what do we do now?”
We all sat in silence for a moment.
Then Tunde spoke up.
“I think I have a very good idea.”
2.2
Tunde’s idea was simple.
“We split up,” he said. “Rex, you and Wolf and Rodger Dodger can track down Naya, and I will go with Teo to the apartment he has in this city. The two of us can begin our work on finding and stopping Kiran.”
“I like this plan,” Teo said. “My place isn’t far.”
Cai nodded, and I shook hands with Tunde and Teo.
“Be in touch,” I said. “We’ll let you know as soon as we find Naya. We can meet back up after and figure out how we’ll make it all work.”
I watched my best friend walk out into the rain with my brother.
See you guys soon.
And then I turned back to the table where Cai and Rodger Dodger were accessing their network of spies and contacts to attempt to trace Naya’s movement after she’d fled Nigeria. Rodger had a small tablet computer ready for the job.
It wasn’t easy.
They motioned for me to join them as they navigated terabytes of footage just to find her arrival from Africa. Luckily, Rodger Dodger had some serious skills—while she wasn’t a computer expert, she had Cai’s quick deductive reasoning.
After Rodger Dodger got us onto Naya’s digital scent, Cai jumped in to predict Naya’s next moves.
“Naya’s communicative,” Cai said. “She’ll be looking to meet up with Terminal.”
“She needs to bring in the data,” I said.
“And quick,” Cai replied.
We all hunched over Rodger’s tablet, watching as Cai sorted through various social media accounts associated with Terminal. She told us she was looking for clues, little giveaways, maybe coded language, that would reveal Naya’s plan.
“There,” Cai said, pointing to the monitor. “Bread crumbs.”
“What is it?” I asked, leaning in to look.
It was a forum for Terminal supporters. They were talking about a “big data haul” and a “triumphant meet-up.” But it was all so vague. At least to me.
“She is in Beijing,” Rodger Dodger said, looking over the information.
“How do you know?” I asked.
Rodger Dodger pointed to a reference to the 798 Art District.
Cai said, “There’s also Terminal chatter, little hints and clues, about what’s happening in China right now. Naya’s bringing in the data.”
“To who?” I asked.
“That is the question,” Cai said.
“We need to know where Naya is right now,” I said, growing frustrated. “We need to get to her before she hands anything over to … whoever.”
“We’ll get it,” Rodger Dodger said. “Just give us a little more time.”
I was beginning to feel some of the same frustration that Teo had. Instead of getting antsy, I decided it couldn’t hurt to order another round of dumplings. The menus on the wall were, of course, in Chinese. When our waiter came over, I pointed to a picture of some dumplings that looked interesting; he nodded and left.
“Those are delicious,” Rodger Dodger said without looking up.
“What’s in them?” I asked.
“Mutton,” she said.
“Awesome.”
Cai elbowed me and whispered, “You’re cute.”
Then she leaned forward, face inches from the tablet screen, and ran her index finger across a posting on one of the Terminal forums. Rodger Dodger read it and nodded. They high-fived before Cai turned to me.
“Naya’s got a customer,” Cai said.
“We know who it is?”
Rodger Dodger said, “Looks like Terminal leadership.”
“No way,” I said, glancing at the screen as if I could read it.
“We do this right,” Cai said, “we’ll find the head of Terminal.”
3. TUNDE
6 DAYS UNTIL SHIVA
Teo and I began the trek to his apartment on foot.
I was happy to be out in the fresh air, despite the rain.
I will tell you that I had an inner peace—a certain stability, a weight from my shoulders—that I had not felt in many, many weeks. With my family and my people safe back in Nigeria, I was now more concerned than ever about ensuring that we accomplished our mission for the sake of my friends. Though I am surely not the bravest of our bunch (that would most definitely be Cai), I did feel the overwhelming urge to ensure we were protected.
I wondered: Wetin be they palava?
The streets outside were just as raucous as they had been before. It seemed to me at the time that this was truly a city that never slept.
It did not even take a nap!
As we crossed a busy intersection jam-packed with hundreds of idling vehicles, I felt a bit silly about my worries. Why was I so nervous? Why was I on edge? No one was looking at me. No one was hiding around a corner. I began to think that my suspicions had been entirely unfounded. Perhaps, I told myself, it was just being in a new city that had me concerned. Though we had traveled so much over the past few weeks, it was likely the strain of our stressful situation had finally gotten the better of me.
Dis stress si mi trouble!
With this thought in mind, I followed Teo across a large plaza that was dotted with trees. People with umbrellas darted to and fro, and I tried to keep up with Teo as he wove expertly through the crowds. That was when I saw them, my friend!
I was not going crazy! I was not overly tired!
There were three young people. They looked very much like contestants at the Game, but these faces were not familiar to me. Two girls and a boy, not much older than the members of the LODGE, stood watching me from across the plaza. They were carefully positioned, the two girls looking at cell phones, while the boy, tall and pale, appeared to be watching the crowds. But I could tell he was actually eyeing me surreptitiously. I knew right away these were the same people who had been following us when we first arrived.
What did they want? Who were they with?
My mind was spinning with questions.
“Tunde?” Teo asked. “What’s up?”
He had noticed I had stopped walking and was staring. I turned to tell him what I had seen, but I knew I would have to point out the young people to prove my suspicions. However, when I looked back to where the threesome had been standing, they were gone. Vanished like ghosts back into the rainy night!