Stone Soldiers: City of Bones by C. E. Martin Page A

room-turned office in Kaiama, Mitch made his way to his jeep outside. He steered it though the streets of the city and finally out onto the highway leading west out of town. Before long, he was turning off the long dirt road leading northwest to the Gwasera Oil Field. He made a mental note to have the road paved as he was jostled by the rough ride- the pipeline was still months away and dirt roads were not efficient for the large tanker trucks. A paved road would cost the company less in fuel, tires and maintenance to move on. No sense wasting oil to get oil.
    After a drive that took far longer than he'd liked, Mitch p ulled up along the outskirts of the boomtown now called Gwasera. It was a collection of prefabricated buildings, shipping containers and hastily assembled shacks the local workers lived in- all surrounded by a high fence the oil company had put up to discourage theft. It was a town of several hundred that was growing by leaps and bounds as workers poured in from all over Nigeria, hoping to cash in on the riches of the newly-discovered oil deposit in Kwara.
    Mitch immediately noticed one of the transport tru cks parked just inside the outer fenceline of the boomtown, the driver's door open. The trailer was empty and the truck appeared as though it were about to leave. He pulled his jeep alongside and looked out. All of the truck's tires were gone- it was sitting just on its bare rims. Looking closer he could see mesh wrapped around the rims- the steel belts from the tires? That was definitely odd.
    Mitch put the jeep back into gear and drove on into the main courtyard, where the stacks of prefabricated shipping container-sized shacks were gathered in a semi circle that formed the companies headquarters on site. Further north, prefabricated buildings lined both sides of a wide dirt road leading to the warehouses and the beginnings of the pipeline pumping stations. Extending to the east and west from that road was a maze of alleys running between prefabricated housing for the workers and the shacks and shops of those lucky enough to get inside the perimeter fenceline.
    A tire suddenly blew out on Mitch’s jeep. Then another, and another, and finally, the fourth tire.
    Mitch cursed and put the jeep in park and got out. The engine rumbled and coughed and died.
    He looked at his tires and was astonished to see them melting off of the rims- turning to a wet gooey mass, like tar, that dripped off, globs disappearing in mid air before they could hit the ground.
    Then his skin began to itch.
    ***
     
    Her real name was not Daisy, but it was the name that had been assigned to her when she entered the NSA's special program. She'd become accustomed to it after all these years- and to her special place in America's intelligence community.
    Daisy banked and rose up above the ocean, gaining altitude as she flew in over the Nigerian coast. She recognized the buildings and landmarks she h ad memorized in her mission pre-briefing and corrected her course.
    Accelerating, she shot over the marshes, rain forests and wetlands until she was streaking above the savanna. She was miles inland now, the ocean far behind her. Again, she got her bearing s and adjusted her course, then accelerated.
    At long last, Daisy reached her objective- an oil drilling site northwest of Kaiama, Nigeria. If she could have gasped in her astral form, she would have.
    Her forward travel immediately stopped and Daisy hung in the air, a faint, barely visible outline of a person, staring in wonder at the small boomtown built miles from anywhere. At least, she assumed it was the boomtown. It was where she had been briefed it would be. She couldn't be sure though, since the entire site was enveloped in a cloud-like mass of glowing energy.
    Normally, Daisy's astral form gave her a distinct advantage over flesh and blood eyes. She could see through darkness, could move at speeds not restricted by the laws of physics. She could pene trate airspace undetected and