29
The Exchange
The turn of the plane woke me up. The wing to my right tipped upwards as we came in for landing. The jungle was long gone. Plants and trees here were rugged, the grass short and brown, and the land flat.
We rumbled along a rough landing strip – a deserted military base with a couple of old, arching hangars at the end of the runway with the rusty shell of a fighter jet parked outside. Weeds squeezed out through the concrete, with nothing much for miles around. The faint red and blue markings on the wings of the old bomber suggested we were in Russia. I unbuckled and climbed out of my seat. In the cargo bay, the van and Hummer had dried out. Both were caked in crusty red African mud. The cargo ramp opened and made contact with the floor.
“Welcome to Russia,” Nathan said,
