We ended up tracking the leopards into the early hours in the truck, not in a traditional sense. Just with the glow stick flowed Jackson had dumped onto one of them.

"Hey, right up there. Up ahead, on the right. We're on the right track." Jackson directs Abe as best he can.

"Maybe somebody should say something about him. Ray. I mean nobody should die without words being spoken, right?" Mitch looks to Jamie and I, who are in the back of the truck with him.

I sigh softly, "Ray was obnoxious, loud, and stubborn, but he was passionate. And he cared more about animals on this Earth than any man I've ever met."

I hear Jackson sigh from the front seat, "Looks like the trail's run out. We lost him."

"Okay, team. What now?" Mitch looks up to Abe and Jackson.

"Let's make camp. We can pick up the trail when it gets light out."

I'm not sure that we really make camp up, we rest for about thirty minutes before the sun comes up. When it does we start out again.

"We lost the tranq gun." Jamie comments, worriedly.

"So we'll make our own. It's not quite ketamine, but it should do the trick. The locals have used the root for hundreds of years to get drunk, so hopefully, it's enough to knock out a leopard." Abe comments as Mitch mixes the compound of roots together.

The smell assaults our noses. Jamie covers her, "That's the most disgusting thing I ever smelled in my life."

I shake my head and place my hand over my mouth and nose, as Mitch takes a dropper and holds it over his mouth, "Are you serious?"

"It's for science." Mitch drops some in his mouth and immediately realizing it was a bad idea and the root tastes nasty. He shakes his head and licks his lips, "Hm...tingles."

"I hope it does more than that to the leopards." I lean back as much as I can in the small back area.

"Stop the Truck!" Jackson shouts, "Right up there. You see those trees with the rocks? The rocks along the base. Looks like their den."

Abe nods, "If we can isolate one leopard, we may have a chance."

I lean forward and poke my head between them, "What if you can't?"

Jackson and Abe almost flat out ignore me and jump out of the car, heading to the back to a spare Jamie and I had made out of a syringe and a stick. "Jackson?"

"Kat, we'll be fine. I promise." Jackson smiles his reassuring smile at me, before turning to Abe. "You ready?"

"After you."

The two of them head into the tall grass and the wood line around the den. I sit back down, next to Jamie and put my hands on either side of my head. Jamie places her hand on my back, "Hey, it's okay. They're gonna be fine."

"Yeah, but if they get a leopard, how are we going to transport it, and where are we gonna go?"

Mitch shakes his head, "We won't need to transport it, we'd just need a tooth from it and I can do the rest from in the back of the truck."

I nod and sigh again. We wait for what feels like hours before Abe and Jackson come back. When they do they came back with a cub. "Did you two kidnap a baby leopard."

"Maybe. Let's go make a cure."

Jamie and I wrap the cub in a thin blanket we have in the back of the cab. Taking turns holding it as we drive down the dirt road. When we get to a bridge to head back to the airfield the bridge is down and we get out of the truck. I head over to the post and look at the rope, it's been chewed through.

"What happened to the bridge?" Jamie calls out of the doorway of the truck, she had stayed in to hold the cub.

I sigh and scratch the back of my head, "The ropes been chewed through."

Abe shakes his head, "We're going to have to drive the long way around the river"

"If we drive the long way around the river, we have to drive through the Ndube Army's territory."

Jamie shakes her head as we walk to the back of the truck, "The Ndube Army? I'm guessing that's not a real army, right?"

Jackson nods, "Far from it. Think of an African Hells Angels. Except instead of motorcycles and leather jackets, they have rifles and machetes."

"There's no other way." Mitch questions, the three of us shake our heads, "Course there isn't." We all get back into the truck and start off, driving slowly so we don't make much noise. "Hey, we sure this is the best plan? We should just drive fast, get the hell through here, not worry about the engine noise."

"No. We should stay quiet."

As we drive we hear a phone go off. "What is that?" We look around the truck and I find a phone in Jackson's pack. "It's Chloe's phone."

"She must've put it in my pack."

I answer the phone, "Hello. This is Katherine, I'm a friend of Chloe's, who is this? She's been arrested. She's fine though. She's safe. She's in FBI custody. What do you mean? How do you know that? She didn't kill that agent. Yes, I will. You do the same."

Jamie looks to me, concerned, "What is it?"

"That fed, Brannigan, he was killed."

Jamie shakes her head, "Reiden."

"If that is the case, then what have they done with Chloe?" Mitch looks around the group. No one knows what to do.

We drive for a little while longer before being stopped by a group of men in trucks. The men come up and point a gun at Jackson. Ordering things at Jackson in another language. "What's he saying?"

"I have no idea. Okay, I'm coming out."

"Jackson!" Abe gets out of the car. "Don't hurt him, take me. Take me." The two of them are forced about 10 feet away from the truck.

"What do we do? We have no guns, no money, we have nothing." Jamie looks between Mitch and I.

"We have him." Mitch gestures to the cub.

I roll my eyes, "What are we gonna do, sic a kitten on them?"

"The needle on Abe's spear, hand it to me."

I reach over and hand to needle to Mitch, who pokes the kitten, causing it to let out a high pitched cry. We are focused on what is going on the cub, we don't see the men coming up behind us. They open the door and pull Jamie and I from the truck.

"NO! NO!" Mitch shouts, "Jamie! Kat!" As he tries to follow us out, he is hit in the stomach with the butt of a shotgun. They pull Mitch out and basically throw him over with Jackson and Abe.

Jamie and I look at each other terrified. "What do we do?"

I take a deep breath. "I don't know."

Jackson and I glance to each other terrified as the men look over Jamie and I. I know that if we don't get out of here the boys will be killed and worse would happen to Jamie and I. Just then a group of leopards attacks the large group of us.

"Jamie! Kat!" The boys shout to us as we run to the truck. Gunshots ring out as we run to the car. As soon as everyone is in the truck Abe speeds off.

Jamie and I look at Mitch, grateful. "That was great what you did back there."

Abe glances back, "What?"

"Mitch stuck the cub with a needle."

"His pain sent a distress call. It was just like the lions in L.A. They communicate over long distances."

"Oh, that was you!"

Mitch nods, "I just put their mutation to good use."

Jamie smiles, scratching the kittens head, "This little guy saved our lives."

"We did it, Rafiki. Man, you saved my life."

The group smiles around each other, all except for Jackson. My eyes stick to him, noticing something is wrong. The color was disappeared from his face. "Jackson?" When I lean forward and get my torso up between the two front seats I see Jackson is holding his stomach and there is blood pooling, soaking his shirt. "Oh, my God! Jackson's been shot!"