Invasion: China (Invasion America) (Volume 5) (30 page)

“Th
is way, Police Minister,” the man behind her said.

He was Colonel Lu, a misshapen monster with a lump on his right shoulder. It gave him a cockeyed walked. Couldn’t surgery correct such a thing?

Probably, it no longer mattered. The lump on his shoulder had misshapen his soul. Others might have tormented him as a youth, and he had let that seep deep within, poisoning his thoughts. Now, he murdered others to his heart’s delight because he was warped.

She feared Colonel Lu. Yes, she wondered if Hong groomed the man to take her place on the Ruling Committee.
It was more than possible.

“Where are we going?” she asked.

“There’s a matter for you to decide.” Lu said cryptically.

“What form
of matter?”

“You’ll see,” he said, turning
down a narrower hall.

Does he mean to kill me? Has Hong given him the
order? It won’t be a simple shot to the head, either, but prolonged torture. I must leave Australia; the pretext doesn’t matter. I’m dying inside, becoming too paranoid. This is hollowing me into a shell of a person.

They reached a place where t
wo big Mongolians stood before a heavy iron door. The two looked abnormal, with stumpy features.

“Who are they?” Shun Li asked.

“My personal attendants,” Colonel Lu said. He signaled them.

One opened a door, and drool spilled from
the man’s lips.

She hid her disgust. Lu picked subnormal humans
as his personal attendants, people to do his bidding unquestioningly. Should she draw her pistol and fire? No, no, that was absurd. Lu couldn’t really mean to murder her. She had to get a grip on her imagination.

The door shut behind her, and she gave a little start.
Glancing up, she saw that Lu watched her. He’d seen her fear. He gave her a little smile. It was enraging and shaming.

“Have no fear, Police Minister,” the colonel said.

You enjoyed saying that.
She would remember this…if she managed to leave the police ministry alive.
Why am I so paranoid?

“Down this hall,” Lu said.

She followed him to a two-way mirror. On the other side was small man in a cell. He sat at a table. With a frown, she made a reassessment. The man wasn’t simply small; he was tiny. Was this another of Lu’s freaks?

“Why is that man wearing an East Lightning uniform?” Shun Li asked.

“Because he’s one of ours, of course,” Lu said.

Shun Li glanced at the colonel.

“Oh, yes, I’m telling you the truth.”

Shun Li
’s frown grew. The man seemed familiar to her, but that was preposterous. Where could she have seen such a diminutive East Lightning officer before?

“Do you have his record?” she asked.

The colonel unlatched a tablet from his belt, holding it out to her.

“Just give me
a summary,” she said.

“He is
First Rank Fu Tao, a field operative,” Lu said.

“A gunman?” Shun Li asked.

“One of our better marksman,” the colonel said. “He also kills without remorse.”

That was high praise for an East Lightning field operative. In truth, very few people could kill in cold blood without remorse
and still maintain a façade of normality. Such people were considered
gems
in secret police work.

“He’s so small
,” Shun Li said.

“He looks like a rabbit but strikes like a leopard.”

“Why is he locked up in here then?” Shun Li asked, intrigued.

“Maybe I should tell you something about his history.” Colonel Lu told her about the rapists in his youth, how Tao often went berserk when he killed, unable to stop until every
one around him was dead.

Hmmm,
so Tao is a flawed gem
.

“That’s why he’s here,” the colonel said. “He’s blood-mad. He was high on methamphetamine
s last time. He killed an entire community and then turned on his partners, murdering them too.”

“Did he say why they killed
them?”

“Oh yes,” Colonel Lu said with a laugh. “It seems his companions raped a few of their victims. That didn’t sit well with our little killer.”

“I see,” Shun Li said.

“He’s warped,” the colonel said, “a broken instrument.
Most here believe East Lightning cannot use him anymore.”

She’d been studying the small man
sitting so peacefully at the table. Now she turned and looked at Lu.

“Let me rephrase that, Police Minister. We’re waiting for you
r judgment on the matter. As you know, we cannot execute our own people without your authority.”

Shun Li nodded slowly, a
s an idea formed in her mind. She needed a gunman loyal to her alone. This First Rank Fu Tao, he looked more like a rabbit than any field operative she’d ever known. That was an extremely valuable trait, for who would suspect the rabbit of being a killer? Ah! Now she recognized him. Yes, during the Red Dragon launch—this little killer had been in northern Mexico. He had gut-shot a launch officer who hadn’t obeyed quickly enough.

“You suggest
we kill him?” she asked Lu.

“Of course,” the colonel said. “He’s too unpredictable.”

“True, true,” she said.
I am a barracuda and Chairman Hong is a Great White of the depths. Barracuda have teeth, and they can kill. I wonder what Colonel Lu is?

Shun Li forced herself to laugh.

The colonel gave her a questioning look.

“He should die,” she said. “But does that mean we cannot, hmm…enjoy ourselves with some light entertainment.”

“What do you have in mind?” he asked.

“You say this Tao hates rape?”

“Indeed.”

“Why don’t you call your two Mongolians,” Shun Li said. “They’re big fellows.”

“Ah,” Lu said, and his eyes become bright. “That is an excellent idea.” He turned to go. Then he paused, looking back at her. “I had begun to wonder about you, Police Minister. Some of the others…they don’t think you’re suited for the task.”

“Sheer nonsense,” she said.

He nodded. “Give me a moment.” The colonel headed down the hall out of sight, soon opening the iron door, the bottom scraping against the floor.

Shun Li moved fast. She unlocked the door to Tao’s cell, opening it.

The First Rank looked up. He was only a boy.

“Listen well, Fu Tao. You are about to die. First, the colonel is summoning his guards. They plan to rape you.”

Tao’s face became like a mask.

“I am the Police Minister.”

He nodded. It appeared he recognized her.

“
If I save you, will you obey me, body and soul?”

Tao cocked his head, and he nodded. “Save me from this, and I will do whatever you say.”

She drew her gun and pitched it too him. He caught it, and he cocked his head again, asking a question without speaking.

“Wait until I give
you the signal,” she said. “Then kill everyone in the room but for me.”

Without a wo
rd, he put the gun out of sight on his lap.

Shun Li barely closed the
cell door in time. The colonel appeared with his two idiot guards.

“I explained the situation
to them,” Lu said.

Shun Li could see that. Both guards had hard-ons
pressing against their trousers as excitement shone on their lumpy faces. She had heard rumors about Colonel Lu, and could see now that they were true.

“One moment,” she said. “I must inform you that I’ve witnessed the Chairman’s Lion Guardsmen in similar action. They prolonged the…hmmm,
encounter
to provide maximum intensity.”

Lu glanced at his large and eager guards. “That might be difficult today.”

“Oh,” she said, as if crestfallen.

“But I have an idea or two,” Lu said
, winking at her. “We will make it agony for the small one.”

“Excellent,” Shun Li said. She noticed a hint of suspicion in Lu’s eyes, and she wondered how she’d given herself away. To cover, she said, “I will go
in first. Follow me.”

“Ah,”
Colonel Lu said.

Shun Li opened the door to the cell. She wondered if Fu Tao would start shooting
immediately, killing all of them. No, the young man looked up as if wondering what would happen to him. He must be wiser than he appeared.

Shun Li stepped to the side. The first Mongolian entered
the cell, then the second and finally Colonel Lu. The heavy door closed behind him.

“I give you the honor,” Shun Li
told the colonel.

Lu clicked his heels, and he addressed the seated man. He told Fu Tao how China had paid for his training and he had rewarded them by his shameful actions.

“Therefore,” Colonel Lu said in a ringing voice. “You will be punished. Can you imagine how you will be punished?”

Fu Tao simply watched and waited.
He didn’t even shake his head.

The first Mongolian giggled as he unbuckled his
belt and zipped open his fly. He shoved his pants down, to reveal a massive, straining sex organ.

“You will be raped many times, Fu Tao,” the colonel said. “You will—”

The small East Lightning operative lifted the pistol off his lap.

“What?” Lu asked. “How did you get that?”

The gun barked with deafening sound in the small confines of the cell. Colonel Lu flew back, groin-shot. He slid down the wall as he began to scream in agony.

Fu Tao pulled the trigger three more times. He shot each Mongol in the forehead, dropping the
two like oat sacks. The third shot he put in Colonel Lu’s left kneecap. The man howled with renewed zeal.

Shun Li began shaking
inside, but steeled herself. She watched Fu Tao the entire time. The man terrified her. He shot without emotion, without the slightest remorse. His eyes showed emptiness, a black hole.

He approached her, with the gun in his hand. He reversed the grip and handed it to her.

With the greatest concentration, she took the pistol with a steady hand.

Colonel Lu continued to scream.

“Thank you, Police Minister,” Tao said in an ordinary voice. “I will never forget this.”

“I take you at your word. Now—”

“Excuse me, Police Minister, but shouldn’t I finish the task?”

“You mean killing Colonel Lu?”

Tao nodded.

“Please do,” she said.

Fu Tao approached Colonel Lu, and he proceeded to kick the man in the head until the colonel died. Then it was over, and Shun Li had her first loyalist.

She wondered why she had not thought of this before.

From
Tank Wars
, by B.K. Laumer III:

The Russian Sneak Attack of 2042:

Seen from a strategic prospective, Premier Konev’s deception proved as brilliant as Hitler’s ability to fool Stalin in 1941 before Operation Barbarossa.

The Russian blitzkrieg
, starting April 10, caught the Chinese flatfooted in Kazakhstan and Siberia. The best divisions of the Sino Interior Reserve were far away in Australia, while both regions lacked their former number of troops.

The Russians had several aces in these
fast-moving battles. One, the Artificial Intelligence Kaisers and “Terminator” drones of General Mansfeld took the brunt of the head-to-head clashes along the Trans-Siberia Highway. Massed airmobile and paratroops—the second ace—swung around and over the fixed Chinese formations, often inducing wholesale surrender. The third ace was American THOR missiles, annihilating onrushing reinforcements, destroying parked drones, fighters and bombers and obliterating Chinese rocket batteries. Finally, Russian hovercraft proved second to none, and made astounding advances. The most famous was their sweep across Lake Baikal, isolating the Chinese Fifth Army in and around Irkutsk.

Russian s
upply difficulties were mastered through airborne transport, both engine-powered and lighter-than-air helium airships, a risky but profitable exercise in the rear areas.

Twenty-one days of breathtaking warfare won the Russians Kazakhstan and the Trans-Siberian road and rail net. They killed, captured and incapacitated over 600,000 Chinese troops for a loss of 183,000 killed, missing and wounded. They passed the
northern Mongolian border and reached Northeast China—Manchuria—finally halting in sheer exhaustion.

Several factors now aided
Hong, including a breathing spell as the Russians regrouped behind the Amur River on the Chinese border. By defeating the Americans-Australians in Australia and keeping the breadbasket country, Chairman Hong convinced the Indian League to resume neutrality. The food convoys from Australia to India began immediately. This allowed the Chinese to begin transferring entire corps from Burma to northern Manchuria.

In the waning days of the blitzkrieg,
more Sino particle beam weapon stations came online. With their highly accurate and powerful beams, these strategic centers succeeded in destroying seventy-three percent of the next wave of THOR missile attacks. The Chinese answer to the space weapons had finally arrived, and none too soon. This greatly encouraged the Northeast Sino Army and the guerilla forces training under East Lightning guidance.

As
Konev rushed supplies east along the Trans-Siberian rail net, building up for a Manchurian offensive, a call went out to America. Director Harold, Chairman Alan and General McGraw all agreed with the proposal. The American Expeditionary Force earmarked for India would reroute to eastern Siberia, using Russian transports. They would take the long way: the Atlantic Ocean to Petersburg, the Trans-Siberian rail to the Manchurian border. Although the troops were geared for jungle warfare, they went as armed to the rugged north. Time was of the essence. The India-Burma venture had fizzled, but now a new opportunity presented itself.

The Russian-European-American alliance realized the need for speed. They had to knock out China’s ability to fight before
Hong could bring enough army units home and before he trained the populace for extended resistance.

The invasion of China
was about to begin, and American hearts leaped with joy at the idea of finally paying the Chinese back in their own coin.

WASHINGTON, DC

Anna Chen shivered as she looked out of the limousine’s tinted windows. Rain slicked the city streets. It was another cold and dreary day. There were few cars moving,
but plenty of bicyclists getting soaked to the skin.

Most of the cars belonged to government employees,
the only people who could afford them these days. Most of those workers belonged to either Homeland Security or the Militia Organization.

It’s different
with Director Harold running the city. Things are more regimented, although more efficient. But something has gone out of the American people, or is that just my imagination?

These days, s
he worked in a CIA annex, far removed from the seat of power. For over five months now, she hadn’t had a glimpse of David, not even a word. It ate at her. That’s why she’d agreed so readily to Harold’s conditions—anything to get a look at David.

Why does
Harold want to see me now? Why is he going to let me talk to David? What’s happened?

The limousine slowed as it approached the White House
entrance. Instead of Marines, Militia guards stood at the main gate. A Militiaman in his red dress uniform checked the driver’s papers and waved them on.

Soon enough, Anna found herself escorted down familiar halls. When she’d been with David—

No, she refused to think about old times. She was finally going to see him. She should concentrate on that.

Big Militia guards walked
before her and others brought up the rear. Did they fear what she might see or do while at the White House? That seemed ridiculous.

The guards brought her to a door, and her heart rate sped up
as the knob turned. Director Max Harold stepped through.

“Anna,” he said. “It was so good of you to come. Please, follow me.”

They moved several doors down from the Oval Office. She hadn’t believed he would take her there. Too many meetings had happened in that room, with David running the show and Anna taking notes.

Max wore a stylish brown suit
, she observed. He’d gained weight and he walked with greater assurance than before. As they entered a room, he indicated a green sofa with red cushions. Each had a green M stenciled on it.

“Thank you,” she said, sitting, tucking
the edges of her skirt under her legs. She wore nylons because David liked them. After all this time, she wanted to be appealing to him. Despite the hard months of loneliness, of not knowing if he lived or died, she’d kept herself fit and trim. She wore the precise amount of makeup that David liked.

“Where is he?” she asked.

Harold sat in a chair, putting his elbows on the rests. The Militia guards closed the doors, and the director and she were alone.

I wonder if snipers
are watching us through hidden cameras. Probably. Harold would record everything. It’s his way. I have to be careful what I say
.

Harold crossed his legs. “I afraid we’re going to have to go over a few ground rules first.”

“He’s all right, isn’t he?”

Harold
smiled. “That depends on your definitions. It always has.”

“Yes…?”

“Anna,” he said, as if they had been longtime friends. “This is a delicate situation. I’ve debated for some time the right way to go about this. I want to make this as easy as I can on you. But…certain realities must be noted and followed.”

“Okay,” she said.

His smile broadened. “Some might say…that I’ve acted with haste in taking over.”

“I don’t say that.”

“You don’t do so openly, and that’s one of the reasons I decided to bring you in on this.” The smile disappeared, showing it had only been mechanical. “I realize you don’t approve of me, you never have. I suppose I’ve never approved of you, either. Your presence softened the President at the times he needed to be hard. That weakened him—and it allowed me to do what had to be done.”

“David was your friend.”

“Please, Anna, let’s not be melodramatic. This is the pinnacle of power, once the most important position in the world. Now the United States vies with many other nations for dominance. At the moment, China has the first seat. We must tear them off it and sit back at our rightful place at the table of nations.”

“What does
any of that have to do with me seeing David?”

“Everything,” Harold said. “Shall I be frank?”

The question frightened her. She wanted him to be nice and polite. Frankness: how it ever helped her?

“Yes, please
, be honest with me,” she said.

Harold glanced at his perched foot, waggling it. He put his fingertips together and gave her another smile. “David collapsed because his heart gave out. The sight of the Chinese holocaust—”

“I was there,” she heard herself say. “I remember what happened.”

Harold chuckled before becoming serious. “I run the White House now. McGraw is busy chasing a dream
with strategic and logistical thoughts. I wish him luck, but he is no longer in the driver’s seat vying for power. Chairman Alan is too didactic and dry to rule. He knows how to organize, but he cannot impassion people. Perhaps I’m too direct, too…well, smart for people to love me. They loved David Sims, though. He has the common touch. He was able to inspire a nation. Naturally, his PR people had something to do with that.”

Anna sat back in her chair as the air expelled from her lungs.

“Are you well?” Harold asked.

“That’s why I’m here,” she said. “You want to use me.”

His gaze bored into her. “Yes, honesty is the best policy. You’re quite right. I want to use you. We’re the big boys and girls, and we can face unpleasant truths.”

“What have you done to him?”

“I’ve keep him drugged, Anna, heavily sedated. Some of my people have suggested I kill him, but—” Harold shook his head. “This isn’t China and I’m not Hong. David Sims was a great man once, a great patriot.”

“
You’ve drugged him?”

“He’s grown thin and becom
e irritable, at least when he’s awake.” Harold pressed his lips together. “That’s bad timing, bad timing for America. We need him to make a public announcement.”

“Why?” she asked. “You haven’t needed him before
this.”

“
It’s different. We’re…we’re about to invade Manchuria in joint alliance with Russia.”

“How many people do we have over there?”

“That’s classified information.”

“But—”

“I want him to stir the nation, Anna. I want the old David Sims. Remember the speech he gave the night he turned the ABM lasers on the world’s communications satellites?”

David Sims had sat erect onscreen, his manner firm, his eyes alight, with the signature American flag pinned to his navy blue suit.

“Yes,” Anna said, “I remember.”

“That was fantastic. He stirred
the people and made them proud again,” Harold said, tapping his heart. “I want him to do that again.”

She frowned. Why bother with something like that
? Then it began to dawn on her. David would give Harold’s action legitimacy. Maybe there was a turf war going on she didn’t know about. Maybe McGraw needed David to rouse the Americans over there. Harold could hold this over the general’s head. Yes, Harold wanted this because it would help him in some manner. The question became, should she help him get what he wanted? Ah. Another question arose. What would Harold give or pay for her help?

“I can do as you ask,” she said. “But I’m going to want something in return.”

“Really? Seeing your lover again isn’t enough?”

“We all have our motives for the things we do,” Anna said.

Harold sat up, and he became more interested. “That’s true enough.”

“I love David, but…”

“But what?” he asked, sharply.

“Director Harold, I have my secrets and you have yours. I’m not prying into yours.”

He grunted, and he watched her more closely, maybe with more respect. “What’s your price?”

Yes, she’d guessed correctly. People see what they want to. Harold lusted for power, and he would find it normal if others did as well.

“I want access,” she said.

“I don’t have room on my staff
for another—”

“Not access to you, Director, but to David.”

“Oh. I see. No…”

“Think about
it for a minute. You said David is becoming unmanageable. I’m sure it’s because he realizes he’s a prisoner. The weight of Presidential authority has taken its toll on him, as it has on every occupant of the White House chair. You’ve let him rest, and no doubt the old, assertive Sims is back, or reappearing.”

“You make me suspect
there’s a leak in my administration. How can you know these things?”

He talks as if he’s already the new President. Does he know how telling that is? Is he that aware
of himself? No. I doubt it
.

“
There are no leaks,” Anna said. “I just know my man.”

Harold put both feet on the carpet.
“Let me get this straight. You want access to David Sims, the man we’re keeping drugged?”

“Yes. I want to take care of him. I want to make sure you’re not destroying his mind.”

“What if we are?”