Chapter Thirty-Nine
Tangshan, People’s Republic of China
June 27 -- 06:25 UTC/2:25 pm local time
This operation was different than the raid on the meeting between Hu Qi and Li Hong. This time Lu Ping wouldn’t just have a small force backing her up, but a whole company of soldiers from the People’s Liberation Army, as well as two dozen agents of the Ministry of State Security. And she had Feng and Yeung with her, the fellow survivors of her little band.
She shuddered to think how close to death she had come. It pained her to think of those who didn’t merely come close to death hat night, but had crossed through that shadowy vale. Wu Lei, Lin, Song and Han had all died that night when their “backup” had finally arrived. The backup that General Zhang had sent didn’t come to help them, but to wipe them out. It had only been through fierce courage that Lu Ping and her two compatriots had managed to fight their way out of the house. Lu Ping had personally shot both Hu Qi and Li Hong before her escape, and had had the presence of mind to grab the laptop from the table.
Jimmy Chen had done as he was instructed, and had fled at the first sign of danger, taking one of the two vans that the raiding group had arrived in. Lu Ping, Yeung and Feng got to the remaining van as quickly as they could and sped off into the night, losing themselves among the late night traffic of the city. They headed straight for the clothing store where they had held their meeting days before, and found Jimmy there nervously awaiting their arrival. He had gone to work at once breaking the encryption on the laptop.
In less than an hour--a very long stretch of time in which the survivors of the raid felt they might be raided themselves at any moment--Jimmy had cracked the encryption and found a pot of gold. The pot of gold came in the form of a folder marked insurance policy. Within the folder there were several text documents. Jimmy had called Lu Ping over to take a look. As she examined the documents herself, a feeling that was one part elation and one part dread had filled her up.
She had rushed immediately to the headquarters of the Ministry of State Security. She didn’t need to fret about who to trust any longer. Thanks to Hu Qi’s little insurance policy--which he had probably thought would protect him if he ever fell out of favor with the rest of the conspirators--she now knew who the double agents and traitors were in the Ministry. She also knew about what Viper had thought of as the “day of reckoning”, which Hu Qi referred to in his documents as X-Day.
Within a matter of hours the conspirators within the Ministry of State Security, the Ministry of National Defense, and the Recovery Team, as well as a few top Army officers, had been rounded up and placed under arrest. Only Zhang had gotten away. Zhang, who also went by another name--Mamba.
There had been some debate within the Chinese government about whether or not to pass along the details of X-Day to the rest of the world. The debate didn’t last long, however; humanity trumped the desire for maintaining secrecy. The result was that, other than the Fireblossom weapon that had been detonated prematurely in Los Angeles and the smaller, less destructive variant used in Pyongyang (an event which the North Koreans denied happened), not a single other one had been used as planned. Two dozen nations in Asia, Europe and North America, given the locations of all Violet Dawn cells within their borders, had acted swiftly, and Violet Dawn as an organization was now believed to be crippled.
Soon after the North Koreans discovered the factory where the Fireblossom weapons had been made, a dozen Chinese Air Force Shenyang J-16s had flown into North Korean air space and bombed the factory until it was no more than a smoking pile of ash and concrete. The North Koreans were angry at the violation of their airspace, but it had been determined that the risk of a souring relationship with the Democratic People’s Republic was a small price to pay to ensure that they did not possess the material and means to build more Fireblossom weapons for their own purposes. So Violet Dawn had been crushed, and their lethal weapons seized. Now for the final act.
Zhang had narrowly escaped capture, and the whole of the Chinese intelligence apparatus had been turned to finding him. It wasn’t just a matter of justice or revenge; Dragon’s Breath was still out there somewhere, and they could only assume that Zhang was either in possession of it or knew where it was hidden. In the early hours of the morning a tip had been received from an unknown informant that Zhang was holed up in a cabin owned by one of his sons-in-law out in the countryside.
That was where Lu Ping was headed now. The helicopter she was a passenger in was one of six, and they were to be met by three truckloads of soldiers who had set out two hours before from their base fifty miles away.
Lu Ping felt a strange sense of calm. For all she knew today could be the end of the world, if Zhang had Dragon’s Breath with him and decided to set it off rather than allow himself to be captured. Yet still she felt calm. Perhaps it was the fact that one way or another, the whole nightmare, all of the confusion and wondering and worry, would be over in less than an hour.
One thing had been settled for her. As confident as she was in her own abilities, she hadn’t been able to get past this question: Why had Zhang placed her at the head of the Recovery Team when there were so many others who had more experience in the field than her? Some had said that Zhang had done it out of deference to her father. She knew the true reason now. He had counted on her to fail.
The helicopter landed one at a time in an open field and the passengers disembarked quickly. Lu Ping conferred with Colonel Chun, who was in charge of the troops. He assured her that his men were ready to go. Lu Ping and those she had brought with her boarded the trucks and they headed off.
Twenty-five minutes later Lu Ping found herself lying flat on a hill, peering down at a cabin that stood alone next to a shallow creek. Every window was obscured by a drawn curtain, and no movement could be seen inside. They would move on the house anyway. Lu Ping crawled back below the line of sight of the cabin and walked down the hill. She handed the binoculars to the soldier who had lent them to her.
“We move in five minutes,” she said. “I don’t have to remind you of what’s at stake here.”
Colonel Chun, who stood nearby, nodded.
“I have given you and your men a description of what Dragon’s Breath will look like. If it is here it is important that we secure it before Zhang can set it off.”
Lu Ping could see the fear in the officer’s eyes. She went over to where Yeung and Feng stood. At the moment, she trusted these men above all other, both for their loyalty and their bravery, and she wanted them by her side. She nodded at them and they nodded back, none of them needing to say a word.
When the time came, it was Lu Ping who gave the order. The raiding party rounded the hill and headed for the cabin. Lu Ping led the way, with Yeung, Feng, and a dozen MSS agents at her side. Behind them was a line of soldiers decked out in fatigues. They moved quickly, but quietly, with weapons drawn. Halfway to the cabin some of the soldiers broke off and started on a course that would take them around to the rear of the cabin, where they would guard against any attempt at escape in that direction. Lu Ping and the rest of the party continued on their original course.
They mounted the porch like a silent wave cresting against a rocky outcrop. In a procedure that felt so familiar, Lu Ping stood aside while a soldier moved forward with a battering ram. Lu Ping counted off three second on her fingers, and on three the soldier battered the door in. Lu Ping entered the cabin first, and immediately she saw (formerly General) Zhang. He was sitting on a chair and watching a small television that was propped up on a milk carton. For a split second, as Zhang turned toward her, she was struck by how pathetic he looked. Just a thin man sitting in a tank top, boxers and dirty tube socks, his skinny legs looking birdish, watching a soap opera on a cheap TV. Then Zhang’s wide eyes narrowed, and in with one fluid motion he reached down and his hand back up. Lu Ping moved her lips to tell him to put his hands up, but before she could speak the words there was a flash of light and something hit her in the chest like a wre
cking ball. She fired three rounds in reflex and Zhang fell from his seat and crumpled to the ground.
The MSS agents and the soldiers rushed in then and spread out through the cabin, searching the rooms. One soldier walked to the spot where Zhang lay and kicked away the gun that had fallen from his grip.
Lu Ping inspected herself. The bullet had hit her in the chest, but had been stopped by her vest. She was okay, though she could expect a nasty bruise to form later. She moved to the spot where Zhang had fallen. He was still alive, but bleeding profusely. His breathing was quick and shallow as she stared up into her eyes. She saw pain in those eyes, but no fear.
“Why?” she asked. “What reason could you have had to help Violet Dawn? To lead them?”
He said nothing; he just smiled a red smile, his teeth stained with his own blood.
“The cabin is clear,” an MSS agent declared. “There’s no sign of Dragon’s Breath.”
Lu Ping looked at the man who had delivered the news, then back down at Zhang.
“Where is it?” she asked.
Zhang laughed, his laughter turning to coughs. Lu Ping knelt beside him.
“Your cause is lost,” Lu Ping said, “You have nothing left to win. Tell me where it is.”
“You’ll never find it,” Zhang rasped. “It’s not…it’s not…”
He coughed up some blood.
“It’s…not…over,” he managed to finish.
As if these words had taken the last energy he had in him, he died then, his eyes open and staring at Lu Ping. For a moment she considered closing his eyes. But she left them open.
“Search the cabin again,” she demanded.
But she knew the truth of it. Dragon’s Breath wasn’t in the cabin. It was out there somewhere. And someone knew where it was.