Luke looked at him insolently.
“You have already been more trouble than you are worth, Mr. Redhead,” the soldier said. “You’d better hope we don’t find many more pick-ups between here and Washington. If the truck gets too full, it’s possible that accidents may happen to some of you.”
“Washington state or the city?” I asked quickly.
My reason for the question was to take his attention from Luke, who looked like he was about to do some more poking. It was risky asking questions, but no riskier than Luke getting killed for impertinence.
The soldier turned his gaze on me.
“We think it is important to take you to a work camp in an unfamiliar area,” he said. “Less chance of trouble. But trucking you all the way across the country is cost prohibitive. New workers are relocated north and south, not east and west.”
“The city then,” I replied, surprised that he was happy to talk.
“Yes,” he said. “The city.”
“You speak English very well,” I said. “Where did you learn it?”
“Stanford,” he said. “I went to graduate school there. American graduate schools are a joke. Or were...”
“You have an advanced degree?” I asked. “What are you doing on a detail like this?”
“Like I said, American graduate schools were a joke. Most businesses and government agencies at home consider my Doctorate in Anthropology to be little better than the Chinese equivalent of a master’s degree.” The soldier stepped over to the restroom door and rapped loudly. “You are taking a long time, honey. Hurry up!”
It was then, over his shoulder, that my eyes were drawn to the shadows at the corner of the bathroom block. At first, I thought I was hallucinating, but when I concentrated there was no doubt. Someone in a ski mask, their head a darker shape in the shadows, was peering at us from the corner of the building.
I didn’t react. I was pretty sure the others didn’t spot our visitor, and the arrogant soldier was oblivious.
Then the shape was gone, vanishing so quickly I almost questioned whether I had really seen anything.
“You have until I count to three,” the soldier yelled and banged on the door. “After that, if I must, I will come in and help you finish up.”
“You bloody ...” Ben started, but Luke and I quickly stepped between him and the soldier.
“That won’t help, Ben,” I said, for the benefit of our captor, then mouthed just wait before: “It’ll just get you beaten up like us.”
Ben and Luke looked at me with eyebrows raised but we all turned to the soldier when he began to count.
“One ... two ... thr-”
He didn’t finish his count. We saw him tense and stiffen before stumbling away from the door and spinning around to look at us angrily. We stepped back as he reached over his shoulder grasping for something.
“What ...?” he began but crumpled to the ground before he could finish.
I rushed over to him and fell to my knees, twisting my back to him so I could get my bound hands close to the knife that hung on his belt.
“Quick, help me get his knife,” I said to Luke. “We can cut our wrists free and get the hell out of here.” I knew the person in black had done this, but I had no way of knowing if the enemy of my enemy was my friend. If we could get free and get the truck, we might not need to find out.
“Um, Isaac,” Luke replied, looking over my shoulder and not moving.
“What are you waiting for Luke? Hurry!”
“Isaac, there are two guys dressed like Ninjas right behind you.”
“Yes,” said Ben, stepping up beside him. “And they aren’t the turtle kind.”
I spun around and saw the black clad person I had seen before and a taller man, dressed identically. They weren’t really dressed as Ninjas, I realized; they were in black Kung Fu gear with ski masks. The taller one was holding a sort of tube thing in his hands and I realized it was a blowgun. My friend Tommy used to have the NERF version of one – we’d played with it the last time I had seen him.
“Cut them free,” the taller figure said to his partner. “I’m going to go see if Allie and Arthur have secured the truck.”
“This guard said there was another one around the back of the building,” I said.
“Already taken care of, before we got your friend out through the bathroom window,” our mysterious savior said as he walked away.
“Is Brooke safe?” Ben asked the one who approached us.
“The girl? Yes. Well, as safe as can be expected,” he said, producing a pocket knife. “Turn around and I’ll free your hands.”
He quickly cut us free and pulled his mask off to reveal a teenage face framed by shaggy blond hair. With the ski-mask off, he looked more like a surfer than a Ninja.
“Thanks,” I said. “I’m Isaac, this is Luke and Ben.”
“I’m John,” he replied. “Follow me. Sonny wants us to gather at the truck.”
“What truck?” Luke asked.
“The one you came in of course. Come on.”
We followed John back to the truck, where we found two more ‘Ninjas’. They were standing over two more Chinese soldiers who were laid out next to the cab; both of their heads rested at awkward angles.
“Oh dear,” Ben said, quietly.
As we reached them, the taller one, and a girl with long dark hair holding her ski mask in her hand, led Brooke out to us. The tall one, who was obviously the leader, then pulled off his mask.
He was Chinese.
I guess I flinched, because he looked at me and immediately burst out laughing.
“Don’t freak out, man,” he said in a perfect American accent, and held out his hand. “I’m not one of them, but luckily I have their genes or I’d have been dead meat when the Flu hit. I’m Sonny Li.”
I shook his hand and introduced our group. Within a few minutes, we had our backpacks back, and, happily, also our weapons. They had been confiscated by the Chinese back at Will’s and had been loaded into a cargo trunk under the side of the truck. Obviously, the Chinese didn’t allow Will’s group to keep more weapons than necessary.
Sonny offered us refuge with his group for as long as we wanted. Unlike my first impression of Will, Sonny came across as welcoming and honest from the get go and besides, he had demonstrated clearly that he wasn’t in cahoots with the Chinese. They were based in Worcester too, which was our next goal, so we all agreed to take up their offer.
“You guys get the truck loaded, I have something to take care of. John, you can help me.”
They headed back to the restrooms and when they returned, Sonny was wearing the uniform of the man who had been escorting us. The look on his face was grim and it didn’t take much to work out what he’d done with the unconscious officer. From the rear of the truck where I was about to climb in, I saw them drag the two bodies by the truck away.
When they were done John climbed in with us and Sonny closed the roller door. The pit stop had come at the first rest area on the freeway between Worcester and Boston. Sonny’s other ‘ninjas’ were all teenagers – Allie, Karen, and Arthur.
During the trip Sonny’s crew were very forthcoming, and we asked a lot of questions.
It turned out Sonny was a Chinese-American, born in China less than a week before his parents had come to live in the United States. Sonny had no memories of his homeland. He barely spoke Chinese as his father had been adamant that he be raised as an American. The only place where this didn’t apply was in martial arts. Mr. Li had made sure his son was well-trained in traditional Chinese arts, such as Tai Chi and Wing Chun Kung Fu.
Sonny had apparently taken such training to heart. The others explained he’d won several martial arts tournaments as a teen and young adult and, when the infection came, the 28-year old Sonny had been the sifu of one of the most popular martial arts academies in the state.
Arthur, John, Allie, and Karen were what remained of his students, along with Mark and Samara who had been left bac
k at their base of operations. I didn’t let on about my own Kung Fu experience just then. We had only just met them and as good as the first impressions were, I felt it might be better to keep my cards close to my chest, especially given what had happened when we trusted Will and his group.
After a quick stop at a department store outside of Worcester to load some supplies into the back of the truck, we were soon on our way to the martial arts academy where Sonny and his students had been holed up since Hell Week.
19
Sonny parked the truck in the underground garage next to the academy and we helped unload the supplies they’d picked up. The academy took up the whole ground floor of a low-rise building. It was carpeted and tidy, with equipment and gear stowed neatly on shelving against the wall. I also saw a rack of assorted hand weapons that took my interest.
When we were done, we sat around a table drinking long life apple juice Sonny had poured us as the others packed away the new supplies. I asked him if he’d felt safe driving the truck.
“They mark their trucks with a special paint on the top to identify them to their satellites, so until the truck is reported as overdue, Chinese monitoring won’t pick up the truck as a threat. Of course, it’s lucky they don’t have checkpoints set up here yet. I’m not so confident I could have bluffed my way through a face to face meeting. Uniform or no uniform.”
“Will you get rid of it?” asked Luke.
“Yeah, we can’t keep it very long. Tonight after dark we’ll drive it to a different parking garage and burn it,” Sonny said. “This’ll make the third truck we’ve hijacked from them in two weeks, so the heat might be on if they work out where we’ve ended up.”
“Third?” I said. “And they haven’t changed their routines or sent an armed response?”
“Just choppers. I think the first couple of times they probably thought it’s just a group of kids. Might be different this time, given that there were prisoners in it and that we killed four soldiers instead of the two we were expecting. We have a radio from the soldier in the first truck we took, so we listen in on their chatter now and then, although I’m the only one here that even partially understands it.”
“They’re probably speaking Mandarin, while it sounds like you might be Cantonese,” Brooke said.
“That’s right, how did you know?” He looked impressed.
“They call you Sifu,” Brooke said. “That’s a Cantonese term. In Mandarin, the term is Shifu – subtle, but still a difference.”
“You speak Chinese?” Sonny asked.
“Just a little,” she replied, blushing. “I had a year of Mandarin, and the teacher often liked to point out the difference between Mandarin and Cantonese.”
“Do you or any of your blokes know Morse code, by any chance?” Ben asked, stepping up beside his sister and placing a hand on her shoulder.
“I think Arthur and John have a handle on it,” Sonny said. “They were both Boy Scouts. Why?”
We spent a half hour telling Sonny what we knew of the message and what we had worked out. I think we’d all just decided it had to be done. We had to trust someone, and this seemed like the right opportunity and the right company to do it in.
“Do you have a normal radio with AM reception?” I asked. “It would be great to get the message written down, so we have more to go on.”
“Of course, although we haven’t turned it on in weeks. I hadn’t even thought of trying the AM channels,” Sonny said, and pointed to Luke and me. “We’ll get it out later. Let’s check your injuries first, you two especially look like you’ve been in the wars.”
Sonny, who apparently had some medical knowledge but no formal training, took some time to check over our assorted injuries and bruises. Brooke made herself scarce when Luke and I took off our shirts while Ben looked as if he was torn between mentioning his dog bite on the backside or following his sister out the door. In the end he chose the latter and Luke and I had a chuckle.
“Anything I should be aware of?” asked Sonny.
“No, nothing,” I said, still smiling.
Sonny probed the lump on my forehead as gently as he could, but it hurt like hell. I sucked in a pained breath.
“Sorry. I don’t think your skull is fractured, but you probably still have a mild concussion. The lump on your head and the black eyes will fade in a week or two.”
My arm and shoulder had come out in a massive purple bruise where the rubber bullet had hit me, but again he didn’t think there were any fractures or permanent damage.
At least the new injuries meant I barely even felt the muscle I had strained in my thigh anymore. He moved on to Luke. Luke’s ribcage was badly bruised and based on the tenderness, Sonny thought he may have some cracked ribs.
“Of course, without an X-ray it’s impossible to tell, but I’ll strap you up anyway.”
He didn’t show any signs of concussion when Sonny looked into his eyes. Apparently, the Chinese soldiers had been quite skillful in disabling us without doing too much damage.
When he was done, he looked us over.
“You guys look beat and after what you went through, who can blame you? Go ahead and take a load off. The practice mats make excellent beds. I’ll wake you if we learn anything new.”
That is exactly what we did. The practice mats did make rather good mattresses to sleep on compared to the rocky ground, although they weren’t really comparable to a real bed … beggars aren’t choosers though. Ben and Brooke bunked down with us too and Sonny made sure the other kids gave us some time to ourselves.
Luke and Ben were snoring almost as soon as they lay down and Brooke was sleeping soundly not long after.
I was tired too, but it took a while for me to get to sleep. I was thinking about how lucky we had been. Lucky that our captors had chosen to stop where they had, lucky that Sonny and his group had been out that particular night on one of their ‘missions’ to harass the enemy.
Hopefully it meant our fortunes were turning.
I also thought about Sonny. He had been born in China, but raised as an American, and he had a rage inside of him that scared me a little when I heard him talk about the Chinese that were invading his ‘homeland.’
He seemed competent at leading his group of students and, if the trophies in the case by the front doors of the academy were any indication, he was probably capable of kicking a tremendous amount of butt. I worried though, what would happen to him and his wards if the Chinese military decided to launch a strike on Worcester to stop the truck disappearances.
I did not want to be here when that went down.
A few isolated patrols without support were one thing, but somehow I doubted that Sonny’s ‘Ninjas’ would be up to taking on a larger group of Chinese soldiers focused on hunting them down. I decided I would do my best to talk them into coming with us to the safe haven. They would certainly be an asset to our little group.
Finally, my weariness got the better of me and I fell asleep feeling more hopeful than I had since the dog attack. I rarely remember my dreams, but that day I clearly remember dreaming of Sarah on a road winding its way through a forest. She was walking away from me and wouldn’t look back, no matter how loud I called or how far I followed her.
It was late afternoon before Sonny woke us up. He told us that both Arthur and John had listened to the coded message, and confirmed it was the same message repeated over and over, switching frequencies every other time.
“Maybe its automated? It might even be a trap?” he worried.
“Maybe, but I don’t think the Chinese would go to all that trouble when they just round up everyone,” said Luke. “They have all the time in the world, after all.”
Excited, we all rushed to the kitchen where Arthur and John sat by the radio.
Arthur slid the writing pad to me.
Safe haven NH. Look for the dragon on the White Mount.
“So, there’s no actual location? This isn’t much more than we already knew,” I said, slightly dis
appointed.
“No, it figures,” said Luke. “They can’t be too detailed; it has to be cryptic in case the Chinese come across it. I don’t even know if they use Morse code, but if they do, the message is backwards and only contains clues. It’s pretty clever, really. Let me get my atlas, now that we have light and my fingers aren’t ice blocks.”
He rushed out of the room.
“When we go, are you going to come with us?” I asked. “We’d be glad to have you.”
Sonny didn’t answer straight away, perhaps conscious of the stares from Arthur and John.
“I don’t know,” he said. “We have it pretty sweet here at the moment, but who knows how long that will last?”
“True. And think, even if we don’t find any other survivors there, it’s going to take the Chinese longer to colonize the mountains of New Hampshire than it is the urban centers like Worcester,” I said.
He nodded, looking thoughtful.
“We’d have to think on it and run it by the others to see what they think.”
Luke hustled back in, slamming the atlas on the table and pouring over the map of New Hampshire. I looked over his shoulder as he ran his finger over and around the part of the map showing the White Mountains National Forest. His finger halted after only 30 seconds, then he pressed it into the page hard enough for the tip to go white.
“There it is my friends!” he declared, looking at me triumphantly. He was pointing at a spot in the national park identified as ‘Drake Mountain’.
“Drake Mountain?”
The others joined us, jostling for a view and bumping heads.
“Yes!” he said.
“Drake Mountain? What about it?”
“Drake! Drake is another word for dragon! Dragon on the white mount!”
“Ah, of course!” I said, the penny finally dropping.
“I’ve been there!” said a voice behind us. It was Allie, she had come into the room as we crowded over the map. “My parents took me to the Drake Mountain Ski Resort two years ago!”
Fight Like Hell [America Falls Series | Books 1-6] Page 11