by Chris Harris
A man walked toward him and held out his hand which the general automatically took and shook. The man spoke to him in perfect Mandarin. “General, welcome. Thankfully we got you out of there just in time. When we got the report yesterday of what had happened to you, we knew we had to act.”
Taken aback at being addressed in his native language, he covered his shock and to counter, replied in English. Not as perfect, but understandable. “Is it you I must thank for saving my life?”
The man shook his head and chuckled. “I think the main thanks should go to Sergeant Cho, but yes, I played a part in organizing it.”
General Liu snapped to attention and saluted. He pulled his gun from its holster and reversed it before handing it grip first to the man. “Please accept my surrender.”
In reply the man saluted smartly. “Sebastian Walker at your service, sir. I think you misunderstand; we do not want your surrender. We need your help to end this war.”
The general bristled indignantly. “I will never betray my country. I have offered my surrender and expect to be treated as your military code sets out.”
Sebastian held his arms up in a calming gesture. “Please, General, let me explain. Cho has reported that you are an honorable soldier who tried to help American citizens when you discovered what certain branches of your government had done. It was as abhorrent to you as it is to us.
“I suspect, General, that if you were in complete control then the job to free our country would be a whole lot more difficult. You would have been a worthy adversary, but now we want to make you an honorable friend. You are shrewd enough to realize that you will ultimately lose this war. If it was waged differently as you well know you probably would be close to winning total victory by now.
“You have not secured our nuclear arsenal, nor ever will. Our allies are preparing and when the time is right we will strike. The American nation is hurt but not beaten. You miscalculated who you were dealing with—”
General Liu interrupted him, “Mister Sebastian Walker you are right. Many times I tried to make my superiors listen to sense, but more powerful voices than mine prevailed. But I repeat, I have surrendered and will never betray my country.”
Sebastian handed his pistol back. “I do not wish to accept your surrender, sir. I want your help to save your country from total annihilation, because if your country continues on the path it has chosen then that will happen. I am sure you want that to happen far less than most.” Sebastian turned as someone called out to him.
Turning back, he continued. “If you would excuse me, sir. I have an urgent matter I must attend to. If you could remain under the care of Sergeant Cho until I return, we can continue our conversation. And I believe others far above my paygrade will want to talk to you too.”
“Of course, Mister Walker, I understand. But before you go could you tell me what branch of your government you work for?”
Sebastian replied in perfect Mandarin, “Please, call me Sebastian. And I no longer work for the government, sir. I am the concierge at the Waldorf Astoria hotel in New York.”
Stunned into silence Liu watched Sebastian don body armor that someone brought to him and run out the door to join a convoy of cars and pickup trucks that sped off down the dirt track.
Liu accepted a coffee and a chair from his former aide. Sipping it, he looked at Cho. “A Concierge! I now fully understand why we will never win.”
Chapter
Twelve
San Antonio
The Russian troops had moved Madeline and the bound Fen Shu into the kitchen area of the café and were hard at work fortifying their position.
A captain, who spoke excellent English, was assigned to protect her along with his platoon of battle-hardened elite troops. Stripping a bulletproof vest and ballistic helmet from one of the dead Chinese soldiers outside, he washed the blood from them and requested politely that Madeline put them on. Once she had, she slung one of the bodyguard’s compact sub machine guns over her shoulder and picked up the handgun, holding it firmly.
The captain nodded at her in respect. Fully aware of who he was assigned to protect he kept her up to date with the situation. The plan was simple: once she had been located, the troops rushed to her position and created a secure cordon to await transport out of the city.
As the Russians disengaged from fighting the Chinese troops and pulled back to her location, a silence descended over the city that had previously echoed with the sound of automatic rifle fire and explosions.
“Captain, how are we getting out of here?” Tanner asked in a strong voice designed to show everyone listening that she was in charge.
“Madam President, the American resistance will provide us with transport. They know we have located you and they are on their way.”
“What about the Chinese, won’t they have something to say about that?”
“Yes, they will,” the Russian officer replied equably, “and I do not suggest that this will be an easy thing we do. There are few of us and many of them. We hit as much of their command network and troop concentrations as we could identify as we were jumping in. The units we initially engaged were already caught unawares and were overcome with relative ease. I imagine currently they are pouring more troops into the area to try to wipe us out. They are not an army of conscription and the soldiers we will be against will be their very best. So no, Madam President, we are, as the saying goes, ‘not out of the wood yet.’”
She glanced down at the pistol in her hand with evident meaning. “Well, I won’t let go of this then.”
Fen Shu had overheard this and began shouting obscenities at them in both English and Mandarin. But she fell silent and her face showed real fear when Madeline turned to her.
“Oh sweetie, have no fear. If we are about to be overrun I will save the last bullet for you. There is no way you are escaping the justice that is coming your way. Captain? Gag her, please.”
The captain smiled and ordered two of his men to hold down the wildly fighting woman, so he could stuff a rag in her mouth and hold it in place with the tape he roughly wound around her head. Her struggles immediately ceased as she fought for breath through the blood that had clotted in her recently broken nose.
The captain smiled as her face turned bright red with the effort. “Don’t worry,” he added with professional cruelty, “we will not let her die. Yet…”
Chapter
Thirteen
Half an hour later the captain listened to an incoming message coming through his headset and turned to Madeline.
“Madam President. The transport will soon be here. Please, we must get ready to depart the moment they arrive.” Walking to the front of the shop she could see hundreds of Russian paratroopers all with weapons raised, utilizing all available cover to defend her from the enemy they expected to appear from any quadrant.
Out of sight to the left, gunshots rang out as the defenders exchanged fire with Chinese troops who were probing and trying to break through the solid ring of defense around her location.
She was surprised at the numbers and knew there were probably more in positions she could not see. “Are they sending enough transport for all of us?” Tanner asked.
“I do not know, Madam President, but we will find out when they arrive I expect,” the hulking Russian replied before laughing briefly. “I am a fan of your American movies Black Hawks Down. We can always run the San Antonio mile. Anything you Americans can do, us Russians can do better.” He stood taller as he bragged, puffing his chest in self-belief. “But do not have the fear; we will all get out of this city one way or another.”
She smiled at his humor and patted his arm. “I hope it does not come to that, Captain.”
Ten minutes later more gunshots could be heard in the distance. As the minutes wore away the sounds of gunfire got closer. The distant sounds of battle began to increase in tempo until it was continuous.
The captain, now with a worried look on his face, approached Madeline. “Madam Pres
ident, we have hit a problem. The transport is heavily engaged with a strong opposing force and are unable to proceed any further. It is recommended by my superiors that we proceed to their location and render assistance.”
He expected her to falter after telling her they were going to confront more danger if they were to get out of the city, but again she surprised him. Tightening the strap on the helmet that was too large for her, so it did not keep falling forward covering her eyes, she pushed the handgun she was holding into a strap on her body armor and reached for the small stubby machine gun that hung from a strap around her shoulders.
Inspecting it briefly, she found and pressed the button that ejected its magazine, checked it and reinserted it into place, and pulled the charging handle. “Let’s go. The longer we wait the more of those brave people who are trying to rescue us will die.”
A senior officer approached and spoke rapidly in Russian to the captain.
“This is Major Egorov, he is asking for me to make translate of instructions to you.”
Madeline shook the major’s hand with a nod of greeting and listened as the captain translated.
The captain would escort her in the center of a tight knot of his men. The rest of his force would form more circles of protection radiating out from her position. If they engaged in a firefight, which they fully expected, she would lie on the ground and the captain and his men’s sole job would be to put their bodies in the way of her and the danger.
He apologized in advance if she might be manhandled roughly but emphasized that her safety was his primary, secondary, and tertiary concern. She smiled at his seriousness.
Five minutes later, with every soldier fully briefed and in position, they set out toward the source of the firing that still echoed through the city streets. Fen Shu was manhandled to her feet by two soldiers. They kept her hands bound behind her back but untied her feet.
Moving at a fast walking pace Madeline could see little through the phalanx of soldiers that surrounded her. The two flanking her both kept a hand on the drag handle on the back of her body armor, to both stop her stumbling and to help her keep up the pace. Her inability to speak Russian did not stop her understanding the meanings of the short conversations and short one-word sentences shouted between the group surrounding her, as orders were given, or as a soldier tripped or stumbled.
Gunfire close by made the soldiers surrounding her stop. She could not tell if it came from the Chinese or Russians, but as the volume increased, she knew it was coming from both sides. With no warning the two holding her drag handle pushed her roughly to the floor. A weight pressing on her back made her realize one was using his knee to hold her down. She lay on the floor holding her gun in her hands, listening to the sounds of battle raging around her.
In her political career she had attended countless meetings, visited numerous bases, and sat on many committees which were concerned with the armed forces. She had listened to many reports regarding skirmishes, small-scale fights and large battles, which the soldiers of the United States had been involved in over the years. As a consequence, she thought she knew what the modern soldier had to endure in battle.
She realized she had no idea what it was really like at all. The firing, shouting, screaming, and utter confusion could never be portrayed in a report read by a bored aide. The fear was also something you could not begin to imagine as you went into sensory overload, your brain trying to cope with so many things going on at once. Coupled with the fact a bullet could end your life at any second, she found it the most terrifying, but at the same time the most exhilarating experience of her entire life.
She had listened to soldiers when they explained that when the bullets start flying, you are no longer fighting for your country, but for your brothers in arms who are beside you, fighting just as hard as you to stay alive, to get back to family and loved ones. She had nodded her politically trained head and put a compassionate look on her face to show she understood.
Now she actually understood what they meant. She was surrounded by soldiers from another country who had parachuted into a nation they had trained to fight. Not as conquerors, but liberators, all fighting as hard as each other just to stay alive. These soldiers, ordered by their government to parachute into a city most had never heard of before they looked at a map, to attempt to rescue her, were just fighting to stay alive.
A soldier kneeling in front of her screamed in pain and fell backwards holding his hands to his leg. Blood began pouring from between his fingers as he tried to stem the flow from the wound. She did not need to understand the one-word sentence his comrades kept repeating at the tops of their voices: they were calling for a medic.
Unable to move with the soldier still kneeling on her back Madeline reached out with her arm to attempt to offer the soldier help. Frustrated at the helplessness she felt at only being able to pat his leg to offer him comfort, she decided she needed to do more.
She pushed upwards and with a shout of annoyance, the soldier kneeling on her back was unbalanced. She turned and stopped him pushing her back down by holding her hand up and then pointing toward the injured man. He immediately understood that she wanted to help.
He nodded in agreement and as she crawled toward the stricken man, he crouched next to her covering as much of her as he could with his own body. Her mind dragged up memories of a first aid course she had attended long ago but as she looked at the blood-soaked trousers covering the soldier’s leg, she knew his injury went far beyond the simple bandaging and wound dressing she had been taught.
A soldier next to her shoved an aid kit he’d pulled from one of his pouches into her hands. Ripping it open she pulled the soldier’s hands away from his wound and, using scissors from the kit, cut the trousers to inspect it.
The wound was not spurting blood which she took as a good sign. Not understanding the writing on the packages within the kit she ripped a few open until she found a large wound dressing which she pressed against the ragged hole in the man’s leg and wound a bandage tightly around it.
The bandages soon changed red and blood began dripping from them indicating her efforts had not stopped the bleeding. To her relief the medic arrived, pushing through her surrounding guards. His uniform, hands, and face were stained with blood from his previous patients.
He took one look at what she had done then pulled a tourniquet from his bag and applied it above the wound. As he finished and was closing his bag he looked at Madeline and said, “Good work.” Then as quick as he arrived he was gone.
Madeline had been concentrating on her task so hard, the sounds of fighting had faded into the background, but they returned to full volume when the captain shouted at her to get ready to move.
Helping the wounded soldier to his feet she put her arm around his shoulder to support him as they began moving again. The men around her continually fired their weapons as they fought their way through any opposition they encountered. Her world shrunk to the small area around her as she put all her efforts into helping the wounded man until, at a shouted command, the knot of men surrounding her stopped.
Gently helping the man to the ground, he kept repeating the only Russian word she understood, “Spasibo,” meaning ‘thank you.’
Her phalanx of guard parted briefly to admit the captain to its protected core. “We wait here, Madam President. The convoy is close. The major is preparing to attack. When it is successful we will proceed.”
“Thank you, Captain. And dare I ask what we do if it is not successful?”
He gave Madeline a big smile. “Then we get the chance to do the San Antonio mile!”
Madeline helped the injured soldier back up and they moved against the wall of a large building and waited. Abruptly the sound of gunfire increased to a crescendo of firing and explosions as more than two hundred Russian paratroopers joined in the fray.
For over five minutes the battle raged until it finally began to peter out. After listening to his radio, the captain turned to her.
/> “The Chinese are defeated; the area is clear. We are finishing to make checks of the area and we will be on our way.”
She breathed a sigh of relief. The men around her also relaxed slightly, still with their weapons held ready but exchanging a few smiles and back slaps with their comrades in arms. Madeline stood up to see the major approaching with a civilian by his side. They were conversing in Russian. As soon as he spotted her the civilian stopped talking, let the weapon he was carrying fall to his side, and saluted.
“Madam President, my name is Sebastian. If you are ready shall we get you to somewhere safer?”
“Thank you, Sebastian, for coming to get us. Tell me, are you the leader of the local resistance or military?”
“No, Madam, I am neither. I am the concierge at the Waldorf Astoria hotel in New York.”
For once stunned into silence she helped the injured Russian soldier to his feet and, still holding a gun in one hand, walked toward the waiting transport.
Chapter
Fourteen
Holly River Base, WV
Bear Grayson took off his headset and turned to the men in the room. “Steve, your wife is out of San Antonio and in a safe place. Getting her to a secure location is now priority number one.”
Steve slumped back in his chair, relief washing over his face. “I need to get to her.”
Gus slapped him on his back. “Trust me, Steve. Whatever you think, you will be way down on the list of who wants to see her.”
Captain Troy Gardner sat thinking silently. Since returning from the aborted mission to release the prisoners from the camp at Caldwell where he and his men had seen the missiles streaking overhead, he had sat brooding as all the coordinated attacks that had been planned were put on hold, including the mission to rescue the scientists sheltering in a secure underground laboratory at Fort Deitrich. They were meant to be a priority as they were confident they could manufacture an effective treatment as soon as they got samples of the virus and a means to mass produce it.