Path of the Tiger

by J M Hemmings

  Almost drowning out the Norsemen’s voices was a saccharine Mando-pop tune blaring from the vehicle’s speakers, its insincere effervescence serving only to mock the devastated landscape. No presence of anything that walked, crawled, slithered or flew could be detected, aside from the odd resilient cockroach they would spot scuttling across the broken walls.

  The driver lowered the volume of the music as he turned to speak to Hrothgar and Sigurd in broken, heavily accented English.

  ‘Okay, we very very careful now, see, bridge broken, okay? We drive through river, it a little … how to say, ah … unstable. You careful, hold careful, okay?’

  The man beamed a rotten-toothed smile at them and then cranked up the music again, muttering to himself as he navigated his way down the slope toward the stream. Sigurd peered through the gloom and saw that the shabbily constructed bridge had indeed been partially washed away, presumably by the massive floods that now regularly plagued this region. The stream was an unnatural yellow hue, almost fluorescent, and the water itself looked completely opaque. An oily metallic sheen shimmered on the surface, giving the flowing liquid the unsettling appearance of mercury.

  ‘By Geirröd,’ Sigurd muttered as he stared at the heavily polluted water. ‘This land has been hung, drawn, quartered … and slaughtered.’

  Hrothgar chuckled coldly.

  ‘One of the traditional execution methods here used to be that of, what do they call it, “a thousand cuts”? They have translated it well, no? They must have slashed a million cuts across this earth before giving it the coup de grâce.’

  Sigurd cracked his knuckles as the SUV ploughed through the polluted stream.

  ‘We in the West did the same to our lands. We lived through the age of industry, and what most of Europe did to their lands was not much different to this, as I recall. Mortals are short-sighted fools the world over, shield-brother. Myself, I prefer to finish my opponent with one stroke of the sword or axe. A warrior’s death should be clean and quick.’

  ‘Of course, but is Nature really an opponent to be bested in battle?’

  ‘We once thought so, didn’t we? But after all I’ve seen, all I’ve lived through, I must now say … no. The earth is a whore to be fucked, or a wealthy man whose riches are to be plundered, but not a foe to be massacred in battle. Keep your whore alive, so that you can keep fucking her. Keep your rich victim’s heart pumping, so that you can continue stealing from him. How can you profit endlessly off a dead thing?’

  Hrothgar shook his head and grimaced.

  ‘Tell that to these idiots.’

  ‘Fuck. Tell it to this glorified peasant who’s driving us. He’s profited handsomely from the drawn-out execution of his land. How much do you think this car is worth?’

  ‘German-made, top of the line … this wasn’t cheap, I can tell you that. He’s got taste … in vehicles. Perhaps not in clothing,’ Hrothgar smirked.

  Sigurd laughed with a brassy cackle.

  ‘Fucking nouveau riche prick! They’re the same everywhere, aren’t they?’

  ‘The same throughout the ages, shield-brother!’ Hrothgar replied with a chortle. ‘I hear there are plenty of them in this part of the world, particularly.’

  The SUV plunged into the yellow depths of the polluted stream, and bilious-looking water splashed up onto the windows, leaving a slick of oily film as it dribbled down the glass.

  ‘We don’t get sick like mortals do,’ Hrothgar remarked, a look of consternation suddenly drawn across his long, angular face, his, hard, craggy features folding into an expression of unease, ‘but do you think that pollution like this can harm us?’

  Sigurd echoed his friend’s frown, stroking his great braided beard as he studied the ruined stream.

  ‘I don’t know, but I don’t want to take that chance,’ he muttered. ‘We’ll do our business here and then get out as fast as possible. Bangkok is a dirty shithole, but it doesn’t have anything on this blighted place. Funny how a comparison for the worse makes one see things in a new light, no? Ha! “Bangkok the Beautiful”, after this hell!’

  Thirty minutes later they reached the grounds of what looked like an abandoned military base. Twenty-foot-high concrete walls, topped with tangled coils of razor wire, stretched out from side to side for at least a kilometre each way, and imposing steel gates stood silent and impassable before them. The driver parked the car and turned to beam his idiot’s grin at them again, moisture gleaming on his discoloured teeth and blackened gums.

  ‘We here, okay.’

  Sigurd nodded, glowering at the driver until the man turned around.

  ‘You’d think this stupid mortal would’ve put a drop of his riches into getting those fucking teeth looked at, wouldn’t you?’ he remarked snidely to Hrothgar, his upper lip curled with distaste. His hand slipped inside his coat pocket and his thick fingers came to rest on the handgrip of the Desert Eagle pistol he always kept holstered at his side. ‘I fear nothing,’ he whispered to himself under his breath. ‘I am the terror in the night, I am Death incarnate.’

  The driver, meanwhile, took out his phone and made a call. When the other party picked up, he jabbered gutturally in Mandarin and then turned around and gave the Norsemen another broken-toothed smile.

  ‘Boss come now, okay? We go inside, you talk boss.’

  Sigurd stared coolly at the man and nodded, waiting in silence for a few minutes before the gates began to creak open from the inside. The driver put the SUV into gear, and they rolled into the compound, which they soon noticed was not abandoned. Troops in grey and black urban camouflage gear manned the walls, and machine gun towers were positioned at key vantage points, invisible from the outside, but affording anyone occupying them a commanding view of the landscape. Rows of barracks occupied one corner of the compound, and a large open training ground covered another. Upon this flat expanse of concrete a number of uniformed children, who looked to be around nine or ten years old, were practicing hand-to-hand combat drills with AK-47 assault rifles with bayonets attached. Occupying the centre of the compound was a complex of buildings which seemed to be a school of sorts.

  The driver pulled up outside an office and gestured for Hrothgar and Sigurd to exit the vehicle. Sigurd climbed out and grunted, shaking out his heavy arms and stretching his long legs, which were aching with a dull and persistent pain after the five-hour drive. From the office waddled a short, plump Chinese man, middle-aged and dressed in a stylish gunmetal grey suit. The meticulously slicked but thinning hair atop his square, flat face added to his formal appearance.

  ‘Greetings Mr Yolkov and Mr Goremykin. My name is Mr Li; we spoke on the phone a few days ago. It is always a pleasure to do business with our neighbours from the north,’ he said in passable Russian, smiling warmly all the while and clasping his chubby hands together in a gesture of benevolent welcome.

  Sigurd and Hrothgar, who were posing as members of the Russian mafia, reciprocated the man’s greetings in perfect Russian. He pulled a silver cigarette case out of his jacket and offered them each a cigarette. They declined so he shrugged, popped one in his mouth and lit up before continuing to speak.

  ‘Would you like a tour of our operation first,’ he asked, ‘or would you prefer to skip that and get straight to examining the products?’

  Sigurd allowed his eyes to rove over the imposing geometric masses of concrete and steel before replying.

  ‘Let’s go on a little tour, Mr Li. I’d like to see how the product is created before we commit to a purchase.’

  Mr Li grinned and squeezed his hands together.

  ‘Of course, of course!’ he said, clapping a vigorous hand repeatedly on Sigurd’s back.

  Sigurd, who stood a full two heads taller than Mr Li, glared down at him with his ice-blue eyes, and then darted out a viper-striking hand to grip the man’s arm with sudden viciousness.

  ‘Don’t touch me,’ he hissed, with deadly wrath frothing in his eyes. ‘Ever.’

  Mr Li swallowed and nodded, withdrawi
ng his hand slowly and then letting it hang flaccidly at his side.

  ‘Come my friends,’ he said, a little less buoyantly this time. ‘Let me just call the manager. She can explain the details of the production process.’

  Mr Li ambled back into the office and returned a few moments later accompanied by a rotund, dour-looking Chinese woman in her fifties or sixties. She was outfitted in the same black and grey urban camouflage fatigues that the troops stationed around the facility were wearing, although she did not seem to be as fighting fit as any of the others who wore this uniform. From beneath thickly lidded eyes she stared with blank disinterest at the men before mumbling an unenthusiastic greeting in Mandarin from her down-turned fish mouth.

  ‘She says—’ Mr Li began.

  ‘Hello, welcome, whatever,’ Hrothgar growled Russian. ‘I don’t give a shit. Show us how you make your products.’

  Mr Li and the manageress began to walk at a brisk place towards the back of the office complex. Mr Li, smoking almost frantically, struggled to keep up on his stumpy legs, while Hrothgar and Sigurd trailed behind them and whispered to one another in Old Norse, keeping their eyes peeled for any signs of danger. Mr Li discarded his cigarette butt, and then they entered the back of the complex through a four-inch-thick steel door, which was manned by a pair of guards armed with a kitted-out HK416 assault rifles.

  As they stepped into the almost-pitch black room, Sigurd immediately noticed a temperature difference; whereas the outside air was humid and crisp, laced with a chill from the nearby mountains, the air in here was warm and dry.

  ‘This is the incubation room,’ Mr Li, who seemed a little out of breath from the brisk walk, explained.

  His assistant flipped a switch and a row of cool white strip lights flickered on, illuminating the long, narrow space. The Norsemen drew in sharp breaths of surprise at the sight that the light revealed: stretching down the length of the room was a seemingly endless row of baby incubators, each occupied by a single sleeping infant.

  ‘This is where the product begins its journey,’ Mr Li said. ‘Let’s have a look at one of the specimens. Come, over here, come close and see the attention to detail! We’ve spared no expenses.’

  Sigurd and Hrothgar walked over to the nearest incubator while the manageress glared with unabashed impatience at them. Mr Li pointed at a computer set up on the wall next to the incubator, from which a vine-tangle of cables hung, all of which were attached to a number of mechanical apparatuses both inside and outside the incubator.

  ‘This computer controls everything that happens inside the incubator. There is a schedule for feeding, with a mechanical nipple and milk formula, and a schedule whereby robotic arms rotate the infant. We have moisture sensors which determine when diapers need to be changed, which is done mechanically as well. Our system is very efficient, as you can see, and this way no external contaminants can enter the incubator. We do, however, expose the infants to small doses of various external elements to build and strengthen their immune systems from an early age: fur and dander from a range of wild and domestic animals, soil, insects, faeces, dust, a selection of essential microbes, and other such things.’

  Sigurd nodded, staring at the little infant in its plastic enclosure, asleep and oblivious to their presence.

  ‘These were all supposed to be aborted, weren’t they?’ Hrothgar asked. ‘I mean, by government decree. They’re all girls, right?’

  ‘Almost every product is female, yes, Mr Li answered. ‘It is, erm, well, you know, we have our cultural prejudices regarding boy children and girl children, and with the government law with the one child policy, well, now two children, officially … you understand, right? We pay the mothers good money to see the product through pregnancy and birth, and we help them to keep it a secret. They give us their female baby, and they can continue to try for a boy.’

  Sigurd nodded without taking his eyes off the baby before him, this tiny being that was so pink and vulnerable and helpless, and utterly isolated inside its tragic plastic cocoon. Deep within himself he felt a strange stirring of an emotion which he had not felt for a very long time … was this pity? Compassion, even? He shook off the sense of unease that accompanied this emotion and glanced up at Mr Li, growling out a reply.

  ‘Efficient, and beneficial to both parties. Yes. Tell me, are all the products sourced locally?’

  ‘If you mean, are they all ethnically Chinese, well yes, the majority are. However, as I mentioned before, we do have other ethnic groups on offer, as we realise that for certain jobs certain ethnicities are more suitable, in terms of being less conspicuous in different regions.’

  Mr Li began to walk as he continued talking while Sigurd and Hrothgar trailed along behind him, each still simultaneously awed and disturbed at the sights all around them.

  ‘Also, while most of our products are female, we do have a few male products too. As a matter of course they are castrated, with the testes removed from the time of infancy so that the infamous male appetite for sex does not interfere with their psychological and mental conditioning. If they are still with us by the time they should go through puberty, we administer hormone replacement therapy so that they develop normally. The females have their ovaries and wombs surgically removed before the onset of puberty for the same reason. Our products have unflappable mental focus; they are absolutely guaranteed to complete any mission assigned to them. Also, as I told you on the phone, we can ship the product worldwide. Passports, paperwork and national borders are not an impediment.’

  Sigurd stroked his beard and then slid his hands behind his back.

  ‘Good, good,’ he rumbled. ‘International shipping and multiple border crossings are definitely going to be needed for the products I intend to purchase.’

  ‘You are after the combat, espionage and assassination model, are you not?’

  ‘Yes. Two of them, as we discussed.’

  ‘Are you sure I couldn’t interest you two in some of our pleasure models, for a little extra? They are far cheaper than the combat models, and—’

  ‘I’m only interested in the combat and espionage models,’ Sigurd replied gruffly.

  Mr Li nodded and spoke in fast, chattering Mandarin to the manageress. He then turned to Hrothgar and smiled his tight-lipped plastic grin at him.

  ‘Are you interested in seeing what we call the “kindergarten phase” of the product development?’

  Hrothgar shook his head.

  ‘No, we don’t really give a shit about that. We’d like to see where the combat models are trained, however.’

  ‘It really is quite fascinating though, I assure you. The “kindergarten” phase is where we separate combat and espionage models from pleasure models, starting at age five, based on DNA analysis and various psycho-analytical tests which—’

  ‘I care about one thing, and one thing only,’ interjected Sigurd gruffly. ‘We just want to see how effective your combat and espionage models are.’

  Mr Li nodded and moved his hand to clasp Sigurd’s shoulder, stopping suddenly and withdrawing it shakily as he remembered Sigurd’s earlier threat.

  ‘Very well, comrades!’

  ‘We’re not your fucking comrades,’ Hrothgar rasped with blunt aggression.

  Mr Li took a red silk handkerchief from his blazer pocket and dabbed at his forehead, upon which beads of perspiration were beginning to glisten.

  ‘Understood, understood,’ he said.

  They left the climate-controlled incubator area and proceeded on to a gymnasium, where a group of eight-year-old girls and a few boys were engaged in hand-to-hand combat training. Some were fighting one another with wooden practice blades, others were grappling on mats, and yet others were sparring in boxing rings.

  ‘This is the hand-to-hand combat area. The products are trained exhaustively in the arts of ninjutsu, escrima, Krav Maga, western boxing, Brazilian jiujitsu, judo, Muay Thai, karate, capoeira, and of course your native Russian systema. We believe in equipping our products wi
th a wide variety of both armed and unarmed fighting skills, you see. Also, the products learn gymnastics and, for a more real-world-applicable style, parkour.’

  Hrothgar and Sigurd watched in silence as the little girls and the handful of boys struck blow after blow with mathematical precision and savage speed and power, and perfectly executed a number of holds, throws and locks.

  ‘Furthermore, as I’m sure you both know, as men who are members of a, how should I say, underground organisation, being an effective fighting machine is just as much about what is in your head as what you can do with your body. The next area we visit will be the mental conditioning area, and this is where the products receive their most intensive training of all. While we push them to the limits of their physical endurance and strength in the gym we’ve just looked at, and on the parkour ground, in here we push them to the limits of their psychological and emotional capabilities. We have isolation chambers where neither light nor sound can enter, water submersion tanks in which they eventually develop the capacity to hold their breath for a minimum passing standard of seven minutes, as well as rooms in which they must endure lengthy periods of both extreme heat and extreme cold. We also condition them against pain by beating them frequently.’

  Sigurd and Hrothgar both nodded appreciatively.

  ‘This is definitely the most efficient operation of this kind that I’ve come across, and I’ll tell you this, I’ve seen a few in my time,’ Sigurd remarked.

  ‘Perfection is what we strive for, Mr Yolkov,’ Mr Li said proudly. ‘Perhaps in business dealings with other Chinese you may have found perfection to be a distant second to the twin priorities of low cost and high output volume? Not so with us. You see, this company was founded by a collaboration of the German Nazi Forces and the Imperial Japanese Army during the Second World War. This facility was built under Japanese occupation, under the guidance and design of Nazi scientists and military commanders. The first products they were aiming to manufacture here were intended to be super-soldiers which would enable the Japanese and German coalition to take out key Allied or Chinese leaders and eventually win the war, but when the Allies took the upper hand in 1944 it had become obvious that the products would never be ready in enough time to make any kind of difference. Even so, they continued product development here, more out of a … morbid curiosity.’