“That is wonderful news, Leader.”
“Over one hundred years ago, the Japanese fought the battle of Coral Sea. They suffered some minor losses and pulled back. The Americans struck at us in the Tasman Sea with THOR missiles, and inflicted losses against us.”
“This is terrible news.”
“No,” the Chairman said. “We survived, and Ling destroyed the invasion fleet and has been sinking American submarines at a prodigious rate. It is very gratifying. However—”
Hong pointed the pigeon stick at Shun Li.
She sat erect, waiting for the worst.
“There are hints that more American task forces slink around the area,” Hong said.
“Will Admiral Ling sink them too, Leader?”
Hong stared at her, and she wondered in what manner she had misspoken.
“Are you faithful to me?” Hong asked.
“With all my heart, Leader,” she said.
“I want to believe you. Yes, I’ve sent you to do many unpleasant tasks. Yet isn’t that the lot of a Police Minister?”
“It is, Leader.”
“Would you like a different post, Shun Li?”
She hesitated for just a fraction of a moment. Indeed, she would. The bloodletting wearied her soul. It stained her, she knew, and she’d become afraid of an accounting someday.
With her hesitation, something changed behind Hong’s dark eyes. They seemed to glitter, and it wasn’t good, but a dark evil.
“No,” Shun Li said. “I am what I am. Your question so startled me, that for a moment I could not speak.”
Those wet eyes watched her, and she felt the furnace heat of his wickedness. Yes, it was evil the things he’d done. Murdering his foes, unleashing nuclear war—the Leader had become a human devil.
What are you thinking? Shun Li asked herself in alarm. It’s possible he can read thoughts, or sense emotions like an empath. Some of his guesses and political moves were uncanny, unnatural, possibly supernatural.
“You are lying to me,” he said in a quiet voice.
She wanted to shudder, but suppressed it. Instead, as calmly as possible, she parted her lips and laughed gently. This was a gamble, but she felt the need to do something.
At first, the shine in his eyes intensified, and she knew the guards would throttle her soon at his orders. Then he smiled, and he, too, chuckled.
Shun Li stopped, letting herself listen to his laughter. It was frightening.
“You speak truth, Police Minister. You are a killer, my killer. You will do exactly as I tell you, won’t you?”
“With all my heart, Leader,” she said. “I live to obey China.”
“It is good to have at least one person you can rely on. I won’t say I fully trust you. That is too difficult to mouth, and who would believe it? But I can rely on you to carry through chilling tasks.”
“That is why I am here,” she said. And that is what I must escape, she thought.
“Yes. I ordered Admiral Ling back to the Coral Sea. We have lost too many carriers, and I cannot risk his in the submarine-laced Tasman Sea. Nor can I risk losing the battleship. Its particle beam cannon performed prodigiously during the THOR strike.”
“That is wonderful news.”
“Indeed, we have found an answer to them. And the construction of more PBW stations around the country continues. Unfortunately, the Americans still possess a few tricks. But we shall overcome them through our superior technology. Once our new particle beams stations can defend every area of China from THOR missile attacks, then we will unleash a new nuclear strike. The Americans are going to learn a harsh lesson.”
“They deserve nothing better,” Shun Li said.
The Chairman grunted an affirmative. “As I said, you perform chilling tasks. I have another one for you. It is possible the Americans will try to land a few amphibious troops onto Australia. Some of the Australians might be foolish enough to throw in their lot with America. Most of our occupation forces are in the northern and central parts of the continent. The deserts have bloomed, and the grain shipments are everything. I have promised the Indians and Russians much, and I need Australia’s bounty. Shun Li, you will take East Lightning operatives and cull the Australian herd for China.”
“Leader?”
“You must risk going to the continent, finding and killing those who love America, or hate China. I have ordered several elite divisions there. If the Americans land…” Hong poked the pigeon in the cage. It flapped its wings, hopping away from him.
“When do I leave?” she asked.
“In an hour,” he said. “I have already chosen the East Lighting police battalions that will accompany you. There is one other thing, Police Minister.”
“Yes?”
“Make Australia scream for mercy,” Hong said. He took a pistachio nut out of a small brown paper bag at the foot of his chair. With his thumbnails, he broke the shell, popping the kernel into his mouth. “Make an example of them, so the rest of the Pan-Asian Alliance becomes terrified at the thought of helping our hated enemies.”
Shun Li’s heart sank—yet more mass killing—but she nodded. “It will be done as you ask.”
“No,” he said, frowning.
“Leader?” What had she done wrong now?
“I haven’t asked you to do this. I order it.”
“Leader,” she said, propelling herself off the chair and falling face-first onto the grass before him. For a moment, she felt the sole of his shoe on her back, and he sighed. Then he removed his shoe and told her to stand.
“Go, Shun Li, and make me proud.”
She saluted, bowed low, and kept her tears inward. He was a devil, and in the eyes of the rest of the world, he was turning her into one, too.
From Military History: Past to Present, by Vance Holbrook:
INVASION OF AUSTRALIA, 2042
2042, March 13. The Sydney Landings. Task Force B. The landings east and west of Sydney met unenthusiastic resistance from Australian military forces. They had no choice but to fight with Chinese political police guns to their heads. Three submarines attempted to storm the main port. Chinese bombers sunk two. The third submarine launched a nuclear-tipped torpedo, creating awful havoc and mass evacuation of the irradiated city. In the turmoil, the American forces forced a beachhead and began broadcasting stories of Chinese perfidy, blaming them for exploding the nuclear device. The propaganda trick worked, and units of the Australian military began defecting to join the Americans.
Task Force C. Brigades landing on both sides of Melbourne Harbor converged on the city. The outrage of the “Death of Sydney” produced immediate results. En masse, the defending Australian military joined the Americans.
2042, March 15-20. Consolidation. Australia quickly divided into Chinese and American-allied camps. Reinforcements flowed in from China, strengthening PAA forces on the continent. Lieutenant General Daryl C. Forbes requested immediate reinforcements from North America. The US government gathered another fleet.
2042, March 20-28. Chinese Blitz. Australian enthusiasm for the American liberators and freedom from Chinese domination brought a massive response from the people. Ad hoc Militia battalions formed, swelling allied numbers so they exceeded Chinese strength. Despite this, on March 20, Marshal Yang unleashed the Chinese assault.
The new divisions from China were rich in tanks and artillery. This gave the PAA forces a three to one advantage in armor and a two to one advantage in artillery. The biggest difference was in air forces. With the drones from the Sung, the Chinese possessed a five to one advantage. Even so, the conclusion was far from certain. The American-Australian forces had high morale and many veteran soldiers.
The Battle of Brisbane proved decisive, as Yang outmaneuvered the allied divisions, falling upon them with his armor. It was a debacle for Australian Militia battalions and saw 20,000 American casualties.
Although the remaining allied formations retreated in good order, the conventional portion of the Australian campaign w
as over. Now would see the bloody city siege war and the later guerilla conflict, fought with unrelenting savagery on both sides.
COMMENT: In retrospect, the Americans brought enough soldiers—if Task Force A had landed—but not enough heavy equipment and too few arms for Australian volunteers. The loss of Task Force A proved critical and the lack of tanks was never rectified. Slowly, brutally, the PAA military machine hunted down allied soldiers, burning the southeastern cities in the process. However, the Chinese divisions sent to Australia critically weakened China for the coming perfidy, and their absence would be sorely missed. Two nuclear explosions, the first in Sydney Harbor and the second at the South Wales Military Installation, had negative results for China as world opinion continued to shift against them for what many considered Hong’s unleashing the genie of nuclear war.
MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA
Shun Li walked through the city’s police ministry building. There were blue tiles on the floor with little black flecks in them. Her eyes were haggard and her shoulders slumped. For weeks, she’d been in this bleeding wreck of a country. Her task had been to lead the liquidation. In this instance, it wasn’t through death squads, but a killing machine process that methodically butchered the Australian people.
Chairman Hong wanted to punish them for siding with the Americans. He desired…a lesson.
Shun Li wore a long leather coat, with a pistol at her side. She no longer felt like the Police Minister of Greater China, but a Guardian Inspector again.
It meant she lived with killers, the men and women who pulled the triggers. She’d watched convicted Australian “terrorists” dig a mass grave. Then East Lighting personnel rounded up North Korean soldiers. Those soldiers manned the machine guns and did the actual murder. If they failed, the East Lightning operatives would pull the triggers and blow out North Korean brains. The soldiers never failed to perform the butchery. Bulldozers pushed the dirt over the holes. Shun Li was certain some people yet lived in the gory piles, buried alive.
It was ghastly, all of it, and Shun Li was sick of doing this.
She marched down a corridor, flanked by East Lighting officers. They were Hong’s creatures, body and soul. She knew they reported to him about her.
The world believes I delight in this. I can’t believe what Hong has done to me.
As she passed an open door, with a naked woman screaming in pain while strapped down on a table, her mind went inward. Had that been Hong’s plan all along for her? Had he wanted to paint her as a monster?
On, Hong was a genius on these matters. He didn’t do as well running a war, but on secret police matters, no one was his equal. It’s why he remained in power.
I’m a figurehead without real authority. That must change.
Yet how could she effect such a transfer? He knew how to buy the loyalty of damaged individuals, the kind who became government killers.
I need to buy loyalty, if even that of a single killer. That would be her beginning.
“This 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 two 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 everyone 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 methamphetamines 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 your judgment on the matter. As you know, we cannot execute our own people without your authority.”
Shun Li nodded slowly, as 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.
“Y
ou 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 word, 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.
Invasion: China (Invasion America) (Volume 5) Page 23