Casey met them at the front door of the building and accepted the canvas bag full of Lu Lei’s belongings. “Matt’s still at the factory, but he said to say hi.”
“Hi back.”
“Are you absolutely positive that you must go to this demonstration?” asked Casey.
“Really, do not worry. It will be fine.” Sun Yi reassured her, though not sounding convincing. She bent down to hug Lu Lei. “I love you,” she said, closing her eyes and hugging her tightly.
“I love you too.” Lu Lei said, arms around her mother’s neck.
Wu Feng was at home preparing a large quantity of special tea made from rose, wolf berries and white peony root. He planned to take it to the demonstration in thermoses with paper cups. The recipe was from the Master who told him it was good for anxiety, though it was traditionally prescribed for premenstrual issues such as cramping and pain.
Wu Feng’s nervousness about the demonstration had dissipated after Sun Yi explained her dream about the thousands of birds on the beach. He had learned to trust his wife’s dreams. They were often useful, though the ones about the future occurred infrequently.
Sun Yi was probably already on her way to the demonstration where she would meet him to help with the big crate of thermoses full of the “menstrual tea.”
Casey and Lu Lei played together for a while until the phone rang and Casey left Lu Lei to her own devices.
“Hi, Matt. What’s going on?”
“I’ll be home in time for dinner, but go ahead and feed Lu Lei when you guys get back from her tai chi class. You and I can eat at eight. Hopefully, by then the demonstration will be over. What’s the little volcano up to?”
“She’s talking to Barbie on the floor in the living room. It’s all about school.”
“Precious. Well, see you later, honey. Have fun.”
“I’m sure I will.” Casey was beaming after she hung up. She knew it was just a one-off thing, having the little Chinese doll here at home with her, but it touched her, and her maternal instincts had ramped up.
Wu Feng pedaled to the corner of the square, shocked to see so many people already sitting on the ground in rows. He counted more than a hundred rows of a hundred people. Already 10,000 protesters, at least.
He parked his bike a block away, walking back with the crate of tea and paper cups. He could see that the police were stationed behind the protesters. They seemed to have a relatively small force. He walked the hundred and fifty meters to the back and put the crate down behind the last row of protesters. Looking around, he saw that none of the police were in riot gear. Scanning the faces of those near him, Wu Feng relaxed. There was no fear or animosity here. Sun Yi had been right.
Wu Feng sat down opposite the police with the crate and smiled, gesturing with one hand. Two by two the police came over for tea, each thanking him.
Their age became apparent to Wu Feng, as if until now he had not thought of them as fellow humans. Most of them were younger than he. Some were only in their early twenties. He looked at the officers in charge. The most senior officer on duty bowed to Wu Feng. The officer’s son was in Wu Feng’s class. He had been a problematic student at first. He struggled with aggression, but after three years in the class, the boy had calmed down and found his stride.
After the last man had been served, Wu Feng turned and joined the demonstrators in meditation and remained still for the next two hours until he heard the general shuffling of the crowd getting up to leave. Wu Feng moved to get up, but felt a firm hand on his shoulder. He turned and looked up to see one of the younger officers standing above him, smiling. The officer nodded at him, then patted him on the back, nodding again before walking off.
“Wu Feng, I found you,” said Sun Yi, walking over.
“Thousands of white birds on a beach, looking out to sea.” he said to her.
She smiled back.
“The police drank all of it,” said Wu Feng, standing up. Bending to pick up the crate.
“It was good that you attended. Good for everybody. You are a good man. Don’t forget.”
Lu Lei’s tai chi class neared its conclusion. The students all sat in neat rows before the Master.
“Many of you seem distracted this evening. You maybe be thinking of your friends and relatives at the demonstration. You are all worried about them.”
A student appeared in the doorway, looking at the Master, eyebrows raised. The Master motioned for him to come over. The student whispered in the Master’s ear. The Master nodded, giving nothing away. When the student had finished, he bowed to the Master and walked back to the doorway where some parents, including Casey, were waiting.
The Master breathed deeply and then addressed the students again:
“We have news. The demonstration was peaceful with no arrests.”
The students murmured. The Master waited for the noise to dissipate.
“All Falun Gong practitioners who were imprisoned have just been released.”
The students erupted in joy and relief with a sustained round of applause. Clearly, the arrests had affected many of the students in a personal way. Some of their parents had been missing since the first round of arrests. Big brothers and sisters too, had been arrested. None of those present had gone unaffected except for Lu Lei, who, though blissfully unaware, enjoyed clapping along nonetheless.
“Do you all know the parable of the father whose son could not go off to war because his father’s lucky horse had kicked him and broken his leg?”
“Yes,” they all groaned. It was an old one that they had all heard many times from their parents, their school teachers, their uncles.
“Thus, you all know that this story teaches us that nothing is necessarily good or bad. It just is. We choose the way in which we respond, much like your assignment to notice your own responses to things that happen to you. Have any of you noticed that you are choosing fear more often than you are choosing love?”
“Yeeeeesss…” they sighed once again, laughing a little this time. They loved the Master and enjoyed the life-games he played with them. Lu Lei seemed to the other students to be young for such exercises, but most of them knew that she was special, and her age was an advantage. They knew that she was absorbing it all in a more elemental way than they could.
“Keep working on this exercise. Note well your reactions. Change the balance. Watch for fear in yourselves and realize that there is another path available to you always.”
The Master bowed his head, indicating the end of his discourse.
“Thank you, Master.”
They all stood and bowed.
The Police Chief was in his office signing papers when the men returned from ‘protest duty.’ He was already annoyed at having been ordered to ‘let the protesters assemble without hindrance or arrest’. He’d originally hoped that Wu Feng and Sun Yi could be arrested and sent to Tianjin with the rest of them. Yesterday, he had finished an entire bottle of whisky after seeing his son’s black-and-blue face. Beaten up by a girl.
This was the second time Wei Bao had been humiliated by that little Tai Chi. He wouldn’t stand for it anymore. Word might already be getting around the police force that his son was being bullied by a girl. He was the chief of police in the most important city in China. He must put his foot down.
The Chief’s door was open and he could hear the conversation going on between men standing at the nearby desks. He thought that he heard Wu Feng’s name mentioned.
“Come in here,” he barked at the three men gossiping outside.
“What are you talking about? Who was serving tea to my men at the protest?”
“Yes, sir. The tai chi teacher gave us all tea, sir.”
“And why did you accept it?”
“Sir, because our commanding officer knows him, sir. His son is in his tai chi class.”
“Get out.”
The Chief picked up his phone and dialed.
Sun Yi and Wu Feng turned into their street to pedal the last hundred
meters to the house. They both noticed a black Mercedes parked outside.
“We could just turn around and leave.” Sun Yi said, glad that Lu Lei was with Casey and Matt.
“They know where we live. I don’t think we can avoid this.” Wu Feng replied, still peddling slowly, the empty thermoses rattling in the crate on the back of the bicycle. They had stayed after the protest for an hour, greeting students and celebrating the news that was filtering back about the prisoners’ release.
Their bikes coasted slowly past the car. All four doors opened and four men got out. Sun Yi recognized only the Police Chief, but Wu Feng had seen the other three stern-faced officers in recent days, albeit from a distance.
Instinctively they both dismounted their bicycles, pushed down the kick-stands and stepped away, standing a meter apart. Neither of them bothered with pleasantries, because the Chief had already breached polite protocols by the manner of his visit. Both of them were on guard for what might happen next. Wu Feng could tell that the three standing behind the Chief were likely hiding weapons behind their backs. Their intentions were written on their faces. The Chief’s hate was bristling around his nose and mouth. He looked smug, obviously because his side outnumbered Wu Feng’s.
“I have come to teach you the lesson that I should have taught you a long time ago.”
With a flick of his wrist, the Chief signaled his three men to begin.
Sun Yi nodded at Wu Feng, a silent battle cry as if to say: I give you my permission to unleash your full power on these invaders.
He nodded back, breathed deeply and relaxed as the three men took the few remaining steps into the couple’s space. The Chief stayed well out of reach, hands behind his back.
Two of the men came at Wu Feng. The third went for Sun Yi, who dealt a lightning-fast kick to his cheek before he could lift the baton. She paused for a moment and asked her assailant, “Are you okay?” successfully angering him.
The first baton came down at Wu Feng. He moved inside its trajectory, catching the forearm. He turned his hips to shift the man’s centre of gravity, tumbling him into the path of the second man’s baton. It glanced off his spine just below the neck.
Sun Yi’s opponent prepared to come at her again, now revealing in his stance that he had received training.
“Kung Fu?” she asked in a little girl’s voice. She smiled coquettishly and adopted her own kung fu stance, but in jest. She had learned very early in her training that an angry opponent was easier to defeat. Wu Feng, she could see, was calmly giving his two friends a difficult time. She dearly wanted to watch him, but her attacker interrupted, spinning into a complex kick sequence. Sun Yi rewarded him with another of her kicks to the same cheek, only this one really connected with his cheekbone. She shook her head at him. “You must remember to breathe. Your whole body is tense, that’s why you move so slowly, like a turtle.”
Wu Feng looked over at the Chief who was wincing at the sight of one of his men already on his knees, clutching his throat. Wu Feng had dealt him an open-palmed strike to the windpipe. It might be a half a minute before he’d be able to breathe comfortably again. As his other opponent rose to his feet. Wu Feng glanced over at his wife to see how she was doing, having only overheard her wise-cracking. It was gratifying to see her toying with some other man’s mind for a change. He noticed that her opponent’s cheek was now bleeding where the skin had parted from the blow from Sun Yi’s foot.
He called over, “Is my wife hurting you? I am so sorry. I will talk to her very sternly after dinner.”
Wu Feng heard the gravel move. He stepped forward, hands poised. The baton again was stopped short of its mark. Wu Feng caught and twisted his attacker’s wrist, and held him there in agony for a moment. Stepping sideways, he brought the man backward into a strong choke-hold. Strangely, and probably out of habit, the man tapped twice on Wu Feng’s leg to communicate that he submitted.
Wu Feng tightened his hold. “You do realize that this is real life, I hope. You can not tap out of real life. When you do the wrong thing, you must accept the consequences.” Wu Feng fired a firm kick at the throat of the other man, who was getting up.
Sun Yi had decided that she would just keep targeting her new friend’s cheek bone until he realized that he could not win.
“You should not have come to our home. Give up now. I don’t want to hurt you. Go home and meditate like a good boy.”
The man moved into punching distance and flailed at her, landing nothing.
“So predictable, you are. I am in your head, comrade. You should say goodnight to your boss now.” She glanced at the Chief whose eyes burned back at her.
She stepped in toward her opponent. He cried out in pain when her fist connected perfectly with his cheek. He stumbled back and fell to the ground.
Sun Yi glanced at the Chief, then turned her attention back to her assailant. “Do you want to pick up your baton? Go on. It is right there. Don’t be frightened. You are going to be the only one left in a minute. Look.” Sun Yi pointed.
The Chief also turned his gaze to Wu Feng, who had now choked his victim long enough that he had gone limp in his arms. His other man was now lying on his side, clutching his throat. The kick had done some real damage.
Sun Yi’s bleeding man was back on his feet, but looked disoriented. Sun Yi rolled her eyes and then issued her man a well-aimed spinning roundhouse kick, again to the cheek, taking him to the ground. She watched him pass out, and then turned to look at Wu Feng and the injured assailant lying on his side, clutching his throat.
“He's having trouble breathing. I must have damaged the trachea.” Wu Feng dropped to his knees next to him. “Go into the house and call an ambulance.”
Sun Yi yelled back, “They will take half an hour. Better to drive him ourselves. What about you, Chief? You could get them here faster.”
The Chief looked at his feet.
“Radio for an ambulance!” Sun Yi screamed at him.
The Chief glanced over his shoulder in the direction of his car, but didn’t move.
Wu Feng yelled, “He’s already going blue. We can’t wait. Run and get the plastic straws, the scissors, and that scalpel from the drawer.”
Sun Yi sprinted toward the house. Once in the kitchen, she rummaged for the scalpel that the monk had left there after making the chair a few months earlier. She and Wu Feng had once seen an emergency procedure performed at a tournament by the on-call medical officer, but he’d had a special kit. He had later explained each of the steps to them both and he had patiently answered all of Wu Feng’s questions, emphasizing that it was only a last resort, and it was always better to leave it to the professionals. The Master had later encouraged Wu Feng to do some reading. Sun Yi was sure that he’d never need this knowledge, but the Master had shushed her and Wu Feng had proceeded to waste an entire week researching emergency airway management.
Wu Feng, kneeling on the gravel, had positioned the man on his back and was waiting impatiently for Sun Yi.
Sun Yi reappeared and knelt down next to the patient, and aimed a flashlight at the incision area.
“Cut one of the straws in half.”
Wu Feng made an incision just below the Adam’s apple. The blood came immediately, but he felt like he had hit the right spot. He held the flaps of skin apart and found the yellow membrane underneath, making an incision in the cricothyroid membrane in which to put the straw. They both stared at the open wound. There was a hissing, gurgling sound as the man’s chest fell and air escaped through the incision.
“Put it in now,” he directed Sun Yi.
She carefully poked the end of the straw into the incision. Wu Feng released his hold. The membrane tightened up around the straw and the man’s chest emptied itself and started moving up and down as he began breathing through the straw. Wu Feng looked at Sun Yi with relief, smiling almost imperceptibly, but neither of them noticed that the other two men, still laid out on the gravel, were stirring.
“Hospital?” Sun Yi asked,
and looked over her shoulder for a moment, shaking her head as the Chief got in his car and drove off alone, the tires spinning in the gravel.
Sun Yi went back to the house for the car keys, muttering to herself about the Chief. Wu Feng watched the patient’s color change from blue to a very pale, but more human color.
Sun Yi returned quickly with the keys. Before getting into the driver’s seat, she asked loudly enough for the other two, still recovering on the ground, to hear, “Do either of you two need a ride to the hospital?”
With the Chief gone, the one with the bleeding cheek relented. “I’m bleeding. I might need stitches,” he said, getting up slowly. The other rose to his feet slowly and limped off, not seeming to care much about his colleagues.
“Let’s go,” Wu Feng shouted as he carried the man to the back seat, the little straw still doing its job.
Sun Yi drove toward the hospital, which was only a few miles away, a straight shot along the main road. Wu Feng was in the back seat with the patient and the other poor fellow was sitting in the front passenger seat, hands covered in his own blood as he held his bleeding cheek. The third had a long walk ahead of him.
Sun Yi broke the silence, “Why are you working for that stupid man? Did he bully you into it? How much is he paying you? What would your mother say? Picking on a young family. Trying to beat up a peaceful couple that doesn’t want to hurt anyone. You should be ashamed of yourself. Where did you grow up? You are not from the city, are you?”
“Sujou,” he mumbled meekly.
“What? Speak up.”
“I’m from Sujou.”
“Then you should know better. People from Sujou are sophisticated. And here you are, following nice people around, frightening them like a stupid gorilla.”
Surviving Spies (Irving Waters, Spy Fiction Series) Page 8