by David Archer
The two men Noah had shot had fallen just in front of an open doorway, and there was sudden shouting from inside that room. Marco hurried past Noah and looked into the room, then fired a couple of quick bursts. The shouting stopped, but there was more noise coming from deeper inside the house. Noah and Marco pushed forward and had almost reached the stairwell leading down when three men suddenly boiled up out of it carrying assault rifles.
Noah and Marco instinctively dropped to their knees and began firing, while the two men behind them fired over their heads. All three of the guards fell instantly, and Marco hurried forward and threw himself flat at the head of the stairs, with his gun aimed down them.
Morgan, one of Davidson’s men, ran up the stairs to look for anyone who might have been hiding there, while Lewis stayed with Noah. At that moment, another scream rang out, and this time they could tell that it was coming from the basement. Noah went right over the top of Marco, descending the stairs three at a time. As he got to the bottom, he saw four soldiers come running out of the room where they had apparently been sleeping, because they were holding their rifles by the barrels and still trying to get their shirts on. He flipped the selector to auto and sprayed them with lead. They fell, all of them dead but one, and Noah quickly put him out of his misery.
A man suddenly stepped out of another room, his hands high and empty. Noah raised his weapon but didn’t fire, and the man looked him in the eye.
“She’s in that room,” he said, pointing at a door just behind where he stood. He dropped to his knees and put his hands on his head, as Noah hurried past him. Marco pushed the man down flat on the floor, as three more soldiers ran out of the bunk room. They looked at their comrades lying dead on the floor, looked up at Marco and the two men behind him, and dropped their weapons.
Lewis looked into the bunk room and declared it clear, just as Noah reached the door behind which Sarah was still screaming. He reached out and tried the knob, but it was locked, so he stepped out and kicked it as hard as he could.
The door frame shattered, and the door flew open to reveal Sarah strapped naked to a table. For a brief second, that was all Noah saw, but then a man spun out from behind the door with a pistol in his hand. The gun was aimed directly at Noah’s face, the end of the barrel less than four inches from his nose, and the look in the man’s eyes was one of glee.
Noah expected the shot to come, but the man simply held the gun pointed at him and stared into his eyes. Noah stood frozen, slowly lowering the muzzle of his gun, keeping his own eyes on those of the man in front of him. He let the submachine gun fall free, hanging from his shoulder by its strap, as he slowly raised his hands.
The man was still looking him directly in the eye, and then he spoke. “You,” he said softly. “You are Camelot.”
And Sarah screamed again. This time, it wasn’t the scream of someone in pain, but a scream of pure rage, a scream of hate and anger and fury, and it was so loud and so shrill that Mr. Xiao instinctively turned his head to look back at her, and that’s when Noah swept the gun away from his face with his left hand. The pistol went off, but the bullet sailed past Noah’s ear and thudded into the wall behind him. His right hand struck Xiao’s elbow and he snatched away the pistol, spinning it instantly to point it back into its owner’s face.
Noah grabbed Xiao by his throat and pushed him into the room, looking at Sarah lying there immobile and exposed, and realized instantly that he was holding the man who was torturing her. Sarah was still screaming, but her eyes were going from his face to Xiao’s, and Noah understood instantly. He yanked Xiao around so that Sarah could see him clearly, then looked the man in the eye again.
“Yes,” he said. “I am Camelot.” He pushed the barrel of the pistol against Xiao’s forehead, then, and squeezed the trigger.
TWENTY-TWO
Noah dropped Xiao’s lifeless body and hurried to Sarah. It took him only seconds to release all the straps, and then she was sitting up in his arms. She clung to him as she wept, ignoring her own nakedness and the torment she had been going through for over three hours, just holding on to the one rock that was always solid in her world.
Marco looked into the room, then pulled the door shut. He looked down at the man who had surrendered to them and considered putting a bullet through his head, but he had heard what this man had said. He had told Noah precisely where to find Sarah, but whether he thought he was helping or trying to send Noah into a trap, Marco wasn’t sure. He’d leave that for Noah to decide.
A moment later, the door opened and Noah stepped out. He was bare to the waist, while Sarah was wearing his shirt. She was having trouble standing, so Noah was supporting her with his left arm while holding his gun with his right.
And then she saw Marco. Days of speculation that he had betrayed her suddenly rushed to the forefront of her mind, and she leapt at him with her fingers curled into claws. Marco’s eyes flew wide as he stumbled back from her, and Noah wrapped an arm around her to hold her off him.
“Easy, easy,” Noah said. “It wasn’t him, Sarah, it wasn’t him! I’ll tell you all about it later, but it wasn’t Marco, he’s been risking his life right beside me every day since you were taken, helping me track you down so we could get you back.”
Sarah continued to growl and gasp for a few moments, but finally Noah’s words got through to her, and she turned to look at him. “You’re sure?”
“Yes,” he said, “absolutely certain. Marco is part of the team.”
Sarah looked at Marco for a moment, then nodded. A second later, she pointed down at the man on the floor. “Is he hurt?” she asked.
“Nope,” Marco said.
“He told me where you were,” Noah said. He looked at Marco and motioned with his chin for Marco to pull the man to his feet.
“It’s Chung,” Sarah said. “He tried—he tried to keep me from being tortured…”
Noah looked at Chung, and the Chinaman met his eyes.
“I am Chung,” he said. “I was sent here to interrogate Sarah, but I prefer less—egregious methods than others do. I did all I could to prevent this, but it was beyond my control.”
“For what it’s worth,” Noah said, “I appreciate that. Unfortunately, you leave me with a dilemma. This is an unsanctioned mission, so I cannot leave witnesses.”
Chung nodded sadly. “I completely understand,” he said. “I am only glad that I was able to see you come for her. About the only thing I was able to learn from her about you is that she loves you, Mr. Camelot. She loves you more than she loves her own life. I have been monitoring what was happening to her, and I can tell you that she endured everything Xiao could do to her, and never revealed anything. Neither of us could break her, by any method.”
Noah looked at Chung, and then at Sarah. There were tears in her eyes as she looked at the man who had tried to protect her, because she understood what Noah had said. An unsanctioned mission could be considered an act of war, so witnesses could not be allowed to testify.
Noah turned back to him. “Run,” he said.
Chung looked at him in confusion for a moment, then smiled and shook his head. “I would prefer to die as a man,” he said. “I will not run from you.”
Noah nodded. “That’s exactly what I thought you would say,” he said. “I have a problem. I can’t leave witnesses to testify that Americans did all this, but I don’t want to kill you. Any ideas?”
Chung blinked a couple of times, glanced once at Sarah and then stared at Noah. “Ideas? I—I don’t know what to say.”
“Defect,” Sarah said suddenly. “Maybe you’ll meet that beautiful woman who can make it worthwhile.”
Chung looked at her for a moment, then began to chuckle. He turned back to Noah. “Can you arrange asylum?” he asked. “I hold the rank of Captain in the Ministry of State Security.”
Noah looked into his eyes for another few seconds, then said, “Come with me.” He half-carried Sarah up the stairs, and was starting toward the front door when Davidson ent
ered.
“Everything under control in here?” the soldier asked.
“Yes,” Noah said. He turned and pointed at Chung. “This man is a captain with State Security. He wishes to defect. You guys know how to handle that?”
Davidson looked at Chung and his eyes went wide in recognition. He laughed. “Captain Chung Ho-seng? Hell, yeah, I know how to handle it,” he said. “We’ll just dump his ass at the embassy. Trust me, they are going to be thrilled to get their hands on him.”
“Good, I’ll leave it to you,” Noah said. He started forward again, but Davidson stopped him.
“You want me to send somebody to get McDermott and the truck to come up here? Doesn’t look like this girl can walk very far.”
“I can do better than that,” Noah said. He handed his gun to Davidson and turned his back to Sarah, crouching down. She looked at him in confusion for a moment, but then she realized what he was doing and put her arms around his neck. He reached back and hooked his hands around her legs, and lifted her up so she was on him piggyback, his long shirt hanging just low enough to cover her.
They moved quickly across the estate and through the trees, and reached McDermott after about twenty minutes. Noah let Sarah slide off him into the truck, then climbed in beside her. The rest of the men piled in, and Neil, who had brought up the rear, squeezed in on the other side of Sarah.
“Hey, little brother,” Sarah said to him, her voice rough and hoarse. “You came too?”
Neil rolled his eyes at her. “Do you think I would’ve let him come without me? We’re Team Camelot, remember? We don’t leave anybody behind.”
McDermott drove directly to the US Embassy, and both he and Noah escorted Chung inside to ask for asylum. The embassy’s intelligence officer, a lieutenant named Darnell, got one look at him and nearly fainted. It seemed that Captain Chung had long been on the list of Chinese officers the CIA wanted to get their hands on.
McDermott shook Noah’s hand, then, and drove away from the embassy quickly. It wasn’t uncommon for American businessmen to visit the embassy from time to time, and McDermott even had a security contract on the building, but he didn’t really want Chinese Intelligence noticing that he had visited it less than an hour after the Tung Li Estate was raided. Thankfully, the overcast sky was getting even darker, so it wasn’t likely too many people were paying attention to the traffic in the streets at that moment.
The embassy had a small medical clinic, and Sarah was taken into it to be examined and treated. She was shocked when it turned out that she had no burns. When she told the doctor what Xiao had done with the little candles, he explained that the sensation of burning pain was simply her subconscious expectation, magnifying the heat she was actually feeling into something agonizing.
The needle punctures and the beatings on her feet, however, were very real. Since there was no way to know if the needles had been sterile, the doctor gave her a shot of powerful antibiotics, but her feet would simply need time to recover.
Between McDermott and Darnell, hasty arrangements were made for a passport and other documents for Sarah. They were printed up in a little room in the basement of the embassy, and one of the secretaries found some clothes that would fit her. They came from a suitcase that had been accidentally left behind by a tourist and never been claimed, and it was given to Sarah as well so that she would have luggage. Even with a private plane, there was little doubt that someone would be watching when they boarded; seeing a young woman climb onto the plane with no luggage might set off alarm bells, especially after the massacre at the Tung Li Estate was discovered.
An embassy car drove them back to the resort, where Marco and Neil went up to the room to collect their things. Noah used the time to call the pilot of the plane and tell him to file a flight plan for the Kirtland airfield in Colorado. The flight would require a fueling stop in San Francisco, the pilot told him, but they’d be back home within fourteen hours after taking off.
And then Noah called Allison. The night operator took the message asking for Mrs. Peabody to call him at her earliest convenience, and his phone rang less than two minutes later.
“Camelot,” Noah said as he answered the encrypted line. “I’ve got her.”
“About damn time,” Allison replied. “Do me a favor, will you? Don’t let that girl out of your sight anymore. Give her a hug for me and tell her I’ll see her as soon as you guys get home. I’m going back to sleep.”
Noah put the phone back into his pocket and looked at Sarah, then turned her face toward his and kissed her gently on the lips. She smiled at him.
“I knew you’d come,” she said softly. “I knew you’d find me.”
“Yes,” he said. “My world isn’t right if you’re not in it.” He reached down and took her hand into his, then glanced at it. It was her left hand, where he had recently put an engagement ring, but she had left it behind when they had departed for the mission in Thailand. “I almost forgot,” he said. “I’ve got something for you.” He reached into his pants pocket and fumbled for a moment, then pulled his hand out. He held onto hers as he did so, and then slid the ring onto her finger.
Sarah looked down at it, and tears began to flow down her cheeks. She looked up at him, blinking.
“Allison was keeping it for you, remember? She caught me before I left to come look for you, and told me to put it back on your finger as soon as I could.”
Sarah looked back at the ring, then leaned close to Noah and held onto him. The tears that fell needed no words to explain them.
Neil and Marco came back with their bags, and the driver took off for the airport. They had only gone a few blocks when it suddenly became apparent that something was going on. Several intersections were blocked by police and soldiers, and it was only the diplomatic license plates and markings on the car that allowed them to pass through.
The driver called in to the embassy and explained what he was seeing. A moment later, the partition between the driver’s compartment and the passenger section slid downward.
“Mr. Duncan?”
“Yes,” Noah said.
“I was just informed, Sir, that an army barricade has been erected around your airplane. It seems the Army is looking for some foreign agents, and they are blocking all private aircraft from being boarded. It’s been suggested that I bring you back to the embassy immediately.”
Noah looked out the window for a moment, staring at one of the roadblocks as they passed it. “If we go back to the embassy,” he said, “what avenues are there for getting us out of the country?”
“Not many, I’m afraid,” the driver said. “Unfortunately, our embassy doesn’t get many large packages. Trying to smuggle all of you out would be just about impossible.”
“Then going back to the embassy would be a very bad idea. Just drive around the city for a bit, while I try to figure out what to do.”
Sarah was looking up at him, and Noah could see the fear she was holding back. To have gone through all of this only to be trapped in China? Even if they tried to remain in the embassy, sooner or later Chinese sharpshooters would be assigned to try to take them out.
Noah took out his phone and called McDermott. It took a moment for him to come to the phone, and Noah could hear the concern in his voice when he answered.
“Duncan? Bit of a mess, isn’t it? I hear tell they’ve got your plane surrounded. What are you going to do?”
“That’s what I’m working on,” Noah said. “Listen, I noticed on your logo that you have a helicopter and an airplane on it. Do you actually use aircraft?”
“Well, yeah,” McDermott said, “but mostly just for aerial surveillance. Construction sites, stuff like that, we fly over periodically just to make sure nobody’s messing with anything. I don’t have anything like your Gulfstream.”
“What do you have? I’m speaking of an airplane, not a helicopter.”
“Not much. I’ve got a Piper Cub and an old Cessna 195. Ain’t neither one of them much good. What have you go
t in mind?”
“Stealing your Cessna. Where do you keep it?”
“Shek Kong airfield,” McDermott said. “It’s fueled up and ready to fly, but you may have trouble getting there. You in the embassy car still?”
“Yes, at the moment. Any suggestions?”
“Hell, yeah! Tell the driver to take you toward the airfield, but to be sure to go through the Tai Lam Tunnel. When he gets into the tunnel, keep his speed down to around eighty KPH, then keep your eyes peeled for my truck. I’ll see you there.”
The phone went dead, and Noah relayed the instructions to the driver.
TWENTY-THREE
The embassy driver hadn’t even made it off Hong Kong Island before the roadblocks began to appear, so it was going to take a little while to make it to the tunnel. Twice, police officers at roadblocks had pretended not to see the diplomatic markings on the car, but the driver was no fool. Whenever they tried to reach for the door handle, he simply stepped on the gas and shot the car forward. No one was going to fire any shots at the car, he knew, because it would create an international incident. The Chinese were great ones for avoiding international incidents.
“Boss,” Neil said after a couple of minutes, “any chance you’re going to let us in on what you got in mind?”
“I have in mind getting us the hell out of China,” Noah said. “They’ve got us blocked from getting to our regular plane, so we need to find another way out of the country. If we can get into McDermott’s Cessna, I’m willing to bet I can fly it under the radar all the way into Vietnam. I’m going to have the Gulfstream take off without us, then divert to Hanoi. The Cessna should have enough range to get us there, and then we can fly on home.”