At the same time, Cole’s other hand came out naturally, clasping the general’s forearm in a gesture of Western friendliness, fingertips finding a second nerve cluster.
He knew he couldn’t put a hand towards the general’s neck or face — such a gesture would be far too intimate for such a meeting — but allowed his hand to leave the forearm and rise higher, just above the elbow.
The gesture was so smooth, so natural, that nobody would think anything of it, and his hand moved swiftly up, fingertips about to deliver the third strike, the coup de grâce which would interrupt the energy flow all down one side of Wu’s body causing a seizure and then a fatal cardiac arrest later that same afternoon.
But then — before his fingertips could do their work — Cole sensed movement to his side, felt the sudden, wrenching force of a hand ripping Cole’s own away from the general’s elbow.
Cole turned, half in shock, Wu’s own face registering surprise as the force of the pull separated them completely.
‘Sha shou!’ Zhou Shihuang screamed, gripping Cole’s arm with unbelievable strength. ‘Sha shou!’
The call reverberated around the room, and Cole could see weapons instantly being engaged around him. Cole knew why — his basic knowledge of Mandarin told him what the word being shouted around the room meant.
Killer. Murderer. Assassin.
What he didn’t know was how the huge bodyguard could possibly have realized what Cole was doing.
Unless Zhou Shihuang also knew the method, Cole realized with a cold fear in the pit of his stomach.
Cole had studied the marma adi death strikes of the Indian Kalaripayattu system, but the Chinese also had a version within their own traditional martial arts known as dim mak.
Had Liu said that Zhou was a renegade Shaolin monk?
Cole’s heart sagged as understanding hit him like a sledgehammer and — perhaps for the first time in his life — he knew he was going to die.
PART FIVE
1
Jake Navarone looked around the sewer tunnel, nodding at each member of the Force One rescue team.
‘It’s time,’ he said simply, his heavily-modified H&K 416 assault rifle held across his armored body.
Barrington nodded in return, performed one more check on her instruments — the area above them clear, positions of friendlies and hostiles noted by everyone — and gave the ‘go’ signal to Collins and Davis.
As one, they reached up and yanked away at the cords securing the ballistic nylon mesh that had been strung tight across that portion of the sewer tunnel’s ceiling, supporting the colossal weight above them.
Barrington had filled the drilled holes with military grade non-explosive demolition gel, which had been gradually hardening and thickening over the past few hours, cracking through the concrete and earth above them, silently destabilizing a portion of the structure.
The nylon mesh had kept the entire thing in place, seemingly intact; but now that it had been removed, the weight no longer supported, the cracks had weakened it so much that it collapsed in on itself, tons of rubble tumbling down into the tunnel below.
Navarone watched as a perfect hole appeared in the ceiling above them, the concrete and earth falling onto a specially-prepared inflatable mattress they’d brought along to help absorb the sound.
Whoever was in the immediate vicinity of the collapse would know what had happened, but those outside the hall would — hopefully — not have heard a thing.
Navarone’s hand chopped forward, and Grayson, Barrington and Collins leapt forward with ladders, placing them at the edges of the hole which had been created above them.
Navarone and Davis followed, feet on the rungs as soon as the ladders touched the sides, sprinting upwards into the Hall of Imperial Supremacy, weapons up and aimed, the other three team members hot on their heels.
Navarone made it up first, just a quarter of a second before Davis, and his eyes took in everything around him in an instant, confirming the layout he’d committed to memory, and the positions of the people they had studied from below.
He turned to his left flank, his suppressed H&K barking four times. He didn’t even wait to see the Chinese guards’ dead bodies hit the floor, racing through the hall to the next position, the sound of Davis’ own weapon spitting to his right.
He didn’t have to look for Davis to know what he was doing, nor the others — he had supreme confidence in them.
From the imagery, they had identified eight armed hostiles located within the hall itself; the plan was for Navarone and Davis to take these men out, while the other three started rounding up the members of the Politburo who — Navarone noted subconsciously — were stood around open-mouthed, incredulous at the speed and ferocity of what was happening around them.
Navarone swept west through the hall, his weapon firing again, and again, and again, his movement so swift and sure that the guards had hardly had the chance to place their fingers on their triggers.
In seconds, it was over, and Navarone made the call, surrounded by scared, bewildered politicians. ‘Clear!’
‘Clear!’ came back Davis’ reply from the other end of the hall.
Navarone nodded to himself. Eight men down in under four seconds, no enemy shots fired. Textbook stuff.
He looked around, saw that Barrington had taken charge of the extraction effort, cajoling the Politburo members down the ladders and back into the sewers, speaking to them in Mandarin as Collins rushed around the building, urging the slower men and women on towards the hole while checking for hidden weapons and covert enemy personnel.
Grayson was back down in the sewer, helping the Politburo members down and counting them off as they came into the tunnel, also ensuring that they didn’t simply run off in a stress-induced panic. Despite their elevated rank, they were made to sit on the wet concrete floor, legs crossed and hands folded behind their heads.
Navarone and Davis checked out of the windows of the hall, checking the courtyard for the six other Politburo members whose body heat hadn’t registered on the images taken from below. From their hours of monitoring, Navarone knew that there was a regular movement of people from inside to outside, and vice versa, although the military personnel had tended to stay where they were.
He spotted two members to the north, strolling in front of the Palace of Peace and Longevity, and called to Davis. ‘Two to the north, three guards that I can see.’
‘Other four are right here,’ Davis whispered back, ‘in the southern courtyard. Five guards.’
Navarone nodded. Eight guards inside, eight outside.
‘Come here,’ he said to Davis, who raced over, past the descending, frightened members of the Politburo.
‘I’ll take two, you take one,’ Navarone said, and Davis nodded, aiming his suppressed muzzle out of the window towards the northern courtyard. ‘Now,’ Navarone said, shooting his own weapon once, twice, two men’s heads exploding in a shower of blood and tissue within half a second of one another; and at the same time, the third guard’s head also disappeared in a fine red mist.
They burst out of the doors together, grabbing the Politburo members before they could scream in surprise, ushering them back inside, pushing them into the queue which waited to go down the ladders.
They raced south to the other end of the hall, lining their weapons back up along that side, guards in their sights.