The crew of his own boat had started to slow too, everyone looking the same way; even the drummer had stopped keeping the beat.
Cole, however, acted instantly, injecting himself into this gap in the patrol boat crew’s attention with perfect timing.
He stood up and wrenched the steering oar from the back, reaching up for the hull of the patrol boat beyond and launching himself towards the guard rail.
He was on the side of the larger vessel before its crew had looked away from the burning flames of the Forbidden City, up and over the guard rail by the time they’d realized he’d even moved.
He targeted the machine gunners first, swiping at their heads with vicious blows of the oar, knocking them unconscious across the deck.
The men with the grappling hooks turned to him then, retrieving their ropes from the water, sharp hooks gleaming at the ends.
As they approached, Cole also saw the captain throw down his loudspeaker and go for the pistol held in the holster at his waist, and quickly sidestepped the oncoming sailors, smashing the steering oar down onto the man’s gun arm. Cole heard the bones in the forearm break, the captain’s screams heard even over the roaring thunder of the continuing storm.
Cole turned back just in time to see the first hook sailing towards him, thrown forcefully by one of the sailors. He blocked it with the wooden oar, letting the sharp metal embed itself into the surface. He then yanked backwards on the oar, ripping the other end of the rope from the sailor’s hands.
Cole caught it in midair as it came back to him, ducking as another grappling hook slashed through the air above him. As the same time as he ducked, Cole pulled the hook from the oar and swung his own rope back towards the sailors, the hook lashing out across the deck, the attached rope wrapping round the legs of two of the men.
Cole pulled back instantly, the taut rope toppling the two sailors to the deck. Cole leapt forward, stamping down on one of the bodies and using it as a platform to kick off, his leather-soled shoe catching another man flush in the face.
He sensed movement from the side and turned as another sailor rushed at him, holding the sharp hook in his hand and using it as a slashing weapon, swinging it wildly at Cole in a rapid figure-eight pattern.
Cole swiftly dodged the incoming strikes, reading the pattern as he moved and throwing a counterpunch straight into the man’s face as he reached the downward portion of his swing, the hook momentarily at a safe distance.
The blow rendered the sailor unconscious immediately, and Cole immediately skipped over the deck to one of the men he’d knocked down before; he was getting back to his feet, reaching for a grappling hook, and Cole knocked him back down with the oar.
The sailors were all down now, the captain still moaning in agony on the deck, but Cole could see other boats moving in to help, and the sound of feet heading his way from the other side of the patrol boat — other sailors, coming to help.
He looked across the bow towards the northeast, seeing the edge of Beihai Lake in the distance, dark and murky through the rain.
A speedboat was coming in fast on the other side, two more dragon boats travelling in opposite directions between them, caught in the middle of something they had never expected.
He saw the shadowy images of the sailors as they approached, saw they held assault rifles, and burst once more into action, his eyes on the far side of the deck and the guard rail which led back to the water.
He dropped the oar as he sprinted, jumping over the discarded bodies of the crew as he went, increasing speed, accelerating toward the guard rail.
He saw the look of surprise on the faces of the crew of the first dragon boat as he sailed high over the rail in a flying leap, his body arcing out across the water towards them.
He landed on the side of the dragon boat, its lightweight frame bucking wildly as he regained his balance, arms out wide to steady himself, and then he stepped between the legs of one of the terrified rowers, balancing once again on the other side of the hull.
The second dragon boat was approaching now, their paths crossing over each other, and Cole stepped off from the first, shaky legs taking him across the dark waters of the lake to rest precariously on the side of the second ship’s hull; with both boats going in different directions, he felt his legs being pulled dangerously apart, feet slipping. But he kept his momentum going, body tilting wildly before he regained his balance and stepped fully into the boat.
He heard warning shots being fired from the patrol boat behind him, but ignored them; they wanted to capture him, not kill him. Besides which, he doubted their marksmanship would be good enough to hit a small moving target in a cloudy storm, while stood on top of a moving ship.
He again kept his forward momentum going, stepping onto the far side of the second boat, the speedboat now in his sights as it cut through the water towards him.
It curved away from the dragon boat, but Cole was already in the air, legs exploding underneath him to propel him once more through the damp, wet air.
For a moment he feared he wouldn’t make it, would end up helpless in the lake, but then his hands made contact with the front of the speedboat, then his knees and feet, his body going flat, clinging to the long front-end as the pilots screamed at him and accelerated away, cutting across the bow of the patrol boat.
Cole knew they were trying to swing the craft around as fast as they could in a desperate attempt to throw him off, but it was no good; he had a secure grip, and slowly started to edge up the boat toward the cabin.
One of the three men in the open cabin leant out of the boat, pointing a pistol at him, but didn’t shoot. Frustrated, the man cried out, then fired two shots into the air as a warning, before pointing the weapon back at Cole once more.
But Cole was too fast, having worked his way up the long bow section to the windshield; and when the gun came down towards him again, he reached out and plucked it straight from the hands of the shocked man.
He knelt up on the bow, pointing the gun through the windshield at the men inside, their faces registering total fear.
Cole moved ahead even further, one hand going to the rim of the windshield, one leg stepping over, coming down on top of the controls inside. Keeping the gun aimed at the men, he stepped over with his other leg, now inside the cabin.
He gestured with the gun to the lake beyond. ‘Out,’ he said in Mandarin. ‘Now.’
The men didn’t have to be told twice, and jumped for their lives. They knew they’d probably get picked up by the patrol boat; and if not, they could always swim to the shore anyway. But either way, it was better than facing a bullet, and the look Cole had given them was enough to convince them that he was prepared to kill if pushed.
Once they were clear, Cole gunned the engines and pulled the boat around, once more headed towards the northeastern corner of the lake, and at a much faster speed than he’d been getting out of the dragon boat crew.
He just hoped his research of the area had been accurate; if it was not, he would be heading straight for a dead end, and a premature conclusion to his desperate escape attempt.
President Ellen Abrams sat in the corner wing chair of her private sitting room, which lay sandwiched between her bedroom on one side and the Yellow Oval Room on the other, looking at the telephone as it rang on the credenza by her side.
It was obscenely early, but she was already up and dressed, not having been able to go back to sleep since Eckhart’s earlier call, and she was now drinking strong black coffee as she mentally prepared herself for the day ahead.
The White House was a big place to live in alone, but it was something she had long grown accustomed to. Besides which, there was always plenty of staff milling around so she wasn’t exactly ever truly alone. But sometimes, she reflected, it would have been nice to have someone to talk to outside of her official circle of advisors and aides.