Navarone had already been in touch with Liu Yingchau, who had an idea of where they might be keeping him, and it was definitely worth a shot.
‘Our chief’s been captured,’ he explained to Sherman, ‘so we’re going back.’
The old navy captain looked at Navarone, saw the determination in the man’s eyes; looked behind him at the rest of the team, saw that they shared his feelings, and nodded his head.
‘Okay,’ he said, ‘okay. You’re one bunch of crazy sonsofbitches, that’s for damn sure.’ He straightened, smiled at them in admiration for their courage. ‘Good luck,’ he said simply, before turning his back on them and marching towards the submarine hatch.
‘Yes sir,’ Navarone whispered in return as he turned back to his own boat, the one that would take them back to the Bund, where they would then proceed onto the Maglev station that would take them straight back into the dark, dangerous heart of Beijing.
Yes, he thought with trepidation, we’re going to need all the help we can get.
3
The pain in Cole’s toes, his chest and his shoulders had now all but eradicated the burning pain in his groin. The crucifixion position he was in had done its work perfectly, leaving him a mess both physically and psychologically.
And it didn’t help, knowing that he was waiting for Zhou’s return, anticipating what it was Zhou was going to do to him.
But it was just pain, he tried to remind himself, it was only pain. He had to try and put his mind elsewhere, just as he’d been trained to do, as he’d done during those hellish months in that stinking prison in the mountains of Pakistan all those years before.
He wasn’t embarrassed for letting go after Zhou’s last visit and crying; it had been necessary, a grieving process which had enabled him to move forward, get his mind back on track, where it had to be.
It was only pain.
Even when the monster forcefully violated him, he would put his mind elsewhere, disconnect himself from the pain, the psychological damage of such an attack.
He assumed Zhou was going to sever his manhood in its entirety too, his promise to use the razor again hinting at such, and again Cole told himself that he could — he would — handle it, if it came to that.
But whatever Zhou was planning on doing to him, Cole had decided that this time he wasn’t going to go down without a fight.
During his last visit, the man had put his face so close to Cole’s, so close that Cole had felt his rotten, stinking breath on his cheek.
He knew the man would do so again, would remove the gag so he could hear Cole beg for mercy; and when he did, Cole would bury his teeth in the man’s face, take hold of his nose and whip his head back and forth like a dog, rip the entire thing off. Or maybe an ear, or the cheek — anything he could sink his teeth into, anything that presented itself.
He should have done it the first time, was angry with himself that he hadn’t.
But he was going to fight this time; hell yes, he was going to put up a fight. He would make that bastard bleed, and then he’d take anything the man gave him in return, his mind made up that he could handle anything the monster threw his way.
Yes, Cole told himself, you can do this. You can do this. You can do this.
And then the metal door creaked open slowly, painfully, the noise deafening him after so much silence, the corridor lights blinding him after so much darkness.
But in the doorway, he could make out the huge, monstrous mass of Zhou Shihuang; watched as the man’s hand crept up the wall, hit a light switch.
The entire cell was bathed in stark, harsh light for the first time since Cole had arrived there, and the first thing he saw was the knowing, lecherous smile on Zhou’s face, a look full of anticipation for the joys to come.
And then he saw the concrete floor, the walls, all stained with dried blood that had been scrubbed but had obviously proved impossible to get out, and Cole wondered how many people had met their lonely, pain-filled deaths here in this horrendous room.
‘Hello,’ said Zhou softly, edging into the cell and closing the door behind him. ‘I couldn’t sleep, thinking about you. I was going to wait until morning, but I couldn’t. I just couldn’t wait to make you my… how do you Americans call it? My bitch.’ He smiled his savage, terrible smile again, and Cole knew the man was far from normal, far from sane.
His heart leapt in his chest, his mind screaming at him in raw panic at what the man was planning on doing to him, but he cut it off with an iron will, concentrating on the only thing he could control — the passage of his teeth towards the big man’s face.
Zhou approached, sizing up Cole’s naked body once more, and then his thick fingers went to the gag, pulling it down to rest around his neck.
‘I’m not American,’ Cole whispered quietly, pretending to be even weaker than he actually was.
‘What was that?’ Zhou asked with interest, unable to hear him. ‘You are what?’
‘I’m Dutch,’ Cole whispered again. ‘I’m not an American.’
Zhou laughed, moving in closer. ‘Say that again, my friend? You are what?’
Yes, you sonofabitch, Cole said to himself, watching as the man’s massive head moved closer towards him, just come a little bit closer, just a little more, a little more…
Cole’s mouth opened, pretending to whisper again as Zhou’s face came in that last fatal inch, his wide, fleshy nose so close now, and Cole primed himself like a rattlesnake for the attack.
‘Sir!’ a voice shouted from the doorway, and Zhou’s head snapped up, immediately out of range.
‘What is it?’ Zhou asked the soldier stood in the open doorway. ‘I gave orders I was not to be disturbed.’
‘It is General Wu, sir. He needs you in the control room immediately.’
Zhou stood stock still, regarding the soldier in front of him, before turning back to his prisoner, casting his eyes once more over Cole’s bleeding, naked body.
He nodded his head in resignation, and looked into Cole’s eyes. ‘I am sorry, but it looks like we will have to delay our little game a while longer. But don’t worry,’ he said with a wink, ‘I will let you have another go at biting me when I return.’
And with that, the big man was gone, striding off out of the cell toward the control room, leaving Cole to ponder the unsettling fact that Zhou had known his plan all along.
‘Is he talking?’ Wu asked Zhou Shihuang, back in the Zhongnonhai control room, two subterranean levels above the prison block.
‘Not yet,’ Zhou said moodily, ‘I was just in the middle of my interrogation. But he will. They all do in the end.’
Wu nodded his head, knowing the man was right. It was impossible to resist forever, for any human being. The question was, how long it would take — it was a simple truth that some took longer to break than others. Still, Zhou always made them crack quickly. He didn’t know how the man did it — and nor did he want to — but Zhou was definitely effective in his work, and that was all there was to it.
Answers would be good, Wu knew, but he had managed to get some political capital out of recent events anyway; the entire world media was fired up about what had happened, many blaming US intelligence for the attacks, all of them wondering why the Politburo had been targeted.
There had been plenty of commentary about the Taihang Mountains and the Great Wall Project too, Wu had been pleased — but not surprised — to see, all of it fearful and panic-inducing. By the time his fleet arrived at the Japanese coast, not one country in the world would have the political will to stop him. The fears of their citizenry would put paid to all notions of helping allies, and it would be every man for himself, America included.