Chu started towards him with a cruel gleam in his eye. Fu grabbed at his pistol and strained to remove it from its holster. Chu closed in, looking like a bear ready to attack. Just as Fu’s violently shaking hand got the pistol free a piercing scream filled the air, “Pui! In God’s name stop!”
As the scream began, Fu simultaneously started to pull the trigger and jerked his head around for a split second in reaction to the sound. Fu’s pistol kicked back and a tarnished brass shell casing flicked out of the ejector port. A red blossom of blood erupted on Chu’s thigh and Chu tumbled to the ground with a roar.
Chu yelled, “You’ve shot me!” It was a statement, not a cry.
Just out of sight Chu’s wife screamed, “Stop!”
Chu lifted himself up on his hands, rocked back on one foot, and launched himself at Fu’s pistol.
Fu fired again, this time the shot passed just to the left of Chu’s heart, grazing the fleshy portion of the farmer’s outstretched arm. If it hurt, Chu didn’t show it.
Chu now had both hands on the pistol and was quickly wrenching it around. Fu managed to pull the trigger once more. The action of the pistol’s slide sliced open both of Chu’s hands while his left hand received a nasty powder burn, but still the farmer pressed on.
The gun was now pointed at Fu’s head. “Go ahead and pull the trigger now you bastard parasite.” Chu triumphantly roared. Fu’s gurgled cry was choked off when Chu’s hands crushed down around Fu’s right hand and squeezed the trigger. The bullet entered under Fu’s jaw and came to a rest just under his cranium. The Party boss’s body convulsed and went limp. Chu just lay there on top of Fu’s lifeless shell, not wanting to be pulled back into the world, back into facing the consequences of his action.
Chu looked up, blinking at the bright July sky. He saw his weeping wife. He saw his older brother, ashen-faced and frozen to the ground. There were four other villagers, good friends all, nearby.
Chu’s wife spoke first. “We need to get you to a doctor. You are bleeding badly.”
“No!” It was Chu Kwok, his brother. “We need to handle this ourselves. A doctor would only alert the Party. This is not good. Oh, my brother, what have you done?” Kwok voice betrayed little sympathy for his sibling.
“Something we all wanted to do years ago!” Chu fiercely said.
“Let’s get you inside and stop the bleeding,” his wife firmly said, “Help me!”
Two men from the village grabbed Chu around each arm and carried him down to the house. Chu carried Fu’s pistol in his right hand like the head of a slain dragon.
Lee Bensui had been Lipu County’s Deputy Party Administrator for 15 years now. Loyal to Fu Mingjie, he nonetheless resented the elder leader’s authority, reach and complete control of all bribes. Fu treated him well enough by the standards in this province, giving him ten percent of all he collected. Lee’s main gripe with Fu was that he allowed no other official corruption other than his own. Everything had to be channeled through him. A smaller man with less intelligence and drive than Fu, Lee made up for his shortcomings by developing a reputation for vicious retribution. Lee considered the local contingent of the People’s Armed Police (PAP) to be his personal vanguard. Fu liked the arrangement as long as Lee kept in line — kind of a good cop, bad cop, ying, yang method that served Fu’s leadership style wonderfully.
When the call came that Fu was killed, murdered by a local villager, Lee was ready to act immediately. If he reacted with enough force, two ends would be achieved: one, this dangerous rebellion would be quickly crushed, and two, his position as Party leader in Lipu County would be assured. With Fu’s network of bribes already in place, Lee figured he ought to be a very wealthy man in no time at all!
Lee called out a company of the PAP and began the trip to bring Fu’s killer to justice and teach those insolent hill people a lesson they’d never forget.
Lee anxiously drove his old brown GAZ-69 jeep in the middle of the convoy of ten trucks carrying a force of 121 men. They would reach the village just before nightfall.
The PAP convoy stopped 500 meters short of the edge of the plateau that held the village. The officers assembled their men and gave them final instructions in the failing light. A lone figure came out of the bushes near the road. He was stopped and frisked by the paramilitaries, then shown to Lee Bensui. The two men conversed for a moment. The man made hand signs and pointed up the road. Lee called the PAP’s company commander over, then soon started up the hill.
A few minutes later, they were at Chu’s house. The shadowed man was allowed to slip away. A platoon of 40 police armed with assault rifles surrounded the house. The captain walked carefully around the house with his pistol drawn, Lee following timidly behind him. The other 80 paramilitaries fanned out in groups of four to round up the rest of the small village.
The PAP captain heard a groan and carefully looked in a window. Inside, beside a kerosene lamp, was the prostrate and bandaged traitor, Chu Pui. At his bedside was Fu’s Makarov.
“He’s armed,” the captain hissed.
Lee shuddered in the twilight, “Kill him.”
The captain motioned for two of his men to come closer.
He whispered the situation to them and pushed them gently forward to the window. The captain stood right behind them, pistol drawn.
“Wait!” Lee rasped. “He’s asleep. We shall capture him and give him a trial tomorrow. Then we shall execute him.” How could I forget? The going price for kidneys was now $2,000 each. Chu’s other internal organs, if properly harvested, could bring another $5,000! I almost threw away a fortune! Lee grinned mercilessly—yes, it is good to be the boss.
It was now almost midnight. Lee was tired, but elated. Except for one small hitch, the operation had gone smoothly. Fu’s killer was in custody and the entire list of subversive religionists in this vile village were safely rounded up. 103 people in all. The only hitch came with trying to figure out what to do with the 42 children. After briefly conferring with the PAP captain, Lee decided to bring them all into town and place them in the Lipu orphanage while the Party decided what to do with their seditious parents.
The cries of the children were disconcerting, and Lee’s anger only made it worse. He finally quieted the lot of them by firing a shot from his pistol into the air.
As the moon began to rise a lone man again stepped out the shadows to confer with Lee. Chu Ling strained her eyes from the back of the 2–1/2-ton truck. “Chu Kwok!” she yelled.
The shadowed man turned briefly.
A guard yelled at Chu Ling, then smashed her foot with the butt of his rifle. Chu Ling winced and yelled again, “God loves you Kwok. He can forgive you for what you have done!”
The guard cursed and swung the butt of his assault rifle at Ling’s head. She felt a blinding pain and with a dull thud, fell into a heap in the bed of the truck.
Lieutenant Colonel Chu Dugen knew his men were ready; whatever for he didn’t know, but he knew they were ready. It was nearing the end of the day, a Day One day in their endless cycle of airport attack training. He finished up two award recommendations. One for a young lieutenant who really excelled at teaching martial arts techniques, the other for a very efficient Sergeant First Class of supply.
Chu heard the light knock at his door that could only mean one person — his political officer. “Come in comrade political officer!”
The young officer with a bad case of acne came in. In the beginning, this creature tried to lord it over Chu with his power — then Chu invited him along for a 40-kilometer speed march with his commandos. Every man had 40-kilograms of rucksack and equipment. Within an hour the poor specimen was weeping at Chu’s feet. Ever since then, Chu had perfect control over the man. Their agreement was simple: Huang Enlai the political officer acted as Chu’s intermediary to the Party, keeping him abreast of Party rumors while Chu kept the political officer out of trouble with his men. Chu knew it must be terribly lonely for the man, but that was Huang’s problem.