“Guardian Inspector,” Chairman Hong said. “It is so good of you to arrive on time. The traffic was light then?”
She had no idea if it had been heavy or light, but she nodded.
“Excellent,” he said. He indicated the big bear. “What do you make of it?”
She turned toward the polar bear. With its black nose, the huge creature nudged something small—
“It has a cub,” she said, surprised at this.
“Yes. It is her first. She’s nursing it.”
Shun Li had no idea what to say.
“If it lives,” Hong said, “the cub is yours.”
She blinked with astonishment. “I… I thank you, sir. It is a marvelous gift.”
“I hear the truth of your words in your voice, Guardian Inspector. Yes, I can see you love the bears as I do. They are a symbol of strength and virtuous purity. They are like China, at once savage and gentle, powerful and given to tender kindness. Only a fool antagonizes a polar bear. It is the supreme master of its domain.”
“Where should I raise the cub?” Shun Li asked. “It must have the best facilities possible.”
Hong turned to her. “Would you raise the cub in your home?”
His scrutiny frightened her. What she said next seemed terribly important. “Leader, I lack the proper funds to raise the cub properly. But yes, if I could and can, I will raise the cub in my home.”
He nodded with a gentle serenity. “I sensed this in you: that you are capable of love. This is good. Police Minister Xiao Yang cannot love. It is his greatest gift and his worst failing.”
Frightened by the comment and thoroughly alert, Shun Li said nothing.
“Ah, you are loyal to your chief,” Hong said. “That is admirable in an underling. Yet I am curious. Are you more loyal to him or to China?”
“Leader, I beg to say that I love China above all else. With that said, I cannot conceive that Xiao Yang would do anything to hurt our great land. But China is always my first and abiding love.”
“I am China and China is me,” Hong told her.
“Yes,” Shun Li said, as if that made perfect sense.
Hong’s gaze lingered on her face. Then he turned to the nursing polar bear. “You have earned my gratitude by your loyal service. You ferreted out the existence of the Behemoth Manufacturing Plant. Because of that, we know Denver’s importance. Last night, the tanks made their appearance, inflicting a deadly loss at precisely the correct moment—for the Americans. I have now instructed Marshal Wu to level the entire city if the enemy proves resistant to capture. We must stamp out this hatful tank plant and annihilate each of the dreadful Behemoths.”
Shun Li stood at attention, deciding to treat the Chairman as if he were a god come to Earth. There was something unsettling about him, and it horrified her to think he could sense her unease. He was like a beast, a creature, and she knew dogs could sense or sniff out discomfort. Perhaps in that way the Chairman had become like a dog, a beast.
“Because of your diligent work,” he said, “my field commander at Denver knew the correct action to take last night. It probably saved a goodly portion of the Third Front’s bomber force. But these tanks will not escape me so easily.”
Chairman Hong grinned, and he raised his hand before her. The oh-so-clean fingers closed into a fist, and the fist shook. “I shall crush these Behemoths. This I vow as China-in-the-flesh.”
Shun Li made her eyes shine with expectation as she looked upon him with forced adoration.
Hong let the arm drop to his side. He smiled. It seemed natural and ordinary. “Guardian Inspector, I trust and like you. You have earned the polar bear cub. For now, it will nurse with its mother.”
“May I come to visit it, sir?” she asked.
“Exactly,” he said. “You will come every day. You will learn about polar bears and you will play with the cub. I will watch, delighted with the antics. Afterward, you will tell me everything you know about Xiao Yang.”
“Gladly, sir,” Shun Li said. Her heart beat with fear. This was intrigue against Xiao Yang. Surely, the Police Minister would soon hear of this. He eventually learned of everything involving security.
“The Police Minister is my trusted confident,” Hong said. “Yet I have begun to feel the stirrings of unease concerning him. Something is amiss with his department. You will be my eyes and ears, Guardian Inspector.”
“You honor me, Leader.”
“I do. But I assure you that you will work hard for this honor. Those I favor, work.”
“Yes, Leader,” Shun Li said.
He studied her, and he nodded. “That is all for now. I will send Tang for you tomorrow.”
She began to speak, but Hong had already turned away. So she remained quiet, standing at attention until the Chairman exited through a side door.
Soldier Rank Zhu and First Rank Tian knelt on the roof of a three-story, burnt-out concrete building in the heart of Centennial. The rest of the squad lay behind them, with discarded dinylon armor and jetpacks beside them. The men enjoyed a moment’s respite from the fighting.
Zhu and Tian scanned the destruction. The Americans had fought hard, and they still fought from building to building, from the sewers and from foxholes in what seemed like every front yard.
Centennial was a dirty, bloody mess. Shells screamed overhead and smashed into the ruins. Geysers of dirty snow, mud, wooden splinters and brick chips fountained upward and rained back down again, rearranging the mess.
Chinese artillery boomed continuously. Marauder light tanks clattered amongst the rubble. Gunhawks hovered high over fierce spots of resistance, pouring down chain-gun fire. Squads crawled from street-to-street, with their assault rifles barking. Always, American machine gun nests hammered back.
The glorious Rocky Mountains behind Greater Denver awed Zhu. They were so beautiful and majestic. The vast urban area spread out before him. Denver had skyscrapers just like Los Angeles. High in the atmosphere, fighters, bombers and drones left white contrails. Occasionally, one of the machines dropped like a pile of junk, as if one of the gods had emptied his trash bin.
The summons had come for them a week ago. Zhu had watched the quick build-up, the trucks coming every minute of every hour. It seemed like the entire Chinese Army had come for the main event. Tian had told him otherwise. Tenth and Fifteenth Armies were here, to take the great urban sprawl from these greedy Americans. The rest of Third Front kept going north.
“This one is going to be bloody,” Tian said.
“Another Los Angeles?” asked Zhu.
“No. We’re going to win this one.”
Zhu lowered his binoculars to glance at the thick First Rank. Tian had a wrestler’s bulky neck and sloping shoulders. A thick vein stood out in his neck.
“We beat the Americans in California,” Zhu said.
It was Tian’s turn to lower his binoculars. He motioned to Zhu, and they backed away from the edge of the building. Who knew when an American sniper might take a potshot at one of them? Tian lay back against his jetpack so his eyes peered up at the clouds.
Zhu did likewise against his jetpack.
“We killed a lot of Americans in California,” Tian said in a low voice. “But we did not win the campaign.”
“We took their city from them.”
Tian shook his head. “We were supposed to take the state, not just its biggest city.”
“We’ll take Denver,” Zhu said. “Then we’ll take this state just as we’ve taken New Mexico, Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas and Oklahoma.”
“Very good, Zhu,” Tian said in his mocking voice. “Can you recite all the other states we need to capture to win this campaign?”
“I cannot, no.”
“Listen,” Tian said. “I’ve seen the directive. We’re supposed to capture the most important slice of Colorado, Kansas, Missouri, Iowa, Nebraska, Wyoming, half of Montana, South and North Dakota and Minnesota. That’s ten more states. So far, we’ve taken five, and winter is now upon us.”