“Stephie, no,” he said.
“They’re coming,” she said without looking at her father. “Run for it!”
“No!”
“Get going!” she shouted, looking around the listing bridge for cover.
“We both go!” Bill said.
“You’re going! I’m staying!”
“No!” Bill shouted.
“You’re the president of the fucking United States and I’m a soldier!” she screamed, beginning to cry. The Chinese troops were close. Soldiers with rifles were climbing onto girders to take aim directly at the exposed pair. Bill grabbed the warm barrel of the machine pistol and pressed it to the concrete. It fell from Stephie’s hands. She dissolved into his arms, sobbing.
“John!” she kept saying as she heaved sobs into Bill’s chest. “Jo-o-ohn!”
“He was a Secret Service agent, Stephie,” Bill told her, rubbing her back as the Chinese neared. “He was assigned to your unit to protect you. He was just doing his job.”
“I know all that!” she blurted out, sobbing like a child. “I’ve known from the very beginning! It was so obvious! But I love him! And he loves…! He loved…! Oh God! Oh God why? Why? Why? Why?” she screamed, flailing her arms. She could say nothing more. Her back heaved in Bill’s arms. He stroked her head and neck, telling her that everything would be all right.
Chinese troops — breathing heavily, sweating, scared — assumed positions all around Bill and Stephie. Over the crest of the bridge’s center, Bill could see the helmets and muzzles of American soldiers, who had barely lost the footrace. The Chinese escorted Bill and Stephie toward the Virginia bank. The Americans held their fire.
Hart had a piss poor shot amid the cluster of escorts who ringed President Baker. They surrounded him with a human shield and kept him stooped low. It was so useless that Hart found himself raising his eye from the scope and glancing toward his lone escape route.
He would never make it to the round black hole in the earth. Every Chinese soldier for a mile would hear his booming .50 caliber rifle. He would drop the weapon and sprint. Fire would fill the woods, rising in caliber to main tank guns maneuvering along the roadside below.
If by some chance he made it over the skyline, down the reverse slope, and into the dark pipe, then what? There could be a metal grate on the opposite end. He’d be trapped. He’d die. The end.
The president and his daughter stepped off the bridge. Hart’s crosshairs danced across the president’s head. He couldn’t get off a kill shot. A single round perfectly placed in the center of his skull. Suddenly, the president popped-into the open. The soldiers parted. Lights bathed the man and his daughter.
Hart was so astonished at the easy shot that he again slowed down and thought about the situation. “Under no circumstances,” the briefers had pressed, “are you to allow him to live.” Hart watched the president through a high-powered scope as he climbed onto the platform. His orders didn’t seem adequate all of the sudden. Hart couldn’t execute his commander in chief just yet. Assassinate, he thought for the first time. The word didn’t sit well with Hart. Having disobeyed express orders after the Chinese had sprung their trap, he couldn’t decide what to do or when to do it. Hart simply joined the president in the last few precious moments of a life that was less than full.
Where is he? Bill Baker wondered as he scanned the high hills. He tried to keep his distance from Stephie, but she kept pressing close to his side. Her head drooped. Bill held his high. Waiting.
“Don’t worry,” whispered a young Chinese officer to Stephie.
“Fuck you,” Stephie replied, her nose thick with congestion from crying.
Bill stared at the young Chinese soldier, whose cheek was covered with a bandage. He was half-Asian, half-Caucasian, and he returned Bill’s quizzical look.
“Bill,” Han Zhemin said, “I’d like you to meet my son. Han Wushi.” Han appeared beside Bill, blocking Bill’s line of sight to the hills.
Do it now, Bill thought with his teeth grinding. He watched Han, waiting for his head to explode but knowing it wouldn’t register in the milliseconds left in his life before the bullet struck him. Below, cameramen swayed as they jostled for position. Bill was quite familiar with media frenzies. Perhaps it was the actor in him, or perhaps the politician, but he could see in his mind’s eye what the cameras saw. They would swing toward him and Stephie — passing over Han — focus, then return to Han’s son. Always to Han’s son.
The boy — a young army officer — was the star of the show. Bill and Stephie were co-stars. Han Zhemin was an extra.
“President Baker,” came a reedy and frail, heavily accented voice. Han stepped aside to reveal a short general with a broad smile. His aide stood a half step behind and to the side. All fouled the aim of any sniper in the wooded hills behind them. “I am General Sheng. You are under arrest for…”
“No,” interrupted Han’s son, the young, bandaged officer. His pistol rose from its holster and fired. Bill jumped. Han jumped. Stephie clutched her father as if to throw him to the ground.
The old general fell dead with a disgusting red hole in his forehead. An instant pool of thick blood gathered beneath him.
Another shot. Bill jumped. Stephie pulled him backwards and stood in front of him.
The general’s aide lay dead beside the old man.
The lieutenant’s smoking pistol pointed stiff-armed into thin air.
Han Zhemin stared wide-eyed at his son and at the smoking muzzle. He was terrified, Bill thought, of his son, who stood there prepared to kill him. No one made a move to interfere.
Bill shoved Stephie aside.
“Wu,” Han whispered, bowing in supplication.
All Bill heard was the whisper of electric motors in two hundred video cameras.
Wu lowered the pistol. None of the thousand people surrounding the platform said a word.
Wu didn’t reholster the gun, Bill noticed. He gripped it repeatedly. Maniacally or angrily or agitated.
“Wu,” Stephie suddenly said, her eyes on the pistol. “Don’t. Life’s not over, yet. Don’t, Wu, don’t.” She never took her eyes off the pistol, which Bill now understood the boy was considering using on himself.
Bill put his arms around his daughter. She hugged him, and lay her head against his chest. The young lieutenant — eyes wet — stared at their embrace.
Someone from the mass all around the platform shouted something in Chinese. It was almost instantly repeated. It unleashed a torrent of cries from dozens, and then hundreds of soldiers near and far. All shouted with abandon that became totally synchronized passion. Rhythmic. Chanted. Adoring. Bill didn’t speak a word of Chinese, but their three joyous words told Bill everything.
“Han!”
“Wu!”
“Shi!”
The soldiers shouted over and over and over.
Hart’s bare finger rested hard on the cold trigger. His crosshairs were on Bill Baker’s head. There were no orders expressly covering this situation. No “if-a-Chinese-lieutenant-shoots-a-Chinese-general-then…” contingency plan. Hart had nothing to fall back on but his standing orders. “If he’s taken, I do the president!” Hart had repeated four times to his insistent, persistent, unknown briefers.