It wasn't necessarily for the benefit of his beloved Chinese. He could be selling Dr Xingyu Baibing down the river in some way, and I didn't like that, Xingyu was mine, he was under my protection, he was the whole of the mission, Bamboo, and I didn't trust this man anymore, this man Trotter, and he went down but he'd seen it coming and swung away, very fast for such a big man, took only half the weight of the strike and was still conscious, shouting the place down, and I didn't have time to follow up with the killer because they were in here now, three of them, coming at the double with their guns out and I took the first one head on and heard the bone go, heard the bone go driving upward into the brain and he screamed very briefly and then it was cut off as he died, the second one coming but I wasn't quite ready because the whole weight of my body had gone into the strike and the momentum was still trying to carry me forward and I needed to recover, wasn't correctly set up-
'Zhua zhu ta! Bie kai qiang!'
Trotter, shouting again as the second man came at me and I did what I could, broke his arm but it didn't stop his momentum, his gun went clattering across the floor but he wouldn't have used it anyway, none of them could, Trotter wanted a live brain lying there under the needle and they knew that, he would have told them, instructed them, one of his hands trying to get a grip on my triceps and I smashed a hammerfist down but the target was too insensitive and he hung on and another man began locking my legs at the ankle and all I could do was try for an eye gouge and got it half right, got another scream but it didn't mean anything useful, they were hanging on me like dogs on a fox, Trotter's face somewhere above me, blood shining on it because I'd raked the skin open with the strike, his eyes frightened, because if he lost me now he'd lose the whole thing, tried one more strike, a strong hiji-uchi with enough force behind it to break whatever it hit, but it didn't connect because I was on the floor now and Trotter was up there, huge, dripping with blood, while they wrapped something around my ankles and he lifted me by the shoulders and they took my feet and between them they laid me on the blankets, on the plinth where I'd been before, got in a quick tiger-claw and drew blood again but technically it was ineffective, simply an attempt to save face.
They held me down, the three of them, Trotter and the two surviving Chinese, while Dr Chen broke open the top of one of the little phials and wiped it with an alcohol swab, from habit I suppose, there wouldn't be time for me to get any kind of infection, would there, the head throbbing a lot now because one of them had opened the wound under the bandage when we'd been milling about, I watched the Chinese, Dr Chen, as he pushed some air into the phial and tilted it and began suction with the plunger, they've made great advances in the field of psychiatric drugs, I could believe that, Trotter was an intelligent man, would know what he was doing, the weight of his huge hands on my shoulders keeping me down, I've never had to deal with anyone so strong, blood on his black beard, his eyes watching the syringe, the plunger still drawing the stuff in, quite a lot of it, we were nearing the 5cc mark on the barrel, I hate these bloody things.
One of the hit men was snivelling a bit because of the eye gouge I'd used on him, didn't look pretty, mucus dripping from his nose, couldn't wipe it away, had to keep both his hands on my legs, I tried a last essay, jerking my knees to connect with his face but it was no go, they'd been waiting for me to do something, didn't trust me anymore, bloody shame, my eyes closing against the flickering light of the lamp over there, watch it, yes, God's sake stay with it, yes indeed, one must remain conscious, mustn't one, opened my eyes again and slowed the breathing, deepened it, sought prana, drew it into the lungs, felt better, a little better now, he was stopping at 5cc, pulled the needle out of the phial and tilted the syringe, pressed the air out and got another swab, asking one of them to pull my sleeve higher, wiped my arm and dropped the swab and brought the syringe into position and I said, 'Trotter, you'd better listen to this.'
Chen looked across at him but Trotter shook his head, keep going, I suppose it meant.
'When I got him through Hong Kong and Chengdu and Gonggar,' I said, 'it was because he was wearing a mask. The «element». I couldn't have got him through without it. You won't get him through to Beijing without it either.'
'Zhan zhu.'
Dr Chen was holding the syringe like a dart, ready to stab, but he didn't move now, watched Trotter.
I said, 'Listen, if this stuff is as good as you say it is, I'll tell you where the mask is, but it won't do you any good because you won't know how to put it on his face. It requires skill and experience, takes nearly an hour, and you haven't been trained, and I have. I'm the only one who can put that mask on, Trotter, so you'd better tell the good doctor, hadn't you, to put that bloody thing away.'
I suppose Trotter would have given it some thought but there wasn't time because the doors of the temple blew open and the whole place shuddered and I saw the light of the explosion on his face before the air blast reached the lamps and blew them out and I twisted and rolled and dropped and got onto my feet and began running through the dark toward the patch of moonlight where the doors had been.
'In there,' I told Chong and he lobbed the next one into the Buddha room and the force came in a wave and I went down under the blast and hit something with my shoulder and spun away and got up again, a few seconds of darkness after the flash and then the moonlight came back, filtering through the smoke where the roof had blown out.
Shot, whining close and bouncing against stone, someone had survived in there but the light was too tricky to let him do any more than shoot wild and 1 checked the vestibule on my left and didn't find anything more than rubble, crossed through the line of fire at a run and called for Chong to look after things and he lobbed another one through the doorway and the building bellowed again and I squeezed my eyes shut against the flash and waited for them to accommodate and then took the room on the other side and found him there, Xingyu, another man with him and I went for a certain kill and called out to Chong again, where was the truck?
Xingyu was conscious and on his feet and I found his flight bag and checked it for the insulin by the light of the flames that had broken out in the Buddha room and then got him through the rubble, another shot and I called out to Chong again but he didn't answer, we needed another bomb in there, Xingyu felt heavy against me and I had to half-carry him, smoke in the lungs and the light deceptive, shadows everywhere as the fire took hold and began blazing.
'Chong!'
Crackling of timber and a beam came down with a crash and sparks flew, a billow of smoke rolling through the doorway and clouding gray in the moonlight, the eyes stinging as we reached the open and I saw the truck, 'Chong!' but no answer.