Wall of Night

83

Taking the steps two at a time, Tanner rushed back down to the engine room and climbed the catwalks to where Hsiao was kneeling. He’d managed to connect the generator cable to the radio’s transformer, which in turn was linked to the Motorola by a pair of fine, copper wires.

“They’re here,” Tanner said.

“I told you he would come,” Lian said. “You’re not going to get away. You won’t live to see another hour — none of you!”

Briggs ignored her and focused on Hsiao. “Any luck?”

“Perhaps. Listen.”

Hsiao began slowly turning the generator’s hand crank. Tanner knelt down and pressed the phone to his ear. At first he heard only static, then in the background came a faint pulsing squelch.

“That’s a carrier wave,” Briggs said.

“Is it the right one, though?”

“It’s all we’ve got. How’s your Morse code?”

“It’s been a while — since boot camp — but I think I can manage as long as it’s short.”

“Just two words: Pelican and Dire. Keep sending it over and over.”

“That’s all?”

“If someone’s listening, it should be enough — I hope.” Tanner unzipped his pack and pulled out his supply of AK magazines — six of them, each containing thirty rounds — then checked over both weapons. He handed one to Hsiao. “You’ve got twenty rounds. Use them wisely.”

“I’d prefer to not have to use them at all.”

“Keep thinking good thoughts. I’ll hold them off as long as I can, then come back here. If I can’t make it, I’ll fire six shots in sets of two. If you hear that, get out.”

Hsiao nodded. He looked Tanner in the eye and extended his hand. “Good luck.”

Briggs took his hand. “You, too; thanks for everything. We wouldn’t have made it this far without you.” He turned to Soong. “Han—”

“Don’t say it. Just go and come back safely.”

“Okay.”

Tanner faced Lian. He could think of nothing to say to her. She glared at him, and he felt her hatred down to his very core. Put it away, Briggs. She’s gone. Put it away; you’ll have time later.

He stood up, tucked the magazines into his belt, and headed for the door.

Once back on the bridge, he dropped into a crouch and waddled out the door to the aft railing.

The soldiers had paused at the river bend. In the middle, two men stood together conferring, one in camouflage gear, the other in civilian clothes. The soldier, Tanner assumed, was the platoon leader, which meant the other man was probably Xiang. Standing behind them was the team’s radioman.

They spoke for a few more moments, then the platoon leader turned and barked an order to his men. His voice echoed across the ice. The men began spreading out in a staggered line abreast. It was a smart move, Tanner knew. The less they bunched up, the harder a time a sniper would have.

Briggs dropped onto his belly and wriggled back from the rail so they would have a more difficult time pinpointing his muzzle flashes, then settled into a firing position. He tucked the stock into his shoulder.

The morning sun was at his back. Light sparkled on the river ice and the air was dead calm. Both conditions would work to his advantage, he hoped, as the soldier’s vision would be degraded by the glare and the lack of wind would better echo his shots.

Regardless of nationality, soldiers share a universal fear of snipers. These paratroopers would probably react better than most, but watching helplessly as comrades are struck dead by phantom bullets tends to shake even the best troops. Even so, Briggs doubted he’d get more than three or four men before the platoon scattered and began laying down suppressing fire.

They were seventy-five yards away now, spread in a staggered line about one hundred yards long. Xiang, the platoon leader, and the team’s radioman had moved to the rear. Which one first? Tanner thought. He desperately wanted it to be Xiang, but he knew better. Once under fire, the troops would look to their leader. He had to be the first target. The radioman would be second; the psychological effect of losing their communications would further unnerve the platoon.

Briggs laid his cheek against the stock and took aim. Breathe and squeeze, breathe and squeeze …

Lieutenant Shen pulled out his compass and took a bearing on the opposite ridgeline. Walking beside him, Xiang said, “Well?”

“We’re on their track.” Two hours after leaving the Hind, they’d spotted the Hoplite’s rotor blade jutting from the hole in the ice and gone to investigate. “At least one of them had to have been injured in the crash,” Shen said. “That had to slow them considerably.”

“Considering they shouldn’t have gotten even this far,” Xiang said, “that’s a rather stupid statement, don’t you think?”

“I suppose.”

“Lieutenant!” Ahead, Sergeant Hjiu was waving. “Come take a look at this!”

They jogged forward to where Hjiu was standing with a group. “What is it?” Shen asked.

Hjiu was pointing upriver to a tree-covered island rising from the ice. “What do you make of that?”

Xiang said, “It’s an island, so what?”

“No, sir, look more closely,” Hjiu said. “You see the straight lines, the tiers …”

“Yes,” Shen murmured. “I see it now. It’s man-made …”

“A boat,” Hjiu said.

“Check the bearing,” Xiang said.

Shen did so. “It matches. If they survived the crash, they’d have been wet and cold, and—”

“Looking for shelter,” Xiang finished. “Let’s check it out.”

Shen nodded. “Sergeant Hjiu, spread the men out and start them forward.”

“Yes, sir.”

They were seventy-five yards away from the island when Xiang heard a double crack. As did a dozen others, he looked down, sure the ice was giving way, then dropped to his belly to distribute his weight. Beside him, he saw Shen and his radioman do the same.

“Shen, do you see anything?”

Silence.

“Shen, answer me—”

Xiang saw blood spreading from beneath Shen’s body. Xiang glanced at the radioman; he lay on his back, dead eyes staring at the sky

Crack! Crack!

To the right, another man dropped, then a third.

“Sniper!” Sergeant Hjiu shouted. “Sniper!” Hunched over, he scrambled back to Xiang, grabbed Shen’s collar, and started running toward the shoreline. “Come on! Move!”

Xiang turned and chased after him.

They were well-trained, Tanner saw. At the shout of “sniper,” there’d been the barest of hesitation before the platoon broke into two sections, each heading for an opposite shoreline. Despite the ice, they covered the distance in less than twenty seconds and slipped into the trees.

Tanner waited and watched for movement.

From the left shore, a lone soldier leaned out from behind a tree. Tanner took aim and fired. The soldier toppled over and rolled onto the ice. To their credit, the paratroopers kept their cool; there was no shouting, no panicked movement.

After thirty seconds, a voice from the right shoreline barked an order; a second voice called back. Tanner missed most of words, but the one he caught was enough: “encircle.”

From both shorelines, he saw movement in the trees as each group began making its way up the slope. Tanner spotted a leg sticking out from behind a tree trunk. He adjusted his aim and fired once. The bullet struck the leg’s thigh; it jerked behind the trunk.

Five down, Briggs thought. Time to move. Once fully under the cover of the trees, the paratroopers would converge on the paddle wheeler from both sides for a simultaneous charge.

Tanner backed away from the railing and started crawling toward the pilothouse door.

Case Officer Karen Hensridge had just come on duty as the OpCenter Duty Officer, or OCDO. Already bored, she stood at the communications console looking over the previous watch’s log entries. Aside from the routine daily traffic, there wasn’t much going on in the intelligence world today — a couple of embassy contact reports and info requests from field personnel, but little else.

The joys of OpCenter duty, Hensridge thought. All case officers had to go through OCDO qualifications, and only the greenest case officers — the ones who hadn’t yet sat through a dozen mind-numbing shifts — looked forward to the experience. However, if you wanted to get promoted up through the CIA’s Operations Directorate, OCDO was part of the price.

“Say, Karen, you got a minute?” one of the communication techs asked her.

“Got more than a minute, Kent. What’s up?”

“Listen to this.”

He handed her his headset, which she put to her ear. “Sounds like static to me.”

“No, listen deeper. Behind the static.”

Hensridge closed her eyes, trying to mentally blot out the hissing. She was about to give up when she heard it — a series of clicks embedded in the carrier wave. “It’s repeating,” she said.

The tech nodded. “Five second intervals.”

“Can you amplify it, maybe bring it to the front?”

“Hold on.”

The tech tapped his keyboard and the static faded slightly. The clicking was more prominent now. Unconsciously, Hensridge began drumming her fingertip along with it. She opened her eyes. “Gimme your pad, quick!”

As the series repeated itself, she began doodling, trying to ferret out the pattern. In a flash, it struck her. “Dots and dashes … It’s Morse code.”

“You’re kidding?”

“No.”

She copied down the series, then snatched a binder from the shelf above the console and began rifling through pages until she came to the reference section. The Morse code page was yellowed from neglect, but still readable.

“P-E-L–I-C-A-N … D-I-R-E,” she recited. “Pelican …” She grabbed another binder, this one the OCDO daybook, and flipped to the “Comms” section. “Pelican” was at the top of the list. “Jesus!”

“What?”

Hensridge reached for the phone.

Mason was in the tank when Coates’s call came through. Mason put him on speakerphone.

“Dick, we think Tanner’s made contact.”

Dutcher was on his feet instantly. “Where, how?” he demanded.

“Morse code, of all things. We’re working on triangulating the signal, but it looks like it’s coming from Siberia just north of the Chinese border. Khabarovsk region, probably.”

“How long till you can pinpoint it?” Mason said.

“Five minutes, maybe less.”

“Did he give anything else? Whether Soong was with him … their condition?”

“No, just the word dire.”

“Call me the second you know.”

Mason disconnected.

“He’s in trouble,” Dutcher said.

“But alive.” Mason turned to Cathermeier. Mason said, “Can we get Beskrovny on the phone?”

“Goddamn right we can!”

The CAC duty officer made the connection and routed it into The Tank. Mason called, “General Beskrovny, can you hear me?”

“I can hear you. Who is this?”

“Dick Mason, CLA. We’ve got a situation we need help with.”

“Go ahead.”

“It’s rather complicated … Ten days ago we sent a man into China to rescue an imprisoned PLA general.”

“Who?”

“Han Soong.”

“He’s alive?”

“Not only is he alive, but we think he may have the answer to what China is up to.”

“And you’re just telling me this now?” Beskrovny snapped.

“Until now, there was no point. We’d lost contact with our man, but we just heard from him. We believe he’s managed to cross the border into your country — somewhere in Khabarovsk.”

“With Soong.”

“We hope so. His situation may be grave, however. If we give you the coordinates, can you—”

“Of course,” Beskrovny said. “I’ll call the Khabarovsk garrison commander.”

“We’ll get back to you.”

Five minutes later Coates called with the coordinates. As Mason recited the numbers, Cathermeier plotted them on the map. Once done, he got Beskrovny back on the line and repeated the coordinates “They’re in Birobijan, Marshal, about seventy-five miles northwest of Novotroitskoye.”

“I know the area. I’ll get the helicopters moving.”

As the phone line went dead, Dick Mason sighed and turned to Dutcher. “I know I shouldn’t be surprised, but I can’t believe it. He made it out. Jesus.”

Dutcher nodded. Hang on, Briggs.

​Tanner was only halfway to the pilothouse hatch when he heard a double thunk behind him. He glanced over his shoulder in time to see a pair of grenades arc over the handrail and roll to a stop beside the smokestack. Briggs dove for the hatch.

The grenades exploded in quick succession, each a muffled crump. Shrapnel struck the open hatch like a flurry of hail. A few still-sizzling chunks landed on the deck beside Tanner. He crawled to the hatch and peeked out.

The underbrush and trees lining the railing were shredded and blackened. The smokestack, along with his makeshift antenna, lay in a smoking heap. So much for the phone call, Briggs thought. There was no reason to loiter now. Xiang and his men would be coming. The only questions were, would they charge in force, or send a recon team, and could Briggs lure aboard the bulk of the platoon before making a run for it?

Tanner dropped through the hatch to the deck below, ran to the spiral stairwell, and down to the main deck. Once there, he sprinted down the main alleyway to the midships intersection, stopping short of the corner. He dropped to his belly, crawled ahead, then peeked out.

Noise. Port side.

Beyond the vine-entangled handrail he could hear the soft crunch of footfalls. A few seconds passed, then a pair of hands emerged from the foliage. One of them gripped the railing, the other, parting the leaves to make an opening. A head emerged, then a torso. The paratrooper moved slowly, quietly, his eyes scanning for movement. Once he was crouched on deck, he gave a soft bird whistle. A second paratrooper crawled over the railing and dropped beside the first.

Wait, Tanner commanded himself. He could feel sweat rolling down the back of his neck. His heartbeat rushed in his ears. Were there more coming? he wondered.

After another ten seconds, no one else had joined the first two. That answered his question: Xiang was taking his time before rushing in. They sat crouched together, unmoving, AKs tracking up and down the deck.

Moving with exaggerated slowness, Briggs edged the barrel of his AK around the corner and pressed his cheek to the stock. He took aim, took a breath, then squeezed off a round. Even as the first paratrooper fell back, Tanner adjusted his aim and fired again. The second man slumped over.

Beyond the railing, a voice called in Mandarin: “Shin-kao!” Report!

Hunched over, Tanner rushed to the bodies. On each he found a pair of grenades and a spare AK magazine. He pocketed everything, then grabbed their weapons and tossed them down the deck, out of site. He grabbed the first body by the arms and dragged it around the corner, then came back and did the same with the second.

More voices now. Boots pounded through the underbrush. Four to six men, Tanner estimated.

Gunfire erupted, slashing through the vines and foliage. Leaves fluttered and branches dropped to the deck, revealing patches of daylight. Bullets pounded into the exterior bulk-head. The fusillade lasted ten seconds, then went silent.

Thunk … thunk … thunk …

Tanner knew the sound: More grenades.

A shouted order: “Go, go, go …”

Here they come … Their recon party having failed, the paratroopers would come in force now, trading bodies in an attempt to overrun him.

He ducked down, covering his ears. Three overlapping explosions shook the deck beneath his feet. A cloud of smoke and debris rushed the alleyway. Shrapnel ripped into the wood beside his head.

He ejected the AKs magazine, slammed home a fresh one, then peeked around the corner. The alleyway’s walls looked as though a giant rake had been dragged over them. Through patches in the smoke he could see the handrail trembling under the weight of multiple bodies. A pair of hands appeared, then another, and another …

From the starboard side he heard more grenades crash through the vines and bounce against the bulkhead. “Kuai pao, pa xia! “ a voice shouted in Mandarin. Run, take cover!

Crump, crump, crump … More smoke billowed. Wait, Briggs … The urge to run was strong. He quashed it. Wait … Now!

He spun around the corner, dropped to one knee, and opened fire. Using three-round bursts, he raked the railing until his magazine was dry. He ejected it, inserted another, kept firing. Bullets sparked off the steel railing. Chunks of foliage disintegrated, revealing more daylight.

He pulled back around the corner and glanced over his shoulder. Four paratroopers were climbing over the railing. One of them saw him and jerked his rifle up. Tanner ducked away. Bullets shredded the wood over his head. Briggs felt a sting on the back of his neck; he reached up and his hand came back bloody. Splinter.

“Zai Nar! Zhua Zhú!” There! After them!

From the corner of his eye, Tanner saw a grenade bounce off the bulkhead and roll to a stop a few feet away. He kicked it with his heel, sending it back around the corner. Crump! Screams of pain echoed down the intersection. He turned and sprinted down the alley and the engine-room hatch.

Halfway there, he stopped and knelt. He pulled out a grenade, jerked the pin, then pressed it spoon-down into his last boot print and covered it with a small mound of dirt.

Behind him, voices.

He spun, fired a dozen rounds at the paratroopers standing in the intersection. They scattered.

He sprinted the last ten feet to the engine-room hatch, heaved it open, and stepped through. He closed the dogging lever and leaned on it. “Hsiao!”

“Here!” Hsiao’s flashlight shone down from the upper cat-walk. “Briggs, the phone—”

“I know, forget it. Come help me.”

Before Hsiao reached him, Tanner heard a muffled boom from the alleyway as his booby trap detonated. Hsiao jogged up. “What—”

Tanner held up a silencing finger. He pressed his ear to the hatch. Five seconds passed, then, from the other side, came whispered voices. He felt the dogging lever rise; he leaned on it. He grabbed Hsiao by the shirtfront and jerked him toward the hatch. At that instant, multiple AKs opened fire, tearing holes in the bulkhead on either side of them.

Hsiao stared wide-eyed at him and mouthed, “Thanks.”

“My pleasure,” Tanner replied, then explained what he wanted to do.

“Got it. Ready when you are.”

Briggs gestured for him to lean on the lever, then backed up, took aim on the weakened bulkhead, and fired off half a magazine, further widening the gash in the wood. He pulled out a grenade, popped the pin, and shoved it through the hole.

“Pa Yia!” Take cover!

Boots pounded. The grenade exploded. Shrapnel peppered the hatch.

“Now!” Tanner rasped.

With their feet on its lowermost rung, he and Hsiao mounted the railing beside the hatch, gripped the top rung, and heaved back. Under their combined weight, the corroded steel groaned and began to bend down

“Harder!” Tanner urged.

The hatch buckled against Tanner as multiple bodies crashed against it. The dogging lever jiggled; Briggs took a hand off the railing and leaned on it

“Pull, Hsiao!”

Using their legs as levers, they began bouncing up and down in unison. With a shriek, the railing folded over until it lay across the hatch’s jamb.

“Go, go!” Tanner ordered.

With Hsiao in the lead, they raced to the upper catwalk. Soong, struggling to raise himself to a sitting position, said to Tanner, “Good to see you.”

“Good to be alive. You ready to travel?”

In response, Soong turned to Lian. Eyes welling with tears, he studied her face.

Looking for his little girl, Briggs thought

“Lian …” Soong pleaded.

She turned her back on him and stared at the far bulkhead. Below, there came a sharp gong as the hatch crashed open against the railing. Through the quarter-inch gap Tanner could see bodies pressed against the steel.

Soong tore his gaze from his daughter and looked up at Tanner. “I’m ready.”

Hsiao knelt down and hefted Soong onto his back.

Tanner said, “Go to the tunnel and wait for me.”

Hsiao nodded. “Okay.”

As they passed him, Soong grabbed his hand. “We go together, right?”

Tanner squeezed his hand and smiled. “I’ll be right behind you.”

Moving at a hurried waddle, Hsiao started down the ladder. Once they were out of sight, Tanner knelt down beside Lian. She glared back at him. “You won’t make it out of here.”

Briggs shrugged. “Maybe not.”

He drew his knife. Eyes wide, she jerked back. In one smooth motion, he cut her hands free, then stood her up and walked her behind the generator. He retaped her hands to the railing.

“Stay behind this and stay down,” Tanner said.

She blinked at him; cocked her head. “What?”

“When they break through there might be some shooting.”

“Why do you care?”

“Because I think — I hope — that somewhere inside you is the woman I fell in love with.”

“You’re wrong.”

Below, bodies crashed against the hatch. With each collision, the railing buckled and trembled.

“Maybe so, but that’s a chance I’m not willing to take.”

As had Soong, Briggs studied her eyes one final time. She met his gaze evenly. For the barest moment he thought he saw a flicker of emotion there, but then it was gone. “Good-bye, Lian.”

He got up and trotted down the catwalk.

As he reached the tunnel’s mouth, the engine-room hatch banged open.

With a jarring crash, the catwalk tore from its mounts and plunged to the deck below. Screaming, two paratroopers tumbled over the edge. Two more faces peeked around the jamb. Flashlights clicked on and pierced the darkness.

“Go,” Tanner whispered. “Head straight for the river bend, then into the trees.”

Hsiao nodded, then backed feet-first into the tunnel, reached out, grabbed Soong under the arms, and pulled him through and out of sight. Tanner turned and took aim on the hatch above. The paratroopers parted and a lone man stepped to the threshold. Though only partially lit from behind, the face was unmistakable: Xiang.

Tanner laid the AKs front site over Xiang’s sternum and curled his finger around the trigger..

“Lian!” Xiang called. “If you’re there, call out.”

Silence.

Tanner hesitated. Why wasn’t she answering? His heart thudded. My God, was she—

“Lian, you’re safe now,” Xiang shouted. “If you can speak, tell me where they are!”

Still no answer.

Suddenly, from outside, came three rifle cracks. Xiang jerked his head around, then turned and disappeared aft, the paratroopers quick on his heels.

Tanner dove for the tunnel and started crawling.

He emerged from the relative dark of the underbrush into dazzling sunlight. An icy wind blew across his face. He shivered and blinked his eyes until his vision cleared.

Fifty yards onto the ice and halfway to the river bend, Hsiao was running backward and firing from the hip at the paddle wheel. Soong clutched doggedly to his back, his legs swaying from side to side. Bullets punched the ice around Hsiao’s feet.

Briggs rolled onto his back and pushed himself out until he could see the upper decks. Four rifle barrels jutted from the shattered pilothouse windows, fire winking from their muzzles. Tanner pulled out his second-to-last grenade, pulled the pin, let the spoon pop free. He counted two seconds, then lofted the grenade in a high arc. It exploded in midair before the windows.

“Go, Hsiao, run!” he called.

With a wave, Hsiao turned and started waddle-running toward the river bend.

Briggs got up and started after them. He’d covered forty yards when the firing resumed. In his peripheral vision, he saw bullets striking the ice, each a mini-explosion of snow. Something plucked at his sleeve. He glanced back. Muzzles flashed from the bridge wings. Near the waterwheel, soldiers emerged from the underbrush and began to give chase.

Thirty yards downriver, Hsiao and Soong reached a berm of fallen trees trapped in the ice. The glistening trunks jutted from the snow, a natural fortification in the otherwise flat landscape. It was as good a place as any to make a stand, Tanner decided. Whether it would change the ultimate outcome, he didn’t know, but he was determined to give Hsiao and Soong a fighting chance.

Ahead, Hsiao glanced over his shoulder, caught Tanner’s eye, raised his hand in salute, then disappeared around the bend. Briggs put everything he had into a final sprint. Twenty yards to go.

Something slammed into him from behind. Off balance and spinning, he stumbled forward. Ten feet short of the berm, he sprawled into the snow. He pushed himself to his knees, trying to stand. His left leg buckled. He looked down. There was a bullet hole in his upper thigh.

Pushing off with his good leg, he dragged himself forward. The berm was five feet away. Bullets raked the tree trunks, snapping off branches and sending up plumes of snow. Behind him, voices shouted in Mandarin. The firing was steady now, the single cracks now a fusillade.

Go, Briggs. Get up!

He tossed the AK over the berm, jammed the toe of his boot into the ice, got traction, then shoved. His hands touched the trunk. He got to his knees and threw his good leg over the trunk.

He felt a sudden stab of heat in his back. He pitched himself headfirst over the berm.

The entire left side of his torso burned. Working on instinct, gasping through the pain, he grabbed his last grenade, pulled the pin, and tossed it over his head.

Crump!

The gunfire ceased. Tanner rolled onto his side and peeked over the trunk. Twenty feet away, three paratroopers lay sprawled around the grenade crater. A few seconds passed, then he heard a grating sound, like stone on stone. Fissures appeared in the ice around the crater and began spreading outward like roots. The shattered ice began to wallow with the current. One by one, each of the bodies slid beneath the surface.

At the paddle wheeler the remaining soldiers — a dozen, Briggs guessed — stood on the bridge wing. At their head, binoculars raised, was Xiang. He pointed toward the berm, then barked an order.

Tanner rolled back out of sight. His vision sparkled. He tried to fill his lungs, but it felt like he was trying to suck air through a sponge. Punctured diaphragm, he thought. Maybe lung. He tore open his field jacket. There was a quarter-size hole beneath his bottom rib. He touched the skin; it was hot. You’re bleeding inside, he thought dully. Not good, Briggs … Have to slow it down …

Jaw set against the pain, he began scooping up snow and packing it against the wound. Almost immediately the snow turned crimson. Snow cone, he thought, then chuckled. Cherry snow cone … Then, from the still-lucid part of his mind, You‘re going into shock.

In the distance he heard a hollow thunk.

He peeked over the berm. A dark object was sailing through the air from the paddle wheel. It took a moment for Tanner to realize what he was seeing: rifle-grenade. He watched, transfixed, as it dropped toward him and slammed into the ice. He rolled into a ball.

The explosion rippled beneath him. Snow billowed over the berm. His vision contracted and started to dim at the edges.

Thunk.

The second grenade impacted to his right. With a sound like a steamroller crushing a bed of glass, the ice began shifting beneath him. Icy water bubbled between his legs.

Thunk.

Snow erupted to his left.

With a grating pop, the ice gave way. He felt himself sliding. He grabbed for the trunk, but it rolled away. He slipped into the water up to his waist; the cold sucked the air from him. He glanced around for something to grab. There was nothing. He clawed at the ice. The water reached his chest, then his neck.

He looked back at the paddle wheeler’s bridge wing. Smiling triumphantly, Xiang lowered his binoculars. He turned to the soldiers, mouthed an order, and pointed in Tanner’s direction. A single soldier stepped forward and raised his rifle.

Here it comes, Briggs thought. Would he hear the shot? he wondered, or would there be nothing? Alive one minute, blackness the next.

Suddenly, from beyond the river bend, came the thumping of rotors. The sound grew until it was a roar. A blizzard of. snow and spray washed over him. A shadow blotted out the sun. He looked up to see the olive-green belly of a helicopter stop in a hover above him. Jutting from the cabin door was a 12.7 mm machine gun. It began coughing. Fire flashed from the muzzle. Spent shells rained down on him, sizzling as they hit the water.

Bullets pounded into the paddle wheeler’s bridge. Xiang and the paratroopers scattered. One of them, too slow, was struck in the chest and his upper torso disintegrated in a plume of blood.

Tanner saw a face appear out of the cabin door and look down at him. Hsiao … A horse-collar attached to a rope dropped into the water beside him. The machine gun kept coughing. Hsiao was mouthing something: Grab it … put it around you, Briggs!

His eyesight contracting to pinpricks, Tanner reached out, grabbed for the horse collar, missed it. His hand felt encased in lead. He felt the water engulf his throat and slosh over his chin. Try again … come on … He threw his hand out, snagged the rope with a finger, and dragged the horse collar to him. He stuck one arm through it, then the other, then clasped his hands.

As the blackness closed in around him, Tanner felt himself rising into the air.