Lena slid her blood-soaked pistol into her waistband at the small of her back. She felt the cool metal on her rear as she headed outside, into the American field of fire, betting they wouldn’t open up on her.
She kept her voice calm as she said in Mandarin, “Sergeant, do you have a radio?”
The startled soldier turned his gaze and weapon toward Lena as she approached.
Her hands slightly raised, she said, “Careful, Sergeant. I am not the enemy.”
She stepped closer. Now ten feet away.
“We already made the radio call,” he said, studying her. “Where is the major?”
The crackle of the radio in the jeep. Lena heard the frantic words of an incoming Chinese security team and then the distant rumble of large military trucks heading their way.
“Sergeant, you need to secure the prisoner. Here, I will do it.”
She took a step closer. Then the shadows lit up. Two flashes as she fired into the soldier’s body. He dropped to the ground.
Lena turned to Chase. “I spoke to the major upstairs. The scientist was here, but they have moved him. I don’t know where. He may be in China. Tell your team that you were too late.”
Chase looked at her, stunned, his face red and sweaty from the action.
Her tone was firm. “You need to go now, Chase. When the PLA soldiers arrive, I’ll tell them you headed south. If you wait, they’ll see you and kill you.”
Chase picked up the weapon on the ground. “You need to come with me.”
She shook her head. “That’s not going to happen.”
Lena was careful to keep her pistol pointed toward the ground. “I’ve fulfilled my part of the bargain. I did what I could.”
Chase stared at her. He was weighing his options. Kill her or leave her. They both knew he wouldn’t be able to drag her with him alive.
Chase said, “What about the boy…”
She leaned in. “Make sure you take care of him. I no longer can.” Their eyes locked together in a moment of understanding. Then Chase turned and ran across the street, disappearing into the jungle.
15
Victoria and the other Americans spent weeks as prisoners aboard the Chinese warship. They slept on the cold floor of the center passageway, near the ship’s aft end. Their captors kept them blindfolded most of the time, with zip ties around their wrists. Going to the bathroom and eating was an ordeal, each activity carefully observed by frowning guards.
As Victoria sat on the rolling deck, her fear turned to anger. She had plenty of time to think. The few conversations between the men were met with swift physical punishment. Victoria would hear the crack of a baton followed by moaning or spitting up blood. Or sometimes silence. That was the worst.
The American prisoners learned it was best to keep quiet. Over the past twenty-four hours, the rolling of the deck died down as the seas grew calm. They could hear the familiar cadence of ship bells and whistles, of 1MC calls and stomping boots.
They were approaching port.
Soon Victoria heard the Chinese sailors calling to each other as they tossed lines on the pier. The sounds of men hurrying through the warship, refilling stores. Cleaning for inspection. Paying little attention to their American prisoners of war as they sat bound and silent on the rough deck. Tired, hungry, and listening intently for any sign of what was to come.
While she waited, Victoria’s thoughts kept wandering back to the darker moments of her past. Her recurring nightmare. Images of her father’s death, as witnessed from the cockpit of her helicopter a year earlier. Waves of guilt washed over her as she replayed the scene. The voices on the radio were still fresh in her memory. The crews aboard the other anti-submarine aircraft all thought they had destroyed the Chinese submarine circling the carrier. Victoria was now pretty sure they had actually destroyed a decoy, allowing the attack sub to launch its anti-ship missiles. Then Victoria watched them explode into the USS Ford’s superstructure, ripping her father apart.
The same feeling of survivor’s guilt overwhelmed Victoria as her memories shifted to recent events. She thought of her fellow sailors aboard the USS Stockdale and its sister ship… of all those…
“Get up!” A shove snapped her back to the present.
Chinese guards pulled on her arms, forcing her off the floor. Beneath her blindfold, she could see that they were being marched single file amidships. The guards removed their blindfolds as they made their way to the gangplank. A bright scene lay before her. Seagulls flying. The smell of the shore.
Victoria heard diesel truck engines rumbling on the pier. Glancing to her right, she saw what must have been fifty trucks, all lined up. Chinese troop transports, with uncovered flatbeds. Metal rail guards and aluminum benches. One of the Chinese soldiers shouted at the prisoners to head into the trucks. The other soldiers used hand gestures to get them moving. Soon they were seated in the rear cargo compartments.
No sooner had Victoria sat down than her vehicle jolted and they began driving forward, bouncing and sliding. The smell of the sea faded as they traveled through a dusty third-world city. Victoria guessed they were in Peru. She’d been to Lima once, and this looked similar. Arid, mountainous terrain with small huts pressed together.
Several PLA soldiers sat near the rear of the vehicle. The Chinese guards looked scared, Victoria thought, even as they held their rifles. They were green, she realized. How long had these boys been in military service? A world at war, sucking everyone into its vacuum.
“No talk,” one of them yelled, and the few whispered conversations ceased.
The truck ride lasted a few hours, ending at a train station surrounded by jungle. The ground rumbled beneath her feet as a train moved slowly down the tracks, the cattle cars finally coming to a halt in front of them.
Troops unloaded the prisoners from the trucks. Victoria saw Plug and the chief who had been in the water with them. She took a quick headcount. There were at least one hundred men. A handful of women. A handful of officers. No pilots other than Plug. They all were wearing the same outfits they’d been captured in, flight suits or Navy working uniforms. Their faces were a mix of scared, shell-shocked, tired, sick, and pissed-off.
PLA soldiers angled their rifles toward the gaggle of Americans as they waited by the train. They looked like cattle, standing there on flat brown dirt. That’s exactly what they were, Victoria realized. And what happened to cattle?
She heard a whisper from a nearby group of Americans and then three of the prisoners began pushing and yelling at each other. Their argument was preposterous. Something about rival football teams.
“The only reason Green Bay even has a team is because of Brett Favre. And where did he end up? That’s right, Minnesota. You see, you dumb bastard, even your hero knows where it’s at…” The men were moving their zip-tied hands and getting in each other’s face.
Based on the animated way they were yelling, Victoria could see they were up to something.
One of the guards shouted, “No talk. NO TALK!” As the group of PLA soldiers moved closer to the prisoners, the guard looked nervously between his comrade and the shouting Americans. He kept his weapon trained on them.
“You know what? You can have him. Brett Favre sucks! But the Green Bay Packers are the goddamned best team in the NFL!”
Out of the corner of her eye, Victoria saw one of the petty officers, an operations specialist, creeping toward the far edge of the group of prisoners.
“NO TALK. STOP. NO TALK.”
The PLA guard prodded one of the instigators with the barrel of his weapon.