Yuri noticed the alert. He analyzed the tracking data and found that after briefly venturing into China, Zoya had returned fifteen minutes later. She hadn’t gone too far. And she seemed fine now.
Yuri suddenly remembered something. There was another way to verify Zoya’s whereabouts. They had placed a second tracker on the tigers. This one though wasn’t in the collar.
Yuri ran the trace again, this time on the second tracker and to his horror, discovered that Zoya’s was still inside China. In fact, it lay motionless at the bottom of the Fangchun Observational Tower.
Yuri picked up his red phone and dialed 1800-TIGER-RUSS.
Fangchun Observational Tower, Tri-border region, China
The Chinese snipers under Hu Gong’s directives had driven the 4x4 jeep into the terrain and picked up the snoozing tiger. After injecting Zoya with some military grade opium from their sniping kits, they had hauled the sleeping tiger onto the jeep and driven back to the Fangchun Observational Tower.
Instead of dealing with the tiger in public, the Tower Troll had taken them to the parking garage under the Tower.
“Sir, whats our next move?” The Team Leader addressed Hu Gong impatiently.
“Yes, Hu, whats next?” pressed the Premier.
Hu Gong looked around. He was THE MAN right now. His men, his premier, the Troll were all helpless without his firm guiding hand.
“The way I see it, we have two options… one, we complete our mission. As in we kill the tiger, take a few selfies, maybe even teriyaki it and then FedEx it all to Moscow. That should send a message to that woman.”
Hu paused for effect before continuing his convoluted theory.
“Or, if you think that killing a sleeping tiger is not our style… we could just say the tiger charged over the border and tried to attack Chinese tourists in the Tower… So we hit it with an opium gun… that will hold water. The Russkies might not believe it… but they will still get the message.”
The premier cleared his throat, “Let’s stick to the first idea. We lost a dozen fine ladies on that train. If I can hit Moscow I would. Let’s fucking hit the tiger.”
Everyone nodded in agreement. Hu Gong shrugged and nodded at the Team Leader. The Team Leader released the safety on his pistol.
Chapter 10
Tri-border Region, Far East Asia
The tri-border region in Asia’s eastern armpit involved three countries. There was Russia on the east, China’s sliver of land in the middle and then there was this other cool and super laidback nation that people rarely talked about.
The best intelligence agency in the tri-border region belonged to this really laid back country. The best agency had been observing the antics of the Chinese for some time now. A week ago, one of their patriotic peasants had mentioned something about some odd Chinese activity near the Fangchun Tower. Being the best, no-bs intelligence agency in the region, they had immediately it checked out.
The best operatives of this best intelligence agency soon realized that the Chinese were scouting Zoya the tiger. They seemed to be interested in the Russian tiger’s movements and schedules. Whatever. The Chinese weren’t that dumb. Surely they weren’t thinking of harming THAT Presidential tiger. Or were they?
The best intelligence agency, had then reported this Chinese cat obsession, up their chain of command. Any other intelligence agency in the world would have been like ‘duh… Chinese and cats go together like noodles and chopsticks’. But this wasn’t any other outfit… this was the best in the region. Being the best, they had a superb ‘chain’ and an excellent ‘of command’. The best intelligence agency acted swiftly by inserting its best special ops team into the Tri-border region.
Dong Ki Moon, bellowed into his collar mic, “Alpha Team, go, go. They are already moving Zoya into that parking garage.”
“Yes, captain.”
The best intelligence agency neither belonged to China nor Russia. It belonged to North Korea.
Dong Ki Moon, watched his forward unit breach the China — North Korea Border. His six men, all equipped with the best equipment from DARPA and the best guns from Germany reached their destination, completely undetected in under 90 seconds.
Dong Ki Moon was the second best Special Forces Captain on His Leader’s Elite Force, the NKSOF. The best guy, another Dong Ki Moon, was on His Leader’s security detail. It annoyed Dong Ki that people often mixed up their names. Yep, that sort of shit was quite common within Pyongyang’s beltway. In fact, at his own Korean barbecue, over eighteen Il-Sungs had shown up in place of his brother in law.
“Captain Dong, this is Alpha 1.”
“Alpha 1. Do you see the tigress?”
“Negative. But we can hear Hu Gong quite clearly.”
“And?”
“Captain, I think they have decided to kill Zoya.”
“Alright. Hit them… Hit them hard.”
“Is there any other way…?”
Meanwhile in the garage, Hu Gong nodded at his Team Leader. The sniper aimed the pistol at Zoya’s head.
As he curled his index finger around the trigger, the garage door blasted inwards, lifting Sniper 1, Sniper 6 and the Troll off their feet. Caught by surprise, the Chinese sniper team or whatever was left, began shooting haphazardly through the door.
The North Koreans quickly lobbed in a couple of stun grenades. After the second one, they crept low and shot out all human legs. They had no intention of becoming the accidental tiger killers. The mobs of Pyongyang were quite different from a twitter mob.
It was all over in 22 seconds. “Captain, we have secured Zoya. Afraid we might have taken out the Chinese Premier’s ankle.”
Dong Ki Moon replied, “Good. As long as he doesn’t die, we are golden. I’m coming in with the vet.”
Captain Dong Ki Moon and the smoking hot vet, Song-Yu parked their Hummer just outside the Fangchun Tower’s underground garage.
“After you,” bowed Dong Ki, allowing the vet to walk in front of him. Magical thirteen seconds.
At the entrance Alpha 1, welcomed Dong Ki and the vet as the rest of the team sifted through the aftermath.
Dong Ki motioned the vet to go take a look at the tiger. “Check the heart first. Run some IVs and give it a Snickers if necessary. We need that thing alive.” He then returned to the rest of the scene.
The entire Chinese sniper team was dead. Good. The Troll was hit, but he would live. He was just a civilian who had accidentally stepped into an Idiots Anonymous meeting. The Premier’s ankle was shattered. He wasn’t going to walk normally again. That left Intelligence Chief Hu Gong.
Despite breathing, Hu Gong was pretty much done. He had stopped a hollow point with his right lung. He looked up at Dong Ki Moon.
“…Why?” gurgled Hu Gong.
Dong Ki Moon decided to grant the man’s last wish, “Didn’t you get the FSB memo?”
“Memo… which one?”
“The one titled ‘Our Tiger Has Two Chips’. Sweet Buddha! What kind of intelligence chief are you man?”
“What?”
“The tiger… Zoya, had two tracking chips on her.”
“…Two?” Hu was sun setting.
“According to our circular, you were also cc’d.”
“Why…?”
“Poachers. Standard stuff man.”
“Oh fuck Hu,” groaned the Premier from another end of the parking lot.
“Yeah, so the second one was attached to Zoya’s heart. Powered by electrical impulses from her heart. Haha. Ya pretty cool stuff. Our Great Benevolent Leader actually wants the same thing for him.”