The CO of the Coast Guard cutter replied, “What about the dead body?”
“Sir, it looks like that person was part of the crew of this mothership. We think he was trying to hide in a small storage locker. There were bullet holes in the locker. The person must have been shot while hiding in there, but then made his way out when the attackers were gone. Then he just bled out. My guess is the other bodies were dumped overboard. Probably floating around here somewhere if the sharks haven’t already gotten to ’em.”
Commander Boyle said, “Alright. Thanks for checking this out, gentlemen. I assume you’ve got it from here? We were just informed that we have a rendezvous with the aircraft carrier Ford that we have to make.”
“We’ve got it from here, Captain,” replied the captain of the Coast Guard cutter.
Commander Boyle recalled his VBSS team to the Farragut. Within the hour, the destroyer was sailing away. The Coast Guard cutter James ended up towing the narcotics mothership back to Panama City. From there, special investigation teams would comb it for clues and pass on the intelligence to various international agencies.
It would be several days before forensic experts matched some of the spent rounds to Chinese military weapons.
5
General Chen threw his cover across the room with such velocity that it slammed into an unstable bookshelf, swaying it and knocking several volumes onto the floor. The noise was sufficient to cause his secretary to open the door and check on him. Through the small sliver that she dared to create, she could see that the general was quite upset, but physically unharmed. She quietly re-closed the door.
Chen knew that three members of this staff would be out there in the waiting area. The general’s mood was the chief indicator of the quality of life of his staffers. General Chen had fifty-six staff members in all, but he only spoke to the most senior officers among them. The others were beneath him. But for those staffers who had daily contact with him, death would be a welcome comfort, providing a quick end to the general’s daily verbal onslaught.
The general knew that he had a certain reputation among his staff officers, but he didn’t care. They were tools for him to use. A good day for them was when the general sent them on a distant errand, usually to investigate the status of one of his units.
Today was not a good day.
Cheng Jinshan and Admiral Song had been arrested over a week ago. To the general’s knowledge, no one in the president’s circle had been aware that he too had been assisting Jinshan. But now he had been told that two Central Committee members were asking about him. Their staffs had contacted his own, asking for information on his schedule.
What if they were scheduling an inquiry? Given his high rank, they would want to be sure of his involvement before leveling any charges.
General Chen had told Jinshan that things were moving too fast. China was a massive country, and massive organizations didn’t move with lightning speed. But Jinshan was notoriously persistent. He’d demanded that the Chinese military be ready for war by spring. How was that supposed to happen given the current presidential leadership? When was Jinshan planning on installing a puppet? If the coup was unsuccessful, any one of them could be rounded up and shot for treason. And now they were in a precarious position…
For the last fifteen to twenty years, the general had been of such high rank that he had grown used to unwavering support of his every idea. His belief that he was supremely intelligent and omnipotent was reinforced by subordinates that quivered at the thought of opposing him. He ruled with an iron fist. Any subordinate that voiced an opinion of dissent was sprayed with a verbal flame that left little doubt as to how to behave in the future. These years of royal treatment had served to reinforce the general’s belief in himself.
Disappointment could be devastating to his psyche. His response was usually disbelief and a therapeutic lashing out at his favorite of targets — the staff.
Where were they? Did they expect him to come get them? Fine. He stomped over to his door and swung it open violently, hitting the wall and causing the secretary to jump in her seat for the second time in as many minutes. The general glared at his men.
“Well?” His voice boomed. “Get in here!”
They scurried in like scared dogs. Then the general slammed the door behind them, marching around his large wooden desk and collapsing in his chair. His staff remained standing. They were senior officers themselves, but the general’s treatment of them was indicative of their place in his eyes. They were the lowest of cretins. They would stand because they were subservient to him. He would sit because he was their king.
“Well? What do you have to say for yourself, Mr. Li?”
Colonel Li, the general’s chief of staff for the last two years, did not know what to say. The general was worried about being taken down with Jinshan and Admiral Song. The senior staff officers knew of Jinshan’s plans. They had to know. It was the senior staff that did all of the work. For them, it was a risky proposition, being loyal to General Chen. That loyalty was a one-way street. But he was quite vindictive, if crossed, and the Chinese government wasn’t known for its surplus of whistle-blowers. The last staff officer who had tried to lodge a complaint against General Chen had ended up getting demoted on the spot. Then he had been shipped off to the Russian border, never to be seen again.
Li could either attempt to show that he had nothing to do with today’s cause of pain, or take responsibility for it himself. Either way, the staff would take a browbeating. The general was in one of his moods.
Li began, “Sir, I sincerely apologize that we have not supported you well enough. I will do everything I can to rectify…”
The general held up his hand. His face was contorted in disgust. “Li, do you know what this is? Failure. Each of you has failed me. Once, just once, I would like the support of my staff. But instead, this occurs. Failure. If I am accused of anything…”—he couldn’t even utter the word criminal—“then I owe it all to you.”
The three men, sweating and swaying in their stance, stood silently and tried not to make eye contact with their boss. There was no reasonable predictor for when the general would be in one of his moods. Each time the staff approached him, it was like sticking their heads into the mouth of a lion to determine whether it was hungry or not.
“Failure,” the general muttered quietly. He was shaking his head now. “How many times did I say that we needed to keep ourselves separate from Admiral Song’s operations?”
The staff nodded in agreement.
“Just get out.”
The three staffers did not need to hear that twice. They walked in a line to the exit, closing the door behind them.
General Chen put his face in his hands. A dark cloud formed over him. He was sixty-two years old. He had spent over forty years in the Chinese military, and twenty as a flag officer. None of this was his fault. His talent and leadership went criminally underappreciated. Those bastard politicians didn’t understand what it was to be a warrior like him.
He was confronted with his own mortality for the first time that he could remember. Over the years, each promotion had been another step on the ladder towards the highest title in the Chinese military. He was so close to it now. Jinshan had made promises.
But those would not come to fruition now.