“Why are you here?”
“To see Ling Shiming,” she gasped. The blanket was pushed onto her face and they started again. This time it went on longer she retched and swallowed some water. They stopped and asked her again. Five or six times it was repeated, she wretched and spit the water out. May coughed herself dry. They started again. She knew soon she’d say anything to stop them. They pulled back to let her cough and asked the same question and got the same answers. The two of them wheeled the stretcher table out of the room and down a corridor. A few passed by men and women, they all looked at her but said nothing. They left her outside while they entered a room. A few minutes later two men in rough working overalls with arms full of wood and tools came by, they stopped and looked at her nakedness, each with a leering stare. One of them set down the wood and started to feel her boobs and put a hand down between her legs and started to massage her. She felt helpless, she wanted to tell them to piss off but knew it would do no good.
Just then the young man came out of the room and saw them.
“You stop. On your way. Now.” He took her into the room, she was lifted off the wheeled frame but left on the table. A man and a woman pushed her into a tube, it looked like some form of CT or MRI scanner. It hummed and hooted and she was taken out. They wheeled her back to the first room. The older man looked down at her.
“Those builders are nearby do you want me to bring them in here? You must be hungry, they may have something for you to eat?”
She felt a flash of anger. “They fuck me, you fuck me. Who cares?” He smiled. The two of them left the room. At least it’s not that waterboarding again. May laid there for over an hour. She drifted off to sleep. A loud buzzer sounded and woke her. She sighed, it was the old sleep deprivation trick. Bastard is, it did eventually work.
LING SHIMING WALKED into the darkened room. The level 3 MSS Officer with the green rimmed glasses led him to the window. There beyond the one-way glass lay the NSB Officer they’d told him about she lay naked on the table with her eyes closed as though she was sleeping. Young and attractive yes, but she’d had a rough time here he could tell.
“She wants to see you is all she says, we’ve done a thorough waterboarding. She must be NSB, anybody else would have broken down. We looked up the Big Book database on the NSB section and we did get some confirmation that they do have an Officer with that name. It’s low level, so not fully confirmed. We have a picture of someone we think is her, amongst a group of people in a party at a barbeque in a park in Taipei. Some of them are known NSB, so it’s likely her, but the quality is so poor it’s unconvincing. We took her for a full body scan, she’s got no devices either bugging or explosive hidden in her body. We believe she’s clean sir.” Ling looked and wondered, why would an NSB Officer come into Xiyuan?
Why would she ask for him? She’d know his name and that he was responsible for Taiwan intelligence. But why here? The NSB were no fools they could have made contact by other more remote means. He’d find out. “Feed her, clothe her, let her sleep in a warm bed for four hours and then bring her to me.”
“Yes sir.”
May was pushed until she awoke, they’d been treating her well for a change. Food, a warm shower, clothes and a bed. It had felt wonderful to sleep.
The young man smiled down at her. “Come on, get up Miss Hsin. Get dressed, you’re going to see Ling Shiming.”
“SO, WE PLAN DE ATTACK on Chinese taskforce. Are we alone?” Captain Manaudou wore a look of concern.
Nathan shook his head. “I think we’ll be able to call on ROC and US forces.” He grew uneasy. “Before we start. I don’t like to plan this sort of thing without someone from my boat. Could the inflatable go back to…”
“No problem old chap, go on up on deck and tell Houseman what you want.”
Nathan returned, they laid out the plan and constituents of the battlespace. Several minutes later the door opened, and Nikki Kaminski walked in.
They stood, Manaudou took her hand and kissed it, “Welcome aboard Suffren, Mademoiselle Kaminski.” He read her uniformed chest ID.
“Thank you.”
“I’ll get some coffee,” he stepped outside and spoke to a crewman. Four coffees were brought in and served.
She sat at the table, Nathan gave her a smile. “We were about to discuss and plan an attack on the PLAN Fleet off Taichung City. This is the disposition of forces as best we know.”
The four of them planned a strike on the Fleet using their missiles and missiles dropped from air assets both ROC and US.
“I’ll send our plans to the Puzzle place and COMSUBPAC when I get back aboard Jackson.”
“One thing, said Nikki, “there’ll be a lot of Chinese troops on Taiwan looking to get out of there, if we’re successful. We’d be better off leaving their transports and landing ships alone and give them safe passage.”
“Qui, it help with no prisoners or transporting men back,” said Manaudou.
Pike grinned at them all. “Now gentlemen let’s bloody well get to it. We’re going to be getting into scrum with the Chinese boats after the missile launches, maybe before.
Let’s coordinate our tactics.” Over time they came to a consensus, they were likely to be outnumbered so tactical surprise was key. Eventually Nikki, Frank and Nathan climbed the sail and got into the inflatable.
BACK IN USS STONEWALL Jackson, Nathan went straight up to Lemineux and gave him details of what he wanted.
“Can you do that?” Lemineux thought for a while.
“Yes, I think so, I’ll need to patch through Pearl.”
“Can you skip that, go direct?”
“Possibly, yes probably. It depends on how cooperative they are.”
“Thanks, try your best, patch it through to my cabin. Oh, and here are some documents for DOD and COMSUBPAC.”
“I’ll see to that. Sir, you have this from COMSUBPAC.” He handed a slip over to Nathan.
He read it with surprise and walked over to the XO Larry Sayers.
“XO. Taiwan’s going to contact Beijing tonight and offer a solution.”
Larry sighed. “Good luck with that.”
Nathan walked aft and entered his cabin, lowered his bunk and climbed in.
He was drifting off to sleep when the intercom buzzed.
“Blake.”
“Sir, I have an Admiral on the line for you. Patching him through.”
“Hi Commander Nathan. You well, I know you fight now.”
“Yes, that’s true sir, you know me very well.” There was a laugh.
“What can I do for you?”
“Sir, I know this will be difficult but…”
The Admiral listened and asked a few questions.
“So, that is all you want?” Nathan could hear the grin.
“Yes sir.”
“Hai. We will be there. Use these codes for quicker communication.”
Nathan took them down. “Arigatuo Admiral Nakata. Goodnight sir.”