Part 20 (2/2)

They're not sure. Maybe they'd just go. A long, hopeful moment pa.s.sed, and then she heard the squishy, gurgly suction of feet laboring through the muck toward her. Soon she felt a finger on her neck, searching for her pulse. Her stomach twisted, her heart slammed its dire warning against her chest: doom-DOOMED... doom-DOOMED...

The hand departed. ”Hu-aw zhe.”

That one she knew, too: ”Alive.” Oh G.o.d oh G.o.d oh G.o.d...

A boot a.s.serted itself roughly against her belly and shoved hard.

Then a ruthless kick missed her ribs but drove the air out of her lungs.

She grunted as the muck acquiesced with a wet pop! and she flipped onto her back-the day's catch.

The right side of her face was slathered with so much mud it sealed her eye shut. But her left eye opened to find six Chinese soldiers standing over her, six QBZ-96s pointed at her. Their blurry images s.h.i.+mmied and swayed. She willed herself to jump up and attack, force them to shoot her. But her body didn't budge. Not her arms. Not her legs.

”May-ee,” declared one of them. ”Jin.”

Despite The Fear's dissonant wailing in her head, Jamie * 172 *

remembered the meaning: ”American military”-and she flashed on the stories she'd heard about how Chinese soldiers didn't much like United States marines. Stories from before Operation Repo.

Without removing their eyes from her, the soldiers began arguing.

She couldn't understand their words, but their rancor and repugnance were unmistakable. Based on the flush she saw in their faces, the way the veins in their necks protruded, how close the QBZ-96 rifle barrels came to her nose, Jamie a.s.sumed they were bickering about which of them would be granted the honor of pumping her full of bullets.

”Gway paw,” jeered one of them. She'd heard that before, too. It meant ”white b.i.t.c.h.” But not just white. Ghost white. The white of the dead.

Not dead yet, though. The resentful accusation in his tone told her.

They're not gonna do it. Jeezus, they're not gonna kill me. She exhaled the breath she'd been holding, but she knew their decision to let her live had nothing to do with international humanitarian law.

The squabble continued, but now it seemed to be about who'd get stuck having to lay hands on her. At least they don't seem interested in rape. Eventually, two of them grabbed her cammie blouse and yanked her upright and forward onto her knees. The sudden movement sent the world spinning. She staved off dizziness while the soldiers bound her hands behind her back, but when they jerked her to her feet, she sank to her knees again and vomited.

After her retching devolved into dry heaves, they pulled her to her feet once more. Two of them held her up while two others removed much of her gear-the pistol holster, the load-bearing vest, the canteen, the first-aid pouch. They searched her pockets, repeating ”Yeh-un jing”-eyegla.s.ses. She responded with a blank stare; this was her first chance to play dumb.

Mud still caked her right eye, but her left eye perceived daylight's fade. The Palawan's primeval night would soon be upon them. EBC219 was almost over.

They shoved her out of the soggy bottom of the gully, kicking and berating her every time she staggered or fell. She fell often. The coast road running through Malihud was perhaps two and a half klicks away, and her frequent stumbling impeded their progress, created opportunities for the unexpected... A lot could happen in the Palawan dark...

”Bah-ee chih!” yelled one of the Chinese soldiers when she * 173 *

skidded sideways down a slope and attempted to turn an accidental stumble into an escape.

Jamie doubled over to protect her belly from his kicks. Profoundly regretting that she hadn't tried harder to get them to shoot her right after they found her, she stayed curled up beneath the blows, unable to prevent the moan that oozed out of her as her strength waned.

It threatened to rule her, this moan. It wanted to tear her open, this moan, so the frenzied panic she'd been holding at bay could flood in, drown her. She began to lose all ability to reason, to hope. Her mind registered only the pain of the beating and the pulsing rhythm of her rampant terror. Oh G.o.d oh G.o.d oh G.o.d...

Never in her life had she felt so helpless. She couldn't even cover her head while they kicked her, couldn't squirm out of the way of their blows, couldn't stop yelping her body's protest. There had to be something she could do, something...

Maybe I should just wilt. If she was unreservedly servile, they might ease off and she could get through it, she could survive. ”Please,” she said, struggling onto her knees when the kicks ceased. She looked up, beseeching the nearest Chinese soldier not to hurt her anymore.

”Please...ching- ng? ”

He growled something she didn't understand and whacked her flat with the b.u.t.t of his rifle.

doom-DOOMED... doom-DOOMED... Drifting at the fringe of consciousness, Jamie grasped the message in her heart's urgent pounding: No way out.

The beating renewed until a shout from one of the others stopped it, and the soldiers turned away from her. She watched them fade in and out as blackness dappled the margins of her vision, she heard them berated by a voice that sounded choppy and angry and strange. Gotta try, gotta... When she lifted her head, no one noticed. The deepening dusk might claim her if she could just roll down the slope, just a couple feet to the tall gra.s.s at the edge of the path and then roll- She had a half-second lead on them, but her legs couldn't help her. The nearest soldier slammed his rifle b.u.t.t into her stomach, and she pa.s.sed out.

By the time they slapped her back to groggy awareness, dusk had given way to darkness. Two of the soldiers lifted her up and another put a container to her lips: Water. She needed water, craved water, and she * 174 *

gulped as much as she could. The soldier issuing orders peeled the mud off her face; from here on, she'd see the unconditionally murky night with both eyes.

”La dao!” he said, as though he believed she'd understand him if she could see out of both eyes. Jamie did understand-he'd told her to forget about it-but she gave nothing, no hint of comprehension.

v ”All coercive techniques are designed to induce regression.” Ever since she first read those words back in scout/sniper school, she'd tried to honestly appraise what she was capable of enduring.

When Operation Repo began, she still hoped that maybe, just maybe she'd be able to leave the Palawan without having to find out. She'd clung to that hope right up to the moment she sent her last two snipes north into the hills and pushed on alone.

What would the Zhong try to find out from her? Stuff about the battalion, future ops, Operation Repo- They'll want to know which way Avery's taking everyone through the mountains...

Jamie had no doubt about how it would go down. Pain, relief, threat of more pain. It had already started: The burden of the journey into Malihud had s.h.i.+fted from Jamie to the six Chinese soldiers. They kept her upright and moving, her first taste of the seduction of relief.

And then- 'Round and 'round 'til I break. Because everybody breaks.

She had to find a way to stall, to keep herself from giving up and giving in at least until Avery got second squad back to the FOB. At least twelve days. Even then, she could get somebody killed if she told the Zhong too much about her crew-where they were based, how they worked. No, no, it's gotta be the whole thirty-nine days. The whole thirty-nine days until her snipes were on that plane home.

Jamie's mind, as helpless as her body, flailed. ”In the darkest hour- ” How the h.e.l.l does that go? Something about light and hope, right? In the darkest hour, light and hope. Oh christ, what a f.u.c.king fiction!

One of the soldiers holding her up tripped her when the guy in charge wasn't looking, and she hit the raggedly inclined ground with a brutal thud just as she thought she might've heard somebody say, ”Fiction's good.”

* 175 *

Fiction? A chill scurried alone her vertebrae as the soldiers picked her up again. Of course. All warfare is based on deception.

Her mind quieted and within minutes, she saw it-the perfect diversion. I could tell them we're gonna invade Borneo. That'd screw 'em up good, because we're never really gonna invade Borneo. And after a while, when I recant, they won't know what the f.u.c.k to believe.

She'd have to concoct all kinds of details, remember as much as possible from the mapping imagery about the terrain of the northern tip of Borneo. And to make it believable, she'd have to hold out for a long time. Thirty-nine days...

For the next hour, Jamie invented plans for a five-p.r.o.nged amphibious a.s.sault on both sides of East Malaysia's Marudu Bay as well as three islands to the north of it. Three islands, right? Yeah, yeah, three. I remember three. Her Marines would be changing the rules of engagement. Her Marines would beat the c.r.a.p out of northern Borneo, southern Palawan, Balabac, Bugsuk, all of it all over the Balabac Strait-and unless the PIA and the Zhong withdrew, they'd be trapped and annihilated. Yeah, f.u.c.k 'em. f.u.c.k 'em all.

While the Zhong soldiers pushed her, dragged her, but mostly carried her, Jamie reeled trancelike through images of an initial briefing with Pinsof about the kinds of training exercises needed to prepare her people. In the gloom, she could see the expression on his face, taste her own nervous antic.i.p.ation as he laid out the plan's preliminaries.

By the time her captors delivered her to their commanding officer, she'd decided the Invasion of Borneo was a d.a.m.n fine idea and she was glad she hadn't been told more about it. Because she couldn't reveal to the enemy what she didn't know.

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