Red Moon

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN liliang pingheng Balance of Forces

Ta Shu was still standing there in the hallway, thinking over his options and realizing he had none to speak of, when a young woman appeared beside him. One of John Semple’s assistants, a diplomat. Valerie something.

“Valerie Tong,” she said. “American Secret Service.” She handed him a pistol no bigger than the palm of his hand, made of plastic, like a child’s toy. “Taser dart,” she said. “It takes about an hour to recover from shots. It has four shots.”

“But—”

“They’re on the top floor, Room 5C.”

“But—”

“Take Fred and Qi downstairs to the transport center. Rover 14 is programmed to drive to the American mine complex in north Procellarum. Put them on that rover and then come back here.”

“Shouldn’t I go with them?”

“We could use you here to help negotiate a settlement.”

“But I’ll be identified as the one who set them free.”

“That doesn’t matter. It might even help. Besides, it will be your word against theirs. Right now the security cameras where you’re going will show blank for the next hour.”

“All right,” Ta Shu said, standing carefully upright and inspecting the little gun in his hand. “Just pull trigger? No safety?”

“The safety is off. Just pull the trigger.”

“Room 14?”

“Room 5C! Top floor. Rover 14 after that, down in the transport center. Bottom floor. Go high then low.”

In the midst of greatest obstruction, friends come.

He hurried as best he could to the stairwell and lofted up the stairs four at a time, feeling like a newborn superhero, clumsy with his unaccustomed powers. The little gun was in his coat pocket, and when he came to the fifth floor, he pulled it out and put his forefinger through the finger guard and pressed the trigger ever so gently. No way to practice pulling it, oh well. He walked gingerly to Room 5C, lurched through the open doorway and shot Bo and Dhu and then two of their henchmen, tick tick tick tick, after which the four fell and thrashed around on the floor, kicking and shuddering. Then a fifth agent came in another doorway looking surprised, and suddenly Fred Fredericks was flying though the air behind him, feet first, kicking the man hard in the back of the head, which sent the man flying across the room into the doorjamb, where he smacked the front of his head. Fred spun in the air, arms thrown out, and landed badly on a desk next to one of the quivering downed men.

Qi appeared in that same doorway holding her belly. She helped Fred get to his feet and away from their spastic captors. The shuddering men were awful to see, but worse was the one Fred had kicked in the head, who lay sprawled on the floor, inert.

Fred’s face was white and his hands trembled violently. “Sorry,” he said to Ta Shu. “I thought he might shoot you.” He gestured at Bo and Dhu. “I think I remember seeing those guys. I think they might be the ones that I shook hands with before I met Chang.”

“Are you sure?” Ta Shu said.

“No. Not sure.” Fred’s voice was trembling too. He sat down in a chair, rubbing his forearm. “My memory is fuzzy, but I kind of thought I recognized them, and now I think it must have been from then.”

“Okay then,” Ta Shu said. The four tasered men were perhaps struggling to rise, but they looked thoroughly disabled, at least for now. The one Fred had kicked groaned. “Let’s get out of here.”

But Fred had put his head in his hands and was leaning forward in his chair, folded up and quivering.

“Come on!” Qi cried at him. “What are you waiting for?”

Fred looked up and glared at her with such murderous resentment that she stepped back as if slapped. Then she stopped, went to him, held out her hand. “Come on,” she insisted more calmly. “Time to go.”

She pulled Fred to his feet so hard that they both staggered into Ta Shu, who helped them recover their balance, after which they moved into the hall, hopping too high over Fred’s groaning victim and almost hitting the lintel on their way out. Even without the surge of adrenaline they were too strong for this gravity, and now they could scarcely control themselves.

“Where to?” Qi said.

Ta Shu closed the door on the Chinese agents. “Downstairs to their transport center, quick as we can. Try not to fall. I’m having a hard time moving quickly.”

“We know.”

They scuttled along, holding handrails wherever they could. Fred was the worst at keeping his balance. Despite her big belly Qi was more graceful than either of the men, gazelling ahead in what looked like little dance steps. The two men banged along after her. When they passed people in the halls they all straightened up and tried to look calm. The Americans they passed seemed unconcerned by their presence; their base was part of an international community, and foreigners in their hallways were none of their affair.

Descending stairs proved to be harder than ascending them. They lofted and clutched, leaped and tiptoed. As they made their way down, Ta Shu tried to explain the evolving situation on Earth, focusing on the fact that some powerful forces in the Chinese government appeared to want Qi in their custody very badly. Forces so powerful that they appeared to have rather immense leverage to bring to bear on both the Chinese and American governments.

“That’s got to be Red Spear,” Qi remarked as she waited for the two men to catch up with her. “Or some tiger using Red Spear.”

When they got down to the transport center they quickly found Rover 14, and Qi and Fred climbed up into it.

“You’re not coming along?” Qi asked Ta Shu.

Ta Shu shook his head and waved them on. “The person helping us here wants me to stay and help negotiate a settlement for all this. That’s probably my best way to help you. This car is programmed to drive down to a mine in Procellarum, she said. It might take you a day or two to get there. By the time you’re there I hope I’ll have gotten hold of some people in China to help us. Qi, do you have any way of contacting your father?”

“No.”

“None at all? Maybe someone who would convey a message?”

“No!”

Ta Shu regarded her. Her face was defiant. Possibly she was not telling the truth. Possibly she didn’t realize the extent of the danger.

He said carefully, “Listen, my friend. There are people who will kill you if they can find you. I don’t think your father is one of them. You may want to get in touch with him, if you can.”

“But I can’t.”

Now the frustration on her face was making him think she was telling the truth.

Then there was a noise behind them and he aimed the empty Taser pistol in that direction, struggling to stay upright after his quick spin.

“Don’t shoot!” It was Valerie Tong. “I’m here to help,” she said. She approached warily, holding out a box that looked like a camera. She said to Qi, “A colleague of Ta Shu’s down at Petrov Crater, a Mr. Zhou, sent this to us and said we should give it to you. Is it yours?”

“Yes,” Qi said, surprised. “Someone in China has been using it to contact me.”

“Someone?”

“I don’t know who. They claimed they wanted to help.”

Valerie shrugged. “Do you want it?”

“Yes.”

But Qi glanced at Fred. His face squinched up in thought. Then he met her gaze, nodded slightly. Qi stepped back out of the rover and took the device from the American. “Thanks,” she said. Then to Ta Shu: “Now I can contact someone. I just don’t know who it is.”

He sighed. “We’ll be in contact too, by way of the rover. Now go.”