Empire Rising (52 page)

*   *   *

The hallway wasn't as crowded as she had hoped, but there were enough people traversing the corridors that she didn't stand out. The eighth person she passed was a Middle Eastern man, and a Caucasian woman passed by a few seconds later. Christine let out a silent sigh of relief. She wasn't sticking out like a sore thumb and there was actually a possibility she would reach the president's office unchallenged.

Her stomach tightened at the thought.

She had no idea what kind of security the president had. There weren't any checkpoints between them, but she doubted the president of China would traipse anywhere, even in the Great Hall, without the equivalent of the Secret Service nearby. Hopefully there would be only a few men, and with surprise on her side, she would break through.

During her last review of the Great Hall's schematics, she had memorized the path to the president's office. Left at the second intersection. Right at the next. Left again. As she traversed the corridors, the throng of personnel thickened, and her trek through the Great Hall was uneventful until she turned the second corner. Two uniformed security guards were heading toward her, glancing at the badges and faces of the men and women passing by. Christine hesitated momentarily, then forced herself to continue walking, hoping neither guard had noticed the slight pause in her gait when she spotted them. She felt her heart pounding in her chest as she continued down the corridor.

As she prepared to pass between the two guards, she decided to ignore them, giving the two men an opportunity to let their eyes wander toward the top of her blouse. Her eyes were set straight ahead, but she concentrated on the periphery of her vision, attempting to detect any indication the guards had become suspicious. She fingered the strap of the purse hanging from her left shoulder, ready at an instant to retrieve the Glock. The two guards were only a few paces away now, and she prepared herself for the worst.

As the two guards approached, they turned their attention to Christine, their eyes examining her face for a moment before shifting down toward her chest. The two guards passed by and Christine continued on, listening for any reaction behind her. There was no indication of anything unusual. As she put distance between herself and the two guards, her pulse began to slow and she suppressed a smile.

At the end of the long hallway, Christine turned again, stepping into a wider corridor, its floor constructed of marble instead of terrazzo, its walls decorated with large oil paintings on canvas stretched between elaborate, ornately carved frames. She had entered the official Politburo spaces.

She was getting close.

Christine knew the corridor would T at the end, running into a perpendicular hallway containing the offices of the nine Politburo members.

Only a few hundred more feet.

Unfortunately, at the end of the corridor was a man wearing a business suit, standing behind a lectern, who would undoubtedly inquire about the purpose of her visit. She was confident she could get past him. What concerned her was what waited in the perpendicular hallway beyond.

One hurdle at a time.

As she approached the man at the lectern, she was thankful there was no one else in the corridor—it would make this part easier. When she was a few feet away, the man looked up from an appointment book, asking Christine a question. She slipped her right hand into her purse, retrieving the Glock. The man's eyes widened, but before he could call out, Christine aimed and squeezed the trigger, putting a bullet in the man's forehead. The pistol recoiled with a whisper and the man's body hit the floor with a dull thud. She returned the pistol to her purse as she continued past the man without breaking stride, reaching the end of the hallway, turning right.

At the end of the corridor, just over fifty feet away, two men in black business suits stood outside a dark-stained wooden door, one man on each side.

Cadre Department bodyguards, no doubt
.

These two wouldn't be so easy.

Christine continued toward them, hoping she would close at least half the distance before she was challenged. She was a decent shot with a pistol at close range, but that was without being nervous and while taking time to aim carefully. Surprise would be on her side, but if she missed, she would not get a second chance. Instead of aiming for their heads, she settled on chest shots, increasing the odds she'd hit her mark.

When she was thirty feet from the door, the guard on the left called out. Christine needed to buy a few more seconds to get close enough to ensure she didn't miss, but didn't understand the question. She replied with a response that hopefully made sense.

“Good morning,” she said in Mandarin.

The guard replied, but Christine again had no idea what he said.

She had to act before either man had an inkling of what was about to occur. She'd rehearsed the sequence of events in her mind a hundred times, and it was finally time to execute.

Christine reached into her purse again, extracting the Glock. As she extended her arm toward the man on the left, she was shocked at how fast the two men were reacting; both were already reaching into their suit jackets.

She pulled the trigger and a bullet slammed into the man's chest. She swung the pistol to the right and steadied up on the second man just as his hand came out of his jacket, a pistol in his grip. She squeezed off another round, the bullet also hitting him squarely in the chest.

She glanced back at the first man.

He was still standing. Something was wrong.

Things were occurring so fast they were blur, yet at the same time the details were clear. There was a bullet hole in the man's shirt, but no blood. The bullet had dazed him, knocking him back against the wall, but his clouded expression cleared and he pulled his weapon from inside his suit jacket.

They were wearing bulletproof vests.

Christine swung her arm toward the first man again, this time aiming for his head. She halted her swing, raised her aim up slightly, and fired. Amazingly, the bullet hit the man between his eyes, jerking his head back. She watched him collapse onto the ground from the corner of her eye as she swung her arm back to the right, returning her attention to the second guard.

Like the other guard, he had been temporarily stunned. But he'd been faster than the first man, already pulling his pistol from inside his jacket before being shot in the chest. As Christine steadied up, she noticed he already had his arm extended and steady, his pistol aimed toward her.

She squeezed the trigger, praying she fired first and that her bullet hit its mark.

A gunshot echoed down the corridor, and her subconscious told her that was a bad sign. Her Glock had a silencer screwed into the end—it didn't make that kind of sound. That meant …

Christine's body jerked backward as white-hot pain tore through her left shoulder. The excruciating pain sapped the strength from her body and her legs gave way; she fell to her knees on the hard marble floor. She fought through the pain, trying to maintain her balance, trying to think clearly. She'd been shot, and if the second guard was still alive, another bullet was coming her way. She remembered squeezing the trigger of her pistol, but had no idea if she had fired or if the bullet found its target. She looked up, noticing the second man sprawled on the ground, a pool of blood spreading from beneath his head across the marble floor.

Warmth ran down her left arm, dangling by her side, and any attempt to move sent mind-numbing pain shooting through her shoulder. But despite her injury, her plan had been successful—she'd cleared the way to the president's office. Unfortunately, the guard's gunshot had announced her presence, and it wouldn't be long before someone arrived to determine what happened. She'd better get moving.

As Christine climbed to her feet, the door to the president's office opened. Xiang Chenglei, the president of China, appeared in the doorway.

Perfect
.

Christine swung the pistol back up. “Don't move!”

Xiang could easily have slammed the door shut as she raised the pistol—it would have been an instinctive reaction. Instead, Xiang opened the door wider, stepping out into the corridor. He stood there, waiting for further direction as he took in the scene, his eyes examining first one bodyguard, then the other, finally coming to rest on Christine.

“You're injured,” Xiang said. “Let me call for medical assistance.”

“Not so fast. We're going to have a talk first.” Christine moved toward him, her left arm dangling by her side, doing her best not to move her shoulder. She stopped a few feet away, pointing the pistol at Xiang's head. “Into your office, before
help
arrives.”

“It would be best if we talked here.”

“Into your office!” Pain shot through Christine's shoulder as she shouted. She clenched her teeth, waiting for the pain to subside. “Now,” she added in a more controlled effort.

“As you wish,” Xiang replied, then turned and stepped into his office.

Christine followed closely behind, her eyes set on his back, wary of any unexpected move. As she entered his office, she spotted another man from the corner of her right eye. Huan was standing by the door, his head wrapped in a white gauze bandage. His hand was high above him, holding something, and he swung it down toward her head.

She tried to duck out of the way but was too slow. A heavy object crushed into her skull and sharp pain sliced through her scalp. Her vision clouded in a yellow haze, the Glock falling from her hand as she crumpled to the floor.

 

76

USS
RONALD REAGAN
TASK FORCE

“Shrek, tally two bandits on your six!”

Marine Corps pilot Stan Borum, call sign Shrek, glanced at the glass touch-screen display that spanned the front of his F-35B cockpit, locating the two bandits behind him. A second later, the F-35's
Barracuda
electronic warfare system, which provided 360-degree surveillance, detected the targeting radar of the two aircraft, classifying them as J-11B Shenyang tactical fighters.

“I see 'em,” Shrek replied as he recalled the capabilities of the Chinese aircraft. The twin-engine J-11B was a fourth-generation tactical fighter—an upgraded version of the Russian Su-27SK, able to fly almost fifty percent faster than Shrek's single-engine Joint Strike Fighter.

The voice of Shrek's wingman came across his helmet speaker again. “I can't help. I'm tied up with two of my own.” Shrek didn't reply as he noted his wingman on his display, headed south with two bandits in trail.

*   *   *

With a six-foot, 230-pound barrel-chested body, Lieutenant Colonel Stan Borum had been awarded the call sign Shrek. He didn't resemble the animated ogre
that
much, he thought. His skin wasn't green. However, despite the connotation of his call sign, Shrek was secretly pleased. He was, after all, a Green Knight. He was the squadron leader of Marine Fighter Attack Squadron VMFA-121, the Green Knights, the first operational squadron of F-35 Lightning II stealth aircraft. Shrek felt fortunate this afternoon, seated in the cockpit of the most advanced fighter in the world. But even though he appreciated the technological advantage of his F-35B over the Chinese aircraft, Shrek figured he'd survived this far into the battle due to the most important ingredient in warfare.

Luck
.

The first few minutes of combat had been overwhelming, the sky filled with a dizzying array of aircraft and missiles. Shrek had fired his wing-mounted ordnance as the two air forces approached each other, then evaded a barrage of incoming missiles. Moments later, the thirty-two U.S. fighters in this sector slammed into seventy Chinese aircraft. Who lived and died those first few minutes had been a crapshoot, each pilot dodging aircraft and missiles, dispensing chaff, and targeting enemy fighters while weaving through a sky lit up with exploding aircraft and streaking missiles.

The sky had thinned out now, with fifty Chinese fighters shot down along with twenty U.S. jets. Unfortunately, Shrek and the other American fighters were still on the wrong end of 2-to-1 odds; twenty Chinese aircraft against a dozen Americans. If that wasn't bad enough, there were another seventy Chinese jets approaching fast.

Shortly after engaging the incoming aircraft, Shrek had determined the Chinese wave was divided into two echelons. The leading group of seventy aircraft were air superiority fighters, predominately the J-10 Chengdu and J-11 Shenyang, followed by another seventy fighter-bombers, primarily the Xian JH-7 and 7A, armed with air-to-surface missiles. The leading Chinese fighters were attempting to clear a path for their fighter-bombers so they could approach within range of their air-to-surface missiles. That, of course, was what Shrek and the rest of
Reagan
's Combat Air Patrol were attempting to prevent.

Shrek had done well, shooting down four J-10s, splashing the last one only a few seconds ago. Despite his success, Shrek and the other American pilots hadn't put a dent in the mass of JH-7 fighter-bombers rapidly approaching. Shrek needed to take out the two trailing J-11s quickly so he could focus on the JH-7s, which were the real threat to the
Reagan
Task Force. Unfortunately, he had only one missile left.

Shrek banked hard right to bring his F-35 around toward the incoming J-11s. Although the J-11s were much faster than his F-35, Shrek had the advantage when it came to weapon systems. He flicked a switch on his flight stick, then tapped his glass touch-screen display, selecting his remaining missile. The starboard weapon bay doors in the fuselage of the F-35 opened in preparation for firing. As Shrek's F-35 came around, he turned his head to the right and targeted the closest J-11 simply by looking at it, the sensors in his helmet visor locking on to the aircraft.

Even though his F-35 was still thirty degrees off-axis from the J-11, Shrek fired his last missile, an AIM-120 AMRAAM, and he guided the missile toward the J-11 by keeping his head pointed at the aircraft. As the AMRAAM completed its turn, its internal radar took over, locking on to the J-11.