Chinook

by M. L. Buchman

  “So, now that I’m an AWACS. The air is pretty thin up here and I’m not used to it. The right question would be… How do we stop China’s president and save Taiwan?”

  “The only way is to keep the CMC stable,” though Jeremy knew that meant leaving Ru in place.

  “No, that won’t be enough.” Unlike Mike, who looked around for an idea, he could feel Taz’s thoughtful glare boring right into him. She took her problems head on.

  “What would Miranda do?” He asked himself that all the time when he was—

  “Goddamn it, Jeremy! She’s not some magical queen. She’s a woman who’s just as fucked-up as the rest of us. Maybe more so. You’ve got to get her off the goddamn pedestal. Yes,” she held out her palms to stop his protest before he could make it, “she’s a fucking genius when it comes to an air crash. The things I thought I already knew when we started going over that J-20 together weren’t a hundredth of what she knows. But she isn’t why this team works, even though you all worship her like a goddess. It’s the three of you. Maybe it’ll be the four someday, but Andi’s even more of a mess than Miranda is right now.”

  Jeremy opened his mouth, but couldn’t think of what to say and closed it again. Maybe Andi wasn’t trying to push him out, instead just trying to survive. But the team worked even partly because of him? There was no way that he—

  “I can feel your brain churning, Jeremy. I saw you side-by-side with her on the CH-47D crash at the fire. You solved the MH-47G’s sabotage completely on your own.”

  “Only because I happened to see it occur.”

  Taz growled deep in her throat. “And you did nothing on uncovering the story behind the J-20’s crash?”

  “She trusts me to—”

  “Exactly. Trusts! Touchdown plus field goal! You just lost all future right to argue with me. Mike pegged you exactly when he said you were just like the Chinook: dead reliable, and able to lift heavy loads for Miranda. And before you deny it, remember that your goddess agreed with the metaphor.”

  He didn’t… He wasn’t… “That’s not how I see myself.”

  “Well, it’s true.”

  “And the way you see yourself is all backward, too. You know, this gives me an idea.”

  “What idea?”

  He grabbed Taz’s hand and dragged her out of bed.

  “This isn’t about more sex, is it?”

  He paused just long enough to kiss her and hold her breast again for a luscious long few seconds.

  Taz almost stumbled into him as she tried to draw out the kiss when he moved away.

  “Regrettably, no. Get dressed.”

  “What?”

  “We have to go see someone.”

  70

  Mei-Li lay happily tangled in Mui’s arms.

  She’d spent the last day and a half in terror that Zhang Ru would find some excuse to block Mui’s departure from China. The instant Mui had appeared at the head of the escalator into SeaTac’s baggage claim area was one of the happiest moments of her life. Exceeded only seconds later when Mui had spotted her and run into her arms.

  Now they were in their own bed, in their own apartment, in America!

  It was as impossible as it was perfect.

  Until a year ago, Mei-Li’s life had been about surviving hell—every single day.

  Mui had taught her more. Mui had taught her that sex didn’t have to be about power, that it could be about fun. And she’d taught Mei-Li about love, which had previously only been a lie in ridiculous movies.

  Yet she loved Mui.

  Mei-Li held her more tightly as Mui slept upon her breast. It was terrifying, too. As if a piece of her heart, Mui, was out walking around in the world.

  But Mei-Li would keep her safe. She’d keep her—

  At the knock on their studio apartment’s door, Mei-Li almost screamed.

  Zhang Ru or his minions had come!

  They would tear everything apart!

  Her heartrate exploded as Mui slowly sat up and rubbed at her sleepy eyes.

  The knock again, and Mei-Li could see the fear slip into Mui’s eyes where it should never be. Where it had never been a year before. After a most privileged upbringing, Mei-Li had taught her fear, and hated herself for it.

  She slipped up to the door and almost yelped again, this time in surprise, when she saw who it was.

  They both quickly pulled on robes.

  Then Mei-Li answered the door.

  “We’re, uh, sorry to bother you so late, but we need to talk.” Jeremy’s eyes traveled from her to Mui to the unmade bed, then he blushed brightly. “Maybe we should come back later.”

  Taz rolled her eyes at Jeremy. Taz’s hair was a mess, and she wore no bra despite her figure. Jeremy’s hair was neatly combed, but his shirt was misbuttoned. There was little question what the two of them had also been doing recently.

  Mei-Li invited them in. Their furniture so far in the spacious studio was two desks with chairs and the bed; she and Mui sat next to each other on the bed with their thighs touching while the Americans took the chairs.

  Jeremy didn’t spend any time on pleasantries. He barely waited until she’d introduced Mui. Thankfully, Mei-Li had already told Mui about the strangeness of the airshow yesterday during the taxi ride home.

  Home? Such a strange word to use automatically. Yet this small studio, when their rank and privilege could have afforded them so much more, was perfect because it was all theirs. Mui’s grandfather had purchased it for them and given them the deed.

  “You should know that the pilot who died in the J-20 crash in Taiwan left a recording that implicated both Zhang Ru and Li Zuocheng.”

  Mui tensed beside her. She was too well trained to show it, but Mui was her lover and their bodies had no secrets from each other.

  “My grandfather would not do such a thing,” Mui finally found her voice. “I know what he is, but he is also a man of honor. He would not sacrifice a man’s life that way.”

  “Well, unless we come up with a different solution, I would bet that recording will leak. When it does, they will both be removed from the CMC. Your president will then have the power to order the military to annex Taiwan. There will be a war.”

  Let them die! Mei-Li would gladly let that happen.

  But again, Mui’s body betrayed her. She wouldn’t.

  Taz spoke for the first time. “I think Zhang Ru should be crucified for what he’s done to you—slowly, painfully, while being forced to chew on his own testicles.”

  Mei-Li let herself smile. She had been right to trust Colonel Vicki Cortez.

  “But Jeremy said there must be a better solution. A way to stop the war before it happens.”

  “No one,” Jeremy nodded at the two of them, “knows more about the seven members of the CMC than you two. Do you have any ideas?”

  Let them die! Again, Mei-Li kept the thought to herself.

  She looked at Taz, who shook her head. “No. I’m not able to see it. Jeremy says that I only think from a place of anger. I know…something of what you went through too well.”

  Mui stroked a hand over Mei-Li’s hair so gently she could almost cry.

  “Mei-Li knew only pain,” Mui concurred. “She has now learned there is more, I offer her all I know how to.”

  “It is more than I ever dreamed of,” Mei-Li kissed her briefly before turning her attention to the Americans. “She is the blessing of my life.” And it was true.

  Mui turned to Jeremy. “Until they learn to leave the anger aside, we must be their guides. Yes?”

  Jeremy looked thoughtful, then offered Mui a slight bow of respect. Mei-Li now knew that Taz had chosen her lover well.

  Taz looked at Jeremy in such surprise that both Mei-Li herself and Mui laughed.

  She grimaced, then shrugged. “We don’t even know if we get to stay together tomorrow.”

  “None of us do,” Mui nodded to the door. “Mei-Li assumes that every knock will be the entire Chinese military marching through the door to dra
g her back into her nightmare. Even though we are finally in America, our visa can be revoked at any moment. I often tell her that the only answer is to live every day very completely so that we do not regret as much if there is no tomorrow.”

  “So, how do we make sure there is a tomorrow?”

  Mui smiled at Jeremy’s question, “I have an idea on that.”

  71

  Taz’s head was still spinning when they arrived back at Tacoma Narrows Airport.

  Jeremy had called ahead and the others were waiting by the Mooney. Mike had already rolled it out of the hangar.

  “It’s only a four-seat airplane.”

  “Andi and I are barely enough to make up a whole person together.”

  “This had better be worth it.” Andi did look a little better for having gotten some sleep.

  After a little juggling, Holly sat behind Mike. Andi ended up in the back seat as well. Taz was on Jeremy’s lap in the front passenger seat, slid all the way back against Andi’s short legs, and held close by a seatbelt extender.

  “If she’d just answer her phone…”

  “Well, she didn’t. So we’ve got to go find her. Just don’t crash.” Taz draped an arm over Jeremy’s neck and pressed against him to not bump the copilot’s control wheel.

  He rested his head on her shoulder and she tipped her cheek onto his hair.

  “Aw, aren’t you two just the sweetest thing since Vegemite.”

  “Vegemite is as bitter as hell,” Taz glanced back at Holly as Mike got them into the air.

  “I didn’t want to get carried away.”

  Was it a warning? Not to get too carried away about Jeremy? Taz couldn’t tell. It’s not as if there was really a place for her on this team. Her car and most of her personal gear were still parked down in southern Oregon at the hotshots’ base. Her future was probably parked in Leavenworth prison.

  Twenty minutes later, they were circling over Spieden Island, and she had no more answers than when they’d first taken off.

  72

  Miranda woke to the sound of an airplane buzzing through her dreams.

  She knew the sound of the plane, but couldn’t place it.

  All she could hear was the heavy beat of a Chinook’s shredding rotors as Zhang Ru chased her across the sky in a shattered Mighty Dragon jet—shedding parts as it raced ever closer.

  Flying through her own—

  She was still on the couch.

  Under the Storm at Sea quilt.

  Out the big picture window, she saw that the plane was real. It circled one last time, switched on a bright landing light, and turned final. The light was glaring right at her, so she couldn’t make out any details.

  When she looked aside, she saw that her runway lights were on. Very few knew how to turn those on, and she couldn’t imagine who it would be.

  Then she finally came fully awake.

  She hadn’t recognized the sound because it was too familiar: a Continental TSIO-550 engine driving a Hartzell Scimitar three-bladed prop.

  It was her Mooney.

  Her watch said it was almost three in the morning.

  What could be so important?

  She dressed carefully and waited for them in the garden by the back door.

  The last thing she wanted was visitors. Even if the visitors were her team. She wished they would go away, but that wasn’t a polite thing to tell a visitor.

  If she’d been younger, she’d definitely have thrown a tantrum. But she wasn’t a child anymore. So she stood in her garden, breathed in the night air, and breathed it back out again.

  It took longer than she expected for them to arrive. Perhaps she should have gone to get them with the golf cart instead of leaving them to walk down from the hangar. Except the golf cart was still parked at the hangar; its keys were in her pocket. But she didn’t want them here anyway.

  She could hear their approaching footsteps.

  They weren’t conversing.

  Without a word, she led them inside and started to make tea.

  Mike shooed her out of her own kitchen and began to make it himself. He would put the tea away wrong and disorganize her mugs once more, but he left her little choice.

  She sat at the table and waited.

  “I’m sorry, Miranda,” Jeremy spoke first. “We tried calling you, but you didn’t answer.”

  “My phone is off.”

  “Oh, well, we want to call General Nason.”

  “Why do you need to call Drake?”

  “We have an idea on how to stop the Chinese president from starting a war over Taiwan, and nobody gets killed.”

  “Who’s we?”

  “These two jokers,” Holly indicated Jeremy and Taz. “As far as we can tell, they had wild sex, went to talk to that Chen Mei-Li girl and her lover, and together the four of them cooked up something. It sounds good to us.”

  “But,” Mike began distributing mugs, “you get last word. And we don’t know how to call Drake.”

  “Oh,” Miranda pulled her phone from her pocket and turned it on.

  The instant she did, it rang so sharply that she almost lost it to the floor.

  73

  “Hi, Miranda, I’m sorry to wake you.”

  “Well, that’s convenient,” Taz kept her voice low as she recognized Drake’s voice over the phone, as apparently everyone else did.

  “We’re not asleep,” Miranda observed in the perfectly logical way of hers.

  “We? Your team is there?”

  “Yes.” There was a small chorus of agreement from the others. Taz still didn’t know what she was, so she kept her mouth shut.

  Miranda continued. “I’m sorry, Drake, but we won’t have even an initial report on the J-20 for you until tomorrow—”

  Holly held up her wrist as if looking at her watch.

  Miranda checked her own. “—or rather later today.”

  “That’s not why I was calling. I’m here with the President.”

  “Good morning, Roy,” Miranda continued without missing a beat.

  Taz glanced at Jeremy and whispered, “Roy?”

  “He asked her to call him that.”

  “And she does?”

  Jeremy just waved a hand toward the recent proof. Maybe Miranda deserved at least some of the pedestal this team had her up on.

  Drake continued, “He wanted to hear from the team on the ground why you think the Chinook MH-47G was sabotaged. If it really was, could it have been related to—”

  Taz jumped in, “Oh, it was sabotaged, Mr. President. We also know that it was done by General Zhang Ru blackmailing a Night Stalkers’ mechanic.”

  “What the hell? Who is this and how do you know?” the President’s voice was even deeper over the phone than on the television.

  Shit! Taz really should know when to keep her mouth shut. “This is…” she took a deep breath “…Colonel Vicki Cortez, former aide to General JJ Martinez. And I know because a Chinese national witnessed the blackmail and informed us.”

  “Cortez? I thought you died with Martinez.”

  “So did I, Mr. President.”

  “This Chinese national Tweety Bird told a dead colonel about blackmail they just happened to witness being done by one of the top seven Chinese military generals?”

  “Yes, sir. She told myself and Jeremy Trahn.” And then Taz looked around the table and realized that neither of them had thought to mention that piece of Mei-Li’s information to the rest of them.

  “Do we have any idea why?” the President’s growl sounded lethal.

  “We were told that it was payback for a person. A connection that our informant uncovered about the timing of a phone call made to General Zhang Ru’s private personal number. I’m sorry, sir, but that was all of the detail I was given.”

  “A Persona?” Miranda asked softly.

  Jeremy smacked his forehead, Holly looked ill, and Mike just folded his arms on the table and slumped until his face rested on them. Only she and Andi were left in the dark.<
br />
  “Fuck!” was Drake’s assessment over the phone.

  Then Taz remembered a tiny news item. It was about the crash of an AN-124 Ruslan Condor in Siberia last year, and the loss of a three-billion-dollar Persona spy satellite during its delivery to an eastern Russia launch site.

  The reactions around the table said that it wasn’t a crash at all. And somehow both Zhang Ru had become involved, and knew that Drake Nason was a part of it.

  Again, glancing around the table, they all looked like normal people, though she was becoming convinced that they weren’t.

  “Okay. I think we’re done with that topic,” the President’s tone put a definitive end to it. “Thank you and your team for their time, Miranda.”

  “Of course, Roy. Though we were calling Drake with a question of our own.”

  “Fire away, Miranda. Anything I’d be interested in or can I get back to my day job?” The President was actually teasing Miranda.

  Miranda waved a hand at her.

  Taz had no idea why she was suddenly the one on deck. Other than there hadn’t been time to bring Miranda up to speed with the latest.

  “Well, Mr. President, it turns out that China’s loss of the J-20 was an opening move about starting a war in Taiwan. And we think we have a way of stopping it.”

  The silence at the other end of the line was deafening.

  “Is that of interest, Roy?” Miranda asked in that perfectly rational way of hers.

  74

  Zhang Ru lay back on the couch watching the Western news. CNN was one of the many privileges of rank. Daiyu and the new girl were talking quietly over tea on the other sofa.

  Ru had thought about calling the girl Lizzy, but it would be too sweet a nickname and he didn’t want her getting any romantic ideas. Daiyu had done that when he’d first married her; thankfully that phase hadn’t lasted long.

  He knew the news release must come sometime today because the West must explain the crashed J-20 jet to the Taiwanese and the world, before another night fell. Crashing it on Fulong Beach the day before a major music festival had been perfect. The media was still covering the removal of the destroyed bandshell, and their lame attempts to still hold the concert on the sand.