Darkness Under Heaven

by F. J. Chase

A stun grenade was tossed in. And when it blew the entry team poured into the apartment. Though the Chinese stun grenade threw off more smoke than a Western model and consequently made it harder to see. The point man took three steps and ran into an ankle-high wire that blended perfectly into the white wall, falling down flat on his face.

  As he hit the floor the ones behind him watched with alarm as something dropped from the ceiling fan and bounced in midair. They all dove to the floor.

  After an uneventful few seconds they lifted their heads up and observed a shiny piece of pipe, capped at both ends, dangling from an electrical wire in the air above them.

  The team leader shouted, “Bomb!” They grabbed the feet of the man who had tripped and dragged him back into the hall, diving for the floor again once they reached it.

  When everyone in the hall saw that happening they went down in succession, like dominoes.

  Word that there was a bomb passed over the radio net and was heard in the lobby. With impressive decisiveness, and a speed that belied his bulk, General Liang dashed out the front door long before anyone else could make up their minds what to do.

  Commissioner Zhou had taken the time to read up on the American Special Forces, and did not doubt that Avakian was capable of constructing explosives from commonly available ingredients. But he did doubt that Avakian could have constructed enough to destroy an entire apartment building, let alone a single floor. “The general seems to have left,” he said to Colonel Shen. “If you require a lift back to your office later, I am at your service.”

  Having lost quite enough face, Colonel Shen did not add to it by replying.

  The Special Force commander was shouting on the radio, trying to determine what was going on.

  “I hope someone is watching the apartment balcony during this confusion,” Commissioner Zhou mentioned.

  Colonel Shen quickly moved over to the Special Force commander and said something to him. The Commander nodded. And Commissioner Zhou chuckled under his breath.

  The apparent bomb dangling from the ceiling placed the Commander in something of a tactical quandary. If he sent his bomb disposal technicians into the apartment without clearing the other rooms, they might be shot by the American. And if he sent his men in to clear the rooms without the bomb techs checking first, they might hit another bomb that might explode instantly.

  Where other units might have sent in a dog, the Chinese resolved the question in classic military style. By calling for patriotic volunteers. Who would of course lose face if they did not volunteer patriotically.

  First an ultimatum was delivered to the apartment. By megaphone, of course, though the entire apartment could not have been more than fifty feet long. “Mr. A-vi-kan, exit the apartment with your hands up and you will not be harmed.”

  There was no response from within the apartment.

  The two three-man teams tiptoed through the living room, giving the dangling pipe a wide berth. Both the bedroom and bathroom doors were closed. But rather than kicking them in the point men instead twisted the knobs and opened the doors a crack, shining a flashlight to check for trip wires. Only then were the doors pushed open and the flashlights played across the floor to detect other wires.

  Rather than taking a chance on snapping on light switches the teams used the flashlights mounted on their JS submachine-guns. They entered the room very gingerly, covering the corners and under the bed. But there was the closet. And opening that a crack wouldn’t work if someone was hiding in there. So one officer took hold of the knob, looked down at the floor so the top of his helmet and not his face would take the brunt of any blast or gunshot, and yanked it open.

  The dancing flashlight beams revealed an empty closet.

  The bathroom was equally empty.

  When the word made it down to the lobby Colonel Shen said, “Another regrettable investigative failure.”

  “Perhaps,” Commissioner Zhou replied. “Whomever called out the Special Force will have much to answer for. Yet someone apparently planted a bomb in this apartment, and I doubt it was an economist for the World Bank. Perhaps we may yet recover valuable evidence.” He turned once again to Inspector Cheng. “Cancel the listening team and summon a scientific team.”

  Upstairs the entry team had pulled back and turned the apartment over to a bomb disposal technician, who was waiting in the hallway in his padded Kevlar blast suit.

  The tech waddled inside and examined the hanging pipe. The end of the wire wrapped around the ceiling fan dangled free. He thought about cutting it and bringing the bomb down to the street in the steel bomb bucket. But inside this outwardly crude device there might be a mercury switch on a timer, and any movement after it had hung stationary would set it off.

  Instead he reached in a suit pocket and peeled the adhesive off a small disruptor charge, about the size of a spool of sewing thread. Holding the pipe motionless with one hand, he carefully attached the charge and spliced the two contacts to the spool of wire that hung from his belt, paying it out as he backed toward the door.

  The tenants had finally been removed from their apartments, and firemen were standing by. The bomb tech ran his wire all the way down the stairwell. Hooking it up to a blasting machine, he paused to radio, “Stand by for explosion.” And pressed the firing button.

  A small pop, not much louder than a firecracker, that could not even be heard a floor away.

  The bomb tech waited fifteen minutes and took the elevator back up to the 7th floor. And a few minutes later took it down to the lobby. He presented his commander with the pipe, split down the middle from the disruptor charge. Which would have scattered any bomb mechanism before it could ignite a charge. But this particular pipe had nothing inside but a rolled piece of paper.

  Colonel Shen reached for it.

  “Wait,” said Commissioner Zhou. He handed Shen a pair of latex gloves.

  Shen yanked them on and unrolled the paper, which was quite scorched from the disruptor charge. Everyone leaned over to see what it was. It was a sheet of plain white paper. And written in large capital letters, in English, was the word BOOM. With an exclamation mark.

  14

  Judy Rose had crawled underneath a side table she was particularly taken with, examining its provenance. “You really found this place on Craigslist?”

  “Craigslist Beijing,” said Avakian. “I knew about a couple of apartments rented by American companies that never got used. Except to entertain the occasional call girl, that is.”

  “Great,” came the droll voice from under the table.

  “But I figured the Chinese would know about them, too. Then I remembered someone at a party saying they’d found their apartment on Craigslist. And after I gave it some thought I kind of came to the conclusion that any furnished luxury apartment advertised in English wouldn’t be getting a lot of renter interest right about now, so why not let ourselves in?”

  “So, in a nutshell, we’re squatters.”

  “On the bright side, it’s probably the least serious crime we’ve committed in a while.”

  “Always looking on the bright side, aren’t you?”

  “It keeps my morale up.”

  “So, following your theory to its logical conclusion, it is the last thing anyone would expect anyone to do.”

  “Why thank you. With the added benefit that furnished luxury apartments on the market always have the utilities turned on. People like playing with the faucets and appliances.”

  “Very clever. But what if the leasing agent does happen to show up with someone who wants to view the apartment?”

  “We’ll just have to cross that bridge if we come to it.” Avakian actually had his pry bar wedged into the door frame, to give them a little warning if that occurred.

  The southwest exposure from the big sliding glass window provided a dramatic though somewhat hazy view of downtown Beijing. The living room walls were a very subtle gold, with a marble gas fireplace mantel, and the furniture, as shown by the doctor’s interest, w
as top of the line. And even arranged according to the principles of feng shui.

  “There was something I wanted to ask,” she said, still under the furniture. “Were you some kind of juvenile delinquent?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You seem to have some definite skills in the areas of lock picking and car theft.”

  “Oh, that. When I was in high school we only stole street signs with interesting names. But lock picking and car theft are actually on the curriculum at the U.S. Army Special Warfare School.”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “Nobody sleeps in that class. Great practical application portion, too. Your tax dollars at work.”

  “They don’t teach good stuff like that in med school.”

  “I guess they don’t expect you to personally seize your patients’ cars for nonpayment of bills.”

  “Funny.”

  She didn’t seem to be any worse for wear after the night’s activities. As a matter of fact she still seemed tweaked on the adrenaline. He didn’t think she’d be crawling around checking to see who made the furniture otherwise. “I don’t want to put a crimp in your antiquing, but we’re out of here this afternoon. And if you don’t take a shower before the water goes off, and hopefully the water will go off, you’re going to be bathing from a pail.”

  Her head emerged from under the table. “You had me at pail.”

  “I boosted my probably no-longer buddy Mark’s robes, so we can also put on a wash.”

  “We are still carrying around a faint suggestion of l’air de sewer, aren’t we? Or is the smell just stuck in my sense memory?”

  “If it is it’s also in mine. Toss your clothes out the bathroom door and I’ll load up the washer.”

  “You bought laundry detergent, too?”

  “Sure.”

  “Unbelievable.”

  “You say that because you’ve never lived for six months in a small rented space in a foreign country with eleven other guys who worked out every day.”

  “And I never imagined there were those gaps in my life experience until I met you.”

  “Just be glad we’re not doing laundry in the aforementioned pail.”

  “I will be giving thanks for that later.”

  “Though sticking your clothes in a garbage bag, adding water and soap, throwing it in the back of a jeep, and driving over rutted third-world roads for an hour or two also works pretty well.”

  “What do you dry them with, a flame thrower?”

  “You know, nobody really uses those anymore,” Avakian said, with a definite note of regret in his voice. “They kind of went out of fashion. Maybe it was carrying thirty pounds of pressurized napalm around on your back.”

  “More’s the pity. There’s nothing like that dryer-fresh napalm smell.”

  “Yeah, it smells like victory.”

  “That’s your commercial jingle, right there.”

  While she was in the bathroom Avakian went through the bags and got everything ready for their next evolution. And he really didn’t know what he was more worried about. That she wouldn’t go along—or that she would.

  So far so good. Avakian didn’t believe in luck. Luck was as much a factor in events as examining the entrails of a goat was in predicting the future. Luck was what happened when your preparation was meticulous and your execution aggressive but flexible.

  “I’m done,” came the call from the hallway.

  He enjoyed his shower. Even if that filmy feel of sewer on his skin was more psychological than vestigial, it was still good to get it off. While he scrubbed himself the rifle lay propped against the toilet, and the pistol on the tank. But he didn’t linger under the water. Too much imagination about what might happen during those moments of vulnerability.

  Toweling off, he wiped the steam from the mirror and examined himself. The new beard was coming in, though right now he looked like a French actor. It was the first time he’d seen his hairline in years. And damn it had gotten high.

  As he opened the door and turned off the fan he heard Judy say, “Pete, can you come in here?”

  “Where are you?” he called back.

  “First bedroom.”

  He took a step toward it, then held up and leaned the rifle against the wall. No sense walking around like G.I. Joe. He stuck the pistol in the front pocket of the robe.

  Avakian really didn’t stroll anywhere. It was too ingrained. Move with a purpose, as they always used to bellow at West Point. And as he breezed through the bedroom doorway the curtains were closed and only the bedside lamp was on, so it took a second for his eyes to adjust. What he saw brought him to an abrupt stop. Because Doctor Rose was standing there naked.

  He was suddenly terrified of saying anything that might kill the moment.

  So it was left to her to say, “Well?”

  He managed to squeeze out, “You’re a very beautiful woman.” Then, after an equally long pause, “Sorry, but I’m drawing a blank on anything else right now.”

  “Then take off your robe and come over here and kiss me.”

  “Okay.” If he’d known this would happen when you turned a respectable surgeon in the throes of a midlife crisis into an urban guerrilla, he might have considered the career change earlier.

  She’d been hoping he wasn’t too hairy, and he wasn’t. And it really was true what they said about short men with big hands.

  The now-forgotten pistol thumped on the floor when he dropped the robe, making him cringe. He did of course waste no time in going over and kissing her.

  And if he’d been capable of more abstract thought at that moment he might have realized that sex was making him act the same way she had the previous night. While she was the one moving with confident calm.

  He wrapped his arms around her shoulders, holding her as close as he could because she felt spectacular. While this was happening she grabbed both his buttocks and he nearly swallowed her tongue.

  He broke their kiss, smiled, and said, “Be gentle with me.”

  “Where’s the fun in that?” she replied.

  15

  Commissioner Zhou was not sure which he found more amusing: the sign in Colonel Shen’s hands or the look on Colonel Shen’s face.

  “What does this say?” Shen demanded, shaking the paper.

  Commissioner Zhou had to pause in order to keep his composure. “It is the English word for the sound made by an explosion.” He noticed Shen’s arms tense and said, “Please refrain from damaging this evidence.”

  Colonel Shen dropped the paper on the floor. Zhou motioned for one of his sergeants to retrieve and bag it.

  “Perhaps you will salvage something from this investigative failure,” said Colonel Shen.

  Commissioner Zhou was not only amused, he also decided to show it. “Do you truly believe you will persuade people you did not create this carnival if only you accuse me enough times?”

  What made the moment so fulfilling was that everyone in the lobby had heard it.

  Commissioner Zhou said to the Special Force Commander, “Comrade Commissioner, if your men are finished with their work I will examine the apartment for additional evidence.”

  Commissioner Kuo nodded and moved in closer to say, “I am confident you will be able to salvage something.”

  Commissioner Zhou replied, “I assure you that I strongly share your hope, Comrade Commissioner.” Which was enough to acknowledge that the Special Force Commander was indeed in trouble that would require his help, while intentionally ambiguous enough that the Special Force Commander would not believe he had declared himself an enemy and therefore feel compelled to attack him through the Public Security bureaucracy.

  Before he went upstairs Commissioner Zhou called the public security minister’s aide once again and related what had just happened. Once your version of events reached the very top it mattered little what other stories were making their way through the lower levels.

  When the elevator did deliver him to the 7th floor the hal
lway was still filled with a light fog of smoke. Some of the Special Force were packing their equipment while others lined up to take the elevator down. And grumbling that with rush hour beginning they would never reach their headquarters in time for dinner.

  The bomb technicians were just leaving the apartment.

  “Is it clear?” Commissioner Zhou demanded.

  He was in civilian clothes, and they had no idea who he was. But ordinary Chinese, let alone police, had an unerring instinct about anyone who had the face to speak with authority.

  The senior man was a grizzled inspector, obviously with many years of service. He said respectfully, “Yes, it is.”

  Commissioner Zhou found it difficult to believe they had not discovered any explosive material. “Do not leave with the others. You may be needed.”

  He could see their confusion and uncertainty. “Notify your commander. He will endorse these orders.” He knew as soon as they left his sight they would ask one of his men who he was.

  And with that he stepped into the apartment. “Allow no one inside who is not wearing gloves,” he said to Inspector He. Chinese policemen were notoriously sloppy about such things, used to suspects who confessed. Or were beaten until they confessed.

  He stood in the center of the living room in order to gain an impression. Such a mass of Western things crammed into the space, so alien to the Chinese eye. The difficulty was that this was not the apartment of his quarry, only his temporary lair. So he must first look for what belonged there, then what might have been taken. And what might have been left.

  While he was surveying the room one of his policemen stepped past him and picked up a magazine from the coffee table. Commissioner Zhou stared at him until the man finally looked over and met his eye. And turned pale, hurriedly dropping the magazine and beating a retreat. Harsh whispers from behind as the man was chastised.

  Commissioner Zhou sighed and shook his head.

  Nothing in the living room struck his interest, so he motioned for his men to begin their examination. But the kitchen unit just off the living room was another matter. A kitchen table always had a cloth or a place set, or a vase or a centerpiece. Condiment dishes. Anything. But this one was totally bare, and so stood out.