by Paul Knox
“To cover as much skin as possible. Bugs. I suggest you do the same.”
“Whatever you say.” Chang plucked another shirt from his bag and did so. “So now that we look like complete foreigners and helpless tourists, where to?”
“We don’t look helpless. We look informed. And…I almost forgot.” Reece reached into the pocket of the pants she had been wearing and pulled the necklace out. It twinkled, almost magically, in the light.
“What is that?” Chang asked.
“The pilot was wearing it.” Then Reece noticed there were two Chinese characters crudely scratched into the back.
绿龙
“What does this say?” Reece handed the necklace over.
Chang stared wide-eyed, like he either didn’t know what to say or didn’t want to say it.
“What is it?” Reece asked.
“It says… It says… Well… Green Dragon.”
“What?” Reece asked, stunned. “Why would it say that? Wasn’t Ju-long the last green dragon?”
“Technically, I was supposed to inherit the title, making me the last green dragon.”
Reece quirked an eyebrow, studying the passive man she had never seen kill a fly, much less fight.
“Um…ri-i-ight,” she drew out.
“Hey,” Chang said in defense. “The green dragon lineage is rightfully mine. Xie did ask me to come down here with you, remember?”
“I’m still questioning his wisdom. Anyway, whatever this means, it can’t be good.” She took the necklace back.
Then she studied the clouds and wind again. If they hurried, they might be able to get out of this forest before the storm hit. El Salvador wasn’t a large country, and there were pockets of civilization everywhere. Racing the weather might be tight, but the alternative—stuck in a dangerous jungle during a storm—would be worse.
“We’ll follow the creek,” she said. “We’re bound to run into civilization or a road. That’s the best chance we have.”
When they returned to the water, Reece washed the necklace. She held it for a moment before putting it on.
“Gold is definitely your color.” Chang smiled, but there was sadness in his eyes.
“I wouldn’t want to lose it. We should go.”
Reece wished she had a machete while using her stick to fend off thorns and branches. They navigated downstream, usually five to ten yards away from the water.
After some time, suddenly, a crack-cracking sound echoed above them.
“Watch out!” Chang yelled.
Reece heard the sound of a breaking branch crashing down toward her. Chang lunged forward and slammed into her body, pushing her out of the way. A large branch the size of a grown man and as thick as a tree trunk plummeted to the ground where Reece had been standing.
Reece landed on her back with a thud. She could smell the wet leaves and moist dirt. To her left, large red ants marched over the decomposed mush of organic material.
“That was close.” Chang began to push himself up.
But Reece shot her hand up, signaling that Chang should freeze.
“What is it?” he whispered.
“Look.” She pointed a few yards above them.
Wrapped around a branch was a large gray snake slithering from one tree to another. Diamond-shaped markings on its back appeared and disappeared as its body twisted around the branch. Then it stopped and eyed the two, its forked tongue flickering in and out of its mouth.
“At least it’s not twenty feet long,” Chang murmured.
“No,” Reece said, “But that’s a venomous Jumping Viper. If one of us got bit, there’s a good chance of infection and death long before we ever made it out of here.”
Chang held his breath.
Soon the viper passed by. They continued on.
About a half an hour later, they heard the faint sound of human voices in the distance. Chang sighed in relief. Reece couldn’t help but smile hopefully. They headed in that direction.
But the closer they got, the more some of the voices sounded angry, and others, conversely, scared. Reece could hear what sounded like two men yelling.
“Move slowly and quietly,” Reece instructed.
They broke through the thick of it but stayed crouching behind trees and boulders, on the perimeter of what appeared to be a small village. They could see what looked like an indigenous tribe being harassed by two men carrying guns, both taller than everyone else.
The two men had their weapons aimed at a few women sitting on the dirt with their heads down.
One of the men cursed and said, “If you don’t tell us where the gold is, today, I’m gonna burn this entire village to the ground.”
Reece watched as one of the nearby indigenous men answered. “I already told you, we don’t know. If we knew, we would be rich. I promise you, times are hard.” He pleaded, “Can’t you see that?”
One of the gun-wielding men turned to the other and said, “Rolando, shoot one. See if that helps his memory.”
The women on the ground started trembling and shaking their heads. Their crying intensified. And their voices blurred together. “No. No, please. Not in front of the children. Please.”
5
“STAY BACK,” Reece ordered Chang.
“Are you going in there?” he asked, as though if she said yes she’d be committing suicide.
“One hundred percent I’m going in there.” Reece took the T-shirt off her hair and neck, tossing it to the side. Then she pulled her hair back in a tight ponytail.
She moved low to the ground, away from Chang while removing the gun from her holster and sliding the rack back, chambering a round.
Suddenly she heard a child’s voice from the group. Reece caught sight of him—a boy, maybe eleven or twelve years old.
He bravely, but perhaps naïvely, announced, “I have a clue. I do! Look at me!”
“Tell me, boy,” the man named Rolando said, not lowering his gun, but turning away from the women to face the kid.
That was the distraction Reece needed. She charged forward and cautiously fired a round at the dirt next to Rolando’s feet, angled in the direction opposite the people.
He jumped back and swiveled around. But Reece had her gun up and ready.
“Drop it!” she yelled in Spanish.
“Señora, what business do you have here?” Rolando asked in English.
“The rescue business. Put it down, slowly.” She diverted her eyes to his accomplice, only a yard or two away. “You too,” she commanded.
“Okay, okay,” the accomplice said, somewhere between annoyed and alarmed.
The two men bent down to set their guns on the dirt. Rolando’s gun dropped to the earth. But then the accomplice whipped his arm up and fired at Reece.
Reece anticipated his movements but wouldn’t fire at him; he was standing directly in front of the group of women. Instead, she leaped sideways to the ground.
Another gunshot rent the air and dirt plumed inches from Reece’s body. The accomplice had fired again. But Reece still wouldn’t fire at him from this angle.
Rolando followed his accomplice’s cue and went to pick up his gun from the ground. Reece identified that the line of sight to Rolando’s gun was clear. She zoned into the black metal and fired.
PING!
The gun flew back a few feet into a fern, most likely permanently damaged after taking a bullet.
Rolando jerked his hand up and stepped back. “Derian, hurry up and shoot her!” he yelled.
Reece fisted a handful of dirt and flung it at Derian just as he was taking another shot. His bullet went wide. The dirt hit him right in the face.
His hands instinctually went to his eyes, wiping at the dirt. Reece sprang to her feet and charged at him. At close range, she would either grab his gun away while he couldn’t see, or shoot him point-blank if it came down to it.
But Rolando leaped forward with speed, intercepting her before she could reach Derian. He tackled Reece and she hit the ground h
ard with him on top.
But Reece’s right arm was free. She thwacked the butt of her gun against his cheekbone, enabling her to dislodge from his hold.
Two of the larger tribal men joined in. They rushed Derian and took him down before he had a chance to fully recover from the dirt in his eyes.
Still on her back, Reece slid out from underneath Rolando. His face was now near her stomach. He gripped Reece’s shirt and stopped her backward movement.
She wrapped both her thighs around his neck and locked her legs, putting him in a firm chokehold. He punched and clawed at her legs but rapidly lost strength.
Derian was now on the ground surrounded by two large men, but he still held his gun. He fired three shots wildly. They didn’t hit anyone, but the two men on him jumped back, startled.
Derian rushed to his feet and manhandled one of the women, digging the gun into her head while calling to Reece. “Let’s make a trade, Señora. Let my brother go. And then I’ll let this one go. Or we all die today.”
The woman Derian held squeezed her eyes shut and cringed in fear or pain, or both, just waiting to be helplessly shot dead. Reece didn’t see a clear-cut solution. Hoping something would present itself, she regretfully released the hold on Rolando.
Red-faced and seconds away from passing out, Rolando wobbled as he scooted away, coughed, and sucked in breath after breath.
Derian removed his gun from the woman’s head. And then pointed it at Reece.
“Get up,” he commanded.
6
TOMMY SHANAHAN hopped out of the shower, toweled off and shaved his morning stubble. On the way to the coffee pot he paused next to the kitchen table by his wife, Jessie, and their baby boy, Zaki.
Jessie had a little spoon in a cinnamon spiced butternut squash, supervising Zaki as he navigated the food from his highchair to his mouth. Every time he took a bite, he made a funny face and spit some onto his chin.
Shanahan kissed Jessie hello and asked, “How’s that veggie working out?”
She gave him a smirk. “Don’t even. I read that kids have to try new foods a dozen times before even knowing if they like it or not.”
Shanahan scooped some coffee into the filter and flipped the machine on. “Give him some credit. He’s a fast learner.”
“It’s coated in delicious warming spices,” Jessie protested. “It’s almost Christmas and this nutmeg-cinnamon combo is…well…you said you liked it—it’s good, isn’t it?”
“Babe, you’re the best cook I know. And the squash last night fresh out of the oven is one of my winter favs.” He moved closer to her and rubbed her shoulders. “Keep feeding it to him. I’m sure you’re right about the dozen-times thing.”
“That feels good,” she said, swaying to the motion of his massage. “And that coffee smells heavenly. By the way, your phone beeped while you were in the shower. Maybe it’s Reece.”
“She can wait a quick sec.” Shanahan kept going, working out a knot. When he finished rubbing his wife’s shoulders, he ambled over to the coffee pot and poured them both a mug.
While doing so, his thoughts drifted back in time. Back to a time in high school during his championship baseball game. He was the team’s pitcher, right there on the mound looking around the diamond. The bases were loaded and the game was in the final inning. His arm was aching, his shoulder throbbing, and the other team was getting hits off him. Another solid hit by this next batter meant Shanahan would blow it for his school.
Shanahan was an only child. His dad had died in the Gulf war and his mom worked to survive. That evening, he’d looked up into the stands, knowing no family would be there.
But there sat Reece Cannon and her younger sister, watching intently. Reece always made his games. When she’d noticed his glance at her, she raised her fist and pumped the air in support. Shanahan remembered feeling something in that moment. Something that was hard to put in words, but if he could, he’d say it felt better than anything in the world. And he decided he’d pay her back some day.
Yet after high school, Reece moved to Los Angeles and disappeared. He’d never gotten the chance.
Years later she moved back to town, and like she never left, they were peas and carrots again. They busted criminals and solved crimes as detectives, as partners. And still, she always managed to be the one saving him. Now that their detective stint was over—he still owed her one.
Shanahan smiled as he set Jessie’s coffee mug next to the butternut squash leftovers.
I threw a strikeout. And we won the championship. Those were the good ol’ days.
He traipsed to the counter and lifted his cell from the charging station.
The beep was just an email notification ping. A package he had ordered for Jessie, for Christmas, was arriving this afternoon.
I better keep this one on the down low.
Then he casually pulled up the flight schedule of Reece’s plane, checking on her status. His mood instantly changed.
“Oh nooo,” he intoned.
“What is it?” Jessie asked, attentively. “Reece ran into problems?”
He looked up from the phone. “Why would you think that?”
“I know what an emergency sounds like.”
“Well, you’re right,” he groaned. “Like always. Her flight never arrived.”
“To El Salvador?”
“She made it there. To El Jocotillo.” Shanahan began downing his coffee with one hand and dialing a number with the other.
“Can you call her?” Jessie dug the little spoon back into the squash.
“Exactly what I had in mind.” Shanahan dropped his mug in the sink just as Reece’s voicemail picked up.
“Let me guess,” Jessie surmised. “No answer?”
Shanahan shook his head. “But she gave me someone to call in an emergency.”
“Get it done, tiger.”
Shanahan mussed Zaki’s soft baby hair and said a couple parentese words to him, eliciting a series of chubby smiles, before giving Jessie one last kiss and getting to work.
* * *
Shanahan sat in his home office dialing the number for Xie, not knowing what to expect.
Reece had briefed him about her mission before leaving. According to Chang, she’d said, Sandy had been working closely with Xie, coordinating vigilante work in the same way he had worked with Michael Alderidge and The Resistance.
Shanahan trusted Reece with his life. But he was highly suspicious of Chang, his mysterious return, and anybody Chang brought to the table in this conundrum. Anybody with the ability to hide from the reach of China’s corrupted officials—with the technology and power that country wielded—was either lying or living a life of lies. Neither of which smelled rosy to Shanahan.
A man picked up. “Wèi?”
Shanahan currently spoke six languages, and Mandarin was one of them.
He answered the man’s standard greeting. “Nǐ hǎo. Xie?”
They continued speaking in the Chinese language.
“Who wants to know?” Xie asked cautiously.
“I’m Reece Cannon’s partner. I think she’s in danger and I don’t think we have time for pleasantries or for me to jump through hoops trying to convince you I’m a good guy. You’ll just have to trust me.”
“You speak Mandarin very fluently. I would think you were a native if I didn’t know this call came from America.” Xie switched to English. “What’s your name, ‘Reece Cannon’s partner’?”
“Shanahan.”
“Ah, Shanahan, of course. What a pleasure. I know who you are. And…” Xie briefly paused. “My AI has just verified your identity by matching your voice to your recorded profile. Please continue.”
“My profile?”
“Mr. Shanahan, if I may use your words—you’ll just have to trust me.”
Shanahan gritted his teeth. He didn’t exactly like being profiled by someone who held no credence or validity with him. But for now, for Reece, he would play along.
He divulged the
little he knew and requested access to the INSITE app. Xie promptly sent it.
Five minutes later, Shanahan inspected a screen on his phone that displayed the exact coordinates of Sandy Cannon.
“This is accurate?” Shanahan asked.
“Within two inches. And it is proprietary technology built by my team here in China. I have full control at my fingertips to shut down any app utilizing INSITE within seconds. Hacking it is near impossible—but even if it was hacked, I would be alerted, thus scrambling the information or manipulating it as I see fit.”
“Do you have satellites?” Shanahan asked. “Or who do you piggyback off of?”
“We have satellites,” Xie said, matter-of-fact.
Shanahan was impressed. But he didn’t say so. Instead, he continued with no time to waste.
“And you haven’t heard from Chang, either?”
“Negative. And I concur with your level of concern, Shanahan. What will you do?”
“I’m still figuring that out. I’ll stay in touch. And you do the same.”
After ending the call, Shanahan dialed the international airport that Reece and Chang had flown into earlier that morning. He was routed to the staff handling small planes and personal flights.
After waiting on hold for a while and talking to multiple people, he finally got in contact with a woman who had met with Reece and Chang personally, and helped book their flight to El Jocotillo.
She didn’t have much information, but did inform him about a man named Lindon. The woman volunteered that Lindon had arranged a new pilot and copilot who were both Asian, but neither of them spoke Spanish.
“This is not good,” he whispered to himself.
“Excuse me?” the woman asked.
“Can I talk to this Lindon?”
“Lindon left on a flight to Los Angeles just minutes ago.”
“Does he have contact information?”
“If you give me your number, I can ask him to call you.”
“Thanks.” Shanahan gave her his number and then hung up.
He slumped back in his desk chair, thinking.
