Vital Force

by Trevor Scott

  He shrugged. “I don’t know. My map isn’t very detailed.”

  She looked outside and saw the sun making its way to the top of the mountain on the right side of the train. Then she looked to the left.

  “Those are the Hinggan Mountains,” she said, closing her eyes slightly and yawning.

  “How can you tell?”

  “First, my grandfather worked here when I was a child. I came to visit him each summer. Might have been on this very train. Second, my company built a communications site on the ridge last year.”

  “For the army?”

  She glanced around the car at the dozing soldiers. “For our government. Why do you think I’m here?” she said more quietly.

  “How far?”

  She looked around and then got up, pulling Jake along until they reached the back of the car. Pulling the door open, they went between two cars. The noise from metal wheels against metal rails would drown out their voices.

  Finally, she turned and said, “They’re not used to hearing English this far north.”

  “Hey, I’m just a tourist,” he said. “You’re my tour guide.” Part of him believed that, but another part, the more realistic part, knew that the authorities in Harbin would put the word out that Su was traveling with an American man. “You’re right. We’ll need to get off this train soon or face a search like the last one. And this time they’ll actually be looking for us.”

  She looked out at the countryside passing by. There where tall fir forests, the frost glistening on the needles with the rising sun.

  “There’s a small village ahead. The next stop. We can get off there. That leaves us ten miles from Nenjiang. The soldiers will get off there and ride by bus to the site.”

  “How far is that?”

  “They go another ten miles into the mountains. They reach a...what you call it in English?” She searched her mind. “Platter?”

  “Plateau?”

  “Yes, a plateau, surrounded on all sides by mountains. Very isolated. Only one road in.”

  “How do we get there?” he asked.

  “We cut off angle from northwest, then travel over the mountain through the forest.”

  Jake looked out the window. The mountains were quite snowy, but they didn’t seem very tall. They reminded him of Oregon’s coast range. The difference? It had to be below zero out there.

  He was wearing short hiking boots; more like high top basketball shoes with deep treads. Those wouldn’t work under these conditions.

  “I need some different clothes,” he said.

  “I’ve got that covered,” she assured him, smiling.

  They went back into the car with the soldiers and took a seat.

  A short while later the train slowed and came to a halt in the small village. As suspected, the soldiers stayed put while Jake and Su casually got off the train and walked into the little town. The air was bitter cold, with a slight breeze sweeping down from the mountains to the west. There was no real downtown. There was a small restaurant attached to a tiny market where, invariably, most people in town would get their food. There was one gas pump that sat alongside the road, and, according to Su, a man would come out from his house when the rare car needed fuel.

  They walked along trying not to stand out, but not being able to hide Jake much. He was, after all, wearing clothes that would never be found in that part of Manchuria, and Jake assumed he was probably at least five or six inches taller than the average man there.

  He was freezing. The wind whipped right through his thin clothes as if they were made of rice paper.

  “What about a change of clothes?” Jake asked her.

  She didn’t lose stride. Instead, she lifted her chin slightly and said, “Just ahead.”

  They were almost out of town now and Jake noticed the train pulling away, steaming toward the north.

  Su turned down a small road that lead to a single house with smoke streaming from a chimney. When they reached the front door, she hesitated, glancing sideways at Jake.

  “What?” Jake said.

  She sighed. “I’m afraid.”

  “Afraid of what?”

  She thought for a moment. “They found my friend. What if they know about this place?”

  “Could they know? Did you plan on coming here?”

  She shook her head.

  “Did you tell your friend about this place?”

  She shook her head again. “No. But he did know about it. It’s my uncle. I talked about him, but we weren’t supposed to come here.”

  “Then you should be all right,” Jake said.

  Reassured, she knocked lightly on the door. Nothing. She was about to knock again, when the door swung open. Standing there was a man in his early sixties, with hair to his shoulders. His mustache, gray and black, hung down to his chin on both sides. Surprisingly, he was as tall as Jake.

  There was a long series of conversation as the man escorted them into his house. They took chairs near the fireplace, and Jake could finally start to feel the skin on his face. In a moment, the conversation seemed to move toward him, since Su was looking at him with her arm extending toward him.

  The old man reached his hand out toward Jake and they shook briefly, which Jake knew was out of tradition for China. Then the uncle got up and went to a small kitchen area, leaving the two of them alone.

  “Does he speak English?” Jake asked her.

  “Not a word,” she said smiling.

  “What did you tell him?”

  “I said you were an old college friend. You wanted to see my homeland, where I spent much of my youth. He’s very happy. They don’t see Americans here.”

  “That could be a problem. You’ll have to tell him not to mention us to the people in town.”

  “I didn’t think about that,” she said. “Problem is, most of the town probably saw us come here.”

  17

  The drive from sunny Central Oregon had gradually turned to sprinkles and then to a steady downpour by the time agents Fisher and Harris had reached Eugene.

  An Oregon Highway Patrol officer, sitting among the thick forest on a side road, had spotted the white Trooper with California plates five miles east of Springfield and had followed it at a distance into Eugene, where they had turned it over to an unmarked police unit. That car had followed the Trooper to the western edge of town to the home of James Patterson, an old college friend of Cliff Johansen. An office worker for the Agency’s Eugene office had delivered a brown Ford Taurus to the agents, taking the Chevy Blazer in return.

  The two of them sat now in the Taurus two blocks down from Patterson’s house in a subdivision of newer homes watching the driveway through a rain-smeared windshield.

  “What are we doing?” Harris asked, running her hands through her hair to remove as much rain as she could. “You see, this is why I live across the mountains.”

  Fisher’s eyes remained on the white Trooper. “I thought you were from Seattle originally. Should be used to this shit.”

  “Doesn’t mean I have to like it,” she said. “Now what?”

  “Now we wait.”

  Fisher’s cell phone jangled a familiar song from the 80s, so he quickly flipped it open and said, “Fisher.” He listened carefully for some time. Then he said “Thanks,” and slammed it shut. He looked across at Harris, who had a quizzical expression. “What?”

  “Barry Manilow?” she said, smiling.

  “I’ve been trying to change it for weeks. Do you want to know what Portland has to say?”

  “Yes, please.”

  “Cliff got a large transfer of money from a Cayman account.”

  “How much?”

  “Half a mil.”

  She let out a little whistle. “Let’s go. We’ve got him.”

  “Maybe. But the money disappeared.”

  She looked confused. “What?”

  “The money was there, and then it wasn’t. They say it was split into pieces and sent elsewhere.”

  “How
many pieces?”

  “At least a hundred.”

  “That’s proof enough,” she said. “He’s trying to hide it.”

  “Right. We can get him on tax evasion a little over a year from now when he fails to report the income. But first we’d have to find it and put all the pieces back together again. Damn it!” He shook his head and stared at the rain hitting the windshield.

  “I thought he wasn’t this smart,” she said.

  “I never said that. I said he had left a trail...not a huge trail, though. I guessed he was in it for the sex. Now I’m not so sure. But he is a brilliant programmer. There’s no doubt about that.”

  “So, where will the money end up?”

  He shrugged. “I would transfer it into another currency or buy up gold. Maybe bonds. Have it held in Europe.”

  “The Swiss are out. I’d guess Luxemburg or Liechtenstein. They’re less obvious.”

  He smiled. “Or he could have it routed right back into the same bank in the Caymans. Regardless, they’ll track it down.”

  Harris leaned forward to wipe the windshield where fog had built up. “I say we haul his ass in. Let me take a shot at that geek.”

  “We have nothing on him officially.”

  “Bullshit! The guy takes off from work for two days without mentioning it to his boss. We know someone transferred some data for at least thirty seconds. Then we have Cliff taking half a million bucks and trying to hide the money. Damn. That’s more probable cause than we had on Walker.”

  “True. But with Walker we at least knew who was paying him. We need to know who this Asian woman works for, otherwise we have nothing.”

  “Great. Then let me have her alone for a while.”

  He smiled with that thought, his eyes penetrating the rain and focused on the Trooper.

  ●

  Inside James Patterson’s house, Cliff sat at the kitchen counter watching his old friend make hamburger’s on the stove.

  “This is one helluva surprise, Cliff,” Patterson said, his attention on his cooking. “Man, I wish you had called. I only have a couple of beers in the house. Shit, we can head on down and pick up some Steelhead. Just like old times. You sure she doesn’t want a burger? Man, you gotta put some meat on her bones.” He glanced back around looking for Li. “Where’d she go?”

  “She’s probably doing some Tai Chi in the bedroom,” Cliff said.

  Patterson reached down and shook his substantial belly. “She can have some of this shit.” Then he flipped the burgers and plopped a thick piece of cheese on each. Cliff’s old friend leaned toward him. “How’d you meet such a hottie?” he whispered.

  “She came to our work to teach a few Tai Chi lessons. Management thought we’d be more productive if we were more relaxed. We kind of hit it off, so she gave me her card and said to come to lessons. Turns out she lived and taught on the east bay close to me.”

  “One thing leads to the next,” Patterson said. “You dog. You always did have a thing for Asian chicks. Not that ya got any.” He turned and pulled the burgers from the pan, setting them gingerly onto buns. “No fries. Just chips.”

  He turned and put the plate down in front of his friend. After a few minutes of silent munching, the food was devoured.

  “How do you like working at home?” Cliff asked him.

  “It’s cool. As you know, you can do websites anywhere. Makes it nice when old college buds show up outta the blue.” He smiled broadly.

  “I’m sorry I didn’t call, man. My bad.”

  “No problemo. But I expect all the sordid details.”

  Cliff smiled, but his smirk quickly changed as he saw Li enter the room.

  She had an automatic pistol with a silencer pointed at his head.

  18

  Shemya, Alaska

  Colonel Powers shuffled across the frozen sidewalk toward the command post. The snow from the night before had mostly blown in strips of one-foot drifts every ten feet. A young airman was just finishing clearing a path.

  “Sorry it’s taking so long, Sir,” the airman said. “The snow blower blew a belt yesterday. I’ll have it fixed by the end of the day.”

  “No problem, John. Looks good.” The colonel entered the building and approached a check point with two security police behind a locked cage. Everything at this base was low tech from first glance and would have to be upgraded before it became operational again. For now, though, it would have to do, the colonel thought. It was more important to make sure the new technology, including the upgraded software, worked as advertised. And, he knew, security was much easier to maintain when he knew every person on a first-name basis.

  “Hey, guys,” the colonel said, pulling his entry badge and I.D. card from inside his parka. “If John slips on the ice out there, you make sure to haul his ass inside. Fifteen minutes out there without moving and he’s dead.”

  “You got it, Sir,” said the sergeant in charge. “Sir, you don’t have to show us those. We know who you are.”

  “My orders,” Colonel Powers said. “No one enters without proper I.D., entry badge, and they have to be on the list.”

  The door buzzed and the colonel entered, the sergeant closing the metal cage behind him.

  “Kinda like my New York club,” the large airman said.

  “That’s right,” Colonel Powers said, his hand on the man’s shoulder. “You’re the bouncer.”

  “Have a good one, Sir,” the sergeant said to the colonel’s back.

  Colonel Powers walked to the end of the corridor, punched in a four-number code on the cipher lock and then entered, heading down a flight of stairs to a basement shelter. The command post was set up to withstand any conventional attack and everything but a direct nuclear strike. The air was filtered and self contained, and there was enough food and water in there to last more than a month.

  At the bottom of the stairs was a series of two doors. The first was controlled by a cipher lock, which the colonel went through. The second was shielded and sealed from inside.

  The colonel punched the buzzer and waited. A couple of seconds later his identity was verified by Captain Sara Chavez, who opened the vault door. She was an attractive woman, her dark hair tied to the back of her head. Although she wore camouflage fatigues, it was quite apparent that she kept herself fit with running, which had become more difficult, the colonel thought, considering the limited distances on Shemya Island. Not to mention the ubiquitous wind and rain. The treadmill had to do the job in the winter.

  “Morning, Sir,” she said, stepping aside.

  “Morning, Sara. How’s the coffee.”

  “A bit strong,” she said, closing the vault door behind him.

  Before even checking the status board, the colonel poured himself a cup of thick, black coffee. Then he glanced about the small compartment. Besides Captain Chavez, there was one other command controller present; Staff Sergeant Greg Wilson, who sat at a console with headphones.

  The colonel took his chair in the back overlooking the status boards and control panels. Most of the panels were inoperative now, phased out by more sophisticated communications, centralized in Colorado. However, the colonel had insisted that they have the most recent communications upgraded as soon as possible, and some of that had already come online.

  Captain Chavez stood to the colonel’s side, sipping her coffee.

  The colonel took a sip and his face crunched. “Wow, Sara. Is this a west Texas brew?”

  She smiled. “Damn straight. Put hair on your chest.”

  “More like curl the hair on your chest,” he said. “Where’s our plane?”

  She turned to Sergeant Wilson. “Greg?”

  “Twenty miles out,” the sergeant said. “They reported some heavy head winds. You want me to patch you through?”

  “That’s all right, Greg. Let ‘em fly.”

  Colonel Powers drank some more coffee and then turned to the captain again. “We have security police on the tarmac standing by?”

  “Yes, Sir
,” she said. Bravo Flight.”

  “Outstanding.”

  “Yes, Sir. Out standing in the cold.” She smiled.

  Finally, the colonel laughed. “How long have you waited for that?”

  “Just came to me, Sir.”

  “What else we got on that plane, Sara?”

  She picked up a clipboard and flipped to the second page. “A Master Sergeant Jones and Senior Airman Cato. Both are programmers.”

  “That’s Jonesy,” he said. “We worked together in Germany. Best point guard we ever had on our basketball team. I don’t know Cato. What else?”

  “Looks like some fresh salmon again.”

  “Great. Just what we need. . .more fish.”

  The colonel sucked down the last of his coffee and got up for more. When he turned around, the captain was leaning over the console talking with Sergeant Wilson, her buttocks pointing right in his direction. Damn. He shook it off and took a seat again.

  There were five monitors that sequenced through various security cameras placed around the base. From the commander’s chair, the colonel could switch to whichever view he wanted and keep it there while the others continued to sequence. He toggled to the corridor above and saw the two security police reading magazines. Then he went to an outside view. Nice job on the sidewalk, he thought. Next he went to the control tower and saw the C-130 had just landed and was now rolling slowly to a halt in front of the operations building. So he switched to the camera above operations and waited.

  “The plane has landed,” the captain said, turning around, and realizing he was watching the monitor. “But you know that.” She stood next to the commander’s chair and watched with him.

  The ground crew pushed a ladder to the plane and then the door opened. Standing back a ways was Bravo Flight with at least fifteen security police airmen. On the perimeter was a Humvee with an M60 machine gun mounted on top and manned. The others had M16s and were spread out around the plane.

  The next few seconds were chaos. One of the men getting off the plane fell to the ground. But the security police turned away, reacting to something else.

  “What’s going on?” the colonel yelled.

  Sergeant Wilson held his hand to his headphone. “Sir, there’s gunfire.”