Sunshine or Lead

by Adam Van Susteren

  Just as exhaustion overtook Xiaowan, Aurora’s phone rang and startled them both.

  “Hello.”

  “It’s Nat. Is Xiaowan with you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Tell her we made contact with her parents. They are safe, but they have missed our primary extraction. I anticipate they will be coming back with us.”

  “Do you?” Aurora asked.

  “No. But we have to know who is involved and how far the Chinese espionage program goes. She will be a better asset if she believes they are safe. And I will have a ‘come to Jesus’ talk with them in their room right now. Have Xiaowan ready to quickly say on the phone that she looks forward to seeing them. We’ll be wheels up by noon and in Hawaii by noon your time.”

  Aurora looked at Xiaowan. “They made contact with your parents. Nat believes they will be going with James and the rest of the guys but isn’t positive yet. She may need you to talk to them.”

  “James, Aaron, Kor, the boys, are they okay?”

  Aurora asked, heard an answer, and relayed, “James and the drunk boys are doing just fine. Can you think of any short message to tell your parents to get them to go with James?”

  “Baba, I don’t want you and Mama to get hurt because of me. I love James and the United States just like I love you and China. Please go with James.”

  Aurora set the phone down. “Sorry you didn’t get a chance to talk to James. It seems like everything is going well there. Let’s try to get some sleep and see what we can figure out in the morning.”

  “Okay. Thanks,” Xiaowan said as tears flowed from her eyes like droplets falling off an icicle on a sunny spring afternoon. She lay her head between two coaster-sized wet spots left by her tears. Xiaowan flipped the pillow over, rolled over, and set her mind to falling asleep. She was able to sleep for three solid hours.

  Chapter 22

  Aaron yelled in the Victory Casino valet area, “Hey Nat!” Less than five feet away, she turned and answered his call with a glare. Aaron continued, “Hey, we all got here at ten am on the dot.”

  Manny looked at Nat. “You go with James to make your final presentation to our guests and get them to come with us. I’ll herd these cats and keep them ready to go.”

  “Thanks.” She looked at James and said, “Let’s go talk with Huifang and Chen.”

  Len and Josh were asleep inside the Suburban. Kor was sitting like a tired golden retriever, not sure if he wanted to fall asleep or go play. When the fellas got back to the casino after the strip club adventure, they decided to go to the circle bar and celebrate with some champagne. Then a round of shots. Then a beer that they took up to the room and drank as they packed with the assistance of a calm Manny, an incredibly frustrated and nervous James, and a slutty-outfit-gone-back-to-business Nat dressed in a still slightly sexy pencil skirt suit.

  Aaron watched Nat and James head back into the hotel. He looked at Kor. “Omaha! Omaha! Kor, Bloody Mary. Kor, Bloody Mary. Hike. Hike.”

  Kor stumbled out of the opened car door. “That’s not how you call a play.”

  Manny said, “Hey, listen here. I’m the coach and I call the plays. You want another drink?”

  “Yes coach!” answered Aaron.

  “Yes coach!” followed Kor.

  “Then here’s the play. Aaron, you stay here and watch Len and Josh. They are your wingmen now. I’ll wingman Kor to the bar and we’ll bring back a round of Bloody Marys.”

  “Good play, coach,” Aaron said and he put his hand out palm down. Kor put his hand on top of it. Manny didn’t know whether to laugh with, or at, their stupidity but put his hand on top.

  “Ready, break,” Kor said.

  As they started breaking the huddle, Aaron said, “Hey, bring it in. Manny, you got internet on something? I need to check something online.”

  Manny pulled out a phone from his pocket, punched in a code, and handed it to Aaron. “Take that and wait for us in the car.”

  “Thanks coach,” Aaron said as he climbed into the front seat and frustratingly tapped keys on the tiny iPhone keyboard. After a minute of tapping and re-tapping, Aaron was able to log into his email account. Thirty two messages, but none from Tina Lee. He almost logged out but saw one from Pat O’brien and wished Pat was there, so he opened it up.

  Aaron,

  I hope things are going well. We talked a bit about

  Ameriprobe so I did some research on it and noticed

  something that made me feel like one of the Najarian brothers for a minute. There is incredibly unusual out-of-the-money call buying for the August 70, 80, and 90 strike prices. The stock closed at 63 and change on Friday. And when I say unusual buying, I mean there were twenty thousand 70 strike calls, thirty thousand 80 strike calls, and fifty thousand 90 strike calls bought. That’s over a thousand times the average call volume and it looks like these were all made by only a few players. This isn’t some high beta penny stock either, it’s a slow thirteen times p/e stock that someone is betting will skyrocket within the next few weeks.

  Like I said, I normally don’t follow other buyers. I also don’t see any earnings reports or investor presentations, nothing that would indicate a big hop. No major drugs are getting ready to clear a FDA hurdle, according to every analyst report that I read. Normally I would say this would be speculation of a buyout, but Ameriprobe is too big to be bought out. But with you looking into the company and a handful of others making such unusual bets, I went ahead and bought some August 75 calls.

  Want me to buy you any?

  Pat

  Aaron wasn’t really in the mental state to understand what was going on. He found the reply button, tapped it, and typed, “Fun here. Buy me a thousand. Talk soon,” and then he hit send.

  Aaron spent the next thirty seconds closing down, without logging out, the email and getting the telephone screen up on the phone. He dialed Tina’s cell phone number and got her voicemail, far too drunk to appreciate the international calling plan on Manny’s satellite phone that allowed him to reach her. He sang into the phone, “It’s a quarter after one, I’m a little drunk and I need you now. Said I wouldn’t call but I lost all control and I need you now.” Then in his deepest voice he said, “Hey baby, where’s your sexy ass at?” Looking out the window, he saw Kor and Manny coming so he hung up the phone.

  Kor opened the front door and handed a drink to Aaron. Then he and Manny climbed into the first row of passenger seats and Manny retrieved his phone from Aaron. “So tell me all about last night, guys. Not just the strip club, but the whole thing after James, Nat, and I left you all at the craps table at eleven.”

  As Aaron and Kor filled Manny in on the post-dinner shenanigans, Nat and James knocked on Xiaowan’s parents’ door.

  Huifang opened the door. “Ni hao James,” she said as she waited for James and Nat to enter the room and closed the door behind them.

  James replied, “Ni hao muqin.” Upon hearing James say “hi mother” in Mandarin, Huifang stepped forward to give him a hug.

  Nat said hello and introduced herself as a member of the United States government; she did not specify the branch. She handed Huifang and Chen the passports that were prepared for them and spoke in Mandarin. “We understand that your daughter is part of a long-standing Chinese espionage program and you may be in grave danger if she is unable to fulfill her obligations.”

  Seated on the bed, with passports in hand, and their heads looking into their laps, they listened with shame while they learned that their daughter could be in harm’s way right now. Chen looked up. “Is she okay? Will she be safe?”

  “Yes. I think she will be safe. She is complying with their request in order to protect you both.”

  “And that is why you want to bring us to the United States, to protect her?”

  James said, “You.”

  Chen shook his head. “We love our daughter and we love our country. We have lived long lives; if she disappoints, we are ready to face any consequence that we must, but we cannot leav
e with you.”

  Nat repeated nearly verbatim what Xiaowan told her on the phone. “Papa and mama, I love you both and I love China. I also love James and the United States. I do not want you to get hurt if I make a mistake. Please go with James to see me.”

  Huifang looked up at Chen, who shook his head. He looked at James and said very slowly in Mandarin, “Tell Xiaowan that I love her.”

  James understood the message. He reached his hand out to shake Chen’s hand. “Zaijian fuqin.”

  Chen understood the deep meaning behind the simple message of “goodbye father.” He took James’ hand and shook it, then used it as leverage to pull himself up to give James a hug. When the embrace ended, James said, “Zaijian muqin,” and Huifang stood up to give him a hug.

  When she let go of James, she looked at Nat. “Tell Xiaowan that she did nothing wrong and that we love her very much.” She looked back at James, cocked her head to look him in his eyes, and said, “Zaijian de erzi.”

  It took every ounce of resolve for James to not cry when hearing his mother-in-law say “goodbye son,” understanding that in the best-case scenario, they could never go to the United States again and both he and Xiaowan would never be allowed to visit China again. And in the worst-case scenario, they would be killed by the Chinese government.

  Even Nat felt the emotion of the moment as they walked out of their hotel room. All the power of the CIA and United States government could not protect Xiaowan’s parents now. Nat and James sat in the back of the Suburban in silence while the four drunks slept and Manny kept a watchful eye over everyone.

  Nat had an uneasy feeling as she, James, and Manny helped load their luggage and four drunks onto the plane. After boarding the plane, she could tell James was lost in thought, wondering how he could face his wife after failing to bring her parents back with him. She saw that Aaron, Kor, Josh, and Len were all sleeping again. Getting them into the plane felt like herding lazy, heavy, smelly zombies.

  Nat typed a message on a little pager-type device; it was a secure worldwide satellite link that allowed her to report the status of this mission back to CIA headquarters. Her uncoded message simply read, “Operative D047383 unable to retrieve parents. On runway to leave Macau, 11:12am local time.”

  Manny could see the stress and hurt in James. He could see the unease in Nat as well. That worry was contagious as it made him start to feel anxious. That anxiety abated for him when the pilot said they were clear for takeoff and the plane started moving, then accelerating, down the runway taking them back towards safety.

  Nat texted on her special device, “Wheels up 11:17am local time.” She let out a long breath and slowly inhaled. She looked at the device that read, “Understood.” The next fifteen minutes were eerily peaceful onboard until the pilot flipped on a microphone. “Uh, I don’t know how to say this, but I just received a radio communication and was provided coordinates to land this aircraft in Beijing.”

  Nat typed into her device, “Major problem.” She followed Manny up to the cockpit and the copilot opened the door for them.

  The pilot asked, “What do we do?”

  Nat asked, “How long until we are clear from Chinese airspace?”

  “Depends on what you mean by airspace.”

  “How so?” Nat asked impatiently.

  “Generally airspace for a country extends as far as ocean space, for twelve nautical miles. That’s about thirteen regular miles. But every country is different regarding their Air Defense Identification Zone, where they control the skies to make sure their air force can respond to threats.”

  “How far is that with China?” asked Nat.

  “They are very aggressive. Their ADIZ extends all the way into the airspace of Japan and Korea in the East China Sea.” The pilot added, “I’d say it goes for at least five hundred miles and we’re about a thousand away from…”

  “What?”

  The pilot held up a finger indicating he needed a second. Nat pulled out her device and typed, “Wake everyone with authority. Potential international crisis.”

  The pilot said in disbelief, “We can expect a Chinese military escort to join us in twenty minutes.”

  Manny was always adept at taking things in and being able to respond on the spot. For the first time in as long as he could remember, Manny Gaglione was at a loss for words.

  “Where can we set down that’s not in China?” Nat asked.

  “We’re about seven hundred miles away from a chain of Japanese islands, one that has a U.S. military base where I was stationed fifteen years ago.”

  “Can we outrun them?”

  The pilot pushed the throttle to full and adjusted his bearing northeast then east, then he looked back at Nat with a smile. “Ma’am, we can try.”

  “What is the air force base there?”

  “Okinawa.”

  Nat typed into the device, “Need to scramble jets at Okinawa base to escort civilian aircraft onto base. Expecting Chinese fighter jets to attempt to escort craft back to Beijing.” She looked up at Manny for a second, then to the ceiling of the plane as she tried to do math. Hong Kong is thirteen hours ahead of New York. It’s 11:30am here, so it’s 10:30pm on Saturday night in Washington D.C. She typed, “Wake the President.”

  “Gathering in the Situation Room now. Is there a secure telecom line?” read the message on her machine.

  Nat asked the pilot, “How are the communication lines on the plane? I need a secure line to the White House.”

  “Not sure what’s secure, but we have satellite links to receive communications. Not sure about holding the line open, though. We’ll need to radio the tower in Okinawa and see if we can’t get some friends to come meet us for an escort.” He turned to his copilot. “Speaking of which, connect us with the Okinawa Air Force Base.”

  Manny offered, “Nat, my phone is a secure satellite-linked phone. Can’t promise it isn’t hackable, but I pay a lot of money for this phone service. Give them this number.”

  Nat typed the number into her device and asked the pilot, “How long until they catch us? If they do, is there any way to evade?”

  “This bird tops out at 0.9 Mach, about seven hundred miles per hour. Most fighter jets can do two, 2.5 Mach, maybe two thousand miles per hour. I hate to say it, but we’ve got less of a chance of evading them than a baby does of out-crawling her parents. But we’re less than a half hour away from U.S. patrolled airspace in Japan. They might back down if we can get there.”

  “So we’re ten minutes short.”

  The pilot responded, “There have been quite a few dustups in China’s ADIZ lately. No engagements or fatalities, but tensions are pretty high. I doubt they’ll shoot us down but wouldn’t want to bet our lives on it.”

  The copilot was talking into his headset while Nat and Manny listened in on the conversation. He looked up. “We can expect two U.S. F-16 escorts in twenty minutes.”

  Manny saw his phone was ringing so he handed it to Nat. She answered, “Agent Rosetti.”

  A voice said, “This is watch team leader Will Kaffenburger. We have requested the presence of the President in the Situation Room. His National Security Advisor, his Chief of Staff, the Secretary of State, and the Secretary of Defense have all been notified and are being patched into a secure conference call as we await their arrival down here as well…”

  Nat responded, “We have Chinese fighter jets coming to escort a civilian craft carrying a federal agent to Beijing and two U.S. F-16s coming to escort us to Okinawa. We have nine United States citizens on board.”

  Will said, “We have the State Department on the line with their counterpart and are requesting an immediate telephone call between the President of the People’s Republic of China and the President of the United States.”

  Six minutes ago, the President was brushing his teeth when he was told there was a situation in China that could become an international incident. He dropped the toothbrush in the sink and spit. He went to his closet, pulled a pair of blue jeans
over his boxer shorts, grabbed a plain white t-shirt, and exited the presidential bedroom.

  Outside the door, he was greeted by three aids. He told one to grab him shoes, socks, and a jacket. The other two briefed him as the three of them jogged down the residential corridor to the West Wing and then on to the Situation Room, which they reached before any of the highest members of his team.

  Nat heard President Barrett Shortree’s voice. “Barrett Shortree present. I understand we have nine American citizens on a plane leaving Macau that was redirected by the PRC back to Beijing, but you are refusing to go, and that we have arranged for American jets from our Okinawa base to escort you safely to that facility. With whom am I speaking?”

  “Mr. President, this is Agent Nat Rossetti of the CIA. On board is Manny Gaglione, Josh Ruyle, Aaron Baker…”

  “Aaron Baker!”

  “Yes, Mr. President.”

  “I understand there was a sensitive operation. What the hell are you doing with civilians?” the President accused. “Never mind, can he hear me?”

  “No sir. He is sleeping,” Nat said flushed with embarrassment.

  “Is this a joke?” the President asked.

  Nat heard a voice pipe up in the Situation Room and she held silent during the background discussion. She heard a voice whisper into her line, “The President of the People’s Republic of China is ready to be connected to the President. He wants you to wake Aaron Baker and get him on the phone.”

  Nat said to the pilot, “You probably don’t need us here. You can concentrate better if we go back.”

  “Yes ma’am. Get everyone to buckle their seat belts.”

  Nat said to Manny, “The President wants to speak to Aaron Baker. Let’s wake him up.”