Islands in the Net (35 page)

She felt cold as the implications mounted.… All that stupid theatrical kung-fu, the dumbest idea in the world, that silly-ass martial artists with no tanks or guns could resist modern cops or trained soldiers.… No, the A-L.P. couldn't fight cops head-on, but room-to-room, with walls riddled with holes, they could sure as hell weasel up from ambush and …

People were going to die here, she realized.
They meant it. Razak meant it
. People were going to die.…

The cops got back into their prowl cars. They retreated. No one came out to yell or jeer, and somehow it was worse that they didn't.…

The rebels were busy elsewhere. Dramatic columns of smoke were rising all along the waterfront. Black, foul, billowing towers, bent like broken fingers by the monsoon breeze. No television, maybe, no phones—but now the whole of Singapore would know that hell was breaking loose. Smoke signals still worked. And their message was obvious.

Down on the docks behind the Rizome godown, three activists sloshed a ribbed jerry can over a heap of stolen truck tires. They stood well back and threw a lit cigarette. The untidy heap went up with a whump, tires jumping like a dropped plate of doughnuts. The tires settled to roast and crackle and spew.…

Derveet wiped at her eyes. “It stinks.…”

“For me, I like up here better than down in those streets, definitely!”

“We could surrender to a helicopter,” Suvendra said practically. “There is room here up on the roof for setdown, and if we signal white flag, they could arrest us, quickly.”

“Very good idea, la!”

“Getting a bed sheet if they have left us any.…”

Mr. Suvendra and an associate named Bima left for a raid downstairs.

Long, tiring minutes passed. There was no violence for the moment, but the quiet didn't help at all. It only made them feel more paranoiac, more besieged.

Down in the loading docks, groups of rebels clustered around their walkie-talkies. The radios were mass-produced kid's toys, Third World export, costing a few cents. Who the hell needed walkie-talkies when you could carry a telephone on your wrist? But the A-L.P. didn't think like that.…

“I don't think the cops can handle this,” Laura said. “They'll have to call in the Army.”

Mr. Suvendra and Bima returned at last, with wadded bed sheets and a few packs of junk food overlooked by the looters. The rebels hadn't bothered them; they had scarcely seemed to notice.

The crew spread a sheet out on the roof. Kneeling, Suvendra broke open a fibertip pen and smeared a thick black SOS across the fabric. They tore up another sheet for a white flag and white armbands.

“Crude, but efficient,” Suvendra said, rising.

“Now we flag up chopper, la.…”

The kid monitoring the television yelled. “The Army is in Johore!”

They dropped everything and rushed to the TV.

The Johore announcers were stunned. Singapore's Army had blitzkrieged across the causeway into Johore Bahru. An armored column was racing through the city, meeting no resistance—not that Maphilindonesia could put up much, at the moment. Singapore described it as a “police action.”

“Oh, God,” Laura said, “how could they be so fucking stupid?”

“They are seizing the reservoirs,” said Mr. Suvendra.

“What?”

“Main Singapore water supply on the mainland. Can't defending Singapore with no water.”

“They did it before once, during Konfrontation,” said Mrs. Suvendra. “Malaysia government very angered at Singapore—try to shut off their water supply.”

“What happened then?” Laura said.

“They storm through Johore and head for Kuala Lumpur, the Malaysia capital.… Malaysia army runs away, stupid Malaysia government falls … next thing we know, is new Maphilindonesia Federation. New federal government was very nice to Singapore, till they agree to go back in their borders.”

“They learn not to bite the ‘Poisonous Shrimp,'” said Mr. Suvendra. “Very hard-working Army in Singapore.”

“Singapore Chinese work too hard,” said Derveet. “Causing all these troubles, la.”

“Now we are enemy aliens, too,” said Bima unhappily. “What to do.”

They waited for a police chopper. Finding one wasn't difficult. By now a dozen lurked over the waterfront, silent, swaying, dodging the columns of smoke.

The Rizome crew waved their white flag enthusiastically as one cruised nearby, with insolent ease.

The chopper hovered above them, its invisible blades hissing. A cop stuck his helmeted head from the bay, flipping up his face plate.

Confused yelling followed. “Not to worry, Rizome!” shouted the cop at last. “We rescue you, no problem!”

“How many of us?” Suvendra yelled, clamping her sun hat to the top of her head.

“Everyone! Whole thing!”

“In one chopper?” Suvendra shouted, confused. The little police craft might have held three passengers at most.

The chopper made no attempt to land. In a few seconds it rose again, heading north in a smooth, determined arc.

“They could hurry,” said Suvendra, glancing at the monsoon front. “Weather turning nasty soon, definitely!”

They wadded up their SOS bed sheet, in case the rebels decided to come up and check on them. Negotiating with the A-L.P. was a possibility, but in council session Rizome had decided not to press them. The rebels had already seized the Rizome godown; they might just as easily seize the Rizome personnel. They'd already kidnapped two cops and a Member of Parliament. The situation's hostage potential was obvious.

Another boring and horrible twenty minutes passed, a tense and morbid silence that fooled nobody. The sun topped the monsoon front, and tropical midmorning blazed over the silent city. So eerie, Laura thought—a blackout of people …

Another chopper, larger this time and twin-rotored, buzzed the waterfront. It spun on its axis and hovered momentarily over a corner of the godown. Three black-clad men leapt from the bay doors onto the rooftop. The chopper rose again immediately.

The three men paused a moment, patting gear, then stalked toward them. They wore black fatigues, black combat boots, black webbing belts hung with brass-snapped holsters and utility pouches and ammo kits. They carried short-muzzled, arcane-looking submachine guns.

“Good morning, all!” said their leader cheerfully. He was a big, ruddy-faced Englishman with close-cropped white hair, a veiny nose, and a permanent tropical sunburn. He looked about sixty, but ominously well preserved, for his age. Blood fractionation? Laura thought.

“Morning …” someone said dazedly.

“Hotchkiss is the name. Colonel Hotchkiss, Special Weapons and Tactics. This is Officer Lu and Officer Aw. We're here for your safety, ladies and gentlemen. So not to worry, okay?” Hotchkiss showed them a rack of white teeth.

Hotchkiss was huge. Six and a half feet tall, well over two hundred pounds. Arms like tree trunks. She'd almost forgotten how big Caucasians could be. With his thick black boots and heavy, elaborate gear, he was like something from another planet. Hotchkiss nodded at Laura, surprised. “I've seen you on telly, dear.”

“The hearings?”

“Yeah. I've—”

There was a sudden bang as the sheet-metal door to the rooftop burst open. A shouting gang of rebels scrambled forward, clutching bamboo clubs.

Hotchkiss spun from the hip and opened up on the doorway with his submachine gun. There was a nerve-shattering racket. Two rebels sprawled, punched backward by impact. The others fled screaming, and suddenly everyone was down, gripping the pebbled surface of the roof in terror.

Lu and Aw kicked the door shut and fired a tangle-round against the jamb, sealing it. They pulled thin loops of plastic from their belts and handcuffed the two fallen, gasping rebels. They sat them up.

“Okay, okay,” Hotchkiss told the rest of them, waving his beefy hand. “Only jelly-rounds. See? No problem, la.”

The Rizome group rose slowly. As the truth dawned on them, there were nervous, embarrassed titters. The two rebels, teenagers, had been strafed across their chests, tearing gaping holes in their paper shirts. Beneath it, their skins showed fist-sized blotches of indelible purple dye.

Hotchkiss chivalrously helped Laura to her feet. “Jelly bullets don't kill,” he announced. “Still pack plenty of sting, however.”

“You shot us with a machine gun!” said one of the rebels sullenly.

“Shut up, son,” Hotchkiss offered kindly. “Lu, Aw, these two are too small. Throw 'em back, eh?”

“Door is secured, sir,” Lu pointed out.

“Use your head, Lu. You have your ropes.”

“Yes, sir,” Lu said, grinning. He and Officer Aw frog-marched the two boys toward the front of the roof. They began snapping their first captive into a set of chromed rappelling gear. From the loading docks three stories below, furious, bloodthirsty yells rose from the roused A-L.P.

“Well,” Hotchkiss said casually. “Seems the rioters have made an operations nexus out of your HQ.” Lu kicked one captive over the edge of the roof and paid out rappelling line as the boy hissed helplessly downward.

“But not to worry,” Hotchkiss said. “We can break them wherever they stand.”

Suvendra winced. “We saw them demolition your squad car.…”

“Sending that car in was the politicals' idea,” Hotchkiss sniffed. “But now it's our business.”

Laura noticed the SWAT leader's complex military watchphone. “What can you tell us, Colonel? We're starved for news up here. Is the Army really in Johore?”

Hotchkiss smiled at her. “This isn't your Texas, dearie. The Army's just on the other side of the causeway—just a little bridge. A few minutes away.” He held up two fingers, an inch apart. “All miniature, you see.”

The two Chinese SWAT officers hooked the second rebel to their ropes. Below them, the angry rioters vented howls of frustrated abuse. Flung bricks arched up to crack on the roof. “Throw a few dye-rounds into them,” Hotchkiss shouted.

The two Chinese unlimbered their sidearms and cut loose over the parapet. The guns blasted a fearsome racket, spitting spent cartridges. Below them, the crowd shrieked in fear and pain. Laura heard them scatter. She felt a surge of nausea.

Hotchkiss gripped her elbow. “You all right?”

She swallowed hard. “I saw a man killed by a machine gun, once.”

“Oh, really?” said Hotchkiss, interested. “You've been to Africa?”

“No—”

“You look a bit young to have seen real action.… Oh, Grenada, eh?” He let her go. Frenzied pounding was shaking the roof door. Hotchkiss fired the remaining jelly-rounds of his magazine against it. Brutal pounding and splattering. He flung the empty magazine away, and fitted a second with the casual look of a man chain-smoking cigarettes.

“Isn't this ‘real action'?” Laura shouted. Her ears were ringing.

“This is only theater, dearie,” Hotchkiss said patiently. “These little parlor radicals don't even have carbines. Try something like this in the bad old days—in Belfast or Beirut—and we'd be lying here with great Armalite sniper holes in us.”

“‘Theater.' What's that supposed to mean?” Laura said.

Hotchkiss chuckled. “I've fought real war! Falkland Islands, '82. That was a classic. Scarcely any televisions …”

“So you're British, then, Colonel? European?”

“British. I was S.A.S.” Hotchkiss wiped sweat. “Europe! What kind of outfit is that, the European Common Army? Bloody joke, is what that is. When we fought for Queen and Country … oh, hell, girl, you wouldn't understand anyway.” He glanced at his watch. “Okay, here come our boys.”

Hotchkiss stalked toward the front of the building. The Rizome crew followed in his wake.

A six-wheeled armored personnel carrier, like some great gray, rubber-wheeled rhinoceros, surged easily over and through the street barricade. Bags burst and squashed aside. Its turret-mounted water cannon swung alertly.

Behind it came two wire-windowed paddy wagons. The wagons flung open rear double doors and cops decamped by the numbers, falling rapidly into disciplined ranks: shields, clubs, helmets.

No one showed to offer resistance. Wisely, because a pair of choppers hung like huge malignant wasps above the street. Their side bays were open and cops crouching inside were manning tear-gas launchers and Gatling tangle-guns.

“Very simple,” said Hotchkiss. “No use street-fighting when we can seize the riot's leaders at will. Now we'll grab ourselves a building full of them, and … oh, bloody hell.”

The entire front of the godown collapsed like cardboard and six giant cargo robots roared into the street.

The cops scattered, stumbling. The robots rushed forward with vim. There was a crude dementia in their actions, the sign of rotten programming. Crude, but efficient. They were built to haul cargo the size of trailers. Now they were grappling wildly at anything remotely the right size.

The paddy wagons toppled over at once, sides denting loudly, tires whirling helplessly at the air. The APC opened up with its water cannon, as three robots tugged and mauled and punched at it with ruthless mechanical stupidity. Finally they levered it over, toppling it stupidly onto the exposed arm of the third robot, which tried to back away, screeching and buckling. The cannon fountained aimlessly, a furious white plume, four stories high.

The rebels were all over the cops. The streets gleamed with water, sloshed under charging feet. Headlong melee, mindless and angry, like a bed of giant ants.

Laura watched in absolute amazement. She could not believe that it had come to this. One of the best-organized cities in the world, and men were beating the shit out of each other in the streets with sticks.

“Oh, Jesus Christ,” said Hotchkiss. “We're better armed, but our morale's blown.… The air support will tell, though.” The copters were firing tangle-rounds at the melee's edges—without much success. Too crowded, too chaotic and slippery. Laura flinched as a skidding dock robot knocked three cops headlong.