The Great Zoo of China (52 page)

CJ began to walk toward Patrick—when suddenly Lucky nudged her and grunted.

‘
Lucky . . . no like . . . Big Eyes. Big Eyes mean human
. . .’

CJ paused, glancing from the dragon to her old colleague, and for a brief instant she wondered if she had made a huge mist—

‘CJ,’ Patrick said. ‘Thanks for coming. I’m so sorry.’

CJ frowned. ‘You’re sorry? Why—?’

The answer stepped out from a door beside the stage: Colonel Bao, Hu Tang and three Chinese soldiers brandishing assault rifles.

B
efore CJ could react, Ben Patrick whipped out a Taser unit—like the ones she had seen in the observation booth in the Nesting Centre—and jammed it against Lucky’s flank. Sparks flew and Lucky dropped to her knees, squealing in agony.

CJ slid to the dragon’s side, staring daggers up at Patrick.

She suddenly recalled the code he had given her to open the safe in the Nesting Centre . . . and how it
hadn’t
worked.

‘You gave me the wrong code for the safe in Bao’s office, didn’t you?’ she said. Beside her, Lucky moaned. Minnie huddled behind her.

Patrick shrugged. ‘To be honest, I didn’t think you’d get that far. But I couldn’t have you getting your hands on a detonator unit. There’s too much riding on this place. For China and for me. This zoo will make me the most famous scientist in the world, CJ. I couldn’t have you succeed in killing the dragons. No matter what damage is sustained here, we
cannot
lose the dragons. Too much time and effort has gone into raising them. Buildings can be rebuilt, but those dragons are priceless. And they can always be retrained, no matter how harshly. The Chinese will rebuild this zoo, we will reintroduce the surviving dragons with new and better safety measures, and it will be like nothing ever happened.’

Colonel Bao and Hu Tang stepped up beside Patrick.

Hu Tang said, ‘And we will bring new journalists here to marvel at it.’

Bao nodded at CJ. ‘Dr Cameron. You are a survivor, I will grant you that. But now it is time for us to restore control. A battalion of troops is on its way here from Chongqing in helicopter gunships. That force will arrive in a few hours and it will bring the remaining dragons into line.’

With those words, Bao calmly drew his pistol. ‘You, however, will go no further.’

CJ threw a horrified look at Minnie. ‘You’re gonna kill this little girl, too?’

Hu Tang strolled toward the edge of the stage, gazed out at the magnificent sight. A few dragons could be seen flying across the valley, specks against the sky. CJ got the distinct impression he was looking away so he would not have to see the executions that were about to take place.

‘She will tell someone eventually,’ Hu said, ‘and we cannot have that. This zoo is bigger than a few individuals, even a child. It will rise again and it will be the glory of the world.’

He nodded at Bao. ‘Kill them both and take the dragon away for re-education.’

‘You callous motherfuc—’ CJ breathed.

She cut herself off when she heard it.

Beep-beep . . . beep-beep.

She didn’t even have time to react.

The next moment something red and black leapt up from below the roofline and took a slashing bite at Hu Tang’s face, and the front of the Communist Party man’s head spewed blood and suddenly Hu Tang turned and CJ saw that
he no longer had a face
.

The dragon had bitten off his fucking face!

From forehead to jaw, Hu Tang’s face was now a mess of pulp and exposed bone. It was perhaps the most hideous thing CJ had ever seen.

Hu’s body collapsed to the stage, convulsing, not dead but not quite alive either, and standing there in his place was the one dragon who had pursued CJ since all this had begun: the prince-sized red-bellied black dragon she had christened Red Face.

Bao and his troops didn’t know or care for CJ’s history with Red Face and they immediately opened fire on the dragon. In the face of their fire, Red Face took flight, disappearing as quickly as he had arrived.

Colonel Bao looked impassively down at the still-shuddering body of his old boss, Hu Tang. ‘How unfortunate.’ He fired a bullet into the faceless head and the body went still.

Then he turned his pistol on CJ and Minnie.

‘You know something, Dr Cameron? Just before your mentor, Dr Lynch, died, he said something to me about you.’

‘You were there when Bill Lynch died?’ CJ said.

‘I was the one who let a dragon tear him apart,’ Bao said. ‘He said you were tougher than he ever was. This may indeed be so, but in the end, you will die just as he did. It is time for you to make peace with your god, Dr Cameron, because you have nothing else to call on.’

‘
She might have this, Colonel
,’ a voice said abruptly over their radio earpieces.

A man’s voice.

Greg Johnson’s voice.

B
ao spun, searching for the source of the voice. CJ did, too, but she couldn’t see Johnson anywhere. She’d been kneeling beside Lucky. Now she stood, searching for the CIA agent.

‘
Down here
,’ Johnson’s voice said. ‘
In the Halfway Hut
.’

CJ and Bao both looked out at the watchtower positioned midway between the main entrance building and Dragon Mountain.

A tiny figure could be seen inside its struts, standing on a platform just below the Hut’s cable car station, beside a large device the size of a small car.

‘
Dr Cameron may not have anything to call on, Bao, but I do. I have your thermobaric bomb.
’

Bao’s eyes went as wide as saucers.

‘
I’ve reset the detonation sequence
,’ Johnson said. ‘
It’s mine now. I have to destroy this place and everything in it
.’

‘You would kill yourself to destroy this zoo?’ Bao said.

‘
Yes
.’

‘You’re bluffing.’

‘
I’m wounded, I’m pissed off, and I have absolutely nothing to lose
,’ Johnson said. ‘
You can’t control these animals, Bao. I’ll blow us all to kingdom come to protect the world from these monsters. And if you think I’m bluffing
. . .’

Down at the Halfway Hut, Johnson held his radio close to the thermobaric bomb and flicked a switch on its detonation panel. A timer came alive, beeping with each tick:

10:00 . . . 9:59 . . . 9:58.

‘. . . think again. You have ten minutes to make peace with
your
god, asshole.’

As this exchange took place, CJ edged over to the lectern on the stage. Unseen by her captors, she flicked on its control panel.

Bao raged. ‘This is insanity!’

CJ saw the button on the lectern that she was looking for, one she had seen hit during the trick show. With the power back on in the zoo, she hoped it still worked. She slammed her finger down on it.

Immediately, the pyrotechnic flame-dischargers arrayed around the stage launched tongues of fire into the air. White smoke enveloped the stage.

And then everything happened at once.

CJ took two bounding steps and hurled herself into Ben Patrick, knocking him off the stage into the front row of seats and sending the Taser unit flying from his hands.

The two closest Chinese soldiers raised their guns at her only to be swept off their feet by a whip-cracking yellow dragon’s tail. Lucky, groaning and weakened, had risen to her elbows and lashed out with her powerful tail, sending the pair of Chinese soldiers flying off their feet.