The White Mountain (28 page)

Not only that, but the
Yu
chose their targets well. Even here, amidst this chaos, they had taken care to identify their victims. Twenty-four men had died here, all but one of them – a guard – regular members of the Club, each of them ‘tagged' by the Yu, brief histories of their worthless lives tied about their necks. The second guard had simply been beaten and tied up, while the servants had again been left unharmed. Such discrimination was impressive and the rumour of it – passed from mouth to ear, in defiance of the explicit warnings of the
T
'
ing Wei
– had thus far served to discredit every effort of that Ministry to portray the terrorists as uncaring, sadistic killers, their victims as undeserving innocents.

He shook his head, then went across. ‘Anything new?' he asked, looking past Chen at the last of the corpses.

‘Nothing,' Chen answered, his weary smile a reminder that they had been on duty more than thirty hours. ‘The only remarkable thing is the similarity of the wounds. My guess is that there was some kind of ritual involved.'

Karr grimaced. ‘Yes. These men weren't just killed, they were executed. And, if our Ko
Ming
friends are right, for good reason.'

Chen looked away, a shudder of disgust passing through him. He too had seen the holos the assassins had left – studies of their victims with young boys taken from the Lowers. Scenes of degradation and torture. Scenes that the
T
'
ing Wei
were certain to keep from popular consumption.

Which was to say nothing of the mutilated corpse of the child they had found in the room at the far end of the club.

Karr leaned across, touching Chen's arm. ‘We're waiting on lab reports,
word from our Triad contacts. There's little we can do just now, so why don't you go home? Spend some time with that wife of yours, or take young Jyan to the Palace of Dreams. They tell me there's a new historical.'

Chen laughed. ‘And Marie? I thought this was supposed to be your honeymoon?'

Karr grinned. ‘Marie understands. It's why she married me.'

Chen shook his head. ‘And I thought
I
was mad.' He laughed. ‘Okay. But let me know as soon as something happens.'

Karr nodded. ‘All right. Now go.'

He watched Chen leave, then stood, feeling the emotional weight of what had happened here bearing down on him. It was rare that he was affected by such scenes, rarer still that he felt any sympathy for the perpetrators, but for once he was. The
Yu
had done society a great service here tonight. Had rid Chung Kuo of the kind of scum he had met so often below the Net.

He breathed out heavily, recalling Chen's disgust, knowing, at the very core of him, that this was what all healthy, decent men
ought
to feel. And yet the
T'ing Wei
would try to twist it, until these good-for-nothing perverts, this shit masquerading as men, were portrayed as shining examples of good citizenship.

Yes, he had seen the holos. Had felt his guts wrenched by the distress in the young boys' eyes, by that helpless, unanswered plea. He shuddered. The oven man had them now. And no evidence remained but for that small, pathetic corpse and these mementoes – these perverse records of a foul desire.

And was he to watch it being whitewashed? Made pure and sparkling by a parcel of lies? He spat, angered by the injustice of it. Was this why he had become Tolonen's man? For this?

Everywhere he looked he found the signature of decadence; of sons given everything by their fathers – everything but time and attention. No wonder they turned out as they did, lacking any sense of value. No wonder they pissed their time away, drinking and gambling and whoring – for inside them there was nothing. Nothing
real
, anyway. Some of them were even clever enough to realize as much, yet all their efforts to fill that nothingness were pointless. The nothingness was vast, unbounded. To fill it was like trying to carry water in a sieve.

Karr sighed, angered by the sheer waste of it all. He had seen enough
to know that it was not even their fault; they had had no choice but to be as they were – spoilt and corrupt, vacuous and sardonic. They had been given no other model to emulate, and now it was too late.

He found the sheer sumptuousness of the room abhorrent. His own taste was for the simple, the austere. Here, confronted by its opposite, he found himself baring his teeth, as if at an enemy. Then, realizing what he was doing, he laughed uncomfortably and turned, forcing himself to be still.

It would be no easy task tracking down the
Yu
, for they were unlike any of the other Ko
Ming
groups currently operating in City Europe. They were fuelled not by simple hatred – by that obsessive urge to destroy that had fired the
Ping Tiao
and their like – but by a powerful indignation and a strong sense of injustice. The first Ko
Ming
emperor, Mao Tse-tung, had once said something about true revolutionaries being the fish that swam in the great sea of the people. Well, these
Yu
– these ‘fish' – were certainly that. They had learned from past excesses. Learned that the people cared who died and who was spared. Discrimination –
moral
discrimination – was their most potent tool, and they took great pains to be in the right. At least, from where he stood, it looked like that, and the failure of the
T'ing Wei
to mould public opinion seemed to confirm his gut instinct.

And now this. Karr looked about him. Last night's raid – this devastatingly direct strike against the corrupt heart of the Above – would do much to bolster the good opinion of the masses. Yes, he could imagine the face of the
T'ing Wei's
Third Secretary, Yen T'ung, when he learned of this. Karr laughed, then fell silent, for his laughter, like the tenor of his thoughts, was indicative of a deep inner division.

His duty was clear. As Tolonen's man he owed unswerving loyalty. If the Marshal asked him to track down the
Yu
, he would track them down. But for the first time ever he found himself torn, for his instinct was for the
Yu
, not against them. If one of those boys had been his son…

But he was Tolonen's man; bound by the strongest of oaths. Sworn to defend the Seven against Ko
Ming
activity, of whatever kind.

He spoke softly to the empty room. ‘Which is why I must find you, Chi Li, even if, secretly, I admire what you have done here. For I am the T'ang's man, and you are the T'ang's enemy. A Ko
Ming
.'

And when he found her? Karr looked down, troubled. When he found her he would kill her. Swiftly, mercifully, and with honour.

The first of them was facing Ywe Hao as she came through the door. He fell back, clutching his ruined stomach, the sound of the gun's detonation echoing in the corridor outside. The second came out of the kitchen. She shot him twice in the chest, even as he fumbled for his weapon. Edel was behind him. He came at her with a small butcher's knife, his face twisted with hatred. She blew his hand off, then shot him through the temple. He fell at her feet, his legs kicking impotently.

She looked about her. There had been five of them, according to her lookouts. So where were the others?

There was shouting outside. Any time now Security would investigate. She went through to the kitchen, then came back, spotting the case on the bed. Good. They'd taken nothing. It was only when she lifted it that she realized she was wrong. They
had
taken something. The case was empty.

‘Shit…'

She looked about her, trying to work out what to do. Where would they have taken the dossiers? What would they have wanted them for?

There were footsteps, coming down the corridor.

She threw the case down and crossed the room, standing beside the open door, clicking the spent clip from the handle of her gun. Outside the footsteps stopped.

‘Edel? Is that you?'

She nodded to herself, then slipped a new clip into the handle. The longer she waited, the more jittery they'd get. At the same time, they might just be waiting for her to put her head round the door.

She smiled. It was the kind of dilemma she understood.

She counted. At eight she turned and went low, the gun kicking noisily in her hand as she moved out into the corridor.

Overhead, tiny armies, tens of thousands strong, fought against a hazed background of mountains, the roar of battle faint against the hubbub of noise in the crowded Main. The giant hologram was suspended in the air above the entrance to the Golden Emperor's Palace of Eternal Dreams.

Crowds were pushing out from the Holo-Palace while others queued to
get in, their necks – young and old alike – craned back to watch the battle overhead. As Kao Chen pushed through, ushering his son before him, he smiled, seeing how his head strained up and back, trying to glimpse the air-show.

‘Well, Jyan? What did you think?'

The ten-year-old looked up at his father and beamed a smile. ‘It was wonderful! That moment when Liu Pang raised his banner and the whole army roared his name. That was great!'

Chen laughed. ‘Yes, wasn't it? And to think he was but Ch'en She, a poor man, before he became Son of Heaven! Liu Pang, founder of the great Han dynasty!'

Jyan nodded eagerly. ‘They should teach it like that at school. It's far more interesting than all that poetry.'

Chen smiled, easing his way through the crowds. ‘Maybe, but not all poetry is bad. You'll understand that when you're older.'

Jyan made a face, making Chen laugh. He too had always preferred history to poetry but, then, he'd never had Jyan's chances, Jyan's education. No, things would be different for Jyan. Very different.

He slowed, then leaned close again. ‘Do you want to eat out, Jyan, or shall we get back?'

Jyan hesitated, then smiled. ‘Let's get back, neh? Mother will be waiting, and I want to tell her all about it. That battle between Liu Pang and the Hegemon King was brilliant. It was like it was really real. All those horsemen and everything!'

Chen nodded. ‘Yes… it was, wasn't it? I wonder how they did that?'

‘Oh, it's easy,' Jyan said, pulling him on by the hand. ‘We learned all about it in school ages ago. It's all done with computer images and simulated movement.'

‘Simulated movement, eh?' Chen laughed, letting himself be pulled through the crowds and into one of the quieter corridors. ‘Still, it seemed real enough. I was wincing myself once or twice during some of those close-up fight scenes.'

Jyan laughed, then fell silent, slowing to a halt.

‘What is it?' Chen said, looking up ahead.

‘Those two…' Jyan whispered. ‘Come. Let's go back. We'll take the south corridor and cut through.'

Chen glanced at Jyan, then looked back down the corridor. The two young men – Han, in their mid teens – were leaning against the wall, pretending to be talking.

Chen bent down, lowering his voice. ‘Who are they?'

Jyan met his eyes. ‘They're senior boys at my school – part of a
tong
, a gang. They call themselves the Green Banner Guardians.'

‘So what do they want?'

‘I don't know. All I know is that they're trouble.'

‘You've not done anything, then, Jyan? Nothing I should know of?'

Jyan looked back at him clear-eyed. ‘Nothing, Father. I swear to you.'

‘Good. Then we've nothing to fear, have we?' He straightened up. ‘Do you want me to hold your hand?'

Jyan shook his head.

Chen smiled, understanding. ‘Okay. Then let's go.'

They were almost level with the two when they turned and stepped out, blocking their way. ‘Where do you think you're going, shit-brains?' the taller of them said, smirking at Jyan.

‘What do you want?' Chen asked, keeping the anger from his voice.

‘Shut your mouth,
lao
jen,' said the second of them, moving closer. ‘We've business with the boy. He owes us money.'