“I can’t leave my mother!”
He was dialling the number. “There’s nothing you can do for her now, Sunni. You have to think of yourself. Do you want to come or not?”
He got a recording at the other end. He spoke into the phone: “
“One forty-seven Hong Ning Road, Kwun Tong.”
Bond repeated it into the phone, then hung up. “You have five minutes to pack,” he said. He understood what the poor girl was going through. In the space of one hour, she had suddenly been confronted with a life-or-death decision and the frightening prospect of abandoning the life she had been living.
Finally she asked, “Can you get me out of Hong Kong?”
He said truthfully, “I can try.”
“Legally?”
“I can try.”
She hesitated another moment, then pulled out a flight bag, began to rummage through her bedroom, and threw clothing into the bag. She spent some time in the bathroom, dumping in supplies. Finally, she went to a bulletin board in the kitchen removed some snapshots that captured moments in her life. The last thing she did was to take a child’s toy from the kitchen window. It was one of those petalshaped pinwheels on a stick. She shoved it into the bag.
“It’s for good luck,” she said. She zipped up the bag and threw it on her shoulder. “I’m ready.”
“Good girl,” he said, then drew his gun. He moved to the front door and listened. He motioned her to follow him as he unlatched the bolt and slid the door open. The hallway was empty. They walked to the lift, and Bond noticed that it was moving up towards their floor.
“Let’s take the stairs,” he said.
With gun in hand, Bond led the way down, a flight at a time. At the twelfth floor, he heard footsteps hurrying up below them. He pressed Sunni back against the wall and waited. Sure enough, two more Chinese youths brandishing choppers appeared. Bond shouted “Freeze!” in Cantonese, but the thugs ignored him and charged. It left him no choice but to shoot. The gunfire reverberated loudly in the stairwell. The two Triads slammed back against the wall, then rolled down a flight of steps.
It wouldn’t be long before the police arrived, he thought. They needed to get to the street and find Woo before that happened. His wounded arm felt as if it was on fire. Sunni was frozen in fear in a corner of the stairwell. He gestured for her to keep following him, and continued down the stairs.
At the seventh floor they encountered four men. They rushed at Bond, attempting to overpower him. Bond got off one shot at point blank range, but had to duck to avoid the swings of the choppers. He rolled forward, through the three standing men, but couldn’t avoid losing his balance and falling down the steps. The Walther flew out of his hand and fell to the landing below. One of the men charged at Sunni, his chopper raised. Instead of screaming and cowering, however, Sunni surprised Bond by performing an expert martial arts manoeuvre. She bent forward as the man swung, blocked his arm and threw him over her back—a perfect
By now, Bond was on his feet, jumping towards the other two. They tried to swing the choppers at him, but he ducked, put his hands on the landing, and shot his legs straight out at them. The kick hit one man in the abdomen, knocking him into his partner. Sunni was behind them, and she grabbed one in a head lock, then brutally rammed him into the wall. In less than a second she was lashing out with a roundhouse kick to the other man’s kidneys, sending him flying back towards Bond who simply grabbed his shoulders as the man fell into him, then sent him sailing down the stairs. All four men were now down.
Bond looked up at her with respect and smiled. “Nice work, Sunni.”
She shrugged. “I grew up on the streets of Hong Kong before going to the States. I’m not totally helpless.”
He retrieved the Walther as they continued down the stairs. Eventually they reached the ground floor and Bond stopped. “They probably have a car down here somewhere. There’ll be at least a couple more of them.”
He peered out into the covered parking area and saw the black sedan idling near the exit. There was only a driver, and he was peering over his shoulder at the lift door, waiting for the men to return. Bond realized that he would certainly see them when they came out of the stairwell.
“Stay here,” Bond said. He took a breath, then bolted out of the stairwell. He performed an agile body roll and ended up behind a stone column. The driver of the car shouted something in Chinese. A shot rang out and a bullet broke away a chunk of the column.
Bond heard the car back up and turn towards him. Another shot demolished a chunk of the concrete dangerously close to his head. His left arm was throbbing with pain now, especially after the fight on the stairwell. He was thankful it wasn’t his gun-arm.
He carefully leaned out and shot towards the car, shattering the windscreen, but the driver had opened the door and was squatting behind it for cover. It was going to be a standoff unless Bond could gain a better vantage point from which to fire.
He could hear police sirens in the distance. They’d arrive any minute. He was about to run back to the stairwell when he heard the screeching of tyres from the parking area entrance. A red taxi zoomed in and slammed into the driver’s side of the black sedan. The driver was sandwiched between the vehicles, his body mangled like a broken doll. Chen Chen was driving the taxi, and his father was sitting beside him.
Bond called to Sunni, and they ran to the cab and got into the back seat. The taxi’s only damage was a bent front bumper, so it manoeuvred around the smashed car and out of the parking area just as a police car entered from the other side.
“You call for cab, mister?” said Woo, displaying his trademark grin.
“Sunni, meet my friend T.Y. and his son Chen Chen,” Bond said. “Fellows, this is Sunni.”
“Welcome and hello,” T.Y. said to her. “We take you somewhere nice, uh huh?”
Sunni managed a smile, but she was still too shaken to speak. She was silent throughout the entire ride as Bond apprised Woo of the evening’s events.
“There goes your cover,” Woo said. “I do not know many journalists who carry guns and shoot Triads in residential housing, uh huh?”
“I’m just going to have to steer clear of the Dragon Wing boys while I’m here. I hope I haven’t compromised anything with Thackeray. I’ll just need to watch my back on the street.” He turned to Sunni. “Do you know a man named Guy Thackeray?”
She shook her head. He believed her.
“Any news from London?” he asked.
“Nothing,” said Woo.
“What about Australia?”
“No one claim responsibility yet. Authorities are clueless. I got report from M. Section A’s early findings indicate device was definitely home-made, probably created in crude laboratory. Sounds like someone independent. No affiliation with particular country. It could also be some stupid research lab, illegally experimenting with nuclear power.”
Bond thought Woo’s theories were sound. There were a lot of companies in the world that had the capability of harnessing nuclear power. The fact that no threats or extortion messages had been received by anyone now seemed to be a positive sign. Perhaps it was merely an act of careless experimentation by an irresponsible energy company, with no intent to harm.
It was 10:00 p.m. by the time the cab arrived at Upper Lascar Row on the island. They all entered the antiques shop and went up the stairs to the safe haven. Woo showed Sunni a room where she could be alone if she wanted. Bond poured himself a glass of straight vodka on ice and drank it quickly. “T.Y., I need to do something about this arm. And quickly.”
“I already made call. I know good doctor, he is on his way now. Works for safe house.”
Sure enough, a few minutes later a little Chinese man named Dr Lo arrived. After half an hour, Bond’s wound had been sterilized and stitched up. It still hurt, but he could live with it.
“I’m going to need some clothes from my hotel,” he told Woo.
