Chapter 21: The supernatural hold summit
Rex settled the reticle of the Zeiss electronic scope on the bridge of Zau’s nose. Through his open off eye he saw buildings and tiny figures in the distance, past Huangsha Avenue far below his aerie and over Liwan Lake. Through his scope, he saw the floating dining room of Panxi Restaurant, Zau sitting impassive and alone at a low and private table, a wisp of steam rising from his cup, cross-hairs centered on his face. The electronics in the gun and scope would guarantee a hit at this once phenomenal distance, especially over the relatively steady air created by the water.
Shifting his scope slightly, Rex saw Joyla, clad in flowing silk sitting in another room of the restaurant, a plate of quail eggs in front of her.
Another shift, Renton lounging outside. Another shift, Marcel. Another shift, Michele. Another shift, Xiaotao. Supporting actors ranged around the lead. None of them carried weapons that he could see, but he assumed that like Joyla, they were capable of surprising amounts of physical destruction with little more than their bodies, discretely concealed oddments and whatever came to hand. The bruise on his chest had faded, but his right thigh still felt as if he’d been run down from her tagging him during their tipsy sparring two nights before, taking the power out of his legs and leaving him open to more devastating blows. He suspected that his takedown of her and their subsequent fevered coupling was a gift from her to his ego, but if so, she had done it so subtly that in the moment and in retrospect, he was unable to point to any split-second where she was anything but committed.
Zau had sounded out Rex, determined the full catalog of delivery services his firm provided, and so here he was, long-distance fire support to an old Chinese man and group of beautiful and well-dressed people, none of whom appeared to be anything but the idle well-off enjoying the food and surroundings.
While he and Joyla were dressing that morning, he had seen her slip a stiletto into a wrist holster, and strap a sheathe containing half a dozen bo shuriken to her lower back, the 12 centimeter spikes disappearing into honed points. While he’d been at the receiving end of her talent with the hanbo, he was perplexed that she was bringing throwing knives to a what might be a gun fight. She’d looked calm and focused however, so he shrugged and concentrated on his own preparations, preparing for the worst and hoping that none of his munitions would be required.
He scanned across the restaurant and its open compartments again, the composition demanding more poetry than his prosaic brain could command, a setting fit for an emperor. A Germanic family caught his eye, frau, herr, nanny and children. An off-colour joke floated through his mind. He dismissed it, hilarity not being to the point. Another scan. An obvious suitor, apparently trying to win his date’s affection by bragging, his hands indicating steepness and then a skiing motion, familiar to Rex from his alpining mates.
The monitors he’d set up with discrete video feeds from the front and rear of the building he was perched in caught his eye, something triggering his interest. A tiny sports car had just entered from the left at an exotic speed, then decelerated at what looked like a numbing rate to a dead stop in front of the pedestrian entrance to the park, close to two kilometers walk to the restaurant. A slip of a woman, an obi wrapped in a complex weave around her tiny frame stepped out, leaned back in and pulled out something moderately heavy. He rolled over, reached for his field glasses and looked down.
The woman pushed the door shut then waved her hand at the car, which accelerated back into traffic at an unbelievable pace, practically disappearing before her hand stopped moving. She glanced around. It was Dian Mu, the potential target should things go wrong, identifiable from the frame grab from the security camera at Opera Hong Kong: the same upswept gamin hair, the cheekbones and the deep blue she evidently preferred in her clothes.
“Incoming from Huangsha Avenue entrance.” Rex muttered into the headset attached to his phone, a secure VOIP chat connecting the supporting team.
Dian Mu bent down, put the object on the ground and flipped out what looked like pedals from its sides. Then she stood, stepped onto it and rolled away. It was a Solowheel.
“Subject alone. Traveling on … electric unicycle.”
She sped off along the path, disappearing momentarily under the spread of the transplanted raffia palms, then reappearing, leaning forward, the wind of her passage ruffling her woven garb, exposing what appeared to be bare flesh underneath it. Quite the distracting entrance and presence, but she appeared to have arrived alone while Zau had come mob-handed.
He rolled back to the rifle, snugged his shoulder against it and scanned until he’d picked her up on the scope. The resolution and enhancement of the scope was much better than the field glasses. He’d been correct: bare skin. This hardly seemed like appropriate garb for an apparently important meeting, one featuring the avuncular but dangerous Zau, the other Dian Mu, apparently a very rich woman with a dangerous organization of her own. It was either disrespectful, indicative of supreme confidence or complete foolhardiness, and Rex was unhappy to realize that he didn’t know enough to have any idea which. He tapped the icon on his phone which raised the alert level of the sensors surrounding his aerie, then settled back to watch.
Gracefully and very quickly, Dian Mu rolled along the paths leading to the floating restaurant. Focused on her, Rex trusted that the other members of the team were picking her out as she closed the distance and establishing their own short term tactics.
She rolled up to the agate doors of the restaurant, propped the wheel against the wall outside, pushed them open and walked in. Moments later she was walking across the gangplank extending from shore to Zau’s segmented dining area. He arose, performed a deeper kau tau than Rex would have expected, indicating great respect and deference, not something Zau had shown to anyone else in their acquaintance. She nodded informally, pulled out a chair and sat across from Zau.
The tableau was framed. Zau to the right, Dian Mu to the left, two powers of a murky sort, a commingling of commerce and crime of some type. And Zau was the supplicant.
Rex settled the reticle on the bridge of Dian Mu’s nose, doing time until action was called for, no change in his heart rate or breathing indicating that he was now in the meditative state from which he responded instantly, smoothly and accurately. Through the scope, he watched as tea was poured, lips moving as pleasantries were exchanged. Both seemed serene, neither upset, hurried or in appearance of having anything better to do than sit in the luscious setting and chat about the beauty of the lake and the fragrance of the exquisite dim sum.
Time passed. Then Zau reached to his side, picked up a felt folder, slipped an iPad out of it. He placed it on the table, slid it across to her. She glanced at it, and it lit up, a faint blur indicating that it was showing her something. She smiled suddenly, and to Rex’ eyes sincerely, very happy with what she saw. She reached out, placed her iPhone beside the iPad, touched an icon, leaned back again in her chair.
They continued to talk, now more intently, business being done. At one point, her eyebrow raised. At another point, a small frown creased her features. They paused, sat silently, sipped fresh tea. After a few minutes, she spoke briefly. Zau nodded. She nodded back. They stood, performed the kau tau between equals.
Dian Mu plucked the iPad from the table and without looking tossed it into the lake, then slipped her iPhone into some hidden pocket in her elaborate wrapping. She turned, looked straight into Rex’ right eye through the magnification of the scope. A mischievous grin crossed her face, and she winked, seemingly at him. The scope went dead. Rex looked up at it, saw a wisp of smoke arising from the $20,000 dollar device.
“Caution. Long distance cover is down. Repeat, I no longer have eyes.”
He rolled over, grabbed the backup optical scope out of his bag, detached the electronic scope and slid the new scope into place. Vastly inferior, and despite his skills inadequate to guarantee hitting anything at this distance, but at least something.
He looked through the scope, scanned, saw Zau talking quietly to Marcel, one hand over his, no panic on their faces. Scanned again, saw Joyla and Xiaotao talking. Scanned again, caught a glimpse of movement and found Dian Mu back on her solitary wheel, an improbable figure balancing on a tiny patch of rubber, heading back to Huangsha Avenue. He switched to the field glasses, tracked her back, looked up to see the tiny sports car repeat the absurd feat of speed and deceleration, watched her tuck herself back in and disappear again in a blur that appeared to defy physics.
He glanced down at his phone, wondering why no one had responded, saw that it had turned into a black glass rectangle instead of a working smart phone, presumably at the same time his scope went dead.
What the hell had just happened?