He took the rifle without much notice. There was old
Liu in the front room, hunched over the desk, mashing cigarettes into the tray,
smoking so often that the nicotine rings around his mouth resembled stubble. An
errand, he told the old fart; the commander requires a rifle. Liu accepted the
fabrication with a bored nod, and fresh flame erupted from his lighter.
Even though the sun was declining, the compound roads were still blurry with heat.
His unit-mates were playing basketball just next door, on the open blacktop courts,
and he wasn't missed. He never had the stomach for the rough-housing which passed
as aggressive play, the indiscriminate elbows to the throat and head, the flickering
grins of apology -- Sorry about that! -- followed by more of the same the
next trip down the court. As he stood outside the granite building, well within
the shade, he heard his comrades holler and cuss. Fuck your mother! someone
shouted, and then laughter. Always that tough laughter.
His glasses had fogged over, and he removed them with vague hands and rubbed them
against his uniform. His jacket was coming undone at the bottom, threads peeling
out. He methodically unbuttoned it and lowered it to the ground, leaving himself
only the flimsy blank T-shirt underneath. He opened the chamber of the rifle and
very carefully loaded it. Five shells was enough. He had his automatic, eight
rounds in that. Someone had told him once that thirteen was not an auspicious
number in America.
As was his wont every day, the sergeant was making the rounds in his jeep. In
theory, it was a communal vehicle, available to all officers of similar rank,
but long ago the sergeant had adopted it as his little pet. Now magazine cutouts
of pretty girls in bikinis were strategically pasted on the dashboard, just behind
the steering wheel. To drive the right of ownership home, the sergeant had loaded
up the passenger seat with books, comics with sloppy covers, all kinds of reading
material which he had never touched.
He stepped directly in the jeep's path, and it came to a lurching halt. Standing
in the middle of the road, the sun was like the hottest spotlight in the world.
Cicadas added their own chatterings of distress.
What the hell are you doing? the sergeant yelled.
I need a ride to the city.
Do you have permission?
I need a ride. Just for a few hours.
The sergeant shoved a cigarette into his mouth. Get yourself a bus.
It's urgent.
You should be with your unit. Buzz off.
Please.
What's this "please" crap? Get out of the way. Move it!
Such a stupid man, he thought. It would be different if he was purposefully insulting,
but his manner was simply a part of him, like breathing.
Please, he repeated.
Move on or I'll report you!
He brought out the automatic, cocked it, and held it against the sergeant's head.
The pressure of the barrel against the flesh pleased him. You drive, he said.
Whoa - The sergeant's cigarette drooped, his hands in the air like a robbery
victim's. Hey, wait, wait. Hey, friend --
Shut up. I'm not your friend. Drive or I'll shoot you right here.
He swept the books off the seat and onto the floor, then clambered in. The pile
was so high that his legs jutted straight out in front of him, and he tried his
best to recline. No good, the seat was rigid with rust.
Go on, he said. We're going east. Into the city.
He snuggled his gun hand beneath his left elbow, the barrel pointed at the sergeant's
upper chest, his rifle propped against his right hip. They approached the outer
gate, and he gave the sergeant a significant look: Don't say anything, just go.
The security man at the gate snapped a salute to the sergeant. The sergeant licked
his lips, his cigarette weakly falling to the floor, but he didn't utter a sound.
Then they were in the countryside, bouncing down the dusty path which would eventually
spill into the main road. He was gripped by something like seasickness as the
trees flashed by in an orderly manner, and the wind kicked fresh air and dust
at him. But he willingly accepted all of it in great gulps of breath, rough grit
grinding in his teeth as he chomped down.
What are you doing? the sergeant whined.
You know.
Why are you -
Shut up. You didn't even notice I was out of uniform. Shut up. He removed his
cap, mopped his face with it, and dropped it into his lap, the fabric newly stained
with his sweat.
They drove on. To their right, the land was leafy, swamped with staked-out fields
and thin rises in between for the farmers to walk on. Further beyond, the hills
were gray-gold and withering. He had been up there a year before, training the
freshman college kids as part of their mandatory one-month army service. Only
a small portion of each day devoted to locking and loading and fire training,
the rest spent digging trenches and gathering weeds, heaping fresh soil all around,
a futile effort to restore farmland which would only crumble and dry out with
the coming of winter and harsh springs. The boys never complained -- they were
too happy for that. Being eighteen years old was a simple time, when the best
could be made of everything. By the end of their stay, their faces were as tan
as his, their knuckles bulging with strength.
The nights were better as they huddled around blustering fires, singing songs
memorized since childhood. The girls went away with the female officers, and he
was left in charge of the boys. Once a girl sneaked in to have a chat with her
boyfriend - lovers were so young these days - and he stumbled upon them in the
fields. The brittle clicks of the boy's lighter had given them away. Both smiled
at him in that helpless yet endearing combination of embarrassment and secrecy:
Please give us a few minutes, just a few. They seemed decorous sitting there,
knees up to their chests and their arms around each other, and not even a loose
tuck of clothing. So he said, No problem, but only ten minutes, okay? He stood
to leave.
Do you have a wife, Uncle? the boy asked.
Yes. Of course. Married six years now.
You have kids? Face swimming in the flickering light, the girl waited eagerly
for him to speak.
He smiled at them, shaking his head in a refusal to answer, and a breeze blew
the lighter out.
The sergeant was babbling, the sounds as hard and annoying as the shafts of light
between the trees. We know it's rough, he said. It was a bitter fruit
that you had to go through that. But how is this going to help? If you want to
see your wife, you should use the normal procedure -
Shut up.
Come on, buddy. This won't help.
You don't want to help me. You're just scared for your life. You're a coward,
so cut out the bullshit.
The sergeant shook his head with a heavy sigh, like an exasperated parent. This
just won't help, he said again.
They were now motoring down Fuxing Road, perhaps ten minutes from downtown. The
street had widened, and on the islands of sidewalks between the automobile and
bicycle lanes, people milled about, waiting for buses. Many stared straight at
him as the jeep passed, as if he could possibly offer them a lift to their destination.
Arms flapped with fans, like birds' wings.
Now where do we go? the sergeant asked.
Downtown. Tiananmen. Government buildings.
The Military Museum, a squat but grand building spread over its own parcel of
land amongst the teeming apartment complexes around it, was on their left. For
a moment, he considered stopping, walking inside amongst the outdated tanks and
jewel-like halberds, carrying out his business there. There would be a certain
irony -- but no, he had come this far, he would go all the way. They drove on,
the jeep sounding positively mild next to the chattering buses and taxis hurtling
past it. Now they had passed the Third Ring Road; just a few minutes now, he thought.
Every so often a shiny glass facade jutted out from the granite and brick, strange
gold, stick-like signs proclaiming restaurants, department stores, fashion outlets.
What are all these places? he thought. Were they here last year? A billboard faced
them - a smiling woman holding shampoo, face so creamy and pale, teeth so white.
He had never met a woman with such perfectly straight teeth.
The jeep's tires screeched as they braked. He was thrown head first against the
dashboard, and his trigger finger jerked. The powder scent was somehow sweet,
like the metallic taste of less-than-ripe fruit. The sergeant yelled, both hands
to his thigh where the bullet had entered. Already blood was gurgling down to
the seat.
Why the hell did you do that? he moaned. That wasn't necessary. Not at
all!
Why did we stop?
Look! Traffic jam! We can't move!
It was true; they were pinned in on all sides now, a bus revving and honking uselessly
behind them, a flatbed truck to their left, shirtless workers draped carelessly
on the sides, on their way home or perhaps to their night job. Now their smudged
faces were staring at the jeep, the gun.
Get us out! he said. Move!
How? There's no way --
Do it!
You think there's a way out? You do it, then!
He sucked in his breath. I can't drive!
No one can drive in this!
He shot the sergeant in the head. Something landed on his face, ran down to the
top of his lips. He licked there, and tasted salt. He couldn't be sure if it was
the sergeant's blood or his own. The sergeant's arms were thrashing crazily like
a marionette's, taking a while to settle. He batted them out of the way and searched
around the man's beltline. He found a fully loaded automatic and jammed it between
his pants and body. Holding the rifle, he climbed out. They were on an overpass,
the Second Ring Road spooling beneath. As far as he could see in both directions,
cars swarmed, and yet there was nothing else there, only buildings seemingly continents
away. The way ahead was choked off by taxis not much bigger than carriages, hulking
double-length buses, bicyclists ringing their flimsy little bells. One of the
bells tinkled behind him, and an old woman shot past, her elbow catching him in
the side. Don't you have eyes - she croaked, and then she was too far gone for
him to hear the rest. He walked on, seeking a way out. Something was stuck to
his arm -- he peeled it away and regarded it. One of the sergeant's books, the
covers removed and fluttering, fragile pages left. He looked at the title: a foreign
writer, a romance his wife had mentioned to him once -- something about a man
taking photographs of bridges. He threw the book into the air, and watched it
tumble artlessly toward the road below the overpass.
He turned to see men making their way towards him. Caps sloppy and pant legs scraping
the ground. Public security officers. Hey, one of them yelled. Hey!
He lifted the rifle and fired. A red haze bloomed around one of the men, and he
disappeared into it. With a general shout, the bicyclists were scattering, bodies
and metal frames getting in each other's way. The other officers fled into the
labyrinths between the parked traffic. He lowered the rifle, and with the pace
of a sleepwalker, continued on. His glasses had fogged up again; he removed and
discarded them.
Thirty meters ahead, a bus had careened off the road and buried itself in the
railing of the overpass, cutting off the sidewalk. He dug the rifle into the ground
like a spear and leaned on it, watching. People were falling out of the front
door of the bus in piles, scrambling and climbing all over each other. A few windows
were plugged, arms and legs waggling almost comically. The people in the surrounding
cars stared baldly at the scene, and as he neared the bus, their unblinking inspections
turned to him. He was too tired to be affected. That's the thing, he thought.
Everything ends when you're tired. The billowing, colorless clouds of car exhaust
choked him.
He turned back towards the mass of people struggling out of the bus, lifted his
automatic, and pointed it at the writhing center. Distantly, he hoped that the
driver was somewhere among them. He fired a few times. The tangle of bodies remained
cohesive, some implacable creature, and then people began to fall like droppings.
Something hissed by from behind, an insect perhaps. He lifted his hand and touched
his ear, came away with a perfect rounded droplet of red. He turned to see men
in uniform, men in his uniform. Their guns were already flashing. A great force
hit his left shoulder and spun him, but he had the strength to drop his automatic,
lift the rifle and fire. Somewhere, a car window shattered. They were still there,
their guns still lifted. He fired again. One of the men grabbed at his forehead
and fell backwards. He charged towards them, the rifle raging in his hands as
he fired it, spikes of pain driving through his injured shoulder. Like magic,
the way ahead became clear, all the way to the soldier's body. He gazed at the
corpse for a few moments, observing the blood settle into a pool on the street,
no sewage drain to bear it away. There was surprisingly little shouting, only
the unceasing sound of idling motors, the weak shuffles of feet as people ran.
Quietly and evenly, he stepped over and behind a car. He braced himself against
the hood to catch his breath. So close, he thought sadly. I was so close.
Then he thought of nothing as he ran back towards the downed bus, the rifle threatening
to tear his arms off. More people fell, arms and legs and trunks settling to the
ground like rain. The smell of spent shells was like burned oranges. He whirled
in a circle, shooting at air and then ground and then what might have been car
roofs and abandoned bicycles. Now there were screams, now the dusty pavement was
spiced with the decorative colors of clothes. The rifle clicked empty, and he
promptly threw it over the side. He climbed onto the railing so that he straddled
it, leaning against the front of the bus where it had crashed and the railing's
steel bars were gnarled and twisted. He drew the sergeant's automatic and fired
a few more times; aiming at a particular target didn't really matter now. Pausing
for another breath, he pressed his cheek against the ridged sides of the bus and
stared at the plain red-on-white numbers which spelled the route number: 37. Hey,
that's me, he thought. I'm thirty-seven. Finally, the sun was perched on the edge
of the horizon, and he was cool, the throb in his left shoulder like ice.
He was still holding the automatic in his lap when he noticed men watching him,
more army men, all lined up in a row underneath their smart caps, rifles aimed
in his direction. He smiled at them in pity, raised his automatic to his head,
and squeezed the trigger. Even as the timid dry sound of the gun signaled an empty
chamber, the other men's weapons roared and he was lifted into space, falling
backward, still smiling as he stared at the generous sky above.