[h1]Africa[/h1]
[h2]Pemba[/h2]

“That's the fifth I've seen this week.” Dezhi Cao observed as he looked out the back window of the command post. Framed in the window of the thinly built screen door that looked out to the beach and sea beyond was a small boat skipping along the blue waves in the distance. With how far it was, the water-craft was little more than a black speck against the ocean. But it – and the appearance of others – was a source of with held curiosity among the base and its command.

“Tanganyikan has become concerned, to say the least.” an African pointed out. Dressed in nearly all black he was very much similar to Chinese IB, save for his equally dark skin tone. Beyond the similarities of dress the man represented a completely different office to a wholly different intelligence agency. He was a Walinzi agent.

Alongside him the lead IB agent for the base sat in a chair, his legs crossed as he leaned back watching things pass by with an alert and attentive look. Though Zhou had often Chen Wu with a distrustful silence, if for his visible and active distaste for her; she was at least glad he hadn't acted smarmy. But perhaps it was for their guest.

“Concerned? How so? Aren't they allied with Ethiopia. Should they not be acting so... hostile?” Dezhi Cao on the other hand had become agitated and skittish. He made efforts to hide the fact. But there was a hesitant way in which he moved that suggested that he wasn't doing so well. Among the troops earlier he kept reserved. But the outer shell was flaking. He was due to break when everyone left.

“Just several days ago they arrested the Taytu.” Chen Wu remarked, entering the conversation. He rose a hand to his temple and rested it there, putting on a bored and placated mask, “The way it was written they're afraid of what Taytu may be there to do.”

“Arrested Taytu?” Cao remarked visibly shocked. He stammered incoherently as he turned away from the window and walked across the room to his desk.

“That's what the briefing I got said.” Wu added dismissively.

“Well that's... uh... That's got to be treason in some book...” Cao mumbled in a low restrained voice. He trailed off into whispering confusion as he shuffled through the papers on his desk, desperately looking for a paper he missed reading. Or to pretend to do something but be surprised there was anything happening.

“So, does Addis expect us to break her out?” Cao asked suddenly, looking up at the African agent standing by the office door. He looked blank at Cao until finally speaking.

“That's not in my position to say, but I can assure you for as much as I know the Ethiopian government doesn't want Chinese assistance. At least not at the moment.” the Walinzi agent softly comforted, “But there is a whole other manner.” he added.

“I- ok. What is, uh- it?” asked the commander.

“Through your embassy we were asked to inform the Pemba garrison that they're to redeploy for Addis Ababa, effective as soon as possible with all deployable units. They're to report to the command of his highness Emperor Yaqob and to perform whatever duties he feels necessary.”

Zhou's heart skipped a beat and she looked up excited at the Walinzi agent. A pleasant warmth filled her chest and she took a deep proud sigh. Chen Wu looked over at her, and seemed to smile if for a little.

“With the situation in Djibouti dire – if not totally lost – then Addis Ababa has become the next vital target. I don't know command's effective strategy on the matter. So I trust they will fill you in on the current strategy and offer you your position of it.

“I was also told you would have gotten the order.” the agent nodded.

“Oh, I... uh-...” Cao stammered.

“We did, and we'll deploy as soon as possible. We're just preparing some assets now to prepare for Addis.” Chen Wu cutting in. The sudden affirmative action of the IB agent startled Cao who may have forgotten the quite agent was even in the room.

“That's good to hear.” the Walinzi agent smiled. “I expect you'll be deploying soon?”

“We will.” Wu assured, “Now, what's the situation on the Spanish? I've had sketchy reports.”

“Well I can understand if the IB has an incomplete dossier on the Spanish. So I might as well.

“Initial Spanish losses that we can estimate put the casualty rate at Djibouti to maybe about as high as six-thousand on the Spanish side. But this is a rough idea. No one can really get to the field to count the dead. But despite this Spanish force may still have a couple ten-thousand men, including armored units and helicopters.

“Through the course of the Djibouti engagement they deployed an unknown aircraft. Though he killed many of our own pilots with ease it was eventually shot down.”

“What are Ethiopian losses?” asked Wu.

“Harder to say, the battle itself isn't really done so our casualties are going up. Yesterday it was equal to Spain. But today it could have surpassed.”

“I see.” Chen Wu sighed, “Thank you.”

“It's a trying time for Africa, that's for sure. If that's all I need to know, I will wait for your departure to Addis if you don't mind.”

“Yes, p-please do.” Cao said quietly, “You're dismissed, comrade.”

“Thank you for the time.” the Ethiopian agent nodded warmly, stepping out of the room. As the room rattled shut behind him the three officers stood in tense silence.

“You ordered my men behind my back?” Cao growled, as he turned to Chen Wu.

“To be honest comrade, it's hardly my order or yours as much as Beijing.” he said, “And I waited an hour after initially receiving the message to wait for you to do something and you didn't do it. If we were to head out then we should be ready to leave at a moment's notice.”

“You still defied my authority!” Cao roared. His anger was intense, but not nearly explosive. He rounded on Chen Wu who remained seated in his chair, staring defiantly up at his superior officer. He was neither cock-sure or directly insubordinate in his expression, but merely un-phased.

“I took initiative.” the agent affirmed. The level-headed tone of his voice was surreal and spooky. And Zhou didn't know if it was this tone that made Zao's face glow redder, or a building sense of anger and characteristic fear.

She knew he wished to deny the war existed, and being slow to move was perhaps his way to uphold the fantasy. Despite African patrol ships just off the coast of the island.

“And there is still an order to things!” Cao continued to scold, “I wanted confirmation. Affirmation we were to be somewhere and do something.”

“And you should have launched earlier this morning.” the agent hissed, “Not wait for some check-in by a foreign service!” though he remained seated, his voice became strained and tense. He wrapped his hands around his sandy-brown pants. His knuckles glowing white as he wrapped them tight.

“You're not in a position to tell me what I need to do. Let me remind you,” Cao lowered himself to face-level with Wu, jabbing a finger into his chest, “You. Are. My. Intelligence. Liason. You are not in ultimate command of operations on this base. I AM! Not even Zhou has the authority to make that order. And you – as she – would do best to not do anything in MY NAME!”

“And what value is your name if you don't do shit!” Wu cracked back, standing up from the chair. “It's worth nothing! Your command is at this point of minimal value in-so-far as I am concerned and I will do damned well to make sure that this mission goes to its furthest value. When we get orders!

“Keep denying this war exists, you will be the first to be killed by Spanish shells when they come knocking on our base. Your family will be next to die when they gas all of China!

“Do you need to be reminded of the assets the Spanish possess which will only steal the world further from the utopia that it should be? The Spanish are the tumor that needs to be cut, before they release their cancer. Stop them now, so they may never use their VX on anybody or home!”

“I will see you relieved from your post.” Cao promised, “Get out of my office!” he demanded.

Chen Wu glowered glumly into Cao's eyes. And without so much as the courtesy of a bow he turned to the door and left. For the second time the door rattled closed and the two officers left listened to the footfalls of Wu as he left. Cao looked up at Zhou. Dark rings had formed under his eyes. And seemingly within minutes he had aged by twenty years, his shoulders sagged and he took on a heavier demeanor.

“So we're committed.” he said in a low voice, as he mourning a past family member. He kicked at the ground with a boot and walked to Zhou. But he dropped eye-contact, dropping his look to the floor.

“It would seem so. Why did you hide the order?” she asked, “I know you read it.”

“I did.” Cao admitted.

“How come?”

“I suppose...” he hesitated, “I suppose I did want to deny there was a war. That in the twisted, insane logic that when there is conflict between such nations it blows itself out before it can ever flair into an inferno. The whole world I guess has been standing on the precipice such as this. Waiting and holding its breath. And I've been trying hard, too hard. Now I am drowned.”

Zhou smiled warmly, she felt she should hug the man. But needed restraint. She instead lowered her head too, gazing down at his boots as she leaned to the side, arms crossed behind her. “You knew it was bound to happen all the same.” she said flatly.

“Don't say it like that.”

“You know you did, in some way. You're cracking up. I've never seen you bent out of shape like this. Knowing of course our career together has been short. But even under duress by the Turks you never truly threatened to snap. But you're starting to show the stresses.

“Have you heard how the steel made for our officer's swords are made?” she asked, looking back up. Cao had raised his head too, but had chosen to look passed her to the windows along the wall at her back. There the men drilled. And beyond the barracks the vaulted roofs of iron hangers stood in the heat of the African summer sun. The planes they once housed though were now of course idling on the tarmac, still hidden from him but all the same there. And waiting.

“Heat-forged steel, tempered and folded several times. Hammered in a mechanical press and fitted on per-fabricated handles. Why?” answered the officer.

“Because these swords aren't just made to look pretty. Inefficient by the standards of today obviously and a relic. But their a symbol and a tool. They can cut like any other knife, they're to be used to issue the justice we the officer feels need to be issued. Or in our defense. My old commanding officer kept himself alive on more than one occasion with his sword, which outdid any club, hatchet, or machete used against him on Mindanao.

“It's a symbol, but it still has its practical uses. And is used as such. We and our swords are much the same. And we've been treated, if in different manners.

“We've been tempered, through education and experience. In practice, a well tempered blade will be strong and powerful. It'll be flexible, and always return to its strength. Pure steel and iron will reinforce it's nature, and it will never break: not even under the worse conditions. Their tempering will carry on into the end, and perhaps beyond as a symbol of our services rendered in life.

“We will die. But our legacy as leaders will continue. We should bend, but never break. Be of the most pure, uncontaminated steel. We will break otherwise.

“With all due respect Cao, your metal is cracking under his stress. It's distressing. Perhaps Chen Wu is right. You can act pretty, that much is certain. But now I don't know if you can cut. Especially when the officer needs it to the most. Especially when your men need you the most.”

Cao chewed on his lip. He still looked tired. Still looked old. Zhou wondered if she had comforted him at all, or even changed his mind. He stood silent for a while, unmoving and without speaking. Zhou wondered if perhaps she had convinced him to give up, and that actually terrified her. Command she imagined would not be thrust upon her in such a dire moment. But somehow a part of her felt that Cao using this moment to pen his immediate resignation wasn't impossible. And another part felt terrified with how he might find a way to do that.

Finally he spoke: “Let's go to Addis then.”

[h2]Addis Ababa[/h2]

Even muffled, the groan of the airplane engines was nearly deafening in the cabin of the aircraft. Only thin plates of aluminum over a stocky frame separated the crew and the passengers from the abyss outside. It already did little for the cold, as it leached slowly in over their high-altitude affair. In the small windows set over the hull the soldiers could look out at passing clouds and the smoky horizon in the far distance.

Though a bomber originally, the large cabin of the Bǎolěi had been refitted to suit its new career as a transport. Simply bare-metal seats ran the length of the hull in benched units of five. Every avaible seat was taken and some stood clinging to the ropes that ran the entire length of the spine, their heads bowed as they clutched the collars of their uniforms tight to hold in as much heat as possible. For having sat in the African sun for so long, it was an understandable shock for many of the anxious-eyed young men.

Dezhi Cao through all of this had not spoken a word.

Sitting across from him Zhou sat watching her shrunken commander. He sat hunched in his seat, as doubled over as a bowed sapling as he slouched back against the cold uncomfortable steel and again forward. He held up an elbow as he rested his round face in the palm of a gloved hand. His eyes stared off into the near space in front of him. To casual observers it could be said he was looking at Zhou. But in all reality he was looking at nothing, simply having passed into a waiting coma.

Chen Wu sat separated from the two, as with the rest of the staff officers who were scattered not just within the aircraft, but among the others. But maybe it was for the best that they did not see their flaking commander as Zhou and Chen Wu knew him. Zhou looked over at the IB agent, he had become cold and impenetrable, riding the trip like a statue glued to his seat. His back lifted away from the back-rest, his signature black coat hung heavy and long across his knees and down to his booted ankles. With his face narrowed, expression frozen he resembled something akin to a priest. The sort of villainous image men in the military's image departments sought to portray the Christian preachers. 'He's only missing the collar.' Zhou thought to herself as they flew along above central Ethiopia.

A sudden sharp bump shook the aircraft and the sound of the engines changed to a lazier drone. There was a sharp electrical buzz, but not much else. But that was all they needed to know. The airplane was beginning its descent. Soldiers who had been holding shut their collars held up that hand to grip the rope for support. Those that sat grabbed hold of their seat as the plane jostled and rattled down. Some turned to peer out the window as outside the glass the clouds parted and in banking Addis Ababa came into view.

Many having not been so far from home gaped and chattered excitedly as they caught their first glimpses of the foreign capital. Zhou strained to look, leaning and twisting to look curiously out the window as her subordinates also leaned in to see. The sharp flashes of tin rooftops glowed out from behind fields of trees and the nested webbing of roadways that crossed the city. Towards its core high-rises stood out over the city-center. But unlike Beijing or Shanghai, these structures rose thin and short, like an eroded and ancient grave-yard. But in place of stone too worn to read, there was the polished shine of glass window panes.

The view did not last as the plane banked again, stealing the soldiers their view of the city as it came down to land. Instead as it swept it put into frame the distant peaks of the mountains and highlands that surrounded the city like a fortress wall, only broken by wide valley gates that nestled and funneled Addis Ababa into its triangular layout.

Groaning and frustrated, the plane erupted into irritated chatter and jeering catcalls from the men at the pilots, clearly dissatisfied with their view of this foreign land being so quickly stolen from them at the blink of an eye. What they got to watch instead was the mottled landscape that surrounded the airport as they came to land.

With a bump and a hard knock from the ground the airplane hit the runaway with a skipping stumble. The tires squealed underneath them and those who had not held themselves in tight were thrown from their chairs or from where they stood. Several took a stumble, much to the bemusement of their more veteran comrades. But as it came to a slow lumbering end, they pulled themselves up and brushed off, nervously grasping out to save what little face they could.

As the airplane drew to a stop the blaring music of whistles echoed in the metallic hull, echoing off themselves and from the walls in a great ear-rending wail summoning the men up. Taking their positions at the center of the plane the junior officers with their whistles in their mouth and hands at the hilt of their swords began directing the men up and into formation as towards the back the door of the bomber-turned-cargo plane opened with the raspy hiss of hydraulic arms.

Standing from his seat, Dezhi Cao sauntered to the opening door, squinting into the blinding afternoon sun that poured in with the hot wet air. Zhou wondered what he was going to do as he stood in the light, a shadow pressed against the burning light of the sun.

Turning abruptly he shouted, “Comrades! Parade formation!”

There was a simultaneous recognition of the order. “Yes, comrade!” the men shouted in unison. With tight step they marched from the back of the airplane. From the dusty Ethiopian runway they confirmed the order to the other unloading airplanes. And still the howl of landing cargo aircraft continued.

“Well, where too?” Chen Wu asked. There was a twisted sort of obedience in his tongue. His voice frowned with his expression.

“Yaqob,” Cao responded. He refused to look to Chu as he answered his question. Turning more to Zhou as he talked, “We're going to Yaqob.”

[h2]Addis Ababa[/h2]
[h3]Han Wen[/h3]

Passing into Addis had been at the tail end of a refugee train. Pulled along in wagons led by mules or packed in the back of trucks refugees fleeing the war with Spain all rushed south to the capital of the Empire. Desperate fearful faces peered out at the capital and them from behind the graying, darkening boards.

Mulki wove her car into the thick streams of people as they wove into the tin roofs of Addis Ababa's outer suburbs. In the shade of Eucalyptus and Acacia trees foreign journalists towered over them on stacks of boxes much like the mountains loomed over Addis proper. In their hands they flashed their cameras, desperately taking in images of the plight of Ethiopians in Spain's wake.

Has they rolled by Han Wen looked on with a captured expression of wonder and irony. The image of so many in Europe carrying perhaps for Ethiopia as their own blood propagated the violence was an astounding image to say the least. But there were those from Asia that he noticed, the leery and watchful NPN journalists who conducted their mission much more conservatively, hiding on ground level among the people and engaging one-on-one with them. Much akin to their Cambodian, Vietnamese, or Korean counterparts.

But never the less their identity of origin Wen's gut twisted inside him with nauseous anxiety. He withdrew down his sea, hiding from sight and hoping to keep from being pointed out. It would be one thing to be noticed first by a Chinese journalist, but it would be a whole new disaster if a pilot was spotted by one of the Westerners.

“What's the matter, you don't want your picture taken?” Mulki asked, obviously puzzled and very humored with Wen's shy attempts at withdrawing from view. He lay slunk all the way back in his seat, his knees bumping high against the dashboard.

“I wouldn't mind,” replied Wen, cautiously as he peered out through the dusty window, “But I'm worried how it might blow back if it was known someone associated with the Chinese military is seen here.”

“Seen!?” exclaimed Mulki, “I don't think you need to worry about that. You don't even have your jacket on, how can they tell?”

“Well maybe they just... can.” Wen frowned. The thought of them coming to know so easily was tickling in a terrifying way. And it made it worse that he fought them. What sort of assassin would the Spanish send after him if that were the case? They were known for stealing entire trains to get a single man, after all.

They continued to crawl along. Through the streets men and women walked back through the traffic, handing out charity as they went. Bottles of water and food items for the hungry travelers fleeing to the city they call home. “So where are we going?” Wen asked as he popped off  the lid of a plastic canteen of water.

“I think they'd like you at the Chinese embassy...” Mulki moaned as she searched the traffic for a opening to take advantage of. But it was bumper to bumper and door to door traffic, a wall of horns and fumes, “But that is if we can get there.”

“So long as we get there before the Spanish come and I'm back in a warplane.” Wen remarked, “That would be best.”

They continued cruising. As they made it past the main thoroughfares into the city the amount of refugee traffic began to thin and mold into the local ambient activity of Addis proper. The families that fled the advance of the Spanish scattered through the city, setting up camps off the sides of the streets or finding room and board where they gathered. It was out of their way, that much Wen was relieved for.

Soon in time the two departed the shanty towns around Addis Ababa's edge and cut began its passage into the city's center. Here the poverty of the outer edge melted away into up kept homes and businesses. Addis here Wen noted, was like some melting point of the world of the Arabs and the Africans, and from Europe itself in the north. Pale, bright, and plastered banks of low townhouses marched in regular succession down a sun-baked side-walked decorated and inter-spaced with gently sighing tree.

Turning through the streets as they continued their sojourn into the crown of the city only illuminated much the same. At times inter-mixing the pale plaster walls with glass facades shiny and illuminated from the African sun. But for all the feigned attempts at modernity there gathered just nearby the still reminders this was Africa. The noble lions that were this country's emblem were emblazoned decoratively on many surfaces. Mule or horse-pulled carts still roamed the streets, and in distant corners, hidden from view behind walls, hedges, and other buildings the fleeting glimpse of grass-thatches roof-tops disappeared from view and suddenly and softly as they came.

There was a tense demeanor to the city. A constant sorrowful note of anxiety that hummed through the city. It did not manifest itself as a full song, and on some streets life in the city seemed to be progressing as it might have before. But there was an urgency in what was happening.

The preparedness and urgency finally burst when they sailed onto Embassy Row. Vigilant at its intersections the street was under-guard as white-uniformed policemen stood at watch alongside barricades, guarding the entrance to the almost idyllic tree-lined avenue. At the corners and down the length of the road the Addis Ababa police loomed in the shade of the trees, looking pomp and regal in white uniforms as they watched the empty street and the foreign embassies with a relaxed look of security.

The Chinese embassy was a starched-white building that stood behind a thick brick wall, stained brown and gray from time and the African weather. Mulki pulled apprehensively and nervously to the front-gate, bringing the nose of the grumbling, hot car to within inches of the gate. Behind, a manicured lawn of green flanked a ribbon of silky black tarmac to the front door of the large house. A guard looked out from inside, an irritated look plastered on his face as he opened the gates and stepped up to the driver's side window.

His uniform was pressed and formal. Not the condition of field fatigues, not warn or haggard. It was sutured and cared for. And by his looks, the soldier leaning in the driver's side door no doubt strayed further than the bars closest to the embassy itself.

He leered inside with a phlegmatic look dashed across his face, “Name and business.” he barked in Chinese, he turned his gaze up to Wen and he glimmer of suspicion shown in his eyes.

“[i]Kong Jun Yi Ji Jun Shi Zhang[/i] Han Wen,” Wen barked back, “2nd jet-fighter group, Shanxi People's Defense Army, Pemba training detachment. Commanding officer is Shang Xiao Mao Hung, above him Dezhi Zao.”

The embassy guard looked up at him, with a stricken face but still coiled in cynicism. Reaching back Wen grabbed his flight jacket and tossed it in his face. The guard recoiled at the crumpled leather jacket, but more from the lingering smell of jet-fuel no doubt. “That's my fucking flight jacket. I don't have a fucking card when I crash landed. Can I fucking come in?” he snapped.

The guard looked from the coat not coiled in a lump in his arms then to Han Wen. With a groaning sigh he resigned. “You can come in.” he admitted, stepped to the gate to open the remaining door, allowing Mulki to coast in.

She drove down the drive-way. Decorating the interior side of the embassy's property wall coils of vines and flowers grew in raised stone beds to hide and shroud the stone-work in a perpetual sheath of green leaves and florescent flowers. Drawing up close to the columned front door of the embassy they passed a shallow pool of crystalline water. As a stream flowed into the pool in a trickling fountain the orange banner of China fluttered in a broken reflection in the pool's surface. Mulki parked nearby.

“We received a message that Dezhi Cao's men will soon be arriving to the embassy.” the front guard called back as he walked up behind him, the leather jacket wrapped around his arm. “So I don't imagine you'll be here long before they come in. But I'd still go and see Ambassador Long, he can at least get word into Beijing that you're not MIA.” he added, throwing the coat to Wen.

He grabbed it, the stiff sun-baked leather thumped heavily in his arms. He tossed it over his shoulders and bowed to the guard, who returned the favor. “Thank you, comrade.”

The guard gave him a silent nod of approval as he turned to the door. “You're going to need to wait in the lobby.” he told Mulki as she followed him inside.
___________________________________________________

Inside the embassy was controlled chaos. Sounds echoed from all the halls of attendants and personnel preparing to move items and furniture out. Or going through books and diplomatic files to decide what to keep and what to destroy before they left. Han Wen could not claim to understand much of it, and could only work around the hurriedly moving embassy personnel as they frantically dashed down the stairs.

“I'm looking for ambassador Long.” he told them, but they ignored them as they galloped across the wood floors with boxes in their arms. Those that did respond gave him vague direction, gently moving him in the direction he needed to go, or they believed he needed to be.

He found him though, standing in the window of a large room that might have once been a master bed-room. It's tall cathedral ceiling echoed with the pilot's foot-falls as he walked across the naked room. Much of what the room had held was moved out by now. The rest that couldn't be moved was already covered in sheets, except for his desk.

“No faith in Hassan?” Wen asked nervously as he came to a stop in the middle of the room. He didn't know how to approach an ambassador. The window the ambassador stood before was impressive, it looked out on the street below where light traffic rolled back and forth, from behind the safety of hedge-covered walls.

He didn't respond. Instead the ambassador slowly turned. He was an impressive man by any standards, in fact very mundane. He was small, even by standards in Asia. His hair was a messy mat of black and his brown eyes fixed themselves on Wen. Deep worry lines carved his melon head. “Who are you?” he asked, the question was sharp but not made out of insult given his softened tone of voice, “You're not the regular staff.”

“Han Wen, from the Pemba Training Group. I was shot down over Somalia some several days ago. I finally managed to secure a way here. I'd like to get back in a plane, comrade.”

“I understand.” Long bowed, “I'm Long Rang-je, pleasure to meet your acquitance.

“Usually I'd have papers for you and I to fill out but I don't think that'll be necessary.” he added on a sour note. His voice was withdrawn and meek, “I'm sure comrade Cao can do the required moves to correct your MIA status in Beijing to active and alive. But right now I'm afraid I can't really do that.”

“How come?” Wen asked, walking closer to the ambassador as he turned to lean over his desk.

“Just earlier this morning I was contacted by Beijing to tell me I was to evacuate Addis as soon as possible.” Long said, “I was also informed that Dezhi Cao is moving up to Addis Ababa. It's my hope that I and my staff can be withdrawn to Pemba.

“On that detachment too was notification the Third International has declared war on Spain.”

“The Comintern declared war on Spain?” Wen asked, “So what does that mean?”

“For us: absolutely nothing. But it's given us commitments. Beijing didn't tell me what they're going to use their commitments on for the war-effort or any details. I only got a briefing on it. I was to send a copy to the Emperor and that was to be my final assignment in Addis before the Spanish arrive.

“I have reason to believe in some manner in the future cooperation between China and Ethiopia will be conducted through military leadership than diplomats for the course of this conflict as long as we're both concerned.

“So: I can't do anything for you.” he smiled apologetically, holding out his hands and shrugging, “Phones even are disconnected. You're just going to have to wait for Cao's men to arrive. Last I heard they just landed.

“Welcome back.”

[h1]China[/h1]
[h2]Heilongjiang[/h2]
“When you look out at this landscape, you come to learn what made our former masters.” a man said, as he sat reclined in a wicker chair on the back porch of a secluded back-woods home. The eaves of the porch dripped with fresh summer rain-water, dropping small diamond glimmers of sun-lit water on the dark maroon handrails of the deck. Even the wood underneath had been soaked through from side-ways passing rainfall. As it had been, the rain was hard and the wind swept sharp. It had just ended moments before, as Chen Wu was told.

The campaign manager who had so quickly found himself managing a nation-wide affair sat alongside his host in a pale-yellow chair. Wrapped over his shoulders was a thin blanket loaned to him by his host, and in his hands a warm cup of tea. The spindly and meekly man had come complaining of the cold nip in the air, even if it was the heart of July and the midst of the short Manchurian summer. But it had rained suddenly, and on its tail came slinking what the weathermen were calling a Siberian low.

His host however did not seem to care.

Chen Yiaoliang was a larger man by comparison to the mousy Wu. He sat with his feet against the railing as he sipped slowly at his tea, savoring the fresh warm drink washing his tongue. A popular musician by all hours, and he looked the part. His face was round and boyish, but had a muture light that glowed from his smiling cheeks and already the faint hints of smile lines were embedding themselves alongside his cheery almond eyes. “It's a hard land, but it's beautiful. It is no wonder the Manchu in their most ancient times were so reverent of nature. It's almost a shame that much of the world has forgotten the natural splendor.” he continued warmly, holding his hands out to the landscape just outside his front-porch.

Yiaoliang's house sat at the top of a rugged hill, its read faced north towards what was often referred to as Chinese Russia. But covered thick in pine forests that sprawled and rose and fell over the broken and bending landscape there was no telling if there was a border here, or where it was. Though it was still miles behind the highest rise from either man's view.

It was idyllic, that much Chen Wu would give him. But it was isolated and difficult to get to. He wanted to out of grace to regard every bead of crystal rain that rested on every leaf and board with the same childish appreciation as Yiaoliang. But he couldn't nearly muster that much fervor for the Taoist. “It's an ocean of eternity I think.” Chen waxed, “It doesn't shift uncomfortably as the ocean would when a storm comes. It will dance if you let it and watch it. But it is resilient, and strong as the stone it sits upon.

“In several thousand – perhaps million – it will finally move. Maybe it'll wash itself as flat as Mongolia. But it will only do so at its own will. It's own natural power.” he smiled around his words, and took a cherishing sip of tea.

“It is a sight.” Wu added, himself drinking from his cup as he wrapped the blanket tighter around him. A light breeze gusted through, bringing a new burst of cool moist air. Nearby chimes sung a silver song at the blowing wind.

“Did you ever want to go somewhere just to forget things?” Yiaoliang asked.

“I never imagined I would ever want to forget anything.” Wu answered coldly.

“Well it's too bad. Man today should really take a moment to be alone and see into themselves. Or to see natural wonder unfettered by human habitation. Here I am isolated. Here I can be among myself, and to my craft. What do you think?”

“I think it sounds fine by you.”

Yiaoliang sighed deep. “So I see.” he whispered, “But really, what keeps you away?”

“My work.”

“I know of your work.” the singer nodded, “I can also guess why you're here. I don't suppose then you want to admire the mountains.”

“I admit I'm not nearly as poetic as you, comrade.” apologized Wu, “I don't write songs. I'm not an artist. I like numbers. I like the results numbers bring, and I want to bring in more. So does my client.”

“Zhang Auyi.”

“He'd appreciate it a lot more than me.”

“I imagine he thinks I owe him favors.” pointed Yiaoliang. As romantic as he was, he wasn't a moron. His poetic warmth subsided to a business cold and his feet came off the railing. He straightened the way he sat, and leaned over his tea. Wu watched in that instant as he became less the celebrity he was, and more a dealer. Something even of a politician if he chose to pursue it. He had been dealing with the political establishment for long enough. Not to know how it works, but enough to understand the intrigue and how to approach it.

This was assertion he was showing Wu.

“To be honest he didn't tell me he thinks you owe him.” Wu told him. He sat up to match, keeping the blanket over his shoulder, “And I'd like to imagine what it is you're thinking.”

“Perhaps I could do with knowing this supposed 'favor' I may be returning?”

“Auyi wants endorsement. He wants support.” offered Chen Wu, “He needs someone who can speak to the younger generation. A progressive, a poet. Someone to wake up a contingency who doesn't realize what they want, and they need to be enlightened.”

“Auyi's a politician, can he not rally the others to bring a vote his way.” Yiaoliang said in a low voice, “That is what this sort of thing turns into. He has influence over the news. He's already won with that sort of key. You and I know it!”

“Perhaps, but it doesn't help that in latest campaign polls Mang Zhu is actually a few points behind. The other part of Auyi's ministerial constituency are agricultural. These are men and their families either too isolated to be counted, too busy to volunteer, or who many not actually know what's going on.

“Do you like Xhu?”

“I can't say I'm passionate about his aggressive ideology. So what we had a successful revolution here in China? It's not a reason to roll tanks to Madrid and warships into range of Tokyo to force the world to succumb.”

“You would have the world mature on their own time?”

“The man who stands to walk against the current will be brought down by it. The people are the currents I feel, and the men who walk in it are the nations.

“I am proud of the state. But not so much to forcefully knock over the existing state on the assumption that's what the river it stands in really wants or flows too. Give time, revolution will come.”

“So you like Auyi?” Wu questioned.

“Hard to say when there's over a dozen people trying to be Hou Sai Tang.”

“Closer to thirty actually.” Chen Wu corrected, “I'm particularly fascinated by the late submissions of William Chou and Grigory Maxov.”

“Never heard of either.”

“You wouldn't have, their support groups are far too small to actually register, they lack the endorsements for campaign invitations. One is a municipal official in Hong Kong and the other is a police chief in Vladivostok.”

“Amazing.” Yiaoliang laughed.

“It's absolutely inspiring, but beyond the point.” noted a cranky Chen Wu, “So what say the offer?”

“If you had written I would have given it thought. But you're here on part of Auyi so I guess he wants an immediate answer.”

“I expect that.”

“I'll have to unfortunately say I'll have to think.” Yiaoliang bitterly admitted, “I appreciate the thought, comrade. But it's a surprising obligation to take up. You're the first and only type to ask. I don't want to stir up the water.”

Wu nodded, “Shall I keep in touch then?”

“Go ahead.”

“I'll contact you in the next week. Election itself happens this coming fall. Remember that.”

“I will.”