Free Citizen One by Andy Oakes Page A

rain’s insistence. Through the open quarter window hurried words.
    “Who can guess what it is that is in the heads of such murderers.”
    Pulling up his collar.
    “They are as the rain, unpredictable.”
    Piao’s whisper, at one with the snare beat rhythm of the rain falling on his head, as he walked toward his apartment.
    “Five spikes. Five. As the points of the People’s Republic’s star. A message there?”
    *

    Public Security Bureau, Divisional Headquarters, Hongkou. 9.30 a.m. the next day .

    In the tray holding the in-coming mail, a fastidiously wrapped package, marked for the personal attention of Comrade Chief Officer Zoul. A tick, irregular but persistent, kicking off above Zoul’s left eye. Slowly peeling the layers away, as with a large gold onion. Not daring to rip the paper. Not daring to hurry the process. Last layer, gently slit and slipping aside. The Comrade Chief Officer falling back in his chair. Perspiration beading his forehead. Trembling fingers pulling the small plastic bottle from his tunic pocket. Fumbling the lid off with sweaty, panicked fingers. The pill to his heavily coated tongue; a taste of sugar giving way to an all-consuming bitterness. And all of the time his eyes never leaving the exposed contents of the package.
    Slowly, the panic abating. Rising, head swimming, legs uncertain. Pulling open a deep filing-cabinet drawer. So many deep filing-cabinet drawers. So many things hidden in their locked, pressed steel innards. From its depths, removing a report, brief, sketchy, hastily compiled. Across its print, across the name signed at its bottom, Senior Investigator Di … fingerprints of concrete dust.
    Moving to the small grey cabinet in the corner of the office. A flick of a switch. Print, signature, all shredding to meaningless tatters. A sigh, but lost in the shredder’s bite.
    Moving back to the deep filing cabinet, taking the contents of the package from his desk and placing it within the darkness of the drawer. But stopping before the drawer had fully closed. A last look. The contents of the package, a bright steel spike and a pair of pitted lensed oxy-acetylene goggles. And in the very back corner of the same deep drawer, cement streaked, a cap badge. A People’s Liberation Army cap badge. The cap badge of a very high ranking officer.
    *

    Dialling the prefix ‘39’ . A long number, routed through its own exchange. A secure highway for cadre deals and gossip. Powerful guan-xi and powerful threats. Dialling the number, but with each digit hoping that the telephone would not be answered.
    Within two rings, her voice, its edge-honed blade softened only by the sound of waves running to shore in the background.
    “Madam, it is Zoul.”
    Silence.
    “Comrade Chief Officer Zoul.”
    Silence.
    Closing his eyes as he spoke the next words.
    “Madam, there have been complications. I have stood by my word to you. Exactly to the letter. I have kept to our, our …”
    “Arrangement? Comrade Chief Officer.”
    “Exactly, Madam. Exactly …”
    Silence.
    “I have protected him, sheltered him. I even transferred him to a new department to keep him safe. But, but…”
    “But, Comrade Chief Officer Zoul?”
    “But, Madam, he is as a river that does not recognise its banks. A river that floods and follows its own path. Sweeping, I might add, all before it.”
    Silence.
    “Madam, although I transferred him to the Vice Squad, a now redundant department due to the magnificent achievement of our Politburo, Senior Investigator Piao has become involved in a complex and highly sensitive investigation.”
    Silence.
    “The tai zi that he is compelled to investigate are dangerous. Very, very dangerous …”
    Silence.
    “His blunt methods. And to be candid, Madam, his refusal to, to … how can I put this delicately?”
    “What you are attempting to say, but with little success, Comrade Chief Officer, is that he refuses to turn his back on an investigation.”
    “A maggot in the rice