My Asian Dragon

Chapter 7

Longwei and Joy’s report to the villagers sent everything into a frenzy. Gathering everyone inside the temple, Longwei laid out the situation, his mind laying out the plan he had thought of during the cross country dash back to the village. He had filled in the details of his plan as they traveled, using his mental link.

We have the best chance to avoid the loss of life if we can shift the attackers off the roads and into the surrounding woods, Longwei had said. There, I can use my dragon form to eliminate more of the gunmen while keeping the villagers safe.

“Are you bulletproof in dragon form?” Joy asked, thinking of the last attack. “I swore that guy couldn’t miss from that range.”

No, I am not invulnerable, Longwei replied. However, I am much faster than human eyes can track, and can use that to my advantage. However, enough things coming from enough angles, and my skin can tear just as easily as any other creature’s. Then, it’s just a matter of my body mass.

“Body mass?”

Imagine shooting a grizzly bear with a small rifle. Unless you hit in a vital spot immediately, all you’ve done is create a very angry bear.

“Will the Triads know this, and prepare accordingly?”

Let’s hope not.

The plan was pretty simple, in Joy’s opinion. All of the children and those unable to fight were to retreat to the temple, deep within the protection of ancient walls. Those who could fight would be in the woods with Longwei, even though all they had were two rifles.

The main element of the defense was to use the time they had to prepare. Joy and Longwei both had long experience with action movies, and mined every bit of pop culture between them for ideas.

The first thing to eliminate was use of the road leading into town. A group of twelve villagers started digging a trap in the road, where the forest pushed in on both sides, one of the only choke points on the approach to the village. If they could cause the attackers to dismount from their vehicles there, they could force them into the woods. Smaller teams of villagers dug up smaller man sized traps throughout the forest, each villager older than eight responsible for at least two traps. While it hurt Joy’s heart, each man trap was lined with sharp sticks, like a tiger trap. There would be no taking prisoners this time.

Joy fell in with the main road diggers, attacking the packed earth with hoe and spade, until the muscles between her shoulder blades burned. The work was different than the field work or other tasks she had done since arriving in the village. There was almost none of the banter and pleasant talk that had highlighted every other endeavor. The villagers dug in silence, their faces grim as they hacked at the earth. The car trap was a massive undertaking, taking up the entire width of the road for a length of almost twenty feet and a maximum depth of six. Instead of swallowing the entire vehicle, the idea was to create a barrier. The bottom of the pit was lined with plastic, and filled with precious fuel for the generators, swirled and blended with pig droppings. Once lit, the flaming dung would create a napalm like wall of fire blocking the road. Forced out of their vehicles, two village gunmen would then fire from protected bunkers towards the attackers, in the attempt to drive them into the woods where Longwei and the others could handle the rest.

The one factor that nobody knew was just how many men the Triad would send. Hefei was not a large city by Chinese standards, and in their time there Joy and Longwei estimated that there were less than 1000 Triads in the city, most of which were in no position to be members of an assassination squad. Still, a squad larger than twenty or thirty would be almost impossible to defend against.

The village worked long into the night, using precious candles and lanterns to supplement the clear moonlight to guide the digging. The main trap was finished on the first day, and the bunkers were done on the second. Disguised as piles of compost, the bunkers were protected by not just packed earth, but a thick layer of rocks from the roadbed. By the end of the second night, over three thousand mantraps had been dug in the forest surrounding the village. Even if the village did survive the attack, there would be no safe hunting in the eastern forest for months to come, if not years.

The only controversy that came was when Joy informed Longwei that she would be one of the people manning the bunkers near the roadside trap. “This all started because of me,” she said. “If they see me, they might just get stupid and give you an easier time.”

“You’re putting yourself in grave danger,” Longwei replied, stroking her arms gently. It was the end of the second night, and both of them lay on his bed, cuddled together. While Joy knew she wished she could express her desire for him physically, she was too exhausted to even consider the possibility of s*x.

“I know. But you’re going to be in greater danger,” Joy said. “You’re not going to be behind a foot of rock and dirt.”

“You’re not going to be a dragon.”

“Well, we can’t have everything,” Joy said, closing her eyes. She tried to sleep, but could feel her mind rebelling against the idea. Finally, she sat up, her breath puffing between her nostrils. “Fu*k.”

“What’s wrong?” Longwei asked, his voice not blurred by sleep at all. Joy was surprised, she was sure he had been asleep against her. “Did I pinch you?”

“No, I just can’t sleep. My mind keeps going forward to what is going to happen tomorrow and I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t scared.”

Longwei nodded. “I understand. I guess I was lucky, the first time I had to kill someone it happened unexpectedly. I reacted by instinct, so I did not have worry beforehand.”

“Tell me about it,” Joy said quietly.

“You were there,” Longwei answered, just as quietly. “I still think about it at times.”

“So what do I do? If I go out there exhausted, I’m not going to be very effective help.”