Don Pendleton: Tiger War

"You execute children, too?"

"He stole a chicken," said the adjutant. They spoke English.

"And for that you're going to kill him?"

The adjutant shrugged. "The colonel ordered."

A blindfold was tied around the boy's head. His wrists were undone so he could hold his hands over his head, the pose for the next cut. The cord from his wrists was used to tie his ankles so he would not run away. A name was called out, and a young soldier rose from the spectator benches. He was not much more than sixteen.

"A cadet," said the adjutant.

The cadet went up to Liu who handed him a sword. He bowed to Liu, then to the audience, then stationed himself at the boy's side. The boy continued shaking, his hands held high in a position of surrender.

"Ichi no do," Liu ordered loudly.

"Across the chest," explained the adjutant.

The cadet raised his sword and swung at the boy. A red gash appeared on the boy's chest and he fell backward screaming. As he rolled in the sand in agony, the blindfold came off. The cadet gazed at him, a stupid expression on his face.

Liu shouted something, and the cadet moved in on the boy, sword raised. Now there followed a macabre game of cat and mouse, the cadet slashing, the boy rolling to avoid the blows, sand flying, the boy screaming, the crowd on its feet yelling with delight.

Bolan bent his head to avoid the spectacle. On the way to the enclosure the adjutant had told him that if he so much as tried to disrupt the proceedings the colonel had ordered that a hundred Montagnards be executed.

"Tsuki!" shouted Liu. Thrust.

A high-pitched scream rent the air as the blade pierced the boy's heart. The crowd applauded as the cadet ran to Liu with the sword dripping blood. The colonel took one look at it and threw it down with disgust. He shouted orders and left the enclosure.

There was a stir in the crowd and faces turned to Bolan. The long nose was next. The enclosure was cleared of tables and equipment. Soldiers appeared with buckets of sand and rakes, and the bloodstains were covered over. In minutes the ring was ready for the main event.

Bolan stared at the ground between his feet in silent communion with his Creator. God, give me the right spirit.

A short while later Liu returned. He no longer wore a uniform but was dressed like Bolan in a white gi and a black hakama. In his hand he held a samurai's katana similar to Bolan's except that instead of lacquered wood, his scabbard was of gold encrusted with lapis lazuli.

Liu entered the enclosure and faced Bolan. With a gesture of the head he bid him enter. Bolan rose and entered the ring. For a while the two men faced each other in silence, Liu looking at Bolan as if he were studying him. Then Liu drew his sword. Bolan followed. Both threw their empty scabbards in the sand.

Holding the swords with two hands in front of them at an angle of forty-five degrees, the men faced each other, standing stock-still. Both had their eyes on the line from the tips of their weapons to the opponent's throat. Both were projecting their life forces, their ki, as it is called in the East.

It was an exercise that required tremendous concentration, possible only if the mind was completely empty. The slightest thought would detract from the ki pressure. Feeling the slack the other would take advantage and move in. It was an exercise in willpower as much as physics.

The long swords gleamed in the sunlight. The crowd was completely silent. Seconds turned to minutes, the sun beat down, the heat grew, the tension became unbearable. For how long could they keep it up?

"Eee-yiii!" Liu charged, his feet raising sand, his sword going up for a sky-to-earth cut.

Bolan watched him come without moving a muscle.

He stood completely unprotected. In a moment the impending blow would cleave him in two. The fight was practically over. Liu was going to kill Bolan with his first blow.

Then something happened that brought a gasp from the crowd. As Liu's sword began its descent, Bolan stepped sideways. By then Liu's attack was fully committed with no possibility of his changing the angle of the cut. The sword swished through thin air.

A murmur ran through the crowd. Who was this man? The way Bolan had reacted was the act of a swordsman who fought in the spirit of munen muso: no conception, no design. The phrase meant the ability to act calmly and naturally even in the face of danger. It was the highest accord with existence, when a man's words and actions were spontaneously the same. Rare indeed were the men capable of it.

Bolan's horror at the executions, which had appalled his imprisoned eyes, turned to pure power as their avenging became his task.

Now that they had gone into motion, Bolan and Liu continued to move, circling each other, Liu changing his stance to a hasso, his sword raised above his head to the right. Bolan continued with his sword in the jodan position, held straight out at a forty-five-degree angle.

To the spectators the change in Liu's position indicated he intended to end the contest. The death, of the long nose would not be preceded by a display of sword fighting. The Lord of Life and Death was going for a quick kill.

Step by step they walked the thousand-mile road, Bolan keeping Liu company every inch of the way, moving sideways, backward, forward, his ki always flowing, his whole being concentrating on the task at hand, his mind empty of thought.

The righteousness of Bolan's cause, the readiness to accept death in the cause of mankind, gave him tremendous powers of concentration. No thought entered his mind because there was nothing to worry about. There was only one way on this earth for him and he was on it: do good for mankind and fight evil.

But Liu was worrying.

The unsuccessful charge had rattled him. It was like charging a phantom. Liu asked himself if the American was one of those who could sense an attack in advance. It was said that some men could do this. They were able to register the intent, that spurt of radiant energy emitted a moment before it is converted into action.

If so, Liu knew he was in trouble. Instead of killing the American, the American might kill him. Unlike Bolan, Liu had not entered the fight to die; he had entered the fight to win. The thought that he might not win forced him to consider a number of techniques to kill Bolan quickly.

"Eee-yiii!"

Liu's charge was premature. Everyone could see it. Just what made him do it no one could tell, not even Bolan. Liu may have realized he was losing his ki and decided to move before Bolan could take advantage. Or perhaps with his concentration wavering he was unable to feel Bolan's ki any longer — you cannot feel the other man's ki if yours is not out — and he mistakenly thought it was time to move in.

Either way, Liu thought, and that was what cost him his life. In kenjutsu one had to feel a move.

Once more Bolan watched Liu come. Once again he waited until Liu's attack was committed before moving out, and this time as Liu passed him he brought his sword down on Liu's neck. A red gash appeared in the pale flesh. Liu's legs buckled and he fell to his knees, rocking, blood spurting from his neck.

Bolan stepped back and raised his sword.

The crowd rose to its feet.

The sword in Bolan's hand flew down, and in a silent ending to the day's butchery, the Lord of Life and Death, heroin king of Asia, was executed.

The exorcism was over. The most hideous experience of his incarnation as Colonel Phoenix was over for Mack Bolan.

He had been trapped in a purposeless knot, the struggle between life and death, when the real struggle, the war between good and evil, had been put aside by the maddening and miasmic pull of the Far East, a murderous place on a bad day....