China Is Vast, Yet So Small

"Brother Fang, Staff Officer Zhu has been in there so long. Nothing's happened to him, has it?" Liang Xiyun poked his head forward and peered in every direction. Aside from a squad of flustered policemen who had just scrambled out of the police bureau's gate, not another living soul was to be seen. If he had not said anything, it might have been fine, but his words sent drums beating in Fang Wenjian's chest. Fang glanced at the two guards by the grated gate, who refused to meet his eyes, then turned and said, "Forget it—we'll wait five more minutes! If there's still no word, charge in with me!" "Understood!" The men behind him rubbed their palms and cracked their knuckles, poised and eager, practically settling into a charging stance. Hardly had the words left his mouth when Zhu Shiqing strolled out at an unhurried pace. In a few strides, he reached the gate and signaled for a withdrawal, murmuring, "Pull back. Return to regimental headquarters." "What's the situation? Were we right?" Fang Wenjian stepped forward to ask. "Ninety percent." "Then let's grab them!" "We don't have hard evidence." Zhu Shiqing shook his head. "I took a look at this Mi Yonghua. He's an office-seeker obsessed with rank, with no real control over the police bureau. The root of the problem still lies with that gang. But the shooting has already started, and we don't have time to mess with them. Let's head back to regimental headquarters first and report this so the military can round them up." At that very moment, the fighting at Guang'anmen was drawing to a close. With the arrival of reinforcements from the Garrison Regiment, the Japanese plan to seize Beiping with two companies fell apart. Recognizing that their firepower was at a distinct disadvantage, the Japanese craftily pulled back from inside the city walls and retreated from the battlefield in trucks. Were it not for the carpets of corpses strewn near Guang'anmen, the Beiping residents might have thought they had merely endured a vivid, terrifying nightmare. The battle at Nanyuan was far more brutal. The Japanese deployed the full brunt of their main force, launching a three-pronged assault under cover of heavy artillery against Nanyuan's outer perimeter. In under an hour, they breached several positions. Japanese bayonets reached almost to the foot of the walls of Nanyuan's inner barracks, and at their closest, their shells struck the stables not far from army headquarters. Tong Linge ordered He Jifeng's brigade to retake the lost ground at all costs, while simultaneously commanding Zhao Dengyu's 132nd Division, which had already reached the vicinity of Wanping, to break through enemy forces along the Ping-Han Railway as swiftly as possible and reinforce Beiping! Inside the city, when Sun Yi reported Zhu Shiqing's findings to Wang Bing of the Garrison Regiment, the regiment happened to be investigating the very same matter. Every soldier who had taken part in the fighting found it bizarre that the city gates had swung open without explanation—and as for the eleven policemen stationed at Guang'anmen, not one was to be found alive, nor had a single body turned up! Weighing Sun Yi's report, Wang Bing made an immediate decision: he dispatched troops to occupy the police bureau, take over all its functions, and detain every official and officer on the premises pending further investigation. In Yingtaoyuan, soldiers held torches aloft, brightly illuminating the entire encampment. At the center of the grounds lay the bodies of forty-two soldiers who had fallen in tonight's battle, laid out in three rows. Stained white sheets rested lightly over them, and amid the rustling leaves stirred by the wind from all directions, everyone looked on in solemn silence. These young recruits of the Military Training Corps had perhaps witnessed killing and war before, but for many, tonight had been their very first time stepping onto a real battlefield to fight for their lives. Before tonight, they were hot-blooded youths determined to lay down their lives for their country; only now, gazing across the divide between life and death, did they truly understand what war was. Sun Yi did not linger amid the grief. An emergency deployment meeting regarding Beiping's defense was being convened through the night at the former 29th Army headquarters. At Song Zheyuan's official residence in Tianjin, that meeting had already reached its conclusion. Overnight, the peace faction within the 29th Army had their heads blasted back into reality by Japanese artillery. The Japanese had never intended to negotiate peace; their true ambition was all of North China—indeed, all of China. After days of hesitation and delay, Song Zheyuan finally realized that his own suspicion and distrust of the central government had been exploited to perfection by Katsuki Kiyoshi. Facing reports that positions at Nanyuan were crumbling one after another, the 29th Army telegraphed Nanjing: "The situation across Beiping-Tianjin has reached a truly grave crisis. We implore the Central Army to advance north along the Ping-Han Railway by forced marches day and night to relieve the siege of Beiping!" Yet the fact that the Japanese had chosen to launch a full-scale offensive tonight—even sending a detached force of two companies in a daring bid to seize Beiping directly—made it plain that Katsuki Kiyoshi meant to settle the Beiping-Tianjin incident once and for all overnight. Against such a ferocious onslaught, facing the thin, undermanned defenses of Beiping, the city's fall was merely a countdown. *** By a nearby earthen slope, the Military Training Corps dug a large trench to lay these young boys properly to rest. Sitting on a flight of steps in the distance, Zhu Shiqing watched. As the night wind blew, images of facing off against the Japanese at Fengtai surfaced unbidden in his mind. For a fleeting instant, Xia Qidong's voice seemed to echo in his ear, but turning his head, he saw Liang Xiyun approaching with a somber expression. "Staff Officer Zhu, do you think we can hold Beiping? The Japanese have never breached our city walls before." Liang Xiyun squatted down beside Zhu Shiqing, his gaze drifting helplessly toward the earthen slope. "I don't know," Zhu Shiqing replied, shaking his head. "The Japanese are coming at us with immense force. Whether we can hold it... it's hard to say." "I suppose if we can't, that's only natural," Liang Xiyun said, letting out a cheerless chuckle with his head hung low. "Why do you say that?" Zhu Shiqing turned to ask softly. Liang Xiyun pointed toward the earthen mound. "One of my classmates is over there. We enlisted together. His home was in Heilongjiang. And Heilongjiang couldn't be held either, could it?" A pang of sorrow pinched Zhu Shiqing's nose. Reaching out with his left hand, he ruffled the boy's hair and offered comfort: "Don't worry. With you boys here, the devils will never break the Chinese people. Even if Beiping falls, we still have Baoding, we still have Zhengzhou, we still have Wuhan." "I know. The teacher who taught us Chinese classics used to say that too—China is vast." Liang Xiyun nodded meekly, but then his tone shifted. "Still, as vast as China is, I won't have a home anymore." "This..." Zhu Shiqing was momentarily at a loss for words, seeing the boy state this with an unnervingly calm face. Before Zhu Shiqing could gather his thoughts, Liang Xiyun continued, "I've heard that children back in the Northeast have to take Japanese classes and learn Japanese etiquette. Will Beiping become like that one day too? If I come back here in the future, will I find that I'm the outsider?" "That's why we have to take up arms and fight these invaders to the bitter end," Zhu Shiqing broke in. Liang Xiyun suddenly smiled, his tone carrying quiet certainty: "I think if Beiping really is going to fall into Japanese hands one day, I'd rather die on this ground, resting forever in my hometown." Zhu Shiqing did not know how to respond to such words. He desperately wanted to tell this young boy that a soldier must first preserve himself before he can kill the enemy, but the words refused to leave his mouth. He could not help wondering: through all those long years, what had been going through the minds of those Northeasterners forced to drift southward? What must the common folk trapped in the occupied territories be feeling? If he were not in Beiping today, but in Nanjing, and massive enemy armies converged from every direction, bringing him to that crossroad of life and death, would he be able to rationally abandon and flee the city he had grown up in? Zhu Shiqing could only let out a quiet sigh and pat Liang Xiyun gently on the shoulder. "Whatever happens, once you're on the battlefield, keep your head down and dodge the bullets. Only by staying alive can you kill more enemies." Yet after lowering his hand, those words lingered in Zhu Shiqing's mind: Indeed, China was vast, with ample strategic depth; but it was also small—so small that every single inch of land was a spiritual home for someone.