The Writers' Circle

THIRTY-SEVEN



The Package Origin
Guanxi, China
Near the Vietnamese border



	Earlier in the day, a few hundred kilometers away in Dìzhou, Guanxi, China .

	She couldn't sleep because of the heat; air-conditioner had failed. She knew her mission to deliver a package was of utmost importance that even a lack of sleep was not a viable option to stay back. Merry Lee Kwen Yao, or Milky, as she was often referred to for her initials, had to get up early and get to Nánníng Airport to catch a flight to Chóngqìng to meet up with a client. Merry-Lee was a cousin to Huáng Shé Jiang, a prominent member of the Pù Táng clan drug syndicate, a niece of the notorious Praying Mantis and recently jailed due to ORF. A sister to Conan Michael Yao, (a Canadian-based microbiologist), she was tasked to deliver a package to Babafemi Udegbunam with strict instructions that only he could be present at the meeting; a long-standing order whenever she accomplished a delivery to Babafemi.
	Merry Lee came from a remote hamlet of Dìzhou, on the northwest side just shy of the Detian Waterfalls, adjacent to the hamlet of Jìngxi, in the Guanxi region of China near the Vietnamese border. Recently, she received a sealed package from her brother Conan that came with an explicit warning sent separately via a coded email message from another contact somewhere in Indonesia. 

	'Do not open the gift. If you do, you and the people around Guanxi will meet up with Hóng Xiùquán. He will be very angry. Give the gift, intact, to our client. I will tell you when and where.'

	Merry Lee Kwen Yao and her cousins believed that their whole Hakka clan descended from Hóng Xiùquán whose encounters with western Christian missionaries in the nineteenth century had led Hóng to believe he was the younger brother of Jesus Christ. He had established himself as the Heavenly King of the Taiping 'tien-quo' or the 'Heavenly Kingdom of Great Peace'. Tragically, Hóng led the failed Taiping rebellion, which saw tens of millions of lives lost.
	It was always the same cryptic message sent with previous deliveries, which accompanied each of the past samples using different wordings, but the same concealed reference to Hóng Xiùquán. However, each of the previous samples were delivered by Udegbunam to various locations in Europe, North America, Asia and other parts of the world. Each delivery had various deadly consequences.
	The veiled message simply declared never to open the package for fear of death to the whole community. Merry-Lee was not one to disobey her brother. She knew that Hóng Xiùquán had died in 1864 and to 'meet up' with him might mean death to her and the surrounding village. She had been discreetly delivering the samples to Udegbunam using different drop-off locations in and around the country. Final drop off instructions had always been handwritten to avoid detection and always given by hand. There were no electronic trails of final instructions. 
	For this package, it was necessary for Merry Lee Kwen Yao to be extra careful, as the final contracts had been agreed to and underway.  There were newspaper and website clippings sent separately by FedEx to be shown as well to Babafemi as proof that what they had supplied was even more virulent than was originally thought.

	Little Swan or Xiaotian'é huoguo was a self-serve restaurant that offered its clientele a choice of a hot or mild broth. The restaurant boasted a buffet table, which would give foreigners and other non-Mandarin-speaking visitors, more control of what goes into their choice of traditional hot pot dishes. Specialties had included 'all-you-can-eat' hot pot with nutritional Chinese herbs, some visitors might refer to it as 'eat all you can identify' hot pot, and medicinal soup made from soft-shelled turtles, tortoises, black chickens, spring pigeons and intestines.
	The orange-colored square pillars, in contrast with a glass entrance, framed with black granite and with a red upper façade, adorned with traditional Chinese grey roof tiles over a black with gold-inscription sign, along with matching gold Chinese-character signs above it, gave the restaurant an easy feeling yet a profound old-world approach to fine hot pot dining. The old and bold Chinese design, mixed with modern glass structure, added some strong Bashu culture of Chóngqìng and Sìchuan into it. 'Ba' had referred to Chóngqìng, and 'Shu' to Sìchuan. Bashu Culture was the regional culture centered by Chóngqìng and Sìchuan, including the minority culture in some parts of the surrounding regions.
	The Prince and Scorpion stood in front of Little Swan and admired the intricately designed entrance, similar to what most tourists would do - in awe. They were both pleasantly surprised to see a fine diner in these parts of China, but the Prince and Scorpion did not come here to eat.

	A pair of lovely ushers in white gloves and Cheongsams smiled them in.
	Scorpion looked at the Prince and stretched a wide grin; upper and lower teeth clamped together, showing an off-centered gold-capped tooth, surrounded by thick dark gums.
	Udegbunam returned a sillier grin and nodded.
	"Les goh find Miss Merry Lee Kwen."
	"Yeeeaow- zah."