Liang Jian Amal kept riding through most of the night, walking the animal as he had to. He was walking the animal, at the moment, frustrated by his slow speed as he was driven on. Dawn had just started to break and he saw a plume of dust start to appear behind him."At last, they finally catch up."
Liang JianAmal continued on, waiting for them to catch up to him, unwilling to stop and wait. He had to keep moving. He couldn"t stop.
A couple of Mahindra"s and Jeep AAVs came roaring up to him first. The calvary was a little further behind carrying the main force of the national guards, which had mobilized on his orders. The vehicles came to a stop before him the men"s faces grim, each armed carried a saber on his left, an AKM, a Marakov Pistol on his right hip, as well as an Ari B"Lailah strapped horizontily to the back of their wide belts.
They were fully armed and dressed in tan camoflauge as he had instructed the guard to tell them to be after the gruesome murders. After last night, the disappearances over the last month, as well as the movements within his uncle"s compounds; Liang JianAmal felt that it all pointed to something large-scale being in set into motion. They needed to be ready for whatever lay at the end of this tunnel.
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Back in the palace Li Hua sat with Hakim Al-Ha.s.san , as the latter tried to comfort the former. She had sat awake all night waiting for Jian to return with her daughter. Initially she had been sitting near the main gateway from the palace to the city, after having stood there until exhaustion, watching, waiting. Hao Jin Ying and Hakim Al-Ha.s.san had persuaded her to come inside, as there was nothing further they could do. She sat on the padded couch in the salon, counting and recounting every tile in the wall and ceiling, trying to distract herself from her trepidation.
Late in the night a spent guardsman returned to the palace with a message for Hao Jin Ying, who then rushed off, dragging the half dead man with her by the shoulder pads of his uniform. Li Hua instinctually had wanted to follow and do anything she could to help, and tried to stand to follow, Hakim al-Ha.s.san stopped her though. He placed one large hand over the two of hers that were gripped together as if in prayer.
"My hafid will take care of this. Trust in him."
"I just feel so useless, my baby is out there somewhere. She"s all that I have.." Li Hua started to weep again as the sun rose illuminating the halls.
"Dear one please don"t weep, you must be strong and take care of yourself otherwise what will little Chang say when she sees you in this state? Come now dry your eyes, you should eat something as well." He gave a motion to one of the maids who stood in the corner in attendance and she flurried off to the kitchen.
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Liang JianAmal left his horse for one of the calvarymen to take care of as he hopped into the back of one of the trucks, bracing himself against the side framing. He grabbed a pistol and one of the Ari B"Lailah"s, from the full set of equipment that was brought for him as well. He was trained by the national guard of the republic of Lahat growing up and was familiar with all the weaponry, as well as how to handle himself in a fight if needed. He worried about the tracks growing fainter and wearing away and so joined the vanguard, wanting only to continue on as quickly as possible.
The tracks continued on taking them into sandier area through hills and scrub brush. As they were continuing on a glint caught the corner of Liang JianAmal"s eye, right before rapid gunfire rang out, ripping through the truck to his left causing it to flip. One of the shots. .h.i.t the driver of the vehicle he was in and tore through the front of the engine. The vehicle slowly crawled to a stop, as the force that commanded it to go had been snuffed out.
From the other truck flipping, a giant cloud of dust and sand rose into the air disrupting sight, and the shots stopped. All the men in the vehicle got out and hid behind the truck, opposite from where the shots rang out. Liang Jian Amal motioned and called out for the other two trucks to pull back and circle round. They needed to pinpoint where those were coming from. There was no doubt now they were on the right track.