(A striking contrast in identity, with an explosive first battle)
“I was crouched beside my electric bike, tearing off a food delivery slip, when a familiar sting suddenly shot through the back of my neck. It was my old shrapnel wound warning me. I looked up to see seven tattooed thugs blocking my way. Their leader held a cigarette and grinned. ‘A delivery guy? I’ll send you on a one-way food delivery to the afterlife.’
I dropped my insulated delivery box to the ground and cracked my knuckles.
Three years ago, in the jungles of northern Myanmar, I wore the same smile when I led my team through a ring of thirty drug traffickers.
‘Gentlemen,’ I said, loosening my collar to reveal the vicious shrapnel scar near my collarbone. ‘Do you know why special forces soldiers aren’t afraid to die?
Because, ’
Before I could finish, I had already seized the wrist of the nearest man and twisted his arm behind his back, forcing it up to the nape of his own neck. My knee slammed into his lower back. ‘We’re not even afraid of pain.’
Later, when the police came to take my statement, the young officer stared at the old scars on my arm and clicked his tongue. ‘Brother, how do you get injuries like that delivering food?’
I glanced down at the still-hot braised pork in my delivery box and smiled. ‘Delivering food?
What I deliver is this city’s last line of defense.’
Some people have rivers and lakes, and rivers and lakes are dangerous.