Chu Im Wang leaned back into the soft leather. Truth be told, he loved the seat behind the wheel just as much as he did the back of the car. But he couldn't drive all the time. Not only was that not possible, it was also inexcusable. There was a time for indulgence and there was a time for practical luxury. This was the time for the latter. That did present the opportunity to look at the outside, the glass of the window serving as good enough barrier of separation. He was six when he asked his now dead grandfather, "Are we special?"
The old man nodded and spoke in an even voice. "Yes, little Wang. We are special. Do you know what makes us special?"
"Money?" he answered weakly.
The old man laughed that rumbling laugh that echoed in the room. He sat the boy on his knee, pointed out the large window at the vast grounds and the city further beyond the quiet outside the walls of the mansion. "You see that, the big city? People there struggle every day to make money, earn money, to fulfil their little dreams. They call themselves regular people. And look at us. Do we need to hold back on our little desires?"
Little Wang shook his head.
"That's right," the old man continued. "We don't. When a little desire pops up in here," pointing first at his head and then at his chest, "we just fulfil it. That makes us different from regular people. Doesn't it?"
Little Wang nodded.
"What does that make us then? Special."
"Special people," little Wang repeated.
"Exactly. Special people. But do you know what that means? To us? It means we have to work as well, harder than normal people, to remain special. You don't have to be very smart. That's okay. Not everyone is smart. But you must be wise. Do you understand little Wang?"
"Yes grandpa, I understand."
Chu Im Wang understood then. And he understood now. Even better. He wasn't smart. Not as much as his brothers and sisters and many of his family. Not as much as the people who worked under him. He had always known that, because grandpa told him. Grandpa also told him it was okay, so he knew that as well. He didn't put on airs. He didn't try to be something he wasn't. He learned wisdom. He was wise. He looked at people, at the vices that pulled them down from the best they could be. He looked at his own vice – that of holding back until the very last moment. He accepted that and all of himself. He quietly remained the best he could be.
"I guess I'm wiser today than yesterday grandpa," he said to the window. And smiled, like grandpa would at him.
He was feeling nostalgic today. Not very surprising. It started with the dream. He dreamed that he'd turned little again. Gone back to the summer when he was eight. That last summer with grandpa. He broke into grandpa's study, found the old man bent over a bunch of papers that he didn't recognize at eight but now did as the reports from the company. Screamed. "Grandpa, I've come." Grinned at the old man who looked up with a wide smile. Rushed into the open arms. And then, they'd played all day. In the evening, when grandpa laid him to bed, he woke up.
He'd gone about the routine as usual. Hardly anyone noticed he was quieter than usual, and if they did, they didn't show it, which was how it should be as far as Im Wang was concerned.
He paused the ruminations as the car slowed in front of the tall building that was the headquarters of Modus Operandi. He could have the driver take the car down to parking, where there were elevators, even those that went up the executive floors, which were the upper floors housing the offices of the executives and would require special access cards. He was his grandpa's little Wang, however. And grandpa always said it felt like his office only if he walked in through the main doors. The car stopped right in front of the main doors, an authority granted only to the higher executives, VPs and up. He opened the door, grabbed his briefcase and started to step out.
He felt it first. A sharp pinch on his right forearm. Then, just as it the pinch magnified into a stabbing pain and the seat burst, he thought he heard a distant click, the sharp sound of a gun. He'd know because he'd fired them. He reacted before his brain could. Slipping out the car to the ground and then rolling under the car, a series of actions he completed smoothly like a single act. He thought he heard another click, another shot fired. He did hear something strike the hardened window that could withstand even a bullet. Then, the screams drowned out all else.
A minute later – maybe it was an hour, you never could say under such duress – security covered the car. Big men standing around a long car and still managing to cover it entirely from distant eyes. Two of them, laying on their stomachs, helped Im Wang out from under, toward the building's entrance. Then, the team surrounded the smaller man in the middle and rushed him inside.
The world fell silent again. Only, it was a silence fraught with tension, with fear.
Inside the building, the team of personnel fell to their stations under the commands of the leader, who too was among them. The leader, a man older than the rest and also bigger and sturdier, offered his shoulder for Im Wang to lean onto. The two rushed to the security office on the first floor for first aid.
Im Wang knew where and how bad he was hurt. The first bullet had gone through his forearm. A through and through. Not a lot of bleeding either. Not worrying. The second was a complete miss. The third was what could be called a miracle shot. It ricocheted off the ground into his side. He didn't feel it immediately. Shock and adrenaline casting their magic. As he was dragging himself out from under the car, the pain shot through all of him. The kind of pain that was unbearable and that brought a man to tears. The kind of pain that would leave a scar, and it was up to the man to decide whether that was a scar of shame or a medal of pride. He would have preferred to hold back the tears. Grandpa always said a man doesn't cry tears, not because it isn't manly to do so, but because it doesn't wisen you. "And we never do what doesn't wisen." But it was a lot of pain. More than any he'd experience all his life. Maybe more than all the pain he'd felt all his life summed up. He couldn't not cry tears. At least no one noticed. Except the leader. That was why he didn't let anyone else come along.
Also because the leader felt the warm blood as he helped the injured Im Wang to the security office. There he sat Im Wang on a chair and checked on the injuries. The hand wasn't worrying. Im Wang groaned, almost screamed really, as he lifted his hands while the team leader took off the jacket. The white shirt was red on one side, and wet.
"This isn't good," the team leader said, after cutting the shirt open and looking at the wound on Im Wang's side. "The bullet's inside. Might have hit organs. I'll be applying pressure. It'll hurt. I'll give you something for the pain."
"No," Im Wang said, shaking his head lightly. "Nothing for the pain. Might complicate things. Put pressure. I'm ready."
He only groaned softly this time. They didn't have to wait long for the ambulance to arrive, with a doctor inside along with the EMTs.
"Three shots," Im Wang said to the team leader before being led off to the hospital.
The team leader nodded to show he understood.