Jen fell, knees hitting soil. “Ah Tay!” she screamed.
Around her, people were yelling, running. They were all dressed in period clothes, as if two different films had collided into one another. There were people dressed like Ah Tay, Chinese men with their hair in braids, long tunics and soft pants. There were women too, but Jen could hear them more than she could see them. In the background, children cried. She did not know where she was. It was all mud and dirt and poorly built houses. People babbled in Hokkien and Mandarin and—she realized—broken Tagalog.
There were other people: guards in light blue uniforms with swords and guns, charging into houses, pulling out men and women and children, kicking at them, stomping on them and, at last, pulling the trigger. She recognized them as the
