Her bare feet left deep imprints in the soft white sand, barely visible in the fading light before they were washed away by gentle waves breaking upon the shore. As day transitioned to night, Peng Weijie could barely make out the silhouette of volcanic cliffs rising a few hundred yards inland. Weijie enjoyed her walks along the sandy shore each day, and the scenery even more. On the northern tip of Taiwan, just forty minutes from Taipei City, Baishawan Beach offered spectacular views of both the east and west. In the early morning hours, the approaching dawn illuminated the horizon in an inspiring fusion of pink and orange hues, and in the evening, the crimson sun set upon her country, stolen by the communists.
Weijie was only five when her family fled the mainland. She could still recall the image clearly—peering over the rusty railing of an aging fishing trawler at the disappearing shoreline, clinging to her mother’s leg as they fled to Taiwan with Chiang Kai-shek and what remained of his supporters. As the trawler pitched in the rough seas, fighting its way across the Strait, the loss was almost unbearable. Their father had been killed by the Red Army in the waning days of China’s bloody civil war.
That was over sixty years ago, and Weijie remained proudly defiant. Her people would never succumb to their larger and more powerful neighbor. She feared the communists would eventually attempt to take their small refuge by force, but they would not be easily conquered. She cast a reassuring glance at the volcanic cliffs. The plateau was populated with dozens of early-warning radars and missile batteries, defending what remained of her homeland. Beneath her fierce defiance, however, Weijie harbored a glimmer of hope that their two countries would indeed be united, her children and grandchildren inhabiting a single, democratic China.
As Weijie’s thoughts turned to her family, she looked forward to tomorrow’s visit by her daughter and granddaughter. She and her daughter would swing Xiaotien between them as they walked along the beach, dipping the child’s feet into the ocean. Weijie’s rumination ended when she stepped on something hard in the soft sand. Stooping to examine the object, she unearthed a mollusk shell, its striated colors shimmering even in the dim light of dusk. Xiaotien would be thrilled to add it to her collection.
Weijie stood, brushing off the remaining sand, and was about to put the shell into her pocket when an unusual sound coming from the west captured her attention. As the sound grew louder, Weijie watched as hundreds of tiny, bright red lights streaked overhead. Seconds later, explosions rocked the peaceful shore, illuminating the plateau in a splattering of fire while hundreds of bright red dots continued inland. After a fearful glance at the darkening west, Weijie turned and ran toward home, dropping the shell onto the soft white sand. To the east, the horizon was alight in an orange glow.