The night before the strike, Batavia was too quiet.
Even the sea seemed to hold its breath.
From the upper floor of Kim Yang's warehouse, Jinyu stood by the shuttered window, the smell of oil and salt thick in the air. On the desk beside him lay the final coded message:
"The tide favors the brave."
It was written in Chen Guosheng's sharp hand — the signal that the telegraph lines were down, Zhou's diversions had begun, and Cai's men had bought the city forty-eight hours of silence. The Dutch were already chasing ghosts across the market districts.
Below, harbor boats were being loaded under the cover of fog. No one spoke. The entire night felt like the pause between breaths.
Jiaxin was there — not in silk, but in a worker's coat thrown over her kebaya, hair tied up and hands steady as she checked the manifest against Chen's notes. She had refused to stay behind.
"Father's ships are ready?" she asked quietly.
"Ready," Jinyu said. "But once this starts, you can't stay."
Her lips curved faintly. "You've said that before."
"And you never listen."
"I do," she said, stepping closer. "I just don't agree."
He exhaled, half a sigh, half surrender. "You should be with your father's men when they sail north."
"You shouldn't be here," he said quietly.
Jiaxin met his gaze, unflinching. "All my life, Father said the world moves because men decide it should. But women… we only get to watch."
Her voice softened. "I'm tired of watching, Jinyu. I want to be part of what changes it."
"And miss history?" she whispered. "I helped you plan this, remember? If we fail, it's our failure. If we win—"
"Then Batavia breathes free," Jinyu finished softly.
She smiled. "Exactly."
Chen's alliance had never been about trade alone. Every crate smuggled under Dutch noses was a quiet rebellion; a promise that the Indies would no longer be a pawn for foreign empires.
Batavia wasn't just a port tonight. It was a message — that the colonies could fight back.
By dawn, the city was unrecognizable.
Zhou's newspapers hit the stands first, their front-page headline "Markets Rejoice for the Harvest" carrying the signal phrase. Within hours, hawkers shut their stalls in mock "celebration." Firecrackers burst near the tram depot, while a staged brawl outside the post office drew Dutch patrols away from their routes.
In the telegraph house, Li's men disguised as repair workers poured resin into copper circuits, rewiring half the switchboard. When the first sparks flew, the entire grid went silent.
No messages in. No orders out.
The colonial network? Essentially blind.
And in that silence, Batavia began to move.
Night fell over Tanjung Priok like a held breath.
The harbor reeked of oil and smoke. Chen's ships rocked softly against the tide, their hulls heavy with "textile shipments" that weighed far too much to be cotton.
Jinyu's soldiers; twenty trained men in plain clothes, moved like clockwork, shifting crates marked Kim Yang Trading Co. into smaller harbor boats waiting in the fog.
"Careful," Jinyu warned as one crate landed with a dull thud. "If the Dutch inspect, one crack—"
"—and we hang," one of Cai's men muttered grimly.
Jinyu nodded once. The plan was simple: deliver the cargo to inland caches before dawn. In twenty-four hours, an entire battalion could arm themselves.
Jiaxin was at the far end of the dock, checking off the last of the marked manifests. Her sleeves were rolled up; her palms smelled faintly of salt and ink. She shouldn't have been there. Everyone knew it, but her focus was sharper than half the men.
"General Xu," Chen called from the dockside. "Telegrams from Noordwijk confirm it — Dutch troops are chasing phantom fires. You have your window."
Jinyu gave a sharp nod. "Then we move."
The first harbor boat pushed off, its engine muffled under tarps. Jiaxin caught his gaze as he turned to oversee the last crate.
"Try not to die before sunrise," she said, almost smiling.
He almost smiled back. "That's an order I can obey."
The first explosion tore through the air before dawn; small, controlled, deliberate. It wasn't meant to kill. It was meant to blind.
Flames licked the telegraph station's roof as Dutch officers scrambled into chaos, shouting orders no one could hear. At the same moment, Jinyu's unit slipped into the Noordwijk depot, their boots whispering over the concrete floor. Crates were pried open one after another; rifles, cartridges, disassembled barrels, all wrapped neatly in muslin.
"Load fast," Jinyu ordered, voice low and sharp.
His soldiers moved like clockwork, passing crates hand to hand toward the water's edge. For a few precious minutes, everything went to plan.
Then the whistle blew.
The shrill sound split the night in half from a Dutch sentry's cry cutting through the fog.
Gunfire erupted. Bullets clanged against metal, ricocheting through the dark.
"Positions!" Jinyu shouted, dropping behind stacked barrels as his men returned fire.
The Dutch had arrived faster than expected. There were at least thirty soldiers, rifles leveled. Chaos lit the docks with fire and noise. Sparks flew as cables snapped and crates shattered.
"Keep moving!" Jinyu barked. "Boats first — don't stop!"
Jiaxin had been helping secure the manifests by the pier; when the shooting started, she didn't run. She grabbed a fallen rifle from one of the crates, her hands were shaking, but steady enough to aim toward the lights.
"Get on the boat!" Jinyu shouted when he saw her.
She didn't. "Not until you do!"
Another gunshot. The bullet hit close. The next one found her.
Jinyu turned just in time to see her stagger, hand pressed against her ribs.
She looked stunned, as if surprised by the pain.
He caught her before she fell.
The air stank of gunpowder and iron.
"Stay with me," he said, command and plea all at once.
Her eyes fluttered, searching his face. "I told you… Batavia would teach you something."
Her hand went still against his.
Jinyu froze. One heartbeat, two — then lowered her gently to the ground, brushing the soot from her face.
Behind him, his soldiers were shouting: "General! We're clear!"
He didn't answer.
Instead, he rose, rifle in hand, and turned back toward the oncoming patrols.
"Go," he said quietly. "Get the last shipment out."
"Sir—"
"That's an order."
They obeyed.
When the Dutch reached the pier, Jinyu stood waiting in the smoke, coat torn, eyes empty.
He fired until his rifle jammed, then drew his sidearm and fired again.
Each shot was slower than the last.
Each breath, heavier.
When the final bullet struck him, he didn't fall right away. He turned once toward the sea — the same sea that had carried their hope, and whispered something no one could hear.
Then, silence.
By the time Chen's remaining ships reached open water, the docks behind them were burning. The operation had succeeded.
But Batavia would remember that night as the one when the tide stopped breathing — and two souls vanished into its smoke.
The Dutch reports later called it an industrial fire. No arrests were recorded. No names mentioned.
But months later, when smuggled rifles appeared in the hands of nationalist cells from Bandung to Semarang, whispers spread through the ports; that Batavia's tide had turned once — just long enough for freedom to breathe.