The Armageddon Machine

by Mike Ramon

Chapter Sixteen

  Tanchon, North Korea

  June 3 -- 12:45 UTC/9:45 pm local time

  Han Ji-hoon tossed his cigarette into the gutter, where it floated in the water left by an earlier rain shower. He looked into the food container, saw that there were only a couple of noodles left at the bottom of the carton, and tossed the container into the gutter to join the cigarette butt. He looked for oncoming traffic, and seeing none he crossed the street.

  He passed a beggar on the street, almost tripping over the old man’s legs in the gloom; he cursed the man before walking on. A utilitarian truck passed by on the muddy street. The truck was painted drab green; a military truck. Probably some soldiers out looking for some girls. If they found any they would have a good night tonight, whether the girls were willing or not. Han Ji-hoon laughed at the thought, regretting that he wouldn’t be able to get in on the fun.

  The street was dark in that way that he should have gotten used to but hadn’t. Another blackout, all too frequent in this country, had extinguished the lights of all the homes and streetlights of the neighborhood he was walking through. He only hoped that the power would be on in the neighborhood that he had called home for the past five weeks.

  Han Ji-hoon walked on, breathing in the crisp night air. He looked up at the sky. The moon was full and bright, and the stars looked like chips of ice spread out on a piece of black felt. After a while he found himself on his block, and to his moderate delight he found that the streetlights there, though sparse, were all ablaze. The place he was staying in was the top apartment of a rundown building that had six units in all, all of the other units being empty. The apartment belonged to an old friend of his who was working in the capital.

  He pushed through the front door of the building, the door squealing on rusted hinges. The hall was dark, but he knew there would be light upstairs, and the promise of it beckoned to him. He climbed the steep staircase, stepping out onto the second floor landing, turning and starting up to the third floor landing. On the third floor he walked to the door of the apartment, the floorboards creaking under his steps like some cliché out of a horror movie.

  He didn’t need a key since he had left the door unlocked when he left the apartment earlier in the day, so he simply turned the knob and walked in. He reached for the light switch and flipped it up. But there was no light. For a moment he stood still in the darkness, wondering what the hell was wrong with the light, and then he felt something sharp jab his arm and he found himself in a whole new realm of darkness.

  When he finally rose up out of the darkness the first thing he saw was light. It looked fuzzy, blurry, much like his head felt. He could tell that it wasn’t sunlight. It was lamplight. So there was nothing wrong with the lamp after all. He tried to remember what had happened after he stepped into the apartment.

  A slap to the face cleared the cobwebs from his head. He looked around the room in a panic. He was bound to a chair, and he was in the living room. There were three people with him. He knew them all, and upon seeing them he knew that he would never see the morning.

  “Good evening, tongmu,” Cobra said. “I was beginning to think that I would not see you again in this life. I am pleased to have been wrong.”

  Cobra was standing nearby. Another chair--matching the one to which Han Ji-hoon had been strapped--had been placed at Cobras side. Sitting on the chair was a black bag; it looked like a doctor’s bag. Tarantula was standing near the window; he had evidently pulled the curtains shut. Black Widow stood near the closed door to the only bedroom in the apartment. Her eyes looked like dark pools of ink even as the light from the lamp illuminated the rest of her face. Han Ji-hoon swung he head back to look at Cobra and found Cobra staring back at him.

  “Brother Taipan,” Cobra spoke. “Why did you betray us?”

  Han Ji-hoon--who until recently had been known simply as Taipan--felt like he couldn’t speak. His lips felt as if they were frozen shut, his tongue felt thick and stupid, his throat felt parched as a desert. He knew that he must speak anyway.

  “I sw-swear, brother Cobra, that I never betrayed any of you. I never betrayed the cause. I would take out my own eyes, my own tongue, before doing such a thing.”

  A look passed across Cobra’s face then; Han Ji-hoon thought it was a look of disappointment.

  “There is no need for lies now, tongmu,” Cobra said. “We are past that. I didn’t come up here from the South to listen to lies and excuses. Don’t you understand? We are not here to find out if you have betrayed us, only why. Can you not find one last shred of truth somewhere deep in your traitor’s heart to tell us the truth?”

  “I knew that brother Scorpion suspected me of something,” Han Ji-hoon said. “I didn’t know what it could be, but I knew there was something. He asked me such strange questions that day. He wanted to know where I went when I was alone, who I spoke to, where I went to eat, who I was sleeping with. There were so many questions. He said that it was a routine security matter, but when I saw him going to speak with Viper after he finished questioning me he looked back at me just once, and I saw it on his face. I saw my judgment there. So I ran. I was so scared that I just ran. You must believe that I have never done anything--would never do anything--to hurt the cause.”

  Black Widow walked over and with a flick of her wrist a hot line spread across Han Ji-hoon’s face, and he let out a sharp cry. As the woman stepped back he saw her return a short blade to a hidden pocket in her shirt. He groaned as he felt blood dripping down his cheek. Over by the window Tarantula laughed.

  “We interrogated Ka Sung-jin,” Cobra said. “We interrogated him…at length. We know everything.”

  “Ka Sung-jin…I don’t recall the name,” Han Ji-hoon said. “Who is he?”

  He flinched as Black Widow stepped forward again, but Cobra stopped her with a motion of his hand. The woman stepped back, obviously disappointed at not having another opportunity to inflict pain on the bound man.

  “Brother, do you want to die screaming, or would you prefer an honorable death?” Cobra asked. “The choice is yours.”

  “Ka Sung-jin…uh, yes I remember him now. An office worker, I believe. I saw him sometimes at a noodle shop that I used to go to sometimes. I think that was in Pyongyang. Y-yes, I’m certain it was there.”

  “And he was only an office worker?”

  “Yes. Well, that’s what he told me. I had no reason to doubt it.”

  “You never knew that he was a member of the State Security Department?”

  Han Ji-hoon looked surprised.

  “No, of course not. If I had known I would have stayed far away from him.”

  “Tell me the truth,” Cobra commanded calmly.

  “I swear that I am, brother. I swear it on the honor of my mother and my ancestors.”

  Cobra lived up to his name, striking out with a fist that was blindingly quick. The blow landed on Han Ji-hoon’s cheek, rocking his head around.

  “We know it all!” Cobra shouted. “You must see that if we know all of this we know it all.”

  Han Ji-hoon started crying then. The tears made him feel shame, but they came regardless.

  “Please, brother,” he pleaded. “Just let me speak to Viper, as I should have done that day instead of running. I beg you. He will understand if I tell him my story.”

  “You will not speak to brother Viper.”

  Han Ji-hoon thought of a defense.

  “I am not a traitor,” he insisted. “If I were a traitor, why would I be here in this shitty apartment? Why wouldn’t I be under government protection?”

  “Your friend who sent you here told us what you said to him that day.”

  Han Ji-hoon’s face darkened.

  “Yes,” Cobra said. “We know about him, too. He was soft. He took less convincing than Ka Sung-jin to betray you. You went to him the day you ran. You were panicked. You said that you had gone to Ka Sung-jin and asked for protection, but that he had turned you away. You were afraid, and so your friend told you
about this apartment.”

  “No, no, he is lying. I told him none of that.”

  “You sold your soul for nothing, brother,” Cobra said. “In your moment of need our enemies would not even take you in. They sent their pet away to whatever fate awaited him.”

  “No, you must believe me.”

  “But I don’t.”

  Cobra leaned down and opened the black bag. He reached in and started taking out his instruments. They gleamed in the lamplight. Han Ji-hoon’s bladder loosed itself then; warm fluid ran down his pant legs.

  “You have chosen, brother,” Cobra said. “You will die screaming.”