The Target

by David Baldacci

  The next. It was her brother.

  The woman screamed the threat again and again. “Do it now, Chung-Cha. Now! Or you are lost forever.”

  The last two strikes. Metal thudded into flesh.

  Chung-Cha no longer had any idea what she was doing. Her hand was moving of its own accord. She could have been stabbing a dead hog.

  When the hood was taken off her dead mother looked down at her.

  Chung-Cha dropped the knife, took a step back, and fell to the floor, crying, her body covered with the blood of her family. Then she picked up the knife and tried to kill herself with it, but the guards were too fast. They took it from her.

  The woman pulled her up. “You have done well. Now you can leave here and serve your country. Forever. You have done well, Chung-Cha. You should be so proud.”

  Chung-Cha looked at the woman. She was smiling down at the little girl who had just slaughtered her family.

  Chung-Cha did not know that she was crying in her bed now.

  But she did know that Min had climbed in with her, wrapped her little body around her, and was hugging her tightly.

  Chung-Cha could not hug her back. Not now.

  On the ceiling was the image of her family.

  Dead by her hand.

  All dead.

  The price of her freedom?

  Chung-Cha’s soul.

  Chapter

  56

  HIS NAME WAS KIM SOOK. He had escaped from Bukchang many years before. Sook had been extremely cooperative in helping Robie and Reel learn about his harrowing flight from the labor camp. He had escaped at age eighteen. He was now nearly thirty.

  He had been imprisoned as a hostile with his family for his father’s alleged crimes against the state. He and a friend, a young man a year older, had planned the escape for months. They had received information from two other prisoners who had escaped but been returned to the camp after their recapture in China.

  They had come back from a work detail outside of the gates. They had dispersed to go back to their huts. The guards had been lackadaisical, Sook said. They had not counted correctly or paid enough attention to where the workers had gone off to. He and his friend had hurried away toward their respective huts. But it was a busy time of the day with many people moving about and few guards to watch over them.

  Sook and his friend had gone to a place where they had hidden old woolen sacks they had collected over time. They waited until dark. It would be madness to attempt escape during daylight, Sook said. Then they wrapped themselves in the woolen sacks, trying to cover their heads and their hands especially.

  They crept toward an unguarded section of the fence. They had observed the patrols of the guards outside the gates and waited for a unit of them to pass by. Then they would have a half hour to make their escape.

  They used a long board they had hidden near the fence to pry apart the electrified wires. Sook said he could feel the current moving through the board and into him, but the wraps around his hand seemed to be working. His friend slipped through the opening in the fence. Then Sook passed the board between the wires and the friend made a gap for him and he slipped through. One of the wires grazed his shoulder and he could feel the jolt of current and smell his skin burning.

  He had opened his shirt and let Robie and Reel see the scar.

  “I was lucky,” he said. “One man who had attempted escape this way two years before got caught in the wires and was electrocuted.”

  Then both men had run. They ran for miles, following the road at first, then a path, and then they simply ran between trees in the surrounding forest.

  That had been the beginning of their long journey, a journey that included stealing clothes and food, bribing border guards with cigarettes, nearly being captured several times, and posing as workers in search of paying labor. Fortunately for them, there were millions of North Koreans looking for work and it was possible for them to become lost in such a multitude.

  “It was still very difficult,” said Sook. “We nearly starved. Were very nearly shot. We finally made it to China. I worked my way westward, into India. I saved my money for two years and then, with help, I flew to France. From there I came to America. I have been here ever since.”

  “And your friend?” Reel asked.

  “I do not know. Once we were in China we parted ways. We thought if we stayed together it would invite suspicion. I hope that he made it to the West, but I do not know.”

  He looked at Robie and Reel. “So you propose to rescue these people from Bukchang?”

  “Yes.”

  “You will not succeed.”

  “Why?” asked Robie.

  “It may be easier than many believe to escape from the camp itself. There are far more prisoners than guards. It is like a handful of men trying to corral a small city. There are many holes, many ways out. They control the population through fear and the snitching of other prisoners. In that way they have many more eyes looking out for problems.”

  “Okay,” said Reel. “And your point?”

  “The real challenge begins after you escape the camp. You have to blend in. There are bribes that must be paid. You must show yourself to those who will have no loyalty. Now, they may look the other way if you are North Korean. After all, you are simply filth trying to get by. You can do no real harm. They will let you pass for a few packs of cigarettes. It is done. You may or may not be recaptured. But the border guards will not suffer because of it.”

  “But if we don’t look like them?” said Robie.

  “You obviously are American. When you open your mouths you will sound like Americans. You are the evil. They will never let you pass. I am sorry.”

  “We won’t have to go through the border, Sook,” said Reel. “We have other resources, ones you didn’t have.”

  “But still, I will tell you, even with all your resources, they will not let you pass. They will capture you.”

  Robie looked at Reel. Reel turned back to Sook.

  “Can you think of some way that we could manage it?”

  Sook sat back in his chair and considered her question.

  “Perhaps if you had a North Korean with you.”

  “I’m pretty sure we don’t have any in our agency,” said Robie.

  “I will do it,” said Sook.

  Robie and Reel exchanged surprised glances.

  She said, “You’d risk going back to a labor camp in North Korea to help people you don’t even know?”

  “I may not know them, but I know what will happen to them in there. That’s enough for me. Let me help you.”

  “That’s not our call, Sook, though we appreciate it,” said Robie. “We’ll have to run it by our superiors.”

  “Then do so,” he replied. “Because without someone like me you don’t stand a chance.”

  Blue Man was for it. Evan Tucker and Josh Potter were against it.

  President Cassion approved it. That negated the two votes against. The president trumped everyone except the collective will of the voters at the ballot box every four years.

  National Geospatial analysts had zeroed in on Bukchang with their satellite eyes, and what they reported back, coupled with the results of other intelligence assets, had confirmed that the adopted son and daughter of General Pak were there. They even knew which hut they were living in. And that four guards surrounded the hut.

  There was also another intelligence success. General Pak had powerful friends in North Korea. One of them had managed to arrange for a coded message to be sent to the son and daughter in the camp. They would know that help would be coming.

  It took another week to prep the mission. Every detail was gone over a hundred times. And every contingency as well in case something went wrong, which they knew was not unlikely.

  North Korea was perhaps the toughest challenge Robie and Reel had yet faced. The country was hard to get into and even more difficult to get out of. It had millions of soldiers and a paranoid citizenry well versed in spying o
n each other. The terrain was difficult, the language and cultural barriers immense, and the country was located in a part of the world where, other than South Korea, the United States had few allies.

  They spent a week at the Burner Box doing intense fieldwork in preparation. The rugged mountains of western North Carolina stood in for the ones they would face at Bukchang. A mockup of the prison and the targeted hut was constructed at the facility. During the first few exercises Robie, Reel, and Sook were “shot dead.” They had made great strides since. But none of them knew if it would be enough when they tried it for real.

  The route in and out of the target would be unusual. As Sook had told them, prisoners escaping from Bukchang invariably headed north, toward China, whose long border with North Korea was not very far away. They would not be heading north. Too many things could go wrong, particularly with two obvious westerners in tow.

  They all hoped that their out-of-the-box thinking would make it impossible for the North Koreans to follow them.

  The night before they were to leave, Robie and Reel sat up late going over the plan one more time.

  “Do you think Sook will hold up?” he asked.

  “He’s done it before, Robie.”

  “Many years ago. And it might have been part luck.”

  “It might have been. But we’re probably going to need some luck too.”

  “I don’t disagree with you. We have to keep our heads down, literally.”

  She said, “But we’re the guardian angels. If we have to fight our way out, we’re going to have to do it.”

  “I know.”

  “I wonder if the president has considered the long game on this?”

  “You mean us snatching the traitor’s family out from under the North Koreans?” Robie asked.

  “Yep. If they were possibly going to come after us before, they’re sure as hell going to come after us if we pull this off.”

  “He was pretty emotional about all this, so maybe he didn’t really think it through. But that’s not our call, Jessica. We’re just the muscle in the field.”

  “Yeah, well, maybe the ‘brains’ should follow the muscles’ advice sometimes.”

  “I don’t see that happening. Too many egos involved.”

  “Seriously though, Robie, the North Koreans have nukes. And they’re crazy enough to use them. We pull this off they’ll feel like they’ve lost all face. They are not going to turn the other cheek. A successful mission here might just prove to be the catalyst for Armageddon.”

  “Which means a lot of poor, innocent people will die because their leadership felt disrespected.”

  “Which pretty much happens in every war ever fought,” she retorted.

  “But this won’t be war; it’ll be annihilation.”

  “You want to refuse the mission?”

  Robie shook his head. “No. I’ll do the mission. I just want both of us to understand the possible outcomes.”

  “I understand them very clearly. And at least the president, with all his faulty logic, is trying to make things right after what happened with Pak. I have to admire that.”

  “So let’s go do this thing,” said Robie.

  Chapter

  57

  THEY FLEW TO CHINA AND traveled to the coast by puddle jumper. From there they took a boat across Korea Bay at night and landed at the end of a small inlet that cut deeply into the North Korean coastline. The closest town was Anju. Bukchang was roughly thirty-five miles due east from their location.

  There were just the three of them: Robie, Reel, and Kim Sook. They were all dressed in black, their faces also blackened. Robie and Reel were heavily armed and had state-of-the-art communication gear. They hoped to be able to use it at some point to later rendezvous with their support team.

  Robie looked at Kim Sook as they tied down their high-performance rigid-hulled inflatable boat. The RIB could reach speeds of over fifty knots using relatively quiet engines.

  “You ready?” Robie asked.

  “Little late for that,” said Sook.

  “Just checking.”

  They had maps and directions loaded on electronic devices attached to their wrists like watches. Above them an American satellite was feeding them details about what lay ahead. In their earwigs a constant stream of intelligence info was being sent.

  Stealth was critical here, but so was speed. They had a long distance to cover and they needed to get there and back while it was still dark. That would be impossible on foot. So they had something else—three small scooters, powered by batteries, which ran very quietly. There were also pedals that helped to recharge the batteries. With night-vision optics they could see in the dark. Robie went first, Sook took the middle, and Reel brought up the rear.

  They stuck to the road as far as they dared, then went off road as they drew closer to the camp. Bukchang was in the middle of nowhere, so they would not have to navigate a city or any sort of populated area before reaching it. You didn’t build concentration camps among millions of people.

  They encountered no problems on the trip in. The satellite gave them a clear line to the camp. The intelligence chatter updated them on recent developments.

  Du-Ho and Eun Sun, Pak’s adopted son and daughter, were being held in a hut near the back of the camp. Unlike other prisoners, who were lumped fifty to a hut, the Paks were being held by themselves with special guards. But having only two prisoners in the hut didn’t make it easier for the rescue attempt; it made it more difficult. The other huts were not individually guarded. Apparently the North Koreans anticipated trouble securing Pak’s children.

  It had been confirmed that a coded message had been passed to Du-Ho and Eun Sun. They had not been told what night it would happen, because if that information had fallen into the wrong hands it would have been disastrous. But the two would know that a rescue attempt was being made and that they would have to be ready.

  When Robie, Reel, and Sook drew close to the camp they dismounted from their scooters and hid them in a patch of trees. Sook changed his clothes, wiped off his face, and hoisted an old duffel bag over his shoulder. Now he looked like a typical North Korean peasant. He took to the road while Robie and Reel paralleled his movements through the trees.

  The outer perimeter patrol of Bukchang lay dead ahead.

  As Sook walked along three guards approached him. They told him to stop and identify himself. He did so, telling them that he was traveling east to Hamhung to see his family and take a job there he had been promised. He gave them his paperwork, which had been expertly prepared.

  While two of them searched his duffel the lead guard examined the paperwork. He finally handed it back.

  “You are near Bukchang camp.” He pointed to the north. “You must head that way. There is a road that will take you around the camp and then you can head east.” He suddenly eyed Sook suspiciously. “What sort of job are you going to do in Hamhung?”

  “Farming.”

  “Let me see your hands.”

  Sook held them up. They were roughened and callused. He had spent a week making them so.

  The guard nodded. “Then go work your ox and smell your horse shit,” he said, and the other guards laughed.

  They stopped laughing when three rounds from suppressed weapons entered their bodies, dropping them where they stood.

  Robie and Reel emerged from the woods and dragged the bodies into the cover of the trees. Robie slipped off one of the guards’ walkie-talkies and handed it to Sook so he could listen in on local communications.

  They moved on and soon reached the rear outer fence of the camp. They had been given the patrol times of the guards and waited for four of them to pass by before moving closer to the fence. They knew it was electrified and had come prepared for that. Using a laser, Reel cut through enough strands to allow a good-sized hole that each of them could slip through.

  Sook went first, followed by Reel and then Robie. The hut they wanted was at the very back of the camp. As they crept forward
they saw a burst of light and then realized it was a guard lighting a cigarette. Reel and Robie circled the hut, counting off the number of guards surrounding it.

  Four. Like the intel had said.