Thunder in the Morning Calm

by Don Brown

  The nurse shifted her eyes back and forth between Pak and Staff Sergeant Mang. “Derogatory comments about Dear Leader?” She took the blood-soaked paper towel away and tossed it into a white trash can. “If she insulted Dear Leader, she is fortunate to still have her teeth.”

  The nurse dabbed another paper towel against Pak’s mouth. This one did not seem to absorb as much blood. “That should stop the bleeding.” The nurse removed the second paper towel and tossed it in the trash can with the first. She picked up her clipboard and started writing again. “My compliments to the disciplinary practices at Kim Yongnam.” She scribbled a few more notes. “I take it that the blister also is a result of a well-deserved disciplinary matter?”

  “Yes,” the colonel’s assistant said. “She is an employee at the prison. However, she was disciplined because she was caught stealing.”

  “Caught stealing?” The nurse looked up from her pad. “Stealing what?”

  “Medicine.”

  “Medicine?”

  “Yes. She stole medicine and attempted to administer it to one of the prisoners.”

  The nurse slammed her clipboard down on her desk. “Does she not realize that medicine is an expensive and rare commodity?”

  “I do believe after our little disciplinary session, she now realizes this.”

  “Do not fear, Sergeant Mang,” the nurse said, “by the time we have finished our readjustment procedures here at the hospital, I do not believe you will have any other problems from this patient.”

  “Excellent, nurse. I will report this to the colonel,” Mang said. “Would you like for me to remove her handcuffs now?”

  “Hmm …” The nurse looked at Pak. “Let us get her on the examination table and put the restraining straps on her. Once we do that, then you can remove the handcuffs.”

  “Certainly. Lie down, Pak.”

  Pak positioned herself on the table, face up.

  The nurse tightened the straps, first across her feet, then across her shoulders.

  “All right, Sergeant, I don’t think she is going anywhere. You can take the cuffs off.”

  The nurse grabbed Pak’s arms and held them. When she did, the sergeant reached over, inserted a key into each handcuff, and the tight cuffs, which had been cutting into her wrists, fell off.

  “Be still and I will tie one more strap,” the nurse said.

  Pak didn’t move, and the nurse tightened a third strap around her waist area. The restraining straps now held her down at her shoulders, her waist, and her feet. The straps weren’t too tight, and she was able to breathe.

  “There,” the nurse said. “I do not think she is going anywhere. Now we can begin our testing.” She walked back over to the desk and picked up her clipboard and began scribbling again. “Sergeant, I understand there is an issue as to whether she is competent to understand the charges against her, and whether she is competent to face a firing squad?”

  “Yes,” the colonel’s assistant said. “That is one of the issues that Colonel Song is instructing us to look into.”

  “Very well, Sergeant,” the nurse said. “Please tell the good colonel that we will make competency determinations on her ability to face a firing squad, and that he will have his determination soon.”

  Pak’s heart beat with a renewed fervor. Whatever your will, Lord.

  The nurse wrote some more. “Sergeant, you are welcome to stay if you care to observe our testing. But this could take a while.”

  “That won’t be necessary. There is business to attend to back at the camp,” she said and checked her watch to see if there still was time for her meeting with the colonel. “I will leave the patient in your hands.”

  “As you wish, Sergeant.” The nurse stood and extended a stiff arm to the sergeant, who took her hand and shook it and then walked out the door. The door closed behind her with a click.

  Lord, not my will but thy will be done. For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever.

  Pak opened her eyes. The nurse was standing next to her. The black plastic glasses were gone. So was the black angry look in her eyes.

  “So what was your real crime, my sister?” The woman’s voice and tone had softened. “You tried to give some medicine to one of the poor old Americans?”

  Even a fool is deemed wise when he is silent.

  “Oh, you do not think anyone knows about the old Americans up there? Do you not know it is the worst-kept secret in this region?”

  She is trying to trick me. If I acknowledge that Americans are there, she will report that I revealed a state secret, and they will behead me.

  “For what it is worth, I think you did the right thing trying to help the old man. It is a shame that they will all be gone soon, and no one will ever know that they have been there all these years. Let me take a closer look at that blister.”

  The nurse bent down and looked carefully at the blister on Pak’s neck.

  “Dear Leader brags about capturing the Pueblo and how we supposedly beat the Americans in the Great War sixty-some years ago. But then he hides this dirty little state secret. Of course we in the hospital know because they have brought them up here for treatment for years. They swear us to secrecy and make it a capital offense if anyone talks. So only hush-hush rumors percolate. They have shot a few people who talked too much about the old Americans and even shot some people who innocently heard too much information.

  “Of course, if you ask me, it is typical Pyongyang hypocrisy. It is as if they are afraid that the Americans would nuke us if they knew. Brag about the Pueblo. But keep this under the covers. It sounds like the great Dear Leader is not as brave as he would have his subjects believe. Hmm …” She eyed Pak’s neck. “A second-degree burn. A cigarette?”

  Surely this was all part of the psychological testing, Pak thought. How could a woman go from so harsh to so soft in such a short period of time?

  “Don’t want to talk? Okay. Hold still while I apply some antiseptic on that blister. I won’t touch it, just drip a little of this on it.”

  She held a bottle over Pak’s neck. Three drops fell on the blister. The soothing was instantaneous. “I am sorry, but that is all the antiseptic we have at the moment. They do not give us much. Medicine is scarce. But do not worry. I will send the doctor into town to the pharmacy for more tomorrow. He is a good man. He is one of us.”

  One of us? What does she mean? Pak wondered.

  “I will loosen these straps in a moment.” She turned and walked back across the room. “As soon as our friend has had time to get back on the road. I must put on a show to convince her and her superiors that I will treat you in the same brutal fashion that they treat you. But do not worry. It is all a show.” The nurse reached up into a cabinet. “We have a small amount of ointment called aloe vera. Smuggled in by Christian missionaries from Seoul. A local pharmacist gets it for us. He is a good man. He is one of us.”

  She removed the tube from the cabinet and walked back over to Pak. “I will apply a small amount around the base of the blister. But I warn you, it can be cold at first.”

  Pak watched the woman squirt green ointment onto her finger. “I’ll try not to touch the blister. So be still.”

  At first, the ointment felt cold, and Pak cringed when it touched her skin. But then the woman rubbed the ointment onto her neck in slow, circular motions, carefully avoiding the blister. “That feels good,” she said, forgetting her self-imposed vow of silence. “Thank you.”

  “You are welcome. Let me do this a bit longer. Then I will loosen these straps.” She continued to rub gently around the blister.

  “There,” she said. “No more aloe. We shall pray that the doctor gets more from the pharmacist tomorrow.”

  The nurse removed the restraints from Pak’s feet. Next she removed the waist strap, and finally she took off the collarbone strap.

  “I am sorry we had to do that. I tried not to make the straps too tight. I hope you could breathe okay.”

  “Yes, I coul
d,” Pak said.

  The nurse examined her mouth. “What really happened here? Did the dog hit you with a pistol?”

  “How did you know?”

  “And let me also guess. You never said a word about the great Dear Leader, but the dog made that up as a story to give to the lady sergeant.”

  Pak was not sure what to think. “How do you know these things?”

  “What is your name, my dear?”

  “Pak. I am Pak.”

  “Well, Pak, I know how they operate. If they want to strike you, they make up a reason. If they want to cut you, they invent an accusation against you. If they want to torture you or shoot you, then they make up stories that you have slandered Dear Leader. That way, they have a range of options, all the way up to murdering you, if that is what they wish to do. Now then, is there anything you want to ask me?”

  Pak hesitated. “What did you mean a moment ago when you described both the doctor who works here and the pharmacist as ‘one of us’?”

  The nurse flashed a beatific smile and then rubbed Pak’s hair. “What do you think I meant?”

  “Perhaps … perhaps you are suggesting that we share a … a common philosophy?” Pak asked.

  “Communism is a philosophy,” the nurse said. “Would you like a glass of water?”

  “Yes, please. Thank you.”

  The nurse walked over to a sink and ran water from the faucet into a glass. “Let me help you sit up. There. Lean forward and I will put pillows behind your back.”

  Pak leaned forward, and the nurse fluffed three pillows and slid them under her back. The pillows felt so soothing. She sipped the water.

  “No,” the nurse said, “a philosophy is something shared by the likes of the animals who burned your neck and tried breaking your teeth by hitting you with a pistol. Philosophies come from man. What we share is not a common philosophy, but rather a common relationship with one who is living, who makes us sisters.”

  Their eyes met. Pak said, “A relationship with one who was and who is and who is to come.”

  The nurse smiled. “A relationship with the one who lived, and died, and rose again, and lives forevermore.” She reached over and opened her arms. They hugged and tears flooded Pak’s eyes. The nurse squeezed her tight in her arms. “It is all right, Pak. We will protect you. The doctor will declare that you are insane and unable to stand trial. Whatever it takes, we will do.”

  CHAPTER 20

  Zodiac boat

  nearing North Korean coastline

  In an earlier life, before he left the private sector to return to the Navy, Lieutenant Commander Gunner McCormick worked as a commodities analyst in the mammoth building of the New York Mercantile Exchange located in the heart of Manhattan’s financial district, on the bank of the Hudson River. He worked nights and monitored the prices of overseas commodities coming from foreign markets. The job paid him considerably more than his Navy job — not that he needed the money. But the hours were bad. He worked the midnight shift, from just before twelve to eight and sometimes nine in the morning. After work he would go home to his posh Manhattan flat, sleep most of the day, get up in the afternoon, have breakfast, and then do it all over again.

  The night shifts were lonely, and oftentimes, between the reports streaming in from overseas markets, Gunner would grab a cup of black coffee, wander over to the large windows overlooking the Hudson River and, from his tenth-floor office, gaze out in the black of night at the river, at the occasional boat passing by, and at all the lights shining on the Jersey shore across the way.

  The few lights he was now seeing on the other side of the narrowing band of black water that separated the Zodiac from the world’s most oppressive Communist regime provided a stark visual contrast. He thought back to the myriad of blinking lights and colors reflecting on the water of the Hudson, a symbol of a powerful economic life, a bustling capitalistic democracy. As they moved closer to shore, Gunner could see only two or three solitary lights on land. There was no loom of city lights anywhere onshore. There was no reflection of lights on the black water. There was only darkness, a darkness that was the end result of a government taking, and taking, and taking some more. In the end, lifelessness.

  Finally, Gunner could see a dim outline of the land that somehow, some way, had taken his grandfather. Somewhere beyond the dark and desolate shoreline and the mountains rising behind it, in this land of mystery and evil, were the answers to his questions.

  Their gasoline was almost gone. They had two options: they could remain at sea and die or go ashore and fight to survive. And maybe solve the mystery of the missing Americans that had gone on for so many years.

  “Let’s hold up for a minute and get organized,” Jackrabbit said. “GPS says we’re one mile from the shoreline.”

  Jung-Hoon let up on the throttle. The boat eased along at idle speed.

  “Okay,” Jackrabbit said, “let’s review the first phase of our landing plan. We hit the beach right straight ahead of us, about ten miles northeast of the town of Sinch’ang. There’s a road snaking along the coastline.” He stopped and took hold of his left upper arm, took a deep breath, and continued with, “We’re sixty miles from the Hamhung area. So we’ve got sixty miles to cover to see if the camps really are there.

  “When we hit the beach, we need to keep moving as far as we can and as fast as we can while it’s still dark. I figure if we don’t have to stop for anything, we can move about five miles in an hour and a half. Doing the math, that’s about ten miles in three hours … if we’re on foot.

  “Right now, it’s twenty-thirty-hundred hours local time. We hit the beach in thirty minutes, assuming we don’t run into any Koreans who distract us with target practice. We change clothes, deflate the raft, and bury it in the sand along with the motor. Then we move inland and head southwest along the road. We need to take advantage of the night and move as far as we can toward Hongwon.

  “By oh-four-hundred, we move up into the mountains, establish base camp, and stand alternating watches while the others get shut-eye. Jung-Hoon will go into town to collect intel. When he gets back, he hits the rack.

  “Remember. The night is our friend. We move quickly, rapidly, silently.” He paused for a moment and again pulled his left upper arm against his body.

  The wind had died down some, and the boat floated in toward shore, the outboard at idle speed. They could hear the soft rhythmic murmur of the waves breaking against the shoreline.

  “Questions?” Jackrabbit said.

  “I’ve got one,” Gunner said.

  “Fire away, Commander.”

  “What’s wrong with your arm?”

  “Nothing’s wrong with my arm,” Jackrabbit snapped.

  “Nothing wrong with your arm? Then why do you keep holding it? Sure looks like something’s wrong.”

  “Like I said,” Jackrabbit snapped again, “nothing’s wrong with it. We’ve gotta get moving. No time to mess with anybody’s arm.”

  Gunner quickly ran his finger down Jackrabbit’s upper arm and felt a tear in the wetsuit. “You’ve been hit.”

  “Nothing to it,” Jackrabbit insisted. “Not the first time I’ve had a little ole bullet graze me. I’ve been splashing it with some cold saltwater. Keeps the bleeding down. It’s nothing.”

  It struck Gunner that with all the hasty planning to get the mission started, one thing had been left out. Antibiotics. In fact, they had no first-aid supplies. Nothing.

  “Jung-Hoon, when we get to a town, a store, take some money and find some first-aid stuff, especially some antibiotics to get on that wound.”

  “That isn’t necessary.” Jackrabbit snorted. “That’s a waste of valuable time and resources. You aren’t a real man unless you’ve taken at least one bullet in your lifetime. Flesh wound. It’ll be all right.”

  “You heard me, Jung-Hoon.”

  “Got it, boss. In fact, one of the underground contacts that Reverend Lee gave us is a pharmacist.”

  “Great,” Gunner sai
d, “let’s get this boat moving again.”

  Jung-Hoon revved the outboard and steered the Zodiac back toward the northwest. The roar of the outboard blended harmonically with the swish, swish, swish as the Zodiac cut a path across the swells.

  Gunner forced his mind to rest. The next fifteen minutes might be his last chance to relax before he either escaped North Korea or died there. He stared straight ahead. There. The dark mass of land, outlined dimly against the sky, seemed to rise higher as they came in closer to shore. Above the dark expanse of land, an army of stars spread out. The sharp black division between the darkness rising from the sea and the field of stars clearly showed the tops of the great mountains that dominate the country. He remembered the words of an American colonel serving in the Korean War who, in describing the Korean landscape, said, “Behind every mountain, there was another mountain.”

  Jung-Hoon shut off the outboard.

  “Okay, we’re about two hundred yards from shore,” Jackrabbit said. “Jung-Hoon and I paddle in the rest of the way. No noise. When I give you the cue, Commander, you get out of the boat and pull us in. No more talking until we hit the beach. If anybody’s out there, well … put it this way … they don’t need to know we’re here. We’ve wasted enough valuable ammunition already this evening.”

  “Got it,” Gunner said. “Mum ‘til we hit the beach.”

  Jung-Hoon and Jackrabbit each grabbed one of the two small paddles.

  This was their last push in to shore. The sound of the breakers crashing on the beach was now much louder. This was the same sound that Gunner had heard over and over, thousands of times, during summer vacations at Nags Head and Cape Hatteras.

  The moment had arrived.

  Gunner turned around and saw Jackrabbit give a thumbs-up. He waited for the next breaker to shove the boat a bit farther along. Then, in the respite between waves, with the Zodiac still moving toward shore, he put his right leg over the side of the boat and waited for the next wave to shove them in closer to shore.