by Trish Loye
Socks on.
Boots on.
She stuck her hands under her armpits and huddled against the trunk of the tree, rocking slightly.
Time to move. She was so tired.
Time to move. Her eyelids closed for a second.
Time to move! Her eyes snapped open as if someone had yelled the words in her ear.
A figure stood by her tree. A burst of adrenaline started her sluggish heart like a defibrillator and she gasped.
“Come.” She connected her guide’s voice to the shadow. He waved her forward. “We must move.”
Her heart rate slowed to a steady thump in her chest. Just Kyung. She gripped the tree trunk beside her with numb hands, digging her fingers into the bark, and pulled herself up. She wanted to lean against the tree and nap, but Kyung had already started to walk, assuming she’d follow.
She had no other choice. She wouldn’t just sit here and turn into a human icicle waiting for the border guards to find her. At best, they’d send her swimming back across the river. And at worst? She’d personally find out about the prison camps.
She trudged after Kyung, her body lethargic, her breathing heavy, her mind numb. It was only three kilometers from the river to where he’d said the car would be. She could make three kilometers. One foot at a time. Branches caught at her coat, roots tripped her and leaves crunched under her feet. Just keep going.
She glanced from Kyung to her footing and back up. Not that she could see anything by her feet. She should have grabbed the night vision goggles from her pack when she’d had the chance, but she’d been afraid she’d drop them with her cold-clumsy hands and break them.
She blinked. Kyung seemed to have stopped ahead, his dark silhouette barely discernible among the black stalks of trees against the shadow night. She halted and squinted.
Fuck.
That wasn’t Kyung. It was a slender tree trunk.
She gasped and scanned the area, her gaze whipping left and right. No, no, no.
Movement. Off to the right. She squinted. That could be Kyung slipping away. She hurried in that direction, tripping and stumbling to catch up.
The moving shadow stopped. “Shhhhhh.”
She expelled a huge breath. It was him. Kyung.
The three kilometers took hours, weeks, months to do. The rest of the time, she stared at the back of Kyung’s head, willing him to be real and unwilling to chance looking away, even if that meant she tripped occasionally. She did not want to be left out here.
The forest lightened ahead. It wasn’t dawn, but the lack of trees barring the moonlight. Her steps quickened and she moved more surely. She wouldn’t lose Kyung again. They’d made it.
Within minutes, Kyung pulled camouflage netting off a light-colored pickup truck and stored it in the bed. The truck had been parked just off a two-lane road. Cassie threw her pack in the back and then clambered into the cab. Kyung started the truck and let it run for a minute before driving off. They rattled and vibrated down the cracked and holed road, and she loved every second of not having to walk.
Heat eventually seeped out of the vents she had her fingers plastered against. Her muscles seemed to melt with the warmth after being constricted from the cold.
“Sleep while you can,” Kyung said. “It’ll be two hours to the location.”
Cassie tilted her head back and fell asleep in seconds.
The engine shut off. Her eyes opened. Complete darkness surrounded the truck while the interior was lit with a few lights from the dash.
“We’re here?”
Her guide nodded and got out, heading around to the back of the truck. Cassie followed; the cool night air slapped her awake. The two-lane road looked the same. Rutted and cracked, it snaked through a dark forest. Her guide had parked right where the road turned south. A smaller road turned north. Only a small sign, warning intruders of trespassing, marked it. A black ridge line dominated the skyline to the west, while mountains surrounded them on all sides.
The narrow road led to Hwasong. Her heart tripped at the thought.
She took a deep breath to calm herself. It was just a matter of hiking five kilometers along the road to find Hwasong, but that could wait for morning. Tonight she needed to find shelter. Shelter that was away from the road and any patrols. It wasn’t an impossible task, especially considering she’d gotten to have a nap.
Kyung put her pack on the side of the road. Followed by a small sack. He handed her a piece of paper. She unfolded it to show a marked-up satellite photo.
“What’s this?”
“My brother printed this off the internet in China. It shows the main features of the area.” He pointed to marked spots on the map. “This is the ridge. Follow it north. Stay away from the road. Here is the camp. Watch out here and here for guard outposts.”
Her brain must still be thawing out. “Why do I need this? Aren’t you my guide?”
He spit on the ground. “No. I have other things to do.”
Her stomach hit the ground. “But I paid—”
He strode to the truck cab. “I will be back just after dark, three days from now.”
“But, you can’t—”
He slammed the truck door shut.
She tried to open his door. Locked. He rolled down his window when she knocked. “Are you seriously going to leave me out here?”
“I’m not crazy enough to want to go to a prison camp. If you survive, I will bring you back, just like you paid for.”
“But…what about food?” She only had energy bars and some chocolate.
“It’s in the sack. You should get going. You will need to find shelter before daylight. The guards do patrols every morning first thing and every evening before dark.” He started the truck. “Don’t get caught.”
She watched him drive away, feeling like an abandoned pet, left in the woods to fend for itself. The truck’s lights disappeared around a bend in the road. What if he didn’t come back?
Omigod, she was alone in North Korea.
The sound of an engine grew louder. Was Kyung coming back? Maybe he’d felt bad about leaving her.
Her cynical side jumped up and down. He wasn’t coming back. Someone else was coming. Someone who might stop to ask for her identification. Someone who might drag her to the authorities.
She needed to get off the road. Right now.
She grabbed her pack and the small sack Kyung had left behind, and scrambled into the trees. A few moments later, a dark sedan cruised by. Definitely not Kyung. She delved into her pack to snag her night vision goggles, a compass, an energy bar, and a bottle of water. She hefted the backpack onto her shoulders, took a basic compass reading, consulted Kyung’s map and took off into the woods, angling toward the ridge line.
It took close to an hour to walk the two kilometers to the ridge. Even with the NVGs, it was tough going through the woods. It wasn’t jungle dense like she’d seen once in Indonesia, but it had layers of obstructing foliage, including felled trees, thick bush, and tangled branches.
At least she didn’t have to worry about animals out here. The people had undergone such severe starvation for decades that they’d wiped out all the large animal species she’d have to worry about.
A cool wind struck up, making her shiver and bringing back memories of the icy Tumen River. She wanted to be out of the wind and get warm. She’d been following the ridge and by her estimation, she’d gone almost halfway to the camp. She wanted to find shelter somewhere within another kilometer or so. The sky that she could see through the branches above had lightened. Predawn, rather than true dawn.
Kyung had marked a stream on the map, a place where she could refill her water bottles. It should be up ahead if she was on track. Please let it be there.
She heard it before she saw it. The sound of gurgling, bubbling water. She’d brought purification tablets that the guy at the camping store said didn’t taste too bad. All she needed now was shelter and for some reason, it didn’t seem so daunting a task. She could do
this. She could find out about the plight of thousands of people condemned to prison camps by a tyrant and his need to keep his people subjugated and himself in power. She hoped her exposé would bring the plight of these people to the world in a way that it couldn’t continue to ignore.
The wind blew her curls across her face and nipped at her cheeks. She hugged her warmth to herself. She was a couple of klicks from the camp. It would have to be far enough for tonight. She began to look for somewhere to shelter. She’d climb a tree if she had to, but she’d prefer somewhere she could make a lean-to to block the wind.
The ridge line turned out to be more of a steep slope than an actual cliff of any kind. It was the first welcome mat of the mountain range beyond. In fact, Hwasong was situated in a valley between ranges. And one of those mountains held Punggye-ri, one of North Korea’s nuclear test sites. That would be extremely well guarded and something she needed to avoid.
She moved farther up the slope, where the trees thinned and kept a northerly heading. The forest lightened further around her and she pulled off her NVGs, blinking with the transition from a world of laser greens to grays and mottled browns. She needed shelter sooner rather than later.
She chewed her lip as she considered a hollowed log. It would keep her out of sight, but be tight and uncomfortable. What if she wanted to eat?
Next she pondered a large Korean pine. Roomier, but she’d need a rope to keep her from falling if she fell asleep, which, after this last night, she certainly would.
The sky lightened some more when she found a dense collection of trees and brush. She might be able to make a cozy nest inside, but she’d have to be careful about making an opening that looked natural. It would block the wind, but also her view of everything around her.
Visions of prison guards sneaking up on her made her move on. If she couldn’t find something in the next fifteen minutes, then she’d come back. She hiked farther, fatigue making her breath drag in and out of her.
Her gaze snagged on a dark spot higher up on the ridge. Was that an opening?
She climbed higher, clinging to the last tree and staring hard at the dark patch. It was an opening. Her heart accelerated and took off. She scrambled up to it, leaving the safety of the trees for precious moments as she made her way to what she’d seen.
As she reached it, her blood slowed and cooled. Yes, it was an opening, but narrow and long horizontally. Maybe only two feet at its tallest point and about three feet long.
She pulled out a flashlight and hunkered down to see how deep it was and grinned. An actual cave.
She pulled off her pack and shoved it ahead of her into the entrance, and wiggled on the ground after it, pushing her way inside. She’d always wished she’d been born taller, stronger, more Amazon-like, but right now, she blessed her parents’ small statures.
The entrance was about four feet of narrowing rock. Visions of giant spiders or, worse, the rock above her cracking and crushing her, had her panting. Something skittered ahead of her and she froze. What if the cave was occupied by a lynx or an angry marten? The chances were slim but she still didn’t move forward. Rustling sounds echoed from within.
Shit. Should she back out or keep going?
The sudden staccato beat of her pulse in her ears made it hard to hear, but nothing hissed ahead. Just a bit of tiny scratching. Still, she hesitated.
Crap. How was she going to survey a prison camp if she couldn’t enter a small cave?
She pushed herself forward, keeping her light pointed ahead, hoping to blind whatever animal lived in the cave. By the time she’d squeezed through the end of it, her harsh breathing had silenced the creature. Her light revealed a high ceiling of about ten feet near the entrance, which then sloped quickly down toward the ground like an uneven lean-to. One side had a jagged opening that led into darkness beyond the power of her light. Damp, cold air filtered from the recesses of darkness. Dirt and rock and forest debris littered the floor.
Something skittered past her feet and she jumped. Mouse. And another one. Four mice scampered out the tunnel entrance. She shuddered. She hoped they didn’t come back while she slept.
She surveyed the space again. It was perfect. Safe from prying eyes and she could see what was going on outside from the safety of her door. She eyed the entrance. She might be able to use the small tarp she’d brought to block any light from escaping. She could have a fire. Tension eased from her muscles. This was going to work.
Time to fix up her home away from home.
Cassie stifled a groan when she woke. She’d been so tired that she’d pulled out her sleeping bag, crawled in and passed out, not bothering to cushion herself from the rock floor. She blinked as she sat up. Tonight she would set up her sleeping mat.
From what she could see, the sun was high in the sky outside. She stretched and got ready to start her information gathering. She ate an energy bar, left her big pack in the cave, and took a daypack with her camera and water bottle, as well as her emergency supplies. She wanted to stay as light as possible.
She also put her satellite phone in a secured pocket. The thing had cost her almost as much as her ticket to China, but it was worth it. It made her feel a bit safer to have a connection to the outside world. Not that having one would do her any good. No one would be able to step in and save her if things went wrong.
Nothing was going to happen, she reminded herself. She was going to be ninja-stealthy.
It was just after noon when she wiggled out of her cave. Birds called to one another and squirrels chittered. Sunlight dappled the ground through the leaves of the trees. The air smelled of pine and crisp fall. She could almost imagine she was Snow-freaking-White walking through the woods, where the worst she had to fear was an old crone carrying apples.
She definitely needed more sleep.
She found a sheltered spot to relieve herself and then took off in the direction of the prison camp, her senses on high alert, constantly planning what she’d do if she ran into a patrol. Here was a good tree to climb for hiding. This area had no cover and she’d have to run. There was a thorny thicket she could dive into.
The closer she got to her destination, the slower her steps became. When she guessed she was within half a kilometer of the edge of the camp, she moved from tree to tree, never leaving cover for more than a moment. The birds had stopped singing.
A bark made her freeze.
Her heart tried to leap out of her chest. Shit. They had dogs. She wanted to bang her forehead against the tree. She’d known they had dogs but she hadn’t really thought what that meant for her.
She took a moment to get her bearings. Another bark farther north. The wind blew from that direction. She breathed a sigh of relief—she was downwind—and stepped out from behind the tree.
She crept along, scanning for any movement ahead of her. A large clearing opened ahead. A barren field, from what she could see. Figures crouched in the neat rows of dirt, gathering something.
Movement to her left startled her. She wanted to leap behind a tree, but knew the sudden motion would attract the attention of the two men walking into her line of sight.
Ever so slowly, she shifted until a tree hid her from view.
The men wore ragged pants and shirts, both the gray-brown of clothes so old and dirty that neither had a true color anymore. Their bare feet shuffled along the ground and their slight shoulders slumped beneath the bulging sacks they carried on them. Their bones seemed to poke through their sallow skin, making their cheekbones have sharp edges and their wrists and hands seem too large and gnarled. They looked like concentration camp victims from the Holocaust.
She had found the prison camp.
6
Cassie waited behind the tree at the edge of the camp, letting her heart rate settle. She pulled her camera out and inched forward on her stomach to get a better view. There was no fence, but the guards didn’t need one. The prisoners she saw barely looked strong enough to walk, let alone run. And there was nowhere for th
em to go. The camp was in the middle of a mountain range, far from any cities or towns.
The two guards watching the prisoners stood, smoking, near a truck at the other end of the field. A German Shepherd lay panting at their feet. About two dozen prisoners worked the field, digging out potatoes from what she could tell. She took pictures of skeletal men and boys, as well as of the guards.
She wanted more.
She moved deeper into the trees and then started moving east, toward the camp entrance and main road. From the satellite photos she’d gathered in her research, she knew about the main buildings but not what they were for. And none of her informants could tell her much about the inner workings of the camp either.
Within thirty minutes, she’d drawn closer to the main compound of buildings in the camp. Concrete block buildings three and four stories high hunkered around a dirt square that she could only glimpse from her position hidden among the trees. She could only begin to guess at what each building housed. Barracks, offices and possibly a mess hall. A chain link fence ringed this part of the compound. An almost subliminal hum told her it was electrified. Trucks and jeeps crowded a parking lot near the main gate.
Armed guards manned the gate and strode about the compound. She didn’t see as many prisoners here.
She took photos and surveyed the area for an hour, almost disappointed with her lack of progress. She had two days before her guide came back. What she’d seen wasn’t enough for a story, for what she wanted to expose. She didn’t want to enter the camp—she wasn’t completely crazy. For now, she’d continue around the edge of the camp, taking as many photos as she could.
She spent the rest of the day creeping through the woods, trying to find some high ground in order to see more of the interior of the camp.
When the sun went down, she pulled out her NVGs and worked her way back along the perimeter of the camp to the ridge line she needed to follow back to her cave. She hadn’t gotten anything really useable yet and frustration made her edgy and her stride quick.