I saw where Kwon Chol was going with this, "Minister Meon, remember my voice? We've spoken before. I explained your demands to these soldiers. Been difficult to raise that amount of cash on short notice. Could we substitute more gold instead?"
Meon coughed a few times. "Kwon? You were ordered to only communicate with me, not to negotiate!"
"You told me they killed all my men. You'll be happy to know I've seen them. Alive."
Now Meon sounded like Santa Claus after he'd had 99 bottles of tequila too many, "That's great news! Must have been a mistake. Our intelligence isn't always the best from south of the DMZ. I'll insist they allow you to bring them both back with you, once this is over."
"Both? Never said there were only two."
"I just assumed. Get Pahk. I have new orders for both of you.
"Slight change in plans."
Pahk stepped forward. Bent over the phone, "I'm here, General."
"You're to take command there. I have a new mission for Kwon, but first, kill the American. He can't be trusted. Make it painful."
I shook my head. "I can hear you. You've lied enough to these men."
Pahk pointed his Type 88 at my head. At this short range, could probably deflect the barrel to the side before he actually fired.
Unfortunately, that would direct his muzzle toward Hyo-jin, restrained at the railing and unable to even attempt to dodge.
Kwon Chol pushed Pahk's barrel down with the wrist of his hand holding the phone. "There is no proof of his words, but do you have evidence you're pushing for peace and not wealth?"
"Evidence? You have your orders, obey them!"
I drew my phone. Held it between us. Handy gadgets, these modern smart phones, even the militarized ones.
"Listen."
I played the recording I'd copied to my phone from Bishop's encrypted chip.
Meon choked on the other side of Kwon Chol's phone. Perhaps a seizure?
I didn't care.
"You'll note he identifies himself. Demands money in exchange for the city. This is my favorite part."
I rewound the recording ten seconds.
Played Meon's final words again, "Comply, and you can keep your city, the bomb, and I'll even throw in a special forces platoon once I'm safely away with my new wealth."
Cocked my head at Pahk, "I guess you dudes are the special forces platoon in his message?"
Their fearful leader made one final attempt, "Don't listen to his lies. That's a fake. Kill him, before he destroys us all."
Kwon Chol lifted his phone to his mouth, "Before he destroys you, you mean? It's all lies. Everything you ever taught me. Everything you ever said to me. Everything in my life so far.
"You killed my brother. His wife and her son are here with me. Your Party killed my parents. Betrayal after betrayal. You aren't my family, you're my slave master.
"No more!"
With those two words, Kwon Chol spun and chucked the phone.
It sailed an arc through the air. Up past the bullet-riddled ceiling. Down through the shattered window frames. Clear out the open end of the observation deck.
Impacted out of sight. Somewhere below.
The first rays of morning hit the ceiling above the opening.
I checked the time. "Meon's 24 hour deadline is over. Guess this means he won't call you and order you to set that thing off?"
Pahk took a step back from us all. Raised his weapon in our general direction.
If he shot Kwon Chol, releasing the dead man's switch, ten million Seoulites would die.
Not to mention Hyo-jin, Michelle, and the rest of us.
Chapter Forty-Five: Spiking Volleyballs
Yang Hyo-jin knew the stress-resistant properties of the vinylon zip ties binding her.
Their yield point and modulus of elasticity. Understood how weight and momentum worked, in detail.
Been a world-class athlete.
So why couldn't she break free?
Family reunions and phone calls distracted the North Koreans.
She stood in a pool of darkness at the edge of the observation platform, the only light on her from the city below, deflected through the floor to ceiling glass windows.
She twisted her wrists in opposite directions. Multiplied the strain she could apply.
Needed to exceed their load carrying capacity at the line of greatest pressure from her twist. Attack her bond's tensile strength at its weakest point.
Lifted her arms high.
Took up the inch of wrist slack.
Slammed her elbows down to generate momentum; brought her wrists apart at the apex of the force she'd generated. Used her force and her bond's friction against the steel railing's edge. Abraded the vinylon cords.
Again.
Again.
On the third try, her restraints parted. Free hands!
She flailed at the railing. Too much momentum. Her bonds didn't hold her to it anymore.
Managed to grab on without falling on her rear. Looked at Sam, Pahk, and the others.
No one had noticed.
Except Sam. He stared at her out of the corner of his eye. She could tell, because after she recovered her balance, he winked and deliberately looked away from her.
They argued with the politician on the phone.
She went to work on the zip ties locking her ankles to the bottom railing.
With the free use of her hands, plus the greater strength of her legs, she broke those faster.
Freedom!
She rubbed her wrists and ankles. Got her blood flowing again.
As the sun rose on their deadline, Kwon Chol spun and chucked his phone out the open end of the observation deck.
Their conversation hadn't gone well. Relationships with old-Korea bureaucratic superiors didn't always go as planned.
Rhee also betrayed her, after all.
Pahk stepped away from the group. Walked backward. Toward her.
Pointed his gun at them.
Sam made eyes at her. Looked at her. Then at Pahk. Trying to tell her something, but she wasn't sure what.
She pointed at herself. At Pahk.
Sam nodded imperceptibly.
She raised her arms up. Mimicked hitting like a boxer.
Sam nodded again. Stepped forward; toward her and Pahk.
Pahk retreated until he was half the length of a volleyball court away from her. Pointed his big gun at Sam.
The biggest threat.
Hyo-jin ran her approach motion, designed to generate maximum momentum at the point of attack above the net.
Pictured Rhee's face on the back of Pahk head.
He turned his neck at the noise of her steps, but kept his weapon trained on Sam.
His face betrayed no fear.
She was just a foolish young scientist, after all. He was a trained special operations soldier.
She adjusted her approach into a curved path behind him. Leapt in the air.
Transmitted her gathered momentum and power into her arm swing.
Spiked the ball; Pahk's head, just above the ear.
The force of her blow drove him into a sideways stagger. His finger on the trigger added new holes to the ceiling.
So loud!
Sam finished his own rush. Slammed his heel into the side of Pahk's knee.
Shouldn't crunch like that. She cringed, unable to not imagine the end of a player's career in the noise.
Pahk collapsed to the deck.
Sam wrestled Pahk's rifle away. Clubbed him in the face with the shoulder stock.
Broke his nose. Blood gushed out.
Sam secured Pahk with his own zip ties.
Hyo-jin put up her hand for a high-five. He'd gotten over his emotional poison.
They'd worked together well.
Sam wrapped her in a bear hug, instead.
* * *
I released Hyo-jin from my embrace.
She blushed. Don't go much for public hugs in Korea. I didn't care.
She'd done exactly
what we needed, taking out Pahk with a volleyball spike to the head.
With Pahk out of commission, tied up on the deck, that left Kwon and the soldiers guarding the base of the tower.
Kwon Chol held up the dead man's switch. "I'd surrender, but they didn't explain how to shut this thing off, just how to arm it."
I used Hyo-jin's arm to tug her over to him. Wasn't about to let her go now, not when I'd just gotten her back. We'd worry about what that meant to us later.
One mistake and we could lose the whole enchilada.
"We can leave the bomb armed. The Army EOD has specialists for that. Just need to eliminate the dead man's switch."
Hyo-jin stuck her hands into the pockets of her lab coat. "How? The spring-loaded button holds the switch closed. Can't take the pressure off of it, not reliably. If it goes to an open state, if the wires are no longer connected, boom!"
She was thinking like a scientist, not an engineer.
"There are two thick wires in that cable connecting the switch to the detonation device. Shouldn't mess with the switch. Too complicated, but wires are just wires. Can you find me electrical wire?"
She looked around. "One second."
Dragged a wooden bench over to the side of the platform where a machine gun had perforated the ceiling.
Set it under a dangling pot light. Used it as a step stool. Fiddled around up above the ceiling.
While she was busy, I'd work on a more sensitive project.
The little wire cutter on my multi-tool included a wire stripper near the handles. All I had to do was remove a tiny bit of the insulation from the wires to gain access to them.
I'd stripped wires a thousand times.
This time, I took a deep breath first to steady my hand. Grabbed a slack portion of cabling near the device. Tuned everything else out.
If I cut all the way through, it would break the circuit, the same result as if Kwon Chol released the button switch.
A little pressure on the handles. Just a dent in the wire.
A little more. The insulation on one side cut through.
A tiny squeeze further. The stripper penetrated the other side.
Access to two bare wires achieved.
Hyo-jin ripped the pot light off the ceiling, bringing strands of wire attached to twist-on wire connectors with it.
She bounced over. Swung the light fixture from a line of wire. "This work?"
"Perfect."
I handed her my tool, not wanting to release the dead man's switch cabling.
"If you'll cut two six inch pieces of wire and strip the insulation off, we can solve this."
Jin-son rolled himself closer. "What're you doing?"
His uncle nodded, "I wondered the same thing. Experts designed the switch."
"It's great for an unexpected release, but the simplicity needed to make sure it won't malfunction renders it vulnerable. As long as you hold the switch down, it connects the two wires, allows electricity to flow between them.
"All we need to do is give the electricity a shorter path to take. Bypass the switch farther down the cable."
Hyo-jin handed me the first of the two naked wires I'd requested.
If I was wrong about how the dead man's switch worked, this is where we'd all find out. Well, we'd actually probably die before realizing anything went wrong.
Didn't matter. Waiting wouldn't improve the odds.
I put the center of the bare wire underneath and across where I'd stripped the insulation away from both sides of the cable. Wrapped it around like a coil, trying to create as much contact as possible.
That shorted the wires. No big bang.
Looked like I'd been right about how it worked. Now to make sure it remained secure.
Heaving on the wires, I pulled the coil tight. Twisted the ends together.
Held them with one hand. Put my other palm out toward Hyo-jin, "Wire nut."
She handed me one from the ceiling attachment.
I twisted it onto the bare wire ends.
"Don't let go of the switch yet, but that should actively bypass the mechanism. I'll need that second wire and another connector."
I moved up the cable, toward the switch, about a foot.
Stripped off even more insulation. Used the second bare wire to wrap the new gap.
It shorted the wires in the cable together a second time. I twisted on another cheap wire nut.
Redundancy is always good when dealing with the lives of ten million people. The lives of those I loved, of my new family.
I took a deep breath. Held it. "Release the switch."
Kwon Chol hesitated.
Did he really trust me? My life was on the line as well. I'd parachuted onto the tower through a storm to stop this thing from going off.
That proved I'd risk my life, not that I knew what I was talking about with electrical stuff.
He put his hand out above the table.
Lay the switch and the end of the cable on the tabletop. Turned his head away, as if that would matter.
Released the button.
Nothing happened.
I breathed out. My voice came out in a high-pitched rush, "See, nothing to worry about."
Cleared my throat. "Leave the rest to the experts. They can take all the time they need. Please radio your men to surrender. I'll call our team down below. Get them to post a guard here."
Former DPRK lieutenant and new uncle Kwon Chol explained to his men that their mission was over and how to surrender safely.
I called Schnier. Explained the situation. Arranged to ensure no one got hurt who didn't deserve it.
Captain Grant would sequester Pahk and his men. Interview them to determine their status.
Michelle had one thing to add before we disconnected, "After hearing what happened, I've transmitted a copy of Meon's message to the Supreme Guard. It's the least I could do."
She'd earned her place as part of my new family, despite her occasional ruthlessness.
Chapter Forty-Six: Crushed
The steam boiler burbled.
Deputy Defense Minister Meon Lon-chun needed to figure out how to salvage this latest blow.
He leaned back in his chair. Stared at the cheap temporary double-aluminum ceiling.
No good ideas.
Not since Kwon Chol hung up on him. Just a litany of scenarios, all bad.
He should forget all this. March out to his official car. Pay a visit to China.
By the time the secretive government spread word of his disappearance, before they noticed he hadn't shown up in Pyongyang as ordered, he'd be feasting in Beijing on what he'd acquired and stored in other countries over the years.
Yes, cut his losses.
A rumble from down the road outside. Those annoying tanks again. Their treads clanked in the frozen mud of the road approaching his temporary office hut.
A little early for them to return from their exercises. More fuel shortage excuses for laziness.
Could he get away with shooting Colonel Jong-rin, that incompetent buffoon?
Even execute him in front of his men, so they learned not to disturb his thoughts with their diesel engines?
The roar of the tank engines just got louder. Worse than ever. Sounded like they were right outside his office walls.
Oh well, he'd depart soon enough.
One had to be philosophical about these things.
Maybe he could convince the Chinese President to back a coup. They'd always considered marching in and taking over North Korea.
He could be useful to them.
A figurehead who knew the players in Pyongyang from the inside. Could bring them plenty of useful information.
The Korean people would welcome him, leader of a liberating army. Over time, he'd become the face of Chinese control in the country and return to true power, the new Supreme Leader.
Found a new dynasty of control.
The corner of a Popkung-Ho tank tread chewed through the wall behind him. Shook his Tommy Gun off
of the wall.
What were those idiots doing?
The tank backed up. Its treads changed their angle. Rushed toward him.
A green laminar steel panel, the front of the main battle tank, burst through the wall. The bottom of the wall flattened under the treads. The wall's top sheered away like a hinged cabinet.
Meon picked up his Tommy Gun. Sighted it on Colonel Jong-rin, his head poked out of the tank commander's hatch. Squeezed the trigger with all his strength.
Nothing.
Never been good at taking care of his tools. Now this one let him down, just like everything else.
Jong-rin shook his fist. "Supreme Leader and my cousin the boiler mechanic have a message for you!"
He ducked into his hatch. The cupola spun toward Meon, barrel forward. The wall no longer blocked their advance.
Both treads churned forward.
Meon scuttled backward. On his knees. Under his desk.
Maybe he could get out, run away, get to his car. Drive to China.
The tank's right tread reversed direction; spun the 45 ton beast onto his teak desk.
His phones jangled. Went silent. The track ground them into spinning shards of plastic and broken electronics. The tank's diesel engine roared above him.
Maybe not.
The edge of the desk gave way. Glass shattered. Liquid leaked from the crushed drawer next to his head.
Meon huddled flat. Pressed palms into ears.
Essential oils mixed with blood.
* * *
Nobody likes a sacrificial goat which refuses to go to the altar properly.
Michelle leaned forward in her chair, toward the video conference screen. She'd spent the last hour here in the embassy's Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility (SCIF) filling in the blanks for Metcalf in D.C.
She spoke up for the microphones, "With the bomb disarmed and the data confirmed destroyed, that wraps up this incident."
The room reminded her of WARCOM's SCIF, where this all started. Same black and gray, decorated by microphones and cameras.
Probably built by the same government contractor in a hardened container and shipped to Korea.
Metcalf waved away the others from his side of the connection. A half-dozen functionaries filed out of the room behind him.
His voice boomed out of the room's speakers at her, "Dangled a lot of rope when you promised citizenship and a scholarship. You let them get you on tape?"
Techno Ranger Page 37