by Sam Powers
‘Do I sense some of that government largesse coming my way? I mean, assuming they don’t kill you before you get a chance to pay me. You know… you can pay me in cool spy stuff, if you want. Like, a car with revolving plates. Or a motorbike with machine guns. Maybe a cool weapon in a secret stash that I can spring on someone when cornered; a fountain pen gun or something?’
‘You know that stuff is all make believe. Anyway, I need you to be focussed! My contacts in Saigon insisted the man I’m looking for is in the DPRK. You have contacts there, the business intel network you sell data from, to the Norwegians and French among others.’
‘My, my! You are well informed these days, Daisy Duke. Still, that must mean what you’re looking for is Hella hard to find. That means I can charge you a shit-ton of money for it.’
‘Hu...’
‘I’ve got this wicked new set of handlebars I’ve been eyeing. What is it, anyway?’
‘I need the location of Duk Su-Ree, personal plastic surgeon to the former supreme leader, Kim Il-Sung.’
‘Huh. You don’t want much, do you? He’s an insider, a trusted friend of the Kim family. That’s some dangerous data to be tossing around in these parts. What’s he to you?’
‘The important question to you, old friend, isn’t why or who, just how much.’
‘With those terms? Ptth! A hundred thousand dollars. No less.’
The value of Fan’s identity could be incalculable, Lee knew. She didn’t really have a choice, even facing the prospect of paying it herself. ‘Done.’
Hu’s surprise was momentary before her business instincts kicked in and she tried stoicism. ‘Done, just like that, huh?
‘When and where?’
She looked around and snorted. ‘Hnnh… Not here, that’s for damn sure! Too many criminals in this place. Feels unsafe or something. Tonight in Myeong-Dong. We’ll get a lobster tail at the booths by Club Clio.’
That was about as public as things could get, which meant some risk, but much more likely there would be too many civilians around for a firefight, no matter how much someone in Beijing wanted her dead. ‘Eight o’clock?’
‘Be there or be square, Daisy Duke.’
But at Eight o’clock, Hu was not there.
Daisy Lee waited while the lobster cook eyed her suspiciously. She was in a business casual dress, and hardly looked the part of the enterprising young lobster tail thief. But he couldn’t be sure, evidently.
That, or business was slow, and he was hoping she would eventually actually buy something.
Her phone rang, the number blocked. ‘This is Daisy.’
‘It’s me. Sorry, my associates are very careful. They wanted me to be sure you’d show up alone.’
‘How long have we known each other?’ Daisy asked indignantly.
‘Relax! Relax, Daisy Duke. Head two blocks west and one south. You’re looking for the money exchange on the corner, near the Chad Keane leather store. I’ll be out front.’
The call ended. Daisy stared down at the phone. It had caught her off guard. If it was anyone else, she’d assume someone was luring her into a trap. She didn’t know Seoul that well, after all.
She also didn’t have much of a choice. Hu probably knew that. I wonder if she’s trying to shake more money out of me.
Lee walked the two blocks casting wary eyes around her. The streets of the district were brightly lit pedestrian thoroughfares with minimal through traffic, electronic store fronts open late, backlit cosmetics models draped in gems, decked out for the luxury luggage next door.
The money changer’s shop didn’t fit the surroundings, with a peeling old wood sign that suggested it had been there since before the economic revival turned the district into an eastern take on Rodeo Drive. Hu stood outside with her hands shoved into the pockets of a big coat, warding off the cool fall air.
‘Why here?’ Daisy asked, before her friend could greet her. She scoped the surroundings to try and peg down an answer. The road ended at a ‘T’ junction, meaning one fewer exit, but that was about it.
‘It’s quiet but still public, still safe,’ Hu said. ‘You bring my money?’
‘I brought you bitcoin for half the amount. You get the second wallet when I’m clear and the information is confirmed. That way, if I do clear my name, there’s at least a chance the ministry will refund the 50k.’
Her old friend frowned at that but it was clear she didn’t have a choice, if she wanted to get paid at all. ‘Fine. Pak has been living in Sonbong, a town in the northeast, along the ...’
‘Along the border with both Russia and China. Plastic surgeon to all sorts of interesting individuals, I’m sure, from such a strategic location. That’s where the uranium mines are too, I believe.’
‘You want to visit a hot zone, sweetie? This one’s as hot as they get. You head to housing block k-3. Its official name is ‘Benevolent Home to Children of the Wise Father,’ but the locals just call it ‘three.’ Apparently, they’re not big on sentiment.’
‘You got a unit? I assume this is one of those thousand-unit mega shitholes, like in PyongYan.
‘I do not, but my guy said he thinks seventh floor.’
‘So… all I have to do to talk to him is break into the most heavily fortified nation in Asia, make my way to its northernmost point, get into a town unseen and unreported despite thousands of soldiers, police and guards… and then make my way through seven stories of concrete bunker filled with some of the party’s most loyal drones.’
‘Yeah… yeah, that’s about it. Easy peasy, as the Brits say. You see that place there?’ Hu nodded down the ‘T’ junction, a narrow one-lane road heading northwest.
‘Sure. You mean the metal gates?’
‘Uh huh?’
‘It looks like some kind of government deal.’
‘It’s a nursery school for rich types. All kinds of high-end security.’
‘Okay. So?’
‘They close at four. After that… the street is kind of deserted…’ Hu’s voice had dropped a notch in volume, and Lee realized the woman had stepped back, out of her peripheral vision. She turned quickly, just in time to see the store’s metal door close behind Hu, the bolt sliding into place. Lee ran over to it and yanked on the handle. But inside, metal security shutters were rolling closed.
That was why she picked this spot. It’s great for an ambush.
Lee heard the motorcycle engines before she saw them, three in a ‘v’ formation heading down the one-way road. There were a few pedestrians using the small stretch, and they stumbled out of the way, warned by the noise as the machines roared into the intersection, riders’ arms extended, ready to…
Her body went to work before her mind had even caught up, recognizing the threat. She turned and ran, taking two strides before diving head-first through the glass front door of the bookshop next door. Bullets strafed the front of the buildings, tearing the books to shreds. Lee hit the floor inside, confetti and wood chips hailing down. She rolled to one side, behind the front display shelves, drawing her Heckler & Koch pistol as she came up in a crouch. There was a thin sightline, just a narrow gap through the door out to the street; but one of the riders had parked right in sight, and she squeezed off three shots toward his center mass, the man crashing to the pavement. Bullets strafed the books again, a woman at the counter behind her going down, crying out from a wound to the leg. The roar from the machine pistols continued for another second before both riders emptied their clips. They ejected them and began to load new ones. In the background, Lee could hear police sirens. She knew she might not survive another barrage, but any help still sounded blocks away.
The men resumed strafing the building, the roar from both guns deafening, drowning out the distant klaxons. Lee popped up once and sighted the first rider, emptying three of the last five shots in her clip to make sure he went down. His partner leaped from his bike and ran toward the front door, covering himself by unleashing another half clip on route. Lee sprinted for better cover,
toward the back of the store, between the racks as the bullets pinged around her, puncturing paperbacks and magazines.
She crept around the end of the displays, keeping her head low. He’d stopped firing and was trying to figure out where she was. She could hear him slowly pacing down the rows, heading her way. She glanced down at the H&K, with just two shots left. She didn’t have a chance against the man’s MP-5, she knew, unless she could get the drop on him or…
Get out. Get out of the confined space. Her instinct kicked in as the man opened fire. The MP5’s insane fire rate meant that if he just sprayed that corner of the store, he’d likely hit her before she could get clear, and Lee sprinted toward the left wall, praying the place was as old and flimsy as she thought. She leaped into it shoulder first, the rotten old drywall giving way like tissue paper, old wooden studs behind it cracking as she punched a hole straight through to the money changers’.
Lee hopped to her feet from her back. Hu was astonished, but she still had the presence of mind to reach for the back of her waist band. But Lee was quicker, her hand raised in a flash, a single shot ringing out, the bullet slamming into Hu’s chest, knocking her off her feet. Lee turned in the same motion and fired, just as her pursuer stepped through the hole in the wall, the shot catching him square in the forehead. He dropped to his knees, then dropped his gun, clattering to the ground, before slumping face down, a pool of blood gathering quickly around his head.
Lee ran over to Hu. She was still alive, gasping for air. The gurgling made it sound as if she’d punctured a lung. The area of the wound suggested the slug had found her heart.
I guess she still has one after all. Lee leaned down. ‘Why, Hu?’
The other girl coughed, fresh, crimson blood spewing out of her mouth as she tried to clear her throat to talk. ‘Intel is intel. Business… is business. Sold you him… sold them... you. Like… my uncle’s store?’
‘You want me to call an ambulance? I don’t think they’re going to make it in time…’
Hu shook her head as well as she could. ‘Don’t got anyone else except uncle… have a drink on me sometimes… okay? Be… nice to be remembered.’
The sirens were really close now, Lee thought. She looked around the room as Hu breathed her last. At the front register, a wizened old man, tiny, had been standing in the corner of the room the entire time, shaking like a leaf, his hands up. He could see that his niece was dead, and despite his offer of surrender, tears streamed down his angry face.
Lee rose and headed for the door. There was no percentage in sticking around to answer questions. The dead would have to lay where they left themselves.
39/
BEIJING
DAY 17
Time had become a factor, and as Yan waited for the files from the ministry’s mainframe to copy over to the encrypted drive, he looked out his office door, to the long, marble hallway. He’d given his secretary the day off, and his researcher, Jun, was at lunch.
The department expected him on a flight to New York. Instead, when he arrived at the airport, he would lose his assistant, then depart for his already planned bolt hole in New Zealand. Like his mentor so many years before, he hoped to be out and gone, with Beijing just a memory by the time his deception was discovered.
The ghost of Jiang Qing was on his side.
He’d spent the morning sending ‘go’ codes to a fleet of bank officials, draining the ministry’s ‘supplemental’ field agents’ fund and his own accounts in one fell swoop, some thirty-two million dollars being converted into cryptocurrency at one end, then back into cash via new anonymous corporate shell bank accounts in Panama, Switzerland and Malta.
Once the file transfer was complete, he’d have enough information to ensure they’d won the intelligence and online information war before the power struggle for the nation had even begun. And he’d have every remaining shred of written evidence in the government’s databases that Legacy or Plenty, Montana ever existed.
The hallway was empty. He waited a few minutes, dreading an appearance, but it stayed vacant and quiet, save for the odd echo from elsewhere in the aging building. Even something as innocuous as the wrong person taking a bathroom break and wondering what he was doing could be his downfall, Yan knew.
But it seemed as if he was on his own, most people away for lunch. He skittered back to his desk and checked the file progress. It was at ninety-seven percent.
Just a few more seconds…
He watched the bar, immobile for what seemed an eternity, the tiny clock icon spinning away. Come on, damn you, hurry! Why is this taking so long…!?’
The bar clicked up one more notch, the number switching to ninety-eight percent, then quite quickly ninety-nine…
And then it froze again.
DAMN IT.
He felt his stomach flip and absently held an arm across it, the rumbling unpleasant, as if his appetite sensed his anxiety and decided it needed the comfort of familiar food.
One hundred percent. The bar hit the end of the line, the clock spun for a few more seconds.
As quickly as it disappeared, he was dragging the little drive icon into the trash and ejecting it, yanking the memory stick from the USB port and on his feet…
His desk phone rang.
The call display said it was coming from Wen Xiu’s mobile.
He hung his head. Not now. Anytime but now…
Yan knew he couldn’t ghost the call. But if he answered it, there was no telling how long the minister’s request would delay him. If they checked the security desk log, they’d know he was still in the office at the time…
To hell with the log, he decided. By then, I will be out of the country and gone. And to hell with Wen Xiu.
The desk phone’s first line continued to flash orange as he pocketed the USB drive and headed for the door.
SONBONG, a small city in the northeast, Democratic People’s Republic of Korea
Sonbong was a town out of place and out of time, the buildings largely dating to the post-war reconstruction, before drab authoritarian utility took over the nation’s architecture. Mottled, muddy pink stucco mixed with teal concrete-and-brick, grey cement, and factory smokestacks. Giant cranes that leaned out in parallel precision across the open waters of the port mostly dated to when the Soviets used it as a Sea of Japan staging base. They were rusted, immobile, but undaunted in their solemn guard duty, refusing to bend to the ravages of nature and the passage of time, undefeated and unbowed by the demands of commerce, but useless to it all the same.
The city was the only ‘economic free zone’ in the entire nation, a place where, under a watchful eye, goods and services could be bought and sold between government-approved merchants and free-market capitalists. Of course, large volumes of additional product moved off the books at the same time.
Their clients were principally from Russia and China, although some Americans, Canadians and Scandinavians also operated in the town. One of Lee’s contacts in the casino industry had met Anna Choi when helping to set up the first such gaming establishment– not open to North Koreans, of course, mostly forbidden from even visiting Sonbong. Choi worked in Sonbong as a trade ambassador for a Chinese manufacturer of voltage regulators. She’d been recruited nearly a decade earlier, but rarely used.
She was small, delicate. She watched Lee from a few feet away as the agent stood at the hotel room window and spied her target through binoculars.
Duk Su-Ree was fat and successful, which was a rare situation in which to find one’s self in the DPRK. The plastic surgeon’s midsection was expanding, but so was his bank account, and his penthouse flat had a lovely balcony that overlooked the Sea of Japan.
Lee hadn’t seen many fat North Koreans, beyond the obvious candidate. She watched Duk sit and read placidly, a glass of wine on the table next to him.
‘He seems harmless enough,’ she said, lowering the spyglasses.
‘He probably is,’ Choi said. ‘It’s his connections that make him dangerous, not t
he man himself. Well… his connections and his skill with a scalpel. He’s made and remade faces for the regime’s criminals and agents for two decades, like his father before him.’
‘Just as his father did for Dorian Fan,’ Lee said. ‘If anyone knows what happened to Fan, whether he died or passed on a mantle to someone else…’
The smaller woman sighed. ‘Good luck. He almost never leaves his place, except to go down to the casino… unless you’re thinking that would be the place…’
Lee shook her head. ‘No, unfortunately not. While taking him at cards like a Bond villain is appealing, the reality is that the same consortium in Macau with whom I sometimes work also owns the place here, and there’s every chance I could be spotted by someone who recognizes my alter ego.’
‘Problematic.’
‘Absolutely. But when isn’t it?’ Lee smiled knowingly, and Choi felt a surge of confidence. She’d been in the grimy, struggling port town for long enough to know that she wanted to be anywhere else. Perhaps a successful mission would get Beijing’s attention and they’d finally pay her out, let her move on from working undercover; clear the record of any notion she cheated on her trade certifications.
The lights flickered twice, then cut out. The air conditioner slowed, the constant drone fading to silence as the apartment was plunged into blackness.
They both listened for a few seconds, the only sounds through the open window of some cars down below and the creaking rustle of the cicadas. ‘Blackout?’ Lee asked.
‘Rotating, sort of. Regular, about every six hours. The local political radicals – the underground movement, weak as it is – believes the blackouts are being caused by the power draw from a construction project just outside the city. Officially, they’re expanding an oil-fired power plant. Unofficially, the radicals think it’s some sort of uranium enrichment facility. I wouldn’t inquire too deeply, however; they’ve also reported seeing some of our boys visiting.’