Thunder in the Morning Calm (11 page)

M
ounds of snow, glistening in the early morning sun, were piled on each side of the gate at the entrance of the prison. Pak squinted her eyes to protect them from the glare. She held her breath as she approached the gate. Two stiff-necked, rifle-bearing guards in drab-green uniforms were in the guard shack. Pak prayed that no one had noticed the missing medicine. These were not the same guards who had been at the gate when she left the night before. One she recognized. The other she did not. The one she recognized opened the gate for her, and she thanked him.

She walked into the prison compound and headed for the prisoners’ barracks, her heart pounding. She held her breath as she walked rapidly away from the guard shack through the newly fallen snow, half expecting a guard to shout, to stop her, to escort her at gunpoint to the colonel’s office when he realized that she was the one who had stolen the bottle of medicine.

When neither guard stopped her, she exhaled and took a deep breath. “Thank you, Lord,” she mumbled. As she approached the courtyard, she thought about the sick old man — the one they called Robert. His head had felt like a hot iron and his body had shaken with chills. Stealing was wrong. Pak knew that. But not taking care of the sick was also wrong. She had just tried to give him some comfort in his last days. The poor old man would not live much longer. She was sure of that. Almost all the others had died here in the camp.

When she was halfway across the courtyard, she heard angry voices yelling near the administration building. She quickened her pace but lost her footing and landed butt first in the snow and fell backward.

“Did you take it?” she heard a man yell as she got back on her feet and dusted the snow off.

“Answer me. Did you take it?”

Pak walked quickly in the direction of the voice. When she passed the corner of the administration building, she saw them. They were about twenty feet in front of her. Two prisoners were standing side by side, shivering in the cold. The colonel, flanked by the three guards and his assistant, stood facing the prisoners and was yelling at the top of his lungs.

“I ask you once more!” He held up something …

What is that? Pak thought.

“You
do
recognize this! Do you not? It is medicine from my personal cabinet. It was found on the floor by your locker. I demand to know! Who stole it?”

The colonel began pacing in front of the two old men.

Keith stared at the ground and said nothing.

“Very well,” the colonel said. “Perhaps this will revive your memory.” He turned to the guard who had found the bottle of penicillin. “What is your name?”

“Kang! Sir!” The guard jumped to a stiff position of attention. “Staff Sergeant Kang Ho-soon!”

“Right,” the colonel snapped. “Revive the prisoner’s memory!”

“Yes, sir!” Kang responded with enthusiasm. He stepped in front of Keith. “Answer the colonel’s question!”

Nothing from Keith except a blank face, eyes down.

“Answer!”

Still nothing.

Kang hauled back with his hand and slapped the old man on the face, sending him tumbling into the snow.

“Where did you get the medicine?” Kang screamed as he stood over the man.

Keith raised his head. Blood was running from his nose.

“Answer me!” Kang cursed. “I will teach you to steal from the Army of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea!” He grabbed a bullwhip and lashed down perilously close to the old man.

WHAP!

“Stop!” Pak screamed. “Stop it! Stop it!”

They all turned around. The colonel said, “Woman, if you know what is best for you, do not interfere with the state’s administration of justice.”

“Please, Colonel! Do not strike the old man!” she begged through her sobs. “I did it!”

“What do you mean?”

“I stole the medicine! Please, do not whip him. I did it.” She dropped to her knees and sobbed. “Please. Do not beat the old man.”

Silence.

Pak hung her head and looked down as a torrent of tears rained down in the snow.

“You two!” She heard the voice of the colonel. “Take these men back to the barracks.”

“Yes, sir!”

“Kang, arrest this woman and take her to my office!”

“With pleasure, sir!”

Pak flinched as Kang grabbed her arm and began to drag her across the yard toward the colonel’s office.

K
ang stood at attention in front of the colonel’s desk. This time, Kang thought, he had been invited into the colonel’s
inner
office. This time, he was not stopped outside, in the office of his commander’s military-mistress-secretary. By proving himself, he had earned the right to be here. He looked over at the other guard, Chung Nam-gyu, who was standing at attention at the other end of the colonel’s desk. Kang considered Chung’s presence a mere formality, present as a practical necessity. He thought back to that morning, how he had taught the two incompetent and spineless guards a real lesson. One he was sure they wouldn’t soon forget.

The colonel was seated behind his desk. Standing between the two guards and facing the colonel was Pak.

This sobbing, worthless, traitorous thief-of-a-woman, Kang thought. The point of this whole meeting, he reasoned, was to draw attention to the fact that
he
— not Chung Nam-gyu — had uncovered the theft of this woman, this traitor to the state, and the colonel knew it and would reward him greatly.

Kang decided that the colonel had brought Chung in only as a second bodyguard. After all, neither Chung Nam-gyu nor the other incompetent excuse-for-a-guard Cho Doo-soon had been selected to interrogate the old-dog prisoner. Only
he
, Kang, had been so selected! And
his
interrogation technique had been so effective that he had psychologically pressured the sobbing heap now standing here to confess her crime.

He wondered what medal he would receive this time. His eyes scanned the photos on the walls, of the colonel standing beside Dear Leader, of the colonel with other decorated leaders of the state.

“Why did you take it?” the colonel’s demanding tone brought Kang’s eyes back on the traitor.

“I … I do not know,” she said through a torrent of tears.

“You do not know?”

“No, sir.”

“You do not know! Well, then, perhaps this will refresh your memory!” The colonel looked at Kang. “Refresh this traitor’s memory!”

“Sir! Colonel! With pleasure!”

He raised his hand and swung.

Whap!

The slap across her face sent Pak spinning. She tumbled to the floor, landing at the feet of Chung, who stepped back. The woman was a sobbing ball at Chung’s feet.

Pathetic against pathetic, Kang thought.

“Get her up!” the colonel ordered.

Kang watched as Chung bent down and pulled Pak to her knees.

Finally, Chung was given a job, Kang thought. What a contrast the colonel must see in us. On his right, an authoritarian, dashing, rising young leader, one capable of uncovering crimes against the state and extracting confessions from those who would oppose Dear Leader. On his left, an incompetent fool in uniform, a man whose only usefulness is to steady a soon-to-be-dead traitor.

“I demand an answer!” the colonel screamed. His face was red and blood vessels bulged on his neck. “Why did you steal property of the state?”

“I … I …” Sobbing, Pak tried to wipe the tears from her face.

“Get your face out of your hands!”

Pak looked up. “I am sorry, Colonel. I felt sorry … for the old man.”

“Ha ha ha ha!” The colonel burst into mocking laughter. “You felt sorry for the old man. So you stole from me?”

“I am so sorry, Colonel. I will not do it again.”

“You felt sorry for an enemy prisoner? Well, how does this feel?” He looked at Kang. “Staff Sergeant?”

“Yes, sir!”

Pak looked at him. She was terrified. Her hands were shaking, her lips were quivering. She mouthed a silent “Please, no.”

Kang drew his arm back again. The second slap struck her face harder than the first had. Again she tumbled like a rag doll.

The colonel smiled. He sat back in his chair and watched while the other guard just stood there, looking down at the traitor sobbing at his feet.

The colonel’s eyes caught Kang’s, and the two men, though separated by a gulf of rank and age, both grinned.

Oh, to be on the same wavelength as leadership! Kang thought. He had already received a medal for meritorious service for his actions at the border last year. He was proud of the fact that he had fired across the river, even fired bravely across the border into China, killing one or two of the Bible-thumping traitors who were helping escapees leave the great Democratic People’s Republic without authority. A few did escape that day, but he knew that his actions served as a mighty deterrent against such treachery in the future! They decorated him, but not to the extent that he deserved. He was “too young,” they said, to receive the highest award of the republic.

But the action he took at the border, he was certain, got him noticed and got him this new assignment. What medal might he receive as a result of his heroism today? he wondered. What promotion was he due for? This was his destiny. This he knew he deserved.

“Get her up!” the colonel shouted.

And again, the other guard put his hands under Pak’s armpits and hauled her back to her feet.

Excellent! Kang thought as he saw his handprint on her face. He considered the mark visible evidence that he shared the mind-set of party leadership toward those hostile to the state.

The colonel glared at Pak. “Stand at attention!”

The woman stood, then bent forward, appearing suddenly dizzy.

“Do not slump in my presence, you piece of traitorous trash! This court-marital of the Army of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea is hereby convened. Stand at attention!” He nodded at Kang, who nodded back and stepped behind Pak. He put one hand in the center of her back and with his other hand pulled her shoulders back, forcing her to stand in an upright position for her sentencing.

“This court-martial, based upon the evidence having been
considered, including the evidence produced from the prisoner and recovered by the staff sergeant, and based upon your own confession, does hereby find you guilty of the high crimes of stealing the property of the state and rendering aid to the enemy. I, and I alone, possess the authority now to sentence you to your fate.” The colonel glared at Pak, whose eyes seemed glazed, unseeing. “And included within my authority is the power to have you executed or to let you go free. Is there anything you wish to say in your defense?”

Tears rained down the red handprint on Pak’s cheek. She brought her hand to her face, wiping the tears away. “I … I meant no harm. I promise not to steal again.” Her voice faded under the sound of more sniffling.

“That is it?” the colonel snapped.

Blood flowed from her nose. She wiped it on her sleeve.

“Very well,” the colonel said. “Having found you guilty on all charges as set forth in the indictment against you, this military court-martial does hereby sentence you to be executed by firing squad.”

“Ah, nooooooooo!!”

“Shut her up! Take her. Lock her up. The sentence shall be carried out at noon! At my direction!”

Kang smiled. “Yes, Colonel!”

US Navy F/A-18s
on patrol over the Yellow Sea

L
ieutenant Commander Corey Jacobs, USN, known by his handle as “Werewolf,” pushed down on the stick of the supersonic fighter and banked the plane to his right. Bright rays of midmorning sun streamed through the top of the clear-glass canopy and into the cockpit. The blue waters of the Yellow Sea glistened ten thousand feet below.

Down to his left and trailing by one hundred feet, his wingman, Lieutenant Bill “Bobcat” Morrison, mimicked the banking maneuver of his senior officer. Morrison’s F/A-18 Super Hornet, its gray wings swept back, flew a broad swoop through the skies, like a graceful gull following its leader.

Today marked the duo’s third mission in three days of high-stakes, cat-and-mouse war games with the Korean People’s Air Force, the official name of the Air Force of North Korea. Each day, the mission had been the same. Launch from USS
Harry S. Truman
in the middle of the northern Yellow Sea, fly due east toward the North Korean coastline, then start a swooping maneuver, turning back thirteen nautical miles from the coastline, just one mile short of entering Communist airspace.

These “fly-ins,” designed to keep the Communists guessing if American jets would invade their airspace, had started in retaliation for the North Koreans buzzing over the top of the USS
Harry S. Truman
, invading its airspace. The rules of engagement, or ROE, called for avoiding North Korean airspace and no firing except in self-defense.

Yet, despite the current rules of engagement, Jacobs, Morrison, and the other pilots in the air wing had contingency orders to change the ROE — to penetrate North Korean airspace, launch missiles against selected military and industrial targets in and around Pyongyang, then break for the safety of Osan Air Base just south of Seoul.

These contingency orders would be implemented only if the Dear Leader’s Air Force took a shot at the
Harry S. Truman
, something they had not yet dared try. But the North Koreans tended to strike on cherished American holidays, like the Fourth of July. And with it being Thanksgiving weekend back home, they just might try something extra.

These round-the-clock flights by the carrier’s air wing to the edge of North Korean territorial airspace would continue until someone with more brass on their collar than Jacobs ordered them to stop.

For the last three days, the war-game routine on both sides had become a repetitive chorus. As Jacobs and his fellow Navy fighter pilots bore down at supersonic speed on Dear Leader’s airspace, MiG-21s of the Korean People’s Air Force would scramble, rocketing out to greet the Super Hornets. The MiG-21s would chase the Super Hornets back to the west, toward the carrier, where the MiGs would be intercepted by two more eastbound Super Hornets flying toward them in defense of the ship.