Not Quite a Bond Girl – Chapter 2
For a brief moment after waking up, Choi Ryu felt at peace, thinking he had died protecting Myeong Wol. He remembered the sniper shot, the car swerving off the street and the accident, followed by the smell of hot metal and gasoline. Myeong Wol had been in the seat next to him, her head pillowed on a deflated airbag. She had looked peaceful. Ryu, however, had felt too aware; every sensation had burned itself into his memory as he had scrambled out of the seatbelt and the car, tumbled over to the other side and dragged Myeong Wol out by her arm. In his memory, time had slowed so much that everything had seemed to take minutes, when in reality it must have been mere moments. What had followed then were a stark noise and a powerful blast wave that had thrown both of them on the ground. The heat had burned on his skin, but he’d paid no attention to it and had got up again, shielding Myeong Wol’s body, and kept moving.
The memories of the explosion brought back the pain that hadn’t registered in his brain before. He groaned, and his jaw and throat rebelled at the movement.
“Don’t move,” a voice murmured and soft hands pressed against his chest. He complied and tried to open his eyes. The room was dark, what little he could see of it. Most of his head seemed to be covered in bandages. He could just make out Myeong Wol’s blurred face – which was unharmed except for a few odd scratches, he noted.
He wanted to ask what had happened to him, where they were, who knew, how long he had been out, the security measures … but his attempt at a groan convinced him otherwise. He closed his eyes instead and drifted off into an uneasy sleep.
*
The abandoned apartment building Myeong Wol had found for them leaked. It didn’t possess a functioning heater either, but that didn’t annoy Ryu as much as the persistent dripping sound from the expanding puddle in the hallway. At least he could move around now, and only his right arm, shoulder and neck were still bandaged up. Myeong Wol made a point of changing the bandages regularly and diligently kept his wounds clean. After all, she owed him her life, she said.
Steps interrupted the monotonous sound of falling drops and Ryu’s hand clumsily grabbed the gun on the table in front of him. A moment later Myeong Wol entered the room with one bag of groceries and another with medicine. She wore a baggy hoodie and had her hair tied back. Along with the wide, long skirt, she looked as unlike herself as she could.
“This should be enough for a few days,” she explained, a small smile gracing her lips when she saw the gun.
A few more days. Ryu sighed. He was getting restless. Sitting around without doing anything wasn’t like him. “We have to talk,” he said.
Myeong Wol paused and seemed uneasy, but she didn’t disagree. “We have enough time for it anyway. Do you want tea?”
Ryu nodded, more to put her at ease than because he felt thirsty. “We have to consider our options.”
A mug of tea appeared in front of him. “Not that we have many,” Myeong Wol scoffed. “Our superiors probably think we’re dead, but unfortunately so does everyone else. And if we don’t want to really be dead, it would be best if they continue to do so.”
Ryu agreed and disagreed at once. “We have to find a way to get them to take the kill orders back. That is the only way you can go back to Kang Woo.” It was the first time either of them had said his name since the crash. Myeong Wol sat down on the second chair and studied her folded hands. He knew her well enough to know that that was what she wanted more than anything, but that she respected him enough not to ask for it.
“The book was my last bargaining chip,” he continued. “The NIS has it now, though.” Ryu had thought about this during the time he could barely move the right side of his body and had swallowed pain killers as if they were candy. “I think the first step should be surrendering to them.”
This made Myeong Wol sit up and take notice. Ryu could see on her face that she could not believe that he, of all people, had said that. “If we play on their gratitude, maybe we can convince them to let us broker the deal with the North regarding the extraction of the rare earths and ask for a pardon for us in exchange for our silence. After all, we know what lengths our superiors went to when it came to the books.”
Myeong Wol looked more hopeful than she had in a long time, and it made Ryu’s heart beat faster. He hoped it would stop doing that one day. Right now, though, he would do everything he could to make her happy, even sell his own soul.
*
The meeting took place in an empty warehouse near the docks. Ryu had scouted it beforehand and knew all the exits, hiding places and CCTV blind spots. He arrived early, too, half an hour before the appointed time, and just before the NIS agents. Myeong Wol was waiting outside and kept an eye on the perimeter.
There were two of them, one keeping himself to the shadows, while a young woman walked towards him without trepidation. He had only heard one car approaching, so there were at worst three more men in the immediate vicinity. He and Myeong Wol could take them down if they had to, he decided, and his muscles relaxed a bit.
“You are early,” the young woman remarked.
“So are you,” Ryu shot back.
The woman smiled and held out a hand – a move that made her seem more suspicious in Ryu’s eyes. “It seems I forgot my manners, Yu Da Hae, NIS. And you are?”
“Major Choi Ryu, North Korean Special Forces,” Ryu grumbled. He did not take the offered hand, but Agent Yu seemed unperturbed.
“You do realise, Major Choi, that this confession is enough grounds for me to arrest you for espionage, don’t you?”
Ryu nodded curtly. “I was hoping you would want to hear what I have to say first.”
Agent Yu grinned at that. “I am curious, I admit, as are my superiors.”
“A while ago, the NIS received a digital copy of a decoded version of a set of ancient books containing the locations of several deposits of rare earths. The problem with that is that the locations are both in South and North Korea.”
Agent Yu blinked in surprise. “And you know about this how?”
Ryu shrugged. “I am the one who decoded them and who arranged for you to receive the chip.”
“And why would a North Korean spy do that?”
Ryu took a deep breath. He had tried to find the right words for this moment in the last few days but failed. “Because my colleague needed a pardon to remain in South Korea. She wanted to get married to a South Korean and defect, but not betray her home country. Your side is not wont to leave former North Korean spies alone without a reason.”
Agent Yu evidently did not know what to make of that. It sounded like a poor excuse in his ears as well, even though it was the truth. “That is a touching story, but what is in it for you?”
“What is important is that our former employers threw a wench in both of our plans and now we are hunted by North Korean assassins. And that is a problem you might be able to help us with.”
“Really?” Agent Yu asked. She was still smiling and seemed at ease, but her eyes scanned the darkness of the warehouse behind Ryu for the mentioned colleague and kept a close watch on his hands. “I don’t think we can call off North Korean assassins, sorry to disappoint. And witness protection is not something we can offer out of the goodness of our hearts.”
“No. You can’t. What you can do is keep your promise of a pardon for my colleague. You will also need to open negotiations with the North Korean government to mine the deposits effectively and to avoid provoking a war. I can help with that – I know the people involved better than any of your agents. And in exchange, you will add a pardon for the North for my colleague and me to the agenda.”
Agent Yu thought for a moment. “An interesting proposal,” she finally admitted. “But I will have to discuss this with someone higher up in the food chain. You’ll understand, of course.”
Ryu nodded.
“It would be very gracious of you if you would follow me to a safe house while your proposal is being considered …” she suggested, but Ryu had other ideas.
“Same day, same time, next week.”
Agent Yu sighed, but nodded. “Maybe you’ll bring your ‘colleague’ as well next time. She must be quite the woman.”
Ryu didn’t think that warranted an answer. He just watched as she vanished into the night. Her partner, who hadn’t said a word the entire time, cast a last glance in his direction, telling him that he didn’t trust him one bit, and that he should better behave. Ryu snorted imperceptibly, and then he left the building to meet Myeong Wol.
*
The wedding was beautiful, that much he could tell even from a distance, and Myeong Wol smiled so much that she made the entire world seem brighter. Choi Ryu watched from the shadows and felt sadder than he had expected to. They were all there – Ok Sun, Hui Bok and even In Ah – and they smiled just as brightly. It seemed as if all he had ever wanted was in the one place that he could never enter. He was happy for Myeong Wol, he really was, but he had lost her and everything else. Now, there was nothing left of him.
A movement attracted his attention; In Ah was about to leave, which reminded him of the other thing he came here to do. He carefully took the scarf out of his pocket and put it under the windscreen wiper of her car. Her confession had touched something in him and he hoped his presumed death hadn’t hurt her too deeply. This, at least, would tell her that he wasn’t dead.
It would be better this way. When he left the scarf he got a good look at the scars that disfigured his arms. Most of the time, he barely remembered that they were there, even when he looked right at them. They reminded him of why it was best that he stayed out of all their lives. They had normal jobs, and normal pasts (or at least normal recent pasts) and friends, while he still owed Agent Yu of the NIS a phone call.
All he knew was being a spy, and her offer had been a tempting one. Although a part of him wanted to forget all of that when he watched as In Ah discovered the scarf and looked around hopefully. Now that Myeong Wol was where she was supposed to be, he didn’t have to keep watch anymore. Kang Woo would do that.
He dialled the number that evening. “Agent Yu,” he greeted.
“Major Choi, have you thought about our proposal?”
“Yes. As long as I don’t have to work on any operations concerning North Korea, I’m in.”
She said nothing for a moment, but more for effect than because she actually needed to think about it, it seemed. “Still a bit sentimental, are we? Okay, report at the office tomorrow morning. And don’t plan for anything else. It might take a while.”
Fin