Chapter 20: They're Insane

TL: LittlePeach

I wrapped Crane No. 13's body in the blanket from the room and stepped outside the building.

The raucous music and bustle around the shopping strip carried on as ever, but after that brief firefight, my heart alone had sunk into dead silence.

Cutting across the alley, I spotted Crane No. 13's private taxi parked in a corner by the roadside.

When I opened the car door with the key I'd taken from the room, the smell of cheap air freshener washed over me.

With my mood driven even further into the floor, I pulled out the phone.

-Is that you?

The moment the call connected, Yang Mi-ryeong demanded to know who I was.

She must have figured the men who killed Crane No. 13 might have finished me off too, then gone through the phone's call log.

"Sparrow No. 7. I killed two of them at the scene."

-And Wang Chil?

"I left him at the scene. It wasn't a situation where I could do anything for him."

-Don't worry about his body anymore. I'll handle the cleanup.

As if something more urgent had come up, Yang Mi-ryeong hurried to add.

-There's information you need to hear.

"Go ahead."

-Dandong Public Security Bureau director Wang Xianqing was just killed. The cause of death was a gunshot.

Exactly what the assassination squad men had confessed.

I nodded.

"They're an assassination squad sent over from North Korea. And you, the Kowloon Society's Dandong branch chief, are on their hit list too."

Yang Mi-ryeong sucked in a breath.

With the Dandong Public Security Bureau director dead just like that, the fact that she'd become the assassination squad's target must have finally hit home.

-How did you find that out?

"Shove a gun in a man's face and he talks. There's no other way."

-North Korean operatives don't open their mouths that easily.

"There are ways. They belong to the North's Reconnaissance General Bureau, 24th Reconnaissance Battalion, ten men in total. I've taken care of two, so that leaves eight."

Then Yang Mi-ryeong cut me off.

-I'm sorry, but the intel you got doesn't match the headcount I have. I personally confirmed a report that fifteen North Koreans crossed the Yalu.

"He did hesitate a bit when he gave the number. Guess their true strength was the one thing he wanted to keep hidden."

That put the remainder at thirteen, not eight.

Even as I nodded, a question suddenly nagged at me.

"How did you get that information?"

-I hold a line far above Dandong Public Security.

"The MSS?"

-That's right.

The Ministry of State Security of the People's Republic of China. The MSS.

A Chinese intelligence agency standing shoulder to shoulder with America's CIA and Russia's FSB; next to them, the overseas intelligence network of our Republic of Korea's NIS was a drop in the bucket.

I was starting to understand why Crane No. 13 had said she could be trusted.

Yang Mi-ryeong's resourcefulness struck me as impressive all over again.

"Impressive."

-From where I sit, you're the more impressive one, squeezing answers out of a North Korean special forces soldier.

"Thanks for the compliment, but.... Anyway, their objective is to erase everyone with even the slightest connection to the So Se-hyok abduction, down to the last man. That includes you and the Chongqing Society's Dandong branch chief."

-How did Crane No. 13's hideout get exposed in the first place?

"I don't know exactly. My guess is the taxi he drove got tracked somewhere along the way. He'd been driving around for days without sleep; he might've slipped and missed his vehicle-laundering window. Even the best slip up sometimes, and everyone makes small mistakes."

Even as I said it, a hollow laugh escaped me.

That one small mistake could snuff out a man's life. It was futile beyond words.

I pressed a hand to my throbbing forehead.

"Some of them may have already infiltrated the Kowloon Hotel disguised as guests."

-...You're probably right. I'll start an internal search right away.

"I don't know how they're armed. The ones who killed Crane No. 13 had nothing more than pistols and grenades."

-Doesn't matter. I'll lock down every entrance to the hotel and hand out guns to the guards. With proper defenses in place, a whole company of reconnaissance troops could come and this place wouldn't budge.

Yang Mi-ryeong spoke as if I were the one who needed reassuring, telling me not to worry.

-The silver lining is that the Chongqing Society is on their target list too. Judging by how they shot the Dandong Public Security Bureau director first, they've got his whole cozy arrangement with the Chongqing Society mapped out.

Listening quietly, a scenario took shape in my head.

When I didn't answer for a while, Yang Mi-ryeong called out to me, impatience thick in her voice.

-Come to the hotel now. It'll be the safest place in Dandong at this point. With the Public Security Bureau director dead, China will move one way or another. Until they deal with the assassination squad for us, all we have to do is wait for the storm to pass.

I shook my head at her offer.

If I were an ordinary agent, I'd have headed straight for her hotel without a backward glance.

"No. I'm going to the Chongqing Society."

-...What? Are you out of your mind?

"I'll contact you again once it's all over."

-Wai....

I hung up without answering.

Just as she'd said, the assassination squad's next target was all but decided, which conveniently settled my next destination.

I dug through my pocket and pulled out a slip of paper.

The business card I'd received from the Black Panther trio a while back.

[Dandong Paradise]

[Serving you in style]

I intended to become the assassin who kills the assassination squad.

*****

"Comrade squad leader. The signals of the two comrades infiltrated into the Kowloon Hotel have gone dark."

At the report from the deputy squad leader, back from making contact, the hand of assassination squad leader Ri Myong-hak, who had drawn a cigarette from his coat and was about to light it, froze in midair.

His sharp eyes narrowed calmly.

"Is that so? The cunning wench caught wind of us quickly enough."

"The bitch has all of Dandong in her fist. She would be quick to smell it out."

Ri Myong-hak lit the cigarette in his mouth and drew in a deep breath.

Whoo. The long stream of smoke tickled the tip of his nose.

"Would it not be better to launch an all-out assault on the Kowloon Hotel this very moment? Now, while our forces remain fully intact, seems the opportune time."

At the deputy squad leader's counsel, Ri Myong-hak calmly looked around at the other squad members.

Eleven men in all, including the two who had joined them after assassinating the Dandong Public Security Bureau director.

They were busy quietly cleaning their weapons, flicking scraps of flesh off the soles of their combat boots.

Until just moments ago, this place had been one cell in the Chongqing Society Dandong branch's cell network; now it was nothing but a tomb where not even a breath could be heard.

Strewn all around were the corpses of twenty Chongqing Society men, limbs shredded by gunfire.

"Still no confirmation on where the Chongqing bastards' main base is?"

"We have tortured the survivors, but nothing on the list comes up certain. It seems they are thrashing with everything they have to hold on to their own lives."

Ri Myong-hak chewed on his cigarette filter, then made a face as if something had occurred to him.

"Then let us try this. Use the mobile phone we secured just now and send word to the Chongqing bastards. If they do not wish to croak before their time this very night, they are to scrape together every man they have left and throw an all-out assault at the Kowloon Hotel. If they accept our proposal meekly, we let them live; but if they refuse, we will cut every last one of their throats before the night is out."

"But Comrade squad leader, are the Chongqing bastards not also on our elimination list? Why join hands with men we will kill anyway?"

At the deputy squad leader's question, Ri Myong-hak stroked his chin.

"Rather than spill our precious comrades' blood for nothing at the Kowloon Hotel, where the defenses will be no small matter, it is far better business to push those Chongqing bastards ahead of us as bullet shields."

"They will know full well we mean to toss them aside once they have served their use. Will they simply take it lying down?"

"If they do not help, they die by our hands this instant; if they do help, perhaps we do not kill them. If a man must die anyway, is it not human nature to want to push the date back even a little? Accept or refuse, either way we lose nothing."

Ri Myong-hak nudged the head of a Chongqing Society man sprawled on the floor with the toe of his boot.

"And if the bastards want to live badly enough to scrape together their remaining men and gather in one place? Then so much the better for us. Rather than groping around blindly as we are now, would it not be far easier to have them bunch up in one spot and butcher them all at once?"

"Oho."

At his words, the deputy squad leader nodded, convinced.

"Indeed, most wise words, Comrade. I will contact the Chongqing Society at once."

"Good. By the way, still no word from the two comrades who went to kill that South Chosun operative?"

His orders given, Ri Myong-hak asked with a jerk of his chin, as if it had just come to mind.

Given the skill of the squad's men, they should have taken the head and rejoined long ago.

"They radioed that the target had already been shot dead. Only, a mobile phone was active when they snuffed the operative out, so they reported they would finish off the other South Chosun rat who would come running at that call before returning. They have laid a trap and are lying in wait, so word should come soon."

"Is that so?"

Ri Myong-hak nodded with a thin smile.

He flicked the burnt-down cigarette butt into a pool of blood and jerked his chin toward the Dandong city lights shimmering beyond.

"Then leave them to it and let us move quickly. The night is still long."

*****

My original plan had been to expose my identity outright and become the bait.

After all, wasn't I the very man the North was scouring the earth for, eyes blazing?

The man who spirited away the Minister of People's Armed Forces, shot dead the External Intelligence Bureau director, and abducted the Investigation Bureau director.

Once I'd lured the assassination squad to one spot with bait that sweet, I planned to use my bullet-deflecting body as a shield and take them all down in one sweep.

But that plan came with one fatal side effect.

Once my identity was exposed like that, I could never again operate as a black agent with this face.

So I changed the plan.

"Hey! What are you standing around like an idiot for? Get in!"

"We deploy today, right now! Hurry it up!"

A bar on the outskirts of the city, Dandong Paradise.

Black Panther Gang members came pouring out through the building's back door, shouting up a racket.

Roughly twelve men.

They crammed themselves like cargo into two beat-up gray vans, packed in hip to hip.

"Go, go!"

"Let's move! We're going up in the world tonight!"

The vans pulled out, belching thick exhaust even in the dark.

After watching them draw away into the distance for a while, I started up Wang Chil's taxi.

Then, headlights off, I tailed them at a careful distance.

Leaving the gaudy neon of downtown Dandong behind, the three vehicles raced down the outer roads for a long stretch.

Then at some point the vans plunged into an abandoned factory district.

They had to be closing in on their destination.

I dropped my speed further, and from then on drove by following the smell of exhaust and the tire tracks.

'Here?'

Then, at some point, I spotted the empty vans parked between derelict storefronts.

I drove on a good while longer and left the taxi at the mouth of a secluded alley.

Getting out and cutting across the dark back streets, I finally confirmed the Black Panther members' final destination.

"Move it, move!"

"Hey, don't just stand there gawking!"

"Ah! S-sorry!"

It was a derelict three-story building, brutishly raised out of solid concrete.

From the outside, it looked like an eyesore of a commercial building abandoned mid-construction when the payments fell through.

Stairs ran along the outer wall from the first floor up to the roof, a layout perfectly suited for immediate escape or evacuation in any direction if things ever went wrong.

A fortress built with defense and escape both in mind.

This was the Chongqing Society's safe house.

"Everyone stay sharp. Pull anything stupid in there and they won't even find your bones."

Among the group barking the men into line, I spotted a familiar face.

One of the Black Panther trio who'd spent the past several days coming around Wang Chunsam's Eatery to smash the standing sign.

He was putting on his best gangster bravado, but whether it was the grim mood of the place or not, his voice trembled ever so slightly.

And no wonder, since the building, inside and out, was already crawling with savagely armed Chongqing Society men.

"Hurk."

"L-look at those guns over there...."

While the Black Panther members huddled together clutching nothing better than steel pipes and sashimi knives, the Chongqing Society men were heavily armed to a man with black rifles and shotguns.

They stood in full readiness to wage a blood-soaked street battle at a moment's notice.

The Black Panther members who'd climbed out of the vans so full of swagger just moments ago could only swallow hard.

"Oi. You the Black Panther guys?"

"Y-yes! That's us!"

"Come grab a gun. Supplies are tight, so one magazine each, exactly one. Don't go spraying bullets at nothing."

"Y-yessir!"

"Holy shit. My whole life in the game, never thought I'd see the day I got to touch a real gun...."

I watched the spooked Black Panther members collecting their weapons a moment longer, then quickly moved on.

Not far away stood another abandoned building with a clear view down onto their main base.

I climbed the dusty old stairs, settled into a good spot in the building's blind zone, and stole a glance below.

The sheer swarming headcount was considerable, but it was their armament that really stood out.

That firepower had probably been stockpiled for a final street war with the Kowloon Society.

With that much force concentrated in one place, even a North Korean assassination squad didn't look likely to punch through easily.

'If they beat each other bloody, all the easier for me.'

My plan was dead simple.

Sit back and watch how tonight's battle played out.

If the Chongqing forces and the North Korean assassination squad obligingly clashed and destroyed each other, nothing could be better for me or for Yang Mi-ryeong.

But if, by some chance, the squad's overwhelming combat power wiped out the Chongqing forces to the last man, I planned to take the drained assassination squad's heads and skim the cream for myself.

So I waited quietly for my moment.

The calm before the storm, or the dead center of a typhoon's eye.

The air wrapping around the abandoned building had exactly that shape.

The suffocating silence dragged on, the kind that made me almost wish a bomb would just go off already, and right then.

Krzzt.

-Seal No. 2, standing by in position.

-Seal No. 3, all clear.

-Seal No. 4....

The radio I'd taken off the assassination squad man's corpse crackled to life on its own.

The very moment I glanced around without thinking.

Thoom.

KA-BOOM!

"Wh-what the!"

"Aaaaaargh!"

In the split second it took to blink, one corner of the safe house's outer wall erupted in a gout of crimson flame.

A high-explosive warhead, flown in and planted dead-on from a position roughly a hundred meters out.

'They're insane. They're firing rockets?'

An RPG-7. Or by its North Korean name, the Type 7 launcher.

*****

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