Chapter 46: For That Precious National Interest of Yours

TL: LittlePeach

At this moment, all he could do was keep his mouth shut and feign ignorance.

An irreversible mood hung between the two of them, and just as silence began to feel like the safest refuge...

-Haah. Quit getting on my nerves for no reason and just listen to the intel I brought.

Consideration, or resignation.

Yang Mi-ryeong smoothly changed the subject.

-Does the NIS Southeast Asia Team have any personnel to spare?

Southeast Asia?

Deputy Director Kim Jin-taek flinched, his brow furrowing.

With her holding the reins of the conversation, he had no choice but to follow along.

"Why Southeast Asia?"

-Because there's some serious movement in Cambodia right now. Several Triad organizations have relocated from Vietnam to Cambodia, and they're planning to launch full-scale operations there.

Yang Mi-ryeong leisurely recited the information she had compiled.

-With Vietnam pushing its Doi Moi opening policy since the year before last, even amending its constitution to do it, the Triads decided there was nothing left to milk in Vietnam. Several organizations have already made the move, and fast.

This wasn't the kind of intel one could let go in one ear and out the other.

-Before long, Cambodia is going to become the mecca of Southeast Asian crime.

Deputy Director Kim Jin-taek straightened up from where he'd been slouched in his chair.

The Triads were not your ordinary back-alley thugs.

They were the enduring symbol of Chinese organized crime, having survived from the distant past to the present day, and a massive business enterprise acutely sensitive to international affairs.

Wherever they moved, enormous sums of money, weapons, and illicit manpower churned along with them, and their migrations inevitably set off tremors in the capital markets.

-You know, the Shanyuan Society boss I met at the Triad banquet made me an offer. Asked if I couldn't round up every North Korean defector crossing into Dandong and sell them to him.

"...The defectors?"

-He's launching a new voice phishing operation targeting South Koreans, and he figures defectors who speak the same language as the Koreans would make nice cheap employees to run into the ground. And since they have no proper identification, if things go sideways, he can just kill them and bury them, no problem at all.

"...."

-He had the gall to say that right to my face. Honestly, the nerve.

Her brusque words trailed off at the end.

Even as she spat it all out in disgust, her tone was bitter, as if reminded that she herself was steeped in that same degrading world.

-Word is he made contact with a defection broker and set up a hideout near Dandong. It sounds recent, so you'd best deploy personnel right away.

"The hideout's location? The broker's name?"

-I didn't ask that far. If I'd pried and something blew up later, the questions might come back around to me, no? What comes next is for the black agents in the Dandong area to handle on their own.

"Hmm."

-Just be careful. The Shanyuan Society grew by cleaning up other Triad organizations' dirty messes, so their members are a nasty breed.

"...Meaning they're heavy on killers."

-That's right.

Deputy Director Kim Jin-taek's eyes turned grave.

Either way, this was high-grade intelligence he never could have obtained without Yang Mi-ryeong.

"Good work bringing that in. I'll keep it in mind for our next operation."

-Fine. That's everything I had to pass along. But....

But it seemed Yang Mi-ryeong wasn't finished.

-Deputy Director. I'd like you to remember why we started all this.

Letting out a deep sigh, she took up the subject they had both been pretending to ignore.

-Why did you turn us into Crow agents in the first place? Wasn't it so we wouldn't get jerked around by the domestic division people who come digging into us every time the administration changes? Isn't that why we went as far as erasing our own identities to do this dirty work?

"...."

-Crane No. 13 didn't have to die.

Deputy Director Kim Jin-taek held his silence.

While he quietly gauged her intentions, Yang Mi-ryeong growled, as if fighting down the emotions boiling up inside her.

-Remember this. We never became Crows for that precious national interest of yours that you keep crying about.

Click.

Without even waiting for Deputy Director Kim Jin-taek's answer, she hung up without mercy.

Beep, beep, beep, beep....

"...."

In the office where stillness had settled, Deputy Director Kim Jin-taek stroked his lips with a careful expression.

A private anguish deepened endlessly within him.

*****

Leaving behind the North Korean freight train, half abandoned in the chaos, we slipped out to the vacant lot on the outskirts we'd marked in advance as our rally point.

Kite No. 3, who had driven up in a small truck, was just about to leave the scene with Chae Ji-jun in the passenger seat.

"By the way, back there I just blurted out that sum without thinking. Felt like the broker was going to snatch him away from us otherwise."

"No. If I'd been in there, I would've done exactly the same."

Kite No. 3 shook his head, then clapped a firm hand on my shoulder.

"Actually, no. Now that I think about it, there's no way I could have pulled off what you did. How did you even think to play it that bold in there? Talking every last one of those North Korean squad leaders around on the spot...."

"That was nothing, really. One look and I could see how the board was laid out."

"Seriously impressive. Me, I would've gotten worked up and gone straight for my gun."

"Heh heh."

I flashed an easy grin.

Kite No. 3 took his hand off my shoulder and nodded.

"The money you spent this time, I'll set it aside and make sure it gets back to you. There's the fee I'm splitting with Owl No. 8, so that should cover it one way or another."

"Forget it. You know I got a fat pile of reward money this time, right? I'll just call it even with that."

"Hey, come on, kid. Even so, how am I supposed to just let that kind of money slide?"

He probably had no idea, but I was seriously rich.

Rich enough, frankly, to toss out yogurt lids without licking them, or to walk out of a pricey hotel buffet having eaten nothing but the salad.

"Let's be honest, sunbae. Did HQ give you so much as a consolation payment for taking a bullet in your left arm?"

"That's.... covered by the hazard pay I got up front."

"So I'll just consider this me paying your consolation money on HQ's behalf."

"You really are something...."

I laid it on thick, all shameless good cheer.

At that, Kite No. 3 slowly rubbed his left shoulder, where the bullet scar would still be.

"All I ever do is strut around playing the senior, and you're the one always bailing me out."

"What's that between us? We look out for each other. Now get going."

"All right. See you around."

"Yeah. I'll come by for spicy cold noodles soon."

Grinning, I gave the side of the truck a tap.

We were just waving our goodbyes when it happened.

"C-Comrade Broker. I am truly grateful for what you did today! I shall not forget this kindness as long as I live."

Chae Ji-jun, who had been sitting there cowed and watching everyone's faces, offered his farewell from the passenger seat.

I grinned and gave him a light wave.

"You've been through a lot, Ji-jun-ssi. Get some good rest, and let's meet again soon."

"Yes! We must surely meet again!"

Vroom.

The truck carrying the two of them faded away down the night streets.

After watching until the vehicle was completely out of sight, I headed straight for the container set back behind us.

Owl No. 8, who had been hiding there, was staring intently at his camera screen.

"So? Get plenty of shots?"

"Heh heh heh heh."

Without a word, Owl No. 8 gleefully turned the camera my way.

We put our heads together, busy poring over the photos.

"Wow.... this is a Scud missile, right? First time I've seen one broken down like this."

"That's right. Doesn't look anything like a missile, does it? Ship it assembled and it could get flagged on an X-ray."

Most people assume the only things North Korea has to sell are rice and minerals.

But ever since North Korea succeeded in developing its own version by dismantling and reverse-engineering Scud missiles it once imported from Egypt, it has been doing a tidy export business with third countries like Iran, Yemen, Pakistan, and Vietnam.

For all practical purposes, North Korea's single best moneymaker was this very homegrown Scud missile.

"And what's this?"

"No idea. Looks like an antique. They're probably planning to sell it off somewhere in inland China for money laundering."

Besides the missile parts, there were a few strange-looking objects inside the crates.

Things that could have been artworks, or maybe antiques.

"Photograph these and send them in, and we can back-trace the channels North Korea uses to launder its funds. Turns out that Chinese logistics company was actually one of North Korea's smuggling routes, that sort of thing."

"Oooh."

I was learning things I'd never known.

Owl No. 8 tucked the camera away against his chest with a deeply gratified look.

He huffed a proud breath through his nose.

"Now I just head back and transmit the files, and the job's done. Starting tomorrow, the US military will have grounds to search every vessel departing China out on the high seas."

At that moment, a fresh bit of curiosity surfaced.

"By the way, Agent Owl, how do you know people at the CIA?"

"Ah, that's...."

"If it's an uncomfortable subject, you don't have to tell me."

"No, well, it's not exactly some deep dark secret...."

Owl No. 8 sheepishly scratched the back of his head.

"I'm actually from there."

"Oh, seriously?"

"Heh heh. Surprising, right?"

Surprising, my foot.

I'd already figured it out last night, the moment he leveled that pistol at me in the rooftop room without so much as a tremor.

For an Owl agent specializing in surveillance, his grip and stance were straight out of the textbook.

"But why leave a cushy job like that and come to the NIS of all places?"

"America takes way too much out in taxes."

"Ah."

A reason that cuts straight to the bone.

Don't they say the most terrifying agency in America isn't the FBI, the CIA, or the Pentagon, but the IRS?

Nothing is certain but death and taxes.

Their famous maxim.

When I nodded, Owl No. 8 grinned.

"But the money I pocket from side jobs like this? No taxes. How great is that?"

"Is that so?"

"Yes! In fact, the fee I'm collecting this time is going to be my personal all-time record. Thanks to you agents, I made my money the easy way. Heh."

"I didn't really do anything, though."

"No, no. Really."

For some reason, Owl No. 8's eyes sparkled at me with open admiration.

"If you hadn't coaxed those North Korean squad leaders into defecting back there, who knows how it would've gone. The workers who started the riot were a complete rabble."

"Were they, now?"

"If you hadn't flipped the whole board in there, my nerves would've given out too, and I'd have pulled out, photos be damned."

That, I hadn't known.

Looking back on it now, the whole game seemed to have come together on some remarkably good luck.

"Anyway! Thanks to you, I earned some sweet free money. I'll split the take for today's photos clean down the middle and send your cut over soon."

"Sure, sure."

In any case, at the mention of splitting money, I didn't bother refusing and nodded along obediently.

Separate from the bank account Yang Mi-ryeong had pressed into my hands, I needed to keep a separate set of finances of my own.

If I kept drawing on that money of hers, I couldn't shake the queasy feeling that I'd degenerate into a crime boss lady's kept man.

And maybe that was exactly what she was angling for when she so casually tossed that fortune my way.

'Terrifying woman....'

My grandmother always said every pretty woman is a fox, and as usual, she was never wrong.

"If you ever need this kind of help again, come find me anytime."

"Of course! I'll be in touch if a good job comes up. We're the Sinuiju operation family, after all!"

"Hahaha."

Owl No. 8 looked absolutely delighted.

And of course he was; the entire operation had gone off smoothly without a single hitch.

Me, though? I was feeling a little out of sorts.

'Why did everything go so well?'

Because in all that mayhem, I never got to fire a single shot.

Maybe that's why?

An itch.

'This is bad.'

I was itching for it.

*****

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