2. Videocall
VIDEOCALL
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Marina said.
“No,” Tobias replied, lifting his eyebrows.
Her German supervisor was circumspect, a man who metered out words like they cost him something.
They were sitting in a secure conference room, a blue flag behind him with a circle of yellow stars on it, the same flag stitched onto every lanyard, every embassy gate, every work polo shirt she owned.
“This is some kind of joke,” she reiterated, looking between the documents he was sharing on-screen and the empty camera feed, as if switching fast enough between the two might make one of them resolve into something less absurd.
“It’s not,” he replied drily.
Marina smiled faintly. Surely he could not be serious.
“I’m glad your sense of humor has returned. We are, indeed, planning an exploratory mission to the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea,” he said.
The European Union government was planning an exploratory mission to North Korea.
To see if they could re-open their old diplomatic outpost in Pyongyang.
“That’s crazy talk,” she muttered under her breath.
“Can you log into the meeting too? It looks nicer on camera,” Tobias asked.
Marina dutifully opened the secure, SCIF-cleared laptop behind her and logged in.
The screen showed one remote attendee waiting to be admitted. Tobias toggled over the name: Esmee Dubois.
He clicked ENTER.
The camera feed started, and Esmee Dubois flickered onscreen, EEAS United Nations - New York written underneath her.
“Sorry I’m late, I was meeting with the ambo.”
Ambo. Marina’s gaze floated up to the ceiling and she took a deep breath.
“Good. Did the ambassador approve your travel?”
Esmee’s smile was flawless. “She did.”
Marina reached for a water bottle from the center of the table and cracked it open. Whenever Esmee was in a meeting, it always ran long.
Onscreen, Esmee tucked a lock of her brunette bobbed hair behind an ear, and adjusted a scarf she’d knotted nattily around her wrist like a bracelet. Esmee was not just French—she was very French, and she didn’t want anyone to forget it.
Marina narrowed her eyes. Esmee was wearing a high-end designer scarf when she was earning a government salary like the rest of them. Marina made a mental note in her security checklist: determine if staff have unexplained sources of wealth.
“Good morning, Marina.”
Marina creased her brows. “Good afternoon, Esmee. It’s ten to five.”
Esmee waved Marina’s comment away with a flourish of short, neutrally polished nails. “Oh, excuse-moi, I was just in Zurich, and then in Zagreb, followed by a weekend in Minsk. Beijing somewhere in there. Now in New York. It all runs together.”
“Mm.” Marina took a sip of water to avoid rolling her eyes. Esmee was such a show-off. “I hope you can get your sense of time back, very soon.”
Tobias shot her a quelling look.
“Have you briefed Marina yet on the little trip to Pyongyang?” Esmee asked.
Marina’s head snapped up.
“Marina, we were just talking about that.”
Little trip to Pyongyang?
Tobias was her boss, not Esmee’s, but it was starting to sound like Marina was the last one to come to the party. It annoyed her all the more that Esmee was city-hopping around the world, Marina was right here in Brussels with Tobias, and yet Esmee seemed more read-in that she was.
“You must tell her about this trip. It will be so interesting.” Esmee folded her arms.
“So Marina, you being our regional security officer here,” he began, avoiding her eyes.
Wait—no. He wasn’t suggesting…?
“And you are a credentialed security officer, and since Rolf retired we have one less on our team.”
He was suggesting.
No!
“We need someone of your experience.”
No.
“I’m needed here in Brussels,” she interjected.
“We’re sending you.”
She slammed her water bottle down hard enough that water sloshed onto the conference table.
“I’m busy. Unavailable.”
She had pressing meetings that could not be postponed or rescheduled. Diplomatic security for the European Union’s embassy headquarters? It wasn't a job where one could disappear for weeks.
“I have to go to?—”
She opened her calendar.
Tobias smiled thinly, pressing his lips together.
She didn’t like that smile. She’d seen it before, when he was diplomatically arm-twisting people through security protocols.
“Lucky for you, I relieved you of your upcoming responsibilities to—how do they say in English?—sand the decks for action.”
“Clear the decks for action,” she replied dully. Damnit, he was arm-twisting her. She pulled up her weekly schedule: her diary was practically empty for the rest of the month, other than daily check-ins with him at eight o’clock on Friday mornings.
He snapped his fingers. “Clear the decks. Ah. That’s that expression. Don’t worry, it’s just a quick look, you will only be there for two weeks, maybe three. Now let me see…” he donned his glasses and looked closely at his screen.
“You told me two months, maybe three months,” Esmee interjected.
Marina had practically forgotten about her.
“That would be for your mission,” Tobias replied.
“The one that the French Prime Minister just walked into your building and told you that I should do?”
Marina remembered the prime ministers walking into the EEAS building.
“Quite.” Even Tobias looked like he was losing his patience with Esmee’s preening.
Marina sat back, still piecing together the puzzle.
She'd spent years keeping diplomats from going into situations exactly like this. Every security course she'd ever attended—or given—had been about reducing unnecessary exposure. A mission to the DPRK flew in the face of every lesson she'd ever taught.
North Korea was the antithesis of how not to end up on the news. She was not volunteering to walk into the one country that gave every risk model a blank stare.
“Ah.” He picked up a pen and wrote on the paper in front of him, his forearm draped across the table just enough that she couldn’t see what he was writing?—
Or was he writing?
She watched the trajectory of the pen. It looped. It scratched. It… cross-hatched.
She was so open-mouthed that she took a sip of water just to cover it up.
Tobias was doodling. In a business meeting. A business meeting about a mission to North Korea.
She rubbed an eyebrow. Her supervisor was putting off telling her something. She had no idea how he ever became a supervisor when he dithered like that.
Damnit, he was not taking this seriously.
“What is it, Tobias?” she asked, exasperation leaking at the edges.