4. Arrival
ARRIVAL
RI SUNG-CHEOL
Pyongyang, Democratic People’s Republic of Korea
The road into Pyongyang’s Embassy Row ran straight and empty, flanked by poplars someone had aligned with military precision.
Their leaves were terracotta and gold, filtering the morning light.
The base of the trees were ringed with flowers.
Some bloomed in spring, others in summer.
These were the autumn variety. Someone had planned for it, to ensure that beauty was there all year.
The planters of Pyongyang were one of the few places where beauty burst through the confines.
Early autumn in the city had a strange, scrubbed quiet to it.
Its wide avenues were built for a volume of traffic that never arrived.
In the distance, propaganda murals on Taehak Street were catching the low sun in blocks of crimson and ochre yellow.
The cool damp of night had not burned off yet, lending a dreamy air to Soviet-style cement apartment blocks painted in undersea tones of seafoam and starfish orange.
He looked down at his suit. It was still immaculate from this morning.
He unconsciously checked his suit one last time: cuffs were still buttoned, tie knot still high and tight.
The enameled red metal badge of the flag with a portrait of the Supreme Leader was on his left side, over his heart, permanently weighing down one side of his jacket.
On his right, the tripartite emblem of the Korean Worker’s Party.
To his left and his right the gate guards and assistants were there. Someone always was with him in Joseon. Always watching, witnessing, ready to report. They might think ratting on someone else would get them ahead, but Ri knew it was a zero-sum game. No one ever got ahead.
He took a deep breath. They all did. They knew his role with them was the same.
The second secretary to the Ministry had briefed him that the Swedish Embassy was driving her in.
The car slowed. Gravel under tires. Blue flags on either side of the vehicle snapped in the breeze: one with the yellow stripes of Sweden, the other with the stars of the European Union. The flags steadied as the engine died.
She stepped out of the vehicle. A European woman, wearing a golf shirt, dark navy cargo pants, and shoes meant for walking. On closer inspection, her golf shirt was embroidered with a ring of stars on the upper left chest.
The corner of his mouth twitched. She too wore the trappings of the government that she worked for.
A lanyard was tucked into her neckline, whatever was on it was tucked under the collar of her shirt, hidden from view.
She wore her dark hair in a ponytail. Her eyes swept the surroundings, and he was immediately pierced by their brilliant blue hue, accentuated by the blue of her government shirt.
She emerged from the car with a rucksack over one shoulder—no wheeled carry-on bag, no attached drink carrier like the tourists used.
She was a foreign security delegate, here to determine whether the government he worked for could be trusted.
He already knew the answer to that; it was his mission to ensure that she didn’t know what he thought.
He schooled his face, adopting the professional neutrality that had become second nature.
She leaned into the trunk and took out a garment bag and a Pelican case for equipment.
He registered it with a quirk of an eyebrow.
No one handed it to her, and she didn’t expect anyone to.
No other personal effects. He was surprised to see her travel with so few personal effects.
She had packed for an inspection, not a state visit.
Perhaps the Central Committee had underestimated her.
He was beginning to wonder if he had, too.
She stepped to the trunk of the car and sunlight lit up her hair. Brunette hair exploded into an unexpected rainbow of colors: strands of gold, threads of fire-red, undertones of night-black.
She must have felt him watching her.
She turned her head and looked straight at him.