8. Pyongyang Main Train Station
PYONGYANG MAIN TRAIN STATION
Giovanni had spent the afternoon with Customs over a shipment that had finally arrived from Dalian.
Aya wanted to see the National Library. Esmee said that she had one of those appointments that was never entered into the shared calendar.
Marina told herself that it was probably a nap, but she knew, as much as she didn’t want to, that Esmee was a professional and was hiding something much more insidious.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs had split the delegation for the afternoon. One guide had been assigned to Giovanni, another to Aya. Sung-cheol had drawn the short straw.
Marina was walking downstairs when Esmee cornered her in the stairwell.
“Two words,” Esmee said, blocking Marina’s passage.
Marina rolled her eyes. “Good afternoon to you too.”
Esmee ignored her, and took a step closer, leaning into her ear: “Watch out. The car is outside with just that one guy driving, it could be a honey pot.”
“Wolf trap,” Marina corrected. “Honey pot is when a female adversary is the bait. Wolf trap is when it’s a male.”
It was Esmee’s turn to roll her eyes. “Thank you for the lesson. English isn’t my native language.”
Marina batted her eyes. “It’s not mine, either. I’m Belgian. Now look, I am aware of the security concerns. I’m the Acting RSO here.”
Esmee muttered something that sounded suspiciously like then act like it.
Ri Sung-cheol was driving and Marina sat up front.
“So do you like your new accommodations? You don’t want to return to the Hotel Yanggakdo?”
He pointed to the tall, Brutalist slab of concrete jutting into the Pyongyang skyline.
She thought about how she now shared a four-bedroom apartment with Giovanni, Esmee, and Aya.
About how she lived with Esmee, a spy whose job was to rat on her.
The apartment didn’t have enough bedrooms for each of them but Giovanni and Aya offered to room together, an offer they presented as self-sacrificing, so the delegation would have an empty bedroom to use as an office.
It was pretty rich, them carrying on that they were letting Esmee and Marina have their own bedrooms when the entire apartment could hear the enthusiasm with which Aya and Giovanni wanted to share one. On the other hand, at least two of their delegation were getting laid.
Marina briefly regretted that Esmee was not a guy. If there were another man living with them, she might also be suitably engaged instead of angling to catch the scent of Ri Sung-cheol: of laundry, aftershave, and underneath it, the scent of just him that was slowly driving her mad.
Her mission today was ostensibly to visit a large group dental practice called by a name only found in communist countries: the Oral Disease Prevention Center.
It was located off a street her pre-departure map had identified as Sosong Street: if she closed her eyes, she could still see the map with the street names in her mind.
The dentist visit was strictly a ruse, as the dentist office backed up to the fenced yard of a massive, villa-type conglomeration of rooftops known as Residence 15. The villa was accessible only by a single, winding, cordoned off street; so unlike the other streets which criss-crossed one another.
In other words, the villa was located inside a city fortress.
If the rest of the city was more or less a crosshatch of connecting streets, the winding, fishhook-shaped road to Residence 15 reminded her of a tapeworm in the heart of the city.
A block away from Residence 15 and the dentist—er, Oral Disease Prevention Center—was Changgwang Street.
And a mysterious building that was identified as Bureau 39, the secretive organization that supported the Kim family with anywhere from 500 million to one billion dollars annually.
Bureau 39 operated a slush funded channeling income from tourism, exports, and overseas restaurants.
They were thought to engage in counterfeiting US dollars, insurance fraud, and manufacturing drugs like methamphetamines.
She hoped to snag a photo of the Bureau. A photo of Residence 15? No, that was unlikely. But a photo of the building could be yield security information—and she could give the photo to Esmee. Esmee might have even more use for it than she did.
She felt the smallest bit of guilt asking Ri to drive her there, but this was work. Touring the dental office was relevant for site security assessment—if someone had an emergency dental issue, the EU didn’t want to medevac them to China for treatment.
“Is that mini-golf place ever open?” she asked, changing the subject.
The mini-golf park was just off the Yanggak Bridge.
“Oh, yes,” he said softly, letting the steering wheel slide through his fingers.
She dropped her eyes to her lap. Maybe she was being insensitive, asking about mini-golf when he lived in a police state.
They passed by a bus stop, a mural behind it exhorting people to be self-sufficient and increase the harvest hundred-fold through socialism and revolutionary zeal: Sven had translated it a few days earlier.
“Sorry, do you want me to arrange a trip there?”
“No. Just asking.”
He chuckled softly and they drove in silence.
She saw something in the corner of her eye as they approached the station.
“Wait, what’s that?”
Sung-cheol looked out. “Nothing,” he said, and suddenly turned onto a side street.
“No, wait, I want to see.”
“There’s nothing to see?—“
“I said I want to see, turn around!”
“No!” he said sharply.
She unlatched her seatbelt but he was too focused on an approaching Army truck, loaded with soldiers, to notice.
He slowed the car at an intersection and she opened the door, rolling out onto the street.
An involuntary sound escaped her as she rolled, but she righted herself and started running back towards the train station.
Sung-cheol slammed on the brakes and put the car into reverse. There was no traffic to avoid, only the personnel carrier and his sedan were on the road outside the country’s main train station.
The personnel carrier truck was slowing, and the driver leaned out the window to watch her.
She saw it briefly when she looked behind her, but turned her head back and slowed her pace, panting.
It was just as she had thought.
Had hoped not to see.
The remains of a very thin, older woman were leaning against a heap of trash bags. One shoe had slipped halfway off, her sock-less foot resting against the curb. She looked like a beggar who’d starved to death.
Marina forgot where she was.
What she was.
And everything around her.
She screamed in horror and sank slowly to her knees.
Strong arms reached underneath her arms and pulled her upright, turning her away from the scene.
“Shhh!”
Sung-cheol was shushing her. Soldiers were watching them, their faces grim.
“There’s a?—“
“Stop!” Sung-cheol said, and for the first time she saw panic on his face. He held his hands out. “Come back with me to the car.”
She heard the military truck roll to a stop behind her. She checked over her shoulder: the soldiers were eyeing her. One of them adjusted a rifle on the back of his shoulder, tightening his jaw as he did so.
She had no accreditation here. She was not a diplomat. She had no immunity from arrest.
Hanging her head, she walked back, Sung-cheol following her.