A Northern Thunder (28 page)

It took until mid-afternoon for the train to reach Wonsan. The arrival was timed so that he and others could easily transfer from the Wonsan Station to the passenger ship
Mangyonghong-92
for the overnight voyage to the port of Niigata.

The early winter winds of the Sea of Japan were fierce that night, but Rei stood on the ship’s front deck just the same, bracing himself against the wind and smoking a pack of his American cigarettes.
I need to get a couple of cartons
, he thought, realizing that this trip might be his last opportunity to do so for some time.

Earlier on board, Rei had met an elderly woman and her middle-aged son. Although Japanese citizens, they, too, were operatives for DPRK’s Intelligence Bureau.
Ch’ongryong
was the name given the thousands of pro-North Korean Japanese who maintained their family ties in North Korea. They were allowed continuous access to North Korea because they represented a well-appreciated intelligence opportunity for the DPRK’s military.

For this
Ch’ongryong
family, the trip had been well-orchestrated. According to detailed passes and paperwork, the middle-aged son and elderly mother were returning from a trip to explore the homeland of her grandfather.

Rei, always worried that his entrance to Japan telegraphed his exit of North Korea, had not been to the Japanese port of Niigata for several years. Trips through Beijing and Moscow had always given him more cover. As he walked down the wooden gangplank into port customs, he immediately noticed a far greater scrutiny than he ever recalled seeing before. Japanese custom officials, accompanied by armed Japanese security forces, stood evenly spaced along the walls of a corridor leading to a large room. Each of four customs desks was situated behind a thick plexiglas shield. A loudspeaker announced a request for declaration of all goods, and amnesty for the tendering of any weapons, which Rei thought was unusual.

The 6:09 a.m. Toki Shinkansen Super Express train left Niigata Station exactly on time, just as it did every day. Rei usually enjoyed the first-class cabin with airline-style luxury seats, but today, he decided to adopt a lower profile, taking an ordinary car instead. In less than two and a half hours, the train pulled into Tokyo.

As soon as he descended the stairs into the main station, Rei felt as if he had been dropped through a giant swirl of ants—two million Tokyo residents passed through the station every morning. He was always amazed that no one ever touched, not even in the most casual of bumps. In Rome, Madrid, or Paris, he would have felt constantly jostled. But in their trams and subways, where people were packed together like sardines, the Japanese tried to respect each other’s space and privacy by not touching or, if at all possible, even looking. It was a culture that stressed casual distance.

The air was beginning to cool in Tokyo, so Rei pulled up the collar of his black leather jacket. He stepped out to the taxi stand in front of the backside of the station, an aluminum and glass structure that rose up to dominate the city block. A driver bowed very briefly as he stood at the rear of his taxicab, opening up the trunk. “Keio Plaza Intercontinental, two twenty-one
nishi-shinjuku
,” Rei said in flawless Japanese.

“
Hya
,” the Tokyo taxi driver said as he again bowed.

The more affluent hotels attracted less attention than some out-of-the-way places. Police around the world would scrutinize a dark alley hotel and keep a far more detailed account of who stayed in its rooms. Rei had even gotten his superiors at Pyongyang to authorize a gold American Express card in several of his cover names in order to carry on missions in this manner. The card’s bill was mailed to a post office box in San Francisco, and always paid on time, through a San Francisco checking account in the name of an electronics company. The electronics company did not exist. The corporate name was changed on a regular basis, making it virtually impossible to trace.

Once checked into the hotel, Rei would make a point of leaving every morning no later than eight o’clock and not returning until after four in the afternoon, to prevent any suspicions that he wasn’t a businessman on a business trip to Tokyo. He often preferred to arrive in the target town about twenty-four hours before his attack, but this time he had arrived earlier.

Rei knew that Dr. Maka Aoano would be at the Tokyo Marriott Kinshicho Tobu, on the far eastern side of the city, for a symposium on silicon conductors for a brief forty-eight hours. The Marriott was two blocks away from one of the city’s smaller train stations, but it was also on the main rail artery to the Norita International Airport. In two weeks, RIKEN, Wako’s Institute of Physical and Chemical Research, was scheduled to hold its annual conference at the Marriott. Based in Wako, Japan, the Surface and Interface Laboratory’s director was the lead presenter. Her topic was using “Ersiz” silicon molecules to reduce the size of computers.

Rei’s plan was simple. He would hit the target at the Marriott, walk the two blocks to the Kinshicho train station, take the express train to the international airport, and be on a flight to Seoul on Korean Airlines in less than an hour.

Amazing
, he thought.
Who would imagine that my last mission would be the simplest of all?
Because it was his final mission, he had planned to rent a car once he arrived at the Seoul International Airport, drive fifteen miles out of town, and take the tunnel he had been able to avoid using so far.

It was under a small barn near a farmhouse only eight kilometers from the border.

T
om Pope started the morning meeting in the SIOC Operation Center with this announcement: “Gentlemen, we have someone.”

“Oh, really?” Dave Creighton dropped his pencil. The group was much smaller than it had been weeks before. Now, Creighton sat in the center chair, handling the senior supervisor’s role, and while the group met every Monday, its composition had changed to include only Creighton, Pope, Dr. Wilhelm, Mark Wilby from the Agency, and one man in uniform from the Joint Chiefs—an admiral.

“Joan reported the coordinating of logistics for someone in New York going to Tokyo in early December—hotels, an American Express card, the usual,” said Tom.

“So,” said Creighton, “what are your thoughts?”

“Sir, we don’t know if he’s going on from Tokyo or if the target is someone in Japan.”

“How many fit your profile of possible targets in Japan?”

“We have three for sure and possibly a fourth,” said Tom.

“How about traces on the portals of entrance?” The others remained silent as Creighton continued to bombard Tom with questions.

“We’re monitoring the major airports and, although it’s a stretch. . .”

“Yes, Tom?”

“We’re looking at direct vessel traffic into Niigata.”

“They can’t be that obvious,” said Creighton.

The admiral made a small note on his pad, then continued to doodle in the margins—boxes within boxes. He smiled slyly as he took everything in.

“I may have some insight on the DPRK’s use of that vessel, the
Mangyonghong-92
,” Admiral Krowl said, rubbing his fingers over his mouth, making it hard to understand what he was saying. “I’ll talk to one of my people and get back to you.”

“Admiral, if it’s significant, do it quickly. We don’t know if this guy hasn’t already gone elsewhere,” said Creighton, irritated.

“I’ll call as soon as we’re done.”

“Tom, what do the Japanese know?” said Creighton.

“Sir, only that we think we have a very big fish in the heroin trade coming through.”

“Good.”

“The only problem is that the Japanese have wanted for years to close that ferry down, and word is they’re close to doing it.”

“Can we get them to hold off?”

“That’s probably not needed,” said Wilby, another Ivy Leaguer dressed in a sharply-cut pinstriped suit. Despite inherited wealth and ingrained cockiness, he had learned at the Agency to speak less and listen more. “You see, sir, they never retrace. DPRK’s intelligence force always goes one way.”

“All right,” said Creighton, “let’s meet daily on this, at least by VTC.”

“Yes, sir,” said Tom.

“Oh seven-hundred tomorrow, and if anything hot breaks, let me know immediately—twenty-four seven.”

As the group disbanded, the admiral stopped Tom at the door. “Hey, you have a secure phone I can use?” he said.

“Sure, Admiral.” He pointed him to a red phone on a pullout drawer, next to the director’s seat. “You can use this one.”

“Thanks, it’ll only take a minute.” He dialed the Pentagon’s direct number to the Executive Support Center.

“This is Krowl. I need to talk immediately, by secure line, to my deputy, Sawyer.” He held his hand over the receiver, muffling his comments, although no one was close enough to overhear.

“Yes, sir, this is Commander Sawyer.”

“Go secure.”

“Yes, sir.” A high-pitched tone sounded for a few seconds. As the phone began scrambling, Krowl pulled out a cigarette and stretched the phone cord, searching the room for an ashtray. A young secretary at one of the terminals brought over a large, brass ashtray imprinted with the Bureau’s logo.

“Sir, I show secure,” said Sawyer.

“Where is she?” said Krowl.

Sawyer braced for the next comment. He knew this would release a ton of crap, but there was no way to avoid it. “Sir, I got a call this morning. She missed reporting in.”

“Shit!” said Krowl. Everyone in the center looked up from his terminal as Krowl, red-faced, yelled into the phone. Sawyer wisely did not reply, waiting, instead, for the torrent to end.

“That Goddamn communist flipping bitch! I’ll let them have her. I’ll be damned if I won’t.”

It took several moments for Krowl to calm down. Sawyer waited until he did, then asked, “Sir, does this stop Nemesis?” In the military, one could not move submarines and aircraft, or mobilize bases, without the grant of a mission designation.

“No!” Krowl yelled again.

“But, sir, this mission was always dangerous,” said Sawyer. “Now, it may simply be a trap.”

“Not if we get her ass first.” His temper flared up again. “I’ll get back there and put the dogs on her—ASAP.”

“Yes, sir.”

I
n its final approach into Hickam Air Field, the Gulf Stream came in low over the crystal blue waters of Pearl Harbor. One benefit of flying in a private jet was that those sitting on the right side felt comfortable abandoning their seatbelts and staring out the windows on the left.

Spotted first was the shadow from the behemoth battleship
Arizona,
which lay below the water. Patches of green and black outlined her long shape below the surface, and a bright white monument stood across her bridge. She appeared broken, her last half moved in crooked fashion, like a distorted, badly fractured arm. The destruction of December 7, 1941 was unmistakable.

“Hey, look over there, to the other side,” said Scott. “That’s the
Florida
.”

Will swiveled for a better view and saw another, larger shape tied up at a small wharf. The
Florida
was long, black, and tubular, with only its nose and tail submerged. The visible dimensions only hinted at the gigantic machine’s proportions.

“That, gentlemen, is our taxicab,” said Will.

“Not every day a billion-dollar Trident sub takes you where you want to go,” Gunny Moncrief quipped.

The jet gently touched down on Honolulu’s main runway, quickly taxiing off of Runway 08 Left, past the public terminal, and toward the backside of adjoining Hickam airbase. It stopped at Hickam’s Hangar 5, built in the early 1940s to handle the larger bombers of World War II. Three black Chevrolet Suburbans, in line under the roof, provided the appearance of a VIP welcome.

Scott bounded down the aircraft’s steps and shook the hands of two men waiting beside the lead vehicle. Will felt the warm breeze, a stark change from the cold air they had left at Fallon several hours earlier.

“Colonel, we can go straight to the boat,” said Scott.

“Okay, Scott, let’s go.” Will and Moncrief got in the rear seats of the first Suburban as the two others climbed into the following vehicle. The black vehicle convoy pulled out of the hangar, cut across the back side of Hickam through the Porter Avenue gate, and continued directly to Pearl Harbor, down the highway to the Ford Island entrance.