Dark Zone

9

The words came at her from somewhere above, blurring together like a murmur that sounded more like a hum than a sentence.

“Mianhamnida mianhamnida mianhamnida…”

Lia bolted upright, consciousness flooding back. Her head quickly began throbbing.

Where was she? What had happened?

“I am intensely sorry,” said a man’s voice in Korean. “Very sorry.”

She glanced down. She was sitting on a couch, wearing different clothes, baggy trousers and a blouse much too big for her. Army clothes, a uniform of some sort.

What had happened to her? She felt dazed. She’d been smashed in the head, beaten, and for a few moments had blacked out.

More than a few moments?

“Where am I?” she asked in Chinese.

“I do not understand,” said the man in Korean. He said something else; Lia had trouble deciphering. When he finally stopped speaking, she answered haltingly in Korean that she was thankful for his kindness but was OK now and could be left alone. The man responded with something else she couldn’t understand.

The pain in her head moved from the back to the front. It felt as if a large vibrating sander was being pulled back and across her skull.

The man was telling her about an airplane. He paused finally and asked if she was all right.

“Wo hen hao,” she replied automatically in Chinese. “I’m fine,” she said. “I’m all right.”

The man shook his head at the obvious lie.

“Gonghang?” she asked in Korean. “Am I at the airport?”

“Ne.”

Yes. She was still at the airport.

Lia blinked, pushing her hand over her eyes, squeezing her eyelids closed. When she opened them, he was gone.

She knew who she was; she knew she was on a mission to North Korea and that it had gone reasonably well. But she didn’t know what had happened since she arrived at the terminal.

She did, though.

Oh yes, she did.

Her body ached; her legs felt as if they had been pummeled. Her neck hurt and her cheek and eye felt swollen.

That wasn’t the half of it.

She knew.

Rage surged in her, then fear, then rage again.

Out. She had to get out.

Out.

Where were her clothes and her suitcase? She needed her belt — it enabled her com system.

Lia got up and took a few unsteady steps toward the closed door. The pain seemed to run to the right side of her head, as if it were water that might slosh around under the effect of gravity. As she reached for the doorknob she sensed that she would find the door locked; she was surprised to find it wasn’t.

The hallway was empty. As Lia stepped out, she realized that she had no shoes on. She continued anyway, padding across the cold concrete. There were two other doors along the hall; when she reached the far end she entered the reception area of the airport. Across from her was the small metal desk the local authorities had been using as a customs station when she arrived. There was no other furniture in the room.

The terminal had two small windows next to the doorway on the right; the door led out to the tarmac area. Her pain increased as she walked toward it, and she felt her eyelids pressing down from above, weighted by the pain and the fatigue from her struggle.

Struggle? Was that the word for what had happened?

Struggle. A nice euphemism.

Something seemed to smack against her forehead as she reached the door. Lia froze, almost dazed again, then realized she was hearing the sound of an aircraft landing-not a jet but a twin-engined turboprop with its loud, waspy roar. She pulled open the door and stepped outside. An aircraft had turned off the runway and was heading toward the terminal.

“Is that my plane?” she said in Chinese, though there was no one to ask except herself.

This was just as well. The words came out in the Cantonese she had first learned as a girl.

Lia remembered a lesson she’d had as a five-year-old with Dr. Lau, a Hong Kong native who’d come to America many years before. Trained as a medical doctor, Lau had never practiced medicine in the United States; he made his living mostly by giving Chinese lessons to his well-heeled Connecticut neighbors. Lia had been adopted by an American couple as a baby; they’d done as much as they could to teach her about her culture, even starting her on Chinese as a three-year-old. Dr. Lau became a family friend as well as an instructor, visiting often until he passed away when she was in high school.

The lessons with Dr. Lau seemed more real to her now than the aircraft taxiing toward her. Just as she took a step back it curled around sharply and stopped a few yards away. Lia began walking forward, ignoring the engines’ roar. She had just about reached the wing when she realized someone was shouting behind her. She turned and saw that the man who’d been with her in the room earlier had run up behind her and was holding out a plastic bag to her. It didn’t look familiar, but she took it anyway.

When Lia turned back around she saw that a door had been opened at the side of the plane. A small set of stairs folded out from the bottom half of the door to the tarmac; a man in a blue uniform stood at the base of the steps. Lia walked toward him, feeling herself tilting sideways, pushed down by the pain in her head and the rest of her body as she walked toward it.

The man said nothing as she climbed inside. Another man stood near the aisle. There were a dozen seats in the plane, but no other passengers. Lia went to the second row and sat down.

Why did the plane come?

Where am I going?

The bag — where is the bag?

It was in her hand. She opened it and saw that her clothes were in it. She stared at them for a while; when she finally looked up, one of the men was standing over her with a cup of tea.

You’re Chinese, she reminded herself, pushing her head down in a bow of gratitude. Stay in character.

As she thought that, she noticed the symbol on the tag of tea, which had been left draped over the side of the cup.

On the tag was the Chinese character jing: Quiet. Silence.

A message?

Lia fingered the tag, then took a sip of the tea, contemplating the bitter taste.