Operation Hail Storm

Wonsan, North Korea ― Warehouse

The wooden chairs in the office of the warehouse were hard and unforgiving on Victor Kornev’s tailbone. He looked at the Minister of State Security for North Korea, Kim Won Dong, sitting across from him. The man appeared to be quite happy with the chairs as well as his surroundings.

The office was hot and the only relief came from a single fan that was sitting on the desk making squeaky passes as it oscillated back and forth. Kim Won Dong seemed ambivalent to the heat as well. In a more civilized nation, what would have been called a coffee table was actually a small crate that occupied space between the wooden chairs and the desk. On the crate sat an assortment of tasty North Korean treats. A large container of Snakehead fish stew appeared to be the main offering. A bowl of rice and a smaller bowl of fermented cabbage were the side items. A jug of murky water that had specs of silver, maybe fish scales, was the non-chilled beverage.

The North Korean bureaucrat appeared to be comfortable with his surroundings. The chairs didn’t seem to bother him one bit. And as he reached over the crate and began to help himself to dinner, Kornev realized that the North Korean was accustomed to it. Accustomed to everything. He was used to the heat. Content with the hard chairs. Pleased with the disgusting food. This hot, hard office was no more out of the norm for this man than it was for Kornev to eat Russian chilled soups based on kvass, such as tyurya and okroshka. Or even pelmeni, a traditional Russian dish usually made with minced meat filling wrapped in thin dough.

Even so, Kornev couldn’t wait to get out of there. After the last stage of the missile had arrived and he had been paid, then it would be a quick ride over to the Wonsan Airport. From there, the Minister of State would escort him to a nondescript cargo plane, and he would get the hell out of this bizarre country.

Through a mouth full of food, Kim Won Dong asked in Korean, “When will the last stage of the missile arrive?”

The problem with that question was that Kornev didn’t know. The route the last missile segment was taking was the most complicated. It entered North Korea into the mouth of the Taedong River, south of Nampo. From there it would continue its route up the narrowing Taedong, past the city of Pyongyan until it reached the Nam — Gang River fork. At that point, the cargo would be transferred to a smaller ship or barge and then it would slowly meander its way up the twisting Nam — Gang River until it reached the town of Sinpyong. The river voyage would be over and the cargo would be transferred to a truck and trailer and driven fifty kilometers along the Pyongyang — Wonsan Highway until it reached the warehouse.

Kornev was an expert at moving contraband by using many different types of routes and vehicles. But North Korea was a communication nightmare all unto itself. The biggest problem was that cell phone service in North Korea was horrible and always had been. Going back to 2011, no mobile phones could dial in or out of the country and there were no Internet connections. Ninety-four percent of the population had cell phones, but only fourteen percent of the country had cell phone coverage. That made certain people’s specialized jobs, such as International Arms Dealer, difficult at best. Kornev could handle all the complicated methods of moving materials into North Korea; the bitch of operating inside North Korea was monitoring the shipments once they had entered its borders.

Kornev dialed the number he had listed for the driver of the diesel rig that was hauling the last missile part. He held his phone high in the air in hopes that the single bar on his phone would grow into two. He pressed the button to activate the speaker on his phone so the Minister could hear the voice of whoever answered.

A pre-recorded Korean voice came on the line and said something like, “The party you are trying to reach is not available. Please try again at another time or leave a message.”

Kornev listened and shook his head toward the Minister.

“I have a signal but the truck driver has no signal,” Kornev said in his best Korean. He clicked off the call.

Kim Won Dong nodded his head in understanding and shoved another spoonful of Snakehead fish stew into his mouth.

Victor thought that the Minister looked very content sitting there eating his Korean shit, sitting on a wooden stone and baking in the office oven. Kornev thought about leaving and driving into Wonsan and maybe getting a room at their best establishment, the Dongmyong Hotel. But that was a lot of effort to stay in a hotel that lacked maintenance and only intermittently had electricity to power their elevators. But if you caught the hotel on a good electricity day, you might even be able to get a hot shower. Victor had been there once before and remembered that the smell of the lobby was so bad that he had to apply tiger balm to his upper lip to neutralize it. He could find the hotel’s restaurant without a problem by looking for the highest density of flies.

The Minister chewed with his mouth open, smacking his lips, making disgusting gooey sounds with his mouth. Kornev groaned slightly as he leaned forward and stretched his back. His ass felt like hamburger. He was tired and wanted to sleep. He was hungry and didn’t want to die by eating what was sitting on the crate. He just wanted the last missile part to arrive so he could get his bag of diamonds and get the hell out of North Korea.

His mind drifted back to his hotel stay in Nizhny Novgorod, Russia ― the beautiful Volna Hotel. And he also thought about the beautiful Tonya Merkulov he had met. He closed his eyes and imagined lying there in the air conditioned room on the big overstuffed mattress with the lovely redhead in his arms. He could almost smell her female scent and feel her soft white skin against his…

“Where’s the truck?” the North Korean grunted again.

Kornev opened his eyes just in time to see a small wad of rice and fish fall out of the man’s mouth and land on the dirty floor. Kornev felt his stomach turn.

Where the hell was the damn truck? Kornev thought to himself.

Sometimes his job really sucked.