"Dear Leader Kim Jong II has been dead these many months."
And hearing these words, the Master of Sinanju flew into a rage. "Liar! Do not lie to the House that has made Koreans the most feared race ever to sanctify the soil with his sandal prints. You lie. I know you lie. You know you lie. Spit out these lies or surrender your lying tongues. Take me to the son of Kim II Sung."
"This will be done," said General Toksa.
At the presidential palace, the Master of Sinanju and his pupil were taken to a sumptuous basement office where sat a cunning, waxy-faced man in an ostentatious green uniform.
"You are not the son of Kim II Sung," Chiun said.
The man placed his naked hands on the desk, smiling thinly. "I am the son of Kim II Sung. I am by name Kim Pyong II."
"Where is Kim Jong II?"
"My half brother has joined his father and his ancestors."
"I will brook no more lies," said the Master of Sinanju, slashing out a hand that seemed only to graze the belly of an attending general. His belly gaped a big red smile and disgorged his bowels.
This impressed Supreme Leader Premier for Life Kim Pyong II, who stood up and said, "My brother is in the countryside doing the work that he loves best."
"Whoring?" asked Chiun.
"No. Directing."
"Take us to him, for I will serve no emperor of Korea other than the true eldest son of Kim II Sung."
Remo rolled his eyes. The last place he wanted to work for was North Korea. But he knew he had no say. Not if he wanted to stay in Chiun's good graces.
Kim Jong II, Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces of North Korea, sat in his director's chair in the soundstage outside Pyongyang. He was happy. For the first time he was happy. He was doing what he wanted. And no one wanted to kill him anymore.
Not that they hadn't tried. If it wasn't the generals who hated him, it was his half brother who feared him or his stepmother who despised him.
All had tried to kill him—and failed. It was getting to be ridiculous. Bombs in his pillows. Poisoned Bim Bam Bop. Diseased courtesans. Nothing worked.
In the end they had cut the unkillable Dear Leader a deal.
Surrender the reins of power to his ambitious half brother and lead a life of luxury and privilege.
It was too good to be true. But since they were all holding pistols and rifles on him and he was soaking in his gold-plated tub, he had agreed.
They marched him out at gunpoint, his stepbrother looking especially nervous, and into a waiting army truck. Naked.
He was sure he was going to be shot. But as they drove, their seething rage suggested otherwise. If he was really going to be killed, they would be gloating over him. Certainly spitting in his hapless face. Kicking him, too. Especially his stepmother, who did that a lot since his father had died.
Instead, they had set him up in production.
"I don't get it," he said in his Hollywood-style Korean as he surveyed the converted aircraft hangar now emblazoned with a Hangul sign that read Dear Leader Productions.
"It is simple," his half brother had barked. "The Western markets are open to us. We need their currencies. To get their currencies, we need the product they want. The Chinese are making a fortune selling epic motion pictures starring a tart named Gong Li."
"Ah," sighed Kim Jong II. "I would give anything to direct Gong Li. She was magnificent in Red Sorghum."
"Make movies the West will pay to watch," said his half brother, slapping him on the head as if he were a naughty child instead of the greatest director in the history of Korean cinema.
And so Kim Jong II had returned to his first love, directing. After a while it all made sense. A dead Kim Jong II, after so many botched assassination attempts, would bring down the whole flimsy regime. For he had been groomed to be the next Dear Leader of North Korea, and all the people knew it. They would accept no substitute.
On the day the South Korean forces rolled across the Thirty-eighth Parallel, Director Kim Jong II was lounging in his Dear Leader director's chair trying to get his leading actress to pout correctly for the camera and wishing he had Gong Li, the hottest Asian actress on the planet, instead of this simpering country-faced wench.
But one worked with what one could scrounge. It was hard to get anyone to visit North Korea in these post-Iron Curtain times, much less settle here.
In the middle of the pivotal scene where Princess An jilts King K'on, sirens began wailing so loudly they pierced the soundproof former bomber hangar.
"Cut!" shouted Kim Jong II, bouncing off his director's chair, his plump body encased in an electric blue silk jogging suit like so much sausage in a foil package. "What the bleep is going on!"
An old gaffer cried, "The Americans are back with their B-52s!"
"Don't be ridic," snorted Kim Jong II. "They're more savvy than all that."
But when he poked his head out the soundstage door, he saw clear skies and a string of official limos coming up the road, their sirens screaming their approach.
"Uh-oh. Dear Leader doesn't like the looks of this setup."
Ducking back, he went in search of a place to hide. But the soundstages had glass offices just like in Hollywood—he had insisted on that, and the glass wasn't exactly bulletproof.
They caught him climbing into the princess's kimono with the actress who was still occupying it and screaming that she was being raped.
"Hail the son of Kim II Sung," boomed a squeaky voice.
And recognizing the voice of the Master of Sinanju, Kim Jong II blurted, "Oh, shit. I'm dead. They hired the best."
Falling to his knees, Kim Jong II implored the Master of Sinanju with these words. "Just make it quick, okay? No pain, no blood, but a clean death. I'll go quietly, I promise."
"I have come because a year ago you offered work to the Master of Sinanju."
Kim Jong II blinked. Was he hearing correctly? "You want to work for me?"
"As eldest son, you have the right of first refusal."
Kim Jong II opened his closed fingers and climbed to his feet. His vision, which had irised down into a gray tunnel with a peephole at the end of it, began to clear.
He saw the Master of Sinanju, resplendent in a poppy-red kimono, along with a white he recognized with a start.
"Does your white slave come in the bargain?" he asked, indicating Remo.
"What's it to you?" Remo demanded.
"Hey! Cool it, baby. I remember you from last time. No hard feelings. Just saying is all."
"Where do you get that talk?"
"Movies. Where else?"
"My son in spirit will serve whatever emperor the House favors," intoned the Master of Sinanju.
"Don't count on it," said Remo.
"Okay. Deal," said Kim Jong II.
"Not without agreeing on payment," Remo said quietly.
"Excellent point," said Chiun. "We must come to terms."
"Gold I ain't got."
Chiun frowned.
"I have gold," said Kim Pyong II from the shadows. He stepped out, surrounded by stern-faced generals.
"Who invited you?" Jong said sourly.
"I must have gold," said Chiun.
"I have something more valuable than gold," said Kim Jong II. "Assuming you want it, that is."
Chiun sniffed, "There is nothing more valuable than gold."
"Depends on how you look at it."
"I too have something more valuable than gold," said Kim Pyong II.
"Here we go. Dueling despots," groaned Remo.
"I will listen to both offers and choose," declared Chiun.
"Me first," said Kim Jong II. And stepping forward, he whispered into the receptive ears of the Master of Sinanju.
"This is an interesting offer," mused Chiun. Then, turning to the other Kim, he asked, "What is your offer?"
"I have no gold to offer, either, but rather information of inestimable importance to you."