A forty-something Korean woman advanced toward them, her face partially obscured by a huge wide-brimmed sun visor. Lonnie referred to the kind of sunshade popular among Korean ajummas (middle-aged women) as a “Darth Visor.” The woman’s body language was tight and purposeful, and energy pulsed out of every short, sharp stride as if she were forcing the earth into submission with each step.
Jim turned to her and smiled. “Yobo, c'mere and meet some of my old chingoos.”
“I don't need no mo' trouble.” She spoke with a harsh Pusan accent that turned her r's into d's, l's into r's and f's into p's. “You nuf po me to handle.”
“Yeah, yeah…I'll handle you all right,” Jim said. “Suki, this is Marcus 'Mojo' Johnson. I told you about him before. And this is Mike Farris, also a Marine, and his wife, Hilde.”
“Onyong haseyo.” Marcus greeted her with a slight bow and the traditional polite Korean greeting, followed by saying how nice it was to meet her. “Manabeyoso pangapseumnida.”
“Heh?” Suki's eyes widened at hearing her native language from him. “No too many Medicans speakuh Hangul. You got no accent. Wheh black man like you learn dat?”
“I was stationed there for two years with the ROK Marines.”
“Ooh, tup guy.” She turned to Mike, “You speakuh Hangul too?”
“No, ma'am,” Mike replied, “Marcus’s brain is bigger than mine. I have a hard enough time with English.”
Suki gave Hilde an overtly judgmental look, her permanently tattooed eyebrows crunching in an expression that could cut diamonds.
“You bedi pretty. You mussa be lots younguh den you husband, heh?”
Hilde blushed. “Thanks, it's only a couple of years. You're very pretty too.”
“Don't lie me,” Suki scolded. “Jimmy just blind, but he good husband and he like kimchi, so I keep him.”
“Marcus's wife is Korean too,” Hilde said, deflecting the intimidating direct attention.
Suki's eyes brightened. “Yah? She makee kimchi po you too?”
“Not really — we usually buy it from the store. She’s adopted, grew up here in Alaska.”
“Too bad. You come my house, Jimmy you drinkee beeyuh and I teach you wipe how makee kimchi. I makee bess kimchi, bess you evah tase, gayentee!”
Marcus smiled at the thought of Lonnie learning to make kimchi from this firebrand of a woman.
“I’m sure she’d love that, ma’am,” he said.
“You betcha,” she replied.
“We’d better let them get back to work,” Jim said.
“Work?” Suki blurted. “You seeket subis? You peziden bodigod?”
“Not exactly,” Mike said, “but we are working with them at the moment.”
“Jimmy, you friends all tup guys like dis? Maybe you get us pron low sheet, heh?” Suki said, her eyes wide in anticipation.
“Get you what?” Hilde asked.
“Front row seats,” Jim translated
“Sure,” Hilde said. “ You’d better head up now, though.”
“Hurry up, Jimmy.” Suki grabbed her husband and pulled his arm toward the stage. “We got pron low sheet ip we go now.”
“Looks like I gotta make my yobo happy,” Jim said. “See you guys later.”
Marcus barely suppressed bursting into laughter as he watched the tough retired Navy chief warrant officer get dragged toward the stage by his tougher wife.
“Match made in heaven, that,” he said. “I don’t think anyone else could’ve tamed Jim Walker like that ajumma could.”
“Scary,” Mike said.
Crowds were now flowing into the park, making their way toward the stage to get a spot to watch the speeches by some of the most powerful men in the world.
By ten a.m., the park was packed by thousands of onlookers. Reporters and television crews hedged the crowd along the sides. Cameras fixed their fields of view toward the stage and the small podium with the presidential seal affixed to its front. Although the president would not be arriving for another hour, the park was already full. Access to the park was closed off, no more spectators allowed through the security cordon. If Farrah and Kharzai were coming, they were already onsite.
The president’s motorcade pulled into the park at five minutes before eleven a.m. Immediately behind the presidential convoy came several limousines and a half dozen Suburbans carrying the president of South Korea, the prime ministers of Japan and Canada, and the foreign minister of the United Kingdom. The president and his entourage made their way across the lawn toward the stage.
Chapter 27
Steven Farrah stepped lightly across the crowded green, scanning the length of the park as he moved through the throng of people making their way toward the stage area. The faces around him glowed expectantly, hoping to catch a glimpse of the most powerful man in the world and his international peers. Farrah fingered the small, round Audi starter fob in his pocket. He looked into the face of a soldier standing nearby. The soldier nodded a polite greeting. Farrah smiled in return, imagining the soldier torn to bits in the coming chaos.
A minimal application of makeup, change of hair style and color, and modified wardrobe had done the trick to get him past the watching eyes. Bits of silicone skin applied to the eye sockets, nose, and jaws altered his features just enough, enabling him to walk past any hidden facial recognition scanners, or human eyes, that may be focusing on him. They would eventually ping on his face, but the changes meant it would take time to search the databases and he didn't need to keep hidden forever. Farrah would try to escape, but he did not expect to survive. He only wanted to accomplish the mission. Vengeance was within his reach.
News crews ringed the crowd and television cameras sent digital signals to satellites hovering at the far reaches of the atmosphere, prepared to beam live feeds around the world. They would get an eyeful indeed, the absolute best in television news, an attack unrivaled since 9/11. Farrah would watch the horror on the faces of these world leaders as they witnessed the kind of destruction their own bombs rained down on other nations.
He found a space in the crowd just ten meters from the stage. To one side, a family of obese people shifted on their feet, sweating and uncomfortable in the already-hot morning. The husband and wife both looked like they weighed well over three hundred pounds, and the child, who could not have been more than eleven or twelve, was at least two hundred pounds. They smelled like old cheese. On his other side were a man and woman whose appearance was the polar opposite of the fat family. Tall, muscular. and chiseled, adorned with designer clothing that seemed out of place in the Arctic, they looked like they both stepped out of a Swedish fashion magazine and carried themselves with the haughty air of cold Nordic deities.
Conceited superiority on one side and slothful gluttony on the other. An absurd image crossed his mind. In the coming panic, the beautiful couple screaming in terror as the frightened fat family eats them whole. He suppressed the urge to laugh, careful not to damage his temporary appearance.
Behind him, a thickly accented woman's voice muttered, “Why you pick dis spot, Jimmy? We should'a gone up pron low.”
“Shh, we got here too late,” a man reponded, presumably Jimmy.
“I canna see nothin',” said the woman. “Dem fat people blocking me dis side and dem tall people's blocking me de utha side.”
Farrah felt a poke on his shoulder, and he turned his head to see a heavily madeup woman with tattooed eyebrows and a huge sun visor giving her a cartoonish appearance.
Suddenly changing to a sweeter-sounding raspy voice, she said, “Hi, you mine ip I stand nexa you? I'm too short, canna see presdin back here.”