The two North Korean guards had marched Granny to one of the abandoned huts in the compound. He dragged his feet, as if barely able to walk. Beyond them, the chain link fence glistened in the moonlight. The rest of the huts were wreathed in shadows. Granny suddenly came to life, trying to wrench the SKS rifle from the guard’s hands. He was slammed with the butt of the rifle, sending him down to his knees. He tried to crawl to his feet, but the second NK guard kicked him back down. Off-balance, Granny could only turn back to his executioners.
The first North Korean guard leveled his rifle at Granny’s head.
McCall moved out of the shadows, knocking the SKS rifle from the man’s hands. He twisted the man’s head and snapped his neck. At the same time, Harry emerged from the shadows outside the abandoned huts and slipped an Italian 5mm Stiletto blade into the North Korean’s back. He crumpled to the ground. While Harry dragged the two dead guards behind the first abandoned hut, McCall grabbed Granny and brought him to his feet. Granny noted that McCall was carrying a Heckler & Koch MP5 submachinegun. Granny looked at him and just nodded. “I knew you would come for me.”
“You would have come for me,” McCall said.
“Yeah, I would have.”
“You’re okay?”
“I’m okay.”
“Where are the other western prisoners?”
“In one of the main huts,” Granny said. “There are five of them. One of them, a contractor named Walter Coburn, has wired up explosives with me that we stole from the prison armory. There is a photojournalist named Liz Montgomery. Her sister Deva only came to the prison camp two days ago. She is being held in Myang-Sook-Jang’s hut. He is the Commandant of the prison. There is also a mercenary who just arrived at the compound named Ji-Yeon. Used to work for various terrorist organizations, but he has gone legitimate now. Hires out to various NATO countries.”
“Who else?”
“Fredrik Jorgensen, a Dutch entrepreneur and Daniel Blake who worked for Associated Press,” Granny said.
Harry returned from disposing the bodies of the guards. McCall said: “This is Yo-Han, a mercenary who is on this mission with me. He has a partner Kyu-Chul who is waiting in a BTR-152 armored vehicle outside the main gate.”
Harry gave Granny a cavalier wave. He had two sets of heavy keys in his hands. McCall turned back to Granny. “Where are the North Korean prisoners located?”
“In the back huts behind here.”
“Set them free, Harry,” McCall said.
“Perfect.”
Harry disappeared back into the deeper shadows around the abandoned huts.
“Where did you pick up the kid?” Granny asked. “He doesn’t look older enough to shave yet.”
“He’s got my back,” McCall said, curtly. “How much time do we have?”
“I’ve got explosives wired under the three watchtowers and more of them in the abandoned huts throughout the compound. Dynamite sticks tied together. The fuses need to be lit. There is some C4 explosives also, but they could have been compromised. Nothing in this place is exactly state-of-the-art. I need to get back into Commandant Jang’s hut and pick Deva up. Ji-Yeon is going to take her with him when he leaves the camp.”
“How is he going to do that?”
“He has a North Korean pilot waiting for him in a MD-500 helicopter. North Korean markings. The prison is being evacuated within the hour.”
McCall looked out into the night that surrounded them. Granny seemed stronger to him now, more in command of his emotions. He would need him to get himself together if they were going to have a chance of survival.
“How long before the fireworks start?” McCall asked.
“As long as it takes me to light the fuses.”
“Do it,” McCall said.
Granny grabbed both of the 58 AKS rifles from the fallen guards. McCall set down his backpack and took out the walkie-talkie from it.
“Kyu-Chul.”
Kyu-Chul’s voice echoed from the walkie. “Here, Mr. McCall.”
“Two minutes to breach the prison gate.”
“Copy that.”
The mercenary clicked off the walkie.
McCall looked back at Granny. “Light your fuses.”
Harry used his stiletto knife on two of the North Korean guards, collecting two more sets of keys. He unlocked the door of the first hut. Bleary faces looked back at him from the cots inside. The North Korean prisoners were dressed in their drab olive prison uniforms. Harry picked up the first few of the prisoners, helping them to stand. He spoke to them in Korean.
“You are leaving this place. Come with me! All of you!”
There was confusion and fear etched on their faces. Harry roughly brought the rest of them to their feet, herding them to the open hut door.
“Outside! Stay together!”
Harry unlocked the next three huts. He grabbed the prisoners, some of them old, infirm, but Yo-Han was not going to leave any of them behind. By the time he got the last of the dilapidated huts open, there were more than forty people milling around him, shivering in the bitter cold. Harry grabbed the arm of one of the younger men.
He asked in Korean: “Where are the others?”
The young man pointed to another row of huts. Harry dumped a set of large keys he had taken from the body of the North Korean guard. “Get them out! But come right back here!”
The young man ran for the first row of huts. Harry aimed his 58 AKS rifle into the glowing darkness, acutely aware that more North Korean guards could come upon them at any moment.
McCall ran onto the rotting porch on the main hut where Granny had directed him. Liz Montgomery had been at the grimy window overlooking the compound. She turned at his entrance. Daniel Blake and Fredrik Jorgensen joined her.
“My name is Robert McCall,” he said. “Come with me.”
Liz stared at him as realization of who he was flooded through her. “Granny talked about you! The guards just dragged him out of here.”
“He got away from them.”
“He was going to set off explosives!” Fredrik Jorgensen said.
“I’d say he’s doing that right now. Anyone else here with you?”
“Just us! They keep us together,” Daniel Blake said.
Liz grabbed McCall’s arm. “I’m not leaving without my sister! She’s been taken to Commandant Jang’s quarters.”
“I’ll get her,” McCall said.
He moved out onto the porch. The other Western prisoners followed him. The compound seemed eerily deserted. McCall took out his walkie-talkie. “Ten seconds, Kyu-Chul!”
“Copy that!” the mercenary said.
At the back of the abandoned huts, Granny knelt down and grabbed up the fuses that were protruding from the ground. He took out a matchbook that he had carefully hidden for months and lit the fuses. They roared along the hardpacked earth, shaking free, burning brightly toward the first watchtower. Granny ran to the next set of fuses and lit them, and the next, until all of them were burning through the loosely packed ground. The searchlight on the tower swung around, blazing a white light across Granny’s figure. He leapt away as bullets kicked the earth around him. He reached the porch of one of the abandoned huts, looking across into the darkness where he knew Walter Coburn waited. He would be lighting the fuses for his C4 charges
Granny counted down the seconds: “Four…three…two…one…”
He looked up at the intimidating watchtower where the searchlight arced down to him. He saw the first fuses reach where the dynamite was buried.
A huge explosion rocked the watchtower, followed by two more eruptions. The watchtower blew apart and started to fall toward the ground, taking the North Korean guards with it. Granny turned to where the second watchtower was precarious perched. For a moment he thought that Coburn had not been able to light his fuses. But the fuses ignited the C4 putty, sending fire exploding across the second watchtower. It collapsed with a rage of light and heat. A moment later the third watchtower exploded, not falling yet but sending its North Korean guards screaming to the ground.
Kyu-Chul smashed through the main gates of the prison, sending them flying. North Korean guards ran from huts, unslinging their rifles. Kyu-Chul mowed them down, his machinegun exploding hot in his hands. More guards were running from the shadows, firing at the armored vehicle.
McCall led the small group of Western prisoners off the porch, firing his Heckler & Koch submachinegun at the North Korean guards who poured out of the wooden huts ringing the compound. They were cut down by the crippling gunfire. McCall saw Granny’s figure running through the swirling clouds of choking smoke heading toward Commandant Myang-Sook-Jang’s quarters. Liz Montgomery clutched McCall’s arm.
“My sister is in there!”
Before McCall could even respond, the door to Jang’s hut flew open. Ji-Yeon dragged Deva Montgomery down the porch steps, firing a heavy Colt Python .357 Magnum revolver into the mayhem. He held onto Deva with an iron grip. At the same time, his pilot in the MD-500 military helicopter had started the rotor turning. Ji-Yeon propelled Deva toward the chopper. Walter Coburn came running up from the dust cloud of the decimated third watchtower, firing the 58 AKS rifle he had picked up from one of the fallen guards. He strafed the remaining guards, sending them to the ground. Kyu-Chul swung the BTR-152 armored vehicle around, aiming the grenade-launcher at Myang-Sook-Jang’s hut. It exploded in a fireball, sending more clouds of dust swirling into the air. Granny reached the shattered porch steps.
McCall pulled Liz Montgomery out of harm’s way as Ji-Yeon fired more rounds with the .357 Python Revolver. In the chaos, Daniel Blake was disoriented, blinded by the acrid smoke. One of the North Korean guards fired at him. He was hit by two bullets and stumbled to the ground. McCall put four bullets into the guard’s body. Deva suddenly wrenched out of Ji-Yeon’s grasp, running to Daniel’s side. He looked up her, his body in shock. Ji-Yeon reached them and pulled both of them to their feet, firing his heavy Revolver. He propelled both Deva and Daniel to the MD-500 helicopter. Liz cried out in anguish. McCall shielded her body as he fired more rounds from the submachinegun, decimating the North Korean guards coming at them.
Ji-Yeon reached the chopper. He hauled Deva up into the arms one of the North Korean guards who had accompanied him. Another of his guards thought that Daniel was also a hostage and dragged the journalist inside the helicopter. Ji-Yeon climbed aboard, emptying his Pylon Revolver at Walter Coburn, who ducked down beside one of the demolished huts.
McCall took aim on the chopper, but it was too late. The helicopter rose and banked steeply over the shattered main gate. Beyond McCall, Kyu-Chul’s vehicle slewed around again, firing the grenade launcher at the next set of buildings. They exploded in a fiery inferno..
Yo-Han led sixty North Korean prisoners past the ruins of the smoking first watchtower, heading for two of the buses parked along the perimeter fence. McCall held on to Liz Montgomery. She was distraught in his arms. He could not do anything about Ji-Yeon’s retreat from the prison camp. It had happened too fast. He needed to get the prisoners to the two buses parked against the chain link fence. He motioned Fredrik Jorgensen to head for them. Behind him, Walter Coburn kept firing on the Korean guards who had taken refuge from the blistering attack.
Granny ran into the shell of Commandant Jang’s headquarters. Two walls had collapsed in the RPG attack. Debris was strewn through the office. The couch and the two high-backed chairs were still standing. A wall-to-ceiling bookcase had fallen, smashing apart. Heavy books, small glass knickknacks and framed pictures had crashed across Jang’s desk. The piano had been blown apart. Smoke hazed through the office, obscuring details.
Myang-Sook-Jang came out of the devastation, aiming his Tokayev pistol at Granny. Granny leapt across Jang’s shattered desk and kicked it out of his hands. Jang snarled at him, hurling what was left of the desk to one side. The Commandant was a skilled martial artiste, striking Granny with punishing blows. Granny countered them, but barely. The blow to his head by the North Korean guard had almost blacked him out. Jang kicked out, his steel-tipped toes slamming into Granny’s body, staggering him. Jang’s had religiously practiced body hardening through a Korean style of fighting called Taekkyon. The nerves in the Commandant’s body were deadened. Jang met Granny’s counter blows on the inside of the arm between the elbow and wrist. Granny knew it was called the “iron bridge”, attacking the soft underbelly. Granny kicked at Jang’s shin, but it was hard as a rock. Jang came back at him with a spinning back kick and then a spinning back fist.
Granny ducked away from the deadly barrage. Large splinters of glass were strewn over the floor. He dived down, grabbed one of them, cutting his right hand as he wielded it. Jang turned, too late. Granny stabbed him in the leg, the dagger penetrating right to the bone. At the same time, Granny used a technique he had taught Robert McCall. He struck his rigid right-hand fingers in an upward move at Jang’s chest, forcing him to expel air from his lungs. It was an “air dimmak point.” Granny grabbed Jang’s right wrist and gouged the pressure points there which made the Commandant believe for a split-second that his whole body had been hit. Granny followed it with an attack on the colon points on the Commandant’s upper forearm, using his own version of the “iron bridge”.
Myang-Sook-Jang staggered back. Granny hit him with his full weight and sent him against the back wall, smashing another bookcase. Jang was off-balance and slipped on the shards of broken glass that littered the floor. Granny brought the Commandant down to his knees. He noted Jang’s swagger stick on the floor just under the debris of the desk. Granny picked it up and brought it to Jang’s throat, pressing back, his knee against the back of his spine.
“This is for Liz Montgomery,” Granny hissed to the Commandant. He pulled back on the swagger stick against Jang’s throat. The Commandant writhed and foamed at the mouth, biting through his lower lip and his tongue. Granny exerted more pressure on Jang’s throat, pulling his hair back, then he put his fingers into Jang’s eyes. The Korean screamed, but he was writhing so violently that it was all Granny could do to hold onto him. More glass showered over them as knickknacks from the shelves rained down.
Jang’s face turned blue as the blood and oxygen drained out of his neck.
Myang-Sook-Jang gave one last, convulsive gasp, then slumped down. He was dead before his body hit the floor. Granny released the swagger stick from the Commandant’s throat. He staggered to his feet and kicked Jang to one side, forcing air into his own lungs. He heard more gunfire outside. Granny ran through the demolished office, leaving Myang-Sook-Jang’s swagger stick beside his body.
Robert McCall and Walter Coburn were firing on the North Korean troops who had taken shelter behind the wooden porches of the huts. More explosions rocked the prison camp, blowing gaping holes in the remaining huts. Kyu-Chul slewed his BRT-152 around and fired on the North Korean troops. He sent a grenade screaming at a hut which exploded in a fireball. Liz and Fredrik Jorgensen had made it to where the first two drab buses stood at the chain fence. Yo-Han had started loading the North Korean prisoners onto both of them. They were frightened and disoriented, but Harry kept them together, shouting to them in Korean.
“On the bus! No stragglers! Everyone gets a free ride today!”
Granny picked up a fallen 58 AKS rifle and knelt down beside McCall who looked at him. “Did you get what you came for?”
“Yeah. Jang’s dead. What happened to Ji-Yeon?”
“He took Liz Montgomery’s sister in the helicopter,” McCall said. “There was nothing I could do to stop him. He also took one of the hostages with him, Daniel Blake. He had been wounded. Ji-Yeon will already have radioed the North Korean authorities.”
“There was nothing you could have done to stop him,” Granny said.
“Leave no one behind,” McCall said.
Kyu-Chul launched another grenade, rocketing into more of the North Korean huts and obliterating them. Then he turned the BTR-152 around and raced toward the shattered main gate.
McCall motioned to Walter Coburn to fall back. He and Granny gave him covering fire as they ran toward the parked buses. A fusillade of bullets struck Coburn as he ran from the protection of one of the huts. He pitched over to the hardbacked earth in the compound. McCall fired into the compound, sending more of the North Korean troops scrambling for cover. Granny came back for Coburn. He looked to be badly hurt. Liz Montgomery was looking at the barbed wire fence as if willing herself to see beyond it. She clutched Granny’s arm.
“He took Deva! Ji-Yeon took my sister!”
“I’ll find him. Get onto the bus, Liz! You’ve got to go right now!”
Shaking with emotion, Liz staggered away from him as if he had betrayed her. Granny lifted Walter Coburn onto on his shoulders in a fireman’s lift. He carried the wounded contractor to one of the two buses. McCall followed, raking the submachinegun across the decimated North Korean troops. Liz climbed up into the first bus. Granny gently laid Walter Coburn across three of the seats. Liz moved over to him.
“How bad is he hurt?”
“I’d say pretty bad,” Granny said. “We need to get him to a hospital right away. Stay with him.”
Liz sat down beside Coburn. He was sweating profusely, but he nodded. “Don’t worry about me,” he said through gritted teeth. “Get us out of here.”
Harry got the North Korean prisoners loaded onto the two buses. He climbed into the driver’s side of the first bus. Fredrik Jorgensen sat beside him. McCall pulled himself onto the bus and moved directly to Walter Coburn. His eyes were closed. McCall moved Granny away from him.
“Walter Coburn has lost of blood,” McCall said. “We need to get him to a hospital in Seoul.”
“I wouldn’t made it without him.”
“Sit tight.”
Granny sat in the front seat. The North Korean prisoners were crowded into both of the buses. “Where do you want to go?” Harry asked them as he slid behind the driver’s seat. “Disneyland or Harry’s Potter’s Wizarding World?”
McCall jumped out as Kyu-Chul screeched to a halt beside him. More bullets were flying around him. “Did the old guy get it?”
“Walter Coburn will live if we can get out of here,” McCall said.
“Follow me,” Kyu-Chul said.
McCall nodded and climbed onto the second bus, sliding into the driver’s seat. Kyu-Chul launched another grenade into one of the huts, totally obliterating it. Debris rained down. Then he turned the BTR-152 around and raced to the shattered main gate. More explosions ripped apart more buildings in the prison compound. McCall drove out through the wide-open gate onto the glowing road. Harry followed him in the second bus, crowded with the rest of the sixty North Korean prisoners. Kyu-Chul fired one last RPG shell which erupted into the demolished building that once had been Myang-Sook-Jang’s quarters. Then he was through the buckled prison gate.
In the first bus, Liz held Walter Coburn’s hand. Fredrik Jorgensen came over and sat beside her. Behind him the Korean prisoners were silent and traumatized.
“You are leaving this place,” Liz said softly to Coburn. “The cavalry is here.”
Coburn just nodded, his eyes far away.
In the second bus, McCall followed Kyu-Chul down a back trail that cut through the woods. He guessed it had once been a logging road, but now it was overgrown with vegetation. The mercenary seemed to know where he was going. McCall had seen him accessing more maps on the helicopter trip into North Korea. In less than twenty minutes McCall found himself on the ribbon of moonlit road where Kyu-Chul and Harry had commandeered the BTR-152 armored vehicle. That led to another back road where they could see the ghostly shape of the CH-47F Chinook helicopter shrouded in the trees. McCall pulled the bus as close to the densely packed trees as he could and cut the engine. He pressed the switch to open the doors. At first the North Korean prisoners did not move, looking at each other as if expecting a new humiliation to befall them. Then one of them, a woman in her sixties with iron-gray hair, stepped down and held out a hand for a frail old man. He climbed down from the bus with her.
Yo-Han drove the second bus through more trees a little closer to the chopper. He brought it to a halt and opened the doors. He started helping the North Korean prisoners down the steps. Fredrik Jorgensen and Liz Montgomery carried Walter Coburn down the steps to the muddy ground. They held him up between them.
Kyu-Chul pulled up in the BTR-152.
McCall ran up to him. “Get the helicopter fired up. I’ll give us some back-up.”
Kyu-Chul just nodded and jumped out. McCall took his place. The North Korean prisoners were moving through the trees to the chopper in an orderly fashion. They had all of the hope squeezed out of them. They were more than willing to be herded together one more time. Liz Montgomery and Fredrik Jorgensen were moving among them, gingerly carrying Walter Coburn. Kyu-Chul and Harry had reached the helicopter and climbed inside. By the time McCall was almost out of the trees the rotor blades were turning.
A Wheeled Improvised Fighting Vehicle flashed down the moonlit road, bristling with North Korean soldiers. McCall fired the grenade launcher on the BTR-152. The RPG exploded into the IFV, sending it down the steep ravine. It was immediately engulfed in flames. Behind it a UAZ-3151 Utility Vehicle appeared out of the trees, also loaded with Korean army personnel. McCall fired another rocket grenade at them. This time the vehicle swerved away from the road and crashed down the incline where it turned over.
McCall turned the BTR-152 around and drove back the way he had come. By the time he reached the copse of trees, the chopper’s rotors were turning at speed. He saw that the last of the North Korean prisoners were now coming aboard. He knew the Chinook 47-F could seat as many as fifty-five passengers, so it would be a tight squeeze, but all of the prisoners, including the western prisoners, would be aboard. McCall jumped out of the BTR-152, took out his Makarov pistol and aimed at the gas tank. The vehicle exploded, sending flames through the trees. McCall ran to the helicopter and climbed onboard.
The North Korean prisoners were jammed into the chopper. Liz Montgomery and Fredrik Jorgensen had found a spot where they could lay Walter Coburn down. Granny was in the cockpit. McCall slid behind the pilot and co-pilot. Kyu-Chul lifted the helicopter off the ground. It banked over the trees and into the night sky.
“How long will take the North Korean military to scramble their F-35 Stealth fighters?” McCall asked.
“There is a contingent of antiquated and obsolete aircraft in the North Korean air force,” Kyu-Chul said. “Also the Shenyang J-5, a Chinese version of the 1950’s era Mikovan Gurevich MiG-17.”
“The Wright Brothers were flying better planes,” Harry said.
“Some F-35 Stealth Fighters were delivered to a military base at Cheogju in North Chungcleong Province, but they won’t be delivered to North Korea yet,” Kyu-Chul said. “The North Korean military will never find us.”
Harry said: “We’re below their radar. We’ll be over the border into South Korea in under fifteen minutes.”
Granny made his way through the crowded helicopter to where Liz Montgomery was sitting. Fredrik Jorgensen was still sitting beside Walter Coburn. Granny slid down beside Liz. Tears glistened on her face. Granny held one of her hands tightly. Then she just collapsed against him. Granny put his arm around her.
“I am going to find Deva,” he whispered to her. “I am going to bring her home.”
If Liz heard him, she did not acknowledge it. She just held onto to Granny, sobbing uncontrollably. Up on the cockpit of the Chinook there was no more conversation until Kyu-Chul turned to McCall twelve minutes later and said: “We’re in South Korean air space.”
“That’s outstanding,” McCall said.
“Your friend ‘Granny’,” Harry said. “We did rescue the right dude, didn’t we?”
McCall looked at him and smiled. “You did good.”
Harry grinned. “Perfect.”