The booze hadn't helped. The dulling effects were mostly burned away by the bitter cold. The rest evaporated the instant he saw the plane.
North Korea's Leader for Life was not alone. He had a small entourage with him, which included several soldiers. General Pun, the head of North Korean intelligence, was there. Pun's special man stood beside the security officer.
In a land for which famine was common, the man to General Pun's left was a healthy aberration. Shan Duk had been born and bred in the slums outside of Pyongyang. A hulking brute of a man, Duk stood six feet four inches tall and was nearly as wide. His broad face was as flat as a frying pan. Angry flesh bunched above his eyes, lending the brute a perpetual squint.
At one point during a particularly devastating famine a few years before it was discovered that Shan Duk was hoarding food. This was when the young man was a mere guard at the People's Bureau of Revolutionary Struggle headquarters. To fuel the massive machine that was his body, Duk had been going from door to door in his neighborhood, shaking down neighbors for portions of their meager rations. When that wasn't enough to sate him, he brought the practice to work. On their way in to work every morning, half-starved coworkers at the PBRS were forced to line up and turn over large chunks of their food allotment to the behemoth. As the starving, hollow-eyed government workers watched Shun Duk gorge himself on their rations, their empty bellies grumbling, the big man always insisted, "Take heart. It is in the interest of the people's glorious revolution that I not go hungry. Is there any soup in that thermos?"
When the complaints about the young guard filtered up to General Pun, the head of Korean intelligence considered disciplining the young soldier. But how? A reprimand seemed too weak for such an infraction. He doubted there was a prison strong enough to hold the monster. He would have had him shot if he thought it just wouldn't have made him mad. In the end Pun had opted for the most prudent alternative.
Shan Duk's promotion to personal bodyguard of General Kye Pun was a win-win situation. Kye Pun got the toughest bodyguard on the Korean peninsula, and Shan Duk got an increase in pay that lessened the need to shake down the intelligence agency staff. He now only did so when he was really, really hungry.
At brutality, few men on Earth showed as much natural talent as Shan Duk. When it came time to select the champion who would carry the banner for North Korea in the Sinanju Time of Succession, there was only one logical choice.
Some found it odd that the premier hadn't recruited the big man for his personal security force. Although Shan Duk was clearly the most formidable individual in the North Korean government, Kim Jong 11 had never considered bringing the man over to work for him for one simple reason: Shan Duk scared the living bejesus out of the Communist leader.
As the plane from the South landed, the premier stood at the center of his entourage, a few men away from the fearsome intelligence officer. On a good day he kept his distance from Shan Duk. But for a moment as the final alcohol buzz burned off, he wished that the most terrifying thing he had to face was a half-starved brute of a bodyguard.
Sober and shaking, Kim Jong Il listened to the plane tires squeal. It rolled to a stop before the group of men.
The air stairs were quickly put in place. When the door opened a minute later, a lone man stepped into the cold air.
At the sight of the Master of Sinanju, Kim Jong Il felt his bowels clench.
"It's show time," he said with a reluctant moan. Entourage in tow, he headed to the base of the stairs.
The Master of Sinanju descended like a floating mummy. His eyes were as hard and cold as the Korean terrain.
"Master of Sinanju!" Kim Jong Il enthused, a phony smile plastered wide over his face. "Welcome home. We weren't expecting you so soon. So where's that sonny boy of yours?" He stood on tiptoes, looking worriedly up the stairs.
Chiun's voice was glacial. "He is not here." A spark of hope lit the Korean premier's eyes. "Oh, no," he said, attempting a sympathetic tone as insincere as his vanishing smile. "I sure as heck hope no one got the better of him in this contest thing."
Chiun gave him a cancerous look that told the Korean leader that Remo was alive and well.
"Sorry," Kim Jong II said, holding up his hands in apology. "I can't help it. That kid of yours gives me a serious case of shit-the-pants. The way he's always smacking me around, busting the place up when he's in town. I don't think he likes me. But you and me. That's a whole 'nother story. We understand each other."
Smiling again, he offered the Master of Sinanju his hand in friendship.
Chiun took the premier's hand. The premier was glad Chiun took his hand. Shaking hands was nice. Friendly people shook hands. And they were both Koreans, after all. Koreans understood each other with the sort of understanding that was sealed with friendly handshaking niceness.
"There." Kim Jong Il beamed. "One, big happy Korean fam- Ahhhhhhhhhhhh!" He was down on his knees before he even realized that Chiun hadn't warmed to a shared bond of Korean niceness after all. He hadn't shaken the premier's hand. Instead, the old man took the web of flesh between the premier's thumb and forefinger and squeezed. The pain was unbelievable. Blinding.
Kim Jong Il's shocked brain couldn't register what had happened. To help it along in understanding, the Master of Sinanju squeezed again.
"Ahhhhhhhh! " Kim Jong Il screamed again.
All around came metallic clicks, like winter crickets suddenly popping from hibernation.
Kim Jong Il's eyes grew wild.
"Hold your fire!" he yelped at his troops, who had quickly taken aim with rifles and handguns on the little man who had brought the Leader for Life of North Korea to his knees on the bitterly cold tarmac of Pyongyang airport. "Back off, back off! That is a goddamn order! Ahhhhhhhhh!" he cried anew, falling farther to the ground. He propped himself up with his free hand. "What's wrong?" he begged.
The old man's eyes were frozen hazel shards. "Are you responsible?" the Master of Sinanju demanded. The premier didn't have time to answer.
As ordered, the men with the guns had backed off. They stood at a short, anxious distance, unsure what to do. But amid the crowd one man had decided on a course of action.
Puffs of angry white steam shot from the flaring nostrils of Shan Duk. He looked like a Korean bull. And like a bull, Shan Duk charged, howling with rage.
No one there was quite sure what happened next. Things moved so quickly they saw only the result. They were certain that Shan Duk had attacked the little old man. They were reasonably certain that he had succeeded in crushing the tiny man to paste, for the old man vanished very briefly underneath the towering mountain of meat that was Shan Duk.
But then Shan Duk was in the air. Floating. And then they saw the bony arm.
It held the mighty North Korean Communist warrior in the air by his back like a waiter's serving tray. The arm was attached to the little old man who, with his free hand, continued to assault North Korea's Leader for Life even as he held the big bodyguard aloft.
Shan Duk was like a turtle on his shell. His big arms were useless as he tried to grab around to the bony hand that propped him up by his meaty back. His tree-trunk legs kicked helplessly at the air.
There was no strain on the hard face of the Master of Sinanju. He continued to stare cold accusation at Kim Jong Il. The premier cowered under the huge, flailing shadow of Shan Duk.
"Are you responsible?" Chiun demanded once more.
"For what?" the premier begged.
"There was an atrocity committed in my village. A man is dead who was more honest and decent than any born of the slatterns in this brothel city. And so I ask again, on pain of a thousand deaths, are you responsible?"
"No!" Kim Jong Il shrieked. "God, no! I swear on a stack of outlawed Bibles. Sinanju is off-limits now. I made sure everyone knows that."