27
As dawn broke, the padlock to the vent grille was forced and opened, creating an entrance just wide enough for Captain Seymour, Ryder, Song and Bom to scramble through. Chol then secured the black, square-patterned metal frame back into position and concealed himself in a vantage point amongst the bush under the overhang to make sure he maintained a good view through the trees to the open ground below. Here he would stay until the others returned. Grace hoped she would cope with the unknown and was under no illusion; it was her time to shine and she knew it. From the moment they had discovered the subterranean laboratory, she had been beset by an almost uncontrollable fear that hitherto had not fully manifested itself. Fear that her courage would fail once inside the mountain; fear at what she might find; fear that she would let these men down, men who risked their lives to ensure she was allowed to do her job; but most of all fear that she would not be able to face death with honour and dignity should it come. These fears played heavily on her almost to the extent that everything else was pushed aside.
Once inside the shaft, following a downward slope, the group could feel the gentle rush of air from behind and hear the faint hum of machinery from somewhere deep below. The shaft, hewn from solid rock, was curved at a radius of about six feet, enough to walk upright in single file. The three men carried silenced pistols together with AK rifles, and wore uniforms taken from the dead soldiers in Sinhung. Grace carried a pistol in holster, strapped to calf, together with a metal container to protect any vaccine phials they should find. Soon she would be in a confined hostile environment with the possibility of confronting a deadly virus. The moment of truth had finally arrived.
The further the little group proceeded into the mountain, the louder the noise of machinery became. Not long after entering through the grille, they arrived in a square chamber with large intake fans on three walls and a single door on the fourth. Ryder checked for surveillance cameras, saw none in the dim light and went to the door. Thankfully, it was not locked. They slipped through and found themselves in a short, narrow corridor with another door at the end. This door too was unlocked and led into a noisy, high domed cavern, again hewn out of solid rock. It looked to the group like the main plant area housing an array of machinery. Checking that all was clear, they edged gingerly between the throbbing machinery until reaching a small office and ablution block. Through a window to the office, they could make out two men eating and a third standing, looking at a chart on the wall. All three wore the same drab-green uniforms as themselves.
“Could be the entrance,” Song said over the noise of the machinery, nodding towards a pair of large double doors in full view of the men in the office.
Ryder acknowledged and hoped another existed. He told him and Bom to take a look whilst he and Grace hid amongst the boilers and mass of pipework. The two Koreans slunk away to return a short while later shaking their heads; no other doors, apart from storage areas and the one they had entered through.
Ryder nodded and glanced towards the office. No choice now but to take the men out if they were to leave through the double doors. He signalled this to the others and told Grace to remain hidden. The three then skirted the machinery until they were outside the office door.
Backs now hard up against the wall, pistols drawn, Ryder stepped away and kicked open the door with one violent move. All three sprang into the room.
‘Phut’, ‘phut’, ‘phut’, and the three guards died instantly, a single bullet to each of their heads.
Upon entering the changing area, the group found a uniform for the captain and then dragged the dead guards to one of the stores. Inside, Grace hurriedly changed into the uniform without concern for modesty, whilst the men concealed the bodies behind racking. Leaving the store, they made directly for the entrance doors hoping the dead men would not be found until they were safely out of the mountain.
The group entered a long corridor outside the plant room, busy with people milling between maintenance areas lining both sides. Striding confidently down the grimy corridor bathed in yellow light, they entered into a similar corridor. Here they saw, through glazed screens, small, dingy laboratories occupied by white-coated medical personnel. They were all hunched over desks, test tubes and microscopes. Grace could see from the equipment being used that they were chemical tests only. Martial music played in the background and pictures of Kim Jong Il and his son, Kim Jong Un, hung side by side on almost every wall. Grace’s first priority now was to locate the medical personnel changing areas and dress appropriately allowing her to move more freely around the laboratories.
She found what she was looking for near the end of the corridor. Grace entered the female changing area whilst the men lingered outside. A number of women occupied the big room between the lines of lockers, making it extremely difficult for Grace to break into one without attracting attention. She mingled, walking up and down the lines, awaiting an opportunity. Unfortunately, it never came; there was always someone nearby. None of the women she encountered wore any form of ID. Mouth dry, Grace felt her fear increase as she reluctantly left to join the men back in the corridor.
“We’ll have to wait,” she said quietly to Ryder.
“We don’t have the time,” he shot back, voice edgy. “We take out one your size and be done with it.” Grace understood. With no game plan and feeling somewhat trapped herself in this labyrinth of corridors, he had the right to be on edge. She eyed the flow of women passing by and reluctantly agreed.
A little later they found an unlocked, empty store off the main corridor. Ryder entered, the others remained outside. Grace nervously waited for a suitable victim. Thank God the discomfort caused by the snake bite had gone away.
She did not have long to wait. A woman, about her size and age, dressed in white medical gown, white cap and white mask dangling around her neck, came out of a lab further down and approached. With some apprehension, using the authority of her uniform, Grace pulled the woman to one side and told her she was required to enter the store to determine if the contents of a medical kit were correct. Slightly bewildered, the woman reluctantly agreed and was ushered into the store.
Minutes later, Ryder stepped out from the store and Grace entered. The woman lay dead on the floor with a broken neck. Guilt grabbed Grace, but it was quickly pushed aside as she removed the woman’s gown, cap and mask, put them on and hurried out, steeling herself for what was to come.
Boldly, she strode down to the end of the corridor in a turmoil of uncertainty, followed at a discrete distance by the other three. Her priority now: to locate the hot zones. It weighed heavily on her knowing basically that she was on her own from now on and would need to keep calm. She focused on getting out of this place alive.
The corridor led into a huge cavernous area where prisoners from the camp were being unloaded from trucks and herded into several wire cages at the rear. This was where the men were separated from the women. The cages each held ten to fifteen prisoners, had dirty mattresses strewn about the floor and buckets for bodily functions lining the back walls. This was obviously the holding area before the poor unfortunates were taken to the labs. She hung around unobtrusively with the group of medical personnel supervising the unloading, hoping to establish where the labs were located.