At two o"clock, Nick stopped by Brian"s cubicle. Brian noticed his roommate was still in a foul mood.
"All right. I admit it," Nick confessed. "The whole Kawasaki thing was just a scam... I really wanted him to a.s.sign me to the Sea Base One story." Nick sighed. "He probably didn"t even know about the Kawasaki plant opening!"
Brian yawned and stretched. "Well, I"m glad I didn"t have to rush out of Tokyo tonight," he said. "I could use another night on the town." Brian remembered the three women in the Hard Rock Cafe from the night before.
"What really bugs me," Nick said, oblivious to Brian"s hint, "is that Max Hulse gets to cover Sea Base! Max Hulse! The most boring newsman on the planet. Do you know what they call him around here? I"ll tell you. Lacks Pulse."
Brian suspected that they really just meant Nick. He was getting to know his roommate pretty well.
A little while later, in the middle of a conversation about the nightclubs in Tokyo, Nick"s eyes widened. He waved his hand and shouted across the newsroom.
"Hey, Yoshi!" Nick cried. "Over here."
Brian saw a young j.a.panese man in a blue suit, speaking with the grizzled j.a.panese man who had first showed him his cubicle. The younger man turned, smiled, and waved back at Nick. He finished his business with the older man and then sauntered over.
"Brian Shimura," Nick said, "this is the best cameraman in Tokyo - Yoshi Masahara!"
"Welcome to j.a.pan." Yoshi said with a slight bow. Then he extended his hand.
"Call me Brian," the American replied.
"And you, please call me Yoshi!" the j.a.panese man replied. His English was excellent. He only slightly slurred the l in please.
"I was just convincing our young friend here that a night on the town would do him good!" Nick said to Yoshi. "I hope you can join us tonight."
A frown appeared on Yoshi"s face. "So sorry." he said apologetically. "Just got an a.s.signment from Takao-san... I must go with Blackthorn Adams on bullet train. I leave tonight."
"Are you covering the Kawasaki plant opening?" Nick said suspiciously.
"Yes!" Yoshi replied. "Last-minute a.s.signment."
Nick threw up his arms and screamed. "That rotten little -" Nick bit back his curse and, without another word, stormed off toward the elevators.
"He does that often," Yoshi said to Brian. "Excuse me for asking an impolite question."
"Of course," Brian said.
"Is this... an American thing?" Yoshi asked.
"No," Brian replied. "I think it"s a Nick Gordon thing."
"Hai!" said Yoshi. "I thought so."
CHAPTER 6.
S.O.S. FROM THE SEA OF j.a.pAN.
May 29, 1998, 6:23 A.M.
The gate to the Pusan ferry
Hakata, j.a.pan
Kim Park liked riding the bullet train okay, but he loved to ride the Pusan ferry. The trip on the ultra- modern train was nowhere near as magical as the 150-mile ferryboat ride between Korea and northern j.a.pan, where he and his mother and father now lived.
Unfortunately, his mother hated it. Kim, only nine years old, couldn"t figure out why. He loved riding a boat, any kind of boat. And he loved the sea.
"Kim!" his mother called from a bench as far from the water as she could get. "Come down from that railing before you fall in!"
Kim took one last look over the fence at the gray water lapping against the pier. Then he turned, jumped down, and ran back to his mother.
"How long before the ferry sails?" Kim asked.
"We can get on board very soon," she answered nervously. Kim looked at the boat. Yes, he thought, his excitement mounting. People are already lining up!
"Come on, Mother," Kim said, pulling her arm. "Let"s get in line so we can get a good seat." Reluctantly, she rose and gathered up her bags. Kim helped her.
"Will Uncle Pak be waiting for us on the other side?" Kim asked as they approached the ship.
"Uncle Pak, and his wife, Hyon, and even Uncle Cho - everyone is coming for your aunt"s wedding tomorrow," his mother said with a smile.
Kim knew his mother was excited about this trip. Things were better for Kim"s family now that Dad had started working for a j.a.panese company, but Kim knew his mother missed her friends and family back in Korea. Kim missed his little cousins, too, but he really missed Uncle Pak, a colonel in the Army of the Republic of Korea.
Uncle Pak was Kim"s hero.
Kim skipped as they approached the ferry. The Pusan ferryboat was an old vessel - nearly half a century old, in fact. Despite a relatively fresh coat of nondescript gray paint, the ship showed her age. But not to Kim. In his imagination, it was the fiercest fighting ship on the ocean - and he was the captain.
As cars and trucks filled the ferry"s hull, Kim and his mother climbed up onto the upper deck. Kim climbed the steps effortlessly, but his mother was breathing heavily by the time they had reached the top. Kim knew she had not slept on the bullet train, though he had.
The ferry was only half full. But it was still early - in another hour or so, the pier would be filled with people heading across the Sea of j.a.pan for work.
Kim was disappointed that his mother chose to sit inside the pa.s.senger cabin instead of out on the deck. She said she was cold, but Kim knew that his mother was afraid of the ocean. He did not argue.
From his seat, Kim scanned the other pa.s.sengers. There were men in suits and work clothes, and women, too. There were truck drivers, and even a small group of Korean nuns. For a moment, Kim"s gaze lingered on a young Caucasian man and a Korean girl. They were holding hands.
Finally, the whistle blew, and the engine began to throb. Kim could feel the deck vibrate. He watched as men untied the thick ropes that moored the ship to the dock. The ferry pulled slowly away from the pier and out to sea. Soon she was steaming toward Korea.
Will Adams rubbed his tired eyes. What am I doing on the Pusan ferry - on my way to South Korea - at six-thirty in the morning? he asked himself for the hundredth time. And, for the hundredth time, he found the answer to his question.
Because I"m with Soonji.
Will shook his head and ran his fingers through his fashionably short hair and goatee. Face it, buddy, you"re hooked. You"d go to the ends of the earth if she asked you!
Will Adams had met Soonji Hwan-Duk three days ago while he was visiting Hakusan National Park with several friends from the American School. In the spring, the national parks of northern Honshu, j.a.pan"s main island, are a bustling tourist attraction. Will liked hiking, and Honshu had some of the best trails.
On one of them, he met Soonji and her friends. Since then, the two of them had been inseparable. Fortunately for them both, they were on vacation.
Will had just graduated from high school and would be heading back to America - and to Harvard - in the fall. Until then, he was spending a couple of months with his divorced father. Blackthorn Adams, Will"s dad, was one of the science correspondents for INN. Soonji seemed very impressed by that.
For Soonji, "vacation" was a permanent condition. Her father was a prominent politician in the current regime in Seoul. She had time - and money - to spare. At her insistence, Will had parted with his friends and followed her to Hakata. While they were in the city, they visited the museum and some Buddhist temples.
Will wasn"t much interested in temples, but he was interested in Soonji.
"Wake up, sleepyhead," Soonji chided him, pouting. "Don"t be tiresome. Talk to me!"
"Sorry," Will said, shaking himself awake. He longed for a cup of hot coffee. He looked longingly at her, too, as she took his hand and gripped it.
"Soon you"ll see my homeland. It"s much more beautifuller than j.a.pan," she insisted.
Will smiled. He found her malapropisms cute. In fact, he found everything about her cute. Will wasn"t blind to Soonji"s faults. He knew she seemed like a shallow teenage girl who was moody, self-centered, and spoiled rotten. But he also knew that she was very beautiful, and that, for the moment, he was hooked.
"Finally the lazy sailors to get their stupid b.u.t.ts moving at last!" Soonji muttered impatiently in butchered English as the ferry pulled away from the pier.
The waters were calm, but the route was foggy as the Pusan ferry chugged its way toward the Korean peninsula.
On the ancient ship"s bridge, high atop the upper decks, the captain scanned the waters ahead. The ferry was already over an hour into its journey, and the Sea of j.a.pan had remained calm. The visibility, however, was less than adequate. The rising sun had not yet burned away the fog. It was an unnatural fog that seemed to envelop the sea in eerie patches. The ferry had been sailing into and out of these huge banks all morning.
"I can see more fog ahead," the captain announced. He lowered the binoculars from his weather-beaten face and turned to the man clutching the wheel.
"Keep the collision radar running, but do not slow down," he commanded.
The other man nodded, but was not happy with his captain"s decision. The so-called "collision radar" on this old tub didn"t always detect objects in the water ahead, especially objects that were low in the water.
But I"m not the captain, the man thought bitterly.
As ordered, the wheelman pushed the throttle forward and the ferry sliced through the waves at a faster rate.
Less than a mile ahead of the ferry, sea birds roosted among strange, rocky outcroppings that projected from the water at odd angles in three long rows. The pointed tips of these outcroppings, which were stained dirty white with bird droppings, rose over fifty feet above the waves.
Kim, standing on the bow, spotted the three rows of rocks. He squinted against the wind and leaned over the rail to get a better look. He had made this trip twice, but had never noticed this strange rock formation before.
He heard a sound. The pa.s.senger cabin door opened, and then closed, behind him. Some pa.s.sengers had come out of the warmth of the interior and onto the windswept deck.
Kim turned.
It was the American student and his girlfriend, the pretty Korean girl. Kim knew that the boy was an American - he"d heard him speak English.
Relieved that it was not his mother come to fetch him, Kim returned his gaze to the rocky formation.
That"s strange, Kim thought. The rocks seem to have moved. The formation had slipped into a fog bank, and then emerged again - this time it seemed much closer to the ferry.
Kim heard a startled exclamation behind him.
The couple had spotted the bird-covered rocks, too. The teenaged boy began jabbering in English.
On the bridge of the Pusan ferry, the captain and the wheelman heard the collision alarm go off.
"All stop!" the captain shouted, even before he saw the object in the ferry"s path.
As the wheelman pulled back on the throttles, the captain lifted his binoculars and scanned the waters ahead.
At first he saw nothing. Rolling fog obscured his vision. Then the mist seemed to part and the captain spotted the floating ma.s.s of bony spikes. The three rows of objects were towering out of the water and drifting into the ferry"s path.
"What is it?" the captain asked the wheelman. But the man at the throttle was far too busy trying to halt the forward momentum of the ship to answer his commanding officer. With a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach, the ferry captain returned his gaze to the horizon. He watched helplessly as the object drifted closer and closer to his ship.
In desperation, the captain reached for the steam whistle and pulled the chain. The loud blast cut through the fog. Birds, which had been roosting on the floating rocks, took to the air in a flurry of wings.
"Reverse all engines!" the captain cried, his eyes locked on the barrier on the horizon.
"Full reverse!" the wheelman answered, throwing the throttle in the opposite direction.
The engines groaned in protest as the propellers under the stern reversed direction. The whole ship shuddered. The captain and wheelman were thrown forward by the momentum of the vessel. Then the ship seemed to stop.
Before it could move backward, however, the Pusan ferry slammed into the floating ma.s.s with a sickening sound of grinding metal.
On the bridge, the captain and wheelman were knocked off their feet. The captain landed hard on the deck. The wheel itself was pulled out of the wheelman"s grip as it twisted to the side. Indeed, the whole ferry was pushed to the side. Then its bow was lifted into the air.