It was fitting. In Greek mythology, Apollo had driven the chariot of the sun across the sky. His fractured essence had sought out one called Sun.
In his first moment of complete possession, Sun had been given a vision by the Pythia. A gift to reward him for his loyal service. Blessed with the ability to foretell the future, the yellow spirit had let Sun see himself in the very near future. He would be a king. The nation he had fled in ignominy would be his to rule over. There would be no North, no South. It would be complete. Whole. Under the iron fist of Man Hyung Sun.
Sun loved that vision, lived for it. It was like a drug to which he had become hopelessly addicted. He longed to see it now, as he stood on that desolate plain in his mind.
THE PYTHIA SLUMPED before him. A strange combination of yellow cloud and human features. Only in this place of unreality could the images be remotely reconciled.
"I grow weaker still," the Pythia lamented. The voice that rattled up the spirit's throat was a pathetic rasp.
"The Greek who ignored your entreaties is no more," Sun offered, as if to cheer up the ancient spirit.
"Do you think I do not know? It is I who told you of his treachery." Squatting in the misery of its own yellow smoke, the Pythia shook its head bitterly. "The time I wasted on that Greek. If my master were here, if my strength were greater, he would not have ignored me. My power was once feared by man. I am a shell of what I once was."
Sun seemed uncomfortable. "You are a powerful seer," he said. He tried to think of something that would bolster the Pythia's flagging spirits. "My 900 line is ringing off the hook," he offered suddenly.
At this, the Pythia looked up at Sun. There was a scornful expression on its bronzed face.
"Vengeance propels me, though my spirit longs for nothingness," the Pythia intoned. "It is time."
"For what?" Sun asked.
"Time to crush my enemies."
Sun's heart raced. The Pythia had prophesied to him that his time of ascendancy would come immediately on the heels of the final defeat of the men from Sinanju.
"What do you wish for me to do, O Prophet?"
"The young one is already in place. Your minions have done well to draw him into my trap."
"Thank you, Great Herald," Sun said proudly.
"It is time to bring the old one there, as well."
Sun's face clouded. "I thought it was your wish to keep them apart."
"It was. It no longer is. The time has come that we should bring them together." The Pythia smiled. "And set them against one another."
And as the Pythia went on to describe its plan to the Reverend Sun, the cult leader could not help but smile, as well. Their deaths-and his future-were all but assured.
CHIUN WAS SITTING in his balcony sunroom, which overlooked the grounds of Sun's estate, when the reverend knocked on his door once more. The Master of Sinanju bade the cult leader enter.
"I have been meditating," Sun said, sitting across from Chiun on the balcony.
The Master of Sinanju did not bother to mention that the all too familiar stench of Sun's after-shave had preceded him into the room yet again. Every time Sun meditated, he came back smelling like a French brothel. His breathing shallow, the old Korean merely nodded.
"I have had a revelation," Sun continued. "It is time."
Sitting in a lotus position on the floor, Chiun had not yet opened his eyes. He did so now.
"Time for what?" he asked, not daring to allow hope to betray his studied tone. The answer sent his soul soaring.
"Pyon ha-da is upon us," Sun said. "As is my moment of greatness. We must return in haste to the land of our birth so that I might be allowed to ascend to my proper place as leader of unified Korea. I wish you to be at my side."
Chiun rose from the floor like a puff of thin smoke. "It will be my joy to safeguard your holy life, Seer of pyon ha-da," the Master of Sinanju intoned, squeaky voice chiming with undisguised joy. The bow he gave to Man Hyung Sun was reverential.
Chapter 25
The student activists of the South were more difficult to get through than the whole of the People's Defense Forces of the North from Pyongyang to the demilitarized zone.
In his U.S. Army jeep, Remo Williams had to dodge bricks, bottles, rocks, sticks and just about anything else the "peace-loving" student demonstrators found to throw.
As he was racing through the streets of Seoul, someone hurled a Molotov cocktail onto the hood of his speeding jeep. The bottle crashed with the sound of shattering china, and the gasoline mixture splattered orange flames back across the windshield. Remo drove through the fire.
Riot police were out in full force. White helmets protected heads while thick transparent face shields extended down to bulletproof vests. Kevlar gloves and blast-resistant shields completed the rest of the armor the police had been forced to wear over their jumpsuits.
From the look of the debris field that was the streets of Seoul, the demonstrations by the students had taken a bad turn during the previous night. Charred cars lined the road, some still sending plumes of acrid smoke into the clear winter-blue sky.
Remo weaved his way through students and police alike, arriving relatively unscathed at the South Korean National Assembly building.
Roving packs of students could be seen wandering between buildings and cars. They looked like the irate villagers out of an old horror movie, determined to rid the local castle of an evil scientist. All they needed were a few pitchforks and some torches to complete the image.
Remo prayed that for now his vehicle would be safe from the students. He didn't plan to leave it there long.
He abandoned the jeep by the side of the road. At a run, Remo flew up the stairs and into the big building.
PRESIDENT KIM DAE JUNG had personally called for the secret emergency meeting of the Kuk Hoe, the National Assembly of the Republic of Korea. All 299 members of the unicameral body were present, as well as every cabinet and high-ranking security officer in the nation. With the number of people crammed inside the assembly hall, the president wondered how long his secret meeting would remain a secret.
The issue before them was one he had not thought to seriously face in his lifetime. Reunification with the North. It had been brought up many times in the past, but it had always been unthinkable to reasonable people. But reason had taken a holiday since the American bombing of Seoul National University.
"The Americans take our relationship for granted!" the ranking member of the Party for Peace and Democracy shouted from behind the podium. "They believe that they can drop bombs on our heads and we will still scurry over to them like dogs beneath their master's table. It is time we demonstrate to the powers of the West that we, too, are a force to be reckoned with. Only a unified Korea can show such strength."
It was the same speech many others had given. From his seat behind the main podium of the parliamentary chamber, the president watched the faces in the crowd.
Only about one-fifth were from the Reunification Democratic Party. These were usually the ones screaming for talks with the North at every perceived slight from the West. But they had remained largely silent this day. Suppressing grins, they had watched others from more conservative parties get up and give the same speeches they had given in the past.
The president had tried to call for calm in the face of this latest crisis. Washington had apologized for the Tomahawk incident. Screaming would not bring the dead back to life. Nor would it rebuild either the destroyed portion of the university or the fragile bridge to the West.
He was shouted down.
The entire nation was spinning out of control. If these supposedly rational elected officials were so frenzied over this issue, there was little hope for the rest of South Korea. Indeed, the rioting overnight in Seoul had been the worst in the president's memory. And he had been an activist and political prisoner years before.
And so he sat, staring into the abyss, helpless to stop his countrymen from taking that last step into madness.
"I cannot help but say that we saw this coming." The ranking delegate of the Reunification Democratic Party had taken the stage. The smugness oozed like snake oil from every pore. "The Americans cannot possibly understand us or our culture. Some of you have had trepidations when we have discussed the inevitable union with our northern cousins. You must all admit now that the North would understand us better than America. The United States bombs us and then they say they are sorry. That might be good enough for our president, but it is not good enough for us."
"What if we say we're really, really sorry?" called a voice from the rear of the assembly hall.