Martin Limon - Joy Brigade

“Beikyang,” he said

The sound was so rough, like a reptile hissing, that at first I didn’t understand him. He repeated the word and then said, “According to your report, the Red Star Brigade will rendezvous there prior to the final assault.”

I nodded.

“We need to know which units will be proceeding where so we can attack them after they leave Beikyang. Have you been able to remember anything else?”

I had, and I pulled the notes out of my pocket. The names of a few petroleum refueling points and which units would be using them.

“Are you sure of this?” he asked.

“The petroleum points, yes,” I replied, “but not of which units will be where.”

Bandit Lee turned away and started giving orders to his waiting officers. Reconnaissance units would be sent out to gather information. Doc Yong was one of the officers who’d be going. The meeting was about to end when I spoke up.

“I will go with her,” I said.

“No,” Bandit Lee said. “You are too important. When the time comes, we will need you to relay information to the Americans.”

I knew better than to argue with him directly. Instead, I said, “My memory is coming back to me gradually. If I can see the units, if I can see the terrain, maybe I will remember more.”

One thing we all knew for sure was that if an order of battle was devised in Pyongyang, the Red Star Brigade would not dare to deviate from it. In the North Korean Army, commanders are given no discretion for independent action. The guidance of the Great Leader is everything.

“If you can remember,” Bandit Lee said, “that would be helpful.” He turned to one of his subordinates. “See that he’s properly outfitted.”

It was an infantry unit with a few armored personnel carriers. They were refueling at a North Korean Army depot two kilometers outside the village of Jong-chol. Doc Yong and I stayed low, hidden behind rocks and shrubs on a hill overlooking the narrow valley. We had been traveling all night across rough terrain, and although Il-yong had been left behind in good hands, Doc Yong seemed more worried about him than she was about the enemy. Now, just after dawn, we counted the soldiers and the vehicles.

“Three platoons,” I said.

Doc Yong stared through binoculars. “With climbing gear,” she said. I took the binoculars from her. She was right. Two soldiers were pulling metal hooks and ropes out of the back of one of the vehicles, checking them, and stuffing them back inside.

“That’s why they have so little armor,” I said, “and no big guns. They’ll try to assault the Manchurian Battalion from the rear.”

Doc Yong jotted down a few notes. “Maybe this is the 7044th Mountain Platoon you mentioned.”

“I’m not sure about the number.”

“Don’t worry. The point is we will have someone waiting for them when they make their way behind Mount O-song.”

We pulled back from our position. We were halfway over the hill when the first shot rang out. I dived for dirt. Doc Yong did the same, landing beside me. We low-crawled toward nearby boulders.

Another shot rang out.

“Sniper,” I said.

I peeked around the boulder, searching for someone on the promontory above us. I saw nothing. Doc Yong looked. After she pulled her head back to safety, she said, “There, at the very top. Beneath some shrubs.”

I looked where her finger pointed and saw him. Just as I pulled back to safety, a third shot rang out.

It was then that it all came back to me.

“Quick,” I said. “Paper!”

“What?”

“Paper! Pencil!”

Quickly, she rummaged through her canvas backpack and pulled out a short pencil and a pad of tattered pulp. I started jotting furiously. It was all there in my mind: unit designations, personnel strength, number of guns and armored vehicles, and, most importantly, which routes they would be taking up into the Kwangju Mountains.

Two more shots rang out.

“There’s more of them now,” Doc Yong said. “Come on. We have to go.”

“Fire back,” I said. “I’m almost done.”

Doc Yong unstrapped the Kalashnikov from her back, lay down next to the boulder, aimed, and fired. Then she sat back facing me. “Not even close. That won’t hold them long.”

I continued to scribble.

“You’ll be able to read that?” she asked.

“When we get back, I’ll recopy it.”

“If we get back.”

Finally, I was done. The firing had stopped.

“They’re trying to get closer,” I said.

We hurried off, crawling through the brush. Unfortunately, not being able to stand up, we weren’t sure where we were going. Only when it was too late did we discover that we’d gone in the wrong direction. A cliff loomed before us.

“We have to go back,” I said.

Doc Yong grabbed my arm. “Too late,” she said. “They’re too close.” She pointed through the shrubbery. In the early morning gloom, I spotted two dark shapes sliding down the slope behind us, no more than a hundred yards away. “If we crawl, it will take too long,” she said. “If we run, they will pick us off.”

I looked down over the cliff. After about twenty feet of rock, a sandy slope tapered steeply to the ravine below.

“We have to jump,” she said.

I glanced back at the snipers. They took turns changing positions, so the stationary one could provide covering fire.

“Okay,” I said, “I’ll go first.”

“No, me.”

I wanted to argue with her, but before I could speak she was already over the edge. She dropped along the jagged rock and landed with a thump on the sand below, immediately tumbling down the hill. A shot rang out, missing me by a few feet. No time to wait. I slid over the edge. All I remember is slamming into about a thousand protuberances until I finally hit the sand. Fifty yards later, I rolled to a halt, stunned but still conscious. I sat up, searching for Doc Yong.

She hissed at me, waving her arm. “This way.”

I stood up unsteadily and staggered toward her. This time I didn’t hear anything. All I knew for sure was that someone must’ve swung an iron rod with all his strength, slamming it into the side of my calf and knocking me down.

And then Doc Yong was firing, her Kalashnikov on full automatic, and the next thing I knew, her hand was in my armpit and she was pulling and screaming at me to get up. I did, leaning on her, and we stumbled forward. Another round zinged past my head and then we were behind a rock.

It took us the better part of that day and into the late evening to make it back to the first guard post surrounding the Manchurian Battalion. I’d lost a lot of blood. All I remember is being carried by stretcher up a steep pathway. Then I passed out.

Il-yong sat on the floor next to me, playing with a ball of yarn. Doc Yong squatted next to my bedding, holding my scribbled notes in her hand.

“I can make out some of the numbers,” she told me, “and some of the words, but do you think you’re well enough to decipher it now?”

I held the paper unsteadily in my hand, staring at it. My eyes wouldn’t focus.

“Never mind,” she said, taking it from me. “We’ll try again after you rest.”

In the distance, an artillery round boomed.

“They’re getting closer,” I said.

“Never mind. You rest now.”

I did.

It had only been a shard of rock that hit my leg, kicked up by the round fired by the sniper. Fortunately, an artery hadn’t been severed, and what with antibiotics and the bandages being replaced regularly by Doc Yong, I felt alert by the next day.

The artillery rounds now fired almost every minute. I rewrote the entire order of battle, explaining it to Doc Yong as I did so. She seemed worried.

“What’s wrong?” I asked. “This should help us.”