The Presidential Election (1)
May 9th.
As in most democracies on election day, specially programmed coverage of the presidential race poured from the television from morning until night.
They cycled through a dozen panelists and a dozen different screens, and then, at last, the count itself began.
Lee Nayoung would win, of course.
The broadcast cut briefly to the politicians assembled at the opposition camp, and there was a familiar face.
Jiwon, that bastard.
Sitting in the front row, too. Looked like he was doing all right for himself.
Forty-three percent. A little lower than I'd expected...
The announcer rattled off the exit-poll numbers like a machine gun, minor-party candidates and all. There were a lot of them.
Twenty people had thrown their hats in this time?
That's a lot of money...
Where the hell had anyone found campaign funds in a situation like this?
"How do you think it'll go?"
"...I couldn't say."
"It'll be one of the two major parties, won't it?"
Who else would it be. If I really stretched it, there was maybe one more person who could have made a race of it — but she was sitting right in front of me, so it hardly mattered.
"Personally, I half expected your name to be among the candidates that announcer was listing."
If she'd run, she'd have swept the North Korean vote and we'd have had a three-way race.
"You didn't end up running, I see."
"That is correct. I am a soldier. I have no interest in politics."
The delivery was stiff, as if she weren't quite used to the words in her mouth.
"Well — thanks to that, we get to meet like this. It took a long time just to get a look at your face, didn't it?"
I'd tried every means I had, every method I could think of, to get in touch with her. All of it had failed. And only now, finally, here she was.
"First time since the debate, so it's been a little over a month. It's a genuine pleasure, Chairman Kim Eunjung. I'm Park Seonghun."
The woman who had walked into the room where I'd been watching the count.
A crop cut so short she looked ready to hit the dirt on a battlefield at a moment's notice, and the distinctive dress uniform of the North Korean military. You could tell she'd been training and eating properly since she was a child — she stood taller and more solidly built than the average woman. Add a cold expression that a stranger would read as stiff, and nothing about her had changed from the last time I'd seen her.
Had her hair grown out a little, maybe?
Military through and through, I'd give her that. Still — she had to own other clothes. Wearing the uniform even now, off duty. Dress down a little, would you.
"If you're curious about the results, we could watch a bit longer before we start."
"That won't be necessary. I don't have much time. I have to return to Pyongyang shortly."
"Ah. Is that so? That's a shame."
We'd need time together if I was going to get close to her, or squeeze anything useful out of her.
I switched off the television, which had already faded into so much noise, and led Kim Eunjung to a table where refreshments had been set out in advance.
Where to even start...
"Did you vote?"
"Yes. I voted this morning, in front of the cameras."
Ah. So she'd come down to Seoul to have her ballot photographed.
They'd set up a polling station in every apartment complex that housed men, supposedly to prevent incidents, which had been convenient enough for the rest of us.
"I just used the one they put in front of my building. Doing it on camera, though — that must've been a hassle. What's it like? The hero's life, every move watched. Is it any good?"
"No. A hero's life? I am not a hero."
"Come on. I was in the service myself, and I know what you did."
If she wasn't a hero, who was?
She'd grabbed a hundred of China's five hundred remaining men, then handed them back one by one — and in exchange, under the heading of war reparations, she'd taken China's three northeastern provinces, along with the food and resources China still held, packed into every ship and plane that could move. While every other country was crawling through hell, we were living relatively well. The shipments were still coming in.
Even thinking about it again, I had no idea how she'd pulled that capture off. Incredible.
"You're one of this country's heroes. I'm sure you're popular with plenty of other people, but among us guys? You're huge."
That was the truth. Plenty of them liked her, wanted to meet her — and more than I'd expected were into the idea that if she just grew her hair out a little, she'd be a proper ice beauty.
"There were even guys who wanted to take this meeting off my hands."
And looking at where she sat — at the very peak of the Korean military — she was clearly a woman of considerable value. Then again, if things went sour, or if a coup ever materialized, she was also the single most likely person to kidnap the men and lock them up.
A rose with thorns, maybe. Or a bomb that hadn't decided when to go off.
Either way, I'd have to be careful. Nobody knew what might happen.
"That... I see. Thank you."
"You said you don't have much time, so I'll get to it. Acting President Lee Nayoung spoke to you about this, I assume?"
"Yes... I heard. She asked if I had any intention of marrying."
"And what would you like to do?"
"....I have never given marriage any thought. And I don't really... understand what any of this actually involves."
"It's not that you dislike men, is it?"
"...Why would I dislike men?"
Hm. Plenty of people in our neighborhood who did. The 4B movement. I guessed things were different up north.
"I should explain this properly, then."
"Yes. I am listening."
"As you know, marriage the way it used to work isn't possible anymore."
"Yes."
"And even under the current Duty Sex system, it would be very difficult for people from the North to participate."
Honestly, how many North Koreans would even clear the bar. Effectively none of them.
"That is so."
"Which means the country splits in half all over again."
"So measures to prevent that are going to be put in place as well. Methods that don't distinguish between South and North — pooling an entire family's social-value creation and concentrating it on a single person, for instance."
We'd filter and re-filter for personality, of course, and even after that the men would pick through them again and toss anyone who didn't make the cut. Opening the door to a possibility wasn't the same as guaranteeing anything.
"But that alone obviously isn't enough, is it? People in the North could still say they're being discriminated against. Which is why we'd like you — the spiritual pillar and hero of the North Korean people — to become a symbol. A symbol that people from the North can do this too. That equality of opportunity isn't a lie, and that there is no discrimination. Not the title you hold on paper. A genuine symbol of North-South unification."
Through marriage to a man.
"You could marry a man you like, even if it's only for form's sake. Or you could seriously see one of the guys who already like you. As I said — there are quite a few of them."
And prevent a coup while we're at it.
"I still don't understand..."
"Which part?"
...That wasn't going to do it.
From here on, there was no taking it back. Clumsy deception wasn't going to solve this, and neither was some finely crafted lie.
"I'll be honest with you. What Acting President Lee Nayoung told you — I was the one who raised it first. Those were my words. Look... I grew up in a reasonably peaceful time. I've been conscripted, I've been to war, and now I'm living through this age of chaos... and the truth is, I want to live in a peaceful world. A world where nothing happens. No incidents, no accidents. Just peace."
I needed to reach whatever she kept in the center of herself, with logic that had real sincerity melted into it.
"And in this age of chaos, Chairman, you're someone who could become the eye of a new storm. Looking at the path you've walked so far, I don't believe that will happen — but nobody knows the future."
I meant it. I genuinely wanted this sweet, easy world of mine to last.
"So I put a conciliatory measure to the Acting President. Something that could make North and South truly one in a unified Korea, and keep anything unsavory from happening."
Was she President by now, I wondered.
"I do hope you see it the same way I do, Chairman. What do you think?"
If she said no, there was nothing I could do about it. I'd put it this nicely — if she still refused, I'd just go ahead with the original plan. What choice did I have?