The Dog Tag
Plop—
Na Kang-hae’s car slammed into the Han River.
The dump truck driver got out and ran for the guardrail. By the time he looked down, the car had already disappeared beneath the water. All that remained was a spreading ripple.
“Shit……”
Cursing under his breath, the driver pulled out his phone and called a number.
“Yes. It’s me.”
[Was it taken care of?]
“W-well…… the car did go off the bridge and into the river…….”
[So you lost him.]
“I’m sorry…….”
[Get out of there first. We’ll handle the cleanup.]
“Understood.”
The driver hung up, climbed back into the dump truck, and drove off the Hannam Bridge.
And at that same moment, water was beginning to pour into Kang-hae’s car.
For that brief instant as the car fell, Kang-hae had rolled down the window.
He didn’t panic. He simply waited until the vehicle filled with water.
Then, the moment the cabin was full, he slipped out.
The current was fierce and the water black as pitch, but for Kang-hae, swimming to the surface was no difficult matter.
“Hoo…….”
Breaking the surface, he drew in a long breath.
Then he started swimming at an angle, cutting across the current.
Thirty minutes later, Kim Seon-ho, a twenty-seven-year-old man jogging along the Han River, screamed when someone burst out of the bushes.
“Aaaah—!”
A man in a suit, drenched head to toe, came walking straight toward him.
It was Kang-hae.
Kim Seon-ho, pale with fear, stumbled backward.
“Let me borrow your phone for one call.”
Kang-hae spoke evenly, and Kim Seon-ho wordlessly held out the phone in his hand.
Kang-hae called Seong Ha-yeong.
He had already memorized her number.
It didn’t take long before her voice came through the phone.
Hello?
“It’s me.”
Kang-hae?!
“Where are you?”
I’m at the funeral home. I arrived a little while ago.
Thank goodness.
Ha-yeong hadn’t been attacked.
But he couldn’t afford to relax.
I was worried because you weren’t answering! Where are you now?
“Something came up on the way to the funeral home.”
Something……? Don’t tell me you were attacked or something……?!
“Yes.”
Are you all right now?!
“Yes. I’m fine.”
Where are you? I’ll come get you.
“No. I’ll come to you.”
How are you getting here?
“I’ll take a taxi.”
All right. Be careful coming over.
Kang-hae ended the call and handed the phone back to Kim Seon-ho.
“Thank you.”
“It’s nothing…… But shouldn’t I call the police or 119?”
“I’m fine.”
With that, Kang-hae left the Han River behind and hailed a taxi.
The driver barked at him when he saw Kang-hae climb in, soaked through, but Kang-hae simply held out all the cash in his wallet.
Six fifty-thousand-won bills.
“Well…… you seem in a hurry, so I’ll take you, but this isn’t exactly polite, you know.”
The taxi driver, grudgingly appeased, took the wet bills and drove Kang-hae to Seoul Mirae Hospital, where the funeral wake had been arranged.
Ha-yeong was waiting outside the funeral home.
The instant she saw Kang-hae step out of the taxi, she rushed toward him.
“Kang-hae!”
“…….”
“Oh my God…… what happened……!”
“A dump truck came up from behind and hit me.”
“A dump truck?!”
“Yes.”
“Then what you said about the director really was true…….”
“I still don’t know whether the people who killed the director and the ones who targeted me are the same.”
“Then who would come after you……?”
“It could be the Cabinet Intelligence and Research Office in Japan.”
“…….”
“For now, we have to keep every possibility open.”
Ha-yeong fell silent.
Kang-hae had said it himself: every possibility.
He intended to sort through them one by one after the funeral was over.
“Let’s go in first.”
“All right.”
Ha-yeong went ahead into the funeral home, and before Kang-hae followed her in, he looked around once more.
Then he spotted a black sedan parked near the entrance.
It was too dark to see inside.
97U1182
Kang-hae memorized the license plate and headed into the wake with Ha-yeong.
* * *
Morning came.
From early in the day, mourners had been arriving without pause.
Even while she busied herself with funeral arrangements, Ha-yeong kept searching the news on her phone whenever she had a spare moment.
But she couldn’t find a single article about Hannam Bridge.
According to Kang-hae, the car had slammed the guardrail and fallen into the Han River.
And yet not even one line in the news…… could that really happen……?
Ha-yeong opened social media and searched every keyword she could think of.
#Han River
#fall
#guardrail
#accident
#falling accident
#traffic accident
#Hannam Bridge
But the accident Kang-hae had described never appeared.
A chill went through her.
Someone was clearly targeting Kang-hae, but she had no idea who.
“Hoo……”
Ha-yeong let out a long breath.
And then Kang-hae appeared.
“Ha-yeong.”
“Oh, Kang-hae.”
“Do you happen to know anyone at the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency?”
“The police agency?”
“We need to check the Hannam Bridge CCTV from this morning.”
“The CCTV?”
“Yes.”
“I have a college senior at TOPIS.”
“TOPIS?”
“The Seoul Metropolitan Government Traffic Information Center. They’d have the CCTV stored there.”
“Then can I get that senior’s contact information? I’ll go meet them.”
“No. Come with me now.”
“Now?”
“Yes. There are other staff here too, and since they’re all out here helping with the funeral, it’ll be fine if we slip away for a bit.”
As Ha-yeong said, the other National Security Office staff had arrived early that morning and were helping with the wake.
There would be no problem if the two of them stepped out for a short while.
“All right.”
“Let’s go.”
The two of them left the funeral home at once, and Kang-hae rode with Ha-yeong as she drove toward Seoul City Hall.
* * *
In front of the TOPIS control room at the Seosomun Annex of Seoul City Hall.
“Senior~. I’m begging you~.”
Looping her arm through Mun Ju-ha’s, Ha-yeong spoke in a sugary, coaxing voice.
Mun Ju-ha was her senior from college and also her senior from ROTC.
Since childhood, Ju-ha had dreamed of becoming a civil servant, and she had joined the military with every intention of making it a career.
But she grew sick of the rigid, conservative life and left the army the moment her mandatory service ended. After two years of studying, she passed the local-government civil service exam at Grade 7 in information and communications and now worked at TOPIS.
“Hey, Seong Ha-yeong. You know this needs an official document, right?”
“Of course I do~. But you know the situation, too. Director Ko Jeong-un passed away, and there isn’t even anyone in his seat who can approve it right now.”
“Sigh.”
Ju-ha sighed and glanced at Kang-hae, who was standing beside Ha-yeong.
“But who’s the person you brought with you……?”
“I’m Na Kang-hae, and I work with Seong Ha-yeong at the National Security Office.”
Kang-hae greeted her, and Ju-ha immediately looked him up and down.
Then she smiled in a way Ha-yeong couldn’t quite miss and glanced at her.
Ha-yeong understood exactly what that smile meant, but she pretended not to.
“Senior~. I’m really in a hurry.”
“Fine. So you just need the footage from this morning between two and three a.m., heading south from Hannam Bridge, right?”
“Yes.”
The TOPIS control center was a restricted area, and anyone entering had to be logged in with a security card.
Even a National Security Office employee couldn’t be taken inside without an official request.
“There’s a café on the first floor. Wait there.”
“Thanks, Senior.”
Ju-ha went into the control room, and Ha-yeong led Kang-hae to the café.
There, the two of them drank coffee and waited for Ju-ha.
An hour later, Ju-ha showed up at the café.
The moment she saw Ha-yeong, she shook her head.
“Nothing.”
“Nothing……?”
“Yeah.”
“Really?”
“Yeah.”
“You’re sure……?”
“I checked it twice.”
“You didn’t confuse it with another date?”
“No. It was definitely this morning.”
Ju-ha didn’t seem to be lying.
And Ha-yeong knew how meticulous she was.
There was no way she would have mistaken the date or time.
But…….
“Thank you.”
Without any outward reaction, Kang-hae thanked Ju-ha.
Then he looked to Ha-yeong, silently telling her it was time to go.
“Thanks, Senior. The director’s funeral still isn’t over, so we should get back quickly. I’ll call you again.”
“All right. Be careful.”
The two of them left the café and headed for the parking lot.
Ha-yeong still wore an expression of disbelief.
“What do you think happened……? Do you think my senior lied?”
“She didn’t look like it.”
“Then why would the CCTV be……?”
“It may have been hacked or tampered with.”
“……!”
She had never even considered that.
“Ha-yeong.”
“Yes?”
“Let’s go to Hannam Bridge.”
“Hannam Bridge?”
“Yes.”
“All right.”
Kang-hae told Ha-yeong, now behind the wheel, the exact spot where the accident had happened that morning, and she drove there at once.
* * *
Hannam Bridge.
The guardrail Kang-hae had crashed through had already been repaired and looked perfectly normal.
“How…….”
For a moment, Ha-yeong wondered if Kang-hae had mistaken the place.
But she had seen it clearly.
She had seen Kang-hae return to the funeral home soaked to the bone.
“Let’s go.”
Kang-hae said that to her, and she turned the car back toward the funeral home.
Another day passed.
Ko Jeong-un was laid to rest at the Seoul National Cemetery.
Tears from the bereaved family and from the current and former soldiers who had followed him soaked the cemetery’s green grass.
After all the funeral rites were finished, the people moved toward the entrance of the National Cemetery.
Ko Jeong-un’s wife thanked the National Security Office staff one by one.
“You worked hard too, Lieutenant Seong.”
She took Ha-yeong’s hands in both of hers.
Ha-yeong, tears streaming down her face, said, “N-no, ma’am…….”
Ko Jeong-un’s wife gently patted Ha-yeong’s hand, then looked at Kang-hae standing beside her.
“Are you Na Kang-hae?”
“Yes. It’s a pleasure to meet you. I’m Na Kang-hae.”
“Could the two of you spare me a moment?”
Kang-hae and Ha-yeong exchanged a glance.
Then Ko Jeong-un’s wife led them to a quiet corner.
“Was there something you wanted to say……?”
Ha-yeong asked her.
Ko Jeong-un’s wife looked around briefly, then lowered her voice.
“My husband used to talk about the two of you now and then. He said you were people he could truly trust. In particular, Lieutenant Seong—he was always very fond of you.”
Hearing that, Ha-yeong felt tears threaten to burst out again, but she swallowed them back at the thought that it would be disrespectful to the bereaved family.
“A few days ago, my husband said something strange. He told me that if anything ever happened to him, I should give this to you, Lieutenant Seong, or to Mr. Kang-hae at the Security Office.”
Kang-hae and Ha-yeong met each other’s eyes.
Then Ko Jeong-un’s wife took something from her pocket and held it out to Ha-yeong.
It was a dog tag.
Taking it, Ha-yeong said, “Why would this……?”
“He insisted I pass it on.”
“…….”
“You both worked hard through the funeral period.”
With that, Ko Jeong-un’s wife returned to her family, and Ha-yeong examined the dog tag.
Army
88-11879463
Ko Jeong-un
B+
Something was off.
Ha-yeong kept staring at the dog tag.
……!
Then she realized what it was.
The service number engraved on Ko Jeong-un’s tag was wrong.
Ha-yeong had been his direct aide, so she remembered his service number more clearly than anyone.
“Kang-hae.”
“Yes.”
“The director’s service number is wrong…… He was commissioned in 1987, not 1988. And the rest of the number is different from what I remember.”
Ha-yeong held out the tag and told him what she had found.
Kang-hae checked the engraved numbers.
And he understood.
The numbers on the dog tag were pointing to a location.
“I think I found where the external drive is hidden.”
Looking at Ha-yeong, Kang-hae spoke in a low voice.