“Will you be able to do it?”

 

Byulyi swallowed as she looked up at her commander.  She was seventeen and small, clutching at the rifle strap on her shoulder like it was her lifeline. 

 

“Yes, sir!”

 

“Although you’ve been training for a year, the field is a different animal.  The reconnaissance work you’ve been assigned to could end in your death.”

 

Byulyi’s hands balled up into fists as she remembered the blaze of fire and the cries of her family muffled by gunshots.

 

“There is nothing for me to go back to, sir. The Liberation Army is all I have.”

 

The commander gave her a hard look, the dim light from the lantern reflecting off his glasses. 

 

“The Liberation Army is all Korea has as well.”

 

Byulyi jolted up, panting as she felt her face sticky with sweat. She realized sluggishly that she was on her back at headquarters, the cold ground buffered by the jacket she’d been using as a pillow.  Barely hiding a large yawn, she sleepily sat up as she observed the girl leaning against the wall, silently watching Byulyi.

 

The gaze was unnerving to say the least, alarmingly empty and yet strangely predatory like a snake’s.  

 

“Good morning,” Byulyi muttered tersely as she reached for her gun bundled in her jacket.  The other woman said nothing and just stared at her with those frightening eyes.

 

Byulyi had offered to sleep at headquarters and keep an eye on the woman while everyone else dispersed across the war-torn streets of Seoul.  She was the best with her gun anyway after her stint with the Liberation Army for nearly four years.  Byulyi also knew that Major Han would feel guilty about killing someone whereas she had done it too many times to count.

 

“Breakfast?” the woman asked in Japanese, her voice raspy from disuse.  Byulyi flinched.  It had been awhile since she’d heard that language in Korea.

 

“If you can’t speak in Japanese, why don’t we cut out that tongue of yours so you can’t speak at all!”

 

“Breakfast,” Byulyi repeated in Korean.  The other woman just blinked owlishly in response.

 

“Breakfast.”

 

twisted a bit at the halting reply and she nodded in affirmation.

 

“You’re hungry? I didn’t know a weapon could get hungry.”

 

The other woman titled her head slightly like she didn’t understand.  With a sigh Byulyi stood and strode toward her.  Carefully she held her palms up as she squatted down.

 

“I’m going to undo the handcuffs.  And you’re going to stay still and not try to kill me.”

 

No response but big brown eyes blinking slowly at her.  Byulyi sighed and bowed her head as she examined the woman’s wrists which weren’t even rubbed raw.  She hadn’t attempted to escape in the night.  Just stayed chained to the table nearby in silence.  

 

She was used to captivity like some animal.  The thought made something twist in Byulyi.

 

Gently, she pulled her key from her jacket pocket, turning the woman’s hand over as she unlocked one of the manacles.  Byulyi flinched when she realized how close the other woman’s face was to hers.  She could feel the warmth from her breath tickling the side of her neck and she couldn’t help the shaky exhale that escaped from her lips.

 

“What are you doing?” she bit out through gritted teeth as the chains on the woman’s wrists clanked to the floor.  Byulyi tensed when she sensed the weapon move her hands.

 

Without thinking she had the weapon pinned on her back, hands braced painfully above her head.  Byulyi panted a bit as she straddled the woman’s thin hips, blowing a piece of stray hair from her eyes.  The weapon just looked up at her, eyes slightly wide but no resistance.

 

“What were you going to do?” Byulyi growled, mouth pulling back into a snarl.  And then the weapon began to move the hand clenched tightly in Byulyi’s grip. She dug into her position on the woman’s hips, pressing harder into the ground.

 

“If you are trying to kill me you’re doing a pretty bad job of it.”

 

The weapon stopped moving at that. And they just stared at each other.

 

“Well that’s certainly one way to wake up in the morning.”

 

Byulyi startled, whipping her head towards Hyejin who was leaning against the secret entry way with her arms crossed.  She hated the warm flush in her cheeks as she rose from her position.  Byulyi turned away before she had to make eye contact with Seulgi who entered along with the rest of the members of the group.

 

“I was unlocking her handcuffs so she could eat breakfast.”

 

“Is that safe?” Hyejin asked skeptically with a cocked brow as she sat at the only table in the room, not even waiting for Wheein to scoop up the papers scattered all over its surface.

 

Byulyi crossed her arms as she looked down at the weapon who merely remained prone on her back, eyes still meeting hers. 

 

“Are you hungry?” Byulyi asked in Japanese, wincing at how easily the language came back to her.  After being forced to speak it for seventeen years she had avoided saying a word at all costs.

 

She ignored the collective gasps behind her. 

 

“Yes.”

 

“I’ll let you eat if you don’t hurt me.”

 

The weapon slowly sat up on her elbows and there was something almost provocative about the way she peeked up at Byulyi from behind the hair covering her face. 

 

“A dog doesn’t bite its master.”

 

“You speak Korean.”  Byulyi glanced behind her at Major Han.  The man took off his raggedy jacket that served as his disguise when he was walking on the streets.

 

“Just that,” the weapon responded, ducking her head and letting the shorter curling hairs framing her face cover her eyes. 

 

“Do you have a name?”

 

The weapon shook her head once, eyes still on the ground.

 

Byulyi’s mouth twitched but she tried to keep her movements measured and professional as she knelt down again and helped with unlocking the woman’s other handcuff.

 

“If you try to act out there will be consequences,” Byulyi reminded quietly, hand lingering on the weapon’s wrist.  She squeezed once before letting go and took a step back, hand on the holster of her gun.  The room was filled with a tense silence as everyone waited in anticipation for whatever the weapon would do.

 

They would be disappointed because the weapon didn’t move at all.  There was something almost childlike with the way the woman slowly lifted her head and looked at everyone with glassy eyes. 

 

“Food?” she asked with an inquisitive head tilt.  And Byulyi couldn’t help the small smile that curled her lips.

 

“Wheein-ah, give the weapon something to eat will you?”

 

The other girl who had been clutching a stack of papers to her chest jumped a little but nodded. 

 

“R-right away!”

 

Byulyi turned back to watching the weapon.  Suddenly the girl reached for the sleeve of her long sleeved shirt.  In a flash she had a gun cocked and ready, trained on the movement.

 

“What are you doing?”

 

The movement paused, small fingers clenching the worn material of the dirty cotton. 

 

“They always did this when I had breakfast.” The weapon mimed something with her hands.  Major Han stepped forward a little and stood next to Byulyi as they watched the girl pull up the sleeve of her shirt to just above her elbow. 

 

Along the crease of the woman’s elbow were distinct needle marks, some scars and some fresh. 

 

“They drugged her every day?” asked Hyejin in disbelief. 

 

Byulyi thought back to yesterday when the weapon had come out of the box, dizzy and uncoordinated.  Her fist clenched tightly and she slammed her gun onto the table in anger.  The sound made everyone turn toward her.  But the set of wide childlike eyes made Byulyi’s blood boil the most.

 

“Did both the Japanese and the Koreans do that to you?”

 

A hesitant nod.

 

Byulyi cursed and grabbed at the jacket on the ground, .

 

“Where are you going? Moon Byulyi!”

 

She turned into Major Han who looked at her, his face smooth of any emotion save the tight purse of her lips.  What a model soldier, able to keep his face composed despite the horrific sight before them all, Byulyi thought.

 

“I’m getting air.”

 

“You need to stay here.  It’s just past dawn.  We’re not supposed to be seen by the Americans or our men.”

 

“I need some air.”

 

Major Han’s jaw clenched.

 

“If I commanded you to stay?”

 

Byulyi just laughed.

 

“I am no soldier, Major Han.  I was just a prisoner from the North before you freed me.  You can’t command a rankless civilian.”

 

With that she glanced at the weapon who was staring again.

 

Wordlessly she her heel and walked away.   

 

 

 

---

 

 

 

 

Byulyi cupped a hand over her cigarette as she lit it.  Around her feet were discarded butts that she had smoked in her frenzy. 

 

She blew smoke from like some dragon from a story her mother had told her years ago. 

 

“Long, long ago when the tiger smoked a pipe…”

 

“Telling yourself a story?”

 

Byulyi startled.  She had been hiding behind a mound of rubble from a building a few blocks from the headquarters.  Sitting with her elbows balanced on her knees kept herself practically unnoticeable from any patrolling soldiers.

 

“Found me, Seulgi-yah.”

 

Byulyi looked up and smiled a little at the younger girl.

 

“I got worried.  You hadn’t returned for awhile.”

 

Seulgi walked around the huge piece of rubble, squeezing past and standing right above Byulyi.  She craned her head back to take the girl in.  Seulgi was wearing a long skirt that barely stopped at the ankles and an oversized army coat that was Byulyi’s. 

 

“You should go inside.  It’s cold out.”

 

Seulgi just wordlessly knelt down in the rubble, plucking the cigarette from Byulyi’s fingers.  Taking a drag, she exhaled with little trouble. 

 

“It upset you, right? That’s why you left.”

 

Byulyi’s mouth twitched as she observed the way Seulgi’s eyes watched her.  Those eyes had never judged her.  No matter what she had seen Byulyi do.  They still shone with the compassionate understanding that Byulyi had fallen in love with years ago.

 

“I just… after the Japanese left Korea I thought that there was hope that maybe this country would be able to rebuild itself from the sin of nearly forty years of colonization.  I missed nearly five years of course, being in prison.  But I just thought that maybe we wouldn’t be making the same mistakes.”

 

Seulgi gave Byulyi an unreadable look before taking another drag from the cigarette.

 

“I’m sorry that the first thing you saw after getting out of prison was the North and the South in a war.”

 

Byulyi chuckled bitterly.

 

“Honestly I wasn’t that surprised.  If you could be a soldier for the Freedom Army for four years and be thrown into prison just because you were from the North, I suppose anything’s possible.”

 

“Byulyi-unnie…”

 

“For so many years I clung onto the hope that I was fighting for something better.  I thought that maybe even if I died fighting against Japan I would be helping bring Korea a step closer to freedom.  But look at us.  Treating a woman like an animal and injecting her with drugs and forcing her to be some kind of attack dog. Maybe I should have just stayed in my cell.”

 

Seulgi looked away, tapping ash off the cigarette. 

 

“They wouldn’t have taken you to prison if you hadn’t been with me….”

 

Byulyi smiled a little and glanced at Seulgi who was looking at her.

 

“You know that’s not true.  They were rounding up anyone they thought was a Communist.  The only reason they didn’t kill me was someone from the Freedom Army vouched for my service against Japan for four years.”

 

“But you had been taking care of me and my uncle… he… for the reward money… even though I was from the North too-”

 

“Seulgi,” Byulyi warned.  After she had found the other girl when she had been freed they had this conversation constantly. It had torn their relationship apart. And yet they still went round and round in circles. 

 

“It’s not your fault.”

 

Seulgi sighed and reached for the collar of Byulyi’s shirt, smoothing the rumpled edge.  Her fingertips skimmed the warm skin of Byulyi’s neck and the closeness made her hold her breath.  Without thinking she gripped Seulgi’s wrist.

 

“It’s not your fault,” Byulyi repeated softly, watching the way the other girl’s gaze moved all over her face to avoid eye contact. “Seulgi.”

 

The other girl nodded again and gently pulled from Byulyi’s grip. 

 

“Do you feel like you can go back now?”

 

“Ready to leave our perfect hideout?”

 

“Our perfect hideout isn’t here.”

 

Byulyi smiled slowly thinking of a memory that was so long ago that it was almost edged with grey.  The two of them high up on a hill with a sunset painting the houses below, two flower crowns woven together with freshly plucked daisies. 

 

“Do you think that place is still there?” Byulyi asked quietly.  After the Japanese had left, it had been by dumb luck that Seulgi had been South of the border placed by the Americans and the Soviets to visit her uncle.  Byulyi had been with the Freedom Army, celebrating the victory in Seoul.  They had both not seen their hometown since the two Koreas had separated abruptly and without exception.

 

“When this is all over, I’d love to see it with you someday. Like we used to.”

 

Byulyi ducked her head and ignored the way her chest painfully clenched.  Even if it all looked the same, would it truly be the same place, she wondered.  They both stood to return to headquarters, careful not to brush against each other. 

 

 

---

 

 

 

 

Byulyi stood, wordlessly staring at the scrap of wood with a hastily painted target.  It was swinging precariously, the nail fastening it to the tree almost popping out.

 

“You have impressive aim,” observed Byulyi with a hand in her pocket.  She glanced at the weapon who still had her arms raised with a gun in hand.  It was like she was waiting for a command before she could relax her posture.  With a sigh Byulyi strode forward and gripped the muzzle of the gun, eyes narrowing.  The weapon seemed to relax at the proximity, fingers loosening until her arms dropped to her sides and Byulyi was left holding a smoking gun.

 

“They weren’t lying when they called you a weapon.”

 

“Am I done?”

 

Byulyi watched the way the weapon’s fingers clenched and unclenched around the oversized sleeves of her long jacket.  It was child-like how small her hands were.  Maybe that explained the horror that churned faintly in Byulyi’s stomach.

 

“I brought you out here to assess you true capabilities as a weapon of use in the fight against the North.”

 

The weapon raised her head and Byulyi swallowed at the way the other woman stared at her.  She had been at the secret base for little more than a month.  Things had been fairly quiet in their spot at Seoul but Byulyi still had a duty to evaluate if this particular weapon was up to the high standards she’d been recommended with.  So, this morning she’d dragged her outside of the city limits to a secluded area on the side of some unnamed mountain for a round of sparring and target practice.   

 

“Have I been assessed to your standards?  Do I please you?”

 

“Pleasure has no role here.”

 

The weapon blinked slowly as if Byulyi had said a joke that she didn’t understand.

 

“Do you have a name?”

 

“What?”

 

“A name.  Besides ‘the weapon.’”

 

Byulyi studied the way the other woman bowed her head, her longish bangs hiding her eyes from view.  She’d been speaking more and more with each passing day and Wheein’s eager efforts to share the wonders of the Korean language.  But there were moments like this one where it seemed like speaking was a chore that exhausted her.  The tiredness would strain her jaw and make her gaze half-lidded.

 

“A name is important for this assessment?”

 

“I can’t have a nameless soldier fighting alongside me.”

 

“I am no soldier.”

 

“Neither am I.”

 

That made the weapon frown and she raised her head in curiosity.  Her nose scrunched a little as she studied the way Byulyi stared steadfastly back at her.

 

“You aren’t a soldier?”

 

“I worked for the Liberation Army for four years.  And then after that I was in prison until this war started.  I suppose I’m a bit like yourself.  Only used as a weapon when convenient.  I don’t even know if I have a side any more.”

 

“Why were you in prison?” the weapon asked quietly.

 

“I don’t know.  I asked myself that every day for a year but then it stopped mattering.”  Byulyi began to reach for her pack of cigarettes before remembering that she’d left them at the base.

 

“I used to live somewhere that used to be a prison.  For years and years.  It was covered in snow for more than half the year.  Sometimes I would look at the snow… and wonder.”

 

Byulyi watched as the weapon tipped her head back and her eyes fluttered in the vestiges of dawn, warming her pale skin orangey-yellow in the growing light.  There was something wild in how her dark hair framed her face, not quite revealing the entirety of her expression.

 

“What did you wonder?”

 

The weapon reached forward and slid her finger slowly along the flat muzzle of the gun still in Byulyi’s hand.

 

“I’d wonder what it would be like… to leave that prison and fall into that white snow.  And disappear with the spring.”

 

They stared at each other then and Byulyi thought of that cold prison where she’d rotted away for years.  She’d cursed every god and name imaginable as she banged her head against the rough walls.  She’d fought for her country’s freedom and just as the gates had been opened they’d slammed shut and she’d been some careless casualty lost in the highs of success.  Byulyi would stare at the tiny window in her cell and when a little bit of snow melt would occasionally flutter into her room, she’d hold out a hand and watch as it melted away in her palm. 

 

“I understand the feeling,” she muttered roughly as she yanked the gun away.  She started to walk toward the target she’d hung up.

 

“Yongsun.”

 

“Hm?”

 

“That was my first name.  For a few years.”

 

Byulyi nodded slowly as she raised her gun at the target.  With an easy squeeze she shot out a bullet that caused the piece of wood to split clean in two.

 

 

 

---

 

 

 

 

The war was going smoothly.

 

Until it wasn’t.

 

And Byulyi found herself sitting in a chair with a man blindfolded and wrists bound.

 

“They say he will not talk.”  Major Han adjusted the rolled up sleeves of his shirt as he handed Byulyi a thick stack of files.  She wrinkled her nose as she pushed them away. 

 

“I simply need to get the information we seek and then our problem’s solved.  I don’t need to learn about him.”

 

Major Han swallowed and the nervous habit made Byulyi raise her head and squint at her superior.

 

“What troubles you, sir?”

 

“We need to know if the North is planning another wave with the renewed support from China.  But…”

 

“But?”

 

“But this man may be someone you’re familiar with.  Because he also had a stint with the Freedom Army.  And he’s originally from the North.”

 

Byulyi’s shoulders stiffened and she squinted as she tried to take in the features of the person in front of her, obscured too much by the dim lighting and the discoloration of multiple beatings.

 

“Regardless of who this man is, Major Han, I know where my loyalties lie.”

 

Their eyes met and Byulyi’s stomach churned at what was undeniably pity in the dark set of the other man’s jaw. 

 

“Feel free to leave.  I can conduct this interrogation by myself if necessary.”

 

“I was told to observe.”

 

“Because of transparency? Or because of distrust?”

 

Major Han breathed heavily through his nose.

 

“Byulyi, you have proven time and time again your loyalty to the South.  I don’t doubt that.”

 

“But Headquarters doesn’t know me like you do, Major Han.  They look at me and they see a potential double agent for the North.  It’s why they put me in prison in the first place, you know.”

 

Major Han opened his mouth to interject but Byulyi simply raised a hand to silence him.  With a new set to her jaw, she reached forward and untied the blindfold covered the seated man’s face. 

 

When their eyes met she shakily put her hands in her pockets.

 

“B-Byulyi…” he choked out, his eyes filling with tears.  She bit on the inside of her cheek so hard filled with blood.  Looking away from the captured Northern soldier she tried to ignore the beginning of a headache pounding at her temples.  When she turned back around, she tried to forget the familiarity of the man’s name on her lips and the warm memories of a shared past.

 

“I’ve been told that you have some information that could be of use to us.”

 

“Byulyi… why are you doing this?  How could you give yourself to them?”

 

She crossed her arms over her chest as she exhaled slowly through her nose.