AUTHOR'S NOTE: It's technically the 8th here soooo...enjoy :)

Smuggler's Blues

Part II

Irene stood by the car with the wind tousling her clothes and wafting through her hair while Seulgi fetched up something from the glovebox and stepped out after her. She had parked directly across the street for the sake of discretion but it was pointless because you could see the Testarossa from about a mile away and it was impossible to hide it anywhere. They stood at the foot of the garden a minute. The empty streets, empty driveway. 'Well,' Irene said. 'What are we waiting for?'

'You eager to meet her again?'

'Sure. She's cooler than you, man. Way cooler.'

Seulgi went on up and knocked on the door and waited. A soft wind blew. They knocked again and a third time and waited for an answer but none came. 'Is she in?' Irene said. 'Or, like...alive? I mean, I just wanna make sure.'

'Listen.'

She made a shushing motion with her finger and they listened. A faint hammering of metal somewhere from the back of the house. 'What the is that?' Irene said. It came again. Seulgi shifted down the side of the house and to the end of the driveway and up to the back gate. They could see very little of the garden beyond it but they could hear the metal. They looked at one another. As if unsure of how to proceed. As if saying: What in the world is this? Then Seulgi knocked and waited. The hammering stopped. The whine of metal. Then footsteps and the bolt of the gate opening and suddenly Wendy there, in a bright green jacket and zebrastripe pants and wearing a red headband and big roundrimmed glasses.

'Hey,' Irene said.

'Hey, man.'

'Did you know we were coming?'

'Of course.'

'Really?'

She made a shrug gesture. They could smell weed. 'What the is that?' Seulgi said, pointing up the garden path. It was some sort of enormous alien spaceship made entirely out of old metal sheets and aluminium bonding and it wobbled dangerously in the wind. The roof was a tall domed spire and there was a staircase up into the interior and sheets of the metal bonded and welded and bent in every direction lay about the ground with nuts and bolts and power tools scattered here and there.

'Yo,' Irene said. 'No . That is cool as . What is it?'

'It's my new base of operations,' Wendy said, showing them up the garden path. They followed her with great caution, navigating between the wood and the scrapmetal and the cardboard boxes stacked with cogs and other accessories they didn't dare inspect any closer. Wendy led them up the staircase and it wobbled under them. The spaceship was a single enclosed room bearing at least half a dozen computers and TV monitors fastened to the walls and a single swivelchair and a tray of cookies on the desk at the back. There were no windows and it stank of weed.

'Close the door,' Wendy said. 'You're letting all the air in.'

'All the air...in?'

She didn't reply. The door was a submarine hatch with a wheel lock, fastened loosely to another aluminium pillar by old hinges. It creaked when they moved it even a slight. Wendy sat in her swivelchair and punched something into two of the computers and ate a cookie and offered one to each of them.

'No thanks,' Seulgi said, and Irene took two.

'What do you want?' Wendy said.

'You don't sound eager to help.'

'Yeah, man. Sorry, but you know how it is. Can't be too careful nowadays. That's why I built this, you see?'

'Why?'

'Because, man. Because. It's got special panels built into the roof that cancel out all incoming radio signals, you dig? So no government interference. No bugging my anymore. I'm free as can be, man. Free as can be. You feel me?'

'Yeah, man,' Irene said. 'Radical.'

'Groovy.'

'Wendy,' said Seulgi. 'We need your help.'

'As always. Congratulations, by the way. For getting that painting back. Yeah, I heard about that . Seems I helped, right?'

'Yeah. Thanks.'

'Any time. Or, most times. Yeah, man. So, what can I help you with?'

'We need-'

'No, wait,' Irene said. They looked at her. 'Richard Nixon.'

'Yooo,' Wendy said. 'That's too groovy. Richard Nixon. I knew you wouldn't forget. So, what exactly is it you need help with? Information?'

'We need something from you,' Seulgi said.

'Uh huh. Well, go on.'

'We need sound bugs.'

'Sound bugs.'

'Like wires for bugging somewhere. So someone can listen in. Or we can record something. Except it's got to be smaller than wires. Small enough that someone won't find anything if we get searched. Which we almost definitely will.'

'Woah. That sounds crazy, man. Totally crazy. You sure you're not in any deep ?'

'It's deep enough.'

'And you came to me for help.'

'As always.'

'I've gotta say, that's almost cool, you know? We make a great team, Seulgs.'

'Don't do that.'

'Do what?'

'Call me Seulgs. No one calls me Seulgs.'

'Yeah they do.'

'Who?'

'Me,' Wendy said. 'Just now.'

'It's got a ring to it,' Irene said. 'Nice job.'

'Yeah, man. Far out.'

'Far out. Right, Seulgs?'

Seulgi ignored her. 'Have you got anything you can give us?' she said, talking to Wendy. Wendy punched something into one of the computers and took another cookie and ate it in one mouthful. She seemed not to be listening to them. The computers whirred and hummed. Or something else in the room did. Then she wheeled the chair around and turned to them and gave a lazy, hazy smile. 'Of course,' she said. 'You forget who you're talking to or something, man? I've got whatever you need. I've got phones and tablets, I've got laptops and black tops, plugs and drugs and bugs, I've got TVs and radios, I've got Coke I've got jokes, I've got dishwater I've got fishwater, I've got-'

'Everything. Yeah. So.'

She looked at them a minute. Or looked at something, but her eyes behind the glasses were imperceptible. Then she stood slowly and pushed the chair away and opened the submarine hatch and led them through the backdoor and into the house. It stank even worse and it hadn't changed at all. Pizza boxes, chicken boxes, chip boxes, curries and takeaways, milk cartons and waterbottles, cookies everywhere. Cookies still in the oven. She stumbled upstairs and they followed her through the dim smoky haze and into one of the spare rooms at the far end of the hallway.

It was a wide room fit for storage and there were shelves everywhere. Piled high on every surface were cardboard boxes full of gadgets and trinkets and items of all types they had never seen before, or even heard of. Toy guns, plastic guns, real guns. Bullets, radar dishes, alien tech, moonrocks and meteorite dust, tinfoil helmets and cookbooks consisting entirely of hundreds of different cookie recipes - chocolate chip, double choc chip, triple, strawberry, raspberry, blueberry, veryberry, coconut, not-coconut, hazelnut, cinnamon, cinnabon. Everything.

She set about fiddling through one of the bigger boxes in the corner and they stood behind her just waiting. Irene fiddling with things and Seulgi occasionally shooting her a glance as to say: Please, for the love of God, behave yourself. But alas. She was Irene. Might as well ask the Pope to not be Catholic.

'How did you know we were coming?' Seulgi said. Wendy seemed to ignore her at first. She lifted one of the boxes onto the shelf by the window and opened another one underneath and blew off the thin ream of dust. Then she said, 'My new superbase, man. I hear everything. And see everything. Metaphorically speaking. It's the grooviest thing. Makes me feel like God or something, you dig?'

'Yeah,' Seulgi lied. While she rifled through the boxes Irene took something from one of the shelves and waved it in front of Seulgi. It looked like an enormous alien eggwhisk, red and gold and with a big barrel that looked more like an antenna. 'Yo,' Irene said. 'What the is this?'

Wendy turned around and nodded and went back to sorting through her stuff. 'Oh, that,' she said. 'That's just a Ray Gun.'

'A Ray Gun.'

'Uh huh.'

'Does it work?'

'Dunno.'

Irene took one more look at it and put it back on the shelf and took something else. It was a formal dress shoe, size nine men's. 'What's this?' she said. 'A shoe?'

'Sure. Tap the heel twice. And don't point it at your face.'

She tapped the side of the heel with her hand as Wendy had instructed and a small blade popped out of the toe, about three inches in length. 'Holy ,' Irene said, turning the shoe in her hand. 'It's a knife-shoe!'

'And it's got about ten millilitres of bullet ant venom on the end of it, so...don't touch it, you dig?'

'I, uh, dig.'

She put the shoe back on the shelf neatly and went fumbling through one of the small boxes and all Seulgi could do was watch them both from the doorway. The weedsmell had not dissipated even a little. Irene pulled out a small handheld device and held it up in the faint light and inspected it. It had a big red button behind a small glass case and a radio antenna protruding from the top and it was snug enough to fit in the palm of her hand. 'What's this?' she said. Wendy ignored her. Irene flipped off the glass casing and thumbed the red button idly and was rewarded with a dull click and a countdown timer signalled by a beeping.

'Uh. Wendy.'

She turned around. She had something in her hands and she pushed her glasses up from her nose and squinted. 'Oh,' she said. 'That's a remote detonator.'

'What? A remote detonator for what?'

'A small local bomb.'

'What the ?' Seulgi said. They looked at one another. The beeping seemed to be growing faster. 'How local is the bomb?'

'In that box behind you.'

'Oh . What do we do? Wendy! What do we do?'

Irene tossed her the detonator and she tossed it back and threw it on the floor and stood on it until it cracked under her foot. 'Wendy,' she said. 'What do we do?'

'Don't sweat it man. It's not live.'

'It's ing beeping!'

'It's got nothing in it. It's just a toy.'

'A toy?'

'I mean, it used to be something. But not anymore.'

'Not anymore.'

'That's right,' Wendy said, smiling. She turned back to her boxes. As if she had not heard the beeping at all. Irene and Seulgi looked at one another. 'Yeah, man. It's old Soviet hardware. A Cold War prototype. Small enough to fit in your suitcase and get through airport security in the seventies but big enough to pack a helluva punch. Could wipe out a small building with that. Yeah. Whoo.'

'Why the do you keep Soviet bombs lying around?'

'They're disarmed, like I said. Jheez, man. Try to keep up. Ah! Here.'

She replaced the boxes in the corner and coughed and opened her palm to show them what she had procured. 'These are nine-carat gold cufflinks,' she said. 'But you see this, right here? It's a tiny little button. See it? You press this and they start recording. You can set them to any frequency you want with this-' she showed a small digital receiver in her other hand. 'Works like magic, honestly. Proper groovy, and just what you need. Small enough to just pin to your cuffs and not draw any attention to yourself. The only downside is they flash red when they're active. But it's not bright or anything, so you should be good.'

'And these work?' Seulgi said.

'Of course they work. Why wouldn't they?'

'Your bombs don't.'

'They're not my bombs. They're Russian bombs. I made these cufflinks myself, so they work fine.'

'You sure?'

'You doubting my engineering abilities?'

'No,' Seulgi lied again. She took a pair of the cufflinks and stuffed them in her pocket and Irene took the other pair and the receiver. 'Groovy,' she said.

'For sure. Now, is there anything else I can do for you?'

'No,' Seulgi said. 'Thank you, Wendy.'

'Any time, sister. Any time.'

She ushered them out to the car and closed the door before they had time to say anything else to her. When they were by the Testarossa they could hear the dim echo of metal ringing out from the garden again. They climbed in and Seulgi started up the Testarossa and just sat for a minute with the engine idling. Both silent. Until Seulgi spoke again.

'Oh, .'

'What?'

She leant over and opened the glovebox and took out the brown heroin packet. 'I forgot to give this to Hongki this morning.'

'You forgot to give him a kilo of heroin.'

Seulgi put it back and closed the glovebox.

'Something you're not telling me, babe?'

'Don't call me that.'

'Babe?'

'Yeah.'

'Why not?'

'Sweetie's bad enough.'

'You've got used to sweetie now, though. Right?'

Seulgi shrugged. She backed the car down the street and turned off northbound heading for her apartment. 'So I can call you sweetie but not babe?' Irene said.

'Whatever.'

'But we're dating. Why can't I call you babe?'

'Do whatever you want.'

'Ah, there we go. Classic Seulgi. These cufflinks are pretty boss, you know? They're actually really fashionable. Once again one of your friends proves they're cooler than you.'

Seulgi ignored her and she continued.

'You know, for someone who claims to be so worried about government surveillance all the time, she doesn't half help. I mean, she could've just told us to off, right? Or flown off in that spaceship or something. Know what I'm trying to say? But instead she helps us like it's nothing. You sure she's not on the police's payroll on the down-low?'

'Maybe she is. I don't know. I don't care.'

'As long as she helps?'

'As long as she helps.'

'Ah,' Irene said, giggling to herself. 'That's the police way.'

♣   ♣   ♣

When she pulled up in the parkinglot of the restaurant called BK in Sinsa it was just before eight and already dark. Small lights in the restaurant windows. She cut the engine and fished around in the glovebox for the cufflinks and handed a pair to Irene. She had changed into a white polo shirt with long sleeves and Seulgi herself wore a white suitjacket and orange shirt underneath but Irene didn't even bother mentioning it. 'Put these on,' she said. Irene took them and pinned them to her left cuff with the sort of languid care that almost seemed to be testing Seulgi. Teasing her.

'What time is it?' she said.

'Five to eight.'

'Can you see them?'

'From here?'

Irene nodded.

'Through the windows?'

Irene shrugged.

'No. I can't.'

'Well, what about their car?'

Seulgi looked about. The lot was almost entirely full. People were standing by the doorway in the faint amber light smoking and talking and they could hear faint music coming from inside. 'I don't know,' Seulgi said. 'I can't see it from here. Maybe they're driving something else. Probably.'

'So. What do we with these?'

Seulgi took the box receiver Wendy had given her and adjusted the big dial on the front until the cufflinks began to blink a dull red in their small gold casings. Then she pressed the little button Wendy had shown them on the inside of the cufflinks themselves.

'Oh .'

'This records everything we hear from now on,' Seulgi said.

'How long for?'

'I don't know.'

'Probably should've asked her that before we left, you know? What if it's only got ten minutes of charge? Or even half an hour. Then we're kinda ed, no?'

'It'll be fine.'

'I admire your positivity sometimes. No seriously, I do. It makes a change from the usual crushing pessimism, even if it is a little misplaced.'

'We'll be alright,' Seulgi said.

'Sure. Nice shirt by the way.'

'Thanks.'

'I mean that, too.'

'Are you feeling okay?'

'What?'

She looked at Irene sheepishly. 'I mean, you complementing me. It's not often I hear that.'

'You wanna hear it more often or something?'

Seulgi looked away.

'Well.'

'Well what?'

'Tough luck, sweetie. Don't get used to it.'

She gave a little smirk and Seulgi coughed into her hand and turned so that she could survey the parkinglot ahead of them. The people displaced between the shadows and the pools of distant light. Here and there. When Irene started laughing she looked back at her and sighed and said, 'What?'

'Oh, nothing.'

'Are you going to make fun of me again?'

'What? No. I was just thinking: How the did we ever get in this position, you know? Or me, at least. Kinda obvious how you did, thinking about it. But me? I'm a thief. I've always been a thief. And now I'm doing undercover heroin deal stakeouts for the police. That's quite a ing upgrade, no? Or am I just getting ahead of myself here? Hey, Seulgs.'

'Don't call me that.'

'Seulgi.'

'What?'

'Does this mean I'm technically a cop now?'

'No. Not a chance.'

Irene pouted and Seulgi refused to look. Not now. Not while they had a serious objective in front of them. 'What's wrong?' Irene said. 'A month ago you were saying I had loads of time to learn about the police and .'

'I never said work with them, though.'

'Is that really the reason? Or is it just because you're embarrassed you were being really soppy and emotional and ? I bet it is, isn't it?'

'Whatever.'

'Seulgs.'

'I told you not to ca-'

'Yeah, yeah. We should get going.'

'You're making the decisions now?'

Irene grinned. 'Makes a change,' she said, opening the passenger-side door and stepping out into the cold before Seulgi had a chance to say anything to her. Like: Maybe you should slow down and let me do the thinking on this one. Or: Please keep that gorgeous mouth of yours closed for once and let me do the talking. Let me do it all. She stepped out and stood a moment while Irene closed her door and brushed down her shirt.

'Wait.'

'What?' Irene said. And when Seulgi made no reply she asked again.

'I just...you know.'

'What?'

'You can stay in the car, if you want.'

'I can stay in the car.'

'You don't have to come in with me, I mean. You can just wait. I won't be long.'

When she heard Irene giggle she immediately regretted having said anything at all. 'I was just offering,' she said.

'Are you getting overprotective with me now, sweetie?'

'I'm just looking out for you, is all.'

'Come on. What's the worst that could happen to us?'

'They could guess we're cops and kill us.'

'Well...okay. What's the second worst thing that could happen to us?'

'They could-'

'Actually, don't answer that. But the point still stands. Kind of. What I mean is, I don't need protecting all the time. I can handle myself. I want to handle myself.'

'Okay.'

'Promise me, Seulgi. Promise me you'll stop trying to tell me what to do.'

'I'm not, I'm just-'

'Please.'

'Okay. I promise.'

She smiled. 'Good. I've got a question, by the way.'

'What?'

'Am I getting paid for this? For helping out, I mean. Am I technically on the payroll?'

'I think it's part of whatever I get paid.'

'Huh. Neat. No offence, of course. And to be fair, I did buy you a Ferrari. I think I'm entitled to some financial compensation.'

Seulgi ignored her. She went on up to the doors and Irene followed close behind. It smelled of expensive brandy and steak. A long room with a partition in the middle and a small VIP area at the far end lit in low gold. Everyone eating there wore a suit or a fancy dress. They stood looking for twenty-two and found it in under the woodbeam partition. Hongmin was with a woman they had never seen before. He stood and shook their hands and smiled and showed them to their seats without even speaking of the woman. She looked at them with a false smile while she ate her food in silence.

'You're very punctual,' he said.

'We aim to be,' said Seulgi. There were two plates of food already out for them and still piping hot. Steaks with gravy and mashed potatoes and celery and greenbeans and a bottle of dark wine. She looked about. There were three men by the far wall watching them very carefully. She poured herself a glass of wine and poured Irene's and he smiled again. 'I trust you made good on checking your purchase,' he said.

'We did.'

'And? Is it satisfactory?'

Seulgi nodded.

'Good. And the cash. You've got all of it with you?'

'Not right now. But we can get it, at a moment's notice.'

He looked at Irene and back. 'Tell me,' he said, 'what brought you to me in the first place?'

'Our mutual friend.'

'Joy. Of course. But why here? Seoul. There are better markets for these sorts of things. Abroad.'

'Seoul has a growing customer base. So does the rest of Korea. That's why we're buying for a high price.'

'A high price.'

'Would you disagree?'

He shrugged.

'It might not be as profitable as, say, Miami, but give it five years. And we'll be there. Ahead of the rest.'

'You have a good mind for business,' he said, toasting his glass. They all toasted with him, even the woman whose name they didn't know. She never spoke a word. 'You like the wine?' he said.

'It's good.'

'Nineteen sixty-eight Chateau. That's French. For something. Five hundred thousand won a bottle. It's got a good colour to it, wouldn't you agree?'

'Yeah.'

'Like raspberry juice,' Irene said.

They looked at her.

'I mean, the colour, you know? Like, uh...like raspberry juice. Not that it's a bad thing. The wine is good. I didn't mean it tasted like raspberry juice. Just it reminded me of it, textually. The wine is fine. Never mind.'

'Indeed,' Hongmin said. He made to say something again and turned and stopped. They followed his gaze to the table across the room from them. Two guys and a girl had just sat down and they were looking around and the two guys nudged the girl and she turned to where Seulgi and Irene were and made a face that Irene immediately wished she hadn't.

'Do you know her or something?' Hongmin said. Seulgi looked at Irene as if to say: That's Yeri, isn't it? And Irene just nodded.

'She's an old friend,' Seulgi said. 'One of Joohyun's friends.'

'Uh huh. That right. Did you lead her here?'

'What? No.'

Irene pushed her chair back and stood and Yeri did the same. 'Oh my god,' she said. 'Oh my god!'

'I'm sorry,' Irene said, turning to Hongmin and his lady friend. 'I'll be right back. I've got to go talk to her.'

They watched her go over to the other table and sit beside Yeri and smile and say something and Yeri pulled her in for a hug and offered her a glass of wine and introduced her to her friends. Seulgi cut off a piece of the steak and mopped it up in the gravy and chewed and swallowed. Hongmin and his friend were silent. He watched Irene and she drank the wine. The three men in the black suits by the wall had their hands folded in front of them. 'She's just like that,' Seulgi said.

'Uh huh.'

He turned back to her. She had not gone red but she thought that she would. She pushed her fork into the greenbeans and scooped up a handful and ate them and made to eat a piece of the steak when her cufflinks fell out of the little hole in the fabric of her cuffs and dropped into her food as if they had been there all along. Hongmin looked at her in silence. He looked rather confused.

'Your food appears to be bleeping at me,' he said.

'What?'

'Your food.'

She looked down onto the plate. The dull red glassbell flashing of the cufflinks was barely visible but visible all the same. They had fallen into her mashed potatoes. Seulgi looked at Irene and Irene was looking at her with an expression of terror. Hongmin's lady friend sipped her wine. Hongmin shifted in his seat and was silent. It was now or never. Seulgi being Seulgi. Her luck as it always was. She ladled some of the excess gravy over the mashed potatoes and without a second thought scooped up the cufflinks and swallowed them in one big mouthful. They tasted exactly as they were - rough shapes of metal. She drank the rest of her wine and smiled awkwardly at him. He just looked at her.

'Now,' she said. 'Back to business.'

'Business.'

'That's right.'

He eyed her for a minute. As if he had just stepped out of a feverdream. Yeri was making far too much noise from the other table. She looked drunk already. Irene made a face that said: Get me the out of here! Please!

'If you want to make this happen,' Seulgi said, 'we see The Mandarin. Or we walk, and you get nothing.'

She thought he might not respond but then he leant forward and said, 'What do you get out of this?'

'I've told you that.'

'How are you planning on selling it, I mean.'

'That's between me and my partner.'

'Ah,' he said. 'Ask no questions, tell no lies, right?'

'Something like that.'

Silence again. He sipped his wine and wobbled the glass about. 'Gangbyeon road,' he said, 'in Seobing. There's an old parkinglot just under the south side of Banpo Bridge. You and your partner over there show up at midnight tomorrow, alone. Eighty million a key.'

'That's not we agreed to.'

'No?'

'Seventy-five million a key. And this is how it's going to happen. Two cars, us in one, The Mandarin in the other. The heroin in the trunk of yours and the money in ours. We park them trunk to trunk. We test one key at random. You can check the money. Then we swap keys and drive off. Seventy-five a key.'

He rubbed his fingers together in thought. Then he said, 'Seventy-five.'

'Or we walk, and you get no deal.'

'There are plenty of people we can sell to in Seoul.'

'And there are just as many people we can buy from.'

Irene was already standing but Seulgi wouldn't look at her. She wouldn't look anywhere but at Hongmin. His lady friend was playing with her food. He sat back and laughed to himself and said, 'Midnight tomorrow.'

'And The Mandarin?'

'He'll be there.'

She rose and offered a hand just as Irene returned and he stood and shook it and shook Irene's hand. 'Are we done?' Irene said.

'We're done. Your friend is a ruthless businesswoman, Miss Joohyun.'

'Yeah. She, uh, used to a banker.'

'A banker?'

'Uh huh.'

'Is that right?'

'Ignore her,' Seulgi said. 'Tomorrow night, then.'

'Indeed, Miss Sachs.'

'Miss Sachs,' Irene said. Seulgi glared at her. They pushed their chairs back and went out through the front without looking back even once. Nobody watched them go. Not even Yeri. She had vomited on the carpet and her friends were busy holding back her hair while the assistant manager mopped her sick into a soapy bucket.

When they were in the car Seulgi sat with her hands on the wheel looking at nothing while Irene fixed her hair and straightened her shirt. 'Jesus,' she said. 'Imagine the ing luck of finding Yeri here. Or unluck, I guess. Is unluck a word? Anyway. I hope you got some good out of him, because all I've got is Yeri shouting at me and the sound of her throwing up. Which was pretty ing gnarly, I'm not gonna lie. Did he say anything. Anything, you know, incriminating and ?'

'I don't have them,' Seulgi said.

'What? Have what?'

'The cufflinks.'

'What do you mean you don't have them?'

'I don't have them.'

'Well where are they?'

Seulgi looked at her. 'It's kind of hard to explain,' she said.

'Why?'

'I don't think you'd believe me.'

'Try me.'

'Well...'