Business Contacts

Chapter Text

The dinner was mostly interminable. A series of white tablecloth-covered tables were arranged in a rough U-shape in one of the hotel's event rooms. The room had been chosen only for its ability to host the requisite number of guests and left mostly undecorated. As a topping indignity, the lights were kept at full illumination, giving Bond the sense that he was dining in a hospital ward.

The dinner was punctuated by a seemingly endless succession of toasts preceded by long-winded and mostly repetitive exhortations about the 'coming together of nations," and 'art healing the wounds of politics' and the sort. Bond mostly tuned out after the third one. At least the food, catered as it was by a high-end Korean restaurant, was quite tasty, and after a seemingly endless day, a steaming plate of Waygu beef bulgogi was more welcome than Bond could have possibly imagined.

Throughout the dinner, he had looked for her. Sitting side-by-side, he wasn't afforded a great vantage, and he could only crane his neck or lean back so many times while remaining inconspicuous. Still, he felt her presence in the room, lowering the temperature like a frigid piece of metal embedded in his flesh.

Mercifully, the dinner was only a preamble to a mixer in an adjoining event room, set up to seem a bar, with lower lighting, louder music, and—most vitally—an open bar. Fed, bored, and vaguely irritated, Bond ordered a martini and elected to nurse it at a corner high-top, while he surveyed the room.

If the intent was to give the various attendees an opportunity to intermingle, then it was a notably mixed success. The various groups tended to cluster together and move like clots in a bloodstream, with only occasional bold stragglers venturing out of their comfortable cliques to approach strangers and offer a simple name and handshake. The exception was, predictably enough, the North Korean delegation, which was surrounded by a small, curious crowd at all times. Enough people to screen them from Bond's vision anyway, spare a fleeting glimpse of a cheap suit or black tie.

He couldn't see her.

"You don't hide your boredom very well," a slightly accented voice came from behind his left elbow. Bond turned and was immediately glad that he had. The woman who stood next to him was simply beautiful—almost startlingly so. More than that, her fair, flawless complexion, deep, brown eyes, perfect cupid's-bow mouth—all were so perfectly, immaculately made up that might have been constructed by a team of experts. Even the imperfections where her gloss-black hair escaped from her simple braid seemed meticulously sculpted and choreographed.

"Just a bit of jet-lag, I'm afraid," Bond said. "Sorry if I've been anti-social."

The woman's perfect mouth curled slightly at the corner. "Jet-lag," she said. "And yet not a hair out of place. I wish I felt the way you look, mister…"

"Boldman," Bond replied. "And you…" he appraised her again, and let he see him seeing her, "look far better than I could possibly feel, Ms…"

"Kim," she extended a slim, white hand. "Judy Kim." Bond took the delicate hand in his. It was cool and dry.

"Pleasure to meet you, Ms. Kim."

"Judy, please," she said, subtly elbowing up beside him and placing her drink of the high-top next to his. "That's the Anglicized version, anyway. I save you the trouble of struggling with the Korean name."

"Try me," Bond challenged. "You might find I'm quite good at wrapping my tongue around things." He took a casual sip of his drink and let the double-entendre land. To his satisfaction, Judy' smirk returned.

"I wouldn't at all be surprised, Mr. Boldman." She leaned in as if sharing a secret. "Do-Ban. Do-Ban Kim."

"Do-Ban," Bond nodded.

"Well, thatwasquite good. You were telling the truth about your…skills."

"I certainly would never lie about that. It would be just gutting to disappoint."

Judy cocked an eyebrow. "I doubt there's much chance of that." Now it was her turn to attend to her drink and let the unspoken linger in the air between them like smoke. After a moment she asked, "What brings you here from the United Kingdom, Mr. Boldman, and gave you that nasty case of jet-lag?"

"I'm with Univex Film Distribution, actually. We're hoping to start bringing some of Korea's output to theaters throughout the UK. I'm here to scope out new talent."

"Have you found anything you like so far?"

Bond avoided the obvious answer. Instead, he asked her, "Are you with the South Korean delegation?"

Judy nodded. "Yes, I'm the associate chair. Carlton's assistant."

Bond nodded, mentally registering the name: Carlton Park. He'd been the slim, elegantly dressed official who'd delivered the first boring toast of the evening.

"This is quite an event you've pulled together. Bringing in filmmakers from the DPRK is a remarkable feat. Especially to do it in the United States. Congratulations."

"Thank you," Judy beamed and gave a short courtesy. "It was quite a bit of effort. We're all very proud. Even if we accomplish nothing else, we managed to show the West that the North Koreans look the same as us. There's no difference at all."

"Perhaps a few," Bond said dryly.

"Not so many," Judy lounged into the table. "The West likes its view of the world to be neat and clear: South Korea is the smiling junior partner, and North Korea is a haven of evil." She looked thoughtful. "Or maybe South Korea is the beautiful woman who needs to be rescued from the mindless beast to its north by the strong and righteous United States before she's ravaged and ruined forever. Whatever fantasy they choose to believe." She shrugged.

"Our grasp on geopolitics can be a bit reductive," Bond admitted. He wasn't sure where the woman was going with this line of thought, but she was beautiful and good to look at, and being here making conversation with her was the first moment of enjoyment he'd experienced since touching down at JFK.

"The truth is, we are all Korean," Judy said. "The North Koreans aren't our enemies. We don't want to destroy them or subjugate them. They're our families. Distant relatives we haven't seen in fifty years, and what we want more than anything is to be able to see them again. The UN separated our country—not us."

"I suppose I hadn't thought of it that way," Bond sipped his martini. Despite himself, Judy had given him food for thought.

"It's not you," Judy said quickly. "But that…simpleton American President and his Legion of Evil or whatever he calls it…" she shook her head angrily. "And the strange thing is, they are so proud of themselves for winning the Cold War, yet they miss the obvious comparison between the Iron Curtain and the Thirty-Eighth Parallel."

"I've never found America to have a particularly acute understanding of international events," Bond said.

"Well, hopefully this conference will show the world a different side of the Korean estrangement," Judy said, as of by rote. Bond wondered if the line had been edited out of Carlton Park's toast.

"I do hope so," Bond tipped his glass to her.

"And what are your hopes, Mister Boldman?"

Bond shrugged. "I'm hoping to establish some solid relationships within the South Korean film industry. Your country has fast become the entertainment powerhouse of Asia, and I'd like to be a gateway to European distribution."

"And you think there's a market?"

"Oh yes," Bond waved airily. "Movies are always good business. Besides, the Southeast Asian population in the UK has ballooned in recent years. So, the market's certainly there. Plus, Korean culture is gradually making its way into the mainstream in larger cities—London, Manchester, Dublin, Glasgow…"

Judy Kim gave him a wry smile. "Be careful. We're taking over the world."

"What a wonderful notion," Bond said and finished his drink. And, truth told, itwasrather a pleasant notion. After years of tangling with the lumbering beast that was the Soviet Union, and now seeming stuck in the sun-blasted tar pits of madness in the Middle East, South Korea seemed a welcome respite.

The World changed since you've been away…M had told him after his release, and she had been right. He had gone into North Korea from one world and returned to a different one entirely. He rather liked the one Judy Kim proposed.

"Careful what you wish for," Judy said flippantly.

"I didn't say that I wished for it, just that I would enjoy it if it were foisted upon me."

Judy laughed. "Well, if that is the case, then perhaps tomorrow I could foist a helicopter tour of the city on you."

"Helicopter tour?"

Judy's cheeks colored. "I thought it would be exciting. I booked the tour and…my delegation, apparently would rather see the city from the ground. I think the two-hundred dollar price may factor in as well."

"I suspect so," Bond nodded. "But I've always enjoyed a bird's-eye view. I'd be delighted to accompany you."

"Even if it was just the two of us?" Judy asked. "You're sure you won't be bored?"

"I think it'll be positively stimulating."

This time there was no mistaking what was behind Judy Park's smile. Bond returned it, the carnal invitation, the promise that, perhaps not tonight, but sometime soon their bodies would be entwined.

And then he caught a glimpse out of the corner of his eye and felt as if he'd been run through from shoulder to hip by a sword crafted from pure ice.

Her. Off to his right, at his two o'clock. The bemused crowd around the North Korean's table had thinned some, and now he had an unobstructed view of the delegation, and of her. She looked startlingly small beside two burly men in ill-fitting suits, and distinctly uncomfortable. Her eyes darted about uncertainly, and her lips pursed tightly between pasted smiles. Bond experienced a sudden moment of dislocation as his brain tried to reconcile his memory of her—an imperious, sadistic queen—with the awkward party guest before him. Even her appearance seemed to have lost the sheen it had in his memories, where she exuded a distinct and deliberate sex appeal. But here, surrounded by men and women in expensive suits and dresses and the results of spas and cosmetics, fitness and toner, she looked pale and drawn.

Then she looked over at him, and the moment hardened into reality. Bond watched as her eyes widened, and cold recognition washed over her face. He didn't move, just held her gaze until someone drew her attention away. She blinked and nodded at the new arrival and smiled thinly. Bond could almost feel the effort she needed to expend to maintain the social façade.

"Mister Boldman?"

Only then did he realize Judy had been saying something.

"Apologies. I seem to have drifted away."

Judy narrowed her eyes. "I hope that's the jet-lag and not a reflection of my company."

"Not at all," Bond smiled reassuringly. "As a matter of fact I would say that you've successfully rescued my evening."

"I was hoping that was the case," Judy's suspicion dropped. "So, the tour tomorrow…"

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