Chasing Liberty // Countryhumans North Korea fanfiction

Hope Is A Ration (And We Are Running Out)

   “More tight-lipped than usual, I assume you mean,” Hwang said.

    “He is,” Chagang confirmed.

     Since the start of the war, Korea had been withholding information. Not of maneuvers they would undertake soon or what was happening back home, but names, specifics. Gyeonggi had asked which statesmen had defected to their side, and Korea ordered him to go help the cultural workers. Hae had wanted to know how the peasants back north were keeping their animals safe as they worked the fields, and had been brushed off. Nothing important. But noticeable. As was his dark blue irritation when he did it, not quite directed at them.

    “Mm, Chagang’s right,” SH confirmed, brows furrowed. “I was asking if we had anyone on the inside in Busan, and he told me it was none of my business.”

    “Not out of character for Korea,” Chungbuk pointed out.

    “It is when it comes to military operations,” Hwang said. “He had been telling us everything about our preparations for the eventual war to ensure that we were all fully prepared for a decisive counterattack.”

  “You think he’s been telling us everything.” North Hamgyong crossed his broad arms, one of which had a bandage wrapped around it from a piece of shrapnel. “He didn’t tell us him and Kim Il-sung were having private talks before the war started.”

     “Korea and the Premier always have private talks,” SH reminded him. “They’re friends. And that’s different from operations orders. Korea has always been open about those.”

    Her brother grunted, unconvinced. “Seodaemun.”

     SH’s lips thinned, and Sang didn’t need to see the inky aggravation coming from her to quickly chime in, “North Hamgyong, that’s unfair. That was a special circumstance, and you might have done the same thing in his place.”

   “I wouldn’t have,” he said, shooting a look at SH.

    Hurt flashed in her eyes, as well as from her body before it was swallowed by irritation again.

     For one moment the pale orange that came from North Hamgyong was bright enough to blind, and Chagang shut his eyes against it. Perhaps he should be off on his own, trying to soothe his throbbing temples. But he wanted to be with his cousins. So he stayed.

    “You would have,” Sang told North Hamgyong. “And you know it. But that was very much a different situation. There’s no reason for Korea to be hiding anything from us right now.”

   "Or at least from you all," Gyeong added. "Since Sang or me could technically be under a Command."

     “Who saw him l-last?” Gangwon questioned, sitting in a cloud of anxiety. Chagang had no way of knowing if it was for Korea. He always looked like that, the opposite of Kangwon’s placidity.

    All eyes went to South Pyongan.

    “What?” she asked, and Chagang wondered why embarrassment started to wave from her.

    “Alright, what did you say to him?” Chungbuk asked.

    “I didn’t say anything,” South Pyongan insisted, embarrassment much brighter now. “We were literally just sitting in silence.”

    North Pyongan raised a brow at her, and she shoved his face away. “We were!”

     She wasn’t as good at lying as she thought she was, and even the others could infer she was not telling all. But Chagang knew it was unspoken that no one would reveal that to her.