Chasing Liberty // Countryhumans North Korea fanfiction

Keeping Faith

   North Pyongan left Anju as soon as his sister was taken. He did not stay to inform their comrades still fighting for the city, for if he did, he knew he would not be able to resist trying to tail South, breaking his sister’s order not to follow her.

    Out of the forest, across the Chongchon, cutting west to avoid the corridor the enemy was using to march towards the Amnok. Every step felt like a knife to his chest, severing the cords that bound his heart in place.

   He had to have faith, just as he always had. Faith in South Pyongan being strong enough to pull through. Faith in South, that he was a good Christian and would make sure his sister received the care she needed. Faith in Korea, that his brother really was what he said he was.

    That last one was a bit like having faith in God, that He would watch over them and keep them all safe. He had to believe it was true, despite the evidence to the contrary.

    As he skirted Chongju the enemy presence grew thicker, and he finally found their front line, much too close to Sinuiju. It was their enemy’s turn to be a wave sweeping Korea, though they had fetched up against a breaker sooner than the KPA had, halted by fierce fighting from those dug in to the hills of North Pyongan’s province.

     He was ushered on by his soldiers, who informed him that the Americans had breached the line to the north, severing Sinuiju from Kanggye, where Supreme Command had moved.

    “But don’t worry,” one of the soldiers had assured him with a mysterious wink when North Pyongan had told him to tell him no more. “Good things are happening.”

    North Pyongan could not think too much on this. Not solely for fear of having intel Commanded out of him if captured, but because if he allowed himself to think he would give in to panic. There was a black pit in his mind that his thoughts rolled around like marbles. If they got too close, they would tumble in, and he would plunge into fear for his sister.

    He tried to drown his worries with the first passage of the Bible he had ever learned, taught to him by the kindly priest that had given them shelter during that cold winter during the Occupation. It had been recited to him because he could not yet read, and he had asked the man to repeat it until he had it memorized.

    ‘The Lord is our shepherd; we shall not want. He makes us lie down in green pastures. He leads us beside still waters. He restores our souls. He leads us in paths of righteousness for His name’s sake.’

    He had swapped out the 'I' for ‘we,’ praying for his sister who had been sprawled out on the pew beside him, fast asleep, and had expanded it to include the rest of their family when they had been found. He directed it now with utmost fervour at the heavens, praying for his stolen sibling, their fierce soldiers, and their people, suffering under bombs and occupation.

    ‘Even though we walk through the valley of the shadow of death, we will fear no evil, for you are with us.’

     ‘The valley of the shadow of death.’ To the him of back then, those words had represented Japan’s Occupation, the shadow of death that had hung over him and his sister no matter where they had gone.

   But he could see now that while that had been true for his people, he had never been in that valley himself. With South Pyongan at his side, the shadow had been unable to touch him, burned away by her unquenchable light.

     As he walked through the real valleys of the rolling hills separating him from his capital, he felt the shadow descend upon him now, settling over him like a sail cut from its ties.

     When he reached the plains that spread out before Sinuiju like pale silk, he froze for a moment. He could see now why the burns had spread up his face, singing the petals of the white flower that marked him.