The Frost

11.

Jin came back and sat in front of Arya again.
There was a lingering silence floating in the air.

"Why is MOSSAD searching for you?"

"This one." Arya pulled out a metallic chain from under her t-shirt.

There was a green maple leaf locket on it.

"Flash drive?" Jin looked at it.

"Yes," she shoved it back inside and sighed, "the first thing I remember is I was in a hospital, they kept watching over me the whole time. They said I was one of them. After I got released, I was arrested, they took me to some sort of boot camp. They trained me there, they..." She suddenly stopped.

Jin nodded lightly, he knows exactly what happens in those boot camps.

They must have shown her hell with all those torture methods. Made her like an order obeying machine.

"Easy," Jin said calmly, "you don't have to talk if it's hard."

She took in some sharp breaths and calmed herself down probably trying to erase the memories.

"I was assigned as a sleeper agent in Jerusalem. But something was missing. There were a lot of things that made no sense. I kept on doubting. Like you, they too wanted to know about some documents which in their words I was assigned to extract but forgot after the plane crash. It made sense at first. But…"

"But?"

"I started to have dreams. Flashbacks. Those were like long-lost memories. Like I lived a long life, a different life before. I didn't know what was true anymore."

"What did you do?"

"I dreamt about strange things, people I have never met. Like you. Some things I have done before, but nothing matched their words about my past. So I started to have doubts."

"And?"

"I hacked into their interface. I wanted to know about me, my past."

"Wasn't a good experience I bet?"

"There was a wanted warrant about me, dead or alive," she sighed, "my identity was there. Nothing special, just a spy with almost no information about her life before showing up in North Korea. Nothing about from where she came, or who is she."

"Then?"

"Then these were there too." She indicated at the locket, "Something about the documents they always asked me about and their links with those documents, some random telephone, and email exchanges, some radio bulletins, some huge amount of cheques and money transferred to some very strange groups across the globe, some strange stuff all related to my documents. I had no idea about those but dug deeper and found some illegal and secret meet-ups with two arms dealers, black market handlers, and some random officials from the CIA. Looked like they were proceeding with a definite strategy with bigger goals ahead and those documents have huge parts in that. I seriously had no ideas about the documents, but I felt suspicious about this information and I downloaded those into this flash drive and dug my grave then there. Within The next two days, I was tried to be killed four times."

"So you fled?"

"Yes, I have been running since then. I went to France, started to live a good life as a saleswoman of cosmetics in a shop until two guys ambushed me."

"You killed them?"

"Yes. Pushed their car down a canyon into the river down there."

"You saved our sleeper agent there. He was suspicious about you and he spotted you after some research. Everyone at NIS thought you are dead after the plane crash."

"Min Jun," Arya remembered that man.

"Yes. But his name is not Min Jun, apparently."

"I guessed that before. I knew he was not just a tourist. But as my identity was exposed, I ran again, ended up in three different countries, laying low for while, changing location frequently. This time it was here."

"You…"

"If I knew Libya was going to have a diplomatic treaty going on with Israel soon, I'd never come here. But I couldn't risk any bigger countries to go, the bigger the country, the more the eyes everywhere."

Jin nodded faintly in agreement.

"They chased me down like a mad dog. They are still after me. It was time to leave again. I don't want to go back to that torture cell where…" She stopped abruptly.

"It's ok." Jin said calmly, "I got you now. I'll get you out of here."

"Will it be safe there? Will I ever be stopped chased after even in there?" Her voice was somehow still doubtful but hopeful at the same time.

"Can't guarantee you that. We have all been chased after all our lives. It's not gonna change. But if you come, I can guarantee that no matter what happens, I'll be there."

"You can't protect me, man. Nobody can," her voice broke, "I'll just end up dead one day."

Jin took time to answer, but when he spoke, his voice was full of determination, "I'll not let that happen." He added one word with it, "again."

His "again" lingered in her mind for a second and fiddled with it, what he might mean by it?
Her fingers were still caressing on the maple leaf, "You don't want it?" She indicated at the locket.

Jin looked at the locket for a few seconds and nodded, "Keep it."