they have a good-size group in Russia—five, six thousand by most estimates—and you can find them all around the States. Maybe another six or seven thousand known to follow Shin’s lead work in upper levels of his companies and follow all the Congregation’s rituals. It’s tax exempt on this side of the water, naturally, which is helpful when it comes to money laundering.”
“For what?”
“Pure speculation at this point. None of his people have been jailed for anything, as far as I can tell, but ATF reports persistent rumors of arms smuggling. Interpol and ICE suspect Shin’s got a hand in human trafficking, moving his people here and there around the world without the legal paperwork.”
“And this ties into LA how?”
“All three perps paid their dues to the Omega Congregation,” Brognola replied. When Bolan frowned, he added, “Sure, I know. Coincidence, some might suggest. And if it was a bigger sect—Buddhism or Catholicism, say—I might buy that. But from the records I’ve obtained, they only have about six hundred members of the Congregation anywhere in California. What are the odds that three of them would get their hands on sarin and coordinate attacks on the same day?”
“I’d call it slim to none,” Bolan replied.
“Which brings us here.” The big Fed paused again to thank the waitress for his meal and watched her walk away before resuming. “The Omega Congregation has its US headquarters in San Francisco, led by Lee Jay-hyun. Officially, he ranks below the founding leader as a je yeonghon. That’s ‘second soul.’ A rank applied to what you might call generals of the sect, each one in charge of operations for a given nation. Shin Bon-jae rules over all as cha ui yeonghon, the ‘primary soul.’ According to the Congregation’s doctrine, he was visited by Jesus Christ in person on his sixteenth birthday—Shin’s, not Christ’s—and was anointed as the leader of a new age leading to the Final Days.”
“So, an apocalyptic cult,” Bolan observed.
“We’ve seen how those worked out before, from Tokyo to Waco, Heaven’s Gate on to the Order of the Solar Temple. Some just kill themselves. Others, like Aum Shinrikyo in Japan, can’t wait to spread the death around.”
“How does that help a self-made billionaire?” Bolan inquired.
“Depends on what he’s thinking underneath. Is he an anticommunist in fact or something else? How would he profit from kick-starting the Apocalypse? There’s money in disasters if you play your cards right—think about the movement to rebuild a new, whiter New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina—and he might have something cooking with the North Korean crowd.”
“Where’s that come from?”
Brognola set his fork down long enough to take a CD from his pocket, sliding it across the table toward Bolan. “You’ll find details on there,” he said. “Long story short, the FBI thinks Lee Jay-hyun’s been meeting with a character named Park Hae-sung in Frisco. He’s another businessman from Seoul, ostensibly, but the Bureau and the Company suspect he’s working for the DPRK’s State Security Department.”
DPRK, Bolan knew, being the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. Staunchly communist since 1946 and presently dominated by its roly-poly Supreme Leader, best known for sweeping human rights violations, random executions of his rivals and erratic threats of global nuclear holocaust.
“I’m guessing step one would be San Francisco?”
“That’s if you’re taking the mission,” Brognola answered.
Bolan pocketed the CD. “Sounds like it’s worth a closer look.”
“I ought to tell you this could wind up going transpacific.”
“Following the prey’s a part of hunting,” Bolan said.
Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport
BOLAN DROPPED HIS rental car in the agency’s parking lot and found his one-way ticket westward waiting at the airline’s window with three hours to spare before takeoff. He made it through security, booting up his laptop at the request of an inspector in a rumpled uniform, then hiked down to his flight’s appointed gate and found himself a corner seat, placing his carry-on in the adjacent chair so no one could sit next to him.
An earpiece for the laptop solved his problem with potential eavesdropping as Bolan slipped Brognola’s CD-ROM into the laptop’s slot and waited for its menu to appear. Four files popped up a moment later, labeled A through D.
The first broke down the history of the Omega Congregation, founded in July of 1998 by Shin Bon-jae. It started small, a curious religious sect that merged Shin’s nationalist stance on politics with the peculiar notion—previously under wraps it seemed—that he’d been visited by Jesus Christ in person, not just once but half a dozen times. The risen Lord allegedly suggested, then insisted, that Shin share his message with the masses, using the financial blessings already bestowed on him by God, to rally wide support for a reunion of the two Koreas after half a century. The chief means of achieving that reunion, Jesus said—through Shin—would be an arduous campaign of prayer.
Over time, a list of right-wing politicians had signed on to the Omega Congregation’s cause, lending their names and paying dues according to the status of their salaries. Meanwhile, the movement spread through lower levels of society, encouraged tacitly by Seoul’s prevailing leaders as a means to counteract threats and demands from its northern rival Kim Jong-il and his successor. The odd part, given its specific politics, was the Omega Congregation’s subsequent expansion through East Asia, into Europe, North America, and even to Australia, where a small but thriving chapter operated from an office suite in Melbourne.
Initially bankrolled by founder Shin via a paper company created for that purpose, the Omega Congregation was a self-supporting entity by August 1999, turning a profit—which, allegedly, it spent on missionary work—by April of 2000. Granted tax exemption as a bona fide religion in the States, it skated on the thin ice of political persuasion but survived investigations by Internal Revenue in 2002, ’04 and ’09. At that point high-priced lawyers formally protested federal harassment of the cult and won their case in 2011.
And it had been smooth sailing after that—at least, until three members of the sect released sarin nerve gas in LA
The list of dead, including terrorists, had reached 217 when Bolan checked the internet after arriving at his airport gate. At least three dozen more victims were critical, clinging to life in ICU, while close to ninety others were described by hospital authorities as being in “stable but guarded” condition.
It was not the worst terrorist attack in US history, but coming out of nowhere as it had, without a hint of any links to radical jihadists or homegrown fascist malcontents, it had taken the country and its leaders by complete surprise. No one had been alert for trouble from Korean immigrants, much less from those allied with a conservative religious sect.
File “B” relayed the history of Shin Bon-jae in greater detail than Brognola had provided over lunch. Born to humble parents in Gyeonggi Province in 1958, Shin made his way to Seoul as a teenager, worked various jobs to make ends meet, then came up with a stake from who knew where to buy a failing carpet factory. He’d turned the company around in record time and soon expanded. First to trucking, as a mode of transportation for his product, then diversifying into other types of manufacturing, founding a two-ship transport line that had expanded over time a hundredfold, and making lucrative investments with advice from certain wealthy friends in industry and politics. His first newspaper,
