As soon as Baek Ayeong left aboard the escape craft, the attitude of the onlookers changed, as if they thought everyone who needed to get out had already gone. The men nearby openly stared up and down at Kim Jaehee’s prosthetic leg.
Since I had sent Seo Jihyeok out first, they didn’t seem to have a sense of what order I was choosing people in. After sending out Takahashi and Baek Ayeong, and now that I was talking with Kim Jaehee, they seemed to understand, if only a little.
Mark snapped at Bart beside him.
“Mr. Seo. Was that bastard a woman?”
······It seemed he didn’t understand after all. Bart looked at Mark as if he were ridiculous and didn’t even answer.
“So who’s next! That guy with the prosthetic leg over there? Then do the rest of us just fight over the two seats left on the escape craft?”
“That dentist guy’s going to get on too. Then there’s only one seat left.”
The man who had been drinking in the back saw the chaotic mood and let out a heh-heh-heh laugh. Sato and Yamashita from Engineer Team Na looked as if they had already given up on getting out on the escape craft.
Inside this escape craft port, there was no one whose disability was as visibly obvious to the naked eye as Kim Jaehee’s. Of course, someone could have been hiding it under their clothes, but no one readily stepped forward. If they had had surgery on parts that were hard to see, like me, there was no way to tell just by looking.
I spoke quietly to Kim Jaehee, who was watching as if it were a fire in someone else’s house.
“Jaehee, this timing will probably be the safest for you to leave.”
“Call someone else from another team, not me.”
Shin Haeryang, who had been listening beside us, seemed to think very differently.
“You wish to send Jaehee out next? A wise decision, Doctor. Just say the word.”
Kim Jaehee seemed slightly flustered by Shin Haeryang’s remark and said,
“Team Leader. I’m staying in the undersea base. I’m not leaving.”
“That’s not for you to decide.”
Shin Haeryang spoke as if, the moment even the ‘Kim’ of Kim Jaehee left my mouth, he would force him into the escape craft. Then Jeong Sanghyeon, who was beside him, hurriedly butted in.
“If Jaehee-hyung says he won’t go, then I can go!”
When Jeong Sanghyeon said that beside him, Shin Haeryang looked back and forth between Jeong Sanghyeon and Kim Jaehee, then said to me,
“If it isn’t Jaehee, Sanghyeon is fine too.”
Shin Haeryang was acting like a salesman trying to offload his team members onto the three remaining escape crafts somehow.
“What about you, Shin Haeryang?”
For a moment, Shin Haeryang didn’t understand what I meant. Then his eyebrows curved as he said,
“······The fewer escape crafts remain, the less it becomes a good choice for me to leave first, leaving behind team members with almost no combat ability.” Shin Haeryang looked at Kim Jaehee and Jeong Sanghyeon; Kim Jaehee smiled, while Jeong Sanghyeon pouted.
“I’m not getting on an escape craft. You can think of it as three remaining.”
Shin Haeryang’s expression turned strange when he heard my answer. He was looking at me the way he had looked at Kim Jaehee just now when he refused to board the escape craft. Could it be······ he was thinking of putting me on an escape craft regardless of my wishes?
I turned my head toward the people from Engineer Team Ma and asked,
“I know Mr. Mark and Mr. Bart’s names. What is the name of the person in the back there?”
I asked the drunkard who seemed to be a member of Engineer Team Ma, but there was no answer. Mark opened his mouth, then furrowed his brows and closed it again. It seemed he didn’t want to answer. He seemed hesitant, afraid that if he told me the man’s name, I would tell that person to get on the escape craft. The man who had been singled out looked at me, but with his face flushed red from drink, he did not answer.
In the end, the man beside him, Bart, couldn’t stand the silence and answered in his place.
“That’s Leonard Sanders. He’s from Engineer Team Ma.”
Then Bart mumbled and shut his mouth. The moment I heard the name, I knew. So you’re the bastard who left Henry behind in Baekho-dong! If possible, I didn’t want to swear directly because of Henry, but harsh words rose all the way to my throat. I had thought that if I ever met Henry’s father in this undersea base, I would fly at him and grab him by the collar first thing, but seeing him drunk only filled me with disgust.
Perhaps because Henry had already gotten out on an escape craft, all I felt now was frustration and irritation. Was that man out of his mind because he was drunk? He hadn’t forgotten, had he?
“Mr. Leonard. Your seven-year-old son was in Room 80 of Baekho-dong, asleep after taking sleeping pills.”
When Mark heard that, he looked at me, then back at Leonard, and his mouth fell open. The people who lived in the Baekho-dong quarters all looked at me, then at Leonard. Leonard said one thing to me.
“Mind your own business. It’s got nothing to do with you.”
Only when Jeong Sanghyeon said in a small voice, “Guess it’s true,” did I realize that people had expected Leonard to deny my words and say I was talking nonsense. Sato made some sarcastic remark, and when Kim Jaehee heard it, he smiled faintly and immediately translated it for me.
“How fortunate that everything from Engineer Team Ga to Team Ma is a mess. Looks like it isn’t just our team that’s ruined.”
It seemed Sato found more comfort in everyone being ruined together than in being the only one ruined. Mark, who stood beside Leonard, seemed even more shocked by Leonard’s answer than I was. Mark began speaking to Leonard far more bluntly than I had.
“Hey. You piece-of-shit motherfucker.”
Leonard stared blankly at Mark. Had they not been on good terms even within Engineer Team Ma? Veins bulging on his forehead, Mark began shouting.
“Yeah, you piece-of-shit bastard. You brought a kid to the undersea base? Are you kidding me? You fucking piece of trash. Do you think this place is a daycare center? Why the fuck would you bring a kid here and leave him here? You bastard, why aren’t you going to get your kid right now?”
“The entrance to Baekho-dong is piled up with trash and obstacles, so I can’t get in. ······Nev will bring him out somehow.”
Leonard took another drink from the bottle and grinned. Why was he smiling? Who was Nev? Was that a nickname for his wife, Nevae? Why was he pleased when it was hard to enter Baekho-dong? Mark shrieked at Leonard.
“Are you joking? Smash through the obstacles with your fucking head if you have to and get in there and save your kid! You irresponsible bastard!”
“What do you care where my kid is!”
Leonard and Mark began shouting wildly at each other. When Mark smacked the hand holding Leonard’s bottle and sent it rolling across the floor, Leonard lunged at Mark.
After that, it turned into a scuffle. Bart tried to stop them from the middle, but he was flung away like a twig caught between two angry ssireum wrestlers.
When the two of them started kicking and punching, I too rushed forward to stop them. Someone grabbed my arm and pulled, so I looked back to see Kim Jaehee holding my forearm. Kim Jaehee said leisurely,
“Just watch. Don’t jump in and get hurt.”
Come to think of it, other than Bart and me, no one had even tried to stop these people. Only Shin Haeryang, beside Kim Jaehee, slowly walked out.
He made one large rotation with his left arm to loosen it, then walked over lightly as if taking a stroll and slipped between the two men fighting. Then he dodged the fist his opponent swung like a bear and, with a single precise left punch, struck Leonard in the face.
He hit him so fast I couldn’t tell exactly where, but it was just one blow to the nose area, and Leonard’s legs immediately gave out. He collapsed limply to the floor. Shin Haeryang stood where he was and looked at Mark, who was about three meters away. Mark panted for breath, then asked,
“You’re Shin Haeryang, the team leader of Team Ga, right?”
“Yes.”
Mark slowly lowered the fist he had been swinging while yelling at Leonard and crept backward. Then, looking at Shin Haeryang, he spoke quickly as if making excuses.
“Look. I’m not the kind of guy who just swings his fists around for no reason! Of course, that bastard’s always been such an asshole that I never liked him much, but his kid and my daughter are the same age! So I just got angry all of a sudden. I always had plenty of thoughts about hitting him, but I didn’t mean to hit him like this.”
Mark rambled incoherently, saying whatever came to mind to Shin Haeryang. If I had been a lawyer, I would have advised Mark to stop talking.
Shin Haeryang shook the blood off the back of his hand but did not approach Mark. He was merely looking somewhere other than where Mark stood. From that direction, Yamashita, who seemed excited, came walking out, shaking his head from right to left and loosening both arms.
When Sato, standing behind Yamashita with his arms crossed, met my eyes, he gave an annoying shrug. It seemed like a gesture saying there was nothing to be done, but the action itself made it feel as if he had let his family’s Tosa dog off its leash.
Why had things suddenly turned out like this? Wasn’t getting on the escape craft and leaving right now the important thing? Why had a fight broken out?
I asked Kim Jaehee, who was watching with his arms crossed, in a grave voice.
“Shouldn’t we stop them?”
“Who should? Savior. Let their fists save each other. This is sacred. They will baptize themselves in blood and reflect on themselves through bruises and wounds. If one of them dies, won’t he go to the heaven or hell made by the god he believes in? Ah. There aren’t any snacks. If you’re going to call my name to tell me to escape, call me after this is over. I want to watch before I go. I’m sure everyone else feels the same.”
Jeong Sanghyeon said to the lunatic cultist,
“I’ll bet five thousand won on Yamashita! Hyung, who are you betting on?”
“What kind of stake is that, Sanghyeon? I’ll put five hundred won on the Team Leader.”
“Ah, Jaehee-hyung! So stingy. If Ayeong or Jihyeok-hyung were here, they would’ve gone up to at least fifty thousand, seriously. They say that guy learned Japanese martial arts! Last time, I’m telling you, he only got hit because he let his guard down! No matter how incredible our Team Leader is, how can he beat someone with a black belt? Hyung, you don’t know much about Japanese martial arts, so think it over again!”
Kim Jaehee snorted at Jeong Sanghyeon’s words, then suddenly broke into a broad smile and said,
“It’s a good thing Ayeong and Jihyeok-hyung left first. We’re even getting to see something like this.”
Flustered, I said to Yamashita and Shin Haeryang,
“Don’t fight. Talk it out. To begin with, I don’t even know why you two are trying to fight.”
“I always wish to handle matters through dialogue.”
At those words, Yamashita ground his teeth and said something in Japanese, but no one translated. Leonard was lying spread-eagled on the floor, but no one paid him any attention. Even Tamaki seemed to be watching.