The hostages, tied up and lying down without knowing anything, smelled the gunpowder in the air, and as they listened to the fire evacuation alarm, their anxiety had been building until it exploded the moment they heard Michael’s shout.
“Save us!”
“Untie this!”
“I don’t want to burn to death!”
“You said you’d save us if we behaved!”
As the hostages squirmed and clamored to be freed, Michael looked toward where they lay with a troubled expression. He had apparently been thinking of the hostages as nothing more than potatoes or sweet potatoes, but when they began making loud noises, he finally seemed to recognize the writhing, bound figures as actual human beings. Immediate regret for accidentally providing information flashed across Michael’s face. A man named Jamal spoke to Michael as if mocking him.
“I believe you realize that was a rash action even without me pointing it out.”
“You just pointed it out.”
Michael’s voice, speaking in an annoyed tone, was much lower than before, when it had sounded like he’d boiled and eaten a train smokestack.
When the hostages screamed for help, David made an irritated expression and fired once at the floor. Bang! At the gunshot, the people immediately clamped their mouths shut. David barked fiercely.
“Shut up if you don’t want to get shot!”
The hostages who had been shouting were startled by the gunshot and his voice and fell silent. To Michael, who had flinched at the shot David fired, Elizabeth—who had been sitting completely still—spoke in a whisper.
“Oh. Don’t worry, Michael. Most of the cultists have already moved to the 1st Undersea Base. We’ll evacuate quickly.”
“…What do you intend to do about the jewels?”
“I have the most important ones. Didn’t you say the fire can be extinguished?”
“It can be extinguished. The problem is the method.”
Elizabeth lifted the handle of the bag she was holding toward Michael. The large, square-shaped bag looked extremely crude and sturdy. When Elizabeth pulled her hand from Jamal’s palm and ran it over the bag once, Michael frowned but approached her side without a word.
“According to those who infiltrated the 4th Undersea Base, it seems to have become a complete flood. The water has risen so high that walking is impossible, so they’ve given up on the search entirely. If the air circulation system stops, they won’t last long.”
“Then our savior must be living like a fish trapped in a tank in some room of the 4th Undersea Base. Ha. Who knew meeting him would be this difficult.”
Fish, my ass. I’m right behind you guys. They say it’s darkest under the lamp—I’m hiding in that very darkness, wearing black clothes, holding a black gun, and pretending to be an Infinite Church cultist. Whether it was a patient visiting the dentist, someone I ran into at a restaurant, or someone I greeted by chance, I felt like someone would recognize me, so I couldn’t even let out a proper breath. I felt like someone who recognized me would shout, “Bak Muhyeon is here! Catch him!” The person I had imagined would be the first to betray me in my mind tapped my stiffly frozen shoulder and said with a smile.
“You look good scared. But you’re trembling too much.”
At Gim Jaehui’s words, I lowered my head and pretended to observe the hostages rolling around at my feet.
I was trembling? Fortunately, perhaps because a commotion had broken out among the hostages, Elizabeth and the others had no time to focus on us. The hostages who recognized Sin Haeryang’s face hidden beneath the blood shouted things like, “Are you Sin Haeryang?” “Hey, look at this. Look at his face! They got Sin too!” and tried to kick despite having their ankles bound. Did they really want to do that in this situation?
I aimed my gun and pushed away the two men who had wriggled close to Sin Haeryang. Elizabeth swept her eyes over our noisy side with an indifferent gaze and spoke.
“Let’s go up.”
Most of the Infinite Church cultists guarding the 2nd Undersea Base seemed to have already evacuated; even including me and Gim Jaehui, there were only about seven people total. I had thought there would be about twenty, so there were far fewer than expected. The Infinite Church cultists closest to the hostages were three wearing balaclavas, and me and Gim Jaehui who had captured Sin Haeryang. David approached, glanced briefly at my torn top, and spoke to the five of us.
“Talk or move, and I’ll shoot.”
“Yes sir.”
Gim Jaehui quickly answered David, and remembering that Sin Haeryang had told me not to speak, I nodded my head firmly. To avoid revealing my face, I kept my head lowered, hooked my index finger on the trigger, and acted as if keeping watch over the hostages who had been noisy until just moments ago. I thought David would ask why my clothes were torn like this, or tell me I looked suspicious and to take off my hat and mask. But David didn’t waste time. He seemed to prioritize the safety of those who needed immediate evacuation. When the group ahead began boarding the central elevator, David’s gaze, which had lingered on me, finally withdrew.
…Please don’t pay attention to me. Just leave. My heart pounded thump-thump right beside my ear. When David boarded the elevator last, the doors soon closed. With them disappearing from sight, I felt like I might actually survive. I let out a deep sigh. Maybe because I’m a coward at heart, I don’t seem cut out for this kind of work. I need to get rid of this gun quickly. I poked the buttocks of one hostage who was unleashing curses about Sin Haeryang’s chin with my gun barrel. Perhaps thinking I’d shoot if he kept making noise, he quickly went quiet.
A woman wearing a balaclava with a grotesque red skull drawn on it spoke to Gim Jaehui—whose face was fully exposed—in a friendly voice, as if she knew her.
“What happened to saying you wouldn’t do it?”
“I’m bored. But why did the fire start?”
Gim Jaehui brazenly asked the terrorist as if she had no idea, and I stood beside her, speechless at the absurdity. How could she say that when she knew best? The red skull balaclava answered her.
“Don’t know. Some idiot probably lit a cigarette.”
“From what Michael says, it sounds too big for a cigarette?”
“Did you see Dan who manages the vending machine earlier? He did something stupid trying to put out the fire and caught his own arm on fire. He was screaming and crying.”
“So such fun things happened while I wasn’t here?”
Gim Jaehui chattered idly with the one wearing the balaclava. Listening from the side, it seemed several Infinite Church cultists had tried to put out the fire and ended up making it bigger. Setting aside the submersible port, not only had the fire spread to two nearby warehouses, but it looked like it would jump to the oil extraction pipes or the exhibition hall, so they had hurriedly ordered an evacuation. When I thought about how the fire I started might burn down the entire 2nd Undersea Base, my conscience began to beat me relentlessly. A woman wearing a black balaclava who had been standing silently spoke.
“Let’s go too now.”
“Which elevator are you taking?”
“The central elevator.”
“I’ll take the elevator on the right with this one. I’ll grab some candy from the candy vending machine on the way.”
As she said that, Gim Jaehui pointed at me. I tore open the dead person’s candy I had put in my pocket and put it under my mask. Seeing that, the other person let out a small “Ah” and spoke as if she understood. She probably thought I wasn’t talking because I was eating candy.
“See you upstairs.”
I nodded at her words. Conscious of the eyes of those heading to the central elevator, Gim Jaehui and I really walked all the way to the candy vending machine. Gim Jaehui began hitting the innocent candy vending machine with her gun, but I couldn’t stop her. The three wearing balaclavas and the two with exposed faces who had been guarding the elevator were busy confirming that everyone had boarded the central elevator. As Gim Jaehui pulled out the candy bags the vending machine had spewed out with strange whining noises, she asked me without looking back.
“Are they all gone?”
“Yes. They went up in the elevator.”
“Then let’s go too, Savior.”
“Yes. Let’s free the hostages and get going quickly too.”
“Let’s the two of us run away. Leave Team Leader Sin behind.”
“What?”
What? Did I hear that right?
“We have weapons too. No one knows who we are. If we take this elevator now, we can go straight up to the 1st Undersea Base. If we keep going like this, we might just be able to leave the undersea base.”
Gim Jaehui smirked and forcibly pushed the candies into my pocket as she spoke.
“You can do it if you come with me.”
Then she began pouring out abusive language about her own team.
“Sin Haeryang. Rumor has it he’s killed an enormous number of people. You saw him using the knife in the bathroom, right? An ordinary person couldn’t kill people that easily. Seo Jihyeok and Baek Aeyeong might be the same. I don’t know if they’re humans worth your effort to save. The hostages lying over there are the same. Ordinary, average, selfish people. They won’t be any help and will only be a burden.”
It suddenly occurred to me that hearing her say such things, Gim Jaehui seemed to have never directly killed anyone. Or perhaps she didn’t count those she had indirectly left to die at all. What Gim Jaehui doesn’t know is that I’ve killed quite a few people with a gun too. It’s a time no one else remembers now, but I do.
Gim Jaehui pressed the elevator button and spoke.
“Why try to help strangers you have no connection to? Just think of your own survival.”
“…Jaehui. You want to be saved through others, yet you hate saving others. I hate petty people like that. Let’s be broad-minded.”
The elevator next to the candy vending machine opened immediately, probably because no one was using it. I pushed Gim Jaehui inside and pressed the button for the 1st Undersea Base. Perhaps because the movement was unexpected for her prosthetic leg, Gim Jaehui fell to the floor.
“Go up first and wait quietly. I’ll do what I think is right.”
The elevator door closed on Gim Jaehui’s stupid face. I ran to where the hostages were tied up, but Sin Haeryang had already untied his own wrists and was sawing at the restraints binding his ankles with a knife.
“What should I help with first?”
In the movies I watched, they broke their right thumb to make the width around it similar to their wrist so they could slip out, but I can’t break all the hostages’ thumbs here. Then I’d be worse than the Infinite Church cultists who tied them up with cable-tie handcuffs. Sin Haeryang spoke to me quickly.
“There should be an emergency axe on the wall.”