Under the parasols in the distance, injured people lay on beach loungers. Judging by their clothes, they looked like people who had been playing at the beach on the weekend and been hit by an unexpected disaster.
People with towels tied around their legs or their arms bound up were wary for a moment of the strangers who had come out of the promenade connected to the beach. But seeing Kim Jaehee and me supporting each other as we walked, and that we had no weapons, they seemed to relax.
Around the beach, there were only parasols and tents, beach loungers, a net that looked meant for beach volleyball, restrooms in the distance, several warning signs, and a few swings.
Walking across the beach in sneakers was twice as hard as walking on flat ground. I had the urge to kick off my shoes and walk barefoot, crushing the soft, warm sand beneath my feet. I already knew the feeling of sun-baked sand, fine as clay, wrapping around the soles of my feet, and the sensation of cold seawater washing over my ankles.
Barefoot would probably be more comfortable than this, with my shoes sinking deep into the sand with every step. Someone... had told me not to do that.
“...I heard there are shards of glass on the beach of Daehan-do, too.”
When I said that while kicking at the sand, Kim Jaehee nodded and answered.
“There’s probably more than just glass. Did someone tell you?”
“I met so many people at the undersea base and had so many conversations that I don’t remember who it was. ...They were probably worried I’d get hurt, since it was my first time at the undersea base.”
I couldn’t afford to add any more injuries. I kept walking in my sneakers, uncomfortable as they were. I didn’t know when Kim Jaehee had stopped wearing shoes, but he was walking on a black foot and a prosthetic leg wrapped in pale-green grapevines.
In front of the beach were several large information signs, stating in five languages not to drink, smoke, solicit, litter, or capture and collect marine life. In particular, beneath the section about littering, the following words were written in very large letters.
[What you throw into the sea will come back.]
Beside those words, in black permanent marker, were jeers and filthy curses ranging from “Then where the hell are we supposed to throw it away?” to “I’ll throw this sign away, so let’s see if it can come back. I’ll throw away a person and test it.”
In the marine life section, there were lines like, [Do not collect sea urchins and throw them at people.] What kind of lunatic had done that?
The sign placed beside it had the word “WARNING” on it and warned people to be especially careful because this beach was an area where all kinds of venomous sea creatures appeared. Various venomous jellyfish, blue-ringed octopuses, cone snails, lionfish, banded sea kraits, sea urchins, and more were drawn at palm-size in a simple style like illustrations from a children’s book, but perhaps because the sunlight beating down on the beach was too strong, the red in the pictures was fading.
On top of that, as if they had gathered every venomous sea creature in the world into the waters off Daehan-do, the warning sign was quite large. I lightly scanned over more than twenty species with my eyes, but there were no sharks. Perhaps sharks weren’t venomous, or perhaps when sharks appeared, venom wasn’t the problem.
There were also several creatures with large red Xs drawn over them, and when I walked closer to the sign, I saw the word “EXTINCT” written in big letters. Most of the Xs were drawn over sea snakes, so if that sign was telling the truth, it seemed sea snakes were nearly extinct. Among the pictures of marine creatures, most of which were jellyfish, a small phrase was written in English.
[If you are bitten by or witness one of the extinct sea snakes drawn on this sign, be sure to contact sea snake expert Kevin Roy before you die!]
What are you supposed to do if you get bitten by a snake that’s supposedly extinct? That’s creepy.
Seeing the pictures of venomous marine life made me start wondering whether the escape craft floating far out at sea, and the people waiting on top of them to be rescued, were all right. ...So I went scuba diving and swam in a sea like this. And yet, aside from the very first time, I’ve never died because of marine life.
A life-saving equipment box had been installed beside the danger sign, but the life rings, life jackets, lifelines, throw ropes, and other items that had been inside were scattered all over the ground. People had probably taken out and used the contents, because the door of the equipment box was wide open.
Three blood-soaked people lay side by side on the sand in a spot where the seawater wouldn’t reach. Their bodies were covered with large fluorescent beach towels, and all the towels were soaked with blood.
As we approached the parasols, someone who had been half-lying on a beach lounger watching us come over sat up. They didn’t seem to have any fatal wounds. It looked like the people had already treated their minor injuries with towels, water, alcohol, and the like. Those who could move slowly approached Kim Jaehee and me.
“Where did you come from? ...You’re not from the hospital, are you?”
They probably asked because the two of us looked like we ought to be going to the hospital ourselves. I glanced at Kim Jaehee for a moment before answering.
“We came from the auditorium.”
“What happened there?”
“Baek Aeyoung defeated the terrorists single-handedly. The injured in the auditorium are being transported to the hospital by medics.”
The people who had gathered around us poured out questions all at once.
“Did a lot of people die there too? Do you know if anyone from the mining team died?”
“Are all the terrorists dead? There aren’t any alive? They won’t come back to the beach, will they?”
“Did anyone come up from the undersea base through the elevator? There are too few escape craft floating out at sea. Do you know anything about the survivors?”
“What happened to the headquarters people? The phones aren’t working. And the internet’s down too.”
It seemed these people had stayed on the beach the whole time. People with sand stuck to their arms and legs grabbed me and asked what they wanted to know, but there wasn’t much I could answer in detail.
Without thinking, I hid the fact that Kim Jaehee was a believer of the Infinite Church. Even if he hadn’t taken up a gun and actively terrorized Daehan-do, if they found out Kim Jaehee was on the same side as the terrorists, I felt like they would throw him straight into the seawater.
Kim Jaehee promptly lay down on an empty beach lounger, as if he were its owner, now that people had gotten up from it. It was as though he had no intention of missing any chance to lie down, no matter the situation. He’d probably lie down like that even if he were thrown into the sea.
“How did those of you here survive? Quite a few of the people in the auditorium had been dragged there from the beach.”
According to the survivors, while people were enjoying their vacation on the beach, escape craft began appearing one by one out in the distant sea. At the time, the people on the beach thought there was some undersea base evacuation training they hadn’t heard about, or that the engineers were repairing the escape craft.
They only realized something was strange when the people who had escaped the undersea base by escape craft swam to the beach and shouted that the undersea base was in danger and needed help. Around the time the people playing on the beach began to question what was happening at the undersea base, a group with guns suddenly appeared and shouted for everyone to get down on the ground immediately.
Even then, the people on the beach apparently suspected it might be a prank by some nasty team. But when the boats and yachts started burning, and the gunmen fired the weapons they had thought were props, they finally realized it was terrorism.
When the terrorists fired several shots into the sky and shouted for people to come out of the water, those who were near the sea instead saw that and all jumped into the water.
The terrorists probably thought that if they fired like that and scared people, everyone would obey out of terror. But many of the people playing on the beach were used to marine sports, and if the alternative was getting shot, they chose to jump into the water. The terrorists didn’t know that people pickled in seawater routinely let other people’s words go in one ear and out the other.
Some people dove and didn’t come back up even after five minutes, or ten. Some people clung to a board and swam far enough from the beach that they wouldn’t be hit by bullets, then waited. Those who went into the water with snorkels stayed underwater until the terrorists disappeared.
Those confident in their swimming skills said that even though the terrorists fired at them from behind, they all jumped into the sea and doggedly swam away with their backs to land. The people in boats saw what was happening on the beach, turned around, and fled from Daehan-do to other islands.
“If I have to choose between dying from a gunshot and dying in the water, I’ll die in the water.”
A woman whose face and neck were burned dark by the sun said that with her forearm wrapped in a towel and cord to stop the bleeding. She wore a swimsuit, and the only pale part of her was around her ankles, so she was probably a surfer. The thing she had used to stop the bleeding on her injured arm also looked like the cord attached to a surfboard.
Looking around, everyone who had been cut or grazed by bullets had stopped the bleeding in similar ways. As if agreeing with her opinion, several people in swimsuits nodded with their seawater-soaked hair. This person seemed to have the exact opposite opinion from Shin Haeryang.
I hated both. But considering how happy I was to feel the sun beating down on the crown of my head, I seemed to have hated the idea of dying underwater more.
In the end, the believers of the Infinite Church had mainly taken people who had been sleeping under the parasol shade in the sea breeze with towels over their faces, people buried in sand for sand baths, people sunbathing in sunglasses, and people who had been flying kites or playing ball until they were captured.
Those who fled into the sea had three broad choices. Return to the beach after the terrorists disappeared, swim out toward the farther sea where escape craft were inexplicably spreading out, or go to the First Undersea Base located fifty meters below.
Most people chose the first. Those who chose the second clung together to one-person escape craft to conserve their strength. A very small number of people headed for the First Undersea Base through freediving and scuba diving.
After taking people away at first, the terrorists apparently only sent one or two people to keep watch every hour or two.
People would rest on the beach, then jump back into the sea when the terrorists came, and return to the beach to rest, hide, or flee elsewhere when they weren’t there. They said that after repeating that game of tag, the terrorists stopped coming entirely a few hours ago.
Only after judging that it was safe did the people who had been watching the beach of Daehan-do swim back to shore. As soon as they arrived, they drank water, collapsed on the sand to rest, treated their wounds, and took care of the dead.
I tried hard to find familiar faces among the escape craft floating on the sea. But among the people who had escaped from the undersea base to Daehan-do, there was no one I knew. When I asked the people who had swum out to the escape craft and come back to the beach whether they had seen Seo Jihyeok or Gang Sujeong, all I got in return was that they didn’t know.