Chapter 35 - Rescue Mission (1)

Yehyeon certainly seemed to know something. That didn't mean I had the nerve to pester my highest-ranking superior, of course. Especially now that my training officer had brought good news.

Yun apparently hadn't expected Yehyeon to be home. His eyes widened when he saw us at the table eating sashimi. Then he tried to throw me out.

"Yehyeon, you're back? I told you to call before coming home. Hey. I've sorted it out, so you can leave now."

"Yessir, thanks. Won't forget this."

"Yun. You can't throw the kid out at this hour."

Taken aback, Yehyeon stopped him from ejecting me.

As Ami had told me, Yun couldn't stand up to Yehyeon, either in private or at work. In the end, I stayed the night.

We quickly cleared away dinner. Once we were finished, Yehyeon handed me a banana pudding. Even his expression was gentle in private.

"So Mühlen did end up meeting Hilde. Did you put a stop to it, Yun?"

Yehyeon gave Yun a look of pleasantly surprised approval. It suggested that he had long been responsible for correcting Yun's behavior. My training officer answered the easy praise in a dry voice.

"I thought he'd kill him if I encouraged him."

An astute observation.

"And I got his test results out of it, so I've got nothing to complain about either."

I quickly finished tidying up and shut myself in the guest room. I quietly got ready for bed, washing in the small bathroom across the hall before retreating to the room again.

After fiddling with my phone for a bit, I lay down. I'd get up early and return to the comfort of the old building. I slept like a log, without a single dream.

* * *

Then I woke before dawn.

BEEP-BEEP!

The door opened.

THUD!

It shut heavily. The sound of whoever had come in kicking off their shoes woke me. I lifted my sleep-heavy eyelids.

The room was tinged blue. Light from the entryway spilled through the crack in the door, dazzling my eyes. As I stared blankly at the ceiling, I slowly grasped the situation. Ami must be back. She'd said she might arrive yesterday evening at the earliest.

The men seemed to be coming out from farther inside the house to greet her.

"You're back."

My training officer's low voice dispelled my drowsiness.

"Good work. You're a mess."

So did Yehyeon's quiet whisper. The house was so extraordinarily quiet that I could hear them talking.

I held my breath and lay still. Ami spoke.

"There are so many."

Clothes rustled.

"They're swarming outside the core. All level five or higher. After one wave hit, there was a brief lull, so we switched out and I came back."

"What about the teams that went as far as Area D and beyond?"

"They're all returning to Area F."

Ami's tone was unusually clipped, stripped of all its usual liveliness. Yehyeon's next question was businesslike too.

"And the portal zone?"

"They're not gathering there, only heading toward the core. The train stations have been shut down. All supply depots in Area F have their maximum-defense systems activated. No entry possible."

"All right."

After a brief silence, Yehyeon continued in his calm voice.

"Nothing unusual from A-Tech?"

"No. The core's in good shape too," Yun answered shortly.

The conversation stopped. The predawn silence returned. The clock ticked in the cool air. I listened to it, straining my ears. Creatures seemed to be gathering near Area F. Around the barrier John Mühlen had invented and Choi Yun had put into practical use.

Did this happen often?

Yun's cool words answered my question.

"The rookie's the cause of this, isn't he?"

My heart sank. Yehyeon didn't answer immediately. Time crawled by, suffocating, my heart clenched tight. Only after a long while did the commander-in-chief slowly break the silence.

"At most, he was the spark that lit the fuse. This was bound to happen someday."

"What is Hilde? You know something, don't you?" Ami asked.

My heart was pounding so fast I could barely breathe. But I forced my breathing to stay quiet. I didn't move a muscle, determined not to let them discover I was awake. I heard Yehyeon sigh.

"We'll need to redeploy personnel inside the core to the outskirts for the time being. Yun. Add the new recruits to the call-up system, including Hilde. We'll be short of people inside the core, so teach them civilian rescue procedures too. We'll have to put them on regular missions sooner than usual."

"Yes, sir. But if the rookie's the cause, shouldn't we keep him separate and under special supervision rather than put him on regular missions? If he draws creatures in while running around trying to rescue civilians, we'll be screwed."

"Hilde doesn't attract every creature. It's just that the ones trying to kill him are gathering."

Huh?

I stared blankly at the pitch-black wall. So that was it?

Listening to the silence that followed, I gazed stupidly into the dark. Well, in terms of the outcome, there didn't seem to be much difference. Still, I'd thought I was emitting some kind of creature-specific hormone. But that wasn't it. Yehyeon did know something after all.

In a low voice, Yun asked the question I wanted to ask.

"Then why are they doing it? Are you going to leave things like this?"

"For now. Until it becomes difficult to keep Hilde hidden any longer."

"What are you hiding Hilde from? The creatures seem to know by now."

Yehyeon didn't answer. Perhaps he smiled bitterly. Or perhaps he lowered his eyes and remained silent. Either way, his expression must have served as an answer. My seniors didn't press him further.

The house fell quiet again. I stared at the wall, more troubled than ever.

Why keep holding on to me? How many times had I told them to just dispose of me? I'd told them I didn't want to cause problems, didn't want to be a burden to the people who'd shown me kindness. I'd been desperate enough to call the commander-in-chief's private number out of the blue and jump at Mühlen's offer.

What should I do now? If the problem kept growing, I'd have to find a solution, even on my own...

Ami's voice pulled me out of my thoughts.

"I still like Hilde, though."

Her youthful voice pierced my heart.

"He's warm and steady and kind. He doesn't rush to take charge, but he's not too passive either. Everything is unfamiliar to him, and he's careful, but he's never overly afraid. He's a really good junior. I like him."

"Really? I'm glad."

I could hear the smile in Yehyeon's answer.

"If that's what you think of him, he must be a genuinely good kid. He seems to be getting along with Yun too."

"He is interesting."

"Yeah. And Riccardo really likes Hilde too. He says he's only interested because Hilde fell out of a portal, but he looks after him an awful lot for that to be all it is."

Ami let out a bright laugh.

"He says it's annoying how Hilde throws himself into everything with that pathetic body of his. Coming from Riccardo, that's high praise, right?"

... How was that praise?

I wanted to ask her to explain, because I didn't understand. I couldn't, though, since I had to pretend to be asleep.

I heard Yehyeon chuckle and Yun snort. The household's predawn conversation continued a little longer, before ending with my training officer's dry remark.

"Well, if that's your decision. I'll make sure the new recruits can start receiving regular missions tomorrow."

* * *

Not even three days after that conversation, an earsplitting noise from my phone made me jump. I was on my way back to the old building after training with Yun. My phone buzzed and blared.

[Mobilization order. Creature sighting in Area 1, Sector B.]

[Mobilization order. Creature sighting in Area 1, Sector B.]

[Level 5. Severe casualties expected. All Badgers in Area 1, deploy.]

I was in Area 1. Where was Sector B?

[Creature sighting in Area 1, Sector C.]

[Creature sighting in Area 1, Sector C.]

[Estimated Level 6. Scientific name undetermined.]

Why did the level keep going up?

Should I go to the higher-level one? Just as I wondered that, the glowing red phone screen switched to an incoming call. My training officer.

When I answered, he got straight to the point.

["Go to Sector B. Tap the alert to bring up the map."]

"What about Sector C?"

["I'm going."]

Was it my imagination, or did he sound annoyed?

["And I was just about to have dinner with Yehyeon."]

Not my imagination.

["Sector B has heavy foot traffic, so two more are being sent there. You just stick to rescuing civilians."]

"What if this one's after me too?"

["If it looks like it's targeting you, lure it over to Sector C," ] he answered matter-of-factly.

I started running through the increasingly noisy streets, toward a roadside where I could catch a bus, a taxi, anything...

["Take the car. I've set the destination, so it'll drive itself."]

SCREEECH!

A sleek white car stopped beside me. It was Yun's new car. How had he known where I was to send it here? The man was uncanny, every single time. I climbed into the driver's seat.

"What if this one gets wrecked too?"

["I've got another one on the way. Doesn't matter."]

I heard him loading a gun over the phone.

["Ram it into the creature if you need to. It's not like it costs much."]

I'd worried for nothing. He made me feel poor without even trying. Grumbling, I buckled my seat belt and shut the driver's door. The pristine sports car took off with a roar.

* * *

Sector B.

Now I understood what he'd meant by heavy foot traffic. It was a typical bustling commercial district. People who'd come out to meet friends were running for their lives, terrified.

The white sports car became trapped in the crowd. People were running in the opposite direction to the car, as though it had been dropped into a migrating herd of buffalo. The self-driving car gave up trying to advance. Once it stopped, I got out.

"Move, move!"

"Mom!"

"Ow! That hurts!"

[Creature sighting at H Tower. Please evacuate to the nearest shelter immediately. Creature sighting at H Tower. Please evacuate to the nearest shelter immediately.]

The sounds of a city in chaos washed over me. Breathing in the fear-soaked air, I checked the map. The GPS said I had to go farther in.

This was maddening. I doggedly pushed through the crowd like I was fighting my way upriver. I had no weapon in hand, but a few hours earlier, Yun had explained that being armed wasn't what mattered.

"Hey, you! You can't go that way!"

A uniformed man raised his voice at me.

"You won't be any help! Leave the creature to the Badgers and evacuate!"

"I am a Badger!"

I turned and shouted to the police officer holding a light baton.

"Coming through!"

Eyes turned toward me. People looked at me as they passed. I ignored their lingering stares. It was all I could do not to hit the civilians running with their teeth clenched.

Ah, there were too many people. I couldn't pick up any speed...

WHOOSH!

A sharp sound passed beside my ear. My white hair whipped about in a fierce gust, then settled. Something seemed to have stopped at about ear level. Eyes widening, I snapped my head around and saw a woman riding a board in midair.

Two-tone hair, pink and yellow.

"Taleb?"

The woman I knew as Shu Diamond looked down at me with expressionless blue eyes.

"H Tower?"

"Yes."

"Excuse me."

When I promptly answered her abrupt question, my bob-haired senior bent at the waist. She gripped my rib cage with both hands and plucked me out of the crowd.

"Aah!"

I was hauled straight into the air like a stuffed toy caught in a claw machine. My viewpoint rose rapidly. The fleeing civilians slowed to look up at us.

"Wh-what is this?"

"Hold on to my arms so you don't fall."

Shu gave the order in a husky voice as we continued to climb.

Dangling from a senior who looked even smaller than Ami, I could only nod vigorously. Falling from here would be a catastrophe. I'd collide with the civilians passing beneath my feet and surely kill some—

WHOOOSH!

The board took off.

"Aaaah!"

"ETA three minutes."

Shu's matter-of-fact report from atop the hoverboard was swept away by the wind.

"I have the new recruit with me."

I clung tightly to her arms and tried to open my eyes. The scenery flashed past. Wind battered my eyes, making them water reflexively. Blinking against the sting, I took in the approaching building. Its clear windows rushed toward us with terrifying speed.

My reflection grew rapidly larger. The silhouette of a huge man held in a tiny person's hands...

CRASH!

We smashed through the window into the tower.

"Arrived at the tower."

Shu dropped me to the floor and jumped off her board.

"I'll take the second floor and above."

Someone seemed to give her an order over the communicator. After listening in silence for a moment, she turned and looked up at me.

"Taleb, first floor. Assist Jonathan Kudo with creature extermination. Your orders are to help the civilians evacuate."

"Yes."

"The most important thing in exterminations inside the core is making sure no Badger causes civilian casualties."

My two-tone-haired senior added her own advice in a flat voice.

"You understand. We might fail to save a civilian, but a Badger must never kill a civilian while exterminating a creature."

I nodded, hearing the same thing Yun had explained a few hours earlier. Of course I understood.

It was what the organization called the Black Badgers feared most. They had surpassed the limits of the human body, overcome aging, escaped the inevitability of death. Naturally, that put them in a position of superiority. What such people inevitably feared was exposing the position they now held to the entire world, impressing upon it the power they had acquired. Reminding the whole world of the danger their existence posed.

Because humanity's enemy might turn out to be not the creatures outside the core, but the Black Badgers living within it.

"I'll keep that in mind."

In Yehyeon's place, I would have given the same orders. It was probably because he'd consistently issued such orders that the Badgers had survived this long. I gave a small nod. Then, leaving my senior to climb back onto her board and take flight, I ran down to the first floor.