I'll Play With You
Rat Gunip, Argon, and Karen Monty sat in the rearmost seats of the airport limousine bus, each checking their passports.
"Isn't the back seat a good place to get sniped?"
"Forget about it. If he shoots, he hits. And most of the guns Han Se-gun uses will punch straight through a car and kill whoever's sitting next to you, too. As long as we're inside the vehicle, he absolutely will not open fire first."
Argon spoke calmly, arms crossed. They would be leaving Korea soon. He had wanted to see Maria and the others one last time, but there was nothing to be done about it. They had a schedule to keep.
"We're finally getting out of here. Time to say goodbye to this damned teddy bear as well."
Karen said this as he held up a teddy bear. Skimming from the job? Rat looked at him with a serious face.
Then the middle-aged woman sitting beside him spoke up.
"Eh? Ah, um, this is…"
"This lady's Chinese, huh?"
Argon understood Chinese and explained Karen to her. The woman started looking at Karen with pity. Something about it felt off, so Karen turned to Argon.
"What did you tell her?"
"Hm? Nothing much. She asked why a grown man was carrying a teddy bear, so I said he has progeria—he's actually only twelve."
"………"
She believed that nonsense…? Karen was dumbfounded, but he didn't lose his temper. Throwing a fit in public would only drain him.
"Progeria."
"Better than premature ejaculation, right? Don't look so gloomy."
When Argon said that, Rat burst out laughing. Meanwhile the bus rolled on toward Yeongjong Island International Airport.
"Thank god we're not going back by ship."
Crossing the Pacific by boat to reach America would be pure insanity. Vampires below Jinma class couldn't endure sunlight, so being sealed up in cramped cabins day after day to hide from the sun was practically solitary confinement.
"Well… price-wise, the plane works out cheaper."
Argon said it without much interest. Ships that crossed the Pacific to America were mostly ferries or cruisers packed with passenger amenities—cruise ships, in other words. Those usually cost more than a flight. And the higher the cabin class, the more ruinously expensive they got.
"Still, I'm surprised he's letting us leave in one piece. Soul Brother. Given his temper, I was sure he'd come after us."
"Wouldn't it have been easier to hit us while we were still in the apartment?"
"Try a firefight inside an eight-pyeong slum apartment and see what happens. Even if you mask the gunshots with magic, a bullet can punch through those shoddy concrete walls and kill the neighbor. You know the MagSafe case? Guy thought it was a burglar, fired his handgun, the round went through the wall and hit his own daughter."
"Instant death."
MagSafe was the brand name for special rounds made by stacking thin disks inside a magnum cartridge—designed to deliver fantastic stopping power with moderate penetration. After a man loaded with those rounds accidentally shot through a wall and instantly killed his daughter in the next room, they were banned from sale.
But those apartment walls really were flimsy enough that a bullet could punch clean through.
"Even so—it's concrete. Surely not."
"It's possible."
Argon grumbled and looked out the window. The sun had already set; the streetlights were glowing. Watching them, Argon drifted into thought.
"Aah. Maybe I'll sleep a bit?"
"What kind of vampire sleeps like a sick chicken?"
"I overdid the training a little."
Argon said this while rubbing his neck. Then it happened.
"Hm?"
The front door opened and someone boarded. In that instant Argon felt a familiar scent sting his nostrils. Guns and gunpowder. That's him!
"What? This—!"
How bold could he be?! Walking straight onto the bus! Then again, given the flight times, calculating when they would board would have been easy. Airport limousine buses kept relatively precise intervals; pay attention and you could time it perfectly.
He came down the aisle toward the three of them in the back seats and, despite plenty of empty seats elsewhere, stopped right in front of them. Karen and Rat realized it was Han Se-gun and went rigid.
"What do we do?"
Han Se-gun asked them carefully. The face was different, but inside that face was Han Se-gun. Argon looked at him and clicked his tongue.
"I have no idea what you're thinking."
"I don't know what I'm thinking either. So? Want to use the humans as shields and ride all the way to the airport? Or get off at the next stop for a quick showdown?"
Han Se-gun was proposing an absurd frontal duel. This madman. What the hell was he thinking at this point? They had a plane to catch soon, and he was throwing down this reckless gauntlet. Then again, if they rode the bus all the way into the airport, even Han Se-gun would have no way left to touch them.
And any sane person had no reason to accept a challenge from a maniac like this. There was such a thing as a Jinma's pride, but that was more like a cultural heritage built up over long ages. A Jinma who had lived for centuries was older than most great works of art or architecture—an artwork and a living proof of the underworld itself. Someone like that had no reason to stake his life against a human who'd only been alive a little over twenty years.
But that was for someone with normal thinking, like Monty. Argon was different.
"Fine. We'll get off at the next stop for a bit."
"Argon!"
Monty nearly fainted. Accepting this idiotic duel!
No—this wasn't idiocy. Han Se-gun had already read Argon's personality and thrown the challenge knowing exactly how he would answer. Looking at him you might not guess it, but Argon had the hot-blooded, free-spirited streak of Viking royalty. He was not the type to dodge a clear challenge and run.
That didn't mean you could just say, How manly of you, either. If Argon died here, Esprit ended that day. They were a loose collection of free spirits with no real cohesion; without Argon as their center they would fall apart into something too embarrassing to even call a clan. And unlike other Jinma, Argon hadn't prepared an Esquire to succeed him if he died.
Rat Gunip was roughly in the Esquire category, but while Rat was a good guy, he lacked the charisma to dominate a room. And funny as it was, even among vampires there were still racists who didn't take kindly to a Black man like Rat.
Of course no one thought Argon would lose. Even Phantom, said to be the strongest among vampires, was no match for Argon. Argon's power was Phantom's natural enemy, and Argon had no particular weaknesses. But there was always that one-in-a-million chance. They had to stop him here. But how? Once Argon's stubbornness reared its head, even an ox would back down.
"Hey, Soul Brother."
Then Rat called to Se-gun. Monty had no idea why Rat was being so friendly with Han Se-gun, but intervening here was the right move.
"Who's your Soul Brother?"
Han Se-gun snapped, turning on Rat. The Ectoplasm Mask made his expression hard to read, but the fury boiling in his eyes made it clear he was enraged. Rat wasn't fazed at all.
"From ancient times, the principle of a real man is not to interfere in a one-on-one fight. But in this case, the circumstances are a little different."
When Rat said that, Monty's expression lit up. Argon also looked curious about what Rat was about to say—the atmosphere was turning in their favor.
"We're broke. If we get into it with Brother and miss our flight, we're in real trouble. So the smart move is to use the people as shields and slip out of here. Or did you prepare tickets for the next flight for us? Do you have the sincerity to stop us in our tracks?"
"That's…"
Even Han Se-gun was at a loss for words. When someone threatened to just walk because they had no money, vampire pride went out the window. In fact, wasn't Esprit the clan with the thinnest pride of all?
Three full-fare one-way tickets to America would cost over two thousand dollars. For Esprit members who made a living gluing eyes onto dolls, that was an impossible sum. Even if Argon had an uncanny talent for winning lotteries, cashing bank lottery prizes with forged identities was absurd. Even this escape from Korea had been hard enough to pull off.
And forged passports only got easier to spot the longer you waited. They wanted out of Korea today no matter what. Looking at all that, answering Han Se-gun's challenge with talk of Jinma pride and manly duels would be pure stupidity.
Of course Han Se-gun had considered the possibility Argon wouldn't take the offer. Blending among humans and riding all the way to the airport was easy for them. Even if he sniped from outside the vehicle, he didn't think one or two shots could kill Jinma Argon and Rat. With the Beast it might be possible—but firing that would obviously produce civilian casualties…
But in the worst case, he was prepared to sacrifice civilians. He had resolved to become evil for the sake of his mission. In other words, he was a terrorist of conviction.
Terrorists spare no means to enact their justice and accept innocent casualties. Thinking that just because Han Se-gun hadn't produced civilian casualties so far meant he never would was a misjudgment. If he cracked the bus roof with detonating cord, escaped, and slapped TNT onto the vehicle, Argon might survive—but Rat and Monty would not. Argon would be seriously wounded… and then catching a Jinma would suddenly get a lot easier. Sacrificing a busload of civilians, but if it meant taking down a powerful Jinma like Argon, wasn't that pretty attractive?
"Kh…"
Even so, Se-gun didn't move right away. The resolve to kill civilians if necessary and the mindset of casually sacrificing them because it was convenient were completely different. Han Se-gun had abandoned being good in order to kill even benevolent vampires, but he hadn't fallen so far as to take pride in being evil.
"No choice… No choice."
Having briefly entertained the vicious thought of just killing the civilians, Han Se-gun shook his head. The matter with Seo Rin had him wound too tight. To think of blasting every civilian to pieces. Efficiency-wise it was optimal, but even he couldn't go that far.
But—
Click!
In an instant Han Se-gun drew the Beast and aimed it at Argon. Point-blank range. But at the same moment Argon drew a Desert Eagle and leveled it at Se-gun's head.
Everyone in the bus froze in shock.
"There's no cure for your foolishness. Benevolent vampires. Benevolent monsters. No matter how hard you try, goodness will never stain your true nature!"
Han Se-gun said this as he peeled off the Ectoplasm Mask. Argon looked at him and snorted a laugh.
"Crazy bastard."
BOOM!
In that instant, gunfire roared.
The rear of the airport limousine bus was blown completely to pieces. When the Beast Double Barrel, loaded with explosive shot, fired both barrels at once, the back of the vehicle was instantly blown open. Take a hit like that and even a Jinma wouldn't have anything left.
But in that same instant Argon shoved Monty aside and spun behind Han Se-gun. The attack route, the bullet trajectory—he had already read it all. Dodging was a gamble, but he was a gambler who'd made his living on bets. This much was easy.
Click!
Now it was his turn. Without hesitation Argon pulled the trigger at the back of Se-gun's head. The .45-caliber Desert Eagle spat fire. The Beast's sheer power made everything else look dim by comparison, but the Desert Eagle was still a leading large-caliber automatic pistol. Hit a human head and it would burst like a watermelon. Vampire or human—no one survived a wound like that.
But this time Han Se-gun dodged the attack. In a fight between a vampire and a vampire hunter—two monsters—point-blank gunfire almost never connected. Han Se-gun destroyed the rear of the airport limousine and leapt out.
With both barrels of the Beast Double Barrel firing at once, the bus had suddenly become a convertible. People were screaming, but fortunately there were no casualties. That didn't mean the problem was over.
"Now that it's come to this, a clean exit is off the table. Our plane tickets are toilet paper."
Something like this had happened—the police would have to investigate. And Han Se-gun had publicly revealed his face. Even if the bounty Flex Medical had put on him was no longer valid, ICPO still wanted him. The reason they were hunting him this hard with no political or financial stake—after he'd blown up a regular corporate building—was that the civilians he'd killed numbered in the hundreds, he was a lone wolf, and he'd announced his attack nationwide then carried out the terror right in front of watching police, dragging the Korean police's reputation through the mud. For a Korean police force with high public-safety rates but relatively low public support, it was an outrageously unfair situation.
Given that, if someone suspected of being Han Se-gun appeared on a limousine bus bound for Yeongjong Island International Airport, every flight would be grounded immediately and every passenger on this bus would be investigated. There was no way they could pass that kind of scrutiny with forged identities and passports. Argon had the power to dominate people's minds, so he could force them through that way—but would Han Se-gun really let them go that easily?
One way or another, the situation was flowing exactly as Han Se-gun had engineered it.
Argon walked out.
It had been a long time since his blood boiled. A long time since he'd faced an enemy whose skill left a match undecided, and a long time since someone had used such a malice-filled scheme to trap him. His mouth opened, revealing sharp fangs. From his body—openly displaying a vampire's ferocity—pure white mist began to pour.
"Fine! I'll play with you!"
Argon launched his body and slipped off to the side of the road.