Chapter 130: Interlude (4)
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 130: Interlude (4)
About two weeks had passed since the day a section of the Olympic Bridge collapsed. Communication within Hunter Killer remained nonexistent; the members continued to spend their days without facing one another or exchanging a single word.
On the top floor of an apartment building, a large TV in a penthouse living room—far too spacious for one person to manage alone—displayed a fast-paced game screen.
Yellow sat on the sofa, her hair pushed back haphazardly with a headband. Dressed in a tracksuit, she silently manipulated the game pad.
Without a word, without a thought, her vacant gaze was fixed on the screen.
She wasn't the type to talk much while gaming. She didn't get excited when she won, nor did she get frustrated when she lost. Even if she felt those emotions, she never let them show.
It wasn't that she had a specific reason for hiding her feelings while playing. It was simply that wasting emotional energy while gaming alone felt like a loss.
Even if she expressed joy after a hard-fought victory, there was no one to be happy with her. Even if she felt bitter after losing a game she was determined to win, there was no one to share her regret.
Gaming had been an escape she found in a life where no one was on her side, but even there, Yellow controlled herself strictly. After all, there was no one to share it with anyway.
Her language only turned foul when someone was around. The emotions she had suppressed and accumulated would burst out harshly the moment she encountered others, and that personality of hers tended to drive people away.
Even when she finally found someone to play games with, they would usually leave her soon enough.
Yellow knew this. She knew it was her fault and that something was wrong with her. However, she didn't go out of her way to change herself, nor did she try to find someone who suited her.
She was already used to a life spent alone.
Then, a strange guy she had never seen before appeared.
A had talked back to her harsh words and hung out with her. Yellow, who had stopped expecting anything from meeting new people, found a new friend—and a lover.
“…….”
The word VICTORY flashed on the screen. Yellow set the game pad down on the table in front of the sofa and turned her gaze to the seat beside her.
Two weeks had passed since the man who always had something to say, whether they won or lost, had vanished.
She thought she was used to being alone. Perhaps she hadn't even known what loneliness felt like. That was why she couldn't handle the void left behind by the precious person who had come into her life and then disappeared.
“Crazy bastard.”
When she first returned home after learning the truth she didn't want to believe, she resented him. Why? Why him? Why did it have to be the members of Hunter Killer, of all people?
Why did these women, who had lived such difficult lives, have to go through this again? Why was A part of Spacetro? Why on earth did they have to meet as enemies?
What followed was a sense of futility.
In the end, she felt that no real change ever existed in the life she had lived. A brief moment of change was merely a prelude to a new storm, not a step toward a better life.
It felt like a cruel twist of fate, giving her a taste of change only to inflict greater pain now that she was becoming accustomed to life as a Superhuman.
She couldn't help but take it as a sign to lower her expectations for herself and for life. Even as those thoughts took hold, Yellow did not shed a tear.
If this situation were simply sad or purely painful, she might have cried. But Yellow, feeling a complex knot of emotions, was simply resigned to the reality she faced.
She did nothing but play games for days on end, spitting out curses. She didn't go outside, nor did she contact anyone. She shut her ears to the world and surrendered her body to the sofa where she had been sitting and gaming with him just a few days ago.
The person who would cheer with her when she won a hard-fought game was gone. The person she would trade insults and laughs with when she lost a game she usually excelled at was gone. The fact that he was gone gradually began to torment her, and the loneliness fueled her rage.
Why did he do that? That bad bastard. That son of a bitch.
Why did it have to be her, of all people? Why did he make her like him so much before leaving?
Why couldn't I just tell him I liked him? You stupid bitch.
Her anger wasn't directed only at A. In her state of confusion, she was also the target of her own fury.
Eventually, her anger turned into a soul-aching longing.
She wanted to ask him. She wanted to know if the things she had heard from Indigo that day were all true. If it was true that he had been playing with them from the very beginning.
The image of the single stone A had thrown as he was losing consciousness and collapsing haunted her. The stone that had fallen onto Pink's foot—Pink, who had stepped forward to secure a shred of hope for A's life.
And the sight of A saying "no."
Was it really true that A had deceived them all and played with them? Was there really not a single ounce of sincerity in him from the start?
Yellow had never been interested in romance; every situation and emotion she was experiencing now was a first. Surely, the other members were the same. That was why she didn't know what to do.
She wanted to see him too much to simply resent him. She wanted to spend time with him. She wanted to experience those happy moments of gaming together again.
But the man who used to sit beside her, enjoying himself regardless of whether they won or lost, was no longer there.
She would rather have him by her side even if they were fighting, hitting each other, and trading harsh words that left deep scars.
“Sigh…….”
Letting out a sigh, Yellow gripped the game pad she had set down and started the game again. The characters on the screen moved violently, and intense sound filled the living room.
But in stark contrast, the atmosphere around Yellow as she controlled the character was infinitely still. Like a sea without a breath of wind, she followed the screen with her eyes and manipulated the pad, but there was absolutely no other movement.
Just then, her smartphone on the table vibrated. Yellow shifted her gaze indifferently, but she flinched when she saw the content on the screen. It wasn't a large reaction, but it was enough to show she was surprised.
A message had appeared in the Hunter Killer group chat, which hadn't seen a single word for nearly two weeks. It was from none other than Red.
[Let's have a meeting.]
It was a short sentence, but that brief text carried the weight of the past two weeks of chaos. Red must have endured an immense amount of time and agonizing thought before saying those words. That was how Yellow felt.
She was certain the other members were going through a difficult time as well.
Comparing the stories of romance they had shared with the A she knew, it was clear that they, too, had been in a tender relationship with him and loved him dearly.
Yellow's reply was also short. [Okay.] She couldn't say anything else. She felt that the moment she added any unnecessary words, thoughts she hadn't intended to voice would come pouring out.
Two days later.
Judging that they wouldn't be able to hold a meeting in the headquarters conference room due to the crowds gathered in front of the Seoul Branch, they decided to find a separate location.
Yellow suggested her spacious home, and after receiving her address, the members began to arrive one by one.
The first to arrive was Green.
“Hi.”
“Yeah. Come in.”
Seeing Yellow's vast home for the first time, Green looked around the various rooms with curiosity.
“Just rest until everyone else gets here.”
Yellow shut down the game she had been playing. Green nodded at her words, looked around, and sat at a table set up on one side of the living room. She said nothing, merely admiring the city view through the window in silence.
As time passed, Red, Blue, and Pink arrived, and all the members of Hunter Killer were gathered in Yellow's home. Seeing the members for the first time in two weeks, they felt a sense of relief, yet they couldn't bear the awkward silence that hung over them.
“The meeting?”
“……First, I'll brief you on what I've been told regarding Team Guerrilla.”
Red briefed the members on the current situation as relayed by Team Special Force. Of course, the members were already aware of these facts, and the gathering became a place to collectively review everything that had happened so far.
“So, in the end, nothing has changed since then, and nothing has been officially announced?”
That was the conclusion Yellow reached. Indigo was still unconscious, Gainsborough's whereabouts were unknown, and Khaki and the other members of Team Guerrilla had offered no answers during interrogation.
In a way, it might have been for the best that the fact that Team Hunter Killer had been dating a Spacetro soldier hadn't been made public.
“Yeah. They only announced that a meeting between Spacetro and the Earth Defense Union took place. There's no information at all about what was discussed.”
This was also why the crowds had gathered in front of the Seoul Headquarters. Although an official meeting had been held, there was no word on what issues were raised or what was said.
Consequently, reporters flocked to Earth Defense Union headquarters everywhere, desperate to uncover even a single piece of information.
“Protests, petitions... it's a mess.”
Petitions to disband the Earth Defense Union appeared on the websites of governments worldwide, and protesters took to the streets in foreign countries.
And with Yellow's final words, a heavy silence settled over the living room. The members looked around the room with wandering gazes.
As they observed one another during the meeting, the members were puzzled by how little everyone seemed to have changed despite such a major incident—until they realized. Everyone was putting up a front.
They were all on the verge of collapsing, and they were doing their best not to show the emotions they felt in a place where people connected to A were gathered.
But the flow of the meeting had been broken, and only one topic remained.
A topic that concerned every member of Hunter Killer and was the most important aspect of this entire incident.
However, no one wanted to be the first to speak. They couldn't. They felt that the moment they uttered a single word, both the speaker and the listener would break down.
It felt as though the invisible walls they had built up would be destroyed in an instant, making it impossible to maintain their sanity. That was why the members hesitated to speak.
“You have a nice place.”
Blue was the first to break the heavy silence. With an awkward smile, she expressed her admiration for Yellow's home, which she was visiting for the first time. Yellow nodded and gave an awkward reply.
“Uh, yeah.”
After that brief exchange, silence returned. It felt suffocating. Even though she was facing members she was as close to as could be, she felt a tightness in her chest.
And then, a single sentence came from Pink, who had been staring intently at the sofa.
“…Is that where you played games together?”
The sofa and the game pads on the table. The TV opposite them and the game console installed beneath it. At those words, everyone's gaze, except for Yellow's, turned toward the sofa.
“……Yeah.”
Yellow replied shortly, her voice low. She had expected this from the moment she suggested her home as the meeting place. She also believed it was a conversation that had to happen.
The person in question wasn't there, but everyone connected to him was. And they were all very familiar with one another. Yellow had suggested the meeting at her house because she believed there were things the members needed to discuss among themselves and that they couldn't keep putting this off.
Upon hearing Yellow's answer, everyone's expression darkened. The thought that traces of A would be left in every corner of this vast house—and in their own homes as well—brought back memories of their meetings with A, which they had intentionally avoided until now.
“……What kind of person was Oppa to the rest of you?”
Red's sudden, pointed question left everyone speechless. They hadn't been saying much to begin with, but Red's words choked back even the things they had been about to say.
“…A good person.”
At Blue's calm words, everyone lowered their heads and remained still. It was because they could feel a weight in that calmness that they didn't dare imagine. And her hollow eyes, which were staring at nothing, made it impossible for anyone to say anything else.
“Ugh, hic, sob….”
The sound of Green's sobbing could be heard as she sat with her head bowed deep. Pink, who was quietly stroking Green's back, also had eyes rimmed with red. The reality they had come to accept so calmly was far too heavy.
“I miss him…. I miss Oppa so much….”
It had already been two weeks since they last saw him. For these women, who saw him as often as every day or at least once a week, A's absence was a profound loneliness.
It was true that A had been seeing every member of the team. But no one in this room could bring themselves to blame one another right now. Who could have imagined that the stories about their boyfriends, which they had shared with such joy and excitement, were all about the same person?
“Shall we talk about this next time?”
Yellow's voice, usually sharp and harsh, was subdued. At her soft words, their scattered gazes turned toward her. She had a faint smile on her lips.
Over the past two weeks, as she longed for A and wished to see him, Yellow had anticipated this to some extent when she suggested the meeting at her house.
But they were broken far more severely than she had expected. Both the members and Yellow herself.
They hadn't exchanged many words, but she could tell the state of the members just by their eyes and expressions. Every single one of them was feeling extreme loneliness due to A's absence.
“……Yeah. Let's do it a bit later.”
Red, judging that they couldn't talk about this right now—though she didn't know when they would be able to—conceded to Yellow's suggestion and nodded.
None of them had recovered from their longing for A yet. In a situation where A might never return, they decided to compose their own emotions for the time being.