Sinner
While Seong-hyeon was finishing his return stream and drifting into a deep, peaceful sleep on his bed, Iris was out on a morning walk—or rather, a morning run along the Han River park.
Huff... huff...
She had come out to clear her head, but her light training clothes were already damp with sweat as she sprinted steadily forward. The people passing by kept stealing curious glances at her, yet she paid them no mind.
Her mind was already tangled enough from yesterday’s clash with Akira.
She had come to Korea for one reason only: to live with Seong-hyeon, just the two of them. Sharing the same space, eating together, sleeping under the same roof, talking until they slowly closed the distance between them—then, when the time was right, she planned to confess the burning feelings she held for him.
Having someone else intrude on that space between them had been something she had never even imagined, much less accepted. It was a disaster.
And of all people, the one who had caused that disaster was Akira, the one person she already got along with the least.
Iris slowed her pace a little and recalled the slur Akira had thrown at her.
“Menhera,” huh.
That was Japanese for a crazy person, wasn’t it?
She let out a small snort and shook her head.
She couldn’t exactly deny the insult.
She knew better than anyone how twisted she was.
In the first place, when Seong-hyeon wasn’t by her side, she had been tormented by flashbacks and nightmares, unable to rest.
She might not have understood the full shape of her own condition, but she couldn’t deny it either. And even setting the PTSD aside, the sticky, obsessive desire she felt toward Seong-hyeon had long since crossed far beyond the limits of anything normal, so Akira’s words only left her feeling strangely hollow.
...Was it really that obvious?
She had tried to hide it, hadn’t she?
She had been so careful with every gesture, every word, even the way her body reacted, trying to conceal the desire she felt for Seong-hyeon. When she spoke to him, she made a point of being formal, keeping her expression as composed as possible.
And yet Akira had pierced through that false mask in an instant, as if mocking all her efforts.
Was that the insight of a soldier who had crawled through three years of war on the front lines?
If she ever got caught doing something indecent while Seong-hyeon was asleep, that would be the day her life ended.
With hearing sharper than most people’s, Akira would notice the smallest moan slipping from her lips in no time.
“Haah...”
Feeling like her chest was about to close up from the suffocating tension, Iris stopped running and brushed her sweat-damp hair back with her hand.
She watched as droplets scattered and darkened the ground below, then lifted her gaze toward the river glittering in the sunlight.
Duck boats bobbing peacefully at the dock.
People gliding across the water on skis.
A line of cars stretching endlessly along the far side.
...
The hideously ordinary, everyday sight of the Han River made Iris frown before she even realized it.
She had definitely taken her medicine before coming out, and yet an unpleasant wave of discomfort, along with fragments of a past she’d rather forget, rose up from somewhere deep in her memory and blurred her vision.
As if trying to shake the thoughts loose, Iris jerked her head hard from side to side—but it was already too late.
Against her will, the record of her crime began playing out in front of her, swallowing her field of vision whole.
"This is Echo-3! We need air support northwest of Tehereun Bridge!"
"This is Delta-4! Enemy armored units are advancing rapidly from the southwest side of Tehereun Bridge! We need support!"
"This is Bravo-6! The squad has been wiped out! I repeat, the squad has been wiped out! We’re retreating to the rear!"
"Damn it, where the hell is the support coming from?!"
"Calm down. Don’t smash the radio."
In the early days of the Fifth Middle East War.
Back when Gibro’s fierce offensive had Solomon’s forces retreating without even getting the chance to fight properly.
On the banks of the Tehereun River, which cut through the center of Solomon territory, two engineers were quietly laying fuses beneath the bridge.
Clad in Solomon military uniforms, the two women moved their hands quickly, terrified that someone might discover them.
On the far side of Tehereun Bridge, across the river, the soldiers of the international corps engineering unit they belonged to must still have been carrying out a delaying action against Gibro’s massed forces.
While they bought time, the two surviving soldiers had to lay the fuse that would detonate the explosives already planted on the bridge supports.
Both of them shuddered at the distant sound of the battle raging beyond the river, but they kept working as quickly as they could. Yet perhaps the pressure had become too much.
Partway through the task, the soldier with the brown ponytail lowered her trembling eyes to her own hands and began muttering to herself.
“Damn it... Rhea’s dead...! Rhea is...”
“She got unlucky.”
“Elara’s dead too...! They’re all dead...! Everyone except us...”
“We were the lucky ones.”
The ponytailed soldier whipped around and glared at the blonde soldier, her bloodshot eyes full of raw accusation.
Her sunken eye sockets were so deeply shadowed they seemed carved into her face, and the veins standing out in her reddened eyes made the whole expression turn ghastly in the sunlight.
“Are we really supposed to blow this thing now? They’re still alive and fighting over there!”
“Those are the orders from above.”
“You mean abandon our comrades? The ones buying us time so we can set this fuse?”
“That’s not what I said.”
“Then what the hell are you saying?!”
Thud—!
The radio, hurled roughly to the ground, struck the dirt and shattered into pieces.
The ponytailed soldier who had thrown it swayed unsteadily, clutching her head in pain.
“Fiona and Gabi are still fighting over there...! If we just wait a little longer, maybe they can cross the bridge alive!”
“And if we miss our window? What if Gibro’s troops cross first? Rhea, Elara, and the rest of our comrades will have died for nothing.”
“Shut up, Iris! This isn’t right! How is blowing this damn bridge apart any different from killing our comrades with my own hands?!”
At the scream of her desperate comrade, Iris averted her eyes without a word.
Originally, if everything had gone according to plan, the engineering unit she belonged to was supposed to blow the bridge and withdraw from the battlefield at once.
But the Solomon 10th Infantry Regiment, which had been holding the line, was suddenly swept away by Gibro’s armored force in a single blow, and the defensive line had collapsed far earlier than anyone had expected.
With no other choice, Iris and the others had been forced to throw up an improvised defensive line using mines, makeshift explosives, and whatever obstacles they could scrounge together, just to keep Gibro pinned and buy time.
But since the engineering corps’ specialty made a full-scale confrontation close to suicide, higher command had finally ordered that some of the surviving personnel be withdrawn across the river to destroy the bridge supports.
Iris and her comrade had simply been the ones burdened with that terrible role.
If she activated the detonator now, the chance that the comrades still fighting would survive would vanish completely.
But if she didn’t, then Gibro’s troops might still make it across the bridge.
And if the enemy found and eliminated her and her comrade before they could cross?
Then they wouldn’t even have the chance to press the detonator, and all they would do was hand the enemy a neatly paved advance route.
...
Iris stared at the detonator in her hand and squeezed her eyes shut.
This was a dilemma with no answer.
Should she kill the comrades she cherished with her own hands in order to protect nameless allies in the rear?
Or should she save a handful of comrades and let the entire operation collapse?
“This... can’t be helped.”
“Iris!”
After facing an impossible problem, after swallowing back the urge to gag and worrying herself nearly sick, Iris finally placed her hand on the detonator, and her comrade cried out her name in a voice packed with disappointment.
One press, and everything would be over.
The operation would end successfully, and Gibro’s advance would be delayed, giving their side a chance to defend and counterattack.
Iris steeled herself and was just about to tighten her grip on the detonator when—
[...This is Echo-4! Retreating with the remaining forces! We’ve reached the bridge supports!]
“What?”
Had it not been for the voice of a comrade spilling out of the radio tucked against her chest, everything might have ended there.
In a mere handful of clipped messages, the atmosphere between Iris and her comrade flipped in an instant.
“They’re alive! They’re all still alive!”
“What is this...”
As her comrade’s eyes sparkled with hope, Iris seized the radio with trembling hands.
“This is Echo-2. Report your situation.”
[This is Echo-4... Dammit! Stop shooting, you bastards!]
The moment the transmission cut out, gunfire and screams erupted from near the bridge.
Her comrades were really crossing Tehereun Bridge.
Panicking, Iris snatched the radio again and shouted harshly into it.
“Echo-4, report your situation!”
[Dammit, this is Echo-4! We’re crossing the supports with Delta and Bravo right now! Don’t detonate yet!]
“You heard them, Iris?! Hurry up and put that thing down!”
Grinning brightly, her comrade rushed over to the stunned Iris, grabbed the detonator from her hand, and tossed it far away.
She thought everything was returning to normal.
That is, until more information crackled through the radio.
[We’re being chased by the enemy right now! Their lead units just entered the supports! We’ll be over there as fast as we can, so wait just a little longer!]
“What...?”
What followed was enough to freeze both of them in place for a brief moment.
Amid the roar of battle above the bridge, a heavy silence fell between the two soldiers.
...
...
Almost as if they had agreed on it beforehand, they looked at each other’s faces.
Then, slowly, they turned their eyes to the detonator lying disgracefully on the ground.
...
...
Lifting their heads again, the two of them met each other’s eyes in silence, their gazes trembling.
There was no need for words.
Just from what they saw in each other’s eyes, they could easily tell what the other was thinking in this very moment.
That was what comrades were—people who shared life and death together on the battlefield.
And that bond, right here and now, was about to break.