Now You See Me (2)
Chirp― chirp― chirp―
The chirping of birds somewhere in the distance woke me from sleep.
With the sunlight filtering through the curtains, a head of blue hair drifted into my field of vision.
"Assistant-kun, still sleeping in as ever, I see~"
"...Don't just barge into other people's rooms."
The first thing I see the moment I open my eyes, and it's that clown striking a pose on top of my window frame. And what kind of twisted motive drives a person to fling wide the curtains right beside a sleeping head?
"Why are you up there?"
"Fufu, stage direction is a magician's basic competency, you know."
"You really love saying that, don't you."
Still... I suppose I did learn a thing or two from her in that regard. How to capture a crowd's attention. How to steer their gaze exactly where you want it. Every one of those tricks, I picked up watching Yelena work.
Not that I'd ever care to tell her so.
Anyway. I threw Yelena her coat and pointed at the door.
"I'll be down in a minute, so go wait downstairs."
"......"
"What are you doing? I told you to go wait outside."
"......"
No answer came back. She just stood there, expression blank, as if lost deep in some thought.
"...Yelena?"
"Ah— yeah. Got a call just now, that's all."
She said it with a smile that snapped right back to her usual self.
But Yelena only kept fidgeting there, making no move whatsoever to leave the room. As if something was troubling her.
"Ah, um... come to think of it, isn't there one more person living here with you?"
"There is. Why?"
"She wouldn't know I was here, would she...?"
"Fair point. Well, if she had noticed, she'd have come by at least once. With all the fireworks and commotion you kicked up last night."
Setting personal feelings aside, Yelena had been plenty loud last night. And yet Seo Yoon never once knocked on my door.
She probably just hadn't noticed. The soundproofing between the rooms in this house is close to flawless. To be honest, this building wasn't originally designed as my residence in the first place, so that's just how it is. Thanks to that, even pressing your ear to the wall gets you nothing but silence from the next room.
"So why are you tiptoeing around? That's not like you."
"Th-that's because from her perspective, she wakes up and there's a total stranger sitting in the living room of her own home. I'm not quite shameless enough to pull that off."
"What's with the sudden modesty? That's exactly your personality."
"Not right now it isn't!"
Ah. Yes. Of course it is.
"......"
...Hm?
"What number are you on right now?"
"...Three."
"Hah. You should've led with that."
"Sorry..."
"Well... now that I know, it's fine."
Lee Jun let out a sigh. His read on the situation had come a beat too late. Probably because it had been so long since he'd gone head-to-head with her like this.
"Phew... I really have lost my touch, haven't I."
"N-no, you haven't! You're still plenty good at it!"
"Forget it. It's not a problem, so don't worry about it either."
"Ah— okay."
She'd come back to herself soon enough, the way she always did. So Lee Jun simply went back to speaking and acting like normal. He knew exactly how to handle Yelena. They'd been through years together; this much was easy.
Lee Jun glanced at his clock and spoke.
"It's seven thirty now, so she'll probably be up soon."
"You even know when she wakes up?"
"If I'm looking after a hunter under my management, of course I keep track of the basics of their daily routine."
"...Right. Of course you do."
For a moment she stood there fidgeting, clutching her coat tightly. But then she headed for the door.
"I'll, um... wait for you out front, then?"
Creeeak―
The door opened with painstaking care.
Click―
And shut just as gently.
"......"
Honestly.
"...Haah."
His old comrades were still the same as ever... and he still had no idea how to deal with them.
Ground floor living room.
Inside a building that was ordinary except for being a touch upscale, a scene that was anything but ordinary was unfolding: two of the barely one hundred S-Class hunters in the entire world, sitting face to face.
And not just any two—an S-Class... with a single-digit rank among them.
"......"
"Um... th-the sofa's really soft...?"
"......"
"Say something, please... Are you mad at me, Assistant-kun...?"
Lee Jun had been sitting on the sofa in dead silence this whole time. As a result, Yelena across from him was gradually starting to break out in a cold sweat.
Well... granted, watching her squirm like that was entertaining, but better to cut the tension first.
"Not at all. I've got no reason to be angry."
"Phew... what a relief."
She visibly relaxed at his reply, her expression easing.
Good—she was back. Judging by her reactions, the switch had flipped all the way over. Time to move the conversation along.
"Yelena."
"Ah, yes...!"
"The reason you came here. Is it okay to tell Seo Yoon as well?"
"She's going to be part of this either way, won't she? In that case... it might be better to just tell her everything."
"If you tell me to keep quiet, I'll come up with some excuse for her. It's bound to be a state secret, no? If it needs hiding, then of course I'll cooperate."
Yelena was Russia's single greatest asset. Even lumping together every hunter the country had, you could still argue she was stronger than all of them combined. If something had the power to move her, its security would have to be airtight.
"......"
"......"
A silence settled between the two of them for a while.
...Yelena. Yelena Zaichik.
Lee Jun still couldn't read her true intentions. He didn't believe she'd laid everything on the table either. But one thing was certain: she would never deceive him, and he would help her as far as his strength allowed. That was their promise. And Yelena knew it too—that was precisely why she was hesitating.
And leaving that unpleasant part to someone else to decide... what else would you expect from a magician.
"Phew, all right. I know this kind of thing is hard for you. So let's try this: we clear the air with a bit of small talk, then come back to the decision. Like always. How does that sound?"
"S-sounds good."
"Whose turn was it this time?"
"Mine."
This was a routine the two of them had long shared. Whenever Yelena's insides got tangled up, he'd help her untangle them like this. There was no way she could manage it alone, and the other comrades all balked at the tedious chore... so the counterpart role had naturally fallen to Lee Jun.
Yelena started, her expression noticeably brighter.
"Oh, right—Assistant-kun. Speaking of which, why does this house even have a basement?"
"The basement's a training hall. I'm not your standard awakener, so I need specialized equipment."
"It's not that. Something else has been bugging me."
Another part, she says...
"How did you know about that?"
"Yeah, took one look and just knew, you could say—"
"...You could say?"
"......"
Yelena's sentence died mid-air. Then, after a brief delay, she hurriedly tacked on an excuse, like a thief with guilt written all over his face.
"A-a magician knows everything!"
"......"
So she'd gone sneaking around the place again. This woman did have a real talent for infiltration, after all. But seriously—she just opened every door in the house?
"Hey, Assistant-kun..."
"What?"
"You're... not mad, right?"
"When have I ever gotten angry over something like this? Obviously not."
This was just about the only area where Lee Jun never lost his temper. No—more accurately, he didn't even get angry in the first place. Not because he was forgiving, but because he'd given up. Yelling at these people changed nothing. They simply were what they were. Think of them as a force of nature, like wind or rain, and life gets easier. At least, it did for him.
And so the two traded a little more small talk about the house.
About ten minutes. By the end of it, Yelena seemed—just faintly—more settled.
"Finished sorting out your thoughts?"
"Not yet. So give me a little more time to talk..."
"I'm afraid I can't stretch this out much further. Our other resident will be waking up soon."
"...Yeah."
Lee Jun didn't want to drag things out any longer here anyway. It was nearly time to make breakfast. So he asked again.
"Yelena. Yelena Zaichik."
"......"
"What number are you on right now?"
At those words—
She slowly closed her eyes.
And after a short while, still with her eyes shut, gazing into the darkness... she asked:
"...Does watching us still hurt you?"
"......"
Goddammit.
"Answer me. What number are you on."
"Answer me first. How are... you?"
"Yelena!"
Lee Jun raised his voice. But she only pressed her lips shut. In this state... things could turn dangerous.
"...Damn it."
A curse slipped out of him, rough and unbidden. Before he knew it, a gun was resting in his hand. A bead of sweat ran down... and Lee Jun set his finger on the trigger.
And then—
"Boss? And... is that...?"
Seo Yoon was coming down from the second floor. She looked utterly bewildered by the scene before her.
Lee Jun... and Yelena? The Yelena? Ranked ninth among the S-Class?
"How is she... here of all places...?"
"......"
But Lee Jun had no room to answer her. A ticking time bomb had entered its final countdown right before his eyes. Who had the luxury of attention to spare?
Yet the thing he'd dreaded, it seemed, was not going to happen. She had already returned to being her usual Yelena Zaichik self.
Her coat, for that matter, had somehow found its way back over her shoulders.
"Ahem, Assistant-kun? This is scary, so could you put the gun away first?"
"...Answer the question. What number are you?"
"Number 1. No more, no less—the one and only me, Yelena Nikolayevna Zaichik, without a shadow of doubt in anyone's mind."
"Phew..."
Clack―
Only then did Lee Jun lower the gun. The tension drained out of his entire body in an instant. In those few moments, he felt like he'd aged years.
That was close enough that I might have had to use Silhouette.
Even now, she was watching all of this from inside his heart. What came through, though, wasn't alarm—it was interest and delight. He could picture her perfectly, snickering to herself at how fun this all was.
Excuse me? Your master nearly died, and you're laughing?
"Um... Boss? I'm having trouble understanding the situation here. Why is Hunter Yelena at our home?"
"It's a long story..."
"Allow me to explain on his behalf, Assistant-kun."
With that, Yelena rose from her seat and headed toward Seo Yoon, hopping about with a bright, chirpy voice.
"Hello there! Assistant-kun's assistant, I presume?"
"Not an assistant—a hunter under Manaagement, I'll have you know."
"Mm-hm, then Assistant-kun's managed hunter, then? Yes, I like that better."
And with that, she went and seized Seo Yoon's hand in a firm grip. In Yelena's own mind, she was probably just offering a handshake. But the force behind it was so overwhelming that Seo Yoon instinctively stumbled half a step backward.
Yes—everyone's like that the first time they meet Yelena. Her energy runs so high that anyone without a coping strategy gets swept away.
Besides... she's sharp as a tack, too.
Right now, Yelena was deliberately acting even more exaggerated than her usual self. Almost certainly to wipe from Seo Yoon's memory the sight of the two of them just now—specifically, of Lee Jun holding a gun in that grave, heavy atmosphere. Of course the image wouldn't vanish entirely, but memory is a volatile thing all the same. If you don't address it on the spot, eventually it gets remembered as something that was never a big deal in the first place.
"So, what's your name, Assistant-kun's managed hunter?"
"It's... Seo Yoon."
"Hmm, is that so. Koreans do seem to have a lot of two-syllable names, don't they? Ah—actually, is the given name just one syllable?"
"That is... correct."
"Which is it, then? The given name? One syllable?"
"The given name is one syllable. And in Korea, most people have two-syllable names. Add the family name, and the three-syllable total is the most common by far."
"Wow, so thorough. You're a strange one too, aren't you, Miss Seo Yoon?"
"You flatter me."
Yelena kept hammering away at Seo Yoon's attention without pause. Seo Yoon didn't rattle easily, but it seemed she was no match for a Yelena who had set her mind to it. You could tell just from watching her ramble on through a needless, elaborate explanation.
"Right, then! I'd say that's enough of the introductions! Looking forward to working with you?"
"...Yes."
Having said her piece, Yelena turned back around and settled onto the sofa again. And as she did, she snuck Seo Yoon a wink—one timed so that Seo Yoon couldn't see it.
Watching that, a hollow laugh escaped him before he could stop it.
"Hah."
Unbelievable. But then, classic Yelena was always classic Yelena. That skill of hers hadn't dulled one bit.
To say it one more time: everything Lee Jun knew about theatrical flourish and redirecting attention, he learned from this woman.
"Fufufu. Now then, where had we gotten to? Ah—Miss Seo Yoon, come join us and we'll talk together."
"Ah... I'll get started on breakfast, if I may. Please carry on with your conversation."
"Sure? Then we'll leave it to you."
......?
Hold on.
"No, wait a moment."
Lee Jun was momentarily thrown. Why was she the one making breakfast?
"Uh, Seo Yoon, I'll handle the food—"
"No. I've been thinking it over, and I believe it should be me, at least until you've fully recovered, Boss. You were swaying on your feet just yesterday, weren't you?"
"Still, even so—"
"Come, come, she's telling you to rest, so rest. I'd love to have Assistant-kun's cooking again after so long too, but we do have a conversation we need to finish first, don't we?"
Hey, you don't know what you're volunteering for. This is bigger than any conversation or whatever.
But Lee Jun had no standing to stop Seo Yoon from cooking. Which was, frankly, a bitter pill to swallow.
"Haah..."
"What's wrong? You don't want to talk to me, Assistant-kun?"
"That's not it... no, never mind..."
Right. Food is food—it's fine as long as it gets eaten. Someday I'll get used to this too.
Getting used to that sweetness somehow felt like losing a piece of what made me human... but hey, whatever. For now, let's focus on the matter Yelena came to bring.
And to make resolving it a little smoother, Lee Jun intended to meet with someone.
"I'll need to talk to Evrah first."
"Old man Evrah? You think that'll work?"
"Of course it will."
Right—Lee Jun was a nobody now. Not a vice-chairman of the Association, just the owner of a small management agency.
But there was one other identity he held—one that was all but omnipotent in matters like this.
"When an S-Class says she's calling on an S-Class, who's going to stop her?"
A title he never bothered to lean on—time to cash it in, just this once.
Absolutely.
Absolutely... not because he didn't want to eat the breakfast Seo Yoon was about to make.
...Probably.