I Won't Give You What You Want
As the winning streak stretched on, the already exhausted Doubles players were forced to travel to the stadium as a group, herded together like schoolchildren on a field trip.
It made sense, really. They had become human-made headlines — pick any one of them at random, and a feature article practically wrote itself. Breaking a record that stood for generations meant carrying the weight of all the years that had been piled on top of it. And that went double when the record in question was the second-best in the entire world.
"Can they really keep it going? They're practically fielding a minor-league lineup today!"
"If they win, great. If not, oh well..."
Dozens of sports writers held their editorial meetings and, in near-unison, predicted the Doubles' collapse.
Then the Doubles took the second game against the Superstars too, and the streak hit twenty-four.
- Are they actually going to do it? Is America's record finally coming down?
- The New York Giants' record, within arm's reach... Are they really challenging a mark that's stood for over 130 years?
"One interview, please! Manager Jung Im-taek!"
"Manager! Over here, just one photo!"
Click-click-click--!! Clickclickclick--!!
"Argh, what the hell did I ever do to deserve this?! Why is the commute to work this punishing?!"
The Doubles had to fight their way through waves of interview requests, camera flashes, and fans demanding handshakes just to clock in for the day.
And that was the manager, who was comparatively famous. Imagine what the players were going through.
"Hey! Stop following me! How many drones does one guy need?!"
The lucky ones got to trade a grudging interview for a promise to be left alone. But Noh In-seong, with the home run record hanging in the balance, should have been utterly unreachable — and by every logic, he was.
"...Hey, where the hell is Noh In-seong? I still need my quote."
"Right? Did he even come to work today?!"
He had simply vanished from the commute entirely, and the reporters were left spinning their wheels.
At best, they got to stalk the players' route to the stadium. That was it.
"Damn it, wasted effort again?!"
One reporter staked out the neighborhood around Noh In-seong's apartment from Sunday all the way to Tuesday lunchtime, flushing days of his life straight down the drain.
"Wait, he had his passport!"
"He posted a photo of it on social media, so obviously we thought he was leaving the country!"
Reporters nearly came to blows at Incheon International Airport.
As thousands of people realized that Noh In-seong had played them all for fools yet again—
"...Okay, so where the hell was this bastard? He did show up to work, right?"
—while they frantically scoured social media trying to piece together what had happened, the man who looked down on all those reporter heads dealt with the situation in a way that was, frankly, even more ingenious.
Screech--
Jo In-soo was a diligent man who almost always arrived first or second at the stadium, without fail.
When he flipped on the locker room lights and stepped inside, there was something there — something squirming, writhing in irritation at the sudden light.
"GYAAAH!"
His first instinct was that some monstrous caterpillar had invaded, and he very nearly lost his mind on the spot.
"...What is this. Are people seriously sleeping in the locker room now? Who—this isn't the team office, you know..."
He quickly realized it was a someone, wrapped up in a green military blanket, and pulled it off.
Fwap!
"Good morn— whoa, what the hell now."
Lim Jae-min, who had faithfully followed his mentor in for morning strength training, jumped too.
"Ugh... the light? Is it morning already... haaam... What are you staring at? Never seen a man sleep?"
Scratching his head, Noh In-seong sat there lazily rubbing his eyes, merely annoyed that morning had arrived.
His method: a mystery blanket thrown over the locker room sofa, and the air conditioning cranked to maximum for a full night's sleep.
"You lunatic. What kind of luxury is this?"
Click.
Jo In-soo switched off the AC, granting the poor overworked machine a well-earned rest.
He hadn't believed it possible — and yet the man had arranged lodging inside Jamsil Baseball Stadium itself.
"...Honestly, he really is a king in a whole different sense. The stadium is literally his personal territory."
"Don't be sarcastic. What's for lunch today?"
The catching corps, who had known all along that he was insane but never imagined the depth of it, could only stare in horror.
The truth was, sleeping at the stadium hadn't been Noh In-seong's plan from the start.
"Oh nice, two whole days off. I'll rest up properly and... hmm."
That thought only came to him a full hour after the game ended, once he'd finally clawed his way out of the lunatics' grasp.
He had two days of vacation. But Noh In-seong never once believed he'd actually get to enjoy them.
Of course he didn't.
Walk down the street? Reporters. Try dodging them by renting a shared bike instead?
"Noh In-seong! One interv—GYAAAH!!"
"You maniac! Who the hell jumps into a bike-only lane?!"
With reporters swerving into his path instead of water deer, there was no way to relax. The holiday was as good as ruined. Even staying home with the TV on wouldn't help — the moment he went live, the chat would flood with interview requests and ban spam until the whole thing collapsed.
So with everything already a disaster, Noh In-seong's scheming brain kicked into gear: if it's ruined anyway, might as well rest properly.
"All that matters is securing a place to sleep, right?"
And then, at last, the catastrophic idea arrived.
First, he'd have to make a show of leaving the house, so his family wouldn't get caught in the crossfire.
"I don't care about me, but Siyeon and Mom did nothing wrong."
Dad was overseas on business as usual, so the safety of those two was everything.
Best to post his daily life on social media and let the reporters figure out for themselves that he wasn't home.
"...Oh, right. Should I post these photos too?"
Some of them wouldn't buy it, of course, and would stake out the neighborhood anyway. But if they did, that was nearly seventy-two hours of their lives flushed down the toilet.
"They'll go right ahead and Buffett their time away, I'm sure. Leave them to it. Apparently the value of time lies in holding out forever."
You only live once, so once in a while you've got to taste the bitter... hold on.
"...Huh? I've lived twice, actually."
Noh In-seong stumbled for a moment as he realized his entire existence was itself a second chance.
"...Eh, who cares about that. What matters is screwing these guys over."
The groundwork was laid. He threw on clothes he never normally wore, called a taxi from the underground parking garage, and slipped out of the house.
Next destination: somewhere these miserable bastards would never dream of looking.
"...Huh? This place is actually pretty great."
Their own home stadium.
On a day with no game scheduled, what reporter in their right mind would show up? The Grizzlys used a different locker room anyway. He could just stroll into the Doubles' locker room and rest there in peace.
Want to work out? Work out. Hungry? Order food. There was a huge mart right nearby, so delivery was always an option.
"There's a fridge in here too, stocked with drinks and snacks and everything."
The sleep room had reclining chairs, and there was a sofa in the locker room — plenty of places to crash.
Eat when hungry, hit the gym when restless.
"Not bad at all. If I want to use a computer, there's always the one in the manager's office."
For a man who wanted zero human contact, it was a genuinely solid choice.
"...Oh... Noh In-seong?"
To be fair, the facility managers and cleaning staff were around, and front-office employees wandered through, so it wasn't a perfect secret.
"No, I'm just here to work out. Carry on with your job."
And what could those people possibly do about it? Worst case, they'd snap a photo and upload it somewhere.
"What are they gonna do with the stadium doors locked, exactly~? That's what I thought."
Besides, not a single one of them ratted him out.
"Planning to report him? Are you insane? Do you know what that lunatic would do to you?"
Granted, that had less to do with warm human feeling and more to do with raw survival instinct — but it worked all the same.
And so Noh In-seong's holiday passed in perfect comfort.
"ARGH, what now! Noh In-seong...!! What in God's name IS this disgusting image...!!"
Breaking into the manager's office and stealing snacks wasn't enough for this delinquent — he'd changed the desktop wallpaper too. Jung Im-taek walked in for work on Tuesday and wept openly at the sight that greeted his eyes.
"Oh, you are dead... You're pitching as many innings as I can wring out of you today."
Jung Im-taek had never imagined that simply turning on a computer could be a hazard to his health, and he took it out on Noh In-seong.
"Don't worry, boss. Word is the other side got their stamina thoroughly drained by reporters too..."
Just as he said — the Doubles were a wreck, but the opposition didn't look much better.
After twenty-four straight wins, the Doubles had become a living natural disaster, and everyone wanted to know who the next sacrifice would be. The Grizzlys players, naturally, had been selected as prime interview targets in exactly the same fashion.
"Do you think you can beat them?"
"...Uh... I mean, we have to believe we can. Yes. They're our rivals, after all..."
Their manager, trembling with dread, was forced to declare total war, insisting he had no intention of becoming the twenty-fifth-straight offering at the altar of the Doubles' streak.
Everyone had a miserable day of it — with the lone exception of Jeong Han-sol, who kept his mouth diplomatically shut.
Because one stray quote from any of them — something like 'Player A of Team X: "I'm terrified. I don't know what those lunatics will do next..."' — would be headline material by sundown.
"Goddamn it, why do I have to go through this hell because of those bastards...!!"
Sung Ji-chang already had a colorful history of incidents with Noh In-seong, which made him the juiciest prey of all. The moment he stepped out his front door, a swarm of drones descended on him like predators.
The engine driving the Grizzlys' improbable autumn run was simple: two mercenary pitchers, Revise and Case, and two bats, Jeong Han-sol and Sung Ji-chang. Which meant, naturally, that from Sunday through Monday, Sung Ji-chang was grilled with endless questions all the way to Tuesday's report time.
"Strike three, batter out!"
[Noh In-seong's breaking slider sends the bat swinging at nothing! That's strikeout number two today!]
[His swing looks uncharacteristically scattered. There's no calm in that bat at all.]
To a fully rested Noh In-seong, the matchup was the equivalent of a free lunch walking in the door.
Sung Ji-chang had put up decent numbers last season riding the shadow-protection of a juiced teammate, but this year had been merciless. His average and on-base percentage had climbed early in the season — and then he'd started chasing bad pitches and paying for it. His slugging percentage cratered, and before anyone noticed, he was drifting through the middle and back half of the season in numbers close to a full-blown slump.
"Damn it. The guy protecting me in the lineup is benched, I can't see the ball, and the guy on the mound is busy racking up records and headlines."
With nothing going right on any front, all he could feel was suffocation.
Cleanup hitter Jeong Han-sol struck out as well, and the Grizzlys' first-inning rally evaporated into nothing.
"...Argh, the bastard really does live up to his nine lives, doesn't he..."
Manager Jung Im-taek had no choice but to tip his hat. Noh In-seong had copied the cat's survival manual word for word.
Over on the other side, the Grizzlys refused to give Noh In-seong — one swing from history — anything even remotely hittable.
"BAAAALL—!!"
"Tell me, was this a calculated image play — wasting pitches to look careful? Or is the kid just broken?"
Jeong Han-sol, who'd had to lunge to snag a fastball drifting way off the outside corner, got asked the question directly.
No answer came back.
Which made sense. This catcher was every bit as rattled as the rest of them.
The opposing starter was trembling so hard his control had completely abandoned him.
And why wouldn't it be? One badly misplaced pitch, and his own face would be taxidermied onto the evening news for the rest of his life.
--NOH IN-SEONG HOME RUN--!!
The cheering was deafening, the pitch clock had run out who-knew-how-many seconds ago, and nothing about this situation made sense.
His second pitch, snatched up in a panic and hurled, also sailed wide outside.
BOOOOOOOO—!!!
[Ah, the second pitch is way outside as well. He's clearly struggling to find the zone.]
[The Doubles fans are raining boos down. Yes, they are very angry.]
The young starter was being jeered by practically the entire ring of humanity encircling the stadium. Sweat poured from Ho Geun-woo's palms.
'Damn it. What am I supposed to do? If I challenge him, I'm going to get killed...!'
The fans didn't understand. They couldn't see how pathetic he looked up on the mound, or how absurdly demonic the man in that batter's box was, dismantling him pitch by pitch. And yet they demanded he compete anyway. What kind of demon followers were these people?
But the ball had to be thrown. Resolving to toss another one well off the plate, Ho Geun-woo released the pitch.
Maybe it was the sweat now slicking his fingers, maybe his control had simply given out entirely — but the four-seamer's trajectory, visibly destined to land closer to the strike zone than either of the first two pitches, came into focus through the eyes of the man who'd thrown it.
'Oh. It's over.'
At the very end of that trajectory, something brown slid smoothly into its path — and then the ball's course bent sharply toward the heavens.
CRRAAACK—!!
[Ladies and gentlemen, the wait is over! You know exactly what that sound means! One look at that trajectory and there can be no doubt!]
[Way out there! It won't vanish into the far sky — but it will most certainly reach the dome's ceiling!]
"Man, that took forever. So we're finally tied, huh?"
Tossing aside a bat so precious it belonged in a baseball museum, Noh In-seong strolled toward first base, unhurried, step by step by step.
The Doubles fans roared. The Grizzlys fans wept into their sleeves.
"Why does he keep doing this to us?!"
Those lunatics had already saddled them with a mountain of bizarre records — and now they wanted to hand them one more? The scars from last year's Korean Series hadn't even healed, and now they were force-feeding the Grizzlys the record-tying 56th home run like it was their dying wish.
The ball — thankfully or not — struck the dome's ceiling in deep outfield and dropped back down to the field. Rivalry or no rivalry, basic decency demanded they hand it over.
And so the record-tying ball found its way into Noh In-seong's hand.
"How much do you figure this would go for at auction later? Maybe I should just give it away in a subscriber giveaway?"
"Oh, you absolute maniac!"
Noh In-seong himself couldn't have cared less about any of it.
'Winning today is what matters. What else would matter?!'
He walked in every at-bat after that, though he didn't attempt a single stolen base. He still ran the bases hard, and behind him, Song Jin-wook beamed from ear to ear yet again, banking another RBI bonus.
Meanwhile, Noh In-seong, who had poured everything into pitching, collected his harvest: four scattered hits over the complete game, sixteen strikeouts. Nine innings, zero runs. A shutout.
With virtually everything in his grasp, he came down off the mound smiling.
"I don't feel like doing interviews today. You people cost me two perfectly good days of sleep at this stadium, and I'm still bitter about it."
And with that same smile, he dropped the bombshell and went home.
"In-seong, what on earth were you doing for two days that you couldn't come home? Mom was worried sick."
Shoveling down his mother's spaghetti, Noh In-seong answered.
"Uh... marine conservation work?"
"...Weren't you a baseball player?"
Well, he had forced a bunch of useless people to experience the great outdoors against their will, so it wasn't entirely a lie.
"ACHOO! Ugh, I think I caught a cold..."
"My back hurts too. Maybe I should see a doctor..."
Noh In-seong's answer wasn't all that far from the truth. And so, once again, Korean baseball rolled on — carried along by exactly this kind of farce.