The Baby (Alice)
"What exactly did you say to Manager Jeong Yong-jun after the game?"
Today's game had ended in a thoroughly entertaining four-run blowout, but the reporters swarmed one man, sensing that he held far more controversy than entertainment value.
"I tossed him a bat. Seemed like he wanted mine, so I threw it over — told him to stop eying it like some beggar and just take it."
Sprawled in his chair, legs spread wide, mid-yawn, the man spewed out one headline-worthy statement after another.
Noh In-seong had turned the post-game scrum into a full-blown press conference.
"Do you feel no remorse for the two injured players on the opposing team?"
The next reporter asked the most obvious question imaginable. Right — of course that's the question when someone gets hurt.
"Why would I be sorry? This was a monumental clash where both sides put their remaining baseball careers on the line. A mere game of catch has no business wedging itself into that."
This was the purest form of combat, gentlemen. That stupid game of catch matters nothing in comparison...
"...You receive a salary for playing that very 'game of catch,' do you not?"
"Oh, good point. Then let's cancel the game-of-catch part."
Either way, he handled every question with genuine aplomb.
"You delivered a dangerous tackle to the catcher. Are you not concerned about potential repercussions going forward...?"
"The ball wasn't even coming home, and the idiot crouched down in advance to block the plate — why exactly should I pirouette around him and slide delicately?"
He was a son of a bitch the moment he did that. Knowing the odds were against him, how was I supposed to dodge and let him wedge his arm in? Did I look like I'd lost my mind?
"Someone once got two months of suspension for sticking an arm between that guy's legs. Meanwhile I do it while pitching too?"
Trading two players for the sake of one out count — what kind of moron signs off on that deal?
"Do you feel any guilt toward players who play the game trying to win honestly, when you carry such a thug's mentality?"
"...So you feel no remorse whatsoever..."
"It was just his turn this time. I'd advise against feeling wronged about it."
Amid the murmuring sea of reporters, he graciously fielded a few more questions.
"Was the incident at second base an accident? You were laughing after your opponent got hurt..."
"That moron came sliding in with his spikes up, then got absolutely destroyed himself and carted off the field. The sheer irony of it cracked me up."
He had a word to say about the earlier collision at second as well.
"Do you intend to keep making dangerous home-plate collisions in the future?"
"There'll always be people who crouch down and ignore their opponent's safety even when the ball isn't anywhere near home, won't there?"
"And those people will find a 194-centimeter, 105-kilogram human bullet — a man who once ran thirty meters in 3.65 seconds — planted in their gut."
If you don't want to be hauled off to a hospital like the idiot carried out today, then don't play that thug's game of blocking the plate with your legs.
Noh In-seong proclaimed.
"In-seong, isn't our Alice just the prettiest thing?"
"......"
The next day, at the team hotel, over a late breakfast... or rather, an ambiguous meal that couldn't quite be called brunch.
Choon-sik — the father of a one-year-old daughter, a man who had long since transcended mere whipped-husband status and entered something beyond — struck up conversation again.
"You little punk, I lived alone for thirty... no, eighteen years straight, and my wardrobe—"
"Ooh, In-seong. That's a very bad thought. You meet a good woman, your life becomes happy."
And then he was off again. Our daughter rolled over for the first time... our daughter's first word wasn't me... our daughter, our Alice, our Alice...
If only I could shove this chicken skewer in front of me down the throat of that infinite-loop tape recorder sitting across the table. Truly, that would be happiness.
While he was carefully chewing his brunch to avoid straying into the blast radius of that murderous aura, the manager showed up.
"Right, plenty of nonsense happened yesterday, but we won, so that's what counts."
He handed Dustin an envelope, calling him the player of the game and declaring it a bonus, then—
"And you're the 'nonsense' itself, you brat."
What's this? What the hell is this, Manager? Why are you handing me a fine invoice?
"Your salary this year is 45 million, and how much have you already paid out in fines?"
Dammit all — 300,000 this time?!
Good thing I took a fat signing bonus up front. That should've covered the window-washing bill for whatever building those idiot association bastards work in.
"Which is exactly why, since I'd rather not collect another fine today, no questions about injured players during this interview."
Today's interview was a pre-game broadcast segment. Panels and interviews were standard fare these days, but—
Technology had advanced to the point where holographic displays floated alongside him, showing in real time who was posting which comment and who had sent which donation.
"Yes, fgj2104-nim. The opposing manager is quite elderly — why do you behave with such a complete lack of manners... ahem. Player Noh In-seong?"
"Because elevating my speech for him would be a waste of effort? Also, the man doesn't even have hair. Next question."
Just like that, a whole system had emerged where the top three donors received special answers.
Still, if there was one perk to being a player, it was that these donation revenues got shared out — meaning, with some luck, he could offset his fines?
"NohInseongSanityRestoration-nim, several of the prophecies you uploaded to the video platform have come true. When did you record them?"
"Ah... that? I posted it before Game 1. His moves were painfully predictable."
The video released on schedule yesterday had turned into a war room packed with Astro fans arriving to curse him out and baseball fans egged on by the drama.
And there, the Astro fans got absolutely shredded by fans of other teams whose catchers and players had suffered hand and arm injuries at their catcher's hands over the years.
They came to hurl abuse at him and left having absorbed twice as much.
This was karma in its purest form. Truly, moments like these were why he played.
"Last question. NohInseongKni... ah, um. InappropriateNicknameBX12-nim. What are your thoughts on baseball's unwritten rules?"
Oh, this one only dropped the bar for baseball fans with that nickname, but it was a decent question.
"I—"
[Whoa — that pitch just sailed right behind Player Noh In-seong's head!]
[Reportedly, after yesterday's incident, the umpires summoned the players before today's game and warned them outright: any repeat offense means immediate ejection.]
"...The hell? Fine, let's go."
The opposing backup catcher was watching him with equal parts embarrassment and fear.
So this wasn't on that guy's orders — the pitcher just had garbage control to begin with?
The opposing pitcher, already saddled with one warning from the home plate umpire, threw his fourth pitch.
[Ball four. Top of the first, and the leadoff hitter reaches base.]
[Not a single pitch in the zone. Hard to believe — a pitcher with stuff this good, having to consider throwing it right down the middle if things go wrong...]
Second base, steal. Smooth as water. Naturally, a success.
After what that team pulled yesterday, he'd fully expected them to brace for a blocking play — but the backup who'd come in to cover hadn't gotten the memo.
"No blocking?"
"...Manager says he doesn't know what a lunatic like you might pull."
Well, well. Already?
At this rate, he was starting to feel like the idiot for preparing countermeasures against people who might do anything.
"Hey, I don't do 'anything.'"
"...Then stop running back and forth like that—"
The problem that the umpires had tried to squash before the game, that the opposing manager had dreaded, and that Noh In-seong had gleefully fanned into flame, finally erupted.
A double in the third. Then, in the top of the fifth, another four-pitch walk — followed by a successful steal from first.
True to a team that abused its bullpen, a reliever came jogging in immediately, and the moment he arrived, he took issue with Noh In-seong's behavior.
"Ah, for— hey! Quit moving your feet!"
"What, does ownership of my feet belong to you, old man?"
Thirty-five. Ancient for a ballplayer, teetering on the edge of retirement — the oldest head on the opposing roster.
Jin Woo-jeong could no longer tolerate the impudent rookie mincing around at second base.
What Jin Woo-jeong demanded was simple.
The game was already a lost cause — the deficit had swollen to 8-0 — and by the unwritten rules, stealing at this score was beyond the pale.
It was such an eminently reasonable request that he assumed even that deranged rookie, if unable to understand it, would at least grudgingly accept it.
"Are you seriously making that asinine demand with a straight face?"
But Jin Woo-jeong had failed to account for two things: the stress index that lunatic rookie had been accumulating all game long through his whipped-husband antics, and the additional stress piled on top via this very fine he was now paying.
And so, sixteen years into his professional career, Jin Woo-jeong witnessed a sight with no precedent in the sport's history.
Papapabat! Papapabat!
Legs moving so fast they blurred, flickering back and forth in an instant — tap, tap-tap, tap against second base.
"What are you looking at, punk! Face forward and pitch the damn ball!"
The Ali Shuffle — a technique lifted straight out of boxing, deployed out of nowhere in a baseball stadium for the sole purpose of provoking an opponent.
Ratatatatatatat.... Goddamn it, that's infuriatingly well-executed — Jin Woo-jeong burned with rage even as his eyes were drawn helplessly to the sheer spectacle—
Ali Shuffle
"Ahh..."
The Pitch Clock: the strictly enforced rule that no matter what chaos unfolded mid-game, time itself waited for no man. Mandatory collection had been levied upon his idiocy of watching the runner instead of pitching. The runner at second jogged safely to third.
[That's over the 25 seconds! A balk is declared!]
[All well and good arguing with Player Noh In-seong — but then you still had to throw over to hold him, didn't you!]
"Wooo!"
Getting a balk called against him thanks to that lunatic rookie was injustice enough — but then the rookie practically walked, taking his sweet time, all the way to third in a lazy little dance.
His face flushed crimson. Perhaps in his fury he'd completely forgotten that the next batter was the slugger who'd gone deep just yesterday, riding high on a hit cycle—
The pitch came right down the middle, thrown at the hardest velocity that day's pitcher had in his arm.
CRACK—!
Unable to bear watching the ball sail into the distance on the principle of action and reaction, he looked up to find that lunatic rookie planting his foot on home plate off a backflip.
"Ah, what now! The game isn't even over and you're pulling him—"
"You deranged bastard, what kind of lunatic on this earth wiggles his legs at second to bait a balk out of the pitcher, then dances his way to third base in the middle of it—"
And with that run, Noh In-seong was pulled from the game — substituted by a terrified Jung Im-taek, who dreaded whatever fresh insanity he might unleash on the field next.
Watching the young player sit slumped in his chair, staring blankly ahead while absorbing the manager's lecture, Dustin mused to himself.
'...He really is young, that must be it. Or maybe the kid's just flat-out broken in the head....'
Malice sat there in the form of a baby — an Alice. Not cuteness, exactly. More a matter of comparable mental age.
"Our kid and that kid — the basic mental age's about the same, don't you think? Andy?"
"True enough. Watching In-seong blow up at the slightest thing, the difference from a baby bawling is pretty marginal..."
And so, in the dugout, the mercenary slugger and the mercenary ace chattered away, comparing Noh In-seong to a child a full year his junior.
Once the manager's lecture finally ended, not much time at all elapsed before both of them were fleeing for their lives from Noh In-seong's fists.