This Won't Do

This wouldn't do at all.

Baek Da-eun had once shared the screen with Yoon Jae-hee in Everything About First Love. Unlike her—he'd only ever dabbled in a handful of commercial shoots and still felt stiff in front of the camera—Yoon Jae-hee had held the entire set in the palm of his hand from the very first take.

Watching him monopolize everyone's attention, she had felt a small twinge of jealousy in her young heart—but a different emotion ran far deeper. I want to see him again. I want to act with him again.

It had been a reckless, calculating move on her part—keep acting, and someday our paths would cross again. By then I'll have sharpened my skills so he can't leave me in the dust. And I'll make him acknowledge me.

It had been the fresh, naive competitive spirit of a child, and beneath it, a first crush—feelings she could barely remember clearly now. After The Child premiered, Yoon Jae-hee vanished without a word, and that was why Baek Da-eun hated The Child.

It can't be him.

Honestly, judged on looks alone, he was a completely different person—yet she kept catching herself seeing traces of Yoon Jae-hee flickering through Yoon Jay, like an optical illusion she couldn't switch off.

Baek Da-eun gave her head a small shake and picked the conversation back up.

"Mr. Jay doesn't seem like that at all. What was it—controlling tendencies, you said?"

"That's a compliment, isn't it?"

"Well, sort of. By the way, when are you planning to drop the formalities with me?"

"In time."

For her part, Baek Da-eun wasn't quick to drop them either. They'd exchanged a few messages in the group chat, but she hadn't seen him nearly as often as Kwon Min-jae had.

"Anyway, if there's ever anything I can do to help with Min-jae's situation, just say the word."

"But... why go this far for him?"

"Because he's my friend. Isn't that why you're helping too, Mr. Jay?"

Yoon Jay nodded for the moment. And yet the attitude Baek Da-eun showed felt like something ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠a little more than the behavior of a close friend...

"Let me say this up front—Kwon Min-jae and I are not some kind of item."

Everyone around them kept trying to pair them off, so she rushed to add the disclaimer. Yoon Jay hadn't really read it that way himself. Assuming a man and a woman must be dating just because they were close struck him as terribly ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠one-dimensional.

"What I picked up from you two... felt less like that and more like the bond between old comrades-in-arms."

"Comrades? Haha!"

When Baek Da-eun burst out laughing, the people nearby glanced over at the two of them.

Word around the industry was that Yoon Jay's nickname was the "Laugh Vending Machine"—and now he'd gone and made even the perpetually deadpan Baek Da-eun crack up.

"Not far off, actually. We debuted around the same time. Even the things we went through were identical. He got caught up in his family's mess; I got snared by a shady company and very nearly paid for it."

"That must have been rough."

"Eh, it worked out in the end. Thanks to the Yoon Jae-hee Special Act."

The moment her own story came up, Yoon Jay found a reason to look away.

Baek Da-eun exhaled a long breath, laced with a trace of resentment. I clawed my way through and survived too, so why couldn't you hold on a little longer? Of course, it wasn't that she couldn't understand why he'd disappeared... and yet the ache of it still weighed on her.

"Anyway, it's a kindred-spirits thing. He and I have a lot in common."

"..."

"I have this certainty that as long as he stays steady, I'll be fine too. Min-jae probably thinks the same thing looking at me. That whole 'constantly compared' relationship?"

Less a comparison than... a mirror, really. Yoon Jay crossed his arms and swept his gaze over the set, where preparations were nearly finished.

Just then, Kwon Min-jae wandered over, asking what on earth they could be talking about so animatedly.

"There you are."

"Nothing unusual today, I hope?"

Kwon Min-jae let out a heavy sigh and held out a letter. It had been slipped into his car while his manager had gone to pick him up.

"We're getting the CCTV footage through the security office."

"Nasty piece of work."

"You haven't read it yet, have you? Let me see it."

Someone who had harassed a man for months without ever getting caught had to be reasonably clever. Even with the CCTV footage, results would probably be meager. They'd have used the blind spots expertly.

Yoon Jay read through the letter quickly. It had been typed and printed, so there were no quirks of handwriting to trace. But there was no shortage of clues.

Hm?

The grammar was coarse and aggressive. Direct declarative statements stood out far more than questions. And it was strange that the writer had started issuing orders the moment filming began. Vicarious satisfaction, perhaps? Was the stalker projecting themselves through controlling Kwon Min-jae? With that, his suspicion hardened into conviction.

"Did you find anything?"

"The stalker's a man... probably?"

"Really? The police said it could be a woman."

"In a typical case, sure, that's what everyone assumes."

When the obsession carried a sexual fixation on the target, opposite-sex stalkers did outnumber same-sex ones. But given the grammatical pattern of the messages sent so far, and the sheer audacity of leaving dead animal carcasses behind, it seemed wiser to focus on a male profile.

"Um... we're truly in your hands."

Kwon Min-jae's manager, who had been eavesdropping on the conversation, sidled up and handed Yoon Jay a vitamin drink.

It wasn't special treatment just because they were celebrities. The police had plenty of cases on their docket, and where celebrities were concerned, the standard line was always the same—this kind of thing happens all the time, so just endure it. The stalker's methods had grown bolder by the week, while the investigation sat stubbornly stagnant.

They had agreed to keep the matter secret until it was solved, fearing that the noisy press might get wind of it.

Permafrost boasted a cast of formidable actors, and even a delay of a few dozen minutes in the shooting schedule could burn through tens of thousands—sometimes hundreds of thousands—in production costs.

"You shouldn't lean on me too heavily. I'm not a professional."

"Still. You said you've caught one before, didn't you?"

"...Where on earth did that come out?"

At Yoon Jay's conspicuous non-denial, Kwon Min-jae's manager pulled his phone from his pocket.

It had all started with Emma Stewart's livestream. While recounting the behind-the-scenes story of copying Baek Jin-ri's wild dance on Cookietok, she had spilled an old "tale" about Yoon Jay.

According to Emma Stewart, hiring Yoon Jay was what finally freed her from the stalker who had tormented her for so long. Like the protagonist of some detective novel, he had deduced ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the culprit's identity, cornered the stalker who had threatened her, and—like a superhero—caught him in a single decisive move.

As Baek Da-eun and Kwon Min-jae, watching the video over his shoulder, let out short gasps of admiration, Yoon Jay alone frowned. Too embellished. It hadn't been like that at all.

Emma Stewart's livestream had been translated by fans and spread far and wide, and the journalists certainly hadn't left it alone.

They say it's hard enough for an Asian actor to even pass an audition out there—so breathless articles soon appeared claiming that receiving an offer from a famous producer back in his civilian days was proof of genuine Hollywood potential.

"Even so, you must keep working with the police on this."

"Of course. We will."

Yoon Jay impressed the point upon Kwon Min-jae's manager once more.

"No wonder you looked so confident. There was a reason behind it, huh?"

"...That was years ago. And she grossly exaggerated the whole thing."

Kwon Min-jae scratched the back of his neck, sheepish, then gave Yoon Jay's shoulder a light thump.

"Thanks for doing this."

"Save the thanks for after we catch them."

"Even so..."

Kwon Min-jae poured out everything he'd been through. It wasn't that there had been no one at all—it was that he'd tried to simply endure it, and it had been too terrifying.

And beyond that, he dreaded the day it came to light, the fingers pointing at him: you're a man, and you can't even handle this much?

"So you caught the attention of a disturbed person—what does gender have to do with anything?"

"He's right."

Baek Da-eun agreed from beside them.

"Honestly, enduring was nothing new to me."

When his money-and-glory-blinded family used him, when his classmates kept their distance because he was a child actor, when a newly hired manager botched things up—Kwon Min-jae had swallowed it all and held on.

"I never had many people I could trust, you see."

That was why Yoon Jay stepping forward like this had finally let him breathe. The time he'd spent around him was short, but Yoon Jay never gossiped about him elsewhere, and there was something dependable about him—something that inspired faith that secrets would be kept. Kwon Min-jae wanted to go back and thank his past self for actively striking up a conversation the first time he'd ever met Yoon Jay.

"Mr. Jay!"

"Yes."

At the staff member's call, Yoon Jay left the two of them and headed for the makeup room. Today's shoot would film the scene that opened the entire film.

Captain Jin Young-do and his squad encountering a mysterious creature in Antarctica. The plan was to capture Jin Young-do's final moments—the sole survivor after a grueling ordeal.

"What brings you here? It's not even your shoot."

"You're the one helping catch the stalker. Figured I ought to cooperate."

More than that, though, she simply wanted to see Yoon Jay's acting up close. A rookie who had appeared like a comet just last year—yet his craft rivaled any seasoned actor's, and she was genuinely curious how he worked on set.

"And what about you two?"

"Same reason as you."

Baek Da-eun answered Kwon Min-jae's question. Both their gazes drifted toward Yoon Jay, who was listening intently to the staff.

"First time shooting on a chroma key set?"

"Yes."

"Don't be too nervous. You're so good that honestly we're not worried about you..."

It was he who lacked confidence, in truth—weren't their expectations simply too high? Yoon Jay stared at the concept art he'd pored over countless times. The imagining part, he could manage...

"Have you memorized all the blocking?"

"Yes."

"Already? It's a one-take scene, so it won't be easy."

"I have a good memory."

"Perfect. Shall we run a rehearsal?"

Yoon Jay moved along the pre-planned blocking, delivering his lines. All that met his eyes was the vast expanse of green chroma key backdrop.

The sound effects and the explosion of a hurled grenade were reasonably realistic, but the scale felt far too small. They said it would all be amplified later with visual effects.

This won't do at all.

Watching the director tilt his head in perplexity after the rehearsal, Yoon Jay shut his eyes tight and conjured up an entirely different landscape.

He reached back for the operations he'd taken part in during his Navy SEAL days.

Afghanistan instead of an Antarctic research base; the extras waiting at their marks overlaid, one by one, with the old comrades who had once fought at his ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠side.

I don't know if this will work...

And I don't know if I can hold myself together through it. But if the shoot dragged on, he would be the one bearing the weight of it.

"We're rolling!"

At the director's sign to just go for a take, Yoon Jay opened his eyes. For an instant, past the green cloth, he seemed to glimpse a desolate brown landscape thick with drifting dust.

"Ready... and cue!"

Yoon Jay sometimes found himself thinking this way. Was saving them the right call? Was surviving the right call?

Wouldn't it have been more honorable to fight bravely on that battlefield and die together?

Was it right that, because I saved them, they were left to wrestle the wounds of war and end their own lives alone in shabby back-alley rooms?

He understood, intellectually, that it was a meaningless hypothetical—yet still, from time to time, the thought found him.

Just as the boy he once been had kept blaming himself for his family's discord, there were still so many questions left inside him that demanded answers.