Instinct's Warning
The day after the midnight fireworks.
"Priest."
Jamie, who had been sharing breakfast with me — cereal mixed with peanut butter — set down her spoon and looked toward the entrance.
"It's the guests from yesterday."
"Looks like they liked the gift we sent them last night."
"Well…"
Jamie rose from her seat with a quiet snort of laughter.
"It was pretty, I'll give them that. Especially at night."
I kept spooning cereal into my mouth while Jamie prepared to receive the visitors in my place.
Click.
Of course, that reception was not going to be a friendly one.
A knock came not long after.
"Come in."
Still seated, I twisted my body just enough to face the door.
It opened, and the man and woman from yesterday showed their faces.
"It seems we've come a bit too early."
"Yeah. I'm almost done eating, though. Have a seat and wait a moment."
"Understood."
Vacuum sat obediently on the sofa. The woman stood behind him, fresh bruises blooming across her face.
Crunch. Crunch.
He was wearing gloves I hadn't seen on him yesterday. Judging by the marks on her face, those gloves had been the culprit.
Gulp.
The peanut butter and milk combination was something of a failure. Not bad, exactly — but the milk had thickened into a cloying sludge that dragged on the way down.
I cleaned the empty bowl, rinsed my mouth with fresh water, and moved over to the sofa.
"Looks like you've reached a conclusion."
"Yes."
His expression was much the same as yesterday. He showed no interest in bringing up the fireworks display from the night before. A sensible choice. Once you'd decided to keep things amicable, dredging up the past never helped anyone.
"A positive one?"
"Of course. If you wish, we've already made every arrangement for you to meet her today."
The answer itself was expected — the fact that they'd come at all said as much. What surprised me was the part about meeting her immediately, if I wanted.
I'd figured they'd stall for at least a few days. But the other side had turned out far more decisive than I'd anticipated.
"Jamie."
"Yes, Priest."
I tipped my head back against the sofa and looked up at her standing behind me.
"You've done well."
"…That's rather sudden."
Jamie let out a small sigh, then drew two pistol magazines from inside her coat and held them out to me.
"Do you have somewhere to hide them?"
"I could just tuck them into an inner coat pocket, the way you do."
"Well, you rarely fire them yourself, so I suppose it doesn't matter."
I took the magazines from her and stood. Across from me, he rose from the sofa as well.
"Let's go."
"I'll lead the way."
Vacuum volunteered as guide, and the nameless woman stuck close behind him.
"Priest."
"Feeling left out?"
"…Honestly, yes."
At her frank answer, I turned to face her fully. Then, reading the silent why? in her eyes, I gently lifted her chin with my hand.
"I have more than enough capacity to look after one Doberman."
"Honestly…"
She exhaled softly, then gave a short laugh and carefully pried my hand from her chin.
"I'm sorry, but I've already sworn my loyalty to the Boss. If you're looking for a hunting dog, you'd best search elsewhere."
"I'm not particularly interested in hunting. A pet dog, though — that I could get behind."
"Then it'll be even harder."
Jamie's face drew closer.
Nip.
The way she sometimes did in bed, she lightly bit the left side of my neck, then straightened up and smiled.
"I'm a hunting dog, not a pet. That's why."
"A shame."
"Still — it's been an honor."
I shrugged. Jamie took my coat from the rack by the entrance and helped me into it herself, one last act of service.
"I'm worried."
"I have the means to look after myself."
"That's not it."
Coming down the stairs beside me, she furrowed one brow slightly.
"It's not you I'm worried about. It's the fallout from whatever you do once you're there."
"Someone overhearing that might get the wrong idea."
"I occasionally find your sheer shamelessness admirable."
"You're still my bodyguard until you report back to Benjamin. You seem to have forgotten that."
"A misunderstanding."
"Ms. Secretary can decide that later."
"…Did you just add an honorific to the end of that?"
"Haha."
In the month or so I'd spent with her, I'd learned that even when my tongue wasn't particularly amused, my mood could still lift. Moments like this one.
"You've worked hard."
"It was an honor to serve you."
We exchanged a brief handshake.
"Give Benjamin my regards."
"I will."
It wasn't a permanent goodbye, so the farewell ended there.
"You can get in here."
"Thank you."
I opened the rear door and accepted Vacuum's less-than-gracious courtesy, climbing into the car they'd brought.
The woman already in the driver's seat glared at me through the rearview mirror. I offered her a light smile. Her brow twitched, and she looked straight ahead again.
"Drive."
"…"
Once he settled into the passenger seat, the frozen scenery outside the window began to slide past.
We drove through streets I now knew by heart, rounded a few bent corners, and arrived at the border zone where I'd previously delivered a generous gift of lead.
Thud! Clunk!!
"Looks like the roads could use some maintenance."
"That would probably be wise."
Potholes everywhere. Buildings reduced to bare skeletons. Rubble piles that hadn't even left that much behind.
Everything matched my memory — except the border itself, which had changed dramatically in just a few days. Dramatically was putting it mildly.
"The iron bars are gone."
"Talk of official exchange came up, so we took the opportunity to tear them down."
"Exchange is good."
Whether that was the real reason, or whether the bars had simply stopped serving their original purpose and been ripped out, there was no way to know just then.
"Priest."
"Yes."
From the passenger seat, he looked at me through the rearview mirror and spoke.
"Would you be willing to write a contract stating that, should anything unfortunate occur during your meeting with her, you will not hold our organization responsible?"
"If the contract specifies that the party causing said unfortunate incident is her, then of course I'll write one."
"Then please do so."
Still seated, I withdrew money through the Benefit Bank and converted it into a contract.
"What's her name?"
"That, even I…"
Vacuum scratched his cheek, looking faintly embarrassed by his own answer, then continued.
"We call her the Elder."
"Then I'll just put 'her.'"
"Fine."
Party A: Baek Jinhyuk
Party B: Grayneck
Should any misfortune befall Party A during the meeting with "her" (the Elder), no liability shall fall upon Grayneck, provided that the cause of said misfortune originates with "her."
I filled in the standard party designations, noted that no sparks would fly toward Grayneck if anything happened to me, and wrapped the contract up cleanly.
Whoosh!
"Thank you. We'll take you straight to the annex where she resides."
The moment the contract burned away, the car picked up speed. We crossed the border into the Western Slum, and before we'd driven far, I found myself impressed by an atmosphere nothing like what I'd expected.
"I'm not joking — the streets are so clean and bright, you could hardly call this a slum."
"Unlike Mad Dog, we manage our entire territory thoroughly. Murder, robbery, rape, even petty violence. I can say with certainty that public safety here is better than outside."
"I see."
There was real pride in his voice, and I agreed with him to a point — I'd seen it with my own eyes, after all. At the same time, I found myself wondering how a system like this could be maintained in a slum.
Drugs, of course.
It occurred to me that perhaps every resident of the Western Slum belonged to their organization in one way or another.
The sight of people living so cleanly, so self-righteously, on money earned by destroying other people's lives — it was genuinely fascinating.
The car finally stopped roughly two hours after we'd entered the Western Slum.
"It's like a small castle."
A structure so massive it made Benjamin's mansion look shabby by comparison.
"It's our pride."
"Pride."
I wondered how many lives had been ruined to pile that thing up.
"That's the place."
Where Vacuum pointed, a single-story annex of considerable size sat alone.
"Go in there. Everything's already been arranged — just knock twice before you enter."
"Understood."
"We'll wait here until you come out."
I nodded once, stepped out of the car, and walked toward the distant building.
The air is remarkably clean.
Anyone who visited without knowing the truth would never guess these people manufactured drugs and flooded the entire city with them. The Western Slum was bright and lovely in every direction.
Even the curtains are all drawn open.
I'd expected her to be holed up somewhere dark and oppressive. Reality was the opposite. This presence had settled itself somewhere the sunlight poured in freely.
"Two knocks, was it."
Tap. Tap.
I knocked and waited, but no invitation came. So I simply opened the door and went inside.
Click. Click.
My footsteps crossed the pure white marble floor for a short while.
Then I faced the guest reclining on a sofa, backlit by a vast glass window pouring in warm sunlight — and for the first time, my instincts issued a warning.
The being in front of me was dangerous.
So this is what it feels like.
An instinctive warning I'd never experienced before was unfamiliar, and it set my heart pounding. So I moved. Closer — toward that presence, toward the woman who seemed to hold an entire atmosphere of decadence in her arms.