One or the Other

The epilogue was built, start to finish, to let the audience down easy.

"The Special Forces Commander thought the raiders under Mother, and that mercenary with a Core ability, might threaten Utopia someday. His last wish was only that I pass you the information. That would've been enough. I kept wondering if there wasn't more I could do. To honor him."

"A touching thought. But a lone postman couldn't have done a thing."

The General sat on the floor with both legs stretched out and crossed at the ankle, one foot wagging. A bottle of liquor rested in his hand. I had no idea when he'd ordered it.

"Alone, of course it would've been impossible."

"So a fellow postman helped you?"

"I'm not a veteran for nothing. Postmen are excellent, sure. I've got other colleagues who are even better."

"Hm?"

Time to play the trump card.

"Mind if I use that radio you confiscated? I'll transmit right here in front of you. Even if I wanted to try something clever, I couldn't, so don't worry."

Time to call in the real colleagues.

"A radio call, all of a sudden?"

"I've been the only one talking this whole time. I thought a witness besides me might help. The next part involves the colleagues I worked with."

"Hm. If we allow the postman to use the radio, raise your hands."

It wasn't unanimous, but so many hands went up there was no point in counting. Encouragingly, the Savior's was among them.

"Fine. Use it."

Good. All that remained was for my colleagues to play their parts.

The black-market Boss reads a room almost as well as I do. That went without saying. Kkamagwi isn't the Boss's equal, but he isn't oblivious either. He was the one who'd noticed something unusual about me.

When I need that eye that sees straight through things. From now on I'll charge you a fair price. I mean it.

Even in the black market, where I was careful not to let on that I had an ability, Kkamagwi had caught the scent. And last, the Physiognomist.

When you talked about that item, brother, your eyes were different. Figured it was something you cared about.

A master currently pretending to have no eye for anything. The talk he'd used to take down the wall between himself and the Boss, who found him grating, had been delicate work.

"I'm calling now, so all of you stay dead quiet. I only ever radio when I'm alone. If they hear another voice beside me, my colleagues will think something's wrong."

The Savior quietly made a circle with his fingers. Ready, then.

One message, and I had to set the whole board, so my colleagues would understand the situation perfectly. Say it as tight as I could.

"Hey, you all hearing me? Remember those raiders Mother was leading? The ones the Physiognomist tracked, and the Boss sent men after. Did Kkamagwi use the tactical prosthetic leg back then? I was just thinking about it, and I can't quite remember."

That ought to do it. The Physiognomist had already radioed the Boss about Mother.

There used to be two bosses. Only one of them's left, and he took his men down to Busan, from what I hear.

Kkamagwi had definitely been listening too. Now I just had to hope they'd all read the room.

Silence.

Don't tell me we were out of range.

Solid colleagues.

"So he did use the leg. I've been in so many fights lately I can't keep track of who I fought or how. Where were those raiders operating again?"

The Physiognomist seemed to have the intel down cold. Good odds he knew.

Next time I saw the Physiognomist, I owed him a hug.

"Right, that was it. Now that I think about it, if we'd left them alone they might've hit the Human Meat Factory and made my job easier."

"Well, it's a pointless what-if at this point. What happened to them in the end, anyway?"

"I'm a little tempted. But that'd be too much, right?"

Right. He had to remember. The Physiognomist's real aim in trying to pass me the news that Mother had gone to Busan.

Mm, I follow the content. But why are you trying to pass it to Bat?

Figured he might be curious. Those raiders are holding something valuable.

The Physiognomist still believed Mother was holding that valuable thing—an Ability Core. All he had to do was say it straight.

Good. Cut it here, like I'd asked something careless and the talk of a valuable item had slipped out.

"Never mind. Forget what I just said. Let's all save the comm cores and the batteries, yeah? No pointless radio. Back to work."

Beautiful. Now if the General took the bait, it would be perfect.

"...Did I just hear something about a valuable item?"

Asking in an awful hurry.

"Ahaha. Well. There was something like that. A valuable item, sure."

"So it wasn't that touching devotion to the Special Forces Commander. You hit the raiders for the valuable item, didn't you?"

"More like two birds with one stone."

"Hm. Two birds, then... What's good is good."

A clean finish.

No matter how much friendship works like a cheat code, picking a fight with a large raider band is hard to imagine. If the Special Forces Commander and I had truly been family, I could have dressed it up as cause enough. Doing all that over a short acquaintance doesn't hold up. Add a treasure worth grabbing into the middle of it, though, and the story becomes a little easier to swallow. A motive I'd hidden because I didn't want to look greedy, slipped out against my will. That staging had sunk in just right.

"Quite the colleagues for a postman. What kind of people are they?"

"Can't go into detail. I figure you'll understand. Letting you hear the raw transmission like that already took some nerve."

"Fair enough. A veteran postman indeed."

Murmurs picked up around the room.

"So the postman actually helped us?"

"He didn't stop an army. He just roughed up one raider band."

"Still removed a threat, didn't he?"

"If he did it for some valuable item or whatever, wasn't he just lining his own pockets?"

"Two birds, remember. It helped us either way."

The current was fully with me. Even the General seemed to be coming around. The persistent one was the Savior.

"What happened to the mercenary the raiders hired? Wasn't there an afterward to that, too?"

Clock-out Man's story. I was getting to that anyway.

"This one's harder to explain in detail, so the short version: I kept him as a pet for a few days, then handed him off to a hunter I know and told them to put him to work. He's probably working hard about now."

A lot left out. Not a single lie.

"...What? I'm not really following."

"Told you. Hard to go into detail."

I'd given them plenty. One vague pass ought to slide.

"You broke him completely. That's what you mean."

The General, understanding perfectly. If only the Savior were even half as smooth and easy as this one.

"Right. I hope the Special Forces Commander up there is at least a little satisfied."

"Touching."

"Hm..."

The Savior still looked unsatisfied. I'd said everything I had to say. Time to bring the curtain down.

"That's the end of my story. So, back to the beginning. I'd like to call for a show of hands."

"You want us to confirm that you're our friend."

"That's right."

"The show was good, and I'm grateful, but friends at a first meeting?"

"A friend's friend is a friend. You don't know that one?"

"He was the Commander's friend, so he's ours too?"

"Didn't seem like an ordinary friend, though."

"We can believe everything the postman said, right?"

"Seems like it? The Savior isn't saying otherwise."

"Fine. But we can't just let an outsider call a vote so easily..."

The General turned in a slow circle, sweeping his eyes over everyone gathered.

"I move we permit the postman to call a vote. Those in favor, raise your hands!"

The rest was Hyper-Democracy's to decide.

"Approved. The postman may call a vote."

But it didn't go smoothly.

"Hold on. Let's rest a bit before the next part."

The Savior, cutting the current.

"You're blocking the vote? Is that allowed under Hyper-Democracy?"

"No. Even I can't block a show of hands. It's just that the hour is what it is."

The hour?

"Already that time. I was so caught up in the story I didn't notice."

The General and his aides rose first.

"Then the vote waits an hour. Right now... it's the Savior's time."

He shot the Savior a look and was gone. The settlers who'd gathered began to leave after him, one by one. Tin Can was at the back of the line, walking out with a sour face, feet dragging.

All that remained were the Savior, a few aides who served him, and three prisoners, myself included.

"No need to look so lost. I'm the master of this place, so everyone clears out."

"This place?"

The space enshrining a statue of Prometheus holding a set of scales. Come to think of it, I was supposed to meet the Savior here in the first place.

"This is a temple."

When the Savior looked up at the statue, his aides drew close and bowed their heads. So it was time for religious observance.

"Wait here a moment. Don't even think about running."

"We're tied ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠up. How would we run?"

"The three of you, if you timed it right, could probably run even like that."

"The three of us, in sync? Never."

"Oh dear. How fortunate."

The Savior approached the statue too, bowed his head the same way, and began to recite something like a chant.

Pain in the ass.

A moment ago, a show of hands would have recognized me as a friend. Funny, leaving even friendship to a vote. Anyway. He'd broken that momentum on purpose. No question. If anything, the General was the friendly one. This guy had some corner of me he didn't like.

Should I throw my weight behind the General? War maniac or whatever he was, not my problem. What mattered was gaining a name here and getting out in one piece. Even if these people went to war with Headquarters, they couldn't win, and there was even less chance I'd be picking up a gun for either side. Someone else's business, through and through.

"Hey. Woo Jungkook."

Once they'd moved off, Dr. Myeong whispered. I'd expected that.

"Hm? Elder Heo fell asleep?"

I looked back. Elder Heo was sitting there, nodding off.

"He's been out for a while. Looked like he was running on empty."

Understandable. He's old. Spent every day shut up in Headquarters, and the moment he came out it was monsters, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠then a kidnapping.

"You acted well. The mood was good. At this rate I thought we might actually get out clean, but..."

"But?"

"That one. The Savior. I don't think he believes all of it."

Even Dr. Myeong saw it. Because he was close to the Special Forces Commander, was there something I'd missed?

"I'm not saying you fell short. That was well done. Con someone that long and there's bound to be one suspicious spot."

"Hm? I ran a con?"

"Don't try to hide it from me too."

Come to think of it, while Elder Heo and Tin Can were pouring tears, Dr. Myeong hadn't reacted at all. Had there been a hole in my story?

"Where did you catch it? The part where my logic was thin."

Worth knowing, before I faced the Savior again.

"I couldn't find a gap in the story either."

"Then?"

"You, traveling with a companion, living like blood brothers, and on top of that personally putting down raiders for him? Does that sound like you?"

So the basis was simply her judgment of who I am. The person Dr. Myeong sees when she looks at me always feels a little different from who I actually am. Well. That's true of anyone.

"Anyway, is there anything I can do to help with this con? If you need something, tell me now."

Desperate, in her own way. Good attitude.

"When you don't know whose drum to dance to, don't take the General's side. Take the Savior's. That's all I need. When Elder Heo wakes up, tell him the same."

"Not hard. But why? Is siding with the Savior safer?"

"I don't know. What I do ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠know is the Savior's the pickier of the two."

The observance ended.

"You three. Staying stuck together like that looks uncomfortable."

"Someone might think you weren't the ones who tied us."

"I'd like to peel the postman off and talk for a moment."

I'd like that too. Problem was, I couldn't. Because of the damned necklace.

"We have to stay attached. There's a story."

"Should I take that as you absolutely refusing to be separated?"

"I'd appreciate it."

"I was trying to be considerate, so your colleagues wouldn't have to see ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠something they shouldn't. Can't be helped."

A pistol clicked in the Savior's hand. The muzzle crept toward my forehead and stopped a breath short of touching.

"If you're going to put it on me, put it on me. Otherwise back off. Hovering like that tickles."

"Is playing it cool a habit?"

"Did it look that way?"

The Savior took one step closer. A soft tap, and the muzzle seated itself against my forehead.

"Thanks. That's more comfortable."

He leaned in even closer. Pressing the muzzle hard enough to leave a mark, he brought his mouth to my ear.

His breath touched my cheek.