No Return

"Babies running in a pack, and already fighting dirty...!"

"Bag his head."

"Wh—what is this! Get it off! Damn it!"

A sack came down over the head of the mercenary, who lay bound tight and rolling on the ground. It wasn't meant to kill him. It was only there to take his eyes.

"Whew... Incredible. You're a senior, aren't you? All I heard was that you were a capable mercenary, but you must be ex-hunter. Which class were you?"

"Goddamn it, which bastard's been going around talking about me?"

"I just overheard it. Do you know what a recorder is?"

"What, a machine that stores sound?"

"Makes you wonder if it's worth the battery, doesn't it? In the old days they used them for something called wiretapping. Stealing sound, that is. Hide one in a target's clothes or in his room, and you can know every word he goes around saying."

"You were after Yeojin? A runt like you, daring to lay a hand on my master—"

The pint-sized hunter clicked his tongue, far too composed for a brat.

"Don't misunderstand. This is to protect my master."

"Protect?"

"Master's a little slow to notice things, you know? He might go around making mistakes, so I'm watching over him."

"...This one's completely insane."

"Then you just rest now, senior."

One of the fellow trainees thrust a hand into the sack over the mercenary's head.

"Shit! What the hell are you doing!"

"Don't worry. It's nothing much."

"You think I won't be able to find you?"

"Yes, yes. They say finding people is your specialty, so of course you will."

The hand had gone in for one reason: to seat plugs in the mercenary's ears.

"Wh—what is this. You're going to leave me like this?"

Beside him the trainees went on about this and that, but the mercenary heard none of it.

"You're not taking these out? You cocky little babies, you're going to regret leaving me alive...!"

And to the trainees, his words were the sort of sound you could hear and still not hear.

"You said one lousy mercenary would be easy. That was not easy."

"Right? What's lousy about him? We nearly lost."

Five against one, and the trainees had only just won.

"We won, didn't we? That's enough."

"You call that something to say right now..."

"What's wrong with what I said? It came out the way we expected. Is there a problem?"

"Relentlessly positive, aren't you."

"Does living as a genius make you positive about everything?"

The pint-sized hunter wasn't unshaken either. Trainees or not, they were five hunters. Set himself aside — the one they called a genius — and the other four were still talents anyone would rate as true prodigies. Five of the Golden Class, and they had struggled to put down a single mercenary.

"See? A mercenary the Instructor trusts with work. I told you our Instructor is no ordinary man."

"...Given the situation, shouldn't we be saying this mercenary is the one who's no ordinary man?"

"No matter what anyone says, you tie it straight back to the Instructor."

"It's Instructor. Don't drop the courtesy."

"Ah. Yes."

"He really is ex-hunter, right?"

"The way he moved wasn't ordinary. I'm sure of it."

"What kind of ability?"

"Who knows. Maybe the genius's eyes caught it."

He had no power that let him see a thing like that with his eyes, but he could reason it out. An ability honed by the man's own hand, without borrowing a core's strength. Keen Eye.

"It's a non-combat ability."

"Huh? It wasn't a combat ability?"

"If it were combat, it would have shown. In a spot where he absolutely had to win, like just now, there's no way he was holding an ability back. He fought by turning whatever non-combat ability he has to use."

"Incredible... So an ability really does depend on how well you've mastered it."

"That's something our Instructor says all the time."

"Ah. Yes."

The pint-sized hunter crouched and felt along the sack until he found one particular part of the mercenary's face.

"Agh! Get off!"

The nose.

"It'll only take a moment. You won't feel a thing."

"Shit! Shit!"

Just as the pint-sized hunter had said, there was no feeling at all. And for a good while yet, there truly would be no feeling at all — not anywhere in his sense of smell.

Even pinned, the mercenary kept the threats coming.

"I memorized every last one of you, from your faces down to how you smell. Just you wait...!"

The trainees had done it because they had a countermeasure.

"Then start."

"Hoo. A mercenary who used to be a hunter. Highest-grade human I've ever worked on."

"Don't tell me your ability won't take."

"Don't jinx it."

The trainee laid a hand on the sack over the mercenary's head.

"What, you're still here? Oh — Headquarters patrol? Hey, get this thing off me!"

The kid kept groping over the mercenary's head.

"Awfully small skull."

"Just start already."

"Shh. I'm concentrating."

"Shit! I said get this off!"

Soon something went wrong with the mercenary.

"Huh...? What?"

The ability had taken cleanly.

"Whew. It's working."

"How long since we met the mercenary?"

"Eight minutes."

"Plenty."

An ability that erased the last ten minutes of memory. That was why, out of so many classmates, the pint-sized hunter had brought this one along.

"Nn? I feel like I can't smell anything at all... Is anybody there? I said, is anybody there!"

The mercenary thrashed harder than before.

"Is it really all right to just leave him like that...?"

They had planned for that, too.

"Headquarters patrol will come get him. I've got them taking another route for a bit. They'll be this way within an hour, at the latest."

"How is that even possible?"

"He's got connections, obviously. More than that — I thought you were just going to dump the guy and go. You're actually showing mercy?"

To the pint-sized hunter, it was the most natural thing in the world.

"He's the Instructor's errand boy. Imagine the trouble if he died."

"Hah..."

The trainee who had used his ability slipped in the question that had nagged him the whole time.

"But why go this far?"

"Hm?"

"That postman. Is there a reason to torment him this much? Just because he's someone the Instruc— the Instructor is obsessed with?"

"Well, that was how it started, but—"

In an instant the pint-sized hunter's face lit up. Someone might have called it innocent. In his colleagues' eyes, it looked like nothing of the sort.

"Aren't you curious? The man our Instructor praises until his mouth goes dry, and it's a postman."

"That much, sure... The survival instructor is such an odd man that even stranger behavior wouldn't seem strange at all."

The other three nodded hard.

"The truth is, the most important part—"

Here came the real reason.

The trainees' heads locked where they were.

"Fun...?"

"Don't you get bored, taking the same training every day and killing time?"

"That's—"

"Taking that stuff doesn't matter. Nothing practices like the real thing anyway."

"Then why even come to Headquarters—"

"But if you want a proper hunter's qualification, you have to finish the course, don't you? We're here because we have no choice. Ah, the precious hours of my life, wasted!"

"Even so, among the seniors—"

"There's nothing but ninety-nine percent idiots. Except the Instructor, and the likes of you."

In truth he thought his colleagues were idiots too, but he buried it with everything he had.

"I mean... we stopped the mercenary, but nobody knows when an air raid actually comes down, right? Unless your luck is spectacularly bad, getting hit shouldn't be easy."

"Which is exactly why it makes your heart race more, doesn't it?"

Even so, his social sense had come at least a little further than it used to. Once, he would have blurted Isn't it more fun? on the spot. He had learned, somewhat, that if he announced he was having fun too often, the people around him went cold.

"What? You still don't get it?"

"No, it's just..."

The colleagues realized the moment had come to give him the reaction they always gave.

"You're right. Heart's racing."

"Same."

"Me too."

"Looking forward to it."

And they thought what they always thought. The wording differed a little from one to the next, but it all meant the same thing: keep this one on our side, or we'll never rest easy.

"And if we can cut the Instructor's obsession while we're at it, all the better, right? A man that outstanding wasting his time on some postman is a loss to the nation."

"Right. A loss."

"Same."

"Me too."

"Looking forwar— ah. A loss, yes, yes."

Meanwhile the mercenary, who had gone on thrashing, went suddenly still when an unidentified mechanical tone sounded.

Beep.

"...What was that just now?"

"That? It's glowing."

"A wristwatch?"

"Did an alarm go off?"

One of the trainees poked him out of curiosity.

"Whoever you are, come back in ten minutes. Lunch is an hour as a rule, but today's an urgent commission, so it's shortened. However rushed things get, you look after your biorhythm if you want to answer when it counts. Do you understand?"

Nothing but words that explained nothing.

Into every head but the pint-sized hunter's, the same instinct struck like a bullet: this man, too, was not someone they wanted for an enemy.

What Tata dug out of a box in a corner of the factory was a radio. I already had one that was a miserable nuisance to haul around, and now I was supposed to carry another. I didn't like it at all. Fortunately, Tata's was a little different.

"Awfully small."

"It's not like that rugged radio you've got. This one's made to hide. Drop it and it breaks, so be careful."

"Then the communication core that goes in it must be small, too."

"That's the problem. Bring it back before the core loses all its light, and I'll swap in a new one. I'll give you one spare core fragment ahead of time, just in case. Don't lose it."

"And you'll cover the upkeep?"

"No. It's settlement public funds."

"Prudent."

And just like that, I had two radios. Trading voices across a distance was no small technology, and it helped you stay alive besides. The problem was the cost of keeping them. A communication core was the most expensive thing there was, after an ability core, and a postman's pay couldn't come close. It was only possible because Boss and Tata were each supplying one.

"Oh — and when the contract ends, you return the radio."

Don't worry. I'm not pocketing it.

"Obviously. When the contract's done, I'll come by whenever I have the time and hand it back."

Whenever I have the time.

For a while now, Dr. Myeong and Elder Heo had been marveling at the bomber drones, and they'd even gotten Tata's leave to touch them. On the underside of the radio, the name Tata was engraved, the same as on the body armor I'd stripped off the special-ops team. Had he carved his name into the bombers, too?

"You engrave your name on everything you make yourself?"

"That's right."

"A mark would be for tracing the route if it leaked outside."

"Quick, aren't you. For that to work, I have to make it unmistakable that I made it."

"Then any mark would do. Why a name, of all things? It identifies you."

"That, obviously—"

Tata gently took the bomber from Dr. Myeong's hands. He turned the body over, and the name cut into the wingtip showed.

The name Tata must have stuck back when he was living as a pet.

I could tell he'd escaped Animal Farm. What I couldn't tell was why his anger seemed aimed at the pets more than at the owners.

Not my concern.

There was every chance the things I'd gone through at Animal Farm would sour Tata's mood. With no way of knowing what went on in that head, playing the man who knew nothing was how I at least came out even.

"What are you planning to use these bombers for?"

Still, it would pay to know where this weapon meant to go. Anything that falls out of the sky, you watch for. An air raid is the sort of thing that can hit you mid-step down a road, if your luck is rotten.

Tata pressed the bomber back into Dr. Myeong's hands.

"The General was for sending them to Yeouido. If the yes votes had won, that's what would have happened."

As far as I knew, Headquarters had no means of stopping this weapon. It was a world where airplanes had gone extinct. Anti-aircraft guns had been abandoned, left as weapons for deserter units to capture and use. There was a railgun, but it was far too slow to bring to bear, and the Government Complex railgun was the size of a building, so the muzzle sat at a considerable height. If one of these little bombers flew low, you could die, wake up, and die again and still never hit it.

"You made them. Vote or no vote, isn't it ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠your call?"

"I'm not the one covering the cost of building them."

"What about the settlement funds?"

"They were made with public funds. But if the General alone left this place, those funds would drop by half."

One monstrously uncomfortable cohabitation. They didn't agree, but if they didn't clasp hands, both of them lost — and it was a closed settlement to begin with. Bringing in new comrades couldn't be easy.

"Anyway, where they go depends on who becomes the enemy, I'd say. Right now there is no enemy, so nothing's scheduled to fly."

"You might never use them at all?"

"Probably. I made them ahead of time just in case. Aircraft aren't a field I know well, so I hadn't even thought of building any — but the blueprints were meticulous. Worked out nicely, thanks to that."

Tata had a production-type core ability. Make one by hand and learn it, then use the ability to finish the rest in a flash. That would be how he'd done it.

"Oh, but—"

He held up a single small part. The automatic navigation unit Tofu had made. I'd heard that if you mounted it and flew, the craft was designed to attack Animal Farm no matter what.

"They planted a cheap little trick like this?"

"Mm?"

"Explaining it properly would be complicated, but anyway, there was a trap. Doesn't work on me. I even know who made it. A stupid beast, through and through. If your intelligence is that low, you've got nothing to say even when you're being controlled."

Tata took the bomber back from Dr. Myeong again, and this time from Elder Heo as well. The viewing was over. As promised, he saw us off only as ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠far as the main gate.

"Try not to die, and don't lose the radio."

"You really do pick only the necessary words."

"From now on, call me Tata."

"I was going to even if you didn't want me to."

"R-right."

"Patient of you."

"The fact is, I'm grateful, for this and that. Oh — doctor, appraiser, you two try not to die either. Thank you. The doctor especially, for the cigarette."

One sentence, and it turned even Dr. Myeong, who had been looking elsewhere.

"You know how to give a blessing and say thank you? Unexpected. Did the smoke fog your head?"

"To mark the occasion, if you've got one left, I'll take another."

"There it is."

Grumbling, Dr. Myeong handed over a fresh one anyway. The last had plainly been a cheap cigarette. This was military issue. Elder Heo, beside them, offered neither a word nor a change of expression. That he was walking at all was something.

"The thanks are sincere. It helped me, at least. The General's grinding his teeth to powder, I'm sure."

"Well. If it had come to it, I was thinking of siding with the General."

"Were you? But you figured sticking with me was how you stayed alive."

"No."

"Huh?"

He said the thanks were sincere. He didn't seem to grasp just how thankful an occasion this was.

"Whichever side I took, I would have lived."

You were only a little luckier.

A search party from the Human Meat Factory showed us the way. Thanks to them, we slipped the traps and got clear of the district unharmed.

"Travel safely, Agent of God. Come to this spot and signal at any time, and we will escort you safely to the last bastion of democracy."

What is he even saying.

"Let's get back. Quickly."

Dr. Myeong's voice was unfamiliar — calm on the surface, and urgent underneath. Elder Heo couldn't lift his head.

"From here, I'll look after Elder Heo. You remember the way we came?"

Dr. Myeong took the lead at once. But Elder Heo didn't look as if he had much time.

"Elder Heo? Ah— careful—"

I caught him ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠as he swayed, just barely, but the pouch in his hand fell to the dirt. What rolled out of it was Elder Heo's treasure, the ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠thing I'd checked in secret the night before. A small core that had lost its light.

And yet—

Shaa.

"...Woo Jungkook. Is something wrong with my eyes?"

"Looks like you and I are seeing the same thing."

A pure white light.

The core was reclaiming its light.