The Art of Survival

Right before departure, Captain Choi brought over a heavy sack.

"What is it?"

"The payment I promised."

He gave the sack a shake, and a familiar sound answered—twenty-five cores knocking together. The fee they'd agreed on for the escape.

"You never asked for it, not right up to the end. Because I didn't bring it up?"

"I meant to collect it after the escape succeeded."

"Not because taking it early would've just been dead weight to haul around?"

You already know. Why ask?

"Well. If you're giving it to me now."

"And if the escape fails, do I get a refund?"

"Half is a retainer. Fail, and if you're still breathing, I'll give you the other half back."

"One more reason not to die."

The more reasons like that, the better. I loosened the mouth of the sack and looked inside.

This many cores left over, and they still had no choice but to starve.

All because they couldn't trade with the outside. If they'd been able to deal beyond the walls, turning cores into food would have been nothing at all. Each core had a letter scrawled across it in thick strokes—the crudest way there was to mark a type. Cores already spent once, just to tell one kind from another.

"If I explain—F is a fuel core, and P is—"

"A purification core. You don't have to explain."

I jammed the sack into the very bottom of my bag, straining under the weight. For a moment I considered dropping the 99.99% core, the one that ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠had been sitting on top, in with the rest. I left it where it was.

"Looks like you've still got a little room in there."

"You never know when you'll pick up spoils, or how."

"There are some consumables I couldn't quite pack. Interested?"

Captain Choi opened a safe. A jumble of odds and ends came into view, but nothing that would fetch a decent price for its weight. Extra baggage, in other words.

Still, if I'm going to burn through them the moment we break out, they're not bad.

As it happened, five smoke grenades sat among the clutter. Consumables made to be used up the instant of an escape.

"I'll take all of these."

"I'd have picked those myself."

I don't lose an argument all that often. This man might make a decent rival. I set the smoke grenades on top of everything else and shut the bag. With that, the preparations were done.

"One last thing. If anything goes wrong during the escape, I take command. Everyone moves on my orders. That includes you, Captain."

All of them, Captain Choi among them, nodded without a word of protest.

I'd half expected him to refuse my orders. Glad he didn't.

He had to be yielding a step because he knew what kind of unit I'd commanded back when I was a soldier. Last of all, he brought out the emergency rations he'd been saving and passed them around. Beef jerky. A commander had issued it once, he said, as a reward.

"You really just kept it stored and didn't eat it, even after your body got that wrecked?"

Jo Shin-hye asked it around a strip of jerky, chewing hard.

"I was saving it for right before I died."

Captain Choi answered without much thought. What he meant was probably that the plan had been to save it, but things had turned out like this, so eating it now wasn't so bad either. Even so, it sounded unlucky enough. Nobody called him on it.

"Then we move out."

The escape was on.

We left the captain's office and scattered. Each of us would go to an assigned spot, then gather at the main gate one by one, staggered in time. Moving around in a clump would look wrong. It was night, so there were hardly any eyes on us, but caution never hurt.

As agreed, I got there first. Up on the wall I could see the backs of the sentries. Standing too close to them sat wrong with me, so I stopped a fair distance off. The main gate was shut tight. Past that gate was the escape.

Soon Sergeant Jeong came up beside me, limping.

"I-I'm shaking!"

"All we have to do is walk. If it goes according to plan."

"I think I'd shake less if we were fighting……."

"Look at you. A ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠combat breed, through and through."

"Don't you get it? That rush, the blood just flooding through you when you pull the trigger?"

"Watch your blood pressure."

Jo An-na joined us next. Sergeant Jeong, who'd been trembling a moment before, suddenly threw his chest out.

"Well then……. I'm counting on you."

"Don't you worry!"

He said it with a fist thumped hard against his chest. The trouble was that he put too much into it—enough that one of the sentries up on the wall heard and glanced back. Then Jo Shin-hye slipped in quietly, and Captain Choi came last.

Pinning that rank on the captain wasn't a waste after all.

He was giving a possessed piece of method acting. A private's insignia on his collar, a helmet jammed low over his brow, and even the way he walked was a raw recruit, through and through.

"Ahem! So. Everyone here?"

Sergeant Jeong pitched it loud on purpose, so the sentries would hear.

"Then let's head out. Corporal Kim!"

"Yes, sir!"

One of the sentries answered the call. Sergeant Jeong was playing leader of the search party.

"We're stepping out, so keep an eye on the house!"

"Have a good trip, sir!"

Hiding the nerves was fine. Overdoing it was another matter. Still, it seemed to land. With a clunk and a long rumble, the huge main gate began to grind open.

Sergeant Jeong moved out in front as if he'd been waiting for it. The Jo sisters and Captain Choi trailed after him in helmets and gas masks. I took the very rear of the column, and with a soft scrape I set the postman's helmet on my head. Most days it was nothing but an accessory hung off the bag. Wearing it after so long only made it feel stuffier. I've always hated anything on my head; even as a soldier I took the helmet off whenever I got the chance. Still, when you have to wear it, you wear it. If you don't want to die.

"I'm scared……."

"Shh."

Jo An-na barely got the word out before her sister shut her down. After that, nobody spoke. While the sentries held their silence too, Sergeant Jeong's right foot finally stretched past the gate. Then the left leg, the one that always limped, reached out unusually straight and planted itself on the far side. He stopped.

There was no time to linger, but the rest of us stopped with him.

A moment of sentiment won't hurt.

He started walking again soon enough, and the rest of us left the settlement behind him. For about twenty steps after that, no one said a word.

"We actually got out……!"

Sergeant Jeong breathed it, eyes fixed straight ahead.

"Don't let your guard down till it's over."

Captain Choi still hadn't eased off. Behind us, the main gate rumbled slowly shut.

"Did the escape work?"

Jo An-na's voice had shrunk small. But the captain was right.

"Not yet."

We couldn't relax. Something was off.

"Sergeant Jeong. Don't look back. Keep walking straight, and just answer what I ask."

"What's the matter, Postman?"

This was bad.

"Is there ever a time they don't shut the main gate right after a search party goes out?"

"Sir?"

The tension must have kept the rest of them from noticing. The gate had stopped halfway through closing. I hadn't heard the clunk.

"If there's no one else going out, the gate's supposed to shut right on time, but……."

Of course it was. A gate left open meant there were still people left to send.

They mean to send a pursuit party.

Getting clear of this the easy way was already finished.

"All of you. Focus on me."

I ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠could feel how tight their nerves had drawn, even from their backs. Every one of them was listening for the next order.

I don't know where it went wrong, but the escape plan is blown.

How had they caught on? Fortunately, they'd been a little late about it. If they'd noticed sooner, they never would have let us out the gate at all.

"From here on, everyone follows my orders."

Their pace slowed of its own accord.

"……All hands, prepare for combat."

At the order, they quietly took up their guns. Meanwhile I started working the zipper of my bag open, very slowly.

"P-Postman? The guys on watch, they haven't done anything—"

"I know."

For Sergeant Jeong most of all. They were his own men.

"Whether you actually shoot to kill is up to each of you."

There was no need to kill them. Cleaner if we did, maybe, but their rifles wouldn't fire anyway. Suppressive fire, just enough to break their will to chase, would do.

"But you will fire. At the settlement."

From behind, I saw them give small nods.

"From the order until the smoke grenades go off, you do not stop shooting."

A waste of ammunition, a little. But for a short while we needed to pour it on and show them our guns worked, and that we weren't short on rounds.

"How long are we going to be shooting……?"

Jo An-na's voice was shaking apart.

"A moment. Only you all will be shooting. I'll go straight for the smoke grenades. When I signal again, stop firing and run after me."

I heard the rough pull of their breathing. My fingertips, slipped into the cracked-open bag, found a smoke grenade.

Let's begin.

I drove my left foot into the ground and stopped. The instant the others read it as the signal and halted with me—

"Open fire!"

A rifle clacked up.

"Sorry, you bastards!"

Sergeant Jeong was the first to wheel, the motion worn smooth by long habit, and he let the rifle rip. A split second behind him, Captain Choi pulled the trigger toward the settlement.

Good start.

The sentries dropped below the wall at once, startled by the gunfire. After that I saw muzzles peek up over the parapet, twitch a few times, and sink back down. They must only now have realized their guns were dead. In that gap Jo Shin-hye opened fire too.

"Ugh……!"

Jo An-na clapped her hands over her ears and crushed her eyes shut. Even so, she had a pistol in each hand. The roar of the rifles right beside her had thrown her.

The gate first.

I pulled two smoke grenades and threw one with each hand—the left in front of the gate, the right sent rolling through the gap where it stood open. Those two were to slow the pursuit. They burst exactly where they were meant to.

Three left.

Two ought to be enough to blank out the view from the top of the wall. I could keep the last in reserve. So, first, one on the left side of the wall…….

Then the anti-aircraft guns began to traverse as one, swinging onto their aim.

A pointless bit of resistance.

The rapport I'd made with the guns before the breakout paid off at once. The moment I fixed on them, blue light began to turn.

The odds they'll function normally are, of course…….

……?

When I read a probability, I don't blink. The numbers come up faint, and if I want them exact I have to concentrate. This time I had no choice. Twice, even.

I hadn't misread it. The anti-aircraft gun at the very end was in a state to fire perfectly.

What in the—

Thinking could wait.

"Everyone, scatter!"

Action first.

"S-sir?"

"I said scatter!"

Sergeant Jeong, after a beat of hesitation, broke right at a run.

"Run, now!"

"Whoa—"

Captain Choi snatched Jo An-na's wrist and ran left.

"Ah!"

Still being hauled along, she caught Jo Shin-hye's hand and dragged her with them.

Smoke, at my feet!

Hiding us, right now, came before anything else. I was driving my hand back into the bag for another grenade when my body locked.

"Kh……!"

What?

A sensation I'd never felt before.

"Postman! Postman, why aren't you running!"

"Don't mind me—get out of here!"

"Come this way!"

Sergeant Jeong had stopped mid-run to wave me over.

"I said get out!"

My mouth still worked. From there down, my body wouldn't listen. I was frozen solid, as if something had seized me and wouldn't let go. What was this?

The anti-aircraft gun finished its traverse. It was pointed toward Captain Choi and the sisters.

Going for the side with more bodies first!

The gun vomited fire.

"Hhk!"

A choked, failing breath from one of the sisters. In an instant dozens of shells streaked in and punched toward the captain and the two of them, and the dull smash of impacts tore the ground apart. The scream I'd barely caught was buried under it completely.

Damn it……!

The gun began to traverse again. Dust packed the place the shells had hit until nothing could be seen, and still my body wouldn't move.

Move, damn you……!

The pressure seemed to have loosened, only a little, from a moment before. All I could manage was a squirm of fingers and toes. I could just about pinch a smoke grenade between my fingers alone. I couldn't set it off.

"You bastards, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠knock it off!"

Sergeant Jeong started ripping rifle fire at the anti-aircraft gun. Hitting the gunner tucked behind it, from this range, was asking too much.

"What are you doing! I told you to get out!"

The gun traversed from left to right. The barrel swept straight past me and onto Sergeant Jeong.

Because he fired? Or because it knows I can't move?

Whatever the reason, this target was Sergeant Jeong. Next was me.

"Get out of here!"

"Postman! Hurry, this way!"

"You little shit, when a man tells you—!"

"Agh!"

Sergeant Jeong, who never stopped firing, right to the end. At the last instant I caught a glimpse of him trying to dodge on that bad leg, and that was all.

"Sergeant Jeong!"

I shouted his name too hard, and my lips, dried stiff, split open with a crack. The dust the shells threw up swallowed him in an instant. The gun traversed again.

"Fuck……."

In the moment the barrel slowly tried to meet my eyes, I felt a texture at my fingertips that was not like the rest.

This?

My neck had locked stiff, so I couldn't drop my head to see what it was. It didn't matter. I knew that familiar feel at once.

The core with a 99.99% chance of failure.

The situation was already past saving. The only thing I could use, with nothing but a twitch of a finger, was the core. Did I use it?

The barrel halted its traverse, fixed dead on me. The gun's odds of functioning normally still wavered in front of my eyes.

Maybe because two bursts had overheated it, the figure that had sat at 100% had slipped a little. On this shot, a generous 0.1% chance the gun would fail. Set against that, the chance of coming out ahead by using this core was 0.01%. On paper, which was the better bet was obvious. In practice, it came to the same thing either way.

And yet. Why was it?

Of all people to surface in a moment like this, the Physiognomist.

And then all five fingers were touching the core.

The survival method I'd drilled into the hunter trainees.

The next moment, all five fingers were already being drawn deep into the core. Heat surged in, as if it were pouring along my veins. The core's red light flashed like lightning, and the world in front of me reeled. My eyes snapped shut from the force of it.

In the black behind them, it felt as if the world had turned over. A fissure opened in a world sunk under darkness, and bright light forced its way through the gap—a wave breaking the skin of the cosmos, an iron horse tearing down a tunnel.

……The Subway?

When I opened my eyes again, contrary to everything I had felt, the world was exactly where I had left it.

Only one thing was different.

Something had changed.