The Story of the Erased Side (2)

She asked if I knew him.

Instead of answering, I looked at Seo Jin-gyeong's face.

The little kid from the photo that man used to show off in the unit tent twenty years ago was standing in front of me now, asking after her father's whereabouts.

Come to think of it, she had his eyes.

I had kept a rule for twenty years.

If anyone asked about the Grand Hall, I brushed it off as ancient history. If they asked about those days, I said I didn't remember and closed the subject.

But that rule had been built against the world — not against that man's daughter.

"Sit down. This isn't something you hear standing up."

Seo Jin-gyeong set her tablet back down and sat.

The way she settled into the chair was careful, almost delicate — like someone who had waited twenty years for an answer and was now rationing even her own breathing.

"Your father was a man with a terrible sense of humor."

At that first sentence, Seo Jin-gyeong's eyes wavered hard.

It was the face of someone who had expected records, or combat reports — not a person.

"On that battlefield, everyone got quieter. When you might die tomorrow, your mouth doesn't exactly open easy. But that man was the opposite. He never gave his mouth a rest."

"My first night after the draft, I was shaking in a corner of the tent. He was the first one who came over and talked to me. Didn't tell me not to shake. Didn't say it'd be okay. Just shoved a photo of his daughter in my face, no warning."

"And he said — if you're scared, look at somebody else's family photo. People don't run when they can see what they're supposed to protect."

"You'd think that wouldn't mean much to a kid who wasn't even twenty yet. But it worked. That was the first night I managed to sleep."

"Among the people who'd been called up, he was on the older side. His power was modest, too. Hardening his body like a chunk of iron — that was all he had. Surrounded by people spitting fire and throwing lightning, he barely registered."

"But on the battlefield, that modest power was the most precious thing we had. We had firepower to spare. The problem was having someone to hold the front while that firepower got ready. That man stood in that spot every single time. Not because his power was the hardest to kill — because he was the ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠man who refused to give ground."

"And strangely enough, on the days he went quiet, the whole unit got restless. His jokes were like roll call for us. Proof we were still alive that day."

Seo Jin-gyeong pressed her lips together.

It wasn't the face of someone holding back tears. It was the face of someone holding back questions.

"He treated me like a kid more than anyone. I was the youngest in the unit. Said I was only a few years older than the daughter he'd left at home. Whenever there was leftover food, he'd shove it toward me."

"And every time we sortied, he said the same thing."

I fiddled with the paper cup.

"We've ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠got to wrap this up quick and clock out. Fridays are fried chicken night with my little girl."

I saw Seo Jin-gyeong's breath catch.

"Said his daughter was scared of chicken legs and wouldn't eat them, so anything she left half-chewed, he'd finish for her. You'd think he'd get tired of it, but it was the same line every time. The whole unit had that girl's fried-chicken preferences memorized, and none of us had ever even seen her face."

"...That's right."

Seo Jin-gyeong's voice cracked as it came out.

"I was scared of the meat tearing off the bone, so I couldn't eat chicken legs when I was little. So Dad always tore them up for me first."

The words stopped there.

It felt like the sound of two twenty-year-old memories locking into place was audible inside the narrow Civil Affairs Office.

With trembling hands, Seo Jin-gyeong opened her bag.

From her wallet she pulled out a single worn photograph. The corners were frayed white. A father and a girl of six or seven, smiling over a box of fried chicken.

"This is all I have left. Of my father's things."

I looked at that photo for a long time.

I had seen it hundreds of times in the tent. He pulled it out so often that I even knew when the corners had first started to fray.

"That used to be two photos."

Seo Jin-gyeong raised her head.

"He carried one of them. Left breast pocket. Before every sortie, he had a habit of tapping that spot."

Seo Jin-gyeong covered her mouth with the hand still holding the photo.

I waited until she could breathe again before I continued.

"I'll tell you about the Grand Hall."

"What the world knows is that one man held the final defensive line alone for three days. That's true. Those three days — I really was alone."

"But on that defensive line, there was half a day that never made it into the records."

Seo Jin-gyeong held her breath.

"The evacuation corridor didn't have just one entrance. The front was the widest, and I took that. The things poured hardest into there, too. But on the flank there was a narrow blind angle. A gap you wouldn't easily notice."

"They started leaking through that way too. I couldn't leave the front. Half a step back and the front would break, and every civilian behind us would be wiped out in one sweep."

"Your father took that blind angle. Nobody ordered him. He volunteered."

Seo Jin-gyeong couldn't say a word.

"He told me — you take the front, kid. I'll take the side. And he stuck on one of those jokes he always made."

"We'll wrap this up quick and clock out."

"Nobody laughed when he said it. First time. First time nobody laughed at one of his jokes. Everyone knew what it meant."

"With nothing but that hardening power, he plugged that narrow blind angle with his body. For half a day. Out of the corner of my eye while I held the front, I could see his back the whole time."

"Around the half-day mark, that back started to sway. His power was spent. The last thing he did was turn his head just enough to say one line."

"Handing off the side too, kid. I'm counting on you."

"And instead of falling back, he walked further into the blind angle. Trying to fill that gap with his own body to the very end. That was the last back I ever saw."

I looked Seo Jin-gyeong straight in the eye.

"After that, I held the front and that blind angle both. Alone."

"The world says I held out alone for three days. That's correct. But that first half-day — the reason I could pour everything into the front alone — was because that man was holding the side. That half-day isn't in any record."

"I'll tell you why there's no body, too."

Seo Jin-gyeong's shoulders went rigid.

"Because he walked all the way into the blind angle. If he'd fallen back even half a step, there might have been a body left. But that man took every last step inward."

"What remained in that place were two things. The traces that for half a day, not a single one of them got a foot past that blind angle — and half a photograph lying on the ground in front of it."

"The night of the second day, when the circuits burned — that was during those three days."

I flicked my white hair with a finger.

"This didn't go gray from age. It's a burn mark from then. The circuits were burning like a fuse, and I still couldn't fall back. I knew what that blind angle had cost in lives. If I gave it up, his death would mean nothing. So I clenched down on the burned circuits with my teeth and forced them back together."

For the first time, a tear fell from Seo Jin-gyeong's eye.

"I never found the other half of the photo. I'm sorry, but that's everything. Still — that half was enough for me to know. What that man was looking at in his last moment. What he was standing for."

The fluorescent light in the Civil Affairs Office hummed low.

"In twenty years, I've never said this to a family member. There was no way to. So know that this is twenty years late."

I bowed my head a little toward her.

"I couldn't save him. I'm sorry."

Seo Jin-gyeong was silent for a long time.

She didn't cry. She didn't lower her head. But the hands folded on her knees had gone white with pressure.

"Just one more question."

When her voice finally came, it was unexpectedly calm.

"Was my father afraid?"

It wasn't a reporter's question.

It was a daughter's.

"He was afraid."

I answered right away.

"Nobody there wasn't. I was afraid too. But that man just had a different way of covering it. He covered it with jokes. Right to the end."

"So he didn't walk in because he had no fear. He walked in knowing full well how afraid he was. Those two things are completely different stories."

Seo Jin-gyeong nodded slowly.

And for the first time, she smiled a little — not as a reporter, not as a bereaved family member.

"That sounds like Dad."

She said it as she slipped the photo back into her wallet.

"This story. Not a single line of it is in the records, is it."

"No. Because they erased it."

"Then starting today, I'm the record. Where my father disappeared, and how — now there are two people in this world who know."

After that, for a while, we sat quietly and let our respective twenty years pass between us.

Seo Jin-gyeong was the first to stand.

"You going to write an article."

"Of course I am."

She answered as she put her tablet into her bag.

"But it won't be about you, Chief. My target is the side that did the erasing. Draft rosters. Missing-person processing. No stated reason. Twenty years of paperwork, and I'm going to put my hands around their throat with it. Who Baekjeong is won't get a single line."

"When a living witness gets loud, people go after the person before they go after the testimony. You just stay quiet, Chief. That's the scariest card you have."

"And when I'm ready, I'll ask you then. Whether you're willing to testify. I'm not asking today. What I heard today isn't an article. It's a memorial service."

She made the business of protecting someone sound that bureaucratic.

Definitely that man's daughter.

"If you hit a wall, come find me."

I said it as I tore open a fresh Mocha Gold.

"This place is for handling complaints, after all."

Seo Jin-gyeong huffed a short laugh.

Then at the door she turned and bowed deeply.

It wasn't a greeting for a source. It was a greeting — twenty years late — for the man who had watched her father's end.

The door closed.

On the closed ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠door, the Closed for Business sign hung crooked.

The complaint I'd handled today was the kind you couldn't enter in the intake log.

Alone in the Civil Affairs Office, I finished the rest of the cold coffee.

My chest felt strangely light. Like I'd spent twenty years sitting on a grave, and for the first time I'd managed to set a proper headstone.

And the person who'd raised it with me was the very reporter everyone blamed for dragging me back into the world.

The gallery would howl that she'd dug up my quiet corner. They wouldn't be entirely wrong.

But my telekinesis can fold a mountain and still can't punch through a single sheet of paper. ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠The paper that erased me twenty years ago — I still can't open it.

That woman can. With a pen. With her name on the line, and her livelihood on the line.

She wasn't selling me out. She was going to carry the place I'd spent twenty years running from.

I didn't know what you call something like that. But I was certain of one thing — she wasn't an enemy.

Still, one thing snagged in my mind.

The package with no sender.

That hand that had turned the lock from the inside.

There's only one neighborhood in this game that wants Baekjeong to be real more than anyone else alive.

Gaon. Ever since their signboard got smashed by my student, they'd been clicking their abacus beads, trying to rebrand that humiliation as the glory of receiving a lesson from the heir to a legend.

Wherever that woman dug, they had calculated that the last shovel-stroke would turn up Baekjeong — and they'd put the shovel in her hands for exactly that reason.

But just now, that woman had decided not to dig for Baekjeong.

The article would carry only the side that did the erasing.

On the board Gaon had laid out, the shovel had turned of its own will.

Not toward a guild. Toward the state.

I looked down at the empty paper cup and thought for a moment.

The side that erased me twenty years ago were not the kind of men who would hide behind paperwork and simply watch a shovel get driven into their own grave.

They were the kind who locked the door with four words — no stated reason — even on a single request for access.

Once someone started knocking on that door in earnest, they wouldn't open it. They'd start looking for the hand doing the knocking.

A headache was just starting to form when the internal line on my desk rang.

There was no reason for an Association internal line to ring in the Civil Affairs Office well after closing time.

I picked up the receiver.

The secretary of the man who had spent twenty years avoiding me had dialed the Civil Affairs Office internal line at ten o'clock at night.