Chapter 270

“It’s been a long time, Bebe.”

In all of his twenty-seven years, only Lewis McCarthy had ever called Siron by that name. There were so many things Siron had wanted to ask him when they met again—where he had been when Siron was abducted, why he hadn’t come for him though still alive, what he had been doing all this time.

But now, face-to-face with Lewis, not a single one of those questions rose to his lips. His head, swollen with things he’d wanted to demand, was emptied at once. All he could think was that he couldn’t let go of the man who had come to rescue him from drifting on that pitch-black sea in the grip of death.

“P-please, save me!”

Clutching Lewis’s arm with all his strength, Siron was hauled up onto the boat. He collapsed to the floorboards, coughing up seawater and trembling violently. Relief at having escaped death broke from him in sobs.

“Lewis—h-hhk—thank you. Hhh, thank you, hhuk, thank you for saving me.”

But it was too soon for relief. The boat rocked so violently in the waves it seemed ready to overturn at any moment. Terrified he would tumble back into the sea, Siron scrambled desperately forward and clung to Lewis’s leg.

“Baekgyeong—hhhk—Isaac... I can’t see them. Hhhuu, they must’ve—must’ve fallen into the water.”

What Siron wanted was for Lewis to cup his frozen face in his hands, to tell him they would find Baekgyeong and Isaac, that nothing would happen to make him afraid as long as Lewis was here. But the man who had pulled him out of the sea offered no such comfort.

The boat pitched on the verge of capsizing. They stood together at the razor’s edge of life and death. Siron should not have had the time or room to be swayed by such details—but Lewis’s unresponsive silence still unsettled him.

There was no time to dwell. A conical beam of light dropped from the sky and landed a short distance away. The helicopter’s searchlight swept toward the boat, bleaching their vision in white.

“Lewis! Run! Now!”

Siron shouted, panic-stricken. The nearer the helicopter came, the harsher the wind whipped up, spray exploding in every direction. Forcing his eyes open against the blinding wash, Siron stared at it—and realized suddenly that there was one more person on the boat. Aside from him and Lewis, a man crouched low, clutching a chair on the deck.

Who is that?

Their eyes met, and a chill ran down Siron’s spine. His chest seized so hard with dread and nameless déjà vu that he could barely breathe. Crawling hastily in the opposite direction, he threw himself against Lewis’s body to hide from the man’s gaze.

The helicopter blades thundered nearer, shaking the air. When Siron tilted his head back, he saw someone clinging to the rope ladder, shouting down with an outstretched hand. That hand, reaching for him—he saw it clearly.

“Lewis, please. What are you doing? We have to run!”

Maybe his plea finally reached him; Lewis started the engine. But not in the direction Siron expected. He turned the wheel and began circling under the descending helicopter.

Siron stared up at him, clinging to his leg, dumbfounded. They looped through the broad cone of white light fanning down from the helicopter. It looked as if Lewis were waiting for the right chance to make contact with the man on the ladder.

But the lower the helicopter hovered, the less control it had. The figure on the ladder swung wildly like a tightrope clown. After several failed attempts to steady near the surface, the helicopter gave up and climbed into the sky. The roar of the rotors faded; static crackled over the radio.

—Proceed east to the resort pier. Over.

“Confirmed. Moving to designated point.”

Siron flinched. His terror of death remained, but Lewis’s unfamiliar voice brought his thoughts snapping back. Lewis was on the radio. Taking orders—from someone in Hybris, no doubt.

Something had changed in him during his disappearance. Changed in a way that filled Siron with dread. And their boat was heading farther and farther from the prison.

Baekgyeong, Isaac...

The farther they went, the more Somora Prison shrank into a black mass against the sea, no longer a fortress but just a blur. What had happened to them? The thing like red ink spreading from Isaac’s side in the tunnel—what was it? Had they too been captured by the men who chased them? Or had they somehow escaped?

No. Impossible. The two of them would never have left without knowing whether Siron was alive.

Numb, staring at the prison receding behind them, Siron lifted his trembling eyes.

“Lewis, there are still people there. Just once, just once—check—”

“Turn left!”

The interruption came from a stranger’s voice before he could finish. Lewis looked back as a wave slammed the boat’s side. Siron, who had almost forgotten there was a third man aboard, stiffened at the growing light and the unsettling sound of laughter. The sea itself seemed to fall silent—the hiss of spray and slap of waves cut off all at once.

“Left? The resort pier is straight ahead. ...Ted. What are you doing?”

An alien beam swept over them in an instant, casting Siron into a prison of pale light. Blinking fast, he forced clarity into his bleached vision. A man wearing a headlamp leaned close, gun aimed at Lewis, his shadowed face tipped toward Siron. Beyond the blinding white, his features were swallowed in black. Siron held his breath, staring at the uncanny presence.

“So this is what your face looks like?”

“...What?”

The voice rang oddly familiar. Siron’s fingers clamped so tightly on Lewis’s leg they tingled, but he couldn’t loosen them.

“Wh-who are you?”

“Ha. Don’t know me? Don’t know who I am?”

The mocking tone almost pulled the truth into focus—but a violent wave slammed the stern, nearly breaking his grip, and Siron lost the thought. The man studied Siron’s pale, vacant face with interest, then flicked a signal to Lewis.

“Didn’t you hear me? Turn the wheel. We’re going to the mainland.”

“You plan to disobey orders?”

Ted sneered, ridiculing him.

“Cut the bullshit. You think I’d dare defy the Architect’s command to bring in an omega?”

The word omega made Siron flinch, his body shivering against Lewis. Lewis, feeling it, asked:

“Then what do you want?”

“I need to confirm something with him. So quit stalling and turn the wheel, unless you want me to put a hole in your skull.”

Lewis chuckled, shoulders shaking. He knew the sound would scrape Ted’s nerves raw, and couldn’t stop himself.

He glanced down at Siron clinging to him like a baby koala. Terrified, yet that pretty face was still plastered with stubborn hope. Looking at it made Lewis want to repent, to accept pure pain, bleeding under the lash.

But another part of him knew he had longed for this moment. That the transgression cleared his head.

So Lewis yielded, turning the boat toward the waves and steering for shore under Ted’s gun.

The boat carrying the three of them skimmed across the swells, racing along the coast. At last, dawn brightened the horizon enough for clear sight. Ted sat with the jolting vibration of the hull beneath him, savoring the plans he was about to set in motion.

His destination was a quiet seaside town on the outskirts of Baggers City. There, a villa belonging to a close friend waited—a place where Ted and companions with the same tastes often gathered to create memories they would never forget. No matter what depravity they committed in that hideout, his father, the city’s police commissioner, always made sure nothing ever came of it.

Remembering those sweet times, Ted licked his lips and looked down at the man unconscious in his own vomit from seasickness.

3543. A homeless man from Lemon Island’s genetic experiments, remade into the world’s only omega. Strangely, his face was nothing like what Ted had seen on the island. Beneath the bruises and swelling was a startlingly fine-boned face. How had such a man ended up homeless? Ted was curious about the unlucky path of his life.

      The stranger thing was how Lewis and 3543 seemed to know each other. An acquaintance reappearing as an omega should have been earth-shaking, yet Lewis accepted it with unnatural calm, as if it made perfect sense. There was clearly some story there.

      I’ll figure it out later.

      Staring at Lewis’s scruffy golden hair from behind, Ted ordered:

      “Head farther south. About a kilometer more, there’s a dock. Tie up there.”

      Without a word or glance back, Lewis obeyed. Just before the sun’s rim broke the horizon, they steered into a deep U-shaped inlet on private property and moored the boat.

      Lewis looped the rope around a post and turned back. Under the paling sky of dawn, Ted’s face looked almost unnaturally handsome, arrogant as he looked down at them.

      “So what now?”

      “Pick him up. Hold him like a child.”

      “...What?”

      Lewis’s expression was incredulous. But understanding Ted’s intent, his face hardened. With open irritation, he grabbed 3543’s arm and hauled him upright. The man was thin but grown; holding him like a child meant bearing his weight and leaving his own arms constrained.

      Lewis stared down at the vomit-streaked face, then wordlessly lifted the hem of his T-shirt and wiped it clean. The unconscious tenderness of the act narrowed Ted’s watchful eyes.