L*st and Death

“Ron, did you make that account I told you about?”

Siron turned his head toward the voice calling him. Ashimi Sumar, who was glued to his phone anytime the boss stepped out, was once again calling out to Siron without so much as glancing up from his screen.

“Account? What account?”

“Oh, come on. You never actually listen to me, do you? I called you last weekend and told you to make a Fresh Eats delivery driver account right away.”

Last weekend—Siron had spent the entire day binge-watching the second season of Return to Bunker. He’d been totally immersed in the story of Plus Company soldiers surviving and dying on the front lines of WWII, so he remembered nothing of the short phone call he’d had with Ashimi.

“...Ah. Right.”

At Siron’s dumb response, Ashimi finally looked up and sighed dramatically, holding out his hand.

“Give me your phone.”

“No.”

“Hurry up!”

Siron reluctantly handed it over, not wanting to sit through another of Ashimi’s lectures.

“Pattern?”

“Capital Z.”

“Wow... that’s very you.”

Ashimi absentmindedly rubbed his greasy mustache and opened the App Store. Siron watched in dismay as the oil from Ashimi’s pores smudged across the screen of his phone and asked,

“What are you doing?”

“Downloading the Fresh Eats app. I told you, Fresh is starting a food delivery service.”

The memory clicked into place. On the TV, Private Norman Anderson was flashing back to happier times just before his death, while on his phone, Ashimi had been nagging him to install an app. But when faced with one of Return to Bunker’s most iconic scenes, Ashimi’s voice hadn’t stood a chance.

“The world’s changing fast. You’re really planning to be chained to this dinky little curry shop forever? I have to tough it out another year because of my visa, but you don’t.”

Their workplace, Curry King, was a Pakistani curry joint run by a local immigrant, famous in Riverland for good food at cheap prices. Since delivery orders made up most of the business, Siron and Ashimi were mostly delivery staff—but when orders were backed up, they pitched in with kitchen and table service too. Basically, whatever the boss told them to do, they did.

“Fresh Eats pays you per delivery. If you do twenty in a day, you’ll earn way more than our daily rate.”

Smartphones had only been around for barely a decade, and the world was already changing at a dizzying pace. Ashimi was always attuned to that pace. Back in Bangladesh, he’d worked as a fund manager—but for the sake of his children’s education, he’d given up a high income to emigrate to the U.S., where visa problems landed him at a Pakistani restaurant. He was only five years older than Siron, but Siron often felt like he was at least twenty years ahead in life experience.

Ashimi was never afraid to jump into something new—just last year, he’d gotten into a cryptocurrency called Deepcoin. It was supposedly an encrypted digital asset developed by a mysterious Japanese cryptographer named Ryō Hirase. Siron didn’t understand even a quarter of what Ashimi rambled about.

He claimed some article online said crypto would upend the world and redefine wealth. Ashimi had practically dragged Siron by the collar, insisting he buy Deepcoin immediately. But Siron had no intention of spending a single cent on a virtual currency that cost \$14 per coin—less valuable than game money.

“I’ve got the app installed. All you need now is a driver account. Ron, if you want to take a day off, no one will hassle you, and if you want to earn more, you just take more orders. If you’re not sure, just try two or three deliveries and see how it feels.”

The ability to work more or less depending on the day—it was definitely appealing. Still, Siron didn’t dislike working at Curry King. Though Ashimi would probably flip the table if he found out, their boss gave Siron the same weekly wage as Ashimi, despite Siron only working there two years compared to Ashimi’s three. The reason? Since Siron started, their reviews and star rating had gone up.

The more he thought about it, the less reason he had to leave. Is this guy trying to push me out or something?

Unable to ask that outright, Siron scratched his nose and gave a mild smile.

“Yeah, I’ll try it later.”

“Sure you will. You’ll probably never do it. Guys like you, who never get off their ass, always miss good chances and end up whining in regret.”

“You have a real gift for making normal advice sound insufferable.”

Unfortunately, Siron couldn’t deny at least some truth in Ashimi’s harsh evaluation. Even knowing something was toxic, he let himself stay bound to shitty relationships, wasting his years.

There had been a time when he’d sip expensive wine in a luxury penthouse, sneering down at the Han River. But the scandal cost him everything—he’d blown all his money on breach-of-contract fees, and now he was broke. These days, he scraped by taking sketchy clinical trial gigs with unknown side effects.

Siron was still chewing on the bitterness of his misfortune when his thoughts circled back to the drug trial—and he jumped. He’d completely forgotten to send in the side effect log he was supposed to submit to Dr. Johnson by noon. It was already 4 p.m.

“I gotta use the bathroom!”

Siron rushed inside and pulled up the email from Dr. Johnson on his phone.

Hello. This is Dr. Johnson Lube.

Following up on Day 4 of the Testosterone/Placebo-Controlled (Injectable) Phase I administration.

Please submit your brief survey and report. Awaiting your response.

The survey had only three questions:

Q1. Have you experienced any new reactions or side effects since the first injection?

Q2. Since the first injection, were you able to achieve and maintain an erection sufficient for intercourse in response to sexual stimulation?

Q3. Since the first injection, have you experienced a burning sensation in the scrotal or perineal region?

It had been five days since the first injection. Thankfully, nothing severe enough to call the doctor over had happened.

“What’s with the burning sensation in the scrotum and perineum question? Is that a side effect?”

Last night, Siron had felt some mild tingling and prickly cramps in his lower belly and perineum just before falling asleep—but by morning, the symptoms had vanished completely. It felt like a possible side effect, but Siron figured the company’s experts knew what they were doing and continued filling out the form.

He had even tried masturbating, out of a personal rule that he had to earn every cent he was paid—but his dick was still as unresponsive as ever. Oddly though, his frequent urination had improved. He no longer had to run to the bathroom every hour or two.

Out of the three planned injections, he’d only received the first—and already, his broken prostate seemed to be gradually returning to normal. One shot had earned him \$1,000 after taxes and might even be curing his bladder issues.

“Kill two birds with one stone, light the nest on fire for warmth, and maybe cook the damn bird while you’re at it. Oh General Kyung, this is what they call a multi-win scenario.”

Siron muttered gleefully to himself in Korean.

Every now and then, random lines of dialogue he’d once struggled to memorize would pop into his head out of nowhere. The ones that didn’t roll off the tongue easily were usually the ones he’d drilled the hardest. Smiling at how perfectly the quote fit the moment, Siron suddenly remembered the man he used to run lines with—and the smile vanished.

“Hey, Ron. Did you clog the toilet or something?”

It was the boss—Ikbal—calling from outside. Siron hadn’t even noticed he’d returned from his errands.

“...Huh?”

“If you’re not plunging out a monster shit, get out here now!”

Siron stepped out to find Ikbal glaring at him with disapproval.

“The hell were you doing in there? Doesn’t smell like you took a dump.”

He had more than a few shameful memories of getting caught by Ikbal, but still—he couldn’t exactly say he’d been filling out a post-injection survey for an erectile dysfunction trial.

“...Bad constipation.”

“Sure. That’s why you were surfing the web on your phone the whole time. We’ve got an order. Go help Ashimi.”

As Siron tried to hurry through the restaurant hall, he ran into an unexpected obstacle. Two young East Asian women, clearly not fluent in English, were sitting in the middle of the dining area using a translation app to interpret the menu.

“Goat bee...riyani? Goat means goat, right?”

“Probably? Biryani... what even is that?”

Familiar Korean stopped Siron in his tracks. He quickly pulled up his mask to cover half his face and slipped into the kitchen. Ashimi, catching the subtle panic, asked quietly,

“Tourists from Korea?”

“Yeah.”

Ashimi clicked his tongue.

“Ron. Do you really think every Korean alive knows your face?”

I was pretty famous, actually. Made the front page of the paper more than once. Even showed up on the 9 o’clock news a few times.

Siron wanted to snark back, but he didn’t say what he was really thinking. Everyone downplays their own past sins. It’s human nature.

“...Not really. I was just some flash-in-the-pan online scandal.”

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