L*st and Death

Isaac opened his eyes to a strange sense of peace. He was leaning against something—not a bed, not a chair, but the entrance.

The entrance? He had no idea why he was here. Staring blankly into the unfamiliar-looking living room with a dazed, dreamlike feeling, he felt as if the whole world were spiraling into a single point far off in the distance. He was dizzy, like he had just felt this exact sensation minutes earlier.

Isaac realized he must’ve passed out from the sharp headache and vertigo.

“Fuck.”

It had clearly been broad daylight when he lost consciousness—but now, the view outside was pitch black. And it was dead silent.

Then, like someone had snapped their fingers, his mind cleared, and the blurry fragments of memory came sharply into focus.

“Yoon Siron.”

The name escaped his lips in a gasp as all the blood in his body ran cold. Isaac stood up at once. The shackles that had bound Siron’s ankle were empty. Siron was nowhere in the hideout. He must have used Isaac’s unconscious body to scan his fingerprint and escape. Every nerve in Isaac’s body went on high alert.

He rushed to unlock the door to the secure room. At its center stood two massive cabinets. On the left were multiple monitors and a computer; on the right, an array of weapons neatly displayed on a rack. The room had been rigged with traps that would destroy all data on the computer and in the cabinets under specific triggers.

His hands tense, Isaac grabbed the mouse. The monitors displayed CCTV feeds from the hideout perimeter and motion sensor logs overlaid with geographical data from the Sombras mountains.

Siron’s escape time was logged at 11:13 AM. From 11:00 AM to the current time—8:58 PM—there were forty-two sensor triggers, but none near the exit path that led to the roads outside the mountain. That meant, with high probability, Siron was still somewhere in the woods.

Isaac mentally logged all time and location data, geared up, and left the hideout.

There were no real paths in the untouched mountain. If Siron had followed the standard survival advice—follow the flow of water—then he would’ve ended up in the worst possible place: the swamp. The entire base of the Sombras mountain range was encircled by marsh, where all the stream runoff pooled into thick, stagnant mire instead of flowing to a river.

The swamp at the foot of the mountain was covered in mud and plant debris, with dense underbrush masking its surface. A first-time traveler could easily mistake it for solid ground and fall in. Worse, Isaac had rigged multiple booby traps all over the area to prevent uninvited guests from approaching.

“Goddamn it!”

There was no way Siron could still be alive. In his mind, Isaac could already see that soft, unarmored body torn apart somewhere in the forest. The image alone made his vision flush red with rage. He screamed Siron’s name until his throat tore, but no reply came from the dark.

Starting at the location of the nearest triggered sensor, Isaac began sweeping the northern slope. The green-hued images within the 40-degree field of view in his night vision scope looked like something from a ghost world.

Eventually, he reached the swamp. Burning with fever and too far gone to feel exhaustion, he called out Siron’s name while scanning the flattened brush. But there was no response from the black mire. Through the scope, he spotted a pair of shoes floating on the swamp water.

Mind blank with desperation, Isaac stepped into the bog. But what he retrieved was a pair far too large to be Siron’s—they were the shoes of the unnamed man Isaac had thrown into the swamp days earlier.

How long had he searched, stumbling through the forest and marsh? Isaac’s body slowly began shutting down from the pain. Cold sweat drenched him, his eyes twitched uncontrollably, and his lungs shriveled like dried bread. The fucking migraine pounded relentlessly from inside and out. He must’ve slammed into something hard when he fell unconscious.

Was he too complacent? Should he have ruled through fear, made Siron too terrified to even dream of escape? It was because he treated Siron like a human being that this had happened.

Isaac let out a manic, deranged laugh. He wanted to rip out Yoon Siron’s throat and kill him with his own teeth.

He passed the trap where a wild animal had once been caught and died, and approached the area logged by the 29th sensor trigger. Finally, just above the edge between swamp and mountain, he found a trace of human presence: several ten-dollar bills, smeared with mud, scattered across the underbrush.

Someone must’ve tripped a low-set wire trap and dropped them. In most of those traps, Isaac had installed net snares—and just as expected, someone had triggered one.

The moment he saw Yoon Siron crumpled unconscious inside the net, all of Isaac’s fury drained away. Suspended in the air, Siron looked like a fly trapped in a massive spiderweb. His legs were caked in dried mud up to the thighs—he’d clearly mistaken the marsh for solid ground.

Isaac stared up at him in a haze. Then, scrambling, he climbed the tree to where the snare rope was anchored. Loosening the tension, he slowly lowered Siron to the ground. The body in the net flinched like a fish. As Isaac cut through the dense, tough mesh, Siron stirred and asked with a trembling voice,

“...D-Doctor Johnson. ...Are you Isaac?”

Siron looked up with unfocused eyes. The forest was too dark for him to see anything. Isaac stared down at him for a long while before finally replying, eerily calm,

“Yes.”

“Ah... thank God.”

Siron reached for him, fumbling with both hands until he found Isaac’s and grabbed on like he’d never let go. He was crying, overwhelmed.

“I really... thought I was gonna die. I even lost my shoes in the swamp, sniff... God, the mosquitos, the wild animals...”

Isaac stared down at the panicking Siron, dazed. Then he shook off the trance and returned to reality. Siron was a mess. Covered in mud, bruised, soaked—like a wounded rat. Isaac hoisted him onto his back. Siron didn’t resist. He wrapped his arms around Isaac’s neck and leaned his head forward.

“I don’t like using the phrase ‘hell on earth,’ but... this was hell.”

“......”

“I heard somewhere that if you follow the flow of water, you’ll end up at a river. But the water here led straight into the swamp. You know those gazelles on nature documentaries that get stuck in a bog while running from lions? That almost happened to me. I gave it everything I had so I wouldn’t die some pathetic death. If I died, Jiyeon would think I ran off and didn’t pay her tuition. I couldn’t die like that.”

Siron rambled on about what had happened in the forest and Jiyeon’s tuition, but then he fell silent. Isaac felt the slump of his weight—he’d gone quiet again.

“Why aren’t you saying anything? I almost died out there.”

“......”

“You’re mad, huh?”

Isaac didn’t reply. He didn’t want to.

“Come on. You are mad. ...Honestly, I’d be pissed too.”

As if a bruised ego was all this was. If it had been anyone other than Yoon Siron, Isaac would’ve put a gun to their forehead by now. And yet he couldn’t stand Siron’s irritating ability to sympathize and assume his feelings. Siron, of course, couldn’t process emotion quietly and muttered aloud,

“But wasn’t it kind of inevitable? Who wouldn’t take a chance like that? I’ve been waiting for a shot to escape forever!”

“Hah.”

“You should’ve warned me how dangerous it is out here at least!”

Fatigue settled over Isaac like fog. And still, his mood didn’t lift. He felt like a broken, mangled body falling endlessly into the dirt. Even though he’d gotten Siron back, the storm of emotions inside him didn’t subside. He thought hard. In the end, the truth was simple.

He wasn’t just angry—he was scared.

“Unbelievable.”

“Hey, you’re finally talking.”

Siron, overwhelmed with relief to be alive, seemed to have completely forgotten that his escape had nearly cost him his life. Or maybe he was just cunning enough to assume Isaac would forgive him again—because he was necessary. And strangely, Isaac didn’t want to punish him this time either.

“Is your head okay?”

“It’s fine.”

“Thank God. ...I was a little worried you might’ve died.”

Siron leaned his forehead against the back of Isaac’s head and let out a long sigh. The warm breath spreading across Isaac’s neck gave him chills. As they climbed the slope together, Siron loosened his muscles and leaned against him, fully relaxed.

On the way back to the hideout, Isaac couldn’t stop thinking: the man who might become his mate—might also be the root of his lifelong anxiety.

Back at the hideout, Siron went straight to the bathroom. After a quick shower under ice-cold water, Isaac dabbed ointment over his body and handed him clothes. The one-piece he had once vehemently rejected—Siron now stared at it with a pensive look before reluctantly taking it.

“What’s this?”

Siron had noticed the long plastic case on the table.

“An injection.”

“I thought the third dose was the last one?”

“This is the final shot.”

Isaac met Siron’s wary eyes. Siron looked like he’d long since stopped trusting him but couldn’t rebel either, and now had nothing left but helpless resentment. Isaac felt a faint, unspoken sympathy—but didn’t let it show.

“Even if I say no, you’ll do it, right?”

“I’ll do it even if I have to tie you down and gag you.”

Siron gave up trying to reason with him. His face twisted with resignation as he turned away. Isaac stepped behind him. Untying the cord at his collar, the one-piece loosened, revealing a back covered in scrapes and bruises.

“You’re injecting my back?”

“The deltoid. It’ll sting for a couple of days. It’s a thick solution.”

“...What the hell are you putting in me?”

Siron groaned, clutching his face in his hands.

“No side effects, right?”

Isaac sat behind him, reading the serial number on the syringe cap in his head.

“None.”

He disinfected the area behind Siron’s shoulder. Where Siron couldn’t see, Isaac slipped a small implant—about the size of a pill—into the syringe. It was a chip, used for location tracking and identity verification.

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