Chapter Text
“So you . . .” Player 456 is looking at him like he can’t quite comprehend what he’s hearing. As if the words have registered without making sense. They both hear what he can’t seem to bring himself to articulate, and the weight of what they haven’t touched hangs heavy. The expression behind Gi-hun’s eyes makes In-ho unexpectedly uncomfortable, as if the other is seeing through him into vulnerabilities he’d rather push down and pretend don’t exist.
“It was the only way to get back to her. Cirrhosis progresses quickly, scars the liver until barely any healthy tissue remains and its ability to function is practically nonexistent. They’re considered the sickest patients in the hospital for a reason.” A muscle jumps in his jaw under Gi-hun’s silent regard. His pity. The Front Man doesn’t want his pity, and he wishes the other man would stop looking at him like that. The player’s room when he’d first brought this up all over again. In-ho’s eyes find and hold the roof’s gravelly surface, but he can’t seem to stop the words crawling up his throat.
There’s very few things that focus one’s mind solely on the present. Terror is one. Grief another. When you love someone, you trade souls with them. They get a piece of yours and you get a piece of theirs. But when your love dies, a little piece of you dies with them. That’s why it hurts so bad.
She was his world. His home. His everything. Her forever young and him left living, a broken heart on borrowed time. He doesn’t deserve the right to grieve.
“The doctors had refused to believe her pain and muscle cramps. Her fatigue. Said she was making up stories during her routine checkups. She was already Stage 4 when they finally conceded to running the tests and caught it. Already pregnant and too stubborn to listen. In the end it didn’t matter what I did. Jun-ho’s family could barely wait to bury her. I missed the funeral.”
“Jun-ho’s family?”
“We’re only related on our father’s side.”
“Oh.” A contemplative look falls over Gi-hun’s face, as if he’s shuffling through memories of Jun-ho and seeing them in an entirely new light. “That explains the age gap, then. I’d wondered about that.” Gi-hun pauses, shifting his weight and adjusting his legs until the left is flat on the roof and the right is bent at the knee. Considering his words. The terror stinging his eyes whenever he looks at In-ho is still there, but also muted somehow. As if In-ho is a fractured mirror in which Player 456 sees himself. A breath. Another.
Careful measurement of how far he thinks In-ho will let him push.
“Does Jun-ho know what happened?”
An innocent question, or it should be. Except it’s not. Of course his brother doesn’t know. Doesn’t understand. Can’t understand. In-ho had tried to get the younger to come with him, bracing himself to bring his brother to his quarters and explain everything, but his brother had rebuffed him. Hadn’t wanted anything to do with him; doubt, shame, and disbelief waring for purchase behind his eyes. The man in the black mask begins to wake up at the back of his mind.
Young-il’s vulnerability and trust have no place in this world. You know that.
Discomfort prickles under his skin, anguish and upset at the memories and this entire situation morphing into an icy venom that pulls taut inside him. Even as the internal inferno of blue fire begins to demand release, In-ho wishes he could see the world through Gi-hun’s eyes. Gi-hun’s big dreamer eyes. Just one more time.
“Does Jung-bae know everything about your first games?”
The counterquestion is sharper than he’d been intending, clearly catching his enemy off guard. Clamming up immediately, Gi-hun drops his eyes from their relentless examination of his profile and the Front Man feels a vicious vindication as the other’s silence and discomfort confirms his point.
Thought not.
The same water rising behind their eyes, and only the two of them able to see the thoughts the other is drowning in. Darkness and light. Fire and water. Two sides of one coin. Today me, tomorrow you.
There has only ever really been one way this was going to end. Seong Gi-hun could never have fathomed that missing his train would change everything forever. How In-ho wishes the other would have just gotten on the damn plane.
Gi-hun recovers quickly, a mulish expression breaking over his features as his eyes leave the ground to sear into In-ho’s. He can’t help but know the Front Man is right and the anger decorating his features confirms it. Jung-bae is a victim, but Gi-hun has become the system. Just like In-ho. Neither his brother nor Player 456’s best friend could ever understand.
The long corridors riddled with cameras. Unable to stop chasing the Recruiter’s memory as it silently ate you alive. Self-isolating from everyone who once loved you in favor of pursing the games. Breaking your promise to your daughter and abandoning her to your obsession. Practically living in your little control room and only sleeping when your body becomes so tired it physically knocks you out. Anything to avoid your memories.
“All your talk about fairness and you won like that? And then you went back?” Gi-hun’s breath is speeding up as his upset gets the better of him. “We bet on you. That’s what you told me, even if I didn’t know it was you at the time. You think you’re so much better than us, that you’re not like us. That you can drink and bet with the rest of those spoiled cats who bet on you and con yourself into pretending you belong.” Gi-hun leans towards him, as if his poison can crawl into In-ho’s space by that action alone. “We’re humans. Not animals to be bet on, and the games have never been fair. Fairness is just a fucked up code you keep to hold the horrors at bay. You’re a hypocrite, In-ho. A dog. Trash that got lucky enough to escape the dumpster before it burned.”
The other’s eyes are licked with fury and pain.
Every choice has fangs.
How dare he think he has the right. The muscle jumps for an entirely different reason and his left hand forms a fist. In-ho doesn’t care that he’s clenching so hard the joints are no longer protected against impact. The pain is a welcome distraction as his mind refuses to admit even the glimmer of the possibility that he’s wrong.
The games are fair. Survival of the fittest is fair. Il-nam saved him and the choices were the best he could have made. The organization provides the authority and control his shambles of a life outside of it lacks.
Everything you touch you ruin.
“You still think a pistol can stop the games?”
Calm. Composed. An elegantly arched brow. He forces his hand to relax. As if Gi-hun’s statements haven’t bothered him in the slightest. In-ho’s been aware of the weapon since Player 456 sat down, and the comment serves as an effort to regain his equilibrium. And mess with Gi-hun. Push him over the edge they both know he’s teetering on. He doesn’t have the games to do that for him right now. It’s clear Player 456 remembers the comment and In-ho can tell just by the heat in the man’s eyes that his blood pressure is spiking.
Gi-hun gains his feet in a movement that’s anything but graceful, and the Front Man mirrors him. Stands with his back to the drop and his eyes calmly fixed on his rival. The other’s demeanor is as reckless and impulsive as usual.
“The games will stop when we capture the man you’re meeting.”
Oh Gi-hun.
“And the numerous guards he’ll be surrounded by? The capsule he’ll crack between his teeth if the meeting doesn’t go his way and he’s compromised? Didn’t account for that, did you.”
The last is a fact not a question. A testament to Player 456’s inability to plan very far down this invisible chess board they’re warring on. Gi-hun looks like he wants to hit him, and In-ho almost wishes he would.
“What if you manage to expose it? Somehow get past all the holes in the media, government, and other influential organizations and tell the people of South Korea what’s happening. Pretend you’re not a hypocrite yourself for making those small sacrifices for the greater good and rebrand yourself the hero. It’s ok for me to be the monster, but not you, is that right? Cleaning up society’s problems, providing a last chance to people driven to a dead end, being fair to them when society refuses to—you’ll tell the world how horrible that is. And what if they love you for it? What if they flock to play one more game courtesy of the organization you’ve proven exists? What if they, like the VIPs, don’t want it to stop.”
Player 456’s expression flickers. In-ho doesn’t let him voice the words forming on his lips.
“The games are inevitable. As inevitable as the sun rising tomorrow over this city. You can’t beat the system, Gi-hun. The rich will stay rich, and the poor will stay desperate. People will remain more than content to walk around others suffering on the street. South Korea is the VIPs’ favorite, and they’ll be more than upset that you’ve temporarily spoiled their fun and left them waiting for the fourth, fifth, and sixth games. They’ll want to know how the story ends.”
Fourth, fifth, and sixth games.
456.
In-ho files the irony away for future consideration. Future ammunition. Anything to hold the VIPs’ interests.
“The island was blown up.” Gi-hun says the words like a man drowning, alone and clinging to a damaged life preserver in the middle of the sea. In-ho grits his teeth briefly at the comment. The system shouldn’t even been able to be overridden like that.
“Merely a contingency. There are other places to play. Other places where the VIPs can get closure on this season. You think you’re just fighting the games in South Korea, but you’re wrong on that too, Player 456.”
Gi-hun opens his mouth to interject, perhaps to argue with him or put forward some demand, but the Front Man cuts him off.
“The international order of things is more than content to stay the way it is.”
The traces of a smirk pull the Front Man’s lips, and he savors the mental victory as Gi-hun’s expression crumples.
_________
Feet refusing to move fast enough. Breath stinging in his lungs.
Jun-ho dashes through the room they’d drilled in, thoughts spiraling in heavy circles as he tries and fails to wrestle free of the worry choking his chest. He’d thought sleeping in the same bed as In-ho was childish, but anything would have been better than this. Better than the roof. He hadn’t even thought his brother would do something like this. Slip away and contemplate something Jun-ho doesn’t want to even think about to avoid making it real. His fault for picking the new room. His failure.
His Hyung’s note is damp in his hand.
Don’t do this, In-ho. Don’t abandon me again. Let me help you. Don’t go somewhere I can’t follow.
He’d known his brother was hurting. Had known that ever since In-ho returned from the hell Jun-ho’s now experienced as the uncover Guard 29. His Hyung has been pulling away from everything for a while now, the dodged phone calls, refusal to spend time with their mother, and vacant expression testaments to In-ho’s inner struggles. Jun-ho has his own traumas—his Hyung’s face emerging from behind that mask and then the elder shooting him off the cliff chief among them—but he understands that In-ho’s life was far from easy even before the games.
Even though they’re brothers, the age gap has made things difficult at times. His Hyung the substitute for the dad who’d abandoned In-ho repeatedly, then remarried and finally left for good three months before Jun-ho was born. He knows the story only from his mother. One more entry on the long list of things the elder prefers not to talk about.
The others might think the Front Man is irredeemable, but Jun-ho refuses to give up on the flashes of his Hyung that show through In-ho’s stoney demeanor. His brother isn’t a bad person, he just broke along the way and made bad decisions. Jun-ho knows his brother is still in there somewhere, desperate and alone and searching for a way out of the darkness.
He doesn’t want to accept that this is their new normal. Their end. That the one he’s looked up to and worshipped his entire life would rather retreat from his pain in the most final sense than let Jun-ho back into his heart. As he forces the air in and out of his lungs, pushing past the discomfort and taking the stairs to the roof two at a time, a small voice whispers that perhaps a part of him has already come to terms with it. His mind accepting what his heart refuses to see.
“HYUNG!”
Jun-ho hears them before he sees them. Gi-hun and his brother, the former adjusting his position and swallowing the end of whatever he’d been saying at Jun-ho’s frantic call. They’re squared off against each other again, shoulders tense and electricity sparking the space that separates them. The calm before another brutal fight. A warped version of In-ho’s face looks at him as Gi-hun shifts to the side, his Hyung’s eyes flat and aloof, and Jun-ho can’t close the distance. Can’t reach him even though the ghost of his brother is right there. He doesn’t recognize the person staring back at him and it’s terrifying. The drop at In-ho’s back causes his heart rate to spike even more.
He’s has always held his heartbreak like a secret, neatly folded and tucked behind a smile, but the apparent fact that In-ho is willing to talk to Gi-hun and not him breaks the dam. Shatters the tenacious hold he’s kept on his saint’s patience about all of this. The note’s apparent sentiment flees the forefront of his mind, and Jun-ho forgets to be careful.
He’s about to purposely poke the monster living inside his brother, but at least maybe he’ll finally get something real in return. Some explanation for all of this. Some reason for why In-ho’s become the demon of so many people’s nightmares. Just something to help Jun-ho cope. In-ho’s cold eyes flick to the ground and then back to Jun-ho’s face as he pauses to kick a pistol back toward the stairs.
“Why?! Why did you do it?!”
A step back mirroring his step forward. Silence as his only answer. Again. It’s infuriating and throws Jun-ho’s sense of reason to the wind.
“Supervisors have an obligation to display exemplary behavior and—”
“—must never behave in ways that dishonor and bring discredit to the department. Thank you for quoting the handbook, Jun-ho, I remember. It wasn’t a bribe.”
“Everyone said it was, Hyung!”
“Everyone was wrong, but you believed them anyway.”
Flat and cold. As if stating a fact that has no effect on him. Jun-ho can tell from the strain around his brother’s eyes and the tightness of his facial features that that’s a lie. They’re much closer to the drop now, but the younger, blinded by his quest for answers, pays the threat no mind. His emotions refuse to be contained after being allowed an outlet.
“Then why won’t you just explain it to me? Why you went back to that place?! Please, Hyung.” He throws his hands up in the air in frustration, voice pleading and accusing at the same time, acutely aware that Gi-hun is silently watching their exchange. “Do you know how many people I saw be burned? How one of those vile elites you serve wanted to have a go at me, and even though you didn’t know it was me you simply allowed it to happen?”
In-ho’s eyes have dropped to the ground, and his expression, no longer blank, seems almost . . . ashamed. Much more open in a way that reminds Jun-ho abruptly of who he’d been before all this. Another few steps forward are immediately answered by the same number in reverse. His Hyung’s left hand clenches at his side.
“I asked you to come with me. I was going to explain. Try to.” His brother’s voice is rough, the kind of tone In-ho would always get back when he’d still been on the force. When a younger Jun-ho would pressure him for details about his latest shift, and something had happened or his brother had seen something he really didn’t want to relive by talking about it. “You made your disgust for me quite clear.”
A wave of hurt surges as the dots connect to what In-ho’s referencing. The unspoken assumption that Jun-ho would have been able to read through the smoke and mirrors after seeing his Hyung’s face emerge from the behind the mask.
“How was I supposed to know that’s why you asked that? You shot me off that cliff, Hyung, and I thought for months you’d been trying to kill me!” A sharp intake of breath follows that statement and Jun-ho wishes again that Gi-hun wasn’t present. In-ho’s shoulders have flicked forward, as if he’s trying to make himself small in the onslaught of Jun-ho’s unexpectedly explosive upset, and Jun-ho’s anger abruptly blows away. In its wake, his heart feels heavy with sadness, heartache, and an unexplainable need to support the one who supported him for most of his life. The one who’d saved his life by donating something of his own.
“I’ll say this again and again until it gets through to you, Hyung. I don’t despise you. I won’t give up on you. I won’t apologize for trying my hardest to protect you and save you from yourself.” In-ho’s eyes rise to meet his, and there’s a strange flicker in their depths that Jun-ho doesn’t like. “I wish I knew what made you this way, and I wish you’d have let me carry some of the burden these last ten years.”
I would burn my dreams away. Love you at your worst. Go anywhere for you. Just to stand in thankless shadows of your reckless love. Even on the days when you say you don’t need me. When you say you don’t believe me. As long as my heart is beating, Hyung. Until there’s nothing left.
Let the tears on my face wash the blood from your hands.
Please don’t shut me out again. Please don’t slam the door. There’s no reason for this distance. No reason for your fear.
He raises a hand between them, heart stuttering in renewed panic as his mind registers he’s come back to himself too late. Tears sting the corners of his eyes upon realizing the terrible reality of their current situation.
Almost the entire heel of one of In-ho’s player shoes is supported by empty air.
________
His namdongsaeng’s hand cuts the air between them like a silent lifeline. A desperate request echoing the one In-ho had offered to him on that cliff overlooking the sea. An offer to trust that In-ho can’t bring himself to take.
“I’ll show you that the world doesn’t always go the way you want it too.”
Most people who disappear want to be alone.
Jun-ho’s words make no sense, his unwillingness to abandon In-ho turning the Front Man’s perceptions on their heads. He’s never wanted Jun-ho dead, just out of his way. Out of the organization’s way. An organization that could be brutal and unforgiving even to its own.
“That is the best choice you can make right now.”
A shattered existence. Actions and memories he didn’t want to face. A grave he couldn’t bring himself to visit. A world that was perfectly content to keep turning without him. Family members whose lives went on, seemingly without too much interruption. He’d taken the out, killed them all to get back to her, and his world had broken into pieces anyway.
Il-nam had contacted him through the card, putting the words he’d spoken during their brief meeting on the back so that In-ho had known immediately who it was from. His savior had revealed the full extent of how far the corruption stretched, how well connected and expansive the games really were, and laid out a view of the world that made sense. There’d been no one left to tether him, no reason not to surrender to the reality hitting him in the face. No reason to say no. He couldn’t beat them, and joining them had seemed like the best choice he could make. The only way to keep things fair.
A purpose. A coping mechanism in its own twisted way. Clarity. Structure. Belonging. The island’s boundaries creating a fair and removed world.
A perfect officer falsely accused of bribery became the overseer of the organization bribing the very people who fired him.
He doesn’t belong with Jun-ho’s family. Doesn’t belong with Jun-ho, despite the younger’s continued pleas to the contrary. He belongs alone. Safe. Where he doesn’t have to worry about hurting anybody. He doesn’t want to be saved. He wants to be with his family.
“Hyung, we were so close. We can be like that again. Please trust me. Step over here, In-ho, please. Please don’t do this to me.”
His silence has stretched too long and Jun-ho’s growing even more desperate. Gi-hun stands to the side, closer to him than Jun-ho is. A silent observer to their collective pain. The cliff flashes through his mind over his brother’s beseeching tone, specters of memory hanging in the distance between them. An outsider observing something that’s not real and that only he can see. The gun goes off, the impact loud as the bullet tears into his loved one’s shoulder. A choice. A decision. His decision. Jun-ho’s terrified eyes hold his own as the younger plummets over the edge. The sound of the splash is a knife in his barely beating heart.
Everything you touch you ruin.
Death is how you get out.
His brother or the games. The same two frustratingly familiar decisions. The same choices since Gi-hun’s first games when Jun-ho refused to take silence as an answer and snuck himself onto the island. Himself a cog in a machine, but a cog with something but Seong Gi-hun and the organization want. The games have cause now to see Player 456 as a potential threat, a horse that must be put down before its wildness infects everything else. The VIPs, as upset as they are, want the games to start up again as soon as possible. As hungry for the final three rounds as Gi-hun is to kill them all.
Selecting and training a replacement as host slows that process considerably.
Removing himself from the equation means Gi-hun has no means to do battle with his empire. No way to drag Jun-ho under when the snipers inevitably come for the hero who’s so sure he can somehow change the world. The one responsible for the island’s premature explosion that spoiled the VIPs’ fun.
“We can’t. I know you’re trying to save me, Jun-ho.” His brother’s outstretched hand trembles and the young man doesn’t appear to be breathing. “But you can’t save someone who’s already dead.”
The absolute misery in those eyes seems to miss the fact that In-ho is just trying to protect him.
Even though he’d never be able to say the words aloud, he’s so proud of his little brother. The younger is brave, brave in a way that looks like weakness until it isn’t. In-ho has become Jun-ho’s purpose, and it will only corrupt his loved one if In-ho doesn’t finally put a full stop to their relationship. He doesn’t want Jun-ho anywhere near the games, never has, and the physical embodiment of them is himself.
His heart shelters a corner of respect for Gi-hun’s tenacious hold on his principles, too.
“We’re humans. Not animals to be bet on, and the games have never been fair.”
Following the path laid by his savior hasn’t fixed anything.
He shifts his weight slightly and gravity unexpectedly pulls at him, the slick soled shoe too far over the edge and the soaked roof providing even less traction than normal. In-ho decides to surrender to it, forging a new choice that will finally set him free. He closes his eyes to block out the visual anguish of Jun-ho’s scream.
I love you, I’m sorry.