Beacon of Light in the Dark Sea

Carlos whispered to us,

“If there aren’t enough escape pods, we’ll have to fight over them no matter where we go. But the Korean team doesn’t have that crazy bastard Team Leader Shin anymore. Instead, Vladimir and Viktor are over there with the Russian team. When Russia wins and gets on the escape pod with one seat left, I’m taking it, yep.”

I asked with a bewildered face,

“Do you think there will be fist fights?”

Spitting, Carlos said,

“What, you think they’ll politely say “After you” and give up seats for each other? Are you too naive about these Korean bastards here? You’d be better off sticking with the Russian guys. Listen to me when I give advice.”

Looking pained, Yoo Geum-yi said,

“Mr. Park and I… we’re Korean.”

“Oh really?”

Looking slightly flustered, Carlos quickly put on a friendly face and winked, saying “You know I didn’t mean you right?” before running to catch up with the Russian men ahead.

Yoo Geum-yi narrowed her eyes and shook her head before looking at Kang Soojung’s back and saying to me,

“What will happen to the child when we go to the South District? Soojung is carrying him for now but no one will want to take him when we split off in the Central district.”

“Then I’ll have to carry him, right? Can’t just leave him here.”

“Alright. We can take turns carrying him on the way back.”

“Thank you.”

Looking at Yoo Geum-yi’s thin arms, I figured even if I died from exhaustion carrying the over 20kg child up to the escape, that would still be better than making her do it. But seeing her determined face, it felt rude to protest. Instead, I decided to come clean about my secret to her, since she was being so helpful. Yoo Geum-yi probably wouldn’t judge or berate me for it.

“I have a secret I’m keeping that I hope you can quietly help me with.”

Looking at me, Yoo Geum-yi replied.

“I’ll keep anything that’s within my ability.”

“I have a cat and a snake hidden in my bag.”

Yoo Geum-yi stared blankly at my bag for a moment before letting out a low, “Ah…”

“So that’s why you asked that.”

I checked my pad from time to time as I walked. If things went similar to my dream, I’d have to post a request on the message boards for Kim Gayoung to come rescue me. Up ahead, Nikita peered out a window into the hallway in West District, frowning before jogging back excitedly to whisper something to Vladimir. Vladimir halted his steps, glanced out the window, then resumed walking.

…They’re wary of each other. If I hadn’t had that dream, I wouldn’t have known the South District was destroyed by missiles either. The engineering Team A who witnessed it while repairing the outer walls, or Team B who confirmed Jwack Research Center’s destruction from the window, aren’t sharing the information they discovered. I feel like in my dream, we found out about South District’s collapse pretty fast. Who told us again?

My memory is fuzzy. The intense moments of climbing stairs, shooting guns, getting bitten by sharks make the earlier details feel so distant.

I sighed inwardly as I watched people walking ahead of me. I wanted to spill everything I knew to them. I had a dream about escaping from this underwater base. I struggled desperately to get up to the 0th level, the Daehandoro street exit, but failed and got bitten to death by a shark. The urge to blurt out how I wanted to forget lottery or misfortune dreams, but things were unfolding similarly to my dream even in reality, welled up in my throat.

But then I recalled what Shin Haeryang said to me while we were trapped in the cable car – that he thought I was an Infinity Church follower.

What if there was someone related to Infinity Church among the people here, and I told them everything I knew?

Though I don’t trust the words of Infinity Church followers, what if the ones who slammed missiles into South District to turn this underwater base into a leaky fish tank had nothing to do with Infinity Church and were forces unknown to me?

What if my testimony about fighting armed engineer teams stirred chaos and alarm in these already tense people?

What if I told them the escape pods we’re all moving towards won’t actually help us escape at all, and everyone onboard died or is dying, how would they react?

…No wait, that’s ridiculous now that I think about it again. If Shin Haeryang thought I was an Infinity Church follower, why did he still choose to move with me? He didn’t just abandon me to die but saved my life multiple times too. He was suspicious yet considered me harmless enough to keep around? Is that what it was?

I deeply contemplated the events of my dream then heaved a big sigh. My head was spinning. Too many things happened in such a short time, it was hard to process everything. The vivid sensation of sharks tearing into my stomach was still fresh. Yet feeling my intact stomach now as I walked down this hallway proved there were no wounds. And the weight on my back and the damp squelching of my shoes and socks made it impossible to dismiss my current situation as just a dream. Plus, it’s better that the time we all died was a dream and this is reality. I’m still just a dentist who knows little about this underwater base even after having such an intense prophetic dream.

…Alright, one thing at a time. It’s not unfolding exactly the same as my dream anyway. Even small deviations probably won’t lead to huge dangers. I stopped and looked out the window. Yoo Geum-yi raised her voice for everyone to hear.

“It’s pitch black. There’s nothing.”

Yoo Geum-yi, who seemed to have a lot on her mind with her lips tightly pursed, shot glances diagonally before saying to me while looking out the window:

“But doesn’t it look a bit like viewing a nightscape from land with some lights from South District Research Center?”

“There’s nothing there though?”

“Huh?”

At that, Yoo Geum-yi hurried over to the window. Huh? I stared out at the dark sea devoid of any light after blurting that out, dumbfounded. I cautiously asked Yoo Geum-yi,

“Wasn’t it always like this?”

“No. No it wasn’t. Those lights don’t go out…”

Still stunned, Yoo Geum-yi began pressing her face against the round window. She would’ve gone right through the glass at this rate. I grabbed her shoulder from behind and pulled since she was gaping vacantly into the darkness. Hearing her endlessly babble about my lab records, my research, my advisor, it felt like her soul had left her body. At another window, Carlos said,

“There’s really nothing? Wasn’t that building one of the biggest structures in this underwater base along with the drilling facility? It didn’t just get swept away like jellyfish by ocean currents?”

Sparks flew in Yoo Geum-yi’s eyes.

“It was a 7-story research building with 3 wings and a 6-story research building with 1 wing! How could something that big get swept away! It housed over 400 resident researchers! If that disappeared, the people inside–!”

Yoo Geum-yi looked back outside and muttered “It’s gone…” before shuffling forward unsteadily as if she could barely remain upright. Lee Jihyun and Jeong Sanghyeon briefly peered out the window before moving on while Kang Soojung shook her head as she passed by Yoo Geum-yi and the lightless darkness outside. I took out a handful of candy from my bag and offered it to Yoo Geum-yi who seemed out of her right mind.

“Eating something sweet helps settle your heart.”

Yoo Geum-yi began loudly crunching on the hard candy with her teeth. That’s not good for your teeth. But Yoo Geum-yi didn’t seem capable of hearing that right now. It must be difficult to accept the sudden disappearance without a trace of a building housing people she knew. I checked my pad again. New posts were piling up over Kang Soojung’s. The user name making these posts now was HELP.

Title: Trapped in South District Room 77

Content: Water is flooding in and the door won’t open. Please help. 5 of us gathered in this room but it won’t budge even with our strength. The water is up to our calves now. If you can’t come help, please leave instructions on how to open the door below this post so we can try. There are no engineers here, only researchers. We need assistance.

Similar pleas for help were flooding the message board. This was definitely Kim Gayoung. Trapped in South District again, huh. Pleased to read her post, another post on the boards caught my eye and I clicked it as if entranced.

Title: Save me too while saving the kid who posted below!

Content: I’m trapped in the Jangsumjeong submarine Merigilmoore 2-ho I was repairing in the East District. Dammit, is no one there at the sub port now? Or are you bastards just ignoring my calls for help?

Startled by this new information, I realized others trapped somewhere could’ve also made rescue requests by posting. Did I carefully read every post in my dream? I couldn’t recall clearly. Who do we need to save first? Shouldn’t it be the South District people with water flooding in? I showed Kang Soojung the post and said,

“It says researchers are trapped in South District lodging. And someone’s also trapped in a submarine in the East District.”

Kang Soojung swiftly read the contents on the pad and answered “I see.” When she showed the pad to Lee Jihyun, Lee Jihyun slowly read through each line. Jeong Sanghyeon came over next to Lee Jihyun, trying to read along from the pad before giving up due to their height difference and turning on his own pad. Once Lee Jihyun was done slowly going over every line and returned the pad to me, I showed Yoo Geum-yi the posted plea for help. I firmly told Kang Soojung,

“We need to go rescue them.”

Hmm… Kang Soojung grimaced, looking off into the distance before simply answering.

“We’re headed to the East District so we’ll come across this person trapped in the submarine along the way. Mr. Park, you should go with Ms. Yoo Geum-yi to rescue the people stuck in the South District.”