Chapter Text
Basics
Understanding basics
You’ll never let your guard down
And always leave a card out
But ‘always’
The word is not so friendly
It brings some fucking baggage
It’s a word that’s used for lying
And ‘never’
Never I would trust
It sticks around for some
While always stays for none
Will someone
Find out what the word is
That makes the world go ‘round
‘Cause I thought it was ‘love’
But some say
That it has to be ‘choice’
I read it in some book
Or an old packet of smokes
And basics
I guess I get the gist
There’s not that much to miss
You choose or you exist
○△□
Hwang Inho
Gihun stood at the edge of the concrete platform, baby gripped tightly in his arms.
Inho had allowed himself a moment of relief when the seams had split and Player 333 had fallen. Gihun had managed to win once again; not without sin this time but somehow still without abandoning his morals altogether. Or so it had seemed, but then Inho had noticed at just the same time as Gihun that the button had not been pressed and the timer never started.
Even now, even after everything, Gihun was not the sort of man to put his own life before that of any child, let alone one whose mother he’d made such an emphatic promise to.
Gihun was so close to the edge.
Real panic rose in Inho’s chest. He sprang up from his seat and took a step towards the one-way glass. He felt his breathing become heavier. A gold mask turned to face him and out of the corner of his eye he saw a sleazy grin and heard a sordid chuckle. The mask muttered, inappropriately entertained, about their host enjoying the view a little too much and Inho wanted to cut his throat. He instead remained transfixed, eyes on Gihun. He flinched when Gihun’s arm twitched minutely.
Gihun turned finally and walked further into the middle of the platform. He crouched, starting to lower the baby to the ground. When he stopped to kiss its forehead, Inho almost gagged; hit with a sudden, sickening clarity that it didn’t matter. It didn’t matter which one of them was right. It didn’t matter who had the final say, the moral high ground or the correct amount of faith in humanity. It had never mattered. He realised he didn’t want nor need to win this argument nor would he garner any kind of satisfaction from escaping their stalemate. Very, very belatedly, it dawned on Inho that all he actually cared about, all that actually mattered in that moment, was Gihun himself. And he was about to lose him.
Gihun straightened up and walked back over to the edge and Inho made his decision. In a fluid, practiced movement, he grabbed his radio out of his pocket, switching it to the correct channel and raising it to his mouth.
“End the game.” He said, quietly. “He’s won.”
A too-long, too-pregnant pause was his only response for a few moments, until he heard a crackly “yes, sir” on the other end. He exhaled.
He walked the last couple of steps to the window and all but pressed himself up against it, ignoring the amused snickers from the VIPs behind him. Gihun opened his mouth, ready to deliver a final line Inho knew would break him, but the click and buzz of the speaker and the start of that crisp female voice stopped him in his tracks.
“Player 222. Player 456.” The speaker rang out. Gihun closed his mouth slowly. “Congratulations on winning the game. Please stand on the centre of the platform to be safely returned to ground level.”
He was too far to be sure, but Inho thought he saw Gihun’s eyes widen for just a moment before he sank to his knees.
The next few minutes were a blur of activity. The VIPs had erupted into a wall of incredulous noise and one of them had even gotten to his feet and into Inho’s face, trying to intimidate him; furious and demanding his money back. Having completely, finally, lost the ability to pretend to care, Inho’d simply pushed the man away with a hand to the masked face and barked some more commands through his radio. He’d preemptively started evacuation orders and had the VIPs removed from the room by a few pink guards within moments.
He tore down the hallway as soon as the elevator doors opened, resenting not for the first time just how twisting and labyrinthine this damned place was. Pink blurred the corners of his vision as he stalked through the corridors; guards diligently moving from location to location, still orderly and punctual as ever, like they didn’t know that the whole world had almost ended a few minutes prior. A couple of them stopped and tried to ask him for clarification or updates on their orders, but he stormed past them without even sparing them a glance. He’d ripped off his mask after a third guard tried to talk to him, and since then had remained entirely unbothered by any of them, message clearly received.
By the time he got to the Sky Squid Game room he was winded and cursed his recent overindulgence in whiskey, but flung the doors open, dropping his mask to the chalk-dusty ground in the process, and maintained his pace despite the burning in his chest. He managed to approach the final concrete tower at just the right angle to make out Gihun at the precipice, unmoved since the announcement. At the sight, he allowed himself to stop for just a second and breathe before resuming resolutely and heading straight for the entrance to the elevator.
Gihun and the baby were still at the top of the platform and as such, so was the elevator. Inho called it down. The wait was excruciating and almost comical. His eye twitched at the sound of grating stone and metal. Billions of won sunk into this island and not a single one was spared to oil the gears. He scanned around him, eyes darting over the handful of dead bodies, unfazed. He looked up, but could no longer see Gihun from this angle and so tore his eyes back down and directed his glazed-over stare into the shaft instead. He stepped onto the elevator once it had finally reached him and then began the painfully slow ascent back up to the surface. By the time he reached the top, he was almost embarrassed. In different circumstances, he might almost have expected Gihun to be laughing at him for it, but as it stood, Gihun apparently hadn’t even noticed he had company.
Still on his knees in the same position he’d sunken to them in, Gihun was stock-still with his back turned to Inho. The baby lay a few feet away from him and it mewled as Inho took a step forward, but Gihun didn’t react to the sound of either.
Inho dithered, unsure of what to say and reluctant to spook Gihun while he was still so close to a sheer drop. He elected to just stand still for a while and observe, comfortably close enough to Gihun just in case.
Upwards of ten minutes passed. Save for the slow rise and fall of his body from soft, surprisingly level breathing, Gihun had still remained completely unmoving. Inho’s radio had beeped and blared inane messages once or twice, and though Gihun had done nothing to acknowledge he’d heard it, there was no way he hadn’t.
Near his feet, the baby started to vocalise. Tired, he presumed. Or uncomfortable, perhaps. He’d had someone feed it earlier so it couldn’t be hunger. Or, at least, that was the assumption he was going to make. Gihun made no motion to comfort the baby so, almost unthinkingly, Inho slowly reached down and gently picked it up, adjusting his hands to support its head and body the way he had, somewhere along the line, learned he was supposed to do. The baby stopped crying almost immediately and Inho’s heart sank. This thing was far too trusting and far too ignorant of what Inho had done. He tried not to look at its face.
Another silence-cutting beep from his radio and Inho could’ve thrown the machine off the tower if he hadn’t already been preoccupied with holding an infant. The voice on the other end warned of an approaching vessel, confirming Inho’s suspicions and validating half the reason he’d sent off evacuation orders already.
Gihun finally stirred, looking over his shoulder at the news of the boat. He scanned over the scene of Inho holding the baby. His face darkened. Inho opened his mouth and closed it again, still not yet finding the right words. Instead, he readjusted the baby so he was supporting it in the crook of one arm and offered the other out to Gihun. Gihun stared, almost unblinking, at Inho’s outstretched hand for a few moments before pressing both of his hands to the floor and pushing himself up off the ground unaided. Inho lowered his hand and then belatedly returned it to the baby.
His radio blared again, repeating its earlier message since it had never received Inho’s response, and Gihun’s eyes narrowed. Inho opened his mouth again, spurred on by the threat of an incoming enemy.
“We should -”
“Give me the baby.” Gihun interrupted. His voice cracked, throat dry, and yet his tone was harsh and dark and strangely chilling.
“I - yes, okay.” Inho said lamely in response. “Okay.”
He approached Gihun, already starting to hold out the baby. If it hadn’t been a living thing, he thought Gihun likely would’ve ripped it off him, but of course Gihun took the child from him so gently, hands brushing his own gloved ones as he did, and Inho felt like his lungs were burning again. He swallowed.
“We should leave.” Inho tried again. “We can’t stay up here.”
Gihun stared at him for a long while, eyes raking over his face in scrutiny. Inho felt strangely vulnerable, not just from the lack of mask but from Gihun’s heartbreaking, searching eyes. He willed himself to stay still under them.
“Fine.” Gihun said eventually. He shifted the baby slightly in his arms before stepping onto the elevator. Inho followed suit.
Gihun stood as distanced from Inho as he could manage on the ride down, but he was far from cowering in fear. He busied himself by retying the jacket-cum-sling around his neck and shoulder. He kept his eyes fixed on the baby, not looking up at Inho once the entire few minutes. Inho, on the other hand, found it impossible to tear his eyes away from them both.
The elevator clunked when they reached the ground, rousing them both from respective reveries. Almost ashamedly, Inho led Gihun through the room and towards the exit. Gihun offered no obvious reaction to the bodies on the floor but Inho knew it was impossible he hadn’t seen them. Inho grabbed his mask from where it had been discarded near the threshold and tightened his grip around it. He held the door open for Gihun and the baby. Gihun sighed and ducked through it.
○△□
Inho marvelled privately at how easily and obediently Gihun was following him through the winding corridors until remembering with a grimace that it was not out of any faint remnants of respect for him and just simply that Gihun did not know the way out.
Inho guided him into an elevator and hovered his hand over the buttons.
“There’s somewhere I’d like to take you before we leave.” Inho admitted, not feeling like hiding things from Gihun right now would benefit either of them. “Something I’d like for you to do.”
Gihun let out a long sigh. “I don’t want to do anything else for you.”
Inho’s stomach churned. “I have to go either way.”
Gihun didn’t respond but made no objections when Inho raised his mask to the camera to be scanned and pressed one of the buttons on the panel.
When they arrived on the correct floor, Inho stepped out first, half expecting Gihun not to join him, but the elevator had opened out into the control room and that was apparently enticing enough for the man to follow. Gihun was wide-eyed and pale, taking everything in with a queasy look on his face. The place was devoid entirely of any pink guards, almost all of them having evacuated the island already, and it was eerily empty. Inho allowed Gihun to walk slowly around the room and watched his mouth tightening in anger more and more with every step. He quietly observed as Gihun stared with vitriol at the walls of monitors displaying ‘GAME OVER’ in English script, then glanced down, finally noticing his own face and Player 222’s beside each other on the floor screen. Gihun snapped his head back up and glared at Inho.
“Why did you bring me here?” He demanded, more of a flat statement than a question. His voice was shaky with rage.
“There was a failsafe installed when this site was built. A panic button.” Inho said, making his way over to his podium and uncovering the detonator. “In case of emergency.”
Gihun’s narrowed eyes followed him as he walked.
“An emergency like being discovered?” Gihun asked sardonically.
“An emergency like stopping the Games.” Inho corrected.
Gihun scoffed, which stirred the baby. He gently rocked it almost subconsciously as he responded. “The game’s over already. What good is your panic button going to do?”
Inho shook his head. “Stopping the Games for good. The island is rigged with enough explosives to wipe out the entire site. This button starts a timer to detonate those explosives in half an hour.”
Gihun levelled him with another long, hard, searching stare. “You’re going to press it?”
“I have to.” Inho said. “I have to do it regardless, because yes, like you said, the island’s been discovered. That’s what the button’s originally intended for.”
Inho’s hands felt clammy beneath his leather gloves. He wanted to take them off.
“But I’d have pressed it anyway.” He continued. “This place has to go.”
Gihun’s stare was burning into his skin. He willed him to look anywhere else. Inho knew he was being searched for proof that he was telling the truth.
“Why are you showing me?” Gihun asked, after a silence that lasted far too long.
“I want you to press it.” Inho said simply. He lifted the glass case over the button. “Or, more, I want you to have the choice to press it. To end it.”
Gihun’s eyebrows raised a fraction and he finally tore his eyes away from Inho to glance down at the detonator button. Inho knew that truly ending the Games would not be that easy and he also knew he was stuck in this for life - he wasn’t going to waste his time by thinking otherwise - but he found himself compulsively scrambling to give Gihun something to hang onto, some semblance of a chance to wrest back control. He would allow him this.
“Half an hour?” Gihun clarified.
Inho nodded.
“We can get far enough away from here in that time?” Gihun asked and gestured with his chin down to the baby. “Or at least get her far enough away?”
The baby was a girl, Inho noted to himself. He nodded again.
“It’s all planned out meticulously. We’ll be the exact necessary distance away to avoid the blast entirely by the time it goes off.”
Gihun opened and closed his mouth a few times. “Is there anyone else still on the island? Your guards…”
“All evacuated by now if all’s gone to plan. I have no reason to believe it hasn’t.”
Gihun nodded. “Good. Good.”
Despite everything, Gihun could somehow bring himself to still care about the fates of the very people he’d been fighting against for so long. He truly was something else. Things like this were what differentiated him and Gihun. There was not a single other person on this island that Inho could even come close to caring about other than the one - perhaps two already in front of him.
Gihun finally took the few strides over to join Inho at the podium. He moved the baby to one arm, like Inho had done earlier, and held his now free hand over the button. With one final intense look into Inho’s eyes, Gihun pressed his lips together tightly and resolutely, then pressed the button.
It was entirely unceremonious, totally at odds with everything else about this place. Nothing happened at all. It was only the sight of the small, innocuous LED timer now slowly counting down from thirty minutes that offered any indication whatsoever that a motion had been put into action.
“We’ll have to board one of the boats. There’ll be one left in dock for us. It’s not far.” Inho said and started to turn, gesturing for Gihun to follow.
Gihun made a choked noise and Inho spun back around to face him. Gihun stood still, eyes wide, panic on his features. Inho looked at him questioningly.
“The boat.” Gihun said. “You said you’ve been discovered. There’s a boat full of people about to get here who don’t know anything about the explosives.”
Before Inho could answer, the elevator behind them pinged again and its doors slowly opened. Gihun’s eyes snapped to it and Inho turned to face it.
Inho almost laughed. Make that three people.
Junho stepped out of the elevator, gun barrel first, and startled at the sight of them. He looked between Inho and Gihun and then down at the baby in surprise.
Gihun was the first to act, launching himself towards Junho, who took a step back in shock. Gihun still had one free hand and he used it to grip Junho’s shoulder. The sight of them both together made Inho feel something akin to vertigo.
“Who else is here?” Gihun asked, frantically. “How many others did you bring?”
Junho looked at him in bewilderment.
“Nobody. Just me.” He replied. “Kim’s not -”
“Okay. Good.” Gihun responded, cutting him off.
Junho glanced over at Inho and then back to Gihun. “Gihun, wh -”
“Let’s go.”
Junho responded with alarm and spluttered and pushed back against Gihun as he attempted to steer Inho’s brother back into the elevator.
Inho, too floored by hearing Junho call Gihun by name, failed to move or react at all. He knew they’d been working together, but seeing them together, in person, was dizzying collision of worlds nonetheless.
“Youngil.” Gihun said. “Come on.”
Inho shook himself out of his momentary stupor at that and strode to join them back at the elevator, stepping inside and readying his mask to show to the camera.
“Youngil?” He heard Junho echo.
Neither of them responded. Inho pressed the button for the correct floor.
The journey was short but allowed enough time for Gihun to briefly explain the explosives situation to Junho, who grew quickly agitated.
“Turn it off! Abort it!” He snapped, voice volume slowly raising. He rounded on Inho. “You can’t destroy the evidence. Not after everything.”
Inho looked at Junho properly for the first time since the elevator doors had closed. He was still gripping his gun but the barrel was no longer pointed at any of them. The ends of his hair were damp. Inho shook his head slightly.
“I can’t. Even if I wanted to.” He replied calmly. “That’s not a functionality that was ever included.”
Junho made a noise of frustration.
“It has to go.” Gihun added, matter-of-fact. “This has to end.”
Junho looked between the two of them frantically. He and Gihun threw a few more lines back and forth at each other, but ultimately, evidently, the realisation sank in that Junho was powerless and that they had an ever-shortening frame of time to get themselves out of there. Junho dejectedly conceded, remarkably not saying another word until the four of them had traipsed through the remainder of the maze-like corridors that led them to one of the island’s main access points and finally opened the heavily reinforced security door to piercing daylight.
They emerged onto the pebbled beach fringing the island and took in the vast span of water around them. Junho recognised where they were, his own boat apparently not too far. With little resistance, Gihun agreed to join him on his boat instead of being led to Inho’s larger capacity one, and Junho insisted Inho follow suit.
Resigned, Inho sent a final command through his radio to his last remaining boat and told them to set sail without him; that he’d secured other arrangements. Junho talked into his own radio to someone whose voice Inho didn’t recognise, telling him to back well away from the island and that he would be rejoining him soon. Gihun muttered something unintelligible to the baby. He stumbled slightly on a dislodged pebble underfoot, prompting both Inho and Junho to reach out to him to steady him, but Gihun resolutely ignored the both of them, tightened his grip on the kid and marched forward.
○△□
The boat ride was long, a little choppy and very quiet. Junho sailed them from the island through dense fog. Inho could just about make out the silhouette of a hulking coastguard vessel some distance away, facing in the direction of the island although it didn’t appear to be moving at all. It would be well out of the blast radius. Inho assumed that was Junho’s doing. Junho continued as the crow flies toward the mainland without deviating to approach the coastguard ship, as Inho might have expected, although it was a relief to him that he did. Though the ships carrying the evacuating guards followed a set route well out of the way of heavily trafficked waters, there was still the possibility that one could’ve been spotted, and the coastguard were clearly already on high alert. It wouldn’t suit him to have to be questioned by any kind of law enforcement right now. He just wanted Gihun back on solid ground before he had to think about anything else.
Gihun sat on the deck, eyes closed, back pressed up against the outer wall of the cabin and his knees bent in front of him, mindful of the baby against his chest still swaddled in a makeshift sling. It was cold, and with all the heavy cloud around them it was likely going to rain and Gihun would eventually have to bring her inside to avoid her getting sick, but for now Inho let them rest out there while he stood inside the cabin and watched them through the salt-stained window.
Junho flipped a switch then stepped back from the dashboard. He turned to face Inho. The movement caught Inho’s eye, and he finally looked away from Gihun in favour of his brother.
“I don’t know what question to ask first.” Junho said, after deliberating for a while, the edge of a desperate laugh in his voice.
Inho exhaled through his nose. He had questions of his own, too. “I wouldn’t know where to start either.”
“I suppose ‘why?’ covers it all, but I guess it won’t be the easiest to answer.”
Inho’s eyes raked over Junho’s face for a moment, then he looked away. “No. Not really.”
Inho decided they’d be best off starting with the smaller stuff.
“You know Gihun.” Inho stated, just to say anything at all. He looked back up. “You’d been working together.”
Junho blinked, then nodded.
“Our goals aligned. And he had an in.” He said, then glanced out the window at Gihun still slumped on the ground. He looked conflicted for a moment. “He’s… quite a difficult man to work with.”
Inho couldn’t help but let out a quiet laugh at that. Junho turned back to face him and raised an eyebrow.
“Does he know what you are?” Junho posed his first question.
“He does.”
“You were together when I found you.” Junho frowned.
“He won the Games.” Inho replied simply.
Junho could tell there was more to it than that, but digging any deeper into that story was far too much of an ask for Inho right then, and Junho seemed to understand that.
He exhaled through his teeth. “And what’s with the baby?”
Inho sighed. “A player he was close with gave birth two days ago. She passed during one of the games and entrusted her child to him.”
“Two days ago?” Junho was shocked. “Fuck. How is that baby still alive?”
“He doesn’t like to break a promise.”
“He’s something else...”
Inho nodded. “He is.”
They fell back into silence for several minutes. Junho turned back to the control panel and fiddled with some gauges and dials. Inho didn’t know that Junho even knew how to captain a ship. He wondered if he’d learned recently or if it was a skill he’d been honing for years. He supposed neither of them knew much at all about each other anymore. He glanced away and back out through the window at Gihun, who appeared to have fallen asleep in that awkward position. Four times Gihun had made this journey and never yet had he been awake for it.
“Captain Park.” Junho said after a while. “Who was he to you?”
Inho didn’t immediately have an answer. A colleague was the easiest truth, or an employee, though strictly speaking it wasn’t quite that. He wasn’t exactly a friend - certainly not any kind of confidante, but he was loyal, and Inho had enjoyed their fishing trips.
“An ally.” He decided finally. He looked back over at Junho.
“He saved my life on your orders.” Junho said.
“Yes.”
“And then he tried to kill me. Was that also on your orders?”
“… Yes.” Inho admitted and lowered his eyes. He wanted to explain himself - that the protection and anonymity of the island had had to take priority over everything else, that he hadn’t had a choice, but he knew he couldn’t justify that. Especially not when he knew he’d never really believed that.
“I trusted him.” Junho replied. “I thought he was an ally too.”
Inho said nothing. Long dormant shame began to rise through his body and he cursed silently that it was only ever Junho and Gihun who could bring that out of him.
“He’s dead.” Junho continued. “I had to.”
Inho had guessed as much as soon as he’d lost contact with him, but he was appreciative to have it confirmed. He was not used to death being ambiguous and backstage. He was used to it being concrete; happening right in front of him and announced on overhead speakers. He was surprised to find he felt somewhat solemn about Park passing. In another life, if he hadn’t fallen into Inho’s line of work, he’d have been a kind man.
“I know.” Inho replied. Still, rather Park than Junho.
“He’s…” Junho’s eyes flickered to the wall beside Inho that separated the cockpit from the rest of the cabin space. “And the crew…”
Junho trailed off but Inho filled in the blanks. The persistent background smell of blood had been hard to ignore, after all. He simply nodded, and made a mental note to keep Gihun out of there.
Just as he was starting to scan the dashboard for a clock to gauge the time, the clouded sky flashed in his periphery, accompanied by a distant but resonating boom that slightly rocked the boat. He and Junho both looked up and out the window in the direction of the island, and although the fog was still too dense to properly make anything out, they both knew what it was.
Half an hour had elapsed. The island was gone. The game was over.