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The first day after the end of it all was the hardest day In-ho could remember in nearly ten years.
After the destruction of the island, he felt something similar to relief. A weight that was slowly lifted from his shoulders. All of it was gone—almost all of it.
Every room, every haunted hall, every record of every player who had gambled their life there, and yet he had left the place cradling a baby in his arms.
Jun-hee’s baby. Player 222. The baby who had not even been given a name.
It would be easy to drop the baby off somewhere, find a living relative or friend of Jun-hee and be done with it, but there was some piece of him that could not part with her, even when the baby cried and screamed in his arms, perhaps innately feeling the absence of her protectors.
But, per the rules of the game, she had won. It was fair to give her a chance in the world, at least until he could find someone to care for her.
In-ho fumbled with the key to his apartment, then slowly pushed the door open. Dusty shelves, dead fish, closed shutters.
A closed door. A barrier between him and the past.
On the other side of it was the nursery. The unused nursery for the child who had never been born.
He had no clue how to care for a newborn baby; he’d never gotten the chance. When Jun-ho was born, he was a teenager, but he couldn’t seem to remember much about his infancy. The briefest memory of his father passing him into his arms, how delicate Jun-ho had looked. He had been scared to drop him, to do the wrong thing, to hurt him. How far they’d come since then. And his own child… he had been scared for her, too. Scared that he would not be a good father.
Belatedly, the thought came to him that Gi-hun would know what to do, and he felt a pang of envy strike at his heart.
There was that look in his eyes as he stared down the camera, stared down In-ho’s soul through it.
A challenge. You may not believe in humanity, but you believe in fairness. You won’t let her die. A choice that In-ho never had.
He couldn’t believe in humanity because he wasn’t sure if he had any of his own—how could he, when he had slaughtered his fellow players when given the opportunity? He was sure Gi-hun would make the same choice, protect the child if not himself, but he had refused. In-ho wasn’t aware that there was another option in this ruthless death game, but…
…look where Gi-hun ended up. Lying dead, alone, now nothing but ashes that would return to the earth.
In-ho won.
Humans were not horses, but they were foolish nonetheless.
He set the baby down in the crib that was meant for his child. Swaddled her in pale yellow blankets. Sent the mobile above her head spinning. The domestic life he should have had.
She began to cry, and In-ho could not just leave her there. He lifted her again, holding her against her chest, but it did nothing to quell her. Her little face scrunched up as she screamed.
“You’re probably hungry, aren’t you?” In-ho muttered to himself, wandering out to the kitchen. What could he feed her? Babies couldn’t have cow’s milk or water, he remembered his wife saying. Perhaps there was still leftover formula in his bags.
He found it quickly, though it wasn’t much. He’d have to go out and buy more soon.
In-ho brought the bottle to the baby’s mouth, and she immediately ceased her crying, quietly drinking the formula. When she had finished off the bottle, her eyes fell shut, small fingers tightly curling and uncurling.
“Now you’re tired,” he said, unable to help the small smile that pulled at the corner of his lips.
He considered bringing her back to the crib, but that didn’t seem right anymore. He didn’t want to let go of her, the innocent creature he had found himself caring for. He was sure she was rather confused, being taken from her mother’s arms to Gi-hun’s to his. A whirlwind of new faces in such a short amount of time. He could at least be a constant for her.
Sitting on the couch, cradling her, In-ho inexplicably found himself thinking of Gi-hun again. His mind often wandered in his direction in times of dullness.
Gi-hun could have stopped the game during the final round, he knew he knew it. He had tried it in the 33rd games, only for it to fail, but here he would have won.
Was it all to prove a point to In-ho? To show him what he had done?
You killed me.
His voice was so painfully clear in his ear that he flinched. But when he turned his head, there was no one there. Of course there was no one. Gi-hun was dead. In-ho killed him. Not with his own hands, but with his ideas.
Maybe there was a world where Gi-hun came around to reason, saw In-ho’s point of view. He’d thought he illuminated it quite well during the rebellion. The world was not just, but it could be in the games. They were all equals. They could have overseen the games together, or abandoned them altogether. Made a good life for themselves.
Now he was thinking nonsense, letting Gi-hun’s sentimentality infect him.
And then there was the thought that he was the only one who would remember that part of him, the whole of him.
Gi-hun would be remembered, in pieces. Old friends who thought of him from time to time, wonder how someone can disappear without a trace. Jun-ho, maybe the only other person who would know his fate but not the reason why. His ex-wife would have divorce papers and headaches to remember him by. His daughter would have 45.6 billion won and bitterness. Maybe the child he held would have a faint memory of one of the pairs of arms that had protected her.
But he had staked his claim on In-ho. There were winners who came and went and disappeared, but the full apparition of Seong Gi-hun would haunt him, achingly so.