Chapter 1.1

01

That day was somehow weird.

My body was heavy ever since I opened my eyes. It was like something was pressuring my shoulder. Maybe a cold is coming. Mason Taylor didn’t think anything weird.

Actually it is weird if my body was light. It’s already been two months since we started our mission. So, for two whole months, I don’t want anything big I just wanted to sleep in a place with a roof.

“I’m seriously gonna quit after this job.”

One of the team members named Clark said something similar what Mason was thinking. Mason laughed. For three years, that guy said exact same thing every time they were on a mission, but he’s still doing this job.

“I’m serious. I even wrote down my letter of resignation to send it right after this job. Do you want to read it?”

This stupid bastard was saying how he wanted to become a writer, so he wrote this really well like poetry. And Mason said "Why do you have to write letter of resignation well?” and frowned.

“I told you my dream was to become a writer. Didn’t you have that kind of a dream, Team leader? Any dreams?”

“Of course I do. Who do you think I am.”

“Team leader has a dream?”

A guy who is so dry? This bastard said it rudely, and Mason nodded and said,

“Ah. This instant, I want to take a hot bath, drink warm milk, and sleep till I’m not tired on a dry bed.”

It couldn’t get any better. Just to imagine that scene made him feel really heavy and tired.

“…..ah seriously…”

Why are you like this Team leader? –That bastard said it like he’s sick of it, and Mason checked his watch and said, “Why are you like this? In front of the enemy’s territory.” They look relaxed, but they are in live or die mission. When they get ready, they will intrude the enemy’s hideout in the bunker and either kill the target or get killed.

“What do you mean?”

Ashley who was applying mascara behind them asked and Clark asked, “Sis, don’t you think our Team leader is very dry?” to get some agreement.

“He said his dream is to take a hot bath and sleep on a dry bed.”

“That sounds good….”

Fred who handed lipstick to Ashley murmured it like he was daydreaming, and Ashely smacked Clark’s head.

“Don’t you think you are too clinging? What kind of mercenary will read this kind of poem?”

“What about poems? I’m really going to quit this. This dry job. People in here think it’s embarrassing to read books. And their brains are filled with muscles…”

“Who are you saying this muscle to? Do you think how disgusting it looks a guy who looks like a gorilla carrying around poetry book and cries over it?”

He got smacked again. Mason laughed looking at him crying holding his poetry book and teased him, “Did you even pay off your credit card debt?”

“This team is so relaxed. –Are you guys ready?”

Aaron who was guarding outside asked looking inside. Three months ago, he got dispatched to Mason’s team, and after they decided the plan, he looked very nervous. He looked like if anyone touches him, right away he will say, ‘actually this mission is to kill weapon merchant Alta…..’

He disagreed strongly when they said they will enter the enemy’s territory disguised as prostitutes. He agreed that this is the only way to kill the target who never came out of the bunker for like two months with only 12 team members. But he still didn’t like this plan.

“Do you want to stay here?”

When Mason asked, Aaron’s pride got hurt and said, “I don’t need it” and frowned. Mason saw Ashely looking at Aaron secretly. Ashely felt Mason’s stare and smiled awkwardly.

“Hm.”

It’s none of my concern, but he is not a good man. Just like common mercenary, he is a common trash. But she probably knows that too.

Mason was checking his weapon. He put Taurus PT 22 on his ankle because it has a small frame, so it’s easy to hide. He checked his watch.

“If we’re too late, they’ll suspect us. We should get going.”

Mason looked at two actual prostitutes and guards. They were shivering next to guards who were tied up and fainted. Both of them were blonde with pale skin. He’s hiding like a mole and has specific preference. Well, that made his job easier.

Mason smiled at them, so they don’t get scared too much.

“About… 30 minutes later. I think you guys can go home.”

Alta’s penis will die like its owner soon. Because he has a scary face, they started to cry. He left them behind and took their Jeep with Ashely.

Mason fixed his ghutra behind his ears, and Aaron just looked at him with displeased face. He looked like he was saying you need to hide your face what are you doing?

“I have an American face so what’s the point covering?”

“…..Do you take this as a joke?”

He replied sharply. Clark tapped him and said, “Hey, what’s wrong?” to stop him, but Aaron’s face didn’t get any better.

“This kind of crappy plan…. It’s only you who has a cheap life, why do we have to get treated same as you?”

He tried to make him mad, but Mason just ignored it.

“If you are that scared, I told you to stay.”

“It’s not like that. Fuck, don’t we at least have to rehearse!”

“Ah, I told you, if you don’t make that kind of face, we’ll be fine.”

Mason knowing that saying this will make him worse but said it with his hand waving at him. He said, “You are the one who should read the poetry book” to insult his delicacy. His face got really red and his eyes were burning like flame, but Mason was just getting the sandy breeze and looking at approaching bunker entrance.

Usually Mason says they’ll be fine, and he’ll take care of everything to make them feel comfortable, but today he didn’t feel that great. His shoulders were getting heavier, and now it feels like a big rock is on his shoulder.

Do I have some grudged ghosts? I’m sure I have a lot of them. And I’m going to have another one soon.

There was Alta’s bunker entrance very close. Mason stopped Aaron from talking and jumped out of the Jeep and called out the guards in front of the gate.

‘Hey! Hey!?’

Mason shouted and the guards were pointing their guns at them. “Who are you?!” They shouted at them. Bingo. It’s good enough that they didn’t shoot right away.

Mason hid his happiness and approached them. They looked surprised that this unarmed American is approaching them.

‘I brought women that you guys told me to, but I have some problem….’

Mason was wiping his sweat off from his forehead and spoke with his poor Arabic. The guards were curious and approached him with their guns pointing at him.

Ashely pretended to faint just like she was told to, and Mason was carrying her on his shoulder and spoke desperately.

‘This bitch took some drugs. Ah fuck, do you have some water??’

‘Hey, what are you?’

‘Ah, do you have water?!’

Mason shouted like a crazy man. Because of his force, the guards all startled and so did Aaron.

‘Do you how much this bitch cost… Water, where’s water??’

He said it like he was going to cry, and one guard came and checked on her and another one gave water. Mason purposely dropped the water and shouted at them ‘Ah, fuck… are you kidding me?!!’

A guard who was checking Ashely thought it was weird that she looked fine, but soon Mason slapped her face and screamed at her ‘Bitch! Wake up!’ and the guard backed away. They startled because of his loud voice.

‘Do you have a doctor inside??’

‘What??’

‘Do you guys have a doctor?! Are you guys gonna take responsibility if she dies?!!’

When Mason shouted at them, they were just staring at him like ‘what the hell is wrong it him.’ He had this really red face like he was going to die. He was crying ‘Fuck, she was so expensive… if she dies, I’m going to be bankrupt!’

‘Don’t you guys have a doctor? I’ll pay.’

He was begging to save her, and the guards were confused and talked to each other. Mason urged them, and one of them talked on the radio.

‘What’s going on??’

The bunker opened and a guy who looks like a doctor came out. Mason saw him and followed him carrying Ashely to him saying ‘Thanks, thanks!’ Everyone looked confused, but no one was able to stop Mason from following the doctor. Aaron quickly followed him, and Mason was urging the doctor for a bed.

They didn’t know what was going on, but Mason was smiling behind the doctor.

Gosh, thanks for getting fooled. Mason looked at Aaron, and he was murmuring, ‘What the… this kind of…” He looked very displeased. He thought that ‘this kind of plan’ wasn’t going to work at all, and it worked without any mistake. He was little annoyed because of that. If you think back, this was a crazy plan. People would definitely say they are crazy for doing this. It was too reckless.

Mason asked the doctor, ‘Where is Alta??’

‘Hey. Ah, is this the woman that he called??’

The doctor pointed at a room without thinking, and Mason smiled wiping his sweat. After they took a turn, he saw there wasn’t any CCTV. He hit the doctor’s neck. The doctor couldn’t even scream and fainted, and Aaron put him in the empty room.

“Wake up Ashely.”

It’s so heavy. Mason complained to Ashely, and she got annoyed and said, “I’m not that heavy” and got off.

“Let’s finish this fast and go home. I feel heavy.”

Mason said while he was tapping his shoulder, and Ashely was looking at him like ‘don't be childish’ stare.

“What is it a cold?”

“I don’t know.”

“-Why do you get annoyed at me.”

She was glaring at him, and Mason was rubbing his cheek with beard and looked around. In front of coward Alta’s room, there were four men guarding the door.

“….Tsk.”

That’s like a jail not a hideout. Actually there weren’t that many number of guards in Alta’s bunker. But if the door was locked from inside, unless you bring a cannon, there was no way to open the gate. And this place was famous for lots of unknown pathways. Right when they open the gate with a cannon, he will definitely run away.

This is the only thing we can do in this kind of situation….

Mason smiled and said hello.

‘I brought the wo…’

He was trying to say it brightly, but he paused and his expression got solid. It was for a second, but he felt some chill behind his back.

‘-What??’

They approached to Mason because he stopped, and Ashely tapped his shoulder. Mason showed servile smile and said,

‘I brought the woman. They were eating outside, so they just told us to go in.’

He saw Ashely was sweating cold sweat, and Mason smiled more comfortably.

He paused for a second, but after passing through the first guard, the second one is nothing since they will just think that we are already verified. These guys didn’t care about them and said, ‘What are they eating at this hour?’

The door opened. Mason put Ashely first and went inside. Mason quickly checked inside the room. Alta was doing some paper work on his bed. Mason told Aaron to locked the door, and Alta looked at them.

Very skinny and pale face. Alta who looks like a mouse asked, “Ah, woman? I called them for two. Why is there only one?”

“!”

Ashely quickly ran to him and punched his mouth. He couldn’t even scream and collapsed on his bed. She punched his bloody mouth again. He was trying to escape, and Mason grabbed his hair and blocked his mouth and said, “I’ll kill you if you scream.”

“Wha, what…”

Mason showed his dirty smile. Purposely he undue the gun safety gear slowly and aimed at him. He was massaging is shoulder while Ashely was tying his wrist and blocking his mouth. Alta was glaring at Mason, Mason smiled back. This kind of smile really helped during this situation.

“You. You know where we’re from right?”

His eyes were shaking. That means he knows. Right, if he didn’t know, he wouldn’t hide in a place like this.

“You have some gut to steal a blueprint from Zii.”

Mason smiled and asked him, and he was shivering and shaking his head. What do you mean no….

Two months ago, a mercenary company Zii where Mason work was guarding Alta and weapon company BS’s deal. Is was a simple task, they just had to get money from BS and handed to Alta and get the blueprint from Alta and handed to BS. But Zii 14 team leader Becky, who had a job to move the blueprint, ran away with it.

Stupid Becky. America’s biggest mercenary company Zii did get some back stabbing before but never missed any traitor. Of course, Becky got caught in four days and before all of her arms and legs got cut off, she told who was behind this. If she told them earlier, she could’ve at least save one hand…..

Anyway the name that she told was expectedly Alta.

Zii sent Mason’s team only with 12 people to get the blueprint back. And even though there wasn’t any direct order, they said, ‘You can kill Alta if necessary.’ this means to kill him.

Alta was shivering and made weird noises with his blocked mouth. Mason got in front of his face and asked,

“The blueprint. Where is it?”

Alta’s eye lids were vibrating. I don’t think it will take a long time before him to spit it out. He was the owner of a big weapon merchandise, and he was very calculative. He’s the person who would stay in this kind of a place to save his precious life. It was stupid of him to betray Zii, but he wasn’t stupid enough to think whether Mason was actually going to torture him.

He was crying, and he pointed to a wall.

“……”

Mason looked at a place where he pointed and smiled.

“You know… if you scream right? That door won’t even open anyway.”

This coward will never use a door that will be easily opened from outside. Mason removed a handkerchief from his mouth. He was rolling his eyes.

“Be..be…behind the frame…”

Mason nodded to Ashely, and she removed the frame from the wall. There was a small safe door.

“It’s inside there…”

Alta said it with a shivering voice, and Mason looked at him and the safe back and forth. Ashely desperately asked, “Passwords?” and he said, “463788….” As soon as Ashely hummed and tried to open the door, Mason saw Alta’s eyes were sparkling. Right away he hit his head with his gun.

“Ashely! Don’t touch that.”

“-What?”

Why, what’s wrong? She asked with surprise, and Mason grabbed Alta’s head from the floor.

“Wha, what..”

“Stand up. You open it.”

After Mason said that, he saw Alta swallowing his dry throat. Ashely took her hands off right away.

“What the… bluffing?”

“Pretty sure… A guy like him will never put his 10 million dollar in a place like there.”

Just by looking at his reaction, probably there is a bomb instead of the paper. If the bomb goes off, he will probably roll under one of those bomb protected table.

“Do you want to open it with your hand, or actually take it out?”

Mason smiled and asked. Alta was rolling his eyes and asked,

“Are..are you gonna kill me?”

“I don’t know. Upper people said ‘eliminate if you need.’”

Because what Mason said, his face was pale due to anxiety. He seemed to know ‘eliminate if you need’ is same thing as ‘kill him.’

“Le..let’s make a deal.”

“A deal?”

“Underneath my bed there is the safe that has the blueprint of the missile and the bank account key from Swiss bank that has my whole fortune. I’ll give you everything so spare me.”

Mason signaled Ashely, and she removed the mattress. She frowned because there was nothing there, but he said to open the bed. Underneath the bed there was a small gap, and she put her finger in it and removed the cover. An adult body size hexagonal shape safe came out.

“It’s about 50 million dollar.”

There was a sound of Ashely and Aaron swallowing after this guy said about the money, but Mason frowned. When he looked at Aaron, Aaron was looking at Ashely.

Fifty million dollar. That’s a lot of money. Alta probably felt Ashely and Aaron’s agitation, so he looked at them carefully.

“If, if you spare me, I’ll tell you the safe number.”

“How do we know if you are telling the truth?”

That was Aaron who asked, and he approached him.

“……”

Mason was about to warn them not to think anything stupid, but he closed his mouth. Probably because of his heavy shoulders, he didn’t want to bother them. Anyway they can’t even do anything else with the money.

“Do… you thing I’ll cheat with my life?”

I know my life is precious. He said it, but Mason laughed. A guy who knows his life is precious betray Zii and BS.

Mason actually didn’t have to know if he was telling them the truth and didn’t have to make the deal with him.

“I…I’ll tell you the password if we’re out.”

“Never mind.”

Mason shrugged and loaded the gun. His face got really pale and Mason was thinking, ‘My shoulder is too heavy’ and stared at him without any expression.

“I’ll just hand that to Zii just like that. The upper smart people will get the password.”

Giving them the whole safe is to annoy the superior who sent only 12 people to do this difficult mission. As a person who took care of many safes before, that safe looked very fucking difficult to open up.

“Wa,wait, it’s 50 million dollar. Wait, I’ll tell you the passwords! They need my iris and fingerprint scanned!”

“Still, no.”

“12, 36.5, 37…”

Alta desperately crawled and poured out the password, and Mason frowned putting his finger on the trigger. If I hear everything, I need to report it to the superior, and I don’t want that. If I tell them the password the director, Berretta, will smile as always and give him these fucked up kind of job again later.

“Wait, Team leader!”

Behind him he heard Aaron calling for him, but Mason didn’t hesitate to pull the trigger. He saw Alta shivering and breathing his last breathe and saw he was saying the last number but pretend not to see it.

“!!”

A gun with the silencer shoot a bullet through Alta’s chest. His coughed out blood and kneeled. He was heavily breathing and frowned and Mason was….

“….Wha, what are you doing! Aaron!”

Ashely screamed.

“…..”

Mason felt warm sticky blood dropping down middle of his forehead. He didn’t have time to understand what was going on. The heavy air that was pressuring his shoulder since the morning pressed his whole body like a compressor.

Mason blinked and Ashely was calling, ‘Tea, team leader… Team leader…’ but he couldn’t answer.

He didn’t even realize something hot was dripping down from his forehead and to the ground, and he fell on the cold floor. He was trying to breathe for a second, but blood came out from his nose and mouth and wet the floor. His whole body was shivering and convulsing. It happened so fast.

The light in his eyes was getting small really fast and blurred. A cold feeling started from his forehead spread quickly through his body. He began to lose his sense started from his fingertips.

“What the hell are you doing?”

Ashely shouted like she was screaming, and Mason saw Aaron was approaching him with his dimmed eyes. He grabbed Alta, who was either already dead or dying, head and pointed a gun to Ashely and said something. He seemed like he was offering something, but Mason couldn’t hear it anymore.

“……..”

Because he already had his last breath.

A dark energy that was pressing on Mason’s shoulder since the morning suddenly swallow him right away.

Inside of death’s stomach was cold and dark.