Gray light crept through the high windows.
The phone was still on the sofa where he had thrown it last night. The screen was black.
He stood up slowly. His left arm was bound in a rigid medical brace wrapping around his chest. He put on his shirt using only his right hand. Ten minutes of cold sweat to slide the fabric over his dislocated shoulder without a sound.
He went down to the street. The air was biting. He paused for a moment in front of the building's glass door.
On the cold concrete ground, a freshly crushed, thin cigarette butt rested. The exact luxury brand Kang Ha Eun smoked. He raised his eyes and scanned the empty gray street with a slow gaze. No one was there, but the message was clear: *We know where you are, too.*
He boarded a public bus. He sat in the back seat and leaned his head against the cold glass. His eyes unintentionally fixed on a small news screen hanging above the driver: *"Former boxer found in an alley with a shattered skull... transferred to ICU at Daerim Hospital"*.
He got off at Yeongdeungpo. He didn't go to the gym. He stood in the corner of a narrow alley, watching the entrance of Seung Woo Park's house from afar.
Twenty minutes later, the old man appeared carrying a plastic bag and entered his house quietly. No blood.
Ji Hun breathed softly, but his eyes caught something else. A black sedan silently parked at the opposite corner of the street. Dark tinted windows. No one moved inside.
Smashing the gym door wasn't the only message. The real message was: *We are guarding him now.*
He turned and walked away with heavy steps. He himself had become the contagion.
Daerim Hospital.
Third floor. The corner of the intensive care unit.
Through the wide glass, he saw the bed. A man connected to breathing tubes, his face a mass of bandages.
"He didn't die."
The voice came from his right. Ji Hun turned.
Do Hyun Seok. Sitting on a plastic chair, squeezing a paper coffee cup. His eyes were bloodshot. He didn't stand up.
Ji Hun sat down, leaving a silent space between them.
"They beat him with iron pipes," Seok said, his eyes on the cup. He turned and looked at Ji Hun's face, then at his medical brace. "I know it wasn't you. Not with that arm. But whatever has a hold on your neck now... did this."
Seok fell silent for a moment, his jaw trembling.
"I know my brother. I know why he stabbed you with that camera... He was never built to bear standing beside someone better." The cup was crushed in his hand, brown drops falling onto his knee. "But he's my brother. Seeing him like this... it's hard to forgive him, and harder to wish him dead."
Ji Hun looked at the medical machines. He remained silent for a long time. Words couldn't mend shattered skulls.
He stood up and left the hallway in silence.
As he walked out the main doors, an unmarked police car pulled up right in front of him.
Detective Oh stepped out. "Ji Hun Min. Hospital security notified us the moment you registered at the gates." The detective looked at his bound arm. "Arson, a smashed gym, and now your old friend is in the ICU. Get in."
He didn't resist. He got into the backseat in silence.
The interrogation room was cramped. Its four corners pressed against the breath under sharp white lighting.
Ji Hun sat with his bound shoulder. Detective Oh tossed photos onto the metal table.
The burned apartment. The shattered glass at the gym. And Do Hyun's body in a pool of blood.
"The motive is there," the detective said, tapping his finger on the bloody photo. He then leaned forward and looked at Ji Hun's expensive brace. "But not with that arm."
The detective clasped his hands. "Your body can't crush a skull alone. So... who held the iron pipe for you? Who are you hiding behind now?"
Ji Hun remained silent. He looked at the faded walls. The air was thinning in the room. He was trapped in a dead corner; between the police who wanted to convict him, the syndicate that owned his neck, and the shadow leaving crushed cigarettes at his door.
"You don't understand your position," the detective said, his tone growing harsher. "You have no alibi. And all circumstantial evidence places you at the center of this blood. You will talk, sooner or later."
Ji Hun looked at the photos scattered on the table. The walls were closing in on him. No way out.
Suddenly, the detective stopped talking.
The metal doorknob turned slowly, and the door opened.