Kill the Lights by Jangryang
Proofreader/Editor: Kaima, Hwarang
“What is, he….?”
Ashley murmured. Apart from the creepy acting skill that can’t be Haley’s, that stare felt like something she had seen before…..
Click. Before Ashley could figure out where she had seen that stare, the screen that was showing pouring dark rain with a solemn music, was turned off.
“What? –I was watching that!”
It was an important scene! Ashley shouted and stood up and looked at the man behind her, who had clicked the remote. The man was looking at her with dislike.
“Is it the time to be watching a TV show, right now?”
“Then what should we do? Should we go out and turn ourselves in to Zii?”
Ashley asked him coldly, and the man, Aaron, frowned.
“That’s probably better, right? If Zii finds us first, just getting shot in the head won’t be enough.”
“Shut up, Ashley.”
“Then why did you kill Mason, you idiot!”
She said it in a resentful way, and Aaron who bit his lips, shouted loudly, “Fuck!”
“Because that son of a bitch was trying to shoot Alta!”
Aaron admitted he had acted crazily. Shooting Mason had been a spontaneous reaction. He hadn’t acted rationally like he should have. It had happened without him knowing. Right afterwards, he realized why. Mason was trying to shoot Alta and as if someone had held his hands, he had pulled the trigger and it had happened unconsciously.
Aaron thought that Mason Taylor was a very annoying man.
When he was first transferred to Mason's team, he has had some expectations. Of course in Zii and even in other corporations, Mason was famous for being an outstanding mercenary. An incredible Veteran who had executed many missions that was seemingly impossible to succeed and had survived. His team was famous for getting dangerous missions, but he had been optimistic about being able to watch such amazing skills put to action.
But the real Mason was not so amazing. He completed the missions like a moth, rushing towards the fire. He wouldn’t have said anything if Mason didn’t have the skill. Even though there were safer ways to execute a mission, Mason acted ignorantly that propelled their opponents into sudden panic and shook them and run towards them with a knife.
Aaron thought, ‘Isn’t it enough to only put himself at risk?’ What made Aaron more annoyed was that, Mason never failed even with such risky strategies.
Like that time, when they went inside the war profiteer, Alta’s, bunker. That kind of idiotic move had worked once again, and right at the moment, when they were about to complete the mission, Alta told them that he would give 50 million dollars.
Fifty million dollars! It was that kind of money, which when you hear about, you don’t even realize how huge it is. Mason had indifferently aimed his gun at Alta, even though he had offered them money, which even if they divided among themselves– Mason, Aaron and Ashley AND their children’s grandchildren, there would be plentiful. Aaron got annoyed at Mason. Motherfucker! He was acting as if he was the only cool guy there.
Looking at the steady gun aimed at him, Alta said the password with a frozen face. 12, 36.5, 37….., and right before the last number came out his mouth, Mason pulled the trigger, unhesitatingly.
At that moment, when the 50 million dollars disappeared in front of his eyes, Aaron couldn’t not pull the trigger. He couldn’t think of anything else except to stop Mason.
‘What are you doing! Team Leader…!’
He found out what he had done after Ashley screamed. A dark red hole appeared on Mason’s forehead, and blood gushed out from behind his head. He was staring at him in wonder, ‘wow, what a pathetic bastard,’ and soon he collapsed.
From that point onwards, there was no turning back.
Alta was trembling on the ground with a shot to his chest, and Aaron pulled his hair to raise him up. And he said while pointing the gun at Ashley.
‘Do you want to die or open the safe and be on the same boat?’
Ashley knew he wasn’t kidding about killing her, so she slowly nodded.
Aaron dragged a shivering Alta and put him in front of the safe, and he was forced to unlock the iris recognition and fingerprint scanners. 12, 36.5, 37, -But before he could say the last number, Alta stopped breathing.
It was such a shitty situation. If he accidentally pressed a wrong number and the password got reset, he would have to start from iris recognition all over again. No matter how many times he put the dead Alta’s eyes in front of the locker, the password will never be solved.
There was no other choice. Aaron, along with Ashley, damaged Mason’s corpse and made it look like himself. Fortunately their heights and size were similar, and he destroyed his face completely so that it cannot be recognized even with dental records. After that, they put the corpse in front of the bluff safe and shot the safe to make it explode.
Alta’s bedroom had several secret passageways and those two ran away with the safe. They erased their tracks and got a shelter in a pretty safe place, but that was it.
They still couldn’t open Alta’s safe, and Zii’s chase was choking them every minute. They contacted a pretty well known safe worker, but they only got shitty news that a bomb was planted in the locking device and if they press the wrong numbers several times in a row, it would explode.
Just like Ashley said, the only thing they could do was either watching dramas or order pizzas. Even so, they won’t be able to continue for long because they didn’t have much money left.
“I told you, right? Team Leader was not an idiot. Do you think he wouldn’t know about this?”
Ashley looked like she was sick of it. Ashley had worked with Mason for three years. Mason mostly worked recklessly and sometimes she thought he was really crazy, but she knew after having worked with him for three years that he was strong in times of danger, quick on the draw and had a natural talent of being able to dig through other people’s inner circle. If there was genius and mediocrity amongst the mercenaries, he was a genius. Mason seemed clumsy, but he never misjudged the circumstances. He’d never failed anything that he said would work and never succeeded anything that he said wouldn’t work.
Aaron complained that Mason was an idiot, but Ashley knew it was Aaron that was the idiot. Also love, was their enemy. Ashley knew that this personality of hers would one day get her killed.
“It’s 50 million dollars!”
Aaron tried to remind himself, and Ashley snapped, “It’s just trash if you can’t open it.” Aaron glared at her and said, “What did you say?” but Ashley didn’t even flinch.
“It can be trash even if we did open it.”
Ashley said with cold eyes. It hit the mark, and Aaron couldn’t hold in his anger. He threw the remote that he had been holding, at her. Crash! Because Ashley tilted her head a little bit to avoid the remote, it flew over to the TV, crashed in to the corner and shattered. Ashley frowned. “Aw fuck, now I would want to kill myself because I’m bored….”
“Think properly, you idiot, if you don’t want to die.”
Do you know what kind of place Zii is? Even if they luckily open and put their hands on the 50 million dollars, there would be no ‘happily ever after’ for these two. Whenever and wherever, Zii will come after its traitors.
Aaron bit his lips and glared at Ashley. Their glaring match ended when Aaron’s phone rang in his pocket. Aaron urgently took his phone out. There was one person who knew his temporary phone number.
Fred Rector. They were Mason’s team members together in Zii. When he told him that he would give one million dollars from the safe, he had occasionally given them insider information.
Aaron answered the phone hoping that he would get some positive news this time. On the other side of the phone was a relaxed voice.
[Hey, you alive?]
“Don’t say something useless. Just tell me the situation fast. Don’t tell me we have to move our shelter?”
Aaron asked sharply, and Fred chuckled. [You’re too tensed.] He sounded like it was no big deal.
[Zii is not looking for Mason anymore.]
“….What are you talking about?”
Zii is not looking for Mason anymore? Did Zii find out that the corpse was Mason and not me? Ashley heard the voice from the phone and swallowed as her throat ran dry.
[The top tier people gave an order, and Zii will not care about this incident anymore.]
“Won’t care?”
[They don’t care if it is you or Mason that took the safe. They will consider this to never have happened.]
Fred said something that was unbelievable, and Aaron turned around to look at Ashley. She looked surprised too. Zii hadn’t even caught the traitors, but they’ll let this one go and consider that it never happened. That can’t happen.
Ashley, who had been listening, took away the phone from Aaron’s hands and put in on a speaker.
“Why?”
Her question was full of suspicion. “You want me to believe this nonsense?” Maybe Fred betrayed them and was trying to fish them out? Even if that was true, this was too noticeable. Fred talked like he understood.
[You know, this is just a rumor…. Do you know Raycarlton? They are saying that Noah Raycarlton is looking for Mason personally. That’s why he told Zii to let go.]
“Why would he?”
“Did they have any personal connection?” Ashley asked, and Fred answered like it was obvious.
[Who knows? Perhaps he’s interested in the safe?]
His tone suggested, ‘what other reason could there be?’ Yes. What else can it be? Mason probably didn’t have any connection with Raycarlton, and even if he did, there was no way that he would use his power on Zii, based on just that connection.
Ashley looked at Aaron who had his eyes wide open. His eyes were full of expectation.
Fred hung up the phone, wishing them well, and Ashley put the phone down on the table and looked at Aaron.
This can probably turn out to be better than they had expected. Of course, they would live and might even be able to sell that safe off.
“No, if he has that much interest, he will definitely buy the safe.”
They didn’t have to know the last number of the password. Raynoah was a man who could call the professionals that made the safe to open it.
They didn’t know what was inside the safe, and it may be not 50 million dollars like Alta had said. But one thing was for sure; whatever was inside the safe was not trash.
“See. I was not wrong.”
Aaron murmured while thinking of the dead Mason. Well, he was dead anyways and he didn’t have to prove that Mason was wrong, not him.
They started to look for a way to meet Raynoah secretly.
For a second, Ashley was reminded of the actor’s stare in the drama that she had been watching, but only for an instant. She got busy suddenly and forgot about whatever that she saw.
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Hoot Hoot! Two in a week~ It's like when I first started to translate this haha
Continue to Part 3
